Algernon Blackwood

Name: The Centaur — Chapter X
Author: Algernon Blackwood

The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

Summary

“The Centaur — Chapter X”, published in 1911, is a work by Algernon Blackwood. It explores elements such as Stahl, belief and survival.

Quotes from The Centaur — Chapter X (Algernon Blackwood)

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ In his hidden and most secret thoughts, those thoughts he never uttered to another, this deep belief in the Earth as a conscious, sentient, living Being had persisted in spite of all the forces education and modern life had turned against it. It seemed in him an undying instinct, an unmovable conviction, though he hardly dared acknowledge it even to himself.
He had always "dreamed" the Earth alive, a mothering organism to humanity; and himself, via his love of Nature, in some sweet close relation to her that other men had forgotten or ignored. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ Further, that he watched him keenly all the time, noting the effect his words produced.
"He is not a human being at all," he continued with a queer thin whisper that conveyed a gravity of conviction singularly impressive, "in the sense in which you and I are accustomed to use the term. His inner being is not shaped, as his outer body, upon quite--human lines. He is a Cosmic Being--a direct expression of cosmic life. A little bit, a fragment, of the Soul of the World, and in that sense a survival--a survival of her youth." ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ Stahl, whether O'Malley liked it or no, was impressive. He gazed at the little figure in front of him, the ragged untidy beard, the light shining on the bald skull, wondering what was coming next and what all this bewildering confession of unorthodox belief was leading up to. He longed to hear more about that hinted Cosmic Life ... and how yearning might lead to its realization.
"For any phenomena of the séance-room that may be genuine," he heard him saying, "are produced by this fluid, detachable portion of the personality, the very thing we have been speaking about. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ It seemed as if he stood upon the edge of hearing something--spoken by a man who was no mere dreamer like himself--that would explain the world, himself, and all his wildest cravings. He both longed and feared to hear it. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ We know today--you certainly know for I've read it accurately described in your books--that the human personality can extend itself under certain conditions called abnormal. It can project portions of itself, show itself even at a distance, operate away from the central covering body. In exactly similar fashion may the Being of the Earth have projected portions of herself in the past. Of such great powers or beings there may be conceivably a survival ... ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ So far as O'Malley could follow it in his curiously excited condition of mind, it was little more or less than a belief he himself had often played lovingly with--the theory that a man has a fluid or etheric counterpart of himself which is obedient to strong desire and can, under certain conditions, be detached--projected in a shape dictated by that desire. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ Stahl took him up, "but in sleep--in the trance consciousness--completely! And therein lies your danger," he added gravely; "for to pass out completely in waking consciousness, is the next step--an easy one; and it constitutes, not so much a disorder of your being, as a readjustment, but a readjustment difficult of sane control." He paused again. "You pass out while fully awake--a waking delusion. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Algernon Blackwood, The Centaur — Chapter X (1911)

“ Stahl was telling calmly how he had been driven to some such belief by the facts that had come under his notice both in the asylums and in his private practice.
"...That in the amazingly complex personality of a human being," he went on, "there does exist some vital constituent, a part of consciousness, that can leave the body for a short time without involving death; that it is something occasionally visible to others; something malleable by thought and desire--especially by intense and prolonged yearning ”

Algernon Blackwood

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