R. Elton Smile

“ Are you in reality so blind, padre, that you are unable to detect the agency of Mr. Welson’s power over the savage? You seem to be impressed with the belief that Mr. Welson has been enacting the part of a magician in producing these effects upon the savage, whose ignorance sympathizes with, or rather reciprocates your superstitious delusions? How is it possible for you to overlook, with thought, an impression so familiar to your understanding, and in fact, place yourself on a level with this savage from a lack of intelligent perception? ”

“ Directing his steps in the gray light to the summit fora, his thoughts were led to view,—in the emergence of day, from the chill sombre darkness of night, as the first radiant rays of sunlight appeared above the horizon,—the bright perspective of Heraclean affection which began to dawn with its warmth and purity, beckoning him from the gloom of the past, with the determination that his example should contrast with it, as a day of light for the guidance of future generations in the path of happiness. ”

“ The consummation of this greeting gave a freer flow to the general expression of joy; the scholars, old and young, soon clustered around us, eager to become known and recognized in the current reciprocation of affection by name, bestowing in love such endearments, that for the moment, with sadness, our own youthful impressions, barren of their cheer, reappeared in contrasted desolation. But translated back to the reality, by the warmth of glowing sympathy, with its unspeakable thrill of tender emotions, the void of our past lives was relieved of its selfish regrets. ”

“ When he was finally permitted to overstep the foræ threshold of the temple portals, he exclaimed with glistening eyes, “My conscience sake alive, I feel as if every soul of those boys had passed through me with gladness; and I can truly and thankfully say, that I feel in the purity of their loving goodness as if they had offered me the only object worth living for. What joy there would be, if our Sundays could be spent in communion with parents and children free from the alloy of selfishness?” The earnestness of the padre’s implied petition met with a hearty response from all. ”

“ Welson was engaged in listening to the rehearsal of the proposed plans of Correliana for the speedy rescue of her people, a falcon in the act of stooping from its poise attracted the quick eyes of Mr. Dow, who raised his rifle, but before he could secure his aim the Heraclean maid uttered an exclamation of alarm which arrested his destructive purpose. In explanation and apology for her impetuous words and act, the falcon settled from his waft upon her shoulder with a flutter of glad recognition, coaxingly pecking at her ear with side glances for accustomed caresses. ”

“ From the light of this morning’s example I can realize, in view of the past, that inconsistency is the soul of instinctive selfishness, as well as the ‘substance’ of law and gospel, upon which we found our vaunted civilization. In addition, your system of education founded upon the practical adaptation of study to the requirements of life, makes me feel that I have used my brain as a store-house for the vile and useless lumber of past ages, which had better have been buried in the instinctive grave of oblivion. ”

“ Speaking honestly, in my own behalf, for my own disparagement, I rarely, if ever, became disengaged in thought from the instincts of selfishness while in association with the most exalted of our kind. In truth, I never felt in the remotest degree that there was a reality in the reputed second existence advocated by our mythology, and was in no way impressed with an assurance of immortality, until we were imperceptibly led to recognize its impression from the example of yourself and people. ”

“ Here the Doschessa was interrupted by the sound of light footsteps, quickly followed by the voices and presence of Cleorita and Oviata, who with an escort of Kyronese maidens came bounding into the triclinium with the joyful announcement, “He’s coming!” Pale and breathless, Correliana, without waiting for farther words of explanation, sped forth, her feet with dainty touch kissing the earth with gladness, passing with the swiftness of an arrow in its flight those already hastening down the avenue of the latifundium, apprised of the near approach of Captain Greenwood. ”

“ I hear the voices of your old sailor companions, Jack and Bill; is it fitting that their honest sincerity should alone be welcomed by their Kyronese admirers? If their quaint, unsophisticated bluntness has been able to recognize the truthful simplicity of Heraclean example, it will prove a greater acquisition for the encouragement of hope than your own; as they represent a class embalmed with the stupidity of erratic animal indulgence, which subjects them to the vilest servitude ever imposed by the arbitrary few upon the unthinking masses of humanity. ”

