Section 9

Man as a rule is a puppet of rythm, tossed about on his sea of being; true to the Law, but all unconscious of its mean- ing. If he calculates, it is in the first four rules of arithmetic; he stores up money
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for sickness and old age, prepares for funeral expenses and a monument, builds a bouse for his descendants, and banks on a reward in heaven. He never dreams that his law of periodicity holds within it its own reward, and that having failed in the reading, he bas missed the philoso- pher's stone. He is always striking out for a place and never arriving ; be whirls round and round like a man who is drunk; he chases butterfly ideals and catches them to break their wings and soil his hands with dust. Within his very self is the high tide of the minute, and he loses its splendor in watching for that of the hour. He sits down in sack-cloth and ashes when the ebb of himself comes on, as though the beginning of the flow were not then at his very heart. Instead of bringing to bear upon his soul's rythm a mental comprehen- sion, he suffers himself to be deluged by the flow of emotion, or left high and dry by its corresponding ebb.
Ah, man I man! puppet of fate! even more than the beast, the insect or bird.
OF THE HE EMETICS 139
Unreasoning reason has despoiled you of the instinct of the gnat, and left you stranded on a jagged rock somewhere twixt sky and sea. Should you reason less, you would evolve from yourself the unerring brute ; more, the panoplied sage. But now, dabbler in logic 1 spumer of in- stinct ! you are neither wise nor a fool. A slave to the law of periodicity, you fail to find in it the touch-stone of being; because blindfolded, you have endured and enjoyed, but have in no way understood.
SOVB MORE fHlLOSOPHt
THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE OTHER CHEEK.
And Jesus said, "Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." For nearly nineteen centu- ries this has been preached from pulpit and rostrum to greedy ears as the ultima thule of negation and self-sacri- fice. It has been lauded as the acme of saint-ship, and the attainment of the power to thus do has been urged as the unfailing passport to celestial bliss. With open mouths and tear-stream- ing eyes the world has imbibed this teach- ing as something utterly foreign to the normal man, and therefore of divine and supernatural origin. The capacity to prac- tice the same is presumed to be cautiously bestowed upon beings favored of heaven,
OF THE HERMETICS
and given, alas I to those only tliat are saved from eternal damnation. We have nothing to say against this teaching ; it is as grand as any truth ever propounded, but we utterly condemn the interpreta- tion of the same, and assert it to be false, and at variance with a well-known law. We also make claim to the possibility, aye the probability, of the use and abuse of this principle by the Devil and all of his descen- dants since time began. The motive which inspires the turning of the other cheek may be noble or otherwise — alas! it is often oth- erwise. There are two ways of resisting an enemy; one in giving blow for blow, the other in refusing to fight. The first is meeting like with like, fire with fire. An- ger is extinguished in this way, either by death or conquest and neutrality and calm- ness consequently restored.
A school of physicians battles disease after this fashion, inaugurating a tussle of smallpox with smallpox, hydrophobia with hydrophobia, by inoculating the patient with a dose of his anticipated disorder. It
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is the hand to hand fight with cutlasses, swords and knives. This is supposed to be the ungodly method, used by the black- browed children of original sin. Resent- ment, which is another word for resistance, has been condemned by "civilized" races from time immemorial, but practiced sub silentio nevertheless.
But as we have said, there are two ways of resisting; the second, as truly normal as the first, with no taint of the so^alled super- natural about it, is the turning of the other cheek; or that method employed by another school of medicine which neutralizes the ac- tion of one disease by administering some- thing which will bring on the opposite. Extremes neutralize each other; a meeting of the positive with the negative causes an interblending and undermining of either.
Defenseless things from all time, through the love of life, have somehow struck upon this law, and have made of it a veritable life- preserver, as helpful as the bloated bladder to a drowning man. Woman, in the inno- cence of her deceit, has kissed away man's
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OF THE HER ME TICS
wrath, since Eve was made; whether through love or hate it makes no difference; her smile, her embrace, her soft other cheek, though but a mask to hide her stormy heart, disarms him, un-mans him, more surely than a right-hand blow. How can he rage at kisses, or strike at clinging arms; he feels himself a fool, and beat, more truly than if knocked down, and battered in the arena by a conquering champion.
But leaving woman out of the question, let us resort to animals as an illustra- tion. All hunters understand, in fact it is well known, that numerous creatures "play dead" when at bay, and so per- fectly simulate a lifeless corpse, that the chase and brutal conquest are utterly devoid of charm. To trample upon an apparently extinct life, to kill something seemingly dead, has too little of excitement in it to spur the hunter to the exercise of his power. The very "playing dead*' is enough to dis- arm the hunter, and though he knows the ruse, he scorns to strike at the limp help- lessness so utterly in his power; nay more,
«44 SOME MOPE PHILOSOPHY
hit laughs at his emotion vhen he sees die lifeless thing pnll itself together and vnnsk vrith the swiftness inspired by £righL The hunter is beat by the law of his own hemg:; he would be more than monster to strike an apparently non-resistant creature, which by the principle of the meeting of exliem e s is in reality the most resistant thing on eaith. Children are utterly irresistible because they cannot resist at all; likewise the infirm and aged.
