_Reader._ Do you admit free‐will?
_Büchner._ “A free‐will,” says Moleschott, “an act of the will which
should be independent of the sum of influences which determine man at
every moment and set limits to the most powerful, does not exist” (p.
239).
_Reader._ Do you adopt this view?
_Büchner._ Of course. “Man is a product of nature in body and mind. Hence
not only what he is, but also what he does, wills, feels, and thinks,
depends upon the same natural necessity as the whole structure of the
world” (_ibid._)
_Reader._ Then free‐will, according to you, would be a mere dream;
political and religious freedom would be delusions; _free_‐thinkers could
never exist; and, what may perhaps strike you most of all, _Free_‐masons
would be actual impossibilities.
_Büchner._ “The connection of nature is so essential and necessary that
free‐will, if it exists, can only have a very limited range” (_ibid._)
_Reader._ What! Do you mean that free‐will can exist, if “what man does,
wills, feels, and thinks depends upon the same natural necessity as the
whole structure of the world”? Can you reconcile necessity and freedom?
_Büchner._ “Human liberty, of which all boast,” says Spinoza, “consists
solely in this, that man is conscious of his will, and unconscious of the
causes by which it is determined” (_ibid._)
_Reader._ This answer does not show that liberty and necessity can be
reconciled. It would rather show, if it were true, that there is no
liberty; for if the human will is determined by any cause distinct from
itself, its volition cannot be free. Accordingly, your assertion that
“free‐will, _if it exist_, can only have a very limited range,” is
inconsistent with your principle of natural, essential, and universal
necessity, and should be changed into this: “Free‐will cannot exist, even
within the most limited range.” If you admit the principle, you must not
be afraid of admitting the consequence; or if you shrink from the
consequence, it is your duty to abandon the principle from which it
descends.
_Büchner._ “The view I have expressed is no longer theoretical, but
sufficiently established by facts, owing to that interesting new science,
statistics, which exhibits fixed laws in a mass of phenomena that until
now were considered to be arbitrary and accidental. The data for this
truth are frequently lost in investigating individual phenomena, but,
taken collectively, they exhibit a strict order inexorably ruling man and
humanity. It may without exaggeration be stated that at present most
physicians and practical psychologists incline to the view in relation to
free‐will that human actions are, in the last instance, dependent upon a
fixed necessity, so that in every individual case free choice has only an
extremely limited, if any, sphere of action” (p. 240).
_Reader._ “Limited, if any”! It is strange that you hesitate to say which
of the two you mean to advocate. Why do you not say clearly, either that
free‐will has a certain sphere of action, or that it has no existence at
all? Instead of explaining your opinion on this point, you try to obscure
the question. Individual free‐will is to be ascertained by the statistics
of the individual, not by that of the collection.
When a crowd moves towards a determinate spot, individuals are carried on
to the same spot, be they willing or unwilling, by the irresistible wave
that presses onward. So also when any collection of men, from a nation to
a family, lives under the same laws, experiences the same wants, enjoys
the same rights, and holds the same practical principles, the general
movement of the mass carries in the same direction every individual member
of the collection, by creating such conditions all around him as will
morally compel his following the general movement. But this is only
_moral_ necessity, against which man can rebel in the same manner as he
can rebel against the divine or the human law; whereas our question
regards the existence or non‐existence of a _physical_ necessity,
physically binding the human will, and determining every one of its
actions. Hence, even were it true that “a strict order inexorably rules
humanity”—that is, the collection of human beings—it would not follow that
the individual will is inexorably ruled by a physical necessity.
