The Sea Lions Part 35

"Yet you have seen, sir, that these apostles believed what you refuse.

One thing has crossed my mind, Captain Gar'ner, which I wish to say to you. I know I'm but an ignorant man, and my idees may be hardly worth your notice; but sich as they be, I want to lay 'em afore you. We are told that these apostles were all men from a humble cla.s.s in life, with little l'arnin', chosen, as it might be, to show men that faith stood in need of no riches, or edication, or worldly greatness, of any sort. To me, sir, there is a wholesome idee in that one thing."

"It gives us all a useful lesson, Stephen, and has often been mentioned, I believe, in connection with the doctrines of Christianity."

"Yes, sir--so I should think; though I don't remember ever to have heard it named from any pulpit. Well, Captain Gar'ner, it does not agree with our notions to suppose that G.o.d himself, a part of the Ruler and Master of the Universe, should be born of a woman, and come among sinners in order to save 'em from his own just judgments."

"That is just the difficulty that I have in believing what are called the dogmas of Christianity on that one point. To me, it has ever seemed the most improbable thing in the world."

"Just so, sir--I had some sort of feelin of that natur' myself once. When G.o.d, in his goodness, put it into my heart to believe, however, as he was pleased to do in a fit of sickness from which I never expected to rise, and in which I was led to pray to him for a.s.sistance, I began to think over all these matters in my own foolish manner. Among other things, I said to myself, 'is it likely that any mortal man would dream of calling Christ the Son of G.o.d, unless it was put into _his_ mind to say so?' Then comes the characters of them men, who all admit were upright and religious. How can we suppose that they would agree in giving the same account of sich a thing, unless what they said had been told to them by some tongue that they believed?"

Roswell smiled at Stephen's reasoning, which was not without a certain point, but which an ingenious man might find the means of answering in various ways.

"There is another thing, sir, that I've read in a book," resumed the boat-steerer, "which goes a great way with me. Jesus allowed others to call him the Son of G.o.d, without rebuking them for doing so. It does really seem that they who believe he was a good man, as I understand is the case with you, Captain Gar'ner, must consider this as a strong fact.

We are to remember what a sin idolatry is; how much all ra'al worshippers abhor it; and then set that feelin' side by side with the fact that the Son did riot think it robbery to be called the equal of the Father. To me, that looks like a proof that our belief has a solid foundation."

Roswell did not reply. He was aware that it would not be just to hold any creed responsible for the manner in which a person like Stimson defended it. Still, he was struck with both of this man's facts. The last, he had often met in books; but the first was new to him. Of the two, this novel idea of the improbability of the apostles' inventing that which would seem to be opposed to all men's notions and prejudices, struck him more forcibly than the argument adduced from the acquiescence of the Redeemer in his own divinity. The last might be subject to verbal criticism, and could possibly be explained away, as he imagined; but the first appeared to be intimately incorporated with the entire history of Christ's ministrations on earth. These were the declarations of John the Baptist, the simple and unpretending histories of the Gospels, the commentaries of St. Paul, and the venerable teachings of the church through so many centuries of varying degrees of faith and contention, each and all going to corroborate a doctrine that, in his eyes, had appeared to be so repugnant to philosophy and reason. Wishing to be alone, Roswell gave an order to Stimson to execute some duty that fell to his share, and continued walking up and down the terrace alone for quite an hour longer.

