Alexander Douglas

“ The attitude of the Bible is just that which every soul must, in its highest and truest moods, always assume—that of a wise wonder in front of such a universe as this—that of a noble humility before a God such as He ‘in whose great Hand we stand.’ This is why—like Alexander’s mirror—like that most precious ‘Cup of Jemshîd,’ imagined by the Persians—the Bible reflects to-day, and will reflect for ever, every wave of human emotion, every passing event of human life—reflect them as faithfully as it did to the great and simple people in whose great and simple tongue it was written. ”

“ Principal Lee has said: "All the accounts of Douglas which I have ever seen in modern books abound with errors. He is represented as having been an obscure Carmelite friar whom the Earl of Argyle chose to employ as his chaplain, and for whom the Archbishop of St Andrews expressed the strongest aversion. He was quite a different man—a man of family undoubtedly, and most probably related to James Douglas the Earl of Morton, son of Sir George Douglas of Pinky, and, like him, a branch of the great family of Angus" (Lee's Lectures, ii. 3) . ”

“ To become renowned, judging from many a peroration in his books, was as great an incentive to Dereham to learn languages as to Alexander Smith’s poet-hero it was an incentive to write poetry.’
‘Ambition and the green gamp,’ said Gordon. ‘But look, the rainbow is fading from the sky without the intervention of gypsy sorceries; and see how the ferns are changing colour with the change in the light.’
But I soon found that if Dereham was not a perfect Child of the Open Air, he was something better: a man of that deep sympathy with human kind which the ‘Child of the Open Air’ must needs lack. ”

“ And perhaps the only truly philosophical definition of the word ‘indecency’ would be this: ‘A painful and shocking contrast of man’s spiritual with his physical nature.’ When Hamlet, with his finger on Yorick’s skull, declares that his ‘gorge rises at it,’ and asks if Alexander’s skull ‘smelt so,’ he shocks us as deeply in a serious way as Sterne in his allusion to the winding up of the clock shocks us in a humourous way, and to express the sensation they each give there is, perhaps, no word but ‘indecent.’ ”

“ While the armies lay thus opposed to each other, Douglas resolved to give the young king of England a lesson in the art of war. At the dead of night, he left the Scottish camp with a small body of chosen horse, not above two hundred, well armed. He crossed the river in deep silence, and came to the English camp, which was but carelessly guarded. Seeing this, Douglas rode past the English sentinels as if he had been an officer of the English army, saying,—"Ha, Saint George! you keep bad watch here!" ”

“ The young chicken very soon pecks at grains of corn, but it pecked while it was still in the shell, and when it hears the hen peck, it pecks again, at first seemingly at random. Then, when it has by chance hit upon a grain, it may, no doubt, learn to notice the field of vision which is at the moment presented to it. ”

“ The feeble nestling when it leaves the shell is blind. One of the several very pronounced and interesting instincts it exhibits at this stage is, that in response to certain sounds it opens its mouth and struggles to hold up its head to be fed. ”

“ Granting our utter inability to go back in imagination through the infinite multitude of forms, with their diversified mental characteristics, that stand between the greyhound and the speck of living jelly to which, according to the theory of evolution, it is related by an unbroken line of descent—granting that we are, if possible, still less able to picture in imagination the process of change from any one form to another—what then? Not surely that the theory of evolution is false! For the same argument will prove that no man present can possibly be the son of his father. ”

“ Douglas was a remarkable man, both in character and in person. In age he may have been about fifty, with a strong-jawed, rugged face, a grizzling moustache, peculiarly keen gray eyes, and a wiry, vigorous figure which had lost nothing of the strength and activity of youth. He was cheery and genial to all, but somewhat offhand in his manners, giving the impression that he had seen life in social strata on some far lower horizon than the county society of Sussex. ”

“ You see an ocean-bound republic requires imagination to get the thrill out of it, but you can catch anybody in America with a military uniform. And while Douglas may be a war man, so to speak, he is really too honest to play that game. I'll grant him that much. I think that the Whigs are outplaying him. And it looks to me that the emotions of America—what some people might call the conscience of America—are being drawn away from Douglas by this slavery matter. Just now territory and railroads are not so strong, or will not be so strong pretty soon as the cry for emancipation. ”

“ We should have no iron bridges built, or Atlantic cables laid, or financial companies started, and we certainly should not have any man-killing machines a million or half-a-million strong; whereas every well-conducted person knows that such things are now-a-days absolutely necessary. The truth is, that John Douglas, or Captain Douglas, as the neighbours called him with a kind of grudging respect, was a skulker from the battle of humanity. What he wanted was a beach of white sand, a hot day, a blue sea, a book, a pipe, and the absence of his fellow-creatures. ”

“ Unarmed, a gentle blitheness graced his style:
A dainty lisp engaged his auditors
With tickling pleasure; such a piquant touch
Was in the Scottish Hector, as they called him,
Tripping with helpless tongue, like rose-lipped girls.
But when he armed his body, then his soul
Was harnessed in a dress of adamant.
In council-halls, o'er ladies' lutes, in war,
Brave, courteous, wise, loyal to truth, he was:
So is he: Douglas changes but for good.
Edward I. You praise him highly. You shall answer him.
He comes. Make room.
Enter Sir James Douglas.
We know your errand, sir. ”

“ At such moments, when answering Douglas in the heat of their joint-debate, or later, during the years of war, when he pronounced with noble gravity the words of his famous addresses, not one in the throngs that heard him could say with truth that he was other than a handsome man. ”

“ In 1858, ability, courage, activity, ambition, the prestige of success, and a plausible moderation in party politics combined to make Douglas the most conspicuous individual in the public view. There was no other way whereby any other man could so surely attract the close and interested attention of the whole people as by meeting Douglas in direct personal competition. If Douglas had not held the position which he did, or if, holding it, he had lived in another State than Illinois, Lincoln might never have been President of the United States. ”

