I was very conscious, during that long voyage by sail, of the
presence and majesty of the Maker. I felt, standing on the deck of the
"Beagle," as if I were surrounded by some awful but beneficent power. The
grandeur of the sea must make a reflective man religious, as its
weirdness might breed superstition in the youthful, or the credulous.'
What wonder, he reasoned as he sailed, that a sailor should be
superstitious? He was separated in boyhood from his home, before he had
forgotten the ghost stories of childhood. While the simple heart still
loved to dwell upon the marvellous, he was placed amid all the marvels of
the sea. In the dark, out of the howl of wind and din of waves, he would
hear strange shrieks piercing the air. By him would float huge forms, dim
and mysterious, from which fancy was prone to build strange phantoms.
Ships might come and ships might go; the sea must ever hold sway over the
sailor man, a mistress to be loved and feared.
'Sailors,' he added, 'are not a religious class, so called, but I believe
they are sincerely religious in their own manner. Poor Jack has faith
that he is being guarded by some supreme power suited to the protection
of the sailor. He does not seek to analyse that power; he simply believes
that it will attend him in the hour of peril.
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