John   Kelman Among Famous Books (fiscle part-I) 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Preface  Pg 1 
 The Object Of The Following Lectures Is Twofold. They Were Delivered In 
 The First Place For The Purpose Of Directing The Attention Of Readers To 
 Books Whose Literary Charm And Spiritual Value Have Made Them 
 Conspicuous In The Vast Literature Of England. Such A Task,  However, 
 Tends To Be So Discursive As To Lose All Unity,  Depending Absolutely 
 Upon The Taste Of The Individual,  And The Chances Of His Experience In 
 Reading. 
   
   
   
 I Have Accordingly Taken For The General Theme Of The Book That Constant 
 Struggle Between Paganism And Idealism Which Is The Deepest Fact In The 
 Life Of Man,  And Whose Story,  Told In One Form Or Another,  Provides The 
 Matter Of All Vital Literature. This Will Serve As A Thread To Give 
 Continuity Of Thought To The Lectures,  And It Will Keep Them Near To 
 Central Issues. 
   
   
   
 Having Said So Much,  It Is Only Necessary To Add One Word More By Way Of 
 Explanation. In Quest Of The Relations Between The Spiritual And The 
 Material,  Or (To Put It Otherwise) Of The Battle Between The Flesh And 
 The Spirit,  We Shall Dip Into Three Different Periods Of Time: (1) 
 Classical,  (2) Sixteenth Century,  (3) Modern. Each Of These Has A 
 Character Of Its Own,  And The Glimpses Which We Shall Have Of Them Ought 
 To Be Interesting In Their Own Right. But The Similarity Between The 
 Three Is More Striking Than The Contrast,  For Human Nature Does Not 
 Greatly Change,  And Its Deepest Struggles Are The Same In All 
 Generations. 
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture i  The Gods Of Greece      Pg 2 
 It Has Become Fashionable To Divide The Rival Tendencies Of Modern 
 Thought Into The Two Classes Of Hellenistic And Hebraistic. The Division 
 Is An Arbitrary And Somewhat Misleading one,  Which Has Done Less Than 
 Justice Both To The Greek And To The Hebrew Genius. It Has Associated 
 Greece With The Idea Of Lawless And Licentious Paganism,  And Israel With 
 That Of A Forbidding and Joyless Austerity. Paganism Is An Interesting 
 Word,  Whose Etymology Reminds Us Of A Time When Christianity Had Won The 
 Towns,  While The Villages Still Worshipped heathen Gods. It Is Difficult 
 To Define The Word Without Imparting into Our Thought Of It The Idea Of 
 The Contrast Between Christian Dogma And All Other Religious Thought And 
 Life. This,  However,  Would Be An Extremely Unfair Account Of The Matter, 
 And,  In the Present Volume,  The Word Will Be Used without Reference 
 Either To Nationality Or To Creed,  And It Will Stand For The 
 Materialistic And Earthly Tendency As Against Spiritual Idealism Of Any 
 Kind. Obviously Such Paganism As This,  Is Not A Thing which Has Died out 
 With The Passing of Heathen Systems Of Religion. It Is Terribly Alive In 
 The Heart Of Modern England,  Whether Formally Believing or Unbelieving. 
 Indeed there Is The Twofold Life Of Puritan And Pagan Within Us All. A 
 Recent Well-Known Theologian Wrote To His Sister: "I Am Naturally A 
 Cannibal,  And I Find Now My True Vocation To Be In the South Sea 
 Islands,  Not After Your Plan,  To Be Arnold To A Troop Of Savages,  But To 
 Be One Of Them,  Where They Are All Selfish,  Lazy,  And Brutal." It Is 
 This Universality Of Paganism Which Gives Its Main Interest To Such A 
 Study As The Present. Paganism Is A Constant And Not A Temporary Or 
 Local Phase Of Human Life And Thought,  And It Has Very Little To Do With 
 The Question Of What Particular Dogmas A Man May Believe Or Reject. 
 
 
 
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 Thus,  For Example,  Although The Greek Is Popularly Accepted as The Type 
 Of Paganism And The Christian Of Idealism,  Yet The Lines Of That 
 Distinction Have Often Been Reversed. Christianity Has At Times Become 
 Hard And Cold And Lifeless,  And Has Swept Away Primitive National 
 Idealisms Without Supplying any New Ones. The Roman Ploughman Must Have 
 Missed the Fauns Whom He Had Been Accustomed to Expect In the Thicket At 
 The End Of His Furrow,  When The New Faith Told Him That These Were 
 Nothing but Rustling leaves. When The Swish Of Unseen Garments Beside 
 The Old Nymph-Haunted fountain Was Silenced,  His Heart Was Left Lonely 
 And His Imagination Impoverished. Much Charm And Romance Vanished from 
 His Early World With The Passing of Its Pagan Creatures,  And Indeed it 
 Is To This Cause That We Must Trace The Extraordinarily Far-Reaching and 
 Varied crop Of Miraculous Legends Of All Sorts Which Sprang Up In early 
 Catholic Times. These Were The Protest Of Unconscious Idealism Against 
 The Bare World From Which Its Sweet Presences Had Vanished. 
   
   
   
      "In Th' Olde Dayes Of The King arthour, 
      Of Which That Britons Speken Greet Honour, 
      Al Was This Land Fulfild Of Fayerye. 
      The Elf-Queen,  With Hir Joly Companye, 
      Daunced ful Ofte In many A Grene Mede; 
      This Was The Olde Opinion,  As I Rede. 
      But Now Can No Man See None Elves Mo. 
      For Now The Grete Charitee And Prayeres 
      Of Limitours And Othere Holy Freres, 
   
             *       *       *       *       * 
   
      This Maketh That There Been No Fayeryes. 
      For Ther As Wont To Walken Was An Elf, 
      Ther Walketh Now The Limitour Himself." 
   
 Against This Impoverishment The Human Revolt Was Inevitable,  And It 
 Explains The Spirit In such Writers As Shelley And Goethe. Children Of 
 Nature,  Who Love The Sun And The Grass,  And Are At Home Upon The Earth, 
 Their Spirits Cry For Something to Delight And Satisfy Them,  Nearer Than 
 Speculations Of Theology Or Cold Pictures Of Heaven. Wordsworth,  In his 
 Famous Lines,  Has Expressed the Protest In the Familiar Words:-- 
   
                "Great God,  I'D Rather Be 
      A Pagan,  Suckled in a Creed outworn; 
      So Might I,  Standing on This Pleasant Lea, 
      Have Glimpses That Would Make Me Less Forlorn; 
      Have Sight Of Proteus Rising from The Sea, 
      Or Hear Old Triton Blow His WreathèD Horn." 
   
   
   
 The Early Classic Thought Which Found Its Most Perfect Expression In the 
 Mythology Of Greece Was Not Originally Or Essentially Pagan. It Was 
 Humanistic,  And Represented the Response Of Man'S Spirit To That Free 
 And Beautiful Spirit Which He Found In nature Around Him. All Such 
 Symbolism Of Greek Religion As That Of The Worship Of Dionysus And 
 Ceres,  Shows This. In these Cults The Commonest Things Of Life,  The Wine 
 And Corn Wherewith Man Sustained himself,  Assumed a Higher And Richer 
 Meaning. Food And Drink Were Not Mere Sensual Gratifications,  But Divine 
 Gifts,  As They Are In the Twenty-Third Psalm; And The Whole Material 
 World Was A Symbol And Sacrament Of Spiritual Realities And Blessings. 
 
 
 
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 Similarly The Ritual Of Eleusis Interpreted man'S Common Life Into A 
 Wonderful World Of Mystic Spirituality. Thus There Was A Great Fund Of 
 Spiritual Insight Of The Finest And Most Beautiful Sort In the Very 
 Heart Of That Life Which Has Thoughtlessly Been Adopted as The Type Of 
 Paganism. 
   
   
   
 Yet The History Of Greece Affords The Explanation And Even The 
 Justification Of The Popular Idea. The Pagan Who Is In us All,  Tends 
 Ever To Draw Us Downwards From Sacramental And Symbolic Ways Of Thinking 
 To The Easier Life Of The Body And The Earth. On The One Hand,  For Blood 
 That Is Young And Hot,  The Life Of Sense Is Overwhelming. On The Other 
 Hand,  For The Weary Toiler Whose Mind Is Untrained,  The Impression Of 
 The World Is That Of Heavy Clay. Each In his Own Way Finds Idealism 
 Difficult To Retain. The Spirituality Of Nature Floats Like A Dream 
 Before The Mind Of Poets,  And Is Seen Now And Then In wistful Glimpses 
 By Every One; But It Needs Some Clearer And Less Elusive Form,  As Well 
 As Some Definite Association With Conscience,  If It Is To Be Defended 
 Against The Pull Of The Green Earth. It Has Been Well Said That,  For The 
 Greek,  God Was The View; But When The Traveller Goes Forward Into The 
 View,  He Meets With Many Things Which It Is Dangerous To Identify With 
 God. For The Young Spirit Of The Early Times The Temptation To 
 Earthliness Was Overwhelming. The World Was Fair,  Its Gates Were Open, 
 And Its Barriers All Down. Men Took From Literature And From Religion 
 Just As Much Of Spirituality As They Understood And As Little As They 
 Desired,  And The Effect Was Swift And Inevitable In that Degeneration 
 Which Reached its Final Form In the Degraded sensuality Of The Later 
 Roman Empire. 
   
 The Confusing element In all Such Inquiry Lies In the Fact That One Can 
 Never Get An Unmixed paganism Nor A Perfect Idealism. Just As The Claims 
 Of Body And Spirit Are In our Daily Life Inextricably Interwoven,  So The 
 Greek Thought Hung Precariously Between The Two,  And Was Always More Or 
 Less At The Mercy Of The Individual Interpreter And Of The Relative 
 Strength Of His Tastes And Passions. So We Shall Find It All Through The 
 Course Of These Studies. It Would Be Preposterous To Deny Some Sort Of 
 Idealism To Almost Any Pagan Who Has Ever Lived. The Contrast Between 
 Pagan And Idealist Is Largely A Matter Of Proportion And Preponderating 
 Tendency: Yet The Lines Are Clear Enough To Enable Us To Work With This 
 Distinction And To Find It Valuable And Illuminating. 
   
   
   
 The Fundamental Fact To Remember In studying any Of The Myths Of Greece 
 Is,  That We Have Here A Composite And Not A Simple System Of Thought And 
 Imagination. There Are Always At Least Two Layers: The Primitive,  And 
 The Olympian Which Came Later. The Primitive Conceptions Were Those 
 Afforded by The Worship Of Ghosts,  Of Dead Persons,  And Of Animals. Miss 
 Jane Harrison Has Pointed out In great Detail The Primitive Elements 
 Which Lingered on Through The Olympian Worship. Perhaps The Most 
 Striking instance Which She Quotes Is The Anthesteria,  Or Festival Of 
 Flowers,  At The Close Of Which The Spirits Were Dismissed with The 
 Formula,  "Depart,  Ye Ghosts,  The Revels Now Are Ended." Mr. Andrew Lang 
 Has Suggested that The Animals Associated with Gods And Goddesses (Such 
 As The Mouse Which Is Found In the Hand,  Or The Hair,  Or Beside The Feet 
 Of The Statues Of Apollo,  The Owl Of Minerva,  Etc.) Are Relics Of The 
 Earlier Worship. This Would Satisfactorily Explain Much Of The 
 Disreputable Element Which Lingered on Side By Side With The Noble 
 Thoughts Of Greek Religion. The Olympians,  A Splendid Race Of Gods, 
 Representing the Highest Human Ideals,  Arrived with The Greeks; But For 
 
 
 
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 The Sake Of Safety,  Or Of Old Association,  The Primitive Worship Was 
 Retained and Blended with The New. In the Extreme Case Of Human 
 Sacrifice,  It Was Retained in the Form Of Surrogates--Little Wooden 
 Images,  Or Even Actual Animals,  Being sacrificed in lieu Of The Older 
 Victims. But All Along The Line,  While The New Gods Brought Their 
 Spiritual Conceptions,  The Older Ones Held Men To A Cruder And More 
 Fleshly Way Of Thinking. There Is A Similar Blend Of New And Old In all 
 Such Movements As That Of The Holy Grail And The Arthurian Legends, 
 Where We Can See The Combination Of Christian And Pagan Elements So 
 Clearly As To Be Able To Calculate The Moral And Spiritual Effect Of 
 Each. Thus We Have In the Early Greek Mythology Much Of Real Paganism 
 Involved in the Retention Of The Old And Earth-Bound Gods Which Attached 
 Themselves To The Nobler Olympians As They Came,  And Dragged them Down 
 To The Ancient Level. 
   
   
   
 This Blending may Be Seen Very Clearly In the Mythology Of Homer And 
 Hesiod. There It Has Been So Thorough That The Only Trace Of 
 Superposition Which We Can Find Is The Succession Of The Dynasties Of 
 Chronos And Jupiter. The Result Is The Most Appalling conception Of The 
 Morality Of Celestial Society. No Earthly State Could Hope To Continue 
 For A Decade Upon The Principles Which Governed the Life Of Heaven; And 
 Man,  If He Were To Escape The Sudden Retributions Which Must Inevitably 
 Follow Anything like An Imitation Of His Gods,  Must Live More Decently 
 Than They. 
   
 Now Homer Was,  In a Sense,  The Bible Of The Greeks,  And As Society 
 Improved in morals,  And Thought Was Directed more And More Fearlessly 
 Towards Religious Questions,  The Puzzle As To The Immoralities Of The 
 Gods Became Acute. The Religious And Intellectual Developments Of The 
 Sixth Century B.C. Led to Various Ways Of Explaining the Old Stories. 
 Sophocles Is Conciliatory,  Conceiving religion In a Sunny Good Temper 
 Which Will Make The Best Of The Situation Whatever It Is. ÆSchylus Is 
 Sombre And Deeply Tragic,  While Yet He Remains Orthodox On The Side Of 
 The Gods. But Euripides Is Angry At The Old Scandals,  And In the Name Of 
 Humanity His Scepticism Rises In protest. 
   
 It May Be Interesting,  At This Point,  To Glance For A Little At The 
 Various Theories Which Have Been Brought Forward To Explain The Myths. 
 The Commonest Of All Such Theories Is That The Divine Personalities 
 Stand For The Individual Powers Of Nature. Most Especially,  The Gods And 
 Goddesses Symbolise The Sun,  Moon,  And Stars,  Night And Morning,  Summer 
 And Winter,  And The General Story Of The Year. No One Will Deny That The 
 Personification Of Nature Had A Large Share In all Mythology. The 
 Oriental Mythologies Rose To A Large Extent In this Fashion. The Baals 
 Of Semitic Worship All Stood For One Or Other Of The Manifestations Of 
 The Fructifying powers Of Nature,  And The Chinese Dragon Is The Symbol 
 Of The Spiritual Mystery Of Life Suggested by The Mysterious And Protean 
 Characteristics Of Water. It Is Very Natural That This Should Be So,  And 
 Every One Who Has Ever Felt The Power Of The Sun In the East Will 
 Sympathise With Turner'S Dying words,  "The Sun,  He Is God." 
   
   
   
 As A Key To Mythology This Theory Was Especially Associated with The 
 Name Of Plutarch Among Ancient Writers,  And It Has Been Accepted more Or 
 Less Completely By A Vast Number Of Moderns. In the Late Sir George 
 Cox'S Fascinating stories It Was Run To Utter Absurdity. The Story Is 
 Beautifully Told In every Case,  And When We Have Enjoyed it And Felt 
 Something of The Exquisiteness Of The Conception And Of The Variety And 
 
 
 
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 Range Of Thought Exhibited in the Fertile Minds Of Those Who Had First 
 Told It,  Sir George Cox Draws Us Back Sharply To The Assertion That All 
 We Have Been Hearing really Meant Another Phase Of Sunset Or Sunrise, 
 Until We Absolutely Rebel And Protest That The Effect Is Unaccountable 
 Upon So Meagre A Cause. It Is An Easy Method Of Dealing with Folk-Lore. 
 If You Take The Rhyme Of Mary And Her Little Lamb,  And Call Mary The Sun 
 And The Lamb The Moon,  You Will Achieve Astonishing results,  Both In 
 Religion And Astronomy,  When You Find That The Lamb Followed mary To 
 School One Day. This Nature Element,  However,  Had Undoubtedly A Very 
 Considerable Part In the Origin Of Myths,  And When Max MüLler Combines 
 It With Philology It Opens A Vast Field Of Extraordinarily Interesting 
 Interpretations Resting upon Words And Their Changes. 
   
   
   
 A Further Theory Of Myths Is That Which Regards Them As The Stories Of 
 Races Told As If They Had Been The Lives Of Individuals. This,  As Is 
 Well Known,  Has Had Permanent Effects Upon The Interpretation Not Only 
 Of Greek But Of Hebrew Ancient Writings,  And It Throws Light Upon Some 
 Of Those Chapters Of Genesis Which,  Without It,  Are But Strings Of 
 Forgotten And Unpronounceable Names. 
   
 But Beyond All Such Explanations,  After We Have Allowed for Them In 
 Every Possible Way,  There Remains A Conviction That Behind These 
 Fascinating stories There Is A Certain Irreducible Remainder Of Actual 
 Fact. Individual Historic Figures,  Seen Through The Mists Of Time,  Walk 
 Before Our Eyes In the Dawn. Long Before History Was Written Men Lived 
 And Did Striking deeds. Heroic Memories And Traditions Of Such 
 Distinguished men Passed in the Form Of Fireside Tales From One 
 Generation To Another Through Many Centuries. Now They Come To Us, 
 Doubtless Hugely Exaggerated and So Far Away From Their Originals As To 
 Be Unrecognisable,  And Yet,  After All,  Based upon Things That Happened. 
 For The Stories Have Living touches In them Which Put Blood Into The 
 Glorious And Ghostly Figures,  And When We Come Upon A Piece Of Genuine 
 Human Nature There Is No Possibility Of Mistaking it. This Thing has 
 Been Born,  Not Manufactured: Nor Has Any Portrait That Is Lifelike Been 
 Drawn Without Some Model. Thus,  Through All The Mist And Haze Of The 
 Past,  We See Men And Women Walking in the Twilight--Dim And Uncertain 
 Forms Indeed,  Yet Stately And Heroic. 
   
 Now All This Has A Bearing upon The Main Subject Of Our Present Study. 
 Meteorology And Astronomy Are Indeed noble Sciences,  But The Proper 
 Study Of Mankind Is Man. While,  No Doubt,  The Sources Of All Early 
 Folk-Lore Are Composite,  Yet It Matters Greatly For The Student Of These 
 Things Whether The Beginnings Of Religious Thought Were Merely In the 
 Clouds,  Or Whether They Had Their Roots In the Same Earth Whereon We 
 Live And Labour. The Heroes And Great People Of The Early Days Are 
 Eternal Figures,  Because Each New Generation Gives Them A Resurrection 
 In Its Own Life And Experience. They Have Eternal Human Meanings, 
 Beneath Whatever Pageantry Of Sun And Stars The Ancient Heroes Passed 
 From Birth To Death. Soon Everything of Them Is Forgotten Except The 
 Ideas About Human Life For Which They Stand. Then Each Of Them Becomes 
 The Expression Of A Thought Common To Humanity,  And Therefore Secure Of 
 Its Immortality To The End Of Time; For The Undying interest Is The 
 Human Interest,  And All Ideas Which Concern The Life Of Man Are Immortal 
 While Man'S Race Lasts. In the Case Of Such Legends As Those We Are 
 Discussing,  It Is Probable That Beyond The Mere Story Some Such Ideal Of 
 Human Life Was Suggested from The Very First. Certainly,  As Time Went 
 On,  The Ideal Became So Identified with The Hero,  That To Thoughtful Men 
 
 
 
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 He Came To Stand For A Particular Idealism Of Human Experience. Thus 
 Pater Speaks Of Dionysus As From First To Last A Type Of Second Birth, 
 Opening up The Hope Of A Possible Analogy Between The Resurrections Of 
 Nature And Something else,  Reserved for Human Souls. "The Beautiful, 
 Weeping creatures,  Vexed by The Wind,  Suffering,  Torn To Pieces,  And 
 Rejuvenescent Again At Last,  Like A Tender Shoot Of Living green Out Of 
 The Hardness And Stony Darkness Of The Earth,  Becomes An Emblem Or Ideal 
 Of Chastening and Purification,  And Of Final Victory Through Suffering." 
 This Theory Would Also Explain The Fact That One Nation'S Myths Are Not 
 Only Similar To,  But To A Large Extent Practically Identical With,  Those 
 Of Other Nations. There Is A Common Stock Of Ideas Supplied by The 
 Common Elements Of Human Nature In all Lands And Times; And These,  When 
 Finely Expressed,  Produce A Common Fund Of Ideals Which Will Appeal To 
 The Majority Of The Human Race. 
   
   
   
 Thus Mythology Was Originally Simple Storytelling. But Men,  Even In the 
 Telling of The Story,  Began To Find Meanings For It Beyond The Mere 
 Narration Of Events; And Thus There Arose In connection With All Stories 
 That Were Early Told,  A Certain Number Of Judgments Of What Was High And 
 Admirable In human Nature. These Were Not Grounded upon Philosophical Or 
 Scientific Bases,  But Upon The Bed-Rock Of Man'S Experience. Out Of 
 These Judgments There Grew The Great Ideals Which From First To Last 
 Have Commanded the Spirit Of Man. 
   
 In This Connection It Is Interesting to Remember That In homer The Men 
 Were Regarded as The Means Of Revealing ideas And Characters,  And Not As 
 Mere Natural Objects In themselves. The Things Among Which They Lived 
 Are Described and Known By Their Appearances; The Men Are Known By Their 
 Words And Deeds. "There Is No Inventory Of The Features Of Men,  Or Of 
 Fair Women,  As There Is In the Greek Poets Of The Decline Or In modern 
 Novels. Man Is Something different From A Curious Bit Of Workmanship 
 That Delights The Eye. He Is A 'Speaker Of Words And A Doer Of Deeds,' 
 And His True Delineation Is In speech And Action,  In thought And 
 Emotion." Thus,  From The First,  Ideas Are The Central And Important 
 Element. They Spring from And Cling to Stories Of Individual Human 
 Lives,  And The Finest Of Them Become Ideals Handed down For The Guidance 
 Of The Future Race. The Myths,  With Their Stories Of Gods And Men,  And 
 Their Implied or Declared religious Doctrines,  Are But The Forms In 
 Which These Ideals Find Expression. The Ideals Remain,  But The Forms Of 
 Their Expression Change,  Advancing from Cruder To Finer And From More 
 Fanciful To More Exactly True,  With The Advance Of Thought And Culture. 
 Meanwhile,  The Ideals Are Above The World,--Dwelling,  Like Plato'S,  In 
 Heaven,--And There Are Always Two Alternatives For Every Man. He May Go 
 Back Either With Deliberate Intellectual Assent,  Or Passion-Led in 
 Sensual Moods,  To The Powers Of Nature And The Actual Human Stories In 
 Their Crude And Earthly Form; Or He May Follow The Idealisation Of Human 
 Experience,  And Discover And Adopt The Ideals Of Which The Earthly 
 Stories And The Nature Processes Are But Shadows And Hints. In the 
 Former Case He Will Be A Pagan; In the Latter,  A Spiritual Idealist. In 
 What Remains Of This Lecture,  We Shall Consider Four Of The Most Famous 
 Greek Legends--Those Of Prometheus,  Medusa,  Orpheus,  And Apollo--In The 
 Light Of What Has Just Been Stated. 
   
 Prometheus,  In the Early Story,  Is A Titan,  Who In the Heavenly War Had 
 Fought On The Side Of Zeus. It Is,  However,  Through The Medium Of The 
 Later Story That Prometheus Has Exercised his Eternal Influence Upon The 
 Thought Of Men. In this Form Of The Legend He Appears Constantly Living 
 
 
 
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 And Striving for Man'S Sake As The Foe Of God. We Hear Of Him Making men 
 And Women Of Clay And Animating them With Celestial Fire,  Teaching them 
 The Arts Of Agriculture,  The Taming of Horses,  And The Uses Of Plants. 
 Again We Hear Of Zeus,  Wearied with The Race Of Men--The New Divinity 
 Making a Clean Sweep,  And Wishing to Begin With Better Material. Zeus Is 
 The Lover Of Strength And The Despiser Of Weakness,  And From The Earth 
 With Its Weak And Pitiful Mortals He Takes Away The Gift Of Fire, 
 Leaving them To Perish Of Cold And Helplessness. Then It Is That 
 Prometheus Climbs To Heaven,  Steals Back The Fire In his Hollow Cane, 
 And Brings It Down To Earth Again. For This Benefaction To The Despised 
 Race Zeus Has Him Crucified,  Fixed for Thirty Thousand Years On A Rock 
 In The Asian Caucasus,  Where,  Until Herakles Comes To Deliver Him,  The 
 Vulture Preys Upon His Liver. 
   
   
   
 Such A Story Tempts The Allegorist,  And Indeed the Main Drift Of Its 
 Meaning is Unmistakable. Cornutus,  A Contemporary Of Christ,  Explained 
 It "Of Forethought,  The Quick Inventiveness Of Human Thought Chained to 
 The Painful Necessities Of Human Life,  Its Liver Gnawed unceasingly By 
 Cares." In the Main,  And As A General Description,  This Is Quite 
 Unquestionable. Prometheus Is The Prototype Of A Thousand Other Figures 
 Of The Same Kind,  Not In mythology Only,  But In history,  Which Tell The 
 Story Of The Spiritual Effort Of Man Frustrated and Brought To Earth. It 
 Is The Story Of Tennyson'S Youth Who 
   
      "Rode A Horse With Wings That Would Have Flown 
      But That His Heavy Rider Bore Him Down." 
   
 Only,  In the Prometheus Idea,  It Is Not A Man'S Senses,  As In tennyson'S 
 Poem,  But The Outward Necessity Of Things,  The Heavy And Cruel Powers Of 
 Nature Around Him,  That Prove Too Much For His Aspirations. In this 
 Respect The Story Is Singularly Characteristic Of The Greek Spirit. That 
 Spirit Was Always Daring with Truth,  Feeling the Risks Of Knowledge And 
 Gladly Taking them,  Passionately Devoted to The Love Of Knowledge For 
 Its Own Sake. 
   
 The Legend Has,  However,  A Deeper Significance Than This. One Of The 
 Most Elemental Questions That Man Can Ask Is,  What Is The Relation Of 
 The Gods To Human Inquiry And Freedom Of Thought? There Always Has Been 
 A School Of Thinkers Who Have Regarded knowledge As A Thing essentially 
 Against The Gods. The Search For Knowledge Thus Becomes A Phase Of 
 Titanism; And Wherever It Is Found,  It Must Always Be Regarded in the 
 Light Of A Secret Treasure Stolen From Heaven Against The Will Of 
 Contemptuous Or Jealous Divinities. On The Other Hand,  Knowledge Is 
 Obviously The Friend Of Man. Prometheus Is Man'S Champion,  And No Figure 
 Could Make A Stronger Appeal Than His. Indeed,  In not A Few Respects He 
 Approaches The Christian Ideal,  And Must Have Brought In some Measure 
 The Same Solution To Those Who Were Able To Receive It. Few Touches In 
 Literature,  For Instance,  Are Finer Than That In which He Comforts The 
 Daughters Of Ocean,  Speaking to Them From His Cross. 
   
   
   
 The Idea Of Titanism Has Become The Commonplace Of Poets. It Is Familiar 
 In Milton,  Byron,  Shelley,  And Countless Others,  And Goethe Tells Us 
 That The Fable Of Prometheus Lived within Him. Many Of The Titanic 
 Figures,  While They Appeared to Be Blaspheming,  Were Really Fighting for 
 Truth And Justice. The Conception Of The Gods As Jealous And 
 Contemptuous Was Not Confined to The Greek Mythology,  But Has Appeared 
 Within The Pale Of Christian Faith As Well As In all Heathen Cults. 
 
 
 
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 Nature,  In some Of Its Aspects,  Seems To Justify It. The Great Powers 
 Appear To Be Arrayed against Man'S Efforts,  And Present The Appearance 
 Of Cruel And Bullying strength. Evidently Upon Such A Theory Something 
 Must Go,  Either Our Faith In god Or Our Faith In humanity; And When 
 Faith Has Gone We Shall Be Left In the Position Either Of Atheists Or Of 
 Slaves. There Have Been Those Who Accepted the Alternative And Went Into 
 The One Camp Or The Other According to Their Natures; But The Greek 
 Legend Did Not Necessitate This. There Was Found,  As In ÆSchylus,  A Hint 
 Of Reconciliation,  Which May Be Taken To Represent That Conviction So 
 Deep In the Heart Of Humanity,  That There Is "Ultimate Decency In 
 Things," If One Could Only Find It Out; Although Knowledge Must Always 
 Remain Dangerous,  And May At Times Cost A Man Dear. 
   
   
   
 The Real Secret Lies In the Progress Of Thought In its Conceptions Of 
 God And Life. Nature,  As We Know And Experience It,  Presents Indeed an 
 Appalling spectacle Against Which Everything that Is Good In us 
 Protests. God,  So Long As He Is But Half Understood,  Is Utterly 
 Unpardonable; And No Man Yet Has Succeeded in justifying the Ways Of God 
 To Men. But "To Understand All Is To Forgive All"--Or Rather,  It Is To 
 Enter Into A Larger View Of Life,  And To Discover How Much There Is In 
 _Us_ That Needs To Be Forgiven. This Is The Wonderful Story Which Was 
 Told By The Hebrews So Dramatically In their Book Of Job; And The Phases 
 Through Which That Drama Passes Might Be Taken As The Completest 
 Commentary On The Myth Of Prometheus Which Ever Has Been Or Can Be 
 Written. 
   
 In Two Great Battlegrounds Of The Human Spirit The Problem Raised by 
 Prometheus Has Been Fought Out. On The Ground Of Science,  Who Does Not 
 Know The Defiant And Titanic Mood In which Knowledge Has At Times Been 
 Sought? The Passion For Knowing flames Through The Gloom And Depression 
 And Savagery Of The Darker Moods Of The Student. Difficulties Are 
 Continually Thrust Into The Way Of Knowledge. The Upper Powers Seem To 
 Be Jealous And Outrageously Thwarting,  And The Path Of Learning becomes 
 A Path Of Tears And Blood. That Is All That Has Been Reached by Many A 
 Grim And Brave Student Spirit. But There Is Another Possible 
 Explanation; And There Are Those Who Have Attained to A Persuasion That 
 The Gods Have Made Knowledge Difficult In order That The Wise May Also 
 Be The Strong. 
   
 The Second Battleground Is That Of Philanthropy. Here Also There Has 
 Been An Apparently Reasonable Titanism. Men Have Struggled in vain,  And 
 Then Protested in bitterness,  Against The Waste And The Meaninglessness 
 Of The Human _DéBâCle_. The Only Aspect Of The Powers Above Them Has 
 Seemed to Many Noble Spirits That Of The Sheer Cynic. He That Sitteth In 
 The Heavens Must Be Laughing indeed. In prometheus The Greek Spirit Puts 
 Up Its Daring plea For Man. It Pleads Not For Pity Merely,  But For The 
 Worth Of Human Nature. The Strong Gods Cannot Be Justified in oppressing 
 Man Upon The Plea That Might Is Right,  And That They May Do What They 
 Please. The Protest Of Prometheus,  Echoed by Browning'S Protest Of 
 Ixion,  Appeals To The Conscience Of The World As Right; And,  Kindling a 
 Noble Titanism,  Puts The Divine Oppressor In the Wrong. Finally,  There 
 Dawns Over The Edge Of The Ominous Dark,  The Same Hope That Prometheus 
 Vaguely Hinted to The Greek. To Him Who Has Understood The Story Of 
 Calvary,  The Ultimate Interpretation Of All Human Suffering is Divine 
 Love. That Which The Cross Of Prometheus In all Its Outrageous Cruelty 
 Yet Hints As In a Whisper,  The Cross Of Christ Proclaims To The End Of 
 Time,  Shouting down The Centuries From Its Blood And Pain That God Is 
 
 
 
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 Love,  And That In all Our Affliction He Is Afflicted. 
   
   
   
 Another Myth Of Great Beauty And Far-Reaching significance Is That Of 
 Medusa. It Is Peculiarly Interesting on Account Of Its Double Edge,  For 
 It Shows Us Both The High Possibilities Of Ideal Beauty And The Deepest 
 Depths Of Pagan Horror. Robert Louis Stevenson Tells Us How,  As He Hung 
 Between Life And Death In a Flooded river Of France,  Looking around Him 
 In The Sunshine And Seeing all The Lovely Landscape,  He Suddenly Felt 
 The Attack Of The Other Side Of Things. "The Devouring element In the 
 Universe Had Leaped out Against Me,  In this Green Valley Quickened by A 
 Running stream. The Bells Were All Very Pretty In their Way,  But I Had 
 Heard Some Of The Hollow Notes Of _Pan'S_ Music. Would The Wicked river 
 Drag Me Down By The Heels,  Indeed? And Look So Beautiful All The Time?" 
 It Was In this Connection That He Gave Us That Striking and Most 
 Suggestive Phrase,  "The Beauty And The Terror Of The World." It Is This 
 Combination Of Beauty And Terror For Which The Myth Of Medusa Stands. It 
 Finds Its Meaning in a Thousand Instances. On The One Hand,  It Is Seen 
 In Such Ghastly Incidents As Those In which The Sheer Horror Of Nature'S 
 Action,  Or Of Man'S Crime,  Becomes Invested with An Illicit Beauty,  And 
 Fascinates While It Kills. On The Other Hand,  It Is Seen In all Of The 
 Many Cases In which Exquisite Beauty Proves Also To Be Dangerous,  Or At 
 Least Sinister. "The Haunting strangeness In beauty" Is At Once One Of 
 The Most Characteristic And One Of The Most Tragic Things In the World. 
   
 There Were Three Sisters,  The Gorgons,  Who Dwelt In the Far West,  Beyond 
 The Stream Of Ocean,  In that Cold Region Of Atlas Where The Sun Never 
 Shines And The Light Is Always Dim. Medusa Was One Of Them,  The Only 
 Mortal Of The Trio. She Was A Monster With A Past,  For In her Girlhood 
 She Had Been The Beautiful Priestess Of Athene,  Golden-Haired and Very 
 Lovely,  Whose Life Had Been Devoted to Virgin Service Of The Goddess. 
 Her Golden Locks,  Which Set Her Above All Other Women In the Desire Of 
 Neptune,  Had Been Her Undoing: And When Athene Knew Of The Frailty Of 
 Her Priestess,  Her Vengeance Was Indeed appalling. Each Lock Of The 
 Golden Hair Was Transformed into A Venomous Snake. The Eyes That Had 
 Been So Love-Inspiring were Now Bloodshot And Ferocious. The Skin,  With 
 Its Rose And Milk-White Tenderness,  Had Changed to A Loathsome Greenish 
 White. All That Remained of Medusa Was A Horrid Thing,  A Mere Grinning 
 Mask With Protruding beast-Like Tusks And Tongue Hanging out. So 
 Dreadful Was The Aspect Of The Changed priestess,  That Her Face Turned 
 All Those Who Chanced to Catch Sight Of It To Stone. There Is A Degree 
 Of Hideousness Which No Eyes Can Endure; And So It Came To Pass That The 
 Cave Wherein She Dwelt,  And All The Woods Around It,  Were Full Of Men 
 And Wild Beasts Who Had Been Petrified by A Glance Of Her,--Grim Fossils 
 Immortalised in stone,--While The Snakes Writhed and The Red eyes 
 Rolled,  Waiting for Another Victim. 
   
   
   
 This Was Not A Case Into Which Any Hope Of Redemption Could Enter,  And 
 There Was Nothing for It But To Slay Her. To Do This,  Perseus Set Out 
 Upon His Long Journey,  Equipped with The Magic Gifts Of Swiftness And 
 Invisibility,  And Bearing on His Arm The Shield That Was Also A Mirror. 
 The Whole Picture Is Infinitely Dreary. As He Travels Across The Dark 
 Sea To The Land Where The Pillars Of Atlas Are Visible Far Off,  Towering 
 Into The Sky,  The Light Decreases. In the Murky And Dangerous Twilight 
 He Forces The Graiai,  Those Grey-Haired sisters With Their Miserable 
 Fragmentary Life,  To Bestir Their Aged limbs And Guide Him To The 
 Gorgons' Den. By The Dark Stream,  Where The Yellow Light Brooded 
 Everlastingly,  He Reached at Last That Cave Of Horrors. Well Was It Then 
 
 
 
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 For Perseus That He Was Invisible,  For The Snakes That Were Medusa'S 
 Hair Could See All Round. But At That Time Medusa Was Asleep And The 
 Snakes Asleep,  And In the Silence And Twilight Of The Land Where There 
 Is "Neither Night Nor Day,  Nor Cloud Nor Breeze Nor Storm," He Held The 
 Magic Mirror Over Against The Monster,  Beheld Her In it Without Change 
 Or Injury To Himself,  Severed the Head,  And Bore It Away To Place It On 
 Athene'S Shield. 
   
   
   
 It Is Very Interesting to Notice How Art Has Treated the Legend. It Was 
 Natural That So Vivid An Image Should Become A Favourite Alike With 
 Poets And With Sculptors,  But There Was A Gradual Development From The 
 Old Hideous And Terrible Representations,  Back To The Calm Repose Of A 
 Beautiful Dead Face. This Might Indeed more Worthily Record The Maiden'S 
 Tragedy,  But It Missed entirely The Thing that The Old Myth Had Said. 
 The Oldest Idea Was Horrible Beyond Horror,  For The Darker Side Of 
 Things Is Always The Most Impressive To Primitive Man,  And Sheer 
 Ugliness Is A Category With Which It Is Easy To Work On Simple Minds. 
 The Rudest Art Can Achieve Such Grotesque Hideousness Long Before It Can 
 Depict Beauty. Later,  As We Have Seen,  Art Tempered the Face To Beauty, 
 But In so Doing forgot The Meaning of The Story. It Was The Old Story 
 That Has Been Often Told,  Of The Fair And Frail One Who Had Fallen Among 
 The Pitiless. For Her There Was No Compassion Either In mortals Or In 
 Immortals. It Was The Tragedy Of Sweet Beauty Desecrated and Lost,  The 
 Petrifying horror Of Which Has Found Its Most Unflinching modern 
 Expression In thomas Hardy'S _Tess Of The D'Urbervilles_. _Corruptio 
 Optimi Pessima_. 
   
 To Interpret Such Stories As These By Any Reference To The Rising sun, 
 Or The Rivalry Between Night And Dawn,  Is Simply To Stultify The Science 
 Of Interpretation. It May,  Indeed,  Have Been True That Most Of Those Who 
 Told And Heard The Tale In ancient Times Accepted it In its Own Right, 
 And Without Either The Desire Or The Thought Of Further Meanings. Yet, 
 Even Told In that Fashion,  As It Clung To Memory And Imagination,  It 
 Must Continually Have Reminded men Of Certain Features Of Essential 
 Human Nature,  Which It But Too Evidently Recorded. Here Was One Of The 
 Sad Troop Of Soulless Women Who Appear In the Legends Of All The Races 
 Of Mankind. Medusa Had Herself Been Petrified before She Turned others 
 To Stone. The Horror That Had Come Upon Her Life Had Been Too Much To 
 Bear,  And It Had Killed her Heart Within Her. 
   
 So Far Of Passion And The Price The Woman'S Heart Has Paid For It. But 
 This Story Has To Do Also With Athene,  On Whose Shield Medusa'S Head 
 Must Rest At Last. For It Is Not Passion Only,  But Knowledge,  That May 
 Petrify The Soul. Indeed,  The Story Of Passion Can Only Do This When The 
 Dazzling glamour Of Temptation Has Passed,  And In place Of It Has Come 
 The Cold Knowledge Of Remorse. Then The Sight Of One'S Own Shame,  And, 
 On A Wider Scale,  The Sight Of The Pain And The Tragedy Of The World, 
 Present To The Eyes Of Every Generation The Spectacle Of Victims 
 Standing petrified like Those Who Had Seen Too Much At The Cave'S Mouth 
 In The Old Legend. 
   
   
   
 It Is Peculiarly Interesting to Contrast The Story Of Medusa With Its 
 Hebrew Parallel In lot'S Wife. Both Are Women Presumably Beautiful,  And 
 Both Are Turned to Stone. But While The Greek Petrifaction Is The Result 
 Of Too Direct A Gaze Upon The Horrible,  The Hebrew Is The Result Of Too 
 Loving and Desirous A Gaze Upon The Coveted beauty Of The World. Nothing 
 Could More Exactly Represent And Epitomise The Diverse Genius Of The 
 
 
 
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 Nations,  And We Understand The Greek Story The Better For The Strong 
 Contrast With Its Hebrew Parallel. To The Greek,  Ugliness Was Dangerous; 
 And The Horror Of The World,  Having no Explanation Nor Redress,  Could 
 But Petrify The Heart Of Man. To The Hebrew,  The Beauty Of The World Was 
 Dangerous,  And Man Must Learn To Turn Away His Eyes From Beholding 
 Vanity. 
   
   
   
 The Legend Of Medusa Is A Story Of Despair,  And There Is Little Room In 
 It For Idealism Of Any Kind; And Yet There May Be Some Hint,  In the 
 Reflecting shield Of Perseus,  Of A Brighter And More Heartening truth. 
 The Horror Of The World We Have Always With Us,  And For All Exquisite 
 Spirits Like Those Of The Greeks There Is The Danger Of Their Being 
 Marred by The Brutality Of The Universe,  And Made Hard And Cold In rigid 
 Petrifaction By The Too Direct Vision Of Evil. Yet For Such Spirits 
 There Is Ever Some Shield Of Faith,  In whose Reflection They May See The 
 Darkest Horrors And Yet Remain Flesh And Blood. Those Who Believe In 
 Life And Love,  Whose Religion--Or At Least Whose Indomitable Clinging to 
 The Beauty They Have Once Descried--Has Taught Them Sufficient Courage 
 In Dwelling upon These Things,  May Come Unscathed through Any Such 
 Ordeal. But For That,  The Story Is One Of Sheer Pagan Terror. It Came 
 Out Of The Old,  Dark Pre-Olympian Mythology (For The Gorgons Are The 
 Daughters Of Hades),  And It Embodied the Ancient Truth That The Sorrow 
 Of The World Worketh Death. It Is A Tragic World,  And The Earth-Bound, 
 Looking upon Its Tragedy,  Will See In it Only The _Macabre_,  And Feel 
 That Graveyard And Spectral Air Which Breathes About The Haunted pagan 
 Sepulchre. 
   
 Another Myth In which We See The Contrast Between Essential Paganism And 
 Idealism Is That Of Orpheus. The Myth Appears In countless Forms And 
 With Innumerable Excrescences,  But In the Main It Is In three Successive 
 Parts. The First Of These Tells Of The Sweet Singer Loved by All The 
 Creatures,  The Dear Friend Of All The World,  Whose Charm Nothing that 
 Lived on Earth Could Resist,  And Whose Spell Hurt No Creature Whom It 
 Allured. The Conception Stands In sharp Contrast To The Ghastly Statuary 
 That Adorned medusa'S Precincts. Here,  With A Song Whose Sweetness 
 Surpassed that Of The Sirens,  Nature,  Dead And Living both (For All 
 Lived unto Orpheus),  Followed him With Glad And Loving movement. Nay, 
 Not Only Beasts And Trees,  But Stones Themselves And Even Mountains, 
 Felt In the Hard Heart Of Them The Power Of This Sweet Music. It Is One 
 Of The Most Perfect Stories Ever Told--The Precursor Of The Legends That 
 Gathered round Francis Of Assisi And Many A Later Saint And Artist. It 
 Is The Prophecy From The Earliest Days Of That Consummation Of Which 
 Isaiah Was Afterwards To Sing and St. Paul To Echo The Song,  When Nature 
 Herself Would Come To The Perfect Reconciliation For Which She Had Been 
 Groaning and Travailing through All The Years. 
   
   
   
 The Second Part Of The Story Tells Of The Tragedy Of Love. Such A Man As 
 Orpheus,  If He Be Fortunate In his Love,  Will Love Wonderfully,  And 
 Eurydice Is His Worthy Bride. Dying,  Bitten By A Snake In the Grass As 
 She Flees From Danger,  She Descends To Hades. But The Surpassing love Of 
 The Sweet Singer Dares To Enter That August Shadow,  Not To Drink The 
 Waters Of Lethe Only And To Forget,  But Also To Drink The Waters Of 
 Eunoe And To Remember. His Music Charms The Dead,  And Those Who Have The 
 Power Of Death. Even The Hard-Hearted monarch Of Hell Is Moved for 
 Orpheus,  Who 
   
      "Drew Iron Tears Down Pluto'S Cheek, 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture i  The Gods Of Greece      Pg 12 
      And Made Hell Grant What Love Did Seek." 
   
   
 But The Rescue Has One Condition. He Must Restrain Himself,  Must Not 
 Look Upon The Face Of His Beloved though He Bears Her In his Arms,  Until 
 They Have Passed the Region Of The Shadow Of Death,  And May See One 
 Another In the Sunlight Of The Bright Earth Again. The Many Versions Of 
 The Tragic Disobedience To This Condition Bear Eloquent Testimony,  Not 
 Certainly To Any Changing phase Of The Sky,  But To The Manifold Aspects 
 Of Human Life. According to Some Accounts,  It Was The Rashness Of 
 Orpheus That Did The Evil--Love'S Impatience,  That Could Not Wait The 
 Fitting time,  And,  Snatching prematurely That Which Was Its Due, 
 Sacrificed all. According to Other Accounts,  It Was Eurydice Who Tempted 
 Orpheus,  Her Love And Pain Having grown Too Hungry And Blind. However 
 That May Be,  The Error Was Fatal,  And On The Very Eve Of Victory All Was 
 Lost. It Was Lost,  Not By Any Snatching back In which Strong Hands Of 
 Hell Tore His Beloved from The Man'S Grasp. Within His Arms The Form Of 
 Eurydice Faded away,  And As He Clutched at Her His Fingers Closed upon 
 The Empty Air. That,  Too,  Is A Law Deep In the Nature Of Things. It Is 
 By No Arbitrary Decree That Self-Restraint Has Been Imposed on Love. In 
 This,  As In all Other Things,  A Man Must Consent To Lose His Life In 
 Order To Find It; And Those Who Will Not Accept The Conditions,  Will Be 
 Visited by No Melodramatic Or Violent Catastrophe. Love Which Has Broken 
 Law Will Simply Fade Away And Vanish. 
   
 The Third Part Of The Story Is No Less Interesting and Significant. 
 Maddened with This Second Loss,  So Irrevocable And Yet Due To So 
 Avoidable A Cause,  Orpheus,  In restless Despair,  Wandered about The 
 Lands. For Him The Nymphs Had Now No Attractions,  Nor Was There Anything 
 In All The World But The Thought Of His Half-Regained eurydice,  Now Lost 
 For Ever. His Music Indeed remained,  Nor Did He Cast Away His Lute; But 
 It Was Heard Only In the Most Savage And Lonely Places. At Length Wild 
 Thracian Women Heard It,  Furious In the Rites Of Dionysus. They Desired 
 Him,  But His Heart Was Elsewhere,  And,  In the Mad Reaction Of Their 
 Savage Breasts,  When He Refused them They Tore Him Limb From Limb. He 
 Was Buried near The River Hebrus,  And His Head Was Thrown Into The 
 Stream. But As The Waters Bore It Down,  The Lips Whose Singing had 
 Charmed the World Still Repeated the Beloved name Eurydice To The Waters 
 As They Flowed. 
   
 Here Again It Is As If,  Searching for The Dead In some Ancient 
 Sepulchre,  We Had Found A Living man And Friend. The Symbolism Of The 
 Story,  Disentangled from Detail Which May Have Been True Enough In a 
 Lesser Way,  Is Clear To Every Reader. It Tells That Love Is Strong As 
 Death--That Old Sweet Assurance Which The Lover In canticles Also 
 Discovered. Love Is Indeed set Here Under Conditions,  Or Rather It Has 
 Perceived the Conditions Which The Order Of Things Has Set,  And These 
 Conditions Have Been Violated. But Still The Voice Of The Severed head, 
 Crying out The Beloved name As The Waters Bore It To The Sea,  Speaks In 
 Its Own Exquisite Way The Final Word. It Gives The Same Assurance With 
 The Same Thrill Which We Feel When We Read The Story Of Herakles 
 Wrestling with Death For The Body Of Alkestis,  And Winning the Woman 
 Back From Her Very Tomb. 
   
   
   
 But Before Love Can Be A Match For Death,  It First Must Conquer Life, 
 And The Early Story Of The Power Of Orpheus Over The Wild Beasts, 
 Restoring,  As It Does,  An Earthly Paradise In which There Is Nothing but 
 Gentleness,  Marks The Conquest Of Life By Love. All Life'S Wildness And 
 
 
 
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 Savagery,  Which Seem To Give The Lie To Love Continually,  Are After All 
 Conquerable And May Be Tamed. And The Lesson Of It All Is The Great 
 Persuasion That In the Depth Of Things Life Is Good And Not Evil. When 
 We Come To The Second Conflict,  And That Love Which Has Mastered life 
 Now Pits Itself Against Death,  It Goes Forward To The Greater Adventure 
 With A Strange Confidence. Who That Has Looked upon The Face Of One 
 Dearly Beloved who Is Dead,  Has Not Known The Leap Of The Spirit,  Not So 
 Much In rebellion As In demand? Love Is So Great A Thing that It 
 Obviously Ought To Have This Power,  And Somehow We Are All Persuaded 
 That It Has It--That Death Is But A Puppet King,  And Love The Master Of 
 The Universe After All. The Story Of Orpheus And Eurydice Is But A 
 Faltering expression Of This Great Assurance,  Yet It Does Express It. 
   
   
   
 For It Explains To All Who Have Ears To Hear,  What Are The Real Enemies 
 Of Love Which Can Weaken It In its Conflict With Death. The Thracian 
 Women,  Those Drunken Bacchanals That Own No Law But Their Desires,  Stand 
 For The Lawless Claim And Attack Of The Lower Life Upon The Higher. They 
 But Repeat,  In exaggerated and Delirious Form,  The Sad Story Of The 
 Forfeiture Of Eurydice. It Is The Touch Of Lawlessness,  Of Haste,  Of 
 Selfishness,  That Costs Love Its Victory And Finally Slays It,  So Far As 
 Love Can Be Slain. 
   
 In This Wonderful Story We Have A Pure Greek Creation In the Form Of One 
 Of The Finest Sagas Of The World. The Battle Between The Pagan And Ideal 
 Aspects Of Life Is Seen In countless Individual Touches Throughout The 
 Story; But The Whole Tale Is One Continuous Symbolic Warning against 
 Paganism,  And A Plea For Idealism Urged in the Form Of A Mighty 
 Contrast. Love Is Here Seen In its Most Spiritual Aspect. Paganism 
 Enters With The Touch Of Lawlessness. On The Large Scale The Battle Was 
 Fought Out Some Centuries Later,  In the Days Of The Roman Empire,  For 
 All The World To See. The Two Things Which Give Their Character To The 
 Centuries From Augustus To Constantine Are The Persistent Cry Of Man For 
 Immortality,  And The Strong Lusts Of The Flesh Which Silenced it. On The 
 Smaller Scale Of Each Individual Life,  Men And Women Will Understand To 
 The End Of Time,  From Their Own Experience,  The Story Of Orpheus. 
   
 It Is Peculiarly Interesting to Remember That The Figure Of The Sweet 
 Singer Grew Into The Centre Of A Great Religious Creed. The Cult Of 
 Orphism,  Higher And More Spiritual Than That Of Either Eleusis Or 
 Dionysus,  Appears As Early As The Sixth Century B.C.,  And Reaches Its 
 Greatest In the Fifth And Fourth Centuries. The Orphic Hymns Proclaim 
 The High Doctrine Of The Divineness Of All Life,  And Open,  At Least For 
 The Hopes Of Men,  The Gates Of Immortality. The Secret Societies Which 
 Professed the Cult Had The Strongest Possible Influence Upon The Thought 
 Of Early Athens,  But Their Most Prominent Effect Is Seen In plato,  Who 
 Derived from Them His Main Doctrines Of Pre-Existence,  Penance, 
 Reincarnation And The Final Purification Of The Soul. Even The Early 
 Christians,  Who Hated so Bitterly Many Of The Myths Of Paganism,  And 
 Found In them Nothing but Doctrines Of Devils,  Treated this Story 
 Tenderly,  Blended the Picture Of Orpheus With That Of Their Own Good 
 Shepherd,  And Found It Edifying to Christian Faith. 
   
   
   
 One More Instance May Be Given In the Story Of Apollo,  In which,  More 
 Perhaps Than In any Other,  There Is An Amazing combination Of Bad And 
 Good Elements. On The One Hand There Are The Innumerable Immoralities 
 And Savageries That Are Found In all The Records Of Mythology. On The 
 Other Hand,  He Who Flays Marsias Alive And Visits The Earth With Plagues 
 
 
 
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 Is Also The Healer Of Men. He Is The Cosmopolitan God Of The Brotherhood 
 Of Mankind,  The Spirit Of Wisdom Whose Oracle Acknowledged and Inspired 
 Socrates,  And,  Generally,  The Incarnation Of The "Glory Of The Lord." 
   
   
   
   
   
 We Cannot Here Touch Upon The Marvellous Tales Of Delos And Of Delphi, 
 Nor Repeat The Strains That Pindar Sang,  Sitting in his Iron Chair 
 Beside The Shrine. This Much At Least We May Say,  That Both The Apollo 
 Of Delos And The Apollo Of Delphi Are Foreign Gods,  Each Of Whom 
 Appropriated to His Own Use A Sacred place Where The Ancient Earth-Bound 
 Religion Had Already Established its Rites. The Greeks Brought With Them 
 A Splendid God From Their Former Home,  But In his New Shrine He Was 
 Identified with A Local God,  Very Far From Splendid; And This Seems To 
 Be The Most Reasonable Explanation Of The Inconsistency Between The 
 Revolting and The Beautiful Elements In his Worship. Pindar At Least 
 Repudiated the Relics Of The Poorer Cult,  And Cried concerning such 
 Stories As Were Current Then,  "Oh,  My Tongue,  Fling this Tale From Thee; 
 It Is A Hateful Cleverness That Slanders Gods." No One Who Has Realised 
 The Power And Glory Of The Eastern Sun,  Can Wonder At The Identification 
 Both Of The Good And Bad Symbolism With The Orb Of Day. Sun-Worship Is 
 Indeed a Form Of Nature-Worship,  And There Are Physical Reasons Obvious 
 Enough For Its Being able To Incorporate Both The Clean And Unclean, 
 Both The Deadly And The Benign Legends. Yet There Is A Splendour In it 
 Which Is Seen In its Attraction For Such Minds As Those Of Aurelian And 
 Julian,  And Which Is Capable Of Refinement In the Delicate Spirituality 
 Of Mithra,  That Worship Of The Essential Principle Of Light,  The Soul Of 
 Sunshine. In the Worship Of Apollo We Have A Combination,  Than Which 
 None On Record Is More Striking,  Of The Finest Spirituality With The 
 Crudest Paganism. 
   
 Here Then,  In the Magical Arena Of The Early World Of Greece,  We See In 
 One Of Its Most Romantic Forms The Age-Long Strife Between Paganism And 
 Spirituality. We Have Taken At Random Four Of The Most Popular Stories 
 Of Greece. We Have Found In each Of Them Pagan Elements Partly 
 Bequeathed by That Earlier And Lower Earth-Bound Worship Which Preceded 
 The Olympians,  Partly Added in decadent Days When The Mind Of Man Was 
 Turned from The Heights And Grovelling again. But We Have Seen A Deeper 
 Meaning in them,  Far Further-Reaching than Any Story Of Days And Nights 
 Or Of Years And Seasons. It Is A Story Of The Aspiring spirit Which Is 
 Ever Wistful Here On The Green Earth (Although That Indeed is Pleasant), 
 And Which Finds Its Home Among High Thoughts,  And Ideas Which Dwell In 
 Heaven. We Shall See Many Aspects Of The Same Twofold Thought And Life, 
 As We Move About From Point To Point Among The Literature Of Later Days. 
 Yet We Shall Seldom Find Any Phase Of The Conflict Which Has Not Been 
 Prophesied,  Or At Least Foreshadowed,  In these Legends Of The Dawn. The 
 Link That Binds The Earliest To The Latest Page Of Literature Is Just 
 That Human Nature Which,  Through All Changes Of Country And Of Time, 
 Remains Essentially The Same. It Is This Which Lends To Our Subject Its 
 Individual As Well As Its Historical Interest. The Battle Is For Each Of 
 Us Our Own Battle,  And Its Victories And Defeats Are Our Own. 
   
   
   
 
 
 
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 Much Has Been Written,  Before And After The Day Of Walter Pater, 
 Concerning that Singularly Pure And Yet Singularly Disappointing 
 Character,  Marcus Aurelius,  And His Times. The Ethical And Religious 
 Ferment Of The Period Has Been Described with Great Fullness And 
 Sympathy By Professor Dill. Yet It May Be Said,  Without Fear Of 
 Contradiction,  That No Book Has Ever Been Written,  Nor Is Likely Ever To 
 Appear,  Which Has Conveyed to Those Who Came Under Its Spell A More 
 Intimate And Familiar Conception Of That Remarkable Period And Man Than 
 That Which Has Been Given By Walter Pater'S _Marius The Epicurean_. 
   
   
   
 Opinion Is Divided about The Value Of Pater'S Work,  And If It Be True 
 That Some Of His Admirers Have Provoked criticism By Their Unqualified 
 Praise,  It Is No Less True That Many Of His Detractors Appear Never To 
 Have Come In contact With His Mind At All. Born In 1839,  He Spent The 
 Greater Part Of His Life In queen'S College,  Oxford,  Where He Died in 
 1894. As Literary Critic,  Humanist,  And Master Of A Thoroughly Original 
 Style,  He Made A Considerable Impression Upon His Generation From The 
 First; But It May Be Safely Said That It Is Only Now,  When Readers Are 
 Able To Look Upon His Work In a More Spacious And Leisurely Way,  That He 
 And His Contribution To English Thought And Letters Have Come To Their 
 Own. 
   
 The Family Was Of Dutch Extraction,  And While The Sons Of His 
 Grandfather Were Trained in the Roman Catholic Religion,  The Daughters 
 Were Protestants From Their Childhood. His Father Left The Roman 
 Catholic Communion Early In life,  Without Adopting any Other Form Of 
 Christian Faith. It Is Not Surprising that Out Of So Strongly Marked and 
 Widely Mingled a Heredity There Should Have Emerged a Writer Prone To 
 Symbolism And Open To The Sense Of Beauty In ritual,  And Yet Too 
 Cosmopolitan To Accept Easily The Conventional Religious Forms. Before 
 His Twentieth Year He Had Come Under The Influence Of Ruskin'S Writings, 
 But He Soon Parted from That Wayward And Contradictory Master,  Whose 
 Brilliant Dogmatism Enslaved so Thoroughly,  But So Briefly,  The Taste Of 
 Young England. Ruskin,  However,  Had Awakened pater,  Although To A Style 
 Of Criticism Very Different From His Own,  And For This Service We Owe 
 Him Much. The Environment Of Oxford Subjected his Spirit To Two Widely 
 Different Sets Of Influences. On The One Hand,  He Was In contact With 
 Such Men As Jowett,  Nettleship,  And Thomas Hill Green: On The Other 
 Hand,  With Swinburne,  Burne-Jones,  And The Pre-Raphaelites. Thus The 
 Awakened spirit Felt The Dominion Both Of A High Spiritual Rationalism, 
 And Of The Beauty Of Flesh And The Charm Of The Earth. A Visit To Italy 
 In Company With Shadwell,  And His Study Of The Renaissance There,  Made 
 Him An Enthusiastic Humanist. The Immediate Product Of This Second 
 Awakening was The _Renaissance_ Essays,  A Very Remarkable Volume Of His 
 Early Work. Twelve Years Later,  _Marius The Epicurean_,  His Second Book, 
 Appeared in 1885. In dr. Gosse,  Pater Has Found An Interpreter Of Rare 
 Sympathy And Insight,  Whose Appreciations Of His Contemporaries Are,  In 
 Their Own Right,  Fine Contributions To Modern Literature. 
   
