* * * I am very glad that you are not offended at L----'s jest, and
that you do not, like Herr von Frömmel,[116] consider him an impious
wretch. You must see, in the first place, that he aims his wit only at
the servile credulity of those men who convert the Unutterable, the
Being of all Beings,--who is ever present to us in a deep and dim
consciousness, but whom we can never comprehend,--into a strange
compound of tyrant, pedagogue, and attendant spirit: who think
themselves constantly guided by him in leading-strings, and regard all
they see and hear, or whatever happens to them, as an interposition of
God, and regarding their own littleness alone. If, for instance, they
fall into the water, or if they win a prize in the lottery, they see the
finger of God incontestably in that incident; if they escape any danger,
they pour out the most vehement thanks to God, as if some strange power
had sent the danger, and God, like a careful and prompt guardian, had
flown to their succour and deliverance. They might reflect, that whence
the deliverance comes, thence comes also the danger; whence the
pleasure, the pain; whence life, death. The whole is one scheme of
existence, bestowed and governed not according to momentary caprice, but
to immutable laws. Such petty views as those he satirizes, bring down
the idea of Omnipotence to our own mutability and frailty. Our thanks,
be they even speechless, are due to Eternal Love, for all that is; and
perhaps no prayer offered by man can be more worthy of the Deity, than
that mute and rapturous feeling of gratitude. But it is childish to be
ever ascribing to the intervention of Omnipotence common-place and
_external_ individual occurrences; such as lucky and unlucky accidents,
riches, poverty, death, and the like, which are subjected to the laws of
nature; or (according to the measure of our powers) to our own control.
Such an intervention on the behalf of our beloved selves, would be no
less strange and ill-adapted, with a view to our instruction and
improvement, than experience proves it to be useless.
His satire is also directed against Christians--who are no
Christians--and are neither so-called Atheists (almost always a
senseless denomination), nor yet genuine sincere fanatics; but that
odious race of modern pietists, who are either feeble creatures with
irritable nerves, or hypocrites of the most impious sort, and further
removed from the elevated purity of Christ than the Dalai Lama. These
are the true Pharisees and dealers in the temple, whom Christ would cast
out were he now on earth. These are they who, were he now to appear,
under a new and obscure name, would be the first to cry out, 'Crucify
him!'[117]
In the main I confess I agree with L----; though, with regard to the
subject of the 'Reflections,' every opinion can be but hypothetical, and
in truth, what relates to another state of existence must, of necessity,
be totally different from all that we have the capacity of understanding
in this. Had we been able to know it, or had it been designed that we
should do so, the Author of our nature would have rendered it as clear,
as obvious to us, as it is that we feel, or think, or exist. What is
needful, is revealed to us _inwardly_; and this has been declared from
all time, in words more or less plain and significant, by the great
spirits whom He has sent on earth.
That the human race is not destined to stand still like a machine devoid
of will, or to revolve in one perpetual circle,--but, on the contrary,
continually to advance, till it has ended its cycle of existence, and
attained the highest perfection of which it is capable, I never for an
instant doubt. But my hypothesis is this;--that our earth, like a vessel
loosened from her moorings, is left, under the protection and coercion
of the immutable laws of nature, to the management of her own crew. We
ourselves, thenceforth, are the framers of our own destiny, (insofar as
it depends on human operation, and not on those immutable laws,) and of
our own history, whether great or small, by our own moral strength or
weakness.
It is not, in my opinion, necessary to suppose the extraordinary and
special interposition of any power who causes a hard winter in Russia
for the special overthrow of Napoleon;--Napoleon rather is overthrown by
the vicious principle which guides him; and which, in the long run, must
inevitably wreck him upon some such external and immediate cause or
other. The physical incident happens, _with reference to him_, only
accidentally; with reference to itself, doubtless, in that necessary
series of laws to which it is subject, although these laws are unknown
to us.
On the same grounds, Providence will generally favour the virtuous, the
industrious, the frugal, the prudent, and grant many or most of their
desires; while the foolish and the wicked, who set themselves in
opposition and hostility to the world, are not ordinarily so successful
or so happy. If a man lets his hand lie in the ice, it is probable that
Providence will ordain it to be frozen; or if he holds it in the fire,
to be burnt. Those who go to sea, Providence will sometimes permit to be
drowned; those, on the other hand, who never quit dry ground, Providence
will hardly suffer to perish in the sea.
It is therefore justly said, "Help yourself, and Heaven will help you."
The truth is, that God _has_ helped us from the beginning: the work of
the master is completed; and, as far as it was intended to be so,
perfect: it requires, therefore, no further extraordinary aids and
corrections from above; its further development and improvement in this
world is placed in our own hands. We may be good or bad, wise or
foolish, not always perhaps in the degree which we, as _individuals_,
might choose, were our wills perfectly free, but so far as the state of
the human race immediately preceding us has formed us to decide.
