Guardian Angel

Wendell Holmes Sr. Oliver

Description

Writer and Harvard Medical School professor Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. first emerged into the American literary limelight on this strength of his medical essays, which couched cutting-edge scientific information in informal, engaging prose. When he began writing long-form fiction, he continued this practice, creating a series of works he referred to as "medicated novels." In The Guardian Angel, a troubled young woman named Myrtle Hazard is driven to the depths of profound mental illness.

Informations

• Publié par: The Floating Press
• Date de parution: 01 décembre 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781776674091
• Langue: English

Extrait

THE GUARDIAN ANGEL
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OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES SR.
 
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The Guardian Angel First published in 1867 Epub ISBN 978-1-77667-409-1 Also available: PDF ISBN 978-1-77667-410-7 © 2015 The Floating Press and its licensors. All rights reserved. While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike. Visit www.thefloatingpress.com
Contents
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To My Readers Preface to the New Edition Chapter I - An Advertisement Chapter II - Great Excitement Chapter III - Antecedents Chapter IV - Byles Gridley, A. M. Chapter V - The Twins Chapter VI - The Use of Spectacles Chapter VII - Myrtle's Letter—The Young Men's Pursuit Chapter VIII - Down the River Chapter IX - Mr. Clement Lindsay Receives a Letter, and Begins His Answer Chapter X - Mr. Clement Lindsay Finishes His Letter—What Came of It Chapter XI - Vexed with a Devil Chapter XII - Skirmishing Chapter XIII - Battle Chapter XIV - Flank Movement Chapter XV - Arrival of Reinforcements Chapter XVI - Victory Chapter XVII - Saint and Sinner Chapter XVIII - Village Poet Chapter XIX - Susan's Young Man Chapter XX - The Second Meeting Chapter XXI - Madness? Chapter XXII - A Change of Programme Chapter XXIII - Myrtle Hazard at the City School Chapter XXIV - Mustering of Forces Chapter XXV - The Poet and the Publisher Chapter XXVI - Mrs. Clymer Ketchum's Party Chapter XXVII - Mine and Countermine Chapter XXVIII - Mr. Bradshaw Calls on Miss Badlam Chapter XXIX - Mistress Kitty Fagan Calls on Master Byles Gridley Chapter XXX - Master Byles Gridley Calls on Miss Cynthia Badlam Chapter XXXI - Master Byles Gridley Consults with Jacob Penhallow, Esquire Chapter XXXII - Susan Posey's Trial Chapter XXXIII - Just as You Expected Chapter XXXIV - Murray Bradshaw Plays His Last Card Chapter XXXV - The Spotted Paper Chapter XXXVI - Conclusion
To My Readers
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"A new Preface" is, I find, promised with my story. If there are anyamong my readers who loved Aesop's Fables chiefly on account of theMoral appended, they will perhaps be pleased to turn backward and learnwhat I have to say here.
This tale forms a natural sequence to a former one, which some mayremember, entitled "Elsie Venner." Like that,—it is intended for twoclasses of readers, of which the smaller one includes the readers of the"Morals" in Aesop and of this Preface.
The first of the two stories based itself upon an experiment which somethought cruel, even on paper. It imagined an alien element introducedinto the blood of a human being before that being saw the light. Itshowed a human nature developing itself in conflict with the ophidiancharacteristics and instincts impressed upon it during the pre-natalperiod. Whether anything like this ever happened, or was possible,mattered little: it enabled me, at any rate, to suggest the limitationsof human responsibility in a simple and effective way.
The story which follows comes more nearly within the range of commonexperience. The successive development of inherited bodily aspectsand habitudes is well known to all who have lived long enough to seefamilies grow up under their own eyes. The same thing happens, but lessobviously to common observation, in the mental and moral nature. Thereis something frightful in the way in which not only characteristicqualities, but particular manifestations of them, are repeated fromgeneration to generation. Jonathan Edwards the younger tells the storyof a brutal wretch in New Haven who was abusing his father, when the oldman cried out, "Don't drag me any further, for I did n't drag my fatherbeyond this tree." [The original version of this often-repeated storymay be found in Aristotle's Ethics, Book 7th, Chapter 7th.] I haveattempted to show the successive evolution of some inherited qualitiesin the character of Myrtle Hazard, not so obtrusively as to disturb thenarrative, but plainly enough to be kept in sight by the small class ofpreface-readers.
If I called these two stories Studies of the Reflex Function in itshigher sphere, I should frighten away all but the professors and thelearned ladies. If I should proclaim that they were protests againstthe scholastic tendency to shift the total responsibility of all humanaction from the Infinite to the finite, I might alarm the jealousy ofthe cabinet-keepers of our doctrinal museums. By saying nothingabout it, the large majority of those whom my book reaches, not beingpreface-readers, will never suspect anything to harm them beyond thesimple facts of the narrative.
