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 perceived particular things through which we conceive and deduce them: Man is more permanent than Tom, or Dick, or Harry; this circle is born with the movement of my pencil and dies under the attrition of my eraser, but the conception Circle goes on forever. This tree stands, and that tree falls; but the laws which determine what bodies shall fall, and when, and how, were without beginning, are now, and ever shall be, without end. There is, as the gentle Spinoza would say, a world of things perceived by sense, and a world of laws in- ferred by thought; we do not see the law of inverse squares but it is there, and everywhere; it was before anything began, and will survive when all the world of things is a finished talc. Here is a bridge: the sense perceives concrete and iron to a hundred million tons; but the mathematician sees, with the mind's eye, the daring and delicate adjustment of all this mass of material to the laws of mechanics and mathematics and en- gineering, those laws according to which all good bridges that are made must be made; if the mathematician be also a poet, he will see these laws upholding the bridge; if the laws were violated the bridge would collapse into the stream beneath; the laws are the God that holds up the bridge in the hollow of his hand. Aristotle hints something of this when he says that by Ideas Plato meant what Pythagoras meant by "num- ber" when he taught that this is a world of numbers (meaning presumably that the world is ruled by mathematical con- stancies and regularities). Plutarch tells us that according to Plato "God always geometrizes"; or, as Spinoza puts the same thought, God and the universal laws of structure and operation are one and the same reality. To Plato, as to Bertrand Russell, mathematics is therefore the indispensable prelude to philosophy, and its highest form; over the doors of his Academy Plato placed, Dantesquely, these words, "Let no man ignorant of geometry enter here."

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 Without these Ideas—these generalizations, regularities and ideals—the world would be to us as it must seem to the first-opened eyes of the child, a mass of unclassified and un- meaning particulars of sensation; for meaning can be given to things only by classifying and generalizing them, by find- ing the laws of their beings, and the purposes and goals of their activity. Or the world without Ideas would be a heap of book-titles fallen haphazard out of the catalogue, as com- pared to the same titles arranged in order according to their classes, their sequences and their purposes; it would be the shadows in a cave as compared with the sunlit realities without, which cast those fantastic and deceptive shadows within (514). Therefore the essence of a higher education is the search for Ideas: for generalizations, laws of sequence, and ideals of development; behind things we must discover their relation and meaning, their mode and law of operation, the function and ideal they serve or adumbrate; we must classify and co- ordinate our sense experience in terms of law and purpose; only for lack of this does the mind of the imbecile differ from the mind of Cæsar.

Well, after five years of training in this recondite doctrine of Ideas, this art of perceiving significant forms and causal sequences and ideal potentialities amid the welter and hazard of sensation; after five years of training in the appli- cation of this principle to the behavior of men and the con- duct of states; after this long preparation from childhood through youth and into the maturity of thirty-five; surely now these perfect products are ready to assume the royal purple and the highest functions of public life?—surely they are at last the philosopher-kings who are to rule and to free the human race?

Alas! not yet. Their education is still unfinished. For after all it has been, in the main, a theoretical education; something else is needed. Let these Ph.D.'s pass down now from the heights of philosophy into the "cave" of the world of men and things; generalizations and abstractions are worth-

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 less except they be tested by this concrete world; let our students enter that world with no favor shown them; they shall compete with men of business, with hard-headed grasping individualists, with men of brawn and men of cunning; in this mart of strife they shall learn from the book of life itself; they shall hurt their fingers and scratch their philosophic shins on the crude realities of the world; they shall earn their bread and butter by the sweat of their high brows. And this last and sharpest test shall go on ruthlessly for fifteen long years. Some of our perfect products will break under the pressure, and be submerged by this last great wave of elimina- tion. Those that survive, scarred and fifty, sobered and self- reliant, shorn of scholastic vanity by the merciless friction of life, and armed now with all the wisdom that tradition and experience, culture and conflict, can coöperate to give—these men at last shall automatically become the rulers of the state.

Automatically—without any hypocrisy of voting. De- mocracy means perfect equality of opportunity, especially in education; not the rotation of every Tom, Dick and Harry in public office. Every man shall have an equal chance to make himself fit for the complex tasks of administration; but only those who have proved their mettle (or, in our myth, their metal), and have emerged from all tests with the insignia of skill, shall be eligible to rule. Public officials shall be chosen not by votes, nor by secret cliques pulling the unseen wires of democratic pretense, but by their own ability as demonstrated in the fundamental democracy of an equal race. Nor shall any man hold office without specific training, nor hold high office till he has first filled a lower office well (Gorgias, 514–5).

Is this aristocracy? Well, we need not be afraid of the word, if the reality is good which it betokens: words are wise men's counters, without value of their own; they are the money

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 only of fools and politicians. We want to be ruled by the best, which is what aristocracy means; have we not, Carlyle- like, yearned and prayed to be ruled by the best? But we have come to think of aristocracies as hereditary: let it be carefully noted that this Platonic aristocracy is not of that kind; one would rather call it a democratic aristocracy. For the people, instead of blindly electing the lesser of two evils presented to them as candidates by nominating cliques, will here be themselves, every one of them, the candidates; and will receive an equal chance of educational election to public office. There is no caste here; no inheritance of position or privilege; no stoppage of talent impecuniously born; the son of a ruler begins on the same level, and receives the same treatment and opportunity, as the son of a boot-black; if the ruler's son is a dolt he falls at the first shearing; if the boot- black's son is a man of ability the way is clear for him to become a guardian of the state (423). Career will be open to talent wherever it is born. This is a democracy of the schools—a hundredfold more honest and more effective than a democracy of the polls.

And so, "setting aside every other business, the guardians will dedicate themselves wholly to the maintenance of free- dom in the state, making this their craft and engaging in no work which does not bear upon this end" (395). They shall be legislature and executive and court in one; even the laws shall not bind them to a dogma in the face of altered cir- cumstance; the rule of the guardians shall be a flexible in- telligence unbound by precedent.

But how can men of fifty have a flexible intelligence? Will they not be mentally plaster-casted by routine? Adeimantus (echoing, no doubt, some hot brotherly debate in Plato's home) objects that philosophers are dolts or rogues, who would rule either foolishly, or selfishly, or both. "The votaries of philosophy who carry on the study not only in youth with a view to education, but as the pursuit of their maturer years—these men for the most part grow into very

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 strange beings, not to say utter scoundrels; and the result with those who may be considered the best of them is, that they are made useless to the world by the very study which you extol" (487). This is a fair enough description of some be-spectacled modern philosophers; but Plato answers that he has guarded against this difficulty by giving his philosophers the training of life as well as the erudition of the schools; that they will in consequence be men of action rather than merely men of thought—men seasoned to high purposes and noble temper by long experience and trial. By philosophy Plato means an active culture, wisdom that mixes with the concrete busy-ness of life; he does not mean a closeted and impractical metaphysician; Plato "is the man who least resembles Kant, which is (with all respect) a considerable merit."

So much for incompetence; as for rascality we may provide against that by establishing among the guardians a system of communism:

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This arrangement will make it unprofitable, as well as dan- gerous, for the guardians to rule as a clique seeking the good of their class rather than that of the community as a whole. For they will be protected from want; the necessities and modest luxuries of a noble life will be theirs in regular provi- sion, without the searing and wrinkling care of economic worry. But by the same token they will be precluded from cupidity and sordid ambitions; they will always have just so much of the world's goods, and no more; they will be like physicians establishing, and themselves accepting, a dietary for a nation. They will eat together, like consecrated men; they will sleep together in single barracks, like soldiers sworn to simplicity. "Friends should have all things in common, as Pythagoras used to say (Laws 807). So the authority of the guardians will be sterilized, and their power made poisonless; their sole reward will be honor and the sense of service to the group. And they will be such men as from the beginning have deliberately consented to so materially limited a career; and such men as at the end of their stern training will have learned to value the high repute of the statesman above the crass emoluments of the office-seeking politicians or the "economic man." At their coming the battles of party politics will be no more.

But what will their wives say to all this? Will they be content to forego the luxuries of life and the conspicuous consumption of goods? The guardians will have no wives. Their communism is to be of women as well as of goods. They are to be freed not only from the egoism of self, but

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 from the egoism of family; they are not to be narrowed to the anxious acquisitiveness of the prodded husband; they are to be devoted not to a woman but to the community. Even their children shall not be specifically or distinguishably theirs; all children of guardians shall be taken from their mothers at birth and brought up in common; their particular parentage will be lost in the scuffle (460). All the guardian- mothers will care for all the guardian-children; the brother- hood of man, within these limits, will graduate from phrase to fact; every boy will be a brother to every other boy, every girl a sister, every man a father, and every woman a mother.

But whence will these women come? Some, no doubt, the guardians will woo out of the industrial or military classes; others will have become, by their own right, members of the guardian class. For there is to be no sex barrier of any kind in this community; least of all in education—the girl shall have the same intellectual opportunities as the boy, the same chance to rise to the highest positions in the state. When Glaucon objects (453 f) that this admission of woman to any office, provided she has passed the tests, violates the principle of the division of labor, he receives the sharp reply that divi- sion of labor must be by aptitude and ability, not by sex; if a woman shows herself capable of political administration, let her rule; if a man shows himself to be capable only of washing dishes, let him fulfil the function to which Providence has as- signed him.

