"EGO."
mapped out
The Frontiers
| closed down upon | open to the higher air |
| 1. The so-called bad | 1. The so-called good |
| 2. The material part of me | 2. The spiritualistic part of me |
| 3. Body | 3. Soul |
| 4. Nature | 4. Grace |
| 5. Reason | 5. Heart |
| 6. The outside of me | 6. Inside of me |
| 7. Mind and Matter | 7. Faith |
| 8. The World I live on | 8. Home |
| I. | I. |
| Intellectual Truth is one; Moral | A Supreme Being. |
| or sentimental Truth varies with the | |
| individual. | |
| II. | II. |
| Revealed religions consist of three | The Trinity, Father, Son, |
| parts, all more or less untrue. | and Holy Ghost. |
| (1) A Cosmogony | |
| more or less absurd. | |
| (2) An Historical sketch, | |
| more or less falsified. | |
| (3) A System of morality | |
| more or less pure. | |
| III. | III. |
| The Higher Law of Humanity bids | Jesus Christ, born of the |
| us cast off the slough of old creeds, | Virgin Mary. |
| especially the obsolete and the | |
| debasing doctrine of degradation; | |
| the Fall of Man, Original Sin, | |
| Redemption, Salvation, | |
| and so forth. | |
| IV. | IV. |
| Reason, while suggesting the idea | Salvation and Hope. |
| of a First Cause, a God, forbids us, | |
| in the present stage of humanity, to | |
| inquire further into the subject. | |
| V. | V. |
| The description of the Devil and | Good and bad deeds and expiation. |
| his Angels, of Hell, Heaven, and | |
| Purgatory given by "Revealed | |
| Religions" are equally dishonouring | |
| to the Creator, and debasing to the | |
| Creature, if at least the latter be | |
| the work of the former. | |
| VI. | VI. |
| Death, physically considered, is not | The Catholic Church and Sacraments. |
| annihilation, but change. | |
| VII. | VII. |
| Man's individuality, his Ego, | Resurrection of body and Soul. |
| survives the death of the body. | |
| VIII. | VIII. |
| To most races of men, the idea of | Communion with the Saints |
| annihilation is painful, whilst | and the Dead. |
| that of eternal parting is too | |
| heavy to be borne. | |
| IX. | IX. |
| A next world, a continuation of | Passing over al-Sirat, the |
| this world, is against our Reason, | bridge as fine as a hair, to |
| but it is supported by sentiment, and | El Mathar, or Purgatory—to |
| by the later traditions of both the | Heaven. |
| Aryan and the Semitic races. | |
| X. | X. |
| The only idea of continuation | Hell—Eternity.[1] |
| acceptable to man, is that the future | |
| world is a copy of this world, whilst | |
| the law of Progress suggests that it is | |
| somewhat less material and not subject | |
| to death or change. | |
We leave London—I get a Bad Fall.
Richard now, intending to make a little tour, and to meet me at Trieste in two or three weeks, went to Hamburg, to Berlin, and to Leipzig to see Tauchnitz, and to Dresden. I packed up and started on my journey Triestewards. As I was about to get into the cab at my father's door a beggar woman asked me for charity, and I gave her a shilling, and she said, "God bless you, and may you reach your home without an accident!" These words made an impression on me afterwards. I slept in Boulogne that night, and went on to Paris the following day. The day after, the 30th of April, I ordered a voiture de place, and was going out to do a variety of visits and commissions. They had been waxing the stairs till they were as slippery as ice. I had heels to my boots, and I took one long slide from the top of the stairs to the bottom, with my leg doubled under me, striking my head and my back on every stair. When I arrived at the bottom I was unconscious, picked up, and taken back to bed. When I came to I said, "I have no time to lose. Don't send the carriage away; I must get my work done and go on;" but, when I attempted to get out of bed, I fell on the floor and fainted again. A doctor was fetched, I was undressed, my boot and stocking had to be cut away; the whole of my leg was as black as ink, and so swollen that at first the doctor thought it was broken. However, it proved to be only a bad sprain and a twisted ankle.
