See reference to Buchanan in the Preface.
I learn from the New Statesman reviewer of the first English Edition that these lines were by Hester, a gifted sister of Mary Cholmondeley. She died at 22.
The world is not so much in need of new thoughts as that when thought grows old and worn with usage it should, like current coin, be called in, and, from the mint of genius, reissued fresh and new.
Alexander Smith (On the Writing of Essays).
It is the calling of great men, not so much to preach new truths, as to rescue from oblivion those old truths which it is our wisdom to remember and our weakness to forget.
Sydney Smith.
In philosophy equally as in poetry it is the highest and most useful prerogative of genius to produce the strongest impressions of novelty, while it rescues admitted truths from the neglect caused by the very circumstances of their universal admission. Extremes meet. Truths, of all others the most awful and interesting, are too often considered as so true, that they lose all the power of truth, and lie bed-ridden in the dormitory of the soul, side by side with the most despised and exploded errors.
S. T. Coleridge (Aids to Reflection).
I’m not denying the women are foolish: God Almighty made ’em to match the men.
George Eliot (Adam Bede).
The Baptist might be in the Wilderness shouting to the poor, who were listening with all their might and faith to the preacher’s awful accents and denunciations of wrath or woe or salvation; and our friend the Sadducee would turn his sleek mule with a shrug and a smile from the crowd, and go home to the shade of his terrace, and muse, over preacher and audience, and turn to his roll of Plato, or his pleasant Greek song-book babbling of honey and Hybla, and nymphs and fountains and love. To what, we say, does this scepticism lead? It leads a man to a shameful loneliness and selfishness, so to speak—the more shameful, because it is so good-humoured and conscienceless and serene. Conscience! What is conscience? Why accept remorse? What is public or private faith? Myths alike enveloped in enormous tradition. If seeing and acknowledging the lies of the world, Arthur, as see them you can with only too fatal a clearness, you submit to them without any protest farther than a laugh: if, plunged yourself in easy sensuality, you allow the whole wretched world to pass groaning by you unmoved: if the fight for the truth is taking place, and all men of honour are on the ground armed on the one side or the other, and you alone are to lie on your balcony and smoke your pipe out of the noise and the danger, you had better have died, or never have been at all, than such a sensual coward.
W. M. Thackeray (Pendennis, XXIII).
What a monstrous spectre is this man, the disease of the agglutinated dust, lifting alternate feet or lying drugged with slumber; killing, feeding, growing, bringing forth small copies of himself; grown upon with hair like grass, fitted with eyes that move and glitter in his face; a thing to set children screaming;—and yet looked at nearlier, known as his fellows know him, how surprising are his attributes! Poor soul, here for so little, cast among so many hardships, filled with desires so incommensurate and so inconsistent, savagely surrounded, savagely descended, irremediably condemned to prey upon his fellow lives: who should have blamed him had he been of a piece with his destiny and a being merely barbarous? And we look and behold him instead filled with imperfect virtues: infinitely childish, often admirably valiant, often touchingly kind; sitting down, amidst his momentary life, to debate of right and wrong and the attributes of the deity; rising up to do battle for an egg or die for an idea; singling out his friends and his mate with cordial affection; bringing forth in pain, rearing with long-suffering solicitude, his young. To touch the heart of his mystery, we find in him one thought, strange to the point of lunacy: the thought of duty; the thought of something owing to himself, to his neighbour, to his God; an ideal of decency, to which he would rise if it were possible; a limit of shame, below which, if it be possible, he will not stoop.
R. L. Stevenson (Pulvis et Umbra).
A CHARGE.
Human nature, trained in the School of Christianity, throws away as false the delineation of piety in the disguise of Hebe, and declares that there is something higher than happiness—that thought which is ever full of care and truth is better far—that all true and disinterested affection, which often is called to mourn, is better still—that the devoted allegiance of conscience to duty and to God—which ever has in it more of penitence than of joy—is noblest of all.
James Martineau (Endeavours after the Christian Life, p. 42).
There is in man a Higher than Love of Happiness; he can do without Happiness, and instead thereof find Blessedness! Was it not to preach forth this same Higher that sages and martyrs, the poet and the priest, in all times have spoken and suffered; bearing testimony, through life and through death, of the Godlike that is in Man, and how in the Godlike only has he Strength and Freedom? Which God-inspired Doctrine art thou also honoured to be taught; O Heavens! and broken with manifold merciful Afflictions, even till thou become contrite and learn it! O thank thy Destiny for these; thankfully bear what yet remain; thou hadst need of them; the Self in thee needed to be annihilated.... Love not Pleasure; love God. This is the EVERLASTING YEA, wherein all contradiction is solved; wherein whoso walks and works, it is well with him.... To the Worship of Sorrow, ascribe what origin and genesis thou pleasest, has not that Worship originated, and been generated? Is it not here? Feel it in thy heart, and then say whether it is of God! This is Belief; all else is Opinion.... Do the Duty which liest nearest thee, which thou knowest to be a Duty. The Situation that has not its Duty, its Ideal, was never yet occupied by man. Yes here, in this poor, miserable, hampered, despicable Actual, wherein thou even now standest, here or nowhere is thy Ideal: work it out therefrom; and working, believe, live, be free. The Ideal is in thyself.
