Autobiography and Letters of Orville Dewey, D.D Part 21

And then,--was ever seen such an ambitious woman! Reading Mill, and going to read Herbert Spencer! And I suppose Kant will come next.

But bravo! I say. I am very much pleased with you. And don't say, "I wish,--but what 's the use!" You are through with the great absorbing mother's cares, and can undertake studies, and I believe there is no study so worthy of our attention as our literature. I confess that I have come [289] to a somewhat new thought of this matter of late. What is there on the earth upon which we stand,--what is there that offers to help us, to lift and build us up, that can compare with the productions of the greatest minds which are gathered up in our literature? Whether we would study human nature or the Nature Divine,-whether we would study religion, science, nature in the world around us, in the life within us,--these are the lights that shine upon our path. For those who have time to read, it seems a deplorable mistake not to turn their thoughts distinctly to what the greatest minds have said; that is, upon as many subjects as they can compa.s.s.

If I were to undertake anything in the way of education, I would set up in New York an Inst.i.tute of English Literature. I do not know but--might do something of the kind,--have a house and receive cla.s.ses that should come once or twice in a week and read in the mean time under her direction, and teach them by reading to them, by commenting, talking, pointing out and opening up to them the best things in the best authors, the poets, the essayists, the historians, the fiction-writers, and thus making them acquainted with the finest productions of the English mind; and, what is better, inspiring them with an enthusiasm and taste for pursuing, for reading such things, instead of sensation novels and such stuff.

Moliere and Corneille have struck me much on this reading,--the first with the tenuity of his thought, the slender thread on which he weaves his entertaining and life-like drama, making it to live through the ages simply by sticking to nature, making his personages speak so naturally; and the second, with the real dramatic [290] grandeur of his genius. I feel that I have never done justice to Corneille before, I have been so dissatisfied with the formal rhyme, the want of the natural dramatic play of language in his work, the stilted rhetoric. And when I heard Rachel in the Cid, I thought, by the rapid, undramatic way in which she hurried through his declamations, while, in a few exclamatory bursts, she swept everything before her, that she justified my criticism. But this was the misfortune of Corneille; he walked in shackles imposed by the taste of his time. Yet it was a lofty stride. I am particularly struck with his grand moral ideals. I wish I had a good life of him. He must have been a good man. Like Beethoven and Michael Angelo, he does not seem to have liked flattery, court, or ceremony. But I guess that is the case with most men of the higher genius. . . .

As ever,

ORVILLE DEWEY.

To Miss Catherine M. Sea'gwitk.

SHEFFIELD, Aug. 27, 1866.

MY DEAR FRIEND,--It is some time since I have written to you, and I am almost afraid you are glad of it, not having to answer. You must acknowledge, however, that I have always offered you the easiest terms of exchange; two for one, three, four, anything you liked. . . . I have been lately with Mr. Bryant, in his great affliction, staying with my sisters, who occupy one of his cottages, but spending all the time I could with him. It was very sad,--talking upon many things as we did, and much upon those things that were pressing upon his mind, for he felt that he was losing his chief earthly [291] treasure. His wife was that to him, by her simplicity, her simple truthfulness, her perfect sincerity and heart-earnestness, latterly of a very religious character, and by her good judgment also; he told me that he always consulted her upon everything he published, and found that her opinion was always confirmed by that of the public, that is, as to the relative merit of his writings. He was bound to her the more, because his ties of close affection with others are so very few. Sometimes he could not repress his tears in our talking; and they told me that in the morning, when he went to her bedside, he often sat weeping, saying, "You have been suffering all night, and I have been sleeping." In the last days she longed to depart, and often said to him, "You must let me go; I want to go" And so she went, peacefully to her rest.

We have had a very pleasant visit from Mr. R. . . . His visits are always a great pleasure to us, both for the talk we have, and the music.

It is really a great thing to know anything as he knows music. As I listened to him last evening, I could not help feeling that I knew nothing as he knows that, and thinking that if there are infant schools in the next world, I should certainly be put into one of them.

I hope the weather will allow you to sit often on the piazza in the coming month. It is what we have not been able to do in the present month at all,--by a fire, rather, in the parlor, half the time.

. . . With our affectionate remembrances to those around you, hold me to be, as ever,

Yours, ORVILLE DEWEY.

[292] To his Daughter Mary.

ST. DAVID'S, Oct. 28, 1866.

