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The Great Adventurer 
 
 By J. E. Sampter 
 
 New York 
 Robert Kerr Press 
 Two East Twenty Ninth Street 
 
 MCMIX 
 
Two Gop:es Re<.<rived 
 
 OEC 12 1908 I 
 
 cuss CC- KXc, v-j 
 
 Copyright, 1908, by 
 J. E. Sampteb 
 
 
 • A 
 
5. 
 
 To 
 J. L 
 
The Face of Lite 
 
The Face of Life 
 I 
 
 THE face of man passes like a shadow and a dream. 
 The face of man is like a cloud that glimmers and 
 passes from the sky. 
 It is Uke a cloud on fire with sunlight, a vapor, a frail 
 and accidental and surpassingly beautiful vision. 
 A man and a woman went forth by moonlight; they 
 knew the planetary forces; they loved, they hved 
 a rapturous moment of Ufe; and, lo, there glim- 
 mered the face of a new man. 
 A troop of soldiers rushed through a town, and stole 
 its fairest daughter, and stupefied her and misused 
 
her; and, Jo, there glimmered the face of a new man. 
 A thoughtless couple was thoughtlessly united, for con- 
 
 venience and through the bahbling force of many 
 
 tongues ; and, lo, there glimmered the face of a new 
 
 man. 
 Like bubbles upon water, like clouds shaped by the 
 
 wind, so shadowlike and accidental is a human face. 
 Behold, this woman wept, and there came forth a dark 
 
 face upon the world. 
 And behold, that woman laughed, and there came forth 
 
 a face that shone like the morning. 
 And she that wept and she that laughed were but as 
 
 clouds shining and darkling in the radiance of a 
 
 fearful sun. 
 
II 
 
 MY birth was an adventure. 
 No perilous voyage was so perilous, so strange, 
 so seemingly fabulous as my voyage to the 
 shores of life. 
 That Columbus reached America is not marvelous. 
 That Balboa looked upon the Pacific was at last inevit- 
 able. 
 But that I reached the shores of life is a great wonder. 
 Could I tell the mysteries and terrors I have seen upon 
 my voyage toward life, no man would believe me. 
 And yet everyone of those who would doubt has 
 traveled as mysterious and terrible a sea. 
 Eternity has been on this adventure with me; even a$ 
 
eternity has been on its adventure with every mb- 
 
 mentary little cloud. 
 Accidents have swayed my course, poles have drawn 
 
 me as if I were a magnet, ships have collided with 
 
 me, and they sank, not I. No special fate watched 
 
 over me. The course of all things carried me to 
 
 my goal. 
 An adventure was my birth. An adventure, as perilous, 
 
 as strange, as seemingly fabulous, shall be my life 
 
 and death. 
 
Ill 
 
 WAS it inevitable that this earth became a solid 
 ball? 
 
 Was not that likewise a seeming chance of 
 nature, an event dependent on every delicate force 
 and balance of a multitude of stars? 
 And yet this I needed for my voyage. 
 I needed seas and continents, seas that are vap')rous 
 still, continents that are as creases upon a harden- 
 ing ball of fire and granite. 
 I needed the little worm that is my grandfather, the 
 
 little plant that is my foster-mother. 
 I needed the horrible struggles of creatures fighting for 
 life. I needed the sharper claws of one creature, 
 
or the keener, crueler wit of another creature. 
 For he of the sharper claws and the crueler wit was 
 
 the father of my fathers. 
 Behold, mountains were moved to let me pass. Behold, 
 
 men and women labored and loved and died, — 
 
 just as they did, and not otherwise — or else had 
 
 I not breathed. 
 Had not a million mothers suffered the throes of agony, 
 
 I could not sing to-day my songs of triumph. 
 Once fire is always fire. What was once a nebulous 
 
 flame upon this earth is now the lamp of my spirit 
 
 and the fire of my tongue. 
 
IV 
 
 I PUT a question to life, and life gave me an answer. 
 I reasoned therefrom, and asked the same question 
 again. But it is another matter whether I am to 
 receive the same answer. 
 
