Part 17
There are many names we all instinctively remember of writers who seem to have had messages to deliver to ourselves, and whose messages we have received with thankfulness, and I trust, humility. It is wonderful sometimes to remember how these messengers have been upheld in their service through dangers and difficulty, and protected against the hatred, malice and uncharitableness of the official ecclesiastical post-boys who claim a monopoly of all moral letter carrying. Take as an instance the author of the Book of Job. It has always been a marvel to me how he ran his message through the cordon of the infidelity and ignorance by which the holy places of his time were surrounded, and landed his book safely and soundly into the centre of the literature of the world. I suppose the creed of the author of the Book of Job was, as Froude puts it, “that the sun shines alike on good and evil, and that the victims of a fallen tower are not greater offenders than their neighbours.” That was a new message then, and very few believe it in their hearts now. Most of us have a secret notion that riches are the right reward of goodness, and poverty the appropriate punishment of evil. It must have required a stout heart to pen that message when the Book of Job was written, and a fearless heart to face the publication of it among the orthodox literature of the time.
I do not know if attention has ever been drawn to the point, but the author of the Book of Job has always settled for me the literary righteousness of the happy ending. Job, you know—as every hero of every story-book ought to—lives happily ever afterwards. The Lord gave him twice as much as he had before, his friends each gave him a piece of money and a ring of gold, and he finished up with fourteen thousand sheep and six thousand camels, and a thousand yoke of oxen and a thousand she-asses, not to mention seven sons and three daughters—“So Job died, being old and full of days.”
Now-a-days, when every story we read or play we see is deliberately formed to leave us more unhappy than it found us, is it not pleasant to those, who like myself do not believe in the dismal Jemmy school of writers, to remember that the author of the Book of Job “went solid” for the happy ending? I have no doubt the dramatic critic of the Babylon Guardian “went solid” for him, and called him a low down, despicable person—but the critics, if any, have disappeared—the author, too, has disappeared—only his message remains, and will always remain until it is no longer necessary to us. And one reason that it remains is, because he was a big enough author to know that if you write for mankind you must not despise mankind, you must not sneer in your hearts at the very people you are writing for, but you must write for them in a spirit of love and affection, and respect, even to the respecting of their little weaknesses, and you must remember that one of the weaknesses of mankind—if it be a weakness—is the child-like love of a story which begins with “Once upon a time,” and ends with everyone living happily ever afterwards.
I have not answered the question, “Why be an author?” because as I said in the beginning I do not know the answer. In so far as there is an answer, it is given, I think, in the words of the prophet, Thomas Carlyle. He is reassuring himself that the work of a writer is after all as real and sensible and practical a work as that of any smith or carpenter. “Hast thou not a Brain?” he says to himself, “furnished with some glimmerings of light; and three fingers to hold a pen withal? Never since Aaron’s Rod went out of practice, or even before it, was there such a wonder-working Tool: greater than all recorded miracles have been performed by Pens. For strangely in this so solid-seeming World, which nevertheless is in continual restless flux, it is appointed that _Sound_ to appearance the most fleeting, should be the most continuing of all things. The WORD is well said to be omnipotent in this world; man, thereby divine, can create as by a Fiat. Awake, arise! Speak forth what is in thee; what God has given thee, what the Devil shall not take away. Higher task than that of Priesthood was allotted to no man: wert thou but the meanest in that sacred Hierarchy, is it not honour enough therein to spend and be spent?”
That, if any, is the answer to the question, “Why be an Author?”
WHICH WAY IS THE TIDE?
“O call back yesterday, bid time return.”
_Richard II._ iii., 2.
Dozing in a railway carriage on a journey to Wales I listened dreamily to the faint echoes of an argument between a gentleman of the old school who contended that the country was going to the dogs, and a younger enthusiast who was optimistic as to the present and future of our race. It was at Deganwy that the older man, who had, I thought, somewhat the worst of the argument, pointed to the sea and said, with the air of one who uttered a new thought, that it was impossible for those who stood on the shore to say at the moment which way the tide was setting. The younger man accepted the stale simile with the courteous reverence that is the debt we willingly pay to age when we know that we know better.
