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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.
CIiap._:.'___.

Copyright

JVo

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

"

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS "

FROM

BULWER-LYTTON

4197G
jl_ibriiry

Congress

of

i"*\AL Copies Rce/eo

SEP

1900

Ctfvrtirht entry

SfrcNO COPY.
0-tvei<i to

OKOtK

DIVISION,

SEP

COPYRIGHT,

1900,

ISOO
BY

JAMES POTT & CO

74^41

PEEFACE.
Of

all

the great classical writers of

the century not one has given utter-

ance to so

many

lofty thoughts

ennobling ideas as the

ton, still so familiarly

his

family

name

of

first

and

Lord Lyt-

known

to us

by

Bulwer-Lytton.

Witty, epigrams, sententious sayings,

flashes

of

workings

keenest
of

the

insight

human

into the
heart,

are

found so abundantly in every work of

his that the difficulty has

been one of

selection rather than of search.

The message

of Bulwer-Lytton to his

age was a strong protest against

pessi-

mism, cynicism, cant and every form

PREFACE.

vi

of materialism, that true greatness in

life

could only come through nobility

of purpose
fied

even

and that great aims

little

digni-

The Ideal can

men.

never be reached in this Avorld, but

nevertheless

men and women

it.

The

true

trials,

all

may

the better for striving after

temptations of
life

is

life

are

a battlefield

its

are ever

Avliere

acquit themselves and where no death

is

ignoble save to him

back on the

conflict.

who

turns his

JANUARY.

Jcmuary

Though Hope

1st.

be a small

can carry a great anchor

child, she

Harold.

Jcmuary
If a

woman

^d.

has once really loved,

the beloved object makes an impenetrable barrier

men

between her and other

their advances terrify

and revolt

she would rather die than be unfaithful

even to a memory.

loves the sex,

woman

Though man
loves only the

individual.
Ernest Maltravera,

January 3d.
However august be the

object

we

propose to ourselves, every less worthy

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS
path

we

take to insure

it

distorts the

mental sight of our ambition

and the

means, by degrees, abase the end to

their

own

misfortune of a

age

that

This

standard.

the

man

is

the true

nobler than his

instruments

he must

use soil himself: half he reforms his

times; but half, too,

the times will

corrupt the reformer.

Bienzi.

January J^th.
Out, then, upon that vulgar craving
of those

who comprehend

vast truths of
ideal art,

life,

neither the

nor the grandeur of

and who ask from poet or

narrator the poor and petty morality

of " Poetical Justice "

a justice
a

ing not in our work -day world

tice existing

existjus-

not in the sombre page of

FE03I
history

BULWEB LYTTON.

justice existing not in the

men whose genius

loftier conceptions of

has grappled with the enigmas which

art

and poetry only can foreshadow and

unknown to us in the street

the market unknown to us on

divine

and

the scaffold of the patriot, or amidst

unknown to
us in the Lear and the Hamlet in the
the flames of the martyr

Agamemnon
Millions

and

upon

the

Prometheus.

millions, ages

upon ages,

are entered but as items in the vast

account in which the recording angel

sums up the unerring

justice of

God

to

man.
The Last of

Jamtary
But the
nate

man

the Barons.

6th.

final greatness of a fortuis

rarely

made by any

vio-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS
own.

lent effort of his

He

has sown

the seeds in the time foregone, and

the ripe time brings up the harvest.

His fate seems taken out of

his

own

control; greatness seems thrust upon

He

him.

ioa7it to

to

it

his

forth

made

himself, as

it

were,

the nation, a thing necessary

he has identified himself with

his age,

on

has

and

in the

wreath or the crown

brow the age

its

itself

seems to put

flower.
Harold.

January
And,

in truth,

to admire

it is

6th.

a divine pleasure

admiration seems in some

measure to appropriate to ourselves

the qualities

wed,

we

tures

we

it

honors in others.

"We

root ourselves to the naso

love

to

contemplate,

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

and

their

life

groAvs a part of our

own.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

January
There

is

7th.

a stronger

not, perhaps,

feeling in the world than pity,

when

united with admiration.

Eugene Aram.

Jamtary

8th.

In every emergency, in every temptation, there rose to his eyes the fate

of

him

so gifted, so noble in

formed for greatness

blasted

by one crime

self -denied;

in

much, so

all

things,

self-sought, but

a crime, the offspring of

bewildered reasonings

all

the while

speculating upon virtue.

Eugene Aram,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

January

"Know

thj^'self,"

"

losophy.

Improve

9th.

said

the old phi-

thyself," saith the

The great object of the Sojourner in Time is not to waste all his
new.

passions and gifts on the things external, that

he must leave behind

that which he cultivates within

is

all

that he can carry into the Eternal

Progress.
The Caxtons,

January
AYhen

10th.

in his fresh

youth and his

calm lofty manhood, Harold saw

tion,

how

ac-

adventurous soever, limited

to the barriers of noble duty

he lived but for

when

his country, all spread

clear before his vision in the sunlight

of

day

but as the barriers receded,

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

while the horizon extended, his eye

left

As

the Certain to rest on the Yague.

though

self,

still

half concealed

his conscience, gradually

assumed the

wide space love of country had

the maze of delusion

from

filled,

commenced

he

was to shape fate out of circumstance,

no longer defy fate through virtue.

Harold.

January
It is
ear,

11th.

an excellent thing to have an

and a

voice,

and a heart for music.

Eryiest Maltravera.

"Follies
others,

January 12th.
seem these thoughts

and to philosophy,

are so," said Rienzi

long,

to

in truth, they

" but all

my

life

omen and type and shadow have

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

10

linked themselves to action and event

and the atmosphere of other men hath

not been mine.

why

Future

word

Life itself a riddle,

should riddles amaze us

The

what

mystery in the very

Had we

lived all through the

Past, since

Time was, our prof oundest

experience of a thousand ages could

not give us a guess of the events that

wait the very

enter

moment we

Thus deserted by Keason, what

wonder that we recur

tion,

are about to

to the Imagina-

on which, by dream and symbol,

God sometimes
things to

come

paints the likeness of

"
Bienzi.

January

Who
all

13th.

can endure to leave the Future

unguessed, and

sit

tamely down to

FROM BULWEB LYTTON,

11

groan under the fardel of the Present ?

ITo,

no! that which the foolish- wise

call Fanaticism,

belongs to the same

Each but

part of us as Hope.

carries

us onward from a barren strand to a

glorious, if

unbounded

the yearning for the

Each

sea.

Great Beyond,
Each

which attests our immortality.

has
false,

its

visions

and chimeras some

but some true

who becomes

great

Yerily, a

is

Pythia which prophesies that he

shall be

one
this

man

made
own soul

often but

so by a kind of sorcery in his

is

great and

so renders the life

effort to fulfil the

folly?it were

so,

stopped at the grave!

warning!
if

all

Is

things

But perhaps

the very sharpening, and exercising,

and

elevating

the

faculties

here

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

12

though but for a bootless end on earth

may be designed to

fit

the soul, thus

quickened and ennobled, to some high

destiny heyond the earth
tell ?

not I

Who

Let us pray

can

Bienzi,

January

llfth.

As Providence bestows upon

the instrument of

fins,

fishes

whereby they

balance and direct their movements,

however rapid and

erratic,

the pathless deeps

so

blooded creatures of our

to

through
the cold-

own species

may be classed under

MONEY-MAKERS the samc

that

the genus
protective

power accords the fin-like properties

of prudence

your

true

and caution, wherewith

money-getter

buoys

and

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

guides

himself

13

through

majestically

the great seas of speculation.

The

Jamiary
Error

is

we

feel

15th.

sometimes sweet

no anguish

is

like

ashamed.

Caxtons.

but there

an error of which
I

cannot submit to

blush for myself.

Ernest Maltravers.

January 16 th.
Our nature is ever grander

in the

individual than the mass.

The Last of the Barons.

January

17th.

In resting so solely on man's perceptions of the right, he lost one attri-

bute of the true

not

mean

that

herofaith.

word

We

do

in the religious

sense alone, but in the

more compre-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

14

He

hensive.

Something pervading

lestial

ture,

did not rely on the Ce-

never seen, only

felt

stronger and

courted,

na-

all

when duly
than

lovelier

what eye could behold and mere

son could embrace.
true, in

God, he

simplicity of the child

tion,

his

To

large

is

to man's secret heart,

and which are woven

of the poet.

rea-

it

lost those fine links

God

that unite

Believing,

use a

alike

from the

and the wisdom

modern

mind was a

illustra'*

cupola

lighted from below."

Harold.

January
In

fact,

before

the world, w^e must,

severe novitiate

much

18th.

we can

by a long and

by the

thought, and

dispense with

probation of

much sorrow

by

FB03I

BULWEB LYTTON

15

deep and sad conviction of the vanity

of all that the world can give us,

raised ourselves

not

an

habitually

hour,

but

world; an abstraction

an

of the wisest can attain

above

the

idealism

how few even

which, in our wiser age,

are thus fortunate,

have

in the fervor of

Yet,

we know

till

we

not the

true divinity of contemplation, nor the

all-sufficing

nor can

we

mightiness of conscience
retreat with solemn foot-

steps into that

Holy

of Holies in our

own souls, wherein we know, and feel,

how much our nature is capable of the
self -existence of a God
!

Bienzi.

January
I tell thee, that

Christendom, and

19th.

if all

all

the priests in

the barons in

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

16

France, stood
bride, I

Foes

the midst.
let

them

between

me and my

my way
invade my

would hew

through
realm

princes conspire against

smile in scorn

this strong

subjects

the dangers which

men should
a man has

mutiny

hand can punish, or

large heart can forgive.

me
this

All these are

He who

governs

be prepared to meet

but

a right to His love, as the

stag to his hind.

Harold.

Jamiav]! Wth.

The husbandman
when, having sown
not

corn.

Thou

accuse not fate

if

accuses not fate,

thistles,

hast

he reaps

sown

crime,

thou reapest not the

harvest of virtue.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON,

January
Virtue

my

is

my

comfort,

17

^Ist.

my

lover,

pride,

my

life of life.

The Caxtons.

January ^2d.

The

objects of the great world are

to be pursued only
of the passions.

by the excitement

The

passions are at

once our masters and our deceivers

they urge us onward, yet present no

limit to our progress.

proceed, the

grows the

man who
the

life

farther

we

goal.

It is impossible for a

leads the life of the world,

of the passions, ever to expe-

rience content.

passions

The

more dim and shadowy

is

For the

life

of the

that of a perpetual desire

but a state of content

is

the absence of

all desire.

Eugene Aram.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

18

It is

January ^3d.
marvellous with what

liberality

Providence atones for the partial

pensations of Fortune.

Independence,

or the vigorous pursuit of

with
,

its

hopes and

dis-

its

it

affection,

rewards

life

only rendered by Art more susceptible

to Nature

in which

the physical en-

joyments are pure and healthful

which the moral

faculties

expand har-

moniously with the intellectual

the heart
is

this a

sire

and

reach

is

at peace with the

mean
is

it

lot for

in

and

mind

ambition to de-

so far out of

human

The

January

Caxtons.

24^th.

To a degenerate and embruted

ple, liberty

peo-

seems too plain a thing,

if

PROM BULWEB LYTTON.

19

unadorned by the pomp of the very

despotism they would dethrone.
their desire, rather

venge

is

lease

and the greater the

Ke-

than Ke-

new power

they create, the greater seems their

venge against the

re-

old.
Bietizi.

January

Now my

'25th.

mother, true

woman

as

womanly love of show

her own quiet way of making a

she was, had a

in

genteel figure" in the

neighborhood

''

eyes of

the

of seeing that sixpence

not only went as far as sixpence ought

to go, but that, in the going,

it

should

emit a mild but imposing splendor,

not, indeed, a

gaudy

flash

a startling

Borealian coruscation, which is scarcely

within the modest and placid idiosyn-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

20

sixpence

crasies of

but

a gleam of

gentle and benign light, just to

show

where a sixpence had been, and allow

you time

to say "

"The jaws

Behold " before

!

of darkness did devour

January

And when you

the

illimitable
I

of a spirit

am

all

not
space

the

on

all

will

For the home

wherever spreads the

is

what numerous
what

on

you

creation,

there

And

IJniversal Presence of God.

paths,

Caxtons.

26th,

look

heaven alone but in

know that

up."

it

The

stages of beings,

duties,

what

to

what

active

and

may we
know and

glorious tasks in other worlds

not be reserved
share

them

perhaps to

together,

and mount age

FI103I

BULWEB LYTTON.

21

after age higher in the scale of being.

For surely in heaven there is no pause

or torpor we do not lie down in
calm and unimprovable repose. Move-

ment and progress

will

remain the law

and condition of existence. And there

will be efforts and duties for us above
as there have been below.
Ernest ^laltravers.

January
Like most other
nation

is

capricious,

often at the

most need

we

its

^7th.

friends, the Imagi-

and forsakes us

moment in which we
As we grow older,
aid.

begin to learn that, of the two,

our more faithful and steadfast comforter

is

Custom.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

22

January

As you

see the

^8th.

wind only agitate

the green leaf upon the bough, while

the leaf which has lain withered and

the ground,

on

seared

trampled upon
gone,

here

is

till

bruised

the sap and

life

suddenly whirled aloft

now

there

without rest

without

and
are

now

stay and

so the love which visits

the happy and the hopeful hath but

freshness on

its

violence

its

from the green things of

fallen

that

wings

is

But the heart that hath

but sportive.

life,

without hope, that hath no

is

summer

in

its

fibres,

torn

is

and

whirled by the same wind that but

caresses

bough
path

its

brethren

to cling to
to

path

till

it is

the

it

hath

no

dashed from

winds

fall,

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

and

it

23

crushed into the mire for-

is

ever.

The Last Days

January

of Pompeii.

'29th.

there no nobler ambition than

Is

Is there

that of the vanity ?

bition of the heart?

an

no am-

ambition to

console, to cheer the griefs of those

who

love and trust us

an ambition

to build a happiness out of the reach

of fate ?

an

high

soul, in

world

to

ambition to soothe some

lull

strife

its

to

smile to serenity

sleep

its

with a mean
its

cares?

pain,

to

Oh, me-

thinks a

woman's true ambition would

the

bravest when, in the very

rise

sight of death itself, the voice of

in

whom

life

him

her glory had dwelt through

should say, " Thou fearest not to

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

24

walk to the grave and

my side

to

heaven by

The Last Days of Pompeii.

tlanuary 30th.
Love, what earthly love should be,

thing pure as light, and peaceful

as

immortality, watching

stormy world, that

it

over

shall

the

survive,

and high above the clouds and vapors

that roll below.

Let

little

minds

in-

troduce into the holiest of affections

all

the bitterness and tumult of com-

mon

life

will

one day be inhabitants of the

Let us love as beings

who

stars
Ernest Maltravers,

In

January 31st.
and in a highly

politics,

cial state,

what doubts

beset us

artifi!

what

FEOM BULWEE LYTTON.

25

we connive at
own reason
abuses, we juggle with our
how
and integrity if we attack them,
derange
much, how fatally we may
order
that solemn and conventional

darkness surrounds

If

the mainspring of the vast

one
machine! How little, too, can
in
man, whose talents may not be

which

is

that coarse

road in

that mephitic at-

mosphere, be enabled to

effect

Ernest Maltravers.

FEBRUARY.

February

Peide had served

1st.

to console

sorrow, and, therefore,

it

him

in

was a friend

had supported him when disgusted

it

with fraud, or in resistance to

lence

and, therefore,

pion and a fortress.

a peculiar sort

was a cham-

it

It

was a pride

attached

it

one point in especial

knowledge, mental

vio-

not

gifts

itself to

of

no

to talent,

still less

to

the vulgar commonplaces of birth and

fortune;

rather

it

resulted

from a

supreme and wholesale contempt of

all

other men, and

of

ambition

business of

was

of

life.

fortitude

it

their objects

all

of

glory

the hard

His favorite virtue

was on

this that

he

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

30

now mainly
proud of
prouder

valued himself.

He was

his struggles against others

still

passions.

of conquests over his

He

own

looked upon fate as the

arch-enemy against whose attacks

should ever prepare.

He

we

fancied that

against fate he had thoroughly schooled

In the arrogance of his heart,

himself.

he said, " I can defy the future."

He

believed in the boast of the vain old

sage

"

am

a world to myself

Alice,

We

all

February ^d.
form to ourselves some heau

ideal of the " fair spirit "

we

desire as

our earthly " minister," and somewhat

capriciously gauge

and proportion our

admiration of living shapes according

as the lean ideal

is

more or

less

em-

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

Beauty, of a

bodied or approached.

stamp

that

dreams of
cold

not

is

31

familiar

to

the

our fancy, may win the

homage

of our judgment, while a

look, a feature, a something that realizes

and

calls

up a boyish

vision,

and

assimilates even distinctly to the pic-

ture

we wear

within

us,

has a

ness peculiar to our eyes,

loveli-

and kindles

an emotion that almost seems to

be-

long to memory.
Ernest Maltravers.

February 3d.
She endured the bitterest curse of
noble natures

hiimiliation !
The Last Days of Pompeii.

February

What

J^th.

a noble heart dares least

belie the plighted word,

is

to

and what the

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

32

kind heart shuns most

is

to

wrong the

confiding friend.
The Last of

FebruaTy

the Barons.

5th.

men may always make

own future, and seize their own

fates.

Prudence, patience, labor, valor

these

"Wise

their

are the stars that rule the career of

mortals.
Harold.

February
" Fate

fate

6th.

" cried Eienzi

" there

is

no

Between the thought and the

God is the only agent; and

success,

(he added with a voice of deep solem-

Yisions

nity) I shall not be deserted.

by

night, even while thine

around

me omens and
:

ring and divine,

arms are

impulses,

by day, even

stir-

in the

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

midst of the living crowd

my

path,

my

and point

33

encourage

goal.

Now,

even now, a voice seems to whisper

Pause not tremble not

waver not for the eye of the All-See-

in

my

ear

ing

is

upon

thee,

and the hand of the

All-Powerful shall protect

'

Bienzi.

February
Neither

is it

just to

7th.

man, nor wisely

submissive to the Disposer of

to suppose that

war

tonly produced by
follies

that

it

is

human

work

crimes and

conduces only to

and does not as often

necessities

all events,

wholly and wan-

arise

ill,

from the

interwoven in the frame-

of society,

ends of the

and speed the great

human

race,

conformably

with the designs of the Omniscient.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

34

JSTot

one great war has ever desolated

the earth, but has left behind

it

seeds

that have ripened into blessings incalculable

The Caxtons.

