Multitudes are doomed to delve and dig. Three-fourths of the race live
on the verge of poverty. The energies of most men are consumed in
supporting the wants of the body. It is given to multitudes to descend
into the coal mine ere the day is risen, to emerge only when night has
fallen. Other multitudes toil in the smithy or tend the loom. The
division of labor has closed many avenues for happiness and culture.
The time was when the village cobbler was primarily a citizen, and
only incidentally a shoemaker. In the old New England days the cobbler
owned his garden and knew the orchard; owned his horse and knew the
care of animals; had his special duties in relation to school and
church, and, therefore, was a student of all public questions. But
tending a machine that clinches tacks, cabins and confines the soul.
The man who begins as a citizen ends an appendage to a wheel. The life
of many becomes a treadmill existence. Year in and year out they tend
some spindle. Now this drudgery of modern life threatens happiness and
manhood. Therefore it was ordained that while the hand digs the mind
may soar.
While Henry Clay's hands were hoeing corn in that field in Kentucky,
through his imagination the young orator was standing in the halls of
Congress. What orations he wrote! What arguments he fashioned! Each
time his hoe cut down a weed, his mind with an argument hewed down an
opponent. Never was there a tool for hoeing corn like unto the
imagination! Christine Nilsson tells that once she toiled as a flower
girl at the country fairs in Sweden. But all the time she delved she
was dreaming, and by her very dreams making herself strong against
the day when she would charm vast audiences with celestial music. What
battles the plowboys have fought in dreams! What orations they have
pronounced! What reforms they have achieved! What tools invented! What
books written! What business reared! Thus the imagination shortens the
hours of labor and sweetens toil. While the body tires, the soul soars
and sings.
This young foreigner newly arrived in our city digs downward with his
spade, but his imagination works upward into the realm of the
invisible. He endures the ditch and the spade through foresight of the
day when his playmate will come over the sea; when together they will
own a little house, and have a garden with vines and flowers, with a
little path leading down to "the spring where the water bubbles out
day and night like a little poem from the heart of the earth;" when
they will have a little competence, so that the sweet babe shall not
want for knowledge. By that dream the youth sustains his loneliness
and poverty; by that dream he conquers his vices and passions; at last
through that dream he is lifted up to the rank of a patriot and worthy
citizen. Nor shall you find one hard-worked man caught to-morrow in
life's swirl who does not endure the strife, the rivalry and the
selfishness of the street with this gift divine. It is the noblest
instrument of the soul. Thereby are the heavens opened. Imagination is
the poor man's friend and saviour. Imagination is God whispering to
the soul what shall be when time and the divine resources have
accomplished their work upon man.
And when imagination has achieved for man, his progress, happiness,
and culture, it goes on to help him to gain personal worth and
character. Above every noble soul hangs a vision of things higher,
better and sweeter. It causes the best men even in their best moods to
feel that better things still are possible. By sweet visions it tempts
men upward, just as of old the bees were lured onward by the honey
dropped through the hunter's hands. The vision of a higher manhood
discontents men with to-day's achievement and takes the flavor out of
yesterday's victory. In such hours it is not enough that men have
bread and raiment, or are better than their fellows. The soul is
filled with nameless yearnings and longings. The deeper convictions,
long hidden, begin to stir and strain, even as in June the seed aches
with its hidden harvest.
Though the youth still pursues, he never overtakes his ideal. In the
process of transmutation into life the ideal is injured and dwarfed.
Just as the poet's vision is transcendently more beautiful than the
song he writes upon the page; as the artist's dream is a
glorious-creation, but his picture is only a photograph thereof; as
the musician's song or symphony is but an echo of the ethereal music
he heard in his soul, so every purpose and ideal is marred in the
effort to give it expression and embodiment.
These children of aspiration hold the secret of all progress for
society. Just as of old artists drew the outline of glowing and
glorious pictures, and then with bits of colored glass and precious
stones filled up the mosaic, causing angels and seraphs to stand forth
in lustrous beauty, so imagination lifts up before the youth its
glowing plans and purposes, and asks him to give himself to the
details of life in filling it up and perfecting a glorious character.