A few days afterwards a friend handed me a copy of an old newspaper. His wife had discovered it with other of its fellows during the Spring cleaning. “The things,” she said in her practical way, “were harbouring dirt.” But from my point of view they were also harbouring history, and turning over the single sheet it occurred to me that it might help one to a conclusion about the ever interesting problem “which way is the tide?” The newspaper was, to be exact, the _Manchester Guardian_, of Saturday, January 24th, 1824, No. 143 of Vol. IV. The price was sevenpence or seven and sixpence a quarter if paid in advance, and eight shillings on credit. In the matter of price the tide was clearly with the moderns. There was an excellent wood-cut on the front page, a semi-advertisement—as I took it—of Messrs. David Bellhouse and Sons, of Eagle Quay, Oxford Road, who “respectfully informed the public that they have commenced carriers of timber by water betwixt Liverpool and Manchester” by means of a paddle steam tug “The Eagle,” with a funnel, the height of its mast and a huge square sail and two Union Jacks, one floating at the masthead and the other astern, and accompanying rafts of timber following the tug. In another column Fredk. and Chas. Barry, sworn brokers, of Vine Street, America Square, London, advertise that the fine fast sailing new brig, Walworth Castle, 240 tons, A.1. coppered, I. Wrentmore, Commander, will sail for Vera Cruz from London, and had only room for about fifty tons of goods. Certainly in the matter of the carriage of goods at sea and by canal we seem to have made progress. When you come to the matter of passenger traffic, it is interesting to read of “The Telegraph,” which leaves every afternoon at 3.30 for London through Macclesfield, Leek, Derby, Leicester, and Northampton to the White Horse, Fetter Lane. In the same column we read of the “North Briton” and “Robert Burns,” which leave every morning at 4.30, and run through Chorley, Preston, Lancaster, Kendal, and Carlisle, to the Buck Inn, Glasgow, and the splendid service of six coaches to Liverpool, starting at intervals from 5 a.m. to 5.30 in the evening. This column of coach advertisements is fine picturesque reading, but it is a little old-fashioned by the side of a sixpenny Bradshaw of to-day.
Again, if we turn to the report of the Salford Epiphany Quarter Sessions, Thomas Starkie, Esquire, Chairman, we have much to be thankful for in latter-day records. It must be remembered of course that the Sessions of to-day are more frequent, and different Sessions are held in small areas. Still, in January, 1824, there were no less than 240 prisoners, a number far in excess of anything we read of to-day. Nearly all the cases seem to have been cases of stealing, and there were few acquittals. The sentences were terrible, and only those who remember sentences given by some of the minor tribunals in comparatively recent years can credit the fact that such sentences were passed by humane and thoughtful men, in what was genuinely believed to be the interest of society. A long list of sentences begins thus: “Transported for life, William Thomas (16), for stealing one pocket handkerchief.” Lower down we find that Thomas Kinsey (21), for stealing thirty pieces of cotton cloth, gets off with transportation for fourteen years. The number of young people that are transported for small thefts is astonishing. Martha Jowett (30), for stealing a purse; John Webster (19) and John Drinkwater (24), for stealing a gun; Martha Myers (16), for stealing wearing apparel, and Mary Mason (24), for stealing a purse, are all among the list of those transported for seven years. More aristocratic sinners had a better chance of acquittal, and the receivers of the Birmingham notes stolen from the Balloon coach were respited because the jury found that the receiving “was elsewhere than in the County of Lancaster,” and counsel successfully contended that they must be discharged. Certainly in these matters the tide has flowed towards less crime and more humanity to prisoners since 1824.
