And now let us consider for a moment the meaning of this word “blasphemy,” which is the burden of the S. R.’s slanderous song; not the legal meaning, but the philosophic, the sense in which it would be used by enlightened and fair controversialists. The most Christian S. R. says to the Atheistic Iconoclast, You blaspheme. Whom? The Christian God! And the S, R. does not appear to see that it is assuming the very existence of God which is in dispute between itself and Iconoclast! For the Atheist, God is a figment, nothing; in blaspheming God he therefore blasphemes nothing. A man really blasphemes when he mocks, insults, pollutes, vilifies that which he really believes to be holy and awful. Thus a Christian who really believes in the Christian God (and there may be a hundred such Christians in England) can be guilty of blasphemy against that God, whether that God really subsists or not; for such a Christian in mocking or vilifying God would really be violating the most sacred convictions of his own nature. Speaking philosophically, an honest Atheist can no more blaspheme God than an honest Republican can be disloyal to a King, than an unmarried man can be guilty of conjugal infidelity.
[This “Word on Blasphemy,” as I have ventured to call it, is from a long article on the Saturday Review and the National Reformer, the rest of which was of merely temporary interest, and that only to the readers of those two journals. The “outburst of Rabelasian laughter” which so provoked the Saturday Review, was a short satire on Christian theology and priestcraft, entitled “The Fanatical Monkeys,” ascribed to Charles Southwell, and just then published in the National Reformer.—Editor.]
[HEINE ON AN ILLUSTRIOUS EXILE WITH SOMETHING ABOUT WHALES]
(From the “De l’Allemagne.”) (1867.)
Neptune is still the monarch of the empire of the seas, and Pluto (although metamorphosed into the Devil) has retained the throne of Tartarus. They have both been more lucky than their brother Jupiter, who had to suffer specially the vicissitudes of fortune. This third son of Saturn, who after the fall of his sire assumed the sovereignty of the heavens, reigned for a long series of years on the summit of Olympus, surrounded by a jovial court of high and of most high gods and demigods, as well as on high and of most high goddesses and nymphs—their celestial ladies of the bedchamber and maids of honor, who all led a joyous life, replete with ambrosia and nectar, despising the clowns attached to the soil down here, and taking no thought of the morrow. Alas, when the reign of the Cross, the empire of suffering, was proclaimed, the supreme Chronide emigrated and disappeared amidst the tumult of the barbarian tribes which invaded the Roman world. All traces of the ex-God were lost, and I have questioned in vain old chronicles and old women; no one has been able to furnish me with any information as to his destiny. I have burrowed in many a library, where I made them bring me the most magnificent codex enriched with gold and jewels, veritable odalisques in the harem of science; and as is the custom, I here render my public thanks to the erudite eunuchs who, without too much grumbling and sometimes even with affability, have given me access to these luminous treasures confided to their care. I am now convinced that the middle ages have not bequeathed to us any traditions concerning the fate of Jupiter after the fall of Paganism. All that I have been able to discover in connection with this subject is the history told me long ago by my friend Niels Andersen.
I have just mentioned Niels Andersen, and this good figure, at once so droll and so lovable, emerges all riant in my memory. I must devote a few lines to him here. For the rest, I like to indicate my authorities and to show their good or bad qualities, in order that the reader may be in a position to judge himself how far these authorities deserve to be trusted.
Niels Andersen, born at Drontheim, in Norway, was one of the most skilful and intrepid whalers I have ever known. It is to him that I am indebted for what knowledge I have of the whale fishery. He taught me all the subtleties of the art; he made me acquainted with all the stratagems and dodges which the intelligent animal employs to baffle these subtle snares and make its escape. It was Niels Andersen who taught me the management of the harpoon; he showed me how you should fix the knee of the right leg against the gun-whale of the boat when launching the harpoon, and how with the left leg you launch a vigorous kick at the imbecile sailor who don’t pay out quickly enough the rope attached to the harpoon. To him I owe all, and if I have not become a famous whaler the fault rests neither with Niels Andersen nor with myself, but with my evil star, which has never allowed me in the course of my life to encounter any whale with which I might have engaged in honorable combat. I have only encountered vulgar stockfish and miserable herrings. Of what use is the best harpoon when you have to deal with a herring? Now that my limbs are paralysed I must renounce for ever the hope of pursuing whales. When at Ritzebuttel, near Cuxhaven, I made the acquaintance of Niels Andersen. He was scarcely more nimble himself, for off the coast of Senegal a young shark, which no doubt took his right leg for a stick of barley sugar, had snapped it off with a snap of his teeth. Since then poor Niels Andersen went limping upon an artificial leg manufactured from one of the firs of his country, and which he extolled as a masterpiece of Norwegian carpentry. His greatest pleasure at this period was to perch himself on the top of a large empty barrel, on the belly of which he drummed away with his wooden leg. I often helped him to climb upon this barrel; but sometimes, when he wished to get down again, I would not give him my help except on the condition that he told me one of his curious traditions of the Arctic Sea.
As Mahomet-Ebn-Mansour commences all his poems with a eulogy of the horse, so Niels Andersen prefaced all his narratives with a panegyrical enumeration of the qualities of the whale. He of course commenced with such a panegyric the legend we give here.
“The whale,” he said, “is not only the largest, but also the most magnificent of animals; the two jets of water leaping from his nostrils, placed at the top of his head, give him the appearance of a fountain, and produce a magical effect, above all at night, in the moonshine. Moreover, this beast is sympathetic. He has a good character and much taste for conjugal life. It is a touching sight,” he added, “to see a family of whales grouped around its venerable patriarch, and couched upon an enormous mass of ice, basking in the sun. Sometimes the young ones begin to frisk and romp, and at length all plunge into the sea to play at hide-and-seek among the immense ice-blocks. The purity of manners and the chastity of the whales should be attributed less to moral principles than to the iciness of the water wherein they continually sport. Nor can it, unhappily, be denied,” went on Niels Anderson, “that they have not any pious sentiment, that they are totally devoid of religion....”
“I believe this is an error,” I cried, interrupting my friend. “I have lately read the report of a Dutch missionary, wherein he describes the magnificence of the creation, which, according to him, reveals itself even in the polar regions at the hour of sunrise, and when the teams of day, transfiguring the gigantic rocks of ice, make them resemble those castles of diamonds we read of in fairy tales. All this beauty of the creation, in the judgment of the good dominie, is a proof of the power of God which influences every living creature, so that not only man, but likewise a great brute of a fish, ravished by this spectacle, adores the Creator and addresses to him its prayers. The dominie assures us that he has seen with his own eyes a whale which held itself erect against the wall of a block of ice, and swayed the upper part of its body as men do in prayer.”