Italian. He says: “Some sensual, inconsiderate persons affirm that
long life is not a blessing; that the state of a man who has passed
his seventy-fifth year does not deserve to be called life, but is
rather a lingering death. This is a great mistake. And I, who have
experienced the salutary effects of temperate, regular habits, am
bound to prove that a man may enjoy a terrestrial paradise after
he is eighty years old. My own existence, so far from being a
lingering death, is a perpetual round of pleasures; and it is my
sincere wish that all men would endeavor to attain my age, in order
that they also may enjoy that period of life which of all others
is the most desirable. For that reason I will give an account of
my recreations, and of the relish I find in life at its present
advanced stage. I can climb my horse without any assistance, or
advantage of situation, and now and then I make one of a hunting
party suitable to my age and taste. I have frequent opportunities
to converse with intelligent, worthy gentlemen, well acquainted
with literature. When I have not such conversation to enjoy, I
betake myself to reading some good book. When I have read as much
as I like, I write, endeavoring in this, as in everything else,
to be of service to others. This I do in my own commodious house,
in the most beautiful quarter of this noble and learned city of
Padua, and around it are gardens supplied with running waters,
where I always find something to do that amuses me. Every spring
and autumn I go to a handsome hunting-lodge, belonging to me,
in the Euganean mountains, which is also adorned with fountains
and gardens. Then I visit my village in the plain, the soil of
which I redeemed from the marshes. I visit neighboring cities,
to meet old friends, and to converse with architects, painters,
sculptors, musicians, and husbandmen, from all of whom I learn
something that gives me satisfaction. I visit their new works,
and I revisit their old ones. I see churches, palaces, gardens,
fortifications, and antiquities, leaving nothing unobserved from
which either entertainment or instruction can be derived. But what
delights me most is the scenery I pass through, in my journeys
backwards and forwards. When I was young, and debauched by an
irregular life, I did not observe the beauties of nature; so that
I never knew, till I grew old, that the world was beautiful. That
no comfort may be wanting to the fulness of my years, I enjoy a
kind of immortality in a succession of descendants. When I return
home from my journeys, I am greeted by eleven grandchildren, the
oldest eighteen, the youngest two years old; all the offspring
of one father and mother. They all have good parts and morals,
are blessed with the best of health, and fond of learning. I play
with the youngest, and make companions of the older ones. Nature
has bestowed on them fine voices. I delight in hearing them sing
and play on various instruments, and I myself sing with them, for
I have a clearer and louder pipe now than at any other period of
life. Such gayety of spirits has been imparted by my temperate
life, that at my present age of eighty-three I have been able to
write a very entertaining comedy, abounding with innocent mirth and
pleasant jests. I declare I would not exchange my gray hairs, or my
mode of living, with any young men, even of the best constitutions,
who seek pleasure through the indulgence of their appetites. I take
an interest in seeing the draining of marshes and the improvement
of the harbor going on, and it is a great comfort to me that my
treatises on a temperate life have proved useful to others, as
many have assured me, both by word of mouth, and by letter. I
may further add, that I enjoy two lives at once. I enjoy this
terrestrial life, in consequence of sobriety and temperance; and,
by the grace of God, I enjoy the celestial life, which he makes me
anticipate by thought,--a thought so lively, that I affirm the
enjoyment to be of the utmost certainty. To die in the manner that
I expect to die is not really death, but merely a passage of the
soul from this earthly life to an infinitely perfect existence. The
prospect of terminating the high gratifications I have enjoyed here
gives me no uneasiness; it rather affords me pleasure, as it will
be only to make room for another glorious and immortal life. How
beautiful the life I lead! How happy my exit!”
His prophecy proved true. He lived to be one hundred and four years
old, and passed away without pain, sitting in his elbow-chair. His
wife,
who was nearly as old as himself, survived
him but a short time, and died easily.
They were buried in St. Anthony’s
Church, at Padua, in a very
unostentatious manner,
according to their
testamentary
directions.
[Illustration]
When Dr. Priestley was young, he preached that old age was the
happiest period of life; and when he was himself eighty, he
wrote, “I have found it so.”
[Illustration]
ROBIN AND JEANNIE.
BY DORA GREENWELL.
“Do you think of the days that are gone, Jeannie,
As you sit by the fire at night?