 I live upon a promise. In winter I live upon the promise 
 of spring, and in spring I live upon the promise of 
 autimin. Forever am I like a mother expecting the 
 birth of her first child ; forever like a bride awaiting 
 the bridegroom. But I may die before night. 
 
 Is it all promise? Is nothing to be fulfilled? Am I 
 like a querulous child to be quieted with false prom- 
 ises? 
 
Is it to keep me from starving that you fill me with 
 promises of bread? 
 
 Woe to me, I have missed the fulfillment! I did not 
 see it. 
 
 While I was awaiting spring my window was brilliant 
 with roses of frost and lilies of ice. While I was 
 awaiting autumn the cherries were already ripe 
 upon the trees. Behold, she who was awaiting her 
 first child had him already in the stillness, closer 
 than ever again. Behold, the bride awaiting her 
 bridegroom hears his voice singing into her ears. 
 
 Though the mother and bride die before night, yet are 
 they no less mother and bride. 
 
 Outward fulfillment is the visible fulfillment which our 
 spirit has already passed, is the husk ripened to fall 
 
away. Within it is a new promise, again invisible. 
 The true fulfillment is the promise. 
 The fairest flower is that within the bud, still folded, 
 
 still perfect, still invisible. 
 How beautiful are the means of life! Hear men cry: 
 
 "The end justifies the means." 
 I say to you: "The means justify the end.'* Let ends 
 
 take care of themselves. I cannot alter them. My 
 
 power is in the means, my fairness lies in making 
 
 the means fair, my delight lies in making the means 
 
 delightful. 
 Mine only is this endless present, with its vision of the 
 
 past and future. 
 Most delightful of all present things, most living and 
 
 nearest to my soul, is just its promise of the future. 
 
Do you hear out of the future years the sweet trem- 
 ulous voices of many unborn children? As the 
 dream and foreboding of next summer's singing 
 birds, so come to me from the future their lisping 
 songs and their playful high chatter and their soft 
 waihngs. 
 They are the children that may be born. They are the 
 
 children that perhaps shall never be born. 
 What a chance it is, what a speculation on our moods 
 and humors whether they shall ever sing and lisji 
 and wail ! They are indeed on a perilous adventure. 
 Generations of unborn children, generations of unborn 
 fathers and mothers, fear not, despair not of birth, 
 
for in one way or another your voices shall be heard; 
 
 they are heard already. 
 For the generations of unborn children are our children. 
 
 In our spirits they are singing already. 
 You are as inevitable as I have been, and every one of 
 
 you shall be born. 
 Sweet children, your voices shall be heard, though none 
 
 should be able to see you. 
 For the power that is in a man must go forward and 
 
 ripen in season ; and if it cannot bear physical fruit, 
 
 it shall bear spiritual fruit. 
 Every man is a spring of the waters of life. The force 
 
 that is in him must pass onward, like the water 
 
 that is pouring from the mountains. Through the 
 
 calm, broad river or the seething narrow chasm, 
 
in clouds or spray or cataract or subterranean 
 stream, it must pour down to the sea. So the force 
 of man, through body or spirit, through good or 
 evil, pours down through the ages. AVhere there 
 is room and passageway his children shall pass. 
 One is the father of heroes and another is the father 
 of prophecies. 
 Evil thoughts and dark ambitions, terrible creeds, sweet 
 songs, truths of science and conventions of life, all 
 these spiritual influences that are living among us 
 and are stronger than the strongest men, what do 
 you think they are? The spiritual children of men 
 and women who lived generations ago. 
 
o 
 
 VI 
 
 STARS and planets, if you have been inevitable, 
 so too have I, so too have all my brothers, the 
 teeming multiform children of life, been just 
 as inevitable. The force of all things in the uni- 
 verse, the balance of every star, the weight of every 
 pebble, all, all, with not one grain of dust left out, 
 bring forth by their vast workings and strugglings 
 and inconsequent strong wills, the world as it is, the 
 world as it must be. The whole of life, within itself, 
 now, is the whole past and the whole future. Each 
 moment is eternity. And only that whole life, that 
 vast completeness, comprehends every moment of 
 the past and future, of all time. In that whole I am 
 
forever. From that whole I cannot be cast away. 
 
