No More Learning

It is to be supposed that the author only condescended
to dine with persons distinguished by their opulence or official
(


## p. 15843 (#175) ##########################################

EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
15843
position; and it seems to prove that domestic service fifty or
sixty years ago, in the mansions of the rich, was as much in a
state of anarchy, owing to the incompetence or ill temper of the
cook and her assistants, as it is now in humbler dwellings. In-
deed, who has not occasionally seen, at ordinary dinner parties
where no aristocratic Colonel Hamilton is present, the flaming
countenance of the mistress of the house, as she takes her seat
at the head of the table, indicating how hard has been her con-
test with her help?
But at the time a Mrs. Schuyler, or a Mrs. Adams, or a Mrs.
Quincy may have appeared to the British guest as a victim to
the incompetency of her cook, a representative of the great house
of Devonshire was subject to a tyranny of another kind. The
duke happened to be prejudiced against port wine, which those
who were admitted to his great dinner parties preferred to other
wines. The duke's butler, knowing his master's taste, provided
the best champagne and claret that could be purchased in
Europe; but bought the worst port he could find at a low
price, and charged the duke at the price which was notoriously
demanded by wine-dealers for the best. The imposition was
successful for years. Nobody who was invited to the dinners
of a duke could dare to remonstrate against the liquid logwood
they swallowed as port.
At last one friend had the courage to
tell the duke that his butler was a rascal. The result was an
investigation of the facts: the offending servant was ignomini-
ously dismissed; but not until he had amassed a comfortable
amount of some two or three thousand pounds as a compensation
for his disgrace.
This is a pertinent illustration of the difference between our
domestics and those of England. People are never tired of be-
.
rating ours as barbarians, and contrasting them with those of
England, who are thoroughly tamed and trained, and do their
work with exemplary skill and propriety. In the great houses
of England most of the servants are sycophantic and crafty, -
bending their knees in prostrate adoration before the "gentry”
they serve, but at the same time taking every secure opportunity
to pick their pockets. An English servant of an English noble
is apt to be the most ignoble of men.
But the female English domestic is the ideal of many Ameri-
can women who can afford to hire one. The history and liter-
ature of England show the incorrectness of this assumption. Take


## p. 15844 (#176) ##########################################

15844
EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
the literature of England from the time of Charles the Second,
and you will find that a majority of the clear-sighted dramatists
and novelists represent the servant-maids as the obedient accom-
plices of their mistresses in every questionable act they do, but
plundering those whom they serve. Even to the present day,
one can hardly enter a theatre without finding the pert and un-
scrupulous chambermaid of the comedy to be a lively combi-
nation of liar and trickster, an expert in effrontery, malice, and
mischief, and destitute equally of the sense of honor and the
sense of shame.
In the last century Fielding condensed the whole class in his
Mrs. Slipslop. “My betters! ” she indignantly exclaims: “who
is my betters, pray ? » As to the large question of domestic
service, Dickens and Thackeray, in our own generation, have
shown what people have to endure in the continual hostility
between the kitchen and the drawing-room. David Copperfield,
when he had won the adorable Dora, his child-wife,” is daily
tormented by the doings and misdoings of the wretches she
employs as servants, and whom the adorable Dora is utterly
incapable of converting into "help"; and in the household of
Mr. Dombey, what a picture is presented of the kitchen aris-
tocracy of the mansion in which the great merchant dwells, and
in which he has the pretension to believe that he is the lord
and master! How is he looked down upon, when he fails, by the
meanest menial whose business it is to scrub the floors of his
house! Indeed, the description of the assembly of Mr. Dombey's
domestics, when it is known that the firm of Dombey and Son
has fallen into cureless ruin, is one of Dickens's masterpieces.
Thackeray, in all his novels, seems to be haunted with the idea
of the utter falsity of English domestics, from the august butler
of the palatial mansion down to the wench who does the lowest
work of the cheap boarding house. He is never more cynical
than when he records the scandalous and unfavorable judgments
delivered by the tenants of the kitchen on their masters and mis-
tresses. One would hesitate, indeed, to undertake the forming
of a household in England, if he were dolorously impressed by
Thackeray's monitions as to the essential antagonism between
those who dwelt below the drawing-room and those who dwelt
in the room itself. The two, being separated by distinction of
caste, can rarely have with each other cordial human relations.
There may be formal subordination and obedience on the part of


## p. 15845 (#177) ##########################################

EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
15845
(
the servants; but hate, envy, uncharitableness, rankle beneath the
mask of sycophancy they wear.
Much has been written about realistic fiction as distinguished
from fiction which is eminently unrealistic; and English novelists
who belong to the latter class are still prone to push upon the
attention of their readers a revival of the old feudal relation
between mistress and maid. It seems from these novels that
they are bound together by the ties of mutual affection. The
mistress condescends to make her maid her confidante, confides
to her all her griefs and joys, and is rewarded for her protecting
kindness by awakening in the bosom of her maid a sentiment of
love which is entirely independent of self-interest. The husband
of the lady is ruined by a trusted friend, who proves to be a
villain, or he is made a bankrupt by some unfortunate specula-
tion, or he is suspected of a crime which compels him to fly from
his home and country: at any rate, he dies forever or disappears
for a time. The disconsolate wife or widow calls the roll of
her “pampered minions,” pays them their wages up to the day
of their separation, and they depart from the house with an ill-
concealed scorn of their ruined employer. But one aged domestic
remains: she protests that she will never leave her mistress; she
will serve her without wages,-nay, all the money she has saved
up for a series of years shall be forthcoming at this moment of
financial distress in the household; and ends by Alinging herself
into the arms of her dejected mistress, and in a flood of tears
declares that she will never desert her beloved mistress - never!
never! ! never! ! ! Three points of admiration hardly do justice to
the pathos of the scene. Scores of novels might be named in
which it is rehearsed to the immense satisfaction of sentimental
readers, who would never do anything of the kind themselves.
Practical people are now apt to consider this disinterested, this
sublime self-devotion of the feminine servant to the feminine
employer as something bordering on the unreal, so far as their
experience goes. Perhaps some of them are malicious enough to
remember Mrs. Micawber's repeated statement to David Cop-
perfield, when the hot punch was passed around the table, that
despite the injurious opinions which her distinguished relations
had formed of her husband's capacity to get an honest living
for himself and family, she would never desert Mr. Micawber-
never, never, never!
Indeed, persons of limited incomes, whether poets, scientists,
mechanics, clerks, or philanthropists, are commonly subjected, and


