The inner beauty

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THE INNER BEAUTY

Maurice Maeterlinck.

LONDON.

ARTHUR L. HUMPHREYS

M. DCCCC. X.

The

Inner beauty

By
Maurice Maeterlinck

London

Arthur L. Humphreys

1910

CONTENTS

MM

THE INNBB BEAUTY ... 1
SILENCE ..... 90
THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS . . 50

Tii

THE INNER BEAUTY

NOTHING in the whole world is so athirst
for beauty as the soul, nor is there any-
thing to which beauty clings so readily.
There is nothing in the world capable of
such spontaneous uplifting, of such speedy
ennoblement ; nothing that offers more
scrupulous obedience to the pure and noble
commands it receives. There is nothing
in the world that yields deeper submission
to the empire of a thought that is loftier

THE INNER BEAUTY

than other thoughts. And on this earth
of ours there are but few souls that can
withstand the dominion of the soul that
has suffered itself to become beautiful.

In all truth might it be said that beauty
is the unique aliment of our soul, for in
all places does it search for beauty, and it
perishes not of hunger even in the most
degraded of lives. For indeed nothing
of beauty can pass by and be altogether
unperceived. Perhaps does it never pass
by save only in our unconsciousness, but
its action is no less puissant in gloom of
night than by light of day ; the joy it
procures may be less tangible, but other
difference there is none. Look at the
most ordinary of men, at a time when
a little beauty has contrived to steal into
their darkness. They have come together,
it matters not where, and for no special
reason ; but no sooner are they assembled
2

THE INNER BEAUTY

than their very first thought would seem
to be to close the great doors of life.
Yet has each one of them, when alone,
more than once lived in accord with his
soul. He has loved perhaps, of a surety
he has suffered. Inevitably must he, too,
have heard the * sounds that come from
the distant country of Splendour and
Terror'; and many an evening has he
bowed down in silence before laws that
are deeper than the sea. And yet when
these men are assembled it is with the
basest of things that they love to debauch
themselves. They have a strange inde-
scribable fear of beauty, and as their
number increases so does this fear become
greater, resembling indeed their dread of
silence or of a verity that is too pure.
And so true is this that, were one of them
to have done something heroic in the
course of the day, he would ascribe
3

THE INNER BEAUTY

wretched motives to his conduct, thereby
endeavouring to find excuses for it, and
these motives would lie readily to his hand
in that lower region where he and his
fellows were assembled. And yet listen :
a proud and lofty word has been spoken,
a word that has in a measure undammed
the springs of life. For one instant has
a soul dared to reveal itself, even such as
it is in love and sorrow, such as it is in
face of death and in the solitude that
dwells around the stars of night." Disquiet
prevails, on some faces there is astonish-
ment, others smile. But have you never
felt at moments such as those how
unanimous is the fervour wherewith every
soul admires, and how unspeakably even
the very feeblest, from the remotest depths
of its dungeon, approves the word it has
recognised as akin to itself? For they
have all suddenly sprung to life again in
4

THE INNER BEAUTY

the primitive and normal atmosphere that
is their own ; and could you but hearken
with angels1 ears, I doubt not but you
would hear mightiest applause in that
• kingdom of amazing radiance wherein the
1 souls do dwell. Do you not think that
even the most timid of them would take
courage unto themselves were but similar
words to be spoken every evening? Do
you not think that men would live purer
lives? And yet though the word come
not again, still will something momentous
have happened, that must leave still more
momentous trace behind. Every evening
will its sisters recognise the soul that
pronounced the word, and henceforth, be
the conversation never so trivial, its mere
presence will, I know not how, add thereto
something of majesty. Whatever else
betide, there has been a change that we
cannot determine. No longer will such
A2 5

THE INNER BEAUTY

absolute power be vested in the baser
side of things, and henceforth, even the
most terror-stricken of souls will know
that there is somewhere a place of
refuge. . . .

Certain it is that the natural and
primitive relationship of soul to soul is
a relationship of beauty. For beauty
is the only language of our soul ; none
other is known to it. It has no other
life, it can produce nothing else, in
nothing else can it take interest. And
therefore it is that the most oppressed,
nay, the most degraded of souls — if it
may truly be said that a soul can be
degraded — immediately hail with acclama-
tion every thought, every word or deed,
that is great and beautiful. Beauty is
the only element wherewith the soul is
organically connected, and it has no other
standard of judgment. This is brought
6

THE INNER BEAUTY

home to us at every moment of our life,
and is no less evident to the man by
whom beauty may more than once have
been denied than to him who is ever
seeking it in his heart. Should a day
come when you stand in profoundest need
of another's sympathy, would you go to
him who was wont to greet the passage of
beauty with a sneering smile? Would
you go to him whose shake of the head
had sullied a generous action or a mere
impulse that was pure ? Even though
perhaps you had been of those who com-
mended him, you would none the less,
when it was truth that knocked at your
door, turn to the man who had known
how to prostrate himself and love.' In
its very depths had your soul passed its
judgment, and it is the silent and unerr-
ing judgment that will rise to the surface,
after thirty years perhaps, and send you
7

THE INNER BEAUTY

towards a sister who shall be more truly
you than you are yourself, for that she
has been nearer to beauty. . . .

There needs but so little to encourage
beauty in our soul ; so little to awaken
the slumbering angels ; or perhaps is there
no need of awakening — it is enough that
we lull them not to sleep. It requires
more effort to fall, perhaps, than to rise.
Can we, without putting constraint upon
ourselves, confine our thoughts to every-
day things at times when the sea stretches
before us, and we are face to face with
the night ? And what soul is there but
knows that it is ever confronting the sea,
ever in presence of an eternal night ?
Did we but dread beauty less it would
come about that nought else in life would
be visible ; for in reality it is beauty that
underlies everything, it is beauty alone
that exists. There is no soul but is
8

THE INNER BEAUTY

conscious of this, none that is not in
readiness; but where are those that hide
not their beauty ? And yet must one of
them 'begin.1 Why not dare to be the
one to ' begin.1 The others are all watch-
ing eagerly around us like little children
in front of a marvellous palace. They
press upon the threshold, whispering to
each other and peering through every
crevice, but there is not one who dares
put his shoulder to the door. They are
all waiting for some grown-up person to
come and fling it open. But hardly ever
does such a one pass by.