 That on which I have moored my hfe may be swept 
 from me by some vast current of antagonistic 
 purpose. Like a barnacle fastened to a ship's side, 
 I am forever fastened to something ; like a barnacle, 
 no matter where the ship may sail, there am I at 
 home. But, lo, they scrape me from the ship. 
 Then begins a new struggle and adventure. 
 
 For me this separate adventure, for me this part, for 
 me only this vision of the face of life. 
 
Into the Depths 
 
Into the Depths 
 
 I 
 
 IHE AR a voice, and I know my friend is near me. I 
 behold a face, and I know it is the face of one I 
 love. Shall I hear the voice of life, and see the 
 face of hfe, and not believe that hfe is there? 
 I behold a green hill, and I believe that the upheaved 
 rock is beneath it; I see the surface of a lake, and 
 I beheve there is a depth below. Such is my faith. 
 I behold the surface and believe in the depth. 
 
II 
 
 HAVE I ever doubted you, my brother, my lim- 
 ited, human, dear brother? Have I ever said: 
 "Perhaps the face and the shape is all of you. 
 Perhaps your seeming self is a picture"? No,* but 
 I have lived upon the sure knowledge of you, of 
 your self. 
 When I was a baby, I looked into my mother's eyes, 
 and saw my like, and had no fear. And when I 
 looked later upon the flowers and stars and clouds, 
 I looked into their eyes, and saw my like again, 
 and had no fear. 
 And now, after long thought and experience, I know 
 what it is that makes me love and trust you so well, 
 
my human brother. It is the knowledge of the 
 self within me that makes me love, that makes me 
 trust the self in you. 
 
 If the voice of creation were to speak to me, saying, 
 *'I am," I could not understand the word unless it 
 were spoken within myself, unless I myself experi- 
 enced the universe. 
 
 My life is meaningless save for the self that creates and 
 breathes therein. This alone is sure, is light, life 
 and form. This is the great adventurer to whom all 
 passing things are food and drink and treasure and 
 an open path. And all that mystifies me, the won- 
 derful unknown, is meaningless until I find therein 
 the self that is more than myself, and yet that I 
 myself must realize. I feel the universe as a self, 
 
a myriad of selves in endless relation, that clash 
 and seem to destroy one another, and know not 
 that they are the same, even as the waves of the sea. 
 I am a wave of the sea. I have come up from the 
 depths, I shall go back to the depths ; and my quick 
 and fleeting life is this sparkle and curve and swift 
 shape of a wave in the sunshine. But I am one 
 with that boundless, multitudinous sea, with that 
 whole existence, that prolific self, which is also 
 within me, the upwelling of my own life — not 
 thought or passion or feeling — but that which looks 
 out and adventures through them all. 
 To myself I am the revealer of life, because I am alive. 
 Life is the one certainty. And yet life is the one 
 unknown. I learn more and more, but the mystery 
 
grows no less. The flame makes all shapes clear 
 but its own shape. It illumines all things, but 
 knows not itself to be the light. 
 
w 
 
 III 
 
 HEN I, hungering and incomplete, I who need 
 the whole world, who move therein as in a 
 socket, 1 w ho teed on stars and seas and prairies 
 and jungles, 1 who die each day and am born each 
 day in the body, and yet shape myself ever accord- 
 ing to my need and my spuit, when I doubt and 
 question the self in hfe, the self that surrounds and 
 f ultills me, I tind myself suddenly in a world of 
 dreams and pictures. When 1 doubt you, my hu- 
 man brother, 1 half slay myself. And when 1 doubt 
 the self, the vital source of all hfe, I am shut out 
 from my body and garden and vast shape, the uni- 
 verse. I can travel no more. My seas are dried up. 
 
and my mountains are shattered, and I am coffined 
 in the narrow bounds of my own shape. 
 For all shape is a dream and a vision and a picture; a 
 dream and a vision and a picture of the unseen 
 self. And out of my heart cries the love that is a 
 proof of my incompleteness. 
 
