do it no harm. But though you really are a very good girl, and as
good-natured as anybody can possibly be, remember, you have your faults,
like other people; and, if I were you, the next time I wanted to assert
anything energetically, I would assert it by 'my badness,' not 'my
goodness.'
KATHLEEN. Ah, now, it's too bad of you!
L. Well, then, I'll invoke, on occasion, my 'too-badness.' But you may
as well pick up the ruby, now you have dropped it; and look carefully at
the beautiful hexagonal lines which gleam on its surface; and here is a
pretty white sapphire (essentially the same stone as the ruby), in which
you will see the same lovely structure, like the threads of the finest
white cobweb. I do not know what is the exact method of a ruby's
construction; but you see by these lines, what fine construction there
_is_, even in this hardest of stones (after the diamond), which usually
appears as a massive lump or knot. There is therefore no real
mineralogical distinction between needle crystals and knotted crystals,
but, practically, crystallised masses throw themselves into one of the
three groups we have been examining to-day; and appear either as
Needles, as Folia, or as Knots; when they are in needles (or fibres),
they make the stones or rocks formed out of them '_fibrous_;' when they
are in folia, they make them '_foliated_;' when they are in knots (or
grains), '_granular_.' Fibrous rocks are comparatively rare, in mass;
but fibrous minerals are innumerable; and it is often a question which
really no one but a young lady could possibly settle, whether one should
call the fibres composing them 'threads' or 'needles.' Here is
amianthus, for instance, which is quite as fine and soft as any cotton
thread you ever sewed with; and here is sulphide of bismuth, with
sharper points and brighter lustre than your finest needles have; and
fastened in white webs of quartz more delicate than your finest lace;
and here is sulphide of antimony, which looks like mere purple wool, but
it is all of purple needle crystals; and here is red oxide of copper
(you must not breathe on it as you look, or you may blow some of the
films of it off the stone), which is simply a woven tissue of scarlet
silk. However, these finer thread forms are comparatively rare, while
the bolder and needle-like crystals occur constantly; so that, I
believe, 'Needle-crystal' is the best word (the grand one is 'Acicular
crystal,' but Sibyl will tell you it is all the same, only less easily
understood; and therefore more scientific). Then the Leaf-crystals, as I
said, form an immense mass of foliated rocks; and the Granular crystals,
which are of many kinds, form essentially granular, or granitic and
porphyritic rocks; and it is always a point of more interest to me (and
I think will ultimately be to you), to consider the causes which force a
given mineral to take any one of these three general forms, than what
the peculiar geometrical limitations are, belonging to its own
crystals.[150] It is more interesting to me, for instance, to try and
find out why the red oxide of copper, usually crystallising in cubes or
octahedrons, makes itself exquisitely, out of its cubes, into this red
silk in one particular Cornish mine, than what are the absolutely
necessary angles of the octahedron, which is its common form. At all
events, that mathematical part of crystallography is quite beyond girls'
strength; but these questions of the various tempers and manners of
crystals are not only comprehensible by you, but full of the most
curious teaching for you. For in the fulfilment, to the best of their
power, of their adopted form under given circumstances, there are
conditions entirely resembling those of human virtue; and indeed
expressible under no term so proper as that of the Virtue, or Courage of
crystals:--which, if you are not afraid of the crystals making you
ashamed of yourselves, we will try to get some notion of, to-morrow. But
it will be a bye-lecture, and more about yourselves than the minerals,
Don't come unless you like.
MARY. I'm sure the crystals will make us ashamed of ourselves; but we'll
come, for all that.
L. Meantime, look well and quietly over these needle, or thread
crystals, and those on the other two tables, with magnifying glasses,
and see what thoughts will come into your little heads about them. For
the best thoughts are generally those which come without being forced,
one does not know how. And so I hope you will get through your wet day
patiently.
FOOTNOTES:
[150] Note iv.
LECTURE V.
_CRYSTAL VIRTUES._
_A quiet talk, in the afternoon, by the sunniest window of
the Drawing-room. Present_, FLORRIE, ISABEL, MAY, LUCILLA,
KATHLEEN, DORA, MARY, _and some others, who have saved time
for the bye-Lecture._
L. So you have really come, like good girls, to be made ashamed of
yourselves?
DORA (_very meekly_). No, we needn't be made so; we always are.
L. Well, I believe that's truer than most pretty speeches: but you know,
you saucy girl, some people have more reason to be so than others. Are
you sure everybody is, as well as you?
THE GENERAL VOICE. Yes, yes; everybody.
L. What! Florrie ashamed of herself?
(FLORRIE _hides behind the curtain._)
L. And Isabel?
(ISABEL _hides under the table._)
L. And May?
(MAY _runs into the corner behind the piano._)
L. And Lucilla?
(LUCILLA _hides her face in her hands._)
L. Dear, dear; but this will never do. I shall have to tell you of the
faults of the crystals, instead of virtues, to put you in heart again.
MAY (_coming out of her corner_). Oh! have the crystals faults, like us?
L. Certainly, May. Their best virtues are shown in fighting their
faults. And some have a great many faults; and some are very naughty
crystals indeed.
FLORRIE (_from behind her curtain_). As naughty as me?
ISABEL (_peeping from under the table cloth_). Or me?
L. Well, I don't know. They never forget their syntax, children, when
once they've been taught it. But I think some of them are, on the whole,
worse than any of you. Not that it's amiable of you to look so radiant,
all in a minute, on that account.
DORA. Oh! but it's so much more comfortable.
(_Everybody seems to recover their spirits. Eclipse of_
FLORRIE _and_ ISABEL _terminates._)
L. What kindly creatures girls are, after all, to their neighbours'
failings! I think you may be ashamed of yourselves indeed, now,
children! I can tell you, you shall hear of the highest crystalline
merits that I can think of, to-day: and I wish there were more of them;
but crystals have a limited, though a stern, code of morals; and their
essential virtues are but two;--the first is to be pure, and the second
to be well shaped.
MARY. Pure! Does that mean clear--transparent?
L. No; unless in the case of a transparent substance. You cannot have a
transparent crystal of gold; but you may have a perfectly pure one.
ISABEL. But you said it was the shape that made things be crystals;
therefore, oughtn't their shape to be their first virtue, not their
second?
L. Right, you troublesome mousie. But I call their shape only their
second virtue, because it depends on time and accident, and things which
the crystal cannot help. If it is cooled too quickly, or shaken, it must
take what shape it can; but it seems as if, even then, it had in itself
the power of rejecting impurity, if it has crystalline life enough. Here
is a crystal of quartz, well enough shaped in its way; but it seems to
have been languid and sick at heart; and some white milky substance has
got into it, and mixed itself up with it, all through. It makes the
quartz quite yellow, if you hold it up to the light, and milky blue on
the surface. Here is another, broken into a thousand separate facets,
and out of all traceable shape; but as pure as a mountain spring. I like
this one best.
THE AUDIENCE. So do I--and I--and I.
MARY. Would a crystallographer?
L. I think so. He would find many more laws curiously exemplified in the
irregularly grouped but pure crystal. But it is a futile question, this
of first or second. Purity is in most cases a prior, if not a nobler,
virtue; at all events it is most convenient to think about it first.
MARY. But what ought we to think about it? Is there much to be
thought--I mean, much to puzzle one?
L. I don't know what you call 'much.' It is a long time since I met with
anything in which there was little. There's not much in this, perhaps.
The crystal must be either dirty or clean,--and there's an end. So it is
with one's hands, and with one's heart--only you can wash your hands
without changing them, but not hearts, nor crystals. On the whole, while
you are young, it will be as well to take care that your hearts don't
want much washing; for they may perhaps need wringing also, when they
do.
(_Audience doubtful and uncomfortable._ LUCILLA _at last
takes courage._)
LUCILLA. Oh! but surely, sir, we cannot make our hearts clean?
L. Not easily, Lucilla; so you had better keep them so when they are.
LUCILLA. When they are! But, sir--
L. Well?
LUCILLA. Sir--surely--are we not told that they are all evil?
L. Wait a little, Lucilla; that is difficult ground you are getting
upon; and we must keep to our crystals, till at least we understand what
_their_ good and evil consist in; they may help us afterwards to some
useful hints about our own. I said that their goodness consisted chiefly
in purity of substance, and perfectness of form: but those are rather
the _effects_ of their goodness, than the goodness itself. The inherent
virtues of the crystals, resulting in these outer conditions, might
really seem to be best described in the words we should use respecting
living creatures--'force of heart' and steadiness of purpose.' There
seem to be in some crystals, from the beginning, an unconquerable purity
of vital power, and strength of crystal spirit. Whatever dead substance,
unacceptant of this energy, comes in their way, is either rejected, or
forced to take some beautiful subordinate form; the purity of the
crystal remains unsullied, and every atom of it bright with coherent
energy. Then the second condition is, that from the beginning of its
whole structure, a fine crystal seems to have determined that it will be
of a certain size and of a certain shape; it persists in this plan, and
completes it. Here is a perfect crystal of quartz for you. It is of an
unusual form, and one which it might seem very difficult to build--a
pyramid with convex sides, composed of other minor pyramids. But there
is not a flaw in its contour throughout; not one of its myriads of
component sides but is as bright as a jeweller's facetted work (and far
finer, if you saw it close). The crystal points are as sharp as
javelins; their edges will cut glass with a touch. Anything more
resolute, consummate, determinate in form, cannot be conceived. Here, on
the other hand, is a crystal of the same substance, in a perfectly
simple type of form--a plain six-sided prism; but from its base to its
point,--and it is nine inches long,--it has never for one instant made
up its mind what thickness it will have. It seems to have begun by
making itself as thick as it thought possible with the quantity of
material at command. Still not being as thick as it would like to be, it
has clumsily glued on more substance at one of its sides. Then it has
thinned itself, in a panic of economy; then puffed itself out again;
then starved one side to enlarge another; then warped itself quite out
of its first line. Opaque, rough-surfaced, jagged on the edge, distorted
in the spine, it exhibits a quite human image of decrepitude and
dishonour; but the worst of all the signs of its decay and helplessness,
is that half-way up, a parasite crystal, smaller, but just as sickly,
has rooted itself in the side of the larger one, eating out a cavity
round its root, and then growing backwards, or downwards, contrary to
the direction of the main crystal. Yet I cannot trace the least
difference in purity of substance between the first most noble stone,
and this ignoble and dissolute one. The impurity of the last is in its
will, or want of will.
MARY. Oh, if we could but understand the meaning of it all!
L. We can understand all that is good for us. It is just as true for us,
as for the crystal, that the nobleness of life depends on its
consistency,--clearness of purpose,--quiet and ceaseless energy. All
doubt, and repenting, and botching, and retouching, and wondering what
it will be best to do next, are vice, as well as misery.
MARY (_much wondering_). But must not one repent when one does wrong,
and hesitate when one can't see one's way?
L. You have no business at all to do wrong; nor to get into any way that
you cannot see. Your intelligence should always be far in advance of
your act. Whenever you do not know what you are about, you are sure to
be doing wrong.
