 Part 2 of the Counter-Reformation in Scandinavia and Poland by Martin Philipsson, from the history of all nations from earliest times, Volume 12, the religious wars, translated under the supervision of John Henry Wright. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, read by Piotr Natter. At the close of the Middle Ages, Ivan III had inaugurated a new epoch for the Russian Empire. This remarkable man, with his cool, refined cruelty, without a single sympathetic trait in his character, was the creator of modern Russia. He put an end forever to tartar rule and brought to a close the destructive wars against the small, half-independent princes, thus securing the independence and unity of Russia. But he did more. He asserted his claim to all lands that had once been Russian, a claim that was to lead to the destruction of the Lithuanian Kingdom, and he declared himself the protector of the Greek Orthodox Church in foreign lands, a step that forced Russia to assume an aggressive policy against Turkey and Poland. This same prince, built up a strong absolutism within his dominions, secured quiet and order to his subjects, framed laws, and founded a standing army. He was a Peter the Great at the close of the 15th century. He was succeeded by Vasily IV Ivanovich, 1505-1533. As his father had put an end to the independence that the great Novgorod had enjoyed for several hundred years, Vasily deprived Pskov of its liberty and at the same time of its prosperity. He conquered Smolensk, then a city of Polish-Lithuania. His father had entertained close relations with the German Empire. Vasily kept up this friendship, and Maximilian I sent as envoy to Moscow the Baron of Herbertstein, author of the extremely interesting Rerum Moskovitecarum Commentarii. Vasily's son, Ivan IV, surnamed the Terrible, 1533-1585, was a prince of far greater ability and power than his father. To understand and appreciate justly his reign, we must take into consideration the state of affairs in Russia after Vasily's death. Grand prince Ivan was only three years of age when he nominally succeeded to the throne. His near relatives perished in the struggle for the regency, and the boyars, the nobility of office in Russia, seized control of the government and treated the young prince within Solens. They were unable, however, to establish their rule firmly. His order, intrigue, murder, and all sorts of violence prevailed all over the land. There were even risings among the common people, long-suffering and submissive as are the Russians of the lower classes. Such was the school in which Ivan grew up. He learned in it the stimulation, hardness, and cruelty. These seemed to him the only means by which to maintain the power of the crown and the unity of the empire. When fourteen years of age he ceased with a firm hand the reigns of government, remorselessly put to death all the leaders of the nobility and assumed, first of all Russian princes, the title of Tsar in 1584. Full of contempt for the rudeness, barbarism, and ignorance of his people, he strove to attract to his country foreign scholars, artisans, and mechanics, and by their means to secure for Russia the advantages, wealth, and power of western civilization. An English merchant fleet having found its way to the White Sea, Ivan gave them a ready welcome and entered into friendly relations with their country. He published the first systematic Russian Code of Law. By the sight of the irregular levies of the lesser nobility and their retainers, he organized a permanent guard, the Streltsy. To remedy the evil of varying religious views and practices, he convoked at Moscow in 1551 a council, the Decrees of which the Stolavne, or Book of the Hundred Chapters, formed to this day the basis of the Russian ecclesiastical polity. They bear upon the discipline and elementary instructions of the clergy, deal with superstitions and crimes, and present Russian faith and Russian morals in a definite and intended contrast to those of the West. This did not interfere with the civilizing efforts of the Tsar and his advisors. Ivan had a printing press set up in Moscow, and the first book printed in Russia appeared there in 1564. He had been reigning long and wisely when he fell severely ill, and the Boyars, who thought him near his death, turned openly against him and went back to their old practices. This awakened in Ivan memories of his sad childhood. He became a prey to incessant suspicions and vindictive rage, and determined to crash the least show of independence. He decimated the higher nobility, and even his very best friends, killing many of them with his own hand. Whole cities were ruined. On the Calumnius charge of a worthless nave, Novgorod was almost wholly destroyed, and thousands of its inhabitants were tortured to death. In a fit of frenzy he slew his eldest son, who resembled him in many ways. In short, he suffered from that tyrannical mania that affected so many Roman emperors. The Roman people rid themselves of such monsters by assassination. The Russians, Morser, while submitted and suffered, but they called him Ivan the Terrible. Meanwhile, however, the Tsar was prosecuting his wars, but fortune had forsaken him. Neither against the Poles nor against the Crime Tatars was he successful. The former, and also the Swedes, drove him out of the Baltic provinces. The latter came and burned down Moscow, the Kremlin alone escaping. On the other hand, some Russian adventurers, unsupported by their government, made the beginning of a very important conquest. Two brothers named Stroganov, large dealers in Salt and Peltries, determined to seek the market beyond the Ural Mountains, which at that time bounded the geographical knowledge of the Russian people. They entrusted the leadership of the expedition to a Kossak, Yermak, who collected a number of companions and crossed the mountains in 1579. They took an active part in the quarrels of the Trans-Huralian princes and possessed themselves of the land of Khan Kushtum and his capital, Sibir, situated on the Irtysh. From this city the whole territory beyond the mountains was called Siberia. Yermak went back to Russia, and the two Stroganovs hastened to convey their unexpected conquest to Ivan and to extend their discoveries farther and farther eastward. Such were the insignificant beginnings of the vast Asiatic Empire of Russia. Worn out by excesses of all kinds, Ivan IV died in 1585 in the 55th year of his age. His son and successor Fyodor was weak in body and mind. His father had for that reason appointed a council of regency consisting of five boyars, foremost among whom were Nikita Romanovich, brother of the young Tsar's mother, and Boris Godunov, brother of Fyodor's wife. But these regions quarreled. At last Boris Godunov treacherously seized the supreme authority by overthrowing his opponents, putting some to death and banishing others. It was then that Siberia began to serve as a place of exile. Godunov was now virtual master, though he left Fyodor the title of Tsar. As the latter was childless, Boris conceived the bold plan of exterminating the relatives of the legitimate ruler and securing the crown for himself and his descendants. Fyodor's younger half-brother Dimitri Demetrius was secretly murdered, and his mother shut up in a convent. The few relatives of the Tsar disappeared one after another in a way that could scarcely be called accidental. Godunov then set himself to secure the favor of the clergy. He made the Russian church independent of the Patriarch of Constantinople by declaring the Metropolitan of Moscow Patriarch of the whole north. He won the nobles by depriving the Russian peasants of their right of migrating freely, thus making the Morial Serbs bound to the soil in 1592. The influential classes having thus been secured, the way to the throne was prepared for him when Fyodor died childless in 1598, and the ruling house of Muscovy ended with him. No one thought of offering the crown to some other one of the numerous descendants of Rurik. It was an easy thing for the grateful clergy to induce the people to call for the coronation of Boris Godunov. The great national assembly, Duma, of bishops, boyars, princes, and representatives of the city merchant guilds approved the choice. For some time Boris, for forum's sake, refused to accept the preferred crown. At length, however, he submitted to God's will, and was solemnly crowned in September 1598. He had reached his goal, but as his want to be the case with the usurpers, he met with great difficulties, as soon as the people had had time to take a calm view of the situation. The peasants could not forget or forgive the loss of their liberty of migrating. The boyars would not forget that Boris had been one of their dumber. The usurper, full of suspicion, dealt harshly with both classes. The Romanov family, that had once stood so near the throne, were deprived of their possessions and banished. Their chief, Prince Fyodor Nikitich, was shorn and shut up in a monastery as a monk under the name of Filaretus. All the higher nobility were soon embittered against the new Tsar. But his worst foes were the very clergy whom he had lately so favored. The cause of their estrangement was Boris' endeavour to encourage intercourse with foreign nations, to attract strangers to Russia, and, last and worst, to found in Moscow a university after the Western plan, and invite to it learned men from other parts of Europe, a terrible famine added to the universal discontent. Under these circumstances there suddenly appeared a youth claiming to be Dimitri, Fyodor's younger brother, who he really was no one could tell, but his speech and general appearance rendered it probable that he was a Pole, a tool of the Jesuits, who wished with his aid to establish Catholicism in Russia. No one now doubts that Dimitri was an impostor. It is an established fact that a groom of the Polish Prince Wysniowiecki, in an alleged severe sickness, asserted while confessing to a Jesuit that he was the real Dimitri. He said that someone else had been slain under his name, and to prove his identity he showed a gold cross adorned with diamonds and various papers, in 1603. His master and his master's family believed his assertion. The Jesuits were naturally much interested in him, and had him enter a Jesuit college to be taught the truths of the Catholic religion. King Zigismund III, as a dutiful pupil of his fathers, at once acknowledged him as Tsar Dimitri, gave him a pension of 20,000 marks and granted permission to all Poles to join the great prince in his attempt to recover his empire. Dimitri solemnly pledged himself to make Catholicism the state religion of Russia, to marry Marina Mnicech, daughter of the voyvote of Sandomir, and to surrender various provinces to the Republic of Poland. He then started on his expedition in August 1604, accompanied by many thousand Polish nobles. As soon as the invading army reached Russian soil, the general dissatisfaction with Boris, the veneration entertained for the old legitimate dynasty, and besides, the force of example brought multitudes of Russians over to the protender. Boris died suddenly on April 13th, 1605, having, it is supposed, poisoned himself in his despair. His widow and his son Fyodor were strangled by the populace. On June 20th, 1605, the false Dimitri made his solemn entrance into Moscow in the midst of rapturous manifestations of joy. The mother of the real Dimitri was released from her imprisonment in a convent, and full of vindictiveness against the Godunovs did nothing to expose the imposter, though she did not formally acknowledge him as her son. The banished families, especially the Romanovs and the Shuyskys, returned, and