## p. 15846 (#178) ##########################################

15846
EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
always have been subjected, to the tyranny of domestics, with-
out regard to their place of residence in one country or another.
Neither genius, nor integrity, nor virtue, nor fame, nor saintliness
of character, can check a virago's tongue when she condescends
to enter a comparatively poor man's home, after she has served
an apprenticeship, even as scullion, in the mansion of a million-
aire. Perhaps nothing could better illustrate this fact than to
cite an instance from the biography of one of the most promi-
nent poets of the century. Thomas Campbell, after publishing
The Pleasures of Hope,' and many immortal lyrics, such as
Hohenlinden,' 'Ye Mariners of England,' and 'The Battle of
the Baltic,' which had thrilled the whole nation, settled down in
Sydenham with his wife and child, — poor, but with a great and
wide poetical fame. In a letter to another immortal, Walter
Scott, he humorously narrates a comic epic which had occurred
in his own home. It seems that he hired a cook, recommended
to him as faithful and sober, who had been with her husband
for many years on board of a man-of-war. In the course of
seven weeks, however, she developed her real character, and went
from bad to worse. « One fatal day,” Campbell says, she fell
upon us in a state of intoxication, venting cries of rage like an
insane bacchanalian, and tagged to our names all the opprobrious
epithets the English language supplies. An energetic mind, in
this state of inflammation, and a face naturally Gorgonian, kindled
to the white heat of fury, and venting the dialect of the damned,
were objects sufficiently formidable to silence our whole house-
hold. The oratrix continued imprecations till I locked up my
wife, child, and nurse, to be out of her reach; and descending to
the kitchen, paid her wages, and thrust her forthwith out of my
doors, she howling with absolute rage. During the dispute she
cursed us for hell-fire children of brimstone, whose religion was
the religion of cats and dogs. I asked the virago what was her
religion, since her practice was so devout. Mine,' says she, is
“
the religion of the Royal Navy,' at the same time showing a
prayer-book. After vainly trying to set the house on fire, this
curious devotee set off for London on the top of a stage-coach,
cursing as she went. ”
It seems that this is a typical scene. It has been witnessed
since by so many small householders, that it is needless to
,
remind them that a certain element of ceremonial religion mixes
with the ribaldry and blasphemy of such domestics. "Mine,” the
drunken brute exclaims, “is the religion of the Royal Navy. "


## p. 15847 (#179) ##########################################

EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
15847
All persons who have borne an active part in turning such
creatures out of their houses must have noticed that a vague
sense of formal piety finds utterance in their wild maledictions;
still it is a piety which comforts itself in predicting sure future
damnation to the masters or mistresses who call it forth. But
perhaps the worst of the matter is that such domestic hornets
develop the habit of swearing in employers who previously had
shown no tendency to the vice. Indeed, to many heads of fami-
lies a course of housekeeping is a school of profanity.
The domestic service of the United States is mostly composed
of immigrants who differ from their employers in race and reli-
gion. In one of the most splendid orations of Edward Everett,
he happily contrasted the peaceful emigrants who came from
Ireland, Germany, and other European countries, to settle here,
with the descent of the barbarians on the Roman Empire. The
former came to increase enormously the wealth and productive
power of the nation they peacefully invaded; the warlike mission
of the latter was to destroy and devastate what the genius and
industry of former centuries had accumulated. The former came
to create new capital; the latter to annihilate the capital which
had previously been added to the stores of civilization. Indeed,
the immense debt which we owe to what is called foreign labor
- though laborers from abroad are so swiftly assimilated into
–
the mass of our citizens, that the word “foreign” hardly applies
to them - is practically incalculable. It has been for some time
considered that the yearly additions to our population from this
source is, in a great degree, an index of our advancing prosperity.
There are evils resulting from this rush of new powers and
influences into the rapid stream of our American life, but the
evils are overcome in time by counterbalancing good. It cer-
tainly is provoking to have a few foreign socialists, escaping per-
haps from the prisons of their native countries, or from the fear
of being imprisoned in them, coming to this land of liberty and
labor, and in corner groceries and lager-beer saloons announcing
the doctrine that laborers cannot get their rights unless they
begin their crusade against capital by robbery, arson, and murder;
but it is hard to convince a workman who really works, that he
is to become better off by destroying the palpable and permanent
monuments of previous generations of laborers, such as houses,
mills, railroads, and other evidences of labor capitalized. Indeed,
the belligerent socialist is merely a reproduction of Attila and
Alboin, acting a part which is foreign to our present civilization.


## p. 15848 (#180) ##########################################

15848
EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
This is one side of foreign immigration,- its beneficent side.
The other side relates to the mothers, daughters, and sisters of
the inflowing host, who "go out to service, and who control
most of the business. The gradual disappearance of American
girls from service in families is a calamity both to themselves
and the public; and it is based on an absurd prejudice that they
lower their position and forfeit their independence in doing what
they call menial work. They accordingly rather prefer to labor
in factories, or swell the crowd of half-starved sewing-women,
than to gain board, lodging, and good wages, in a private family.
The result is that the Irish, German, and Swedish women who
have had no education qualifying them for the business of cooks
and general household work, learn their duties by experiment-
ing on the meats given them to prepare for the table, and on
the floors and carpets they are to scrub or sweep. This Kinder-
garten system results in educating them at last into domestics;
but it is at the expense of a great breaking of crockery, a series
of burnt steaks and chops which are uneatable, and a trial of the
employer's patience which gradually results in nervous prostra-
tion. The servants undoubtedly follow the Baconian theory that
knowledge is obtained by observation and experiment; but their
experiments resemble those of the Irish pilot, who, after remark-
ing to the captain of the ship that the coast was full of sunken
rocks, casually added as the vessel struck, “And that is one of
'em! ”
It would be a lesson in the study of human nature to note
all the varieties of experience which the mistress of a house
passes through when one servant, who has been educated in this
way, departs, and another, who has also obtained an approximate
idea of what good housekeeping means, applies for the vacant
There is no form of “interviewing” more prolific than
this, of incidents illustrating the conflicts and collisions of ad-
verse specimens of human character. There for instance is the
interesting invalid, who is bullied and browbeaten by the ener-
getic virago who storms into the house, demands the wages which
she thinks her services are worth, obtains them, and then dom-
inates the household; reigning supreme until the master of the
establishment is compelled to interfere, and dismisses her with
words that savor more of strength than of righteousness. The
list might go on to include the fretful, the economical, the bad-
tempered, the shrewd, the equitable, the humane female heads of
households that require help, but find it difficult to procure from
»
»
place.


## p. 15849 (#181) ##########################################

EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
15849
»
(
»
those who offer it. Perhaps it would be well to condense and
generalize the whole matter in dispute, by citing an example in
which the applicant for a situation was confronted by a woman
who had a touch of humor in her composition. In all the dig-
nity of second-hand finery, resplendent with Attleboro' diamonds
and rubies, which must have cost at the least a quarter of a dollar
a gem, the towering lady sweeps into the parlor, and demands
a sight of the lady of the house. The meek lady of the house
appears.
“I understand you want a second-girl to do the house-
work. ” “Yes,” is the gentle response. The high contracting
parties forth with proceed to discuss the terms of the treaty by
which the claimant for the office of second-girlship will con-
descend to accept the place, stating her terms, her perquisites,
and her right to have two or three evenings of every week at
her own disposal, when her engagements will compel her to be
absent from the house. The reply is, “It seems to me, if we
comply with your terms, it would be better for my husband and
myself to go out to service ourselves; for we never have had
such privileges as you claim. " — «That is nothing to me. I have
lived in the most genteel families of the city, and have always
insisted on my rights in this matter. By the way, have you any
children ? ” — “Yes, I have two. ” — “Well, I object to children. ”
- "If your objections, madam, are insuperable, the children can
easily be killed. ” – “Oh! you are joking, I see. But I think I
will try you for a week to see how I can get along with you. "
The curt response is: “You shall not try me but the one minute
which elapses between your speedy descent from those stairs
and your equally speedy exit from the door. ” The high contract-
ing parties being unable, under the circumstances, to formulate a
treaty agreeable to both, the applicant for the vacant place dis-
appears in a fury of rage.
It may be said that this is a caricature of what actually
occurs in such interviews and encounters; but it has an essen-
tial truth underneath its seeming exaggeration. In almost all the
professions and occupations in which men are engaged, the sup-
ply is commonly more than equal to the demand. In domestic
.
service the supply of intelligently trained servants is notoriously
far short of the demand. One must notice the readiness with
which clubs, of late, are formed, for advancing all imaginable
causes which can arrest the attention of intelligent, patriotic,
philanthropic men. They meet weekly, fortnightly, or monthly,
,


