"I like such a storm as this," said Flemming, who stood at the window, looking out into the tempest and the gathering6 darkness. "The silent falling of snow is to me one of the most solemn things in nature. The fall of autumnal leaves does not so much affect me. But the driving storm is grand. It startles me; it awakens7 me. It is wild and woful, like my own soul. I cannot help thinking of the sea; how the waves run and toss their arms about,--and the wind plays on those great harps8, made by the shrouds9 and masts of ships. Winter is here in earnest! Whew! How the old churl10 whistles and threshes the snow! Sleet11 and rain are falling too. Already the trees are bearded with icicles; and the two broad branches of yonder pine look like the white mustache of some old German Baron."
"And to-morrow it will look more wintry still," said his friend. "We shall wake up and find that the frost-spirit has been at work all night building Gothic Cathedrals on our windows, just as the devil built the Cathedral of Cologne. Sodraw the curtains, and come sit here by the warm fire."
"And now," said Flemming, having done as his friend desired, "tell me something of Heidelberg and its University. I suppose we shall lead about as solitary12 and studious a life here as we did of yore in little Göttingen, with nothing to amuse us, save our own day-dreams."
"Pretty much so," replied the Baron; "which cannot fail to please you, since you are in pursuit of tranquillity13. As to the University, it is, as you know, one of the oldest in Germany. It was founded in the fourteenth century by the Count Palatine Ruprecht, and had in the first year more than five hundred students, all busily committing to memory, after the old scholastic14 wise, the rules of grammar versified by Alexander de Villa15 Dei, and the extracts made by Peter the Spaniard from Michel Psellus's Synopsis16 of Aristotle's Organon, and the Categories, with Porphory's Commentaries. Truly, I do not much wonder, that Eregina Scotus should have been put to death byhis scholars with their penknives. They must have been pushed to the very verge17 of despair."
"What a strange picture a University presents to the imagination. The lives of scholars in their cloistered18 stillness;--literary men of retired19 habits, and Professors who study sixteen hours a day, and never see the world but on a Sunday. Nature has, no doubt, for some wise purpose, placed in their hearts this love of literary labor20 and seclusion21. Otherwise, who would feed the undying lamp of thought? But for such men as these, a blast of wind through the chinks and crannies of this old world, or the flapping of a conqueror's banner, would blow it out forever. The light of the soul is easily extinguished. And whenever I reflect upon these things I become aware of the great importance, in a nation's history, of the individual fame of scholars and literary men. I fear, that it is far greater than the world is willing to acknowledge; or, perhaps I should say, than the world has thought of acknowledging. Blot22 out from England's history the names of Chaucer, Shakspere, Spenser, and Milton only, and how much of her glory would you blot out with them! Take from Italy such names as Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, Michel Angelo, and Raphael, and how much would still be wanting to the completeness of her glory! How would the history of Spain look if the leaves were torn out, on which are written the names of Cervantes, Lope de Vega, and Calderon! What would be the fame of Portugal, without her Camoens; of France, without her Racine, and Rabelais, and Voltaire; or Germany, without her Martin Luther, her Goethe, and Schiller!--Nay, what were the nations of old, without their philosophers, poets, and historians! Tell me, do not these men in all ages and in all places, emblazon with bright colors the armorial bearings of their country? Yes, and far more than this; for in all ages and all places they give humanity assurance of its greatness; and say; Call not this time or people wholly barbarous; for thus much, even then and there, could the human mind achieve! But the boisterous23 world has hardlythought of acknowledging all this. Therein it has shown itself somewhat ungrateful. Else, whence the great reproach, the general scorn, the loud derision, with which, to take a familiar example, the monks24 of the Middle Ages are regarded! That they slept their lives away is most untrue. For in an age when books were few,--so few, so precious, that they were often chained to their oaken shelves with iron chains, like galley-slaves to their benches, these men, with their laborious26 hands, copied upon parchment all the lore27 and wisdom of the past, and transmitted it to us. Perhaps it is not too much to say, that, but for these monks, not one line of the classics would have reached our day. Surely, then, we can pardon something to those superstitious28 ages, perhaps even the mysticism of the scholastic philosophy, since, after all, we can find no harm in it, only the mistaking of the possible for the real, and the high aspirings of the human mind after a long-sought and unknown somewhat. I think the name of Martin Luther, the monk25 of Wittemberg, alone sufficient to redeem29 all monkhoodfrom the reproach of laziness! If this will not, perhaps the vast folios of Thomas Aquinas will;--or the countless30 manuscripts, still treasured in old libraries, whose yellow and wrinkled pages remind one of the hands that wrote them, and the faces that once bent31 over them."
