if any one whose eye may fall upon these pages be absolutely equable of temperament, serene, contented, the same one day as another, as dr. johnson said of reynolds, let him not read this chapter—he will think it a mere cry in the dark, better smothered in the bed-clothes, an unmanly piece of morbid pathology, a secret and sordid disease better undivulged, on which all persons of proper pride should hold their peace.
well, it is not for him that i write; there are books and books, and even chapters and chapters, just as there are people and people. i myself avoid books dealing with health and disease. i used when younger to be unable to resist the temptation of a medical book; but now i am wiser, and if i sometimes yield to the temptation, it is with a backward glancing eye and a cautious step. and i will say that i generally put back the book with a snap, in a moment, as though a snake had[215] stung me. but there will be no pathology here—nothing but a patient effort to look a failing in the face, and to suggest a remedy.
fears
i speak to the initiated, to those who have gone down into the dark cave, and seen the fire burn low in the shrine, and watched aghast the formless, mouldering things—hideous implements are they, or mere weapons?—that hang upon the walls.
do you know what it is to dwell, perhaps for days together, under the shadow of a fear? perhaps a definite fear—a fear of poverty, or a fear of obloquy, or a fear of harshness, or a fear of pain, or a fear of disease—or, worse than all, a boding, misshapen, sullen dread which has no definite cause, and is therefore the harder to resist.
dreams
these moods, i say it with gratitude for myself and for the encouragement of others, tend to diminish in acuteness and in frequency as i grow older. they are now, as ever, preluded by dreams of a singular kind, dreams of rapid and confused action, dreams of a romantic and exaggerated pictorial character—huge mountain ranges, lofty and venerable buildings, landscapes of incredible beauty, gardens of unimaginable luxuriance, which[216] pass with incredible rapidity before the mind. i will indicate two of these in detail. i was in a vessel like a yacht, armed with a massive steel prow like a ram, which moved in some aerial fashion over a landscape, skimming it seemed to me but a few feet above the ground. a tall man of benignant aspect stood upon the bridge, and directed the operations of the unseen navigator. we ascended a heathery valley, and presently encountered snow-drifts, upon which the vessel seemed to settle down to her full speed; at last we entered a prodigious snowfield, with vast ridged snow-waves extending in every direction for miles; the vessel ran not over but through these waves, sending up huge spouts of snow which fell in cool showers upon my head and hands, while the tinkle of dry ice fragments made a perpetual low music. at last we stopped and i descended on to the plateau. far ahead, through rolling clouds, i saw the black snow-crowned heights of a mountain, loftier than any seen by human eye, and for leagues round me lay the interminable waste of snow. i was aroused from my absorption by a voice behind me; the vessel started again on her course with a leap like a porpoise, and though i screamed[217] aloud to stop her, i saw her, in a few seconds, many yards ahead, describing great curves as she ran, with the snow spouting over her like a fountain.
the second was a very different scene. i was in the vine-clad alleys of some italian garden; against the still blue air a single stone pine defined itself; i walked along a path, and turning a corner an exquisite conventual building of immense size, built of a light brown stone, revealed itself. from all the alleys round emerged troops of monastic figures in soft white gowns, and a mellow chime of exceeding sweetness floated from the building. i saw that i too was robed like the rest; but the gliding figures outstripped me; and arriving last at a great iron portal i found it closed, and the strains of a great organ came drowsily from within.
then into the dream falls a sudden sense of despair like an ashen cloud; a feeling of incredible agony, intensified by the beauty of the surrounding scene, that agony which feverishly questions as to why so dark a stroke should fall when the mind seems at peace with itself and lost in dreamy wonder at the loveliness all about it. then the vision closes, and[218] for a time the mind battles with dark waves of anguish, emerging at last, like a diver from a dim sea, into the waking consciousness. the sickly daylight filters through the window curtains and the familiar room swims into sight. the first thought is one of unutterable relief, which is struck instantly out of the mind by the pounce of the troubled mood; and then follows a ghastly hour, when every possibility of horror and woe intangible presses in upon the battling mind. at such moments a definite difficulty, a practical problem would be welcome—but there is none; the misery is too deep for thought, and even, when after long wrestling, the knowledge comes that it is all a subjective condition, and that there is no adequate cause in life or circumstances for this unmanning terror—even then it can only be silently endured, like the racking of some fierce physical pain.
woe
the day that succeeds to such a waking mood is almost the worst part of the experience. shaken and dizzied by the inrush of woe, the mind straggles wearily through hour after hour; the familiar duties are intolerable; food has no savour; action and thought no interest; and if for an hour the tired head is[219] diverted by some passing event, or if, oppressed with utter exhaustion, it sinks into an unrefreshing slumber, repose but gives the strength to suffer—the accursed mood leaps again, as from an unseen lair, upon the unnerved consciousness, and tears like some strange beast the helpless and palpitating soul.
when first, at cambridge, i had the woeful experiences above recorded, i was so unused to endurance, so bewildered by suffering, that i think for awhile i was almost beside myself. i recollect going down with some friends, in a brief lull of misery, to watch a football match, when the horror seized me in the middle of a cheerful talk with such vehemence, that i could only rush off with a muttered word, and return to my rooms, in which i immured myself to spend an hour in an agony of prayer. again i recollect sitting with some of the friends of my own age after hall; we were smoking and talking peacefully enough—for some days my torment had been suspended—when all at once, out of the secret darkness the terror leapt upon me, and after in vain resisting it for a few moments, i hurried away, having just enough self-respect to glance at my watch and mutter something[220] about a forgotten engagement. but worst of all was a walk taken with my closest friend on a murky november day. we started in good spirits, when in a moment the accursed foe was upon me; i hardly spoke except for fitful questions. our way led us to a level crossing, beside a belt of woodland, where a huge luggage train was jolting and bumping backwards and forewards. we hung upon the gate; and then, and then only, came upon me in a flash an almost irresistible temptation to lay my head beneath the ponderous wheels, and end it all; i could only pray in silence, and hurry from the spot in speechless agitation. what wonder if i heard on the following day that my friend complained that i was altering for the worse—that i had become so sullen and morose that it was no use talking to me.
gradually, very gradually, the aching frost of the soul broke up and thawed; little trifling encouraging incidents—a small success or two, an article accepted by a magazine, a friendship, an athletic victory, raised me step by step out of the gloom. one benefit, even at the time, it brought me—an acute sensitiveness to beauty both of sight and sound. i used to steal at even-song into the dark nave of[221] king’s chapel, and the sight of the screen, the flood of subdued light overflowing from the choir, the carven angels with their gilded trumpets, penetrated into the soul with an exquisite sweetness; and still more the music—whether the low prelude with the whispering pedals, the severe monotone breaking into freshets of harmony, the swing and richness of the chants, or the elaborate beauty of some familiar magnificat or anthem—all fell like showers upon the arid sense. the music at king’s had one characteristic that i have never heard elsewhere; the properties of the building are such that the echo lingers without blurring the successive chords—not “loth to die,” i used to think, as wordsworth says, but sinking as it were from consciousness to dream, and from dream to death.
the brotherhood of sorrow
one further gain—the greater—was that my suffering did not, i think, withdraw me wholly into myself and fence me from the world; rather it gave me a sense of the brotherhood of grief. i was one with all the agonies that lie silent in the shadow of life; and though my suffering had no tangible cause, yet i was initiated into the fellowship of those who bear. i understood;—weak,[222] faithless, and faulty as i was, i was no longer in the complacent isolation of the strong, the successful, the selfish, and even in my darkest hour i had strength to thank god for that.