Do you wish that the morn would bring back the time,
When your heart and your step were so light?”
“I think of the days that are gone, Robin,
And of all that I joyed in then;
But the brightest that ever arose on me,
I have never wished back again.”
“Do you think of the hopes that are gone, Jeannie,
As you sit by the fire at night?
Do you gather them up, as they faded fast,
Like buds with an early blight?”
“I think of the hopes that are gone, Robin,
And I mourn not their stay was fleet,
For they fell as the leaves of the roses fall,
And were even in falling sweet.”
“Do you think of the friends that are gone, Jeannie,
As you sit by the fire at night?
Do you wish they were round you again once more,
By the hearth that they made so bright?”
“I think of the friends that are gone, Robin;
They are dear to my heart as then;
But the best and the dearest among them all
I have never wished back again.”
* * * * *
“We have lived and loved together,
Through many changing years;
We have shared each other’s gladness,
We have wept each other’s tears.
“I have never known a sorrow
That was long unsoothed by thee;
For thy smile can make a summer,
Where darkness else would be.
“And let us hope the future
As the past has been, will be;
I will share with thee thy sorrows,
And thou thy smiles with me.”
ANONYMOUS.
[Illustration]
A GOOD OLD AGE.
FROM MOUNTFORD’S EUTHANASY.
A good old age is a beautiful sight, and there is nothing earthly
that is as noble,--in my eyes, at least. And so I have often
thought. A ship is a fine object, when it comes up into a port,
with all its sails set, and quite safely, from a long voyage. Many
a thousand miles it has come, with the sun for guidance, and the
sea for its path, and the winds for its speed. What might have been
its grave, a thousand fathoms deep, has yielded it a ready way; and
winds that might have been its wreck have been its service. It has
come from another meridian than ours; it has come through day and
night; it has come by reefs and banks that have been avoided, and
past rocks that have been watched for. Not a plank has started, nor
one timber in it proved rotten. And now it comes like an answer to
the prayers of many hearts; a delight to the owner, a joy to many a
sailor’s family, and a pleasure to all ashore, that see it. It has
been steered over the ocean, and been piloted through dangers, and
now it is safe.
But still more interesting than this is a good life, as it
approaches its threescore years and ten. It began in the century
before the present; it has lasted on through storms and sunshine;
and it has been guarded against many a rock, on which shipwreck
of a good conscience might have been made. On the course it has
taken, there has been the influence of Providence; and it has been
guided by Christ, that day-star from on high. Yes, old age is even
a nobler sight than a ship completing a long, long voyage.
On a summer’s evening, the setting sun is grand to look at. In his
morning beams, the birds awoke and sang, men rose for their work,
and the world grew light. In his mid-day heat, wheat-fields grew
yellower, and fruits were ripened, and a thousand natural purposes
were answered, which we mortals do not know of. And at his setting,
all things seem to grow harmonious and solemn in his light.
But what is all this to the sight of a good life, in those years
that go down into the grave? In the early days of it, old events
had their happening; with the light of it many a house has been
brightened; and under the good influence of it, souls have grown
better, some of whom are now on high. And then the closing period
of such a life,--how almost awful is the beauty of it! From his
setting, the sun will rise again to-morrow; and he will shine on
men and their work, and on children’s children and their labors.
But when once finished, even a good life has no renewal in this
world. It will begin again; but it will be in
a new earth, and under new heavens.
Yes, nobler than a ship safely
ending a long voyage, and
sublimer than the setting
sun, is the old age of
a just, a kind,
and useful
life.
[Illustration]
A good old man is the best antiquity; one whom time hath been
thus long a working, and, like winter fruit, ripened when
others are shaken down. He looks over his former life as a
danger well past, and would not hazard himself to begin again.
The next door of death saps him not, but he expects it calmly,
as his turn in nature. All men look on him as a common father,
and on old age, for his sake, as a reverent thing. He practises
his experience on youth, without harshness or reproof, and in
his council is good company. You must pardon him if he likes
his own times better than these, because those things are
follies to him now, that were wisdom then; yet he makes us of
that opinion, too, when we see him, and conjecture those times
by so good a relic.--BISHOP EARLE.
[Illustration]
MY PSALM.
BY JOHN G. WHITTIER.
I mourn no more my vanished years:
Beneath a tender rain,--
An April rain of smiles and tears,--
My heart is young again.