KATHLEEN. Oh, dear, but I never know what I am about!
L. Very true, Katie, but it is a great deal to know, if you know that.
And you find that you have done wrong afterwards; and perhaps some day
you may begin to know, or at least, think, what you are about.
ISABEL. But surely people can't do very wrong if they don't know, can
they? I mean, they can't be very naughty. They can be wrong, like
Kathleen or me, when we make mistakes; but not wrong in the dreadful
way. I can't express what I mean; but there are two sorts of wrong are
there not?
L. Yes, Isabel; but you will find that the great difference is between
kind and unkind wrongs, not between meant and unmeant wrong. Very few
people really mean to do wrong,--in a deep sense, none. They only don't
know what they are about. Cain did not mean to do wrong when he killed
Abel.
(ISABEL _draws a deep breath, and opens her eyes very
wide._)
L. No, Isabel; and there are countless Cains among us now, who kill
their brothers by the score a day, not only for less provocation than
Cain had, but for _no_ provocation,--and merely for what they can make
of their bones,--yet do not think they are doing wrong in the least.
Then sometimes you have the business reversed, as over in America these
last years, where you have seen Abel resolutely killing Cain, and not
thinking he is doing wrong. The great difficulty is always to open
people's eyes: to touch their feelings, and break their hearts, is easy;
the difficult thing is to break their heads. What does it matter, as
long as they remain stupid, whether you change their feelings or not?
You cannot be always at their elbow to tell them what is right: and they
may just do as wrong as before, or worse; and their best intentions
merely make the road smooth for them,--you know where, children. For it
is not the place itself that is paved with them, as people say so often.
You can't pave the bottomless pit; but you may the road to it.
MAY. Well, but if people do as well as they can see how, surely that is
the right for them, isn't it?
L. No, May, not a bit of it; right is right, and wrong is wrong. It is
only the fool who does wrong, and says he 'did it for the best.' And if
there's one sort of person in the world that the Bible speaks harder of
than another, it is fools. Their particular and chief way of saying
'There is no God' is this, of declaring that whatever their 'public
opinion' may be, is right: and that God's opinion is of no consequence.
MAY. But surely nobody can always know what is right?
L. Yes, you always can, for to-day; and if you do what you see of it
to-day, you will see more of it, and more clearly, to-morrow. Here, for
instance, you children are at school, and have to learn French, and
arithmetic, and music, and several other such things. That is your
'right' for the present; the 'right' for us, your teachers, is to see
that you learn as much as you can, without spoiling your dinner, your
sleep, or your play; and that what you do learn, you learn well. You all
know when you learn with a will, and when you dawdle. There's no doubt
of conscience about that, I suppose?
VIOLET. No; but if one wants to read an amusing book, instead of
learning one's lesson?
L. You don't call that a 'question,' seriously, Violet? You are then
merely deciding whether you will resolutely do wrong or not.
MARY. But, in after life, how many fearful difficulties may arise,
however one tries to know or to do what is right!
L. You are much too sensible a girl, Mary, to have felt that, whatever
you may have seen. A great many of young ladies' difficulties arise from
their falling in love with a wrong person: but they have no business to
let themselves fall in love, till they know he is the right one.
DORA. How many thousands ought he to have a year?
L. (_disdaining reply_). There are, of course, certain crises of fortune
when one has to take care of oneself, and mind shrewdly what one is
about. There is never any real doubt about the path, but you may have to
walk very slowly.
MARY. And if one is forced to do a wrong thing by some one who has
authority over you?
L. My dear, no one can be forced to do a wrong thing, for the guilt is
in the will: but you may any day be forced to do a fatal thing, as you
might be forced to take poison; the remarkable law of nature in such
cases being, that it is always unfortunate _you_ who are poisoned, and
not the person who gives you the dose. It is a very strange law, but it
_is_ a law. Nature merely sees to the carrying out of the normal
operation of arsenic. She never troubles herself to ask who gave it you.
So also you may be starved to death, morally as well as physically, by
other people's faults. You are, on the whole, very good children sitting
here to-day;--do you think that your goodness comes all by your own
contriving? or that you are gentle and kind because your dispositions
are naturally more angelic than those of the poor girls who are playing,
with wild eyes, on the dustheaps in the alleys of our great towns; and
who will one day fill their prisons,--or, better, their graves? Heaven
only knows where they, and we who have cast them there, shall stand at
last. But the main judgment question will be, I suppose, for all of us,
'Did you keep a good heart through it?' What you were, others may answer
for;--what you tried to be, you must answer for, yourself. Was the heart
pure and true--tell us that?
And so we come back to your sorrowful question, Lucilla, which I put
aside a little ago. You would be afraid to answer that your heart _was_
pure and true, would not you?
LUCILLA. Yes, indeed, sir.
L. Because you have been taught that it is all evil--'only evil
continually.' Somehow, often as people say that, they never seem, to me,
to believe it? Do you really believe it?
LUCILLA. Yes, sir; I hope so.
L. That you have an entirely bad heart?
LUCILLA (_a little uncomfortable at the substitution of the monosyllable
for the dissyllable, nevertheless persisting in her orthodoxy_). Yes,
sir.
L. Florrie, I am sure you are tired; I never like you to stay when you
are tired; but, you know, you must not play with the kitten while we're
talking.
FLORRIE. Oh! but I'm not tired; and I'm only nursing her. She'll be
asleep in my lap directly.
L. Stop! that puts me in mind of something I had to show you, about
minerals that are like hair. I want a hair out of Tittie's tail.
FLORRIE (_quite rude, in her surprise, even to the point of repeating
expressions_). Out of Tittie's tail!
L. Yes; a brown one: Lucilla, you can get at the tip of it nicely, under
Florrie's arm; just pull one out for me.
LUCILLA. Oh! but, sir, it will hurt her so!
L. Never mind; she can't scratch you while Florrie is holding her. Now
that I think of it, you had better pull out two.
LUCILLA. But then she may scratch Florrie! and it will hurt her so, sir!
if you only want brown hairs, wouldn't two of mine do?
L. Would you really rather pull out your own than Tittie's?
LUCILLA. Oh, of course, if mine will do.
L. But that's very wicked, Lucilla!
LUCILLA. Wicked, sir?
L. Yes; if your heart was not so bad, you would much rather pull all the
cat's hairs out, than one of your own.
LUCILLA. Oh! but sir, I didn't mean bad, like that.
L. I believe, if the truth were told, Lucilla, you would like to tie a
kettle to Tittie's tail, and hunt her round the playground.
LUCILLA. Indeed, I should not, sir.
L. That's not true, Lucilla; you know it cannot be.
LUCILLA. Sir?
L. Certainly it is not;--how can you possibly speak any truth out of
such a heart as you have? It is wholly deceitful.
LUCILLA. Oh! no, no; I don't mean that way; I don't mean that it makes
me tell lies, quite out.
L. Only that it tells lies within you?
LUCILLA. Yes.
L. Then, outside of it, you know what is true, and say so; and I may
trust the outside of your heart; but within, it is all foul and false.
Is that the way?
LUCILLA. I suppose so: I don't understand it, quite.
L. There is no occasion for understanding it; but do you feel it? Are
you sure that your heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately
wicked?
LUCILLA (_much relieved by finding herself among phrases with which she
is acquainted_). Yes, sir. I'm sure of that.
L. (_pensively_). I'm sorry for it, Lucilla.
LUCILLA. So am I, indeed.
L. What are you sorry with, Lucilla?
LUCILLA. Sorry with, sir?
L. Yes; I mean, where do you feel sorry? in your feet?
LUCILLA (_laughing a little_). No, sir, of course.
L. In your shoulders, then?
LUCILLA. No, sir.
L. You are sure of that? Because, I fear, sorrow in the shoulders would
not be worth much.
LUCILLA. I suppose I feel it in my heart, if I really am sorry.
L. If you really are! Do you mean to say that you are sure you are
utterly wicked, and yet do not care?
LUCILLA. No, indeed; I have cried about it often.
L. Well, then, you are sorry in your heart?
LUCILLA. Yes, when the sorrow is worth anything.
L. Even if it be not, it cannot be anywhere else but there. It is not
the crystalline lens of your eyes which is sorry, when you cry?
LUCILLA. No, sir, of course.
L. Then, have you two hearts; one of which is wicked, and the other
grieved? or is one side of it sorry for the other side?
LUCILLA (_weary of cross-examination, and a little vexed_). Indeed, sir,
you know I can't understand it; but you know how it is written--'another
law in my members, warring against the law of my mind.'
L. Yes, Lucilla, I know how it is written; but I do not see that it will
help us to know that, if we neither understand what is written, nor feel
it. And you will not get nearer to the meaning of one verse, if, as soon
as you are puzzled by it, you escape to another, introducing three new
words--'law,' 'members,' and 'mind'; not one of which you at present
know the meaning of; and respecting which, you probably never will be
much wiser; since men like Montesquieu and Locke have spent great part
of their lives in endeavouring to explain two of them.
LUCILLA. Oh! please, sir, ask somebody else.
L. If I thought anyone else could answer better than you, Lucilla, I
would; but suppose I try, instead, myself, to explain your feelings to
you?
LUCILLA. Oh, yes; please do.
L. Mind, I say your 'feelings,' not your 'belief.' For I cannot
undertake to explain anybody's beliefs. Still I must try a little,
first, to explain the belief also, because I want to draw it to some
issue. As far as I understand what you say, or any one else, taught as
you have been taught, says, on this matter,--you think that there is an
external goodness, a whited-sepulchre kind of goodness, which appears
beautiful outwardly, but is within full of uncleanness: a deep secret
guilt, of which we ourselves are not sensible; and which can only be
seen by the Maker of us all. (_Approving murmurs from audience._)
L. Is it not so with the body as well as the soul?
(_Looked notes of interrogation._)
L. A skull, for instance, is not a beautiful thing?
(_Grave faces, signifying 'Certainly not,' and 'What
next?'_)
L. And if you all could see in each other, with clear eyes, whatever God
sees beneath those fair faces of yours, you would not like it?
(_Murmured 'No's.'_)
L. Nor would it be good for you?
(_Silence._)
L. The probability being that what God does not allow you to see, He
does not wish you to see; nor even to think of?
(_Silence prolonged._)
L. It would not at all be good for you, for instance, whenever you were
washing your faces, and braiding your hair, to be thinking of the shapes
of the jawbones, and of the cartilage of the nose, and of the jagged
sutures of the scalp?
(_Resolutely whispered No's._)
L. Still less, to see through a clear glass the daily processes of
nourishment and decay?
(_No._)
L. Still less if instead of merely inferior and preparatory conditions
of structure, as in the skeleton,--or inferior offices of structure, as
in operations of life and death,--there were actual disease in the body;
ghastly and dreadful. You would try to cure it; but having taken such
measures as were necessary, you would not think the cure likely to be
promoted by perpetually watching the wounds, or thinking of them. On the
contrary, you would be thankful for every moment of forgetfulness: as,
in daily health, you must be thankful that your Maker has veiled
whatever is fearful in your frame under a sweet and manifest beauty; and
has made it your duty, and your only safety, to rejoice in that, both in
yourself and in others:--not indeed concealing, or refusing to believe
in sickness, if it come; but never dwelling on it.
