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The Ethics of the Dust, a non-fiction book by John Ruskin |
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_ NOTE I.
THROUGHOUT the dialogues, it must be observed that "Sibyl" is addressed (when in play) as having once been the Cumaean Sibyl; and "Egypt" as having been Queen Nitocris,--the Cinderella and "the greatest heroine and beauty" of Egyptian story. The Egyptians called her "Neith the Victorious" (Nitocris), and the Greeks "Face of the Rose" (Rhodope). Chaucer's beautiful conception of Cleopatra in the "Legend of Good Women," is much more founded on the traditions of her than on those of Cleopatra; and, especially in its close, modified by Herodotus's terrible story of the death of Nitocris, which, however, is mythologically nothing more than a part of the deep monotonous ancient dirge for the fulfillment of the earthly destiny of Beauty: "She cast herself into a chamber full of ashes." I believe this Queen is now sufficiently ascertained to have either built, or increased to double its former size, the third pyramid of Gizeh: and the passage following in the text refers to an imaginary endeavor, by the Old Lecturer and the children together, to make out the description of that pyramid in the 167th page of the second volume of Bunsen's "Egypt's Place in Universal History"--ideal endeavor,--which ideally terminates as the Old Lecturer's real endeavors to the same end always have terminated. There are, however, valuable notes respecting Nitocris at page 210 of the same volume: but the "Early Egyptian History for the Young," by the author of "Sidney Gray," contains, in a pleasant form, as much information as young readers will usually need.
THIS pyramid, in mythology, divides with the Tower of Babel the shame, or vain glory, of being presumptuously, and first among great edifices, built with "brick for stone." This was the inscription on it, according to Herodotus: "Despise me not, in comparing me with the pyramids of stone; for I have the pre-eminence over them, as far as Jupiter has pre- eminence over the gods. For, striking with staves into the pool, men gathered the clay which fastened itself to the staff, and kneaded bricks out of it, and so made me." The word I have translated "kneaded" is literally "drew;" in the sense of drawing, for which the Latins used "duco;" and thus gave us our "ductile" in speaking of dead clay, and Duke, Doge, or leader, in speaking of living clay. As the asserted pre-eminence of the edifice is made, in this inscription, to rest merely on the quantity of labor consumed in it, this pyramid is considered, in the text, as the type, at once, of the base building, and of the lost labor, of future ages, so far at least as the spirits of measured and mechanical effort deal with it; but Neith, exercising her power upon it, makes it a type of the work of wise and inspired builders.
IT is impossible, as yet, to define with distinctness the personal agencies of the Egyptian deities. They are continually associated in function, or hold derivative powers, or are related to each other in mysterious triads, uniting always symbolism of physical phenomena with real spiritual power. I have endeavored partly to explain this in the text of the tenth Lecture here, it is only necessary for the reader to know that the Greater Pthah more or less represents the formative power of order and measurement he always stands on a four-square pedestal, "the Egyptian cubit, metaphorically used as the hieroglyphic for truth," his limbs are bound together, to signify fixed stability, as of a pillar; he has a measuring-rod in his hand, and at Philas, is represented as holding an egg on a potter's wheel; but I do not know if this symbol occurs in older sculptures. His usual title is the "Lord of Truth". Others, very beautiful "King of the Two Worlds, of Gracious Countenance," "Superintendent of the Great Abode," etc., are given by Mr. Birch in Arundale's "Gallery of Antiquities," which I suppose is the book of best authority easily accessible. For the full titles and utterances of the gods, Rosellini is as yet the only--and I believe, still a very questionable--authority, and Arundale's little book, excellent in the text, has this great defect, that its drawings give the statues invariably a ludicrous or ignoble character Readers who have not access to the originals must be warned against this frequent fault in modern illustration (especially existing also in some of the painted casts of Gothic and Norman work at the Crystal Palace). It is not owing to any willful