Year: 1868

LETTER Iv.-HAvB WE THE RIGHT TO


LIVE FOR NO END?


My Dear with your permission
will resume the subject of my last let
ter, and view it from the standpoint of
mans own constitution. As you have
already seen, nature in all her different
departments pronounces the ainaless life
a strange anomaly, a violation of the
grand law of order, jarring note in
the chorus of the universe.


But that is not all such a life finds
re6uke in the sOul itself. Man gives
judgment against himself, and hangs his
head in guilty shame before the accusing
whispers in which he chides his folly and
his crime. A voice within joins its
anathemas to those of a voice without.
God does not draw his testimony from
the silent heavens and earth alone; but
makes the soul bear faithful witness to
its own criminality, and by its restless
ness, uneasiness, and dissatisfaction, re-
echo the truth, that every rational and
moral being should live with some dis
tinct and well-de6ned end in view.


Your own life has been so steady in its
aim, and your general acquaintance with
the world so little, that you probably
have not followed, with much care at
least, the history Of those unfortunate
persons who have no fixed purpose, and
pursue no straightforward course; but
ike the thin vapors of the air, are the
sport of every tickle breeze. Mark them
we'll, however, and you will find them
strangers to real, substantial happiness.
They may have so much stohdity and
senselessness, as hardly to be susceptible
of misery, or by force of wicked will
may school themselves into an artificial
insensibility; but they know nothing of
that exuberant satisfaction which natu
rally flows from the active play of mans
faculties, when working smoothly and
vigorously in the pursuit of the object
for which they were given him.


Do not understand me as implying
that all activity which looks to definite
end, necessarily INVOLVES happiness as a
consequence. That is not true, and it
can be shown to be not true. The pirate
may sweep his glass with ever-watchful
eye around the wide horizon of the sea,
in the hope of deserving some argosy in
the distance; the brigand in his noun
tain fastness wait patiently from day to
day for the passing of some unprotected,
hckless traveller; or the genius of an
ambitious Napoleon bend every energy
to the acquisition of empire. But who,
that knows himself or humanity, will say
that piracy, free-bOOting, and ambition
gives solid and enduring peace? In the
excitement Of the hour, some principles
of mans nature may find a mOmentary
qualification, and for the while a faint
flush of satisfaction spread itself over
the soul. But it will not bear the test
of solitude or reflection.


And yet nothing is truer than this,
that the want of employment and the
absence of aim are the parents of mise
~. The mind cannot drivel, without
losing its peace. The incOrrigible lOafer,
if he thinks and feels, is meorrigibly
wretehed. Mature abhors vacuum, F"
the philosophers say; and none more
than the dreary vacuity of life which
is consciously without an object. She
asserts the right to be heard, and avenges
with speedy justice the contempt of her
wholesome laws. She holds a whip of
scorpions in her hand, and not only re-
fuses her favor to the despiser of her
authority, but lashes him numerically
with disquiet and uneasiness, often in
deed with positive and almost intolerable
wretchedness.


Man, therefore, is a witness against
himself, and at the same time warning
to himself. He can not only hear the
eloquence of the ocean and the poetry
of the skies, but the "still, small voice "
that rises within, and breathes so softly
as to reach no ear but his. And how
vivid and impressive are these lessons,
which sometimes steal in upon the soul at
night, after day that has been spent in
vain There is no teacher like expert