the Nuzar began his reign wisely and mildly. But his past rose threateningly against him. He had to reward the greedy Poles who had accompanied him with Russian gold and Russian estates. Polish customs and Polish influence prevailed at his court. He entertained close relations with the hated West and allowed the Jesuits to hold Catholic worship in the Kremlin. Finally Dimitri wished to organize a standing army of foreigners, which was to be maintained in large measure at the expense of the Church. Marina, a Polish woman, and a Catholic, was betrothed to Dimitri, and, I think, never done before solemnly crowned as Zarina. The fanatical hatred of the Russians against everything foreign, and especially against the Roman Catholic Church now broke out in all its intensity. They, the only Orthodox believers, saw themselves delivered over to heretics and to their hated Polish neighbors. Ryns Wasili Szujski, whom Dimitri had unwisely pardoned for a former conspiracy, gave able leadership to the general discontent and strengthened it with his armed retainers. On May 17th, 1606, a terrible riot broke out in Moscow in which the pretender and his most prominent adherents, many Germans among them, were slain by the enraged mob. Other Poles, the Zarina, the Miniceks, and the Wyschniewieckis included, were arrested and distributed among various Russian cities. Thus ended the reign of the imposter Dimitri after less than a year's duration. The throne was now vacant, and no legitimate climate was on hand. As an attack on the part of Poland was expected, the Boyars, with the approval of the people, made Wasili Szujski, leader of the insurrection, Tsar. He at once did away with all of Dimitri's innovations, made important concessions to the Boyars and to prevent the imitation of the imposter's attempt, caused the body of the true Dimitri to be disinterred and publicly exposed. It began at once to work miracles, and Dimitri was added to the saints of the Greek calendar. It was unavoidable that the elevation of Szujski should excite the envy and jealousy of many great nobles. They sent to Poland to secure there a new foes Dimitri, and the Poles were quite ready to encourage civil war in Russia, and thus weaken a rival at whose expense Poland might grow rich. The new adventurer, as to whose origin nothing certain is known, maintained that he was Dimitri and that he had escaped from the May Massacre in Moscow. Accompanied by numerous Polish volunteers, he entered Russia in June 1607 and penetrated as far as the gates of Moscow, where he entrenched himself in the Hamlet of Tushino, hence he is known to Russian tradition as the Thief of Tushino. Many Russians joined him, and Marina, having escaped from confinement, shamelessly acknowledged him as her husband. Szujski, threatened by danger so near, turned for assistance to Sigismund's enemy, Charles IX of Sweden. 5,000 Swedes, under the able generals, the Lagarde and Horn, came to his relief, and easily routed the undisciplined mob of rebels in 1608. When Sigismund saw that the Thief of Tushino was making no headway, he deemed it best to turn the civil troubles of Russia wholly to his own advantage, declared war against that empire in 1609, and after a long and heroic resistance took the important fortress of Smolensk. The second false Dimitri and Marina withdrew to Kaluga, where they carried on a plundering warfare till he was assassinated in December 1610. These disturbances gave rise to a profound dissatisfaction with Szujski's rule. The discontent broke out in an open rebellion, when, in June 1610, a Polish army under Stanisław Żukiewski won a brilliant victory over the Tsar at Moszajsk. The Moskowites rose against their ruler and forced him to submit to the tonsure and enter a monastery. The rapid approach of the Poles forced the Council of Bojars to acknowledge Władysław, son of Sigismund, as Tsar, but not before he had pledged himself to protect the Greek Church, indeed to join it, as well as to admit the cooperation of the Bojars in legislation and in levying the taxes. The newly elected Tsar did not abide in Russia long, but soon returned to Poland. His father seemed disposed to make use of his son's new dignity for the purpose of plundering and robbing Russia, and a Polish garrison kept Moskow in order by fire and sword. Complete anarchy now prevailed in 1611. Marina Mnicek proclaimed as Tsar her son by the Tushino thief. A third pseudo-Dmitry arose in the person of the deacon Isidor, who found adherents in Pskov. Delagardy and his suites seized the fortress of Keksholm in Russian Finland and forced Novgorod degrade to recognize a Swedish prince, Charles Philip, as Tsar. Russia seemed lost, a helpless prey to foreigners. She was saved by the patriotism, the courage, the resolution of the common people, that multitude which the worthless and selfish nobles loved to consider and to treat as slaves. A butcher of Nizhny Novgorod, Kosmaminin, summoned first his fellow citizens, and then, when these had readily answered his call, all threw Russians to deliver their country from Polish heretics. Crowds came together to accomplish this task. The inhabitants of Great Novgorod were easily induced to renounce their Swedish prince. The citizens of Pskov likewise drove out the priest Isidor. The Russians, once more united, attacked the Poles near Moskow and after a fierce battle lasting four days, August 20 to August 23, 1612, won a complete victory. Two months later, the Polish garrison of the Kremlin surrendered, after a brave defense, and with the exception of Smolensk, all Russia was now rid of foreigners. The question of supreme moment was now to place the nation under the rule of an able and legitimate chief. The nobles, the higher clergy, and representatives of the cities and circles met together. After long deliberations, Michael, the son of that Fyodor Romanov whom Godunov had thrust into a monastery, was elected Tsar on February 21, 1613, because he was the youngest and least powerful of the candidates, and had, moreover, formally acknowledged the right of the boyars to cooperate in the government. During the following years the Romanov dynasty established itself more and more firmly on the throne, and the year 1613 may be considered as having put a final stop to the confusion that had prevailed in Russian politics. The Romanovs are today the ruling dynasty of Russia. Charles IX had been unable to do anything to maintain the claims of his son, Charles Philip, to the Russian throne. He already had on his hands hostilities with Poland and with Denmark, in 1611. In this latter country the peaceable Frederick II had, in the year 1588, been succeeded by Christian IV, then only eleven years of age. As soon as this prince became his own master, in 1569 he manifested a most ambitious spirit. He wished to acquire military fame, and turned upon Sweden, which he thought occupied in the Baltic provinces, and whose king he deemed weak and sickly. He found a pretext for war in certain disputes about the Lapland boundaries. His plan was at first successful, he defeated the Swedish king and took the important fortress of Kalmar. Before Charles IX could make that loss good, he died, October 30, 1611, at the age of 60. A strong, energetic and even passionate man of great sagacity and with deep and lofty feelings. He had succeeded in directing the destinies of his people according to his purpose, because he understood that people recognized their needs and desires, and helped them to realize them. He was succeeded by his son Gustav II Adolfus, who was born on December 9, 1594. This young prince had been most carefully educated by his father. He spoke Latin, German, Dutch and French fluently, and had a fair knowledge of Greek, Polish and Russian. When yet a lad he had taken part in state affairs, as a listener mostly, but now and then called upon for advice. In the campaign of 1611 he had played a not-inglorious part. For a youth of 17 the situation presented great difficulties. Charles, with his peculiar conscientiousness, had left to the estates the choice between Zygizmunt's brother, Duke John, and his own son, Gustavus Adolfus. The choice fell on Gustavus, but John, as compensation, received all of East and West Gotland as an almost independent duchy. The young king's brother, Charles Philip, obtained Südermannland, together with Norike and Wermland. Thus the unity of the nation was once more broken. Besides, the nobles took advantage of the youth's and insecure position of the new prince to impose upon him their cooperation by means of the Royal Council. The young king's chancellor was Axel Ochsenstein, only twenty-eight years of age but already an experienced statesman and an indefatigable worker. Bloody and costly wars were part of the inheritance which Charles IX had left to his son, and one of the first cares of Gustavus was to put a measurably satisfactory end to them. It was clear that, in spite of their heroic valor, the Swedes could not face their foes on both the East and the West. It was fortunate for Sweden that the Danish nobles did not look favorably on their king's military successes, fearing lest he might grow proud thereby and destroy them and their liberties. So Christian IV was disposed to listen to overtures of peace, though the terms he granted the Swedes were quite severe. By the Treaty of Knerot, January 1613, Gustavus renounced his sovereignty over Lapland and redeemed Elvesborg, the only Swedish port on the North Sea, at a cost of a million rex-tallars, not inconsiderable some for the times. To guard against the return of such humiliations, Gustavus contracted an alliance of fifteen years with the state's general of the Netherlands, but with a keen eye to the future stipulated that it should in no wise affect the supremacy and control of the Baltic Sea. The Dutch envoys described the young king as slender in figure, shapely, with a pale complexion, somewhat long features, light hair, and a pointed blonde beard. Great things were even then expected of him, and men praised his kindness, his prudence, and his eloquence. Gustavus, having no longer anything to fear on the side of Denmark, determined to profit by the confusion prevailing in Russia, and met with some successes, though he failed to retake Pskov. In February 1617 a peace was concluded at Stolbova, by which Sweden obtained possession of Ingermanland and Karelia. This was an acquisition of the greatest importance, as Russia was now shut out from the Baltic Sea. Ingermanland and Karelia were bulwarks not only for Finland, but for Sweden herself. How wisely the king had judged was shown a hundred years later when those provinces were restored to Russia. I hope to God, Gustavus said as the treaty was passed, that the Russians will not now find it easy to cross this brook, the Baltic. Gustavus made it one of the first aims of his reign, to secure for Sweden the Baltic Sea and its shores. A good beginning was the setting aside of his Russian rivals. Sweden now stood forth bold and powerful, full of protestant zeal and faith, the shield of the reformation in Europe, and especially in Germany. The efforts of the Catholics had proved utterly unavailing, they had resulted in utterly eradicating from the people's hearts all attachment to the old doctrines and intensifying their hatred of Catholicism. For a few years longer Rome flattered itself that with the aid of Poland it might win Russia to the Catholic faith. To this end the Jesuits had applied all the means of deceit, falsehood and violence so characteristic of their order. But the Russian people, grown conscious of their own strength, had broken the net woven about them and Poland and Jesuits had been