DEAREST MOLLY,--I have the pleasure to be seated at my desk to write to you, in my new gown and slippers, and with my new sermon, finished, before me. A "combination and a form," indeed, but I say no more. "But how is the sermon?" you 'll say. Why, as inimitable as the writer. But really, I think it is worth something. I did think, indeed, when I took my pen, that I could write a stronger argument for immortality than I ever saw, that is, in any one sermon or thesis. And if I have failed entirely, and shall come to think so, as is very likely, it will be no worse, doubtless, than my presumption deserved. You and K., who are satisfied with your spiritual instincts, would think it no better, probably, than a belt of sand to bolster up a mountain. Well, every one must help himself as he can. This meditation certainly has strengthened my own faith in the immortal life.

I should like to go to church with you this morning, where you are probably going; but the places are very few where I should want to go. More and more do all public services dissatisfy me,--all devout utterances, my own included. Communion with the Highest, with the Unseen and Unspeakable, seems to me to consist of breathings, not words, and requires a freedom of all thoughts and feelings,--of awe and wonder, of adoration and thanksgiving, of meditations and of stirrings of the deeps within us, such as can with difficulty be brought into a regular prayer.

[293] To the Same.

Nov. 21, 1866.

THE last "Register" has a sermon in it of Abbot's upon the Syracuse Conference, which I thought so excellent, that I told the editor it was itself worth a quarter's payment. Your mother admires it, too. Though she has no sympathy, as you well know, with Abbot's Left-Wing views, her righteous nature warmly takes part with his argument. The fact is, the Conference is wrong. If it expects the young men to act with it, it should adopt a platform on which they can conscientiously and comfortably stand. The conduct of the majority, in my opinion, is inconsistent and ungenerous. Either take ground upon which all can stand,--and I think there is such ground,--or else say to the ultra-liberals, "We cannot consent that any part of our common means shall be used for the spread of your views, influence, and preaching, and we must part."

To Rev. Henry W. Bellows, D.D.

ST. DAVID'S, March 20, 1867.

COME up here, my anxious friend, and I'll read my Concio to you; for it is written, as I preferred to do, before the warm and cold, wet and dry meslin of April weather comes, which always breaks me up in my studies.

I will read it to you, and I rather think you will like it. . . . But do not make yourself uneasy. There will be nothing in the address of what you call "a defection to the radical side," simply because, in opinion, I cannot take that ground. I do not and cannot give up the miraculous element in Christianity. But I [294] embrace our whole denomination in my sympathies and do not think our differences so important as you do.

That religion has its roots in our nature, if that is radicalism, I strongly hold and always have. And in its development and culture I have never given that exclusive place to Christianity that many do. I confess that I always disliked and resisted the utterances of the extreme conservatives on this point, more than those of their opponents. So you see that M. was mainly right. And certainly I think the minority in the Conference has had hard measure from the majority; and I liked Abbot's sermon as much as you heard I did.

Yours ever,

ORVILLE DEWEY.

To Mrs. David Lane.

ST. DAVID'S, April 14, 1867.

DEAR FRIEND,--Why should I write to you about the things you speak of in your letter which crossed mine? How vain to attempt to discuss such matters on note-paper!

But, without discussing, I will tell you, in few words, what I think.

The vitality of the Christian religion lies deeper than the miraculous element in it. The miraculous is but an attestation to that. That is authority to me. The authority of G.o.d is more clearly and unquestionably revealed to me, than in anything else, in the inborn spiritual convictions of my nature, without which, indeed, I could not understand Christianity, nor anything else religious. These convictions accord with the deepest truths of Christianity, else I could not receive it. Jesus has strengthened, elevated, and purified these natural [295] convictions in such a way,--by such teachings, by such a life, by such an unparalleled beauty of character,-that I believe G.o.d has breathed a grace into his soul that he never-has [given] in the same measure and perfection to any other. Effects must have causes, and such an effect seems to me fairly to indicate such a cause.

But there are those who cannot take this view; who look upon the gospel as simply the best exposition of national religion ever given, without any other breath of inspiration upon the record than such as was breathed upon the pages of Plato or Epictetus. Now, if they went further, and disowned the very spirit of Jesus, rejected the very essence of the gospel, certainly they would not be Christians. But this they do not; on the contrary, they reverently and heartily accept it, and seek to frame their lives upon this model. Am I to hold such persons as outcasts from the Christian fold, to refuse them my sympathy, to accord them only my "pity "? Certainly, I can take no such ground.

