Read Ebook: Mountain Meditations and some subjects of the day and the war by Lind Af Hageby L Lizzy

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 342 lines and 46523 words, and 7 pages

Transcriber's Note:

Footnotes have been moved to follow the paragraphs in which they are referenced.

OBSERVATIONS ON THE SERMONS OF ELIAS HICKS

SEVERAL LETTERS TO HIM;

WITH

SOME INTRODUCTORY REMARKS,

ADDRESSED TO THE

JUNIOR MEMBERS

OF THE

SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.

BY A DEMI-QUAKER.

Robert Waln

PHILADELPHIA 1826.

TO THE JUNIOR MEMBERS OF THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS.

The situation in which the Society of Friends has of late been placed, has, I have no doubt, attracted the attention of all its members; and that even those among you who have not been in the habit of attending its meetings for discipline, are no strangers to their proceedings, although you have not yet felt it your duty to take any part in them. And to you more especially I submit the observations contained in the following letters.

When in my early days I sometimes attended these meetings, my mind was filled with admiration at the harmony and prudence with which their affairs were conducted, and that genuine christian forbearance, one with another, which enabled them to triumph over all the difficulties which are imposed by conflicting opinions, and generally to unite in the adoption of such measures as true wisdom dictated; and it was gratifying to me to observe that it was, to other sects, a subject of wonder, how any numerous association could conduct their business without the intervention of votes or other substitutes, to ascertain the opinions of the majority of the assembly.

The form is, I have no doubt, yet preserved, and the language of forbearance and humility retained by many who in their hearts entertain far different feelings; and the proceedings have in several instances proved, that the spirit which formerly pervaded these assemblies, no longer prevails in some of them.

Why this great change has taken place, will no doubt be ascribed to different causes by the parties more immediately interested: an impartial spectator may form conclusions different from many of them, and may be permitted to ask, whether the leading causes may not have been produced by some of that class, to whom the great majority of the members of the society look for instruction.

The situation of a christian teacher is of awful responsibility, and in the Society of Friends peculiarly beset with dangers, not only because of the high claim on which their ministry is founded, and which seems to require a degree of unremitting watchfulness with which it is difficult for man to comply; but also, because it requires a constant attention to keeping the mind in that state of lowliness and humility, which can alone preserve them from mistaking the wanderings of the imagination for a call of duty; and from those feelings which lead them to seek after the applause of men. Hence it must necessarily follow, that but few among them are always preserved in such a state of mind, as not to require the caution and advice of their friends: and consequently, that some portion of the society must be selected to watch over their conduct; and as this is an office of the greatest importance to their well being, the greatest care ought to be observed in the appointment. The elders are the depositaries of this power, so essential to the very existence of the society; and as the most prudent and cautious use of it cannot always prevent the objects of their attention from feelings of resentment, so it will naturally follow, that those to whom the exercise of it is most necessary, will always be the most zealous in abridging it.

This impatience of control is increased by a ranting spirit which seems of late to have infected a portion of the society, and which, in its consequences, is always more injurious than infidelity itself; and generally arises from a restlessness of disposition, which not content with the measure of light which may have been imparted, is always aspiring after greater things. It arises from a desire after distinction; and as this disposition must prevent a growth in genuine religion, the delusions of self-love easily enable a man to substitute his own imaginations for revelations; and as every passion is strengthened by indulgence, he proceeds from one step to another, until he fancies himself under the constant and peculiar guidance of the spirit, not only in his religious duties, but in all the temporal concerns of life. It naturally follows, that when he has persuaded himself that he is thus gifted and endowed, he will feel himself above the advice of men, and regard all regulations which may have a tendency to restrain his wanderings, as obstructing him in his duties, and it will be one of his favourite objects to relieve himself from all control. How individuals actuated by such passions can subject the minds of others to their illusions, would indeed be wonderful, did not history furnish sufficient proof that it is difficult to calculate too largely on the credulity of a portion of mankind.

Whenever this disposition of mind is discovered, especially in any part of the ministry, every reflecting member of society must perceive the necessity of adopting means to prevent the injurious consequences of it; and as that duty more especially devolves on the elders, they soon become objects of dislike to the sublimated spirits opposed to them, and the diminution of their power and authority, the first and favourite scheme.