But whereas human institutions seem to have improved, human nature seems to have been much as it is to-day. Dr. Lamert—the predecessor of many twentieth century quacks—is at No. 68 Piccadilly, ready to be consulted about and to cure “all diseases incidental to the human frame,” and has his testimonials and affidavits as to the success of his treatment almost in the very language in which we can read them to-day. “The greatest discovery in the memory of man is universally allowed to be the celebrated Cordial Balm of Rakasiri,” whose name is “blown on the bottle” and whose properties will cure any disease from “headache to consumptions.” “Smith’s Genuine Leamington Salts are confidently offered to the public under the recommendation of Dr. Kerr, Northampton,” and other eminent medical men, whilst from Mottershead and other chemists you can obtain Black Currant Lozenges “in which are concentrated all the well-known virtues of that fruit.” In this backwater of life the tide seems to be running, if at all, the other way. In the matter of gambling, too, it would be hard to say whether State lotteries, well protected from private imitations, were worse for our morals than free trade in bookmaking, coupled by uncertain and unequally worked police supervision. In the paper before me, “T. Bish, of the Old State Lottery Office, 4 Cornhill, respectfully reminds his best friends the public that the State lottery begins the 19th of next month.” There are to be seven £20,000 prizes and many others, and “in the very last Lottery Bish shared and sold 18,564, a prize of £20,000, 1379 a prize of £10,000, and several other capitals.” Bish of 1824 was but one evil more or less honest in his dealings and controlled by the State. Bish of 1911 is a legion of bookmakers, more or less dishonest and wholly uncontrolled. Still I am far from saying things are not better so, and even here could we discern it clearly the tide may be flowing the right way.
In the interest taken in art and literature it would be hard to say that we do not see signs of earnestness and enthusiasm in this one newspaper of 1824 that it would be hard to find in a single copy of a journal of to-day. The people of Liverpool are sinking sectarian differences and starting a mechanics and apprentices’ library, and already have 1,500 volumes. It is true that the whole thing was done very much on the lines of the gospel according to Mr. Barlow and Mr. Fairchild, but it was being done with enthusiasm. The elder Mr. Gladstone sent ten pounds and a letter of “correct ideas,” which was read to the meeting, but unfortunately we shall never read the “correct ideas” which were “basketed” by the then subeditor. The Library was to contain no works of controversial theology or politics, and the _Liverpool Advertiser_ sees with regret that “Egan’s Sporting Anecdotes” was amongst a number of volumes contributed by an American gentleman. The Pharisee, we must admit, is with us to-day, and even in well governed cities sometimes finds a place on Library Committees. But here is another announcement in this wonderful number of the newspaper which lovers of art will read with pious interest. “There is to be a General Meeting of the Governors of the Manchester Institution, to consider a report to be submitted with reference to the building and to the general welfare of the Institution.” Below this is printed “amounts already advertised £14,610,” and then follows a list of between thirty and forty new hereditary members subscribing forty guineas apiece.
A hundred years hence a newspaper of our own day will be unearthed to tell future generations of a City Council refusing supplies for continuing the great work that these city fathers started with their own monies. Could we to-day from a far richer Manchester and far wealthier citizens obtain hereditary subscribers at forty guineas apiece for a new theatre or opera house or art gallery, if such were required in Manchester? It is at least doubtful.
Two other announcements that cannot rightly be evidence of human progress, but which may make us worthily envious of the good old days that are gone:—at the Theatre Royal, Mr. Matthews is playing in “The Road to Ruin” and the musical farce of “The Bee Hive,” and on Wednesday he will have a benefit with three musical farces including “The Review.” It would be worth owning one of Mr. Wells’s time machines to take the chance of dropping into Manchester in 1824, if only to go to the Royal and see the show. And here is another echo of glad tidings. “We have been informed that the author of Waverley has contracted with his bookseller to furnish him with three novels a year for three years, and that he is to have ten thousand pounds a year for the supply, and that four novels have actually been delivered as per contract.”