The patterns of life are only given upon that holy mount where, midst
clouds and darkness, dwell God and the higher imagination.
But if the imagination has its use, it has its abuse also. If visions
of truth and beauty can exalt, visions of vice can debase and degrade.
In that picture where Faust and Satan battle together for the
scholar's soul, the angels share in the conflict. Plucking the roses
of Paradise, they fling them over the battlements down upon the heads
of the combatants. When the roses fall on Faust they heal his wounds;
when they fall on Satan they turn into coals of fire. Thus the
imagination casts inspirations down upon the pure, but smites the evil
into the abyss. The miseries of men of genius like Burns are perpetual
warnings to youth against the riotings of imagination. There are
poems, also novels and lurid scenes in the city, hanging pictures
before the imagination and scorching the soul like flames of fire. For
as of old so now, what a man imagineth in his heart that he is. For
not what a man does outwardly, but what he dreams inwardly, determines
his character.
Most men are better than we think, but some men are worse. As steam in
the boiler makes itself known by hisses, so the evil imaginings heave
and strain, seeking escape. Many forbear vice and crime through fear;
their conscience is cowardice; if they dared they would riot through
life like the beasts of the field; if all their inner imaginings were
to take an outward expression in deeds, they would be scourges,
plagues and pests. In the silence of the soul they commit every vice.
But they who sow the wind shall reap the whirlwind; the revealing day
will come when the films of life shall be withdrawn, and the
character shall appear faithful as a portrait, and then all the
meanness and sliminess shall be seen to have given something to the
soul's picture. Oh, be warned against these dreams, all ye young
hearts! The indulgence of the imagination is like the sultriness of a
summer's day; what began so fair ends with sharp lightnings and
thunder. How terrible is this word to evil-doers! "As a man thinketh
in his heart, so is he."
It is also given to this vision faculty to redeem men out of
oppression and misfortune, and through its intimations of royalty to
lend victory and peace. Oft the days are full of storms and
turbulence; oft events grow bad as heart can wish; full oft the next
step promises the precipice. There are periods in every career when
troubles are so strangely increased that the world seems like an orb
let loose to wander widely through space. In these dark hours some
endure their pain and trouble through dogged, stoical toughness. Then
men imitate the turtle as it draws in its head and neck, saying to
misfortune: "Behold the shell, and beat on that." But, God be thanked!
victory over trouble has been ordained. In the blackest hour of the
storm it is given to the vision faculty to lift man into the realm of
tranquillity. As travelers in the jungle climb the trees at night and
draw the ladder up after them, and dwell above the reach of wild
beasts and serpents, so the soul in its higher moods ascends into the
realms of peace and rest. In that dark hour just before Jesus Christ
entered into the cloud and darkness, and fronted His grievous
suffering, He called His disciples about Him and uttered that
discourse beginning: "Let not your hearts be troubled." Strange wonder
words; words of matchless genius and beauty.
Moreover, the vision faculty furnishes man his idea and picture of
God. Many suppose that all that is necessary to understand the divine
nature is that it should be stated distinctly in language. Greater
error there could not be. There can be no language for causing a
little child to understand the larger truths of heroism, art or
government. The unripe cannot understand the mature. Each mind must
paint its own picture of God. Nature itself is but a palette upon
which God draws her portrait. Reason furnishes the materials and
truths about God, and the imagination unites them in some noble
conception of His all-helpful nature. Everything in nature that has
power or beauty or benefit has received it from God. Moving along the
Alpine valleys the traveler sees huge bowlders lying in the stream,
and, looking to the mountain side, his eye rests upon the very cliff
from which the bowlder fell. Thus discerning the noble qualities in
mother or patriot, in hero or friend, we trace their beautiful
qualities back to God, from whom all noble souls borrow their
excellence. In the largest sense all the elements of power in sea and
sky and sun, all the beauty of the fields and forests, of summers and
winters, are letters in nature's alphabet for spelling out the name of
God. As a diamond has many facets, and every one reflects the sun, so
the universe itself is a gem whose every facet reflects the mind and
genius of God.
