Forging of Passion into Power/Preface
PREFACE
In matters of external advantage the poor must feed on the crumbs which fall from the rich man's table. In the mental science of how to suspend passion so as to convert it into power, the inverse rule holds good. Or perhaps it would be a truer statement of the case if we said that the same rule holds good in both realms, but the classification is inverted: the rich in the goods of this world have to ask for crumbs which fall from the table of the others.
Many of the world's wealthy ones appear to be sincerely desirous to give to us more than crumbs of their external advantages. But there seems to be some insuperable obstacle in the way. The poor in money, health, sanity, culture, and reputation are always with us, and the other poor, the poor in the science of forging passion into power, are with us too.
Perhaps one reason why the world's favoured ones find it difficult to reach us either to give or to receive effectively, is that we, the poor, do not reach each other. Perhaps if we were more generous to each other, the current thus set flowing might draw with it the possibility of effective currents being set flowing across barriers made by worldly prosperity.
I hope in this volume to introduce to each other various kinds of persons who, in various ways, have successfully learned the great art of converting passion into power.
If, or in so far as, any of the world's favoured ones should at some future day read, and in any manner profit by, the following pages, what they receive will be a gift from the poor to the rich, from the sick to the healthy, from those who have lacked the advantages of education to those who have enjoyed them, from patients in lunacy wards to commissioners in lunacy, from overworked and struggling illegitimate children to their sheltered and well-cared-for legitimate cousins, from Asia to Europe, from Celts to Anglo-Saxons, from despised and oppressed races to their conquerors, from the hooligan class to the respectable, from Jews to Christendom, from benighted and superstitious orthodox Jews to their liberal and enlightened co-religionists, from everything that is despised and rejected to whosoever is honoured by the world.
But for the present we, the less favoured ones, are going to have a little talk together.
Of those who have assisted in accumulating the information contained in this work, such as are still in the flesh can claim their share of credit (or discredit?) if they like to do so. There is a word or two that must be said about some who have passed into the Silent Land.
Nicolas Antoine Boulanger.—Left school a hopeless dunce, who could not learn algebra. Died in his fortieth year, a good mathematician, and a famous engineer. Was one of the Enyclopædists. Left behind him writings from which it appears evident that he had recovered the Ancient Secret Method used in Egypt and India for training scientific men, engineers, and prophets.
John Boole.—Made shoes, shortly after the date of the French Revolution, in an underground and sometimes very damp cellar in London. Kept a French dictionary in the drawer with his tools. Set up a shoemaker's shop in Lincoln. After his death, his widow, being congratulated on the achievements of her son, a distinguished mathematician, replied: "Yes; George is a clever lad. But did you know his father, sir? He was a philosopher."
George Everest.—Went to India at sixteen years old, in the service of the East India Company. Put himself under the tuition of natives of India. Learned from them Oriental languages, religion, and philosophy, and taught himself European mathematics from books. Became Surveyor-General of India.
George, soft of the above-named John Boole.—Earned his own living from the age of fifteen and a half. Was prevented from going to college by the necessity of assisting to maintain his parents and younger brothers. Became distinguished in logic and mathematics.
James Hinton.—Began life at about fifteen as cashier in a woollen-draper's shop. Wrote books on morphology and psychology that considerably affected the trend of science.
David Marks.—Was brought up at the Jews' Free School, and earned his own living from the age of fourteen. In his youth no honourable careers were open to Jews, except as teachers among their own people, and, being really much attracted by the New Testament, the brilliant boy was terribly tempted for some years to make a profession of Christianity in order to open up for himself a possibility of entering some university. But by the age of twenty he had finally taken his resolution; to use his own expression, he had decided that "there was life in the old ship yet." He came to the conclusion that the best Christianity for a Jew is to conduct himself and his ritual so that Jesus Christ, if He were on earth, might worship beside him with satisfaction. Never were more significant words uttered in London than when David Marks said to his congregation at Berkeley Street: "If the Founder of Christianity came back to earth, where would He be to-day? In church? No, but here with us, repeating the Shemang Israel as a good Jew should, and as He did when on earth."
