by John Ruskin
LECTURE X.
_THE CRYSTAL REST._
_Evening. The fireside._ L's _arm-chair in the comfortablest corner._
L. (_perceiving various arrangements being made of foot-stool, cushion,screen, and the like_). Yes, yes, it's all very fine! and I am to sithere to be asked questions till supper-time, am I?
DORA. I don't think you can have any supper to-night:--we've got so muchto ask.
LILY. Oh, Miss Dora! We can fetch it him here, you know, so nicely!
L. Yes, Lily, that will be pleasant, with competitive examination goingon over one's plate; the competition being among the examiners. Really,now that I know what teasing things girls are, I don't so much wonderthat people used to put up patiently with the dragons who took _them_for supper. But I can't help myself, I suppose;--no thanks to St.George. Ask away, children, and I'll answer as civilly as may be.
DORA. We don't so much care about being answered civilly, as about notbeing asked things back again.
L. 'Ayez seulement la patience que je le parle.' There shall be norequitals.
DORA. Well, then, first of all--What shall we ask first, Mary?
MARY. It does not matter. I think all the questions come into one, atlast, nearly.
DORA. You know, you always talk as if the crystals were alive; and wenever understand how much you are in play, and how much in earnest.That's the first thing.
L. Neither do I understand, myself, my dear, how much I am in earnest.The stones puzzle me as much as I puzzle you. They look as if they werealive, and make me speak as if they were; and I do not in the least knowhow much truth there is in the appearance. I'm not to ask things backagain to-night, but all questions of this sort lead necessarily to theone main question, which we asked, before, in vain, 'What is it to bealive?'
DORA. Yes; but we want to come back to that: for we've been readingscientific books about the 'conservation of forces,' and it seems all sogrand, and wonderful; and the experiments are so pretty; and I supposeit must be all right: but then the books never speak as if there wereany such thing as 'life.'
L. They mostly omit that part of the subject, certainly, Dora; but theyare beautifully right as far as they go; and life is not a convenientelement to deal with. They seem to have been getting some of it into andout of bottles, in their 'ozone' and 'antizone' lately; but they stillknow little of it: and, certainly, I know less.
DORA. You promised not to be provoking, to-night.
L. Wait a minute. Though, quite truly, I know less of the secrets oflife than the philosophers do; I yet know one corner of ground on whichwe artists can stand, literally as 'Life Guards' at bay, as steadily asthe Guards at Inkermann; however hard the philosophers push. And you maystand with us, if once you learn to draw nicely.
DORA. I'm sure we are all trying! but tell us where we may stand.
L. You may always stand by Form, against Force. To a painter, theessential character of anything is the form of it; and the philosopherscannot touch that. They come and tell you, for instance, that there isas much heat, or motion, or calorific energy (or whatever else they liketo call it), in a tea-kettle as in a Gier-eagle. Very good; that is so;and it is very interesting. It requires just as much heat as will boilthe kettle, to take the Gier-eagle up to his nest; and as much more tobring him down again on a hare or a partridge. But we painters,acknowledging the equality and similarity of the kettle and the bird inall scientific respects, attach, for our part, our principal interest tothe difference in their forms. For us, the primarily cognisable facts,in the two things, are, that the kettle has a spout, and the eagle abeak; the one a lid on its back, the other a pair of wings;--not tospeak of the distinction also of volition, which the philosophers mayproperly call merely a form or mode of force;--but then, to an artist,the form, or mode, is the gist of the business. The kettle chooses tosit still on the hob; the eagle to recline on the air. It is the fact ofthe choice, not the equal degree of temperature in the fulfilment of it,which appears to us the more interesting circumstance;--though the otheris very interesting too. Exceedingly so! Don't laugh, children; thephilosophers have been doing quite splendid work lately, in their ownway: especially, the transformation of force into light is a great pieceof systematised discovery; and this notion about the sun's beingsupplied with his flame by ceaseless meteoric hail is grand, and looksvery likely to be true. Of course, it is only the old gun-lock,--flintand steel,--on a large scale: but the order and majesty of it aresublime. Still, we sculptors and painters care little about it. 'It isvery fine,' we say, 'and very useful, this knocking the light out of thesun, or into it, by an eternal cataract of planets. But you may hailaway, so, for ever, and you will not knock out what we can. Here is abit of silver, not the size of half-a-crown, on which, with a singlehammer stroke, one of us, two thousand and odd years ago, hit out thehead of the Apollo of Clazomenae. It is merely a matter of form; but ifany of you philosophers, with your whole planetary system to hammerwith, can hit out such another bit of silver as this,--we will take offour hats to you. For the present, we keep them on.'
