The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862

Intoxicated with conceit, we fancy that we have but to eat of the tree of knowledge to become gods. Some go so far as to say that we are even now a part of divinity. 'The universe—it is God;' therefore we, as a part of the universe, are a part of God. The universe God? If it is a part of God, (which it is not,) it is so small a fraction that in all mathematical calculations, it would be called nothing. Were all the minds in the universe mingled into one, that one would be but as a drop to the ocean that girdles Infinity—God.

You will think me too earnest. The O'Mollys were ever an earnest race and an orthodox race. With what earnestness did they, in the good old times, from those peculiarly Irish goblets, that wouldn't stand, drink Irish whisky, till they partook of the nature of the goblets and came to the floor with them—the goblets with a crash, but the O'Mollys got up as sound as a bell, and next morning were ready to attend mass, into which they entered with as much earnestness as into their revelry. No people equal the Irish in earnestness in spiritual matters. It is perhaps not for a female O'Molly to record these roysterings; but I am the last of my race, I only am left to chronicle the glorious doings of my ancestors. Then, too, on our escutcheon is one of these same goblets. The origin of this escutcheon it has been a family task to trace, with but little success, however, till the present generation, I had a cousin who inherited all the family pride. He became a martyr to his devotion to the 'time-honored custom;' for alas! good old Irish whisky is as certainly among the 'things that were,' as are the Irish kings. Some have shrewdly thought that it was the only real Irish king. Well, then, it is owing to this cousin's loyalty to the usurper, or rather pretender, that I am the family chronicler. He was wonderfully ingenious; could from the slightest hint guess at the whole story; he was equal to those naturalists who from one bone can make out the animal. With the remains of an old family tradition for his clue, he traced the origin of the escutcheon. It was on this wise. One of the Irish kings, traveling incog., stopped at the castle of an O'Molly, who, though he knew not the rank of his guest, entertained him with the utmost hospitality. Freely the goblet circulated, and as they two only drank from it, it was soon broken. The king, next morning, revealed his rank to his host, and dubbed him Knight of the Goblet; hence the goblet on the shield, an emblem of hospitality. And never has there been a stain on the escutcheon of the O'Mollys.

I said they were an orthodox race. Perhaps they were too bigoted in their adherence to the old customs and the old faith. But there is too much latitudinarianism in this nineteenth century. Too many think it matters but little what a man's belief is, if he is only sincere in it; as if the consequences of any thing could be averted by not believing in it. The hands of your clock may be so turned around that they will point to the wrong figures; does that change the time? Or, what amounts to the same thing, it may be so ill-regulated, the machinery may be so out of gear, that you are deceived. But morning, noon, and night do not regulate their face by your clock. There is a dial that unerringly marks 'the stately stoppings' of the sun of suns—let us regulate our belief by it.

Truth is not like the clouds that, it is said, take the form of the country over which they pass. It does not change to suit your condition or mind, and we can not change it, neither can we dilute it. What is not truth is falsehood, and this, as the acid dissolved the pearl which Cleopatra dropped into it, will dissolve truth and convert it into its own nature.

How little we prize truth, even if we do not thus attempt to dissolve it. It lies in our heart unheeded. We are almost as unconscious of it as the oyster is of the pearl within his shell.

A friend of mine, having a daughter 'to finish,' looked over advertisement after advertisement, till finally her eye lighted on the circular of Mrs. Smith's Female Seminary, situated in the quiet and salubrious village of–, within a few minutes' walk of three or four places of worship.... Great care taken of the health, manners, and morals of the pupils.... Exercise insisted on.... Those whose parents may wish it, allowed the use of a quiet saddle-horse.... The pupils under the immediate supervision of the principal.... They have all the comforts of Home, etc., etc. All this, in addition to a thorough course of instruction in every thing ever heard of, not forgetting the Use of the Globes.... Music on the piano and guitar; there are six pianos in the institution.... Drawing, Monochromatic, Grecian, Oriental, etc., etc. Painting in oils and water-colors.... Embroidery, ten different kinds.... Terms, $—per annum. Then follows an imposing list of references, Reverends, Esquires, and Honorables.

