{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_2317/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_2317","id":"gutenberg_2317","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2317","summary":null,"tags":["Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography","Category: Biographies","Category: British Literature","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Country life -- England","Jefferies, Richard, 1848-1887","Natural history -- England","Naturalists -- Great Britain -- Biography"],"text":"[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nThe Story of My Heart\n\nMY AUTOBIOGRAPHY\n\nby Richard Jefferies\n\n\nContents\n\n CHAPTER I.\n CHAPTER II.\n CHAPTER III.\n CHAPTER IV.\n CHAPTER V.\n CHAPTER VI.\n CHAPTER VII.\n CHAPTER VIII.\n CHAPTER IX.\n CHAPTER X.\n CHAPTER XI.\n CHAPTER XII.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\nThe story of my heart commences seventeen years ago. In the glow of\nyouth there were times every now and then when I felt the necessity of\na strong inspiration of soul-thought. My heart was dusty, parched for\nwant of the rain of deep feeling; my mind arid and dry, for there is a\ndust which settles on the heart as well as that which falls on a ledge.\nIt is injurious to the mind as well as to the body to be always in one\nplace and always surrounded by the same circumstances. A species of\nthick clothing slowly grows about the mind, the pores are choked,\nlittle habits become a part of existence, and by degrees the mind is\ninclosed in a husk. When this began to form I felt eager to escape from\nit, to throw off the heavy clothing, to drink deeply once more at the\nfresh foundations of life. An inspiration\u2014a long deep breath of the\npure air of thought\u2014could alone give health to the heart.\n\nThere is a hill to which I used to resort at such periods. The labour\nof walking three miles to it, all the while gradually ascending, seemed\nto clear my blood of the heaviness accumulated at home. On a warm\nsummer day the slow continued rise required continual effort, which\ncaried away the sense of oppression. The familiar everyday scene was\nsoon out of sight; I came to other trees, meadows, and fields; I began\nto breathe a new air and to have a fresher aspiration. I restrained my\nsoul till reached the sward of the hill; psyche, the soul that longed\nto be loose. I would write psyche always instead of soul to avoid\nmeanings which have become attached to the word soul, but it is awkward\nto do so. Clumsy indeed are all words the moment the wooden stage of\ncommonplace life is left. I restrained psyche, my soul, till I reached\nand put my foot on the grass at the beginning of the green hill itself.\n\nMoving up the sweet short turf, at every step my heart seemed to obtain\na wider horizon of feeling; with every inhalation of rich pure air, a\ndeeper desire. The very light of the sun was whiter and more brilliant\nhere. By the time I had reached the summit I had entirely forgotten the\npetty circumstances and the annoyances of existence. I felt myself,\nmyself. There was an intrenchment on the summit, and going down into\nthe fosse I walked round it slowly to recover breath. On the\nsouth-western side there was a spot where the outer bank had partially\nslipped, leaving a gap. There the view was over a broad plain,\nbeautiful with wheat, and inclosed by a perfect amphitheatre of green\nhills. Through these hills there was one narrow groove, or pass,\nsouthwards, where the white clouds seemed to close in the horizon.\nWoods hid the scattered hamlets and farmhouses, so that I was quite\nalone.\n\nI was utterly alone with the sun and the earth. Lying down on the\ngrass, I spoke in my soul to the earth, the sun, the air, and the\ndistant sea far beyond sight. I thought of the earth\u2019s firmness\u2014I felt\nit bear me up: through the grassy couch there came an influence as if I\ncould feel the great earth speaking to me. I thought of the wandering\nair\u2014its pureness, which is its beauty; the air touched me and gave me\nsomething of itself. I spoke to the sea: though so far, in my mind I\nsaw it, green at the rim of the earth and blue in deeper ocean; I\ndesired to have its strength, its mystery and glory. Then I addressed\nthe sun, desiring the soul equivalent of his light and brilliance, his\nendurance and unwearied race. I turned to the blue heaven over, gazing\ninto its depth, inhaling its exquisite colour and sweetness. The rich\nblue of the unattainable flower of the sky drew my soul towards it, and\nthere it rested, for pure colour is rest of heart. By all these I\nprayed; I felt an emotion of the soul beyond all definition; prayer is\na puny thing to it, and the word is a rude sign to the feeling, but I\nknow no other.\n\nBy the blue heaven, by the rolling sun bursting through untrodden\nspace, a new ocean of ether every day unveiled. By the fresh and\nwandering air encompassing the world; by the sea sounding on the\nshore\u2014the green sea white-flecked at the margin and the deep ocean; by\nthe strong earth under me. Then, returning, I prayed by the sweet\nthyme, whose little flowers I touched with my hand; by the slender\ngrass; by the crumble of dry chalky earth I took up and let fall\nthrough my fingers. Touching the crumble of earth, the blade of grass,\nthe thyme flower, breathing the earth-encircling air, thinking of the\nsea and the sky, holding out my hand for the sunbeams to touch it,\nprone on the sward in token of deep reverence, thus I prayed that I\nmight touch to the unutterable existence infinitely higher than deity.\n\nWith all the intensity of feeling which exalted me, all the intense\ncommunion I held with the earth, the sun and sky, the stars hidden by\nthe light, with the ocean\u2014in no manner can the thrilling depth of these\nfeelings be written\u2014with these I prayed, as if they were the keys of an\ninstrument, of an organ, with which I swelled forth the note of my\nsoul, redoubling my own voice by their power. The great sun burning\nwith light; the strong earth, dear earth; the warm sky; the pure air;\nthe thought of ocean; the inexpressible beauty of all filled me with a\nrapture, an ecstasy, and inflatus. With this inflatus, too, I prayed.\nNext to myself I came and recalled myself, my bodily existence. I held\nout my hand, the sunlight gleamed on the skin and the iridescent nails;\nI recalled the mystery and beauty of the flesh. I thought of the mind\nwith which I could see the ocean sixty miles distant, and gather to\nmyself its glory. I thought of my inner existence, that consciousness\nwhich is called the soul. These, that is, myself\u2014I threw into the\nbalance to weight the prayer the heavier. My strength of body, mind and\nsoul, I flung into it; I put forth my strength; I wrestled and\nlaboured, and toiled in might of prayer. The prayer, this soul-emotion\nwas in itself-not for an object-it was a passion. I hid my face in the\ngrass, I was wholly prostrated, I lost myself in the wrestle, I was\nrapt and carried away.\n\nBecoming calmer, I returned to myself and thought, reclining in rapt\nthought, full of aspiration, steeped to the lips of my soul in desire.\nI did not then define, or analyses, or understand this. I see now that\nwhat I laboured for was soul-life, more soul-nature, to be exalted, to\nbe full of soul-learning. Finally I rose, walked half a mile or so\nalong the summit of the hill eastwards, to soothe myself and come to\nthe common ways of life again. Had any shepherd accidentally seen me\nlying on the turf, he would only have thought that I was resting a few\nminutes; I made no outward show. Who could have imagined the whirlwind\nof passion that was going on within me as I reclined there! I was\ngreatly exhausted when I reached home. Occasionally I went upon the\nhill deliberately, deeming it good to do so; then, again, this craving\ncarried me away up there of itself. Though the principal feeling was\nthe same, there were variations in the mode in which it affected me.\n\nSometimes on lying down on the sward I first looked up at the sky,\ngazing for a long time till I could see deep into the azure and my eyes\nwere full of the colour; then I turned my face to the grass and thyme,\nplacing my hands at each side of my face so as to shut out everything\nand hide myself. Having drunk deeply of the heaven above and felt the\nmost glorious beauty of the day, and remembering the old, old, sea,\nwhich (as it seemed to me) was but just yonder at the edge, I now\nbecame lost, and absorbed into the being or existence of the universe.\nI felt down deep into the earth under, and high above into the sky, and\nfarther still to the sun and stars. Still farther beyond the stars into\nthe hollow of space, and losing thus my separateness of being came to\nseem like a part of the whole. Then I whisper-ed to the earth beneath,\nthrough the grass and thyme, down into the depth of its ear, and again\nup to the starry space hid behind the blue of day. Travelling in an\ninstant across the distant sea, I saw as if with actual vision the\npalms and cocoanut trees, the bamboos of India, and the cedars of the\nextreme south. Like a lake with islands the ocean lay before me, as\nclear and vivid as the plain beneath in the midst of the amphitheatre\nof hills.\n\nWith the glory of the great sea, I said, with the firm, solid, and\nsustaining earth; the depth, distance, and expanse of ether; the age,\ntamelessness, and ceaseless motion of the ocean; the stars, and the\nunknown in space; by all those things which are most powerful known to\nme, and by those which exist, but of which I have no idea whatever, I\npray. Further, by my own soul, that secret existence which above all\nother things bears the nearest resemblance to the ideal of spirit,\ninfinitely nearer than earth, sun, or star. Speaking by an inclination\ntowards, not in words, my soul prays that I may have something from\neach of these, that I may gather a flower from them, that I may have in\nmyself the secret and meaning of the earth, the golden sun, the light,\nthe foam-flecked sea. Let my soul become enlarged; I am not enough; I\nam little and contemptible. I desire a great-ness of soul, an\nirradiance of mind, a deeper insight, a broader hope. Give me power of\nsoul, so that I may actually effect by its will that which I strive\nfor.\n\nIn winter, though I could not then rest on the grass, or stay long\nenough to form any definite expression, I still went up to the hill\nonce now and then, for it seemed that to merely visit the spot repeated\nall that I had previously said. But it was not only then.\n\nIn summer I went out into the fields, and let my soul inspire these\nthoughts under the trees, standing against the trunk, or looking up\nthrough the branches at the sky. If trees could speak, hundreds of them\nwould say that I had had these soul-emotions under them. Leaning\nagainst the oak\u2019s massive trunk, and feeling the rough bark and the\nlichen at my back, looking southwards over the grassy fields,\ncowslip-yellow, at the woods on the slope, I thought my desire of\ndeeper soul-life. Or under the green firs, looking upwards, the sky was\nmore deeply blue at their tops; then the brake fern was unrolling, the\ndoves cooing, the thickets astir, the late ash-leaves coming forth.\nUnder the shapely rounded elms, by the hawthorn bushes and hazel,\neverywhere the same deep desire for the soul-nature; to have from all\ngreen things and from the sunlight the inner meaning which was not\nknown to them, that I might be full of light as the woods of the sun\u2019s\nrays. Just to touch the lichened bark of a tree, or the end of a spray\nprojecting over the path as I walked, seemed to repeat the same prayer\nin me.\n\nThe long-lived summer days dried and warmed the turf in the meadows. I\nused to lie down in solitary corners at full length on my back, so as\nto feel the embrace of the earth. The grass stood high above me, and\nthe shadows of the tree-branches danced on my face. I looked up at the\nsky, with half-closed eyes to bear the dazzling light. Bees buzzed over\nme, sometimes a butterfly passed, there was a hum in the air,\ngreenfinches sang in the hedge. Gradually entering into the intense\nlife of the summer days\u2014a life which burned around as if every grass\nblade and leaf were a torch\u2014I came to feel the long-drawn life of the\nearth back into the dimmest past, while the sun of the moment was warm\non me. Sesostris on the most ancient sands of the south, in ancient,\nancient days, was conscious of himself and of the sun. This sunlight\nlinked me through the ages to that past consciousness. From all the\nages my soul desired to take that soul-life which had flowed through\nthem as the sunbeams had continually poured on earth. As the hot sands\ntake up the heat, so would I take up that soul-energy. Dreamy in\nappearance, I was breathing full of existence; I was aware of the grass\nblades, the flowers, the leaves on hawthorn and tree. I seemed to live\nmore largely through them, as if each were a pore through which I\ndrank. The grasshoppers called and leaped, the greenfinches sang, the\nblackbirds happily fluted, all the air hummed with life. I was plunged\ndeep in existence, and with all that existence I prayed.\n\nThrough every grass blade in the thousand, thousand grasses; through\nthe million leaves, veined and edge-cut, on bush and tree; through the\nsong-notes and the marked feathers of the birds; through the insects\u2019\nhum and the colour of the butterflies; through the soft warm air, the\nflecks of clouds dissolving\u2014I used them all for prayer. With all the\nenergy the sunbeams had poured unwearied on the earth since Sesostris\nwas conscious of them on the ancient sands; with all the life that had\nbeen lived by vigorous man and beauteous woman since first in dearest\nGreece the dream of the gods was woven; with all the soul-life that had\nflowed a long stream down to me, I prayed that I might have a soul more\nthan equal to, far beyond my conception of, these things of the past,\nthe present, and the fulness of all life. Not only equal to these, but\nbeyond, higher, and more powerful than I could imagine. That I might\ntake from all their energy, grandeur, and beauty, and gather it into\nme. That my soul might be more than the cosmos of life.\n\nI prayed with the glowing clouds of sun-set and the soft light of the\nfirst star coming through the violet sky. At night with the stars,\naccording to the season: now with the Pleiades, now with the Swan or\nburning Sirius, and broad Orion\u2019s whole constellation, red Aldebaran,\nArcturus, and the Northern Crown; with the morning star, the\nlight-bringer, once now and then when I saw it, a white-gold ball in\nthe violet-purple sky, or framed about with pale summer vapour floating\naway as red streaks shot horizontally in the east. A diffused saffron\nascended into the luminous upper azure. The disk of the sun rose over\nthe hill, fluctuating with throbs of light; his chest heaved in fervour\nof brilliance. All the glory of the sunrise filled me with broader and\nfurnace-like vehemence of prayer. That I might have the deepest of\nsoul-life, the deepest of all, deeper far than all this greatness of\nthe visible universe and even of the invisible; that I might have a\nfulness of soul till now unknown, and utterly beyond my own conception.\n\nIn the deepest darkness of the night the same thought rose in my mind\nas in the bright light of noontide. What is there which I have not used\nto strengthen the same emotion?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n\nSometimes I went to a deep, narrow valley in the hills, silent and\nsolitary. The sky crossed from side to side, like a roof supported on\ntwo walls of green. Sparrows chirped in the wheat at the verge above,\ntheir calls falling like the twittering of swallows from the air. There\nwas no other sound. The short grass was dried grey as it grew by the\nheat; the sun hung over the narrow vale as if it had been put there by\nhand. Burning, burning, the sun glowed on the sward at the foot of the\nslope where these thoughts burned into me. How many, many years, how\nmany cycles of years, how many bundles of cycles of years, had the sun\nglowed down thus on that hollow? Since it was formed how long? Since it\nwas worn and shaped, groove-like, in the flanks of the hills by mighty\nforces which had ebbed. Alone with the sun which glowed on the work\nwhen it was done, I saw back through space to the old time of\ntree-ferns, of the lizard flying through the air, the lizard-dragon\nwallowing in sea foam, the mountainous creatures, twice-elephantine,\nfeeding on land; all the crooked sequence of life. The dragon-fly which\npassed me traced a continuous descent from the fly marked on stone in\nthose days. The immense time lifted me like a wave rolling under a\nboat; my mind seemed to raise itself as the swell of the cycles came;\nit felt strong with the power of the ages. With all that time and power\nI prayed: that I might have in my soul the intellectual part of it; the\nidea, the thought. Like a shuttle the mind shot to and fro the past and\nthe present, in an instant.\n\nFull to the brim of the wondrous past, I felt the wondrous present. For\nthe day\u2014the very moment I breathed, that second of time then in the\nvalley, was as marvellous, as grand, as all that had gone before. Now,\nthis moment was the wonder and the glory. Now, this moment was\nexceedingly wonderful. Now, this moment give me all the thought, all\nthe idea, all the soul expressed in the cosmos around me. Give me still\nmore, for the interminable universe, past and present, is but earth;\ngive me the unknown soul, wholly apart from it, the soul of which I\nknow only that when I touch the ground, when the sunlight touches my\nhand, it is not there. Therefore the heart looks into space to be away\nfrom earth. With all the cycles, and the sunlight streaming through\nthem, with all that is meant by the present, I thought in the deep vale\nand prayed.\n\nThere was a secluded spring to which I sometimes went to drink the pure\nwater, lifting it in the hollow of my hand. Drinking the lucid water,\nclear as light itself in solution, I absorbed the beauty and purity of\nit. I drank the thought of the element; I desired soul-nature pure and\nlimpid. When I saw the sparkling dew on the grass\u2014a rainbow broken into\ndrops\u2014it called up the same thought-prayer. The stormy wind whose\nsudden twists laid the trees on the ground woke the same feeling; my\nheart shouted with it. The soft summer air which entered when I opened\nmy window in the morning breathed the same sweet desire. At night,\nbefore sleeping, I always looked out at the shadowy trees, the hills\nlooming indistinctly in the dark, a star seen between the drifting\nclouds; prayer of soul-life always. I chose the highest room, bare and\ngaunt, because as I sat at work I could look out and see more of the\nwide earth, more of the dome of the sky, and could think my desire\nthrough these. When the crescent of the new moon shone, all the old\nthoughts were renewed.\n\nAll the succeeding incidents of the year repeated my prayer as I noted\nthem. The first green leaf on the hawthorn, the first spike of meadow\ngrass, the first song of the nightingale, the green ear of wheat. I\nspoke it with the ear of wheat as the sun tinted it golden; with the\nwhitening barley; again with the red gold spots of autumn on the beech,\nthe buff oak leaves, and the gossamer dew-weighted. All the larks over\nthe green corn sang it for me, all the dear swallows; the green leaves\nrustled it; the green brook flags waved it; the swallows took it with\nthem to repeat it for me in distant lands. By the running brook I\nmeditated it; a flash of sunlight here in the curve, a flicker yonder\non the ripples, the birds bathing in the sandy shallow, the rush of\nfalling water. As the brook ran winding through the meadow, so one\nthought ran winding through my days.\n\nThe sciences I studied never checked it for a moment; nor did the books\nof old philosophy. The sun was stronger than science; the hills more\nthan philosophy. Twice circumstances gave me a brief view of the sea\nthen the passion rose tumultuous as the waves. It was very bitter to me\nto leave the sea.\n\nSometimes I spent the whole day walking over the hills searching for\nit; as if the labour of walking would force it from the ground. I\nremained in the woods for hours, among the ash sprays and the\nfluttering of the ring-doves at their nests, the scent of pines here\nand there, dreaming my prayer.\n\nMy work was most uncongenial and useless, but even then sometimes a\ngleam of sunlight on the wall, the buzz of a bee at the window, would\nbring the thought to me. Only to make me miserable, for it was a waste\nof golden time while the rich sunlight streamed on hill and plain.\nThere was a wrenching of the mind, a straining of the mental sinews; I\nwas forced to do this, my mind was yonder. Weariness, exhaustion,\nnerve-illness often ensued. The insults which are showered on poverty,\nlong struggle of labour, the heavy pressure of circumstances, the\nunhappiness, only stayed the expression of the feeling. It was always\nthere. Often in the streets of London, as the red sunset flamed over\nthe houses, the old thought, the old prayer, came.\n\nNot only in grassy fields with green leaf and running brook did this\nconstant desire find renewal. More deeply still with living human\nbeauty; the perfection of form, the simple fact of form, ravished and\nalways will ravish me away. In this lies the outcome and end of all the\nloveliness of sunshine and green leaf, of flowers, pure water, and\nsweet air. This is embodiment and highest ex-pression; the scattered,\nuncertain, and designless loveliness of tree and sunlight brought to\nshape. Through this beauty I prayed deepest and longest, and down to\nthis hour. The shape\u2014the divine idea of that shape\u2014the swelling muscle\nor the dreamy limb, strong sinew or curve of bust, Aphrodite or\nHercules, it is the same. That I may have the soul-life, the\nsoul-nature, let divine beauty bring to me divine soul. Swart Nubian,\nwhite Greek, delicate Italian, massive Scandinavian, in all the\nexquisite pleasure the form gave, and gives, to me immediately becomes\nintense prayer.\n\nIf I could have been in physical shape like these, how despicable in\ncomparison I am; to be shapely of form is so infinitely beyond wealth,\npower, fame, all that ambition can give, that these are dust before it.