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THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE

                                  1872

FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN

THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE

by Hans Christian Andersen



FAR away towards the east, in India, which seemed in those days

the world's end, stood the Tree of the Sun; a noble tree, such as we

have never seen, and perhaps never may see.

The summit of this tree spread itself for miles like an entire

forest, each of its smaller branches forming a complete tree. Palms,

beech-trees, pines, plane-trees, and various other kinds, which are

found in all parts of the world, were here like small branches,

shooting forth from the great tree; while the larger boughs, with

their knots and curves, formed valleys and hills, clothed with velvety

green and covered with flowers. Everywhere it was like a blooming

meadow or a lovely garden. Here were birds from all quarters of the

world assembled together; birds from the primeval forests of

America, from the rose gardens of Damascus, and from the deserts of

Africa, in which the elephant and the lion may boast of being the only

rulers. Birds from the Polar regions came flying here, and of course

the stork and the swallow were not absent. But the birds were not

the only living creatures. There were stags, squirrels, antelopes, and

hundreds of other beautiful and light-footed animals here found a

home.

The summit of the tree was a wide-spreading garden, and in the

midst of it, where the green boughs formed a kind of hill, stood a

castle of crystal, with a view from it towards every quarter of

heaven. Each tower was erected in the form of a lily, and within the

stern was a winding staircase, through which one could ascend to the

top and step out upon the leaves as upon balconies. The calyx of the

flower itself formed a most beautiful, glittering, circular hall,

above which no other roof arose than the blue firmament and the sun

and stars.

Just as much splendor, but of another kind, appeared below, in the

wide halls of the castle. Here, on the walls, were reflected

pictures of the world, which represented numerous and varied scenes of

everything that took place daily, so that it was useless to read the

newspapers, and indeed there were none to be obtained in this spot.

All was to be seen in living pictures by those who wished it, but

all would have been too much for even the wisest man, and this man

dwelt here. His name is very difficult; you would not be able to

pronounce it, so it may be omitted. He knew everything that a man on

earth can know or imagine. Every invention already in existence or yet

to be, was known to him, and much more; still everything on earth

has a limit. The wise king Solomon was not half so wise as this man.

He could govern the powers of nature and held sway over potent

spirits; even Death itself was obliged to give him every morning a

list of those who were to die during the day. And King Solomon himself

had to die at last, and this fact it was which so often occupied the

thoughts of this great man in the castle on the Tree of the Sun. He

knew that he also, however high he might tower above other men in

wisdom, must one day die. He knew that his children would fade away

like the leaves of the forest and become dust. He saw the human race

wither and fall like leaves from the tree; he saw new men come to fill

their places, but the leaves that fell off never sprouted forth again;

they crumbled to dust or were absorbed into other plants.

"What happens to man," asked the wise man of himself, "when

touched by the angel of death? What can death be? The body decays, and

the soul. Yes; what is the soul, and whither does it go?"

"To eternal life," says the comforting voice of religion.

"But what is this change? Where and how shall we exist?"

"Above; in heaven," answers the pious man; "it is there we hope to

go."

"Above!" repeated the wise man, fixing his eyes upon the moon

and stars above him. He saw that to this earthly sphere above and

below were constantly changing places, and that the position varied

according to the spot on which a man found himself. He knew, also,

that even if he ascended to the top of the highest mountain which

rears its lofty summit on this earth, the air, which to us seems clear

and transparent, would there be dark and cloudy; the sun would have

a coppery glow and send forth no rays, and our earth would lie beneath

him wrapped in an orange-colored mist. How narrow are the limits which

confine the bodily sight, and how little can be seen by the eye of the

soul. How little do the wisest among us know of that which is so

important to us all.

In the most secret chamber of the castle lay the greatest treasure

on earth- the Book of Truth. The wise man had read it through page

after page. Every man may read in this book, but only in fragments. To

many eyes the characters seem so mixed in confusion that the words

cannot be distinguished. On certain pages the writing often appears so

pale or so blurred that the page becomes a blank. The wiser a man

becomes, the more he will read, and those who are wisest read most.