February 8th.
wars yet perplex us as to

If later

the good that the All-wise

from

their

evils,

One draws

may
we now

our posterity

read their uses as clearly as

read the finger of Providence resting

on the barrows of Marathon, or guiding Peter the Hermit to the battleof

fields

admit the
tion,

Palestine.

we deny
that make

can

virtues

JSTor,

while

we

evil to the passing genera-

vitality of peace

that

many

of the

the ornament and

sprung up

first in

the

convulsion of war
The Caxtons.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

35

February 9th.
"Pauperism, in contradistinction to
poverty," he was

wont

to say, "

is

the

dependence upon other people for ex-

on our own exertions;

istence,

not

there

a moral pauperism in the

who

is

is

dependent on

man

others for that

support of moral life self-respect."

Ernest Maltravers.

February 10th.
Can
Belief cometh as the wind.
the tree say to the wind, "Kest thou

boughs"? or Man to
" Fold thy wings on my heart

on

my

Belief,

Harold.

Isis is

which

Fehruo/ry 11th.
a fable start not !that for

Isis is

a type

mortal being;

is

Isis is

a reality, an im-

nothing.

Nature,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

36

which she represents,

all

things

dark,

the mother of

is

ancient, inscrutable,

None among

"

save to the gifted few.

my

mortals hath ever lifted up

so saith the Isis that

veil,"

you adore; but

to the wise that veil hath been re-

moved, and we have stood face to

face with

the

solemn loveliness of

Nature.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

February

Few men
servants

to

12th.

throughout

one

life

desire.

are the

When we

gain the middle of the bridge of our

mortality, different objects from those

which attracted us upward almost

invariably lure

us

to

the

Happy they who exhaust

descent.

in the for-

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

mer

37

part of the journey all the foibles

of existence
Eugene Aram.

February

13th.

"That serene heaven, those lovely

stars," said Maltravers at last, "do
they not preach to us the Philosophy

Peace?

of

much calm

Do

they not

tell

us

how

belongs to the dignity of

man, and the sublime essence of the

Petty

soul?

distractions

and

self-

wrought cares are not congenial to

our real nature

ance

is

their very disturb-

a proof that they are at war

with our natures."

Ernest Maltravers.

February Hth.

St.

Valentine's

Day.

Miserable animals are bachelors in

all

countries

but most miserable in

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

38

A man

Bushland.

what a helpmate
in the

know

of the soft sex

is

Old World, where women seem

But

a matter of course.

a wife

not

does

is literally

flesh of

your

in the

Bush

bone of your bone,

flesh

your

better half,

your ministering angel, your Eve of

the

Eden

in

short,

that poets

all

have sung, or young orators say at

public dinners,

when

give the toast of "

The

upon to

called

Ladies."
The Caxtons.

There
because
is

is
it is

February 15th.
an eloquence in Memory,
the nurse of Hope.

There

a sanctity in the Past, but only be-

cause of the chronicles

it

retains,

chronicles of the progress of mankind,

stepping-stones in

civilization, in lib-

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

39

Our

fathers

and

erty,

in knowledge.

forbid us to recede,

what

is

they

our rightful heritage, they bid

us reclaim, they bid us

heritage,

preserve

avoid their errors.

uses of the Past.

which we

in

fice

teach us

upon which

augment that
and

their virtues,

These are the true

Like the sacred
are,

it

is

edi-

a tomb

to rear a temple.
Eienzi.

It

is

February 16th.
deadening
thought to mental
a

ambition, that the circle of happiness

we can

create

is

formed more by our

moral than our mental

warm

heart,

qualities.

though accompanied but

by a mediocre understanding,
more

likely to

is

even

promote the happiness

of those around, than are the absorbed

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

40

and

abstract,

though kindly, powers of

a more elevated genius.

Eugene Aram,

February

17th.

"There," said Adam, quietly, and

pointing to the feudal roofs, "there

seems

to

power

rise

and

yonder

(glancing to the river), yonder seems

to

flow Genius

century

or so

hence, the walls shall vanish, but the

river shall roll on.
castle,

Man makes
the power

and founds

the

God

forms the river and creates the Genius."

The Last of

February
There

is

the Barons.

18th.

a beautiful and singular pas-

sage in Dante (which has not perhaps

attracted

the attention

it

deserves),

wherein the stern Florentine defends

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

41

Fortune from the popular accusations

According to him, she

against her.

is

an angelic power appointed by the

Supreme Being to
course of

human

God; she

the will of

hearing not those

calm and

aloft

powers,

gelic

course,

and

direct

and order the

splendors
is

she obeys

blessed, and,

who blaspheme

her,

amongst the other anrevolves

her

spheral

rejoices in her beatitude.

The Caxtons.

FebTuary

19th.

"Christian, believest

thou,

among

the doctrines of thy creed, that the

dead

live again

that

they

who have

loved here are united hereafter

that

beyond the grave our good name shines

pure from the mortal mists that unjustly

dim

it

in the gross-eyed

world

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

42

and that the streams which are divided

by the

desert

and the rock meet

in the

solemn Hades, and flow once more into

one

"

" Believe I that,

I

do not believe

Athenian

I hiow

No,

"

The Last Days of Pompeiu

February Wth.
Up, Truth, whose
purity,

whose image

is

strength

is

in

woman, and aid

the soul of the brave

Harold.

February ^Ist
I think

we have tampered Love

to

too great a preponderance over the

As children,

other excitements of life.

we

are taught to

dream of

it

in youth,

our books, our conversation, our plays,

are filled with

it.

We

are trained to

FROM BULWER LYTTON,

consider

it

43

the essential of life; and

moment we come to actual

experience, the moment we indulge

yet, the

and stimulated craving,

this inculcated

nine times out of ten

we

Ah, believe

and undone.

wretched

me, Mr. Maltravers, this

in

find ourselves

is

which we should preach

not a world
up, too far,

the philosophy of Love

Ernest Maltravers,

February

'22 d.

Washington''

Birth-

day.

Pluck the

scales

from the hand of

the sword from the hand of

Violence the balance and the sword
Fraud

are the ancient attributes of Justice

restore

them

your high

to her again

task,

these

This be

be your great

BEAUTIFUL TITOUOnTS

44

ends!
thorn

11

Doom any man who

opposes

traitor to his country.

Gain a

victory greater than those of the Ciosars

a victory over yourselves

Kicnzi.

Oh, mother niinol that the boy had

stood by thy Unoo, and heard from thy
li[)s

why

shall

lii'e

was ^iven

us, in

what

end, and how heaven stands

to us night

and day

life

o})on

Oh, falhor mine

that thou luidst been his preceptor, not

in

book learning, but the heart's sim])lo

wisdom

()h, tiiat

ho had learned from

thee, in parables closed

the

ha[>pinoss

how "good

of

with practice,

self-sacrifice,

and

deeds sliould repair the

bad!"
The Caxtom.

FRODI lillLUim LYTTON.

Awful

February 'JJ,th.
lJi(i (liK^I botwoon man and

is

TiiK A(iK

wliich Im livosl

in

The Lant of

February

the Jiarotm.

'J.^/jtL

TIio l(3SSons of julvorsity aro not al-

ways

soniotiuios tlicy soltou

salutary

and amend, but as often they

and

pervert.

more

liarshly

those around

edge
the

trciJitiHl

us,

by

I'ate

tluui

and do not acknowl-

own deeds the justice

severity, we become too a])t

(hnim

in

our

1\h)

world

ourselves in

our

indur-ate

vv(^ (M)!isi(l(ir oursiilviis

11"

softer

our (^ruMny

(U^lia.nco, to
t<elf,

and

darker passions which

The

to

(5a,se

wrestle against
to

a,i'e

mented by the sense of

to

oT

indiij^ci

tlie

so (easily fer-

injustice.

IaihI Ddi/H

of rompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

46

February

26th.

As Napoleon wept over one wounded

soldier in the field of battle, yet or-

dered without emotion thousands to a

certain death; so

Aram would

sacrificed himself for

would not have

have

an individual, but

sacrificed a

momentary

gratification for his race.

Eugenie

February

Aram.

27th.

" Man renews the fibre and material

of his

body every seven

my father

years," said

" in three times seven years

he has time to renew the inner man.

Can two passengers in yonder street

be more unlike each other than the soul
is

to the soul after

years

an interval of twenty

Brother, the plough does not

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

47

pass over the soul in vain, nor care

over the

human

heart.

ISTew

change the character of the land

crops
;

and

the plough must go deep indeed before

it stirs

up the mother stone."

The Caxtom,

February

You may

think

it

^8th.

strange that I

plain, steadfast, trading,

ful

,man

should

have

ings; but I will tell

working, careall

these feel-

you wherefore

such as I sometimes have them, nurse

them, brood on them, more than you

lords

and gentlemen, with

graceful arts in pleasing.

light loves

all

your

We know no

no brief distractions to the

one arch passion

"We sober sons of

the stall and the ware are no general

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

48

gallants

once,

we

love plainly,

and we love

we

love but

heartily.
The Last of the Barons.

February 29th,
There are sometimes event and
son in the

most

of

life

rational,

man

sea-

the hardest and

when he

is

driven per-

force to faith the most implicit

and

submissive; as the storm drives the

wings of the petrel over a measureless

sea, till it falls

refuge,

on the

Seasons

when

tame, and rejoicing at

sails of

some lonely

difficulties,

ship.

against which

reason seems stricken into palsy, leave

him bewildered in dismay

ness,

when dark-

which experience cannot

pierce,

wraps the conscience, as sudden night

wraps the traveller in the desert

when

error entangles his feet in

its in-

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

extricable

web

when,

still

desirous of

him but a
and the Angel of the

the right, he sees before

choice of evil

Past, with a flaming sword, closes

him the

on

Then,

gates of the Future.

Faith flashes on him, with a light from

the cloud.

Then, he clings to Prayer

drowning wretch to the plank.

Then, that solemn authority which

as a

clothes the Priest, as the interpreter

between the soul and the Divinity,

seizes

on the heart that trembles with

terror

and joy

then, that mysterious

recognition of Atonement, of sacrifice

of purifying lustration (mystery
lies

hid in the core of

which

all religions),

smooths the frown on the Past, removes

the flaming sword from the Future.
Harold.

MARCH.

March
And,

1st.

the beauty of that face were

if

not of the loftiest or the most dazzling

order,

if its

soft

and quiet character

might be outshone by many, of

loveli-

ness less really perfect, yet never

there
eyes,
ing,

countenance that, to

was

some

would have seemed more charm-

and never one

in

which more

quently was wrought

elo-

that ineffable

and virgin expression which Italian

art seeks for in its models

modesty

is

in which

the outward, and tenderness

the latent, expression; the bloom of

youth, both of form and heart, ere the
first

frail

and

delicate

freshness of

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

54

either

is

even love

brushed away
itself,

itant that should be

age,

is

and when

the only unquiet

known

vis-

at such

an

but a sentiment, and not a

passion
Bienzi,

March
I agree with

'2d.

Helvetius, the child

should be educated from

how

there

is

school forthwith
school

the rub
!

birth

its
:

Certainly, he

already with the two

teachers, IN'ature

but

send him to

and Love.

at

is

great

Observe,

that childhood and genius have the

same master-organ

in

common in-

quisitiveness.

Let childhood have

way, and as

began where genius be-

gins, it

may

it

find

what genius

its

finds.

The Caxtona.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

March

55

3d.

Charity and compassion are virtues

taught

men

with

to

difficulty

ordinary

to true Genius they are but the

instincts

which

born to

direct

to the Destiny

it

viz,

the discovery

and redemption of new

tracts in our

it

is

common

fulfil

Genius

nature.

Missionary

the Sublime

goes forth from the serene

Intellect of the

Author

to live in the

wants, the griefs, the infirmities of

others, in order that

language; and as

ment

is

requisite

Pathos, so
is

may

it

its

learn their

highest achieve-

its

most absolute

Pity
Ernest Maltravers.

March
There

lith.

is

Inauguration Day.

more glory

in laying these

rough foundations of a mighty

state,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

56

though

no trumpets resound

your victory

with

though no laurels shall

than in forcing

shadow your tomb

the

onward progress

burning

cities

of your race over

and hecatombs of men

The Caxtons,

March
So wonderful

and

all

life

are these

5tli.

in equalizing all states

times in the varying tide of

of mankind,

two rulers yet levellers

Hope and Custom, that

the very idea of an eternal punishment

includes that of an utter alteration of

the whole mechanism of the soul in

human

state,

and no

agination, assisted

effort of

its

an im-

by past experience,

can conceive a state of torture which

Custom can never

blunt,

and from

which the chainless and immaterial

FE03I
spirit

BULWEB LYTTON.

57

can never be beguiled into even

a momentary escape.
Eugene Aram.

March
IN",

whatever the

6th.

sin of

my

oath,

never will I believe that heaven can

punish millions for the error of one
Let the bones of the dead war

man.

against us
ourselves,

in

life,

and no

they were

so holy as the freemen

their hearths

and

men

like

saints in the calendar

who

fight for

their altars.
Harold.

March
That

trust in

an

7th.

all-directing Provi-

dence, to which he had schooled himself,

had

(if

we may

so say with rever-

ence) driven his beautiful soul into the

opposite error, so fatal to the affairs of

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

58

life

the error that deadens and be-

numbs the energy

of free will

and the

noble alertness of active duty.

strain

and

world

best.

Why

strive for the things of this

God would order all for the

Alas
God hath placed us in
!

this world, each,

from king to peasant,

with nerves, and hearts, and blood,

and
kind

struggle

passions, to
;

and, no matter

with our

how heavenly

the goal, to labor with the million in

the race
Tlie

March
There

are times

quivers within us

hart,
is

we

8th.

when

in

seems too confined.

Last of the Barons.

the arrow

which

all

space

Like the wounded

could fly on forever; there

a vague desire of escape

a yearn-

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

ing,

59

almost insane, to get out from our

own

selves

the soul struggles to flee

away, and take the wings of the morning.

Ernest Maltravers.

March
One
eyes

last, last

of

Fanny,

rushed upon

in

it

a ghost

Solitude

as something

overpowering.

the glare of

heard

filled

and then

me rushed,

visible, palpable,
it

9th.

glance from the soft

the

I felt

sunbeam

in the breath of the air

it

rose there

where

she

like

had

the space with her presence but a

moment

before.

gone from

the

A something seemed
universe forever;

change

like

that

through

my

being

to feel that

my

of
;

death

and when

passed
I

woke

being lived again, I

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

60

knew

that

it

was

my

youth and

its

poet-land that were no more, and that

I

had passed, with an unconscious

which never could retrace

its

the hard world of laborious

step,

way, into

man
The Caxtons.

March
I

am

that

seek

work never
it

10th.

hard-hearted enough to believe

in

good

fails

to those

earnest.

some man, famous

It

for

was

who

said of

keeping his

word, that, "if he had promised you

an acorn, and

all

the oaks in England

failed to produce one,

sent to

Norway

for

he would have

an acorn."

If I

wanted work, and there was none

to

be had in the Old World, I would find

my way

to the

New.
The Caxtons.

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

March
Though a
is

scholar

61

11th.
is

often a fool, he

never a fool so supreme, so superla-

when he

tive, as

is

unsullied page of the

entering into
his

own

it

me is

one

most

unfit to teach

mother

sir

is

human history, by

A scholar,

least

mother,

first

the commonplaces of

pedantry.
like

defacing the

sir

at

of all persons the

young

children.

simple, natural, loving

the infant's true guide to

knowledge.
The Caxtons,

March IMh.

Men

dupe,

deceive

for selfish purposes

even

and

our sex

they are pardoned

Did

ceive

by their
you with a

what

my object ?what my excuse ?

victims.
false

hope ?

I de-

Well

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

62

my

husband's liberty

vation

Woman,

my

land's sal-

my Lord,

your

alas,

SOX too rarely understand her weak-

her

ness or

human

greatness

as she

Erring

to others

is

all

God gifts

her with a thousand virtues to the one

she loves

from that love that

It is

she alone drinks her nobler nature.

For the hero of her worship she has

the meekness of the dove
tion of the saint

the

devo-

for his safety in

rescue in misfortune, her

peril, for his

vain sense imbibes the sagacity of the

serpent

her

weak

heart, the courage

of the lioness
Eienzi.

March
Think you

it is

13th,

the man, the emperor,

that thus sways ?

no,

it is

the pomp,

FROM BVLWEB LYTTON.

63

the awe, the majesty that surround

him

these are his impostures, his de-

lusions our oracles

;

our

rites

and our divinations,

and our ceremonies, are the

means of our sovereignty and the

They are the

engines of our power.

same means
fare

to the

same end, the

wel-

and harmony of mankind.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

March nth.
Life

that
tle it

is

so uncertain

we cannot

and so

short,

too soon bring the

lit-

can yield into the great common-

wealth of the Beautiful or the Honest

and both belong

to

and make up the

Useftd.
Ernest Maltravers.

March

15th.

" But," answered the Nazarene, " ask

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

64

thy reason, can that religion be sound

which outrages

all

morality

your gods.

told to worship

You are
What are

those gods, even according to yourselves ?

What their actions, what their

attributes?

Are they not

all

repre-

sented to you as the blackest of criminals ? yet

you are asked

as the holiest of

himself

What

is

to serve

divinities.

them

Jupiter

a parricide and an adulterer.

are the meaner deities but imi-

tators of his vices ?

are told not

you worship murderers

to murder, but

you are

You

told not to

commit adultery,

and you make your prayers to an

adulterer.

Oh

mockery of the
nature, which

is

what

is

this

but a

holiest part of man's

"
faith ?
The Last Days of Pompeii.

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

March

66

16th.

Genius, in an age where

it is

not ap-

the greatest curse the iron

preciated,

is

Fates can

inflict

on man.
The Last of the Barona.

March
The

17th.

philosophy limited to the reason

puts into motion the automata of the

closet but

to

who have the

and who find their

those

world for a stage,

hearts are the great actors, experience

and wisdom must be wrought from the

Philosophy of the Passion.
Ernest Maltra/vera.

March
Ought we not

to

18th.

make something

great out of a youth under twenty,

who

has, in the highest degree, quick-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS
ness to conceive and courage to exe-

cute

On

that can

the other hand,

make

can

that

all faculties

greatness, contain those

attain

goodness.

