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He says here, 'A ransom for many. Now that word is not used in this instance in contradistinction to 'all, nor in contradistinction to 'few. It is distinctly employed as emphasising the contrast between the single death and the wide extent of its benefits; and in terms which, rigidly taken, simply express indefiniteness, it expresses universality.
No exquisite delicacy, no insinuating softness, mixed with respect, none of that hovering over the border, as Papa used to say, none of that happy indefiniteness of manner which seems to declare "I would love you if I might," or "I do, but I dare not tell," even when engaged in the most trivial attentions handing a footstool, remarking on the soup, etc.
It is a sort of escape, a safety-valve for the hot fire of controversy on the soul's fate, and offers in its pertinent indefiniteness a vast solace to those who are trying to balance the bewildering account of virtue with sin. Hawthorne found that here was a partial solution of the problem, and he enlarged upon it, toward the end of his life, in "The Marble Faun."
Nothing else has that definite indefiniteness, that melting permanence, that evanescing changelessness. Clouds in vain strive to imitate it; they are made of slighter stuff; they can be blunt or ragged, but they cannot have that solid positiveness. Mountains, too, are very stationary, always at their post.
It has that definiteness of mood with that indefiniteness of circumstance in which music wins its most dignified prosperity. The woeful plaint of this voice breathing above a low sinister roll of the tympanum establishes at once the atmosphere of melancholy. Other instruments join the wail, which breaks out wildly from the whole orchestra.
"Where?" he would ask, tempting the darkness as a child, fearfully certain of a reply. Then another voice, cadenced like the soft rush of waves up the sand, would murmur, "Somewhere away! Somewhere away! Somewhere away!" And in the indefiniteness of that answer he found an inexplicable joy. The vagueness of "Somewhere away" was as vast with pregnant possibilities as his desert.
Such expressions are partly responsible for consequences of which, since they are not actually expressed, one is never sure how far they are contained in the utterances and really follow from them. It is this indefiniteness of the content and form of the press which prevents the laws governing it from assuming that precision which one demands of laws.
It denotes the boundary line of the long ages of dimness and indefiniteness about two things assurance of salvation in this life, and certainty of immediate blessedness in the life to come. "To-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise!" There is nothing like it in all the Scriptures.
I have purposely dwelt long on this preliminary stage because it is only in it that treatment is likely to be of any service, while the very indefiniteness of the symptoms constantly leads to their being overlooked, or referred to teething, or thought at any rate to be a mere temporary ailment for which it is not worth while to call in the doctor.
And until we have done so until we have made clear to ourselves the kind of future citizen which as a State we desire to rear up our educational agencies must manifest a like indefiniteness, a like inconsistency, and a like want of connection as do our educational aims and ideals.
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