\nUnless of the human form, no pictures hold me; the rest are flat\nsurfaces. So, too, with the other arts, they are dead; the potters, the\narchitects, meaningless, stony, and some repellent, like the cold touch\nof porcelain. No prayer with these. Only the human form in art could\nraise it, and most in statuary. I have seen so little good statuary, it\nis a regret to me; still, that I have is beyond all other art.\nFragments here, a bust yonder, the broken pieces brought from Greece,\ncopies, plaster casts, a memory of an Aphrodite, of a Persephone, of an\nApollo, that is all; but even drawings of statuary will raise the\nprayer. These statues were like myself full of a thought, for ever\nabout to burst forth as a bud, yet silent in the same attitude. Give me\nto live the soul-life they express. The smallest fragment of marble\ncarved in the shape of the human arm will wake the desire I felt in my\nhill-prayer.\n\nTime went on; good fortune and success never for an instant deceived me\nthat they were in themselves to be sought; only my soul-thought was\nworthy. Further years bringing much suffering, grinding the very life\nout; new troubles, renewed insults, loss of what hard labour had\nearned, the bitter question: Is it not better to leap into the sea?\nThese, too, have made no impression; constant still to the former\nprayer my mind endures. It was my chief regret that I had not\nendeavoured to write these things, to give expression to this passion.\nI am now trying, but I see that I shall only in part succeed.\n\nThe same prayer comes to me at this very hour. It is now less solely\nassociated with the sun and sea, hills, woods, or beauteous human\nshape. It is always within. It requires no waking; no renewal; it is\nalways with me. I am it; the fact of my existence expresses it.\n\nAfter a long interval I came to the hills again, this time by the\ncoast. I found a deep hollow on the side of a great hill, a green\nconcave opening to the sea, where I could rest and think in perfect\nquiet. Behind me were furze bushes dried by the heat; immediately in\nfront dropped the steep descent of the bowl-like hollow which received\nand brought up to me the faint sound of the summer waves. Yonder lay\nthe immense plain of sea, the palest green under the continued\nsunshine, as though the heat had evaporated the colour from it; there\nwas no distinct horizon, a heat-mist inclosed it and looked farther\naway than the horizon would have done. Silence and sunshine, sea and\nhill gradually brought my mind into the condition of intense prayer.\nDay after day, for hours at a time, I came there, my soul-desire always\nthe same. Presently I began to consider how I could put a part of that\nprayer into form, giving it an object. Could I bring it into such a\nshape as would admit of actually working upon the lines it indicated\nfor any good?\n\nOne evening, when the bright white star in Lyra was shining almost at\nthe zenith over me, and the deep concave was the more profound in the\ndusk, I formulated it into three divisions. First, I desired that I\nmight do or find something to exalt the soul, something to enable it to\nlive its own life, a more powerful existence now. Secondly, I desired\nto be able to do something for the flesh, to make a discovery or\nperfect a method by which the fleshly body might enjoy more pleasure,\nlonger life, and suffer less pain. Thirdly, to construct a more\nflexible engine with which to carry into execution the design of the\nwill. I called this the Lyra prayer, to distinguish it from the far\ndeeper emotion in which the soul was alone concerned.\n\nOf the three divisions, the last was of so little importance that it\nscarcely deserved to be named in conjunction with the others. Mechanism\nincreases convenience\u2014in no degree does it confer physical or moral\nperfection. The rudimentary engines employed thousands of years ago in\nraising buildings were in that respect equal to the complicated\nmachines of the present day. Control of iron and steel has not altered\nor improved the bodily man. I even debated some time whether such a\nthird division should be included at all. Our bodies are now conveyed\nall round the world with ease, but obtain no advantage. As they start\nso they return. The most perfect human families of ancient times were\nalmost stationary, as those of Greece. Perfection of form was found in\nSparta; how small a spot compared to those continents over which we are\nnow taken so quickly! Such perfection of form might perhaps again\ndwell, contented and complete in itself, on such a strip of land as I\ncould see between me and the sand of the sea. Again, a watch keeping\ncorrect time is no guarantee that the bearer shall not suffer pain. The\nowner of the watch may be soulless, without mind-fire, a mere creature.\nNo benefit to the heart or to the body accrues from the most accurate\nmechanism. Hence I debated whether the third division should be\nincluded. But I reflected that time cannot be put back on the dial, we\ncannot return to Sparta; there is an existent state of things, and\nexistent multitudes; and possibly a more powerful engine, flexible to\nthe will, might give them that freedom which is the one, and the one\nonly, political or social idea I possess. For liberty, therefore, let\nit be included.\n\nFor the flesh, this arm of mine, the limbs of others gracefully moving,\nlet me find something that will give them greater perfection. That the\nbones may be firmer, somewhat larger if that would be an advantage,\ncertainly stronger, that the cartilage and sinews may be more enduring,\nand the muscles more powerful, something after the manner of those\nideal limbs and muscles sculptured of old, these in the flesh and real.\nThat the organs of the body may be stronger in their action, perfect,\nand lasting. That the exterior flesh may be yet more beautiful; that\nthe shape may be finer, and the motions graceful. These are the\nsoberest words I can find, purposely chosen; for I am so rapt in the\nbeauty of the human form, and so earnestly, so inexpressibly, prayerful\nto see that form perfect, that my full thought is not to be written.\nUnable to express it fully, I have considered it best to put it in the\nsimplest manner of words. I believe in the human form; let me find\nsomething, some method, by which that form may achieve the utmost\nbeauty. Its beauty is like an arrow, which may be shot any distance\naccording to the strength of the bow. So the idea expressed in the\nhuman shape is capable of indefinite expansion and elevation of beauty.\n\nOf the mind, the inner consciousness, the soul, my prayer desired that\nI might discover a mode of life for it, so that it might not only\nconceive of such a life, but actually enjoy it on the earth. I wished\nto search out a new and higher set of ideas on which the mind should\nwork. The simile of a new book of the soul is the nearest to convey the\nmeaning\u2014a book drawn from the present and future, not the past. Instead\nof a set of ideas based on tradition, let me give the mind a new\nthought drawn straight from the wondrous present, direct this very\nhour. Next, to furnish the soul with the means of executing its will,\nof carrying thought into action. In other words, for the soul to become\na power. These three formed the Lyra prayer, of which the two first are\nimmeasurably the in more important. I believe in the human being, mind\nand flesh; form and soul.\n\nIt happened just afterwards that I went to Pevensey, and immediately\nthe ancient wall swept my mind back seventeen hundred years to the\neagle, the pilum, and the short sword. The grey stones, the thin red\nbricks laid by those whose eyes had seen C\u00e6sar\u2019s Rome, lifted me out of\nthe grasp of house-life, of modern civilisation, of those minutiae\nwhich occupy the moment. The grey stone made me feel as if I had\nexisted from then till now, so strongly did I enter into and see my own\nlife as if reflected. My own existence was focused back on me; I saw\nits joy, its unhappiness, its birth, its death, its possibilities among\nthe infinite, above all its yearning Question. Why? Seeing it thus\nclearly, and lifted out of the moment by the force of seventeen\ncenturies, I recognised the full mystery and the depths of things in\nthe roots of the dry grass on the wall, in the green sea flowing near.\nIs there anything I can do? The mystery and the possibilities are not\nin the roots of the grass, nor is the depth of things in the sea; they\nare in my existence, in my soul. The marvel of existence, almost the\nterror of it, was flung on me with crushing force by the sea, the sun\nshining, the distant hills. With all their ponderous weight they made\nme feel myself: all the time, all the centuries made me feel myself\nthis moment a hundred-fold. I determined that I would endeavour to\nwrite what I had so long thought of, and the same evening put down one\nsentence. There the sentence remained two years. I tried to carry it\non; I hesitated because I could not express it: nor can I now, though\nin desperation I am throwing these rude stones of thought together,\nrude as those of the ancient wall.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\n\nThere were grass-grown tumuli on the hills to which of old I used to\nwalk, sit down at the foot of one of them, and think. Some warrior had\nbeen interred there in the antehistoric times. The sun of the summer\nmorning shone on the dome of sward, and the air came softly up from the\nwheat below, the tips of the grasses swayed as it passed sighing\nfaintly, it ceased, and the bees hummed by to the thyme and heathbells.\nI became absorbed in the glory of the day, the sunshine, the sweet air,\nthe yellowing corn turning from its sappy green to summer\u2019s noon of\ngold, the lark\u2019s song like a waterfall in the sky. I felt at that\nmoment that I was like the spirit of the man whose body was interred in\nthe tumulus; I could understand and feel his existence the same as my\nown. He was as real to me two thousand years after interment as those I\nhad seen in the body. The abstract personality of the dead seemed as\nexistent as thought. As my thought could slip back the twenty centuries\nin a moment to the forest-days when he hurled the spear, or shot with\nthe bow, hunting the deer, and could return again as swiftly to this\nmoment, so his spirit could endure from then till now, and the time was\nnothing.\n\nTwo thousand years being a second to the soul could not cause its\nextinction. It was no longer to the soul than my thought occupied to\nme. Recognising my own inner consciousness, the psyche, so clearly,\ndeath did not seem to me to affect the personality. In dissolution\nthere was no bridgeless chasm, no unfathomable gulf of separation; the\nspirit did not immediately become inaccessible, leaping at a bound to\nan immeasurable distance. Look at another person while living; the soul\nis not visible, only the body which it animates. Therefore, merely\nbecause after death the soul is not visible is no demonstration that it\ndoes not still live. The condition of being unseen is the same\ncondition which occurs while the body is living, so that intrinsically\nthere is nothing exceptionable, or supernatural, in the life of the\nsoul after death. Resting by the tumulus, the spirit of the man who had\nbeen interred there was to me really alive, and very close. This was\nquite natural, as natural and simple as the grass waving in the wind,\nthe bees humming, and the larks\u2019 songs. Only by the strongest effort of\nthe mind could I understand the idea of extinction; that was\nsupernatural, requiring a miracle; the immortality of the soul natural,\nlike earth. Listening to the sighing of the grass I felt immortality as\nI felt the beauty of the summer morning, and I thought beyond\nimmortality, of other conditions, more beautiful than existence, higher\nthan immortality.\n\nThat there is no knowing, in the sense of written reasons, whether the\nsoul lives on or not, I am fully aware. I do not hope or fear. At least\nwhile I am living I have enjoyed the idea of immortality, and the idea\nof my own soul. If then, after death, I am resolved without exception\ninto earth, air, and water, and the spirit goes out like a flame, still\nI shall have had the glory of that thought.\n\nIt happened once that a man was drowned while bathing, and his body was\nplaced in an outhouse near the garden. I passed the outhouse\ncontinually, sometimes on purpose to think about it, and it always\nseemed to me that the man was still living. Separation is not to be\ncomprehended; the spirit of the man did not appear to have gone to an\nin conceivable distance. As my thought flashes itself back through the\ncenturies to the luxury of Canopus, and can see the gilded couches of a\ncity extinct, so it slips through the future, and immeasurable time in\nfront is no boundary to it. Certainly the man was not dead to me.\n\nSweetly the summer air came up to the tumulus, the grass sighed softly,\nthe butterflies went by, sometimes alighting on the green dome. Two\nthousand years! Summer after summer the blue butterflies had visited\nthe mound, the thyme had flowered, the wind sighed in the grass. The\nazure morning had spread its arms over the low tomb; and full glowing\nnoon burned on it; the purple of sunset rosied the sward. Stars, ruddy\nin the vapour of the southern horizon, beamed at midnight through the\nmystic summer night, which is dusky and yet full of light. White mists\nswept up and hid it; dews rested on the turf; tender harebells drooped;\nthe wings of the finches fanned the air\u2014finches whose colours faded\nfrom the wings how many centuries ago! Brown autumn dwelt in the woods\nbeneath; the rime of winter whitened the beech clump on the ridge;\nagain the buds came on the wind-blown hawthorn bushes, and in the\nevening the broad constellation of Orion covered the east. Two thousand\ntimes! Two thousand times the woods grew green, and ring-doves built\ntheir nests. Day and night for two thousand years\u2014light and shadow\nsweeping over the mound\u2014two thousand years of labour by day and slumber\nby night. Mystery gleaming in the stars, pouring down in the sunshine,\nspeaking in the night, the wonder of the sun and of far space, for\ntwenty centuries round about this low and green-grown dome. Yet all\nthat mystery and wonder is as nothing to the Thought that lies therein,\nto the spirit that I feel so close.\n\nRealising that spirit, recognising my own inner consciousness, the\npsyche, so clearly, I cannot understand time. It is eternity now. I am\nin the midst of it. It is about me in the sunshine; I am in it, as the\nbutterfly floats in the light-laden air. Nothing has to come; it is\nnow. Now is eternity; now is the immortal life. Here this moment, by\nthis tumulus, on earth, now; I exist in it. The years, the centuries,\nthe cycles are absolutely nothing; it is only a moment since this\ntumulus was raised; in a thousand years it will still be only a moment.\nTo the soul there is no past and no future; all is and will be ever, in\nnow. For artificial purposes time is mutually agreed on, but is really\nno such thing. The shadow goes on upon the dial, the index moves round\nupon the clock, and what is the difference? None whatever. If the clock\nhad never been set going, what would have been the difference? There\nmay be time for the clock, the clock may make time for itself; there is\nnone for me.\n\nI dip my hand in the brook and feel the stream; in an instant the\nparticles of water which first touched me have floated yards down the\ncurrent, my hand remains there. I take my hand away, and the flow\u2014the\ntime\u2014of the brook does not exist to me. The great clock of the\nfirmament, the sun and the stars, the crescent moon, the earth circling\ntwo thousand times, is no more to me than the flow of the brook when my\nhand is withdrawn; my soul has never been, and never can be, dipped in\ntime. Time has never existed, and never will; it is a purely artificial\narrangement. It is eternity now, it always was eternity, and always\nwill be. By no possible means could I get into time if I tried. I am in\neternity now and must there remain. Haste not, be at rest, this Now is\neternity. Because the idea of time has left my mind\u2014if ever it had any\nhold on it\u2014to me the man interred in the tumulus is living now as I\nlive. We are both in eternity.\n\nThere is no separation-no past; eternity, the Now, is continuous. When\nall the stars have revolved they only produce Now again. The continuity\nof Now is for ever. So that it appears to me purely natural, and not\nsuper natural, that the soul whose temporary frame was interred in this\nmound should be existing as I sit on the sward. How infinitely deeper\nis thought than the million miles of the firmament! The wonder is here,\nnot there; now, not to be, now always. Things that have been miscalled\nsupernatural appear to me simple, more natural than nature, than earth,\nthan sea, or sun. It is beyond telling more natural that I should have\na soul than not, that there should be immortality; I think there is\nmuch more than immortality. It is matter which is the supernatural, and\ndifficult of under-standing. Why this clod of earth I hold in my hand?\nWhy this water which drops sparkling from my fingers dipped in the\nbrook? Why are they at all? When? How? What for? Matter is beyond\nunderstanding, mysterious, impenetrable; I touch it easily, comprehend\nit, no. Soul, mind\u2014the thought, the idea\u2014is easily understood, it\nunderstands itself and is conscious.\n\nThe supernatural miscalled, the natural in truth, is the real. To me\neverything is supernatural. How strange that condition of mind which\ncannot accept anything but the earth, the sea, the tangible universe!\nWithout the misnamed supernatural these to me seem incomplete,\nunfinished. Without soul all these are dead. Except when I walk by the\nsea, and my soul is by it, the sea is dead. Those seas by which no man\nhas stood\u2014which no soul has been\u2014whether on earth or the planets, are\ndead. No matter how majestic the planet rolls in space, unless a soul\nbe there it is dead. As I move about in the sunshine I feel in the\nmidst of the supernatural: in the midst of immortal things. It is\nimpossible to wrest the mind down to the same laws that rule pieces of\ntimber, water, or earth. They do not control the soul, however rigidly\nthey may bind matter. So full am I always of a sense of the immortality\nnow at this moment round about me, that it would not surprise me in the\nleast if a circumstance outside physical experience occurred. It would\nseem to me quite natural. Give the soul the power it conceives, and\nthere would be nothing wonderful in it.\n\nI can see nothing astonishing in what are called miracles. Only those\nwho are mesmerised by matter can find a difficulty in such events. I am\naware that the evidence for miracles is logically and historically\nuntrustworthy; I am not defending recorded miracles. My point is that\nin principle I see no reason at all why they should not take place this\nday. I do not even say that there are or ever have been miracles, but I\nmaintain that they would be perfectly natural. The wonder rather is\nthat they do not happen frequently. Consider the limitless conceptions\nof the soul: let it possess but the power to realise those conceptions\nfor one hour, and how little, how trifling would be the helping of the\ninjured or the sick to regain health and happiness\u2014merely to think it.\nA soul-work would require but a thought. Soul-work is an expression\nbetter suited to my meaning than \u201cmiracle,\u201d a term like others into\nwhich a special sense has been infused.\n\nWhen I consider that I dwell this moment in the eternal Now that has\never been and will be, that I am in the midst of immortal things this\nmoment, that there probably are Souls as infinitely superior to mine as\nmine to a piece of timber, what then, pray, is a \u201cmiracle\u201d? As commonly\nunderstood, a \u201cmiracle\u201d is a mere nothing. I can conceive soul-works\ndone by simple will or thought a thousand times greater. I marvel that\nthey do not happen this moment. The air, the sunlight, the night, all\nthat surrounds me seems crowded with inexpressible powers, with the\ninfluence of Souls, or existences, so that I walk in the midst of\nimmortal things. I myself am a living witness of it. Sometimes I have\nconcentrated myself, and driven away by continued will all sense of\noutward appearances, looking straight with the full power of my mind\ninwards on myself. I find \u201cI\u201d am there; an \u201cI\u201d I do not wholly\nunderstand, or know\u2014something is there distinct from earth and timber,\nfrom flesh and bones. Recognising it, I feel on the margin of a life\nunknown, very near, almost touching it: on the verge of powers which if\nI could grasp would give me an immense breadth of existence, an ability\nto execute what I now only conceive; most probably of far more than\nthat. To see that \u201cI\u201d is to know that I am surrounded with immortal\nthings. If, when I die, that \u201cI\u201d also dies, and becomes extinct, still\neven then I have had the exaltation of these ideas.\n\nHow many words it has taken to describe so briefly the feelings and the\nthoughts that came to me by the tumulus; thoughts that swept past and\nwere gone, and were succeeded by others while yet the shadow of the\nmound had not moved from one thyme flower to another, not the breadth\nof a grass blade. Softly breathed the sweet south wind, gently the\nyellow corn waved beneath; the ancient, ancient sun shone on the fresh\ngrass and the flower, my heart opened wide as the broad, broad earth. I\nspread my arms out, laying them on the sward, seizing the grass, to\ntake the fulness of the days. Could I have my own way after death I\nwould be burned on a pyre of pine-wood, open to the air, and placed on\nthe summit of the hills. Then let my ashes be scattered abroad\u2014not\ncollected in an urn\u2014freely sown wide and broadcast. That is the\nnatural interment of man\u2014of man whose Thought at least has been among\nthe immortals; interment in the elements. Burial is not enough, it does\nnot give sufficient solution into the elements speedily; a furnace is\nconfined. The high open air of the topmost hill, there let the tawny\nflame lick up the fragment called the body; there cast the ashes into\nthe space it longed for while living. Such a luxury of interment is\nonly for the wealthy; I fear I shall not be able to afford it. Else the\nsmoke of my resolution into the elements should certainly arise in time\non the hill-top.