Life Without and Life Within; or, Reviews, Narratives, Essays, and Poems.
and wither; but faithful remained the old housemaid, always the servant
of the last heir.
But one morning--hear what happened. All the people came to table, and
lo! there was nothing to eat, for our good old Mistress Potato had not
been able to rise from her bed. She felt sharp pains creeping through
her poor old bones. No wonder she was worn out at last! She had not in
all her life dared take a day's rest, lest so the poor should starve.
Indeed, it is wonderful that her good will should have kept her up so
long. She must have had a great constitution to begin with.
The guests had to go away without breakfast. They were a little
troubled, but hoped to make up for it at dinner time. But dinner time
came, and the table was empty; and then, indeed, they began to inquire
about the welfare of Cookmaid Potato. And up into her dark chamber,
where she lay on her poor bed, came great and little, young and old, to
ask after the good creature. "What can be done for her?" "Bring warm
clothes, medicine, a better bed." "Lay aside your work to help her." "If
she dies we shall never again be able to fill the table;" and now,
indeed, they sang her praises.
O, what a fuss about the sick bed in that moist and mouldy chamber! and
out doors it was just the same--priests with their masses, processions,
and prayers, and all the world ready to walk to penance, if Mistress
Potato could but be saved. And the doctors in their wigs, and
counsellors in masks of gravity, sat there to devise some remedy to
avert this terrible ill.
As when a most illustrious dame is recovering from birth of a son, so
now bulletins inform the world of the health of Mistress Potato, and,
not content with what they thus learn, couriers and lackeys besiege the
door; nay, the king's coach is stopping there. Yes! yes! the humble poor
maid, 'tis about her they are all so frightened! Who would ever have
believed it in days when the table was nicely covered?
The gentlemen of pens and books, priests, kings, lords, and ministers,
all have senses to scent our famine. Natheless Mistress Potato gets no
better. May God help her for the sake, not of such people, but of the
poor. For the great it is a token they should note, that all must
crumble and fall to ruin, if they will work and weary to death the poor
maid who cooks in the kitchen.
She lived for you in the dirt and ashes, provided daily for poor and
rich; you ought to humble yourselves for her sake. Ah, could we hope
that you would take a hint, and _next time_ pay some heed to the
housemaid before she is worn and wearied to death!
* * * * *
So sighs, rather than hopes, Moritz Hartmann. The wise ministers of
England, indeed, seem much more composed than he supposes them. They are
like the old man who, when he saw the avalanche coming down upon his
village, said, "It is coming, but I shall have time to fill my pipe once
more." _He_ went in to do so, and was buried beneath the ruins. But Sir
Robert Peel, who is so deliberate, has, doubtless, manna in store for
those who have lost their customary food.
Another sign of the times is, that there are left on the earth none of
the last dynasty of geniuses, rich in so many imperial heads. The world
is full of talent, but it flows downward to water the plain. There are
no towering heights, no Mont Blancs now. We cannot recall one great
genius at this day living. The time of prophets is over, and the era
they prophesied must be at hand; in its couduct a larger proportion of
the human race shall take part than ever before. As prime ministers have
succeeded kings in the substantiate of monarchy, so now shall a house of
representatives succeed prime ministers.
Altogether, it looks as if a great time was coming, and that time one of
democracy. Our country will play a ruling part. Her eagle will lead the
van; but whether to soar upward to the sun or to stoop for helpless
prey, who now dares promise? At present she has scarce achieved a Roman
nobleness, a Roman liberty; and whether her eagle is less like the
vulture, and more like the Phoeix, than was the fierce Roman bird, we
dare not say. May the new year give hopes of the latter, even if the
bird need first to be purified by fire.
_Jan. 1, 1846._
NEW YEAR'S DAY.
It was a beautiful custom among some of the Indian tribes, once a year,
to extinguish all the fires, and, by a day of fasting and profound
devotion, to propitiate the Great Spirit for the coming year. They then
produced sparks by friction, and lighted up afresh the altar and the
hearth with the new fire.
And this fire was considered as the most precious and sacred gift from
one person to another, binding them in bonds of inviolate friendship for
that year, certainly; with a hope that the same might endure through
life. From the young to the old, it was a token of the highest respect;
from the old to the young, of a great expectation.
To us would that it might be granted to solemnize the new year by the
mental renovation of which this ceremony was the eloquent symbol. Would
that we might extinguish, if only for a day, those fires where an
uninformed religious ardor has led to human sacrifices; which have
warmed the household, but, also, prepared pernicious, more than
wholesome, viands for their use.
The Indian produced the new spark by friction. It would be a still more
beautiful emblem, and expressive of the more extended powers of
civilized men, if we should draw the spark from the centre of our system
and the source of light, by means of the burning glass.
