It is only to the fantastic mind of a heretic that its meaning appeals, only the heart of a cynic is touched by the instinctive heroism of the white man of the South.
December 15.
"Oh, Eloquent, Just, and Mighty Death."
I am just home from a meeting of one of those literary clubs we American women so much affect, in the absence of any masculine society, and we have been talking about Stevenson as the poet most typical of the mind of the nineteenth century. It was all that delicious welter in the sentimentalities of the domestic affections which any assemblage of females finds it impossible to avoid; and we read aloud to one another—with the vox humana lilt turned on—all those decidedly dull little lyrics in the "Child's Garden of Verses," and came away with just that moist brightness of the eye, that wistful, tender "mother-smile," which was correct of the occasion.
I say we, but of course my wicked old eyes were as hard as horn, yet, thank heaven! my unruly tongue uttered not a note out of tune with the Domestic Symphony. Who will say that social slappings have taught me nothing? Even I can be daunted by the unhappy silences that so often greet my blurted comments, and by the soft rustles of relief that respond to the rising of some gentle lady, who will obliquely but certainly crush me with her pious phrases, that throb with the warm sweetness of the dear old human platitudes, and which are rewarded by applause which politely accentuates my disgrace.... Oh, amiable and philosophic white page! To you I can be a tiresome and protesting bore, sure of no strictures in your silence. Here I can unpack my heart with words, unrebuked. Here I can whisper safely my suspicion that dear R. L. S. himself would have been consumed with cheerful amusement at our gentle comments upon his doughty spirit.
The world says all sorts of absurd things about Stevenson. Some one the other day called him "an unquenchable Calvinist"!—He who was all pagan and Roman. The Calvinist was the European most subdued by the Semitic beliefs, most merged into Oriental preconceptions of life.
Certainly the European mind in its natural state faced its consciousness of existence with no preconceived theories. Its attitude was that of the child. It found itself face to face with a great, astonishing, beautiful universe, and asked itself what it must think of this universe; how use its opportunities therein. The child stumbled into a thousand infantile delusions and misconceptions, but its eyes were unclouded, its intelligence good. He soon discovered that though many things were pleasant, these pleasant things, when used indiscreetly, had a hidden potentiality of pain. With this second discovery, however—being a wise child—came no foolish horror of all pleasant things; only an illumination as to the value of moderation.
The phenomena of age, death, and decay left the child serious, but not depressed. These were not pleasant things, admittedly; but since they appeared inevitable, there was plainly no use in attempting to escape them. The proper attitude toward such solemnities was a manly courage, a brave submission. In any case, the child concluded, with all the sufferings, contradictions, and puzzling inequalities of existence, at least for all those called upon to face these griefs, there remained some small space of clear, warm, beautiful life; sunshine, food, love, and—more and better than all—that tingling, exquisite quiver of the senses which he agreed to call by the divine name of Beauty. He saw that the pains, the joys, the growth and blight, decay and extinction, were not of his lot only, but were shared by all his surroundings. Feeling himself alone neither in his opportunities nor his inevitable doom, he accepted his fate with the courageous calm, the uncomplaining resignation, of his fellow-creatures. He lived and he died as unresentfully as did the summer leaves, whose season of existence was so much briefer than his own.
His kinship with encompassing nature was so close that it touched him on every side. He became as aware of the souls of all things about him as he was aware of his own. He felt a similar spirit of life in the trees of the forest, the stones of the mountains, in the sea winds, in the brooks, the rivers and their reeds. He guessed at their names, their loves, their histories, as one guesses at those of unknown passers-by travelling the same road. Out of these speculations arose all his arts, his poetry, his legends, and his myths. When the moon stooped toward the western hills she leaned in a passion like his own toward youth and desire. The blood of a slain love became visible to him as it returned to the upper air in dim, faint-scented blossoms, bearing written on their purple leaves the plaintive ai! ai! of her left mourning for dead beauty. The very breeze that sighed through the rushes was the wistful voice of one unwisely reluctant of earthly joy and pain.
It is almost impossible for us—so long saturated with Semitic thought—to recreate for ourselves the mind of the Greeks and Romans fed upon the strength and beauty of a noble pantheism—whose interpretation of life knit their souls to the wholesome earth, and filled them with zest to live and patience to die—whose gods embodied their own lovely ideals of youth immortal, beauty unfading, serene wisdom, the soil's natural wealth, the vine's purple joy. Their attention was fixed upon the present life—their problem how to live it bravely, wisely, richly. All beyond this were uncertain shadows, about which it was impossible to know, and useless to speculate.