And yet what is needed to become the
grown-up person for whom they lie in
wait ? So little ! The soul is not exact-
ing. A thought that is almost beautiful —
a thought that you speak not, but that
you cherish within you at this moment,
will irradiate you as though you were
9

THE INNER BEAUTY

a transparent vase. They will see it and
their greeting to you will be very different
than had you been meditating how best
to deceive your brother. We are surprised
when certain men tell us that they have
never come across real ugliness, that they
cannot conceive that a soul can be base.
Yet need there be no cause for surprise.
These men had ' begun.1 They themselves
had been the first to be beautiful, and
had therefore attracted all the beauty that
passed by, as a lighthouse attracts the
vessels from the four corners of the
horizon. Some there are who complain
of women, for instance, never dreaming
that, the first time a man meets a woman,
a single word or thought that denies the
beautiful or profound will be enough to
poison for ever his existence in her soul.

* For my part,1 said a sage to me one day,

* I have never come across a single woman

10

THE INNER BEAUTY

who did not bring to me something that
was great.' He was great himself first of
all ; therein lay his secret. There is one
thing only that the soul can never forgive ;
it is to have been compelled to behold, or
share, or pass close to an ugly action, word,
or thought. It cannot forgive, for for-
giveness here were but the denial of itself.
And yet with the generality of men,
ingenuity, strength and skill do but imply
that the soul must first of all be banished
from their life, and that every impulse
that lies too deep must be carefully
brushed aside. Even in love do they act
thus, and therefore it is that the woman,
who is so much nearer the truth, can
scarcely ever live a moment of the true
life with them. It is as though men
dreaded the contact of their soul, and
were anxious to keep its beauty at im-
measurable distance. Whereas, on the
11

THE INNER BEAUTY

contrary, we should endeavour to move in
advance of ourselves. If at this moment
you think or say something that is too
beautiful to be true in you — if you have
but endeavoured to think or say it to-day,
on the morrow it will be true. We must
try to be more beautiful than ourselves ;
we shall never distance our soul. We
can never err when it is question of silent
or hidden beauty. Besides, so long as
the spring within us be limpid, it matters
but little whether error there be or not.
But do any of us ever dream of making
the slightest unseen effort ? And yet in
the domain where we are everything is
effective, for that everything is waiting.
All the doors are unlocked, we have but
to push them open, and the palace is full
of manacled queens. A single word will
very often suffice to clear the mountain
of refuse. Why not have the courage to
12

THE INNER BEAUTY

meet a base question with a noble answer ?
Do you imagine it would pass quite un-
noticed or merely arouse surprise? Do
you not think it would be more akin to
the discourse that would naturally be
held between two souls? We know
not where it may give encouragement,
where freedom. Even he who rejects
your word will, in spite of himself, have
taken a step towards the beauty that is
within him. ' Nothing of beauty dies
without having purified something, nor
can aught of beauty be lost. Let us not
be afraid of sowing it along the road.
It may remain there for weeks or years,
but like the diamond it cannot dissolve,
and finally there will pass by some one
whom its glitter will attract; he will
pick it up and go his way, rejoicing.
Then why keep back a lofty, beautiful
word, for that you doubt whether others
13

THE INNER BEAUTY

will understand? An instant of higher
goodness was impending over you; why
hinder its coming, even though you believe
not that those about you will profit there-
by ? What if you are among men of the
valley, is that sufficient reason for check-
ing the instinctive movement of your
soul towards the mountain peaks ? Does
darkness rob deep feeling of its power?
Have the blind nought but their eyes
wherewith to distinguish those who love
them from those who love them not?
Can the beauty not exist that is not
understood, and is there not in every
man something that does understand —
in regions far beyond what he seems to
understand, far beyond, too, what he
believes he understands? 'Even to the
very wretchedest of all,' said to me one
day the loftiest minded creature it has
ever been my happiness to know, 'even
14

THE INNER BEAUTY

to the very wretchedest of all I never
have the courage to say anything in reply
that is ugly or mediocre.' I have for a
long time followed that man's life, and
have seen the inexplicable power he exer-
cised over the most obscure, the most
unapproachable, the blindest, even the
most rebellious of souls.' For no tongue
can tell the power of a soul that strives to
live in an atmosphere of beauty, and is
actively beautiful in itself. And indeed
is it not the quality of this activity that
renders life either miserable or divine ?

If we could but probe to the root of
things it might well be discovered that it
is by the strength of some souls that are
beautiful that others are sustained in life.
Is it not the idea we each form of certain
chosen ones that constitutes the only liv-
ing, effective morality? But in this
idea how much is there of the soul that is
15

THE INNER BEAUTY

chosen, how much of him who chooses ?
Do not these things blend very mysteri-
ously, and does not this ideal morality lie
infinitely deeper than the morality of the
most beautiful books? A far-reaching
influence exists therein whose limits it is
indeed difficult to define, and a fountain
of strength whereat we all of us drink
many times a day. Would not any weak-
ness in one of those creatures whom you
thought perfect and loved in the region
of beauty, at once lessen your confidence
in the universal greatness of things, and
would your admiration for them suffer?
And again, I doubt whether anything
in the world can beautify a soul more
spontaneously, more naturally, than the
knowledge that somewhere in its neigh-
bourhood there exists a pure and noble be-
ing whom it can unreservedly love. When
the soul has veritably drawn near to such
16

THE INNER BEAUTY

a being, beauty is no longer a lovely,
lifeless thing, that one exhibits to the
stranger, for it suddenly takes unto itself
an imperious existence, and its activity
becomes so natural as to be henceforth
irresistible. Wherefore you will do well
to think it over, for none are alone, and
those who are good must watch.