## p. 15850 (#182) ##########################################

15850
EDWIN PERCY WHIPPLE
at some hotels noted for their excellent method of cooking the
fish and flesh which are daily on the dinner-tables of the mem-
bers, but cooked on a different method. The Sunday newspapers
report the effusions of eloquence which the Saturday meetings
call forth. The clubs multiply also with a rapidity which puzzles
ordinary observers to account for their popularity. Perhaps a
simple reason may be timidly ventured as an explanation of this
phenomenon. Men who are classed as prosperous citizens like
a good dinner, which they cannot get at home; and at stated
periods they throng to a hotel, where the Lord sends the meats,
and at the same time prevents the Devil from sending the cooks.
It will be said that this attack on the present disorganiza-
tion of our domestic service is one-sided. It is. Doubtless much
may be urged in reply, arraigning the conduct of employers
and defending that of the employees. Many evils of the present
relations between the two might be averted by a mutual under-
standing of each other's motives and aims. Still the previous
education of domestics, not only in the enlightenment of their
minds but in the regulation of their tempers, is the pressing
need at present. If some charitable person should start a Col-
lege for the Education of Female Domestics, its success in
increasing human happiness would prompt others to follow in
his lead. Such a college might turn out thousands on thousands
of competent servants every three or four months.
The diplo-
mas it would give would command attention at once; and the
way now followed, of sending to the girl's “reference” and giving
evasive replies, would be discountenanced. It would also give all
classes of domestics a great lift in social estimation; the cer-
tificates that they have graduated with honor in such colleges
would be equivalent to the B. A. or A. M. of colleges of another
sort, when a young student applies for the position of schoolmas-
ter in a country town or village. At any rate, a vast mass of
unnecessary misery in families might be prevented, and a large
addition made to the stock of human happiness.
»
1
1


## p. 15851 (#183) ##########################################

15851
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
(1832-)
MERICAN cosmopolitanism in educational and political affairs
is well illustrated in the life and writings of Andrew Dick-
son White, whose ripe scholarship has been rendered all
the more influential by his wide and varied contact with men and
things. As a statesman, as a teacher, as a diplomat, as an organizer
of great educational movements, he has exhibited the true culture
which makes scholarship subservient to life.
His career is an illustration of the possi-
bilities of activity in many fields open to
the educated American, whose citizenship
derives not a small portion of its worth
from liberal and strenuous intellectual train-
ing. Born in Homer, New York, Novem-
ber 7th, 1832, he was graduated from Yale
in 1853; going soon after to Europe, where,
as an attaché of the Russian Legation, he
carried on further study, laying the founda-
tion of that broad historical and sociologi-
cal knowledge for which he is distinguished.
From 1857 to 1862 he was professor of ANDREW D. White
history and English literature in the Uni-
versity of Michigan. He served as State Senator in New York from
1863 to 1866. He was one of the organizers of Cornell University,
and its first president— the duration of his office being from 1867 to
1885. It was owing in large part to his wise guidance and to his
munificence, that the growth of the university proceeded so rapidly.
He bestowed upon it an endowment of a hundred thousand dollars,
and founded the White Historical Library, to which he presented a
unique collection of books and manuscripts relating to the period
of the French Revolution. In 1871 he was commissioner to Santo
Domingo. From 1879 to 1881 he was United States minister to Ger-
many. In 1892 he was appointed United States minister to Russia,
an office which he held for two years. He is again minister to Ger-
many, having been appointed early in 1897.
While his most comprehensive work is “The History of the War-
fare of Science with Theology,' it is in his pamphlets on the study
of history and on education, that the secret of the vitality of

-


## p. 15852 (#184) ##########################################

15852
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
as a
scholarship may be found. His conception of history is of interest,
not because it is original, but because it is clearly the result of that
wide acquaintance with men and affairs, through which the convic-
tion is attained that history is not a mere record of wars, but the
record chiefly of the development of humanity. It is revelation or it
is nothing « The great deep ground out of which large historical
studies may grow is the ethical ground, - the simple ethical necessity
for the perfecting, first, of man as man, and secondly, of man
member of society; or in other words, the necessity for the develop-
ment of humanity on one hand and society on the other. ”
With this elemental principle in mind, he is quick to perceive that
the great forces of history being moral forces, apparently insignificant
events may furnish a clue to the spirit of an entire period. « Louis
XIV. receiving Condé on the great staircase of Versailles was an
immense fact at the time; to us, in the light of general history, it is
worth little or nothing. Louis XVI. calling for bread and cheese
when arrested in Varennes, and declaring it the best bread and cheese
he ever ate, furnishes a fact apparently worthless, but really of sig-
nificance; for it reveals the easy-going helplessness which was so
important a factor in the wreck of the old French monarchy. ” His-
tory must therefore “occupy itself with men and events which sig-
nify something. " These extracts from the pamphlet On Studies in
General History and the History of Civilization, contributed to the
American Historical Association, give evidence of an essentially mod-
ern and humanistic scholarship; as does also the pamphlet on “The
Relation of National and State Governments to Advanced Education,'
in which the author advocates making institutions for advanced edu-
cation the objects of governmental support, on grounds both of patri-
otism and of culture.
In 1861, Andrew D. White published an Outline of a Course of
Lectures on History'; in 1876 a treatise on Paper Money Inflation
in France. In the same year appeared a little book with the title
(The Warfare of Science, which had grown out of a lecture of which
the thesis was that “in all modern history, interference with sci-
ence in the supposed interest of religion, no matter how conscientious
such interference may have been, has resulted in the direst evils both
to religion and to science, and invariably; and on the other hand,
all untrammeled scientific investigation, no matter how dangerous
to religion some of its stages may have seemed for the time to be,
has invariably resulted in the highest good both of religion and of
science. ”
This book was supplemented by further articles in the Popular
Science Monthly in support of the thesis, which grew gradually into
the comprehensive work published in 1896 under the title A History
of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom. This work