The peculiarities of certain individuals--the "cold abstractions" of one, and the rash utterances of another--have nothing essentially to do with the case; nor has the hurt they may be thought to do to our Unitarian cause anything to do with the essential truth of things. Nor do I know that extreme Radicalism does us any more harm than extreme Conservatism. I belong to neither extreme; and my business is, without regard to public cause or private reputation, to keep, as far as I can, my own mind right.

The fact is, you are so conservative on every subject,--society, politics, medicine, religion,--that it is very difficult for you to do justice to the radical side. But consider that such men as Martineau, Bartol, Stebbins, [296] Ames, and Abbot are mainly on that side, and that it will not do to cast about scornful or pitying words concerning such. As to __ I give him up to you, for I don't like his writing any better than you do.

I think the great Exposition which you are soon to see may give you a liberalizing hint. There, the industry of all nations will be exhibited.

All are bent, honestly and earnestly, upon one point,--the development of the human energies in that direction. And it will infer nothing against their good character, or their t.i.tles to sympathy and respect, that they differ more or less with regard to the modes and means of arriving at the end.

Well, you will go before I come to New York. G.o.d bless and keep you, and bring you safely back!

Ever your friend,

ORVILLE DEWEY.

There are some pa.s.sages in an unpublished sermon, preached by my father at Church Green, in 1858, which I will quote presently, as ill.u.s.trative of the same tone of thought shown in these letters. His clinging to the miraculous element in the life of Jesus, while refusing to base any positive authority upon it, is equally characteristic of him, arising from the caution, at once reverent and intellectual, which made him extremely slow to remove any belief, consecrated by time and affection, till it was proved false and dangerous, and from his thorough conviction that every man stands or falls by so much of the Infinite Light and Love as he is able to receive directly into his being. He was conservative by [297] feeling, and radical by thought, and the two wrought in him a grand charity of judgment, far above what is ordinarily called toleration.

These are the extracts referred to:

"Society as truly as nature, nay, as truly as the holy church, is a grand organism for human culture. I say emphatically,--as truly as the holy church; for we are p.r.o.ne to take a narrow view of man's spiritual growth, and to imagine that there is nothing to help it, out of the pale of Christianity. We make a sectarism of our Christian system, even as the Jews did of the Hebrew, though ours was designed to break down all such narrow bounds; so that I should not wonder if some one said to me,--Are you preaching the Christian religion when you thus speak of nature and society?' And I answer, 'No; I am speaking of a religion elder than the Christian.' . . .

"There was a righteousness, then, before and beside the Christian. Am I to be told that Socrates and Plato, and Marcus Antoninus and Boethius, had no right culture, no religion, no rect.i.tude? and they were cast upon the bosom of nature and of society for their instruction, and of that light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.'"

To his Daughter Mary.

ST. DAVID'S, Sept. 20, 1867.

. . . THINK of my having read the whole of Voltaire's "Henriade" last week! But think especially of eminent French critics, and Marmontel among them (in the preface), praising it to the stars, saying that some of the [298] pa.s.sages are superior to Homer and Virgil! However, it is really better than I expected, and I read on, partly from curiosity and partly for the history. The French would have been very glad to find it an epic worthy of the name, for they have n't one. Voltaire frankly confesses that the French have not a genius for great poetry,--too much in love, he says, with exactness and elegance.

I have--read--through--"Very Hard Cash;" and very hard it is to read.

Reade has some pretty remarkable powers,--powers of description and of characterization; but the moment he touches the social relations, and should be dramatic, he is struck with total incapacity. Indeed, what one novelist has been perfect in dialogue, making each person say just what he should and nothing else, but glorious Sir Walter?

To the Same.

SHEFFIELD, Sept. 20, 1867.

DEAR MARY,--"Live and learn." Next time, if it ever come, I shall put up peaches in a little box by themselves. But the fact is, peaches can't travel, unless they are plucked so early as nearly to spoil them of all their "deliciarunz,"--which we are enjoying in those we eat here. And Bryant with us,--fruity fellow that he is!--I am glad we have some good fruit to give him. Yesterday we had a very good cantelope, and pears are on hand all the while. I am sorry that I could not get the pears to you just in eating condition, and the Hurlbut apples too; but they'll all come right.