“ The dwarfed reduction of their graceful forms and faces to a semblance in breadth of visaged mouth, nose, cheek, and eyes, to the chattel biddy instincts who hold untidy supremacy in the kitchen departments of civilization, gave a mirthful vitality to the metallic expression that heightened the ludicrous effect, so that under our watchful gaze, it would occasionally culminate in the voiceful melody of a laugh. Purity and order reigned supreme, so that there was neither odor or speck for insect attraction. ”

“ If the impression you wish to make on those of our citizens who are hardened in their conspirations for misrule, prove successful, although, for the time being, it ministers for good through the superstitious vagaries of their perverse blindness, we will bless you in their behalf for the legacy of affection that will return to them through their children’s dutiful love. Indeed, they will be ignorantly grateful, that your people made them subserve as bridges for the safe passage of their children over the slough of accumulations that flow from the sewerage gratifications of sensuality. ”

“ If the possibility or probability of reducing a woman’s tongue, young or old, of any race, to the limits of useful, witty, or consoling speech, dictated from thoughtful impressions for kindly reciprocation, had been advocated in my presence by the members of the royal scientific societies of London, Paris, or Berlin, I should have given less heed to their arguments in support of feasibility, than to the babblings of a brook. ”

“ Your college and scientific professors can be truthfully likened to your railroad locomotives, which swiftly progress forwards and backwards on their rails, but once off their tracks are helpless, from their own resources, to move themselves or their trains. But with the stage gradations of instinct now open to your view, you can readily discover and test the animus source of present happiness with the realities of its impression as an assurance of immortality. ”

“ It has occurred to me frequently, of late, that there must have been some interior creative object in the gradations of instinct, and ultimate alliance of superhuman intelligence with the highest grade? It is certainly impossible for me to reason myself into the belief that we have been endowed with a perception of goodness, and the necessity of purity for its attainment, to have them dispensed with in life for the substitution of the instinctive greed of selfishness, with the accommodating proviso of repurification by an act of saving grace! ”

“ At the close of Codecio’s exposition the padre, who had listened attentively, could not withhold his approval, which he characteristically expressed. “I declare to conscience, upon my soul, I believe you are right! But how are we to get on with our national mixtures, when the stronger prey upon the weaker, without laws and government? If we are not able to govern ourselves just now, individually and collectively, I think you must allow that it would be hard to find a better constitution than that of the United States for liberty?” ”

“ Unless, in their kindly pity, they should look upon them as samples of a female species of humans, who had in penance for stupidity been made to assume the role of jennies, self-condemned as beasts of burden to bear the material emblems of folly. Indeed, when fully impressed with the utter dearth of their conceptive intelligence, beyond the formulistic rites of fashionable instinct, and rote rehearsals of prayers for selfish preservation, from the goading effects of self-immolation styled conscience, even pity would be likely to suffer in trembling hesitation upon the verge of abhorrence. ”

“ But works, you know, are as nothing in the balance with one’s soul without faith, which works wonders. Neither can I blame you in any way, except that you reject the light, confident in your own good works; and I greatly fear that the sources of happiness you suppose to be real are the delusions of the devil, who goes about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. ”

“ As you can well imagine, I have but little to say in extenuation for my past infatuation, other than that my reason and reverence halted with the dullness of indifference, causing me to accept forms, from the fact that my veneration could find no hopeful resting place. We can now scarcely endure the reflection, that through life we have remained so dull of apprehension, as not to have discovered from self-intuition, that purity and goodness could alone fulfill the indications of Creative intention for the assurance, in life, of an affectionate immortality. ”

“ After regaling the falcons in relief from their lenten diet, they, of their own accord, continued their flight to the mainland. Our joy was much depressed, while passing over the beautiful land scenes, by the fierce cries of giga hosts engaged in battle encounter. In our course eastward, to a country of colored races resembling the aboriginals of our own, not a day passed without our forced observation of a battle scene, with fields and smoking ruins that bespoke the devastation of warful rage. ”

“ In the calm quiet of Heraclean life, with associate correspondence in purity and goodness, your impressions and desires have been so occupied with happy realities, that even in reflection, from memory, the gala day celebrations that attracted your instinctive passions of sense with evanescent beguilement have proved an aversion to thought. ”