## p. 15853 (#185) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15853
is at once popular and scholarly. It is written in a style which
would interest a schoolboy, yet it bears evidence of a scholarship
whose thoroughness is only equaled by its breadth. The author's
European residences afforded him opportunities for wide research, and
for the consultation of sources. It has literally compassed the earth
for information which would throw light upon subjects of world-wide
significance. He traces the growth of the modern spirit in many
departments of thought and speculation, -- the passing away of the
old order of mediævalism, and the dawn of scientific enlightenment.
In 1882 he published New Germany'; a subject on which he
was well qualified to write, through his ministerial residence in that
country. In 1886 appeared A History of the Doctrine of Comets,'
and in 1887 European Schools of History and Politics. His works
are written in a clear and forcible style, most appropriate to the
positive and definite subjects of which he treats.
-
RECONSTRUCTIVE FORCE OF SCIENTIFIC CRITICISM
From History of the Warfare of Science with Theology) Copyright 1896,
by D. Appleton & Co.
FM
a
or all this dissolving away of traditional opinions regarding
our sacred literature, there has been a cause far more gen-
eral and powerful than any which has been given; for it is
cause surrounding and permeating all. This is simply the
atmosphere of thought engendered by the development of all sci-
ences during the last three centuries.
Vast masses of myth, legend, marvel, and dogmatic assertion,
coming into this atmosphere, have been dissolved and are now
dissolving quietly away, like icebergs drifted into the Gulf
Stream. In earlier days, when some critic in advance of his
time insisted that Moses could not have written an account em-
bracing the circumstances of his own death, it was sufficient to
answer that Moses was a prophet; if attention was called to the
fact that the great early prophets, by all which they did and did
not do, showed that there could not have existed in their time
any Levitical code,” a sufficient answer was “mystery"; and if
the discrepancy was noted between the two accounts of creation
in Genesis, or between the genealogies of the dates of the cruci-
fixion in the Gospels, the cogent reply was "infidelity. ”
thinking world has at last been borne, by the general develop-
ment of a scientific atmosphere, beyond that kind of refutation.
((


## p. 15854 (#186) ##########################################

15854
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
>
If, in the atmosphere generated by the earlier developed
sciences, the older growths of Biblical interpretations have
,
drooped and withered, and are evidently perishing, new and
better growths have arisen with roots running down into the
newer sciences. Comparative anthropology in general, by show-
ing that various early stages of belief and observance, once sup-
posed to be derived from direct revelation from heaven to the
Hebrews, are still found as arrested developments among vari-
ous savage and barbarous tribes; comparative mythology and folk-
lore, by showing that ideas and beliefs regarding the Supreme
Power in the universe are progressive, and not less in Judea than
in other parts of the world; comparative religion and literature,
by searching out and laying side by side those main facts in
the upward struggle of humanity which show that the Israelites,
like other gifted peoples, rise gradually through ghost-worship,
fetishism, and polytheism, to higher theological levels, and that
as they thus rose, their conceptions and statements regarding
the God they worshiped became nobler and better,-- all these
sciences are giving a new solution to those problems which
dogmatic theology has so long labored in vain to solve. While
researches in these sciences have established the fact that accounts
formerly supposed to be special revelations to Jews and Christ-
ians are but repetitions of wide-spread legends dating from far
earlier civilizations, and that beliefs formerly thought funda-
mental to Judaism and Christianity are simply based on ancient
myths, they have also begun to impress upon the intellect and
conscience of the thinking world the fact that the religious and
moral truths thus disengaged from the old masses of myth
and legend are all the more venerable and authoritative, and that
all individual or national life of any value must be vitalized by
them.
If, then, modern science in general has acted powerfully to
dissolve away the theories and dogmas of the older theological
interpretation, it has also been active in a reconstruction and re-
crystallization of truth; and very powerful in this reconstruction
have been the evolution doctrines which have grown out of the
thought and work of men like Darwin and Spencer.
In the light thus obtained the sacred text has been trans-
formed: out of the old chaos has come order; out of the old
welter of hopelessly conflicting statements in religion and mor-
als has come, in obedience to this new conception of develop-
ment, the idea of a sacred literature which mirrors the most


## p. 15855 (#187) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15855
striking evolution of morals and religion in the history of our
race. Of all the sacred writings of the world, it shows us our
own as the most beautiful and the most precious; exhibiting to us
the most complete religious development to which humanity has
attained, and holding before us the loftiest ideals which our race
has known. Thus it is that, with the keys furnished by this
new race of Biblical scholars, the way has been opened to treas-
ures of thought which have been inaccessible to theologians for
two thousand years.
As to the Divine power in the universe: these interpreters
have shown how, beginning with the tribal god of the Hebrews,
- one among many jealous, fitful, unseen, local sovereigns of
Asia Minor,- the higher races have been borne on to the idea
of the just Ruler of the whole earth, as revealed by the later
and greater prophets of Israel, and finally to the belief in the
Universal Father, as best revealed in the New Testament. As
to man: beginning with men after Jehovah's own heart, - cruel,
treacherous, revengeful, - we are borne on to an ideal of men
who do right for right's sake; who search and speak the truth
for truth's sake; who love others as themselves.
As to the world
at large: the races dominant in religion and morals have been
lifted from the idea of a "chosen people,” stimulated and abetted
by their tribal god in every sort of cruelty and injustice, to the
conception of a vast community, in which the fatherhood of God
overreaches all, and the brotherhood of man permeates all.
Thus, at last, out of the old conception of our Bible as a
collection of oracles- a mass of entangling utterances, fruitful
in wrangling interpretations, which have given to the world long
and weary ages of hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness”; of
fetishism, subtlety, and pomp; of tyranny, bloodshed, and sol-
emnly constituted imposture; of everything which the Lord Jesus
Christ most abhorred-has been gradually developed through the
centuries, by the labors, sacrifices, and even the martyrdom of a
long succession of men of God, the conception of it as a sacred
literature: a growth only possible under that divine light which
the various orbs of science have done so much to bring into the
mind and heart and soul of man; a revelation, not of the Fall of
Man, but of the Ascent of Man; an exposition, not of temporary
dogmas and observances, but of the Eternal Law of Righteous-
ness, – the one upward path for individuals and for nations. No
longer an oracle, good for the lower orders” to accept, but to
a
>


## p. 15856 (#188) ##########################################

15856
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
be quietly sneered at by “the enlightened ”; no longer a fetish,
whose defenders must become persecutors, or reconcilers, or
“apologists”: but a most fruitful fact, which religion and science
may accept as a source of strength to both.
MEDIÆVAL GROWTH OF THE DEAD SEA LEGENDS
From History of the Warfare of Science with Theology. ' Copyright 1896,
by D. Appleton & Co.
T*
HE history of myths, of their growth under the earlier phases
of human thought and of their decline under modern think-
ing, is one of the most interesting and suggestive of human
studies; but since to treat it as a whole would require volumes,
I shall select only one small group, and out of this mainly a
single myth, - one about which there can no longer be any
dispute, - the group of myths and legends which grew up on the
shore of the Dead Sea, and especially that one which grew up to
account for the successive salt columns washed out by the rains
at its southwestern extremity.
The Dead Sea is about fifty miles in length and ten miles in
width; it lies in a very deep fissure extending north and south,
and its surface is about thirteen hundred feet below that of the
Mediterranean. It has therefore no outlet, and is the receptacle
for the waters of the whole system to which it belongs, including
those collected by the Sea of Galilee and brought down thence
by the river Jordan.
It certainly — or at least the larger part of it — ranks geologi- .
cally among the oldest lakes on earth. In a broad sense the
region is volcanic: on its shore are evidences of volcanic action,
which must from the earliest period have aroused wonder and
fear, and stimulated the myth-making tendency to account for
them.
On the eastern side are impressive mountain masses,
which have been strewn up from old volcanic vents; mineral and
hot springs abound, some of them spreading sulphurous odors;
earthquakes have been frequent, and from time to time these
have cast up bitumen; concretions of sulphur and large forma-
tions of salt constantly appear.
The water which comes from the springs or oozes through
the salt layers upon its shores constantly brings in various salts
in solution; and being rapidly evaporated under the hot sun and