"An eloquent32 homily," said the Baron laughing, "a most touching33 appeal in behalf of suffering humanity! For my part, I am no friend of this entire seclusion from the world. It has a very injurious effect on the mind of a scholar. The Chinese proverb is true; a single conversation across the table with a wise man, is better than ten years' mere34 study of books. I have known some of these literary men, who thus shut themselves up from the world. Their minds never come in contact with those of their fellow-men. They read little. They think much. They are mere dreamers. They know not what is new nor what is old. They often strike upon trains of thought, which stand written in good authors some century or so back, and are even current in the mouths of men aroundthem. But they know it not; and imagine they are bringing forward something very original, when they publish their thoughts."
"It reminds me," replied Flemming, "of what Dr. Johnson said of Goldsmith, when he proposed to travel abroad in order to bring home improvements;--`He will bring home a wheelbarrow, and call that an improvement.' It is unfortunately the same with some of these scholars."
"And the worst of it is," said the Baron, "that, in solitude35, some fixed36 idea will often take root in the mind, and grow till it overshadow all one's thoughts. To this must all opinions come; no thought can enter there, which shall not be wedded37 to the fixed idea. There it remains38, and grows. It is like the watchman's wife, in the tower of Waiblingen, who grew to such a size, that she could not get down the narrow stair-case; and, when her husband died, his successor was forced to marry the fat widow in the tower."
"I remember an old English comedy," said Flemming laughing, "in which a scholar is described, as a creature, that can strike fire in the morning at his tinder-box,--put on a pair of lined slippers,--sit ruminating39 till dinner, and then go to his meat when the bell rings;--one that hath a peculiar40 gift in a cough, and a license41 to spit;--or, if you will have him defined by negatives, he is one that cannot make a good leg;--one that cannot eat a mess of broth42 cleanly. What think you of that?"
"That it is just as people are always represented in English comedy," said the Baron. "The portrait is over-charged,--caricatured."
"And yet," continued Flemming, "no longer ago than yesterday, in the Preface of a work by Dr. Rosenkranz, Professor of Philosophy in the University of Halle, I read this passage."
He opened a book and read.
"Here in Halle, where we have no public garden and no Tivoli, no London Exchange, no Paris Chamber43 of Deputies, no Berlin nor Vienna Theatres, no Strassburg Minster, nor Salzburg Alps,--no Grecian ruins nor fantastic Catholicism, in fine, nothing, which after one's daily task is finished, can divert and refresh him, without his knowing or caring how,--I consider the sight of a proof-sheet quite as delightful44 as a walk in the Prater45 of Vienna. I fill my pipe very quietly, take out my ink-stand and pens, seat myself in the corner of my sofa, read, correct, and now for the first time really set about thinking what I have written. To see this origin of a book, this metamorphosis of manuscript into print, is a delight to which I give myself up entirely46. Look you, this melancholy47 pleasure, which would have furnished the departed Voss with worthy48 matter for more than one blessed Idyl--(the more so, as on such occasions, I am generally arrayed in a morning gown, though I am sorry to say, not a calamanco one, with great flowers;) this melancholy pleasure was already grown here in Halle to a sweet, pedantic49 habit. Since I began my hermit's life here, I have been printing; and so long as I remain here, I shall keep on printing. In all probability, I shall die with a proof-sheet in my hand."
