The Story of My Life, Helen Keller [best book recommendations .txt] 📗

The next lines are still more idiomatic, “When Suetonius left the country, they fell upon his troops and retook the island of Anglesea.” Here is her interpretation of the sentence: “It means that when the Roman general had gone away, the Britons began to fight again; and because the Roman soldiers had no general to tell them what to do, they were overcome by the Britons and lost the island they had captured.”

She prefers intellectual to manual occupations, and is not so fond of fancy work as many of the blind children are; yet she is eager to join them in whatever they are doing. She has learned to use the Caligraph typewriter, and writes very correctly, but not rapidly as yet, having had less than a month’s practice.

More than two years ago a cousin taught her the telegraph alphabet by making the dots and dashes on the back of her hand with his finger. Whenever she meets any one who is familiar with this system, she is delighted to use it in conversation. I have found it a convenient medium of communicating with Helen when she is at some distance from me, for it enables me to talk with her by tapping upon the floor with my foot. She feels the vibrations and understands what is said to her.

It was hoped that one so peculiarly endowed by nature as Helen, would, if left entirely to her own resources, throw some light upon such psychological questions as were not exhaustively investigated by Dr. Howe; but their hopes were not to be realized. In the case of Helen, as in that of Laura Bridgman, disappointment was inevitable. It is impossible to isolate a child in the midst of society, so that he shall not be influenced by the beliefs of those with whom he associates. In Helen’s case such an end could not have been attained without depriving her of that intercourse with others, which is essential to her nature.

It must have been evident to those who watched the rapid unfolding of Helen’s faculties that it would not be possible to keep her inquisitive spirit for any length of time from reaching out toward the unfathomable mysteries of life. But great care has been taken not to lead her thoughts prematurely to the consideration of subjects which perplex and confuse all minds.

Children ask profound questions, but they often receive shallow answers, or, to speak more correctly, they are quieted by such answers.

“Were did I come from?” and “Where shall I go when I die?” were questions Helen asked when she was eight years old. But the explanations which she was able to understand at that time did not satisfy, although they forced her to remain silent, until her mind should begin to put forth its higher powers, and generalize from innumerable impressions and ideas which streamed in upon it from books and from her daily experiences. Her mind sought for the cause of things.

As her observation of phenomena became more extensive and her vocabulary richer and more subtle, enabling her to express her own conceptions and ideas clearly, and also to comprehend the thoughts and experiences of others, she became acquainted with the limit of human creative power, and perceived that some power, not human, must have created the earth, the sun, and the thousand natural objects with which she was perfectly familiar.

Finally she one day demanded a name for the power, the existence of which she had already conceived in her own mind.

Through Charles Kingsley’s “Greek Heroes” she had become familiar with the beautiful stories of the Greek gods and goddesses, and she must have met with the words GOD, HEAVEN, SOUL, and a great many similar expressions in books.

She never asked the meaning of such words, nor made any comment when they occurred; and until February, 1889, no one had ever spoken to her of God. At that time, a dear relative who was also an earnest Christian, tried to tell her about God but, as this lady did not use words suited to the comprehension of the child, they made little impression upon Helen’s mind. When I subsequently talked with her she said: “I have something very funny to tell you. A. says God made me and every one out of sand; but it must be a joke. I am made of flesh and blood and bone, am I not?” Here she examined her arm with evident satisfaction, laughing heartily to herself. After a moment she went on: “A.

says God is everywhere, and that He is all love; but I do not think a person can be made out of love. Love is only something in our hearts. Then A. said another very comical thing. She says He (meaning God) is my dear father. It made me laugh quite hard, for I know my father is Arthur Keller.”

I explained to her that she was not yet able to understand what had been told her, and so easily led her to see that it would be better not to talk about such things until she was wiser.

She had met with the expression Mother Nature in the course of her reading, and for a long time she was in the habit of ascribing to Mother Nature whatever she felt to be beyond the power of man to accomplish. She would say, when speaking of the growth of a plant, “Mother Nature sends the sunshine and the rain to make the trees and the grass and the flowers grow.” The following extract from my notes will show what were her ideas at this time:

Helen seemed a little serious after supper, and Mrs. H. asked her of what she was thinking. “I am thinking how very busy dear Mother Nature is in the springtime,” she replied. When asked why, she answered: “Because she has so many children to take care of.

