Sheer Lane, December 30.
I was walking about my chamber this morning in a very gay humour, when I
saw a coach stop at my door, and a youth about fifteen alighting out of
it, who I perceived to be the eldest son of my bosom friend, that I gave
some account of in a previous paper. I felt a sensible pleasure rising
in me at the sight of him, my acquaintance having begun with his father
when he was just such a stripling, and about that very age. When he came
up to me, he took me by the hand, and burst into tears. I was extremely
moved, and immediately said, "Child, how does your father do?" He began
to reply, "My mother--" but could not go on for weeping. I went down
with him into the coach, and gathered out of him, "That his mother was
then dying; and that, while the holy man was doing the last offices to
her, he had taken that time to come and call me to his father, who, he
said, would certainly break his heart, if I did not go and comfort
him." The child's discretion in coming to me of his own head, and the
tenderness he showed for his parents would have quite overpowered me,
had I not resolved to fortify myself for the seasonable performances of
those duties which I owed to my friend. As we were going, I could
not but reflect upon the character of that excellent woman, and the
greatness of his grief for the loss of one who has ever been the support
to him under all other afflictions. How, thought I, will he be able to
bear the hour of her death, that could not, when I was lately with him,
speak of a sickness, which was then past, without sorrow! We were now
got pretty far into Westminster, and arrived at my friend's house. At
the door of it I met Favonius, not without a secret satisfaction to find
he had been there. I had formerly conversed with him at his house;
and as he abounds with that sort of virtue and knowledge which makes
religion beautiful, and never leads the conversation into the violence
and rage of party disputes, I listened to him with great pleasure. Our
discourse chanced to be upon the subject of death, which he treated with
such a strength of reason, and greatness of soul, that, instead of being
terrible, it appeared to a mind rightly cultivated, altogether to be
contemned, or rather to be desired. As I met him at the door, I saw in
his face a certain glowing of grief and humanity, heightened with an air
of fortitude and resolution, which, as I afterwards found, had such
an irresistible force, as to suspend the pains of the dying, and the
lamentation of the nearest friends who attended her. I went up directly
to the room where she lay, and was met at the entrance by my friend,
who, notwithstanding his thoughts had been composed a little before,
at the sight of me turned away his face and wept. The little family
of children renewed the expressions of their sorrow according to their
several ages and degrees of understanding. The eldest daughter was in
tears, busied in attendance upon her mother; others were kneeling about
the bedside: and what troubled me most, was, to see a little boy, who
was too young to know the reason, weeping only because his sisters did.
The only one in the room who seemed resigned and comforted was the dying
person. At my approach to the bedside, she told me, with a low broken
voice, "This is kindly done--take care of your friend--do not go from
him!" She had before taken leave of her husband and children, in a
manner proper for so solemn a parting, and with a gracefulness peculiar
to a woman of her character. My heart was torn to pieces, to see the
husband on one side suppressing and keeping down the swellings of his
grief, for fear of disturbing her in her last moments; and the wife even
at that time concealing the pains she endured, for fear of increasing
his affliction. She kept her eyes upon him for some moments after she
grew speechless, and soon after closed them for ever. In the moment of
her departure, my friend, who had thus far commanded himself, gave a
deep groan, and fell into a swoon by her bedside. The distraction of the
children, who thought they saw both their parents expiring together,
and now lying dead before them, would have melted the hardest heart; but
they soon perceived their father recover, whom I helped to remove into
another room, with a resolution to accompany him till the first pangs of
his affliction were abated. I knew consolation would now be impertinent;
and, therefore, contented myself to sit by him, and condole with him in
silence. For I shall here use the method of an ancient author, who in
one of his epistles, relating the virtues and death of Macrinus's wife,
expresses himself thus: "I shall suspend my advice to this best of
friends, till he is made capable of receiving it by those three great
remedies (necessitas ipsa, dies longa, et satietas doloris), the
necessity of submission, length of time, and satiety of grief."
In the meantime, I cannot but consider, with much commiseration, the
melancholy state of one who has had such a part of himself torn from
him, and which he misses in every circumstance of life. His condition is
like that of one who has lately lost his right arm, and is every moment
offering to help himself with it. He does not appear to himself the same
person in his house, at his table, in company, or in retirement; and
loses the relish of all the pleasures and diversions that were before
entertaining to him by her participation of them. This additional
satisfaction, from the taste of pleasures in the society of one we love,
is admirably described in Milton, who represents Eve, though in Paradise
itself, no further pleased with the beautiful objects around her, than
as she sees them in company with Adam, in that passage so inexpressibly
charming:
"With thee conversing, I forget all time;
All seasons, and their change; all please alike.
Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet
With charm of earliest birds; pleasant the sun,
When first on this delightful land he spreads
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flower,
Glistering with dew; fragrant the fertile earth
After short showers; and sweet the coming on
Of grateful evening mild; the silent night,
With this her solemn bird, and this fair moon,
And these the gems of Heaven, her starry train.
But neither breath of morn when she ascends
With charm of earliest birds; nor rising sun
On this delightful land; nor herb, fruit, flower,
Glistering with dew; nor fragrance after showers;
Nor grateful evening mild; nor silent night,
With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,
Or glittering star-light, without thee is sweet."
The variety of images in this passage is infinitely pleasing; and the
recapitulation of each particular image, with a little varying of the
expression, makes one of the finest turns of words that I have ever
seen: which I rather mention because Mr. Dryden has said, in his preface
to Juvenal, that he could meet with no turn of words in Milton.
It may further be observed, that though the sweetness of these verses
has something in it of a pastoral, yet it excels the ordinary kind, as
much as the scene of it is above an ordinary field or meadow. I might
here, as I am accidentally led into this subject, show several passages
in Milton that have as excellent turns of this nature as any of our
English poets whatsoever; but shall only mention that which follows, in
which he describes the fallen angels engaged in the intricate disputes
of predestination, free-will, and fore-knowledge; and, to humour the
perplexity, makes a kind of labyrinth in the very words that describe
it.
"Others apart sat on a hill retired,
In thoughts more elevate, and reasoned high
Of providence, fore-knowledge, will, and fate,
Fixed fate, free-will, fore-knowledge absolute,
And found no end, in wandering mazes lost."