The only matter in which I can be concerned is the progress of reason and morality in the world of reasonable beings; and this only for its own sake, — for the sake of this progress. Whether I or some one else be the instrument of this progress, whether it be my deed or that of another which prospers or is prevented, is of no importance to me. I regard myself merely as one of the instruments for carrying 3 B .546 THE VOCATION" OF MAN.
out the purpose of reason; I respect, love, or feel an interest in myself only as such, and desire the successful issue of my deed only in so far as it pro motes this purpose. I regard all the events of this world, in the same way, only with reference to this one purpose; whether they proceed from me or from others, whether they relate directly to me or to others. My breast is steeled against annoyance on account of personal offences and vexations, or exultation in per sonal merit; for my whole personality has disappeared in the contemplation of the purpose of my being.
Should it ever seem to me as if truth had been put to silence, and virtue expelled from the world; as if folly and vice had now summoned all their powers, and even assumed the place of reason and true wisdom; should it happen, that just when all good men looked with hope for the regeneration of the human race, everything should become even worse than it had been before; should the work, well and happily begun, on which the eyes of all true-minded men were fixed with joyous expectation, suddenly and unexpectedly be changed into the vilest forms of evil, — these things will not disturb me; and as little will I be persuaded to indulge in idleness, neglect, or false security, on account of an apparent rapid growth of enlightenment, a seeming diffusion of freedom and independence, an increase of more gentle manners, peacefulness, docility, and general moderation among men, as if now every thing were attained. Thus it appears to me; or rather it is so, for it is actually so to me; and I know in both cases, as indeed I know in all possible cases, what I have next to do. As to everything else, I rest in the most perfect tranquillity, for I know nothing whatever about any other thing. Those, to me, so sorrowful events may, in the plan of the Eternal One, be the direct means for the attainment of a good result; — that strife of evil against good may be their last decisive struggle, and it may be permitted to the former to assemble all its powers for this encounter only to lose them, and thereby to exhibit itself in all its impotence. These, to me, joyful appearances may rest on very uncertain foundations; — what I had taken for enlightenment may perhaps be but hollow superficiality, and aversion to all true ideas; what I had taken for independence, but unbridled passion; what I had taken for gentle ness and moderation, but weakness and indolence. I do not indeed know this, but it might be so; and then I should have as little cause to mourn over the one as to rejoice over the other. But I do know, that I live in a world which belongs to the Supreme Wisdom and Goodness, who thoroughly comprehends its plan, and will infallibly accomplish it; and in this conviction I rest, and am blessed.
That there are free beings, destined to reason and morality, who strive against reason, and call forth all their powers to the support of folly and vice; — just as little will this disturb me, and stir up within me indig nation and wrath. The perversity which would hate what is good because it is good, and promote evil merely from a love of evil as such, — this perversity which alone could excite my just anger, I ascribe to no one who bears the form of man, for I know that it does not lie in human nature. I know that for all who act thus, there is really, in so far as they act thus, neither good nor evil, but only an agreeable or disagreeable feeling; that they do not stand under their own dominion, but under the power of Nature; and that it is not themselves, but this nature in them, which seeks the former, and flies from the latter with all its strength, without regard to whether it be, otherwise, good or evil. I know that being, once for all, what they are, they cannot act in any respect otherwise than as they do act, and I am very far from getting angry with ne cessity, or indulging in wrath against blind and un conscious Nature. In this indeed lies their guilt and their unworthiness, that they are what they are; and that, in place of being free and independent, they have resigned themselves to the current of natural impulse.