Plotinus, in the eighth book of the fifth
*Ennead,' after speaking of the beauty
that is 'intelligible1 — i.e. divine— con-
cludes thus : ' As regard ourselves, we
are beautiful when we belong to ourselves,
and ugly when we lower ourselves to our
inferior nature. Also are we beautiful
when we know ourselves, and ugly when
we have no such knowledge.1 Bear it in
mind, however, that here we are on the
mountains, where not to know oneself
means far more than mere ignorance of
what takes place within us at moments
B 17

THE INNER BEAUTY

of jealousy or love, fear or envy, happiness
or unhappiness. Here not to know oneself
means to be unconscious of all the divine
that throbs in man. As we wander from
the gods within us so does ugliness enwrap
us ; as we discover them, so do we become
more beautiful. But it is only by reveal-
ing the divine that is in us that we may
discover the divine in others. Needs must
one god beckon to another, and no signal
is so imperceptible but they will every one
of them respond. It cannot be said too
often that, be the crevice never so small,
it will yet suffice for all the waters of
heaven to pour into our soul, Every cup
is stretched out to the unlcnown spring,
and we are in a region where none think
of aught but beauty. If we could ask
of an angel what it is that our souls do
in the shadow, I believe the angel would
answer, after having looked for many years
18

THE INNER BEAUTY

perhaps, and seen far more than the things
the soul seems to do in the eyes of men,
* They transform into beauty all the little
things that are given to them.1 Ah ! we
must admit that the human soul is pos-
sessed of singular courage! Resignedly
does it labour, its whole life long, in the
darkness whither most of us relegate it,
where it is spoken to by none. There,
never complaining, does it do all that
in its power lies, striving to tear from out
the pebbles we fling to it the nucleus
of eternal light that peradventure they
contain. And in the midst of its work
it is ever lying in wait for the moment
when it may show, to a sister who is more
tenderly cared for, or who chances to be
nearer, the treasures it has so toilfully
amassed. But thousands of existences
there are that no sister visits ; thousands
of existences wherein life has infused such
19

THE INNER BEAUTY

timidity into the soul that it departs
without saying a word, without even once
having been able to deck itself with the
humblest jewels of its humble crown. . . .
And yet, in spite of all, does it watch over
everything from out its invisible heaven.
It warns and loves, it admires, attracts,
repels. At every fresh event does it rise
to the surface, where it lingers till it be
thrust down again, being looked upon as
wearisome and insane. It wanders to and
fro, like Cassandra at the gates of the
Atrides. It is ever giving utterance to
words of shadowy truth, but there are
none to listen. When we raise our eyes
it yearns for a ray of sun or star, that it
may weave into a thought, or, haply, an
impulse, which shall be unconscious and
very pure. And if our eyes bring it
nothing, still will it know how to turn its
pitiful disillusion into something ineffable,
20

THE INNER BEAUTY

that it will conceal even till its death.
When we love, how eagerly does it drink
in the light from behind the closed door
— keen with expectation, it yet wastes not
a minute, and the light that steals through
the apertures becomes beauty and truth to
the soul. But if the door opens not (and
how many lives are there wherein it does
open?) it will go back into its prison,
and its regret will perhaps be a loftier
verity that shall never be seen, for we are
now in the region of transformations
whereof none may speak ; and though
nothing born this side of the door can be
lost, yet does it never mingle with our
life. . . .

I said just now that the soul changed
into beauty the little things we gave to
it. It would even seem, the more we
think of it, that the soul has no other
reason for existence, and that all its
B2 21

THE INNER BEAUTY

activity is consumed in amassing, at
the depths of us, a treasure of in-
describable beauty. Might not every-
thing naturally turn into beauty, were
we not unceasingly interrupting the
arduous labours of our soul? Does not
evil itself become precious so soon as it
has gathered therefrom the deep lying
diamond of repentance? The acts of
injustice whereof you have been guilty,
the tears you have caused to flow, will
not these end too by becoming so much
radiance and love in your soul? Have
you ever cast your eyes into this kingdom
of purifying flame that is within you?
Perhaps a great wrong may have been
done you to-day, the act itself being
mean and disheartening, the mode of
action of the basest, and ugliness wrapped
you round as your tears fell. But let
some years elapse, then give one look into
22

THE INNER BEAUTY

your soul, and tell me whether, beneath
the recollection of that act, you see not
something that is already purer than
thought; an indescribable, unnameable
force that has nought in common with
the forces of this world ; a mysterious in-
exhaustible spring of the other life, whereat
you may drink for the rest of your days.
And yet will you have rendered no assist-
ance to the untiring queen; other
thoughts will have filled your mind, and
it will be without your knowledge that
the act will have been purified in the
silence of your being, and will have flown
into the precious waters that lie in the
great reservoir of truth and beauty,
which, unlike the shallower reservoir of
true or beautiful thoughts, has an ever
unruffled surface, and remains for all
time out of reach of the breath of life.
Emerson tells us that there is not an act
23

THE INNER BEAUTY

or event in our life but, sooner or later,
casts off its outer shell, and bewilders us
by its sudden flights from the very depths
of us, on high into the empyrean. And
this is true to a far greater extent than
Emerson had foreseen, for the further we
advance in these regions, the diviner are
the spheres we discover.

We can form no adequate conception
of what this silent activity of the souls
that surround us may really mean.
Perhaps you have spoken a pure word to
one of your fellows by whom it has not
been understood. You look upon it as
lost and dismiss it from your mind. But
one day, peradventure, the word comes
up again extraordinarily transformed, and
revealing the unexpected fruit it has
borne in the darkness ; then silence once
more falls over all. But it matters not ;
we have learned that nothing can be lost
24

THE INNER BEAUTY

in the soul, and that even to the very
pettiest there come moments of splendour.
It is unmistakably borne home to us that
even the unhappiest and the most des-
titute of men have at the depths of their
being and in spite of themselves a treasure
of beauty that they cannot despoil.
They have but to acquire the habit of
dipping into this treasure. It suffices
not that beauty should keep solitary
festival in life; it has to become a
festival of every day. There needs no
great effort to be admitted into the ranks
of those * whose eyes no longer behold
earth in flower and sky in glory in
infinitesimal fragments, but indeed in
sublime masses,1 and I speak here of
flowers and sky that are purer and more
lasting than those that we behold.
Thousands of channels there are through
which the beauty of our soul may sail
25

c THE INNER BEAUTY

v

even unto our thoughts. Above all is

there the wonderful, central channel of
love.