The wise man knew how to unite the sunlight and the moonlight with

the light of reason and the hidden powers of nature; and through

this stronger light, many things in the pages were made clear to

him. But in the portion of the book entitled "Life after Death" not

a single point could he see distinctly. This pained him. Should he

never be able here on earth to obtain a light by which everything

written in the Book of Truth should become clear to him? Like the wise

King Solomon, he understood the language of animals, and could

interpret their talk into song; but that made him none the wiser. He

found out the nature of plants and metals, and their power in curing

diseases and arresting death, but none to destroy death itself. In all

created things within his reach he sought the light that should

shine upon the certainty of an eternal life, but he found it not.

The Book of Truth lay open before him, but, its pages were to him as

blank paper. Christianity placed before him in the Bible a promise

of eternal life, but he wanted to read it in his book, in which

nothing on the subject appeared to be written.

He had five children; four sons, educated as the children of

such a wise father should be, and a daughter, fair, gentle, and

intelligent, but she was blind; yet this deprivation appeared as

nothing to her; her father and brothers were outward eyes to her,

and a vivid imagination made everything clear to her mental sight. The

sons had never gone farther from the castle than the branches of the

trees extended, and the sister had scarcely ever left home. They

were happy children in that home of their childhood, the beautiful and

fragrant Tree of the Sun. Like all children, they loved to hear

stories related to them, and their father told them many things

which other children would not have understood; but these were as

clever as most grownup people are among us. He explained to them

what they saw in the pictures of life on the castle walls- the

doings of man, and the progress of events in all the lands of the

earth; and the sons often expressed a wish that they could be present,

and take a part in these great deeds. Then their father told them that

in the world there was nothing but toil and difficulty: that it was

not quite what it appeared to them, as they looked upon it in their

beautiful home. He spoke to them of the true, the beautiful, and the

good, and told them that these three held together in the world, and

by that union they became crystallized into a precious jewel,

clearer than a diamond of the first water- a jewel, whose splendor had

a value even in the sight of God, in whose brightness all things are

dim. This jewel was called the philosopher's stone. He told them that,

by searching, man could attain to a knowledge of the existence of God,

and that it was in the power of every man to discover the certainty

that such a jewel as the philosopher's stone really existed. This

information would have been beyond the perception of other children;

but these children understood, and others will learn to comprehend its

meaning after a time. They questioned their father about the true, the

beautiful, and the good, and he explained it to them in many ways.

He told them that God, when He made man out of the dust of the

earth, touched His work five times, leaving five intense feelings,

which we call the five senses. Through these, the true, the beautiful,

and the good are seen, understood, and perceived, and through these

they are valued, protected, and encouraged. Five senses have been

given mentally and corporeally, inwardly and outwardly, to body and

soul.

The children thought deeply on all these things, and meditated

upon them day and night. Then the eldest of the brothers dreamt a

splendid dream. Strange to say, not only the second brother but also

the third and fourth brothers all dreamt exactly the same thing;

namely, that each went out into the world to find the philosopher's

stone. Each dreamt that he found it, and that, as he rode back on

his swift horse, in the morning dawn, over the velvety green

meadows, to his home in the castle of his father, that the stone

gleamed from his forehead like a beaming light; and threw such a

bright radiance upon the pages of the Book of Truth that every word

was illuminated which spoke of the life beyond the grave. But the

sister had no dream of going out into the wide world; it never entered

her mind. Her world was her father's house.

"I shall ride forth into the wide world," said the eldest brother.

"I must try what life is like there, as I mix with men. I will

practise only the good and true; with these I will protect the

beautiful. Much shall be changed for the better while I am there."