want of veracity: the plates in Arundale's book are laboriously faithful: but the expressions of both face and body in a figure depend merely on emphasis of touch, and, in barbaric art most draughtsmen emphasize what they plainly see--the barbarism, and miss conditions of nobleness, which they must approach the monument in a different temper before they will discover and draw with great subtlety before they can express. The character of the Lower Pthah, or perhaps I ought rather to say, of Pthah in his lower office, is sufficiently explained in the text of the third Lecture, only the reader must be warned that the Egyptian symbolism of him by the beetle was not a scornful one, it expressed only the idea of his presence in the first elements of life. But it may not unjustly be used, in another sense, by us, who have seen his power in new development, and, even as it was, I cannot conceive that the Egyptians should have regarded their beetle headed image of him (Champollion, "Pantheon," p. 12), without some occult scorn. It is the most painful of all their types of any beneficent power, and even among those of evil influences, none can be compared with it, except its opposite, the tortoise headed demon of indolence. Pasht (p. 27, line 9) is connected with the Greek Artemis, especially in her offices of judgment and vengeance. She is usually lioness headed, sometimes cat headed, her attributes seeming often trivial or ludicrous unless their full meaning is known, but the inquiry is much too wide to be followed here. The cat was sacred to her, or rather to the sun, and secondarily to her. She is alluded to in the text because she is always the companion of Pthah (called "the beloved of Pthah," it may be as Judgment, demanded and longed for by Truth), and it may be well for young readers to have this fixed in their minds, even by chance association. There are more statues of Pasht in the British Museum than of any other Egyptian deity; several of them fine in workmanship, nearly all in dark stone, which may be, presumably, to connect her, as the moon, with the night; and in her office of avenger, with grief. Thoth (p. 31, line 12), is the Recording Angel of Judgment; and the Greek Hermes--Phre (line 16), is the Sun. Neith is the Egyptian spirit of divine wisdom, and the Athena of the Greeks. No sufficient statement of her many attributes, still less of their meanings, can be shortly given; but this should be noted respecting the veiling of the Egyptian image of her by vulture wings--that as she is, physically, the goddess of the air, this bird, the most powerful creature of the air known to the Egyptians, naturally became her symbol. It had other significations; but certainly this, when in connection with Neith. As representing her, it was the most important sign, next to the winged sphere, in Egyptian sculpture; and, just as in Homer, Athena herself guides her heroes into battle, this symbol of wisdom, giving victory, floats over the heads of the Egyptian Kings. The Greeks, representing the goddess herself in human form, yet would not lose the power of the Egyptian symbol, and changed it into an angel of victory. First seen in loveliness on the early coins of Syracuse and Leontium, it gradually became the received sign of all conquest, and the so called "Victory" of later times, which, little by little, loses its truth, and is accepted by the moderns only as a personification of victory itself,--not as an actual picture of the living Angel who led to victory. There is a wide difference between these two conceptions,--all the difference between insincere poetry, and sincere religion. This I have also endeavored farther to illustrate in the tenth Lecture, there is however one part of Athena's character which it would have been irrelevant to dwell upon there, yet which I must not wholly leave unnoticed. As the goddess of the air, she physically represents both its beneficent calm, and necessary tempest other storm deities (as Chrysaor and Aeolus) being invested with a subordinate and more or less malignant function, which is exclusively their own, and is related to that of Athena as the power of Mars is related to hers in war. So also Virgil makes her able to wield the lightning herself, while Juno cannot, but must pray for the intervention of Aeolus. She has precisely the correspondent moral authority over calmness of mind, and just anger. She soothes Achilles, as she incites Tydides; her physical power over the air being always hinted correlatively. She grasps Achilles by his hair--as the wind would lift it--softly,
NOTE IV.