In

the

savage Scandinavian, or the ruthless

Frank, lay the germs of a Sydney or a

What would

Bayard.
be, if

the best of us

he were suddenly placed at war

with the whole world

The Caxtons,

March

My

Lord

my

19th.

Lord

there

is

but

one way to restore the greatness of a

people

it

themselves.

is

an appeal to the people

It

is

not in the power of

princes and barons

to

make a

permanently glorious they

;

selves,

raise

state

them-

but they raise not the people

with them.

All great regenerations

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

movement

the universal

are

67

of

the

mass.
Bienzi.

March Wth.
outskirt of the
on
the
Yet,

forest,

dusk and shapeless, that witch without

a name stood in the shadow, pointing

toward them, with outstretched arm,

in

vague and denouncing menace;

as

if,

come what may,

change of

all

be the faith ever so simple, the

truth ever so bright and clear, there
creed,

is

SUPERSTITION

native

to

that

Border-land between the Visible and

the Unseen, which will find

and
ing

its votaries, till

splendor of

its priest

the full and crown-

Heaven

shall

melt

every shadow from the world

Harold.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

68

March '21st.
Happy the man who hath never
known what it is to taste of Fame
to have

it is

a purgatory, to want

it is

a hell!
The Last of the Barons.

March

22d.

Great was the folly and great the

error

of

had no

indulging imagination that

basis

of linking the whole use-

my

the will of a

fulness

of

human

creature like myself.

life

to

Heaven

did not design the passion of love to

be this tyrant, nor

is

it

so with the

mass and multitude of human

We

life.

dreamers, solitary students like

me, or half poets like poor Koland,

make our own

disease.
The

Caxtwiis,

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

March

A man

69

23d.

ought not to attempt any of

the highest walks of

Mind and

Art, as

the mere provision of daily bread

not

literature alone, but everything else of

He

the same degree.

ought not to be

a statesman, or an orator, or a philosopher, as a thing of pence and

ings

and usually

all

shill-

men, save the

poor poet, feel this truth insensibly.

Ernest Maltravers.

March 2Ji.th.
The hero weeps less at the reverses
of his enemy than at the fortitude
with which he bears them.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

March

And
the

he, indeed,

bondsman the

25th.

who

first

arouses in

sense and soul of

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

70

freedom, comes as near as

to

is

permitted

man, nearer than the philosopher,

nearer even than the poet, to the great

creative attribute of

God

breast be uneducated,
curse the giver

But,

the gift

if

the

may

and he who passes

at

once from the slave to the freeman

nuiy pass as rapidly from the freeman
to the rullian.
Rienzi.

Mivrh
But
from

capital,

^26th.

where was that to come

Nature gives us

all

except the

means

to turn her into

count.

As old Plautus saith so wittily,

night, water, sun and moon are

" l^ay,
to be

had

gratis

marketable

ac-

for everything else

"

down with your dust

The Caxtons.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

March
There
that

is

we

to see

71

^7th.

one very peculiar pleasure

feel as

embodied

we grow

older,

it is

and a more

in another

lovely shape the thoughts and senti-

ments we once nursed ourselves

it is

we viewed before us the incarnation of our own youth; and it is no

wonder that we are warmed toward

as

if

the object that thus seems the living

apparition of all that was brightest in
ourselves
Eugene Aram.

March
It

is

in our

within us
not, or

is

power

all soul

felt

^8th.

to

make

the

life

so that the heart

is

not; so that grief and

joy have no power over us

so that

we

look tranquil on the stormy earth.

Harold,

BEAUTIFUL THOUQHTS

72

March

mo

Tell

^9th.

there over, even in the

if

ages most favorable to glory, could be

a triumph more exalted and elating

than the conquest of one noble

heai-t ?

The Last Days of rom^ycii,

March

oOth.

Strange that people should weary

so

much

of themselves that the}^ can-

not brave the prospect of a few minutes passed in reflection

and the resources

that a shower

of their

are evils so galling

own thoughts

very

strange

in-

deed.
Ernest Malt ravers.

March
Mind,

SJst.

understanding,

things

man,

you must

But,

to

genius

fine

educate the whole

educate

something

FliOnr

luoro

llia-M

mind,

BULWKR LYTTON.

tlio,S(i.

Not

understanding,

Borgias and

Ncros

for

want of

gonius,

loft

73

liavo

Uioir ii;un(\s

as nionunients of horror to mankind.

Whoro,

in

iosson to

the soul

all

this toaching,

warm

was ono

the heart, and guide

The (hxtona.

APRIL.

April

One

1st.

" April FooVs

Day.''^

does not have gumption

one has been properly cheated

must be made a

till

one

fool very often in

order not to be fooled at last

Eugene Aram.

April 2d.
All the kings since Saul,
are not worth one scholar's

it

may

be,

life

The Last of the Barons.

April 3d.
In the battle of life the arrows

we

neglect to pick up, Fate, our foe, will

store in her quiver.
Harold.

If there

April Jfth.
be a vile thing in the world.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

78

it is

a plebeian, advanced by patricians,

own

not for the purpose of righting his

order, but for pkiying the pander to

He who

the worst interests of theirs.

is

of the people but

traitor to his birth,

if

makes himself a
he furnishes the

excuse for these tyrant hypocrites to

lift

up

what
the

their

hands and cry

liberty exists in
patricians,

beian "
!

plebeian

beians?
lifted

Did
if

thus

they

" See

Eome, when
elevate

ever

elevate

he sympathized with

No, brother; should

above our condition,

we,
ple-

ple-

be

I will

be

by the arms of my countrymen,

and not upon their necks."

raised

Rienzi.

April
"

The

5th.

desire of distinction," said he,

FR03I lilJLWKR LYTTON.

a pause, " grows upon us

after

becomes

excitement
child

79

who

The

disease.

born with

is

laughs with

instinct

till

mariner's

tlie

when

glee

his

paper bark skims the wave of a pool.

By and

by, nothing will content

but the ship and the ocean.

child

is

Like the

the author."
ErnvM

April

Wonder

not that

bookman

myself,

MaltravcvH.

Gill.
I,

a bookman's son,

and, at certain ])eriods of

grade

him

my

though

in that venerable class

not that

sition stage

of

life,

k)vvly

wonder

shouhl thus, in that tran-

between youtii and man-

hood, have turned impatiently from

books.

Most

students, at one time or

other in their existence, have

felt

the

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

80

demand

imperious
principle) in

that

of

restless

man's nature, which

upon each son of

Adam

calls

to contribute

his share to the vast treasury of

human

deeds.
jfTie

April

Gold

it

is

7th.

the great magician of earth

realizes

our dreams

the power of a god

eur,

Caxtons,

a sublimity, in

it

there

its

gives
is

them

a grand-

possession

it is

the mightiest, yet the most obedient of

our slaves.
'Tlie

April

Last Days of Fompeii.

Sth.

We do indeed cleave the vast heaven

of Truth with a

wing: and often

weak and crippled

we are appalled in

our Avay by a dread sense of the im-

Fli03I

BULWEB LYTTON.
and of the

mensity around

us,

adequacy of our

own

there

difficult air,

and

in the prog-

by which we compass

while

in-

But

strength.

a rapture in the breath of the

is

pure and
ress

81

we draw

earth, the

nearer to the stars,

that again exalts us beyond ourselves,

and reconciles the true student unto

all

even to the
the conviction

hardest of

things,

them

all,

how

feebly

our performance can ever imitate the

grandeur of our ambition

Eugene Aram.

April
If it

be a

sin, as

9th.

the priests say, to

pierce the dark walls

us here,

and read the future

world beyond,

Heaven,

which surround

the

why
reason,

in the

dim

gavest thou,

never

resting.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

82

when

save

Why

explores?

it

hast

Law

thou set in the heart the mystic

of Desire, ever toiling to the High,

ever grasping at the

L\ir ?
Harold.

April 10th.
Nothing kindles the fire of love
a sprinkling of the anxieties of

ousy

it

resistless
it

takes then a wilder, a

liame

it

forgets

ceases to be tender

thing of the intensity

it

its

like
jeal-

more

softness

assumes some-

of the ferocity

of hate.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

April nth.
It is not vanity alone that

man

of the Tnode invent a

give his
riage

name

it is

to a

makes a

new

new kind

bit,

or

of car-

the influence of that mystic

FROM BULWEB LYTTON,

yearning after

utility,

which

83

is

one of

the master-ties between the individual

and the

species.
Ernest Maltravers.

April

God
know;

is

mh.

kinder to us

for

man

than

all

man can

only to the

looks

sorrow on the surface, and sees not the

consolation in the deeps of the unwit-

nessed soul.
The Last of the Barons.

April

"So say

all

13th.

tyrants," rejoined the

smith hardily, as he leaned his

against a fragment of stone

nant of ancient

some rem-

Eome " they

fight against each other but

our good.

hammer

One Colonna

throat of Orsini's baker

it is

for

me

the

cuts

never

it is

for our

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

84

good

another Colonna seizes on the

daughter of Orsini's tailor

our good

our good

of the people

and

tailors,

it

is

for

yes, for the good

the good of the bakers

eh ? "
Bienzi.

Ajpril

When

land and day,

crepit

by

IJfth.

compare the Saxon of our

all

enervated and de-

priestly superstition, with his

forefathers in the first Christian era,

yielding to the religion they adopted

in its simple truths, but not to that rot

of social happiness

and free manhood

which

lifeless

this cold

and

monachism

making virtue the absence of human

spreads aroundwhich the great
ties

Bede, though himself a monk, vainly

but bitterly denounced; yea, verily,

BULWEB LYTTON.

FE03I

85

when I see the Saxon already the theowe of the priest, I shudder to ask
how long he will be folk-free of the
tyrant.
Harold.

April

15th.

Like the rainbow, Peace rests upon

the

earth,

heaven.
light

it

but

its

arch

Heaven bathes

it

is

lost

in

in hues of

springs up amidst tears and

clouds,it

is

a reflection of the Eternal

an assurance of calm it is
the sign of a great covenant between
Man and God. Such peace, O young
Sun,

man!

it is

is

the smile of the soul;

it

is

an emanation from the distant orb

of immortal light.

Peace

be with

you!
The Last Days of Pompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

86

Ajyril 16th.

Long

is

tlio

that leads

vvjiy

luptuary to the severities of

it is

vo-

tlio

life

but

only one step from pleasant sin to

sheltering liypocrisy.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

April

As we grow

17th.

older,

and sometimes a

hope, sometimes a friend,

is

shivered

from our path, the thought of an immortality

upon

us

little,

as

loill

press

and

there,

the

ant

itself

by

piles

foi'cibly

little

and

grain after

grain, the garners of a future suste-

nance,

we

learn to carry our hopes,

and harvest, as

it

were, our wishes.

Eugene Aram.

April
Tt is sti'ango to

18th.

imagine that war,

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

which of

87

things appears the most

all

savage, should be the passion of the

most heroic

spirits.

But

drawn
is

'tis

most

is

war

closest

war that mutual succor

in

given

and common

mutual

danger run,

most exerted

affection

and employed

in

'tis

that the knot of fellowship

and philan-

for heroism

thropy are almost one and the same

The Caxtons.

April

What

new

young man

of life does a

make, when

a clever

Perhaps

how

it

he

first

of genius

compares

and experience with the

theories
lect of

19th.

step in the philosophy

it

woman

his

intel-

of the world

does not elevate him, but

enlightens and refines

what

numberless minute yet important mys-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

88

human

teries in

character and prac-

wisdom does he drink unconsciously from the sparkling pe/s/Jlage

tical

of such a companion
Ernest Maltravet-a.

April 20th.

He knew
criminal

is

within us

henceforth that even the

not
is

and many

sometimes

us

angel

not easily expelled

survives sin, ay,

leaves

the

evil;

all

in

sins,

it

and

amaze and

marvel at the good that lingers I'ound

the

even of

heart

the hardiest of-

fender.
Eugene Aram.

The

evil

April 21st.
was simply this

the intelligence of a
evil

and

man

here was

in all that

is

the ignorance of an infant

FEOM BULWER LYTTON.

in all that

worldly,

the

is

In matters merely

good.

what wonderful acumen!

plain

principles

wrong, what gross and

ness

At one

time, I

in

and

right

of

stolid obtuse-

am

straining all

my

poor wit to grapple in an encoun-

ter

on the knottiest mysteries of

life;

at another,

am

social

guiding

re-

luctant fingers over the horn-book of

the most obvious morals.

The Caxtons.

April S^d,

The

A French Novel.

true artist, whether in

Eomance

or the Drama, will often necessarily

interest us

character

in

but

a vicious or criminal

he does not the

less

leave clear to our reprobation the vice

or the crime.
self called

But here

upon not only

found my-

to feel inter-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

90

est in the villain

fectly

allowable

interested .in

(which would be per-

am

very

much

Macbeth and Lovelace)

but to admire and sympathize with

Nor was it the

wrong and right in

the villainy

itself.

confusion of

all

individual character that shocked

the most

but

me

rather the view of so-

ciety altogether, painted in colors so

hideous that,
lution, it

if true,

instead of a revo-

would draw down a deluge.

The Caxtons.

April 3Sd.
It

was thus that the same fervor

which made the Churchman of the

middle age a bigot without mercy,

made

the Christian of the early days a

hero without fear.

T/ie

Last Days of Pompeii,

BULWER LYTTON.

FR03I

April

91

^4,th.

Fly from a load upon the heart, on

the genius, the energy, the pride, and
the

spirit,

which not one man

thousand can bear

ily

from the curse

owing everything to a wife

of

a reversal of

a blow to

You know
wife's

all

far, so

if it

it is

it is

do

us.

My

till

after

it

saved

well;

from the charge of

fortune-hunting.

that

it is

came not

reputation

manhood within

not what

so

natural position,

the

fortune

marriage

my

all

in ten

But, I

tell

never came at

you

all,

fairly,

I should

be a prouder, and a greater, and a

happier

man

than I have ever been, or

ever can bo, with

it

all

its

has a millstone round

advantages

my

neck.
Tlie Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

92

April ^6th.

The world, the world

everything

gentle,

Everything

pure,

everything

and holy

noble, high-wrought

is

to

be squared, and cribbed, and maimed

to the rule

and measure of the world

The world are you too its slave?

Do you not despise its hollow cant
its

methodical hypocrisy

Ernest Maltravers.

April

The

in its errors.

might of the

and

sources

which

36th.

soul really grand

it

is

only tested

As we know
intellect

patient

redeems a

the true

by the

rich re-

strength

failure, so

with

do we

prove the elevation of the soul by

its

courageous return into

in-

stinctive

light,

rebound into higher

its

air, after

FROM BULWKR LYTTON.

some error that has darkened
and

9:i

its

vision

soiled its plumes.

Harold.

A2)ril 27th.

spirit

noble and pure than

loss

Harold's, once entering

on the dismal

world of enchanted superstition, had

habituated

phere

itself to

that nether atmos-

once misled from hardy truth

and healthful reason,

deeper
But,

and deeper

unlike

beth, the

his

Man

of the Fiend.

it

had plunged

into

the

maze.

contemporary, Mac-

escaped from the lures

Not

as Flocate in hell,

but as Dian in heaven, did he confront

the pale

(} odd ess

of Kight.
Harold.

April 28th.
Before that hour in which he had

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

94

deserted the

human judgment

for the

ghostly delusion: before that day in

which the brave

had humbled

desertion,

man, in

his nature,

than the god.

flame

heart, in its sudden

his pride

was more strong

Now,

purified

by the

that had scorched, and

nerved from the

fall

the
more

that had stunned,

that great soul rose sublime through

the wrecks of the Past, serene through

the clouds of the future, concentring

in its solitude the

kind,

and

Eternity

destinies of

strong

amidst

all

with
the

Man-

instinctive

terrors

of

Time.
Harold.

"No

April '29tli.
sound ever went to the heart,"

said Adrian,

"whose arrow was not

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

feathered

by

ment, Montreal,

True

sadness.
is

95

senti-

twin with melan-

choly, though not with gloom."

Bienzi.

April 30th.

But what the impulse

of genius

is

to

the great, the instinct of vocation

is

to

the mediocre.

a magnet;

man

In every

man

in that thing

can do best there

is

there

is

which the

a loadstone.
The Caxtons.

MAY.

Mwy

hi.

TiHH wjm
iiiohI-

liln

Early

how

higher

whi<*h

hy nxhirruil o-vmils

livo

n.

jti

our

iiMMlilxitiorm

Ii<u/.'hl>

H<i('oiMl

Uio

Ui;ui

oxn.tii|)h\

in

(;nil,uro

nnd

Um'< liour in

UiJH

Willi

Heir

had HoinoLhin^-

prayrr; ;uid

if

jiimI

Ui\\\\

(/rnaior,

oi'

Uir,

Um'>

of

hour*

whi<-h

ill

|)r,o|)l4Ml

Mm-

hnyoiid

il,M

Uvo
tlin

i(hjal

iiK'Ji

Uin

own

it,

holinoHH of

Iroui dniarrm

diviiH) l.ooiU'Uilio.r vinioriH) MiinnJHo

ii,n<l

l>y

wliicJi l.hou^hl,

(luruin/^

and

nioni

uol,

u|),

uiii(/OH

|)r(HM)))i,

our nial

lil.Uo

wr,

lil'n

dnmrriH.

Kv(>\yn

wliori

how

icll,

(lironic-lrd

riiuch

[lour

llio

fir,n,'iil)ly

in

Mondng.

iiciul.

liiiry h'liid

waH

painted

hnh>w

worJdH thai ntretch

of tiino on whJcJi

wo

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

100

stand, Imagination

perhaps holier

is

than Memory.
Alice.

Ma/y 2d. The Spirit of the Age.

I would make every man's conduct

more or

less

mechanical

for system

mind over matter

the triumph of

just equilibrium of all the

may seem

passions

Be

it so.

the

like

is

the

powers and
machinery.

Nature meant the world

creation

man

himself,

for

ma-

chines.
Ernest Maltravers.

May
The

seas

of

Wisdom may
it

must

first

3d.

human

life

are wide.

suggest the voyage, but

look to the condition of

the ship, and the nature of the mer-

chandise

to

exchange.

Not

every

BULWER LYTTON.

FliOM
that

vessel

sails

101

from Tarshish can

bring back the gold of Ophir

shall

No

it

therefore rot in

give

its sails

tlie

but

harbor?

wind

to the

Tlie Caxtons.