\n\nThe silky grass sighs as the wind comes carrying the blue butterfly\nmore rapidly than his wings. A large humble-bee burrs round the green\ndome against which I rest; my hands are scented with thyme. The\nsweetness of the day, the fulness of the earth, the beauteous earth,\nhow shall I say it?\n\nThree things only have been discovered of that which concerns the inner\nconsciousness since before written history began. Three things only in\ntwelve thousand written, or sculptured, years, and in the dumb, dim\ntime before then. Three ideas the Cavemen primeval wrested from the\nunknown, the night which is round us still in daylight\u2014the existence of\nthe soul, immortality, the deity. These things found, prayer followed\nas a sequential result. Since then nothing further has been found in\nall the twelve thousand years, as if men had been satisfied and had\nfound these to suffice. They do not suffice me. I desire to advance\nfurther, and to wrest a fourth, and even still more than a fourth, from\nthe darkness of thought. I want more ideas of soul-life. I am certain\nthat there are more yet to be found. A great life\u2014an entire\ncivilisation\u2014lies just outside the pale of common thought. Cities and\ncountries, inhabitants, intelligences, culture\u2014an entire civilisation.\nExcept by illustrations drawn from familiar things, there is no way of\nindicating a new idea. I do not mean actual cities, actual\ncivilisation. Such life is different from any yet imagined. A nexus of\nideas exists of which nothing is known\u2014a vast system of ideas\u2014a cosmos\nof thought. There is an Entity, a Soul-Entity, as yet unrecognised.\nThese, rudely expressed, constitute my Fourth Idea. It is beyond, or\nbeside, the three discovered by the Cavemen; it is in addition to the\nexistence of the soul; in addition to immortality; and beyond the idea\nof the deity. I think there is something more than existence.\n\nThere is an immense ocean over which the mind can sail, upon which the\nvessel of thought has not yet been launched. I hope to launch it. The\nmind of so many thousand years has worked round and round inside the\ncircle of these three ideas as a boat on an inland lake. Let us haul it\nover the belt of land, launch on the ocean, and sail outwards.\n\nThere is so much beyond all that has ever yet been imagined. As I write\nthese words, in the very moment, I feel that the whole air, the\nsunshine out yonder lighting up the ploughed earth, the distant sky,\nthe circumambient ether, and that far space, is full of soul-secrets,\nsoul-life, things outside the experience of all the ages. The fact of\nmy own existence as I write, as I exist at this second, is so\nmarvellous, so miracle-like, strange, and supernatural to me, that I\nunhesitatingly conclude I am always on the margin of life illimitable,\nand that there are higher conditions than existence. Everything around\nis supernatural; everything so full of unexplained meaning.\n\nTwelve thousand years since the Caveman stood at the mouth of his\ncavern and gazed out at the night and the stars. He looked again and\nsaw the sun rise beyond the sea. He reposed in the noontide heat under\nthe shade of the trees, he closed his eyes and looked into himself. He\nwas face to face with the earth, the sun, the night; face to face with\nhimself. There was nothing between; no wall of written tradition; no\nbuilt up system of culture\u2014his naked mind was confronted by naked\nearth. He made three idea-discoveries, wresting them from the unknown;\nthe existence of his soul, immortality, the deity. Now, to-day, as I\nwrite, I stand in exactly the same position as the Caveman. Written\ntradition, systems of culture, modes of thought, have for me no\nexistence. If ever they took any hold of my mind it must have been very\nslight; they have long ago been erased.\n\nFrom earth and sea and sun, from night, the stars, from day, the trees,\nthe hills, from my own soul\u2014from these I think. I stand this moment at\nthe mouth of the ancient cave, face to face with nature, face to face\nwith the supernatural, with myself. My naked mind confronts the\nunknown. I see as clearly as the noonday that this is not all; I see\nother and higher conditions than existence; I see not only the\nexistence of the soul, immortality, but, in addition, I realise a\nsoul-life illimitable; I realise the existence of a cosmos of thought;\nI realise the existence of an inexpressible entity infinitely higher\nthan deity. I strive to give utterance to a Fourth Idea. The very idea\nthat there is another idea is something gained. The three found by the\nCavemen are but stepping-stones: first links of an endless chain. At\nthe mouth of the ancient cave, face to face with the unknown, they\nprayed. Prone in heart to-day I pray, Give me the deepest soul-life.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n\nThe wind sighs through the grass, sighs in the sunshine; it has drifted\nthe butterfly eastwards along the hill. A few yards away there lies the\nskull of a lamb on the turf, white and bleached, picked clean long\nsince by crows and ants. Like the faint ripple of the summer sea\nsounding in the hollow of the ear, so the sweet air ripples in the\ngrass. The ashes of the man interred in the tumulus are\nindistinguishable; they have sunk away like rain into the earth; so his\nbody has disappeared. I am under no delusion; I am fully aware that no\ndemonstration can be given of the three stepping-stones of the Cavemen.\nThe soul is inscrutable; it is not in evidence to show that it exists;\nimmortality is not tangible. Full well I know that reason and knowledge\nand experience tend to disprove all three; that experience denies\nanswer to prayer. I am under no delusion whatever; I grasp death firmly\nin conception as I can grasp this bleached bone; utter extinction,\nannihilation. That the soul is a product at best of organic\ncomposition; that it goes out like a flame. This may be the end; my\nsoul may sink like rain into the earth and disappear. Wind and earth,\nsea, and night and day, what then? Let my soul be but a product, what\nthen? I say it is nothing to me; this only I know, that while I have\nlived\u2014now, this moment, while I live\u2014I think immortality, I lift my\nmind to a Fourth Idea. If I pass into utter oblivion, yet I have had\nthat.\n\nThe original three ideas of the Cavemen became encumbered with\nsuperstition; ritual grew up, and ceremony, and long ranks of souls\nwere painted on papyri waiting to be weighed in the scales, and to be\npunished or rewarded. These cobwebs grotesque have sullied the original\ndiscoveries and cast them into discredit. Erase them altogether, and\nconsider only the underlying principles. The principles do not go far\nenough, but I shall not discard all of them for that. Even supposing\nthe pure principles to be illusions, and annihilation the end, even\nthen it is better\u2014it is something gained to have thought them. Thought\nis life; to have thought them is to have lived them. Accepting two of\nthem as true in principle, then I say that these are but the threshold.\nFor twelve thousand years no effort has been made to get beyond that\nthreshold. These are but the primer of soul-life; the merest\nhieroglyphics chipped out, a little shape given to the unknown.\n\nNot to-morrow but to-day. Not the to-morrow of the tumulus, the hour of\nthe sunshine now. This moment give me to live soul-life, not only after\ndeath. Now is eternity, now I am in the midst of immortality; now the\nsupernatural crowds around me. Open my mind, give my soul to see, let\nme live it now on earth, while I hear the burring of the larger bees,\nthe sweet air in the grass, and watch the yellow wheat wave beneath me.\nSun and earth and sea, night and day\u2014these are the least of things.\nGive me soul-life.\n\nThere is nothing human in nature. The earth, though loved so dearly,\nwould let me perish on the ground, and neither bring forth food nor\nwater. Burning in the sky the great sun, of whose company I have been\nso fond, would merely burn on and make no motion to assist me. Those\nwho have been in an open boat at sea without water have proved the\nmercies of the sun, and of the deity who did not give them one drop of\nrain, dying in misery under the same rays that smile so beautifully on\nthe flowers. In the south the sun is the enemy; night and coolness and\nrain are the friends of man. As for the sea, it offers us salt water\nwhich we cannot drink. The trees care nothing for us; the hill I\nvisited so often in days gone by has not missed me. The sun scorches\nman, and willing his naked state roast him alive. The sea and the fresh\nwater alike make no effort to uphold him if his vessel founders; he\ncasts up his arms in vain, they come to their level over his head,\nfilling the spot his body occupied. If he falls from a cliff the air\nparts; the earth beneath dashes him to pieces.\n\nWater he can drink, but it is not produced for him; how many thousands\nhave perished for want of it? Some fruits are produced which he can\neat, but they do not produce themselves for him; merely for the purpose\nof continuing their species. In wild, tropical countries, at the first\nglance there appears to be some consideration for him, but it is on the\nsurface only. The lion pounces on him, the rhinoceros crushes him, the\nserpent bites, insects torture, diseases rack him. Disease worked its\ndreary will even among the flower-crowned Polynesians. Returning to our\nown country, this very thyme which scents my fingers did not grow for\nthat purpose, but for its own. So does the wheat beneath; we utilise\nit, but its original and native purpose was for itself. By night it is\nthe same as by day; the stars care not, they pursue their courses\nrevolving, and we are nothing to them. There is nothing human in the\nwhole round of nature. All nature, all the universe that we can see, is\nabsolutely indifferent to us, and except to us human life is of no more\nvalue than grass. If the entire human race perished at this hour, what\ndifference would it make to the earth? What would the earth care? As\nmuch as for the extinct dodo, or for the fate of the elephant now\ngoing.\n\nOn the contrary, a great part, perhaps the whole, of nature and of the\nuniverse is distinctly anti-human. The term inhuman does not express my\nmeaning, anti-human is better; outre-human, in the sense of beyond,\noutside, almost grotesque in its attitude towards, would nearly convey\nit. Everything is anti-human. How extraordinary, strange, and\nincomprehensible are the creatures captured out of the depths of the\nsea! The distorted fishes; the ghastly cuttles; the hideous eel-like\nshapes; the crawling shell-encrusted things; the centipede-like beings;\nmonstrous forms, to see which gives a shock to the brain. They shock\nthe mind because they exhibit an absence of design. There is no idea in\nthem.\n\nThey have no shape, form, grace, or purpose; they call up a vague sense\nof chaos, chaos which the mind revolts from. It would be a relief to\nthe thought if they ceased to be, and utterly disappeared from the sea.\nThey are not inimical of intent towards man, not even the shark; but\nthere the shark is, and that is enough. These miserably hideous things\nof the sea are not anti-human in the sense of persecution, they are\noutside, they are ultra and beyond. It is like looking into chaos, and\nit is vivid because these creatures, interred alive a hundred fathoms\ndeep, are seldom seen; so that the mind sees them as if only that\nmoment they had come into existence. Use has not habituated it to them,\nso that their anti-human character is at once apparent, and stares at\nus with glassy eye.\n\nBut it is the same in reality with the creatures on the earth. There\nare some of these even now to which use has not accustomed the mind.\nSuch, for instance, as the toad. At its shapeless shape appearing in an\nunexpected corner many people start and exclaim. They are aware that\nthey shall receive no injury from it, yet it affrights them, it sends a\nshock to the mind. The reason lies in its obviously anti-human\ncharacter. All the designless, formless chaos of chance-directed\nmatter, without idea or human plan, squats there embodied in the\npathway. By watching the creature, and convincing the mind from\nobservation that it is harmless, and even has uses, the horror wears\naway. But still remains the form to which the mind can never reconcile\nitself. Carved in wood it is still repellent.\n\nOr suddenly there is a rustle like a faint hiss in the grass, and a\ngreen snake glides over the bank. The breath in the chest seems to lose\nits vitality; for an instant the nerves refuse to transmit the force of\nlife. The gliding yellow-streaked worm is so utterly opposed to the\never present Idea in the mind. Custom may reduce the horror, but no\nlong pondering can ever bring that creature within the pale of the\nhuman Idea. These are so distinctly opposite and anti-human that\nthousands of years have not sufficed to soften their outline. Various\ninsects and creeping creatures excite the same sense in lesser degrees.\nAnimals and birds in general do not. The tiger is dreaded, but causes\nno disgust. The exception is in those that feed on offal. Horses and\ndogs we love; we not only do not recognise anything opposite in them,\nwe come to love them.\n\nThey are useful to us, they show more or less sympathy with us, they\npossess, especially the horse, a certain grace of movement. A gloss, as\nit were, is thrown over them by these attributes and by familiarity.\nThe shape of the horse to the eye has become conventional: it is\naccepted. Yet the horse is not in any sense human. Could we look at it\nsuddenly, without previous acquaintance, as at strange fishes in a\ntank, the ultra-human character of the horse would be apparent. It is\nthe curves of the neck and body that carry the horse past without\nadverse comment. Examine the hind legs in detail, and the curious\nbackward motion, the shape and anti-human curves become apparent. Dogs\ntake us by their intelligence, but they have no hand; pass the hand\nover the dog\u2019s head, and the shape of the skull to the sense of feeling\nis almost as repellent as the form of the toad to the sense of sight.\nWe have gradually gathered around us all the creatures that are less\nmarkedly anti-human, horses and dogs and birds, but they are still\nthemselves. They originally existed like the wheat, for themselves; we\nutilise them, but they are not of us.\n\nThere is nothing human in any living animal. All nature, the universe\nas far as we see, is anti- or ultra-human, outside, and has no concern\nwith man. These things are unnatural to him. By no course of reasoning,\nhowever tortuous, can nature and the universe be fitted to the mind.\nNor can the mind be fitted to the cosmos. My mind cannot be twisted to\nit; I am separate altogether from these designless things. The soul\ncannot be wrested down to them. The laws of nature are of no importance\nto it. I refuse to be bound by the laws of the tides, nor am I so\nbound. Though bodily swung round on this rotating globe, my mind always\nremains in the centre. No tidal law, no rotation, no gravitation can\ncontrol my thought.\n\nCenturies of thought have failed to reconcile and fit the mind to the\nuniverse, which is designless, and purposeless, and without idea. I\nwill not endeavour to fit my thought to it any longer; I find and\nbelieve myself to be distinct\u2014separate; and I will labour in earnest to\nobtain the highest culture for myself. As these natural things have no\nconnection with man, it follows again that the natural is the strange\nand mysterious, and the supernatural the natural.\n\nThere being nothing human in nature or the universe, and all things\nbeing ultra-human and without design, shape, or purpose, I conclude\nthat, no deity has anything to do with nature. There is no god in\nnature, nor in any matter anywhere, either in the clods on the earth or\nin the composition of the stars. For what we understand by the deity is\nthe purest form of Idea, of Mind, and no mind is exhibited in these.\nThat which controls them is distinct altogether from deity. It is not\nforce in the sense of electricity, nor a deity as god, nor a spirit,\nnot even an intelligence, but a power quite different to anything yet\nimagined. I cease, therefore, to look for deity in nature or the cosmos\nat large, or to trace any marks of divine handiwork. I search for\ntraces of this force which is not god, and is certainly not the higher\nthan deity of whom I have written. It is a force without a mind. I wish\nto indicate something more subtle than electricity, but absolutely\ndevoid of consciousness, and with no more feeling than the force which\nlifts the tides.\n\nNext, in human affairs, in the relations of man with man, in the\nconduct of life, in the events that occur, in human affairs generally\neverything happens by chance. No prudence in conduct, no wisdom or\nforesight can effect anything, for the most trivial circumstance will\nupset the deepest plan of the wisest mind. As Xenophon observed in old\ntimes, wisdom is like casting dice and determining your course by the\nnumber that appears. Virtue, humanity, the best and most beautiful\nconduct is wholly in vain. The history of thousands of years\ndemonstrates it. In all these years there is no more moving instance on\nrecord than that of Danae, when she was dragged to the precipice, two\nthousand years ago. Sophron was governor of Ephesus, and Laodice\nplotted to assassinate him. Danae discovered the plot, and warned\nSophron, who fled, and saved his life. Laodice\u2014the murderess in\nintent\u2014had Danae seized and cast from a cliff. On the verge Danae said\nthat some persons despised the deity, and they might now prove the\njustice of their contempt by her fate. For having saved the man who was\nto her as a husband, she was rewarded in this way with cruel death by\nthe deity, but Laodice was advanced to honour. The bitterness of these\nwords remains to this hour.\n\nIn truth the deity, if responsible for such a thing, or for similar\nthings which occur now, should be despised. One must always despise the\nfatuous belief in such a deity. But as everything in human affairs\nobviously happens by chance, it is clear that no deity is responsible.\nIf the deity guides chance in that manner, then let the deity be\ndespised. Apparently the deity does not interfere, and all things\nhappen by chance. I cease, therefore, to look for traces of the deity\nin life, because no such traces exist.\n\nI conclude that there is an existence, a something higher than\nsoul\u2014higher, better, and more perfect than deity. Earnestly I pray to\nfind this something better than a god. There is something superior,\nhigher, more good. For this I search, labour, think, and pray. If after\nall there be nothing, and my soul has to go out like a flame, yet even\nthen I have thought this while it lives. With the whole force of my\nexistence, with the whole force of my thought, mind, and soul, I pray\nto find this Highest Soul, this greater than deity, this better than\ngod. Give me to live the deepest soul-life now and always with this\nSoul. For want of words I write soul, but I think that it is something\nbeyond soul.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\n\nIt is not possible to narrate these incidents of the mind in strict\norder. I must now return to a period earlier than anything already\nnarrated, and pass in review other phases of my search from then up\ntill recently. So long since that I have forgotten the date, I used\nevery morning to visit a spot where I could get a clear view of the\neast. Immediately on rising I went out to some elms; thence I could see\nacross the dewy fields to the distant hill over or near which the sun\nrose. These elms partially hid me, for at that time I had a dislike to\nbeing seen, feeling that I should be despised if I was noticed. This\nhappened once or twice, and I knew I was watched contemptuously, though\nno one had the least idea of my object. But I went every morning, and\nwas satisfied if I could get two or three minutes to think unchecked.\nOften I saw the sun rise over the line of the hills, but if it was\nsummer the sun had been up a long time.\n\nI looked at the hills, at the dewy grass, and then up through the elm\nbranches to the sky. In a moment all that was behind me, the house, the\npeople, the sounds, seemed to disappear, and to leave me alone.\nInvoluntarily I drew a long breath, then I breathed slowly. My thought,\nor inner consciousness, went up through the illumined sky, and I was\nlost in a moment of exaltation. This only lasted a very short time,\nperhaps only part of a second, and while it lasted there was no\nformulated wish. I was absorbed; I drank the beauty of the morning; I\nwas exalted. When it ceased I did wish for some increase or enlargement\nof my existence to correspond with the largeness of feeling I had\nmomentarily enjoyed. Sometimes the wind came through the tops of the\nelms, and the slender boughs bent, and gazing up through them, and\nbeyond the fleecy clouds, I felt lifted up. The light coming across the\ngrass and leaving itself on the dew-drops, the sound of the wind, and\nthe sense of mounting to the lofty heaven, filled me with a deep sigh,\na wish to draw something out of the beauty of it, some part of that\nwhich caused my admiration, the subtle inner essence.\n\nSometimes the green tips of the highest boughs seemed gilded, the light\nlaid a gold on the green. Or the trees bowed to a stormy wind roaring\nthrough them, the grass threw itself down, and in the east broad\ncurtains of a rosy tint stretched along. The light was turned to\nredness in the vapour, and rain hid the summit of the hill. In the rush\nand roar of the stormy wind the same exaltation, the same desire,\nlifted me for a moment. I went there every morning, I could not exactly\ndefine why; it was like going to a rose bush to taste the scent of the\nflower and feel the dew from its petals on the lips. But I desired the\nbeauty\u2014the inner subtle meaning\u2014to be in me, that I might have it, and\nwith it an existence of a higher kind.