Maturin

“ Breakfasting with Portia “PROBABLY few persons who are not professionally interested,” said Professor Maturin, “realize how earnestly the schools of to-day are endeavoring not only to conserve the proved excellences of traditional knowledge, but also to provide new varieties of training that are made imperative by present-day conditions. Hence the subjects in the curriculum that appear fads to the fathers—nature study, manual training, physical education, household science and art, music, and the fine arts. ”

“ In it all there is an intellectual optimism that inevitably follows the thought wherever it roams—and it often roams far afield—which is one of the thrice blessed things of life. If through it all there runs, as again may clearly be seen, the visible thread of the conscious pursuit of happiness, Professor Maturin is no mere eudemonist whose belly is his god and whose goal is pleasure, but rather one who sees in the attainment of personal happiness the rightful accessory of a rounded and rational living. ”

“ A Small College PROFESSOR Maturin has always questioned the somewhat popular belief that the small college, once so important, is about to disappear between the portentously rumbling upper and nether millstones of the universities and the public schools. ”

“ Nor do I see any reason, as we become more and more a new race, blended of many, why our good fortunes should not continue and increase. Anything else would falsify our trust in a wide and a wise humanity—and that is unthinkable.
[34] “But, I beg your pardon,” said Professor Maturin, as I rose to say good-night, “I did not mean to take the stump; and yet, I believe that it is good sometimes to give utterance to these things which all of us feel. Nothing revives the vigor of one’s spirit like the conscious realization of being in harmony with fundamental law.” ”

“ A man’s look is the work of years; it is stamped on his countenance by the events of his whole life, nay more, by the hand of nature.... This sort of prima facie evidence shows what a man is, better than what he says or does.’”
[94] X
Mental Hygiene AS the Vicar, the Physician, and I entered Professor Maturin’s study, after dinner, the Vicar sank into his chair with a deep sigh. “Is it so bad as that?” queried Professor Maturin, as he passed the cigars. “I beg a general pardon,” replied the Vicar. “To-day has quite tired me out, although I am just back from a vacation.” ”

“ He declines his head on her bosom, and she feels with delighted amazement, a few tears streaming on it for the first time for years—a soft but conscious pressure of her hand, seems to her like the signal of reviving intelligence—with breathless hope she watches him as he slowly raises his head, and fixes his eyes—God of all consolation, there is intelligence in his glance! ”

“ Even in the isle where he first saw her in the infancy of her intellect, she had felt the consciousness of superior powers, which were then her solace, not her pride. Her value for herself rose with her devotion to him. ”

“ In England he would have been considered a thoroughly moderate man, but to the Irish evangelical masses he always appeared as little removed from a papist, and to a large section in Dublin his name was a term of theological reproach. In his personal character Maturin was most distinguished. After speaking of the great qualities of his sermons, Professor Mahaffy says of Maturin: 'He was a grim Dantesque sort of man, with deep affection for his family and friends hidden under a severe exterior. ”

“ His [193] own college, in the last five years, had enlarged its endowment from three hundred thousand to nearly a million dollars, and its attendance from two to nearly four hundred students. Five hundred was to be the limit, the president and his faculty being unanimous in believing that no college should be too large to give attention to every student every day in every class. “This was sufficiently reassuring,” said Professor Maturin, as he told me about it, “to permit my attending comfortably to my surroundings, which were indeed charming.” ”

“ I know not, Sir, nor is it a problem to be solved by human intellect, whether this inscrutable being had not the power to influence my dreams, and dictate to a tempting demon the images which had driven me to fling myself at his feet for hope and safety. ”

“ For student use the collection seemed quite adequate, not indeed for specialization, but certainly for the fundamental, general training for which the college stood. The work of the freshman and sophomore years consisted largely of required subjects, the junior and senior years largely of electives. This system, long in vogue, proved most acceptable, particularly to such graduates as my friend the professor, who had taken in college, Latin, Greek, French, and German; much English, some history, and a little economics; geology, physics, chemistry, physiology, and hygiene ”

