First Dialogueb

This is precisely the humour of a furious lover, though the same may be said of nearly all mortals who are seriously affected in any way. We cannot say that this accords with all conditions in a general way, but only with those mortals who were, and who are, wretched. So that to him who sought a kingdom and obtained it, belongs the fear of losing the same; and to one who has laboured to secure the fruits of love, such as the special grace of the beloved, belongs the tooth of jealousy and suspicion. Thus, too, with the states of the world; when we find ourselves in darkness and in adversity we may surely prophecy light and prosperity, and when we are in a state of happiness and discipline, doubtless we have to expect the advent of ignorance and distress. As in the case of Hermes Trismegistus, who, seeing Egypt in all the splendour of the sciences and of occultism, so that he considered that men were consorting with gods and spirits and were in consequence most pious, he made that prophetic lament to Asclepios, saying that the darkness of new religions and cults must follow, and that of the then present things nothing would remain but idle tales and matter for condemnation. So the Hebrews, when they were slaves in Egypt, and banished to the deserts, were comforted by their prophets with the hope of liberty and the re-acquisition of their country; when they were in authority and tranquillity they were menaced with dispersion and captivity. And as in these days there is no evil nor injury to which we are not subject, so there is no good nor honour that we may not promise ourselves. Thus does it happen to all the other generations and states, the which, if they endure and be not destroyed entirely by the force of vicissitude, it is inevitable that from evil they come to good, from good to evil, from low estate to high, from high to low, out of obscurity into splendour, out of splendour into obscurity, for this is the natural order of things; outside of which order, if another should be found which destroys or corrects it, I should believe it and not dispute it, for I reason with none other than a natural spirit.[B] [B] As in long-drawn systole and long-drawn diastole, must the period of Faith, alternate with the period of Denial; must the vernal growth, the summer luxuriance of all Opinions, Spiritual Representations and Creations, be followed by, and again follow the autumnal decay, the winter dissolution.—("Sartor Resartus.") Mar. We know that you are not a theologian but a philosopher, and that you treat of philosophy and not of theology. Ces. It is so. But let us see what follows. II. Ces. I see a smoking thurible, supported by an arm, and the legend which says: "Illius aram," and then the following:— 42. Now who shall say the breath of my desire Of high and holy worship is demeaned If decked in divers forms ornate she come Through vows I offer to the shrine of Fame? And if another work should call, and lead me on, Who would aver that more it might beseem If that, of Heaven so loved and eulogized, Should hold me not in its captivity. Leave, oh leave me, every other wish, Cease, fretting thoughts, and give me peace; Why draw me forth from looking at the sun, From looking at the sun that I so love. You ask in pity, wherefore lookest thou On that, on which to look is thy undoing? Wherefore so captivated by that light?