May
In the tale of
there

ages,

is

Jf^th.

human passion,

in past

something of interest

even in the remoteness of the time.

We

love to feel within us the

bond

which unites the most distant eras

men,

nations,

customs

perish

AFFECTIONS AKE IMMOKTAL

the

they

are the sympathies which unite the

The past lives

when we look upon its emotions

ceaseless generations.

again,

it

lives

was, ever

our

in
is

own

That which

The magician's

that revives the dead

that

gift,

animates

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

102

the dust of forgotten graves,

the author's
the reader

skill

it is

is

not in

in the heart of

The Last Days of Pompeii.

May
You

world says

Deeds

6th.

man the wide

do not deceive woman
men words women

never deceived

kill

it

The Last of

May
Oh,

the

Barons.

6th.

Madeline! methinks

there

is

nothing under heaven like the feeling

which puts us apart from

tates,

and

herd of

fevers,

men

upon

it

that agi-

which grants us to con-

trol the tenor of

cause

all

and degrades the

our future

annihilates

life,

be-

our dependence

others, and, while the rest of the

earth are hurried on, blind and uncon-

FE03I

BULWEB LYTTON.

103

by the hand of Fate, leaves us

scious,

the sole lords of our destiny, and able,

from the Past, which we have governed, to

become the prophets of our

Future
Eugene Aram,

MoA/

7th,

Even the most unearthly love

selfish in the

rapture of being loved

is
!

Bienzi.

May
IN'either

man

uses of life

till

8th,

nor wood comes to the

the green leaves are

And

stripped and the sap gone.

the

uses

of

life

strange things with other names

tree

a tree no more

is

a ship

the youth

then

transform us into

is

it is

the

a gate or

a youth no more,

but a one-legged soldier;

a hollow-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

104

eyed statesman

a scholar spectacled

and slippered
The Caxtona,

May
Had

9th.

the early Christians been more

controlled

by

" the

"
ties of custom

solemn

less of

plausibili-

democrats in

the pure and lofty acceptation of that

perverted word,

Christianity

have perished in

its

would

cradle

The Last Days of Pompeii.

Mmj
" It

is

10th.

an excitement," said Yalerie,

"to climb a mountain, though

tigues

fa-

and though the clouds may even

deny us a prospect from

it is

it

its

summit

an excitement that gives a very

universal pleasure,

most as

if it

and that seems

were the

result of a

al-

com-

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

mon human

instinct,

desire to rise

to

105

which makes us

get above the ordi-

nary thoroughfares and level of

Some such
intellectual

mind

is

the

pleasure

ambition,

upward

life.

you must have

in

which the

in

traveller."
Ernest Maltravera,

May
Nothing

is

11th.

strong on earth but the

Will; and hate to the will

is

as the

iron in the hands of the war-man.

Harold.

May

mil.

Is there not distinction

the best

enough at

Does not one wear purple,

and the other rags?

ease and the other toil ?

Ilath not one

Doth not the

one banquet while the other starves

Do

I nourish

any mad scheme to

level

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

106

the ranks which society renders a necessary evil

No.

war no more

with Dives than with Lazarus.

l>iit

before man's judgment-scat, as before

God's,

Lazarus and Dives are

equaL

JNo more.
The Last

May
I

])tx(/s

made

of Povipcii.

loth.

have never yet found

in

life

one

man who made happiness his end and

aim.
One wants to gain a fortune,
another

to

s}>ond

it

one

phice, another to buikl a

they

all

know very

well that

happiness thoy search

tarian
terest,

to

for.

poor man,
Ids

when he

unpopular

it is

but

not

]\o Utili-

was ever actuated by

scribble

get a

name

sat

self-in-

down

crotchets

to
to

FKCm nULWER LYTTON.

And

prove solf-interest universal.

to

iiolalxlo

tliJit

enliglitene(J
is

and

or

If

it.

man who

you

fine speech, that

be any hapjiier

if

of Milton or the

Jiad mucii

the

But

he will not

power of

Pitt,

the country, and posti)one to

last

the days of dyspepsia and

you

fairJy:

quite as sensible of that as

am

I shall

mind

and

own happiness,

better cultivate a farm,

gout, he will answer

am

are inllu-

the young

he attain to the fame

that, for the sake of his

live in

we

tell

has just written a line book

made a

he

self-interest

the more the self-interest

enliglitened, the less

enced by

as

between

distinction

vulgar

seli'-in teres t

107

you

"I
are.

not thinking whether or not

be happy.

to be,

if 1

have made up

my

can, a great author, or


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

108

So

a prime minister."

it

is

is

And you

the law of nature.

all

To push

the active sons of the world.

on

with

can

no more say to men and to nations

than to children

"Sit

still,

and don't

wear out your shoes."

The Caxtom,

May
It is

an awful

What is wisdom virtue

men piety to Heaven all
nurture we bestow on ourselves

human

life

faith

to

the
all

nth.
state of being, this

our desire to win a loftier sphere,

when we
merest

are thus the tools of the

chance

the

pettiest villainy;

ence

our

victims

of

and our very

the

exist-

very senses almost, at the

mercy of every

traitor

and every fool ?

Ernest Maltravers.

FB03I

BULWER LYTTON.

May

109

15th,

These vain prophecies of human wit

They

guard the soul from no danger.

mislead us by riddles which our hot

hearts interpret according to their
desires.

Keep thou

fast

to

own

youth's

simple wisdom, and trust only to the

pure

spirit

and the watchful God.

Harold,

May

16th.

the discoverythe
despair hear me, as

The crime
mediable
voice of a

man who

is

irre-

the

on the brink of

a world, the awful nature of which

reason cannot pierce

hear me

when

your heart tempts to some wandering

from the
men,

and

line allotted to the rest of

whispers

crime in others, but

is

may be
"
not so in thee

"This

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

110

tremble

cling fast, fast to the path

you are lured

to

Eemember

leave.

me!
Eugene Aram,

May
Alas
that

is

it

17th.

only to be

among men

freedom and virtue are to be

deemed

Why

united?

should

the

slavery that destroys you be consid-

ered the only method to preserve us

Ah

believe me,

error

of

worked

men

it

has been the great

and

bitterly

on

one

has

that

their destinies

imagine that the nature of

(I will

to

women is
may be

not say inferior, that

from

so,

but) so different

in

making laws unfavorable

their

tellectual

advancement

Have they

not, in so doing,

of

own,

to the in-

women.

made laws

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

whom women

against their children,

are to rear ?

Ill

against the husbands, of

whom women

are to be the friends,

nay, sometimes the advisers

The Last Days of Pompeii,

May
"

good

him

carries

one

heart, "

my

18th.

Everybody who
two

here,"

is

in earnest to be

about with

fairies

and he touched

my

and one here," and he touched

forehead.
The

May
" It

is

19th.

not the ambition that pleases,"

replied Maltravers, "

it is

the following

a path congenial to our

made dear to us in a
The moments

habit.

Caxtons.

tastes,

short time
in

and

by

which we

look beyond our work, and fancy our-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

112

selves seated beneath the Everlasting

It is the

Laurel, are few.

whether of action or

and

interests

work

excites

us.

length the dryness of

toil

And

charm

But in

there

another

is

we become more intimate with

our

own

soul

grow

nature.

affections

we

labor

at

takes the

familiar sweetness of custom.

intellectual

itself,

literature, that

The heart and the

friends, as it were,

and aspirations

are never without society

never alone;
learned,

all

that

and the

unite.

we are

we have

and discovered,

is

Thus,

read,

company

to

us."
Ernest Maltravers.

MOA/ Wth.

What

love has most to dread in the

wild heart of aspiring man,

is

not per-

FE03I:

BULWER LYTTON.

sons, but tilings,

113

not things, but

is

their symbols.
Harold.

May
I

then

see

form

solemn in their

as he stood

him before me,

his

smile, a

^Ist

erect, his
light,

dark eyes

a serenity in his

grandeur on his brow, that

had never marked

that the same

man

till

then!

Was

had recoiled from

as the sneering cynic, shuddered at as

the audacious traitor, or wept over as

the cowering outcast

How

little

the

nobleness of aspect depends on sym-

metry of

feature, or the

What

tions of form!

the

man who

is

filled

mere propordignity robes

with a lofty

thought
The

Caxtons.


BEAUTIFUL TBOUGHTS

114

May 2M.
But the

the body usually

illness of

brings out a latent power and philoso-

phy

of the soul,

which health never

knows; and God has mercifully

dained

it

as the customary

ture, that in proportion as

into the grave,

or-

lot of na-

we

decline

the sloping path

made smooth and easy

is

to our feet;

and every day, as the films of clay are

removed from our

eyes.

Death

the false aspect of the spectre,

fall

at last into its

child

arms

upon the bosom

loses

and we

as a wearied

of its mother.
Ernest Maltravers.

May 2Sd.
I love not the trader spirit,

man

the spirit that cheats, and cringes, and

haggles,

and

splits

straws for pence.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

and

roasts eggs

115

by other men^s blazing

rafters.
The Last of the Barons,

May
For oh

what a

^Ifih.

terrible devil creeps

into that man's soul

at his door

many
life

One tender

sees famine
act,

and how

black designs, struggling into

you may crush forever!

within,

He who deems
vince

who

him

it is like

the world his foe, con-

that he has one friend, and

snatching a dagger from his

hand
Eugene Aram.

May

^5th.

Oh,

God

Westminster Bridge.
how many

stormy hearts have

on that
thought

spot, for

of

stilled

wild

and

themselves

one dread instant of

calculation

of

resolve

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

116

one instant, the

last of life

Look

at

night along the course of that stately

how

river,

gloriously

it

seems to mock

the passions of them that dwell beside

Unchanged

it.

around
life

itself

all

smiling up to the grey stars,

and singing from

bounds along.

proud of

unchanging

quick death, and troubled

it

solemn

its

deep heart as

its

Beside

it is

it

the Senate,

triflers,

and there

the cloistered tomb, in which, as the

loftiest

honor, some handful of the

fiercest

of the

f orgetf ulness

and a grave

no moral to a great
that washes

may

strugglers
!

gain

There

is

city like the river

its walls.

Eugene Aram.

May
Say

'26tli.

to the busiest

man whom

thou

FEOM BULWER LYTTQN.

camp, or senate,

seest in mart,

seems

thee

to

117

worldly schemes,

who

upon

intent

all

"Thy home

his

reft

is

thy household gods are

shatteredthat sweet noiseless content

from thee

in the regular

which
into

mechanism

set the large

movement

and

is

straightway

robbed of

thine nevermore "

!

all

object

its

of the springs

wheels of thy soul

exertion seems

aim of

all

its

alluring charm.
Harold.

May
What
bor,

my la-

me

of re-

now thou

pose?

How

wrung from
and

foes,

27th.

are all the rewards to

hast robbed
little

are all the gains

strife, in

a world of rivals

compared to the smile whose

sweetness I

knew not

till

it

was

lost,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

118

and the sense of security from mortal

ill

which I took from the

and

trust

sympathy of love ?
Harold.

May
The burning

^8th.

have known

desires I

the resplendent visions I have nursed

the
lifted

sublime

me

aspirings

so often

that

have

from sense and clay

these me, that, whether for good

or
I am the thing of an Immortaltell

ill

ity,

and the creature of a God

Eugene Aram,

May S9th.
Nor

is

he whom, for high purposes,

Heaven hath

raised

from the cottage

to the popular throne, without invisi-

ble aid

and

protection.

If

hereditary monarchs are deemed

sa-

spiritual

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

119

cred, how much more one in whose

power the divine hand hath writ its

Yes, over

him who

witness

for his

country, whose greatness

country's gift,
try's liberty,
just,

whose

lives

life is his

watch the

is

but
his

coun-

souls of the

and the unsleeping eyes of the

s worded

seraphim
Bienzi.

May
To be
thing

great

Memorial Bay.
you must sacrifice some-

30th.

free,

for freedom,

what

sacrifice too

Bienzi.

May Slst.
Yery near

are

two hearts that have

no guile between them.

The Caxtom.

JUNE.

June

Our own
earth

itself,

yoath

when

and waters with

ran

it

peopled the woods

divinities

when

life

all its

shapes of poetry,

all

the melodies of Arcady and

airs,

Olympus

The Golden Age never

leaves the world;

shall exist,

no more

like that of the

and yet only gave birth to

riot,

beauty
its

Ist.
is

till

it

exists

still,

and

love, health, poetry, are

but only for the young

Eienzi,

June 2d.
Not in such jaded bosoms can Nature awaken that enthusiasm which
alone draws from her chaste reserve
all

her unspeakable beauty

she de-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

124

mands from you, not the exhaustion

but

passion,

which you

that

all

onl}^ seek, in

of

from

fervor,

adoring her, a

release.
The Last Days of Pompeii,

June

Was

ture, that

dearer

3d.

the perversity of

it

makes the things

to

human

na-

of morality

us in proportion as they

fade from our hopes, like birds whoso

hues are only unfolded

when they

take wing and vanish amidst the skies

or was

on

it

that he had ever doted

of

loveliness

form, and the

more

mind than that

first

more, the more the

of

bloomed out the

last

decayed

Ernest Maltravers.

June

He who

is

Jt-th.

ambitious of things afar

FR03T

BULWEB LYTTON.

125

and uncertain, passes at once into the

Poet-Land of Imagination; to aspire

and to imagine are yearnings twinborn.

,^

Harold.

June 6th.
Mankind are not instantaneously
corrupted.

Villainy

is

pro-

always

We decline from right not

gressive.

suddenly, but step after step.

Eugene Aram.

June
In a word, dear

6th.
sir

and

friend, in

this crowded Old World, there

the same

room

men

to

jostle their neighbors.

must

sit

down

not

that our bold fore-

fathers found for

and

is

like

walk about

No

they

boys at their form,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

126

and work out

their tasks, with

rounded

shoulders and aching fingers.

There

has been a pastoral age, and a hunting

age,

and a fighting age.

Now we have

arrived at the age sedentary.

who

sit

longest carry

all

Men

before them

puny, delicate fellows, with hands just

strong enough to wield a pen, eyes so
bleared by the midnight lamp that they
see

no joy

draws

me

draws the

in that

buxom sun (which

forth into the fields, as

living),

life

and digestive organs

worn and macerated by the

relentless

flagellation of the brain.

The Caxtom.

June
Wise

is

whose book

ever
is

the

7th.

the counsel of him

human

heart.
Harold.

FB03I

BULWEB LYTTON.
June

127

8th.

From LITEKATUEE he imagined had

come

all

ened

and men humane.

makes nations

that

loved Literature

her

he

because

were not those of

distinctions

the world

And

more,

the

enlight-

because

she had neither

ribands, nor stars, nor high places at

her command.
gratitude and

name

in the deep

hereditary delight of

men this was

the

title

she bestowed.

Hers was the Great Primitive Church

of

the

Muftis

world,

Her

hierarchies.

the

without

sinecures,

earth

anxious

as

the

only to

Popes

pluralities,

or

and

servants spoke to

prophets of

be

old,

heard and be-

lieved.
Ernest Maltravers.

128

BEAUTIFUL TEOUOHTS

June

He who

9th.

awaits death, dies twice.

The Last Days of Pompeii

June 10 th.
lu

all

these solemn riddles of the

Jove world and the Christ's

the imperious necessity that

of repentance

involved

is

man hath

and atonement through

:

their clouds, as a rainbow, shines the

covenant that reconciles the God and

the man.
Harold.

June

11th.

Observe, that, throughout the whole

world, a great revolution has begun.

The barbaric darkness

been broken; the

made men

of centuries has

knowledge which

as demigods in

the past

time has been called from her urn

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

Power, subtler

129

brute force, and

tliiiii

mightier than armed men,

at

is

we have begun once more

work

do hom-

to

age to the Jioyalty of Mind.

Riejizi.

June

We may talk of
but no

man

12th.

the fidelity of books,

own

ever wrote even his

biography, without being com[)elled to

omit at least nine- tent

what

six

volumes in a
joy,

day

is

are three

We

live

how

fear,

prolix

they might each

But man's

and everlasting and

curate

confessions

are

tell

life itself

a brief epitome of that which

finite

six

Thought, emotion,

be, if

their hourly tale

of the most

is

volumes?

sorrow, hope,

would they

What

important materials.

his

is in-

most

ac-

miserable

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

130

abridgment of a hurried and confused

compendium
Ernest Maltravera.

June

New

13th.

laws are declared to him

who

a heaven, a true Olympus,

revealed to him who has eyes heed
has ears

then,

is

and

listen.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

June nth.
Ass indeed

warn

others,

his eyes

what

is

he

who

pretends to

nor sees an inch before

his

own

fate will be
Harold.

June

15th.

I say, then, that books, taken indis-

criminately, are no cure to the diseases

and

afflictions of

the mind.

There

is

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

131

world of science necessary in the taking them.

have known some people

in great sorrow fly to a novel, or the

last light

as

One might

book in fashion.

well take a rose-draught for the

plague!

when

Light reading does not do

the heart

is

told that Goethe,

really heavy.

when he

Ah

am

lost his son,

took to study a science that was

to him.

new

Goethe was a physician

who knew what

he was about.

In a

great grief like that you cannot tickle

and divert the mind you must wrench

;

it

away, abstract, absorb

an abyss, hurry

it

bury

it

in

into a labyrinth.

Therefore, for the irremediable sor-

rows of middle

recommend a
science

life

strict

and old age,

chronic course of

and hard reasoning

Counter-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

132

Bring the brain to act upon

irritation.

the heart
The Caxtona.

June
that

fear

travers
ence,

as

had gained

16th.

yet
little

Ernest

Mal-

from Experi-

except a few current coins of

worldly wisdom (and not very valuable those

of

that

),

while he had lost

nobler

much

wealth with which

youthful enthusiasm sets out on the

Experience

journey of

life.

giver, but

a stealthy

thief.

is

an open

There

is,

however, this to be said in her favor,

we retain her gifts; and if ever

we demand restitution in earnest, 'tis
ten to one but what we recover her
that

thefts.
Ernest Maltravera.

FEOM BULWER LYTTON.

"

June 17 th.
Norman,

He

ingly

my

died," said the

" but shriven

133

sooth-

and absolved and

;

cousin says, calm and hopeful, as

who have

they die ever

Saviour's

tomb

knelt at the

Harold.

