I do not call reason that brutal reason which crushes with its weight what is holy and sacred; that malignant reason which delights in the errors it succeeds in discovering; that unfeeling and scornful reason which insults credulity.--_Joubert._
True art, which requires free and healthy faculties, is opposed to pedantry, which crushes the soul under a burden.
Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called.
Debt is to a man what the serpent is to the bird; its eye fascinates, its breath poisons, its coil crushes both sinew and bone; its jaw is the pitiless grave.
Death, the dry pedant, spares neither the rose nor the thistle, nor does he forget the solitary blade of grass in the distant waste. He destroys thoroughly and unceasingly. Everywhere we may see how he crushes to dust plants and beasts, men and their works. Even the Egyptian pyramids, that would seem to defy him, are trophies of his power,--monuments of decay, graves of primeval kings.--_Heinrich Heine._
Truth and fidelity are the pillars of the temple of the world; when these are broken, the fabric falls, and crushes all to pieces.
Ill fortune never crushes that man whom good fortune deceived not.
The great wheel of Fate rolls on like a Juggernaut, and crushes us all in turn, some soon, some late.
It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul. So the decision-making of daily life involves not, as in normal affairs, shifting from one annoying situation to another less annoying — or from discomfort to relative comfort, or from boredom to activity — but moving from pain to pain. One does not abandon, even briefly, one's bed of nails, but is attached to it wherever one goes.
Giant Ant?us in the fable acquired new strength every time he touched the earth; so some brave minds gain fresh energy from that which depresses and crushes others.
Katya never had made such confessions to Alyosha before, and he felt that she was now at that stage of unbearable suffering when even the proudest heart painfully crushes its pride and falls vanquished by grief. Oh, Alyosha knew another terrible reason of her present misery, though she had carefully concealed it from him during those days since the trial; but it would have been for some reason too painful to him if she had been brought so low as to speak to him now about that. She was suffering for her "treachery" at the trial, and Alyosha felt that her conscience was impelling her to confess it to him, to him, Alyosha, with tears and cries and hysterical writhings on the floor. But he dreaded that moment and longed to spare her. It made the commission on which he had come even more difficult. He spoke of Mitya again.
In violent emotions, one does not read, one flings to the earth, so to speak, the paper which one holds, one clutches it like a victim, one crushes it, one digs into it the nails of one's wrath, or of one's joy; one hastens to the end, one leaps to the beginning; attention is at fever heat; it takes up in the gross, as it were, the essential points; it seizes on one point, and the rest disappears. In Marius' note to Cosette, Jean Valjean saw only these words:--
The rule of the Perpetual Adoration is so rigid in its nature that it alarms, vocations recoil before it, the order receives no recruits. In 1845, it still obtained lay-sisters here and there. But of professed nuns, none at all. Forty years ago, the nuns numbered nearly a hundred; fifteen years ago there were not more than twenty-eight of them. How many are there to-day? In 1847, the prioress was young, a sign that the circle of choice was restricted. She was not forty years old. In proportion as the number diminishes, the fatigue increases, the service of each becomes more painful; the moment could then be seen drawing near when there would be but a dozen bent and aching shoulders to bear the heavy rule of Saint-Benoit. The burden is implacable, and remains the same for the few as for the many. It weighs down, it crushes. Thus they die. At the period when the author of this book still lived in Paris, two died. One was twenty-five years old, the other twenty-three. This latter can say, like Julia Alpinula: "Hic jaceo. Vixi annos viginti et tres." It is in consequence of this decay that the convent gave up the education of girls.
When Turnus saw the Trojan quit the plain, His chiefs dismay'd, his troops a fainting train, Th' unhop'd event his heighten'd soul inspires: At once his arms and coursers he requires; Then, with a leap, his lofty chariot gains, And with a ready hand assumes the reins. He drives impetuous, and, where'er he goes, He leaves behind a lane of slaughter'd foes. These his lance reaches; over those he rolls His rapid car, and crushes out their souls: In vain the vanquish'd fly; the victor sends The dead men's weapons at their living friends. Thus, on the banks of Hebrus' freezing flood, The God of Battles, in his angry mood, Clashing his sword against his brazen shield, Let loose the reins, and scours along the field: Before the wind his fiery coursers fly; Groans the sad earth, resounds the rattling sky. Wrath, Terror, Treason, Tumult, and Despair (Dire faces, and deform'd) surround the car; Friends of the god, and followers of the war. With fury not unlike, nor less disdain, Exulting Turnus flies along the plain: His smoking horses, at their utmost speed, He lashes on, and urges o'er the dead. Their fetlocks run with blood; and, when they bound, The gore and gath'ring dust are dash'd around. Thamyris and Pholus, masters of the war, He kill'd at hand, but Sthenelus afar: From far the sons of Imbracus he slew, Glaucus and Lades, of the Lycian crew; Both taught to fight on foot, in battle join'd, Or mount the courser that outstrips the wind.