   
   
 The Characteristics Of His Style Were Also Those Both Of His Thought And 
 Of His Character. Dr. Gosse Has Summed up The Reserve And Shy Reticence 
 And The Fastidious Taste Which Always Characterise His Work,  In saying 
 
 
 
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 That He Was "One Of The Most Exquisite,  Most Self-Respecting,  The Most 
 Individual Prose Writers Of The Age." Even In the Matter Of Style He 
 Consciously Respected his Own Individuality,  Refusing to Read Either 
 Stevenson Or Kipling for Fear That Their Masterful Strength Might Lead 
 Him Out Of His Path. Certainly His Bitterest Enemies Could Not Accuse 
 Him Of Borrowing from Either Of Them. Mr. Kipling is Apt To Sacrifice 
 Everything to Force,  While Pater Is Perhaps The Gentlest Writer Of Our 
 Time. In stevenson There Is A Delicate And Yet Vigorous Human Passion, 
 But Also A Sense Of Fitness,  A Consciousness Of Style That Is All His 
 Own. He Is Preaching,  And Not Swearing at You,  As You Often Feel Mr. 
 Kipling to Be Doing. To Preach At One May Be Indeed to Take A Great 
 Liberty,  But Of Course Much Will Depend Upon Whether The Preaching is 
 Good Preaching. Be That As It May,  Pater Is Distinctive,  And Borrows 
 Nothing from Any Writer Whose Influence Can Be Traced in his Work. He 
 Neither Swears Nor Preaches,  But Weaves About His Reader A Subtle Film 
 Of Thought,  Through Whose Gossamer All Things Seem To Suffer A Curious 
 Change,  And To Become Harmonious And Suggestive,  As Dark And 
 Quiet-Coloured things Often Are. The Writer Does Not Force Himself Upon 
 His Readers,  Nor Tempt Even The Most Susceptible To Imitate Him; Rather 
 He Presupposes Himself,  And Dominates Without Appearing. His Reticence, 
 To Which We Have Already Referred,  Is One Of His Most Characteristic 
 Qualities. Dr. Gosse Ascribes It To A Somewhat Low And Sluggish Vitality 
 Of Physical Spirits. For One In this Condition "The First Idea In the 
 Presence Of Anything too Vivacious Is To Retreat,  And The Most Obvious 
 Form Of Social Retreat Is What We Call Affectation." That Pater'S Style 
 Has Impressed many Readers As Affected there Can Be No Question,  And It 
 Is As Unquestionable That Dr. Gosse'S Explanation Is The True One. 
   
 His Style Has Been Much Abused by Critics Who Have Found It Easy To Say 
 Smart Things About Such Tempting peculiarities. We May Admit At Once 
 That The Writing is Laboured and Shows Constant Marks Of The Tool. The 
 Same Criticism Applies,  For That Matter,  To Much That Stevenson Has 
 Written. But Unless A Man'S Style Is Absolutely Offensive,  Which Pater'S 
 Emphatically Is Not,  It Is A Wise Rule To Accept It Rather As A 
 Revelation Of The Man Than As A Chance For Saying clever Things. As One 
 Reads The Work Of Some Of Our Modern Critics,  One Cannot But Perceive 
 And Regret How Much Of Pleasure And Of Profit Their Cleverness Has Cost 
 Them. Acknowledging his Laboriousness And Even His Affectation,  We Still 
 Maintain That The Style Of Walter Pater Is A Very Adequate Expression Of 
 His Mind. There Is A Calm Suggestive Atmosphere,  A Spirit Half-Childish 
 And Half-Aged about His Work. It Is The Work Of A Solemn And Sensitive 
 Child,  Who Has Kept The Innocence Of His Eye For Impressions,  And Yet 
 Brought To His Speech The Experience,  Not Of Years Only,  But Of 
 Centuries. He Has Many Things To Teach Directly; But Even When He Is Not 
 Teaching so,  The Air You Breathe With Its Delicate Suggestion Of Faint 
 Odours,  The Perfect Taste In selection,  The Preferences And Shrinkings 
 And Shy Delights,  All Proclaim A Real And High Culture. And,  After All, 
 The Most Notable Point In his Style Is Just Its Exactness. Over-Precise 
 It May Be Sometimes,  And Even Meticulous,  Yet That Is Because It Is The 
 Exact Expression Of A Delicate And Subtle Mind. In his _Appreciations_ 
 He Lays Down,  As A First Canon For Style,  Flaubert'S Principle Of The 
 Search,  The Unwearied search,  Not For The Smooth,  Or Winsome,  Or 
 Forcible Word As Such,  But,  Quite Simply And Honestly,  For The Word'S 
 Adjustment To Its Meaning. It Will Be Said In reply To Any Such Defence 
 That The Highest Art Is To Conceal Art. That Is An Old Saying and A Hard 
 One,  And It Is Not Possible To Apply Its Rule In every Instance. Pater'S 
 Immense Sense Of The Value Of Words,  And His Choice Of Exact 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture ii ( Marius The Epicurean )    Pg 17 
 Expressions,  Resulted in language Marvellously Adapted to Indicate The 
 Almost Inexpressible Shades Of Thought. When A German Struggles For The 
 Utterance Of Some Mental Complexity He Fashions New Compounds Of Words; 
 A Frenchman Helps Out His Meaning by Gesture,  As The Greek Long Ago Did 
 By Tone. Pater Knows Only One Way Of Overcoming such Situations,  And 
 That Is By The Painful Search For The Unique Word That He Ought To Use. 
   
   
   
 One Result Of This Habit Is That He Has Enriched our Literature With A 
 Large Number Of Pregnant Phrases Which,  It Is Safe To Prophesy,  Will 
 Take Their Place In the Vernacular Of Literary Speech. "Hard Gem-Like 
 Flame," "Drift Of Flowers," "Tacitness Of Mind,"--Such Are Some 
 Memorable Examples Of The Exact Expression Of Elusive Ideas. The House 
 Of Literature Built In this Fashion Is A Notable Achievement In the 
 Architecture Of Language. It Reminds Us Of His Own Description Of A 
 Temple Of ÆSculapius: "His Heart Bounded as The Refined and Dainty 
 Magnificence Of The Place Came Upon Him Suddenly,  In the Flood Of Early 
 Sunshine,  With The Ceremonial Lights Burning here And There,  And With 
 All The Singular Expression Of Sacred order,  A Surprising cleanliness 
 And Simplicity." Who Would Not Give Much To Be Able To Say The Thing he 
 Wants To Say So Exactly And So Beautifully As That Is Said? Indeed the 
 Love Of Beauty Is The Key Both To The Humanistic Thought And To The 
 Simple And Lingering style Of Pater'S Writing. If It Is Not Always 
 Obviously Simple,  That Is Never Due Either To Any Vagueness Or Confusion 
 Of Thought,  But Rather To A Struggle To Express Precise Shades Of 
 Meaning which May Be Manifold,  But Which Are Perfectly Clear To Himself. 
   
 A Mind So Sensitive To Beauty And So Fastidious In judging of It And 
 Expressing it,  Must Necessarily Afford A Fine Arena For The Conflict 
 Between The Tendencies Of Idealism And Paganism. Here The Great Struggle 
 Between Conscience And Desire,  The Rivalry Of Culture And Restraint,  The 
 Choice Between Athens And Jerusalem,  Will Present A Peculiarly 
 Interesting spectacle. In walter Pater Both Elements Are Strongly 
 Marked. The Love Of Ritual,  And A Constitutional Delight In solemnities 
 Of All Kinds,  Was Engrained in his Nature. The Rationalism Of Green And 
 Jowett,  With Its High Spirituality Lighting it From Within,  Drove Off 
 The Ritual For A Time At Least. The Result Of These Various Elements Is 
 A Humanism For Which He Abandoned the Profession Of Christianity With 
 Which He Had Begun. Yet He Could Not Really Part From That Earlier 
 Faith,  And For A Time He Was,  As Dr. Gosse Has Expressed it,  "Not All 
 For Apollo,  And Not All For Christ." The Same Writer Quotes As 
 Applicable To Him An Interesting phrase Of Daudet'S,  "His Brain Was A 
 Disaffected cathedral," And Likens Him To That Mysterious Face Of Mona 
 Lisa,  Of Whose Fantastic Enigma Pater Himself Has Given The Most 
 Brilliant And The Most Intricate Description. From An Early Christian 
 Idealism,  Through A Period Of Humanistic Paganism,  He Passed gradually 
 And Naturally Back To The Abandoned faith Again,  But In readopting it He 
 Never Surrendered the Humanistic Gains Of The Time Between. He Accepted 
 In Their Fullness Both Ideals,  And So Spiritualised his Humanism And 
 Humanised his Idealism. Anything less Rich And Complete Than This Could 
 Never Have Satisfied him. Self-Denial Is Obviously Not An End In itself; 
 And Yet The Real End,  The Fulfilment Of Nature,  Can Never By Any 
 Possibility Be Attained by Directly Aiming at It,  But Must Ever Involve 
 Self-Denial As A Means Towards Its Attainment. It Is Pater'S Clear Sight 
 Of The Necessity Of These Two Facts,  And His Lifelong Attempt To 
 Reconcile Them,  That Give Him,  From The Ethical And Religious Point Of 
 View,  His Greatest Importance. 
   
 
 
 
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 The Story Of This Reconciliation Is _Marius The Epicurean_. It Is A 
 Spiritual Biography Telling the Inner History Of A Roman Youth Of The 
 Time Of Marcus Aurelius. It Begins With An Appreciative Interpretation 
 Of The Old Roman Religion As It Was Then,  And Depicts The Family 
 Celebrations By Which The Devout Were Wont To Seek "To Produce An 
 Agreement With The Gods." Among The Various And Beautiful Tableaux Of 
 That Roman Life,  We See The Solemn Thoughtful Boy Reading hard And 
 Becoming a Precocious Idealist,  Too Old Already For His Years,  But 
 Relieving the Inward Tension By Much Pleasure In the Country And The 
 Open Air. A Time Of Delicate Health Brings Him And Us To A Temple Of 
 ÆSculapius. The Priesthood There Is A Kind Of Hospital College 
 Brotherhood,  Whose Teaching and Way Of Life Inculcate A Mysteriously 
 Sacramental Character In all Matters Of Health And The Body. 
   
   
   
 Like All Other Vital Youths,  Marius Must Eat Of The Tree Of Knowledge 
 And Become A Questioner Of Hitherto Accepted views. "The Tyrannous 
 Reality Of Things Visible," And All The Eager Desire And Delight Of 
 Youth,  Make Their Strong Appeal. Two Influences Favour The Temptation. 
 First There Is His Friend,  Flavian The Epicurean,  Of The School That 
 Delights In pleasure Without Afterthought,  And Is Free From The Burden 
 And Restraint Of Conscience; And Later On,  _The Golden Book_ Of 
 Apuleius,  With Its Exquisite Story Of Cupid And Psyche,  And Its Search 
 For Perfectness In the Frankly Material Life. The Moral Of Its Main 
 Story Is That The Soul Must Not Look Upon The Face Of Its Love,  Nor Seek 
 To Analyse Too Closely The Elements From Which It Springs. Spirituality 
 Will Be Left Desolate If It Breaks This Ban,  And Its Wiser Course Is To 
 Enjoy Without Speculation. Thus We See The Youth Drawn Earthwards,  Yet 
 With A Clinging sense Of Far Mystic Reaches,  Which He Refuses As Yet To 
 Explore. The Death Of Flavian Rudely Shatters This Phase Of His 
 Experience,  And We Find Him Face To Face With Death. The Section Begins 
 With The Wonderful Hymn Of The Emperor Hadrian To His Dying soul-- 
   
      Dear Wanderer,  Gipsy Soul Of Mine, 
      Sweet Stranger,  Pleasing guest And Comrade Of My Flesh, 
      Whither Away? Into What New Land, 
      Pallid One,  Stoney One,  Naked one? 
   
 But The Sheer Spectacle And Fact Of Death Is Too Violent An Experience 
 For Such Sweet Consolations,  And The Death Of Flavian Comes Like A Final 
 Revelation Of Nothing less Than The Soul'S Extinction. Not Unnaturally, 
 The Next Phase Is A Rebound Into Epicureanism,  Spiritual Indeed in the 
 Sense That It Could Not Stoop To Low Pleasures,  But Living wholly In the 
 Present None The Less,  With A Strong And Imperative Appreciation Of The 
 Fullness Of Earthly Life. 
   
   
   
 The Next Phase Of The Life Of Marius Opens With A Journey To Rome, 
 During which He Meets A Second Friend,  The Soldier Cornelius. This Very 
 Distinctly Drawn Character Fascinates The Eye From The First. In him We 
 Meet A Kind Of Earnestness Which Seems To Interpret And Fit In with The 
 Austere Aspects Of The Landscape. It Is Different From That Disciplined 
 Hardness Which Was To Be Seen In roman Soldiers As The Result Of Their 
 Military Training; Indeed,  It Seems As If This Were Some New Kind Of 
 Knighthood,  Whose Mingled austerity And Blitheness Were Strangely 
 Suggestive Of Hitherto Unheard-Of Achievements In character. 
   
   
   
 The Impression Made By Rome Upon The Mind Of Marius Was A Somewhat 
 Morbid One. He Was Haunted more Or Less By The Thought Of Its Passing 
 
 
 
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 And Its Eventual Ruin,  And He Found Much,  Both In its Religion And Its 
 Pleasure,  To Criticise. The Dominant Figure In the Imperial City Was 
 That Of Marcus Aurelius The Emperor,  So Famous In his Day That For Two 
 Hundred years After His Death His Image Was Cherished among The Penates 
 Of Many Pious Families. Amid Much That Was Admirable In him,  There Was A 
 Certain Chill In his Stoicism,  And A Sense Of Lights Fading out Into The 
 Night. His Words In praise Of Death,  And Much Else Of His,  Had Of Course 
 A Great Distinction. Yet In his Private Intercourse With Marcus 
 Aurelius,  Marius Was Not Satisfied,  Nor Was It The Bleak Sense That All 
 Is Vanity Which Troubled him,  But Rather A Feeling of Mediocrity--Of A 
 Too Easy Acceptance Of The World--In The Imperial Philosophy. For In the 
 Companionship Of Cornelius There Was A Foil To The Stoicism Of Marcus 
 Aurelius,  And His Friend Was More Truly An Aristocrat Than His Emperor. 
 Cornelius Did Not Accept The World In its Entirety,  Either Sadly Or 
 Otherwise. In him There Was "Some Inward Standard ... Of Distinction, 
 Selection,  Refusal,  Amid The Various Elements Of The Period And The 
 Corrupt Life Across Which They Were Moving together." And,  Apparently As 
 A Consequence Of This Spirit Of Selection,  "With All The Severity Of 
 Cornelius,  There Was A Breeze Of Hopefulness--Freshness And 
 Hopefulness--As Of New Morning,  About Him." Already,  It May Be,  The 
 Quick Intelligence Of The Reader Has Guessed what Is Coming. Jesus 
 Christ Said Of Himself On One Occasion,  "For Distinctions I Am Come Into 
 The World." Marius' Criticism Of The Emperor Reached its Climax In his 
 Disgust At The Amusements Of The Amphitheatre,  Which Also Marcus 
 Aurelius Accepted. 
   
 There Follows A Long Account Of Roman Life And Thought,  With Much 
 Speculation As To The Ideal Commonwealth. That Dream Of The Philosophers 
 Remains For Ever In the Air,  Detached from Actual Experiences And 
 Institutions,  But Marius Felt Himself Passing beyond It To Something in 
 Which It Would Be Actually Realised and Visibly Localised,  "The Unseen 
 Rome On High." Thus In correcting and Supplementing the Philosophies, 
 And In insisting upon Some Actual Embodiment Of Them On The Earth,  He Is 
 Groping his Way Point By Point To Christ. The Late Dean Church Has Said: 
 "No One Can Read The Wonderful Sayings Of Seneca,  Epictetus,  Or Marcus 
 Aurelius,  Without Being impressed,  Abashed perhaps,  By Their Grandeur. 
 No One Can Read Them Without Wondering the Next Moment Why They Fell So 
 Dead--How Little Response They Seem To Have Awakened round Them." It Is 
 Precisely At This Point That The Young Christian Church Found Its 
 Opportunity. Pagan Idealisms Were Indeed in the Air. The Christian 
 Idealism Was Being realised upon The Earth,  And It Was This With Which 
 Marius Was Now Coming into Contact. 
   
   
   
 So He Goes On Until He Is Led up To Two Curious Houses. The First Of 
 These Was The House Of Apuleius,  Where In a Subtle And Brilliant System 
 Of Ideas It Seemed as If A Ladder Had Been Set Up From Earth To Heaven. 
 But Marius Discovered that What He Wanted was The Thing itself And Not 
 Its Mere Theory,  A Life Of Realised ideals And Not A Dialectic. The 
 Second House Was More Curious Still. Much Pains Is Spent Upon The 
 Description Of It With Its "Quiet Signs Of Wealth,  And Of A Noble 
 Taste," In which Both Colour And Form,  Alike Of Stones And Flowers, 
 Seemed expressive Of A Rare And Potent Beauty In the Personality That 
 Inhabited them. There Were Inscriptions There To The Dead Martyrs, 
 Inscriptions Full Of Confidence And Peace. Old Pagan Symbols Were There 
 Also--Herakles Wrestling with Death For Possession Of Alkestis,  And 
 Orpheus Taming the Wild Beasts--Blended naturally With New Symbols Such 
 As The Shepherd And The Sheep,  And The Good Shepherd Carrying the Sick 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture ii ( Marius The Epicurean )    Pg 20 
 Lamb Upon His Shoulder. The Voice Of Singers Was Heard In the House Of 
 An Evening singing the Candle Hymn,  "Hail,  Heavenly Light." Altogether 
 There Seemed here To Be A Combination Of Exquisite And Obvious Beauty 
 With "A Transporting discovery Of Some Fact,  Or Series Of Facts,  In 
 Which The Old Puzzle Of Life Had Found Its Solution." 
   
   
   
 It Was None Other Than The Church Of The Early Christian Days That 
 Marius Had Stumbled on,  Under The Guidance Of His New Friend; And 
 Already In heart He Had Actually Become A Christian Without Knowing it, 
 For These Friends Of Comeliness Seemed to Him To Have Discovered the 
 Secret Of Actualising the Ideal As None Others Had Done. At Such A 
 Moment In his Spiritual Career It Is Not Surprising that He Should 
 Hesitate To Look Upon That Which Would "Define The Critical 
 Turning-Point," Yet He Looked. He Saw The Blend Of Greek And Christian, 
 Each At Its Best--The Martyrs' Hope,  The Singers' Joy And Health. In 
 This "Minor Peace Of The Church," So Pure,  So Delicate,  And So Vital 
 That It Made The Roman Life Just Then "Seem Like Some Stifling forest Of 
 Bronze-Work,  Transformed,  As If By Malign Enchantment,  Out Of The 
 Generations Of Living trees," He Seemed to See The Possibility Of 
 Satisfaction At Last. For Here There Was A Perfect Love And 
 Self-Sacrifice,  Outwardly Expressed with A Mystic Grace Better Than The 
 Greek Blitheness,  And A New Beauty Which Contrasted brightly With The 
 Roman Insipidity. It Was The Humanism Of Christianity That So Satisfied 
 Him,  Standing as It Did For The Fullness Of Life,  In spite Of All Its 
 Readiness For Sacrifice. And It Was Effective Too,  For It Seemed to Be 
 Doing rapidly What The Best Paganism Was Doing very Slowly--Attaining, 
 Almost Without Thinking about It,  The Realisation Of The Noblest Ideals. 
   
 "And So It Came To Pass That On This Morning marius Saw For The First 
 Time The Wonderful Spectacle--Wonderful,  Especially,  In its Evidential 
 Power Over Himself,  Over His Own Thoughts--Of Those Who Believe. There 
 Were Noticeable,  Among Those Present,  Great Varieties Of Rank,  Of Age, 
 Of Personal Type. The Roman _Ingenuus_,  With The White Toga And Gold 
 Ring,  Stood Side By Side With His Slave; And The Air Of The Whole 
 Company Was,  Above All,  A Grave One,  An Air Of Recollection. Coming thus 
 Unexpectedly Upon This Large Assembly,  So Entirely United,  In a Silence 
 So Profound,  For Purposes Unknown To Him,  Marius Felt For A Moment As If 
 He Had Stumbled by Chance Upon Some Great Conspiracy. Yet That Could 
 Scarcely Be,  For The People Here Collected might Have Figured as The 
 Earliest Handsel,  Or Pattern,  Of A New World,  From The Very Face Of 
 Which Discontent Had Passed away. Corresponding to The Variety Of Human 
 Type There Present,  Was The Various Expression Of Every Form Of Human 
 Sorrow Assuaged. What Desire,  What Fulfilment Of Desire,  Had Wrought So 
 Pathetically On The Features Of These Ranks Of Aged men And Women Of 
 Humble Condition? Those Young Men,  Bent Down So Discreetly On The 
 Details Of Their Sacred service,  Had Faced life And Were Glad,  By Some 
 Science,  Or Light Of Knowledge They Had,  To Which There Had Certainly 
 Been No Parallel In the Older World. Was Some Credible Message From 
 Beyond 'The Flaming rampart Of The World'--A Message Of Hope Regarding 
 The Place Of Men'S Souls And Their Interest In the Sum Of 
 Things--Already Moulding anew Their Very Bodies,  And Looks,  And Voices, 
 Now And Here? At Least,  There Was A Cleansing and Kindling flame At Work 
 In Them,  Which Seemed to Make Everything else Marius Had Ever Known Look 
 Comparatively Vulgar And Mean." 
   
 The Spectacle Of The Sacrament Adds Its Deep Impression,  "Bread And Wine 
 Especially--Pure Wheaten Bread,  The Pure White Wine Of The Tusculan 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture ii ( Marius The Epicurean )    Pg 21 
 Vineyards. There Was Here A Veritable Consecration,  Hopeful And 
 Animating,  Of The Earth'S Gifts,  Of Old Dead And Dark Matter Itself,  Now 
 In Some Way Redeemed at Last,  Of All That We Can Touch And See,  In the 
 Midst Of A Jaded world That Had Lost The True Sense Of Such Things." 
   
   
 The Sense Of Youth In it All Was Perhaps The Dominating impression--The 
 Youth That Was Yet Old As The World In experience And Discovery Of The 
 True Meaning of Life. The Young Christ Was Rejuvenating the World,  And 
 All Things Were Being made New By Him. 
   
 This Is The Climax Of The Book. He Meets Lucian The Aged,  Who For A 
 Moment Darkens His Dawning faith,  But That Which Has Come To Him Has 
 Been No Casual Emotion,  No Forced or Spectacular Conviction. He Does Not 
 Leap To The Recognition Of Christianity At First Sight,  But Very Quietly 
 Realises And Accepts It As That Secret After Which His Pagan Idealism 
 Had Been All The Time Groping. The Story Closes Amid Scenes Of Plague 
 And Earthquake And Martyrdom In which He And Cornelius Are Taken 
 Prisoners,  And He Dies At Last A Christian. "It Was The Same People Who, 
 In The Grey,  Austere Evening of That Day,  Took Up His Remains,  And 
 Buried them Secretly,  With Their Accustomed prayers; But With Joy Also, 
 Holding his Death,  According to Their Generous View In this Matter,  To 
 Have Been Of The Nature Of A Martyrdom; And Martyrdom,  As The Church Had 
 Always Said,  Was A Kind Of Sacrament With Plenary Grace." 
   
   
   
 Such Is Some Very Brief And Inadequate Conception Of One Of The Most 
 Remarkable Books Of Our Time,  A Book "Written To Illustrate The Highest 
 Ideal Of The æSthetic Life,  And To Prove That Beauty May Be Made The 
 Object Of The Soul In a Career As Pure,  As Concentrated,  And As Austere 
 As Any That Asceticism Inspires. _Marius_ Is An Apology For The Highest 
 Epicureanism,  And At The Same Time It Is A Texture Which The Author Has 
 Embroidered with Exquisite Flowers Of Imagination,  Learning,  And 
 Passion. Modern Humanism Has Produced no More Admirable Product Than 
 This Noble Dream Of A Pursuit Through Life Of The Spirit Of Heavenly 
 Beauty." Nothing could Be More True,  So Far As It Goes,  Than This 
 Admirable Paragraph,  Yet Pater'S Book Is More Than That. The Main Drift 
 Of It Is The Reconciliation Of Hellenism With Christianity In the 
 Experience Of A Man "Bent On Living in the Full Stream Of Refined 
 Sensation," Who Finds Christianity In every Point Fulfilling the Ideals 
 Of Epicureanism At Its Best. 
   
   
   
 The Spiritual Stages Through Which Marius Passes On His Journey Towards 
 This Goal Are Most Delicately Portrayed. In the Main These Are Three, 
 Which,  Though They Recur And Intertwine In his Experience,  Yet May Be 
 Fairly Stated in their Natural Order And Sequence As Normal Types Of 
 Such Spiritual Progress. 
   
   
   
 The First Of These Stages Is A Certain Vague Fear Of Evil,  Which Seems 
 To Be Conscience Hardly Aware Of Itself As Such. It Is "The Sense Of 
 Some Unexplored evil Ever Dogging his Footsteps," Which Reached its 
 Keenest Poignancy In a Constitutional Horror Of Serpents,  But Which Is A 
 Very Subtle And Undefinable Thing,  Observable Rather As An Undertone To 
 His Consciousness Of Life Than As Anything tangible Enough To Be Defined 
 Or Accounted for By Particular Causes. On The Journey To Rome,  The Vague 
 Misgivings Took Shape In one Definite Experience. "From The Steep Slope 
 A Heavy Mass Of Stone Was Detached,  After Some Whisperings Among The 
 Trees Above His Head,  And Rushing down Through The Stillness Fell To 
 Pieces In a Cloud Of Dust Across The Road Just Behind Him,  So That  
 
 
 
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 Felt The Touch Upon His Heel." That Was Sufficient,  Just Then,  To Rouse 
 Out Of Its Hiding-Place His Old Vague Fear Of Evil--Of One'S "Enemies." 
 Such Distress Was So Much A Matter Of Constitution With Him,  That At 
 Times It Would Seem That The Best Pleasures Of Life Could But Be 
 Snatched hastily,  In one Moment'S Forgetfulness Of Its Dark Besetting 
 Influence. A Sudden Suspicion Of Hatred against Him,  Of The Nearness Of 
 Enemies,  Seemed all At Once To Alter The Visible Form Of Things. When 
 Tempted by The Earth-Bound Philosophy Of The Early Period Of His 
 Development,  "He Hardly Knew How Strong That Old Religious Sense Of 
 Responsibility,  The Conscience,  As We Call It,  Still Was Within Him--A 
 Body Of Inward Impressions,  As Real As Those So Highly Valued outward 
 Ones--To Offend Against Which,  Brought With It A Strange Feeling of 
 Disloyalty,  As To A Person." Later On,  When The "Acceptance Of Things" 
 Which He Found In marcus Aurelius Had Offended him,  And Seemed to Mark 
 The Emperor As His Inferior,  We Find That There Is "The Loyal Conscience 
 Within Him,  Deciding,  Judging himself And Every One Else,  With A 
 Wonderful Sort Of Authority." This Development Of Conscience From A 
 Vague Fear Of Enemies To A Definite Court Of Appeal In a Man'S Judgment 
 Of Life,  Goes Side By Side With His Approach To Christianity. The Pagan 
 Idealism Of The Early Days Had Never Been Able To Cope With That Sense 
 Of Enemies,  Nor Indeed to Understand It; But In the Light Of His Growing 
 Christian Faith,  Conscience Disentangles Itself And Becomes Clearly 
 Defined. 
   
 Another Element In the Spiritual Development Of Marius Is That Which May 
 Be Called his Consciousness Of An Unseen Companion. Marius Was 
 Constitutionally _Personel_,  And Never Could Be Satisfied with The Dry 
 Light Of Pure Reason,  Or With Any Impersonal Ideal Whatsoever. For Him 
 The Universe Was Alive In a Very Real Sense. At First,  However,  This Was 
 The Vaguest Of Sentiments,  And It Needed much Development Before It 
 Became Clear Enough To Act As One Of The Actual Forces Which Played upon 
 His Life. We First Meet With It In connection With The Philosophy Of 
 Marcus Aurelius And His Habit Of Inward Conversation With Himself,  Made 
 Possible By Means Of The _Logos_,  "The Reasonable Spark In man,  Common 
 To Him With The Gods." "There Could Be No Inward Conversation With 
 Oneself Such As This,  Unless There Were Indeed some One Else Aware Of 
 Our Actual Thoughts And Feelings,  Pleased or Displeased at One'S 
 Disposition Of Oneself." This,  In a Dim Way,  Seemed a Fundamental 
 Necessity Of Experience--One Of Those "Beliefs,  Without Which Life 
 Itself Must Be Almost Impossible,  Principles Which Had Their Sufficient 
 Ground Of Evidence In that Very Fact." So Far Marcus Aurelius. But The 
 Conviction Of Some August Yet Friendly Companionship In life Beyond The 
 Veil Of Things Seen,  Took Form For Marius In a Way Far More Picturesque. 
 The Passage Which Describes It Is One Of The Finest In the Book,  And May 
 Be Given At Length. 
   
   
   
 "Through A Dreamy Land He Could See Himself Moving,  As If In another 
 Life,  And Like Another Person,  Through All His Fortunes And Misfortunes, 
 Passing from Point To Point,  Weeping,  Delighted,  Escaping from Various 
 Dangers. That Prospect Brought Him,  First Of All,  An Impulse Of Lively 
 Gratitude: It Was As If He Must Look Round For Some One Else To Share 
 His Joy With: For Some One To Whom He Might Tell The Thing,  For His Own 
 Relief. Companionship,  Indeed,  Familiarity With Others,  Gifted in this 
 Way Or That,  Or At Least Pleasant To Him,  Had Been,  Through One Or 
 Another Long Span Of It,  The Chief Delight Of The Journey. And Was It 
 Only The Resultant General Sense Of Such Familiarity,  Diffused through 
 His Memory,  That In a While Suggested the Question Whether There Had Not 
 
 
 
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 Been--Besides Flavian,  Besides Cornelius Even,  And Amid The Solitude 
 Which In spite Of Ardent Friendship He Had Perhaps Loved best Of All 
 Things--Some Other Companion,  An Unfailing companion,  Ever At His Side 
 Throughout; Doubling his Pleasure In the Roses By The Way,  Patient Of 
 His Peevishness Or Depression,  Sympathetic Above All With His Grateful 
 Recognition,  Onward From His Earliest Days,  Of The Fact That He Was 
 There At All? Must Not The Whole World Around Have Faded away For Him 
 Altogether,  Had He Been Left For One Moment Really Alone In it?" One Can 
 See In this Sense Of Constant Companionship The Untranslated and Indeed 
 The Unexamined christian Doctrine Of God. And,  Because This God Is 
 Responsive To All The Many-Sided human Experience Which Reveals Him,  It 
 Will Be An Actual Preparation Not For Theism Only,  But For That 
 Complexity In unity Known As The Christian Trinity. Nothing could Better 
 Summarise This Whole Achievement In religion Than Pater'S Apt Sentence, 
 "To Have Apprehended the _Great Ideal_,  So Palpably That It Defined 
 Personal Gratitude And The Sense Of A Friendly Hand Laid Upon Him Amid 
 The Shadows Of The World." 
   
   
   
 The Third Essential Development Of Marius' Thought Is That Of The City 
 Of God,  Which For Him Assumes The Shape Of A Perfected and Purified 
 Rome,  The Concrete Embodiment Of The Ideals Of Life And Character. This 
 Is Indeed the Inevitable Sequel Of Any Such Spiritual Developments As 
 The Fear Of Enemies And The Sense Of An Unseen Companion. Man Moves 
 Inevitably To The City,  And All His Ideals Demand An Embodiment In 
 Social Form Before They Reach Their Full Power And Truth. In that House 
 Of Life Which He Calls Society,  He Longs To See His Noblest Dreams Find 
 A Local Habitation And A Name. This Is The Grand Ideal Passed from Hand 
 To Hand By The Greatest And Most Outstanding of The World'S Seers--From 
 Plato To Augustine,  From Augustine To Dante--The Ideal Of The City Of 
 God. It Is But Little Developed in the Book Which We Are Now 
 Considering,  For That Would Be Beside The Purpose Of So Intimate And 
 Inward A History. Yet We See,  As It Were,  The Towers And Palaces Of This 
 "Dear City Of Zeus" Shining in the Clear Light Of The Early Christian 
 Time,  Like The Break Of Day Over Some Vast Prospect,  With The New City, 
 As It Were Some Celestial New Rome,  In the Midst Of It. 
   
   
   
 These Are But A Few Glimpses At This Very Significant And Far-Reaching 
 Book,  Which Indeed takes For Its Theme The Very Development From Pagan 
 To Christian Idealism With Which We Are Dealing. In it,  In countless 
 Bright And Vivid Glances,  The Beauty Of The World Is Seen With Virgin 
 Eye. Many Phases Of That Beauty Belong To The Paganism Which Surrounds 
 Us As We Read,  Yet These Are Purified from All Elements That Would Make 
 Them Pagan In the Lower Sense,  And Under Our Eyes They Free Themselves 
 For Spiritual Flights Which Find Their Resting-Place At Last And Become 
 At Once Intelligible And Permanent In the Faith Of Jesus Christ. 
   
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iii  (The Two Fausts )   Pg 24 
 It May Seem Strange To Pass Immediately From The Time Of Marcus Aurelius 
 To Marlowe And Goethe,  And Yet The Tale Upon Which These Two Poets 
 Wrought Is One Whose Roots Are Very Deep In history,  And Which Revives 
 In A Peculiarly Vital And Interesting fashion The Age-Long Story Of 
 Man'S Great Conflict. Indeed the Saga On Which It Is Founded belongs 
 Properly To No One Period,  But Is The Tragic Drama Of Humanity. It 
 Tells,  Through All The Ages,  The Tale Of The Struggle Between Earth And 
 The Spiritual World Above It; And The Pagan Forms Which Are Introduced 
 Take Us Back Into The Classical Mythology,  And Indeed into Still More 
 Ancient Times. 
   
   
   
 The Hero Of The Story Must Be Clearly Distinguished from Fust The 
 Printer,  A Wealthy Goldsmith Of Mayence,  Who,  In the Middle Of The 
 Fifteenth Century,  Was Partner With Gutenberg In the New Enterprise Of 
 Printing. Robert Browning,  In _Fust And His Friends_,  Tells Us,  With 
 Great Vivacity,  The Story Of The Monks Who Tried to Exorcise The Magic 
 Spirits From Fust,  But Forgot Their Psalm,  And So Caused an Awkward 
 Pause During which Fust Retired and Brought Out A Printed copy Of The 
 Psalm For Each Of Them. The Only Connection With Magic Which This Fust 
 Had,  Was That So Long As This Or Any Other Process Was Kept Secret,  It 
 Was Attributed to Supernatural Powers. 
   
 Faust,  Although A Contemporary Of Fust The Printer,  Was A Very Different 
 Character. Unfortunately,  Our Information About Him Comes Almost 
 Entirely From His Enemies,  And Their Accounts Are By No Means Sparing in 
 Abuse. Trithemius,  A Benedictine Abbot Of Spanheim In the Early Part Of 
 The Sixteenth Century,  Writes Of Him With The Most Virulent Contempt,  As 
 A Debauched person And A Criminal Whose Overweening vanity Arrogated to 
 Itself The Most Preposterous Supernatural Powers. It Would Appear That 
 He Had Been Some Sort Of Travelling charlatan,  Whose Performing horse 
 And Dog Were Taken For Evil Spirits,  Like Esmeralda'S Goat In victor 
 Hugo'S _Notre Dame_. Even Melanchthon And Luther Seem To Have Shared the 
 Common View Of Him,  And At Last There Was Published at Frankfurt The 
 _Historie Of The Damnable Life And Deserved death Of Dr. John Faustus_. 
 The Date Of This Work Is 1587,  And A Translation Of It Appeared in 
 London In 1592. It Is A Discursive Composition,  Founded upon 
 Reminiscences Of Some Ancient Stroller Who Lived very Much By His Wits; 
 But It Took Such A Hold Upon The Imagination Of The Time That,  By The 
 Latter Part Of The Sixteenth Century,  Faust Had Become The Necromancer 
 _Par Excellence_. Into The Faust-Book There Drifted endless Necromantic 
 Lore From The Middle Ages And Earlier Times. It Seems To Have Had Some 
 Connection With Jewish Legends Of Magicians Who Invoked the _Satanim_, 
 Or Lowest Grade Of Elemental Spirits Not Unlike The "Elementals" Of 
 Modern Popular Spiritualism. It Was The Story Of A Christian Selling his 
 Soul To The Powers Of Darkness,  And It Had Behind It One Of The Poems Of 
 Hrosvitha Of Gandersheim Which Relates A Similar Story Of An Archdeacon 
 Of Cilicia Of The Sixth Century,  And Also The Popular Tradition Of Pope 
 Sylvester The Second,  Who Was Suspected of Having made The Same Bargain. 
 Yet,  As Lebahn Says,  "The Faust-Legend In its Complete Form Was The 
 Creation Of Orthodox Protestantism. Faust Is The Foil To Luther,  Who 
 Worsted the Devil With His Ink-Bottle When He Sought To Interrupt The 
 Sacred work Of Rendering the Bible Into The Vulgar Tongue." This Legend, 
 By The Way,  Is A Peculiarly Happy One,  For Luther Not Only Aimed his 
 Ink-Bottle At The Devil,  But Most Literally And Effectively Hit Him With 
 It,  When He Wrote Those Books That Changed the Face Of Religious Europe. 
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iii  (The Two Fausts )   Pg 25 
 The _Historie_ Had An Immense And Immediate Popularity,  And Until Well 
 Into The Nineteenth Century It Was Reproduced and Sold Throughout 
 Europe. As We Read It,  We Cannot But Wonder What Manner Of Man It Really 
 Was Who Attracted to Himself Such Age-Long Hatred and Fear,  And Held The 
 Interest Of The Centuries. In many Respects,  Doubtless,  His Story Was 
 Like That Of Paracelsus,  In whom The World Has Recognised the Struggle 
 Of Much Good With Almost Inevitable Evil,  And Who,  If He Had Been Born 
 In Another Generation,  Might Have Figured as A Commanding spiritual Or 
 Scientific Authority. 
   
   
   
 Christopher Marlowe Was Born At Canterbury In 1564,  Two Months Before 
 Shakespeare. He Was The Son Of A Shoemaker,  And Was The Pupil Of Kett,  A 
 Fellow And Tutor Of Corpus Christi College. This Tutor Was Probably 
 Accountable For Much In the Future Marlowe,  For He Was A Mystic,  And Was 
 Burnt For Heresy In 1589. After A Short And Extremely Violent Life,  The 
 Pupil Followed his Master Four Years Later To The Grave,  Having been 
 Killed in a Brawl Under Very Disgraceful Circumstances. He Only Lived 
 Twenty-Nine Years,  And Yet He,  Along With Kyd,  Changed the Literature Of 
 England. Lyly'S Pastorals Had Been The Favourite Reading of The People 
 Until These Men Came,  Keen And Audacious,  To Lead And Sing their "Brief, 
 Fiery,  Tempestuous Lives." When They Wrote Their Plays And Created their 
 Villains,  They Were Not Creating so Much As Remembering. Marlowe'S Plays 
 Were Four,  And They Were All Influential. His _Edward The Second_ Was 
 The Precursor Of The Historical Plays Of Shakespeare. His Other Plays 
 Were _Tamburlaine The Great_,  _Dr. Faustus_,  And _The Jew Of Malta_ 
 (Barabbas). These Three Were All Upon Congenial Lines,  Expressing that 
 Titanism In revolt Against The Universe Which Was The Inspiring spirit 
 Of Marlowe. But It Was The Character Of Faust That Especially Fascinated 
 Him,  For He Found In the Ancient Magician A Pretty Clear Image Of His 
 Own Desires And Ambitions. He Was One Of Those Who Loved "The Dangerous 
 Edge Of Things," And,  As Charles Lamb Said,  "Delighted to Dally With 
 Interdicted subjects." The Form Of The Plays Is Loose And Broken,  And 
 Yet There Is A Pervading larger Unity,  Not Only Of Dramatic Action,  But 
 Of Spirit. The Laughter Is Loud And Coarse,  The Terror Unrelieved,  And 
 The Splendour Dazzling. There Is No Question As To The Greatness Of This 
 Work As Permanent Literature. It Has Long Outlived the Amazing 
 Detractions Of Hallam And Of Byron,  And Will Certainly Be Read So Long 
 As English Is A Living tongue. 
   
 The Next Stage In this Curious History Is A Peculiarly Interesting one. 
 In Former Days There Sprang Up Around Every Great Work Of Art A Forest 
 Of Slighter Literature,  In the Shape Of Chap-Books,  Ballads,  And Puppet 
 Plays. By Far The Most Popular Of The Puppet Plays Was That Founded upon 
 Marlowe'S _Faust_. The German Version Continued to Be Played in germany 
 Until Three Hundred years Later. Goethe Constructed his Masterpiece 
 Largely By Its Help. English Actors Travelling abroad Had Brought Back 
 The Story To Its Native Land Of Germany,  And In every Town The Bands Of 
 Strolling players Sent Marlowe'S Great Conception Far And Wide. In 
 England Also The Puppet Play Was Extremely Popular. The Drama Had Moved 
 From The Church To The Market-Place,  And Much Of The Elizabethan Drama 
 Appeared in this Quaint Form,  Played by Wooden Figures Upon Diminutive 
 Boards. To The Modern Mind Nothing could Be More Incongruous Than The 
 Idea Of A Solemn Drama Forced to Assume A Guise So Grotesque And 
 Childish; But,  According to Jusserand,  Much Of The Stage-Work Was 
 Extremely Ghastly,  And No Doubt It Impressed the Multitude. There Is 
 Even A Story Of Some Actors Who Had Gone Too Far,  And Into The Midst Of 
 Whose Play The Real Devil Suddenly Descended with Disastrous Results 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iii  (The Two Fausts )   Pg 26 
 Must,  However,  Be Allowed that Even The Serious Plays Were Not Without 
 An Abundant Element Of Grotesqueness. The Occasion For Faustus' Final 
 Speech Of Despair,  For Instance,  Was The Lowering and Raising before His 
 Eyes Of Two Or Three Gilded arm-Chairs,  Representing the Thrones In 
 Heaven Upon Which He Would Never Sit. It Does Not Seem To Have Occurred 
 To The Audience As Absurd That Heaven Should Be Regarded as A Kind Of 
 Drawing-Room Floating in the Air,  And Indeed that Idea Is Perhaps Not 
 Yet Obsolete. However That May Be,  It Is Quite Evident That Such 
 Machinery,  Ill-Suited though It Was To The Solemnities Of Tragedy,  Must 
 Have Been Abundantly Employed in the Puppet Plays. 
   
 The German Puppet Play Of _Faust_ Has Been Transcribed by Dr. Hamm And 
 Translated by Mr. Hedderwick Into English. It Was Obtained at First With 
 Great Difficulty,  For The Showmen Kept The Libretto Secret,  And Could 
 Not Be Induced to Lend It. Dr. Hamm,  However,  Followed the Play Round, 
 Listening and Committing much Of It To Memory,  And His Version Was 
 Finally Completed when His Amanuensis Obtained for A Day Or Two The 
 Original Manuscript After Plying one Of The Assistants With Much Beer 
 And Wine. It Was A Battered book,  Thumb-Marked and Soaked with Lamp Oil, 
 But It Has Passed on To Posterity One Of The Most Remarkable Pieces Of 
 Dramatic Work Which Have Come Down To Us From Those Times. 
   
 In All Essentials The Play Is The Same As That Of Marlowe,  Except For 
 The Constant Interruptions Of The Clown Casper,  Who Intrudes With His 
 Absurdities Even Into The Most Sacred parts Of The Action,  And Entirely 
 Mars The Dreadful Solemnity Of The End By Demanding his Wages From Faust 
 While The Clock Is Striking the Diminishing intervals Of The Last Hour. 
   
 It Was Through This Curious Intermediary That Goethe Went Back To 
 Marlowe And Created what Has Been Well Called "The Most Mystic Poetic 
 Work Ever Created," And "The _Divina Commedia_ Of The Eighteenth 
 Century." Goethe'S _Faust_ Is Elemental,  Like _Hamlet_. Readers Of 
 _Wilhelm Meister_ Will Remember How Profound An Impression _Hamlet_ Had 
 Made Upon Goethe'S Mind,  And This Double Connection Between Goethe And 
 The English Drama Forms One Of The Strongest And Most Interesting of All 
 The Links That Bind Germany To England. His _Faust_ Was The Direct 
 Utterance Of Goethe'S Own Inner Life. He Says: "The Marionette Folk Of 
 _Faust_ Murmured with Many Voices In my Soul. I,  Too,  Had Wandered into 
 Every Department Of Knowledge,  And Had Returned early Enough,  Satisfied 
 With The Vanity Of Science. And Life,  Too,  I Had Tried under Various 
 Aspects,  And Always Came Back Sorrowing and Unsatisfied." Thus _Faust_ 
 Lay In the Depths Of Goethe'S Life As A Sort Of Spiritual Pool, 
 Mirroring all Its Incidents And Thoughts. The Play Was Begun Originally 
 In The Period Of His _Sturm Und Drang_,  And It Remained unpublished 
 Until,  In old Age,  The Ripened mind Of The Great Poet Took It Over 
 Practically Unchanged,  And Added the Calmer And More Intellectual Parts. 
 The Whole Of The Marguerite Story Belongs To The Earlier Days. 
   
   
   
 There Is Nothing in the Whole Of Literature Which Could Afford Us A 
 Finer And More Fundamental Account Of The Battle Between Paganism And 
 Idealism In the Soul Of Man,  Than The Comparison Between The _Fausts_ Of 
 Marlowe And Of Goethe. But Before We Come To This,  It May Be Interesting 
 To Notice Two Or Three Points Of Special Interest In the Latter Drama, 
 Which Show How Entirely Pagan Are The Temptations Of Faust. 
   
   
   
 The First Passage To Notice Is That Opening one On Easter Day,  Where The 
 Devil Approaches Faust In the Form Of A Dog. Choruses Of Women, 
 
 
 
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 Disciples,  And Angels Are Everywhere In the Air; And Although The Dog 
 Appears First In the Open,  Yet The Whole Emphasis Of The Passage Is Upon 
 The Contrast Between That Brilliant Easter Morning with Its Sunshine And 
 Its Music,  And The Close And Darkened study Into Which Faust Has Shut 
 Himself. It Is True He Goes Abroad,  But It Is Not To Join With The Rest 
 In Their Rejoicing,  But Only As A Spectator,  With All The Superiority As 
 Well As The Wistfulness Of His Illicit Knowledge. Evidently The 
 Impression Intended is That Of The Wholesomeness Of The Crowd And The 
 Open Air. He Who Goes In with The Rest Of Men In their Sorrow And Their 
 Rejoicing cannot But Find The Meaning of Easter Morning for Himself. It 
 Is A Festival Of Earth And The Spring,  An Earth Idealised,  Whose Spirit 
 Is Incarnate In the Risen Christ. Faust Longs To Share In that,  And On 
 Easter Eve Tries In vain To Read His Gospel And To Feel Its Power. But 
 The Only Cure For Such Morbid Introspectiveness As His,  Is To Cast 
 Oneself Generously Into The Common Life Of Man,  And The Refusal To Do 
 This Invites The Pagan Devil. 
   
   
   
 Another Point Of Interest Is The Coming of The _Erdgeist_ Immediately 
 After The _Weltschmerz_. The Sorrow That Has Filled his Heart With Its 
 Melancholy Sense Of The Vanity And Nothingness Of Life,  And The 
 Thousandfold Pity And Despondency Which Go To Swell That Sad Condition, 
 Are Bound To Create A Reaction More Or Less Violent Towards That Sheer 
 Worldliness Which Is The Essence Of Paganism. In bunyan'S _Pilgrim'S 
 Progress_ It Is Immediately After His Floundering in the Slough Of 
 Despond That Christian Is Accosted by Mr. Worldly Wiseman. Precisely The 
 Same Experience Is Recorded here In faust,  Although The Story Is Subtler 
 And More Complex Than That Of Bunyan. The _Erdgeist_ Which Comes To The 
 Saddened scholar Is A Noble Spirit,  Vivifying and Creative. It Is The 
 World In all Its Glorious Fullness Of Meaning,  Quite As True An Idealism 
 As That Which Is Expressed in the Finest Spirit Of The Greeks. But For 
 Faust It Is Too Noble. His Morbid Gloom Has Enervated him,  And The Call 
 Of The Splendid Earth Is Beyond Him. So There Comes,  Instead Of It,  A 
 Figure As Much Poorer Than That Of Worldly Wiseman As The _Erdgeist_ Is 
 Richer. Wagner Represents The Poor Commonplace World Of The Wholly 
 Unideal. It Is Infinitely Beneath The Soul Of Faust,  And Yet For The 
 Time It Conquers Him,  Being nearer To His Mood. Thus Mephistopheles 
 Finds His Opportunity. The Scholar,  Embittered with The Sense That 
 Knowledge Is Denied to Him,  Will Take To Mere Action; And The Action 
 Will Not Be Great Like That Which The _Erdgeist_ Would Have Prompted, 
 But Poor And Unsatisfying to Any Nobler Spirit Than That Of Wagner. 
   
   
   
 The Third Incident Which We May Quote Is That Of _Walpurgis-Night_. Some 
 Critics Would Omit This Part,  Which,  They Say,  "Has Naught Of Interest 
 In Bearing on The Main Plot Of The Poem." Nothing could Be More Mistaken 
 Than Such A Judgment. In the _Walpurgis-Night_ We Have The Play Ending 
 In That Sheer Paganism Which Is The Counterpart To Easter Day At The 
 Beginning. Walpurgis Has A Strange History In german Folklore. It Is 
 Said That Charlemagne,  Conquering the German Forests For The Christian 
 Faith,  Drove Before Him A Horde Of Recalcitrant Pagans,  Who Took A Last 
 Shelter Among The Trees Of The Brocken. There,  On The Pagan May-Day,  In 
 Order To Celebrate Their Ancient Rites Unmolested,  They Dressed 
 Themselves In all Manner Of Fantastic And Bestial Masks,  So As To 
 Frighten Off The Christianising invaders From The Revels. The Walpurgis 
 Of _Faust_ Exhibits Paganism At Its Lowest Depths. Sir Mammon Is The 
 Host Who Invites His Boisterous Guests To The Riot Of His Festive Night. 
 The Witches Arrive On Broomsticks And Pitchforks; Singing,  Not Without 
 Significance,  The Warning of Woe To All Climbers--For Here Aspiration  
 
 
 
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 Any Sort Is A Dangerous Crime. The Crane'S Song Reveals The Fact That 
 Pious Men Are Here,  In the Blocksberg,  United with Devils; Introducing 
 The Same Cynical And Desperate Disbelief In goodness Which Nathaniel 
 Hawthorne Has Told In similar Fashion In his Tale Of _Young Goodman 
 Brown_; And The Most Horrible Touch Of All Is Introduced when Faust In 
 Disgust Leaves The Revel,  Because Out Of The Mouth Of The Witch With 
 Whom He Had Been Dancing there Had Sprung A Small Red mouse. Throughout 
 The Whole Play The Sense Of Holy And Splendid Ideals Shines At Its 
 Brightest In lurid Contrast With The Hopeless And Sordid Dark Of The 
 Pagan Earth. 
   
 Returning now To Our Main Point,  The Comparison Of Marlowe'S Play With 
 Goethe'S,  Let Us First Of All Contrast The Temptations In the Two. 
 Marlowe'S Play Is Purely Theological. Jusserand Finely Describes The 
 Underlying tragedy Of It. "Faust,  Like Tamburlaine,  And Like All The 
 Heroes Of Marlowe,  Lives In thought,  Beyond The Limit Of The Possible. 
 He Thirsts For A Knowledge Of The Secrets Of The Universe,  As The Other 
 Thirsted for Domination Over The World." Both Are Titanic Figures 
 Exactly In the Pagan Sense,  But The Form Of Faustus' Titanism Is The 
 Revolt Against Theology. From The Early Days Of The Christian 
 Persecutions,  There Had Been A Tendency To Divorce The Sacred from The 
 Secular,  And To Regard All That Was Secular As Being of The Flesh And 
 Essentially Evil. The MediæVal Views Of Celibacy,  Hermitage,  And The 
 Monastic Life,  Had Intensified this Divorce; And While Many Of The Monks 
 Were Interested in human Secular Learning,  Yet There Was A Feeling, 
 Which In many Cases Became A Kind Of Conscience,  That Only The Divine 
 Learning was Either Legitimate Or Safe For A Man'S Eternal Well-Being. 
 The Faust Of Marlowe Is The Prometheus Of His Own Day. The New Knowledge 
 Of The Renaissance Had Spread Like Fire Across Europe,  And Those Who Saw 
 In It A Resurrection Of The Older Gods And Their Secrets,  Unhesitatingly 
 Condemned it. The Doctrine Of Immortality Had Entirely Supplanted the 
 Old Greek Ideal Of A Complete Earthly Life For Man,  And All That Was 
 Sensuous Had Come To Be Regarded as Intrinsically Sinful. Thus We Have 
 For Background A Divided universe,  In which There Is A Great Gulf Fixed 
 Between This World And The Next,  And A Hopeless Cleavage Between The 
 Life Of Body And That Of Spirit. 
   
 In This Connection We May Also Consider The Women Of The Two Plays. 
 Charles Lamb Has Asked,  "What Has Margaret To Do With Faust?" And Has 
 Asserted that She Does Not Belong To The Legend At All. Literally,  This 
 Is True,  In so Far As There Is No Margaret In the Earlier Form Of The 
 Play,  Whose Interest Was,  As We Have Seen,  Essentially Theological. Yet 
 Margaret Belongs To The Essential Story And Cannot Be Taken Out Of It. 
 She Is The "Eternal Feminine," In which The Battle Between The Spirit 
 And The Flesh,  Between Idealism And Paganism,  Will Always Make Its Last 
 Stand. Even Marlowe Has To Introduce A Woman. His Helen Is,  Indeed,  A 
 Mere Incident,  For The Real Bride Of The Soul Must Be Either Theological 
 Or Secular Science; And Yet So Essential And So Poignant Is The Question 
 Of Woman To The Great Drama,  That The Passage In which The Incident Of 
 Helen Is Introduced far Surpasses Anything else In marlowe'S Play,  And 
 Indeed is One Of The Grandest And Most Beautiful In all Literature. 
   
   
   
      "Was This The Face That Launch'D A Thousand Ships, 
      And Burned the Topless Towers Of Ilium? 
      Sweet Helen,  Make Me Immortal With A Kiss. 
   
             *       *       *       *       * 
 
 
 
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  O,  Thou Art Fairer Than The Evening air, 
      Clad In the Beauty Of A Thousand Stars." 
   
   
   
 Still,  Marlowe'S _Motif_ Is Not Sex But Theology. The Former Heretics 
 Whom We Named had Been Saved--Theophilus By The Intervention Of The 
 Blessed virgin Mary,  And Pope Sylvester Snatched from The Very Jaws Of 
 Hell--By A Return To Orthodoxy. That Was In the Roman Catholic Days,  But 
 The Savage Antithesis Between Earth And Heaven Had Been Taken Over By 
 The Conscience Of Protestantism,  Making a Duality Which Rendered life 
 Always Intellectually Anxious And Almost Impossible. It Is This 
 Condition In which Marlowe Finds Himself. The Good And The Evil Angels 
 Stand To Right And Left Of His Faustus,  Pleading with Him For And 
 Against Secular Science On The One Side And Theological Knowledge On The 
 Other. For That Is The Implication Behind The Contest Between Magic And 
 Christianity. "The Faust Of The Earlier Faust-Books And Ballads,  Dramas, 
 Puppet Shows,  Which Grew Out Of Them,  Is Damned because He Prefers The 
 Human To The Divine Knowledge. He Laid The Holy Scriptures Behind The 
 Door And Under The Bench,  Refused to Be Called doctor Of Theology,  But 
 Preferred to Be Called doctor Of Medicine." Obviously Here We Find 
 Ourselves In a Very Lamentable _Cul-De-Sac_. Idealism Has Floated apart 
 From The Earth And All Its Life,  And Everything else Than Theology Is 
 Condemned as Paganism. 
   
 Goethe Changes All That. In the Earlier _Weltschmerz_ Passages Some 
 Traces Of It Still Linger,  Where Faust Renounces Theology; But Even 
 There It Is Not Theology Alone That He Renounces,  But Philosophy, 
 Medicine,  And Jurisprudence As Well,  So That His Renunciation Is 
 Entirely Different From That Of Marlowe'S Faustus. In goethe It Is No 
 Longer One Doctrine Or One Point Of View Against Another Doctrine Or 
 Another Point Of View. It Is Life,  Vitality In all Its Forms,  Against 
 All Mere Doctrine Whatsoever. 
   
      "Grey,  Dearest Friend,  Is Every Theory, 
      But Golden-Green Is The Tree Of Life." 
   
 Thus The Times Had Passed into A Sense Of The Limits Of Theology Such As 
 Has Been Well Expressed in rossetti'S Lines-- 
   
      "Let Lore Of All Theology 
      Be To Thee All It Can Be, 
      But Know,--The Power That Fashions Man 
      Measured not Out Thy Little Span 
      For Thee To Take The Meting-Rod 
      In turn And So Approve On God." 
   
   
   
 So In goethe We Have The Unsatisfied human Spirit With Its Infinite 
 Cravings And Longings For Something more Than Earth Can Give--Something, 
 However,  Which Is Not Separated from The Earth,  And Which Is Entirely 
 Different From Theological Dogma Or Anything of That Sort. In this, 
 Goethe Is Expressing a Constant Yearning of His Own,  Which Illuminated 
 All His Writings Like A Gentle Hidden Fire Within Them,  Hardly Seen In 
 Many Passages And Yet Always Somehow Felt. It Is _Through_ The Flesh 
 That He Will Find The Spirit,  _Through_ This World That He Will Find The 
 Next. The Quest Is Ultimately The Same As That Of Marlowe,  But The Form 
 Of It Is Absolutely Opposed to His. Goethe Is As Far From Marlowe'S 
 Theological Position As _Peer Gynt_ Is,  And Indeed there Is A 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iii  (The Two Fausts )   Pg 30 
 Considerable Similarity Between Ibsen'S Great Play And Goethe'S. As The 
 Drama Develops,  It Is True That The Love Of Faust Becomes Sensual And 
 His Curiosity Morbid; But The Tragedy Lies No Longer In the Belief That 
 Sense And Curiosity Are In themselves Wrong,  But In the Fact That Faust 
 Fails To Distinguish Their High Phases From Their Low. We Have Already 
 Seen That The _Erdgeist_ Which First Appeals To Faust Is Too Great For 
 Him,  And It Is There That The Tragedy Really Lies. The Earth Is Not An 
 Accursed place,  And The _Erdgeist_ May Well Find Its Home Among The 
 Ideals; But Wagner Is Neither Big Enough Nor Clean Enough To Be Man'S 
 Guide. 
   
   
   
 The Contrast Between The High And Low Ideals Comes To Its Finest And 
 Most Tragic In the Story Of Margaret. Spiritual And Sensual Love 
 Alternate Through The Play. Its Tragedy And Horror Concentrate Round The 
 Fact That Love Has Followed the Lower Way. Margaret Has Little To Give 
 To Faust Of Fellowship Along Intellectual Or Spiritual Lines. She Is A 
 Village Maiden,  And He Takes From Her Merely The Obvious And Lower Kind 
 Of Love. It Is A Way Which Leads Ultimately To The Dance Of The Witches 
 And The Cellar Of Auerbach,  Yet Faust Can Never Be Satisfied with These, 
 And From The Witch'S Mouth Comes Forth The Red mouse--The Climax Of 
 Disgust. In auerbach'S Cellar He Sees Himself As The Pagan Man In him 
 Would Like To Be. In martha One Sees The Pagan Counterpart To The Pure 
 And Simple Margaret,  Just As Mephistopheles Is The Pagan Counterpart To 
 Faust. The Lower Forms Of Life Are The Only Ones In which Martha And 
 Mephistopheles Are At Home. For Faust And Margaret The Lapse Into The 
 Lower Forms Brings Tragedy. Yet It Must Be Remembered also That Faust 
 And Mephistopheles Are Really One,  For The Devil Who Tempts Every Man Is 
 But Himself After All,  The Animal Side Of Him,  The Dog. 
   
 The Women Thus Stand For The Most Poignant Aspect Of Man'S Great 
 Temptation. It Is Not,  As We Have Already Said,  Any Longer A Conflict 
 Between The Secular And The Sacred that We Are Watching,  Nor Even The 
 Conflict Between The Flesh And The Spirit. It Is Between A Higher And A 
 Lower Way Of Treating life,  Flesh And Spirit Both. Margaret Stands For 
 All The Great Questions That Are Addressed to Mankind. There Are For 
 Every Man Two Ways Of Doing work,  Of Reading a Book,  Of Loving a Woman. 
 He Who Keeps His Spiritual Life Pure And High Finds That In all These 
 Things There Is A Noble Path. He Who Yields To His Lower Self Will 
 Prostitute And Degrade Them All,  And The Tragedy That Leads On To The 
 Mad Scene At The Close,  Where The Cries Of Margaret Have No Parallel In 
 Literature Except Those Of Lady Macbeth,  Is The Inevitable Result Of 
 Choosing the Pagan And Refusing the Ideal. The Blocksberg Is The Pagan 
 Heaven. 
   