Now these thoughts were great and daring, as our thoughts

generally are at home, before we have gone out into the world, and

encountered its storms and tempests, its thorns and its thistles. In

him, and in all his brothers, the five senses were highly

cultivated, inwardly and outwardly; but each of them had one sense

which in keenness and development surpassed the other four. In the

case of the eldest, this pre-eminent sense was sight, which he hoped

would be of special service. He had eyes for all times and all people;

eyes that could discover in the depths of the earth hidden

treasures, and look into the hearts of men, as through a pane of

glass; he could read more than is often seen on the cheek that blushes

or grows pale, in the eye that droops or smiles. Stags and antelopes

accompanied him to the western boundary of his home, and there he

found the wild swans. These he followed, and found himself far away in

the north, far from the land of his father, which extended eastward to

the ends of the earth. How he opened his eyes with astonishment! How

many things were to be seen here! and so different to the mere

representation of pictures such as those in his father's house. At

first he nearly lost his eyes in astonishment at the rubbish and

mockery brought forward to represent the beautiful; but he kept his

eyes, and soon found full employment for them. He wished to go

thoroughly and honestly to work in his endeavor to understand the

true, the beautiful, and the good. But how were they represented in

the world? He observed that the wreath which rightly belonged to the

beautiful was often given the hideous; that the good was often

passed by unnoticed, while mediocrity was applauded, when it should

have been hissed. People look at the dress, not at the wearer; thought

more of a name than of doing their duty; and trusted more to

reputation than to real service. It was everywhere the same.

"I see I must make a regular attack on these things," said he; and

he accordingly did not spare them. But while looking for the truth,

came the evil one, the father of lies, to intercept him. Gladly

would the fiend have plucked out the eyes of this Seer, but that would

have been a too straightforward path for him; he works more cunningly.

He allowed the young man to seek for, and discover, the beautiful

and the good; but while he was contemplating them, the evil spirit

blew one mote after another into each of his eyes; and such a

proceeding would injure the strongest sight. Then he blew upon the

motes, and they became beams, so that the clearness of his sight was

gone, and the Seer was like a blind man in the world, and had no

longer any faith in it. He had lost his good opinion of the world,

as well as of himself; and when a man gives up the world, and

himself too, it is all over with him.

"All over," said the wild swan, who flew across the sea to the

east.

"All over," twittered the swallows, who were also flying

eastward towards the Tree of the Sun. It was no good news which they

carried home.

"I think the Seer has been badly served," said the second brother,

"but the Hearer may be more successful."

This one possessed the sense of hearing to a very high degree:

so acute was this sense, that it was said he could hear the grass

grow. He took a fond leave of all at home, and rode away, provided

with good abilities and good intentions. The swallows escorted him,

and he followed the swans till he found himself out in the world,

and far away from home. But he soon discovered that one may have too

much of a good thing. His hearing was too fine. He not only heard

the grass grow, but could hear every man's heart beat, whether in

sorrow or in joy. The whole world was to him like a clockmaker's great

workshop, in which all the clocks were going "tick, tick," and all the

turret clocks striking "ding, dong." It was unbearable. For a long

time his ears endured it, but at last all the noise and tumult

became too much for one man to bear.

There were rascally boys of sixty years old- for years do not

alone make a man- who raised a tumult, which might have made the

Hearer laugh, but for the applause which followed, echoing through

every street and house, and was even heard in country roads. Falsehood

thrust itself forward and played the hypocrite; the bells on the

fool's cap jingled, and declared they were church-bells, and the noise

became so bad for the Hearer that he thrust his fingers into his ears.

Still, he could hear false notes and bad singing, gossip and idle

words, scandal and slander, groaning and moaning, without and

within. "Heaven help us!" He thrust his fingers farther and farther

into his ears, till at last the drums burst. And now he could hear

nothing more of the true, the beautiful, and the good; for his hearing

was to have been the means by which he hoped to acquire his knowledge.

He became silent and suspicious, and at last trusted no one, not

even himself, and no longer hoping to find and bring home the costly

jewel, he gave it up, and gave himself up too, which was worse than

all.

The birds in their flight towards the east, carried the tidings,

and the news reached the castle in the Tree of the Sun.

"I will try now," said the third brother; "I have a keen nose."

Now that was not a very elegant expression, but it was his way, and we

must take him as he was. He had a cheerful temper, and was, besides, a

real poet; he could make many things appear poetical, by the way in

which he spoke of them, and ideas struck him long before they occurred

to the minds of others. "I can smell," he would say; and he attributed

to the sense of smelling, which he possessed in a high degree, a great

power in the region of the beautiful. "I can smell," he would say,

"and many places are fragrant or beautiful according to the taste of

the frequenters. One man feels at home in the atmosphere of the

tavern, among the flaring tallow candles, and when the smell of

spirits mingles with the fumes of bad tobacco. Another prefers sitting

amidst the overpowering scent of jasmine, or perfuming himself with

scented olive oil. This man seeks the fresh sea breeze, while that one

climbs the lofty mountain-top, to look down upon the busy life in

miniature beneath him."

