(_For the Mirror._)
"Call not earth a barren spot,
Pass it not ungrateful by,
'Tis to man a lovely lot."
There is no subject on which such a variety of opinions exist, as on
the question "Whether man is happy;" and that it is not easy to be
settled, is certain. Many persons have been so far contented with
their lot as to wish to have their life over again, and yet as many
have expressed themselves to the contrary.
Dr. Johnson, who always spoke of human life in the most desponding
terms, and considered earth a vale of tears,
"Yet hope, not life from pain or sorrow free,
Or think the doom of man reversed for thee--"
declared that he would not live over again a single week of his life,
had it been allowed him.[2] Such was his opinion on the past; but so
great is the cheering influence with which Hope irradiates the mind,
that in looking forward to the future, he always talked with pleasure
on the prospect of a long life.
[2] Chamfort observes, that the writers on physics, natural
history, physiology, and chemistry, have been generally men of a
mild, even, and happy temperament, while the writers on politics,
legislation, and even morals, commonly exhibited a melancholy and
fretful spirit. It is to be expected that an inspection of the
beauty and order of nature should affect the mind with peculiar
pleasure.--_Gaieties and Gravities_.
When he was in Scotland, Boswell told him that after his death, he
intended to erect a memorial to him. Johnson, to whom the very
mention of death was unpleasant, replied, "Sir, I hope to see your
grand-children." On his death-bed he observed to the surgeon who was
attending him, "_I want life_, you are afraid of giving me pain."
It has been supposed that this question had been settled by the
authority of Scripture. "Man is born to trouble," says Job, "as
the sparks fly upward." In turning over a few pages more, we find
ourselves in doubt again. "_The latter end of Job was more blessed
than his beginning_; for he had 14,000 sheep, and 6,000 camels, and
1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 she-asses. He had also seven sons and
three daughters. So Job died being old and full of days."
It may not be unpleasant to place before the reader the opinions of
several celebrated men, on Life, that he may choose his side, and
either like the bee or the spider, extract the poison or gather the
honey. We will begin with Sterne, one who well knew the human heart.
"What is the life of man? is it not to shift from side to side!
from sorrow to sorrow!"
"When I consider how oft we eat the bread of affliction, when one
runs over the catalogue of all the cross reckonings and sorrowful
items with which the heart of man is overcharged, 'tis wonderful
by what hidden resources the mind is enabled to stand it out, and
bear itself up, as it does, against the impositions laid upon our
nature."--_T. Shandy_.
"A man has but a bad bargain of it at the best."--_Chesterfield_.
"No scene of human life but teems with mortal woe."--_Sir Walter
Scott_.
In opposition to these sentiments, Franklin, in writing on the death
of a friend, gives us his opinion, "_It is a party of pleasure_, some
take their seats first."
And Lord Byron, describing Sunrise, in the second canto of _Lara_,
says
"But mighty nature bounds as from her birth,
The sun is in the heavens, and life on earth;
Flowers in the valley, splendour in the beam.
Health on the gale, and freshness in the stream.
Immortal Man! Behold her glories shine,
And cry exultingly, 'They are thine'
Gaze on, while yet thy gladdened eyes may see,
A morrow comes when they are not for thee."
In the same spirit Cowper begins his poem on Hope:
"See Nature gay as when she first began,
With smiles alluring her admirer, man,
She spreads the morning over eastern hills.
Earth glitters with the drops the night distils.
The sun obedient at her call appears
To fling his glories o'er the robe she wears,
... to proclaim
His happiness, her dear, her only aim."
"The Thracians," says Cicero, "wept when a child was born, and feasted
and made merry when a man went out of the world, and with reason. Show
me the man who knows what life is, and dreads death, and I'll show
thee a prisoner who dreads his liberty."
Of the misery of human life, Gray speaks in similar terms:
"To all their sufferings all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan,
The feeling for another's pain,
The unfeeling for his own."
Audi alteram partem:
"It's a happy world after all."--_Paley_.
And Gray himself:
"For who to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This careful, anxious being e'er resigned,
E'er left the precincts of the _cheerful day_
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind."
And another popular author:
"A world of pleasure is continually streaming in on every side. It
only depends on man to be a demi-god, and to convert this world
into Elysium."--_Gaieties and Gravities_.
It is doubtless wise to incline to the latter sentiment.
Of the instability of human happiness and glory, a fine picture is
drawn by Appian, who represents Scipio weeping over the destruction of
Carthage. "When he saw this famous city, which had flourished seven
hundred years, and might have been compared to the greatest empires,
on account of the extent of its dominions, both by sea and land,
its mighty armies, its fleets, elephants and riches; and that the
Carthaginians were even superior to other nations, by their courage
and greatness of soul, as, notwithstanding their being deprived of
arms and ships, they had sustained for three whole years, all the
hardships and calamities of a long siege; seeing, I say, this city
entirely ruined, historians relate that he could not refuse his tears
to the unhappy fate of Carthage. He reflected that cities, nations,
and empires are liable to revolutions, no less than particular men;
that the like sad fate had befallen Troy, once so powerful; and in
later times, the Assyrians, Medes, and Persians, whose dominions were
once of so great an extent; and lastly, the Macedonians, whose empire
had been so glorious throughout the world." Full of these mournful
ideas, he repeated the following verse of Homer:
"The day shall come, that great avenging day,
Which Troy's proud glories in the dust shall lay,
When Priam's powers, and Priam's self shall fall,
And one prodigious ruin swallow all--"
thereby denouncing the future destiny of Rome, as he himself confessed
to Polybius, who desired Scipio to explain himself on that occasion.
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