Complete Works of Edward Young, page 104
“Nor end our healing hopes of comfort here; not only to beseech, commiserate, and weep, descended the Lord of glory and eternal life, but to die. And what a death! and after what a life! A life of compassions without number, and beyond measure; what a shining progress, what a stupendous ascent in love! He meets the returning prodigal; looks compassion on denying Peter; rejects not disbelieving Thomas; admits sinful Magdalen; pardons the taken adulteress: and associates to himself in paradise (where angels cast their crowns at his feet) a thief from the cross. What a marvellous and most adorable climax is this! And is it possible for love to rise higher still? O let it rise higher, and reach even me.
“What am I, thou most exuberant fountain of love, that I should set a bound to such compassion as this? Can ocean be repelled by a single grain on the shore? What a triumph of mercy to pluck the ruined from ruin! What an omnipotent action to save the most lost! Though pleasure has fooled me; though reason, conscience, heaven, nay, and earth too, in one scale, has been outweighed by a feather in the other; though, with Esau, I sold my birthright for nothing; yet, Lord, let these distractions of thought, these convulsions of heart, these pangs of the wretch, if not the prayer of the penitent, reach the foot of thy throne: for his dear sake who spared not his most precious blood, O spare, pardon, bless; yes, bless me, even me, O my Father! Yes, thou all-surrounding, all-pervading, all-sustaining, and all-blessing Majesty of heaven! bless me, even me, O my God!
“Thou! who, if thou movest thy lip, it thunders; if thou liftest thine eye, the sun is dark; who hast thy way in the whirlwind, and walkest on the wings of the wind; who sittest above the heavens, and hidest thy footsteps in the great deep; but, above all, whose superabundant effluence, whose ocean of love, overflows the whole creation! add to these wonders one wonder more — the forgiveness of guilt like mine; hear the suppliant voice, see the bleeding bosom, these throes, these throbs of the most vile and abandoned — but most repentant and heart-broken, of men.
“Then, Lord, come the worst, I will not complain! My joy shall burst its way through the frowns of the world, and the shadows of death. Then blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be to Him who sitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb, who nails sin to his cross! Thus will I sing in spite of my groans! Thus will I sing with my last expiring breath! Thus will I sing for ever and ever.
“Amen. O my soul! Amen, Amen!”
This, sir, is that importunate, ardent, persevering spirit of address, which was suitable to the state of the person from whom I borrowed it. It may possibly (partly at least) suit some others. And I thought it inhuman to gaze so long as I have done on the disease, without aiming at some expedient to mitigate its malignity. There is a sovereign balm in prayer.
I know, sir, there are certain quietists in devotion, saints of great repose in prayer, who may censure this as too warm. But when should we be warm, if not when our eternity is at stake? Shall we be warm in our vices, and cool in our repentance! Were our passions given for nothing! or given only as the servants of sin! Is it not heaven, but its reverse, that is to be taken by violence! I, therefore, drop this dispute, not only as unchristian, but undeistical too; for, if there is a God, all our affections are too feeble, all the wings of our soul are too few, to be put forth in pursuit of his favour; and being languid in devotion, is being solemnly undevout. If there is a God, he gave ns our passions, as well as our reason; they, therefore, as well as reason, should assist in his service. And, indeed, reason without them, though it may loudly tell, will but lamely perform, our duty. How great a part of the scripture must these men’s kind of criticism explode! Poor David must break his harp, lest it give offence. Even angels have their passions, nor are any beings exempt from the need of them on this side the throne of God. Whatever exemption some may fancy in their own favour, let us, my friend, who have seen the necessity of devotion for others, not neglect our own; nor, in the pride of instructing, lose the prudence of safety.
You and I, my friend, lie under two disadvantages in this point; the world’s example, and our own years. It is an undevout age; and will you not be surprised to hear me say, that ours is an undevout period of life! Yet it is most certain, that there is a tenderness of heart, and a susceptibility of awe, with regard to God, as well as man, in youth, which, in most, is wanting afterwards. This want is an enemy we must fight; and fervent prayer, that “sword of the Spirit,” is the best weapon against him. Prayer, because the most easy of duties, seems, with many, the hardest to be performed. It costs them so little pains, they think they may as well let it alone. Whereas, it is the supreme, the great mother-duty; all other duties and virtues are its progeny; are brought forth, nursed, nourished, and sustained by it. Devotion is the sole asylum of human frailty, and sole support of heavenly perfection; it is the golden chain of union between heaven and earth; keeps open the blessed communication; — Geminique facit commercia regni. — CLAUDIANUS.
