The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1852-01-01
NO. 261.

ana beauty charm away the hours and Of
summer-day recrcations beneath the vino.
welded elms OF the Tber, or on the breezy
slopes of Soracte yet seldom read them with
out feeling Of sadness. low wall of inar-
peasable sorrow. an undertone of dirges, min.
giles with his gay melodies. His immediate
horizon is bright with sunshine but beyond is
land Of darkness the light whereofis darkness
IL is walled about by the everlasting Night
The skeleton sits at his table: shadow Of
the inevitable Terror rests upon all his pleasant
pictures. He was without God in the world
he had no clear abiding hope in life beyond
that which was Fastening to close Eat and
drink, he tells us, enjoy present health and
competence, alleviate present evils or forget
them, in social intercourse. in wine, music, and
sensual indulgence for tomorrow we must die
Death was in his view no mere change Of con-
dtion and relation, it was the black end Of all
Ii is evident that he placed no reliance on the
mythology of his time, and that he regarded
the fables of the Elysian Fields, and their dim
and wandering ghosts simply in the light of
convenient poetic fictions for illustration and
imagery. Nothing can, in my view, be sadder
than his attempts ut consolation for the loss OF
friends. Witness his Ode to Virgil, ON the
death Of Quintllius lie tells his illustrous
friend simply, that his calamity is without
hope irretrevable, and eternal that il is idle
to implore the gods TO restore the dead and
that although his Tyre may be more sweet than
that of Orpheus he cannot re-animate the
shadow of his friend, usr persuade the ghost
,s .., g. = 'r'..s ...o2 49, -. -"
ne urges Pauenc6' ~ rne soio resource he
~ ft--%Z-., 81 d. ,.,o.,, IL,
the same despAiring tone In the Ode to Tor
quatus-one of the most beautiful and touch
ing Of all hc has written-he sets before his
friend, in melancholy contrast the return Of
the seasons, and Of the moon renewed in bright
ness, with the end Of man. who sinks into the
endless dark. leaving nothing save ashes and
shadows. He then, in the true spirit of his
philosophy, urges Torquatus to give his present
hour and wealth to pleasures and delights as
he had no assurance of tomorrow"
In something of the same strain" said |,
"Maschus moralizes on the death of Bion:
Our trees and plants revive; tho rose
In annual youth Of beauty glows,
But when the pride of nature dos
Man, who alone is great and wise,
No more he rises into light
The wakeess sleeper of eternal night"
at reminds me, said Elder Staples, of the
sad burden of Ecclesiastes the mournfnllest
book of Scripture; because, while the preacher
dwels with oarnestness upon the vanity and
uncertainty of the things of time and sense, he
has no apparent hope of immortality to relieve
the dark picture. Like Horace, he sees moth
ing better than to eat his bread with ioy
and drink his wine with a merry heart II
seems TO me the wise man might have gone
farther in his enumeration of the folly and
emptiness of life, and pronounced his own pre-
| scrption for the evil, vanity also. What is il
| but plucking flowers on the banks of the
| stream which hnrries us over the cataract--or
feasting on the thin crust of a volcano. upon
delicate meats prepared over the fires which
are soon 20 engulf us Oh! what glor is
contrast to this is the Gospel of Him who
brought to light life and Immortality The
transition from the Koheleth to the Epistle Of
| Paul is like passing from Il cavern, where tho
artificial light falls indeed upon gems and
crystals but is everywhere circumscribva and
overshadowed by unknown and unexplored
darkness, into the warm light and free atmos-
phere of day"
yet | asked, ARE there not times when
we all wish for some clearer evidence of immor-
tai life than has been afforded us, when we
even turn away unsatisfed from the pages of
the Holy Book, with all the mysterious prob
lens of life pressing about us and camoring
for solution, till, perplexed and darkened, we
look up TO the still heavens, as if we sought
thence an answer visible or audible TO their
questionings! We want something beyond the
bare announcement of the momentous fact of n
future life; we long for miracle to confirm
lur weak faith and silence forever the doubts
which torment MS"
"And what would miracle avail us at such
times of darkness and strong temptation 90
'ad the Elder. Have We not been told that
hey whom Moses and the Prophets have failed
toconyince, would not believe, although one rose
rom the dead That God has revealed no
more to us is to my mind evidence that he has
revealed enough"
May it not be-" queried tho Doctor, "that
Infinite Wisdom sees that clearer and fuller
revelation Of the Future Life would render us
ess willing or able to perform our appropriate
iutics in the present condition! Enchanted by
clear view Of the Heavenly Hills, and of our
owed ones reckoning us from the pearl gates
If the City of God, could we patiently work
'ut our life-task here or make the necessary
'xertions to provide for the wants of these
bodies whose ,cncumbrance alone can prevent
Is from rising to higher place Of exstencel"
81 reckon" said the Skipper, who had been
IN attentive although at times evidently puz-
lied listener, "that it would be with us pretty
much as it was with a crew of French sailors
hat once shipped ut the Isle Of France, for the
port Of Marseilles. never had better hands
until we hove in sight of their native country,
which they hadn't seen for years The FIRST
ook Of the land set 'em all crazy they danced,
laughed, shouted, put on their best clothes and
had to get new hands to help me bring the
vessel to her moorings"
Your story is quite to the point skipper"
'ad the Doctor. :" If things had been ordered
differently we should all, ! fear, be disposed to
iuit work and fall into tantrums like your
French sailors, and 80 fail of bringing tho world
airly into port"
Goods WAYS are hest - amid tho Elder and