The Angel in the Cloud

by Edwin W. Fuller

Then for your doubts about the righteous poor;
A certain law is fixed for general good,—
Some actions yield a gain and some a loss.
A wicked man may use the first, and gain,
A righteous man may use the last, and lose;
The wicked does not gain by wickedness,
But by compliance with this natural law.
The righteous, still as righteous, might have gained
By different course of conduct, had he known;
But his condition now, can but be changed
By special miracle; but miracles,
In favor of the righteous, would destroy
All strife for good as good.
Their compensation in another world;
The poor may find
And even here, in consciousness of right,
In surety of Heav’n, and peace of mind.
And in the case you’ve stated, like all those
Who talk as you have done, you overdraw,
And color more with Fancy than with Truth.
You’ll find no widow, perfect in her trust,
As you’ve described, who is so destitute.
Go search the lanes and alleys; where you find
The greatest squalor, there is greatest crime;
For poverty is oftenest but a name
For reckless vice, and vile depravity.
Your case is but exception to the rule,
And not the rule, of Providence. To give
The righteous, only, wealth and worldly store
Would take away Man’s freedom, and all good.

But I will answer in your folly’s mode.
The justice, then, of Nature’s laws you doubt,
Forgetting they are fixed for general good,
And not for individual. These laws,
In their effects, you praise as very good;
Yet, in their causes, call the most unjust.
The fertile fields, with grain for man’s support,
Are nourished by a miasmatic air,
That, sickening but a few, feeds all the world.
While, were the air all pure, a few were well,
And millions starving. In the tropics, too,
The scenes you deprecate, themselves but cause
The very beauties you admire. Unjust,
You would enjoy effects without a cause.
The goods of Nature often take their rise
From what to man proves evil. For the goods,
He makes his mind to meet the evils; then
Can he complain, or think it hard to bear?
But Nature’s dealings towards Man are just.
He knows that he is free, and Nature not;
If he opposes Nature’s laws and falls,
Is Nature to be blamed? The widow’s cot
Is frail; the laws of general good require
A storm; it comes, and shattered falls the cot.
Should God have saved it by a miracle,
Then all His people could demand the same,
And Earth would soon become the bar of God,
God may exert a special providence,
But Man may not detect it, as the rule
Invariable of life, and still be free;
For he were thus compelled to seek the good.
Then Nature, over Man, holds not a tyranny,
But keeps the perfect pandect of her laws,
And Man is free to obey them, or oppose.

Like shallow-thoughted reasoners of Earth,
You make assertions without slightest proof,
Or faintest shade of truth. Your thesis, this:
God marks with disapproval all the good,
And blesses all the evil with His smile.
Entirely false in every case! The good
Are ever happiest, in peace of mind,
In ease of conscience, and the hope of Heaven.
The wicked may be even rich, but wealth
And happiness are far from synonyms.
Is happiness the child of circumstance,
Or is it not the offspring of the mind?
And if the mind be tranquil and serene,
Does happiness not follow everywhere?
The cause of doubt in you, and many more,
Is that the thousands who profess the good,
Are ever mourning their unhappy lot,
And sighing o’er the gloomy, narrow way;
The tribulation of the promise read,
Without its good cheer context. These are they
Who stamp with misery’s blackest seal, a life
Of righteousness. By these you cannot judge,
For they are not what they profess, and would
Be miserable in Heaven, unless changed.
But take the truly good, one who’s content
To take whate’er befalls, submissively;
Who feels assured that all works for the best;
Take him, in all conditions, rich or poor,
In sickness or in health, in pain or ease;
Compare your happy wicked, with his gold,
’Twill not require a moment to decide
Which one is happier!
Again, you ask
Why Man was not created happy, and kept so?
His very freedom and intelligence
Prevents a forcèd happiness. The ends
Of all Creation would be marred, and Man
Lose personality. A happiness
Made universal, asks morality
That’s universally compelled; and lost
Is all the scheme of virtue and reward.
Man, forced to action would degenerate
Into a listless, lifeless thing; the world
Lose all its fine machinery of thought
Combined with action. Beautiful variety
Could not exist, dull sameness would be life.
But Man is placed, with free intelligence,
Amid surroundings from which he may cull
A happiness intense, whate’er their nature be.
If bright, the consciousness they are deserved;
If gloomy, sweet reflections that they drape
A future all the brighter for their gloom.

But Man, within himself, your puzzle proves;
And not to you alone, for Angel wings
Have hovered o’er your globe, and Angel minds
Peered curiously into his soul, to learn
Its mysteries, in vain. The Mind Supreme
That formed the soul, alone can understand
Its wondrous depths. ’Tis not surprising then
That Man has tried in vain to know himself.
His mind, compared with his body, seems so great,
He deems its power unlimited. He finds
It weak, before the barriers of thought,
That gird it, mountain high, on every side.
No path can he pursue that’s infinite.
And few exist, that do not thither lead.
Hence all the vagaries that have obtained
Among your race. The doubt of everything,
Is only too far tracing of a thought
Into absurdity intense. If you
Deem all the world effect upon yourself,
A principle of fairness would demand
That you accord the right to other men.
The question then arises, who is he
That really does exist, and all the rest
His ideas? Sure your neighbor has the right
To claim the honor, just as well as you!
Hume’s foolish thought, extended to its length,
Will answer not a single end of life,
And terminates in nonsense none believe.