IT is difficult, without a tedious accuracy, or without full illustration, to express the complete relations of crystalline structure, which dispose minerals to take, at different times, fibrous, massive, or foliated forms; and I am afraid this chapter will be generally skipped by the reader: yet the arrangement itself will be found useful, if kept broadly in mind; and the transitions of state are of the highest interest, if the subject is entered upon with any earnestness. It would have been vain to add to the scheme of this little volume any account of the geometrical forms of crystals an available one, though still far too difficult and too copious, has been arranged by the Rev. Mr. Mitchell, for Orr's "Circle of the Sciences;" and, I believe, the "nets" of crystals, which are therein given to be cut out with scissors and put prettily together, will be found more conquerable by young ladies than by other students. They should also, when an opportunity occurs, be shown, at any public library, the diagram of the crystallization of quartz referred to poles, at p. 8 of Cloizaux's "Manuel de Mineralogie;" that they may know what work is; and what the subject is. With a view to more careful examination of the nascent states of silica, I have made no allusion in this volume to the influence of mere segregation, as connected with the crystalline power. It has only been recently, during the study of the breccias alluded to in page 186, that I have fully seen the extent to which this singular force often modifies rocks in which at first its influence might hardly have been suspected; many apparent conglomerates being in reality formed chiefly by segregation, combined with mysterious brokenly-zoned structures, like those of some malachites. I hope some day to know more of these and several other mineral phenomena (especially of those connected with the relative sizes of crystals), which otherwise I should have endeavored to describe in this volume. NOTE V. "St. Barbara." I WOULD have given the legends of St. Barbara, and St. Thomas, if I had thought it always well for young readers to have everything at once told them which they may wish to know. They will remember the stories better after taking some trouble to find them; and the text is intelligible enough as it stands. The idea of St. Barbara, as there given, is founded partly on her legend in Peter de Natahbus, partly on the beautiful photograph of Van Eyck's picture of her at Antwerp: which was some time since published at Lille. NOTE VI. "King of the Valley of Diamonds." ISABEL interrupted the Lecturer here, and was briefly bid to hold her tongue; which gave rise to some talk, apart, afterwards, between L. and Sibyl, of which a word or two may be perhaps advisably set down. SIBYL. We shall spoil Isabel, certainly, if it don't mind: I was glad you stopped her, and yet sorry, for she wanted so much to ask about the Valley of Diamonds again, and she has worked so hard at it, and made it nearly all out by herself. She recollected Elisha's throwing in the meal, which nobody else did. L. But what did she want to ask? SIBYL. About the mulberry trees and the serpents; we are all stopped by that. Won't you tell us what it means? L. Now, Sibyl, I am sure you, who never explained yourself, should be the last to expect others to do so. I hate explaining myself. SIBYL. And yet how often you complain of other people for not saying what they meant. How I have heard you growl over the three stone steps to purgatory, for instance! L. Yes; because Dante's meaning is worth getting at, but mine matters nothing at least, if ever I think it is of any consequence so I speak it as clearly as may be. But you may make anything you like of the serpent forests I could have helped you to find out what they were, by giving a little more detail, but it would have been tiresome. SIBYL. It is much more tiresome not to find out Tell us, please, as Isabel says, because we feel so stupid. L. There is no stupidity, you could not possibly do more than guess at anything so vague. But I think, you, Sibyl, at least, might have recollected what first dyed the mulberry. SIBYL. So I did, but that helped little, I thought of Dante's forest of suicides, too, but you would not simply have borrowed that. L. No! If I had had strength to use it, I should have stolen it, to beat into another shape; not borrowed it. But that idea of souls in trees is as old as the world; or at least, as the world of man. And I DID mean that there were souls in those dark branches,--the souls of all those who had perished in misery through the pursuit of riches, and that the river was of their blood, gathering gradually, and flowing out of the valley. Then I meant the serpents for the souls of those who had lived carelessly and wantonly in their riches; and who have all their sins forgiven by the world, because they are rich: and therefore they have seven crimson crested heads, for the seven mortal sins; of which they are proud: and these, and the memory and report of them, are the chief causes of temptation to others, as showing the pleasantness and absolving power of riches; so that thus they are singing serpents. And the worms are the souls of the common money getters and traffickers, who do nothing but eat and spin: and who gain habitually by the distress or foolishness of others (as you see the butchers have been gaining out of the panic at the cattle plague, among the poor),--so they are made to eat the dark leaves, and spin, and perish. SIBYL. And the souls of the great, cruel, rich people who oppress the poor, and lend money to government to make unjust war, where are they? L. They change into the ice, I believe, and are knit with the gold, and make the grave dust of the valley I believe so, at least, for no one ever sees those souls anywhere. (SIBYL ceases questioning.) ISABEL (who has crept up to her side without any one seeing). Oh, Sibyl, please ask him about the fireflies! L. What, you there, mousie! No; I won't tell either Sibyl or you about the fireflies, nor a word more about anything else you ought to be little fireflies yourselves, and find your way in twilight by your own wits. ISABEL. But you said they burned, you know? L. Yes; and you may be fireflies that way too, some of you, before long, though I did not mean that. Away with you, children. You have thought enough for to-day. NOTE TO SECOND EDITION
"I am reading the Ethics with a nice Irish girl who is staying here, and she's just as puzzled as I've always been about the fireflies, and we both want to know so much.--Please be a very nice old Lecturer, and tell us, won't you?" Well, May, you never were a vain girl; so could scarcely guess that I meant them for the light, unpursued vanities, which yet blind us, confused among the stars. One evening, as I came late into Siena, the fireflies were flying high on a stormy sirocco wind,--the stars themselves no brighter, and all their host seeming, at moments, to fade as the insects faded.
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