The night was coming in cold and still. It was one of those last efforts of winter in which all the terrible force of the season was concentrated: and it really appeared as if nature, wearied with its struggle to return to a more genial temperature, yielded in despair, and was literally returning backwards through the coldest of her months. The moon was young, but the stars gave forth a brightness that is rarely seen, except in the clear cold nights of a high lat.i.tude. Each and all of these sublime emblems of the power of G.o.d were twinkling like bright torches glowing in s.p.a.ce; and the mind had only to endow each with its probable or known dimensions, its conjectural and reasonable uses, to form a picture of the truest sublimity in which man is made to occupy his real position. In this world, where, in a certain sense, he is master, where all things are apparently under his influence, if not absolutely subject to his control; where little that is distinctly visible is to be met with that does seem to be created to meet his wants, or to be wholly at his disposal, one gets a mistaken and frequently a fatal notion of his true place in the scale of the beings who are intended to throng around the footstool of the Almighty. As the animalculae of the atmospheric air bear a proportion to things visible, so would this throng seem to bear a proportion to our vague estimates of the spiritual hosts. All this Roswell was very capable of feeling, and in some measure of appreciating; and never before had he been made so conscious of his own insignificance, as he became while looking on the firmament that night, glowing with its bright worlds and suns, doubtless the centres of other systems in which distance swallowed up the lesser orbs.

Almost every one has heard or read of that collection of stars which goes by the name of the Southern Cross. The resemblance to the tree on which Christ suffered is not particularly striking, though all who navigate the southern hemisphere know it, and recognize it by its imputed appellation.

It now attracted Roswell's gaze; and coming as it did after so much reading, so many conversations with Stephen, and addressing itself to one whose heart was softened by the fearful circ.u.mstances that had so long environed the sealers, it is not surprising that it brought our young master to meditate seriously on his true condition in connection with the atonement that he was willing to admit had been made for him, in common with all of earth, at the very moment he hesitated to believe that the sufferer was, in any other than a metaphorical sense, the Son of G.o.d.

It is not our intention to describe more of the religious for me. Where there is the same knowledge, there is too much companionship, like, for worship and reverence."

"But we are told that man was created after the image of G.o.d."

"In his likeness, Captain Gar'ner--with _some_ of the Divine Spirit, but not with all. That makes him different from the brutes, and immortal. I have conva.r.s.ed with a clergyman who thinks that the angels, and archangels, and other heavenly beings, are far before even the Saints in Heaven, such as have been only men on 'arth."

The idea of not having a Deity that he could not comprehend had long been one of Roswell Gardiner's favourite rules of faith. He did not understand by this pretending dogma, that he was, in any respect, of capacity equal to comprehend with that of the Divine Being, but simply that he was not to be expected or required to believe in any theory which manifestly conflicted with his knowledge and experience, as both were controlled by the powers of induction he had derived directly from his Creator. In a word, his exception was one of the most obvious of the suggestions of the pride of reason, and just so much in direct opposition to the great law of regeneration, which has its very gist in the converse of this feeling --Faith.

As our young master paced the terrace alone, that idea of the necessity of the Creator's being incomprehensible to the created, recurred to him. The hour that succeeded was probably the most important in Roswell Gardiners life. So intense were his feelings, so active the workings of his mind, that he was quite insensible to the intensity of the cold; and his body keeping equal motion with his thoughts, if one may so express it, his frame actually set at defiance a temperature that might otherwise have chilled it, warmly and carefully as it was clad.

Truly there were many causes existing at that time and place, to bring any man to a just sense of his real position in the scale of created beings.

The vault above Roswell was sparkling with orbs floating in s.p.a.ce, most of them far more vast than this earth, and each of them doubtless having its present or destined use. What was that light, so brilliant and pervading throughout s.p.a.ce, that converted each of those ma.s.ses of dark matter into globes clothed with a glorious brightness? Roswell had seen chemical experiments that produced wonderful illuminations; but faint, indeed, were the most glowing of those artificial torches, to the floods of light that came streaming out of the void, on missions of millions and millions of miles. Who, and what was the Dread Being--dread in his Majesty and Justice, but inexhaustible in Love and Mercy--who used these exceeding means as mere instruments of his pleasure? and what was he himself, that he should presume to set up his miserable pride of reason, in opposition to a revelation supported by miracles that must be admitted to come through men inspired by the Deity, or rejected altogether?

In this frame of mind Roswell was made to see that Christianity admitted of no half-way belief; it was all true, or it was wholly false.