Now, your wisdom and duty touching soul-sickness are just the same.
Ascertain clearly what is wrong with you; and so far as you know any
means of mending it, take those means, and have done: when you are
examining yourself, never call yourself merely a 'sinner,' that is very
cheap abuse; and utterly useless. You may even get to like it, and be
proud of it. But call yourself a liar, a coward, a sluggard, a glutton,
or an evil-eyed jealous wretch, if you indeed find yourself to be in any
wise any of these. Take steady means to check yourself in whatever fault
you have ascertained, and justly accused yourself of. And as soon as you
are in active way of mending, you will be no more inclined to moan over
an undefined corruption. For the rest, you will find it less easy to
uproot faults, than to choke them by gaining virtues. Do not think of
your faults; still less of others' faults: in every person who comes
near you, look for what is good and strong: honour that; rejoice in it;
and, as you can, try to imitate it: and your faults will drop off, like
dead leaves, when their time comes. If, on looking back, your whole life
should seem rugged as a palm tree stem; still, never mind, so long as it
has been growing; and has its grand green shade of leaves, and weight of
honied fruit, at top. And even if you cannot find much good in yourself
at last, think that it does not much matter to the universe either what
you were, or are; think how many people are noble, if you cannot be; and
rejoice in _their_ nobleness. An immense quantity of modern confession
of sin, even when honest, is merely a sickly egotism; which will rather
gloat over its own evil, than lose the centralisation of its interest in
itself.
MARY. But then, if we ought to forget ourselves so much, how did the old
Greek proverb 'Know thyself' come to be so highly esteemed?
L. My dear, it is the proverb of proverbs; Apollo's proverb, and the
sun's;--but do you think you can know yourself by looking _into_
yourself? Never. You can know what you are, only by looking _out_ of
yourself. Measure your own powers with those of others; compare your own
interests with those of others; try to understand what you appear to
them, as well as what they appear to you; and judge of yourselves, in
all things, relatively and subordinately; not positively: starting
always with a wholesome conviction of the probability that there is
nothing particular about you. For instance, some of you perhaps think
you can write poetry. Dwell on your own feelings and doings:--and you
will soon think yourselves Tenth Muses; but forget your own feelings;
and try, instead, to understand a line or two of Chaucer or Dante: and
you will soon begin to feel yourselves very foolish girls--which is much
like the fact.
So, something which befalls you may seem a great misfortune;--you
meditate over its effects on you personally; and begin to think that it
is a chastisement, or a warning, or a this or that or the other of
profound significance; and that all the angels in heaven have left their
business for a little while, that they may watch its effects on your
mind. But give up this egotistic indulgence of your fancy; examine a
little what misfortunes, greater a thousandfold, are happening, every
second, to twenty times worthier persons: and your self-consciousness
will change into pity and humility; and you will know yourself, so far
as to understand that 'there hath nothing taken thee but what is common
to man.'
Now, Lucilla, these are the practical conclusions which any person of
sense would arrive at, supposing the texts which relate to the inner
evil of the heart were as many, and as prominent, as they are often
supposed to be by careless readers. But the way in which common people
read their Bibles is just like the way that the old monks thought
hedgehogs ate grapes. They rolled themselves (it was said), over and
over, where the grapes lay on the ground. What fruit stuck to their
spines, they carried off, and ate. So your hedgehoggy readers roll
themselves over and over their Bibles, and declare that whatever sticks
to their own spines is Scripture; and that nothing else is. But you can
only get the skins of the texts that way. If you want their juice, you
must press them in cluster. Now, the clustered texts about the human
heart, insist, as a body, not on any inherent corruption in all hearts,
but on the terrific distinction between the bad and the good ones. 'A
good man, out of the good treasure of his heart, bringeth forth that
which is good; and an evil man, out of the evil treasure, bringeth
forth that which is evil.' 'They on the rock are they which, in an
honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it.' 'Delight thyself
in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.' 'The
wicked have bent their bow, that they may privily shoot at him that is
upright in heart.' And so on; they are countless, to the same effect.
And, for all of us, the question is not at all to ascertain how much or
how little corruption there is in human nature; but to ascertain
whether, out of all the mass of that nature, we are of the sheep or the
goat breed; whether we are people of upright heart, being shot at, or
people of crooked heart, shooting. And, of all the texts bearing on the
subject, this, which is a quite simple and practical order, is the one
you have chiefly to hold in mind. 'Keep thy heart with all diligence,
for out of it are the issues of life.'
LUCILLA. And yet, how inconsistent the texts seem!
L. Nonsense, Lucilla! do you think the universe is bound to look
consistent to a girl of fifteen? Look up at your own room window;--you
can just see it from where you sit. I'm glad that it is left open, as it
ought to be, in so fine a day. But do you see what a black spot it
looks, in the sunlighted wall?
LUCILLA. Yes, it looks as black as ink.
L. Yet you know it is a very bright room when you are inside of it;
quite as bright as there is any occasion for it to be, that its little
lady may see to keep it tidy. Well, it is very probable, also, that if
you could look into your heart from the sun's point of view, it might
appear a very black hole indeed; nay, the sun may sometimes think good
to tell you that it looks so to Him; but He will come into it, and make
it very cheerful for you, for all that, if you don't put the shutters
up. And the one question for _you_, remember, is not 'dark or light?'
but 'tidy or untidy?' Look well to your sweeping and garnishing; and be
sure it is only the banished spirit, or some of the seven wickeder ones
at his back, who will still whisper to you that it is all black.
LECTURE VI.
_CRYSTAL QUARRELS._
_Full conclave, in Schoolroom. There has been a game at
crystallisation in the morning, of which various account has
to be rendered. In particular, everybody has to explain why
they were always where they were not intended to be._
L. (_having received and considered the report_). You have got on pretty
well, children: but you know these were easy figures you have been
trying. Wait till I have drawn you out the plans of some crystals of
snow!
MARY. I don't think those will be the most difficult:--they are so
beautiful that we shall remember our places better; and then they are
all regular, and in stars: it is those twisty oblique ones we are afraid
of.
L. Read Carlyle's account of the battle of Leuthen, and learn
Freidrich's 'oblique order.' You will 'get it done for once, I think,
provided you _can_ march as a pair of compasses would.' But remember,
when you can construct the most difficult single figures, you have only
learned half the game--nothing so much as the half, indeed, as the
crystals themselves play it.
MARY. Indeed; what else is there?
L. It is seldom that any mineral crystallises alone. Usually two or
three, under quite different crystalline laws, form together. They do
this absolutely without flaw or fault, when they are in fine temper: and
observe what this signifies. It signifies that the two, or more,
minerals of different natures agree, somehow, between themselves, how
much space each will want;--agree which of them shall give away to the
other at their junction; or in what measure each will accommodate itself
to the other's shape! And then each takes its permitted shape, and
allotted share of space; yielding, or being yielded to, as it builds,
till each crystal has fitted itself perfectly and gracefully to its
differently-natured neighbour. So that, in order to practise this, in
even the simplest terms, you must divide into two parties, wearing
different colours; each must choose a different figure to construct; and
you must form one of these figures through the other, both going on at
the same time.
MARY. I think _we_ may, perhaps, manage it; but I cannot at all
understand how the crystals do. It seems to imply so much preconcerting
of plan, and so much giving way to each other, as if they really were
living.
L. Yes, it implies both concurrence and compromise, regulating all
wilfulness of design: and, more curious still, the crystals do _not_
always give way to each other. They show exactly the same varieties of
temper that human creatures might. Sometimes they yield the required
place with perfect grace and courtesy; forming fantastic, but
exquisitely finished groups: and sometimes they will not yield at all;
but fight furiously for their places, losing all shape and honour, and
even their own likeness, in the contest.
MARY. But is not that wholly wonderful? How is it that one never sees it
spoken of in books?
L. The scientific men are all busy in determining the constant laws
under which the struggle takes place; these indefinite humours of the
elements are of no interest to them. And unscientific people rarely give
themselves the trouble of thinking at all when they look at stones. Not
that it is of much use to think; the more one thinks, the more one is
puzzled.
MARY. Surely it is more wonderful than anything in botany?
L. Everything has its own wonders; but, given the nature of the plant,
it is easier to understand what a flower will do, and why it does it,
than, given anything we as yet know of stone-nature, to understand what
a crystal will do, and why it does it. You at once admit a kind of
volition and choice, in the flower, but we are not accustomed to
attribute anything of the kind to the crystal. Yet there is, in reality,
more likeness to some conditions of human feeling among stones than
among plants. There is a far greater difference between kindly-tempered
and ill-tempered crystals of the same mineral, than between any two
specimens of the same flower: and the friendships and wars of crystals
depend more definitely and curiously on their varieties of disposition,
than any associations of flowers. Here, for instance, is a good garnet,
living with good mica; one rich red, and the other silver white: the
mica leaves exactly room enough for the garnet to crystallise
comfortably in; and the garnet lives happily in its little white house;
fitted to it, like a pholas in its cell. But here are wicked garnets
living with wicked mica. See what ruin they make of each other! You
cannot tell which is which; the garnets look like dull red stains on the
crumbling stone. By the way, I never could understand, if St. Gothard is
a real saint, why he can't keep his garnets in better order. These are
all under his care; but I suppose there are too many of them for him to
look after. The streets of Airolo are paved with them.
MAY. Paved with garnets?
L. With mica-slate and garnets; I broke this bit out of a paving stone.
Now garnets and mica are natural friends, and generally fond of each
other; but you see how they quarrel when they are ill brought up. So it
is always. Good crystals are friendly with almost all other good
crystals, however little they chance to see of each other, or however
opposite their habits may be; while wicked crystals quarrel with one
another, though they may be exactly alike in habits, and see each other
continually. And of course the wicked crystals quarrel with the good
ones.
ISABEL. Then do the good ones get angry?
L. No, never: they attend to their own work and life; and live it as
well as they can, though they are always the sufferers. Here, for
instance, is a rock-crystal of the purest race and finest temper, who
was born, unhappily for him, in a bad neighbourhood, near Beaufort in
Savoy; and he has had to fight with vile calcareous mud all his life.
See here, when he was but a child, it came down on him, and nearly
buried him; a weaker crystal would have died in despair; but he only
gathered himself together, like Hercules against the serpents, and threw
a layer of crystal over the clay; conquered it,--imprisoned it,--and
lived on. Then, when he was a little older, came more clay; and poured
itself upon him here, at the side; and he has laid crystal over that,
and lived on, in his purity. Then the clay came on at his angles, and
tried to cover them, and round them away; but upon that he threw out
buttress-crystals at his angles, all as true to his own central line as
chapels round a cathedral apse; and clustered them round the clay; and
conquered it again. At last the clay came on at his summit, and tried to
blunt his summit; but he could not endure that for an instant; and left
his flanks all rough, but pure; and fought the clay at his crest, and
built crest over crest, and peak over peak, till the clay surrendered at
last; and here is his summit, smooth and pure, terminating a pyramid of
alternate clay and crystal, half a foot high!