Virtue and vice, wisdom and folly, are indeed words which receive their
meaning solely from human society, and apart from that would have no
signification. The ideas of the good and the wicked are excited solely
by the effect of our actions upon others; for a man who never saw a
fellow-man can act neither well nor ill,--nay, can scarcely feel or
think, well or ill: he possesses, indeed, all the requisite capacities
which form the groundwork of his higher moral and intellectual nature;
but it is only by means of creatures of a like nature, that these
capacities can be brought into activity; as fire can only exist, or
become sensible, when combustible materials are present. The ideas of
prudent and imprudent arise indeed earlier, and with reference to the
individual alone; for a single man in conflict with inanimate nature may
either injure himself foolishly, or employ the materials given him with
prudence and skill; and may have a full perception of these qualities or
modes of action in himself. To be good, therefore, in every point of
view, means nothing but to love other men, and to submit to the laws and
rules imposed by society: to be wicked, to rebel against those laws, to
disregard the weal of others, and in our conduct to have only our own
momentary gratification in view. To be prudent, on the other hand, is
only to have the power of perceiving and securing our own advantage by
the best and aptest means: to be imprudent, to neglect these means, or
to form a false estimate concerning them.
It is evident also that good and prudent--wicked and imprudent--are in
the highest sense nearly synonymous: for a man who is good, will, in the
common order of events, please his fellow-men, consequently will be
beloved by them, and consequently will be found to be prudent,--that is,
to have secured his own greatest happiness and advantage: while the bad
man, engaged in an interminable conflict, must at length have the worst,
and consequently suffer loss and injury.
But when once the moral sense has received its last development and
highest culture, the virtuous man, though insulated, frames laws to
himself, which he follows, unheeding of advantage, danger, or the
opinion of others. The bases of these laws will, however, always be what
I have described;--consideration of the well-being of his fellow-men,
and of the duty thence deduced, which follows as a consequence of the
way he has traced out to himself. But when this point is reached, the
inward consciousness of having fulfilled this duty, gives the moral man
purer and higher satisfaction than the possession of all earthly
enjoyments could confer upon him. It is therefore permanently, and in
both views of the subject, true, that it is the highest prudence to be
virtuous, the greatest folly to be wicked.
But here, indeed, from the busy and complicated nature of human life,
arise many and varied shades and distinctions. It is very easy, even
with great prudence, where the earthly and external is concerned, to
seize upon appearance instead of reality. It is possible for one man to
deceive others, and to make them believe that he does them good, that he
deserves their respect and their thanks, when he only uses them as
instruments of his own advantage, and does them the bitterest injury.
Folly too often produces the opposite effect, and imputes to others
wicked designs and bad motives, where the very contrary have place.
Hence arises the maxim,--painful indeed! but too firmly based on
universal experience,--that in worldly connections and affairs, folly
and imprudence are productive of more certain disadvantage to the
individual than vice and wickedness. The external consequences of the
latter may be kept off, perhaps entirely prevented, by prudence; but
nothing can ward off the consequences of folly, which is perpetually
working against itself.
The want, and the existence, of positive religions are mainly
attributable to the general persuasion of this truth, and of the
consequent insufficiency of penal laws of human institution. Hence
arises the doctrine of future rewards and punishments, awarded by an
All-seeing Power, against whose eye the precautions of prudence are
vain, and from whom the imprudent expects pity and compensation: for
truly he who has combined prudence and virtue needs no further
recompense,--he finds it rich and overflowing in himself. Who would not,
without a moment's hesitation, give everything in the world to enjoy the
blessedness of being perfectly good? A time may perhaps come, when all
church and state religions may be buried and forgotten; but Poetry and
Love, whose flower is true religion, whose fruit Virtue, must forever
rule the human heart in their holy Tri-unity,--the adoration of God as
the source of all existence, the admiration of nature as his high work,
and love to men as our brethren. And this is the true doctrine of
Christ,--by none more purely, touchingly, simple, and deeply expressed,
although its forms and premises are adapted to the times in which he
lived. And therefore is he become the seed from which the fruit of
after-times shall arise; the true Mediator, whose doctrine, as we must
hope, will, in time, become Christianity in deed and in truth, and not
in words alone. * * *
[Here occurs a chasm in the letters, which begin again on the 28th.]
_Capel Cerig, July 28th, late in the evening._
As the weather cleared up, and the friends whom I expected did not
arrive, I hastened to take advantage of the first ray of sun to
penetrate deeper amid the mountains; and set off about seven in the
evening, in an Irish car drawn by one horse, for Capel Cerig. I left my
servant, and took only a light travelling-bag containing a little linen
and a change of clothes.--This carriage consists of an open box,
standing on two wheels, resting on four horizontal springs, and
containing two opposite benches, on which four persons can commodiously
sit. You ascend from behind, as the door is between the wheels;--the
whole is very light and convenient. The moment was unusually
propitious;--nearly a week of rain had so swollen all the waterfalls,
brooks, and rivers, that they appeared in their fullest beauty; trees
and grass were clothed in their softest green, and the air was
transparent and pure as crystal. I admired the rich masses of gay
mountain flowers and heaths which grew luxuriantly in the clefts of the
rocks, and regretted that I did not know enough of botany to enjoy them
with more than my eye. I soon reached that sterner region in which
flowers are rarely seen, and trees never.
I alighted at the waterfall of Idwal to visit a little lake, which might
serve as the entrance to Hades.
