Chapter 7
L. My dear child, in the daily course and discipline of right life, we must continually and reciprocally submit and surrender in all kind and courteous and affectionate ways: and these submissions and ministries to each other, of which you all know (none better) the practice and the preciousness, are as good for the yielder as the receiver: they strengthen and perfect as much as they soften and refine. But the real sacrifice of all our strength, or life, or happiness to others (though it may be needed, and though all brave creatures hold their lives in their hand, to be given, when such need comes, as frankly as a soldier gives his life in battle), is yet always a mournful and momentary necessity; not the fulfillment of the continuous law of being. Self-sacrifice which is sought after, and triumphed in, is usually foolish; and calamitous in its issue: and by the sentimental proclamation and pursuit of it, good people have not only made most of their own lives useless, but the whole framework of their religion so hollow, that at this moment, while the English nation, with its lips, pretends to teach every man to "love his neighbor as himself," with its hands and feet it clutches and tramples like a wild beast; and practically lives, every soul of it that can, on other people's labor. Briefly, the constant duty of every man to his fellows is to ascertain his own powers and special gifts; and to strengthen them for the help of others. Do you think Titian would have helped the world better by denying himself, and not painting; or Casella by denying himself, and not singing! The real virtue is to be ready to sing the moment people ask us; as he was, even in purgatory. The very word "virtue" means not "conduct" but "strength," vital energy in the heart. Were not you reading about that group of words beginning with V,--vital, virtuous, vigorous, and so on,--in Max Muller, the other day, Sibyl? Can't you tell the others about it?
SIBYL. No, I can't; will you tell us, please?
L. Not now, it is too late. Come to me some idle time to-morrow, and I'll tell you about it, if all's well. But the gist of it is, children, that you should at least know two Latin words; recollect that "mors" means death and delaying; and "vita" means life and growing: and try always, not to mortify yourselves, but to vivify yourselves.
VIOLET. But, then, are we not to mortify our earthly affections? and surely we are to sacrifice ourselves, at least in God's service, if not in man's?
L. Really, Violet, we are getting too serious. I've given you enough ethics for one talk, I think! Do let us have a little play. Lily, what were you so busy about, at the ant-hill in the wood, this morning?
LILY. Oh, it was the ants who were busy, not I; I was only trying to help them a little.
L. And they wouldn't be helped, I suppose?
LILY. No, indeed. I can't think why ants are always so tiresome, when one tries to help them! They were carrying bits of stick, as fast as they could, through a piece of grass; and pulling and pushing, SO hard; and tumbling over and over,--it made one quite pity them; so I took some of the bits of stick, and carried them forward a little, where I thought they wanted to put them; but instead of being pleased, they left them directly, and ran about looking quite angry and frightened; and at last ever so many of them got up my sleeves, and bit me all over, and I had to come away.
L. I couldn't think what you were about. I saw your French grammar lying on the grass behind you, and thought perhaps you had gone to ask the ants to hear you a French verb.
ISABEL. Ah! but you didn't, though!
L. Why not, Isabel? I knew, well enough, Lily couldn't learn that verb by herself.
ISABEL. No; but the ants couldn't help her.
L. Are you sure the ants could not have helped you, Lily?
LILY (thinking). I ought to have learned something from them, perhaps.
L. But none of them left their sticks to help you through the irregular verb?
LILY. No, indeed. (Laughing, with some others.)
L. What are you laughing at, children? I cannot see why the ants should not have left their tasks to help Lily in hers,--since here is Violet thinking she ought to leave HER tasks, to help God in his. Perhaps, however, she takes Lily's more modest view, and thinks only that "He ought to learn something from her."
(Tears in VIOLET'S eyes.)
DORA (scarlet). It's too bad--it's a shame:--poor Violet!
L. My dear children, there's no reason why one should be so red, and the other so pale, merely because you are made for a moment to feel the absurdity of a phrase which you have been taught to use, in common with half the religious world. There is but one way in which man can ever help God--that is, by letting God help him: and there is no way in which His name is more guiltily taken in vain, than by calling the abandonment of our own work, the performance of His.