When reason has culled out of life and nature everything that excites
awe or admiration, everything that represents bounty and beauty, then
imagination lifts up all these ideals and sweeps them together and
melts them into one glowing and glorious conception of the God of
power, wisdom and love. But even then the heart whispers: "He is that,
and infinitely more than that, even as the sun is more than the little
taper man has made." But if the reason and memory, through misuse,
furnish but few of the truths about God, and if the imagination has
been weakened in its power, then how poor the picture the soul paints!
What scant, feeble portraits of God some men have! What can an Eskimo,
whose highest conception of summer is a stunted bush, know of tropical
orchards, of luscious peach, pear and plum? If the student has seen
only the broken fragments of Phidias, what can he know of the
Parthenon as it once stood in the zenith of its perfection, in the
splendor of its beauty? But if man's reason can cull out all the
lustrous facts of nature and history, and if his imagination has
strength and skill to bring them all together, then how beautiful will
be the face and name of God! That name will fill his soul with music.
That thought will set his heart vibrating with tumultuous joy. If all
the air were filled with invisible bells, and angels were the ringers,
and music fell in waves as sweet as melted amethyst and pearl, we
should have that which would answer to the sweetness that by day and
night rains down upon the hearts of those who approach God--not
through the eye nor ear, not through argument nor judgment, but
through the heart, through the imagination, as they endure, beholding
Him who is invisible.
THE ENTHUSIASM OF FRIENDSHIP
"He that walketh with wise men shall be wise."--_Solomon._
"The only way to have a friend is to be one."--_Emerson._
"A talent is perfected in solitude; a character in the
stream of the world."--_Goethe._
"It is certain that either wise bearing or ignorant
carriage is caught as men take diseases, one of another;
therefore let men take heed of their
company."--_Shakespeare._
"Beyond all wealth, honor or even health, is the
attachment we form to noble souls, because to become one
with the good, generous and true, is to become, in a
measure, good, generous and true ourselves."--_Thomas
Arnold._
"Cicero said: 'Friendship can make riches splendid.'
Friendship can plan many things for its wealth to
execute. It can plan a good winter evening for a group,
and it can plan an afternoon for a hundred children. It
can roll in a Christmas log for a large hearth. It can
spread happiness to the right and left. It can spend
money most beautifully and make gold to shine.
Civilization itself is of the heart."--_Swing._
VIII
THE ENTHUSIASM OF FRIENDSHIP
Destiny is determined by friendship. Fortune is made or marred when
the youth selects his companions. Friendship has ever been the
master-passion ruling the forum, the court, the camp. The power of
love is God-breathed, and life has nothing like love for majesty and
beauty. Civilization itself is more of the heart than of the mind. As
an eagle cannot rise with one wing, so the soul ascends borne up
equally by reason and affection. Plato found the measure of greatness
in a man's capacity for exalted friendship. All the great ones of
history stand forth as unique in some master passion as in their
intellectual supremacy. Witness David and Jonathan, with love
surpassing the love of women. Witness Socrates and his group of
immortal friends. Witness Dante and his deathless love for Beatrice.
Witness Tennyson and his refrain for Arthur Hallam. Witness the
disciples and Christ, with "love as strong as death."
Sweetness is not more truly the essence of music than is love the very
soul of a deep, strong, harmonious manhood. Friendship cheers like a
sunbeam; charms like a good story; inspires like a brave leader; binds
like a golden chain; guides like a heavenly vision. To love alone is
it given to wrestle victoriously with death.
Lord Bacon said: "He who loves solitude is either a wild beast or a
god." The normal man is gregarious. He wants companionship. The very
cattle go in herds. The fishes go in shoals. The bees go in swarms.
And men come together in families and cities. As men go up toward
greatness their need of friendship increases. No mind of the first
order was ever a hermit. Modern literature enshrines the friendships
of the great and makes them memorable. While letters last, society
will never forget Charles Lamb and his companions; Dr. Johnson and his
immortal group; Petrarch and his helpless dependence upon Laura; while
the letters of Abelard and Heloise enshrine them in everlasting
remembrance.