## p. 15857 (#189) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15857
)
dry wind, there has been left, in the bed of the lake, a strong
brine heavily charged with the usual chlorides and bromides, -a
sort of bitter mother liquor. ” This fluid has become so dense
as to have a remarkable power of supporting the human body; it
is of an acrid and nauseating bitterness; and by ordinary eyes
no evidence of life is seen in it.
Thus it was that in the lake itself, and in its surrounding
shores, there was enough to make the generation of explanatory
myths on a large scale inevitable.
The main northern part of the lake is very deep, the plum-
met having shown an abyss of thirteen hundred feet; but the
southern end is shallow and in places marshy.
The system of which it forms a part shows a likeness to that
in South America of which the mountain lake Titicaca is the
main feature; as a receptacle for surplus waters, only rendering
them by evaporation, it resembles the Caspian and many other
seas; as a sort of evaporating dish for the leachings of salt rock,
and consequently holding a body of water unfit to support
the higher forms of animal life, it resembles among others the
Median lake of Urumiah; as a deposit of bitumen, it resembles
the pitch lakes of Trinidad.
In all this there is nothing presenting any special difficulty to
the modern geologist or geographer; but with the early dweller
in Palestine the case was very different. The rocky, barren des-
olation of the Dead Sea region impressed him deeply; he nat-
urally reasoned upon it: and this impression and reasoning we find
stamped into the pages of his sacred literature, rendering them
all the more precious as a revelation of the earlier thought of
mankind. The long circumstantial account given in Genesis;
its application in Deuteronomy; its use by Amos, by Isaiah, by
Jeremiah, by Zephaniah, and by Ezekiel; the references to it in
the writings attributed to St. Paul, St. Peter, and St. Jude, in the
Apocalypse, and above all, in more than one utterance of the
Master himself, -all show how deeply these geographical feat-
uires impressed the Jewish mind.
At a very early period, myths and legends, many and circum-
stantial, grew up to explain features then so incomprehensible.
As the myth and legend grew up among the Greeks of a
refusal of hospitality to Zeus and Hermes by the village in
Phrygia, and the consequent sinking of that beautiful region with
its inhabitants beneath a lake and morass, so there came belief in
XXVII-992


## p. 15858 (#190) ##########################################

15858
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
a similar offense by the people of the beautiful valley of Siddim,
and the consequent sinking of that valley with its inhabitants be-
neath the waters of the Dead Sea. Very similar to the accounts
of the saving of Philemon and Baucis are those of the saving
of Lot and his family.
But the myth-making and miracle-mongering by no means
ceased in ancient times; they continued to grow through the
mediæval and modern period, until they have quietly withered
away in the light of modern scientific investigation, leaving to us
the religious and moral truths they inclose.
It would be interesting to trace this whole group of myths:
their origin in times prehistoric, their development in Greece
and Rome, their culmination during the ages of faith, and their
disappearance in the age of science. It would be especially in-
structive to note the conscientious efforts to prolong their life by
making futile compromises between science and theology regard-
ing them; but I shall mention this main group only incidentally,
confining myself almost entirely to the one above named, - the
most remarkable of all, — the myth which grew about the salt
pillars of Usdum.
I select this mainly because it involves only elementary prin-
ciples, requires no abstruse reasoning, and because all controversy
regarding it is ended. There is certainly now no theologian with
a reputation to lose who will venture to revive the idea regard-
ing it which was sanctioned for hundreds, nay, thousands, of years
by theology, was based on Scripture, and was held by the uni.
versal Church until our own century.
The main feature of the salt region of Usdum is a low range
of hills near the southwest corner of the Dead Sea, extending in a
southeasterly direction for about five miles, and made up mainly
of salt rock. This rock is soft and friable; and under the influ-
ence of the heavy winter rains, it has been without doubt, from
a period long before human history, as it is now, cut ever in
new shapes, and especially into pillars or columns, which some-
times bear a semblance to the human form.
An eminent clergyman who visited this spot recently, speaks
of the appearance of this salt range as follows:
« Fretted by fitful showers and storms, its ridge is exceed-
ingly uneven, its sides carved out and constantly changing;
and each traveler might have a new pillar of salt to
wonder over at intervals of a few years. ”
.


## p. 15859 (#191) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15859
C
>
or
(
Few things could be more certain than that, in the indolent
dream-life of the East, myths and legends would grow up to
account for this as for other strange appearances in all that
region. The question which a religious Oriental put to himself
in ancient times at Usdum was substantially that which his
descendant to-day puts to himself at Kosseir: “Why is this
region thus blasted ? » “Whence these pillars of salt ? »
«Whence these blocks of granite ? ” «What aroused the venge-
ance of Jehovah or of Allah to work these miracles of deso-
lation ? »
And just as Maxime Du Camp recorded the answer of the
modern Shemite at Kosseir, so the compilers of the Jewish
sacred books recorded the answer of the ancient Shemite at the
Dead Sea; just as Allah at Kosseir blasted the land and trans-
formed the melons into bowlders which are seen to this day, so
Jehovah at Usdum blasted the land and transformed Lot's wife
into a pillar of salt, which is seen to this day.
No more difficulty was encountered in the formation of the
Lot legend, to account for that rock resembling the human form,
than in the formation of the Niobe legend, which accounted for
a supposed resemblance in the rock at Sipylos: it grew up just
as we have seen thousands of similar myths and legends grow
up about striking natural appearances in every early home of
the human race. Being thus consonant with the universal view
regarding the relation of physical geography to the Divine gov-
ernment, it became a treasure of the Jewish nation and of the
Christian Church, - a treasure not only to be guarded against all
hostile intrusion, but to be increased, as we shall see, by the
myth-making powers of the Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans
for thousands of years.
The spot where the myth originated was carefully kept in
mind; indeed, it could not escape, for in that place alone were
constantly seen the phenomena which gave rise to it. We have
a steady chain of testimony through the ages, all pointing to the
salt pillar as the irrefragable evidence of Divine judgment. That
great theological test of truth - the dictum of St. Vincent of
Lerins — would certainly prove that the pillar was Lot’s wife;
for it was believed so to be by Jews, Christians, and Mohamme-
dans from the earliest period down to a time almost within pres-
ent memory — “always, everywhere, and by all. ” It would stand
perfectly the ancient test insisted upon by Cardinal Newman,
«Securus judicat orbis terrarum ” [The world judges infallibly].
>