God is a kind Father. He sets us all in the places where He wishes us to be employed; and that employment is truly "our Father's business." He chooses work for every creature which will be delightful to them, if they do it simply and humbly. He gives us always strength enough, and sense enough, for what He wants us to do; if we either tire ourselves or puzzle ourselves, it is ourselves, it is our own fault. And we may always be sure, whatever we are doing, that we cannot be pleasing Him, if we are not happy ourselves. Now, away with you, children; and be as happy as you can. And when you cannot, at least don't plume yourselves upon pouting.
LECTURE 7.
HOME VIRTUES
By the fireside, in the Drawing-room. Evening.
DORA. Now, the curtains are drawn, and the fire's bright, and here's your arm-chair--and you're to tell us all about what you promised.
L. All about what?
DORA. All about virtue.
KATHLEEN. Yes, and about the words that begin with V.
L. I heard you singing about a word that begins with V, in the playground, this morning, Miss Katie.
KATHLEEN. Me singing!
MAY. Oh tell us--tell us.
L. "Vilikens and his--"
KATHLEEN (stopping his mouth). Oh! please don't. Where were you?
ISABEL. I'm sure I wish I had known where he was! We lost him among the rhododendrons, and I don't know where he got to; oh, you naughty--naughty--(climbs on his knee).
DORA. Now, Isabel, we really want to talk.
L. _I_ don't.
DORA. Oh, but you must. You promised, you know.
L. Yes, if all was well; but all's ill. I'm tired and cross; and I won't.
DORA. You're not a bit tired, and you're not crosser than two sticks; and we'll make you talk, if you were crosser than six. Come here, Egypt; and get on the other side of him.
(EGYPT takes up a commanding position near the hearth-brush.)
DORA (reviewing her forces). Now, Lily, come and sit on the rug in front.
(LILY does as she is bid.)
L. (seeing he has no chance against the odds). Well, well; but I'm really tired. Go and dance a little, first; and let me think.
DORA. No; you mustn't think. You will be wanting to make us think next; that will be tiresome.
L. Well, go and dance first, to get quit of thinking: and then I'll talk as long as you like.
DORA. Oh, but we can't dance to-night. There isn't time; and we want to hear about virtue.
L. Let me see a little of it first. Dancing is the first of girls' virtues.
EGYPT. Indeed! And the second?
L. Dressing.
EGYPT. Now, you needn't say that! I mended that tear the first thing before breakfast this morning.
L. I cannot otherwise express the ethical principle, Egypt; whether you have mended your gown or not.
DORA. Now don't be tiresome. We really must hear about virtue, please; seriously.
L. Well. I'm telling you about it, as fast as I can.
DORA. What! the first of girls' virtues is dancing?
L. More accurately, it is wishing to dance, and not wishing to tease, nor hear about virtue.
DORA (to EGYPT). Isn't he cross?
EGYPT. How many balls must we go to in the season, to be perfectly virtuous?
L. As many as you can without losing your color. But I did not say you should wish to go to balls. I said you should be always wanting to dance.
EGYPT. So we do; but everybody says it is very wrong.
L. Why, Egypt, I thought--
"There was a lady once, That would not be a queen,--that would she not, For all the mud in Egypt."
You were complaining the other day of having to go out a great deal oftener than you liked.
EGYPT. Yes, so I was; but then, it isn't to dance. There's no room to dance: it's--(Pausing to consider what it is for).
L. It is only to be seen, I suppose. Well, there's no harm in that. Girls ought to like to be seen.
DORA (her eyes flashing). Now, you don't mean that; and you're too provoking; and we won't dance again, for a month.
L. It will answer every purpose of revenge, Dora, if you only banish me to the library; and dance by yourselves; but I don't think Jessie and Lily will agree to that. You like me to see you dancing, don't you, Lily?
LILY. Yes, certainly,--when we do it rightly.