LILY. Oh, how nice of him! What a dear, brave crystal! But I can't bear
to see his flanks all broken, and the clay within them.
L. Yes; it was an evil chance for him, the being born to such
contention; there are some enemies so base that even to hold them
captive is a kind of dishonour. But look, here has been quite a
different kind of struggle: the adverse power has been more orderly, and
has fought the pure crystal in ranks as firm as its own. This is not
mere rage and impediment of crowded evil: here is a disciplined
hostility; army against army.
LILY. Oh, but this is much more beautiful!
L. Yes, for both the elements have true virtue in them; it is a pity
they are at war, but they war grandly.
MARY. But is this the same clay as in the other crystal?
L. I used the word clay for shortness. In both, the enemy is really
limestone; but in the first, disordered, and mixed with true clay;
while, here, it is nearly pure, and crystallises into its own primitive
form, the oblique six-sided one, which you know: and out of these it
makes regiments; and then squares of the regiments, and so charges the
rock crystal literally in square against column.
ISABEL. Please, please, let me see. And what does the rock crystal do?
L. The rock crystal seems able to do nothing. The calcite cuts it
through at every charge. Look here,--and here! The loveliest crystal in
the whole group is hewn fairly into two pieces.
ISABEL. Oh, dear; but is the calcite harder than the crystal then?
L. No, softer. Very much softer.
MARY. But then, how can it possibly cut the crystal?
L. It did not really cut it, though it passes through it. The two were
formed together, as I told you; but no one knows how. Still, it is
strange that this hard quartz has in all cases a good-natured way with
it, of yielding to everything else. All sorts of soft things make nests
for themselves in it; and it never makes a nest for itself in anything.
It has all the rough outside work; and every sort of cowardly and weak
mineral can shelter itself within it. Look; these are hexagonal plates
of mica; if they were outside of this crystal they would break, like
burnt paper; but they are inside of it,--nothing can hurt them,--the
crystal has taken them into its very heart, keeping all their delicate
edges as sharp as if they were under water, instead of bathed in rock.
Here is a piece of branched silver: you can bend it with a touch of your
finger, but the stamp of its every fibre is on the rock in which it lay,
as if the quartz had been as soft as wool.
LILY. Oh, the good, good quartz! But does it never get inside of
anything?
L. As it is a little Irish girl who asks, I may perhaps answer, without
being laughed at, that it gets inside of itself sometimes. But I don't
remember seeing quartz make a nest for itself in anything else.
ISABEL. Please, there was something I heard you talking about, last
term, with Miss Mary. I was at my lessons, but I heard something about
nests; and I thought it was birds' nests; and I couldn't help
listening; and then, I remember, it was about 'nests of quartz in
granite.' I remember, because I was so disappointed!
L. Yes, mousie, you remember quite rightly; but I can't tell you about
those nests to-day, nor perhaps to-morrow: but there's no contradiction
between my saying then, and now; I will show you that there is not, some
day. Will you trust me meanwhile?
ISABEL. Won't I!
L. Well, then, look, lastly, at this piece of courtesy in quartz; it is
on a small scale, but wonderfully pretty. Here is nobly born quartz
living with a green mineral, called epidote; and they are immense
friends. Now, you see, a comparatively large and strong quartz-crystal,
and a very weak and slender little one of epidote, have begun to grow,
close by each other, and sloping unluckily towards each other, so that
they at last meet. They cannot go on growing together; the quartz
crystal is five times as thick, and more than twenty times as
strong,[151] as the epidote; but he stops at once, just in the very
crowning moment of his life, when he is building his own summit! He lets
the pale little film of epidote grow right past him; stopping his own
summit for it; and he never himself grows any more.
LILY (_after some silence of wonder_). But is the quartz _never_ wicked
then?
L. Yes, but the wickedest quartz seems good-natured, compared to other
things. Here are two very characteristic examples; one is good quartz,
living with good pearlspar, and the other, wicked quartz, living with
wicked pearlspar. In both, the quartz yields to the soft carbonate of
iron: but, in the first place, the iron takes only what it needs of
room; and is inserted into the planes of the rock crystal with such
precision, that you must break it away before you can tell whether it
really penetrates the quartz or not; while the crystals of iron are
perfectly formed, and have a lovely bloom on their surface besides. But
here, when the two minerals quarrel, the unhappy quartz has all its
surfaces jagged and torn to pieces; and there is not a single iron
crystal whose shape you can completely trace. But the quartz has the
worst of it, in both instances.
VIOLET. Might we look at that piece of broken quartz again, with the
weak little film across it? it seems such a strange lovely thing, like
the self-sacrifice of a human being.
L. The self-sacrifice of a human being is not a lovely thing, Violet. It
is often a necessary and noble thing; but no form nor degree of suicide
can be ever lovely.
VIOLET. But self-sacrifice is not suicide!
L. What is it then?
VIOLET. Giving up one's self for another.
L. Well; and what do you mean by 'giving up one's self?'
VIOLET. Giving up one's tastes, one's feelings, one's time, one's
happiness, and so on, to make others happy.
L. I hope you will never marry anybody, Violet, who expects you to make
him happy in that way.
VIOLET (_hesitating_). In what way?
L. By giving up your tastes, and sacrificing your feelings, and
happiness.
VIOLET. No, no, I don't mean that; but you know, for other people, one
must.
L. For people who don't love you, and whom you know nothing about? Be it
so; but how does this 'giving up' differ from suicide then?
VIOLET. Why, giving up one's pleasures is not killing one's self?
L. Giving up wrong pleasure is not; neither is it self-sacrifice, but
self-culture. But giving up right pleasure is. If you surrender the
pleasure of walking, your foot will wither; you may as well cut it off:
if you surrender the pleasure of seeing, your eyes will soon be unable
to bear the light; you may as well pluck them out. And to maim yourself
is partly to kill yourself. Do but go on maiming, and you will soon
slay.
VIOLET. But why do you make me think of that verse then about the foot
and the eye?
L. You are indeed commanded to cut off and to pluck out, if foot or eye
offend you; but why _should_ they offend you?
VIOLET. I don't know; I never quite understood that.
L. Yet it is a sharp order; one needing to be well understood if it is
to be well obeyed! When Helen sprained her ancle the other day, you saw
how strongly it had to be bandaged: that is to say, prevented from all
work, to recover it. But the bandage was not 'lovely.'
VIOLET. No, indeed.
L. And if her foot had been crushed, or diseased, or snake-bitten,
instead of sprained, it might have been needful to cut it off. But the
amputation would not have been 'lovely.'
VIOLET. No.
L. Well, if eye and foot are dead already, and betray you--if the light
that is in you be darkness, and your feet run into mischief, or are
taken in the snare,--it is indeed time to pluck out, and cut off, I
think: but, so crippled, you can never be what you might have been
otherwise. You enter into life, at best, halt or maimed; and the
sacrifice is not beautiful, though necessary.
VIOLET (_after a pause_). But when one sacrifices one's self for others?
L. Why not rather others for you?
VIOLET. Oh! but I couldn't bear that.
L. Then why should they bear it?
DORA (_bursting in, indignant_). And Thermopylae, and Protesilaus, and
Marcus Curtius, and Arnold de Winkelried, and Iphigenia, and Jephthah's
daughter?
L. (_sustaining the indignation unmoved_). And the Samaritan woman's
son?
DORA. Which Samaritan woman's?
L. Read 2 Kings vi. 29.
DORA (_obeys_). How horrid! As if we meant anything like that!
L. You don't seem to me to know in the least what you do mean, children.
What practical difference is there between 'that,' and what you are
talking about? The Samaritan children had no voice of their own in the
business, it is true; but neither had Iphigenia: the Greek girl was
certainly neither boiled, nor eaten; but that only makes a difference in
the dramatic effect; not in the principle.
DORA (_biting her lip_). Well, then, tell us what we ought to mean. As
if you didn't teach it all to us, and mean it yourself, at this moment,
more than we do, if you wouldn't be tiresome!
L. I mean, and have always meant, simply this, Dora;--that the will of
God respecting us is that we shall live by each other's happiness, and
life; not by each other's misery, or death. I made you read that verse
which so shocked you just now, because the relations of parent and child
are typical of all beautiful human help. A child may have to die for its
parents; but the purpose of Heaven is that it shall rather live for
them;--that, not by its sacrifice, but by its strength, its joy, its
force of being, it shall be to them renewal of strength; and as the
arrow in the hand of the giant. So it is in all other right relations.
Men help each other by their joy, not by their sorrow. They are not
intended to slay themselves for each other, but to strengthen themselves
for each other. And among the many apparently beautiful things which
turn, through mistaken use, to utter evil, I am not sure but that the
thoughtlessly meek and self-sacrificing spirit of good men must be named
as one of the fatallest. They have so often been taught that there is a
virtue in mere suffering, as such; and foolishly to hope that good may
be brought by Heaven out of all on which Heaven itself has set the stamp
of evil, that we may avoid it,--that they accept pain and defeat as if
these were their appointed portion; never understanding that their
defeat is not the less to be mourned because it is more fatal to their
enemies than to them. The one thing that a good man has to do, and to
see done, is justice; he is neither to slay himself nor others
causelessly: so far from denying himself, since he is pleased by good,
he is to do his utmost to get his pleasure accomplished. And I only wish
there were strength, fidelity, and sense enough, among the good
Englishmen of this day, to render it possible for them to band together
in a vowed brotherhood, to enforce, by strength of heart and hand, the
doing of human justice among all who came within their sphere. And
finally, for your own teaching, observe, although there may be need for
much self-sacrifice and self-denial in the correction of faults of
character, the moment the character is formed, the self-denial ceases.
Nothing is really well done, which it costs you pain to do.
VIOLET. But surely, sir, you are always pleased with us when we try to
please others, and not ourselves?
L. My dear child, in the daily course and discipline of right life, we
must continually and reciprocally submit and surrender in all kind and
courteous and affectionate ways: and these submissions and ministries to
each other, of which you all know (none better) the practice and the
preciousness, are as good for the yielder as the receiver: they
strengthen and perfect as much as they soften and refine. But the real
sacrifice of all our strength, or life, or happiness to others (though
it may be needed, and though all brave creatures hold their lives in
their hand, to be given, when such need comes, as frankly as a soldier
gives his life in battle), is yet always a mournful and momentary
necessity; not the fulfilment of the continuous law of being.
Self-sacrifice which is sought after, and triumphed in, is usually
foolish; and calamitous in its issue: and by the sentimental
proclamation and pursuit of it, good people have not only made most of
their own lives useless, but the whole framework of their religion so
hollow, that at this moment, while the English nation, with its lips,
pretends to teach every man to 'love his neighbour as himself,' with its
hands and feet it clutches and tramples like a wild beast; and
practically lives, every soul of it that can, on other people's labour.