MARY. Yes, I understand; and that is nice; but I don't think we shallany of us like having only form to depend upon.
L. It was not neglected in the making of Eve, my dear.
MARY. It does not seem to separate us from the dust of the ground. It isthat breathing of the life which we want to understand.
L. So you should: but hold fast to the form, and defend that first, asdistinguished from the mere transition of forces. Discern the mouldinghand of the potter commanding the clay, from his merely beating foot,as it turns the wheel. If you can find incense, in the vase,afterwards,--well: but it is curious how far mere form will carry youahead of the philosophers. For instance, with regard to the mostinteresting of all their modes of force--light;--they never consider howfar the existence of it depends on the putting of certain vitreous andnervous substances into the formal arrangement which we call an eye. TheGerman philosophers began the attack, long ago, on the other side, bytelling us, there was no such thing as light at all, unless we chose tosee it: now, German and English, both, have reversed their engines, andinsist that light would be exactly the same light that it is, thoughnobody could ever see it. The fact being that the force must be there,and the eyes there; and 'light' means the effect of the one on theother;--and perhaps, also--(Plato saw farther into that mystery than anyone has since, that I know of),--on something a little way within theeyes; but we may stand quite safe, close behind the retina, and defy thephilosophers.
SIBYL. But I don't care so much about defying the philosophers, if onlyone could get a clear idea of life, or soul, for one's self.
L. Well, Sibyl, you used to know more about it, in that cave of yours,than any of us. I was just going to ask you about inspiration, and thegolden bough, and the like; only I remembered I was not to ask anything.But, will not you, at least, tell us whether the ideas of Life, as thepower of putting things together, or 'making' them; and of Death, as thepower of pushing things separate, or 'unmaking' them, may not be verysimply held in balance against each other?
SIBYL. No, I am not in my cave to-night; and cannot tell you anything.
L. I think they may. Modern Philosophy is a great separator; it islittle more than the expansion of Moliere's great sentence, 'Il s'ensuitde la, que tout ce qu'il y a de beau est dans les dictionnaires; il n'ya que les mots qui sont transposes.' But when you used to be in yourcave, Sibyl, and to be inspired, there was (and there remains still insome small measure), beyond the merely formative and sustaining power,another, which we painters call 'passion'--I don't know what thephilosophers call it; we know it makes people red, or white; andtherefore it must be something, itself; and perhaps it is the most truly'poetic' or 'making' force of all, creating a world of its own out of aglance, or a sigh: and the want of passion is perhaps the truest death,or 'unmaking' of everything;--even of stones. By the way, you were allreading about that ascent of the Aiguille Verte, the other day?
SIBYL. Because
you had told us it was so difficult, you thought it couldnot be ascended.
L. Yes; I believed the Aiguille Verte would have held its own. But doyou recollect what one of the climbers exclaimed, when he first feltsure of reaching the summit?
SIBYL. Yes, it was, 'Oh, Aiguille Verte, vous etes morte, vous etesmorte!'
L. That was true instinct. Real philosophic joy. Now can you at allfancy the difference between that feeling of triumph in a mountain'sdeath; and the exultation of your beloved poet, in its life--
'Quantus Athos, aut quantus Eryx, aut ipse coruscis Quum fremit ilicibus quantus, gandetque nivali Vertice, se attollens pater Apenninus ad auras.'
DORA. You must translate for us mere house-keepers, please,--whateverthe cave-keepers may know about it.
MARY. Will Dryden do?