It is this alone which could excite my indignation; but here I should fall into absolute absurdity. I cannot call them to account for their want of freedom, without first attributing to them the power of making them selves free. I wish to be angry with them, and find no object for my wrath. What they actually are, does not deserve my anger; what might deserve it, they are not, and they would not deserve it, if they were. My displeasure would strike an impalpable nonentity. I must indeed always treat them, and address them, as if they were what I well know they are not; I must always suppose in them that whereby alone I can ap proach them, and communicate with them. Duty commands me to act towards them according to a conception of them, the opposite of that which I arrive at by contemplating them. And thus it may certainly happen, that I turn towards them with a noble in dignation, as if they were free, in order to arouse within them a similar indignation against themselves, — an indignation which in my own heart I cannot reasonably entertain. It is only the practical man of society within me whose anger is excited by folly and vice; not the contemplative man who reposes undis turbed in the calm completeness of his own spirit, Should I be visited by corporeal suffering, pain, or disease, I cannot avoid feeling them, for they are accidents of my nature; and as long as I remain here below, I am a part of Nature. But they shall not grieve me. They can only touch the nature with which, in a wonderful manner, I am united, — not myself, the being exalted above all Nature. The sureend of all pain, and of all sensibility to pain, is death: and of all things which the mere natural man is wont to regard as evils, this is to me the least. I shall not die to myself, but only to others; to those who remain behind, from whose fellowship I am torn: — for myself the hour of Death is the hour of Birth to a new, more excellent life.
Now that my heart is closed against all desire for earthly things, now that I have no longer any sense for the transitory and perishable, the universe appears before my eyes clothed in a more glorious form. The dead heavy mass, which did but stop up space, has vanished; and in its place there flows onward, with the rushing music of mighty waves, an eternal stream of life and power and action which issues from the original Source of all life — from Thy Life, 0 Infinite One! for all life is Thy Life, and only the religious eye penetrates to the realm of True Beauty.
I am related to Thee, and what I behold around me is related to me; all is life and blessedness, and regards me with bright spirit-eyes, and speaks with spirit-voices to my heart. In all the forms that sur- 3 B 2 5.30 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
round me, I behold the reflection of my own being, broken up into countless diversified shapes, as the morning sun, broken in a thousand dew-drops, sparkles towards itself.
Thy Life, as alone the finite mind can conceive it, is self-forming, self-manifesting Will: — this Life, clothed to the eye of the mortal with manifold sen suous forms, flows forth through me, and throughout the immeasurable universe of Nature. Here it streams as self-creating and self-forming matter through my veins and muscles, and pours its abundance into the tree, the flower, the grass. Creative life flows forth in one continuous stream, drop on drop, through all forms and into all places where my eye can follow it; and reveals itself to me, in a different shape in each various corner of the universe, as the same power by which in secret darkness my own frame was formed. There, in free play, it leaps and dances as spontaneous motion in the animal, and manifests itself in each new form as a new, peculiar, self-subsisting world: — the same power which, invisibly to me, moves and animates my own frame. Everything that lives and moves follows this universal impulse, this one principle of all motion, which, from one end of the universe to the other, guides the harmonious movement; — in the animal ivithout freedom; in me, from whom in the visible world the motion proceeds although it has not its source in me, with freedom.
But pure and holy, and as near to Thine own nature as aught can be to mortal eye, does this Thy Life flow forth as the bond which unites spirit with spirit, as the breath and atmosphere of a rational world, un imaginable and incomprehensible, and yet there, clearly visible to the spiritual eye. Borne onwards in this stream of light, thought floats from soul to soul, with out pause or variation, and returns purer and brighter from a kindred mind. Through this mysterious union does each individual perceive, understand, and love him self only in another; every soul developes itself only by means of other souls, and there are no longer individual men, but only one humanity; no individual thought or love or hate, but only thought, love, and hate, in and through each other. Through this won drous influence does the affinity of spirits in the invisible world permeate even their physical nature; mani fest itself in two sexes, which, even if that spiritual bond could be torn asunder, would, simply as creatures of nature, be compelled to love each other; flow forth in the tenderness of parents and children, brothers and sisters, as if the souls were of one blood like the bodies, and their minds were branches and blossoms of the same stem; and from these, embrace, in nar rower or wider circles, the whole sentient world. Even at the root of their hate, there lies a thirst after love; and no enmity springs up but from friendship denied.
Through that which to others seems a dead mass, my eye beholds this eternal life and movement in every vein of sensible and spiritual Xature, and sees this life rising in ever-increasing growth, and ever purifying itself to a more spiritual expression. The universe is to me no longer that ever-recurring circle, that eternallyrepeated play, that monster swallowing itself up, only to bring itself forth again as it was before; it has be come transfigured before me, and now bears the one stamp of spiritual life, — a constant progress towards 5,52 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
higher perfection in a line that runs out into the Infinite.
