Oftentimes, as I have lain swinging on the water, in the swell of the Chelsea ferry-boats, in that long, sharp-pointed, black cradle in which I love to let the great mother rock me, I have seen a tall ship glide by against the tide, as if drawn by some invisible towline, with a hundred strong arms pulling it.Her sails hung unfilled, her streamers were drooping, she had neither side-wheel nor stern-wheel; still she moved on, stately, in serene triumph, as if with her own life.But I knew that on the other side of the ship, hidden beneath the great hulk that swam so majestically, there was a little toiling steam-tug, with heart of fire and arms of iron, that was hugging it close and dragging it bravely on; and I knew, that, if the little steam-tug untwined her arms and left the tall ship, it would wallow and roll about, and drift hither and thither, and go off with the refluent tide, no man knows whither.And so Ihave known more than one genius, high-decked, full-freighted, wide-sailed, gay-pennoned, that, but for the bare toiling arms, and brave, warm, beating heart of the faithful little wife, that nestled close in his shadow, and clung to him, so that no wind or wave could part them, and dragged him on against all the tide of circumstance, would soon have gone down the stream and been heard of no more.
--No, I am too much a lover of genius, I sometimes think, and too often get impatient with dull people, so that, in their weak talk, where nothing is taken for granted, I look forward to some future possible state of development, when a gesture passing between a beatified human soul and an archangel shall signify as much as the complete history of a planet, from the time when it curdled to the time when its sun was burned out.And yet, when a strong brain is weighed with a true heart, it seems to me like balancing a bubble against a wedge of gold.
--It takes a very true man to be a fitting companion for a woman of genius, but not a very great one.I am not sure that she will not embroider her ideal better on a plain ground than on one with a brilliant pattern already worked in its texture.But as the very essence of genius is truthfulness, contact with realities, (which are always ideas behind shows of form or language,) nothing is so contemptible as falsehood and pretence in its eyes.Now it is not easy to find a perfectly true woman, and it is very hard to find a perfectly true man.And a woman of genius, who has the sagacity to choose such a one as her companion, shows more of the divine gift in so doing than in her finest talk or her most brilliant work of letters or of art.
I have been a good while coming at a secret, for which I wished to prepare you before telling it.I think there is a kindly feeling growing up between Iris and our young Marylander.Not that Isuppose there is any distinct understanding between them, but that the affinity which has drawn him from the remote corner where he sat to the side of the young girl is quietly bringing their two natures together.Just now she is all given up to another; but when he no longer calls upon her daily thoughts and cares, I warn you not to be surprised, if this bud of friendship open like the evening primrose, with a sound as of a sudden stolen kiss, and lo! the flower of full-blown love lies unfolded before you.
And now the days had come for our little friend, whose whims and weaknesses had interested us, perhaps, as much as his better traits, to make ready for that long journey which is easier to the cripple than to the strong man, and on which none enters so willingly as he who has borne the life-long load of infirmity during his earthly pilgrimage.At this point, under most circumstances, I would close the doors and draw the veil of privacy before the chamber where the birth which we call death, out of life into the unknown world, is working its mystery.But this friend of ours stood alone in the world, and, as the last act of his life was mainly in harmony with the rest of its drama, I do not here feel the force of the objection commonly lying against that death-bed literature which forms the staple of a certain portion of the press.Let me explain what Imean, so that my readers may think for themselves a little, before they accuse me of hasty expressions.
The Roman Catholic Church has certain formulas for its dying children, to which almost all of them attach the greatest importance.There is hardly a criminal so abandoned that he is not anxious to receive the "consolations of religion" in his last hours.
Even if he be senseless, but still living, I think that the form is gone through with, just as baptism is administered to the unconscious new-born child.Now we do not quarrel with these forms.
We look with reverence and affection upon all symbols which give peace and comfort to our fellow-creatures.But the value of the new-born child's passive consent to the ceremony is null, as testimony to the truth of a doctrine.The automatic closing of a dying man's lips on the consecrated wafer proves nothing in favor of the Real Presence, or any other dogma.And, speaking generally, the evidence of dying men in favor of any belief is to be received with great caution.
They commonly tell the truth about their present feelings, no doubt.
A dying man's deposition about anything he knows is good evidence.
But it is of much less consequence what a man thinks and says when he is changed by pain, weakness, apprehension, than what he thinks when he is truly and wholly himself.Most murderers die in a very pious frame of mind, expecting to go to glory at once; yet no man believes he shall meet a larger average of pirates and cut-throats in the streets of the New Jerusalem than of honest folks that died in their beds.
Unfortunately, there has been a very great tendency to make capital of various kinds out of dying men's speeches.The lies that have been put into their mouths for this purpose are endless.The prime minister, whose last breath was spent in scolding his nurse, dies with a magnificent apothegm on his lips, manufactured by a reporter.