University of Virginia Library

LETTER XXXV.

A book has been lately published called the Westover
Manuscripts, written more than a hundred years ago, by
Col. William Byrd, an old Virginian cavalier, residing at
Westover, on the north bank of James river. He relates
the following remarkable circumstance, which powerfully
arrested my attention, and set in motion thoughts that flew
beyond the stars, and so I lost sight of them, till they again
come within my vision, in yonder world, where, as the
German beautifully expresses it, “we shall find our dreams,
and only lose our sleep.” The writer says:

“Of all the effects of lightning that ever I heard of, the
most amazing happened in this country, in the year 1736.
In the summer of that year, a surgeon of a ship, whose
name was Davis, came ashore at York, to visit a patient.
He was no sooner got into the house, but it began to rain,
with many terrible claps of thunder. When it was almost
dark, there came a dreadful flash of lightning, which struck
the surgeon dead, as he was walking about the room, but
hurt no other person, though several were near him. At
the same time, it made a large hole in the trunk of a pine
tree, which grew about ten feet from the window. But
what was most surprising in this disaster was, that on the
breast of the unfortunate man that was killed, was the figure
of a pine tree, as exactly delineated as any limner in the
world could draw it; nay, the resemblance went so far as to
represent the colour of the pine, as well as the figure. The
lightning must probably have passed through the tree first,
before it struck the man, and by that means have printed
the icon of it on his breast. But whatever may have been
the cause, the effect was certain, and can be attested by a
cloud of witnesses, who had the curiosity to go and see
this wonderful phenomenon.”

This lightning daguerreotype aroused within me the old
inquiry, “What is electricity? Of what spiritual essence
is it the form and type?” Questions that again and again
have led my soul in such eager chase through the universe,
to find an answer, that it has come back weary, as if it had
carried heavy weights, and traversed Saturn's rings, in
magnetic sleep. Thick clouds come between me and this
mystery, into which I have searched for years; but I see
burning lines of light along the edges, which significantly
indicate the glory it veils.

I sometimes think electricity is the medium which puts
man into relation with all things, enabling him to act on all,
and receive from all. It is now well established as a scientific

fact, though long regarded as an idle superstition, that
some men can ascertain the vicinity of water, under ground,
by means of a divining rod. Thouvenel, and other scientific
men in France, account for it by supposing that “the
water forms with the earth above it, and the fluids of the
human body, a galvanic circle.” The human body is said
to be one of the best conductors yet discovered, and nervous
or debilitated persons to be better conductors than
those in sound health. If the body of the operator be a
very good conductor, the rod in his hand will be forcibly
drawn toward the earth, whenever he approaches a vein of
water, that lies near the surface. If silk gloves or stockings
are worn, the attraction is interrupted; and it varies in
degree, according as any substances between the water and
the hand of the operator are more or less good conductors
of the galvanic fluid.

Everybody knows what a frightful imitation of life
can be produced in a dead body by the galvanic battery.

The animal magnetizer often feels as if strength had
gone out of him; and it is very common for persons in
magnetic sleep to speak of bright emanations from the fingers
which are making passes over them.

What is this invisible, all-pervading essence, which thus
has power to put man into communication with all? That
man contains the universe within himself, philosophers conjectured
ages ago; and therefore named him “the microcosm.”
If man led a true life, he would, doubtless, come
into harmonious relation with all forms of being, and thus
his instincts would be universal, and far more certain and
perfect, than those of animals. The bird knows what
plant will cure the bite of a serpent; and if man led a life
as true to the laws of his being, as the bird does to hers, he
would have no occasion to study medicine, for, he would at
once perceive the medicinal quality of every herb and
mineral. His inventions are, in fact, only discoveries; for

all existed, before he applied it, and called it his own.
The upholsterer-bee had a perfect cutting instrument, ages
before scissors were invented; the mason-bee cemented
pebbles together, for his dwelling, centuries before houses
were built with stone and mortar; the wasp of Cayenne
made her nest of beautiful white card paper, cycles before
paper was invented; the lightning knew how to print images,
æons before Monsieur Daguerre found out half the
process; viz: the form without the colour; the bee knew
how to take up the least possible room in the construction
of her cells, long before mathematicians discovered that she
had worked out the problem perfectly; and I doubt not
fishes had the very best of submarine reflectors, before
Mrs. Mather invented her ocean telescope, which shows
a pin distinctly on the muddy bottom of the bay.

I cannot recall the name of the ancient philosopher, who
spent his days in watching insects and other animals, that
he might gather hints to fashion tools; but the idea has
long been familiar to my mind, that every conceivable thing
which has been, or will be invented, already exists in nature,
in some form or other. Man alone can reproduce all
things of creation; because he contains the whole in
himself, and all forms of being flow into his, as a common
centre.

Of what spiritual thing is electricity the type? Is there
a universal medium by which all things of spirit act on the
soul, as matter on the body by means of electricity? And is
that medium the will, whether of angels or of men? Wonderful
stories are told of early Friends, how they were guided
by a sudden and powerful impulse, to avoid some particular
bridge, or leave some particuler house, and subsequent
events showed that danger was there. Many people consider
this fanaticism; but I have faith in it. I believe the
most remarkable of these accounts give but a faint idea of

the perfection to which man's moral and physical instincts
might attain, if his life were obedient and true.