“ Douglas is only thirty-seven; he will not fully mature his powers for ten years yet. I have talked with him many times and have known him intimately and I think I understand the man. He is distrusted in the South simply because he will not bend all law making to the slave interests. ”

“ The earldom and entailed estates of Douglas reverted by the patent of 1358 to Archibald Douglas, 3rd Earl of Douglas, called “The Grim” (c. 1328–c. 1400) , a natural son of the “good” Sir James. With his cousin, the 1st earl of Douglas, he had fought at Poitiers, where he was taken prisoner, but was released through ignorance of his real rank. On his return to Scotland he became constable and sheriff of Edinburgh, and, later, warden of the western marches, where his position was strengthened by his becoming lord of Galloway in 1369 and by his purchase of the earldom of Wigtown in 1372. ”

“ Then, when his father also passed away, on May 24, 1799, he was left in possession of the ancestral estates and became the fifth Earl of Selkirk.
As a youngest son, who would have to make his own way in the world, Thomas Douglas had prepared himself, and this was a distinct advantage to him when his elevation in rank occurred. He entered into his fortune and place an educated man, with the broad outlook upon life and the humanitarian sympathy which study and experience bring to a generous spirit. ”

“ I sink fast; but let them still cry my war-cry, and conceal my death from my followers. There was a tradition in our family that a dead Douglas should win a field, and I trust it will this day be accomplished."
The Nobles did as he had enjoined; they concealed the Earl's body, and again rushed on to the battle, shouting "Douglas! Douglas!" louder than before. The English were weakened by the loss of the brave brothers Henry and Ralph Percy, both of whom were made prisoners, fighting most gallantly; and almost no man of note amongst the English escaped death or captivity. ”

“ Give Douglas wit, humor, and he would carry the whole country. For it runs after greatness of territory, railroads, the equality of man, the superiority of the white race. As dull as the mob is it knows that Douglas does not stand for its morality and its God. If he had wit he could make them laugh and forget the distance that divides him from them. We all understand why he has enemies; why the revolutionaries from Germany, Hungary, Austria, divide in doubt over him. But what has he to carry against them that will be a loss to the world, if he fails? ”

“ With all this intellectual activity, Douglas was not a reader. I had found Emerson through Abigail; I read the North American Review, and Cooper's novels as they appeared. But Douglas had contempt for the moral idealism of New England. He thought it impractical. "You can't have a brain without a body," said Douglas. "Let the country develop its bones, its muscles, attain its stature. These men think the world is run by righteousness, especially if you let them prescribe the righteousness. ”

“ I asked, "that Douglas is against all these people and that he has all these influences to fight? For example, these Puritans cannot rule if popular sovereignty is adopted everywhere. They are numerically too inferior. How, for example, can you stop the railroads on Sunday if you let communities, states, control the matter? But if these fanatics get into control of the Federal government, they can do it. Don't you see the point? This is what Douglas is thinking about. He knows that you can have freedom about life only where every man has a say." ”

“ If I were recording the life of an artist I should be dealing with different causes acting upon his development, or with different effects produced by the same times in which Douglas lived. Instead I am trying to set forth the soul of a great man who extracted from his environment other things than beauty; or rather the beauty of national progress. The question was, after all, whether Douglas was helping to give America a soul. ”

“ The independence of Scotland was to be guaranteed, and a special clause provided for the restoration of the English estates of the Douglas family. On the accession of Robert II. he was nevertheless reconciled, becoming justiciar of southern Scotland, and the last years of his life were spent in making and repelling border raids. He died at Douglas in May 1384, and was succeeded by his son James. By his wife’s sister-in-law, Margaret Stewart, countess of Angus in her own right, and widow of the 13th earl of Mar, he had a son George, afterwards 1st earl of Angus. ”

“ Stung with this reproach, Randolph called upon his soldiers to follow him, exclaiming, "My wreath shall bloom, or I shall perish!"
As he advanced, the English, who were ten to one, wheeled round to attack him, and pressed hard on his little band. Douglas saw his jeopardy, and requested the king's permission to succour him. "You shall not move from your ground," cried the king; "let Randolph extricate himself as he best may,—I will not alter my order of battle, and lose the advantage of my position." ”

“ He soon became prosperous. Now he is rich. What public man has become so rich? Yes, here is the American cotter's home; and so many boys have come out of a place like this and gone to the wars or into public life. It is America's symbol."
"You do not like Douglas, do you, Reverdy?" I asked, as we turned away. "Yes, I like him, I have always supported him—but somehow I feel that he is not good enough. I don't know what else to call it. You know, I don't like slavery; at the same time I don't know what to do with it. Sometimes I think Douglas' plan is all right, again I am not sure. ”

“ Last of all, he killed his prisoners, and flung the dead bodies among this disgusting heap, throwing salt over the whole. This his men called in derision of the English, the Douglas Larder. Then he flung dead horses into the well to destroy it; set fire to the castle; and afterwards marching away, took refuge with his followers in the hills and forests. "He loved better," he said, "to hear the lark sing than the mouse squeak;" that is, he loved better to keep in the open field with his men, than to shut himself and them up in castles. ”

“ His politics partook of this character, and I always used to think that it was a queer destiny which made him a Radical teacher. The Radical literature of England is, with few exceptions, of a prosaic character. The most famous school of radicalism is utilitarian and systematic. Douglas was, emphatically, neither. He was impulsive, epigrammatic, sentimental. He dashed gaily against an institution, like a picador at a bull. He never sat down, like the regular workers of his party, to calculate the expenses of monarchy or the extravagance of the civil list. ”