ingloriously driven out of the land. The counter-reformation in the northeast retained only one of its conquests, Poland. This was a misfortune for that noble country. Catholic bigotry worked the same ruin for the Poles that is wrought in Spain and in Italy. Lands where Rome prevailed were doomed to decay and sometimes utter ruin, while protestant countries grew more and more powerful and enterprising. Whether one looks upon it with joy or with regret it cannot be gained sad. At the beginning of the 17th century protestant nations were steadily growing in power, greatness and prosperity. The nations over which Jesuitism and Romanism had control were showing signs of rapid and apparently irretrievable decay. To revert to Poland, how successfully, how smoothly had the transition seemed to be made from the old dynasty to the new order, whilst neighboring Russia, after the extinction of its hereditary house, sank into apparently hopeless confusion. And yet the heroic firmness of the Russian people had extricated them out of this confusion and had laid the foundations of a mightier and larger development, whilst in Poland the germ of decay that lay in its very vitals was rapidly destroying the body politic. The clergy kept the lower classes in subjection, whilst themselves serving the interests of a rude, selfish and disillusioned nobility. But in Germany the momentous question was into which of the two camps, that of protestantism or that of the counter-reformation, the nation would pass. Not the German people alone, but the whole West was profoundly interested in the issue. And of part two of The Counter-Reformation in Scandinavia and Poland by Martin Fiebsson. The Crisis, Nihilism and the Idea of Recurrence, by Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900, from the Wheel to Power, Book 1. This is a LibriVox recording, or LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Crisis, Nihilism and the Idea of Recurrence Extreme positions are not relieved by more moderate ones, but by extreme opposite positions, and thus the belief in the utter immorality of nature and in the absence of all purpose and sense are psychologically necessary attitudes when the belief in God, and in an essentially moral order of things, is no longer tenable. Nihilism now appears, not because the sorrows of existence are greater than they were formerly, but because in a general way people have grown suspicious of the meaning which might be given to evil and even to existence. One interpretation has been overthrown, but since it was held to be that interpretation, it seems as though there were no meaning in existence at all, as though everything were in vain. It yet remains to be shown that this in vain is the character of present nihilism. The mistrust of our former valuations has increased to such an extent that it has led to the question, are not all values merely allurements prolonging the duration of the comedy without however bringing the unraveling any closer. The long period of time which has culminated in and in vain without either goal or purpose is the most paralyzing of thoughts, more particularly when one sees that one is duped without however being able to resist being duped. Let us imagine this thought in its worst form, existence as it is without either a purpose or a goal, but inevitably recurring, without an end in non-entity, eternal recurrence. This is the extremist form of nihilism, nothing, purposelessness, eternal. European form of Buddhism, the energy of knowledge and of strength drives us to such a belief. It is the most scientific of all hypothesis. We deny final purposes. If existence had a final purpose it would have reached it. It should be understood that what is being aimed at here is a contradiction of pantheism for everything perfect, divine, eternal, also leads to the belief in eternal recurrence. Has this pantheistic and affirmative attitude to all things also been made possible by morality? At bottom only the moral God has been overcome. Is there any sense in imagining a God beyond good and evil? Would pantheism in this sense be possible? Do we withdraw the idea of purpose from the process and affirm the process notwithstanding? This were so if within that process something were attained every moment and always the same thing. Spinoza one an affirmative position of this sort in the sense that every moment according to him has a logical necessity, and he triumphed by means of his fundamentally logical instinct over a like confirmation of the world. But his case is exceptional. If every fundamental trait of character which lies beneath every act and which finds expression in every act were recognized by the individual as his fundamental trait of character, this individual would be driven to regard every moment of his existence in general triumphantly as good. It would simply be necessary for that fundamental trait of character to be felt in oneself as something good, valuable, and pleasurable. Now in the case of those men and classes of men who were treated with violence and oppressed by their fellows, morality saved life from despair and from the leap into non-entity. For impotence in relation to mankind and not in relation to nature is what generates the most desperate bitterness towards existence. Morality treated the powerful, the violent, and the masters in general as enemies against whom the common man must be protected, that is to say, emboldened, strengthened. Morality has therefore always taught the most profound hatred and contempt of the fundamental trait of character of all rulers, i.e., their will to power. To suppress, to deny, and to decompose this morality would mean to regard this most thoroughly detested instinct with the reverse of the old feeling and valuation. If the sufferer and the oppressed man were to lose his belief in his right to condemn the will to power, his position would be desperate. This would be so if the trait above mentioned were essential to life, in which case it would follow that even that will to morality was only a cloak to this will to power, as are also even that hatred and contempt. The oppressed man would then perceive that he stands on the same platform with the oppressor and that he has no individual privilege nor any higher rank than the latter. On the contrary, there is nothing on earth which can have any value if it have not a modicum of power, granted, of course, that life itself is the will to power. Morality protected the botched and bungled against nihilism, in that it gave every one of them infinite worth, metaphysical worth, and clustered them all together in one order which did not correspond with that of worldly power and order of rank. It taught submission, humility, etc. Admitting that the belief in this morality be destroyed, the botched and the bungled would no longer have any comfort and would perish. This perishing seems like self-annihilation, like an instinctive selection of that which must be destroyed. The symptoms of this self-destruction of the botched and the bungled, self-vivisection, poisoning, intoxication, romanticism, and above all, the instinctive constraint to acts whereby the powerful are made into mortal enemies, training, so to speak, one's own hangmen. The will to destruction as the will to a still deeper instinct, of the instinct of self-destruction, the will to non-entity. Nihilism is a sign that the botched and bungled in order to be destroyed, that, having been deprived of morality, they no longer have any reason to resign themselves, that they take up their stand on the territory of the opposite principle, and will also exercise power themselves, by compelling the powerful to become their hangmen. This is the European form of Buddhism, that active negation, after all existence has lost its meaning. It must not be supposed that poverty has grown more acute, on the contrary, God, morality, resignation were remedies in the very deepest stages of misery. Active nihilism made its appearance in circumstances which were relatively much more favorable. The fact alone that morality is regarded as overcome presupposes a certain degree of intellectual culture, while this very culture for its part bears evidence to a certain relative well-being. A certain intellectual fatigue brought on by the long struggle concerning philosophical opinions, and carried to hopeless skepticism against philosophy, shows moreover that the level of these nihilists is by no means a low one. Only think of the conditions in which Buddha appeared. The teaching of the eternal recurrence would have learned principles to go upon. Just as Buddha's teaching, for instance, had the notion of causality, etc. What do we mean today by the words botched and bungled? In the first place they are used physiologically, and not politically. The unhealthiest kind of man all over Europe, in all classes, is the soil out of which nihilism grows. This species of man will regard eternal recurrence as damnation. Once he is bitten by the thought he can no longer recoil before any action. He would not extirpate passively, but would cause everything to be extirpated, which is meaningless and without a goal, to this extent. Although it is only a spasm, or sort of blind rage in the presence of the fact that everything has existed again and again for an eternity, even this period of nihilism and destruction. The value of such a crisis is that it purifies, that it unites similar elements and makes them mutually destructive, that it assigns common duties to men of opposite persuasions and brings the weaker and more uncertain among them to the light, thus taking the first step towards a new order of rank among forces from the standpoint of health, recognizing commanders as commanders, subordinates as subordinates, naturally irrespective of all the present forms of society. What class of man will prove their strongest in this new order of things? The most moderate, they who do not require any extreme forms of belief, they who not only admit of, but actually like, a certain modicum of chance and nonsense. They who can think of man with a very moderate view of his value, without becoming weak and small on that account, the most rich in health, who are able to withstand a maximum amount of sorrow, and who are therefore not so very much afraid of sorrow, men who are certain of their power and who represent with conscious pride the state of strength to which man has attained. How could such a man think of eternal recurrence? The periods of European nihilism. The period of obscurity. All kinds of groping measures devised to preserve old institutions and not to arrest the progress of new ones. The period of light. Men see that old and new are fundamental contraries, that the old values are born of descending life, and that the new ones are born of ascending life, that all old ideals are unfriendly to life, born of decadence and determining it, however much they may be decked out in the Sunday finery of morality. We understand the old, but are far from being sufficiently strong for the new. The periods of the three great passions. Contempt, pity, destruction. The periods of catastrophes. The rise of a teaching which will sift mankind, which drives the weak to some decision, and the strong also. And of the crisis, nihilism, and the idea of recurrence. By Friedrich Nietzsche. From the Will to Power. Book 1. Eternal Recurrence. By Friedrich Nietzsche. 