Is it not in love that are found the
purest elements of beauty that we can
offer to the soul? Some there are who
do thus in beauty love each other.
And to love thus means that, little by
little, the sense of ugliness is lost; that
one's eyes are closed to all the littlenesses
of life, to all but the freshness and vir-
ginity of the very humblest of souls.
Loving thus, we have no longer even
the need to forgive. Loving thus, we
can no longer have anything to conceal,
for that the ever-present soul transforms
all things into beauty. It is to behold
evil in so far only as it purifies indulgence,
and teaches us no longer to confound the
sinner with his sin. Loving thus do we
raise on high within ourselves all those
26

THE INNER BEAUTY

about u£ who have attained an eminence
where failure has become impossible ;
heights whence a paltry action has so far
to fall that, touching earth, it is com-
pelled to yield up its diamond soul. It
is to transform, though all unconsciously,
the feeblest intention that hovers about
us into illimitable movement. It is to
summon all that is beautiful in earth,
heaven or soul, to the banquet of love.
Loving thus, we do indeed exist before
our fellows as we exist before God. It
means that the least gesture will call
forth the presence of the soul with all its
treasure. No longer is there need of
death, disaster or tears for that the soul
shall appear; a smile suffices. Loving
thus, we perceive truth in happiness as
profoundly as some of the heroes per-
ceived it in the radiance of greatest
sorrow. It means that the beauty that
27

THE INNER BEAUTY

turns into love is undistinguishable from
the love that turns into beauty. It
means to be able no longer to tell where
the ray of a star leaves off and the kiss of
an ordinary thought begins. It means to
have come so near to God that the angels
possess us. Loving thus, the same soul
will have been so beautified by us all that
it will become, little by little, the
4 unique angel ' mentioned by Swedenborg.
It means that each day will reveal to us
a new beauty in that mysterious angel,
and that we shall walk together in a
goodness that shall ever become more and
more living, loftier and loftier. For
there exists also a lifeless beauty, made
up of the past alone; but the veritable
love renders the past useless, and its
approach creates a boundless future of
goodness, without disaster and without
tears. To love thus is but to free one's
28

THE INNER BEAUTY

soul, and to become as beautiful as the
soul thus freed. * If, in the emotion that
this spectacle cannot fail to awaken in
thee,1 says the great Plotinus, when deal-
ing with kindred matters — and of all the
intellects known to me that of Plotinus
draws the nearest to the divine — ' If in
the emotion that this spectacle cannot
fail to awaken in thee, thou proclaimest
not that it is beautiful ; and if, plunging
thine eyes into thyself, thou dost not
then feel the charm of beauty, it is in
vain that, thy disposition being such,
thou shouldst seek the intelligible beauty ;
for thou wouldst seek it only with that
which is ugly and impure. Therefore
it is that the discourse we hold here is
not addressed to all men. But if thou
hast recognised beauty within thyself, see
that thou rise to the recollection of the
intelligible beauty.'

29

SILENCE

'SILENCE and Secrecy!1 cries Carlyle.
'Altars might still be raised to them
(were this an altar-building time) for
universal worship. Silence is the ele-
ment in which great things fashion
themselves together, that at length
they may emerge, full-formed and
majestic, into the daylight of Life, which
they are henceforth to rule. Not
William the Silent only, but all the
30

SILENCE

considerable men I have known, and the
most undiplomatic and unstrategic of
these, forbore to babble of what they
were creating and projecting. Nay, in
thy own mean perplexities, do thou thy-
self but " hold thy tongue for one day " ;
on the morrow how much clearer are thy
purposes and duties ; what wreck and
rubbish have these mute workmen within
thee swept away, when intrusive noises
were shut out ! Speech is too often not,
as the Frenchman defined it, the art of
concealing Thought, but of quite stifling
and suspending Thought, so that there is
none to conceal. Speech, too, is great, but
not the greatest. As the swift inscription
says : " Sprechen ist Silbern, Schweigen
ist goldern" (Speech is silver, Silence is
golden) ; or, as I might rather express it,
Speech is of Time, Silence is of Eternity.
4 Bees will not work except in darkness ;
31

SILENCE

Thought will not work except in Silence ;
neither will Virtue work except in secrecy.'
It is idle to think that, by means of
words, any real communication can ever
pass from one man to another. The lips
or the tongue may represent the soul,
even as a cipher or a number may re-
present a picture of Memling ; but from
the moment that we have something to
say to each other, we are compelled to
hold our peace : and if at such times we
do not listen to the urgent commands of
silence, invisible though they be, we shall
have suffered an eternal loss that all the
treasures of human wisdom cannot make
good; for we shall have let slip the
opportunity of listening to another soul,
and of giving existence, be it only for an
instant, to our own ; and many lives there
are in which such opportunities do not
present themselves twice. . . .
32

SILENCE

It is only when life is sluggish within
us that we speak : only at moments when
reality lies far away, and we do not wish
to be conscious of our brethren. And no
sooner do we speak than something warns
us that the divine gates are closing.
Thus it comes about that we hug silence
to us, and are very misers of it ; and even
the most reckless will not squander it on
the first comer. There is an instinct of the
superhuman truths within us which warns
us that it is dangerous to be silent with
one whom we do not wish to know, or do
not love : for words may pass between
men, but let silence have had its instant
of activity, and it will never efface itself;
and indeed the true life, the only life
that leaves a trace behind, is made up
of silence alone. Bethink it well, in that
silence to which you must again have
resource, so that it may explain itself, by
c 33

SILENCE

itself; and if it be granted to you to
descend for one moment into your soul,
into the depths where the angels dwell, it
is not the words spoken by the creature
you loved so dearly that you will recall,
or the gestures that he made, but it is,
above all, the silences that you have lived
together that will come back to you : for
it is the quality of those silences that
alone revealed the quality of your love
and your souls.

So far I have considered active silence
only, for there is a passive silence, which
is the shadow of sleep, of death or non-
existence. It is the silence of lethargy,
and is even less to be dreaded than
speech, so long as it slumbers ; but beware
lest a sudden incident awake it, for then
would its brother, the great active silence,
at once rear himself upon his throne. Be
on your guard. Two souls would draw
34

SILENCE

near each other: the barriers would fall
asunder, the gates fly open, and the life
of every day be replaced by a life of
deepest earnest, wherein all are defence-
less ; a life in which laughter dares not
show itself, in which there is no obeying,
in which nothing can evermore be for-
gotten. . . .