The conflict of the mental powers defeats
Your inquiries. You cannot reconcile
The unruled circumstance, with Man’s free-will
You deem the motive free, and Man its slave;
As if the motive, unintelligent,
Could have a freedom, or a slavery!
You make the motive to exist within the mind,
When it, perforce, must be without. You get
The unruled motive from the circumstance,
When this itself must act upon the mind,
And if free motives rise within the mind,
They are a part, and therefore mind is free.
And what you deemed a motive to the mind,
Was mental action, and its modes of thought.
The motive is confined to circumstance,
And mind the circumstance can oft control,
And even when it cannot, acts at will.

The mind may to a kingdom be compared,
Where Reason occupies the throne. Beneath
Its scepter bow, in perfect vassalage,
The faculties, desires, and appetites.
These then are acted on by motive powers,
And straight report the action to their king,
Who does impartially decide for each.
The unruled motive is without the mind,
And forms no part of it, although the parts,
Receiving motive action, so are called.
Thus when you hunger, the desire of food,
Confined to mind, is not a motive power;
But urged by motive bodily demand,
It tells the need to Reason, who decides.
Thus when you pare your peach, the tempting fruit
And fleshly need, move on the appetite,
Who begs the Reason for consent to eat;
Your friend’s opinion of your self-control,
Is motive to Desire of esteem,
Who begs the Reason to refuse consent.
The Reason, then, like righteous judge, decrees
In favor of that one, more strongly shown;
And feels a perfect freedom in its choice.

’Tis most unfair to wait the action’s end,
Then cry, the mind was forced to choose this act;
But choice is Reason’s free decree. Sometimes
The Reason errs, and evil then ensues;
But Reason, now more conscious that ’tis free,
Regrets it had not acted otherwise.
By knowing what your reason deems the best,
You judge how other men will act. You learn,
By intercourse, what they permit to change
The Reason’s sentence. So, while with a friend,
You show your wealth, because you know he’s free,
And can, and will, resist impulse to crime.
Were he not free, you’d dare not go alone
With him, for, any moment, might arise
A motive irresistible, and he
Would kill and rob, because that motive’s slave.
Were he not free, you were no more secure,
In pleasant parlance, than on desert isle.

The laws are made for man, alone, as free.
For, otherwise, the motives they present
Were blind attempts so coincide with Fate.
They would complete the gross absurdity,
Of Man collective governing himself,
And therefore free, while individuals
Are helpless slaves of motives they but aid
To furnish.
Fate, as held in fullest form,
Yourself has proved the theory of fools;
For were it true, a blind passivity
Were Man’s perfection on the Earth. Compare
The two; Free-will as held, whate’er their faith,
By every one, in daily practices;
A world of harmony, for very wars
Yield good; a mechanism complicate,
That even Angels, wondering at, admire;
A world, whose wondrous progress is maintained
By practical belief in liberty.
And on the other hand, behold a world
Of universal inactivity!
Its millions starving for delinquent Fate;—
I doubt your faith would last till dinner-time,
A morning’s lapse would change a hungry globe
To firm belief in free-will work for food.

With many, God’s foreknowledge binds free-will;
He knows the future, how each man will act,
And man can never change from what God knows.
They reason thus, that prescience is decree,
And what God knows will happen, must take place.
That God may know the future of free-will
I prove by this. Suppose two worlds alike,
And governed by two Gods. Each one can see,
And foresee all transpires in both the worlds,
Yet each o’er th’ other’s world exerts no power.
A man in one does wrong; the other God
May have foreseen the action for an age,
Yet had not slightest power to cause or stop.
Does his foreknowledge qualify the act?
If thus you can suppose, why not believe,
When errors flow from opposite belief?
God in the future stands, and waits for man,
Who works the present, only gift of Time.
There is no future save in God’s own mind.
Man’s future means continued present time;
God’s future is but present time to Him,
In which He lives, not will live when it comes.
Man’s acts He sees as done, not to be done.
And God compels not more than Man does Man,
Who sees his fellow’s deeds, not causes them.
Man only knows Man’s present acts; but God
The future sees, as present to His mind.

To end with perfect proof, you know you’re free.
This all the world attests, and each believes.
How subtle soe’er may his reasoning be,
He contradicts it throughout all his life;
And all his plans, and all the right and wrong
Of self and friends he bases on free-will.
If disbelief no inconvenience prove,
Few men believe what is not understood;
And yet the most familiar things of life
Are far beyond their comprehensions’ power.
Who understands the turning of the food
To sinew, muscle, blood, and bone? yet who
Will starve because he knows not how ’tis done?
Who understands the mystery of birth,
And when and where the soul originates?
And yet a million mothers bend, to-day,
O’er tender babes, and know that they exist;
A billion people know they once were born.
Who understands the mystery of death,
And how the soul is severed from its clay?
Yet who has not wept o’er departed ones,
Received the dying clasp, the dying look,
And known, full well, Death’s bitter, bitter truth?
None comprehends the movement of a limb,
Yet many boast the powers of their’s might.
Then why doubt freedom of the will, when life,
In every phase, but proves its certain truth?
The edifice of shallow theorists
Before the sweeping blade of practice falls.