Community of wives does not mean indiscriminate mating; rather there is to be strict eugenic supervision of all repro- ductive relations. The argument from the breeding of animals here starts its wandering career: if we get such good results in breeding cattle selectively for qualities desired, and from breeding only from the best in each generation, why should we not apply similar principles to the matings of mankind? (459). For it is not enough to educate the child properly; he must be properly born, of select and healthy ancestry; "education should begin before birth" (Laws, 789).

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 Therefore no man or woman shall procreate unless in perfect health; a health certificate is to be required of every bride and groom (Laws, 772). Men may reproduce only when they are above thirty and under forty-five; women only when they are above twenty and under forty. Men unmarried by thirty-five are to be taxed into felicity (Laws, 771). Off- spring born of unlicensed matings, or deformed, are to be exposed and left to die. Before and after the ages specified for procreation, mating is to be free, on condition that the foetus be aborted. "We grant this permission with strict or- ders to the parties to do all in their power to prevent any embryo from seeing the light; and if any should force its way to birth, they must understand that the offspring of such a union cannot be maintained, and they must make their ar- rangements accordingly" (461). The marriage of relatives is prohibited, as inducing degeneration (310). "The best of either sex should be united with the best as often as possible, and the inferior with the inferior; and they are to rear the off- spring of the one sort but not that of the other; for this is the only way of keeping the flock in prime condition.…Our braver and better youth, beside their other honors and rewards, are to be permitted a greater variety of mates; for such fathers ought to have as many sons as possible" (459–60).

But our eugenic society must be protected not only from disease and deterioration within, but from enemies without. It must be ready, if need be, to wage successful war. Our model community would of course be pacific, for it would restrict population within the means of subsistence; but neighboring states not so managed might well look upon the orderly prosperity of our Utopia as an invitation to raid and rapine. Hence, while deploring the necessity, we shall have, in our intermediate class, a sufficient number of well-trained soldiers, living a hard and simple life like the guardians, on a stated modicum of goods supplied by their "maintainers and fore-fathers," the people. At the same time every pre- caution must be taken to avoid the occasions of war. The

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 primary occasion is overpopulation (373); the second is foreign trade, with the inevitable disputes that interrupt it. Indeed, competitive trade is really a form of war; "peace is only a name" (Laws, 622). It will be well then to situate our ideal state considerably inland, so that it shall be shut out from any high development of foreign commerce. "The sea fills a country with merchandise and money-making and bargaining; it breeds in men's minds habits of financial greed and faithlessness, alike in its internal and in its foreign rela- tions" (Laws, 704–7). Foreign trade requires a large navy to protect it; and navalism is as bad as militarism. "In every case the guilt of war is confined to a few persons, and the many are friends" (471). The most frequent wars are precisely the vilest-civil wars, wars of Greek against Greek; let the Greeks form a pan-Hellenic league of nations, uniting lest "the whole Greek race some day fall under the yoke of bar- barian peoples" (469).

So our political structure will be topped with a small class of guardians; it will be protected by a large class of soldiers and "auxiliaries"; and it will rest on the broad base of a commercial, industrial, and agricultural population. This last or economic class will retain private property, private mates, and private families. But trade and industry will be regulated by the guardians to prevent excessive individual wealth or poverty; any one acquiring more than four times the average possession of the citizens must relinquish the excess to the state (Laws, 714 f). Perhaps interest will be forbidden, and profits limited (Laws, 920). The communism of the guardians is impracticable for the economic class; the distinguishing characteristics of this class are powerful instincts of acquisition and competition; some noble souls among them will be free from this fever of combative pos- session, but the majority of men are consumed with it; they hunger and thirst not after righteousness, nor after honor, but after possessions endlessly multiplied. Now men engrossed in the pursuit of money are unfit to rule a state; and our

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 entire plan rests on the hope that if the guardians rule well and live simply, the economic man will be willing to let them monopolize administration if they permit him to monopolize luxury. In short, the perfect society would be that in which each class and each unit would be doing the work to which its nature and aptitude best adapted it; in which no class or individual would interfere with others, but all would co-operate in difference to produce an efficient and harmonious whole (433–4). That would be a just state.

And now our political digression is ended, and we are ready at last to answer the question with which we began—What is justice? There are only three things worth while in this world—justice, beauty and truth; and perhaps none of them can be defined. Four hundred years after Plato a Roman procurator of Judea asked, helplessly, "What is truth?"—and philosophers have not yet answered, nor told us what is beauty. But for justice Plato ventures a definition. "Justice," he says, "is the having and doing what is one's own" (433).

This has a disappointing sound; after so much delay we expected an infallible revelation. What does the definition mean? Simply that each man shall receive the equivalent of what he produces, and shall perform the function for which he is best fit. A just man is a man in just the right place, doing his best, and giving the full equivalent of what he re- ceives. A society of just men would be therefore a highly harmonious and efficient group; for every element would be in its place, fulfilling its appropriate function like the pieces in a perfect orchestra. Justice in a society would be like that harmony of relationships whereby the planets are held together in their orderly (or, as Pythagoras would have said, their musical) movement. So organized, a society is fit for survival; and justice receives a kind of Darwinian sanction. Where men are out of their natural places, where the business

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 man subordinates the statesman, or the soldier usurps the posi- tion of the king—there the coördination of parts is destroyed, the joints decay, the society disintegrates and dissolves. Justice is effective coördination.

And in the individual too, justice is effective coördination, the harmonious functioning of the elements in a man, each in its fit place and each making its cooperative contribution to behavior. Every individual is a cosmos or a chaos of desires, emotions and ideas; let these fall into harmony, and the individual survives and succeeds; let them lose their proper place and function, let emotion try to become the light of action as well as its heat (as in the fanatic), or let thought try to become the heat of action as well as its light (as in the intellectual)—and disintegration of personality begins, failure advances like the inevitable night. Justice is a taxis kai kosmos—an order and beauty—of the parts of the soul; it is to the soul as health is to the body. All evil is dis- harmony: between man and nature, or man and men, or man and himself.

So Plato replies to Thrasymachus and Callicles, and to all Nietzscheans forever: Justice is not mere strength, but harmonious strength—desires and men falling into that order which constitutes intelligence and organization; justice is not the right of the stronger, but the effective harmony of the whole. It is true that the individual who gets out of the place to which his nature and talents adapt him may for a time seize some profit and advantage; but an inescapable Nemesis pursues him—as Anaxagoras spoke of the Furies pursuing any planet that should wander out of its orbit; the terrible baton of the Nature of Things drives the refractory instrument back to its place and its pitch and its natural note. The Corsican lieutenant may try to rule Europe with a ceremonious despotism fitted better to an ancient monarchy than to a dynasty born overnight; but he ends on a prison-rock in the sea, ruefully recognizing that he is "the slave of the Na- ture of Things." Injustice will out.

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 There is nothing bizarrely new in this conception; and in- deed we shall do well to suspect, in philosophy, any doctrine which plumes itself on novelty. Truth changes her garments frequently (like every seemly lady), but under the new habit she remains always the same. In morals we need not expect startling innovations: despite the interesting adventures of Sophists and Nietzscheans, all moral conceptions revolve about the good of the whole. Morality begins with association and interdependence and organization; life in society requires the concession of some part of the individual's sovereignty to the common order; and ultimately the norm of conduct becomes the welfare of the group. Nature will have it so, and her judg- ment is always final; a group survives, in competition or con- flict with another group, according to its unity and power, according to the ability of its members to coöperate for com- mon ends. And what better coöperation could there be than that each should be doing that which he can do best? This is the goal of organization which every society must seek, if it would have life. Morality, said Jesus, is kindness to the weak; morality, said Nietzsche, is the bravery of the strong; morality, says Plato, is the effective harmony of the whole. Probably all three doctrines must be combined to find a per- fect ethic; but can we doubt which of the elements is funda- mental?

And now what shall we say of this whole Utopia? Is it feasible? And if not, has it any practicable features which we could turn to contemporary use? Has it ever in any place or measure been realized?

At least the last question must be answered in Plato's favor. For a thousand years Europe was ruled by an order of guardians considerably like that which was visioned by our philosopher. During the Middle Ages it was customary to classify the population of Christendom into laboratores (work- ers), bellatores (soldiers), and oratores (clergy). The last

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 group, though small in number, monopolized the instruments and opportunities of culture, and ruled with almost unlimited sway half of the most powerful continent on the globe. The clergy, like Plato's guardians, were placed in authority not by the suffrages of the people, but by their talent as shown in ecclesiastical studies and administration, by their disposition to a life of meditation and simplicity, and (perhaps it should be added) by the influence of their relatives with the powers of state and church. In the latter half of the period in which they ruled, the clergy were as free from family cares as even Plato could desire; and in some cases, it would seem, they en- joyed no little of the reproductive freedom accorded to the guardians. Celibacy was part of the psychological structure of the power of the clergy; for on the one hand they were unimpeded by the narrowing egoism of the family, and on the other their apparent superiority to the call of the flesh added to the awe in which lay sinners held them, and to the readiness of these sinners to bare their lives in the confessional.

Much of the politics of Catholicism was derived from Plato's "royal lies," or influenced by them: the ideas of heaven, pur- gatory, and hell, in their medieval form, are traceable to the last book of the Republic; the cosmology of scholasticism comes largely from the Timaeus; the doctrine of realism (the objective reality of general ideas) was an interpretation of the doctrine of Ideas; even the educational "quadrivium" (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music) was modeled on the curriculum outlined in Plato. With this body of doctrine the people of Europe were ruled with hardly any resort to force; and they accepted this rule so readily that for a thou- sand years they contributed plentiful material support to their rulers, and asked no voice in the government. Nor was this acquiescence confined to the general population; merchants and soldiers, feudal chieftains and civil powers all bent the knee to Rome. It was an aristocracy of no mean political sagacity; it built probably the most marvelous and powerful organization which the world has ever known.