The dreary and wild aspect of the deep mountain enclosure is really
awful. I had read that it was possible to reach Capel Cerig from hence,
going in a straight line over Trivaen (the mountain with basaltic
columns, of which I have spoken) and the surrounding rocks. The passage
was represented as very difficult, but surpassingly beautiful. At this
moment I saw a shepherd descending from the mountain, and I felt the
strongest inclination to attempt the expedition with the guide which
chance thus so opportunely threw in my way. I got the postilion to act
as interpreter of my wishes. The man thought it was too late, and that
the descent on the other side by night would be hazardous. On my
pressing him further, he said, however, that there would be a moon, and
that if I could follow him at a brisk rate, he thought we might manage
to cross the mountain in two hours,--but that there were some very
awkward places to pass. I had tried my strength too well on Snowdon to
shrink from the enterprise; I therefore closed the bargain, only taking
the precaution to order the driver to wait for me an hour, lest any
unforeseen difficulties should cause me to return, and then to drive
back to Capel Cerig.
The path along which we had to climb was from the outset very steep, and
lay over a boggy soil between enormous detached masses of rock strewed
in wild disorder. It might be about half past seven o'clock:--there was
no trace of any beaten path; Trivaen reared its grotesque peak like an
embattled wall before us, nor was it easy to discover how we were to
cross it. The mountain sheep here rendered us good service; they climbed
before us, and showed the often uncertain guide the most practicable
places. After a quarter of an hour of very wearisome climbing, with many
a giddy glance into the chasms beneath, to which, however, the eye
became gradually familiarized, we came to a little swampy 'plateau'
through which we were obliged to wade knee-deep in a bog. Here we had a
beautiful view of the sea, the Isle of Man, and Ireland dimly appearing
in the distance.
Immediately above the bog a completely different sort of ground awaited
us; a wall of perpendicular and compact sharp and ragged rocks, over
which we scrambled on hands and feet. The sun had already sunk behind a
high mountain sideward of us, and reddened the whole wild scenery
around, as well as the wall on which we hung, with a dark and fiery
glow--one of the strangest effects of sunlight I ever beheld. It was
like a theatrical representation of Hell. Our way now lay across a
swollen mountain-stream, over which a fallen block of stone had formed a
natural bridge; and then over bare rocks wholly unmixed with earth, till
at length we reached the high crest which had so long stood right before
us, and at which I expected an end of all our difficulties. I was
therefore not a little disappointed when I saw another defile before me,
which we must first descend and then climb up the opposite side, for no
human foot could have found a sure hold on the semicircular edge of the
crest, across which lay a shorter road.
We had now entirely lost sight of the sea; our view lay landward, where
the mountain region of Wales lay before us in its whole breadth; peak
above peak, solitary, silent, and mighty. The sterile valley beneath us
was filled with giant stones hurled about in wild disorder; and truly
the game which was here played, with rocks for balls, must have been a
spectacle for Gods. While I stood lost in contemplation of this chaos, I
heard a shrill reiterated cry close to me, and looking up saw two
majestic eagles soaring over our heads with outstretched wings--a rarity
in these mountains. Welcome faithful birds[118] of my house, exclaimed
I,--here, where there are only hard rocks, but no false hearts; are you
come to carry me, like the Roc bird, into some valley of diamonds? or do
you bring me tidings from my far distant home? The noble creatures
seemed as if they answered me by their cries; but unfortunately I am not
skilled in the language of birds: and they left me, wheeling higher,
till they disappeared among the columns of Trivaen. I look upon the
repeated attentions paid me by birds of prey as a good omen. It was
extremely inconvenient that I could no more speak with my guide than
with the eagles, for he understood not a word of English. We could
therefore only converse by signs. After we had for some time descended
with comparative ease, he pointed to a place to which we must now turn
our steps:--we had arrived at the 'bad passage.' This consisted of a
perfectly perpendicular wall, certainly not less than six hundred feet
in depth; and above it a scarcely less steep ascent of earth, washed
over by the rain, and strewed with small loose stones. Across this we
were to make our way--a distance of fifteen hundred paces. Formerly, I
should have regarded this undertaking as impracticable; but being urged
by necessity, after the first few steps I found it quite easy.