My friend, taken with this, decided that her daughter, Bessie, should go to Mrs. Smith's seminary. Accordingly, a short time before the commencement of the next term, she accompanied her there; was so pleased with Mrs. Smith's bland politeness toward herself, and her affectionate, almost matronly manner toward her daughter, that she came away relieved of all anxiety on Bessie's account.

I hope I am not 'violating the sanctity of private correspondence,' in giving the following letter from Bessie:

'My Dear Molly: I received yours last evening, and hasten to reply, though, to answer your numerous questions will take me till after prayers. I shall consequently, as I am not the model pupil, get an absence-mark. You inquire as to the advancement I am making in my studies. One thing is certain, I shall not come home the encyclopedia mother expects. I'll not say that this 'flourishing institution' is a humbug; but will say that facts and the circular do not exactly tally. A few of the facts I will give, and you can judge for yourself.

'To begin with the supervision of the bland, portly principal. She enters the school-room makes a few criticisms, asks a blessing at the table; occasionally a misdemeanor is reported to her, when the offender is cited to the august presence, and duly reprimanded, not according to the quality of the offense, but, in an inverse proportion, to the quality of the offender. Her teachers do the mental drudgery of the institution. Their life is about as varied and pleasant as that of a churn-dog; that is, if the dog were kept churning all day. The balancing of accounts with them, and the making out of the bills for the patrons, are certainly 'under the immediate supervision of the principal.' These bills, which fond parents suppose amount to $—, have a rat-like appendage (excuse the expression) of 'incidentals,' that wasn't drawn into the modest 'terms' of the circular. I nearly forgot her Friday afternoon lectures, for which she sometimes substitutes Hannah More, and the Young Ladies' Own Book. These lectures are as commonplace as expatiations on the importance of cultivating the mind and heart, interspersed with 'hence the necessity,' and 'highly essential,' can mate them. Last Friday, as she was enlarging on the advantage of having had our birth in an enlightened, Christian land, Jenny Dean wrote on a slip of paper, and poked it over to me,'not have our berth in a Christian land.' Mrs. Smith saw her, confiscated the paper, and gave her a severe reprimand, for evincing such a disposition to trifle with serious things. Jenny was right; if ours is a Christian berth, commend me to heathendom. Mrs. Smith neglected to mention in her circular the instruction in entomology her pupils receive; probably because they are, as 'the Autocrat' says every traveler is, self-taught. I wish she would omit a few lessons in the 'Use of the Globes,' and teach the servants the use of hot water, corrosive sublimate, and roach-poison.

'I begin to understand why it is called a finishing school. Don't tell mother, or she will have me put in quarantine when I return. But, really, I'm getting quite thin; the demand made on my system being greater than the supply of 'plain wholesome food.' Now, I'm not going to complain of this 'plain wholesome,' though the butter is sometimes strong, the lamb (?) ditto, (see circular in regard to home comforts.) But I wish you would suggest to mother the propriety of sending me another box; the last we finished in short metre. You know this is a finishing school. Only one of the girls of our hall is too mean to treat, and she gets lots of things from home. Yesterday, she brought a beautiful basket of apples to my room, just to show me how nice they looked. I suggested that 'the proof of the pudding was in the eating.' She was too obtuse to take the hint. It is almost sacrilege to talk so about her; she is Mrs. Smith's model pupil, which, as I before informed you, your humble servant is not. Jenny Dean and I are always getting into trouble. Somehow, we've got a bad name, and our slightest misdemeanor is noticed, so we think that we 'might as well be killed for a sheep as a lamb:' in other words, if the camel's back must be broken, it may as well be by a hundred-pound weight as a feather.

'We have an Italian music-teacher, chiefly noticeable for his length of limb, an exiled nobleman, of course. I hinted to Jenny a doubt as to his nobility. She said, if he didn't belong to 'the Brahmin caste,' he did to the Bramah cast, and that was the next thing to it. He has become violently attached to the assistant music-teacher, who is very thin. Now, he has been teaching us to screech 'For Bonnie Annie Laurie.' Jenny persists in calling it, For bony Annie Laurie. The gravity with which he each time corrects her is amusing. Signor executes to the admiration of patrons, etc.; though music on those horrid pianos is rather like music on the rack. Of the six inventoried, (see circular,) two are in the garret, superannuated; two more ought to be; as for the remaining two, on one of them your friend Bessie practices, and it is too great a trial to her nerves to speak of them. You say that you have music in your souls that I must learn to express for you; that you can't turn a tune to save your life; that the attempt is like the attempt to make a curve of straight lines, (you see how I remember all you write or say.) If you were here, you would wish all the melody of the institution voiceless, and that it wouldn't ooze out at the finger-ends.