He that has never prayed, can never conceive, and he that has prayed as he ought, can never forget, how much is to be gained by prayer. — |
Dear Sir,
Yours.
LETTER V. LIFE’S REVIEW.
THE GENERAL CAUSE OF SECURITY IN SIN. THOUGHTS FOR AGE, &c.
LIFE’S REVIEW.
DEAR SIR, IN this and the following letters I shall touch on five points: Life’s Review; the general Cause of Security in Sin; Thoughts for Age; the Dignity of Man; the Centaur’s Restoration to Humanity. The three first are naturally suggested to me by the world’s wickedness and our own, and our advanced time of life. The fourth, namely, the Dignity of Man, is naturally suggested by the notoriety of its reverse in those for whose sake these letters are principally written. For who can look on Lucifer in his abyss without thinking of that height from which he fell? by which alone we can take any just measure of his calamity. And the fifth point, namely, the Centaur’s Restoration to Humanity, is forcibly imposed on me by the transporting thought, that such an event is possible. Yet, should it take place, posterity will scarce believe it: Annalium nostrorum laborabit fides. (Lucius FLORUS.)
I begin with the Review of Life; and that, though chiefly for our own sakes, yet also for the sake of all our grey-headed boys, as Sudbury, Torrismond, Ironside, &c.; for though beasts of so gross a class as they choose to rank with scarce deserve to be brought to the manege, yet pupils not yet expelled the school of life ought still, if possible, to be taught the lesson they have so long neglected; and I offer myself gladly for their tutor; though I fear they would prefer a tetanothrum [A medicine to take out wrinkles.] to an apotheosis; their erudition will not leave them at a loss to know what I mean.
There is nothing of which men are more liberal than their good advice, be their stock of it ever so small; because it seems to carry in it an intimation of our own influence, importance, or worth. We (for you approved it; we, I say) have bestowed abundance of it on our centaurs, which, I fear, will bring us in but little thanks. Let us, therefore, return from abroad, come to ourselves; and see if our export of wisdom may not be wanted at home. We have censured the aged; are we not such ourselves? Is there no folly to be found but at assemblies and masquerades? Or is folly not folly, because it hits our own taste? Let us lay the line to our own conduct; let us drop foreign ware, and put ourselves into the scale.
Yes, my friend! let us make a short visit to our former selves. They are, indeed, great strangers; nor much to be liked; yet it is a visit all should make who wish well to the future of life. A review of life is an employment agreeable but to few, because none can look back without self-condemnation; and none will look forward but with self-flattery. But though the task may be bitter, it is wholesome too. Ask you, “What advantage from it?” — It is the only way of taking my centaur’s advice, and knowing ourselves. A man can see himself in retrospection only. When warm in action, he is ever looking on something else, on his point in view; or, if he could see himself, he could not judge aright either of himself or others. While warm in action, prejudices, and passions, excited by the then present objects and incidents, corrupt his judgment. But in a cool review, he becomes rather a bystander, than the party, and is patient of truth. His then former rivals are no longer rivals; therefore he judges better of men. His former points of view are no longer points of view; therefore he judges better of things. He can judge, nay, he cannot but judge, as impartially of himself as of the rest of mankind.
Wisdom is the growth of experience: but experience is not the growth of action, but of reflection on it. In an active life is sown the seed of wisdom; but he who reflects not, never reaps; has no harvest from it; but carries the burden of age without the wages of experience; nor knows himself old, but from his infirmities, the parish register, and the contempt of mankind. And what has age, if it has not esteem? It has nothing.