"Monsieur Pontmercy, this is not common sense, I am an honest man. It is by degrading myself in your eyes that I elevate myself in my own. This has happened to me once before, but it was less painful then; it was a mere nothing. Yes, an honest man. I should not be so if, through my fault, you had continued to esteem me; now that you despise me, I am so. I have that fatality hanging over me that, not being able to ever have anything but stolen consideration, that consideration humiliates me, and crushes me inwardly, and, in order that I may respect myself, it is necessary that I should be despised. Then I straighten up again. I am a galley-slave who obeys his conscience. I know well that that is most improbable. But what would you have me do about it? it is the fact. I have entered into engagements with myself; I keep them. There are encounters which bind us, there are chances which involve us in duties. You see, Monsieur Pontmercy, various things have happened to me in the course of my life."
Revolt is a sort of waterspout in the social atmosphere which forms suddenly in certain conditions of temperature, and which, as it eddies about, mounts, descends, thunders, tears, razes, crushes, demolishes, uproots, bearing with it great natures and small, the strong man and the feeble mind, the tree trunk and the stalk of straw. Woe to him whom it bears away as well as to him whom it strikes! It breaks the one against the other.
"I mean that I feel it impossible to struggle against this deadly weight which crushes me. Gentlemen, I know I am in the hands of an avenging God! We need no proofs; everything relating to this young man is true." A dull, gloomy silence, like that which precedes some awful phenomenon of nature, pervaded the assembly, who shuddered in dismay. "What, M. de Villefort," cried the president, "do you yield to an hallucination? What, are you no longer in possession of your senses? This strange, unexpected, terrible accusation has disordered your reason. Come, recover."
"She has been unkind to you, no doubt; because you see, she dislikes your cast of character, as Miss Scatcherd does mine; but how minutely you remember all she has done and said to you! What a singularly deep impression her injustice seems to have made on your heart! No ill-usage so brands its record on my feelings. Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited? Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs. We are, and must be, one and all, burdened with faults in this world: but the time will soon come when, I trust, we shall put them off in putting off our corruptible bodies; when debasement and sin will fall from us with this cumbrous frame of flesh, and only the spark of the spirit will remain,--the impalpable principle of light and thought, pure as when it left the Creator to inspire the creature: whence it came it will return; perhaps again to be communicated to some being higher than man--perhaps to pass through gradations of glory, from the pale human soul to brighten to the seraph! Surely it will never, on the contrary, be suffered to degenerate from man to fiend? No; I cannot believe that: I hold another creed: which no one ever taught me, and which I seldom mention; but in which I delight, and to which I cling: for it extends hope to all: it makes Eternity a rest--a mighty home, not a terror and an abyss. Besides, with this creed, I can so clearly distinguish between the criminal and his crime; I can so sincerely forgive the first while I abhor the last: with this creed revenge never worries my heart, degradation never too deeply disgusts me, injustice never crushes me too low: I live in calm, looking to the end."
HAZEL (O. Eng. _hæsel_[1]; cf. Ger. _Hasel_, Swed. and Dan. _hassel_, &c.,; Fr. _noisetier, coudrier_), botanically _corylus_, a genus of shrubs or low trees of the natural order Corylaceae. The common hazel, _Corylus Avellana_ (fig. 1), occurs throughout Europe, in North Africa and in central and Russian Asia, except the northernmost parts. It is commonly found in hedges and coppices, and as an undergrowth in woods, and reaches a height of some 12 ft.; occasionally, as at Eastwell Park, Kent, it may attain to 30 ft. According to Evelyn (_Sylva_, p. 35, 1664), hazels "above all affect cold, barren, dry, and sandy soils; also mountains, and even rockie ground produce them; but more plentifully if somewhat moist, dankish, and mossie." In Kent they flourish best in a calcareous soil. The bark of the older stems is of a bright brown, mottled with grey, that of the young twigs is ash-coloured, and glandular and hairy. The leaves are alternate, from 2 to 4 in. in length, downy below, roundish heart-shaped, pointed and shortly stalked. In the variety _C. purpurea_, the leaves, as also the pellicle of the kernel and the husk of the nut, are purple, and in _C. heterophylla_ they are thickly clothed with hairs. In autumn the rich yellow tint acquired by the leaves of the hazel adds greatly to the beauty of landscapes. The flowers are monoecious, and appear in Great Britain in February and March, before the leaves. The cylindrical drooping yellow male catkins (fig. 2) are 1 to 2½ in. long, and occur 2 to 4 in a raceme; when in unusual numbers they may be terminal in position. The female flowers are small, sub-globose and sessile, resembling leaf-buds, and have protruding crimson stigmas; the minute inner bracts, by their enlargement, form the palmately lobed and cut involucre or husk of the nut. The ovary is not visible till nearly midsummer, and is not fully developed before autumn. The nuts have a length of from ½ to ¾ in., and grow in clusters. Double nuts are the result of the equal development of the two carpels of the original flower, of which ordinarily one becomes abortive; fusion of two or more nuts is not uncommon. From the light-brown or brown colour of the nuts the terms _hazel_ and _hazelly_, i.e. "in hue as hazel nuts" (Shakespeare, _Taming of the Shrew_, ii. 1), derive their significance.