In all literature there is no more touching death-bed scene than that
of the patriarch Jacob. Dying, the Prince forgot his gold and silver,
his herds and lands. Lifted up upon his pillows, in tremulous
excitement he took upon his lips two names--God and Rachel. More than
a score of years had passed since her death, but in that memorable
hour the great man built a monument to her who had fed his joy and
deepened his life.
Friendship carries a certain fertilizing force. All biographers tell
us that each epoch in a hero's life was ushered in by a new friend.
When Schiller met Goethe every latent talent awakened. The poet's
friendship caused the youth to grow by leaps and bounds. Once,
returning home after a brief visit to Goethe's house, one exclaimed:
"I am amazed by the progress Schiller can make within a single
fortnight!" Perhaps this explains why the great seem to come in
groups. Thrust an Emerson into any Concord, and his pungent presence
will penetrate the entire region. Soon all who come within the radius
of his life respond to his presence, as flowers and trees respond with
boughs brilliant and fragrant to the sunshine when spring replaces the
icy winter. After a little time, each Emerson stands girt about with
Hawthornes, Whittiers, Holmeses, and Lowells. The greatness of each
Milton lingers in his friends, Cromwell and Hampden, as the sun
lingers in the clouds after the day is done. Therefore the great epics
and dramas, from the Iliad to the Idylls of the King, are stories of
friendships. Take love out of our greatest literature, and it is like
taking a sweet babe out of the clothes that cover it. Man listens
eagerly to tales of eloquence and heroism, but loves most of all the
stories of the heart. God is not more truly the life of dead matter
than is love the very life of man.
Now, the secret of eminence in the realm of industry or art or
invention is this: that the worker has wrought in his luminous mental
moods. In its passive, inert states, the mind is receptive. Then
reason is like a sheathed sword. Thought must be struck forth as fire
is struck from flint. But under inspirational moods the mind begins to
glow and kindle. Then the reason of the orator, the poet or reformer
ceases to be like a taper, needing a match to light it, and becomes a
sun, blazing with its own radiance. Spencer wrote: "By no political
alchemy can we get golden conduct out of leaden instincts." Thus there
is no necromancy by which the mind can get superior work out of its
inferior moods.
When, then, reason approaches its task under the inspiration of
enthusiasm and love, nature yields up all her secrets. Here is the
author sitting down to write. Memory refuses facts, and reason
declines to create fictions. The mind is dull and dead. Suddenly the
step of some friend long absent is heard at the door. Then how do the
faculties awake! Through all the long winter evening, the mind brings
forth its treasures of wit, of anecdote, of instructive fact and
charming allusion. Here is some Edison, with an enthusiasm for
invention, who found his electric lamps that burned well for a month
had suddenly gone out, and read in the morning paper the judgment of
the scientist that his electric bulb was a good toy but a poor tool.
In his enthusiasm for his work, the man exclaimed, "I will make a
statue of that professor, and illumine him with electric lamps, and
make his ignorance memorable." Then Edison went away to begin a series
of experiments that drove sleep from his eyes and slumber from his
eyelids through five successive days and nights, until love and
enthusiasm helped reason to wrest victory from defeat.
Here is the boy Mozart, with his love of music, toiling through the
long days at tasks he hated, and in the darkening twilight stealing
into the old church, where he poured out his very soul over the organ
keys, sobbing out his mournful melodies. Here is Lincoln, with his
enthusiasm for books, coming in at night all aching with cold and wet,
and rising when parents slept, to roll another log upon the blazing
hearth, while midst the grateful heat his eager eyes searched out the
treasures that lay along the line of the printed page, until his mind
grew rich and strong. And here are the Scottish clansmen and patriots,
for love's sake, following the noble chieftain, their hearts all
aflame, who, if they had a hundred lives, would gladly have given them
all for their heroic leader. And here is the orator rising to plead
the cause of the savage, and of the slave, before men who feel no
sympathy, and are as castles locked and barred. But the love for the
poor shines in Wendell Phillips' eyes, trembles in his voice, pleads
in his thinking, until the multitude become all plastic to his
thought, and his smile becomes their smile, his tear their tear, the
throb of his heart the throb of the whole assembly. Here is the
Scottish girl, in love with truth, standing midst the sea, within the
clutches of the incoming tide. She is bound down midst the rising
waters. Doomed is she and soon must die. But her eyes are turned
upward toward the sky, and a great sweet light is on her face that
tells us enthusiasm and love in her have been victorious over death.