June

"How
him
"

little

in the eyes of

The

18th.

a man's virtues profit

men

" thought he.

subject saves the crown,

and the

crown's wearer never pardons the pre-

sumption

The Last of the Barona.

June
"

19th.

God never made Genius

to be

envied " interrupted Yillani, with an

!

energy

that

overcame

his

respect.

"

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

134

"

We

envy not the sun, but rather the

valleys that ripen beneath his beams."

" Yerily,

if

be the sun," said Kienzi

with a bitter and melancholy smile, "

long for night,

and

come

it will,

to

human as to the celestial Pilgrim

Thank Heaven at least, that our ambition cannot make us immortal
the

Bienzi.

June 20th.
The tench, no doubt,
pond in which he lives
World.

There

stagnant, which

is
is

no

People

who have
still

as the Great

place,

however

not the great world

to the creatures that

in a village

considers the

move about

in

lived all their lives

talk of the world as

they had ever seen

it.

it

An

old

if

woman

in a hovel does not put her nose out of

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

135

her door on a Sunday without thinking she

and

is

going amongst the pomps

vanities of the great world.

the great world

circle in

is

Ergo,

to all of us the little

which we

live.
Ernest Maltravers.

June
Sir,

a religious

'21st.

man

does not want

to reason about his religion

is

not mathematics.

felt,

not proved.

religion

Keligion

is

to be

There are a great

many things in the religion of a good

man which are not in the catechism.
The Caxtona.

He was

June 22d.
the more original because

he sought rather after the True than

New.

two minds are ever the

same; and therefore any man who
the

]^o

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

136

will give us fairly

own

sults of his

enced by the
w^ill

and frankly the

re-

impressions, uninflu-

servilities of imitation,

be original.
Ernest Maliravers.

June ^3d.

A man is a poor

creature

in a passion sometimes;

who

and

in the

wrong

not

but a very

unjust, or a very foolish one,

in a passion with the

is

wrong

if

he be

person,

place and time.

Ernest Maliravers.

J\ine 24th.

And

as

gold, the

adorner of the

world, springs from the sordid bosom

of earth, so

chastity,

gold, rose bright

the clay of

human

the image of

and unsullied from

desire.
Harold.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

June

137

25th.

In that era of passionate and poetical

romance, which Petrarch repre-

sented rather than created, Love had

already begun to assume a more tender

and sacred character than

erto

known,

had

hith-

had gradually imbibed

it

the divine spirit which

Christianity,

it

it

derives from

and which associates

its

sorrows on earth with the visions and

hopes of heaven.

To him who

relies

upon immortality,

fidelity to the

dead

is

easy; because death cannot extin-

guish

hope,

mourner

is

to come.

and the

soul

of

the

already half in the world

It is

an age that desponds

representing death as
separation in which,

of a future life

an

men

eternal

if

grieve awhile for the dead, they

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

138

hasten to reconcile themselves to the

For true

living.

is

the old aphorism,

that love exists not without hope.

Bienzi.

It is in

learn

June Mth.
sorrow or sickness that we

why Faith was given as a

man Faith, which is Hope

soother to

with a holier name

hope that knows

neither deceit nor death.

Ah, how

wisely do you speak of the philosophy

of belief

It

is,

indeed, the telescope

through which the stars grow large

upon our

gaze.
Ernest Maltravers.

June

Man

is

for others.

27th.

never wrong while he lives

The philosopher who

con-

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

templates from the rock

image than the

sailor

is

139

a less noble

who

struggles

with the storm.

The Caxtons.

June ^8th.A Lover's Farting.

I know not, in the broken words
that passed between us, in the sorrow-

which those words revealed

I know not if there were that which

ful hearts

they

who own,

in

human

passion, but

the storm and the whirlwind, would

call

the love of maturer years

the

love that gives fire to the song, and

tragedy to the stage

but I

know

that

was neither a word nor a

thought which made the sorrow of the

there

children a rebellion to the heavenly

Father.
The Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

140

Janr
Thero
tellect,

is

in

with

'29th.

a sound and correct

its

all

gilts

fairly

in-

bal-

anced, a calm consciousness of power,

a cm'tainty

tliaX

fairly put out, it

when

must be to

ond-rate faculties, on the

by Muur

tower,

own

tl

u^y

contrar}'',

are

are
its

do not estimate

talents, but

some one
but

uujasuring

own

of sec-

and nervous, lidgeting after a

celebrity wliicli

ents of

is

realize the

Men

usual result of strength.

fretful

strength

its

by the

They

else.

occupied

tal-

see a

only with

shadow, and think their

height (which they never calcu-

late) is to cast as Inroad

earth.

It is tln^ short

a,

one over the

man who

is al-

ways throwing up his (^hin, and is as

The tall man stoops.
erect as a dart.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

and the strong man

is

not

141

always

using the dumb-bells.

Ernest Maltravers.

June 30th.
The eye that would guard the living
should not be dimmed by the vapors
that encircle the dead.
Harold.

JULY.

July

1st.

Oh, what a crushing sense

of impo-

when we

feel that

tence comes over us,

our frame cannot support our mind

when

the hand can no longer execute

what the
ceives
to the

soul, actively

and

dead

as ever, con-

the quick tied

form the ideas fresh as

desires

life

immortality, gushing forth rich and

golden, and the broken nerves, and the

aching frame, and the weary eyes

the spirit athirst for liberty and heaven

and the damning, choking consciousness that

in a

place

we

are walled up

and prisoned

dungeon that must be our

!

Talk not of freedom

burial-

there

no such thing as freedom to a

is

man

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

146

whose body
ties are

is

the

jail,

whose

infirmi-

the racks, of his genius

Ernest Maltravers.

July 2d.

Only by the candle held

eton hand of Poverty can

own dark

in the skel-

man read his

heart.
The Last of

July 3d.
I value Gold, for Gold
tect of

Power

storms the city

place

it

is

camp

fills

it

buys the market-

I value

means necessary

the Archi-

the

It

Gold,

raises the palace

the throne.

the Barons.

to

my

it
it

it

founds
is

the

end
Bienzi.

July

Jith.

Independence Day.

Depend on

it,

the

New

"World will

be friendly or hostile to the Old, not in

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

jprojportion to the hinshij^

147

of race^ hut in

j^roportion to the similarity of ^manners

and

institxLtions

mighty truth to

which we colonizers have been

blind.

The Caxtona.

July

A man is a rude,
mal, and requires
tions to dignify

6th.

coarse, sensual ani-

all

and

manner of associa-

refine him,

women

are so naturally susceptible of every-

thing beautiful in sentiment and generous in purpose, that she

true

woman

is

fit

who

is

peer for a king.

Tlie Caxtona,

July

No man
gods,

and

its

miserable creeds

upon the weak

great

its

6th.

ever so scorned

its

its

its

false

war

fawning upon the

ingratitude to benefactors

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

148

its

league

sordid

against excellence.

with

mediocrity

Yes, in proportion

as I love mankind, I despise

and detest

that worse than Venetian oligarchy

which mankind
"

set over

them and

call

THE WOELD."
Ernest Maltravers.

July 7th.
While the mind alone

is

occupied,

you may be contented with the pride

of stoicism:

when

but there are moments

the heart wakens as from a sleep

wakens

like a frightened child

feel itself alone

and

to

in the dark.
Ernest Maltravers,

July

8th.

I tell thee that I renounce henceforth

all faith

save in

Him whose ways

concealed from our eyes.

Thy

are
seid

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

149

and thy galdra have not guarded me

armed me against

against peril, nor

sin.

will

Nay, perchance

but

peace:

no more tempt the dark art, I will

no more seek to disentangle the awful

truth from the juggling
foretold

All so

lie.

me I will seek to forget,

hope

from no prophecy, fear from no warning.

Let the soul go to the future un-

der the shadow of

God
Harold.

July

Whenwhen
parities

9th.

will these hideous dis-

be banished from the world

How many

noble natures

glorious hopes

how many

how much

of the ser-

aph's intellect, have been crushed into

the mire, or blasted into guilt, by the

mere force of physical want?

"What


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

150

are the temptations of the rich to those

Yet

of the poor ?

see

how

lenient

we

how

re-

are to the crimes of the one,

lentless to those of the other

Eugene Aram.

July

There
stronger

Poverty

is

than
^6"

10th.

stern

truth which

the master-ill of the Avorld.

Look round.

Does poverty leave

signs over the graves ?

large

Look

tomb fenced round

long inscription

husbands "

is

Spartan lessons

all

''

affectionate

"inconsolable grief"
joyful hope,''

" Virtue "

etc.,

read that

" best of
father "

"sleeps

etc.

pose these stoneless

its

at that

in

the

Do you sup-

mounds hide no

what were men just as good ?

But no epitaph tells their virtues, be-

dust of

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

151

speaks thoir wives' grief, or promises

joyful

hope to them

Does

it

matter

Does God care for

the epitaph and tombstone ?

Tlie Caxtons.

July
Their talk
love.

11th.

now was

only of their

Over the rapture of the present

the hopes of the future glowed like the

heaven above the gardens of spring.

They went
far

down

in their trustful thoughts

the stream of time

they laid

out the chart of their destiny to come

they sulFercd the light of to-day to

suffuse the

their hearts

morrow.
it

In the youth of

seemed as

if

care,

and

change, and death, were as things un-

known.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

152

"

July mil.
mystic lights," said he,

Ye

quizing " worlds upon worlds

;

incalculable.
and change,

we

solilo-

infinite

Bright defiers of rest

rolling forever above our

petty sea of mortality,

wave,

wave

as,

after

fret forth our little life,

sink into the black abyss

and

can we look

upon you, note your appointed order,

and your unvarying
feel that

we

course,

and not

are indeed the poorest

puppets of an all-pervading and

resist-

less destiny ?

Eugene Aram.

July
Is

some ?

me

13th.

that too masculine a spirit for

the

Let each please himself.

woman who

can

thoughts that are noblest in

Give

echo

all

men

The Caxtons.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

July

When we
what stop
where

is

153

Htli.

have commenced a career,

is

there

till

the grave?

the definite barrier of that am-

bition which,

the eastern bird,

like

seems ever on the wing, and never

rests

upon the

earth.
Ernest Maltravers.

July

Man

is

15th.

arrogant in proportion to his

ignorance.
Zanoni.

July

16th.

The man who hath served me wrongs

me till I have served him again !
The Last of the Barons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

154

July 17th.

Conduct
lies

my

conductconductthere

talent

and what

is

conduct but

a steady walk from a design to

cution

its

exe-

Ernest Maltravers,

July

Poor
of

is

18th.

the strength of body

law can entangle

it,

a web

and a word from

a priest's mouth can palsy.

Harold,

July

19th.

HoAV a man past thirty

scarcely twenty

mere
est

foils

man

what superiority the

fact of living-on gives to the dull-

dog

The Caxtons.

July Wth.
It is a fearful thing to see men weep
Eugene Aram.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

155

Jtoly ^Ist

There seems something intuitive in

the

wliich

science

teaches

knowledge of our race.

emerge from
all at once,

us

the

Some men

their seclusion,

and

find,

a power to dart into the

minds and drag forth the motives of

those they see
sight,

it is

a sort of second

born with them, not acquired.

Eugene Aram.

Had
less

July nd.
more with men, and

lived

with dreams and books,

have made

my

should

nature large enough

to bear the loss of a single passion.

But

in

plant so

and the

solitude

much

as

we shrink up. Ko
man needs the sun

air.

The Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

156

July 23d.

Love should
dence as
jealousy

its
is

have

oonfu

implicit

bond and nature

doubt,

and doubt

and
the

is

death of love.
Ernest Maltravers.

July ^ith.

As

ashes cannot be rekindled

as

love once dead can never revive, so

freedom

departed from a people

is

never regained.
The Lost Days of Pompeii,

July 25th.

Of

all

heart

is

the conditions to which the

subject, suspense

is

the one

gnaws and cankers into the

One little month of that suspense, when it involves death, we are
told, in a ver}^ remarkable work lately
that most

frame.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

published by an eyewitness,

plough fixed lines

157

is

and

suffi-

fur-

cient

to

rows

in the face of a convict of five-

and-twenty

sufficient

dash

to

brown hair with grey, and

the

to bleach

the grey to white.

Eugene Aram.

Jtdy ^6th.
Is

a crime to murder

it

crime

greater

which

the

is

to

man?

murder

life of all

thought,

men.

The Last of

the Barons.

July 27th.
It is not

a writer
as in

study alone that produces

it is

intensity.

In the mind,

yonder chimney, to make the

fire

burn hot and quick, you must narrow

the draft.
The Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

158

July 28th.

The moment we

we
it

lose sight of a

lose forethought,

duty

seems like a paradox,

dom

and though

we can

be careless without being

sel-

selfish.

Ernest Maltravers.

'Tis

It
and

July 29th.
a winning thing,

sir,

a garden

brings us an object every day;

that's

to have

if

what

think a

man

ought

he wishes to lead a happy

life.

Eugene Aram.

July 30th.

The great

moments.

limited
of the

struggles

In

in

the

life

are

drooping

head upon the bosom, in the

pressure of the hand upon the brow,

we may

scarcely

consume a second

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

in our threescore years

what revolutions

may

and ten; but

of our whole being

pass within us while that single

sand drops noiseless

tom

159

down

to the bot-

of the hour-glass
The Caxtom.

July

Thou

31st.

art wise in the lore of the

heart and love hath been thy study

from youth to grey

is

it

hairs.

Is it love,

hate, that prefers death for the

loved one, to the thought of her

life

as another's ?
Harold.

AUGUST.

August

The

1st.

who

situation of a Patrician

honestly loves the people

is,

in those

when power oppresses and

freedom struggles, when the two
divisions of men are wrestling against
evil times,

each

other,

the

most irksome and

perplexing their destiny can possibly

contrive

nobles?
"With

Shall he take part with the

he

betrays his conscience!

people

the

he

deserts

his

friends
Bienzi.

August

A
he

baker

is

sells his

'2d.

not to be called venal

loaves

he

is

venal

if

if

he

sells himself.

Tht Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

164

August

3d.

However we may darken and

ourselves with fancies

and

puzzle

visions,

and

the ingenuities of fanatical mysticism,

no man can mathematically or

gistically

contend

the

that

syllo-

world

which a God made, and a Saviour

visited,

was designed to be damned

Ernest Maltravers.

August

ith.

I shudder not at the creed of others.

I

dare not curse them

pray the

Great Father to convert.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

August

One
that,

5th.

thing, however,

is

quite clear

whether Fortune be more

Plutus or an angel,

it is

like

no use abusing

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

her
a

one

star.

may
And

165

throw stones at

as well

one looked

I think, if

narrowly at her operations, one might

perceive that she gives every

man

chance, at least once in his

take and

renew her

make

the best of

visits, if not,

life
it,

itur

if

he

she will

ad astra

The Caxtons.

Aitgust 6th.

But they were both

thing

alike

one

in

they were not with the Future,

the

they were sensible of the Present

sense of the actual
of

the

life,

breathing

within them.

the enjoyment

time,

Such

was strong

the privilege of

is

the extremes of our existence

and Age.
to-day, its

Middle

home

is

life

in

is

Youth

never with

to-morrow

anxious, and scheming, and desiring,

BEAUTIFUL TBOUQHTS

166

and wishing
hope

this plot ripened

while every

fulfilled,

forgotten

Time brings

nearer to the end of

our

consumed

life is

it

and that

wave

of the

nearer and

all things.

Half

in longing to be

nearer death.
Ernest MaUravns.

Augitst 7th.

For we should be

we

men before
when we wish

as old

engage, and as youths

to perform.
Harold.

August 8th.
Too mean
there
go to
I

ing

mean

base soul under high

boy, there

before God, unless

is

Nature signs

titles.

is

noth-

it

bo a

With me,

but one nobility, and

its

charter.
Riemi.

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

August
Kill

me!

167

0th.

not my thought
The Last of

the Baro7i8.

August 10 th.

What an

incalculable field of dread

and sombre contemplation

every

man who,

opened to

with his heart disen-

from himself,

gaged

is

and

his

eyes

accustomed to the sharp observance

of his tribe, walks through the streets

What

of a

great city

dark

and troublous

breast of every one

you!

Goethe

has

a world of
in

secrets

who
said

the

hurries

by

somewhere,

that each of us, the best as the worst,

hides

within

feeling,

him something

some remembrance

some

that,

known, would make you hate him.

Eugene Aram.

if

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

168

August
I

11th.

advanced, and beheld a spectacle

of such agony, as can only be con-

ceived by those
tlie

who have

looked on

which takes no fortitude

grief

from reason, no consolation from conscience

the

grief

which

tells

what

us

would be the earth were man abandoned

of the

to his passions,

atheist

merciless heavens.

Pride humbled to

ambition shivered into frag-

the dust

ments;

love

taken for

and the chance

reigned alone in the

it)

(or

the

bereaved of

first

onset,

holiest

ties,

forsaken

by

its

guide!

shame that writhed

venge,

and

prayer all,

mis-

blasted into ashes;

the

at

passion

remorse
all

that

life,

its

truest

for re-

knew not

blended, yet distinct.

FROM JiULWKR LYTTON.

were

169

in that avvlul spectaclo of

tlio

guilty son.
The Caxtona.

August

l^th.

Night, to tho earnest soul, opens the

bil)h3

of

of tho universe, and on the Uiaves

Heaven

where

is

written

*'

God

is

every-

The Last of the

liaronn.

A m/uH mh.
Tell a man, in the full tide of his

triumphs, that he bears death within

him

and what

crisis of

thought can

be more startling and more terrible

ErncM

A uquHt
The good
all

MnltraverH.

1J,th.

pilot wins his

way through

winds, and the brave heart fastens

fate to its flag.

Harold.

"

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

170

Augicst

Human

life is

15tli.

compared to the

circle

Is the simile just?All lines that are

drawn from the centre to touch the
circumference, by the law of the circle,
are

But

equal.

the

lines

drawn from the heart

the verge of his destiny

Alas

that are

of the

man

do they equal
some seem so

each

other

brief,

and some lengthen on as

to

for-

ever.
Ernest Maltravers.

August
There

is

16th.

but one philosophy (though

there are a thousand schools), and

name is Fortitude.
"to bear is to conquer our fate

its

The Last Days of Pompeii.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

171

August 17 th.
So

is

fade;

it

ever in

immortal

life

mortal things

things

spring more

freshly with every step to the tomb.

The Caxtons.

