The truth is that love, considered merely as the preference of one
person for another of the opposite sex, is not "the greatest thing
in the world." It becomes great only when it leads on, as it often
does, to heroism and self-sacrifice and fidelity. Its chief value
for art (the interpreter) lies not in itself, but in its quickening
relation to the other elements of life. It must be seen and shown
in its due proportion, and in harmony with the broader landscape.
Do you believe that in all the world there is only one woman
specially created for each man, and that the order of the universe
will be hopelessly askew unless these two needles find each other in
the haystack? You believe it for yourself, perhaps; but do you
believe it for Tom Johnson? You remember what a terrific
disturbance he made in the summer of 189-, at Bar Harbor, about
Ellinor Brown, and how he ran away with her in September. You have
also seen them together (occasionally) at Lenox and Newport, since
their marriage. Are you honestly of the opinion that if Tom had not
married Ellinor, these two young lives would have been a total
wreck?
Adam Smith, in his book on THE MORAL SENTIMENTS, goes so far as to
say that "love is not interesting to the observer because it is AN
AFFECTION OF THE IMAGINATION, into which it is difficult for a third
party to enter." Something of the same kind occurred to me in
regard to Tom and Ellinor. Yet I would not have presumed to suggest
this thought to either of them. Nor would I have quoted in their
hearing the melancholy and frigid prediction of Ralph Waldo Emerson,
to the effect that they would some day discover "that all which at
first drew them together--those once sacred features, that magical
play of charm--was deciduous."
DECIDUOUS, indeed? Cold, unpleasant, botanical word! Rather would
I prognosticate for the lovers something perennial,
"A sober certainty of waking bliss,"
to survive the evanescence of love's young dream. Ellinor should
turn out to be a woman like the Lady Elizabeth Hastings, of whom
Richard Steele wrote that "to love her was a liberal education."
Tom should prove that he had in him the lasting stuff of a true man
and a hero. Then it would make little difference whether their
conjunction had been eternally prescribed in the book of fate or
not. It would be evidently a fit match, made on earth and
illustrative of heaven.
But even in the making of such a match as this, the various stages
of attraction, infatuation, and appropriation should not be
displayed too prominently before the world, nor treated as events of
overwhelming importance and enduring moment. I would not counsel
Tom and Ellinor, in the midsummer of their engagement, to have their
photographs taken together in affectionate attitudes.
The pictures of an imaginary kind which deal with the subject of
romantic love are, almost without exception, fatuous and futile.
The inanely amatory, with their languishing eyes, weary us. The
endlessly osculatory, with their protracted salutations, are
sickening. Even when an air of sentimental propriety is thrown
about them by some such title as "Wedded" or "The Honeymoon," they
fatigue us. For the most part, they remind me of the remark which
the Commodore made upon a certain painting of Jupiter and lo which
hangs in the writing-room of the Contrary Club.
"Sir," said that gently piercing critic, "that picture is equally
unsatisfactory to the artist, to the moralist, and to the
voluptuary."
Nevertheless, having made a clean breast of my misgivings and
reservations on the subject of lovers and landscape, I will now
confess that the whole of my doubts do not weigh much against my
unreasoned faith in romantic love. At heart I am no infidel, but a
most obstinate believer and devotee. My seasons of skepticism are
transient. They are connected with a torpid liver and aggravated by
confinement to a sedentary life and enforced abstinence from
angling. Out-of-doors, I return to a saner and happier frame of
mind.
As my wheel rolls along the Riverside Drive in the golden glow of
the sunset, I rejoice that the episode of Charles Henry and Matilda
Jane has not been omitted from the view. This vast and populous
city, with all its passing show of life, would be little better than
a waste, howling wilderness if we could not catch a glimpse, now and
then, of young people falling in love in the good old-fashioned way.
Even on a trout-stream, I have seen nothing prettier than the sight
upon which I once came suddenly as I was fishing down the Neversink.
A boy was kneeling beside the brook, and a girl was giving him a
drink of water out of her rosy hands. They stared with wonder and
compassion at the wet and solitary angler, wading down the stream,
as if he were some kind of a mild lunatic. But as I glanced
discreetly at their small tableau, I was not unconscious of the new
joy that came into the landscape with the presence of
"A lover and his lass."
I knew how sweet the water tasted from that kind of a cup. I also
have lived in Arcadia, and have not forgotten the way back.
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