\n\nLater on I began to have daily pilgrimages to think these things. There\nwas a feeling that I must go somewhere, and be alone. It was a\nnecessity to have a few minutes of this separate life every day; my\nmind required to live its own life apart from other things. A great oak\nat a short distance was one resort, and sitting on the grass at the\nroots, or leaning against the trunk and looking over the quiet meadows\ntowards the bright southern sky, I could live my own life a little\nwhile. Behind the trunk I was alone; I liked to lean against it; to\ntouch the lichen on the rough bark. High in the wood of branches the\nbirds were not alarmed; they sang, or called, and passed to and fro\nhappily. The wind moved the leaves, and they replied to it softly; and\nnow at this distance of time I can see the fragments of sky up through\nthe boughs. Bees were always humming in the green field; ring-doves\nwent over swiftly, flying for the woods.\n\nOf the sun I was conscious; I could not look at it, but the boughs held\nback the beams so that I could feel the sun\u2019s presence pleasantly. They\nshaded the sun, yet let me know that it was there. There came to me a\ndelicate, but at the same time a deep, strong, and sensuous enjoyment\nof the beautiful green earth, the beautiful sky and sun; I felt them,\nthey gave me inexpressible delight, as if they embraced and poured out\ntheir love upon me. It was I who loved them, for my heart was broader\nthan the earth; it is broader now than even then, more thirsty and\ndesirous. After the sensuous enjoyment always came the thought, the\ndesire: That I might be like this; that I might have the inner meaning\nof the sun, the light, the earth, the trees and grass, translated into\nsome growth of excellence in myself, both of body and of mind; greater\nperfection of physique, greater perfection of mind and soul; that I\nmight be higher in myself. To this oak I came daily for a long time;\nsometimes only for a minute, for just to view the spot was enough. In\nthe bitter cold of spring, when the north wind blackened everything, I\nused to come now and then at night to look from under the bare branches\nat the splendour of the southern sky. The stars burned with brilliance,\nbroad Orion and flashing Sirius\u2014there are more or brighter\nconstellations visible then than all the year: and the clearness of the\nair and the blackness of the sky\u2014black, not clouded\u2014let them gleam in\ntheir fulness. They lifted me\u2014they gave me fresh vigour of soul. Not\nall that the stars could have given, had they been destinies, could\nhave satiated me. This, all this, and more, I wanted in myself.\n\nThere was a place a mile or so along the road where the hills could be\nseen much better; I went there frequently to think the same thought.\nAnother spot was by an elm, a very short walk, where openings in the\ntrees, and the slope of the ground, brought the hills well into view.\nThis too, was a favourite thinking-place. Another was a wood, half an\nhour\u2019s walk distant, through part of which a rude track went, so that\nit was not altogether inclosed. The ash-saplings, and the trees, the\nfirs, the hazel bushes\u2014to be among these enabled me to be myself. From\nthe buds of spring to the berries of autumn, I always liked to be\nthere. Sometimes in spring there was a sheen of blue-bells covering\nacres; the doves cooed; the blackbirds whistled sweetly; there was a\ntaste of green things in the air. But it was the tall firs that pleased\nme most; the glance rose up the flame-shaped fir-tree, tapering to its\ngreen tip, and above was the azure sky. By aid of the tree I felt the\nsky more. By aid of everything beautiful I felt myself, and in that\nintense sense of consciousness prayed for greater perfection of soul\nand body.\n\nAfterwards, I walked almost daily more than two miles along the road to\na spot where the hills began, where from the first rise the road could\nbe seen winding southwards over the hills, open and uninclosed. I\npaused a minute or two by a clump of firs, in whose branches the wind\nalways sighed\u2014there is always a movement of the air on a hill.\nSouthwards the sky was illumined by the sun, southwards the clouds\nmoved across the opening or pass in the amphitheatre, and southwards,\nthough far distant, was the sea. There I could think a moment. These\npilgrimages gave me a few sacred minutes daily; the moment seemed holy\nwhen the thought or desire came in its full force.\n\nA time came when, having to live in a town, these pilgrimages had to be\nsuspended. The wearisome work on which I was engaged would not permit\nof them. But I used to look now and then, from a window, in the evening\nat a birch-tree at some distance; its graceful boughs drooped across\nthe glow of the sunset. The thought was not suspended; it lived in me\nalways. A bitterer time still came when it was necessary to be\nseparated from those I loved. There is little indeed in the more\nimmediate suburbs of London to gratify the sense of the beautiful. Yet\nthere was a cedar by which I used to walk up and down, and think the\nsame thoughts as under the great oak in the solitude of the sunlit\nmeadows. In the course of slow time happier circumstances brought us\ntogether again, and, though near London, at a spot where there was easy\naccess to meadows and woods. Hills that purify those who walk on them\nthere were not. Still I thought my old thoughts.\n\nI was much in London, and, engagements completed, I wandered about in\nthe same way as in the woods of former days. From the stone bridges I\nlooked down on the river; the gritty dust, the straws that lie on the\nbridges, flew up and whirled round with every gust from the flowing\ntide; gritty dust that settles in the nostrils and on the lips, the\nvery residuum of all that is repulsive in the greatest city of the\nworld. The noise of the traffic and the constant pressure from the\ncrowds passing, their incessant and disjointed talk, could not distract\nme. One moment at least I had, a moment when I thought of the push of\nthe great sea forcing the water to flow under the feet of these crowds,\nthe distant sea strong and splendid; when I saw the sunlight gleam on\nthe tidal wavelets; when I felt the wind, and was conscious of the\nearth, the sea, the sun, the air, the immense forces working on, while\nthe city hummed by the river. Nature was deepened by the crowds and\nfoot-worn stones. If the tide had ebbed, and the masts of the vessels\nwere tilted as the hulls rested on the shelving mud, still even the\nblackened mud did not prevent me seeing the water as water flowing to\nthe sea. The sea had drawn down, and the wavelets washing the strand\nhere as they hastened were running the faster to it. Eastwards from\nLondon Bridge the river raced to the ocean.\n\nThe bright morning sun of summer heated the eastern parapet of London\nBridge; I stayed in the recess to acknowledge it. The smooth water was\na broad sheen of light, the built-up river flowed calm and silent by a\nthousand doors, rippling only where the stream chafed against a chain.\nRed pennants drooped, gilded vanes gleamed on polished masts,\nblack-pitched hulls glistened like a black rook\u2019s feathers in sunlight;\nthe clear air cut out the forward angles of the warehouses, the\nshadowed wharves were quiet in shadows that carried light; far down the\nships that were hauling out moved in repose, and with the stream\nfloated away into the summer mist. There was a faint blue colour in the\nair hovering between the built-up banks, against the lit walls, in the\nhollows of the houses. The swallows wheeled and climbed, twittered and\nglided downwards. Burning on, the great sun stood in the sky, heating\nthe parapet, glowing steadfastly upon me as when I rested in the narrow\nvalley grooved out in prehistoric times. Burning on steadfast, and ever\npresent as my thought. Lighting the broad river, the broad walls;\nlighting the least speck of dust; lighting the great heaven; gleaming\non my finger-nail. The fixed point of day\u2014the sun. I was intensely\nconscious of it; I felt it; I felt the presence of the immense powers\nof the universe; I felt out into the depths of the ether. So intensely\nconscious of the sun, the sky, the limitless space, I felt too in the\nmidst of eternity then, in the midst of the supernatural, among the\nimmortal, and the greatness of the material realised the spirit. By\nthese I saw my soul; by these I knew the supernatural to be more\nintensely real than the sun. I touched the supernatural, the immortal,\nthere that moment.\n\nWhen, weary of walking on the pavements, I went to rest in the National\nGallery, I sat and rested before one or other of the human pictures. I\nam not a picture lover: they are flat surfaces, but those that I call\nhuman are nevertheless beautiful. The knee in Daphnis and Chloe and the\nbreast are like living things; they draw the heart towards them, the\nheart must love them. I lived in looking; without beauty there is no\nlife for me, the divine beauty of flesh is life itself to me. The\nshoulder in the Surprise, the rounded rise of the bust, the exquisite\ntints of the ripe skin, momentarily gratified the sea-thirst in me. For\nI thirst with all the thirst of the salt sea, and the sun-heated sands\ndry for the tide, with all the sea I thirst for beauty. And I know full\nwell that one lifetime, however long, cannot fill my heart. My throat\nand tongue and whole body have often been parched and feverish dry with\nthis measureless thirst, and again moist to the fingers\u2019 ends like a\nsappy bough. It burns in me as the sun burns in the sky.\n\nThe glowing face of Cytherea in Titian\u2019s Venus and Adonis, the heated\ncheek, the lips that kiss each eye that gazes on them, the desiring\nglance, the golden hair\u2014sunbeams moulded into features\u2014this face\nanswered me. Juno\u2019s wide back and mesial groove, is any thing so lovely\nas the back? Cythereals poised hips unveiled for judgment; these called\nup the same thirst I felt on the green sward in the sun, on the wild\nbeach listening to the quiet sob as the summer wave drank at the land.\nI will search the world through for beauty. I came here and sat to rest\nbefore these in the days when I could not afford to buy so much as a\nglass of ale, weary and faint from walking on stone pavements. I came\nlater on, in better times, often straight from labours which though\nnecessary will ever be distasteful, always to rest my heart with\nloveliness. I go still; the divine beauty of flesh is life itself to\nme. It was, and is, one of my London pilgrimages.\n\nAnother was to the Greek sculpture galleries in the British Museum. The\nstatues are not, it is said, the best; broken too, and mutilated, and\nseen in a dull, commonplace light. But they were shape\u2014divine shape of\nman and woman; the form of limb and torso, of bust and neck, gave me a\nsighing sense of rest. These were they who would have stayed with me\nunder the shadow of the oaks while the blackbirds fluted and the south\nair swung the cowslips. They would have walked with me among the\nreddened gold of the wheat. They would have rested with me on the\nhill-tops and in the narrow valley grooved of ancient times. They would\nhave listened with me to the sob of the summer sea drinking the land.\nThese had thirsted of sun, and earth, and sea, and sky. Their shape\nspoke this thirst and desire like mine\u2014if I had lived with them from\nGreece till now I should not have had enough of them. Tracing the form\nof limb and torso with the eye gave me a sense of rest.\n\nSometimes I came in from the crowded streets and ceaseless hum; one\nglance at these shapes and I became myself. Sometimes I came from the\nReading-room, where under the dome I often looked up from the desk and\nrealised the crushing hopelessness of books, useless, not equal to one\nbubble borne along on the running brook I had walked by, giving no\nthought like the spring when I lifted the water in my hand and saw the\nlight gleam on it. Torso and limb, bust and neck instantly returned me\nto myself; I felt as I did lying on the turf listening to the wind\namong the grass; it would have seemed natural to have found butterflies\nfluttering among he statues. The same deep desire was with me. I shall\nalways go to speak to them; they are a place of pilgrimage; wherever\nthere is a beautiful statue there is a place of pilgrimage.\n\nI always stepped aside, too, to look awhile at the head of Julius\nC\u00e6sar. The domes of the swelling temples of his broad head are full of\nmind, evident to the eye as a globe is full of substance to the sense\nof feeling in the hands that hold it. The thin worn cheek is entirely\nhuman; endless difficulties surmounted by endless labour are marked in\nit, as the sandblast, by dint of particles ceaselessly driven, carves\nthe hardest material. If circumstances favoured him he made those\ncircumstances his own by marvellous labour, so as justly to receive the\ncredit of chance. Therefore the thin cheek is entirely human\u2014the sum of\nhuman life made visible in one face\u2014labour, and endurance, and mind,\nand all in vain. A shadow\u2014of deep sadness has gathered on it in the\nyears that have passed, because endurance was without avail. It is\nsadder to look at than the grass-grown tumulus I used to sit by,\nbecause it is a personality, and also on account of the extreme folly\nof our human race ever destroying our greatest.\n\nFar better had they endeavoured, however hopelessly, to keep him living\ntill this day. Did but the race this hour possess one-hundredth part of\nhis breadth of view, how happy for them! Of whom else can it be said\nthat he had no enemies to forgive because he recognised no enemy?\nNineteen hundred years ago he put in actual practice, with more\narbitrary power than any despot, those very principles of humanity\nwhich are now put forward as the highest culture. But he made them to\nbe actual things under his sway.\n\nThe one man filled with mind; the one man without avarice, anger,\npettiness, littleness; the one man generous and truly great of all\nhistory. It is enough to make one despair to think of the mere brutes\nbutting to death the great-minded C\u00e6sar. He comes nearest to the ideal\nof a design-power arranging the affairs of the world for good in\npractical things. Before his face\u2014the divine brow of mind above, the\nhuman suffering-drawn cheek beneath\u2014my own thought became set and\nstrengthened. That I could but look at things in the broad way he did;\nthat I could not possess one particle of such width of intellect to\nguide my own course, to cope with and drag forth from the\niron-resisting forces of the universe some one thing of my prayer for\nthe soul and for the flesh.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\n\nThere is a place in front of the Royal Exchange where the wide pavement\nreaches out like a promontory. It is in the shape of a triangle with a\nrounded apex. A stream of traffic runs on either side, and other\nstreets send their currents down into the open space before it. Like\nthe spokes of a wheel converging streams of human life flow into this\nagitated pool. Horses and carriages, carts, vans, omnibuses, cabs,\nevery kind of conveyance cross each other\u2019s course in every possible\ndirection. Twisting in and out by the wheels and under the horses\u2019\nheads, working a devious way, men and women of all conditions wind a\npath over. They fill the interstices between the carriages and blacken\nthe surface, till the vans almost float on human beings. Now the\nstreams slacken, and now they rush amain, but never cease; dark waves\nare always rolling down the incline opposite, waves swell out from the\nside rivers, all London converges into this focus. There is an\nindistinguishable noise\u2014it is not clatter, hum, or roar, it is not\nresolvable; made up of a thousand thousand footsteps, from a thousand\nhoofs, a thousand wheels\u2014of haste, and shuffle, and quick movements,\nand ponderous loads; no attention can resolve it into a fixed sound.\n\nBlue carts and yellow omnibuses, varnished carriages and brown vans,\ngreen omnibuses and red cabs, pale loads of yellow straw, rusty-red\niron clanking on paintless carts, high white wool-packs, grey horses,\nbay horses, black teams; sunlight sparkling on brass harness, gleaming\nfrom carriage panels; jingle, jingle, jingle! An intermixed and\nintertangled, ceaselessly changing jingle, too, of colour; flecks of\ncolour champed, as it were, like bits in the horses\u2019 teeth, frothed and\nstrewn about, and a surface always of dark-dressed people winding like\nthe curves on fast-flowing water. This is the vortex and whirlpool, the\ncentre of human life today on the earth. Now the tide rises and now it\nsinks, but the flow of these rivers always continues. Here it seethes\nand whirls, not for an hour only, but for all present time, hour by\nhour, day by day, year by year.\n\nHere it rushes and pushes, the atoms triturate and grind, and, eagerly\nthrusting by, pursue their separate ends. Here it appears in its\nunconcealed personality, indifferent to all else but itself, absorbed\nand rapt in eager self, devoid and stripped of conventional gloss and\npoliteness, yielding only to get its own way; driving, pushing, carried\non in a stress of feverish force like a bullet, dynamic force apart\nfrom reason or will, like the force that lifts the tides and sends the\nclouds onwards. The friction of a thousand interests evolves a\ncondition of electricity in which men are moved to and fro without\nconsidering their steps. Yet the agitated pool of life is stonily\nindifferent, the thought is absent or preoccupied, for it is evident\nthat the mass are unconscious of the scene in which they act.\n\nBut it is more sternly real than the very stones, for all these men and\nwomen that pass through are driven on by the push of accumulated\ncircumstances; they cannot stay, they must go, their necks are in the\nslave\u2019s ring, they are beaten like seaweed against the solid walls of\nfact. In ancient times, Xerxes, the king of kings, looking down upon\nhis myriads, wept to think that in a hundred years not one of them\nwould be left. Where will be these millions of to-day in a hundred\nyears? But, further than that, let us ask, Where then will be the sum\nand outcome of their labour? If they wither away like summer grass,\nwill not at least a result be left which those of a hundred years hence\nmay be the better for? No, not one jot! There will not be any sum or\noutcome or result of this ceaseless labour and movement; it vanishes in\nthe moment that it is done, and in a hundred years nothing will be\nthere, for nothing is there now. There will be no more sum or result\nthan accumulates from the motion of a revolving cowl on a housetop. Nor\ndo they receive any more sunshine during their lives, for they are\nunconscious of the sun.\n\nI used to come and stand near the apex of the promontory of pavement\nwhich juts out towards the pool of life; I still go there to ponder.\nBurning in the sky, the sun shone on me as when I rested in the narrow\nvalley carved in prehistoric time. Burning in the sky, I can never\nforget the sun. The heat of summer is dry there as if the light carried\nan impalpable dust; dry, breathless heat that will not let the skin\nrespire, but swathes up the dry fire in the blood. But beyond the heat\nand light, I felt the presence of the sun as I felt it in the solitary\nvalley, the presence of the resistless forces of the universe; the sun\nburned in the sky as I stood and pondered. Is there any theory,\nphilosophy, or creed, is there any system or culture, any formulated\nmethod able to meet and satisfy each separate item of this agitated\npool of human life? By which they may be guided, by which hope, by\nwhich look forward? Not a mere illusion of the craven heart\u2014something\nreal, as real as the solid walls of fact against which, like drifted\nsea-weed, they are dashed; something to give each separate personality\nsunshine and a flower in its own existence now; something to shape this\nmillion-handed labour to an end and outcome that will leave more\nsunshine and more flowers to those who must succeed? Something real\nnow, and not in the spirit-land; in this hour now, as I stand and the\nsun burns. Can any creed, philosophy, system, or culture endure the\ntest and remain unmolten in this fierce focus of human life?\n\nConsider, is there anything slowly painted on the once mystic and now\ncommonplace papyri of ancient, ancient Egypt, held on the mummy\u2019s\nwithered breast? In that elaborate ritual, in the procession of the\nsymbols, in the winged circle, in the laborious sarcophagus? Nothing;\nabsolutely nothing! Before the fierce heat of the human furnace, the\npapyri smoulder away as paper smoulders under a lens in the sun.\nRemember Nineveh and the cult of the fir-cone, the turbaned and bearded\nbulls of stone, the lion hunt, the painted chambers loaded with tile\nbooks, the lore of the arrow-headed writing. What is in Assyria? There\nare sand, and failing rivers, and in Assyria\u2019s writings an utter\nnothing. The aged caves of India, who shall tell when they were\nsculptured? Far back when the sun was burning, burning in the sky as\nnow in untold precedent time. Is there any meaning in those ancient\ncaves? The indistinguishable noise not to be resolved, born of the\nhuman struggle, mocks in answer.\n\nIn the strange characters of the Zend, in the Sanscrit, in the\neffortless creed of Confucius, in the Aztec coloured-string writings\nand rayed stones, in the uncertain marks left of the sunken Polynesian\ncontinent, hieroglyphs as useless as those of Memphis, nothing.\nNothing! They have been tried, and were found an illusion. Think then,\nto-day, now looking from this apex of the pavement promontory outwards\nfrom our own land to the utmost bounds of the farthest sail, is there\nany faith or culture at this hour which can stand in this fierce heat?\nFrom the various forms of Semitic, Aryan, or Turanian creed now\nexisting, from the printing-press to the palm-leaf volume on to those\nwho call on the jewel in the lotus, can aught be gathered which can\nface this, the Reality? The indistinguishable noise, non-resolvable,\nroars a loud contempt.\n\nTurn, then, to the calm reasoning of Aristotle; is there anything in\nthat? Can the half-divine thought of Plato, rising in storeys of\nsequential ideas, following each other to the conclusion, endure here?\nNo! All the philosophers in Diogenes Laertius fade away: the theories\nof medi\u00e6val days; the organon of experiment; down to this hour\u2014they are\nuseless alike. The science of this hour, drawn from the printing-press\nin an endless web of paper, is powerless here; the indistinguishable\nnoise echoed from the smoke-shadowed walls despises the whole. A\nthousand footsteps, a thousand hoofs, a thousand wheels roll over and\nutterly contemn them in complete annihilation. Mere illusions of heart\nor mind, they are tested and thrust aside by the irresistible push of a\nmillion converging feet.