“ You know the step I have taken, you must be aware I will pursue it with all the powers of nature,—that I will never rest till my vows are annulled, while a hope of it remains,—and that a soul, determined as mine, can convert despair itself into hope. Surrounded, suspected, watched as I have been, I yet found the means of conveying my papers to the hands of the advocate. Calculate the strength of that resolution which could effectuate such a measure in the very heart of a convent. ”

“ A very slight gift of a guinea or two obliges as much, is more fashionable, and not a moment sooner forgotten than a magnificent one; and then you may cheaply oblige the more persons.’”
“Such being the earlier history and tradition of the festival, what should be its modern spirit?” I inquired.
“For that, too,” continued Professor Maturin, “there is no lack of leading. Charles Lamb is frankly for ‘the good old munching system ... ingens gloria apple-pasty-orum,’ and does not hesitate to prescribe for Christmas, 1800, ‘snipes exactly [71] at nine, punch at ten, with argument ”

“ Immalee paused for a moment, as if making the first effort of reflection—an exertion painful enough to a being whose existence was composed of felicitous tacts and unreflecting instincts—and then exclaimed, “We both must have grown in the world of voices, for I know what you say better than the chirp of the loxia, or the cry of the peacock. That must be a delightful world where they all speak—what would I give that my roses grew in the world of answers!” ”

“ Seven mornings and evenings Immalee paced the sands of her lonely isle, without seeing the stranger. She had still his promise to console her, that they should meet in the world of suffering; and this she repeated to herself as if it was full of hope and consolation. In this interval she tried to educate herself for her introduction into this world, and it was beautiful to see her attempting, from vegetable and animal analogies, to form some image of the incomprehensible destiny of man. ”

“ I had noted with interest how the habit of observation seemed to lead inevitably to comparison, and that to generalization and conclusion. It had been no small satisfaction to learn how adequately the human frame and mind had met and withstood the severer experiences of the more daring—how small, after all, were the world’s greatest difficulties and dangers to the unconquerable spirit. But it was most gratifying of all to realize that the general experience had resulted not in distrust, but in belief in the fundamental kindliness, if not goodness, of [23] general human nature ”

“ I believed myself your future patron, I conceived myself redeeming the injustice of nature, aiding and aggrandizing you, forcing you to confess that you owed more to me than to your parents, and throwing myself, with a disarmed and naked heart, on your gratitude alone for affection. ”

“ While this man, with all his physical strength, and all his mental hardihood, was tossing on the earth with the imbecillity of an infant, in a paroxysm of unappeasable passion, I was his consoler, adviser, and supporter. At last he suffered himself to hear reason; he agreed that we must remain twenty-four hours more in the passage, on which he bestowed a whole litany of curses. So we determined to stand in stillness and darkness till night ”

“ I was silent in the refectory,—in the garden I walked alone. I neither thought, nor felt, nor lived,—if life depends on consciousness, and the motions of the will. I slept through my existence like the Simorgh in the Eastern fable, but this sleep was not to last long. My abstraction and calmness would not do for the Jesuits. My stupor, my noiseless tread, my fixed eyes, my ghastly silence, might indeed have impressed a superstitious community with the idea that it was no human creature who stalked through their cloisters, and haunted their choir. ”

“ But, how little every thing is!—thought should have made every thing larger—thought should be a god. But,” she added with quick intelligence and self-accusing diffidence, “perhaps I am wrong. Sometimes I have thought I could lay my hand on the top of a palm-tree, but when, after a long, long time, I came close to it, I could not have reached its lowest leaf were I ten times higher than I am. Perhaps your beautiful world may grow higher as I approach it.”—“Hold, Immalee,” said the stranger, taking the telescope from her hands, “to enjoy this sight you should understand it.”—“Oh yes!” ”