L. And besides, Miss Dora, if young ladies really do not want to be seen, they should take care not to let their eyes flash when they dislike what people say: and, more than that, it is all nonsense from beginning to end, about not wanting to be seen. I don't know any more tiresome flower in the borders than your especially "modest" snowdrop; which one always has to stoop down and take all sorts of tiresome trouble with, and nearly break its poor little head off, before you can see it; and then, half of it is not worth seeing. Girls should be like daisies, nice and white, with an edge of red, if you look close, making the ground bright wherever they are, knowing simply and quietly that they do it, and are meant to do it and that it would be very wrong if they didn't do it. Not want to be seen, indeed! How long were you in doing up your back hair, this afternoon Jessie?
(JESSIE not immediately answering, DORA comes to her assistance)
DORA. Not above three-quarters of an hour, I think, Jess?
JESSIE (putting her finger up). Now, Dorothy, you needn't talk, you know!
L. I know she needn't, Jessie, I shall ask her about those dark plaits presently. (DORA looks round to see if there is any way open for retreat) But never mind, it was worth the time, whatever it was, and nobody will ever mistake that golden wreath for a chignon: but if you don't want it to be seen you had better wear a cap.
JESSIE. Ah, now, are you really going to do nothing but play? And we all have been thinking, and thinking, all day, and hoping you would tell us things, and now--!
L. And now I am telling you things, and true things, and things good for you, and you won't believe me. You might as well have let me go to sleep at once, as I wanted to. (Endeavors again to make himself comfortable.)
ISABEL. Oh, no, no, you sha'n't go to sleep, you naughty!-- Kathleen, come here.
L. (knowing what he has to expect if KATHLEEN comes). Get away, Isabel, you're too heavy. (Sitting up.) What have I been saying?
DORA. I do believe he has been asleep all the time! You never heard anything like the things you've been saying.
L. Perhaps not. If you have heard them, and anything like them, it is all I want.
EGYPT. Yes, but we don't understand, and you know we don't; and we want to.
L. What did I say first?
DORA. That the first virtue of girls was wanting to go to balls.
L. I said nothing of the kind.
JESSIE. "Always wanting to dance," you said.
L. Yes, and that's true. Their first virtue is to be intensely happy;--so happy that they don't know what to do with themselves for happiness,--and dance, instead of walking. Don't you recollect "Louisa,"
"No fountain from a rocky cave E'er tripped with foot so free; She seemed as happy as a wave That dances on the sea."
A girl is always like that, when everything's right with her.
VIOLET. But, surely, one must be sad sometimes?
L. Yes, Violet and dull sometimes and stupid sometimes, and cross sometimes. What must be, must; but it is always either our own fault, or somebody else's. The last and worst thing that can be said of a nation is, that it has made its young girls sad, and weary.
MAY. But I am sure I have heard a great many good people speak against dancing?
L. Yes, May, but it does not follow they were wise as well as good. I suppose they think Jeremiah liked better to have to write Lamentations for his people, than to have to write that promise for them, which everybody seems to hurry past, that they may get on quickly to the verse about Rachel weeping for her children, though the verse they pass is the counter blessing to that one: "Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance; and both young men and old together, and I will turn their mourning into joy."
(The children get very serious, but look at each other, as if pleased.)
MARY. They understand now: but, do you know what you said next?
L. Yes, I was not more than half asleep. I said their second virtue was dressing.
MARY. Well! what did you mean by that?
L. What do YOU mean by dressing?
MARY. Wearing fine clothes.
L. Ah! there's the mistake. _I_ mean wearing plain ones.
MARY. Yes, I daresay I but that's not what girls understand by dressing, you know.
L. I can't help that. If they understand by dressing, buying dresses, perhaps they also understand by drawing, buying pictures. But when I hear them say they can draw, I understand that they can make a drawing; and when I hear them say they can dress, I understand that they can make a dress and--which is quite as difficult--wear one.
DORA. I'm not sure about the making; for the wearing, we can all wear them--out, before anybody expects it.
EGYPT (aside to L., piteously). Indeed I have mended that torn flounce quite neatly; look if I haven't!
L. (aside, to EGYPT). All right; don't be afraid. (Aloud to DORA.) Yes, doubtless; but you know that is only a slow way of UNdressing.
DORA. Then, we are all to learn dress-making, are we?
