THE PEDESTRIAN
In June, with a gnarled stick in my hand (like the god Bishamon), I am that mysterious passer-by who crosses the path of groups of simple, ruddy peasants; and, at six in the evening, while the storm-cloud in the sky endlessly continues its monstrous assault on the mountain, I am that lonely man one sees upon this abandoned road.
I am going nowhere in particular. My wanderings are without end and without profit. The itinerary of the soldier or the merchant, the piety of the sterile woman who, with hopeful humility, seven times makes a tour of the holy peak,—these have nothing in common with my travels. The footprint pointed in the usual direction does not allure my own far enough to lead me astray; and soon, urged by the intimacy there is in treading this moss through the heart of the woods, to pick the black leaf of a camellia by the weeping of a secret waterfall,—I flee suddenly, like an awkward deer. Then, amid the silence of growingthings, poised on one foot, I await the echo. How fresh and comic the song of this little bird seems to me! And how the cry of the rooks below delights me! Each tree has its personality, each little beast his part, each voice its place in the symphony; as they say music is comprehended, so I comprehend Nature.
It is like a story of many details, where only the proper names are given. As my walk—and the day—proceeds, I advance also in the development of a philosophy. Already I have discovered with delight that all things exist in a certain accord; and, though believing this secret relationship, by which the blackness of this pine below espouses the clear green of these maples, it is my purified sight only which establishes it; so, because of this restoration of the original design, I call my visit a Revision. I am the Inspector of Creation, the Verifier of all present things. The reality of this world is the cause of my beatitude. In ordinary hours we employ things for their usefulness, forgetting their purer value: that they should exist at all. But when, after a long effort, pushing through branches and briars, I place my hand on the burning shoulder of this heavy rock in the heart of a glade, the entry ofAlexander into Jerusalem is alone comparable to the sublimity of my achievement.
And I go on and on! Each one of us contains in himself the autonomous power of motion by which he moves toward his food and his work. As for me, the even motion of my legs serves to measure for me the intensity of more subtle appeals. The allurement of everything! I feel it in the silence of my soul. I understand the harmony of the world. When shall I surprise its melody?