Note then, the wisdom of the Master, the Nazarene; His only hope of a promulgation of His system of truth, lay in the resist- ance of nonrresistance. To be sure this method sometimes fails, as does the other of fighting fire with fire, but with the mass of mankind, it works its own sweet will again, and yet again. Whether human nature changes or not, principles are eternal, and the application of the well known law was worth the trying.
There is another aspect of the question; to be in love with, full of something, no matter what — a country, an idea, or a per-
OF THE HERMETICS
son, for the time being precludes the hate which it is necessary to arouse in order that one may actively retaliate. Christ com- manded that His disciples think on Him; "Ivovest thou me?" "What, could ye not watch with me one hour? " He held him- self ever before them like a suspended cruci- fix, as an object upon which to dwell; He hypnotized them with His glance, not from selfishness, but because of the majesty of the Law. Full of Him, seeing, hearing naught but Him, symbolized at the right hand of God, even in the skies, they were utterly in- capacitated for literal retaliation; and mak- ing themselves incapable of hate through an excess of love, turned their right cheeks for the enemy's blows, and stripped themselves of their cloaks as well as their coats, at the enemy's demand. They lost life to save it, and th us worked out a subtle principle of philosophy which is nothing else than the neutralization resulting from opposing op- posites.
That this is the greatest of principles, we are not prepared to admit; when dealing
with laws, there is no great nor small. It is left with the judgment of man to rightly use or abuse this paradox of resistant non- resistance. That it gives a more extended scope for hypocrisy and dissimulation than the robust method of out and out warfare we admit; that it is pregnant with the mild lying of women, children, animals and in- sects we well understand, yet as all things, in order to exist and thrive, must have weapons of defense, if Nature has provided some of her children with smiles, soft cheeks and a power to love, we can not question the integrity of her who seeks to preserve her beautiful unarmed progeny, as well as those who are born equipped for battle.
The wisdom of the Sage of Syria can never be disputed; it was far too subtle for a universal interpretation, and consequently has been abused and misunderstood. The "Three baskets" of Guatama, have been unpacked and comprehended, but it takes a philosopher to read between the lines of the New Testament, and unravel the parable- paradox in which the Nazarene gloried.
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Of THE HERMETICS
THE PREACHER.
It is not essential that you go to church to find him ; the temple is everywhere and the preacher is within yourself. He is an encumbrance to most of you, however, so you provide him with no audience, and pay him no salary. You stop your mental ears lest you hear his persuasive voice, and deaf, you desecrate the sanctuary and turn the holy of holies into a counting house or a brothel.
There is much said on the highways and byways about the voice of conscience; as though there were a veritable divinity, sit- ting aloft in the soul of man, acting as abso- lute dictator, and punishing or rewarding as he is obeyed or disregarded. This idea is
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founded upon truth certainly; and we would only add, that each monarch preaches a somewhat different code from every other, reads a different hymn at the beginning of the sermon, and declares a new cult each time he speaks. If conscience means knowl- edge (and it does) it must certainly be vari- able according to the advancement of a given Ego along the lines of experience. Judgment, which is the finality of one's knowledge, determines man's acts for him, according as he is true to the light of his own torch. The preacher then is not an outsider nor an intruder, but entirely at home; and is educated or not according to the College or University where he obtained his orders.
But how about the temple? We discover that when we recog^nize the preacher, some- times it is a horrible little shrine, vulgar, foul-smelling, worse than the most degraded Josh-house of the veritable idol worshiper; again it is domed with the blue arc of heaven, and frescoed with stars, its altar a snow-capped mountain, and its nave a green
OF THE HE K ME TICS
and tufted Chamouni between the heights. Whatever it is, wherever, it is environment, nothing else.
We go from one temple to another, if we would but call them so, eternally. We dig- nify environment or not, in proportion as we listen to the preacher. He, the preacher, has an eloquent tongue; at times, in some, he is a true Demosthenes, or a thunder and lightning Zeus. He defies the roar of ocean, and holds the waves spell-bound by his volley of words. He speaks in a still small voice, or louder than the thunder- storm. He paints environment with the color of his eloquence, till a dungeon is patterned with glittering mosaics, and a hovel turned into a shrine of glittering gems. He undermines cities with his trumpet blast, and discovers the soil of Eden under their rotting pile.
