 | Letters from New York |  |
LETTER XXXIX.
There is a fine engraving of Jean Paul Richter, surrounded
by floating clouds, all of which are angels' faces;
but so soft and shadowy, that they must be sought for to be
perceived. It was a beautiful idea thus to environ Jean
Paul; for whosoever reads him, with an earnest thoughtfulness,
will see heavenly features perpetually shining
through the golden mists or rolling vapour.
But the picture interested me especially, because it embodied
a great spiritual truth. In all clouds that surround
the soul, there are angel faces, and we should see them if
we were calm and holy. It is because we are impatient of
our destiny, and do not understand its use in our eternal
progression, that the clouds which envelope it seem like
black masses of thunder, or cold and dismal obstructions of
the sunshine. If man looked at his being as a whole, or
had faith that all things were intended to bring him into
harmony with the divine will, he would gratefully acknowledge
that spiritual dew and rain, wind and lightning, cloud
and sunshine, all help his growth, as their natural forms
bring to maturity the flowers and the grain. “Whosoever
quarrels with his fate, does not understand it,” says Bettine;
and among all her inspired sayings, she spake none
wiser.
Misfortune is never mournful to the soul that accepts it;
for such do always see that every cloud is an angel's face.
Every man deems that he has precisely the trials and
temptations which are the hardest of all others for him to
bear; but they are so, simply because they are the very
ones he most needs.
I admit the truth of Bulwer's assertion, that “long adversity
hardened to affection; passive and quiet of hope, resigned
to the worst, as to the common order of events, and
expecting little from the best, as an unlooked for incident
in the regularity of human afflictions.” But I apprehend
this remark is mainly applicable to pecuniary difficulties,
which, “in all their wretched and entangling minutiæ, like
the diminutive cords by which Gulliver was bound, tame
the strongest mind, and quell the most buoyant spirit.”
These vexations are not man's natural destiny, and therefore
are not healthy for his soul. They are produced by
a false structure of society, which daily sends thousands
of kind and generous hearts down to ruin and despair, in
its great whirl of falsity and wrong. These are victims of
a stinging grief, which has in it nothing divine, and brings
no healing on its wings.
But the sorrow which God appoints is purifying and ennobling,
and contains within it a serious joy. Our Father
saw that disappointment and separation were necessary,
and he has made them holy and elevating. From the
sepulchre the stone is rolled away, and angels declare to
the mourner, “He is not here; he is risen. Why seek
ye the living among the dead?” And a voice higher than
the angels, proclaims, “Because I live, ye shall live also.”
No Time to those who see Eternity.”
Blessed indeed are the ministrations of sorrow! Through
it, we are brought into more tender relationship to all other
forms of being, obtain a deeper insight into the mystery of
eternal life, and feel more distinctly the breathings of the infinite.
“All sorrow raises us above the civic, ceremonial
law, and makes the prosaist a psalmist,” says Jean Paul.
Whatsoever is highest and holiest is tinged with melancholy.
The eye of genius has always a plaintive expression,
than other men; and He who was greater than all prophets,
was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.”
Sorrow connects the soul with the invisible and the everlasting;
and therefore all things prophesy it, before it comes
to us. The babe weeps at the wail of music, though he is
a stranger to grief; and joyful young hearts are saddened
by the solemn brightness of the moon. When men try to
explain the oppressive feelings inspired by moonlight and
the ever silent stars, they say it is as if spirits were near.
Thus Bettine writes to Günderode “In the night was
something confidential, which allured me as a child; and
before I ever heard of spirits, it seemed as if there was
something living near me, in whose protection I trusted.
So was it with me on the balcony, when a child three or
four years old, when all the bells were tolling for the emperor's
death. As it always grew more nightly and cool,
and nobody with me, it seemed as if the air was full of bell-chimes,
which surrounded me; then came a gloom over my
little heart, and then again sudden composure, as if my
guardian angel had taken me in his arms. What a great
mystery is life, so closely embracing the soul, as the chrysalis
the butterfly!”
The spiritual speaks ever to us, but we hear it at such
moments, because the soul is silent and listening, and therefore
the infinite pervades it.—All alone, alone, through deep
shadows, thus only can ye pass to golden sunshine on the
eternal shore! this is the prophetic voice, whose sad but
holy utterance goes deep down into the soul when it is
alone with moonlight and stars. Under its unearthly influence,
childhood nestles closer to its mother's side, and the
mirthful heart of youth melts into tears. It is as if the
cross upreared its dark shadow before the vision of the infant
Saviour.
As we grow older, this prophecy becomes experience.
scroll, and we stand consciously in the presence of the infinite
and the eternal. The wailing of the autumn wind,
the lone stubble waving in the wintry field, the falling
foliage, and the starry stillness, are no longer a luxury of
sadness, as in the days of youthful imagination. The voice
of wailing has been within us; our loved ones have left us,
and we are like the lone stubble in the once blooming field;
the leaves of our hopes are falling withered around us;
and the midnight stillness is filled with dreary echoes of
the past.
Oh, Father, how fearful is this pilgrimage!—Alone in the
twilight, and voices from the earth, the air, and the sky, call,
“Whence art thou?—Whither goest thou?” And none
makes answer. Behind us comes the voice of the Past,
like the echo of a bell travelling through space for a thousand
years; and all it utters is, “As thou art, I was.” Before
us stands the Future, a shadow robed in vapour,
with a far-off sunlight shining through. The Present is
around us—passing away—passing away. And we? Oh,
Father! fearful indeed is this earth pilgrimage, when the
soul has learned that all its sounds are echoes,—all its
sights are shadows.
But lo! the clouds open, and a face serene and hopeful
looks forth, and says, Be thou as a little child, and thus
shalt thou become a seraph. The shadows which perplex
thee are all realities; the echoes are all from the eternal
voice which gave to light its being. All the changing forms
around thee are but images of the infinite and the true,
seen in the mirror of time, as they pass by, each on a heavenly
mission. Be thou as a little child. Thy Father's
hand will guide thee home.
I bow my head in silent humility. I cannot pray that
afflictions may not visit me. I know why it was that Mrs.
Fletcher said, “Such prayers never seem to have wings.”
meekly as a blessing. I see that all the clouds are angels'
faces, and their voices speak harmoniously of the everlasting
chime.
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