That they will not succeed, I am fully persuaded; because I think it must be evident to every unclouded mind, that without such salutary interference as they often find it necessary to exercise, all order and propriety would be banished from the society.

Cunning is not more inconsistent with fanaticism, than it is with lunacy; for however perverted the mind may be in relation to particular subjects, we often see individuals in both situations, adopting the most plausible means for the accomplishment of the most irrational objects. It is not therefore to be expected that any attempts will be made totally to abolish the eldership: such a proposal would hardly be successful; but if means are found to render that body less independent, and to diminish the weight and authority which they have long and deservedly possessed, it may subserve the cause, and lead to ultimate success in their projects: and here, if any where, the danger seems to be.

Footnote 1:

It is with this disposition that such extraordinary solicitude has been manifested, to induce the youth of the society and others of its members, who had before silently attended to its proceedings, to take part in its deliberations, and to flatter them into a belief that they are qualified to administer to its affairs and direct its proceedings; instead of recommending an endeavour to discipline the mind to the weighty business of the society, and cautioning them against indulging a spirit of judging without a serious and solemn consideration of the subject; and against interrupting the business by their councils, unless it is under a solemn impression of duty.

The effect has been such as might be expected, and was probably intended. Individuals who had before taken no part in the deliberations of the society, and who, had never evinced that disposition of mind which had before been thought a necessary qualification of an active member, are now among the most busy; and some of the younger portion of the society forgetting that modesty is the most becoming ornament of youth, are found opposing their unripe notions with unhesitating pertinacity, to the wisdom and experience of age.

Under these circumstances is it not proper for you to consider whether you have not a part to act? When you look back to the history of your society and consider its admirable organization; and when you reflect on the respectable standing, to which the unostentatious propriety by which all its transactions have been governed, has raised it; you must be impressed with an honest zeal for its welfare; and that reverence which every ingenuous mind feels for the institutions and practices of their ancestors, strengthened as it is in this case by the best of all tests, a long experience, must induce you to oppose the innovations of the restless agitators of the present day: and your good sense will, I trust, enable you to distinguish between true religion and fanaticism, and not permit you to lose your reverence for the one, in contemplating the wild deformity of the other.

And perhaps you may be induced to believe that your attendance at the meetings for discipline, may not be without its use; that your presence may give additional strength and encouragement to the long tried standard bearers, and though you may not feel yourselves called upon to take a very active part in their deliberations, your example may be of use to some of those froward spirits, who, whatever may be their exterior appearance, are less qualified for the important business than many of yourselves.

I know there are individuals in every stage of life, who judge of preaching as others do of music, by the concord of sweet sounds; and who are convinced more by the harmony of a well turned sentence, than by the sentiment it is intended to convey; whose religion is founded on sensation rather than reflection, and is an affair of feeling instead of a deliberate sense of duty. To these I have nothing to say. My endeavour has been to show the inconsistencies into which men are led, by unfounded pretensions to a state of perfectability, and an acquaintance with the inscrutable workings of Providence, to show that such lofty aspirations are not in accordance with the genuine principles of the religion of Jesus Christ; and that it is by a submissive acquiescence in the measure of knowledge communicated, and an anxious endeavour to fulfil the obligations it imposes, rather than by curious researches into hidden things, that we best perform our duties here; and as no intelligent mind among you can believe that the suggestions of infinite wisdom are ever contradictory, it was part of my plan to show the inconsistencies in the doctrines of the great leader of the illuminati of your soclasting assault upon the Gods by the Titans, sons of strife. And if you are very patient you may witness Zeus, the lightning-gatherer, pierce the black clouds and rend the sky, illuminating hill and vale with the fierce light which makes even the battle of Troy intelligible.

You may bathe your soul in that Natura Maligna which only reveals its blessings to pagans and poets. Byron is the chosen bard of the destructive might of the mountains--

Ye toppling crags of ice! Ye avalanches, whom a breath draws down In mountainous o'erwhelming, come and crush me! . . . . . The mists boil up around the glaciers; clouds Rise curling fast beneath me, white and sulphury, Like foam from the roused ocean of deep Hell, Whose every wave breaks on a living shore, Heaped with the damned like pebbles.