Briefly, the constant duty of every man to his fellows is to ascertain
his own powers and special gifts; and to strengthen them for the help of
others. Do you think Titian would have helped the world better by
denying himself, and not painting; or Casella by denying himself, and
not singing? The real virtue is to be ready to sing the moment people
ask us; as he was, even in purgatory. The very word 'virtue' means not
'conduct' but 'strength,' vital energy in the heart. Were not you
reading about that group of words beginning with V,--vital, virtuous,
vigorous, and so on,--in Max Muller, the other day, Sibyl? Can't you
tell the others about it?
SIBYL. No, I can't; will you tell us, please?
L. Not now, it is too late. Come to me some idle time to-morrow, and
I'll tell you about it, if all's well. But the gist of it is, children,
that you should at least know two Latin words; recollect that 'mors'
means death and delaying; and 'vita' means life and growing: and try
always, not to mortify yourselves, but to vivify yourselves.
VIOLET. But, then, are we not to mortify our earthly affections? and
surely we are to sacrifice ourselves, at least in God's service, if not
in man's?
L. Really, Violet, we are getting too serious. I've given you enough
ethics for one talk, I think! Do let us have a little play. Lily, what
were you so busy about, at the ant-hill in the wood, this morning?
LILY. Oh, it was the ants who were busy, not I; I was only trying to
help them a little.
L. And they wouldn't be helped, I suppose?
LILY. No, indeed. I can't think why ants are always so tiresome, when
one tries to help them! They were carrying bits of stick, as fast as
they could, through a piece of grass; and pulling and pushing, _so_
hard; and tumbling over and over,--it made one quite pity them; so I
took some of the bits of stick, and carried them forward a little, where
I thought they wanted to put them; but instead of being pleased, they
left them directly, and ran about looking quite angry and frightened;
and at last ever so many of them got up my sleeves, and bit me all over,
and I had to come away.
L. I couldn't think what you were about. I saw your French grammar lying
on the grass behind you, and thought perhaps you had gone to ask the
ants to hear you a French verb.
ISABEL. Ah! but you didn't, though!
L. Why not, Isabel? I knew, well enough, Lily couldn't learn that verb
by herself.
ISABEL. No; but the ants couldn't help her.
L. Are you sure the ants could not have helped you, Lily?
LILY (_thinking_). I ought to have learned something from them, perhaps.
L. But none of them left their sticks to help you through the irregular
verb?
LILY. No, indeed. (_Laughing, with some others._)
L. What are you laughing at, children? I cannot see why the ants should
not have left their tasks to help Lily in her's,--since here is Violet
thinking she ought to leave _her_ tasks, to help God in His. Perhaps,
however, she takes Lily's more modest view, and thinks only that 'He
ought to learn something from her.'
(_Tears in_ VIOLET'S _eyes._)
DORA (_scarlet_). It's too bad--it's a shame:--poor Violet!
L. My dear children, there's no reason why one should be so red, and the
other so pale, merely because you are made for a moment to feel the
absurdity of a phrase which you have been taught to use, in common with
half the religious world. There is but one way in which man can ever
help God--that is, by letting God help him: and there is no way in which
his name is more guiltily taken in vain, than by calling the abandonment
of our own work, the performance of His.
God is a kind Father. He sets us all in the places where He wishes us to
be employed; and that employment is truly 'our Father's business.' He
chooses work for every creature which will be delightful to them, if
they do it simply and humbly. He gives us always strength enough, and
sense enough, for what He wants us to do; if we either tire ourselves or
puzzle ourselves, it is our own fault. And we may always be sure,
whatever we are doing, that we cannot be pleasing Him, if we are not
happy ourselves. Now, away with you, children; and be as happy as you
can. And when you cannot, at least don't plume yourselves upon pouting.
FOOTNOTES:
[151] Quartz is not much harder than epidote; the strength is only
supposed to be in some proportion to the squares of the diameters.
LECTURE VII.
_HOME VIRTUES._
_By the fireside, in the Drawing-room. Evening._
DORA. Now, the curtains are drawn, and the fire's bright and here's your
arm-chair--and you're to tell us all about what you promised.
L. All about what?
DORA. All about virtue.
KATHLEEN. Yes, and about the words that begin with V.
L. I heard you singing about a word that begins with V, in the
playground, this morning, Miss Katie.
KATHLEEN. Me singing?
MAY. Oh tell us--tell us.
L. 'Vilikens and his----'
KATHLEEN (_stopping his mouth_). Oh! please don't. Where were you?
ISABEL. I'm sure I wish I had known where he was! We lost him among the
rhododendrons, and I don't know where he got to; oh, you
naughty--naughty--(_climbs on his knee_).
DORA. Now, Isabel, we really want to talk.
L. _I_ don't.
DORA. Oh, but you must. You promised, you know.
L. Yes, if all was well; but all's ill. I'm tired, and cross; and I
won't.
DORA. You're not a bit tired, and you're not crosser than two sticks;
and we'll make you talk, if you were crosser than six. Come here, Egypt;
and get on the other side of him.
(EGYPT _takes up a commanding position near the
hearth-brush._)
DORA (_reviewing her forces_). Now, Lily, come and sit on the rug in
front.
(LILY _does as she is bid._)
L. (_seeing he has no chance against the odds_.) Well, well; but I'm
really tired. Go and dance a little, first; and let me think.
DORA. No; you mustn't think. You will be wanting to make us think next;
that will be tiresome.
L. Well, go and dance first, to get quit of thinking; and then I'll talk
as long as you like.
DORA. Oh, but we can't dance to-night. There isn't time; and we want to
hear about virtue.
L. Let me see a little of it first. Dancing is the first of girl's
virtues.
EGYPT. Indeed! And the second?
L. Dressing.
EGYPT. Now, you needn't say that! I mended that tear the first thing
before breakfast this morning.
L. I cannot otherwise express the ethical principle, Egypt; whether you
have mended your gown or not.
DORA. Now don't be tiresome. We really must hear about virtue, please;
seriously.
L. Well. I'm telling you about it, as fast as I can.
DORA. What! the first of girls' virtues is dancing?
L. More accurately, it is wishing to dance, and not wishing to tease,
nor hear about virtue.
DORA (_to_ EGYPT). Isn't he cross?
EGYPT. How many balls must we go to in the season, to be perfectly
virtuous?
L. As many as you can without losing your colour. But I did not say you
should wish to go to balls. I said you should be always wanting to
dance.
EGYPT. So we do; but everybody says it is very wrong.
L. Why, Egypt, I thought--
'There was a lady once,
That would not be a queen,--that would she not,
For all the mud in Egypt.'
You were complaining the other day of having to go out a great deal
oftener than you liked.
EGYPT. Yes, so I was; but then, it isn't to dance. There's no room to
dance: it's--(_Pausing to consider what it is for_).
L. It is only to be seen, I suppose. Well, there's no harm in that.
Girls ought to like to be seen.
DORA (_her eyes flashing_). Now, you don't mean that; and you're too
provoking; and we won't dance again, for a month.
L. It will answer every purpose of revenge, Dora, if you only banish me
to the library; and dance by yourselves: but I don't think Jessie and
Lily will agree to that. You like me to see you dancing, don't you Lily?
LILY. Yes, certainly,--when we do it rightly.
L. And besides, Miss Dora, if young ladies really do not want to be
seen, they should take care not to let their eyes flash when they
dislike what people say; and, more than that, it is all nonsense from
beginning to end, about not wanting to be seen. I don't know any more
tiresome flower in the borders than your especially 'modest' snowdrop;
which one always has to stoop down and take all sorts of tiresome
trouble with, and nearly break its poor little head off, before you can
see it; and then, half of it is not worth seeing. Girls should be like
daisies; nice and white, with an edge of red, if you look close; making
the ground bright wherever they are; knowing simply and quietly that
they do it, and are meant to do it, and that it would be very wrong if
they didn't do it. Not want to be seen, indeed! How long were you in
doing your back hair, this afternoon, Jessie?
(JESSIE _not immediately answering_, DORA _comes to her
assistance._)
DORA. Not above three-quarters of an hour, I think, Jess?
JESSIE (_putting her finger up_). Now, Dorothy, _you_ needn't talk, you
know!
L. I know she needn't, Jessie; I shall ask her about those dark plaits
presently. (DORA _looks round to see if there is any way open for
retreat._) But never mind; it was worth the time, whatever it was; and
nobody will ever mistake that golden wreath for a chignon; but if you
don't want it to be seen, you had better wear a cap.
JESSIE. Ah, now, are you really going to do nothing but play? And we all
have been thinking, and thinking, all day; and hoping you would tell us
things; and now--!
L. And now I am telling you things, and true things, and things good for
you; and you won't believe me. You might as well have let me go to sleep
at once, as I wanted to.
(_Endeavours again to make himself comfortable._)
ISABEL. Oh, no, no, you sha'n't go to sleep, you naughty--Kathleen, come
here.
L. (_knowing what he has to expect if_ KATHLEEN _comes_). Get away,
Isabel, you're too heavy. (_Sitting up._) What have I been saying?
DORA. I do believe he has been asleep all the time! You never heard
anything like the things you've been saying.
L. Perhaps not. If you have heard them, and anything like them, it is
all I want.
EGYPT. Yes, but we don't understand, and you know we don't; and we want
to.
L. What did I say first?
DORA. That the first virtue of girls was wanting to go to balls.
L. I said nothing of the kind.
JESSIE. 'Always wanting to dance,' you said.
L. Yes, and that's true. Their first virtue is to be intensely
happy;--so happy that they don't know what to do with themselves for
happiness,--and dance, instead of walking. Don't you recollect 'Louisa,'
'No fountain from a rocky cave
E'er tripped with foot so free;
She seemed as happy as a wave
That dances on the sea.'
A girl is always like that, when everything's right with her.
VIOLET. But, surely, one must be sad sometimes?
L. Yes, Violet; and dull sometimes, and stupid sometimes, and cross
sometimes. What must be, must; but it is always either our own fault,
or somebody else's. The last and worst thing that can be said of a
nation is, that it has made its young girls sad, and weary.
MAY. But I am sure I have heard a great many good people speak against
dancing?
L. Yes, May; but it does not follow they were wise as well as good. I
suppose they think Jeremiah liked better to have to write Lamentations
for his people, than to have to write that promise for them, which
everybody seems to hurry past, that they may get on quickly to the verse
about Rachel weeping for her children; though the verse they pass is the
counter-blessing to that one: 'Then shall the virgin rejoice in the
dance; and both young men and old together; and I will turn their
mourning into joy.'
(_The children get very serious, but look at each other, as
if pleased._)
MARY. They understand now: but, do you know what you said next?
L. Yes; I was not more than half asleep. I said their second virtue was
dressing.
MARY. Well! what did you mean by that?
L. What do _you_ mean by dressing?
MARY. Wearing fine clothes.
L. Ah! there's the mistake. _I_ mean wearing plain ones.
MARY. Yes, I daresay! but that's not what girls understand by dressing,
you know.
L. I can't help that. If they understand by dressing, buying dresses,
perhaps they also understand by drawing, buying pictures. But when I
hear them say they can draw, I understand that they can make a drawing;
and when I hear them say they can dress, I understand that they can make
a dress and--which is quite as difficult--wear one.