_Büchner._ “The conduct and actions of every individual are dependent upon
the character, manners, and modes of thought of the nation to which he
belongs. These, again, are, to a certain extent, the necessary product of
external circumstances under which they live and have grown up. Galton
says: ‘The difference of the moral and physical character of the various
tribes of South Africa depends on the form, the soil, and the vegetation
of the parts they inhabit.’ ... ‘It is about two hundred and thirty
years,’ says Desor, ‘since the first colonists, in every respect true
Englishmen, came to New England. In this short time they have undergone
considerable changes. A peculiar American type has been developed,
chiefly, it appears, by the influence of the climate. An American is
distinguished by his long neck, his spare figure, and by something
irritable and feverish in his character.... It has been observed that,
during the prevalence of easterly winds, the irritability of the Americans
is considerably increased. The rapidity of the American state development,
which surprises us, may thus, to a considerable extent, be ascribed to the
climate.’ As in America, so have the English given rise to a new type in
Australia, especially in New South Wales....” (pp. 241, 242).
_Reader._ Has all this anything to do with the question of free‐will?
_Büchner._ Certainly. “If the nations are thus in the aggregate, in regard
to character and history, dependent upon external circumstances, the
individual is no less the product of external and internal natural
actions, not merely in relation to his physical and moral nature, but in
his actions. These actions depend necessarily, in the first instance, upon
his intellectual individuality. But what is this intellectual
individuality, which determines man, and prescribes to him, in every
individual case, his mode of action with such force that there remains for
him but a minute space for free choice? What else is it but the necessary
product of congenital physical and mental dispositions in connection with
education, example, rank, property, sex, nationality, climate, soil, and
other circumstances? Man is subject to the same laws as plants and
animals” (pp. 242, 243).
_Reader._ I do not see any ground for this conclusion. Our “intellectual
individuality” is, I surmise, our individual soul, or our individual
intellect. Now, our intellect may speculatively prescribe, in individual
cases, some mode of action, but even then it lets our will free to obey
the prescription. Moreover, it is not true that our intellect prescribes,
in every individual case, a determinate mode of action. How often do we
not hesitate, even after long intellectual examination, what line of
action we should adopt! How often do we not entertain distressing doubts,
and have no means of emerging from our state of perplexity! It is
therefore false that our “intellectual individuality” prescribes to us, in
every individual case, our mode of action. Hence your other assertion,
that the same intellectual individuality urges us “with such a force that
there remains for us but a minute space for free choice,” needs no further
discussion, as being contrary to constant experience and observation. It
is curious that a man who professes, as you do, to argue from nothing but
facts, should coolly assume as true what is contradicted by universal
experience; but you have already accustomed us to such proceedings. What
strikes me is that your blunder cannot here be excused by the plea of
ignorance, as you cannot be ignorant of your own mode of action; whence
your reader must infer that your direct intention in writing is to cheat
him to the best of your power.
As to education, example, rank, climate, soil, and other circumstances, I
admit that they are calculated to favor the development of particular
mental and physical dispositions; but I deny, first, that such
dispositions are the “intellectual individuality,” and, secondly, that the
existence of such dispositions is incompatible with the exercise of free‐
will. Of course, we experience a greater attraction towards those things
which we are accustomed to look upon as more conducive to our well‐being,
and towards those actions of which we may have acquired the habit; but
this attraction is an invitation, not a compulsion, and we can freely do
or choose the contrary, and are responsible for our choice.
_Büchner._ “Natural dispositions, developed by education, example, etc.,
are so powerful in human nature that neither deliberation nor religion can
effectually neutralize them, and it is constantly observed that man rather
follows his inclinations. How frequently does it occur that a man, knowing
his intellectual character and the error of his ways, is yet unable to
struggle successfully against his inclinations!” (p. 244.)
_Reader._ I do not deny the power of natural or acquired dispositions, and
I admit that men usually follow their inclinations; but this is not the
question. The question is, “Do men follow their inclinations freely or
necessarily?” The assertion that “neither deliberation nor religion can
effectually neutralize” such inclinations is ambiguous. If you mean that,
in spite of all deliberation, we continue to feel those inclinations, the
thing is obviously true, but proves nothing against free‐will; if, on the
contrary, you mean that, after deliberation, we cannot act against such
inclinations, the assertion is evidently false; for we very often do
things most repugnant to our habitual inclinations.
