In a few months, cock fights will be held in the same place. I shall send you a description of them.
Dec. 21st.
There are unquestionably three natures in man,—a vegetable one, which is content merely to exist; an animal, which destroys; and an intellectual, which creates. Many are satisfied with the first, most lay claim to the second, and a few to the third. I must confess, alas! that my life here belongs to Class I., at which I am often discontented enough: ‘but I can’t help it.’
You have heard of the English Roscius. A new little wonder of this kind has appeared, and the maturity of his early talent is really astonishing. Master Burke (so this little fellow is called) acts at the Surrey Theatre. Though only ten years old, he played five or six very different parts, with a humour, apparent familiarity with the stage, ‘aplomb,’ volubility of utterance, accurate memory, and suppleness and power over his little person, which are perfectly amazing. What struck me most, however, was, that in a little interlude he acted his own natural part,—a boy of ten years old,—with such uncommon truth that the genuine ‘naivété’ of childhood he represented, could be nothing but the inspiration of genius,—it is impossible it could be the result of reflection in such a child. He began with the part of an Italian music-master, in which he displayed extraordinary mastery of the violin, and that not only in acquired dexterity, but in the good taste of his playing, and a fulness and beauty of tone seldom equalled. You perceived in his whole performance that he was born a musician. Next followed a learned pedant; then a rough captain of a ship; and so on;—every part admirably filled, and the by play, in which so many fail, peculiarly easy, clever, and appropriate. His last character was Napoleon,—the only one in which he failed; and this failure was exactly the thing that put the crown to my admiration. It is characteristic of true genius, that in the meagre, absurd, and foolish, it appears foolish too; and this part was the quintessence of bad taste and stupidity. It is the same in life. Turn Lessing into a courtier for instance, or Napoleon into R—— Lieutenant, and you will see how miserably each will fill his part.
Generally speaking, the important thing is that every man should be in his right place. If he is, some excellence will scarcely ever fail to be developed in him. Thus, for instance, my genius consists in a fancy, so to say, practically applicable; I have nothing to do but to wind it up like a watch, not only to find myself immediately at home in every actual situation, but employing it as a stimulus, to throw myself headlong down any conceivable precipice. If I get hurt in the fall, I can use it again as a restorative, by the unexpected discovery of some wonderful piece of luck or other. Now is this the consequence of an accidental physical organization, or of an acquired power,—acquired perhaps through a hundred preceding generations? Had this spiritual individual whom I call myself, any previous existence connected with another form? and does it endure independent, or does it lose itself again in the universal Whole, after the bursting of that bubble which the eternal fermentation of the universe throws up?
Is—as many will have it—the history of the world (or what passes in time), as well as of nature (or what passes in space,) predetermined through its whole course, according to the immutable laws of a guiding will? and does it end like a drama in the victory of good over evil?—or does the free power of the spirit fashion its own future, uncertain in all its incidents, and only subject to the conditions necessary to its existence?—‘That is the question!’ Meantime, thus much appears to me clear;—that, by the adoption of the former hypothesis,—turn it which way we will,—we are all, more or less, mere finely-constructed puppets: it is only according to the second, that we remain free spirits. I will not deny that there is in me an unconquerable, instinctive feeling, like the deepest consciousness of self, which impels me to the latter belief. This may possibly be an inspiration of the devil! Yet he does not lead me so far astray, as that I do not, with profound humility and gratitude, ascribe this, our mysterious being, to that great incomprehensible Creator, the object of my highest and deepest love. But forasmuch as our origin is god-like, we must live on, independently, in God. Hear what Angelius Silesius, the pious Catholic, says on this subject.
“Soll ich mein letztes End, und ersten Anfang finden,
So muss ich mich in Gott und Gott in Mir ergrunden;
Und werden das, was Er, ich muss ein Schein im Schein,
Ich muss ein Wert im Wort, ein Gott im Gotte seyn.”[73]
For this very reason is the doctrine intolerable to me, that man was formerly in a more exalted and perfect state than now; but has gradually degenerated, and must labour up again, through sin and misery, till he reach his pristine perfection. How much more accordant with all the laws of nature,—how much more consistent with the character of an eternal, most high, all-pervading, all-ruling Love and Justice, is it, to imagine that the human race (which I regard as one) advances, from a beginning necessarily imperfect, onward and onward towards perfection, by its own energy; although indeed the germ of that energy be implanted by the love of the Most Highest! The golden age of mankind, says the Duke de St. Simon, very justly, is not behind, but before us. Our age might be called (rather for the will than the power) the mystic age. True mysticism is indeed rare; but it must be confessed that it is a most skilful and profitable invention of the worldly-wise, to throw a cloak of titular mysticism over absurdity itself. Behind this curtain, unhappily, lurk many things,—even that original sin which our modern mystics dwell upon so much.
Some years ago I was in a very intelligent party, though small in number,—consisting only of a lady and two gentlemen. An argument arose concerning original sin. The lady and I declared ourselves against the doctrine,—the two gentlemen, for it, though perhaps, more for the sake of letting off some intellectual fireworks than from conviction. “Yes,” said our antagonists at length, “the doctrine of original sin is doubtless true: like the new French Charter, it was the impulse towards knowledge forcing its way. With the gratification of this impulse came evil into the world; which, however, was also necessary to our purification,—to our own merit, the only thing truly meritorious.” “On this interpretation,” replied I, turning to my ally, “we may be content to admit it; for this is only our own meaning in other words,—a schooling—the necessary transition from bad to better, by the help of our own experience and acquired wisdom.” “Certainly,” added the lady; “only then you ought not to call it hereditary sin.”[74] “‘Gnädige Frau,’” answered one of our antagonists, “we will not quarrel about the name; if you like it better, we will call it hereditary nobility for the future.”
After all these profound and subtle reflections, I made the discovery to-day that the most frivolous people in the world do actually reflect on their own minds and characters. An Austrian of rank who has been here some time, did me the favour to give me the following counsels of practical philosophy, which I must record literally for the sake of their originality.