Chapter 7: The Gifted
Yes, in what tumultuous huge anarchy soever a Noble human
Principle may dwell and strive, such tumult is in the way of
being calmed into a fruitful sovereignty. It is inevitable. No
Chaos can continue chaotic with a soul in it. Besouled with
earnest human Nobleness, did not slaughter, violence and fire-
eyed fury, grow into a Chivalry; into a blessed Loyalty of
Governor and Governed? And in Work, which is of itself noble, and the only true fighting, there shall be no such possibility? Believe it not; it is incredible; the whole Universe contradicts it. Here too the Chactaw Principle will be subordinated; the Man Principle will, by degrees, become superior, become supreme.
I know Mammon too; Banks-of-England, Credit-Systems, worldwide
possibilities of work and traffic; and applaud and admire them. Mammon is like Fire; the usefulest of all servants, if the frightfulest of all masters! The Cliffords, Fitzadelms and Chivalry Fighters 'wished to gain victory,' never doubt it: but victory, unless gained in a certain spirit, was no victory; defeat, sustained in a certain spirit, was itself victory. I say again and again, had they counted the scalps alone, they had continued Chactaws, and no Chivalry or lasting victory had been. And in Industrial Fighters and Captains is there no nobleness discoverable? To them, alone of men, there shall forever be no blessedness but in swollen coffers? To see beauty, order, gratitude, loyal human hearts around them, shall be of no moment; to see fuliginous deformity, mutiny, hatred and despair, with the addition of half a million guineas, shall be better? Heaven's blessedness not there; Hell's cursedness, and your half-million bits of metal, a substitute for that! Is there no profit in diffusing Heaven's blessedness, but only in gaining gold?--If so, I apprise the Mill-owner and Millionaire, that he too must prepare for vanishing; that neither is _he_ born to be of the sovereigns of this world; that he will have to be trampled and chained down in whatever terrible ways, and brass-collared safe, among the born thralls of this worrd! We cannot have _Canailles_ and Doggeries that will not make some Chivalry of themselves: our noble Planet is impatient of such; in the end, totally intolerant of such!
For the Heavens, unwearying in their bounty, do send other souls
into this world, to whom yet, as to their forerunners, in Old
Roman, in Old Hebrew and all noble times, the omnipotent guinea
is, on the whole, an impotent guinea. Has your half-dead
avaricious Corn-Law Lord, your half-alive avaricious Cotton-Law
Lord, never seen one such? Such are, not one, but several; are, and will be, unless the gods have doomed this world to swift dire ruin. These are they, the elect of the world; the born champions, strong men, and liberatory Samsons of this poor world: whom the poor Delilah-world will not always shear of their strength and eyesight, and set to grind in darkness at _its_ poor gin-wheel! Such souls are, in these days, getting somewhat out of humour with the world. Your very Byron, in these days, is at least driven mad; flatly refuses fealty to the world. The world with its injustices, its golden brutalities, and dull yellow guineas, is a disgust to such souls: the ray of Heaven that is in them does at least pre-doom them to be very miserable here. Yes:--and yet all misery is faculty misdirected, strength that has not yet found its way. The black whirlwind is mother of the lightning. No _smoke,_ in any sense, but can become flame and radiance! Such soul, once graduated in Heaven's stern University, steps out superior to your guinea.
Dost thou know, O sumptuous Corn-Lord, Cotton-Lord, O mutinous
Trades-Unionist, gin-vanquished, undeliverable; O much-enslaved
World,--this man is not a slave with thee! None of thy
promotions is necessary for him. His place is with the stars of
Heaven: to thee it may be momentous, to him it is indifferent, whether thou place him in the lowest hut, or forty feet higher at the top of thy stupendous high tower, while here on Earth. The joys of Earth that are precious, they depend not on thee and thy promotions. Food and raiment, and, round a social hearth, souls who love him, whom he loves: these are already his. He wants none of thy rewards; behold also, he fears none of thy penalties. Thou canst not answer even by killing him: the case of Anaxarchus thou canst kill; but the self of Anaxarchus, the word or act of Anaxarchus, in no wise whatever. To this man death is not a bugbear; to this man life is already as earnest and awful, and beautiful and terrible, as death.