L. No. Dryden is a far way worse than nothing, and nobody will 'do.' Youcan't translate it. But this is all you need know, that the lines arefull of a passionate sense of the Apennines' fatherhood, or protectingpower over Italy; and of sympathy with their joy in their snowy strengthin heaven; and with the same joy, shuddering through all the leaves oftheir forests.
MARY. Yes, that is a difference indeed! but then, you know, one can'thelp feeling that it is fanciful. It is very delightful to imagine themountains to be alive; but then,--_are_ they alive?
L. It seems to me, on the whole, Mary, that the feelings of the purestand most mightily passioned human souls are likely to be the truest.Not, indeed, if they do not desire to know the truth, or blindthemselves to it that they may please themselves with passion; for thenthey are no longer pure: but if, continually seeking and accepting thetruth as far as it is discernible, they trust their Maker for theintegrity of the instincts He has gifted them with, and rest in thesense of a higher truth which they cannot demonstrate, I think they willbe most in the right, so.
DORA _and_ JESSIE (_clapping their hands_). Then we really may believethat the mountains are living?
L. You may at least earnestly believe, that the presence of the spiritwhich culminates in your own life, shows itself in dawning, wherever thedust of the earth begins to assume any orderly and lovely state. Youwill find it impossible to separate this idea of gradated manifestationfrom that of the vital power. Things are not either wholly alive, orwholly dead. They are less or more alive. Take the nearest, most easilyexamined instance--the life of a flower. Notice what a different degreeand kind of life there is in the calyx and the corolla. The calyx isnothing but the swaddling clothes of the flower; the child-blossom isbound up in it, hand and foot; guarded in it, restrained by it, till thetime of birth. The shell is hardly more subordinate to the germ in theegg, than the calyx to the blossom. It bursts at last; but it neverlives as the corolla does. It may fall at the moment its task isfulfilled, as in the poppy; or wither gradually, as in the buttercup; orpersist in a ligneous apathy, after the flower is dead, as in the rose;or harmonise itself so as to share in the aspect of the real flower, asin the lily; but it never shares in the corolla's bright passion oflife. And the gradations which thus exist between the different membersof organic creatures, exist no less between the different ranges oforganism. We know no higher or more energetic life than our own; butthere seems to me this great good in the idea of gradation of life--itadmits the idea of a life above us, in other creatures, as much noblerthan ours, as ours is nobler than that of the dust.
MARY. I am glad you have said that; for I know Violet and Lucilla andMay want to ask you something; indeed, we all do; only you frightenedViolet so about the ant-hill, that she can't say a word; and May isafraid of your teasing her, too: but I know they are wondering why youare always telling them about heathen gods and goddesses, as if you halfbelieved in them; and you represent them as good; and then we see thereis really a kind of truth in the stories about them; and we are allpuzzled: and, in this, we cannot even make our difficulty quite clear toourselves;--it would be such a long confused question, if we could askyou all we should like to know.
L. Nor is it any wonder, Mary; for this is indeed the longest, and themost wildly confused question that reason can deal with; but I will tryto give you, quickly, a few clear ideas about the heathen gods, whichyou may follow out afterwards, as your knowledge increases.
Every heathen conception of deity in which you are likely to beinterested, has three distinct characters:--
I. It has a physical character. It represents some of the great powersor objects of nature--sun or moon, or heaven, or the winds, or the sea.And the fables first related about each deity represent, figuratively,the action of the natural power which it represents; such as the risingand setting of the sun, the tides of the sea, and so on.
II. It has an ethical character, and represents, in its history, themoral dealings of God with man. Thus Apollo is first, physically, thesun contending with darkness; but morally, the power of divine lifecontending with corruption. Athena is, physically, the air; morally, thebreathing of the divine spirit of wisdom. Neptune is, physically, thesea; morally, the supreme power of agitating passion; and so on.
III. It has, at last, a personal character; and is realised in the mindsof its worshippers as a living spirit, with whom men may speak face toface, as a man speaks to his friend.