It certainly looked most terrific, but the numerous stones and the moist
soft earth afforded a firmer footing than might have been expected:
indeed these things, even in an unexaggerated description, always sound
more perilous than they are. It is very true that one false step would
cause inevitable destruction; but this is exactly what one takes good
care not to set: so a man must be drowned in the water, if he leaves off
swimming. Any body who can walk, and has a steady head, may perform such
exploits without the slightest danger. Twilight now began to close in;
the mountains became dim and indistinct; under us lay, like steaming
cauldrons, the misty lakes of Capel Cerig and Beddgelert. We had reached
the highest point, and hastened as much as possible to reach the former
lake. We waded through another bog, and scrambled down over rocks, till
we came to the part of our way which looked the least difficult, but was
in fact the most fatiguing;--a firm and smooth hill covered with turf,
very steep, and with a substratum of rock which in many parts presented
itself at the surface in broad smooth shelves. Down this declivity we
rather slid than walked; and the effort was at length followed by such
pain in the knees, that both the guide and I fell several times, though
without sustaining any hurt. The lofty mountains around us had hitherto
concealed the moon, which now arose large and bloody-red above their
wavy line. We soon lost her again. Near our journey's end she once more
rose upon us, golden, clear, and small, mirrored in the still waters of
the lake, on whose shores the inn stood. The last part of the way lay
along a level high-road, and offered such a contrast to what had
preceded it, that I felt as if I could have walked along it sleeping. It
was as if my steps were not the result of any act of the will, but
rather of some mechanical power; like children's toys, which when wound
up run round and round the table without stopping. We completed our
expedition in an hour and three quarters; and proud of my achievement, I
entered Capel Cerig, where my host would hardly believe we had
accomplished the distance by night in so short a time.--I had lived such
an indolent, effeminate life for some years, that I fancied myself grown
almost old; but to-day's experience proved, to my great joy, that I want
nothing but stimulus and opportunity, to recover all the freshness and
vigour of my bodily and mental powers;--danger and difficulty had always
been my most kindred element when fate threw them in my way.
My driver had not yet returned with the carriage, and I was obliged to
equip myself in the clothes of my portly host, in which I now doubtless
cut a very extraordinary figure; while my own are drying at the
kitchen-fire; and I am alternately occupied in writing to you, and in
drinking tea.
To-morrow morning I shall leave my pillow at four o'clock,--guess in
search of what;--the rock of the enchanter Merlin, where he prophesied
to king Vortigern the history of coming times, and where his wondrous
treasures, the golden throne and diamond sword, still lie buried in its
hidden caves. Here is a new and most safe object of speculation to the
mining companies of London and Elberfield.
_Beddgelert, July 29th, early._
Admire Merlin's vale with me, dearest Julia. It is indeed enchanting;
but its rocks--Dinas Emrys, I shall long remember. But let me begin at
the beginning. I went to bed at one, rose again punctually at four, and
in ten minutes was ready to start: for as soon as you bid adieu to
servants and luxuries, everything goes at an easier and quicker pace.
The fine weather had given place to the usual mists of these mountains;
and I was glad to avail myself of my mountain walking-stick of yesterday
in its other capacity of umbrella, as well as of that venerable cloak,
the honoured relic of my warlike services against France, which I was
once forced to throw out of a balloon, together with all other ballast,
to avoid ending my aerial excursion in the water.
At first the road was dull and uninteresting enough, till we came to the
foot of Snowdon, which reared its uncovered head majestically above the
clouds, by which we were encircled and bedewed. Its aspect is peculiarly
grand and sublime from this point. It rises in nearly perpendicular
height from the vale of Gwynant, which commences here. This richly
watered valley unites the most luxuriant vegetation with the sublimest
views. The loftiest mountains of Wales are grouped around it in manifold
forms and colours. The river which flows through it forms, in its
course, two lakes, not broad but deep, the valley being narrow
throughout, a circumstance which greatly contributes to enhance the
colossal air of the mountains which enclose it. In the richest part of
it a merchant of Chester has a park, which he justly calls Elysium.
On a high and thickly wooded ridge, out of whose deep verdure rocks
which rival each other in wildness of form break forth, overlooking the
mountain river which flows through a beautiful stretch of meadows,
stands the unpretending and lovely villa. Below lies the lake, behind
which stands Merlin's solitary rock, apparently closing the valley,
which here makes an abrupt turn.
Dinas Emrys is doubly impressed on my memory: first, for its romantic
beauty; secondly, because on it I literally hung between life and death.
Although not above four or five hundred feet high, it is considered
accessible only on one side. I had taken a little boy with me as guide,
but when we reached the spot he seemed to know very little about the
matter. The way which he took through an oak copse appeared to me from
the first suspicious, from its uncommon steepness; but he tranquillized
my fears in broken English, and I could do nothing but follow the little
fellow, (who sprang before me like a chamois,) as well as I could.
Merlin appeared to frown upon us: a violent wind had arisen, and the
sun, which had shone upon us for a moment, imbedded himself behind black
clouds; while the long wet grass which hung over the blocks of stone
made climbing very dangerous. This did not much impede the barefooted
little boy, but was a serious obstacle to my limbs, somewhat stiff from
my yesterday's exploits. The higher we went, the steeper the rocks
became; often we were obliged to swing ourselves up by the help of the
shrubs which grew out of the clefts, avoiding as well as we could to
look behind us. At length I observed that the boy himself was quite
irresolute, and creeping on his belly looked anxiously around. We now
wriggled right and left through some clefts, and suddenly found
ourselves standing on the peak of a smooth and lofty wall, with scarcely
room to set our feet, and above us a similar wall, out of which grew
some tufts of grass. The summit of this appeared to overtop the whole.
The prospect was not encouraging: the child began to cry, and I
considered not without some uneasy feelings what was to be done.