August

He who

18th.

himself betrays, cannot call

vengeance treason
The Last of

August

Humph! when
and
in

the Barons.

19th.

nobles are hated,

soldiers are bought, a

mob may,

any hour, become the master.

honest people and a weak mob,

An

corrupt people and a strong mob.

Bienzi.

August

The end

20th.

of a scientific morality

is

not to serve others only, but also to


172

BEAUTIFUL THOUOETS

perfect

and accomplish our individual

selves;

our

trust to

own souls
our own lives.

are a solemn

Ernest Maltravers.

August

^Ist.

Master books, but do not

master you.

Eead

let

them

to live, not live to

read.
The Caxtons.

August 22d.

Whoever strives to know learns

that no human lore is despicable.
Despicable
bloated

only

things

you

ye

slaves

sluggards in thought

of

fat

and

luxury

who, cultivating

nothing but the barren sense, dream

that

its

poor

soil

myrtle and the

only can enjoy

can produce alike the

laurel.

InTo,

the wise

to us only true luxury

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

given,

is

when mind,

173

brain, invention,

experience,

thought, learning, imagi-

nation,

contribute

all

swell the seas of

sense

like

rivers

to

The Last Days of Pompeii.

August 23 d.

What

royal robe so invests with im-

perial majesty the

form of man as the

grave sense of power responsible, in an

earnest soul ?
Harold.

August
It

is

the Senior, of from two to ten

years, that
us.

He

^Jpth.

most seduces and enthrals

has the same pursuits

views,

objects, pleasures, but more art and

experience in them
us in the path

all.

we

He

goes with

are ordained to

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

174

tread, but

from which the elder gener-

ation desires to

very

little

warn

influence

us

There

off.

where there

is

is

not

great sympathy.
Ernest Maltravers.

August

Who

25th.

shall describe those

awful and

mysterious moments, when man, with

his

all

fiery

passions,

turbulent

thoughts, wild hopes, and despondent

fears,

demands the

of his

Maker ?

solitary audience

Bienzi,

August

When

Fate

agents, her dark

is

at

26th.

her

selects

human

and mysterious

work within them

spirit

she moulds

their hearts, she exalts their energies,

she shapes them to the part she has

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

allotted them,

175

and renders the mortal

instrument worthy of the solemn end.

Eugene Aram.

August

We

should begin

27th.
life

with books;

they multiply the sources of employ-

ment

so does capital

of no use, unless
est,

we

but capital

live

on the

is

inter-

books are waste paper, unless we

spend in action the wisdom

we

get

from thought.
Ernest Maltravers.

August

28th.

All that wakes curiosity

if

innocent

all

is

wisdom,

that pleases the fancy

now, turns hereafter to love or to

knowledge.
The Caxtona.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

176

August Wth.

Mne

times out of ten

Bridge of Sighs that

row

That interval
an

Youth

gulf from
is

over the

pass the nar-

to

Manhood.

usually occupied

by

ill-placed or disappointed affection.

We

recover,

new

being.

and we find ourselves a

The

hardened by the
it

it is

we

has passed.

intellect has
fire

become

through which

The mind

profits

by the

wrecks of every passion, and we

may

measure our road to wisdom by the

sorrows

we have undergone.
Ernest Maltravers.

August

As

the

moon

30th.

plays upon the waves,

and seems to our eyes to favor with a

peculiar

beam one long

track amidst

the waters, leaving the rest in com-

FliOM

BULWEB LYTTON.

parative obscurity

yet

all

177

the while,

no niggard in her lustre for

though the rays that meet not our

she

is

eyes seem to us as though they were

not, yet she with an equal and unf avor-

ing loveliness, mirrors herself on every

wave: even

so,

perhaps. Happiness falls

with the same brightness and power

over the whole expanse of life, though
to our limited eyes she seems only to
rest on those billows from which the

ray

is

reflected

back upon our

sight.

Eugene Aram.

August
For few,

names may

alas!

31st.

are

they,

outlive the grave

thoughts of every

man who

made undying ;others

advance, exalt

them

whose
but the

writes, are

appropriate,

and millions of

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

178

minds unknown,

uiulri^anied of, are re-

quired to pi-oduco the immortality of

one

Eienzi.

SEr^TEMBER.

September
I

WAS

Happy

always

the

1st.

an

early

who

man

riser.

Every

is!

morning day comes to him with a

of bloom, and
full
love,
virgin's
purity,

ITature
of a

and
is

freshness.

The youth

happy

child.

doubt

if

any man

can be called "old " so long as he

early riser and an early walker.

oh Youth

of

contagious, like the gladness

is

an

And,

take my word of youth

it

in dressing-gown

and

slippers,

ling over breakfast at noon,

is

dawda very

decrepit, ghastly

image of that youth

which

sun blush over the

sees

the

mountains, and the dews sparkle upon

blossoming hedgerows.
TAe Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

182

SepteTriber 2d.

Custom

blunts us to every

surely

may happen

chance, every danger, that

to us hourly,

you

were the avalanche over

for a day,

torture,

but

grant your state of

had an avalanche rested

over you for years, and not yet

you would forget that

fall;

you would

love, as

if it

fallen,

could ever

it

eat, sleep,

and make

were not
Eugene Aram.

September 3d.
of Authors, those

The biographies
ghostlike beings

no

life

who seem

but in the shadow

to have

of their

had

own

haunting and imperishable thoughts,

dimmed

the inspiration he might have

caught from their pages. Those Slaves

of the

Lamp, those Silk-worms of the

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

183

Closet, how little had they enjoyed,

how little had they lived Condemned
!

by the wholesale

to a mysterious fate
of

destinies

born but to

and

to spin thoughts

common crowd and,

the

for

the world, they seemed

toil

their

task performed in drudgery and in

when no
be wrung from

darkness, to die

further serv-

ice could

their exhaus-

l^ames had they been in

tion,

and
life

life,

names they

lived forever, in

as in death, airy

and unsubstantial

as

phantoms.
Ernest Maltravers.

September

There
bling to

is

J^th.

something,

human

Lester,

hum-

pride in a rustic's

life.

It grates against the heart to think of

the tone in which

we

unconsciously

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

184

permit ourselves to address him.

him humanity

in

see

gtate

we

despise

it

our species

is

by

art

its

simple

a sad thought to feel that

it is

in

We

we

that all

respect in

what has been created

the gaud}^ dress, the glittering

equipage, or even the cultivated intellect

the mere and naked material of

Nature we eye with indifference or

trample on with disdain.
Eugene Aram.

Se-ptemher 6th.

Poor child of

dawn

to

toil,

from the grey

the setting sun, one long

no

thought

awakened beyond those that

suffice to

task!

no

idea

elicited

make him the machine

serf of the

hard

soil

of others

And

mark how we scowl upon

the

then, too,

his scanty

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

holidays,

how we hedge

185

in his mirth

with laws, and turn his hilarity into

crime

We

make

the whole of the

gay world, wherein we walk and take

our pleasure, to him a place of snares

and
an

If

perils.

he leave his labor for

instant, in that instant

how many
And

temptations spring up to him

yet

we have no mercy

the

jail

lows

the

for his errors

transport-ship

the

gal-

those are our sole lecture-books,

and our only methods of expostulation.

Eugene Aram.

September

6th.

Fie on the disparities of the world

They
sense,

links

two

cripple the heart, they blind the

they concentrate the thousand

between man and

man

basest of earthly ties

into the

servility

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

186

and
out

pride.

Methinks the devils laugh

when they hear

that his soul

as glorious

is

our own;

as

us tell the boor

and eternal

and yet when

grinding drudgery of his

in

life,

the

not a

spark of that soul can be called forth

when

it

sleeps,

walled around in

its

lumpish clay, from the cradle to the

without a dream to

grave,

deadness of

its

stir

the

torpor.
Eugene Aram.

September' 7th.

Action, Maltravers, action; that

the

life

for us.

passion,

fancy,

is

At our age we have

sentiment; we can't

read them away, nor scribble them

away

we must

live

upon them gener-

ously, but economically.

Ernest Maltravers.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

September 8th,
one man is resolved to

When
another,

187

it

vent him

is

know

almost impossible to pre-

we

see daily the

most

re-

markable instances of perseverance on

one side conquering distaste on the
other.

September 9th.

No

I don't say that

it is

an

inevi-

table

law that man should not be

happy

but

it is

an inevitable law that

a man, in spite of himself, should live

for

something higher than his

happiness.

He

however

or for himself,

may

try to be.

links

him with

machine

he

is

own

cannot live in himself

Every
others.

egotistical

he

desire he has

Man

is

not a

a part of one.
The Caxtons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

188

September 10th.

Three

ever

are

things

silent:

Thought, Destiny, and the Grave.

Harold,

September 11th.

We
whose

are
life

and the
rivals,

but

here

as

schoolboys,

begins where school ends

battles

we

fought with our

and the toys that we shared

with our playmates, and the names

that
wall,

we

carved, high or low, on the

above our desks

will

much

bestead us hereafter?

fates

crowd upon

us,

than pass through the

smile or a sigh?
school-days,

they so

As new

can they more

memory with

Look back to thy

and answer.
The Caxtons.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

September

vulgar

knows what
steps

boy

189

l^tli.

Heaven
move three

requires

assiduity to

do not say

gentleman,

like a

but like a body that has a soul in

it

but give the least advantage of society

or tuition to a peasant girl, and a hun-

dred to one but she will glide into

finement before the boy can

bow

re-

make a

without upsetting the table.

Ernest Maltravera.

/September ISth.

literal ratiocinator,

and dull to the

true logic of Attic irony

comprehend that an
genuine as
be

nature
others

felt

can't

affection

may

by the man, yet

spurious

man may

in

you

relation

be
its

to

genuinely be-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

190

lieve

he

when he

loves
roasts

or guillotines

fellow-creatures,

his

them

them

like

Torquemada,

like St. Just

The Caxtons.

Every

September l^th.
cheek was flushed

every

tongue spoke: the animation of the

orator had passed, like a living

spirit,

He

into the breasts of the audience.

had thundered against the disorders of

the patricians, yet, by a word, he had

disarmed the anger of the plebeians

he had preached freedom, yet he had

had calmed the

opposed

license.

present,

by a promise

He had

lie

of the future.

chid their quarrels, yet had

supported their cause.

He had

mas-

tered the revenge of to-day by a

emn

sol-

assurance that there should come

FROM BULWEB LYTTOK

justice for the

morrow.

191

So great

may

be the power, so mighty the eloquence,

so formidable the genius, of one

man

without arms, without rank, without

sword or ermine, who addresses himself to

a people that

is

oppressed
liienzi.

September ISth.
All great knavery

is

madness

world could not get on

if

The

truth and

goodness were not the natural tendencies of sane

minds.
27ie Caxtons.

September 16th.

Oh,
like

most

my

dear brother, what minds

yours should guard against the

is

not the meanness of evil

it is

the evil that takes false nobility, by

BEAUTIFUL

192

garbing

in

itself

OUGHTS

TJff

the royal magnifi-

cence of good.
The Caxtons.

Septemher 17th.

The great

secret of eloquence,

be in earnest

the

Kienzi's eloquence

ness

of

great

was

spoke as one

secret

to
of

in the mighti-

enthusiasm.

his

is

He

never

who doubted of success.

men who undertake

Perhaps, like most

high and great actions, he himself was

never

thoroughly aware of the ob-

stacles in his

way.

He saw

the end,

bright and clear, and overleaped, in

the vision of his soul, the crosses and

the length of the path
convictions of his

themselves

thus the deep

own mind stamped

irresistibly

upon

others.

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

He

seemed

less

to

193

promise than to

prophesy.
Bienzi,

September 18th.
In our estimate of the ills of

never

suificiently take into

life,

we

our consid-

eration the wonderful elasticity of our

moral

frame, the unlooked

startling facility with

ject

the

which the hu-

man mind accommodates

change of

for,

itself to all

circumstance, making an

ob-

and even a joy from the hardest

and seemingly the

least

redeemed con-

ditions of fate.
Eugene Aram.

Let any
let

him

September 19th.
look over his past

man

recall not

of agony, for to

life,

moments, not hours

them Custom lends

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

194

not her blessed magic; but

single out

physical or moral endurance

tily
first,

reverting to

series of days

but

it,

the

let

him

in has-

wretched

life,

him look more

little

closely, it

was
;

things, in the bustle of

dormant

him

without a star;

and

unheeded,

started forth into notice,

to

at

marked with the black

clouds

not so during the time of suffering

thousand

of

may seem

it

I grant, altogether

stone,

let

some lengthened period

then

and became

objects of interest or diversion

made familiar,
away from him, not less than if
had been all happiness; his mind

the dreary present, once

glided
it

dwelt not on the dull intervals, but

the stepping-stone

placed at each

it

had created and

and, by that

moral

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

195

dreaming which forever goes on within

man's secret heart, he lived as

little in

the immediate world before him, as in

the most sanguine period of his youth,

or the most scheming of his maturity.
Eugene Aram.

Septemher Wth.
"

Good

sense," said he one

Maltravers,

day to

not a merely intellec-

''is

It is rather the result

tual attribute.

of a just equilibrium of all our faculties, spiritual

est,

and moral.

or the toys of their

may have
ever,

genius

have good

The

own

dishon-

passions,

but they rarely,

if

sense in the conduct

They may often win large

prizes, but it is by a game of chance,
not skill. But the man whom I perof

life.

ceive walking

an honorable and up-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

196

right career

just

to himself (for
selves

to others,

we owe

and

also

justice to our-

to the care of our fortunes, our

to the management of our

a more dignified repre-

character
passions)

is

Maker than the mere

sentative of his
child of genius.

Ernest Maltravers.

jSeptemher 21st.

Of such a man, we say, he has good

SENSE yes, but he has also integrity,
;

self-respect,

sand

trials

and

self-denial.

which

thou-

his sense braves

and

conquers, are temptations also to his

probity
the

his temperin a word, to

many

ture.

have

all

sides of his complicated na-

]^ow, I do not think he will

this

good

se7ise

any more than a

drunkard will have strong nerves, un-

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

less

197

he be in the constant habit of

keeping his mind clear from the intoxication of envy, vanity,

and the various

emotions that dupe and mislead

Good

sense

is

not, therefore,

an ab-

stract quality or a solitary talent

it is

us.

but

the natural result of the habit of

thinking justly, and therefore seeing

and

clearly,

is

as different

from the

sagacity that belongs to a diplomatist

or attorney, as the philosophy of Socrates

differed

Gorgias.

from the rhetoric of

As a mass of individual exmake up this attribute in a

a mass of such men thus char-

cellencies

man, so

acterized give a character to a nation.

Ernest Maltravera.

jSeptemher 22d.

And

out from

all

these speculations,


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

198

to

which

do such hurried and scanty

justice,

he drew the blessed truth, that

carries

hope to the land of the

the hut of the

Bushman

Caffre,

that there

is

nothing in the flattened skull and the

ebon aspect that

improvement
ciple

which

God's law

rejects

that by the same prin-

raises the dog, the lowest

of animals in its savage state, to the

highest after

you

race

man

viz,

admixture of

can elevate into nations of

majesty and power the outcasts of humanity,

now your compassion

or your

scorn.
The Caxtona.

/Septemher 23d.

The worst

fatigue

is

that which

comes without exercise.

Ernest Maliravers.

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

Bejptember

199

^Iith.

But he who admits Ambition

to the

companionship of Love, admits a giant

that outstrides the gentler footsteps of
its

comrade.
Harold.

" Forget

we

SejptembeT ^5th.
" said Aram, stopping ab-

"ay, forget

ruptly;
truth

do

it

forget

passes over the furrow,

springs up

is

a strange

the

summer

and the corn

the sod forgets the flower

of the past year; the battlefield for-

gets the blood that has been spilt upon

its

turf

the sky forgets the storm

and the water the noonday sun that

slept

upon

its

bosom.

preaches forgetfulness.
is

All
Its

ISTature

very order

the progress of oblivion.

Eugene Aram.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

200

September 26th.

He who
pletely

never despairs seldom com-

fails.

Kenelm

Chillingly.

September 27th.

Do you
ety sitting

ever see a

mute

man

in

for hours,

any

soci-

and not

an uneasy curiosity to penetrate

feel

the wall he thus builds up between

others and himself ?

Does he not

in-

terest you far more than the brilliant

talker at your left

the

your right, whose shafts

on

the

man

airy wit at
fall in

sullen barrier of
Silence,

dark

vain

the silent

sister of

Nox and

Erebus, how, layer upon layer, shadow

upon shadow, blackness upon

ness,

black-

thou stretchest thyself from hell

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

to heaven, over thy

man's

201

two chosen haunts

heart and the grave

The Caxtons.

Septemher 28th.

Ah! do not fancy that in lovers'

quarrels there is any sweetness that
compensates the

sting.
Ernest Maltravers.

Septemler 29th.
us, not to indulge only in

God made
crystal

pictures,

pine alone, and

weave

idle

fancies,

mourn over what we

cannot helpbut to be alert and

tive

givers of happiness.

ac-

The Caxtons.

Septem.her 20th.

The pen

is

mightier than the sword.

Richelieu,

OCTOBER.

October

Theee

is

1st,

something so unselfish in

tempers reluctant to despond. You

that such persons are not occupied
see

with their

own

existence

they are not

life
fretting the calm of the present
the egotisms of care, and con-

with

jecture,

anxiety,

and calculation
it is

for another

heart of that other,

how

they learn

if

but in the

entire

trust

is

their

Eugene Aram.

October

Less terrible

is

it

M.
to find the

body

the
wasted, the features sharp with
on the
great life-struggle, than to look
face

from which the mind

is

gone


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

206

the eyes in which there

tion.

Such a sight

is

no recogni-

a startling shock

is

to that unconscious habitual material-

ism with which

to regard those

we
we

are apt familiarly

love

for in thus

missing the mind, the heart, the

tion that sprang to ours,

denly

made aware

that

we

affec-

are sud-

was the

it

something within the form, and not

the form

itself,

The form
altered

that was so dear to us.

itself

is still,

but that

lip

perhaps,

little

which smiles no

welcome, that eye which wanders over

us as strangers, that ear which distinguishes no

more our

we sought
own love is

is

not there

chilled

the friend

voices

back

Even our

grows a kind

of vague superstitious terror.

was not the matter,

still

Yes,

it

present to us.