   
   
 A Still More Striking contrast Between The Plays Meets Us When We 
 Consider The Respective Characters Of Mephistopheles. When We Compare 
 The Two Devils We Are Reminded of That Most Interesting passage In 
 Professor Masson'S Great Essay,  Which Describes The Secularisation Of 
 Satan Between _Paradise Lost_ And The _Faust_ Of Goethe:-- 
   
   
   
 "We Shall Be On The Right Track If We Suppose Mephistopheles To Be What 
 Satan Has Become After Six Thousand Years.... Goethe'S Mephistopheles Is 
 This Same Being after The Toils And Vicissitudes Of Six Thousand Years 
 In His New Vocation: Smaller,  Meaner,  Ignobler,  But A Million Times 
 Sharper And Cleverer.... For Six Thousand Years He Has Been Pursuing the 
 Walk He Struck Out At The Beginning,  Plying his Self-Selected function, 
 Dabbling devilishly In human Nature,  And Abjuring all Interest In the 
 
 
 
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 Grander Physics; And The Consequence Is,  As He Himself Anticipated,  That 
 His Nature,  Once Great And Magnificent,  Has Become Small,  Virulent,  And 
 Shrunken. He,  The Scheming,  Enthusiastic Archangel,  Has Been Soured and 
 Civilised into The Clever,  Cold-Hearted mephistopheles." 
   
   
   
 Marlowe'S Devil Is Of The Solemn Earlier Kind,  Not Yet Degraded into The 
 Worldling whom Goethe Has Immortalised. Marlowe'S Mephistophilis Is 
 Essentially The Idealist,  And It Is His Faust Who Is Determined for The 
 World. One Feels About Mephistophilis That He Is A Kind Of Religious 
 Character,  Although Under A Cloud. The Things He Does Are Done To Organ 
 Music,  And He Might Be A Figure In some Stained-Glass Window Of Old. Not 
 Only Is He "A Melancholy Devil,  With A Soul Above The Customary Hell," 
 But He Actually Retains A Kind Of Despairing idealism Which Somehow 
 Ranks Him On The Side Rather Of Good Than Of Evil. The Puppet Play 
 Curiously Emphasises This. "Tell Me," Says Faust,  "What Would You Do If 
 You Could Attain To Everlasting salvation?" "Hear And Despair! Were I To 
 Attain To Everlasting salvation,  I Would Mount To Heaven On A Ladder, 
 Though Every Rung Were A Razor Edge." The Words Are Exactly In the 
 Spirit Of The Earlier Play. So Sad Is The Devil,  So Oppressed with A 
 Sense Of The Horror Of It All,  That,  As We Read,  It Almost Seems As If 
 Faust Were Tempting the Unwilling mephistophilis To Ruin Him. 
   
      "Why,  This Is Hell,  Nor Am I Out Of It; 
      Think'St Thou That I,  Who Saw The Face Of God, 
      And Tasted the Eternal Joys Of Heaven, 
      Am Not Tormented with Ten Thousand Hells 
      In being depriv'D Of Everlasting bliss? 
      O Faustus,  Leave These Frivolous Demands, 
      Which Strike A Terror To My Fainting soul!" 
   
 To Which Faust Replies-- 
   
      "What,  Is Great Mephistophilis So Passionate 
      For Being deprived of The Joys Of Heaven? 
      Learn Thou Of Faustus Manly Fortitude, 
      And Scorn Those Joys Thou Never Shalt Possess." 
   
 Goethe'S Mephistopheles Near The End Of The Play Taunts Faust In the 
 Words,  "Why Dost Thou Seek Our Fellowship If Thou Canst Not Go Through 
 With It?... Do We Force Ourselves On Thee,  Or Thou On Us?" And One Has 
 The Feeling that,  Like Most Other Things The Fiend Says,  It Is An 
 Apparent Truth Which Is Really A Lie; But It Would Have Been Entirely 
 True If Marlowe'S Devil Had Said It. 
   
   
   
 The Mephistopheles Of Goethe Is Seldom Solemnised at All. Once Indeed on 
 The Harz Mountains He Says-- 
   
      "Naught Of This Genial Influence Do I Know! 
      Within Me All Is Wintry. 
   
             *       *       *       *       * 
   
      How Sadly,  Yonder,  With Belated glow, 
      Rises The Ruddy Moon'S Imperfect Round!" 
   
 Yet There It Is Merely By Discomfort,  And Not By The Pain And Hideous 
 Sorrow Of The World Surrounding him,  That He Is Affected. He Is Like 
 
 
 
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 Satan In the Book Of Job,  Except That He Is Offering his Victim Luxuries 
 Instead Of Pains. In the Prologue In heaven He Speaks With Such A Jaunty 
 Air That Professor Blackie'S Translation Has Omitted the Passage As 
 Irreverent. He Is The Spirit That _Denies_--Sceptical And Cynical,  The 
 Anti-Christian That Is In us All. His Business Is To Depreciate 
 Spiritual Values,  And To Persuade Mortals That There Is No Real 
 Distinction Between Good And Bad,  Or Between High And Low. We Have Seen 
 In The Character Of Cornelius In _Marius The Epicurean_ "Some Inward 
 Standard ... Of Distinction,  Selection,  Refusal,  Amid The Various 
 Elements Of The Period." Here Is The Extreme Opposite. There Is No 
 Divine Discontent In him,  Nor Longing for Happier Things. He Would Never 
 Have Said That He Would Climb To Heaven Upon A Ladder Of Razor Edges. 
 There Is Nothing of The Fallen Angel About Him At All,  For He Is A 
 Spirit Perfectly Content With An Intolerable Past,  Present,  And Future. 
 Before The Throne Of God He Swaggers With The Same Easy Insolence As In 
 Martha'S Garden. He Is The Very Essence And Furthest Reach Of Paganism. 
   
   
   
 So We Have This Curious Fact,  That Marlowe'S Faust Is The Pagan And 
 Mephistophilis The Idealist; While Goethe Reverses The Order,  Making 
 Paganism Incarnate In the Fiend And Idealism In the Nobler Side Of The 
 Man. It Is A Far Truer And More Natural Story Of Life Than That Which 
 Had Suggested it; For In the Soul Of Man There Is Ever A Hunger And 
 Thirst For The Highest,  However Much He May Abuse His Soul. At The 
 Worst,  There Remains Always That Which "A Man May Waste,  Desecrate, 
 Never Quite Lose." 
   
 One More Contrast Marks The Difference Of The Two Plays,  Namely,  The 
 Fate Of Faust. Marlowe'S Faust Is Utterly And Irretrievably Damned. On 
 The Old Theory Of An Essential Antagonism Between The Secular And The 
 Sacred,  And Upon The Old Cast-Iron Theology To Which The Intellect Of 
 Man Was Enjoined to Conform,  There Is No Escape Whatsoever For The 
 Rebel. So The Play Leads On To The Sublimely Terrific Passage At The 
 Close,  When,  With The Chiming of The Bell,  Terror Grows To Madness In 
 The Victim'S Soul,  And At Last He Envies The Beasts That Perish-- 
   
                           "For,  When They Die, 
      Their Souls Are Soon Dissolved in elements; 
      But Mine Must Live Still To Be Plagued in hell. 
      Curs'D Be The Parents That Engender'D Me! 
      No,  Faustus,  Curse Thyself,  Curse Lucifer 
      That Hath Deprived thee Of The Joys Of Heaven." 
   
   
   
 Goethe,  With His Changed conception Of Life In general,  Could Not Have 
 Accepted this Ending. It Was Indeed lessing who First Pointed out That 
 The Final End For Faust Must Be His Salvation And Not His Doom; But 
 Goethe Must Necessarily Have Arrived at The Same Conclusion Even If 
 Lessing had Not Asserted it. It Is Clearly Visible Throughout The Play, 
 By Touches Here And There,  That Faust Is Not "Wholly Damnable" As Martha 
 Is. His Pity For Women,  Relevant To The Main Plot Of The Play,  Breaks 
 Forth In horror When He Discovers The Fate Of Margaret. "The Misery Of 
 This One Pierces Me To The Very Marrow,  And Harrows Up My Soul; Thou Art 
 Grinning calmly Over The Doom Of Thousands!" And These Words Follow 
 Immediately After An Outbreak Of Blind Rage Called forth By 
 Mephistopheles' Famous Words,  "She Is Not The First." Such A Faust As 
 This,  We Feel,  Can No More Be Ultimately Lost Than Can The 
 Mephistophilis Of Marlowe. As For Marlowe'S Faust,  The Plea For His 
 Destruction Is The Great Delusion Of A Hard Theology,  And The Only 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iii  (The Two Fausts )   Pg 33 
 Really Damnable Person In the Whole Company Is The Mephistopheles Of 
 Goethe,  Who Seems From First To Last Continually To Be Committing the 
 Sin Against The Holy Ghost. 
   
   
   
 The Salvation Of Faust Is Implicit In the Whole Structure And Meaning of 
 The Play. It Is Worked out Mystically In the Second Part,  Along Lines Of 
 Human Life And Spiritual Interest Far-Flung Into The Sphere That 
 Surrounds The Story Of The First. But Even In the First Part,  The Happy 
 Issue Is Involved in the Terms Of Faust'S Compact With The Devil. Only 
 On The Condition That Mephistopheles Shall Be Able To Satisfy Faust And 
 Cheat Him "Into Self-Complacent Pride,  Or Sweet Enjoyment," Only 
   
   
   
      "If Ever To The Passing hour I Say, 
      So Beautiful Thou Art! Thy Flight Delay"-- 
   
 Only Then Shall His Soul Become The Prey Of The Tempter. But From The 
 First,  In the Scorn Of Faust For This Poor Fiend And All He Has To 
 Bestow,  We Read The Failure Of The Plot. Faust May Sign A Hundred such 
 Bonds In his Blood With Little Fear. He Knows Well Enough That A Spirit 
 Such As His Can Never Be Satisfied with What The Fiend Has To Give,  Nor 
 Lie Down In sleek Contentment To Enjoy The Earth Without Afterthought. 
   
   
   
 It Is The Strenuous And Insatiable Spirit Of The Man That Saves Him. It 
 Is True That "Man Errs So Long As He Is Striving," But The Great Word Of 
 The Play Is Just This,  That No Such Errors Can Ever Be Final. The Deadly 
 Error Is That Of Those Who Have Ceased to Strive,  And Who Have 
 Complacently Settled down In the Acceptance Of The Lower Life With Its 
 Gratifications And Delights. 
   
   
   
 But Such Striving is,  As Robert Browning tells Us In _Rabbi Ben Ezra_ 
 And _The Statue And The Bust_,  The Critical And All-Important Point In 
 Human Character And Destiny. It Is This Which Distinguishes Pagan From 
 Idealist In the End. Faust'S Errors Fall Off From Him Like A Discarded 
 Robe; The Essential Man Has Never Ceased to Strive. He Has Gone Indeed 
 To Hell,  But He Has Never Made His Bed there. He Is Saved by Want Of 
 Satisfaction. 
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iv  (Celtic Revivals Of Paganism  Omar KayyÁM And Fiona Macleod )   Pg 34 
 It Is Extremely Difficult To Judge Justly And Without Prejudice The 
 Literature Of One'S Own Time. So Many Different Elements Are Pouring 
 Into It That It Assumes A Composite Character,  Far Beyond The Power Of 
 Definition Or Even Of Epigram To Describe As A Whole. But,  While This Is 
 True,  It Is Nevertheless Possible To Select From This Vast Amalgam 
 Certain Particular Elements,  And To Examine Them And Judge Them Fairly 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iv  (Celtic Revivals Of Paganism  Omar KayyÁM And Fiona Macleod )   Pg 35 
 The Field In which We Are Now Wandering may Be Properly Included under 
 The Head Of Ancient Literature,  Although In another Sense It Is The Most 
 Modern Of All. The Two Authors Whom We Shall Consider In this Lecture, 
 Although They Have Come Into Our Literature But Recently,  Yet Represent 
 Very Ancient Thought. There Is Nothing whatsoever That Is Modern About 
 Them. They Describe Bed-Rock Human Passions And Longings,  Sorrowings 
 And Consolations. Each May Be Claimed as A Revival Of Ancient Paganism, 
 But Only One Of Them Is Capable Of Translation Into A Useful Idealism. 
   
   
   
   
   
   
 Omar KayyÁM 
   
 In The Twelfth Century,  At KhorassáN In persia Omar KayyáM The Poet Was 
 Born. He Lived and Died at NaisháPúR,  Following the Trade Of A 
 Tent-Maker,  Acquiring knowledge Of Every Available Kind,  But With 
 Astronomy For His Special Study. His Famous Poem,  The _RubáIyáT_,  Was 
 First Seen By Fitzgerald In 1856 And Published in 1868. So Great Was The 
 Sensation Produced in england By The Innovating sage,  That In 1895 The 
 Omar KayyáM Club Was Founded by Professor Clodd,  And That Club Has Since 
 Come To Be Considered "The Blue Ribbon Of Literary Associations." 
   
 In Omar'S Time Persian Poetry Was In the Hands Of The SúFis,  Or 
 Religious Teachers Of Persia. He Found Them Writing verses Which 
 Professed to Be Mystical And Spiritual,  But Which Might Sometimes Be 
 Suspected of Earthlier Meanings Lurking beneath The Pantheistic Veil. It 
 Was Against The Poetry Of Such SúFis That Omar KayyáM Rose In revolt. 
 Loving frankness And Truth,  He Threw All Disguises Aside,  And Became The 
 Exponent Of Materialistic Epicureanism Naked and Unashamed. 
   
 A Fair Specimen Of The Finest SúFi Poetry Is _The Rose Garden Of Sa'Di_, 
 Which It May Be Convenient To Quote Because Of Its Easy Accessibility In 
 English Translation. Sa'Di Also Was A Twelfth-Century Poet,  Although Of 
 A Later Time Than Omar. He Was A Student Of The College In baghdad,  And 
 He Lived as A Hermit For Sixty Years In shiraz,  Singing of Love And War. 
 His Mind Is Full Of Mysticism,  Wisdom And Beauty Going hand In hand 
 Through A Dim Twilight Land. Dominating all His Thought Is The Primary 
 Conviction That The Soul Is Essentially Part Of God,  And Will Return To 
 God Again,  And Meanwhile Is Always Revealing,  In mysterious Hints And 
 Half-Conscious Visions,  Its Divine Source And Destiny. Here And There 
 You Will Find The Deep Fatalism Of The East,  As In the Lines-- 
   
   
   
      "Fate Will Not Alter For A Thousand Sighs, 
        Nor Prayers Importunate,  Nor Hopeless Cries. 
      The Guardian Of The Store-House Of The Wind 
        Cares Nothing if The Widow'S Lantern Dies." 
   
 These,  However,  Are Relieved by That Which Makes A Friend Of Fate-- 
   
   
   
      "To God'S Beloved even The Dark Hour 
        Shines As The Morning glory After Rain. 
      Except By Allah'S Grace Thou Hast No Power 
        Nor Strength Of Arm Such Rapture To Attain." 
   
 It Was Against This Sort Of Poetry That Omar KayyáM Revolted. He Had Not 
 
 
 
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 Any Proof Of Such Spiritual Assurances,  And He Did Not Want That Of 
 Which He Had No Proof. He Understood The Material World Around Him,  Both 
 In Its Joy And Sorrow,  And Emphatically He Did Not Understand Any Other 
 World. He Became A Sort Of Marlowe'S Faust Before His Time,  And 
 Protested against The Vague Spirituality Of The SúFis By An Assertion Of 
 What May Be Called a Brilliant Animalism. He Loved beauty As Much As 
 They Did,  And There Is An Oriental Splendour About All His Work,  Albeit 
 An Earthly Splendour. He Became,  Accordingly,  An Audacious Epicurean Who 
 "Failed to Find Any World But This," And Set Himself To Make The Best Of 
 What He Found. His Was Not An Exorbitant Ambition Nor A Fiery Passion Of 
 Any Kind. The Bitterness And Cynicism Of It All Remind Us Of The 
 Inscription Upon Sardanapalus' Tomb--"Eat,  Drink,  Play,  The Rest Is Not 
 Worth The Snap Of A Finger." Drinking-Cups Have Been Discovered with 
 Such Inscriptions On Them--"The Future Is Utterly Useless,  Make The Most 
 Of To-Day,"--And Omar'S Poetry Is Full Both Of The Cups And The 
 Inscription. 
   
   
   
 The French Interpreter,  Nicolas,  Has Indeed spiritualised his Work. In 
 His View,  When Omar Raves About Wine,  He Really Means God; When He 
 Speaks Of Love,  He Means The Soul,  And So On. As A Matter Of Fact,  No 
 Man Has Ever Written A Plainer Record Of What He Means,  Or Has Left His 
 Meaning less Ambiguous. When He Says Wine And Love He Means Wine And 
 Love--Earthly Things,  Which May Or May Not Have Their Spiritual 
 Counterparts,  But Which At Least Have Given No Sign Of Them To Him. The 
 Same Persistent Note Is Heard In all His Verses. It Is The Grape,  And 
 Wine,  And Fair Women,  And Books,  That Make Up The Sum Total Of Life For 
 Omar As He Knows It. 
   
      "Come,  Fill The Cup,  And In the Fire Of Spring 
      Your Winter-Garment Of Repentance Fling: 
        The Bird Of Time Has But A Little Way 
      To Flutter--And The Bird Is On The Wing. 
   
      A Book Of Verses Underneath The Bough, 
      A Jug Of Wine,  A Loaf Of Bread--And Thou 
        Beside Me Singing in the Wilderness-- 
      Oh,  Wilderness Were Paradise Enow! 
   
      We Are No Other Than A Moving row 
      Of Magic Shadow-Shapes That Come And Go 
        Round With The Sun-Illumined lantern Held 
      In midnight By The Master Of The Show." 
   
   
   
 It Would Show A Sad Lack Of Humour If We Were To Take This Too 
 Seriously,  And Shake Our Heads Over Our Eastern Visitor. The Cult Of 
 Omar Has Been Blamed for Paganising english Society. Really It Came In 
 As A Foreign Curiosity,  And,  For The Most Part,  That It Has Remained. 
 When We Had A Visit Some Years Ago From That Great Oriental Potentate Li 
 Hung Chang,  We All Put On Our Best Clothes And Went Out To Welcome Him. 
 That Was All Right So Long As We Did Not Naturalise Him,  A Course Which 
 Neither He Nor We Thought Of Our Adopting. Had We Naturalised him,  It 
 Would Have Been A Different Matter,  And Even Mayfair Might Have Found 
 The Fashions Of China Somewhat _Risqué_. One Remembers That Introductory 
 Note To Browning'S _Ferishtah'S Fancies_--"You,  Sir,  I Entertain You For 
 One Of My Hundred; Only,  I Do Not Like The Fashion Of Your Garments: You 
 Will Say They Are Persian; But Let Them Be Changed."[1] The Only Safe 
 Way Of Dealing with Omar KayyáM Is To Insist That His Garments Be _Not_ 
 
 
 
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 Changed. If You Naturalise Him He Will Become Deadly In the West. The 
 East Thrives Upon Fatalism,  And There Is A Glamour About Its Most 
 Materialistic Writings,  Through Which Far Spiritual Things Seem To 
 Quiver As In a Sun-Haze. The Atmosphere Of The West Is Different,  And 
 Fatalism,  Adopted by Its More Practical Mind,  Is Sheer Suicide. 
   
   
   
 Not That There Is Much Likelihood Of A Nation With The History And The 
 Literature Of England Behind It,  Ever Becoming to Any Great Extent 
 Materialistic In the Crude Sense Of Omar'S Poetry. The Danger Is 
 Subtler. The Motto,  "Let Us Eat And Drink For To-Morrow We Die," Is 
 Capable Of Spiritualisation,  And If You Spiritualise That Motto It 
 Becomes Poisonous Indeed. For There Are Various Ways Of Eating and 
 Drinking,  And Many Who Would Not Be Tempted with The Grosser Appetites 
 May Become Pagans By Devoting themselves To A Rarer Banquet,  The Feast 
 Of Reason And The Flow Of Soul. It Is Possible In that Way Also To Take 
 The Present Moment For Eternity,  To Live And Think Without Horizons. Mr. 
 Peyton Has Said,  "You See In some Little House A Picture Of A Cottage On 
 A Moor,  And You Wonder Why These People,  Living,  Perhaps,  In the Heart 
 Of A Great City,  And In the Most Commonplace Of Houses,  Put Such A 
 Picture There. The Reason For It Is,  That That Cottage Is For Them The 
 Signal Of The Immortal Life Of Men,  And The Moor Has Infinite Horizons." 
 That Is The Root Of The Matter After All--The Soul And Horizons. He Who 
 Says,  "To-Day Shall Suffice For Me," Whether It Be In the High 
 Intellectual Plane Or In the Low Earthly One,  Has Fallen Into The Grip 
 Of The World That Passeth Away; And That Is A Danger Which Omar'S Advent 
 Has Certainly Not Lessened. 
   
 The Second Reason For Care In this Neighbourhood Is That Epicureanism Is 
 Only Safe For Those Whose Tastes Lie In the Direction Of The Simple 
 Life. Montaigne Has Wisely Said That It Is Pernicious To Those Who Have 
 A Natural Tendency To Vice. But Vice Is Not A Thing which Any Man Loves 
 For Its Own Sake,  Until His Nature Has Suffered a Long Process Of 
 Degradation. It Is Simply The Last Result Of A Habit Of Luxurious 
 Self-Indulgence; And The Temptation To The Self-Indulgent,  The Present 
 World In one Form Or Another,  Comes Upon Everybody At Times. There Are 
 Moods When All Of Us Want To Break Away From The Simple Life,  And Feel 
 The Splendour Of The Dazzling lights And The Intoxication Of The Strange 
 Scents Of The World. To Surrender To These Has Always Been,  And Always 
 Will Be,  Deadly. It Is The Old Temptation To Cease To Strive,  Which We 
 Have Already Found To Be The Keynote Of Goethe'S _Faust_. Kingsley,  In 
 One Of The Most Remarkable Passages Of _Westward Ho!_ Describes Two Of 
 Amyas Leigh'S Companions,  Settled down In a Luscious Paradise Of Earthly 
 Delights,  While Their Comrades Endured the Never-Ending hardships Of The 
 March. By The Sight Of That Soft Luxury Amyas Was Tempted of The Devil. 
 But As He Gazed,  A Black Jaguar Sprang From The Cliff Above,  And 
 Fastened on The Fair Form Of The Bride Of One Of The Recreants. "O Lord 
 Jesus," Said Amyas To Himself,  "Thou Hast Answered the Devil For Me!" 
   
   
   
 It Does Not,  However,  Need the Advent Of The Jaguar To Introduce The 
 Element Of Sheer Tragedy Into Luxurious Life. In his _Conspiracy Of 
 Pontiac_,  Parkman Tells With Rare Eloquence The Character Of The Ojibwa 
 Indians: "In The Calm Days Of Summer,  The Ojibwa Fisherman Pushes Out 
 His Birch Canoe Upon The Great Inland Ocean Of The North; ... Or He 
 Lifts His Canoe From The Sandy Beach,  And,  While His Camp-Fire Crackles 
 On The Grass-Plot,  Reclines Beneath The Trees,  And Smokes And Laughs 
 Away The Sultry Hours,  In a Lazy Luxury Of Enjoyment.... But When Winter 
 Descends Upon The North,  Sealing up The Fountains ... Now The Hunter Can 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iv  (Celtic Revivals Of Paganism  Omar KayyÁM And Fiona Macleod )   Pg 38 
 Fight No More Against The Nipping cold And Blinding sleet. Stiff And 
 Stark,  With Haggard Cheek And Shrivelled lip,  He Lies Among The 
 Snow-Drifts; Till,  With Tooth And Claw,  The Famished wild-Cat 
 Strives In vain To Pierce The Frigid Marble Of His Limbs." 
   
   
   
 Meredith Tells Of A Bird,  Playing with A Magic Ring,  And All The Time 
 Trying to Sing its Song; But The Ring falls And Has To Be Picked up 
 Again,  And The Song Is Broken. It Is A Good Parable Of Life,  That 
 Impossible Compromise Between The Magic Ring and The Simple Song. Those 
 Who Choose The Earth-Magic Of Omar'S Epicureanism Will Find That The 
 Song Of The Spirit Is Broken,  Until They Cease From The Vain Attempt At 
 Singing and Fall Into An Earth-Bound Silence. 
   
   
   
 Thus Omar KayyáM Has Brought Us A Rich Treasure From The East,  Of 
 Splendid Diction And Much Delightful And Fascinating sweetness Of 
 Poetry. All Such Gifts Are An Enrichment To The Language And A 
 Decoration To The Thought Of A People. When,  However,  They Are Taken 
 More Seriously,  They May Certainly Bring plague With Them,  As Other 
 Eastern Things Have Sometimes Done. 
   
   
   
   
 Fiona Macleod 
   
 To Turn Suddenly From This Curious Persian Life And Thought To The Still 
 More Curious Life And Thought Of Ancient Scotland Is Indeed a Violent 
 Change. Nothing could Be More Dissimilar Than The Two Types Of Paganism 
 Out Of Which They Spring; And If Fiona Macleod'S Work May Have Its 
 Dangers For The Precarious Faith Of Modern Days,  They Are Certainly 
 Dangers Which Attack The Soul In a Different Fashion From Those Of Omar. 
   
 The Revelation Of Fiona Macleod'S Identity With William Sharp Came Upon 
 The English-Reading world As A Complete Surprise. Few Deaths Have Been 
 More Lamented in the Literary World Than His,  And That For Many Reasons. 
 His Biography Is One Of The Most Fascinating that Could Be Imagined. His 
 Personality Was A Singularly Attractive One,--So Vital,  So 
 Indefatigable,--With Interests So Many-Sided,  And A Heart So Sound In 
 All Of Them. It Is Characteristic Of Him That In his Young Days He Ran 
 Away For A Time With Gipsies,  For He Tells Us,  "I Suppose I Was A Gipsy 
 Once,  And Before That A Wild Man Of The Woods." The Two Great Influences 
 Of His Life Were Shelley And D.G. Rossetti. The Story Of His Literary 
 Struggles Is Brimful Of Courage And Romance,  And The Impression Of The 
 Book Is Mainly That Of Ubiquity. His Insatiable Curiosity Seems To Have 
 Led him To Know Everybody,  And Every Place,  And Everything. 
   
   
   
 At Length Fiona Macleod Was Born. She Arose Out Of Nowhere,  So Far As 
 The Reading public Could Discover. Really There Was A Hidden Shy Self In 
 Sharp,  Which Must Find Expression Impossible Except In some Secret Way. 
 We Knew Him As The Brilliant Critic,  The Man Of Affairs,  And The Wide 
 And Experienced traveller. We Did Not Know Him,  Until We Discovered that 
 He Was Fiona,  In that Second Life Of His In the Borderland Where Flesh 
 And Spirit Meet. 
   
   
   
 First There Came _Pharais_ In 1893,  And That Was The Beginning of Much. 
 Then Came _The Children Of To-Morrow_,  The Forerunner Of Fiona Macleod. 
 It Was His First Prose Expression Of The Subjective Side Of His Nature, 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iv  (Celtic Revivals Of Paganism  Omar KayyÁM And Fiona Macleod )   Pg 39 
 Together With The Element Of Revolt Against Conventionalities,  Which Was 
 Always Strongly Characteristic Of Him. It Introduced england To The 
 Hidden Places Of The Green Life. 
   
   
   
 The Secret Of His Double Personality Was Confided only To A Few Friends, 
 And Was Remarkably Well Kept. When Pressed by Adventurous Questioners, 
 Some Of These Allies Gave Answers Which Might Have Served for Models In 
 The Art Of Diplomacy. So Sharp Wrote On,  Openly As William Sharp,  And 
 Secretly As Fiona Macleod. Letters Had To Reach Fiona Somehow,  And So It 
 Was Given Out That She Was His Cousin,  And That Letters Sent To Him 
 Would Be Safely Passed on To Her. If,  However,  It Was Difficult To Keep 
 The Secret From The Public,  It Was Still More Difficult For One Man To 
 Maintain Two Distinct Personalities. William Sharp Of Course Had To 
 Live,  While Fiona Might Die Any Day. Her Life Entailed upon Him Another 
 Burden,  Not Of Personification Only,  But Of Subject And Research,  And He 
 Was Driven To Sore Passes To Keep Both Himself And Her Alive. For Each 
 Was Truly Alive And Individual--Two Distinct People,  One Of Whom Thought 
 Of The Other As If She Were "Asleep In another Room." Even The Double 
 Correspondence Was A Severe Burden And Strain,  For Fiona Macleod Had Her 
 Own Large Post-Bag Which Had To Be Answered,  Just As William Sharp Had 
 His. But Far Beyond Any Such Outward Expressions Of Themselves As These, 
 The Difficulty Of The Double Personality Lay In deep Springs Of 
 Character And Of Taste. Sharp'S Mind Was Keenly Intellectual,  Observant, 
 And Reasoning; While Fiona Macleod Was The Intuitional And Spiritual 
 Dreamer. She Was Indeed the Expression Of The Womanly Element In sharp. 
 This Element Certainly Dominated him,  Or Rather Perhaps He Was One Of 
 Those Who Have Successfully Invaded the Realm Of Alien Sex. In his 
 Earlier Work,  Such As _The Lady Of The Sea_,--"The Woman Who Is In the 
 Heart Of Woman,"--We Have Proof Of This; For In that Especially He So 
 "Identified himself With Woman'S Life,  Seeing it Through Her Own Eyes 
 That He Seems To Forget Sometimes That He Is Not She." So Much Was This 
 The Case That Fiona Macleod Actually Received at Least One Proposal Of 
 Marriage. It Was Answered quite Kindly,  Fiona Replying that She Had 
 Other Things To Do,  And Could Not Think Of It; But The Little Incident 
 Shows How True The Saying about Sharp Was,  That "He Was Always In love 
 With Something or Another." This Loving and Love-Inspiring element In 
 Him Has Been Strongly Challenged,  And Some Of The Women Who Have Judged 
 Him,  Have Strenuously Disowned him As An Exponent Of Their Sex. Yet The 
 Fact Is Unquestionable That He Was Able To Identify Himself In a Quite 
 Extraordinary Degree With What He Took To Be The Feminine Soul. 
   
   
   
 It Seems To Have Something to Do With The Celtic Genius. One Can Always 
 Understand A Scottish Celt Better By Comparing him With An Irish One Or 
 A Welsh; And It Will Certainly Prove Illuminative In the Present Case To 
 Remember Mr. W.B. Yeats While One Is Thinking of Fiona Macleod. To The 
 Present Writer It Seems That The Woman-Soul Is Apparent In both,  And 
 That She Is Singing the Same Tune; The Only Difference Being,  As It 
 Were,  In the Quality Of The Voice,  Fiona Macleod Singing in high 
 Soprano,  And Mr. Yeats In deep And Most Heart-Searching contralto. 
   
   
   
 The Fiona Macleod Side Of Sharp Never Throve Well In london. Hers Was 
 The Fate Of Those Who In this Busy World Have Retained the Faculty And 
 The Need for Dreaming. So Sharp Had To Get Away From London--Driven Of 
 The Spirit Into The Wilderness--That His Other Self Might Live And 
 Breathe. One Feels The Power Of This Second Self Especially In certain 
 Words That Recur Over And Over Again,  Until The Reader Is Almost 
 Hypnotised by Their Lilting,  And Finds Himself In a Kind Of Sleep. That 
 
 
 
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 Dreaming personality,  With Eyes Half Closed and Poppy-Decorated hair, 
 Could Never Live In the Bondage Of The City Cage. The Spirit Must Get 
 Free,  And The Longing for Such Freedom Has Been Well Called "A Barbaric 
 Passion,  A Nostalgia For The Life Of The Moor And Windy Sea." 
   
   
   
 There Are Two Ways Of Loving and Understanding nature. Meredith Speaks 
 Of Those Who Only See Nature By Looking at It Along The Barrel Of A Gun. 
 The Phrase Describes That Large Company Of People Who Feel The Call Of 
 The Wild Indeed,  And Long For The Country At Certain Seasons,  But Must 
 Always Be Doing something with Nature--Either Hunting,  Or Camping out, 
 Or Peradventure Going upon A Journey Like Baal In the Old Testament. But 
 There Is Another Way,  To Which Carlyle Calls Attention As Characteristic 
 Of Robert Burns,  And Which He Pronounces The Test Of A True Poet. The 
 Test Is,  Whether He Can Wander The Whole Day Beside A Burn "And No' 
 Think Lang." Such Was Fiona'S Way With Nature. She Needed nothing to 
 Interest Her But The Green Earth Itself,  And Its Winds And Its Waters. 
 It Was Surely The Fiona Side Of Sharp That Made Him Kiss The Grassy Turf 
 And Then Scatter It To The East And West And North And South; Or Lie 
 Down At Night Upon The Ground That He Might See The Intricate Patterns 
 Of The Moonlight,  Filtering through The Branches Of The Trees. 
   
 In All This,  It Is Needless To Say,  Mr. Yeats Offers A Close Parallel. 
 He Understands So Perfectly The Wild Life,  That One Knows At Once That 
 It Is In him,  Like A Fire In his Blood. Take This For Instance-- 
   
      "They Found A Man Running there; 
      He Had Ragged long Grass-Coloured hair; 
      He Had Knees That Stuck Out Of His Hose; 
      He Had Puddle Water In his Shoes; 
      He Had Half A Cloak To Keep Him Dry, 
      Although He Had A Squirrel'S Eye." 
   
 Such Perfect Observation Is Possible Only To The Detached spirit,  Which 
 Is Indeed doing nothing to Nature,  But Only Letting nature Do Her Work. 
 In The Sharp Outline Of This Imagery,  And In the Mind That Saw And The 
 Heart That Felt It,  There Is Something of The Keenness Of The Squirrel'S 
 Eye For Nature. 
   
 Fiona'S Favourite Part Of Nature Is The Sea. That Great And Many-Sided 
 Wonder,  Whether With Its Glare Of Phosphorescence Or The Stillness Of 
 Its Dead Calm,  Fascinates The Poems Of Sharp And Lends Them Its Spell. 
 But Of The Prose Of Fiona It May Be Truly Said That Everything 
   
      "... Doth Suffer A Sea-Change, 
      Into Something rich And Strange." 
   
 These Marvellous Lines Were Never More Perfectly Illustrated than Here. 
 As We Read We Behold The Sea,  Now Crouching like A Gigantic Tiger,  Now 
 Moaning with Some Celtic Consciousness Of The Grim And Loathsome 
 Treasures In its Depths,  Ever Haunted and Ever Haunting. It Is Probable 
 That Sharp Never Wrote Anything that Had Not For His Ear An Undertone Of 
 The Ocean. Sitting in london In his Room,  He Heard,  On One Occasion,  The 
 Sound Of Waves So Loud That He Could Not Hear His Wife Knocking at The 
 Door. Similarly In fiona Macleod'S Writing seas Are Always Rocking and 
 Swinging. Gulfs Are Opening to Disclose The Green Dim Mysteries Of The 
 Deeper Depths. The Wind Is Running riot With The Surface Overhead,  And 
 The Sea Is Lord In all Its Mad Glory And Wonder And Fear. 
 
 
 
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 Mr. Yeats Has The Same Characteristic,  But Again It Is Possible To Draw 
 A Fantastic Distinction Like That Between The Soprano And The Alto. It 
 Is Lake Water Rather Than The Ocean That Sounds The Under-Tone Of Mr. 
 Yeats' Poetry-- 
   
   
   
      "I Will Arise And Go Now,  For Always Night And Day 
      I Hear Lake Water Lapping with Low Sounds By The Shore; 
      While I Stand On The Roadway,  Or On The Pavement Grey, 
          I Hear It In the Deep Heart'S Core." 
   
   
   
 The Oldest Sounds In the World,  Mr. Yeats Tells Us Are Wind And Water 
 And The Curlew: And Of The Curlew He Says-- 
   
      "O Curlew,  Cry No More In the Air, 
      Or Only To The Waters Of The West; 
      Because Your Crying brings To My Mind 
      Passion-Dimmed eyes And Long Heavy Hair 
      That Was Shaken Out Over My Breast: 
      There Is Enough Evil In the Crying of Wind." 
   
 In All This You Hear The Crying of The Wind And The Swiftly Borne Scream 
 Of The Curlew On It,  And You Know That Lake Water Will Not Be Far Away. 
 This Magic Power Of Bringing busy City People Out Of All Their 
 Surroundings Into The Green Heart Of The Forest And The Moorland,  And 
 Letting them Hear The Sound Of Water There,  Is Common To Them Both. 
   
 Fiona Macleod Is A Lover And Worshipper Of Beauty. Long Before Her,  The 
 Greeks Had Taught The World Their Secret,  And The Sweet Spell Had 
 Penetrated many Hearts Beyond The Pale Of Greece. It Was Augustine Who 
 Said,  "Late I Have Loved thee,  Oh Beauty,  So Old And Yet So New,  Late I 
 Have Loved thee." And Marius The Epicurean,  In pater'S Fine Phrase,  "Was 
 One Who Was Made Perfect By Love Of Visible Beauty." It Is A Direct 
 Instinct,  This Bracing and Yet Intoxicating love Of Beauty For Its Own 
 Sake. Each Nation Produces A Spiritual Type Of It,  Which Becomes One Of 
 The Deepest National Characteristics,  And The Celtic Type Is Easily 
 Distinguished. No Celt Ever Cared for Landscape. "It Is Loveliness I 
 Ask,  Not Lovely Things," Says Fiona; And It Is But A Step From This To 
 That Abstract Mystical And Spiritual Love Of Beauty,  Which Is The Very 
 Soul Of The Celtic Genius. It Expresses Itself Most Directly In colours, 
 And The Meaning of Them Is Far More Than Bright-Hued surfaces. The Pale 
 Green Of Running water,  The Purple And Pearl-Grey Of Doves,  Still More 
 The Remote And Liquid Colours Of The Sky,  And The Sad-Toned or The Gay 
 Garments Of The Earth--These Are More By Far To Those Who Know Their 
 Value Than Pigments,  However Delicate. They Are Either A Sensuous 
 Intoxication Or Else A Mystic Garment Of The Spirit. Seumas,  The Old 
 Islander,  Looking seaward At Sunrise,  Says,  "Every Morning like This I 
 Take My Hat Off To The Beauty Of The World." And As We Read We Think Of 
 Mr. Neil Munro'S Lord Of Doom Castle Walking uncovered in the Night 
 Before Retiring to His Rest,  And With Tears Welling in his Eyes 
 Exclaiming that The Mountains Are His Evening prayer. Such Mystics As 
 These Are In touch With Far-Off Things. Sharp,  Indeed,  Was Led 
 Definitely To Follow Such Leading into Regions Of Spiritualism Where Not 
 Many Of His Readers Will Be Able Or Willing to Follow Him,  But Fiona 
 Macleod Left The Mystery Vague. It Might Easily Have Defined itself In 
 Some Sort Of Pantheistic Theory Of The Universe,  But It Never Did So. 
 "The Green Fire" Is More Than The Sap Which Flows Through The Roots Of 
 
 
 
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 The Trees. It Is As Alfred de Musset Has Called it,  The Blood That 
 Courses Through The Veins Of God. As We Realise The Full Force Of That 
 Imaginative Phrase,  The Dark Roots Of Trees Instinct With Life,  And The 
 Royal Liquor Rising to Its Foam Of Leaves,  We Have Something very Like 
 Fiona'S Mystic Sense Of Nature. Any Extreme Moment Of Human Experience 
 Will Give An Interpretation Of Such Symbolism--Love Or Death Or The Mere 
 Springtide Of The Year. 
   
   
   
 It Is Not Without Significance That Sharp And Mr. Yeats And Mr. Symons 
 All Dreamed on The Same Night The Curious Dream Of A Beautiful Woman 
 Shooting arrows Among The Stars. All The Three Had Indeed the Beautiful 
 Woman In the Heart Of Them,  And In far-Darting thoughts And Imaginations 
 She Was Ever Sending arrows Among The Stars. But Mr. Yeats Is Calmer And 
 Less Passionate Than Fiona,  As Though He Were Crooning a Low Song All 
 The Time,  While The Silent Arrows Flash From His Bow. Sometimes,  Indeed, 
 He Will Blaze Forth Flaming with Passion In showers Of Light Of The 
 Green Fire. Yet From First To Last,  There Is Less Of The Green Fire And 
 More Of The Poppies In mr. Yeats And It Is Fiona Who Shoots Most 
 Constantly And Farthest Among The Stars. 
   
 _Haunted_,  That Is The Word For This World Into Which We Have Entered. 
 The House Without Its Guests Would Be Uninhabitable For Such Poets As 
 These. The Atmosphere Is Everywhere That Of A Haunted earth Where 
 Strange Terrors And Beauties Flit To And Fro--Phantoms Of Spectral Lives 
 Which Seem To Be Looking on While We Play Out Our Bustling parts Upon 
 The Stage. They Are Separate From The Body,  These Shadows,  And Belong To 
 Some Former Life. They Are An Ancestral Procession Walking ever Behind 
 Us,  And Often They Are Changing the Course Of Our Visible Adventures By 
 The Power Of Sins And Follies That Were Committed in the Dim And 
 Remotest Past. Certainly The Author Is,  As He Says,  "Aware Of Things And 
 Living presences Hidden From The Rest." "The Shadows Are Here." The 
 Spirits Of The Dead And The Never Born Are Out And At Large. These Or 
 Others Like Them Were The Folk That Abt Vogler Encountered as He Played 
 Upon His Instrument--"Presences Plain In the Place." 
   
 One Of The Most Striking chapters In that Very Remarkable Book Of Mr. 
 Fielding hall'S,  _The Soul Of A People_,  Is That In which He Describes 
 The Nats,  The Little Dainty Spirits That Haunt The Trees Of Burmah. But 
 It Is Not Only The Eastern Trees That Are Haunted,  And Sharp Is Always 
 Seeing tree-Spirits,  And Nature-Spirits Of Every Kind,  And Talking with 
 Them. Now And Again He Will Give You A Natural Explanation Of Them,  But 
 That Always Jars And Sounds Prosaic. In fact,  We Do Not Want It; We 
 Prefer The "Delicate Throbbing things" Themselves,  To Any Facts You Can 
 Give Us Instead Of Them,  For To Those Who Have Heard And Seen Beyond The 
 Veil,  They Are Far More Real Than Any Of Your Mere Facts. Here We Think 
 Of Mr. Yeats Again With His Cry,  "Come Into The World Again Wild Bees, 
 Wild Bees." But He Hardly Needed to Cry Upon Them,  For The Wild Bees 
 Were Buzzing in every Page He Wrote. 
   
   
   
 A World Haunted in this Fashion Has Its Sinister Side,  Allied with The 
 Decaying corpses Deep In the Earth. When Passion Has Gone Into The World 
 Beyond That Which Eye Hath Seen And Ear Heard,  It Takes,  In presence Of 
 The Thought Of Death,  A Double Form. It Is In love With Death And Yet It 
 Hates Death. So We Come Back To That Singular Sentence Of Robert Louis 
 Stevenson'S,  "The Beauty And The Terror Of The World," Which So 
 Adequately Describes The Double Fascination Of Nature For Man. Her Spell 
 Is Both Sweet And Terrible,  And We Would Not Have It Otherwise  
 
 
 
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 Menace In summer'S Beauty,  The Frightful Contrast Between The Laughing 
 Earth And The Waiting death,  Are All Felt In the Prolonged and Deep 
 Sense Of Gloom That Broods Over Much Of Fiona'S Work,  And In the 
 Second-Sight Which Very Weirdly Breaks Through From Time To Time, 
 Forcing our Entrance Into The Land From Which We Shrink. 
   
   
   
 Mr. Yeats Is Not Without The Same Sinister And Moving undergloom, 
 Although,  On The Whole,  He Is Aware Of Kindlier Powers And Of A Timid 
 Affection Between Men And Spirits. He Actually Addresses A Remonstrance 
 To Scotsmen For Having soured the Disposition Of Their Ghosts And 
 Fairies,  And His Reconstructions Of The Ancient Fairyland Are Certainly 
 Full Of Lightsome And Pleasing passages. Along Either Lane You May 
 Arrive At Peace,  Which Is The Monopoly Neither Of The Eastern Nor Of The 
 Western Celt,  But It Is A Peace Never Free From A Great Wistfulness. 
   
      "How Many Loved your Moments Of Glad Grace, 
        And Loved your Beauty With Love False Or True; 
        But One Man Loved the Pilgrim Soul In you, 
      And Loved the Sorrows Of Your Changing face." 
   
 That There Is Much Paganism In all This Must Be Obvious To Any One Who 
 Has Given Any Attention To The Subject. The Tale Of _The Annir-Choille_ 
 Confesses It Frankly Enough,  Where The Young Christian Prince Is Brought 
 Back By The Forest Maiden From His New Faith To The Ancient Pagan World. 
 Old Gods Are Strewn Everywhere Upon The Waysides Down Which Fiona Leads 
 Us,  And There Are Many Times When We Cannot Disentangle The Spiritual 
 From The Material,  Nor Indeed the Good From The Evil Influences. Dr. 
 John Brown Used to Tell The Story Of A Shepherd Boy Near Biggar,  Who One 
 Day Was Caught Out On The Hill In a Thunder-Storm. The Boy Could Not 
 Remember Whether Thunder-Storms Were Sent By God Or Satan,  And So To Be 
 Quite Safe,  He Kept Alternately Repeating the Ejaculations,  "Eh,  Guid 
 God," And "Eh,  Bonny Deil." One Often Thinks Of Fiona In connection With 
 That Story. You Are Seldom Quite Sure Whether It Is A Christian Or A 
 Pagan Deity Whom You Are Invoking,  But There Is No Question As To The 
 Paganism Of The Atmosphere Which You Often Breathe. 
   
   
   
 As A Matter Of Fact,  William Sharp Began In frank And Avowed paganism, 
 And Passed from That Through Various Phases Into A High Spirituality. 
 His Early Utterances In regard To Art,  In which He Deprecated any 
 Connection Between Art And A Message,  And Insisted upon Its Being mere 
 Expression,  Were Of Course Sheer Paganism. In 1892,  Before Fiona Was 
 Born,  He Published one Of Those Delightful Magazines Which Run Through A 
 Short And Daring career And Then Vanish As Suddenly As They Arose. In 
 Fact His Magazine,  _The Pagan Review_,  From First To Last Had Only One 
 Number. It Was Edited by Mr. Brooks And William Sharp,  And Its Articles 
 Were Contributed by Seven Other People. But These Seven,  And Mr. Brooks 
 As Well,  Turned out Eventually All To Be William Sharp Himself. It Was 
 "Frankly Pagan; Pagan In sentiment,  Pagan In convictions,  Pagan In 
 Outlook.... The Religion Of Our Forefathers Has Not Only Ceased for Us 
 Personally,  But Is No Longer In any Vital And General Sense A Sovereign 
 Power In the Realm." He Finished up With The Interesting phrase,  "Sic 
 Transit Gloria Grundi," And He Quotes Gautier: "'Frankly I Am In earnest 
 This Time. Order Me A Dove-Coloured vest,  Apple-Green Trousers,  A Pouch, 
 A Crook; In short,  The Entire Outfit Of A Lignon Shepherd. I Shall Have 
 A Lamb Washed to Complete The Pastoral....' This Is The Lamb." 
   
 The Magazine Was An Extraordinarily Clever Production,  And The Fact That 
 
 
 
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 He Was Its Author Is Significant. For To The End Of Her Days Fiona Was A 
 Pagan Still,  Albeit Sometimes A More Or Less Converted pagan. In _The 
 Annir-Choille_,  _The Sin-Eater_,  _The Washer Of The Ford_,  And The 
 Others,  You Never Get Away From The Ancient Rites,  And There Is One 
 Story Which May Be Taken As Typical Of All The Rest,  _The Walker In the 
 Night_:-- 
   
   
   
 "Often He Had Heard Of Her. When Any Man Met This Woman His Fate 
 Depended on Whether He Saw Her Before She Caught Sight Of Him. If She 
 Saw Him First,  She Had But To Sing her Wild Strange Song,  And He Would 
 Go To Her; And When He Was Before Her,  Two Flames Would Come Out Of Her 
 Eyes,  And One Flame Would Burn Up His Life As Though It Were Dry Tinder, 
 And The Other Would Wrap Round His Soul Like A Scarlet Shawl,  And She 
 Would Take It And Live With It In a Cavern Underground For A Year And A 
 Day. And On That Last Day She Would Let It Go,  As A Hare Is Let Go A 
 Furlong Beyond A Greyhound. Then It Would Fly Like A Windy Shadow 
 From Glade To Glade,  Or From Dune To Dune,  In the Vain Hope To Reach A 
 Wayside Calvary: But Ever In vain. Sometimes The Holy Tree Would Almost 
 Be Reached; Then,  With A Gliding swiftness,  Like A Flood Racing down A 
 Valley,  The Walker In the Night Would Be Alongside The Fugitive. Now And 
 Again Unhappy Nightfarers--Unhappy They,  For Sure,  For Never Does Weal 
 Remain With Any One Who Hears What No Human Ear Should Hearken--Would Be 
 Startled by A Sudden Laughing in the Darkness. This Was When Some Such 
 Terrible Chase Had Happened,  And When The Creature Of The Night Had 
 Taken The Captive Soul,  In the Last Moments Of The Last Hour Of The Last 
 Day Of Its Possible Redemption,  And Rent It This Way And That,  As A Hawk 
 Scatters The Feathered fragments Of Its Mutilated quarry." 
   
 We Have Said That Nature May Be Either An Intoxication Or A Sacrament, 
 And Paganism Might Be Defined as The View Of Nature In the Former Of 
 These Two Lights. But Where You Have A Growing spirituality Like That Of 
 William Sharp,  You Are Constantly Made Aware Of The Hieratic Or 
 Sacramental Quality In nature Also. It Is This Which Gives Its Peculiar 
 Charm And Spell To Celtic Folklore In general. The Saxon Song Of Beowulf 
 Is A Rare Song,  And Its Story Is The Swinging tale Of A "Pagan Gentleman 
 Very Much In the Rough," But For The Most Part It Is Quite Destitute Of 
 Spiritual Significance. It May Be Doubted if This Could Be Said Truly Of 
 Any Celtic Tale That Was Ever Told. Fiona Macleod Describes _The Three 
 Marvels_ As "Studies In old Religious Celtic Sentiment,  So Far As That 
 Can Be Recreated in a Modern Heart That Feels The Same Beauty And 
 Simplicity In the Early Christian Faith"; And There Is A Constant Sense 
 That However Wild And Even Wicked the Tale May Be,  Yet It Has Its 
 Christian Counterpart,  And Is In some True Sense A Strayed idealism. 
   
   
   
 At This Point We Become Aware Of One Clear Distinction Between William 
 Sharp And Fiona Macleod. To Him,  Literature Was A Craft,  Laboured at 
 Most Honestly And Enriched with An Immense Wealth Both Of Knowledge And 
 Of Cleverness; But To Her,  Literature Was A Revelation,  With Divine 
 Inspirations Behind It--Inspirations Authentically Divine,  No Matter By 
 What Name The God Might Be Called. So It Came To Pass That _The Pagan 
 Review_ Had Only One Number. That Marked the Transition Moment,  When 
 Fiona Macleod Began To Predominate Over William Sharp,  Until Finally She 
 Controlled and Radically Changed him Into Her Own Likeness. He Passes On 
 To The Volume Entitled _The Divine Adventure_,  Which Interprets The 
 Spirit Of Columba. Nature And The Spiritual Meet In the Psychic Phase 
 Into Which Sharp Passed,  Not Only In the Poetic And Native Sense,  But In 
 A More Literal Sense Than That. For The Green Life Continually Leads 
 
 
 
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 Those Who Are Akin To It Into Opportunities Of Psychical Research Among 
 Obscure And Mysterious Forces Which Are Yet Very Potent. With A Nature 
 Like His It Was Inevitable That He Should Be Eventually Lured 
 Irresistibly Into The Enchanted forest,  Where Spirit Is More And More 
 The One Certainty Of Existence. 
   
   
   
 For Most Of Us There Is Another Guide Into The Spirit Land. In the 
 Region Of The Spectral And Occult Many Of Us Are Puzzled and Ill At 
 Ease,  But We All,  In some Degree,  Understand The Meaning of Ordinary 
 Human Love. Even The Most Commonplace Nature Has Its Magical Hours Now 
 And Then,  Or At Least Has Had Them And Has Not Forgotten; And It Is Love 
 That "Leads Us With A Gentle Hand Into The Silent Land." This May Form A 
 Bond Of Union Between Fiona Macleod And Many Who Are Mystified rather 
 Than Enlightened by Psychic Phenomena In the Technical Meaning of The 
 Phrase. Here,  Perhaps,  We Find The Key To The Double Personality Which 
 Has Been So Interesting in this Whole Study. It Was William Sharp Who 
 Chose For His Tombstone The Inscription,  "Love Is More Great Than We 
 Conceive,  And Death Is The Keeper Of Unknown Redemptions." Fiona'S Work, 
 Too,  Is Full Of The Latent Potency Of Love. Like Marius,  She Has 
 Perceived an Unseen Companion Walking with Men Through The Gloom And 
 Brilliance Of The West And North,  And Sometimes Her Heart Is So Full 
 That It Cannot Find Utterance At All. In the "Dream State," That Which 
 Is Mere Nature For The Scientist Reveals Itself,  Obscurely Indeed and 
 Yet Insistently,  As Very God. God Is Dwelling in fiona. He Is Smiling in 
 All Sunsets. He Is Filling the Universe With His Breath And Holding us 
 All In his "Mighty Moulding hand." 
   
 The Relation In which All This Stands To Christianity Is A Very Curious 
 Question. The Splendour,  Beauty,  And Spirituality Of It All Are Evident 
 Enough,  But The References To Anything like Dogmatic Or Definite 
 Christian Doctrine Are Confusing and Obscure. Perhaps It Was Impossible 
 That One So Literally A Child Of Nature,  And Who Had Led such An 
 Open-Air Life From His Childhood,  Could Possibly Have Done Otherwise 
 Than To Rebel. It Was The Gipsy In him That Revolted against 
 Christianity And Every Other Form And Convention Of Civilised life,  And 
 Claimed a Freedom Far Beyond Any Which He Ever Used. We Read That In his 
 Sixth Year,  When Already He Found The God Of The Pulpit Remote And 
 Forbidding,  He Was Nevertheless Conscious Of A Benign And Beautiful 
 Presence. On The Shore Of Loch Long He Built A Little Altar Of Rough 
 Stones Beneath A Swaying pine,  And Laid An Offering of White Flowers 
 Upon It. In the College Days He Turned still More Definitely Against 
 Orthodox Presbyterianism; But He Retained all Along,  Not Only Belief In 
 The Central Truths That Underlie All Religions,  But Great Reverence And 
 Affection For Them. 
   
   
   
 It Is Probable That Towards The Close He Was Approaching nearer To 
 Formal Christianity Than He Knew. We Are Told That He "Does Not 
 Reverence The Bible Or Christian Theology In themselves,  But For The 
 Beautiful Spirituality Which Faintly Breathes Through Them Like A Vague 
 Wind Blowing through Intricate Forests." His Quarrel With Christianity 
 Was That It Had Never Done Justice To Beauty,  That It Had A Gloom Upon 
 It,  And An Unlovely Austerity. This Indeed is A Strange Accusation From 
 So Perfect An Interpreter Of The Celtic Gloom As He Was,  And The Retort 
 _Tu Quoque_ Is Obvious Enough. There Have Indeed been Phases Of 
 Christianity Which Seemed to Love And Honour The Ugly For Its Own Sake, 
 Yet There Is A Rarer Beauty In the Man Of Sorrows Than In all The 
 Smiling faces Of The World. This Is That Hidden Beauty Of Which The 
 
 
 
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 Saints And Mystics Tell Us. They Have Seen It In the Face More Marred 
 Than Any Man'S,  And Their Record Is That He Who Would Find A Lasting 
 Beauty That Will Satisfy His Soul,  Must Find It Through Pain Conquered 
 And Ugliness Transformed and Sorrow Assuaged. The Christ Beautiful Can 
 Never Be Seen When You Have Stripped him Of The Crown Of Thorns,  Nor Is 
 There Any Loveliness That Has Not Been Made Perfect By Tears. Thus 
 Though There Is Truth In sharp'S Complaint That Christianity Has Often 
 Done Sore Injustice To Beauty As Such,  Yet It Must Be Repeated that This 
 Exponent Of The Celtic Heart Somehow Missed the Element In christianity 
 Which Was Not Only Like,  But Actually Identical With,  His Own Deepest 
 Truth. 
   
   
   
 Sharp Often Reminds One Of Heine,  With His Intensely Human Love Of Life, 
 Both In its Brightness And In its Darkness. Where That Love Is So 
 Intense As It Was In these Hearts,  It Is Almost Inevitable That It 
 Should Sometimes Eclipse The Sense Of The Divine. Thus Sharp Tells Us 
 That "Celtic Paganism Lies Profound Still Beneath The Fugitive Drift Of 
 Christianity And Civilisation,  As The Deep Sea Beneath The Coming and 
 Going of The Tides." He Was Indeed so Aware Of This Underlying paganism, 
 That We Find It Blending with Christian Ideas In practically The Whole 
 Of His Work. Nothing could Be Quoted as A More Distinctive Note Of His 
 Genius Than That Blend. It Is Seen Perhaps Most Clearly In such Stories 
 As _The Last Supper_ And _The Fisher Of Men_. In these Tales Of 
 Unsurpassable Power And Beauty,  Fiona Macleod Has Created the Gaelic 
 Christ. The Christ Is The Same As He Of Galilee And Of The Upper Room In 
 Jerusalem,  And His Work The Same. But He Talks The Sweet Celtic 
 Language,  And Not Only Talks It But _Thinks_ In it Also. He Walks Among 
 The Rowan Trees Of The Shadowy Glen,  While The Quiet Light Flames Upon 
 The Grass,  And The Fierce People That Lurk In shadow Have Eyes For The 
 Helplessness Of The Little Lad Who Sees Too Far. Such Tales Are Full Of 
 A Strange Light That Seems To Be,  At One And The Same Time,  The Celtic 
 Glamour And The Light Of The World. 
   
 All The Lovers Of Mr. Yeats Must Have Remembered many Instances Of The 
 Same Kind In his Work. "And Are There Not Moods Which Need heaven,  Hell, 
 Purgatory,  And Faeryland For Their Expression,  No Less Than This 
 Dilapidated earth? Nay,  Are There Not Moods Which Shall Find No 
 Expression Unless There Be Men Who Dare To Mix Heaven,  Hell,  Purgatory, 
 And Faeryland Together,  Or Even To Set The Heads Of Beasts To The Bodies 
 Of Men,  Or To Thrust The Souls Of Men Into The Heart Of Rocks? Let Us Go 
 Forth,  The Tellers Of Tales,  And Seize Whatever Prey The Heart Longs 
 For,  And Have No Fear." 
   
   
   
 Mr. Yeats Is Continually Identifying these Apparently Unrelated things; 
 And Youth And Peace,  Faith And Beauty,  Are Ever Meeting in converging 
 Lines In his Work. No Song Of His Has A Livelier Lilt Than The _Fiddler 
 Of Dooney_. 
   
      "I Passed my Brother And Cousin: 
        They Read In their Books Of Prayer; 
      I Read In my Book Of Songs 
        I Bought At Sligo Fair. 
   
      When We Come At The End Of Time, 
        To Peter Sitting in state, 
      He Will Smile On The Three Old Spirits, 
        But Call Me First Through The Gate. 
 
 
 
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      And When The Folk There Spy Me, 
        They Will All Come Up To Me, 
      With,  'Here Is The Fiddler Of Dooney!' 
        And Dance Like A Wave Of The Sea." 
   
   
   
 In A Few Final Words We May Try To Estimate What All This Amounts To In 
 The Long Battle Between Paganism And Idealism. There Is No Question That 
 Fiona Macleod May Be Reasonably Claimed by Either Side. Certainly It Is 
 True Of Her Work,  That It Is Pure To The Pure And Dangerous To Those Who 
 Take It Wrongly. Meredith'S Great Line Was Never Truer Than It Is Here, 
 "Enter These Enchanted woods,  Ye Who Dare." The Effect Upon The Mind, 
 And The Tendency In the Life,  Will Depend Upon What One Brings To The 
 Reading of It. 
   
   
   
 All This Bringing back Of The Discarded gods Has Its Glamour And Its 
 Risk. Such Gods Are Excellent As Curiosities,  And May Provide The 
 Quaintest Of Studies In human Nature. They Give Us Priceless Fragments 
 Of Partial And Broken Truth,  And They Exhibit Cross-Sections Of The 
 Evolution Of Thought In some Of Its Most Charming moments. Besides All 
 This,  They Are Exceedingly Valuable As Providing us With That General 
 Sense Of Religion,  Vague And Illusive,  Which Is Deeper Than All Dogma. 
   
 But,  For The Unwary,  There Is The Double Danger In all This Region That 
 They Shall,  On The One Hand,  Be Tempted to Worship The Old Gods; Or 
 That,  On The Other Hand,  Even In loving them Without Definite Worship, 
 The Old Black Magic May Spring out Upon Them. As To The Former 
 Alternative,  Light Minds Will Always Prefer The Wonderfully Coloured but 
 More Or Less Formless Figure In a Dream,  To Anything more Definite And 
 Commanding. They Will Cry,  "Here Is The Great God"; And,  Intoxicated by 
 The Mystery,  Will Fall Down To Worship. But That Which Does Not Command 
 Can Never Save,  And For A Guiding faith We Need something more Sure Than 
 This. 
   