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 The Jesuits who for a time ruled Paraguay were semi- Platonic guardians, a clerical oligarchy empowered by the possession of knowledge and skill in the midst of a barbarian population. And for a time the Communist Party which ruled Russia after the revolution of November, 1917, took a form strangely reminiscent of the Republic. They were a small minority, held together almost by religious conviction, wield- ing the weapons of orthodoxy and excommunication, as sternly devoted to their cause as any saint to his, and living a frugal existence while ruling half the soil of Europe.

Such examples indicate that within limits and with modifica- tions, Plato's plan is practicable; and indeed he himself had derived it largely from actual practice as seen on his travels. He had been impressed by the Egyptian theocracy: here was a great and ancient civilization ruled by a small priestly class; and compared with the bickering and tyranny and incompe- tence of the Athenian Ecclesia Plato felt that the Egyptian government represented a much higher form of state (Laws, 819). In Italy he had stayed for a time with a Pythagorean community, vegetarian and communist, which had for genera- tions controlled the Greek colony in which it lived. In Sparta he had seen a small ruling class living a hard and simple life in common in the midst of a subject population; eating together, restricting mating for eugenic ends, and giving to the brave the privilege of many wives. He had no doubt heard Euripi- des advocate a community of wives, the liberation of slaves, and the pacification of the Greek world by an Hellenic league (Medea, 230; Fragm., 655); no doubt, too, he knew some of the Cynics who had developed a strong communist movement among what one would now call the Socratic Left. In short, Plato must have felt that in propounding his plan he was not making an impossible advance on realities which his eyes had seen.

Yet critics from Aristotle's day to ours have found in the Republic many an opening for objection and doubt. "These things and many others," says the Stagyrite, with cynical

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 brevity, "have been invented several times over in the course of ages." It is very pretty to plan a society in which all men will be brothers; but to extend such a term to all our male contem- poraries is to water out of it all warmth and significance. So with common property: it would mean a dilution of respon- sibility; when everything belongs to everybody nobody will take care of anything. And finally, argues the great con- servative, communism would fling people into an intolerable continuity of contact; it would leave no room for privacy or in- dividuality; and it would presume such virtues of patience and coöperation as only a saintly minority possess. "We must neither assume a standard of virtue which is above ordinary persons, nor an education which is exceptionally favored by nature and circumstance; but we must have regard to the life which the majority can share, and to the forms of to which states in general can attain." government

So far Plato's greatest (and most jealous) pupil; and most of the criticisms of later date strike the same chord. Plato underrated, we are told, the force of custom accumulated in the institution of monogamy, and in the moral code attached to that institution; he underestimated the possessive jealousy of males in supposing that a man would be content to have merely an aliquot portion of a wife; he minimized the maternal instinct in supposing that mothers would agree to have their children taken from them and brought up in a heartless anonymity. And above all he forgot that in abolishing the family he was destroying the great nurse of morals and the chief source of those coöperative and communistic habits which would have to be the psychological basis of his state; with un- rivaled eloquence he sawed off the branch on which he sat.

To all these criticisms one can reply very simply, that they destroy a straw man. Plato explicitly exempts the majority from his communistic plan; he recognizes clearly enough that only a few are capable of the material self-denial which he proposes for his ruling class; only the guardians will call every guardian brother or sister; only the guardians will be

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 without gold or goods. The vast majority will retain all respectable institutions-property, money, luxury, competi- tion, and whatever privacy they may desire. They will have marriage as monogamic as they can bear, and all the morals derived from it and from the family; the fathers shall keep their wives and the mothers shall keep their children ad libitum and nauseam. As to the guardians, their need is not so much a communistic disposition as a sense of honor, and love of it; pride and not kindness is to hold them up. And as for the maternal instinct, it is not strong before the birth, or even the growth, of the child; the average mother accepts the new- born babe rather with resignation than with joy; love for it is a development, not a sudden miracle, and grows as the child grows, as it takes form under the painstaking care of the mother; not until it has become the embodiment of maternal artistry does it irrevocably catch the heart.

Other objections are economic rather than psychological. Plato's republic, it is argued, denounces the division of every city into two cities, and then offers us a city divided into three. The answer is that the division in the first case is by economic conflict; in Plato's state the guardian and auxiliary classes are specifically excluded from participation in this competi- tion for gold and goods. But then the guardians would have power without responsibility; and would not this lead to tyranny? Not at all; they have political power and di- rection, but no economic power or wealth; the economic class, if dissatisfied with the guardians' mode of rule, could hold up the food supply, as Parliaments control executives by hold- ing up the budget. Well, then, if the guardians have political but not economic power, how can they maintain their rule? Have not Harrington and Marx and many others shown that political power is a reflex of economic power, and becomes pre- carious as soon as economic power passes to a politically subject group—as to the middle classes in the eighteenth cen- tury?

This is a very fundamental objection, and perhaps a fatal

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 one. The answer might be made that the power of the Roman Catholic Church, which brought even kings to kneel at Ca- nossa, was based, in its earlier centuries of rule, rather on the inculcation of dogmas than on the strategy of wealth. But it may be that the long dominion of the Church was due to the agricultural condition of Europe: an agricultural population is inclined to supernatural belief by its helpless dependence on the caprice of the elements, and by that inability to control nature which always leads to fear and thence to worship; when industry and commerce developed, a new type of mind and man arose, more realistic and terrestrial, and the power of the Church began to crumble as soon as it came into conflict with this new economic fact. Political power must repeatedly re- adjust itself to the changing balance of economic forces. The economic dependence of Plato's guardians on the economic class would very soon reduce them to the controlled political executives of that class; even the manipulation of military power would not long forestall this inevitable issue—any more than the military forces of revolutionary Russia could pre- vent the development of a proprietary individualism among the peasants who controlled the growth of food, and there- fore the fate of the nation. Only this would remain to Plato: that even though political policies must be determined by the economically dominant group, it is better that those policies should be administered by officials specifically prepared for the purpose, than by men who stumble out of commerce or manu- facturing into political office without any training in the arts of statesmanship.

What Plato lacks above all, perhaps, is the Heracleitean sense of flux and change; he is too anxious to have the moving picture of this world become a fixed and still tableau. He loves order exclusively, like any timid philosopher; he has been frightened by the democratic turbulence of Athens into an extreme neglect of individual values; he arranges men in classes like an entomologist classifying flies; and he is not averse to using priestly humbug to secure his ends. His state

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 is static; it might easily become an old-fogey society, ruled by inflexible octogenarians hostile to invention and jealous of change. It is mere science without art; it exalts order, so dear to the scientific mind, and quite neglects that liberty which is the soul of art; it worships the name of beauty, but exiles the artists who alone can make beauty or point it out. It is a Sparta or a Prussia, not an ideal state.

And now that these unpleasant necessities are candidly writ- ten down, it remains to do willing homage to the power and profundity of Plato's conception. Essentially he is right—is he not?—what this world needs is to be ruled by its wisest It is our business to adapt his thought to our own times and limitations. Today we must take democracy for granted: we cannot limit the suffrage as Plato proposed; but we can put restrictions on the holding of office, and in this way secure that mixture of democracy and aristocracy which Plato seems to have in mind. We may accept without quarrel his con- tention that statesmen should be as specifically and thoroughly trained as physicians; we might establish departments of po- litical science and administration in our universities; and when these departments have begun to function adequately we might make men ineligible for nomination to political office unless they were graduates of such political schools. We might even make every man eligible for an office who had been trained for it, and thereby eliminate entirely that complex system of nom- inations in which the corruption of our democracy has its seat; let the electorate choose any man who, properly trained and qualified, announces himself as a candidate. In this way democratic choice would be immeasurably wider than now, when Tweedledum and Tweedledee stage their quadrennial show and sham. Only one amendment would be required to make quite democratic this plan for the restriction of office to graduates in administrative technique; and that would be such equality of educational opportunity as would open to all men and women, irrespective of the means of their parents, the road to university training and political advancement. It

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 would be very simple to have municipalities and counties and states offer scholarships to all graduates of grammar school, high school and college who had shown a certain standard of ability, and whose parents were financially unable to see them through the next stage of the educational process. That would be a democracy worthy of the name.

Finally, it is only fair to add that Plato understands that his Utopia does not quite fall within the practicable realm. He admits that he has described an ideal difficult of attain- ment; he answers that there is nevertheless a value in painting these pictures of our desire; man's significance is that he can image a better world, and will some part of it at least into reality; man is an animal that makes Utopias. "We look be- fore and after and pine for what is not." Nor is it all without result: many a dream has grown limbs and walked, or grown wings and flown, like the dream of Icarus that men might fly. After all, even if we have but drawn a picture, it may serve as goal and model of our movement and behavior; when sufficient of us see the picture and follow its gleam, Utopia will find its way upon the map. Meanwhile "in heaven there is laid up a pattern of such a city, and he who desires may behold it, and beholding, govern himself accordingly. But whether there really is or ever will be such a city on earth,…he will act according to the laws of that city, and no other" (592). The good man will apply even in the imper- fect state, the perfect law.

