20 February: Boreham on Understatement

Pastels of Sound
About this time of year, as Summer fades imperceptively into Autumn [FWB was writing in the southern hemisphere], nature abounds in an infinite variety of soft tints and quiet colours. Moreover, the ear has its pastel shades as well as the eye. The symphony of life is very largely moulded on its undertones—the whispering among the leaves, the humming of insects, the sigh of the breeze, the twittering of birds, the lapping of waves, and all those gentle and subdued sounds that, every day of our lives, soothe and strengthen us. On the very last page of his "Confessions of an Uncommon Attorney," Reginald Hine paints an picture of the idyllic scenes amidst which he is laying aside his pen. It is a beautiful estate at Minsden, in Hertfordshire, the haunt of every kind of wild flower and of every species of feathered songster. The picturesque ruins of a fourteenth century church add to its charm. It would, Mr. Hine says, be a lovely place to die in.

Peaceful as it is, however, he makes it clear that its tranquillity does not consist in its silence, "The very air," he says, "is tremulous with that faint murmur—call it the undersong of earth, the music of the spheres, the sight of departed time, or what you will—which only the more attuned spirits overhear:—

Stillness accompanied with sound so soft
Charms more than silence. Meditation
here
May think down hours to moments.

"For those who have ears to hear," Mr. Hine concludes, "how peaceful and assuaging it is to listen to the zephyr's call, the night wind's lovely vesper hymn!" These are the pastel sounds that sweeten and sanctify earth's silences.

Softer Than Silence More Eloquent Than Speech
For silence in itself can be maddening. As those who have endured solitary confinement know, silence hath its horrors no less renowned than noise. What was the world like before the hurricane of mechanisation awoke the screech and the crash and the roar by which all modern generations have been tortured? In a state of nature, Man would be familiar with many sounds; but it is safe to assume that they would all be beneficent sounds—pleasant sounds designed for his delectation and unpleasant sounds designed to warn him of the proximity of his natural enemies. Between a sound and a noise there is all the difference in the world. A noise will awaken a child; the mother, in restoring it to its slumbers, will resort, not to silence, but to sound; she will croon a lullaby.

A recent traveller tells how he arrived one evening, very tired, at an English seaside resort. Obtaining a room at a hotel, he retired early, but not to sleep. Holiday-makers chattered, giggled, and exchanged raucous inanities in the corridor; and, just as things promised to simmer down, a theatre round the corner began to disgorge its patrons, unleashing a babel of tootings, changings of gear and all the confusion incidental to congested motor traffic. But, at long last, he says, there came, not silence, but something infinitely sweet and soothing—the distant sound of the waves upon the shore, the murmur and the music of the sea.

The incident reminds us of Lockhart's beautiful description of the passing of Sir Walter Scott. It was not by silence, but by something lovelier, that his last moments were solaced. "It was so quiet a day that the sound he loved best, the gentle ripple of the Tweed over its pebbles, was distinctly audible as we knelt around his bed whilst his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes." Sir Walter's requiem was chanted by Nature in her choicest pastel tones.

Nature's Accompaniment To Humanity's Passion
In one of his greatest novels, Trollope declares that there is scarcely a mood that such sounds will not match. Resting near the Rhine, his heroine is enjoying the delicious music of its rapidly moving waters. "If you are chatting with your friend," Trollope observes, "such melodious sounds wrap up your speech, keeping it to your two selves. If you would sleep, it is of all lullabies the sweetest. If you are alone, and would think, it aids your thoughts. If you are alone, and, because thought would be too painful, you do not wish to think, it gently dispels your sorrow." All this goes to show that, whilst silence is infinitely preferable to noise, there is something even more grateful to the ear than silence. Such subdued sounds mingle with the songs of life and with the silences of life to produce that essential symphony of repose in which the ordinary man may find his soul. Every man should, occasionally, lend his ear to the undertones of life. "Give me my scallop shell of quiet!" begged Sir Walter Raleigh in the poem that he penned just before his execution; and, in making that eloquent request, he speaks for us all.

All through life the voices that most profoundly impress us, and that most imperatively command us, are gentle and perfectly controlled voices. We may be hectored into compliance by bellow and bluster, but it is the whisper that more often secures our whole-hearted co-operation.

Is it any wonder then, that the Divine voice, whenever and wherever heard, is invariably marked by softness, calmness, and restraint? The most convincing and compelling exhibitions of superhuman power come to men, not in the earthquake nor in the fire, but in the still small voice. Reason speaks in an undertone; so does conscience; and so does revelation. In one of his most rapturous and seraphic predictions concerning the coming Redeemer, the prophet Isaiah declares that His voice shall be quiet, subdued, restrained. "He shall not scream nor shout, nor advertise Himself." His utterance, that is to say, shall be expressive, persuasive, effective; but there shall be nothing loud or self-assertive about it. The eloquence of heaven is always couched in pastel accents and in delicate and melodious undertones.

F W Boreham

Picture: Walter Raleigh