1844-1900. From the Will to Power. Book 4. This is a Libravox recording, all Libravox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit Libravox.org. 1845. Eternal Recurrence. My philosophy reveals the triumphant thought through which all other systems of thought must ultimately perish. It is the great disciplinary thought. Those races that cannot bear it are doomed, those which regard it as the greatest blessing are destined to rule. The greatest of all fights. For this purpose a new weapon is required. A hammer. A terrible alternative must be created. Europe must be brought face to face with the logic of facts, and confronted with the question whether its will for ruin is really earnest. While leveling down to mediocrity must be avoided, rather than this it would be preferable to perish. A pessimistic attitude of mind and a pessimistic doctrine and ecstatic nihilism may in certain circumstances even prove indispensable to the philosopher. That is to say, as a mighty form of pressure, or hammer, with which he can smash up degenerate perishing races and put them out of existence, with which he can beat a track to a new order of life, or instill a longing for non-entity in those who are degenerate and who desire to perish. I wish to teach the thought which gives unto many the right to cancel their existences. The great disciplinary thought. No recurrence or prophecy. One, the exposition of the doctrine and its theoretical first principles and results. Two, the proof of the doctrine. Three, probable results which will follow from its being believed, it makes everything break open. A, the means of enduring it. B, the means of ignoring it. Four, its place in history is a means. The period of greatest danger. The foundation of an oligarchy above peoples and their interests. Education directed at establishing a political policy for humanity in general. A counterpart of Jesuitism. The two greatest philosophical points of view. Both discovered by Germans. A, that of becoming and that of evolution. B, that based upon the values of existence. But the wretched form of German pessimism must first be overcome. Both points of view reconciled by me in a decisive manner. Everything becomes and returns forever. Escape is impossible. Granted that we could appraise the value of existence, what would be the result of it? The thought of recurrence is a principle of selection in the service of power and barbarity. The rightness of man for this thought. One, the thought of eternal recurrence, its first principles which must necessarily be true, if it were true, what its result is. Two, it is the most oppressive thought, its probable result, provided it be not prevented, that is to say, provided all values be not transvalued. Three, the means of enduring it. The transvaluation of all values. There no longer to be found in certainty, but in uncertainty. No longer cause and effect, but continual creativeness. No longer the will to self-preservation, but to power. No longer the modest expression, it is all only subjective. But it is all our work. Let us be proud of it. In order to endure the thought of recurrence, freedom from morality is necessary. No means against the fact pain. Pain regarded as the instrument, as the father of pleasure. There is no accretive consciousness of pain. Pleasure derived from all kinds of uncertainty and tentativeness as a counter-poise to extreme fatalism. Suppression of the concept, necessity. Suppression of the will. Suppression of absolute knowledge. Greatest elevation of man's consciousness of strength, as that which creates Superman. The two extremes of thought, the materialistic and the platonic, are reconciled in eternal recurrence. Both are regarded as ideals. If the universe had a goal, that goal would have been reached by now. If any sort of unforeseen final state existed, that state also would have been reached. If it were capable of any halting or stability of any being, it would only have possessed this capability of becoming stable for one instant in its development, and again becoming would have been at an end for ages, and with it all thinking and all spirit. The fact of intellect's being in a state of development proves that the universe can have no goal, no final state, and is incapable of being. But the old habit of thinking of some purpose in regard to all phenomena, and of thinking of a directing and creating deity in regard to the universe, is so powerful that the thinker has to go to great pains in order to avoid thinking of the very aimlessness of the world as intended. The idea that the universe intentionally evades a goal, and even knows artificial means were with, it prevents itself from falling into a circular movement, must occur to all those who would feign a tribute to the universe, the capacity of eternally regenerating itself. That is to say, they would feign impose upon a finite, definite force which is invariable in quantity, like the universe, the miraculous gift of renewing its forms and its conditions for all eternity. Although the universe is no longer a god, it must still be capable of the divine power of creating and transforming. It must forbid itself to relapse into any one of its previous forms. It must not only have the intention, but also the means of avoiding any sort of repetition every second of its existence, even. It must control every single one of its movements, with a view of avoiding goals, final states, and repetition, and all the other results of such an unpardonable and insane method of thought and desire. All this is nothing more than the old religious mode of thought and desire, which, in spite of all, longs to believe that in some way or other the universe resembles the old, beloved, infinite, and infinitely creative god, that in some way or other the old god still lives. That longing of Spinoza's, which is expressed in the words Diaz Siva Natura, what he really felt was Natura Siva Diaz, which then is the proposition and belief in which the decisive change, the present preponderance of the scientific spirit over the religious and god fancying spirit, is best formulated. Aught it not to be, the universe as force must not be thought of as unlimited because it cannot be thought of in this way. We forbid ourselves the concept infinite force because it is incompatible with the idea of force. Hence it follows that the universe lacks the power of eternal renewal. The principle of the conservation of energy inevitably involves eternal recurrence. That a state of equilibrium has never been reached proves that it is impossible, but in infinite space it must have been reached, likewise in spherical space. The form of space must be the cause of the eternal movement and ultimately of all imperfection. That energy and stability and immutability are contradictory. The measure of energy dimensionally is fixed, though it is essentially fluid. That which is timeless must be refuted. Any given moment of energy, the absolute conditions for a new distribution of all forces are present. It cannot remain stationary. Change is part of its essence, therefore time is as well. By this means, however, the necessity of change has only been established once more in theory. A certain emperor always bore the fleeting nature of all things in his mind in order not to value them too seriously and to be able to live quietly in their midst. Conversely, everything seems to me much too important for it to be so fleeting. I seek an eternity for everything. I want to pour the most precious salves and wines into the sea. My consolation is that everything that has been is eternal. The sea will wash it up again. The New Concept of the Universe The Universe exists. It is nothing that grows into existence and that passes out of existence. Or better still, it develops. It passes away. But it never began to develop and has never ceased from passing away. It maintains itself in both states. It lives on itself. Its excrements are its nourishment. We need not concern ourselves for one instant with the hypothesis of a created world. The concept create is today utterly indefinable and unrealizable. It is but a word which hails from superstitious ages. Nothing can be explained with a word. The last attempt that was made to conceive of a world that began occurred quite recently, in many cases with the help of logical reasoning. Generally, too, as you will guess, with an ulterior theological motive. Several attempts have been made lately to show that the concept that the universe has an infinite past regresses in infinitum is contradictory. It was even demonstrated it is true at the price of confounding the head with the tail. Nothing can prevent me from calculating backwards from this moment of time and of saying, I shall never reach the end. Just as I can calculate without end in a forward direction from the same moment, it is only when I wish to commit the air I shall be careful to avoid it of reconciling this correct concept of a regressus in infinitum with the absolutely unrealizable concept of a finite progressus up to the present. Only when I consider the direction forwards or backwards as logically indifferent that I take hold of the head this very moment, and think I hold the tail. This pleasure I leave to you, Mr. During. I have come across this thought in other thinkers before me, and every time I found that it was determined by other ulterior motives, chiefly theological in favor of a creator-spiritus. If the universe were in any way able to congeal, to dry up, to perish, or if it were capable of attaining to a state of equilibrium, or if it had any kind of goal at all, which a long lapse of time immutability and finality reserved for it, in short, to speak metaphysically, if becoming could resolve itself into being or into non-entity, this state ought already to have been reached, but it has not been reached. It therefore follows this is the only certainty we can grasp which can serve as a corrective to a host of cosmic hypotheses possible in themselves. If, for instance, materialism cannot consistently escape the conclusion of a finite state which William Thompson has traced out for it, then materialism is thereby refuted. If the universe may be conceived as a definite quantity of energy, as a definite number of centers of energy, and every other concept remains indefinite and therefore useless, it follows therefrom that the universe must go through a calculable number of combinations in the great game of chance, which constitutes its existence. In infinity, at some moment or other, every possible combination must once have been realized, not only this, but it must have been realized an infinite number of times. And in as much as between every one of these combinations and its next recurrence, every other possible combination would necessarily have been undergone. And since every one of these combinations would determine the whole series in the same order, a circular movement of absolutely identical series is thus demonstrated. The universe is thus shown to be a circular movement which has already repeated itself an infinite number of times and which plays its game for all eternity. This conception is not simply materialistic, for if it were this, it would not involve an infinite recurrence of identical cases, but a finite state. Owing to the fact that the universe has not reached this finite state, materialism shows itself to be but an imperfect and provisional hypothesis. And do ye know what the universe is to my mind? Shall I show it to you in my mirror? This universe is a monster of energy. Without beginning or end, a fixed and brazen quantity of energy which grows neither bigger nor smaller, which does not consume itself, but only alters its face. As a whole, its bulk is immutable. It is a household without either losses or gains, but likewise without increase and without sources of revenue surrounded by non-entity as by a frontier. It is nothing vague or wasteful. It does not stretch into infinity, but it