statue, at the first sight; there is a mind and heart to be searched;
the veil of modesty covers merit, and the mask of hypocrisy disguises
malignity. There are but few judges that have knowledge to discern
aright to pass sentence; 'tis but by little and little, and perhaps even
by time and occasion, that complete virtue or perfect vice come at last
to show themselves." "A man," said Emerson, "is like a bit of Labrador
spar, which has no lustre as you turn it in your hand, until you come to
a particular angle; then it shows deep and beautiful colors." What you
think of him depends so much on how you look at him. As a creature of
small ways and little achievements, he seems fit only for "stopping a
bung-hole;" as an embodiment of every manly trait and of every Christian
virtue, he appears indeed "a noble animal, splendid in ashes, and
pompous in the grave." The petty tyrant of a family, he satirizes Caesar;
the canting bigot of the church, he brings reproach upon religion. Now a
gentleman, he makes you think of Sidney; now a beast, of Swift's
revolting Yahoo. When truly humble and consciously ignorant, he hath the
aspect of a child of God; when conceited, dogmatic, aggressive, all the
forgotten orthodox teachings of the fate of the hopeless come back to
you with the force of apostolic thunder. As the splendid immortal he is
destined to be, you hasten to apotheosize him; as the monster he
sometimes appears, you wonder that he exists. Burns, who was a master in
human nature, characterized woman as "great for good, or great for evil;
when not an angel, she's a devil." "There is something still more to be
dreaded than a Jesuit," said Eugene Sue, "and that is a Jesuitess." It
seems to be nearly impossible to be moderate. If we are calm or
deliberate enough to be just, we are almost sure to be indifferent. Our
ignorance, our education, our interests, our prejudices, blind our eyes,
darken our minds, or drive us to violence. There is nothing half and
half about us. The little that we see, we see so differently and so
partially, and ignorance finds its complement in feeling. Dryden said of
some of the judges of his day, that, right or wrong, they always decided
for the poor against the rich; and he quoted a saying of Charles II.,
that the crown was uniformly worsted in every case which was heard
before Sir Matthew Hale. "The eyes of critics," said Landor, "whether
in commending or carping, are both on one side, like a turbot's."
"Truth, as Humanity knows it," said Bulwer, "is not what the schoolmen
call it, one and indivisible; it is like light, and splits not only into
elementary colors, but into innumerable tints. Truth with Raphael is not
the same as truth with Titian; truth with Shakespeare is not the same as
truth with Milton; truth with St. Xavier is not the same as truth with
Luther; truth with Pitt is not the same as truth with Fox. Each man
takes from life his favorite truth, as each man takes from light his
favorite color."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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