He had the nature-mystic's thirst for a touch of the untamed power of Nature, for communion with the magnificence of death, shaking the mountain with wind and falling snow, with leaping rock and earth-eating torrent. Such would fain die that they may experience the joys of being possessed by Nature. For they have entered on the marriage of life and death, heaven and hell, and out of the roaring cataclysm of destruction they rise winged with a new life.

Whilst the poets chant the awful power of the distant mountain, Byron comes to us out of the mountain, fashioned by its force, intoxicated by the wine of its wild life. Mountain climbers meet with strange and unexpected bedfellows in the course of their wanderings. In his cry for the baptism of the wild winds of the mountain, Matthew Arnold approaches Byron closely--

Ye storm-winds of Autumn . . . . . Ye are bound for the mountains-- Ah, with you let me go . . . . . Hark! fast by the window The rushing winds go, To the ice-cumber'd gorges, The vast seas of snow. There the torrents drive upward Their rock-strangled hum, There the avalanche thunders The hoarse torrent dumb. --I come, O ye mountains! Ye torrents, I come!

Shelley sings exquisitely of its grandeur, its ceaseless motion; he voices the wonderment of man before the complex problem of Mont Blanc. But his mind has never participated in the revels on the mountain, he has not lost and barely recovered his soul in adventurous crevasses. He retains something of the old horror of the desolate heights--

A desert peopled by the storms alone, Save when the eagle brings some hunter's bone, And the wolf tracks her there. How hideously, Its shapes are heaped around! rude, bare, and high, Ghastly, and scarred, and riven.--Is this the scene Where the old Earthquake-daemon taught her young Ruin?

There is a trace of the same awe in Coleridge's deathless hymn to Mont Blanc--

On thy bald, awful head, O sovran Blanc, . . . . . O dread and silent mount!

Nearly all the poets have been moved by the primitive sense of their awe-commanding power. Wordsworth never forgets the blackness, though he is, above all, the bard of mountain light and sweetness, of warbling birds and maiden's haycocks. The poet does not lose the blessed gift of wonder possessed by children and savages. And nothing in Nature can startle the mind like the sight of a mighty range of mountains. They recall primitive feelings of fear before the great unknown, they tower above the human form with a colossal imperturbability which withers our importance and confuses our standards of value. Victor Hugo never quite freed himself from the mediaeval dread of the mountains or the mediaeval speculation on their meaning. His letters to his wife from the Alps and Pyrenees record his impressions with a painstaking and detailed accuracy which does not forget the black-and-yellow spider performing somersaults on an imperceptible thread hung from one brier to another. The emotion after an hour on the Rigi-Kulm "is immense." "The tourist comes here to get a point of view; the thinker finds here an immense book in which each rock is a letter, each lake is a phrase, each village is an accent; from it arise, like a smoke, two thousand years of memories."

Here speaks the true panoramic man, the man whose mind attains to fulness of expression on mountain-tops from which the whole landscape of life may be contemplated. And yet he notes the "ominous configuration of Mount Pilatus" and its terrible form, and writes of adjoining mountains as "these hump-backed, goitred giants crouching around me in the darkness." The Rigi appears as "a dark and monstrous perpendicular wall."

His mind is occupied with the presence of idiots in the Alps. He finds an explanation: "It is not granted to all intelligences to co-habit with such marvels and to keep from morning till evening without intoxication and without stupor, turning a visual radius of fifty leagues across the earth around a circumference of three hundred." On the Rigi his musings on the magnificence of the view are checked by the presence of a cretin. Behold the contrast! An idiot with a goitre and an enormous face, a blank stare, and a stupid laugh is sole participator with Victor Hugo in this "marvellous festival of the mountains."

"Oh! abysm!" he cries; "the Alps were the spectacle, the spectator was an idiot! I forgot myself in this frightful antithesis: man face to face with nature; Nature in her superbest aspect, man in his most miserable debasement. What could be the significance of this mysterious contrast? What was the sense of this irony in a solitude? Have I the right to believe that the landscape was designed for him--the cretin, and the irony for me--the chance visitor?"