[2] The wood of the hazel is whitish-red, close in texture and pliant, and has when dry a weight of 49 lb. per cub. ft.; it has been used in cabinet-making, and for toys and turned articles. Curiously veined veneers are obtained from the roots; and the root-shoots are largely employed in the making of crates, coal-corves or baskets, hurdles, withs and bands, whip-handles and other objects. The rods are reputed to be most durable when from the driest ground, and to be especially good where the bottom is chalky. The light charcoal afforded by the hazel serves well for crayons, and is valued by gunpowder manufacturers. An objection to the construction of hedges of hazel is the injury not infrequently done to them by the nut-gatherer, who "with active vigour crushes down the tree" (Thomson's _Seasons_, "Autumn"), and otherwise damages it. Entry: HAZEL
ANGINA PECTORIS (Latin for "pain of the chest"), a term applied to a violent paroxysm of pain, arising almost invariably in connexion with disease of the coronary arteries, a lesion causing progressive degeneration of the heart muscle (see HEART: _Disease_). An attack of angina pectoris usually comes on with a sudden seizure of pain, felt at first over the region of the heart, but radiating through the chest in various directions, and frequently extending down the left arm. A feeling of constriction and of suffocation accompanies the pain, although there is seldom actual difficulty in breathing. When the attack comes on, as it often does, in the course of some bodily exertion, the sufferer is at once brought to rest, and during the continuance of the paroxysm experiences the most intense agony. The countenance becomes pale, the surface of the body cold, the pulse feeble, and death appears to be imminent, when suddenly the attack subsides and complete relief is obtained. The duration of a paroxysm rarely exceeds two or three minutes, but it may last for a longer period. The attacks are apt to recur on slight exertion, and even in aggravated cases without any such exciting cause. Occasionally the first seizure proves fatal; but more commonly death takes place as the result of repeated attacks. Angina pectoris is extremely rare under middle life, and is much more common in males than in females. It must always be regarded as a disorder of a very serious nature. In the treatment of the paroxysm, nitrite of amyl has now replaced all other remedies. It can be carried by the patient in the form of nitrite of amyl pearls, each pearl containing the dose prescribed by the physician. Kept in this way the drug does not lose strength. As soon as the pain begins the patient crushes a pearl in his handkerchief and holds it to his mouth and nose. The relief given in this way is marvellous and usually takes place within a very few seconds. In the rare cases where this drug does not relieve, hypodermic injections of morphia are used. But on account of the well-known dangers of this drug, it should only be administered by a medical man. To prevent recurrence of the attacks something may be done by scrupulous attention to the general health, and by the avoidance of mental and physical strain. But the most important preventive of all is "bed," of which fourteen days must be enforced on the least premonition of anginal pain. Entry: ANGINA
(ii.-iv.) Across the Cévennes lay Caesar's conquests, Atlantic in climate, new to Roman ways. The whole area, often collectively styled "Gallia Comata," often "Tres Provinciae," was divided into three provinces, each under a _legatus pro praetore_ appointed by the emperor, with a common capital at Lugudunum (Lyons). The three provinces were: _Aquitania_, reaching from the Pyrenees almost to the Loire; _Lugudunensis_, the land between Loire and Seine, reaching from Brittany in the west to Lyons in the south-east; and _Belgica_ in the north. The boundaries, it will be observed, were wholly artificial. Here also it was found possible to dispense with garrisons, not because the provinces were as peaceful as Narbonensis, but because the Rhine army was close at hand. As befitted an unromanized region, the local government was unlike that of Italy or Narbonensis. Roman municipalities were not indeed unknown, but very few: the local authorities were the magistrates of the old tribal districts. Local autonomy was here carried to an extreme. But the policy succeeded. The Gauls of the Three Provinces, or some of them, revolted in A.D. 21 under Florus and Sacrovir, in 68 under Vindex, and in 70 under Classicus and Tutor (see CIVILIS, CLAUDIUS). But all five leaders were romanized nobles, with Roman names and Roman citizenship, and their risings were directed rather against the Roman government than the Roman empire. In