That a man, knowing the error of his ways, “is unable to struggle
successfully against his inclinations,” is a wicked and scandalous
proposition. As long as he remains in possession of his reason, man is
able to struggle successfully, not only against his own inclinations, but
also against his predominant passions. The struggle may indeed be hard,
for it is a struggle; but its success is in the hands of man. How could
criminals be struck by the sword of justice, if, when committing crime,
they had been unable to check the temptation? Your doctrine would, if
adopted, soon put an end to the existence of civil society, and transform
mankind into a herd of brutes. If we cannot successfully struggle against
our bad inclinations, then theft, murder, adultery, drunkenness, and all
kinds of vice and iniquity are lawful, or at least justifiable, and
nothing but tyranny can undertake to suppress them or to inflict
punishment for them. Is it necessary to prove that a theory which leads to
such results is a libel against humanity?
_Büchner._ “The most dreadful crimes have, independently of the will of
the agent, been committed under the influence of abnormal corporeal
conditions. It was reserved for modern science closely to examine such
cases, and to establish disease as the cause of crimes which formerly were
considered as the result of deliberate choice” (p. 245).
_Reader._ Modern science pretends, of course, to have established a great
many things. But how can you explain the fact that, when “the most
dreadful crimes” are committed by common criminals, science still
considers and condemns them as a result of deliberate choice, whilst, if
such crimes are committed by members of secret societies, science
attributes them to abnormal corporeal conditions? Can we trust a science
which so nicely discriminates between the Freemason and the Christian? Yet
even your modern science, not to become ridiculous, is obliged, in order
to absolve criminals, to put forward a plea of _temporary insanity_, thus
acknowledging that a man who enjoys the use of his reason is always
responsible, as a free agent, for his actions. Hence, even according to
your modern science, our actions, so long as we are not struck with
insanity, are the result of our deliberate choice. It is only when you
lose your brain that you are “under the influence of those abnormal
corporeal conditions” which prevent all deliberate choice.
_Büchner._ Yet man’s freedom “must, in theory and practice, be restricted
within the narrowest compass. Man is free, but his hands are bound; he
cannot cross the limit placed by nature. For what is called free‐will,
says Cotta, is nothing but the result of the strongest motives” (pp. 245,
246).
_Reader._ It is difficult, doctor, to hold a discussion with you. Your
views are contradictory, and your argumentation consists of assertions or
quotations for which no good reason is, or can be, adduced. If man is
free, his hands are _not_ bound; and although he cannot cross the limits
of nature by which he is surrounded, he has yet a great latitude for the
exercise of freedom within said limits. We are not free to attain the end
without using the means, to live on air, to fly to the moon, to add an
inch to our stature; but these are limits of physical power, not limits of
free volition. Our will is moved by objects through the intellect; and no
object which is apprehended as unnecessary to our intellectual nature can
necessitate the will. To admit that what is presented to the will as
unnecessary can produce necessity, is to admit an effect greater than its
cause. Hence the range of free‐will is as wide as creation itself; for no
created object can be considered by the intellect as necessary to our
rational nature. One object alone may be so considered—that is, God, whose
possession alone is sufficient, and therefore necessary, to fill the
cravings of our heart. Thus man’s freedom is not to be restricted “within
the narrowest compass,” as you pretend, but is to be stretched to the very
limits of creation.
But “what is called free‐will,” you say, “is nothing but the result of the
strongest motives.” I answer that the stronger the motive is, the intenser
is the movement of the will, since the effect must be proportionate to its
cause. But the movement of the will is not a reflex act; it is merely an
indispensable condition for it, and its existence does not necessarily
entail the existence of the rational volition. The first movements of our
appetitive faculty are not formally free; for they are not originated by
the will, but by the objects. It is only when we reflect upon ourselves
and our movements that we become capable of rationally approving or
reprobating that towards which or against which we feel moved; and
consequently it is only after such a reflection that our will makes its
choice. Now, it is impossible that the rational soul, reflecting upon
itself and its first movements towards a finite good, should consider its
possession as a necessity of its own nature; for all good that is finite
is deficient, and if the rational soul considered finite good as necessary
to its happiness, it would in fact consider its deficiency also as
necessary to its happiness; which cannot be. Hence, whatever the strength
of the motives by which we are impelled, no movement excited by finite
good interferes with the freedom of the volition.