“ Judged from the grades given by instructors to several thousand school and college students, the natural sciences are closer to Latin, in the kind of ability they require, than they are to mathematics. Algebra and geometry are almost as different from one another as mathematics in general are from non-mathematical subjects.
“Such facts certainly seemed to warrant the conclusions of the professor to whose guidance Portia now consigned me: ‘The mind is not a functional unit, nor even a collection of general [177] faculties which work irrespective of particular material. ”

“ The community separated after dinner. I watched for the toll of the bell for vespers,—I imagined that would be decisive. The bell tolled at last,—the monks assembled. I joined them without opposition,—I took my place in the choir,—my triumph was complete, and I trembled at it. Alas! in what moment of success do we not feel a sensation of terror? Our destiny always acts the part of the ancient slave to us, who was required every morning to remind the monarch that he was a man; and it seldom neglects to fulfil its own predictions before the evening. ”

“ I felt as if not a living being was in existence but those who surrounded me, and who appeared, in the livid light of one taper burning faintly in that dismal passage, like spectres hurrying a condemned soul to his doom. ”

“ They all interrupted me with exclamations, as they repeated my last words,—“Reluctance! invincible! Is it for this you have been admitted to our presence? Is it for this we have borne so long with your contumacy, only to hear it repeated with aggravations?” “Yes, my father,—yes, for this or nothing. If I am not permitted to speak, why am I suffered in your presence?” “Because we hoped to witness your submission.” “Allow me to give the proofs of it on my knees;”—and I fell on my knees, hoping that my posture might soften the effect of the words I could not help uttering. ”

“ The daughters, Ines and Julia, had all the loveliness of their colder climate—the luxuriant ringlets of golden hair, the large bright blue eyes, the snow-like whiteness of their bosoms, and slender arms, and the rose-leaf tint and peachiness of their delicate cheeks, made them, as they attended their parents with graceful and fond officiousness, resemble two young Hebes ministering cups, which their touch alone was enough to turn into nectar. ”

“ Such early vigor and maturity would have been astonishing in one who had enjoyed all the advantages of early training, all the aids afforded by the best theological institutions and instructors; but in one who had passed through so many hardships, overcome so many difficulties, and was so emphatically self-taught and self-made, they can only be regarded as evidences of the highest genius, and the immediate favorable interposition of Divine Providence. ”

“ Is all the energy of intellect, and all the enthusiasm of feeling, to be expended in contrivances how to meet or shift off the petty but torturing pangs of hourly necessity? Is the fire caught from heaven to be employed in lighting a faggot to keep the cold from the numbed and wasted fingers of poverty. Pardon this digression, Senhor,” said the stranger, “but I had a painful feeling, that forced me to make it.” ”

“ It is the consciousness of a Being superior to all worlds and their inhabitants, because he is the Maker of all, and will be their judge—of a Being whom we cannot see, but in whose power and presence we must believe, though invisible—of one who is every where unseen ”

“ In this way, without relaxing his following of the latest professional knowledge, he came to believe increasingly in direct observation and experience, and acquired a discriminating respect for the traditional lore of old men and women. ”

“ Wherefore, it being certified unto me by our brother, that thou wert a youth who couldst handle the pen of a scribe, and, moreover, wast in need of a city of refuge, and a strong wall of defence, against the laying-in-wait of thy brethren round about thee, I was willing that thou shouldst come under my roof, and eat of such things as I set before thee, and such as thy soul desireth, excepting only the abominable things forbidden in the law of the prophet; and shouldst, moreover, receive wages as an hired servant.”
“You will perhaps smile, Sir ”

“ What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul. The philosopher, the saint, and the hero,—the wise, the good, and the great man, very often lie hid and concealed in a plebeian, which a proper education might have disinterred and brought to light.—Addison.
Very few men are wise by their own counsel, or learned by their own teaching; for he that was only taught by himself had a fool to his master.—Ben Jonson.
I am always for getting a boy forward in his learning, for that is sure good. ”