Nevertheless, with all these concessions to doubt, the Master was bold enough to risk himself when a chance offered to re- alize his plan. In the year 387 Plato received an invita- tion from Dionysius, ruler of the then flourishing and powerful Syracuse, capital of Sicily, to come and turn his kingdom into Utopia; and the philosopher, thinking like Turgot that it was easier to educate one man—even though a king—than a whole people, consented. But when Dionysius found that the plan required either that he should become a philosopher or

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 cease to be a king, he balked; and the upshot was a bitter quarrel. Story has it that Plato was sold into slavery, to be rescued by his friend and pupil Anniceris; who, when Plato's Athenian followers wished to reimburse him for the ransom he had paid, refused, saying that they should not be the only ones privileged to help philosophy. This (and, if we may be- lieve Diogenes Laertius, another similar) experience may ac- count for the disillusioned conservatism of Plato's last work, the Laws.

And yet the closing years of his long life must have been fairly happy. His pupils had gone out in every direction, and their success had made him honored everywhere. He was at peace in his Academe, walking from group to group of his students and giving them problems and tasks on which they were to make research and, when he came to them again, give report and answer. La Rochefoucauld said that "few know how to grow old." Plato knew: to learn like Solon and to teach like Socrates; to guide the eager young, and find the intellectual love of comrades. For his students loved him as he loved them; he was their friend as well as their philosopher and guide.

One of his pupils, facing that great abyss called marriage, invited the Master to his wedding feast. Plato came, rich with his eighty years, and joined the merry-makers gladly. But as the hours laughed themselves away, the old philosopher retired into a quiet corner of the house, and sat down on a chair to win a little sleep. In the morning, when the feast was over, the tired revellers came to wake him. They found that during the night, quietly and without ado, he had passed from a little sleep to an endless one. All Athens followed him to the grave.

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 ONLY Ꭺ WOMAN AFTER ALL. 273.

rest. I suppose it would be useless to urge you to go to bed.

“Good-night, or good-morning.”

Again his hand touched mine, and sent the blood tingling to my cheeks.

I suppcese I’m a little goose to write all this; but it will be pleasant to look back upon when I have begun “my career,” as Mr. Barrington calls it.

There is one thing, I shall have the satisfaction of proving my theory to him, for he tells me he is coming here to live permanently. He does not mention my old home in any way, and I heartily thank him for it; for when I do have a chance to think, the awful sense of being utterly alone overwhelms me. I will lie down now, as I should have done before, had I not desired to chronicle this night while its impressions were strongest.

October 18th.—I have received an answer to my application for the secretaryship. It reads thus: “Dear Madam—We have received your note in regard to the position to be vacated in this Institution. A gentleman has already been engaged to fill the place; and even were it otherwise, we fear the duties are more arduous than a lady could perform,” which is a polite way of saying they don’t think a woman knows enough. When will the world learn that jus tice is better than generosity, plain truth than polite falsehood?

I am discouraged, though I told myself I would not be, at the first failure. I know the way I have chosen is hard, but I will struggle along it till 1 show my friends I am right.

Eliza is rapidly improving. She has slept much of the time since the night of the crisis, and the physician thinks she will be able to come down stairs the first of next week. Dr. Marly says my magnetic influence over her is good, so I spend all the time she is awake in her room.

John is like himself now, and is the same kind friend he has always been.

I cannot help contrasting in my own mind Eliza’s future with my own. Her husband is a generous, cultivated gentleman, devoted to her, and her life will flow happily and sweetly to the end. My future will be full of storms and darkness, through which, now and then, I shall catch glimpses of brightness and beauty that I can never reach. But I would not change with my friend. I have made my decision, and shall abide by it. After Eliza went to sleep this afternoon, I picked up my hat and went out into the garden for a walk in the delicious breeze. I had only gone half down the terrace when Mr. Barrington joined me. I was not inclined to talk, for I felt that every word I should utter would betray my disappointment, and to him of all persons I was unwilling to show it. He seemed to read my thoughts, for very soon he asked, Haven’t you succeeded in becoming secretary tO the Institution you told me about?”

I did not answer at first, and he added,

“Pardon me, if I seem inquisitive. I am very much interested in your experiment.”

“It is an experiment which will eventually succeed, though in this particular instance I have failed.”

“Undoubtedly it will succeed, since you are But now I suppose you won’t leave your friends so soon as you expected?”

This piqued me a little, for I felt as if he meant that I could not do without my friends; so I answered abruptly,

“I shall, probably, leave this house even sooner than I expected. Eliza is gaining so rapidly she will not need me much longer.”

«Then, if you are determined to go, won't you walk over to my new home with me, at this time to-morrow, and see a few improve alterations I have been making? It would gratify me very much.”

At. first I felt that I could not bear it; but I remembered the delicacy which changed on his lips the word improvements to alterations, and I knew I should suffer no more than I had the last time I was there. So I said, ‘I will go,” and came into the house.

October 30th.—How long it seems since I last made a record in this little book; and it is really only twelve days. Twelve such days as have never been to me before. When I accepted Mr. Barrington’s invitation, I never dreamed that little walk would revolutionize my whole life.

At the appointed hour I found him waiting for me on the piazza, and we walked on silently. I could scarcely keep the tears back as we neared the house. All that had been, all that was to come, enveloped me in a mist of thought. We went on, I following where he led, carefully noting the few changes he had made. They were improvements, and I knew it. At last we reached the family sitting-room, and,overpowered by tender emotions, I leaned my head against the window, weeping silently. Mr. Barrington took my hands, and said, gently,

"Dear child, I will not wait longer to tell you why I brought you here. I have found something for you to do. Be my wife. I want

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text: The Story of Philosophy/Chapter 1

title: The Story of Philosophy/Chapter 1


text:
Talk:Constitution of Nepal (1990)

Source
The text of the constitution can be found e. g. at https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1272&context=himalaya, but some wording (in the preamble) or numbering is different. --Jan Kameníček (talk) 23:31, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

title: Talk:Constitution of Nepal (1990)


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 a post-chaise might do; but the carriage upsets everything. I longed to slip out unseen, and to run away by myself in amongst the hills and dales. Erratic and vagrant instincts tormented me, and these I was obliged to control, or rather suppress, for fear of growing in any degree enthusiastic, and thus drawing attention to the 'lioness'—the authoress.

"You say that you suspect I have formed a large circle of acquaintance by this time. No: I cannot say that I have. I doubt whether I possess either the wish or the power to do so. A few friends I should like to have, and these few I should like to know well; if such knowledge brought proportionate regard, I could not help concentrating my feelings; dissipation, I think, appears synonymous with dilution. However, I have, as yet, scarcely been tried. During the month I spent in London in the spring, I kept very quiet, having the fear of lionising before my eyes. I only went out once to dinner; and once was present at an evening party; and the only visits I have paid have been to Sir James Kay Shuttleworth's and my publisher's. From this system I should not like to depart; as far as I can see, indiscriminate visiting tends only to a waste of time and a vulgarising of character. Besides, it would be wrong to leave Papa often; he is now in his seventy-fifth year, the infirmities of age begin to creep upon him; during the summer he has been much harassed by chronic bronchitis, but I am thankful to say that he is now somewhat better. I think my own health has derived benefit from change and exercise.


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 "Somebody in D professes to have authority for saying, that 'when Miss Brontë was in London she neglected to attend Divine service on the Sabbath, and in the week spent her time in going about to balls, theatres, and operas.' On the other hand, the London quidnuncs make my seclusion a matter of wonder, and devise twenty romantic fictions to account for it. Formerly I used to listen to report with interest, and a certain credulity; but I am now grown deaf and sceptical: experience has taught me how absolutely devoid of foundation her stories may be."

I must now quote from the first letter I had the privilege of receiving from Miss Brontë. It is dated August the 27th.

"Papa and I have just had tea; he is sitting quietly in his room, and I in mine; 'storms of rain' are sweeping over the garden and churchyard: as to the moors, they are hidden in thick fog. Though alone, I am not unhappy; I have a thousand things to be thankful for, and, amongst the rest, that this morning I received a letter from you, and that this evening I have the privilege of answering it.

"I do not know the 'Life of Sydney Taylor;' whenever I have the opportunity I will get it. The little French book you mention shall also take its place on the list of books to be procured as soon as possible. It treats a subject interesting to all women—perhaps, more especially to single women; though, indeed, mothers, like you, study it for the sake of their


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 274 VOICES OF THE TWILIGHT.

you to come back to your old home in this house, and your new home in my heart; to leave all your schemes for the future; to place your life and happiness in my keeping, and to assure you the trust will not be betrayed. Will you?"

A flood of happiness filled me; my plans, my ambition, my independence melted away, and as I turned toward him, and felt his arms about me, his warm kisses on hair, and cheek, and lips, I knew that the only future I cared to have must be blended with his.

After awhile he told me how from interest in me love had sprung; and how he had deter- mined to let me try the world a little before taking me home; for he seems to have felt sure I should come, and that, after seeing my first disappointment, he could not bear to wait longer. We only waited till Eliza was able to come to our wedding; and last night, just before dusk, Richard and I walked together to the little church beside the shining river, where I first saw him, and with John and Eliza as our only friends, we pledged our faith. And now, at my husband's request, having written all I care to transmit to paper, I close this book, perhaps forever, and sign myself, for the first time, Hilda Home Barrington.

VOICES OF THE TWILIGHT.

