This eBook was produced by Dagny,
and David Widger,
SPINOZA is said to have loved, above all other amusements, to put fliesinto a spider's web; and the struggles of the imprisoned insects werewont to bear, in the eyes of this grave philosopher, so facetious andhilarious an appearance, that he would stand and laugh thereat until thetears "coursed one another down his innocent nose." Now it so happenedthat Spinoza, despite the general (and, in my most meek opinion, thejust) condemnation of his theoretical tenets,* was, in character and innature, according to the voices of all who knew him, an exceedinglykind, humane, and benevolent biped; and it doth, therefore, seem alittle strange unto us grave, sober members of the unphilosophical Many,that the struggles and terrors of these little winged creatures shouldstrike the good subtleist in a point of view so irresistibly ludicrousand delightful. But, for my part, I believe that that most imaginativeand wild speculator beheld in the entangled flies nothing more than aliving simile—an animated illustration—of his own beloved vision ofNecessity; and that he is no more to be considered cruel for thecomplacency with which he gazed upon those agonized types of his systemthan is Lucan for dwelling with a poet's pleasure upon the manyingenious ways with which that Grand Inquisitor of Verse has contrivedto vary the simple operation of dying. To the bard, the butcheredsoldier was only an epic ornament; to the philosopher, the murdered flywas only a metaphysical illustration. For, without being a fatalist, ora disciple of Baruch de Spinoza, I must confess that I cannot conceive agreater resemblance to our human and earthly state than the penalpredicament of the devoted flies. Suddenly do we find ourselves plungedinto that Vast Web,—the World; and even as the insect, when he firstundergoeth a similar accident of necessity, standeth amazed and still,and only by little and little awakeneth to a full sense of hissituation; so also at the first abashed and confounded, we remain on themesh we are urged upon, ignorant, as yet, of the toils around us, andthe sly, dark, immitigable foe that lieth in yonder nook, alreadyfeasting her imagination upon our destruction. Presently we revive, westir, we flutter; and Fate, that foe—the old arch-spider, that hath nomoderation in her maw—now fixeth one of her many eyes upon us, andgiveth us a partial glimpse of her laidly and grim aspect. We pause inmute terror; we gaze upon the ugly spectre, so imperfectly beheld; thenet ceases to tremble, and the wily enemy draws gently back into hernook. Now we begin to breathe again; we sound the strange footing onwhich we tread; we move tenderly along it, and again the grisly monsteradvances on us; again we pause; the foe retires not, but remains still,and surveyeth us; we see every step is accompanied with danger; we lookround and above in despair; suddenly we feel within us a new impulse anda new power! we feel a vague sympathy with /that/ unknown region whichspreads beyond this great net,—/that limitless beyond/ hath a mysticaffinity with a part of our own frame; we unconsciously extend our wings(for the soul to us is as the wings to the fly!); we attempt torise,—to soar above this perilous snare, from which we are unable tocrawl. The old spider watcheth us in self-hugging quiet, and, lookingup to our native air, we think,—now shall we escape thee. Out on it!We rise not a hair's breadth: we have the /wings/, it is true, but the/feet/ are fettered. We strive desperately again: the