Starting, my friend, from the same goal, through different paths, which severed our fortune, not our affection, we have run our race, and now approach its end. Jaded with our long journey, the spur of ambition blunted, and our spirits off their speed, we are glad of rest. In which, reflection on the past is not only useful, but extremely natural. Look on the stormy sea, whose billows reach the clouds; then on the peaceful lake, where the feather, or fallen leaf, lies unmoved; and you see the difference between the cool evening and warm meridian of man. Reflection is as natural to one, as action to the other. Unactive youth, and unreflecting age, are equal blanks in the book of life. Man varies no less than those varying insects at which he wonders. In his morning he crawls; long ere noon, flutters, and flies; at evening, chilled into languor, he creeps into corners, lies hid, and sleeps; or, if awake, having but little ground before him, nor that the best, how naturally he looks back on the past! how naturally his winter’s evening calls for its tale! and to self-love, what tale so natural as our own? How idle soever our tale has been, if we can draw some moral from it, that will abate its insignificance, and give it some little weight by making us wiser for the future.
And want we not to be wiser! On how many fruitless friendships, ill-judged enmities, rash presumptions, cowardly despairs, unmanly flatteries, bold indecencies, idle schemes, airy hopes, groundless fears, opportunities lost, admonitions slighted, escapes unacknowledged, evils improved, blessings neglected, and trifles admired; — on what a swarm of infirmities I look back with shame! How ambitious have we been in our attachments, not aware that all, most worth our ambition, we can give ourselves! How fearful of expenses, not aware that, till it escapes the gripe, and takes its flight into some prudent use, money is not wealth; that it truly becomes ours only by our parting with it! How fond have we been of applause, not aware that human, separate from superior, applause is the greatest vanity, as well as the most common pursuit, in life! How plainly I now see that few things are more pernicious than too keen an appetite for applause, except a bold defiance of just reproach! That makes coxcombs; this, felons. This calls for detestation; that, for contempt.
How plainly do I now see that our ignorance has been great! How often have we been so idle as to complain of our wants; that is, of our capacity of being happy! For without wants there would be no desires; and without desires, no gratification of them; and without gratification of desire, no happiness; for human happiness, nay, happiness of all created beings, consists in nothing else.
What, on retrospect, appears to me to be the capital weakness of man, is that strange ascendant which his wishes have over his understanding; it is this makes a centaur. How often have we looked on our wishes as infallible arguments for the certainty of what we desired; when others saw it was an impossible point! And of this capital weakness, a capital instance is, that dying men can scarce believe that they shall die. Are we not now as those yellow autumn leaves, which the first blast sweeps away? Yet we seem to think the green bud hardly more tenacious of the stem.
On farther review, this is stranger still; our friends are our strongest ties to life; when these are cut, what but folly can renew the charm? what, re-engage our disenchanted hearts? And what, in my retrospect, is an object more obvious or striking than yonder ensigns of death? How the tyrant triumphs! What numerous monuments rise over the cold bosoms that once warmly received us! that shared our counsels, our ambitions, our pleasures, and our hearts! Their epitaphs collected would make a volume. A volume how instructive, if read aright! A friend’s monument is a friend’s legacy; and a richer to the considerate than any parchment can convey. What, for the most part, is human wisdom, but the melancholy growth of a bleeding heart? The thought of death is the directing helm of life; and he bespeaks a wreck who lays it aside.
O my friend, how rapid the human march! Men are in haste; how they hurry over the stage! Where are those luminaries in every various walk of fame, in every kind of excellence and renown, who most fired our ambition and provoked our envy? Are they not passed away as April shadows over the field; or, by the fire-side, a winter’s tale? Are not those far-seen, shining lights gone out apace after one another, as little sparks in the fired leaf or paper, leaving us nothing but ashes behind? And in their ashes is there nothing to be found but sorrow? May we not light on a little prudence in them?
Sorrow, indeed, predominates. O recent wound! Sorrow how just! Whom lost we the very last moon? — Lost we? That is vainly sad: whom lost the public? whom, the whole nation? Few have left it more worthy all love and esteem than our friend deceased [Sir J. S.]. He was made by nature to be beloved; and entitled by virtue to be admired.
—— Quem temper amatum,
Semper honoratum, sic Dii voluistis, habebo. — Virg.
Well had it been, if we, like him, had sought esteem; but we would not pay the price. Love, we thought, would come cheaper; and seeking that, were in danger of losing both. The wise world will part with nothing but by force. Love cannot be compelled, esteem may. And when it is, we lay in it, at the same time, the surest foundation for lasting love.
