Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, DR. SCUDDER'S CLINICAL LECTURE, by EDGAR LEE MASTERS


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DR. SCUDDER'S CLINICAL LECTURE, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: I lectured last upon the morbus sacer
Last Line: At their convenience in the laboratory.
Subject(s): Physiology


I lectured last upon the morbus sacer,
Or falling sickness, epilepsy, of old
In Palestine and Greece so much ascribed
To deities or devils. To resume
We find it caused by morphological
Changes of the cortex cells. Sometimes,
More times, indeed, the anatomical
Basis, if one be, escapes detection.
For many functions of the cortex are
Unknown, as I have said.

And now remember
Mercier's analysis of heredity:
Besides direct transmission of unstable
Nervous systems, there remains the law
Hereditary of sanguinity.
Then here's another matter: Parents may
Have normal nervous systems, yet produce
Children of abnormal nerves and minds,
Caused by unsuitable sexual germs.
Let me repeat before I leave the matter
The factors in a perfect organization:
First quality in the germ producing matter;
Then quality in the sperm producing force,
And lastly relative fitness of the two.
We are but plants, however high we rise,
Whatever thoughts we have, or dreams we dream
We are but plants, and all we are and do
Depends upon the seed and on the soil.
What Mendel found in raising peas may lead
To perfect knowledge of the human mind.
There is one law for men and peas, the law
Makes peas of certain matter, and makes men
And mind of certain matter, all depends
Not on a varying law, but on a law
Varied in its course by matter, as
The arm, which is a lever and which works
By lever principle cannot make use
And form cement with trowel to the forms
It makes of paint or marble.

To resume:
A child may take the qualities of one parent
In some respects, and of the other parent
In some respects. A child may have the traits
Of father at one period of his life,
The mother at one period of his life.
And if the parents' traits are similar
Their traits may be prepotent in a child,
Thus giving rise to qualities convergent.
So if you take a circle and draw off
A line which would become another circle
If drawn enough, completed, but is left
Half drawn or less, that illustrates a mind
Of cumulative heredity. Take John,
My gardener, John, within his sphere is perfect,
John has a mind which is a perfect circle.
A perfect circle can be small, you know.
And so John has good sense within his sphere.
But if some force began to work like yeast
In brain cells, and his mind shot forth a line
to make a larger thinking circle, say
About a great invention, heaven or God,
Then John would be abnormal, till this line
Shot round and joined, became a larger circle.
This is the secret of eccentric genius,
The man is half a sphere, sticks out in space
Does not enclose co-ordinated thought.
He's like a plant mutating, half himself
Half something new and greater. If we looked
To John's heredity we'd find this change
Was manifest in mother or in father
About the self-same period of life,
Most likely in his father. Attributes
Of fathers are inherited by sons,
Of mothers by the daughters.

Now this morning
I take up paranoia. Paranoics
Are often noted for great gifts of mind.
Mahomet, Swedenborg were paranoics,
Joan of Arc, and Ossawatomie Brown,
Cellini, many others. All who think
Themselves inspired of God, and all who see
Themselves appointed to a work, the subjects
Of prophecies are paranoics. All
Who visions have of God or archangels,
Hear voices or celestial music, these
Are paranoics. And whether it be they rise
Enough above the earth to look along
A longer arc and see realities,
Or see strange things through atmospheric strata
Which build up or distort the things they see
Remains the question. Let us wait the proof.

Last week I told you I would have to-day
The skull and brain of Jacob Groesbell here,
And lecture on his case. Here is the brain:
Weight sixteen hundred grammes. Students may look
After the lecture at the brain and skull.
There's nothing anatomical at fault
With this fine brain, so far as I can find.
You'll note how deep the convolutions are,
Arrangement quite symmetrical. The skull
Is well formed too. The jaws are long you'll note,
The palate roof somewhat asymmetrical.
But this is scarce significant. Let me tell
How Jacob Groesbell looked:

The man was tall,
Had shapely hands and feet, but awkward limbs.
His hair was brown and fine, his forehead high,
And ran back at an angle, temples full.
His nose was long and fleshy at the point,
Was tilted to one side. His eyes were gray,
The iris flecked. They looked as if a light
As of a sun-set shone behind them. Ears
Were very large, projected at right angles.
His neck was slender, womanish. His skin
Of finest texture, white and very smooth.
His voice was quiet, musical. His manner
Patient and gentle, modest, reasonable.
His parents, as I learned through inquiry,
Were Methodists, devout and greatly loved.
The mother healthy both in mind and body.
The father was eccentric, perhaps insane.
They were first cousins.