'As for drawing, (see circular,) this department, to save expense, Mrs. Smith's accomplished daughter has. She teaches crayoning and pencilling—a few learn to daub in water-colors—but this she rather discourages, as colored crayoning is much easier and quite as showy—this is the word for everything here. Miss Smith also teaches French—Anglicized. It is hardly worth while to mention 'the solids,' as these are shoved into a corner to give place to the accomplishments.... As for the exercise—we do, two or three times a week, file down the street, then file back again—are thus exhibited to the admiring gaze of the Esquires, Reverends, and Honorables, (see circular.) The 'quiet saddle-horse' (see circular) is a 'poetic fiction,' a 'pious fraud'—as much a myth as Pegasus himself. Though there is a tradition in the school that, a short time after the founding of the establishment, the late lamented husband of Mrs. Smith, who was fond of equestrian exercise, kept a horse—which a parlor-boarder, niece of Mrs. Smith, was allowed to ride—hence the provision in the circular. One part of it is correct—he doubtless is now a very quiet saddle-horse—that is, if he had not the tenacity of life of the lamb that, judging from the savory odor, we are to have for dinner, ('what's in a name?') Perhaps the 'late lamented' was as fond of his nag as was the man who entertained his guests with his horse in the form of soup. Jenny Dean says that is what she calls true horse-pitality.

'There goes the bell. Don't forget the box. Mrs. Smith—unlike many principals—approves of them—the reason you can guess—the fact please mention to mother. In haste,

Bessie.'

It seems hardly consistent with my regard for the 'dear reader,' to add any thing by way of remark on this true school-girl letter. But it is so suggestive. How many circulars do tally with facts? Even in those of the best schools, that need none of this clap-trap, there is a little humbug. But this is rather the fault of the patrons; like Bessie's mother, they will hardly look at a plain advertisement. The truth is, we love to be humbugged. Among the 'wants of the age' may be classed humbug.

I have read of a painter with disproportionately short legs, who, in all his pictures of human figures—from Moses down to the Mayor, done in heroic style—substituted his own legs. Your thorough utilitarian, deficient in imagination, his idea of mental symmetry being his own mental proportions, thinks no mind well balanced that has not a similar deficiency. He is a believer in nothing but the real and the useful—all else is stuff and nonsense; to him a mountain is a high elevation of land; a plain, a level tract; a forest, so much timber in a green state; a cloud, a collection of vapor. He sees in every thing just what there is in it and nothing more. Why does any one see more? It has been a puzzle to me, the undefinable longing I have sometimes felt in looking at a beautiful scene; a feeling akin to this, though lower, is that awakened by the fragrance of some flowers—it is so unsatisfactory, you wish to taste them. These somethings bring up a shadow of 'shadowy recollections,' an echo of an echo of a past so indistinct, so dimly distant, that it seems to have been a part of another life.

It may be that all earthly things are but types of spiritual things in a future spiritual existence—hence the yearning; or they may be expressions of spiritual things in a past spiritual existence—hence the 'shadowy recollections.' One thing is certain: all beauty and grandeur are faint expressions of the ideas of the All-Father; therefore, O utilitarian! you do wrong to ask of them: 'What use?' Better cultivate a taste for them, and with this taste an earnest desire to look into that Mind and read there thoughts of which Mont Blanc and the exquisite flowers are but feeble utterances.

How the Great Teacher has lavished on us illustrations of his goodness, as if he would in some way make it plain to all, 'what use.' There must be a use in every thing he creates. Every dew-drop that the meanest weed has wooed and won from the atmosphere, is as tenderly cared for by him, as the stream is that supplies your mill-pond; every briny tear on the infant's cheek, as the ocean that bears on its bosom your merchant-vessels. What use? Have not some things been made useless—in your sense of the term—that they might be preserved from destruction? The gorgeous-plumed birds, and brightly-enameled fish of the tropics, are unfit for food—so, to your mind, of no use. I wonder if this holds good in cannibal countries; if so, it would be no protection to poor Molly O'Molly if she were there.

