Twenty years or more were spent in the great combat between my old natural man and the new spiritual man which was being conceived, born, nourished, instructed and vitalized within me. I am still engaged in the same conflict. But after twenty years, I felt that the good had attained a permanent ascendency—that duty had become pleasure—that self was so far subdued that I expected nothing, desired nothing for myself alone, and experienced a serene delight in promoting the happiness of others.
The reader need not think that a convict’s prison afforded no opportunities for the great work of regeneration, and for the development of Christian character. The rainbow that shines in the cloud, and glitters in the dew-drop, is the same. The divine influx is identical in the greatest things and in the least. The patience, the meekness, the kindness to others, the obedience to law, the truthfulness, the industry, the honesty which can be exhibited in the lowliest sphere of human life, have no sweeter odor, no greater worth in the sight of heaven when they are displayed on the throne of the Cæsars.
I worked faithfully at all my tasks until my overseers respected me so much that they did not watch me at all. I was always ready to assist every one with word and deed, until my power over my fellow-prisoners was such that my voice of intercession could suspend a quarrel or [pg 364]even suppress a riot. I delighted to instruct these poor degraded fellows in the truths of religion; and when they turned a deaf ear to these, I could still please them with scraps of poetry or history or science. It was a special pleasure to nurse the sick; and in the course of twenty or thirty years, hundreds and even thousands felt the benefit and the blessing of my presence.
This steady growth of a good and useful character in spite of the sneers and rebuffs of the ill-disposed, and in the face of mighty difficulties, brought substantial comforts to myself also. I was released from strict confinement; I was made overseer of a considerable party; I was allowed liberties I had not known before; and I was fed with abundance from the officers’ table. Thus, with advancing years, I became contented and happy, and my means of being useful to others were greatly increased.
I was permitted to plant flowers and vines in the interior courtyard of our prison. After long and patient labor I adorned and beautified the spot so greatly that it attracted the attention of every visitor.
The mission of flowers is like that of poetry, to enchant, to elevate, and to purify. Therefore the Spring comes annually to shower her myriads of fragrant little lyrics upon the world!
It seemed a shame to constrain these sweet and free children of the air and sunlight to illumine the interior of a dungeon and to live with criminals; but I remembered that the angels whom they represent, delight to visit the humblest spot and to assist the most forlorn and helpless creatures of God.
I had been in prison about fifteen years without seeing [pg 365]a book, when a singular old Greek character was confined with us for some nameless crime. He was taciturn and stately, and evidently a man of education. He had a copy of the Tragedies of Eschylus which the guard had not taken from him, although parchments so well executed as that, were of considerable value. He seemed to know Eschylus by heart, and he loaned the book to me. With what delight I devoured it!
It was to me a whole flower-garden of sweets and beauties. The sad fate of Orestes, haunted by the Furies, struck the tenderest chords in my heart; and I contemplated with the joy of kinship and sympathy the grandeur of Prometheus chained to the rock, for holding in his possession secret knowledge which no tortures could compel him to reveal.
I, too, was to learn the sanctity of silence!