And now, is it true that our choice always answers to the strongest
motives? This question may be understood in two ways, according as the
motives are considered objectively or subjectively. The motives which are
the strongest objectively may become the weakest subjectively, and _vice
versa_. It is with our will moved by different motives as with the lever
loaded with different weights. The heavier weight absolutely prevails over
the lighter; but if the arms of the lever be suitably determined, the
lighter will prevail over the heavier. Thus the lightest motives may
prevail over the strongest ones, when our soul adapts itself to them, by
shifting, so to say, its own fulcrum, and thus altering the momenta of the
opposite forces. The motives which prevail are therefore the strongest in
this sense only: that the will has made them such; and, properly speaking,
we should not even say that they are the strongest, but only that they are
the most enhanced by the will.
These explanations may be new to you, but they are the result of
experience and observation. I abstain from developing them further, as it
is no part of my duty to vindicate them by positive arguments. No truth is
so universally and unavoidably recognized as the existence of free‐will. A
man of common sense must be satisfied of this truth by simply reflecting
upon his own acts. Criminals may pretend that they have not the power to
avoid crime; but doctors should not countenance such a pretension contrary
to evidence. To excuse crime on such a miserable plea is to encourage the
triumph of villany and the overthrow of human society.
_Büchner._ Indeed, it has been said that “the partisans of this doctrine
denied the discernment of crime, and that they desired the acquittal of
every criminal, by which the state and society would be thrown into a
state of anarchy.... What is true is that the partisans of these modern
ideas hold different opinions as regards crime, and would banish that
cowardly and irreconcilable hatred which the state and society have
hitherto cherished with so much hypocrisy as regards the ‘malefactor’ ”
(p. 247).
_Reader._ To denounce the state and society as hypocritical is scarcely a
good method of exculpating yourself. Yet your denunciation is false, so
far at least as regards Christian states and Christian society; for as
regards anti‐Christian societies connected with Freemasonry, and states
fallen under their degrading influence and tyranny, I fully admit that
they cannot, without hypocrisy, hate malefactors. Those who plunder whole
nations, who corrupt public education, who persecute religion, who sow
everywhere the seeds of atheism, materialism, and utilitarianism, have no
right to hate malefactors. As to those who teach that “neither
deliberation nor religion can effectually neutralize the dispositions of
man,” and that “man, knowing the error of his ways, is yet unable to
struggle successfully against his inclinations,” what right have they to
speak of crime or of malefactors? Can there be crime and malefactors
without free‐will? You see, doctor, that your materialistic doctrines do
away with all morality, and that a society imbued with them cannot be
moral. Hence it is bad taste in you to declaim against modern society, as
you do (p. 247), on account of vices which are nothing but the result of
materialism. “We are astonished,” you say, “that our society is so
ticklish as regards certain truths taught by science—a society whose
social virtue is nothing but hypocrisy covered by a veil of morality. Just
cast a glance at this society, and tell us whether it acts from virtuous,
divine, or even moral motives! Is it not, in fact, a _bellum omnium contra
omnes_? Does it not resemble a race‐course, where every one does all he
can to outrun or even to destroy the other?... Every one does what he
believes he can do without incurring punishment. He cheats and abuses
others as much as possible, being convinced that they would do the same to
him. Any one who acts differently is treated as an idiot. Is it not the
most refined egotism which is the spring of this social mechanism? And
distinguished authors who best know human society, do they not constantly
depict in their narrations the cowardice, disloyalty, and hypocrisy of
this European society? A society which permits human beings to die of
starvation on the steps of houses filled with victuals; a society whose
force is directed to oppress the weak by the strong, has no right to
complain that the natural sciences subvert the foundations of its
morality.” These last words should be slightly modified; for the truth is
that such a society is the victim of your modern theories, which you
dignify with the name of _natural sciences_, and which have already
subverted the foundations of social morality. The society you describe in
this passage is not the old Christian society formed on the doctrine of
the Gospel, but the materialistic society formed on modern thought. The
moral distemper of modern society is the most irrefragable condemnation of
all your doctrines. By its fruits we know the tree.