As he spoke in this way, it seemed as if he had already been out

in the world, as if he had already known and associated with man.

But this experience was intuitive- it was the poetry within him, a

gift from Heaven bestowed on him in his cradle. He bade farewell to

his parental roof in the Tree of the Sun, and departed on foot, from

the pleasant scenes that surrounded his home. Arrived at its confines,

he mounted on the back of an ostrich, which runs faster than a

horse, and afterwards, when he fell in with the wild swans, he swung

himself on the strongest of them, for he loved change, and away he

flew over the sea to distant lands, where there were great forests,

deep lakes, lofty mountains, and proud cities. Wherever he came it

seemed as if sunshine travelled with him across the fields, for

every flower, every bush, exhaled a renewed fragrance, as if conscious

that a friend and protector was near; one who understood them, and

knew their value. The stunted rose-bush shot forth twigs, unfolded its

leaves, and bore the most beautiful roses; every one could see it, and

even the black, slimy wood-snail noticed its beauty. "I will give my

seal to the flower," said the snail, "I have trailed my slime upon it,

I can do no more.

"Thus it always fares with the beautiful in this world," said

the poet. And he made a song upon it, and sung it after his own

fashion, but nobody listened. Then he gave a drummer twopence and a

peacock's feather, and composed a song for the drum, and the drummer

beat it through the streets of the town, and when the people heard

it they said, "That is a capital tune." The poet wrote many songs

about the true, the beautiful, and the good. His songs were listened

to in the tavern, where the tallow candles flared, in the fresh clover

field, in the forest, and on the high-seas; and it appeared as if this

brother was to be more fortunate than the other two.

But the evil spirit was angry at this, so he set to work with soot

and incense, which he can mix so artfully as to confuse an angel,

and how much more easily a poor poet. The evil one knew how to

manage such people. He so completely surrounded the poet with

incense that the man lost his head, forgot his mission and his home,

and at last lost himself and vanished in smoke.

But when the little birds heard of it, they mourned, and for three

days they sang not one song. The black wood-snail became blacker

still; not for grief, but for envy. "They should have offered me

incense," he said, "for it was I who gave him the idea of the most

famous of his songs- the drum song of 'The Way of the World;' and it

was I who spat at the rose; I can bring a witness to that fact."

But no tidings of all this reached the poet's home in India. The

birds had all been silent for three days, and when the time of

mourning was over, so deep had been their grief, that they had

forgotten for whom they wept. Such is the way of the world.

"Now I must go out into the world, and disappear like the rest,"

said the fourth brother. He was as good-tempered as the third, but

no poet, though he could be witty.

The two eldest had filled the castle with joyfulness, and now

the last brightness was going away. Sight and hearing have always been

considered two of the chief senses among men, and those which they

wish to keep bright; the other senses are looked upon as of less

importance.

But the younger son had a different opinion; he had cultivated his

taste in every way, and taste is very powerful. It rules over what

goes into the mouth, as well as over all which is presented to the

mind; and, consequently, this brother took upon himself to taste

everything stored up in bottles or jars; this he called the rough part

of his work. Every man's mind was to him as a vessel in which

something was concocting; every land a kind of mental kitchen.

"There are no delicacies here," he said; so he wished to go out into

the world to find something delicate to suit his taste. "Perhaps

fortune may be more favorable to me than it was to my brothers. I

shall start on my travels, but what conveyance shall I choose? Are air

balloons invented yet?" he asked of his father, who knew of all

inventions that had been made, or would be made.

Air balloons had not then been invented, nor steam-ships, nor

railways.

"Good," said he; "then I shall choose an air balloon; my father

knows how they are to be made and guided. Nobody has invented one yet,

and the people will believe that it is an aerial phantom. When I

have done with the balloon I shall burn it, and for this purpose,

you must give me a few pieces of another invention, which will come

next; I mean a few chemical matches."