I knew Jacob Groesbell
Ten years before he died. I knew him first
When he was sent to mend my porch. A workman
With saw and hammer never excelled him. Then
As time went on I saw him when he came
At my request to do my carpentry.
I grew to know him, and by slow degrees
He told me of his readings in the Bible,
And gave me his interpretations. At last
Aged forty-six, had ulcers of the stomach,
Which took him off. He sent for me, and said
He wished me to attend him, which I did.
He told me I could have his body and brain
To lecture on, dissect, since some had said
He was insane, he told me, and if so
I should find something wrong with brain or body.
And if I found a wrong then all his visions
Of God and archangels were just the fancies
That come to madmen. So he made provision
To give his brain and body for this cause,
And here's his brain and skull, and I am lecturing
On Jacob Groesbell as a paranoic.

As I have said before, in making tests
And observations of the patient, have
His conversation taken stenographically,
In order to preserve his speech exactly,
And catch the flow if he becomes excited.
So we determine if he makes new words,
If he be incoherent, or repeats.
I took my secretary once to make
A stenographic record. Strange enough
He would not talk while she was writing down.
And when I asked him why, he would not tell.
So I devised a scheme: I took a satchel,
And put in it a dictaphone, and when
A cylinder was full I'd stoop and put
My hand among my bottles in the satchel,
As if I was compounding medicine,
Instead I'd put another cylinder on.
And thus I got his story in his voice,
Just as he talked, with nothing lost at all,
Which you shall hear. For with this megaphone
The students in the farthest gallery
Can hear what Jacob Groesbell said to me,
And weigh the thought that stirred within the brain
Here in this jar beside me. Listen now
To Jacob Groesbell's voice:

"Will you repeat
From the beginning connectedly the story
Of your religious life, illumination,
What you have called your soul's escape?"

"I will,
Since I shall never tell it again."

"I grew up
Timid and sensitive, not very strong,
Not understood of father or of mother.
They did not love me, and I never felt
A tenderness for them. I used to quote:
'Who is my mother and who are my brothers?'
At school I was not liked. I had a chum
From time to time, that's all. And I remember
My mother on a day put with my luncheon
A bottle of milk, and when the noon hour came
I missed it, found some boys had taken it,
And when I asked for it, they made the cry:
'Bottle of milk, bottle of milk,' and I
Flushed through with shame, and cried, and to this hour
It hurts me to remember it. Such days,
All misery! For all my clothes were patched.
They hooted at me. So I lived alone.
At twelve years old I had great fears of death,
And hell, heard devils in my room. One night
During a thunderstorm heard clanking chains,
And hid beneath the pillows. One spring day
As I was walking on the village street
Close to the church I heard a voice which said
'Behold, my son' -- and falling on my knees
I prayed in ecstacy -- but as I prayed
Some passing school boys laughed, threw stones at me.
A heat ran through me, I arose and fled.
Well, then I joined the church and was baptized.
But something left me in the ceremony,
I lost my ecstacy, seemed slipping back
Into the trap. I took to wandering
In solitary places, could not bear
To see a human face. I slept for nights
In still ravines, or meadows. But one time
Returning to my home, I found the room
Filled up with visitors -- my heart stopped short,
And glancing at the faces of my parents
I hurried, bolted through, and did not speak,
Entered a bed-room door and closed it. So
I tell this just to illustrate my shyness,
Which cursed my youth and made me miserable,
Something I fought but could not overcome.
And pondering on the Scriptures I could see
How I resembled the saints, our Saviour even,
How even as my brothers called me mad
They called our Saviour so.

"At fourteen years
My father taught me carpentry, his trade,
And made me work with him. I seemed to be
The butt for jokes and laughter with the men --
I know not why. For now and then they'd drop
A word that showed they knew my secrets, knew
I had heard voices, knew I loathed the lusts
Of women, drink. Oh these were sorry years,
God was not with me though I sought Him ever
And I was persecuted for His sake. My brain
Seemed like to burst at times, saw sparkling lights,
Heard music, voices, made strange shapes of leaves,
Clouds, trunks of trees, -- illusions of the devil.
I was turned twenty years when on an evening
Calm, beautiful in June, after a day
Of healthful toil, while sitting on the porch,
The sun just sinking, at my left I heard
A voice of hollow clearness: "You are Christ."
My eyes grew blind with tears for the evil
Of such a thought, soul stained with such a thought,
So devil stained, soul damned with blasphemy.
I ran into my room and seized a pistol
To end my life. God willed it otherwise.
I fainted and awoke upon the floor
After some hours. To heap my suffering full
A few days after this while in the village
I went into a store. The friendly clerk --
I knew him always -- said 'What will you have?
I wait first always on the little boys.'
I laughed and went my way. But in an hour
His saying rankled, I began to brood
On ways of vengeance, till it seemed at last
His life must pay. O, soul so full of sin,
So devil tangled, tortured -- which not prayer
Nor watching could deliver. So I thought
To save my soul from murder I must fly --
I felt an urging as one does in sleep
Pursued by giant things to fly, to fly
From terror, death, from blankness on the scene,
From emptiness, from beauty gone. The world
Seemed something seen in fever, where the steps
Of men are muffled, and a futile scheme
Impels all steps. So packing up my kit,
My Bible in my pocket, secretly
I disappeared. Next day took up my life
In Barrington, a village thirty miles
From all I knew, besides a lovely lake,
Reached by a road that crossed a bridge
Over a little bay, the bridge's ends
Clustered with boats for fishermen. And here
Night after night I fished, or stood and watched
The star-light on the water.