And it is because we all of us know of
this sombre power and its perilous mani-
festations that we stand in so deep a
dread of silence. We can bear, when need
must be, the silence of ourselves, that of
isolation : but the silence of many —
silence multiplied — and above all the
silence of a crowd — these are super-
natural burdens, whose inexplicable weight
brings dread to the mightiest soul. We
spend a goodly portion of our lives in
seeking places where silence is not. No
sooner have two or three men met than
35

SILENCE

their one thought is to drive away the
invisible enemy ; and of how many
ordinary friendships may it not be said
that their only foundation is the common
hatred of silence ! And if, all efforts not-
withstanding, it contrives to steal among
a number of men, disquiet will fall upon
them, and their restless eyes will wander
in the mysterious direction of things
unseen: and each man will hurriedly go
his way, flying before the intruder: and
henceforth they will avoid each other,
dreading lest a similar disaster should
again befall them, and suspicious as to
whether there be not one among them
who would treacherously throw open the
gate to the enemy. . . .

In the lives of most of us, it will not

happen more than twice or thrice that

silence is really understood and freely

admitted. It is only on the most solemn

36

SILENCE

occasions that the inscrutable guest is
welcomed ; but, when such come about,
there are few who do not make the wel-
come worthy, for even in the lives of the
most wretched there are moments when
they know how to act, even as though
they knew already that which is known
to the gods. Remember the day on
which, without fear in your heart, you met
your first silence. The dread hour had
sounded; silence went before your soul.
You saw it rising from the unspeakable
abysses of life, from the depths of the
inner sea of horror or beauty, and you
did not fly. ... It was at a homecoming,
on the threshold of a departure, in the
midst of a great joy, at the pillow of
a death-bed, on the approach of a dire
misfortune. Bethink you of those mo-
ments when all the secret jewels shone
forth on you, and the slumbering truths
c2 37

SILENCE

sprung to life, and tell me whether silence,
then, was not good and necessary,
whether the caresses of the enemy you
had so persistently shunned were not
truly divine ? The kisses of the silence
of misfortune — and it is above all at
times of misfortune that silence caresses
us — can never be forgotten; and there-
fore it is that those to whom they have
come more often than to others are
worthier than those others. They alone
know, perhaps, how voiceless and un-
fathomable are the waters on which the
fragile shell of daily life reposes : they
have approached nearer to God, and the
steps they have taken towards the light
are steps that can never be lost, for the
soul may not rise, perhaps, but it can
never sink. . . . 'Silence, the great
Empire of Silence,1 says Carlyle again —
he who understood so well the empire of

SILENCE

the life which holds us — 'higher than
the stars, deeper than the Kingdom of
Death ! . . . Silence, and the great silent
men ! . . . Scattered here and there,
each in his department; silently think-
ing, silently working ; whom no morning
newspaper makes mention of! They are
the salt of the earth. A country that
has none or few of these is in a bad way.
Like a forest which had no roots ; which
had all turned to leaves and boughs ;
which must soon wither and be no forest.'
But the real silence, which is greater
still and more difficult of approach than
the material silence of which Carlyle
speaks — the real silence is not one of
those gods that can desert mankind.
It surrounds us on every side; it is
the source of the undercurrents of our
life ; and let one of us but knock, with
trembling fingers, at the door of the abyss,

SILENCE

it is always by the same attentive silence
that this door will be opened.

It is a thing that knows no limit, and
before it all men are equal ; and the
silence of king or slave, in presence of
death, or grief, or love, reveals the
same features, hides beneath its im-
penetrable mantle the self-same treasure.
For this is the essential silence of our
soul, our most inviolable sanctuary, and
its secret can never be lost ; and, were the
first born of men to meet the last inhabi-
tant of the earth, a kindred impulse
would sway them, and they would be
voiceless in their caresses, in their terror
and their tears ; a kindred impulse would
sway them, and all that could be said
without falsehood would call for no spoken
word : and, the centuries notwithstanding,
there would come to them, at the same
moment, as though one cradle had held
40

SILENCE

them both, comprehension of that which
the tongue shall not learn to tell before
the world ceases. . . .

No sooner are the lips still than the
soul awakes, and sets forth on its labours ;
for silence is an element that is full of
surprise, danger and happiness, and in
these the soul possesses itself in freedom.
If it be indeed your desire to give your-
self over to another, be silent ; and if you
fear being silent with him — unless this
fear be the proud uncertainty, or hunger,
of the love that yearns for prodigies — fly
from him, for your soul knows well how
far it may go. There are men in whose
presence the greatest of heroes would not
dare to be silent ; and even the soul that
has nothing to conceal trembles lest
another should discover its secret. Some
there are that have no silence, and that
kill the silence around them, and these
41

SILENCE

are the only creatures that pass through
life unperceived. To them it is not given
to cross the zone of revelation, the great
zone of the firm and faithful light.

We cannot conceive what sort of man
is he who has never been silent. It is to
us as though his soul were featureless.
* We do not know each other yet,1 wrote
to me one whom I hold dear above all
others, 'we have not yet dared to be
silent together/ And it was true :
already did we love each other so deeply
that we shrank from the superhuman
ordeal. And each time that silence fell
upon us — the angel of the supreme truth,
the messenger that brings to the heart
the tidings of the unknown — each time
did we feel that our souls were craving
mercy on their knees, were begging for a
few hours more of innocent falsehood, a
few hours of ignorance, a few hours of
42

SILENCE

childhood. . . . And none the less must
its hour come. It is the sun of love, and
it ripens the fruit of the soul, as the sun
of heaven ripens the fruits of the earth.
But it is not without cause that men fear
it; for none can ever tell what will be
the quality of the silence which is about
to fall upon them. Though all words
may be akin, every silence differs from
its fellow; and, with rare exceptions,
it is an entire destiny that will be
governed by the quality of this first
silence which is descending upon two
souls. They blend : we know not where,
for the reservoirs of silence lie far above
the reservoirs of thought, and the strange
resultant brew is either sinisterly bitter
or profoundly sweet. Two souls, admir-
able both and of equal power, may yet
give birth to a hostile silence, and wage
pitiless war against each other in the
43

SILENCE

darkness ; while it may be that the soul
of a convict shall go forth and commune
in divine silence with the soul of a virgin.
The result can never be foretold ; all
this comes to pass in a heaven that never
warns; and therefore it is that the
tenderest of lovers will often defer to the
last hour of all the solemn entry of the
great revealer of the depths of our
being. . . .