I, too, am a believer in the real and the useful; but to me, the sphere of both is almost infinite. Are not the feelings awakened on viewing a beautiful sunset, as real as your satisfaction after eating roast-beef? Though I acknowledge that no one can thoroughly enjoy the one, who feels the need of the other; if then weighed in the scale, the sunset would 'kick the beam.' All things 'by season seasoned are to their right praise and true perfection.' It would, for instance, be rather out of place to talk of the beauty of the stars to the houseless wanderer, for whom there were no 'cheerful lights of home;' to expatiate on the loveliness of the moon to him who must spend the chill night with no other covering than her 'silver mantle.'… Moonlight and memory are associated together in my mind—reflections of a set sun, wrapping in their calm, beautiful light, all things, even the graves of those we love.... I have thought that the murmur of the brook was the voice of Silence. Moonlight expresses to the eye—silence.... 'All this unreal?' I beg your pardon; I claim for my feelings the same reality that you claim for yours. Is only what is gross real? Is not the sky as real as the mountain that pierces it? Is there more reality in the chink of the dollar than in 'the music of the spheres'? This first is, I acknowledge, to me a pleasant sound, though only 'heard at rarest intervals.'… Yet I am rather inclined to believe in the reality of the music of the spheres; it is too ethereal, too spiritual a music for the ear to sense it; the food and drink of the gods, ambrosia and nectar, even were we to swallow them, could our mortal palates taste them? Even thus may we drink in the music of the spheres, and, strange as it may seem, the more ear we have, the less likely we will be to hear it.

But—not 'in this connection,' in no connection—the utilitarian also thoroughly despises cobweb theories, as he terms them. The world owes its greatest achievements to theories—cobwebs they may be. In caves have been found books of stone, whose nucleus was but cobweb; along these webs the calcareous solution ran, and hardened into stone. A cobweb theory has been the thread, on which, drop by drop, as it were, experiments have run and hardened into a possibility on which might be hung a steam-boat.

There goes the night-train. Every morning as the engine with its train passes, the dark smoke rushing out of the chimney is touched by the rays of the rising sun and made glorious. I doubt not my enjoyment in looking at it is as real as that of the heaviest stockholder. Here I 'pitch my foot against'—as Paley says in his famous watch-argument—a quotation.

'Life is transfigured in the soft and tenderLight of love, as a volume denseOf rolling smoke becomes a wreathed splendorIn the setting sun.'

But this warm subject of love I avoid as the whale avoids the warm water of the Gulf Stream. So I will wheel about—first, one more digression: This love, like the Gulf Stream, softens many a climate naturally as cold as that of Labrador. I just throw out this hint for the sentimental reader to enlarge upon.

That quotation from Alexander Smith reminds me of one other thing, for which your utilitarian has a sovereign contempt—that is poetry. What is poetry? Every thing that stirs the soul to its depths, or but crisps the surface, is poetry—every truth does this, therefore every truth is poetry. Mind, I don't say conversely, etc. There—that word 'conversely,' suggests to you that now you have me; there is mathematical truth, you say; you might as well attempt to raise a tree from cube-root as to attempt to make poetry sprout from mathematics.... Is there no poetry in the marked path of the vessel on the trackless ocean—no poetry in the magnificent sweep of suns and worlds through space—in the eccentric orbit of the faithful comet—faithful, for from the most distant errands he passes right by earth, and even Venus, lingers not a moment, but hastens back to his lord—is there no poetry in the icing over of the brook, (if you think not, read Lowell's Sir Launfel,) each icy crystal being an exact geometrical figure? When 'God geometrizes,' he also poetizes.

Then if we can't say conversely all poetry is truth, yet poetry gives to every thing she touches with her magic wand, the charm of reality. Are not Ariel, Puck, Oberon, real characters, though but 'beings of the mind'? Shylock and Lady Macbeth are to me as real as John Wesley and Hannah More, and far more real than the dimly defined heroes of Plutarch, except those that Shakspeare has thrilled with his own life-blood—his very ghosts have an awful individuality—they are enough to make you believe in ghosts. But hark! what was that—pshaw! it is only a screech-owl on the maple near my window—Keats' 'owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold,' I should think this was, from his shivering notes. Listen again! how old is the dead Time, whose age the distant town-clock is tolling? I don't care to count—to tell the truth, that owl makes me nervous—and if it is 'the witching time of night,' I don't care to know it—so good-night.

