The Silesian Horseherd - Questions of the Hour

by F. Max Müller

“Those who think as I do constitute a silent but large congregation: silent, because the time is not yet ripe for a view that will rob thousands of their illusions. We do not preach a new salvation, but a silent, for many, a painful, renunciation. But the profound [pg 081] peace that lies in this view is as precious to those who have acquired it as is the hope of heaven to the believer. In honest doubt, too, lies a saving power as well as in faith; and your Horseherd is on the path of this salvation. (I believe that too.)”

With great respect,

Yours very faithfully,

Ignotus Agnosticus.

* * * * *

Whilst I received this and many other letters from many lands, no sign of life reached me from my Horseherd. He must have received my letter, or it would have been returned to me through the post. I regretted this, for I had formed a liking for the man as he appeared in his letter, and he no doubt would have had much to say in reply to my letter, which would have placed his views in a clearer light. He was an honest fellow, and I respect every conviction that is honest and sincere, even if it is diametrically opposite to my own. Now, my unknown friend could have had no thought of self in the matter. He knew that his name would not be mentioned by me, and it would probably have been of little concern to him if his name had become known. The worst feature of all discussions is the intrusion of the personal element. If for instance in a criticism of a new book we emphasise that which we think erroneous, for which every author should be grateful, we feel at the same time, that while desiring to render a service to the cause of [pg 082] truth, we may not only have hurt the book or the writer, but may have done a positive injury. The writer then feels himself impelled to defend his view not only with all the legitimate arts of advocacy, but also with the illegitimate. This poor truth is the greatest sufferer. As long as two paths are open, there is room for quiet discussion with one's travelling companion as to which may be the right and best path by which to reach the desired point. Both parties have the same object in view, the truth. As soon however as one goes, or has gone his own way, the controversy becomes personal and violent. There is no thought of turning back. It is no longer said: “This is the wrong path,” but “You are on the wrong path,” and even if it were possible to turn back, the controversy generally ends with, “I told you so.” Poor Truth stands by sorrowfully and rubs its eyes.

Now what was the Horseherd to me, and what is he now, even if he has been brought to what he called a joyful end by his catarrh “verging upon a perfect asthma.” There was nothing personal between us. He knew me only by that which I have thought and said; I knew of him only what he had gathered in his hours of leisure, and had laid aside for life. I have never seen him face to face, do not know the colour of his eyes, hardly even whether he was old or young. He was a man, but he may be even that no longer. Everything that in our common view constitutes a man, his body, his speech, his experience, is gone. We did not bring these things with us into [pg 083] the world and probably shall not take them away with us. What the body is, we see with our eyes, especially if we attend a cremation, or if in ancient graves we look into the urns which contain the grayish black ashes, whilst near by there sleeps in cold marble, as in the Museo Nazionale in Rome, the lovely head of the young Roman maiden, to whom two thousand years ago belonged these ashes, as well as the beautiful mansion that has been excavated from the earth and rebuilt round about her. And the language, the language in which all our experience here on earth lies stored, will this be everlasting? Shall we in another life speak English or Sanscrit? The philologist knows too well of what material speech is made, how much of the temporal and accidental it has adopted in its eternal forms, to cherish such a hope, and to think that the Logos can be eternally bound to the regular or irregular declensions or conjugations of the Greek, the German, or even the Hottentot languages. What then remains? Not the person, or the so-called ego—that had a beginning, a continuation, and an end. Everything that had a beginning, once was not, and what once was not, has in itself, from its very beginning, the germ of its end. What remains is only the eternal One, the eternal Self, that lives in us all without beginning and without end, in which each one has his true existence, in which we live, move, and have our being. Each temporal ego is only one of the million phenomena of this eternal Self, and such a phenomenon [pg 084] was the Horseherd to me. It is only what we recognise in all men as the eternal, or as the divine, that we can love and retain. Everything else comes and goes, as the day comes in the morning and goes at night, but the light of the sun remains forever. Now it may be said: This Self, that is and abides, is after all next to nothing. It is, however, and that “is” is more than everything else. Light is not much either, probably only vibration, but what would the world be without it? Did we not begin this life simply with this Self, continue it with this Self, and bring it to an end with this Self? There is nothing that justifies us in saying that this Self had a beginning, and will therefore have an end. The ego had a beginning, the persona, the temporal mask that unfolds itself in this life, but not the Self that wears the mask. When therefore my Horseherd says, “After death we are just as much a nullity as before our birth,” I say, quoderat demonstrandum is still to be proved. What does he mean by we? If we were nothing before birth, that is, if we never had been at all, what would that be that is born? Being born does not mean becoming something out of nothing. What is born or produced was there, before it was born or produced, before it came into the light of the world. All creation out of nothing is a pure chimera for us. Have we ever the feeling or experience that we had a beginning here on earth, or have we entirely forgotten the most remarkable thing in our life, viz., its beginning? Have we ever [pg 085] seen a beginning? Can we even think of an absolute beginning? In order to have had our beginning on earth, there must have been something that begins, be it a cell or be it the Self. All that we call ego, personality, character, etc., has unfolded itself on earth, is earthly, but not the Self. If we now on earth were content with the pure Self, if in all those that we love, we loved the eternal Self and not only the appearance, what then is more natural than that it should be so in the next world, that the continuity of existence cannot be severed, that the Self should find itself again, even though in new and unexpected forms? When therefore my friend makes the bold assertion: “After our death we are again as much a nullity as before our birth,” I say, “Yes, if we take nullity in the Hegelian sense.” Otherwise I say the direct contrary to this: “After our death we are again as little a nullity as before our birth. What we shall be we cannot know; but that we shall be, follows from this, that the Self or the divine within us can neither have a beginning nor an end.” That is what the ancients meant in saying that death was to be best understood from the time before birth. But we must not think that each single ego lays claim only to a part of the Self, for then the Self would be divided, limited, and finite. No, the entire Self bears us, just as the entire light illumines all, every grain of sand and every star, but for that reason does not belong exclusively to any one grain of sand or star. [pg 086] It is that which is eternal, or in the true sense of the word that which is divine in us, that endures in all changes, that makes all change possible, for without something that endures in change, there could be no change; without something continuous, that persists through transformation, nothing could be transformed. The Self is the bond that unites all souls, the red thread which runs through all being, and the knowledge of which alone gives us knowledge of our true nature. “Know thyself” no longer means for us “Know thy ego,” but “Know what lies beyond thy ego, know the Self,” the Self that runs through the whole world, through all hearts, the same for all men, the same for the highest and the lowest, the same for creator and creature, the Âtman of the Veda, the oldest and truest word for God.