For they too are well aware — the love
that is truly love brings the most frivolous
back to life's centre — they too are well
aware that all that had gone before was but
as children playing outside the gates, and
that it is now that the walls are falling
and existence lying bare. Their silence
will be even as are the gods within them ;
and if in this first silence, there be not
harmony, there can be no love in their
souls, for the silence will never change.
44

SILENCE

It may rise or it may fall between two
souls, but its nature can never alter ; and
even until the death of the lovers will it
retain the form, the attitude and the
power that were its own when, for the
first time, it came into the room.

As we advance through life, it is more
and more brought home to us that
nothing takes place that is not in accord
with some curious, preconceived design :
and of this we never breathe a word, we
scarcely dare to let our minds dwell upon
it, but of its existence, somewhere above
our heads, we are absolutely convinced.
The most fatuous of men smiles, at the
first encounters, as though he were the
accomplice of the destiny of his brethren.
And in this domain, even those who can
speak the most profoundly realise — they,
perhaps, more than others — that words
can never express the real, special relation-
45

SILENCE

ship that exists between two beings.
Were I to speak to you at this moment
of the gravest things of all — of love,
death or destiny — it is not love, death
or destiny that I should touch ; and,
my efforts notwithstanding, there would
always remain between us a truth which
had not been spoken, which we had not
even thought of speaking ; and yet it is
this truth only, voiceless though it has
been, which will have lived with us for
an instant, and by which we shall have
been wholly absorbed. For that truth,
was our truth as regards death des-
tiny or love, and it was in silence only
that we could perceive it. And nothing
save only the silence will have had any
importance. 'My sisters,' says a child
in the fairy-story, cyou have each of
you a secret thought — I wish to know
it.' We, too, have something that people
46

SILENCE

wish to know, but it is hidden far above
the secret thought — it is our secret silence.
But all questions are useless. When our
spirit is alarmed, its own agitation becomes
a barrier to the second life that lives in
this secret ; and, would we know what it is
that lies hidden there, we must cultivate
silence among ourselves, for it is then
only that for one instant the eternal
flowers unfold their petals, the mysterious
flowers whose form and colour are ever
changing in harmony with the soul that
is by their side. As gold and silver are
weighed in pure water, so does the soul
test its weight in silence, and the words
that we let fall have no meaning apart
from the silence that wraps them round.
If I tell someone that I love him — as I
may have told a hundred others — my
words will convey nothing to him ; but
the silence which will ensue, if I do indeed
47

SILENCE

love him, will make clear in what depths
lie the roots of my love, and will in its
turn give birth to a conviction, that shall
itself be silent ; and in the course of a
lifetime, this silence and this conviction
will never again be the same. . . .

Is it not silence that determines and
fixes the savour of love ? Deprived of it,
love would lose its eternal essence and
perfume. Who has not known those
silent moments which separated the lips
to reunite the souls ? It is these that we
must ever seek. There is no silence more
docile than the silence of love, and it is
indeed the only one that we may claim
for ourselves alone. The other great
silences, those of death, grief or destiny,
do not belong to us. They come towards
us at their own hour, following in the
track of events, and those whom they do
not meet need not reproach themselves.
48

SILENCE

But we can all go forth to meet the
silences of love. They lie in wait for us,
night and day, at our threshold, and are
no less beautiful than their brothers.
And it is thanks to them that those who
have seldom wept may know the life of
the soul almost as intimately as those to
whom much grief has come : andnherefore
it is that such of us as have loved deeply
have learnt many secrets that are unknown
to others : for thousands and thousands
of things quiver in silence on the lips of
true friendship and love, that are not
to be found in the silence of other
lips, to which friendship and love are
unknown. . . /

49

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

IT is a thing, said to me one evening the
sage I had chanced to meet by the sea
shore, whereon the waves were breaking
almost noiselessly — it is a thing that we
scarcely notice, that none seem to take
into account, and yet do I conceive it to
be one of the forces that safeguard man-
kind. In a thousand diverse ways do the
gods from whom we spring reveal them-
selves within us, but it may well be that
50

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

this unnoticed secret goodness, to which
sufficiently direct allusion has never yet
been made, is the purest token of their
eternal life. Whence it comes we know
not. It is there in its simplicity, smiling
on the threshold of our soul ; and those
in whom its smiles lie deepest, or shine
forth most frequently, may make us suffer
day and night and they will, yet shall it
be beyond our power to cease to love
them. . . .

It is not of this world, and still are there
few agitations of ours in which it takes
not part. It cares not to reveal itself
even hi look or tear. Nay, it seeks con-
cealment, for reasons one cannot divine.
It is as though it were afraid to make
use of its power. It knows that its most
involuntary movement will cause immortal
things to spring to life about it ; and we
are miserly with immortal things. Why
61

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

are we so fearful lest we exhaust the
heaven within us? We dare not act
upon the whisper of the God who inspires
us. We are afraid of everything that
cannot be explained by word or gesture ;
and we shut our eyes to all that we do,
ourselves notwithstanding, in the empire
where explanations are vain ! Whence
comes the timidity of the divine in man ?
For truly might it be said that the nearer
a movement of our soul approaches the
divine, so much the more scrupulously
do we conceal it from the eyes of our
brethren. Can it be that man is nothing
but a frightened god ? Or has the com-
mand been laid upon us that the superior
powers must not be betrayed ? Upon all
that does not form part of this too visible
world there rests the tender meekness of
the little ailing girl, for whom her mother
will not send when strangers come to the
52

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

house. And therefore it is that this secret
goodness of ours has never yet passed
through the silent portals of our soul.
It lives within us like a prisoner forbidden
to approach the barred window of her
cell. But indeed, what matter though it
do not approach ? Enough that it be
there. Hide as it may, let it but raise its
head, move a link of its chain or open its
hand, and the prison is illumined, the
pressure of radiance from within bursts
open the iron barrier, and then, suddenly,
there yawns a gulf between words and
beings, a gulf peopled with agitated
angels : silence falls over all : the eyes
turn away for a moment and two souls
embrace tearfully on the threshold. . . .

