贝壳电子书 > 英文原著电子书 > memories and portraits >

第8章

memories and portraits-第8章

小说: memories and portraits 字数: 每页4000字

按键盘上方向键 ← 或 → 可快速上下翻页,按键盘上的 Enter 键可回到本书目录页,按键盘上方向键 ↑ 可回到本页顶部!
————未阅读完?加入书签已便下次继续阅读!




the throat; and to see him there; so gentle; patient; brave and 

pious; oppressed but not cast down; sorrow was so swallowed up in 

admiration that we could not dare to pity him。  Even if the old 

fault flashed out again; it but awoke our wonder that; in that lost 

battle; he should have still the energy to fight。  He had gone to 

ruin with a kind of kingly ABANDON; like one who condescended; but 

once ruined; with the lights all out; he fought as for a kingdom。  

Most men; finding themselves the authors of their own disgrace; 

rail the louder against God or destiny。  Most men; when they 

repent; oblige their friends to share the bitterness of that 

repentance。  But he had held an inquest and passed sentence: MENE; 

MENE; and condemned himself to smiling silence。  He had given 

trouble enough; had earned misfortune amply; and foregone the right 

to murmur。



Thus was our old comrade; like Samson; careless in his days of 

strength; but on the coming of adversity; and when that strength 

was gone that had betrayed him … 〃for our strength is weakness〃 … 

he began to blossom and bring forth。  Well; now; he is out of the 

fight: the burden that he bore thrown down before the great 

deliverer。  We



〃In the vast cathedral leave him;

God accept him;

Christ receive him!〃





IV





If we go now and look on these innumerable epitaphs; the pathos and 

the irony are strangely fled。  They do not stand merely to the 

dead; these foolish monuments; they are pillars and legends set up 

to glorify the difficult but not desperate life of man。  This 

ground is hallowed by the heroes of defeat。



I see the indifferent pass before my friend's last resting…place; 

pause; with a shrug of pity; marvelling that so rich an argosy had 

sunk。  A pity; now that he is done with suffering; a pity most 

uncalled for; and an ignorant wonder。  Before those who loved him; 

his memory shines like a reproach; they honour him for silent 

lessons; they cherish his example; and in what remains before them 

of their toil; fear to be unworthy of the dead。  For this proud man 

was one of those who prospered in the valley of humiliation; … of 

whom Bunyan wrote that; 〃Though Christian had the hard hap to meet 

in the valley with Apollyon; yet I must tell you; that in former 

times men have met with angels here; have found pearls here; and 

have in this place found the words of life。〃









CHAPTER IV。 A COLLEGE MAGAZINE





I





ALL through my boyhood and youth; I was known and pointed out for 

the pattern of an idler; and yet I was always busy on my own 

private end; which was to learn to write。  I kept always two books 

in my pocket; one to read; one to write in。  As I walked; my mind 

was busy fitting what I saw with appropriate words; when I sat by 

the roadside; I would either read; or a pencil and a penny version…

book would be in my hand; to note down the features of the scene or 

commemorate some halting stanzas。  Thus I lived with words。  And 

what I thus wrote was for no ulterior use; it was written 

consciously for practice。  It was not so much that I wished to be 

an author (though I wished that too) as that I had vowed that I 

would learn to write。  That was a proficiency that tempted me; and 

I practised to acquire it; as men learn to whittle; in a wager with 

myself。  Description was the principal field of my exercise; for to 

any one with senses there is always something worth describing; and 

town and country are but one continuous subject。  But I worked in 

other ways also; often accompanied my walks with dramatic 

dialogues; in which I played many parts; and often exercised myself 

in writing down conversations from memory。



This was all excellent; no doubt; so were the diaries I sometimes 

tried to keep; but always and very speedily discarded; finding them 

a school of posturing and melancholy self…deception。  And yet this 

was not the most efficient part of my training。  Good though it 

was; it only taught me (so far as I have learned them at all) the 

lower and less intellectual elements of the art; the choice of the 

essential note and the right word: things that to a happier 

constitution had perhaps come by nature。  And regarded as training; 

it had one grave defect; for it set me no standard of achievement。  

So that there was perhaps more profit; as there was certainly more 

effort; in my secret labours at home。  Whenever I read a book or a 

passage that particularly pleased me; in which a thing was said or 

an effect rendered with propriety; in which there was either some 

conspicuous force or some happy distinction in the style; I must 

sit down at once and set myself to ape that quality。  I was 

unsuccessful; and I knew it; and tried again; and was again 

unsuccessful and always unsuccessful; but at least in these vain 

bouts; I got some practice in rhythm; in harmony; in construction 

and the co…ordination of parts。  I have thus played the sedulous 

ape to Hazlitt; to Lamb; to Wordsworth; to Sir Thomas Browne; to 

Defoe; to Hawthorne; to Montaigne; to Baudelaire and to Obermann。  

I remember one of these monkey tricks; which was called THE VANITY 

OF MORALS: it was to have had a second part; THE VANITY OF 

KNOWLEDGE; and as I had neither morality nor scholarship; the names 

were apt; but the second part was never attempted; and the first 

part was written (which is my reason for recalling it; ghost…like; 

from its ashes) no less than three times: first in the manner of 

Hazlitt; second in the manner of Ruskin; who had cast on me a 

passing spell; and third; in a laborious pasticcio of Sir Thomas 

Browne。  So with my other works: CAIN; an epic; was (save the 

mark!) an imitation of SORDELLO: ROBIN HOOD; a tale in verse; took 

an eclectic middle course among the fields of Keats; Chaucer and 

Morris: in MONMOUTH; a tragedy; I reclined on the bosom of Mr。 

Swinburne; in my innumerable gouty…footed lyrics; I followed many 

masters; in the first draft of THE KING'S PARDON; a tragedy; I was 

on the trail of no lesser man than John Webster; in the second 

draft of the same piece; with staggering versatility; I had shifted 

my allegiance to Congreve; and of course conceived my fable in a 

less serious vein … for it was not Congreve's verse; it was his 

exquisite prose; that I admired and sought to copy。  Even at the 

age of thirteen I had tried to do justice to the inhabitants of the 

famous city of Peebles in the style of the BOOK OF SNOBS。  So I 

might go on for ever; through all my abortive novels; and down to 

my later plays; of which I think more tenderly; for they were not 

only conceived at first under the bracing influence of old Dumas; 

but have met with resurrection: one; strangely bettered by another 

hand; came on the stage itself and was played by bodily actors; the 

other; originally known as SEMIRAMIS: A TRAGEDY; I have observed on 

bookstalls under the ALIAS of Prince Otto。  But enough has been 

said to show by what arts of impersonation; and in what purely 

ventriloquial efforts I first saw my words on paper。



That; like it or not; is the way to learn to write whether I have 

profited or not; that is the way。  It was so Keats learned; and 

there was never a finer temperament for literature than Keats's; it 

was so; if we could trace it out; that all men have learned; and 

that is why a revival of letters is always accompanied or heralded 

by a cast back to earlier and fresher models。  Perhaps I hear some 

one cry out: But this is not the way to be original!  It is not; 

nor is there any way but to be born so。  Nor yet; if you are born 

original; is there anything in this training that shall clip the 

wings of your originality。  There can be none more original than 

Montaigne; neither could any be more unlike Cicero; yet no 

craftsman can fail to see how much the one must have tried in his 

time to imitate the other。  Burns is the 

返回目录 上一页 下一页 回到顶部 0 0

你可能喜欢的