BY ADDIE A. SEARLE.  WHEN the glory has died from the hill-tops, And the blue faded into the gray; When day is veiled from the dreamer, And night lingers long in the way; When the humming is still in the clover, And the night-Bowers bloom on the lea, I list in the twilight for voices, That come through the stillness to me.

There's the ringing of merry laughter, And the prattle of childish glee; I peer through the gathering dimness, For faces I may not see; But I know that a little angel Has come through the portals of light, And with soft arms round me clinging, Has folded her wings tonight.

Then there comes the laugh of a maiden, And the chaunt of a school-day strain, And soft through the evening stillness Comes, in tenderest tones, my name; And I list for the sound of a footfall, For the echo of parted feet; I grope in vain through the darkness, No answering touch I greet.

And then, as the shadows deepen, And darkness begins his reign, Comes a dearer than childhood's music, A sweeter than maiden's strain; From the endless brightness of Heaven, The home of the guardian band, It comes, in the childtime of even, At the touching of memory's wand.

I welcome the gentle presence, Though I see not the vanished face, And I know soft arms are about me, Though I feel not their fond embrace. White hands are raised in blessing, I kneel as in childhood there, And linger last in the twilight, The tones of a mother's prayer.

PRESENT AND FUTURE.

BY T. C. IRWIN.

By a cottage sat, one eventide, An old man: withered and gray was he; His son was resting by his side, A blooming bride upon his kuee; Bright and low, and lower yet the orbed day went down before them. Deep and deeper yet away, the world through starry darkness bore them. And the father said:— “Thus the life-light quits my soul, Wears the radiant chain that bound me; Toward the spectral deeps I roll; Woe is me, ah! bitter woe, Son and daughter, must I go Far from ye, with nought around me Save the starry dead?”

Upon a supreme summit bright, Above a paradisial star, Three spirits dazzled in the light Of universes gazed afar. Vast and rich, and richer yet the radiant spaces spread around them; Deep and deeper yet away, the throbbing depths of Being wound them! And exclaimed the three:— “Death and fear for evermore Have vanished from our spirit’s vision, Space is ours from shore to shore; From sun to sun existence turns In endless gloried godlike dreams, In realms of bliss and thoughts elysian— Our soul’s home is—infinity.”

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 daughters. The 'Westminster Review' is not a periodical I see regularly, but some time since I got hold of a number—for last January, I think—in which there was an article entitled 'Woman's Mission' (the phrase is hackneyed), containing a great deal that seemed to me just and sensible. Men begin to regard the position of woman in another light than they used to do; and a few men, whose sympathies are fine and whose sense of justice is strong, think and speak of it with a candour that commands my admiration. They say, however—and, to an extent, truly—that the amelioration of our condition depends on ourselves. Certainly there are evils which our own efforts will best reach; but as certainly there are other evils—deep-rooted in the foundations of the social system—which no efforts of ours can touch: of which we cannot complain; of which it is advisable not too often to think.

"I have read Tennyson's 'In Memoriam,' or rather part of it; I closed the book when I had got about half way. It is beautiful; it is mournful; it is monotonous. Many of the feelings expressed bear, in their utterance, the stamp of truth; yet, if Arthur Hallam had been somewhat nearer Alfred Tennyson,—his brother instead of his friend,—I should have distrusted this rhymed, and measured, and printed monument of grief. What change the lapse of years may work I do not know; but it seems to me that bitter sorrow, while recent, does not flow out in verse.

"I promised to send you Wordsworth's 'Prelude,'


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 and, accordingly, despatch it by this post; the other little volume shall follow in a day or two. I shall be glad to hear from you whenever you have time to write to me, but you are never, on any account, to do this except when inclination prompts and leisure permits. I should never thank you for a letter which you had felt it a task to write."

A short time after we had met at the Briery, she sent me the volume of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell's poems; and thus alludes to them in the note that accompanied the parcel:—

"The little book of rhymes was sent by way of fulfilling a rashly-made promise; and the promise was made to prevent you from throwing away four shillings in an injudicious purchase. I do not like my own share of the work, nor care that it should be read: Ellis Bell's I think good and vigorous, and Acton's have the merit of truth and simplicity. Mine are chiefly juvenile productions; the restless effervescence of a mind that would not be still. In those days, the sea too often 'wrought and was tempestuous,' and weed, sand, shingle—all turned up in the tumult. This image is much too magniloquent for the subject, but you will pardon it."

Another letter of some interest was addressed, about this time, to a literary friend, on Sept. 5th:—

"The reappearance of the 'Athenæum' is very acceptable, not merely for its own sake,—though I esteem the opportunity of its perusal a privilege,—but because,


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 and what was the great sorrow with which he was afflicted?’ Upon this the glazier related to him the whole affair; how, that being weary, he had seated himself on a mound by the road-side, how this had suddenly overthrown him, and broken to pieces his whole stock of glass, which was well worth eight dollars; and how, in short, the mound itself had entirely disappeared—he knew not in the least how to recover his loss, and bring the business to a good ending. The compassionate mountain-sprite comforted him, told him who he was, and that he himself had played him the trick; and at the same time bade him be of good cheer, for his losses should be made good to him.

Upon this, Rubezahl transformed himself into an ass, and directed the glazier to sell him at the mill which lay at the foot of the mountain, and to be sure to make off with the purchase-money as quickly as possible. The glazier accordingly immediately bestrode the transformed mountain-sprite, and rode upon him down the mountain to the mill, where he offered him for sale to the miller at the price of ten dollars; the miller offered nine, and the glezier, without further haggling, took the money and went his way with it.

When he was gone, the miller sent his newly purchased beast to the stable, and the boy who had the charge of him immediately filled his rack with hay. Upon this Rubezahl exclaimed—“I don’t eat hay; I eat nothing but roasted and boiled, and that of the best!” The boy’s hair stood on end; he flew to his master, and related to him this wondrous tale; who no sooner heard it than he hastened to the stable, and there found nothing, for the ass and his nine dollars were alike vanished.

But the miller was rightly served, for he had cheated in


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NORTON CABAL INTERVIEW Malaclypse, text is mine although some things credited to either Mal2 or Omar were actually co-written and passed back and forth and rewritten by each of us. The marginalia, dingbats and pasted in titles and heads and things came from wherever I found them -- some of which is original but uncredited Discordian output, like the page head on 12 and other pages which is from a series of Satiric memo pads from Our Peoples Underworld Cabal. All page layout is mine and some whole graphics like Sacred Chao and the Hodge Podge Transformer are mine mostly I just found stuff and integrated did concept, say 50% of the writing, 10% of the graphics, all of the layout.

Gypsie: Specifically, what are some of the sources?

Hill: Well, the poem on the front cover is by Walt Kelly and was spoken by one of his characters in Pogo. The government seals starting on page 1 are from a book of sample seals from the U.S. Government Printing Office. Western Union on page 6 got into the act because I used to be a teletype operator and had access to blank forms. Rubber stamps came from all over the place and some, like the apple on page 27, I carved myself. A few I ordered to my specification, like on page 1. The quote on top of page 8 might be from Barnum, I'm not sure. The jumping man on page 12 is from an advertisement. I recognize the style -- a popular commercial artist -- but I don't know his name. The Chinese on that page is a grocery ad, I think. The Norton money on page 14 is historic, plus my little additions. The apple on page 17, as well as the triangle on 23 and the Sacred Chao on 50 are, belivebelieve [sic] it or not, pasteups from mimeographs, from Seattle Cabal. That group produced the. best damn mimeography I've ever seen. The Lick Here Box on page 23 is one of many tidbits making the rounds in alternative/underground newspapers in those days. Trip 5 page header on 29 was a chapter title in one of Tim Leary's books. The Knight on the bull with the TV antenna on his helmet on page 46 came from a very artistic magazine called Horseshit put out by two brothers from Long Beach. I don't remember their names. Wonderful magazine.

Occupant: Eris told Mal2 what to use and where to find it.

Hill: Yeah, in a way that is right. That is why my name does not appear anywhere on the Principia and why it was published with a broken copyright -- Reprint What You Like. I knew I was taking liberties and didn't want my intentions to be misunderstood. It was an experiment and was intended to be an underground work and that involves a different set of ethics than commercial work.

Gypsie: There are no real names at all? 79/11/26


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276 SOME LEAVES FROM A LIFE.

brought him home to tea!—a stranger, who had come from a long distance to attend some important anniversary, and whom father, in his generous hospitality, seized upon with delight because he was a stranger, and needed the shelter of a friendly roof. Dear father! how many might say to him, ‘I was a stranger and ye took me in.” Rosalie and 1 were tuo much accustomed to visitors to be at all excited at such an occurrence, for we were motherless girls, and accustomed to doing the honors of our father’s’ house; but a handsome, gentle- manly, unmarried clergyman, like Mr. Nilmore, was not a frequent guest; and such visits were real enjoyment.

He stayed all night; and that evening was one to be remembered. How very different he then seemed, and how little one can tell what men really are! He was bright and enthu- siastic, with such a charming smile; and I actually accused myself of the folly of almost losing my heart to him! He talked more to me than to Rosalie, we seemed to have more in common; but Rosalie posed herself in graceful attitudes, and I knew that he could not but ad- mire her. There was never any feeling of rivalry between us. I think Rosalie was more generally liked than I; but the few who cared for me cared heartily, and I gave them the same in return.

When Mr. Nilmore left us, he was cordially invited to repeat his visit; and he said that, if he ever wandered so far from his parish again, he would be most happy to do so.