Should any professional alarmist choose to confound the doctrine oflimited responsibility with that which denies the existence of anyself-determining power, he may be presumed to belong to the class ofintellectual half-breeds, of which we have many representatives in ournew country, wearing the garb of civilization, and even the gown ofscholarship. If we cannot follow the automatic machinery of nature intothe mental and moral world, where it plays its part as much as in thebodily functions, without being accused of laying "all that we are evilin to a divine thrusting on," we had better return at once to ourold demonology, and reinstate the Leader of the Lower House in histime-honored prerogatives.
As fiction sometimes seems stranger than truth, a few words maybe needed here to make some of my characters and statements appearprobable. The long-pending question involving a property which hadbecome in the mean time of immense value finds its parallel in the greatDe Haro land-case, decided in the Supreme Court while this story was inprogress (May 14th, 1867). The experiment of breaking the child'swill by imprisonment and fasting is borrowed from a famous incident,happening long before the case lately before one of the courts ofa neighboring Commonwealth, where a little girl was beaten to deathbecause she would not say her prayers. The mental state involving utterconfusion of different generations in a person yet capable of forminga correct judgment on other matters, is almost a direct transcriptfrom nature. I should not have ventured to repeat the questions ofthe daughters of the millionaires to Myrtle Hazard about her familyconditions, and their comments, had not a lady of fortune and positionmentioned to me a similar circumstance in the school history of one ofher own children. Perhaps I should have hesitated in reproducing MyrtleHazard's "Vision," but for a singular experience of his own related tome by the late Mr. Forceythe Willson.
Gifted Hopkins (under various alliasis) has been a frequentcorrespondent of mine. I have also received a good many communications,signed with various names, which must have been from near femalerelatives of that young gentleman. I once sent a kind of encyclicalletter to the whole family connection; but as the delusion under whichthey labor is still common, and often leads to the wasting of time,the contempt of honest study or humble labor, and the misapplication ofintelligence not so far below mediocrity as to be incapable of affordinga respectable return when employed in the proper direction, I thoughtthis picture from life might also be of service. When I say that nogenuine young poet will apply it to himself, I think I have so farremoved the sting that few or none will complain of being wounded.
It is lamentable to be forced to add that the Reverend Joseph BellamyStoker is only a softened copy of too many originals to whom, as aregular attendant upon divine worship from my childhood to the presenttime, I have respectfully listened, while they dealt with me and mineand the bulk of their fellow-creatures after the manner of their sect.If, in the interval between his first showing himself in my story andits publication in a separate volume, anything had occurred to makeme question the justice or expediency of drawing and exhibiting such aportrait, I should have reconsidered it, with the view of retouching itssharper features. But its essential truthfulness has been illustratedevery month or two, since my story has been in the course ofpublication, by a fresh example from real life, stamped in darker colorsthan any with which I should have thought of staining my pages.
There are a great many good clergymen to one bad one, but a writerfinds it hard to keep to the true proportion of good and bad persons intelling a story. The three or four good ministers I have introduced inthis narrative must stand for many whom I have known and loved, and someof whom I count to-day among my most valued friends. I hope the best andwisest of them will like this story and approve it. If they cannot alldo this, I know they will recognize it as having been written with aright and honest purpose.
BOSTON, 1867.
Preface to the New Edition
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It is a quarter of a century since the foregoing Preface was written,and that is long enough to allow a story to be forgotten by the public,and very possibly by the writer of it also. I will not pretend that Ihave forgotten all about "The Guardian Angel," but it is long sinceI have read it, and many of its characters and incidents are far frombeing distinct in my memory. There are, however, a few points which holdtheir place among my recollections. The revolt of Myrtle Hazard from thetyranny of that dogmatic dynasty now breaking up in all directions hasfound new illustrations since this tale was written. I need only referto two instances of many. The first is from real life. Mr. RobertC. Adams's work, "Travels in Faith from Tradition to Reason," is theoutcome of the teachings of one of the most intransigeant of our NewEngland Calvinists, the late Reverend Nehemiah A