The sun rises and sets, the stars sink and re appear, and all the spheres hold their circle-dance; but they never return again as they disappeared, and even in the bright fountain of life itself there is life and progress. Every hour which they lead on, every mor ning, and every evening, sinks with new increase upon the world; new life and new love descend from the spheres like dew-drops from the clouds, and encircle nature as the cool night the earth.
All Death in nature is Birth, and in Death itself appears visibly the exaltation of Life. There is no de structive principle in Nature, for Nature throughout is pure, unclouded life; it is not death which kills, but the new life, which, concealed behind the former, begins, and developes itself. Deatli and Birth are but the struggle of life with itself to assume a more glorious and congenial form. And my death, — how can it be aught else, since I am not a mere show and semblance of life, but bear within me the one original, true, and essential Life? It is impossible to conceive that Nature should annihilate a life which does not proceed from her; the Nature which exists for me, and not I for her.
Yet even my natural life, even this mere outward manifestation to mortal sight of the inward invisible Life, she cannot destroy without destroying herself, — she who only exists for me, and on account of me, and exists not if I am not. Precisely because she destroys me, must she animate me anew; it is only my higher life, unfolding itself in her, before which my present life can disappear; and what mortals call Death is the visible appearance of a second Life. Did no reasonable being who had once beheld the light of this world die, there would be no ground to look with faith for a new heavens and a new earth; the only possible purpose of Nature, to manifest and maintain Reason, would be ful filled here below, and her circle would be completed. But the act by which she consigns a free and inde pendent being to death, is her own solemn entrance, intelligible to all Reason, into a region beyond this act itself, and beyond the whole sphere of existence which is thereby closed. Death is the ladder by which my spiritual eye ascends to a new Life, and a new Nature.
Every one of my fellow-creatures, who leaves this earthly brotherhood, and whom my spirit cannot re gard as annihilated, — because he is rny brother, — draws my thoughts after him beyond the grave; — he is still, and to him belongs a place. While we mourn for him here below, as in the dim realms of unconscious ness there might be mourning when a man bursts from them into the light of this world's sun, above there is rejoicing that a man is born into that world, as we citizens of the earth receive with joy those who are born unto us. When I shall one day follow, there will be but joy for me; sorrow shall remain behind in the sphere I shall have left.
The world, on which but now I gazed with wonder, passes away from before me, and sinks from my sight. With all the fulness of life, order, and increase which I beheld in it, it is yet but the curtain by which one infinitely more perfect is concealed from me, and the germ from which that other shall dcvelope itself. My FAITH looks behind this veil, and cherishes and animates this germ. It sees nothing definite, but it expects more than it can conceive here below, more than it will ever be able to conceive in all time.
Thus do I live, thus am I, and thus am I unchange able, firm, and completed for all Eternity; — for this is no existence assumed from without, — it is my own, true, essential life and being.
THE END.
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FICHTE'S POPULAR WORKS AND LIFE.
JUST PUBLISHED, I.
Memoir of Johann Gottlieb Fichte.
By WILLIAM SMITH. price 4s. 6d.
Second Edition, Post Octavo, cloth boards, "...A Life of Fichte, full of nobleness and instruction, of grand pur pose, tender feeling, and brave effort;...the compilation of which is exe cuted with great judgment and fidelity."— Prospective Review.
" The material trials that Fichte encoun tered in the body are lost sight of in the spiritual contest which he maintained with his own mind. The page that keeps the record of incidents is dignified throughout by the strong moral light that falls every where upon it like a glory, and sweetened i by a living episode that flows through its dark and bright places like a stream of music." — Atltenwum.
" We state Fichte's character as it is known and admitted by men of all parties among the Germans, when we say that so robust an intellect, a soul so calm, so lofty, massive, and immovable, has not mingled in philosophical discussion since the time of Luther Fichte's opinions may be true or false: but his character as a thinker can be slightly valued only by such as know it ill: and as a man approved by action and suffering, in his life and in his death, he ranks with a class of men who were common only in better ages than ours." — State of German Literature, by Thoni'ti Carlyk.
