VII

SIR WALTER SCOTT’S TEXT

I

It was a very happy bridegroom and a very happy bride that came to Lasswade Cottage early in 1798. They had been married on Christmas Eve; and, after a few days in Edinburgh, had come on to this pretty little home on the banks of the Esk. Walter Scott was twenty-six; not one of his books had been written; no thought of fame had visited him; he dreamed only the happiness that must be his in the new life that he had so recently entered; whilst she tells him that she is sure that he will rise in his profession, become a judge, and die immensely wealthy. Scott vows that he will make his riverside home the sweetest spot beneath the stars. He takes infinite pains in laying out the gardens and the lawns. In the years that followed he never looked upon any of his novels or biographies with greater pride than that with which he surveyed the mystic arch that he built with his own hands over the gate that opened on the Edinburgh Road. In this romantic home he spent some of the sunniest years of his life; and, as Lockhart points out, it was amongst these delicious solitudes that he produced the works that laid the imperishable foundations of all his fame. As you stroll about this pretty garden, and mark the diligence with which this young husband of ours has trained all his flowers and creepers, I would have you step out on to the lawn. And here, in the centre of the lawn, is a sundial. Our happy young bridegroom ordered it before his marriage, and it has been made to his design. See how carefully he has planted the creepers around it! And, according to custom, he has had a motto engraved upon the dial, a motto of his own selection. It consists of three Greek words: ‘The Night Cometh!’ Scott was not morbid; he was a great human. But in the sunshine of life’s morning he solemnly reminded himself that high noon is not a fixture. The brightest day wears away to evening at last. He horrified his bride-elect by arranging, before his marriage, for a place of burial, ‘What an idea of yours,’ she says in a letter written a few days before the wedding, ‘what an idea of yours was that to mention where you wish to have your bones laid! If you were married I should think you were tired of me. A very pretty compliment before marriage! I hope sincerely that I shall not live to see that day. If you always have those cheerful thoughts, how very pleasant and gay you must be!’ Poor, distressed little bride! But she soon found that her apprehensions were unfounded. Her lover was not as gloomy as she feared. He was reminding himself that the sunshine does not last for ever, it is true; but, just because the sunshine does not last for ever, he was vowing that he would make the most of it. ‘The Night Cometh,’ he wrote upon the sundial on the lawn. ‘The night cometh;’ therefore revel in the daylight whilst it lasts! ‘I must work the works of Him that sent me whilst it is day; the night cometh when no man can work.’

II

The inscription on Sir Walter Scott’s sundial must have been suggested by the inscription on Dr. Johnson’s watch. Scott was a great admirer of Johnson. In some respects there is a strong resemblance between them. Sir Alfred Dale, Vice-Chancellor of Liverpool University, recently referred to them as ‘two of the most heroic and, at the same time, most pathetic figures in the annals of our literature.’ Boswell’s Life of Johnson, and Lockhart’s Life of Scott are, by common consent, the two greatest biographies in the language. The former was a new book, and was still the talk of the town, in the days of Scott’s courtship and marriage. And in that noble record of a noble life Scott had read Boswell’s account of the glimpse that he once caught of the old doctor’s watch. As Dr. Johnson drew it from his pocket one day, Boswell noticed that on its face it bore a Greek inscription. The inscription consisted of the three Greek words, ‘The Night Cometh!’ It reminded the doctor, whenever he consulted his watch, that the daylight does not last for ever. ‘Work whilst it is day’ the watch seemed to say, ‘for the night Cometh when no man can work!’

III

It is 1831. Scott is sixty now. It is thirty-three years since we saw him walking on the lawn at Lass wade Cottage with his bride. Then none of his books were written; now they are all complete. Fame and honour are most richly his. His poor bride, however, had her wish. ‘The burial of your bones!’ she wrote, in pretty scorn, in the midst of her preparations for the wedding. ‘I hope sincerely that I shall not live to see that day!’ She did not. She has been five years dead. The brilliant sunshine of that early day has vanished; life is wearing towards its eventide. ‘The Night Cometh!’ Sir Walter is spending a day with old friends at Douglas. There is a sadness on his spirit that nothing can dispel; and once or twice, as he strides across old familiar landscapes, his companions catch the glint of tears upon his cheek. It has been agreed that there shall be no company but friends of old standing, and among these is Mr. Elliott Lockhart, whom Scott has not seen for many years. Since they last met, both men have been very ill. In the old days they followed the hounds together, and Lockhart was as handsome a specimen of a Border gentleman as ever cheered a hunting field. ‘When they met now,’ says the biographer, ‘each saw his own case glassed in the other, and neither of their manly hearts could well contain itself as they embraced.’ They part at night, Scott promising to call on his old friend in the course of his own homeward journey. ‘But next morning, at breakfast, came a messenger to inform us that Mr. Lockhart, on returning to his own house, fell down in a fit, and that his life was despaired of. Immediately, although he had intended to remain two days. Sir Walter drew his host aside, and besought him to lend him horses as far as Lanark, for that he must set off with the least possible delay. He would listen to no persuasions. ‘No, William,’ he said, ‘this is a sad warning. I must home to work while it is called day; for the night cometh when no man can work. I put that text many a year ago on my dialstone, but it often preached in vain.’ It may have done. But anybody who surveys the long row of noble classics with which he has enriched our literature will feel that it must still more often have preached with remarkable effect.

IV

The Night!