DORA. I'm not sure about the making; for the wearing, we can all wear
them--out, before anybody expects it.
EGYPT (_aside, to_ L., _piteously_). Indeed I have mended that torn
flounce quite neatly; look if I haven't!
L. (_aside, to_ EGYPT). All right; don't be afraid. (_Aloud to_ DORA.)
Yes, doubtless; but you know that is only a slow way of _un_dressing.
DORA. Then, we are all to learn dress-making, are we?
L. Yes; and always to dress yourselves beautifully--not finely, unless
on occasion; but then very finely and beautifully too. Also, you are to
dress as many other people as you can; and to teach them how to dress,
if they don't know; and to consider every ill-dressed woman or child
whom you see anywhere, as a personal disgrace; and to get at them,
somehow, until everybody is as beautifully dressed as birds.
(_Silence; the children drawing their breaths hard, as if
they had come from under a shower bath._)
L (_seeing objections begin to express themselves in the eyes_). Now you
needn't say you can't; for you can: and it's what you were meant to do,
always; and to dress your houses, and your gardens, too; and to do very
little else, I believe, except singing; and dancing, as we said, of
course; and--one thing more.
DORA. Our third and last virtue, I suppose?
L. Yes; on Violet's system of triplicities.
DORA. Well, we are prepared for anything now. What is it?
L. Cooking.
DORA. Cardinal, indeed! If only Beatrice were here with her seven
handmaids, that she might see what a fine eighth we had found for her!
MARY. And the interpretation? What does 'cooking' mean?
L. It means the knowledge of Medea, and of Circe, and of Calypso, and of
Helen, and of Rebekah, and of the Queen of Sheba. It means the knowledge
of all herbs, and fruits, and balms, and spices; and of all that is
healing and sweet in fields and groves, and savoury in meats; it means
carefulness, and inventiveness, and watchfulness, and willingness, and
readiness of appliance; it means the economy of your great-grandmothers,
and the science of modern chemists; it means much tasting, and no
wasting; it means English thoroughness, and French art, and Arabian
hospitality; and it means, in fine, that you are to be perfectly and
always 'ladies'--'loaf-givers;' and, as you are to see, imperatively
that everybody has something pretty to put on,--so you are to see, yet
more imperatively, that everybody has something nice to eat.
(_Another pause, and long drawn breath._)
DORA (_slowly recovering herself_) _to_ EGYPT. We had better have let
him go to sleep, I think, after all!
L. You had better let the younger ones go to sleep now: for I haven't
half done.
ISABEL (_panic-struck_). Oh! please, please! just one quarter of an
hour.
L. No, Isabel; I cannot say what I've got to say, in a quarter of an
hour; and it is too hard for you, besides:--you would be lying awake,
and trying to make it out, half the night. That will never do.
ISABEL. Oh, please!
L. It would please me exceedingly, mousie: but there are times when we
must both be displeased; more's the pity. Lily may stay for half an
hour, if she likes.
LILY. I can't; because Isey never goes to sleep, if she is waiting for
me to come.
ISABEL. Oh, yes, Lily; I'll go to sleep to-night, I will, indeed.
LILY. Yes, it's very likely, Isey, with those fine round eyes! (_To_ L.)
You'll tell me something of what you've been saying, to-morrow, won't
you?
L. No, I won't, Lily. You must choose. It's only in Miss Edgeworth's
novels that one can do right, and have one's cake and sugar afterwards,
as well (not that I consider the dilemma, to-night, so grave).
(LILY, _sighing, takes_ ISABEL's _hand._)
Yes, Lily dear, it will be better, in the outcome of it, so, than if you
were to hear all the talks that ever were talked, and all the stories
that ever were told. Good night.
(_The door leading to the condemned cells of the Dormitory
closes on_ LILY, ISABEL, FLORRIE, _and other diminutive and
submissive victims._)
JESSIE (_after a pause_). Why, I thought you were so fond of Miss
Edgeworth!
L. So I am; and so you ought all to be. I can read her over and over
again, without ever tiring; there's no one whose every page is so full,
and so delightful; no one who brings you into the company of pleasanter
or wiser people; no one who tells you more truly how to do right. And it
is very nice, in the midst of a wild world, to have the very ideal of
poetical justice done always to one's hand:--to have everybody found
out, who tells lies; and everybody decorated with a red riband, who
doesn't; and to see the good Laura, who gave away her half sovereign,
receiving a grand ovation from an entire dinner party disturbed for the
purpose; and poor, dear, little Rosamond, who chooses purple jars
instead of new shoes, left at last without either her shoes or her
bottle. But it isn't life: and, in the way children might easily
understand it, it isn't morals.
JESSIE. How do you mean we might understand it?
L. You might think Miss Edgeworth meant that the right was to be done
mainly because one was always rewarded for doing it. It is an injustice
to her to say that: her heroines always do right simply for its own
sake, as they should; and her examples of conduct and motive are wholly
admirable. But her representation of events is false and misleading. Her
good characters never are brought into the deadly trial of
goodness,--the doing right, and suffering for it, quite finally. And
that is life, as God arranges it. 'Taking up one's cross' does not at
all mean having ovations at dinner parties, and being put over everybody
else's head.
DORA. But what _does_ it mean then? That is just what we couldn't
understand, when you were telling us about not sacrificing ourselves,
yesterday.
L. My dear, it means simply that you are to go the road which you see to
be the straight one; carrying whatever you find is given you to carry,
as well and stoutly as you can; without making faces, or calling people
to come and look at you. Above all, you are neither to load, nor unload,
yourself; nor cut your cross to your own liking. Some people think it
would be better for them to have it large; and many, that they could
carry it much faster if it were small; and even those who like it
largest are usually very particular about its being ornamental, and made
of the best ebony. But all that you have really to do is to keep your
back as straight as you can; and not think about what is upon it--above
all, not to boast of what is upon it. The real and essential meaning of
'virtue' is in that straightness of back. Yes; you may laugh, children,
but it is. You know I was to tell about the words that began with V.
Sibyl, what does 'virtue' mean, literally?
SIBYL. Does it mean courage?
L. Yes; but a particular kind of courage. It means courage of the nerve;
vital courage. That first syllable of it, if you look in Max Mueller, you
will find really means 'nerve,' and from it come 'vis,' and 'vir,' and
'virgin' (through vireo), and the connected word 'virga'--'a rod;'--the
green rod, or springing bough of a tree, being the type of perfect human
strength, both in the use of it in the Mosaic story, when it becomes a
serpent, or strikes the rock; or when Aaron's bears its almonds; and in
the metaphorical expressions, the 'Rod out of the stem of Jesse,' and
the 'Man whose name is the Branch,' and so on. And the essential idea of
real virtue is that of a vital human strength, which instinctively,
constantly, and without motive, does what is right. You must train men
to this by habit, as you would the branch of a tree; and give them
instincts and manners (or morals) of purity, justice, kindness, and
courage. Once rightly trained, they act as they should, irrespectively
of all motive, of fear, or of reward. It is the blackest sign of
putrescence in a national religion, when men speak as if it were the
only safeguard of conduct; and assume that, but for the fear of being
burned, or for the hope of being rewarded, everybody would pass their
lives in lying, stealing, and murdering. I think quite one of the
notablest historical events of this century (perhaps the very
notablest), was that council of clergymen, horror-struck at the idea of
any diminution in our dread of hell, at which the last of English
clergymen whom one would have expected to see in such a function, rose
as the devil's advocate; to tell us how impossible it was we could get
on without him.
VIOLET (_after a pause_). But, surely, if people weren't
afraid--(_hesitates again_).
L. They should be afraid of doing wrong, and of that only, my dear.
Otherwise, if they only don't do wrong for fear of being punished, they
_have_ done wrong in their hearts, already.
VIOLET. Well, but surely, at least one ought to be afraid of displeasing
God; and one's desire to please Him should be one's first motive?
L. He never would be pleased with us, if it were, my dear. When a father
sends his son out into the world--suppose as an apprentice--fancy the
boy's coming home at night, and saying, 'Father, I could have robbed the
till to-day; but I didn't, because I thought you wouldn't like it.' Do
you think the father would be particularly pleased?
(VIOLET _is silent._)
He would answer, would he not, if he were wise and good, 'My boy, though
you had no father, you must not rob tills'? And nothing is ever done so
as really to please our Great Father, unless we would also have done it,
though we had had no Father to know of it.
VIOLET (_after long pause_). But, then, what continual threatenings, and
promises of reward there are!
L. And how vain both! with the Jews, and with all of us. But the fact
is, that the threat and promise are simply statements of the Divine law,
and of its consequences. The fact is truly told you,--make what use you
may of it: and as collateral warning, or encouragement, or comfort, the
knowledge of future consequences may often be helpful to us; but helpful
chiefly to the better state when we can act without reference to them.
And there's no measuring the poisoned influence of that notion of future
reward on the mind of Christian Europe, in the early ages. Half the
monastic system rose out of that, acting on the occult pride and
ambition of good people (as the other half of it came of their follies
and misfortunes). There is always a considerable quantity of pride, to
begin with, in what is called 'giving one's self to God.' As if one had
ever belonged to anybody else!
DORA. But, surely, great good has come out of the monastic system--our
books,--our sciences--all saved by the monks?
L. Saved from what, my dear? From the abyss of misery and ruin which
that false Christianity allowed the whole active world to live in. When
it had become the principal amusement, and the most admired art, of
Christian men, to cut one another's throats, and burn one another's
towns; of course the few feeble or reasonable persons left, who desired
quiet, safety, and kind fellowship, got into cloisters; and the
gentlest, thoughtfullest, noblest men and women shut themselves up,
precisely where they could be of least use. They are very fine things,
for us painters, now,--the towers and white arches upon the tops of the
rocks; always in places where it takes a day's climbing to get at them;
but the intense tragi-comedy of the thing, when one thinks of it, is
unspeakable. All the good people of the world getting themselves hung up
out of the way of mischief, like Bailie Nicol Jarvie;--poor little
lambs, as it were, dangling there for the sign of the Golden Fleece; or
like Socrates in his basket in the 'Clouds'! (I must read you that bit
of Aristophanes again, by the way.) And believe me, children, I am no
warped witness, as far as regards monasteries; or if I am, it is in
their favour. I have always had a strong leaning that way; and have
pensively shivered with Augustines at St. Bernard; and happily made hay
with Franciscans at Fesole; and sat silent with Carthusians in their
little gardens, south of Florence; and mourned through many a day-dream,
at Melrose and Bolton. But the wonder is always to me, not how much, but
how little, the monks have, on the whole, done, with all that leisure,
and all that goodwill! What nonsense monks characteristically
wrote;--what little progress they made in the sciences to which they
devoted themselves as a duty,--medicine especially;--and, last and
worst, what depths of degradation they can sometimes see one another,
and the population round them, sink into; without either doubting their
system, or reforming it!