IV 
 
 IF life is a sign, what is signified? If life is a dream, 
 who is the dreamer? If life is a shadow, what is 
 the substance? 
 I am the sign and the signified; I am the dream and 
 the dreamer; I am the shadow and the substance. 
 I myself am the answer. 
 
V 
 
 THE fruit of reason, no less than the fruit of feeling, 
 is faith. In one age men get for their questions 
 this answer : Jehovah ; in another age this answer : 
 Christ; in a third age, this answer: Nature. Each 
 is an act of faith. 
 Different are the fruits of reason and feeling for each 
 
 man. But their root is one. 
 Though the scientist believe that lightning is an electric 
 flash, and the savage believe that it is a sign of the 
 anger of gods, and though both may be wrong, 
 yet both have seen and known the flash of lightning. 
 Every man who knows the wonder of life within liim, 
 and finds expression, however crude or false, knows 
 
the truth. Though he clothe his body of truth in 
 rags or silk, in feathers or paint, that body is still 
 the same. His act of faith is a living thing; his 
 form of faith is a dress. 
 
VI 
 
 So far as man can know, nothing is ever destroyed; 
 existence is change; change is eternal. 
 
 I am eternal; I am forever. But I am infinitely 
 
 mortal. 
 I am born forever, I die forever, I am changed forever; 
 
 I know not what I may become, nor what I may 
 
 have been. 
 According to the strength that is within me, for this 
 
 eternal point of time that is called the present, I 
 
 am free. I am a magnet and a blast of wind. 
 Each one of us is so much : A part of our whole selves, 
 
 a part of all force, a part of all hfe and freedom. 
 
 The whole of self is the universe. 
 
Even as the present moment Is a part of eternity, and, 
 in a certain sense, is eternity itself. 
 
VII 
 
 I HAVE come upward from the darkness of my baby 
 soul, which knew all things darkly. 
 And I would grow to include the seas and earth and 
 heaven and all things, till the stars and planets and 
 man among them should sing together in a univer- 
 sal light. 
 
 My love is a great love. My longing is without end. 
 
 And to-day in its human shape it needs and wills all that 
 is human. It sees itself as a part of the great 
 human drama, as one among many, who are all 
 me, mine; who shall live in relation to my will. 
 
 I shall shape and mold the lives about me, according 
 
to my might, not for my limited pleasure or satis- 
 faction, but for my vision of that humanity. 
 
 I shall go beyond my pain and beyond my joy. As 
 notes forget themselves in 4 melody, so shall I 
 forget myself in the larger fullness of that human 
 chant. Pain shall not affright me, where there is 
 growth and adventure and love. I shall make life 
 sweet and rhythmic where I can touch it, to be my 
 life and my perfection. 
 
 I shall want life fair and open and true; and I shall be 
 as one who looks down upon myself, and sees my 
 own human shape and passage of hfe as part of a 
 large drama of myself. I shall shape my life to 
 fit into that drama of beauty as I long for it, just 
 as I might wish to shape the life of another. 
 
And so shall I be complete according to my light, by 
 living in and for all that I know and understand. 
 
 For all that I love and know is a part of me, and my 
 completeness. 
 
VIU 
 
 I KNOW not why or how I was separated from the 
 world, but I know that my longing is to be united 
 once more. Am I not, even now, united ? I believe 
 that now, in this life, if anywhere, that union should 
 be realized. 
 This one experience called human life and human death 
 can be lived and died in the spirit of a world, in 
 manifold adjustment with all other worlds. Like 
 a planet or star in the vast system I shall feel and 
 know every vibration from all space and time. The 
 universe shall be myself, and in that perfection 
 alone shall I be perfect ; in relation to the vast plan 
 shall I move and be myself. And yet like a world, 
 
with its attraction, shall I attract and sway all 
 things, shall I keep myself whole and strong, a 
 force among the forces of life. I shall be so poised, 
 so centred, that I shall touch life at every point, 
 and hold it and shape it with my will. 
 