Willingly, I confess, should I have climbed down again, and left
Merlin's rock to witches and gnomes, if I had thought it possible to
descend without dizziness, or indeed to find the way by which we had
ascended. Before us there lay no chance of escape but by scaling the
wall as we best might. The boy, as the lightest and most practised, went
first; I followed him step by step, holding by the slight support of
tufts of grass, clinging with hand and foot in every little cleft; and
thus hanging between heaven and earth we reached the giddy summit in
safety. I was quite exhausted. A more daring climber may laugh at me;
but I honestly confess to you, that when a tuft of grass or root seemed
unsteady, and threatened to give way before I had raised myself up by
it, I felt what terror is. As I lay now panting with fatigue and fright
on the turf, I saw a large black lizard couched just opposite to me, who
appeared to look at me with scornful, malicious eyes, as if he were the
enchanter himself in disguise. I was however glad to see him, and in
high good humour at having got out of the scrape so cheaply; though I
thought fit to threaten the little imp, who like a mischievous gnome had
enticed me into such perils, with all sorts of terrible punishments, if
he did not make out the right way back. In his absence I examined the
remains of the area, as it is here called,--the ruined walls, where
"Prophetic Merlin sat, when to the British king
The changes long to come auspiciously he told."
I grubbed among the stones, I crept into the fallen caverns--but from
me, as from others, the treasures remained hidden;--the moment has not
yet arrived. As a compensation, the boy reappeared jumping gaily along,
and boasting of the beauty of the way, which he had at length found.
If it was not quite so smooth and easy as that of sin, it was at least
not like the last, inaccessible. Merlin's displeasure, however, pursued
us in the shape of torrents of rain, which obliged me again to send my
clothes to the kitchen fire, at which I am reposing.
The inn, completely shaded by high trees, is most delightful. Just
before my window is a fresh-mown meadow, behind which a huge mountain
rears itself, covered from top to bottom with deep purple heather,
glowing like the morning sky, in spite of the sheets of rain and of the
clouded heavens. While my dinner was preparing, (for I dine like
Suwarroff at eight o'clock in the morning), a harper, the humble relic
of Welsh bards, played on his curious and primitive instrument. He is
blind, and so is his dog, who stands behind him on his hind legs,
waiting with unwearied patience, till one bestows a piece of money on
his master, and of bread on himself. _Beddgelert_ means "Gelert's
grave," _bed_ and _grave_ being poetically expressed in Welsh by the
same word. Gelert was no other than a greyhound, whose history is,
however, so touching, that as soon as my 'déjeuné dinatoire' is removed,
I will tell it you.
_Caernarvon, July 30th._
I had kept the harper playing during the whole time of dinner at
Beddgelert, and had amused myself, like a child, with his dog, with whom
it had become so much a second nature to stand on two legs, that he
would have been a better representative of man than Plato's plucked
fowl. The perfect ease of his attitude, together with his serious
countenance, had something so whimsical, that one had only to imagine
him in a petticoat, with a snuff-box in his paw, to take him for a blind
old lady.
In the same proportion as this dog resembles the heroic Gelert, do the
modern Welsh seem to resemble their ancestors. Without the energy or
activity of the English, still less animated by the fire of the Irish,
they vegetate, poor and obscure, between both. They have, however,
retained the simplicity of mountaineers, and they are neither so rude
and boorish, nor do they cheat so impudently, as the Swiss. 'Point
d'argent, point de Suisse' is not yet applicable here. On the contrary,
living is so cheap that bankrupt Englishmen often retire hither: I am
assured that a man may have good board and lodging, the use of a poney,
and leave to shoot, for fifty guineas a year.
The environs of Beddgelert are the last continuation of the magnificent
valley which I have described to you. It was now alive with a hundred
waterfalls, which dashed foaming and white as milk from every chasm and
gorge. About a mile and a half in the rear of the village the rocks
stand so near together that there is scarce room for road and river to
run side by side. Here rises the Devil's bridge, and closes the valley,
or rather the defile. You now again approach the sea, and the country
assumes a gayer character. In two hours I reached the great resort of
tourists, Tan y Bwlch, whose chief attraction is a beautiful park
extending over two rocky mountains overgrown with lofty wood, between
which gushes a mountain stream forming numerous cascades. The walks are
admirably cut, leading, through the best chosen gradations and changes,
to the various points of view; from which you catch now an island in the
sea, now a precipice, with a foaming waterfall, now a distant peak, or
solitary group of rock under the night of primeval oaks.
I wandered for above an hour along these walks; but was greatly
surprised to see them in so neglected a state, that in most places I had
to wade through the deep grass, and to toil through the rank and
overgrown vegetation. Even the house seemed in decay. I afterwards
learned that the proprietor had lost his fortune at play in London.