Now it is impossible to define exactly, how far, at any period of anational religion, these three ideas are mingled; or how far oneprevails over the other. Each enquirer usually takes up one of theseideas, and pursues it, to the exclusion of the others: no impartialeffort seems to have been made to discern the real state of the heathenimagination in its successive phases. For the question is not at allwhat a mythological figure meant in its origin; but what it became ineach subsequent mental development of the nation inheriting the thought.Exactly in proportion to the mental and moral insight of any race, itsmythological figures mean more to it, and become more real. An early andsavage race means nothing more (because it has nothing more to mean) byits Apollo, than the sun; while a cultivated Greek means every operationof divine intellect and justice. The Neith, of Egypt, meant, physically,little more than the blue of the air; but the Greek, in a climate ofalternate storm and calm, represented the wild fringes of thestorm-cloud by the serpents of her aegis; and the lightning and cold ofthe highest thunder-clouds, by the Gorgon on her shield: while morally,the same types represented to him the mystery and changeful terror ofknowledge, as her spear and helm its ruling and defensive power. And nostudy can be more interesting, or more useful to you, than that of thedifferent meanings which have been created by great nations, and greatpoets, out of mythological figures given them, at first, in uttersimplicity. But when we approach them in their third, or personal,character (and, for its power over the whole national mind, this is farthe leading one), we are met at once by questions which may well put allof you at pause. Were they idly imagined to be real beings? and did theyso usurp the place of the true God? Or were they actually realbeings--evil spirits,--leading men away from the true God? Or is itconceivable that they might have been real beings,--goodspirits,--entrusted with some message from the true God? These were thequestions you wanted to ask; were they not, Lucilla?
LUCILLA. Yes, indeed.
L. Well, Lucilla, the answer will much depend upon the clearness of yourfaith in the personality of the spirits which are described in the bookof your own religion;--their personality, observe, as distinguished frommerely symbolical visions. For instance, when Jeremiah has the visionof the seething pot with its mouth to the north, you know that thiswhich he sees is not a real thing; but merely a significant dream. Also,when Zechariah sees the speckled horses among the myrtle trees in thebottom, you still may suppose the vision symbolical;--you do not thinkof them as real spirits, like Pegasus, seen in the form of horses. Butwhen you are told of the four riders in the Apocalypse, a distinct senseof personality begins to force itself upon you. And though you might, ina dull temper, think that (for one instance of all) the fourth rider onthe pale horse was merely a symbol of the power of death,--in yourstr
onger and more earnest moods you will rather conceive of him as areal and living angel. And when you look back from the vision of theApocalypse to the account of the destruction of the Egyptian first-born,and of the army of Sennacherib, and again to David's vision at thethreshing floor of Araunah, the idea of personality in this death-angelbecomes entirely defined, just as in the appearance of the angels toAbraham, Manoah, or Mary.
Now, when you have once consented to this idea of a personal spirit,must not the question instantly follow: 'Does this spirit exercise itsfunctions towards one race of men only, or towards all men? Was it anangel of death to the Jew only, or to the Gentile also?' You find acertain Divine agency made visible to a King of Israel, as an armedangel, executing vengeance, of which one special purpose was to lowerhis kingly pride. You find another (or perhaps the same) agency, madevisible to a Christian prophet as an angel standing in the sun, callingto the birds that fly under heaven to come, that they may eat the fleshof kings. Is there anything impious in the thought that the same agencymight have been expressed to a Greek king, or Greek seer, by similarvisions?--that this figure, standing in the sun, and armed with thesword, or the bow (whose arrows were drunk with blood), and exercisingespecially its power in the humiliation of the proud, might, at first,have been called only 'Destroyer,' and afterwards, as the light, or sun,of justice, was recognised in the chastisement, called also 'Physician'or 'Healer?' If you feel hesitation in admitting the possibility ofsuch a manifestation, I believe you will find it is caused, partlyindeed by such trivial things as the difference to your ear betweenGreek and English terms; but, far more, by uncertainty in your own mindrespecting the nature and truth of the visions spoken of in the Bible.Have any of you intently examined the nature of your belief in them?You, for instance, Lucilla, who think often, and seriously, of suchthings?