And why should not Christ be the Son of G.o.d, as the Fathers of the Church had perseveringly, but so simply proclaimed, and as that church had continued to teach for eighteen centuries? Roswell believed himself to have been created in the image of G.o.d; and his much-prized reason told him that he could perpetuate himself in successors: and that which the Creator had given _him_ the power to achieve, could he not in his own person perform? For the first time, an inference to the contrary seemed to be illogical.

Then the necessity for the great expiation occurred to his mind. This had always been a stumbling-block to Roswell's faith. He could not see it; and that which he could not see he was indisposed to believe. Here was the besetting weakness of his character; a weakness which did not suffer him to perceive that could he comprehend so profound a mystery, he would be raised far above that very nature in which he took so much pride. As he reflected on this branch of the subject, a thousand mysteries, physical and moral, floated before his mind; and he became aware of the little probability that he should have been endowed with the faculties to comprehend this, the greatest of them all. Had not science gradually discovered the chemical processes by which gases could be concentrated and disengaged, the formation of one of those glittering orbs above his head would have been quite as unintelligible a mystery to him, as the incarnation of the Saviour. The fact was, that phenomena that were just as mysterious to the human mind as any that the dogmas of Christianity required to be believed, exist hourly before our eyes without awakening skepticism, or exciting discussion; finding their impunity in their familiarity. Many of these phenomena were strictly incomprehensible to human understandings, which could reason up to a fountain-head in each case; and there it was obliged to abandon the inductive process, purely for the want of power to grapple with the premises which control the whole demonstration.

Could Mary Pratt have known what was going on in Roswell Gardiner's soul that night, her happiness would have been as boundless as her grat.i.tude to G.o.d. She would have seen the barrier that had so long interposed itself to her wishes broken down; not by any rude hand, but by the influence of those whisperings of the Divine Spirit, which open the way to men to fit themselves for the presence of G.o.d.

Chapter XXVI.

"Let winter come! let polar spirits sweep The darkening world, and tempest-troubled deep!"

Campbell.

While the bosom of Roswell was thus warming with the new-born faith, of which the germ was just opening in his heart, Stimson came out upon the terrace to see what had become of his officer. It was much past the hour when the men got beneath the coverings of their mattresses; and the honest boat-steerer, who had performed the duty on which he had been sent, was anxious about Roswell's remaining so long in the open air, on this positively the severest night of the whole season.

"You stand the cold well, Captain Gar'ner," said Stephen, as he joined his officer; "but it might be prudent, now, to get under cover."

"I do not feel it cold, Stephen"--returned Roswell--"on the contrary, I'm in a pleasant glow. My mind has been busy, while my frame has kept in motion. When such are the facts, the body seldom suffers. But, hearken--does it not seem that some one is calling to us from the direction of the wreck?"

The great distance to which sounds are conveyed in intensely cold and clear weather, is a fact known to most persons. Conversations in the ordinary tone had been heard by the sealers when the speakers were nearly a mile off; and, on several occasions, attempts had been made to hold communications, by means of the voice, between the wreck and the hut.

Certain words _had_ been understood; but it was found impossible to hold anything that could be termed conversation. Still, the voice had been often heard, and a fancy had come over the mind of Roswell that he heard a cry like a call for a.s.sistance, just as Stimson joined him.

"It is so late, sir, that I should hardly think any of the Vineyarders would be up," observed the boat-steerer, after listening some little time in the desire to catch the sound mentioned. "Then it is so cold, that most men would like to get beneath their blankets as soon as they could."

"I do not find it so very cold, Stephen. Have you looked at the thermometer lately?"

"I gave it a look in coming out, sir; and it tells a terrible story to-night! The marcury is all down in the ball, which is like givin' the matter up, I do suppose, Captain Gar'ner."

"'Tis strange! I do not _feel_ it so very cold! The wind seems to be getting round to north-east, too; give us enough of that, and we shall have a thaw. Hark! there is the cry again."