"This," said Flemming, closing the book, "is no caricature by a writer of comedy, but a portrait by a man's own hand. We can see by it how easily, under certain circumstances, one may glide50 into habits of seclusion, and in a kind of undress, slipshod hardihood, with a pipe and a proof-sheet, defy the world. Into this state scholars have too often fallen; thus giving some ground for the prevalent opinion, that scholarship and rusticity51 are inseparable. To me, I confess, it is painful to see the scholar and the world assume so often a hostile attitude, and set each other at defiance52. Surely, it is a characteristic trait of a great and liberal mind, that it recognises humanity in all its forms and conditions. I am a student;--and always, when I sit alone at night, I recognise the divinity of the student, as she reveals herself to me in the smoke of the midnight lamp. But, because solitude and books are not unpleasant to me,--nay, wished-for,--sought after,--shall I say to my brother, Thou fool! Shall I take the world by the beard and say, Thou art old, and mad!--Shall I look society in the face and say, Thou art heartless!--Heartless! Beware of that word! Life, says very wisely the good Jean Paul, Life in every shape, should be precious to us, for the same reason that the Turks carefully collect every scrap53 of paper that comes in their way, because the name of God may be written upon it. Nothing is more true than this, yet nothing more neglected!"
"If it be painful to see this misunderstanding between scholars and the world," said the Baron, "I think it is still more painful to see the private sufferings of authors by profession. How many have languished54 in poverty, how many died broken-hearted, how many gone mad with over-excitement and disappointed hopes! How instructive and painfully interesting are their lives! with so many weaknesses,--so much to pardon,--so much to pity,--so much to admire! I think he was not so far out of the way, who said, that, next to the Newgate Calendar, the Biography of Authors is the most sickening chapter in the history of man."
"It is indeed enough to make one's heart ache!" interrupted Flemming. "Only think of Johnson and Savage55, rambling56 about the streets of London at midnight, without a place to sleep in; Otway starved to death; Cowley mad, and howling like a dog, through the aisles57 of Chichester Cathedral, at the sound of church music; and Goldsmith, strutting58 up Fleet Street in his peach-blossom coat, to knock a bookseller over the pate59 with one of his own volumes; and then, in his poverty, about to marry his landlady60 in Green Arbour Court."
"A life of sorrow and privation, a hard life, indeed, do these poor devil authors have of it," replied the Baron; "and then at last must get them to the work-house, or creep away into some hospital to die."
"But something worse," interrupted the Baron; "as Dufresny said, when he married his laundress, because he could not pay her bill. Hewas the author, as you know, of the opera of Lot; at whose representation the great pun was made;--I say the great pun, as we say the great ton of Heidelberg. As one of the performers was singing the line, `L'amour a vaincu Loth,' (vingt culottes,) a voice from the pit cried out, `Qu'il en donne une à l'auteur!' "
Flemming laughed at the unseasonable jest; and then, after a short pause, continued;
"And yet, if you look closely at the causes of these calamities62 of authors, you will find, that many of them spring from false and exaggerated ideas of poetry and the poetic63 character; and from disdain64 of common sense, upon which all character, worth having, is founded. This comes from keeping aloof65 from the world, apart from our fellow-men; disdainful of society, as frivolous66. By too much sitting still the body becomes unhealthy; and soon the mind. This is nature's law. She will never see her children wronged. If the mind, which rules the body, ever forgets itself so far as to trample67 upon its slave, the slave is never generousenough to forgive the injury; but will rise and smite68 its oppressor. Thus has many a monarch69 mind been dethroned."
"After all," said the Baron, "we must pardon much to men of genius. A delicate organization renders them keenly susceptible70 to pain and pleasure. And then they idealize every thing; and, in the moonlight of fancy, even the deformity of vice seems beautiful."
"And this you think should be forgiven?"
"At all events it is forgiven. The world loves a spice of wickedness. Talk as you will about principle, impulse is more attractive, even when it goes too far. The passions of youth, like unhooded hawks71, fly high, with musical bells upon their jesses; and we forget the cruelty of the sport in the dauntless bearing of the gallant72 bird."