Conclusion.
We ask the indulgence of our readers for having led them through so many
disgusting details of pestilential philosophy. Without such details it was
impossible to give a clear idea of the futility and perversity which
characterize the teaching of one of the greatest luminaries of modern
infidelity. We have shown that Dr. Büchner’s _Force and Matter_, in spite
of all its pretensions, is, in a philosophical point of view, a complete
failure. We have omitted many of the author’s passages, which we thought
too profane to be inserted in these pages, and which, as consisting of
vain declamation, arrogance, and assumption, had no need of refutation. As
to our mode of dealing with our adversary, we have been pained to hear
that some consider it harsh. We beg to say that a man who employs his
talents to war against his Creator has no right to expect much regard from
any of God’s creatures. Men of this type are frequently treated with too
much forbearance, owing to the false idea that every literary character
should be treated as a gentleman. Blasphemers are not gentlemen, nor
should they be dealt with as gentlemen. They should be made to feel the
disgrace which attaches to their moral degradation. Such was the practice
in the good old times; and we may justify it by the example of One who did
not hesitate, in his infinite wisdom, publicly to rebuke the Scribes and
Pharisees in terms not at all complimentary, and certainly much stronger
than those which we have used in censuring the author of _Force and
Matter_.
The Ice‐Wigwam Of Minnehaha.
The winter of 1855‐56, memorable for its excessive and prolonged cold,
while it brought suffering to many a household throughout the land, and is
recalled by that fact almost solely, is fixed in my memory by its
verification of an old Indian legend of the ice‐wigwam of Minnehaha.
Longfellow has made this name familiar to the English‐speaking world, and
beyond. A little waterfall, whose silvery voice is for ever singing a
love‐song to the mighty Father of Waters, and into whose bosom it hastens
to cast itself, bears the name and personates the Indian maiden.
On the right bank of the Mississippi, between the Falls of St. Anthony and
the mouth of the Minnesota, is a broad, level prairie, starting from the
high bluffs of the Mississippi, and running far out in the direction of
sundown. In the month of June this prairie is profusely decked with bright
flowers, forming a carpet which the looms of the world will never rival.
Stretching far into the west is a tortuous ribbon of rich, dark green,
marking the path of a stream which stealthily glides beneath the shadows
of the long grass. As it nears the eastern border of the prairie, this
stream becomes more bold. Its expanded surface glistens in the noon‐day
sun. Here it passes slowly under a rustic bridge, upon an almost seamless
bed of rock. Then its motion quickens, as if in haste to reach the ledge
which overhangs the broad valley of the Mississippi, when, with one bound,
it plunges into its basin sixty feet below. This is Minnehaha, the little
hoiden who throws herself upon the outstretched arm of the great Father of
Waters with a merry laugh that wins the heart of every comer. Beautiful
child of the plain! How many have sought you in your flower‐decked home,
and loved you! Hoiden you may be; but coquette, never. Your life is freely
given to be absorbed in the life of him you seek.
But Minnehaha is at times the ward of another—an old man whose white locks
are so often the sport of the winds, whose very presence makes the limbs
of mortals tremble, and their teeth chatter at his approach. Yet he is
wondrous kind to his beautiful ward—touchingly kind is the Ice‐King of the
North. When the blasts from his realms, freighted with the chill of death,
scourge the lands over which they pass, and a silence awe‐inspiring and
complete falls on all; when the flowers are being buried beneath the snow,
and the mighty river bound with ice, then it is the ice‐king exhausts his
powers to build for Minnehaha a palace worthy of her. The summer through
(and spring and autumn scarce are known where Minnehaha dwells) the maid
has worn about her, as a veil, a cloud of mist and spray. O wondrous
architect! Of mist and spray you build a palace even Angelo might not
conceive in wildest dreams, were marbles, opals, pearls, all gems and
stones and precious metals, cut and fashioned ready to his hand! Thy
breath, O ice‐king! fashions mist and spray into grand temples, palaces,
more chaste and cold than any stuff Italian quarries yield! Behold the
ice‐king build! He breathes upon the mist, and on all sides strong‐based
foundations fix about the space he would enclose. The walls on these rise
up, as mist and spray are gathered there and set with his chill breath.