 Moreover,  There Is The Second Alternative Of The Old Black Magic. A 
 Discarded god Is Always An Uncanny Thing to Take Liberties With. While 
 The Earth-Spirit In all Its Grandeur May Appeal To The Jaded and 
 Perplexed minds Of To-Day As A Satisfying object Of Faith,  The Result 
 Will Probably Be But A Modern Form Of The Ancient Baal-Worship. It Will 
 In Some Respects Be A Superior Cult To Its Ancient Prototype. Its 
 Devotees Will Not Cut Themselves With Knives. They Will Cut Themselves 
 With Sweet And Bitter Poignancies Of Laughter And Tears,  When The Sun 
 Shines Upon Wet Forests In the Green Earth. This,  Too,  Is Baal-Worship, 
 Hardly Distinguishable In essence From That Cruder Devotion To The 
 Fructifying and Terrifying powers Of Nature Against Which The Prophets 
 Of Israel Made Their War. In much That Fiona Macleod Has Written We Feel 
 The Spirit Struggling like Samson Against Its Bonds Of Green Withes, 
 Though By No Means Always Able To Break Them As He Did; Or Lying down In 
 An Earth-Bound Stupor,  Content With The World That Nature Produces And 
 Sustains. Here,  Among The Elemental Roots Of Things,  When The Heart Is 
 Satisfying itself With The Passionate Life Of Nature,  The Red flower 
 Grows In the Green Life,  And The Imperative Of Passion Becomes The Final 
 Law. 
   
   
   
 On The Other Hand,  A Child Of Nature May Remember That He Is Also A 
 Child Of The Spirit; And,  Even In the Vale Perilous,  The Spirit May Be 
 An Instinctive And Faithful Guide. Because We Love The Woods We Need not 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture iv  (Celtic Revivals Of Paganism  Omar KayyÁM And Fiona Macleod )   Pg 48 
 Worship The Sacred mistletoe. Because We Listen To The Sea We Need not 
 Reject Greater And More Intelligible Voices Of The Word Of Life. And The 
 Mention Of The Sea,  And The Memory Of All That It Has Meant In fiona 
 Macleod'S Writing,  Reminds Us Strangely Of That Old Text,  "Born Of Water 
 And Of The Spirit." While Man Lives Upon The Sea-Girt Earth,  The Voices 
 Of The Ocean,  That Seem To Come From The Depths Of Its Green Heart,  Will 
 Always Call To Him,  Reminding him Of The Mysterious Powers And The 
 Terrible Beauties Among Which His Life Is Cradled. Yet There Are Deeper 
 Secrets Which The Spirit Of Man May Learn--Secrets That Will Still Be 
 Told When The Day Of Earth Is Over,  When The Sea Has Ceased from Her 
 Swinging,  And The Earth-Spirit Has Fled for Ever. It Is Well That A Man 
 Should Remember This,  And Remain A Spiritual Man In spite Of Every Form 
 Of Seductive Paganism. 
   
   
   
 Sharp Has Said In his _Green Fire_:-- 
   
 "There Are Three Races Of Man. There Is The Myriad Race Which Loses All, 
 Through (Not Bestiality,  For The Brute World Is Clean And Sane) 
 Perverted animalism; And There Is The Myriad Race Which Denounces 
 Humanity,  And Pins All Its Faith And Joy To A Life The Very Conditions 
 Of Whose Existence Are Incompatible With The Law To Which We Are 
 Subject; The Sole Law,  The Law Of Nature. Then There Is That Small 
 Untoward Class Which Knows The Divine Call Of The Spirit Through The 
 Brain,  And The Secret Whisper Of The Soul In the Heart,  And For Ever 
 Perceives The Veils Of Mystery And The Rainbows Of Hope Upon Our Human 
 Horizons: Which Hears And Sees,  And Yet Turns Wisely,  Meanwhile,  To The 
 Life Of The Green Earth,  Of Which We Are Part,  To The Common Kindred of 
 Living things,  With Which We Are At One--Is Content,  In a Word,  To Live, 
 Because Of The Dream That Makes Living so Mysteriously Sweet And 
 Poignant; And To Dream,  Because Of The Commanding immediacy Of Life." 
   
   
   
 There Are Indeed the Three Races. There Is The Pagan,  Which Knows Only 
 The Fleshly Aspect Of Life,  And Seeks Nothing beyond It. There Is The 
 Spiritual,  Which Ignores And Seeks To Flee From That To Which Its Body 
 Chains It. There Is Also That Wise Race Who Know That All Things Are 
 Theirs,  Flesh And Spirit Both,  And Who Have Learned how To Reap The 
 Harvests Both Of Time And Of Eternity. 
   
   
   
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 49 
 We Have Seen The Eternal Battle In its Earlier Phases Surging to And Fro 
 Between Gods Of The Earth That Are As Old As Time,  And Daring thoughts 
 Of Men That Rose Beyond Them And Claimed a Higher Inheritance. Between 
 That Phase Of The Warfare And The Same Battle As It Is Fought To-Day,  We 
 Shall Look At Two Contemporary Men In the Latter Part Of The Seventeenth 
 Century Who May Justly Be Taken As Examples Of The Opposing types. John 
 Bunyan And Samuel Pepys,  However,  Will Lead Us No Dance Among The 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 50 
 Elemental Forces Of The World. They Will Rather Show Us,  With Very 
 Fascinating _NaïVeté_,  True Pictures Of Their Own Aspirations,  Nourished 
 In The One Case Upon The Busy And Crowded life Of The Time,  And In the 
 Other,  Upon The Definite And Unquestioned conceptions Of A Complete And 
 Systematic Theology. Yet,  Typical Though They Are,  It Is Easy To 
 Exaggerate Their Simplicity,  And It Will Be Interesting to See How John 
 Bunyan,  Supposed to Be A Pure Idealist,  Aloof From The World In which He 
 Lived,  Yet Had The Most Intimate And Even Literary Connection With That 
 World. Pepys Had Certain Curious And Characteristic Outlets Upon The 
 Spiritual Region,  But He Seems To Have Closed them All,  And Become 
 Increasingly A Simple Devotee Of Things Seen And Temporal. 
   
   
   
 Bunyan Comes Upon Us Full Grown And Mature In the Work By Which He Is 
 Best Known And Remembered. His Originality Is One Of The Standing 
 Wonders Of History. The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Was Written At A Time When 
 Every Man Had To Take Sides In a Savage And Atrocious Ecclesiastical 
 Controversy. The Absolute Judgments Passed on Either Side By The Other, 
 The Cruelties Practised and The Dangers Run,  Were Such As To Lead The 
 Reader To Expect Extreme Bitterness And Sectarian Violence In every 
 Religious Writing of The Time. Bunyan Was Known To His Contemporaries As 
 A Religious Writer,  Pure And Simple,  And A Man Whose Convictions Had 
 Caused him Much Suffering at The Hands Of His Enemies. Most Of The First 
 Readers Of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Had No Thought Of Any Connection 
 Between That Book And Worldly Literature; And The Pious People Who Shook 
 Their Heads Over His Allegory As Being rather Too Interesting for A 
 Treatise On Such High Themes As Those Which It Handled,  Might Perhaps 
 Have Shaken Their Heads Still More Solemnly Had They Known How Much Of 
 What They Called the World Was Actually Behind It. Bunyan Was A 
 Voluminous Writer Of Theological Works,  And The Complete Edition Of Them 
 Fills Three Enormous Volumes,  Closely Printed in double Column. But It 
 Is The Little Allegory Embedded in one Of These Volumes Which Has Made 
 His Fame Eternal,  And For The Most Part The Rest Are Remembered now Only 
 In So Far As They Throw Light Upon That Story. One Exception Must Be 
 Made In favour Of _Grace Abounding_. This Is Bunyan'S Autobiography,  In 
 Which He Describes,  Without Allegory,  The Course Of His Spiritual 
 Experience. For An Understanding of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ It Is 
 Absolutely Necessary To Know That Companion Volume. 
   
 It Is Very Curious To Watch The Course Of Criticism As It Was Directed 
 To Him And To His Story. The Eighteenth Century Had Lost The Keenness Of 
 Former Controversies,  And From Its Classic Balcony It Looked down Upon 
 What Seemed to It The Somewhat Sordid Arena Of The Past. _The Examiner_ 
 Complains That He Never Yet Knew An Author That Had Not His Admirers. 
 Bunyan And Quarles Have Passed through Several Editions And Pleased as 
 Many Readers As Dryden And Tillotson. Even Cowper,  Timidly Appreciative 
 And Patronising,  Wrote Of The "Ingenious Dreamer"-- 
   
   
   
      "I Name Thee Not,  Lest So Despised a Name 
      Should Move A Sneer At Thy Deserved fame," 
   
   
   
 --Lines Which Have A Pathetic Irony In them,  As We Contrast The Anxious 
 Cowper,  With The Occasional Revivals Of Interest And The Age-Long Tone 
 Of Patronage Which Have Been Meted out To Him,  With The Robust And 
 Sturdy Immortality Of The Man He Shrank From Naming. Swift Discovered 
 Bunyan'S Literary Power,  And Later Johnson And Southey Did Him Justice. 
 In The Nineteenth Century His Place Was Secured for Ever,  And Macaulay'S 
 Essay On Him Will Probably Retain Its Interest Longer Than Anything else 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 51 
 That Macaulay Wrote. 
   
   
   
 We Are Apt To Think Of Him As A Mere Dreamer,  Spinning his Cobwebs Of 
 Imagination Wholly Out Of His Own Substance--A Pure Idealist,  Whose 
 Writing dwells Among His Ideals In a Region Ignorant Of The Earth. In 
 One Of His Own Apologies He Tells Us,  Apparently In answer To 
 Accusations That Had Been Made Against Him,  That He Did Not Take His 
 Work From Anybody,  But That It Came From Himself Alone. Doubtless That 
 Is True So Far As The Real Originality Of His Work Is Concerned,  Its 
 General Conception,  And The Working out Of Its Details Point By Point. 
 Yet,  To Imagine That If There Had Been No Other English Literature The 
 _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Would Have Been Exactly What It Is,  Is Simply To 
 Ignore The Facts Of The Case. John Bunyan Is Far More Interesting just 
 Because His Work Is Part Of English Literature,  Because It Did Feel The 
 Influences Of His Own Time And Of The Past,  Than It Could Ever Have Been 
 As The Mere Monstrosity Of Detachment Which It Has Been Supposed to Be. 
 The Idealist Who Merely Dreams And Takes No Part In the Battle,  Refusing 
 To Know Or Utilise The Writing of Any Other Man,  Can Be No Fair Judge Of 
 The Life Which He Criticises,  And No Reliable Guide Among Its Facts. 
   
 Bunyan Might Very Easily Indeed have Been A Pagan Of The Most Worldly 
 Type. It Was Extremely Difficult For Him To Be A Puritan,  Not Only On 
 Account Of Outward Troubles,  But Also Of Inward Ones Belonging to His 
 Own Disposition And Experience. Accepting puritanism,  The Easiest Course 
 For Him Would Have Been That Of Fanaticism,  And Had He Taken That Course 
 He Would Certainly Have Had No Lack Of Companions. It Was Far More 
 Difficult To Remain A Puritan And Yet To Keep His Heart Open To The 
 Beauty And Fascination Of Human Life. Yet He Was Interested in what Men 
 Were Writing or Had Written. All Manner Of Songs And Stories,  Heard In 
 Early Days In pot-Houses,  Or In later Times In prison,  Kept Sounding in 
 His Ears,  And He Wove Them Into His Work. The Thing that He Meant To 
 Say,  And Did Say,  Was Indeed one About Which Controversy And Persecution 
 Were Raging,  But,  Except In a Very Few General References,  His Writing 
 Shows No Sign Of This. His Eye Is Upon Far-Off Things,  The Things Of The 
 Soul Of Man And The Life Of God,  But The Way In which He Tells These 
 Things Shows Innumerable Signs Of The Bright World Of English Books. 
   
 It Is Worth While To Consider This Large And Human Bunyan,  Who Has Been 
 Very Erroneously Supposed to Be A Mere Literary Freak,  Detached from All 
 Such Influences As Go To The Making of Other Writers. He Tells Us, 
 Indeed,  That "When I Pulled it Came," And That Is Delightfully True. 
 Yet,  It Came Not Out Of Nowhere,  And It Is Our Part In this Essay To 
 Inquire As To The Places From Which It Did Come. As We Have Said,  It 
 Came Out Of Two Worlds,  And The Web Is Most Wonderfully Woven And 
 Coloured,  But Our Present Concern Is Rather With The Earthly Part Of It 
 Than The Heavenly. 
   
   
   
 No One Can Read John Bunyan Without Thinking of George Herbert. Few Of 
 The Short Biographies In our Language Are More Interesting reading than 
 Isaac Walton'S Life Of Herbert. That Master Of Simplicity Is Always 
 Fascinating,  And In this Biography He Gives Us One Of The Most Beautiful 
 Sketches Of Contemporary Narrative That Has Ever Been Penned. Herbert 
 Was The Quaintest Of The Saints. He Lived in the Days Of Charles The 
 First And James The First,  A High Churchman Who Had Laud For His Friend. 
 Shy,  Sensitive,  High-Bred,  Shrinking from The World,  He Was At The Same 
 Time A Man Of Business,  Skilful In the Management Of Affairs,  And Yet A 
 Man Of Morbid Delicacy Of Imagination. The Picture Of His Life At Little 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 52 
 Gidding,  Where He And Mr. Farrer Instituted a Kind Of Hermitage,  Or 
 Private Chapel Of Devotion,  In which The Whole Of The Psalms Were Read 
 Through Once In every Twenty-Four Hours,  Grows Peculiarly Pathetic When 
 We Remember That The House And Chapel Were Sacked by The Parliamentary 
 Army,  In which For A Time John Bunyan Served. No Two Points Of View,  It 
 Would Seem,  Could Be More Widely Contrasted than Those Of Bunyan And 
 Herbert,  And Yet The Points Of Agreement Are Far More Important Than The 
 Differences Between Them,  And _The Temple_ Has So Much In common With 
 The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ That One Is Astonished to Find That The 
 Likenesses Seem To Be Entirely Unconscious. Matthew Henry Is Perpetually 
 Quoting _The Temple_ In his Commentary. Writing only A Few Years 
 Earlier,  Bunyan Reproduces In his Own Fashion Many Of Its Thoughts,  But 
 Does Not Mention Its Existence. 
   
   
   
 In Order To Know Bunyan'S Early Life,  And Indeed to Understand The 
 _Pilgrim'S Progress_ At All Adequately,  One Must Read _Grace Abounding_. 
 It Is A Short Book,  Written In the Years When He Was Already Growing 
 Old,  For Those Whom He Had Brought Into The Fold Of Religion. From This 
 Autobiography It Has Usually Been Supposed that He Had Led a Life Of The 
 Wildest Debauchery Before His Christian Days; But The More One Examines 
 The Book,  And Indeed all His Books,  The Less Is One Inclined to Believe 
 In Any Such Desperate Estimate Of The Sins Of His Youth. The Measure Of 
 Sin Is The Sensitiveness Of A Man'S Conscience; And Where,  As In 
 Bunyan'S Case,  The Conscience Is Abnormally Delicate And Subject To 
 Violent Reactions,  A Life Which In another Man Would Be A Pattern Of 
 Innocence And Respectability May Be Regarded as An Altogether 
 Blackguardly And Vicious One. It Was,  However Evidently A Life Of Strong 
 And Intense Worldly Interest Stepping over The Line Here And There Into 
 Positive Wrong-Doing,  But For The Most Part Blameworthy Mainly On 
 Account Of Its Absorption In the Passing shows Of The Hour. 
   
 What Then Was That World Which Interested bunyan So Intensely,  And Cost 
 Him So Many Pangs Of Conscience? No Doubt It Was Just The Life Of The 
 Road As He Travelled about His Business; For Though By No Means A Tinker 
 In The Modern Sense Of The Word,  He Was An Itinerant Brazier,  Whose 
 Business Took Him Constantly To And Fro Among The Many Villages Of The 
 District Of Bedford. He Must Have Heard In inns And From Wayside 
 Companions Many A Catch Of Plays And Songs,  And Listened to Many A 
 Lively Story,  Or Read It In the Chap-Books Which Were Hawked about The 
 Country Then. It Must Also Be Remembered that These Were The Days Of 
 Puppet Shows. The English Drama,  As We Have Already Mentioned in 
 Connection With _Faust_,  Was By No Means Confined to The Boards Of 
 Actual Theatres Where Living actors Played the Parts. Little Mimic 
 Stages Travelled about The Country In all Directions Reproducing the 
 Plays,  Very Much After The Fashion Of Punch And Judy; And Even The 
 Solemnest Of Shakespeare'S Tragedies Were Exhibited in this Way. There 
 Is No Possibility Of Doubt That Bunyan Must Have Often Stood Agape At 
 These Exhibitions,  And Thus Have Received much Of The Highest Literature 
 At Second Hand. 
   
   
   
 As To How Much Of It He Had Actually Read,  That Is A Different Question. 
 One Is Tempted to Believe That He Must Have Read George Herbert,  But Of 
 This There Is No Positive Proof. We Are Quite Certain About Five Books, 
 For Which We Have His Own Express Statements. His Wife Brought Him As 
 Her Dowry The Very Modest Furniture Of Two Small Volumes,  Baily'S 
 _Practice Of Piety_ And Dent'S _The Plain Man'S Pathway To Heaven_. The 
 First Is A Very Complicated and Elaborate Statement Of Christian Dogma, 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 53 
 Which Bunyan Passes By With The Scant Praise,  "Wherein I Also Found Some 
 Things That Were Somewhat Pleasing to Me." The Other Is A Much More 
 Vital Production. Even To This Day It Is An Immensely Interesting piece 
 Of Reading. It Consists Of Conversations Between Various Men Who Stand 
 For Types Of Worldling,  Ignoramus,  Theologian,  Etc.,  And There Are Very 
 Clear Traces Of It In the _Pilgrim'S Progress_,  Especially In the Talks 
 Between Bunyan'S Pilgrims And The Man Ignorance. 
   
   
   
 Another Book Which Played a Large Part In bunyan'S Life Was The Short 
 Biography Of Francis Spira,  An Italian,  Who Had Died shortly Before 
 Bunyan'S Time. Spira Had Been A Protestant Lawyer In italy,  But Had 
 Found It Expedient To Abate The Open Profession Of Protestantism With 
 Which He Began,  And Eventually To Transfer His Allegiance To The Roman 
 Church. The Biography Is For The Most Part An Account Of His Death-Bed 
 Conversation,  Which Lasted a Long Time,  Since His Illness Was Even More 
 Of The Mind Than Of The Body. It Is An Extremely Ghastly Account Of A 
 Morbid And Insane Melancholia. It Was The Fashion Of The Time To Take 
 Such Matters Spiritually Rather Than Physically,  And We Read That Many 
 Persons Went To His Death-Bed and Listened to His Miserable Cries And 
 Groanings In the Hope Of Gaining edification For Their Souls. How The 
 Book Came Into Bunyan'S Hands No One Can Tell,  But Evidently He Had 
 Found It In english Translation,  And Many Of The Darkest Parts Of _Grace 
 Abounding_ Are Directly Due To It,  While The Man In the Iron Cage Quotes 
 The Very Words Of Spira. 
   
 Another Book Which Bunyan Had Read Was Luther'S _Commentary On The 
 Galatians_. The Present Writer Possesses A Copy Of That Volume Dated 
 1786,  At The Close Of Which There Are Fourteen Pages,  On Which Long 
 Lists Of Names Are Printed. The Names Are Those Of Weavers, 
 Shoe-Makers,  And All Sorts Of Tradesmen In the Western Scottish Towns 
 Of Kilmarnock,  Paisley,  And Others Of That Neighbourhood,  Who Had 
 Subscribed for A Translation Of The Commentary That They Might Read It 
 In Their Own Tongue. This Curious Fact Reminds Us That The Book Had 
 Among The Pious People Of Our Country An Audience Almost As Enthusiastic 
 As Bunyan Himself Was. Another Of His Books,  And The Only One Quoted by 
 Name In the _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Or _Grace Abounding_,  With The 
 Exception Of Luther On Galatians,  Is Foxe'S _Book Of Martyrs_,  Traces Of 
 Which Are Unmistakable In such Incidents As The Trial And Death Of 
 Faithful And In other Parts. 
   
   
   
 In These Few Volumes May Be Summed up The Entire Literary Knowledge 
 Which Bunyan Is Known To Have Possessed. He Stands Apart From Mere 
 Book-Learning,  And Deals With Life Rather Through His Eyes And Ears 
 Directly Than Through The Medium Of Books. But Then Those Eyes And Ears 
 Of His Were No Ordinary Organs; And His Imagination,  Whose Servants They 
 Were,  Was Quick To Enlist Every Vital And Suggestive Image And Idea For 
 Its Own Uses. Thus The Rich Store Of Observation Which He Had Already 
 Laid Up Through The Medium Of Puppet Plays,  Fragments Of Song And 
 Popular Story,  Was All At His Disposal When He Came To Need it. Further, 
 Even In his Regenerate Days,  There Was No Dimming of The Imaginative 
 Faculty Nor Of The Observant. The Whole Neighbourhood In which He Lived 
 Was An Open Book,  In which He Read The Wonderful Story Of Life In many 
 Tragic And Comic Tales Of Actual Fact; And In the Prison Where He Spent 
 Twelve Years,  He Must Often Have Heard From His Fellow-Prisoners Such 
 Fragments As They Knew And Remembered,  With Which Doubtless They Would 
 Beguile The Tedium Of Their Confinement. That Would Be For The Most Part 
 In The First And Second Imprisonments,  Extending from The Years 1660 To 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 54 
 1672. The Third Imprisonment Was A Short Affair Of Only Some Nine 
 Months,  Spent In the Little Prison Upon The Bridge Of Bedford,  Where 
 There Would Be Room For Very Few Companions. The Modern Bridge Crosses 
 The River At Almost Exactly The Same Spot; And If You Look Over The 
 Parapet You May See,  When The River Is Low,  Traces Of What Seem To Be 
 The Foundations Of The Old Prison Bridge. 
   
   
   
 When We Would Try To Estimate The Processes By Which The Great Allegory 
 Was Built Up,  The First Fact That Strikes Us Is Its Extreme Aloofness 
 From Current Events Which Must Have Been Very Familiar To Him. In others 
 Of His Works He Tells Many Stories Of Actual Life,  But These Are Of A 
 Private And More Or Less Gossiping nature,  Many Of Them Fantastic And 
 Grotesque,  Such As Those Appalling tales Of Swearers,  Drunkards,  And 
 Other Specially Notorious Sinners Being snatched away By The 
 Devil--Narratives Which Bear The Marks Of Crude Popular Imagination In 
 Details Like The Actual Smell Of Sulphur Left Behind. In the Whole 
 _Pilgrim'S Progress_ There Is No Reference Whatever To The Civil War,  In 
 Which We Know That Bunyan Had Fought,  Although There Are Certain Parts 
 Of It Which Were Probably Suggested by Events Of That Campaign. The 
 Allegory Is Equally Silent Concerning the Great Fire And The Great 
 Plague Of London,  Which Were Both Fresh In the Memory Of Every Living 
 Man. The Only Phrase Which Might Have Been Suggested by The Fire,  Is 
 That In which The Pilgrim Says,  "I Hear That Our Little City Is To Be 
 Destroyed by Fire"--A Phrase Which Obviously Has Much More Direct 
 Connection With The Destruction Of Sodom Than With That Of London. The 
 Only Suggestions Of Those Disastrous Latter Years Of The Reign Of 
 Charles The Second,  Are Some Doubtful Allusions To The Rise And Fall Of 
 Persecution,  Few Of Which Can Be Clearly Identified with Any Particular 
 Events. 
   
 There Are Several Interesting indications That Bunyan Made Use Of Recent 
 And Contemporary Secular Literature. The Demonology Of The _Pilgrim'S 
 Progress_ Is Quite Different From That Of The _Holy War_. It Used to Be 
 Suggested that Bunyan Had Altered his Views In consequence Of The 
 Publication Of Milton'S _Paradise Regained_,  Which Appeared in 1671. 
 That Was When It Was Generally Supposed that He Had Written The 
 _Pilgrim'S Progress_ In his Earlier Imprisonment. If,  As Is Now 
 Conceded,  It Was In the Later Imprisonment That He Wrote The Book,  This 
 Theory Loses Much Of Its Plausibility,  For Milton Published his 
 _Paradise Regained_ Before The First Edition Of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ 
 Was Penned. It Is,  Of Course,  Always Possible That Between The 
 _Pilgrim'S Progress_ And The _Holy War_ Bunyan May Have Seen Milton'S 
 Work,  Or May Have Been Told About It,  For He Certainly Changed his 
 Demonology And Made It More Like Milton'S. Again,  There Are Certain 
 Passages In spenser'S _Faerie Queene_ Which Bear So Close A Resemblance 
 To Bunyan'S Description Of The Celestial City,  That It Is Difficult Not 
 To Suppose That Either Directly Or Indirectly That Poem Had Influenced 
 Bunyan'S Creation; While In at Least One Of His Songs He Approaches So 
 Near Both The Language And The Rhythm Of A Song Of Shakespeare'S As To 
 Make It Very Probable That He Had Heard It Sung.[2] 
   
   
   
 These Suppositions Are Not Meant In any Way To Detract From The 
 Originality Of The Great Allegory,  But Rather To Link The Writer In with 
 That English Literature Of Which He Is So Conspicuous An Ornament. They 
 Are No More Significant And No Less,  Than The Fact That So Much Of The 
 Geography Of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Seems Not To Have Been Created by 
 His Imagination,  But To Have Been Built Up From Well-Remembered 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 55 
 Landscapes. From His Prison Window He Could Not But See The Ruins Of Old 
 Bedford Castle,  Which Stood Demolished upon Its Hill Even In his Time. 
 This,  Together With Cainhoe Castle,  Only A Few Miles Away,  May Well Have 
 Suggested the Castle Of Despair In bypath Meadow Near The River Of God. 
 Again,  Memories Of Elstow Play A Notable Part In the Story. A Cross 
 Stood There,  At The Foot Of Which,  When He Was Playing the Game Of Cat 
 Upon A Certain Sunday,  The Voice Came To His Soul With Its Tremendous 
 Question,  "Wilt Thou Leave Thy Sins And Go To Heaven Or Have Thy Sins 
 And Go To Hell?" There Stood The Moot Hall As It Stands To-Day,  In 
 Which,  During his Worldly Days,  He Had Danced with The Rest Of The 
 Villagers And Gained his Personal Knowledge Of Vanity Fair. There,  As He 
 Tells Us Expressly,  Is The Wicket Gate,  The Rough Old Oak And Iron Gate 
 Of Elstow Parish Church. Close Beside It,  Just As You Read In the Story, 
 Stands That Great Tower Which Suggested a Devil'S Castle Beside The 
 Wicket Gate,  Whence Satan Showered his Arrows On Those Who Knocked 
 Below. Not Only So,  But There Was A Special Reason Why For Bunyan That 
 Ancient Church Tower May Well Have Been Symbolic Of The Stronghold Of 
 The Devil; For It Had Bells In it,  And He Was So Fond Of Bell-Ringing 
 That It Got Upon His Conscience And Became His Darling sin. It Is Easy 
 To Make Light Of His Heart-Searchings About So Innocent An Employment, 
 But Doubtless There Were Other Things That Went Along With It. We Have 
 All Seen Those Large Drinking-Vessels,  Known As Bell-Ringers' Jugs; And 
 These Perhaps May Suggest An Explanation Of The Sense Of Sin Which 
 Burdened his Conscience So Heavily. Anyhow,  There The Tower Stands,  And 
 In The Gothic Doorway Of It There Are One Or Two Deeply Cut Grooves, 
 Obviously Made By The Ropes Of The Bell-Ringers When,  Instead Of 
 Standing below Their Ropes,  They Preferred the Open Air,  And Drew The 
 Ropes Through The Archway Of The Door,  So As To Cut Into Its Moulding. 
 The Little Fact Gains Much Significance In the Light Of Bunyan'S Own 
 Confession That He Was So Afraid That The Bell Would Fall Upon Him And 
 Kill Him As A Punishment From God,  That He Used to Go Outside The Door 
 To Ring it. Then Again There Was The Old Convent At Elstow,  Where,  Long 
 Before Bunyan'S Time,  Nuns Had Lived,  Who Were Known To Tradition As 
 "The Ladies Of Elstow." Very Aristocratic And Very Human Ladies They 
 Seem To Have Been,  Given To The Entertainment Of Their Friends In the 
 Intervals Of Their Tasteful Devotion,  And Occasionally Needing a Rebuke 
 From Headquarters. Yet It Seems Not Improbable That There Is Some 
 Glorified memory Of Those Ladies In the Inhabitants Of The House 
 Beautiful,  Which House Itself Appears To Have Been Modelled upon 
 Houghton House On The Ampthill Heights,  Built By Sir Philip Sidney'S 
 Sister But A Century Before. The Silver Mine Of Demas Might Seem To Have 
 Come From Some Far-Off Source In chap-Book Or Romance,  Until We Remember 
 That At The Village Of Pulloxhill,  Which Had Been The Original Home Of 
 The Bunyan Family,  And Near Which Bunyan Was Arrested and Brought For 
 Examination To The House Of Justice Wingate,  There Are The Actual 
 Remains Of An Ancient Gold Mine Whose Tradition Still Lingers Among The 
 Villagers. 
   
   
   
 All These Things Seem To Indicate That The Great Allegory Is By No Means 
 So Remote From The Earth As Has Sometimes Been Imagined; And Perhaps The 
 Most Touching commentary Upon This Statement Is The Curious And Very 
 Unlovely Burying-Ground In bunhill Fields,  Cut Through By A Straight 
 Path That Leads From One Busy Thoroughfare To Another. A Few Yards To 
 The Left Of That Path Is The Tomb And Monument Of John Bunyan,  While At 
 An Equal Distance To The Right Lies Daniel Defoe. The _Pilgrim'S 
 Progress_ And _Robinson Crusoe_ Are Perhaps The Two Best-Known Stories 
 In The World,  And They Are Not So Far Remote From One Another As They 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 56 
 Seem. 
   
   
   
 Nor Was It Only In the Outward Material With Which He Worked that John 
 Bunyan Had Much In common With The Romance And Poetry Of England. He 
 Could Indeed write Verses Which,  For Sheer Doggerel,  It Would Be 
 Difficult To Match,  But In spite Of That There Was The Authentic Note Of 
 Poetry In him. Some Of His Work Is Not Only Vigorous,  Inspiring,  And 
 Full Of The Brisk Sense Of Action,  But Has An Unconscious Strength And 
 Worthiness Of Style,  Whose Compression And Terseness Have Fulfilled at 
 Least One Of The Canons Of High Literature. Take,  For Example,  The Lines 
 On Faithful'S Death-- 
   
   
   
      "Now Faithful,  Play The Man,  Speak For Thy God: 
      Fear Not The Wicked'S Malice,  Nor Their Rod: 
      Speak Boldly,  Man,  The Truth Is On Thy Side; 
      Die For It,  And To Life In triumph Ride." 
   
 Or Take This As A Second Example,  From His _Prison Meditations_-- 
   
      "Here Come The Angels,  Here Come Saints, 
        Here Comes The Spirit Of God, 
      To Comfort Us In our Restraints 
        Under The Wicked'S Rod. 
   
      This Gaol To Us Is As A Hill, 
        From Whence We Plainly See 
      Beyond This World,  And Take Our Fill 
        Of Things That Lasting be. 
   
      We Change Our Drossy Dust For Gold, 
        From Death To Life We Fly: 
      We Let Go Shadows,  And Take Hold 
        Of Immortality." 
   
 This Whole Poem Has In it Not Merely The Bright March Of A Very Vigorous 
 Mind,  But Also A Great Many Of The Elements Which Long Before Had Built 
 Up The Ancient Romances. In it,  And In much Else That He Wrote,  He Finds 
 A Congenial Escape From The Mere Middle-Class Respectability Of His 
 Time,  And Ranges Himself With The Splendid Chivalry Both Of The Past And 
 Of The Present. There Is An Elfin Element In him As There Was In 
 Chaucer,  Which Now And Again Twinkles Forth In a Quaint Touch Of Humour, 
 Or Escapes From The Merely Spiritual Into An Extremely Interesting human 
 Region. 
   
   
   
 In _Grace Abounding_ He Very Pleasantly Tells Us That He Could Have 
 Written In a Much Higher Style If He Had Chosen To Do So,  But That For 
 Our Sakes He Has Refrained. He Does,  However,  Sometimes "Step Into" His 
 Finer Style. There Is Some Exquisite Pre-Raphaelite Work That Comes 
 Unexpectedly Upon The Reader,  In which He Is Not Only A Poet,  But A 
 Writer Capable Of Seeing and Of Describing the Most Highly Coloured and 
 Minute Detail: "Besides,  On The Banks Of This River On Either Side Were 
 Green Trees,  That Bore All Manner Of Fruit...." "On Either Side Of The 
 River Was Also A Meadow,  Curiously Beautified with Lilies; And It Was 
 Green The Year Long." At Other Times He Affrights Us With A Sudden 
 Outburst Of The Most Terrifying imagination,  As In the Close Of The Poem 
 Of _The Fly At The Candle_-- 
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 57 
 "At Last The Gospel Doth Become Their Snare, 
      Doth Them With Burning hands In pieces Tear." 
   
   
   
 His Imagination Was Sometimes As Quaint And Sweet As At Other Times It 
 Could Be Lurid And Powerful. _Upon A Snail_ Is Not A Very Promising 
 Subject For A Poem,  But Its First Lines Justify The Experiment-- 
   
   
   
      "She Goes But Softly,  But She Goeth Sure; 
      She Stumbles Not,  As Stronger Creatures Do." 
   
 He Can Adopt The Methods Of The Stately Poets Of Nature,  And Break Into 
 Splendid Descriptions Of Natural Phenomena-- 
   
   
   
      "Look,  Look,  Brave Sol Doth Peep Up From Beneath, 
      Shews Us His Golden Face,  Doth On Us Breathe; 
      Yea,  He Doth Compass Us Around With Glories, 
      Whilst He Ascends Up To His Highest Stories, 
      Where He His Banner Over Us Displays, 
      And Gives Us Light To See Our Works And Ways." 
   
 Again In the Art Of Childlike Interest And Simplicity He Can Write Such 
 Lines As These-- 
   
      Of The Child With The Bird On The Bush 
   
      "My Little Bird,  How Canst Thou Sit 
        And Sing amidst So Many Thorns? 
      Let Me But Hold Upon Thee Get, 
        My Love With Honour Thee Adorns. 
   
      'Tis True It Is Sunshine To-Day, 
        To-Morrow Birds Will Have A Storm; 
      My Pretty One,  Come Thou Away, 
        My Bosom Then Shall Keep Thee Warm. 
   
      My Father'S Palace Shall Be Thine, 
        Yea,  In it Thou Shalt Sit And Sing; 
      My Little Bird,  If Thou'Lt Be Mine, 
        The Whole Year Round Shall Be Thy Spring. 
   
      I'Ll Keep Thee Safe From Cat And Cur, 
        No Manner O' Harm Shall Come To Thee: 
      Yea,  I Will Be Thy Succourer, 
        My Bosom Shall Thy Cabin Be." 
   
 The Last Line Might Have Been Written By Ben Jonson,  And The Description 
 Of Sunrise In the Former Poem Might Almost Have Been From Chaucer'S Pen. 
   
   
   
 Yet The Finest Poetry Of All Is The Prose Allegory Of The _Pilgrim'S 
 Progress_. English Prose Had Taken Many Centuries To Form,  In the 
 Moulding hands Of Chaucer,  Malory,  And Bacon. It Had Come At Last To 
 Bunyan With All Its Flexibility And Force Ready To His Hand. He Wrote 
 With Virgin Purity,  Utterly Free From Mannerisms And Affectations; And, 
 Without Knowing himself For A Writer Of Fine English,  Produced it. 
   
   
   
 The Material Of The Allegory Also Is Supplied from Ancient Sources. One 
 Curious Paragraph In bunyan'S Treatise Entitled _Sighs From Hell_,  Gives 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 58 
 Us A Broad Hint Of This. "The Scriptures,  Thought I Then,  What Are They? 
 A Dead Letter,  A Little Ink And Paper,  Of Three Or Four Shillings Price. 
 Alack! What Is Scripture? Give Me A Ballad,  A News-Book,  _George On 
 Horseback_ Or _Bevis Of Southampton_. Give Me Some Book That Teaches 
 Curious Arts,  That Tells Old Fables." In _The Plain Man'S Pathway To 
 Heaven_ There Is A Longer List Of Such Romances As These,  Including 
 _Ellen Of Rummin_,  And Many Others. As Has Been Already Stated,  These 
 Tales Of Ancient Folklore Would Come Into His Hands Either By Recitation 
 Or In the Form Of Chap-Books. The Chap-Book Literature Of Old England 
 Was Most Voluminous And Interesting. It Consisted of Romances And Songs, 
 Sold At Country Fairs And Elsewhere,  And The Passing reference Which We 
 Have Quoted proves Conclusively,  What We Might Have Known Without Any 
 Proof,  That Bunyan Knew Them. 
   
   
   
 _George On Horseback_ Has Been Identified by Professor Firth With The 
 _Seven Champions Of England_,  An Extremely Artificial Romance,  Which May 
 Be Taken As Typical Of Hundreds More Of Its Kind. The 1610 Edition Of It 
 Is A Very Lively Book With A Good Deal Of Playing to The Gallery,  Such 
 As This: "As For The Name Of Queen,  I Account It A Vain Title; For I Had 
 Rather Be An English Lady Than The Greatest Empress In the World." There 
 Is Not Very Much In this Romance Which Bunyan Has Appropriated,  Although 
 There Are Several Interesting correspondences. It Is Very Courtly And 
 Conventional. The Narrative Is Broken Here And There By Lyrics,  Quite In 
 Bunyan'S Manner,  But It Is Difficult To Imagine Bunyan,  With His Direct 
 And Simple Taste,  Spending much Time In reading such Sentences As The 
 Following: "By The Time The Purple-Spotted morning had Parted with Her 
 Grey,  And The Sun'S Bright Countenance Appeared on The Mountain-Tops, 
 St. George Had Rode Twenty Miles From The Persian Court." On The Other 
 Hand,  When Great-Heart Allows Giant Despair To Rise After His Fall, 
 Showing his Chivalry In refusing to Take Advantage Of The Fallen Giant, 
 We Remember The Incident Of Sir Guy And Colebrand In the _Seven 
 Champions_. 
   
      "Good Sir,  An' It Be Thy Will, 
      Give Me Leave To Drink My Fill, 
          For Sweet St. Charity, 
      And I Will Do Thee The Same Deed 
      Another Time If Thou Have Need, 
          I Tell Thee Certainly." 
   
 St. George,  Like Christian In the Valley Of The Shadow Of Death, 
 Traverses An Enchanted vale,  And Hears "Dismal Croakings Of Night 
 Ravens,  Hissing of Serpents,  Bellowing of Bulls,  And Roaring of 
 Monsters."[3] St. Andrew Traverses A Land Of Continual Darkness,  The 
 Vale Of Walking spirits,  Amid Similar Sounds Of Terror,  Much As The 
 Pilgrims Of The Second Part Of Bunyan'S Story Traverse The Enchanted 
 Ground. And As These Pilgrims Found Deadly Arbours In that Land, 
 Tempting them To Repose Which Must End In death,  So St. David Was 
 Tempted in an Enchanted garden,  And Fell Flat Upon The Ground,  "When His 
 Eyes Were So Fast Locked up By Magic Art,  And His Waking senses Drowned 
 In Such A Dead Slumber,  That It Was As Impossible To Recover Himself 
 From Sleep As To Pull The Sun Out Of The Firmament." 
   
   
   
 _Bevis Of Southampton_ Has Many Points In common With St. George In the 
 _Seven Champions_. The Description Of The Giant,  The Escape Of Bevis 
 From His Dungeon,  And A Number Of Other Passages Show How Much Was 
 Common Stock For The Writers Of These Earlier Romances. There Is The 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 59 
 Same Rough Humour In it From First To Last,  And The Wonderful Swing and 
 Stride Of Vigorous Rhyming metre. Of The Humour,  One Quotation Will Be 
 Enough For An Example. It Is When They Are Proposing to Baptize The 
 Monstrous Giant At Cologne,  Whom Bevis Had First Conquered and Then 
 Engaged as His Body-Servant. At The Christening of Josian,  Wife Of 
 Bevis,  The Bishop Sees The Giant. 
   
   
   
      "'What Is,' Sayde He,  'This Bad Vysage?' 
      'Sir,' Sayde Bevys,  'He Is My Page-- 
      I Pray You Crysten Hym Also, 
      Thoughe He Be Bothe Black And Blo!' 
      The Bysshop Crystened josian, 
      That Was As White As Any Swan; 
      For Ascaparde Was Made A Tonne, 
      And Whan He Shulde Therein Be Done, 
      He Lept Out Upon The Brenche 
      And Sayde: 'Churle,  Wylt Thou Me Drenche? 
      The Devyl Of Hel Mot Fetche The 
      I Am To Moche Crystened to Be!' 
      The Folke Had Gode Game And Laughe, 
      But The Bysshop Was Wrothe Ynoughe." 
   
 There Is A Curious Passage Which Is Almost Exactly Parallel To The 
 Account Of The Fight With Apollyon In the _Pilgrim'S Progress_,  And 
 Which Was Doubtless In bunyan'S Mind When He Wrote That Admirable Battle 
 Sketch-- 
   
      "Beves Is Swerde Anon Upswapte, 
      He And The Geaunt Togedre Rapte; 
      And Delde Strokes Mani And Fale, 
      The Nombre Can I Nought Telle In tale. 
      The Geaunt Up Is Clubbe Haf, 
      And Smot To Beves With Is Staf, 
      But His Scheld Flegh From Him Thore, 
      Three Acres Brede And Somedel More, 
      Tho Was Beves In strong Erur 
      And Karf Ato The Grete Levour, 
      And On The Geauntes Brest A-Wonde 
      That Negh A-Felde Him To The Grounde. 
      The Geaunt Thoughte This Bataile Hard, 
      Anon He Drough To Him A Dart, 
      Throgh Beves Scholder He Hit Schet, 
      The Blold Ran Doun To Beves' Fet, 
      The Beves Segh Is Owene Blod 
      Out Of His Wit He Wex Negh Wod, 
      Unto The Geaunt Ful Swithe He Ran, 
      And Kedde That He Was Doughti Man, 
      And Smot Ato His Nekke Bon; 
      The Geant Fel To Grounde Anon." 
   
   
   
 It Is Part Of His General Sympathy With The Spirit Of The Romances That 
 Bunyan'S Giants Were Always Real Giants To Him,  And He Evidently Enjoyed 
 Them For Their Own Sake As Literary And Imaginative Creations,  As Well 
 As For The Sake Of Any Truths Which They Might Be Made To Enforce. 
 Despair And Slay-Good Are Distinct To His Imagination. His Interest 
 Remains Always Twofold. On The One Hand There Is Allegory,  And On The 
 Other Hand There Is Live Tale. Sometimes The Allegory Breaks Through And 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 60 
 Confuses The Tale A Little,  As When Mercy Begs For The Great Mirror That 
 Hangs In the Dining-Room Of The Shepherds,  And Carries It With Her 
 Through The Remainder Of Her Journey. Sometimes The Allegory Has To Stop 
 In Order That A Sermon May Be Preached on Some Particular Point Of 
 Theology,  And Such Sermons Are By No Means Short. Still The Story Is So 
 True To Life That Its Irresistible Simplicity And Naturalness Carry It 
 On And Make It Immortal. When We Read Such A Conversation As That 
 Between Old Honest And Mr. Standfast About Madam Bubble,  We Feel That 
 The Tale Has Ceased to Be An Allegory Altogether And Has Become A Novel. 
 This Is Perhaps More Noticeable In the Second Part Than In the First. 
 The First Part Is Indeed almost A Perfect Allegory; Although Even There, 
 From Time To Time,  The Earnestness And Rush Of The Writer'S Spirit 
 Oversteps The Bounds Of Consistency And Happily Forgets The Moral 
 Because The Story Is So Interesting,  Or Forgets For A Moment The Story 
 Because The Moral Is So Important. In the Second Part The Two Characters 
 Fall Apart More Definitely. Now You Have Delightful Pieces Of Crude 
 Human Nature,  NaïVe And Sparkling. Then You Have Long And Intricate 
 Theological Treatises. Neither The Allegorical Nor The Narrative Unity 
 Is Preserved to Anything like The Same Extent As On The Whole Is The 
 Case In part I. The Shrewd And Humorous Touches Of Human Nature Are 
 Especially Interesting. Bunyan Was By No Means The Gentle Saint Who 
 Shrank From Strong Language. When The Gate Of Doubting castle Is 
 Opening,  And At Last The Pilgrims Have All But Gone Free,  We Read That 
 "The Lock Went Damnable Hard." When Great-Heart Is Delighted with Mr. 
 Honest,  He Calls Him "A Cock Of The Right Kind." The Poem _On Christian 
 Behaviour_,  Which We Have Quoted,  Contains The Lines-- 
   
      "When All Men'S Cards Are Fully Played, 
      Whose Will Abide The Light?" 
   
 These Are Quaint Instances Of The Way In which Even The Questionable 
 Parts Of The Unregenerate Life Of The Dreamer Came In the End To Serve 
 The Uses Of His Religion. 
   
 There Are Many Gems In the Second Part Of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_ Which 
 Are Full Of Mother-Wit And Sly Fun. Mr. Honest Confesses,  "I Came From 
 The Town Of Stupidity; It Lieth About Four Degrees Beyond The City Of 
 Destruction." Then There Is Mr. Fearing,  That Morbidly Self-Conscious 
 Creature,  Who Is So Much At Home In the Valley Of Humiliation That He 
 Kneels Down And Kisses The Flowers In its Grass. He Is A Man Who Can 
 Never Get Rid Of Himself For A Moment,  And Who Bores All The Company 
 With His Illimitable And Anxious Introspection. Yet,  In vanity Fair, 
 When Practical Facts Have To Be Faced instead Of Morbid Fancies And 
 Inflamed conscience,  He Is The Most Valiant Of Men,  Whom They Can Hardly 
 Keep From Getting himself Killed,  And For That Matter All The Rest Of 
 Them. Here,  Again,  Is An Inimitable Flash Of Insight,  Where Simple, 
 Sloth,  And Presumption Have Prevailed with "One Short-Wind,  One 
 Sleepy-Head,  And With A Young Woman,  Her Name Was Dull,  To Turn Out Of 
 The Way And Become As They." 
   
   
   
 Every Now And Then These Natural Touches Of Portraiture Rise To A True 
 Sublimity,  As All Writing that Is Absolutely True To The Facts Of Human 
 Nature Tends To Do. Great-Heart Says To Mr. Valiant-For-Truth,  "Let Me 
 See Thy Sword," And When He Has Taken It In his Hand And Looked at It 
 For Awhile,  He Adds,  "Ha! It Is A Right Jerusalem Blade." That Sword 
 Lingers In bunyan'S Imagination,  For,  At The Close Of Valiant'S Life, 
 Part Of His Dying speech Is This "My Sword I Give To Him That Shall 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 61 
 Succeed me In my Pilgrimage,  And My Courage And Skill To Him That Can 
 Get It. My Marks And Scars I Carry With Me,  To Be A Witness For Me That 
 I Have Fought His Battles." 
   
   
   
 Bunyan Is So Evidently An Idealist And A Prince Of Spiritual Men,  That 
 No One Needs To Point Out This Characteristic Of The Great Dreamer,  Nor 
 To Advertise So Obvious A Thing as His Spiritual Idealism. We Have 
 Accordingly Taken That For Granted and Left It To The Reader To 
 Recognise In every Page For Himself. We Have Sought In this To Show What 
 Has Sometimes Been Overlooked,  How Very Human The Man And His Work Are. 
 Yet His Humanism Is Ever At The Service Of The Spirit,  Enlivening his 
 Book And Inspiring it With A Perpetual And Delicious Interest,  But Never 
 For A Moment Entangling him Again In the Old Yoke Of Bondage,  From Which 
 At His Conversion He Had Been Set Free. For The Human As Opposed to The 
 Divine,  The Fleshly As The Rival Of The Spiritual,  He Has An Open And 
 Profound Contempt,  Which He Expresses In no Measured terms In such 
 Passages As That Concerning adam The First And Madam Wanton. These Are 
 For Him Sheer Pagans. At The Cave,  Indeed,  Which His Pilgrim Visits At 
 The Farther End Of The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death,  We Read That Pope 
 And Pagan Dwelt There In old Time,  But That Pagan Has Been Dead Many A 
 Day. Yet The Pagan Spirit Lives On In many Forms,  And Finds An Abiding 
 Place And Home In vanity Fair. As Professor Firth Has Pointed out,  Ben 
 Jonson,  In his Play _Bartholomew Fair_,  Had Already Told The Adventures 
 Of Two Puritans Who Strayed into The Fair,  And Who Regarded the Whole 
 Affair As The Shop Of Satan. There Were Many Other Fairs,  Such As That 
 Of Sturbridge,  And The Elstow Fair Itself,  Which Was Instituted by The 
 Nuns On The Ground Close To Their Convent,  And Which Is Held Yearly To 
 The Present Day. Such Fairs As These Have Been A Source Of Much 
 Temptation And Danger To The Neighbourhood,  And Represent In its Popular 
 Form The Whole Spirit Of Paganism At Its Worst. 
   
 All The Various Elements Of Bunyan'S World Live On In the England Of 
 To-Day. Thackeray,  With A Stroke Of Characteristic Genius,  Has Expanded 
 And Applied the Earlier Conception Of Paganism In his Great Novel Whose 
 Title _Vanity Fair_ Is Borrowed from Bunyan. But The Main Impression Of 
 The Allegory Is The Victory Of The Spiritual At Its Weakest Over The 
 Temporal At Its Mightiest. His Descriptions Of The Supper And Bed 
 Chamber In the House Beautiful,  And Of The Death Of Christiana At The 
 End Of The Second Part,  Are Immortal Writings,  In the Most Literal 
 Sense,  Amid The Shows Of Time. They Have Indeed laid Hold Of Immortality 
 Not For Themselves Only,  But For The Souls Of Men. Nothing could Sum Up 
 The Whole Story Of Bunyan Better Than The Legend Of His Flute Told By 
 Mr. S.S. M'Currey In his Book Of Poems Entitled _In Keswick Vale_. The 
 Story Is That In his Prison Bunyan Took Out A Bar From One Of The Chairs 
 In His Cell,  Scooped it Hollow,  And Converted it Into A Flute,  Upon 
 Which He Played sweet Music In the Dark And Solitary Hours Of The Prison 
 Evening. The Jailers Never Could Find Out The Source Of That Music,  For 
 When They Came To Search His Cell,  The Bar Was Replaced in the Chair, 
 And There Was No Apparent Possibility Of Flute-Playing; But When The 
 Jailers Departed the Music Would Mysteriously Recommence. It Is Very 
 Unlikely That This Legend Is Founded upon Fact,  Or Indeed that Bunyan 
 Was A Musician At All (Although We Do Have From His Pen One Touching and 
 Beautiful Reference To The Finest Music In the World Being founded upon 
 The Bass),  But,  Like His Own Greater Work,  The Little Legend Is An 
 Allegory. The World For Centuries Has Heard Sweet Music From Bunyan,  And 
 Has Not Known Whence It Came. It Has Seemed to Most Men A Miracle,  And 
 Indeed they Were Right In counting it So. Yet There Was A Flute From 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture v ( John Bunyan)  Pg 62 
 Which That Music Issued,  And The Flute Was Part Of The Rough Furniture 
 Of His Imprisoned world. He Was No Scholar,  Nor Delicate Man Of _Belles 
 Lettres_,  Like So Many Of His Contemporaries. He Took What Came To His 
 Hand; And In this Lecture We Have Tried to Show How Much Did Come Thus 
 To His Hand That Was Rare And Serviceable For The Purposes Of His 
 Spirit,  And For The Expression Of High Spiritual Truth. 
   
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 63 
 It Is Doubtful Whether Any Of Bunyan'S Contemporaries Had So Strong A 
 Human Interest Attaching to His Person And His Work As Samuel Pepys. 
 There Is Indeed something in common To The Two Men,--Little Or Nothing 
 Of Character,  But A Certain _NaïVeté_ And Sincerity Of Writing,  Which 
 Makes Them Remind One Of Each Other Many Times. All The More Because Of 
 This Does The Contrast Between The Spirit Of The Two Force Itself Upon 
 Every Reader; And If We Should Desire To Find A Typical Pagan To Match 
 Bunyan'S Spirituality And Idealism,  It Would Be Difficult To Go Past 
 Samuel Pepys. 
   
   
   
 There Were,  As Everybody Knows,  Two Famous Diarists Of The Restoration 
 Period,  Pepys And Evelyn. It Is Interesting to Look At The Portraits Of 
 The Two Men Side By Side. Evelyn'S Face Is Anxious And Austere, 
 Suggesting the Sort Of Stuff Of Which Soldiers Or Saints Are Made. Pepys 
 Is A Voluptuous Figure,  In the Style Of Charles The Second,  With Regular 
 And Handsome Features Below His Splendid Wig,  And Eyes That Are Both 
 Keen And Heavy,  Penetrating and Luxurious. These Two Men (Who,  In the 
 Course Of Their Work,  Had To Compare Notes On Several Occasions,  And 
 Between Whom We Have The Record Of More Than One Meeting) Were Among The 
 Most Famous Gossips Of The World. But Evelyn'S Gossip Is A Succession Of 
 Solemnities Compared with The Racy Scandal,  The Infantile And Insatiable 
 Curiosity,  And The Incredible Frankness Of The Pagan Diarist. 
   
   
   
 Look At His Face Again,  And You Will Find It Impossible Not To Feel A 
 Certain Amount Of Surprise. Of All The Unlikely Faces With Which History 
 Has Astonished the Readers Of Books,  There Are None More Surprising than 
 Those Of Three Contemporaries In the Later Seventeenth Century. 
 Claverhouse,  With His Powerful Character And Indomitable Will,  With His 
 Titanic Daring and Relentless Cruelty,  Has The Face Of A Singularly 
 Beautiful Young Girl. Judge Jeffreys,  Whose Delight In blood Was Only 
 Equalled by The Foulness And Extravagance Of His Profanity,  Looks In his 
 Picture The Very Type Of Spiritual Wistfulness. Samuel Pepys,  Whose 
 Large Oval Eyes And Clear-Cut Profile Suggest A Somewhat Voluptuous And 
 Very Fastidious Aristocrat,  Was Really A Man Of The People,  Sharp To A 
 Miracle In all The Detail Of The Humblest Kind Of Life,  And Apparently 
 Unable To Keep From Exposing himself To Scandal In many Sorts Of Mean 
 And Vulgar Predicament. 
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 64 
 Since The Deciphering and Publication Of His Diary,  A Great Deal Has 
 Been Written Concerning it. The Best Accounts Of It Are Henry B. 
 Wheatley'S _Samuel Pepys And The World He Lived in_,  And Robert Louis 
 Stevenson'S Little Essay In his _Short Studies Of Men And Books_. The 
 Object Of The Present Lecture Is Not To Give Any General Account Of The 
 Time And Its Public Events,  Upon Which The Diary Touches At A Thousand 
 Points,  But Rather To Set The Spirit Of This Man In contrast With That 
 Of John Bunyan,  Which We Have Just Considered. The Men Are Very Typical, 
 And Any Adequate Conception Of The Spirit Of Either Will Give A True 
 Cross-Section Of The Age In which He Lived. Pepys,  It Must Be Confessed, 
 Is Much More At Home In his Times Than Bunyan Ever Could Be. One Might 
 Even Say That The Times Seem To Have Been Designed as A Background For 
 The Diarist. There Is As Little Of The Spirit Of A Stranger And Pilgrim 
 In Pepys,  Even In his Most Pathetic Hours,  As There Is In john Bunyan 
 The Spirit Of A Man At Home,  Even In his Securest. It Was A Very Pagan 
 Time,  And Pepys Is The Pagan _Par Excellence_ Of That Time,  The Bright 
 And Shining example Of The Pagan Spirit Of England. 
   
 His Lot Was Cast In high Places,  To Which He Rose By Dint Of Great 
 Ability And Indomitable Perseverance In his Office. He Talks With The 
 King,  The Duke Of York,  The Archbishop,  And All The Other Great Folks Of 
 The Day; And No Volume Has Thrown More Light On The Character Of Charles 
 The Second Than His. We See The King at The Beginning kissing the Bible, 
 And Proclaiming it To Be The Thing which He Loves Above All Other 
 Things. He Rises Early In the Morning,  And Practises Others Of The Less 
 Important Virtues. We See Him Touching all Sorts Of People For The 
 King'S Evil,  A Process In which Pepys Is Greatly Interested at First, 
 But Which Palls When It Has Lost Its Novelty. Similarly,  The Diarist Is 
 Greatly Excited on The First Occasion When He Actually Hears The King 
 Speak,  But Soon Begins To Criticise Him,  Finding that He Talks Very Much 
 Like Other People. He Describes The Starvation Of The Fleet,  The Country 
 Sinking to The Verge Of Ruin,  And The Maudlin Scenes Of Drunkenness At 
 Court,  With A Minuteness Which Makes One Ashamed even After So Long An 
 Interval. However Revolting or Shameful The Institution May Be,  The Fact 
 That It Is An Institution Gives It Zest For The Strange Mind Of Pepys. 
 He Is,  However,  Capable Also Of Moralising. "Oh,  That The King would 
 Mind His Business!" He Would Exclaim,  After Having delighted himself And 
 His Readers With The Most Droll Accounts Of His Majesty'S Frivolities. 
 "How Wicked a Wretch Cromwell Was,  And Yet How Much Better And Safer The 
 Country Was In his Hands Than It Is Now." And Often He Will End The 
 Bewildering account With Some Such Bitter Comment As The Assertion "That 
 Every One About The Court Is Mad." 
   
   
   
 In Politics He Had Been A Republican In his Early Days,  And When Charles 
 The First'S Head Fell At Whitehall,  He Had Confided to A Friend The 
 Dangerous Remark That If He Were To Preach A Sermon On That Event He 
 Would Choose As His Text The Words,  "The Memory Of The Wicked shall 
 Rot." The Later Turn Of Events Gave Him Abundant Opportunities For 
 Repenting of That Indiscretion,  And He Repents At Intervals All Through 
 His Diary. For Now He Is A Royalist In his Politics,  Having in him Not A 
 Little Of The Spirit Of The Vicar Of Bray,  And Of Bunyan'S Mr. By-Ends. 
   
   
   
 The Political References Lead Him Beyond England,  And We Hear With 
 Consternation Now And Again About The Dangerous Doings Of The 
 Covenanters In scotland. We Hear Much Also Of France And Holland,  And 
 Still More Of Spain. Outside The Familiar European Lands There Is A 
 Fringe Of Curious Places Like Tangier,  Which Is Of Great Account At That 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 65 
 Time,  And Is Destined in pepys' Belief To Play An Immense Part In the 
 History Of England,  And Of The More Distant Bombain In india,  Which He 
 Considers To Be A Place Of Little Account. Here And There The Terror Of 
 A New Popish Plot Appears. The Kingdom Is Divided against Itself,  And 
 The King and The Commons Are At Drawn Battle With The Lords,  While Every 
 One Shapes His Views Of Things According as His Party Is In or Out Of 
 Power. 
   
   
   
 Three Great Historic Events Are Recorded with Singular Minuteness And 
 Interest In the Diary,  Namely,  The Plague,  The Dutch War,  And The Fire 
 Of London. 
   
   
   
 As To The Plague,  We Have All The Vivid Horror Of Detail With Which 
 Defoe Has Immortalised it,  With The Additional Interest That Here No 
 Consecutive History Is Attempted,  But Simply A Record Of Daily 
 Impressions Of The Streets And Houses. On His First Sight Of The Red 
 Cross Upon A Door,  The Diarist Cries Out,  "Lord,  Have Mercy Upon Us," In 
 Genuine Terror And Pity. The Coachman Sickens On His Box And Cannot 
 Drive His Horses Home. The Gallant Draws The Curtains Of A Sedan Chair 
 To Salute Some Fair Lady Within,  And Finds Himself Face To Face With The 
 Death-Dealing eyes And Breath Of A Plague-Stricken Patient. Few People 
 Move Along The Streets,  And At Night The Passenger Sees And Shuns The 
 Distant Lights Of The Link-Boys Guiding the Dead To Their Burial. A 
 Cowardly Parson Flies Upon Some Flimsy Excuse From His Dangerous Post, 
 And Makes A Weak Apology On His First Reappearance In the Pulpit. 
 Altogether It Is A Picture Unmatched in its Broken Vivid Flashes,  In 
 Which The Cruelty And Wildness Of Desperation Mingle With The Despairing 
 Cry Of Pity. 
   