For this reason the Horseherd was to me what all men have always been to me—an appearance of the Self, the same as I myself, not only a fellow-creature, but a fellow-man, a fellow-self. Had I met him in life, who knows whether his ego or his appearance would have attracted me as much as his letter. We all have our prejudices, and much as I honour a Silesian peasant who has spent his life faithfully and honestly in a strange land, I do not know whether I should have sat down by his iron stove and chatted with him about τὰ μέγιστα.

I also felt as I read his letter, that it was not a solitary voice in the desert, but that he spoke in the name of many who felt as he felt, without being [pg 087] willing or able to express it. This also has proved to be entirely true.

Judging by the numerous letters and manuscripts that reach me, the Horseherd was not alone in his opinions. There are countless others in the world of the same mind, and even if his voice is silenced, his ideas survive in all places and directions, and he will not lack followers and defenders. The striking thing in the letters that reached me was that the greater number and the most characteristic among his sympathisers did not wish their names to be known. What does this signify? Do we still live on a planet on which we dare not express what we hold to be the truth—planet Terra so huge and yet so contemptibly small? Has mankind still only freedom of thought, but not freedom of utterance? The powers may blockade Greece; can they blockade thoughts on wings of words? It has been attempted, but force is no proof, and when we have visited the prisons in which Galilei or even Giordano Bruno was immured, we learn how nothing lends greater strength to the wings of truth than the heavy chains with which men try to fetter it. It is still the general opinion that even in free England thought and speech are not free, that in the realm of thought there is even less freedom on this side of the Channel than on the other.[37] Oxford especially, my own university, is still considered the stronghold of [pg 088] obscurantists, and my Horseherd even considers the fact that I have lived so long in Oxford a circonstance atténuante of my so-called orthodoxy. Plainly what is thought, said, and published in England, and especially in Oxford, is not read. In England we can say anything we please, we must only bear in mind that the same consideration is due to others that we claim from others. It is true that from time to time in England, and even in Oxford, feeble efforts have been made, if not to curtail freedom of thought, at least to punish those who laid claim to it. Where possible the salaries of professors were curtailed; in certain elections very weak candidates were preferred because they were outwardly orthodox. I do not wish to mention any names, but I myself have received in England, even if not in Oxford, a gentle aftertaste of this antiquated physic. When at the request of my friend Stanley, the Dean of Westminster Abbey, I delivered a discourse in his venerable church, which was crowded to the doors, petitions were sent to Parliament to condemn me to six months' imprisonment. I was accosted in the streets and an ordinary tradesman said to me, “Sir, if you are sent to prison, you shall have at least two warm dinners each week from me.” I am, to be sure, the first layman that ever spoke publicly in an English church, but I had the advice of the highest authorities that the Dean was perfectly within his rights and that we were guilty of no violation of law. I therefore waited in silence; I knew that public opinion [pg 089] was on my side, and that in the end the petition to Parliament would simply be laid aside. Later on it was attempted again. At the time that I delivered my lectures on the Science of Religion at the university of Glasgow, by invitation of the Senate, I was accused first before the presbytery at Glasgow, and when this attempt failed, the charge was carried before the great Synod at Edinburgh. In this case, too, I went on my way, in silence, and in the end, even in Scotland, the old saying, “Much cry and little wool,” was verified. This proverb is frequently heard in England. I have often inquired into its origin. Finally I found that there is a second line, “As the deil said when he shore the sow.” Of course such an operation was accompanied with much noise on the part of the sow, but little wool, nothing but bristles. I have never, however, had to turn my bristles against the gentlemen who wished to shear me.