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Translated by WILLIAM SMITH. Post Octavo, cloth boards, price 2s.
" ' The Vocation of the Scholar'...is distinguished by the same high moral tone, and manly, vigorous expression which characterize all Fichte's works in the Ger man, and is nothing lost in Mr. Smith's clear, unembarrassed, and thoroughly Eng lish translation." — Douglas Jerrohl's Paper.
" We are glad to see this excellent trans lation of one of tlie best of Fichte's works presented to the public in a very neat form...No class needs an earnest and : sincere spirit more than the literary class; and therefore the ' Vocation of the Scholar,1 j the ' Guide of the Human Race,' written in Fichte's most earnest, most commanding temper, will be welcomed in its English i dress by public writers, and be beneficial to the cause of truth." — Economist.
III.
The Nature of the Scholar and its Manifestations.
Translated by WILLIAM SMITH. Second Edition, Post Octavo, cloth boards, price 3s. 6d.
religions feeling breathes throughout the whole." — Irish Monthly Magazine.
" This work must inevitably arrest the attention of the scientific physician, by the grand spirituality of its doctrines, and the pure morality it teaches Shall we be presumptuous if we recommend these views to our professional brethren? or if we say to the enlightened, the thoughtful, I the serious, This— if you be true Scholars — is tiotir Vocation? We know not a higher j morality than this, or more noble principles than these: they are full of truth."— llrilish I and Foreign iledico-Chirurgical Review.
" With great satisfaction we welcome this first English translation of an author who occupies the most exalted position as a profound and original thinker; as an ir resistible orator in the cause of what lie believed to be truth; as a thoroughly honest and heroic man The appearance of any of his works in our language is, we believe, a perfect novelty These orations are admirably fitted for their pur pose; so grand is the position taken by the lecturer, and so irresistible their eloquence." — Examiner.
"A pure and exalted morality and deep Fichte's Popular Works.
IV.
Translated by WILLIAM SMITH. Post Octavo, cloth bds. price 4s. 6cl.
" In the progress of my present work, I excites thought. If it rouses you to combat have taken a deeper glance into religion his conclusions, it has done a good work; than ever I did before. In me the emotions j for in that very effort you are stirred to a of the heart proceed only from perfect in- ( consideration of points" which have hithertellectual clearness: — it cannot be but that j to escaped your indolent acquiseseence. " — the clearness I have now attained on this; Foreign Quarterly Review. subject shall also take possession of my! " This is Fichtc's most popular work, and heart." — Fichte's Correspondence. is every way remarkable. Aware that the " ' THE VOCATION OF MAS' is, as Fichte great public was fully competent to grapple truly says, intelligible to all readers who are with the most arduous problems of philosoreally able to understand a book at all; and phy, when lucidly stated, however it might as the history of the mind in its various shrink from the jargon of the schools, Fichte phases of doubt, knowledge, and faith, it is: undertook to present his opinions in a popuof interest to all. Agree with Kichte, or dis- lar form.'1 — Atlas.
agree with him, you cannot help being ear- j " It appears to us the boldest and most ried along by his earnestness; you cannot emphatic attempt that has yet been made help being struck with his subtlety and to explain to man his restless and uncondepth. Argument, in such a matter, we querable desire to win the True and the take to be wholly indifferent. A book of this, Eternal." — Sentiml. stamp is sure to teach you much, because it | V. The Characteristics of the Present Age.
Translated by WILLIAM SMITH. Post Octavo, cloth boards, price 7s.
" A noble and most notable acquisition " lie makes us think, and perhaps more to the literature of England." — Douglas Jer- sublimely than we have ever formerly rolifs Weekly Paper. \ thought, but it is only in order that we may " We accept these lectures as a true and i the more nobly act.
most admirable delineation of the present " As a majestic and most stirring utterage; and on this ground alone we should > ance from the lips of the greatest German bestow on them our heartiest recommends- i prophet, we trust that the book will find a response in many an English soul, and potently help to regenerate English society."
tion; but it is because they teach us how we may rise above the age, that we bestow on them our most emphatic praise.
VI. The Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte.
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Volume Second uill contain — 1. The Characteristics of the Present Age. 2. The Doctrine of Religion.