If the preacher within you has something to feed upon, if you nourish him well, if you encourage him by your devotion, he will shine on environment with such
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glamour and glow, that out of every ugly so-called reality, you will catch the glitter of the apparent illusion, and live in a fog- tinted splendor which will be utterly unac- countable to one who has stopped the mouth of the interpreter and plugged his own ears.
OF THE HE S ME TICS
THE OPTIMIST.
The absolute certainty which the Opti- mist and Pessimist feel of their positions, gives some color to the probability that both are in a degree right. The Optimist sees the crescent, the Pessimist the veiled half of the moon, but neither grasps the complete orb. The Optimist ignores shadows and declares the inability of an object to cast one, or if he admits the shadow, he defines it as absorbed sunshine. He maintains that the Universe is the best that could possibly be and consequently perfect; that evil is only seeming, and sin an imagination. He repudiates disease and death, and declares that whatever is, is not only right, but de- lightful. He uses cant phrases glibly, and asserts that "all is well" a dozen times a
SOME MORE PWLOSOPHY
day. If you seek consolation from him in time of great sorrow, he smiles and declares that your trouble is in reality joy. If you consult him in sickness, he tells you that there is nothing the matter. He is some- times comforting, but more often aggravat- ing. His umbrella power of shedding afflictions, as one does a shower of rain, is in no way consoling to him who is less gifted.
The Optimist gets around unpleasantness by ignoring it; on no account will he look into the face of sorrow, but throws open the blinds that sunshine may flood the house of grief, while he paints the cheek of the corpse to simnlate life. He is rich in expedients, and escapes quarrels, shocks and upheavals. He detests iconoclasts and truth seekers, who accept facts at all hazards. He despises a religion which includes in its vocabulary the words " Hell " and "Devil." He is ex- cessively fond of cheerful poetry and flowers. He is constantly decorating graves, and shutting his eyes to withered roses. He has a power of deafness and blindness on oo-
OF THE HERMETICS
casion that is amazing to one who sees the worm on the leaf; his spectacles (he is never without them) are many-tinted, one day a sea-green, another an azure, and again rose. He is utterly impervious to harsh sounds, but revels in music that has no minor strain ; and discord, if there be any, resolves itself into harmony through his exultant interpretation. He is steeped in sweet odors, and inhales no breath but that of flowers. Altogether he is provokingly happy, and a great bore to one who now and then longs to enjoy his miseries.
There is nevertheless something shallow about the Optimist's rose-tiuted bliss; it lacks the Rembrandt shading. There is no gloaming in his sky, and the sunshine misses its foil. A diamond glows in dim places, but the Optimist never glitters; he is a pale reflector, that seems to have but one side. There is nothing of the brilliant about him, but a deal of monotony. The rich variety called forth by an interplay of light and shade, is utterly out of the ques- tion in his case. The grand, the majestic,
SOME MORE PHILOSOPHY
the magnificent, the awful, are not where he is. He takes the fire out of lightning, and the resonance from thunder. He belit- tles the ocean in its unceasing plaint, and christens it a summer sea. He undignifies dignity, and touches grandeur with pretti- ness. The dim, arched cathedral with its mystic echoes, or the Minster of Nature with its nave twixt lofty pines, the mosque with its minaret and dome, its incense and mystery, are rarely dwarfed by the tread of his frisky feet. He prefers a cheerful church with plush carpets, an abundance of flowers, a choir of opera singers, and a preacher who dotes on sunshine.
The Optimist is, in a degree, a magician; he extracts the stings of bees and the fangs of snakes; he neutralizes poisons, and floods everything with a pale light, which though inane, is restful to tired nerves. It is pleasant to meet him, when you are drunk with the grandeur of the Matterhorn, and long for something homely and simple. Overwhelmed with the awfulness of a shadowy gorge, which like a gigantic
OF THE HERMETtCS
grave threatens to engulf you, dazed with the intoxication of the precipice till you cover your eyes, how welcome this mild angel with his cup of sage tea and prattle! He fondles the Alpine edelweiss and calls it pretty names, helping you to find your balance again; indicating by his very pres- ence that some things are small. Or if he happens to be by, when you hang, as if for dear life on the words of an orator, one whose lightning eloquence transfixes you, he brings you down surely and swiftly from the danger climax of genius, where you must otherwise swoon from sheer ecstacy, ^^'ith the remark that, "it is clever, it is sweet."
Yes, he is restful, he saves us from our Poes, our Napoleons, and ourselves. Though aggravating at times he is more often soothing, yet he has no hashish glamour about him, nor a veiled De Qmncy power of bestowing visions, nor is he alto- gether common; he smiles too often to be one of the vulgar crowd. But his eyes, alas I have the look of the infant's before it