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

which had conciliated

all

207

those subtle

nameless sentiments which are classed

and fused

was the

in the

word

" affection^''

it

airy, intangible, electric some-

thing^ the absence of

which now

ap-

pals us.
Tlie Caxtons.

October 3d.

The
on the

influence of fate seems so small

man who,

in erring, but errs as

the egoist, and shapes out of

use that can profit himself.

ill

some

But Fate

hangs a shadow so vast on the heart

that errs but in venturing abroad, and

knows only

in others the sources of

sorrow and joy.

Ernest Maltravers.

October

Shame

is

liili.

not in the loss of other

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

208

men's esteem,

it is

in the loss of our

own.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

October 5th.

In the pure heart of a girl loving for

the

first

time

love

is

far

more

than in man, inasmuch as

fevered by desire

makes the only

ence which

ecstatic

it

is

un-

love then and there

state of

human

exist-

at once capable of calm-

is

ness and transport.

Eugene Aram.

October 6th.

Things seem to approximate to God

in

proportion

movement.
and

How

Of

to

their

vitality

all things, least

sullen should be the soul of

and
inert

man.

the grass grows up over the very

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

graves

but
my

quickly

it

209

grows and greenly

neither so quick nor so green,

Blanche, as hope and comfort from

human

sorrows.
The Caxtons.

October 7th.
It is

in small states that glory

most active and pure,

the more con-

fined the limits of the circle, the

In small

ardent the patriotism.

opinion

is

is

more

states,

concentrated and strong,

every eye reads your actions

your

public motives are blended with your

private

ties,

row sphere
familiar

every
is

since

spot in your nar-

crowded with forms

your

childhood,

applause of your citizens

caresses of

your

is

the

like the

friends.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

210

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS
October 8th.

The haughty woman who can stand

alone and requires no leaning-place in

our heart, loses the spell of her sex.

Ernest MaUravers.

October 9th.

Genius

is

essentially honest.
Ernest MaUravers,

October 10th.

For, despite Helvetius, a

experience

teaches

education

and

us

that

common
though

circumstances

mould the mass, Nature

may

herself some-

times forms the individual, and throws

into the clay, or its spirit, so

much

of

beauty or deformity, that nothing can

utterly subdue the original elements of
character.
Ernest MaUravers,

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

211

October 11th.

No

man

son of fortune, no

himself and the world

placing

in antagonism,

can ever escape from some belief in the

and

Caesar could ridicule

invisible.

Koman

profane the mystic rights of

mythology, but he must

still

believe in

\A^ fortune.
Harold.

Octoler 12th.

Thou

Discovery

beautiful

land

the exiles, and Ararat to

tered

whom

Ark

of America.

Canaan

many

of

a shat-

Fair cradle of a race for

the unbounded heritage of a

future, that

no sage can conjecture, no

prophet divine,
promise-light of

lies

afar in the golden

Time

destined, per-

chance, from the sins and sorrows of a

civilization

struggling with

its

own

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

212

elements of decay, to renew the youth

of the world,

and transmit the great

England through the

soul of
Infinite

Change.

All

cycles of

climates

that

can best ripen the products of earth,

form into various character and

or

temper the different families of man,

" rain

influences "

from

heaven

the

that smiles so benignly on those

who

had once shrunk ragged from the wind,

or scowled on the thankless sun.
The Caxtons.

October 13th.
I

do think

it

requires a great sense

of religion, or, at all events, children

of one's own, in

whom

one

is

young

again, to reconcile oneself to becom-

ing old.
The Caxtons.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

213

October Hth.

Harold's Prayer hefore the Battle of

Hastings,

1066

Fought on

Octoler

Hth,

Lord of Hosts We Children of

Doubt and Time, trembling

in the

dare not take to ourselves to

dark,

Sorrow

question Thine unerring will.

and death, as joy and life, are at the

breath of a mercy divine, and a wis-

dom

all-seeing

of evil

and out

Thou drawest,

the eternity of Good.

of the hours

in mystic circle,
"

Thy

will be

in heaven."

done on earth, as

it is

events,

If,

prayers are not adverse to

human
Thy pre-

judged decrees, protect these

lives,

Disposer

of

our

bulwarks of our homes and

whom

the

altars, sons

the land offers as a sacrifice.

/
!

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

214

May

Thine angel turn aside the blade

as

of old

But

if,

from the heart of Isaac

Kuler of E"ations, in whose

moments, and

sight the ages are as

generations but as sands in the sea,

these lives are doomed,

may

the death

expiate their sins, and, shrived on the

battlefield,

and receive the

absolve

soul!
Harold.

October 15th.

Come,
of

my

I will tell

public

life

you the one

all its failure (for, in spite

tion, I

have

secret

that which explains

failed)

and

its

of

my

posi-

regrets

want conviction !
Tlie Caxions.

October 16th.

"There,"

Heaven.

thought

the

musing

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

cease

and

"cruelty

maiden,

there,

vanish

215

shall

strife

harsh

the

there,

those

dif-

whom

ferences

of

we have

loved and lost are found, and

life

through the Son,

sorrow,

we

who

tasted of mortal

are raised to the

the Eternal Father

The Last of

mh.The

Octoher

"And
sage,

home

of

the Barons.

Same.

there," thought the aspiring

"the

mind,

dungeoned

and

chained below, rushes free into the

realms of space

mystery

falls

Omniscient

there,

the

smiles

veil

on

through the darkness of

that

lamp

the

soul

from every

there,
those
life,

there.

the

who,

have fed
Thought,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

216

but the seed on earth, bursts into the

flower,

and ripens

to the fruit
The Last of

"
!

the

Barom.

October ISth.
Life

a sleep in which

is

we dream

most at the commencement and the

close

the

much

middle part absorbs us too

for dreams.
Ernest Maltravers.

October 19th.

Perhaps

would rather dream of

him, such as I would have him, than

know him

for

what he

He might
or love me

is.

be unkind, or ungenerous,
but
at

little

all,

my

rather Avould I not be loved

than loved coldly, and eat away

heart by comparing

it

can love him

now

stract, unreal,

and divine

as

with

his.

something ab:

but what

FBOM BULWER LYTTON.

my

would be

shame,

were to find him

agined

less

Then, indeed,

have been wasted

my

217

grief, if

than

my

have im-

would

life

then, indeed, the

beauty of the earth would be gone

Bienzi,

October Wth.
Soldiers brave not the dangers that

are braved

by a wise man

in

an un-

wise age
The Last of

the Barons.

October 2 1st.

How

incalculable

how measureless

how viewless the consequences of one

crime, even

when we think we have

weighed them

would

have

all

with

turned

scales

with

that
hair's

weight
Eugene Aram.


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

218

October

from

yourself

De-fine-gentlemanize

the crown of your head to the sole of

your

foot,

and become the greatest

aristocrat for so doing

than an aristocrat, he

for he
is

is

suffices in all things for himself

is

his

own

more

who
who

a king,

master, because he wants no

valetaille.

The Caxtons.

Oetoher 23d.

Stop there, Mr. Simcox.

Never mind

awhile.

Let her

learn to do good, that

God may

the devil

her;
rather

yet

the rest will follow.

make people

religious

first

love

would

through

their best feelings than their worst,

through their gratitude and

affections,

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

219

rather than their fears and calculations of risk

and punishment.
Ernest Maltravers.

October ^th.

we love that make

haunts we have known.

It is the persons

beautiful the

Harold,

October 26th.

man who gets in

himself may be soon

a passion with

out of temper

with others.
Eugene Aram.

October 26th.

The brave

man wants no charms

to

encourage him to his duty, and the

good man scorns

would deter

all

him from

warnings that
fulfilling

it.

Harold.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

220

There

is

October mth.
nothing more salutary to

men than occasional intervals

when we look within, inrepose,

active

of

stead of without,

and examine almost

insensibly (for I hold strict

scious self-scrutiny a thing

than

we

what

suspect)

we

settling,

is

and con-

much

rarer

what we have done

are capable of doing.

as

it

It

were, a debtor and

creditor account with the Past, before

we

plunge into

new

speculations.
Ernest Maltravers.

October 28th.
It is

better

to

sow a good heart

with kindness than a

field

for the heart's harvest

is

with corn,

perpetual.
Eugene Aram,

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

221

October 29th.

We

are apt to connect the voice of

Conscience with the

But

night.

innocent
"

think

hour.

It

stillness of

mid-

we wrong

that

that

is

NEXT MORNING," when

wide
fastens

away
duel

upon which

awake,
its

his

fangs.
all,

is

remorse

Has a man gambled

or shot his friend in a

when

it is

the next morn-

the irretrievable past rises

before him like a spectre

the churchyard of
its

reason

has he committed a crime, or

incurred a laugh
ing,

terrible

grizzly

dead

hour when

memory

then

is

then doth
yield

up

the witching

the foul fiend within us

can least tempt perhaps, but most

tor-

ment.
Ernest Maltravers.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

222

October 30th.

The doubt and the

the caprice

fear

and the change, which agitate the

sur-

face, swell also the tides, of passion.

Woman,

whose love

too,

is

so

much

the creature of her imagination,

al-

ways asks something of mystery and

conjecture in

It is a

fection.

object of her af-

the

luxury to her to per-

plex herself with a thousand apprehensions

lover

and the more

occupies

restlessly her

her mind, the

deeply he enthrals

more

it.

Eugene Aram.

October 31st.

By

St.

Dunstan

doth

what may be the cause

it

matter

of quarrel.

FE03I
SO long as

BULWEB LYTTON.

223

dog or man bears himself

bravely, with a due sense of honor and

derring-do.
The Last of

the Barons.

NOVEMBER.

I^ovemher

Me

Is

it

1st.

ruin

to

possible

the

and strong, and

Kuin me, with these thews and sinews
ruin me, with the education you have
healthy

young,

methews and sinews of the

mind! Oh no! there, Fortune is
given

harmless

The

Novemher

What

contradiction of

our

'2d.

deduction from

ever apply to love

the

high-spirited,

meek,

the

man

is

can

a very

the elements of

ordinary nature,

proud

reason

Love

all

Caxtons.

it

makes the

cheerful, sad,

tame

our strong-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

228

est

resolutions,

fail

before

our hardiest

energy-

it.

Eugene Aram.
ISl'ovem'ber 3d.

Continue to cultivate the mind, to

sharpen by exercise the genius, to

at-

tempt to delight or to instruct your

race

and even supposing you

short of every model

you

supposing

with your dust,

passed

life

you

your name
still

you

moulder
will

more nobly than the

borious herd.

how can you

may have

have
unla-

Grant that you win not

that glorious accident, **a

low,"

fall

set before

tell

name

be-

but what you

fitted yourself for

high des-

tiny and employ in the world not of

men, but of

spirits ?

The powers

of

the mind are things that cannot be

FE03f
less

BULWEB LYTTON.

229

immortal than the mere sense of

identity

their acquisitions

accompany

us through the Eternal Progress

we may

obtain a lower or a higher

grade hereafter, in proportion as

are

and

more or

less fitted

of our intellect to

we

by the exercise

comprehend and

ex-

ecute the solemn agencies of God.

Ernest 3IaUraver8,

JVoveviher 4th.

"A king without letters is a crowned

ass ? " When the king is an ass, asinine
are his

subjects.

Learn that a

full

head makes a weighty hand.

Harold,

Novemher

6th.

Happiness will not permit us to be

mirthful.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

230

November
" It is destiny "
!

human

heart

" It

6th.

phrase of the weak

is

destiny

apology for every error

"

dark

The strong

and the virtuous admit no destiny!

On earth, guides Consciencein heaven

watches God. And Destiny is but
the phantom we invoke to silence the
one

to dethrone the other

The Last of the Barons.

November 7th,
"Giacomo," said Angelo, thoughtfully, " there are

some men

whom

we,

mind and mould, can

rarely

comprehend, and never fathom.

And

of another

of such

men

have observed that a

supreme confidence in their own

tunes or their

own

common feature.

souls, is

for-

the most

Thus impressed, and

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

231

thus buoyed, they rush into danger

with a seeming madness, and from danger soar to greatness, or sink to death.
Bienzi.

November 8th.
The only gold a young man should
covet

is

enough

to

suffice

the

for

knight's spurs to his heels.

The Last of the Barons.

November
"

Men

sadly, yet

women

9th.

are often deceived," said she

with a half smile

rarely,

^'

but

save in love."
Bienzi.

November
"Whoever

is

10th.

above the herd, whether

knight or scholar, must learn to despise the hootings that follow Merit.

The Last of the Barons.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

232

Novemher

God and His

11th.

angels are in every

spot where virtue trembles and resists.

The Last of the Barons.

Noveiiiber l^th.
It

is

when

a dark epoch in a man's

sleep

tosses to

forsakes him;

and

fro,

not be silenced;

when he

and Thought

when

life

will

the drug and

draught are the courters of stupefaction,

is

not sleep

when

as a knotted log

close but

with an

down pillow
when the eyelids
the

effort,

and there

is

drag and a weight, and a dizziness in

the eyes at morn.
Eugene Aram.

Novemher

13th.

Desire and grief, and love, these are

the

young man's torments, but

iliQj

233

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

Time; Time
are the creatures of
the vigils
moves them as it brings, and
re-

days come
keep, "while the evil
brief and few. But
not," if weary, are

we

and
Memory, and Care and Ambition,
demon-gods that
Avarice, these are the
them.
the Time that fathered
defy

Eugene Aram.

Novemher

The
growth
grave

is

of

mature

dug but

IJfth.

are

passions

worldlier

years,

the

and their

in our own.

northern
dark Spirits in the

As
tale,

the
that

of one of a
watch against the coming
lest, if he
brighter and holier race,
he bind them
seize them unawares,
ward
in his chain, they keep

prisoners

entrance of that deep

at night over the

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

234

cave

the

away

human

heart

and

scare

the angel Sleep

Eugene Aram.

November 15th.
Amidst the grief and solitude

of the

pure, there comes, at times, a strange

and rapt

serenity

sleep-awake

over which the instinct of

life

beyond

the grave glides like a noiseless dream

and ever that heaven that the soul

yearns for
the fond

is

colored

human

by the

heart,

fancies of

each fashion-

ing the above from the desires unsatisfied below.

The Last of the Barons.

JVovemher 16th.
Better task than that of astrologers,

and astronomers to boot

Who among

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

them can

" loosen the

band

235

of Orion " ?

but who amongst us may not be permitted by

God

to

have sway over the

action and orbit of the

human
The

November

soul ?
Caxtons.

17th.

In a dominant church the genius of

intolerance

hetrays

its

cause;

weak and a persecuted

same genius mainly

in

church, the

supports.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

November

18th.

Terrible and eternal moral for Wis-

dom and
kings

for Avarice, for sages

and for

ever shall he who would be the

maker

of

gold,

breathe

the air of

death
The Last of the Barons.


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

236

NoveTnher 19th.
these
The Night and the Solitude
make the ladder round which angels
!

cluster,

Oh

can dream of God.

know what

is

none can

nursing no

and dreading no danger

him

with

murmur
in the

spirit

the pilgrim feels as he

walks on his holy course

fear,

my

and beneath which

He

glad tidings

shadow

of

for God

hears the winds

;

the woods sleep

Almighty wings

stars are the Scriptures of

the

Heaven, the

tokens of love, and the witnesses of

immortality.

J^ight

is

the Pilgrim's

day.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

Behold

out of his

November Wth.
the kingdom a man makes

own mind

is

the only one

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

that

it

delighteth

hold, he

lord over

is

movements

man

its

237

to govern
its

Be-

springs and

wheels revolve and

stop at his bidding.

The Last of the Barons.

JSTovemher 21st.

Freedom alone makes men

sacrifice

to each other.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

Novemher '2'2d.
But while a nation has already a
fair

degree of constitutional freedom,

I believe

no struggle so perilous and

awful as that between the aristocratic

and the democratic

principle.

ple against a despot

quires no prophet

an

A peo-

that contest re-

but the change from

aristocratic to a democratic

com-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

238

monwealth

is

indeed the wide, un-

bounded prospect upon which

rest

shadows, clouds, and darkness.

Ernest Maltravers.

NovemheT ^Sd.
with stern and

It is ever the case

stormy

spirits,

the

that

which contrast them

into their affections.

human

meek ones

steal strangely

This principle of

nature can alone account for

the enthusiastic devotion which the

mild
in

sujfferings of

the Saviour

awoke

the fiercest exterminators of the

North.

In proportion, often, to the

warrior's ferocity,

was

his love to that

Divine model, at whose sufferings he

wept, to whose
barefoot,

tomb he wandered

and whose example of com-

passionate forgiveness he would have

FEOM BULWEB LYTTON.

thought himself the basest of
follow

239

men

to

Harold,

November

^^th.

Charm was the characteristic of

Lady EUinor a charm indefinable.

It

was not the mere grace of refined

breeding, though that went a great

way

it

was a charm that seemed to

spring from natural sympathy.

Whom-

soever she addressed, that person ap-

peared for the

moment

to

engage

all

her attention, to interest her whole

mind.

She had a

very peculiar.

gift of conversation

She made what she

said like a continuation of

said to her.

She seemed as

what was
if

she had

entered into your thoughts, and talked

them

aloud.

Her mind was

evidently

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

240

cultivated with great care, but she

perfectly void of pedantry.

an allusion
she

knew

sufficed to

was

hint,

show how much

to one well instructed, with-

out mortifying or perplexing the

ig-

norant.
The Caxtons.

November

The law
polite

than

is

^5th.

very obliging, but more

efficient.

The Last Days of Pompeii,

November

26th.

Ambition, like any other passion,

gives us

unhappy moments

us also an animated
suit,

not

life.

but it gives

In

its

pur-

the minor evils of the world are

felt

little crosses, little

do not disturb
in sleep,

we

us.

Like

vexations

men who walk

are absorbed in one pow-

BULWEB LYTTON.

FE03I
erful dream,

241

and do not even know the

obstacles in our way, or the dangers

that surround us

no private

life.

in a

word we have

All that

anxiety

merely

is

and the

domestic,

the

which

other men, which blight the

fret

happiness of other men, are not

us

we

we
lose

are wholly public

much

comfort,

we

loss

felt

so

by

that

escape

if

much

care.
Eugene Aram.

I^ovemher

From

27tli.

this record of error

he drew

forth the grand eras of truth.