It is not a thing that comes from this

earth of ours, and all descriptions can be

of no avail. They who would understand

must have, in themselves too, the same

D2 63

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

point of sensibility. If you have never in
your life felt the power of your invisible
goodness, go no further; it would be
useless. But are there really any who
have not felt this power, and have the
worst of us never been invisibly good ? I
know not : of so many in this world does
the aim seem to be the discouragement of
the divine in their soul. And yet there
needs but one instant of respite for the
divine to spring up again, and even the
wickedest are not incessantly on their
guard; and hence doubtless has it
arisen that so many of the wicked
are good, unseen of all, whereas divers
saints and sages are not invisibly
good. . . .

More than once have I been the

cause of suffering, he went on, even as

each being is the cause of suffering about

him. I have caused suffering because we

54

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

are in a world where all is held together
by invisible threads, in a world where
none are alone, and where the gentlest
gesture of love or kindliness may so often
wound the innocence by our side! —
I have caused suffering, too, because
there are times when the best and
tenderest are impelled to seek I know
not what part of themselves in the grief
of others. For, indeed, there are seeds
that only spring up in our soul beneath
the rain of tears shed because of us, and
none the less do these seeds produce good
flowers and salutary fruit. What would
you? It is no law of our making, and
I know not whether I would dare to love
the man who had made no one weep.
Frequently, indeed, will the greatest suf-
fering be caused by those whose love is
greatest, for a strange, timid, tender
cruelty is most often the anxious sister of
65

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

love. On all sides does love search for
the proofs of love, and the first proofs —
who is not prone to discover them in the
tears of the beloved ?

Even death could not suffice to reassure
the lover who dared to give ear to the
unreasoning claims of love; for to the
intimate cruelty of love, the instant of
death seems too brief; over beyond death
there is yet room for a sea of doubts, and
even in those who die together may dis-
quiet still linger as they die. Long, slowly
falling tears are needed here. Grief is
love^ first food, and every love that has
not been fed on a little pure suffering
must die like the babe that one had
tried to nourish on the nourishment of
a man. Will the love inspired by the
woman who always brought the smile to
your lips be quite the same as the love
you feel for her who at times called
56

forth your tears ? Alas ! needs must love
weep, and often indeed is it at the very
moment when the sobs burst forth that
love's chains are forged and tempered for
life. . . .

Thus, he continued, I have caused
suffering because I loved, and also have
I caused suffering because I did not love
— but how great was the difference in
the two cases ! In the one the slowly
dropping tears of well-tried love seemed
already to know, at the depths of them,
that they were bedewing all that was
ineffable in our united souls ; in the other
the poor tears knew that they were falling
in solitude on a desert. But it is at
those very moments when the soul is all
ear — or, haply, all soul — that I have
recognised the might of an invisible good-
ness that could offer to the wretched tears
of an expiring love the divine illusions
57

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

of a love on the eve of birth. Has there
never come to you one of those sorrowful
evenings when dejection lay heavy upon
your unsmiling kisses, and it at length
dawned upon your soul that it had been
mistaken ? With direst difficulty did your
words ring forth in the cold air of the
separation that was to be final ; you were
about to part for ever, and your almost
lifeless hands were outstretched for the
farewell of a departure that should know
no return, when suddenly your soul made
an imperceptible movement within itself.
On that instant did the soul by the side
of you awake on the summits of its being ;
something sprang to life in regions loftier
far than the love of jaded lovers ; and for
all that the bodies might shrink asunder,
henceforth would the souls never forget
that for an instant they had beheld each
other high above mountains they had
58

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

never seen, and that for a second's space
they had been good with a goodness they
had never known until that day. . . .

What can this be, this mysterious
movement that I speak of here in con-
nection with love only, but which may
well take place in the smallest events of
life? Is it I know not what sacrifice
or inner embrace, is it the profoundest
desire to be soul for a soul, or the con-
sciousness, ever quickening within us, of
the presence of a life that is invisible,
but equal to our own ? Is it all that is
admirable and sorrowful in the mere act
of living that, at such moments, floods
our being — is it the aspect of life, one
and indivisible? I know not; but in
truth it is then that we feel that there
lurks, somewhere, an unknown force; it is
then that we feel that we are the treasures
of an unknown God who loves all, that

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

not a gesture of this God may pass unper-
ceived, and that we are at length in the
region of things that do not betray them-
selves. . . .

Certain it is that, from the day of our
birth to the day of our death, we never
emerge from this clearly defined region,
but wander in God like helpless sleep-
walkers, or like the blind who despairingly
seek the very temple in which they do
indeed befind themselves. We are there
in life, man against man, soul against
soul, and day and night are spent under
arms. We never see each other, we never
touch each other. We see nothing but
bucklers and helmets, we touch nothing
but iron and brass. But let a tiny
circumstance, come from the simpleness
of the sky, for one instant only cause
the weapons to fall, are there not always
tears beneath the helmet, childlike smiles
60

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

behind the buckler, and is not another
verity revealed ?

He thought for a moment, then went
on, more sadly : A woman — as I believe
I told you just now — a woman to whom
I had caused suffering against my will —
for the most careful of us scatter suffering
around them without their knowledge —
a woman to whom I had caused suffering
against my will, revealed to me one
evening the sovereign power of this in-
visible good. To be good we must needs
have suffered ; but perhaps it is necessary
to have caused suffering before we can
become better. This was brought home
to me that evening. I felt that I had
arrived, alone, at that sad zone of kisses
when it seems to us that we are visiting
the hovels of the poor, while she, who
had lingered on the road, was still smiling
in the palace of the first days. Love, as
61

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

men understand it, was dying between us
like a child stricken with a disease come
one knows not whence, a disease that has
no pity. We said nothing. It would
be impossible for me to recall what my
thoughts were at that earnest moment.
They were doubtless of no significance.
I was probably thinking of the last face
I had seen, of the quivering gleam of a
lantern at a deserted street corner; and,
nevertheless, everything took place in a
light a thousand times purer, a thousand
times higher, than had there intervened all
the forces of pity and love which I com-
mand in my thoughts and my heart. We
parted, and not a word was spoken, but at
one and the same moment had we under-
stood our inexpressible thought. We
know now that another love had sprung to
life, a love that demands not the words, the
little attentions and smiles of ordinary
62

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

love. We have never met again. Perhaps
centuries will elapse before we ever do
meet again.