 The Dutch War Was Raging then,  Not On The High Seas Only,  But At The 
 Very Gates Of England; And Pepys,  Whose Important And Responsible 
 Position As Clerk Of The Acts Of The Navy Gave Him Much First-Hand 
 Information,  Tells Many Great Stories In his Casual Way. We Hear The 
 Guns Distinctly And Loud,  Booming at The Mouth Of The Thames. The 
 Press-Gang Sweeps The Streets,  And Starving women,  Whose Husbands Have 
 Been Taken From Them,  Weep Loudly In our Ears. Sailors Whose Wages Have 
 Not Been Paid Desert Their Ships,  In some Cases Actually Joining the 
 Dutch And Fighting against Their Comrades. One Of The Finest Passages 
 Gives A Heartrending and Yet Bracing picture Of The Times. "About A 
 Dozen Able,  Lusty,  Proper Men Came To The Coach-Side With Tears In their 
 Eyes,  And One Of Them That Spoke For The Rest Began,  And Said To Sir W. 
 Coventry,  'We Are Here A Dozen Of Us,  That Have Long Known And Loved, 
 And Served our Dead Commander,  Sir Christopher Mings,  And Have Now Done 
 The Last Office Of Laying him In the Ground. We Would Be Glad We Had Any 
 Other To Offer After Him,  And In revenge Of Him. All We Have Is Our 
 Lives; If You Will Please To Get His Royal Highness To Give Us A 
 Fire-Ship Among Us All,  Here Are A Dozen Of Us,  Out Of All Which,  Choose 
 You One To Be Commander; And The Rest Of Us,  Whoever He Is,  Will Serve 
 Him; And,  If Possible,  Do That Which Shall Show Our Memory Of Our Dead 
 Commander,  And Our Revenge.' Sir W. Coventry Was Herewith Much Moved,  As 
 Well As I,  Who Could Hardly Abstain From Weeping,  And Took Their Names, 
 And So Parted." 
   
   
   
 Perhaps,  However,  The Finest Work Of All Is Found In the Descriptions Of 
 The Fire Of London. From That Night When He Is Awakened by The Red glare 
 Of The Fire In his Bedroom Window,  On Through The Days And Weeks Of 
 Terror,  When No Man Knew How Long He Would Have A Home,  We Follow By The 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 66 
 Light Of Blazing houses The Story Of Much That Is Best And Much That Is 
 Worst In human Nature. The Fire,  Indeed,  Cleanses The City From The Last 
 Dregs Of The Plague Which Are Still Lingering there,  But It Also Stirs 
 Up The City Until Its Inhabitants Present The Appearance Of Ants Upon A 
 Disturbed ant-Hill. And Not The Least Busy Among Them,  Continually 
 Fussing about In all Directions,  Is The Diarist Himself,  Eagerly 
 Planning for The Preservation Of His Money,  Dragging it Hither And 
 Thither From Hiding-Place To Hiding-Place In the City,  And Finally 
 Burying it In bags At Dead Of Night In a Garden. Nothing is Too Small 
 For Him To Notice. The Scrap Of Burnt Paper Blown By The Wind To A 
 Lady'S Hand,  On Which The Words Are Written,  "Time Is,  It Is Done," Is 
 But One Of A Thousand Equally Curious Details. 
   
   
 His Own Character,  As Reflected in the Narrative Of These Events,  Is 
 Often Little To His Credit,  And The Frank And Unblushing selfishness Of 
 His Outlook Upon Things In general Is As Amusing as It Is Shameful. And 
 Yet,  On The Other Hand,  When Most Men Deserted london,  Pepys Remained in 
 It Through The Whole Dangerous Time Of The Plague,  Taking his Life In 
 His Hand And Dying daily In his Imagination In spite Of The Quaint 
 Precautions Against Infection Which He Takes Care On Every Occasion To 
 Describe. Through The Whole Dismal Year,  With Plague And Fire Raging 
 Around Him,  He Sticks To His Post And Does His Work As Thoroughly As The 
 Disorganised circumstances Of His Life Allow. If We Could Get Back To 
 The Point Of View Of Those Who Thought About Pepys And Formed a Judgment 
 Of Him Before His Diary Had Been Made Public,  We Should Be Confronted 
 With The Figure Of A Man As Different From The Diarist As It Is Possible 
 For Two Men To Be. His Contemporaries Took Him For A Great Englishman,  A 
 Man Who Did Much For His Country,  And Whose Character Was A Mirror Of 
 All The National And Patriotic Ideals. His Public Work Was By No Means 
 Unimportant,  Even In a Time So Full Of Dangers And So Critical For The 
 Destinies Of England. Little Did The People Who Loved and Hated him In 
 His Day And Afterwards Dream Of The Contents Of That Small Volume,  So 
 Carefully Written In such An Unintelligible Cipher,  Locked nightly With 
 Its Little Key,  And Hidden In some Secure Place. When At Last The 
 Writing was Deciphered,  There Came Forth Upon Us,  From The August And 
 Honourable State In which The Navy Commissioner Had Lain So Long,  This 
 Flood Of Small Talk,  The Greatest Curiosity Known To English Literature. 
 Other Men Than Pepys Have Suffered in reputation From The Yapping of 
 Dogs And The Barn-Door Cackle That Attacked their Memories. England 
 Blushed as She Heard The Noise When The Name Of Carlyle Became The 
 Centre Of Such Commotion. But If Samuel Pepys Has Suffered in the Same 
 Way He Has No One To Thank For It But Himself; For,  If His Own 
 Hand-Writing had Not Revealed it,  No One Could Possibly Have Guessed 
 It From The Facts Of His Public Career. Yet What A Rare Show It Is,  That 
 Multitude Of Queer Little Human Interests That Intermingle With The Talk 
 About Great Things! It May Have Been Quite Wrong To Translate It,  And 
 Undoubtedly Much Of It Was Disreputable Enough For Any Man To Write,  Yet 
 It Will Never Cease To Be Read; Nor Will England Cease To Be Glad That 
 It Was Translated,  So Long As The Charm Of History Is Doubled by Touches 
 Of Strange Imagination And Confessions Of Human Frailty. 
   
   
 Pepys' Connection With Literature Is That Rather Of A Virtuoso Than Of A 
 Student In the Strict Sense Of The Term. He Projected a Great History Of 
 The Navy,  Which Might Have Immortalised him In a Very Different Fashion 
 From That Of The Immortality Which The Diary Has Achieved. But His Life 
 Was Crowded with Business And Its Intervals With Pleasures. The Weakness 
 Of His Eyes Also Militated against Any Serious Contribution To 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 67 
 Literature,  And Instead Of The History,  For Which He Had Gathered much 
 Material And Many Manuscripts,  He Gave Us Only The Little Volume 
 Entitled _Memoirs Of The Navy_,  Which,  However,  Shows A Remarkable Grasp 
 Of His Subject,  And Of All Corresponding affairs,  Such As Could Only 
 Have Been Possessed by A Man Of Unusually Thorough Knowledge Of His 
 Business. He Collected what Was For His Time A Splendid Library, 
 Consisting of Some Three Thousand Volumes,  Now Preserved in his College 
 (Magdalene College,  Cambridge),  Very Carefully Arranged and Catalogued. 
 We Read Much Of This Library While It Is Accumulating--Much More About 
 The Mahogany Cases In which The Books Were To Stand Than About The Books 
 Themselves,  Or His Own Reading of Them. The Details Of Their Arrangement 
 Were Very Dear To His Curious Mind. He Tells Us That Where The Books 
 Would Not Fit Exactly To The Shelves,  But Were Smaller Than The Space, 
 He Had Little Gilded stilts Made,  Adjusted to The Size Of Each Book,  And 
 Placed under The Volumes,  Which They Lifted to The Proper Height. Little 
 Time Can Have Been Left Over For The Study Of At Least The Stiffer Works 
 In That Library,  Although There Are Many Notes Which Show That He Was In 
 Some Sense A Reader,  And That Books Served the Same Purpose As Events 
 And Personalities In leading him Up And Down The Byways Of What He 
 Always Found To Be A Curious And Interesting world. 
   
 But The Immortal Part Of Pepys Is Undoubtedly His Diary. Among Others Of 
 The Innumerable Curious Interests Which This Man Cultivated was That Of 
 Studying the Secret Ciphers Which Had Been Invented and Used by Literary 
 People In the Past. From His Knowledge Of These He Was Enabled to Invent 
 A Cipher Of His Own,  Or Rather To Adopt One Which He Altered somewhat To 
 Serve His Uses. Having found This Sufficiently Secret Code,  He Was Now 
 Able To Gratify His Immense Interest In himself And His Inordinate 
 Personal Vanity By Writing an Intimate Narrative Of His Own Life. The 
 Diary Covers Nine And A Half Years In all,  From January 1660 To May 
 1669. For Nearly A Century And A Half It Lay Dead And Silent,  Until Rev. 
 J. Smith,  With Infinite Diligence And Pains,  Discovered the Key To It, 
 And Wrote His Translation. A Later Translation Has Been Made By Rev. 
 Mynors Bright,  Which Includes Some Passages By The Judgment Of The 
 Former Translator Considered unnecessary Or Inadvisable. 
   
 Opinions Differ As To The Wisdom,  And Indeed the Morality,  Of Forcing 
 Upon The Public Ear The Accidentally Discovered secrets Which A Dead Man 
 Had Guarded so Carefully. There Is,  Of Course,  The Possibility That,  As 
 Some Think,  Pepys Desired that Posterity Should Have The Complete Record 
 In All Its Frankness And Candour. If This Be So,  One Can Only Say That 
 The Wish Is Evidence Of A Morbid And Unbalanced mind. It Seems Much More 
 Probable That He Wrote The Diary For The Luxury Of Reading it To 
 Himself,  Always Intending to Destroy It Before His Death. But A Piece Of 
 Work So Intimate As This Is,  In a Sense,  A Living part Of The Man Who 
 Creates It,  And One Can Well Imagine Him Putting off The Day Of Its 
 Destruction,  And Grudging that It Should Perish With All Its Power Of 
 Awakening old Chords Of Memory And Revitalising buried years. For His 
 Own Part He Was No Squeamish Moralist And If It Were Only For His Own 
 Eyes He Would Enjoy Passages Which The More Fastidious Public Might 
 Judge Differently. 
   
   
   
 So It Comes To Pass That This Amazing _Omnium Gatherum_ Of A Book Is 
 Among The Most Living of All The Gifts Of The Past To The Present, 
 Telling everything and Telling it Irresistibly. His Hat Falls Through A 
 Hole,  And He Writes Down All About The Incident As Faithfully As He 
 Describes The Palace Of The King of France,  And The English War With 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 68 
 Holland. His Nature Is Amazingly Complicated,  And Yet Our Judgment Of It 
 Is Simplified by His Passion For Telling everything,  No Matter How 
 Discreditable Or How Ignoble The Detail May Be. He Is A Great Man And A 
 Great Statesman,  And He Is The Liveliest Of Our English Crickets On The 
 Hearth. One Set Of Excerpts Would Present Him As The Basest,  Another Set 
 As The Pleasantest And Kindliest Of Men; And Always Without Any 
 Exception He Is Refreshing by His Intense And Genial Interest In the 
 Facts Of The World. Of The Many Summaries Of Himself Which He Has Given 
 Us,  None Is More Characteristic Than The Following,  With Which He Closes 
 The Month Of April Of The Year 1666: "Thus Ends This Month; My Wife In 
 The Country,  Myself Full Of Pleasure And Expence; In some Trouble For My 
 Friends,  And My Lord Sandwich,  By The Parliament,  And More For My Eyes, 
 Which Are Daily Worse And Worse,  That I Dare Not Write Or Read Almost 
 Anything." He Is Essentially A Virtuoso Who Has Been Forced by 
 Circumstances Into The Necessity Of Being also A Public Man,  And Has 
 Developed on His Own Account An Extraordinary Passion For The 
 Observation Of Small And Wayside Things. At The High Table Of Those 
 Times,  Where Milton And Bunyan Sit At The Mighty Feast Of English 
 Literature,  He Is Present Also: But He Is Under The Table,  A Mischievous 
 And Yet Observant Child,  Loosening the Neckerchiefs Of Those Who Are Too 
 Drunk,  And Picking up Scraps Of Conversation Which He Will Retail 
 Outside. There Is Something peculiarly Pathetic In the Whole Picture. 
 One Remembers Defoe,  Who For So Many Years Lived in the Reputation Of 
 Honourable Politics And In the Odour Of Such Sanctity As Robinson Crusoe 
 Could Give,  Until The Discovery Of Certain Yellow Papers Revealed the 
 Base Political Treachery For Which The Great Island Story Had Been A 
 Kind Of Anodyne To Conscience. So Samuel Pepys Would Have Passed for A 
 Great Naval Authority And An Anxious Friend Of England When Her Foes 
 Were Those Of Her Own Household,  Had He Only Been Able To Make Up His 
 Mind To Destroy These Little Manuscript Volumes. 
   
 Why Did He Write Them,  One Still Asks? Readers Of Robert Browning'S 
 Poems,  _House_ And _Shop_,  Will Remember The Scorn Which That Poet Pours 
 Upon Any One Who Unlocks His Heart To The General Public. And These 
 Narrations Of Pepys' Are Certainly Of Such A Kind That If He Intended 
 Them To Be Read By Any Public In any Generation Of England,  He Must Be 
 Set Down As Unique Among Sane Men. Stevenson Indeed considers That There 
 Was In the Diary A Side Glance At Publication,  But The Proof Which He 
 Adduces From The Text Does Not Seem Sufficient To Sustain So Remarkable 
 A Freak Of Human Nature,  Nor Does The Fact That On One Occasion Pepys 
 Set About Destroying all His Papers Except The Diary,  Appear To Prove 
 Very Much One Way Or Another. Stevenson Calls It Inconsistent And 
 Unreasonable In a Man To Write Such A Book And To Preserve It Unless He 
 Wanted it To Be Read. But Perhaps No Writing of Diaries Is Quite 
 Reasonable; And As For His Desire To Have It Read By Others Than 
 Himself,  We Find That His Diary Was So Close A Secret That He Expresses 
 Regret For Having mentioned it To Sir William Coventry. No Other Man 
 Ever Heard Of It In pepys' Lifetime,  "It Not Being necessary,  Nor Maybe 
 Convenient,  To Have It Known." 
   
   
 Why,  Then,  Did He Write It? Why Does Anybody Write A Diary? Probably The 
 Answer Nearest To The Truth Will Be That Every One Finds Himself 
 Interesting,  And Some People Have So Keen An Interest In themselves That 
 It Becomes A Passion,  Clamorous To Be Gratified. Now As Bacon Tells Us, 
 "Writing maketh An Exact Man," And The Writing of Diaries Reduces To The 
 Keenest Vividness Our Own Impressions Of Experience And Thoughts About 
 Things. Pepys Was,  Above All Other Men,  Interested in himself. He Was 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 69 
 Intensely In love With Himself. The Beautiful,  Jealous,  Troublesome,  And 
 Yet Inevitable Mrs. Pepys Was But Second In her Husband'S Affections 
 After All. He Was His Own Wife. One Remembers Fashionable Novels Of The 
 Time Of _Evelina_ Or The _Mysteries Of Udolpho_,  And Recollects How The 
 Ladies There Speak Lover-Like Of Their Diaries,  And,  When Writing them, 
 Feel Themselves Always In the Best Possible Company. For Pepys,  His 
 Diary Does Not Seem To Have Been So Much A Refuge From Daily Cares And 
 Worries,  Nor A Preparation For The Luxury Of Reading it In his Old Age, 
 As An Indulgence Of Intense And Poignant Pleasure In the Hour Of 
 Writing. 
   
   
 His Interest In himself Was Quite Extraordinary. When His Library Was 
 Collected and His Books Bound And Gilded they Were Doubtless A Treasured 
 Possession Of Which He Was Hugely Proud. But This Was Not So Much A 
 Possession As It Was A Kind Of _Alter Ego_,  A Fragment Of His Living 
 Self,  Hidden Away From All Eyes But His Own. No Trifle In his Life Is 
 Too Small For Record. He Cannot Change His Seat In the Office From One 
 Side Of The Fireplace To Another Without Recording it. The Gnats Trouble 
 Him At An Inn In the Country. His Wig Takes Fire And Crackles,  And He Is 
 Mighty Merry About It Until He Discovers That It Is His Own Wig That Is 
 Burning and Not Somebody Else'S. He Visits The Ships,  And,  Remembering 
 Former Days,  Notes Down Without A Blush The Sentence,  "Poor Ship,  That I 
 Have Been Twice Merry In." Any One Could Have Written The Diary,  So Far 
 As Intellectual Or Even Literary Power Is Concerned,  Though Perhaps Few 
 Would Have Chosen Precisely Pepys' Grammar In which To Express 
 Themselves. But Nobody Else That Ever Lived could Have Written It With 
 Such Sheer Abandonment And Frankness. He Has A Positive Talent,  Nay,  A 
 Genius For Self-Revelation,  For There Must Be A Touch Of Genius In any 
 Man Who Is Able To Be Absolutely True. Other Men Have Struggled hard To 
 Gain Sincerity,  And When It Is Gained the Struggle Has Made It Too 
 Conscious To Be Perfectly Sincere. Pepys,  With Utter Unconsciousness,  Is 
 Sincere Even In his Insincerities. Some Of Us Do Not Know Ourselves And 
 Our Real Motives Well Enough To Attempt Any Formal Statement Of Them. 
 Others Of Us May Suspect Ourselves,  But Would Die Before We Would 
 Confess Our Real Motives Even To Ourselves,  And Would Fiercely Deny Them 
 If Any Other Person Accused us Of Them. But This Man'S Barriers Are All 
 Down. There Is No Reserve,  But Frankness Everywhere And To An Unlimited 
 Extent. There Is No Pose In the Book Either Of Good Or Bad,  And It Is 
 One Of The Very Few Books Of Which Such A Statement Could Be Made. He 
 Has Been Accused of Many Things,  But Never Of Affectation. The Bad 
 Actions Are Qualified by Regrets,  And The Disarmed critic Feels That 
 They Have Lost Any Element Of Tragedy Which They Might Otherwise Have 
 Had. The Good Actions Are Usually Spoiled by Some Selfish _Addendum_ 
 Which Explains And At The Same Time Debases Them. Surely The Man Who 
 Could Do All This Constantly Through So Many Hundreds Of Pages,  Must Be 
 In His Way A Unique Kind Of Genius,  To Have So Clear An Eye And So 
 Little Self-Deception. 
   
   
 The Diary Is Full Of Details,  For He Is The Most Curious Man In the 
 World. One Might Apply To Him The Word Catholicity If It Were Not Far 
 Too Big And Dignified an Epithet. The Catholicity Of His Mind Is That Of 
 The _Old Curiosity Shop_. The Interest Of The Book Is Inexhaustible, 
 Because To Him The Whole World Was Just Such A Book. His World Was 
 Indeed 
   
   
      So Full Of A Number Of Things 
      He Was Sure We Should All Be As Happy As Kings. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 70 
 Like Chaucer'S Pardoner He Was "Meddlesome As A Fly." Now He Lights Upon 
 A Dane'S Skin Hung In a Church. Again,  Upon A Magic-Lantern. Yet Again 
 Upon A Traitor'S Head,  And The Prospect Of London In the Distance. He 
 Will Drink Four Pints Of Epsom Water. He Will Learn To Whistle Like A 
 Bird,  And He Will Tell You A Tale Of A Boy Who Was Disinherited because 
 He Crowed like A Cock. He Will Walk Across Half The Country To See 
 Anything new. His Heart Is Full Of A Great Love Of Processions, 
 Raree-Shows Of Every Kind,  And,  Above All,  Novelty. His Confession That 
 The Sight Of The King touching for The Evil Gave Him No Pleasure Because 
 He Had Seen It Before,  Applies To Most Things In his Life. For Such A 
 Man,  This World Must Indeed have Been An Interesting place. 
   
   
 We Join Him In well-Nigh Every Meal He Sits Down To,  From The First Days 
 When They Lived so Plainly,  On To The Greater Times Of The End,  When He 
 Gives A Dinner To His Friends,  Which Was "A Better Dinner Than They 
 Understood Or Deserved." He Delights In all The Detail Of The Table. The 
 Cook-Maid,  Whose Wages Were £4 Per Annum,  Had No Easy Task To Satisfy 
 Her Fastidious Master,  And Mrs. Pepys Must Now And Then Rise At Four In 
 The Morning to Make Mince-Pies. Any New Kind Of Meat Or Drink Especially 
 Delights Him. He Finds Ortolans To Be Composed of Nothing but Fat,  And 
 He Often Seems,  In his Thoughts On Other Nations,  To Have For His First 
 Point Of View The Sight Of Foreigners At Dinner. But This Is Only Part 
 Of The Insatiable And Omnivorous Interest In odds And Ends Which Is 
 Everywhere Apparent. The Ribbons He Has Seen At A Wedding,  The Starving 
 Seamen Who Are Becoming a Danger To The Nation,  The Drinking of Wine 
 With A Toad In the Glass,  A Lightning flash That Melted fetters From The 
 Limbs Of Slaves,  Harry'S Chair (The Latest Curiosity Of The 
 Drawing-Rooms,  Whose Arms Rise And Clasp You Into It When You Sit Down), 
 The New Messiah,  Who Comes With A Brazier Of Hot Coals And Proclaims The 
 Doom Of England--These,  And A Thousand Other Details,  Make Up The 
 Furniture Of This Most Miscellaneous Mind. 
   
 Everything in the World Amuses Him,  And From First To Last There Is An 
 Immense Amount Of Travelling,  Both Physical And Mental. With Him We 
 Wander Among Companies Of Ladies And Gentlemen Walking in gardens,  Or 
 Are Rowed up And Down The Thames In boats,  And It Is Always Exciting and 
 Delightful. That Is A Kind Of Allegory Of The Man'S View Of Life. But 
 Nothing is Quite So Congenial To Him,  After All,  As Plays At The 
 Theatre. One Feels That He Would Never Have Been Out Of Theatres Had It 
 Been Possible,  And In order To Keep Himself To His Business He Has To 
 Make Frequent Vows (Which Are Generally More Or Less Broken) That He 
 Will Not Go To See A Play Again Until Such And Such A Time. When The Vow 
 Is Broken And The Play Is Past He Lamentably Regrets The Waste Of 
 Resolution,  And Stays Away For A Time Until The Next Outburst Comes. The 
 Plays Were Then Held In the Middle Of The Day,  And Must Have Cut In 
 Considerably Upon The Working-Time Of Business Men; Although,  To Be 
 Sure,  The Office Hours Began With Earliest Morning,  And By The Afternoon 
 Things Were Growing slacker. The Light,  However,  Was Artificial,  And The 
 Flare Of The Candles Often Hurt His Eyes,  And Gave Him A Sufficient 
 Physical Reason To Fortify His Moral Ones For Abstention. His Taste In 
 The Dramatic Art Would Commend Itself To Few Moderns. He Has No Patience 
 With Shakespeare,  And Speaks Disparagingly Of _Twelfth Night_, 
 _Midsummer Night'S Dream_,  And _Othello_; While He Constantly Informs Us 
 That He "Never Saw Anything so Good In his Life" As The Now 
 Long-Forgotten Productions Of Little Playwrights Of His Time. He Would, 
 We Suspect,  Prefer At All Times A Puppet Show To A Play; Partly,  No 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 71 
 Short As I Can,  And Obscure." "But He Do Tell Me That The House Is In Doubt,  Because That Was The Fashion,  And Partly Because That Type Of 
 Drama Was Nearer His Size. Throughout The Volumes Of The Diary There Are 
 Few Things Of Which He Speaks With Franker And More Enthusiastic Delight 
 Than The Enjoyment Which He Derives From Punchinello. 
   
   
 Next To The Delight Which He Derived from The Theatre Must Be Mentioned 
 That Which He Continually Found In music. He Seems To Have Made An 
 Expert And Scientific Study Of It,  And The Reader Hears Continually The 
 Sound Of Lutes,  Harpsichords,  Violas,  Theorbos,  Virginals,  And 
 Flageolets. He Takes Great Numbers Of Music Lessons,  But Quarrels With 
 His Teacher From Time To Time. He Praises Extravagantly Such Music As He 
 Hears,  Or Criticises It Unsparingly,  Passing on One Occasion The 
 Desperate Censure "That Mrs. Turner Sings Worse Than My Wife." 
   
   
 His Interest In science Is As Curious And Miscellaneous As His Interest 
 In Everything else. He Was Indeed president Of The Royal Society Of His 
 Time,  And He Is Immensely Delighted with Boyle And His New Discoveries 
 Concerning colours And Hydrostatics. Yet So Rare A Dilettante Is He, 
 In This As In other Things,  That We Find This President Of The Royal 
 Society Bringing in a Man To Teach Him The Multiplication Table. He Has 
 No Great Head For Figures,  And We Find Him Listening to Long Lectures 
 Upon Abstruse Financial Questions,  Not Unlike The Bimetallism 
 Discussions Of Our Own Day,  Which He Finds So Clear,  While He Is 
 Listening,  That Nothing could Be Clearer,  But Half An Hour Afterwards He 
 Does Not Know Anything whatever About The Subject. 
   
 Under The Category Of His Amusements,  Physic Must Be Included; For,  Like 
 Other Egoists,  He Was Immensely Interested in his Real Or Imaginary 
 Ailments,  And In the Means Which Were Taken To Cure Them. On Some Days 
 He Will Sit All Day Long Taking physic. He Derives An Immense Amount Of 
 Amusement From The Process Of Doctoring himself,  And Still More From 
 Writing down In all Their Detail Both His Symptoms And Their Treatment. 
 His Pharmacopoeia Is By No Means Scientific,  For He Includes Within It 
 Charms Which Will Cure One Of Anything,  And He Always Keeps A Hare'S 
 Foot By Him,  And Will Sometimes Tell Of Troubles Which Came To Him 
 Because He Had Forgotten It. 
   
 He Is Constantly Passing the Shrewdest Of Judgments Upon Men And Things, 
 Or Retailing them From The Lips Of Others. "Sir Ellis Layton Is,  For A 
 Speech Of Forty Words,  The Wittiest Man That Ever I Knew In my Life,  But 
 Longer He Is Nothing." "Mighty Merry To See How Plainly My Lord And Povy 
 Do Abuse One Another About Their Accounts,  Each Thinking the Other A 
 Fool,  And I Thinking they Were Not Either Of Them,  In that Point,  Much 
 In The Wrong." "How Little Merit Do Prevail In the World,  But Only 
 Favour; And That,  For Myself,  Chance Without Merit Brought Me In; And 
 That Diligence Only Keeps Me So,  And Will,  Living as I Do Among So Many 
 Lazy People That The Diligent Man Becomes Necessary,  That They Cannot Do 
 Anything without Him." "To The Cocke-Pitt Where I Hear The Duke Of 
 Albemarle'S Chaplain Make A Simple Sermon: Among Other Things, 
 Reproaching the Imperfection Of Humane Learning,  He Cried,  'All Our 
 Physicians Cannot Tell What An Ague Is,  And All Our Arithmetique Is Not 
 Able To Number The Days Of A Man'--Which,  God Knows,  Is Not The Fault Of 
 Arithmetique,  But That Our Understandings Reach Not The Thing." "The 
 Blockhead Albemarle Hath Strange Luck To Be Loved,  Though He Be,  And 
 Every Man Must Know It,  The Heaviest Man In the World,  But Stout And 
 Honest To His Country." "He Advises Me In what I Write To Him,  To Be As 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 72 
 Such A Condition That Nobody Can Tell What To Make Of Them,  And,  He 
 Thinks,  They Were Never In before; That Everybody Leads And Nobody 
 Follows." "My Lord Middleton Did Come To-Day,  And Seems To Me But A 
 Dull,  Heavy Man; But He Is A Great Soldier,  And Stout,  And A Needy 
 Lord." A Man Who Goes About The World Making remarks Of That Kind,  Would 
 Need a Cipher In which To Write Them Down. His World Is Everything to 
 Him,  And He Certainly Makes The Most Of It So Far As Observation And 
 Remark Are Concerned. 
   
   
 If Pepys' Curiosity And Infinitely Varied shrewdness And Observation May 
 Be Justly Regarded as Phenomenal,  The Complexity Of His Moral Character 
 Is No Less Amazing. He Is Full Of Industry And Ambition,  Reading for His 
 Favourite Book Bacon'S _Faber Fortunæ_,  "Which I Can Never Read Too 
 Often." He Is "Joyful Beyond Myself That I Cannot Express It,  To See, 
 That As I Do Take Pains,  So God Blesses Me,  And Has Sent Me Masters That 
 Do Observe That I Take Pains." Again He Is "Busy Till Night Blessing 
 Myself Mightily To See What A Deal Of Business Goes Off A Man'S Hands 
 When He Stays At It." Colonel Birch Tells Him "That He Knows Him To Be A 
 Man Of The Old Way Of Taking pains." 
   
 This Is Interesting in itself,  And It Is A Very Marked trait In his 
 Character,  But It Gains A Wonderful Pathos When We Remember That This 
 Infinite Taking of Pains Was Done In a Losing battle With Blindness. 
 There Is A Constantly Increasing succession Of References In the Diary 
 To His Failing eyesight And His Fears Of Blindness In the Future. The 
 References Are Made In a Matter-Of-Fact Tone,  And Are As Free From 
 Self-Pity As If He Were Merely Recording the Weather Or The Date. All 
 The More On That Account,  The Days When He Is Weary And Almost Blind 
 With Writing and Reading,  And The Long Nights When He Is Unable To Read, 
 Show Him To Be A Very Brave And Patient Man. He Consults Boyle As To 
 Spectacles,  But Fears That He Will Have To Leave Off His Diary,  Since 
 The Cipher Begins To Hurt His Eyes. The Lights Of The Theatre Become 
 Intolerable,  And Even Reading is A Very Trying ordeal,  Notwithstanding 
 The Paper Tubes Through Which He Looks At The Print,  And Which Afford 
 Him Much Interest And Amusement. So The Diary Goes On To Its Pathetic 
 Close:--"And Thus Ends All That I Doubt I Shall Ever Be Able To Do With 
 My Own Eyes In the Keeping of My Journal,  I Being not Able To Do It Any 
 Longer,  Having done Now So Long As To Undo My Eyes Almost Every Time 
 That I Take A Pen In my Hand; And,  Therefore,  Whatever Comes Of It,  I 
 Must Forbear; And,  Therefore,  Resolve,  From This Time Forward,  To Have 
 It Kept By My People In long-Hand,  And Must Be Contented to Set Down 
 No More Than Is Fit For Them And All The World To Know; Or,  If There Be 
 Anything,  I Must Endeavour To Keep A Margin In my Book Open,  To Add, 
 Here And There,  A Note In shorthand With My Own Hand. 
   
   
 "And So I Betake Myself To That Course,  Which Is Almost As Much As To 
 See Myself Go Into My Grave; For Which,  And All The Discomforts That 
 Will Accompany My Being blind,  The Good God Prepare Me!--S.P." 
   
   
 It Is Comforting to Know That,  In spite Of These Fears,  He Did Not Grow 
 Blind,  But Preserved a Certain Measure Of Sight To The End Of His 
 Career. 
   
   
 In Regard To Money And Accounts,  His Character And Conduct Present The 
 Same Extraordinary Mixture As Is Seen In everything else That Concerns 
 Him. Money Flows Profusely Upon Valentines,  Gloves,  Books,  And Every 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 73 
 Sort Of Thing conceivable; Yet He Grudges The Price Of His Wife'S Dress 
 Although It Is A Sum Much Smaller Than The Cost Of His Own. He Allows 
 Her £30 For All Expenses Of The Household,  And She Is Immensely Pleased, 
 For The Sum Is Much Larger Than She Had Expected. The Gift To Her Of A 
 Necklace Worth £60 Overtops All Other Generosity,  And Impresses Himself 
 So Much That We Hear Of It Till We Are Tired. A Man In such A Position 
 As His,  Is Bound To Make Large Contributions To Public Objects,  Both In 
 The Forms Of Donations And Of Loans; But Caution Tempers His Public 
 Spirit. A Characteristic Incident Is That In which He Records His 
 Genuine Shame That The Navy Board Had Not Lent Any Money Towards The 
 Expenses Caused by The Fire And The Dutch War. But When The Loan Is 
 Resolved upon,  He Tells Us,  With Delicious NaïVeté,  How He Rushes In to 
 Begin The List,  Lest Some Of His Fellows Should Head It With A Larger 
 Sum,  Which He Would Have To Equal If He Came After Them. He Hates 
 Gambling,--It Was Perhaps The One Vice Which Never Tempted him,--And He 
 Records,  Conscientiously And Very Frequently,  The Gradual Growth Of His 
 Estate From Nothing at All To Thousands Of Pounds,  With Constant Thanks 
 To God,  And Many Very Quaint Little Confessions And Remarks. 
   
 He Was On The One Hand Confessedly A Coward,  And On The Other Hand A Man 
 Of The Most Hasty And Violent Temper. Yet None Of His Readers Can 
 Despise Him Very Bitterly For Either Of These Vices. For He Disarms All 
 Criticism By The Incredibly Ingenious Frankness Of His Confessions; And 
 The Instances Of These Somewhat Contemptible Vices Alternate With Bits 
 Of Real Gallantry And Fineness,  Told In the Same Perfectly Natural And 
 Unconscious Way. 
   
 His Relations With His Wife And Other Ladies Would Fill A Volume In 
 Themselves. It Would Not Be A Particularly Edifying volume,  But It 
 Certainly Would Be Without Parallel In the Literature Of This Or Any 
 Other Country For Sheer Extremity Of Frankness. Mrs. Pepys Appears To 
 Have Been A Very Beautiful And An Extremely Difficult Lady,  Disagreeable 
 Enough To Tempt Him Into Many Indiscretions,  And Yet So Virtuous As To 
 Fill His Heart With Remorse For All His Failings,  And Still More With 
 Vexation For Her Discoveries Of Them. But Below All This Surface Play Of 
 Pretty Disreputable Outward Conduct,  There Seems To Have Been A Deep And 
 Genuine Love For Her In his Heart. He Can Say As Coarse A Thing about 
 Her As Has Probably Ever Been Recorded,  But He Balances It With 
 Abundance Of Solicitous And Often Ineffective Attempts To Gratify Her 
 Capricious And Imperious Little Humours. 
   
   
 These Curious Mixtures Of Character,  However,  Are But Byplay Compared 
 With The Phenomenal And Central Vanity,  Which Alternately Amazes And 
 Delights Us. After All The Centuries There Is A Positive Charm About 
 This Grown Man Who,  After All,  Never Seems To Have Grown Up Into 
 Manhood. He Is As Delighted with Himself As If He Were New,  And As 
 Interested in himself As If He Had Been Born Yesterday. He Prefers 
 Always To Talk With Persons Of Quality If He Can Find Them. "Mighty Glad 
 I Was Of The Good Fortune To Visit Him (Sir W. Coventry),  For It Keeps 
 In My Acquaintance With Him,  And The World Sees It,  And Reckons My 
 Interest Accordingly." His Public Life Was Distinguished by One Great 
 Speech Made In answer To The Accusations Of Some Who Had Attacked him 
 And The Navy Board In the House Of Commons. That Speech Seems Certainly 
 To Have Been Distinguished and Extraordinarily Able,  But It Certainly 
 Would Have Cost Him His Soul If He Had Not Already Lost That In other 
 Ways. Every Sentence Of Flattery,  Even To The Point Of Being told That 
 He Is Another Cicero,  He Not Only Takes Seriously,  But Duly Records. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 74 
 There Is An Immense Amount Of Snobbery,  Blatant And Unashamed. A Certain 
 Captain Cooke Turns Out To Be A Man Who Had Been Very Great In former 
 Days. Pepys Had Carried clothes To Him When He Was A Little 
 Insignificant Boy Serving in his Father'S Workshop. Now Captain Cooke'S 
 Fortunes Are Reversed,  And Pepys Tells Us Of His Many And Careful 
 Attempts To Avoid Him,  And Laments His Failure In such Attempts. He 
 Hates Being seen On The Shady Side Of Any Street Of Life,  And Is 
 Particularly Sensitive To Such Company As Might Seem Ridiculous Or 
 Beneath His Dignity. His Brother Faints One Day While Walking with Him 
 In The Street,  On Which His Remark Is,  "Turned my Head,  And He Was 
 Fallen Down All Along Upon The Ground Dead,  Which Did Put Me Into A 
 Great Fright; And,  To See My Brotherly Love! I Did Presently Lift Him Up 
 From The Ground." This Last Sentence Is So Delightful That,  Were It Not 
 For The Rest Of The Diary,  It Would Be Quite Incredible In any Human 
 Being past The Age Of Short Frocks. All This Side Of His Character 
 Culminates In the Immense Amount Of Information Which We Have Concerning 
 His Coach. He Has Great Searching of Heart As To Whether It Would Be 
 Good Policy Or Bad To Purchase It. All That Is Within Him Longs To Have 
 A Coach Of His Own,  But,  On The Other Hand,  He Fears The Jealousy Of His 
 Rivals And The Increased demands Upon His Generosity Which Such A Luxury 
 May Be Expected to Bring. At Last He Can Resist No Longer,  And The Coach 
 Is Purchased. No Sooner Does He Get Inside It Than He Assumes The Air Of 
 A Gentleman Whose Ancestors Have Ridden In coaches Since The Beginning 
 Of Time. "The Park Full Of Coaches,  But Dusty,  And Windy,  And Cold,  And 
 Now And Then A Little Dribbling of Rain; And What Made It Worse,  There 
 Were So Many Hackney Coaches As Spoiled the Sight Of The Gentlemen'S." 
   
 A Somewhat Amazing fact In this Strange And Contradictory Character Is 
 The Constant Element Of Subtlety Which Blends With So Much Frankness. He 
 Wants To Do Wrong In many Different Ways But He Wants Still More To Do 
 It With Propriety,  And To Have Some Sort Of Plausible Excuse Which Will 
 Explain It In a Respectable Light. Nor Is It Only Other People Whom He 
 Is Bent On Deceiving. Were That All,  We Should Have A Very Simple Type 
 Of Hypocritical Scoundrel,  Which Would Be As Different As Possible From 
 The Extraordinary Pepys. There Is A Sense Of Propriety In him,  And A 
 Conscience Of Obeying the Letter Of The Law And Keeping up Appearances 
 Even In his Own Eyes. If He Can Persuade Himself That He Has Done That, 
 All Things Are Open To Him. He Will Receive A Bribe,  But It Must Be 
 Given In such A Way That He Can Satisfy His Conscience With Ingenious 
 Words. The Envelope Has Coins In it,  But Then He Opens It Behind His 
 Back And The Coins Fall Out Upon The Floor. He Has Only Picked them Up 
 When He Found Them There,  And Can Defy The World To Accuse Him Of Having 
 Received any Coins In the Envelope. That Was The Sort Of Conscience 
 Which He Had,  And Whose Verdicts He Never Seems Seriously To Have 
 Questioned. He Vows He Will Drink No Wine Till Christmas,  But Is 
 Delighted to Find That Hippocras,  Being a Mixture Of Two Wines,  Is Not 
 Necessarily Included in his Vow. He Vows He Will Not Go To The Play 
 Until Christmas,  But Then He Borrows Money From Another Man And Goes 
 With The Borrowed money; Or Goes To A New Playhouse Which Was Not Open 
 When The Vow Was Made. He Buys Books Which No Decent Man Would Own To 
 Having bought,  But Then He Excuses Himself On The Plea That He Has Only 
 Read Them And Has Not Put Them In his Library. Thus,  Along The Whole 
 Course Of His Life,  He Cheats Himself Continually. He Prefers The Way Of 
 Honour If It Be Consistent With A Sufficient Number Of Other 
 Preferences,  And Yet Practises A Multitude Of Curiously Ingenious 
 Methods Of Being excusably Dishonourable. On The Whole,  In regard  
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 75 
 Public Business And Matters Of Which Society Takes Note,  He Keeps His 
 Conduct Surprisingly Correct,  But All The Time He Is Remembering,  Not 
 Without Gusto,  What He Might Be Doing if He Were A Knave. It Is A 
 Curious Question What Idea Of God Can Be Entertained by A Man Who Plays 
 Tricks With Himself In this Fashion. Of Pepys Certainly It Cannot Be 
 Said That God "Is Not In all His Thoughts," For The Name And The 
 Remembrance Are Constantly Recurring. Yet God Seems To Occupy A Quite 
 Hermetically Sealed compartment Of The Universe; For His Servant In 
 London Shamelessly Goes On With The Game He Is Playing,  And Appears To 
 Take A Pride In the Very Conscience He Systematically Hoodwinks. 
   
   
 It Is Peculiarly Interesting to Remember That Samuel Pepys And John 
 Bunyan Were Contemporaries. There Is,  As We Said,  Much In common Between 
 Them,  And Still More In violent Contrast. He Had Never Heard Of The 
 Tinker Or His Allegory So Far As His Diary Tells Us,  Nor Is It Likely 
 That He Would Greatly Have Appreciated the _Pilgrim'S Progress_ If It 
 Had Come Into His Hands. Even _Hudibras_ He Bought Because It Was The 
 Proper Thing to Do,  And Because He Had Met Its Author,  Butler; But He 
 Never Could See What It Was That Made That Book So Popular. Bunyan And 
 Pepys Were Two Absolutely Sincere Men. They Were Sincere In opposite 
 Ways And In diametrically Opposite Camps,  But It Was Their Sincerity, 
 The Frank And Natural Statement Of What They Had To Say,  That Gave Its 
 Chief Value To The Work Of Each Of Them. It Is Interesting to Remember 
 That Pepys Was Sent To Prison Just When Bunyan Came Out Of It,  In the 
 Year 1678. The Charge Against The Diarist Was Indeed a False One,  And 
 His Imprisonment Cast No Slur Upon His Public Record: While Bunyan'S 
 Charge Was So True That He Neither Denied it Nor Would Give Any Promise 
 Not To Repeat The Offence. Pepys,  Had He Known Of Bunyan,  Would Probably 
 Have Approved of Him,  For He Enthusiastically Admired people Who Were 
 Living for Conscience' Sake,  Like Dr. Johnson'S Friend,  Dr. Campbell,  Of 
 Whom It Was Said He Never Entered a Church,  But Always Took Off His Hat 
 When He Passed one. On The Whole Pepys' References To The Fanatiques,  As 
 He Calls Them,  Are Not Only Fair But Favourable. He Is Greatly 
 Interested in their Zeal,  And Impatient With The Stupidity And Brutality 
 Of Their Persecutors. 
   
 In Regard To Outward Details There Are Many Interesting little Points Of 
 Contact Between The Diary And The _Pilgrims Progress_. We Hear Of Pepys 
 Purchasing foxe'S _Book Of Martyrs_; Bartholomew And Sturbridge Fairs 
 Come In for Their Own Share Of Notice; Nor Is There Wanting a 
 Description Of Such A Cage As Christian And Faithful Were Condemned to 
 In Vanity Fair. Justice Keelynge,  The Judge Who Condemned bunyan,  Is 
 Mentioned on Several Occasions By Pepys,  Very Considerably To His 
 Disadvantage. But By Far The Most Interesting point That The Two Have In 
 Common Is Found In that Passage Which Is Certainly The Gem Of The Whole 
 Diary. Bunyan,  In the Second Part Of The _Pilgrim'S Progress_, 
 Introduces A Shepherd Boy Who Sings Very Sweetly Upon The Delectable 
 Mountains. It Is The Most Beautiful And Idyllic Passage In the Whole 
 Allegory,  And Has Become Classical In english Literature. Yet Pepys' 
 Passage Will Match It For Simple Beauty. He Rises With His Wife A Little 
 Before Four In the Morning to Make Ready For A Journey Into The Country 
 In The Neighbourhood Of Epsom. There,  As They Walk Upon The Downs,  They 
 Come "Where A Flock Of Sheep Was; And The Most Pleasant And Innocent 
 Sight That Ever I Saw In my Life. We Found A Shepherd And His Little Boy 
 Reading,  Far From Any Houses Or Sight Of People,  The Bible To Him; So I 
 Made The Boy Read To Me,  Which He Did.... He Did Content Himself 
 Mightily In my Liking his Boy'S Reading,  And Did Bless God For Him,  The 
 
 
 
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 Most Like One Of The Old Patriarchs That Ever I Saw In my Life,  And It 
 Brought Those Thoughts Of The Old Age Of The World In my Mind For Two Or 
 Three Days After." 
   
   
 Such Is Some Slight Conception,  Gathered from A Few Of Many Thousands Of 
 Quaint And Sparkling revelations Of This Strange Character. Over Against 
 The "Ingenious Dreamer," Bunyan,  Here Is A Man Who Never Dreams. He Is 
 The Realist,  Pure And Unsophisticated; And The Stray Touches Of Pathos, 
 On Which Here And There One Chances In his Diary,  Are Written Without 
 The Slightest Attempt At Sentiment,  Or Any Other Thought Than That They 
 Are Plain Matters Of Fact. He Might Have Stood For This Prototype Of 
 Many Of Bunyan'S Characters. Now He Is Mr. Worldly Wiseman,  Now Mr. 
 By-Ends,  And Mr. Hold-The-World; And Taken Altogether,  With All His 
 Good And Bad Qualities,  He Is A Fairly Typical Citizen Of Vanity Fair. 
   
   
 There Are Indeed in his Character Exits Towards Idealism And 
 Possibilities Of It,  But Their Promise Is Never Fulfilled. There Is,  For 
 Instance,  His Kindly Good-Nature. That Quality Was The One And 
 All-Atoning virtue Of The Times Of Charles The Second,  And It Was 
 Supposed to Cover A Multitude Of Sins. Yet Charles The Second'S Was A 
 Reign Of Constant Persecution,  And Of Unspeakable Selfishness In high 
 Places. Pepys Persecutes Nobody,  And Yet Some Touch Of Unblushing 
 Selfishness Mars Every Kindly Thing he Does. If He Sends A Haunch Of 
 Venison To His Mother,  He Lets You Know That It Was Far Too Bad For His 
 Own Table. He Loves His Father With What Is Obviously A Quite Genuine 
 Affection,  But In his References To Him There Is Generally A Significant 
 Remembrance Of Himself. He Tells Us That His Father Is A Man "Who, 
 Besides That He Is My Father,  And A Man That Loves Me,  And Hath Ever 
 Done So,  Is Also,  At This Day,  One Of The Most Careful And Innocent Men 
 Of The World." He Advises His Father "To Good Husbandry And To Be Living 
 Within The Bounds Of £50 A Year,  And All In such Kind Words,  As Not Only 
 Made Both Them But Myself To Weep." He Hopes That His Father May Recover 
 From His Illness,  "For I Would Fain Do All I Can,  That I May Have Him 
 Live,  And Take Pleasure In my Doing well In the World." Similarly,  When 
 His Uncle Is Dying,  We Have A Note "That He Is Very Ill,  And So God'S 
 Will Be Done." When The Uncle Is Dead,  Pepys' Remark Is,  "Sorry In one 
 Respect,  Glad In my Expectations In another Respect." When His 
 Predecessor Dies,  He Writes,  "Mr. Barlow Is Dead; For Which God Knows My 
 Heart,  I Could Be As Sorry As Is Possible For One To Be For A Stranger, 
 By Whose Death He Gets £100 Per Annum." 
   
   
 Another Exit Towards Idealism Of The Christian And Spiritual Sort Might 
 Be Supposed to Be Found In his Abundant And Indeed perpetual References 
 To Churches And Sermons. He Is An Indomitable Sermon Taster And Critic. 
 But His Criticisms,  Although They Are Among The Most Amusing of All His 
 Notes,  Soon Lead Us To Surrender Any Expectation Of Escape From Paganism 
 Along This Line. "We Got Places,  And Staid To Hear A Sermon; But It, 
 Being a Presbyterian One,  It Was So Long,  That After Above An Hour Of It 
 We Went Away,  And I Home,  And Dined; And Then My Wife And I By Water To 
 The Opera." This Is Not,  Perhaps,  Surprising,  And May In some Measure 
 Explain His Satisfaction With Dr. Creeton'S "Most Admirable,  Good, 
 Learned,  And Most Severe Sermon,  Yet Comicall," In which The Preacher 
 "Railed bitterly Ever And Anon Against John Calvin,  And His Brood,  The 
 Presbyterians," And Ripped up Hugh Peters' Preaching,  Calling him "The 
 Execrable Skellum." One Man Preaches "Well And Neatly"; Another "In A 
 Devout Manner,  Not Elegant Nor Very Persuasive,  But Seems To Mean Well, 
 And That He Would Preach Holily"; While Mr. Mills Makes "An Unnecessary 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 77 
 Sermon Upon Original Sin,  Neither Understood By Himself Nor The People." 
 On The Whole,  His Opinion Of The Church Is Not Particularly High,  And He 
 Seems To Share The View Of The Confessor Of The Marquis De Caranen, 
 "That The Three Great Trades Of The World Are,  The Lawyers,  Who Govern 
 The World; The Churchmen Who Enjoy The World; And A Sort Of Fellows Whom 
 They Call Soldiers,  Who Make It Their Work To Defend The World." 
   
   
 It Must Be Confessed that,  When There Were Pretty Ladies Present And 
 When His Wife Was Absent,  The Sermons Had But Little Chance. "To 
 Westminster To The Parish Church,  And There Did Entertain Myself With My 
 Perspective Glass Up And Down The Church,  By Which I Had The Great 
 Pleasure Of Seeing and Gazing at A Great Many Very Fine Women; And What 
 With That,  And Sleeping,  I Passed away The Time Till Sermon Was Done." 
 Sometimes He Goes Further,  As At St. Dunstan'S,  Where "I Heard An Able 
 Sermon Of The Minister Of The Place; And Stood By A Pretty,  Modest Maid, 
 Whom I Did Labour To Take By The Hand; But She Would Not,  But Got 
 Further And Further From Me; And,  At Last,  I Could Perceive Her To Take 
 Pins Out Of Her Pocket To Prick Me If I Should Touch Her Again--Which, 
 Seeing,  I Did Forbear,  And Was Glad I Did Spy Her Design." 
   
 He Visits Cathedrals,  And Tries To Be Impressed by Them,  But More 
 Interesting things Are Again At Hand. At Rochester,  "Had No Mind To Stay 
 There,  But Rather To Our Inne,  The White Hart,  Where We Drank." At 
 Canterbury He Views The Minster And The Remains Of Beckett'S Tomb,  But 
 Adds,  "A Good Handsome Wench I Kissed,  The First That I Have Seen A 
 Great While." There Is Something ludicrously Incongruous About The Idea 
 Of Samuel Pepys In a Cathedral,  Just As There Is About His Presence In 
 The Great Plague And Fire. Among Any Of These Grand Phenomena He Is 
 Altogether Out Of Scale. He Is A Fly In a Thunderstorm. 
   
 His Religious Life And Thought Are An Amazing complication. He Can 
 Lament The Decay Of Piety With The Most Sanctimonious. He Remembers God 
 Continually,  And Thanks And Praises Him For Each Benefit As It Comes, 
 With Evident Honesty And Refreshing gratitude. He Signs And Seals His 
 Last Will And Testament,  "Which Is To My Mind,  And I Hope To The Liking 
 Of God Almighty." But In all This There Is A Curious Consciousness,  As 
 Of One Playing to A Gallery Of Unseen Witnesses,  Human Or Celestial. On 
 A Fast-Day Evening he Sings In the Garden "Till My Wife Put Me In mind 
 Of Its Being a Fast-Day; And So I Was Sorry For It,  And Stopped,  And 
 Home To Cards." He Does Not Indeed appear To Regard Religion As A Matter 
 Merely For Sickness And Deathbeds. When He Hears That The Prince,  When 
 In Apprehension Of Death,  Is Troubled,  But When Told That He Will 
 Recover,  Is Merry And Swears And Laughs And Curses Like A Man In health, 
 He Is Shocked. Pepys' Religion Is The Same In prosperous And Adverse 
 Hours,  A Thing constantly In remembrance,  And Whose Demands A Gentleman 
 Can Easily Satisfy. But His Conscience Is Of That Sort Which Requires An 
 Audience,  Visible Or Invisible. He Hates Dissimulation In other People, 
 But He Himself Is Acting all The Time. "But,  Good God! What An Age Is 
 This,  And What A World Is This! That A Man Cannot Live Without Playing 
 The Knave And Dissimulation." 
   
   
 Thus His Religion Gave Him No Escape From The World. He Was A Man Wholly 
 Governed by Self-Interest And The Verdict Of Society,  And His Religion 
 Was Simply The Celestial Version Of These Motives. He Has Conscience 
 Enough To Restrain Him From Damaging excesses,  And To Keep Him Within 
 The Limits Of The Petty Vices And Paying virtues Of A Comfortable Man--A 
 Conscience Which Is A Cross Between Cowardice And Prudence. We Are 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture vi  (Pepys' Diary)P Pg 78 
 Constantly Asking why He Restrained himself So Much As He Did. It Seems 
 As If It Would Have Been So Easy For Him Simply To Do The Things Which 
 He Unblushingly Confesses He Would Like To Do. It Is A Question To Which 
 There Is No Answer,  Either In his Case Or In any Other Man'S. Why Are 
 All Of Us The Very Complex And Unaccountable Characters That We Are? 
   
   
 Pepys Was A Pagan Man In a Pagan Time,  If Ever There Was Such A Man. The 
 Deepest Secret Of Him Is His Intense Vitality. Here,  On The Earth,  He Is 
 Thoroughly Alive,  And Puts His Whole Heart Into Most Of His Actions. He 
 Is Always In the Superlative Mood,  Finding things Either The Best Or The 
 Worst That "He Ever Saw In all His Life." His Great Concern Is To Be 
 Merry,  And He Never Outgrows The Crudest Phases Of This Desire,  But 
 Carries The Monkey Tricks Of A Boy Into Mature Age. He Will Draw His 
 Merriment From Any Source. He Finds It "Very Pleasant To Hear How The 
 Old Cavaliers Talk And Swear." At The Blue Ball,  "We To Dancing,  And 
 Then To A Supper Of French Dishes,  Which Yet Did Not Please Me,  And Then 
 To Dance And Sing; And Mighty Merry We Were Till About Eleven Or Twelve 
 At Night,  With Mighty Great Content In all My Company,  And I Did,  As I 
 Love To Do,  Enjoy Myself." "This Day My Wife Made It Appear To Me That 
 My Late Entertainment Of This Week Cost Me Above £12,  An Expence Which I 
 Am Almost Ashamed of,  Though It Is But Once In a Great While,  And Is The 
 End For Which,  In the Most Part,  We Live,  To Have Such A Merry Day Once 
 Or Twice In a Man'S Life." 
   
 The Only Darkening element In his Merriment Is His Habit Of Examining it 
 Too Anxiously. So Greedy Is He Of Delight That He Cannot Let Himself Go, 
 But Must Needs Be Measuring the Extent To Which He Has Achieved his 
 Desire. Sometimes He Finds Himself "Merry," But At Other Times Only 
 "Pretty Merry." And There Is One Significant Confession In connection 
 With Some Performance Of A Favourite Play,  "And Indeed it Is Good, 
 Though Wronged by My Over Great Expectations,  As All Things Else Are." 
 This Is One Of The Very Few Touches Of Anything approaching to Cynicism 
 Which Are To Be Found In his Writings. His Greed of Merriment Overleaps 
 Itself,  And The Confession Of That Is The Deepest Note In all His Music. 
   
   
 Thus All The Avenues Leading beyond The Earth Were Blocked. Other Men 
 Escape Along The Lines Of Kindliness,  Love Of Friends,  Art,  Poetry,  Or 
 Religion. In all These Avenues He Walks Or Dances,  But They Lead Him 
 Nowhere. At The Bars He Stands,  An Absolute Worldling and Pagan,  Full Of 
 An Insatiable Curiosity And An Endless Hunger And Thirst. There Is No 
 Touch Of Eternity Upon His Soul: His Universe Is Vanity Fair. 
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 79 
 We Now Begin The Study Of The Last Of The Three Stages In the Battle 
 Between Paganism And Idealism. Having seen Something of Its Primitive 
 And Classical Forms,  We Took A Cross Section Of It In the Seventeenth 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 80 
 Century,  And Now We Shall Review One Or Two Of Its Phases In our Own 
 Time. The Leap From The Seventeenth Century To The Twentieth Necessarily 
 Omits Much That Is Vital And Interesting. The Eighteenth Century,  In its 
 Stately And Complacent Fashion,  Produced some Of The Most Deliberate And 
 Finished types Of Paganism Which The World Has Seen,  And These Were 
 Opposed by Memorable Antagonists. We Cannot Linger There,  However,  But 
 Must Pass On To That Great Book Which Sounded the Loudest Bugle-Note 
 Which The Nineteenth Century Heard Calling men To Arms In this Warfare. 
   
   
 Nothing could Be More Violent Than The Sudden Transition From Samuel 
 Pepys,  That Inveterate Tumbler In the Masque Of Life,  Whose Absurdities 
 And Antics We Have Been Looking at But Now,  To This Solemn And 
 Tremendous Book. Great In its Own Right,  It Is Still Greater When We 
 Remember That It Stands At The Beginning of The Modern Conflict Between 
 The Material And Spiritual Development Of England. Every Student Of The 
 Fourteenth Century Is Familiar With Two Great Figures,  Typical Of The 
 Two Contrasted features Of Its Life. On The One Hand Stands Chaucer, 
 With His Infinite Human Interest,  His Good-Humour,  And His Inexhaustible 
 Delight In man'S Life Upon The Earth. On The Other Hand,  Dark In shadows 
 As Chaucer Is Bright With Sunshine,  Stands Langland,  Colossal In his 
 Sadness,  Perplexed as He Faces The Facts Of Public Life Which Are Still 
 Our Problems,  Earnest As Death. There Is No One Figure Which Corresponds 
 To Chaucer In the Modern Age,  But Carlyle Is Certainly The Counterpart 
 Of Langland. Standing in the Shadow,  He Sends Forth His Great Voice To 
 His Times,  Now Breaking into Sobs Of Pity,  And Anon Into Shrieks Of 
 Hoarse Laughter,  Terrible To Hear. He,  Too,  Is Bewildered,  And He Comes 
 Among His Fellows "Determined to Pluck Out The Heart Of The 
 Mystery"--The Mystery Alike Of His Own Times And Of General Human Life 
 And Destiny. 
   
 The Book Is In a Great Measure Autobiographical,  And Is Drawn From Deep 
 Wells Of Experience,  Thought,  And Feeling. Inasmuch As Its Writer Was A 
 Very Typical Scotsman,  It Also Was In a Sense A Manifesto Of The 
 National Convictions Which Had Made Much Of The Noblest Part Of Scottish 
 History,  And Which Have Served to Stiffen The New Races With Which 
 Scottish Emigrants Have Blended,  And To Put Iron Into Their Blood. It Is 
 A Book Of Incalculable Importance,  And If It Be The Case That It Finds 
 Fewer Readers In the Rising generation Than It Did Among Their Fathers, 
 It Is Time That We Returned to It. It Is For Want Of Such Strong Meat As 
 This That The Spirit Of An Age Tends To Grow Feeble. 
   
   
   
 The Object Of The Present Lecture Is Neither To Explain _Sartor 
 Resartus_ Nor To Summarise It. It Certainly Requires Explanation,  And It 
 Is No Wonder That It Puzzled the Publishers. Before It Was Finally 
 Accepted by Fraser,  Its Author Had "Carried it About For Some Two Years 
 From One Terrified owl To Another." When It Appeared,  The Criticisms 
 Passed on It Were Amusing enough. Among Those Mentioned by Professor 
 Nichol Are,  "A Heap Of Clotted nonsense," And "When Is That Stupid 
 Series Of Articles By The Crazy Tailor Going to End?" A Book Which Could 
 Call Forth Such Abuse,  Even From The Dullest Of Minds,  Is Certainly In 
 Need of Elucidation. Yet Here,  More Perhaps Than In any Other Volume One 
 Could Name,  The Interpretation Must Come From Within. The Truth Which It 
 Has To Declare Will Appeal To Each Reader In the Light Of His Own 
 Experience Of Life. And The Endeavour Of The Present Lecture Will Simply 
 Be To Give A Clue To Its Main Purpose. Every Reader,  Following up That 
 Clue For Himself,  May Find The Growing interest And The Irresistible 
 Fascination Which The Victorians Found In it. And When We Add That 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 81 
 Without Some Knowledge Of _Sartor_ It Is Impossible To Understand Any 
 Serious Book That Has Been Written Since It Appeared,  We Do Not 
 Exaggerate So Much As Might Be Supposed on The First Hearing of So 
 Extraordinary A Statement. 
   
   
 The First And Chief Difficulty With Most Readers Is A Very Obvious And 
 Elementary One. What Is It All About? As You Read,  You Can Entertain No 
 Doubt About The Eloquence,  The Violent And Unrestrained earnestness Of 
 Purpose,  The Unmistakable Reserves Of Power Behind The Detonating words 
 And Unforgettable Phrases. But,  After All,  What Is It That The Man Is 
 Trying to Say? This Is Certainly An Unpromising beginning. Other Great 
 Prophets Have Prophesied in the Vernacular; But "He That Speaketh In an 
 Unknown Tongue Speaketh Not Unto Men But Unto God; For No Man 
 Understandeth Him; Howbeit In the Spirit He Speaketh Mysteries." Yet 
 There Are Some Things Which Cannot Convey Their Full Meaning in the 
 Vernacular,  Thoughts Which Must Coin A Language For Themselves; And 
 Although At First There May Be Much Bewilderment And Even Irritation, 
 Yet In the End We Shall Confess That The Prophecy Has Found Its Proper 
 Language. 
   
