WHO says that life is a treadmill?
You, merchant, when, after a weary day of measuring cotton-cloth ornumbering flower barrels, bowing to customers or taking account ofstock, you stumble homeward, thinking to yourself that the moon is atolerable substitute for gas light, to prevent people from runningagainst the posts--and then, by chance, recall the time when, aschool-boy, you read about "chaste Dian" in your Latin books, anddiscovered a striking resemblance to moonbeams in certain blue eyesthat beamed upon you from the opposite side of the school-room.
Ah! those were the days when brick side-walks were as elastic asIndia rubber beneath your feet; shop windows were an exhibition oftransparencies to amuse children and young people, and the world inprospect was one long pleasure excursion. Then you drank the brighteffervescence in your glass of soda-water, and now you must swallowthe cold, flat settlings, or not get your money's worth. Long agoyou found out that the moon is the origin of moonshine, that blueeyes are not quite as fascinating under gray hair and behindspectacles, and that "money answereth all things."
You say so, clerk or bank-teller, when you look up from your booksat the new-fallen snow glistening in the morning light, and feelsomething like the prancing of horses' hoofs in the soles of yourboots, and hear the jingling of sleigh bells in your mind's ear,long after the sound of them has passed from your veritableauriculars.
You say so, teacher, while going through the daily drill of your A BC regiments, your multiplication table platoons, and yourchirographical battalions.
You say so, factory girl, passing backward and forward from thenoise and whirl of wheels in the mills, to the whirl and noise ofwheels in your dreams.
You say so, milliner's apprentice, as you sit down to sew gayribbons on gay bonnets, and stand up to try gay bonnets on gayheads.
You say so, housemaid or housekeeper, when the song of the earlybird reminds you of crying children, whose faces are to be washed;when the rustling of fallen leaves in the wind makes you wonder howthe new broom is going to sweep; when the aroma of roses suggeststhe inquiry whether the box of burnt coffee is empty; and when therising sun, encircled by vapoury clouds, brings up the similitude ofa huge fire-proof platter, and the smoke of hot potatoes.
There is a principle in human nature which rebels againstrepetitions. Who likes to fall asleep, thinking that to-morrowmorning he must get up and do exactly the same things that he didto-day, the next day ditto, and so forth, until the chapter ofearthly existence is finished!
It is very irksome for these soaring thoughts winged to "wanderthrough eternity," to come down and work out the terms of a tediousapprenticeship to the senses. And yet, what were thoughtsunlocalized and unembodied? Mere comets or vague nebulosities in thefirmament, without a form, and without a home.
All things have their orbit, and are held in it by the power of twogreat opposing forces.
Outward circumstances form the centripetal force, which keeps us inours. Let the eccentric will fly off at ever so wide a tangent for atime, back it must come to a regular diurnal path, or wander awayinto the "blackness of darkness." And if these daily duties andcares come to us robed in the shining livery of Law, should we notaccept them as bearers of a sublime mission?
"What?" you say, "anything sublime in yardstick tactics or ledgercolumns? Anything sublime in washing dishes or trimming bonnets? Theidea is simply ridiculous!"
No, not ridiculous; only a simple idea, and great in its simplicity.For the manner of performing even menial duties, gives you the gaugeand dimensions of the doer's inward strength. The power of the soulasserts itself, not so much in shaping favourable circumstances todesired ends, as in resisting the pressure of crushingcircumstances, and triumphing over them.
Manufactures, trades, and all the subordinate arts and occupationsthat keep the car of civilization in motion, may be to you machinesmoving with a monotonous and unmeaning buzz, or they may be likeEzekiel's vision of wheels involved in wheels, that were lifted upfrom the earth by the power of the living creature that was in them.
Grumbling man or woman, life is a treadmill to you, because youlook doggedly down and see nothing but the dull steps you take. Ifyou would cease grumbling, and look up, your life would betransformed into a Jacob's ladder, and every step onward would be astep upward too. And even if it were a treadmill, to which you andother mortals were condemned for past offences, a kindly sympathyfor your fellow-prisoners could carpet the way with velvet, and youmight move on smilingly together, as through the mazes of an easydance.
It is of no use to preach the old sermon of contentment with onecondition, whatever it may be, a sermon framed for lands wherearistocracies are fixtures, in this generation and on thiscontinent. Discontent is a necessity of republicanism, until themillennium comes.
Yet it is not sensible to complain of the present, until we havegleaned its harvests and drained its sap, and it has become capitalfor us to draw upon in the future. Most of the dissatisfiedgrumblers of our day are like children from whom the prospect of aChristmas pie, intended for the climax of a supper, takes away allrelish for the more solid and wholesome introductory exercises ofbread and butter.
What is it we would have our life? Not princely pop and equipments,nor to "marry the prince's own," which used to form the denouementof every fairy tale, will suffice us now; for every ingenious Yankeeschool-boy or girl has learned to dissect the puppet show ofroyalty, and knows that its personages move in a routine the mosthampered and helpless of all.
The honour of being four years in stepping from one door of the"White House" to the other, ceases to be the meed of a dignifiedambition when it results from a skilful shuffling of politicalcards, rather than from strength and steadiness of head and anupright gait.
If we ask for freedom from care, and leisure to enjoy life--until wehave learned, through the discipline of labour and care, how toappreciate and use leisure--we might as well petition fromgovernment a grant of prairie land for Egyptian mummies to run racesupon.
If one might get himself appointed to the general overseership ofthe solar system, still, what would his occupation be but a regularpacing to and fro from the sun to the outermost limits of LeVerrier's calculations, and perhaps a little farther? A successionof rather longish strides he would have to take, to be sure; nowburning his soles in the fires of Mercury; now hitting his cornsagainst some of the pebbly Asteroids, and now slipping upon the icyrim of Neptune. Still, if he made drudgery of his work by keepinghis soul out of it, he would only have his treadmill life overagain, on a large scale.
The monotony of our three-score years and ten is wearisome to us;what can we think then of the poor planets, doomed to the samediurnal spinning, the same annual path, for six thousand years, toour certain knowledge? And, if telescopes tell us the truth, theuniverse is an ever-widening series of similar monotonies.
Yet space is ample enough to give all systems variety of place.While each planet moves steadily along on the edge of its plane, thewhole solar equipage is going forward to open a new track on thevast highway of the heavens.
We too, moving in our several spheres with honest endeavours andaspirations, are, by the stability of our motions, lifting and beinglifted, with the whole compact human brotherhood, into a higherelevation, a brighter revelation of the Infinite, the Universe ofWisdom and Love.
And in this view, though our efforts be humble and our toil hard,life can never be a treadmill.
THE END.
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