How easy is it to record upon paper the sweeping words—“Nineteen years had passed away since the occurrences just related:”—how easy is it with a few moments’ manipulation of the pen to leap over a period embracing almost the fifth part of a century!
Nineteen years!—a few short syllables—a drop of ink—a scrap of paper—and a minute’s trouble,—these are all that the novelist needs to enable him to pass by the deeds of nineteen years!
Oh! this very power compels us to look with suspicion upon the utility of our own avocations,—to reflect how far removed from the natural is even the most natural of the works of fiction,—and to feel the nothingness of all the efforts of the imagination when placed in contrast with the stern and stubborn facts of the real world!
For though the novelist, exercising a despotic power over the offspring of his fancy, may dispose of years—aye, even of centuries, with a dash of his pen,—yet of Time, as the universe actually experiences its march, not one instant can he stay—not one instant accelerate.
Great Kings, who have proclaimed themselves demigods and compelled the millions to abase themselves round their mighty thrones,—at whose awful nod whole nations have trembled as if at the frown of Olympian Jove, and whose impatient stamp on the marble pavement of their palaces has seemed to shake the earth to its very centre,—proud and haughty monarchs such as these have been powerless in the hands of Time as infants in the grasp of a Giant. Though heads would fall at their command, yet not a hair of their own could they prevent from turning gray: though at their beck whole provinces were de-populated, yet not a single moment could they add to their own lives!
Time is a sovereign more potent than all the imperial rulers that ever wore the Tyrian purple,—stronger than the bravest warriors that ever led conquering armies over desolated lands,—less easy to be moved to mercy than the fiercest tyrants that ever grasped earthly sceptres.
To those who, being in misery, look forward to the certain happiness that already gleams upon them with orient flickerings from the distance, Time is slow—oh! so slow, that his feet seem heavy with iron weights and his wings with lead:—but to those who, being as yet happy, behold unmistakeable auguries of approaching affliction, Time is rapid—oh! so rapid, that his feet appear to glide glancingly along like those of a sportive boy in pursuit of a butterfly, and his wings are as light and buoyant as the fleetest of birds.
The wicked man, stretched upon the bed of death, cries out, “Oh! for leisure to repent!”—but Time disregardeth his agonising prayer, and saith, “Die!” The invalid, racked with excruciating pains, and wearied of an existence which knows no relief from suffering, exclaims, “Oh! that death would snatch me away!”—but Time accordeth not the shrieking aspiration, and saith, “Live on!”
Passionless and without feeling though he be, Time shows caprices in which the giddiest and most wilful girl would be ashamed to indulge,—sparing where he ought to slay—slaying where he ought to spare: insensible to all motives, incompetent to form designs, he appears to act with a method of contradictions and on a system of studied irregularities.