Thomas Carlyle (Sartor Resartus).
The belief that the sense of duty and moral aspiration arise from within ourselves, and are the cause rather than the result of sociological evolution is far more widespread to-day than in what Carlyle calls his “atheistical century.” The “Everlasting Yea” is opposed to the “Everlasting No” of nescience.
For the subject of the verse see title of poem.
David Gray was a young poet and a great friend of Buchanan’s. Another verse in the poem is:
Andrea del Sarto says that, but for certain unfortunate circumstances, he might have reached the high eminence of Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Michael Angelo. In heaven he may have another chance to compete with them.
This and the five following quotations and others through the book are from a small collection of word-pictures, that I had begun to put together. They are mostly well-known.
It is a ghost-child who is playing in the great cathedral.
Edward Fitzgerald, quoting this in “Euphranor,” says the “meadow” is the grass reserved for meadowing, or mowing.
THE FEAST OF ADONIS.
Gorgo. Is Praxinoë at home?
Praxinoë. My dear Gorgo, at last! Yes, here I am. Euno, find a chair—get a cushion for it.
Gorgo. It will do beautifully as it is.
Praxinoë. Do sit down.
Gorgo. Oh, this gad-about spirit! I could hardly get to you, Praxinoë, through all the crowd and all the carriages. Nothing but heavy boots, nothing but men in uniform. And what a journey it is! My dear child, you really live too far off.
Praxinoë. It is all that insane husband of mine. He has chosen to come out here to the end of the world, and take a hole of a place—for a house it is not—on purpose that you and I might not be neighbours. He is always just the same—anything to quarrel with one! anything for spite!
Gorgo. My dear, don’t talk so of your husband before the little fellow. Just see how astonished he looks at you. (Talking to the child.) Never mind, Zopyrio my pet, she is not talking about papa. (Good heavens, the child does really understand.) Pretty papa!
Praxinoë. That “pretty papa” of his the other day (though I told him beforehand to mind what he was about), when I sent him to a shop to buy soap and rouge, brought me home salt instead; stupid, great, big, interminable animal!
Gorgo. Mine is just the fellow to him. But never mind now, get on your things and let us be off to the palace to see the Adonis. I hear the Queen’s decorations are something splendid.
Praxinoë. “In grand people’s houses everything is grand.” What things you have seen in Alexandria! What a deal you will have to tell to anybody who has never been there!
Gorgo. Come, we ought to be going.
Praxinoë. “Every day is a holiday to people who have nothing to do.” Eunoë, pick up your work; and take care, you lazy girl, how you leave it lying about again; the cats find it just the bed they like. Come, stir yourself, fetch me some water, quick! I wanted the water first, and the girl brings me the soap. Never mind; give it me. Not all that, extravagant! Now pour out the water—stupid! Why don’t you take care of my dress? That will do. I have got my hands washed as it pleased God. Where is the key of the large wardrobe? Bring it here—quick!
Gorgo. Praxinoë, you can’t think how well that dress, made full, as you have got it, suits you. Tell me, how much did it cost—the dress by itself, I mean?
Praxinoë. Don’t talk of it, Gorgo: more than eight guineas of good hard money. And about the work on it, I have almost worn my life out.
Gorgo. Well, you couldn’t have done better.
Praxinoë. Thank you. Bring me my shawl, and put my hat properly on my head—properly. No, child (to her little boy,) I am not going to take you; there’s a bogey on horseback who bites. Cry as much as you like; I’m not going to have you lamed for life. Now we’ll start. Nurse take the little one and amuse him; call the dog in, and shut the street door. (They go out.) Good heavens! what a crowd of people! How on earth are we ever to get through all this? They are like ants: you can’t count them. My dearest Gorgo, what will become of us? Here are the Royal Horse Guards. My good man, don’t ride over me! Look at that bay horse rearing bolt upright; what a vicious one! Eunoë, you mad girl, do take care!—that horse will certainly be the death of the man on his back. How glad I am now, that I left the child safe at home.
Gorgo. All right, Praxinoë, we are safe behind them; and they have gone on to where they are stationed.
Praxinoë. Well, yes, I begin to revive again. From the time I was a little girl I have had more horror of horses and snakes than of anything else in the world. Let us get on; here’s a great crowd coming this way upon us.
Gorgo (to an old woman). Mother, are you from the palace?
Old woman. Yes, my dears.
Gorgo. Has one a tolerable chance of getting there?
Old woman. My pretty young lady, the Greeks got to Troy by dint of trying hard; trying will do anything in this world.
Gorgo. The old creature has delivered an oracle and disappeared.