 Let Us Go Back To The Time In which The Book Was Written. In the Late 
 Twenties And Early Thirties Of The Nineteenth Century A Quite 
 Exceptional Group Of Men And Women Were Writing books. It Was One Of 
 Those Galaxies That Now And Then Over-Crowd The Literary Heavens With 
 Stars. To Mention Only A Few Of The Famous Names,  There Were Byron, 
 Scott,  Wordsworth,  Dickens,  Tennyson,  And The Brownings. It Fills One 
 With Envy To Think Of Days When Any Morning might Bring a New Volume 
 From Any One Of These. Emerson Was Very Much Alive Then,  And Was Already 
 Corresponding with Carlyle. Goethe Died in 1832,  But Not Before He Had 
 Found In carlyle One Who "Is Almost More,  At Home In our Literature Than 
 Ourselves," And Who Had Penetrated to The Innermost Core Of The German 
 Writings Of His Day. 
   
 At That Time,  Too,  Momentous Changes Were Coming upon The Industrial And 
 Political Life Of England. In 1830 The Liverpool And Manchester Railway 
 Was Opened,  And In 1832 The Reform Bill Was Passed. Men Were Standing in 
 The Backwash Of The French Revolution. The Shouts Of Acclamation With 
 Which The Promise Of That Dawn Was Hailed,  Had Been Silenced long Ago By 
 The Bloody Spectacle Of Paris And The Career Of Napoleon Buonaparte. The 
 Day Of Byronism Was Over,  And Polite England Was Already Settling down 
 To The Conventionalities Of The Early Victorian Period. The Romantic 
 School Was Passing away,  And The New Generation Was Turning from It To 
 Seek Reality In physical Science. But Deep Below The Conventionality And 
 The Utilitarianism Alike There Remained from The Revolution Its Legacy 
 Of Lawlessness,  And Many Were More Intent On Adventure Than On 
 Obedience. 
   
   
 It Was In the Midst Of This Confused _MêLéE_ Of Opinions And Impulses 
 That Thomas Carlyle Strode Into The Lists With His Strange Book. On The 
 One Hand It Is A Titanic Defence Of The Universe Against The Stage 
 Titanism Of Byron'S _Cain_. On The Other Hand It Is A Revolt Of Reality 
 Against The Empire Of Proprieties And Appearances And Shams. In a 
 Generation Divided between The Red cap Of France And The Coal-Scuttle 
 Bonnet Of England Carlyle Stands Bareheaded under The Stars. Along With 
 Him Stand Benjamin Disraeli,  Combining a Genuine Sympathy For The Poor 
 With A Most Grotesque Delight In the Aristocracy; And John Henry Newman, 
 Fierce Against The Liberals,  And Yet The Author Of "Lead,  Kindly Light." 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 82 
 The Book Was Handicapped more Heavily By Its Own Style Than Perhaps Any 
 Book That Ever Fought Its Way From Neglect And Vituperation To 
 Idolatrous Popularity. There Is In it An Immense Amount Of Gag And 
 Patter,  Much Of Which Is Brilliant,  But So Wayward And Fantastic As To 
 Give A Sense Of Restlessness And Perpetual Noise. The Very Title Is 
 Provoking,  And Not Less So Is The Explanation Of It--The Pretended 
 Discovery Of A German Volume Upon "Clothes,  Their Origin And Influence," 
 Published by Stillschweigen And Co.,  Of Weissnichtwo,  And Written By 
 Diogenes TeufelsdröCkh. The Puffs From The Local Newspaper,  And The 
 Correspondence With Hofrath "Grasshopper," In no Wise Lessen The Odds 
 Against Such A Work Being taken Seriously. 
   
   
 Again,  As Might Be Expected of A Professor Of "Things In general," The 
 Book Is Discursive To The Point Of Bewilderment. The Whole Progeny Of 
 "Aerial,  Aquatic,  And Terrestrial Devils" Breaks Loose Upon Us Just As 
 We Are About To Begin Such A List Of Human Apparel As Never Yet Was 
 Published save In the Catalogue Of A Museum Collected by A Madman. A Dog 
 With A Tin Kettle At His Tail Rushes Mad And Jingling across The Street, 
 Leaving behind Him A New View Of The Wild Tyranny Of Ambition. A Great 
 Personage Loses Much Sawdust Through A Rent In his Unfortunate Nether 
 Garments. Sirius And The Pleiades Look Down From Above. The Book Is 
 Everywhere,  And Everywhere At Once. The _Asides_ Seem To Occupy More 
 Space Than The Main Thesis,  Whatever That May Be. Just When You Think 
 You Have Found The Meaning of The Author At Last,  Another Display Of 
 These Fireworks Distracts Your Attention. It Is Not Dark Enough To See 
 Their Full Splendour,  Yet They Confuse Such Daylight As You Have. 
   
 Yet The Main Thesis Cannot Long Remain In doubt. Through Whatever 
 Amazement And Distraction,  It Becomes Clear Enough At Last. Clothes, 
 Which At Once Reveal And Hide The Man Who Wears Them,  Are An Allegory Of 
 The Infinitely Varied aspects And Appearances Of The World,  Beneath 
 Which Lurk Ultimate Realities. But Essential Man Is A Naked animal,  Not 
 A Clothed one,  And Truth Can Only Be Arrived at By The Most Drastic 
 Stripping off Of Unreal Appearances That Cover It. The Professor Will 
 Not Linger Upon The Consideration Of The Lord'S Star Or The Clown'S 
 Button,  Which Are All That Most Men Care To See: He Will Get Down To The 
 Essential Lord And The Essential Clown. And This Will Be More Than An 
 Interesting literary Occupation To Him,  Or It Will Not Long Be That. 
 Truth And God Are One,  And The Devil Is The Prince Of Lies. This 
 Philosophy Of Clothes,  Then,  Is Religion And Not _Belles Lettres_. The 
 Reason For Our Sojourn On Earth,  And The Only Ground Of Any Hope For A 
 Further Sojourn Elsewhere,  Is That In god'S Name We Do Battle With The 
 Devil. 
   
   
 The Quest Of Reality Must Obviously Be Wide As The Universe,  But If We 
 Are To Engage In it To Any Purpose We Must Definitely Begin It 
 _Somewhere_. A Treatise On Reality May Easily Be The Most Unreal Of 
 Things--A Mere Battle In the Air. So Long As It Is A Discussion Of 
 Theories It Has This Danger,  And The First Necessity Is To Bring the 
 Search Down To The Region Of Experience And Rigorously Insist On Its 
 Remaining there. For This End The Device Of Biography Is Adopted,  And We 
 See The Meaning of All That Apparent Byplay Of The Six Paper Bags,  And 
 Of The Weissnichtwo Allusions Which Drop As Puzzling fragments Into Book 
 I. The Second Book Is Wholly Biographical. It Is In human Life And 
 Experience That We Must Fight Our Way Through Delusive Appearances To 
 Reality; And Carlyle Constructs A Typical And Immortal Biography. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 83 
 To The Childless Old People,  Andreas And Gretchen Futteral,  Leading 
 Their Sweet Orchard Life,  There Comes,  In the Dusk Of Evening,  A 
 Stranger Of Reverend Aspect--Comes,  And Leaves With Them The "Invaluable 
 Loan" Of The Baby TeufelsdröCkh. Thenceforward,  Beside The Little 
 Kuhbach Stream,  We Watch The Opening out Of A Human Life,  From Infancy 
 To Boyhood,  And From Boyhood To Manhood. The Story Has Been Told A 
 Million Times,  But Never Quite In this Fashion Before. For Rough 
 Delicacy,  For Exquisitely Tender Sternness,  The Biography Is Unique. 
   
   
 From The Sleep Of Mere Infancy The Child Is Awakened to The 
 Consciousness Of Creatorship By The Gift Of Tools With Which To Make 
 Things. Tales Open Up For Him The Long Vistas Of History; And The 
 Stage-Coach With Its Slow Rolling blaze Of Lights Teaches Him Geography, 
 And The Far-Flung Imaginative Suggestiveness Of The Road; While The 
 Annual Cattle-Fair Actually Gathers The Ends Of The Earth About His 
 Wondering eyes,  And Gives Him His First Impression Of The Variety Of 
 Human Life. 
   
 Childhood Brings With It Much That Is Sweet And Gentle,  Flowing on Like 
 The Little Kuhbach; And Yet Suggests Far Thoughts Of Time And Eternity, 
 Concerning which We Are Evidently To Hear More Before The End. The 
 Formal Education He Receives--That "Wood And Leather Education"--Calls 
 Forth Only Protest. But The Development Of His Spirit Proceeds In spite 
 Of It. So Far As The Passive Side Of Character Goes,  He Does 
 Excellently. On The Active Side Things Go Not So Well. Already He Begins 
 To Chafe At The Restraints Of Obedience,  And The Youthful Spirit Is 
 Beating against Its Bars. The Stupidities Of An Education Which Only 
 Appeals To The One Faculty Of Memory,  And To That Mainly By Means Of 
 Birch-Rods,  Increase The Rebellion,  And The Sense Of Restraint Is 
 Brought To A Climax When At Last Old Andreas Dies. Then "The Dark 
 Bottomless Abyss,  That Lies Under Our Feet,  Had Yawned open; The Pale 
 Kingdoms Of Death,  With All Their Innumerable Silent Nations And 
 Generations,  Stood Before Him; The Inexorable Word Never! Now 
 First Showed its Meaning." 
   
 The Youth Is Now Ready To Enter,  As Such A One Inevitably Must,  Upon The 
 Long And Losing battle Of Faith And Doubt. He Is At The Theorising stage 
 As Yet,  Not Having learned to Make Anything,  But Only To Discuss Things. 
 And Yet The Time Is Not Wasted if The Mind Have Been Taught To Think. 
 For "Truly A Thinking man Is The Worst Enemy The Prince Of Darkness Can 
 Have." 
   
   
 The Immediate Consequence And Employment Of This Unripe Time Of 
 Half-Awakened manhood Is,  However,  Unsatisfactory Enough. There Is Much 
 Reminiscence Of Early Edinburgh Days,  With Their Law Studies,  And 
 Tutoring,  And Translating,  In teufelsdröCkh'S Desultory Period. The 
 Climax Of It Is In those Scornful Sentences About Aesthetic Teas,  To 
 Which The Hungry Lion Was Invited,  That He Might Feed on Chickweed--Well 
 For All Concerned if It Did Not End In his Feeding on The Chickens 
 Instead! It Is An Unwholesome Time With The Lad--A Time Of Sullen 
 Contempt Alternating with Loud Rebellion,  Of Mingled vanity And 
 Self-Indulgence,  And Of Much Sheer Devilishness Of Temper. 
   
   
 Upon This Exaggerated and Most Disagreeable Period,  Lit By "Red streaks 
 Of Unspeakable Grandeur,  Yet Also In the Blackness Of Darkness," There 
 Comes Suddenly The Master Passion Of Romantic Love. Had This Adventure 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 84 
 Proved successful,  We Should Have Simply Had The Old Story,  Which Ends 
 In "So They Lived happily Ever After." What The Net Result Of All The 
 Former Strivings After Truth And Freedom Would Have Been,  We Need not 
 Inquire. For This Is Another Story,  Equally Old And To The End Of Time 
 Ever Newly Repeated. There Is Much Of Werther In it,  And Still More Of 
 Jean Paul Richter. Its Finest English Counterpart Is Longfellow'S 
 _Hyperion_--The Most Beautiful Piece Of Our Literature,  Surely,  That Has 
 Ever Been Forgotten--In Which Richter'S Story Lives Again. But Never Has 
 The Tale Been More Exquisitely Told Than In _Sartor Resartus_. For One 
 Sweet Hour Of Life The Youth Has Been Taken Out Of Himself And Pale 
 Doubt Flees Far Away. Life,  That Has Been But A Blasted heath,  Blooms 
 Suddenly With Unheard-Of Blossoms Of Hope And Of Delight. Then Comes The 
 End. "Their Lips Were Joined,  Their Two Souls,  Like Two Dewdrops,  Rushed 
 Into One,--For The First Time,  And For The Last! Thus Was TeufelsdröCkh 
 Made Immortal By A Kiss. And Then? Why,  Then--Thick Curtains Of Night 
 Rushed over His Soul,  As Rose The Immeasurable Crash Of Doom; And 
 Through The Ruins As Of A Shivered universe Was He Falling,  Falling, 
 Towards The Abyss." 
   
   
 The Sorrows Of TeufelsdröCkh Are But Too Well Known. Flung Back Upon His 
 Former Dishevelment Of Mind From So Great And Calm A Height,  The Crash 
 Must Necessarily Be Terrible. Yet He Will Not Take Up His Life Where He 
 Left It To Follow Blumine. Such An Hour Inevitably Changes A Man,  For 
 Better Or For Worse. There Is At Least A Dignity About Him Now,  Even 
 While The "Nameless Unrest" Urges Him Forward Through His Darkened 
 World. The Scenes Of His Childhood In the Little Entepfuhl Bring no 
 Consolation. Nature,  Even In his Wanderings Among Her Mountains,  Is 
 Equally Futile,  For The Wanderer Can Never Escape From His Own Shadow 
 Among Her Solitudes. Yet Is His Nature Not Dissolved,  But Only 
 "Compressed closer," As It Were,  And We Watch The Next Stage Of This 
 Development With A Sense That Some Mysteriously Great And Splendid 
 Experience Is On The Eve Of Being born. 
   
 Thus We Come To Those Three Central Chapters--Chapters So Fundamental 
 And So True To Human Life,  That It Is Safe To Prophesy That They Will Be 
 Familiar So Long As Books Are Read Upon The Earth--"The Everlasting no," 
 "Centre Of Indifference" And "The Everlasting yea." 
   
 In "The Everlasting no" We Watch The Work Of Negation Upon The Soul Of 
 Man. His Life Has Capitulated to The Spirit That Denies,  And The 
 Unbelief Is As Bitter As It Is Hopeless. "Doubt Had Darkened into 
 Unbelief; Shade After Shade Goes Grimly Over Your Soul,  Till You Have 
 The Fixed,  Starless,  Tartarean Black." "Is There No God,  Then; But At 
 Best An Absentee God,  Sitting idle,  Ever Since The First Sabbath,  At The 
 Outside Of His Universe,  And _Seeing_ It Go? Has The Word Duty No 
 Meaning?" 
   
   
 "Thus Has The Bewildered wanderer To Stand,  As So Many Have Done, 
 Shouting question After Question Into The Sibyl-Cave Of Destiny,  And 
 Receive No Answer But An Echo." Faith,  Indeed,  Lies Dormant But Alive 
 Beneath The Doubt. But In the Meantime The Man'S Own Weakness Paralyses 
 Action; And,  While This Paralysis Lasts,  All Faith Appears To Have 
 Departed. He Has Ceased to Believe In himself,  And To Believe In his 
 Friends. "The Very Devil Has Been Pulled down,  You Cannot So Much As 
 Believe In a Devil. To Me The Universe Was All Void Of Life,  Of Purpose, 
 Of Volition,  Even Of Hostility: It Was One Huge,  Dead,  Immeasurable 
 Steam-Engine,  Rolling on,  In its Dead Indifference,  To Grind Men Limb 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 85 
 From Limb. O,  The Vast,  Gloomy,  Solitary Golgotha,  And Mill Of Death!" 
   
   
 He Is Saved from Suicide Simply By The After-Shine Of Christianity. 
 The Religion Of His Fathers Lingers,  No Longer As A Creed,  But As A 
 Powerful Set Of Associations And Emotions. It Is A Small Thing to Cling 
 To Amid The Wrack Of A Man'S Universe; Yet It Holds Until The Appearance 
 Of A New Phase In which He Is To Find Escape From The Prison-House. He 
 Has Begun To Realise That Fear--A Nameless Fear Of He Knows Not 
 What--Has Taken Hold Upon Him. "I Lived in a Continual,  Indefinite, 
 Pining fear; Tremulous,  Pusillanimous." Fear Affects Men In widely 
 Different Ways. We Have Seen How This Same Vague "Sense Of Enemies" 
 Obsessed the Youthful Spirit Of Marius The Epicurean,  Until It Cleared 
 Itself Eventually Into The Conscience Of A Christian Man. But 
 TeufelsdröCkh Is Prouder And More Violent Of Spirit Than The Sedate And 
 Patrician Roman,  And He Leaps At The Throat Of Fear In a Wild Defiance. 
 "What _Art_ Thou Afraid Of? Wherefore,  Like A Coward,  Dost Thou Forever 
 Pip And Whimper,  And Go Cowering and Trembling? Despicable Biped! What 
 Is The Sum-Total Of The Worst That Lies Before Thee? Death? Well,  Death: 
 And Say The Pangs Of Tophet Too,  And All That The Devil And Man May, 
 Will Or Can Do Against Thee! Hast Thou Not A Heart; Canst Thou Not 
 Suffer Whatsoever It Be; And,  As A Child Of Freedom,  Though Outcast, 
 Trample Tophet Itself Under Thy Feet,  While It Consumes Thee? Let It 
 Come,  Then; I Will Meet It And Defy It!" 
   
 This Is No Permanent Or Stable Resting-Place,  But It Is The Beginning of 
 Much. It Is The Assertion Of Self In indignation And Wild Defiance, 
 Instead Of The Former Misery Of A Man Merely Haunted by Himself. This Is 
 That "Baphometic Fire-Baptism" Or New-Birth Of Spiritual Awakening, 
 Which Is The Beginning of True Manhood. The Everlasting no Had Said: 
 "Behold,  Thou Art Fatherless,  Outcast,  And The Universe Is Mine (The 
 Devil'S); To Which My Whole Me Now Made Answer: I Am Not Thine,  But 
 Free,  And Forever Hate Thee!" 
   
 The Immediate Result Of This Awakening is Told In "Centre Of 
 Indifference"--_I.E._,  Indifference To Oneself,  One'S Own Feelings,  And 
 Even To Fate. It Is The Transition From Subjective To Objective 
 Interests,  From Eating one'S Own Heart Out To A Sense Of The Wide And 
 Living world By Which One Is Surrounded. It Is The Same Process Which, 
 Just About This Time,  Robert Browning was Describing in _Paracelsus_ And 
 _Sordello_. Once More TeufelsdröCkh Travels,  But This Time How 
 Differently! Instead Of Being absorbed by The Haunting shadow Of 
 Himself,  He Sees The World Full Of Vital Interests--Cities Of Men, 
 Tilled fields,  Books,  Battlefields. The Great Questions Of The 
 World--The True Meanings Alike Of Peace And War--Claim His Interest. The 
 Great Men,  Whether Goethe Or Napoleon,  Do Their Work Before His 
 Astonished eyes. "Thus Can The Professor,  At Least In lucid Intervals, 
 Look Away From His Own Sorrows,  Over The Many-Coloured world,  And 
 Pertinently Enough Note What Is Passing there." He Has 
 Reached--Strangely Enough Through Self-Assertion--The Centre Of 
 Indifference To Self,  And Of Interest In other People And Things. And 
 The Supreme Lesson Of It All Is The Value Of _Efficiency_. Napoleon "Was 
 A Divine Missionary,  Though Unconscious Of It; And Preached,  Through The 
 Cannon'S Throat,  That Great Doctrine,  _La CarrièRe Ouverte Aux Talens_ 
 (The Tools To Him That Can Handle Them)." 
   
   
 This Bracing doctrine Carries Us At Once Into The Everlasting yea. It Is 
 Not Enough That A Man Pass From The Morbid And Self-Centered mood To An 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 86 
 Interest In the Outward World That Surrounds Him. That Might Transform 
 Him Simply Into A Curious But Heartless Dilettante,  A Mere Tourist Of 
 The Spirit,  Whose Sole Desire Is To See And To Take Notes. But That 
 Could Never Satisfy Carlyle; For That Is But Self-Indulgence In its More 
 Refined form Of The Lust Of The Eyes. It Was Not For This That The 
 Everlasting no Had Set TeufelsdröCkh Wailing,  Nor For This That He Had 
 Risen Up In wrath And Bidden Defiance To Fear. From His Temptation In 
 The Wilderness The Son Of Man Must Come Forth,  Not To Wander 
 Open-Mouthed about The Plain,  But To Work His Way "Into The Higher 
 Sunlit Slopes Of That Mountain Which Has No Summit,  Or Whose Summit Is 
 In Heaven Only." 
   
   
 In Other Words,  A Great Compassion For His Fellow-Men Has Come Upon Him. 
 "With Other Eyes,  Too,  Could I Now Look Upon My Fellow-Man: With An 
 Infinite Love,  An Infinite Pity. Poor,  Wandering,  Wayward Man! Art Thou 
 Not Tried,  And Beaten With Stripes,  Even As I Am? Ever,  Whether Thou 
 Bear The Royal Mantle Or The Beggar'S Gabardine,  Art Thou Not So Weary, 
 So Heavy-Laden; And Thy Bed of Rest Is But A Grave. O My Brother,  My 
 Brother,  Why Cannot I Shelter Thee In my Bosom,  And Wipe Away All Tears 
 From Thy Eyes!" The Words Remind Us Of The Famous Passage,  Occurring 
 Early In the Book,  Which Describes The Professor'S Watchtower. It Was 
 Suggested by The Close-Packed streets Of Edinburgh'S Poorer Quarter,  As 
 Seen From The Slopes Of The Hills Which Stand Close On Her Eastern Side. 
 Probably No Passage Ever Written Has So Vividly And Suggestively Massed 
 Together The Various And Contradictory Aspects Of The Human Tragedy. 
   
 One More Question,  However,  Has Yet To Be Answered before We Have Solved 
 Our Problem. What About Happiness? We All Cry Aloud For It,  And Make Its 
 Presence Or Absence The Criterion For Judging the Worth Of Days. 
 TeufelsdröCkh Goes To The Heart Of The Matter With His Usual Directness. 
 It Is This Search For Happiness Which Is The Explanation Of All The 
 Unwholesomeness That Culminated in the Everlasting no. "Because The 
 Thou (Sweet Gentleman) Is Not Sufficiently Honoured,  Nourished, 
 Soft-Bedded,  And Lovingly Cared-For? Foolish Soul! What Act Of 
 Legislature Was There That _Thou_ Shouldst Be Happy? A Little While Ago 
 Thou Hadst No Right To _Be_ At All. What If Thou Wert Born And 
 Predestined not To Be Happy,  But To Be Unhappy! Art Thou Nothing other 
 Than A Vulture,  Then,  That Fliest Through The Universe Seeking after 
 Somewhat To _Eat_; And Shrieking dolefully Because Carrion Enough Is Not 
 Given Thee? Close Thy _Byron_; Open Thy _Goethe_." In effect,  Happiness 
 Is A Relative Term,  Which We Can Alter As We Please By Altering the 
 Amount Which We Demand From Life. "Fancy That Thou Deservest To Be 
 Hanged (As Is Most Likely),  Thou Wilt Feel It Happiness To Be Only Shot: 
 Fancy That Thou Deservest To Be Hanged in a Hair-Halter,  It Will Be A 
 Luxury To Die In hemp." 
   
   
 Such Teaching is Neither Sympathetic Enough Nor Positive Enough To Be Of 
 Much Use To Poor Mortals Wrestling with Their Deepest Problems. Yet In 
 The Very Negation Of Happiness He Discovers A Positive Religion--The 
 Religion Of The Cross,  The Worship Of Sorrow. Expressed crudely,  This 
 Seems To Endorse The Ascetic Fallacy Of The Value Of Self-Denial For Its 
 Own Sake. But From That It Is Saved by The Divine Element In sorrow 
 Which Christ Has Brought--"Love Not Pleasure; Love God. This Is The 
 Everlasting yea,  Wherein All Contradiction Is Solved: Wherein 
 Whoso Walks And Works,  It Is Well With Him." 
   
 This Still Leaves Us Perilously Near To Morbidness. The Worship Of 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 87 
 Sorrow Might Well Be But A Natural And Not Less Morbid Reaction From The 
 Former Morbidness,  The Worship Of Self And Happiness. From That, 
 However,  It Is Saved by The Word "Works," Which Is Spoken With Emphasis 
 In This Connection. So We Pass To The Last Phase Of The Everlasting yea, 
 In Which We Return To The Thesis Upon Which We Began,  Viz.,  That "Doubt 
 Of Any Sort Cannot Be Removed except By Action." "Do The Duty Which 
 _Lies Nearest Thee_,  Which Thou Knowest To Be A Duty! Thy Second Duty 
 Will Already Have Become Clearer.... Yes Here,  In this Poor,  Miserable, 
 Hampered,  Despicable Actual,  Wherein Thou Even Now Standest,  Here Or 
 Nowhere Is Thy Ideal; Work It Out Therefrom; And Working,  Believe,  Live, 
 Be Free.... Produce! Produce! Were It But The Pitifullest Infinitesimal 
 Fraction Of A Product,  Produce It,  In god'S Name! 'Tis The Utmost Thou 
 Hast In thee; Out With It,  Then. Up,  Up! Whatsoever Thy Hand Findeth To 
 Do,  Do It With Thy Whole Might. Work While It Is Called today; For The 
 Night Cometh,  Wherein No Man Can Work." 
   
   
 Thus The Goal Of Human Destiny Is Not Any Theory,  However True; Not Any 
 Happiness,  However Alluring. It Is For Practical Purposes That The 
 Universe Is Built,  And He Who Would Be "In Tune With The Universe" Must 
 First And Last Be Practical. In various Forms This Doctrine Has 
 Reappeared and Shown Itself Potent. Ritschl Based his System On 
 Practical Values In religion,  And Professor William James Has Proclaimed 
 The Same Doctrine In a Still Wider Application In his Pragmatism. The 
 Essential Element In both Systems Is That They Lay The Direct Stress Of 
 Life,  Not Upon Abstract Theory But Upon Experience And Vital Energy. 
 This Transference From Theorising and Emotionalism To The Prompt And 
 Vigorous Exercise Of Will Upon The Immediate Circumstance,  Is Carlyle'S 
 Understanding of The Word Conversion. 
   
 When It Comes To The Particular Question Of What Work The Professor Is 
 To Do,  The Answer Is That He Has Within Him The Word Omnipotent,  Waiting 
 For A Man To Speak It Forth. And Here In this Volume Upon Clothes,  This 
 _Sartor Resartus_,  Is His Deliberate Response To The Great Demand. At 
 First He Seems Here To Relapse From The High Seriousness Of The Chapters 
 We Have Just Been Reading,  And To Come With Too Great Suddenness To 
 Earth Again. Yet That Is Not The Case; For,  As We Shall See,  The Rest Of 
 The Volume Is The Attempt To Reconstruct The Universe On The Principles 
 He Has Discovered within His Own Experience. The Story To Which We Have 
 Been Listening is TeufelsdröCkh'S Way Of Discovering reality; Now We Are 
 To Have The Statement Of It On The Wider Planes Of Social And Other 
 Philosophy. This We Shall Briefly Review,  But The Gist Of The Book Is In 
 What We Have Already Found. To Most Readers The Quotations Must Have 
 Been Old And Well-Remembered friends. Yet They Will Pardon The 
 Reappearance Of Them Here,  For They Have Been Amongst The Most Powerful 
 Of All WingéD Words Spoken In england For Centuries. The Reason For The 
 Popularity Of The Book Is That These Biographical Chapters Are The 
 Record Of Normal And Typical Human Experience. This,  Or Something like 
 This,  Will Repeat Itself So Long As Human Nature Lasts; And Men,  Grown 
 Discouraged with The Mystery And Bewilderment Of Life,  Will Find Heart 
 From These Chapters To Start "Once More On Their Adventure,  Brave And 
 New." 
   
   
 This,  Then,  Is TeufelsdröCkh'S Reconstruction Of The World; And The 
 World Of Each One Of Us Requires Some Such Reconstruction. For Life Is 
 Full Of Deceptive Outward Appearances,  From Which It Is The Task Of 
 Every Man To Come Back In his Own Way To The Realities Within. The 
 Shining example Of Such Reconstruction Is That Of George Fox,  Who Sewed 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 88 
 Himself A Suit Of Leather And Went Out To The Woods With It--"Every 
 Stitch Of His Needle Pricking into The Heart Of Slavery,  And 
 World-Worship,  And The Mammon God." The Leather Suit Is An Allegory Of 
 The Whole. The Appearances Of Men And Things Are But The Fantastic 
 Clothes With Which They Cover Their Nakedness. They Take These Clothes 
 Of Theirs To Be Themselves,  And The First Duty And Only Hope Of A Man Is 
 To Divest Himself Of All Such Coverings,  And Discover What Manner Of Man 
 He Really Is. 
   
   
 This Process Of Divesting,  However,  May Yield Either Of Two Results. A 
 Man May Take,  For The Reality Of Himself,  Either The Low View Of Human 
 Nature,  In which Man Is But "A Forked straddling animal With Bandy 
 Legs," Or The High View,  In which He Is A Spirit,  And Unutterable 
 Mystery Of Mysteries. It Is The Latter View Which Thomas Carlyle 
 Champions,  Through This And Many Other Volumes,  Against The 
 Materialistic Thought Of His Time. 
   
   
 The Chapter On Dandies Is A Most Extraordinary Attack On The Keeping up 
 Of Appearances. The Dandy Is He Who Not Only Keeps Up Appearances But 
 Actually Worships Them. He Is Their Advocate And Special Pleader. His 
 Very Office And Function Is To Wear Clothes. Here We Have The Illusion 
 Stripped from Much That We Have Taken For Reality. Sectarianism Is A 
 Prominent Example Of It,  The Reading of Fashionable Novels Is Another. 
 In The Former Two Are Seen The Robes Of Eternity Flung Over One Very 
 Vulgar Form Of Self-Worship,  And In the Latter The Robe Of Fashionable 
 Society Is Flung Over Another. The Reality Of Man'S Intercourse With 
 Eternity And With His Fellow-Men Has Died within These Vestures,  But The 
 Eyes Of The Public Are Satisfied,  And Never Guess The Corpse Within. 
 Sectarianism And Vanity Fair Are But Common Forms Of Self-Worship,  In 
 Which Every One Is Keeping up Appearances,  And Is So Intent Upon That 
 Exercise That All Thought Of Reality Has Vanished. 
   
 A Shallower Philosopher Would Have Been Content With Exposing these And 
 Other Shams; And Consequently His Philosophy Would Have Led nowhere. 
 Carlyle Is A Greater Thinker,  And One Who Takes A Wider View. He Is No 
 Enemy Of Clothes,  Although Fools Have Put Them To Wrong Uses And Made 
 Them The Instruments Of Deception. His Choice Is Not Between Worshipping 
 And Abandoning the World And Its Appearances. He Will Frankly Confess 
 The Value Of It And Of Its Vesture,  And So We Have The Chapter On 
 Adamitism,  In defence Of Clothes,  Which Acknowledges In great And 
 Ingenious Detail The Many Uses Of The Existing order Of Institutions. 
 But Still,  Through All Such Acknowledgment,  We Are Reminded constantly 
 Of The Main Truth. All Appearance Is For The Sake Of Reality,  And All 
 Tools For Expressing the Worker. When The Appearance Becomes A 
 Substitute For The Reality,  And The Tools Absorb The Attention That 
 Should Be Devoted to The Work For Whose Accomplishment They Exist,  Then 
 We Have Relapsed into The Fundamental Human Error. The Object Of The 
 Book Is To Plunge Back From Appearance To Reality,  From Clothes To Him 
 Who Wears Them. "Who Am I? What Is This Me?... Some Embodied, 
 Visualised idea In the Eternal Mind." 
   
   
 This Swift Retreat Upon Reality Occurs At Intervals Throughout The Whole 
 Book,  And In connection With Every Conceivable Department Of Human Life 
 And Interest. In many Parts There Is Little Attempt At Sequence Or 
 Order. The Author Has Made Voluminous Notes On Men And Things,  And The 
 Whole Fantastic Structure Of _Sartor Resartus_ Is A Device For 
 Introducing these Disjointedly. In the Remainder Of This Lecture We 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 89 
 Shall Select And Displace Freely,  In order To Present The Main Teachings 
 Of The Book In manageable Groups. 
   
   
 1. _Language And Thought._--Language Is The Natural Garment Of Thoughts, 
 And While Sometimes It Performs Its Function Of Revealing them,  It Often 
 Conceals Them. Many People'S Whole Intellectual Life Is Spent In dealing 
 With Words,  And They Never Penetrate To The Thoughts At All. Still More 
 Commonly,  People Get Lost Among Words,  Especially Words Which Have Come 
 To Be Used metaphorically,  And Again Fail To Penetrate To The Thought. 
 Thus The _Name_ Is The First Garment Wrapped around The Essential 
 Me; And All Speech,  Whether Of Science,  Poetry,  Or Politics,  Is 
 Simply An Attempt At Right Naming. The Names By Which We Call Things Are 
 Apt To Become Labelled pigeon-Holes In which We Bury Them. Having 
 Catalogued and Indexed our Facts,  We Lose Sight Of Them Thenceforward, 
 And Think And Speak In terms Of The Catalogue. If You Are A Liberal,  It 
 Is Possible That All You May Know Or Care To Know About Conservatism Is 
 The Name. Nay,  Having catalogued yourself A Liberal,  You May Seldom Even 
 Find It Necessary To Inquire What The Significance Of Liberalism Really 
 Is. If You Happen To Be A Conservative,  The Corresponding risks Will 
 Certainly Not Be Less. 
   
 The Dangers Of These Word-Garments,  And The Habit Of Losing all Contact 
 With Reality In our Constant Habit Of Living among Mere Words,  Naturally 
 Suggest To Carlyle His Favourite Theme--A Plea For Silence. We All Talk 
 Too Much,  And The First Lesson We Have To Learn On Our Way To Reality Is 
 To Be Oftener Silent. This Duty Of Silence,  As Has Been Wittily 
 Remarked,  Carlyle Preaches In thirty-Seven Volumes Of Eloquent English 
 Speech. "Silence And Secrecy! Altars Might Still Be Raised to Them (Were 
 This An Altar-Building time) For Universal Worship. Silence Is The 
 Element In which Great Things Fashion Themselves Together; That At 
 Length They May Emerge,  Full-Formed and Majestic,  Into The Daylight Of 
 Life,  Which They Are Thenceforth To Rule.... Nay,  In thy Own Mean 
 Perplexities,  Do Thou Thyself But _Hold Thy Tongue For One Day_: On The 
 Morrow How Much Clearer Are Thy Purposes And Duties." Andreas,  In his 
 Old Camp-Sentinel Days,  Once Challenged the Emperor Himself With The 
 Demand For The Password. "Schweig,  Hund!" Replied frederich; And 
 Andreas,  Telling the Tale In after Years Would Add,  "There Is What I 
 Call A King." 
   
 Yet Silence May Be As Devoid Of Reality As Words,  And Most Minds Require 
 Something external To Quicken Thought And Fill Up The Emptiness Of Their 
 Silences. So We Have Symbols,  Whose Doctrine Is Here Most Eloquently 
 Expounded. Man Is Not Ruled by Logic But By Imagination,  And A Thousand 
 Thoughts Will Rise At The Call Of Some Well-Chosen Symbol. In itself It 
 May Be The Poorest Of Things,  With No Intrinsic Value At All--A Clouted 
 Shoe,  An Iron Crown,  A Flag Whose Market Value May Be Almost Nothing. 
 Yet Such A Thing may So Work Upon Men'S Silences As To Fill Them With 
 The Glimmer Of A Divine Idea. 
   
   
 Other Symbols There Are Which _Have_ Intrinsic Value--Works Of Art, 
 Lives Of Heroes,  Death Itself,  In all Of Which We May See Eternity 
 Working through Time,  And Become Aware Of Reality Amid The Passing 
 Shows. Religious Symbols Are The Highest Of All,  And Highest Among These 
 Stands Jesus Of Nazareth. "Higher Has The Human Thought Not Yet Reached: 
 This Is Christianity And Christendom; A Symbol Of Quite Perennial, 
 Infinite Character; Whose Significance Will Ever Demand To Be Anew 
 Enquired into,  And Anew Made Manifest." In other Words,  Jesus Stands For 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 90 
 All That Is Permanently Noble And Permanently Real In human Life. 
   
 Such Symbols As Have Intrinsic Value Are Indeed perennial. Time At 
 Length Effaces The Others; They Lose Their Associations,  And Become But 
 Meaningless Lumber. But These Significant Works And Personalities Can 
 Never Grow Effete. They Tell Their Own Story To The Succeeding 
 Generations,  Blessing them With Visions Of Reality And Preserving them 
 From The Babel Of Meaningless Words. 
   
   
 2. _Body And Spirit._--Souls Are "Rendered visible In bodies That Took 
 Shape And Will Lose It,  Melting into Air." Thus Bodies,  And Not Spirits, 
 Are The True Apparitions,  The Souls Being the Realities Which They Both 
 Reveal And Hide. In fact,  Body Is Literally A Garment Of Flesh--A 
 Garment Which The Soul Has For A Time Put On,  But Which It Will Lay 
 Aside Again. One Of The Greatest Of All The Idolatries Of Appearance Is 
 Our Constant Habit Of Judging one Another By The Attractiveness Of The 
 Bodily Vesture. Many Of The Judgments Which We Pass Upon Our Fellows 
 Would Be Reversed if We Trained ourselves To Look Through The Vestures 
 Of Flesh To The Men Themselves--The Souls That Are Hidden Within. 
   
 The Natural Expansion Of This Is In the General Doctrine Of Matter And 
 Spirit. Purely Material Science--Science Which Has Lost The Faculty Of 
 Wonder And Of Spiritual Perception--Is No True Science At All. It Is But 
 A Pair Of Spectacles Without An Eye. For All Material Things Are But 
 Emblems Of Spiritual Things--Shadows Or Images Of Things In the 
 Heavens--And Apart From These They Have No Reality At All. 
   
 3. _Society And Social Problems._--It Follows Naturally That A Change 
 Must Come Upon Our Ways Of Regarding the Relations Of Man To Man. If 
 Every Man Is Indeed a Temple Of The Divine,  And Therefore To Be Revered, 
 Then Much Of Our Accepted estimates And Standards Of Social Judgment 
 Will Have To Be Abandoned. Society,  As It Exists,  Is Founded on Class 
 Distinctions Which Largely Consist In the Exaltation Of Idleness And 
 Wealth. Against This We Have Much Eloquent Protest. "Venerable To Me Is 
 The Hard Hand; Crooked,  Coarse; Wherein Notwithstanding lies A Cunning 
 Virtue,  Indefeasibly Royal,  As Of The Sceptre Of This Planet. Venerable 
 Too Is The Rugged face,  All Weather-Tanned,  Besoiled,  With Its Rude 
 Intelligence; For It Is The Face Of A Man Living man Like." How Far Away 
 We Are From All This With Our Mammon-Worship And Our Fantastic Social 
 Unrealities,  Every Student Of Our Times Must Know,  Or At Least Must Have 
 Often Heard. He Would Not Have Heard It So Often,  However,  Had Not 
 Thomas Carlyle Cried it Out With That Harsh Voice Of His,  In this And 
 Many Others Of His Books. It Was His Gunpowder,  More Than Any Other 
 Explosive Of The Nineteenth Century,  That Broke Up The Immense 
 Complacency Into Which Half England Always Tends To Relapse. 
   
   
 He Is Not Hopeless Of The Future Of Society. Society Is The True 
 Phoenix,  Ever Repeating the Miracle Of Its Resurrection From The Ashes 
 Of The Former Fire. There Are Indestructible Elements In the Race Of 
 Man--"Organic Filaments" He Calls Them--Which Bind Society Together,  And 
 Which Ensure A Future For The Race After Any Past,  However Lamentable. 
 Those "Organic Filaments" Are Carlyle'S Idea Of Social Reality--The Real 
 Things Which Survive All Revolution. There Are Four Such Realities Which 
 Ensure The Future For Society Even When It Seems Extinct. 
   
   
 First,  There Is The Fact Of Man'S Brotherhood To Man--A Fact Quite 
 Independent Of Man'S Willingness To Acknowledge That Brotherhood. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I)   Lecture vii  (Sartor Resartus) Pg 91 
 Second,  There Is The Common Bond Of Tradition,  And All Our Debt To The 
 Past,  Which Is A Fact Equally Independent Of Our Willingness To 
 Acknowledge It. Third,  There Is The Natural And Inevitable Fact Of Man'S 
 Necessity For Reverencing some One Above Him. Obedience And Reverence 
 Are Forthcoming,  Whenever Man Is In the Presence Of What He _Ought_ To 
 Reverence,  And So Hero-Worship Is Secure. 
   
   
 These Three Bonds Of Social Reality Are Inseparable From One Another. 
 The First,  The Brotherhood Of Man,  Has Often Been Used as The Watchword 
 Of A False Independence. It Is Only Possible On The Condition Of 
 Reverence And Obedience For That Which Is Higher Than Oneself,  Either In 
 The Past Or The Present. "Suspicion Of 'Servility,' Of Reverence For 
 Superiors,  The Very Dog-Leech Is Anxious To Disavow. Fools! Were Your 
 Superiors Worthy To Govern,  And You Worthy To Obey,  Reverence For Them 
 Were Even Your Only Possible Freedom." These Three,  Then,  Are The Social 
 Realities,  And All Other Social Distinctions And Conventionalities Are 
 But Clothes,  To Be Replaced or Thrown Away At Need. 
   
   
 But There Is A Fourth Bond Of Social Reality--The Greatest And Most 
 Powerful Of All. That Reality Is Religion. Here,  Too,  We Must 
 Distinguish Clothes From That Which They Cover--Forms Of Religion From 
 Religion Itself. Church-Clothes,  Indeed,  Are As Necessary As Any Other 
 Clothes,  And They Will Harm No One Who Remembers That They Are But 
 Clothes,  And Distinguishes Between Faith And Form. The Old Forms Are 
 Already Being discarded,  Yet Religion Is So Vital That It Will Always 
 Find New Forms For Itself,  Suited to The New Age. For Religion,  In one 
 Form Or In another,  Is Absolutely Essential To Society; And,  Being a 
 Grand Reality,  Will Continue To Keep Society From Collapse. 
   
 4. From This We Pass Naturally To The Great And Final Doctrine In which 
 The Philosophy Of Clothes Is Expounded. That Doctrine,  Condensed into A 
 Single Sentence,  Is That "The Whole Universe Is The Garment Of God." 
 This Brings Us Back To The Song Of The _Erdgeist_ In goethe'S _Faust_:-- 
   
      "In Being'S Floods,  In action'S Storm, 
      I Walk And Work,  Above,  Beneath, 
      Work And Weave In endless Motion! 
              Birth And Death, 
              An Infinite Ocean; 
              A Seizing and Giving 
              The Fire Of Living: 
      'Tis Thus At The Roaring loom Of Time I Ply, 
      And Weave For God The Garment Thou Seest Him By." 
   
   
 This Is,  Of Course,  No Novelty Invented by Goethe. We Find It In marius 
 The Epicurean,  And He Found It In ancient Wells Of Greek Philosophy. 
 Carlyle'S Use Of It Has Often Been Taken For Pantheism. In so Mystic A 
 Region It Is Impossible To Expect Precise Theological Definition,  And 
 Yet It Is Right To Remember That Carlyle Does Not Identify The Garment 
 With Its Wearer. The Whole Argument Of The Book Is To Distinguish 
 Appearance From Reality In every Instance,  And This Is No Exception. 
 "What Is Nature? Ha! Why Do I Not Name Thee God? Art Thou Not The 
 'Living garment Of God'? O Heavens,  Is It In very Deed he,  Then,  That 
 Ever Speaks Through Thee? That Lives And Loves In thee,  That Lives And 
 Loves In me?... The Universe Is Not Dead And Demoniacal,  A Charnel-House 
 With Spectres: But Godlike And My Father'S." "This Fair Universe,  Were 
 It In the Meanest Province Thereof,  Is In very Deed the Star-Domed city 
 
 
 
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 Of God; Through Every Star,  Through Every Grass-Blade,  And Most 
 Through Every Living soul,  The Glory Of A Present God Still Beams. But 
 Nature,  Which Is The Time-Vesture Of God,  And Reveals Him To The Wise, 
 Hides Him From The Foolish." 
   
   
 Such Is Some Very Broken Sketch Of This Great Book. It Will At Least 
 Serve To Recall To The Memory Of Some Readers Thoughts And Words Which 
 Long Ago Stirred their Blood In youth. No Volume Could So Fitly Be 
 Chosen As A Background Against Which To View The Modern Surge Of The 
 Age-Long Battle. But The Charm Of _Sartor Resartus_ Is,  After All, 
 Personal. We Go Back To The Life-Story Of TeufelsdröCkh,  Out Of Which 
 Such Varied and Such Lofty Teachings Sprang,  And We Read It Over And 
 Over Again Because We Find In it So Much That Is Our Own Story Too. 
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture viii  (Pagan Reactions) Pg 93 
 In The Last Lecture We Began The Study Of The Modern Aspects Of Our 
 Subject With Carlyle'S _Sartor Resartus_. Now,  In a Rapid Sketch,  We 
 Shall Look At Some Of The Writings Which Followed that Great Book; And, 
 With It As Background,  We Shall See Them In stronger Relief. It Is 
 Impossible To Over-Estimate The Importance Of The Influence Which Was 
 Wielded by Carlyle,  And Especially By His _Sartor Resartus_. His Was A 
 Gigantic Power,  Both In literature And In morals. At First,  As We Have 
 Already Noted,  He Met With Neglect And Ridicule In abundance,  But 
 Afterwards These Passed into Sheer Wonder,  And Then Into A Wide And 
 Devoted worship. Everybody Felt His Power,  And All Earnest Thinkers Were 
 Seized in the Strong Grip Of Reality With Which He Laid Hold Upon His 
 Time. 
   
   
 The Religious Thought And Faith Both Of England And Of Scotland Felt 
 Him,  But His Mark Was Deepest Upon Scotland,  Because Of Two Interesting 
 Facts. First Of All,  Carlyle Represented that Old Calvinism Which Had 
 Always Fitted so Exactly The National Character And Spirit; And Second, 
 There Were In scotland Many People Who,  While Retaining the Calvinistic 
 Spirit,  Had Lost Touch With The Old Definite Creed. Nothing could Be 
 More Characteristic Of Carlyle Than This Calvinism Of The Spirit Which 
 Had Passed beyond The Letter Of The Old Faith. He Stands Like An Old 
 Covenanter In the Mist; And Yet A Covenanter Grasping his Father'S Iron 
 Sword. It Is Because Of These Two Facts _Sartor Resartus_ Has Taken So 
 Prominent A Place In our Literature. It Stands For A Kind Of Conscience 
 Behind The Manifold Modern Life Of Our Day. Beneath The Shrieks And The 
 Laughter Of The Time We Hear In it The Boom Of Great Breakers. Never 
 Again Can We Forget,  Amidst The Gaieties Of Any Island Paradise,  The 
 Solemn Ocean That Surrounds It. Carlyle'S Teaching sounds And Recurs 
 Again And Again Like The Pilgrims' March In _TannhäUser_ Breaking 
 Through The Overture,  And Rivalling until It Vanquishes The Music Of The 
 Venusberg. 
 
 
 
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 Yet It Was Quite Inevitable That There Should Be Strong Reaction From 
 Any Such Work As This. To The Warm Blood And The Poignant Sense Of The 
 Beauty Of The World It Brought A Sense Of Chill,  A Forbidding Sombreness 
 And Austerity. Carlyle's Conception Of Christianity Was That Of The 
 Worship Of Sorrow; And,  While The Essence Of His Gospel Was Labour,  Yet 
 To Many Minds Self-Denial Seemed To Be No Longer Presented,  As In The 
 Teaching Of Jesus,  As A Means Towards The Attainment Of Further 
 Spiritual Ends. It Had Become An End In Itself,  And One That Few Would 
 Desire Or Feel To Be Justified. In The Reaction It Was Felt That 
 Self-Development Had Claims Upon The Human Spirit As Well As 
 Self-Denial,  And Indeed That The Happy Instincts Of Life Had No Right To 
 Be So Winsome Unless They Were Meant To Be Obeyed. The Beauty Of The 
 World Could Not Be Regarded As A Mere Trap For The Tempting Of People, 
 If One Were To Retain Any Worthy Conception Of The Powers That Govern 
 The World. From This Point Of View The Carlylians Appeared To Enter Into 
 Life Maimed. That,  Indeed,  We All Must Do,  As Christ Told Us; But They 
 Seemed To Do It Like The Beggars Of Colombo,  With A Deliberate And 
 Somewhat Indecent Exhibition Of Their Wounds. 
   
   
 Carlyle Found Many Men Around Him Pagan,  Worshipping The Earth Without 
 Any Spiritual Light In Them. He Feared That Many Others Were About To Go 
 In The Same Direction,  So He Cried Aloud That The Earth Was Too Small, 
 And That They Must Find A Larger Object Of Worship. For The Earth He 
 Substituted The Universe,  And Led Men's Eyes Out Among The Immensities 
 And Eternities. Professor James Tells A Story Of Margaret Fuller,  The 
 American Transcendentalist,  Having Said With Folded Hands,  "I Accept The 
 Universe," And How Carlyle,  Hearing This,  Had Answered,  "Gad,  She'd 
 Better!" It Was This Insistence Upon The Universe,  As Distinguished From 
 The Earth,  Which Was The Note Of _Sartor Resartus_. 
   
 The Reactionaries Took Carlyle At His Word. They Said,  "Yes,  We Shall 
 Worship The Universe"; But They Went On To Add That Carlyle's Universe 
 Is Not Universal. It Is At Once Too Vague And Too Austere. There Are 
 Other Elements In Life Besides Those To Which He Called 
 Attention--Elements Very Definite And Not At All Austere--And They Too 
 Have A Place In The Universe And A Claim Upon Our Acceptance. Many Of 
 These Are In Every Way More Desirable To The Type Of Mind That Rebelled 
 Than The Aspects Of The Universe On Which Carlyle Had Insisted,  And So 
 They Went Out Freely Among These Neglected Elements,  Set Them Over 
 Against His Kind Of Idealism,  And Became Themselves Idealists Of Other 
 Sorts. 
   
   
 Matthew Arnold,  The Apostle Of Culture,  Found His Idealism In The Purely 
 Mental Region. Rossetti Was The Idealist Of The Heart,  With Its Whole 
 World Of Emotions,  And That Subtle And Far-Reaching Inter-Play Between 
 Soul And Body For Which Carlyle Had Always Made Too Little Allowance. 
 Mr. H.G. Wells And Mr. Bernard Shaw,  Proclaiming Themselves Idealists Of 
 The Social Order,  Have Been Reaching Conclusions And Teaching Doctrines 
 At Which Carlyle Would Have Stood Aghast. These Are But Random Examples, 
 But They Are One In This,  That Each Has Protested Against That 
 One-Sidedness For Which Carlyle Stood. Yet Each Is A One-Sided Protest, 
 And Falls Again Into The Snare Of Setting The Affections Upon Things 
 Which Are Not Eternal,  And So Wedding Man To The Green Earth Again. 
   
   
 Thus We Find Paganism--In Some Quarters Paganism Quite Openly 
 Confessed--Occupying A Prominent Place In Our Literature To-Day. Before 
 We Examine Some Of Its Aspects In Detail A Word Or Two Of Preliminary 
 
 
 
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 Warning May Be Permissible. It Is A Mistake To Take The Extremer Forms 
 Of This Reaction Too Seriously,  Although At The Present Time This Is 
 Very Frequently Done. One Must Remember That Such A Spirit As This Is To 
 Be Found In Every Age,  And That It Always Creates An Ephemeral 
 Literature Which Imagines Itself To Be A Lasting One. It Is Nothing New. 
 It Is As Old And As Perennial As The Complex Play Of The Human Mind And 
 Human Society. 
   
   
 Another Reason For Not Taking This Phase Too Seriously Is That It Was 
 Quite Inevitable That Some Such Reaction Should Follow Upon The Huge 
 Solemnities Of Carlyle. Just As In Literature,  After The Classic 
 Formality Of Johnson And His Contemporaries,  There Must Come The 
 Reaction Of The Romantic School,  Which Includes Sir Walter Scott,  Byron, 
 And Burns; So Here There Must Be An Inevitable Reaction From Austerity 
 To A Daring Freedom Which Will Take Many Various Forms. From Carlyle's 
 Solemnising Liturgy We Were Bound To Pass To The Slang And Colloquialism 
 Of The Man In The Street And The Woman In The Modern Novel. Body And 
 Spirit Are Always In Unstable Equilibrium,  And An Excess Of Either At 
 Once Swings The Fashion Back To The Other Extreme. Carlyle Had His Day 
 Largely In Consequence Of What One May Call The Eighteenth-Century 
 Glut--The Georgian Society And Its Economics,  And The Byronic Element In 
 Literature. The Later Swing Back Was As Inevitable As Carlyle Had Been. 
 Perhaps It Was Most Clearly Noticed After The Deaths Of Browning And 
 Tennyson,  In The Late Eighties And The Early Nineties. But Both Before 
 And Since That Time It Has Been Very Manifest In England. 
   
 But Beyond All These Things There Is The General Fact That Before Any 
 Literature Becomes Pagan The Land Must First Have Been Paganised. Of 
 Course There Is Always Here Again A Reaction Of Mutual Cause And Effect 
 Between Literature And National Spirit. Carlyle Himself,  In His Doctrine 
 Of Heroes,  Was Continually Telling Us That It Is The Personality Which 
 Produces The _Zeitgeist_,  And Not _Vice Versa_. On The Other Hand It Is 
 Equally Certain That No Personality Is Independent Of His Age And The 
 Backing He Finds In It,  Or The Response Which He May Enlist For His 
 Revolt From It. Both Of These Are True Statements Of The Case; As To 
 Which Is Ultimate,  That Is The Old And Rather Academic Question Of 
 Whether The Oak Or The Acorn Comes First. We Repeat That It Is 
 Impossible,  In This Double Play Of Cause And Effect,  To Say Which Is The 
 Ultimate Cause And Which The Effect. The Controversy Which Was Waged In 
 The Nineteenth Century Between The Schools Of Buckle And Carlyle Is 
 Likely To Go On Indefinitely Through The Future. But What Concerns Us At 
 Present Is This,  That All Paganism Which Finds Expression In A 
 Literature Has Existed In The Age Before It Found That Expression. The 
 Literature Is Indeed To Some Extent The Creator Of The Age,  But To A Far 
 Greater Extent It Is The Expression Of The Age,  Whose Creation Is Due To 
 A Vast Multiplicity Of Causes. 
   
   
 Among These Causes One Of The Foremost Was Political Advance And 
 Freedom--The Political Doctrines,  And The Beginnings Of Socialistic 
 Thought,  Which Had Appeared About The Time When _Sartor Resartus_ Was 
 Written. The Reform Bill Of 1832 Tended To Concentrate Men's Attention 
 Upon Questions Of Material Welfare. Commercial And Industrial Prosperity 
 Followed,  Keeping The Nation Busy With The Earth. In Very Striking 
 Language Lord Morley Describes This Fact,  In Language Specially Striking 
 As Coming From So Eminently Progressive A Man.[4] "Far The Most 
 Penetrating Of All The Influences That Are Impairing The Moral And 
 Intellectual Nerve Of Our Generation,  Remain Still To Be Mentioned. The 
 
 
 
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 First Of Them Is The Immense Increase Of Material Prosperity,  And The 
 Second Is The Immense Decline In Sincerity Of Spiritual Interest. The 
 Evil Wrought By The One Fills Up The Measure Of The Evil Wrought By The 
 Other. We Have Been,  In Spite Of Momentary Declensions,  On A Flood-Tide 
 Of High Profits And A Roaring Trade,  And There Is Nothing Like A Roaring 
 Trade For Engendering Latitudinarians. The Effect Of Many Possessions, 
 Especially If They Be Newly Acquired,  In Slackening Moral Vigour,  Is A 
 Proverb. Our New Wealth Is Hardly Leavened By Any Tradition Of Public 
 Duty Such As Lingers Among The English Nobles,  Nor As Yet By Any Common 
 Custom Of Devotion To Public Causes,  Such As Seems To Live And Grow In 
 The United States. Under Such Conditions,  With New Wealth Come Luxury 
 And Love Of Ease And That Fatal Readiness To Believe That God Has Placed 
 Us In The Best Of Possible Worlds,  Which So Lowers Men's Aims And 
 Unstrings Their Firmness Of Purpose. Pleasure Saps High Interests,  And 
 The Weakening Of High Interests Leaves More Undisputed Room For 
 Pleasure." "The Political Spirit Has Grown To Be The Strongest Element 
 In Our National Life; The Dominant Force,  Extending Its Influence Over 
 All Our Ways Of Thinking In Matters That Have Least To Do With Politics, 
 Or Even Nothing At All To Do With Them. There Has Thus Been Engendered 
 Among Us The Real Sense Of Political Responsibility. In A Corresponding 
 Degree Has Been Discouraged ... The Sense Of Intellectual 
 Responsibility.... Practically,  And As A Matter Of History,  A Society Is 
 Seldom At The Same Time Successfully Energetic Both In Temporals And 
 Spirituals; Seldom Prosperous Alike In Seeking Abstract Truth And 
 Nursing The Political Spirit." 
   
 The Result Of The New Phase Of English Life Was,  On The One Hand, 
 Industrialism With Its Material Values,  And On The Other Hand The 
 Beginnings Of A Socialism Equally Pagan. The Motto Of Both Schools Was 
 That A Man's Life Consisteth In The Abundance Of The Things That He 
 Possesseth,  That You Should Seek First All These Things,  And That The 
 Kingdom Of God And His Righteousness May Be Added Unto You,  If You Have 
 Any Room For Them. Make Yourself Secure Of All These Other Things; Seek 
 Comfort Whether You Be Rich Or Poor; Make This World As Agreeable To 
 Yourself As Your Means Will Allow,  And Seek To Increase Your Means Of 
 Making It Still More Agreeable. After You Have Done All That,  Anything 
 That Is Left Over Will Do For Your Idealism. Your God Can Be Seen To 
 After You Have Abundantly Provided For The Needs Of Your Body. Nothing 
 Could Be More Characteristic Paganism Than This,  Which Makes Material 
 Comfort The Real End Of Life,  And All Spiritual Things A Residual 
 Element. It Is The Story Which Isaiah Tells,  With Such Sublimity Of 
 Sarcasm,  Of The Huntsman And Craftsman Who Warms His Hands And Cries To 
 Himself,  "Aha! I Am Warm. I Have Seen The Fire." He Bakes Bread And 
 Roasts Flesh,  And,  With The Residue Of The Same Log Which He Has Used 
 For Kindling His Fire,  He Maketh A God. So This Modern God Of England, 
 When England Had Become Materialised,  Was Just That Ancient Fire-Worship 
 And Comfort-Worship In Its Nineteenth-Century Phase. In The First Demand 
 Of Life There Is No Thought Of God Or Of Idealism Of Any Kind. These,  If 
 They Appear At All,  Have To Be Made Out Of What Is Left. "Of The Residue 
 He Maketh A God." 
   
 It Is By Insidious Degrees That Materialism Invades A Nation's Life. At 
 First It Attacks The Externals,  Appearing Mainly In The Region Of Work, 
 Wealth,  And Comfort. But,  Unless Some Check Is Put Upon Its Progress,  It 
 Steadily Works Its Way To The Central Depths,  Attacking Love And Sorrow, 
 And Changing Them To Sensuality And Cynicism. Then The Nation's Day Is 
 Over,  And Its Men And Women Are Lost Souls. Many Instances Might Be 
 
 
 
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 Quoted In Which This Progress Has Actually Been Made In The Literature 
 Of England. At Present We Are Only Pointing To The Undoubted Fact That 
 The Forces Of Materialism Have Been At Work Among Us. If Proof Of This 
 Were Needed,  Nothing Could Afford It More Clearly Than Our Loss Of Peace 
 And Dignity In Modern Society. Many Costly Luxuries Have Become 
 Necessities,  And They Have Increased The Pace Of Life To A Rush And Fury 
 Which Makes Business A Turmoil And Social Life A Fever. A Symbolic 
 Embodiment Of This Spirit May Be Seen In The Motor Car And The Aeroplane 
 As They Are Often Used. These Indeed Need Not Be Ministers Of Paganism. 
 The Glory Of Swift Motion And The Mounting Up On Wings As Eagles Reach 
 Very Near To The Spiritual,  If Not Indeed Across Its Borderland,  As 
 Exhilarating And Splendid Stimuli To The Human Spirit. But,  On The Other 
 Hand,  They May Be Merely Instruments For Gratifying That Insane Human 
 Restlessness Which Is But The Craving For New Sensations. Along The 
 Whole Line Of Our Commercial And Industrial Prosperity There Runs One 
 Great Division. There Are Some Who,  In The Midst Of All Change,  Have 
 Preserved Their Old Spiritual Loyalties,  And There Are Others Who Have 
 Substituted Novelty For Loyalty. These Are The Idealists And The Pagans 
 Of The Twentieth Century. 
   
 Another Potent Factor In The Making Of The New Times Was The Scientific 
 Advance Which Has Made So Remarkable A Difference To The Whole Outlook 
 Of Man Upon The Earth. Darwin's Great Discovery Is Perhaps The Most 
 Epoch-Making Fact In Science That Has Yet Appeared Upon The Earth. The 
 First Apparent Trend Of Evolution Seemed To Be An Entirely Materialistic 
 Reaction. This Was Due To The Fact That Believers In The Spiritual Had 
 Identified With Their Spirituality A Great Deal That Was Unnecessary And 
 Merely Casual. If The Balloon On Which People Mount Up Above The Earth 
 Is Any Such Theory As That Of The Six Days' Creation,  It Is Easy To See 
 How When That Balloon Is Pricked The Spiritual Flight Of The Time 
 Appears To Have Ended On The Ground. 
   