is a definite quantum of energy located in limited space, and not in space which would be anywhere empty. It is rather energy everywhere. The play of forces and force waves at the same time, one and many, adlomerating here and diminishing there. A sea of forces storming and raging in itself, forever changing, forever rolling back over in calculable ages of recurrence with an ebb and flow of its forms, producing the most complicated things out of the most simple structures, producing the most hardened, most savage and the most contradictory things out of the quietest, most rigid and the most frozen material. And then returning from multifariousness to uniformity, from the play of contradictions back into the delight of consonants, saying yay unto itself, even in this homogeneity of its courses and ages, forever blessing itself as something which recurs for all eternity, a becoming which knows not satiety or disgust or weariness. This, my Dionysian world of eternal self-creation, of eternal self-destruction, this mysterious world of twofold voluptuousness, this, my beyond good and evil without aim, unless there is an aim in the bliss of the circle, without will, unless a ring must by nature keep good will to itself. Would you have a name for my world? A solution to all your riddles? Do ye also want a light, ye most concealed, strongest and the most undaunted men of the blackest midnight? This world is the will to power and nothing else. And even ye yourselves are this will to power and nothing besides, and of eternal recurrence by Friedrich Nietzsche, from the will to power, book four. James Wilson, Blind Biographer, 1775, 1845. Wilson's introduction to the 1835 edition of his biography of the blind or lives of such as have distinguished themselves as poets, philosophers, artists, et cetera, as well as a few particulars of the life of the author. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Introduction. The branch of biography which the following pages exhibit has not until now been entered on as a distinct subject. In all preceding works, the lives of the blind have been classed and confounded with those of others. And though the individuals have been pointed out as objects of admiration and astonishment, yet no work has appeared in which they have been considered in a proper point of view as a class of men seemingly separated from society, cut off as it were from the whole visible world and deprived of the most valuable faculty that man can possess, yet in many instances overcoming all those difficulties which would have been thought insurmountable had not experienced proof the contrary. In the pursuit of knowledge, the blind have been very successful and many of them have acquired the first literary honors that their own or foreign universities could confer. In the different branches of philosophy, if they have not excelled, they have been equal to many of their contemporaries. But more particularly in the science of mathematics, many of them having been able to solve the most abstruse problems in algebra. In poetry, they have been equally distinguished. Two of the greatest men that ever courted the muses labored under the deprivation of sight, Homer, the venerable father of epic poetry and the inimitable author of Paradise Lost. These two illustrious bards will live in the minds of every true lover of poetry as long as learning and learned men shall have a place in the page of history. In philosophy, Saundersen and Euler appear in the most conspicuous point of view. The former lost his sight when only 12 months old but was enabled by the strength of his comprehensive genius to delineate the phenomena of the rainbow with all the variegated beauty of colors and to clear up several dark and mysterious passages which appeared in Newton's Principia. And though the latter did not lose his sight until he arrived at the years of manhood, yet from that period he was able to astonish the world by his labors in the rich fields of science where he earned those laurels which still continue to flourish in unfaded bloom. He had the honor of settling that dispute which has so long divided the opinions of the philosophers of Europe respecting the Newtonian and Cartesian systems by deciding in favor of Newton to the satisfaction of all parties. The treasures of his fertile genius still enrich the academies of Paris, Basel, Berlin and St. Petersburg. In mechanics, the blind have gone to considerable length almost to surpass the bounds of probability were not the fact supported by evidence of unquestionable authority. Here we find architects building bridges, drawing plans of new roads and executing them to the satisfaction of the commissioners. These roads are still to be seen through the counties of York and Lancaster where they have been carried through the most difficult parts of the country over bogs and mountains. Indeed, there are few branches of mechanics in which the blind have not excelled. It was of trifling importance to me at what time of life or by what cause the subjects of these memoirs lost their sight provided they distinguished themselves after they became blind. My principal object was to exemplify the powers of the human mind under one of the greatest privations to which man is exposed in this life. It was partly with a view of rescuing my fellow sufferers from the neglect and obscurity in which many of them were involved that induced me to undertake the present work and undertaking attended with immense toil and laborious research. This will readily be allowed when it is considered that I had often to depend on the kindness of strangers for the loan of such books as were requisite for my purpose and even to supply the place of a reader or a manuensis. However, after surmounting the various difficulties with which I had to contend, in 1820 the work made its appearance in one volume, 12 MO. The reception it met with from the public was gratifying to my feelings and far exceeded my expectations. The present edition is very much improved and enlarged, many new and interesting subjects being added, which I hope will meet with the approbation of my kind friends and generous subscribers. James Wilson. A few particulars of the life of the author, I was born May the 24th, 1779, in Richmond, State of Virginia, North America. My father, John Wilson, was a native of Scotland. His family was originally of Queens Ferry, a small village in Fifeshire, about 11 miles from Edinburgh. He had an uncle who emigrated to America when a young man, as a mechanic, where by honest industry and prudent economy, he soon amassed a considerable property. He wrote for my father, who was then about 18 years of age, and promised to make him his heir in case he would come to America. My grandfather hesitated for some time, but at length, consented, and preparations were accordingly made for my father's departure, who sailed from Greenock and arrived safe at Norfolk, from whence he was forwarded by a merchant of that place and soon reached Richmond, where he was gladly received by his uncle. This man, being in the decline of life, without a family and bowed down by infirmities, now looked upon his nephew as the comfort of his life and the support of his declining years, and therefore entrusted him with the entire management of his affairs, which he had the happiness of conducting to the old man's satisfaction. Thus he continued to act till the death of his uncle in 1775, when he found himself in possession of 3,000 pounds value in money and landed property. Prior to this event, my father, on a visit to Baltimore, got acquainted with my mother, Elizabeth Johnson. To her he was introduced by an intimate friend, a Mr. Freeman, whom I may have occasion to mention hereafter. His uncle, on hearing this, could not bear the idea of a matrimonial connection during his life, and so stood as a grand barrier to the completion of his wishes. But after the decease of the old man, being left to think and act for himself, as soon as his affairs were settled, he hastened to Baltimore, where the long wished for union took place. Shortly after his marriage, he returned again to Virginia. His whole mind was now bent to the improvement of his plantation and the acquiring of a paternal inheritance for his offspring, flushed with the hope of spending the eve of life on a fertile estate that amply rewarded the hand of industry, of spending it in the bosom of his family, and of tasting the pleasures which domestic retirement affords. He followed his avocation with alacrity and could say in the midst of his enjoyments, the winter's night and summer's day glide imperceptibly away. But, alas, how uncertain are human prospects and worldly possessions. How often do they wither in the bud or bloom like the rose to be blasted when full blown? How repeatedly do they sicken even in enjoyment? And what appears at a distance like a beautiful, verdant hill degenerates on a close survey into a rugged barren rock. This moment the sky is bright, the air is serene, and the sun of our prosperity beams forth in unclouded splendor, and in the next, blackness and darkness envelop us around. The cloud of adversity bursts upon our devoted heads and we are overwhelmed by the storm. It was so with my father, and of course the misfortune was entailed on me. The disturbance which took place at Boston was at first considered only a riot, but it shortly began to assume a more formidable aspect. The insurgents were soon embodied throughout all the colonies and the insurrection became general. Between them and the loyal party, no neutrality was allowed and every man was finally under the necessity of joining one side or the other. For some time indeed, my father strove to avoid taking an active part, but he was soon convinced that this was totally impossible. Many of his early friends had embraced the cause of the revolutionists and were very anxious that he should join their party. To incite him to this, several advantageous offers were made to him and when this expedient failed, threats were resorted to, exercising the right which belongs to every man in politics as well as in religion. I mean the right of private judgment. He, in conjunction with a number of his neighbors, enrolled himself in a core of volunteers for the joint purpose of defending private property and supporting the royal cause. It would indeed be painful to me to enter minutely into the sufferings of my parents at this eventful period. Suffice it to say they were stripped of their all and were left destitute and forlorn. Down to the period of which I am now speaking, no political question had ever given rise to more controversy than the American war. It is not my business to enter into a discussion of the subject. All that remains necessary for me to say is a word or two in relation to my father's political conduct. That man who would not rejoice in being able to speak well of a departed parent is not entitled to the name of man and cannot be characterized by the feelings common to our nature. It affords me, then, a degree of pleasure to reflect that my father must have acted throughout from principle. On this point I am perfectly satisfied when I consider him rejecting emolument, despising threats, volunteering in the royal cause, forsaking his own home, and thereby leaving his family and property exposed, braving every danger, serving during five campaigns and continuing active in the cause he had espoused as long as he could be useful to it. Being attached to that part of the army under the immediate command of Lord Cornwallis, he was taken prisoner when that gallant general was compelled to surrender to a superior force. His health during these disasters was