When one reads an announcement such as that, and thinks of the joy of unpacking the parcel of books when it arrives, and cutting and reading three new masterpieces a year hot from the press, the novel reader of to-day may be excused if he sighs over a golden age that will never return. Nevertheless, man cannot live by Waverley novels alone; and what is this we read a little lower down the column? “Average price of corn from the returns received in the week ending January 10:
Wheat, 57s. 4d.”
Of a truth in essential things the tide has flowed steadily in the right direction since this year of 1824, and is not on the turn—as yet.
KISSING THE BOOK.[4]
“The evidence you shall give to the Court touching the matter in question shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth—So help you God.”
_The Oath._
When the clerk in an English Court of Justice administers the usual oath, he finishes with the words “Kiss the Book,” spoken in an imperative mood, and if the witness shows any hesitation in carrying out the unsavoury ceremony, he does his best to compel performance. The imperative mood of the clerk has not, to my thinking, any legal sanction. Kissing the Book is not, and never has been, as far as I can learn, a necessary legal incident of the oath of a Christian witness or juror. Why, then, does the twentieth-century Englishman kiss the Book by way of assuring his fellow-citizens that he is not going to lie if he can help it? The answer is probably akin to the answer given to the question: “Why does a dog walk round and round in a circle before he flings himself upon the hearth-rug?” Naturalists tell us that it is because the wild dog of prehistoric days made his bed in the contemporary grass of the forest after that fashion. Both man and dog are victims of hereditary habit. Probably the majority of men and dogs never consider for a moment how they came by the habit. But when, as in the case of kissing the Book, the habit is so insanitary, superstitious and objectionable, it is worth a few moments to consider its history, origin, and practical purpose, and then to further consider whether mankind is not old enough to give it up, and whether we should not make an effort at reform in the healthy spirit that a growing schoolboy approaches the manly problem of ceasing to bite his nails.
In a modern English Encyclopædia of Law it is suggested that the habit of kissing the Book did not become recognised in the English Courts until the middle of the seventeenth century, and that it only became general in the latter part of the eighteenth century. For my part, I cannot subscribe to that view. It is true that there is very little direct authority in any ancient law book on practice which enables one to say what the practice was. But that is because the old lawyers did not consider “kissing the Book” essential to the oath, and the practice was so universally followed that there was no need to describe it.
Shakespeare wrote “The Tempest” about 1613. He gives Stephano, when offering Caliban the bottle, these lines: “Come, swear to this; kiss the book:—I will furnish it anon with new contents:—swear. (_Gives Caliban drink._)” And a few lines later on Caliban says, “I’ll kiss thy foot; I’ll swear myself thy subject.” To me, reading the scene to-day, and bearing in mind that it was a low-comedy scene written to amuse the groundlings, the conclusion is irresistible that Shakespeare drew his simile from the common stock of everyday affairs, and that the idea of kissing the Book was as familiar to the average playgoer at the Globe or the Curtain as it is to-day to the pittite at His Majesty’s. Beaumont and Fletcher, too, in _Women Pleased_, II, vi, have the lines: “Oaths I swear to you ... and kiss the book, too”; and no doubt, if diligent search were made in the Elizabethan writers other such popular references could be found.
Samuel Butler, who, we must remember, was clerk to Sir Samuel Luke, of Bedfordshire, and other Puritan Justices of the Peace, and therefore had administered the oath many hundreds of times prior to the Restoration, has the following passage in “Hudibras” concerning a perjurer:—
“Can make the Gospel serve his turn, And helps him out; to be forsworn; When ’tis laid hands upon and kiss’d; To be betrayed and sold like Christ.”
This is, I think, conclusive that in 1660, in the common form of oath, the practice was for the witness to lay the hand upon the Book and afterwards to kiss it.