LUCILLA. No; I never could tell what to believe about them. I know theymust be true in some way or other; and I like reading about them.
L. Yes; and I like reading about them too, Lucilla; as I like readingother grand poetry. But, surely, we ought both to do more than like it?Will God be satisfied with us, think you, if we read His words merelyfor the sake of an entirely meaningless poetical sensation?
LUCILLA. But do not the people who give themselves to seek out themeaning of these things, often get very strange, and extravagant?
L. More than that, Lucilla. They often go mad. That abandonment of themind to religious theory, or contemplation, is the very thing I havebeen pleading with you against. I never said you should set yourself todiscover the meanings; but you should take careful pains to understandthem, so far as they _are_ clear; and you should always accuratelyascertain the state of your mind about them. I want you never to readmerely for the pleasure of fancy; still less as a formal religious duty(else you might as well take to repeating Paters at once; for it issurely wiser to repeat one thing we understand, than read a thousandwhich we cannot). Either, therefore, acknowledge the passages to be, forthe present, unintelligible to you; or else determine the sense in whichyou at present receive them; or, at all events, the different sensesbetween which you clearly see that you must choose. Make either yourbelief, or your difficulty, definite; but do not go on, all through yourlife, believing nothing intelligently, and yet supposing that yourhaving read the words of a divine book must give you the right todespise every religion but your own. I assure you, strange as it mayseem, our scorn of Greek tradition depends, not on our belief, but ourdisbelief, of our own traditions. We have, as yet, no sufficient clue tothe meaning of either; but you will always find that, in proportion tothe earnestness of our own faith, its tendency to accept a spiritualpersonality increases: and that the most vital and beautiful Christiantemper rests joyfully in its conviction of the multitudinous ministry ofliving angels, infinitely varied in rank and power. You all know oneexpression of the purest and happiest form of such faith, as it existsin modern times, in Richter's lovely illustrations of the Lord's Prayer.The real and living death-angel, girt as a pilgrim for journey, andsoftly crowned with flowers, beckons at the dying mother's door;child-angels sit talking face to face with mortal children, among theflowers;--hold them by their little coats, lest they fall on thestairs;--whisper dreams of heaven to them, leaning over their pillows;carry the sound of the church bells for them far through the air; andeven descending lower in service, fill little cups with honey, to holdout to the weary bee. By the way, Lily, did you tell the other childrenthat story about your little sister, and Alice, and the sea?
LILY. I told it to Alice, and to Miss Dora. I don't think I did toanybody else. I thought it wasn't worth.
L. We shall think it worth a great deal now, Lily, if you will tell itus. How old is Dotty, again? I forget.
LILY. She is not quite three; but she has such odd little old ways,sometimes.
L. And she was very fond of Alice?
LILY. Yes; Alice was so good to her always!
L. And so when Alice went away?
LILY. Oh, it was nothing, you know, to tell about; only it was strangeat the time.
L. Well; but I want you to tell it.
LILY. The morning after Alice had gone, Dotty was very sad and restlesswhen she got up; and went about, looking into all the corners, as if shecould find Alice in them, and at last she came to me, and said, 'Is Aliegone over the great sea?' And I said, 'Yes, she is gone over the great,deep sea, but she will come back again some day.' Then Dotty lookedround the room; and I had just poured some water out into the basin; andDotty ran to it, and got up on a chair, and dashed her hands through thewater, again and again; and cried, 'Oh, deep, deep sea! send little Alieback to me.'
L. Isn't that pretty, children? There's a dear little heathen for you!The whole heart of Greek mythology is in that; the idea of a personalbeing in the elemental power;--of its being moved by prayer;--and of itspresence everywhere, making the broken diffusion of the element sacred.