The west winds blow, and, singing low,
I hear the glad streams run;
The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun.
No longer forward nor behind
I look in hope or fear;
But, grateful, take the good I find,
The best of now and here.
I plough no more a desert land,
To harvest weed and tare;
The manna dropping from God’s hand
Rebukes my painful care.
I break my pilgrim staff, I lay
Aside the toiling oar;
The angel sought so far away,
I welcome at my door.
The airs of Spring may never play
Among the ripening corn,
Nor freshness of the flowers of May
Blow through the Autumn morn;--
Yet shall the blue-eyed Gentian look
Through fringèd lids to Heaven,
And the pale Aster in the brook
Shall see its image given;--
The woods shall wear their robes of praise,
The south-wind softly sigh;
And sweet, calm days, in golden haze,
Melt down the amber sky.
Not less shall manly deed and word
Rebuke an age of wrong;
The graven flowers that wreathe the sword
Make not the blade less strong.
But smiting hands shall learn to heal,
To build, as to destroy;
Nor less my heart for others feel,
That I the more enjoy.
All as God wills, who wisely heeds
To give or to withhold,
And knoweth more of all my needs
Than all my prayers have told.
Enough that blessings undeserved
Have marked my erring track,--
That, wheresoe’er my feet have swerved,
His chastening turned me back,--
That more and more a Providence
Of love is understood,
Making the springs of time and sense
Sweet with eternal good,--
That death seems but a covered way
Which opens into light,
Wherein no blinded child can stray
Beyond the Father’s sight,--
That care and trial seem at last,
Through Memory’s sunset air,
Like mountain-ranges, overpast,
In purple distance fair,--
That all the jarring notes of life
Seem blending in a psalm,
And all the angles of its strife
Slow rounding into calm.
And so the shadows fall apart,
And so the west winds play;
And all the windows of my heart
I open to the day.
* * * * *
Over the winter glaciers,
I see the summer glow,
And, through the wild piled snow-drift,
The warm rosebuds below.
R. W. EMERSON.
[Illustration]
JOHN HENRY VON DANNECKER.
DERIVED FROM MRS. JAMESON’S SKETCHES, LONGFELLOW’S HYPERION, AND
FROM VARIOUS EUROPEAN LETTERS.
This celebrated German sculptor was born in 1758, at Stuttgard.
His father, who was one of the grooms of the Duke of Würtemberg,
was a stupid, harsh man. He thought it sufficient for his son to
know how to work in the stable; and how the gifted boy contrived to
pick up the rudiments of reading and writing, he could not remember
in after life. He had an extraordinary passion for drawing, and
being too poor to buy paper and pencils, he used to scrawl figures
with charcoal on the slabs of a neighboring stone-cutter. When
his father discovered this, he beat him for his idleness; but his
mother interfered to protect him. After he arrived at manhood,
he was accustomed to speak of her with the utmost tenderness and
reverence; saying that her promptings were the first softening
and elevating influences he ever knew. His bright countenance and
alert ways sometimes attracted the notice of the Duke, who saw him
running about the precincts of the palace, ragged and barefoot; but
he was far enough from foreseeing the wonderful genius that would
be developed in this child of one of his meanest servants.
When John Henry was about thirteen years old, the Duke established
a military school, into which poor boys, who manifested sufficient
intelligence, might be admitted. As soon as he heard of this
opportunity, he eagerly announced the intention of presenting
himself as a candidate. His surly father became very angry at
this, and told him he should stay at home and work. When the lad
persisted in saying he wanted to get a chance to learn something,
he beat him and locked him up. The persevering boy jumped out
of the window, collected several of his comrades together, and
proposed to them to go to the Duke and ask to be admitted into his
school. The whole court happened to be assembled at the palace when
the little troop marched up. Being asked by one of the attendants
what they wanted, Dannecker replied, “Tell his Highness the Duke
that we want to be admitted to the Charles School.” The Duke, who
was amused by this specimen of juvenile earnestness, went out
to inspect the boys. He led aside one after another, till only
Dannecker and two others remained. He used to say afterward that
he supposed himself rejected, and suffered such an agony of shame,
that he was on the point of running away and hiding himself,
when he discovered that those who had been led aside were the
rejected ones. The Duke ordered the successful candidates to go
next morning to the school, and dismissed them. The father did not
dare to resist such high authority, but he was so enraged with his
son, that he turned him out of the house and forbade him ever to
enter it again. But his good mother packed up a little bundle of
necessaries for him, accompanied him some distance on the road, and
parted with him with tears and blessings.