\n\nBurning in the sky, the sun shines as it shone on me in the solitary\nvalley, as it burned on when the earliest cave of India was carved.\nAbove the indistinguishable roar of the many feet I feel the presence\nof the sun, of the immense forces of the universe, and beyond these the\nsense of the eternal now, of the immortal. Full well aware that all has\nfailed, yet, side by side with the sadness of that knowledge, there\nlives on in me an unquenchable belief, thought burning like the sun,\nthat there is yet something to be found, something real, something to\ngive each separate personality sunshine and flowers in its own\nexistence now. Something to shape this million-handed labour to an end\nand outcome, leaving accumulated sunshine and flowers to those who\nshall succeed. It must be dragged forth by might of thought from the\nimmense forces of the universe.\n\nTo prepare for such an effort, first the mind must be cleared of the\nconceit that, because we live to-day, we are wiser than the ages gone.\nThe mind must acknowledge its ignorance; all the learning and lore of\nso many eras must be erased from it as an encumbrance. It is not from\npast or present knowledge, science or faith, that it is to be drawn.\nErase these altogether as they are erased under the fierce heat of the\nfocus before me. Begin wholly afresh. Go straight to the sun, the\nimmense forces of the universe, to the Entity unknown; go higher than a\ngod; deeper than prayer; and open a new day. That I might but have a\nfragment of C\u00e6sar\u2019s intellect to find a fragment of this desire!\n\nFrom my home near London I made a pilgrimage almost daily to an aspen\nby a brook. It was a mile and a quarter along the road, far enough for\nme to walk off the concentration of mind necessary for work. The idea\nof the pilgrimage was to get away from the endless and nameless\ncircumstances of everyday existence, which by degrees build a wall\nabout the mind so that it travels in a constantly narrowing circle.\nThis tether of the faculties tends to make them accept present\nknowledge, and present things, as all that can be attained to. This is\nall\u2014there is nothing more\u2014is the iterated preaching of house-life.\nRemain; be content; go round and round in one barren path, a little\nmoney, a little food and sleep, some ancient fables, old age and death.\nOf all the inventions of casuistry with man for ages has in various\nways which manacled himself, and stayed his own advance, there is none\nequally potent with the supposition that nothing more is possible. Once\nwell impress on the mind that it has already all, that advance is\nimpossible because there is nothing further, and it is chained like a\nhorse to an iron pin in the ground. It is the most deadly\u2014the most\nfatal poison of the mind. No such casuistry has ever for a moment held\nme, but still, if permitted, the constant routine of house-life, the\nsame work, the same thought in the work, the little circumstances\nregularly recurring, will dull the keenest edge of thought. By my daily\npilgrimage, I escaped from it back to the sun.\n\nIn summer the leaves of the aspen rustled pleasantly, there was the\ntinkle of falling water over a hatch, thrushes sang and blackbirds\nwhistled, greenfinches laughed in their talk to each other. The\ncommonplace dusty road was commonplace no longer. In the dust was the\nmark of the chaffinches\u2019 little feet; the white light rendered even the\ndust brighter to look on. The air came from the south-west\u2014there were\ndistant hills in that direction\u2014over fields of grass and corn. As I\nvisited the spot from day to day the wheat grew from green to yellow,\nthe wild roses flowered, the scarlet poppies appeared, and again the\nbeeches reddened in autumn. In the march of time there fell away from\nmy mind, as the leaves from the trees in autumn, the last traces and\nrelics of superstitions and traditions acquired compulsorily in\nchildhood. Always feebly adhering, they finally disappeared.\n\nThere fell away, too, personal bias and prejudices, enabling me to see\nclearer and with wider sympathies. The glamour of modern science and\ndiscoveries faded away, for I found them no more than the first\npotter\u2019s wheel. Erasure and reception proceeded together; the past\naccumulations of casuistry were erased, and my thought widened to\nreceive the idea of something beyond all previous ideas. With\ndisbelief, belief increased. The aspiration and hope, the prayer, was\nthe same as that which I felt years before on the hills, only it now\nbroadened.\n\nExperience of life, instead of curtailing and checking my prayer, led\nme to reject experience altogether. As well might the horse believe\nthat the road the bridle forces it to traverse every day encircles the\nearth as I believe in experience. All the experience of the greatest\ncity in the world could not withhold me. I rejected it wholly. I stood\nbare-headed before the sun, in the presence of the earth and air, in\nthe presence of the immense forces of the universe. I demand that which\nwill make me more perfect now, this hour. London convinced me of my own\nthought. That thought has always been with me, and always grows wider.\n\nOne midsummer I went out of the road into the fields, and sat down on\nthe grass between the yellowing wheat and the green hawthorn bushes.\nThe sun burned in the sky, the wheat was full of a luxuriant sense of\ngrowth, the grass high, the earth giving its vigour to tree and leaf,\nthe heaven blue. The vigour and growth, the warmth and light, the\nbeauty and richness of it entered into me; an ecstasy of soul\naccompanied the delicate excitement of the senses: the soul rose with\nthe body. Rapt in the fulness of the moment, I prayed there with all\nthat expansion of mind and frame; no words, no definition,\ninexpressible desire of physical life, of soul-life, equal to and\nbeyond the highest imagining of my heart.\n\nThese memories cannot be placed in exact chronological order. There was\na time when a weary restlessness came upon me, perhaps from\ntoo-long-continued labour. It was like a drought\u2014a moral drought\u2014as if\nI had been absent for many years from the sources of life and hope. The\ninner nature was faint, all was dry and tasteless; I was weary for the\npure, fresh springs of thought. Some instinctive feeling uncontrollable\ndrove me to the sea; I was so under its influence that I could not\narrange the journey so as to get the longest day. I merely started, and\nof course had to wait and endure much inconvenience. To get to the sea\nat some quiet spot was my one thought; to do so I had to travel\nfarther, and from want of prearrangement it was between two and three\nin the afternoon before I reached the end of my journey. Even then,\nbeing too much preoccupied to inquire the way, I missed the road and\nhad to walk a long distance before coming to the shore. But I found the\nsea at last; I walked beside it in a trance away from the houses out\ninto the wheat. The ripe corn stood up to the beach, the waves on one\nside of the shingle, and the yellow wheat on the other.\n\nThere, alone, I went down to the sea. I stood where the foam came to my\nfeet, and looked out over the sunlit waters. The great earth bearing\nthe richness of the harvest, and its hills golden with corn, was at my\nback; its strength and firmness under me. The great sun shone above,\nthe wide sea was before me, the wind came sweet and strong from the\nwaves. The life of the earth and the sea, the glow of the sun filled\nme; I touched the surge with my hand, I lifted my face to the sun, I\nopened my lips to the wind. I prayed aloud in the roar of the waves\u2014my\nsoul was strong as the sea and prayed with the sea\u2019s might. Give me\nfulness of life like to the sea and the sun, to the earth and the air;\ngive me fulness of physical life, mind equal and beyond their fulness;\ngive me a greatness and perfection of soul higher than all things; give\nme my inexpressible desire which swells in me like a tide\u2014give it to me\nwith all the force of the sea.\n\nThen I rested, sitting by the wheat; the bank of beach was between me\nand the sea, but the waves beat against it; the sea was there, the sea\nwas present and at hand. By the dry wheat I rested, I did not think, I\nwas inhaling the richness of the sea, all the strength and depth of\nmeaning of the sea and earth came to me again. I rubbed out some of the\nwheat in my hands, I took up a piece of clod and crumbled it in my\nfingers\u2014it was a joy to touch it\u2014I held my hand so that I could see the\nsunlight gleam on the slightly moist surface of the skin. The earth and\nsun were to me like my flesh and blood, and the air of the sea life.\n\nWith all the greater existence I drew from them I prayed for a bodily\nlife equal to it, for a soul-life beyond my thought, for my\ninexpressible desire of more than I could shape even into idea. There\nwas something higher than idea, invisible to thought as air to the eye;\ngive me bodily life equal in fulness to the strength of earth, and sun,\nand sea; give me the soul-life of my desire. Once more I went down to\nthe sea, touched it, and said farewell. So deep was the inhalation of\nthis life that day, that it seemed to remain in me for years. This was\na real pilgrimage.\n\nTime passed away, with more labour, pleasure, and again at last, after\nmuch pain and wearinesss of mind, I came down again to the sea. The\ncircumstances were changed\u2014it was not a hurried glance\u2014there were\nopportunities for longer thought. It mattered scarcely anything to me\nnow whether I was alone, or whether houses and other people were near.\nNothing could disturb my inner vision. By the sea, aware of the sun\noverhead, and the blue heaven, I feel that there is nothing between me\nand space. This is the verge of a gulf, and a tangent from my feet goes\nstraight unchecked into the unknown. It is the edge of the abyss as\nmuch as if the earth were cut away in a sheer fall of eight thousand\nmiles to the sky beneath, thence a hollow to the stars. Looking\nstraight out is looking straight down; the eye-glance gradually departs\nfrom the sea-level, and, rising as that falls, enters the hollow of\nheaven. It is gazing along the face of a vast precipice into the hollow\nspace which is nameless.\n\nThere mystery has been placed, but realising the vast hollow yonder\nmakes me feel that the mystery is here. I, who am here on the verge,\nstanding on the margin of the sky, am in the mystery itself. If I let\nmy eye look back upon me from the extreme opposite of heaven, then this\nspot where I stand is in the centre of the hollow. Alone with the sea\nand sky, I presently feel all the depth and wonder of the unknown come\nback surging up around, and touching me as the foam runs to my feet. I\nam in it now, not to-morrow, this moment; I cannot escape from it.\nThough I may deceive myself with labour, yet still I am in it; in sleep\ntoo. There is no escape from this immensity.\n\nFeeling this by the sea, under the sun, my life enlarges and quickens,\nstriving to take to itself the largeness of the heaven. The frame\ncannot expand, but the soul is able to stand before it. No giant\u2019s body\ncould be in proportion to the earth, but a little spirit is equal to\nthe entire cosmos, to earth and ocean, sun and star-hollow. These are\nbut a few acres to it. Were the cosmos twice as wide, the soul could\nrun over it, and return to itself in a time so small, no measure exists\nto mete it. Therefore, I think the soul may sometimes find out an\nexistence as superior as my mind is to the dead chalk cliff.\n\nWith the great sun burning over the foam-flaked sea, roofed with\nheaven\u2014aware of myself, a consciousness forced on me by these things\u2014I\nfeel that thought must yet grow larger and correspond in magnitude of\nconception to these. But these cannot content me, these Titanic things\nof sea, and sun, and profundity; I feel that my thought is stronger\nthan they are. I burn life like a torch. The hot light shot back from\nthe sea scorches my cheek\u2014my life is burning in me. The soul throbs\nlike the sea for a larger life. No thought which I have ever had has\nsatisfied my soul.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\nMy strength is not enough to fulfil my desire; if I had the strength of\nthe ocean, and of the earth, the burning vigour of the sun implanted in\nmy limbs, it would hardly suffice to gratify the measureless desire of\nlife which possesses me. I have often walked the day long over the\nsward, and, compelled to pause, at length, in my weariness, I was full\nof the same eagerness with which I started. The sinews would obey no\nlonger, but the will was the same. My frame could never take the\nviolent exertion my heart demanded. Labour of body was like meat and\ndrink to me. Over the open hills, up the steep ascents, mile after\nmile, there was deep enjoyment in the long-drawn breath, the spring of\nthe foot, in the act of rapid movement. Never have I had enough of it;\nI wearied long before I was satisfied, and weariness did not bring a\ncessation of desire; the thirst was still there.\n\nI rowed, I used the axe, I split tree-trunks with wedges; my arms\ntired, but my spirit remained fresh and chafed against the physical\nweariness. My arms were not strong enough to satisfy me with the axe,\nor wedges, or oars. There was delight in the moment, but it was not\nenough. I swam, and what is more delicious than swimming? It is\nexercise and luxury at once. But I could not swim far enough; I was\nalways dissatisfied with myself on leaving the water. Nature has not\ngiven me a great frame, and had it done so I should still have longed\nfor more. I was out of doors all day, and often half the night; still I\nwanted more sunshine, more air, the hours were too short. I feel this\neven more now than in the violence of early youth: the hours are too\nshort, the day should be sixty hours long. Slumber, too, is abbreviated\nand restricted; forty hours of night and sleep would not be too much.\nSo little can be accomplished in the longest summer day, so little rest\nand new force is accumulated in a short eight hours of sleep.\n\nI live by the sea now; I can see nothing of it in a day; why, I do but\nget a breath of it, and the sun sinks before I have well begun to\nthink. Life is so little and so mean. I dream sometimes backwards of\nthe ancient times. If I could have the bow of Ninus, and the earth full\nof wild bulls and lions, to hunt them down, there would be rest in\nthat. To shoot with a gun is nothing; a mere touch discharges it. Give\nme a bow, that I may enjoy the delight of feeling myself draw the\nstring and the strong wood bending, that I may see the rush of the\narrow, and the broad head bury itself deep in shaggy hide. Give me an\niron mace that I may crush the savage beast and hammer him down. A\nspear to thrust through with, so that I may feel the long blade enter\nand the push of the shaft. The unwearied strength of Ninus to hunt\nunceasingly in the fierce sun. Still I should desire greater strength\nand a stouter bow, wilder creatures to combat. The intense life of the\nsenses, there is never enough for them. I envy Semiramis; I would have\nbeen ten times Semiramis. I envy Nero, because of the great concourse\nof beauty he saw. I should like to be loved by every beautiful woman on\nearth, from the swart Nubian to the white and divine Greek.\n\nWine is pleasant and meat refreshing; but though I own with absolute\nhonesty that I like them, these are the least of all. Of these two only\nhave I ever had enough. The vehemence of exertion, the vehemence of the\nspear, the vehemence of sunlight and life, the insatiate desire of\ninsatiate Semiramis, the still more insatiate desire of love, divine\nand beautiful, the uncontrollable adoration of beauty, these\u2014these:\ngive me these in greater abundance than was ever known to man or woman.\nThe strength of Hercules, the fulness of the senses, the richness of\nlife, would not in the least impair my desire of soul-life. On the\nreverse, with every stronger beat of the pulse my desire of soul-life\nwould expand. So it has ever been with me; in hard exercise, in\nsensuous pleasure, in the embrace of the sunlight, even in the drinking\nof a glass of wine, my heart has been lifted the higher towards\nperfection of soul. Fulness of physical life causes a deeper desire of\nsoul-life.\n\nLet me be physically perfect, in shape, vigour, and movement. My frame,\nnaturally slender, will not respond to labour, and increase in\nproportion to effort, nor will exposure harden a delicate skin. It\ndisappoints me so far, but my spirit rises with the effort, and my\nthought opens. This is the only profit of frost, the pleasure of\nwinter, to conquer cold, and to feel braced and strengthened by that\nwhose province it is to wither and destroy, making of cold, life\u2019s\nenemy, life\u2019s renewer. The black north wind hardens the resolution as\nsteel is tempered in ice-water. It is a sensual joy, as sensuous as the\nwarm embrace of the sunlight, but fulness of physical life ever brings\nto me a more eager desire of soul-life.\n\nSplendid it is to feel the boat rise to the roller, or forced through\nby the sail to shear the foam aside like a share; splendid to undulate\nas the chest lies on the wave, swimming, the brimming ocean round: then\nI know and feel its deep strong tide, its immense fulness, and the sun\nglowing over; splendid to climb the steep green hill: in these I feel\nmyself, I drink the exquisite joy of the senses, and my soul lifts\nitself with them. It is beautiful even to watch a fine horse gallop,\nthe long stride, the rush of the wind as he passes\u2014my heart beats\nquicker to the thud of the hoofs, and I feel his strength. Gladly would\nI have the strength of the Tartar stallion roaming the wild steppe;\nthat very strength, what vehemence of soul-thought would accompany it.\nBut I should like it, too, for itself. For I believe, with all my\nheart, in the body and the flesh, and believe that it should be\nincreased and made more beautiful by every means. I believe\u2014I do more\nthan think\u2014I believe it to be a sacred duty, incumbent upon every one,\nman and woman, to add to and encourage their physical life, by\nexercise, and in every manner. A sacred duty each towards himself, and\neach towards the whole of the human race. Each one of us should do some\nlittle part for the physical good of the race\u2014health, strength, vigour.\nThere is no harm therein to the soul: on the contrary, those who stunt\ntheir physical life are most certainly stunting their souls.\n\nI believe all manner of asceticism to be the vilest blasphemy\u2014blasphemy\ntowards the whole of the human race. I believe in the flesh and the\nbody, which is worthy of worship\u2014to see a perfect human body unveiled\ncauses a sense of worship. The ascetics are the only persons who are\nimpure. Increase of physical beauty is attended by increase of soul\nbeauty. The soul is the high even by gazing on beauty. Let me be\nfleshly perfect.\n\nIt is in myself that I desire increase, profit, and exaltation of body,\nmind, and soul. The surroundings, the clothes, the dwelling, the social\nstatus, the circumstances are to me utterly indifferent. Let the floor\nof the room be bare, let the furniture be a plank table, the bed a mere\npallet. Let the house be plain and simple, but in the midst of air and\nlight. These are enough\u2014a cave would be enough; in a warmer climate the\nopen air would suffice. Let me be furnished in myself with health,\nsafety, strength, the perfection of physical existence; let my mind be\nfurnished with highest thoughts of soul-life. Let me be in myself\nmyself fully. The pageantry of power, the still more foolish pageantry\nof wealth, the senseless precedence of place; words fail me to express\nmy utter contempt for such pleasure or such ambitions. Let me be in\nmyself myself fully, and those I love equally so.\n\nIt is enough to lie on the sward in the shadow of green boughs, to\nlisten to the songs of summer, to drink in the sunlight, the air, the\nflowers, the sky, the beauty of all. Or upon the hill-tops to watch the\nwhite clouds rising over the curved hill-lines, their shadows\ndescending the slope. Or on the beach to listen to the sweet sigh as\nthe smooth sea runs up and recedes. It is lying beside the immortals,\nin-drawing the life of the ocean, the earth, and the sun.\n\nI want to be always in company with these, with earth, and sun, and\nsea, and stars by night. The pettiness of house-life\u2014chairs and\ntables\u2014and the pettiness of observances, the petty necessity of useless\nlabour, useless because productive of nothing, chafe me the year\nthrough. I want to be always in company with the sun, and sea, and\nearth. These, and the stars by night, are my natural companions. My\nheart looks back and sympathises with all the joy and life of ancient\ntime. With the circling dance burned in still attitude on the vase;\nwith the chase and the hunter eagerly pursuing, whose javelin trembles\nto be thrown; with the extreme fury of feeling, the whirl of joy in the\nwarriors from Marathon to the last battle of Rome, not with the\nslaughter, but with the passion\u2014the life in the passion; with the\ngarlands and the flowers; with all the breathing busts that have panted\nbeneath the sun. O beautiful human life! Tears come in my eyes as I\nthink of it. So beautiful, so inexpressibly beautiful!\n\nSo deep is the passion of life that, if it were possible to live again,\nit must be exquisite to die pushing the eager breast against the sword.\nIn the flush of strength to face the sharp pain joyously, and laugh in\nthe last glance of the sun\u2014if only to live again, now on earth, were\npossible. So subtle is the chord of life that sometimes to watch troops\nmarching in rhythmic order, undulating along the column as the feet are\nlifted, brings tears in my eyes. Yet could I have in my own heart all\nthe passion, the love and joy, burned in the breasts that have panted,\nbreathing deeply, since the hour of Ilion, yet still I should desire\nmore. How willingly I would strew the paths of all with flowers; how\nbeautiful a delight to make the world joyous! The song should never be\nsilent, the dance never still, the laugh should sound like water which\nruns for ever.