(_Seeing questions rising to lips._) Hold your little tongues, children;
it's very late, and you'll make me forget what I've to say. Fancy
yourselves in pews, for five minutes. There's one point of possible good
in the conventual system, which is always attractive to young girls; and
the idea is a very dangerous one;--the notion of a merit, or exalting
virtue, consisting in a habit of meditation on the 'things above,' or
things of the next world. Now it is quite true, that a person of
beautiful mind, dwelling on whatever appears to them most desirable and
lovely in a possible future will not only pass their time pleasantly,
but will even acquire, at last, a vague and wildly gentle charm of
manner and feature, which will give them an air of peculiar sanctity in
the eyes of others. Whatever real or apparent good there may be in this
result, I want you to observe, children, that we have no real authority
for the reveries to which it is owing. We are told nothing distinctly of
the heavenly world; except that it will be free from sorrow, and pure
from sin. What is said of pearl gates, golden floors, and the like, is
accepted as merely figurative by religious enthusiasts themselves; and
whatever they pass their time in conceiving, whether of the happiness of
risen souls, of their intercourse, or of the appearance and employment
of the heavenly powers, is entirely the product of their own
imagination; and as completely and distinctly a work of fiction, or
romantic invention, as any novel of Sir Walter Scott's. That the romance
is founded on religious theory or doctrine;--that no disagreeable or
wicked persons are admitted into the story;--and that the inventor
fervently hopes that some portion of it may hereafter come true, does
not in the least alter the real nature of the effort or enjoyment.
Now, whatever indulgence may be granted to amiable people for pleasing
themselves in this innocent way, it is beyond question, that to seclude
themselves from the rough duties of life, merely to write religious
romances, or, as in most cases, merely to dream them, without taking so
much trouble as is implied in writing, ought not to be received as an
act of heroic virtue. But, observe, even in admitting thus much, I have
assumed that the fancies are just and beautiful, though fictitious. Now,
what right have any of us to assume that our own fancies will assuredly
be either the one or the other? That they delight us, and appear lovely
to us, is no real proof of its not being wasted time to form them: and
we may surely be led somewhat to distrust our judgment of them by
observing what ignoble imaginations have sometimes sufficiently, or even
enthusiastically, occupied the hearts of others. The principal source of
the spirit of religious contemplation is the East; now I have here in my
hand a Byzantine image of Christ, which, if you will look at it
seriously, may, I think, at once and for ever render you cautious in the
indulgence of a merely contemplative habit of mind. Observe, it is the
fashion to look at such a thing only as a piece of barbarous art; that
is the smallest part of its interest. What I want you to see, is the
baseness and falseness of a religious state of enthusiasm, in which such
a work could be dwelt upon with pious pleasure. That a figure, with two
small round black beads for eyes; a gilded face, deep cut into horrible
wrinkles; an open gash for a mouth, and a distorted skeleton for a body,
wrapped about, to make it fine, with striped enamel of blue and
gold;--that such a figure, I say, should ever have been thought helpful
towards the conception of a Redeeming Deity, may make you, I think, very
doubtful, even of the Divine approval,--much more of the Divine
inspiration,--of religious reverie in general. You feel, doubtless, that
your own idea of Christ would be something very different from this; but
in what does the difference consist? Not in any more divine authority in
your imagination; but in the intellectual work of six intervening
centuries; which, simply, by artistic discipline, has refined this crude
conception for you, and filled you, partly with an innate sensation,
partly with an acquired knowledge, of higher forms,--which render this
Byzantine crucifix as horrible to you, as it was pleasing to its maker.
More is required to excite your fancy; but your fancy is of no more
authority than his was: and a point of national art-skill is quite
conceivable, in which the best we can do now will be as offensive to the
religious dreamers of the more highly cultivated time, as this Byzantine
crucifix is to you.
MARY. But surely, Angelico will always retain his power over everybody?
L. Yes, I should think, always; as the gentle words of a child will: but
you would be much surprised, Mary, if you thoroughly took the pains to
analyse, and had the perfect means of analysing, that power of
Angelico,--to discover its real sources. Of course it is natural, at
first, to attribute it to the pure religious fervour by which he was
inspired; but do you suppose Angelico was really the only monk, in all
the Christian world of the middle ages, who laboured, in art, with a
sincere religious enthusiasm?
MARY. No, certainly not.
L. Anything more frightful, more destructive of all religious faith
whatever, than such a supposition, could not be. And yet, what other
monk ever produced such work? I have myself examined carefully upwards
of two thousand illuminated missals, with especial view to the discovery
of any evidence of a similar result upon the art, from the monkish
devotion; and utterly in vain.
MARY. But then, was not Fra Angelico a man of entirely separate and
exalted genius?
L. Unquestionably; and granting him to be that, the peculiar phenomenon
in his art is, to me, not its loveliness, but its weakness. The effect
of 'inspiration,' had it been real, on a man of consummate genius,
should have been, one would have thought, to make everything that he did
faultless and strong, no less than lovely. But of all men, deserving to
be called 'great,' Fra Angelico permits to himself the least pardonable
faults, and the most palpable follies. There is evidently within him a
sense of grace, and power of invention, as great as Ghiberti's:--we are
in the habit of attributing those high qualities to his religious
enthusiasm; but, if they were produced by that enthusiasm in him, they
ought to be produced by the same feelings in others; and we see they
are not. Whereas, comparing him with contemporary great artists, of
equal grace and invention, one peculiar character remains notable in
him--which, logically, we ought therefore to attribute to the religious
fervour;--and that distinctive character is, the contented indulgence of
his own weaknesses, and perseverance in his own ignorances.
MARY. But that's dreadful! And what _is_ the source of the peculiar
charm which we all feel in his work?
L. There are many sources of it, Mary; united and seeming like one. You
would never feel that charm but in the work of an entirely good man; be
sure of that; but the goodness is only the recipient and modifying
element, not the creative one. Consider carefully what delights you in
any original picture of Angelico's. You will find, for one minor thing,
an exquisite variety and brightness of ornamental work. That is not
Angelico's inspiration. It is the final result of the labour and thought
of millions of artists, of all nations; from the earliest Egyptian
potters downwards--Greeks, Byzantines, Hindoos, Arabs, Gauls, and
Northmen--all joining in the toil; and consummating it in Florence, in
that century, with such embroidery of robe and inlaying of armour as had
never been seen till then; nor, probably, ever will be seen more.
Angelico merely takes his share of this inheritance, and applies it in
the tenderest way to subjects which are peculiarly acceptant of it. But
the inspiration, if it exist anywhere, flashes on the knight's shield
quite as radiantly as on the monk's picture. Examining farther into the
sources of your emotion in the Angelico work, you will find much of the
impression of sanctity dependent on a singular repose and grace of
gesture, consummating itself in the floating, flying, and above all, in
the dancing groups. That is not Angelico's inspiration. It is only a
peculiarly tender use of systems of grouping which had been long before
developed by Giotto, Memmi, and Orcagna; and the real root of it all is
simply--What do you think, children? The beautiful dancing of the
Florentine maidens!
DORA (_indignant again_). Now, I wonder what next! Why not say it all
depended on Herodias' daughter, at once?
L. Yes; it is certainly a great argument against singing, that there
were once sirens.
DORA. Well, it may be all very fine and philosophical, but shouldn't I
just like to read you the end of the second volume of 'Modern Painters'!
L. My dear, do you think any teacher could be worth your listening to,
or anybody else's listening to, who had learned nothing, and altered his
mind in nothing, from seven and twenty to seven and forty? But that
second volume is very good for you as far as it goes. It is a great
advance, and a thoroughly straight and swift one, to be led, as it is
the main business of that second volume to lead you, from Dutch cattle
pieces, and ruffian-pieces, to Fra Angelico. And it is right for you
also, as you grow older, to be strengthened in the general sense and
judgment which may enable you to distinguish the weaknesses from the
virtues of what you love: else you might come to love both alike; or
even the weaknesses without the virtues. You might end by liking
Overbeck and Cornelius as well as Angelico. However, I have perhaps been
leaning a little too much to the merely practical side of things, in
to-night's talk; and you are always to remember, children, that I do not
deny, though I cannot affirm, the spiritual advantages resulting, in
certain cases, from enthusiastic religious reverie, and from the other
practices of saints and anchorites. The evidence respecting them has
never yet been honestly collected, much less dispassionately examined:
but assuredly, there is in that direction a probability, and more than a
probability, of dangerous error, while there is none whatever in the
practice of an active, cheerful, and benevolent life. The hope of
attaining a higher religious position, which induces us to encounter,
for its exalted alternative, the risk of unhealthy error, is often, as I
said, founded more on pride than piety; and those who, in modest
usefulness, have accepted what seemed to them here the lowliest place in
the kingdom of their Father, are not, I believe, the least likely to
receive hereafter the command, then unmistakable, 'Friend, go up
higher.'
LECTURE VIII.
_CRYSTAL CAPRICE._
_Formal Lecture in Schoolroom, after some practical examination of
minerals._
L. We have seen enough, children, though very little of what might be
seen if we had more time, of mineral structures produced by visible
opposition, or contest among elements; structures of which the variety,
however great, need not surprise us: for we quarrel, ourselves, for many
and slight causes;--much more, one should think, may crystals, who can
only feel the antagonism, not argue about it. But there is a yet more
singular mimicry of our human ways in the varieties of form which appear
owing to no antagonistic force; but merely to the variable humour and
caprice of the crystals themselves: and I have asked you all to come
into the schoolroom to-day, because, of course, this is a part of the
crystal mind which must be peculiarly interesting to a feminine
audience. (_Great symptoms of disapproval on the part of said
audience._) Now, you need not pretend that it will not interest you; why
should it not? It is true that we men are never capricious; but that
only makes us the more dull and disagreeable. You, who are crystalline
in brightness, as well as in caprice, charm infinitely, by infinitude of
change. (_Audible murmurs of 'Worse and worse!' 'As if we could be got
over that way!' &c. The_ LECTURER, _however, observing the expression of
the features to be more complacent, proceeds._) And the most curious
mimicry, if not of your changes of fashion, at least of your various
modes (in healthy periods) of national costume, takes place among the
crystals of different countries. With a little experience, it is quite
possible to say at a glance, in what districts certain crystals have
been found; and although, if we had knowledge extended and accurate
enough, we might of course ascertain the laws and circumstances which
have necessarily produced the form peculiar to each locality, this would
be just as true of the fancies of the human mind. If we could know the
exact circumstances which affect it, we could foretell what now seems to
us only caprice of thought, as well as what now seems to us only caprice
of crystal: nay, so far as our knowledge reaches, it is on the whole
easier to find some reason why the peasant girls of Berne should wear
their caps in the shape of butterflies; and the peasant girls of Munich
their's in the shape of shells, than to say why the rock-crystals of
Dauphine should all have their summits of the shape of lip-pieces of
flageolets, while those of St. Gothard are symmetrical; or why the fluor
of Chamouni is rose-coloured, and in octahedrons, while the fluor of
Weardale is green, and in cubes. Still farther removed is the hope, at
present, of accounting for minor differences in modes of grouping and
construction. Take, for instance, the caprices of this single mineral,
quartz;--variations upon a single theme. It has many forms; but see what
it will make out of this _one_, the six-sided prism. For shortness'
sake, I shall call the body of the prism its 'column,' and the pyramid
at the extremities its 'cap.' Now, here, first you have a straight
column, as long and thin as a stalk of asparagus, with two little caps
at the ends; and here you have a short thick column, as solid as a
haystack, with two fat caps at the ends; and here you have two caps
fastened together, and no column at all between them! Then here is a
crystal with its column fat in the middle, and tapering to a little cap;
and here is one stalked like a mushroom, with a huge cap put on the top
of a slender column! Then here is a column built wholly out of little
caps, with a large smooth cap at the top. And here is a column built of
columns and caps; the caps all truncated about half way to their points.