much impaired and on being liberated, he thought of returning to Europe in hopes that the heir of his native country would restore him to his wanted state of health and vigor. My mother was now residing near New York in the house of a friend and thither he directed his steps. There he abode for a year and found his health so much improved that he determined to lose no more time in America and so prepared to recross the Atlantic. And anxious to review his native shore upon the roaring waves embarked once more. Bound for Liverpool under the guidance of Captain Smith, the vessel set sail and my parents bade a final adieu to the shores of Columbia. What his feelings were at this crisis, it would be difficult to describe. Separated from that country in which his best hopes centered, cut off from the enjoyment of his legal possessions without a probability of ever regaining them, impaired in his constitution and crossed in all his former prospects, we may view him mourning over his misfortunes and devising plans for his future exertions. It is true he might have consoled himself with a pleasing reflection that he was now about to revisit his native land to meet with his nearest relations and best friends and to spend the remainder of his days in the place of his nativity, in peace and safety. But how vain and transient are the hopes of mortal man. All his joys and sorrows, hopes and fears, anxious cares and premature plans were shortly to terminate with himself. And I was to be left at four years of age, destitute of a father. They had scarcely lost sight of land when his disease returned with increased violence and 12 days after the vessel left New York, he expired. The reader will not consider my situation as deplorable while he thinks that still I had a mother to take care of me and to assist me in my childish years. True, I had a mother and a mother who survived my father, but it was only for 20 minutes. For she being in the last stage of pregnancy, the alarm occasioned by his death brought on premature labor and terminated her existence. Thus on a sudden I lost both father and mother, saw them sewed up in the same hammock and committed to a watery grave. Here my misfortunes did not end. I was seized by the smallpox and for want of a mother's care and proper medical aid, this most loathsome disease deprived me of my sight. After a long and dangerous voyage, it being a hurricane almost all the time, the captain was obliged to put into Belfast Harbor as the ship had suffered much in her masts, rigging, et cetera, and the crew were nearly exhausted. When we arrived there, I had not recovered from the effects of my late illness, the symptoms of which were at one period so violent as to threaten instant dissolution. To make me the more comfortable I was sent immediately to Belfast. There was no time lost by Captain Smith in applying to the church warden in my behalf and in order to prevent me from becoming a charge to the parish, he deposited in his hands a sum of money sufficient to pay the expense of supporting me for five years. I was soon provided with a nurse. The ship being now completely repaired, the benevolent captain and kind-hearted crew left me in Belfast, a total stranger. No one knew me nor had ever heard anything of my family. My situation at this time was truly pitiable as I was deprived of my parents at the time I most required their care. Still, however, I was under the protection of a merciful providence who can temper the wind to the shorn lamb. In his word, he has promised to be a father to the fatherless, and to me this gracious saying has certainly been fulfilled. Many of the first families in the kingdom I can rank among my kindest friends and to nothing can I attribute this but to the influence of his providence who inclines the hearts of men to that which is pleasing in his sight. My nurse was a good-natured old woman and the anxiety which she showed for my recovery was much greater than could be expected from a stranger. Night after night she sat by me, attended to my calls and administered to my wants with all that maternal tenderness which a fond mother manifests to the child of her bosom. The prayers which she offered up in my behalf and the tears of sympathy which stole down her aged cheek bespoke a heart that could feel for the miseries of a fellow creature. Contrary to all expectation I recovered and in the course of a few months I was able to grope my way through the house alone. Shortly after this my right eye was couched by the late surgeon Wilson and in consequence of this operation I could soon discern the surrounding objects and their various colors. This was certainly a great mercy for though the enjoyment did not continue long yet the recollection of it affords me pleasure even to the present day. One day when about seven years of age as I crossed the street I was attacked and dreadfully mangled by an ill-natured cow. This accident nearly cost me my life and deprived me of that sight which was in a great degree restored and which I have never since enjoyed. Thus it was the will of Providence to baffle the efforts of human ingenuity and to doom me to perpetual blindness and this reflection enables me to bear my misfortunes without repining. A few years after this event my foster mother died and again I was left forlorn and without a friend. In this precarious state the only means I had of obtaining subsistence were apparently ill-suited to my situation. The reader may perhaps smile when I inform him that at this time I was considered by many as a man of letters and that I earned my bread in consequence of my practical engagements in relation to them. This indeed was the case for I was employed to carry letters to and from the offices of the different merchants in the town and neighborhood. My punctuality and dispatch in this respect were much in my favor so that I was generally employed in preference to those who enjoyed the use of all their senses. In the course of time my sphere was enlarged and often on important business I have borne dispatches to the distance of 30 or 40 miles. This was certainly not a little extraordinary in a place where the confusion and bustle of business subjected me to many dangers. Being advised to attempt the study of music I made an almost fruitless effort as I had no person to instruct me. But although I could only scrape a few tunes which I had learned by ear this did not prevent me from being called on occasionally to officiate at dances. For no matter how despicable the musician or insignificant his instrument the sound operates like an invisible charm elevates the passions of the lower orders makes them shake their grief and their cares off at their heels and moving on the light fantastic toe causes them to forget the bitterness of the past and prevents them from brooding over the prospect of future evils and happy though my harsh touch faltering still but mocked all time and marred the dancer's skill yet would the village praise my wondrous power and dance forgetful of the noontide hour. I soon found in consequence of this avocation that I was exposed to numerous vices. I was obliged to associate with the dregs of society to witness many scenes of folly and great wickedness to stay out late at night and thus expose myself to dangers of different kinds as my feelings were continually at variance with this occupation which I adopted more from necessity than choice I soon gave it up and composed a farewell address to my fiddle. The family in which I lived was both poor and illiterate not one among them could spell their own name and hence I was a considerable time before I acquired any taste for knowledge. It was painful indeed both in towns and villages to behold the ignorance and wickedness which prevailed among children of both sexes swearing, lying and throwing stones and the feelings of the passengers while walking along were not only hurt by the profane language of these culprits but their personal safety was always in danger from the stones which were carelessly and mischievously flung around them. But thanks be to God this evil is at length disappearing. The remedy applied has been successful and that remedy is the Sunday schools. In the districts where these institutions are established the children both in their appearance and manners have undergone a great change for the better instead of injuring their neighbors and breaking the Lord's day. They are now taught to read the scriptures which under the divine blessing qualifies them to fill the various situations in society. They are also taught to honor their parents that they may obtain the blessing which God has promised unto the children of obedience that their days may be long in the land which the Lord their God giveth them. These doctrines may be lightly looked upon by some but it is in a breach of these laws a disregard for these truths that originate all the crimes which disgrace the character of man and degrade him below the brutes of the field. I present these circumstances to the reader that he may know the kind of society in which I mingled during the first 15 years of my life. It cannot be imagined that much information could be derived from such a source as this. About this time I began to pay some attention to books but my first course of reading was indeed of a very indifferent description. I was obliged to listen to what was most convenient. However, I made the best of what I heard and in a short time in conjunction with a boy of my own age who read to me I was master of the principal circumstances in Jack the Giant Killer, Valentine and Orson, Robinson Caruso and Gulliver's Travels. The subject matter of these formed my taste was swallowed with avidity and inspired me with a degree of enthusiasm which awakes even at the present day on hearing a new and interesting work read. These however were soon laid aside for novels and romances, several hundred volumes of which I procured and got read in the course of three years. But although there are few passages out of all I heard then which I think worth a place in my recollection now, yet at that time I was well acquainted with the most interesting characters and events contained in these works. My present dislike to this kind of reading I do not entertain without reason. For first, a great deal of precious time is thereby spent that might be more usefully employed. Secondly, the judgment is left without exercise while the passions are inflamed. And thirdly, those who are much in the habit of novel reading seldom have a taste for books of any other kind and hence their judgments of men and things must differ as far from his who has seen the world as most novels differ from real life. I am well aware that some of them are well written and display ability in the author have the circumstances well disposed, the characters ably delineated and the effect preserved till the final close of the last scene which generally proves interesting and affecting. But to what does all this tend except in recording the customs and manners of the times which they represent only to mislead the imagination to foster a morbid sensibility to fictitious woe and a romantic admiration of ideal and unattainable perfection without strengthening the judgment cultivating active benevolence or a just appreciation of real life. In contrasting the characters of Tom Jones and Sir Charles Grandison with those of the Duke of Sully and Lord Clarendon we observe a striking difference between the real and fictitious personages. Yet the mere novel reader is neither improved nor amused in reading the lives of these illustrious characters while the tear of sympathy steals down the cheek as he pours over the