He obtained what he wanted, and flew away. The birds accompanied

him farther than they had the other brothers. They were curious to

know how this flight would end. Many more of them came swooping

down; they thought it must be some new bird, and he soon had a

goodly company of followers. They came in clouds till the air became

darkened with birds as it was with the cloud of locusts over the

land of Egypt.

And now he was out in the wide world. The balloon descended over

one of the greatest cities, and the aeronaut took up his station at

the highest point, on the church steeple. The balloon rose again

into the air, which it ought not to have done; what became of it is

not known, neither is it of any consequence, for balloons had not then

been invented.

There he sat on the church steeple. The birds no longer hovered

over him; they had got tired of him, and he was tired of them. All the

chimneys in the town were smoking.

"There are altars erected to my honor," said the wind, who

wished to say something agreeable to him as he sat there boldly

looking down upon the people in the street. There was one stepping

along, proud of his purse; another, of the key he carried behind

him, though he had nothing to lock up; another took a pride in his

moth-eaten coat; and another, in his mortified body. "Vanity, all

vanity!" he exclaimed. "I must go down there by-and-by, and touch

and taste; but I shall sit here a little while longer, for the wind

blows pleasantly at my back. I shall remain here as long as the wind

blows, and enjoy a little rest. It is comfortable to sleep late in the

morning when one had a great deal to do," said the sluggard; "so I

shall stop here as long as the wind blows, for it pleases me."

And there he stayed. But as he was sitting on the weather-cock

of the steeple, which kept turning round and round with him, he was

under the false impression that the same wind still blew, and that

he could stay where he was without expense.

But in India, in the castle on the Tree of the Sun, all was

solitary and still, since the brothers had gone away one after the

other.

"Nothing goes well with them," said the father; "they will never

bring the glittering jewel home, it is not made for me; they are all

dead and gone." Then he bent down over the Book of Truth, and gazed on

the page on which he should have read of the life after death, but for

him there was nothing to be read or learned upon it.

His blind daughter was his consolation and joy; she clung to him

with sincere affection, and for the sake of his happiness and peace

she wished the costly jewel could be found and brought home.

With longing tenderness she thought of her brothers. Where were

they? Where did they live? How she wished she might dream of them; but

it was strange that not even in dreams could she be brought near to

them. But at last one night she dreamt that she heard the voices of

her brothers calling to her from the distant world, and she could

not refrain herself, but went out to them, and yet it seemed in her

dream that she still remained in her father's house. She did not see

her brothers, but she felt as it were a fire burning in her hand,

which, however, did not hurt her, for it was the jewel she was

bringing to her father. When she awoke she thought for a moment that

she still held the stone, but she only grasped the knob of her

distaff.

During the long evenings she had spun constantly, and round the

distaff were woven threads finer than the web of a spider; human

eyes could never have distinguished these threads when separated

from each other. But she had wetted them with her tears, and the twist

was as strong as a cable. She rose with the impression that her

dream must be a reality, and her resolution was taken.

It was still night, and her father slept; she pressed a kiss

upon his hand, and then took her distaff and fastened the end of the

thread to her father's house. But for this, blind as she was, she

would never have found her way home again; to this thread she must

hold fast, and trust not to others or even to herself. From the Tree

of the Sun she broke four leaves; which she gave up to the wind and

the weather, that they might be carried to her brothers as letters and

a greeting, in case she did not meet them in the wide world. Poor

blind child, what would become of her in those distant regions? But

she had the invisible thread, to which she could hold fast; and she

possessed a gift which all the others lacked. This was a determination

to throw herself entirely into whatever she undertook, and it made her

feel as if she had eyes even at the tips of her fingers, and could

hear down into her very heart. Quietly she went forth into the

noisy, bustling, wonderful world, and wherever she went the skies grew

bright, and she felt the warm sunbeam, and a rainbow above in the blue

heavens seemed to span the dark world. She heard the song of the

birds, and smelt the scent of the orange groves and apple orchards

so strongly that she seemed to taste it. Soft tones and charming songs

reached her ear, as well as harsh sounds and rough words- thoughts and

opinions in strange contradiction to each other. Into the deepest

recesses of her heart penetrated the echoes of human thoughts and

feelings. Now she heard the following words sadly sung,-

            "Life is a shadow that flits away

In a night of darkness and woe."