Instead of stopping there six weeks, as the doctor said I must, I had myself bound up and conveyed to the Gare de Lyons on the fourth day, where, with a wagon-lit, I arrived at Turin in twenty-four hours. There I had to be conveyed to the hotel, being too bad to go on; but next day I insisted on being packed up again, and having another coupé-lit in the train to Mestre. I suffered immensely from the heat, for the first time since leaving England. At Mestre I had to wait four hours in the wretched station, sitting on a chair with my leg hanging down, which gave me intense pain, and then to embark in the Post-Zug, a slow train, where there were no coupé-lits to be had, arriving at half-past eight in the morning, where I found Richard waiting to receive me on the platform, and I was carried home and put into my own bed. In spite of pain I was as charmed as ever with the run down from Nabresina to dear old Trieste.
I cannot say how thankful I was to be safe and sound in my own home at Trieste with Richard, and how sweet were the welcomes, and the flowers, and the friends' visits. I was a very long time before I could leave my bed. It was found that I had injured my back and my ankle very badly, and I went through a long course of shampooing and soap baths, but I never got permanently quite well. Strong health and nerves I had hitherto looked upon as a sort of right of nature, and supposed everybody had them, and had never felt grateful for them as a blessing; but I began to learn what suffering was from this date. Richard took me up to Opçina for a great part of the summer, and used to invite large parties of friends up to dinner. We used to dine out in the lit-up gardens in the evening, overlooking the sea, which was very pleasant; and often itinerant Hungarian gypsy bands would come in and play. This summer we had the usual annual fête for the cause of humanity, and speeches and giving of prizes.
"Gold in Midian.
"To the Editor of the Globe.
"Sir,—The Globe of the 25th of May has printed from the Sheffield Telegraph a very serious misstatement on the subject of the twenty-five tons of mineral brought by Captain Burton from Midian, and I beg you to allow me a little space to refute it. The moment a lion leaves a place the jackals generally set up a bark; we left Egypt only on the 12th of May. There is a Spanish proverb which says, 'No one ever pelts a tree unless there is fruit upon it;' if this discovery were worth so little as its enemies assert, no one would take the trouble to attack it. We are only too glad to court discussion, but we want truth. Captain Burton will have to suffer for Midian what M. de Lesseps had to go through for his canal. There are plenty of drowning men in Cairo, who are only too happy to catch at any straw. Let me note the two principal blunders in the Sheffield Telegraph. Firstly, Captain Burton reported to his Highness the Khedive, and to the public, only what the Egyptian Government's own geologist and engineer, appointed by them to the Expedition, reported (of course, officially) to Captain Burton, and to the Government in whose employ he (M. George Marie) is. Secondly, close examinations and analysis show none of the evil results mentioned in the Sheffield Telegraph. On arriving in Trieste, Captain Burton was careful to have his own little private collection analyzed by Dr. L. Karl Moser, an able professor of geology, who declares that the turquoises are not malachites, but pure crystals of turquoise. Moreover, he has found metals in three several rocks where, till now, they were not known to exist—dendritic gold in chalcedony; silver lead in a peculiar copper-bearing quartz, and possibly in the red veins traversing the gypsum; and, lastly, worked coppers in obsidian slag. In fact, the collection has only gained, and will gain, by being scientifically examined. The Khedive has sent a quantity of each sort of mineral to London for analysis, and as soon as Captain Burton receives a telegram from his secretary, in whose charge it is, to say that it has arrived, he will, if permitted, hasten home to superintend the operation personally, and forward the official report to his Highness the Khedive. Meanwhile we only ask every one to suspend judgment till the results are known, instead of publishing and believing every gossiping bit of jealousy and intrigue that may issue from Cairo, thereby injuring the interest of future companies, of his Highness, and of Egypt, and lastly, but not least, casting a slight upon the noble and arduous work of my husband.
"I have the honour to be, sir, yours obediently,
"Isabel Burton.
"Her Britannic Majesty's Consulate, Trieste, May 30."