He

showed how earnest men never think

in vain,
errors.

though their thoughts

He

age after age, the

on

like

may

proved how, in vast

be

cycles,

human mind marches

the ocean, receding here, but

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

242

there advancing

how from

the specu-

lations of the Greeks sprang all true

how from the institutions

Koman rose all durable systems
government how from the robust

philosophy

of the
of

follies of

chivalry,

the north came the glory of

and the modern

delicacies of

honor, and the sweet, harmonizing

fluences of

in-

woman.
The Gaxtons.

J^ominber 28th.

Time had been, indeed, at work but,

with the same exulting bound and
happy voice, that little brook leaped
along its way. Ages hence, may the
;

course be as glad, and the

full of

mirth

They

murmur

as

are blessed things,

those remote and unchanging streams

they

fill

us with the same love as

if

FEOM BULWEE LYTTON.

243

they were living creatures ! and in a

green corner of the world there is one
that, for

my

part, I never see

without

forgetting myself to tears tears that

I would not lose for a king's ransom
tears that
call

from

affection,

no other sight or sound could

their source

what

tears of

soft regret

what

tears that

leave me, for days afterward, a better

and a kinder man

Eugene Aram.

Nommher Wth.
I

have noted myself in life, that there

are objects, senseless as that

iron,

which,

round

if

we

labor at

our hearts as

and blood.

if

mould

of

them, wind

they were flesh

So some men love

learn-

ing, others glory, others power.

The La8t of the Barons,

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

244

JVovemher SOth.
Better

hew wood and draw

water,

then attach ourselves devotedly to an

art in

which we have not the capacity

to excel.

...

It is to

healthful objects of

dream,
it

is

worse

to

throw away the

life

for a diseased

than the Kosicrucians,

make a

sacrifice of all

human

beauty for the smile of a sylphid, that

never

visits

us but in visions.
Ernest Maltravera,

DECEMBER.

December

Examine

not,

1st.

child of

man

ex-

amine not that mysterious melancholy

with the hard eyes of thy reason
canst not impale

it

thou

on the spikes of thy

thorny logic, nor describe

its

enchanted

by problems conned from thy

circle

schools.

worlds

Borderer

the

thyself

two

Dead and the Living

give thine ear to the tones,

soul to the

of

shadows that

bow thy

steal, in

the

Season of Change, from the dim Border

Land.
The Caxtons.

Decemher

'2d.

Tlie

Creed of an An-

cient Egyptian.

Of

that which created the world,

we know, we can know,

nothing, save

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

248

power and unvarying

crushing, relentless
regularity heeding no individual cases
rollingsweepingburning on no
these attributes

regularity

stern,

matter what scattered hearts, severed

from the general mass,

scorched beneath

its

fall

ground and

wheels.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

December 3d.
Thus,

when a great man, who has

en-

grossed our thoughts, our conjectures,

our homage,
left

in

dies,

a gap seems suddenly

the world

a wheel in

the

mechanism of our own being appears

abruptly stilled

a portion of ourselves,

and not our worst portion, for how

many
it

pure, high, generous sentiments

contains, dies with

him

The Last Days of Pompeii.

FROM BULWER LYTTON,

December

Thou

Ifth.

249

A Loveless Match.

dost not love.

Bid farewell

ever to thy fond dreams of a

life

for-

more

From

blessed than that of mortals.

the stormy sea of the future are blotted

out eternally for thee

Golden
the

Thou

Isle.

paint on the

canst

dim canvas

form of

couldst

Calyph and her

dwell

no more

of thy desires

her with

whom

thou

forever.

Thou

hast

been unfaithful to thine

own

ideal

thou hast given thyself forever and

forever

to

another

thou

thou

must

nounced hope

prison, with a being with

hast

re-

live as in a

whom

thou

hast not the harmory of love.

Ernest Maltravers.

December

5th.

A Love Match.

Attest the betrothal of these young

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

250

hearts,

ye Powers that draw nature

to nature

by

can trace,

which no galdra

spells

and have wrought

Attest
attest

fect as love,

thou altar!
air!

may

While

the

in the

no mystery so per-

secrets of creation

thou temple,

it,

it,

sun and

forms are divided,

the souls cling together

sorrow

with sorrow, and joy with joy.

And

when, at length, bride and bridegroom

are one,

stars,

may

the trouble

with which ye are charged have exburthen

may no danger

hausted

its

molest,

and no malice

disturb,

but,

over the marriage-bed, shine in peace,

ye stars
Harold.

Decemher
In that love

my

6th.

spirit

awoke, and

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

251

was baptized every thought that has

in
risen from earth, and lost itself
by
heart
my
into
heaven, was breathed
;

thee!

Thy

creature

hadst thou tempted

and thy

me

slave,

to sin, sin

had

seemed hallowed by thy voice; but

thou saidst, " True love is virtue," and
thee.
so I worshipped virtue in loving

Strengthened, purified, by thy bright

companionship, from thee came the
strength to resign

theefrom thee the

refuge under the wings of

God

from

thee the firm assurance that our union

yet shall

benot

as our poor Hilda

dreams, on the perishable earth,but

there! oh, there! yonder by the
celestial altars, in the
all spirits

land in which

are filled with love.

Harold.


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

252

my

Kill

Decemher 7th.
labor and thou destroyest

VCLQ

The Last of

the Barons.

December 8th.
Look round on Nature

behold the

only company that humbles

me

not

except the dead whose souls speak to

us

from the immortality of books.

These herbs at your

secrets

their life

me

know

feet, I

their

watch the mechanism of

they have taught

language the stars I have

their

the winds

unravelled their mysteries

and

these,

God
by my mood to

the creatures and ministers of

these I offend not

them

I utter

forth into

my

and without

my

thoughts, and break

dreams, without reserve

fear.

Eugene Aram.

FB03I

BULWEB LYTTON.

Decemher

253

9th.

The tyrant thinks he is free, because

the meanest
he commands slaves
peasant in a free state is more free
:

than he

is.

Bienzi.

December
"

And

travers,
lieart

if,

stars

10th.

"

murmured Malhis excited

from the depths of

"

if

have been insensible to

your solemn beauty

if

the Heaven

and the Earth had been to

air

and

clay

if

me

but as

were one of a dull

and dim-eyed herd

might

live on,

and drop into the grave from the

ness of unprofitable years.

ripe-

It is be-

cause I yearn for the great objects of

an immortal being, that

and

shrivels

up

life

like a scroll.

shrinks

Away

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

254

I will not listen to these

human and

material monitors, and consider

life

as a thing greater than the things that

I

would

glory

is

live for.

My

choice

is

made,

more persuasive than the

grave."
Ernest Maltravers.

December

As courage was
honor

called

from which
proceed

so

all

11th.

the

forth

first

the

safety and

we do

virtue that
first

virtue

civilization

right to keep that

one virtue at least clear and unsullied

from

all

the money-making, mercenary,

pay-me-in-cash abominations which are

the vices, not the virtues, of the

zation

it

civili-

has produced.
The Caxtona.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

December
There

is

255

12th.

a terrible disconnection be-

tween the author and the man

author's

life

and the man's

eras of visible triumph

life

may

the
the

be those

of the most intolerable, though unre-

vealed

and

unconjectured

The book that delighted

may

first

anguish.

us to compose

appear in the hour when

all

things under the sun are joyless.

Ernest Maltravers.

December

13th.

Ars Longa

Vita

Brevis.

vast empire rises on

my

view,

greater than that of Caesars and con-

querors

an

empire durable and uni-

versal in the souls of men, that time

itself

cannot overthrow

marches with me,

side

by

and Death
side,

and the

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

256

hand waves me back

skeleton

nothingness of

to the

common men.
Ernest Maltravers.

December

"Your

IJ/ih.

Holiness knows well," said

the Cardinal, " that for the multitude

of

men

war

there are

two watchwords

of

Liberty and Keligion."

Bienzi,

Decemher

A young man's
ity,

it

15th.

ambition

has no definite aim,

with a thousand toys.

is

but van-

it

plays

As with one

passion, so with the rest.

love

is

In youth,

ever on the Aving, but, like the

birds in April,

it

hath not yet built

its

nest.
With so long a career of summer and hope before it, the disappointment of to-day is succeeded by the

FE03I

BULWER LYTTON.

novelty of to-morrow

and

257

the sun

that advances to the noon but dries up

its

But when we have

fervent tears.

arrived at that epoch of

if

the light

wither,

we

fail

us

life,

when,

the last rose

if

feel that the loss

cannot

be retrieved, and that the frost and

the darkness are at hand,

Love

be-

comes to us a treasure that we watch

over and hoard with a miser's care.

Our youngest-born
darling

and

our

affection
idol,

the

is

our

fondest

pledge of the Past, the most cherished

of our hopes for the Future.

A cer-

tain melancholy that mingles with our

joy the possession, only enhances

charm.
ent on

We
it

feel ourselves so

for all that

Our other barks

our

is

its

depend-

yet to come.

gay

galleys of

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

258

pleasure

have

our stately argosies of

morseless wave.

we

pride

been swallowed up by the

On

freight our all

ment we commit
that guides

it is

re-

this last vessel

to

our guide,

tempest that menaces,

tene-

its frail

ourselves.

The

star

and in the

we behold our

own doom
Alice,

December
It

was one

those strange

16th.

of those listless panics,

fits

of indifference and

lethargy which often seize upon a people

who make

liberty a matter of im-

pulse and caprice, to

whom

it

has be-

come a catchword, who have not long

enjoyed

all its rational,

practical,

and blessed

and sound, and

results;

who

have been affrayed by the storms that

FBOM BULWEB LYTTON.

herald

its

common

dawn

people such as

to the south:

the north has

259

is

such as even

known; such

had

as,

Cromwell lived a year longer, even

England might have seen; and,

in-

deed, in some measure, such a reaction

from popular enthusiasm to pop-

ular

indifference

when her
the

fruits

children
of

England

did

see,

madly surrendered
bloody war, with-

out reserve, without foresight, to the

lewd pensioner of Louis, and the royal

murderer of Sydney.

To such

prostra-

tion of soul, such blindness of intellect,

even the noblest people will be subjected,

when

liberty,

which should be

the growth of ages, spreading

its

roots

through the strata of a thousand

toms,

is

raised, the exotic of

cus-

an hour.


BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

260

and

(like

the tree and

cient fable) flourishes

Dryad

of an-

and withers with

the single spirit that protects

it.

Bienzi,

December

What

17th.

has been the use of those ac-

quirements

Has he

kind by them
the historian

Show me

the

yield to none of
line herself in

benefited man-

and

orator,

you

the poet
I will

no, not to

homage

Made-

of their genius

but the mere creature of books

dry and

the

sterile collector of

other men's

nono.

should I ad-

learning

What

mire in such a machine of

literature,

except a waste of perseverance

Eugene Aram,

December
Love, in

its first

18th,

dim and imperfect

FROM BULWER LYTTON.

shape,

is

on one

261

but imagination concentrated

object.

It is a genius of the

heart, resembling that of the intellect

it

appeals

sentiments

to, it

and

stirs up, it

evokes the

sympathies that

lie

Its sigh is

most latent in our nature.

that moves over the ocean,

the spirit

and rouses the Anadyomene into

Therefore

is

it,

that

life.

mind produces

affections deeper than those of exter-

nal form

therefore

that

it is,

are worshippers of glory,

women

which

is

the

palpable and visible representative of

a genius whose operations they cannot

always comprehend.
Alice.

December

19th.

Genius has so much in

love

the

common with

imagination that animates

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

262

one

much

so

is

the property of the

that there

other

is

not a surer sign of

the existence of genius than the love

that

creates

it

etrates

and bequeaths.

deeper

than

It pen-

reason

the

it

binds a nobler captive than the fancy.

As

the sun upon the

the

human

its light.

gives to

heart both

its

shadow and

Nations are

its

worshippers

and wooers
its

dial, it

and Posterity learns from

oracles

to

dream

to

aspire

to

adore
Alice.

December Wth.
If a

man

that he

is

is

called a genius,

in this

life.

for anything but a garret

into

means

to be thrust out of all the

good things
nius

it

office

make

He
!

is

not

Put a

fit

ge-

a genius a

FB03I
bishop

BULWER LYTTON.
a

or

lord

chancellor

263

the

world would be turned topsyturvy

You

see that

you are quite astonished,

that a genius can be even a county

know

magistrate, and

the difference

between a spade and a poker

fact,

a genius

is

In

supposed to be the

most ignorant, impracticable, good-fornothing, do-nothing, sort of thing that

ever walked upon two legs.

men have
and

fishes

rise in

fers

Mediocre

the monopoly of the loaves

;

and even when talent does

life, it is

a talent that only

dif-

from mediocrity by being more

energetic and bustling.

Alice.

Decemher '21st.
His was the age when we most
sitively enjoy the

mere sense of

sen-

exist-

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

264

ence

when

the face of J^ature, and a

passive conviction of the benevolence

of our Great Father, suffice to create a

serene and ineffable happiness, which

rarely visits us

the passions;
alive

till

we have done with

till

memories,

if

more

than heretofore, are yet mel-

lowed

in the hues of time,

harmony

softens

into

perities

and harshness

all
;

and Faith
their

till

as-

nothing

within us remains to cast a shadow

over the things without

verge of

life,

and

on the

the Angels are nearer to

us than of yore.

There

is

an old ago

which has more youth of heart than

youth

itself
Alice,

December 22d.
Oh, Youth! begin not thy career

FB03I

BULWEB LYTTON.

265

too soon, and let one passion succeed

due order to another

in its

so

every season of life

may have

propriate pursuit and

charm

that

its

ap-

Alice,

December ^Sd,

The

fact

is,

that in civilization

behold a splendid aggregate;

we

litera-

ture and science, wealth and luxury,

commerce and glory

we

but

see not

the million victims crushed beneath

the health
breadless the

the wheels of the machine

sacrij&ced

the board
the hospitals

jails

filled

the

human

spring,

poisoned

and poured forth

Neither do

marked

life

we remember

by

reeking

desolation,

all

every

in

like

water!

the steps,

crime,

and

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

266

bloodshed,

by which

barren sum-

this

mit has been reached.

Alice.

December

2Jf.th.

But the discontent does not prey

upon the springs of

life

it is

the

content of hope, not of despair;

dis-

it calls

forth faculties, energies, and passions,

in

which there

row.

It

is

more joy than

is

this

which makes

desire

the citizen in private

an anxious

life

father, a careful master,

sor-

an

active,

and

You

therefore not an unhappy, man.

allow that individuals can effect individual good

this

very

restlessness,

this very discontent with the exact

place that he occupies,

makes the

zen a benefactor in his narrow

Commerce, better than

citi-

circle.

charity, feeds

FB03I

BULWEB LYTTON.

267

the hungry, and clothes the naked.

Ambition, better than brute affection,

gives education to our children, and
teaches them the love of industry, the

pride of independence, the respect for

others and themselves

^^^^^

December ^5th. Christmas Day.

Was it not worthy of a God to descend to these dim valleys, in order to
clear up the clouds gathered over the

mount beyond to satisfy the

doubts of sages to convert specula-

dark

tion

into

certainty by example to

point out the rules of life by revelation to solve the

enigma of the grave

and to prove that the soul did not

yearn in vain when it dreamed of an
immortality?
"^

,
. ^
The Last Days of Pompeii.

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

268

December

26th.

said the

Nazarene

"Come,"

perceived the effect

"

come

meet

to the

listen

and

of

our

which we

hall in

chosen few

there to our prayers

sincerity

he

he had produced)

humble

select

(as

note the

repentant

mingle in our simple

sacrifice

tears

not of

victims, nor of garlands, but offered

by white-robed thoughts upon the

of the heart.

there

are

over us

The flowers

imperishable

when we

that

they

are no

more

altar

we

lay

bloom
;

nay,

they accompany us beyond the grave,

they spring up beneath our feet in
heaven, they delight us with an eternal
odor, for they are of the soul, they

partake of

its

nature; these offerings

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

are

269

overcome, and sins

temptations

repented."
The Last Days of Pompeii.

Thou

December '27th.
comest amongst us

an

as

examiner, mayest thou remain a convert

Yon

Our

religion ?

you behold

cross our sole image,

yon

it

scroll

the mysteries of our Csere and Eleusis

Our morality ?
sinners

we

all

it

is

in

have been; who

can accuse us of a crime

tized ourselves

from the

not that this

of us,

is

our lives

we have
past.

it is

now
bap-

Think

of God.

The Last Days of Pompeii.

Decemher

28th.

Apaecides had already learned that

the faith of the philosophers

was not

BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

270

that of the herd

that

they secretly

if

some diviner

professed

power,

was not the creed which

it

creed

in

they thought

it

community.

He had

wise to impart to the

already learned,

that even the priest ridiculed

what he

that

the no-

preached to the people

tions of the

few and the many were

never united.
it

But, in this

new

faith,

seemed to him that philosopher,

priest,

and people, the expounders of

the religion and

alike accordant

and

its

followers,

were

they did not speculate

debate upon immortality, they

spoke of

it

assured;

the

as

a thing certain and

magnificence

promise dazzled him

its

of

the

consolations

soothed.
The Last Days of Pompeii.

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

271

December 29th.
Yes, he was a rare character, that
village

priest

Would

it

have been

better for Christianity, or the State,

yet, alas! so

spiritual

if

And

they had made him a bishop?

do we confound things

with things temporal, that

nine readers out of ten would be glad

to find, at the

end of these volumes,

that the poor curate had been " properly

rewarded for

Do lawn
and the

sleeves, a

title

make more

his deserts."

of "

powdered wig,

My Lord the Bishop,"

beautiful on the mountain-

tops the feet of

him who bringeth glad

tidings ?
Alice.

December

30th.

Beauty, thou art twice blessed

thou

a
BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS

272

blessest the gazer

and the possessor;

often, at once the effect

and the cause

A sweet disposition
an affectionate nature
will speak in the eyes the
the
brow and become the cause of beauty.
of goodness

lovely soul

lips

On

the other hand, they

commands

gift that

opens

all

hearts,

the world
to hope

love, a

are

clined to look with

who have

key that

ordinarily in-

happy eyes upon

to be cheerful and serene

and to

confide.

There

more

is

wisdom than the vulgar dream

of, in

our admiration of a fair face.

Alice,

December

What
its

is

31st.

the Earth to Infinity

duration to the Eternal

what

Oh,

how

FROM BULWEB LYTTON.

much

greater

is

273

the soul of one

than the vicissitudes

of

the

man

whole

globe.
Zanoni.

stp

mo

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Neutralizing agent:
Treatment Date:

111

April

2009

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