I grew calmer
Almost found peace, got work to do, and lived
Under a widow's roof, who was devout
And knew my love for God. Now listen, doctor,
To every word: I was now twenty-five,
In perfect health, no longer persecuted,
At peace with all the world, if not my soul
Had wholly found its peace, for truth to tell
It had an ache which sometimes I could feel,
And yet I had this soul awakening.
I know I have been counted mad, so watch
Each detail here and judge.

At four o'clock
The thirtieth day of June, my work being done,
My kit upon my back I walked this road
Toward the village. 'Twas an afternoon
Of clouds, no rain, a little breeze, the tinkle
Of cow bells in the air, a heavenly silence
Pervading nature. Reaching the hill's foot
I sat down by a tree to rest, enjoy
The greenness of the forests, meadows, flats
Along the bay, the blueness of the lake,
The ripple of the water at my feet,
The rythmic babble of the little boats
Tied to the bridge. And as I sat there musing,
Myself lost in the self, in time the clouds
Lifted, blew off, to let the sun go down
Over the waters gloriously to rest.
So as I stared upon the sun on the water,
Some minutes, though I know not for how long,
Out of the splendor of the shining sun
Upon the water, Jesus of Nazareth
Clothed all in white, the nimbus round his brow,
His face all wisdom, love, rose to my view,
And then he spake: 'Jacob, my son, arise
And come with me.'

"And in an instant there
Something fell from me, I became a cloud,
A soul with wings. A glory burned about me.
And in that glory I perceived all things:
I saw the eternal wheels, the deepest secrets
Of creatures, herbs and grass, and stars and suns
And I knew God, and knew all things as God:
The All loving, the Perfect One, the Perfect Wisdom,
Truth, love and purity. And in that instant
Atoms and molecules I saw, and faces,
And how they are arranged order to order,
With no break in the order, one harmonious
Whole of universal life all blended
And interfused with universal love.
And as it was with Shelley so I cried,
And clasped my hands in ecstacy and rose
And started back to climb the hill again,
Scarce knowing, neither caring what I did,
Nor where I went, and thinking if this be
A fancy only of the Saviour then
He will not follow me, and if it be
Himself, indeed, he will not let me fall
After the revelation. As I reached
The brow of the hill, I felt his presence with me
And turned, and saw Him. 'Thou hast faith, my son,
Who knowest me, when they who walked with me
Toward Emmaus knew me not, to whom I told
All secrets of the scriptures beginning at Moses,
Who knew me not till I brake bread and then,
As after thought could say, Did not our heart
Within us burn while he talked. O, Jacob Groesbell,
Thou carpenter, as I was, greatly blessed
With visions and my Father's love, this walk
Is your walk toward Emmaus.' So he talked,
Expounding all the scriptures, telling me
About the race of men who live and move
Along a life of meat and drink and sleep
And comforts of the flesh, while here and there
A hungering soul is chosen to lift up
And re-create the race. 'The prophet, poet
Must seek and must find God to keep the race
Awake to the divine and to the orders
Of universal and harmonious life,
All interfused with Universal love,
Which love is God, lest blindness, atheism,
Which sees no order, reason, no intent
Beat down the race to welter in the mire
When storms, and floods come. And the sons of God,
The leaders of the race from age to age
Are chosen for their separate work, each work
Fits in the given order. All who suffer
The martyrdom of thought, whether they think
Themselves as servants of my Father, or even
Mock at the images and rituals
Which prophets of dead creeds did symbolize
The mystery they sensed, or whether they be
Spirits of laughter, logic, divination
Of human life, the human soul, all men
Who give their essence, blindly or in vision
In faith that life is worth their utmost love,
They are my brothers and my Father's sons.'
So Jesus told me as we took my walk
Toward my Emmaus. After a time we turned
And walked through heading rye and purple vetch
Into an orchard where great rows of pears
Sloped up a hill. It was now evening:
Stretches of scarlet clouds were in the west,
And a half moon was hanging just above
The pears' white blossoms. O, that evening!
We came back to the boats at last and loosed
One of them and rowed out into the bay,
And fished, while the stars appeared. He only said
'Whatever they did with me you too shall do.'
A haziness came on me now. I seem
To find myself alone there in that boat.
At mid-night I awoke, the moon was sunk,
The whippoorwills were singing. I walked home
Back to the village in a silence, peace,
A happiness profound.

