Prophet and Clown

“They are constantly colonists and emigrants; they have the name of being at home in every country. But they are in exile in their own country. They are torn between love of home and love of
something else; of which the sea may be the explanation or may be only the symbol. It is also found in a nameless nursery rhyme which is the finest line in English literature and the dumb refrain of all English poems, 'Over the hills and far away.” ~G.K. Chesterton on the English~

Many have heard of or read C.S. Lewis, but far fewer know of Chesterton.  I love Lewis, but no one amuses me like Chesterton, even if his meaning escapes me far more than I'd like to admit.  Lewis is an academic and a theologian, explaining high concepts to simple minds in a way that allows we common men to easily and wondrously grasp just a bit of the heavenly mystery.  Chesterton is a philosopher and a jester, a frolicsome, lighthearted puppy that likes to chew on the slippers of divine truth.  Lewis is concise, Chesterton a glorious rambler.  Lewis would make an in depth study of those hills faraway, Chesterton gads through those green hills with all the joy and innocence of a spring lamb.

My dilemma with this passage is that I am unsure if Chesterton is stealing the Apostle Peter's 'peculiar people' and usurping the spiritual exiles of the book of Hebrews and applying it to the English or if I am reading a deeper meaning into his words than he ever intended.  I am a closet Anglophile (though I must admit, Ireland and especially Scotland are very dear to me as well).  As I am not technically English by birth or culture, but certainly by literary adoption and heredity, I suppose I am not technically allowed to commentate on this desperate riddle, but as no one else seems intent to do so, I will amuse myself thus.

I think this little snippet a perfect description of not only the English, but of the citizens of that much greater Kingdom of which Chesterton is our most amusing Prophet.  To add to our musings, consider L.M. Montgomery's description of the sea: "The woods call to us with a hundred voices, but the sea has one only — a mighty voice that drowns our souls in its majestic music. The woods are human, but the sea is of the company of the archangels.”

Mystery, adventure, the sea as symbol or definition, the poetry of things barely glimpsed, there is a seed of it in every soul, whether we allow it to grow and flourish is another matter, or whether it lays quiet, forgotten until the rains come at last or it rots through the grip of a hundred endless winters, that is our choice.  We all hear that 'dumb refrain,' but does it resonate in our hearts and souls and inspire us to dream and join the dance, or do we grumble or scowl or turn away in disgust or busyness?  It is the very heart of the 'Parable of the Sower,' but are we fertile ground yielding a hundredfold in our turn or do the birds or weeds or stones bar that 'fine line' from residing within us?