\n\nI would submit to a severe discipline, and to go without many things\ncheerfully, for the good and happiness of the human race in the future.\nEach one of us should do something, however small, towards that great\nend. At the present time the labour of our predecessors in this\ncountry, in all other countries of the earth, is entirely wasted. We\nlive\u2014that is, we snatch an existence\u2014and our works become nothing. The\npiling up of fortunes, the building of cities, the establishment of\nimmense commerce, ends in a cipher. These objects are so outside my\nidea that I cannot understand them, and look upon the struggle in\namazement. Not even the pressure of poverty can force upon me an\nunderstanding of, and sympathy with, these things. It is the human\nbeing as the human being of whom I think. That the human being as the\nhuman being, nude\u2014apart altogether from money, clothing, houses,\nproperties\u2014should enjoy greater health, strength, safety, beauty, and\nhappiness, I would gladly agree to a discipline like that of Sparta.\nThe Spartan method did produce the finest race of men, and Sparta was\nfamous in antiquity for the most beautiful women. So far, therefore, it\nfits exactly to my ideas.\n\nNo science of modern times has yet discovered a plan to meet the\nrequirements of the millions who live now, no plan by which they might\nattain similar physical proportion. Some increase of longevity, some\nslight improvement in the general health is promised, and these are\ngreat things, but far, far beneath the ideal. Probably the whole mode\nof thought of the nations must be altered before physical progress is\npossible. Not while money, furniture, affected show and the pageantry\nof wealth are the ambitions of the multitude can the multitude become\nideal in form. When the ambition of the multitude is fixed on the ideal\nof form and beauty, then that ideal will become immediately possible,\nand a marked advance towards it could be made in three generations.\nGlad, indeed, should I be to discover something that would help towards\nthis end.\n\nHow pleasant it would be each day to think, To-day I have done\nsomething that will tend to render future generations more happy. The\nvery thought would make this hour sweeter. It is absolutely necessary\nthat something of this kind should be discovered. First, we must lay\ndown the axiom that as yet nothing has been found; we have nothing to\nstart with; all has to be begun afresh. All courses or methods of human\nlife have hitherto been failures. Some course of life is needed based\non things that are, irrespective of tradition. The physical ideal must\nbe kept steadily in view.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\n\nAn enumeration of the useless would almost be an enumeration of\neverything hitherto pursued. For instance, to go back as far as\npossible, the study and labour expended on Egyptian inscriptions and\npapyri, which contain nothing but doubtful, because laudatory history,\ninvocations to idols, and similar matters: all these labours are in\nvain. Take a broom and sweep the papyri away into the dust. The\nAssyrian terra-cotta tablets, some recording fables, and some even\nsadder\u2014contracts between men whose bodies were dust twenty centuries\nsince\u2014take a hammer and demolish them. Set a battery to beat down the\npyramids, and a mind-battery to destroy the deadening influence of\ntradition. The Greek statue lives to this day, and has the highest use\nof all, the use of true beauty. The Greek and Roman philosophers have\nthe value of furnishing the mind with material to think from. Egyptian\nand Assyrian, medi\u00e6val and eighteenth-century culture, miscalled, are\nall alike mere dust, and absolutely useless.\n\nThere is a mass of knowledge so called at the present day equally\nuseless, and nothing but an encumbrance. We are forced by circumstances\nto become familiar with it, but the time expended on it is lost. No\nphysical ideal\u2014far less any soul-ideal\u2014will ever be reached by it. In a\nrecent generation erudition in the text of the classics was considered\nthe most honourable of pursuits; certainly nothing could be less\nvaluable. In our own generation, another species of erudition is\nlauded\u2014erudition in the laws of matter\u2014which, in itself, is but one\ndegree better. The study of matter for matter\u2019s sake is despicable; if\nany can turn that study to advance the ideal of life, it immediately\nbecomes most valuable. But not without the human ideal. It is nothing\nto me if the planets revolve around the sun, or the sun around the\nearth, unless I can thereby gather an increase of body or mind. As the\nconception of the planets revolving around the sun, the present\nastronomical conception of the heavens, is distinctly grander than that\nof Ptolemy, it is therefore superior, and a gain to the human mind. So\nwith other sciences, not immediately useful, yet if they furnish the\nmind with material of thought, they are an advance.\n\nBut not in themselves\u2014only in conjunction with the human ideal. Once\nlet that slip out of the thought, and science is of no more use than\nthe invocations in the Egyptian papyri. The world would be the gainer\nif the Nile rose and swept away pyramid and tomb, sarcophagus, papyri,\nand inscription; for it seems as if most of the superstitions which\nstill to this hour, in our own country, hold minds in their sway,\noriginated in Egypt. The world would be the gainer if a Nile flood of\nnew thought arose and swept away the past, concentrating the effort of\nall the races of the earth upon man\u2019s body, that it might reach an\nideal of shape, and health, and happiness.\n\nNothing is of any use unless it gives me a stronger body and mind, a\nmore beautiful body, a happy existence, and a soul-life now. The last\nphase of philosophy is equally useless with the rest. The belief that\nthe human mind was evolved, in the process of unnumbered years, from a\nfragment of palpitating slime through a thousand gradations, is a\nmodern superstition, and proceeds upon assumption alone.\n\nNothing is evolved, no evolution takes place, there is no record of\nsuch an event; it is pure assertion. The theory fascinates many,\nbecause they find, upon study of physiology, that the gradations\nbetween animal and vegetable are so fine and so close together, as if a\ncommon web bound them together. But although they stand so near they\nnever change places. They are like the figures on the face of a clock;\nthere are minute dots between, apparently connecting each with the\nother, and the hands move round over all. Yet ten never becomes twelve,\nand each second even is parted from the next, as you may hear by\nlistening to the beat. So the gradations of life, past and present,\nthough standing close together never change places. Nothing is evolved.\nThere is no evolution any more than there is any design in nature. By\nstanding face to face with nature, and not from books, I have convinced\nmyself that there is no design and no evolution. What there is, what\nwas the cause, how and why, is not yet known; certainly it was neither\nof these.\n\nBut it may be argued the world must have been created, or it must have\nbeen made of existing things, or it must have been evolved, or it must\nhave existed for ever, through all eternity. I think not. I do not\nthink that either of these are \u201cmusts,\u201d nor that any \u201cmust\u201d has yet\nbeen discovered; not even that there \u201cmust\u201d be a first cause. There may\nbe other things\u2014other physical forces even\u2014of which we know nothing. I\nstrongly suspect there are. There may be other ideas altogether from\nany we have hitherto had the use of. For many ages our ideas have been\nconfined to two or three. We have conceived the idea of creation, which\nis the highest and grandest of all, if not historically true; we have\nconceived the idea of design, that is of an intelligence making order\nand revolution of chaos; and we have conceived the idea of evolution by\nphysical laws of matter, which, though now so much insisted on, is as\nancient as the Greek philosophers. But there may be another\nalternative; I think there are other alternatives.\n\nWhenever the mind obtains a wider view we may find that origin. For\ninstance, is not always due to what is understood by cause. At this\nmoment the mind is unable to conceive of anything happening, or of\nanything coming into existence, without a cause. From cause to effect\nis the sequence of our ideas. But I think that if at some time we\nshould obtain an altogether different and broader sequence of ideas, we\nmay discover that there are various other alternatives. As the world,\nand the universe at large, was not constructed according to plan, so it\nis clear that the sequence or circle of ideas which includes plan, and\ncause, and effect, are not in the circle of ideas which would correctly\nexplain it. Put aside the plan-circle of ideas, and it will at once be\nevident that there is no inherent necessity or \u201cmust.\u201d There is no\ninherent necessity for a first cause, or that the world and the\nuniverse was created, or that it was shaped of existing matter, or that\nit evolved itself and its inhabitants, or that the cosmos has existed\nin varying forms for ever. There may be other alternatives altogether.\nThe only idea I can give is the idea that there is another idea.\n\nIn this \u201cmust\u201d\u2014\u201cit must follow\u201d\u2014lies my objection to the logic of\nscience. The arguments proceed from premises to conclusions, and end\nwith the assumption \u201cit therefore follows.\u201d But I say that, however\ncarefully the argument be built up, even though apparently flawless,\nthere is no such thing at present as \u201cit must follow.\u201d Human ideas at\npresent naturally form a plan, and a balanced design; they might be\nindicated by a geometrical figure, an upright straight line in the\ncentre, and branching from that straight line curves on either hand\nexactly equal to each other. In drawing that is how we are taught, to\nbalance the outline or curves on one side with the curves on the other.\nIn nature and in fact there is no such thing. The stem of a tree\nrepresents the upright line, but the branches do not balance; those on\none side are larger or longer than those on the other. Nothing is\nstraight, but all things curved, crooked, and unequal.\n\nThe human body is the most remarkable instance of inequality, lack of\nbalance, and want of plan. The exterior is beautiful in its lines, but\nthe two hands, the two feet, the two sides of the face, the two sides\nof the profile, are not precisely equal. The very nails of the fingers\nare set ajar, as it were, to the lines of the hand, and not quite\nstraight. Examination of the interior organs shows a total absence of\nbalance. The heart is not in the centre, nor do the organs correspond\nin any way. The viscera are wholly opposed to plan. Coming, lastly, to\nthe bones, these have no humanity, as it were, of shape; they are\nneither round nor square; the first sight of them causes a sense of\nhorror, so extra-human are they in shape; there is no balance of design\nin them. These are very brief examples, but the whole universe, so far\nas it can be investigated, is equally unequal. No straight line runs\nthrough it, with balanced curves each side.\n\nLet this thought now be carried into the realms of thought. The mind,\nor circle, or sequence of ideas, acts, or thinks, or exists in a\nbalance, or what seems a balance to it. A straight line of thought is\nset in the centre, with equal branches each side, and with a generally\nrounded outline. But this corresponds to nothing in tangible fact.\nHence I think, by analogy, we may suppose that neither does it\ncorrespond to the circle of ideas which caused us and all things to be,\nor, at all events, to the circle of ideas which accurately understand\nus and all things. There are other ideas altogether. From standing face\nto face so long with the real earth, the real sun, and the real sea, I\nam firmly convinced that there is an immense range of thought quite\nunknown to us yet.\n\nThe problem of my own existence also convinces me that there is much\nmore. The questions are: Did my soul exist before my body was formed?\nOr did it come into life with my body, as a product, like a flame, of\ncombustion? What will become of it after death? Will it simply go out\nlike a flame and become non-existent, or will it live for ever in one\nor other mode? To these questions I am unable to find any answer\nwhatsoever. In our present range of ideas there is no reply to them. I\nmay have previously existed; I may not have previously existed. I may\nbe a product of combustion; I may exist on after physical life is\nsuspended, or I may not. No demonstration is possible. But what I want\nto say is that the alternatives of extinction or immortality may not be\nthe only alternatives. There may be something else, more wonderful than\nimmortality, and far beyond and above that idea. There may be something\nimmeasurably superior to it. As our ideas have run in circles for\ncenturies, it is difficult to find words to express the idea that there\nare other ideas. For myself, though I cannot fully express myself, I\nfeel fully convinced that there is a vast immensity of thought, of\nexistence, and of other things beyond even immortal existence.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n\nIn human affairs everything happens by chance\u2014that is, in defiance of\nhuman ideas, and without any direction of an intelligence. A man bathes\nin a pool, a crocodile seizes and lacerates his flesh. If any one\nmaintains that an intelligence directed that cruelty, I can only reply\nthat his mind is under an illusion. A man is caught by a revolving\nshaft and torn to pieces, limb from limb. There is no directing\nintelligence in human affairs, no protection, and no assistance. Those\nwho act uprightly are not rewarded, but they and their children often\nwander in the utmost indigence. Those who do evil are not always\npunished, but frequently flourish and have happy children. Rewards and\npunishments are purely human institutions, and if government be relaxed\nthey entirely disappear. No intelligence whatever interferes in human\naffairs. There is a most senseless belief now prevalent that effort,\nand work, and cleverness, perseverance and industry, are invariably\nsuccessful. Were this the case, every man would enjoy a competence, at\nleast, and be free from the cares of money. This is an illusion almost\nequal to the superstition of a directing intelligence, which every fact\nand every consideration disproves.\n\nHow can I adequately express my contempt for the assertion that all\nthings occur for the best, for a wise and beneficent end, and are\nordered by a humane intelligence! It is the most utter falsehood and a\ncrime against the human race. Even in my brief time I have been\ncontemporary with events of the most horrible character; as when the\nmothers in the Balkans cast their own children from the train to parish\nin the snow; as when the _Princess Alice_ foundered, and six hundred\nhuman beings were smothered in foul water; as when the hecatomb of two\nthousand maidens were burned in the church at Santiago; as when the\nmiserable creatures tore at the walls of the Vienna theatre. Consider\nonly the fates which overtake the little children. Human suffering is\nso great, so endless, so awful that I can hardly write of it. I could\nnot go into hospitals and face it, as some do, lest my mind should be\ntemporarily overcome. The whole and the worst the worst pessimist can\nsay is far beneath the least particle of the truth, so immense is the\nmisery of man. It is the duty of all rational beings to acknowledge the\ntruth. There is not the least trace of directing intelligence in human\naffairs. This is a foundation of hope, because, if the present\ncondition of things were ordered by a superior power, there would be no\npossibility of improving it for the better in the spite of that power.\nAcknowledging that no such direction exists, all things become at once\nplastic to our will.\n\nThe credit given by the unthinking to the statement that all affairs\nare directed has been the bane of the world since the days of the\nEgyptian papyri and the origin of superstition. So long as men firmly\nbelieve that everything is fixed for them, so long is progress\nimpossible. If you argue yourself into the belief that you cannot walk\nto a place, you cannot walk there. But if you start you can walk there\neasily. Any one who will consider the affairs of the world at large,\nand of the individual, will see that they do not proceed in the manner\nthey would do for our own happiness if a man of humane breadth of view\nwere placed at their head with unlimited power, such as is credited to\nthe intelligence which does not exist. A man of intellect and humanity\ncould cause everything to happen in an infinitely superior manner.\nCould one like the divine Julius\u2014humane, generous, broadest of view,\ndeep thinking\u2014wield such power, certainly every human being would enjoy\nhappiness.\n\nBut that which is thoughtlessly credited to a non-existent intelligence\nshould really be claimed and exercised by the human race. It is\nourselves who should direct our affairs, protecting ourselves from\npain, assisting ourselves, succouring and rendering our lives happy. We\nmust do for ourselves what superstition has hitherto supposed an\nintelligence to do for us. Nothing whatsoever is done for us. We are\nborn naked, and not even protected by a shaggy covering. Nothing is\ndone for us. The first and strongest command (using the word to convey\nthe idea only) that nature, the universe, our own bodies give, is to do\neverything for ourselves. The sea does not make boats for us, nor the\nearth of her own will build us hospitals. The injured lie bleeding, and\nno invisible power lifts them up. The maidens were scorched in the\nmidst of their devotions, and their remains make a mound hundreds of\nyards long. The infants perished in the snow, and the ravens tore their\nlimbs. Those in the theatre crushed each other to the death\u2014agony. For\nhow long, for how many thousand years, must the earth and the sea, and\nthe fire and the air, utter these things and force them upon us before\nthey are admitted in their full significance?\n\nThese things speak with a voice of thunder. From every human being\nwhose body has been racked by pain; from every human being who has\nsuffered from accident or disease; from every human being drowned,\nburned, or slain by negligence, there goes up a continually increasing\ncry louder than the thunder. An awe-inspiring cry dread to listen to,\nwhich no one dares listen to, against which ears are stopped by the wax\nof superstition and the wax of criminal selfishness:\u2014These miseries are\nyour doing, because you have mind and though, and could have prevented\nthem. You can prevent them in the future. You do not even try.\n\nIt is perfectly certain that all diseases without exception are\npreventable, or, if not so, that they can be so weakened as to do no\nharm. It is perfectly certain that all accidents are preventable; there\nis not one that does not arise from folly or negligence. All accidents\nare crimes. It is perfectly certain that all human beings are capable\nof physical happiness. It is absolutely incontrovertible that the ideal\nshape of the human being is attainable to the exclusion of deformities.\nIt is incontrovertible that there is no necessity for any man to die\nbut of old age, and that if death cannot be prevented life can be\nprolonged far beyond the farthest now known. It is incontrovertible\nthat at the present time no one ever dies of old age. Not one single\nperson ever dies of old age, or of natural causes, for there is no such\nthing as a natural cause of death. They die of disease or weakness\nwhich is the result of disease either in themselves or in their\nancestors. No such thing as old age is known to us. We do not even know\nwhat old age would be like, because no one ever lives to it.\n\nOur bodies are full of unsuspected flaws, handed down it may be for\nthousands of years, and it is of these that we die, and not of natural\ndecay. Till these are eliminated, or as nearly eliminated as possible,\nwe shall never even know what true old age is like, nor what the true\nnatural limit of human life is. The utmost limit now appears to be\nabout one hundred and five years, but as each person who has got so far\nhas died of weaknesses inherited through thousands of years, it is\nimpossible to say to what number of years he would have reached in a\nnatural state. It seems more than possible that true old age\u2014the slow\nand natural decay of the body apart from inherited flaw\u2014would be free\nfrom very many, if not all, of the petty miseries which now render\nextreme age a doubtful blessing. If the limbs grew weaker they would\nnot totter; if the teeth dropped it would not be till the last; if the\neyes were less strong they would not be quite dim; nor would the mind\nlose its memory.\n\nBut now we see eyes become dim and artifical aid needed in comparative\nyouth, and teeth drop out in mere childhood. Many men and women lose\nteeth before they are twenty. This simple fact is evidence enough of\ninherited weakness or flaw. How could a person who had lost teeth\nbefore twenty be ever said to die of old age, though he died at a\nhundred and ten? Death is not a supernatural event; it is an event of\nthe most materialistic character, and may certainly be postponed, by\nthe united efforts of the human race, to a period far more distant from\nthe date of birth than has been the case during the historic period.\nThe question has often been debated in my mind whether death is or is\nnot wholly preventable; whether, if the entire human race were united\nin their efforts to eliminate causes of decay, death might not also be\naltogether eliminated.\n\nIf we consider ourselves by the analogy of animals, trees, and other\nliving creatures, the reply is that, however postponed, in long process\nof time the tissues must wither. Suppose an ideal man, free from\ninherited flaw, then though his age might be prolonged to several\ncenturies, in the end the natural body must wear out. That is true so\nfar. But it so happens that the analogy is not just, and therefore the\nconclusions it points to are not tenable.