November 7.
Emotions and Oxydization.
H—— told a curious story last night of the bobstay on his yacht, which time after time rusted, broke, and betrayed him at critical moments of racing. Replacing with the best material and by the best workmen was futile, though all the rest of the wire rigging remained intact. It seemed a "hoodoo" until it was discovered to be due to oxydization from a bolt which touched a copper plate on the stem. F—— said it was easy to see how, before the chemical action of steel and copper were understood, the most sensible and logical mind might be driven to attribute such a thing to witchcraft, and it occurred to me that perhaps when we know more of the chemistry of psychology, many of our emotional puzzles will be more easily solved. Jealousy, anger, suspicion, ingratitude, it will then be easy to correct by some simple act of insulation. We know that many evil moral tendencies are caused by pressure upon certain portions of the brain, and my own personal experience and long observation makes me confident that half the baser passions are due to acidity in the blood. It makes one slow to indulge one's emotions when one realizes they may simply be the result of a lack of a therapeutic alkali. With such a conviction one will generally wait for the slower and more balanced action of reason.
What a great alteration would take place in the history of the world if it could be rewritten from the point of view of what the doctors describe as "the gouty acid diathesis."
Bess of Hardwicke's marital troubles, which convulsed all England, and even drew Elizabeth and Burleigh into the turmoil, were due entirely to the unhappy Earl's gout, as no one can doubt after reading his letters. Charles V. was driven from his throne by it, and Napoleon's gout lost him the battle of Leipsic and set his feet in "slippery places." Henry VIII.'s shoes were not slashed without reason, and Pitt was lost to England when she most needed him by the same agent. These are but a few of the notorious examples, but how many wars, revolutions, massacres, had their origin in that same corroding oxydization of the spirit of man we will probably never fully determine.
November 10.
Abelard to Heloise.
Dear Sister in Christ:
God send you peace from Heaven!
I would that to your restless heart
His blessed peace was given,
And that you found
In contemplation of His love
Balm for that wound
That ever frets you sore.
'Twere meet you wore
Much sack cloth,
And with scourge and fasting drove
This passion from your soul....
Christ's Bride thou art;
Therefore give Him the whole.
I charge thou keep'st back not any part
Of His just due to spend upon a worm....
Nay, woman! would'st thou bring on me a curse
For that I stand between thy soul and God?...
Thy love for me is but a thing perverse.
Cast it forth from thee, or a heavy rod
May prove that God is still a jealous God.
But that you are a woman, and infirm
Of will and purpose, I should say
Some bitter words to purge you of this sin!
Natheless each day
I painful penance do
For that 'twas I who led you first astray—
(For which great sin may He my soul assoil!)
And wrestle mightily each night in prayer
That Christ may yet your stubborn heart subdue
To His sweet will, and—the sharp fret and coil
Of earth cast forth—He then may enter in
To find a garnished chamber, and an altar fair....
—Nay, now, bethink you!
Love like yours is grievous sin,
And the time wasteth swift toward death.
All love is but a breath
Which clouds the glass that we see darkly through—
When you to Heaven shall win
And there see face to face your risen Lord,
Wilt know 'twas but the hot fume of a word
Spake by a devil, dimmed your earthly glass....
In essence love is sin!—
Save only love of God.
It is a gin,
Set by the Evil One to snare the feet
Of those who haste toward Heaven,
By its false likeness to the spiritual love,
And by it man is driven
Down the steep slope to Hell.
'Tis thus when sanctioned by the Church; how then
Of love like thine, which is accursed of men,
And doubly cursed by God?...
Last night in dreams I trod
Up the long windings of the heavenly stair,
And heard the angels singing loud and sweet,
And neared the gate, when sudden both my feet
Were caught amid the tangles of thy hair,—
Spread like a cruel web across my path,—
In which I struggled, mad with woe and wrath,
And could not free me; so at last I fell,
Stumbling and plunging down to blackest Hell,
Wherein I cursed the hour I saw thy face,
And most I cursed the hour, the day, the place
When thou didst give me love....
Waking then, I strove
For holier thoughts, and could at last forgive
The wrong thou didst me.
But no more, I prithee, vex me with thy tale
Of love. It wearieth me, and henceforth I must live
In larger peace, or I may not prevail
Within the Schools
Against the babbling of the narrow fools
Who blindly are withstanding my new light
Upon the Divine Essence's nature, and my clasp
Of the ringed Trinitarian mysteries. Matters your slight
Woman's comprehension may not grasp....
Farewell. Neglect not prayer.
Heloïse to Abelard.
My good Lord Abbot:—But this once
I speak, and then no more.
I must not 'gainst the lore
Of the great Schools
Set my weak cries
For warmth and life and love.
The snow now lies
Deep round the Paraclete,
Where from my pale nuns rise
In never ceasing chant of nones and primes
Incense of prayers to ease the need of God
For broken contrite hearts and dropping tears.
And sometimes I have fears
That each one wears
'Neath her long habit
As sad a heart as mine,
For in their eyes,
Which each unto the skies
Lifts many times each day,
I see desire for love,
A gift they pray
From God, since man gives not
That which they need.
I watch them from my carven chair,
While lingering on a bead,
And add, beneath my hood,
Beads to my rosary of tears
To think how good
To each 'twould seem to change
This Latin drone and censer's clank
For the dear homely noise
Around the hearth
Of little girls and boys—
For all these weary prayers
The daily household cares
For some tired labourer
Who earned their bread.
Oh, little hands and feet!—
There is no room
Within this cloistered tomb
Wherein we worship God,
For one dear curly head.