## p. 15860 (#192) ##########################################

15860
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
For ever since the earliest days of Christianity, the identity
of the salt pillar with Lot's wife has been universally held, and
supported by passages in Genesis, in St. Luke's Gospel, and in
the Second Epistle of St. Peter,-- coupled with a passage in the
book of the Wisdom of Solomon, which to this day, by a major-
ity in the Christian Church, is believed to be inspired, and from
which are specially cited the words, "A standing pillar of salt is
a monument of an unbelieving soul. ”
Never was chain of belief more continuous. In the first cen.
tury of the Christian era Josephus refers to the miracle, and
declares regarding the statue, "I have seen it, and it remains
at this day"; and Clement, Bishop of Rome,- one of the most
revered fathers of the Church, noted for the moderation of his
statements,-- expresses a similar certainty, declaring the miracu-
lous statue to be still standing.
In the second century that great father of the Church, bishop
and martyr, Irenæus, not only vouched for it, but gave his ap-
proval to the belief that the soul of Lot's wife still lingered in
the statue, giving it a sort of organic life: thus virtually began
in the Church that amazing development of the legend which
we shall see taking various forms through the Middle Ages,-
the story that the salt statue exercised certain physical functions
which in these more delicate days cannot be alluded to save
under cover of a dead language.
This addition to the legend, - which in these signs of life, as in
other things, is developed almost exactly on the same lines with
the legend of the Niobe statue in the rock of Mount Sipylos, and
with the legends of human beings transformed into bowlders in
various mythologies, was for centuries regarded as an additional
confirmation of revealed truth.
In the third century the myth burst into still richer bloom in
a poem long ascribed to Tertullian. In this poem more miracu-
lous characteristics of the statue are revealed. It could not be
washed away by rains; it could not be overthrown by winds; any
wound made upon it was miraculously healed; and the earlier
statements as to its physical functions were amplified in sonorous
Latin verse.
With this appeared a new legend regarding the Dead Sea: it
became universally believed, and we find it repeated throughout
the whole mediaval period, that the bitumen could only be dis-
solved by such fluids as in the process of animated nature came
from the statue.


## p. 15861 (#193) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15861
(
The legend thus amplified we shall find dwelt upon by pious
travelers and monkish chroniclers for hundreds of years: so it
came to be more and more treasured by the universal Church, and
held more and more firmly,- always, everywhere, and by all. ”
In the two following centuries we have an overwhelming
mass of additional authority for the belief that the very statue of
salt into which Lot's wife was transformed was still existing. In
the fourth, the continuance of the statue was vouched for by
St. Silvia, who visited the place: though she could not see it, she
was told by the Bishop of Segor that it had been there some
time before, and she concluded that it had been temporarily cov-
ered by the sea. In both the fourth and fifth centuries, such
great doctors in the Church as St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom,
and St. Cyril of Jerusalem, agreed in this belief and statement:
hence it was, doubtless, that the Hebrew word which is trans-
lated in the authorized English version pillar,” was translated
in the Vulgate, which the majority of Christians believe virtually
inspired, by the word “statue”; we shall find this fact insisted
upon by theologians arguing in behalf of the statue, as a result
and monument of the miracle, for over fourteen hundred years
afterward
About the middle of the sixth century, Antoninus Martyr
visited the Dead Sea region and described it; but curiously re-
versed a simple truth in these words: “Nor do sticks or straws
float there, nor can a man swim; but whatever is cast into it
sinks to the bottom. ” As to the statue of Lot's wife, he threw
doubt upon its miraculous renewal, but testified that it was still
standing
In the seventh century the Targum of Jerusalem not only
testified that the salt pillar at Usdum was once Lot's wife, but
declared she must retain that form until the general resurrection.
In the seventh century, too, Bishop Arculf traveled to the Dead
Sea, and his work was added to the treasures of the Church. He
greatly develops the legend, and especially that part of it given
by Josephus. The bitumen that floats upon the sea “resembles
gold and the form of a bull or camel”; “birds cannot live near
it”; and “the very beautiful apples” which grow there, when
;
plucked, “burn and are reduced to ashes, and smoke as if they
were still burning. ”
In the eighth century the Venerable Bede takes these state-
ments of Arculf and his predecessors, binds them together in his


## p. 15862 (#194) ##########################################

15862
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
work on 'The Holy Places,' and gives the whole mass of myths
and legends an enormous impulse.
In the tenth century new force is given to it by the pious
Moslem Mukadassi. Speaking of the town of Segor, near the
salt region, he says that the proper translation of its name is
“Hell”; and of the lake he says, “Its waters are hot, even as
though the place stood over hell-fire. ”
In the crusading period, immediately following, all the legends
burst forth more brilliantly than ever.
The first of these new travelers who makes careful statements
is Fulk of Chartres, who in 1100 accompanied King Baldwin to
the Dead Sea, and saw many wonders; but though he visited the
salt region at Usdum, he makes no mention of the salt pillar:
evidently he had fallen on evil times; the older statues had
probably been washed away, and no new one had happened to
be washed out of the rocks just at that period.
But his misfortune was more than made up by the triumph-
ant experience of a far more famous traveler, half a century
later, - Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela.
Rabbi Benjamin finds new evidences of miracle in the Dead
Sea, and develops to a still higher point the legend of the salt
statue of Lot's wife, enriching the world with the statement that
it was steadily and miraculously renewed; that though the cattle
of the region licked its surface, it never grew smaller. Again a
thrill of joy went through the monasteries and pulpits of Christ-
endom at this increasing evidence of the truth of Scripture. ”
Toward the end of the thirteenth century there appeared in
Palestine a traveler superior to most before or since, - Count
Burchard, monk of Mount Sion. He had the advantage of know-
ing something of Arabic, and his writings show him to have
been observant and thoughtful. No statue of Lot's wife appears
to have been washed clean of the salt rock at his visit, but he
takes it for granted that the Dead Sea is the mouth of hell,”
and that the vapor rising from it is the smoke from Satan's fur-
naces.
These ideas seem to have become part of the common stock;
for Ernoul, who traveled in the Dead Sea during the same cen-
tury, always speaks of it as the Sea of Devils.
Near the beginning of the fourteenth century appeared the
book, of far wider influence, which bears the name of Sir John
Mandeville; and in the various editions, its myths and legends of
>


## p. 15863 (#195) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15863
the Dead Sea and of the pillar of salt burst forth into wonderful
luxuriance.
This book tells us that masses of fiery matter are every day
thrown up from the water as large as a horse"; that though it
contains no living thing, it has been shown that men thrown
into it cannot die; and finally, as if to prove the worthlessness
of devout testimony to the miraculous, he says: "And whoever
throws a piece of iron therein, it floats; and whoever throws a
feather therein, it sinks to the bottom: and because that is con-
trary to nature, I was not willing to believe it until I saw it. ”
The book, of course, mentions Lot's wife; and says that
the pillar of salt “stands there to-day,” and “has a right salty
taste. ”
Injustice has perhaps been done to the compilers of this
famous work in holding them liars of the first magnitude: they
simply abhorred skepticism, and thought it meritorious to believe
all pious legends. The ideal Mandeville was a man of over-
mastering faith, and resembled Tertullian in believing some
things because they are impossible”; he was doubtless entirely
conscientious; the solemn ending of the book shows that he
listened, observed, and wrote under the deepest conviction, and
those who re-edited his book were probably just as honest in
adding the later stories of pious travelers.
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville,' thus appealing to
the popular heart, were most widely read in the monasteries and
repeated among the people. Innumerable copies were made in
manuscript, and finally in print; and so the old myths received
a new life.
In the fifteenth century wonders increased. In 1418 we
have the Lord of Caumont, who makes a pilgrimage and gives
us a statement which is the result of the theological reasoning
of centuries, and especially interesting as a typical example of
the theological method in contrast with the scientific. He could
not understand how the blessed waters of the Jordan could be
allowed to mingle with the accursed waters of the Dead Sea.
In spite, then, of the eye of sense, he beheld the water with the
eye of faith, and calmly announced that the Jordan water passes
through the Sea, but that the two masses of water are not mingled.
As to the salt statue of Lot's wife, he declares it to be still exist-
ing; and copying a table of indulgences granted to the Church
by pious pilgrims, he puts down the visit to the salt statue as
giving an indulgence of seven years.