imaginary sufferings of his heroes and heroines. There are, I know, many novels to which the above observations do not apply particularly some of modern date which are very superior to those above mentioned but still the best even of these present overcharged pictures of real life and in proportion as they are fascinating they indispose the mind to more serious reading. At this time the French Revolution gave a sudden turn to the posture of affairs in Europe and every male which arrived brought an account of some important change in the political state of that unhappy country. All the powers of the continent now armed against France and she on her part received them with a firmness which reflected honor upon her arms. The public mind at this period was much agitated and wisest politicians of the day were filled with alarm and dreaded the consequences which were likely to result from a revolution that threatened every government in Europe with a total overthrow. For my part I had little to lose as an individual and the only concern I felt was for the safety of my country. Politics therefore became my favorite study and I soon got acquainted with the passing news of the day. A late writer in speaking of memory calls it the storehouse of the mind but it has often been compared to a well constructed arch on which the more weight is laid the stronger it becomes. This I found to be the case with mine. For the more I committed to it the more I found it was capable of receiving and retaining. In what manner ideas of extrinsic objects and notions of certain relations can be preserved in the mind it is impossible to determine but of this we are sure that the thing is so though the manner be unknown to us. As ideas and recollections are merely immaterial things which can in no wise partake of the known properties of matter so the receptacle in which they lodge must be of a similar nature. That matter and spirit are united we have no reason to doubt for the pleasures which arise from memory in the moment of reflection are evidently operative on the body in as much as its motions and gestures are expressive of the inward feelings of the mind. As the memory therefore is more or less capacious as the store of ideas laid up there is great or little and as those ideas are pleasing or unpleasing in themselves so the recollection of them is either powerful or weak either pleasing or painful. As my taste always inclined to literature and the knowledge of things valuable in themselves consequently the remembrance of them is a never failing source of amusement to me whether I be found in the void waste or in this city full. It was now indeed that I was able to appreciate the pleasures of memory in a superior degree. I knew the names, stations and admirals of almost all the ships in the Navy and was also acquainted with the number, facing and name of every regiment in the Army according to their respective towns, cities or shires from which they were raised. I served of course as an Army and Navy list for the poor in the neighborhood who had relations in either of these departments and was capable of informing them of all the general news. The following anecdote shows the powers of my memory at that period. Being invited by a friend to spend an evening at his house I had scarcely sat down when three gentlemen entered the conversation turned on the news of the day. I was requested by my friend to repeat the names of as many of the ships of the British Navy as I could recollect, telling me that he had a particular reason for making the request. I commenced and my friend marked them down as I went along until I had repeated 620. When he stopped me, saying I had gone far enough, the cause of the request was then explained. One of the gentlemen had waged a supper that I could not mention 500. He, however, expressed himself much pleased at his loss, having been, as he acknowledged, highly entertained by the experiment. Although at this time I had little relish for any other kind of reading but newspapers and novels, yet I was not wholly insensible to the charms of poetry. I amused myself with making verses at intervals, but I could never produce anything in that way which pleased myself. My acquaintances, particularly the young people, gave me sufficient employment in composing epigrams, love songs, epistles, and acrostics in praise of their sweethearts. Many of those juvenile productions are still extant, and though miserable in themselves, continued to find admirers among the classes for whom they were composed. The first of my productions, which met the public eye, was an elegy on the death of an unfortunate female. This poor maniac was known for more than 20 years in the neighborhood of Belfast by the appellation of Mad Mary. She was found dead in the ruins of an old house where she had taken refuge during a stormy winter night. This little piece, being much noticed on account of the subject having excited a general interest, I was advised to collect my best productions and give them to the public. Encouraged by the patronage of a few generous individuals, I set about the work which, in a few months, made its appearance. In the early part of life, I prided myself much on my activity as a pedestrian. I have frequently traveled through a part of the country with which I was totally unacquainted at the rate of 30 miles in a day, but this was only in case of emergency, for my usual rate was from 15 to 20 miles. This, however, is too much for a person in my situation. For supposing a blind man sets out to travel on foot alone to a distance of 20 miles, he will experience much more fatigue and go over more ground than he who has his sight will do in a journey twice that length. This is evident from the zig-zag manner in which he traverses the road, and as Hammond says in his description of the drunken man staggering home, quote, from the serpentine manner in which he goes, he makes as much of a mile as possible, end quote. In the summertime, the blind man subjects his whole frame to a shock by trampling in the cart-ruts that are dried upon the roads, and in winter he travels through thick and thin. It is impossible for him to choose his steps, and at this season of the year, the water is collected into puddles on the road, which he cannot avoid, and hence in walking to a distance, he is sure to wet both his feet and legs, which is not only disagreeable, but frequently injurious to his health. At one time he bruises his foot against the stone. At another he sprains his ankle, and frequently when stepping out quickly, his foot comes in contact with something unexpectedly by which he is thrown on his face. Thus in traveling on foot, he labors under various disadvantages unknown to those who are blessed with a sense of sight. The above accidents, however, are not the only misfortunes connected with the state of the blind. In walking alone he often wanders out of his direct way, sometimes into fields, and sometimes into bypass, so that the greater part of the day may be spent before he can rectify his mistake. Often have I been in this predicament myself, and frequently have I sat a considerable part of the day, listening by the wayside for a passing foot or the joyful sound of the human voice, and sometimes have I been obliged in the evening to retrace the ground I had gone over in the morning, and thus endured much fatigue of body and mind before I could regain the road from which I had wandered. How different, then, is my situation from the person who is possessed of sight. From the impediments which cause me so much pain, he is happily exempt. While he pursues his journey, he can trace the various beauties of the surrounding scenery, the picturesque landscape, the spreading oak, the flowing brook, the towering mountain that hides its blue summit in the clouds, the majestic ocean dashing upon the shelly shore, and the vast expansive arch of heaven, bespangled with innumerable stars, have all for him their respective beauties and fail not to awaken pleasing and agreeable sensations. But to the blind these pleasures are unknown, the charms of nature are concealed under an impenetrable veil, and the God of light has placed between him and silent but animated nature and insuperable barrier. A blind person always inclines to the hand in which his staff is carried, and this often has a tendency to lead him astray when he travels on a road with which he is unacquainted. But were there no danger arising from this, still from his situation, he is liable to imminent dangers on his way, from which nothing can preserve him but an all-directing providence, and this I have frequently experienced. In a cold winter's evening, as I traveled to Lisburn, I happened to wander from the direct road into a lane which led immediately to the canal, unconscious of the danger to which I was exposed, I was stepping on pretty freely when my attention was suddenly arrested by a cry of, stop, stop! Of the first or second call I took no notice, as I judged some other person was addressed. But at the third warning I stopped when a woman came running up almost breathless and asked me where I was going, I replied to Lisburn. No, said she, you are going directly to the canal, and three or four steps more would have plunged you into it. My heart glowed with thankfulness to the all-wise disposer of events and to the female who was made the instrument of my preservation. She said she happened to come to the door to throw out some slops when she saw me posting on, and thinking from my manner of walking that I was intoxicated, she became alarmed for my safety as a person had been drowned in the very same place not many days before. About three miles from Straybane at the little village of Clotty, there was a bridge across the fin. I had just passed along it on my way to Straybane when a man inquired if I had been conducted over by any person. I replied in the negative. It was a fortunate circumstance then indeed, said he, that you kept the left side, for the range wall is broken down on the right side, just above the center arch, and the river there is very rapid, and the bank on each side steep. Had you fallen in, you must have been inevitably lost. The following instance of providential preservation is still more singular than either of the preceding. From Ballemina I was one day going out to the Reverend Robert Stewart's. At the end of the town the road divides and one branch leads to Ballemina and the other to Browshain. In the fork an old well was open for the purpose of sinking a pump. It being one o'clock in the day, the workmen were all at dinner. I was groping about with my staff to ascertain the turn of the road when a man bawled out to me to stand still and not move a single step. I did so when he came forward and told me that two steps more would have hurried me into a well 80 feet deep and half full of water. He held me by the arm and made me put forth my staff to feel and be convinced of my danger. And when I found that I was actually not more than two yards from the edge, the blood ran cold in my veins. These are but a few of the numerous instances of hair breath escapes, which I have experienced in my peregrinations through life. In the year 1800 there was an institution established in Belfast for the purpose of instructing those who were deprived of sight in such employments as were suited to their unfortunate situation. This was styled the asylum for the blind. I entered myself on the books of the institution as an apprentice and continued until within a few months of its dissolution. When I left the asylum, I proposed working on my own account and having acquired a partial knowledge of the upholstery business I