In haste, Molly O'Molly.

WOUNDED

Up the quiet street in the early Sunday morning, came with slowsteps and silently, two wounded soldiers:One with shattered arm and a cruel sabre-cut on his forehead;One with amputated leg, hobbled slowly along on crutches.In the thunder-storm and sharp crash of terrible battle, 'mid blood,carnage, and death,Comrades in arms, they fell side by side; one of them senseless, theother feeling his life-blood flowing away…Faintness came over him, breathing the sulphurous smoke, with thetornado of battle stunning his brain—Faintness—forgetfulness. A vision of childhood, of the sweetHeaven-time of life, came to him…He hoped it was death, coming as no king of terrors, but as abeautiful flower-crowned child,Bidding a hero welcome to the great halls of the laurel-wreatheddead—those who died for their country.From this dream of the Future came sharp awaking to life; rattlingaway in the ambulance…Crashing pains shooting wildly from leg to brains—the heart now andthen grasped with steel fingers and squeezed…The knife and the tourniquet, the rapid surgical operation: thepoor, pale fellow maimed for life.At home in a hospital kindly nursed and tended, hearing for thefirst time in life the name of God—not taken in vain: seeing thegood deeds of true woman…Knowing that should he die he would ask no gentler sounds to cheerhim on his road to the Hereafter, than the prayer he once heardread by The Lady in Gray to a dying soldier in the samehospital:… thus passed he back again to life.Now convalescent he walks in the fresh morning up the quiet street,under the leafy shadow of lindens… he and his comrade in battle.In the faces of both you may see that they know how earnest islife…The Angel of Death on the battle-field raised the veil of theFuture: transient the glimpse, but they will never forget it…The Angel of Mercy here in the hospital bound up their wounds,cheering their hearts with kind looks and well-spoken words oftrue sympathy…Solemnly earnest and beautiful is Life to these two wounded soldiers.The lame one is weary, and halts by the steps of a handsome house;his comrade with one arm helps him sit down there, on the loweststep, leaning against the white marble balustrade.Through lace and silk curtains, from drawing-room window, looks down the streeta beautiful woman, waiting impatiently carriage, coachman, and footman,to carry her grandly to church.Up comes the carriage; wide open the doors of the house: Madame descends…How is this?… She stops by the two wounded soldiers.I have two sons in the army, she thought; what if they were weary and woundedlike these?Then she speaks to the comrades in battle, and learning where they were going,insisted on their taking her carriage. She will have no refusal: and nowJohn the footman, inwardly groaning, assists the lame man to enter, thenthe other one takes a seat…Off they whirl to their hospital-home, with a blessing upon the fair lady who daredfollow the teachings of One whom that morning she worshiped with words …and with deeds.Open your hands—and your hearts—ye who stand afar off from the battle! Lo!the wounded and dying are here at your doors.Slumber no more; but awake, awake to their cries!

ASTOR AND THE CAPITALISTS OF NEW-YORK

The accumulation of wealth has always been a chief proclivity of our race. The earliest of all books (Job) mentions it with sharp reproof, as though even then it had become a theme with the moralist. In olden time, wealth was even more unreliable than at the present day, especially as the mere possession of gold was enough to endanger one's life. The modern capitalist avoids this by devolving the custody of his cash on some bank and holding its stock instead of a hoard of ingots. The science of wealth now takes a more philosophic turn, and may be summed up in one word, debt. To be rich is simply to have brought the community in debt to yourself; and the greater it is, the greater, of course, your riches. To be poor is simply to reverse this condition, and to be in debt to others. The richest of all mankind may not have on hand, in specie, at any one time, more than the amount of a single day's income, and may be only able to show for his entire capital sundry pieces of paper, representing value. This is a vast improvement upon antiquity, since then wealth was identified with the holding of bullion, for whose protection an especial deity was invented. By a strange coïcidence, while Pluto was god of the lower regions, a slight change of the name represented his moneyed colleague, and Plutus presided over money. This connection is with sober wit hit off by Milton, who sets the fallen angels at once to work digging gold.