Truly, that Greek did well to call enthusiasm "a god within," for love
is stronger than death.
The historian tells us that all the liberties, reforms and political
achievements of society have been gained by nations thrilling and
throbbing to one great enthusiasm. The Renaissance does not mean a
single Dante, nor Boccaccio, but a national enthusiasm and a "god
within all minds." The Reformation is not a single Savonarola, nor
Luther, but a universal enthusiasm and "a god within," all heart and
conscience. If we study these movements of society as typified by
their leaders, these heroes stand forth before us with hearts all
aflame and with minds that grow like suns. In times of great danger
men develop unsuspected physical strength, and the force of the whole
body seems to rush upward and compact itself with the thumb or fist.
And in the mental world lawyers and orators tell us that at heated
crises, when great issues hang upon their words, the memory achieves
feats otherwise impossible. In these hours the mind becomes luminous.
All the experience of the past passes before the orator with the
majesty of a mighty wave or a rushing storm. Similarly, the hero
inflamed with love or liberty becomes invincible. When some Garibaldi
or Lincoln appears, and the people behold his greatness and beauty and
magnanimity, every heart catches the sacred passion. Then the
narrow-minded youth tumbles down his little idols, sets up diviner
ideals, and finds new measurements for the thrones of heaven and
earth. Then, in a great abandonment of love, the nation pours out its
heart for the cause it loves.
Froude tells us that self-government has cost mankind hundreds of wars
and thousands of battle-fields. Tennyson writes of the boy who was
following his father's plow when the share turned up a human skull.
There, where the plow stayed, the patriot had fallen in battle.
Sitting upon the furrow with the child upon his knee, the father
caused his boy to see a million men in arms fighting for some great
principle; to see the battle-fields all red with blood; the hillsides
all billowy with graves; caused him to hear the shrieking shot and
shell; pointed out the army of cripples hobbling homeward. When the
child shivered in fear the father whispered, "Your ancestors would
have gladly died daily for the liberty they loved." And if to-day good
men brood over the wrongs of Armenia, and breathe a silent prayer for
those who struggle against desperate odds and "the unspeakable Turk,"
and if to-morrow and on the morrow's morrow editors and orators unite
in words of sympathy and encouragement for the patriots fighting in
some Cuba, it is because we believe the love of liberty implies the
right to liberty; that despotism corrupts manhood; that
self-government is the best for industry, the best for integrity, the
best for intelligence. If the red plowshare of war must pass through
the soil of the nations, may it bury forever the seeds of oppression
and injustice, and sow for future generations the seeds of liberty,
intelligence and religion!
Moreover, an overmastering passion is the secret of all eminence in
scholarship. Each autumn the golden gates of learning swing wide to
welcome the thousands who enter our colleges and universities. If it
were possible for each young student to sit down and speak with the
library and laboratory as with a familiar friend, we would hear
wisdom's voice uttering one report: "I love them that love me." None
of those forms of mental wealth called art or science or literature,
enters the mind unasked or stays unurged. All the shelves are heavy
with mental treasure, but only the eager mind may harvest it. Beauty
sleeps in all the quarries, but only the eager chisel wakens it.
Wealth is in every crack and crevice of the soil, but nature forbids
the sluggard to mine it. Those forms of paradise called fame,
position, influence, stand with gates open by day and night, but the
cherubim with flaming swords wave back all idle youth. When the
Grecian king set forth upon his expedition he stayed his golden
chariot at the market-place. Lifting up his voice he forbade any man's
body to enter his chariot whose heart remained behind. Thus the mind
is a chariot that sweeps no unwilling student upward toward those
heights where wisdom and happiness dwell.