“ For ages untold, our race have waited in patient expectation for the morning’s dawn when they could salute yours face to face, and impart to you a source of happiness that in life realizes communion with immortality. ”

“ Then the three unfortunates were reduced as nearly to a state of nature as the regulations of modesty permitted; the knight and squire were haltered and placed upon the roach in a reversed position and led from the arena amid the jeers of the multitude. The heartless lack of pitying sympathy shown to the knight and his companions in misfortune, aroused in our breasts emotions akin to indignation, but we were again warned that we must not be prodigal with our kindly instincts unless we wished to bankrupt them in utter disgust. ”

“ In truth, we have never failed to discover in women, when free from the actual vices of corruption, the latent spark of goodness that with exampled cultivation may be revived for truthful reciprocation. Dependent as we have been upon auramentation for the invocation of purity in thought, the impressions are as transient as the conjurations of a dream, which give place to the more tangible waking visions of sense. ”

“ We feel ourselves novices in appreciation and capacity for reciprocation, as well as in the power of self-command, but will treasure your loving example for a clearer perception of our faults of omission and commission. Notwithstanding our gratitude has but recently emerged from its cocoon of selfishness, we feel that its rays are brighter, warmer, and more kindly in their influence and extension, and truly hope that we shall be able to reflect your example for the lasting good of the well disposed. ”

“ To be not only cleanly, but pure, without a questioning thought of subterfuge, was clearly the motor influence of every enactment, with the special desire that their personalities should reflect the refinements of reality. “In all the departments the children are taught by example, that their personal individuality may become responsible to itself for acceptable purity to others in current association; so that in health all their wants of instinct are self supplied, although rendered facile by household coöperation, without unnatural exactions that would beget impressions of mentality. ”

“ When at length, after surmounting many difficulties, it opened to our view we were overjoyed with its beauty and the bounteous prospect it afforded for the fruitful recompense of our mischance in original intention. In the sincerity of our joy we could not withhold our thanksgiving for the divine direction that had conducted us through so many perils to a land, where, as demi-gods, we could live in freedom from the dread of invasion and corrupt oppression of imposed tyrants. Our advent brought peace to our benefactors, who had been forced into wandering exile by the neighboring tribes ”

“ The instinctive elements of humanity, like those which hold irruptive sway from excessive accumulation in the earth’s interior, involve anticipatory emotions of coming events. As, with the vacuum lull of the forest that heralds the tornado; or, in the ocean calm, the bubbling ripple crests which warn the volantaph of an approaching tempest; and the dread silence that precedes the earthquake’s convulsive throes,—the congregated multitude in counterpart had anticipated from the dirge the startling premonition of some horrible gratification. ”

“ The shades of the northern colonnades and courts have, by the reflection of this wise choice, been made luminous with the rays of affectionate goodness, for woman’s sympathy in its purity and brightness can illumine the darkest night with enduring warmth proof to the vicissitudes of time and place. ”

“ To our chance acquaintance with you, fostered with affectionate sympathy, I must charge this defection, also the retrospective pangs of shame engendered from sensitive regrets for my stupidity, which suffers from revival with every rattling peal of church bells. Not content with casting these heretical shadows across our path, you have devised to rob us of our niñas, our abiding source of love. Bethink you of the accountability you have incurred, with your chances of self-forgiveness. ”

“ Of all the civilized nations of the world, we can claim for the Germans a just preëminence in those departments of science devoted to the investigations of the habits and associations of insect life. In truth, the enthusiasm shown for insect explorations has extended itself to every department of their national existence; from the palace to the cabin particular attention is devoted to hunting, impaling, and preserving their cadavers, arranged in order, genera, and species, in mausoleum cabinets for mummified exhibition as shrines for the enraptured gaze of Teutonic devotees. ”

“ As the loss of the photograph had been the cause of continued anxiety to all, 279from the inconsolable regrets of the loser, the Captain determined to summons the padre to appear with the couriers at Amelcoy, to bear the treasure back to its owner, in penance for the sorrow he had caused by his heedlessness. Correliana’s conscious blush of happiness, as the semblance of her chosen was passed in review, imparted its impression to the invisible as well as the visible, for the Doschavita with her coterie of companions were anxious to judge of the selection made by their favorite. ”