He did not find himself well situated in this school. The teachers
were accustomed to employ the poorer boys as servants, and he
was kept so constantly at work, that what little he learned was
mostly accomplished by stealth. But he met with one piece of great
good fortune. Schiller, who afterward became world-renowned as a
writer, was at this school. The two boys recognized kindred genius
in each other, and formed a friendship which lasted through life.
When he was fifteen years old, his remarkable talent for drawing
caused him to be removed to the School of Art in Stuttgard, where
he received instruction from Grubel, the sculptor. The next year,
he obtained the highest prize for a statue of Milo, modelled in
clay. The Duke, who had forgotten the bright, ragged boy that
formerly attracted his attention, was astonished to hear he had
carried off the highest honors of the School of Art. He employed
him to carve cornices and ornaments for two new palaces he was
building. Ten years were thus spent, during which he acquired a
great deal of mere mechanical skill and dexterity. But he longed
to improve himself by the sight of noble models; and at last he
obtained leave to travel. The allowance granted him by his ducal
patron was only one hundred and twenty dollars a year. With this
he set off for Paris, where he studied in the galleries of the
Louvre, often going the whole day without food, and in a dress
too shabby to be considered respectable. Those who saw him thus
perseveringly employed, passed by without recognizing the divine
soul that dwelt within the forlorn exterior. He afterward went to
Rome, where for some months, he wandered about among monuments
and ruins, friendless and homesick. But luckily his illustrious
countrymen, Herder and Goethe were there. He was introduced to
them, and their conversation imbued him with higher ideas of Art
than he had ever before received. The celebrated Italian sculptor,
Canova, also became acquainted with him, and often visited him
in his studio. There was but a year’s difference in their ages,
and their friendship became intimate. He remained five years in
Rome, and distinguished himself by the production of several fine
statues. He then returned to his native country, where he married.
At fifty years of age he was considered the greatest sculptor in
Germany. The Grand Duke ennobled him, as the phrase is; though it
seems absurd enough that wearing a ribbon in his button-hole, and
being allowed to put _von_ before the name his genius had rendered
illustrious, could add any nobility to a man like Dannecker.
His two most celebrated works are Ariadne riding on a panther, and
his statue of Christ. The circumstances under which the latter
was produced are very peculiar. Dannecker was a devout Lutheran,
and he often meditated upon a statue of the Mediator between God
and man as the highest problem of Art. He sought to embody it,
but felt that something was wanting. A child, who was accustomed
to run about his studio, came in while he was at his work. “Who
do you think that is?” said the artist, pointing to his model.
The child looked, and replied: “I don’t know; I guess it is some
great king.” Ah, thought Dannecker, I have made the expression of
power to predominate over love. The search after a perfect ideal
of the Divine and human combined took complete possession of
his mind. Filled with such thoughts, he fell asleep and dreamed
of a face and form transcending anything he had conceived. He
hastened to model it in clay, while the vision was still fresh in
his mind. When it was shown to the child, he at once exclaimed,
“That is the Redeemer. Mother reads to me about him, where he
says, ‘Suffer little children to come unto me.’” This confirmed
Dannecker in the belief that he had been directly inspired from
above. Others regarded it as a dream produced by the intense
activity of his thoughts concentrated upon one subject; but he
always viewed it as an immediate revelation. He was fifty-eight
years old when this sublime vision was presented to him in his
sleep, and for eight years he devoted to it all the energies of
mind and heart. He studied the Scriptures intently, and prayed
for Divine assistance. His enthusiasm was a compound of Religion
and Art. Under this combined influence, he said he felt as if he
were pursued by some irresistible power, which visited him in his
sleep, and often compelled him to rise in the night and embody the
ideas which had been presented to him. When he was sixty-six years
old, the glorious statue was completed. It is clothed in a simple
robe reaching to the feet. The hair is parted on the forehead, and
falls in ringlets over the shoulders. The head is purely moral and
intellectual in its outline. One hand is pressed upon the bosom,
the other extended, and the lips are partially unclosed, as if in
the act of speaking. The expression is said to be a remarkable
combination of majesty and tenderness, exciting involuntary
reverence in all who look upon it.