We supposed that this was the last of him; but a few weeks afterward, there came a very manly, straightforward sort of letter, addressed to ‘Miss Rosalie Benners,” and requesting the pleasure of a correspondence with her with a view to their better acquaintance. The letter was signed ‘Howard Nilmore;” and the writer spoke of the pleasant evening spent in her society, and a strong desire for many more evenings of the same kind.

Rosalie laughed a good deal over this letter; and, as was our wont in any such matter, showed it at once to father.

‘You can answer it,” said he, “if you feel disposed—a correspondence with Mr. Nilmore can do you no harm.”

We had considerable trouble with the an- swer—for I was called into council, and the great difficulty lay in the beginning. Rosalie wrote down, ‘‘My Dear Mr. Nilmore,” and con- cluded that this was too affectionate; then, “Mr. Nilmore;” and then, “Sir;” but these last were too stiff and business-like. His own letter began, “My Dear Miss Rosalie,” and went on as naturally as though he had written to her all his life. Finally, we settled upon “Dear Mr. Nilmore;” and after much laughter, and many alterations, the epistle was, at length, disposed of.
 * Dear Sir,”’ which did not seem much better;

Rosalie said that it was extremely funny, about the last thing she would have expected; and I could not tell why I felt depressed about it. Did I imagine that the letter should have been written to me?

Mr. Nilmore sent another epistle so promptly, that Rosalie declared it quite a bore to be writing to him so often. I had my sister’s answers to overlook and correct; for Rosalie had a natural infirmity, peculiar to some persons, of misspelling her words: neither were her sentences always grammatically arranged. Once, when she was sick, she fairly teased me into writing an entire letter for her, which she copied and sent with much satisfaction. Mr. Nilmore’s next letter spoke of this enthusiastically, declaring it to be the most charming epistle she had written to him. Rosalie laughed; but she was not troubled about it, as I would have been.

Soon after this came the proposal; and my sister seemed scarcely to know her own mind in the business. Father gave his consent, with the warmest expressions of satisfaction; but Rosalie told me in confidence that ‘‘she didn’t think she was a bit in love.”

“Then I wouldn’t marry him,” said I, decidedly.

“But, perhaps, I never shall be in love,’’ continued my sister.

“Then,” I replied, ‘‘never marry.”

«But, Susan,” pursued Rosalie, ‘‘I don’t want to be an old maid!”

“Ah, me!” I thought, “how often, in this world, are ‘pearls cast before swine!’ ”

“I am a little afraid of Mr. Nilmore said my sister; ‘‘and as I rather like any one I am afraid of, I think I shall take him into consideration. Then, too, he has such a pretty parsonage—he has written me all about it; and I should think it might be rather nice to be a clergyman’s wife.”

Another impassioned letter soon arrived from Mr. Nilmore, in which he added so many argu- ments, that Rosalie was finally prevailed on to decide favorably.

Then poured in congratulations, for my sister seemed rather proud of publishing the fact that she was to marry a clergyman, and go off so many hundred miles to live; and one of those persons, whose mission seems to be to say some-

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 his time many poor people. Therefore Rubezahl punished in this manner the injustice of which he had been guilty.

In the year 1512, a man of noble family, who was a very tyrant and oppressor, had commanded one of his vassals or peasants to carry home with his horses and cart, an oak of extraordinary magnitude, and threatened to visit him with the heaviest disgrace and punishment if he neglected to fulfil his desires. The peasant saw that it was impossible he could execute the command of his lord, and therefore fled to the woods with great sorrow and lamentation.

There he was accosted by Rubezahl, who appeared unto him like a man, and enquired of him the cause of his so great grief and affliction. Upon this, the peasant related to him all the circumstances of the case. When Rubezahl heard them, he bade him be of good cheer and care not, but go home to his own house again; he would soon transport the oak which his lord and feudal master required into his court-yard.

Scarcely had the peasant got well home again, before Rubezahl took the huge and monstrous oak-tree, with its thick and sturdy boughs, and hurled it into the court-yard of the nobleman; and with its huge stem, and its many


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 278 SOME LEAVES FROM A LIFE.

that his baby's smile will wake an answering sunshine in Howard's face.

I am sure he was not always so moody and distant ; for an old woman told me confidentially, the other day, that " Mr. Nilmore was so stilllike, since he married, people wondered what had come over him." The old women and children almost worship him; and few clergymen are as generally beloved in their parish as Howard.

I can see that people look pityingly at Rosalie-they evidently think that, by some strange mistake, she has gotten into a place for which she is quite unfit.

September 15th .-Rosalie is lying very ill, having taken a turn for the worse that puzzles us not a little, and the doctor evidently does not understand it. Her baby girl is five days old , and, until the third day, the mother seemed unusually strong and well. A bright fever spot burns on either cheek, and they have cut off all her pretty curls. She is very much changed, and her mind wanders continually. There is a constitutional tendency to disease, the doctor says, never before developed.

I cannot do much else but pray. Howard makes the tenderest of nurses, and looks more like a ghost than ever.

September 20th.-I am holding a newspaper in my hand, with my eyes fixed on two lines, that I study again and again, in the vain hope of being able to realize the sad truth:

"Died, on the twenty- fourth instant, Rosalie, wife of the Rev. Howard Nilmore, aged twenty one years."

I cannot realize that my bright, young sister is soon to be laid in the grave. Oh, Rosalie! my sister! How willingly I would have died in your stead! I have nothing to live for; but you had so much!

October 20th. "You will not leave me yet, Susan ?" said my brother-in-law, imploringly, when we returned from the funeral. "I know that you will care for Rosalie's child."

"I care for you, too, very much, " I said, completely melted by the scene through which we had passed, and by the thought of what he must be suffering in his quiet, enduring fashion. "I care very much for Rosalie's husband and child; and I shall not leave you, if my presence is any comfort, until it is my duty to go elsewhere."

A faint smile of gratitude, that made him look more as he did when I first saw him, lighted up his face; and with the scarcely audible words , "Thank you," he went into his study, and I saw him no more that night.

Poor, motherless baby! My heart' bled for her when the nurse brought her down, with black ribbons on her little sleeves -and I took the poor little thing to my affections at once. Her father loves her, too, and will hold her by the hour together. She is a pretty child, but delicate as a spring blossom ; and we call her, " Wind-Flower. "

Howard is certainly softened ; he seems no longer stern - only sad He never speaks of Rosalie I believe he loved her very deeply, after all ; and now that she is gone, he is more kind to me because I am her sister.

December 9th. -Would it not be a charitable enterprise to get up a society to provide employment of mind for people who have nothing to do but to attend to their neighbors' affairs? One of these unfortunate ones said to me today,

"People think that Mr. Nilmore will not go very far to look for a second wife. It must be quite a different feeling to be step- mother to a sister's child, instead of a stranger's"

"A second wife!" And poor Rosalie scarcely cold in her grave! I was filled with wrath; and I answered warmly,

"People think' and say a great deal that they have no right to think and say. Can they not respect our grief at such a time as this, instead of publishing their coarse surmises ? As far as I am concerned, and I now say it once for all, I could never look upon a dead sister's husband in any other light than that of a brother; and I am sure that Mr. Nilmore would be equally shocked by such a revolting idea. I beg to hear no more of this-but it shall not prevent me from doing my duty."

March 20th. For six months our little blossom looked, with wondering eyes, upon this curious world, and then went back to heaven. I robed the waxen form in its prettiest dress, and laid it in the flower-wreathed casket. When they opened the mother's grave, and laid her babe again upon her bosom, I felt that I had done my last duty to Rosalie and her child.

Soon I was on my homeward way, with the recollection of Howard's warm, clasping hand; and his murmured, "God bless you, Susan! for all your kindness to me and mine! You have been an angel of light to this sorrow-stricken dwelling; don't forget the lonely minister in your far-off home."

December 19th. -Nearly Christmas again, the second Christmas since Rosalie's death; and my story is coming out so strangely that I know not how to write it. Not long ago, I had a letter from Howard-a letter that sent the blood in quick bounds through my veins, and nearly deprived me of every portion of my sober senses.

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 thick branches, so choked and blocked up the entrance that no one could get either in or out. And because the oak proved harder than their iron tools, and could in no manner or wise, and with no power which they could apply to it, be hewn and cut to pieces, the nobleman was compelled, by unavoidable necessity, to break through the walls in another part of the court-yard, and to have a new door made, which was not done but at great labour and expense.

Once upon a time, Rubezahl made, from what materials is not known, a quantity of pigs, which he drove to the neighbouring market and sold to a peasant, with a caution, that the purchaser should not drive them through any water.

Now, what happened? Why these same swine having chanced to get sadly covered with mire, what must the peasant do but drive them to the river, which they had no sooner entered, than the supposed pigs suddenly became wisps of straw, and were carried away by the stream. The purchaser was moreover obliged to put up with his loss, for he neither knew what was become of, nor from whom he had purchased the pigs.

.—From, who has derived it from .—(1 Theil. s. 284—5.284—5.) [sic]


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 THEY DO NOT DIE. 279.

“I have a story to tell,” said the writer, “which must be told, although it may not avail me now. I love you, sweet Susan, and have loved you from the first moment I saw you.