As I feared I should spend too much time here, I gave up my visit to
Festiniog and its celebrated waterfall, hired an airy 'Sociable' (a sort
of light four-seated 'calêche' without a roof) from my host, and set out
for Tremadoc, distant about ten miles. I was richly rewarded, although
the road is the very worst I have yet met with in Great Britain; for
some miles it runs _in_ the sea, that is to say, through a part of it
which Mr. Maddox, a rich land owner here, has cut off by a monstrous
dam; he has thus redeemed from the ocean a tract of fertile land equal
in extent to a _rittergut_ (a knight's fee). From this dam, twenty feet
high and two miles long, you command the most magnificent views: the
drained land forms a nearly regular semicircle, whose walls appear to be
formed by the whole amphitheatre of the mountains. Here the art of man
has drawn aside the veil from the bottom of the deep; and instead of the
ship, the plough now tracks the broad expanse. But on the left, the
ocean still hides all the secrets of "the fathomless profound" under his
liquid mountains. The line of coast is terminated at no great distance
by a bold headland, on which the ruins of Harlech Castle, with its five
mouldering towers, overhang the waves. In front, at the end of the dam,
a quiet cheerful valley opens before you, cradled amid lofty mountains,
with a small but busy harbour, near which Tremadoc seems to grow out of
the rock.
In spite of all this, you, my Julia, would hardly bring yourself to ride
across this dam, which is indeed better fitted for foot-passengers. It
is, as I have already said, twenty feet high, and consists of rude,
angular, and jagged blocks of stone, heaped on one another. The road at
the top is only four ells wide, without any thing like a railing. On one
side the breakers dash furiously against it; and if your horses shyed at
them, you would infallibly be thrown on the points of rocks which
bristle like pikes on the other. The mountain horses alone can cross
such a road with safety, as they seem to estimate the danger and to be
familiar with it: nevertheless a carriage is seldom seen here. Wagons of
stone cross the dam on a railroad, which makes it still worse for all
other vehicles. Tremadoc itself stands on land formerly redeemed by a
similar process. The resemblance which this land, reclaimed some
centuries since, has to the sandy banks of northern Germany, which were
gained from the sea perhaps a thousand years ago, is very striking: the
little town itself and its inhabitants--as if like soil produced like
character of people--as completely resembled the melancholy villages of
that country. It is dreary, neglected, and dirty; the men ill-clad; the
inn not better than a Silesian one, nor less filthy; and, that nothing
might be wanting, the post-horses out at field, so that I had to wait an
hour and a half for them. When they appeared, their condition, the
wretched state of their tackle, and the dress of the postilion, were all
perfectly true to their model. This applies only to the part redeemed
from the sea: as soon as you have gone four or five miles further, and
reached the surrounding heights, the country changes to the fruitful and
the beautiful. It had, indeed, lost its wild and gigantic character; but
after so long a stay among the rocks, this change refreshed me,
especially as the most brilliant and lovely evening shone over the
landscape.
The sun gleamed so brightly on the emerald meadows, woody hills lay so
peacefully as if at rest around the crystal stream, and scattered
cottages hung so temptingly on their shady sides, that I felt as if I
could have staid there forever. I had dismounted from the carriage; and
throwing myself on the soft moss under a large nut-tree, I gave myself
up with delight to my dreams. The evening light glittered like sparks
through the thick-leaved branches, and a hundred gay insects sported in
its ruddy light; while the gentle wind sighed in its topmost boughs, in
melodies which are understood and felt by the initiated.
The carriage arrived. Once more I cast a longing glance on the dark blue
sea; once more I drank in the fragrance of the mountain flowers, and the
horses bore the loiterer quickly to the plains.
From this point the romantic wholly ceases; I rode along a well-tilled
country till the towers of Caernarvon castle rose in the twilight above
the trees.--Here I intend to rest some days, having performed
seventy-four English miles to-day, partly on foot, between four in the
morning and ten at night.
_August 1st._
This morning I received letters from you, which make me
melancholy.--Yes, indeed, you are right; it was a hard destiny which
troubled the calmest and cheerfullest happiness, the most perfect mutual
understanding, and tore asunder the best suited minds (both too in the
full enjoyment of their respective tastes and pursuits), as a storm
troubles and tears up the peaceful sea. At one time, indeed, this was
well-nigh destruction to both; condemning the one to restless wandering,
the other to comfortless solitude; both to grief, anxiety, and vain
longings. But was not this storm necessary for the dwellers on the deep?
would not, perhaps, the stagnant and motionless air have been yet more
destructive to them? Let us not therefore give way to excessive grief:
let us never regret the past, which is always vain; let us only stretch
forward to what is better, and even in the worst exigencies let us be
true to ourselves. How often are the evils created by our own
imaginations the hardest to bear! What burning pains are caused by
wounded vanity! what agonizing shame by notions of false honour! I am
not much the better for perceiving this, and am often tempted to wish
for Falstaff's philosophy. Nature has however endowed me with one
precious gift, which I would most gladly share with you. In every
situation, I promptly, and as it were by instinct, discover the good
side of things and enjoy it, be it what it may, with a freshness of
feeling, a childlike Christmas-day delight in trifles, which I am
convinced will never grow old in me.
And in what situation does not the good, in the long run, outweigh the
evil?--this persuasion is the ground-work of my piety. The gifts of God
are infinite; and we might almost say we are inexcusable if we are not
happy. How often indeed we have it in our power to be so, every one may
see, who looks back at his past life;--he cannot escape the conviction
that he might easily have turned almost every evil to good. As I have
long ago and often said to you, We are the makers of our own destiny. It
is true, however, that ourselves we have _not_ made, and therein lies a
wide unknown Past, concerning which we perplex our spirits in vain: our
speculations can lead to no practical end. Let every one only do his
utmost to be of good courage, and to regard the outward things of this
world, without exception, as of light moment,--for the things of this
world are really light and unimportant, in good as in evil. There is no
better weapon against unhappiness; only we must not on that account
cross our hands, and do nothing.