' Much is to learn, much to forget,
Through worlds I shall traverse not a

few1

before we shall again find ourselves in the
same movement of the soul as on that
evening: but we can well afford to
wait. . . .

And thus, ever since that day, have I
greeted, in all places, even in the very
bitterest of moments, the beneficent pres-
ence of this marvellous power. He who
has but once clearly seen it, shall never
again find it possible to turn away from
its face. You will often behold it smiling
in the last retreat of hatred, in the depths
of the cruellest tears. And yet does it
not reveal itself to the eyes of the body.
Its nature changes from the moment that
63

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

it manifests itself by means of an exterior
act; and we are no longer in the truth
according to the soul, but in a kind of
falsehood as conceived by man. Good-
ness and love that are self-conscious have
no influence on the soul, for they have
departed from the kingdoms where they
have their dwelling; but, do they only
remain blind, they can soften Destiny
itself. I have known more than one man
who performed every act of kindness and
mercy without touching a single soul ;
and I have known others, who seemed
to live in falsehood and injustice, yet
were no souls driven from them nor
did any for an instant even believe
that these men were not good. Nay,
more, even those who do not know
you, who are merely told of your acts
of goodness and deeds of love — if you
be not good according to the invisible
64

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

goodness, these, even, will feel that
something is lacking, and they will never
be touched in the depths of their being.
One might almost believe that there
exists, somewhere, a place where all is
weighed in the presence of the spirits, or
perhaps, out yonder, the other side of the
night, a reservoir of certitudes whither
the silent herd of souls flock every morn-
ing to slake their thirst.

Perhaps we do not yet know what
the word 'to love1 means. There are
within us lives in which we love uncon-
sciously. To love thus means more than
to have pity, to make inner sacrifices, to
be anxious to help and give happiness ; it
is a thing that lies a thousand fathoms
deeper, where our softest, swiftest, strong-
est words cannot reach it. At moments
we might believe it to be a recollection,
furtive, but excessively keen, of the great
E 65

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

primitive unity. There is in this love
a force that nothing can resist. Which
of us — an he question himself the side of
the light, from which our gaze is habitu-
ally averted — which of us but will find in
himself the recollection of certain strange
workings of this force? Which of us,
when by the side of the most ordinary
person perhaps, but has suddenly become
conscious of the advent of something that
none had summoned? Was it the soul,
or perhaps life, that had turned within
itself like a sleeper on the point of
awakening? I know not; nor did you
know, and no one spoke of it; but you
did not separate from each other as
though nothing had happened.

To love thus is to love according to
the soul ; and there is no soul that does
not respond to this love. For the soul
of man is a guest that has gone hungry

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

these centuries back, and never has it to
be summoned twice to the nuptial feast.
The souls of all our brethren are ever
hovering about us, craving for a caress,
and only waiting for the signal. But how
many beings there are who all their life
long have not dared make such a signal !
It is the disaster of our entire existence
that we live thus away from our soul, and
stand in such dread of its slightest move-
ment. Did we but allow it to smile
frankly in its silence and its radiance, we
should be already living an eternal life.
We have only to think for an instant
how much it succeeds in accomplishing
during those rare moments when we
knock off its chains — for it is our custom
to enchain it as though it were distraught
— what it does in love, for instance, for
there we do permit it at times to ap-
proach the lattices of external life. And
67

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

would it not be in accordance with the
primal truth if all men were to feel that
they were face to face with each other,
even as the woman feels with the man
she loves ?

This invisible and divine goodness, of
which I only speak here because of its
being one of the surest and nearest signs
of the unceasing activity of our soul, this
invisible and divine goodness ennobles,
in decisive fashion, all that it has un-
consciously touched. Let him who has a
grievance against his fellow, descend into
himself and seek out whether he never
has been good in the presence of that
fellow. For myself, I have never met any
one by whose side I have felt my invisible
goodness bestir itself, without he has
become, at that very instant, better than
myself. Be good at the depths of you,
and you will discover that those who
68

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

surround you will be good even to the
same depths. Nothing responds more
infallibly to the secret cry of goodness
than the secret cry of goodness
that is near. While you are actively
good in the invisible, all those who ap-
proach you will unconsciously do things
that they could not do by the side of any
other man. Therein lies a force that has
no name ; a spiritual rivalry that knows
no resistance. It is as though this were
the actual place where is the sensitive
spot of our soul ; for there are souls
that seem to have forgotten their existence
and to have renounced everything that
enables the being to rise ; but, once
touched here, they all draw themselves
erect ; and in the divine plains of the
secret goodness, the most humble of
souls cannot endure defeat.

And yet it is possible that nothing is
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THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

changing in the life one sees ; but is it
only that which matters, and is our
existence indeed confined to actions we
can take in our hand like stones on the
highroad? If you ask yourself, as we
are told we should ask every evening,
* What of immortal have I done to-day ? *
Is it always on the material side that we
can count, weigh and measure unerringly ;
is it there that you must begin your
search? It is possible for you to cause
extraordinary tears to flow ; it is possible
that you may fill a heart with unheard-
of certitudes, and give eternal life unto
a soul, and no one shall know of it, nor
shall you even know yourself. It may be
that nothing is changing ; it may be that
were it put to the test all would crumble,
and that this goodness we speak of would
yield to the smallest fear. It matters
not. Something divine has happened ;
70

THE INVISIBLE GOODNESS

and somewhere must our God. have
smiled. May it not be the supreme aim
of life thus to bring to birth the inexplic-
able within ourselves ; and do we know how
much we add to ourselves when we awake
something of the incomprehensible that
slumbers in every corner? Here you
have awakened love which will not fall
asleep again. The soul that your soul
has regarded, that has wept with you the
holy tears of the solemn joy that none
may behold, will bear you no resentment,
not even in the midst of torture. It will
not even feel the need of forgiving. So
convinced is it of one knows not what,
that nothing can henceforth dim or efface
the smile that it wears within ; for nothing
can ever separate two souls which, for an
instant, ' have been good together.1

71

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