Now, remember, the measure in which we may permit ourselves to think ofthis trusted and adored personality, in Greek, or in any other,mythology, as conceivably a shadow of truth, will depend on the degreein which we hold the Greeks, or other great nations, equal, or inferior,in privilege and character, to the Jews, or to ourselves. If we believethat the great Father would use the imagination of the Jew as aninstrument by which to exalt and lead him; but the imagination of theGreek only to degrade and mislead him: if we can suppose that realangels were sent to minister to the Jews and to punish them; but noangels, or only mocking spectra of angels, or even devils in the shapesof angels, to lead Lycurgus and Leonidas from desolate cradle tohopeless grave:--and if we can think that it was only the influence ofspectres, or the teaching of demons, which issued in the making ofmothers like Cornelia, and of sons like Cleobis and Bito, we may, ofcourse, reject the heathen Mythology in our privileged scorn: but, atleast, we are bound to examine strictly by what faults of our own it hascome to pass, that the ministry of real angels among ourselves isoccasionally so ineffectual, as to end in the production of Corneliaswho entrust their child-jewels to Charlotte Winsors for the betterkeeping of them; and of sons like that one who, the other day, inFrance, beat his mother to death with a stick; and was brought in by thejury, 'guilty, with extenuating circumstances.'
MAY. Was that really possible?
L. Yes, my dear. I am not sure that I can lay my hand on the referenceto it (and I should not have said 'the other day'--it was a year or twoago), but you may depend on the fact; and I could give you many like it,if I chose. There was a murder done in Russia, very lately, on atraveller. The murderess's little daughter was in the way, and found itout, somehow. Her mother killed her, too, and put her into the oven.There is a peculiar horror about the relations between parent and child,which are being now brought about by our variously degraded forms ofEuropean white slavery. Here _is_ one reference, I see, in my notes onthat story of Cleobis and Bito; though I suppose I marked this chieflyfor its quaintness, and the beautifully Christian names of the sons; butit is a good ins
tance of the power of the King of the Valley ofDiamonds[153] among us.
In 'Galignani' of July 21-22, 1862, is reported a trial of a farmer'sson in the department of the Yonne. The father, two years ago, at Malayle Grand, gave up his property to his two sons, on condition of beingmaintained by them. Simon fulfilled his agreement, but Pierre would not.The tribunal of Sens condemns Pierre to pay eighty-four francs a year tohis father. Pierre replies, 'he would rather die than pay it.' Actually,returning home, he throws himself into the river, and the body is notfound till next day.
MARY. But--but--I can't tell what you would have us think. Do youseriously mean that the Greeks were better than we are; and that theirgods were real angels?
L. No, my dear. I mean only that we know, in reality, less than nothingof the dealings of our Maker with our fellow-men; and can only reason orconjecture safely about them, when we have sincerely humble thoughts ofourselves and our creeds.
We owe to the Greeks every noble discipline in literature; every radicalprinciple of art; and every form of convenient beauty in our householdfurniture and daily occupations of life. We are unable, ourselves, tomake rational use of half that we have received from them: and, of ourown, we have nothing but discoveries in science, and fine mechanicaladaptations of the discovered physical powers. On the other hand, thevice existing among certain classes, both of the rich and poor, inLondon, Paris, and Vienna, could have been conceived by a Spartan orRoman of the heroic ages only as possible in a Tartarus, where fiendswere employed to teach, but not to punish, crime. It little becomes usto speak contemptuously of the religion of races to whom we stand insuch relations; nor do I think any man of modesty or thoughtfulness willever speak so of any religion, in which God has allowed one good man todie, trusting.
The more readily we admit the possibility of our own cherishedconvictions being mixed with error, the more vital and helpful whateveris right in them will become: and no error is so conclusively fatal asthe idea that God will not allow _us_ to err, though He has allowed allother men to do so. There may be doubt of the meaning of other visions,but there is none respecting that of the dream of St. Peter; and you maytrust the Rock of the Church's Foundation for true interpreting, when helearned from it that, 'in every nation, he that feareth God and workethrighteousness, is accepted with Him.' See that you understand what thatrighteousness means; and set hand to it stoutly: you will always measureyour neighbors' creed kindly, in proportion to the substantial fruits ofyour own. Do not think you will ever get harm by striving to enter intothe faith of others, and to sympathise, in imagination, with the guidingprinciples of their lives. So only can you justly love them, or pitythem, or praise. By the gracious effort you will double, treble--nay,indefinitely multiply, at once the pleasure, the reverence, and theintelligence with which you read: and, believe me, it is wiser andholier, by the fire of your own faith to kindle the ashes of expiredreligions, than to let your soul shiver and stumble among their graves,through the gathering darkness, and communicable cold.