But then would follow brighter thoughts:

            "Life has the rose's sweet perfume

With sunshine, light, and joy."

And if one stanza sounded painfully-

            "Each mortal thinks of himself alone,

Is a truth, alas, too clearly known;"

Then, on the other hand, came the answer-

            "Love, like a mighty flowing stream,

Fills every heart with its radiant gleam."

She heard, indeed, such words as these-

            "In the pretty turmoil here below,

All is a vain and paltry show.

Then came also words of comfort-

            "Great and good are the actions done

By many whose worth is never known."

And if sometimes the mocking strain reached her-

            "Why not join in the jesting cry

That contemns all gifts from the throne on high?"

In the blind girl's heart a stronger voice repeated-

            "To trust in thyself and God is best,

In His holy will forever to rest."



But the evil spirit could not see this and remain contented. He

has more cleverness than ten thousand men, and he found means to

compass his end. He betook himself to the marsh, and collected a few

little bubbles of stagnant water. Then he uttered over them the echoes

of lying words that they might become strong. He mixed up together

songs of praise with lying epitaphs, as many as he could find,

boiled them in tears shed by envy; put upon them rouge, which he had

scraped from faded cheeks, and from these he produced a maiden, in

form and appearance like the blind girl, the angel of completeness, as

men called her. The evil one's plot was successful. The world knew not

which was the true, and indeed how should the world know?

           "To trust in thyself and God is best,

In his Holy will forever to rest."

So sung the blind girl in full faith. She had entrusted the four green

leaves from the Tree of the Sun to the winds, as letters of greeting

to her brothers, and she had full confidence that the leaves would

reach them. She fully believed that the jewel which outshines all

the glories of the world would yet be found, and that upon the

forehead of humanity it would glitter even in the castle of her

father. "Even in my father's house," she repeated. "Yes, the place

in which this jewel is to be found is earth, and I shall bring more

than the promise of it with me. I feel it glow and swell more and more

in my closed hand. Every grain of truth which the keen wind carried up

and whirled towards me I caught and treasured. I allowed it to be

penetrated with the fragrance of the beautiful, of which there is so

much in the world, even for the blind. I took the beatings of a

heart engaged in a good action, and added them to my treasure. All

that I can bring is but dust; still, it is a part of the jewel we

seek, and there is plenty, my hand is quite full of it."

She soon found herself again at home; carried thither in a

flight of thought, never having loosened her hold of the invisible

thread fastened to her father's house. As she stretched out her hand

to her father, the powers of evil dashed with the fury of a

hurricane over the Tree of the Sun; a blast of wind rushed through the

open doors, and into the sanctuary, where lay the Book of Truth.

"It will be blown to dust by the wind," said the father, as he

seized the open hand she held towards him.

"No," she replied, with quiet confidence, "it is indestructible. I

feel its beam warming my very soul."

Then her father observed that a dazzling flame gleamed from the

white page on which the shining dust had passed from her hand. It

was there to prove the certainty of eternal life, and on the book

glowed one shining word, and only one, the word BELIEVE. And soon

the four brothers were again with the father and daughter. When the

green leaf from home fell on the bosom of each, a longing had seized

them to return. They had arrived, accompanied by the birds of passage,

the stag, the antelope, and all the creatures of the forest who wished

to take part in their joy.

We have often seen, when a sunbeam burst through a crack in the

door into a dusty room, how a whirling column of dust seems to

circle round. But this was not poor, insignificant, common dust, which

the blind girl had brought; even the rainbow's colors are dim when

compared with the beauty which shone from the page on which it had

fallen. The beaming word BELIEVE, from every grain of truth, had the

brightness of the beautiful and the good, more bright than the

mighty pillar of flame that led Moses and the children of Israel to

the land of Canaan, and from the word BELIEVE arose the bridge of

hope, reaching even to the unmeasurable Love in the realms of the

infinite.

                        THE END

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