## p. 15864 (#196) ##########################################

15864
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
Toward the end of the century we have another traveler yet
more influential: Bernard of Breydenbach, Dean of Mainz. His
book of travels was published in 1486, at the famous press of
Schoeffer, and in various translations it was spread through Eu-
rope, exercising an influence wide and deep. His first important
notice of the Dead Sea is as follows: "In this, Tirus the serpent
is found, and from him the Tiriac medicine is made. He is
blind; and so full of venom that there is no remedy for his bite
excepting cutting off the bitten part. He can only be taken by
striking him and making him angry; then his venom flies into
his head and tail. ” Breyden bach calls the Dead Sea "the chim-
ney of hell,” and repeats the old story as to the miraculous solv-
ent for its bitumen. He too makes the statement that the holy
water of the Jordan does not mingle with the accursed water of
the infernal Sea; but increases the miracle which Caumont had
announced by saying that although the waters appear to come
together, the Jordan is really absorbed in the earth before it
reaches the Sea.
As to Lot's wife, various travelers at that time had various
fortunes. Some, like Caumont and Breydenbach, took her con-
tinued existence for granted; some, like Count John of Solms,
saw her and were greatly edified; some, like Hans Werli, tried
to find her and could not, but like St. Silvia a thousand years
before, were none the less edified by the idea that for some
inscrutable purpose, the Sea had been allowed to hide her from
them: some found her larger than they expected, - even forty
feet high, as was the salt pillar which happened to be standing at
the visit of Commander Lynch in 1848,— but this only added
a new proof to the miracle; for the text was remembered,
« There were giants in those days. "
:
Out of the mass of works of pilgrims during the fifteenth
century, I select just one more as typical of the theological view
then dominant; and this is the noted book of Felix Fabri, a
preaching friar of Ulm. I select him, because even so eminent
an authority in our own time as Dr. Edward Robinson declares
him to have been the most thorough, thoughtful, and enlightened
traveler of that century.
Fabri is greatly impressed by the wonders of the Dead Sea,
and typical of his honesty influenced by faith is his account of
the Dead Sea fruit: he describes it with almost perfect accuracy,
but adds the statement that when mature it is filled with ashes
and cinders. ”
a


## p. 15865 (#197) ##########################################

ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
15865
(
As to the salt statue, he says: “We saw the place between
the sea and Mount Segor, but could not see the statue itself
because we were too far distant to see anything of human size:
but we saw it with firm faith, because we believed Scripture,
which speaks of it; and we were filled with wonder. ”
To sustain absolute faith in the statue, he reminds his read-
ers that God is able even of these stones to raise up seed to
Abraham," and goes into a long argument, discussing such trans-
formations as those of King Atlas and Pygmalion's statue, with
a multitude of others, - winding up with the case given in the
miracles of St. Jerome, of a heretic who was changed into a log
of wood, which was then burned.
He gives a statement of the Hebrews that Lot's wife received
her peculiar punishment because she had refused to add salt to
the food of the angels when they visited her; and he preaches
a short sermon, in which he says that as salt is the condiment
of food, so the salt statue of Lot's wife "gives us a condiment
of wisdom. ”
There were indeed many discrepancies in the testimony of
travelers regarding the salt pillar,— so many, in fact, that at a
later period the learned Dom Calmet acknowledged that they
shook his belief in the whole matter; but during this earlier
time, under the complete sway of the theological spirit, these
difficulties only gave new and more glorious opportunities for
faith.
For if a considerable interval occurred between the washing
of one salt pillar out of existence and the washing of another
into existence, the idea arose that the statue, by virtue of the
soul which still remained in it, had departed on some mysterious
excursion. Did it happen that one statue was washed out one year
in one place and another statue another year in another place, this
difficulty was surmounted by believing that Lot's wife still walked
about. Did it happen that a salt column was undermined by
the rains and fell, this was believed to be but another sign of
life. Did a pillar happen to be covered in part by the sea, this
was enough to arouse the belief that the statue from time to
time descended into the Dead Sea depths, - possibly to satisfy
that old fatal curiosity regarding her former neighbors. Did some
smaller block of salt happen to be washed out near the statue,
it was believed that a household dog, also transformed into salt,
had followed her back from beneath the deep. Did more statues


## p. 15866 (#198) ##########################################

15866
ANDREW DICKSON WHITE
»
than one appear at one time, that simply made the mystery more
impressive.
In facts now so easy of scientific explanation, the theologians
found wonderful matter for argument.
One great question among them was whether the soul of Lot's
wife did really remain in the statue. On one side it was insisted
that as Holy Scripture declares that Lot's wife was changed into
a pillar of salt, and as she was necessarily made up of a soul
and a body, the soul must have become part of the statue. This
argument was clinched by citing that passage in the Book of
Wisdom in which the salt pillar is declared to be still standing
as “the monument of an unbelieving soul. ” On the other hand,
it was insisted that the soul of the woman must have been incor-
poreal and immortal, and hence could not have been changed into
a substance corporeal and mortal. Naturally, to this it would
be answered that the salt pillar was no more corporeal than the
ordinary materials of the human body, and that it had been made
miraculously immortal, and with God all things are possible. ”
Thus were opened long vistas of theological discussion.
As we enter the sixteenth century, the Dead Sea myths, and
especially the legends of Lot's wife, are still growing.
Father Anselm of the Minorites declares that the sea sometimes
covers the feet of the statue, sometimes the legs, sometimes the
whole body.
In 1555, Gabriel Giraudet, priest at Puy, journeyed through
Palestine. His faith was robust, and his attitude toward the
myths of the Dead Sea is seen by his declaration that its waters
are so foul that one can smell them at a distance of three leagues;
that straw, hay, or feathers thrown into them will sink, but that
iron and other metals will float; that criminals have been kept in
them three or four days and could not drown. As to Lot's wife,
he says that he found her “ lying there, her back toward heaven,
converted into salt stone; for I touched her, and put a piece of
her into my mouth, and she tasted salt. ”
At the centre of these legends we see, then, the idea that
though there were no living beasts in the Dead Sea, the people
of the overwhelmed cities were still living beneath its waters,
probably in hell; that there was life in the salt statue, and that
it was still curious regarding its old neighbors.
In 1507


