- end_line
- 9927
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:09.931Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 9864
- text
- spawn and depart. We inhabit but a crust, rough surfaces, odds and ends
of the isles; the abounding lagoon being its two-thirds, its grand
feature from afar; and forever unfathomable.
“‘What shaft has yet been sunk to the antipodes? What underlieth the
gold mines?
“‘But even here, above-ground, we grope with the sun at meridian.
Vainly, we seek our Northwest Passages,—old alleys, and thoroughfares
of the whales.
“‘Oh men! fellow men! we are only what we are; not what we would be;
nor every thing we hope for. We are but a step in a scale, that reaches
further above us than below. We breathe but oxygen. Who in Arcturus
hath heard of us? They know us not in the Milky Way. We prate of
faculties divine: and know not how sprouteth a spear of grass; we go
about shrugging our shoulders: when the firmament-arch is over us; we
rant of etherealities: and long tarry over our banquets; we demand
Eternity for a lifetime: when our mortal half-hours too often prove
tedious. We know not of what we talk. The Bird of Paradise out-flies
our flutterings. What it is to be immortal, has not yet entered into
our thoughts. At will, we build our futurities; tier above tier, all
galleries full of laureates: resounding with everlasting oratorios!
Pater-nosters forever, or eternal Misereres! forgetting that in Mardi,
our breviaries oft fall from our hands. But divans there are, some say,
whereon we shall recline, basking in effulgent suns, knowing neither
Orient nor Occident. Is it so? Fellow men! our mortal lives have an
end; but that end is no goal: no place of repose. Whatever it may be,
it will prove but as the beginning of another race. We will hope, joy,
weep, as before; though our tears may be such as the spice-trees shed.
Supine we can only be, annihilated.
“‘The thick film is breaking; the ages have long been circling.
Fellow-men! if we live hereafter, it will not be in lyrics; nor shall
we yawn, and our shadows lengthen, while the eternal cycles are
revolving. To live at all, is a high vocation; to live forever, and run
parallel with Oro, may truly appall us. Toil we not here? and shall we
be forever slothful elsewhere? Other worlds differ not much from this,
but in degree. Doubtless, a pebble is a fair specimen of the universe.
“‘We point at random. Peradventure at this instant, there are beings
gazing up to this very world as their future heaven. But the universe
is all over a heaven: nothing but stars on stars, throughout infinities
of expansion. All we see are but a cluster. Could we get to Bootes, we
would be no nearer Oro, than now he hath no place; but is here.
Already, in its unimaginable roamings, our system may have dragged us
through and through the spaces, where we plant cities of beryl and
jasper. Even now, we may be inhaling the ether, which we fancy seraphic
wings are fanning. But look round. There is much to be seen here, and
now. Do the archangels survey aught more glorious than the
constellations we nightly behold? Continually we slight the wonders, we
deem in reserve. We await the present. With marvels we are glutted,
till we hold them no marvels at all. But had these eyes first opened
upon all the prodigies in the Revelation of the Dreamer, long
familiarity would have made them appear, even as these things we see.
Now, _now_, the page is out-spread: to the simple, easy as a primer; to
the wise, more puzzling than hieroglyphics. The eternity to come, is
but a prolongation of time present: and the beginning may be more
wonderful than the end.
“‘Then let us be wise. But much of the knowledge we seek, already we
have in our cores. Yet so simple it is, we despise it; so bold, we fear
it.
- title
- Chunk 2