 Of Course All That Has Long Passed By. Of Late Years Haeckel Has Been 
 Crying Out That All His Old Friends Have Deserted Him And Have Gone Over 
 To The Spiritual Side--A Cry Which Reminds One Of The Familiar Juryman 
 Who Finds His Fellows The Eleven Most Obstinate Men He Has Ever Known. 
 The Conception Of Evolution Has Long Since Been Taken Over By The 
 Idealists,  And Has Become Perhaps The Most Splendidly Christian And 
 Idealistic Idea Of The New Age. When Darwin Published His _Origin Of 
 Species_,  Hegel Cried Out In Germany,  "Darwin Has Destroyed Design." 
 To-Day Darwin And Hegel Stand Together As The Prophets Of The 
 Unconquerable Conviction Of The Reality Of Spirit. From The Days Of 
 Huxley And Haeckel We Have Passed Over To The Days Of Bergson And Sir 
 Oliver Lodge. 
   
   
 The Effect Of All This Upon Individuals Is A Very Interesting Phenomenon 
 To Watch. Every One Of Us Has Been Touched By The Pagan Spirit Which Has 
 Invaded Our Times At So Many Different Points Of Entrance. It Has Become 
 An Atmosphere Which We Have All Breathed More Or Less. If Some One Were 
 To Say To Any Company Of British People,  One By One,  That They Were 
 Pagans,  Doubtless Many Of Them Would Resent It,  And Yet More Or Less It 
 Would Be True. We All Are Pagans; We Cannot Help Ourselves,  For Every 
 One Of Us Is Necessarily Affected By The Spirit Of His Generation. 
 Nobody Indeed Says,  "Go To,  I Will Be A Pagan"; But The Old Story Of 
 Aaron's Golden Calf Repeats Itself Continually. Aaron,  When Moses 
 Rebuked Him,  Said Naïvely,  "There Came Out This Calf." That Exactly 
 Describes The Situation. That Calf Is The Only Really Authentic Example 
 
 
 
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 Of Spontaneous Generation,  Of Effect Without Cause. Nobody Expected It. 
 Nobody Wanted It. Everybody Was Surprised To See It When It Came. It Was 
 The Melchizedek Among Cattle--Without Father,  Without Mother,  Without 
 Descent. Unfortunately It Seems Also To Have Been Without Beginning Of 
 Days Or End Of Life. Every Generation Simply Puts In Its Gold And There 
 Comes Out This Calf--It Is A Way Such Calves Have. 
   
   
 Thus It Is With Our Modern Paganism. We All Of Us Want To Be Idealists, 
 And We Sometimes Try,  But There Are Hidden Causes Which Draw Us Back 
 Again To The Earth. These Causes Lie In The Opportunities That Occur One 
 By One: In Politics,  In Industrial And Commercial Matters,  In Scientific 
 Theories,  Or By Mere Reaction. The Earth Is More Habitable Than Once It 
 Was,  And We All Desire It. It Masters Us,  And So The Golden Calf 
 Appears. 
   
   
 We Shall Now Glance Very Rapidly At A Few Out Of The Many Literary 
 Forces Of Our Day In Which We May See The Various Reactions From 
 Carlyle. First,  There Was The Early Victorian Time,  The Eighteenth 
 Century In Homespun. It Was Not Great And Pompous Like That Century,  But 
 It Lived By Formality,  Propriety,  And Conventionality. It Was Horribly 
 Shocked When George Eliot Published _Scenes Of Clerical Life_ And _Adam 
 Bede_ In 1858 And 1859. Outwardly It Was Eminently Respectable,  And Its 
 Respectability Was Its Particular Method Of Lapsing Into Paganism. It 
 Was Afraid Of Ideals,  And For Those Who Cherish This Fear The Worship Of 
 Respectability Comes To Be A Very Dangerous Kind Of Worship,  And Its 
 Idol Is Perhaps The Most Formidable Of All The Gods. 
   
 Meanwhile That Glorious Band Of Idealists,  Whose Chief Representatives 
 Were Tennyson,  Browning,  And Ruskin,  To Be Joined Later By George 
 Meredith,  Were Fighting Paganism In The Spirit Of Arthur's Knights,  Keen 
 To Drive The Heathen From The Land. Tennyson,  The Most Popular Of Them 
 All,  Probably Achieved More Than Any Other In This Conflict. Ruskin Was 
 Too Contradictory And Bewildering,  And So Failed Of Much Of His Effect. 
 Browning And Meredith At First Were Reckoned Unintelligible,  And Had To 
 Wait Their Day For A Later Understanding. Still,  All These,  And Many 
 Others Of Lesser Power Than Theirs,  Were Knights Of The Ideal,  Warring 
 Against The Domination Of Dead And Unthinking Respectability. 
   
 Matthew Arnold Came Upon The Scene,  With His Great Protest Against The 
 Preponderance Of Single Elements In Life,  And His Plea For Wholeness. In 
 This Demand For Whole And Not One-Sided Views Of The World,  He Is More 
 Nearly Akin To Goethe Than Perhaps Any Other Writer Of Our Time. His 
 Great Protest Was Against The Worship Of Machinery,  Which He Believed To 
 Be Taking The Place Of Its Own Productions In England. He Conceived Of 
 The English People As Being Under A General Delusion Which Led Them To 
 Mistake Means For Ends. He Spoke Of Them As "Barbarians,  Philistines, 
 And Populace," According To The Rank In Life They Held; And Accused Them 
 Of Living For Such Ends As Field Sports,  The Disestablishment Of The 
 Church Of England,  And The Drinking Of Beer. He Pointed Out That,  So Far 
 As Real Culture Is Concerned,  These Can At Best Be But Means Towards 
 Other Ends,  And Can Never Be In Themselves Sufficient To Satisfy The 
 Human Soul. He Protested Against Carlyle,  Although In The Main Thesis 
 The Two Are Entirely At One. "I Never Liked Carlyle," He Said; "He 
 Always Seemed To Me To Be Carrying Coals To Newcastle." He Took Carlyle 
 For The Representative Of What He Called "Hebraism," And He Desired To 
 Balance The Undue Preponderance Of That By Insisting Upon The Necessity 
 Of The Hellenistic Element In Culture. Both Of These Are Methods Of 
 
 
 
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 Idealism,  But Arnold Protested That The Human Spirit Is Greater Than Any 
 Of The Forces That Bear It Onwards; And That After You Have Said All 
 That Carlyle Has To Say,  There Still Remains On The Other Side The 
 Intellect,  With Rights Of Its Own. He Did Not Exclude Conscience,  For He 
 Held That Conduct Made Up Three-Fourths Of Life. He Was The Idealist Of 
 A Whole Culture As Against All One-Sidedness; But Curiously,  By Flinging 
 Himself Upon The Opposite Side From Carlyle,  He Became Identified In The 
 Popular Mind With What It Imagined To Be Hellenic Paganism. This Was 
 Partly Due To His Personal Idiosyncrasies,  His Fastidiousness Of Taste, 
 And The Somewhat Cold Style Of The _Exquisite_ In Expression. These 
 Deceived Many Of His Readers,  And Kept Them From Seeing How Great And 
 Prophetic A Message It Was That Came To England Beneath Arnold's 
 Mannerisms. 
   
   
 Dante Gabriel Rossetti Appeared,  And Many More In His Train. He,  More 
 Perfectly Than Any Other,  Expressed The Marriage Of Sense And Soul In 
 Modern English Poetry. He Was The Idealist Of Emotion,  Who,  In The 
 Far-Off Dim Borderlands Between Sense And Spirit,  Still Preserved The 
 Spiritual Search,  Nor Ever Allowed Himself To Be Completely Drugged With 
 The Vapours Of The Region. There Were Others,  However,  Who Tended 
 Towards Decadence. Some Of Rossetti's Readers,  Whose Sole Interest Lay 
 In The Lower World,  Claimed Him As Well As The Rest For Their Guides, 
 And Set A Fashion Which Is Not Yet Obsolete. There Is No Lack Of 
 Solemnity Among These. The Scent Of Sandalwood And Of Incense Is Upon 
 Their Work,  And You Feel As You Read Them That You Are Worshipping In 
 Some Sort Of A Temple With Strange And Solemnising Rites. Indeed They 
 Insist Upon This,  And Assiduously Cultivate A Kind Of Lethargic And 
 Quasi-Religious Manner Which Is Supposed To Be Very Impressive. But 
 Their Temple Is A Pagan Temple,  And Their Worship,  However Much They May 
 Borrow For It The Language Of A More Spiritual Cult,  Is Of The Earth, 
 Earthy. 
   
 Mr. Thomas Hardy Was The Inevitable Sequel To George Eliot. Everybody 
 Knows How Beautiful And How Full Of Charm His Lighter Writings Can Be; 
 And In His More Tragic Work There Is Much That Is True,  Terrifically 
 Expressed. Yet He Has Got Upon The Wrong Side Of The World,  And Can 
 Never See Beyond The Horror Of Its Tragedy. Consequently In Him We Have 
 Another Form Of Paganism,  Not This Time That Which The Seductive Earth 
 With Its Charms Is Suggesting,  But The Hopeless Paganism Which Sees The 
 Earth Only In Its Bitterness. In _The Return Of The Native_ He Says: 
 "What The Greeks Only Suspected We Know Well; What Their Aeschylus 
 Imagined Our Nursery Children Feel. That Old-Fashioned Revelling In The 
 General Situation Grows Less And Less Possible As We Uncover The Defects 
 Of Natural Laws,  And See The Quandary Man Is In By Their Operation." It 
 Is No Wonder That He Who Expressed The Spirit Of The Modern Age In These 
 Words Should Have Closed His Well-Known Novel With The Bitter Saying 
 That The Upper Powers Had Finished Their Sport With _Tess_. "To Have 
 Lost The God-Like Conceit That We May Do What We Will,  And Not To Have 
 Acquired A Homely Zest For Doing What We Can,  Shows A Grandeur Of Temper 
 Which Cannot Be Objected To In The Abstract,  For It Denotes A Mind That, 
 Though Disappointed,  Forswears Compromise." Here Is Obviously A Man Who 
 Would Love The Highest If He Saw It,  Who Would Fain Welcome And Proclaim 
 The Ideals If He Could Only Find Them On The Earth; But Who Has Found 
 Instead The Bitterness Of Darkness,  The Sarcasm And The Sensationalism 
 Of An Age That The Gods Have Left. He Is Too Honest To Shout _Pour 
 Encourager Les Autres_ When His Own Heart Has No Hope In It; And His 
 Greater Books Express The Wail And Despair Of Our Modern Paganism. 
 
 
 
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 Breaking Away From Him And All Such Pessimistic Voices Came The Glad 
 Soul Of Robert Louis Stevenson,  Whose Old-Fashioned Revelling In The 
 Situation Is The Exact Counter-Blast To Hardy's Modernism,  And Is One Of 
 Those Perennial Human Things Which Are Ever Both New And Old. It Is Not 
 That Stevenson Has Not Seen The Other Side Of Life. He Has Seen It And 
 He Has Suffered From It Deeply,  Both In Himself And In Others; Yet Still 
 Indomitably He "Clings To His Paddle." "I Believe," He Says,  "In An 
 Ultimate Decency Of Things; Ay,  And If I Woke In Hell,  Should Still 
 Believe It." 
   
   
 Then There Came The Extraordinary Spirit Of Mr. Rudyard Kipling. At 
 First Sight Some Things That He Has Written Appear Pagan Enough,  And 
 Have Been Regarded As Such. The God Of Christians Seems To Inhabit And 
 Preside Over An Amazing Valhalla Of Pagan Divinities; And Indeed 
 Throughout Mr. Kipling's Work The Heavens And The Earth Are Mingled In A 
 Most Inextricable And Astonishing Fashion. It Is Said That Not Long Ago, 
 During The Launch Of A Chinese Battleship At One Of Our British Yards, 
 They Were Burning Papers To The Gods In A Small Joss-House Upon The 
 Pier,  While The Great Vessel,  Fitted With All The Most Modern Machinery, 
 Was Leaving The Stocks. There Is Something About The Tale That Reminds 
 Us Of Mr. Kipling. Now He Is The Prophet Of Jehovah,  Now The Corybantic 
 Pagan Priest,  Now The Interpreter Of The Soul Of Machines. He Is 
 Everything And Everybody. He Knows The Heart Of The Unborn,  And,  Telling 
 Of Days Far In The Future,  Can Make Them As Living And Real As The Hours 
 Of To-Day. It Was The Late Professor James Who Said Of Him,  "Kipling Is 
 Elemental; He Is Down Among The Roots Of All Things. He Is Universal 
 Like The Sun. He Is At Home Everywhere. When He Dies They Won't Be Able 
 To Get Any Grave To Hold Him. They Will Have To Bury Him Under A 
 Pyramid." In Our Reckoning Such A Man Hardly Counts. It Would Be Most 
 Interesting,  If It Were As Yet Possible,  To Speculate As To Whether His 
 Permanent Influence Has Been More On The Side Of A Kind Of A Wild 
 Titanic Paganism,  Or Of That Ancient Calvinistic God Whom Macandrew 
 Worships In The Temple Of His Engine-Room. 
   
 We Now Come To A Later Phase,  For Which We May Take As Representative 
 Writers The Names Of Mr. H.G. Wells And Mr. Bernard Shaw. Science,  For 
 The Meantime At Least,  Has Disentangled Herself From Her Former 
 Materialism,  And A Nobly Ideal And Spiritual View Of Science Has Come 
 Again. It May Even Be Hoped That The Pagan View Will Never Be Able Again 
 To Assert Itself With The Same Impressiveness As In The Past. But Social 
 Conditions Are To-Day In The Throes Of Their Strife,  And From That 
 Quarter Of The Stage There Appear Such Writers As Those We Are Now To 
 Consider. They Both Present Themselves As Idealists. Mr. Wells Has 
 Published A Long Volume About His Religion,  And Mr. Shaw Prefaces His 
 Plays With Essays As Long Or Even Longer Than The Plays Themselves, 
 Dealing With All Manner Of The Most Serious Subjects. The Surface 
 Flippancy Both Of Prefaces And Plays Has Repelled Some Readers In Spite 
 Of All Their Cleverness,  And Tended Towards An Unjust Judgment That He 
 Is Upsetting The Universe With His Tongue In His Cheek All The Time. 
 Later One Comes To Realise That This Is Not The Case,  That Mr. Shaw Does 
 Really Take Himself And His Message Seriously,  And From First To Last 
 Conceives Himself As The Apostle Of A Tremendous Creed. Among Many Other 
 Things Which They Have In Common,  These Writers Have Manifested The 
 Tendency To Regard All Who Ever Went Before Them As,  In A Certain Sense, 
 Thieves And Robbers; At Least They Give One The Impression That The 
 Present Has Little Need For Long Lingering Over The Past. Mr. Wells,  For 
 
 
 
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 Instance,  Cannot Find Words Strong Enough To Describe The Emancipation 
 Of The Modern Young Man From Mr. Kipling With His Old-Fashioned 
 Injunction,  "Keep Ye The Law." There Are Certain Laws Which Mr. Wells 
 Proclaims On The Housetops That He Sees No Necessity For Keeping,  And So 
 Mr. Kipling Is Buried Under Piles Of Opprobrium--"The Tumult And The 
 Bullying,  The Hysteria And The Impatience,  The Incoherence And The 
 Inconsistency," And So On. As For Mr. Bernard Shaw,  We All Know His Own 
 View Of The Relation In Which He Stands To William Shakespeare. 
   
   
 Mr. Wells Has Written Many Interesting Books,  And Much Could Be Said Of 
 Him From The Point Of View Of Science,  Or Of Style,  Or Of Social Theory. 
 That,  However,  Is Not Our Present Concern,  Either With Him Or With Mr. 
 Shaw. It Is As Idealist Or Pagan Influences That We Are Discussing Them 
 And The Others. Mr. Wells Boasts A New Morality In His Books,  And Mr. 
 Shaw In His Plays. One Feels The Same Startling Sense Of A _Volte Face_ 
 In Morality As A Young Recruit Is Said To Do When He Finds All The 
 Precepts Of His Childhood Reversed By The Ethics Of His First 
 Battlefield. Each In His Own Way Falls Back Upon Crude And Primitive 
 Instincts And Justifies Them.[5] 
   
 Mr. Wells Takes The Change With Zest,  And Seems To Treat The Adoption Of 
 A New Morality In The Same Light-Hearted Spirit As He Might Consider The 
 Buying Of A New Hat. From The First He Has A Terrifying Way Of Dealing 
 Familiarly With Vast Things. Somehow He Reminds One Of Those Jugglers 
 Who,  For A Time,  Toss Heavy Balls About,  And Then Suddenly Astonish The 
 Audience By Introducing A Handkerchief,  Which Flies Lightly Among Its 
 Ponderous Companions. So Mr. Wells Began To Juggle With Worlds. He Has 
 Latterly Introduced That Delicate Thing,  The Human Soul And Conscience, 
 Into The Play,  And You See It Precariously Fluttering Among The 
 Immensities Of Leaping Planets. He Persuades Himself That The Common 
 Morality Has Not Gripped People,  And That They Really Don't Believe In 
 It At All. He Aims At A Way Of Thinking Which Will Be So Great As To Be 
 Free From All Commonplace And Convention. Honesty Is To Be Practically 
 The Only Virtue In The New World. If You Say What You Mean,  You Will 
 Earn The Right To Do Anything Else That You Please. Mr. Wells In This Is 
 The Counterpart Of Those Plain Men In Private Life So Well Known To Us 
 All,  Who Perpetually Remind Us That They Are People Who Call A Spade A 
 Spade. Such Men Are Apt To Interpret This Dictum As A Kind Of Charter 
 Which Enables A Man To Say Anything Foolish,  Or Rude,  Or Bad That May 
 Occur To Him,  And Earn Praise For It Instead Of Blame. Some Of Us Fail 
 To Find The Greatness Of This Way Of Thinking,  However Much We May Be 
 Impressed By Its Audacity. Indeed There Seems To Be Much Smallness In It 
 Which Masquerades As Immensity. 
   
   
 This Smallness Is Due First Of All To Sheer Ignorance. When A Man Tells 
 Us That He Prefers Oliver Goldsmith To Jesus Christ,  He Merely Shows 
 That Upon The Subject He Is Discussing He Is Not Educated,  And Does Not 
 Know What He Is Talking About. A Second Source Of Pettiness Is To Be 
 Found In The Mistake Of Imagining That Mere Smartness Of Diction And 
 Agility Of Mind Are Signs Of Intellectual Keenness. The Mistake Is As 
 Obvious As It Is Unfortunate. Smartness Can Be Learned With Perhaps The 
 Least Expenditure Of Intellect That Is Demanded By Any Literary Exercise 
 Of The Present Day. It Is A Temptation Which A Certain Kind Of Clever 
 Man Always Has To Face,  And It Only Assumes A Serious Aspect When It 
 Leads The Unthinking To Mistake It For A New And Formidable Element Of 
 Opposition To Things Which He Has Counted Sacred. 
   
 
 
 
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 The Whole Method Is Not So Very Subtle After All. Pick Out A Vice Or A 
 Deformity. Do Not Trouble To Acquaint Yourself Too Intimately With The 
 History Of Morals In The Past,  But Boldly Canonise Your Vice Or Your 
 Deformity With Ritual Of Epigram And Paradox. Proclaim Loudly And 
 Eloquently That This Is Your Faith,  And Give It A Pathetic Aspect By 
 Dwelling Tenderly Upon Any Trouble Which It May Be Likely To Cost Those 
 Who Venture To Adopt It. It Is Not Perhaps A Very Admirable Way To Deal 
 With Such Subjects. The Whole World Of Tradition And The Whole 
 Constitution Of Human Nature Are Against You. Men Have Wrestled With 
 These Things For Thousands Of Years,  And They Have Come To Certain 
 Conclusions Which The Experience Of All Time Has Enforced Upon Them. By 
 A Dash Of Bold Imagination You May Discount All That Laborious Past,  And 
 Leave An Irrevocable Stain Upon The Purity Of The Mind Of A Generation. 
 Doubtless You Will Have A Following--Such Teachers Have Ever Had Those 
 Who Followed Them--And Yet Time Is Always On The Side Of Great 
 Traditions. If Enlightened Thought Has In Any Respect To Change Them,  It 
 Changes Them Reverently,  And Knowing What Their Worth Has Been. Sooner 
 Or Later All Easy Ignoring Of Them Is Condemned As Sheer Impertinence. 
 There Is Singularly Little Reason For Being Impressed By This Hasty, 
 Romantic,  And Loud-Sounding Crusade Against Christian Morality And Its 
 Ideal. 
   
 In Mr. George Bernard Shaw We Have A Very Different Man. Nobody Denies 
 Mr. Shaw's Cleverness,  Least Of All Mr. Shaw Himself. He Is Depressingly 
 Clever. He Exhibits The Spectacle Of A Man Trying To Address His 
 Audience While Standing On His Head--And Succeeding. 
   
 He Has Been Singularly Fortunate In His Biographer,  Mr. Chesterton,  And 
 One Of The Things That Make This Biography Such Pleasing Reading Is The 
 Personal Element That Runs Through It All. The Introduction Is 
 Characteristic And Delightful: "Most People Either Say That They Agree 
 With Bernard Shaw,  Or That They Do Not Understand Him. I Am The Only 
 Person Who Understands Him,  And I Do Not Agree With Him." It Is Not 
 Unnatural That He Should Take His Friend A Little More Seriously Than 
 Most Of Us Will Be Prepared To Do. It Really Is A Big Thing To Stand On 
 The Shoulders Of William Shakespeare,  And We Shall Need Time To Consider 
 It Before We Subscribe To The Statue. 
   
 For There Is Here An Absolutely Colossal Egotism. There Are Certain 
 Newspapers Which Usually Begin With A Note Of The Hours Of Sunrise And 
 Sunset. During The Recent Coal Strike,  Some Of These Newspapers Inserted 
 First Of All A Notice That They Would Not Be Sent Out So Early As Usual, 
 And Then Cheered Our Desponding Hearts By Assuring Us That The Sun Rises 
 At 5.37 Notwithstanding--As If By Permission Of The Newspaper. Mr. Shaw 
 Somehow Gives Us A Similar Impression. Most Things In The Universe Seem 
 To Go On By His Permission,  And Some Of Them He Is Not Going To Allow To 
 Go On Much Longer. He Will Tilt Without The Slightest Vestige Of 
 Humility Against Any Existing Institution,  And The Tourney Is Certainly 
 One Of The Most Entertaining And Most Extraordinary Of Our Time. 
   
   
 No One Can Help Admiring Mr. Shaw. The Dogged Persistence Which Has 
 Carried Him,  Unflinching,  Through Adversity Into His Present Fame, 
 Without A Single Compromise Or Hesitation,  Is,  Apart Altogether From The 
 Question Of The Truth Of His Opinions,  An Admirable Quality In A Man. We 
 Cannot But Admire His Immense Forcefulness And Agility,  The Fertility Of 
 His Mind,  And The Swiftness Of Its Play. But We Utterly Refuse To Fall 
 Down And Worship Him On Account Of These. Indeed The Kind Of Awe With 
 
 
 
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 Which He Is Regarded In Some Quarters Seems To Be Due Rather To The 
 Eccentricities Of His Expression Than To The Greatness Of His Message Or 
 The Brilliance Of His Achievements. 
   
   
 There Is No Question Of His Earnestness. The Puritan Is Deep In Mr. 
 Shaw,  In His Very Blood. He Has Indeed Given To The Term Puritan A 
 Number Of Unexpected Meanings,  And Yet No One Can Justly Question His 
 Right To It. His _Plays For Puritans_ Are Not Exceptional In This 
 Matter,  For All His Work Is Done In The Same Spirit. His Favourite 
 Author Is John Bunyan,  About Whom He Tells Us That He Claims Him As The 
 Precursor Of Nietzsche,  And That In His Estimation John Bunyan's Life 
 Was One Long Tilt Against Morality And Respectability. The Claim Is 
 Sufficiently Grotesque,  Yet There Is A Sense In Which He Has A Right To 
 John Bunyan,  And Is In The Same Line As Thomas Carlyle. He Is Trying 
 Sincerely To Speak The Truth And Get It Spoken. He Appears As Another Of 
 The Destroyers Of Shams,  The Breakers Of Idols. He May Indeed Be Claimed 
 As A Pagan,  And His Influence Will Certainly Preponderate In That 
 Direction; And Yet There Is A Strain Of High Idealism Which Runs 
 Perplexingly Through It All. 
   
 The Explanation Seems To Be,  As Mr. Chesterton Suggests,  That The Man Is 
 Incomplete. There Are Certain Elementary Things Which,  If He Had Ever 
 Seen Them As Other People Do,  Would Have Made Many Of His Positions 
 Impossible. "Shaw Is Wrong," Says Mr. Chesterton,  "About Nearly All The 
 Things One Learns Early In Life While One Is Still Simple." Among Those 
 Things Which He Has Never Seen Are The Loyalties Involved In Love, 
 Country,  And Religion. The Most Familiar Proof Of This In Regard To 
 Religion Is His Extraordinary Tirade Against The Cross Of Calvary. It Is 
 One Of The Most Amazing Passages In Print,  So Far As Either Taste Or 
 Judgment Is Concerned. It Is Significant That In This Very Passage He 
 Actually Refers To The "Stable At Bethany," And The Slip Seems To 
 Indicate From What A Distance He Is Discussing Christianity. It Is 
 Possible For Any Of Us To Measure Himself Against The Cross And Him Who 
 Hung Upon It,  Only When We Have Travelled Very Far Away From Them. When 
 We Are Sufficiently Near,  We Know Ourselves To Be Infinitesimal In 
 Comparison. Nor In Regard To Home,  And All That Sanctifies And Defends 
 It,  Does Mr. Shaw Seem Ever To Have Understood The Real Morality That Is 
 In The Heart Of The Average Man. The Nauseating Thing Which He Quotes As 
 Morality Is A Mere Caricature Of That Vital Sense Of Honour And 
 Imperative Conscience Of Righteousness Which,  Thank God,  Are Still Alive 
 Among Us. "My Dear," He Says,  "You Are The Incarnation Of Morality,  Your 
 Conscience Is Clear And Your Duty Done When You Have Called Everybody 
 Names." Similar,  And No Less Unfortunate,  Is His Perversion Of That 
 Instinct Of Patriotism Which,  However Mistaken In Some Of Its 
 Expressions,  Has Yet Proved Its Moral And Practical Worth During Many A 
 Century Of British History. There Is The Less Need To Dwell Upon This, 
 Because Those Who Discard Patriotism Have Only To State Their Case 
 Clearly In Order To Discredit It. 
   
   
 We Do Not Fear Greatly The Permanent Influence Of These Fundamental 
 Errors. The Great Heart Of The Civilised World Still Beats True,  And Is 
 Healthy Enough To Disown So Maimed An Account Of Human Nature. Yet There 
 Is Danger In Any Such Element In Literature As This. Mr. Shaw's 
 Biographer Has Virtually Told Us That In These Matters He Is But A Child 
 In Whom "Irish Innocence Is Peculiar And Fundamental." The Pleadings Of 
 The Nurse For The Precocious And Yet Defective Infant Are Certainly Very 
 Touching. He May Be The Innocent Creature That Mr. Chesterton Takes Him 
 
 
 
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 For,  But He Has Said Things Which Will Exactly Suit The Views Of 
 Libertines Who Read Him. Such Pleadings Are Quite Unavailing To Excuse 
 Any Such Child If He Does Too Much Innocent Mischief. His Puritanism And 
 His Childlikeness Only Make His Teaching More Dangerous Because More 
 Piquant. It Has The Air Of Proceeding From The Same Source As The Ten 
 Commandments,  And The Effect Of This Upon The Unreflecting Is Always 
 Considerable. If A Child Is Playing In A Powder Magazine,  The More 
 Childish And Innocent He Is The More Dangerous He Will Prove; And The 
 Explosion,  Remember,  Will Be Just As Violent If Lit By A Child's Hand As 
 If It Had Been Lit By An Anarchist's. We Have In England Borne Long 
 Enough With People Trifling With The Best Intentions Among Explosives, 
 Moral And Social,  And We Must Consider Our Own Safety And That Of 
 Society When We Are Judging Them. 
   
   
 As To The Relation In Which Mr. Shaw Stands To Paganism,  His Relations 
 To Anything Are So "Extensive And Peculiar" That They Are Always 
 Difficult To Define. But The Later Phase Of His Work,  Which Has Become 
 Famous In Connection With The Word "Superman," Is Due In Large Part To 
 Nietzsche,  Whose Strange Influence Has Reversed The Christian Ideals For 
 Many Disciples On Both Sides Of The North Sea. So This Idealist,  Who,  In 
 _Major Barbara_,  Protests So Vigorously Against Paganism,  Has Become One 
 Of Its Chief Advocates And Expositors. One Of His Characters Somewhere 
 Says,  "I Wish I Could Get A Country To Live In Where The Facts Were Not 
 Brutal And The Dreams Were Not Unreal." It May Be Admitted That There 
 Are Many Brutal Facts And Perhaps More Unreal Dreams; But,  For Our Part, 
 That Which Keeps Us From Becoming Pagans Is That We Have Found Facts 
 That Are Not Brutal And Dreams Which Are The Realest Things In Life. 
   
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 105 
 There Is On Record The Case Of A Man Who,  After Some Fourteen Years Of 
 Robust Health,  Spent A Week In Bed. His Illness Was Apparently Due To A 
 Violent Cold,  But He Confessed,  On Medical Cross-Examination,  That The 
 Real And Underlying Cause Was The Steady Reading Of Mr. Chesterton's 
 Books For Several Days On End. 
   
   
 No One Will Accuse Mr. Chesterton Of Being An Unhealthy Writer. On The 
 Contrary,  He Is Among The Most Wholesome Writers Now Alive. He Is 
 Irresistibly Exhilarating,  And He Inspires His Readers With A Constant 
 Inclination To Rise Up And Shout. Perhaps His Danger Lies In That Very 
 Fact,  And In The Exhaustion Of The Nerves Which Such Sustained 
 Exhilaration Is Apt To Produce. But Besides This,  He,  Like So Many Of 
 Our Contemporaries,  Has Written Such A Bewildering Quantity Of 
 Literature On Such An Amazing Variety Of Subjects,  That It Is No Wonder 
 If Sometimes The Reader Follows Panting,  Through The Giddy Mazes Of The 
 Dance. He Is The Sworn Enemy Of Specialisation,  As He Explains In His 
 Remarkable Essay On "The Twelve Men." The Subject Of The Essay Is The 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 106 
 British Jury,  And Its Thesis Is That When Our Civilisation "Wants A 
 Library To Be Catalogued,  Or A Solar System Discovered,  Or Any Trifle Of 
 That Kind,  It Uses Up Its Specialists. But When It Wishes Anything Done 
 Which Is Really Serious,  It Collects Twelve Of The Ordinary Men Standing 
 Round. The Same Thing Was Done,  If I Remember Right,  By The Founder Of 
 Christianity." For The Judging Of A Criminal Or The Propagation Of The 
 Gospel,  It Is Necessary To Procure Inexpert People--People Who Come To 
 Their Task With A Virgin Eye,  And See Not What The Expert (Who Has Lost 
 His Freshness) Sees,  But The Human Facts Of The Case. So Mr. Chesterton 
 Insists Upon Not Being A Specialist,  Takes The World For His Parish,  And 
 Wanders Over It At Will. 
   
   
 This Being So,  It Is Obvious That He Cannot Possibly Remember All That 
 He Has Said,  And Must Necessarily Abound In Inconsistencies And Even 
 Contradictions. Yet That Is By No Means Always Unconscious,  But Is Due 
 In Many Instances To The Very Complex Quality And Subtle Habit Of His 
 Mind. Were He By Any Chance To Read This Statement He Would Deny It 
 Fiercely,  But We Would Repeat It With Perfect Calmness,  Knowing That He 
 Would Probably Have Denied Any Other Statement We Might Have Made Upon 
 The Subject. His Subtlety Is Partly Due To The Extraordinary Rapidity 
 With Which His Mind Leaps From One Subject To Another,  Partly To The 
 Fact That He Is So Full Of Ideas That Many Of His Essays (Like Mr. 
 Bernard Shaw's Plays) Find It Next To Impossible To Get Themselves 
 Begun. He Is So Full Of Matter That He Never Seems To Be Able To Say 
 What He Wants To Say,  Until He Has Said A Dozen Other Things First. 
   
   
 The Present Lecture Is Mainly Concerned With His Central Position,  As 
 That Is Expounded In _Heretics_ And _Orthodoxy_. Our Task Is Not To 
 Criticise,  Nor Even To Any Considerable Extent To Characterise His 
 Views,  But To State Them As Accurately As We Can. It Is A Remarkable 
 Phenomenon Of Our Time That All Our Literary Men Are Bent On Giving Us 
 Such Elaborate And Solemnising Confessions Of Their Faith. It Is An Age 
 Notorious For Its Aversion To Dogma,  And Yet Here We Have Mr. Huxley, 
 Mr. Le Gallienne,  Mr. Shaw,  Mr. Wells (To Mention Only A Few Of Many), 
 Who In This Creedless Age Proclaim In The Market-Place,  Each His Own 
 Private And Brand-New Creed. 
   
 Yet Mr. Chesterton Has Perhaps A Special Right To Such A Proclamation. 
 He Believes In Creeds Vehemently. And,  Besides,  The Spiritual Biography 
 Of A Man Whose Mental Development Has Been So Independent And So 
 Interesting As His,  Must Be Well Worth Knowing. Amid The Many Weird 
 Theologies Of Our Time We Have Met With Nothing So Startling,  So 
 Arresting,  And So Suggestive Since Mr. Mallock Published His _New 
 Republic_ And His _Contemporary Superstitions_. There Is Something 
 Common To The Two Points Of View. To Some,  They Come As Emancipating And 
 Most Welcome Reinforcements,  Relieving The Beleaguered Citadel Of Faith. 
 But Others,  Who Differ Widely From Them Both,  May Yet Find In Them So 
 Much To Stimulate Thought And To Rehabilitate Strongholds Held 
 Precariously,  As To Awaken Both Appreciation And Gratitude. 
   
   
 Mr. Chesterton's Political Opinions Do Not Concern Us Here. It Is A 
 Curious Fact,  Of Which Innumerable Illustrations May Be Found In Past 
 And Present Writers,  That Political Radicalism So Often Goes Along With 
 Conservative Theology,  And _Vice Versa_. Mr. Chesterton Is No Exception 
 To The Rule. His Orthodoxy In Matters Of Faith We Shall Find To Be 
 Altogether Above Suspicion. His Radicalism In Politics Is Never Long 
 Silent. He Openly Proclaims Himself At War With Carlyle's Favourite 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 107 
 Dogma,  "The Tools To Him Who Can Use Them." "The Worst Form Of Slavery," 
 He Tells Us,  "Is That Which Is Called Cæsarism,  Or The Choice Of Some 
 Bold Or Brilliant Man As Despot Because He Is Suitable. For That Means 
 That Men Choose A Representative,  Not Because He Represents Them But 
 Because He Does Not." And If It Be Answered That The Worst Form Of 
 Cruelty To A Nation Or To An Individual Is That Abuse Of The Principle 
 Of Equality Which Is For Ever Putting Incompetent People Into False 
 Positions,  He Has His Reply Ready: "The One Specially And Peculiarly 
 Un-Christian Idea Is The Idea Of Carlyle--The Idea That The Man Should 
 Rule Who Feels That He Can Rule. Whatever Else Is Christian,  This Is 
 Heathen." 
   
   
 But This,  And Much Else Of Its Kind,  Although He Works It Into His 
 General Scheme Of Thinking,  Is Not In Any Sense An Essential Part Of 
 That Scheme. Our Subject Is His Place In The Conflict Between The 
 Paganism And The Idealism Of The Times,  And It Is A Sufficiently Large 
 One. But Before We Come To That,  We Must Consider Another Matter,  Which 
 We Shall Find To Be Intimately Connected With It. 
   
   
 That Other Matter Is His Habit Of Paradox,  Which Is Familiar To All His 
 Readers. It Is A Habit Of Style,  But Before It Became That It Was 
 Necessarily First A Habit Of Mind,  Deeply Ingrained. He Disclaims It So 
 Often That We Cannot But Feel That He Protesteth Too Much. He 
 Acknowledges It,  And Explains That "Paradox Simply Means A Certain 
 Defiant Joy Which Belongs To Belief." Whether The Explanation Is Or Is 
 Not Perfectly Intelligible,  It Must Occur To Every One That A Writer Who 
 Finds It Necessary To Give So Remarkable An Explanation Can Hardly Be 
 Justified In His Astonishment When People Of Merely Average Intelligence 
 Confess Themselves Puzzled. His Aversion To Walter Pater--Almost The 
 Only Writer Whom He Appears Consistently To Treat With Disrespect--Is 
 Largely Due To Pater's Laborious Simplicity Of Style. But It Was A 
 Greater Than Either Walter Pater Or Mr. Chesterton Who First Pointed Out 
 That The Language Which Appealed To The Understanding Of The Common Man 
 Was Also That Which Expressed The Highest Culture. Mr. Chesterton's 
 Habit Of Paradox Will Always Obscure His Meanings For The Common Man. He 
 Has A Vast Amount To Tell Him,  But Much Of It He Will Never Understand. 
   
   
 Paradox,  When It Has Become A Habit,  Is Always Dangerous. Introduced On 
 Rare And Fitting Occasions,  It May Be Powerful And Even Convincing,  But 
 When It Is Repeated Constantly And Upon All Sorts Of Subjects,  We Cannot 
 But Dispute Its Right And Question Its Validity. Its Effect Is Not 
 Conviction But Vertigo. It Is Like Trying To Live In A House Constructed 
 So As To Be Continually Turning Upside Down. After A Certain Time, 
 During Which Terror And Dizziness Alternate,  The Most Indulgent Reader 
 Is Apt To Turn Round Upon The Builder Of Such A House With Some 
 Asperity. And,  After All,  The General Judgment May Be Right And Mr. 
 Chesterton Wrong. 
   
   
 Upon Analysis,  His Paradox Reveals As Its Chief And Most Essential 
 Element A Certain Habit Of Mind Which Always Tends To See And Appreciate 
 The Reverse Of Accepted Opinions. So Much Is This The Case That It Is 
 Possible In Many Instances To Anticipate What He Will Say Upon A 
 Subject. It Is On Record That One Reader,  Coming To His Chapter On Omar 
 Khayyám,  Said To Himself,  "Now He Will Be Saying That Omar Is Not Drunk 
 Enough"; And He Went On To Read,  "It Is Not Poetical Drinking,  Which Is 
 Joyous And Instinctive; It Is Rational Drinking,  Which Is As Prosaic As 
 An Investment,  As Unsavoury As A Dose Of Camomile." Similarly We Are 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 108 
 Told That Browning Is Only Felt To Be Obscure Because He Is Too 
 Pellucid. Such Apparent Contradictoriness Is Everywhere In His Work,  But 
 Along With It Goes A Curious Ingenuity And Nimbleness Of Mind. He Cannot 
 Think About Anything Without Remembering Something Else,  Apparently Out 
 Of All Possible Connection With It,  And Instantly Discovering Some 
 Clever Idea,  The Introduction Of Which Will Bring The Two Together. 
 Christianity "Is Not A Mixture Like Russet Or Purple; It Is Rather Like 
 A Shot Silk,  For A Shot Silk Is Always At Right Angles,  And Is In The 
 Pattern Of The Cross." 
   
   
 In All This There Are Certain Familiar Mechanisms Which Constitute 
 Almost A Routine Of Manipulation For The Manufacture Of Paradoxes. One 
 Such Mechanical Process Is The Play With The Derivatives Of Words. Thus 
 He Reminds Us That The Journalist Is,  In The Literal And Derivative 
 Sense,  A _Journalist_,  While The Missionary Is An Eternalist. Similarly 
 "Lunatic," "Evolution," "Progress," "Reform," Are Etymologically 
 Tortured Into The Utterance Of The Most Forcible And Surprising Truths. 
 This Curious Word-Play Was A Favourite Method With Ruskin; And It Has 
 The Disadvantage In Mr. Chesterton Which It Had In The Earlier Critic. 
 It Appears Too Clever To Be Really Sound,  Although It Must Be Confessed 
 That It Frequently Has The Power Of Startling Us Into Thoughts That Are 
 Valuable And Suggestive. 
   
   
 Another Equally Simple Process Is That Of Simply Reversing Sentences And 
 Ideas. "A Good Bush Needs No Wine." "Shakespeare (In A Weak Moment,  I 
 Think) Said That All The World Is A Stage. But Shakespeare Acted On The 
 Much Finer Principle That A Stage Is All The World." Perhaps The Most 
 Brilliant Example That Could Be Quoted Is The Plea For The Combination 
 Of Gentleness And Ferocity In Christian Character. When The Lion Lies 
 Down With The Lamb,  It Is Constantly Assumed That The Lion Becomes 
 Lamblike. "But That Is Brutal Annexation And Imperialism On The Part Of 
 The Lamb. That Is Simply The Lamb Absorbing The Lion,  Instead Of The 
 Lion Eating The Lamb." 
   
 By This Process It Is Possible To Attain Results Which Are 
 Extraordinarily Brilliant In Themselves And Fruitful In Suggestion. It 
 Is A Process Not Difficult To Learn,  But The Trouble Is That You Have To 
 Live Up To It Afterwards,  And Defend Many Curious Propositions Which May 
 Have Been Arrived At By Its So Simple Means. Take,  For Instance,  The 
 Sentence About The Stage Being All The World. That Is Undeniably Clever, 
 And It Contains An Idea. But It Is A Haphazard Idea,  Arrived At By A 
 Short-Cut,  And Not By The High Road Of Reasonable Thinking. Sometimes A 
 Truth May Be Reached By Such A Short-Cut,  But Such Paradoxes Are 
 Occasionally No Better Than Chartered Errors. 
   
   
 Yet Even When They Are That,  It May Be Said In Their Favour That They 
 Startle Us Into Thought. And Truly Mr. Chesterton Is Invaluable As A 
 Quickener And Stimulator Of The Minds Of His Readers. Moreover,  By 
 Adopting The Method Of Paradox,  He Has Undoubtedly Done One Remarkable 
 Thing. He Has Proved What An Astonishing Number Of Paradoxical Surprises 
 There Actually Are,  Lying Hidden Beneath The Apparent Commonplace Of The 
 World. Every Really Clever Paradox Astonishes Us Not Merely With The 
 Sense Of The Cleverness Of Him Who Utters It,  But With The Sense Of How 
 Many Strange Coincidences Exist Around Us,  And How Many Sentences,  When 
 Turned Outside In,  Will Yield New And Startling Truths. However Much We 
 May Suspect That The Performance We Are Watching Is Too Clever To Be 
 Trustworthy,  Yet After All The World Does Appear To Lend Itself To Such 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 109 
 Treatment. 
   
   
 There Is,  For Example,  The Paradox Of The Love Of The World--"Somehow 
 One Must Love The World Without Being Worldly." Again,  "Courage Is 
 Almost A Contradiction In Terms. It Means A Strong Desire To Live Taking 
 The Form Of A Readiness To Die." The Martyr Differs From The Suicide In 
 That He Cherishes A Disdain Of Death,  While The Motive Of The Suicide Is 
 A Disdain Of Life. Charity,  Too,  Is A Paradox,  For It Means "One Of Two 
 Things--Pardoning Unpardonable Acts,  Or Loving Unlovable People." 
 Similarly Christian Humility Has A Background Of Unheard-Of Arrogance, 
 And Christian Liberty Is Possible Only To The Most Abject Bondsmen In 
 The World. 
   
   
 This Long Consideration Of Mr. Chesterton's Use Of Paradox Is More 
 Relevant To Our Present Subject Than It May Seem. For,  Curiously Enough, 
 The Habit Of Paradox Has Been His Way Of Entrance Into Faith. At The Age 
 Of Sixteen He Was A Complete Agnostic,  And It Was The Reading Of Huxley 
 And Herbert Spencer And Bradlaugh Which Brought Him Back To Orthodox 
 Theology. For,  As He Read,  He Found That Christianity Was Attacked On 
 All Sides,  And For All Manner Of Contradictory Reasons; And This 
 Discovery Led Him To The Conviction That Christianity Must Be A Very 
 Extraordinary Thing,  Abounding In Paradox. But He Had Already Discovered 
 The Abundant Element Of Paradox In Life; And When He Analysed The Two 
 Sets Of Paradoxes He Found Them To Be Precisely The Same. So He Became A 
 Christian. 
   
 It May Seem A Curious Way To Enter The Kingdom Of Heaven. Those Who Are 
 Accustomed To Regard The Strait Gate As Of Gothic Architecture May Be 
 Shocked To Find A Man Professing To Have Entered Through This 
 Alhambra-Like Portal. But It Is A Lesson We All Have To Learn Sooner Or 
 Later,  That There Are At Least Eleven Gates Besides Our Own,  And That 
 Every Man Has To Enter By That Which He Finds Available. Paradox Is The 
 Only Gate By Which Mr. Chesterton Could Get Into Any Place,  And The 
 Kingdom Of Heaven Is No Exception To The Rule. 
   
 His Account Of This Entrance Is Characteristic. It Is Given In The First 
 Chapter Of His _Orthodoxy_. There Was An English Yachtsman Who Set Out 
 Upon A Voyage,  Miscalculated His Course,  And Discovered What He Thought 
 To Be A New Island In The South Seas. It Transpired Afterwards That He 
 Had Run Up His Flag On The Pavilion Of Brighton,  And That He Had 
 Discovered England. That Yachtsman Is Mr. Chesterton Himself. Sailing 
 The Great Sea Of Moral And Spiritual Speculation,  He Discovered A Land 
 Of Facts And Convictions To Which His Own Experience Had Guided Him. On 
 That Strange Land He Ran Up His Flag,  Only To Make The Further And More 
 Astonishing Discovery That It Was The Christian Faith At Which He Had 
 Arrived. Nietzsche Had Preached To Him,  As To Mr. Bernard Shaw,  His 
 Great Precept,  "Follow Your Own Will." But When Mr. Chesterton Obeyed He 
 Arrived,  Not At Superman,  But At The Ordinary Old-Fashioned Morality. 
 That,  He Found,  Is What We Like Best In Our Deepest Hearts,  And Desire 
 Most. So He Too "Discovered England." 
   
   
 He Begins,  Like Margaret Fuller,  With The Fundamental Principle Of 
 Accepting The Universe. The Thing We Know Best And Most Directly Is 
 Human Nature In All Its Breadth. It Is Indeed The One Thing Immediately 
 Known And Knowable. Like R.L. Stevenson,  He Perceives How Tragically And 
 Comically Astonishing A Phenomenon Is Man. "What A Monstrous Spectre Is 
 This Man," Says Stevenson,  "The Disease Of The Agglutinated Dust, 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 110 
 Lifting Alternate Feet Or Lying Drugged With Slumber; Killing,  Feeding, 
 Growing,  Bringing Forth Small Copies Of Himself; Grown Upon With Hair 
 Like Grass,  Fitted With Eyes That Move And Glitter In His Face; A Thing 
 To Set Children Screaming;--And Yet Looked At Nearlier,  Known As His 
 Fellows Know Him,  How Surprising Are His Attributes!" In Like Manner Mr. 
 Chesterton Discovers Man--That Appalling Mass Of Paradox And 
 Contradiction--And It Is The Supreme Discovery In Any Spiritual Search. 
   
   
 Having Discovered The Fundamental Fact Of Human Nature,  He At Once Gives 
 In His Allegiance To It. "Our Attitude Towards Life Can Be Better 
 Expressed In Terms Of A Kind Of Military Loyalty Than In Terms Of 
 Criticism And Approval. My Acceptance Of The Universe Is Not Optimism, 
 It Is More Like Patriotism. It Is A Matter Of Primary Loyalty. The World 
 Is Not A Lodging-House At Brighton,  Which We Are To Leave Because It Is 
 Miserable. It Is The Fortress Of Our Family,  With The Flag Flying On The 
 Turret,  And The More Miserable It Is,  The Less We Should Leave It." 
   
   
 There Is A Splendid Courage And Heartiness In His Complete Acceptance Of 
 Life And The Universe. In A Time When Clever People Are So Busy 
 Criticising Life That They Are In Danger Of Forgetting That They Have To 
 Live It,  So Busy Selecting Such Parts Of It As Suit Their Taste That 
 They Ignore The Fact That The Other Parts Are There,  He Ignores Nothing 
 And Wisely Accepts Instead Of Criticising. Mr. Bernard Shaw,  As We Have 
 Seen,  Will Consent To Tolerate The Universe _Minus_ The Three Loyalties 
 To The Family,  The Nation,  And God. Mr. Chesterton Has No Respect 
 Whatever For Any Such Mutilated Scheme Of Human Life. His View Of The 
 Institution Of The Family Is Full Of Wholesome Common Sense. He 
 Perceives The Immense Difficulties That Beset All Family Life,  And He 
 Accepts Them With Immediate And Unflinching Loyalty,  As Essential Parts 
 Of Our Human Task. His Views On Patriotism Belong To The Region Of 
 Politics And Do Not Concern Us Here. In Regard To Religion,  He Finds The 
 Modern School Amalgamating Everything In Characterless Masses Of 
 Generalities. They Deny The Reality Of Sin,  And In Matters Of Faith 
 Generally They Have Put Every Question Out Of Focus Until The Whole 
 Picture Is Blurred And Vague. He Attacks This Way Of Dealing With 
 Religion In One Of His Most Amusing Essays,  "The Orthodox Barber." The 
 Barber Has Been Sarcastic About The New Shaving--Presumably In Reference 
 To M. Gillett's Excellent Invention. "'It Seems You Can Shave Yourself 
 With Anything--With A Stick Or A Stone Or A Pole Or A Poker' (Here I 
 Began For The First Time To Detect A Sarcastic Intonation) 'Or A Shovel 
 Or A----' Here He Hesitated For A Word,  And I,  Although I Knew Nothing 
 About The Matter,  Helped Him Out With Suggestions In The Same Rhetorical 
 Vein. 'Or A Button-Hook,' I Said,  'Or A Blunderbuss Or A Battering-Ram 
 Or A Piston-Rod----' He Resumed,  Refreshed With This Assistance,  'Or A 
 Curtain-Rod Or A Candlestick Or A----' 'Cow-Catcher,' I Suggested 
 Eagerly,  And We Continued In This Ecstatic Duet For Some Time. Then I 
 Asked Him What It Was All About,  And He Told Me. He Explained The Thing 
 Eloquently And At Length. 'The Funny Part Of It Is,' He Said,  'That The 
 Thing Isn't New At All. It's Been Talked About Ever Since I Was A Boy, 
 And Long Before.'" Mr. Chesterton Rejoins In A Long And Eloquent And 
 Most Amusing Sermon,  The Following Extracts From Which Are Not Without 
 Far-Reaching Significance. 
   
   
 "'What You Say Reminds Me In Some Dark And Dreamy Fashion Of Something 
 Else. I Recall It Especially When You Tell Me,  With Such Evident 
 Experience And Sincerity,  That The New Shaving Is Not Really New. My 
 Friend,  The Human Race Is Always Trying This Dodge Of Making Everything 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 111 
 Entirely Easy; But The Difficulty Which It Shifts Off One Thing It 
 Shifts On To Another.... It Would Be Nice If We Could Be Shaved Without 
 Troubling Anybody. It Would Be Nicer Still If We Could Go Unshaved 
 Without Annoying Anybody-- 
   
   
      "'But,  O Wise Friend,  Chief Barber Of The Strand, 
      Brother,  Nor You Nor I Have Made The World. 
   
   
 Whoever Made It,  Who Is Wiser,  And We Hope Better Than We,  Made It Under 
 Strange Limitations,  And With Painful Conditions Of Pleasure.... But 
 Every Now And Then Men Jump Up With The New Something Or Other And Say 
 That Everything Can Be Had Without Sacrifice,  That Bad Is Good If You 
 Are Only Enlightened,  And That There Is No Real Difference Between Being 
 Shaved And Not Being Shaved. The Difference,  They Say,  Is Only A 
 Difference Of Degree; Everything Is Evolutionary And Relative. 
 Shavedness Is Immanent In Man.... I Have Been Profoundly Interested In 
 What You Have Told Me About The New Shaving. Have You Ever Heard Of A 
 Thing Called The New Theology?' He Smiled And Said That He Had Not." 
   
   
 In Contrast With All This,  It Is Mr. Chesterton's Conviction That The 
 Facts Must Be Unflinchingly And In Their Entirety Accepted. With 
 Characteristic Courage He Goes Straight To The Root Of The Matter And 
 Begins With The Fact Of Sin. "If It Be True (As It Certainly Is) That A 
 Man Can Feel Exquisite Happiness In Skinning A Cat,  Then The Religious 
 Philosopher Can Only Draw One Of Two Deductions. He Must Either Deny The 
 Existence Of God,  As All Atheists Do; Or He Must Deny The Present Union 
 Between God And Man,  As All Christians Do. The New Theologians Seem To 
 Think It A Highly Rationalistic Solution To Deny The Cat." It Is As If 
 He Said,  Here You Have Direct And Unmistakable Experience. A Man Knows 
 His Sin As He Knows Himself. He May Explain It In Either One Way Or 
 Another Way. He May Interpret The Universe Accordingly In Terms Either 
 Of Heaven Or Of Hell. But The One Unreasonable And Impossible Thing To 
 Do Is To Deny The Experience Itself. 
   
   
 It Is Thus That He Treats The Question Of Faith All Along The Line. If 
 You Are Going To Be A Christian,  Or Even Fairly To Judge Christianity, 
 You Must Accept The Whole Of Christ's Teaching,  With All Its 
 Contradictions,  Paradoxes,  And The Rest. Some Men Select His Charity, 
 Others His Social Teaching,  Others His Moral Relentlessness,  And So On, 
 And Reject All Else. Each One Of These Aspects Of The Christian Faith Is 
 Doubtless Very Interesting,  But None Of Them By Itself Is An Adequate 
 Representation Of Christ. "They Have Torn The Soul Of Christ Into Silly 
 Strips,  Labelled Egoism And Altruism,  And They Are Equally Puzzled By 
 His Insane Magnificence And His Insane Meekness. They Have Parted His 
 Garments Among Them,  And For His Vesture They Have Cast Lots; Though The 
 Coat Was Without Seam,  Woven From The Top Throughout." 
   
   
 The Characteristic Word For Mr. Chesterton And His Attitude To Life Is 
 _Vitality_. He Has Been Seeking For Human Nature,  And He Has Found It At 
 Last In Christian Idealism. But Having Found It,  He Will Allow No 
 Compromise In Its Acceptance. It Is Life He Wants,  In Such Wholeness As 
 To Embrace Every Element Of Human Nature. And He Finds That Christianity 
 Has Quickened And Intensified Life All Along The Line. It Is The Great 
 Source Of Vitality,  Come That Men Might Have Life And That They Might 
 Have It More Abundantly. He Finds An Essential Joy And Riot In Creation, 
 A "Tense And Secret Festivity." And Christianity Corresponds To That 
 Riot. "The More I Considered Christianity,  The More I Found That While 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 112 
 It Had Established A Rule And Order,  The Chief Aim Of That Order Was To 
 Give Room For Good Things To Run Wild." It Has Let Loose The Wandering, 
 Masterless,  Dangerous Virtues,  And Has Insisted That Not One Or Another 
 Of Them Shall Run Wild,  But All Of Them Together. The Ideal Of Wholeness 
 Which Matthew Arnold So Eloquently Advocated,  Is Not A Dead Mass Of 
 Theories,  But A World Of Living Things. Christ Will Put A Check On None 
 Of The Really Genuine Elements In Human Nature. In Him There Is No 
 Compromise. His Love And His Wrath Are Both Burning. All The Separate 
 Elements Of Human Nature Are In Full Flame,  And It Is The Only Ultimate 
 Way Of Peace And Safety. The Various Colours Of Life Must Not Be Mixed 
 But Kept Distinct. The Red And White Of Passion And Purity Must Not Be 
 Blended Into The Insipid Pink Of A Compromising And Consistent 
 Respectability. They Must Be Kept Strong And Separate,  As In The Blazing 
 Cross Of St. George On Its Shield Of White. 
   
   
 Chaucer's "Daisy" Is One Of The Greatest Conceptions In All Poetry. It 
 Has Stood For Centuries As The Emblem Of Pure And Priceless Womanhood, 
 With Its Petals Of Snowy White And Its Heart Of Gold. Mr. Chesterton 
 Once Made A Discovery That Sent Him Wild With Joy-- 
   
   
      "Then Waxed I Like The Wind Because Of This, 
        And Ran Like Gospel And Apocalypse 
        From Door To Door,  With Wild,  Anarchic Lips, 
      Crying The Very Blasphemy Of Bliss." 
   
   
 The Discovery Was That "The Daisy Has A Ring Of Red." Purity Is Not The 
 Enemy Of Passion; Nor Must Passion And Purity Be So Toned Down And Blent 
 With One Another,  As To Give A Neutral Result. Both Must Remain,  And 
 Both In Full Brilliance,  The Virgin White And The Passionate Blood-Red 
 Ring. 
   
   
 In The Present Age Of Reason,  The Cry Is All For Tolerance,  And For 
 Redefinition Which Will Remove Sharp Contrasts And Prove That Everything 
 Means The Same As Everything Else. In Such An Age A Doctrine Like This 
 Seems To Have A Certain Barbaric Splendour About It,  As Of A Crusader 
 Risen From The Dead. But Mr. Chesterton Is Not Afraid Of The 
 Consequences Of His Opinions. If Rationalism Opposes His Presentation Of 
 Christianity,  He Will Ride Full Tilt Against Reason. In Recent Years, 
 From The Time Of Newman Until Now,  There Has Been A Recurring Habit Of 
 Discounting Reason In Favour Of Some Other Way Of Approach To Truth And 
 Life. Certainly Mr. Chesterton's Attack On Reason Is As Interesting As 
 Any That Have Gone Before It,  And It Is Even More Direct. Even On Such A 
 Question As The Problem Of Poverty He Frankly Prefers Imagination To 
 Study. In Art He Demands Instinctiveness,  And Has A Profound Suspicion 
 Of Anybody Who Is Conscious Of Possessing The Artistic Temperament. As A 
 Guide To Truth He Always Would Follow Poetry In Preference To Logic. He 
 Is Never Tired Of Attacking Rationality,  And For Him Anything Which Is 
 Rationalised Is Destroyed In The Process. 
   
   
 In One Of His Most Provokingly Unanswerable Sallies,  He Insists That The 
 True Home Of Reason Is The Madhouse. "The Madman Is Not The Man Who Has 
 Lost His Reason. The Madman Is The Man Who Has Lost Everything Except 
 His Reason." When We Say That A Man Is Mad,  We Do Not Mean That He Is 
 Unable To Conduct A Logical Argument. On The Contrary,  Any One Who Knows 
 Madmen Knows That They Are Usually Most Acute And Ingeniously Consistent 
 In Argument. They Isolate Some One Fixed Idea,  And Round That They Build 
 Up A World That Is Fiercely And Tremendously Complete. Every Detail Fits 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 113 
 In,  And The World In Which They Live Is Not,  As Is Commonly Supposed,  A 
 World Of Disconnected And Fantastic Imaginations,  But One Of Iron-Bound 
 And Remorseless Logic. No Task Is More Humiliating,  Nor More Likely To 
 Shake One's Sense Of Security In Fundamental Convictions,  Than That Of 
 Arguing Out A Thesis With A Lunatic. 
   
   
 Further,  Beneath This Rationality There Is In The Madman A Profound 
 Belief In Himself. Most Of Us Regard With Respect Those Who Trust Their 
 Own Judgment More Than We Find Ourselves Able To Trust Ours. But Not The 
 Most Confident Of Them All Can Equal The Unswerving Confidence Of A 
 Madman. Sane People Never Wholly Believe In Themselves. They Are Liable 
 To Be Influenced By The Opinion Of Others,  And Are Willing To Yield To 
 The Consensus Of Opinion Of Past Or Present Thinkers. The Lunatic Cares 
 Nothing For The Views Of Others. He Believes In Himself Against The 
 World,  With A Terrific Grip Of Conviction And A Faith That Nothing Can 
 Shake. 
   
   
 Mr. Chesterton Applies His Attack Upon Rationality To Many Subjects, 
 With Singular Ingenuity. In The Question Of Marriage And Divorce,  For 
 Instance,  The Modern School Which Would Break Loose From The Ancient 
 Bonds Can Present Their Case With An Apparently Unassailable Show Of 
 Rationality. But His Reply To Them And To All Other Rationalists Is That 
 Life Is Not Rational And Consistent But Paradoxical And Contradictory. 
 To Make Life Rational You Have To Leave Out So Many Elements As To Make 
 It Shrink From A Big World To A Little One,  Which May Be Complete,  But 
 Can Never Be Much Of A World. Its Conception Of God May Be A Complete 
 Conception,  But Its God Is Not Much Of A God. But The World Of Human 
 Nature Is A Vast World,  And The God Of Christianity Is An Infinite God. 
 The Huge Mysteries Of Life And Death,  Of Love And Sacrifice,  Of The Wine 
 Of Cana And The Cross Of Calvary--These Outwit All Logic And Pass All 
 Understanding. So For Sane Men There Comes In A Higher Authority. You 
 May Call It Common Sense,  Or Mysticism,  Or Faith,  As You Please. It Is 
 The Extra Element By Virtue Of Which All Sane Thinking And All Religious 
 Life Are Rendered Possible. It Is The Secret Spring Of Vitality Alike In 
 Human Nature And In Christian Faith. 
   