And in both these last, the little crystals are set anyhow, and build
the large one in a disorderly way; but here is a crystal made of columns
and truncated caps, set in regular terraces all the way up.
MARY. But are not these, groups of crystals, rather than one crystal?
L. What do you mean by a group, and what by one crystal?
DORA (_audibly aside, to_ MARY, _who is brought to pause_). You know you
are never expected to answer, Mary.
L. I'm sure this is easy enough. What do you mean by a group of people?
MARY. Three or four together, or a good many together, like the caps in
these crystals.
L. But when a great many persons get together they don't take the shape
of one person?
(MARY _still at pause._)
ISABEL. No, because they can't; but, you know the crystals can; so why
shouldn't they?
L. Well, they don't; that is to say, they don't always, nor even often.
Look here, Isabel.
ISABEL. What a nasty ugly thing!
L. I'm glad you think it so ugly. Yet it is made of beautiful crystals;
they are a little grey and cold in colour, but most of them are clear.
ISABEL. But they're in such horrid, horrid disorder!
L. Yes; all disorder is horrid, when it is among things that are
naturally orderly. Some little girl's rooms are naturally _dis_orderly,
I suppose; or I don't know how they could live in them, if they cry out
so when they only see quartz crystals in confusion.
ISABEL. Oh! but how come they to be like that?
L. You may well ask. And yet you will always hear people talking as if
they thought order more wonderful than disorder! It _is_ wonderful--as
we have seen; but to me, as to you, child, the supremely wonderful thing
is that nature should ever be ruinous or wasteful, or deathful! I look
at this wild piece of crystallisation with endless astonishment.
MARY. Where does it come from?
L. The Tete Noire of Chamonix. What makes it more strange is that it
should be in a vein of fine quartz rock. If it were in a mouldering
rock, it would be natural enough; but in the midst of so fine substance,
here are the crystals tossed in a heap; some large, myriads small
(almost as small as dust), tumbling over each other like a terrified
crowd, and glued together by the sides, and edges, and backs, and heads;
some warped, and some pushed out and in, and all spoiled and each
spoiling the rest.
MARY. And how flat they all are!
L. Yes; that's the fashion at the Tete Noire.
MARY. But surely this is ruin, not caprice?
L. I believe it is in great part misfortune; and we will examine these
crystal troubles in next lecture. But if you want to see the
gracefullest and happiest caprices of which dust is capable, you must go
to the Hartz; not that I ever mean to go there myself, for I want to
retain the romantic feeling about the name; and I have done myself some
harm already by seeing the monotonous and heavy form of the Brocken from
the suburbs of Brunswick. But whether the mountains be picturesque or
not, the tricks which the goblins (as I am told) teach the crystals in
them, are incomparably pretty. They work chiefly on the mind of a
docile, bluish coloured, carbonate of lime; which comes out of a grey
limestone. The goblins take the greatest possible care of its education,
and see that nothing happens to it to hurt its temper; and when it may
be supposed to have arrived at the crisis which is, to a well brought up
mineral, what presentation at court is to a young lady--after which it
is expected to set fashions--there's no end to its pretty ways of
behaving. First it will make itself into pointed darts as fine as
hoar-frost; here, it is changed into a white fur as fine as silk; here
into little crowns and circlets, as bright as silver; as if for the
gnome princesses to wear; here it is in beautiful little plates, for
them to eat off; presently it is in towers which they might be
imprisoned in; presently in caves and cells, where they may make
nun-gnomes of themselves, and no gnome ever hear of them more; here is
some of it in sheaves, like corn; here, some in drifts, like snow; here,
some in rays, like stars: and, though these are, all of them,
necessarily, shapes that the mineral takes in other places, they are
all taken here with such a grace that you recognise the high caste and
breeding of the crystals wherever you meet them; and know at once they
are Hartz-born.
Of course, such fine things as these are only done by crystals which are
perfectly good, and good-humoured; and of course, also, there are
ill-humoured crystals who torment each other, and annoy quieter
crystals, yet without coming to anything like serious war. Here (for
once) is some ill-disposed quartz, tormenting a peaceable octahedron of
fluor, in mere caprice. I looked at it the other night so long, and so
wonderingly, just before putting my candle out, that I fell into another
strange dream. But you don't care about dreams.
DORA. No; we didn't, yesterday; but you know we are made up of caprice;
so we do, to-day: and you must tell it us directly.
L. Well, you see, Neith and her work were still much in my mind; and
then, I had been looking over these Hartz things for you, and thinking
of the sort of grotesque sympathy there seemed to be in them with the
beautiful fringe and pinnacle work of Northern architecture. So, when I
fell asleep, I thought I saw Neith and St. Barbara talking together.
DORA. But what had St. Barbara to do with it?[152]
L. My dear, I am quite sure St. Barbara is the patroness of good
architects: not St. Thomas, whatever the old builders thought. It might
be very fine, according to the monks' notions, in St. Thomas, to give
all his employer's money away to the poor: but breaches of contract are
bad foundations; and I believe, it was not he, but St. Barbara, who
overlooked the work in all the buildings you and I care about. However
that may be, it was certainly she whom I saw in my dream with Neith.
Neith was sitting weaving, and I thought she looked sad, and threw her
shuttle slowly; and St. Barbara was standing at her side, in a stiff
little gown, all ins and outs, and angles; but so bright with embroidery
that it dazzled me whenever she moved; the train of it was just like a
heap of broken jewels, it was so stiff, and full of corners, and so
many-coloured, and bright. Her hair fell over her shoulders in long,
delicate waves, from under a little three pinnacled crown, like a tower.
She was asking Neith about the laws of architecture in Egypt and Greece;
and when Neith told her the measures of the pyramids, St. Barbara said
she thought they would have been better three-cornered: and when Neith
told her the measures of the Parthenon, St. Barbara said she thought it
ought to have had two transepts. But she was pleased when Neith told her
of the temple of the dew, and of the Caryan maidens bearing its frieze:
and then she thought that perhaps Neith would like to hear what sort of
temples she was building herself, in the French valleys, and on the
crags of the Rhine. So she began gossiping, just as one of you might to
an old lady: and certainly she talked in the sweetest way in the world
to Neith; and explained to her all about crockets and pinnacles: and
Neith sat, looking very grave; and always graver as St. Barbara went on;
till at last, I'm sorry to say, St. Barbara lost her temper a little.
MAY (_very grave herself_). 'St. Barbara?'
L. Yes, May. Why shouldn't she? It was very tiresome of Neith to sit
looking like that.
MAY. But, then, St. Barbara was a saint!
L. What's that, May?
MAY. A saint! A saint is--I am sure you know!
L. If I did, it would not make me sure that you knew too, May: but I
don't.
VIOLET (_expressing the incredulity of the audience_). Oh,--sir!
L. That is to say, I know that people are called saints who are supposed
to be better than others: but I don't know how much better they must be,
in order to be saints; nor how nearly anybody may be a saint, and yet
not be quite one; nor whether everybody who is called a saint was one;
nor whether everybody who isn't called a saint, isn't one.
(_General silence; the audience feeling themselves on the
verge of the Infinities--and a little shocked--and much
puzzled by so many questions at once._)
L. Besides, did you never hear that verse about being 'called to be
saints'?
MAY (_repeats Rom._ i. 7.)
L. Quite right, May. Well, then, who are called to be that? People in
Rome only?
MAY. Everybody, I suppose, whom God loves.
L. What! little girls as well as other people?
MAY. All grown-up people, I mean.
L. Why not little girls? Are they wickeder when they are little?
MAY. Oh, I hope not.
L. Why not little girls, then?
(_Pause._)
LILY. Because, you know, we can't be worth anything if we're ever so
good;--I mean, if we try to be ever so good; and we can't do difficult
things--like saints.
L. I am afraid, my dear, that old people are not more able or willing
for their difficulties than you children are for yours. All I can say
is, that if ever I see any of you, when you are seven or eight and
twenty, knitting your brows over any work you want to do or to
understand, as I saw you, Lily, knitting your brows over your slate this
morning, I should think you very noble women. But--to come back to my
dream--St. Barbara _did_ lose her temper a little; and I was not
surprised. For you can't think how provoking Neith looked, sitting there
just like a statue of sandstone; only going on weaving, like a machine;
and never quickening the cast of her shuttle; while St. Barbara was
telling her so eagerly all about the most beautiful things, and
chattering away, as fast as bells ring on Christmas Eve, till she saw
that Neith didn't care; and then St. Barbara got as red as a rose, and
stopped, just in time;--or I think she would really have said something
naughty.
ISABEL. Oh, please, but didn't Neith say anything then?
L. Yes. She said, quite quietly, 'It may be very pretty, my love; but it
is all nonsense.'
ISABEL. Oh dear, oh dear; and then?
L. Well; then I was a little angry myself, and hoped St. Barbara would
be quite angry; but she wasn't. She bit her lips first; and then gave a
great sigh--such a wild, sweet sigh--and then she knelt down and hid her
face on Neith's knees. Then Neith smiled a little, and was moved.
ISABEL. Oh, I am so glad!
L. And she touched St. Barbara's forehead with a flower of white lotus;
and St. Barbara sobbed once or twice, and then said: 'If you only could
see how beautiful it is, and how much it makes people feel what is good
and lovely; and if you could only hear the children singing in the Lady
chapels!' And Neith smiled,--but still sadly,--and said, 'How do you
know what I have seen, or heard, my love? Do you think all those vaults
and towers of yours have been built without me? There was not a pillar
in your Giotto's Santa Maria del Fiore which I did not set true by my
spearshaft as it rose. But this pinnacle and flame work which has set
your little heart on fire, is all vanity; and you will see what it will
come to, and that soon; and none will grieve for it more than I. And
then every one will disbelieve your pretty symbols and types. Men must
be spoken simply to, my dear, if you would guide them kindly, and long.'
But St. Barbara answered, that, 'Indeed she thought every one liked her
work,' and that 'the people of different towns were as eager about their
cathedral towers as about their privileges or their markets;' and then
she asked Neith to come and build something with her, wall against
tower; and 'see whether the people will be as much pleased with your
building as with mine.' But Neith answered, 'I will not contend with
you, my dear. I strive not with those who love me; and for those who
hate me, it is not well to strive with me, as weaver Arachne knows. And
remember, child, that nothing is ever done beautifully, which is done in
rivalship; nor nobly, which is done in pride.'