VII.
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Italy: past and present.
Or, GENERAL VIEWS of its HISTORY, RELIGION, POLITICS, LITERATURE, and ART. By L. MARIOTTI. 2 vols. post Svo. Cloth, £1 is.
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Vol. I. THE PAST. — The Middle Ages — Dante — Petrarch — Boccaccio — Machiavelli — Michael Angelo — Ariosto — Tasso — Vittoria Colonna — Galileo — Napoleon.
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'' This is a useful book, informed witli lively feeling and sound judgment. It contains an exhibition of Italian views of matters, social and political, by an Italian who has learned to speak through English thoughts as well as English words. Particularly valuable are the sketches of recent Italian history; for the prominent characters are delineated in a cordial and sympa thetic spirit, yet free from enthusiastic ideas, and with unsparing discrimina tion...The criticisms on " The Past" will richly repay perusal; it is, how ever, on " The Present" of Italy that the main interest of the book resides. This volume does not merely possess an interest similar to that of contemporary works; it supplies a desideratum, and is well adapted to aid the English reader in forming a just estimate of the great events now in progress in Italy. Not the least wonderful part of the book is the entire mastery the author has acquired of our language." — Ex aminer, April.
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" A very rapid and summary resume of the fortunes of Italy from the fall of the Roman Empire to the present moment. — A work of industry and labour, written with a good purpose. — A bird's-eye view of the subject that will revive the recollections of the scholar, and seduce the tyro into a longer course of reading." — Athenreum.
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" In reference to style, the work before us is altogether extraordinary, as that of a foreigner, and in the higher quality of thought we may commend the author for his acute, and often original, criticism, and his quick per ception of the grand and beautiful in his native literature."— Prescott (in the Noi'th American Review.)
" The work before us consists of a continuous parallel of the political and literary history of Italy from the earli est period of the middle ages to the present time. The author not only penetrates the inner relations of those dual appearances of national life, but possesses the power of displaying them to the reader with great clearness and effect. We remember no other work in which the civil conditions and literary achievements of a people have been blended in such a series of living pic tures, representing successive periods of history."— Algemeine Zeitung.
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The Principles of V'f HIT. her Divine Revelations, and a Voice TO MANKIND. By and through ANDREW JACKSON DAVIS, the " Poughkcepsie Seer," and " Clairvoyant." 2 vols. large 8vo. cloth, 18s. [Now ready.
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" For some time past the most extra ordinary interest has been excited in New York by a series of lectures de livered by a Mr. A. J. Davis, while in a state of mesmeric sleep The lectures, though thus delivered while Mr. Davis is sound asleep, occupy from an hour to an hour and a half in the delivery, and are enunciated with a fluency and ease never surpassed by the most accomplished speaker. They embrace every variety of scientific sub ject, cosmology, ethnology, astronomy, geology, physiology, languages, &c. What makes the matter the more ex traordinary is the fact, that on all the subjects on which Mr. Davis lectures when in a state of mesmeric sleep, he is profoundly ignorant in his WBJdng moments." — London Observer.
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" Taken as a whole, the work is a profound and elaborate discussion of the Philosophy of the L'nirtrie, and for gran deur of conception, soundness of prin ciple, clearness of illustration, order of arrangement and encyclopediacal range of subjects, I know of no work of any single mind that will bear away from it tlit; palm. To every theme the inditing mind approaches with a certain latent consciousness of mastery of all its principles, details, and technicalities; and yet without the least ostentatious displayof superior mental powers." — Dr. But/i, Professor of Hebrew in New York.
" In whatever view the work is regarded, it is a very remarkable pro duction, and will assuredly attract extensive attention here, as it already has in America." — Morning Advertiser.
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" In saying explicitly that we cannot conceive of a more captivating ami ab sorbing book, (to us, far more so than any novel we Have ever read)— we have no need to express, one way or another, an opinion as to thentpmuburoi quality of the 'Revelations'. To an unbeliever it will be a most delicious and far-reach ing work of imagination, written with a vast background of scientific and philosophical knowledge, while, to the believer, it will be, of course, like con verse with an archangel on the compa rison of other worlds with ours." — Home Journal, written by N. B. Willis.
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