MARY (_after some pause_). We shall all like reading Greek history somuch better after this! but it has put everything else out of our headsthat we wanted to ask.
L. I can tell you one of the things; and I might take credit forgenerosity in telling you; but I have a personal reason--Lucilla's verseabout the creation.
DORA. Oh, yes--yes; and its 'pain together, until now.'
L. I call you back to that, because I must warn you against an old errorof my own. Somewhere in the fourth volume of 'Modern Painters,' I saidthat the earth seemed to have passed through its highest state: andthat, after ascending by a series of phases, culminating in itshabitation by man, it seems to be now gradually becoming less fit forthat habitation.
MARY. Yes, I remember.
L. I wrote those passages under a very bitter impression of the gradualperishing of beauty from the loveliest scenes which I knew in thephysical world;--not in any doubtful way, such as I might haveattributed to loss of sensation in myself--but by violent and definitephysical action; such as the filling up of the Lac de Chede by landslipsfrom the Rochers des Fiz;--the narrowing of the Lake Lucerne by thegaining delta of the stream of the Muotta-Thal, which, in the course ofyears, will cut the lake into two, as that of Brientz has been dividedfrom that of Thun;--the steady diminishing of the glaciers north of theAlps, and still more, of the sheets of snow on their southern slopes,which supply the refreshing streams of Lombardy:--the equally steadyincrease of deadly maremma round Pisa and Venice; and other suchphenomena, quite measurably traceable within the limits even of shortlife, and unaccompanied, as it seemed, by redeeming or compensatoryagencies. I am still under the same impression respecting the existingphenomena; but I feel more strongly, every day, that no evidence to becollected within historical periods can be accepted as any clue to thegreat tendencies of geological change; but that the great laws whichnever fail, and to which all change is subordinate, appear such as toaccomplish a gradual advance to lovelier order, and more calmly, yetmore deeply, animated Rest. Nor has this conviction ever fastened itselfupon me more distinctly, than during my endeavour to trace the lawswhich govern the lowly framework of the dust. For, through all thephases of its transition and dissolution, there seems to be a continualeffort to raise itself into a higher state; and a measured gain, throughthe fierce revulsion and slow renewal of the earth's frame, in beauty,and order, and permanence. The soft white sediments of the sea drawthemselves, in process of time, into smooth knots of sphered symmetry;burdened and strained under increase of pressure, they pass into anascent marble; scorched by fervent heat, they brighten and blanch intothe snowy rock of Paros and Carrara. The dark drift of the inland river,or stagnant slime of inland pool and lake, divides, or resolves itselfas it dries, into layers of its several elements; slowly purifying eachby the patient withdrawal of it from the anarchy of the mass in which itwas mingled. Contracted by increasing drought, till it must shatter intofragments, it infuses continually a finer ichor into the opening veins,and finds in its weakness the first rudiments of a perfect strength.Bent at last, rock from rock, nay, atom from atom, and tormented inlambent fire, it knits, through the fusion, the fibres of a perennialendurance; and, during countless subsequent centuries, declining, orrather let me say, rising to repose, finishes the infallible lustre ofits crystalline beauty, under harmonies of law which are whollybeneficent, because wholly inexorable.
(_The children seem pleased, but more inclined to think over these matters than to talk._)
L. (_after giving them a little time_). Mary, I seldom ask you to readanything out of books of mine; but there is a passage about the Law ofHelp, which I want you to read to the children now, because it is of nouse merely to put it in other words for them. You know the place I mean,do not you?
MARY. Yes (_presently finding it_); where shall I begin?