Mrs. Jameson visited Dannecker in 1830. The statue was still
standing in his studio. She says: “He told me that the figure had
visited him in a dream three several times, and that he firmly
believed he had been predestined to the work, and divinely
inspired. I shall not easily forget the countenance of the good and
gifted old man, as he leaned on the pedestal, with his cap in his
hand, and his long gray hair waving round his face, looking up at
his work with a mixture of reverence and exultation.”
This remarkable statue was purchased by the Emperor Alexander,
and is now in Russia. A year after its completion, he made a
colossal statue of the Evangelist John, for the royal chapel at
Rothenberg. He had for many years been Professor of the Fine Arts
at the Academy in Stuttgard, and the instructions he was obliged to
give there, combined with the labors of his studio, kept him very
constantly occupied. Mrs. Jameson again visited him in 1833, when
he was seventy five years old. She says: “A change had come over
him. His trembling hand could no longer grasp the mallet or guide
the chisel. His fine benevolent countenance wore a childish smile,
and was only now and then crossed by a gleam of awakened memory
or thought. Yet he seemed perfectly happy. He walked backward and
forward from his statue of Christ to his bust of Schiller, with an
unwearied self-complacency, in which there was something mournful,
yet delightful. While I was looking at the magnificent head of
Schiller, he took my hand, and trembling with emotion, said, ‘We
were friends from boyhood. I worked upon it with love and grief;
and one can do no more.’ I took leave of Dannecker with emotion. I
shall never see him again. But he is one of those who cannot die.
Canova, after he was a melancholy invalid, visited his studio, and
was so much struck by his childlike simplicity, his pure, unworldly
nature, his genuine goodness, and lively, happy temperament, that
he gave him the surname of _Il Beato_, The Blessed. And surely if
that epithet can with propriety be bestowed upon any mortal, it
is on him whose long life has been one of labor and of love; who
has left behind him lasting memorials of his genius; who has never
profaned to any unworthy purpose the talents which God has given
him, but, in the midst of all the beautiful and exciting influences
of Poetry and Art, has kept, from youth to age, a soul serene, a
conscience and a life pure in the sight of God and man.”
Longfellow, in his prose-poem called “Hyperion,” thus introduces
the renowned German artist, on a calm Sabbath forenoon:--“Flemming
stole out into the deserted street, and went to visit the veteran
sculptor Dannecker. He found him in his parlor, sitting alone,
with his psalm-book and the reminiscences of his long life. As
Flemming entered, he arose from the sofa and tottered toward him;
a venerable old man, of low stature, and dressed in a loose white
jacket, with a face like Franklin’s, his white hair flowing over
his shoulders, and a pale blue eye.
“‘So you are from America,’ said he. ‘I have never been in America.
I shall never go there. I am now too old. I have been in Paris and
in Rome. But that was long ago. I am now seventy-eight years old.’
“He took Flemming by the hand, and made him sit by his side on
the sofa. And Flemming felt a mysterious awe creep over him, on
touching the hand of the good old man, who sat so serenely amid
the gathering shade of years, and listened to life’s curfew-bell,
telling, with eight and seventy solemn strokes, that the hour
had come, when the fires of all earthly passion must be quenched
within, and man must prepare to lie down and rest till morning.
“‘You see,’ he continued, ‘my hands are cold. They were warmer
once. I am now an old man.’
“‘Yet these are the hands that sculptured the beautiful Ariadne and
the Panther,’ replied Flemming. ‘The soul never grows old.’
“‘Nor does Nature,’ said the old man, pleased with this allusion to
his great work, and pointing to the green trees before his window.
‘This pleasure I have left to me. My sight is still good. I can
even distinguish objects on the side of yonder mountain. My hearing
is also unimpaired. For all which I thank God.’
“Directing Flemming’s attention to a fine engraving which hung on
the opposite wall of the room, he continued: ‘That is an engraving
of Canova’s Religion. I love to sit here and look at it, for hours
together. It is beautiful. He made the statue for his native town,
where they had no church, until he built them one. He placed the
statue in it. He sent me this engraving as a present. Ah, he was a
dear, good man! The name of his native town I have forgotten. My
memory fails me. I cannot remember names.’