L. Yes; and always to dress yourselves beautifully--not finely, unless on occasion; but then very finely and beautifully, too. Also, you are to dress as many other people as you can; and to teach them how to dress, if they don't know; and to consider every ill-dressed woman or child whom you see anywhere, as a personal disgrace; and to get at them, somehow, until everybody is as beautifully dressed as birds.
(Silence; the children drawing their breaths hard, as if they had come from under a shower bath.)
L. (seeing objections begin to express themselves in the eyes). Now you needn't say you can't; for you can, and it's what you were meant to do, always; and to dress your houses, and your gardens, too; and to do very little else, I believe, except singing; and dancing, as we said, of course and--one thing more.
DORA. Our third and last virtue, I suppose?
L. Yes; on Violet's system of triplicities.
DORA. Well, we are prepared for anything now. What is it?
L. Cooking.
DORA. Cardinal, indeed! If only Beatrice were here with her seven handmaids, that she might see what a fine eighth we had found for her!
MARY. And the interpretation? What does "cooking" mean?
L. It means the knowledge of Medea, and of Circe, and of Calypso, and of Helen, and of Rebekah, and of the Queen of Sheba. It means the knowledge of all herbs, and fruits, and balms, and spices; and of all that is healing and sweet in fields and groves, and savory in meats, it means carefulness, and inventiveness, and watchfulness, and willingness, and readiness of appliance, it means the economy of your great-grandmothers, and the science of modern chemists; it means much tasting, and no wasting, it means English thoroughness, and French art, and Arabian hospitality, and it means, in fine, that you are to be perfectly and always "ladies"--"loaf-givers;" and, as you are to see, imperatively, that everybody has something pretty to put on,--so you are to see, yet more imperatively, that everybody has something nice to eat.
(Another pause, and long drawn breath.)
DORA (slowly recovering herself) to EGYPT. We had better have let him go to sleep, I think, after all!
L. You had better let the younger ones go to sleep now: for I haven't half done.
ISABEL (panic-struck). Oh! please, please! just one quarter of an hour.
L. No, Isabel, I cannot say what I've got to say in a quarter of an hour; and it is too hard for you, besides:--you would be lying awake, and trying to make it out, half the night. That will never do.
ISABEL. Oh, please!
L. It would please me exceedingly, mousie: but there are times when we must both be displeased; more's the pity. Lily may stay for half an hour, if she likes.
LILY. I can't, because Isey never goes to sleep, if she is waiting for me to come.
ISABEL. Oh, yes, Lily, I'll go to sleep to-night. I will, indeed.
LILY. Yes, it's very likely, Isey, with those fine round eyes! (To L.) You'll tell me something of what you we been saying, to- morrow, won't you?
L. No, I won't, Lily. You must choose. It's only in Miss Edgeworth's novels that one can do right, and have one's cake and sugar afterwards as well (not that I consider the dilemma, to- night, so grave).
(LILY, sighing, takes ISABEL'S hand.)
Yes, Lily dear, it will be better, in the outcome of it, so, than if you were to hear all the talks that eer were talked, and all the stories that ever were told. Good-night.
(The door leading to the condemned cells of the Dormitory closes on LILY, ISABEL, FLORRIE, and other diminutive and submissive victims.)
JESSIE (after a pause). Why, I thought you were so fond of Miss Edgeworth.
L. So I am, and so you ought all to be. I can read her over and over again, without ever tiring; there's no one whose every page is so full, and so delightful, no one who brings you into the company of pleasanter or wiser people; no one who tells you more truly how to do right. And it is very nice, in the midst of a wild world, to have the very ideal of poetical justice done always to one's hand:--to have everybody found out, who tells lies; and everybody decorated with a red riband, who doesn't; and to see the good Laura, who gave away her half sovereign, receiving a grand ovation from an entire dinner party disturbed for the purpose; and poor, dear, little Rosamond, who chooses purple jars instead of new shoes, left at last without either her shoes or her bottle. But it isn't life: and, in the way children might easily understand it, it isn't morals.
JESSIE. How do you mean we might understand it?