\n\nMan is altogether different from every other animal, every other living\ncreature known. He is different in body. In his purely natural state\u2014in\nhis true natural state\u2014he is immeasurably stronger. No animal\napproaches to the physical perfection of which a man is capable. He can\nweary the strongest horse, he can outrun the swiftest stag, he can bear\nextremes of heat and cold hunger and thirst, which would exterminate\nevery known living thing. Merely in bodily strength he is superior to\nall. The stories of antiquity, which were deemed fables, may be fables\nhistorically, but search has shown that they are not intrinsically\nfables. Man of flesh and blood is capable of all that Ajax, all that\nHercules did. Feats in modern days have surpassed these, as when Webb\nswam the Channel; mythology contains nothing equal to that. The\ndifference does not end here. Animals think to a certain extent, but if\ntheir conceptions be ever so clever, not having hands they cannot\nexecute them.\n\nI myself maintain that the mind of man is practically infinite. It can\nunderstand anything brought before it. It has not the power of its own\nmotion to bring everything before it, but when anything is brought it\nis understood. It is like sitting in a room with one window; you cannot\ncompel everything to pass the window, but whatever does pass is seen.\nIt is like a magnifying glass, which magnifies and explains everything\nbrought into its focus. The mind of man is infinite. Beyond this, man\nhas a soul. I do not use this word in the common sense which\ncircumstances have given to it. I use it as the only term to express\nthat inner consciousness which aspires. These brief reasons show that\nthe analogy is imperfect, and that therefore, although an ideal\nanimal\u2014a horse, a dog, a lion\u2014must die, it does not follow that an\nideal man must. He has a body possessed of exceptional recuperative\npowers, which, under proper conditions, continually repairs itself. He\nhas a mind by which he can select remedies, and select his course and\ncarefully restore the waste of tissue. He has a soul, as yet, it seems\nto me, lying in abeyance, by the aid of which he may yet discover\nthings now deemed supernatural.\n\nConsidering these things I am obliged by facts and incontrovertible\nargument to conclude that death is not inevitable to the ideal man. He\nis shaped for a species of physical immortality. The beauty of form of\nthe ideal human being indicates immortality\u2014the contour, the curve, the\noutline answer to the idea of life. In the course of ages united effort\nlong continued may eliminate those causes of decay which have grown up\nin ages past, and after that has been done advance farther and improve\nthe natural state. As a river brings down suspended particles of sand,\nand depositing them at its mouth forms a delta and a new country; as\nthe air and the rain and the heat of the sun desiccate the rocks and\nslowly wear down mountains into sand, so the united action of the human\nrace, continued through centuries, may build up the ideal man and\nwoman. Each individual labouring in his day through geological time in\nfront must produce an effect. The instance of Sparta, where so much was\ndone in a few centuries, is almost proof of it.\n\nThe truth is, we die through our ancestors; we are murdered by our\nancestors. Their dead hands stretch forth from the tomb and drag us\ndown to their mouldering bones. We in our turn are now at this moment\npreparing death for our unborn posterity. This day those that die do\nnot die in the sense of old age, they are slain. Nothing has been\naccumulated for our benefit in ages past. All the labour and the toil\nof so many millions continued through such vistas of time, down to\nthose millions who at this hour are rushing to and fro in London, has\naccumulated nothing for us. Nothing for our good. The only things that\nhave been stored up have been for our evil and destruction, diseases\nand weaknesses crossed and cultivated and rendered almost part and\nparcel of our very bones. Now let us begin to roll back the tide of\ndeath, and to set our faces steadily to a future of life. It should be\nthe sacred and sworn duty of every one, once at least during lifetime,\nto do something in person towards this end. It would be a delight and\npleasure to me to do something every day, were it ever so minute. To\nreflect that another human being, if at a distance of ten thousand\nyears from the year 1883, would enjoy one hour\u2019s more life, in the\nsense of fulness of life, in consequence of anything I had done in my\nlittle span, would be to me a peace of soul.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n\nUnited effort through geological time in front is but the beginning of\nan idea. I am convinced that much more can be done, and that the length\nof time may be almost immeasurably shortened. The general principles\nthat are now in operation are of the simplest and most elementary\ncharacter, yet they have already made considerable difference. I am not\ncontent with these. There must be much more\u2014there must be things which\nare at present unknown by whose aid advance may be made. Research\nproceeds upon the same old lines and runs in the ancient grooves.\nFurther, it is restricted by the ultra-practical views which are alone\ndeemed reasonable. But there should be no limit placed on the mind. The\npurely ideal is as worthy of pursuit as the practical, and the mind is\nnot to be pinned to dogmas of science any more than to dogmas of\nsuperstition. Most injurious of all is the continuous circling on the\nsame path, and it is from this that I wish to free my mind.\n\nThe pursuit of theory\u2014the organon of pure thought\u2014has led incidentally\nto great discoveries, and for myself I am convinced it is of the\nhighest value. The process of experiment has produced much, and has\napplied what was previously found. Empiricism is worthy of careful\nre-working out, for it is a fact that most things are more or less\nempirical, especially in medicine. Denial may be given to this\nstatement, nevertheless it is true, and I have had practical\nexemplification of it in my own experience. Observation is perhaps more\npowerful an organon than either experiment or empiricism. If the eye is\nalways watching, and the mind on the alert, ultimately chance supplies\nthe solution.\n\nThe difficulties I have encountered have generally been solved by\nchance in this way. When I took an interest in archaeological\nmatters\u2014an interest long since extinct\u2014I considered that a part of an\narmy known to have marched in a certain direction during the Civil War\nmust have visited a town in which I was interested. But I exhausted\nevery mode of research in vain; there was no evidence of it. If the\nknowledge had ever existed it had dropped again. Some years afterwards,\nwhen my interest had ceased, and I had put such inquiries for ever\naside (being useless, like the Egyptian papyri), I was reading in the\nBritish Museum. Presently I returned my book to the shelf, and then\nslowly walked along the curving wall lined with volumes, looking to see\nif I could light on anything to amuse me. I took out a volume for a\nglance; it opened of itself at a certain page, and there was the\ninformation I had so long sought\u2014a reprint of an old pamphlet\ndescribing the visit of the army to the town in the Civil War. So\nchance answered the question in the course of time.\n\nAnd I think that, seeing how great a part chance plays in human\naffairs, it is essential that study should be made of chance; it seems\nto me that an organon from experiment. Then there is the inner\nconsciousness\u2014the psyche\u2014that has never yet been brought to bear upon\nlife and its questions. Besides which there is a super-sensuous reason.\nOften I have argued with myself that such and such a course was the\nright one to follow, while in the intervals of thinking about it an\nundercurrent of unconscious impulse has desired me to do the reverse or\nto remain inactive. Sometimes it has happened that the supersensuous\nreasoning has been correct, and the most faultless argument wrong. I\npresume this supersensuous reasoning, preceeding independently in the\nmind, arises from perceptions too delicate for analysis. From these\nconsiderations alone I am convinced that, by the aid of ideas yet to be\ndiscovered, the geological time in front may be immeasurably shortened.\nThese modes of research are not all. The psyche\u2014the soul in me\u2014tells me\nthat there is much more, that these are merely beginnings of the\ncrudest kind.\n\nI fully recognise the practical difficulty arising from the ingrained,\nhereditary, and unconscious selfishness which began before history, and\nhas been crossed and cultivated for twelve thousand years since. This\nrenders me less sanguine of united effort through geological time\nahead, unless some idea can be formed to give a stronger impulse even\nthan selfishness, or unless the selfishness can be utilised. The\ncomplacency with which the mass of people go about their daily task,\nabsolutely indifferent to all other considerations, is appalling in its\nconcentrated stolidity. They do not intend wrong\u2014they intend rightly:\nin truth, they work against the entire human race. So wedded and so\nconfirmed is the world in its narrow groove of self, so stolid and so\ncomplacent under the immense weight of misery, so callous to its own\npossibilities, and so grown to its chains, that I almost despair to see\nit awakened. Cemeteries are often placed on hillsides, and the white\nstones are visible far off. If the whole of the dead in a hillside\ncemetery were called up alive from their tombs, and walked forth down\ninto the valley, it would not rouse the mass of people from the dense\npyramid of stolidity which presses on them.\n\nThere would be gaping and marvelling and rushing about, and what then?\nIn a week or two the ploughman would settle down to his plough, the\ncarpenter to his bench, the smith to his anvil, the merchant to his\nmoney, and the dead come to life would be utterly forgotten. No matter\nin what manner the possibilities of human life are put before the\nworld, the crowd continues as stolid as before. Therefore nothing\nhitherto done, or suggested, or thought of, is of much avail; but this\nfact in no degree stays me from the search. On the contrary, the less\nthere has been accomplished the more anxious I am; the truth it teaches\nis that the mind must be lifted out of its old grooves before anything\nwill be certainly begun. Erase the past from the mind\u2014stand face to\nface with the real now\u2014and work out all anew. Call the soul to our\nassistance; the soul tells me that outside all the ideas that have yet\noccurred there are others, whole circles of others.\n\nI remember a cameo of Augustus C\u00e6sar\u2014the head of the emperor is graven\nin delicate lines, and shows the most exquisite proportions. It is a\nbalanced head, a head adjusted to the calmest intellect. That head when\nit was living contained a circle of ideas, the largest, the widest, the\nmost profound current in his time. All that philosophy had taught, all\nthat practice, experiment, and empiricism had discovered, was familiar\nto him. There was no knowledge in the ancient world but what was\naccessible to the Emperor of Rome. Now at this day there are amongst us\nheads as finely proportioned as that cut out in the cameo. Though these\nliving men do not possess arbitrary power, the advantages of arbitrary\npower\u2014as far as knowledge is concerned\u2014are secured to them by\neducation, by the printing-press, and the facilities of our era. It is\nreasonable to imagine a head of our time filled with the largest, the\nwidest, the most profound ideas current in the age. Augustus C\u00e6sar,\nhowever great his intellect, could not in that balanced head have\npossessed the ideas familiar enough to the living head of this day. As\nwe have a circle of ideas unknown to Augustus C\u00e6sar, so I argue there\nare whole circles of ideas unknown to us. It is these that I am so\nearnestly desirous of discovering.\n\nFor nothing has as yet been of any value, however good its intent.\nThere is no virtue, or reputed virtue, which has not been rigidly\npursued, and things have remained as before. Men and women have\npractised self-denial, and to what end? They have compelled themselves\nto suffer hunger and thirst; in vain. They have clothed themselves in\nsack cloth and lacerated the flesh. They have mutilated themselves.\nSome have been scrupulous to bathe, and some have been scrupulous to\ncake their bodies with the foulness of years. Many have devoted their\nlives to assist others in sickness or poverty. Chastity has been\nfaithfully observed, chastity both of body and mind. Self-examination\nhas been pursued till it ended in a species of sacred insanity, and all\nthese have been of no more value than the tortures undergone by the\nIndian mendicant who hangs himself up by a hook through his back. All\nthese are pure folly.\n\nAsceticism has not improved the form, or the physical well-being, or\nthe heart of any human being. On the contrary, the hetaira is often the\nwarmest hearted and the most generous. Casuistry and self-examination\nare perhaps the most injurious of all the virtues, utterly destroying\nindependence of mind. Self-denial has had no result, and all the\nself-torture of centuries has been thrown away. Lives spent in doing\ngood have been lives nobly wasted. Everything is in vain. The circle of\nideas we possess is too limited to aid us. We need ideas as far outside\nour circle as ours are outside those that were pondered over by\nAugustus C\u00e6sar.\n\nThe most extraordinary spectacle, as it seems to me, is the vast\nexpenditure of labour and time wasted in obtaining mere subsistence. As\na man, in his lifetime, works hard and saves money, that his children\nmay be free from the cares of penury and may at least have sufficient\nto eat, drink, clothe, and roof them, so the generations that preceded\nus might, had they so chosen, have provided for our subsistence. The\nlabour and time of ten generations, properly directed, would sustain a\nhundred generations succeeding to them, and that, too, with so little\nself-denial on the part of the providers as to be scarcely felt. So men\nnow, in this generation, ought clearly to be laying up a store, or,\nwhat is still more powerful, arranging and organising that the\ngenerations which follow may enjoy comparative freedom from useless\nlabour. Instead of which, with transcendent improvidence, the world\nworks only for to-day, as the world worked twelve thousand years ago,\nand our children\u2019s children will still have to toil and slave for the\nbare necessities of life. This is, indeed an extraordinary spectacle.\n\nThat twelve thousand written years should have elapsed, and the human\nrace\u2014able to reason and to think, and easily capable of combination in\nimmense armies for its own destruction\u2014should still live from hand to\nmouth, like cattle and sheep, like the animals of the field and the\nbirds of the woods; that there should not even be roofs to cover the\nchildren born, unless those children labour and expend their time to\npay for them; that there should not be clothes, unless, again, time and\nlabour are expended to procure them; that there should not be even food\nfor the children of the human race, except they labour as their fathers\ndid twelve thousand years ago; that even water should scarce be\naccessible to them, unless paid for by labour! In twelve thousand\nwritten years the world has not yet built itself a House, nor filled a\nGranary, nor organised itself for its own comfort. It is so marvellous\nI cannot express the wonder with which it fills me. And more wonderful\nstill, if that could be, there are people so infatuated, or, rather, so\nlimited of view, that they glory in this state of things, declaring\nthat work is the main object of man\u2019s existence\u2014work for\nsubsistence\u2014and glorying in their wasted time. To argue with such is\nimpossible; to leave them is the only resource.\n\nThis our earth this day produces sufficient for our existence. This our\nearth produces not only a sufficiency, but a superabundance, and pours\na cornucopia of good things down upon us. Further, it produces\nsufficient for stores and granaries to be filled to the rooftree for\nyears ahead. I verily believe that the earth in one year produces\nenough food to last for thirty. Why, then, have we not enough? Why do\npeople die of starvation, or lead a miserable existence on the verge of\nit? Why have millions upon millions to toil from morning to evening\njust to gain a mere crust of bread? Because of the absolute lack of\nOrganisation by which such labour should produce its effect, the\nabsolute lack of distribution, the absolute lack even of the very idea\nthat such things are possible. Nay, even to mention such things, to say\nthat they are possible, is criminal with many. Madness could hardly go\nfarther.\n\nThat selfishness has all to do with it I entirely deny. The human race\nfor ages upon ages has been enslaved by ignorance and by interested\npersons whose object it has been to confine the minds of men, thereby\ndoing more injury than if with infected hands they purposely imposed\ndisease on the heads of the people. Almost worse than these, and at the\npresent day as injurious, are those persons incessantly declaring,\nteaching, and impressing upon all that to work is man\u2019s highest\ncondition. This falsehood is the interested superstition of an age\ninfatuated with money, which having accumulated it cannot even expend\nit in pageantry. It is a falsehood propagated for the doubtful benefit\nof two or three out of ten thousand, It is the lie of a morality\nfounded on money only, and utterly outside and having no association\nwhatever with the human being in itself. Many superstitions have been\ngot rid of in these days; time it is that this, the last and worst,\nwere eradicated.\n\nAt this hour, out of thirty-four millions who inhabit this country,\ntwo-thirds\u2014say twenty-two millions\u2014live within thirty years of that\nabominable institution the poorhouse. That any human being should dare\nto apply to another the epithet \u201cpauper\u201d is, to me, the greatest, the\nvilest, the most unpardonable crime that could be committed. Each human\nbeing, by mere birth, has a birthright in this earth and all its\nproductions; and if they do not receive it, then it is they who are\ninjured, and it is not the \u201cpauper\u201d\u2014oh, inexpressibly wicked word!\u2014it\nis the well-to-do, who are the criminal classes. It matters not in the\nleast if the poor be improvident, or drunken, or evil in any way. Food\nand drink, roof and clothes, are the inalienable right of every child\nborn into the light. If the world does not provide it freely\u2014not as a\ngrudging gift but as a right, as a son of the house sits down to\nbreakfast\u2014then is the world mad. But the world is not mad, only in\nignorance\u2014an interested ignorance, kept up by strenuous exertions, from\nwhich infernal darkness it will, in course of time, emerge, marvelling\nat the past as a man wonders at and glories in the light who has\nescaped from blindness.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\n\nThis our earth produces not only a sufficiency a superabundance, but in\none year pours a cornucopia of good things forth, enough to fill us for\nmany years in succession. The only reason we do not enjoy it is the\nwant of rational organisation. I know, of course, and all who think\nknow, that some labour or supervision will always necessary, since the\nplough must travel the furrow and the seed must must be sown; but I\nmaintain that a tenth, nay, a hundredth, part of the labour and slavery\nnow gone through will be sufficient, and that in the course of time, as\norganisation perfects itself and discoveries advance, even that part\nwill diminish. For the rise and fall of the tides alone furnish forth\nsufficient power to do automatically all the labour that is done on the\nearth. Is ideal man, then, to be idle? I answer that, if so, I see no\nwrong, but a great good. I deny altogether that idleness is an evil, or\nthat it produces evil, and I am well aware why the interested are so\nbitter against idleness\u2014namely, because it gives time for thought, and\nif men had time to think their reign would come to an end.\nIdleness\u2014that is, the absence of the necessity to work for\nsubsistence\u2014is a great good.\n\nI hope succeeding generations will be able to be ideal. I hope that\nnine-tenths of their time will be leisure time; that they may enjoy\ntheir days, and the earth, and the beauty of this beautiful world; that\nthey may rest by the sea and dream; that they may dance and sing, and\neat and drink. I will work towards that end with all my heart. If\nemployment they must have\u2014and the restlessness of the mind will insure\nthat some will be followed\u2014then they will find scope enough in the\nperfection of their physical frames, in the expansion of the mind, and\nin the enlargement of the soul. They shall not work for bread, but for\ntheir souls. I am willing to divide and share all I shall ever have for\nthis purpose, though I think the end will rather be gained by\norganisation than by sharing alone.\n\nIn these material things, too, I think that we require another circle\nof ideas, and I believe that such ideas are possible, and, in a manner\nof speaking, exist. Let me exhort every one to do their utmost to think\noutside and beyond our present circle of ideas. For every idea gained\nis a hundred years of slavery remitted. Even with the idea of\norganisation which promises most I am not satisfied, but endeavour to\nget beyond and outside it, so that the time now necessary may be\nshortened. Besides which, I see that many of our difficulties arise\nfrom obscure and remote causes\u2014obscure like the shape of bones, for\nwhose strange curves there is no familiar term. We must endeavour to\nunderstand the crookedness and unfamiliar curves of the conditions of\nlife. Beyond that still there are other ideas. Never, never rest\ncontented with any circle of ideas, but always be certain that a wider\none is still possible. For my thought is like a hyperbola that\ncontinually widens ascending.