## p. 15867 (#199) ##########################################

15867
GILBERT WHITE
(1720-1793)
T
CHE Natural History of Selborne,' written by Gilbert White,
an English clergyman of the eighteenth century, belongs
to literature rather than to science, because of its poetical
spirit of intimacy with the living world, making knowledge as much
the fruit of intuition as of intellectual research. Like Thoreau's
works, it springs from the heart of its author; lacking all the sever-
ity of a scientific treatise, warm instead with the humanity that feels
itself close to all happy living things.
White of Selborne was, however, a naturalist of no mean rank;
although his field of research was limited, including only the parishes
in the South of England to which he ministered, and of which Sel-
borne furnished him the greater part of the material for his famous
book. In a letter to Thomas Pennant, he thus describes the geogra-
phy of this parish, every inch of whose ground he knew and loved :-
The parish of Selborne lies in the extreme eastern corner of the county
of Hampshire, bordering on the county of Sussex, and not far from the county
of Surrey; it is about fifty miles southwest of London, in latitude 51°, and
near midway between the towns of Alton and Petersfield. Being very large
and extensive, it abuts on twelve parishes, two of which are in Sussex,- viz. ,
Trotton and Rogate. If you begin from the south, and proceed westward, the
adjacent parishes are Emshot, Newton Valence, Faringdon, Harteley-Mandent,
Great Wardlebam, Kingsley, Hedleigh, Bramshot, Trotton, Rogate, Lysse, and
Greatham. The soils of this district are almost as various and diversified as
the views and aspects. The high part to the southwest consists of a vast bill
of chalk, rising three hundred feet above the village; and is divided into a
sheep-down, the high wood, and a long hanging wood called the Hanger. The
covert of this eminence is altogether beech; the most lovely of all forest trees,
whether we consider its smooth rind or bark, its glossy foliage, or graceful
pendulous boughs. The down or sheep-walk is a pleasant park-like spot of
about one mile by half that space, jutting out on the verge of the hill country,
where it begins to break down into the plains, and commanding a very enga-
ging view; being an assemblage of hill, dale, woodlands, heath, and water. )
In this parish of Selborne, Gilbert White was born in 1720; was
educated at Basingstoke, under Warton the father of the poet, and at
Oriel College, Oxford, where he obtained a fellowship in 1744. He
removed to a country curacy in 1753, but returned to Selborne again
In 1758 he obtained a sinecure living from his college;
in 1755.


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15868
GILBERT WHITE
1
----
became curate of Faringdon, remaining there until 1784; when he
again assumed the charge of Selborne Church, and ministered there
until his death in 1793.
From his youth he had shown the strongest love for natural his-
tory,- a passion shared by his brothers: one of whom, Benjamin,
retired from trade to devote himself to natural and physical science,
and besides contributing papers to the Royal Society, became a pub-
lisher of works of natural history; another brother, John, vicar of
Gibraltar, wrote a natural history of the rock and its neighborhood.
Their fame, however, is overshadowed by that of the author of the
Natural History of Selborne. The scientific value of this book is
not inconsiderable. It is a storehouse of the knowledge patiently
acquired by a man who was watchful of each phenomenon of nature;
whose methods of gaining information were essentially modern, be-
cause they aimed at complete accuracy attained by personal research.
But the charm of this record, not only of days but of hours in Sel-
borne, lies not in its merits as a circumstantial history of the natural
phenomena of an English parish, but in its spirit of loving intimacy
with the out-of-door world. The book is fragrant with the wandering
airs of the fields and woods. Each chapter is a ramble in rural Eng-
land. It is a home-like work, because it tells of things that keen
eyes might see from the cottage window, or perhaps no farther than
the garden dial, or the graves in the ancient church-yard. White
noted many curious things of birds and field-mice, of bats and frogs
and insects, on his strolls through the village lanes. His humble
neighbors must have caught some of his enthusiasm for natural
knowledge; for mention is often made of their bringing to him curi-
ous scraps of information, the results of their observations in his
behalf.
“A shepherd saw, as he thought, some white larks on a down
above my house this winter: were not these the Emberiza nivalis, the
snowflake of the Brit. Zool. ? No doubt they were. ”
“As a neighbor was lately plowing in a dry chalky field, far re-
moved from any water, he turned out a water-rat, that was curiously
laid up in an hybernaculum artificially formed of grass and leaves.
At one end of the burrow lay about a gallon of potatoes, regularly
stowed, on which it was to have supported itself for the winter. ”
It was upon the birds of his district that the attention of White
seems to have been chiefly centred. He knew the times of their
appearance in spring and summer so accurately, that he is able to
make out chronological lists which tell the day and almost the hour
of their coming. He heads the list of the summer birds of pass-
age with the wryneck, which comes in the middle of March, and
has a harsh note; with the smallest willow wren, which appears on
the 23d of the same month, and “chirps till September”; some have
1
1


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GILBERT WHITE
15869
names.
(C
a sweet wild note,” some «a sweet plaintive note); last of all is
the fly-catcher, who arrives on May 12th, and is a very mute bird. ”
He also makes a list of those birds who continue in full song until
after midsummer, and of those who have ceased to sing before mid-
summer. To these he gives their Latin as well as their English
His quaint scholarship shows itself in scattered Latin quota-
tions bearing upon his subject; sometimes in happy lines from the
old English poets; sometimes in a verse from the Bible, as when he
uses the words of Job, in speaking of the cuckoo's cruelty to its
young: -
“She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were
not hers:
« Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he im-
parted to her understanding. "
The Natural History of Selborne) is chiefly embodied in White's
letters to Thomas Pennant. He corresponded also with Barrington,
with Lightfoot, with Sir Joseph Banks, and other noted naturalists.
The style of the book is simple, scholarly, and not without a homely
beauty of its own. One of the most restful figures in the restless
and artificial eighteenth century is this of Gilbert White: living his
serene life near to the heart of nature, writing of what he saw to
sympathetic friends, accumulating for himself a long and quiet fame.
His grave is in Selborne church-yard, amid the scenes with which he
was associated in so loving an intimacy.
HABITS OF THE TORTOISE
Letter to Hon. Daines Barrington: from "The Natural History of Selborne)
T"
he old Sussex tortoise that I have mentioned to you so often
is become my property. I dug it out of its winter dor-
mitory in March last, when it was enough awakened to
express its resentments by hissing; and packing it in a box with
earth, carried it eighty miles in post-chaises. The rattle and
hurry of the journey so perfectly roused it, that when I turned
it out on a border, it walked twice down to the bottom of my
garden; however, in the evening, the weather being cold, it bur-
ied itself in the loose mold, and continues still concealed.
As it will be under my eye, I shall now have an opportunity
of enlarging my observations on its mode of life and propensi-
ties: and perceive already that towards the time of coming forth,
it opens a breathing-place in the ground near its head; requiring,


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15870
GILBERT WHITE
I conclude, a freer respiration as it becomes more alive. This
creature not only goes under the earth from the middle of No-
vember to the middle of April, but sleeps great part of summer;
for it goes to bed in the longest days at four in the afternoon,
and often does not stir in the morning till late. Besides, it re-
tires to rest for every shower, and does not move at all on wet
days. When one reflects on the state of this strange being, it is
a matter of wonder to find that Providence should bestow such a
profusion of days, such a seeming waste of longevity, on a reptile
that appears to relish it so little as to squander more than two-
thirds of its existence in a joyless stupor, and to be lost to all
sensation for months together in the profoundest of slumbers.
When I was writing this letter, a moist and warm afternoon,
with the thermometer at fifty, brought forth troops of shell-snails,
and at the same juncture the tortoise heaved up the mold and
put out his head: and the next morning came forth, as if raised
from the dead; and walked about until four in the afternoon.