Here the Baron rang, and ordered a bottle of Prince Metternich. He then very slowly filled his pipe, and began to smoke. Flemming was lost in a day-dream.
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1
baron
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| n.男爵；(商业界等)巨头，大王 | |
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2
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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3
aslant
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| adv.倾斜地；adj.斜的 | |
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4
torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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5
wrecked
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| adj.失事的，遇难的 | |
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6
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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7
awakens
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的第三人称单数 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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8
harps
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| abbr.harpsichord 拨弦古钢琴n.竖琴( harp的名词复数 ) | |
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shrouds
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| n.裹尸布( shroud的名词复数 )；寿衣；遮蔽物；覆盖物v.隐瞒( shroud的第三人称单数 )；保密 | |
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10
churl
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| n.吝啬之人；粗鄙之人 | |
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11
sleet
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| n.雨雪；v.下雨雪，下冰雹 | |
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12
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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13
tranquillity
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| n. 平静, 安静 | |
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14
scholastic
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| adj.学校的，学院的，学术上的 | |
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15
villa
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| n.别墅，城郊小屋 | |
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synopsis
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| n.提要，梗概 | |
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17
verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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18
cloistered
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| adj.隐居的，躲开尘世纷争的v.隐退，使与世隔绝( cloister的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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19
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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21
seclusion
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| n.隐遁，隔离 | |
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22
blot
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| vt.弄脏（用吸墨纸）吸干；n.污点，污渍 | |
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23
boisterous
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| adj.喧闹的，欢闹的 | |
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monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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monk
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| n.和尚，僧侣，修道士 | |
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26
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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lore
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| n.传说；学问，经验，知识 | |
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28
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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29
redeem
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| v.买回，赎回，挽回，恢复，履行（诺言等） | |
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30
countless
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| adj.无数的，多得不计其数的 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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32
eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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33
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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34
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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wedded
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| adj.正式结婚的；渴望…的，执著于…的v.嫁，娶，（与…）结婚( wed的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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38
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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39
ruminating
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| v.沉思( ruminate的现在分词 )；反复考虑；反刍；倒嚼 | |
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40
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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41
license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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42
broth
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| n.原(汁)汤(鱼汤、肉汤、菜汤等) | |
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43
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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44
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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prater
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| 多嘴的人，空谈者 | |
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46
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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47
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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48
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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49
pedantic
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| adj.卖弄学问的；迂腐的 | |
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50
glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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51
rusticity
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| n.乡村的特点、风格或气息 | |
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52
defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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53
scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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54
languished
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| 长期受苦( languish的过去式和过去分词 )； 受折磨； 变得（越来越）衰弱； 因渴望而变得憔悴或闷闷不乐 | |
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55
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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56
rambling
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| adj.[建]凌乱的，杂乱的 | |
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57
aisles
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| n. (席位间的)通道, 侧廊 | |
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58
strutting
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| 加固，支撑物 | |
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59
pate
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| n.头顶；光顶 | |
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60
landlady
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| n.女房东，女地主 | |
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61
vice
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| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
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62
calamities
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| n.灾祸，灾难( calamity的名词复数 )；不幸之事 | |
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63
poetic
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| adj.富有诗意的，有诗人气质的，善于抒情的 | |
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64
disdain
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| n.鄙视，轻视；v.轻视，鄙视，不屑 | |
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65
aloof
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| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
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66
frivolous
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| adj.轻薄的；轻率的 | |
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67
trample
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| vt.踩，践踏；无视，伤害，侵犯 | |
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68
smite
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| v.重击；彻底击败；n.打；尝试；一点儿 | |
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69
monarch
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| n.帝王，君主，最高统治者 | |
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70
susceptible
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| adj.过敏的，敏感的；易动感情的，易受感动的 | |
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71
hawks
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| 鹰( hawk的名词复数 )； 鹰派人物，主战派人物 | |
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72
gallant
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| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
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corrupt
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| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
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