A Strange Story | Page 3

the image of sensuous, soulless Nature, such as the Materialist
had conceived it; secondly, the image of Intellect, obstinately
separating all its inquiries from the belief in the spiritual essence and
destiny of man, and incurring all kinds of perplexity and resorting to all
kinds of visionary speculation before it settles at last into the simple
faith which unites the philosopher and the infant; and thirdly, the image
of the erring but pure-thoughted visionary, seeking over-much on this
earth to separate soul from mind, till innocence itself is led astray by a
phantom, and reason is lost in the space between earth and the stars.
Whether in these pictures there be any truth worth the implying, every
reader must judge for himself; and if he doubt or deny that there be any
such truth, still, in the process of thought which the doubt or denial
enforces, he may chance on a truth which it pleases himself to discover.
"Most of the Fables of AEsop,"--thus says Montaigne in his charming
essay "Of Books"[7]--"have several senses and meanings, of which the
Mythologists choose some one that tallies with the fable. But for the
most part 't is only what presents itself at the first view, and is
superficial; there being others more lively, essential, and internal, into
which they had not been able to penetrate; and"--adds Montaigne--"the
case is the very same with me."
[1] OEuvres inedites de Maine de Biran, vol. i. See introduction.
[2] OEuvres inedites de Maine de Biran, vol. iii. p. 546
(Anthropologie).
[3] OEuvres inedites de Maine de Biran, vol. iii. p. 524.
[4] "The Golden Ass" of Apuleius.

[5] Sir William Hamilton: Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 40.
[6] Jacobi: Von der Gottlichen Dingen; Werke, p. 424-426.
[7] Translation, 1776, Yol. ii. p. 103.
CHAPTER I.
In the year 18-- I settled as a physician at one of the wealthiest of our
great English towns, which I will designate by the initial L----. I was
yet young, but I had acquired some reputation by a professional work,
which is, I believe, still amongst the received authorities on the subject
of which it treats. I had studied at Edinburgh and at Paris, and had
borne away from both those illustrious schools of medicine whatever
guarantees for future distinction the praise of professors may concede
to the ambition of students. On becoming a member of the College of
Physicians, I made a tour of the principal cities of Europe, taking letters
of introduction to eminent medical men, and gathering from many
theories and modes of treatment hints to enlarge the foundations of
unprejudiced and comprehensive' practice. I had resolved to fix my
ultimate residence in London. But before this preparatory tour was
completed, my resolve was changed by one of those unexpected events
which determine the fate man in vain would work out for himself. In
passing through the Tyro, on my way into the north of Italy, I found in
a small inn, remote from medical attendance, an English traveller
seized with acute inflammation of the lungs, and in a state of imminent
danger. I devoted myself to him night and day; and, perhaps more
through careful nursing than active remedies, I had the happiness to
effect his complete recovery. The traveller proved to be Julius Faber, a
physician of great distinction, contented to reside, where he was born,
in the provincial city of L----, but whose reputation as a profound and
original pathologist was widely spread, and whose writings had formed
no unimportant part of my special studies. It was during a short holiday
excursion, from which he was about to return with renovated vigour,
that he had been thus stricken down. The patient so accidentally met
with became the founder of my professional fortunes. He conceived a
warm attachment for me,--perhaps the more affectionate because he

was a childless bachelor, and the nephew who would succeed to his
wealth evinced no desire to succeed to the toils by which the wealth
had been acquired. Thus, having an heir for the one, he had long looked
about for an heir to the other, and now resolved on finding that heir in
me. So when we parted Dr. Faber made me promise to correspond with
him regularly, and it was not long before he disclosed by letter the
plans he had formed in my favour. He said that he was growing old; his
practice was beyond his strength; he needed a partner; he was not
disposed to put up to sale the health of patients whom he had learned to
regard as his children: money was no object to him, but it was an object
close at his heart that the humanity he had served, and the reputation he
had acquired, should suffer no loss in his choice of a