L. You might think Miss Edgeworth meant that the right was to be done mainly because one was always rewarded for doing it. It is an injustice to her to say that: her heroines always do right simply for its own sake, as they should; and her examples of conduct and motive are wholly admirable. But her representation of events is false and misleading. Her good characters never are brought into the deadly trial of goodness,--the doing right, and suffering for it, quite finally. And that is life, as God arranges it. "Taking up one's cross" does not at all mean having ovations at dinner parties, and being put over everybody else's head.
DORA. But what does it mean then? That is just what we couldn't understand, when you were telling us about not sacrificing ourselves, yesterday.
L. My dear, it means simply that you are to go the road which you see to be the straight one; carrying whatever you find is given you to carry, as well and stoutly as you can; without making faces, or calling people to come and look at you. Above all, you are neither to load, nor unload, yourself; nor cut your cross to your own liking. Some people think it would be better for them to have it large; and many, that they could carry it much faster if it were small; and even those who like it largest are usually very particular about its being ornamental, and made of the best ebony. But all that you have really to do is to keep your back as straight as you can; and not think about what is upon it--above all, not to boast of what is upon it. The real and essential meaning of "virtue" is in that straightness of back. Yes; you may laugh, children, but it is. You know I was to tell you about the words that began with V. Sibyl, what does "virtue" mean literally?
SIBYL. Does it mean courage?
L. Yes; but a particular kind of courage. It means courage of the nerve; vital courage. That first syllable of it, if you look in Max Muller, you will find really means "nerve," and from it come "vis," and "vir," and "virgin" (through vireo), and the connected word "virga"--"a rod;"--the green rod, or springing bough of a tree, being the type of perfect human strength, both in the use of. it in the Mosaic story, when it becomes a serpent, or strikes the rock; or when Aaron's bears its almonds; and in the metaphorical expressions, the "Rod out of the stem of Jesse," and the "Man whose name is the Branch," and so on. And the essential idea of real virtue is that of a vital human strength, which instinctively, constantly, and without motive, does what is right. You must train men to this by habit, as you would the branch of a tree; and give them instincts and manners (or morals) of purity, justice, kindness, and courage. Once rightly trained, they act as they should, irrespectively of all motive, of fear, or of reward. It is the blackest sign of putrescence in a national religion, when men speak as if it were the only safeguard of conduct; and assume that, but for the fear of being burned, or for the hope of being rewarded, everybody would pass their lives in lying, stealing, and murdering. I think quite one of the notablest historical events of this century (perhaps the very notablest), was that council of clergymen, horror-struck at the idea of any diminution in our dread of hell, at which the last of English clergymen whom one would have expected to see in such a function, rose as the devil's advocate; to tell us how impossible it was we could get on without him.
VIOLET (after a pause). But, surely, if people weren't afraid-- (hesitates again).
L. They should be afraid of doing wrong, and of that only, my dear. Otherwise, if they only don't do wrong for fear of being punished, they HAVE done wrong in their hearts already.
VIOLET. Well, but surely, at least one ought to be afraid of displeasing God; and one's desire to please Him should be one's first motive?
L. He never would be pleased with us, if it were, my dear. When a father sends his son out into the world--suppose as an apprentice --fancy the boy's coming home at night, and saying, "Father, I could have robbed the till to-day; but I didn't, because I thought you wouldn't like it." Do you think the father would be particularly pleased?
(VIOLET is silent.)
He would answer, would he not, if he were wise and good, "My boy, though you had no father, you must not rob tills"? And nothing is ever done so as really to please our Great Father, unless we would also have done it, though we had had no Father to know of it.
VIOLET (after long pause). But, then, what continual threatenings, and promises of reward there are!
L. And how vain both! with the Jews, and with all of us. But the fact is, that the threat and promise are simply statements of the Divine law, and of its consequences. The fact is truly told you,-- make what use you may of it: and as collateral warning, or encouragement, or comfort, the knowledge of future consequences may often be helpful to us; but helpful chiefly to the better state when we can act without reference to them. And there's no measuring the poisoned influence of that notion of future reward on the mind of Christian Europe, in the early ages. Half the monastic system rose out of that, acting on the occult pride and ambition of good people (as the other half of it came of their follies and misfortunes). There is always a considerable quantity of pride, to begin with, in what is called "giving one's self to God." As if one had ever belonged to anybody else!