Your womanish fault, my dear Julia, is, in evil times to abandon
yourself to Heaven and its assistance, as 'Deus ex machinâ,' with a
feeble and helpless sort of piety. For if this assistance fails us, our
ruin is then certain and inevitable.
Both, pious hope and energetic action, consist perfectly well together,
and indeed mutually aid each other. No man can doubt that the former
greatly lightens the latter: for if that sort of piety which is common
in the world,--that confident expectation of earthly and peculiar
protection from above, that supplication for good and against evil,--is
merely a self-delusion, still it is a beneficent one, and perhaps
grounded in our very nature, subject as we are to so many illusions,
which, when they take fast hold on our minds, become to us individual
truth. It appears that our nature has the power of creating to itself a
factitious reality, as a sort of auxiliary support, where reality itself
is unattainable. Thus a pious confidence in special interpositions,
though but a form of superstition, gives courage. A man who goes into
battle with a talisman which he believes renders him invulnerable, will
see bullets rain around him with indifference. But still more powerful
and exalting is the enthusiasm excited by ideas which place us above the
external world; thus religious fanatics have frequently been seen
animated by a spirit which enabled them to brave the most horrible
bodily tortures with truly miraculous power:--thus do the afflicted and
oppressed create to themselves blissful hopes of a future state of
felicity, which indemnify them even here. All these are effects of the
potent instinct of self-preservation in its widest sense,--which brings
the abovenamed power of our nature into operation wherever it is needed.
Hence, lastly, in feeble characters, those death-bed conversions,
useless indeed in themselves, but tranquillizing.
Every being must pay his tribute to this want in one form or other:
every one creates to himself his earthly god; and thus is the descent of
God to us under human attributes ever repeated.
The conception of the all-loving Father is certainly the noblest and
most beautiful of these images, nor can the human imagination rise
higher. And it must be conceded, that the mere idea of the Highest
Principle of all things, exalted, sublimated, and I might almost say,
evaporated, to the Incomprehensible, the Unutterable, no longer warms
the human heart, conscious of its own weakness, with the same fervent
emotion.
It often appears to me that all which is fashioned by nature or by man,
may be reduced to two primary elements, Love and Fear, which might be
called the Divine and the Earthly principles. All thoughts, feelings,
passions and actions arise from these: either from one, or from a
mixture of the two. Love is the divine cause of all things;--Fear seems
to be their earthly preserver. The words, 'Ye shall love God and fear
him,' must be so interpreted, or they have no meaning; for absolute and
unmixed love _cannot_ fear, because it is the absence of all
self-regarding thoughts and feelings; and indeed, if it truly inspired
us, would make us one with God and the universe; and we _have_ moments
in which we feel this.
When I use this notion as a standard or measure by which to try all
human actions, I find it constantly confirmed. Love fertilizes,--fear
preserves and destroys. In all nature, too, I see the principle of
self-preservation or fear, (it is one and the same,) in what we call,
according to our system of morals, crime or wickedness; that is, founded
on the annihilation of another's individuality. One race lives by the
destruction of another; life is fed by death, to all eternity of
reproduction and reappearance, which, precisely by this kind of unity,
continues in perpetual change.
It is also worthy of note, that this fear, although so indispensably
necessary to all of us for our earthly support and preservation, is even
here so little esteemed by our diviner part, that scarcely any possible
crime is covered with such deep contempt as cowardice.
On the other hand, nothing so effectually conquers fear, as a great and
lofty idea springing from the dominion of love. A man inspired by such a
feeling, even hurries along others with him; and whole nations devote
themselves under its influence, although nothing earthly can remain pure
from all admixture of the baser principle. Fear has reference to the
future in time and space: Love, to the present, eternally; and knows
neither time nor space. Love is endless and blessed--Fear dies an
eternal death.
_K---- Park, August 2nd._
On my return to Bangor, I made acquaintance with the possessor of ----
Castle, (the black Saxon castle which I described to you,) a man to whom
I am strongly attracted by our common building mania.
It is now seven years since the castle was begun, in which time
20,000_l._ have been spent upon it; and it will probably take four years
more to complete it. During all this time, this wealthy man lives with
his family in a humble hired cottage in the neighbourhood, with a small
establishment; he feasts once a week on the sight of his fairy castle,
which, after the long continuance of such simple habits, he will
probably never bring himself to inhabit. It appeared to give him great
pleasure to show and explain everything to me; and I experienced no less
from his enthusiasm, which was agreeable and becoming in a man otherwise
cold.