Praxinoë. Women can tell you everything about everything, even about Jupiter’s marriage with Juno!
Gorgo. Look, Praxinoë, what a squeeze at the palace gates.
Praxinoë. Tremendous! Take hold of me, Gorgo; and you, Eunoë, take hold of Eutychis!—tight hold, or you’ll be lost. Here we go in all together. Hold tight to us, Eunoë! Oh, dear! oh, dear! Gorgo, there’s my scarf torn right in two. For heaven’s sake, my good man, as you hope to be saved, take care of my dress!
Stranger. I’ll do what I can, but it doesn’t depend upon me.
Praxinoë. What heaps of people! They push like a drove of pigs.
Stranger. Don’t be frightened, ma’am, we are all right.
Praxinoë. May you be all right, my dear sir, to the last day you live, for the care you have taken of us! What a kind, considerate man! There is Eunoë jammed in a squeeze. Push, you goose, push! Capital! We are all of us the right side of the door, as the bridegroom said when he had locked himself in with the bride.
Gorgo. Praxinoë, come this way. Do but look at that work, how delicate it is!—how exquisite! Why, the gods might wear it in heaven.
Praxinoë. Goddess of Spinning, what hands were hired to do that work? Who designed those beautiful patterns? They seem to stand up and move about, as if they were real—as if they were living things, and not needlework. Well, man is a wonderful creature! And look, look, how charming he lies there on his silver couch, with just a soft down on his cheeks, that beloved Adonis—Adonis, whom one loves even though he is dead!
Another stranger. You wretched women, do stop your incessant chatter! Like turtles, you go on for ever.
Gorgo. Lord, where does the man come from? What is it to you if we are chatterboxes? Order about your own servants!
Praxinoë. Oh, honey-sweet Proserpine, let us have no more masters than the one we’ve got! We don’t the least care for you; pray don’t trouble yourself for nothing.
Gorgo. Be quiet, Praxinoë! That first-rate singer, the Argive woman’s daughter, is going to sing the Adonis hymn. She is the same who was chosen to sing the dirge last year. We are sure to have something first-rate from her. She is going through her airs and graces ready to begin.
Theocritus (Fifteenth Idyll).
This is Matthew Arnold’s translation of a poem by Theocritus, who lived in the Third Century B.C., 2,200 years ago, (see Arnold’s Essay on Pagan and Mediaeval Religious Sentiment). I have altered a few words and also omitted part because of its length.
Gorgo, a lady of Alexandria, calls on her friend Praxinoë, to take her to the Festival of Adonis. Greek ladies were allowed to go out on Festival days if veiled and attended, and, therefore, Gorgo and Praxinoë take with them their respective maids, Eutychis and Eunoë, who would no doubt be slave-girls.
Some curious facts may be noted. The wife is kept in seclusion and the husband does the marketing, buying among other things her rouge. Observe how perfunctory are the pretty lady’s ablutions (the soap, by the way, is in the form of paste). The little boy represents the ruling sex and will be removed at an early age from her control. She is disposed to rebel against her lord and master, but takes the utmost care of the important boy-child. While the ladies with their slaves make up their own dresses, the designs and the finest needlework are done by men. The Greek woman in Athens was practically uneducated and regarded as an inferior being; but these ladies were Dorian Greeks and would no doubt be better treated and have somewhat more freedom—especially in Alexandria, which was a colony and, therefore, probably less conservative. Although no doubt veiled, their eyes would be visible and, as seen in the East to-day, a pretty woman can always manage to show her beauty, if she chooses. It will be seen that one man is polite to the two young, pretty, richly-dressed ladies, and saves them from being crushed by the crowd, while another is a crusty, grumpy person, who treats them with some rudeness and, in the original, ridicules their Dorian pronunciation. Praxinoë is most grateful to the polite man for what would now be an ordinary act of courtesy.
As regards the conversation Andrew Lang says: “Nothing can be more gay and natural than the chatter of the women, which has changed no more in two thousand years than the song of birds.”
Marriage is a desperate thing; the Frogs in Aesop were extreme wise: they had a great mind to some Water, but they would not leap into the Well, because they could not get out again.
’Tis reason a Man that will have a Wife should be at the Charge of her Trinkets, and pay all the Scores she sets on him. He that will keep a Monkey, ’tis fit he should pay for the Glasses he breaks.
Selden (Table Talk).
When you’re a married man, Samivel, you’ll understand a good many things as you don’t understand now; but vether it’s worth while goin’ through so much to learn so little, as the charity-boy said wen he got to the end of the alphabet, is a matter o’ taste. I rayther think it isn’t.
Charles Dickens (Pickwick Papers).
Matrimony is the only game of chance the clergy favour.
Author not traced.
A man, who admires a fine woman, has yet no more reason to wish himself her husband, than one, who admired the Hesperian fruit, would have had to wish himself the dragon that kept it.
Alexander Pope.