   
 At This Point It May Be Permissible To Question Mr. Chesterton's Use Of 
 Words In One Important Point. He Appears To Fall Into The Old Error Of 
 Confounding Reason With Reasoning. Reason Is One Thing And Argument 
 Another. It May Be Impossible To Express Either Human Nature Or 
 Religious Faith In A Series Of Syllogistic Arguments,  And Yet Both May 
 Be Reasonable In A Higher Sense. Reason Includes Those Extra Elements To 
 Which Mr. Chesterton Trusts. It Is The Synthesis Of Our Whole Powers Of 
 Finding Truth. Many Things Which Cannot Be Proved By Reasoning May Yet 
 Be Given In Reason--Involved In Any Reasonable View Of Things As A 
 Whole. Thus Faith Includes Reason--It _Is_ Reason On A Larger Scale--And 
 It Is The Only Reasonable Course For A Man To Take In A World Of 
 Mysterious Experience. If The Matter Were Stated In That Way,  Mr. 
 Chesterton Would Probably Assent To It. Put Crudely,  The Fashion Of 
 Pitting Faith Against Reason And Discarding Reason In Favour Of Faith, 
 Is Simply Sawing Off The Branch On Which You Are Sitting. The Result Is 
 That You Must Fall To The Ground At The Feet Of The Sceptic,  Who Asks, 
 "How Can You Believe That Which You Have Confessed There Is No Reason To 
 Believe?" We Have Abundant Reason For Our Belief,  And That Reason 
 Includes Those Higher Intuitions,  That Practical Common Sense,  And That 
 View Of Things As A Whole,  Which The Argument Of The Mere Logician 
 Necessarily Ignores. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 114 
 With This Reservation,[6] Mr. Chesterton's Position In Regard To Faith 
 Is Absolutely Unassailable. He Is The Most Vital Of Our Modern 
 Idealists,  And His Peculiar Way Of Thinking Himself Into His Idealism 
 Has Given To The Term A Richer And More Spacious Meaning,  Which Combines 
 Excellently The Greek And The Hebrew Elements. His Great Ideal Is That 
 Of Manhood. Be A Man,  He Cries Aloud,  Not An Artist,  Not A Reasoner,  Not 
 Any Other Kind Or Detail Of Humanity,  But Be A Man. But Then That Means, 
 Be A Creature Whose Life Swings Far Out Beyond This World And Its 
 Affairs--Swings Dangerously Between Heaven And Hell. Eternity Is In The 
 Heart Of Every Man. The Fashionable Modern Gospel Of Pragmatism Is 
 Telling Us To-Day That We Should Not Vex Ourselves About The Ultimate 
 Truth Of Theories,  But Inquire Only As To Their Value For Life Here And 
 Now,  And The Practical Needs Which They Serve. But The Most Practical Of 
 All Man's Needs Is His Need Of Some Contact With A Higher World Than 
 That Of Sense. "To Say That A Man Is An Idealist Is Merely To Say That 
 He Is A Man." In The Scale Of Differences Between Important And 
 Unimportant Earthly Things,  It Is The Spiritual And Not The Material 
 That Counts. "An Ignorance Of The Other World Is Boasted By Many Men Of 
 Science; But In This Matter Their Defect Arises,  Not From Ignorance Of 
 The Other World,  But From Ignorance Of This World." "The Moment Any 
 Matter Has Passed Through The Human Mind It Is Finally And For Ever 
 Spoilt For All Purposes Of Science. It Has Become A Thing Incurably 
 Mysterious And Infinite; This Mortal Has Put On Immortality." 
   
   
 Here We Begin To See The Immense Value Of Paradox In The Matter Of 
 Faith. Mr. Chesterton Is An Optimist,  Not Because He Fits Into This 
 World,  But Because He Does Not Fit Into It. Pagan Optimism Is Content 
 With The World,  And Subsists Entirely In Virtue Of Its Power To Fit Into 
 It And Find It Sufficient. This Is That Optimism Of Which Browning 
 Speaks With Scorn-- 
   
   
      "Tame In Earth's Paddock As Her Prize," 
   
   
 And Which He Repudiates In The Famous Lines, 
   
   
        "Then,  Welcome Each Rebuff 
        That Turns Earth's Smoothness Rough, 
        Each Sting That Bids Nor Sit Nor Stand But Go! 
        Be Our Joys Three Parts Pain! 
        Strive,  And Hold Cheap The Strain; 
      Learn,  Nor Account The Pang; Dare,  Never Grudge The Throe!" 
   
   
 Mr. Chesterton Insists That Beyond The Things Which Surround Us Here On 
 The Earth There Are Other Things Which Claim Us From Beyond. The Higher 
 Instincts Which Discover These Are Not Tools To Be Used For Making The 
 Most Of Earthly Treasures,  But Sacred Relics To Be Guarded. He Is An 
 Idealist Who Has Been Out Beyond The World. There He Has Found A Whole 
 Universe Of Mysterious But Commanding Facts,  And Has Discovered That 
 These And These Alone Can Satisfy Human Nature. 
   
   
 The Question Must,  However,  Arise,  As To The Validity Of Those Spiritual 
 Claims. How Can We Be Sure That The Ideals Which Claim Us From Beyond 
 Are Realities,  And Not Mere Dream Shapes? There Is No Answer But This, 
 That If We Question The Validity Of Our Own Convictions And The Reality 
 Of Our Most Pressing Needs,  We Have Simply Committed Spiritual Suicide, 
 And Arrived Prematurely At The End Of All Things. With The Habit Of 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 115 
 Questioning Ultimate Convictions Mr. Chesterton Has Little Patience. 
 Modesty,  He Tells Us,  Has Settled In The Wrong Place. We Believe In 
 Ourselves And We Doubt The Truth That Is In Us. But We Ourselves,  The 
 Crude Reality Which We Actually Are,  Are Altogether Unreliable; While 
 The Vision Is Always Trustworthy. We Are For Ever Changing The Vision To 
 Suit The World As We Find It,  Whereas We Ought To Be Changing The World 
 To Bring It Into Conformity With The Unchanging Vision. The Very Essence 
 Of Orthodoxy Is A Profound And Reverent Conviction Of Ideals That Cannot 
 Be Changed--Ideals Which Were The First,  And Shall Be The Last. 
   
   
 If Mr. Chesterton Often Strains His Readers' Powers Of Attention By 
 Rapid And Surprising Movements Among Very Difficult Themes,  He Certainly 
 Has Charming Ways Of Relieving The Strain. The Favourite Among All Such 
 Methods Is His Reversion To The Subject Of Fairy Tales. In "The Dragon's 
 Grandmother" He Introduces Us To The Arch-Sceptic Who Did Not Believe In 
 Them--That Fresh-Coloured And Short-Sighted Young Man Who Had A Curious 
 Green Tie And A Very Long Neck. It Happened That This Young Man Had 
 Called On Him Just When He Had Flung Aside In Disgust A Heap Of The 
 Usual Modern Problem-Novels,  And Fallen Back With Vehement Contentment 
 On _Grimm's Fairy Tales_. "When He Incidentally Mentioned That He Did 
 Not Believe In Fairy Tales,  I Broke Out Beyond Control. 'Man,' I Said, 
 'Who Are You That You Should Not Believe In Fairy Tales? It Is Much 
 Easier To Believe In Blue Beard Than To Believe In You. A Blue Beard Is 
 A Misfortune; But There Are Green Ties Which Are Sins. It Is Far Easier 
 To Believe In A Million Fairy Tales Than To Believe In One Man Who Does 
 Not Like Fairy Tales. I Would Rather Kiss Grimm Instead Of A Bible And 
 Swear To All His Stories As If They Were Thirty-Nine Articles Than Say 
 Seriously And Out Of My Heart That There Can Be Such A Man As You; That 
 You Are Not Some Temptation Of The Devil Or Some Delusion From The 
 Void.'" The Reason For This Unexpected Outbreak Is A Very Deep One. 
 "Folk-Lore Means That The Soul Is Sane,  But That The Universe Is Wild 
 And Full Of Marvels. Realism Means That The World Is Dull And Full Of 
 Routine,  But That The Soul Is Sick And Screaming. The Problem Of The 
 Fairy Tale Is--What Will A Healthy Man Do With A Fantastic World? The 
 Problem Of The Modern Novel Is--What Will A Madman Do With A Dull World? 
 In The Fairy Tale The Cosmos Goes Mad; But The Hero Does Not Go Mad. In 
 The Modern Novels The Hero Is Mad Before The Book Begins,  And Suffers 
 From The Harsh Steadiness And Cruel Sanity Of The Cosmos." 
   
   
 In Other Words,  The Ideals,  The Ultimate Convictions,  Are The 
 Trustworthy Things; The Actual Experience Of Life Is Often Matter Not 
 For Distrust Only But For Scorn And Contempt. And This Philosophy Mr. 
 Chesterton Learned In The Nursery,  From That "Solemn And Star-Appointed 
 Priestess," His Nurse. The Fairy Tale,  And Not The Problem-Novel,  Is The 
 True Presentment Of Human Nature And Of Life. For,  In The First Place It 
 Preserves In Man The Faculty Most Essential To Human Nature--The Faculty 
 Of Wonder,  Without Which No Man Can Live. To Regain That Faculty Is To 
 Be Born Again,  Out Of A False World Into A True. The Constant Repetition 
 Of The Laws Of Nature Blunts Our Spirits To The Amazing Character Of 
 Every Detail Which She Reproduces. To Catch Again The Wonder Of Common 
 Things-- 
   
   
                           "The Hour 
      Of Splendour In The Grass,  Of Glory In The Flower" 
   
   
 --Is To Pass From Darkness Into Light,  From Falsehood To Truth. "All The 
 Towering Materialism Which Dominates The Modern Mind Rests Ultimately 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 116 
 Upon One Assumption: A False Assumption. It Is Supposed That If A Thing 
 Goes On Repeating Itself It Is Probably Dead: A Piece Of Clockwork." But 
 That Is Mere Blindness To The Mystery And Surprise Of Everything That 
 Goes To Make Up Actual Human Experience. "The Repetition In Nature 
 Seemed Sometimes To Be An Excited Repetition,  Like That Of An Angry 
 Schoolmaster Saying The Same Thing Over And Over Again. The Grass Seemed 
 Signalling To Me With All Its Fingers At Once; The Crowded Stars Seemed 
 Bent On Being Understood. The Sun Would Make Me See Him If He Rose A 
 Thousand Times." 
   
   
 That Is One Fact,  Which Fairy Tales Emphasise--The Constant Demand For 
 Wonder In The World,  And The Appropriateness And Rightness Of The 
 Wondering Attitude Of Mind,  As Man Passes Through His Lifelong Gallery 
 Of Celestial Visions. The Second Fact Is That All Such Vision Is 
 Conditional,  And "Hangs Upon A Veto. All The Dizzy And Colossal Things 
 Conceded Depend Upon One Small Thing Withheld. All The Wild And Whirling 
 Things That Are Let Loose Depend Upon One Thing Which Is Forbidden." 
 This Is The Very Note Of Fairyland. "You May Live In A Palace Of Gold 
 And Sapphire,  _If_ You Do Not Say The Word 'Cow'; Or You May Live 
 Happily With The King's Daughter,  _If_ You Do Not Show Her An Onion." 
 The Conditions May Seem Arbitrary,  But That Is Not The Point. The Point 
 Is That There Always _Are_ Conditions. The Parallel With Human Life Is 
 Obvious. Many People In The Modern World Are Eagerly Bent On Having The 
 Reward Without Fulfilling The Condition,  But Life Is Not Made That Way. 
 The Whole Problem Of Marriage Is A Case In Point. Its Conditions Are 
 Rigorous,  And People On All Sides Are Trying To Relax Them Or To Do Away 
 With Them. Similarly,  All Along The Line,  Modern Society Is Seeking To 
 Live In A Freedom Which Is In The Nature Of Things Incompatible With The 
 Enjoyment Or The Prosperity Of The Human Spirit. There Is An _If_ In 
 Everything. Life Is Like That,  And We Cannot Alter It. Quarrel With The 
 Seemingly Arbitrary Or Unreasonable Condition,  And The Whole Fairy 
 Palace Vanishes. "Life Itself Is As Bright As The Diamond,  But As 
 Brittle As The Window-Pane." 
   
   
 From All This It Is But A Step To The Consideration Of Dogma And The 
 Orthodox Christian Creed. Mr. Chesterton Is At War To The Knife With 
 Vague Modernism In All Its Forms. The Eternal Verities Which Produce 
 Great Convictions Are Incomparably The Most Important Things For Human 
 Nature. No "Inner Light" Will Serve Man's Turn,  But Some Outer Light, 
 And That Only And Always. "Christianity Came Into The World,  Firstly In 
 Order To Assert With Violence That A Man Had Not Only To Look Inwards, 
 But To Look Outwards,  To Behold With Astonishment And Enthusiasm A 
 Divine Company And A Divine Captain." This Again Is Human Nature. No Man 
 Can Live His Life Out Fully Without Being Mastered By Convictions That 
 He Cannot Challenge,  And For Whose Origin He Is Not Responsible. The 
 Most Essentially Human Thing Is The Sense That These,  The Supreme 
 Conditions Of Life,  Are Not Of Man's Own Arranging,  But Have Been And 
 Are Imposed Upon Him. 
   
   
 At Almost Every Point This System May Be Disputed. Mr. Chesterton,  Who 
 Never Shrinks From Pressing His Theories To Their Utmost Length,  Scoffs 
 At The Modern Habit Of "Saying That Such-And-Such A Creed Can Be Held In 
 One Age,  But Cannot Be Held In Another. Some Dogma,  We Are Told,  Was 
 Credible In The Twelfth Century,  But Is Not Credible In The Twentieth. 
 You Might As Well Say That A Certain Philosophy Can Be Believed On 
 Mondays,  But Cannot Be Believed On Tuesdays. You Might As Well Say Of A 
 View Of The Cosmos That It Was Suitable To Half-Past Three,  But Not 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture ix ( Mr. G.K. Chesterton's Point Of View ) Pg 117 
 Suitable To Half-Past Four." That Is Precisely What Many Of Us Do Say. 
 Our Powers Of Dogmatising Vary To Some Extent With Our Moods,  And To A 
 Still Greater Extent With The Reception Of New Light. There Are Many 
 Days On Which The Dogmas Of Early Morning Are Impossible And Even Absurd 
 When Considered In The Light Of Evening. 
   
   
 But It Is Not Our Task To Criticise Mr. Chesterton's Faith Nor His Way 
 Of Dealing With It. Were We To Do So,  Most Of Us Would Probably Strike A 
 Balance. We Would Find Many Of His Views And Statements Unconvincing; 
 And Yet We Would Acknowledge That They Had The Power Of Forcing The Mind 
 To See Fresh Truth Upon Which The Will Must Act Decisively. The Main 
 Point In His Orthodoxy Is Unquestionably A Most Valuable Contribution To 
 The General Faith Of His Time And Country. That Point Is The Adventure 
 Which He Narrates Under The Similitude Of The Voyage That Ended In The 
 Discovery Of England. He Set Out To Find The Empirical Truth Of Human 
 Nature And The Meaning Of Human Life,  As These Are To Be Explored In 
 Experience. When He Found Them,  It Was Infinitely Surprising To Him To 
 Become Aware That The System In Which His Faith Had Come At Last To Rest 
 Was Just Christianity--The Only System Which Could Offer Any Adequate 
 And Indeed Exact Account Of Human Nature. The Articles Of Its Creed He 
 Recognised As The Points Of Conviction Which Are Absolutely Necessary To 
 The Understanding Of Human Nature And To The Living Of Human Life. 
   
 Thus It Comes To Pass That In The Midst Of A Time Resounding With Pagan 
 Voices Old And New,  He Stands For An Unflinching Idealism. It Is The 
 Mark Of Pagans That They Are Children Of Nature,  Boasting That Nature Is 
 Their Mother: They Are Solemnised By That Still And Unresponsive 
 Maternity,  Or Driven Into Rebellion By Discovering That The So-Called 
 Mother Is But A Harsh Stepmother After All. Mr. Chesterton Loves Nature, 
 Because Christianity Has Revealed To Him That She Is But His Sister, 
 Child Of The Same Father. "We Can Be Proud Of Her Beauty,  Since We Have 
 The Same Father; But She Has No Authority Over Us; We Have To Admire, 
 But Not To Imitate." 
   
 It Follows That Two Worlds Are His,  As Is The Case With All True 
 Idealists. The Modern Reversion To Paganism Is Founded On The 
 Fundamental Error That Christianity Is Alien To Nature,  Setting Up 
 Against Her Freedom The Repellent Ideal Of Asceticism,  And Frowning Upon 
 Her Beauty With The Scowl Of The Harsh Moralist. For Mr. Chesterton The 
 Bleakness Is All On The Side Of The Pagans,  And The Beauty With The 
 Idealists. They Do Not Look Askance At The Green Earth At All. They Gaze 
 Upon It With Steady Eyes,  Until They Are Actually Looking Through It, 
 And Discovering The Radiance Of Heaven There,  And The Sublime Brightness 
 Of The Eternal Life. The Pagan Virtues,  Such As Justice And Temperance, 
 Are Painfully Reasonable And Often Sad. The Christian Virtues Are Faith, 
 Hope,  And Charity--Each More Unreasonable Than The Last,  From The Point 
 Of View Of Mere Mundane Common Sense; But They Are Gay As Childhood,  And 
 Hold The Secret Of Perennial Youth And Unfading Beauty,  In A World Which 
 Upon Any Other Terms Than These Is Hastening To Decay. 
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 118 
   
   
   
 In Bringing To A Close These Studies Of The Long Battle Between Paganism 
 And Idealism,--Between The Life Which Is Lived Under The Attraction Of 
 This World And Which Seeks Its Satisfaction There,  And That Wistful Life 
 Of The Spirit Which Has Far Thoughts And Cannot Settle Down To The Green 
 And Homely Earth,--It Is Natural That We Should Look For Some Literary 
 Work Which Will Describe The Decisive Issue Of The Whole Conflict. Such 
 A Work Is Francis Thompson's _Hound Of Heaven_,  Which Is Certainly One 
 Of The Most Remarkable Poems That Have Been Published In England For 
 Many Years. 
   
   
 To Estimate Its Full Significance It Is Necessary In A Few Words To 
 Recapitulate The Course Of Thought Which Has Been Followed In The 
 Preceding Chapters. We Began With The Ancient Greeks,  And Distinguished 
 The High Idealism Of Their Religious Conceptions From The Paganism Into 
 Which These Declined. The Sense Of The Sacredness Of Beauty,  Forced Upon 
 The Greek Spirit By The Earth Itself,  Was A High Idealism,  Without Which 
 No Conception Of Life Or Of The Universe Can Be Anything But A Maimed 
 And Incomplete Expression Of Their Meaning. Yet,  For Lack Of Some 
 Sufficiently Powerful Element Of Restraint And Some Sufficiently Daring 
 Faith In Spiritual Reality,  Hellenism Sank Back Upon The Mere Earth,  And 
 Its Dying Fires Lit Up A World Too Sordid For Their Sacred Flame. In 
 _Marius The Epicurean_ The One Thing Lacking Was Supplied By The Faith 
 Of Early Christianity. The Greek Idealism Of Beauty Was Not Only 
 Conserved But Enriched,  And The Human Spirit Was Revived,  By That Heroic 
 Faith Which Endured As Seeing The Invisible. The Two _Fausts_ Revealed 
 The Struggle At Later Stages Of The Development Of Christianity. 
 Marlowe's Showed It Under The Light Of Mediæval Theology And Goethe's 
 Under That Of Modern Humanism,  With The Curious Result That In The 
 Former Tragedy The Man Is The Pagan And The Devil The Idealist,  While In 
 The Latter This Order Is Reversed. Omar Khayyám And Fiona Macleod 
 Introduce The Oriental And The Celtic Strains. In Both There Is The Cry 
 Of The Senses And The Strong Desire And Allurement Of The Green Earth; 
 But In Fiona Macleod There Is The Dominant Undertone Of The Eternal And 
 The Spiritual,  Never Silent And Finally Overwhelming. 
   
   
 The Next Two Lectures,  In A Cross-Section Of The Seventeenth Century, 
 Showed John Bunyan Keenly Alive To The Literature And The Life Of The 
 World Of Charles The Second's Time,  Yet Burning Straight Flame Of 
 Spiritual Idealism With These For Fuel. Over Against Him Stood Samuel 
 Pepys,  Lusty And Most Amusing,  Declaring In Every Page Of His _Diary_ 
 The Lengths To Which Unblushing Paganism Can Go. 
   
   
 Representative Of Modern Literature,  Carlyle Comes First With His 
 _Sartor Resartus_. At The Ominous And Uncertain Beginning Of Our Modern 
 Thought He Stood,  Blowing Loud Upon His Iron Trumpet A Great Blast Of 
 Harsh But Grand Idealism,  Before Which The Walls Of The Pagan Jericho 
 Fell Down In Many Places. Yet Such An Inspiring Challenge As His Was 
 Bound To Produce _Reactions_,  And We Have Them In Many Forms. Matthew 
 Arnold Presses Upon His Time,  In Clear And Unimpassioned Voice,  The 
 Claim Of Neglected Hellenism. Rossetti,  With Heavy,  Half-Closed Eyes, 
 Hardly Distinguishes The Body From The Soul. Mr. Thomas Hardy,  The Titan 
 Of The Modern World,  Whose Heart Is Sore With Disillusion And The 
 Bitterness Of The Earth,  And Yet Blind To The Light Of Heaven That Still 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 119 
 Shines Upon It,  Has Lived Into The Generation Which Is Reading Mr. Wells 
 And Mr. Shaw. These Appear To Be Outside Of All Such Distinctions As 
 Pagan And Idealist; But Their Influence Is Strongly On The Pagan Side. 
 Mr. Chesterton Appears,  With His Quest Of Human Nature,  And He Finds It 
 Not On Earth But In Heaven. He Is The David Of Christian Faith,  Come To 
 Fight Against The Heretic Goliaths Of His Day; And,  So Far As His Style 
 And Literary Manner Go,  He Continues The Ancient Rôle,  Smiting Goliath 
 With His Own Sword. 
   
   
 Francis Thompson's _Hound Of Heaven_ Is For Many Reasons A Fitting Close 
 And Climax To These Studies. He Is As Much Akin To Shelley And Swinburne 
 As Mr. Chesterton Is Akin To Mr. Bernard Shaw. From Them He Has Gathered 
 Not A Little Of His Style And Diction. He Is With Them,  Too,  In His 
 Passionate Love Of Beauty,  Without Which No Idealist Can Possibly Be A 
 Fair Judge Of Paganism. "With Many," He Tells Us In That _Essay On 
 Shelley_ Which Mr. Wyndham Pronounces The Most Important Contribution To 
 English Letters During The Last Twenty Years--"With Many The Religion Of 
 Beauty Must Always Be A Passion And A Power,  And It Is Only Evil When 
 Divorced From The Worship Of The Primal Beauty." In This Confession We 
 Are Brought Back To The Point Where We Began. The Gods Of Greece Were 
 Ideals Of Earthly Beauty,  And By Them,  While Their Worship Remained 
 Spiritual,  Men Were Exalted Far Above Paganism. And Now,  As We Are 
 Drawing To A Close,  It Is Fitting That We Should Again Remind Ourselves 
 That Religious Idealism Must Recover "The Christ Beautiful," If It Is To 
 Retain Its Hold Upon Humanity. In This Respect,  Religion Has Greatly And 
 Disastrously Failed,  And He Who Can Redeem That Failure For Us Will 
 Indeed Be A Benefactor To His Race. Religion Should Lead Us Not Merely 
 To Inquire In God's Holy Place,  But To Behold The Beauty Of The Lord; 
 And To Behold It In All Places Of The Earth Until They Become Holy 
 Places For Us. Christ,  The Man Of Sorrows,  Has Taught The World That 
 Wild Joy Of Which Mr. Chesterton Speaks Such Exciting Things. It Remains 
 For Thompson To Remind Us That He Whose Visage Was More Marred Than Any 
 Man Yet Holds That Secret Of Surpassing Beauty After Which The Poets' 
 Hearts Are Seeking So Wistfully. 
   
   
 Besides All This,  We Shall Find Here Something Which Has Not As Yet Been 
 Hinted At In Our Long Quest. The Sound Of The Age-Long Battle Dies Away. 
 Here Is A Man Who Does Not Fight For Any Flag,  But Simply Tells Us The 
 Mysterious Story Of His Own Soul And Ours. It Is A Quiet And A Fitting 
 Close For Our Long Tale Of Excursions And Alarums. But Into The Quiet 
 Ending There Enters A Very Wonderful And Exciting New Element. We Have 
 Been Watching Successive Men Following After The Ideal,  Which,  Like Some 
 Receding Star,  Travelled Before Its Pilgrims Through The Night. Here The 
 Ideal Is No Longer Passive,  A Thing To Be Pursued. It Halts For Its 
 Pilgrims--"The Star Which Chose To Stoop And Stay For Us." Nay,  More,  It 
 Turns Upon Them And Pursues Them. The Ideal Is Alive And Aware--A Real 
 And Living Force Among The Great Forces Of The Universe. It Is Out After 
 Men,  And In This Great Poem We Are To Watch It Hunting A Soul Down. The 
 Whole Process Of Idealism Is Now Suddenly Reversed,  And The Would-Be 
 Captors Of Celestial Beauty Are Become Its Captives. 
   
   
 As Has Been Already Stated,  We Must Be In Sympathetic Understanding With 
 The Pagan Heart In Order To Be Of Any Account As Advocates Of Idealism. 
 No Reader Of Thompson's Poetry Can Doubt For A Moment His Fitness Here. 
 From The Days Of Pindar There Has Been A Brilliant Succession Of Singers 
 And Worshippers Of The Sun,  Culminating In The Matchless Song Of 
 Shelley. In Francis Thompson's Poems Of The Sun,  The Succession Is Taken 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 120 
 Up Again In A Fashion Which Is Not Unworthy Of The Splendours Of 
 Paganism At Its Very Highest. 
   
   
      "And The Sun Comes With Power Amid The Clouds Of Heaven, 
          Before His Way 
        Went Forth The Trumpet Of The March 
        Before His Way,  Before His Way, 
        Dances The Pennon Of The May! 
      O Earth,  Unchilded,  Widowed Earth,  So Long 
      Lifting In Patient Pine And Ivy-Tree 
      Mournful Belief And Steadfast Prophecy, 
        Behold How All Things Are Made True! 
        Behold Your Bridegroom Cometh In To You 
          Exceeding Glad And Strong!" 
   
   
 The Great Song Takes Us Back To The Days Of Mithra And The _Sol 
 Invictus_ Of Aurelian. That Outburst Of Sunshine In The Evening Of The 
 Roman Empire,  Rekindling The Fires Of Apollo's Ancient Altars For Men 
 Who Loved The Sunshine And Felt The Wonder Of It,  Is Repeated With 
 Almost Added Glory In Thompson's Marvellous Poems. 
   
   
 Yet For Francis Thompson All This Glory Of The Sun Is But A Symbol. The 
 World Where His Spirit Dwells Is Beyond The Sun,  And In Nature It 
 Displays Itself To Man But Brokenly. In The Bloody Fires Of Sunset,  In 
 The Exquisite White Artistry Of The Snow-Flake,  This Supernatural 
 World Is But Showing Us A Few Of Its Miracles,  By Which The Miracles Of 
 Christian Faith Are Daily And Hourly Matched For Sheer Wonder And 
 Beauty. The Idealist Claims As His Inheritance All Those Things In Which 
 The Pagan Finds His Gods,  And Views Them As The Revelations Of The 
 Master Spirit. 
   
 It Is Difficult To Write About Thompson's Poetry Without Writing Mainly 
 About Himself. In _The Hound Of Heaven_,  As In Much Else That He Has 
 Written,  There Is Abundance Of His Own Experience,  And Indeed His Poems 
 Often Remind Us Of The Sorrows Of Teufelsdröckh. That,  However,  Is Not 
 The Purpose Of This Lecture; And,  Beyond A Few Notes Of A General Kind, 
 We Shall Leave Him To Reveal Himself. Except For Mr. Meynell's 
 Illuminative And All Too Short Introduction To His Volume Of _Thompson's 
 Selected Poems_,  There Are As Yet Only Scattered Articles In Magazines 
 To Tell His Strange And Most Pathetic Story. His Writings Are Few, 
 Comprising Three Short Books Of Poetry,  His Prose _Essay On Shelley_, 
 And A _Life Of St. Ignatius_,  Which Is Full Of Interest And Almost 
 Overloaded With Information,  But Which May Be Discounted From The List 
 Of His Permanent Contributions To Literature Or To Thought. Yet That 
 Small Output Is Enough To Establish Him Among The Supreme Poets Of Our 
 Land. 
   
   
 Apart From Its Poetic Power And Spiritual Vision,  His Was An Acute And 
 Vivid Mind. On Things Political And Social He Could Express Himself In 
 Little Casual Flashes Whose Shrewd And Trenchant Incisiveness Challenge 
 Comparison With Mr. Chesterton's Own Asides. His Acquaintance With 
 Science Seems To Have Been Extensive,  And At Times He Surprises Us With 
 Allusions And Metaphors Of An Unusually Technical Kind,  Which He Somehow 
 Renders Intelligible Even To The Non-Scientific Reader. These Are Doubly 
 Illuminative,  Casting Spiritual Light On The Material World,  And 
 Strengthening With Material Fact The Tenuous Thoughts Of The Spiritual. 
 The Words Which He Used Of Shelley Are,  In This Respect,  Applicable To 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 121 
 Himself. "To Shelley's Ethereal Vision The Most Rarefied Mental Or 
 Spiritual Music Traced Its Beautiful Corresponding Forms On The Sand Of 
 Outward Things." 
   
   
 His Style And Choice Of Words Are An Achievement In Themselves,  As 
 Distinctive As Those Of Thomas Carlyle. They,  And The Attitude Of Mind 
 With Which They Are Congruous,  Have Already Set A Fashion In Our Poetry, 
 And Some Of Its Results Are Excellent. In _Rose And Vine_,  And In Other 
 Poems Of Mrs. Rachel Annand Taylor,  We Have The Same Blend Of Power And 
 Beauty,  The Same Wildness In The Use Of Words,  And The Same Languor And 
 Strangeness As If We Had Entered Some Foreign And Wonderfully Coloured 
 World. In _Ignatius_ The Style And Diction Are Quite Simple,  Ordinary, 
 And Straightforward,  But That Biography Is Decidedly The Least Effective 
 Of His Works. It Would Seem That Here As Elsewhere Among Really Great 
 Writings The Style Is The Natural And Necessary Expression Of The 
 Individual Mind And Imagination. The _Life Of Shelley_,  Which Is 
 Certainly One Of The Masterpieces Of English Prose,  Has Found For Its 
 Expression A Style Quite Unique And Distinctive,  In Which There Are 
 Constant Reminders Of Other Stylists,  Yet No Imitation Of Any. The 
 Poetry Is Drugged,  And As We Read His Poems Through In The Order Of 
 Their Publication,  We Feel The Power Of The Poppy More And More. At Last 
 The Hand Seems To Lose Its Power And The Will Its Control,  Though In 
 Flashes Of Sheer Flame The Imagination Shows Wild And Beautiful As Ever. 
 His Gorgeousness Is Beyond That Of The Orient. The Eccentric And 
 Arresting Words That Constantly Amaze The Ear,  Bring With Them A Sense 
 Of Things Occult Yet Dazzling,  As If We Were Assisting At Some Mystic 
 Rite,  In A Ritual Which Demanded Language Choice And Strange. 
   
   
 Something Of This May Be Due To Narcotics,  And To The Depressing Tragedy 
 Of His Life. More Of It Is Due To Shelley,  Keats,  And Swinburne. But 
 These Do Not Explain The Style,  Nor The Thoughts Which Clothed 
 Themselves In It. Both Style And Thoughts Are Native To The Man. What He 
 Borrows He First Makes His Own,  And Thus Establishes His Right To 
 Borrow--A Right Very Rarely To Be Conceded. Much That He Has Learned 
 From Shelley He Passes On To His Readers,  But Before They Receive It,  It 
 Has Become,  Not Shelley's,  But Francis Thompson's. To Stick A 
 Lotos-Flower In Our Buttonhole--Harris-Cloth Or Broadcloth,  It Does Not 
 Matter--Is An Impertinent Folly That Makes A Guy Of The Wearer. But This 
 Man's Raiment Is His Own,  Not That Of Other Men,  And Shelley Himself 
 Would Willingly Have Put His Own Flowers There. 
   
   
 Those Who Stumble At The Prodigality And Licence Of His Style,  And The 
 Unchartered Daring Of His Imagination,  Will Find A Most Curious And 
 Brilliant Discussion Of The Whole Subject In His _Essay On Shelley_, 
 Which May Be Summed Up In The Injunction That "In Poetry,  As In The 
 Kingdom Of God,  We Should Not Take Thought Too Greatly Wherewith We 
 Shall Be Clothed,  But Seek First--Seek _First_,  Not Seek _Only_--The 
 Spirit,  And All These Things Will Be Added Unto Us." He Discusses His 
 Own Style With An Unexpected Frankness. His View Of The Use Of 
 Imagination Is Expressed In The Suggestive And Extraordinary Words--"To 
 Sport With The Tangles Of Neæra's Hair May Be Trivial Idleness Or 
 Caressing Tenderness,  Exactly As Your Relation To Neræa Is That Of 
 Heartless Gallantry Or Of Love. So You May Toy With Imagery In Mere 
 Intellectual Ingenuity,  And Then You Might As Well Go Write Acrostics; 
 Or You May Toy With It In Raptures,  And Then You May Write A _Sensitive 
 Plant_." If A Man Is Passionate,  And Passion Is Choosing Her Own 
 Language In His Work,  He May Be Forgiven Much. If He Chooses Strange 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 122 
 Words Deliberately And In Cold Blood,  There Is No Reason Why We Should 
 Forgive Him Anything. 
   
   
 So Much Has Been Necessary As An Introduction,  But Our Subject Is 
 Neither The Man Francis Thompson Nor His Poetry In General,  But The One 
 Poem Which Is At Once The Most Characteristic Expression Of His 
 Personality And Of His Poetic Genius. _The Hound Of Heaven_ Has For Its 
 Idea The Chase Of Man By The Celestial Huntsman. God Is Out After The 
 Soul,  Pursuing It Up And Down The Universe. God,--But God Incarnate In 
 Jesus Christ,  Whose Love And Death Are Here The Embodiment And 
 Revelation Of The Whole Ideal World. The Hunted One Flees,  As Men So 
 Constantly Flee From The Highest,  And Seeks Refuge In Every Possible 
 Form Of Earthly Experience--At Least In Every Clean And Noble Form,  For 
 There Is Nothing Suggestive Of Low Covert Or The Mire. It Is Simply The 
 Second-Best As A Refuge From The Best That Is Depicted Here--The Earth 
 At Its Pagan Finest,  In Whose Charm Or Homeliness The Soul Would Fain 
 Hide Itself From The Spiritual Pursuit. And The Great Huntsman Is 
 Remorseless In His Determination To Win The Soul For The Very Best Of 
 All. The Soul Longs For Beauty,  For Interest,  For Comfort; And In The 
 Beautiful,  Various,  Comfortable Life Of The Earth She Finds Them. The 
 Inner Voice Still Tells Of A Nobler Heritage; But She Understands And 
 Loves These Earthly Things,  And Would Fain Linger Among Them,  Shy Of The 
 Further Flight. 
   
   
 The Whole Conception Of The Poem Is The Counterpart Of Browning's 
 _Easter Day_,  Where The Soul Chooses And Is Allowed To Choose The Same 
 Regions Of The Lesser Good And Beauty For Its Home. In That Poem The 
 Soul Is Permitted To Devote Itself For Ever To The Finest Things That 
 Earth Can Give--Life,  Literature,  Scientific Knowledge,  Love. The 
 Permission Sends It Wild With Joy,  And Having Chosen,  It Settles Down 
 For Ever To The Earth-Bound Life. But Eternity Is Too Long For The Earth 
 And All That Is Upon It. It Wears Time Out,  And All The Desire Of Our 
 Mortality Ages And Grows Weary. The Spirit,  Made For Immortal Thoughts 
 And Loves And Life,  Finds Itself The Ghastly Prisoner Of That Which Is 
 Inevitably Decaying; But Its Immortality Postpones The Decent And 
 Appropriate End To An Eternal Mockery And Doom. At Last,  In The 
 Tremendous Close,  It Wakens To The Unspeakable Blessedness Of _Not_ 
 Being Satisfied With Anything That Earth Can Give,  And So Proves Itself 
 Adequate For Its Own Inheritance Of Immortality. In Thompson's Poem The 
 Soul Is Never Allowed,  Even In Dream,  To Rest In Lower Things Until 
 Satiety Brings Disillusion. The Higher Destiny Is Swift At Her Heels; 
 And Ever,  Just As She Would Nestle In Some New Covert,  She Is Torn From 
 It By The Imperious Best Of All That Claims Her For Its Own. 
   
   
 There Is No Obvious Sequence Of The Phases Of The Poem,  Nor Any Logical 
 Order Connecting Them Into A Unity Of Experience. They May Or May Not Be 
 A Rescript Of Thompson's Own Inner Life,  But Every Detail Might Be 
 Placed In Another Order Without The Slightest Loss To The Meaning Or The 
 Truth. The Only Guiding And Unifying Element Is A Purely Artistic 
 One--That Of The Hound In Full Cry,  And The Unity Of The Poem Is But 
 That Of A Day's Hunting. One Would Like To Know What Remote Origin It Is 
 To Which We Owe The Figure. Thompson Was A Greek Scholar,  And Some Such 
 Legend As That Of Actæon May Well Have Been In His Mind. But The Chase 
 Of Dogs Was A Common Horror In The Middle Ages,  And Many Of The Mediæval 
 Fiends Are Dog-Faced. In Those Days,  When Conscience Had As Yet Received 
 None Of Our Modern Soporifics,  And Men Believed In Hell,  Many A Guilty 
 Sinner Knew Well The Baying Of The Hell-Hounds,  Masterless And 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 123 
 Bloody-Fanged,  That Chased The Souls Of Even Good Men Up To The Very 
 Gates Of Heaven. Conscience And Remorse Ran Wild,  And The Hound Of Hell 
 Was A Characteristic Part Of The Machinery That Made The Tragedy Of Life 
 So Terrific In Those Old Days. But Here,  By A _Tour De Force_ In Which 
 Is Summed Up The Entire Transformation From Ancient To Modern Thought, 
 The Hell-Hounds Are Transformed Into The Hound Of Heaven. That Something 
 Or Some One Is Out After The Souls Of Men,  No Man Who Has Understood His 
 Inner Life Can Question For A Moment. But Here The Great Doctrine Is 
 Proclaimed,  That The Huntsman Of The Soul Is Love And Not Hate,  Eternal 
 Good And Not Evil. No Matter What Cries May Freeze The Soul With Horror 
 In The Night,  What Echoes Of The Deep-Voiced Dogs Upon The Trail Of 
 Memory And Of Conscience,  It Is God And Not The Devil That Is Pursuing. 
   
   
 The Poem,  By A Strange Device Of Rhythm,  Keeps Up The Chase In The Most 
 Vividly Dramatic Realism. The Metre Throughout Is Irregular,  And The 
 Verses Swing Onward For The Most Part In Long,  Sweeping Lines. But Five 
 Times,  At Intervals In The Poem,  The Sweep Is Interrupted By A Stanza Of 
 Shorter Lines,  Varied Slightly But Yet In Essence The Same-- 
   
        "But With Unhurrying Chase, 
        And Unperturbèd Pace, 
      Deliberate Speed,  Majestic Instancy, 
        They Beat--And A Voice Beat 
        More Instant Than The Feet-- 
      All Things Betray Thee,  Who Betrayest Me." 
   
 By This Device Of Rhythm The Footfall Of The Hound Is Heard In All The 
 Pauses Of The Poem. In The Short And Staccato Measures You Hear The 
 Patter Of The Little Feet Padding After The Soul From The Unseen 
 Distance Behind. It Is A Daring Use Of The Onomatopoeic Device In 
 Poetry,  And It Is Effective To A Wonder,  Binding The Whole Poem Into The 
 Unity Of A Single Chase. 
   
 The First Nine Lines Are The Story Of A Soul Subjective As Yet And 
 Self-Absorbed. The First Covert In Which It Seeks To Hide Is Its Own 
 Life--The Thoughts And Tears And Laughter,  The Hopes And Fears Of A Man. 
 This Is In Most Men's Lives The First Attempt At Escape. The Verses Here 
 Give The Inner Landscape,  The Country Of A Soul's Experience,  With 
 Wonderful Compression. Then Comes The Patter Of The Hound's Feet,  And 
 For The Rest We Are No Longer In The Thicket Of The Inner Life,  But In 
 The Open Country Of The Outer World. This Is But The Constantly Repeated 
 Transition Which,  As We Have Already Seen,  Browning Illustrates In His 
 _Sordello_,  The Turning-Point Between The Early Introspective And The 
 Later Dramatic Periods. 
   
   
 Having Gained The Open Country Of The Outward And Objective World,  The 
 Inevitable First Thought Is Of Love As A Refuge From Spiritual Pursuit. 
 The Story Is Shortly Told In Nine Lines. The Human And The Divine Love 
 Are Rivals Here; Pagan _Versus_ Ideal Affection. The Hunted Heart Is Not 
 Allowed To Find Refuge Or Solace In Human Love. The Man Knows That It Is 
 Love That Follows Him: Yet It Is The Warm,  Red,  Earthly Passion That He 
 Craves For,  And The Divine Pursuer Seems Cold,  Exacting,  And Austere. 
   
   
 Finding No Refuge In Human Love From This "Tremendous Lover," He Seeks 
 It Next In A Kind Of Imaginative Materialism,  Half-Scientific, 
 Half-Fantastic. He Appeals At "The Gold Gateways Of The Stars" And At 
 "The Pale Ports O' The Moon" For Shelter. He Seeks To Hide Beneath The 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 124 
 Vague And Blossom-Woven Veil Of Far Sky-Spaces,  Or,  In Lust Of Swift 
 Motion,  "Clings To The Whistling Mane Of Every Wind!" Here Is A Choice 
 Of Paganism At Its Most Modern And Most Impressive. The Cosmic 
 Imagination,  Revelling In The Limitless Fields Of Time And Space,  Will 
 Surely Be Sufficient For A Man's Idealism,  Without Any Insistence Upon 
 Further Definition. Here Are Carlyle's Eternities And Immensities--Are 
 They Not Enough? The Answer Is That These Are But The Servants Of One 
 Mightier Than They. Incorruptible And Steadfast In Their Allegiance, 
 They Will Neither Offer Pity Nor Will They Allow Peace To Him Who Is Not 
 Loyal To Their Master. And The Hunted Soul Is Stung By A Fever Of 
 Restlessness That Chases Him Back Across "The Long Savannahs Of The 
 Blue" To Earth Again,  With The Recurring Patter Of The Little Feet 
 Behind Him. 
   
   
 Doubling Upon The Course,  The Quarry Seeks The Surest Refuge To Be Found 
 On Earth. Children Are Still Here,  And In Their Simplicity And Innocence 
 There Is Surely A Hiding-Place That Will Suffice. Here Is No Danger Of 
 Earthly Passion,  No Titanic Stride Among The Vast Things Of The 
 Universe. Are They Not The True Idealists,  The Children? Are They Not 
 The Authentic Guardians Of Fairyland And Of Heaven? Francis Thompson Is 
 An Authority Here,  And His Love Of Children Has Expressed Itself In Much 
 Exquisite Prose And Poetry. "Know You What It Is To Be A Child? It Is To 
 Be Something Very Different From The Man Of To-Day. It Is To Have A 
 Spirit Yet Streaming From The Waters Of Baptism; It Is To Believe In 
 Love,  To Believe In Loveliness,  To Believe In Belief; It Is To Be So 
 Little That The Elves Can Reach To Whisper In Your Ear; It Is To Turn 
 Pumpkins Into Coaches,  And Mice Into Horses,  Lowness Into Loftiness,  And 
 Nothing Into Everything,  For Each Child Has Its Fairy Godmother In Its 
 Own Soul; It Is To Live In A Nutshell And To Count Yourself The King Of 
 Infinite Space." "To The Last He [Shelley] Was The Enchanted Child.... 
 He Is Still At Play,  Save Only That His Play Is Such As Manhood Stops To 
 Watch,  And His Playthings Are Those Which The Gods Give Their Children. 
 The Universe Is His Box Of Toys. He Dabbles His Fingers In The Day-Fall. 
 He Is Gold-Dusty With Tumbling Amidst The Stars. He Makes Bright 
 Mischief With The Moon. The Meteors Nuzzle Their Noses In His Hand. He 
 Teases Into Growling The Kennelled Thunder,  And Laughs At The Shaking Of 
 Its Fiery Chain. He Dances In And Out Of The Gates Of Heaven; Its Floor 
 Is Littered With His Broken Fancies. He Runs Wild Over The Fields Of 
 Ether. He Chases The Rolling World." He Who Could Write Thus,  And Who 
 Could Melt Our Hearts With _To Monica Thought Dying_ And Its Refrain, 
   
   
          "A Cup Of Chocolate, One Farthing Is The Rate, 
      You Drink It Through A Straw,  A Straw,  A Straw" 
   
   
 --Surely He Must Have Had Some Wonderful Right Of Entrance Into The 
 Innocent Fellowships Of Childhood. Still More Intimate,  Daring In Its 
 Incredible Humility And Simpleness,  Is His _Ex Ore Infantium_:-- 
   
   
      "Little Jesus,  Wast Thou Shy 
   
       Once,  And Just As Small As I? 
      And What Did It Feel Like To Be 
      Out Of Heaven,  And Just Like Me?... 
      Hadst Thou Ever Any Toys, 
      Like Us Little Girls And Boys? 
      And Didst Thou Play In Heaven With All 
      The Angels,  That Were Not Too Tall?... 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 125 
      So,  A Little Child,  Come Down 
      And Hear A Child's Tongue Like Thy Own; 
      Take Me By The Hand And Walk, 
      And Listen To My Baby-Talk." 
   
   
 But Not Even This Refuge Is Open To The Rebel Soul. 
   
      "I Turned Me To Them Very Wistfully; 
      But Just As Their Young Eyes Grew Sudden Fair 
            With Dawning Answers There, 
      Their Angel Plucked Them From Me By The Hair." 
   
   
 Driven From The Fairyland Of Childhood,  He Flees,  As A Last Resort,  To 
 Nature. This Time It Is Not In Science That He Seeks Her,  But In Pure 
 Abandonment Of His Spirit To Her Changing Moods. He Will Be One With 
 Cloud And Sky And Sea,  Will Be The Brother Of The Dawn And Eventide. 
   
   
          "I Was Heavy With The Even, 
          When She Lit Her Glimmering Tapers 
          Round The Day's Dead Sanctities. 
          I Laughed In The Morning's Eyes, 
      I Triumphed And I Saddened With All Weather." 
   
   
 Here Again Francis Thompson Is On Familiar Ground. If,  Like Mr. 
 Chesterton,  He Holds The Key Of Fairyland,  Like Him Also He Can Retain 
 Through Life His Wonder At The Grass. His Nature-Poetry Is Nearer 
 Shelley Than Anything That Has Been Written Since Shelley Died. In It 
   
   
      "The Leaves Dance,  The Leaves Sing, 
      The Leaves Dance In The Breath Of Spring," 
   
   
 Or-- 
   
          "The Great-Vanned Angel March 
              Hath Trumpeted 
      His Clangorous 'Sleep No More' To All The Dead-- 
      Beat His Strong Vans O'er Earth And Air And Sea 
              And They Have Heard; 
          Hark To The _Jubilate_ Of The Bird." 
   
   
 These,  And Such Exquisite Detailed Imagery As That Of The Poem _To A 
 Snowflake_--The Delicate Silver Filigree Of Verse--Rank Him Among The 
 Most Privileged Of The Ministrants In Nature's Temple,  Standing Very 
 Close To The Shrine. Yet Here Again There Is Repulse For The Flying 
 Soul. This Fellowship,  Like That Of The Children,  Is Indeed Fair And 
 Sheltering,  But It Is Not For Him. It Is As When Sunset Changes The 
 Glory From The Landscape Into The Cold And Dead Aspect Of Suddenly 
 Fallen Night. Nature,  That Seemed So Alive And Welcoming,  Is Dead To 
 Him. Her Austerity And Aloofness Change Her Face; She Is Not Friend But 
 Stranger. Her Language Is Another Tongue From His-- 
   
   
      "In Vain My Tears Were Wet On Heaven's Grey Cheek," 
   
 --And The Padding Of The Feet Is Heard Again. 
   
   
 Thus Has He Compassed The Length And Breadth Of The Universe In The Vain 
 Attempt To Flee From God. Now At Last He Finds Himself At Bay. God Has 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 126 
 Been Too Much For Him. Against His Will,  And Wearied Out With The Vain 
 Endeavour To Escape,  He Must Face The Pursuing Love At Last. 
   
   
      "Naked I Wait Thy Love's Uplifted Stroke! 
      My Harness Piece By Piece Thou Hast Hewn From Me, 
                And Smitten Me To My Knee. 
            I Am Defenceless Utterly." 
   
   
 So,  Faced By Ultimate Destiny In The Form Of Divine Love At Last,  He 
 Remembers The Omnipotence That Once Had Seemed To Dwell In Him,  When 
   
   
      "In The Rash Lustihead Of My Young Powers, 
        I Shook The Pillaring Hours 
      And Pulled My Life Upon Me," 
   
 And, 
   
      "The Linked Fantasies,  In Whose Blossomy Twist 
      I Swung The Earth A Trinket At My Wrist." 
   
   
 All That Is Gone,  And He Is Face To Face With The Grim Demands Of God. 
   
   
 There Follows A Protest Against Those Demands. To Him It Appears That 
 They Are The Call For Sheer Sacrifice And Death. He Had Sought 
 Self-Realisation In Every Lovely Field That Lay Open To The Earth. But 
 Now The Trumpeter Is Sounding,  "From The Hid Battlements Of Eternity," 
 The Last Word And Final Meaning Of Human Life. His Is A Dread Figure, 
 "Enwound With Glooming Robes Purpureal,  Cypress-Crowned." His Demand Is 
 For Death And Sacrifice,  Calling The Reluctant Children Of The Green 
 Earth Out From This Pleasance To Face The Awful Will Of God. 
   
   
 It Is The Cross That He Has Seen In Nature And Beyond It. Long Ago It 
 Was Set Up In England,  That Same Cross,  When Cynewulf Sang His _Christ_. 
 On Judgment Day He Saw It Set On High,  Streaming With Blood And Flame 
 Together,  Amber And Crimson,  Illuminating The Day Of Doom. Thompson Has 
 Found It,  Not On Calvary Only,  But Everywhere In Nature,  And By _Tour De 
 Force_ He Blends The Sunset With Golgotha And Finds That The Lips Of 
 Nature Proclaim The Gospel Of Jesus Christ. In The Garden Of The 
 Monastery There Stands A Cross,  And The Sun Is Setting Over It. 
   
   
                           "Thy Straight 
      Long Beam Lies Steady On The Cross. Ah Me! 
          What Secret Would Thy Radiant Finger Show? 
      Of Thy Bright Mastership Is This The Key? 
          Is _This_ Thy Secret Then,  And Is It Woe? 
   
   
      Thou Dost Image,  Thou Dost Follow 
          That King-Maker Of Creation 
      Who Ere Hellas Hailed Apollo 
          Gave Thee,  Angel-God,  Thy Station; 
   
   
      Thou Art Of Him A Type Memorial. 
          Like Him Thou Hangst In Dreadful Pomp Of Blood 
              Upon Thy Western Rood; 
          And His Stained Brow Did Veil Like Thine To Night. 
   
   
        Now,  With Wan Ray That Other Sun Of Song 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 127 
            Sets In The Bleakening Waters Of My Soul. 
        One Step,  And Lo! The Cross Stands Gaunt And Long 
            'Twixt Me And Yet Bright Skies,  A Presaged Dole. 
   
   
        Even So,  O Cross! Thine Is The Victory, 
            Thy Roots Are Fast Within Our Fairest Fields; 
        Brightness May Emanate In Heaven From Thee: 
            Here Thy Dread Symbol Only Shadow Yields." 
   
   
 This Is Ever The First Appearance Of The Highest When Men See It. And, 
 To The Far-Seeing Eyes Of The Poet,  Nature Must Also Wear The Same 
 Aspect. Apollo,  When His Last Word Is Said,  Must Speak The Same Language 
 As Christ. Paganism Is An Elaborate Device To Do Without The Cross. Yet 
 It Is Ever A Futile Device,  For The Cross Is In The Very Grain And 
 Essence Of All Life; It Is Absolutely Necessary To All Permanent And 
 Satisfying Gladness. Francis Thompson Is Not The First Who Has Shrunk 
 Back From The Bitter Truth. Many Others Have Found The Bitterness Of The 
 Cross A Lesson Too Dreadful For Their Joyous Or Broken Hearts To Learn. 
 Who Are We That We Should Judge Them? Have We Not All Rebelled At This 
 Bitter Aspect Of The Highest,  And Said,  In Our Own Language-- 
   
   
          "Ah! Is Thy Love Indeed 
      A Weed,  Albeit An Amaranthine Weed 
      Suffering No Flowers Except Its Own To Mount?" 
   
   
 Finally We Have The Answer Of Christ To The Soul He Has Chased Down 
 After So Long A Following-- 
   
   
          "Strange,  Piteous,  Futile Thing! 
      Wherefore Should Any Set Thee Love Apart? 
      Seeing None But I Makes Much Of Nought (He Said), 
      And Human Love Needs Human Meriting: 
          How Hast Thou Merited-- 
      Of All Man's Clotted Clay The Dingiest Clot? 
          Alack,  Thou Knowest Not 
      How Little Worthy Of Any Love Thou Art! 
      Whom Wilt Thou Find To Love Ignoble Thee, 
          Save Me,  Save Only Me? 
      All Which I Took From Thee I Did But Take, 
          Not For Thy Harms, 
      But Just That Thou Mightst Seek It In My Arms. 
          All Which Thy Child's Mistake 
      Fancies As Lost,  I Have Stored For Thee At Home: 
          Rise,  Clasp My Hand,  And Come." 
   
   
 And The Poem Ends Upon The Patter Of The Little Feet-- 
   
   
          "Halts By Me That Footfall: 
          Is My Gloom,  After All, 
      Shade Of His Hand,  Outstretched Caressingly? 
          Ah,  Fondest,  Blindest,  Weakest, 
          I Am He Whom Thou Seekest! 
      Thou Drovest Love From Thee,  Who Drovest Me." 
   
   
 It Is A Perfect Ending For This Very Wonderful Song Of Life,  And It 
 Tells The Old And Constantly Repeated Story Of The Victory Of The Cross 
 Over The Pagan Gods. It Is Through Pain And Not Through Indulgence That 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 128 
 The Ideals Gain For Themselves Eternal Life. Until The Soul Has Been 
 Transformed And Strengthened By Pain,  Its Attempt To Fulfil Itself And 
 Be At Peace In A Pagan Settlement On The Green Earth Must Ever Be In 
 Vain. And In Our Hearts We All Know This Quite Well. We Really Desire 
 The Highest,  And Yet We Flee In Terror From It Always,  Until The Day Of 
 The Wise Surrender. This Is Perhaps The Greatest Of All Our Paradoxes 
 And Contradictions. 
   
   
 As Has Been Already Pointed Out,  The New Feature Which Is Introduced To 
 The Aspect Of The Age-Long Conflict By _The Hound Of Heaven_ Is That The 
 Parts Are Here Reversed,  And Instead Of The Soul Seeking The Highest, 
 The Highest Is Out In Full Cry After The Soul. In This The Whole Quest 
 Crosses Over Into The Supernatural,  And Can No Longer Be Regarded Simply 
 As A Study Of Human Nature. Beyond The Human Region,  Out Among Those 
 Eternities And Immensities Where Carlyle Loved To Roam,  There Is That 
 Which Loves And Seeks. This Is The Very Essence Of Christian Faith. The 
 Good Shepherd Seeketh The Lost Sheep Until He Find It. He Is Found Of 
 Those That Sought Him Not. Until The Search Is Ended The Silly Sheep May 
 Flee Before His Footsteps In Terror,  Even In Hatred,  For The Bewildered 
 Hour. Yet It Is He Who Gives All Reality And Beauty Even To Those Things 
 Which We Would Fain Choose Instead Of Him--He Alone. The Deep Wisdom Of 
 The Cross Knows That It Is Pain Which Gives Its Grand Reality To Love, 
 So Making It Fit For Eternity,  And That Sacrifice Is The Ultimate Secret 
 Of Fulfilment. Truly Those Who Lose Their Life For His Sake Shall Find 
 It. Not To Have Him Is To Renounce The Possibility Of Having Anything: 
 To Have Him Is To Have All Things Added Unto Us. 
   
   
 So Far We Have Considered This Poem As A Record Of Personal Experience, 
 But It May Be Taken Also As A Message For The Age In Which We Live. 
 Regarded So,  It Is An Appeal To Pagan England To Come Back From All Its 
 Idols,  From Its Attempt To Force Upon The Earth A Worship Which She 
 Repudiates: 
   
   
      "Worship Not Me But God,  The Angels Urge." 
   
   
 The Angels Of Earth Say That,  As Well As Those Of Heaven--The Angels Of 
 Nature And The Open Field,  Of Homes And The Love Of Women And Of Men,  Of 
 Little Children And Of Grave Science And All Learning. The Desire Of The 
 Soul Is Very Near It,  Nay,  Is Pursuing It With Patient And Remorseless 
 Footsteps Down Every Quiet And Familiar Street. The Land Of Heart's 
 Desire Is No Strange Land,  Nor Has Heaven Been Lifted From About Our 
 Heads. 
   
   
      "Not Where The Whirling Systems Darken, 
        And Our Benumbed Conceiving Soars!-- 
      The Drift Of Pinions,  Would We Hearken, 
        Beats At Our Own Clay-Shuttered Doors. 
   
   
      The Angels Keep Their Ancient Places;-- 
        Turn But A Stone,  And Start A Wing! 
      'Tis Ye,  'Tis Your Estrangèd Faces, 
        That Miss The Many-Splendoured Thing. 
   
   
      But (When So Sad Thou Canst Not Sadder) 
        Cry;--And Upon Thy So Sore Loss 
      Shall Shine The Traffic Of Jacob's Ladder 
        Pitched Between Heaven And Charing Cross. 
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Lecture x  (The Hound Of Heaven) Pg 129 
      Yea,  In The Night,  My Soul,  My Daughter, 
        Cry;--Clinging Heaven By The Hems; 
      And Lo,  Christ Walking On The Water, 
        Not Of Genesareth,  But Thames."[7] 
   
   
   
   
   
   
 _Printed By_ Morrison & Gibb Limited,  _Edinburgh_ 
   
   
   
 
 
 
 Book name ( Among Famous Books (Fiscle Part-I) Footnotes  Pg 130 
 [1] _King Lear_,  Act Iii. Scene Vi. 
   
   
 [2] Compare The Song Of Mr. Valiant-For-Truth Beginning, 
   
         "Who Would True Valour See" 
   
     With Shakespeare's 
   
         "Who Doth Ambition Shun." 
   
                       _As You Like It_,  Ii. V. 
   
   
 [3] For These And Other Points Of Resemblance,  Cf. Professor Firth's 
 Leaflet On Bunyan (_English Association Papers_,  No. 19). 
   
   
 [4] _On Compromise_,  Published 1874. 
   
 [5] In His Latest Volume (_Marriage_),  Mr. Wells Has Spoken In A 
 Different Tone From That Of His Other Recent Works. It Is A Welcome 
 Change,  And It May Be The Herald Of Something More Positive Still,  And 
 Of A Wholesome And Inspiring Treatment Of The Human Problems. But Behind 
 It Lie _First And Last Things_,  _Tono Bungay_,  _Ann Veronica_,  And _The 
 New Macchiavelli_. 
   
   
 [6] Mr. Chesterton Perceives This,  Though He Does Not Always Express It 
 Unmistakably. He Tells Us That He Does Not Mean To Attack The Authority 
 Of Reason,  But That His Ultimate Purpose Is Rather To Defend It. 
   
   
 [7] These Verses,  Probably Unfinished And Certainly Left Rough For 
 Future Perfecting,  Were Found Among Francis Thompson's Papers When He 
 Died. 
   
   
   
   
 
 
 Publication Date: May 15th 2014 https://www.bookrix.com/-whdbd538e463635