In compliance with an invitation which I had received in London, and
which had since been pressingly renewed, I came hither yesterday
morning. My road lay at first through fertile fields, between the lake
and the foot of the mountains; sometimes crossed by a sudden defile or
glen, and by rapid brooks hurrying to the sea. On Penman Mawr, the road,
which is blasted in the rock, contracts into a narrow and fearful pass,
the left side of which overhangs the sea at a perpendicular height of
five hundred feet. A most necessary parapet wall guards carriages. I sat
on the imperial, a place which I frequently take in fine weather, and
enjoyed the wide sea-view in full freedom: the wind meanwhile sighed and
whistled in every variety of tone, and I with difficulty kept my cloak
about me. In an hour I reached Conway, whose site is most beautiful.
Here stands the largest of those strong castles which Edward built, and
Cromwell demolished. It is likewise the most remarkable for the
picturesque beauty both of its position and structure.
The outer walls, though ruinous, are still standing, with all their
towers, to the number, it is said, of fifty-two. The whole town, a
strange, but not unpicturesque mixture of old and new, is contained
within the enclosure of these walls. A chain-bridge, with pillars in the
form of Gothic towers, has lately been thrown over the river Conway, on
whose banks the castle stands: it increases the grandeur and strangeness
of the scene. The surrounding country is magnificent: woody hills rise
opposite to the ruins, and behind them appears a yet higher range.
Numerous country-houses adorn the sides of the hills; among others a
most lovely villa, which is for sale, and bears the seducing name of
'Contentment.'
In the castle, the imposing remains of the banqueting-hall, with its two
enormous fire-places are still visible, as is also the king's chamber.
In the queen's closet there is an altar of beautiful workmanship, in
tolerably good preservation, and a splendid oriel window. The town also
contains very remarkable old buildings, with strange fantastic devices
in wood. One of these houses was built, as a tombstone in the church
testifies, in the fourteenth century, by a man named Hooke, the
forty-first son of his father--a rare instance in Christendom. A large
child in swaddling-clothes, carried by a stork, was carved in oak, and
occurred in various parts of the building.
Conway is a laudable place in a gastronomic point of view: it abounds
with a fish, the firm yet tender flesh of which is delicious. Its name
is Place,[119] as who should say, Place for me, who am the worthiest!
And truly I shall always be glad to give him the place of honour at my
table.
I quitted Conway early, driving across the chain-bridge, which serves as
a most noble 'point d'appui' to the ruined castle. The monstrous chains
lose themselves so romantically in the solid rock-like towers, that one
would scarcely be reminded of their newness, if there were not
unluckily a tollhouse on the other side, built exactly in the form of a
diminutive castle, and looking like a harlequin apeing the other.
The nearer you approach to St. Asaph, the softer the character of the
country becomes. In a semicircular bay, which the eye can scarcely
traverse, the tranquil sea washes fruitful fields and meadows, richly
studded with towns and villages. All the country gentlemen seem lovers
of the Gothic style of architecture. The taste is carried so far, that
even an inn by the road-side was provided with portcullis, loopholes and
battlements, though there was no garrison to defend it, except geese and
hens. Don Quixote might have been excused here; and the host would not
do amiss to hang out the knight of the sorrowful countenance, with
couched lance and brazen helmet, as his sign. At some distance I saw
what appeared to be a ridge of hills crowned with a Gothic castle:--it
had such a striking aspect that I was duped into dismounting and
climbing the toilsome ascent. It was at once ridiculous and vexatious to
find that the kernel of the jest was only a small and insignificant
house, and that which had attracted me were mere walls, which, built on
the summits and declivities of the mountain, represented towers, roofs,
and large battlements, half hidden in wood; but served, in fact, only to
enclose a kitchen and fruit garden. A lucky dog, a shopkeeper, who had
suddenly become rich, had built this harmless fortress, as I was told,
in two years--a perfect satire on the ruling taste.
Towards evening I arrived at the house of my worthy Colonel, a true
Englishman, in the best sense of the word. He and his amiable family
received me in the friendliest manner. Country gentlemen of his class,
who are in easy circumstances (with us they would be thought rich,) and
fill a respectable station in society; who are not eager and anxious
pursuers of fashion in London, but seek to win the affection of their
neighbours and tenants; whose hospitality is not mere ostentation; whose
manners are neither 'exclusive' nor outlandish; but who find their
dignity in a domestic life polished by education and adorned by
affluence, and in the observance of the strictest integrity;--such form
the most truly respectable class of Englishmen. In the great world of
London, indeed, they play an obscure part; but on the wide stage of
humanity, one of the most noble and elevated that can be allotted to
man. Unfortunately, however, the predominance and the arrogance of the
English aristocracy is so great, and that of fashion yet so much more
absolute and tyrannous, that such families, if my tribute of praise and
admiration were ever to fall under their eye, would probably feel less
flattered by it, than they would be if I enumerated them among the
leaders of 'ton.'
To what a pitch this weakness reaches, even amongst the worthiest people
in this country, is not to be believed without actual observation and
experience;--without seeing all classes of society affected by it in a
most ludicrous manner.--But I have written you enough on this subject
from the 'foyer' of European Aristocracy, and will not therefore repeat
myself. It is, moreover, high time to close this letter, otherwise I
fear my correspondence will be too long even for you; for though the
heart is never weary, the head puts in other claims.
But I know how much I may trust to your indulgence in this point.
Your ever truly devoted L.