This time there could be no mistake. A human voice had certainly been raised amid the stillness of that almost polar night, clearly appealing to human ears, for succour. The only word heard or comprehended was that of "help;" one well enough adapted to carry the sound far and distinctly.

There was a strain of agony in the cry, as if he who made it uttered it in despair. Roswell's blood seemed to flow back to his heart; never had he before felt so appalling a sense of the dependence of man on a Divine Providence, as at that moment.

"You heard it?" he said, inquiringly, to Stephen, after an instant of silent attention, to make sure that no more was to reach his ears just then.

"Sartain, sir--no man could mistake _that_. It was the voice of the n.i.g.g.e.r, Joe; him that Captain Daggett has for a cook."

"Think you so, Stephen? The fellow has good lungs, and they may have set him to call upon us in their distress. What can be the nature of the a.s.sistance they ask?"

"I've been thinking of that, Captain Gardner; and a difficult p'int it is to answer. Food they must have still; and was they in want of their rations, hands would have been sent across to get 'em. They may have let their fire go out, and be without the means to re-light it. I can think of nothing else that is likely to happen to men so sarc.u.mstanced."

The last suggestion struck Roswell as possible. From the instant he felt certain that he was called on for aid, he had determined to proceed to the wreck, notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, and the intense severity of the weather. As he had intimated to Stephen, he was not at all conscious how very cold it was; exercise and the active workings of his mind having brought him to an excellent condition to resist the sternness of the season. The appeal had been so sudden and unexpected, however, that he was at first somewhat at a loss how to proceed. This matter was now discussed between him and Stimson, when the following plan was adopted:--

The mates were to be called, and made acquainted with what had occurred, and put on their guard as to what might possibly be required of them. It was not thought necessary to call any of the rest of the men. There was always one hand on the watch in the house, whose duty it was to look to the fires, for the double purpose of security against a conflagration, and to prevent the warmth within from sinking too near to the cold without. It had often occurred to Roswell's mind that a conflagration would prove quick destruction to his party. In the first place, most of the provisions would be lost; and it was certain that, without a covering and the means of keeping warm within it, the men could not resist the climate eight-and-forty hours. The burning of the hut would be certain death.

Roswell took no one with him but Stimson. Two were as good as a hundred, if all that was asked were merely the means to re-light the fire. These means were provided, and a loaded pistol was taken also, to enable a signal-shot to be fired, should circ.u.mstances seem to require further aid.

One or two modes of communicating leading facts were concerted, when our hero and his companion set forth on their momentous journey.

Taking the hour, the weather, and the object before him into the account, Roswell Gardiner felt that he was now enlisted in the most important undertaking of his whole life, as he and Stephen shook hands with the two mates, and left the point. The drifts rendered a somewhat circuitous path necessary at first; but the moon and stars shed so much of their radiance on the frozen covering of the earth, that the night was quite as light as many a London day. Excitement and motion kept the blood of our two adventurers in a brisk circulation, and prevented their becoming immediately conscious of the chill intensity of the cold to which they were exposed.

"It is good to think of Almighty. G.o.d, and of his many marcies," said Stephen, when a short distance from the house, "as a body goes forth on an expedition as serious as this. We may not live to reach the wrack, for it seems to me to grow colder and colder!"

"I wonder we hear no more of the cries," remarked Roswell, who was thinking of the distress he was bent on relieving. "One would think that a man who could call so stoutly would give us another cry."

"A body can never calcilate on a n.i.g.g.e.r," answered Stephen, who had the popular American prejudice against the caste that has so long been held in servitude in the land. "They call out easily, and shut up oncommon quick, if there's nothin' gained by yelling. Black blood won't stand cold like white blood, Captain Gar'ner, any more than white blood will stand heat like black blood."

"I have heard this before, Stephen; and it has surprised me that Captain Daggett's cook should be the only one of that party who seems to have had any voice to-night."