L. Here; but the elder ones had better look afterwards at the piecewhich comes just before this.
MARY (_reads_):
* * * * *
'A pure or holy state of anything is that in which all its parts arehelpful or consistent. The highest and first law of the universe, andthe other name of life, is therefore, "help." The other name of death is"separation." Government and co-operation are in all things, andeternally, the laws of life. Anarchy and competition, eternally, and inall things, the laws of death.
'Perhaps the best, though the most familiar, example we could take ofthe nature and power of consistence, will be that of the possiblechanges in the dust we tread on.
'Exclusive of animal decay, we can hardly arrive at a more absolute typeof impurity, than the mud or slime of a damp, over-trodden path, in theoutskirts of a manufacturing town. I do not say mud of the road, becausethat is mixed with animal refuse; but take merely an ounce or two of theblackest slime of a beaten footpath, on a rainy day, near amanufacturing town. That slime we shall find in most cases composed ofclay (or brickdust, which is burnt clay), mixed with soot, a little sandand water.
All these elements are at helpless war with each other, anddestroy reciprocally each other's nature and power: competing andfighting for place at every tread of your foot; sand squeezing out clay,and clay squeezing out water, and soot meddling everywhere, and defilingthe whole. Let us suppose that this ounce of mud is left in perfectrest, and that its elements gather together, like to like, so that theiratoms may get into the closest relations possible.
'Let the clay begin. Ridding itself of all foreign substance, itgradually becomes a white earth, already very beautiful, and fit, withhelp of congealing fire, to be made into finest porcelain, and paintedon, and be kept in kings' palaces. But such artificial consistence isnot its best. Leave it still quiet, to follow its own instinct of unity,and it becomes, not only white but clear; not only clear, but hard; noronly clear and hard, but so set that it can deal with light in awonderful way, and gather out of it the loveliest blue rays only,refusing the rest. We call it then a sapphire.
'Such being the consummation of the clay, we give similar permission ofquiet to the sand. It also becomes, first, a white earth; then proceedsto grow clear and hard, and at last arranges itself in mysterious,infinitely fine parallel lines, which have the power of reflecting, notmerely the blue rays, but the blue, green, purple, and red rays, in thegreatest beauty in which they can be seen through any hard materialwhatsoever. We call it then an opal.
'In next order the soot sets to work. It cannot make itself white atfirst; but, instead of being discouraged, tries harder and harder; andcomes out clear at last; and the hardest thing in the world: and forthe blackness that it had, obtains in exchange the power of reflectingall the rays of the sun at once, in the vividest blaze that any solidthing can shoot. We call it then a diamond.
'Last of all, the water purifies, or unites itself; contented enough ifit only reach the form of a dewdrop: but, if we insist on its proceedingto a more perfect consistence, it crystallises into the shape of a star.And, for the ounce of slime which we had by political economy ofcompetition, we have, by political economy of co-operation, a sapphire,an opal, and a diamond, set in the midst of a star of snow.'
* * * * *
L. I have asked you to hear that, children, because, from all that wehave seen in the work and play of these past days, I would have you gainat least one grave and enduring thought. The seeming trouble,--theunquestionable degradation,--of the elements of the physical earth, mustpassively wait the appointed time of their repose, or their restoration.It can only be brought about for them by the agency of external law. Butif, indeed, there be a nobler life in us than in these strangely movingatoms;--if, indeed, there is an eternal difference between the firewhich inhabits them, and that which animates us,--it must be shown, byeach of us in his appointed place, not merely in the patience, but inthe activity of our hope; not merely by our desire, but our labour, forthe time when the Dust of the generations of men shall be confirmed forfoundations of the gates of the city of God. The human clay, nowtrampled and despised, will not be,--cannot be,--knit into strength andlight by accident or ordinances of unassisted fate. By human cruelty andiniquity it has been afflicted;--by human mercy and justice it must beraised: and, in all fear or questioning of what is or is not, the realmessage of creation, or of revelation, you may assuredly find perfectpeace, if you are resolved to do that which your Lord has plainlyrequired,--and content that He should indeed require no more ofyou,--than to do Justice, to love Mercy, and to walk humbly with Him.
FOOTNOTES:
[153] Note vi.