“Do not turn from this in scorn. I was at your father’s house, you will remember, but one evening, on that first visit; and by some stupid mistake on my part, I thought they called you ‘Rosalie.’ Your face and your words haunted me when I returned to my quiet parsonage—I felt that you were just the wife I wanted. I could not leave my duties again to renew our acquaintance, and so penned that letter—directed to your sister, but intended for you. Your reply, as I thought it, did not quite answer my expectations, as coming from you; but the next letter I liked better; and, finally, I asked you to become my wife, and was accepted by your sister.

‘Never, as long as I live, can I forget the night that opened to me the dreadful truth. I sat listening for your footstep, picturing to myself your elegant face, and scarcely able to wait for your coming to clasp you to my bosom, and call you mine.

‘In the midst of these thoughts the door opened, and Rosalie appeared, blushing, expectant, with a face and manner that told the whole dreadful mistake. For a moment the room seemed to reel around me, and I had to struggle hard to retain possession of my senses; but a stern feeling of honor nerved me to endurance, as I glanced at the pretty, timid- looking girl, who had confided herself to my love and tenderness.

“I do not know what I said; but when I met you, my senses nearly forsook me again. Oh, beloved! it is a hard and bitter thing for a man to see before him the woman he loves, and the woman to whom his honor is pledged, and to find that they are not one, but two! No one knows what I suffered in those first hours. You asked me if I had been sick, and I felt like replying, ‘I am sick, sick unto death.’ I saw that you looked upon me with distrust, and I hardened myself into frigidness, for fear of betraying my feelings.

“I know that you thought me cold, and even rude, perhaps, in my own house; but my teeth were hard set in endurance, and I dared not assume toward you a brother’s manner, lest I should unguardedly betray the lover. Innocent words were often spoken by you and Rosalie that sent a sharp pain to my heart; and, at times, the very sight of you was almost maddening. In those occasional moments, when we have been alone together, I have been on the point of saying, ‘Go! leave my sight, or I shall tell you all!”

“I believe that Rosalie was a happy wife; I think no suspicion of the truth ever crossed her mind; and it is now more than a year since we laid her in the grave. Will you, my first, my only love, not take the place offered to you before, and be to me what no other woman ever could be, my wife in the best and holiest sense of the word?”

I read this letter with many tears; and I felt then that I had loved Howard Nilmore, not as a brother, but even as he loved me.

My love, however, was not allowed to run riot over every other feeling. I asked myself seriously if I could go to that home where my sister had reigned so short a time before, and where gossips were waiting for this very confirmation of their surmises. I did not think I could face it; for although the circumstances entirely changed my sentiments with respect to marrying a sister’s husband, yet I had uttered those sentiments there most decidedly; and I could not make our story public.

So I wrote to Howard as gently as I could, telling him of all these things, and begging him to think more of his usefulness as a Christian minister than of a few short years of happiness for us on earth.

I have made a great sacrifice, but I fully mean it; he has set me a noble example.

January 1st.—Another letter from that persevering man! Howard had long thought it best, for many reasons, to change his parish; and in the course of the coming year, he will remove to L, a place only ten miles from my own home.

There came also a letter for father, who seems ready to give Howard Nilmore all the daughters he possesses. A few weeks hence I shall stand in the very parlor which poor Rosalie entered with such different feelings, waiting for the lover who has always been mine.

THEY DO NOT DIE.

BY CATHARINE ALLAN. WAY should we, for the dying, weep? They do not die, they only sleep. 'Tis not the soul, ' tis but the shell

We bury with the funeral knell. This sorrowing life, thank God, is brief; But that's eternal-why this grief?

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text: Supplement to the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Editions of the Encyclopædia Britannica/Annuities


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 A similar trick is related of the celebrated Bohemian Conjuror, Zytho, of whom we shall have more to say in the ‘.’

The universally current superstition, that running water has the power to dissolve the spells of necromancy, appears prominently in the foregoing legend, where the seeming pigs are, upon entering it, instantly restored to their original form.

It came to pass, once upon a time, that Rubezahl took up his abode in a deserted hostelry, and exhibited himself as if he had really been the landlord of it; so much so, that various people of rank, who chanced to be travelling that way, actually determined to take up their lodgings there for the night. Certainly, when the guests first arrived, there seemed but little means of entertaining them; but in a short time the tables were covered and prepared, and on the benches there lay various empty casks and great logs, in which stood taps, such as are usually seen in casks.

Besides this, Rubezahl contrived that a window of the apartment should be neatly transformed into a closet; this he opened, and kept taking from it great dishes of meat, one after the other, and placing them on the table. Part was cold, and the rest warm. And when these were all prepared, the guests thought to themselves, it is now all ready; but he kept still going to the closet, and bringing further viands of different sorts. At length they became to marvel where all this good cheer came from, and how their host had been able to get it ready for them!


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 INFANT'S PILCH. BIBS. SHIRT AND FLANNEL PETTICOAT. WRAP -JACKET AND OUT-DOOR JACKET.

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 NOTHING

ELSE

TO

DO.

Composed and Arranged for the Piano-Forte.

As published by SEP. WINNER & SON, 1C08 Spring Garden St., Philadelphia.

WORDS BY HERBERT FRY.

MUSIC BY J. L. HATTON.

ALLEGRETTO.

PIANO. brillante.

Ped.

1. 'Twas a 2. Off I

pleasant summer's start- ed through the

dim. b

morning, Just the day I like t'en-joy, When I woke and look'd out early, Puz-zled meadows,Where the dew-beads pearl'd the spray, And re-spon-sive to the song- birds, I kept

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 NOTHING

ELSE

TO

DO.

how my time t' employ ; In such fine and splendid weather, I don't care for work, do singing all the way; Quite surpris'd she was to see me Come so early there to

So Till

I I

went to see my sweetheart, As I'd said I'd just walk'd o ver, ' Cause I'd

99

you ? Woo,

nothing nothing

else else

to to

nothing nothing

else else

to to

ad lib.

do, do,

So I Till I

went to see my sweetheart, As said I'd just walk over, ' Cause

I'd I'd

colla voce.

do.

dim.

f

3 Then we rambled forth together, Down the lane beneath the trees, While gently stirr'd the shadows Of their branches in the breeze; And whene'er our conversation Languish'd for a word or two, Why, of course, I kindly kiss'd her, As I'd nothing else to do,

But before the day was over, I'd somehow made up my mind, That I'd pop the question to her, If to me her heart inclined ; So I whisper'd, " Sweet, my darling, Will you have me, Yes, or No?" "Well," said she, " perhaps I may, my dear, When I've nothing else to do."

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 CHILDRE N'S FASHION S FOR NOVEMB ER .

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G. Skripto Hill: Oh, some. Camden Benares is a real name because he legally changed his original name to his Holy Name. Also, instead of using Mordecai Malignatus I used Bob Wilson's real name on page 12 because Werewolf Bridge was a work before Discordianism. And of course real people like Neils Bohr crop up in quotes.

Gypsie: What. do you think about the Principia now? would you want to change it?

Hill: 1 consider it a successful work and I wouldn't want to change it. In some ways it is immature and I am not the same person I was 10 years ago, but it accomplished the objectives I set for myself and it has the effect I wanted it to have. There are a few errors though.

Gypsie: Like what?

Rill: Oh, I changed a quote from Tom Gnostic on page 61 and I don't think he ever did forgive me for it. He's right. Starbuck's Pebbles should have been preceded by the Myth of Starbuck which was being saved for something else and never got used. I should have used it when I had the chance. And then Eris did a neat little trick on me by having IBM make the Greek selectric typewriter element not coincide with all the characters on their keyboard. So the little "kallisti" that first appears on the title page and lastly on the back cover came out "kallixti" and I was too dumb to know the difference.

Gypsie: Will there ever be a Fifth Edition?

Hill: There already is a Fifth Edition, by Mal2. It is a one page telegram that reduces everthing to an infinite aum. I found it at Western Union where a machine dot stuck and kicked out hundreds of pages of nothing but m's. He made it the Fifth Edition and then left.

Principia/Malaclypse was a very personal work for me and actually took 10 years ta culminate. It was one single statement. that included my adolescence in the 50's and my young adulthood in the 60's. When I finally had the paste-ups done I knew that I had finished it. That is why, quote, Malaclypse left. I knew it was finished. I didn't know exactly what it was, but it was done.

Occupant: See?

Gypsie: Earlier you said that you met your objectives. Jest what were those objectives?

Hill: Well, that's hard to answer because it kept refining itself over the years. In 1969 I mainly


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274 received a great reward from both parties, and became a very famous man.


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 THE LIBRARY OF FATE.

281

Toward evening, finding himself too weary and giddy to walk without reeling, or stand without falling, Braithe accosted a policeman.

"My friend, is there anywhere that I can go and sit down awhile without having to pay for the accommodation?"

"Sure an' there's the Li'bry - it's free to all, " replied Dogberry, himself of such recent impor { tation that he had not unlearned all his civility. and Braithe staggered in at the designated door-way, found the library, took a book in his hand, and seating himself upon the floor, in the furthest angie of the remotest alcove, went fast asleep, and so remained for the next six hours.

He was awakened by the clang of the city clocks striking midnight, an operation lasting over some ten minutes, an approach to unanimity really wonderful, when we consider that most ofthese clocks are upon Christian churches of different creeds.

"Why, where- where am I ?" muttered Romuald Braithe, rubbing his eyes, and sitting up very straight. For manifest reasons, nobody replied to this question; and after staring about him for a minute or two, the young man scrambled to his feet, stretched himself, and staggered back against the book-shelves.

