And I have here a volume,[C] before quoted, by a very foolish and very lugubrious author, who in his concluding chapter gives us,—founded, you will observe, on a series of 'ifs,'—the latest scientific views concerning the order of creation. "We have spoken already about a medium pervading space"—this is the Scientific God, you observe, differing from the unscientific one, in that the purest in heart cannot see—nor the softest in heart feel—this spacious Deity—a Medium, pervading space—"the office of which" (italics all mine) "appears to be to degrade and ultimately extinguish, all differential motion. It has been well pointed out by Thomson, that, looked at in this light, the universe is a system that had a beginning and must have an end, for a process of degradation cannot be eternal. If we could view the Universe as a candle not lit, then it is perhaps conceivable to regard it as having been always in existence; but if we regard it rather as a candle that has been lit, we become absolutely certain that it cannot have been burning from eternity, and that a time will come when it will cease to burn. We are led to look to a beginning in which the particles of matter were in a diffuse chaotic state, but endowed with the power of gravitation; and we are led to look to an end in which the whole Universe will be one equally heated inert mass, and from which everything like life, or motion, or beauty, will have utterly gone away."
Do you wish me to congratulate you on this extremely cheerful result of telescopic and microscopic observation, and so at once close my lecture? or may I venture yet to trespass on your time by stating to you any of the more comfortable views held by persons who did not regard the universe in what my author humorously calls "this light"?
In the peculiarly characteristic notice with which the 'Daily News' honored my last week's lecture, that courteous journal charged me, in the metaphorical term now classical on Exchange, with "hedging," to conceal my own opinions. The charge was not prudently chosen, since, of all men now obtaining any portion of popular regard, I am pretty well known to be precisely the one who cares least either for hedge or ditch, when he chooses to go across country. It is certainly true that I have not the least mind to pin my heart on my sleeve, for the daily daw, or nightly owl, to peck at; but the essential reason for my not telling you my own opinions on this matter is—that I do not consider them of material consequence to you.
It might possibly be of some advantage for you to know what—were he now living, Orpheus would have thought, or Æschylus, or a Daniel come to judgment, or John the Baptist, or John the Son of Thunder; but what either you, or I, or any other Jack or Tom of us all, think,—even if we knew what to think,—is of extremely small moment either to the Gods, the clouds, or ourselves.
Of myself, however, if you care to hear it, I will tell you thus much: that had the weather when I was young been such as it is now, no book such as 'Modern Painters' ever would or could have been written; for every argument, and every sentiment in that book, was founded on the personal experience of the beauty and blessing of nature, all spring and summer long; and on the then demonstrable fact that over a great portion of the world's surface the air and the earth were fitted to the education of the spirit of man as closely as a school-boy's primer is to his labor, and as gloriously as a lover's mistress is to his eyes.
That harmony is now broken, and broken the world round: fragments, indeed, of what existed still exist, and hours of what is past still return; but month by month the darkness gains upon the day, and the ashes of the Antipodes glare through the night.[D]
What consolation, or what courage, through plague, danger, or darkness, you can find in the conviction that you are nothing more than brute beasts driven by brute forces, your other tutors can tell you—not I: but this I can tell you—and with the authority of all the masters of thought since time was time,—that, while by no manner of vivisection you can learn what a Beast is, by only looking into your own hearts you may know what a Man is,—and know that his only true happiness is to live in Hope of something to be won by him, in Reverence of something to be worshiped by him, and in Love of something to be cherished by him, and cherished—forever.
Having these instincts, his only rational conclusion is that the objects which can fulfill them may be by his effort gained, and by his faith discerned; and his only earthly wisdom is to accept the united testimony of the men who have sought these things in the way they were commanded. Of whom no single one has ever said that his obedience or his faith had been vain, or found himself cast out from the choir of the living souls, whether here, or departed, for whom the song was written:—
God be merciful unto us, and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us;
That Thy way may be known upon earth, Thy saving health among all nations.