"And the next morning
I awoke with aching head, spent body, yet
With spiritual vision so intense I looked
Through things material as if they were
But shadows -- old things passed away or grew
A lovelier order. And my heart was full.
Infinitely I loved, and infinitely was loved.
My landlady looked at me sharply, asked
What hour I entered, where I was so late.
I only answered fishing. For I told
No person of my vision, went my way
At carpentry in silence, in great joy.
For archangels and powers were at my side,
They led me, bore me up, instructed me
In mysteries, and voices said to me
'Write' as the voice in Patmos said to John.
I wrote and printed and the village read,
And called me mad. And so I grew to see
The deepest truths of God, and God Himself,
The geniture of all things, of the Word
Becoming flesh in Christ. I knew all ages,
Times, empires, races, creeds, the human weakness
Which makes life wearisome, confused and pained,
And how the search for something (it is God)
Makes divers worships, fire, the sun, and beasts
Takes form in Eleusinian mysteries
Or festivals where sex, the vine, the Earth
At harvest time have praise or reverence.
I knew God, talked with God, and knew that God
Is more than Thought or Love. Our twisted brains
Are but the wires in the bulb which stays,
Resists the current and makes human thought.
As the electric current is not light
But heat and power as well. Our little brains
Resist God and make thought and love as well.
But God is more than these. Oh I heard much
Of music, heard the whirring as of wheels,
Or buzzing as of ears when a room is still.
That is the axis of profoundest life
Which turns and rests not. And I heard the cry
And hearing wept, of man's soul, heard the ages,
The epochs of this earth as it were the feet
Of multitudes in corridors. And I knew
The agony of genius and the woe
Of prophets and the great.

"From that next morning
I searched the scriptures with more fervid zeal
Than I had ever done. I could not open
Its pages anywhere but I could find
Myself set forth or mirrored, pointed to.
I could not doubt my destiny was bound
With man's salvation. Jeremiah said
'Take forth the precious from the vile.' Those words
To me were spoken, and to no one else.
And so I searched the scriptures. And I found
I never had a thought, experience, pang,
A state in human life our Saviour had not.
He was a carpenter, and so was I.
He had his soul's illumination, so had I.
His brethren called him mad, they called me mad.
He triumphed over death, so shall I triumph.
For I could, I can feel my way along
Death's stages as a man can reach and feel
Ahead of him along a wall. I know
This body is a shell, a butterfly's
Excreta pushed away with rising wings.

"I searched the scriptures. How should I believe
Paul's story, not my own? Did he not see
At mid-day in the way a light from heaven
Above the brightness of the sun and hear
The voice of Jesus saying to him 'Saul,'
Why persecutest thou me?' And did not Festus,
Before whom Paul stood speaking for himself,
Call Paul a mad man? Even while he spake
Such words as none but men inspired can speak,
As well as words of truth and soberness,
Such as myself speak now.

"And from the scriptures
I passed to studies of the men who came
To great illuminations. You will see
There are two kinds: One's of the intellect,
The understanding, one is of the soul.
The x-ray lets the eye behind the flesh
To see the ribs, or heart beat, choose! So men
In their illumination see the frame-work
Of life or see its spirit, so align
Themselves with Science, Satire, or align
Themselves with Poetry or Prophecy.
So being Aristotle, Rabelais,
Paul, Swedenborg.

"And as the years
Went on, as I had time, was fortunate
In finding books I read of many men
Who had illumination, as I had it. Read
Of Dante's vision, how he found himself
Saw immortality, lost fear of death.
Read Swedenborg, who left the intellect
At fifty-four for God, and entered heaven
Before he quitted life and saw behind
The sun of fire, a sun of love and truth.
Read Whitman who exclaimed to God: 'Thou knowest
My manhood's visionary meditations
Which come from Thee, the ardor and the urge.
Thou lightest my life with rays ineffable
Beyond all signs, descriptions, languages.'
Read Blake, Spinoza, Emerson, read Wordsworth
Who wrote of something 'deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue skies, and in the mind of man --
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought
And rolls through all things.'

"And at last they called me
The mad, and learned carpenter. And then --
I'm growing faint. Your hand, hold ..."

At this point
He fainted, sank into a stupor. There
I watched him, to discover if 'twas death.
But soon I saw him rally, then he spoke.
There was some other talk, but not of moment.
I had to change the cylinder -- the talk
Was broken, rambling, and of trifling things,
Throws no light on the case, being sane enough.
He died next morning.

Students who desire
To examine the skull and brain may do so now
At their convenience in the laboratory.





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