"I'm very hungry," remarked he, plaintively: "and I don't remember where I can be. Oh, yes ! the free library ! I wonder if a fellow is free to die here."

No copy of the regulations being at hand, or any light to read it by if there had been, this question also went unanswered, and Romuald remained leaning against the book-shelves, in a profound fit of meditation.

"Very hungry, and very cold, " continued he, presently. " I wonder if that old door-keeper has left some fire in his rusty grate ? Who knows but the remnant of his luncheon may be found in some of those drawers beside his desk. I will go and sec. If not, I shall eat the binding of one of those books ; I hope I shall be able to find a new one, not too much thumbed."

So muttering, Braithe felt his way along the line of shelves until emerging from the alcove into the open space, he could gain a view of the further end of the hall. A faint glimmer of firelight served to guide him between the Scylla of the reading-table and the Charybdis of the bookcases, and he finally reached a point from which he could command the nook usually occupied by the janitor. To his astonishment it was so occupied now, or at least the figure of an old man was seated in the leathern armchair appropriated to that officer, and appeared

to be writing diligently in a thick volume bound in vellum.

" So the old fellow stayed with us for company ; that was very polite of him, " murmured Braithe, whose brain, giddy from long fasting and recent sleep, seemed incapable of any serious ideas : and advancing a few steps, he politely inquired.

Did you stay here to make sure that I should not be disturbed, or was it to keep up the fire for me, my good sir?"

Thus addressed, the figure at the desk looked up, fixing his dim, blue eyes upon the face or the young man, who now stood close beside him. Something, he knew not what, in that dim, far-off regard, chilled the blood at Braithe's heart, and involuntarily he drew back from his close vicinity to the supposed janitor.

"I beg pardon, sir," stammered he, confusedly.

"What name?" asked the old man, in a voice so like his look that one could hardly tell whether it was the eyes that spoke and the voice that looked, or the converse.

"What name?" asked he again, as the youth delayed to answer.

"My name, do you mean, sir?"

"Surely. You wish your volume, do you not ?"

"I- I hardly know. It seems to me that we mistake each other, sir," hesitated Braithe. “ I am a mere wayfarer, who, straying into this place overnight, have overslept myself, and am now intruding both upon your time and your premises. "

"You think so. But you would find it all written in your volume. I knew you would come to-night, but I did not care to look out your name-what is it ?"

" My name is Romuald Braithe ; but, excuse me, I hardly think you could have known of my coming, any more than I now know what you mean by my volume. This is the City Library, is it not?"

"This is the Library of Fate, young man, and I am the librarian. Do you see these volumes?"

He waved his hands as he spoke, and Romuald, looking about him, noticed, for the first time, that the bookcases he had already seen were swung open like doors, giving entrance to long arcades and vistas, extending far as the eye could reach, and all lined with tiers upon tiers of books bound like that upon the desk, in white vellum, with a label of read leather at the back. In front of these bookcases, and eagerly examining volumes which they held in their hands, were crowds of figures, which to the bewildered vision of the young man seemed incapable of

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 282 THE LIBRARY OF FATE.

resolution into individuals. Say as he might, and as he did, he found it impossible to select one face or form from the densest group, and make of it a distinct impression upon his brain , each seemed to melt into each, to change and disappear, and yet return with increasing motion , so that Braithe found himself at last seriously questioning whether he was surrounded by a vast multitude of persons, or whether he was quite alone, nay deprived even of the company of his own senses and his own identity.

From this speculation he was roused by the vague voice of the librarian, who was saying, as he walked down one of the long arcades at his side,

"Of course, being here, you wish to see your volume ?"

"Yes," answered the young man, mechanically.

"But do you know how uncommon a privilege this is which you enjoy ? Had not you been born at precisely midnight of midsummer-eve, it would have been impossible, and now it is only once in seven of your birth nights, and then but for an hour, that you enjoy the privilege."

"But all these?" asked Braithe, pointing at the throng about him, which, as before, seemed to melt away the moment he closely inspected it. His conductor glanced carelessly in the direction of his gesture, and replied,

"Ah, yes! these to be sure. But where are their bodies, you know?"

"Why, are they not in their bodies?"

"Of course not. These are all souls, which, having left the bodies to which they belong fast asleep, have sped hither to take a peep into their respective volumes. Tomorrow, when they and their bodies awaken, there will remain within the souls some memories, perhaps, so vivid as to be called dreams, perhaps so vague as to vanish the instant the coarser perceptions attempt to lay hold upon them, but, at any rate, all that the poor souls succeed in carrying away of all that they learn here. Were you never yourself conscious, on first waking, of some such reminiscence? An impression of something highly important and valuable which you have known while you were asleep, and which eludes your waking consciousness?"

"Yes, I have had such experiences," replied Braithe, eagerly.

"Well, it was because your soul had been here while you slept. But tonight you are here in the body, and, as I say, it is a rare privilege. "

"Is no one else here in the same way tonight?"

'Not one."

"And you?" asked Braithe, hesitatingly.

"I-I am myself the embodiment of fate. As you see me now I have always existed, and shall always exist until"

Until when?"

"How can I tell? Fate itself has limits, and I know not mine. "

The voice of the librarian seemed to die away with the last words, not so much as if he had ceased to speak, as if he could speak no more, and Braithe, turning suddenly toward him, was hardly surprised at seeing nothing, but almost before he was conscious of the fact, the same weird voice spoke at his other side. Here is your volume-do you see it?"

He pointed as he spoke to a volume, upon whose back Romuald Braithe read his own name. He extended his hand eagerly, but was checked by the librarian.

"Have a care," said he. " Do not strain the cords."

" The cords!" echoed the young man, pausing with his hand upon the book.

"Yes. Take it down; in fact, no one but yourself has the power to touch it at all, but handle it carefully."

Braithe did as he was ordered, and carefully drawing the volume from its place, he perceived that several fine cords proceeding from between its pages, connected it more or less nearly with other volumes in the same compartment, and that, although these cords were elastic and strong, a rough motion upon his part might sever them.

"Whose volumes are these to which I am thus bound?" asked he, turning to the librarian.

"Those persons with whom fate has connected you from the moment of your birth."

"But the ties can be broken. "

"Yes, and fate would reunite them. But the knots and weak places thus caused would give you and the others infinite trouble when you arrived at them. "

"Here is one of silk and gold. To whom does this unite me?" asked the young man, curiously examining the cords which he held in his hand.

"Open to the page it marks and read. But your hour is nearly gone; you have need to hasten."

Braithe opened precipitately. The page was covered with close, crabbed characters in some unknown language, as incomprehensible to him as if it had been the ancient Copt, or the primitive Sanscrit. Bitterly disappointed, he turned to the librarian, who, with a shadowy smile, replied to his unspoken appeal.

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 the poor fellow, from very weariness, threw away the bewitched weapon, in the name of the Evil One, and went his way without it.

But he had not ridden above a quarter of a mile thus unspeared, when looking carelessly about him, lo and behold, there lay his spear beside him; sadly he was frightened at the sight, and little did he know what to make of it. At last he boldly ventured to lay hands upon it; he did so, and lifted up the spear, though he knew not how to carry it. To rest it on the earth, he had no longer any desire; the thoughts of carrying it on his shoulders, made him shudder; nothing therefore remained but to hold it in his hand, so that it would drag after him along the ground.

But, fresh troubles here arose; it weighed so heavily that he could not stir a foot from the spot, and though he tried first one hand and then the other, he found no difference, it still kept up the same tune. At last, he bethought him of another fashion, that is to say, to ride upon it, as a child bestrides a stick; and in this manner it went on as if it had been greased, that is to say, he ran away with all speed, felt no sense of weariness, and thought no otherwise than that he had a good fleet horse under him. Thus mounted he rode forth without ceasing, until he descended from the mountain into the city, and excited the wonder, delight, and laughter of the worthy burghers.

Although the messenger had endured some trouble in the early part of his journey, he was at all events at the close amply compensated, and then he even comforted himself still more, by making up his mind that in all future journeys, which he was destined to perform, he would for the better performance bestride his nimble spear.


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 no means accomplish, his lips were so much too large. Thereupon Rubezahl’s servant brought him wine in a cart, by which means he was enabled to get a hearty draught. Thus had the lords their sport with the ox, and were indeed right well pleased with this merry andrew’s trick.

In the meanwhile the rumour reached the ears of this guest’s wife, upon which she, with some of her companions, rode after her husband and alighted at the dwelling of Rubezahl. On entering she was informed that her husband had got an ox’s head. She sought him instantly and found that it was so. Upon this she addressed the foulest language to Rubezahl, and rated him soundly for putting this shame upon her husband. Rubezahl in reply, spoke mildly to her, telling her to hold her tongue. This, too, did the other guests, but in vain. Then Rubezahl conjured upon the woman’s shoulders a cow’s-head, with horns complete. Upon this the laughter increased; and when the woman sought to remonstrate, she began to blare, and so did the ox likewise.

Then, indeed, one might have seen merry faces, when these set themselves in order, and wore their caps so merrily. In this spirit did the guests at last all go to sleep together, and snore the whole night through.

When they at length awoke early on the following morning, lo! there they lay on an open heath, and the occurrence of the preceding day seemed no more than a dream. Yet some of them considered that this jest had been put upon them by Rubezahl.

.—This story is derived by from the same source. , p. 285—292. It is one of the most amusing and surprising of Number Nip’s adventures.


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 Variants   Notes