The model of the world,then,is at once unattainable by the world,and much worth attaining?England,as I read the omens,is called a second time to "show the Nations how to live;"for by her Parliament,as chief governing entity,I fear she is long for this world!Poor England must herself again,in these new strange times,the old methods being quite worn out,"learn how to live."That is the terrible problem for England,as for all the Nations;and she alone of all,yet sunk into open Anarchy,but left with time for repentance and amendment;she,wealthiest of all in material resource,in spiritual energy,in ancient loyalty to law,and in the qualities that yield such loyalty,--she perhaps alone of all may be able,with huge travail,and the strain of all her faculties,to accomplish some solution.She will have to try it,she has to try it;she must accomplish it,or perish from her place in the world!
England,as I persuade myself,still contains in it many kings ;possesses,as old Rome did,many men needing "election"to command,but eternally elected for it by the Maker Himself.England's one hope is in these,just .They are among the silent,I believe;mostly far away from platforms and public palaverings;speaking forth the image of their leness in transitory words,but imprinting it,each on his own little section of the world,in silent facts,in modest valiant actions,that will endure forevermore.They must sit silent longer.They are summoned to assert themselves;to act forth,and articulately vindicate,in the teeth of howling multitudes,of a world too justly maddened into all manner of delirious clamors,what of wisdom they derive from God.England,and the Eternal Voices,summon them;poor England never so needed them as .Up,be doing everywhere:the hour of crisis has verily come!In all sections of English life,the god-made king is needed;is pressingly demanded in most;in some,can longer,without peril as of conflagration,be dispensed with.He,wheresoever he finds himself,can say,"Here too am I wanted;here is the kingdom I have to subjugate,and introduce God's Laws into,--God's Laws,instead of Mammon's and M'Croudy's and the Old Anarch's!Here is my work,here or here."--Are there many such,who will answer to the call,in England?It turns on that,whether England,rapidly crumbling in these very years and months,shall go down to the Abyss as her neighbors have all done,or survive to new grander destinies without solution of continuity!Probably the chief question of the world at present.
The true "commander"and king;he who ks for himself the divine Appointments of this Universe,the Eternal Laws ordained by God the Maker,in conforming to which lies victory and felicity,in departing from which lies,and forever must lie,sorrow and defeat,for each and all of the Posterity of Adam in every time and every place;he who has sworn fealty to these,and dare alone against the world assert these,and dare with the whole world at his back deflect from these;--he,I k too well,is a rare man.Difficult to discover;quite discoverable,Iapprehend,by mauvring of ballot-boxes,and riddling of the popular clamor according to the most approved methods.He is sold at any shop I k of,--though sometimes,as at the sign of the Ballot-box,he is advertised for sale.Difficult indeed to discover:and very much assisted,or encouraged in late times,to discover himself ;--which,I think,might be a kind of help?Encouraged rather,and commanded in all ways,if he be wise,to hide himself,and give place to the windy Counterfeit of himself;such as the universal suffrages can recognize,such as loves the most sweet voices of the universal suffrages!--OPeter,what becomes of such a People;what can become?
Did you never hear,with the mind's ear as well,that fateful Hebrew Prophecy,I think the fatefulest of all,which sounds daily through the streets,"Ou'clo!Ou'clo!"--A certain People,once upon a time,clamorously voted by overwhelming majority,"he ;Barabbas,he!Him ,and what he is,and what be deserves,we k well egh:a reviler of the Chief Priests and sacred Chancery wigs;a seditious Heretic,physical-force Chartist,and enemy of his country and mankind:
To the gallows and the cross with him!Barabbas is our man;Barabbas,we are for Barabbas!"They got Barabbas:--have you well considered what a fund of purblind obduracy,of opaque flunkyism grown truculent and transcendent;what an eye for the phylacteries,and want of eye for the eternal lenesses;sordid loyalty to the prosperous Semblances,and high-treason against the Supreme Fact,such a vote betokens in these natures?For it was the consummation of a long series of such;they and their fathers had long kept voting so.A singular People;who could both produce such divine men,and then could so stone and crucify them;a People terrible from the beginning!--Well,they got Barabbas;and they got,of course,such guidance as Barabbas and the like of him could give them;and,of course,they stumbled ever downwards and devilwards,in their truculent stiffnecked way;and--and,at this hour,after eighteen centuries of sad fortune,they prophetically sing "Ou'clo!"in all the cities of the world.Might the world,at this late hour,but take e of them,and understand their song a little!