general, the Gauls of these provinces accepted Roman civilization more or less rapidly, and in due course became hardly distinguishable from the Italian. In particular, they eagerly accepted the worship of "Augustus and Rome," devised by the first emperor as a bond of state religion connecting the provinces with Rome. Each August, despite the heat, representatives from the 60 (or 64) tribes of Gallia Comata met at Lyons, elected a priest, "sacerdos ad aram Augusti et Romae," and held games. The post of representative, and still more that of priest, was eagerly coveted and provided a scope for the ambitions which despotism usually crushes. It agrees with the vigorous development of this worship that the Three Provinces, though romanized, retained their own local feeling. Even in the 3rd century the cult of Celtic deities (Hercules Magusanus, Deusoniensis, &c.) were revived, the Celtic _leuga_ reintroduced instead of the Roman mile on official milestones, and a brief effort made to establish an independent, though romanized, Gaul under Postumus and his short-lived successors (A.D. 250-273). Not only was the area too large and strong to lose its individuality: it was also too rural and too far from the Mediterranean to be romanized as fully and quickly as Narbonensis. It is even probable that Celtic was spoken in forest districts into the 4th century A.D. Town life, however, grew. The _chefs-lieux_ of the tribes became practically, though not officially, municipalities, and many of these towns reached considerable size and magnificence of public buildings. But they attest their tribal relations by their appellations, which are commonly drawn from the name of the tribe and not of the town itself. Thus the capitals of the Remi and Parisii were actually Durocortorum and Lutetia: the appellations in use were Remis or Remus, Parisiis or Parisius--these forms being indeclinable nouns formed from a sort of locative of the tribe names. Literature also flourished. In the latest empire Ausonius, Symmachus, Apollinaris, Sidonius and other Gaulish writers, chiefly of Gallia Comata, kept alive the classical literary tradition, not only for Gaul but for the world. Entry: GAUL
The _Phenomenology_ is the picture of the Hegelian philosophy in the making--at the stage before the scaffolding has been removed from the building. For this reason the book is at once the most brilliant and the most difficult of Hegel's works--the most brilliant because it is to some degree an autobiography of Hegel's mind--not the abstract record of a logical evolution, but the real history of an intellectual growth; the most difficult because, instead of treating the rise of intelligence (from its first appearance in contrast with the real world to its final recognition of its presence in, and rule over, all things) as a purely subjective process, it exhibits this rise as wrought out in historical epochs, national characteristics, forms of culture and faith, and philosophical systems. The theme is identical with the introduction to the _Encyklopädie_; but it is treated in a very different style. From all periods of the world--from medieval piety and stoical pride, Kant and Sophocles, science and art, religion and philosophy--with disdain of mere chronology, Hegel gathers in the vineyards of the human spirit the grapes from which he crushes the wine of thought. The mind coming through a thousand phases of mistake and disappointment to a sense and realization of its true position in the universe--such is the drama which is consciously Hegel's own history, but is represented objectively as the process of spiritual history which the philosopher reproduces in himself. The _Phenomenology_ stands to the _Encyklopädie_ somewhat as the dialogues of Plato stand to the Aristotelian treatises. It contains almost all his philosophy--but irregularly and without due proportion. The personal element gives an undue prominence to recent phenomena of the philosophic atmosphere. It is the account given by an inventor of his own discovery, not the explanation of an outsider. It therefore to some extent assumes from the first the position which it proposes ultimately to reach, and gives not a proof of that position, but an account of the experience (_Erfahrung_) by which consciousness is forced from one position to another till it finds rest in _Absolutes Wissen_. Entry: A
_Grinding and Leaching[1] Tanning Materials._--At first sight it would not seem possible that science could direct such a clumsy process as the grinding of tanning materials, and yet even here, the "scientific smashing" of tanning materials may mean the difference between profit and loss to the tanner. In most materials the tannin exists imprisoned in cells, and is also to some extent free, but with this latter condition the science of grinding has nothing to do. If tanning materials are simply broken by a series of clean cuts, only those cells directly on the surfaces of the cuts will be ready to yield their tannin; therefore, if materials are ground by cutting, a proportion of the total tannin is thrown away. Hence it is necessary to bruise, break and otherwise sever the walls of all the cells containing the tannin; so that the machine wanted is one which crushes, twists and cuts the material at the same time, turning it out of uniform size and with little dust. Entry: A