Voltaire had more than negative lucidity; he had the large and true conception that a number and equilibrium of activities were necessary for man. "Il faut douner à notre áme toutes les formes possibles" was a maxim which Voltaire really and truly applied in practice, "advancing," as Michelet finely said of him, in every direction with a marvelous vigor and with that conquering ambition which Vico called mens heroica. Nevertheless. Voltaire's signal characteristic was his lucidity, his negative lucidity.
There was a great and free intellectual movement in England in the eighteenth century--indeed, it was from England that it passed into France; but the English had not that strong natural bent for lucidity which the French had. Its bent was toward other things in preference. Our leading thinkers had not the genius and passion for lucidity which distinguished Voltaire. In their free inquiry they soon found themselves coming into collision with a number of established facts, beliefs, conventions. Thereupon all sorts of practical considerations began to sway them. The danger signal went up, they often stopped short, turned their eyes another way, or drew down a curtain between themselves and the light. "It seems highly probable," said Voltaire, "that nature has made thinking a portion of the brain, as vegetation is a function of trees; that we think by the brain just as we walk by the feet." So our reason, at least, would lead us to conclude, if the theologians did not assure us of the contrary; such, too, was the opinion of Locke, but he did not venture to announce it. The French Revolution came, England grew to abhor France, and was cut off from the Continent, did great things, gained much, but not in lucidity. The Continent was reopened, the century advanced, time and experience brought their lessons, lovers of free and clear thought, such as the late John Stuart Mill, arose among us. But we could not say that they had by any means founded among us the reign of lucidity.
Let them consider that movement of which we were hearing so much just now: let them look at the Salvation Army and its operations. They would see numbers, funds, energy, devotedness, excitement, conversions, and a total absence of lucidity. A little lucidity would make the whole movement impossible. That movement took for granted as its basis what was no longer possible or receivable; its adherents proceeded in all they did on the assumption that that basis was perfectly solid, and neither saw that it was not solid, nor ever even thought of asking themselves whether it was solid or not.
Taking a very different movement, and one of far higher dignity and import, they had all had before their minds lately the long-devoted, laborious, influential, pure, pathetic life of Dr. Pusey, which had just ended. Many of them had also been reading in the lively volumes of that acute, but not always good-natured rattle, Mr. Mozley, an account of that great movement which took from Dr. Pusey its earlier name. Of its later stage of Ritualism they had had in this country a now celebrated experience. This movement was full of interest. It had produced men to be respected, men to be admired, men to be beloved, men of learning, goodness, genius, and charm. But could they resist the truth that lucidity would have been fatal to it? The movers of all those questions about apostolical succession, church patristic authority, primitive usage, postures, vestments--questions so passionately debated, and on which he would not seek to cast ridicule--did not they all begin by taking for granted something no longer possible or receivable, build on this basis as if it were indubitably solid, and fail to see that their basis not being solid, all they built upon it was fantastic?
He would not say that negative lucidity was in itself a satisfactory possession, but he said that it was inevitable and indispensable, and that it was the condition of all serious construction for the future. Without it at present a man or a nation was intellectually and spiritually all abroad. If they saw it accompanied in France by much that they shrank from, they should reflect that in England it would have influences joined with it which it had not in France--the natural seriousness of the people, their sense of reverence and respect, their love for the past. Come it must; and here where it had been so late in coming, it would probably be for the first time seen to come without danger.
Capitals were natural centers of mental movement, and it was natural for the classes with most leisure, most freedom, most means of cultivation, and most conversance with the wide world to have lucidity though often they had it not. To generate a spirit of lucidity in provincial towns, and among the middle classes bound to a life of much routine and plunged in business, was more difficult. Schools and universities, with serious and disinterested studies, and connecting those studies the one with the other and continuing them into years of manhood, were in this case the best agency they could use. It might be slow, but it was sure. Such an agency they were now going to employ. Might it fulfill all their expectations! Might their students, in the words quoted just now, advance in every direction with a marvelous vigor, and with that conquering ambition which Vico called mens heroica! And among the many good results of this, might one result be the acquisition in their midst of that indispensable spirit--the spirit of lucidity!
ON SOME APPARATUS THAT PERMIT OF ENTERING FLAMES.
[Footnote: A. de Rochas in the Revue Scientifique.]