My retrospect shows me a transitory love of which we have been too fond; a love often bestowed by great ones on those whom they cannot esteem. This love, supposing it sterling, I (stutus ego!) returned in kind; but I do not repent it. I may not repent of my virtue; for, my friend, there are two sorts of charity in the world; and which the greatest, is hard to say. We are bound in compassion to help the poor to live, and the rich to enjoy; who feel a pain peculiar to themselves, — that of being mocked by abundance, which denies them their expected happiness; happiness in proportion to their purse. All I learn from such ardent lovers (for such generally they are) is, that it is dangerous to dip into most men below the surface, lest our curiosity should rob us of our good opinion of them. Much decorum, little homage, is requisite. My whole life tells me, that a just demand for esteem is sacred, but rare. We may well afford to pay it when it is due; nor must our love be withheld where it is not. Universal love enjoined, is designed as an antidote against reciprocal contempt; and as a discipline to human pride, which must stoop to love men in their infirmities and faults: nor is it more our duty than our prudence; how else could we hope quarter for our own, which both tell us of others’ faults, and bid us forgive them? For many of them we should not suspect but from the whispers of their parallels in our own bosoms. And therefore, by not forgiving them, we condemn ourselves. If then we would be forgiven by ourselves, or others, we must forgive. A truth for which I thank my present review.
What I like least in this survey, for fear it should prove our own case, is this: I find old men apt to think well of themselves, not because they fly vice, but because vice is fled; repute themselves virtuous, because free from boys’ offences; set down impotence for victory; and triumph, because they have not fought, because they meet no foe. And what makes me even tremble is, I see some, who, blameless in youth, are overtaken by folly when in years, and (of all sights the most deplorable!) I see them dragged by their white beards into the foulest enormities. Faults which are the natural growth of the distinct periods of life, may meet with some toleration; but the monstrous growth of vices out of season no man spares; because the hot-beds of Lucifer only can raise crimes, in which nature has no hand.
Heaven avert from us such an end! for, far from blameless was our beginning. In our early days (called the days of innocence) we had our little villainies: our vice in miniature. As years and temptations increased, in years less ripe than in iniquity, we were no petty criminals before we were men. We wished, indeed, for wisdom; but what wisdom would have avoided, we made our favourite choice; what wisdom would have chosen, we bid wait till to-morrow. Frequent were our quarrels with our faults; but rarely pushed on to a parting. Pleasure had its charms, and virtue its efforts; and sometimes in a passion threw its rider. But triumphs of passion are but short. No rebukes are so powerful as those from our own conduct. Affords not this, then, a strong caution for the future? The distempers of the past periods of our lives are the best antidotes for those to come.
Retrospection informs me, it was now open war with our enemy; now, perfect peace: how easy sin sat on our hearts, and called itself “spirit,”
“wisdom,” any thing but what it was! When some merciful discipline awaked us from our trance, we fought, and we conquered. But what was our conquest! such as rather marred our wrong enjoyments, than wedded us closely to the right. We called the right our beloved, our spouse; but often committed adultery against it; thus losing the joys both of the sinner and the saint: so motley a creature is man; as mutable as God is fixed. Ours, indeed, was no uncommon case; but others’ faults are not our absolution. An absolution it is, however, with which many are content; though his holiness could scarce give his saints one more ineffectual and vain.
Who is he, my dear friend, that can absolve us, or condemn! Look through thy whole past life, and answer. What year, nay, what day, has passed unempowered to vouch for his clement and absolute reign! See I not, in numberless instances, the naked hand of Providence stretched out, as it were, on this side the clouds, pointing us to good! Now, showing how little this world can give, by pouring on us the full enjoyment of it; to turn our hearts on a better. Now showing us, by the calamities of others, how much we may suffer in this world; to keep us in awe, though ourselves were unhurt. Now, breaking to pieces all our own schemes, and raising our happiness out of their ruins; to teach us humility, gratitude, and on whom to rely; showing us, that most of our triumphs are errors; and our disappointments, escapes. Now bringing us, when most secure, to the brink of the grave; to repress presumption. Now snatching us from it, when past all human help; to kindle devotion, and forbid the pain of despair. Now defeating us in spite of all our wisdom; now blessing us in spite of all our folly; blessing, to sweeten life; the contrary, to wean us from it; and thus in both worlds to provide for our welfare, as far as the nature of humanity will admit.