IX 
 
 SOME are sculptors of marble and some are casters 
 of bronze and some are molders of wax. The great 
 art-master has given each of us a different material. 
 We cannot choose. But each of us is free to choose 
 and create a form of beauty, according to his own 
 light, and each of us knows that the form shall be 
 destroyed again and again, and melted for new uses. 
 
 However we plan and work, unconsciously we are mak- 
 ing images of our self. And because our self is 
 forever changing, therefore does each image, as soon 
 as it is finished, become a false image, to be recast. 
 
 Some lose with sorrow their beautiful images; some, 
 though they conceive beauty, cannot stamp it upon 
 
the face of their mold ; some behold with horror that 
 they have conceived and wrought ugliness and 
 falsehood. 
 But ever the sculptor remains, and ever the great art- 
 master brings new and strange substances. 
 
MY great art-master is my creative spirit. It is 
 stern, it is single-minded ; it bids me waste noth- 
 ing and withhold nothing. 
 If I defied this master spirit, I were like a planet that 
 lost its strength of gravity, and divided into a 
 thousand insufficient and uncertain particles. 
 Till death divide me, while I stand thus crystallized in 
 the shape of human life, I would have my will and 
 purpose as single, as individual, as separate as the 
 shape that is my body. 
 Daring, self-contained and free is this warm body in its 
 world of fluid shapes. It shall be cold. It shall 
 crumble. It shall plunge into the terrible sea of 
 
boundless re-creation. And I am that body, I am 
 that life, one with all others through endless inter- 
 change. Each smallest shape is universal because 
 it is related with all energies forever. I am the 
 strong master of myself, the zenith of my own life. 
 And yet I am nobly and magnificently dependent, 
 the child and lover of my vast self through life 
 and through death. I am myself because I am 
 much more than myself. I am myself because I 
 lose myself forever. One law spreads out the oceans 
 and holds the drop of water in its perfect globe, 
 will to live intact. Through life and into death I 
 shall follow my particular, finite, splendid love, 
 without fear or sight, as a planet or star follows 
 its unseen course in the track of its own will. I 
 
shall devote myself to my course, to my chosen path 
 of life. My whole soul, my whole life and will to 
 this adventure, while it lasts, and to the next ad- 
 venture, if it come! I shall give myself wholly, 
 or withhold myself wholly. I shall not choose that 
 which will let me hve, but live or die for that which 
 I choose. 
 For my creative spirit is a child of the vast world. It 
 knows that infinite circles sweep onward in strong 
 and definite lines. 
 
XI 
 
 SHIP of life, I am dizzy, dancing over the waves. 
 Now on the crest of one, I pray to stay there, to 
 
 reel forever on that sunny, life-giving height. Now 
 
 in the hollow of one, I pray to sink to the very 
 
 depths. 
 There, surely, in the stillness, in the depths, are no more 
 
 dizzy changes, no motion, nothing but changeless- 
 
 ness and dead calm. 
 But from the shore and the continents I hear jagged 
 
 mountain-tops crying aloud. 
 They cry: "We were once in the deepest depths of the 
 
 sea. Behold, how we have risen! Nowhere is 
 
 changelessness ; nowhere is dead calm." 
 
I know a deeper depth and a higher height. I know 
 a depth that is not reached by sinldng. I know a 
 height that is not reached by rising. 
 
 It is the innermost self, the one known, the one un- 
 knowable. 
 
F 
 
 XII 
 
 ACE of man, nearest face, just awakened, splen- 
 did, changing, dying face, you cannot hide from 
 me the self that I know. Through the changing 
 cloud, through the shifting wave, through the pass- 
 ing face I recognize myself. 
 
XIII 
 
 BEHIND me is darkness, before me is a deep pit. 
 I plunge into the night, as I have done forever. 
 And lo, about me is the radiance of my own 
 light. The darkness is my friend, the night is my 
 mother. I lean upon empty space; I step smiling 
 into the darkness. For do not the planets and stars 
 lean upon empty space? And does not darkness 
 spread forth their fire? 
 I love the fearful world. I trust the unknown, because 
 it is the whole of myself. The space holds me; and 
 the darkness spreads a great hght. For this is the 
 bottomless pit and the roofless heaven, and in it I 
 am forever. 
 
1908