Though in vigorous health, I am habitually affected by
the weather. I never indulge gloomy thoughts; but resolutely
turn away my gaze from the lone stubble waving in
the autumn wind, and think only of the ripe, golden seed
which the sower will go forth to sow. But when to the
dreariness of departing summer is added a week of successive
rains; when day after day, the earth under foot is
slippery mud, and the sky over head like gray marble, then
my nature yields itself prisoner to utter melancholy. I am
ashamed to confess it, and hundreds of times have struggled
desperately against it, unwilling to be conquered by
the elements, looking at me with an “evil eye.” But so it
is—a protracted rain always convinces me that I never did
any good, and never can do any; that I love nobody, and
nobody loves me. I have heard that Dr. Franklin acknowledges
a similar effect on himself, and philosophically conjectures
the physical cause. He says animal spirits depend
greatly on the presence of electricity in our bodies;
and during long-continued rain, the dampness of the atmosphere
absorbs a large portion of it; for this reason, he advises
that a silk waistcoat be worn next the skin; silk being
a non-conductor of electricity. Perhaps this precaution
might diminish the number of suicides in the foggy month
of November, “when Englishmen are so prone to hang
and drown themselves.”

Animal magnetism is connected, in some unexplained
way, with electricity. All those who have tried it, are
aware that there is a metallic feeling occasioned by the
magnetic passes—a sort of attraction, as one might imagine
the magnet and the steel to feel when brought near each
other. The magnetizer passes his hands over the subject,
without touching, and at the end of each operation shakes
them, precisely as if he were conducting off electric fluid.

If this is the actual effect, the drowsiness, stupor, and final
insensibility, may be occasioned by a cause similar to that
which produces heaviness and depression of spirits in rainy
weather. Why it should be so, in either case, none can
tell. The most learned have no knowledge what electricity
is; they can only tell what it does, not how it does it.

That the state of the atmosphere has prodigious effect
on human temperament, is sufficiently indicated by the
character of nations. The Frenchman owes his sanguine
hopes, his supple limbs, his untiring vivacity, to a genial
climate; to this too, in a great measure, the Italian owes
his pliant gracefulness and impulsive warmth. The Dutchman,
on his level marshes, could never dance La Sylphide;
nor the Scotch girl, on her foggy hills, become an improvisatrice.
The French dance into everything, on everything,
and over everything; for they live where the breezes
dance among vines, and the sun showers down gold to the
the piper; and dance they must, for gladsome sympathy.
We call them of “mercurial” temperament; according to
Dr. Franklin's theory, they are surcharged with electricity.

In language, too, how plainly one perceives the influence
of climate! Languages of northern origin abound in consonants,
and sound like clanging metals, or the tipping up
of a cart-load of stones. The southern languages flow like
a rill that moves to music; the liquid vowels so sweetly
melt into each other. This difference is observable even
in the dialect of our northern and southern tribes of Indians.
At the north, we find such words as Carratunk, Scowhegan,
Norridgewock, and Memphremagog; at the south, Pascagoula,
Santee, and that most musical of all names, Oceola.

Climate has had its effect, too, on the religious ideas
of nations. How strongly does the bloody Woden and the
thundering Thor, of northern mythology, contrast with the
beautiful Graces and gliding Nymphs of Grecian origin. As
a general rule, (sometimes affected by local causes,) southern

nations cling to the pictured glory of the Catholic
church, while the northern assimilate better with the severe
plainness of the Protestant.

If I had been reared from infancy under the cloudless
sky of Athens, perhaps I might have bounded over the
earth, as if my “element were air, and music but the echo
of my steps;” the caution that looks where it treads, might
have been changed for the ardent gush of a Sappho's song;
the sunbeam might have passed into my soul, and written
itself on the now thoughtful countenance in perpetual
smiles.

Do you complain of this, as you do of phrenology, and
say that it favours fatalism too much? I answer, no matter
what it favours, if it be truth. No two truths ever devoured
each other, or ever can. Look among the families
of your acquaintance—you will see two brothers vigorous,
intelligent, and enterprising; the third was like them, till
he fell on his head, had fits, and was ever after puny and
stupid. There are two sunny-tempered, graceful girls—
their sister might have been as cheerful as they, but their
father died suddenly, before her birth, and the mother's
sorrow chilled the fountains of her infant life, and she is
nervous, deformed, and fretful. Is there no fatality, as you
call it, in this? Assuredly, we are all, in some degree,
the creatures of outward circumstance; but this in nowise
disturbs the scale of moral responsibility, or prevents
equality of happiness. Our responsibility consists in the
use we make of our possessions, not on their extent. Salvation
comes to all through obedience to the light they have,
be it much or little. Happiness consists not in having
much, but in wanting no more than we have. The idiot
is as happy in playing at Jack Straws, or blowing bubbles
all the livelong day, as Newton was in watching the great
choral dance of the planets. The same universe lies above
and around both. “The mouse can drink no more than

his fill at the mightiest river;” yet he enjoys his draught as
well as the elephant. Thus are we all unequal, yet equal.
That we are, in part, creatures of necessity, who that has
tried to exert free will, can doubt? But it is a necessity
which has power only over the outward, and can never
change evil into good, or good into evil. It may compel
us to postpone or forbear the good we would fain do, but it
cannot compel us to commit the evil.

If a consideration of all these outward influences teach
us charity for the deficiencies of others, and a strict watch
over our own weaknesses, they will perform their appropriate
office.