Fleetwood, the Recorder of London, writing to Lord Burghley, describing Serjeant Anderson taking his seat as Chief Justice of the Common Pleas in 1582, notes that: “Then the clarke of the corone, Powle, did read hym his oathe, and after, he himself read the oathe of the supremacie, and so kist the booke.” This, of course, was a ceremonial oath, but it throws light upon the custom. Although the direct references to kissing the Book are few and far between, several interesting specimens are given in _Notes and Queries_ from early Irish records, showing that oaths were taken both upon holy relics and upon the Holy Gospels, _corporaliter tacta et deosculata_, in the time of Henry VI., and that in the reign of Edward I. kissing the Book was an incident of the official oath of the Exchequer. It is possible that a close study of the records of a Catholic country would throw light upon the origin of kissing the Book, which, from a Protestant point of view, is doubtless as superstitious a custom as kissing relics or the Pope’s toe or a crucifix. It was said by John Coltus, the Archbishop of Armagh, in 1397, that the English introduced the custom of swearing on the Holy Evangelists into Ireland, and that in earlier days the Irish resorted to croziers, bells, and other sacred reliquaries to give solemnity to their declarations. That kissing the Book is directly evolved from the superstitious but reverential worship of holy relics can scarcely be doubted. When Harold pledged his solemn oath to William the Conqueror, we learn in the old French _Roman de Rou_ how William piled up a reliquary with holy bodies and put a pall over them to conceal them, and, having persuaded Harold to take the oath upon these hidden relics, he afterwards showed Harold what he had done, and _Heraut forment s’espoanta_, Harold was sadly alarmed. Curious, but interesting, is the form of oath here described. Harold first of all _suz sa main tendi_, held his hand over the reliquary, then he repeated the words of his oath, and then _li sainz beisiez_ kissed the relics. It is almost the same ceremony that we have to-day, and in the same order. The Book is held in the hand, the words of the oath are repeated, and then the Book is kissed.
The Rev. James Tyler, in his interesting book on oaths, quotes an eleventh-century oath of Ingeltrude, wife of Boston, that she swore to Pope Nicholas, as one of the earliest examples of kissing the Book. It runs thus: “I, Ingeltrude, swear to my Lord Nicholas, the chief Pontiff and universal Pope, by the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, and these four Evangelists of Christ our God which I hold in my hands and kiss with my mouth.” This early example of the habit shows that kissing the Book was contemporaneous with kissing bells, crucifixes and relics, and that the religious origin of the custom is similar. In the Roman Catholic ritual the priest still kisses the Gospel after he has read it, and I have been told that this is done in some Anglican churches. It is curious that the ceremony should survive in the law courts and have died out in most of the churches. But in these things the average man violently strains at gnats and complacently swallows camels. The Roman ceremony of kissing the Book—which is done reverently by the priest as part of a religious ceremony—would distress a Protestant, who watches the kissing of the same Book in a modern police court without the least sign of moral or mental disturbance.
Of the ultimate origin of kissing as a sign and pledge of truth much could be written, and it would be an interesting task to trace the history of the ceremonial kiss to its earliest source. The perjury of Judas was signed by a kiss, and Jacob deceived his father with the same pledge of faith. So also false, fleeting, perjured Clarence swears to his brother: “In sign of truth I kiss your highness’ hand.” The kiss as a pledge or symbol of truth is probably as old in the world as the degraded ceremony of spitting on a coin for luck, and is what students of folk-lore call a saliva custom, the origin of which seems to have been a desire on the part of the devotee for a union with the divine or holy thing.
So much for the ancient origin of the kissing portion of this ceremony. It is shown to be of superstitious if not idolatrous origin, and I hope to show beyond doubt that in the view of English lawyers it is not, and never has been, an essential part of the English Christian oath. That is to say, an English Christian has a legal right to take the oath by merely laying his hand upon the Book, and the act of kissing the Book afterwards is a work of supererogation, and of no legal force or effect whatever.