Where, then, is to be found the new knowledge, the new thought, the new
hope, that shall begin a new year in a spirit not discordant with "the
acceptable year of the Lord"? Surely there must be such existing, if
latent--some sparks of new fire, pure from ashes and from smoke, worthy
to be offered as a new year's gift. Let us look at the signs of the
times, to see in what spot this fire shall be sought--on what fuel it
may be fed. The ancients poured out libations of the choicest juices of
earth, to express their gratitude to the Power that had enabled them to
be sustained from her bosom. They enfranchised slaves, to show that
devotion to the gods induced a sympathy with men.
Let us look about us to see with what rites, what acts of devotion, this
modern Christian nation greets the approach of the new year; by what
signs she denotes the clear morning of a better day, such as may be
expected when the eagle has entered into covenant with the dove.
This last week brings tidings that a portion of the inhabitants of
Illinois, the rich and blooming region on which every gift of nature has
been lavished, to encourage the industry and brighten the hopes of man,
not only refuses a libation to the Power that has so blessed their
fields, but declares that the dew is theirs, and the sunlight is
theirs--that they live from and for themselves, acknowledging no
obligation and no duty to God or to man.[28]
One man has freed a slave; but a great part of the nation is now busy in
contriving measures that may best rivet the fetters on those now
chained, and forge them strongest for millions yet unborn.
Selfishness and tyranny no longer wear the mask; they walk haughtily
abroad, affronting with their hard-hearted boasts and brazen resolves
the patience of the sweet heavens. National honor is trodden under foot
for a national bribe, and neither sex nor age defends the redresser of
injuries from the rage of the injurer.
Yet, amid these reports which come flying on the paperwings of every
day, the scornful laugh of the gnomes, who begin to believe they can
buy all souls with their gold, was checked a moment when the aged
knight[29] of the better cause answered the challenge--truly in keeping
with the "chivalry" of the time--"You are in the wrong, and I will kick
you," by holding the hands of the chevalier till those around secured
him. We think the man of old must have held him with his eye, as
physicians of moral power can insane patients. Great as are his exploits
for his age, he cannot have much bodily strength, unless by miracle.
The treatment of Mr. Adams and Mr. Hoar seems to show that we are not
fitted to emulate the savages in preparation for the new fire. The
Indians knew how to reverence the old and the wise.
Among the manifestos of the day, it is impossible not to respect that of
the Mexican minister for the manly indignation with which he has uttered
truths, however deep our mortification at hearing them. It has been
observed for the last fifty years, that the tone of diplomatic
correspondence was much improved, as to simplicity and directness. Once,
diplomacy was another name for intrigue, and a paper of this sort was
expected to be a mesh of artful phrases, through which the true meaning
might be detected, but never actually grasped. Now, here is one where an
occasion being afforded by the unutterable folly of the corresponding
party, a minister speaks the truth as it lies in his mind, directly and
plainly, as man speaks to man. His statement will command the sympathy
of the civilized world.
As to the state papers that have followed, they are of a nature to make
the Austrian despot sneer, as he counts in his oratory the woollen
stockings he has got knit by imprisoning all the free geniuses in his
dominions. He, at least, only appeals to the legitimacy of blood; these
dare appeal to legitimacy, as seen from a moral point of view. History
will class such claims with the brags of sharpers, who bully their
victims about their honor, while they stretch forth their hands for the
gold they have won with loaded dice. "Do you dare to say the dice are
loaded? Prove it; _and_ I will shoot you for injuring my honor."
The Mexican makes his gloss on the page of American honor;[30] the
girl[31] in the Kentucky prison on that of her freedom; the delegate of
Massachusetts,[32] on that of her union. Ye stars, whose image America
has placed upon her banner, answer us! Are not your unions of a
different sort? Do they not work to other results?
Yet we cannot lightly be discouraged, or alarmed, as to the destiny of
our country. The whole history of its discovery and early progress
indicates too clearly the purposes of Heaven with regard to it. Could we
relinquish the thought that it was destined for the scene of a new and
illustrious act in the great drama, the past would be inexplicable, no
less than the future without hope.
Last week, which brought us so many unpleasant notices of home affairs,
brought also an account of the magnificent telescope lately perfected by
the Earl of Rosse. With means of observation now almost divine, we
perceive that some of the brightest stars, of which Sirius is one, have
dark companions, whose presence is, by earthly spectators, only to be
detected from the inequalities they cause in the motions of their
radiant companions. It was a new and most imposing illustration how, in
carrying out the divine scheme, of which we have as yet only spelled out
the few first lines, the dark is made to wait upon, and, in the full
result, harmonize with, the bright. The sense of such pervasive
analogies should enlarge patience and animate hope.
Yet, if offences must come, woe be to those by whom they come; and that
of men, who sin against a heritage like ours, is as that of the
backsliders among the chosen people of the elder day. We, too, have been
chosen, and plain indications been given, by a wonderful conjunction of
auspicious influences, that the ark of human hopes has been placed for
the present in our charge. Woe be to those who betray this trust! On
their heads are to be heaped the curses of unnumbered ages!
Can he sleep, who in this past year has wickedly or lightly committed