To mourn a mischief that is past and gone "We, ignorant of ourselves, Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers " The Tempest" is a play which reflects, as a whole, Shakespeare's perfect acquaintance with his true ego. Prospero stands for the personality of God or good, developed in the mortal Shakespeare. The power of Prospero is only used for good. A storm is created; a shipwreck follows; and yet no harm comes. Instead of harm, wrongs are righted; hearts are lighted up with love; forgiveness is asked with perfect faith that it rejoices alike "him that gives and him that receives;" and life and love seal an eternal Now with peace, and joy and rest. Then Shakespeare most timely and fittingly declares his work done. Emerson perfectly understood the true source of the power of the genius, and clearly and boldly declared it: "This overestimate of the possibilities of Paul and Pericles, this underestimate of our own, comes from the neglect of the fact of an identical nature." "A man's genius, the quality that differences him from every other, the susceptibility to one class of influences, the selection of what is fit for him, the rejection of what is unfit, determines for him the character of the universe." Emerson, however, in "The Over-soul," is most complete in his wonderful revelation of the center: "All goes to show that the soul of man is not an organ, but animates and exercises all the organs; is not a function like the power of memory, of calculation, of comparison, but uses these as hands and feet; is not a faculty, but a light; is not the intellect or the will, but the master of the intellect and the will; is the vast background of our being, in which they lie-an immensity that is not possessed and that cannot be possessed." Henry More tells of the undivided union of the soul and God in, "But souls that of His own good life partake, Robert Holt, of London, in a little poem, most daintily tells the story as it came to him: "We talk not of God in such phrases, But humbly avow that we know not For time never knew retrogression, Who tenderly teaching would win us These quotations from geniuses tell us that all of them recognized a higher power directing and guiding. Some of them hint at the way of approach to it; but, as a rule, they are more or less vague on that subject. The poet can hardly be expected to be didactic. When he nears that plane the intellect is guiding his pen; when he feels his best and greatest thoughts he writes from the seat of the emotions. These have little to do with logic, they have all to do with the soul. The new metaphysics of to-day is founded on the bold propo sition that all can learn how to reach this center. These scientists tell us that when Jesus said "I am the truth and the life," the "I" did not neous, and Newton's discovery developed from a simple incident. For one rapt moment each, in seeming listless mood, when intellect was resting from her weary battles, found himself in complete harmony with his own spiritual self, and the Kingdom of Heaven was found. The God within, always ready to help, was unhindered, for an instant; and then the work was done. Burns, untutored, caught a glimpse of that divine light, and sang the songs that gushed forth from his soul. He merely uttered what his inner consciousness breathed. He could not help it. He was only the instrument to record the melodies God (his subjected self) sang while he listened. Lincoln, withdrawing his gaze from the smoke and horror of the battle-field, saw freedom fettered and humanity outraged, and the God within him spoke. The emancipation proclamation was published; and a whole nation, startled, saw that its President in reaching one hand down to the slave had grasped the God of the universe with the other. By that act a new force was created which saved the Union. A thought current was established, bearing on its bosom the emblem of right and freedom, and naught could resist its progress. The intellect never gave birth to such a God-like deed as that. We may never know how Bulwer came to write "The Coming Race." He had studied Eastern thought, and naturally reflected some of its teachings; and yet it was his inner consciousness, his soul, that taught him the possibilities of vril. Chatterton's active mind was completely obliterated or unhinged by the spiritual self within. The prose of life was torture to him, for the material is not of the spirit. He became over-spiritualized for his physical strength; and, having tasted the joys of Heaven, he could not endure the cares of this work-a-day world. The intelligence surrounding him failed to understand him, so he rashly destroyed both his works and himself. What light burst upon Franklin that led to his flying a kite in the midst of a thunderstorm? Why did Morse conceive the telegraphic alphabet before he made a test? What power directed Shakespeare when he wrote, "I'll put a girdle round about the earth in forty minutes?" Whence comes the mighty power of a single word like patriotism? Is not love as real as existence, and what has its genuine force to do with intellectual culture? |