p. 318 | Hermit | AdventAI

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · May 27, 1886

FromThe Signs of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 20

Hermit.

ABOUT half a century ago a young planter who lived among the mountains of North Carolina grew impatient of the quiet and solitude of his life, removed his family to a large seaboard city, and plunged into politics. For many years he was successful; then overwhelming defeat came. He could not bear it coolly as did others of his party; he grew cynical, bitter, angry against man and God.

He declared himself weary of fashion, ambition, and the struggle and crowd of civilized life. He pined for the solitude and calm of the mountains, “the world forgetting, by the world forgot.” He would go and dwell apart; give himself up to the study of nature and to high contemplation.

Taking with him one negro servant, he hid himself in the recesses of the Black Mountains in North Carolina, where he occupied a cabin just large enough to hold his books and himself. The first year he was interested in his studies; his books were like old friends whom he had not met for a long time.

But they finally palled on him. What need he care for the history, the philosophy, the laws, of men whom he never would see again? At first he keenly felt the magnificence of the scenery, the sunsets, the storms; but after a year he began to understand that there was no one to whom he could say they were magnificent, and that there never would be any one.

After the second year he seldom turned to nature or to books; his chief interest in life lay in the next meal; he made a companion of his stupid servant; his only hope was to catch a glimpse once in months of a passing hunter. His pride would not allow him to return to the world. He sank at last into a state of melancholy mania, and died, after six years of solitude, a prematurely old, imbecile man. Not having strength to live in a crowd, he had no strength to live alone.

Hermits and anchorites were common in the early days of civilization, when men believed they could come closer to God and lead purer lives by separating themselves from the work and relations of the world. Even at this day we are apt to think at times that if we could but live in solitude with nature, we could reach heights of thought and devotion to which we cannot attain in the town.

But it is not the air which a man breathes that makes him manly or devout or noble; it is the foundation on which he stands and bases his thoughts and hopes and actions.

If that ground beneath his feet be the truth of God, he will dwell calm and apart as on a mountain height, in the very market-place; but if the base of his life be fashion or gluttony or the greed of money, to live among trees instead of houses, and sheep in place of men, will not make him less harmful or less miserable.—Youth’s Companion.