 | Pierre, or, The ambiguities |  |
I.
Inasmuch as by various indirect intimations much more
than ordinary natural genius has been imputed to Pierre, it
may have seemed an inconsistency, that only the merest magazine
papers should have been thus far the sole productions of
his mind. Nor need it be added, that, in the soberest earnest,
those papers contained nothing uncommon; indeed—entirely
now to drop all irony, if hitherto any thing like that has been
indulged in—those fugitive things of Master Pierre's were the
veriest common-place.
It is true, as I long before said, that Nature at Saddle Meadows
had very early been as a benediction to Pierre;—had
blown her wind-clarion to him from the blue hills, and murmured
melodious secrecies to him by her streams and her
woods. But while nature thus very early and very abundantly
feeds us, she is very late in tutoring us as to the proper methodization
of our diet. Or,—to change the metaphor,—there
are immense quarries of fine marble; but how to get it out;
how to chisel it; how to construct any temple? Youth must
wholly quit, then, the quarry, for awhile; and not only go
forth, and get tools to use in the quarry, but must go and
thoroughly study architecture. Now the quarry-discoverer is
long before the stone-cutter; and the stone-cutter is long before
for the temple is the crown of the world.
Yes; Pierre was not only very unarchitectural at that time,
but Pierre was very young, indeed, at that time. And it is
often to be observed, that as in digging for precious metals in
the mines, much earthy rubbish has first to be troublesomely
handled and thrown out; so, in digging in one's soul for the
fine gold of genius, much dullness and common-place is first
brought to light. Happy would it be, if the man possessed in
himself some receptacle for his own rubbish of this sort: but
he is like the occupant of a dwelling, whose refuse can not be
clapped into his own cellar, but must be deposited in the street
before his own door, for the public functionaries to take care
of. No common-place is ever effectually got rid of, except by
essentially emptying one's self of it into a book; for once
trapped in a book, then the book can be put into the fire, and
all will be well. But they are not always put into the fire;
and this accounts for the vast majority of miserable books over
those of positive merit. Nor will any thoroughly sincere man,
who is an author, ever be rash in precisely defining the period,
when he has completely ridded himself of his rubbish, and
come to the latent gold in his mine. It holds true, in every
case, that the wiser a man is, the more misgivings he has on
certain points.
It is well enough known, that the best productions of the
best human intellects, are generally regarded by those intellects
as mere immature freshman exercises, wholly worthless in
themselves, except as initiatives for entering the great University
of God after death. Certain it is, that if any inferences can
be drawn from observations of the familiar lives of men of the
greatest mark, their finest things, those which become the foolish
glory of the world, are not only very poor and inconsiderable
to themselves, but often positively distasteful; they would
rather not have the book in the room. In minds comparatively
so sadden and unfit, that they become careless of what
they write; go to their desks with discontent, and only remain
there—victims to headache, and pain in the back—by the hard
constraint of some social necessity. Equally paltry and despicable
to them, are the works thus composed; born of unwillingness
and the bill of the baker; the rickety offspring of a parent,
careless of life herself, and reckless of the germ-life she contains.
Let not the short-sighted world for a moment imagine, that
any vanity lurks in such minds; only hired to appear on the
stage, not voluntarily claiming the public attention; their utmost
life-redness and glow is but rouge, washed off in private
with bitterest tears; their laugh only rings because it is hollow;
and the answering laugh is no laughter to them.
There is nothing so slipperily alluring as sadness; we become
sad in the first place by having nothing stirring to do;
we continue in it, because we have found a snug sofa at last.
Even so, it may possibly be, that arrived at this quiet retrospective
little episode in the career of my hero—this shallowly
expansive embayed Tappan Zee of my otherwise deep-heady
Hudson—I too begin to loungingly expand, and wax harmlessly
sad and sentimental.
Now, what has been hitherto presented in reference to
Pierre, concerning rubbish, as in some cases the unavoidable
first-fruits of genius, is in no wise contradicted by the fact, that
the first published works of many meritorious authors have
given mature token of genius; for we do not know how many
they previously published to the flames; or privately published
in their own brains, and suppressed there as quickly. And in
the inferior instances of an immediate literary success, in very
young writers, it will be almost invariably observable, that for
that instant success they were chiefly indebted to some rich and
peculiar experience in life, embodied in a book, which because,
for that cause, containing original matter, the author himself,
original books, being the product of very unoriginal minds.
Indeed, man has only to be but a little circumspect, and away
flies the last rag of his vanity. The world is forever babbling
of originality; but there never yet was an original man, in the
sense intended by the world; the first man himself—who according
to the Rabbins was also the first author—not being an
original; the only original author being God. Had Milton's
been the lot of Caspar Hauser, Milton would have been vacant
as he. For though the naked soul of man doth assuredly contain
one latent element of intellectual productiveness; yet never
was there a child born solely from one parent; the visible world
of experience being that procreative thing which impregnates
the muses; self-reciprocally efficient hermaphrodites being but
a fable.
There is infinite nonsense in the world on all of these matters;
hence blame me not if I contribute my mite. It is impossible
to talk or to write without apparently throwing oneself
helplessly open; the Invulnerable Knight wears his visor
down. Still, it is pleasant to chat; for it passes the time ere
we go to our beds; and speech is further incited, when like
strolling improvisatores of Italy, we are paid for our breath.
And we are only too thankful when the gapes of the audience
dismiss us with the few ducats we earn.
| Pierre, or, The ambiguities | |