On his ninetieth birthday David Marks received congratulations and thanks from Jews all over the world for having pioneered the way for Israel from slavery and superstition towards culture and progress.
But the reformer, in his anxiety to purify the old Hebrew ritual from superstitious and misleading accretions, left out several elements of overwhelming importance to our knowledge of the methods of culture in use in the Sacred Past where men were trained in the science of prophecy. These elements have mercifully been preserved for us by old-fashioned Jews in Russia and Poland and the Ghetto quarters of East London:— "This strange people, wading through the ages, bearing on their shoulders the burden of their great trust."
Lucy Everest Boole.—Never at any college. Learned chemistry in order to qualify to act as dispenser or shop assistant in pharmacy. Became Fellow of the Institute of Chemistry, Lecturer on Chemistry, and Head of the Chemical Laboratories at the London School of Medicine for Women.
"Frances," only child of an Irish gentleman of good family who died early, leaving her a ward of the English Court of Chancery. During an illness which supervened on the death of her mother, she was found, by a jury consisting of two or three English doctors (who were not her peers), guilty of two crimes, viz., incapacity for taking care of money, and the habit of using Oriental imagery to express thoughts too subtle or too sublime to find expression in ordinary English. She was imprisoned in a lunatic asylum. The familiarities and spiritual promiscuity of such places being intolerable to her sensitive instincts, she took refuge in a mode of self-protection often resorted to in such cases: she set up a claim to be called Queen, and surrounded herself with a sort of mock court etiquette. She took the title of "Queen of Servia " (Land of Slaves), and the signature "Frances Obrenovitch," and occupied herself in studying psychology and in acting as a sort of confidante, confessor, or chaplain to such of the patients (and they were not a few) as she could induce to listen to her exhortations. I met her when she had been already four years in captivity; she was, I think, the grandest spiritual force which ever came into my life. She was so little under any real delusion about her title that from the time she realised my respect for her spiritual instincts she forbade me to kiss her hand, or to address her as "your Majesty." She suffered terribly from the constant companionship of lunatics, some of whom were vicious, and of doctors and nurses, all of whom were ignorant of psychology, and, though kindly and well-meaning, often hideously irreverent. I offered to procure her freedom by taking out a certificate as lunatic attendant and getting her consigned to my care. The temptation to consent was evidently very great. But she had scruples about hampering my work and career; and, after a few days of heroic struggle with herself, she not only refused to accept my offer, but gave me to understand that the continuance of our friendship depended on my abstaining in future from putting such temptation in her way. To her I owe nearly all that I know about adumbrations and nostalgias; about the conditions under which hallucinations become fixed, and the manner in which they can be dispersed; about the formation of protective optical illusions and the prevention of dangerous delusions. She gave me my first clear insight into the systematic use of Oriental imagery as an organic scientific notation. To her also I owe—though without her knowledge—my clear perception of how a person like myself may be led into crime; for, had Frances ever for one hour so far lost her head as to express a wish to be avenged, there is no telling what I might not have been tempted to do. But Frances never lost her self-control or her spiritual judgment; her own influence over others gave to her both an awe-struck sense of her own responsibility, and a respectful sympathy with all persons in any kind of responsible position. Though revolutionary in every fibre of her being, she would never allow a disrespectful word to be said of any official person in her presence without rebuking it.
"Vengeance is Mine," says the Eternal Pulsator. Had Frances remained at large, she would have been known only as a pious and well-meaning, but somewhat eccentric, lady. By incarcerating her, her guardian made of her a valuable factor in that great chain of inter-racial sympathies which is so rapidly making all races subject to the British crown aware of certain subtle dangers to which they expose themselves by trusting English officials.
There was another woman, whose name shall be wrapped in silence. She was the "illegitimate" daughter of a well-to-do man. She refused to accept from her "honourable" father the insolent patronage which such men offer to those who have inherited their own pride; preferring to face the struggle for life in a world of strangers. She bequeathed, to some who have helped me, a large share of hereditary intellectual power, and a determination to base a true morality on solid fact, and not to be satisfied with any imitation constructed of parchments tied together with red tape, smeared over with white paint, and stuffed with corruption.