Height on height they rise, until the arch is sprung; and then the dome is
gathered in to meet the solid rock above, and all the outer work is done.
Within, the decorations form as do the stalactites within the caves. Then
these are covered with the diamond frost, such as December’s shrubs and
trees so oft put on to greet the rising sun. And Minnehaha, so the legend
says, sings here the winter through. This is the masterpiece of the great
ice‐king. Solomon in all his glory possessed no temple to compare with
this, nor Queen of Sheba ever saw its counterpart.
A party of four started from St. Paul in the latter part of March, 1856,
to visit this wonder of the North. For many years the winters had not been
protracted enough to permit the planting of a Maypole upon the ice of Lake
Pepin, nor had eye seen the ice‐wigwam of Minnehaha. Marquette, Hennepin,
Lesueur, and the early Catholic missionaries had carried with them their
love for the month of Mary into that cold region, and settlers and
Christian Indians made the opening day of this month one of joyful
festivity. To plant a May‐pole upon the ice of Lake Pepin (which is always
the last point on the Upper Mississippi where the ice breaks up, as no
current helps to cut or break it) was quite an event. The May‐pole, decked
with garlands of green and dotted with the many‐colored crocuses that
spring up and bloom at the very edge of the melting snow, and long before
the drifts and packs have disappeared, if planted on the ice, permitted
dancing on its smooth surface, and pleasanter footing than the loose,
moistened soil. May‐day can seldom be pleasantly celebrated in that region
out‐of‐doors, except upon the ice. Ice on Lake Pepin, then, is to the
young folk of that latitude as important an event as a bright, sunny day
in latitudes below.
During the month of March, 1856, a bright, warm sun melted the snows to
such an extent as to cover the level prairies with several inches of
water, confined within banks of melting snow. Wheels were taking the place
of runners. Our party drove over the undulating prairie to St. Anthony,
crossed the Mississippi by the first suspension bridge which spanned its
waters just above the Falls of St. Anthony, and from Minneapolis, on the
west bank, moved out into the dead level which extends south and west
toward the Minnesota River. A splashing drive of four miles brought us to
the bridge above the Falls of Minnehaha, from which we could see on our
left a cone of dirty ice, disfigured here and there with sticks and stones
and clods of earth; its base far down within an ice‐lined gorge, its top
close pressed upon an overhanging ledge. Was _this_ the wonder we had come
to see? A wonder, then, we came. But we did not turn back at this
unsightly scene. There was a charm about this legend of Minnehaha’s ice‐
wigwam that surely did not have its source in the charmless thing before
us. Nor could we believe the imagination of the red man capable of drawing
so poetic an inspiration from so prosaic a source. We therefore set to
work to discover the hidden things, if such there were. With large stones
we broke away the ice about the top of the cone, hoping to peer through
the opening by which the water of the stream entered. We failed in this,
but let in the western sun through the opening we had made. Then we
descended to the bottom of the gorge, over ice and snow, to seek a new
point of observation. Here, to the east, lay the broad, snow‐covered
valley of the Mississippi; before us, at the west, rose the cone of ice
full sixty feet in height, its wrinkled surface all discolored and
defaced, inspiring naught of poetry, stifling imagination. Moving
northward around the ungainly mass, and part way up the north side of the
gorge, we reached a terrace which led behind the cone and underneath the
overhanging ledge. We enter from the north (by broad steps of ice, each
rising three or four inches above the other) a hall twelve by twenty feet,
floored, columned, curtained, arched, and walled with ice. At somewhat
regular intervals elliptical columns of ice rose from floor to spring of
arch. Between these columns curtains hung, with convolutes and folds and
borders, filling all the space—and all of ice. Above us was the ledge of
rock overhanging the basin of the fall, behind us the bluff, and under our
feet the terrace of earth midway the cone; and all was paved and curtained
and ceiled with ice. Before us stood the upper half of the cone, meeting
the ledge above.