She is the mother of everything; the flowers and trees and winds.”

“How does Mother Nature take care of the flowers?” I asked.

“She sends the sunshine and rain to make them grow,” Helen replied; and after a moment she added, “I think the sunshine is Nature’s warm smile, and the raindrops are her tears.”

Later she said: “I do not know if Mother Nature made me. I think my mother got me from heaven, but I do not know where that place is. I know that daisies and pansies come from seeds which have been put in the ground; but children do not grow out of the ground, I am sure. I have never seen a plant-child! But I cannot imagine who made Mother Nature, can you? I love the beautiful spring, because the budding trees and the blossoming flowers and the tender green leaves fill my heart with joy. I must go now to see my garden. The daisies and the pansies will think I have forgotten them.”

After May, 1890, it was evident to me that she had reached a point where it was impossible to keep from her the religious beliefs held by those with whom she was in daily contact. She almost overwhelmed me with inquiries which were the natural outgrowth of her quickened intelligence.

Early in May she wrote on her tablet the following list of questions:

“I wish to write about things I do not understand. Who made the earth and the seas, and everything? What makes the sun hot? Where was I before I came to mother? I know that plants grow from seeds which are in the ground, but I am sure people do not grow that way. I never saw a child-plant. Little birds and chickens come out of eggs. I have seen them. What was the egg before it was an egg? Why does not the earth fall, it is so very large and heavy?

Tell me something that Father Nature does. May I read the book called the Bible? Please tell your little pupil many things when you have much time.”

Can any one doubt after reading these questions that the child who was capable of asking them was also capable of understanding at least their elementary answers? She could not, of course, have grasped such abstractions as a complete answer to her questions would involve; but one’s whole life is nothing more than a continual advance in the comprehension of the meaning and scope of such ideas.

Throughout Helen’s education I have invariably assumed that she can understand whatever it is desirable for her to know. Unless there had been in Helen’s mind some such intellectual process as the questions indicate, any explanation of them would have been unintelligible to her. Without that degree of mental development and activity which perceives the necessity of superhuman creative power, no explanation of natural phenomena is possible.

After she had succeeded in formulating the ideas which had been slowly growing in her mind, they seemed suddenly to absorb all her thoughts, and she became impatient to have everything explained. As we were passing a large globe a short time after she had written the questions, she stopped before it and asked, “Who made the REAL world?” I replied, “No one knows how the earth, the sun, and all the worlds which we call stars came to be; but I will tell you how wise men have tried to account for their origin, and to interpret the great and mysterious forces of nature.”

She knew that the Greeks had many gods to whom they ascribed various powers, because they believed that the sun, the lightning, and a hundred other natural forces, were independent and superhuman powers. But after a great deal of thought and study, I told her, men came to believe that all forces were manifestations of one power, and to that power they gave the name GOD.

She was very still for a few minutes, evidently thinking earnestly. She then asked, “Who made God?” I was compelled to evade her question, for I could not explain to her the mystery of a self-existent being. Indeed, many of her eager questions would have puzzled a far wiser person than I am. Here are some of them: “What did God make the new worlds out of?” “Where did He get the soil, and the water, and the seeds, and the first animals?”

“Where is God?” “Did you ever see God?” I told her that God was everywhere, and that she must not think of Him as a person, but as the life, the mind, the soul of everything. She interrupted me: “Everything does not have life. The rocks have not life, and they cannot think.” It is often necessary to remind her that there are infinitely many things that the wisest people in the world cannot explain.

No creed or dogma has been taught to Helen, nor has any effort been made to force religious beliefs upon her attention. Being fully aware of my own incompetence to give her any adequate explanations of the mysteries which underlie the names of God, soul, and immortality, I have always felt obliged, by a sense of duty to my pupil, to say as little as possible about spiritual matters. The Rt. Rev. Phillips Brooks has explained to her in a beautiful way the fatherhood of God.

She has not as yet been allowed to read the Bible, because I do not see how she can do so at present without getting a very erroneous conception of the attributes of God. I have already told her in simple language of the beautiful and helpful life of Jesus, and of His cruel death. The narrative affected her greatly when first she listened to it.

When she referred to our conversation again, it was to ask,