\n\nFor grief there is no known consolation. It is useless to fill our\nhearts with bubbles. A loved one gone is gone, and as to the\nfuture\u2014even if there is a future\u2014it is unknown. To assure ourselves\notherwise is to soothe the mind with illusions; the bitterness of it is\ninconsolable. The sentiments of trust chipped out on tombstones are\ntouching instances of the innate goodness of the human heart, which\nnaturally longs for good, and sighs itself to sleep in the hope that,\nif parted, the parting is for the benefit of those that are gone. But\nthese inscriptions are also awful instances of the deep intellectual\ndarkness which presses still on the minds of men. The least thought\nerases them. There is no consolation. There is no relief. There is no\nhope certain; the whole system is a mere illusion. I, who hope so much,\nand am so rapt up in the soul, know full well that there is no\ncertainty.\n\nThe tomb cries aloud to us\u2014its dead silence presses on the drum of the\near like thunder, saying, Look at this, and erase your illusions; now\nknow the extreme value of human life; reflect on this and strew human\nlife with flowers; save every hour for the sunshine; let your labour be\nso ordered that in future times the loved ones may dwell longer with\nthose who love them; open your minds; exalt your souls; widen the\nsympathies of your hearts; face the things that are now as you will\nface the reality of death; make joy real now to those you love, and\nhelp forward the joy of those yet to be born. Let these facts force the\nmind and the soul to the increase of thought, and the consequent\nremission of misery; so that those whose time it is to die may have\nenjoyed all that is possible in life. Lift up your mind and see now in\nthis bitterness of parting, in this absence of certainty, the fact that\nthere is no directing intelligence; remember that this death is not of\nold age, which no one living in the world has ever seen; remember that\nold age is possible, and perhaps even more than old age; and beyond\nthese earthly things-what? None know. But let us, turning away from the\nillusion of a directing intelligence, look earnestly for something\nbetter than a god, seek for something higher than prayer, and lift our\nsouls to be with the more than immortal now.\n\nA river runs itself clear during the night, and in sleep thought\nbecomes pellucid. All the hurrying to and fro, the unrest and stress,\nthe agitation and confusion subside. Like a sweet pure spring, thought\npours forth to meet the light, and is illumined to its depths. The dawn\nat my window ever causes a desire for larger thought, the recognition\nof the light at the moment of waking kindles afresh the wish for a\nbroad day of the mind. There is a certainty that there are yet ideas\nfurther, and greater\u2014that there is still a limitless beyond. I know at\nthat moment that there is no limit to the things that may be yet in\nmaterial and tangible shape besides the immaterial perceptions of the\nsoul. The dim white light of the dawn speaks it. This prophet which has\ncome with its wonders to the bedside of every human being for so many\nthousands of years faces me once again with the upheld finger of light.\nWhere is the limit to that physical sign?\n\nFrom space to the sky, from the sky to the hills, and the sea; to every\nblade of grass, to every leaf, to the smallest insect, to the million\nwaves of ocean. Yet this earth itself appears but a mote in that\nsunbeam by which we are conscious of one narrow streak in the abyss. A\nbeam crosses my silent chamber from the window, and atoms are visible\nin it; a beam slants between the fir-trees, and particles rise and fall\nwithin, and cross it while the air each side seems void. Through the\nheavens a beam slants, and we are aware of the star-stratum in which\nour earth moves. But what may be without that stratum? Certainly it is\nnot a void. This light tells us much, but I think in the course of time\nyet more delicate and subtle mediums than light may be found, and\nthrough these we shall see into the shadows of the sky. When will it be\npossible to be certain that the capacity of a single atom has been\nexhausted? At any moment some fortunate incident may reveal a fresh\npower. One by one the powers of light have been unfolded.\n\nAfter thousands of years the telescope opened the stars, the prism\nanalysed the substance of the sun, the microscope showed the minute\nstructure of the rocks and the tissues of living bodies. The winged men\non the Assyrian bas-reliefs, the gods of the Nile, the chariot-borne\nimmortals of Olympus, not the greatest of imagined beings ever\npossessed in fancied attributes one-tenth the power of light. As the\nswallows twitter, the dim white finger appears at my window full of\nwonders, such as all the wise men in twelve thousand precedent years\nnever even hoped to conceive. But this is not all\u2014light is not all;\nlight conceals more than it reveals; light is the darkest shadow of the\nsky; besides light there are many other mediums yet to be explored. For\nthousands of years the sunbeams poured on the earth, full as now of\nmessages, and light is not a hidden thing to be searched out with\ndifficulty. Full in the faces of men the rays came with their\nintelligence from the sun when the papyri were painted beside the\nancient Nile, but they were not understood.\n\nThis hour, rays or undulations of more subtle mediums are doubtless\npouring on us over the wide earth, unrecognised, and full of messages\nand intelligence from the unseen. Of these we are this day as ignorant\nas those who painted the papyri were of light. There is an infinity of\nknowledge yet to be known, and beyond that an infinity of thought. No\nmental instrument even has yet been invented by which researches can be\ncarried direct to the object. Whatever has been found has been\ndiscovered by fortunate accident; in looking for one thing another has\nbeen chanced on. A reasoning process has yet to be invented by which to\ngo straight to the desired end. For now the slightest particle is\nenough to throw the search aside, and the most minute circumstance\nsufficient to conceal obvious and brilliantly shining truths. One\nsummer evening sitting by my window I watched for the first star to\nappear, knowing the position of the brightest in the southern sky. The\ndusk came on, grew deeper, but the star did not shine. By-and-by, other\nstars less bright appeared, so that it could not be the sunset which\nobscured the expected one. Finally, I considered that I must have\nmistaken its position, when suddenly a puff of air blew through the\nbranch of a pear-tree which overhung the window, a leaf moved, and\nthere was the star behind the leaf.\n\nAt present the endeavour to make discoveries is like gazing at the sky\nup through the boughs of an oak. Here a beautiful star shines clearly;\nhere a constellation is hidden by a branch; a universe by a leaf. Some\nmental instrument or organon is required to enable us to distinguish\nbetween the leaf which may be removed and a real void; when to cease to\nlook in one direction, and to work in another. Many men of broad brow\nand great intellect lived in the days of ancient Greece, but for lack\nof the accident of a lens, and of knowing the way to use a prism, they\ncould but conjecture imperfectly. I am in exactly the position they\nwere when I look beyond light. Outside my present knowledge I am\nexactly in their condition. I feel that there are infinities to be\nknown, but they are hidden by a leaf. If any one says to himself that\nthe telescope, and the microscope, the prism, and other discoveries\nhave made all plain, then he is in the attitude of those ancient\npriests who worshipped the scarabaeus or beetle. So, too, it is with\nthought; outside our present circle of ideas I believe there is an\ninfinity of idea. All this that has been effected with light has been\ndone by bits of glass\u2014mere bits of shaped glass, quickly broken, and\nmade of flint, so that by the rude flint our subtlest ideas are gained.\nCould we employ the ocean as a lens, and force truth from the sky, even\nthen I think there would be much more beyond.\n\nNatural things are known to us only under two conditions\u2014matter and\nforce, or matter and motion. A third, a fourth, a fifth\u2014no one can say\nhow many conditions\u2014may exist in the ultra-stellar space, and such\nother conditions may equally exist about us now unsuspected. Something\nwhich is neither matter nor force is difficult to conceive, yet, I\nthink, it is certain that there are other conditions. When the mind\nsucceeds in entering on a wider series, or circle of ideas, other\nconditions would appear natural enough. In this effort upwards I claim\nthe assistance of the soul\u2014the mind of the mind. The eye sees, the mind\ndeliberates on what it sees, the soul understands the operation of the\nmind. Before a bridge is built, or a structure erected, or an\ninteroceanic canal made, there must be a plan, and before a plan the\nthought in the mind. So that it is correct to say the mind bores\ntunnels through the mountains, bridges the rivers, and constructs the\nengines which are the pride of the world.\n\nThis is a wonderful tool, but it is capable of work yet more wonderful\nin the exploration of the heavens. Now the soul is the mind of the\nmind. It can build and construct and look beyond and penetrate space,\nand create. It is the keenest, the sharpest tool possessed by man. But\nwhat would be said if a carpenter about to commence a piece of work\nexamined his tools and deliberately cast away that with the finest\nedge? Such is the conduct of those who reject the inner mind or psyche\naltogether. So great is the value of the soul that it seems to me, if\nthe soul lived and received its aspirations it would not matter if the\nmaterial universe melted away as snow. Many turn aside the instant the\nsoul is mentioned, and I sympathise with them in one sense; they fear\nlest, if they acknowledge it, they will be fettered by medi\u00e6val\nconditions. My contention is that the restrictions of the medi\u00e6val era\nshould entirely be cast into oblivion, but the soul recognised and\nemployed. Instead of slurring over the soul, I desire to see it at its\nhighest perfection.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\n\nSubtle as the mind is, it can effect little without knowledge. It\ncannot construct a bridge, or a building, or make a canal, or work a\nproblem in algebra, unless it is provided with information. This is\nobvious, and yet some say, What can you effect by the soul? I reply\nbecause it has had no employment. Mediaeval conditions kept it in\nslumber: science refuses to accept it. We are taught to employ our\nminds, and furnished with materials. The mind has its logic and\nexercise of geometry, and thus assisted brings a great force to the\nsolution of problems. The soul remains untaught, and can effect little.\n\nI consider that the highest purpose of study is the education of the\nsoul or psyche. It is said that there is no proof of the existence of\nthe soul, but, arguing on the same grounds, there is no proof of the\nexistence of the mind, which is not a tangible thing. For myself, I\nfeel convinced that there is a soul, a mind of the mind\u2014and that it\nreally exists. Now, glancing at the state of wild and uneducated men,\nit is evident that they work with their hands and make various things\nalmost instinctively. But when they arrive at the idea of mind, and say\nto themselves, I possess a mind, then they think and proceed farther,\nforming designs and constructions both tangible and mental.\n\nNext then, when we say, I have a soul, we can proceed to shape things\nyet further, and to see deeper, and penetrate the mystery. By denying\nthe existence and the power of the soul\u2014refusing to employ it\u2014we should\ngo back more than twelve thousand written years of human history. But\ninstead of this, I contend, we should endeavour to go forward, and to\ndiscover a fourth Idea, and after that a fifth, and onwards\ncontinually.\n\nI will not permit myself to be taken captive by observing physical\nphenomena, as many evidently are. Some gases are mingled and produce a\nliquid; certainly it is worth careful investigation, but it is no more\nthan the revolution of a wheel, which is so often seen that it excites\nno surprise, though, in truth, as wonderful. So is all motion, and so\nis a grain of sand; there is nothing that is not wonderful; as, for\ninstance, the fact of the existence of things at all. But the intense\nconcentration of the mind on mechanical effects appears often to render\nit incapable of perceiving anything that is not mechanical. Some\ncompounds are observed to precipitate crystals, all of which contain\nknown angles. Thence it is argued that all is mechanical, and that\naction occurs in set ways only. There is a tendency to lay it down as\nan infallible law that because we see these things therefore everything\nelse that exists in space must be or move exactly in the same manner.\nBut I do not think that because crystals are precipitated with fixed\nangles therefore the whole universe is necessarily mechanical. I think\nthere are things exempt from mechanical rules. The restriction of\nthought to purely mechanical grooves blocks progress in the same way as\nthe restrictions of medi\u00e6val superstition. Let the mind think, dream,\nimagine: let it have perfect freedom. To shut out the soul is to put us\nback more than twelve thousand years.\n\nJust as outside light, and the knowledge gained from light, there are,\nI think, other mediums from which, in times to come, intelligence will\nbe obtained, so outside the mental and the spiritual ideas we now\npossess I believe there exists a whole circle of ideas. In the\nconception of the idea that there are others, I lay claim to another\nidea.\n\nThe mind is infinite and able to understand everything that is brought\nbefore it; there is no limit to its understanding. The limit is in the\nlittleness of the things and the narrowness of the ideas which have\nbeen put for it to consider. For the philosophies of old time past and\nthe discoveries of modern research are as nothing to it. They do not\nfill it. When they have been read, the mind passes on, and asks for\nmore. The utmost of them, the whole together, make a mere nothing.\nThese things have been gathered together by immense labour, labour so\ngreat that it is a weariness to think of it; but yet, when all is\nsummed up and written, the mind receives it all as easily as the hand\npicks flowers. It is like one sentence\u2014read and gone.\n\nThe mind requires more, and more, and more. It is so strong that all\nthat can be put before it is devoured in a moment. Left to itself it\nwill not be satisfied with an invisible idol any more than with a\nwooden one. An idol whose attributes are omnipresence, omnipotence, and\nso on, is no greater than light or electricity, which are present\neverywhere and all-powerful, and from which perhaps the thought arose.\nPrayer which receives no reply must be pronounced in vain. The mind\ngoes on and requires more than these, something higher than prayer,\nsomething higher than a god.\n\nI have been obliged to write these things by an irresistible impulse\nwhich has worked in me since early youth. They have not been written\nfor the sake of argument, still less for any thought of profit, rather\nindeed the reverse. They have been forced from me by earnestness of\nheart, and they express my most serious convictions. For seventeen\nyears they have been lying in my mind, continually thought of and\npondered over. I was not more than eighteen when an inner and esoteric\nmeaning began to come to me from all the visible universe, and\nindefinable aspirations filled me. I found them in the grass fields,\nunder the trees, on the hill-tops, at sunrise, and in the night. There\nwas a deeper meaning everywhere. The sun burned with it, the broad\nfront of morning beamed with it; a deep feeling entered me while gazing\nat the sky in the azure noon, and in the star-lit evening.\n\nI was sensitive to all things, to the earth under, and the star-hollow\nround about; to the least blade of grass, to the largest oak. They\nseemed like exterior nerves and veins for the conveyance of feeling to\nme. Sometimes a very ecstasy of exquisite enjoyment of the entire\nvisible universe filled me. I was aware that in reality the feeling and\nthe thought were in me, and not in the earth or sun; yet I was more\nconscious of it when in company with these. A visit to the sea\nincreased the strength of the original impulse. I began to make efforts\nto express these thoughts in writing, but could not succeed to my own\nliking. Time went on, and harder experiences, and the pressure of\nlabour came, but in no degree abated the fire of first thought. Again\nand again I made resolutions that I would write it, in some way or\nother, and as often failed. I could express any other idea with ease,\nbut not this. Once especially I remember, in a short interval of\ndistasteful labour, walking away to a spot by a brook which skirts an\nancient Roman wall, and there trying to determine and really commence\nto work. Again I failed. More time, more changes, and still the same\nthought running beneath everything. At last, in 1880, in the old castle\nof Pevensey, under happy circumstances, once more I resolved, and\nactually did write down a few notes. Even then I could not go on, but I\nkept the notes (I had destroyed all former beginnings), and in the end,\ntwo years afterwards, commenced this book.\n\nAfter all this time and thought it is only a fragment, and a fragment\nscarcely hewn. Had I not made it personal I could scarcely have put it\ninto any shape at all. But I felt that I could no longer delay, and\nthat it must be done, however imperfectly. I am only too conscious of\nits imperfections, for I have as it were seventeen years of\nconsciousness of my own inability to express this the idea of my life.\nI can only say that many of these short sentences are the result of\nlong-continued thought. One of the greatest difficulties I have\nencountered is the lack of words to express ideas. By the word soul, or\npsyche, I mean that inner consciousness which aspires. By prayer I do\nnot mean a request for anything preferred to a deity; I mean intense\nsoul-emotion, intense aspiration. The word immortal is very\ninconvenient, and yet there is no other to convey the idea of\nsoul-life. Even these definitions are deficient, and I must leave my\nbook as a whole to give its own meaning to its words.\n\nTime has gone on, and still, after so much pondering, I feel that I\nknow nothing, that I have not yet begun; I have only just commenced to\nrealise the immensity of thought which lies outside the knowledge of\nthe senses. Still, on the hills and by the seashore, I seek and pray\ndeeper than ever. The sun burns southwards over the sea and before the\nwave runs its shadow, constantly slipping on the advancing slope till\nit curls and covers its dark image at the shore. Over the rim of the\nhorizon waves are flowing as high and wide as those that break upon the\nbeach. These that come to me and beat the trembling shore are like the\nthoughts that have been known so long; like the ancient, iterated, and\nreiterated thoughts that have broken on the strand of mind for\nthousands of years. Beyond and over the horizon I feel that there are\nother waves of ideas unknown to me, flowing as the stream of ocean\nflows. Knowledge of facts is limitless: they lie at my feet innumerable\nlike the countless pebbles; knowledge of thought so circumscribed! Ever\nthe same thoughts come that have been written down centuries and\ncenturies.\n\nLet me launch forth and sail over the rim of the sea yonder, and when\nanother rim arises over that, and again and onwards into an\never-widening ocean of idea and life. For with all the strength of the\nwave, and its succeeding wave, the depth and race of the tide, the\nclear definition of the sky; with all the subtle power of the great\nsea, there rises an equal desire. Give me life strong and full as the\nbrimming ocean; give me thoughts wide as its plain; give me a soul\nbeyond these. Sweet is the bitter sea by the shore where the faint blue\npebbles are lapped by the green-grey wave, where the wind-quivering\nfoam is loth to leave the lashed stone. Sweet is the bitter sea, and\nthe clear green in which the gaze seeks the soul, looking through the\nglass into itself. The sea thinks for me as I listen and ponder; the\nsea thinks, and every boom of the wave repeats my prayer.\n\nSometimes I stay on the wet sands as the tide rises, listening to the\nrush of the lines of foam in layer upon layer; the wash swells and\ncircles about my feet, I have my hands in it, I lift a little in my\nhollowed palm, I take the life of the sea to me. My soul rising to the\nimmensity utters its desire-prayer with all the strength of the sea.\nOr, again, the full stream of ocean beats upon the shore, and the rich\nwind feeds the heart, the sun burns brightly; the sense of soul-life\nburns in me like a torch.\n\nLeaving the shore I walk among the trees; a cloud passes, and the sweet\nshort rain comes mingled with sunbeams and flower-scented air. The\nfinches sing among the fresh green leaves of the beeches. Beautiful it\nis, in summer days, to see the wheat wave, and the long grass\nfoam\u2014flecked of flower yield and return to the wind. My soul of itself\nalways desires; these are to it as fresh food. I have found in the\nhills another valley grooved in prehistoric times, where, climbing to\nthe top of the hollow, I can see the sea. Down in the hollow I look up;\nthe sky stretches over, the sun burns as it seems but just above the\nhill, and the wind sweeps onward. As the sky extends beyond the valley,\nso I know that there are ideas beyond the valley of my thought; I know\nthat there is something infinitely higher than deity. The great sun\nburning in the sky, the sea, the firm earth, all the stars of night are\nfeeble\u2014all, all the cosmos is feeble; it is not strong enough to utter\nmy prayer-desire. My soul cannot reach to its full desire of prayer. I\nneed no earth, or sea, or sun to think my thought. If my\nthought-part\u2014the psyche\u2014were entirely separated from the body, and from\nthe earth, I should of myself desire the same. In itself my soul\ndesires; my existence, my soul-existence is in itself my prayer, and so\nlong as it exists so long will it pray that I may have the fullest\nsoul-life.","title":"The Story of My Heart: An Autobiography","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":32012}