The Night Cometh!

Was Sir Walter justified in reminding himself, amidst the dazzling sunshine of his wedding bliss, that the night cometh? Was old Dr. Johnson wise in confronting himself with that stern truth whenever he consulted his watch? Why not? Is the night an ugly thing? I recall a very familiar incident in the life of Thomas Carlyle. One lovely evening he and Leigh Hunt, the poet, strolled off together amidst scenery that was full of rugged grandeur and exquisite charm. Presently the stars shone out, and added immeasurably to the glory of the night. Both men gazed upon the heavens for some moments in silence; and then the poet, to whose soul they had been whispering of peace and happiness and love, burst into the rapturous exclamation, ‘God the Beautiful!’ Immediately, Carlyle, seeing only the dread majesty of heaven, sprang to his feet and exclaimed, ‘God the Terrible!’ And both were right. The Night is Beautiful as God is Beautiful! The Night is Terrible as God is Terrible! Carlyle dreaded the Night as Scott dreaded it, and as Johnson dreaded it. They all three trembled lest the Night should fall before they had finished the work which they had been appointed to do. ‘The only happiness that a brave man ever troubles himself much about,’ I find Carlyle saying, ‘is happiness enough to get his work done. Not “I can’t eat!” but “I can’t work!” that is the burden of all wise complaining men. It is, after all, the one unhappiness of a man that he cannot work; that he cannot get his destiny as a man fulfilled. Behold, the day is passing swiftly away, our life is passing over; and the night cometh wherein no man can work!’ And who can forget those sledge-hammer sentences with which he concludes his ‘Everlasting Yea?’ ‘I say now to myself, Produce! Produce! Were it but the pitifullest infinitesimal fraction of a Product, produce it, in God’s name! ’Tis the utmost thou hast in thee; out with it, then! Up; up! Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy whole might! Work while it is called To-day; for the Night cometh, wherein no man can work!’ And so twice, at least, I find the Sage of Chelsea emphasising the text that made the Wizard of the North.

‘The Night Cometh!’ says Dr. Johnson, and he has the words inscribed upon the face of his watch.

‘The Night Cometh!’ says Sir Walter Scott, and he has the words engraved on the sundial on the lawn at Lasswade Cottage.

‘The Night Cometh!’ says Thomas Carlyle in the pages of his first book, a book that was written among the mosshags of Craigenputtock before the world had even heard his name. ‘Work while it is called To-day; for the Night cometh, wherein no man can work.’

And these three — Johnson, Scott and Carlyle — became three of the most prodigious workers of all history.

V

‘The Night Cometh!’ It came to Dr. Johnson, the Night that he had dreaded for so long! ‘The infirmities of age,’ says Macaulay, ‘were creeping fast upon him. That inevitable event of which he never thought without horror was brought near to him; and his whole life was darkened by the shadow of death.’ It is not pleasant reading. Let us turn the page! And what is this? ‘When at length the moment, dreaded through so many years, came close, the dark cloud passed away from Johnson’s mind. His temper became unusually patient and gentle; he ceased to think with terror of death, and of that which lies beyond death ; and he spoke much of the mercy of God and of the propitiation of Christ.’ His faith triumphed over all his fears; he talked with rapture of the love of God; he pointed his friends to the Cross; and he confidently resigned his soul to his Saviour. ‘The Night Cometh!’ he had said to himself with a shudder, over and over and over again. But when it came, that night was as tranquil as an infant’s slumber and illumined by a million stars. The night that follows a great day’s work well done is never a very terrible affair.

VI

‘The Night Cometh!’ It came to Sir Walter Scott, the Night of which the sundial had spoken so effectively and so long. We have all dwelt with lingering fondness on that closing scene. Here he is, at Abbots ford, surrounded by his grandchildren and his dogs. He is too feeble to rise, but, at his desire, they wheel him round the lawns in a bath-chair. He strokes the hair of the children; pats the dogs on the heads; and pauses to admire his favourite roses.

‘I have seen much in my time,’ he whispers softly, ‘but nothing like my ain house — give me one turn more!’

Exhausted by his ride, and by the tumult of emotions that it has awakened, the dying man is put to bed. Next morning he asks to be wheeled into the library. They place his chair against the central window that he may look down on the shining waters of the Tweed. He glances round upon the shelves containing his thousands of be- loved books.

‘Read to me !’ he says to Lockhart.

‘From what book shall I read?’

‘Need you ask? There is but one!’

Lockhart takes down the Bible, and opens it at the fourteenth chapter of the Gospel of John.

‘Let not your heart be troubled; ye believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you . . .’ And so on. The matchless cadences that have soothed and softened and sweetened a million deathbeds fall like a foretaste of the eternal harmonies upon the sick man’s ear.

‘This is a great comfort—great comfort,’ he murmurs.

He lingers for a while; but the atmosphere of that conversation by the library window enfolds him to the last. The Night comes; and with the Night come weariness and restfulness and tired hands gently folded.

VII

There is only one way of preparing for the night. We must work! That is what Jesus said. ‘We must work while it is called To-day; the Night Cometh when no man can work!’ A good day’s work means a good night’s rest. Johnson and Scott and Carlyle had learned that secret, but it was from Him that they learned it. And they became the men that they were because they took His words and engraved them on their watches and on their sundials. Yes, on their watches and on their sundials — and on their hearts!

Dr. F. W. Boreham