Some Platitudes

Some Platitudes By Alfred Lambourne Yes, I might call these few random thoughts platitudes, for that is what they surely are. Platitudes, because we have all re- ceived the same thoughts, no doubt; and yet they might be original to each one of us. I always feel mentally flattered when I discover that some thought of mine but parallels a thought that has come to some writer whom I admire. Such a discovery establishes a relationship of mind or soul that is pleas- ant to one's vanity at least. Therefore, platitudes, and if I am fortunate enough to find a response in the mind of a reader parallel to some thought of his or hers, let us shake hands in the unseen friendship. Release The other day the foolish resolve came to me that I would do a bit of autobiographical writing, and afterwards came this thought: Alpha and Omega ! As persons cannot write at first hand about their entry into this world of action, so neither can they tell of their own demise. The more is the pity! One would like to gather up the ravelled threads of the broken cord of life and see them in the completed circle. What a delightsome mo- ment that must be when the soul, made free of the tenement of earthly being, looks on the now useless clay? Unless, indeed — ! Well, I have listened, through the words of spiritualist mediums, to the supposed accounts of the departed. I have waited upon the statements of Theosophists, and I have read the Mesmer- ic Revelations of Edgar A. Poe; and also the Strange Case of M. Valdemar by the same gifted writer, as well as his The Colloquy of Monos and Una — all food for the imagination, yet how one would like to know truly concerning the moment of release. Spiritism, Theosophy, Mesmerism, the projection of the poetic imagination into the realms of unknown, have left me as wise as I was before. My venture into autobiography, if I pursue it further, must, like all others, remain uncompleted. After all, have I not confounded the boundary lines? How ^ery differently, indeed, the process of death, the final moments of life as related from the opposite spheres of thought! But release? Ah, never might the soul cease release from progress! But from the burden of the aging flesh, yes. Release from the limitation of the mortal senses, of space and time. Self-Analysis "Man, know thyself" — there is no more often quoted ad- monition by any sage. Yes, know, and then show a further wis-

SOME PLATITUDES 731 dom in remaining silent. What is more egotistical than a word picture of one's self? And yet there has been some formal and remarkable men who have indulged themselves in this weakness. Sir Thomas Browne, for instance. In his Religio-Medica the sententious writer has given us an exalted likeness of himself, and it were well for one if he could justly desire some of the high hope and beliefs of the old writer. Then there is Milton writing nobly of himself in A True Poem, and the garrulous Pepy's own portrait in his now deciphered cryptogram in his stately Diary; there is Samuel Richardson, too, who has given himself almost world renown by his skill as a word-artist in his letter to Lady Bradshaigh, and what a re-creation of one's self is the Journal of Marie Bashkirtseff ; the wonderful young Russian lives again in her pages. Nor do we lack for the very latest of the modern instances. In the endless manner of today's biographies we see the very essence of the human egotism. Ah, yes, they take us back to when we find a difference only in kind between the Pensees of Pascal and the Commentaries of Caesar. "Man, know thyself:" yes, indeed. There is the beginning of wisdom. But to what purpose? Perhaps we are all quite vain enough to desire that our fellow creatures might know what manner of men we are. And yet, is it important to the world — the details or even the aggregate of our least or highest doings? Vanitus vanitatum! That is our mood today — but tomorrow? Retrospection Great experiences are things to be coveted. So, perhaps, the truly fortunate beings are those who have scaled the heights of rapture and descended to the depths of sorrow. Extremes must meet before a circle is formed. One segment in the circle of experience must be as important as another. Pleasure and pain; success and failure; these are all essential to the rounded life. Yes, and I will add, to the rounded memory. Experience — surely the devil told a truth in the Garden of Eden, — and ex- perience goes to the making of gods and men. One would like to receive answers to his own soul's questionings from certain shades of the august dead. What completeness of opposites must occupy the retrospection of ancient shades! "Through a glass darkly" — the experiences of the lesser human beings are as im- portant to them as are the experiences of the great. The human race has not yet become a race of stoics. The philosophers who followed the teachings of Zeno only bade us know the half of the circle and would leave us forever incomplete. But we return to our question on retrospection. Ah, ex- perience is the true teacher, and retrospection surely one of its gieatest benefits. Ask the ghost of the Corsican, he who desired

732 IMPROVEMENT ERA to rule the world, think you that he would tell us after all that he regretted his lesson of St. Helena? William of Normandy, was he taught more in his days of triumph than in the miseries of his last days on earth? And Alexander? The Grecian's death on the banks of the Nile — what counterpoise to all his vic- tories! Question the defeated Xerxes and the assassinated Cae- sar, would one regret his humiliation at Salamis? the other the dagger of Brutus? O, retrospection — how wonderful to the liv- ing! What must it be to the dead? Retrospection — Socrates and the cup of hemlock! Job and the dunghill! Jesus upon the Cross ! Friendship and Love I have been reading the Sonnets of Michael Angelo. Surely more noble verse has never been written. How strange and un- usual was the spectacle presented! We mean the spectacle of love so overcoming in his period of age, that intellectual giant! Michael Angelo reversed the usual tale of love; no young man was he when he so 'oved, but one stricken with years. It was after his tremendous life labors and unparalleled achievements in the realm of art, that he bowed to woman's beauty, became the adorer of Vittoria Colonna. Painter of the great fresco, representing the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel; sculp- tor of the wonderful statue of Moses, the designer of the vast edifice of St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome; Angelo was humble in love as a little child; and became a poet in his adoration. That this love like that of Tasso and Petrarch was hopeless makes no difference to the tale. The grizzled Angelo believed that love hallowed his age, and that beauty sublimed his love. For us the love of the great Italian produced for our reading the marvelous Sonnets. Friendship — what a Golconda mine of life-wealth is there! Whole libraries have been written upon that theme. Friend- ship is as rare as faith, more rare than lo\e. Chaff, chaff! lies, lies! How much there is of chaff and lies. So much of chaff and lies in the protestations and actions of men, in art, in science, in history, in philosophy, and in so-called theology ! There is so much that it is apparently useless in all things, there is so much that is apparently a lie. How shall we tell that which is chaff and that which is wheat? What a pity, in friendship or love, to take the chaff and lies and lose that which is wheat and truth. In friendship I believe with Mohammed, give me one true friend, one who believes in and understands me, and how easy to face an adverse world. And how much more true is the courage that is given from love. Give one love, the refuge of a heart; then, come what may, still he shares with heaven.