was soon employed. My friends exerted themselves on this occasion to promote my interest. And though there were several individuals who had learned the business in the same asylum and who could work better than I, yet I generally got the preference. Many of my friends went so far as even to contrive work for me for which they had not immediate use, merely to keep me employed. Although my pecuniary circumstances were not much improved, yet I now experienced a greater share of mental happiness than I had ever enjoyed before. I was in a situation that offered me better opportunities of acquiring knowledge than I had ever possessed previous to this time. In 1833, a number of young men formed a reading society in Belfast. And although they were all mechanics, yet were they also men of taste, and some of them were possessed of considerable talents. Into this society, I was admitted a member. At the same time, I was kindly exempted from the expense attending its regulations. One of the members was a man of the most extraordinary character I had ever known, and therefore I attached myself to him. To good nature, he united an original genius, a good taste and extreme sensibility, and had an early education been his lot, or had his mind been sufficiently expanded by study, he would have become an ornament to society. This man proposed to read to me if I would procure books. Our stated hour for this employment was from nine o'clock in the evening until one in the morning in the winter season, and from seven until 11 in the summer. When I was not particularly engaged, I frequently attended him at other intervals. At breakfast he had half an hour allotted to him. At dinner a whole hour. Every minute of this was filled up for he generally read to me between every cup of tea, and by this means I committed to memory a vast collection of pieces, both in prose and verse, which I still retain, and which have been, until the present hour, a never-failing source of amusement to me. The more I heard, the more my desire for knowledge increased, while I learned at the same time that, the more a man knows, he finds he knows the less. So ardent and steady was my desire for knowledge at that time that I could never bear to be absent a single night from my friend, and often when working in the country where I could have been comfortably accommodated, I have traveled three or four miles in a severe winter's night to be at my post in time. Pinched with cold and drenched with rain, I have many a time sat down and listened for several hours together to the writings of Plutarch, Roland, or Clarendon. For seven or eight years we continued this course of reading, but to give a catalog of the authors we perused in that time would be foreign to my present purpose. Suffice it to say that every book in the English language which we could procure was read with a vitally, ancient and modern history, poetry, biography, essays, magazines, voyages, travels, et cetera were among our studies. The persons to whom I had entrusted the management of my little domestic concerns did not hesitate to take advantage of my ignorance of such affairs as well as of my situation. Many of my friends felt for me and advised me strongly to marry as I should be more comfortable and out of the power of these unprincipled people. They said that could I meet with a sober, steady woman who would be likely to make a good wife, the change would be advantageous to me in more respects than one. I objected to this proposal on the grounds of my inability to provide for a family, the precarious manner of earning my subsistence with such an idea beyond my expectations. It was enough for me to suffer alone. I could not think of entailing misery upon others. This they could not deny, but then they put the question in this way. They thought no one required the kind assistance of an affectionate wife more than a blind man. They said I had not one friend, one relative to look after me. What would become of me in my old age? I should be helpless in the extreme. These and many other arguments were used to induce me to ascent to a measure which they thought would finally conduce to my happiness. Their ideas had been fully justified. I am happy. I had the pleasure of being known for some time to a young woman who lived in the neighborhood. I had met her occasionally at the house of a friend where I used to visit. Her plain and unassuming manners recommended her to my notice, but what endeared her to me most was her filial piety. She lived with her aged mother, and they were respected by all who knew them. Without any other dependence than the work of her own hands, she supported herself and her parent. I thought that she who was such an attentive and feeling daughter must necessarily make an affectionate wife, and in this opinion I was not disappointed. Filial affection is so endearing of virtue that whenever we meet with an instance of it, whether in an exalted or humble station, the exercise of it must, to the benevolent mind, be a source of the highest gratification. It is a duty which our gracious and kind creator has enjoined us to fulfill, commanding in his holy word to honor our father and mother as an inducement or motive to the performance of which he has promised that our day shall be long in the land, and he who has promised this is able and willing to perform. I addressed a copy of verses to her who had now become the object of my affection, which were printed in the first collection of my poems. They had the desired effect. They produced an impression which has never been, and I may venture to say never will be, effaced. After the expiration of two years, our correspondence happily terminated, and we were married on the 27th of November, 1802. And though she could boast of no high dissent, no personal accomplishments, nor of having brought me any fortune, yet she was possessed of such qualities as every virtuous mind will admire. She was sober, chaste, and unassuming, and though her education was not according to the rules laid down by Miss Hamilton, yet she understood in her own way the principles of domestic economy, prudence, and frugality. Well has the wise man described a virtuous woman when he says, who can find a virtuous woman for her price is far above rubies? We have now lived 32 years together, happy in each other's society, and though we have had many trials in the course of that time, such as the loss of children, bad health, and distressed circumstances, a murmur never escaped her lips. In our pilgrimage here below, these little crosses are necessary. They teach us to know ourselves. Were we to pass the little time which is allotted to us in this world without trials and afflictions, we should soon forget that we are dependent creatures. But a merciful providence has wisely guarded us against these dangers by letting us know our infirmities and how little we can do for ourselves. We are assured in the word of God that he never afflicts his creatures but for their good. And when these visitations are sanctified by his Holy Spirit, they then become profitable to us. They wean us as it were from the world and we become sick of its flimsy joys and imaginary pleasures. We learn from them that here we have no abiding city, but we seek one to come. We have had eleven children, six of whom are still alive. And with the exception of those diseases which are common to their years, they are all healthy and stout. It is certainly one of the greatest blessings which parents can enjoy to see a vigorous offspring rise around them and listen to their innocent prattle. How often have I been struck with the force and beauty of that passage and holy writ where Jesus, in order to teach humility under his disciples, called a little child under him and set him in the midst of them? To descend from the divine author of our religion to creatures like ourselves, we read in Cox's life of that pious reformer melanchthon that he was particularly fond of his children and notwithstanding the multiplicity of his engagements, the discharge of which in those perilous times was attended with difficulties and danger, yet would he often descend from that lofty station where genius and public opinion had enthroned him to the more endearing scenes of domestic retirement. A Frenchman one day found him holding a book in one hand and with the other rocking his child's cradle. Upon his manifesting considerable surprise, melanchthon took occasion from this incident to converse with his visitor on the duties of parents and on the regard of heaven for little children in such a pious and affectionate manner that his astonishment was quickly transformed into admiration. January 1835. And of James Wilson, blind biographer, 1775, 1845, Wilson's introduction to the 1835 edition of his biography of the blind or lives of such as have distinguished themselves as poets, philosophers, artists, et cetera, as well as a few particulars of the life of the author, read for LibriVox by Sue Anderson. Letter to Lord Chesterfield by Samuel Johnson. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. To the right honorable, the Earl of Chesterfield. February, 1755. My Lord, I have been lately informed by the proprietor of the world that two papers in which my dictionary is recommended to the public were written by your lordship. To be so distinguished is an honor which being very little accustomed to favors from the great, I know not well how to receive or in what terms to acknowledge. But upon some slight encouragement, I first visited your lordship. I was overpowered like the rest of mankind by the enchantment of your dress and could not forbear to wish that I might boast myself, live en coeur, do van coeur, de la terre, that I might obtain that regard for which I saw the world contending. But I found my attendance so little encouraged that neither pride nor modesty would suffer me to continue it. When I had once addressed your lordship in public, I had exhausted all the art of pleasing which a retired and uncourtly scholar can possess. I had done all that I could and no man is well pleased to have his all neglected be it ever so little. Seven years, my lord, have now passed since I waited in your outward ruins or was repulsed from your door, during which time I have been pushing on my work through difficulties of which it is useless to complain and have brought it at last to the verge of publication without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile of favour. Such treatment I did not expect, for I never had a patron before. The shepherd in Virgil grew at last acquainted with love and found him a native of the rocks. It is not a patron, my lord, one who looks with unconcern on a man struggling for life in the water and when he has reached ground, encumbers him with help. The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labours had it been early, had been kind, but it has been delayed, till I am indifferent and cannot enjoy it, till I am solitaire and cannot impart it, till I am known and do not want it. I hope it is no very cynical asperity not to confess obligations when a benefit has been received or to be unwilling that the public should consider me as owing that to a patron which providence has enabled me to do for myself. Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any favour of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should conclude it, if less be possible with less, for I have been long wakened from that dream of hope in which I once boasted myself with so much exultation. My lord, your lordship's most humble, most obedient servant, Sam Johnson. End of the letter to Lord Chesterfield by Samuel Johnson, read by Daniel Davison.