IINOON
Thenoon is short; the sun never loiters on the meridian, nor does the shadow on the old dial by the garden stay long at XII. The present, like the noon, is only a point, and a point so fine that it is not measurable by the grossness of action. Thought alone is delicate enough to tell the breadth of the present.
The past belongs to God; the present only is ours. And, short as it is, there is more in it, and of it, than we can well manage. That man who can grapple it, and measure it, and fill it with his purpose, is doing a man’s work; none can do more; but there are thousands who do less.
Short as it is, the present is great and strong—as much stronger than the past as fire than ashes, or as death than the grave. The noon sun will quicken vegetable life that in the morning was dead. It is hot and scorching; I feel it now upon my head; but it does not scorch and heat like the bewildering present. There are no oak leaves to interrupt the rays of the burning now. Its shadows do not fall east or west—like the noon, the shade it makes falls straight from sky to earth—straight from heaven to hell!
Memory presides over the past; Action presides over the present. The first lives in a rich temple hung with glorious trophies and lined with tombs; the other has no shrine but Duty, and it walks the earth like a spirit.
—I called my dog to me, and we shared together the meal that I had brought away at sunrise from the mansion under the elms; and now Carlo is gnawing at the bone that I have thrown to him, and I stroll dreamily in the quiet noon atmosphere upon that grassy knoll under the oaks.
Noon in the country is very still; the birds do not sing; the workmen are not in the field; the sheep lay their noses to the ground, and the herds stand in pools under shady trees, lashing their sides, but otherwise motionless. The mills upon the brook, far above, have ceased for an hour their labor; and the stream softens its rustle and sinks away from the sedgy banks. The heat plays upon the meadow in noiseless waves, and the beech leaves do not stir.
Thought, I said, was the only measure of the present; and the stillness of noon breeds thought; and my thought brings up the old companions and stations them in the domain of now. Thought ranges over the world, and brings up hopes, and fears, and resolves, to measure the burning now. Joy, and grief, and purpose, blending in my thought, give breadth to the Present.
—Where—thought I—is little Isabel now? Where is Lilly—where is Ben? Where is Leslie—where is my old teacher? Where is my chum, who played such rare tricks—where is the black-eyed Jane? Where is that sweet-faced girl whom I parted with upon that terrace looking down upon the old spire of Modbury church? Where are my hopes—where my purposes—where my sorrows?
I care not who you are—but if you bring such thought to measure the present, the present will seem broad; and it will be sultry at noon—and make a fever of Now.