While giving play to admiration of the architectural beauties of the
place, our ears were greeted with a sound muffled or distant, as of
falling water. Whence could this come? Could there be life or motion
within that frozen mass? In the chill of that drear winter was not the
laughing voice of Minnehaha hushed?
The sun was dropping down the western sky, and a shadow lengthened in the
gorge below. The broken edges of the ice which overhung the quiet stream
gave back the borrowed rays of sunlight more brilliant than they came.
One of the party had, slung to his side, the customary long‐knife of those
days. With it in hand he started in search of the creature whose voice
lured him on, not, as the siren, to destruction, but to a scene of beauty,
brilliance, glory, with which the fabled cave of Stalacta was but as
shadow. Between him and the voice he sought a wall of ice imposed. The
knife at once was called to play its part. Between two columns this wall
was cut away, a window opened, through which we saw the glories of the
wigwam. Our eyes were dazzled and our senses mazed. The curtain rent
exposed to view the inner surface of a dome high‐arched and perfect in its
curves. From base, through all its height, it was hung with myriad
stalactites of ice, which seemed to point us to the laughing voice still
rippling on the waters far below. These stalactites were covered thick
with richest frost‐work; and from ten thousand upon thousand points the
glinting light fell off in floods. Near to the centre of the upper dome
the waters of the stream pour in in one broad sheet. An instant only is
such form preserved. The sheet of water breaks, and countless globes, from
raindrops to a sphere the hand would scarcely grasp with ease, come down,
and break still more in passing through the air, until within the basin
all is mist and spray. These globes at first arrange themselves in systems
not unlike the planetariums of the schools, where sun and planets, with
their satellites, are shown the youths, to aid such minds as seek to learn
the grander works of God in space. These systems, as they fall, are
countless; and by common impulse, which means law, the smaller range
themselves about a greater central orb. And so they pass through space, to
fall upon the bosom of the pool in mist. Is there no emblem here of life
and God?
And as we look, behold! the walls and dome are striped and slashed with
silver and with gold; then barred; and then again are panelled with this
silver sheen and gold. The gold and silver interchange positions, fade,
return, as the Northern Lights dissolve or chase each other here and
there. The mystery of this party‐colored scene was soon resolved. The ice
we broke away with stones had let the sun shine through the opening, and
the waters, flowing in, disputed passage with the light. There is an ebb
and flow in running water so like to pulse‐beats that it may not seem
strange to those who stop to think, that ruder men have worshipped streams
as gods. This ebb and flow upon the ledge so changed the depth of water
there that the sunlight, as it struggled through these different depths
(for ever changing), cast the light in silver or in gold upon the walls
and dome.
And now the sun bows down still more, and shines still more within the
dome; its rays are kissed by countless water‐drops, and changed by that
caress from white to all the colors of the bow or prism. But, strange, no
bow is formed; but in its stead a circle of the varied hues is poised
within the midst of all this splendor, as though the sun and flood had
come to crown the Indian maid, and vie with the ice‐king in doing fullest
homage to his ward.
Such is the legend realized. The time, the accidents, and every impediment
we overcame seemed but steps so prearranged that we might see complete the
efforts of the cold, the light, the water, all combined to create The
Beautiful. It was the meeting of extremes in harmony for common end,
instead of conflict. Here was a grand display of powers without jealousy.
The cold took irresistible possession of the water, mist, and spray, and
reared a work that art can scarcely copy. But all was cold and chaste and
white. The light possessed itself of the water also, but with a touch so
delicate and warm that color mantled the coldest, chastest, whitest ice.
Do you, dear reader, imagine this a fancy sketch? Be undeceived. Three of
the “four” still verify its truth. The fourth has fallen upon the
outstretched arm of the great Father of mankind. It is in tribute to his
memory that I write; for never soul more chaste, or heart more warm, or
life more full of love for all the beautiful, made up a man.
A Russian Sister Of Charity.