I can imagine that to be present at, or even to undergo, important events has little or no influence on a certain type of disposition, unequipped with the capacity for receiving and digesting impressions. If anyone doubt this, let him ask himself whether he would be justified in ascribing experience to all the inhabitants of France who were forty or fifty in 1815. And yet all of these were persons who not only had seen the stupendous drama that began with 1789 staged, but who had even taken part in that drama in some more or less weighty rôle.
And, vice versa, how many undergo a series of emotions without the outward circumstances appearing to give occasion for it! One may remember the Crusoe novels, Silvio Pellico’s Captivity, Saintine’s charming Picciola, the struggle in the breast of an “old maid” who all her life long hugged one love without ever betraying by one single word what went on in her heart, or finally, the emotions of a humanitarian who, without externally being concerned in the course of events, nevertheless takes a burning interest in the well-being of his fellow citizens or fellow men. One may imagine how that humanitarian hopes and fears alternately, how he watches every change, how he enthuses over a beautiful idea, and burns with indignation when he sees it pushed out of the way and trampled upon by the many who, for a moment at any rate, are stronger than beautiful ideas. One may think of the philosopher who, from the seclusion of his cell, tries to teach the people what is truth, when he has to experience that his voice is drowned by the clatter of pietistic hypocrisy or gain-hunting quackery. One may picture Socrates—not while drinking the cup of hemlock, for I wish to refer to the experience of the soul, not that which comes direct from external circumstances—how deeply grieved his heart must have been when he, who strove to find truth and goodness, heard himself called “a corrupter of youth and reviler of the gods.”
Or even better: one may think of Jesus when so sadly gazing upon Jerusalem, and lamenting that her people “would not” take heed.
