THE WONDERS OF THE SHORE. 155 
and to them, as to us, as soon as we begin asking 
“ How?” and “ Why?” the mighty Mother will only 
reply with that magnificent smile of hers, most 
genial, but most silent, which she has worn since 
the foundation of all worlds; that silent smile which 
has tempted many a man to suspect her of irony, 
even of deceit and hatred of the human race; the 
silent smile which Solomon felt, and answered in 
“ Ecclesiastes ;” which Goethe felt, and did not 
answer in his “ Faust;” which Pascal felt, and tried 
to answer in his “ Thoughts,” and fled from into self- 
torture and superstition, terrified beyond his powers 
of endurance, as he found out the true meaning of 
St. John’s vision, and felt himself really standing on 
that fragile and slippery “sea of glass,” and close 
beneath him the bottomless abyss of doubt, and the 
nether fires of moral retribution. He fled from 
Nature’s silént smile, as that poor old King Edward 
(mis-called the Confessor) fled from her hymns of 
praise, in the old legend of Havering-atte-bower, 
when he cursed the nightingales because their songs 
confused him in his prayers: but the wise man need 
