LETTER XXVII.
Dear Charles,—You think I stand committed to give
you “some adverse incidents leading to good.” I am not
aware of an express promise; still I am not unwilling to
allow such promise to have been somewhere or other implied.
My own experience is, that from early manhood I have
usually failed to get the stations which seemed desirable and
were earnestly coveted. All means were used and instruments
set at work and plied, in the way prudence suggested;
and yet all was failure. Then on the next apparent opening,
were tried different, and even opposite means;—as for
instance, now was given direct and personal attention—now
indirect and with the agency of friends;—and again, letters
were the medium—and again, all means were united;—but
nevertheless all has been failure. Few persons have had
more influential, and disinterested, and active friends, who
have sometimes labored for me as for a brother:—and these
I have obeyed, both when my judgment was different, and
when we thought alike; and for many years I have endeavored
to qualify myself for the places in question; yet I am,
at this hour, farther away, and to human eye irremediably,
from those situations than ever; although I would here
remark that the desire for those places is gone too. At present,
hardly any inducement could be powerful enough to
make me enter situations, once so apparently agreeable and
valuable. Nos mutamur!
In all this, Charles, I have long discerned the hand of a
gracious Providence. For while I may not say that I deem
myself unfit for many places and modes of life, often
unsuccessfully sought; yet am I not ashamed to confess,
that for some such places and modes of life, I have discovered
myself unfit. Hence reason and faith both say that some
evil to myself, to the community, to my friends, would have
arisen from the very situations for which fitness seemed to
exist.
Charles, many lessons not given at schools, are yet highly
important for us in this world, whether we would reach
heaven, or do good on the earth. And these lessons are not
to be learned by a man in every state of his spirit. Nay,
very often, should a valued friend in a tender and delicate
way hint certain subjects, he would be deemed officious, perhaps
cruel and censorious. In this case, adverse providences
are the
only instructors that can be tolerated: and happy he
that can listen to, and understand, the voice of the Rod.
All praise the “know-thyself” lesson; but, Charles, a
man cannot know himself by looking for ever into flattering
mirrors. These magnify and beautify our mental and moral
proportions, till we really imagine ourselves Large-Body;
and the world or man in general to be Little-Body. Naturally
then, we come to regard the world as a tolerably fair theatre
or arena for the display of our comely selves, in all the versatility
of our amazing talent! Nay, we seriously think
there is need of us; that it will be a melancholy day to the
nations when we die; and thus we stand, in quite a jovian
magnificence of thought, balancing whether to bestow ourselves
on this city or that village!—hem!
Aye! we now are satisfied that we do know ourselves—
if the world also did only know us! What a scrabble for
us—there would be! Of course, in this self-glorification
era, we do not “condescend to men of low estate,” nor mind
“the day of small things:”—plenty of small talent for that
sort of things;—we aim to help man in general and not to
do good in particular. Meanwhile the little opportunities for
doing good or showing off, are passed, hundreds in a week;
and the large ones, by an unaccountable fatality, all come
to inferior persons; and we stand perfectly amazed at the
stupidity and ingratitude of the world! Do tell!
True, some people did see us; and of these, a small part
pitied and would have helped; but the great majority of such
said, “Let a fool pass on and be punished.” In the mean
while arose in our hearts “envy,” not “at the prosperity of
the wicked,” but of the wise and good! Our peace was
ever disturbed; pride and self-consequence being at work in
the deep bosom, agitating its dark waters and turning up the
mire and dirt! “Heaven saves all beings but himself, that
sight—a naked human heart.”
What, Charles, in such cases is wanting? Let me tell
you—a certain operation vulgarly called, “wiping the conceit
out.” For what can a man do with the conceit in him?
Whence come swellings, wraths, strifes, emulations, jealousies,
secret envyings, cum multis alisi? The conceit is
not wiped out.
Now, please your reverence, your friend has undergone
a
little of this important swabbing. And when he looks into
the mirror, whether the mirror be altered, or his eye has become
“single,” and has lost a portion of its “beam,” he
certainly does not appear quite so great and comely a personage
as the said mirror used to reflect him. He is moderately
well satisfied, that if he be never heard of, or die tomorrow,
no earthquake will follow;—that scores of better
men do exist, competent for the grand situations once thought
to be mourning his absence—and that if he be not remembered
before the Holy One, his departure—(save in one little
circle,)—will be no more noticed or felt than if a moth had
ceased! In that dear circle will be
lacrymæ rerum—none
elsewhere!
That friend has learned that whatever the Heavenly
Father, in the infinitude, not of his justice but of his mercy,
many think of him, he is as to the world an atom. And that
discovery of his essential littleness, is the grandest lesson ever
learned; and that, if no earthly advantage ever arose from
it. But the earthly advantages are neither few nor small.
Among these is the secret love and approbation of the wise,
who have seen us, in both the empty eared and the full eared
state; and who smote us with words like an excellent oil,
healing as they wounded. There is also the better capacity
of being found faithful in a few and small things—and the
peace, undisturbed by “minding high things.” Above all,
there is a calm and settled feeling that when we have passed
—as we soon shall—into that better land, a voice of condescending
love in infinite mercy will be heard, saying, “Thou
hast tried to be faithful in a few things; enter into the joy of
thy Lord.”