The idiot and the mountain shared, no doubt, a supreme indifference to the commotion which their proximity had set up in the poet's mind. With his love of antithesis Hugo had seized the picture of the glories of the mountain wasting themselves before the gaze of the senseless idiot. Apart from geographical conditions and hygienic defects there is an interesting aesthetic problem connected with the presence of idiots in the mountains. It is not only the idiot who is indifferent to the beauties of the Alps; the sane and healthy peasant whose eyes wander over the glaciers and snow-fields as he rests for a few minutes from hoeing his potatoes is not moved by the sight to ecstatic delight.

I have many dear friends amongst peasants. They are richly endowed with common sense and kindness of heart; their brains can compete favourably with those of the folk of any other country. Their hard struggle with a rebellious soil has given them a quiet determination and tenacity of purpose which are the root of Alpine enterprise and resourcefulness. They possess character and independence in a high degree--mental reflexes of the peaks of freedom, ever before their eyes. But they, children of the mountain, born and bred amidst its beauties, are surprisingly insensitive to beauty.

I remember one exquisite sunset--one of those superlative sunsets that burn themselves into the consciousness with a joy akin to pain, and of which only a few are allotted to each human life. I stood watching the sinking sun throw a crimson net over the snow mountains as the shadow of night crept slowly up the hillside. The sky took on an opal light in which were merged and transcended all the colours of the day. Every pinnacle and rock was lit up as by a heavenly fire, the pines were outlined like black sentinels against the sky, guardians of that merciful green life from which we spring and to which we return. My old friend the goat-herd and daily messenger from the highest pastures stood beside me. "Beautiful, Pierre," I said, "and in this you have lived all your life."

"Yes," he said, slowly shifting the pipe from the left side of his mouth to the right; "the cheese is fat and good in the mountains, and the milk is not poisonous as it is in the plains, but it is hard work for the back to carry it down twice a day." He looked at me as if searching for better understanding. "But I will tell you something nice," he added, by way of stirring up my sluggish imagination; "the little brown cow has calved, and this autumn we are going to kill the old cow, and we shall have good meat all the winter."

Far be it from me to join in the thoughtless generalizations about the obtuseness of the Alpine peasant which have disfigured some of the literature of climbing. These climbers have shown infinitely greater obtuseness before Alpine realities than the peasants derided by them. True, a star may compete in vain with a cheese in suggesting visions of joy, but our supercilious climbers forget that their admiration of nature's marvels is generally built up on a substratum of cheese--or the equivalent of cheese--plentifully supplied by the labour of others. There is another class of climbers who idealize the peasant and the guide, and who write of Alpine peasant-life as if it were nothing but a series of perilous ascents nobly undertaken for the advancement of humanity.

I can understand the indifference of the peasant to the visions around him. After a hard day's scything or woodcutting on slopes so steep that the resistance of one's hob-nailed boots seems like that of soft soap, I have felt profoundly healthy and ready to go to bed without listening to any lyrics on the Alps. And even the thought of Tennyson's "awful rose of dawn" would not have roused me before the labour of the next day.

But we--how proud I am of that "we"!--who have chosen hard labour on the mountain know something which the mere visitors know not. We have a sense of home which no other habitation can impart--a passionate love of the soil, a unity with the little patch that is our own, bringing joys undimmed by any descriptions of other-worldly possessions. Our trees may be wrecked by an avalanche, our garden plot may be obliterated by a land slip; the stone walls we build up in defiance of the snow are always pulled down by mountain sprites. Our agriculture is precarious, and every carrot is bought by the sweat of our brow. The struggle keeps pace with our love--there is a tenfold sweetness in the fruit we reap. And when fate compels us to leave our mountains we are pursued by restlessness. We know no peace, no home elsewhere. We do assume the airs of Victor Hugo's cretin when we are placed face to face with the riches of Croesus or the splendours of Pharaoh.

But my heart is a lonely hunter that hunts on A lonely hill.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet