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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/2015-0.txt b/2015-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6740a0 --- /dev/null +++ b/2015-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5293 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: A Miscellany of Men + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: December, 1999 [eBook #2015] +[Most recently updated: September 10, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Michael Pullen, Michael K. Johnson, Joe Moretti and David Widger + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN *** + + + + +A MISCELLANY OF MEN + +By G. K. Chesterton + + + +Contents + + THE SUFFRAGIST + + THE POET AND THE CHEESE + + THE THING + + THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + + THE NAMELESS MAN + + THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + + THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + + THE MAD OFFICIAL + + THE ENCHANTED MAN + + THE SUN WORSHIPPER + + THE WRONG INCENDIARY + + THE FREE MAN + + THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + + THE PRIEST OF SPRING + + THE REAL JOURNALIST + + THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + + THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + + THE FOOL + + THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + + THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + + THE MYSTAGOGUE + + THE RED REACTIONARY + + THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + + THE MUMMER + + THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + + THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + + THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + + THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + + THE SULTAN + + THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + + THE MAN ON TOP + + THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + + THE MEDIÆVAL VILLAIN + + THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + + THE ELF OF JAPAN + + THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + + THE CONTENTED MAN + + THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + + + +THE SUFFRAGIST + +Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, +can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching +those political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular +sentiments, it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. +One part of it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up +her fists to a man she is putting herself in the only posture in which +he is not afraid of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more +of her silence; but force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon +of which he has grown ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite +accurate in any matter of the instincts. For the things which are the +simplest so long as they are undisputed invariably become the subtlest +when once they are disputed: which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, +when he said, “It is not hard to believe in God if one does not define +Him.” When the evil instincts of old Foulon made him say of the poor, +“Let them eat grass,” the good and Christian instincts of the poor +made them hang him on a lamppost with his mouth stuffed full of that +vegetation. But if a modern vegetarian aristocrat were to say to the +poor, “But why don't you like grass?” their intelligences would be much +more taxed to find such an appropriate repartee. And this matter of the +functions of the sexes is primarily a matter of the instincts; sex and +breathing are about the only two things that generally work best +when they are least worried about. That, I suppose, is why the same +sophisticated age that has poisoned the world with Feminism is also +polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We plunge at once into a forest +of false analogies and bad blundering history; while almost any man or +woman left to themselves would know at least that sex is quite different +from anything else in the world. + +There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and +woman (however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave +and master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the +Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; +these other alien groups never came into contact until they came into +collision. Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards +melted into amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they +like each other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and +sorrows that often come of their mating, it was not such things that +made them meet. It is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern +writers and talkers miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one +would suppose woman a victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, +emancipated woman has, age after age, been knocked silly with a stone +axe. But really there is no fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman +was ever knocked silly; except the fact that she is silly. And that +might have arisen in so many other ways. Real responsible woman has +never been silly; and any one wishing to knock her would be wise (like +the streetboys) to knock and run away. It is ultimately idiotic to +compare this prehistoric participation with any royalties or rebellions. +Genuine royalties wish to crush rebellions. Genuine rebels wish to +destroy kings. The sexes cannot wish to abolish each other; and if we +allow them any sort of permanent opposition it will sink into something +as base as a party system. + +As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, +you cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere +collisions of separate institutions. You could compare it with the +emancipation of negroes from planters--if it were true that a white +man in early youth always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black +man. You could compare it with the revolt of tenants against a +landlord--if it were true that young landlords wrote sonnets to +invisible tenants. You could compare it to the fighting policy of the +Fenians--if it were true that every normal Irishman wanted an +Englishman to come and live with him. But as we know there are no +instincts in any of these directions, these analogies are not only +false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not speak of the comparative +comfort or merit of these different things: I say they are different. It +may be that love turned to hate is terribly common in sexual matters: it +may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in the rivalries of race +or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that begins with anything +but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a fallacy; and all +its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and impertinent as puns. + +But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express +or even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very +much concerned with what literary people call “style” in letters or more +vulgar people call “style” in dress. They are much concerned with how +a thing is done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest +elements in their attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed +by stray examples or sudden images. When Danton was defending himself +before the Jacobin tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard +across the Seine, in quite remote streets on the other side of the +river. He must have bellowed like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would +think of that prodigy except as something poetical and appropriate. None +of us would instinctively feel that Danton was less of a man or even +less of a gentleman, for speaking so in such an hour. But suppose we +heard that Marie Antoinette, when tried before the same tribunal, +had howled so that she could be heard in the Faubourg St. +Germain--well, I leave it to the instincts, if there are any left. +It is not wrong to howl. Neither is it right. It is simply a question +of the instant impression on the artistic and even animal parts of +humanity, if the noise were heard suddenly like a gun. + +Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may be found in +the gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must +always be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the French +committee or the English House of Lords. And “demagogue,” in the good +Greek meaning, does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who +leads it: and if you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive +gestures of oratory are gestures of military leadership; pointing the +people to a path or waving them on to an advance. Notice that long +sweep of the arm across the body and outward, which great orators use +naturally and cheap orators artificially. It is almost the exact gesture +of the drawing of a sword. + +The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that +votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so +long as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient +militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd +that is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth +hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points +with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated +finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, +these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. +No honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the +political woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing +to do with any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a +desire exists. A husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown +and proclaimed laws from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles +from the tripod of a priestess; or if she could walk in mystical +motherhood before the procession of some great religious order. But that +she should stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; +leaning forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth +open a little longer and wider than is dignified--well, I only +write here of the facts of natural history; and the fact is that it is +this, and not publicity or importance, that hurts. It is for the modern +world to judge whether such instincts are indeed danger signals; and +whether the hurting of moral as of material nerves is a tocsin and a +warning of nature. + + + + +THE POET AND THE CHEESE + +There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the +white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of +the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even +when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement +of music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with +a shout like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open +arms and warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the +great level lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even +when there are plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. +One's voice seems to break an almost elvish silence, and something +unreasonably weird in the phrase of the nursery tales, “And he went a +little farther and came to another place,” comes back into the mind. + +In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and +found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was +one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may +be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass +did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious +impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally +lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of +being so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the +air of something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like +a big yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and +railings; and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that +dead hour of the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, +nor anything else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling +that I had strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in +the twenty-four. + +I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost +as private as a private house. Those who talk of “public-houses” as if +they were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with +such a place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an +elaborate cap sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of +comfortable Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) +the original Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat +a tall, strong, and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and +a pair of scissors stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. +Two feet behind them sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like +wood painted scarlet, with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not +touched, and probably would not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there +was an equally motionless cat; and on the table a copy of 'Household +Words'. + +I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had +met somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; +and yet it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at +once solid and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in +some of Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness +and wonder, and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was +curious; for Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of +the fenlands or flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water +and the mirrored skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline +virtue. Perhaps that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead +of a mountain poet. Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the +whole of that town was like a cup of water given at morning. + +After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of +rustic courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The +old lady answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued +her needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at +her with a suddenly arrested concern. “I suppose,” I said, “that it has +nothing to do with the cheese of that name.” “Oh, yes,” she answered, +with a staggering indifference, “they used to make it here.” + +I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. “But this +place is a Shrine!” I said. “Pilgrims should be pouring into it from +wherever the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a +colossal statue in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton +cheese. There ought to be another colossal statue of the first cow who +provided the foundations of it. There should be a burnished tablet let +into the ground on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton +cheese, and survived. On the top of a neighbouring hill (if there +are any neighbouring hills) there should be a huge model of a Stilton +cheese, made of some rich green marble and engraven with some haughty +motto: I suggest something like 'Ver non semper viret; sed Stiltonia +semper virescit.'” The old lady said, “Yes, sir,” and continued her +domestic occupations. + +After a strained and emotional silence, I said, “If I take a meal here +tonight can you give me any Stilton?” + +“No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton,” said the immovable +one, speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + +“This is awful,” I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of +England as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and +forgotten, so to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it +yet more symbolic because from all that old and full and virile life, +the great cheese was gone; and only the beer remained. And even that +will be stolen by the Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. +Politely disengaging myself, I made my way as quickly as possible to +the nearest large, noisy, and nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I +sought out the nearest vulgar, tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + +There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I +got a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote +a sonnet to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my +sonnet is not strictly new; that it contains “echoes” (as they express +it) of some other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, +are the lines I wrote: + + SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE + + Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour + And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby; + England has need of thee, and so have I-- + She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour, + League after grassy league from Lincoln tower + To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen. + Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men, + Like a tall green volcano rose in power. + + Plain living and long drinking are no more, + And pure religion reading 'Household Words', + And sturdy manhood sitting still all day + Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core; + While my digestion, like the House of Lords, + The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. + +I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that +has haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is +hopeless to disentangle it now. + + + + +THE THING + +The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like +the war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken +free. For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and +physical, like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing +itself was walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of +beech. + +Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have +been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from +its enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations +tend to perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this +we hear much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the +spirit of religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of +the same stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded +that just as church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are +not knowledge, and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to +find people in the big cities who can read and write quickly enough to +be clerks, but who are actually ignorant of the daily movements of the +sun and moon. + +The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one +watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government +arose among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the +ancients) out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. +The notion of self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes +of it seem to think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be +consulted as one consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked +a lot of fancy questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows +are to be, within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. +They shall decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of +the spade or the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the +valley shall be devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the +men of the town shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or +splendid with spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather +under a patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in +case the word “man” be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral +atmosphere, this original soul of self-government, the women always have +quite as much influence as the men. But in modern England neither the +men nor the women have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the +moulding of the landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people +are utterly impotent. They stand and stare at imperial and economic +processes going on, as they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + +Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place +which really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for +good or evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever +it is) is advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the +villas advance in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates +into which England has long been divided are passing out of the hands +of the English gentry into the hands of men who are always upstarts and +often actually foreigners. + +Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was +really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate +whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a +gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps +they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that +the filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof +over his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say +in, if he is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange +trend of recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over +and treat as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa +is as incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all +Lancashire were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium +were flooded by the sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a +moneylender is a minor and exceptional necessity. In reality it is a +thing like a German invasion. Sometimes it is a German invasion. + +Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes +round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It +is believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of +self-government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions +about everything except what he understands. The examination paper of +the Election generally consists of some such queries as these: “I. Are +the green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your +opinion fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the +President of the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you +think that the savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy +and hygienic as the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? +IV. Did the lost Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III +reserve the right of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of +what America thinks of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst +thinks of the state of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the +two persons in frock-coats placed before you at this election.” + +Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that +the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions +like these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and +Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether +farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether +stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But +these are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to +touch with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and +divine mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he +knows nothing about. The name of self-government is noisy everywhere: +the Thing is throttled. + +The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; +in scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances +of martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of +Napoleon and all the tongues of terror with which the Thing has gone +forth: the spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning +only a branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of +the great country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would +have happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + + + + +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + +The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, +if he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes +nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific +or skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution +and Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But +especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the +writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For +the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + +Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, +perhaps, the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as +possible, and from it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right +mode in which all real results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which +is confusing all our current discussions, especially our discussions +about the relations of the sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I +notice an object which is often mentioned in the higher and subtler of +these debates about the sexes: I mean a poker. I will take a poker and +think about it; first forwards and then backwards; and so, perhaps, show +what I mean. + +The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin +somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star +the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, +comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only +naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his +shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He +might almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone +bathing and left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat +upon the beaver and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth +for a waistcoat, and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has +no heat in his hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must +look for light and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is +cast. This is equally true of his soul and of his body; he is the one +creature that has lost his heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a +spiritual sense he has taken leave of his senses; and even in a literal +sense he has been unable to keep his hair on. And just as this external +need of his has lit in his dark brain the dreadful star called religion, +so it has lit in his hand the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red +flower called Fire. Fire, the most magic and startling of all material +things, is a thing known only to man and the expression of his sublime +externalism. It embodies all that is human in his hearths and all that +is divine on his altars. It is the most human thing in the world; seen +across wastes of marsh or medleys of forest, it is veritably the purple +and golden flag of the sons of Eve. But there is about this generous and +rejoicing thing an alien and awful quality: the quality of torture. Its +presence is life; its touch is death. Therefore, it is always necessary +to have an intermediary between ourselves and this dreadful deity; to +have a priest to intercede for us with the god of life and death; to +send an ambassador to the fire. That priest is the poker. Made of +a material more merciless and warlike than the other instruments of +domesticity, hammered on the anvil and born itself in the flame, the +poker is strong enough to enter the burning fiery furnace, and, like +the holy children, not be consumed. In this heroic service it is often +battered and twisted, but is the more honourable for it, like any other +soldier who has been under fire. + +Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right +view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong +view of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's +children, or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman +jump, as the clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to +the beginning, and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see +things in their right order, the one depending on the other in degree of +purpose and importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man +and the man for the glory of God. + +This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, +Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in +an opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:--A modern +intellectual comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not +begin with any dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about +the mystery of fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and +the first thing he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, +“Poor poker; it's crooked.” Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and +is told that there is a thing in the world (with which his temperament +has hitherto left him unacquainted)--a thing called fire. He points +out, very kindly and clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want +a straight poker, to put it into a chemical combustion which will very +probably heat and warp it. “Let us abolish fire,” he says, “and then +we shall have perfectly straight pokers. Why should you want a fire +at all?” They explain to him that a creature called Man wants a fire, +because he has no fur or feathers. He gazes dreamily at the embers for +a few seconds, and then shakes his head. “I doubt if such an animal is +worth preserving,” he says. “He must eventually go under in the cosmic +struggle when pitted against well-armoured and warmly protected species, +who have wings and trunks and spires and scales and horns and shaggy +hair. If Man cannot live without these luxuries, you had better abolish +Man.” At this point, as a rule, the crowd is convinced; it heaves up all +its clubs and axes, and abolishes him. At least, one of him. + +Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's +welfare, let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a +straightforward way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern +movements may be right; but let them be defended because they are right, +not because they are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the +actual woman or man in the street, who is cold; like mankind before the +finding of fire. Do not let us begin with the end of the last red-hot +discussion--like the end of a red hot poker. Imperialism may be +right. But if it is right, it is right because England has some divine +authority like Israel, or some human authority like Rome; not because we +have saddled ourselves with South Africa, and don't know how to get rid +of it. Socialism may be true. But if it is true, it is true because the +tribe or the city can really declare all land to be common land, not +because Harrod's Stores exist and the commonwealth must copy them. +Female suffrage may be just. But if it is just, it is just because women +are women, not because women are sweated workers and white slaves and +all sorts of things that they ought never to have been. Let not the +Imperialist accept a colony because it is there, nor the Suffragist +seize a vote because it is lying about, nor the Socialist buy up an +industry merely because it is for sale. + +Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal +decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies proved +that we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall +some day want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and +not, in mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female +suffrage, let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as +the male blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be +Socialism, let it be social; that is, as different as possible from all +the big commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman +tailor does not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more +cloth. The really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing +conditions, he denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some +deeply planted tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at +last into tiny twigs; and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is +trying to bend the tree by a twig: to alter England through a distant +colony, or to capture the State through a small State department, or to +destroy all voting through a vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise +who resists this temptation of trivial triumph or surrender, and happy +(in an echo of the Roman poet) who remembers the roots of things. + + + + +THE NAMELESS MAN + +There are only two forms of government—the monarchy or personal +government, and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a +government; England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. +But there is one real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the +method of abstract democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal +government politics are so much more personal. In France and America, +where the State is an abstraction, political argument is quite full +of human details--some might even say of inhuman details. But in +England, precisely because we are ruled by personages, these personages +do not permit personalities. In England names are honoured, and +therefore names are suppressed. But in the republics, in France +especially, a man can put his enemies' names into his article and his +own name at the end of it. + +This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our +anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We +should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, +for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, +and have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, +I had little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for +anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity +is safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact +that you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a +proof that you ought to publish it. + +But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name +to his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and +it is never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a +man's name is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person +today is eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For +instance, we all read with earnestness and patience the pages of the +'Daily Mail', and there are times when we feel moved to cry, “Bring to +us the man who thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture +him, take great care of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some +precious bale of silk, that we may look upon the face of the man who +desires such things to be printed. Let us know his name; his social +and medical pedigree.” But in the modern muddle (it might be said) +how little should we gain if those frankly fatuous sheets were indeed +subscribed by the man who had inspired them. Suppose that after every +article stating that the Premier is a piratical Socialist there were +printed the simple word “Northcliffe.” What does that simple word +suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul (uninstructed otherwise) +it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in the wintry seas towards +the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the top of this crag the +fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, of course, I +know that the word does not mean this; it means another Fleet Street +journalist like myself or only different from myself in so far as he has +sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a jolly time. + +A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not +distinguish. A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a +hiding-place. + +But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not +merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic +titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been +essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in +which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is +nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk +means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the +Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government +or for it. All government is representative government until it begins +to decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to +decay the instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant +as envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in +becoming aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of +Norfolk ought simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + +I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of +Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very +high at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, +ought to end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences +with the word “together”; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus +I shall expect the Duke of Norfolk to say: “I beg to second the motion +together”; or “This is a great constitutional question together.” I +shall expect him to know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers +above them; to know about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to +know too much about anything else. Of mountains he must be wildly and +ludicrously ignorant. He must have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even +the flatness of Norfolk. He must remind me of the watery expanses, the +great square church towers and the long level sunsets of East England. +If he does not do this, I decline to know him. + +I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I +lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that +his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot +with romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but +clotted cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna +Doone', and be unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he +must regard with some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I +should expect the Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and +dreamy ardour of the Celtic fringe. + +Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and +that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke +of Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point +is that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do +we find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, +his locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, +the thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a +gouty admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: +you will hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande +dame, and behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These +are light complications of the central fact of the falsification of all +names and ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediæval knights who +should have exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule +seems to be that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; +and that the Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so +long as they are not Cornish. + +The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England +is an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, +as some say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and +paralysis of China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that +it calls cats dogs and describes the sun as the moon--and is very +particular about the preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and +to be carefully wrong, that is the definition of decadence. The disease +called aphasia, in which people begin by saying tea when they mean +coffee, commonly ends in their silence. Silence of this stiff sort is +the chief mark of the powerful parts of modern society. They all seem +straining to keep things in rather than to let things out. For the kings +of finance speechlessness is counted a way of being strong, though it +should rather be counted a way of being sly. By this time the Parliament +does not parley any more than the Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper +editors and proprietors are more despotic and dangerous by what they do +not utter than by what they do. We have all heard the expression “golden +silence.” The expression “brazen silence” is the only adequate phrase +for our editors. If we wake out of this throttled, gaping, and wordless +nightmare, we must awake with a yell. The Revolution that releases +England from the fixed falsity of its present position will be not less +noisy than other revolutions. It will contain, I fear, a great deal of +that rude accomplishment described among little boys as “calling names”; +but that will not matter much so long as they are the right names. + + + + +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + +Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. +Indeed, the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on +cooperation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French +Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its +proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The +essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by +yourself. + +Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates +the things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and +suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest +approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the +country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached +to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean +the small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized +gardens; who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and +who frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the +characteristics of the true Peasant--especially the characteristics +that people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which +is the consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even +disliked sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because +(like Micaiah) he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The +English gardener is grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even +economical. Nor is this (as the reader's lightning wit will flash back +at me) merely because the English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. +The type does exist in pure South England blood and speech; I have +spoken to the type. I was speaking to the type only the other evening, +when a rather odd little incident occurred. + +It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and +radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it +is of the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and +hackneyed line about coming “before the swallow dares.” Spring never is +Spring unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, +without any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in +heaven. The gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is needless +to explain the causes of this difference; it would be to tell the +tremendous history of two souls. It is needless because there is a more +immediate explanation of the case: the gardener and I, if not equal in +agreement, were at least equal in difference. It is quite certain that +he would not have allowed me to touch the garden if I had gone down +on my knees to him. And it is by no means certain that I should have +consented to touch the garden if he had gone down on his knees to me. +His activity and my idleness, therefore, went on steadily side by side +through the long sunset hours. + +And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not +sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about +the earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and +the flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a +herald. He possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while +I only possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than +coal-owners know about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they +are brought above the surface of the earth. I know more about gardens +than railway shareholders seem to know about railways: for at least I +know that it needs a man to make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But +as I walked on that grass my ignorance overwhelmed me--and yet that +phrase is false, because it suggests something like a storm from the sky +above. It is truer to say that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like +a mine dug long before; and indeed it was dug before the beginning of +the ages. Green bombs of bulbs and seeds were bursting underneath me +everywhere; and, so far as my knowledge went, they had been laid by +a conspirator. I trod quite uneasily on this uprush of the earth; the +Spring is always only a fruitful earthquake. With the land all alive +under me I began to wonder more and more why this man, who had made the +garden, did not own the garden. If I stuck a spade into the ground, I +should be astonished at what I found there...and just as I thought this +I saw that the gardener was astonished too. + +Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by +the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It +was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, +I believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + +If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can +explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: +and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came +there I have not a notion--unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his +hurry to get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold +recital of facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under +the earth there, for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a +treasure without a Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it +will never be found, for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams +of avarice since I know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. +And, for the other party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the +garden. + +Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw +that answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not +belong to the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than +simply putting the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only +underground seed that I could understand. Only by having a little more +of that dull, battered yellow substance could I manage to be idle while +he was active. I am not altogether idle myself; but the fact remains +that the power is in the thin slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, +not in the strong square and curve of metal which we call the Spade. +And then I suddenly remembered that as I had found gold on my ground by +accident, so richer men in the north and west counties had found coal in +their ground, also by accident. + +I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, +but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and +then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he +would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But +a little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not +get a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering +and unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such +accidental and irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? +Perhaps he dimly felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that +buried treasure is a thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps +he thought there was a curse on such capital: on the coal of the +coal-owners, on the gold of the gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + + + + +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + +The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was +stated wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best +men from devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a +fanatical conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote +themselves to politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and +babies and things like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in +party politics, I wish there was more of it. The real danger of the two +parties with their two policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of +the ordinary citizen. They make him barren instead of creative, because +he is never allowed to do anything except prefer one existing policy to +another. We have not got real Democracy when the decision depends upon +the people. We shall have real Democracy when the problem depends upon +the people. The ordinary man will decide not only how he will vote, but +what he is going to vote about. + +It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations +towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all +questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of +the suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not +the quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting +about. A certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses +and the highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they +must go down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but +only which they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it +thus. The Suffragettes--if one may judge by their frequent ringing +of his bell--want to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion +what it is. Let us say (for the sake of argument) that they want to +paint him green. We will suppose that it is entirely for that simple +purpose that they are always seeking to have private interviews with +him; it seems as profitable as any other end that I can imagine to such +an interview. Now, it is possible that the Government of the day might +go in for a positive policy of painting Mr. Asquith green; might give +that reform a prominent place in their programme. Then the party in +opposition would adopt another policy, not a policy of leaving Mr. +Asquith alone (which would be considered dangerously revolutionary), but +some alternative course of action, as, for instance, painting him red. +Then both sides would fling themselves on the people, they would both +cry that the appeal was now to the Caesar of Democracy. A dark and +dramatic air of conflict and real crisis would arise on both sides; +arrows of satire would fly and swords of eloquence flame. The Greens +would say that Socialists and free lovers might well want to paint Mr. +Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole town red. Socialists would +indignantly reply that Socialism was the reverse of disorder, and that +they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red so that he might resemble +the red pillar-boxes which typified State control. The Greens would +passionately deny the charge so often brought against them by the Reds; +they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith green in order that he +might be invisible on the green benches of the Commons, as certain +terrified animals take the colour of their environment. + +There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, +flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, “Keep the +Red Flag Flying,” and the other, “The Wearing of the Green.” But when +the last effort had been made and the last moment come, when two +crowds were waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the +declaration of the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now +for democracy to do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her +head in awful loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. +Yet this might not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in +awful loneliness and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale +blue. The democracy of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed +to make up a policy for itself, might have desired him to be black +with pink spots. It might even have liked him as he is now. But a huge +apparatus of wealth, power, and printed matter has made it practically +impossible for them to bring home these other proposals, even if they +would really prefer them. No candidates will stand in the spotted +interest; for candidates commonly have to produce money either from +their own pockets or the party's; and in such circles spots are not +worn. No man in the social position of a Cabinet Minister, perhaps, +will commit himself to the pale-blue theory of Mr. Asquith; therefore it +cannot be a Government measure, therefore it cannot pass. + +Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will +declare dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes +it, that red and green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE +OBSERVER will say: “No one who knows the solid framework of politics or +the emphatic first principles of an Imperial people can suppose for +a moment that there is any possible compromise to be made in such a +matter; we must either fulfil our manifest racial destiny and crown the +edifice of ages with the august figure of a Green Premier, or we must +abandon our heritage, break our promise to the Empire, fling ourselves +into final anarchy, and allow the flaming and demoniac image of a Red +Premier to hover over our dissolution and our doom.” The DAILY MAIL +would say: “There is no halfway house in this matter; it must be green +or red. We wish to see every honest Englishman one colour or the other.” + And then some funny man in the popular Press would star the sentence +with a pun, and say that the DAILY MAIL liked its readers to be green +and its paper to be read. But no one would even dare to whisper that +there is such a thing as yellow. + +For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly +examples than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But +I could give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which +I refer. In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually +insisted in every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and +that it was only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It +was not inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to +make peace with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with +their conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been +better for us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and +prestige, if we had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a +matter of opinion. What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was +not, as was said, the only possible course; there were plenty of other +courses; there were plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the +discussion about Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind +that we must choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they +call Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean +that anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral +philosophy of the young Horner--and say what a good boy he is for +helping himself. + +It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a +Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this +moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary +to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I +should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply +not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal +order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound +scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might +have peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry +George; we might have a number of tiny communes; we might have +co-operation; we might have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred +things. I am not saying that any of these are right, though I cannot +imagine that any of them could be worse than the present social +madhouse, with its top-heavy rich and its tortured poor; but I say that +it is an evidence of the stiff and narrow alternative offered to the +civic mind, that the civic mind is not, generally speaking, conscious of +these other possibilities. The civic mind is not free or alert enough +to feel how much it has the world before it. There are at least ten +solutions of the Education question, and no one knows which Englishmen +really want. For Englishmen are only allowed to vote about the two +which are at that moment offered by the Premier and the Leader of the +Opposition. There are ten solutions of the drink question; and no one +knows which the democracy wants; for the democracy is only allowed to +fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + +So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer +questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political +aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably +cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be +rather careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and +self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less +democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of +slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both +of them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification +of taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much +alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold--and then +for a great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + + + + +THE MAD OFFICIAL + +Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very +nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all +my friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of +moderns; I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of +thinking before he comes to the first chance of living. + +But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man +does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a +certain dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very +atmosphere of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his +madness, he would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel +or cryptograms in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, +which are on his nose night and day. If once he could take off the +spectacles he would smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the +Sixth Seal or the Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible +first principle. If he could once see the first principle, he would see +that it is not there. + +This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur +not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard +to pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental +degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a +real test. A nation is not going mad when it does extravagant things, +so long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting +their beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other +Harmodius and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these +are wild things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + +But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State +is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, +this would logically allow me to fire off fifty-nine enormous field-guns +day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man +doing it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the +neighbours putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing +merely because it might happen to fulfill the letter of my license. + +Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I +know) to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should +not be surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England +there is practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be +surprised even at the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he +lived long under the English landlord system, might do anything. But I +should be surprised at the people who consented to stand it. I should, +in other words, think the world a little mad if the incident, were +received in silence. + +Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every +day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. All blows +fall soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a +passive as well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of +the nerves to respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural +stimulation. There are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here +and there in history, which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from +glory to insignificance, or from freedom to slavery, not only in +silence, but with serenity. The face still smiles while the limbs, +literally and loathsomely, are dropping from the body. These are peoples +that have lost the power of astonishment at their own actions. When they +give birth to a fantastic fashion or a foolish law, they do not start +or stare at the monster they have brought forth. They have grown used +to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; and the whirlwind is the +breath of their nostrils. These nations are really in danger of going +off their heads en masse; of becoming one vast vision of imbecility, +with toppling cities and crazy country-sides, all dotted with +industrious lunatics. One of these countries is modern England. + +Now here is an actual instance, a small case of how our social +conscience really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in +realisation; a thing without the light of mind in it. I take this +paragraph from a daily paper:--“At Epping, yesterday, Thomas +Woolbourne, a Lambourne labourer, and his wife were summoned for +neglecting their five children. Dr. Alpin said he was invited by the +inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to visit defendants' cottage. Both the +cottage and the children were dirty. The children looked exceedingly +well in health, but the conditions would be serious in case of illness. +Defendants were stated to be sober. The man was discharged. The woman, +who said she was hampered by the cottage having no water supply and +that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' imprisonment. The sentence +caused surprise, and the woman was removed crying, 'Lord save me!'” + +I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of +some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces +and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the +accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning +has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago +that can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of +reason to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + +I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman +was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for +being ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a +matter of fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. +The doctor was called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty +to Children. Was this woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the +least. Did the doctor say she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in +the least. Was these any evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of +cruelty? Not a rap. The worse that the doctor could work himself up +to saying was that though the children were “exceedingly” well, the +conditions would be serious in case of illness. If the doctor will tell +me any conditions that would be comic in case of illness, I shall attach +more weight to his argument. + +Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has +gone mad. He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite +literally and practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, +Quis docebit ipsum doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly +unnatural thing; instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect +of children is a natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is +a mere difference of degree that divides extending arms and legs in +calisthenics and extending them on the rack. It is a mere difference of +degree that separates any operation from any torture. The thumb-screw +can easily be called Manicure. Being pulled about by wild horses can +easily be called Massage. The modern problem is not so much what people +will endure as what they will not endure. But I fear I interrupt.... The +boiling oil is boiling; and the Tenth Mandarin is already reciting the +“Seventeen Serious Principles and the Fifty-three Virtues of the Sacred +Emperor.” + + + + +THE ENCHANTED MAN + +When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, +who acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, +it is the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very +late. This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late +comers had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English +audience always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and +(as I have found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable +taunts rather than come forward. The English are a modest people; that +is why they are entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to +be immodest. In theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in +most playhouses we find the bored people in front and the eager people +behind. + +As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored +person; but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus +required to sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in +the dramatic world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all +critics have to take off their heads. The people behind will have a +chance then. And as it happens, in this case, I had not so much taken +off my head as lost it. I had lost it on the road; on that strange +journey that was the cause of my coming in late. I have a troubled +recollection of having seen a very good play and made a very bad speech; +I have a cloudy recollection of talking to all sorts of nice people +afterwards, but talking to them jerkily and with half a head, as a man +talks when he has one eye on a clock. + +And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, +hung uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure +for such bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I +was moonstruck. A lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had +inexplicably got in between me and all other scenes. If any one had +asked me I could not have said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing +had occurred to me; except the breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge +of a hill. It was not an adventure; it was a vision. + +I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small +car that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as +night blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way +increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. +Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a +yet steeper road like a ladder. + +At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower +of Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, +and the driver saying that “it couldn't be done.” I got out of the car +and suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + +From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which +I am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his +great patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts +of South Africa, he made use of the expression “the illimitable veldt.” + The word “veldt” is Dutch, and the word “illimitable” is Double Dutch. +But the meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him +a sense of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. +Well, if he never found it in England it was because he never looked for +it in England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable +veldts. I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many +different hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite +horizon, free and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little +more desolate than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as +that English hill was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + +I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if +at a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on +that freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost +fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening +forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an +abyss which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless +only because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries +had been swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the +hills. I could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if +I hurled huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had +bewitched the landscape: but that again does not express the best or +worst of it. All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so +inhuman that it has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on +them; that is the nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking +at the back of the world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the +universe in the rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon +an unconscious creation. + +I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it +is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about +its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in +some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical +phrases of the populace, “a God-forsaken place.” Yet something was +present there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. +Then suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. It +had been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales about +princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were in a +land where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The moon +looked at me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; the +one white eye of the world. + +There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a +point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There +were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for +they were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration +which is the transition from life to art. But all the time I was +mesmerised by the moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted +things. The poacher shot pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the +wife hid pheasants; they were all (especially the policeman) as true +as death. But there was something more true to death than true to life +about it all: the figures were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or +fear or custom such as does not cramp the movements of the poor men of +other lands. I looked at the poacher and the policeman and the gun; then +at the gun and the policeman and the poacher; and I could find no name +for the fancy that haunted and escaped me. The poacher believed in the +Game Laws as much as the policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed +in the Game Laws, but protected them as well as him. She got a promise +from her husband that he would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he +kept it I doubt; I fancy he sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. +But I am sure he never shot a policeman. For we live in an enchanted +land. + + + + +THE SUN WORSHIPPER + +There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. +And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in +that sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the +warning to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as +fate, if they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that +argument will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and +the slave. To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, +so to speak, in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern +doctrine, taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is +called the materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: +that all the important things in history are rooted in an economic +motive. In short, history is a science; a science of the search for +food. + +Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely +untrue, but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too +feebly to say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would +not have any history if he were only economic. The need for food is +certainly universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows +have an economic motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal +delicacies may be in a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass +anywhere and never eats anything else. In short, the cow does fulfill +the materialist theory of history: that is why the cow has no history. +“A History of Cows” would be one of the simplest and briefest of +standard works. But if some cows thought it wicked to eat long grass +and persecuted all who did so; if the cow with the crumpled horn were +worshipped by some cows and gored to death by others; if cows began to +have obvious moral preferences over and above a desire for grass, then +cows would begin to have a history. They would also begin to have a +highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same thing. + +The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually +outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that +is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men +are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we +have made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended +on economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two +legs. It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a +condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly +a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two +legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or +a coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or +no information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy +romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating +millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported +on legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more +generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much +grander and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the +hills and see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the +horizon broken by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + +So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. +But history--the whole point of history--precisely is that +some two legged soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical +structure, did not. The whole point of history precisely is: some people +(like poets and tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while +others (such as millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun +of bothering about it. There would be no history if there were only +economic history. All the historical events have been due to the +twists and turns given to the economic instinct by forces that were not +economic. For instance, this theory traces the French war of Edward +III to a quarrel about the French wines. Any one who has even smelt the +Middle Ages must feel fifty answers spring to his lips; but in this case +one will suffice. There would have been no such war, then, if we all +drank water like cows. But when one is a man one enters the world +of historic choice. The act of drinking wine is one that requires +explanation. So is the act of not drinking wine. + +But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + +When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, +an ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said +that they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was +eagerly taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do +not see why it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable +uprisings in history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is +generally rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on +the sudden and mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from +captivity. The English strikers used some barren republican formula +(arid as the definitions of the medieval schoolmen), some academic +shibboleth about being free men and not being forced to work except for +a wage accepted by them. Just in the same way the Israelites in Egypt +employed some dry scholastic quibble about the extreme difficulty of +making bricks with nothing to make them of. But whatever fantastic +intellectual excuses they may have put forward for their strange and +unnatural conduct in walking out when the prison door was open, there +can be no doubt that the real cause was the warm weather. Such a climate +notoriously also produces delusions and horrible fancies, such as Mr. +Kipling describes. And it was while their brains were disordered by the +heat that the Jews fancied that they were founding a nation, that they +were led by a prophet, and, in short, that they were going to be of some +importance in the affairs of the world. + +Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was +pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + +In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself +in accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at +these words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three +times), and I rather think that exceptions might be found to the +principle. Yet it is not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my +belief in it. + +No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by +which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of +class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not +leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave +off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high +interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to +what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years +ago. The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking +because they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy +confirmation from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges +and other persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition +to strike. I have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my +own; and I continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to +steal a phrase from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that +is other than the elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + +When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really +time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession +of what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of +the mediæval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing +from a slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land +rather than the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could +not be raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the +lord rode down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he +had the chance of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the +means of production. + +Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; +and something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is +no doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we +have destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in +serfdom; nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich +man has entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in +the modern industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They +can only find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such +competitive and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + +Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts +inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That +retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut +off. Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows +or the Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more +dreamed of than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. +He owned all the birds that passed over his land: he might as well have +owned all the clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's +land to Brown's land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. +The logical answer to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's +land ought to be able to prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp +without a muzzle. + +Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep +in the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +A landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way +that a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or +on a seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense +of fun) as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + +The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings +would fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike +or deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the +passerby. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A +man in England can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in +the name of God. + +You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor +to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have +still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: +that weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the +working of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had +this last retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat +was also perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. +Whereupon the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at +your Boards and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you +opened on them the eyes of owls, and said, “It must be the sunshine.” + You could only go on saying, “The sun, the sun.” That was what the man +in Ibsen said, when he had lost his wits. + + + + +THE WRONG INCENDIARY + +I stood looking at the Coronation Procession--I mean the one +in Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I +believe, had some success in London--and I was seriously impressed. +Most of my life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that +I was quite right. Never before have I realised how right I was in +maintaining that the small area expresses the real patriotism: the +smaller the field the taller the tower. There were things in our local +procession that did not (one might even reverently say, could not) occur +in the London procession. One of the most prominent citizens in our +procession (for instance) had his face blacked. Another rode on a pony +which wore pink and blue trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan +affair, and therefore my assertion is subject to such correction as the +eyewitness may always offer to the absentee. But I believe with some +firmness that no such features occurred in the London pageant. + +But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of +something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my +garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind +of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead +trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, +reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material +and mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the +day when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather +strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any +sort of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + +In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I +supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose +stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out +cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big +stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also +a strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every +now and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew +what it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across +two meadows smote me where I stood. “Oh, my holy aunt,” I thought, +“they've mistaken the Coronation Day.” + +And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like +a bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close +to the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink +with the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted +as black as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart +edged with a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured +like a scarlet snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of +light. + +I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling +noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The +heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if +some giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I +had not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; +but the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered +the grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the +last fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and +cavernous; and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the +dark and magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a +rood past me; then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell +him where the fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought +it was the cottages by the wood-yard. He said, “My God!” and vanished. + +A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and +the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were +dim huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The +fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which +seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a +very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that +most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in +dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of +midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that +the fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard +itself. There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly +accidental; though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and +revenge. But for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a +swollen, tragic, portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something +to do with the crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end +of England. It was not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad +daylight next morning that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight +adventure had not happened outside this world. + +But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or +Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was +feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles +of virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good +things were being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, +walking-sticks, wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for +girls I could hear the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the +flames. And then I thought of that other noble tower of needless things +that stood in the field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of +vanities, that is meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in +the meadow, and the birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and +spangled its twigs. And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, +the Bad Fire and the Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of +Bonfire. And the paradox is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of +things that we do not want; but the Bad Fire is made of good things, +of things that we do want; like all that wealth of wood that might have +made dolls and chairs and tables, but was only making a hueless ash. + +And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there +are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race +between them. Which will happen first--the revolution in which +bad things shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things +shall perish also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most +conservative, really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the +face of the well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the +throat of despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is +possible, take tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into +bundles and burn them. And the other is the disruption that may come +prematurely, negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my +little town. + +It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in +it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and +fair ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two +revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway +trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the +tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a +cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout +like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a +blazing pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one +could fancy it visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along +the terraces of the Chiltern Hills. + + + + +THE FREE MAN + +The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men +find it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally +to the fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save +their lives by law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked +Coleridge for praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun +to be free. It seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the +sun. Speaking as a Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of +Joshua stopping the sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting +his daily round in imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, +and his astronomical act was distinctly revolutionary. For all +revolution is the mastering of matter by the spirit of man, the +emergence of that human authority within us which, in the noble words of +Sir Thomas Browne, “owes no homage unto the sun.” + +Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant +merely to receive good laws, good food or good conditions, like a +tree in a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in +selecting and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning +of the trade of Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real +idea of liberty are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the +word “make” about most of the things in which freedom is essential, as +a country walk or a friendship or a love affair. When a man “makes his +way” through a wood he has really created, he has built a road, like the +Romans. When a man “makes a friend,” he makes a man. And in the third +case we talk of a man “making love,” as if he were (as, indeed, he is) +creating new masses and colours of that flaming material an awful form +of manufacture. In its primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in +man, or, if you like the word, the artist. + +In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the +citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men +are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the +eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, +bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing +the citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the +State. You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may +call the bees a despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who +attempted to introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a +career as curt and fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm +alone. The isolation of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious +character; but it is not even in humanity by any means equally +distributed. The idea that the State should not only be supported by +its children, like the ant-hill, but should be constantly criticised and +reconstructed by them, is an idea stronger in Christendom than any +other part of the planet; stronger in Western than Eastern Europe. And +touching the pure idea of the individual being free to speak and act +within limits, the assertion of this idea, we may fairly say, has been +the peculiar honour of our own country. For my part I greatly prefer the +Jingoism of Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of The Recessional. I have +no objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I draw the line when +she begins to rule the dry land--and such damnably dry land +too--as in Africa. And there was a real old English sincerity +in the vulgar chorus that “Britons never shall be slaves.” We had no +equality and hardly any justice; but freedom we were really fond of. +And I think just now it is worth while to draw attention to the old +optimistic prophecy that “Britons never shall be slaves.” + +The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than +it has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy +to slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people +up. Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect +high-placed officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts +rather than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished +the Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed +a law (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not +depend upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have +got hold of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty +is in the air. A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square +without a word of accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says +that in his opinion the police are very nice people, and there is an end +of the matter. A Member of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. +The Speaker says he must not criticise a peerage, and there the matter +drops. + +Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of +criticising those flexible parts of the State which constantly require +reconsideration, not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, +it means the power of saying the sort of things that a decent but +discontented citizen wants to say. He does not want to spit on the +Bible, or to run about without clothes, or to read the worst page in +Zola from the pulpit of St. Paul's. Therefore the forbidding of these +things (whether just or not) is only tyranny in a secondary and special +sense. It restrains the abnormal, not the normal man. But the normal +man, the decent discontented citizen, does want to protest against +unfair law courts. He does want to expose brutalities of the police. +He does want to make game of a vulgar pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He +does want publicly to warn people against unscrupulous capitalists and +suspicious finance. If he is run in for doing this (as he will be) +he does want to proclaim the character or known prejudices of the +magistrate who tries him. If he is sent to prison (as he will be) he +does want to have a clear and civilised sentence, telling him when he +will come out. And these are literally and exactly the things that +he now cannot get. That is the almost cloying humour of the present +situation. I can say abnormal things in modern magazines. It is the +normal things that I am not allowed to say. I can write in some solemn +quarterly an elaborate article explaining that God is the devil; I can +write in some cultured weekly an aesthetic fancy describing how I +should like to eat boiled baby. The thing I must not write is rational +criticism of the men and institutions of my country. + +The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can +say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot +say, for instance, that--But I am afraid I must leave out +that instance, because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my +case--because it is so true. + + + + +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + +We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded +that he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is +extreme, and my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. +But I never quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at +least from my own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught +my eye; and thus the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite +constantly walked into another man's house, thinking it was my own +house; my visits became almost monotonous. But walking into my own house +and thinking it was another man's house is a flight of poetic detachment +still beyond me. Something of the sensations that such an absent-minded +man must feel I really felt the other day; and very pleasant sensations +they were. The best parts of every proper romance are the first chapter +and the last chapter; and to knock at a strange door and find a nice +wife would be to concentrate the beginning and end of all romance. + +Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the +same kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin +and unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was +treading in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty +years old. + +It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost +unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were +once great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, +as it says in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is +something singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that +were so long a human property and care fighting for their own hand in +the thicket. One almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the +dog evolved into a wolf. + +This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned +out for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite +threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years +ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone +no farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked +building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or +coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick +of which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a +blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; +and on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white +which always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of +some blind giant. + +I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had +not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought +much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth +walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged +person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off +than childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal +picture, distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I +stood; and I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. +They still stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, +as if they had stood for centuries. + +I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half +slid on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked +off the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but +were still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks +off the tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I +had recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And +then I came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with +the sawdust and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three +green stars of dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding +road. + +I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those +years ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this +red and white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more +lonesome than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could +only be full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of +the ghosts of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future +as he can find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediæval +notion of erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting +on it a miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I +thought to myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built +boxes was indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real +miracle play; that human family that is almost the holy one, and that +human death that is near to the last judgment. + +For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row +especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. +Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; +and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and +solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction +upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the +convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + +As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played +the fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in +my pocket, I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; +things addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had +written up in what I supposed to be the dining-room: + + James Harrogate, thank God for meat, + Then eat and eat and eat and eat, + +or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric +was scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something +beginning: + + When laying what you call your head, + O Harrogate, upon your bed, + +and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite +vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, +and the places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in +memory; for when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century +the house was very different. + +I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its +windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low +square windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream +of lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, +was standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy +sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the +wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that +lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express +if I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red +chalk upon the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to +withdraw, a mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct +accents to a very smart suburban maid, “Does Mr. James Harrogate live +here?” + +She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking +for him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I +had one moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then +decided not to look for him at all. + + + + +THE PRIEST OF SPRING + +The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. +But it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty +but of revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect +who will fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to +be congratulated on fitting in with the Spring--or the Spring on +fitting in with Easter. + +The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a +story; and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed +very voluptuous appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like +mathematics, logic, or chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind +are like mere pleasures of the body. That is, they are mere pleasures, +though they may be gigantic pleasures; they can never by a mere increase +of themselves amount to happiness. A man just about to be hanged may +enjoy his breakfast; especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and +in the same way he may enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, +especially if it is his favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy +either of them does not depend on either of them; it depends upon his +spiritual attitude towards a subsequent event. And that event is really +interesting to the soul; because it is the end of a story and (as some +hold) the end of a person. + +Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for +our scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about +true religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of +mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself +to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) +that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis +or Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, +they have got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is +sufficiently interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any +particular mystery or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to +disguise them under the image of a very handsome young man, which is a +vastly more interesting thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall +of leaves in autumn and the return of flowers in spring, the process of +thought was quite different. It is a process of thought which springs +up spontaneously in all children and young artists; it springs up +spontaneously in all healthy societies. It is very difficult to explain +in a diseased society. + +The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A +cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a +dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a +daydream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a +start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save +in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its +trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete +phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream +sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting +in of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was +asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to +rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by +certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were +always unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always +intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of “the +survival of the fittest,” meaning only the survival of the survivors; or +wherever a man says that the rich “have a stake in the country,” as +if the poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or +where a man talks about “going on towards Progress,” which only means +going on towards going on; or when a man talks about “government by the +wise few,” as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. “The wise +few” must mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very +foolish who think themselves wise. + +There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves +saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am +particularly irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the +nineteenth century, especially in connection with the study of myths and +religions. The fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes +the form of saying “This god or hero really represents the sun.” Or +“Apollo killing the Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter.” + Or “The King dying in a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting +in the west.” Now I should really have thought that even the skeptical +professors, whose skulls are as shallow as frying-pans, might have +reflected that human beings never think or feel like this. Consider what +is involved in this supposition. It presumes that primitive man went out +for a walk and saw with great interest a big burning spot on the sky. He +then said to primitive woman, “My dear, we had better keep this quiet. +We mustn't let it get about. The children and the slaves are so very +sharp. They might discover the sun any day, unless we are very careful. +So we won't call it 'the sun,' but I will draw a picture of a man +killing a snake; and whenever I do that you will know what I mean. +The sun doesn't look at all like a man killing a snake; so nobody can +possibly know. It will be a little secret between us; and while the +slaves and the children fancy I am quite excited with a grand tale of +a writhing dragon and a wrestling demigod, I shall really MEAN this +delicious little discovery, that there is a round yellow disc up in the +air.” One does not need to know much mythology to know that this is a +myth. It is commonly called the Solar Myth. + +Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god +was never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a +hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend +Dombey is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods +and heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw +the sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress +of nightfall, and he said, “That is how the face of the god would shine +when he had slain the dragon,” or “That is how the whole world would +bleed to westward, if the god were slain at last.” + +No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No +man, however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man +as round as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however +attracted to an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the +Dryad was as lean and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never +worshipped Nature; and indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all +human beings are superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon +Nature, as God has printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous +sun to stand still; we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more +for a star than for a starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we +could not for the time control, we have conceived great beings in human +shape controlling them. Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the +march and victory of Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is +his, and he made it. In other words, what the savage really said about +the sea was, “Only my fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of +mere water.” What the savage really said about the sun was, “Only my +great great-grandfather Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown.” + +About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. +I say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that +one of them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are +no real ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real +bank-notes. Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to +those of us that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, +even a false god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the +second place. When once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before +Him, offering flowers in spring as flames in winter. “My love is like a +red, red rose” does not mean that the poet is praising roses under the +allegory of a young lady. “My love is an arbutus” does not mean that the +author was a botanist so pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he +said he loved it. “Who art the moon and regent of my sky” does not mean +that Juliet invented Romeo to account for the roundness of the moon. +“Christ is the Sun of Easter” does not mean that the worshipper is +praising the sun under the emblem of Christ. Goddess or god can clothe +themselves with the spring or summer; but the body is more than raiment. +Religion takes almost disdainfully the dress of Nature; and indeed +Christianity has done as well with the snows of Christmas as with the +snow-drops of spring. And when I look across the sun-struck fields, I +know in my inmost bones that my joy is not solely in the spring, for +spring alone, being always returning, would be always sad. There is +somebody or something walking there, to be crowned with flowers: and my +pleasure is in some promise yet possible and in the resurrection of the +dead. + + + + +THE REAL JOURNALIST + +Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of +reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce +between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is +done. I take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. +Nothing looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel +columns, its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its +responsible, polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter +of fact, goes every night through more agonies of adventure, more +hairbreadth escapes, desperate expedients, crucial councils, random +compromises, or barely averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it +seems to come round as automatically as the clock and as silently as the +dawn. Seen from the inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief +every morning to see that it has come out at all; that it has come out +without the leading article upside down or the Pope congratulated on +discovering the North Pole. + +I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) +from the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little +episode in the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and +instructive: the tale of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There +are really two stories: the story as seen from the outside, by a +man reading the paper; and the story seen from the inside, by the +journalists shouting and telephoning and taking notes in shorthand +through the night. + +This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The +notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy +pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, +long calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant +leader of the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his +fanatic soul. In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not +having the fear of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote +the line “that wreathes its old fantastic roots so high.” This he said +because he had been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because +he thought craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and +forgotten rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that +orthodox gentleman made a howling error; and received some twenty-five +letters and post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the +mistake. + +But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it +was a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, +and cried, “What is the joke NOW?” Another professed (and practised, for +all I know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and +failed to find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, +asking, as in confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a +noble collection; but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and +exactitude in the recipient's profession and character which is far from +the truth. Let us pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + +In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same +culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to +Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another +cropper--or whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was +printed by the editor with the justly scornful title, “Mr. Chesterton +'Explains'?” Any man reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the +meaning of the sarcastic quotation marks. They meant, of course, “Here +is a man who doesn't know Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up +and he can't even spell Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation.” + That is the perfectly natural inference of the reader from the letter, +the mistake, and the headline--as seen from the outside. The +falsehood was serious; the editorial rebuke was serious. The stern +editor and the sombre, baffled contributor confront each other as the +curtain falls. + +And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly +rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really +are. A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a +column in the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it +(which is always at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded +by infants of all shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and +he has to cope with the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a +glorious thing; but the journalist in question has never understood +why it was considered a soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not +of watering little budding flowers, but of wrestling for hours with +gigantic angels and devils. Moral problems of the most monstrous +complexity besiege him incessantly. He has to decide before the awful +eyes of innocence, whether, when a sister has knocked down a brother's +bricks, in revenge for the brother having taken two sweets out of his +turn, it is endurable that the brother should retaliate by scribbling on +the sister's picture book, and whether such conduct does not justify the +sister in blowing out the brother's unlawfully lighted match. + +Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest +morality, it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday +article; and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly +calls to somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for +a messenger; he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, +wondering what on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on +the door outside and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his +thoughts; and he is able to observe some newspapers and circulars in +wrappers lying on the table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second +is a shiny pamphlet about petrol; the third is a paper called The +Christian Commonwealth. He opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a +page a sentence with which he honestly disagrees. It says that the sense +of beauty in Nature is a new thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A +stream of images and pictures pour through his head, like skies chasing +each other or forests running by. “Not felt before Wordsworth!” he +thinks. “Oh, but this won't do... bare ruined choirs where late the +sweet birds sang... night's candles are burnt out... glowed with living +sapphires... leaving their moon-loved maze... antique roots fantastic... +antique roots wreathed high... what is it in As You Like It?” + +He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children +drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the +messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making +the world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making +Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting “fantastic +roots wreathed high” instead of “antique roots peep out.” Then the +journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma +of whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the +sister pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is +how an article is really written. + +The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article +has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: +but the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the +paper and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his +friends at the other end; he knows that they can spell “Gray,” as no +doubt they can: but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a +pencil scribble and the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes +at the top of the letter “'G. K. C.' Explains,” putting the initials in +quotation marks. The next man passing it for press is bored with these +initials (I am with him there) and crosses them out, substituting with +austere civility, “Mr. Chesterton Explains.” But and now he hears +the iron laughter of the Fates, for the blind bolt is about to +fall--but he neglects to cross out the second “quote” (as we call +it) and it goes up to press with a “quote” between the last words. +Another quotation mark at the end of “explains” was the work of one +merry moment for the printers upstairs. So the inverted commas were +lifted entirely off one word on to the other and a totally innocent +title suddenly turned into a blasting sneer. But that would have +mattered nothing so far, for there was nothing to sneer at. In the same +dark hour, however, there was a printer who was (I suppose) so devoted +to this Government that he could think of no Gray but Sir Edward Grey. +He spelt it “Grey” by a mere misprint, and the whole tale was complete: +first blunder, second blunder, and final condemnation. + +That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic +and ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might +remember it when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged +by the neck on circumstantial evidence. + + + + +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + +Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most +romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch +blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; +that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it +is always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that +they have an eye to business. I like that phrase “an eye” to business. + +Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his +forehead. It served him admirably for the only two duties which are +demanded in a modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties +of counting sheep and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out +he was done for. But the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though +their best friends must admit that they are occasionally business-like. +They are, quite fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this +is proved by the very economic argument that is used to prove their +harshness and hunger for the material. The mass of Scots have accepted +the industrial civilisation, with its factory chimneys and its famine +prices, with its steam and smoke and steel--and strikes. The mass +of the Irish have not accepted it. The mass of the Irish have clung to +agriculture with claws of iron; and have succeeded in keeping it. That +is because the Irish, though far inferior to the Scotch in art and +literature, are hugely superior to them in practical politics. You do +need to be very romantic to accept the industrial civilisation. It does +really require all the old Gaelic glamour to make men think that Glasgow +is a grand place. Yet the miracle is achieved; and while I was in +Glasgow I shared the illusion. I have never had the faintest illusion +about Leeds or Birmingham. The industrial dream suited the Scots. Here +was a really romantic vista, suited to a romantic people; a vision of +higher and higher chimneys taking hold upon the heavens, of fiercer +and fiercer fires in which adamant could evaporate like dew. Here were +taller and taller engines that began already to shriek and gesticulate +like giants. Here were thunderbolts of communication which already +flashed to and fro like thoughts. It was unreasonable to expect the +rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot to stand still in such a whirl of wizardry +to ask whether he, the ordinary Scot, would be any the richer. + +He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich +city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich +men. It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, +Manchester, Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, +Munich, or Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, +perhaps, be due to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots +has there been reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence +of the Irish. In any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main +historical fact. The Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal +opportunities of industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The +Irish refused those enormous and unequal opportunities, because the +Irish are clear-sighted. They would not need very clear sight by this +time to see that in England and Scotland the temptation has been a +betrayal. The industrial system has failed. + +I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of +the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and +the widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with +the fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, +when he gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediæval +diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of +Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in +the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying +to be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full +(as its history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The +wageslavery we live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing in which +the Scotch are more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, +than in their Scotch wickedness. It is what makes the Master of +Ballantrae the most thrilling of all fictitious villains. It is what +makes the Master of Lovat the most thrilling of all historical villains. +It is poetry. It is an intensity which is on the edge of madness or +(what is worse) magic. Well, the Scotch have managed to apply something +of this fierce romanticism even to the lowest of all lordships and +serfdoms; the proletarian inequality of today. You do meet now and then, +in Scotland, the man you never meet anywhere else but in novels; I mean +the self-made man; the hard, insatiable man, merciless to himself as +well as to others. It is not “enterprise”; it is kleptomania. He is +quite mad, and a much more obvious public pest than any other kind of +kleptomaniac; but though he is a cheat, he is not an illusion. He does +exist; I have met quite two of him. Him alone among modern merchants +we do not weakly flatter when we call him a bandit. Something of the +irresponsibility of the true dark ages really clings about him. Our +scientific civilisation is not a civilisation; it is a smoke nuisance. +Like smoke it is choking us; like smoke it will pass away. Only of one +or two Scotsmen, in my experience, was it true that where there is smoke +there is fire. + +But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage +of this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all +chronicles, it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland +nearly everything has always been in revolt--especially loyalty. +If these people are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of +wrecking it; and the thought of my many good friends in that city makes +me really doubtful about which would figure in human memories as the +more huge calamity of the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so +weak as to call themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men +weak enough to believe them. + +As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had +little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies +who used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes. They were not, however, +strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since +they worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked +in the mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment +when I saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. +They were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was +the finest thing they could do. + + + + +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + +A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are +and should be various, there must be some communication between them if +they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual +formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not +depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all start +with the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our +different visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees +the sun as a perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is +an impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The +colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to +live under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that +there is nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle +(like a monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is +shut up in the cell of a separate universe. + +But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from +the denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the +individual become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world +like a cloud; he causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. +For what happens is this: that all the shortsighted people come together +and build a city called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for +granted and paint short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted +policies. Meanwhile all the men who can stare at the sun get together on +Salisbury Plain and do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who +see a blue moon band themselves together and assert the blue moon, not +once in a blue moon, but incessantly. So that instead of a small and +varied group, you have enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the +liberty of dogma, you have the tyranny of taste. + +Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; +perhaps the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership +by the organ of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to +production. If a man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be +any kind of man he likes in any other sense--a bookie, a Mahatma, +a man about town, an archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling +at the moment clear-headed Socialists in all of these capacities, it +is obvious that a clear-headed Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a +creed) can be a soldier, like Mr. Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, +or a Bathchairman like Mr. Meeke, or a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, +or an artistic tradesman like the late Mr. William Morris. + +But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by +what they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far +more than this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is, etc., +etc. Now mark their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be +tradesmen, or soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, +but become a particular sort of person who is always the same. When once +it has been discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic +formula, it is also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one +particular kind of clothes, reading one particular kind of books, +hanging up one particular kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases +even eating one particular kind of food. For men must recognise each +other somehow. These men will not know each other by a principle, like +fellow citizens. They cannot know each other by a smell, like dogs. So +they have to fall back on general colouring; on the fact that a man of +their sort will have a wife in pale green and Walter Crane's “Triumph of +Labour” hanging in the hall. + +There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost +made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret +the supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but +embracing all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan +unity which is founded rather on certain social habits, certain common +notions, both permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular +social pleasures. + +Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) +it did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a +thing asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical +genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of +Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous +varnish. + +And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a +creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to +believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of +religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; +the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people +do each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, +with heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which +alone holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own +kind outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and +call each other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call +themselves weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker +in a general atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off +looking for somebody else with whom to brawl. + +This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been +in many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having +got beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to +get beyond catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from +neglect of the same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that +they may differ on everything else; that God gave men a law that they +might turn it into liberties. + +There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife +and husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the +contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of +identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent +contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more +incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul +cannot possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first +cousin. There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; +they are generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to +think the same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to +think the same thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at +it, in the last extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing +disgrace--this really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; +and it is much better represented by a common religion than it is by +affinities and auras. And what applies to the family applies to the +nation. A nation with a root religion will be tolerant. A nation with no +religion will be bigoted. Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: +that when men come together to profess a creed, they come courageously, +though it is to hide in catacombs and caves. But when they come together +in a clique they come sneakishly, eschewing all change or disagreement, +though it is to dine to a brass band in a big London hotel. For birds of +a feather flock together, but birds of the white feather most of all. + + + + +THE FOOL + +For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I +had been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think +that he was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; +but before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of +him. After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline +to think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately +most of them occupying important positions. When I say “him,” I mean the +entire idiot. + +I have never been able to discover that “stupid public” of which so many +literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at tea +parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough +so to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have +heard brilliant “conversationalists” conversing with other people, the +conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of +intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other +people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their +stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find +the refreshment of a single fool. + +But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous +brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle +of humour and good sense. The “mostly fools” theory has been used in an +anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I +did not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the +aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite +rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an +idea of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities +of his experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, +not that section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. +They are often cynical, especially about money, but even their +boredom tends to make them a little eager for any real information or +originality. If a man like Mr. Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up +his mind for any reason to attack Syndicalism he would find out what it +was first. Not so the man I found in the club. + +He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black +clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the +whole suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one +of those who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some +third element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His +manners were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. +They involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I +suddenly remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old +playgoers who had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, +“If I was the Government,” and then put a cigar in his mouth which he +lit carefully with long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out +of his mouth again and said, “I'd give it 'em,” as if it were quite a +separate sentence. But even while his mouth was stopped with the cigar +his companion or interlocutor leaped to his feet and said with great +heartiness, snatching up a hat, “Well, I must be off. Tuesday!”. I +dislike these dark suspicions, but I certainly fancied I recognised the +sudden geniality with which one takes leave of a bore. + +When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was +to me that he addressed the belated epigram. “I'd give it 'em.” + +“What would you give them,” I asked, “the minimum wage?” + +“I'd give them beans,” he said. “I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, +every man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's +the whole country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows +standing between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!” + +“That would surely be a little harsh,” I pleaded. “After all, they +are not under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have +commissions in the Yeomanry.” + +“Commissions in the Yeomanry!” he repeated, and his eyes and face, which +became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me +feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + +“Besides,” I continued, “wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their +money?” + +“Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow,” he said, “and I'd +confiscate their funds as well.” + +“The policy is daring and full of difficulty,” I replied, “but I do not +say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But +you must remember that though the facts of property have become +quite fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These +coal-owners, though they have not earned the mines, though they could +not work the mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. +Hence your suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating +their property, raises very--” + +“What do you mean?” asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. +“Who yer talking about?” + +“I'm talking about what you were talking about,” I replied; “as you put +it so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing +between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their +own coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those +prices, care as little for national starvation as most merchant princes +and pirates have cared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples +that were enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a +bit of a revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme +violence you suggest. You say--” + +“I say,” he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid +energy like that of some noble beast, “I say I'd take all these blasted +miners and--” + +I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood +staring at that mental monster. + +“Oh,” I said, “so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal +servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be +shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead +they will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem +somewhat moved. The fact is, I have just found something. Something I +have been looking for for years.” + +“Well,” he asked, with no unfriendly stare, “and what have you found?” + +“No,” I answered, shaking my head sadly, “I do not think it would be +quite kind to tell you what I have found.” + +He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, +and we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the +disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country +sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county +magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important +companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + +The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory +this article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the +miner, who is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He +is not the mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by +selling his coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic +politician, who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic +opportunities. But he is the man who appears in scores of public places +open to the upper middle class or (that less known but more powerful +section) the lower upper class. Men like this all over the country are +really saying whatever comes into their heads in their capacities of +justice of the peace, candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, +old family doctor, Poor Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in +trade disputes. He suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the +brain; he has softened it by always taking the view of everything most +comfortable for his country, his class, and his private personality. +He is a deadly public danger. But as I have given him his name at the +beginning of this article there is no need for me to repeat it at the +end. + + + + +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + +Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And +I think the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to +record as plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on +his mind by anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of +any modern problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike +was a flat meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or +two, he will probably throw more light on the strike by describing this +which he has seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and +the bloody leaders of the mob whom he has never seen--nor any one +else either. If he comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as +happened to a friend of my grandfather) he should still remember that a +true account of the day after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to +have. Though he was on the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being +murdered, we should still like to have the wrong side described in +the right way. Upon this principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or +military arrangements, and have only held my breath like the rest of +the world while France and Germany were bargaining, will tell quite +truthfully of a small scene I saw, one of the thousand scenes that were, +so to speak, the anterooms of that inmost chamber of debate. + +In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares +of a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray +and rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, +like the solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; +the sloping roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping +with damp; and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were +scoured with old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with +many doors and found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. +I also found a notice of services, etc., and among these I found the +announcement that at 11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there +would be a special service for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft +of young men who were being taken from their homes in that little town +and sent to serve in the French Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful +moment, when the French Army was encamped at a parting of the ways. +There were already a great many people there when I entered, not only of +all kinds, but in all attitudes, kneeling, sitting, or standing +about. And there was that general sense that strikes every man from a +Protestant country, whether he dislikes the Catholic atmosphere or +likes it; I mean, the general sense that the thing was “going on all the +time”; that it was not an occasion, but a perpetual process, as if it +were a sort of mystical inn. + +Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, +when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. +They were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French +conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young +criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so +obviously prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to +them like hell; others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so +decent a place. But it was not so much the mere class variety that most +sharply caught an Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those +one or two kinds of men who would never have become soldiers in any +other way. + +There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of +hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it +may be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. +But there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never +tend to soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red +hair, large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across +the church that he had always taken care of his health, not even from +thinking about it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one +of those who pass from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a +man. In the row in front of him there was a very slight and vivid little +Jew, of the sort that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those +accidents that make real life so unlike anything else, he was the one +of the company who seemed especially devout. Behind these stiff or +sensitive boys were ranged the ranks of their mothers and fathers, with +knots and bunches of their little brothers and sisters. + +The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and +gaped at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying +their own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of +rain outside gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church +continuously darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn +in odd, rather strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but +only one perpetual refrain; so that it sounded like + + Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie, + Valdarkararump pour la patrie. + +Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing +gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child +started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a +French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + +I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline +of its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to +talk about “clericalism” and “militarism.” Those who talk like that are +made of the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate +“Socialism.” The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God +and the Mother of God were not “clericalists”; or, if they were, +they had forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not +“militarists”--quite the other way just then. The priest made a +short speech; he did not utter any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), +he uttered platitudes. In such circumstances platitudes are the only +possible things to say; because they are true. He began by saying that +he supposed a large number of them would be uncommonly glad not to go. +They seemed to assent to this particular priestly dogma with even +more than their alleged superstitious credulity. He said that war was +hateful, and that we all hated it; but that “in all things reasonable” + the law of one's own commonwealth was the voice of God. He spoke about +Joan of Arc; and how she had managed to be a bold and successful soldier +while still preserving her virtue and practising her religion; then he +gave them each a little paper book. To which they replied (after a brief +interval for reflection): + + Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie, + Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. + +which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + +While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded +about my own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening +church. They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I +cannot utter them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me +that we were barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was +happening outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the +windows darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the +nature of that light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and +hardly dared to guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that +enemies were already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were +groaning under their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town +itself had been destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands +of years hence, and that if I opened the door I should come out on a +wilderness as flat and sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the +veil of stone and slate grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to +see chasms cloven to the foundations of all things, and letting up an +infernal dawn. Huge things happily hidden from us had climbed out of +the abyss, and were striding about taller than the clouds. And when the +darkness crept from the sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of +St. John I fancied that some hideous giant was walking round the church +and looking in at each window in turn. + +Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a +ship carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes +I thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron +chain out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the +wings of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young +men inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things +outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + +I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of +limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic +tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and +his mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the +passes of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies +and thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter +it now. + +But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, +but only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters +announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + + + + +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + +It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by +some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a +man sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State +may remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; +when the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + +The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been +gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not +merely because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an +aesthete--that is, an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other +people's bodies; he tortured his own soul into the same red revolting +shapes. Though he came quite early in Roman Imperial history and was +followed by many austere and noble emperors, yet for us the Roman +Empire was never quite cleansed of that memory of the sexual madman. The +populace or barbarians from whom we come could not forget the hour when +they came to the highest place of the earth, saw the huge pedestal of +the earthly omnipotence, read on it Divus Caesar, and looked up and saw +a statue without a head. + +It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from +which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI +was a very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many +good business men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the +torturer clung about everything he did, even when it was right. And just +as the great Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so +even the silver splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, +has never painted out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis +XI. Whenever the unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible +savour that humanity finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the +unhealthy man is on top; but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or +mad on statecraft, like Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our +tyrant is not the satyr or the torturer; but the miser. + +The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; +but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had +some touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected +gold--a substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory +or old oak. An old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the +simple ardour, something of the mystical materialism, of a child who +picks out yellow flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but +coloured clay can be very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is +content with far less genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like +the glitter of buttercups, the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, +compared with the dreary papers and dead calculations which make the +hobby of the modern miser. + +The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content +sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the +mere repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs +to eggs. And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many +tramps and savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man +could find some comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But +the Yankee millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his +bed-head and ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's +stocking were safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's +ledger are safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with +their increase depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least +collects coins; his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts +collects nothings. + +It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; +but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The +answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma +for us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is +important; because this special problem is separate from the old general +quarrel about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong +books, old and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers +and privileges have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out +of the power of the moderately rich as well as of the moderately +poor. They are out of the power of everybody except a few +millionaires--that is, misers. In the old normal friction of normal +wealth and poverty I am myself on the Radical side. I think that a +Berkshire squire has too much power over his tenants; that a Brompton +builder has too much power over his workmen; that a West London doctor +has too much power over the poor patients in the West London Hospital. + +But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for +instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper +Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze +everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern +market. The things that change modern history, the big national and +international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, +the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, +the big expenses often incurred in elections--these are getting too +big for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly +fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + +There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about +them. The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the +chance of a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser +aristocracies. The moderately rich include all kinds of people even +good people. Even priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are +sometimes heroes. Some doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their +patients and not by flattering them; some brewers have been known to +sell beer. But among the Very Rich you will never find a really generous +man, even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will +never give themselves away; they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old +bones. To be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough +to want it. + +Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser +is flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never +called self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called +self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like +Dancer was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A +man like Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his +early rising or his unassuming dress. His “simple” meals, his “simple” + clothes, his “simple” funeral, are all extolled as if they were +creditable to him. They are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful +as the tatters and vermin of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To +be in rags for charity would be the condition of a saint; to be in rags +for money was that of a filthy old fool. Precisely in the same way, +to be “simple” for charity is the state of a saint; to be “simple” for +money is that of a filthy old fool. Of the two I have more respect for +the old miser, gnawing bones in an attic: if he was not nearer to God, +he was at least a little nearer to men. His simple life was a little +more like the life of the real poor. + + + + +THE MYSTAGOGUE + +Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and +impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your +aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is +perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond +all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all +good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; +and though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is +always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are +that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + +Thus Giotto or Fra Angelico would have at once admitted theologically +that God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint +Him. And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather +quaint old man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the +elves, was less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him +in some way. That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy +pictures and twisted statues which seem, to many refined persons, more +blasphemous than the secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good +is always towards Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined +thinkers who worship the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the +salons of Paris, always insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, +the unutterable character of the abomination. They call him “horror +of emptiness,” as did the black witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they +worship him as the unspeakable name; as the unbearable silence. They +think of him as the void in the heart of the whirlwind; the cloud on +the brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets of vertigo or the endless +corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians who gave the Devil a +grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and spiked tail. It +was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. The Satanists +never drew him at all. + +And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity +and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may +separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt +from mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he +has an idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has +no idea will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too +subtle to be explained. The first idea may really be very outree or +specialist; it may really be very difficult to express to ordinary +people. But because the man is trying to express it, it is most probable +that there is something in it, after all. The honest man is he who is +always trying to utter the unutterable, to describe the indescribable; +but the quack lives not by plunging into mystery, but by refusing to +come out of it. + +Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the +thing called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that +an attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy +cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that +a landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait +painter only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. +And again it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the +pictures can only express half of them, and that the less important +half. Still, it does express something; the thread is not broken that +connects God With Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The +“Mona Lisa” was in some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her +to be. Leonardo's picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And +Walter Pater's rich description was, in some respects, like the picture. +Thus we come to the consoling reflection that even literature, in the +last resort, can express something other than its own unhappy self. + +Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely +inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being +speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in +Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically +the critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of +painting into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be +inadequate--but so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the +first to admit. But anything which has been intelligently received can +at least be intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent +cause for the cadaverous colour of Botticelli's “Venus Rising from the +Sea.” Ruskin does suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying +forests and falsifying landscapes. These two great critics were far too +fastidious for my taste; they urged to excess the idea that a sense +of art was a sort of secret; to be patiently taught and slowly learnt. +Still, they thought it could be taught: they thought it could be learnt. +They constrained themselves, with considerable creative fatigue, to find +the exact adjectives which might parallel in English prose what has been +clone in Italian painting. The same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. +Stevenson and many others in the exposition of Velasquez. They had +something to say about the pictures; they knew it was unworthy of the +pictures, but they said it. + +Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and Post +Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They +are not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt +to translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is +untranslatable--that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, +impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their +banner; they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper +on which Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried +to dry it with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good +old anti-democratic muddlements: that “the public” does not understand +these things; that “the likes of us” cannot dare to question the dark +decisions of our lords. + +I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple +test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, +something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man +is made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt +is as good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go +back and look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, +it is the business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic +literary expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to +it. If they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their +eulogies, as there is nothing except eulogy--then they are quacks +or the high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say +nothing about the artists except that they are good it is because +the artists are bad. They can explain nothing because they have found +nothing; and they have found nothing because there is nothing to be +found. + + + + +THE RED REACTIONARY + +The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and +complete road to anything--even to restoration. Revolution alone +can be not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the +dead. + +A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) +was once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated +in that area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great +creative crisis about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its +own, and made a revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down +this street he whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. +Gandish, “in his researches into 'istry,” and which had somehow taken +his fancy; the song to which those last sincere loyalists went into +battle. I think the words ran: + + Monsieur de Charette. + Dit au gens d'ici. + Le roi va remettre. + Le fleur de lys. + +My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and +it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic +lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy +the “Dies Irae,” or a Protestant to remember “Lillibullero.” Yet he was +stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might +get him at least into temporary trouble. + +A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by +walking round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a +bonfire cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot +be too loud, and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I +actually recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a +formidable proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that +had been primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. +Some of the real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such +as “Charlie is My Darling,” or “What's a' the steer, kimmer?” songs that +men had sung while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under +which we live. They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present +King were swept aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual +words “King George” occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they +were played to celebrate his very Coronation; played as promptly and +innocently as if they had been “Grandfather's Clock” or “Rule Britannia” + or “The Honeysuckle and the Bee.” + +That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between +two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not +really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that +has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. +When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was +picked up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the +throne the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been +driven out of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that +the Bourbons might possibly return that they will take a little trouble +to discourage it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never +return that we actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment +to their rivals. And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the +faces of all the bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: +indeed, it is difficult to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it +quite unconsciously; because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the +French have not. We really believe that the past is past. It is a very +doubtful point. + +Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men +free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared +away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who +have preserved everything--we cannot restore anything. Take, +for the sake of argument, the complex and many coloured ritual of the +Coronation recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate +centuries; from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade +of culture or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or +even dated. The fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord +“against all manner of folk” obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; +no longer confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes +from some chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four +of our counties; and when hostile “folk” might live in the next village. +The sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless +and the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great +attempt to make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the +Coronation Service says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. +Elaborate local tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the +Manor of Work-sop is alone allowed to do something or other, these +probably belong to the decay of the Middle Ages, when that great +civilisation died out in grotesque literalism and entangled heraldry. +Things like the presentation of the Bible bear witness to the +intellectual outburst at the Reformation; things like the Declaration +against the Mass bear witness to the great wars of the Puritans; and +things like the allegiance of the Bishops bear witness to the wordy and +parenthetical political compromises which (to my deep regret) ended the +wars of religion. + +But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all +that long list of variations there must be, and there are, things +which energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable +modification, to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see +again the great Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique +and almost frozen formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the +old passion that excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc +would really prefer the Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer +the Erastian oligarchy of the eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would +probably be disputed (from widely different motives) by Mr. Rudyard +Kipling and Mr. Cunninghame Graham. But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would +win. + +But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is +that none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back +to the Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediævals; because +(alas) there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for +building or rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can +wander back and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top +of them, and can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without +being able to take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide +that their Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that +a Republic was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French +democracy actually desired every detail of the mediæval monarchy, they +could have it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If +another Dauphin were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc +actually bore a miraculous banner before him; if mediæval swords shook +and blazed in every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every +tapestry; if this were really proved to be the will of France and the +purpose of Providence--such a scene would still be the lasting and +final justification of the French Revolution. + +For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + + + + +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + +In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in +Asiatic arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we +tend nowadays to do to our own records and our own religion. The first +is a tendency to talk as if certain things were not only present in the +higher Orientals, but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will +fall into a habit of wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, +as if no Western knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern +knights had ever broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full +of the praises of Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no +Christians had been saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the +first injustice is to think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the +other injustice is a failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly +Eastern. It is too much taken for granted that the Eastern sort of +idealism is certainly superior and convincing; whereas in truth it is +only separate and peculiar. All that is richest, deepest, and subtlest +in the East is rooted in Pantheism; but all that is richest, deepest, +and subtlest in us is concerned with denying passionately that Pantheism +is either the highest or the purest religion. + +Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the +spirit of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and +curiously assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with +the full stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so +that the stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung +arms. Now in this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. +In so far as what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all +things, the Eastern artists have no more monopoly of it than they have +of hunger and thirst. + +I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit +this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far +East to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even +in other painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that +ornament of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: “Even the +most undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing +meditations not to be exhibited by much weeping.” But, I do not +therefore admit that a Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made +a somewhat similar remark) had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere +Occidental fable and travesty of that celebrated figure. I do not deny +that Tinishona wrote that exquisite example of the short Japanese poem +entitled “Honourable Chrysanthemum in Honourable Hole in Wall.” But I do +not therefore admit that Tennyson's little verse about the flower in the +cranny was not original and even sincere. + +It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that +when engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster +and chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being +much affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon +tablets of ivory the lines beginning: “Small and unobtrusive blossom +with ruby extremities.” But this incident, touching as it is, does not +shake my belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am +left with an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere +in their poetry--and in their prose. + +I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and +its admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go +on to more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say--with +the utmost respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form +of Cheek, for this school to speak in this way about the mother that +bore them, the great civilisation of the West. The West also has its +magic landscapes, only through our incurable materialism they look +like landscapes as well as like magic. The West also has its symbolic +figures, only they look like men as well as symbols. It will be answered +(and most justly) that Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own +instinct and tradition; that its artists are concerned to suggest one +thing and our artists another; that both should be admired in their +difference. Profoundly true; but what is the difference? It is certainly +not as the Orientalisers assert, that we must go to the Far East for a +sympathetic and transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid +a long enough toll of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that +disability. + +Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern +mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy +of creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, +like St. Francis, “My brother fire and my sister water”; the former +says, “Myself fire and myself water.” Whether you call the Eastern +attitude an extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of +oneself into nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The +effect is the same, an effect which lives and throbs throughout all the +exquisite arts of the East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a +pulsation of pattern, or of ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, +but always suggesting the unification of the individual with the world. +But there is quite another kind of sympathy the sympathy with a +thing because it is different. No one will say that Rembrandt did not +sympathise with an old woman; but no one will say that Rembrandt painted +like an old woman. No one will say that Reynolds did not appreciate +children; but no one will say he did it childishly. The supreme instance +of this divine division is sex, and that explains (what I could never +understand in my youth) why Christendom called the soul the bride of +God. For real love is an intense realisation of the “separateness” of +all our souls. The most heroic and human love-poetry of the world is +never mere passion; precisely because mere passion really is a melting +back into Nature, a meeting of the waters. And water is plunging +and powerful; but it is only powerful downhill. The high and human +love-poetry is all about division rather than identity; and in the great +love-poems even the man as he embraces the woman sees her, in the same +instant, afar off; a virgin and a stranger. + +For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if +we grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised +in what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and +the Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the +East. There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even +the superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential +difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; +whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the +Dragon. In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the +stories he not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the +Christian have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, +really has an appetite for cold Christian--and especially for cold +Christianity. This blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of +everything and digest it in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is +what is really meant by the Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The +Cosmos as such is cannibal; as old Time ate his children. The Eastern +saints were saints because they wanted to be swallowed up. The Western +saint, like St. George, was sainted by the Western Church precisely +because he refused to be swallowed. The same process of thought that has +prevented nationalities disappearing in Christendom has prevented the +complete appearance of Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist +the idea of being absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a +British, or a Turkish Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and +much more tyrannical, which free men will resist with even stronger +passion. The free man violently resists being absorbed into the empire +which is called the Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, +but still more Home Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home +Rule for himself. He claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem +fatalism. He claims the right to be damned in spite of theosophical +optimism. He refuses to be the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + + + + +THE MUMMER + +The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so +close that they might as well have been inside the house instead of +just outside; so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem +farther away. Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who +come every year in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of +the old Christmas play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very +Venal Doctor. I will not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will +describe my parallel sentiments as it passed. + +One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic +revivals of mediæval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are +elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple +society of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are +mediævalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The +first is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child +just able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up +as anybody--but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea +of being the King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is +generally suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, +from far deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because +it is Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a +ritual investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the +dances of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries +of Persia. For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the +concealment of the personality combined with the exaggeration of the +person. The man performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and +conspicuous. It is part of that divine madness which all other creatures +wonder at in Man, that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and +anonymity. Man is not, perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, +but he is the only creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do +indeed take the colours of their environment; but that is not in order +to be watched, but in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism +of rejoicing, but the formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose +nature is the unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue +because they lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles +powder their hair to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not +dressing up as kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. +Nay, even when modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is +doubted by some naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping +notice. So merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten +and exaggerate their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, +primarily speaking, in another identity. It is not Acting--that +comparatively low profession—comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; +and, as Mr. Kensit would truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is +Mummery. That is, it is the noble conception of making Man something +other and more than himself when he stands at the limit of human things. +It is only careful faddists and feeble German philosophers who want to +wear no clothes; and be “natural” in their Dionysian revels. Natural +men, really vigorous and exultant men, want to wear more and more +clothes when they are revelling. They want worlds of waistcoats and +forests of trousers and pagodas of tall hats toppling up to the stars. + +Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If +our more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to +reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight +(I do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque +and appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from +the best books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and +ornaments would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my +garden door opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, +the appearance of that champion was slightly different. His face was +energetically blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an +aged and very tall top hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a +surplice, and he flourished a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, +talk about “ignorance”; or suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a +very pleasant Ratcatcher, with a tenor voice) did this because he knew +no better. Try to realise that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of +England was not black, and did not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. +The Rat-catcher is not under this delusion; any more than Paul Veronese +thought that very good men have luminous rings round their heads; any +more than the Pope thinks that Christ washed the feet of the twelve in +a Cathedral; any more than the Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a +tabard are like the lions at the Zoo. These things are denaturalised +because they are symbols; because the extraordinary occasion must hide +or even disfigure the ordinary people. Black faces were to mediæval +mummeries what carved masks were to Greek plays: it was called being +“vizarded.” My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently arrogant to suppose for +a moment that he looks like St. George. But he is sufficiently humble to +be convinced that if he looks as little like himself as he can, he will +be on the right road. + +This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in +disguise. There are, of course, other mediæval elements in it which +are also difficult to explain to the fastidious mediævalists of to-day. +There is, for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It +can best be defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the +faintest desire to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the +trick of turning on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely +believed, merely for the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling +yet careless phrases. When Tennyson says that King Arthur “drew all the +petty princedoms under him,” and “made a realm and ruled,” his grave +Royalism is quite modern. Many mediævals, outside the mediæval +republics, believed in monarchy as solemnly as Tennyson. But that older +verse + + When good King Arthur ruled this land + He was a goodly King-- + He stole three pecks of barley-meal + To make a bag-pudding. + +is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are +other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called +Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediævals merely +Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, +I think, in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in +healthy darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. +If you cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can +carry the forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk +under universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom +a walking forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very +intensity of the notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a +mob of masks? + + + + +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + +The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the +antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost +unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs +of a hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does +not necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere +unlettered simplicity of mind. + +But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our +decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its +best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many +of the philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God +fearing fisher or a noble mountaineer. His antics with donkeys and +concertinas, crowded charabancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are +not so vicious or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements +of the overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than +they are at a political “At Home,” or even an artistic soiree; and if +the female trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed +and underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to +be a donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks +men and women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that +wants them to change heads. + +But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as +there is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity +which is characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very +people who persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the +whole society, and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does +things in a clumsy and unbeautiful way. + +A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to +visit yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of +Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge +at all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray +tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour +of primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and +very lonely Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he +missed Stonehenge. But it does spoil his mood to find +Stonehenge--surrounded by a brand-new fence of barbed wire, with a +policeman and a little shop selling picture post-cards. + +Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer +you, “Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and +carve names and spoil the look of Stonehenge.” It does not seem to +occur to them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of +Stonehenge. The scratching of a name, particularly when performed +with blunt penknife or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board +education, can be trusted in a little while to be indistinguishable from +the grayest hieroglyphic by the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could +get a modern policeman into the same picture with a Druid. This really +vital piece of vandalism was done by the educated, not the uneducated; +it was done by the influence of the artists or antiquaries who wanted +to preserve the antique beauty of Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to +preserve your lady's beauty from freckles by blacking her face all over; +or to protect the pure whiteness of your wedding garment by dyeing it +green. + +And if you ask, “But what else could any one have done, what could the +most artistic age have done to save the monument?” I reply, “There are +hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediævals might have done; and I have +no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in +their whole society they would have done something that was decent and +serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or +warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so +their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; +not deliberately--they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious +order such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of +guard would protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all +sorts of rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you +mere raving superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me one +twentieth part so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as +calmly making a spot hideous in order to keep it beautiful.” + +The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to +live in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles +down in a place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar +personal cases, of course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, +the Jew is a genuine peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering +cad. He is a highly civilised man in a highly difficult position; the +world being divided, and his own nation being divided, about whether he +can do anything else except wander. + +The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated +Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by +calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen +are extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. +The truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude +Englishman. What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is +the polite Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders +for Rembrandts, and he treats the great nations that made these things +courteously--as he would treat the custodians of any museum. It +does not seem to strike him that the Italian is not the custodian of the +pictures, but the creator of them. He can afford to look down on such +nations--when he can paint such pictures. + +That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. +If, living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian +character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire +Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. +It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will +often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality +of the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without +discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If +you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians--you are a +cheap tripper. + +The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere +that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, +coming among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is +caddish to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a wine +taster; and then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink and +squint at the colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; and +then refuse to buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a thing +and not use it. But the main point is that one has no right to see +Stonehenge without Salisbury Plain and Salisbury. One has no right to +respect the dead Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no +right to visit a Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea +fishes--fed along a lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing +the sights without breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + + + + +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + +It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story +that the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is +almost peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, +of their nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even +phrases invented for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new +while it is nearly a thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old +while they were still new. + +The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, +they are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive +inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an +offender; they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been +convicted of murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous +rebellion, when his offence has really been a sleek submission to +the powers that be. They must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his +eloquence to rouse the mob, whereas he has really shown considerable +cleverness in damping it down. It was probably under the same impulse +towards a mysterious misfit of names that people denounced Dr. Inge as +“the Gloomy Dean.” + +Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there +anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but +sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives +have made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him +this erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern +capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared +to anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that +gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very +curious state of things. + +When Dr. Inge was called “the Gloomy Dean” a great injustice was done +him. He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against +the forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism +rather than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have +suffered no wrong, or that employers have done no wrong--such a man +is not a Gloomy Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A +man who can feel satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with +a mysterious fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not +less curious; because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom +reposes on his having said that our worker's demand high wages, while +the placid people of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + +This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much +difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low +wages for the same reason that they will submit to “the punishment known +as Li, or Slicing”; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy +and suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to +the husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their +temples with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they +sometimes seem to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual +perversion. They do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with +traditions different from ours about the limits of endurance and the +gestures of self-respect. They may be very much better than we are in +hundreds of other ways; and I can quite understand a man (though +hardly a Dean) really preferring their historic virtues to those of +Christendom. A man may perhaps feel more comfortable among his Asiatic +coolies than among his European comrades: and as we are to allow the +Broadest Thought in the Church, Dr. Inge has as much right to his heresy +as anybody else. It is true that, as Dr. Inge says, there are numberless +Orientals who will do a great deal of work for very little money; and +it is most undoubtedly true that there are several high-placed and +prosperous Europeans who like to get work done and pay as little as +possible for it. + +But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and +traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which +he has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of +years of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge +admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced +the sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious +deduction is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen +Chinese. Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he +ought to be at the head of a great mission in London for converting the +English to Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties +of paganism would have free and natural play; his style would improve; +his mind would begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all +sorts of little irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the +most Conservative Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + +In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism +and public change which is the note of all our history springs from a +certain spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; +nay, it may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the +special defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the +ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It +will often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice +though the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the +formula of the great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that +all men were free and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the +formula of the peasant who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there +were but one slave in England, and he did all the work while the rest +of us made merry, this spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to +God night and day. Whether or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly +works with, a creed which postulates a humanised God and a vividly +personal immortality. Men must not be busy merely like a swarm, or even +happy merely like a herd; for it is not a question of men, but of a +man. A man's meals may be poor, but they must not be bestial; there must +always be that about the meal which permits of its comparison to +the sacrament. A man's bed may be hard, but it must not be abject or +unclean: there must always be about the bed something of the decency of +the death-bed. + +This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible +murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil +that threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot +encourage the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. +Christendom will continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being +Christian: it is the Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had +absent-mindedly strayed into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I +advise him to chuck it. + +But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian +temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. +Inge is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. +Such a man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being +“court chaplains of King Demos” or about his own superb valour in +defying the democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. +We should not expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that +Demos has never been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; +we should not expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains +they would be uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; +he considers himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New +Theologian; that is, he is liberal in theology--and nothing else. +He is apparently in sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy +with those who would soften the superior claim of our creed by urging +the rival creeds of the East; with those who would absorb the virtues of +Buddhism or of Islam. He holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of +Religions where all believers respect each other's unbelief. + +Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When +next you hear the “liberal” Christian say that we should take what is +best in Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people +like Dr. Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge +propose to take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of +the Moslem. You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of +the Hindoo. The more you study the “broad” movement of today, the more +you will find that these people want something much less like Chinese +metaphysics, and something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find +the levelling of creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of +wages. Dr. Inge is the typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never +more so than when he appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as +the apostle of the blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely +among the prosperous and polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or +Mohammedanism practically means this--that the poor must be as meek +as Buddhists, while the rich may be as ruthless as Mohammedans. That is +what they call the reunion of all religions. + + + + +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + +The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of +washing; and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore +comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. +Rain, that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities +of these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists +are eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public +bath; it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons +coming fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished +or dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when +coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an +enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: +it scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry +rafters and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring +cleaning. + +If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble +at the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are +constantly told that we should leave our little special possessions and +join in the enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social +machinery. I offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It +disregards that degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman +to take his shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because +it is public and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls +the string. + +As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the +neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water +drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and +debauch of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative +intoxication of the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret +or the golden clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such +scenes of apocalypse, towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne +falls like fire from heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with +the terrible colours of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as +he rolls in the long soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, +and listens to the roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who +ought to be the true bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are +drinking water. Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the +trees rave and reel to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs +as revellers clash cups; they roar undying thirst and howl the health of +the world. + +All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes +a noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count +it Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I +complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all +living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every +weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, +their need is greater than mine--especially for water. + +There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild +Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an +incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel +a tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he +puts on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying an +umbrella; it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of +despots in the dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable +walking stick; open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no +taste for pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my +hat, and precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against +wet, it must be by some closer and more careless protection, something +that I can forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be +that yet more Highland thing, a mackintosh. + +And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military +qualities of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and +white sheen as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think +of it as the uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty +raids. I like to think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, +descending on some doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs +flashing in the sun or moon. For indeed this is one of the real beauties +of rainy weather, that while the amount of original and direct light +is commonly lessened, the number of things that reflect light is +unquestionably increased. There is less sunshine; but there are more +shiny things; such beautifully shiny things as pools and puddles and +mackintoshes. It is like moving in a world of mirrors. + +And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual +works of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it +doubles it. If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the +roads (to the sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. +Shallow lakes of water reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we +dwell in a double universe. Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous +pavements, wet under numerous lamps, a man seems a black blot on all +that golden looking-glass, and could fancy he was flying in a yellow +sky. But wherever trees and towns hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, +the sense of Celestial topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, +dazzling confusion of shape and shadow, of reality and reflection, will +appeal strongly to any one with the transcendental instinct about this +dreamy and dual life of ours. It will always give a man the strange +sense of looking down at the skies. + + + + +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + +When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) +to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is +amusing to ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours +especially, when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of +one weakness this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + +This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares +more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its “methods” + more than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good +communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are +precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean +a hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good +communications may in practice be very like those evil communications +which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a +“scientific age,” which wants to know whether the train is in the +timetable, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one +instance in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the +case of photography. + +Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, +and the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so +that he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted +or suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head +thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and +slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, +a definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I +should have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, +with a profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + +Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great +many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, +if seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland +Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and +dark emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic +or whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked +like some swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of +coal-black hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately +under his eyes his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have +been painted scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one +under the lower, seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches +of Mephistopheles. His eyes had that “dancing madness” in them which +Stevenson saw in the Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes +distorted the expression by screwing a monstrous monocle into one of +them. A man more unmistakable would have been hard to find. You could +have picked him out in any crowd--so long as you had not seen his +photograph. + +But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and +conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits +of photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring +of cheek and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the +darkness out of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The +framing and limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; +and the devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write +poetry made him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people +do when they are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never +held it normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated +his slight figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished +by a button and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature +has been more delicately and dexterously omitted than they could +have been by the most namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest +water-colours, on the smoothest ivory. + +I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of +which depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents +an utterly incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate +language the license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it +strictly safe and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They +would have clapped me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate +Max's caricature. But the caricature would have been far more likely to +find the man. + +This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific +civilisation. It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man +that it never asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, +seemingly most detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever +since I was a boy. We were told that in some row Boer policemen had +shot an Englishman, a British subject, an English citizen. A long time +afterwards we were quite casually informed that the English citizen was +quite black. Well, it makes no difference to the moral question; black +men should be shot on the same ethical principles as white men. But +it makes one distrust scientific communications which permitted so +startling an alteration of the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a +photographic negative in which a black man came out white. Later we were +told that an Englishman had fought for the Boers against his own flag, +which would have been a disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted +that he was an Irishman; which is exactly as different as if he had been +a Pole. Common sense, with all the facts before it, does see that black +is not white, and that a nation that has never submitted has a right to +moral independence. But why does it so seldom have all the facts before +it? Why are the big aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic +wrath, always left out in such official communications, as they were +left out in the photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an +African and eyes as fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation +drop all four of the facts? Its error is to omit the arresting +thing--which might really arrest the criminal. It strikes first the +chilling note of science, demanding a man “above the middle height, chin +shaven, with gray moustache,” etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir +Redvers Buller. It does not seize the first fact of impression, as that +a man is obviously a sailor or a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a +nigger or an albino or a prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. +These are the realities by which the people really recognise each other. +They are almost always left out of the inquiry. + + + + +THE SULTAN + +There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial +cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter +far you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in +something dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you +find your butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you +find your ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread +them among your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. +There are numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is +this. That we have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we +have Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + +I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise +out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, +and like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not +that, like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that +he committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and +errors in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the +ideas they could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand +for Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the +world. He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the +principles that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs +of a Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. +That the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the +fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could +not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which +he lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old +bachelor of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently +quoted in the Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his +time. It was not his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill +somewhere in South Africa “his church.” It was not his fault, I mean, +that he could not see that a church all to oneself is not a church at +all. It is a madman's cell. It was not his fault that he “figured out +that God meant as much of the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible.” + Many evolutionists much wiser had “figured out” things even more +babyish. He was an honest and humble recipient of the plodding popular +science of his time; he spread no ideas that any cockney clerk in +Streatham could not have spread for him. But it was exactly because he +had no ideas to spread that he invoked slaughter, violated justice, and +ruined republics to spread them. + +But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not +only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are +actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to +extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented +as seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our +Imperialist aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the +East. For that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism +has been deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + +The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of +politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first +to steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial +cynic who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself +submitted to Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism +and destiny. + +There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of +Rhodes. The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that +Africa is still chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in +the South confronting savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, +Arabs, and Soudanese, and then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: +“It is inevitable fate that all this should be changed; and I should +like to be the agent of fate.” That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine +idea; and it is an Oriental idea. + +Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial +position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and +barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. +We are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to +teach a Turk to say “Kismet”; which he has said since his cradle. We +are to deny Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in +order to teach an Arab to believe he is “an agent of fate,” when he has +never believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true +(which fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia +or Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in +billycocks, instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. +The best Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a +doubtful and romantic future in which all things may happen--this +essential Western idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he +says himself) he did not believe in it. + +It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress +in addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of +King is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant +to be vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and +Moon, the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in +the days of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather +a religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. +He was not merely a conqueror, but a father--yes, even when he was +a bad father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local +affections and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the +King, but the Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic +of money, of luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen +race. Indeed Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to +the Sultan, from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + + + + +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + +The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion +which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic +architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained +in most of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic +eclipses the classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once +lively and mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally +rich and complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No +man ever got out of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a +cathedral tower. Over all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India +there is the presence of something stiff and heartless, of something +tortured and silent. Dwarfed trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers +and hunchbacked birds accentuate by the very splendour and contrast of +their colour the servility and monotony of their shapes. It is like the +vision of a sneering sage, who sees the whole universe as a pattern. +Certainly no one ever felt like this about Gothic, even if he happens +to dislike it. Or, again, some will say that it is the liberty of the +Middle Ages in the use of the comic or even the coarse that makes the +Gothic more interesting than the Greek. There is more truth in this; +indeed, there is real truth in it. Few of the old Christian cathedrals +would have passed the Censor of Plays. We talk of the inimitable +grandeur of the old cathedrals; but indeed it is rather their gaiety +that we do not dare to imitate. We should be rather surprised if a +chorister suddenly began singing “Bill Bailey” in church. Yet that would +be only doing in music what the mediævals did in sculpture. They put +into a Miserere seat the very scenes that we put into a music hall +song: comic domestic scenes similar to the spilling of the beer and the +hanging out of the washing. But though the gaiety of Gothic is one of +its features, it also is not the secret of its unique effect. We see +a domestic topsy-turvydom in many Japanese sketches. But delightful +as these are, with their fairy tree-tops, paper houses, and toddling, +infantile inhabitants, the pleasure they give is of a kind quite +different from the joy and energy of the gargoyles. Some have even been +so shallow and illiterate as to maintain that our pleasure in medieval +building is a mere pleasure in what is barbaric, in what is rough, +shapeless, or crumbling like the rocks. This can be dismissed after the +same fashion; South Sea idols, with painted eyes and radiating bristles, +are a delight to the eye; but they do not affect it in at all the +same way as Westminster Abbey. Some again (going to another and almost +equally foolish extreme) ignore the coarse and comic in mediævalism; +and praise the pointed arch only for its utter purity and simplicity, as +of a saint with his hands joined in prayer. Here, again, the uniqueness +is missed. There are Renaissance things (such as the ethereal silvery +drawings of Raphael), there are even pagan things (such as the +Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere a piety. None of these +explanations explain. And I never saw what was the real point about +Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw it behind a row of +furniture-vans. + +I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the +smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall +cut off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the +yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across +that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the +more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it +like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this +ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly +coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond +that the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, +straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as +the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + +As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; +what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not +variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, +but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man +of our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or +an Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had +mistaken for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this +gave to my eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving +towards the right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across +the plain like the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with +the clouds. Then I saw what it was. + +The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that +it is on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting +architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are +stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear +the arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty +and numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of +imperial elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners +going into battle; the silence was deafening with all the mingled noises +of a military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up +its thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from +all the roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in +the core of the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his +wings of brass. + +And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in +the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; +the voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of +spears. I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; +and I knew indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in +either hand the trowel and the sword. + +I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had +marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. +Some Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of +the desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been +woke at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the +tall pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every +snake or sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner +of the architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally +in the flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like +torches across dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of +music and darkness and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln +hill. So for some hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of +the Gothic; then the last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw +only a church tower in a quiet English town, round which the English +birds were floating. + + + + +THE MAN ON TOP + +There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be +stated too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not +trusted simply because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite +clearly seen and said without any reference to our several passions or +partisanships. It does not follow that we think such a distrust a wise +sentiment to express; it does not even follow that we think it a good +sentiment to entertain. But such is the sentiment, simply because such +is the fact. The distinction can be quite easily defined in an example. +I do not think that private workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their +employer. But I do think that patriotic soldiers owe a more or less +indefinite loyalty to their leader in battle. But even if they ought to +trust their captain, the fact remains that they often do not trust him; +and the fact remains that he often is not fit to be trusted. + +Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very +muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to +put employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should +have thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has +nothing to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; +it is a distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more +elegance and poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment +under Lord Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the +atmosphere, but in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order +to pay Lord Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and +philanthropic, did exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the +shopkeeper it failed as a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he +is underpaid, but only if he is defeated. The object of the Army is the +safety of the nation from one particular class of perils; therefore, +since all citizens owe loyalty to the nation, all citizens who are +soldiers owe loyalty to the Army. But nobody has any obligation to make +some particular rich man richer. A man is bound, of course, to consider +the indirect results of his action in a strike; but he is bound to +consider that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, or a smoking concert; +in his wildest holiday or his most private conversation. But direct +responsibility like that of a soldier he has none. He need not aim +solely and directly at the good of the shop; for the simple reason that +the shop is not aiming solely and directly at the good of the nation. +The shopman is, under decent restraints, let us hope, trying to get what +he can out of the nation; the shop assistant may, under the same decent +restraints, get what he can out of the shopkeeper. All this distinction +is very obvious. At least I should have thought so. + +But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the +military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious +shop assistant “disloyal”--that leaves exactly where it was the +question of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. +Granted that all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the +cloven pennon of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true +that the pennon may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that +all Barney Barnato's workers ought to have followed him to death or +glory, it is still a Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was +likely to lead them to. Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for +his master's medicines, we may still hold an inquest to find out if he +died of them. While we forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may +still wish the general were shot. + +The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. +Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are +worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. +The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are +accidents--or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is +a generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A +revolutionist would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next +to nothing about coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners +know next to nothing about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend +the nature of their own monopoly with any consistent and courageous +policy, however wicked, as did the old aristocrats with the monopoly of +land. They have not the virtues nor even the vices of tyrants; they have +only their powers. It is the same with all the powerful of to-day; it is +the same, for instance, with the high-placed and high-paid official. Not +only is the judge not judicial, but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. +The arbiter decides, not by some gust of justice or injustice in his +soul like the old despot dooming men under a tree, but by the permanent +climate of the class to which he happens to belong. The ancient wig of +the judge is often indistinguishable from the old wig of the flunkey. + +To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one +must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against +details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just +judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such +as Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. +Seen close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and +impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can +tell if the Tower leans. + +Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, +we shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole +governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will +see some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the +employer often comes there early in the morning; that he has great +organising power; that if he works over the colossal accumulation of +wealth he also works over its wise distribution. All this may be true of +many employers, and it is practically said of all. + +But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply +ask what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the +capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and +solid result of the reign of the employers has been--unemployment. +Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot +upon which the whole process turns. + +Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great +squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense +or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care +for the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see +much cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts +of the estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has +been the actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is +plain. At the end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the +land. The practical effect of having landlords is not having tenants. +The practical effect of having employers is that men are not employed. +The unrest of the populace is therefore more than a murmur against +tyranny; it is against a sort of treason. It is the suspicion that +even at the top of the tree, even in the seats of the mighty, our very +success is unsuccessful. + + + + +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + +There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are +some who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again--or +snore again. There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration +Courts as to the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the +day that they look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + +The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may +incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things +for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when +the States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or +when all the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of +Washington. It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The +real democratic unrest at this moment is not an extension of the +representative process, but rather a revolt against it. It is no good +giving those now in revolt more boards and committees and compulsory +regulations. It is against these very things that they are revolting. +Men are not only rising against their oppressors, but against their +representatives or, as they would say, their misrepresentatives. +The inner and actual spirit of workaday England is coming out not in +applause, but in anger, as a god who should come out of his tabernacle +to rebuke and confound his priests. + +There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom +we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of +whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't +have. She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger +and exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than +the modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the +horror of bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; +and it is quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort +of industry natural to the classes from which men can climb into great +wealth. He has grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, +accustomed to have dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without +discomfort. He regards cleanliness as a kind of separate and special +costume; to be put on for great festivals. He has several really curious +characteristics, which would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they +had any eyes. For instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in +marked contrast to his actual spirit, which is generally patient and +civil. He has an odd way of using certain words of really horrible +meaning, but using them quite innocently and without the most distant +taint of the evils to which they allude. He is rather sentimental; and, +like most sentimental people, not devoid of snobbishness. At the +same time, he believes the ordinary manly commonplaces of freedom and +fraternity as he believes most of the decent traditions of Christian +men: he finds it very difficult to act according to them, but this +difficulty is not confined to him. He has a strong and individual sense +of humour, and not much power of corporate or militant action. He is not +a Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to a Labour Member +than he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This is the Common +Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at last. + +See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it +is his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to +cure, and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including +two of his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal +Commission to consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike +upon the railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, +any of the gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to +Mr. Henderson, whom I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of +confusing with that of a railway-porter. I do not think that any old +gentleman, however absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, +let us say, to hand his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to +reward that politician with twopence. Of the others I can only judge +by the facts about their status as set forth in the public Press. The +Chairman, Sir David Harrell, appeared to be an ex-official distinguished +in (of all things in the world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no +earthly reason to doubt that the Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not +talking about what men mean to be, but about what they are. The police +in Ireland are practically an army of occupation; a man serving in them +or directing them is practically a soldier; and, of course, he must +do his duty as such. But it seems truly extraordinary to select as one +likely to sympathise with the democracy of England a man whose whole +business in life it has been to govern against its will the democracy +of Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers were offered the +sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police in Finland +or Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised world sees +Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time we did. +The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct +and habit akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the +Commissioners actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then +came Mr. Henderson (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, “By your +leave.”), and then another less known gentleman who had “corresponded” + with the Board of Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to +represent the very poor. + +Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough +report, and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of +that kind are tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably +business-like. But if any one supposes that men of that kind can +conceivably quiet any real quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the +man whom I first described, it is frantic. The common worker is angry +exactly because he has found out that all these boards consist of the +same well-dressed Kind of Man, whether they are called Governmental or +Capitalist. If any one hopes that he will reconcile the poor, I say, as +I said at the beginning, that such a one has not looked on the light of +day or dwelt in the land of the living. + +But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical +and urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man +of whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern +England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would +be offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost +incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This +Kind of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be +represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind +of Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the +middle class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, +he must remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + +Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory +powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the +first Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you +drove him with a whip. + + + + +THE MEDIÆVAL VILLAIN + +I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King +John. + +But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he +believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a +whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not +sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or +merely a humdrum respectability. + +I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is +a protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a +particular attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always +hunting and Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, +and Charles I always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in +rotation making his people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and +King John pulling out Jews' teeth with the celerity and industry of +an American dentist. Anything is good that shakes all this stiff +simplification, and makes us remember that these men were once alive; +that is, mixed, free, flippant, and inconsistent. It gives the mind +a healthy kick to know that Alfred had fits, that Charles I prevented +enclosures, that Rufus was really interested in architecture, that Henry +VIII was really interested in theology. + +And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid +imagination of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are +on the right side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a +Puritan, and John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they +were people whom we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think +that John was a nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of +him is all wrong. Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had +what commonly makes them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and +hotheaded decision. But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, +but which we misunderstand. + +The mediæval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In +their social system the mediævals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as +their heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings +of guild or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of +man as standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While +they clad and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly +and quaintly for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have +of the freedom of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an +eagle in the heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern +as most fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + +For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute +description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused +the apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been +in an unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have +decided the other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of +another world, a world that now can never be. + +This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way +can be felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and +ballad. It is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy +intellectual forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the +physical science of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have +taught, have darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of +bad men as something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of +people. The Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It +brought the villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version +of King John. But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that +about him, even when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to +be a man of mixed passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil +passions to have much too good a time of it. They might have spoken of +him as a man in considerable danger of going to hell; but they would +have not talked of him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of +Percy or Robin Hood it frequently happens that the King comes upon the +scene, and his ultimate decision makes the climax of the tale. But we +do not feel, as we do in the Byronic or modern romance, that there is +a definite stage direction “Enter Tyrant.” Nor do we behold a deus ex +machina who is certain to do all that is mild and just. The King in the +ballad is in a state of virile indecision. Sometimes he will pass from +a towering passion to the most sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; +sometimes he will begin an act of vengeance and be turned from it by +a jest. Yet this august levity is not moral indifference; it is moral +freedom. It is the strong sense in the writer that the King, being +the type of man with power, will probably sometimes use it badly and +sometimes well. In this sense John is certainly misrepresented, for he +is pictured as something that none of his own friends or enemies saw. In +that sense he was certainly not so black as he is painted, for he lived +in a world where every one was piebald. + +King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind +of degenerate; a shifty-eyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's +backbone and green blood in his veins. The mediævals were quite capable +of boiling him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable +of despairing of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori +case is that of the strange mediæval legend of Robert the Devil. +Robert was represented as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman +actually in answer to prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are +simply those of the infernal fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he +can be called almost literally a child of hell, yet the climax of the +story is his repentance at Rome and his great reparation. That is the +paradox of mediæval morals: as it must appear to the moderns. We must +try to conceive a race of men who hated John, and sought his blood, and +believed every abomination about him, who would have been quite capable +of assassinating or torturing him in the extremity of their anger. And +yet we must admit that they would not really have been fundamentally +surprised if he had shaved his head in humiliation, given all his goods +to the poor, embraced the lepers in a lazar-house, and been canonised +as a saint in heaven. So strongly did they hold that the pivot of Will +should turn freely, which now is rusted, and sticks. + +For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our +public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a +noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit +that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the +powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and +rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect +him to go on maddening them--and us. We do not expect him, let +us say, suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of +repentance; especially in public things; that is why we cannot +really get rid of our great national abuses of economic tyranny and +aristocratic avarice. Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal +drudge; and mostly consists of being moved on by the police. We move on +because we are not allowed to move back. But the really ragged prophets, +the real revolutionists who held high language in the palaces of kings, +they did not confine themselves to saying, “Onward, Christian soldiers,” + still less, “Onward, Futurist soldiers”; what they said to high emperors +and to whole empires was, “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?” + + + + +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + +Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there +are even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to +most modern books. A detective story generally describes six living +men discussing how it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story +generally describes six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be +alive. But those who have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted +one thing, that when the murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. +“That,” says Sherlock Holmes, “is the advantage of being a private +detective”; after he has caught he can set free. The Christian Church +can best be defined as an enormous private detective, correcting +that official detective--the State. This, indeed, is one of the +injustices done to historic Christianity; injustices which arise from +looking at complex exceptions and not at the large and simple fact. We +are constantly being told that theologians used racks and thumbscrews, +and so they did. Theologians used racks and thumbscrews just as they +used thimbles and three-legged stools, because everybody else used them. +Christianity no more created the mediæval tortures than it did the +Chinese tortures; it inherited them from any empire as heathen as the +Chinese. + +The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and +employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, +if we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real +difference between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The +State, in all lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, +more bloody and brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal +everywhere. The Church is the only institution that ever attempted to +create a machinery of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever +attempted by system to pursue and discover crimes, not in order to +avenge, but in order to forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the +weaknesses of the religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the +world. Its speciality--or, if you like, its oddity--was this +merciless mercy; the unrelenting sleuthhound who seeks to save and not +slay. + +I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays +on somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in +America. The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent +experiment, dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure +as he passes through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to +make cheap fun of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; +that is a point of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions +have been abrupt. This saviour's method of making people good is to tell +them how good they are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, +whose moral backs are broken, and who are soaked with sincere +self-contempt, I can imagine that this might be quite the right way. +I should not deliver this message to authors or members of Parliament, +because they would so heartily agree with it. + +Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. +Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a +detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of +tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. +Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine +thing, though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be +faced, even in order to be forgiven; the great objection to “letting +sleeping dogs lie” is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. +Jerome's Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine +detective, pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a +sort of divine dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not +see anything that is going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, “Tout +comprendre est tout pardonner.” But it is much more evidently true to +say, “Rien comprendre est rien Pardonner,” and the “Third Floor Back” + does not seem to comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite +selfish sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his +neighbours. There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been +deceived. The heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived. + +When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play +which I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. +I mean Mr. Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which +sprawls over so many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned +with a dim, yet evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a +whole group of persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; +in fact, it is a very fine play indeed; but there is nothing +aesthetic or fastidious about it. It is as much or more than the other +sensational, democratic, and (I use the word in a sound and good sense) +Salvationist. + +But the difference lies precisely in this--that the Christ of Mr. +Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; +he declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons +evil, but he will not ignore it. In other words, he is a Christian, and +not a Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained +by the problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes +Christ to be trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, +is naturally a simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying +to save the reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief +characters in The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous +vicar, universally respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. +It would have been no good to tell these people they had some good in +them--for that was what they were telling themselves all day long. +They had to be reminded that they had some bad in them--instinctive +idolatries and silent treasons which they always tried to forget. It is +in connection with these crimes of wealth and culture that we face the +real problem of positive evil. The whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy +about sin was vitiated throughout by one's consciousness that whenever +he wrote the word “sinner” he thought of a man in rags. But here, again, +we can find truth merely by referring to vulgar literature--its +unfailing fountain. Whoever read a detective story about poor people? +The poor have crimes; but the poor have no secrets. And it is because +the proud have secrets that they need to be detected before they are +forgiven. + + + + +THE ELF OF JAPAN + +There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I +love them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but +psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me +as examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from +another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he +might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about +cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral +independence and readiness to scratch anybody “if he does not behave +himself.” Others, like Mr. Belloc, regard the cat as cruel and secret, a +fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, +poisoned food, “so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and +humility.” For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats +as I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They +are both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And +this abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called +Love; for it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it +is a vision. It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for +nothing in return. I love all the cats in the street as St. Francis of +Assisi loved all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not +so much, of course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to +bridle a bird and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. +He did not wish to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the +name “Francis,” and the address “Assisi”--as one does with a dog. +He did not wish them to belong to him or himself to belong to them; +in fact, it would be a very awkward experience to belong to a lot of +fishes. But a man does belong to his dog, in another but an equally +real sense with that in which the dog belongs to him. The two bonds of +obedience and responsibility vary very much with the dogs and the men; +but they are both bonds. In other words, a man does not merely love a +dog; as he might (in a mystical moment) love any sparrow that perched +on his windowsill or any rabbit that ran across his path. A man likes a +dog; and that is a serious matter. + +To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a +cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is +so mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like +Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is +really cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men +of old time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those +magnificent old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which +one really loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and +within reason) loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man +feels himself--no, not absorbed into the unity of all things (a +loathsome fancy)--but delighting in the difference of all things. +At the moment when a man really knows he is a man he will feel, however +faintly, a kind of fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is +a crocodile. All the more will he exult in the things that are more +evidently beautiful than crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and +cats--which are more beautiful than either. But it does not follow +that he will wish to pick all the flowers or to cage all the birds or to +own all the cats. + +No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit +that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful +analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of +such fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like +cats in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I +feel it about certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the +Japanese. The exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall +see no more, now Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a +quality that was infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures +were really rather like pictures made by cats. They were full of +feathery softness and of sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will +wander in some gallery fortunate enough to have a fine collection of +those slight water-colour sketches on rice paper which come from the +remote East, he will observe many elements in them which a fanciful +person might consider feline. There is, for instance, that odd enjoyment +of the tops of trees; those airy traceries of forks and fading twigs, up +to which certainly no artist, but only a cat could climb. There is that +elvish love of the full moon, as large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, +hung in these tenuous branches. That moon is so large and luminous +that one can imagine a hundred cats howling under it. Then there is the +exhaustive treatment of the anatomy of birds and fish; subjects in which +cats are said to be interested. Then there is the slanting cat-like eye +of all these Eastern gods and men--but this is getting altogether +too coincident. We shall have another racial theory in no time +(beginning “Are the Japs Cats?”), and though I shall not believe in +my theory, somebody else might. There are people among my esteemed +correspondents who might believe anything. It is enough for me to say +here that in this small respect Japs affect me like cats. I mean that I +love them. I love their quaint and native poetry, their instinct of easy +civilisation, their unique unreplaceable art, the testimony they bear +to the bustling, irrepressible activities of nature and man. If I were +a real mystic looking down on them from a real mountain, I am sure I +should love them more even than the strong winged and unwearied birds +or the fruitful, ever multiplying fish. But, as for liking them, as one +likes a dog--that is quite another matter. That would mean trusting +them. + +In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much +in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not +specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; +but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give +the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would +happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always +a fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as +wedding cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as +lanterns!... but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the +paper) that the assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture +was a mere matter of verbal translation. “The Japanese would not call +twisting the thumbs back 'torture.'” + + + + +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + +I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark +in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming +a peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist +asceticism to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an +atheist and an ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious +to see one's country thus losing her special point of honour about +asylum and liberty. It will be quite a new departure if we begin to +protect and whitewash foreign policemen. I always understood it was +only English policemen who were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, +however, have begun to feel with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities +and officials are being questioned. But there is one most graphic and +extraordinary fact, which it did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch +upon, but which somebody really must seize and emphasise. It is +this: that at the very time when we are all beginning to doubt these +authorities, we are letting laws pass to increase their most capricious +powers. All our commissions, petitions, and letters to the papers +are asking whether these authorities can give an account of their +stewardship. And at the same moment all our laws are decreeing that they +shall not give any account of their stewardship, but shall become yet +more irresponsible stewards. Bills like the Feeble-Minded Bill and +the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate names for them) actually arm with +scorpions the hand that has chastised the Malatestas and Maleckas with +whips. The inspector, the doctor, the police sergeant, the well-paid +person who writes certificates and “passes” this, that, or the other; +this sort of man is being trusted with more authority, apparently +because he is being doubted with more reason. In one room we are asking +why the Government and the great experts between them cannot sail a +ship. In another room we are deciding that the Government and experts +shall be allowed, without trial or discussion, to immure any one's body, +damn any one's soul, and dispose of unborn generations with the levity +of a pagan god. We are putting the official on the throne while he is +still in the dock. + +The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as +when people talk of an author's “message,” without thinking whom it +is from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of +another word. It is the excellent mediæval word “charter.” I remember +the Act that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called +“The Children's Charter.” Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as +lunatics people who are not lunatics was actually called a “charter” of +the feeble-minded. Now this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the +Bills are right. Even were they right in theory they would be applied +only to the poor, like many better rules about education and cruelty. +A woman was lately punished for cruelty because her children were not +washed when it was proved that she had no water. From that it will be an +easy step in Advanced Thought to punishing a man for wine-bibbing when +it is proved that he had no wine. Rifts in right reason widen down the +ages. And when we have begun by shutting up a confessedly kind +person for cruelty, we may yet come to shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for +feeblemindedness. + +But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use +the word “charter.” A charter does not mean a thing that does good to +people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. +It may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their +cigarettes: it might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of +their cigars. But I think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much +surprised if the King granted them a new charter (in place of their +mediæval charter), and it only meant that policemen might pull the +cigars out of their mouths. It may be a good thing that all drunkards +should be locked up: and many acute statesmen (King John, for instance) +would certainly have thought it a good thing if all aristocrats could +be locked up. But even that somewhat cynical prince would scarcely have +granted to the barons a thing called “the Great Charter” and then locked +them all up on the strength of it. If he had, this interpretation of the +word “charter” would have struck the barons with considerable surprise. +I doubt if their narrow mediæval minds could have taken it in. + +The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no +Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own +conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them +till he understands this word “charter.” I will attempt in a moment +to state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, +practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter +was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last +Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called +in the current jargon “recognition”; the acknowledgment in so many words +by society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If +there had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have +been a railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the +King, defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea +still true and then almost universal: that authority is necessary +for nothing so much as for the granting of liberties. Like everything +mediæval, it ramified back to a root in religion; and was a sort of +small copy of the Christian idea of man's creation. Man was free, not +because there was no God, but because it needed a God to set him free. +By authority he was free. By authority the craftsmen of the guilds were +free. Many other great philosophers took and take the other view: +the Lucretian pagans, the Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and +determinists, all roughly confine themselves to saying that God gave +man a law. The mediæval Christian insisted that God gave man a charter. +Modern feeling may not sympathise with its list of liberties, which +included the liberty to be damned; but that has nothing to do with the +fact that it was a gift of liberties and not of laws. This was mirrored, +however dimly, in the whole system. There was a great deal of gross +inequality; and in other aspects absolute equality was taken +for granted. But the point is that equality and inequality were +ranks--or rights. There were not only things one was forbidden +to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. A man was not only +definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. The holidays of +his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really meant lingers alive +in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a “chartered” libertine. + +Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every +man's door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes +liberties with everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel +that the wind is always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. +But remember that in the days when free men had charters, they held that +the wind itself was wild by authority; and was only free because it had +a father. + + + + +THE CONTENTED MAN + +The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating +because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the +style of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied +with our countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, +however, has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the “sweet +content” of the poet and the “cubic content” of the mathematician. Some +distinguish these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might +happen to any of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, “Of the +content of the King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be +ignorant”; or “Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, +you are stealing the spoons.” And there really is an analogy between the +mathematical and the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation +of which the latter has been much weakened and misused. + +The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far +that the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane +peril of our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of +security; and it is not strange that our workers should often think +about rising above their position, since they have so continually to +think about sinking below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to +saving and simple pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To +advise people to be content with what they have got may or may not be +sound moral philosophy. + +But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece +of impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the +creed of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, +it remains true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine +discontent; discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must +always be the human thing. It may be true that a particular man, in his +relation to his master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, +will do well to be fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry +justice. But it is not true, no sane person can call it true, that man +as a whole in his general attitude towards the world, in his posture +towards death or green fields, towards the weather or the baby, will be +wise to cultivate dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly +experience, the great truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet +his neighbour's ox nor his ass nor anything that is his. In highly +complex and scientific civilisations he may sometimes find himself +forced into an exceptional vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and +scientific civilisations, nine times out of ten, he only wants his own +ass back. + +But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than +in moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has +been undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other +meaning. It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some +accounts of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + +But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the +idea of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; +for feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. +“Content” ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; +placidly, perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with +bread and cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought +to mean caring for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic +content of the bread and cheese and adding it to your own. Being +content with an attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and +resigned to living in it. It ought to mean appreciating what there is +to appreciate in such a position; such as the quaint and elvish slope of +the ceiling or the sublime aerial view of the opposite chimney-pots. And +in this sense contentment is a real and even an active virtue; it is not +only affirmative, but creative. The poet in the attic does not forget +the attic in poetic musings; he remembers whatever the attic has of +poetry; he realises how high, how starry, how cool, how unadorned and +simple--in short, how Attic is the attic. + +True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of +getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and +it is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so +cold and incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been +“through” things; when it is evident that they have come out on the +other side quite unchanged. A man might have gone “through” a plum +pudding as a bullet might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the +size of the pudding--and the man. But the awful and sacred question +is “Has the pudding been through him?” Has he tasted, appreciated, and +absorbed the solid pudding, with its three dimensions and its three +thousand tastes and smells? Can he offer himself to the eyes of men as +one who has cubically conquered and contained a pudding? + +In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through +trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content +of them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a +pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + +Thus the young genius says, “I have lived in my dreary and squalid +village before I found success in Paris or Vienna.” The sound +philosopher will answer, “You have never lived in your village, or you +would not call it dreary and squalid.” + +Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and +always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, “I've been right away from +these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies.” The +sound philosopher will reply, “You have never been in these islands; you +have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise +you could never have called them either muddy or little.” + +Thus the Suffragette will say, “I have passed through the paltry duties +of pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come +out to intellectual liberty.” The sound philosopher will answer, “You +have never passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it +vulgar. Wiser and stronger women than you have really seen a poetry +in pots and pans; naturally, because there is a poetry in them.” It is +right for the village violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; +it is right for the stray Englishman to climb across the high shoulder +of the world; it is right for the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae +or high places she can allow to her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that +any of these climbers should kick the ladder by which they have climbed. +But indeed these bitter people who record their experiences really +record their lack of experiences. It is the countryman who has not +succeeded in being a countryman who comes up to London. It is the +clerk who has not succeeded in being a clerk who tries (on vegetarian +principles) to be a countryman. And the woman with a past is generally a +woman angry about the past she never had. + +When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and +love it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really +been through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them +back again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because +we have drunk them dry. + + + + +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + +I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover +a very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the +controversies, whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather +up into this last article a valedictory violence about all such things; +and then pass to where, beyond these voices, there is peace--or in +other words, to the writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed +work. But before I finally desert the illusions of rationalism for +the actualities of romance, I should very much like to write one last +roaring, raging book telling all the rationalists not to be so utterly +irrational. The book would be simply a string of violent vetoes, like +the Ten Commandments. I would call it “Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things +I am Tired Of.” + +This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would +begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing +imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might +begin thus:-- + +(1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out the noun. +An adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, “Give me a +patriotism that is free from all boundaries.” It is like saying, “Give +me a pork pie with no pork in it.” Don't say, “I look forward to that +larger religion that shall have no special dogmas.” It is like saying, +“I look forward to that larger quadruped who shall have no feet.” A +quadruped means something with four feet; and a religion means something +that commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. Don't let +the meek substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, exuberant +adjective. + +(2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This +practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The +trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable +terms, and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the +simplest form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who +said to his tenants in an election speech, “Of course I'm not going to +threaten you, but if this Budget passes the rents will go up.” The thing +can be done in many forms besides this. “I am the last man to +mention party politics; but when I see the Empire rent in pieces by +irresponsible Radicals,” etc. “In this hall we welcome all creeds. We +have no hostility against any honest belief; but only against that black +priestcraft and superstition which can accept such a doctrine as,” etc. +“I would not say one word that could ruffle our relations with Germany. +But this I will say; that when I see ceaseless and unscrupulous +armament,” etc. Please don't do it. Decide to make a remark or not to +make a remark. But don't fancy that you have somehow softened the saying +of a thing by having just promised not to say it. + +(3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. “Happiness” (let us say) +is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well +know when you haven't. “Progress” is a secondary word; it means the +degree of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But +modern controversies constantly turn on asking, “Does Happiness help +Progress?” Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. +Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. +Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is “spasmodic” (whatever that +means); while our “reactionism is settled and permanent.” It never +strikes Mr. Swann that democracy means something in itself; while +“reactionism” means nothing--except in connection with democracy. +You cannot react except from something. If Mr. Swann thinks I have ever +reacted from the doctrine that the people should rule, I wish he would +give me the reference. + +(4) Don't say, “There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself +right and the others wrong.” Probably one of the creeds is right and +the others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must +be wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be +wrong. I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more +desperate sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are +certainly solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts +his shirt on Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other +men putting their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in +them quite as sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are +wrong. But one of them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of +the horses does win; not always even the dark horse which might stand +for Agnosticism, but often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. +Democracy has its occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been +known to come in first. But the point here is that something comes in +first. That there were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there +was one well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the +world is round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular +or oblong does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and +therefore not any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of +imprecation, don't say that the variety of creeds prevents you from +accepting any creed. It is an unintelligent remark. + +(5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), +don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the +majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of +mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The +man who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his +neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not +try to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks +himself Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself +Rockefeller; as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But +madmen never meet. It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, +they can inspire, they can fight, they can found religions; but they +cannot meet. Maniacs can never be the majority; for the simple reason +that they can never be even a minority. If two madmen had ever agreed +they might have conquered the world. + +(6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some +men are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height +of the French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat +short. In the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that +Rockefeller is stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human +equality reposes upon this: That there is no man really clever who has +not found that he is stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt +small. Some men never feel small; but these are the few men who are. + +(7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman +with a club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male +sparrow knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe +knock down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male +have had to use any violence at any time in order to make the female a +female? Why should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the +sow or the she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these +creatures were creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not +talk such bosh. I implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. +Utterly and absolutely abolish all such bosh--and we may yet +begin to discuss these public questions properly. But I fear my list of +protests grows too long; and I know it could grow longer for ever. The +reader must forgive my elongations and elaborations. 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K. Chesterton</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: A Miscellany of Men</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: G. K. Chesterton</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: December, 1999 [eBook #2015]<br /> +[Most recently updated: September 10, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Michael Pullen, Michael K. Johnson, Joe Moretti and David Widger</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN ***</div> + + <h1> + A MISCELLANY OF MEN + </h1> + + <h2 class="no-break"> + By G. K. Chesterton + </h2> + + <hr /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> THE SUFFRAGIST </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> THE POET AND THE CHEESE </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> THE THING </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> THE NAMELESS MAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> THE MAD OFFICIAL </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> THE ENCHANTED MAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> THE SUN WORSHIPPER </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> THE WRONG INCENDIARY </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> THE FREE MAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> THE PRIEST OF SPRING </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> THE REAL JOURNALIST </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> THE FOOL </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0019"> THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0020"> THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0021"> THE MYSTAGOGUE </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0022"> THE RED REACTIONARY </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0023"> THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0024"> THE MUMMER </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0025"> THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0026"> THE NEW THEOLOGIAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0027"> THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0028"> THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0029"> THE SULTAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0030"> THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0031"> THE MAN ON TOP </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0032"> THE OTHER KIND OF MAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0033"> THE MEDIÆVAL VILLAIN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0034"> THE DIVINE DETECTIVE </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0035"> THE ELF OF JAPAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0036"> THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0037"> THE CONTENTED MAN </a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0038"> THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL </a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + + <hr /> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"></a> + THE SUFFRAGIST + </h2> + <p> + Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, + can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching those + political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular sentiments, + it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. One part of + it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up her fists to a + man she is putting herself in the only posture in which he is not afraid + of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more of her silence; but + force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon of which he has grown + ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite accurate in any matter + of the instincts. For the things which are the simplest so long as they + are undisputed invariably become the subtlest when once they are disputed: + which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, when he said, “It is not hard to + believe in God if one does not define Him.” When the evil instincts of old + Foulon made him say of the poor, “Let them eat grass,” the good and + Christian instincts of the poor made them hang him on a lamppost with his + mouth stuffed full of that vegetation. But if a modern vegetarian + aristocrat were to say to the poor, “But why don't you like grass?” their + intelligences would be much more taxed to find such an appropriate + repartee. And this matter of the functions of the sexes is primarily a + matter of the instincts; sex and breathing are about the only two things + that generally work best when they are least worried about. That, I + suppose, is why the same sophisticated age that has poisoned the world + with Feminism is also polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We plunge at + once into a forest of false analogies and bad blundering history; while + almost any man or woman left to themselves would know at least that sex is + quite different from anything else in the world. + </p> + <p> + There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and woman + (however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave and + master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the + Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; these + other alien groups never came into contact until they came into collision. + Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards melted into + amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they like each + other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and sorrows that + often come of their mating, it was not such things that made them meet. It + is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern writers and talkers + miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one would suppose woman a + victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, emancipated woman has, age + after age, been knocked silly with a stone axe. But really there is no + fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman was ever knocked silly; except + the fact that she is silly. And that might have arisen in so many other + ways. Real responsible woman has never been silly; and any one wishing to + knock her would be wise (like the streetboys) to knock and run away. It is + ultimately idiotic to compare this prehistoric participation with any + royalties or rebellions. Genuine royalties wish to crush rebellions. + Genuine rebels wish to destroy kings. The sexes cannot wish to abolish + each other; and if we allow them any sort of permanent opposition it will + sink into something as base as a party system. + </p> + <p> + As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, you + cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere collisions + of separate institutions. You could compare it with the emancipation of + negroes from planters—if it were true that a white man in early + youth always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black man. You could + compare it with the revolt of tenants against a landlord—if it were + true that young landlords wrote sonnets to invisible tenants. You could + compare it to the fighting policy of the Fenians—if it were true + that every normal Irishman wanted an Englishman to come and live with him. + But as we know there are no instincts in any of these directions, these + analogies are not only false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not + speak of the comparative comfort or merit of these different things: I say + they are different. It may be that love turned to hate is terribly common + in sexual matters: it may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in + the rivalries of race or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that + begins with anything but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a + fallacy; and all its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and + impertinent as puns. + </p> + <p> + But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express or + even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very much + concerned with what literary people call “style” in letters or more vulgar + people call “style” in dress. They are much concerned with how a thing is + done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest elements in their + attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed by stray examples or + sudden images. When Danton was defending himself before the Jacobin + tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard across the Seine, in + quite remote streets on the other side of the river. He must have bellowed + like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would think of that prodigy except + as something poetical and appropriate. None of us would instinctively feel + that Danton was less of a man or even less of a gentleman, for speaking so + in such an hour. But suppose we heard that Marie Antoinette, when tried + before the same tribunal, had howled so that she could be heard in the + Faubourg St. Germain—well, I leave it to the instincts, if there are + any left. It is not wrong to howl. Neither is it right. It is simply a + question of the instant impression on the artistic and even animal parts + of humanity, if the noise were heard suddenly like a gun. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may be found in the + gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must always + be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the French committee + or the English House of Lords. And “demagogue,” in the good Greek meaning, + does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who leads it: and if + you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive gestures of oratory + are gestures of military leadership; pointing the people to a path or + waving them on to an advance. Notice that long sweep of the arm across the + body and outward, which great orators use naturally and cheap orators + artificially. It is almost the exact gesture of the drawing of a sword. + </p> + <p> + The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that + votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so long + as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient + militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd that + is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth + hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points + with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated + finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, + these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. No + honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the political + woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing to do with + any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a desire exists. A + husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown and proclaimed laws + from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles from the tripod of a + priestess; or if she could walk in mystical motherhood before the + procession of some great religious order. But that she should stand on a + platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; leaning forward a + little more than is graceful and holding her mouth open a little longer + and wider than is dignified—well, I only write here of the facts of + natural history; and the fact is that it is this, and not publicity or + importance, that hurts. It is for the modern world to judge whether such + instincts are indeed danger signals; and whether the hurting of moral as + of material nerves is a tocsin and a warning of nature. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"></a> + THE POET AND THE CHEESE + </h2> + <p> + There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the + white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of + the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even + when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement of + music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with a shout + like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open arms and + warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the great level + lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even when there are + plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. One's voice seems to + break an almost elvish silence, and something unreasonably weird in the + phrase of the nursery tales, “And he went a little farther and came to + another place,” comes back into the mind. + </p> + <p> + In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and + found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was + one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may + be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass + did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious + impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally + lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of being + so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the air of + something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like a big + yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and railings; + and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that dead hour of + the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, nor anything + else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling that I had + strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in the + twenty-four. + </p> + <p> + I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost as + private as a private house. Those who talk of “public-houses” as if they + were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with such a + place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an elaborate cap + sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of comfortable + Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) the original + Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat a tall, strong, + and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and a pair of scissors + stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. Two feet behind them + sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like wood painted scarlet, + with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not touched, and probably would + not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there was an equally motionless cat; + and on the table a copy of 'Household Words'. + </p> + <p> + I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had met + somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; and yet + it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at once solid + and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in some of + Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness and wonder, + and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was curious; for + Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of the fenlands or + flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water and the mirrored + skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline virtue. Perhaps + that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead of a mountain poet. + Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the whole of that town was + like a cup of water given at morning. + </p> + <p> + After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of rustic + courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The old lady + answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued her + needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at her + with a suddenly arrested concern. “I suppose,” I said, “that it has + nothing to do with the cheese of that name.” “Oh, yes,” she answered, with + a staggering indifference, “they used to make it here.” + </p> + <p> + I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. “But this place + is a Shrine!” I said. “Pilgrims should be pouring into it from wherever + the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a colossal statue + in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton cheese. There ought to + be another colossal statue of the first cow who provided the foundations + of it. There should be a burnished tablet let into the ground on the spot + where some courageous man first ate Stilton cheese, and survived. On the + top of a neighbouring hill (if there are any neighbouring hills) there + should be a huge model of a Stilton cheese, made of some rich green marble + and engraven with some haughty motto: I suggest something like 'Ver non + semper viret; sed Stiltonia semper virescit.'” The old lady said, “Yes, + sir,” and continued her domestic occupations. + </p> + <p> + After a strained and emotional silence, I said, “If I take a meal here + tonight can you give me any Stilton?” + </p> + <p> + “No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton,” said the immovable one, + speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + </p> + <p> + “This is awful,” I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of England + as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and forgotten, so + to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it yet more symbolic + because from all that old and full and virile life, the great cheese was + gone; and only the beer remained. And even that will be stolen by the + Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. Politely disengaging myself, + I made my way as quickly as possible to the nearest large, noisy, and + nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I sought out the nearest vulgar, + tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + </p> + <p> + There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I got + a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote a sonnet + to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my sonnet is + not strictly new; that it contains “echoes” (as they express it) of some + other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, are the lines I + wrote: + </p> +<p class="center"> + SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE +</p> + +<p class="poem"> + Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour<br /> + And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby;<br /> + England has need of thee, and so have I—<br /> + She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour,<br /> + League after grassy league from Lincoln tower<br /> + To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen.<br /> + Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men,<br /> + Like a tall green volcano rose in power.<br /> +<br /> + Plain living and long drinking are no more,<br /> + And pure religion reading 'Household Words',<br /> + And sturdy manhood sitting still all day<br /> + Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core;<br /> + While my digestion, like the House of Lords,<br /> + The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. +</p> + <p> + I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that has + haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is + hopeless to disentangle it now. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"></a> + THE THING + </h2> + <p> + The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like the + war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken free. + For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and physical, + like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing itself was + walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of beech. + </p> + <p> + Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have + been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from its + enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations tend to + perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this we hear + much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the spirit of + religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of the same + stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded that just as + church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are not knowledge, + and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to find people in the + big cities who can read and write quickly enough to be clerks, but who are + actually ignorant of the daily movements of the sun and moon. + </p> + <p> + The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one + watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government arose + among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the ancients) + out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. The notion of + self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes of it seem to + think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be consulted as one + consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked a lot of fancy + questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows are to be, + within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. They shall + decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of the spade or + the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the valley shall be + devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the men of the town + shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or splendid with + spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather under a + patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in case the + word “man” be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral atmosphere, + this original soul of self-government, the women always have quite as much + influence as the men. But in modern England neither the men nor the women + have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the moulding of the + landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people are utterly + impotent. They stand and stare at imperial and economic processes going + on, as they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + </p> + <p> + Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place which + really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for good or + evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever it is) is + advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the villas advance + in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates into which England + has long been divided are passing out of the hands of the English gentry + into the hands of men who are always upstarts and often actually + foreigners. + </p> + <p> + Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was + really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate + whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a + gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps + they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that the + filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof over + his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say in, if he + is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange trend of + recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over and treat + as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa is as + incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all Lancashire + were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium were flooded by the + sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a moneylender is a minor and + exceptional necessity. In reality it is a thing like a German invasion. + Sometimes it is a German invasion. + </p> + <p> + Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes + round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It is + believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of + self-government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions + about everything except what he understands. The examination paper of the + Election generally consists of some such queries as these: “I. Are the + green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your opinion + fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the President of + the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you think that the + savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy and hygienic as + the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? IV. Did the lost + Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III reserve the right + of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of what America thinks + of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst thinks of the state + of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the two persons in + frock-coats placed before you at this election.” + </p> + <p> + Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that + the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions like + these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and + Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether + farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether + stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But these + are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to touch + with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and divine + mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he knows + nothing about. The name of self-government is noisy everywhere: the Thing + is throttled. + </p> + <p> + The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; in + scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances of + martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of Napoleon + and all the tongues of terror with which the Thing has gone forth: the + spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning only a + branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of the great + country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would have + happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"></a> + THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + </h2> + <p> + The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, if + he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes + nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific or + skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution and + Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But + especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the + writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For + the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + </p> + <p> + Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, perhaps, + the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as possible, and from + it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right mode in which all real + results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which is confusing all our + current discussions, especially our discussions about the relations of the + sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I notice an object which is often + mentioned in the higher and subtler of these debates about the sexes: I + mean a poker. I will take a poker and think about it; first forwards and + then backwards; and so, perhaps, show what I mean. + </p> + <p> + The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin + somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star + the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, + comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only + naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his + shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He might + almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone bathing and + left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat upon the beaver + and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth for a waistcoat, + and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has no heat in his + hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must look for light + and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is cast. This is equally + true of his soul and of his body; he is the one creature that has lost his + heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a spiritual sense he has taken + leave of his senses; and even in a literal sense he has been unable to + keep his hair on. And just as this external need of his has lit in his + dark brain the dreadful star called religion, so it has lit in his hand + the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red flower called Fire. Fire, + the most magic and startling of all material things, is a thing known only + to man and the expression of his sublime externalism. It embodies all that + is human in his hearths and all that is divine on his altars. It is the + most human thing in the world; seen across wastes of marsh or medleys of + forest, it is veritably the purple and golden flag of the sons of Eve. But + there is about this generous and rejoicing thing an alien and awful + quality: the quality of torture. Its presence is life; its touch is death. + Therefore, it is always necessary to have an intermediary between + ourselves and this dreadful deity; to have a priest to intercede for us + with the god of life and death; to send an ambassador to the fire. That + priest is the poker. Made of a material more merciless and warlike than + the other instruments of domesticity, hammered on the anvil and born + itself in the flame, the poker is strong enough to enter the burning fiery + furnace, and, like the holy children, not be consumed. In this heroic + service it is often battered and twisted, but is the more honourable for + it, like any other soldier who has been under fire. + </p> + <p> + Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right + view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong view + of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's + children, or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman + jump, as the clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to the + beginning, and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see things + in their right order, the one depending on the other in degree of purpose + and importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man and the + man for the glory of God. + </p> + <p> + This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, + Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in an + opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:—A modern + intellectual comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not + begin with any dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about the + mystery of fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and the + first thing he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, “Poor + poker; it's crooked.” Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and is told + that there is a thing in the world (with which his temperament has + hitherto left him unacquainted)—a thing called fire. He points out, + very kindly and clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want a + straight poker, to put it into a chemical combustion which will very + probably heat and warp it. “Let us abolish fire,” he says, “and then we + shall have perfectly straight pokers. Why should you want a fire at all?” + They explain to him that a creature called Man wants a fire, because he + has no fur or feathers. He gazes dreamily at the embers for a few seconds, + and then shakes his head. “I doubt if such an animal is worth preserving,” + he says. “He must eventually go under in the cosmic struggle when pitted + against well-armoured and warmly protected species, who have wings and + trunks and spires and scales and horns and shaggy hair. If Man cannot live + without these luxuries, you had better abolish Man.” At this point, as a + rule, the crowd is convinced; it heaves up all its clubs and axes, and + abolishes him. At least, one of him. + </p> + <p> + Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's welfare, + let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a straightforward + way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern movements may be + right; but let them be defended because they are right, not because they + are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the actual woman or man in + the street, who is cold; like mankind before the finding of fire. Do not + let us begin with the end of the last red-hot discussion—like the + end of a red hot poker. Imperialism may be right. But if it is right, it + is right because England has some divine authority like Israel, or some + human authority like Rome; not because we have saddled ourselves with + South Africa, and don't know how to get rid of it. Socialism may be true. + But if it is true, it is true because the tribe or the city can really + declare all land to be common land, not because Harrod's Stores exist and + the commonwealth must copy them. Female suffrage may be just. But if it is + just, it is just because women are women, not because women are sweated + workers and white slaves and all sorts of things that they ought never to + have been. Let not the Imperialist accept a colony because it is there, + nor the Suffragist seize a vote because it is lying about, nor the + Socialist buy up an industry merely because it is for sale. + </p> + <p> + Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal + decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies proved that + we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall some day + want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and not, in + mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female suffrage, + let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as the male + blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be Socialism, let + it be social; that is, as different as possible from all the big + commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman tailor does + not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more cloth. The + really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing conditions, he + denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some deeply planted + tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at last into tiny twigs; + and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is trying to bend the tree + by a twig: to alter England through a distant colony, or to capture the + State through a small State department, or to destroy all voting through a + vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise who resists this temptation of + trivial triumph or surrender, and happy (in an echo of the Roman poet) who + remembers the roots of things. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"></a> + THE NAMELESS MAN + </h2> + <p> + There are only two forms of government—the monarchy or personal + government, and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a + government; England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. But + there is one real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the method + of abstract democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal government + politics are so much more personal. In France and America, where the State + is an abstraction, political argument is quite full of human details—some + might even say of inhuman details. But in England, precisely because we + are ruled by personages, these personages do not permit personalities. In + England names are honoured, and therefore names are suppressed. But in the + republics, in France especially, a man can put his enemies' names into his + article and his own name at the end of it. + </p> + <p> + This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our + anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We + should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, + for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, and + have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, I had + little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for + anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity is + safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact that + you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a proof + that you ought to publish it. + </p> + <p> + But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name to + his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and it is + never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a man's name + is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person today is + eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For instance, we all + read with earnestness and patience the pages of the 'Daily Mail', and + there are times when we feel moved to cry, “Bring to us the man who + thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture him, take great care + of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some precious bale of silk, + that we may look upon the face of the man who desires such things to be + printed. Let us know his name; his social and medical pedigree.” But in + the modern muddle (it might be said) how little should we gain if those + frankly fatuous sheets were indeed subscribed by the man who had inspired + them. Suppose that after every article stating that the Premier is a + piratical Socialist there were printed the simple word “Northcliffe.” What + does that simple word suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul + (uninstructed otherwise) it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in + the wintry seas towards the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the + top of this crag the fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, + of course, I know that the word does not mean this; it means another Fleet + Street journalist like myself or only different from myself in so far as + he has sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a jolly time. + </p> + <p> + A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not distinguish. + A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a hiding-place. + </p> + <p> + But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not + merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic + titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been essentially + unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in which titles + originated. In essential nonsense of application there is nothing to + choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk means (as my + exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the Leader of + Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government or for it. + All government is representative government until it begins to decay. + Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to decay the + instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant as envoys of + democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in becoming + aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of Norfolk ought + simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + </p> + <p> + I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of + Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very high + at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, ought to + end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences with the + word “together”; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus I shall expect + the Duke of Norfolk to say: “I beg to second the motion together”; or + “This is a great constitutional question together.” I shall expect him to + know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers above them; to know + about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to know too much about anything + else. Of mountains he must be wildly and ludicrously ignorant. He must + have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even the flatness of Norfolk. He must + remind me of the watery expanses, the great square church towers and the + long level sunsets of East England. If he does not do this, I decline to + know him. + </p> + <p> + I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I + lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that + his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot with + romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but clotted + cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna Doone', and be + unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he must regard with + some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I should expect the + Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and dreamy ardour of + the Celtic fringe. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and + that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke of + Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point is + that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do we + find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, his + locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, the + thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a gouty + admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: you will + hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande dame, and + behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These are light + complications of the central fact of the falsification of all names and + ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediæval knights who should have + exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule seems to be + that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; and that the + Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so long as they are + not Cornish. + </p> + <p> + The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England is + an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, as some + say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and paralysis of + China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that it calls cats + dogs and describes the sun as the moon—and is very particular about + the preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and to be carefully + wrong, that is the definition of decadence. The disease called aphasia, in + which people begin by saying tea when they mean coffee, commonly ends in + their silence. Silence of this stiff sort is the chief mark of the + powerful parts of modern society. They all seem straining to keep things + in rather than to let things out. For the kings of finance speechlessness + is counted a way of being strong, though it should rather be counted a way + of being sly. By this time the Parliament does not parley any more than + the Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper editors and proprietors are more + despotic and dangerous by what they do not utter than by what they do. We + have all heard the expression “golden silence.” The expression “brazen + silence” is the only adequate phrase for our editors. If we wake out of + this throttled, gaping, and wordless nightmare, we must awake with a yell. + The Revolution that releases England from the fixed falsity of its present + position will be not less noisy than other revolutions. It will contain, I + fear, a great deal of that rude accomplishment described among little boys + as “calling names”; but that will not matter much so long as they are the + right names. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"></a> + THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + </h2> + <p> + Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. Indeed, + the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on + cooperation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French + Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its + proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The + essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by + yourself. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates the + things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and + suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest + approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the + country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached + to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean the + small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized gardens; + who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and who + frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the + characteristics of the true Peasant—especially the characteristics + that people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which is + the consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even disliked + sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because (like Micaiah) + he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The English gardener is + grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even economical. Nor is this + (as the reader's lightning wit will flash back at me) merely because the + English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. The type does exist in pure + South England blood and speech; I have spoken to the type. I was speaking + to the type only the other evening, when a rather odd little incident + occurred. + </p> + <p> + It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and + radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it is of + the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and hackneyed + line about coming “before the swallow dares.” Spring never is Spring + unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, without + any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in heaven. The + gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is needless to explain the + causes of this difference; it would be to tell the tremendous history of + two souls. It is needless because there is a more immediate explanation of + the case: the gardener and I, if not equal in agreement, were at least + equal in difference. It is quite certain that he would not have allowed me + to touch the garden if I had gone down on my knees to him. And it is by no + means certain that I should have consented to touch the garden if he had + gone down on his knees to me. His activity and my idleness, therefore, + went on steadily side by side through the long sunset hours. + </p> + <p> + And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not + sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about the + earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and the + flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a herald. He + possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while I only + possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than coal-owners know + about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they are brought above the + surface of the earth. I know more about gardens than railway shareholders + seem to know about railways: for at least I know that it needs a man to + make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But as I walked on that grass my + ignorance overwhelmed me—and yet that phrase is false, because it + suggests something like a storm from the sky above. It is truer to say + that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like a mine dug long before; and + indeed it was dug before the beginning of the ages. Green bombs of bulbs + and seeds were bursting underneath me everywhere; and, so far as my + knowledge went, they had been laid by a conspirator. I trod quite uneasily + on this uprush of the earth; the Spring is always only a fruitful + earthquake. With the land all alive under me I began to wonder more and + more why this man, who had made the garden, did not own the garden. If I + stuck a spade into the ground, I should be astonished at what I found + there...and just as I thought this I saw that the gardener was astonished + too. + </p> + <p> + Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by + the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It + was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, I + believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + </p> + <p> + If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can + explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: + and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came + there I have not a notion—unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his + hurry to get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold + recital of facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under the + earth there, for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a + treasure without a Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it + will never be found, for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams + of avarice since I know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. + And, for the other party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the + garden. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw that + answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not belong to + the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than simply putting + the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only underground seed that + I could understand. Only by having a little more of that dull, battered + yellow substance could I manage to be idle while he was active. I am not + altogether idle myself; but the fact remains that the power is in the thin + slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, not in the strong square and curve + of metal which we call the Spade. And then I suddenly remembered that as I + had found gold on my ground by accident, so richer men in the north and + west counties had found coal in their ground, also by accident. + </p> + <p> + I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, + but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and + then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he + would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But a + little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not get + a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering and + unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such accidental and + irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? Perhaps he dimly + felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that buried treasure is a + thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps he thought there was a + curse on such capital: on the coal of the coal-owners, on the gold of the + gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"></a> + THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + </h2> + <p> + The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was stated + wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best men from + devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a fanatical + conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote themselves to + politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and babies and things + like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in party politics, I wish + there was more of it. The real danger of the two parties with their two + policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of the ordinary citizen. + They make him barren instead of creative, because he is never allowed to + do anything except prefer one existing policy to another. We have not got + real Democracy when the decision depends upon the people. We shall have + real Democracy when the problem depends upon the people. The ordinary man + will decide not only how he will vote, but what he is going to vote about. + </p> + <p> + It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations + towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all + questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of the + suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not the + quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting about. A + certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses and the + highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they must go + down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but only which + they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it thus. The + Suffragettes—if one may judge by their frequent ringing of his bell—want + to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion what it is. Let us say + (for the sake of argument) that they want to paint him green. We will + suppose that it is entirely for that simple purpose that they are always + seeking to have private interviews with him; it seems as profitable as any + other end that I can imagine to such an interview. Now, it is possible + that the Government of the day might go in for a positive policy of + painting Mr. Asquith green; might give that reform a prominent place in + their programme. Then the party in opposition would adopt another policy, + not a policy of leaving Mr. Asquith alone (which would be considered + dangerously revolutionary), but some alternative course of action, as, for + instance, painting him red. Then both sides would fling themselves on the + people, they would both cry that the appeal was now to the Caesar of + Democracy. A dark and dramatic air of conflict and real crisis would arise + on both sides; arrows of satire would fly and swords of eloquence flame. + The Greens would say that Socialists and free lovers might well want to + paint Mr. Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole town red. Socialists + would indignantly reply that Socialism was the reverse of disorder, and + that they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red so that he might resemble + the red pillar-boxes which typified State control. The Greens would + passionately deny the charge so often brought against them by the Reds; + they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith green in order that he might + be invisible on the green benches of the Commons, as certain terrified + animals take the colour of their environment. + </p> + <p> + There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, + flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, “Keep the Red + Flag Flying,” and the other, “The Wearing of the Green.” But when the last + effort had been made and the last moment come, when two crowds were + waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the declaration of + the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now for democracy to + do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her head in awful + loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. Yet this might + not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in awful loneliness + and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale blue. The democracy + of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed to make up a policy for + itself, might have desired him to be black with pink spots. It might even + have liked him as he is now. But a huge apparatus of wealth, power, and + printed matter has made it practically impossible for them to bring home + these other proposals, even if they would really prefer them. No + candidates will stand in the spotted interest; for candidates commonly + have to produce money either from their own pockets or the party's; and in + such circles spots are not worn. No man in the social position of a + Cabinet Minister, perhaps, will commit himself to the pale-blue theory of + Mr. Asquith; therefore it cannot be a Government measure, therefore it + cannot pass. + </p> + <p> + Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will declare + dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes it, that red and + green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE OBSERVER will say: + “No one who knows the solid framework of politics or the emphatic first + principles of an Imperial people can suppose for a moment that there is + any possible compromise to be made in such a matter; we must either fulfil + our manifest racial destiny and crown the edifice of ages with the august + figure of a Green Premier, or we must abandon our heritage, break our + promise to the Empire, fling ourselves into final anarchy, and allow the + flaming and demoniac image of a Red Premier to hover over our dissolution + and our doom.” The DAILY MAIL would say: “There is no halfway house in + this matter; it must be green or red. We wish to see every honest + Englishman one colour or the other.” And then some funny man in the + popular Press would star the sentence with a pun, and say that the DAILY + MAIL liked its readers to be green and its paper to be read. But no one + would even dare to whisper that there is such a thing as yellow. + </p> + <p> + For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly examples + than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But I could + give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which I refer. + In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually insisted in + every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and that it was + only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It was not + inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to make peace + with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with their + conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been better for + us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and prestige, if we + had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a matter of opinion. + What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was not, as was said, the + only possible course; there were plenty of other courses; there were + plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the discussion about + Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind that we must + choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they call + Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean that + anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral philosophy of + the young Horner—and say what a good boy he is for helping himself. + </p> + <p> + It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a + Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this + moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary + to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I + should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply + not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal + order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound + scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might have + peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry George; we + might have a number of tiny communes; we might have co-operation; we might + have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred things. I am not saying + that any of these are right, though I cannot imagine that any of them + could be worse than the present social madhouse, with its top-heavy rich + and its tortured poor; but I say that it is an evidence of the stiff and + narrow alternative offered to the civic mind, that the civic mind is not, + generally speaking, conscious of these other possibilities. The civic mind + is not free or alert enough to feel how much it has the world before it. + There are at least ten solutions of the Education question, and no one + knows which Englishmen really want. For Englishmen are only allowed to + vote about the two which are at that moment offered by the Premier and the + Leader of the Opposition. There are ten solutions of the drink question; + and no one knows which the democracy wants; for the democracy is only + allowed to fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + </p> + <p> + So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer + questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political + aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably + cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be rather + careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and + self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less + democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of + slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both of + them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification of + taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much + alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold—and then + for a great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"></a> + THE MAD OFFICIAL + </h2> + <p> + Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very + nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all my + friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of + moderns; I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of + thinking before he comes to the first chance of living. + </p> + <p> + But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man + does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a certain + dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very atmosphere + of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his madness, he + would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel or cryptograms + in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, which are on his + nose night and day. If once he could take off the spectacles he would + smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the Sixth Seal or the + Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible first principle. If he + could once see the first principle, he would see that it is not there. + </p> + <p> + This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur + not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard to + pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental + degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a + real test. A nation is not going mad when it does extravagant things, so + long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting their + beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other Harmodius + and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these are wild + things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + </p> + <p> + But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State + is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, + this would logically allow me to fire off fifty-nine enormous field-guns + day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man doing + it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the neighbours + putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing merely because + it might happen to fulfill the letter of my license. + </p> + <p> + Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I know) + to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should not be + surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England there is + practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be surprised even at + the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he lived long under the + English landlord system, might do anything. But I should be surprised at + the people who consented to stand it. I should, in other words, think the + world a little mad if the incident, were received in silence. + </p> + <p> + Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every + day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. All blows fall + soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a passive as + well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of the nerves to + respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural stimulation. There + are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here and there in history, + which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from glory to insignificance, or + from freedom to slavery, not only in silence, but with serenity. The face + still smiles while the limbs, literally and loathsomely, are dropping from + the body. These are peoples that have lost the power of astonishment at + their own actions. When they give birth to a fantastic fashion or a + foolish law, they do not start or stare at the monster they have brought + forth. They have grown used to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; + and the whirlwind is the breath of their nostrils. These nations are + really in danger of going off their heads en masse; of becoming one vast + vision of imbecility, with toppling cities and crazy country-sides, all + dotted with industrious lunatics. One of these countries is modern + England. + </p> + <p> + Now here is an actual instance, a small case of how our social conscience + really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in realisation; a + thing without the light of mind in it. I take this paragraph from a daily + paper:—“At Epping, yesterday, Thomas Woolbourne, a Lambourne + labourer, and his wife were summoned for neglecting their five children. + Dr. Alpin said he was invited by the inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to visit + defendants' cottage. Both the cottage and the children were dirty. The + children looked exceedingly well in health, but the conditions would be + serious in case of illness. Defendants were stated to be sober. The man + was discharged. The woman, who said she was hampered by the cottage having + no water supply and that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' + imprisonment. The sentence caused surprise, and the woman was removed + crying, 'Lord save me!'” + </p> + <p> + I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of + some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces + and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the + accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning + has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago that + can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of reason + to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + </p> + <p> + I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman + was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for being + ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a matter of + fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. The doctor was + called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Was this + woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Did the doctor say + she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Was these any + evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of cruelty? Not a rap. The worse + that the doctor could work himself up to saying was that though the + children were “exceedingly” well, the conditions would be serious in case + of illness. If the doctor will tell me any conditions that would be comic + in case of illness, I shall attach more weight to his argument. + </p> + <p> + Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has gone mad. + He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite literally and + practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, Quis docebit ipsum + doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly unnatural thing; + instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect of children is a + natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is a mere difference of + degree that divides extending arms and legs in calisthenics and extending + them on the rack. It is a mere difference of degree that separates any + operation from any torture. The thumb-screw can easily be called Manicure. + Being pulled about by wild horses can easily be called Massage. The modern + problem is not so much what people will endure as what they will not + endure. But I fear I interrupt.... The boiling oil is boiling; and the + Tenth Mandarin is already reciting the “Seventeen Serious Principles and + the Fifty-three Virtues of the Sacred Emperor.” + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"></a> + THE ENCHANTED MAN + </h2> + <p> + When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, who + acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, it is + the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very late. + This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late comers + had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English audience + always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and (as I have + found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable taunts rather + than come forward. The English are a modest people; that is why they are + entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to be immodest. In + theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in most playhouses + we find the bored people in front and the eager people behind. + </p> + <p> + As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored person; + but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus required to + sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in the dramatic + world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all critics have to + take off their heads. The people behind will have a chance then. And as it + happens, in this case, I had not so much taken off my head as lost it. I + had lost it on the road; on that strange journey that was the cause of my + coming in late. I have a troubled recollection of having seen a very good + play and made a very bad speech; I have a cloudy recollection of talking + to all sorts of nice people afterwards, but talking to them jerkily and + with half a head, as a man talks when he has one eye on a clock. + </p> + <p> + And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, hung + uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure for such + bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I was moonstruck. A + lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had inexplicably got in + between me and all other scenes. If any one had asked me I could not have + said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing had occurred to me; except the + breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge of a hill. It was not an + adventure; it was a vision. + </p> + <p> + I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small car + that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as night + blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way + increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. + Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a yet + steeper road like a ladder. + </p> + <p> + At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower of + Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, and + the driver saying that “it couldn't be done.” I got out of the car and + suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + </p> + <p> + From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which I + am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his great + patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts of South + Africa, he made use of the expression “the illimitable veldt.” The word + “veldt” is Dutch, and the word “illimitable” is Double Dutch. But the + meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him a sense + of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. Well, if + he never found it in England it was because he never looked for it in + England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable veldts. + I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many different + hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite horizon, free + and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little more desolate + than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as that English hill + was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + </p> + <p> + I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if at + a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on that + freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost + fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening + forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an abyss + which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless only + because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries had been + swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the hills. I + could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if I hurled + huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had bewitched + the landscape: but that again does not express the best or worst of it. + All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so inhuman that it + has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on them; that is the + nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking at the back of the + world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the universe in the + rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon an unconscious + creation. + </p> + <p> + I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it + is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about + its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in + some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical + phrases of the populace, “a God-forsaken place.” Yet something was present + there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. Then + suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. It had + been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales about + princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were in a land + where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The moon looked at + me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; the one white + eye of the world. + </p> + <p> + There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a + point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There + were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for they + were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration which is + the transition from life to art. But all the time I was mesmerised by the + moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted things. The poacher shot + pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the wife hid pheasants; they + were all (especially the policeman) as true as death. But there was + something more true to death than true to life about it all: the figures + were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or fear or custom such as does not + cramp the movements of the poor men of other lands. I looked at the + poacher and the policeman and the gun; then at the gun and the policeman + and the poacher; and I could find no name for the fancy that haunted and + escaped me. The poacher believed in the Game Laws as much as the + policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed in the Game Laws, but + protected them as well as him. She got a promise from her husband that he + would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he kept it I doubt; I fancy he + sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. But I am sure he never shot a + policeman. For we live in an enchanted land. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"></a> + THE SUN WORSHIPPER + </h2> + <p> + There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. And + in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in that + sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the warning + to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as fate, if + they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that argument + will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and the slave. + To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, so to speak, + in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern doctrine, + taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is called the + materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: that all the + important things in history are rooted in an economic motive. In short, + history is a science; a science of the search for food. + </p> + <p> + Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely + untrue, but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too feebly + to say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would not have + any history if he were only economic. The need for food is certainly + universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows have an economic + motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal delicacies may be in + a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass anywhere and never eats + anything else. In short, the cow does fulfill the materialist theory of + history: that is why the cow has no history. “A History of Cows” would be + one of the simplest and briefest of standard works. But if some cows + thought it wicked to eat long grass and persecuted all who did so; if the + cow with the crumpled horn were worshipped by some cows and gored to death + by others; if cows began to have obvious moral preferences over and above + a desire for grass, then cows would begin to have a history. They would + also begin to have a highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same + thing. + </p> + <p> + The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually + outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that + is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men are + far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we have + made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended on + economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two + legs. It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a + condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly a + soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two + legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or a + coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or no + information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy + romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating + millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported on + legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more + generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much grander + and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the hills and + see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the horizon broken by + crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + </p> + <p> + So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. + But history—the whole point of history—precisely is that some + two legged soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical + structure, did not. The whole point of history precisely is: some people + (like poets and tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while + others (such as millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun of + bothering about it. There would be no history if there were only economic + history. All the historical events have been due to the twists and turns + given to the economic instinct by forces that were not economic. For + instance, this theory traces the French war of Edward III to a quarrel + about the French wines. Any one who has even smelt the Middle Ages must + feel fifty answers spring to his lips; but in this case one will suffice. + There would have been no such war, then, if we all drank water like cows. + But when one is a man one enters the world of historic choice. The act of + drinking wine is one that requires explanation. So is the act of not + drinking wine. + </p> + <p> + But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + </p> + <p> + When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, an + ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said that + they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was eagerly + taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do not see why + it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable uprisings in + history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is generally + rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on the sudden and + mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from captivity. The English + strikers used some barren republican formula (arid as the definitions of + the medieval schoolmen), some academic shibboleth about being free men and + not being forced to work except for a wage accepted by them. Just in the + same way the Israelites in Egypt employed some dry scholastic quibble + about the extreme difficulty of making bricks with nothing to make them + of. But whatever fantastic intellectual excuses they may have put forward + for their strange and unnatural conduct in walking out when the prison + door was open, there can be no doubt that the real cause was the warm + weather. Such a climate notoriously also produces delusions and horrible + fancies, such as Mr. Kipling describes. And it was while their brains were + disordered by the heat that the Jews fancied that they were founding a + nation, that they were led by a prophet, and, in short, that they were + going to be of some importance in the affairs of the world. + </p> + <p> + Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was + pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + </p> + <p> + In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself in + accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at these + words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three times), and + I rather think that exceptions might be found to the principle. Yet it is + not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my belief in it. + </p> + <p> + No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by + which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of + class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not + leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave + off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high + interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to + what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years ago. + The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking because + they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy confirmation + from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges and other + persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition to strike. I + have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my own; and I + continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to steal a phrase + from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that is other than the + elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + </p> + <p> + When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really + time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession of + what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of the + mediæval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing from a + slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land rather than + the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could not be + raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the lord rode + down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he had the chance + of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the means of production. + </p> + <p> + Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; and + something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is no + doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we have + destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in serfdom; + nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich man has + entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in the modern + industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They can only + find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such competitive + and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + </p> + <p> + Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts + inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That + retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. + Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows or the + Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more dreamed of + than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. He owned all the + birds that passed over his land: he might as well have owned all the + clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's land to Brown's + land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. The logical answer + to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's land ought to be able to + prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp without a muzzle. + </p> + <p> + Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep in + the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A + landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way that + a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or on a + seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense of fun) + as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + </p> + <p> + The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings would + fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike or + deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the passerby. + That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A man in England + can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in the name of God. + </p> + <p> + You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor + to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have + still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: that + weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the working + of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had this last + retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat was also + perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. Whereupon + the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at your Boards + and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you opened on + them the eyes of owls, and said, “It must be the sunshine.” You could only + go on saying, “The sun, the sun.” That was what the man in Ibsen said, + when he had lost his wits. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"></a> + THE WRONG INCENDIARY + </h2> + <p> + I stood looking at the Coronation Procession—I mean the one in + Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I believe, + had some success in London—and I was seriously impressed. Most of my + life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that I was quite + right. Never before have I realised how right I was in maintaining that + the small area expresses the real patriotism: the smaller the field the + taller the tower. There were things in our local procession that did not + (one might even reverently say, could not) occur in the London procession. + One of the most prominent citizens in our procession (for instance) had + his face blacked. Another rode on a pony which wore pink and blue + trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan affair, and therefore my + assertion is subject to such correction as the eyewitness may always offer + to the absentee. But I believe with some firmness that no such features + occurred in the London pageant. + </p> + <p> + But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of + something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my + garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind + of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead + trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, + reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material and + mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the day + when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather + strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any sort + of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + </p> + <p> + In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I + supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose + stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out + cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big + stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also a + strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every now + and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew what + it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across two + meadows smote me where I stood. “Oh, my holy aunt,” I thought, “they've + mistaken the Coronation Day.” + </p> + <p> + And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like a + bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close to + the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink with + the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted as black + as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart edged with + a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured like a scarlet + snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of light. + </p> + <p> + I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling + noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The + heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if some + giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I had + not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; but + the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered the + grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the last + fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and cavernous; + and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the dark and + magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a rood past me; + then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell him where the + fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought it was the + cottages by the wood-yard. He said, “My God!” and vanished. + </p> + <p> + A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and + the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were dim + huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The + fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which + seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a + very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that + most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in + dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of + midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that the + fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard itself. + There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly accidental; + though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and revenge. But + for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a swollen, + tragic, portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something to do with + the crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end of England. It + was not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad daylight next + morning that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight adventure had + not happened outside this world. + </p> + <p> + But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or + Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was + feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles of + virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good things were + being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, walking-sticks, + wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for girls I could hear + the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the flames. And then I + thought of that other noble tower of needless things that stood in the + field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of vanities, that is + meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in the meadow, and the + birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and spangled its twigs. + And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, the Bad Fire and the + Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of Bonfire. And the paradox + is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of things that we do not + want; but the Bad Fire is made of good things, of things that we do want; + like all that wealth of wood that might have made dolls and chairs and + tables, but was only making a hueless ash. + </p> + <p> + And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there + are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race + between them. Which will happen first—the revolution in which bad + things shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things shall + perish also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most + conservative, really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the + face of the well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the + throat of despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is + possible, take tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into + bundles and burn them. And the other is the disruption that may come + prematurely, negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my + little town. + </p> + <p> + It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in + it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and fair + ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two + revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway + trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the + tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a + cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout + like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a blazing + pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one could fancy it + visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along the terraces of + the Chiltern Hills. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"></a> + THE FREE MAN + </h2> + <p> + The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men find + it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally to the + fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save their lives by + law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked Coleridge for + praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun to be free. It + seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the sun. Speaking as a + Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of Joshua stopping the + sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting his daily round in + imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, and his astronomical + act was distinctly revolutionary. For all revolution is the mastering of + matter by the spirit of man, the emergence of that human authority within + us which, in the noble words of Sir Thomas Browne, “owes no homage unto + the sun.” + </p> + <p> + Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant + merely to receive good laws, good food or good conditions, like a tree in + a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in selecting + and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning of the trade of + Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real idea of liberty + are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the word “make” about + most of the things in which freedom is essential, as a country walk or a + friendship or a love affair. When a man “makes his way” through a wood he + has really created, he has built a road, like the Romans. When a man + “makes a friend,” he makes a man. And in the third case we talk of a man + “making love,” as if he were (as, indeed, he is) creating new masses and + colours of that flaming material an awful form of manufacture. In its + primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in man, or, if you like the + word, the artist. + </p> + <p> + In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the + citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men + are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the + eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, + bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing the + citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the State. + You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may call the bees a + despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who attempted to + introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a career as curt and + fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm alone. The isolation + of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious character; but it is not + even in humanity by any means equally distributed. The idea that the State + should not only be supported by its children, like the ant-hill, but + should be constantly criticised and reconstructed by them, is an idea + stronger in Christendom than any other part of the planet; stronger in + Western than Eastern Europe. And touching the pure idea of the individual + being free to speak and act within limits, the assertion of this idea, we + may fairly say, has been the peculiar honour of our own country. For my + part I greatly prefer the Jingoism of Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of + The Recessional. I have no objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I draw + the line when she begins to rule the dry land—and such damnably dry + land too—as in Africa. And there was a real old English sincerity in + the vulgar chorus that “Britons never shall be slaves.” We had no equality + and hardly any justice; but freedom we were really fond of. And I think + just now it is worth while to draw attention to the old optimistic + prophecy that “Britons never shall be slaves.” + </p> + <p> + The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than it + has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy to + slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people up. + Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect + high-placed officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts + rather than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished the + Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed a law + (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not depend + upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have got hold + of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty is in the air. + A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square without a word of + accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says that in his opinion the + police are very nice people, and there is an end of the matter. A Member + of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. The Speaker says he must + not criticise a peerage, and there the matter drops. + </p> + <p> + Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of criticising + those flexible parts of the State which constantly require + reconsideration, not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, it + means the power of saying the sort of things that a decent but + discontented citizen wants to say. He does not want to spit on the Bible, + or to run about without clothes, or to read the worst page in Zola from + the pulpit of St. Paul's. Therefore the forbidding of these things + (whether just or not) is only tyranny in a secondary and special sense. It + restrains the abnormal, not the normal man. But the normal man, the decent + discontented citizen, does want to protest against unfair law courts. He + does want to expose brutalities of the police. He does want to make game + of a vulgar pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He does want publicly to warn + people against unscrupulous capitalists and suspicious finance. If he is + run in for doing this (as he will be) he does want to proclaim the + character or known prejudices of the magistrate who tries him. If he is + sent to prison (as he will be) he does want to have a clear and civilised + sentence, telling him when he will come out. And these are literally and + exactly the things that he now cannot get. That is the almost cloying + humour of the present situation. I can say abnormal things in modern + magazines. It is the normal things that I am not allowed to say. I can + write in some solemn quarterly an elaborate article explaining that God is + the devil; I can write in some cultured weekly an aesthetic fancy + describing how I should like to eat boiled baby. The thing I must not + write is rational criticism of the men and institutions of my country. + </p> + <p> + The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can + say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot say, + for instance, that—But I am afraid I must leave out that instance, + because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my case—because it is so + true. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"></a> + THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + </h2> + <p> + We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded that + he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is extreme, and + my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. But I never + quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at least from my + own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught my eye; and thus + the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite constantly walked into + another man's house, thinking it was my own house; my visits became almost + monotonous. But walking into my own house and thinking it was another + man's house is a flight of poetic detachment still beyond me. Something of + the sensations that such an absent-minded man must feel I really felt the + other day; and very pleasant sensations they were. The best parts of every + proper romance are the first chapter and the last chapter; and to knock at + a strange door and find a nice wife would be to concentrate the beginning + and end of all romance. + </p> + <p> + Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the same + kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin and + unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was treading + in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty years old. + </p> + <p> + It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost + unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were once + great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, as it says + in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is something + singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that were so long a + human property and care fighting for their own hand in the thicket. One + almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the dog evolved into a + wolf. + </p> + <p> + This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned out + for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite + threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years + ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone no + farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked + building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or + coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick of + which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a + blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; and + on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white which + always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of some + blind giant. + </p> + <p> + I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had + not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought + much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth + walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged + person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off than + childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal picture, + distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I stood; and + I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. They still + stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, as if they + had stood for centuries. + </p> + <p> + I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half slid + on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked off + the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but were + still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks off the + tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I had + recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And then I + came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with the sawdust + and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three green stars of + dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding road. + </p> + <p> + I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those years + ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this red and + white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more lonesome + than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could only be + full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of the ghosts + of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future as he can + find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediæval notion of + erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting on it a + miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I thought to + myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built boxes was + indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real miracle play; that + human family that is almost the holy one, and that human death that is + near to the last judgment. + </p> + <p> + For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row + especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. + Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; + and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and + solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction + upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the + convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + </p> + <p> + As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played the + fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in my pocket, + I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; things + addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had written up in + what I supposed to be the dining-room: + </p> +<p class="poem"> + James Harrogate, thank God for meat,<br /> + Then eat and eat and eat and eat, +</p> + <p> + or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric was + scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something beginning: + </p> +<p class="poem"> + When laying what you call your head,<br /> + O Harrogate, upon your bed, +</p> + <p> + and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite + vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, and the + places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in memory; for + when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century the house was + very different. + </p> + <p> + I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its + windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low square + windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream of + lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, was + standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy + sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the + wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that + lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express if + I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red chalk upon + the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to withdraw, a + mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct accents to a + very smart suburban maid, “Does Mr. James Harrogate live here?” + </p> + <p> + She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking for + him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I had one + moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then decided not + to look for him at all. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"></a> + THE PRIEST OF SPRING + </h2> + <p> + The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. But + it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty but of + revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect who will + fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to be + congratulated on fitting in with the Spring—or the Spring on fitting + in with Easter. + </p> + <p> + The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a story; + and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed very voluptuous + appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like mathematics, logic, or + chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind are like mere pleasures of the + body. That is, they are mere pleasures, though they may be gigantic + pleasures; they can never by a mere increase of themselves amount to + happiness. A man just about to be hanged may enjoy his breakfast; + especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and in the same way he may + enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, especially if it is his + favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy either of them does not depend + on either of them; it depends upon his spiritual attitude towards a + subsequent event. And that event is really interesting to the soul; + because it is the end of a story and (as some hold) the end of a person. + </p> + <p> + Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for our + scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about true + religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of + mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself + to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) + that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis or + Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, they have + got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is sufficiently + interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any particular mystery + or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to disguise them under + the image of a very handsome young man, which is a vastly more interesting + thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall of leaves in autumn and the + return of flowers in spring, the process of thought was quite different. + It is a process of thought which springs up spontaneously in all children + and young artists; it springs up spontaneously in all healthy societies. + It is very difficult to explain in a diseased society. + </p> + <p> + The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A + cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a + dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a + daydream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a + start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save + in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its + trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete + phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream + sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting in + of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was + asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to + rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by + certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were always + unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always + intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of “the + survival of the fittest,” meaning only the survival of the survivors; or + wherever a man says that the rich “have a stake in the country,” as if the + poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or where a + man talks about “going on towards Progress,” which only means going on + towards going on; or when a man talks about “government by the wise few,” + as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. “The wise few” must + mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very foolish who + think themselves wise. + </p> + <p> + There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves + saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am particularly + irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the nineteenth century, + especially in connection with the study of myths and religions. The + fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes the form of saying + “This god or hero really represents the sun.” Or “Apollo killing the + Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter.” Or “The King dying in + a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting in the west.” Now I should + really have thought that even the skeptical professors, whose skulls are + as shallow as frying-pans, might have reflected that human beings never + think or feel like this. Consider what is involved in this supposition. It + presumes that primitive man went out for a walk and saw with great + interest a big burning spot on the sky. He then said to primitive woman, + “My dear, we had better keep this quiet. We mustn't let it get about. The + children and the slaves are so very sharp. They might discover the sun any + day, unless we are very careful. So we won't call it 'the sun,' but I will + draw a picture of a man killing a snake; and whenever I do that you will + know what I mean. The sun doesn't look at all like a man killing a snake; + so nobody can possibly know. It will be a little secret between us; and + while the slaves and the children fancy I am quite excited with a grand + tale of a writhing dragon and a wrestling demigod, I shall really MEAN + this delicious little discovery, that there is a round yellow disc up in + the air.” One does not need to know much mythology to know that this is a + myth. It is commonly called the Solar Myth. + </p> + <p> + Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god was + never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a + hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend Dombey + is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods and + heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw the + sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress of + nightfall, and he said, “That is how the face of the god would shine when + he had slain the dragon,” or “That is how the whole world would bleed to + westward, if the god were slain at last.” + </p> + <p> + No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No man, + however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man as round + as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however attracted to + an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the Dryad was as lean + and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never worshipped Nature; and + indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all human beings are + superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon Nature, as God has + printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous sun to stand still; + we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more for a star than for a + starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we could not for the time + control, we have conceived great beings in human shape controlling them. + Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the march and victory of + Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is his, and he made it. In + other words, what the savage really said about the sea was, “Only my + fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of mere water.” What the + savage really said about the sun was, “Only my great great-grandfather + Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown.” + </p> + <p> + About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. I + say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that one of + them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are no real + ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real bank-notes. + Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to those of us + that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, even a false + god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the second place. When + once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before Him, offering flowers + in spring as flames in winter. “My love is like a red, red rose” does not + mean that the poet is praising roses under the allegory of a young lady. + “My love is an arbutus” does not mean that the author was a botanist so + pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he said he loved it. “Who art + the moon and regent of my sky” does not mean that Juliet invented Romeo to + account for the roundness of the moon. “Christ is the Sun of Easter” does + not mean that the worshipper is praising the sun under the emblem of + Christ. Goddess or god can clothe themselves with the spring or summer; + but the body is more than raiment. Religion takes almost disdainfully the + dress of Nature; and indeed Christianity has done as well with the snows + of Christmas as with the snow-drops of spring. And when I look across the + sun-struck fields, I know in my inmost bones that my joy is not solely in + the spring, for spring alone, being always returning, would be always sad. + There is somebody or something walking there, to be crowned with flowers: + and my pleasure is in some promise yet possible and in the resurrection of + the dead. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"></a> + THE REAL JOURNALIST + </h2> + <p> + Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of + reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce + between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is done. I + take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. Nothing + looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel columns, + its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its responsible, + polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter of fact, goes every + night through more agonies of adventure, more hairbreadth escapes, + desperate expedients, crucial councils, random compromises, or barely + averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it seems to come round as + automatically as the clock and as silently as the dawn. Seen from the + inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief every morning to see + that it has come out at all; that it has come out without the leading + article upside down or the Pope congratulated on discovering the North + Pole. + </p> + <p> + I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) from + the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little episode in + the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and instructive: the tale + of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There are really two stories: + the story as seen from the outside, by a man reading the paper; and the + story seen from the inside, by the journalists shouting and telephoning + and taking notes in shorthand through the night. + </p> + <p> + This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The + notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy + pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, long + calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant leader of + the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his fanatic soul. + In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not having the fear + of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote the line “that + wreathes its old fantastic roots so high.” This he said because he had + been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because he thought + craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and forgotten + rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that orthodox + gentleman made a howling error; and received some twenty-five letters and + post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the mistake. + </p> + <p> + But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it was + a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, and + cried, “What is the joke NOW?” Another professed (and practised, for all I + know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and failed to + find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, asking, as in + confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a noble collection; + but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and exactitude in the + recipient's profession and character which is far from the truth. Let us + pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + </p> + <p> + In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same + culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to + Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another cropper—or + whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was printed by the editor + with the justly scornful title, “Mr. Chesterton 'Explains'?” Any man + reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the meaning of the sarcastic + quotation marks. They meant, of course, “Here is a man who doesn't know + Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up and he can't even spell + Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation.” That is the perfectly + natural inference of the reader from the letter, the mistake, and the + headline—as seen from the outside. The falsehood was serious; the + editorial rebuke was serious. The stern editor and the sombre, baffled + contributor confront each other as the curtain falls. + </p> + <p> + And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly + rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really are. + A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a column in + the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it (which is always + at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded by infants of all + shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and he has to cope with + the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a glorious thing; but the + journalist in question has never understood why it was considered a + soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not of watering little budding + flowers, but of wrestling for hours with gigantic angels and devils. Moral + problems of the most monstrous complexity besiege him incessantly. He has + to decide before the awful eyes of innocence, whether, when a sister has + knocked down a brother's bricks, in revenge for the brother having taken + two sweets out of his turn, it is endurable that the brother should + retaliate by scribbling on the sister's picture book, and whether such + conduct does not justify the sister in blowing out the brother's + unlawfully lighted match. + </p> + <p> + Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest + morality, it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday + article; and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly calls + to somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for a + messenger; he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, + wondering what on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on the + door outside and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his thoughts; + and he is able to observe some newspapers and circulars in wrappers lying + on the table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second is a shiny + pamphlet about petrol; the third is a paper called The Christian + Commonwealth. He opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a page a + sentence with which he honestly disagrees. It says that the sense of + beauty in Nature is a new thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A stream + of images and pictures pour through his head, like skies chasing each + other or forests running by. “Not felt before Wordsworth!” he thinks. “Oh, + but this won't do... bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang... + night's candles are burnt out... glowed with living sapphires... leaving + their moon-loved maze... antique roots fantastic... antique roots wreathed + high... what is it in <i>As You Like It</i>?” + </p> + <p> + He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children + drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the + messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making the + world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making + Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting “fantastic + roots wreathed high” instead of “antique roots peep out.” Then the + journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma of + whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the sister + pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is how an + article is really written. + </p> + <p> + The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article + has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: but + the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the paper + and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his friends at + the other end; he knows that they can spell “Gray,” as no doubt they can: + but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a pencil scribble and + the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes at the top of the letter + “'G. K. C.' Explains,” putting the initials in quotation marks. The next + man passing it for press is bored with these initials (I am with him + there) and crosses them out, substituting with austere civility, “Mr. + Chesterton Explains.” But and now he hears the iron laughter of the Fates, + for the blind bolt is about to fall—but he neglects to cross out the + second “quote” (as we call it) and it goes up to press with a “quote” + between the last words. Another quotation mark at the end of “explains” + was the work of one merry moment for the printers upstairs. So the + inverted commas were lifted entirely off one word on to the other and a + totally innocent title suddenly turned into a blasting sneer. But that + would have mattered nothing so far, for there was nothing to sneer at. In + the same dark hour, however, there was a printer who was (I suppose) so + devoted to this Government that he could think of no Gray but Sir Edward + Grey. He spelt it “Grey” by a mere misprint, and the whole tale was + complete: first blunder, second blunder, and final condemnation. + </p> + <p> + That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic and + ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might remember it + when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged by the neck on + circumstantial evidence. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"></a> + THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + </h2> + <p> + Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most + romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch + blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; + that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it is + always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that they + have an eye to business. I like that phrase “an eye” to business. + </p> + <p> + Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his forehead. + It served him admirably for the only two duties which are demanded in a + modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties of counting sheep + and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out he was done for. But + the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though their best friends must + admit that they are occasionally business-like. They are, quite + fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this is proved by the very + economic argument that is used to prove their harshness and hunger for the + material. The mass of Scots have accepted the industrial civilisation, + with its factory chimneys and its famine prices, with its steam and smoke + and steel—and strikes. The mass of the Irish have not accepted it. + The mass of the Irish have clung to agriculture with claws of iron; and + have succeeded in keeping it. That is because the Irish, though far + inferior to the Scotch in art and literature, are hugely superior to them + in practical politics. You do need to be very romantic to accept the + industrial civilisation. It does really require all the old Gaelic glamour + to make men think that Glasgow is a grand place. Yet the miracle is + achieved; and while I was in Glasgow I shared the illusion. I have never + had the faintest illusion about Leeds or Birmingham. The industrial dream + suited the Scots. Here was a really romantic vista, suited to a romantic + people; a vision of higher and higher chimneys taking hold upon the + heavens, of fiercer and fiercer fires in which adamant could evaporate + like dew. Here were taller and taller engines that began already to shriek + and gesticulate like giants. Here were thunderbolts of communication which + already flashed to and fro like thoughts. It was unreasonable to expect + the rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot to stand still in such a whirl of wizardry + to ask whether he, the ordinary Scot, would be any the richer. + </p> + <p> + He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich + city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich men. + It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, Manchester, + Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, Munich, or + Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, perhaps, be due + to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots has there been + reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence of the Irish. In + any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main historical fact. The + Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal opportunities of + industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The Irish refused those + enormous and unequal opportunities, because the Irish are clear-sighted. + They would not need very clear sight by this time to see that in England + and Scotland the temptation has been a betrayal. The industrial system has + failed. + </p> + <p> + I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of + the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and the + widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with the + fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, when he + gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediæval + diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of + Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in + the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying to + be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full (as its + history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The wageslavery we + live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing in which the Scotch are + more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, than in their Scotch + wickedness. It is what makes the Master of Ballantrae the most thrilling + of all fictitious villains. It is what makes the Master of Lovat the most + thrilling of all historical villains. It is poetry. It is an intensity + which is on the edge of madness or (what is worse) magic. Well, the Scotch + have managed to apply something of this fierce romanticism even to the + lowest of all lordships and serfdoms; the proletarian inequality of today. + You do meet now and then, in Scotland, the man you never meet anywhere + else but in novels; I mean the self-made man; the hard, insatiable man, + merciless to himself as well as to others. It is not “enterprise”; it is + kleptomania. He is quite mad, and a much more obvious public pest than any + other kind of kleptomaniac; but though he is a cheat, he is not an + illusion. He does exist; I have met quite two of him. Him alone among + modern merchants we do not weakly flatter when we call him a bandit. + Something of the irresponsibility of the true dark ages really clings + about him. Our scientific civilisation is not a civilisation; it is a + smoke nuisance. Like smoke it is choking us; like smoke it will pass away. + Only of one or two Scotsmen, in my experience, was it true that where + there is smoke there is fire. + </p> + <p> + But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage of + this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all + chronicles, it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland + nearly everything has always been in revolt—especially loyalty. If + these people are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of + wrecking it; and the thought of my many good friends in that city makes me + really doubtful about which would figure in human memories as the more + huge calamity of the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so weak as + to call themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men weak enough + to believe them. + </p> + <p> + As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had + little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies who + used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes. They were not, however, + strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since they + worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked in the + mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment when I + saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. They + were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was the + finest thing they could do. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"></a> + THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + </h2> + <p> + A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are + and should be various, there must be some communication between them if + they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual + formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not + depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all start with + the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our different + visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees the sun as a + perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is an + impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The + colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to live + under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that there is + nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle (like a + monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is shut up in + the cell of a separate universe. + </p> + <p> + But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from the + denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the individual + become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world like a cloud; he + causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. For what happens + is this: that all the shortsighted people come together and build a city + called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for granted and paint + short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted policies. Meanwhile + all the men who can stare at the sun get together on Salisbury Plain and + do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who see a blue moon band + themselves together and assert the blue moon, not once in a blue moon, but + incessantly. So that instead of a small and varied group, you have + enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the liberty of dogma, you have the + tyranny of taste. + </p> + <p> + Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; perhaps + the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership by the organ + of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to production. If a + man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be any kind of man he + likes in any other sense—a bookie, a Mahatma, a man about town, an + archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling at the moment clear-headed + Socialists in all of these capacities, it is obvious that a clear-headed + Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a creed) can be a soldier, like Mr. + Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, or a Bathchairman like Mr. Meeke, or + a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, or an artistic tradesman like the late + Mr. William Morris. + </p> + <p> + But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by what + they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far more than + this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is, etc., etc. Now mark + their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be tradesmen, or + soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, but become a + particular sort of person who is always the same. When once it has been + discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic formula, it is + also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one particular kind of + clothes, reading one particular kind of books, hanging up one particular + kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases even eating one particular + kind of food. For men must recognise each other somehow. These men will + not know each other by a principle, like fellow citizens. They cannot know + each other by a smell, like dogs. So they have to fall back on general + colouring; on the fact that a man of their sort will have a wife in pale + green and Walter Crane's “Triumph of Labour” hanging in the hall. + </p> + <p> + There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost + made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret the + supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but embracing + all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan unity which is + founded rather on certain social habits, certain common notions, both + permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular social + pleasures. + </p> + <p> + Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) it + did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a thing + asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical + genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of + Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous + varnish. + </p> + <p> + And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a + creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to + believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of + religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; + the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people do + each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, with + heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which alone + holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own kind + outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and call each + other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call themselves + weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker in a general + atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off looking for somebody + else with whom to brawl. + </p> + <p> + This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been in + many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having got + beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to get beyond + catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from neglect of the + same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that they may differ on + everything else; that God gave men a law that they might turn it into + liberties. + </p> + <p> + There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife and + husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the + contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of + identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent + contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more + incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul cannot + possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first cousin. + There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; they are + generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to think the + same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to think the same + thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at it, in the last + extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing disgrace—this + really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; and it is much better + represented by a common religion than it is by affinities and auras. And + what applies to the family applies to the nation. A nation with a root + religion will be tolerant. A nation with no religion will be bigoted. + Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: that when men come together to + profess a creed, they come courageously, though it is to hide in catacombs + and caves. But when they come together in a clique they come sneakishly, + eschewing all change or disagreement, though it is to dine to a brass band + in a big London hotel. For birds of a feather flock together, but birds of + the white feather most of all. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"></a> + THE FOOL + </h2> + <p> + For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I had + been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think that he + was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; but + before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of him. + After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline to + think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately most + of them occupying important positions. When I say “him,” I mean the entire + idiot. + </p> + <p> + I have never been able to discover that “stupid public” of which so many + literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at tea + parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough so + to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have + heard brilliant “conversationalists” conversing with other people, the + conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of + intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other + people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their + stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find + the refreshment of a single fool. + </p> + <p> + But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous + brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle + of humour and good sense. The “mostly fools” theory has been used in an + anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I did + not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the + aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite + rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an idea + of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities of his + experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, not that + section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. They are often + cynical, especially about money, but even their boredom tends to make them + a little eager for any real information or originality. If a man like Mr. + Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up his mind for any reason to attack + Syndicalism he would find out what it was first. Not so the man I found in + the club. + </p> + <p> + He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black + clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the whole + suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one of those + who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some third + element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His manners + were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. They + involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I suddenly + remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old playgoers who + had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, “If I was the + Government,” and then put a cigar in his mouth which he lit carefully with + long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out of his mouth again and + said, “I'd give it 'em,” as if it were quite a separate sentence. But even + while his mouth was stopped with the cigar his companion or interlocutor + leaped to his feet and said with great heartiness, snatching up a hat, + “Well, I must be off. Tuesday!”. I dislike these dark suspicions, but I + certainly fancied I recognised the sudden geniality with which one takes + leave of a bore. + </p> + <p> + When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was to + me that he addressed the belated epigram. “I'd give it 'em.” + </p> + <p> + “What would you give them,” I asked, “the minimum wage?” + </p> + <p> + “I'd give them beans,” he said. “I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, every + man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's the whole + country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows standing + between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!” + </p> + <p> + “That would surely be a little harsh,” I pleaded. “After all, they are not + under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have commissions + in the Yeomanry.” + </p> + <p> + “Commissions in the Yeomanry!” he repeated, and his eyes and face, which + became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me + feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + </p> + <p> + “Besides,” I continued, “wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their + money?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow,” he said, “and I'd + confiscate their funds as well.” + </p> + <p> + “The policy is daring and full of difficulty,” I replied, “but I do not + say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But you + must remember that though the facts of property have become quite + fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These coal-owners, + though they have not earned the mines, though they could not work the + mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. Hence your + suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating their property, + raises very—” + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean?” asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. + “Who yer talking about?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm talking about what you were talking about,” I replied; “as you put it + so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing + between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their own + coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those prices, care + as little for national starvation as most merchant princes and pirates + have cared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples that were + enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a bit of a + revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme violence + you suggest. You say—” + </p> + <p> + “I say,” he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid + energy like that of some noble beast, “I say I'd take all these blasted + miners and—” + </p> + <p> + I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood + staring at that mental monster. + </p> + <p> + “Oh,” I said, “so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal + servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be + shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead they + will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem somewhat + moved. The fact is, I have just found something. Something I have been + looking for for years.” + </p> + <p> + “Well,” he asked, with no unfriendly stare, “and what have you found?” + </p> + <p> + “No,” I answered, shaking my head sadly, “I do not think it would be quite + kind to tell you what I have found.” + </p> + <p> + He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, and + we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the + disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country + sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county + magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important + companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + </p> + <p> + The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory this + article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the miner, who + is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He is not the + mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by selling his + coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic politician, + who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic opportunities. + But he is the man who appears in scores of public places open to the upper + middle class or (that less known but more powerful section) the lower + upper class. Men like this all over the country are really saying whatever + comes into their heads in their capacities of justice of the peace, + candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, old family doctor, Poor + Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in trade disputes. He + suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the brain; he has + softened it by always taking the view of everything most comfortable for + his country, his class, and his private personality. He is a deadly public + danger. But as I have given him his name at the beginning of this article + there is no need for me to repeat it at the end. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"></a> + THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + </h2> + <p> + Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And I think + the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to record as + plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on his mind by + anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of any modern + problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike was a flat + meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or two, he will + probably throw more light on the strike by describing this which he has + seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and the bloody + leaders of the mob whom he has never seen—nor any one else either. + If he comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as happened to a + friend of my grandfather) he should still remember that a true account of + the day after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to have. Though he + was on the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being murdered, we + should still like to have the wrong side described in the right way. Upon + this principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or military arrangements, + and have only held my breath like the rest of the world while France and + Germany were bargaining, will tell quite truthfully of a small scene I + saw, one of the thousand scenes that were, so to speak, the anterooms of + that inmost chamber of debate. + </p> + <p> + In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares of + a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray and + rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, like the + solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; the sloping + roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping with damp; + and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were scoured with + old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with many doors and + found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. I also found a + notice of services, etc., and among these I found the announcement that at + 11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there would be a special service + for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft of young men who were being + taken from their homes in that little town and sent to serve in the French + Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful moment, when the French Army was + encamped at a parting of the ways. There were already a great many people + there when I entered, not only of all kinds, but in all attitudes, + kneeling, sitting, or standing about. And there was that general sense + that strikes every man from a Protestant country, whether he dislikes the + Catholic atmosphere or likes it; I mean, the general sense that the thing + was “going on all the time”; that it was not an occasion, but a perpetual + process, as if it were a sort of mystical inn. + </p> + <p> + Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, + when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. They + were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French + conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young + criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so obviously + prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to them like hell; + others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so decent a place. + But it was not so much the mere class variety that most sharply caught an + Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those one or two kinds of + men who would never have become soldiers in any other way. + </p> + <p> + There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of + hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it may + be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. But + there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never tend to + soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red hair, + large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across the church + that he had always taken care of his health, not even from thinking about + it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one of those who pass + from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a man. In the row in + front of him there was a very slight and vivid little Jew, of the sort + that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those accidents that make real + life so unlike anything else, he was the one of the company who seemed + especially devout. Behind these stiff or sensitive boys were ranged the + ranks of their mothers and fathers, with knots and bunches of their little + brothers and sisters. + </p> + <p> + The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and gaped + at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying their + own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of rain outside + gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church continuously + darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn in odd, rather + strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but only one perpetual + refrain; so that it sounded like + </p> +<p class="poem"> + Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie,<br /> + Valdarkararump pour la patrie. +</p> + <p> + Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing + gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child + started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a + French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + </p> + <p> + I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline of + its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to talk + about “clericalism” and “militarism.” Those who talk like that are made of + the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate + “Socialism.” The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God and + the Mother of God were not “clericalists”; or, if they were, they had + forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not “militarists”—quite + the other way just then. The priest made a short speech; he did not utter + any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), he uttered platitudes. In such + circumstances platitudes are the only possible things to say; because they + are true. He began by saying that he supposed a large number of them would + be uncommonly glad not to go. They seemed to assent to this particular + priestly dogma with even more than their alleged superstitious credulity. + He said that war was hateful, and that we all hated it; but that “in all + things reasonable” the law of one's own commonwealth was the voice of God. + He spoke about Joan of Arc; and how she had managed to be a bold and + successful soldier while still preserving her virtue and practising her + religion; then he gave them each a little paper book. To which they + replied (after a brief interval for reflection): + </p> +<p class="poem"> + Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie,<br /> + Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. +</p> + <p> + which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + </p> + <p> + While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded about my + own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening church. + They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I cannot utter + them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me that we were + barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was happening + outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the windows + darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the nature of that + light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and hardly dared to + guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that enemies were + already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were groaning under + their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town itself had been + destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands of years hence, and + that if I opened the door I should come out on a wilderness as flat and + sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the veil of stone and slate + grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to see chasms cloven to the + foundations of all things, and letting up an infernal dawn. Huge things + happily hidden from us had climbed out of the abyss, and were striding + about taller than the clouds. And when the darkness crept from the + sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of St. John I fancied that some + hideous giant was walking round the church and looking in at each window + in turn. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a ship + carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes I + thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron chain + out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the wings + of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young men + inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things + outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + </p> + <p> + I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of + limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic + tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and his + mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the passes + of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies and + thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is + Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter + it now. + </p> + <p> + But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, but + only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters + announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"></a> + THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + </h2> + <p> + It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by + some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a man + sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State may + remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; when + the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + </p> + <p> + The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been + gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not merely + because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an aesthete—that + is, an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other people's bodies; he + tortured his own soul into the same red revolting shapes. Though he came + quite early in Roman Imperial history and was followed by many austere and + noble emperors, yet for us the Roman Empire was never quite cleansed of + that memory of the sexual madman. The populace or barbarians from whom we + come could not forget the hour when they came to the highest place of the + earth, saw the huge pedestal of the earthly omnipotence, read on it Divus + Caesar, and looked up and saw a statue without a head. + </p> + <p> + It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from + which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI was a + very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many good business + men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the torturer clung + about everything he did, even when it was right. And just as the great + Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so even the silver + splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, has never painted + out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis XI. Whenever the + unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible savour that humanity + finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the unhealthy man is on top; + but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or mad on statecraft, like + Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our tyrant is not the satyr + or the torturer; but the miser. + </p> + <p> + The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; + but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had some + touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected gold—a + substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory or old oak. An + old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the simple ardour, + something of the mystical materialism, of a child who picks out yellow + flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but coloured clay can be + very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is content with far less + genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like the glitter of buttercups, + the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, compared with the dreary + papers and dead calculations which make the hobby of the modern miser. + </p> + <p> + The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content + sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the mere + repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs to eggs. + And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many tramps and + savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man could find some + comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But the Yankee + millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his bed-head and + ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's stocking were + safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's ledger are safe + in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with their increase + depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least collects coins; + his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts collects nothings. + </p> + <p> + It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; + but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The + answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma for + us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is important; + because this special problem is separate from the old general quarrel + about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong books, old + and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers and privileges + have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out of the power of + the moderately rich as well as of the moderately poor. They are out of the + power of everybody except a few millionaires—that is, misers. In the + old normal friction of normal wealth and poverty I am myself on the + Radical side. I think that a Berkshire squire has too much power over his + tenants; that a Brompton builder has too much power over his workmen; that + a West London doctor has too much power over the poor patients in the West + London Hospital. + </p> + <p> + But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for + instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper + Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze + everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern + market. The things that change modern history, the big national and + international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, + the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, + the big expenses often incurred in elections—these are getting too + big for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly + fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + </p> + <p> + There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about them. + The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the chance of + a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser aristocracies. + The moderately rich include all kinds of people even good people. Even + priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are sometimes heroes. Some + doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their patients and not by + flattering them; some brewers have been known to sell beer. But among the + Very Rich you will never find a really generous man, even by accident. + They may give their money away, but they will never give themselves away; + they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To be smart enough to get + all that money you must be dull enough to want it. + </p> + <p> + Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser is + flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never called + self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called + self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like Dancer + was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A man like + Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his early rising or + his unassuming dress. His “simple” meals, his “simple” clothes, his + “simple” funeral, are all extolled as if they were creditable to him. They + are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful as the tatters and vermin + of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To be in rags for charity would + be the condition of a saint; to be in rags for money was that of a filthy + old fool. Precisely in the same way, to be “simple” for charity is the + state of a saint; to be “simple” for money is that of a filthy old fool. + Of the two I have more respect for the old miser, gnawing bones in an + attic: if he was not nearer to God, he was at least a little nearer to + men. His simple life was a little more like the life of the real poor. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"></a> + THE MYSTAGOGUE + </h2> + <p> + Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and + impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your + aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is + perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond + all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all + good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; and + though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is + always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are + that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + </p> + <p> + Thus Giotto or Fra Angelico would have at once admitted theologically that + God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint Him. + And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather quaint old + man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the elves, was + less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him in some way. + That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy pictures and twisted + statues which seem, to many refined persons, more blasphemous than the + secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good is always towards + Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined thinkers who worship + the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the salons of Paris, always + insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, the unutterable character + of the abomination. They call him “horror of emptiness,” as did the black + witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they worship him as the unspeakable name; + as the unbearable silence. They think of him as the void in the heart of + the whirlwind; the cloud on the brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets + of vertigo or the endless corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians + who gave the Devil a grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and + spiked tail. It was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. + The Satanists never drew him at all. + </p> + <p> + And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity + and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may + separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt from + mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he has an + idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has no idea + will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too subtle to be + explained. The first idea may really be very outree or specialist; it may + really be very difficult to express to ordinary people. But because the + man is trying to express it, it is most probable that there is something + in it, after all. The honest man is he who is always trying to utter the + unutterable, to describe the indescribable; but the quack lives not by + plunging into mystery, but by refusing to come out of it. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the thing + called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that an + attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy + cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that a + landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait painter + only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. And again + it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the pictures can + only express half of them, and that the less important half. Still, it + does express something; the thread is not broken that connects God With + Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The “Mona Lisa” was in + some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her to be. Leonardo's + picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And Walter Pater's rich + description was, in some respects, like the picture. Thus we come to the + consoling reflection that even literature, in the last resort, can express + something other than its own unhappy self. + </p> + <p> + Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely + inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being + speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in + Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically the + critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of painting + into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be inadequate—but + so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the first to admit. But + anything which has been intelligently received can at least be + intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent cause for the + cadaverous colour of Botticelli's “Venus Rising from the Sea.” Ruskin does + suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying forests and falsifying + landscapes. These two great critics were far too fastidious for my taste; + they urged to excess the idea that a sense of art was a sort of secret; to + be patiently taught and slowly learnt. Still, they thought it could be + taught: they thought it could be learnt. They constrained themselves, with + considerable creative fatigue, to find the exact adjectives which might + parallel in English prose what has been clone in Italian painting. The + same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. Stevenson and many others in the + exposition of Velasquez. They had something to say about the pictures; + they knew it was unworthy of the pictures, but they said it. + </p> + <p> + Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and Post + Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They are + not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt to + translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is + untranslatable—that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, + impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their banner; + they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper on which + Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried to dry it + with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good old + anti-democratic muddlements: that “the public” does not understand these + things; that “the likes of us” cannot dare to question the dark decisions + of our lords. + </p> + <p> + I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple + test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, + something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man is + made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt is as + good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go back and + look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, it is the + business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic literary + expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to it. If + they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their + eulogies, as there is nothing except eulogy—then they are quacks or + the high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say nothing + about the artists except that they are good it is because the artists are + bad. They can explain nothing because they have found nothing; and they + have found nothing because there is nothing to be found. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"></a> + THE RED REACTIONARY + </h2> + <p> + The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and + complete road to anything—even to restoration. Revolution alone can + be not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the dead. + </p> + <p> + A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) was + once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated in that + area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great creative crisis + about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its own, and made a + revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down this street he + whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. Gandish, “in his + researches into 'istry,” and which had somehow taken his fancy; the song + to which those last sincere loyalists went into battle. I think the words + ran: + </p> +<p class="poem"> + Monsieur de Charette.<br /> + Dit au gens d'ici.<br /> + Le roi va remettre.<br /> + Le fleur de lys. +</p> + <p> + My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and + it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic + lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy the + “Dies Irae,” or a Protestant to remember “Lillibullero.” Yet he was + stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might + get him at least into temporary trouble. + </p> + <p> + A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by walking + round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a bonfire + cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot be too loud, + and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I actually + recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a formidable + proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that had been + primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. Some of the + real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such as “Charlie is + My Darling,” or “What's a' the steer, kimmer?” songs that men had sung + while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under which we live. + They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present King were swept + aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual words “King George” + occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they were played to celebrate his + very Coronation; played as promptly and innocently as if they had been + “Grandfather's Clock” or “Rule Britannia” or “The Honeysuckle and the + Bee.” + </p> + <p> + That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between + two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not + really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that + has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. + When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was picked + up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the throne + the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been driven out + of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that the Bourbons + might possibly return that they will take a little trouble to discourage + it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never return that we + actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment to their rivals. + And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the faces of all the + bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: indeed, it is difficult + to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it quite unconsciously; + because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the French have not. We + really believe that the past is past. It is a very doubtful point. + </p> + <p> + Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men + free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared + away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who have + preserved everything—we cannot restore anything. Take, for the sake + of argument, the complex and many coloured ritual of the Coronation + recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate centuries; + from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade of culture + or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or even dated. The + fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord “against all + manner of folk” obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; no longer + confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes from some + chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four of our + counties; and when hostile “folk” might live in the next village. The + sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless and + the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great attempt to + make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the Coronation Service + says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. Elaborate local + tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the Manor of Work-sop is + alone allowed to do something or other, these probably belong to the decay + of the Middle Ages, when that great civilisation died out in grotesque + literalism and entangled heraldry. Things like the presentation of the + Bible bear witness to the intellectual outburst at the Reformation; things + like the Declaration against the Mass bear witness to the great wars of + the Puritans; and things like the allegiance of the Bishops bear witness + to the wordy and parenthetical political compromises which (to my deep + regret) ended the wars of religion. + </p> + <p> + But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all that + long list of variations there must be, and there are, things which + energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable + modification, to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see again + the great Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique and + almost frozen formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the old + passion that excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc would really + prefer the Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer the Erastian + oligarchy of the eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would probably be + disputed (from widely different motives) by Mr. Rudyard Kipling and Mr. + Cunninghame Graham. But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would win. + </p> + <p> + But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is that + none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back to the + Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediævals; because (alas) + there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for building or + rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can wander back + and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top of them, and + can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without being able to + take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide that their + Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that a Republic + was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French democracy + actually desired every detail of the mediæval monarchy, they could have + it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If another Dauphin + were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc actually bore a + miraculous banner before him; if mediæval swords shook and blazed in + every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every tapestry; if this + were really proved to be the will of France and the purpose of Providence—such + a scene would still be the lasting and final justification of the French + Revolution. + </p> + <p> + For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"></a> + THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + </h2> + <p> + In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in Asiatic + arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we tend nowadays + to do to our own records and our own religion. The first is a tendency to + talk as if certain things were not only present in the higher Orientals, + but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will fall into a habit of + wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, as if no Western + knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern knights had ever + broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full of the praises of + Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no Christians had been + saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the first injustice is to + think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the other injustice is a + failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly Eastern. It is too much + taken for granted that the Eastern sort of idealism is certainly superior + and convincing; whereas in truth it is only separate and peculiar. All + that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in the East is rooted in Pantheism; + but all that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in us is concerned with + denying passionately that Pantheism is either the highest or the purest + religion. + </p> + <p> + Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the spirit + of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and curiously + assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with the full + stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so that the + stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung arms. Now in + this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. In so far as + what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all things, the Eastern + artists have no more monopoly of it than they have of hunger and thirst. + </p> + <p> + I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit + this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far East + to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even in other + painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that ornament + of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: “Even the most + undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing meditations + not to be exhibited by much weeping.” But, I do not therefore admit that a + Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made a somewhat similar remark) + had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere Occidental fable and travesty of + that celebrated figure. I do not deny that Tinishona wrote that exquisite + example of the short Japanese poem entitled “Honourable Chrysanthemum in + Honourable Hole in Wall.” But I do not therefore admit that Tennyson's + little verse about the flower in the cranny was not original and even + sincere. + </p> + <p> + It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that when + engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster and + chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being much + affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon tablets + of ivory the lines beginning: “Small and unobtrusive blossom with ruby + extremities.” But this incident, touching as it is, does not shake my + belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am left with + an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere in their + poetry—and in their prose. + </p> + <p> + I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and its + admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go on to + more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say—with the + utmost respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form of + Cheek, for this school to speak in this way about the mother that bore + them, the great civilisation of the West. The West also has its magic + landscapes, only through our incurable materialism they look like + landscapes as well as like magic. The West also has its symbolic figures, + only they look like men as well as symbols. It will be answered (and most + justly) that Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own instinct and + tradition; that its artists are concerned to suggest one thing and our + artists another; that both should be admired in their difference. + Profoundly true; but what is the difference? It is certainly not as the + Orientalisers assert, that we must go to the Far East for a sympathetic + and transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid a long enough + toll of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that disability. + </p> + <p> + Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern + mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy of + creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, like + St. Francis, “My brother fire and my sister water”; the former says, + “Myself fire and myself water.” Whether you call the Eastern attitude an + extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of oneself into + nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The effect is the same, an + effect which lives and throbs throughout all the exquisite arts of the + East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a pulsation of pattern, or of + ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, but always suggesting the + unification of the individual with the world. But there is quite another + kind of sympathy the sympathy with a thing because it is different. No one + will say that Rembrandt did not sympathise with an old woman; but no one + will say that Rembrandt painted like an old woman. No one will say that + Reynolds did not appreciate children; but no one will say he did it + childishly. The supreme instance of this divine division is sex, and that + explains (what I could never understand in my youth) why Christendom + called the soul the bride of God. For real love is an intense realisation + of the “separateness” of all our souls. The most heroic and human + love-poetry of the world is never mere passion; precisely because mere + passion really is a melting back into Nature, a meeting of the waters. And + water is plunging and powerful; but it is only powerful downhill. The high + and human love-poetry is all about division rather than identity; and in + the great love-poems even the man as he embraces the woman sees her, in + the same instant, afar off; a virgin and a stranger. + </p> + <p> + For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if we + grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised in + what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and the + Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the East. + There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even the + superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential + difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; + whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the + Dragon. In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the + stories he not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the + Christian have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, really + has an appetite for cold Christian—and especially for cold + Christianity. This blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of + everything and digest it in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is + what is really meant by the Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The + Cosmos as such is cannibal; as old Time ate his children. The Eastern + saints were saints because they wanted to be swallowed up. The Western + saint, like St. George, was sainted by the Western Church precisely + because he refused to be swallowed. The same process of thought that has + prevented nationalities disappearing in Christendom has prevented the + complete appearance of Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist + the idea of being absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a + British, or a Turkish Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and + much more tyrannical, which free men will resist with even stronger + passion. The free man violently resists being absorbed into the empire + which is called the Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, + but still more Home Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home Rule + for himself. He claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem fatalism. + He claims the right to be damned in spite of theosophical optimism. He + refuses to be the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"></a> + THE MUMMER + </h2> + <p> + The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so close + that they might as well have been inside the house instead of just + outside; so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem farther + away. Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who come every + year in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of the old + Christmas play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very Venal + Doctor. I will not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will describe + my parallel sentiments as it passed. + </p> + <p> + One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic + revivals of mediæval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are + elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple society + of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are + mediævalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The first + is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child just + able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up as + anybody—but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea of being + the King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is generally + suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, from far + deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because it is + Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a ritual + investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the dances + of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries of Persia. + For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the concealment of + the personality combined with the exaggeration of the person. The man + performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and conspicuous. It is + part of that divine madness which all other creatures wonder at in Man, + that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and anonymity. Man is not, + perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, but he is the only + creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do indeed take the + colours of their environment; but that is not in order to be watched, but + in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism of rejoicing, but the + formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose nature is the + unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue because they + lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles powder their hair + to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not dressing up as + kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. Nay, even when + modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is doubted by some + naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping notice. So + merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten and exaggerate + their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, primarily + speaking, in another identity. It is not Acting—that comparatively + low profession—comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; and, as Mr. Kensit + would truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is Mummery. That is, it is + the noble conception of making Man something other and more than himself + when he stands at the limit of human things. It is only careful faddists + and feeble German philosophers who want to wear no clothes; and be + “natural” in their Dionysian revels. Natural men, really vigorous and + exultant men, want to wear more and more clothes when they are revelling. + They want worlds of waistcoats and forests of trousers and pagodas of tall + hats toppling up to the stars. + </p> + <p> + Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If our + more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to + reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight (I + do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque and + appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from the best + books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and ornaments + would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my garden door + opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, the appearance + of that champion was slightly different. His face was energetically + blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an aged and very tall top + hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a surplice, and he flourished + a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, talk about “ignorance”; or + suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a very pleasant Ratcatcher, + with a tenor voice) did this because he knew no better. Try to realise + that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of England was not black, and did + not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. The Rat-catcher is not under this + delusion; any more than Paul Veronese thought that very good men have + luminous rings round their heads; any more than the Pope thinks that + Christ washed the feet of the twelve in a Cathedral; any more than the + Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a tabard are like the lions at the + Zoo. These things are denaturalised because they are symbols; because the + extraordinary occasion must hide or even disfigure the ordinary people. + Black faces were to mediæval mummeries what carved masks were to Greek + plays: it was called being “vizarded.” My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently + arrogant to suppose for a moment that he looks like St. George. But he is + sufficiently humble to be convinced that if he looks as little like + himself as he can, he will be on the right road. + </p> + <p> + This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in disguise. + There are, of course, other mediæval elements in it which are also + difficult to explain to the fastidious mediævalists of to-day. There is, + for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It can best be + defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the faintest desire + to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the trick of turning + on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely believed, merely for + the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling yet careless phrases. When + Tennyson says that King Arthur “drew all the petty princedoms under him,” + and “made a realm and ruled,” his grave Royalism is quite modern. Many + mediævals, outside the mediæval republics, believed in monarchy as + solemnly as Tennyson. But that older verse + </p> +<p class="poem"> + When good King Arthur ruled this land<br /> + He was a goodly King—<br /> + He stole three pecks of barley-meal<br /> + To make a bag-pudding. +</p> + <p> + is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are + other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called + Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediævals merely + Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, I think, + in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in healthy + darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. If you + cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can carry the + forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk under + universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom a walking + forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very intensity of the + notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a mob of masks? + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0025" id="link2H_4_0025"></a> + THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + </h2> + <p> + The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the + antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost + unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs of a + hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does not + necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere + unlettered simplicity of mind. + </p> + <p> + But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our + decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its + best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many of the + philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God fearing + fisher or a noble mountaineer. His antics with donkeys and concertinas, + crowded charabancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are not so vicious + or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements of the + overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than they are + at a political “At Home,” or even an artistic soiree; and if the female + trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed and + underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to be a + donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks men and + women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that wants them + to change heads. + </p> + <p> + But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as there + is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity which is + characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very people who + persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the whole society, + and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does things in a + clumsy and unbeautiful way. + </p> + <p> + A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to visit + yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of + Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge at + all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray + tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour of + primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and very lonely + Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he missed Stonehenge. But + it does spoil his mood to find Stonehenge—surrounded by a brand-new + fence of barbed wire, with a policeman and a little shop selling picture + post-cards. + </p> + <p> + Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer + you, “Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and + carve names and spoil the look of Stonehenge.” It does not seem to occur + to them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of + Stonehenge. The scratching of a name, particularly when performed with + blunt penknife or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board education, + can be trusted in a little while to be indistinguishable from the grayest + hieroglyphic by the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could get a modern + policeman into the same picture with a Druid. This really vital piece of + vandalism was done by the educated, not the uneducated; it was done by the + influence of the artists or antiquaries who wanted to preserve the antique + beauty of Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to preserve your lady's + beauty from freckles by blacking her face all over; or to protect the pure + whiteness of your wedding garment by dyeing it green. + </p> + <p> + And if you ask, “But what else could any one have done, what could the + most artistic age have done to save the monument?” I reply, “There are + hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediævals might have done; and I have + no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in + their whole society they would have done something that was decent and + serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or + warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so + their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; not + deliberately—they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious order + such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of guard would + protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all sorts of + rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you mere raving + superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me one twentieth part + so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as calmly making a spot + hideous in order to keep it beautiful.” + </p> + <p> + The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to live + in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles down in a + place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar personal cases, of + course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, the Jew is a genuine + peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering cad. He is a highly + civilised man in a highly difficult position; the world being divided, and + his own nation being divided, about whether he can do anything else except + wander. + </p> + <p> + The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated + Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by + calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen are + extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. The + truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude Englishman. + What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is the polite + Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders for Rembrandts, + and he treats the great nations that made these things courteously—as + he would treat the custodians of any museum. It does not seem to strike + him that the Italian is not the custodian of the pictures, but the creator + of them. He can afford to look down on such nations—when he can + paint such pictures. + </p> + <p> + That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. If, + living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian + character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire + Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. + It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will + often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality of + the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without + discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If + you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians—you are a + cheap tripper. + </p> + <p> + The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere + that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, coming + among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is caddish + to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a wine taster; and + then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink and squint at the + colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; and then refuse to + buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a thing and not use it. + But the main point is that one has no right to see Stonehenge without + Salisbury Plain and Salisbury. One has no right to respect the dead + Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no right to visit a + Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea fishes—fed + along a lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing the sights without + breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0026" id="link2H_4_0026"></a> + THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + </h2> + <p> + It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story that + the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is almost + peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, of their + nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even phrases invented + for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new while it is nearly a + thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old while they were still + new. + </p> + <p> + The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, they + are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive + inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an offender; + they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been convicted of + murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous rebellion, when + his offence has really been a sleek submission to the powers that be. They + must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his eloquence to rouse the mob, + whereas he has really shown considerable cleverness in damping it down. It + was probably under the same impulse towards a mysterious misfit of names + that people denounced Dr. Inge as “the Gloomy Dean.” + </p> + <p> + Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there + anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but + sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives have + made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him this + erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern + capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared to + anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that + gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very + curious state of things. + </p> + <p> + When Dr. Inge was called “the Gloomy Dean” a great injustice was done him. + He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against the + forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism rather + than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have suffered no + wrong, or that employers have done no wrong—such a man is not a + Gloomy Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A man who can + feel satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with a mysterious + fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not less curious; + because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom reposes on his + having said that our worker's demand high wages, while the placid people + of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + </p> + <p> + This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much + difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low + wages for the same reason that they will submit to “the punishment known + as Li, or Slicing”; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy and + suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to the + husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their temples + with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they sometimes seem + to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual perversion. They + do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with traditions different + from ours about the limits of endurance and the gestures of self-respect. + They may be very much better than we are in hundreds of other ways; and I + can quite understand a man (though hardly a Dean) really preferring their + historic virtues to those of Christendom. A man may perhaps feel more + comfortable among his Asiatic coolies than among his European comrades: + and as we are to allow the Broadest Thought in the Church, Dr. Inge has as + much right to his heresy as anybody else. It is true that, as Dr. Inge + says, there are numberless Orientals who will do a great deal of work for + very little money; and it is most undoubtedly true that there are several + high-placed and prosperous Europeans who like to get work done and pay as + little as possible for it. + </p> + <p> + But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and + traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which he + has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of years + of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge + admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced the + sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious deduction + is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen Chinese. + Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he ought to be + at the head of a great mission in London for converting the English to + Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties of paganism + would have free and natural play; his style would improve; his mind would + begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all sorts of little + irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the most Conservative + Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + </p> + <p> + In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism and + public change which is the note of all our history springs from a certain + spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; nay, it + may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the special + defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the + ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It will + often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice though + the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the formula of the + great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that all men were free + and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the formula of the peasant + who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there were but one slave in + England, and he did all the work while the rest of us made merry, this + spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to God night and day. Whether + or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly works with, a creed which + postulates a humanised God and a vividly personal immortality. Men must + not be busy merely like a swarm, or even happy merely like a herd; for it + is not a question of men, but of a man. A man's meals may be poor, but + they must not be bestial; there must always be that about the meal which + permits of its comparison to the sacrament. A man's bed may be hard, but + it must not be abject or unclean: there must always be about the bed + something of the decency of the death-bed. + </p> + <p> + This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible + murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil that + threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot encourage + the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. Christendom will + continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being Christian: it is the + Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had absent-mindedly strayed + into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I advise him to chuck it. + </p> + <p> + But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian + temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. Inge + is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. Such a + man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being “court + chaplains of King Demos” or about his own superb valour in defying the + democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. We should not + expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that Demos has never + been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; we should not + expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains they would be + uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; he considers + himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New Theologian; that is, + he is liberal in theology—and nothing else. He is apparently in + sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy with those who would + soften the superior claim of our creed by urging the rival creeds of the + East; with those who would absorb the virtues of Buddhism or of Islam. He + holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of Religions where all + believers respect each other's unbelief. + </p> + <p> + Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When next + you hear the “liberal” Christian say that we should take what is best in + Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people like Dr. + Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge propose to + take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of the Moslem. + You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of the Hindoo. The + more you study the “broad” movement of today, the more you will find that + these people want something much less like Chinese metaphysics, and + something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find the levelling of + creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of wages. Dr. Inge is the + typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never more so than when he + appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as the apostle of the + blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely among the prosperous and + polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or Mohammedanism practically means + this—that the poor must be as meek as Buddhists, while the rich may + be as ruthless as Mohammedans. That is what they call the reunion of all + religions. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0027" id="link2H_4_0027"></a> + THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + </h2> + <p> + The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of + washing; and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore + comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. Rain, + that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities of + these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists are + eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public bath; + it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons coming + fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished or + dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when + coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an + enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: it + scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry rafters + and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring cleaning. + </p> + <p> + If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble at + the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are constantly + told that we should leave our little special possessions and join in the + enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social machinery. I + offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It disregards that + degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman to take his + shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because it is public + and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls the string. + </p> + <p> + As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the + neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water + drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and debauch + of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative intoxication of + the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret or the golden + clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such scenes of apocalypse, + towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne falls like fire from + heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with the terrible colours + of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as he rolls in the long + soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, and listens to the + roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who ought to be the true + bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are drinking water. + Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the trees rave and reel + to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs as revellers clash cups; + they roar undying thirst and howl the health of the world. + </p> + <p> + All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes a + noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count it + Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I + complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all + living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every + weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, + their need is greater than mine—especially for water. + </p> + <p> + There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild + Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an + incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel a + tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he puts + on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying an umbrella; + it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of despots in the + dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable walking stick; + open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no taste for + pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my hat, and + precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against wet, it must + be by some closer and more careless protection, something that I can + forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be that yet more + Highland thing, a mackintosh. + </p> + <p> + And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military qualities + of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and white sheen + as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think of it as the + uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty raids. I like to + think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, descending on some + doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs flashing in the sun or moon. + For indeed this is one of the real beauties of rainy weather, that while + the amount of original and direct light is commonly lessened, the number + of things that reflect light is unquestionably increased. There is less + sunshine; but there are more shiny things; such beautifully shiny things + as pools and puddles and mackintoshes. It is like moving in a world of + mirrors. + </p> + <p> + And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual works + of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it doubles + it. If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the roads (to the + sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. Shallow lakes of water + reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we dwell in a double universe. + Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous pavements, wet under numerous + lamps, a man seems a black blot on all that golden looking-glass, and + could fancy he was flying in a yellow sky. But wherever trees and towns + hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, the sense of Celestial + topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, dazzling confusion of shape + and shadow, of reality and reflection, will appeal strongly to any one + with the transcendental instinct about this dreamy and dual life of ours. + It will always give a man the strange sense of looking down at the skies. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0028" id="link2H_4_0028"></a> + THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + </h2> + <p> + When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) + to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is amusing to + ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours especially, + when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of one weakness + this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + </p> + <p> + This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares + more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its “methods” more + than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good + communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are + precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean a + hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good + communications may in practice be very like those evil communications + which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a + “scientific age,” which wants to know whether the train is in the + timetable, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one + instance in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the + case of photography. + </p> + <p> + Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, and + the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so that + he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted or + suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head + thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and + slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, a + definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I should + have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, with a + profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + </p> + <p> + Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great + many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, if + seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland + Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and dark + emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic or + whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked like some + swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of coal-black + hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately under his eyes + his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have been painted + scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one under the lower, + seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches of Mephistopheles. + His eyes had that “dancing madness” in them which Stevenson saw in the + Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes distorted the expression by + screwing a monstrous monocle into one of them. A man more unmistakable + would have been hard to find. You could have picked him out in any crowd—so + long as you had not seen his photograph. + </p> + <p> + But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and + conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits of + photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring of cheek + and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the darkness out + of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The framing and + limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; and the + devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write poetry made + him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people do when they + are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never held it + normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated his slight + figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished by a button + and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature has been more + delicately and dexterously omitted than they could have been by the most + namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest water-colours, on the + smoothest ivory. + </p> + <p> + I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of which + depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents an utterly + incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate language the + license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it strictly safe + and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They would have clapped + me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate Max's caricature. But the + caricature would have been far more likely to find the man. + </p> + <p> + This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific + civilisation. It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man + that it never asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, + seemingly most detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever + since I was a boy. We were told that in some row Boer policemen had shot + an Englishman, a British subject, an English citizen. A long time + afterwards we were quite casually informed that the English citizen was + quite black. Well, it makes no difference to the moral question; black men + should be shot on the same ethical principles as white men. But it makes + one distrust scientific communications which permitted so startling an + alteration of the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a photographic + negative in which a black man came out white. Later we were told that an + Englishman had fought for the Boers against his own flag, which would have + been a disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted that he was an + Irishman; which is exactly as different as if he had been a Pole. Common + sense, with all the facts before it, does see that black is not white, and + that a nation that has never submitted has a right to moral independence. + But why does it so seldom have all the facts before it? Why are the big + aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic wrath, always left + out in such official communications, as they were left out in the + photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an African and eyes as + fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation drop all four of the + facts? Its error is to omit the arresting thing—which might really + arrest the criminal. It strikes first the chilling note of science, + demanding a man “above the middle height, chin shaven, with gray + moustache,” etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir Redvers Buller. It + does not seize the first fact of impression, as that a man is obviously a + sailor or a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a nigger or an albino or a + prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. These are the realities by + which the people really recognise each other. They are almost always left + out of the inquiry. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0029" id="link2H_4_0029"></a> + THE SULTAN + </h2> + <p> + There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial + cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter far + you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in something + dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you find your + butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you find your + ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread them among + your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. There are + numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is this. That we + have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we have + Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + </p> + <p> + I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise + out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, and + like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not that, + like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that he + committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and errors + in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the ideas they + could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand for + Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the world. + He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the principles + that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs of a + Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. That + the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the + fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could + not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which he + lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old bachelor + of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently quoted in the + Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his time. It was not + his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill somewhere in South + Africa “his church.” It was not his fault, I mean, that he could not see + that a church all to oneself is not a church at all. It is a madman's + cell. It was not his fault that he “figured out that God meant as much of + the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible.” Many evolutionists much wiser + had “figured out” things even more babyish. He was an honest and humble + recipient of the plodding popular science of his time; he spread no ideas + that any cockney clerk in Streatham could not have spread for him. But it + was exactly because he had no ideas to spread that he invoked slaughter, + violated justice, and ruined republics to spread them. + </p> + <p> + But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not + only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are + actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to + extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented as + seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our Imperialist + aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the East. For + that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism has been + deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + </p> + <p> + The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of + politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first to + steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial cynic + who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself submitted to + Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism and destiny. + </p> + <p> + There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of Rhodes. + The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that Africa is still + chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in the South confronting + savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, Arabs, and Soudanese, and + then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: “It is inevitable fate that + all this should be changed; and I should like to be the agent of fate.” + That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine idea; and it is an Oriental + idea. + </p> + <p> + Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial + position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and + barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. We + are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to teach + a Turk to say “Kismet”; which he has said since his cradle. We are to deny + Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in order to + teach an Arab to believe he is “an agent of fate,” when he has never + believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true (which + fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia or + Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in + billycocks, instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. + The best Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a + doubtful and romantic future in which all things may happen—this + essential Western idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he says + himself) he did not believe in it. + </p> + <p> + It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress in + addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of King + is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant to be + vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and Moon, + the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in the days + of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather a + religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. He + was not merely a conqueror, but a father—yes, even when he was a bad + father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local affections + and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the King, but the + Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic of money, of + luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen race. Indeed + Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to the Sultan, + from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0030" id="link2H_4_0030"></a> + THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + </h2> + <p> + The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion + which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic + architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained in most + of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic eclipses the + classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once lively and + mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally rich and + complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No man ever got out + of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a cathedral tower. Over + all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India there is the presence of + something stiff and heartless, of something tortured and silent. Dwarfed + trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers and hunchbacked birds accentuate + by the very splendour and contrast of their colour the servility and + monotony of their shapes. It is like the vision of a sneering sage, who + sees the whole universe as a pattern. Certainly no one ever felt like this + about Gothic, even if he happens to dislike it. Or, again, some will say + that it is the liberty of the Middle Ages in the use of the comic or even + the coarse that makes the Gothic more interesting than the Greek. There is + more truth in this; indeed, there is real truth in it. Few of the old + Christian cathedrals would have passed the Censor of Plays. We talk of the + inimitable grandeur of the old cathedrals; but indeed it is rather their + gaiety that we do not dare to imitate. We should be rather surprised if a + chorister suddenly began singing “Bill Bailey” in church. Yet that would + be only doing in music what the mediævals did in sculpture. They put into + a Miserere seat the very scenes that we put into a music hall song: comic + domestic scenes similar to the spilling of the beer and the hanging out of + the washing. But though the gaiety of Gothic is one of its features, it + also is not the secret of its unique effect. We see a domestic + topsy-turvydom in many Japanese sketches. But delightful as these are, + with their fairy tree-tops, paper houses, and toddling, infantile + inhabitants, the pleasure they give is of a kind quite different from the + joy and energy of the gargoyles. Some have even been so shallow and + illiterate as to maintain that our pleasure in medieval building is a mere + pleasure in what is barbaric, in what is rough, shapeless, or crumbling + like the rocks. This can be dismissed after the same fashion; South Sea + idols, with painted eyes and radiating bristles, are a delight to the eye; + but they do not affect it in at all the same way as Westminster Abbey. + Some again (going to another and almost equally foolish extreme) ignore + the coarse and comic in mediævalism; and praise the pointed arch only for + its utter purity and simplicity, as of a saint with his hands joined in + prayer. Here, again, the uniqueness is missed. There are Renaissance + things (such as the ethereal silvery drawings of Raphael), there are even + pagan things (such as the Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere + a piety. None of these explanations explain. And I never saw what was the + real point about Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw it + behind a row of furniture-vans. + </p> + <p> + I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the + smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall cut + off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the + yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across + that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the + more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it + like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this + ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly + coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond that + the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, + straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as + the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + </p> + <p> + As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; + what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not + variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, + but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man of + our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or an + Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had mistaken + for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this gave to my + eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving towards the + right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across the plain like + the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with the clouds. Then I + saw what it was. + </p> + <p> + The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that it is + on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting + architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are + stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear the + arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty and + numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of imperial + elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners going into + battle; the silence was deafening with all the mingled noises of a + military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up its + thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from all the + roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in the core of + the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his wings of + brass. + </p> + <p> + And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in + the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; the + voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of spears. + I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; and I knew + indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in either hand the + trowel and the sword. + </p> + <p> + I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had + marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. Some + Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of the + desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been woke + at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the tall + pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every snake or + sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner of the + architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally in the + flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like torches across + dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of music and darkness + and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln hill. So for some + hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of the Gothic; then the + last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw only a church tower in a + quiet English town, round which the English birds were floating. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0031" id="link2H_4_0031"></a> + THE MAN ON TOP + </h2> + <p> + There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be stated + too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not trusted simply + because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite clearly seen and said + without any reference to our several passions or partisanships. It does + not follow that we think such a distrust a wise sentiment to express; it + does not even follow that we think it a good sentiment to entertain. But + such is the sentiment, simply because such is the fact. The distinction + can be quite easily defined in an example. I do not think that private + workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their employer. But I do think that + patriotic soldiers owe a more or less indefinite loyalty to their leader + in battle. But even if they ought to trust their captain, the fact remains + that they often do not trust him; and the fact remains that he often is + not fit to be trusted. + </p> + <p> + Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very + muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to put + employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should have + thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has nothing + to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; it is a + distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more elegance and + poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment under Lord + Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the atmosphere, but + in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order to pay Lord + Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and philanthropic, did + exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the shopkeeper it failed as + a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he is underpaid, but only if + he is defeated. The object of the Army is the safety of the nation from + one particular class of perils; therefore, since all citizens owe loyalty + to the nation, all citizens who are soldiers owe loyalty to the Army. But + nobody has any obligation to make some particular rich man richer. A man + is bound, of course, to consider the indirect results of his action in a + strike; but he is bound to consider that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, + or a smoking concert; in his wildest holiday or his most private + conversation. But direct responsibility like that of a soldier he has + none. He need not aim solely and directly at the good of the shop; for the + simple reason that the shop is not aiming solely and directly at the good + of the nation. The shopman is, under decent restraints, let us hope, + trying to get what he can out of the nation; the shop assistant may, under + the same decent restraints, get what he can out of the shopkeeper. All + this distinction is very obvious. At least I should have thought so. + </p> + <p> + But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the + military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious + shop assistant “disloyal”—that leaves exactly where it was the + question of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. + Granted that all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the + cloven pennon of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true + that the pennon may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that all + Barney Barnato's workers ought to have followed him to death or glory, it + is still a Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was likely to + lead them to. Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for his master's + medicines, we may still hold an inquest to find out if he died of them. + While we forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may still wish the + general were shot. + </p> + <p> + The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. + Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are + worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. + The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are + accidents—or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is a + generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A revolutionist + would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next to nothing about + coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners know next to nothing + about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend the nature of their own + monopoly with any consistent and courageous policy, however wicked, as did + the old aristocrats with the monopoly of land. They have not the virtues + nor even the vices of tyrants; they have only their powers. It is the same + with all the powerful of to-day; it is the same, for instance, with the + high-placed and high-paid official. Not only is the judge not judicial, + but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. The arbiter decides, not by some + gust of justice or injustice in his soul like the old despot dooming men + under a tree, but by the permanent climate of the class to which he + happens to belong. The ancient wig of the judge is often indistinguishable + from the old wig of the flunkey. + </p> + <p> + To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one + must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against + details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just + judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such as + Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. Seen + close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and + impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can tell + if the Tower leans. + </p> + <p> + Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, we + shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole + governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will see + some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the employer + often comes there early in the morning; that he has great organising + power; that if he works over the colossal accumulation of wealth he also + works over its wise distribution. All this may be true of many employers, + and it is practically said of all. + </p> + <p> + But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply ask + what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the + capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and + solid result of the reign of the employers has been—unemployment. + Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot upon + which the whole process turns. + </p> + <p> + Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great + squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense + or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care for + the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see much + cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts of the + estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has been the + actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is plain. At the + end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the land. The practical + effect of having landlords is not having tenants. The practical effect of + having employers is that men are not employed. The unrest of the populace + is therefore more than a murmur against tyranny; it is against a sort of + treason. It is the suspicion that even at the top of the tree, even in the + seats of the mighty, our very success is unsuccessful. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0032" id="link2H_4_0032"></a> + THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + </h2> + <p> + There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are some + who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again—or snore + again. There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration Courts + as to the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the day that + they look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + </p> + <p> + The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may + incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things + for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when the + States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or when all + the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of Washington. + It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The real democratic + unrest at this moment is not an extension of the representative process, + but rather a revolt against it. It is no good giving those now in revolt + more boards and committees and compulsory regulations. It is against these + very things that they are revolting. Men are not only rising against their + oppressors, but against their representatives or, as they would say, their + misrepresentatives. The inner and actual spirit of workaday England is + coming out not in applause, but in anger, as a god who should come out of + his tabernacle to rebuke and confound his priests. + </p> + <p> + There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom + we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of + whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't + have. She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger and + exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than the + modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the horror of + bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; and it is + quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort of industry + natural to the classes from which men can climb into great wealth. He has + grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, accustomed to have + dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without discomfort. He regards + cleanliness as a kind of separate and special costume; to be put on for + great festivals. He has several really curious characteristics, which + would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they had any eyes. For + instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in marked contrast to his + actual spirit, which is generally patient and civil. He has an odd way of + using certain words of really horrible meaning, but using them quite + innocently and without the most distant taint of the evils to which they + allude. He is rather sentimental; and, like most sentimental people, not + devoid of snobbishness. At the same time, he believes the ordinary manly + commonplaces of freedom and fraternity as he believes most of the decent + traditions of Christian men: he finds it very difficult to act according + to them, but this difficulty is not confined to him. He has a strong and + individual sense of humour, and not much power of corporate or militant + action. He is not a Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to a + Labour Member than he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This is + the Common Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at last. + </p> + <p> + See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it is + his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to cure, + and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including two of + his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal Commission to + consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike upon the + railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, any of the + gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to Mr. Henderson, whom + I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of confusing with that of a + railway-porter. I do not think that any old gentleman, however + absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, let us say, to hand + his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to reward that politician + with twopence. Of the others I can only judge by the facts about their + status as set forth in the public Press. The Chairman, Sir David Harrell, + appeared to be an ex-official distinguished in (of all things in the + world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no earthly reason to doubt that the + Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not talking about what men mean to be, + but about what they are. The police in Ireland are practically an army of + occupation; a man serving in them or directing them is practically a + soldier; and, of course, he must do his duty as such. But it seems truly + extraordinary to select as one likely to sympathise with the democracy of + England a man whose whole business in life it has been to govern against + its will the democracy of Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers + were offered the sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police + in Finland or Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised world + sees Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time we did. + The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct and habit + akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the Commissioners + actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then came Mr. Henderson + (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, “By your leave.”), and then + another less known gentleman who had “corresponded” with the Board of + Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to represent the very poor. + </p> + <p> + Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough + report, and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of that kind + are tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably business-like. But + if any one supposes that men of that kind can conceivably quiet any real + quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the man whom I first described, + it is frantic. The common worker is angry exactly because he has found out + that all these boards consist of the same well-dressed Kind of Man, + whether they are called Governmental or Capitalist. If any one hopes that + he will reconcile the poor, I say, as I said at the beginning, that such a + one has not looked on the light of day or dwelt in the land of the living. + </p> + <p> + But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical and + urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man of + whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern + England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would be + offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost + incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This Kind + of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be + represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind of + Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the middle + class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, he must + remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + </p> + <p> + Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory + powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the first + Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you drove him + with a whip. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0033" id="link2H_4_0033"></a> + THE MEDIÆVAL VILLAIN + </h2> + <p> + I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King John. + </p> + <p> + But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he + believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a + whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not + sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or + merely a humdrum respectability. + </p> + <p> + I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is a + protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a particular + attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always hunting and + Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, and Charles I + always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in rotation making his + people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and King John pulling out Jews' + teeth with the celerity and industry of an American dentist. Anything is + good that shakes all this stiff simplification, and makes us remember that + these men were once alive; that is, mixed, free, flippant, and + inconsistent. It gives the mind a healthy kick to know that Alfred had + fits, that Charles I prevented enclosures, that Rufus was really + interested in architecture, that Henry VIII was really interested in + theology. + </p> + <p> + And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid imagination + of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are on the right + side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a Puritan, and + John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they were people whom + we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think that John was a + nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of him is all wrong. + Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had what commonly makes + them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and hotheaded decision. + But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, but which we + misunderstand. + </p> + <p> + The mediæval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In their + social system the mediævals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as their + heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings of guild + or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of man as + standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While they clad + and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly and quaintly + for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have of the freedom + of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an eagle in the + heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern as most + fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + </p> + <p> + For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute + description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused the + apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been in an + unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have decided the + other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of another world, a + world that now can never be. + </p> + <p> + This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way can be + felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and ballad. It + is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy intellectual + forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the physical science + of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have taught, have + darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of bad men as + something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of people. The + Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It brought the + villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version of King John. + But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that about him, even + when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to be a man of mixed + passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil passions to have much + too good a time of it. They might have spoken of him as a man in + considerable danger of going to hell; but they would have not talked of + him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of Percy or Robin Hood it + frequently happens that the King comes upon the scene, and his ultimate + decision makes the climax of the tale. But we do not feel, as we do in the + Byronic or modern romance, that there is a definite stage direction “Enter + Tyrant.” Nor do we behold a deus ex machina who is certain to do all that + is mild and just. The King in the ballad is in a state of virile + indecision. Sometimes he will pass from a towering passion to the most + sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; sometimes he will begin an act of + vengeance and be turned from it by a jest. Yet this august levity is not + moral indifference; it is moral freedom. It is the strong sense in the + writer that the King, being the type of man with power, will probably + sometimes use it badly and sometimes well. In this sense John is certainly + misrepresented, for he is pictured as something that none of his own + friends or enemies saw. In that sense he was certainly not so black as he + is painted, for he lived in a world where every one was piebald. + </p> + <p> + King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind of + degenerate; a shifty-eyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's backbone + and green blood in his veins. The mediævals were quite capable of boiling + him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable of despairing + of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori case is that of + the strange mediæval legend of Robert the Devil. Robert was represented + as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman actually in answer to + prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are simply those of the infernal + fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he can be called almost literally a + child of hell, yet the climax of the story is his repentance at Rome and + his great reparation. That is the paradox of mediæval morals: as it must + appear to the moderns. We must try to conceive a race of men who hated + John, and sought his blood, and believed every abomination about him, who + would have been quite capable of assassinating or torturing him in the + extremity of their anger. And yet we must admit that they would not really + have been fundamentally surprised if he had shaved his head in + humiliation, given all his goods to the poor, embraced the lepers in a + lazar-house, and been canonised as a saint in heaven. So strongly did they + hold that the pivot of Will should turn freely, which now is rusted, and + sticks. + </p> + <p> + For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our + public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a + noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit + that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the + powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and + rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect him + to go on maddening them—and us. We do not expect him, let us say, + suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of repentance; + especially in public things; that is why we cannot really get rid of our + great national abuses of economic tyranny and aristocratic avarice. + Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal drudge; and mostly consists + of being moved on by the police. We move on because we are not allowed to + move back. But the really ragged prophets, the real revolutionists who + held high language in the palaces of kings, they did not confine + themselves to saying, “Onward, Christian soldiers,” still less, “Onward, + Futurist soldiers”; what they said to high emperors and to whole empires + was, “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?” + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0034" id="link2H_4_0034"></a> + THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + </h2> + <p> + Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there are + even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to most modern + books. A detective story generally describes six living men discussing how + it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story generally describes + six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be alive. But those who + have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted one thing, that when the + murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. “That,” says Sherlock Holmes, + “is the advantage of being a private detective”; after he has caught he + can set free. The Christian Church can best be defined as an enormous + private detective, correcting that official detective—the State. + This, indeed, is one of the injustices done to historic Christianity; + injustices which arise from looking at complex exceptions and not at the + large and simple fact. We are constantly being told that theologians used + racks and thumbscrews, and so they did. Theologians used racks and + thumbscrews just as they used thimbles and three-legged stools, because + everybody else used them. Christianity no more created the mediæval + tortures than it did the Chinese tortures; it inherited them from any + empire as heathen as the Chinese. + </p> + <p> + The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and + employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, if + we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real difference + between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The State, in all + lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, more bloody and + brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal everywhere. The + Church is the only institution that ever attempted to create a machinery + of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever attempted by system to + pursue and discover crimes, not in order to avenge, but in order to + forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the weaknesses of the + religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the world. Its speciality—or, + if you like, its oddity—was this merciless mercy; the unrelenting + sleuthhound who seeks to save and not slay. + </p> + <p> + I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays on + somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in America. + The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent experiment, + dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure as he passes + through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to make cheap fun + of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; that is a point + of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions have been abrupt. + This saviour's method of making people good is to tell them how good they + are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, whose moral backs are + broken, and who are soaked with sincere self-contempt, I can imagine that + this might be quite the right way. I should not deliver this message to + authors or members of Parliament, because they would so heartily agree + with it. + </p> + <p> + Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. + Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a + detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of + tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. + Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine thing, + though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be faced, even in + order to be forgiven; the great objection to “letting sleeping dogs lie” + is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. Jerome's Passing of + the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine detective, pitiless in + his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a sort of divine dupe, who + does not pardon at all, because he does not see anything that is going on. + It may, or may not, be true to say, “Tout comprendre est tout pardonner.” + But it is much more evidently true to say, “Rien comprendre est rien + Pardonner,” and the “Third Floor Back” does not seem to comprehend + anything. He might, after all, be a quite selfish sentimentalist, who + found it comforting to think well of his neighbours. There is nothing very + heroic in loving after you have been deceived. The heroic business is to + love after you have been undeceived. + </p> + <p> + When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play which + I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. I mean Mr. + Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which sprawls over so + many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned with a dim, yet + evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a whole group of + persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; in fact, it is a + very fine play indeed; but there is nothing aesthetic or fastidious about + it. It is as much or more than the other sensational, democratic, and (I + use the word in a sound and good sense) Salvationist. + </p> + <p> + But the difference lies precisely in this—that the Christ of Mr. + Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; he + declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons evil, + but he will not ignore it. In other words, he is a Christian, and not a + Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained by the + problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes Christ to be + trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, is naturally a + simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying to save the + reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief characters in + The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous vicar, universally + respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. It would have been no + good to tell these people they had some good in them—for that was + what they were telling themselves all day long. They had to be reminded + that they had some bad in them—instinctive idolatries and silent + treasons which they always tried to forget. It is in connection with these + crimes of wealth and culture that we face the real problem of positive + evil. The whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy about sin was vitiated + throughout by one's consciousness that whenever he wrote the word “sinner” + he thought of a man in rags. But here, again, we can find truth merely by + referring to vulgar literature—its unfailing fountain. Whoever read + a detective story about poor people? The poor have crimes; but the poor + have no secrets. And it is because the proud have secrets that they need + to be detected before they are forgiven. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0035" id="link2H_4_0035"></a> + THE ELF OF JAPAN + </h2> + <p> + There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I love + them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but + psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me as + examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from + another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he + might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about + cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral + independence and readiness to scratch anybody “if he does not behave + himself.” Others, like Mr. Belloc, regard the cat as cruel and secret, a + fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, + poisoned food, “so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and + humility.” For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats as + I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They are + both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And this + abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called Love; for + it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it is a vision. + It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for nothing in + return. I love all the cats in the street as St. Francis of Assisi loved + all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not so much, of + course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to bridle a bird + and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. He did not wish + to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the name “Francis,” and + the address “Assisi”—as one does with a dog. He did not wish them to + belong to him or himself to belong to them; in fact, it would be a very + awkward experience to belong to a lot of fishes. But a man does belong to + his dog, in another but an equally real sense with that in which the dog + belongs to him. The two bonds of obedience and responsibility vary very + much with the dogs and the men; but they are both bonds. In other words, a + man does not merely love a dog; as he might (in a mystical moment) love + any sparrow that perched on his windowsill or any rabbit that ran across + his path. A man likes a dog; and that is a serious matter. + </p> + <p> + To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a + cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is so + mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like + Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is really + cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men of old + time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those magnificent + old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which one really + loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and within reason) + loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man feels himself—no, + not absorbed into the unity of all things (a loathsome fancy)—but + delighting in the difference of all things. At the moment when a man + really knows he is a man he will feel, however faintly, a kind of + fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is a crocodile. All the + more will he exult in the things that are more evidently beautiful than + crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and cats—which are more + beautiful than either. But it does not follow that he will wish to pick + all the flowers or to cage all the birds or to own all the cats. + </p> + <p> + No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit + that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful + analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of such + fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like cats + in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I feel it about + certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the Japanese. The + exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall see no more, now + Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a quality that was + infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures were really rather + like pictures made by cats. They were full of feathery softness and of + sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will wander in some gallery + fortunate enough to have a fine collection of those slight water-colour + sketches on rice paper which come from the remote East, he will observe + many elements in them which a fanciful person might consider feline. There + is, for instance, that odd enjoyment of the tops of trees; those airy + traceries of forks and fading twigs, up to which certainly no artist, but + only a cat could climb. There is that elvish love of the full moon, as + large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, hung in these tenuous branches. That + moon is so large and luminous that one can imagine a hundred cats howling + under it. Then there is the exhaustive treatment of the anatomy of birds + and fish; subjects in which cats are said to be interested. Then there is + the slanting cat-like eye of all these Eastern gods and men—but this + is getting altogether too coincident. We shall have another racial theory + in no time (beginning “Are the Japs Cats?”), and though I shall not + believe in my theory, somebody else might. There are people among my + esteemed correspondents who might believe anything. It is enough for me to + say here that in this small respect Japs affect me like cats. I mean that + I love them. I love their quaint and native poetry, their instinct of easy + civilisation, their unique unreplaceable art, the testimony they bear to + the bustling, irrepressible activities of nature and man. If I were a real + mystic looking down on them from a real mountain, I am sure I should love + them more even than the strong winged and unwearied birds or the fruitful, + ever multiplying fish. But, as for liking them, as one likes a dog—that + is quite another matter. That would mean trusting them. + </p> + <p> + In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much + in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not + specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; + but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give + the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would + happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always a + fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as wedding + cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as lanterns!... + but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the paper) that the + assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture was a mere matter + of verbal translation. “The Japanese would not call twisting the thumbs + back 'torture.'” + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0036" id="link2H_4_0036"></a> + THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + </h2> + <p> + I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark + in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming a + peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist asceticism + to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an atheist and an + ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious to see one's + country thus losing her special point of honour about asylum and liberty. + It will be quite a new departure if we begin to protect and whitewash + foreign policemen. I always understood it was only English policemen who + were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, however, have begun to feel + with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities and officials are being + questioned. But there is one most graphic and extraordinary fact, which it + did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch upon, but which somebody really + must seize and emphasise. It is this: that at the very time when we are + all beginning to doubt these authorities, we are letting laws pass to + increase their most capricious powers. All our commissions, petitions, and + letters to the papers are asking whether these authorities can give an + account of their stewardship. And at the same moment all our laws are + decreeing that they shall not give any account of their stewardship, but + shall become yet more irresponsible stewards. Bills like the Feeble-Minded + Bill and the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate names for them) actually arm + with scorpions the hand that has chastised the Malatestas and Maleckas + with whips. The inspector, the doctor, the police sergeant, the well-paid + person who writes certificates and “passes” this, that, or the other; this + sort of man is being trusted with more authority, apparently because he is + being doubted with more reason. In one room we are asking why the + Government and the great experts between them cannot sail a ship. In + another room we are deciding that the Government and experts shall be + allowed, without trial or discussion, to immure any one's body, damn any + one's soul, and dispose of unborn generations with the levity of a pagan + god. We are putting the official on the throne while he is still in the + dock. + </p> + <p> + The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as + when people talk of an author's “message,” without thinking whom it is + from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of another + word. It is the excellent mediæval word “charter.” I remember the Act + that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called “The Children's + Charter.” Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as lunatics people who + are not lunatics was actually called a “charter” of the feeble-minded. Now + this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the Bills are right. Even were + they right in theory they would be applied only to the poor, like many + better rules about education and cruelty. A woman was lately punished for + cruelty because her children were not washed when it was proved that she + had no water. From that it will be an easy step in Advanced Thought to + punishing a man for wine-bibbing when it is proved that he had no wine. + Rifts in right reason widen down the ages. And when we have begun by + shutting up a confessedly kind person for cruelty, we may yet come to + shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for feeblemindedness. + </p> + <p> + But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use + the word “charter.” A charter does not mean a thing that does good to + people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. It + may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their cigarettes: it + might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of their cigars. But I + think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much surprised if the King + granted them a new charter (in place of their mediæval charter), and it + only meant that policemen might pull the cigars out of their mouths. It + may be a good thing that all drunkards should be locked up: and many acute + statesmen (King John, for instance) would certainly have thought it a good + thing if all aristocrats could be locked up. But even that somewhat + cynical prince would scarcely have granted to the barons a thing called + “the Great Charter” and then locked them all up on the strength of it. If + he had, this interpretation of the word “charter” would have struck the + barons with considerable surprise. I doubt if their narrow mediæval minds + could have taken it in. + </p> + <p> + The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no + Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own + conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them + till he understands this word “charter.” I will attempt in a moment to + state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, + practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter + was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last + Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called in + the current jargon “recognition”; the acknowledgment in so many words by + society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If there + had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have been a + railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the King, + defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea still true + and then almost universal: that authority is necessary for nothing so much + as for the granting of liberties. Like everything mediæval, it ramified + back to a root in religion; and was a sort of small copy of the Christian + idea of man's creation. Man was free, not because there was no God, but + because it needed a God to set him free. By authority he was free. By + authority the craftsmen of the guilds were free. Many other great + philosophers took and take the other view: the Lucretian pagans, the + Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and determinists, all roughly confine + themselves to saying that God gave man a law. The mediæval Christian + insisted that God gave man a charter. Modern feeling may not sympathise + with its list of liberties, which included the liberty to be damned; but + that has nothing to do with the fact that it was a gift of liberties and + not of laws. This was mirrored, however dimly, in the whole system. There + was a great deal of gross inequality; and in other aspects absolute + equality was taken for granted. But the point is that equality and + inequality were ranks—or rights. There were not only things one was + forbidden to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. A man was not + only definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. The holidays of + his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really meant lingers alive + in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a “chartered” libertine. + </p> + <p> + Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every man's + door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes liberties with + everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel that the wind is + always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. But remember that + in the days when free men had charters, they held that the wind itself was + wild by authority; and was only free because it had a father. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0037" id="link2H_4_0037"></a> + THE CONTENTED MAN + </h2> + <p> + The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating + because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the style + of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied with our + countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, however, + has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the “sweet content” of + the poet and the “cubic content” of the mathematician. Some distinguish + these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might happen to any + of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, “Of the content of the + King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be ignorant”; or + “Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, you are stealing + the spoons.” And there really is an analogy between the mathematical and + the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation of which the latter + has been much weakened and misused. + </p> + <p> + The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far that + the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane peril of + our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of security; and + it is not strange that our workers should often think about rising above + their position, since they have so continually to think about sinking + below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to saving and simple + pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To advise people to be + content with what they have got may or may not be sound moral philosophy. + </p> + <p> + But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece of + impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the creed + of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, it remains + true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine discontent; + discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must always be the + human thing. It may be true that a particular man, in his relation to his + master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, will do well to be + fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry justice. But it is not + true, no sane person can call it true, that man as a whole in his general + attitude towards the world, in his posture towards death or green fields, + towards the weather or the baby, will be wise to cultivate + dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly experience, the great + truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet his neighbour's ox nor his + ass nor anything that is his. In highly complex and scientific + civilisations he may sometimes find himself forced into an exceptional + vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and scientific civilisations, nine + times out of ten, he only wants his own ass back. + </p> + <p> + But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than in + moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has been + undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other + meaning. It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some + accounts of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + </p> + <p> + But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the idea + of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; for + feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. “Content” + ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; placidly, + perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with bread and + cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought to mean caring + for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic content of the bread + and cheese and adding it to your own. Being content with an attic ought + not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to living in it. It + ought to mean appreciating what there is to appreciate in such a position; + such as the quaint and elvish slope of the ceiling or the sublime aerial + view of the opposite chimney-pots. And in this sense contentment is a real + and even an active virtue; it is not only affirmative, but creative. The + poet in the attic does not forget the attic in poetic musings; he + remembers whatever the attic has of poetry; he realises how high, how + starry, how cool, how unadorned and simple—in short, how Attic is + the attic. + </p> + <p> + True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of + getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and it + is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so cold and + incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been “through” + things; when it is evident that they have come out on the other side quite + unchanged. A man might have gone “through” a plum pudding as a bullet + might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the size of the pudding—and + the man. But the awful and sacred question is “Has the pudding been + through him?” Has he tasted, appreciated, and absorbed the solid pudding, + with its three dimensions and its three thousand tastes and smells? Can he + offer himself to the eyes of men as one who has cubically conquered and + contained a pudding? + </p> + <p> + In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through + trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content of + them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a + pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + </p> + <p> + Thus the young genius says, “I have lived in my dreary and squalid village + before I found success in Paris or Vienna.” The sound philosopher will + answer, “You have never lived in your village, or you would not call it + dreary and squalid.” + </p> + <p> + Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and + always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, “I've been right away from + these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies.” The + sound philosopher will reply, “You have never been in these islands; you + have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise + you could never have called them either muddy or little.” + </p> + <p> + Thus the Suffragette will say, “I have passed through the paltry duties of + pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come out to + intellectual liberty.” The sound philosopher will answer, “You have never + passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it vulgar. Wiser and + stronger women than you have really seen a poetry in pots and pans; + naturally, because there is a poetry in them.” It is right for the village + violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; it is right for the stray + Englishman to climb across the high shoulder of the world; it is right for + the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae or high places she can allow to + her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that any of these climbers should kick + the ladder by which they have climbed. But indeed these bitter people who + record their experiences really record their lack of experiences. It is + the countryman who has not succeeded in being a countryman who comes up to + London. It is the clerk who has not succeeded in being a clerk who tries + (on vegetarian principles) to be a countryman. And the woman with a past + is generally a woman angry about the past she never had. + </p> + <p> + When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and love + it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really been + through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them back + again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because we + have drunk them dry. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + + <h2><a name="link2H_4_0038" id="link2H_4_0038"></a> + THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + </h2> + <p> + I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover a + very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the controversies, + whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather up into this last + article a valedictory violence about all such things; and then pass to + where, beyond these voices, there is peace—or in other words, to the + writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed work. But before I + finally desert the illusions of rationalism for the actualities of + romance, I should very much like to write one last roaring, raging book + telling all the rationalists not to be so utterly irrational. The book + would be simply a string of violent vetoes, like the Ten Commandments. I + would call it “Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things I am Tired Of.” + </p> + <p> + This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would + begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing + imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might + begin thus:— + </p> + <p> + (1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out the noun. An + adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, “Give me a + patriotism that is free from all boundaries.” It is like saying, “Give me + a pork pie with no pork in it.” Don't say, “I look forward to that larger + religion that shall have no special dogmas.” It is like saying, “I look + forward to that larger quadruped who shall have no feet.” A quadruped + means something with four feet; and a religion means something that + commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. Don't let the meek + substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, exuberant adjective. + </p> + <p> + (2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This + practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The + trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable terms, + and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the simplest + form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who said to his + tenants in an election speech, “Of course I'm not going to threaten you, + but if this Budget passes the rents will go up.” The thing can be done in + many forms besides this. “I am the last man to mention party politics; but + when I see the Empire rent in pieces by irresponsible Radicals,” etc. “In + this hall we welcome all creeds. We have no hostility against any honest + belief; but only against that black priestcraft and superstition which can + accept such a doctrine as,” etc. “I would not say one word that could + ruffle our relations with Germany. But this I will say; that when I see + ceaseless and unscrupulous armament,” etc. Please don't do it. Decide to + make a remark or not to make a remark. But don't fancy that you have + somehow softened the saying of a thing by having just promised not to say + it. + </p> + <p> + (3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. “Happiness” (let us say) + is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well + know when you haven't. “Progress” is a secondary word; it means the degree + of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But modern + controversies constantly turn on asking, “Does Happiness help Progress?” + Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. Egerton Swann, in + which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. Belloc, on the + ground that our democracy is “spasmodic” (whatever that means); while our + “reactionism is settled and permanent.” It never strikes Mr. Swann that + democracy means something in itself; while “reactionism” means nothing—except + in connection with democracy. You cannot react except from something. If + Mr. Swann thinks I have ever reacted from the doctrine that the people + should rule, I wish he would give me the reference. + </p> + <p> + (4) Don't say, “There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself + right and the others wrong.” Probably one of the creeds is right and the + others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must be + wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be wrong. + I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more desperate + sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are certainly + solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts his shirt on + Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other men putting + their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in them quite as + sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are wrong. But one of + them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of the horses does win; + not always even the dark horse which might stand for Agnosticism, but + often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. Democracy has its + occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been known to come in + first. But the point here is that something comes in first. That there + were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there was one + well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the world is + round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular or oblong + does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and therefore not + any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of imprecation, don't + say that the variety of creeds prevents you from accepting any creed. It + is an unintelligent remark. + </p> + <p> + (5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), + don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the + majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of + mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The man + who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his + neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not try + to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks himself + Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself Rockefeller; + as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But madmen never meet. + It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, they can inspire, they + can fight, they can found religions; but they cannot meet. Maniacs can + never be the majority; for the simple reason that they can never be even a + minority. If two madmen had ever agreed they might have conquered the + world. + </p> + <p> + (6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some men + are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height of the + French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat short. In + the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that Rockefeller is + stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human equality reposes + upon this: That there is no man really clever who has not found that he is + stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt small. Some men never + feel small; but these are the few men who are. + </p> + <p> + (7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman with a + club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male sparrow + knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe knock + down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male have had to + use any violence at any time in order to make the female a female? Why + should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the sow or the + she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these creatures were + creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not talk such bosh. I + implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. Utterly and + absolutely abolish all such bosh—and we may yet begin to discuss + these public questions properly. But I fear my list of protests grows too + long; and I know it could grow longer for ever. The reader must forgive my + elongations and elaborations. I fancied for the moment that I was writing + a book. + </p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ +concept and trademark. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8a19dfc --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #2015 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2015) diff --git a/old/2015.txt b/old/2015.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..15c3336 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/2015.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5310 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost +no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use +it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this +eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Miscellany of Men + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: November 5, 2008 [EBook #2015] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN *** + + + + +Produced by Michael Pullen, Michael K. Johnson, and Joe Moretti + + + + + + + +A MISCELLANY OF MEN + +By G. K. Chesterton + + + +Contents + + THE SUFFRAGIST + + THE POET AND THE CHEESE + + THE THING + + THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + + THE NAMELESS MAN + + THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + + THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + + THE MAD OFFICIAL + + THE ENCHANTED MAN + + THE SUN WORSHIPPER + + THE WRONG INCENDIARY + + THE FREE MAN + + THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + + THE PRIEST OF SPRING + + THE REAL JOURNALIST + + THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + + THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + + THE FOOL + + THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + + THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + + THE MYSTAGOGUE + + THE RED REACTIONARY + + THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + + THE MUMMER + + THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + + THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + + THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + + THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + + THE SULTAN + + THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + + THE MAN ON TOP + + THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + + THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN + + THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + + THE ELF OF JAPAN + + THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + + THE CONTENTED MAN + + THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + + + +THE SUFFRAGIST + +Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, +can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching +those political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular +sentiments, it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. +One part of it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up +her fists to a man she is putting herself in the only posture in which +he is not afraid of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more +of her silence; but force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon +of which he has grown ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite +accurate in any matter of the instincts. For the things which are the +simplest so long as they are undisputed invariably become the subtlest +when once they are disputed: which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, +when he said, "It is not hard to believe in God if one does not define +Him." When the evil instincts of old Foulon made him say of the poor, +"Let them eat grass," the good and Christian instincts of the poor +made them hang him on a lamppost with his mouth stuffed full of that +vegetation. But if a modern vegetarian aristocrat were to say to the +poor, "But why don't you like grass?" their intelligences would be much +more taxed to find such an appropriate repartee. And this matter of the +functions of the sexes is primarily a matter of the instincts; sex and +breathing are about the only two things that generally work best +when they are least worried about. That, I suppose, is why the same +sophisticated age that has poisoned the world with Feminism is also +polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We plunge at once into a forest +of false analogies and bad blundering history; while almost any man or +woman left to themselves would know at least that sex is quite different +from anything else in the world. + +There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and +woman (however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave +and master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the +Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; +these other alien groups never came into contact until they came into +collision. Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards +melted into amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they +like each other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and +sorrows that often come of their mating, it was not such things that +made them meet. It is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern +writers and talkers miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one +would suppose woman a victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, +emancipated woman has, age after age, been knocked silly with a stone +axe. But really there is no fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman +was ever knocked silly; except the fact that she is silly. And that +might have arisen in so many other ways. Real responsible woman has +never been silly; and any one wishing to knock her would be wise (like +the streetboys) to knock and run away. It is ultimately idiotic to +compare this prehistoric participation with any royalties or rebellions. +Genuine royalties wish to crush rebellions. Genuine rebels wish to +destroy kings. The sexes cannot wish to abolish each other; and if we +allow them any sort of permanent opposition it will sink into something +as base as a party system. + +As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, +you cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere +collisions of separate institutions. You could compare it with the +emancipation of negroes from planters—if it were true that a white +man in early youth always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black +man. You could compare it with the revolt of tenants against a +landlord—if it were true that young landlords wrote sonnets to +invisible tenants. You could compare it to the fighting policy of the +Fenians—if it were true that every normal Irishman wanted an +Englishman to come and live with him. But as we know there are no +instincts in any of these directions, these analogies are not only +false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not speak of the comparative +comfort or merit of these different things: I say they are different. It +may be that love turned to hate is terribly common in sexual matters: it +may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in the rivalries of race +or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that begins with anything +but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a fallacy; and all +its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and impertinent as puns. + +But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express +or even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very +much concerned with what literary people call "style" in letters or more +vulgar people call "style" in dress. They are much concerned with how +a thing is done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest +elements in their attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed +by stray examples or sudden images. When Danton was defending himself +before the Jacobin tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard +across the Seine, in quite remote streets on the other side of the +river. He must have bellowed like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would +think of that prodigy except as something poetical and appropriate. None +of us would instinctively feel that Danton was less of a man or even +less of a gentleman, for speaking so in such an hour. But suppose we +heard that Marie Antoinette, when tried before the same tribunal, +had howled so that she could be heard in the Faubourg St. +Germain—well, I leave it to the instincts, if there are any left. +It is not wrong to howl. Neither is it right. It is simply a question +of the instant impression on the artistic and even animal parts of +humanity, if the noise were heard suddenly like a gun. + +Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may be found in +the gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must +always be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the French +committee or the English House of Lords. And "demagogue," in the good +Greek meaning, does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who +leads it: and if you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive +gestures of oratory are gestures of military leadership; pointing the +people to a path or waving them on to an advance. Notice that long +sweep of the arm across the body and outward, which great orators use +naturally and cheap orators artificially. It is almost the exact gesture +of the drawing of a sword. + +The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that +votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so +long as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient +militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd +that is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth +hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points +with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated +finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, +these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. +No honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the +political woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing +to do with any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a +desire exists. A husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown +and proclaimed laws from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles +from the tripod of a priestess; or if she could walk in mystical +motherhood before the procession of some great religious order. But that +she should stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; +leaning forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth +open a little longer and wider than is dignified—well, I only +write here of the facts of natural history; and the fact is that it is +this, and not publicity or importance, that hurts. It is for the modern +world to judge whether such instincts are indeed danger signals; and +whether the hurting of moral as of material nerves is a tocsin and a +warning of nature. + + + + +THE POET AND THE CHEESE + +There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the +white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of +the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even +when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement +of music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with +a shout like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open +arms and warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the +great level lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even +when there are plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. +One's voice seems to break an almost elvish silence, and something +unreasonably weird in the phrase of the nursery tales, "And he went a +little farther and came to another place," comes back into the mind. + +In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and +found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was +one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may +be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass +did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious +impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally +lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of +being so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the +air of something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like +a big yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and +railings; and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that +dead hour of the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, +nor anything else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling +that I had strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in +the twenty-four. + +I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost +as private as a private house. Those who talk of "public-houses" as if +they were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with +such a place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an +elaborate cap sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of +comfortable Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) +the original Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat +a tall, strong, and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and +a pair of scissors stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. +Two feet behind them sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like +wood painted scarlet, with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not +touched, and probably would not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there +was an equally motionless cat; and on the table a copy of 'Household +Words'. + +I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had +met somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; +and yet it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at +once solid and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in +some of Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness +and wonder, and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was +curious; for Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of +the fenlands or flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water +and the mirrored skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline +virtue. Perhaps that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead +of a mountain poet. Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the +whole of that town was like a cup of water given at morning. + +After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of +rustic courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The +old lady answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued +her needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at +her with a suddenly arrested concern. "I suppose," I said, "that it has +nothing to do with the cheese of that name." "Oh, yes," she answered, +with a staggering indifference, "they used to make it here." + +I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. "But this +place is a Shrine!" I said. "Pilgrims should be pouring into it from +wherever the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a +colossal statue in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton +cheese. There ought to be another colossal statue of the first cow who +provided the foundations of it. There should be a burnished tablet let +into the ground on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton +cheese, and survived. On the top of a neighbouring hill (if there +are any neighbouring hills) there should be a huge model of a Stilton +cheese, made of some rich green marble and engraven with some haughty +motto: I suggest something like 'Ver non semper viret; sed Stiltonia +semper virescit.'" The old lady said, "Yes, sir," and continued her +domestic occupations. + +After a strained and emotional silence, I said, "If I take a meal here +tonight can you give me any Stilton?" + +"No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton," said the immovable +one, speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + +"This is awful," I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of +England as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and +forgotten, so to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it +yet more symbolic because from all that old and full and virile life, +the great cheese was gone; and only the beer remained. And even that +will be stolen by the Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. +Politely disengaging myself, I made my way as quickly as possible to +the nearest large, noisy, and nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I +sought out the nearest vulgar, tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + +There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I +got a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote +a sonnet to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my +sonnet is not strictly new; that it contains "echoes" (as they express +it) of some other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, +are the lines I wrote: + + SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE + + Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour + And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby; + England has need of thee, and so have I— + She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour, + League after grassy league from Lincoln tower + To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen. + Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men, + Like a tall green volcano rose in power. + + Plain living and long drinking are no more, + And pure religion reading 'Household Words', + And sturdy manhood sitting still all day + Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core; + While my digestion, like the House of Lords, + The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. + +I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that +has haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is +hopeless to disentangle it now. + + + + +THE THING + +The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like +the war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken +free. For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and +physical, like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing +itself was walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of +beech. + +Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have +been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from +its enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations +tend to perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this +we hear much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the +spirit of religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of +the same stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded +that just as church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are +not knowledge, and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to +find people in the big cities who can read and write quickly enough to +be clerks, but who are actually ignorant of the daily movements of the +sun and moon. + +The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one +watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government +arose among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the +ancients) out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. +The notion of self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes +of it seem to think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be +consulted as one consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked +a lot of fancy questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows +are to be, within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. +They shall decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of +the spade or the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the +valley shall be devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the +men of the town shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or +splendid with spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather +under a patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in +case the word "man" be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral +atmosphere, this original soul of self-government, the women always have +quite as much influence as the men. But in modern England neither the +men nor the women have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the +moulding of the landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people +are utterly impotent. They stand and stare at imperial and economic +processes going on, as they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + +Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place +which really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for +good or evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever +it is) is advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the +villas advance in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates +into which England has long been divided are passing out of the hands +of the English gentry into the hands of men who are always upstarts and +often actually foreigners. + +Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was +really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate +whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a +gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps +they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that +the filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof +over his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say +in, if he is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange +trend of recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over +and treat as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa +is as incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all +Lancashire were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium +were flooded by the sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a +moneylender is a minor and exceptional necessity. In reality it is a +thing like a German invasion. Sometimes it is a German invasion. + +Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes +round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It +is believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of +self-government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions +about everything except what he understands. The examination paper of +the Election generally consists of some such queries as these: "I. Are +the green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your +opinion fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the +President of the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you +think that the savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy +and hygienic as the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? +IV. Did the lost Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III +reserve the right of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of +what America thinks of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst +thinks of the state of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the +two persons in frock-coats placed before you at this election." + +Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that +the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions +like these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and +Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether +farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether +stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But +these are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to +touch with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and +divine mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he +knows nothing about. The name of self-government is noisy everywhere: +the Thing is throttled. + +The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; +in scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances +of martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of +Napoleon and all the tongues of terror with which the Thing has gone +forth: the spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning +only a branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of +the great country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would +have happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + + + + +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + +The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, +if he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes +nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific +or skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution +and Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But +especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the +writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For +the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + +Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, +perhaps, the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as +possible, and from it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right +mode in which all real results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which +is confusing all our current discussions, especially our discussions +about the relations of the sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I +notice an object which is often mentioned in the higher and subtler of +these debates about the sexes: I mean a poker. I will take a poker and +think about it; first forwards and then backwards; and so, perhaps, show +what I mean. + +The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin +somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star +the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, +comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only +naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his +shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He +might almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone +bathing and left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat +upon the beaver and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth +for a waistcoat, and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has +no heat in his hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must +look for light and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is +cast. This is equally true of his soul and of his body; he is the one +creature that has lost his heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a +spiritual sense he has taken leave of his senses; and even in a literal +sense he has been unable to keep his hair on. And just as this external +need of his has lit in his dark brain the dreadful star called religion, +so it has lit in his hand the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red +flower called Fire. Fire, the most magic and startling of all material +things, is a thing known only to man and the expression of his sublime +externalism. It embodies all that is human in his hearths and all that +is divine on his altars. It is the most human thing in the world; seen +across wastes of marsh or medleys of forest, it is veritably the purple +and golden flag of the sons of Eve. But there is about this generous and +rejoicing thing an alien and awful quality: the quality of torture. Its +presence is life; its touch is death. Therefore, it is always necessary +to have an intermediary between ourselves and this dreadful deity; to +have a priest to intercede for us with the god of life and death; to +send an ambassador to the fire. That priest is the poker. Made of +a material more merciless and warlike than the other instruments of +domesticity, hammered on the anvil and born itself in the flame, the +poker is strong enough to enter the burning fiery furnace, and, like +the holy children, not be consumed. In this heroic service it is often +battered and twisted, but is the more honourable for it, like any other +soldier who has been under fire. + +Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right +view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong +view of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's +children, or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman +jump, as the clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to +the beginning, and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see +things in their right order, the one depending on the other in degree of +purpose and importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man +and the man for the glory of God. + +This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, +Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in +an opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:—A modern +intellectual comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not +begin with any dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about +the mystery of fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and +the first thing he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, +"Poor poker; it's crooked." Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and +is told that there is a thing in the world (with which his temperament +has hitherto left him unacquainted)—a thing called fire. He points +out, very kindly and clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want +a straight poker, to put it into a chemical combustion which will very +probably heat and warp it. "Let us abolish fire," he says, "and then +we shall have perfectly straight pokers. Why should you want a fire +at all?" They explain to him that a creature called Man wants a fire, +because he has no fur or feathers. He gazes dreamily at the embers for +a few seconds, and then shakes his head. "I doubt if such an animal is +worth preserving," he says. "He must eventually go under in the cosmic +struggle when pitted against well-armoured and warmly protected species, +who have wings and trunks and spires and scales and horns and shaggy +hair. If Man cannot live without these luxuries, you had better abolish +Man." At this point, as a rule, the crowd is convinced; it heaves up all +its clubs and axes, and abolishes him. At least, one of him. + +Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's +welfare, let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a +straightforward way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern +movements may be right; but let them be defended because they are right, +not because they are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the +actual woman or man in the street, who is cold; like mankind before the +finding of fire. Do not let us begin with the end of the last red-hot +discussion—like the end of a red hot poker. Imperialism may be +right. But if it is right, it is right because England has some divine +authority like Israel, or some human authority like Rome; not because we +have saddled ourselves with South Africa, and don't know how to get rid +of it. Socialism may be true. But if it is true, it is true because the +tribe or the city can really declare all land to be common land, not +because Harrod's Stores exist and the commonwealth must copy them. +Female suffrage may be just. But if it is just, it is just because women +are women, not because women are sweated workers and white slaves and +all sorts of things that they ought never to have been. Let not the +Imperialist accept a colony because it is there, nor the Suffragist +seize a vote because it is lying about, nor the Socialist buy up an +industry merely because it is for sale. + +Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal +decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies proved +that we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall +some day want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and +not, in mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female +suffrage, let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as +the male blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be +Socialism, let it be social; that is, as different as possible from all +the big commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman +tailor does not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more +cloth. The really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing +conditions, he denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some +deeply planted tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at +last into tiny twigs; and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is +trying to bend the tree by a twig: to alter England through a distant +colony, or to capture the State through a small State department, or to +destroy all voting through a vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise +who resists this temptation of trivial triumph or surrender, and happy +(in an echo of the Roman poet) who remembers the roots of things. + + + + +THE NAMELESS MAN + +There are only two forms of government the monarchy or personal +government, and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a +government; England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. +But there is one real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the +method of abstract democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal +government politics are so much more personal. In France and America, +where the State is an abstraction, political argument is quite full +of human details—some might even say of inhuman details. But in +England, precisely because we are ruled by personages, these personages +do not permit personalities. In England names are honoured, and +therefore names are suppressed. But in the republics, in France +especially, a man can put his enemies' names into his article and his +own name at the end of it. + +This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our +anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We +should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, +for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, +and have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, +I had little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for +anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity +is safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact +that you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a +proof that you ought to publish it. + +But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name +to his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and +it is never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a +man's name is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person +today is eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For +instance, we all read with earnestness and patience the pages of the +'Daily Mail', and there are times when we feel moved to cry, "Bring to +us the man who thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture +him, take great care of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some +precious bale of silk, that we may look upon the face of the man who +desires such things to be printed. Let us know his name; his social +and medical pedigree." But in the modern muddle (it might be said) +how little should we gain if those frankly fatuous sheets were indeed +subscribed by the man who had inspired them. Suppose that after every +article stating that the Premier is a piratical Socialist there were +printed the simple word "Northcliffe." What does that simple word +suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul (uninstructed otherwise) +it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in the wintry seas towards +the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the top of this crag the +fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, of course, I +know that the word does not mean this; it means another Fleet Street +journalist like myself or only different from myself in so far as he has +sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a jolly time. + +A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not +distinguish. A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a +hiding-place. + +But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not +merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic +titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been +essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in +which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is +nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk +means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the +Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government +or for it. All government is representative government until it begins +to decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to +decay the instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant +as envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in +becoming aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of +Norfolk ought simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + +I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of +Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very +high at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, +ought to end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences +with the word "together"; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus +I shall expect the Duke of Norfolk to say: "I beg to second the motion +together"; or "This is a great constitutional question together." I +shall expect him to know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers +above them; to know about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to +know too much about anything else. Of mountains he must be wildly and +ludicrously ignorant. He must have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even +the flatness of Norfolk. He must remind me of the watery expanses, the +great square church towers and the long level sunsets of East England. +If he does not do this, I decline to know him. + +I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I +lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that +his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot +with romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but +clotted cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna +Doone', and be unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he +must regard with some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I +should expect the Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and +dreamy ardour of the Celtic fringe. + +Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and +that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke +of Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point +is that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do +we find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, +his locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, +the thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a +gouty admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: +you will hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande +dame, and behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These +are light complications of the central fact of the falsification of all +names and ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediaeval knights who +should have exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule +seems to be that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; +and that the Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so +long as they are not Cornish. + +The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England +is an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, +as some say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and +paralysis of China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that +it calls cats dogs and describes the sun as the moon—and is very +particular about the preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and +to be carefully wrong, that is the definition of decadence. The disease +called aphasia, in which people begin by saying tea when they mean +coffee, commonly ends in their silence. Silence of this stiff sort is +the chief mark of the powerful parts of modern society. They all seem +straining to keep things in rather than to let things out. For the kings +of finance speechlessness is counted a way of being strong, though it +should rather be counted a way of being sly. By this time the Parliament +does not parley any more than the Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper +editors and proprietors are more despotic and dangerous by what they do +not utter than by what they do. We have all heard the expression "golden +silence." The expression "brazen silence" is the only adequate phrase +for our editors. If we wake out of this throttled, gaping, and wordless +nightmare, we must awake with a yell. The Revolution that releases +England from the fixed falsity of its present position will be not less +noisy than other revolutions. It will contain, I fear, a great deal of +that rude accomplishment described among little boys as "calling names"; +but that will not matter much so long as they are the right names. + + + + +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + +Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. +Indeed, the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on +cooperation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French +Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its +proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The +essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by +yourself. + +Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates +the things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and +suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest +approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the +country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached +to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean +the small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized +gardens; who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and +who frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the +characteristics of the true Peasant—especially the characteristics +that people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which +is the consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even +disliked sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because +(like Micaiah) he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The +English gardener is grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even +economical. Nor is this (as the reader's lightning wit will flash back +at me) merely because the English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. +The type does exist in pure South England blood and speech; I have +spoken to the type. I was speaking to the type only the other evening, +when a rather odd little incident occurred. + +It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and +radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it +is of the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and +hackneyed line about coming "before the swallow dares." Spring never is +Spring unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, +without any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in +heaven. The gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is needless +to explain the causes of this difference; it would be to tell the +tremendous history of two souls. It is needless because there is a more +immediate explanation of the case: the gardener and I, if not equal in +agreement, were at least equal in difference. It is quite certain that +he would not have allowed me to touch the garden if I had gone down +on my knees to him. And it is by no means certain that I should have +consented to touch the garden if he had gone down on his knees to me. +His activity and my idleness, therefore, went on steadily side by side +through the long sunset hours. + +And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not +sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about +the earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and +the flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a +herald. He possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while +I only possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than +coal-owners know about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they +are brought above the surface of the earth. I know more about gardens +than railway shareholders seem to know about railways: for at least I +know that it needs a man to make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But +as I walked on that grass my ignorance overwhelmed me—and yet that +phrase is false, because it suggests something like a storm from the sky +above. It is truer to say that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like +a mine dug long before; and indeed it was dug before the beginning of +the ages. Green bombs of bulbs and seeds were bursting underneath me +everywhere; and, so far as my knowledge went, they had been laid by +a conspirator. I trod quite uneasily on this uprush of the earth; the +Spring is always only a fruitful earthquake. With the land all alive +under me I began to wonder more and more why this man, who had made the +garden, did not own the garden. If I stuck a spade into the ground, I +should be astonished at what I found there...and just as I thought this +I saw that the gardener was astonished too. + +Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by +the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It +was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, +I believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + +If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can +explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: +and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came +there I have not a notion—unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his +hurry to get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold +recital of facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under +the earth there, for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a +treasure without a Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it +will never be found, for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams +of avarice since I know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. +And, for the other party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the +garden. + +Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw +that answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not +belong to the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than +simply putting the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only +underground seed that I could understand. Only by having a little more +of that dull, battered yellow substance could I manage to be idle while +he was active. I am not altogether idle myself; but the fact remains +that the power is in the thin slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, +not in the strong square and curve of metal which we call the Spade. +And then I suddenly remembered that as I had found gold on my ground by +accident, so richer men in the north and west counties had found coal in +their ground, also by accident. + +I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, +but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and +then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he +would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But +a little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not +get a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering +and unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such +accidental and irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? +Perhaps he dimly felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that +buried treasure is a thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps +he thought there was a curse on such capital: on the coal of the +coal-owners, on the gold of the gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + + + + +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + +The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was +stated wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best +men from devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a +fanatical conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote +themselves to politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and +babies and things like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in +party politics, I wish there was more of it. The real danger of the two +parties with their two policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of +the ordinary citizen. They make him barren instead of creative, because +he is never allowed to do anything except prefer one existing policy to +another. We have not got real Democracy when the decision depends upon +the people. We shall have real Democracy when the problem depends upon +the people. The ordinary man will decide not only how he will vote, but +what he is going to vote about. + +It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations +towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all +questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of +the suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not +the quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting +about. A certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses +and the highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they +must go down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but +only which they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it +thus. The Suffragettes—if one may judge by their frequent ringing +of his bell—want to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion +what it is. Let us say (for the sake of argument) that they want to +paint him green. We will suppose that it is entirely for that simple +purpose that they are always seeking to have private interviews with +him; it seems as profitable as any other end that I can imagine to such +an interview. Now, it is possible that the Government of the day might +go in for a positive policy of painting Mr. Asquith green; might give +that reform a prominent place in their programme. Then the party in +opposition would adopt another policy, not a policy of leaving Mr. +Asquith alone (which would be considered dangerously revolutionary), but +some alternative course of action, as, for instance, painting him red. +Then both sides would fling themselves on the people, they would both +cry that the appeal was now to the Caesar of Democracy. A dark and +dramatic air of conflict and real crisis would arise on both sides; +arrows of satire would fly and swords of eloquence flame. The Greens +would say that Socialists and free lovers might well want to paint Mr. +Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole town red. Socialists would +indignantly reply that Socialism was the reverse of disorder, and that +they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red so that he might resemble +the red pillar-boxes which typified State control. The Greens would +passionately deny the charge so often brought against them by the Reds; +they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith green in order that he +might be invisible on the green benches of the Commons, as certain +terrified animals take the colour of their environment. + +There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, +flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, "Keep the +Red Flag Flying," and the other, "The Wearing of the Green." But when +the last effort had been made and the last moment come, when two +crowds were waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the +declaration of the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now +for democracy to do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her +head in awful loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. +Yet this might not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in +awful loneliness and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale +blue. The democracy of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed +to make up a policy for itself, might have desired him to be black +with pink spots. It might even have liked him as he is now. But a huge +apparatus of wealth, power, and printed matter has made it practically +impossible for them to bring home these other proposals, even if they +would really prefer them. No candidates will stand in the spotted +interest; for candidates commonly have to produce money either from +their own pockets or the party's; and in such circles spots are not +worn. No man in the social position of a Cabinet Minister, perhaps, +will commit himself to the pale-blue theory of Mr. Asquith; therefore it +cannot be a Government measure, therefore it cannot pass. + +Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will +declare dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes +it, that red and green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE +OBSERVER will say: "No one who knows the solid framework of politics or +the emphatic first principles of an Imperial people can suppose for +a moment that there is any possible compromise to be made in such a +matter; we must either fulfil our manifest racial destiny and crown the +edifice of ages with the august figure of a Green Premier, or we must +abandon our heritage, break our promise to the Empire, fling ourselves +into final anarchy, and allow the flaming and demoniac image of a Red +Premier to hover over our dissolution and our doom." The DAILY MAIL +would say: "There is no halfway house in this matter; it must be green +or red. We wish to see every honest Englishman one colour or the other." +And then some funny man in the popular Press would star the sentence +with a pun, and say that the DAILY MAIL liked its readers to be green +and its paper to be read. But no one would even dare to whisper that +there is such a thing as yellow. + +For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly +examples than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But +I could give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which +I refer. In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually +insisted in every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and +that it was only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It +was not inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to +make peace with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with +their conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been +better for us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and +prestige, if we had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a +matter of opinion. What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was +not, as was said, the only possible course; there were plenty of other +courses; there were plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the +discussion about Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind +that we must choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they +call Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean +that anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral +philosophy of the young Horner—and say what a good boy he is for +helping himself. + +It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a +Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this +moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary +to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I +should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply +not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal +order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound +scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might +have peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry +George; we might have a number of tiny communes; we might have +co-operation; we might have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred +things. I am not saying that any of these are right, though I cannot +imagine that any of them could be worse than the present social +madhouse, with its top-heavy rich and its tortured poor; but I say that +it is an evidence of the stiff and narrow alternative offered to the +civic mind, that the civic mind is not, generally speaking, conscious of +these other possibilities. The civic mind is not free or alert enough +to feel how much it has the world before it. There are at least ten +solutions of the Education question, and no one knows which Englishmen +really want. For Englishmen are only allowed to vote about the two +which are at that moment offered by the Premier and the Leader of the +Opposition. There are ten solutions of the drink question; and no one +knows which the democracy wants; for the democracy is only allowed to +fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + +So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer +questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political +aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably +cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be +rather careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and +self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less +democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of +slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both +of them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification +of taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much +alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold—and then +for a great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + + + + +THE MAD OFFICIAL + +Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very +nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all +my friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of +moderns; I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of +thinking before he comes to the first chance of living. + +But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man +does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a +certain dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very +atmosphere of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his +madness, he would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel +or cryptograms in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, +which are on his nose night and day. If once he could take off the +spectacles he would smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the +Sixth Seal or the Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible +first principle. If he could once see the first principle, he would see +that it is not there. + +This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur +not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard +to pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental +degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a +real test. A nation is not going mad when it does extravagant things, +so long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting +their beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other +Harmodius and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these +are wild things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + +But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State +is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, +this would logically allow me to fire off fifty-nine enormous field-guns +day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man +doing it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the +neighbours putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing +merely because it might happen to fulfill the letter of my license. + +Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I +know) to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should +not be surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England +there is practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be +surprised even at the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he +lived long under the English landlord system, might do anything. But I +should be surprised at the people who consented to stand it. I should, +in other words, think the world a little mad if the incident, were +received in silence. + +Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every +day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. All blows +fall soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a +passive as well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of +the nerves to respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural +stimulation. There are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here +and there in history, which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from +glory to insignificance, or from freedom to slavery, not only in +silence, but with serenity. The face still smiles while the limbs, +literally and loathsomely, are dropping from the body. These are peoples +that have lost the power of astonishment at their own actions. When they +give birth to a fantastic fashion or a foolish law, they do not start +or stare at the monster they have brought forth. They have grown used +to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; and the whirlwind is the +breath of their nostrils. These nations are really in danger of going +off their heads en masse; of becoming one vast vision of imbecility, +with toppling cities and crazy country-sides, all dotted with +industrious lunatics. One of these countries is modern England. + +Now here is an actual instance, a small case of how our social +conscience really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in +realisation; a thing without the light of mind in it. I take this +paragraph from a daily paper:—"At Epping, yesterday, Thomas +Woolbourne, a Lambourne labourer, and his wife were summoned for +neglecting their five children. Dr. Alpin said he was invited by the +inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to visit defendants' cottage. Both the +cottage and the children were dirty. The children looked exceedingly +well in health, but the conditions would be serious in case of illness. +Defendants were stated to be sober. The man was discharged. The woman, +who said she was hampered by the cottage having no water supply and +that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' imprisonment. The sentence +caused surprise, and the woman was removed crying, 'Lord save me!'" + +I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of +some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces +and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the +accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning +has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago +that can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of +reason to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + +I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman +was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for +being ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a +matter of fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. +The doctor was called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty +to Children. Was this woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the +least. Did the doctor say she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in +the least. Was these any evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of +cruelty? Not a rap. The worse that the doctor could work himself up +to saying was that though the children were "exceedingly" well, the +conditions would be serious in case of illness. If the doctor will tell +me any conditions that would be comic in case of illness, I shall attach +more weight to his argument. + +Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has +gone mad. He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite +literally and practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, +Quis docebit ipsum doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly +unnatural thing; instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect +of children is a natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is +a mere difference of degree that divides extending arms and legs in +calisthenics and extending them on the rack. It is a mere difference of +degree that separates any operation from any torture. The thumb-screw +can easily be called Manicure. Being pulled about by wild horses can +easily be called Massage. The modern problem is not so much what people +will endure as what they will not endure. But I fear I interrupt.... The +boiling oil is boiling; and the Tenth Mandarin is already reciting the +"Seventeen Serious Principles and the Fifty-three Virtues of the Sacred +Emperor." + + + + +THE ENCHANTED MAN + +When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, +who acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, +it is the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very +late. This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late +comers had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English +audience always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and +(as I have found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable +taunts rather than come forward. The English are a modest people; that +is why they are entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to +be immodest. In theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in +most playhouses we find the bored people in front and the eager people +behind. + +As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored +person; but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus +required to sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in +the dramatic world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all +critics have to take off their heads. The people behind will have a +chance then. And as it happens, in this case, I had not so much taken +off my head as lost it. I had lost it on the road; on that strange +journey that was the cause of my coming in late. I have a troubled +recollection of having seen a very good play and made a very bad speech; +I have a cloudy recollection of talking to all sorts of nice people +afterwards, but talking to them jerkily and with half a head, as a man +talks when he has one eye on a clock. + +And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, +hung uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure +for such bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I +was moonstruck. A lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had +inexplicably got in between me and all other scenes. If any one had +asked me I could not have said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing +had occurred to me; except the breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge +of a hill. It was not an adventure; it was a vision. + +I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small +car that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as +night blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way +increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. +Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a +yet steeper road like a ladder. + +At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower +of Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, +and the driver saying that "it couldn't be done." I got out of the car +and suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + +From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which +I am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his +great patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts +of South Africa, he made use of the expression "the illimitable veldt." +The word "veldt" is Dutch, and the word "illimitable" is Double Dutch. +But the meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him +a sense of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. +Well, if he never found it in England it was because he never looked for +it in England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable +veldts. I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many +different hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite +horizon, free and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little +more desolate than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as +that English hill was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + +I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if +at a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on +that freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost +fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening +forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an +abyss which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless +only because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries +had been swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the +hills. I could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if +I hurled huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had +bewitched the landscape: but that again does not express the best or +worst of it. All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so +inhuman that it has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on +them; that is the nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking +at the back of the world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the +universe in the rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon +an unconscious creation. + +I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it +is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about +its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in +some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical +phrases of the populace, "a God-forsaken place." Yet something was +present there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. +Then suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. It +had been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales about +princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were in a +land where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The moon +looked at me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; the +one white eye of the world. + +There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a +point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There +were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for +they were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration +which is the transition from life to art. But all the time I was +mesmerised by the moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted +things. The poacher shot pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the +wife hid pheasants; they were all (especially the policeman) as true +as death. But there was something more true to death than true to life +about it all: the figures were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or +fear or custom such as does not cramp the movements of the poor men of +other lands. I looked at the poacher and the policeman and the gun; then +at the gun and the policeman and the poacher; and I could find no name +for the fancy that haunted and escaped me. The poacher believed in the +Game Laws as much as the policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed +in the Game Laws, but protected them as well as him. She got a promise +from her husband that he would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he +kept it I doubt; I fancy he sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. +But I am sure he never shot a policeman. For we live in an enchanted +land. + + + + +THE SUN WORSHIPPER + +There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. +And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in +that sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the +warning to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as +fate, if they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that +argument will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and +the slave. To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, +so to speak, in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern +doctrine, taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is +called the materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: +that all the important things in history are rooted in an economic +motive. In short, history is a science; a science of the search for +food. + +Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely +untrue, but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too +feebly to say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would +not have any history if he were only economic. The need for food is +certainly universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows +have an economic motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal +delicacies may be in a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass +anywhere and never eats anything else. In short, the cow does fulfill +the materialist theory of history: that is why the cow has no history. +"A History of Cows" would be one of the simplest and briefest of +standard works. But if some cows thought it wicked to eat long grass +and persecuted all who did so; if the cow with the crumpled horn were +worshipped by some cows and gored to death by others; if cows began to +have obvious moral preferences over and above a desire for grass, then +cows would begin to have a history. They would also begin to have a +highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same thing. + +The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually +outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that +is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men +are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we +have made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended +on economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two +legs. It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a +condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly +a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two +legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or +a coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or +no information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy +romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating +millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported +on legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more +generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much +grander and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the +hills and see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the +horizon broken by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + +So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. +But history—the whole point of history—precisely is that +some two legged soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical +structure, did not. The whole point of history precisely is: some people +(like poets and tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while +others (such as millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun +of bothering about it. There would be no history if there were only +economic history. All the historical events have been due to the +twists and turns given to the economic instinct by forces that were not +economic. For instance, this theory traces the French war of Edward +III to a quarrel about the French wines. Any one who has even smelt the +Middle Ages must feel fifty answers spring to his lips; but in this case +one will suffice. There would have been no such war, then, if we all +drank water like cows. But when one is a man one enters the world +of historic choice. The act of drinking wine is one that requires +explanation. So is the act of not drinking wine. + +But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + +When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, +an ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said +that they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was +eagerly taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do +not see why it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable +uprisings in history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is +generally rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on +the sudden and mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from +captivity. The English strikers used some barren republican formula +(arid as the definitions of the medieval schoolmen), some academic +shibboleth about being free men and not being forced to work except for +a wage accepted by them. Just in the same way the Israelites in Egypt +employed some dry scholastic quibble about the extreme difficulty of +making bricks with nothing to make them of. But whatever fantastic +intellectual excuses they may have put forward for their strange and +unnatural conduct in walking out when the prison door was open, there +can be no doubt that the real cause was the warm weather. Such a climate +notoriously also produces delusions and horrible fancies, such as Mr. +Kipling describes. And it was while their brains were disordered by the +heat that the Jews fancied that they were founding a nation, that they +were led by a prophet, and, in short, that they were going to be of some +importance in the affairs of the world. + +Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was +pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + +In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself +in accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at +these words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three +times), and I rather think that exceptions might be found to the +principle. Yet it is not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my +belief in it. + +No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by +which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of +class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not +leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave +off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high +interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to +what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years +ago. The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking +because they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy +confirmation from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges +and other persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition +to strike. I have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my +own; and I continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to +steal a phrase from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that +is other than the elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + +When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really +time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession +of what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of +the mediaeval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing +from a slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land +rather than the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could +not be raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the +lord rode down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he +had the chance of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the +means of production. + +Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; +and something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is +no doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we +have destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in +serfdom; nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich +man has entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in +the modern industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They +can only find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such +competitive and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + +Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts +inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That +retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut +off. Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows +or the Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more +dreamed of than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. +He owned all the birds that passed over his land: he might as well have +owned all the clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's +land to Brown's land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. +The logical answer to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's +land ought to be able to prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp +without a muzzle. + +Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep +in the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +A landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way +that a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or +on a seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense +of fun) as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + +The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings +would fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike +or deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the +passerby. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A +man in England can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in +the name of God. + +You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor +to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have +still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: +that weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the +working of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had +this last retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat +was also perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. +Whereupon the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at +your Boards and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you +opened on them the eyes of owls, and said, "It must be the sunshine." +You could only go on saying, "The sun, the sun." That was what the man +in Ibsen said, when he had lost his wits. + + + + +THE WRONG INCENDIARY + +I stood looking at the Coronation Procession—I mean the one +in Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I +believe, had some success in London—and I was seriously impressed. +Most of my life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that +I was quite right. Never before have I realised how right I was in +maintaining that the small area expresses the real patriotism: the +smaller the field the taller the tower. There were things in our local +procession that did not (one might even reverently say, could not) occur +in the London procession. One of the most prominent citizens in our +procession (for instance) had his face blacked. Another rode on a pony +which wore pink and blue trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan +affair, and therefore my assertion is subject to such correction as the +eyewitness may always offer to the absentee. But I believe with some +firmness that no such features occurred in the London pageant. + +But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of +something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my +garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind +of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead +trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, +reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material +and mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the +day when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather +strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any +sort of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + +In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I +supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose +stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out +cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big +stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also +a strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every +now and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew +what it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across +two meadows smote me where I stood. "Oh, my holy aunt," I thought, +"they've mistaken the Coronation Day." + +And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like +a bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close +to the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink +with the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted +as black as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart +edged with a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured +like a scarlet snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of +light. + +I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling +noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The +heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if +some giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I +had not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; +but the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered +the grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the +last fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and +cavernous; and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the +dark and magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a +rood past me; then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell +him where the fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought +it was the cottages by the wood-yard. He said, "My God!" and vanished. + +A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and +the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were +dim huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The +fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which +seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a +very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that +most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in +dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of +midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that +the fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard +itself. There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly +accidental; though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and +revenge. But for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a +swollen, tragic, portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something +to do with the crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end +of England. It was not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad +daylight next morning that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight +adventure had not happened outside this world. + +But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or +Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was +feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles +of virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good +things were being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, +walking-sticks, wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for +girls I could hear the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the +flames. And then I thought of that other noble tower of needless things +that stood in the field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of +vanities, that is meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in +the meadow, and the birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and +spangled its twigs. And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, +the Bad Fire and the Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of +Bonfire. And the paradox is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of +things that we do not want; but the Bad Fire is made of good things, +of things that we do want; like all that wealth of wood that might have +made dolls and chairs and tables, but was only making a hueless ash. + +And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there +are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race +between them. Which will happen first—the revolution in which +bad things shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things +shall perish also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most +conservative, really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the +face of the well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the +throat of despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is +possible, take tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into +bundles and burn them. And the other is the disruption that may come +prematurely, negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my +little town. + +It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in +it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and +fair ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two +revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway +trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the +tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a +cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout +like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a +blazing pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one +could fancy it visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along +the terraces of the Chiltern Hills. + + + + +THE FREE MAN + +The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men +find it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally +to the fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save +their lives by law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked +Coleridge for praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun +to be free. It seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the +sun. Speaking as a Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of +Joshua stopping the sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting +his daily round in imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, +and his astronomical act was distinctly revolutionary. For all +revolution is the mastering of matter by the spirit of man, the +emergence of that human authority within us which, in the noble words of +Sir Thomas Browne, "owes no homage unto the sun." + +Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant +merely to receive good laws, good food or good conditions, like a +tree in a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in +selecting and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning +of the trade of Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real +idea of liberty are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the +word "make" about most of the things in which freedom is essential, as +a country walk or a friendship or a love affair. When a man "makes his +way" through a wood he has really created, he has built a road, like the +Romans. When a man "makes a friend," he makes a man. And in the third +case we talk of a man "making love," as if he were (as, indeed, he is) +creating new masses and colours of that flaming material an awful form +of manufacture. In its primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in +man, or, if you like the word, the artist. + +In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the +citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men +are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the +eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, +bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing +the citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the +State. You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may +call the bees a despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who +attempted to introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a +career as curt and fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm +alone. The isolation of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious +character; but it is not even in humanity by any means equally +distributed. The idea that the State should not only be supported by +its children, like the ant-hill, but should be constantly criticised and +reconstructed by them, is an idea stronger in Christendom than any +other part of the planet; stronger in Western than Eastern Europe. And +touching the pure idea of the individual being free to speak and act +within limits, the assertion of this idea, we may fairly say, has been +the peculiar honour of our own country. For my part I greatly prefer the +Jingoism of Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of The Recessional. I have +no objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I draw the line when +she begins to rule the dry land—and such damnably dry land +too—as in Africa. And there was a real old English sincerity +in the vulgar chorus that "Britons never shall be slaves." We had no +equality and hardly any justice; but freedom we were really fond of. +And I think just now it is worth while to draw attention to the old +optimistic prophecy that "Britons never shall be slaves." + +The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than +it has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy +to slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people +up. Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect +high-placed officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts +rather than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished +the Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed +a law (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not +depend upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have +got hold of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty +is in the air. A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square +without a word of accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says +that in his opinion the police are very nice people, and there is an end +of the matter. A Member of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. +The Speaker says he must not criticise a peerage, and there the matter +drops. + +Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of +criticising those flexible parts of the State which constantly require +reconsideration, not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, +it means the power of saying the sort of things that a decent but +discontented citizen wants to say. He does not want to spit on the +Bible, or to run about without clothes, or to read the worst page in +Zola from the pulpit of St. Paul's. Therefore the forbidding of these +things (whether just or not) is only tyranny in a secondary and special +sense. It restrains the abnormal, not the normal man. But the normal +man, the decent discontented citizen, does want to protest against +unfair law courts. He does want to expose brutalities of the police. +He does want to make game of a vulgar pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He +does want publicly to warn people against unscrupulous capitalists and +suspicious finance. If he is run in for doing this (as he will be) +he does want to proclaim the character or known prejudices of the +magistrate who tries him. If he is sent to prison (as he will be) he +does want to have a clear and civilised sentence, telling him when he +will come out. And these are literally and exactly the things that +he now cannot get. That is the almost cloying humour of the present +situation. I can say abnormal things in modern magazines. It is the +normal things that I am not allowed to say. I can write in some solemn +quarterly an elaborate article explaining that God is the devil; I can +write in some cultured weekly an aesthetic fancy describing how I +should like to eat boiled baby. The thing I must not write is rational +criticism of the men and institutions of my country. + +The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can +say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot +say, for instance, that—But I am afraid I must leave out +that instance, because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my +case—because it is so true. + + + + +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + +We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded +that he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is +extreme, and my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. +But I never quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at +least from my own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught +my eye; and thus the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite +constantly walked into another man's house, thinking it was my own +house; my visits became almost monotonous. But walking into my own house +and thinking it was another man's house is a flight of poetic detachment +still beyond me. Something of the sensations that such an absent-minded +man must feel I really felt the other day; and very pleasant sensations +they were. The best parts of every proper romance are the first chapter +and the last chapter; and to knock at a strange door and find a nice +wife would be to concentrate the beginning and end of all romance. + +Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the +same kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin +and unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was +treading in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty +years old. + +It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost +unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were +once great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, +as it says in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is +something singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that +were so long a human property and care fighting for their own hand in +the thicket. One almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the +dog evolved into a wolf. + +This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned +out for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite +threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years +ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone +no farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked +building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or +coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick +of which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a +blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; +and on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white +which always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of +some blind giant. + +I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had +not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought +much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth +walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged +person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off +than childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal +picture, distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I +stood; and I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. +They still stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, +as if they had stood for centuries. + +I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half +slid on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked +off the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but +were still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks +off the tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I +had recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And +then I came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with +the sawdust and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three +green stars of dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding +road. + +I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those +years ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this +red and white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more +lonesome than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could +only be full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of +the ghosts of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future +as he can find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediaeval +notion of erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting +on it a miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I +thought to myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built +boxes was indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real +miracle play; that human family that is almost the holy one, and that +human death that is near to the last judgment. + +For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row +especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. +Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; +and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and +solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction +upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the +convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + +As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played +the fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in +my pocket, I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; +things addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had +written up in what I supposed to be the dining-room: + + James Harrogate, thank God for meat, + Then eat and eat and eat and eat, + +or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric +was scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something +beginning: + + When laying what you call your head, + O Harrogate, upon your bed, + +and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite +vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, +and the places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in +memory; for when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century +the house was very different. + +I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its +windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low +square windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream +of lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, +was standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy +sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the +wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that +lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express +if I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red +chalk upon the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to +withdraw, a mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct +accents to a very smart suburban maid, "Does Mr. James Harrogate live +here?" + +She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking +for him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I +had one moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then +decided not to look for him at all. + + + + +THE PRIEST OF SPRING + +The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. +But it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty +but of revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect +who will fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to +be congratulated on fitting in with the Spring—or the Spring on +fitting in with Easter. + +The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a +story; and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed +very voluptuous appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like +mathematics, logic, or chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind +are like mere pleasures of the body. That is, they are mere pleasures, +though they may be gigantic pleasures; they can never by a mere increase +of themselves amount to happiness. A man just about to be hanged may +enjoy his breakfast; especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and +in the same way he may enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, +especially if it is his favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy +either of them does not depend on either of them; it depends upon his +spiritual attitude towards a subsequent event. And that event is really +interesting to the soul; because it is the end of a story and (as some +hold) the end of a person. + +Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for +our scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about +true religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of +mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself +to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) +that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis +or Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, +they have got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is +sufficiently interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any +particular mystery or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to +disguise them under the image of a very handsome young man, which is a +vastly more interesting thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall +of leaves in autumn and the return of flowers in spring, the process of +thought was quite different. It is a process of thought which springs +up spontaneously in all children and young artists; it springs up +spontaneously in all healthy societies. It is very difficult to explain +in a diseased society. + +The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A +cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a +dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a +daydream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a +start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save +in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its +trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete +phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream +sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting +in of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was +asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to +rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by +certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were +always unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always +intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of "the +survival of the fittest," meaning only the survival of the survivors; or +wherever a man says that the rich "have a stake in the country," as +if the poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or +where a man talks about "going on towards Progress," which only means +going on towards going on; or when a man talks about "government by the +wise few," as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. "The wise +few" must mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very +foolish who think themselves wise. + +There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves +saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am +particularly irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the +nineteenth century, especially in connection with the study of myths and +religions. The fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes +the form of saying "This god or hero really represents the sun." Or +"Apollo killing the Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter." +Or "The King dying in a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting +in the west." Now I should really have thought that even the skeptical +professors, whose skulls are as shallow as frying-pans, might have +reflected that human beings never think or feel like this. Consider what +is involved in this supposition. It presumes that primitive man went out +for a walk and saw with great interest a big burning spot on the sky. He +then said to primitive woman, "My dear, we had better keep this quiet. +We mustn't let it get about. The children and the slaves are so very +sharp. They might discover the sun any day, unless we are very careful. +So we won't call it 'the sun,' but I will draw a picture of a man +killing a snake; and whenever I do that you will know what I mean. +The sun doesn't look at all like a man killing a snake; so nobody can +possibly know. It will be a little secret between us; and while the +slaves and the children fancy I am quite excited with a grand tale of +a writhing dragon and a wrestling demigod, I shall really MEAN this +delicious little discovery, that there is a round yellow disc up in the +air." One does not need to know much mythology to know that this is a +myth. It is commonly called the Solar Myth. + +Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god +was never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a +hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend +Dombey is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods +and heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw +the sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress +of nightfall, and he said, "That is how the face of the god would shine +when he had slain the dragon," or "That is how the whole world would +bleed to westward, if the god were slain at last." + +No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No +man, however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man +as round as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however +attracted to an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the +Dryad was as lean and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never +worshipped Nature; and indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all +human beings are superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon +Nature, as God has printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous +sun to stand still; we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more +for a star than for a starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we +could not for the time control, we have conceived great beings in human +shape controlling them. Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the +march and victory of Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is +his, and he made it. In other words, what the savage really said about +the sea was, "Only my fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of +mere water." What the savage really said about the sun was, "Only my +great great-grandfather Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown." + +About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. +I say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that +one of them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are +no real ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real +bank-notes. Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to +those of us that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, +even a false god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the +second place. When once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before +Him, offering flowers in spring as flames in winter. "My love is like a +red, red rose" does not mean that the poet is praising roses under the +allegory of a young lady. "My love is an arbutus" does not mean that the +author was a botanist so pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he +said he loved it. "Who art the moon and regent of my sky" does not mean +that Juliet invented Romeo to account for the roundness of the moon. +"Christ is the Sun of Easter" does not mean that the worshipper is +praising the sun under the emblem of Christ. Goddess or god can clothe +themselves with the spring or summer; but the body is more than raiment. +Religion takes almost disdainfully the dress of Nature; and indeed +Christianity has done as well with the snows of Christmas as with the +snow-drops of spring. And when I look across the sun-struck fields, I +know in my inmost bones that my joy is not solely in the spring, for +spring alone, being always returning, would be always sad. There is +somebody or something walking there, to be crowned with flowers: and my +pleasure is in some promise yet possible and in the resurrection of the +dead. + + + + +THE REAL JOURNALIST + +Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of +reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce +between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is +done. I take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. +Nothing looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel +columns, its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its +responsible, polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter +of fact, goes every night through more agonies of adventure, more +hairbreadth escapes, desperate expedients, crucial councils, random +compromises, or barely averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it +seems to come round as automatically as the clock and as silently as the +dawn. Seen from the inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief +every morning to see that it has come out at all; that it has come out +without the leading article upside down or the Pope congratulated on +discovering the North Pole. + +I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) +from the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little +episode in the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and +instructive: the tale of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There +are really two stories: the story as seen from the outside, by a +man reading the paper; and the story seen from the inside, by the +journalists shouting and telephoning and taking notes in shorthand +through the night. + +This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The +notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy +pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, +long calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant +leader of the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his +fanatic soul. In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not +having the fear of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote +the line "that wreathes its old fantastic roots so high." This he said +because he had been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because +he thought craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and +forgotten rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that +orthodox gentleman made a howling error; and received some twenty-five +letters and post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the +mistake. + +But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it +was a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, +and cried, "What is the joke NOW?" Another professed (and practised, for +all I know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and +failed to find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, +asking, as in confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a +noble collection; but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and +exactitude in the recipient's profession and character which is far from +the truth. Let us pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + +In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same +culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to +Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another +cropper—or whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was +printed by the editor with the justly scornful title, "Mr. Chesterton +'Explains'?" Any man reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the +meaning of the sarcastic quotation marks. They meant, of course, "Here +is a man who doesn't know Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up +and he can't even spell Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation." +That is the perfectly natural inference of the reader from the letter, +the mistake, and the headline—as seen from the outside. The +falsehood was serious; the editorial rebuke was serious. The stern +editor and the sombre, baffled contributor confront each other as the +curtain falls. + +And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly +rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really +are. A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a +column in the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it +(which is always at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded +by infants of all shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and +he has to cope with the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a +glorious thing; but the journalist in question has never understood +why it was considered a soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not +of watering little budding flowers, but of wrestling for hours with +gigantic angels and devils. Moral problems of the most monstrous +complexity besiege him incessantly. He has to decide before the awful +eyes of innocence, whether, when a sister has knocked down a brother's +bricks, in revenge for the brother having taken two sweets out of his +turn, it is endurable that the brother should retaliate by scribbling on +the sister's picture book, and whether such conduct does not justify the +sister in blowing out the brother's unlawfully lighted match. + +Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest +morality, it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday +article; and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly +calls to somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for +a messenger; he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, +wondering what on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on +the door outside and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his +thoughts; and he is able to observe some newspapers and circulars in +wrappers lying on the table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second +is a shiny pamphlet about petrol; the third is a paper called The +Christian Commonwealth. He opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a +page a sentence with which he honestly disagrees. It says that the sense +of beauty in Nature is a new thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A +stream of images and pictures pour through his head, like skies chasing +each other or forests running by. "Not felt before Wordsworth!" he +thinks. "Oh, but this won't do... bare ruined choirs where late the +sweet birds sang... night's candles are burnt out... glowed with living +sapphires... leaving their moon-loved maze... antique roots fantastic... +antique roots wreathed high... what is it in As You Like It?" + +He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children +drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the +messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making +the world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making +Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting "fantastic +roots wreathed high" instead of "antique roots peep out." Then the +journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma +of whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the +sister pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is +how an article is really written. + +The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article +has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: +but the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the +paper and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his +friends at the other end; he knows that they can spell "Gray," as no +doubt they can: but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a +pencil scribble and the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes +at the top of the letter "'G. K. C.' Explains," putting the initials in +quotation marks. The next man passing it for press is bored with these +initials (I am with him there) and crosses them out, substituting with +austere civility, "Mr. Chesterton Explains." But and now he hears +the iron laughter of the Fates, for the blind bolt is about to +fall—but he neglects to cross out the second "quote" (as we call +it) and it goes up to press with a "quote" between the last words. +Another quotation mark at the end of "explains" was the work of one +merry moment for the printers upstairs. So the inverted commas were +lifted entirely off one word on to the other and a totally innocent +title suddenly turned into a blasting sneer. But that would have +mattered nothing so far, for there was nothing to sneer at. In the same +dark hour, however, there was a printer who was (I suppose) so devoted +to this Government that he could think of no Gray but Sir Edward Grey. +He spelt it "Grey" by a mere misprint, and the whole tale was complete: +first blunder, second blunder, and final condemnation. + +That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic +and ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might +remember it when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged +by the neck on circumstantial evidence. + + + + +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + +Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most +romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch +blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; +that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it +is always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that +they have an eye to business. I like that phrase "an eye" to business. + +Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his +forehead. It served him admirably for the only two duties which are +demanded in a modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties +of counting sheep and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out +he was done for. But the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though +their best friends must admit that they are occasionally business-like. +They are, quite fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this +is proved by the very economic argument that is used to prove their +harshness and hunger for the material. The mass of Scots have accepted +the industrial civilisation, with its factory chimneys and its famine +prices, with its steam and smoke and steel—and strikes. The mass +of the Irish have not accepted it. The mass of the Irish have clung to +agriculture with claws of iron; and have succeeded in keeping it. That +is because the Irish, though far inferior to the Scotch in art and +literature, are hugely superior to them in practical politics. You do +need to be very romantic to accept the industrial civilisation. It does +really require all the old Gaelic glamour to make men think that Glasgow +is a grand place. Yet the miracle is achieved; and while I was in +Glasgow I shared the illusion. I have never had the faintest illusion +about Leeds or Birmingham. The industrial dream suited the Scots. Here +was a really romantic vista, suited to a romantic people; a vision of +higher and higher chimneys taking hold upon the heavens, of fiercer +and fiercer fires in which adamant could evaporate like dew. Here were +taller and taller engines that began already to shriek and gesticulate +like giants. Here were thunderbolts of communication which already +flashed to and fro like thoughts. It was unreasonable to expect the +rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot to stand still in such a whirl of wizardry +to ask whether he, the ordinary Scot, would be any the richer. + +He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich +city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich +men. It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, +Manchester, Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, +Munich, or Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, +perhaps, be due to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots +has there been reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence +of the Irish. In any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main +historical fact. The Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal +opportunities of industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The +Irish refused those enormous and unequal opportunities, because the +Irish are clear-sighted. They would not need very clear sight by this +time to see that in England and Scotland the temptation has been a +betrayal. The industrial system has failed. + +I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of +the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and +the widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with +the fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, +when he gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediaeval +diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of +Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in +the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying +to be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full +(as its history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The +wageslavery we live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing in which +the Scotch are more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, +than in their Scotch wickedness. It is what makes the Master of +Ballantrae the most thrilling of all fictitious villains. It is what +makes the Master of Lovat the most thrilling of all historical villains. +It is poetry. It is an intensity which is on the edge of madness or +(what is worse) magic. Well, the Scotch have managed to apply something +of this fierce romanticism even to the lowest of all lordships and +serfdoms; the proletarian inequality of today. You do meet now and then, +in Scotland, the man you never meet anywhere else but in novels; I mean +the self-made man; the hard, insatiable man, merciless to himself as +well as to others. It is not "enterprise"; it is kleptomania. He is +quite mad, and a much more obvious public pest than any other kind of +kleptomaniac; but though he is a cheat, he is not an illusion. He does +exist; I have met quite two of him. Him alone among modern merchants +we do not weakly flatter when we call him a bandit. Something of the +irresponsibility of the true dark ages really clings about him. Our +scientific civilisation is not a civilisation; it is a smoke nuisance. +Like smoke it is choking us; like smoke it will pass away. Only of one +or two Scotsmen, in my experience, was it true that where there is smoke +there is fire. + +But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage +of this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all +chronicles, it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland +nearly everything has always been in revolt—especially loyalty. +If these people are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of +wrecking it; and the thought of my many good friends in that city makes +me really doubtful about which would figure in human memories as the +more huge calamity of the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so +weak as to call themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men +weak enough to believe them. + +As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had +little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies +who used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes. They were not, however, +strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since +they worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked +in the mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment +when I saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. +They were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was +the finest thing they could do. + + + + +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + +A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are +and should be various, there must be some communication between them if +they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual +formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not +depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all start +with the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our +different visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees +the sun as a perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is +an impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The +colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to +live under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that +there is nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle +(like a monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is +shut up in the cell of a separate universe. + +But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from +the denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the +individual become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world +like a cloud; he causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. +For what happens is this: that all the shortsighted people come together +and build a city called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for +granted and paint short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted +policies. Meanwhile all the men who can stare at the sun get together on +Salisbury Plain and do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who +see a blue moon band themselves together and assert the blue moon, not +once in a blue moon, but incessantly. So that instead of a small and +varied group, you have enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the +liberty of dogma, you have the tyranny of taste. + +Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; +perhaps the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership +by the organ of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to +production. If a man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be +any kind of man he likes in any other sense—a bookie, a Mahatma, +a man about town, an archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling +at the moment clear-headed Socialists in all of these capacities, it +is obvious that a clear-headed Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a +creed) can be a soldier, like Mr. Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, +or a Bathchairman like Mr. Meeke, or a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, +or an artistic tradesman like the late Mr. William Morris. + +But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by +what they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far +more than this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is, etc., +etc. Now mark their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be +tradesmen, or soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, +but become a particular sort of person who is always the same. When once +it has been discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic +formula, it is also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one +particular kind of clothes, reading one particular kind of books, +hanging up one particular kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases +even eating one particular kind of food. For men must recognise each +other somehow. These men will not know each other by a principle, like +fellow citizens. They cannot know each other by a smell, like dogs. So +they have to fall back on general colouring; on the fact that a man of +their sort will have a wife in pale green and Walter Crane's "Triumph of +Labour" hanging in the hall. + +There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost +made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret +the supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but +embracing all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan +unity which is founded rather on certain social habits, certain common +notions, both permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular +social pleasures. + +Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) +it did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a +thing asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical +genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of +Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous +varnish. + +And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a +creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to +believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of +religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; +the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people +do each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, +with heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which +alone holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own +kind outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and +call each other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call +themselves weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker +in a general atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off +looking for somebody else with whom to brawl. + +This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been +in many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having +got beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to +get beyond catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from +neglect of the same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that +they may differ on everything else; that God gave men a law that they +might turn it into liberties. + +There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife +and husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the +contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of +identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent +contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more +incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul +cannot possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first +cousin. There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; +they are generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to +think the same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to +think the same thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at +it, in the last extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing +disgrace—this really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; +and it is much better represented by a common religion than it is by +affinities and auras. And what applies to the family applies to the +nation. A nation with a root religion will be tolerant. A nation with no +religion will be bigoted. Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: +that when men come together to profess a creed, they come courageously, +though it is to hide in catacombs and caves. But when they come together +in a clique they come sneakishly, eschewing all change or disagreement, +though it is to dine to a brass band in a big London hotel. For birds of +a feather flock together, but birds of the white feather most of all. + + + + +THE FOOL + +For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I +had been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think +that he was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; +but before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of +him. After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline +to think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately +most of them occupying important positions. When I say "him," I mean the +entire idiot. + +I have never been able to discover that "stupid public" of which so many +literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at tea +parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough +so to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have +heard brilliant "conversationalists" conversing with other people, the +conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of +intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other +people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their +stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find +the refreshment of a single fool. + +But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous +brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle +of humour and good sense. The "mostly fools" theory has been used in an +anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I +did not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the +aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite +rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an +idea of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities +of his experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, +not that section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. +They are often cynical, especially about money, but even their +boredom tends to make them a little eager for any real information or +originality. If a man like Mr. Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up +his mind for any reason to attack Syndicalism he would find out what it +was first. Not so the man I found in the club. + +He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black +clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the +whole suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one +of those who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some +third element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His +manners were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. +They involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I +suddenly remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old +playgoers who had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, +"If I was the Government," and then put a cigar in his mouth which he +lit carefully with long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out +of his mouth again and said, "I'd give it 'em," as if it were quite a +separate sentence. But even while his mouth was stopped with the cigar +his companion or interlocutor leaped to his feet and said with great +heartiness, snatching up a hat, "Well, I must be off. Tuesday!". I +dislike these dark suspicions, but I certainly fancied I recognised the +sudden geniality with which one takes leave of a bore. + +When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was +to me that he addressed the belated epigram. "I'd give it 'em." + +"What would you give them," I asked, "the minimum wage?" + +"I'd give them beans," he said. "I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, +every man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's +the whole country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows +standing between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!" + +"That would surely be a little harsh," I pleaded. "After all, they +are not under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have +commissions in the Yeomanry." + +"Commissions in the Yeomanry!" he repeated, and his eyes and face, which +became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me +feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + +"Besides," I continued, "wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their +money?" + +"Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow," he said, "and I'd +confiscate their funds as well." + +"The policy is daring and full of difficulty," I replied, "but I do not +say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But +you must remember that though the facts of property have become +quite fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These +coal-owners, though they have not earned the mines, though they could +not work the mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. +Hence your suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating +their property, raises very—" + +"What do you mean?" asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. +"Who yer talking about?" + +"I'm talking about what you were talking about," I replied; "as you put +it so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing +between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their +own coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those +prices, care as little for national starvation as most merchant princes +and pirates have cared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples +that were enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a +bit of a revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme +violence you suggest. You say—" + +"I say," he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid +energy like that of some noble beast, "I say I'd take all these blasted +miners and—" + +I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood +staring at that mental monster. + +"Oh," I said, "so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal +servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be +shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead +they will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem +somewhat moved. The fact is, I have just found something. Something I +have been looking for for years." + +"Well," he asked, with no unfriendly stare, "and what have you found?" + +"No," I answered, shaking my head sadly, "I do not think it would be +quite kind to tell you what I have found." + +He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, +and we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the +disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country +sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county +magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important +companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + +The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory +this article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the +miner, who is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He +is not the mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by +selling his coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic +politician, who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic +opportunities. But he is the man who appears in scores of public places +open to the upper middle class or (that less known but more powerful +section) the lower upper class. Men like this all over the country are +really saying whatever comes into their heads in their capacities of +justice of the peace, candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, +old family doctor, Poor Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in +trade disputes. He suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the +brain; he has softened it by always taking the view of everything most +comfortable for his country, his class, and his private personality. +He is a deadly public danger. But as I have given him his name at the +beginning of this article there is no need for me to repeat it at the +end. + + + + +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + +Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And +I think the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to +record as plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on +his mind by anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of +any modern problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike +was a flat meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or +two, he will probably throw more light on the strike by describing this +which he has seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and +the bloody leaders of the mob whom he has never seen—nor any one +else either. If he comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as +happened to a friend of my grandfather) he should still remember that a +true account of the day after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to +have. Though he was on the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being +murdered, we should still like to have the wrong side described in +the right way. Upon this principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or +military arrangements, and have only held my breath like the rest of +the world while France and Germany were bargaining, will tell quite +truthfully of a small scene I saw, one of the thousand scenes that were, +so to speak, the anterooms of that inmost chamber of debate. + +In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares +of a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray +and rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, +like the solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; +the sloping roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping +with damp; and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were +scoured with old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with +many doors and found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. +I also found a notice of services, etc., and among these I found the +announcement that at 11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there +would be a special service for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft +of young men who were being taken from their homes in that little town +and sent to serve in the French Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful +moment, when the French Army was encamped at a parting of the ways. +There were already a great many people there when I entered, not only of +all kinds, but in all attitudes, kneeling, sitting, or standing +about. And there was that general sense that strikes every man from a +Protestant country, whether he dislikes the Catholic atmosphere or +likes it; I mean, the general sense that the thing was "going on all the +time"; that it was not an occasion, but a perpetual process, as if it +were a sort of mystical inn. + +Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, +when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. +They were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French +conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young +criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so +obviously prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to +them like hell; others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so +decent a place. But it was not so much the mere class variety that most +sharply caught an Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those +one or two kinds of men who would never have become soldiers in any +other way. + +There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of +hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it +may be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. +But there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never +tend to soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red +hair, large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across +the church that he had always taken care of his health, not even from +thinking about it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one +of those who pass from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a +man. In the row in front of him there was a very slight and vivid little +Jew, of the sort that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those +accidents that make real life so unlike anything else, he was the one +of the company who seemed especially devout. Behind these stiff or +sensitive boys were ranged the ranks of their mothers and fathers, with +knots and bunches of their little brothers and sisters. + +The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and +gaped at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying +their own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of +rain outside gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church +continuously darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn +in odd, rather strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but +only one perpetual refrain; so that it sounded like + + Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie, + Valdarkararump pour la patrie. + +Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing +gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child +started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a +French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + +I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline +of its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to +talk about "clericalism" and "militarism." Those who talk like that are +made of the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate +"Socialism." The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God +and the Mother of God were not "clericalists"; or, if they were, +they had forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not +"militarists"—quite the other way just then. The priest made a +short speech; he did not utter any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), +he uttered platitudes. In such circumstances platitudes are the only +possible things to say; because they are true. He began by saying that +he supposed a large number of them would be uncommonly glad not to go. +They seemed to assent to this particular priestly dogma with even +more than their alleged superstitious credulity. He said that war was +hateful, and that we all hated it; but that "in all things reasonable" +the law of one's own commonwealth was the voice of God. He spoke about +Joan of Arc; and how she had managed to be a bold and successful soldier +while still preserving her virtue and practising her religion; then he +gave them each a little paper book. To which they replied (after a brief +interval for reflection): + + Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie, + Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. + +which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + +While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded +about my own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening +church. They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I +cannot utter them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me +that we were barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was +happening outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the +windows darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the +nature of that light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and +hardly dared to guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that +enemies were already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were +groaning under their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town +itself had been destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands +of years hence, and that if I opened the door I should come out on a +wilderness as flat and sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the +veil of stone and slate grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to +see chasms cloven to the foundations of all things, and letting up an +infernal dawn. Huge things happily hidden from us had climbed out of +the abyss, and were striding about taller than the clouds. And when the +darkness crept from the sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of +St. John I fancied that some hideous giant was walking round the church +and looking in at each window in turn. + +Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a +ship carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes +I thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron +chain out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the +wings of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young +men inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things +outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + +I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of +limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic +tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and +his mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the +passes of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies +and thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter +it now. + +But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, +but only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters +announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + + + + +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + +It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by +some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a +man sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State +may remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; +when the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + +The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been +gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not +merely because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an +aesthete—that is, an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other +people's bodies; he tortured his own soul into the same red revolting +shapes. Though he came quite early in Roman Imperial history and was +followed by many austere and noble emperors, yet for us the Roman +Empire was never quite cleansed of that memory of the sexual madman. The +populace or barbarians from whom we come could not forget the hour when +they came to the highest place of the earth, saw the huge pedestal of +the earthly omnipotence, read on it Divus Caesar, and looked up and saw +a statue without a head. + +It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from +which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI +was a very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many +good business men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the +torturer clung about everything he did, even when it was right. And just +as the great Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so +even the silver splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, +has never painted out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis +XI. Whenever the unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible +savour that humanity finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the +unhealthy man is on top; but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or +mad on statecraft, like Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our +tyrant is not the satyr or the torturer; but the miser. + +The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; +but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had +some touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected +gold—a substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory +or old oak. An old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the +simple ardour, something of the mystical materialism, of a child who +picks out yellow flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but +coloured clay can be very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is +content with far less genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like +the glitter of buttercups, the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, +compared with the dreary papers and dead calculations which make the +hobby of the modern miser. + +The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content +sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the +mere repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs +to eggs. And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many +tramps and savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man +could find some comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But +the Yankee millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his +bed-head and ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's +stocking were safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's +ledger are safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with +their increase depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least +collects coins; his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts +collects nothings. + +It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; +but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The +answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma +for us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is +important; because this special problem is separate from the old general +quarrel about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong +books, old and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers +and privileges have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out +of the power of the moderately rich as well as of the moderately +poor. They are out of the power of everybody except a few +millionaires—that is, misers. In the old normal friction of normal +wealth and poverty I am myself on the Radical side. I think that a +Berkshire squire has too much power over his tenants; that a Brompton +builder has too much power over his workmen; that a West London doctor +has too much power over the poor patients in the West London Hospital. + +But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for +instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper +Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze +everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern +market. The things that change modern history, the big national and +international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, +the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, +the big expenses often incurred in elections—these are getting too +big for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly +fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + +There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about +them. The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the +chance of a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser +aristocracies. The moderately rich include all kinds of people even +good people. Even priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are +sometimes heroes. Some doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their +patients and not by flattering them; some brewers have been known to +sell beer. But among the Very Rich you will never find a really generous +man, even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will +never give themselves away; they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old +bones. To be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough +to want it. + +Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser +is flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never +called self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called +self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like +Dancer was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A +man like Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his +early rising or his unassuming dress. His "simple" meals, his "simple" +clothes, his "simple" funeral, are all extolled as if they were +creditable to him. They are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful +as the tatters and vermin of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To +be in rags for charity would be the condition of a saint; to be in rags +for money was that of a filthy old fool. Precisely in the same way, +to be "simple" for charity is the state of a saint; to be "simple" for +money is that of a filthy old fool. Of the two I have more respect for +the old miser, gnawing bones in an attic: if he was not nearer to God, +he was at least a little nearer to men. His simple life was a little +more like the life of the real poor. + + + + +THE MYSTAGOGUE + +Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and +impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your +aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is +perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond +all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all +good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; +and though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is +always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are +that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + +Thus Giotto or Fra Angelico would have at once admitted theologically +that God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint +Him. And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather +quaint old man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the +elves, was less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him +in some way. That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy +pictures and twisted statues which seem, to many refined persons, more +blasphemous than the secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good +is always towards Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined +thinkers who worship the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the +salons of Paris, always insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, +the unutterable character of the abomination. They call him "horror +of emptiness," as did the black witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they +worship him as the unspeakable name; as the unbearable silence. They +think of him as the void in the heart of the whirlwind; the cloud on +the brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets of vertigo or the endless +corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians who gave the Devil a +grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and spiked tail. It +was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. The Satanists +never drew him at all. + +And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity +and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may +separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt +from mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he +has an idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has +no idea will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too +subtle to be explained. The first idea may really be very outree or +specialist; it may really be very difficult to express to ordinary +people. But because the man is trying to express it, it is most probable +that there is something in it, after all. The honest man is he who is +always trying to utter the unutterable, to describe the indescribable; +but the quack lives not by plunging into mystery, but by refusing to +come out of it. + +Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the +thing called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that +an attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy +cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that +a landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait +painter only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. +And again it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the +pictures can only express half of them, and that the less important +half. Still, it does express something; the thread is not broken that +connects God With Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The +"Mona Lisa" was in some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her +to be. Leonardo's picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And +Walter Pater's rich description was, in some respects, like the picture. +Thus we come to the consoling reflection that even literature, in the +last resort, can express something other than its own unhappy self. + +Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely +inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being +speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in +Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically +the critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of +painting into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be +inadequate—but so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the +first to admit. But anything which has been intelligently received can +at least be intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent +cause for the cadaverous colour of Botticelli's "Venus Rising from the +Sea." Ruskin does suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying +forests and falsifying landscapes. These two great critics were far too +fastidious for my taste; they urged to excess the idea that a sense +of art was a sort of secret; to be patiently taught and slowly learnt. +Still, they thought it could be taught: they thought it could be learnt. +They constrained themselves, with considerable creative fatigue, to find +the exact adjectives which might parallel in English prose what has been +clone in Italian painting. The same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. +Stevenson and many others in the exposition of Velasquez. They had +something to say about the pictures; they knew it was unworthy of the +pictures, but they said it. + +Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and Post +Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They +are not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt +to translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is +untranslatable—that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, +impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their +banner; they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper +on which Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried +to dry it with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good +old anti-democratic muddlements: that "the public" does not understand +these things; that "the likes of us" cannot dare to question the dark +decisions of our lords. + +I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple +test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, +something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man +is made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt +is as good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go +back and look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, +it is the business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic +literary expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to +it. If they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their +eulogies, as there is nothing except eulogy—then they are quacks +or the high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say +nothing about the artists except that they are good it is because +the artists are bad. They can explain nothing because they have found +nothing; and they have found nothing because there is nothing to be +found. + + + + +THE RED REACTIONARY + +The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and +complete road to anything—even to restoration. Revolution alone +can be not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the +dead. + +A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) +was once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated +in that area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great +creative crisis about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its +own, and made a revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down +this street he whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. +Gandish, "in his researches into 'istry," and which had somehow taken +his fancy; the song to which those last sincere loyalists went into +battle. I think the words ran: + + Monsieur de Charette. + Dit au gens d'ici. + Le roi va remettre. + Le fleur de lys. + +My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and +it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic +lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy +the "Dies Irae," or a Protestant to remember "Lillibullero." Yet he was +stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might +get him at least into temporary trouble. + +A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by +walking round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a +bonfire cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot +be too loud, and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I +actually recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a +formidable proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that +had been primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. +Some of the real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such +as "Charlie is My Darling," or "What's a' the steer, kimmer?" songs that +men had sung while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under +which we live. They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present +King were swept aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual +words "King George" occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they +were played to celebrate his very Coronation; played as promptly and +innocently as if they had been "Grandfather's Clock" or "Rule Britannia" +or "The Honeysuckle and the Bee." + +That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between +two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not +really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that +has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. +When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was +picked up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the +throne the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been +driven out of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that +the Bourbons might possibly return that they will take a little trouble +to discourage it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never +return that we actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment +to their rivals. And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the +faces of all the bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: +indeed, it is difficult to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it +quite unconsciously; because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the +French have not. We really believe that the past is past. It is a very +doubtful point. + +Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men +free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared +away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who +have preserved everything—we cannot restore anything. Take, +for the sake of argument, the complex and many coloured ritual of the +Coronation recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate +centuries; from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade +of culture or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or +even dated. The fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord +"against all manner of folk" obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; +no longer confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes +from some chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four +of our counties; and when hostile "folk" might live in the next village. +The sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless +and the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great +attempt to make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the +Coronation Service says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. +Elaborate local tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the +Manor of Work-sop is alone allowed to do something or other, these +probably belong to the decay of the Middle Ages, when that great +civilisation died out in grotesque literalism and entangled heraldry. +Things like the presentation of the Bible bear witness to the +intellectual outburst at the Reformation; things like the Declaration +against the Mass bear witness to the great wars of the Puritans; and +things like the allegiance of the Bishops bear witness to the wordy and +parenthetical political compromises which (to my deep regret) ended the +wars of religion. + +But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all +that long list of variations there must be, and there are, things +which energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable +modification, to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see +again the great Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique +and almost frozen formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the +old passion that excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc +would really prefer the Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer +the Erastian oligarchy of the eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would +probably be disputed (from widely different motives) by Mr. Rudyard +Kipling and Mr. Cunninghame Graham. But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would +win. + +But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is +that none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back +to the Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediaevals; because +(alas) there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for +building or rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can +wander back and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top +of them, and can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without +being able to take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide +that their Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that +a Republic was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French +democracy actually desired every detail of the mediaeval monarchy, they +could have it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If +another Dauphin were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc +actually bore a miraculous banner before him; if mediaeval swords shook +and blazed in every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every +tapestry; if this were really proved to be the will of France and the +purpose of Providence—such a scene would still be the lasting and +final justification of the French Revolution. + +For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + + + + +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + +In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in +Asiatic arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we +tend nowadays to do to our own records and our own religion. The first +is a tendency to talk as if certain things were not only present in the +higher Orientals, but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will +fall into a habit of wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, +as if no Western knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern +knights had ever broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full +of the praises of Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no +Christians had been saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the +first injustice is to think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the +other injustice is a failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly +Eastern. It is too much taken for granted that the Eastern sort of +idealism is certainly superior and convincing; whereas in truth it is +only separate and peculiar. All that is richest, deepest, and subtlest +in the East is rooted in Pantheism; but all that is richest, deepest, +and subtlest in us is concerned with denying passionately that Pantheism +is either the highest or the purest religion. + +Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the +spirit of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and +curiously assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with +the full stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so +that the stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung +arms. Now in this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. +In so far as what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all +things, the Eastern artists have no more monopoly of it than they have +of hunger and thirst. + +I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit +this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far +East to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even +in other painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that +ornament of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: "Even the +most undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing +meditations not to be exhibited by much weeping." But, I do not +therefore admit that a Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made +a somewhat similar remark) had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere +Occidental fable and travesty of that celebrated figure. I do not deny +that Tinishona wrote that exquisite example of the short Japanese poem +entitled "Honourable Chrysanthemum in Honourable Hole in Wall." But I do +not therefore admit that Tennyson's little verse about the flower in the +cranny was not original and even sincere. + +It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that +when engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster +and chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being +much affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon +tablets of ivory the lines beginning: "Small and unobtrusive blossom +with ruby extremities." But this incident, touching as it is, does not +shake my belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am +left with an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere +in their poetry—and in their prose. + +I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and +its admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go +on to more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say—with +the utmost respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form +of Cheek, for this school to speak in this way about the mother that +bore them, the great civilisation of the West. The West also has its +magic landscapes, only through our incurable materialism they look +like landscapes as well as like magic. The West also has its symbolic +figures, only they look like men as well as symbols. It will be answered +(and most justly) that Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own +instinct and tradition; that its artists are concerned to suggest one +thing and our artists another; that both should be admired in their +difference. Profoundly true; but what is the difference? It is certainly +not as the Orientalisers assert, that we must go to the Far East for a +sympathetic and transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid +a long enough toll of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that +disability. + +Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern +mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy +of creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, +like St. Francis, "My brother fire and my sister water"; the former +says, "Myself fire and myself water." Whether you call the Eastern +attitude an extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of +oneself into nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The +effect is the same, an effect which lives and throbs throughout all the +exquisite arts of the East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a +pulsation of pattern, or of ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, +but always suggesting the unification of the individual with the world. +But there is quite another kind of sympathy the sympathy with a +thing because it is different. No one will say that Rembrandt did not +sympathise with an old woman; but no one will say that Rembrandt painted +like an old woman. No one will say that Reynolds did not appreciate +children; but no one will say he did it childishly. The supreme instance +of this divine division is sex, and that explains (what I could never +understand in my youth) why Christendom called the soul the bride of +God. For real love is an intense realisation of the "separateness" of +all our souls. The most heroic and human love-poetry of the world is +never mere passion; precisely because mere passion really is a melting +back into Nature, a meeting of the waters. And water is plunging +and powerful; but it is only powerful downhill. The high and human +love-poetry is all about division rather than identity; and in the great +love-poems even the man as he embraces the woman sees her, in the same +instant, afar off; a virgin and a stranger. + +For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if +we grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised +in what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and +the Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the +East. There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even +the superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential +difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; +whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the +Dragon. In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the +stories he not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the +Christian have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, +really has an appetite for cold Christian—and especially for cold +Christianity. This blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of +everything and digest it in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is +what is really meant by the Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The +Cosmos as such is cannibal; as old Time ate his children. The Eastern +saints were saints because they wanted to be swallowed up. The Western +saint, like St. George, was sainted by the Western Church precisely +because he refused to be swallowed. The same process of thought that has +prevented nationalities disappearing in Christendom has prevented the +complete appearance of Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist +the idea of being absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a +British, or a Turkish Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and +much more tyrannical, which free men will resist with even stronger +passion. The free man violently resists being absorbed into the empire +which is called the Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, +but still more Home Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home +Rule for himself. He claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem +fatalism. He claims the right to be damned in spite of theosophical +optimism. He refuses to be the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + + + + +THE MUMMER + +The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so +close that they might as well have been inside the house instead of +just outside; so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem +farther away. Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who +come every year in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of +the old Christmas play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very +Venal Doctor. I will not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will +describe my parallel sentiments as it passed. + +One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic +revivals of mediaeval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are +elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple +society of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are +mediaevalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The +first is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child +just able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up +as anybody—but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea +of being the King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is +generally suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, +from far deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because +it is Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a +ritual investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the +dances of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries +of Persia. For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the +concealment of the personality combined with the exaggeration of the +person. The man performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and +conspicuous. It is part of that divine madness which all other creatures +wonder at in Man, that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and +anonymity. Man is not, perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, +but he is the only creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do +indeed take the colours of their environment; but that is not in order +to be watched, but in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism +of rejoicing, but the formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose +nature is the unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue +because they lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles +powder their hair to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not +dressing up as kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. +Nay, even when modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is +doubted by some naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping +notice. So merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten +and exaggerate their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, +primarily speaking, in another identity. It is not Acting—that +comparatively low profession-comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; +and, as Mr. Kensit would truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is +Mummery. That is, it is the noble conception of making Man something +other and more than himself when he stands at the limit of human things. +It is only careful faddists and feeble German philosophers who want to +wear no clothes; and be "natural" in their Dionysian revels. Natural +men, really vigorous and exultant men, want to wear more and more +clothes when they are revelling. They want worlds of waistcoats and +forests of trousers and pagodas of tall hats toppling up to the stars. + +Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If +our more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to +reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight +(I do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque +and appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from +the best books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and +ornaments would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my +garden door opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, +the appearance of that champion was slightly different. His face was +energetically blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an +aged and very tall top hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a +surplice, and he flourished a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, +talk about "ignorance"; or suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a +very pleasant Ratcatcher, with a tenor voice) did this because he knew +no better. Try to realise that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of +England was not black, and did not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. +The Rat-catcher is not under this delusion; any more than Paul Veronese +thought that very good men have luminous rings round their heads; any +more than the Pope thinks that Christ washed the feet of the twelve in +a Cathedral; any more than the Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a +tabard are like the lions at the Zoo. These things are denaturalised +because they are symbols; because the extraordinary occasion must hide +or even disfigure the ordinary people. Black faces were to mediaeval +mummeries what carved masks were to Greek plays: it was called being +"vizarded." My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently arrogant to suppose for +a moment that he looks like St. George. But he is sufficiently humble to +be convinced that if he looks as little like himself as he can, he will +be on the right road. + +This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in +disguise. There are, of course, other mediaeval elements in it which +are also difficult to explain to the fastidious mediaevalists of to-day. +There is, for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It +can best be defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the +faintest desire to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the +trick of turning on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely +believed, merely for the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling +yet careless phrases. When Tennyson says that King Arthur "drew all the +petty princedoms under him," and "made a realm and ruled," his grave +Royalism is quite modern. Many mediaevals, outside the mediaeval +republics, believed in monarchy as solemnly as Tennyson. But that older +verse + + When good King Arthur ruled this land + He was a goodly King— + He stole three pecks of barley-meal + To make a bag-pudding. + +is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are +other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called +Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediaevals merely +Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, +I think, in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in +healthy darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. +If you cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can +carry the forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk +under universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom +a walking forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very +intensity of the notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a +mob of masks? + + + + +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + +The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the +antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost +unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs +of a hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does +not necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere +unlettered simplicity of mind. + +But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our +decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its +best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many +of the philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God +fearing fisher or a noble mountaineer. His antics with donkeys and +concertinas, crowded charabancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are +not so vicious or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements +of the overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than +they are at a political "At Home," or even an artistic soiree; and if +the female trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed +and underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to +be a donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks +men and women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that +wants them to change heads. + +But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as +there is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity +which is characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very +people who persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the +whole society, and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does +things in a clumsy and unbeautiful way. + +A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to +visit yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of +Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge +at all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray +tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour +of primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and +very lonely Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he +missed Stonehenge. But it does spoil his mood to find +Stonehenge—surrounded by a brand-new fence of barbed wire, with a +policeman and a little shop selling picture post-cards. + +Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer +you, "Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and +carve names and spoil the look of Stonehenge." It does not seem to +occur to them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of +Stonehenge. The scratching of a name, particularly when performed +with blunt penknife or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board +education, can be trusted in a little while to be indistinguishable from +the grayest hieroglyphic by the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could +get a modern policeman into the same picture with a Druid. This really +vital piece of vandalism was done by the educated, not the uneducated; +it was done by the influence of the artists or antiquaries who wanted +to preserve the antique beauty of Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to +preserve your lady's beauty from freckles by blacking her face all over; +or to protect the pure whiteness of your wedding garment by dyeing it +green. + +And if you ask, "But what else could any one have done, what could the +most artistic age have done to save the monument?" I reply, "There are +hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediaevals might have done; and I have +no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in +their whole society they would have done something that was decent and +serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or +warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so +their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; +not deliberately—they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious +order such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of +guard would protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all +sorts of rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you +mere raving superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me one +twentieth part so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as +calmly making a spot hideous in order to keep it beautiful." + +The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to +live in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles +down in a place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar +personal cases, of course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, +the Jew is a genuine peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering +cad. He is a highly civilised man in a highly difficult position; the +world being divided, and his own nation being divided, about whether he +can do anything else except wander. + +The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated +Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by +calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen +are extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. +The truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude +Englishman. What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is +the polite Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders +for Rembrandts, and he treats the great nations that made these things +courteously—as he would treat the custodians of any museum. It +does not seem to strike him that the Italian is not the custodian of the +pictures, but the creator of them. He can afford to look down on such +nations—when he can paint such pictures. + +That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. +If, living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian +character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire +Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. +It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will +often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality +of the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without +discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If +you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians—you are a +cheap tripper. + +The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere +that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, +coming among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is +caddish to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a wine +taster; and then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink and +squint at the colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; and +then refuse to buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a thing +and not use it. But the main point is that one has no right to see +Stonehenge without Salisbury Plain and Salisbury: One has no right to +respect the dead Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no +right to visit a Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea +fishes—fed along a lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing +the sights without breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + + + + +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + +It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story +that the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is +almost peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, +of their nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even +phrases invented for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new +while it is nearly a thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old +while they were still new. + +The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, +they are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive +inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an +offender; they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been +convicted of murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous +rebellion, when his offence has really been a sleek submission to +the powers that be. They must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his +eloquence to rouse the mob, whereas he has really shown considerable +cleverness in damping it down. It was probably under the same impulse +towards a mysterious misfit of names that people denounced Dr. Inge as +"the Gloomy Dean." + +Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there +anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but +sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives +have made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him +this erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern +capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared +to anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that +gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very +curious state of things. + +When Dr. Inge was called "the Gloomy Dean" a great injustice was done +him. He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against +the forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism +rather than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have +suffered no wrong, or that employers have done no wrong—such a man +is not a Gloomy Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A +man who can feel satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with +a mysterious fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not +less curious; because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom +reposes on his having said that our worker's demand high wages, while +the placid people of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + +This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much +difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low +wages for the same reason that they will submit to "the punishment known +as Li, or Slicing"; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy +and suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to +the husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their +temples with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they +sometimes seem to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual +perversion. They do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with +traditions different from ours about the limits of endurance and the +gestures of self-respect. They may be very much better than we are in +hundreds of other ways; and I can quite understand a man (though +hardly a Dean) really preferring their historic virtues to those of +Christendom. A man may perhaps feel more comfortable among his Asiatic +coolies than among his European comrades: and as we are to allow the +Broadest Thought in the Church, Dr. Inge has as much right to his heresy +as anybody else. It is true that, as Dr. Inge says, there are numberless +Orientals who will do a great deal of work for very little money; and +it is most undoubtedly true that there are several high-placed and +prosperous Europeans who like to get work done and pay as little as +possible for it. + +But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and +traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which +he has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of +years of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge +admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced +the sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious +deduction is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen +Chinese. Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he +ought to be at the head of a great mission in London for converting the +English to Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties +of paganism would have free and natural play; his style would improve; +his mind would begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all +sorts of little irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the +most Conservative Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + +In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism +and public change which is the note of all our history springs from a +certain spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; +nay, it may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the +special defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the +ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It +will often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice +though the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the +formula of the great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that +all men were free and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the +formula of the peasant who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there +were but one slave in England, and he did all the work while the rest +of us made merry, this spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to +God night and day. Whether or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly +works with, a creed which postulates a humanised God and a vividly +personal immortality. Men must not be busy merely like a swarm, or even +happy merely like a herd; for it is not a question of men, but of a +man. A man's meals may be poor, but they must not be bestial; there must +always be that about the meal which permits of its comparison to +the sacrament. A man's bed may be hard, but it must not be abject or +unclean: there must always be about the bed something of the decency of +the death-bed. + +This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible +murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil +that threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot +encourage the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. +Christendom will continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being +Christian: it is the Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had +absent-mindedly strayed into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I +advise him to chuck it. + +But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian +temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. +Inge is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. +Such a man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being +"court chaplains of King Demos" or about his own superb valour in +defying the democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. +We should not expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that +Demos has never been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; +we should not expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains +they would be uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; +he considers himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New +Theologian; that is, he is liberal in theology—and nothing else. +He is apparently in sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy +with those who would soften the superior claim of our creed by urging +the rival creeds of the East; with those who would absorb the virtues of +Buddhism or of Islam. He holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of +Religions where all believers respect each other's unbelief. + +Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When +next you hear the "liberal" Christian say that we should take what is +best in Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people +like Dr. Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge +propose to take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of +the Moslem. You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of +the Hindoo. The more you study the "broad" movement of today, the more +you will find that these people want something much less like Chinese +metaphysics, and something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find +the levelling of creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of +wages. Dr. Inge is the typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never +more so than when he appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as +the apostle of the blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely +among the prosperous and polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or +Mohammedanism practically means this—that the poor must be as meek +as Buddhists, while the rich may be as ruthless as Mohammedans. That is +what they call the reunion of all religions. + + + + +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + +The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of +washing; and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore +comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. +Rain, that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities +of these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists +are eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public +bath; it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons +coming fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished +or dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when +coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an +enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: +it scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry +rafters and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring +cleaning. + +If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble +at the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are +constantly told that we should leave our little special possessions and +join in the enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social +machinery. I offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It +disregards that degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman +to take his shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because +it is public and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls +the string. + +As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the +neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water +drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and +debauch of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative +intoxication of the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret +or the golden clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such +scenes of apocalypse, towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne +falls like fire from heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with +the terrible colours of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as +he rolls in the long soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, +and listens to the roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who +ought to be the true bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are +drinking water. Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the +trees rave and reel to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs +as revellers clash cups; they roar undying thirst and howl the health of +the world. + +All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes +a noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count +it Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I +complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all +living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every +weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, +their need is greater than mine—especially for water. + +There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild +Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an +incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel +a tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he +puts on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying all +umbrella; it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of +despots in the dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable +walking stick; open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no +taste for pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my +hat, and precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against +wet, it must be by some closer and more careless protection, something +that I can forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be +that yet more Highland thing, a mackintosh. + +And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military +qualities of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and +white sheen as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think +of it as the uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty +raids. I like to think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, +descending on some doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs +flashing in the sun or moon. For indeed this is one of the real beauties +of rainy weather, that while the amount of original and direct light +is commonly lessened, the number of things that reflect light is +unquestionably increased. There is less sunshine; but there are more +shiny things; such beautifully shiny things as pools and puddles and +mackintoshes. It is like moving in a world of mirrors. + +And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual +works of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it +doubles it. If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the +roads (to the sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. +Shallow lakes of water reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we +dwell in a double universe. Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous +pavements, wet under numerous lamps, a man seems a black blot on all +that golden looking-glass, and could fancy he was flying in a yellow +sky. But wherever trees and towns hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, +the sense of Celestial topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, +dazzling confusion of shape and shadow, of reality and reflection, will +appeal strongly to any one with the transcendental instinct about this +dreamy and dual life of ours. It will always give a man the strange +sense of looking down at the skies. + + + + +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + +When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) +to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is +amusing to ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours +especially, when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of +one weakness this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + +This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares +more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its "methods" +more than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good +communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are +precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean +a hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good +communications may in practice be very like those evil communications +which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a +"scientific age," which wants to know whether the train is in the +timetable, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one +instance in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the +case of photography. + +Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, +and the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so +that he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted +or suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head +thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and +slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, +a definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I +should have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, +with a profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + +Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great +many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, +if seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland +Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and +dark emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic +or whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked +like some swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of +coal-black hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately +under his eyes his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have +been painted scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one +under the lower, seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches +of Mephistopheles. His eyes had that "dancing madness" in them which +Stevenson saw in the Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes +distorted the expression by screwing a monstrous monocle into one of +them. A man more unmistakable would have been hard to find. You could +have picked him out in any crowd—so long as you had not seen his +photograph. + +But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and +conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits +of photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring +of cheek and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the +darkness out of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The +framing and limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; +and the devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write +poetry made him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people +do when they are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never +held it normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated +his slight figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished +by a button and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature +has been more delicately and dexterously omitted than they could +have been by the most namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest +water-colours, on the smoothest ivory. + +I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of +which depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents +an utterly incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate +language the license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it +strictly safe and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They +would have clapped me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate +Max's caricature. But the caricature would have been far more likely to +find the man. + +This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific +civilisation. It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man +that it never asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, +seemingly most detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever +since I was a boy. We were told that in some row Boer policemen had +shot an Englishman, a British subject, an English citizen. A long time +afterwards we were quite casually informed that the English citizen was +quite black. Well, it makes no difference to the moral question; black +men should be shot on the same ethical principles as white men. But +it makes one distrust scientific communications which permitted so +startling an alteration of the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a +photographic negative in which a black man came out white. Later we were +told that an Englishman had fought for the Boers against his own flag, +which would have been a disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted +that he was an Irishman; which is exactly as different as if he had been +a Pole. Common sense, with all the facts before it, does see that black +is not white, and that a nation that has never submitted has a right to +moral independence. But why does it so seldom have all the facts before +it? Why are the big aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic +wrath, always left out in such official communications, as they were +left out in the photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an +African and eyes as fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation +drop all four of the facts? Its error is to omit the arresting +thing—which might really arrest the criminal. It strikes first the +chilling note of science, demanding a man "above the middle height, chin +shaven, with gray moustache," etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir +Redvers Buller. It does not seize the first fact of impression, as that +a man is obviously a sailor or a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a +nigger or an albino or a prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. +These are the realities by which the people really recognise each other. +They are almost always left out of the inquiry. + + + + +THE SULTAN + +There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial +cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter +far you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in +something dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you +find your butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you +find your ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread +them among your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. +There are numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is +this. That we have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we +have Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + +I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise +out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, +and like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not +that, like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that +he committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and +errors in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the +ideas they could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand +for Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the +world. He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the +principles that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs +of a Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. +That the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the +fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could +not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which +he lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old +bachelor of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently +quoted in the Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his +time. It was not his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill +somewhere in South Africa "his church." It was not his fault, I mean, +that he could not see that a church all to oneself is not a church at +all. It is a madman's cell. It was not his fault that he "figured out +that God meant as much of the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible." +Many evolutionists much wiser had "figured out" things even more +babyish. He was an honest and humble recipient of the plodding popular +science of his time; he spread no ideas that any cockney clerk in +Streatham could not have spread for him. But it was exactly because he +had no ideas to spread that he invoked slaughter, violated justice, and +ruined republics to spread them. + +But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not +only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are +actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to +extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented +as seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our +Imperialist aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the +East. For that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism +has been deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + +The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of +politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first +to steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial +cynic who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself +submitted to Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism +and destiny. + +There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of +Rhodes. The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that +Africa is still chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in +the South confronting savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, +Arabs, and Soudanese, and then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: +"It is inevitable fate that all this should be changed; and I should +like to be the agent of fate." That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine +idea; and it is an Oriental idea. + +Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial +position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and +barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. +We are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to +teach a Turk to say "Kismet"; which he has said since his cradle. We +are to deny Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in +order to teach an Arab to believe he is "an agent of fate," when he has +never believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true +(which fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia +or Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in +billycocks, instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. +The best Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a +doubtful and romantic future in which all things may happen—this +essential Western idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he +says himself) he did not believe in it. + +It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress +in addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of +King is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant +to be vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and +Moon, the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in +the days of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather +a religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. +He was not merely a conqueror, but a father—yes, even when he was +a bad father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local +affections and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the +King, but the Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic +of money, of luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen +race. Indeed Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to +the Sultan, from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + + + + +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + +The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion +which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic +architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained +in most of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic +eclipses the classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once +lively and mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally +rich and complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No +man ever got out of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a +cathedral tower. Over all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India +there is the presence of something stiff and heartless, of something +tortured and silent. Dwarfed trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers +and hunchbacked birds accentuate by the very splendour and contrast of +their colour the servility and monotony of their shapes. It is like the +vision of a sneering sage, who sees the whole universe as a pattern. +Certainly no one ever felt like this about Gothic, even if he happens +to dislike it. Or, again, some will say that it is the liberty of the +Middle Ages in the use of the comic or even the coarse that makes the +Gothic more interesting than the Greek. There is more truth in this; +indeed, there is real truth in it. Few of the old Christian cathedrals +would have passed the Censor of Plays. We talk of the inimitable +grandeur of the old cathedrals; but indeed it is rather their gaiety +that we do not dare to imitate. We should be rather surprised if a +chorister suddenly began singing "Bill Bailey" in church. Yet that would +be only doing in music what the mediaevals did in sculpture. They put +into a Miserere seat the very scenes that we put into a music hall +song: comic domestic scenes similar to the spilling of the beer and the +hanging out of the washing. But though the gaiety of Gothic is one of +its features, it also is not the secret of its unique effect. We see +a domestic topsy-turvydom in many Japanese sketches. But delightful +as these are, with their fairy tree-tops, paper houses, and toddling, +infantile inhabitants, the pleasure they give is of a kind quite +different from the joy and energy of the gargoyles. Some have even been +so shallow and illiterate as to maintain that our pleasure in medieval +building is a mere pleasure in what is barbaric, in what is rough, +shapeless, or crumbling like the rocks. This can be dismissed after the +same fashion; South Sea idols, with painted eyes and radiating bristles, +are a delight to the eye; but they do not affect it in at all the +same way as Westminster Abbey. Some again (going to another and almost +equally foolish extreme) ignore the coarse and comic in mediaevalism; +and praise the pointed arch only for its utter purity and simplicity, as +of a saint with his hands joined in prayer. Here, again, the uniqueness +is missed. There are Renaissance things (such as the ethereal silvery +drawings of Raphael), there are even pagan things (such as the +Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere a piety. None of these +explanations explain. And I never saw what was the real point about +Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw it behind a row of +furniture-vans. + +I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the +smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall +cut off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the +yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across +that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the +more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it +like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this +ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly +coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond +that the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, +straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as +the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + +As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; +what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not +variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, +but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man +of our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or +an Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had +mistaken for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this +gave to my eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving +towards the right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across +the plain like the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with +the clouds. Then I saw what it was. + +The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that +it is on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting +architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are +stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear +the arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty +and numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of +imperial elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners +going into battle; the silence was deafening with all the mingled noises +of a military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up +its thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from +all the roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in +the core of the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his +wings of brass. + +And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in +the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; +the voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of +spears. I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; +and I knew indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in +either hand the trowel and the sword. + +I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had +marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. +Some Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of +the desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been +woke at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the +tall pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every +snake or sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner +of the architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally +in the flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like +torches across dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of +music and darkness and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln +hill. So for some hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of +the Gothic; then the last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw +only a church tower in a quiet English town, round which the English +birds were floating. + + + + +THE MAN ON TOP + +There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be +stated too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not +trusted simply because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite +clearly seen and said without any reference to our several passions or +partisanships. It does not follow that we think such a distrust a wise +sentiment to express; it does not even follow that we think it a good +sentiment to entertain. But such is the sentiment, simply because such +is the fact. The distinction can be quite easily defined in an example. +I do not think that private workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their +employer. But I do think that patriotic soldiers owe a more or less +indefinite loyalty to their leader in battle. But even if they ought to +trust their captain, the fact remains that they often do not trust him; +and the fact remains that he often is not fit to be trusted. + +Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very +muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to +put employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should +have thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has +nothing to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; +it is a distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more +elegance and poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment +under Lord Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the +atmosphere, but in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order +to pay Lord Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and +philanthropic, did exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the +shopkeeper it failed as a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he +is underpaid, but only if he is defeated. The object of the Army is the +safety of the nation from one particular class of perils; therefore, +since all citizens owe loyalty to the nation, all citizens who are +soldiers owe loyalty to the Army. But nobody has any obligation to make +some particular rich man richer. A man is bound, of course, to consider +the indirect results of his action in a strike; but he is bound to +consider that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, or a smoking concert; +in his wildest holiday or his most private conversation. But direct +responsibility like that of a soldier he has none. He need not aim +solely and directly at the good of the shop; for the simple reason that +the shop is not aiming solely and directly at the good of the nation. +The shopman is, under decent restraints, let us hope, trying to get what +he can out of the nation; the shop assistant may, under the same decent +restraints, get what he can out of the shopkeeper. All this distinction +is very obvious. At least I should have thought so. + +But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the +military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious +shop assistant "disloyal"—that leaves exactly where it was the +question of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. +Granted that all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the +cloven pennon of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true +that the pennon may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that +all Barney Barnato's workers ought to have followed him to death or +glory, it is still a Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was +likely to lead them to. Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for +his master's medicines, we may still hold an inquest to find out if he +died of them. While we forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may +still wish the general were shot. + +The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. +Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are +worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. +The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are +accidents—or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is +a generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A +revolutionist would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next +to nothing about coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners +know next to nothing about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend +the nature of their own monopoly with any consistent and courageous +policy, however wicked, as did the old aristocrats with the monopoly of +land. They have not the virtues nor even the vices of tyrants; they have +only their powers. It is the same with all the powerful of to-day; it is +the same, for instance, with the high-placed and high-paid official. Not +only is the judge not judicial, but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. +The arbiter decides, not by some gust of justice or injustice in his +soul like the old despot dooming men under a tree, but by the permanent +climate of the class to which he happens to belong. The ancient wig of +the judge is often indistinguishable from the old wig of the flunkey. + +To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one +must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against +details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just +judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such +as Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. +Seen close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and +impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can +tell if the Tower leans. + +Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, +we shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole +governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will +see some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the +employer often comes there early in the morning; that he has great +organising power; that if he works over the colossal accumulation of +wealth he also works over its wise distribution. All this may be true of +many employers, and it is practically said of all. + +But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply +ask what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the +capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and +solid result of the reign of the employers has been—unemployment. +Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot +upon which the whole process turns. + +Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great +squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense +or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care +for the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see +much cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts +of the estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has +been the actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is +plain. At the end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the +land. The practical effect of having landlords is not having tenants. +The practical effect of having employers is that men are not employed. +The unrest of the populace is therefore more than a murmur against +tyranny; it is against a sort of treason. It is the suspicion that +even at the top of the tree, even in the seats of the mighty, our very +success is unsuccessful. + + + + +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + +There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are +some who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again—or +snore again. There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration +Courts as to the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the +day that they look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + +The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may +incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things +for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when +the States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or +when all the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of +Washington. It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The +real democratic unrest at this moment is not an extension of the +representative process, but rather a revolt against it. It is no good +giving those now in revolt more boards and committees and compulsory +regulations. It is against these very things that they are revolting. +Men are not only rising against their oppressors, but against their +representatives or, as they would say, their misrepresentatives. +The inner and actual spirit of workaday England is coming out not in +applause, but in anger, as a god who should come out of his tabernacle +to rebuke and confound his priests. + +There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom +we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of +whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't +have. She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger +and exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than +the modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the +horror of bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; +and it is quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort +of industry natural to the classes from which men can climb into great +wealth. He has grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, +accustomed to have dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without +discomfort. He regards cleanliness as a kind of separate and special +costume; to be put on for great festivals. He has several really curious +characteristics, which would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they +had any eyes. For instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in +marked contrast to his actual spirit, which is generally patient and +civil. He has an odd way of using certain words of really horrible +meaning, but using them quite innocently and without the most distant +taint of the evils to which they allude. He is rather sentimental; and, +like most sentimental people, not devoid of snobbishness. At the +same time, he believes the ordinary manly commonplaces of freedom and +fraternity as he believes most of the decent traditions of Christian +men: he finds it very difficult to act according to them, but this +difficulty is not confined to him. He has a strong and individual sense +of humour, and not much power of corporate or militant action. He is not +a Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to a Labour Member +than he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This is the Common +Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at last. + +See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it +is his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to +cure, and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including +two of his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal +Commission to consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike +upon the railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, +any of the gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to +Mr. Henderson, whom I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of +confusing with that of a railway-porter. I do not think that any old +gentleman, however absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, +let us say, to hand his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to +reward that politician with twopence. Of the others I can only judge +by the facts about their status as set forth in the public Press. The +Chairman, Sir David Harrell, appeared to be an ex-official distinguished +in (of all things in the world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no +earthly reason to doubt that the Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not +talking about what men mean to be, but about what they are. The police +in Ireland are practically an army of occupation; a man serving in them +or directing them is practically a soldier; and, of course, he must +do his duty as such. But it seems truly extraordinary to select as one +likely to sympathise with the democracy of England a man whose whole +business in life it has been to govern against its will the democracy +of Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers were offered the +sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police in Finland +or Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised world sees +Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time we did. +The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct +and habit akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the +Commissioners actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then +came Mr. Henderson (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, "By your +leave."), and then another less known gentleman who had "corresponded" +with the Board of Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to +represent the very poor. + +Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough +report, and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of +that kind are tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably +business-like. But if any one supposes that men of that kind can +conceivably quiet any real 'quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the +man whom I first described, it is frantic. The common worker is angry +exactly because he has found out that all these boards consist of the +same well-dressed Kind of Man, whether they are called Governmental or +Capitalist. If any one hopes that he will reconcile the poor, I say, as +I said at the beginning, that such a one has not looked on the light of +day or dwelt in the land of the living. + +But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical +and urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man +of whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern +England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would +be offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost +incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This +Kind of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be +represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind +of Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the +middle class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, +he must remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + +Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory +powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the +first Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you +drove him with a whip. + + + + +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN + +I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King +John. + +But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he +believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a +whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not +sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or +merely a humdrum respectability. + +I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is +a protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a +particular attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always +hunting and Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, +and Charles I always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in +rotation making his people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and +King John pulling out Jews' teeth with the celerity and industry of +an American dentist. Anything is good that shakes all this stiff +simplification, and makes us remember that these men were once alive; +that is, mixed, free, flippant, and inconsistent. It gives the mind +a healthy kick to know that Alfred had fits, that Charles I prevented +enclosures, that Rufus was really interested in architecture, that Henry +VIII was really interested in theology. + +And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid +imagination of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are +on the right side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a +Puritan, and John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they +were people whom we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think +that John was a nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of +him is all wrong. Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had +what commonly makes them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and +hotheaded decision. But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, +but which we misunderstand. + +The mediaeval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In +their social system the mediaevals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as +their heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings +of guild or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of +man as standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While +they clad and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly +and quaintly for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have +of the freedom of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an +eagle in the heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern +as most fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + +For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute +description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused +the apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been +in an unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have +decided the other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of +another world, a world that now can never be. + +This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way +can be felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and +ballad. It is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy +intellectual forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the +physical science of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have +taught, have darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of +bad men as something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of +people. The Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It +brought the villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version +of King John. But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that +about him, even when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to +be a man of mixed passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil +passions to have much too good a time of it. They might have spoken of +him as a man in considerable danger of going to hell; but they would +have not talked of him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of +Percy or Robin Hood it frequently happens that the King comes upon the +scene, and his ultimate decision makes the climax of the tale. But we +do not feel, as we do in the Byronic or modern romance, that there is +a definite stage direction "Enter Tyrant." Nor do we behold a deus ex +machina who is certain to do all that is mild and just. The King in the +ballad is in a state of virile indecision. Sometimes he will pass from +a towering passion to the most sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; +sometimes he will begin an act of vengeance and be turned from it by +a jest. Yet this august levity is not moral indifference; it is moral +freedom. It is the strong sense in the writer that the King, being +the type of man with power, will probably sometimes use it badly and +sometimes well. In this sense John is certainly misrepresented, for he +is pictured as something that none of his own friends or enemies saw. In +that sense he was certainly not so black as he is painted, for he lived +in a world where every one was piebald. + +King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind +of degenerate; a shifty-eyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's +backbone and green blood in his veins. The mediaevals were quite capable +of boiling him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable +of despairing of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori +case is that of the strange mediaeval legend of Robert the Devil. +Robert was represented as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman +actually in answer to prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are +simply those of the infernal fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he +can be called almost literally a child of hell, yet the climax of the +story is his repentance at Rome and his great reparation. That is the +paradox of mediaeval morals: as it must appear to the moderns. We must +try to conceive a race of men who hated John, and sought his blood, and +believed every abomination about him, who would have been quite capable +of assassinating or torturing him in the extremity of their anger. And +yet we must admit that they would not really have been fundamentally +surprised if he had shaved his head in humiliation, given all his goods +to the poor, embraced the lepers in a lazar-house, and been canonised +as a saint in heaven. So strongly did they hold that the pivot of Will +should turn freely, which now is rusted, and sticks. + +For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our +public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a +noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit +that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the +powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and +rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect +him to go on maddening them—and us. We do not expect him, let +us say, suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of +repentance; especially in public things; that is why we cannot +really get rid of our great national abuses of economic tyranny and +aristocratic avarice. Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal +drudge; and mostly consists of being moved on by the police. We move on +because we are not allowed to move back. But the really ragged prophets, +the real revolutionists who held high language in the palaces of kings, +they did not confine themselves to saying, "Onward, Christian soldiers," +still less, "Onward, Futurist soldiers"; what they said to high emperors +and to whole empires was, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?" + + + + +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + +Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there +are even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to +most modern books. A detective story generally describes six living +men discussing how it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story +generally describes six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be +alive. But those who have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted +one thing, that when the murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. +"That," says Sherlock Holmes, "is the advantage of being a private +detective"; after he has caught he can set free. The Christian Church +can best be defined as an enormous private detective, correcting +that official detective—the State. This, indeed, is one of the +injustices done to historic Christianity; injustices which arise from +looking at complex exceptions and not at the large and simple fact. We +are constantly being told that theologians used racks and thumbscrews, +and so they did. Theologians used racks and thumbscrews just as they +used thimbles and three-legged stools, because everybody else used them. +Christianity no more created the mediaeval tortures than it did the +Chinese tortures; it inherited them from any empire as heathen as the +Chinese. + +The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and +employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, +if we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real +difference between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The +State, in all lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, +more bloody and brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal +everywhere. The Church is the only institution that ever attempted to +create a machinery of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever +attempted by system to pursue and discover crimes, not in order to +avenge, but in order to forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the +weaknesses of the religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the +world. Its speciality—or, if you like, its oddity—was this +merciless mercy; the unrelenting sleuthhound who seeks to save and not +slay. + +I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays +on somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in +America. The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent +experiment, dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure +as he passes through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to +make cheap fun of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; +that is a point of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions +have been abrupt. This saviour's method of making people good is to tell +them how good they are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, +whose moral backs are broken, and who are soaked with sincere +self-contempt, I can imagine that this might be quite the right way. +I should not deliver this message to authors or members of Parliament, +because they would so heartily agree with it. + +Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. +Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a +detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of +tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. +Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine +thing, though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be +faced, even in order to be forgiven; the great objection to "letting +sleeping dogs lie" is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. +Jerome's Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine +detective, pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a +sort of divine dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not +see anything that is going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, "Tout +comprendre est tout pardonner." But it is much more evidently true to +say, "Rien comprendre est rien Pardonner," and the "Third Floor Back" +does not seem to comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite +selfish sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his +neighbours. There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been +deceived. The heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived. + +When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play +which I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. +I mean Mr. Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which +sprawls over so many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned +with a dim, yet evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a +whole group of persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; +in fact, it is a very fine play indeed; but there is nothing +aesthetic or fastidious about it. It is as much or more than the other +sensational, democratic, and (I use the word in a sound and good sense) +Salvationist. + +But the difference lies precisely in this—that the Christ of Mr. +Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; +he declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons +evil, but he will not ignore it. In other words, he is a Christian, and +not a Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained +by the problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes +Christ to be trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, +is naturally a simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying +to save the reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief +characters in The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous +vicar, universally respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. +It would have been no good to tell these people they had some good in +them—for that was what they were telling themselves all day long. +They had to be reminded that they had some bad in them—instinctive +idolatries and silent treasons which they always tried to forget. It is +in connection with these crimes of wealth and culture that we face the +real problem of positive evil. The whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy +about sin was vitiated throughout by one's consciousness that whenever +he wrote the word "sinner" he thought of a man in rags. But here, again, +we can find truth merely by referring to vulgar literature—its +unfailing fountain. Whoever read a detective story about poor people? +The poor have crimes; but the poor have no secrets. And it is because +the proud have secrets that they need to be detected before they are +forgiven. + + + + +THE ELF OF JAPAN + +There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I +love them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but +psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me +as examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from +another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he +might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about +cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral +independence and readiness to scratch anybody "if he does not behave +himself." Others, like Mr. Belloe, regard the cat as cruel and secret, a +fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, +poisoned food, "so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and +humility." For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats +as I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They +are both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And +this abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called +Love; for it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it +is a vision. It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for +nothing in return. I love all the eats in the street as St. Francis of +Assisi loved all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not +so much, of course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to +bridle a bird and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. +He did not wish to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the +name "Francis," and the address "Assisi"—as one does with a dog. +He did not wish them to belong to him or himself to belong to them; +in fact, it would be a very awkward experience to belong to a lot of +fishes. But a man does belong to his dog, in another but an equally +real sense with that in which the dog belongs to him. The two bonds of +obedience and responsibility vary very much with the dogs and the men; +but they are both bonds. In other words, a man does not merely love a +dog; as he might (in a mystical moment) love any sparrow that perched +on his windowsill or any rabbit that ran across his path. A man likes a +dog; and that is a serious matter. + +To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a +cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is +so mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like +Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is +really cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men +of old time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those +magnificent old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which +one really loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and +within reason) loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man +feels himself—no, not absorbed into the unity of all things (a +loathsome fancy)—but delighting in the difference of all things. +At the moment when a man really knows he is a man he will feel, however +faintly, a kind of fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is +a crocodile. All the more will he exult in the things that are more +evidently beautiful than crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and +eats—which are more beautiful than either. But it does not follow +that he will wish to pick all the flowers or to cage all the birds or to +own all the cats. + +No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit +that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful +analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of +such fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like +eats in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I +feel it about certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the +Japanese. The exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall +see no more, now Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a +quality that was infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures +were really rather like pictures made by cats. They were full of +feathery softness and of sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will +wander in some gallery fortunate enough to have a fine collection of +those slight water-colour sketches on rice paper which come from the +remote East, he will observe many elements in them which a fanciful +person might consider feline. There is, for instance, that odd enjoyment +of the tops of trees; those airy traceries of forks and fading twigs, up +to which certainly no artist, but only a cat could climb. There is that +elvish love of the full moon, as large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, +hung in these tenuous branches. That moon is so large and luminous +that one can imagine a hundred cats howling under it. Then there is the +exhaustive treatment of the anatomy of birds and fish; subjects in which +cats are said to be interested. Then there is the slanting cat-like eye +of all these Eastern gods and men—but this is getting altogether +too coincident. We shall have another racial theory in no time +(beginning "Are the Japs Cats?"), and though I shall not believe in +my theory, somebody else might. There are people among my esteemed +correspondents who might believe anything. It is enough for me to say +here that in this small respect Japs affect me like cats. I mean that I +love them. I love their quaint and native poetry, their instinct of easy +civilisation, their unique unreplaceable art, the testimony they bear +to the bustling, irrepressible activities of nature and man. If I were +a real mystic looking down on them from a real mountain, I am sure I +should love them more even than the strong winged and unwearied birds +or the fruitful, ever multiplying fish. But, as for liking them, as one +likes a dog—that is quite another matter. That would mean trusting +them. + +In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much +in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not +specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; +but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give +the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would +happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always +a fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as +wedding cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as +lanterns!… but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the +paper) that the assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture +was a mere matter of verbal translation. "The Japanese would not call +twisting the thumbs back 'torture.'" + + + + +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + +I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark +in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming +a peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist +asceticism to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an +atheist and an ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious +to see one's country thus losing her special point of honour about +asylum and liberty. It will be quite a new departure if we begin to +protect and whitewash foreign policemen. I always understood it was +only English policemen who were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, +however, have begun to feel with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities +and officials are being questioned. But there is one most graphic and +extraordinary fact, which it did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch +upon, but which somebody really must seize and emphasise. It is +this: that at the very time when we are all beginning to doubt these +authorities, we are letting laws pass to increase their most capricious +powers. All our commissions, petitions, and letters to the papers +are asking whether these authorities can give an account of their +stewardship. And at the same moment all our laws are decreeing that they +shall not give any account of their stewardship, but shall become yet +more irresponsible stewards. Bills like the Feeble-Minded Bill and +the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate names for them) actually arm with +scorpions the hand that has chastised the Malatestas and Maleckas with +whips. The inspector, the doctor, the police sergeant, the well-paid +person who writes certificates and "passes" this, that, or the other; +this sort of man is being trusted with more authority, apparently +because he is being doubted with more reason. In one room we are asking +why the Government and the great experts between them cannot sail a +ship. In another room we are deciding that the Government and experts +shall be allowed, without trial or discussion, to immure any one's body, +damn any one's soul, and dispose of unborn generations with the levity +of a pagan god. We are putting the official on the throne while he is +still in the dock. + +The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as +when people talk of an author's "message," without thinking whom it +is from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of +another word. It is the excellent mediaeval word "charter." I remember +the Act that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called +"The Children's Charter." Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as +lunatics people who are not lunatics was actually called a "charter" of +the feeble-minded. Now this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the +Bills are right. Even were they right in theory they would be applied +only to the poor, like many better rules about education and cruelty. +A woman was lately punished for cruelty because her children were not +washed when it was proved that she had no water. From that it will be an +easy step in Advanced Thought to punishing a man for wine-bibbing when +it is proved that he had no wine. Rifts in right reason widen down the +ages. And when we have begun by shutting up a confessedly kind +person for cruelty, we may yet come to shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for +feeblemindedness. + +But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use +the word "charter." A charter does not mean a thing that does good to +people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. +It may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their +cigarettes: it might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of +their cigars. But I think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much +surprised if the King granted them a new charter (in place of their +mediaeval charter), and it only meant that policemen might pull the +cigars out of their mouths. It may be a good thing that all drunkards +should be locked up: and many acute statesmen (King John, for instance) +would certainly have thought it a good thing if all aristocrats could +be locked up. But even that somewhat cynical prince would scarcely have +granted to the barons a thing called "the Great Charter" and then locked +them all up on the strength of it. If he had, this interpretation of the +word "charter" would have struck the barons with considerable surprise. +I doubt if their narrow mediaeval minds could have taken it in. + +The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no +Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own +conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them +till he understands this word "charter." I will attempt in a moment +to state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, +practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter +was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last +Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called +in the current jargon "recognition"; the acknowledgment in so many words +by society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If +there had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have +been a railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the +King, defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea +still true and then almost universal: that authority is necessary +for nothing so much as for the granting of liberties. Like everything +mediaeval, it ramified back to a root in religion; and was a sort of +small copy of the Christian idea of man's creation. Man was free, not +because there was no God, but because it needed a God to set him free. +By authority he was free. By authority the craftsmen of the guilds were +free. Many other great philosophers took and take the other view: +the Lucretian pagans, the Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and +determinists, all roughly confine themselves to saying that God gave +man a law. The mediaeval Christian insisted that God gave man a charter. +Modern feeling may not sympathise with its list of liberties, which +included the liberty to be damned; but that has nothing to do with the +fact that it was a gift of liberties and not of laws. This was mirrored, +however dimly, in the whole system. There was a great deal of gross +inequality; and in other aspects absolute equality was taken +for granted. But the point is that equality and inequality were +ranks—or rights. There were not only things one was forbidden +to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. A man was not only +definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. The holidays of +his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really meant lingers alive +in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a "chartered" libertine. + +Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every +man's door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes +liberties with everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel +that the wind is always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. +But remember that in the days when free men had charters, they held that +the wind itself was wild by authority; and was only free because it had +a father. + + + + +THE CONTENTED MAN + +The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating +because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the +style of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied +with our countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, +however, has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the "sweet +content" of the poet and the "cubic content" of the mathematician. Some +distinguish these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might +happen to any of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, "Of the +content of the King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be +ignorant"; or "Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, +you are stealing the spoons." And there really is an analogy between the +mathematical and the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation +of which the latter has been much weakened and misused. + +The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far +that the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane +peril of our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of +security; and it is not strange that our workers should often think +about rising above their position, since they have so continually to +think about sinking below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to +saving and simple pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To +advise people to be content with what they have got may or may not be +sound moral philosophy. + +But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece +of impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the +creed of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, +it remains true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine +discontent; discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must +always be the human thing. It may be true that a particular man, in his +relation to his master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, +will do well to be fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry +justice. But it is not true, no sane person can call it true, that man +as a whole in his general attitude towards the world, in his posture +towards death or green fields, towards the weather or the baby, will be +wise to cultivate dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly +experience, the great truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet +his neighbour's ox nor his ass nor anything that is his. In highly +complex and scientific civilisations he may sometimes find himself +forced into an exceptional vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and +scientific civilisations, nine times out of ten, he only wants his own +ass back. + +But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than +in moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has +been undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other +meaning. It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some +accounts of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + +But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the +idea of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; +for feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. +"Content" ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; +placidly, perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with +bread and cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought +to mean caring for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic +content of the bread and cheese and adding it to your own. Being +content with an attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and +resigned to living in it. It ought to mean appreciating what there is +to appreciate in such a position; such as the quaint and elvish slope of +the ceiling or the sublime aerial view of the opposite chimney-pots. And +in this sense contentment is a real and even an active virtue; it is not +only affirmative, but creative. The poet in the attic does not forget +the attic in poetic musings; he remembers whatever the attic has of +poetry; he realises how high, how starry, how cool, how unadorned and +simple—in short, how Attic is the attic. + +True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of +getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and +it is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so +cold and incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been +"through" things; when it is evident that they have come out on the +other side quite unchanged. A man might have gone "through" a plum +pudding as a bullet might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the +size of the pudding—and the man. But the awful and sacred question +is "Has the pudding been through him?" Has he tasted, appreciated, and +absorbed the solid pudding, with its three dimensions and its three +thousand tastes and smells? Can he offer himself to the eyes of men as +one who has cubically conquered and contained a pudding? + +In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through +trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content +of them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a +pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + +Thus the young genius says, "I have lived in my dreary and squalid +village before I found success in Paris or Vienna." The sound +philosopher will answer, "You have never lived in your village, or you +would not call it dreary and squalid." + +Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and +always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, "I've been right away from +these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies." The +sound philosopher will reply, "You have never been in these islands; you +have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise +you could never have called them either muddy or little." + +Thus the Suffragette will say, "I have passed through the paltry duties +of pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come +out to intellectual liberty." The sound philosopher will answer, "You +have never passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it +vulgar. Wiser and stronger women than you have really seen a poetry +in pots and pans; naturally, because there is a poetry in them." It is +right for the village violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; +it is right for the stray Englishman to climb across the high shoulder +of the world; it is right for the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae +or high places she can allow to her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that +any of these climbers should kick the ladder by which they have climbed. +But indeed these bitter people who record their experiences really +record their lack of experiences. It is the countryman who has not +succeeded in being a countryman who comes up to London. It is the +clerk who has not succeeded in being a clerk who tries (on vegetarian +principles) to be a countryman. And the woman with a past is generally a +woman angry about the past she never had. + +When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and +love it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really +been through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them +back again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because +we have drunk them dry. + + + + +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + +I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover +a very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the +controversies, whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather +up into this last article a valedictory violence about all such things; +and then pass to where, beyond these voices, there is peace—or in +other words, to the writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed +work. But before I finally desert the illusions of rationalism for +the actualities of romance, I should very much like to write one last +roaring, raging book telling all the rationalists not to be so utterly +irrational. The book would be simply a string of violent vetoes, like +the Ten Commandments. I would call it "Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things +I am Tired Of." + +This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would +begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing +imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might +begin thus:— + +(1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out the noun. +An adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, "Give me a +patriotism that is free from all boundaries." It is like saying, "Give +me a pork pie with no pork in it." Don't say, "I look forward to that +larger religion that shall have no special dogmas." It is like saying, +"I look forward to that larger quadruped who shall have no feet." A +quadruped means something with four feet; and a religion means something +that commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. Don't let +the meek substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, exuberant +adjective. + +(2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This +practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The +trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable +terms, and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the +simplest form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who +said to his tenants in an election speech, "Of course I'm not going to +threaten you, but if this Budget passes the rents will go up." The thing +can be done in many forms besides this. "I am the last man to +mention party politics; but when I see the Empire rent in pieces by +irresponsible Radicals," etc. "In this hall we welcome all creeds. We +have no hostility against any honest belief; but only against that black +priestcraft and superstition which can accept such a doctrine as," etc. +"I would not say one word that could ruffle our relations with Germany. +But this I will say; that when I see ceaseless and unscrupulous +armament," etc. Please don't do it. Decide to make a remark or not to +make a remark. But don't fancy that you have somehow softened the saying +of a thing by having just promised not to say it. + +(3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. "Happiness" (let us say) +is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well +know when you haven't. "Progress" is a secondary word; it means the +degree of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But +modern controversies constantly turn on asking, "Does Happiness help +Progress?" Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. +Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. +Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is "spasmodic" (whatever that +means); while our "reactionism is settled and permanent." It never +strikes Mr. Swann that democracy means something in itself; while +"reactionism" means nothing—except in connection with democracy. +You cannot react except from something. If Mr. Swann thinks I have ever +reacted from the doctrine that the people should rule, I wish he would +give me the reference. + +(4) Don't say, "There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself +right and the others wrong." Probably one of the creeds is right and +the others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must +be wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be +wrong. I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more +desperate sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are +certainly solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts +his shirt on Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other +men putting their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in +them quite as sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are +wrong. But one of them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of +the horses does win; not always even the dark horse which might stand +for Agnosticism, but often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. +Democracy has its occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been +known to come in first. But the point here is that something comes in +first. That there were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there +was one well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the +world is round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular +or oblong does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and +therefore not any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of +imprecation, don't say that the variety of creeds prevents you from +accepting any creed. It is an unintelligent remark. + +(5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), +don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the +majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of +mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The +man who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his +neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not +try to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks +himself Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself +Rockefeller; as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But +madmen never meet. It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, +they can inspire, they can fight, they can found religions; but they +cannot meet. Maniacs can never be the majority; for the simple reason +that they can never be even a minority. If two madmen had ever agreed +they might have conquered the world. + +(6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some +men are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height +of the French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat +short. In the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that +Rockefeller is stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human +equality reposes upon this: That there is no man really clever who has +not found that he is stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt +small. Some men never feel small; but these are the few men who are. + +(7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman +with a club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male +sparrow knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe +knock down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male +have had to use any violence at any time in order to make the female a +female? Why should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the +sow or the she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these +creatures were creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not +talk such bosh. I implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. +Utterly and absolutely abolish all such bosh—and we may yet +begin to discuss these public questions properly. But I fear my list of +protests grows too long; and I know it could grow longer for ever. The +reader must forgive my elongations and elaborations. I fancied for the +moment that I was writing a book. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Miscellany of Men, by G. 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CHESTERTON + + + + +CONTENTS + +THE SUFFRAGIST +THE POET AND THE CHEESE +THE THING +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS +THE NAMELESS MAN +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES +THE MAD OFFICIAL +THE ENCHANTED MAN +THE SUN WORSHIPPER +THE WRONG INCENDIARY +THE FREE MAN +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER +THE PRIEST OF SPRING +THE REAL JOURNALIST +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY +THE FOOL +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS +THE MYSTAGOGUE +THE RED REACTIONARY +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS +THE MUMMER +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER +THE SULTAN +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS +THE MAN ON TOP +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE +THE ELF OF JAPAN +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE +THE CONTENTED MAN +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + + + +THE SUFFRAGIST + + +Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, +can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching those +political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular sentiments, +it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. One part +of it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up her fists +to a man she is putting herself in the only posture in which he is not +afraid of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more of her +silence; but force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon of which +he has grown ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite accurate +in any matter of the instincts. For the things which are the simplest so +long as they are undisputed invariably become the subtlest when once they +are disputed: which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, when he said, "It +is not hard to believe in God if one does not define Him." When the evil +instincts of old Foulon made him say of the poor, "Let them eat grass," +the good and Christian instincts of the poor made them hang him on a lamp- +post with his mouth stuffed full of that vegetation. But if a modern +vegetarian aristocrat were to say to the poor, "But why don't you like +grass ?" their intelligences would be much more taxed to find such an +appropriate repartee. And this matter of the functions of the sexes is +primarily a matter of the instincts; sex and breathing are about the only +two things that generally work best when they are least worried about. +That, I suppose, is why the same sophisticated age that has poisoned the +world with Feminism is also polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We +plunge at once into a forest of false analogies and bad blundering +history; while almost any man or woman left to themselves would know at +least that sex is quite different from anything else in the world. + +There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and +woman (however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave +and master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the +Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; +these other alien groups never came into contact until they came into +collision. Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards +melted into amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they +like each other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and +sorrows that often come of their mating, it was not such things that made +them meet. It is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern +writers and talkers miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one +would suppose woman a victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, +emancipated woman has, age after age, been knocked silly with a stone axe. +But really there is no fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman was +ever knocked silly; except the fact that she is silly. And that might +have arisen in so many other ways. Real responsible woman has never been +silly; and any one wishing to knock her would be wise (like the street- +boys) to knock and run away. It is ultimately idiotic to compare this +prehistoric participation with any royalties or rebellions. Genuine +royalties wish to crush rebellions. Genuine rebels wish to destroy kings. +The sexes cannot wish to abolish each other; and if we allow them any +sort of permanent opposition it will sink into something as base as a +party system. + +As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, +you cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere +collisions of separate institutions. You could compare it with the +emancipation of negroes from planters--if it were true that a white man +in early youth always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black man. You +could compare it with the revolt of tenants against a landlord--if it +were true that young landlords wrote sonnets to invisible tenants. You +could compare it to the fighting policy of the Fenians-if it were true +that every normal Irishman wanted an Englishman to come and live with him. +But as we know there are no instincts in any of these directions, these +analogies are not only false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not +speak of the comparative comfort or merit of these different things: I +say they are different. It may be that love turned to hate is terribly +common in sexual matters: it may be that hate turned to love is not +uncommon in the rivalries of race or class. But any philosophy about the +sexes that begins with anything but the mutual attraction of the sexes, +begins with a fallacy; and all its historical comparisons are as +irrelevant and impertinent as puns. + +But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express or +even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very +much concerned with what literary people call "style" in letters or more +vulgar people call "style" in dress. They are much concerned with how a +thing is done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest +elements in their attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed by +stray examples or sudden images. When Danton was defending himself +before the Jacobin tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard +across the Seine, in quite remote streets on the other side of the river. +He must have bellowed like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would think +of that prodigy except as something poetical and appropriate. None of us +would instinctively feel that Danton was less of a man or even less of a +gentleman, for speaking so in such an hour. But suppose we heard that +Marie Antoinette, when tried before the same tribunal, had howled so that +she could be heard in the Faubourg St. Germain--well, I leave it to the +instincts, if there are any left. It is not wrong to howl. Neither is +it right. It is simply a question of the instant impression on the +artistic and even animal parts of humanity, if the noise were heard +suddenly like a gun. + +Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may he found in the +gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must +always be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the. French +committee or the English House of Lords. And "demagogue," in the good +Greek meaning, does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who +leads it: and if you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive +gestures of oratory are gestures of military leadership; pointing the +people to a path or waving them on to an advance. Notice that long sweep +of the arm across the body and outward, which great orators use naturally +and cheap orators artificially. It is almost the exact gesture of the +drawing of a sword. + +The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that +votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so +long as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient +militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd +that is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth +hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points +with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated +finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, +these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. +No honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the +political woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing +to do with any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a +desire exists. A husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown +and proclaimed laws from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles +from the tripod of a priestess; or if she could walk in mystical +motherhood before the procession of some great religious order. But that +she should stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; +leaning forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth open +a little longer and wider than is dignified--well, I only write here of +the facts of natural history; and the fact is that it is this, and not +publicity or importance, that hurts. It is for the modern world to judge +whether such instincts are indeed danger signals; and whether the hurting +of moral as of material nerves is a tocsin and a warning of nature. + + + +THE POET AND THE CHEESE + + +There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the +white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of +the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even +when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement +of music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with a +shout like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open +arms and warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the +great level lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even +when there are plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. +One's voice seems to break an almost elvish silence, and something +unreasonably weird in the phrase of the nursery tales, "And he went a +little farther and came to another place," comes back into the mind. + +In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and +found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was +one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may +be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass +did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious +impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally +lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of +being so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the +air of something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like +a big yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and +railings; and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that +dead hour of the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, +nor anything else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling +that I had strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in the +twenty-four. + +I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost as +private as a private house. Those who talk of "public-houses" as if they +were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with such a +place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an elaborate +cap sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of comfortable +Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) the original +Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat a tall, +strong, and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and a pair of +scissors stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. Two feet +behind them sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like wood painted +scarlet, with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not touched, and +probably would not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there was an +equally motionless cat; and on the table a copy of 'Household Words'. + +I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had met +somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; and +yet it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at once +solid and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in some of +Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness and wonder, +and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was curious; for +Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of the fenlands or +flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water and the mirrored +skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline virtue. Perhaps +that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead of a mountain poet. +Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the whole of that town +was like a cup of water given at morning. + +After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of rustic +courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The old +lady answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued her +needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at her +with a suddenly arrested concern. "I suppose," I said, "that it has +nothing to do with the cheese of that name." "Oh, yes," she answered, +with a staggering indifference, "they used to make it here." + +I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. "But this +place is a Shrine!" I said. "Pilgrims should be pouring into it from +wherever the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a +colossal statue in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton +cheese. There ought to be another colossal statue of the first cow who +provided the foundations of it. There should be a burnished tablet let +into the ground on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton +cheese, and survived. On the top of a neighbouring hill (if there are +any neighbouring hills) there should be a huge model of a Stilton cheese, +made of some rich green marble and engraven with some haughty motto: I +suggest something like 'Ver non semper viret; sed Stiltonia semper +virescit.'" The old lady said, "Yes, sir," and continued her domestic +occupations. + +After a strained and emotional silence, I said, "If I take a meal here to- +night can you give me any Stilton?" + +"No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton," said the immovable one, +speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + +"This is awful," I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of +England as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and +forgotten, so to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it +yet more symbolic because from all that old and full and virile life, the +great cheese was gone; and only the beer remained. And even that will be +stolen by the Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. Politely +disengaging myself, I made my way as quickly as possible to the nearest +large, noisy, and nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I sought out +the nearest vulgar, tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + +There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I got +a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote a +sonnet to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my +sonnet is not strictly new; that it contains "echoes" (as they express +it) of some other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, +are the lines I wrote :- + + SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE + + Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour + And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby; + England has need of thee, and so have I-- + She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour, + League after grassy league from Lincoln tower + To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen. + Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men, + Like a tall green volcano rose in power. + + Plain living and long drinking are no more, + And pure religion reading 'Household Words', + And sturdy manhood sitting still all day + Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core; + While my digestion, like the House of Lords, + The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. + +I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that has +haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is +hopeless to disentangle it now. + + + +THE THING + + +The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like the +war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken free. +For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and +physical, like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing +itself was walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of +beech. + +Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have +been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from +its enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations +tend to perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this +we hear much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the +spirit of religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of +the same stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded +that just as church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are not +knowledge, and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to find +people in the big cities who can read and write quickly enough to be +clerks, but who are actually ignorant of the daily movements of the sun +and moon. + +The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one +watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government +arose among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the +ancients) out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. +The notion of self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes of +it seem to think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be consulted +as one consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked a lot of +fancy questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows are to +be, within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. They +shall decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of the +spade or the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the valley +shall be devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the men of +the town shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or splendid +with spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather under a +patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in case the +word "man" be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral atmosphere, +this original soul of self-government, the women always have quite as +much influence as the men. But in modern England neither the men nor the +women have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the moulding of +the landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people are utterly +impotent. They stand and stare at imperial and economic processes going +on, as they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + +Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place +which really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for +good or evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever it +is) is advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the villas +advance in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates into which +England has long been divided are passing out of the hands of the English +gentry into the hands of men who are always upstarts and often actually +foreigners. + +Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was +really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate +whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a +gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps +they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that +the filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof +over his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say in, +if he is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange +trend of recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over +and treat as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa is +as incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all +Lancashire were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium were +flooded by the sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a money- +lender is a minor and exceptional necessity. In reality it is a thing +like a German invasion. Sometimes it is a German invasion. + +Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes +round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It is +believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of self- +government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions about +everything except what he understands. The examination paper of the +Election generally consists of some such queries as these: "I. Are the +green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your opinion +fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the President +of the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you think +that the savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy and +hygienic as the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? IV. +Did the lost Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III +reserve the right of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of +what America thinks of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst +thinks of the state of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the +two persons in frock-coats placed before you at this election." + +Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that +the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions like +these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and +Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether +farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether +stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But +these are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to +touch with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and +divine mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he +knows nothing about. The name of selfgovernment is noisy everywhere: the +Thing is throttled. + +The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; in +scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances of +martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of +Napoleon and all the tongues Of terror with which the Thing has gone +forth: the spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning +only a branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of +the great country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would +have happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + + + +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + + +The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, if +he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes +nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific +or skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution and +Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But +especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the +writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For +the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + +Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, perhaps, +the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as possible, and +from it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right mode in which all +real results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which is confusing all our +current discussions, especially our discussions about the relations of +the sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I notice an object which is +often mentioned in the higher and subtler of these debates about the +sexes: I mean a poker. I will take a poker and think about it; first +forwards and then backwards; and so, perhaps, show what I mean. + +The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin +somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star +the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, +comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only +naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his +shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He +might almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone +bathing and left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat upon +the beaver and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth for +a waistcoat, and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has no +heat in his hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must look +for light and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is cast. +This is equally true of his soul and of his body; he is the one creature +that has lost his heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a spiritual +sense he has taken leave of his senses; and even in a literal sense he +has been unable to keep his hair on. And just as this external need of +his has lit in his dark brain the dreadful star called religion, so it +has lit in his hand the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red flower +called Fire. Fire, the most magic and startling of all material things, +is a thing known only to man and the expression of his sublime +externalism. It embodies all that is human in his hearths and all that is +divine on his altars. It is the most, human thing in the world; seen +across wastes of marsh or medleys of forest, it is veritably the purple +and golden flag of the sons of Eve. But there is about this generous and +rejoicing thing an alien and awful quality: the quality of torture. Its +presence is life; its touch is death. Therefore, it is always necessary +to have an intermediary between ourselves and this dreadful deity; to +have a priest to intercede for us with the god of life and death; to send +an ambassador to the fire. That priest is the poker. Made of a material +more merciless and warlike than the other instruments of domesticity, +hammered on the anvil and born itself in the flame, the poker is strong +enough to enter the burning fiery furnace, and, like the holy children, +not be consumed. In this heroic service it is often battered and twisted, +but is the more honourable for it, like any other soldier who has been +under fire. + +Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right +view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong +view of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's +children, or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman +jump, as the clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to +the beginning, and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see +things in their right order, the one depending on the other in degree of +purpose and importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man +and the man for the glory of God. + +This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, +Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in an +opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:- A modern intellectual +comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not begin with +any dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about the mystery +of fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and the first +thing he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, "Poor +poker; it's crooked." Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and is +told that there is a thing in the world (with which his temperament has +hitherto left him unacquainted)--a thing called fire. He points out, +very kindly and clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want a +straight poker, to put it into a chemical combustion which will very +probably heat and warp it. "Let us abolish fire," he says, "and then we +shall have perfectly straight pokers. Why should you want a fire at +all?" They explain to him that a creature called Man wants a fire, +because he has no fur or feathers. He gazes dreamily at the embers for a +few seconds, and then shakes his head. "I doubt if such an animal is +worth preserving," he says. "He must eventually go under in the cosmic +struggle when pitted against well-armoured and warmly protected species, +who have wings and trunks and spires and scales and horns and shaggy hair. +If Man cannot live without these luxuries, you had better abolish Man." +At this point, as a rule, the crowd is convinced; it heaves up all its +clubs and axes, and abolishes him. At least, one of him. + +Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's welfare, +let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a straightforward +way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern movements may be +right; but let them be defended because they are right, not because they +are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the actual woman or man +in the street, who is cold; like mankind before the finding of fire. Do +not let us begin with the end of the last red-hot discussion--like the +end of a redhot poker. Imperialism may be right. But if it is right, it +is right because England has some divine authority like Israel, or some +human authority like Rome; not because we have saddled ourselves with +South Africa, and don't know how to get rid of it. Socialism may be true. +But if it is true, it is true because the tribe or the city can really +declare all land to be common land, not because Harrod's Stores exist and +the commonwealth must copy them. Female suffrage may be just. But if it +is just, it is just because women are women, not because women are +sweated workers and white slaves and all sorts of things that they ought +never to have been. Let not the Imperialist accept a colony because it +is there, nor the Suffragist seize a vote because it is lying about, nor +the Socialist buy up an industry merely because it is for sale. + +Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal +decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies' proved +that we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall +some day want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and +not, in mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female +suffrage, let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as the +male blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be +Socialism, let it be social; that is, as different as possible from all +the big commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman +tailor does not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more +cloth. The really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing +conditions, he denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some +deeply planted tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at last +into tiny twigs; and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is +trying to bend the tree by a twig: to alter England through a distant +colony, or to capture the State through a small State department, or to +destroy all voting through a vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise +who resists this temptation of trivial triumph or surrender, and happy +(in an echo of the Roman poet) who remembers the roots of things. + + + +THE NAMELESS MAN + + +There are only two forms of government the monarchy or personal +government, and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a +government; England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. But +there is one real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the method +of abstract democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal government +politics are so much more personal. In France and America, where the +State is an abstraction, political argument is quite full of human +details--some might even say of inhuman details. But in England, +precisely because we are ruled by personages, these personages do not +permit personalities. In England names are honoured, and therefore names +are suppressed. But in the republics, in France especially, a man can +put his enemies' names into his article and his own name at the end of it. + + +This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our +anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We +should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, +for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, +and have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, I +had little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for +anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity is +safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact +that you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a +proof that you ought to publish it. + +But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name +to his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and +it is never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a +man's name is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person to- +day is eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For instance, +we all read with earnestness and patience the pages of the 'Daily Mail', +and there are times when we feel moved to cry, "Bring to us the man who +thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture him, take great care +of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some precious bale of silk, +that we may look upon the face of the man who desires such things to be +printed. Let us know his name; his social and medical pedigree." But in +the modern muddle (it might be said) how little should we gain if those +frankly fatuous sheets were indeed subscribed by the man who had inspired +them. Suppose that after every article stating that the Premier is a +piratical Socialist there were printed the simple word "Northcliffe." +What does that simple word suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul +(uninstructed otherwise) it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in +the wintry seas towards the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the +top of this crag the fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, +of course, I know that the word does not mean this; it means another +Fleet Street journalist like myself or only different from myself in so +far as he has sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a +jolly time. + +A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not distinguish. +A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a hiding-place. + +But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not +merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic +titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been +essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in +which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is +nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk +means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the +Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government +or for it. All government is representative government until it begins +to decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to +decay the instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant +as envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in +becoming aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of +Norfolk ought simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + +I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of +Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very +high at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, +ought to end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences +with the word "together"; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus I +shall expect the Duke of Norfolk to say: "I beg to second the motion +together"; or "This is a great constitutional question together." I +shall expect him to know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers +above them; to know about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to know too +much about anything else. Of mountains he must be wildly and ludicrously +ignorant. He must have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even the flatness +of Norfolk. He must remind me of the watery expanses, the great square +church towers and the long level sunsets of East England. If he does not +do this, I decline to know him. + +I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I +lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that +his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot +with romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but +clotted cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna Doone', +and be unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he must +regard with some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I +should expect the Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and +dreamy ardour of the Celtic fringe. + +Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and +that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke +of Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point +is that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do +we find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, +his locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, +the thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a +gouty admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: you +will hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande dame, +and behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These are +light complications of the central fact of the falsification of all names +and ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediaeval knights who should +have exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule seems +to be that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; and +that the Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so long as +they are not Cornish. + +The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England +is an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, as +some say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and paralysis +of China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that it calls +cats dogs and describes the sun as the moon--and is very particular about +the preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and to be carefully +wrong, that is the definition of decadence. The disease called aphasia, +in which people begin by saying tea when they mean coffee, commonly ends +in their silence. Silence of this stiff sort is the chief mark of the +powerful parts of modern society. They all seem straining to keep things +in rather than to let things out. For the kings of finance +speechlessness is counted a way of being strong, though it should rather +be counted a way of being sly. By this time the Parliament does not +parley any more than the Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper editors and +proprietors are more despotic and dangerous by what they do not utter +than by what they do. We have all heard the expression "golden silence." +The expression "brazen silence" is the only adequate phrase for our +editors. If we wake out of this throttled, gaping, and wordless +nightmare, we must awake with a yell. The Revolution that releases +England from the fixed falsity of its present position will be not less +noisy than other revolutions. It will contain, I fear, a great deal of +that rude accomplishment described among little boys as "calling names"; +but that will not matter much so long as they are the right names. + + + +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + + +Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. Indeed, +the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on co- +operation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French +Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its +proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The +essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by +yourself. + +Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates the +things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and +suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest +approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the +country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached +to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean +the small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized +gardens; who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and who +frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the +characteristics of the true Peasant--especially the characteristics that +people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which is the +consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even disliked +sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because (like Micaiah) +he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The English gardener is +grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even economical. Nor is this +(as the reader's lightning wit will flash back at me) merely because the +English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. The type does exist in +pure South England blood and speech; I have spoken to the type. I was +speaking to the type only the other evening, when a rather odd little +incident occurred. + +It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and +radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it is +of the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and +hackneyed line about coming "before the swallow dares." Spring never is +Spring unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, +without any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in +heaven. The gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is +needless to explain the causes of this difference; it would be to tell +the tremendous history of two souls. It is needless because there is a +more immediate explanation of the case: the gardener and I, if not equal +in agreement, were at least equal in difference. It is quite certain +that he would not have allowed me to touch the garden if I had gone down +on my knees to him. And it is by no means certain that I should have +consented to touch the garden if he had gone down on his knees to me. +His activity and my idleness, therefore, went on steadily side by side +through the long sunset hours. + +And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not +sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about +the earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and the +flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a herald. +He possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while I only +possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than coal-owners +know about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they are brought +above the surface of the earth. I know more about gardens than railway +shareholders seem to know about railways: for at least I know that it +needs a man to make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But as I walked +on that grass my ignorance overwhelmed me--and yet that phrase is false, +because it suggests something like a storm from the sky above. It is +truer to say that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like a mine dug +long before; and indeed it was dug before the beginning of the ages. +Green bombs of bulbs and seeds were bursting underneath me everywhere; +and, so far as my knowledge went, they had been laid by a conspirator. I +trod quite uneasily on this uprush of the earth; the Spring is always +only a fruitful earthquake. With the land all alive under me I began to +wonder more and more why this man, who had made the garden, did not own +the garden. If I stuck a spade into the ground, I should be astonished +at what I found there ...and just as I thought this I saw that the +gardener was astonished too. + +Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by +the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It +was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, +I believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + +If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can +explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: +and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came +there I have not a notion--unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his hurry to +get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold recital of +facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under the earth +there, for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a treasure +without a Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it will +never be found, for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams of +avarice since I know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. And, +for the other party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the garden. + + +Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw +that answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not belong +to the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than simply +putting the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only underground +seed that I could understand. Only by having a little more of that dull, +battered yellow substance could I manage to be idle while he was active. +I am not altogether idle myself; but the fact remains that the power is +in the thin slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, not in the strong +square and curve of metal which we call the Spade. And then I suddenly +remembered that as I had found gold on my ground by accident, so richer +men in the north and west counties had found coal in their ground, also +by accident. + +I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, +but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and +then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he +would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But +a little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not +get a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering +and unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such +accidental and irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? +Perhaps he dimly felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that +buried treasure is a thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps he +thought there was a curse on such capital: on the coal of the coal-owners, +on the gold of the gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + + + +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + + +The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was +stated wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best +men from devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a +fanatical conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote +themselves to politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and +babies and things like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in party +politics, I wish there was more of it. The real danger of the two +parties with their two policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of +the ordinary citizen. They make him barren instead of creative, because +he is never allowed to do anything except prefer one existing policy to +another. We have not got real Democracy when the decision depends upon +the people. We shall have real Democracy when the problem depends upon +the people. The ordinary man will decide not only how he will vote, but +what he is going to vote about. + +It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations +towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all +questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of +the suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not +the quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting +about. A certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses +and the highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they +must go down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but +only which they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it +thus. The Suffragettes--if one may judge by their frequent ringing of +his bell--want to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion what it +is. Let us say (for the sake of argument) that they want to paint him +green. We will suppose that it is entirely for that simple purpose that +they are always seeking to have private interviews with him; it seems as +profitable as any other end that I can imagine to such an interview. Now, +it is possible that the Government of the day might go in for a positive +policy of painting Mr. Asquith green; might give that reform a prominent +place in their programme. Then the party in opposition would adopt +another policy, not a policy of leaving Mr. Asquith alone (which would +be considered dangerously revolutionary), but some alternative course of +action, as, for instance, painting him red. Then both sides would fling +themselves on the people, they would both cry that the appeal was now to +the Caesar of Democracy. A dark and dramatic air of conflict and real +crisis would arise on both sides; arrows of satire would fly and swords +of eloquence flame. The Greens would say that Socialists and free lovers +might well want to paint Mr. Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole +town red. Socialists would indignantly reply that Socialism was the +reverse of disorder, and that they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red +so that he might resemble the red pillar-boxes which typified State +control. The Greens would passionately deny the charge so often brought +against them by the Reds; they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith +green in order that he might be invisible on the green benches of the +Commons, as certain terrified animals take the colour of their +environment. + +There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, +flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, "Keep the +Red Flag Flying," and the other, "The Wearing of the Green." But when +the last effort had been made and the last moment come, when two crowds +were waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the +declaration of the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now +for democracy to do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her +head in awful loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. +Yet this might not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in +awful loneliness and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale +blue. The democracy of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed +to make up a policy for itself, might have desired him to be black with +pink spots. It might even have liked him as he is now. But a huge +apparatus of wealth, power, and printed matter has made it practically +impossible for them to bring home these other proposals, even if they +would really prefer them. No candidates will stand in the spotted +interest; for candidates commonly have to produce money either from their +own pockets or the pasty's; and in such circles spots are not worn. No +man in the social position of a Cabinet Minister, perhaps, will commit +himself to the pale-blue theory of Mr. Asquith; therefore it cannot be a +Government measure, therefore it cannot pass. + +Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will declare +dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes it, that red +and green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE OBSERVER will +say: "No one who knows the solid framework of politics or the emphatic +first principles of an Imperial people can suppose for a moment that +there is any possible compromise to be made in such a matter; we must +either fulfil our manifest racial destiny and crown the edifice of ages +with the august figure of a Green Premier, or we must abandon our +heritage, break our promise to the Empire, fling ourselves into final +anarchy, and allow the flaming and demoniac image of a Red Premier to +hover over our dissolution and our doom." The DAILY MAIL would say: +"There is no halfway house in this matter; it must be green or red. We +wish to see every honest Englishman one colour or the other." And then +some funny man in the popular Press would star the sentence with a pun, +and say that the DAILY MAIL liked its readers to be green and its paper +to be read. But no one would even dare to whisper that there is such a +thing as yellow. + +For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly examples +than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But I could +give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which I refer. +In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually insisted in +every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and that it was +only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It was not +inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to make peace +with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with their +conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been better for +us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and prestige, if we +had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a matter of opinion. +What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was not, as was said, +the only possible course; there were plenty of other courses; there were +plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the discussion about +Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind that we must +choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they call +Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean that +anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral philosophy +of the young Horner--and say what a good boy he is for helping himself. + +It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a +Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this +moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary +to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I +should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply +not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal +order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound +scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might +have peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry George; +we might have a number of tiny communes; we might have co-operation; we +might have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred things. I am not +saying that any of these are right, though I cannot imagine that any of +them could be worse than the present social madhouse, with its top-heavy +rich and its tortured poor; but I say that it is an evidence of the stiff +and narrow alternative offered to the civic mind, that the civic mind is +not, generally speaking, conscious of these other possibilities. The +civic mind is not free or alert enough to feel how much it has the world +before it. There are at least ten solutions of the Education question, +and no one knows which Englishmen really want. For Englishmen are only +allowed to vote about the two which are at that moment offered by the +Premier and the Leader of the Opposition. There are ten solutions of the +drink question; and no one knows which the democracy wants; for the +democracy is only allowed to fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + +So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer +questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political +aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably +cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be +rather careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and +self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less +democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of +slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both +of them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification of +taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much +alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold--and then for a +great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + + + +THE MAD OFFICIAL + + +Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very +nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all my +friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of +moderns; I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of +thinking before he comes to the first chance of living. + +But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man +does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a certain +dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very atmosphere +of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his madness, he +would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel or cryptograms +in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, which are on +his nose night and day. If once he could take off the spectacles he +would smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the Sixth Seal or +the Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible first principle. +If he could once see the first principle, he would see that it is not +there. + +This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur +not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard to +pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental +degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a +real test. A nation is not going mad when it doe's extravagant things, so +long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting +their beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other +Harmodius and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these +are wild things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + +But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State +is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, +this would logically allow me to fire off fiftynine enormous field-guns +day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man +doing it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the +neighbours putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing +merely because it might happen to fulfil the letter of my license. + +Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I +know) to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should +not be surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England +there is practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be +surprised even at the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he +lived long under the English landlord system, might do anything. But I +should be surprised at the people who consented to stand it. I should, +in other words, think the world a little mad if the incident, were +received in silence. + +Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every +day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. Ail blows +fall soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a +passive as well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of the +nerves to respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural +stimulation. There are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here +and there in history, which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from +glory to insignificance, or from freedom to slavery, not only in silence, +but with serenity. The face still smiles while the limbs, literally and +loathsomely, are dropping from the body. These are peoples that have +lost the power of astonishment at their own actions. When they give +birth to a fantastic fashion or a foolish law, they do not start or stare +at the monster they have brought forth. They have grown used to their +own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; and the whirlwind is the breath of +their nostrils. These nations are really in danger of going off their +heads en masse; of becoming one vast vision of imbecility, with toppling +cities and crazy country-sides, all dotted with industrious lunatics. +One of these countries is modern England. + +Now here is an actual instance, a small ease of how our social conscience +really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in realisation; a +thing without the light of mind in it. I take this paragraph from a +daily paper :- "At Epping, yesterday, Thomas Woolbourne, a Lambourne +labourer, and his wife were summoned for neglecting their five children. +Dr. Alpin said he was invited by the inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to +visit defendants' cottage. Both the cottage and the children were dirty. +The children looked exceedingly well in health, but the conditions would +be serious in case of illness. Defendants were stated to be sober. The +man was discharged. The woman, who said she was hampered by the cottage +having no water supply and that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' +imprisonment. The sentence caused surprise, and the woman was removed +crying, 'Lord save me! '" + +I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of +some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces +and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the +accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning +has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago +that can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of +reason to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + +I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman +was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for being +ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a matter of +fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. The doctor +was called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Was +this woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Did the +doctor say she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Was +these any evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of cruelty? Not a +rap. The worse that the doctor could work himself up to saying was that +though the children were "exceedingly" well, the conditions would be +serious in case of illness. If the doctor will tell me any conditions +that would be comic in case of illness, I shall attach more weight to his +argument. + +Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has gone +mad. He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite +literally and practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, +Quis docebit ipsum doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly +unnatural thing; instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect +of children is a natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is a +mere difference of degree that divides extending arms and legs in +calisthenics and extending them on the rack. It is a mere difference of +degree that separates any operation from any torture. The thumb-screw +can easily be called Manicure. Being pulled about by wild horses can +easily be called Massage. The modern problem is not so much what people +will endure as what they will not endure. But I fear I interrupt.... +The boiling oil is boiling; and the Tenth Mandarin is already reciting +the "Seventeen Serious Principles and the Fifty-three Virtues of the +Sacred Emperor." + + + +THE ENCHANTED MAN + + +When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, who +acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, it is +the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very late. +This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late comers +had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English audience +always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and (as I have +found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable taunts rather +than come forward. The English are a modest people; that is why they are +entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to be immodest. In +theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in most playhouses +we find the bored people in front and the eager people behind. + +As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored person; +but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus required to +sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in the dramatic +world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all critics have to +take off their heads. The people behind will have a chance then. And as +it happens, in this case, I had not so much taken off my head as lost it. +I had lost it on the road; on that strange journey that was the cause of +my coming in late. I have a troubled recollection of having seen a very +good play and made a very bad speech; I have a cloudy recollection of +talking to all sorts of nice people afterwards, but talking to them +jerkily and with half a head, as a man talks when he has one eye on a +clock. + +And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, +hung uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure for +such bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I was +moonstruck. A lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had +inexplicably got in between me and all other scenes. If any one had +asked me I could not have said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing +had occurred to me; except the breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge of +a hill. It was not an adventure; it was a vision. + +I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small car +that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as night +blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way +increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. +Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a yet +steeper road like a ladder. + +At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower of +Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, and +the driver saying that "it couldn't be done." I got out of the car and +suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + +From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which I +am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his +great patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts +of South Africa, he made use of the expression "the illimitable veldt." +The word "veldt" is Dutch, and the word "illimitable" is Double Dutch. +But the meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him +a sense of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. +Well, if he never found it in England it was because he never looked for +it in England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable +veldts. I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many +different hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite +horizon, free and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little +more desolate than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as +that English hill was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + +I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if +at a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on +that freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost +fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening +forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an +abyss which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless +only because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries had +been swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the hills. +I could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if I +hurled huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had +bewitched the landscape: but that again does not express the best or +worst of it. All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so +inhuman that it has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on +them; that is the nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking +at the back of the world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the +universe in the rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon +an unconscious creation. + +I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it +is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about +its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in +some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical +phrases of the populace, "a God-forsaken place." Yet something was +present there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. +Then suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. +It had been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales +about princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were +in a land where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The +moon looked at me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; +the one white eye of the world. + +There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a +point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There +were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for they +were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration which is +the transition from life to art. But all the time I was mesmerised by +the moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted things. The poacher +shot pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the wife hid pheasants; +they were all (especially the policeman) as true as death. But there was +something more true to death than true to life about it all: the figures +were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or fear or custom such as does +not cramp the movements of the poor men of other lands. I looked at the +poacher and the policeman and the gun; then at the gun and the policeman +and the poacher; and I could find no name for the fancy that haunted and +escaped me. The poacher believed in the Game Laws as much as the +policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed in the Game Laws, but +protected them as well as him. She got a promise from her husband that +he would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he kept it I doubt; I +fancy he sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. But I am sure he +never shot a policeman. For we live in an enchanted land. + + + +THE SUN WORSHIPPER + + +There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. +And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in that +sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the warning +to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as fate, if +they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that argument +will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and the slave. +To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, so to speak, +in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern doctrine, +taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is called the +materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: that all +the important things in history are rooted in an economic motive. In +short, history is a science; a science of the search for food. + +Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely +untrue, but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too +feebly to say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would +not have any history if he were only economic. The need for food is +certainly universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows have +an economic motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal +delicacies may be in a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass +anywhere and never eats anything else. In short, the cow does fulfil the +materialist theory of history: that is why the cow has no history. "A +History of Cows" would be one of the simplest and briefest of standard +works. But if some cows thought it wicked to eat long grass and +persecuted all who did so; if the cow with the crumpled horn were +worshipped by some cows and gored to death by others; if cows began to +have obvious moral preferences over and above a desire for grass, then +cows would begin to have a history. They would also begin to have a +highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same thing. + +The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually +outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that +is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men +are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we +have made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended on +economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two +legs. It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a +condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly +a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two +legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or +a coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or +no information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy +romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating +millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported on +legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more +generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much +grander and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the +hills and see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the +horizon broken by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + +So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. +But history--the whole point of history--precisely is that some two- +legged soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical structure, +did not. The whole point of history precisely is: some people (like +poets and tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while others +(such as millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun of +bothering about it. There would be no history if there were only +economic history. All the historical events have been due to the twists +and turns given to the economic instinct by forces that were not economic. +For instance, this theory traces the French war of Edward III to a +quarrel about the French wines. Any one who has even smelt the Middle +Ages must feel fifty answers spring to his lips; but in this cause one +will suffice. There would have been no such war, then, if we all drank +water like cows. But when one is a man one enters the world of historic +choice. The act of drinking wine is one that requires explanation. So +is the act of not drinking wine. + +But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + +When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, an +ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said that +they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was eagerly +taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do not see why +it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable uprisings in +history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is generally +rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on the sudden and +mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from captivity. The +English strikers used some barren republican formula (arid as the +definitions of the medieval schoolmen), some academic shibboleth about +being free men and not being forced to work except for a wage accepted by +them. Just in the same way the Israelites in Egypt employed some dry +scholastic quibble about the extreme difficulty of making bricks with +nothing to make them of. But whatever fantastic intellectual excuses +they may have put forward for their strange and unnatural conduct in +walking out when the prison door was open, there can be no doubt that the +real cause was the warm weather. Such a climate notoriously also +produces delusions and horrible fancies, such as Mr. Kipling describes. +And it was while their brains were disordered by the heat that the Jews +fancied that they were founding a nation, that they were led by a prophet, +and, in short, that they were going to be of some importance in the +affairs of the world. + +Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was +pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + +In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself in +accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at these +words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three times), +and I rather think that exceptions might be found to the principle. Yet +it is not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my belief in it. + +No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by +which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of +class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not +leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave +off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high +interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to +what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years ago. +The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking because +they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy confirmation +from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges and other +persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition to strike. +I have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my own; and I +continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to steal a phrase +from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that is other than the +elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + +When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really +time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession of +what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of +the mediaeval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing +from a slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land +rather than the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could +not be raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the +lord rode down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he had +the chance of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the means +of production. + +Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; +and something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is +no doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we +have destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in +serfdom; nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich +man has entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in +the modern industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They +can only find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such +competitive and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + +Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts +inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That +retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows or +the Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more +dreamed of than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. He +owned all the birds that passed over his land: he might as well have +owned all the clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's +land to Brown's land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. +The logical answer to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's land +ought to be able to prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp without +a muzzle. + +Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep +in the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +A landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way +that a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or +on a seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense +of fun) as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + +The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings +would fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike or +deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the passer- +by. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A man in +England can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in the name +of God. + +You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor +to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have +still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: that +weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the working +of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had this last +retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat was also +perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. Whereupon +the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at your +Boards and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you +opened on them the eyes of owls, and said, "It must be the sunshine." +You could only go on saying, "The sun, the sun." That was what the man +in Ibsen said, when he had lost his wits. + + + +THE WRONG INCENDIARY + + +I stood looking at the Coronation Procession--I mean the one in +Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I believe, +had some success in London--and I was seriously impressed. Most of my +life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that I was quite +right. Never before have I realised how right I was in maintaining that +the small area expresses the real patriotism: the smaller the field the +taller the tower. There were things in our local procession that did not +(one might even reverently say, could not) occur in the London procession. +One of the most prominent citizens in our procession (for instance) had +his face blacked. Another rode on a pony which wore pink and blue +trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan affair, and therefore my +assertion is subject to such correction as the eyewitness may always +offer to the absentee. But I believe with some firmness that no such +features occurred in the London pageant. + +But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of +something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my +garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind +of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead +trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, +reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material +and mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the +day when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather +strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any sort +of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + +In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I +supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose +stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out +cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big +stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also +a strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every now +and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew +what it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across +two meadows smote me where I stood. "Oh, my holy aunt," I thought, +"they've mistaken the Coronation Day." + +And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like a +bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close to +the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink with +the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted as +black as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart +edged with a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured +like a scarlet snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of +light. + +I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling +noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The +heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if +some giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I +had not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; +but the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered the +grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the last +fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and cavernous; +and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the dark and +magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a rood past +me; then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell him where +the fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought it was the +cottages by the wood-yard. He said, "My God!" and vanished. + +A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and +the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were +dim huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The +fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which +seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a +very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that +most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in +dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of +midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that the +fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard itself. +There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly accidental; +though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and revenge. +But for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a swollen, +tragic, portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something to do +with the crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end of +England. It was not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad +daylight next morning that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight +adventure had not happened outside this world. + +But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or +Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was +feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles +of virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good things +were being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, walking- +sticks, wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for girls I +could hear the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the flames. +And then I thought of that other noble tower of needless things that +stood in the field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of +vanities, that is meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in +the meadow, and the birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and +spangled its twigs. And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, +the Bad Fire and the Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of +Bonfire. And the paradox is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of +things that we do not want; but the Bad Fire is made of good things, of +things that we do want; like all that wealth of wood that might have made +dolls and chairs and tables, but was only making a hueless ash. + +And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there +are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race +between them. Which will happen first--the revolution in which bad +things shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things shall +perish also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most +conservative, really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the +face of the well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the +throat of despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is +possible, take tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into +bundles and burn them. And the other is the disruption that may come +prematurely, negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my +little town. + +It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in +it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and fair +ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two +revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway +trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the +tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a +cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout +like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a +blazing pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one could +fancy it visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along the +terraces of the Chiltern Hills. + + + +THE FREE MAN + + +The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men find +it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally to +the fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save their +lives by law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked +Coleridge for praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun +to be free. It seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the +sun. Speaking as a Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of +Joshua stopping the sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting +his daily round in imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, +and his astronomical act was distinctly revolutionary. For all +revolution is the mastering of matter by the spirit of man, the emergence +of that human authority within us which, in the noble words of Sir Thomas +Browne, "owes no homage unto the sun." + +Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant +merely to receive good laws, good food: or good conditions, like a tree +in a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in +selecting and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning of +the trade of Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real +idea of liberty are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the +word "make" about most of the things in which freedom is essential, as a +country walk or a friendship or a love affair. When a man "makes his +way" through a wood he has really created, he has built a road, like the +Romans. When a man "makes a friend," he makes a man. And in the third +case we talk of a man "making love," as if he were (as, indeed, he is) +creating new masses and colours of that flaming material an awful form of +manufacture. In its primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in man, +or, if you like the word, the artist. + +In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the +citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men +are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the +eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, +bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing +the citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the +State. You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may call +the bees a despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who +attempted to introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a +career as curt and fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm +alone. The isolation of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious +character; but it is not even in humanity by any means equally +distributed. The idea that the State should not only be supported by its +children, like the ant-hill, but should be constantly criticised and +reconstructed by them, is an idea stronger in Christendom than any other +part of the planet; stronger in Western than Eastern Europe. And touching +the pure idea of the individual being free to speak and act within limits, +the assertion of this idea, we may fairly say, has been the peculiar +honour of our own country. For my part I greatly prefer the Jingoism of +Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of The Recessional. I have no +objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I draw the line when she begins +to rule the dry land--and such damnably dry land too--as in Africa. And +there was a real old English sincerity in the vulgar chorus that "Britons +never shall be slaves." We had no equality and hardly any justice; but +freedom we were really fond of. And I think just now it is worth while +to draw attention to the old optimistic prophecy that "Britons never +shall be slaves." + +The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than it +has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy to +slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people up. +Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect high- +placed officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts rather +than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished the +Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed a +law (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not +depend upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have +got hold of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty is +in the air. A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square +without a word of accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says +that in his opinion the police are very nice people, and there is an end +of the matter. A Member of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. +The Speaker says he must not criticise a peerage, and there the matter +drops. + +Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of criticising +those flexible parts of the State which constantly require +reconsideration, not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, it +means the power of saying the sort of things that a decent but +discontented citizen wants to say. He does not want to spit on the Bible, +or to run about without clothes, or to read the worst page in Zola from +the pulpit of St. Paul's. Therefore the forbidding of these things +(whether just or not) is only tyranny in a secondary and special sense. +It restrains the abnormal, not the normal man. But the normal man, the +decent discontented citizen, does want to protest against unfair law +courts. He does want to expose brutalities of the police. He does want +to make game of a vulgar pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He does want +publicly to warn people against unscrupulous capitalists and suspicious +finance. If he is run in for doing this (as he will be) he does want to +proclaim the character or known prejudices of the magistrate who tries +him. If he is sent to prison (as he will be) he does want to have a +clear and civilised sentence, telling him when he will come out. And +these are literally and exactly the things that he now cannot get. That +is the almost cloying humour of the present situation. I can say +abnormal things in modern magazines. It is the normal things that I am +not allowed to say. I can write in some solemn quarterly an elaborate +article explaining that God is the devil; I can write in some cultured +weekly an aesthetic fancy describing how I should like to eat boiled baby. +The thing I must not write is rational criticism of the men and +institutions of my country. + +The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can +say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot +say, for instance, that--But I am afraid I must leave out that instance, +because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my case--because it is so true. + + + +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + + +We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded that +he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is extreme, +and my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. But I +never quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at least +from my own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught my eye; +and thus the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite constantly +walked into another man's house, thinking it was my own house; my visits +became almost monotonous. But walking into my own house and thinking it +was another man's house is a flight of poetic detachment still beyond me. +Something of the sensations that such an absent-minded man must feel I +really felt the other day; and very pleasant sensations they were. The +best parts of every proper romance are the first chapter and the last +chapter; and to knock at a strange door and find a nice wife would be to +concentrate the beginning and end of all romance. + +Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the same +kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin and +unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was +treading in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty +years old. + +It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost +unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were +once great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, as +it says in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is +something singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that +were so long a human property and care fighting for their own hand in the +thicket. One almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the dog +evolved into a wolf. + +This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned out +for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite +threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years +ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone no +farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked +building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or +coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick +of which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a +blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; and +on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white which +always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of some +blind giant. + +I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had +not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought +much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth +walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged +person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off +than childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal +picture, distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I +stood; and I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. +They still stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, +as if they had stood for centuries. + +I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half +slid on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked +off the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but were +still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks off +the tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I had +recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And then +I came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with the +sawdust and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three green +stars of dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding road. + +I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those +years ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this red +and white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more +lonesome than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could +only be full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of the +ghosts of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future as +he can find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediaeval +notion of erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting +on it a miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I +thought to myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built +boxes was indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real miracle +play; that human family that is almost the holy one, and that human death +that is near to the last judgment. + +For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row +especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. +Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; +and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and +solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction +upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the +convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + +As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played +the fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in my +pocket, I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; +things addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had +written up in what I supposed to be the dining-room: + + James Harrogate, thank God for meat, + Then eat and eat and eat and eat, + +or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric was +scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something beginning: + + When laying what you call your head, + O Harrogate, upon your bed, + +and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite +vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, and +the places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in +memory; for when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century +the house was very different. + +I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its +windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low +square windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream +of lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, was +standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy +sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the +wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that +lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express +if I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red chalk +upon the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to +withdraw, a mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct +accents to a very smart suburban maid, "Does Mr. James Harrogate live +here?" + +She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking for +him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I had +one moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then decided +not to look for him at all. + + + +THE PRIEST OF SPRING + + +The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. +But it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty +but of revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect who +will fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to be +congratulated on fitting in with the Spring--or the Spring on fitting in +with Easter. + +The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a story; +and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed very +voluptuous appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like mathematics, +logic, or chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind are like mere +pleasures of the body. That is, they are mere pleasures, though they may +be gigantic pleasures; they can never by a mere increase of themselves +amount to happiness. A man just about to be hanged may enjoy his +breakfast; especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and in the same +way he may enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, especially +if it is his favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy either of them +does not depend on either of them; it depends upon his spiritual attitude +towards a subsequent event. And that event is really interesting to the +soul; because it is the end of a story and (as some hold) the end of a +person. + +Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for +our scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about true +religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of +mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself +to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) +that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis or +Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, they have +got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is +sufficiently interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any +particular mystery or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to +disguise them under the image of a very handsome young man, which is a +vastly more interesting thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall of +leaves in autumn and the return of flowers in spring, the process of +thought was quite different. It is a process of thought which springs up +spontaneously in all children and young artists; it springs up +spontaneously in all healthy societies. It is very difficult to explain +in a diseased society. + +The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A +cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a +dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a day- +dream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a +start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save +in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its +trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete +phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream +sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting +in of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was +asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to +rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by +certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were always +unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always +intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of "the +survival of the fittest," meaning only the survival of the survivors; or +wherever a man says that the rich "have a stake in the country," as if +the poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or where +a man talks about "going on towards Progress," which only means going on +towards going on; or when a man talks about "government by the wise few," +as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. "The wise few" must +mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very foolish who +think themselves wise. + +There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves +saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am +particularly irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the +nineteenth century, especially in connection with the study of myths and +religions. The fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes +the form of saying "This god or hero really represents the sun." Or +"Apollo killing the Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter." +Or "The King dying in a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting in +the west." Now I should really have thought that even the skeptical +professors, whose skulls are as shallow as frying-pans, might have +reflected that human beings never think or feel like this. Consider what +is involved in this supposition. It presumes that primitive man went out +for a walk and saw with great interest a big burning spot on the sky. He +then said to primitive woman, "My dear, we had better keep this quiet. +We mustn't let it get about. The children and the slaves are so very +sharp. They might discover the sun any day, unless we are very careful. +So we won't call it 'the sun,' but I will draw a picture of a man killing +a snake; and whenever I do that you will know what I mean. The sun +doesn't look at all like a man killing a snake; so nobody can possibly +know. It will be a little secret between us; and while the slaves and +the children fancy I am quite excited with a grand tale Of a writhing +dragon and a wrestling demigod, I shall really MEAN this delicious little +discovery, that there is a round yellow disc up in the air." One does +not need to know much mythology to know that this is a myth. It is +commonly called the Solar Myth. + +Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god was +never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a +hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend +Dombey is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods +and heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw +the sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress +of nightfall, and he' said, "That is how the face of the god would shine +when he had slain the dragon," or "That is how the whole world would +bleed to westward, if the god were slain at last." + +No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No man, +however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man as +round as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however +attracted to an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the Dryad +was as lean and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never worshipped +Nature; and indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all human +beings are superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon Nature, +as God has printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous sun to +stand still; we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more for a star +than for a starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we could not +for the time control, we have conceived great beings in human shape +controlling them. Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the march +and victory of Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is his, +and he made it. In other words, what the savage really said about the +sea was, "Only my fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of mere +water." What the savage really said about the sun was," Only my great- +great-grandfather Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown." + +About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. +I say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that one +of them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are no real +ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real bank-notes. +Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to those of us +that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, even a false +god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the second place. When +once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before Him, offering +flowers in spring as flames in winter. "My love is like a red, red rose" +does not mean that the poet is praising roses under the allegory of a +young lady. "My love is an arbutus" does not mean that the author was a +botanist so pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he said he loved +it. "Who art the moon and regent of my sky" does not mean that Juliet +invented Romeo to account for the roundness of the moon. "Christ is the +Sun of Easter" does not mean that the worshipper is praising the sun +under the emblem of Christ. Goddess or god can clothe themselves with +the spring or summer; but the body is more than raiment. Religion takes +almost disdainfully the dress of Nature; and indeed Christianity has done +as well with the snows of Christmas as with the snow-drops of spring. +And when I look across the sun-struck fields, I know in my inmost bones +that my joy is not solely in the spring, for spring alone, being always +returning, would be always sad. There is somebody or something walking +there, to be crowned with flowers: and my pleasure is in some promise yet +possible and in the resurrection of the dead. + + + +THE REAL JOURNALIST + + +Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of +reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce +between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is done. +I take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. +Nothing looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel +columns, its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its +responsible, polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter of fact, +goes every night through more agonies of adventure, more hairbreadth +escapes, desperate expedients, crucial councils, random compromises, or +barely averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it seems to come +round as automatically as the clock and as silently as the dawn. Seen +from the inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief every +morning to see that it has come out at all; that it has come out without +the leading article upside down or the Pope congratulated on discovering +the North Pole. + +I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) +from the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little +episode in the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and instructive: +the tale of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There are really +two stories: the story as seen from the outside, by a man reading the +paper; and the story seen from the inside, by the journalists shouting +and telephoning and taking notes in shorthand through the night. + +This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The +notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy +pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, +long calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant leader +of the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his fanatic +soul. In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not having +the fear of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote the line +"that wreathes its old fantastic roots so high." This he said because he +had been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because he thought +craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and forgotten +rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that orthodox +gentleman made a howling error; and received some twentyfive letters and +post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the mistake. + +But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it was +a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, and +cried, "What is the joke NOW?" Another professed (and practised, for all +I know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and failed +to find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, asking, as +in confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a noble +collection; but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and +exactitude in the recipient's profession and character which is far from +the truth. Let us pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + +In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same +culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to +Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another +cropper--or whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was printed by +the editor with the justly scornful title, "Mr. Chesterton 'Explains'?" +Any man reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the meaning of the +sarcastic quotation marks. They meant, of course, "Here is a man who +doesn't know Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up and he can't +even spell Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation." That is the +perfectly natural inference of the reader from the letter, the mistake, +and the headline--as seen from the outside. The falsehood was serious; +the editorial rebuke was serious. The stern editor and the sombre, +baffled contributor confront each other as the curtain falls. + +And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly +rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really are. +A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a column +in the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it (which is +always at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded by infants +of all shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and he has to +cope with the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a glorious +thing; but the journalist in question has never understood why it was +considered a soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not of watering +little budding flowers, but of wrestling for hours with gigantic angels +and devils. Moral problems of the most monstrous complexity besiege him +incessantly. He has to decide before the awful eyes of innocence, +whether, when a sister has knocked down a brother's bricks, in revenge +for the brother having taken two sweets out of his turn, it is endurable +that the brother should retaliate by scribbling on the sister's picture- +book, and whether such conduct does not justify the sister in blowing out +the brother's unlawfully lighted match. + +Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest +morality, it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday +article; and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly +calls to somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for a +messenger; he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, +wondering what on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on the +door outside and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his thoughts; +and he is able to observe some newspapers and circulars in wrappers lying +on the table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second is a shiny +pamphlet about petrol; the third is a paper called The Christian +Commonwealth. He opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a page a +sentence with which he honestly disagrees. It says that the sense of +beauty in Nature is a new thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A stream +of images and pictures pour through his head, like skies chasing each +other or forests running by. "Not felt before Wordsworth!" he thinks. +"Oh, but this won't do...bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds +sang...night's candles are burnt out... glowed with living sapphires. +leaving their moon-loved maze...antique roots fantastic... antique roots +wreathed high...what is it in As You Like It?" + +He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children +drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the +messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making the +world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making +Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting "fantastic +roots wreathed high" instead of "antique roots peep out." Then the +journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma of +whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the +sister pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is +how an article is really written. + +The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article +has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: but +the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the +paper and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his +friends at the other end; he knows that they can spell "Gray," as no +doubt they can: but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a +pencil scribble and the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes at +the top of the letter "'G. K. C.' Explains," putting the initials in +quotation marks. The next man passing it for press is bored with these +initials (I am with him there) and crosses them out, substituting with +austere civility, "Mr. Chesterton Explains." But and now he hears the +iron laughter of the Fates, for the blind bolt is about to fall--but he +neglects to cross out the second "quote" (as we call it) and it goes up +to press with a "quote" between the last words. Another quotation mark +at the end of "explains" was the work of one merry moment for the +printers upstairs. So the inverted commas were lifted entirely off one +word on to the other and a totally innocent title suddenly turned into a +blasting sneer. But that would have mattered nothing so far, for there +was nothing to sneer at. In the same dark hour, however, there was a +printer who was (I suppose) so devoted to this Government that he could +think of no Gray but Sir Edward Grey. He spelt it "Grey" by a mere +misprint, and the whole tale was complete: first blunder, second blunder, +and final condemnation. + +That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic +and ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might +remember it when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged +by the neck on circumstantial evidence. + + + +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + + +Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most +romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch +blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; +that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it +is always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that +they have an eye to business. I like that phrase "an eye" to business. + +Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his forehead. +It served him admirably for the only two duties which are demanded in a +modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties of counting +sheep and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out he was done +for. But the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though their best +friends must admit that they are occasionally business-like. They are, +quite fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this is proved by the +very economic argument that is used to prove their harshness and hunger +for the material. The mass of Scots have accepted the industrial +civilisation, with its factory chimneys and its famine prices, with its +steam and smoke and steel--and strikes. The mass of the Irish have not +accepted it. The mass of the Irish have clung to agriculture with claws +of iron; and have succeeded in keeping it. That is because the Irish, +though far inferior to the Scotch in art and literature, are hugely +superior to them in practical politics. You do need to be very romantic +to accept the industrial civilisation. It does really require all the +old Gaelic glamour to make men think that Glasgow is a grand place. Yet +the miracle is achieved; and while I was in Glasgow I shared the illusion. +I have never had the faintest illusion about Leeds or Birmingham. The +industrial dream suited the Scots. Here was a really romantic vista, +suited to a romantic people; a vision of higher and higher chimneys +taking hold upon the heavens, of fiercer and fiercer fires in which +adamant could evaporate like dew. Here were taller and taller engines +that began already to shriek and gesticulate like giants. Here were +thunderbolts of communication which already flashed to and fro like +thoughts. It was unreasonable to expect the rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot +to stand still in such a whirl of wizardry to ask whether he, the +ordinary Scot, would be any the richer. + +He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich +city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich +men. It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, +Manchester, Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, +Munich, or Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, +perhaps, be due to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots +has there been reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence of +the Irish. In any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main +historical fact. The Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal +opportunities of industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The +Irish refused those enormous and unequal opportunities, because the Irish +are clear-sighted. They would not need very clear sight by this time to +see that in England and Scotland the temptation has been a betrayal. The +industrial system has failed. + +I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of +the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and +the widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with +the fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, when +he gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediaeval +diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of +Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in +the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying +to be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full (as +its history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The wage- +slavery we live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing-in which the +Scotch are more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, than in +their Scotch wickedness. It is what makes the Master of Ballantrae the +most thrilling of all fictitious villains. It is what makes the Master +of Lovat the most thrilling of all historical villains. It is poetry. +It is an intensity which is on the edge of madness or (what is worse) +magic. Well, the Scotch have managed to apply something of this fierce +romanticism even to the lowest of all lordships and serfdoms; the +proletarian inequality of today. You do meet now and then, in Scotland, +the man you never meet anywhere else but in novels; I mean the self-made +man; the hard, insatiable man, merciless to himself as well as to others. +It is not "enterprise "; it is kleptomania. He is quite mad, and a much +more obvious public pest than any other kind of kleptomaniac; but though +he is a cheat, he is not an illusion. He does exist; I have met quite +two of him. Him alone among modern merchants we do not weakly flatter +when we call him a bandit. Something of the irresponsibility of the true +dark ages really clings about him. Our scientific civilisation is not a +civilisation; it is a smoke nuisance. Like smoke it is choking us; like +smoke it will pass away. Only of one or two Scotsmen, in my experience, +was it true that where there is smoke there is fire. + +But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage +of this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all +chronicles, it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland +nearly everything has always been in revolt--especially loyalty. If +these people are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of +wrecking it; and the thought of my many good friends in that city makes +me really doubtful about which would figure in human memories as the more +huge calamity of the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so weak as +to call themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men weak +enough to believe them. + +As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had +little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies who +used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes] They were not, however, +strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since +they worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked +in the mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment +when I saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. +They were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was +the finest thing they could do. + + + +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + + +A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are +and should be various, there must be some communication between them if +they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual +formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not +depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all stark +with the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our +different visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees +the sun as a perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is +an impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The +colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to live +under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that there is +nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle (like a +monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is shut up in +the cell of a separate universe. + +But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from the +denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the individual +become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world like a cloud; +he causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. For what +happens is this: that all the shortsighted people come together and build +a city called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for granted and +paint short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted policies. +Meanwhile all the men who can stare at the sun get together on Salisbury +Plain and do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who see a blue +moon band themselves together and assert the blue moon, not once in a +blue moon, but incessantly. So that instead of a small and varied group, +you have enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the liberty of dogma, +you have the tyranny of taste. + +Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; perhaps +the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership by the +organ of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to +production. If a man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be +any kind of man he likes in any other sense--a bookie, a Mahatma, a man +about town, an archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling at the +moment clear-headed Socialists in all of these capacities, it is obvious +that a clear-headed Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a creed) can be +a soldier, like Mr. Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, or a Bath- +chairman like Mr. Meeke, or a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, or an +artistic tradesman like the late Mr. William Morris. + +But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by what +they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far more +than this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is: etc., etc. +Now mark their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be +tradesmen, or soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, +but become a particular sort of person who is always the same. When once +it has been discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic +formula, it is also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one +particular kind of clothes, reading one particular kind of books, hanging +up one particular kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases even +eating one particular kind of food. For men must recognise each other +somehow. These men will not know each other by a principle, like +fellowcitizens. They cannot know each other by a smell, like dogs. So +they have to fall back on general colouring; on the fact that a man of +their sort will have a wife in pale green and Walter Crane's "Triumph of +Labour" hanging in the hall. + +There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost +made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret the +supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but embracing +all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan unity which is +founded rather on certain social habits, certain common notions, both +permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular social +pleasures. + +Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) it +did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a thing +asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical +genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of +Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous +varnish. + +And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a +creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to +believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of +religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; +the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people do +each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, with +heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which +alone holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own kind +outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and call each +other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call themselves +weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker in a general +atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off looking for +somebody else with whom to brawl. + +This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been in +many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having got +beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to get beyond +catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from neglect of +the same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that they may +differ on everything else; that God gave men a law that they might turn +it into liberties. + +There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife and +husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the +contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of +identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent +contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more +incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul cannot +possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first cousin. +There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; they are +generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to think the +same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to think the +same thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at it, in the +last extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing disgrace-- +this really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; and it is much +better represented by a common religion than it is by affinities and +auras. And what applies to the family applies to the nation. A nation +with a root religion will be tolerant. A nation with no religion will be +bigoted. Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: that when men come +together to profess a creed, they come courageously, though it is to hide +in catacombs and caves. But when they come together in a clique they +come sneakishly, eschewing all change or disagreement, though it is to +dine to a brass band in a big London hotel. For birds of a feather flock +together, but birds of the white feather most of all. + + + +THE FOOL + + +For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I +had been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think +that he was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; +but before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of +him. After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline +to think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately +most of them occupying important positions. When I say "him," I mean the +entire idiot. + +I have never been able to discover that "stupid public" of which so many +literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at tea- +parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough +so to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have +heard brilliant "conversationalists" conversing with other people, the +conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of +intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other +people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their +stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find +the refreshment of a single fool. + +But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous +brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle +of humour and good sense. The "mostly fools" theory has been used in an +anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I did +not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the +aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite +rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an +idea of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities of +his experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, not +that section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. They +are often cynical, especially about money, but even their boredom tends +to make them a little eager for any real information or originality. If +a man like Mr. Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up his mind for +any reason to attack Syndicalism he would find out what it was first. +Not so the man I found in the club. + +He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black +clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the +whole suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one of +those who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some +third element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His +manners were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. +They involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I +suddenly remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old +playgoers who had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, +"If I was the Government," and then put a cigar in his mouth which he lit +carefully with long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out of his +mouth again and said, "I'd give it 'em," as if it were quite a separate +sentence. But even while his mouth was stopped with the cigar his +companion or interlocutor leaped to his feet and said with great +heartiness, snatching up a hat, "Well, I must be off. Tuesday!". I +dislike these dark suspicions, but I certainly fancied I recognised the +sudden geniality with which one takes leave of a bore. + +When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was to +me that he addressed the belated epigram. "I'd give it 'em." + +"What would you give them," I asked, "the minimum wage?" + +"I'd give them beans," he said. "I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, +every man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's the +whole country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows +standing between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!" + +" That would surely be a little harsh," I pleaded. "After all, they are +not under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have +commissions in the Yeomanry." + +"Commissions in the Yeomanry!" he repeated, and his eyes and face, which +became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me +feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + +"Besides," I continued, "wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their +money?" + +"Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow," he said, "and I'd +confiscate their funds as well." + +"The policy is daring and full of difficulty," I replied, "but I do not +say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But +you must remember that though the facts of property have become quite +fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These coal-owners, +though they have not earned the mines, though they could not work the +mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. Hence your +suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating their property, +raises very--" + +"What do you mean?" asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. +"Who yer talking about?" + +"I'm talking about what you were talking about," I replied; "as you put +it so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing +between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their +own coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those prices, +care as little for national starvation as most merchant princes and +pirates have eared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples that +were enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a bit +of a revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme +violence you suggest. You say--" + +"I say," he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid +energy like that of some noble beast, "I say I'd take all these blasted +miners and--" + +I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood +staring at that mental monster. + +"Oh," I said, "so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal +servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be +shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead +they will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem +somewhat moved.. The fact is, I have just found something. something I +have been looking for for years." + +"Well," he asked, with no unfriendly stare, "and what have you found?" + +"No," I answered, shaking my head sadly, "I do not think it would be +quite kind to tell you what I have found." + +He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, +and we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the +disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country +sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county +magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important +companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + +The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory +this article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the +miner, who is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He +is not the mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by +selling his coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic +politician, who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic +opportunities. But he is the man who appears in scores of public places +open to the upper middle class or (that less known but more powerful +section) the lower upper class. Men like this all over the country are +really saying whatever comes into their heads in their capacities of +justice of the peace, candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, +old family doctor, Poor Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in +trade disputes. He suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the +brain; he has softened it by always taking the view of everything most +comfortable for his country, his class, and his private personality. He +is a deadly public danger. But as I have given him his name at the +beginning of this article there is no need for me to repeat it at the end. + + + + +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + + +Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And I +think the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to record +as plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on his +mind by anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of any +modern problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike was a +flat meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or two, he +will probably throw more light on the strike by describing this which he +has seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and the bloody +leaders of the mob whom he has never seen--nor any one else either. If +he comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as happened to a +friend of my grandfather) he should still remember that a true account of +the day after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to have. Though he +was on the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being murdered, we +should still like to have the wrong side described in the right way. +Upon this principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or military +arrangements, and have only held my breath like the rest of the world +while France and Germany were bargaining, will tell quite truthfully of a +small scene I saw, one of the thousand scenes that were, so to speak, the +anterooms of that inmost chamber of debate. + +In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares +of a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray +and rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, +like the solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; the +sloping roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping with +damp; and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were scoured +with old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with many +doors and found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. I +also found a notice of services, etc., and among these I found the +announcement that at 11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there would +be a special service for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft of +young men who were being taken from their homes in that little town and +sent to serve in the French Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful +moment, when the French Army was encamped at a parting of the ways. There +were already a great many people there when I entered, not only of all +kinds, but in all attitudes, kneeling, sitting, or standing about. And +there was that general sense that strikes every man from a Protestant +country, whether he dislikes the Catholic atmosphere or likes it; I mean, +the general sense that the thing was "going on all the time"; that it was +not an occasion, but a perpetual process, as if it were a sort of +mystical inn. + +Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, +when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. They +were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French +conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young +criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so +obviously prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to them +like hell; others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so decent +a place. But it was not so much the mere class variety that most sharply +caught an Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those one or two +kinds of men who would never have become soldiers in any other way. + +There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of +hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it +may be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. +But there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never +tend to soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red +hair, large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across the +church that he had always taken care of his health, not even from +thinking about it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one of +those who pass from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a man. +In the row in front of him there was a very slight and vivid little Jew, +of the sort that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those accidents +that make real life so unlike anything else, he was the one of the +company who seemed especially devout. Behind these stiff or sensitive +boys were ranged the ranks of their mothers and fathers, with knots and +bunches of their little brothers and sisters. + +The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and +gaped at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying +their own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of rain +outside gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church +continuously darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn +in odd, rather strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but +only one perpetual refrain; so that it sounded like + + Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie, + Valdarkararump pour la patrie. + +Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing +gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child +started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a +French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + +I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline +of its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to +talk about "clericalism" and "militarism." Those who talk like that are +made of the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate +"Socialism." The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God +and the Mother of God were not "clericalists "; or, if they were, they +had forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not +"militarists"--quite the other way just then. The priest made a short +speech; he did not utter any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), he +uttered platitudes. In such circumstances platitudes are the only +possible things to say; because they are true. He began by saying that +he supposed a large number of them would be uncommonly glad not to go. +They seemed to assent to this particular priestly dogma with even more +than their alleged superstitious credulity. He said that war was hateful, +and that we all hated it; but that "in all things reasonable" the law of +one's own commonwealth was the voice of God. He spoke about Joan of Arc; +and how she had managed to be a bold and successful soldier while still +preserving her virtue and practising her religion; then he gave them each +a little paper book. To which they replied (after a brief interval for +reflection): + + Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie, + Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. + +which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + +While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded about +my own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening church. +They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I cannot +utter them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me that we +were barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was happening +outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the windows +darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the nature of +that light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and hardly +dared to guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that enemies +were already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were groaning +under their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town itself had +been destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands of years +hence, and that if I opened the door I should come out on a wilderness as +flat and sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the veil of stone +and slate grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to see chasms cloven to +the foundations of all things, and letting up an infernal dawn. Huge +things happily hidden from us had climbed out of the abyss, and were +striding about taller than the clouds. And when the darkness crept from +the sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of St. John I fancied +that some hideous giant was walking round the church and looking in at +each window in turn. + +Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a +ship carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes +I thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron chain +out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the wings +of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young men +inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things +outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + +I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of +limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic +tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and his +mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the passes +of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies and +thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter +it now. + +But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, but +only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters +announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + + + +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + + +It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by +some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a +man sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State +may remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; +when the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + +The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been +gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not merely +because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an aesthete--that is, +an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other people's bodies; he tortured +his own soul into the same red revolting shapes. Though he came quite +early in Roman Imperial history and was followed by many austere and +noble emperors, yet for us the Roman Empire was never quite cleansed of +that memory of the sexual madman. The populace or barbarians from whom +we come could not forget the hour when they came to the highest place of +the earth, saw the huge pedestal of the earthly omnipotence, read on it +Divus Caesar, and looked up and saw a statue without a head. + +It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from +which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI was +a very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many good +business men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the +torturer clung about everything he did, even when it was right. And just +as the great Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so +even the silver splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, +has never painted out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis +XI. Whenever the unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible +savour that humanity finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the +unhealthy man is on top; but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or +mad on statecraft, like Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our +tyrant is not the satyr or the torturer; but the miser. + +The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; +but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had some +touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected gold--a +substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory or old oak. +An old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the simple ardour, +something of the mystical materialism, of a child who picks out yellow +flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but coloured clay can be +very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is content with far less +genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like the glitter of buttercups, +the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, compared with the dreary +papers and dead calculations which make the hobby of the modern miser. + +The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content +sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the +mere repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs to +eggs. And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many +tramps and savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man +could find some comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But +the Yankee millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his +bed-head and ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's +stocking were safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's +ledger are safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with +their increase depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least +collects coins; his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts +collects nothings. + +It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; +but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The +answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma for +us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is important; +because this special problem is separate from the old general quarrel +about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong books, old +and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers and +privileges have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out of the +power of the moderately rich as well as of the moderately poor. They are +out of the power of everybody except a few millionaires--that is, misers. +In the old normal friction of normal wealth and poverty I am myself on +the Radical side. I think that a Berkshire squire has too much power +over his tenants; that a Brompton builder has too much power over his +workmen; that a West London doctor has too much power over the poor +patients in the West London Hospital. + +But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for +instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper +Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze +everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern +market. The things that change modern history, the big national and +international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, +the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, +the big expenses often incurred in elections--these are getting too big +for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly +fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + +There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about them. +The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the chance +of a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser +aristocracies. The moderately rich include all kinds of people even good +people. Even priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are +sometimes heroes. Some doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their +patients and not by flattering them; some brewers have been known to sell +beer. But among the Very Rich you will never find a really generous man, +even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will never +give themselves away; they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To +be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it. + +Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser is +flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never +called self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called +self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like +Dancer was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A man +like Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his early rising +or his unassuming dress. His "simple" meals, his "simple" clothes, his +"simple" funeral, are all extolled as if they were creditable to him. +They are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful as the tatters and +vermin of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To be in rags for +charity would be the condition of a saint; to be in rags for money was +that of a filthy old fool. Precisely in the same way, to be "simple" for +charity is the state of a saint; to be "simple" for money is that of a +filthy old fool. Of the two I have more respect for the old miser, +gnawing bones in an attic: if he was not nearer to God, he was at least a +little nearer to men. His simple life was a little more like the life of +the real poor. + + + +THE MYSTAGOGUE + + +Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and +impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your +aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is +perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond +all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all +good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; +and though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is +always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are +that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + +Thus Giotto or Fra Angelieo would have at once admitted theologically +that God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint +Him. And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather +quaint old man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the +elves, was less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him +in some way. That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy pictures +and twisted statues which seem, to many refined persons, more blasphemous +than the secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good is always +towards Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined thinkers who +worship the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the salons of +Paris, always insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, the +unutterable character of the abomination. They call him "horror of +emptiness," as did the black witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they +worship him as the unspeakable name; as the unbearable silence. They +think of him as the void in the heart of the whirlwind; the cloud on the +brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets of vertigo or the endless +corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians who gave the Devil a +grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and spiked tail. It +was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. The Satanists +never drew him at all. + +And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity +and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may +separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt from +mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he has an +idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has no idea +will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too subtle to +be explained. The first idea may really be very outree or specialist; it +may really be very difficult to express to ordinary people. But because +the man is trying to express it, it is most probable that there is +something in it, after all. The honest man is he who is always trying to +utter the unutterable, to describe the indescribable; but the quack lives +not by plunging into mystery, but by refusing to come out of it. + +Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the thing +called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that an +attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy +cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that a +landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait +painter only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. +And again it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the +pictures can only express half of them, and that the less important half. +Still, it does express something; the thread is not broken that connects +God With Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The "Mona +Lisa" was in some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her to be. +Leonardo's picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And Walter +Pater's rich description was, in some respects, like the picture. Thus +we come to the consoling reflection that even literature, in the last +resort, can express something other than its own unhappy self. + +Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely +inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being +speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in +Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically the +critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of painting +into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be inadequate--but +so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the first to admit. But +anything which has been intelligently received can at least be +intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent cause for the +cadaverous colour of Botticelli's "Venus Rising from the Sea." Ruskin +does suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying forests and +falsifying landscapes. These two great critics were far too fastidious +for my taste; they urged to excess the idea that a sense of art was a +sort of secret; to be patiently taught and slowly learnt. Still, they +thought it could be taught: they thought it could be learnt. They +constrained themselves, with considerable creative fatigue, to find the +exact adjectives which might parallel in English prose what has been +clone in Italian painting. The same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. +Stevenson and many others in the exposition of Velasquez. They had +something to say about the pictures; they knew it was unworthy of the +pictures, but they said it. + +Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and Post- +Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They are +not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt to +translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is +untranslatable--that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, +impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their banner; +they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper on +which Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried to +dry it with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good old +anti-democratic muddlements: that "the public" does not understand these +things; that "the likes of us" cannot dare to question the dark decisions +of our lords. + +I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple +test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, +something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man +is made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt +is as good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go +back and look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, +it is the business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic +literary expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to +it. If they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their +eulogies, as there is nothing except eulogy--then they are quacks or the +high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say nothing +about the artists except that they are good it is because the artists are +bad. They can explain nothing because they have found nothing; and they +have found nothing because there is nothing to be found. + + + +THE RED REACTIONARY + + +The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and +complete road to anything--even to restoration. Revolution alone can be +not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the dead. + +A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) was +once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated in +that area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great creative +crisis about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its own, and +made a revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down this +street he whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. +Gandish, "in his researches into 'istry," and which had somehow taken his +fancy; the song to which those last sincere loyalists went into battle. +I think the words ran :- + + Monsieur de Charette. + Dit au gens d'ici. + Le roi va remettre. + Le fleur de lys. + +My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and +it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic +lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy +the "Dies Irae," or a Protestant to remember "Lillibullero." Yet he was +stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might +get him at least into temporary trouble. + +A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by +walking round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a +bonfire cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot be +too loud, and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I +actually recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a +formidable proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that +had been primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. +Some of the real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such as +"Charlie is My Darling," or "What's a' the steer, kimmer?" songs that +men had sung while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under +which we live. They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present +King were swept aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual +words "King George" occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they were +played to celebrate his very Coronation; played as promptly and +innocently as if they had been "Grandfather's Clock" or "Rule Britannia" +or "The Honeysuckle and the Bee." + +That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between +two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not +really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that +has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. +When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was +picked up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the +throne the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been +driven out of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that +the Bourbons might possibly return that they will take a little trouble +to discourage it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never +return that we actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment +to their rivals. And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the +faces of all the bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: +indeed, it is difficult to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it +quite unconsciously; because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the +French have not. We really believe that the past is past. It is a very +doubtful point. + +Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men +free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared +away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who +have preserved everything--we cannot restore anything. Take, for the +sake of argument, the complex and manycoloured ritual of the Coronation +recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate centuries; +from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade of culture +or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or even dated. +The fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord "against all +manner of folk" obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; no longer +confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes from some +chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four of our +counties; and when hostile" folk" might live in the next village. The +sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless and +the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great attempt to +make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the Coronation Service +says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. Elaborate local +tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the Manor of Work-sop is +alone allowed to do something or other, these probably belong to the +decay of the Middle Ages, when that great civilisation died out in +grotesque literalism and entangled heraldry. Things like the +presentation of the Bible bear witness to the intellectual outburst at +the Reformation; things like the Declaration against the Mass bear +witness to the great wars of the Puritans; and things like the allegiance +of the Bishops bear witness to the wordy and parenthetical political +compromises which (to my deep regret) ended the wars of religion. + +But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all +that long list of variations there must be, and there are, things which +energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable +modification, to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see +again the great Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique +and almost frozen formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the old +passion that excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc would +really prefer the Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer the Erastian +oligarchy of the eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would probably be +disputed (from widely different motives) by Mr. Rudyard Kipling and Mr. +Cunninghame Graham. But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would win. + +But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is +that none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back to +the Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediaevals; because +(alas) there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for +building or rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can +wander back and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top +of them, and can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without +being able to take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide +that their Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that +a Republic was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French +democracy actually desired every detail of the mediaeval monarchy, they +could have it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If +another Dauphin were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc +actually bore a miraculous banner before him; if mediaeval swords shook +and. blazed in every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every +tapestry; if this were really proved to be the will of France and the +purpose of Providence--such a scene would still be the lasting and final +justification of the French Revolution. + +For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + + + +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + + +In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in +Asiatic arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we tend +nowadays to do to our own records and our own religion. The first is a +tendency to talk as if certain things were not only present in the higher +Orientals, but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will fall into +a habit of wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, as if no +Western knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern knights +had ever broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full of the +praises of Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no +Christians had been saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the +first injustice is to think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the +other injustice is a failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly +Eastern. It is too much taken for granted that the Eastern sort of +idealism is certainly superior and convincing; whereas in truth it is +only separate and peculiar. All that is richest, deepest, and subtlest +in the East is rooted in Pantheism; but all that is richest, deepest, and +subtlest in us is concerned with denying passionately that Pantheism is +either the highest or the purest religion. + +Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the spirit +of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and curiously +assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with the full +stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so that the +stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung arms. Now in +this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. In so far as +what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all things, the +Eastern artists have no more monopoly of it than they have of hunger and +thirst. + +I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit +this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far East +to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even in +other painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that +ornament of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: "Even the +most undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing +meditations not to be exhibited by much weeping." But, I do not +therefore admit that a Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made a +somewhat similar remark) had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere +Occidental fable and travesty of that celebrated figure. I do not deny +that Tinishona wrote that exquisite example of the short Japanese poem +entitled "Honourable Chrysanthemum in Honourable Hole in Wall." But I do +not therefore admit that Tennyson's little verse about the flower in the +cranny was not original and even sincere. + +It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that +when engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster +and chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being +much affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon +tablets of ivory the lines beginning: "Small and unobtrusive blossom with +ruby extremities." But this incident, touching as it is, does not shake +my belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am left +with an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere in +their poetry--and in their prose. + +I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and its +admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go on to +more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say--with the utmost +respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form of Cheek, for +this school to speak in this way about the mother that bore them, the +great civilisation of the West. The West also has its magic landscapes, +only through our incurable materialism they look like landscapes as well +as like magic. The West also has its symbolic figures, only they look +like men as well as symbols. It will be answered (and most justly) that +Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own instinct and tradition; +that its artists are concerned to suggest one thing and our artists +another; that both should be admired in their difference. Profoundly +true; but what is the difference? It is certainly not as the +Orientalisers assert, that we must go to the Far East for a sympathetic +and transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid a long enough +toll of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that disability. + +Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern +mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy +of creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, +like St. Francis, "My brother fire and my sister water "; the former +says, "Myself fire and myself water." Whether you call the Eastern +attitude an extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of +oneself into nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The effect +is the same, an effect which lives and throbs throughout all the +exquisite arts of the East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a +pulsation of pattern, or of ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, +but always suggesting the unification of the individual with the world. +But there is quite another kind of sympathy the sympathy with a thing +because it is different. No one will say that Rembrandt did not +sympathise with an old woman; but no one will say that Rembrandt painted +like an old woman. No one will say that Reynolds did not appreciate +children; but no one will say he did it childishly. The supreme instance +of this divine division is sex, and that explains (what I could never +understand in my youth) why Christendom called the soul the bride of God. +For real love is an intense realisation of the "separateness" of all our +souls. The most heroic and human love-poetry of the world is never mere +passion; precisely because mere passion really is a melting back into +Nature, a meeting of the waters. And water is plunging and powerful; but +it is only powerful downhill. The high and human love-poetry is all +about division rather than identity; and in the great love-poems even the +man as he embraces the woman sees her, in the same instant, afar off; a +virgin and a stranger. + +For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if we +grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised in +what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and the +Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the East. +There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even the +superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential +difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; +whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the +Dragon. In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the +stories he not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the +Christian have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, really +has an appetite for cold Christian--and especially for cold Christianity. +This blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of everything and +digest it in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is what is really +meant by the Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The Cosmos as such +is cannibal; as old Time ate his children. The Eastern saints were +saints because they wanted to be swallowed up. The Western saint, like St. +George, was sainted by the Western Church precisely because he refused +to be swallowed. The same process of thought that has prevented +nationalities disappearing in Christendom has prevented the complete +appearance of Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist the idea +of being absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a British, or a +Turkish Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and much more +tyrannical, which free men will resist with even stronger passion. The +free man violently resists being absorbed into the empire which is called +the Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, but still more +Home Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home Rule for himself. He +claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem fatalism. He claims the +right to be damned in spite of theosophical optimism. He refuses to be +the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + + + +THE MUMMER + + +The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so close +that they might as well have been inside the house instead of just +outside; so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem farther +away. Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who come +every year in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of the +old Christmas play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very Venal +Doctor. I will not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will describe +my parallel sentiments as it passed. + +One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic +revivals of mediaeval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are +elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple society +of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are +mediaevalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The +first is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child +just able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up as +anybody--but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea of being the +King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is generally +suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, from far +deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because it is +Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a ritual +investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the dances +of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries of Persia. +For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the concealment +of the personality combined with the exaggeration of the person. The man +performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and conspicuous. It is +part of that divine madness which all other creatures wonder at in Man, +that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and anonymity. Man is +not, perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, but he is the only +creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do indeed take the +colours of their environment; but that is not in order to be watched, but +in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism of rejoicing, but the +formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose nature is the +unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue because they +lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles powder their +hair to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not dressing up as +kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. Nay, even when +modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is doubted by some +naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping notice. So +merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten and exaggerate +their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, primarily +speaking, in another identity. It is not Acting--that comparatively low +profession-comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; and, as Mr. Kensit +would truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is Mummery. That is, it +is the noble conception of making Man something other and more than +himself when he stands at the limit of human things. It is only careful +faddists and feeble German philosophers who want to wear no clothes; and +be "natural" in their Dionysian revels. Natural men, really vigorous and +exultant men, want to wear more and more clothes when they are revelling. +They want worlds of waistcoats and forests of trousers and pagodas of +tall hats toppling up to the stars. + +Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If +our more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to +reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight +(I do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque +and appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from +the best books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and +ornaments would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my +garden door opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, +the appearance of that champion was slightly different. His face was +energetically blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an aged and +very tall top hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a surplice, +and he flourished a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, talk about +"ignorance"; or suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a very +pleasant Ratcatcher, with a tenor voice) did this because he knew no +better. Try to realise that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of +England was not black, and did not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. The +Rat-catcher is not under this delusion; any more than Paul Veronese +thought that very good men have luminous rings round their heads; any +more than the Pope thinks that Christ washed the feet of the twelve in a +Cathedral; any more than the Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a tabard +are like the lions at the Zoo. These things are denaturalised because +they are symbols; because the extraordinary occasion must hide or even +disfigure the ordinary people. Black faces were to mediaeval mummeries +what carved masks were to Greek plays: it was called being "vizarded." +My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently arrogant to suppose for a moment that +he looks like St. George. But he is sufficiently humble to be convinced +that if he looks as little like himself as he can, he will be on the +right road. + +This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in disguise. +There are, of course, other mediaeval elements in it which are also +difficult to explain to the fastidious mediaevalists of to-day. There is, +for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It can best +be defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the faintest +desire to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the trick of +turning on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely believed, +merely for the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling yet careless +phrases. When Tennyson says that King Arthur "drew all the petty +princedoms under him," and "made a realm and ruled," his grave Royalism +is quite modern. Many mediaevals, outside the mediaeval republics, +believed in monarchy as solemnly as Tennyson. But that older verse- + + When good King Arthur ruled this land + He was a goodly King-- + He stole three pecks of barley-meal + To make a bag-pudding. + +is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are +other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called +Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediaevals merely +Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, I +think, in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in +healthy darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. If +you cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can +carry the forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk +under universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom a +walking forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very +intensity of the notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a +mob of masks? + + + +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + + +The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the +antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost +unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs of +a hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does not +necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere +unlettered simplicity of mind. + +But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our +decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its +best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many of +the philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God +fearing fisher or a noble mountaineer. His an- tics with donkeys and +concertinas, crowded char-abancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are +not so vicious or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements +of the overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than +they are at a political "At Home," or even an artistic soiree; and if the +female trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed and +underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to be +a donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks men +and women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that wants +them to change heads. + +But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as there +is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity which is +characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very people who +persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the whole society, +and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does things in a +clumsy and unbeautiful way. + +A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to +visit yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of +Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge at +all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray +tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour of +primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and very lonely +Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he missed Stonehenge. +But it does spoil his mood to find Stonehenge--surrounded by a brand-new +fence of barbed wire, with a policeman and a little shop selling picture +post-cards. + +Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer +you, "Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and +carve names and spoil the look of Stonehenge." It does not seem to occur +to them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of +Stonehenge. The scratching of a name, particularly when performed with +blunt penknife or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board education, +can be trusted in a little while to be indistinguishable from the grayest +hieroglyphic by the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could get a modern +policeman into the same picture with a Druid. This really vital piece of +vandalism was done by the educated, not the uneducated; it was done by +the influence of the artists or antiquaries who wanted to preserve the +antique beauty of Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to preserve your +lady's beauty from freckles by blacking her face all over; or to protect +the pure whiteness of your wedding garment by dyeing it green. + +And if you ask, "But what else could any one have done, what could the +most artistic age have done to save the monument?" I reply, "There are +hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediaevals might have done; and I have +no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in +their whole society they would have done something that was decent and +serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or +warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so +their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; not +deliberately--they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious order +such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of guard +would protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all sorts +of rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you mere raving +superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me onetwentieth part +so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as calmly making a +spot hideous in order to keep it beautiful." + +The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to +live in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles +down in a place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar personal +cases, of course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, the Jew is a +genuine peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering cad. He is +a highly civilised man in a highly difficult position; the world being +divided, and his own nation being divided, about whether he can do +anything else except wander. + +The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated +Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by +calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen are +extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. The +truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude Englishman. +What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is the polite +Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders for Rembrandts, +and he treats the great nations that made these things courteously--as he +would treat the custodians of any museum. It does not seem to strike him +that the Italian is not the custodian of the pictures, but the creator of +them. He can afford to look down on such nations--when he can paint such +pictures. + +That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. If, +living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian +character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire +Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. +It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will +often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality of +the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without +discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If +you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians--you are a cheap +tripper. + +The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere +that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, +coming among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is +caddish to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a +winetaster; and then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink +and squint at the colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; +and then refuse to buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a +thing and not use it. But the main point is that one has no right to see +Stonehenge without Salisbury Plain and Salisbury: One has no right to +respect the dead Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no +right to visit a Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea +fishes--fed along a lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing the +sights without breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + + + +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + + +It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story that +the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is almost +peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, of +their nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even phrases +invented for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new while it +is nearly a thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old while +they were still new. + +The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, they +are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive +inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an offender; +they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been convicted of +murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous rebellion, when +his offence has really been a sleek submission to the powers that be. +They must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his eloquence to rouse the +mob, whereas he has really shown considerable cleverness in damping it +down. It was probably under the same impulse towards a mysterious misfit +of names that people denounced Dr. Inge as "the Gloomy Dean." + +Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there +anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but +sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives have +made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him this +erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern +capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared +to anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that +gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very +curious state of things. + +When Dr. Inge was called "the Gloomy Dean" a great injustice was done +him. He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against +the forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism +rather than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have +suffered no wrong, or that employers have done no wrong--such a man is +not a Gloomy Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A man +who can feel satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with a +mysterious fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not less +curious; because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom reposes on +his having said that our worker's demand high wages, while the placid +people of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + +This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much +difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low +wages for the same reason that they will submit to "the punishment known +as Li, or Slicing"; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy +and suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to +the husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their +temples with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they +sometimes seem to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual +perversion. They do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with +traditions different from ours about the limits of endurance and the +gestures of self-respect. They may be very much better than we are in +hundreds of other ways; and I can quite understand a man (though hardly a +Dean) really preferring their historic virtues to those of Christendom. +A man may perhaps feel more comfortable among his Asiatic coolies than +among his European comrades: and as we are to allow the Broadest Thought +in the Church, Dr. Inge has as much right to his heresy as anybody else. +It is true that, as Dr. Inge says, there are numberless Orientals who +will do a great deal of work for very little money; and it is most +undoubtedly true that there are several high-placed and prosperous +Europeans who like to get work done and pay as little as possible for it. + +But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and +traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which he +has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of +years of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge +admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced the +sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious deduction +is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen Chinese. +Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he ought to +be at the head of a great mission in London for converting the English to +Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties of paganism +would have free and natural play; his style would improve; his mind would +begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all sorts of little +irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the most Conservative +Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + +In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism +and public change which is the note of all our history springs from a +certain spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; +nay, it may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the +special defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the +ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It +will often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice +though the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the +formula of the great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that all +men were free and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the formula +of the peasant who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there were +but one slave in England, and he did all the work while the rest of us +made merry, this spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to God night +and day. Whether or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly works +with, a creed which postulates a humanised God and a vividly personal +immortality. Men must not be busy merely like a swarm, or even happy +merely like a herd; for it is not a question of men, but of a man. A +man's meals may be poor, but they must not be bestial; there must always +be that about the meal which permits of its comparison to the sacrament. +A man's bed may be hard, but it must not be abject or unclean: there must +always be about the bed something of the decency of the death-bed. + +This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible +murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil that +threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot encourage +the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. Christendom +will continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being Christian: it is +the Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had absent-mindedly +strayed into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I advise him to +chuck it. + +But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian +temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. +Inge is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. +Such a man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being +"court chaplains of King Demos" or about his own superb valour in defying +the democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. We +should not expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that +Demos has never been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; +we should not expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains +they would be uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; +he considers himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New +Theologian; that is, he is liberal in theology--and nothing else. He is +apparently in sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy with +those who would soften the superior claim of our creed by urging the +rival creeds of the East; with those who would absorb the virtues of +Buddhism or of Islam. He holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of +Religions where all believers respect each other's unbelief. + +Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When +next you hear the "liberal" Christian say that we should take what is +best in Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people +like Dr. Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge +propose to take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of +the Moslem. You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of +the Hindoo. The more you study the "broad" movement of today, the more +you will find that these people want something much less like Chinese +metaphysics, and something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find +the levelling of creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of wages. +Dr. Inge is the typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never more so +than when he appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as the +apostle of the blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely among the +prosperous and polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or Mohammedanism +practically means this--that the poor must be as meek as Buddhists, while +the rich may be as ruthless as Mohammedans. That is what they call the +reunion of all religions. + + + +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + + +The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of +washing; and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore +comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. +Rain, that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities +of these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists +are eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public +bath; it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons +coming fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished +or dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when +coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an +enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: +it scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry +rafters and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring- +cleaning. + +If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble +at the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are +constantly told that we should leave our little special possessions and +join in the enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social +machinery. I offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It +disregards that degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman +to take his shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because +it is public and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls +the string. + +As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the +neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water +drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and +debauch of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative +intoxication of the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret +or the golden clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such +scenes of apocalypse, towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne +falls like fire from heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with +the terrible colours of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as +he rolls in the long soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, +and listens to the roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who ought +to be the true bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are drinking +water. Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the trees rave +and reel to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs as revellers +clash cups; they roar undying thirst and howl the health of the world. + +All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes +a noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count it +Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I +complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all +living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every +weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, +their need is greater than mine--especially for water. + +There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild +Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an +incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel a +tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he puts +on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying all umbrella; +it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of despots in +the dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable walking- +stick; open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no taste for +pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my hat, and +precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against wet, it must +be by some closer and more careless protection, something that I can +forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be that yet +more Highland thing, a mackintosh. + +And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military qualities +of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and white +sheen as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think of it +as the uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty raids. +I like to think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, descending +on some doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs flashing in the sun +or moon. For indeed this is one of the real beauties of rainy weather, +that while the amount of original and direct light is commonly lessened, +the number of things that reflect light is unquestionably increased. +There is less sunshine; but there are more shiny things; such beautifully +shiny things as pools and puddles and mackintoshes. It is like moving in +a world of mirrors. + +And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual +works of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it +doubles it. If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the +roads (to the sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. +Shallow lakes of water reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we dwell +in a double universe. Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous pave- +ments, wet under numerous lamps, a man seems a black blot on all that +golden looking-glass, and could fancy he was flying in a yellow sky. But +wherever trees and towns hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, the sense +of Celestial topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, dazzling +confusion of shape and shadow, of reality and reflection, will appeal +strongly to any one with the transcendental instinct about this dreamy +and dual life of ours. It will always give a man the strange sense of +looking down at the skies. + + + +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + + +When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) +to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is amusing to +ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours especially, +when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of one +weakness this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + +This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares +more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its "methods" more +than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good +communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are +precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean a +hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good +communications may in practice be very like those evil communications +which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a +"scientific age," which wants to know whether the train is in the time- +table, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one instance +in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the case of +photography. + +Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, and +the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so that +he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted or +suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head +thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and +slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, a +definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I should +have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, with a +profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + +Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great +many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, +if seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland +Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and +dark emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic +or whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked like +some swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of coal- +black hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately under +his eyes his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have been +painted scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one under +the lower, seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches of +Mephistopheles. His eyes had that "dancing madness" in them which +Stevenson saw in the Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes +distorted the expression by screwing a monstrous monocle into one of them. +A man more unmistakable would have been hard to find. You could have +picked him out in any crowd--so long as you had not seen his photograph. + +But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and +conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits of +photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring of cheek +and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the darkness +out of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The framing +and limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; and the +devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write poetry made +him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people do when they +are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never held it +normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated his slight +figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished by a button +and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature has been more +delicately and dexterously omitted than they could have been by the most +namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest water-colours, on the +smoothest ivory. + +I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of +which depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents an +utterly incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate +language the license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it +strictly safe and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They +would have clapped me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate Max's +caricature. But the caricature would have been far more likely to find +the man. + +This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific +civilisation. It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man +that it never asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, +seemingly most detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever +since I was a boy. We were told that in some row Boer policemen had shot +an Englishman, a British subject, an English citizen. A long time +afterwards we were quite casually informed that the English citizen was +quite black. Well, it makes no difference to the moral question; black +men should be shot on the same ethical principles as white men. But it +makes one distrust scientific communications which permitted so startling +an alteration of the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a +photographic negative in which a black man came out white. Later we were +told that an Englishman had fought for the Boers against his own flag, +which would have been a disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted +that he was an Irishman; which is exactly as different as if he had been +a Pole. Common sense, with all the facts before it, does see that black +is not white, and that a nation that has never submitted has a right to +moral independence. But why does it so seldom have all the facts before +it? Why are the big aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic +wrath, always left out in such official communications, as they were left +out in the photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an +African and eyes as fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation drop +all four of the facts? Its error is to omit the arresting thing--which +might really arrest the criminal. It strikes first the chilling note of +science, demanding a man "above the middle height, chin shaven, with gray +moustache," etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir Redvers Buller. +It does not seize the first fact of impression, as that a man is +obviously a sailor or a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a nigger or +an albino or a prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. These are +the realities by which the people really recognise each other. They are +almost always left out of the inquiry., + + + +THE SULTAN + + +There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial +cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter +far you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in +something dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you +find your butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you +find your ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread +them among your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. +There are numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is +this. That we have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we +have Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + +I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise +out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, and +like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not that, +like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that he +committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and errors +in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the ideas they +could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand for +Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the world. +He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the principles +that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs of a +Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. That +the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the +fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could +not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which he +lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old +bachelor of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently +quoted in the Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his +time. It was not his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill +somewhere in South Africa "his church." It was not his fault, I mean, +that he could not see that a church all to oneself is not a church at all. +It is a madman's cell. It was not his fault that he "figured out that +God meant as much of the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible." Many +evolutionists much wiser had "figured out" things even more babyish. He +was an honest and humble recipient of the plodding popular science of his +time; he spread no ideas that any cockney clerk in Streatham could not +have spread for him. But it was exactly because he had no ideas to +spread that he invoked slaughter, violated justice, and ruined republics +to spread them. + +But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not +only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are +actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to +extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented as +seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our Imperialist +aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the East. For +that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism has been +deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + +The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of +politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first to +steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial +cynic who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself +submitted to Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism +and destiny. + +There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of Rhodes. +The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that Africa is +still chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in the South +confronting savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, Arabs, and +Soudanese, and then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: "It is +inevitable fate that all this should be changed; and I should like to be +the agent of fate." That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine idea; and +it is an Oriental idea. + +Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial +position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and +barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. +We are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to +teach a Turk to say "Kismet "; which he has said since his cradle. We +are to deny Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in +order to teach an Arab to believe he is "an agent of fate," when he has +never believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true +(which fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia +or Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in billy- +cocks, instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. The +best Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a +doubtful and romantic future in which all things may happen--this +essential Western idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he says +himself) he did not believe in it. + +It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress in +addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of +King is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant to +be vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and +Moon, the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in +the days of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather +a religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. +He was not merely a conqueror, but a father--yes, even when he was a bad +father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local +affections and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the +King, but the Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic +of money, of luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen +race. Indeed Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to +the Sultan, from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + + + +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + + +The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion +which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic +architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained in +most of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic +eclipses the classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once +lively and mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally +rich and complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No man +ever got out of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a cathedral +tower. Over all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India there is the +presence of something stiff and heartless, of something tortured and +silent. Dwarfed trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers and +hunchbacked birds accentuate by the very splendour and contrast of their +colour the servility and monotony of their shapes. It is like the vision +of a sneering sage, who sees the whole universe as a pattern. Certainly +no one ever felt like this about Gothic, even if he happens to dislike it. +Or, again, some will say that it is the liberty of the Middle Ages in +the use of the comic or even the coarse that makes the Gothic more +interesting than the Greek. There is more truth in this; indeed, there +is real truth in it. Few of the old Christian cathedrals would have +passed the Censor of Plays. We talk of the inimitable grandeur of the +old cathedrals; but indeed it is rather their gaiety that we do not dare +to imitate. We should be rather surprised if a chorister suddenly began +singing "Bill Bailey" in church. Yet that would be only doing in music +what the mediaevals did in sculpture. They put into a Miserere seat the +very scenes that we put into a musichall song: comic domestic scenes +similar to the spilling of the beer and the hanging out of the washing. +But though the gaiety of Gothic is one of its features, it also is not +the secret of its unique effect. We see a domestic topsy-turvydom in +many Japanese sketches. But delightful as these are, with their fairy +tree-tops, paper houses, and toddling, infantile inhabitants, the +pleasure they give is of a kind quite different from the joy and energy +of the gargoyles. Some have even been so shallow and illiterate as to +maintain that our pleasure in medieval building is a mere pleasure in +what is barbaric, in what is rough, shapeless, or crumbling like the +rocks. This can be dismissed after the same fashion; South Sea idols, +with painted eyes and radiating bristles, are a delight to the eye; but +they do not affect it in at all the same way as Westminster Abbey. Some +again (going to another and almost equally foolish extreme) ignore the +coarse and comic in mediaevalism; and praise the pointed arch only for +its utter purity and simplicity, as of a saint with his hands joined in +prayer. Here, again, the uniqueness is missed. There are Renaissance +things (such as the ethereal silvery drawings of Raphael), there are even +pagan things (such as the Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere +a piety. None of these explanations explain. And I never saw what was +the real point about Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw +it behind a row of furniture-vans. + +I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the +smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall +cut off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the +yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across +that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the +more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it +like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this +ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly +coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond that +the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, +straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as +the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + +As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; +what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not +variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, +but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man +of our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or an +Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had +mistaken for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this +gave to my eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving +towards the right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across +the plain like the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with the +clouds. Then I saw what it was. + +The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that it +is on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting +architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are +stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear +the arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty and +numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of +imperial elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners +going into battle; the silence was deafening with ail the mingled noises +of a military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up its +thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from all +the roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in the core +of the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his wings of +brass. + +And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in +the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; +the voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of +spears. I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; +and I knew indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in either +hand the trowel and the sword. + +I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had +marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. +Some Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of the +desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been +woke at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the +tall pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every +snake or sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner +of the architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally +in the flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like torches +across dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of music and +darkness and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln hill. So for +some hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of the Gothic; +then the last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw only a church +tower in a quiet English town, round which the English birds were +floating. + + + +THE MAN ON TOP + + +There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be +stated too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not +trusted simply because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite +clearly seen and said without any reference to our several passions or +partisanships. It does not follow that we think such a distrust a wise +sentiment to express; it does not even follow that we think it a good +sentiment to entertain. But such is the sentiment, simply because such +is the fact. The distinction can be quite easily defined in an example. +I do not think that private workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their +employer. But I do think that patriotic soldiers owe a more or less +indefinite loyalty to their leader in battle. But even if they ought to +trust their captain, the fact remains that they often do not trust him; +and the fact remains that he often is not fit to be trusted. + +Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very +muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to put +employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should have +thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has +nothing to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; +it is a distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more +elegance and poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment +under Lord Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the +atmosphere, but in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order to +pay Lord Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and +philanthropic, did exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the +shopkeeper it failed as a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he is +underpaid, but only if he is defeated. The object of the Army is the +safety of the nation from one particular class of perils; therefore, +since all citizens owe loyalty to the nation, all citizens who are +soldiers owe loyalty to the Army. But nobody has any obligation to make +some particular rich man richer. A man is bound, of course, to consider +the indirect re-suits of his action in a strike; but he is bound to +consider that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, or a smoking concert; in +his wildest holiday or his most private conversation. But direct +responsibility like that of a soldier he has none. He need not aim +solely and directly at the good of the shop; for the simple reason that +the shop is not aiming solely and directly at the good of the nation. +The shopman is, under decent restraints, let us hope, trying to get what +he can out of the nation; the shop assistant may, under the same decent +restraints, get what he can out of the shopkeeper. All this distinction +is very obvious. At least I should have thought so. + +But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the +military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious +shop assistant "disloyal"--that leaves exactly where it was the question +of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. Granted that +all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the cloven pennon +of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true that the pennon +may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that all Barney +Barnato's workers ought to have followed him to death or glory, it is +still a Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was likely to lead +them to. Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for his master's +medicines, we may still hold an inquest to find out if he died of them. +While we forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may still wish the +general were shot. + +The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. +Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are +worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. +The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are +accidents--or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is a +generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A +revolutionist would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next +to nothing about coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners +know next to nothing about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend +the nature of their own monopoly with any consistent and courageous +policy, however wicked, as did the old aristocrats with the monopoly of +land. They have not the virtues nor even the vices of tyrants; they have +only their powers. It is the same with all the powerful of to-day; it is +the same, for instance, with the high-placed and high-paid official. Not +only is the judge not judicial, but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. +The arbiter decides, not by some gust of justice or injustice in his soul +like the old despot dooming men under a tree, but by the permanent +climate of the class to which he happens to belong. The ancient wig of +the judge is often indistinguishable from the old wig of the flunkey. + +To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one +must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against +details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just +judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such +as Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. +Seen close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and +impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can tell +if the Tower leans. + +Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, we +shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole +governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will see +some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the +employer often comes there early in the morning; that he has great +organising power; that if he works over the colossal accumulation of +wealth he also works over its wise distribution. All this may be true of +many employers, and it is practically said of all. + +But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply ask +what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the +capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and +solid result of the reign of the employers has been--unemployment. +Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot +upon which the whole process turns. + +Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great +squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense +or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care for +the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see much +cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts of +the estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has been +the actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is plain. +At the end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the land. The +practical effect of having landlords is not having tenants. The +practical effect of having employers is that men are not employed. The +unrest of the populace is therefore more than a murmur against tyranny; +it is against a sort of treason. It is the suspicion that even at the +top of the tree, even in the seats of the mighty, our very success is +unsuccessful. + + + +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + + +There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are +some who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again--or snore +again. There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration Courts +as to the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the day that +they look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + +The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may +incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things +for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when +the States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or when +all the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of +Washington. It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The real +democratic unrest at this moment is not an extension of the +representative process, but rather a revolt against it. It is no good +giving those now in revolt more boards and committees and compulsory +regulations. It is against these very things that they are revolting. +Men are not only rising against their oppressors, but against their +representatives or, as they would say, their misrepresentatives. The +inner and actual spirit of workaday England is coming out not in applause, +but in anger, as a god who should come out of his tabernacle to rebuke +and confound his priests. + +There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom +we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of +whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't +have. She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger +and exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than +the modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the +horror of bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; +and it is quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort of +industry natural to the classes from which men can climb into great +wealth. He has grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, +accustomed to have dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without +discomfort. He regards cleanliness as a kind of separate and special +costume; to be put on for great festivals. He has several really curious +characteristics, which would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they +had any eyes. For instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in +marked contrast to his actual spirit, which is generally patient and +civil. He has an odd way of using certain words of really horrible +meaning, but using them quite innocently and without the most distant +taint of the evils to which they allude. He is rather sentimental; and, +like most sentimental people, not devoid of snobbishness. At the same +time, he believes the ordinary manly commonplaces of freedom and +fraternity as he believes most of the decent traditions of Christian men: +he finds it very difficult to act according to them, but this difficulty +is not confined to him. He has a strong and individual sense of humour, +and not much power of corporate or militant action. He is not a +Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to a Labour Member than +he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This is the Common +Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at last. + +See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it +is his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to +cure, and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including +two of his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal +Commission to consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike +upon the railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, +any of the gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to Mr. +Henderson, whom I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of +confusing with that of a railway-porter. I do not think that any old +gentleman, however absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, +let us say, to hand his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to +reward that politician with twopence. Of the others I can only judge by +the facts about their status as set forth in the public Press. The +Chairman, Sir David Harrell, appeared to be an ex-official distinguished +in (of all things in the world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no +earthly reason to doubt that the Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not +talking about what men mean to be, but about what they are. The police +in Ireland are practically an army of occupation; a man serving in them +or directing them is practically a soldier; and, of course, he must do +his duty as such. But it seems truly extraordinary to select as one +likely to sympathise with the democracy of England a man whose whole +business in life it has been to govern against its will the democracy of +Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers were offered the +sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police in Finland or +Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised world sees +Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time we did. +The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct and +habit akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the +Commissioners actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then came Mr. +Henderson (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, "By your leave."), +and then another less known gentleman who had "corresponded" with the +Board of Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to represent the +very poor. + +Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough +report, and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of that +kind are tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably business-like. +But if any one supposes that men of that kind can conceivably quiet any +real 'quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the man whom I first +described, it is frantic. The common worker is angry exactly because he +has found out that all these boards consist of the same well-dressed Kind +of Man, whether they are called Governmental or Capitalist. If any one +hopes that he will reconcile the poor, I say, as I said at the beginning, +that such a one has not looked on the light of day or dwelt in the land +of the living. + +But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical +and urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man +of whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern +England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would be +offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost +incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This +Kind of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be +represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind +of Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the +middle class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, +he must remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + +Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory +powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the first +Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you drove him +with a whip. + + + +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN + + +I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King John. + +But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he +believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a +whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not +sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or +merely a humdrum respectability. + +I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is a +protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a +particular attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always +hunting and Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, +and Charles I always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in +rotation making his people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and King +John pulling out Jews' teeth with the celerity and industry of an +American dentist. Anything is good that shakes all this stiff +simplification, and makes us remember that these men were once alive; +that is, mixed, free, flippant, and inconsistent. It gives the mind a +healthy kick to know that Alfred had fits, that Charles I prevented +enclosures, that Rufus was really interested in architecture, that Henry +VIII was really interested in theology. + +And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid imagination +of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are on the right +side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a Puritan, and +John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they were people +whom we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think that John +was a nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of him is all +wrong. Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had what +commonly makes them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and hot- +headed decision. But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, but +which we misunderstand. + +The mediaeval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In +their social system the mediaevals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as their +heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings of guild +or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of man as +standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While they +clad and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly and +quaintly for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have of +the freedom of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an +eagle in the heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern +as most fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + +For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute +description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused +the apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been in +an unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have decided +the other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of another world, +a world that now can never be. + +This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way can be +felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and ballad. +It is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy +intellectual forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the +physical science of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have +taught, have darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of bad +men as something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of people. +The Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It brought +the villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version of King +John. But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that about +him, even when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to be a +man of mixed passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil passions +to have much too good a time of it. They might have spoken of him as a +man in considerable danger of going to hell; but they would have not +talked of him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of Percy or +Robin Hood it frequently happens that the King comes upon the scene, and +his ultimate decision makes the climax of the tale. But we do not feel, +as we do in the Byronic or modern romance, that there is a definite stage +direction "Enter Tyrant." Nor do we behold a deus ex machina who is +certain to do all that is mild and just. The King in the ballad is in a +state of virile indecision. Sometimes he will pass from a towering +passion to the most sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; sometimes he +will begin an act of vengeance and be turned from it by a jest. Yet this +august levity is not moral indifference; it is moral freedom. It is the +strong sense in the writer that the King, being the type of man with +power, will probably sometimes use it badly and sometimes well. In this +sense John is certainly misrepresented, for he is pictured as something +that none of his own friends or enemies saw. In that sense he was +certainly not so black as he is painted, for he lived in a world where +every one was piebald. + +King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind of +degenerate; a shiftyeyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's backbone +and green blood in his veins. The mediaevals were quite capable of +boiling him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable of +despairing of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori case +is that of the strange mediaeval legend of Robert the Devil. Robert was +represented as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman actually in +answer to prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are simply those of +the infernal fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he can be called +almost literally a child of hell, yet the climax of the story is his +repentance at Rome and his great reparation. That is the paradox of +mediaeval morals: as it must appear to the moderns. We must try to +conceive a race of men who hated John, and sought his blood, and believed +every abomination about him, who would have been quite capable of +assassinating or torturing him in the extremity of their anger. And yet +we must admit that they would not really have been fundamentally +surprised if he had shaved his head in humiliation, given all his goods +to the poor, embraced the lepers in a lazar-house, and been canonised as +a saint in heaven. So strongly did they hold that the pivot of Will +should turn freely, which now is rusted, and sticks. + +For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our +public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a +noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit +that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the +powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and +rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect him +to go on maddening them--and us. We do not expect him, let us say, +suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of repentance; +especially in public things; that is why we cannot really get rid of our +great national abuses of economic tyranny and aristocratic avarice. +Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal drudge; and mostly consists +of being moved on by the police. We move on because we are not allowed +to move back. But the really ragged prophets, the real revolutionists +who held high language in the palaces of kings, they did not confine +themselves to saying, "Onward, Christian soldiers," still less, "Onward, +Futurist soldiers"; what they said to high emperors and to whole empires +was, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?" + + + +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + + +Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there are +even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to most +modern books. A detective story generally describes six living men +discussing how it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story +generally describes six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be +alive. But those who have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted one +thing, that when the murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. "That, +" says Sherlock Holmes, "is the advantage of being a private detective"; +after he has caught he can set free. The Christian Church can best be +defined as an enormous private detective, correcting that official +detective--the State. This, indeed, is one of the injustices done to +historic Christianity; injustices which arise from looking at complex +exceptions and not at the large and simple fact. We are constantly being +told that theologians used racks and thumbscrews, and so they did. +Theologians used racks and thumbscrews just as they used thimbles and +three-legged stools, because everybody else used them. Christianity no +more created the mediaeval tortures than it did the Chinese tortures; it +inherited them from any empire as heathen as the Chinese. + +The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and +employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, +if we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real +difference between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The State, +in all lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, more +bloody and brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal +everywhere. The Church is the only institution that ever attempted to +create a machinery of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever +attempted by system to pursue and discover crimes, not in order to avenge, +but in order to forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the +weaknesses of the religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the world. +Its speciality--or, if you like, its oddity--was this merciless mercy; +the unrelenting sleuthhound who seeks to save and not slay. + +I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays on +somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in America. +The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent experiment, +dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure as he passes +through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to make cheap +fun of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; that is a +point of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions have been +abrupt. This saviour's method of making people good is to tell them how +good they are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, whose moral +backs are broken, and who are soaked with sincere self-contempt, I can +imagine that this might be quite the right way. I should not deliver +this message to authors or members of Parliament, because they would so +heartily agree with it. + +Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. +Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a +detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of +tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. +Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine thing, +though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be faced, even +in order to be forgiven; the great objection to "letting sleeping dogs +lie" is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. Jerome's +Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine detective, +pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a sort of +divine dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not see anything +that is going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, "Tout comprendre +est tout pardonner." But it is much more evidently true to say, "Rien +comprendre est rien Pardonner," and the "Third Floor Back" does not seem +to comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite selfish +sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his neighbours. +There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been deceived. The +heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived. + +When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play which +I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. I mean Mr. +Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which sprawls over +so many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned with a dim, +yet evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a whole group of +persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; in fact, it is +a very fine play indeed; but there is nothing aesthetic or fastidious +about it. It is as much or more than the other sensational, democratic, +and (I use the word in a sound and good sense) Salvationist. + +But the difference lies precisely in this--that the Christ of Mr. +Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; he +declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons evil, +but he will not ignore it. In other words, be is a Christian, and not a +Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained by +the problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes Christ +to be trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, is +naturally a simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying to +save the reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief +characters in The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous vicar, +universally respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. It would +have been no good to tell these people they had some good in them--for +that was what they were telling themselves all day long. They had to be +reminded that they had some bad in them--instinctive idolatries and +silent treasons which they always tried to forget. It is in connection +with these crimes of wealth and culture that we face the real problem of +positive evil. The whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy about sin was +vitiated throughout by one's consciousness that whenever he wrote the +word "sinner" he thought of a man in rags. But here, again, we can find +truth merely by referring to vulgar literature--its unfailing fountain. +Whoever read a detective story about poor people? The poor have crimes; +but the poor have no secrets. And it is because the proud have secrets +that they need to be detected before they are forgiven. + + + +THE ELF OF JAPAN + + +There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I love +them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but +psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me +as examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from +another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he +might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about +cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral +independence and readiness to scratch anybody "if he does not behave +himself." Others, like Mr. Belloe, regard the cat as cruel and secret, +a fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, +poisoned food, "so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and +humility." For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats +as I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They +are both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And +this abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called Love; +for it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it is a +vision. It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for +nothing in return. I love all the eats in the street as St. Francis of +Assisi loved all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not +so much, of course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to +bridle a bird and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. +He did not wish to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the name +"Francis," and the address "Assisi"--as one does with a dog. He did not +wish them to belong to him or himself to belong to them; in fact, it +would be a very awkward experience to belong to a lot of fishes. But a +man does belong to his dog, in another but an equally real sense with +that in which the dog belongs to him. The two bonds of obedience and +responsibility vary very much with the dogs and the men; but they are +both bonds. In other words, a man does not merely love a dog; as he +might (in a mystical moment) love any sparrow that perched on his window- +sill or any rabbit that ran across his path. A man likes a dog; and that +is a serious matter. + +To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a +cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is +so mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like +Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is +really cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men +of old time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those +magnificent old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which +one really loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and +within reason) loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man +feels himself--no, not absorbed into the unity of all things (a loathsome +fancy)--but delighting in the difference of all things. At the moment +when a man really knows he is a man he will feel, however faintly, a kind +of fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is a crocodile. All +the more will he exult in the things that are more evidently beautiful +than crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and eats--which are more +beautiful than either. But it does not follow that he will wish to pick +all the flowers or to cage all the birds or to own all the cats. + +No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit +that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful +analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of +such fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like +eats in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I feel +it about certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the +Japanese. The exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall +see no more, now Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a +quality that was infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures +were really rather like pictures made by cats. They were full of +feathery softness and of sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will +wander in some gallery fortunate enough to have a fine collection of +those slight water-colour sketches on rice paper which come from the +remote East, he will observe many elements in them which a fanciful +person might consider feline. There is, for instance, that odd enjoyment +of the tops of trees; those airy traceries of forks and fading twigs, up +to which certainly no artist, but only a cat could climb. There is that +elvish love of the full moon, as large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, +hung in these tenuous branches. That moon is so large and luminous that +one can imagine a hundred cats howling under it. Then there is the +exhaustive treatment of the anatomy of birds and fish; subjects in which +cats are said to be interested. Then there is the slanting cat-like eye +of all these Eastern gods and men--but this is getting altogether too +coincident. We shall have another racial theory in no time (beginning +"Are the Japs Cats?"), and though I shall not believe in my theory, +somebody else might. There are people among my esteemed correspondents +who might believe anything. It is enough for me to say here that in this +small respect Japs affect me like cats. I mean that I love them. I love +their quaint and native poetry, their instinct of easy civilisation, +their unique unreplaceable art, the testimony they bear to the bustling, +irrepressible activities of nature and man. If I were a real mystic +looking down on them from a real mountain, I am sure I should love them +more even than the strongwinged and unwearied birds or the fruitful, ever- +multiplying fish. But, as for liking them, as one likes a dog--that is +quite another matter. That would mean trusting them. + +In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much +in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not +specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; +but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give +the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would +happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always +a fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as wedding +cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as lanterns! +.. . but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the paper) that the +assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture was a mere matter +of verbal translation. "The Japanese would not call twisting the thumbs +back 'torture.'" + + + +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + + +I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark +in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming a +peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist +asceticism to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an +atheist and an ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious +to see one's country thus losing her special point of honour about asylum +and liberty. It will be quite a new departure if we begin to protect and +whitewash foreign policemen. I always understood it was only English +policemen who were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, however, have +begun to feel with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities and officials +are being questioned. But there is one most graphic and extraordinary +fact, which it did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch upon, but which +somebody really must seize and emphasise. It is this: that at the very +time when we are all beginning to doubt these authorities, we are letting +laws pass to increase their most capricious powers. All our commissions, +petitions, and letters to the papers are asking whether these authorities +can give an account of their stewardship. And at the same moment all our +laws are decreeing that they shall not give any account of their +stewardship, but shall become yet more irresponsible stewards. Bills +like the Feeble-Minded Bill and the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate +names for them) actually arm with scorpions the hand that has chastised +the Malatestas and Maleckas with whips. The inspector, the doctor, the +police sergeant, the well-paid person who writes certificates and +"passes" this, that, or the other; this sort of man is being trusted with +more authority, apparently because he is being doubted with more reason. +In one room we are asking why the Government and the great experts +between them cannot sail a ship. In another room we are deciding that +the Government and experts shah be allowed, without trial or discussion, +to immure any one's body, damn any one's soul, and dispose of unborn +generations with the levity of a pagan god. We are putting the official +on the throne while he is still in the dock. + +The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as +when people talk of an author's "message," without thinking whom it is +from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of another +word. It is the excellent mediaeval word "charter." I remember the Act +that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called "The +Children's Charter." Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as +lunatics people who are not lunatics was actually called a "charter" of +the feeble-minded. Now this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the +Bills are right. Even were they right in theory they would be applied +only to the poor, like many better rules about education and cruelty. A +woman was lately punished for cruelty because her children were not +washed when it was proved that she had no water. From that it will be an +easy step in Advanced Thought to punishing a man for wine-bibbing when it +is proved that he had no wine. Rifts in right reason widen down the ages. +And when we have begun by shutting up a confessedly kind person for +cruelty, we may yet come to shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for feeble- +mindedness. + +But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use +the word "charter." A charter does not mean a thing that does good to +people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. +It may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their cigarettes: +it might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of their cigars. +But I think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much surprised if the +King granted them a new charter (in place of their mediaeval charter), +and it only meant that policemen might pull the cigars out of their +mouths. It may be a good thing that all drunkards should be locked up: +and many acute statesmen ("King John, for instance) would certainly have +thought it a good thing if all aristocrats could be locked up. But even +that somewhat cynical prince would scarcely have granted to the barons a +thing called "the Great Charter" and then locked them all up on the +strength of it. If he had, this interpretation of the word "charter" +would have struck the barons with considerable surprise. I doubt if +their narrow mediaeval minds could have taken it in. + +The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no +Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own +conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them +till he understands this word "charter." I will attempt in a moment to +state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, +practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter +was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last +Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called +in the current jargon "recognition"; the acknowledgment in so many words +by society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If +there had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have been +a railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the King, +defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea still true +and then almost universal: that authority is necessary for nothing so +much as for the granting of liberties. Like everything mediaeval, it +ramified back to a root in religion; and was a sort of small copy of the +Christian idea of man's creation. Man was free, not because there was no +God, but because it needed a God to set him free. By authority he was +free. By authority the craftsmen of the guilds were free. Many other +great philosophers took and take the other view: the Lucretian pagans, +the Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and determinists, all roughly +confine themselves to saying that God gave man a law. The mediaeval +Christian insisted that God gave man a charter. Modern feeling may not +sympathise with its list of liberties, which included the liberty to be +damned; but that has nothing to do with the fact that it was a gift of +liberties and not of laws. This was mirrored, however dimly, in the +whole system. There was a great deal of gross inequality; and in other +aspects absolute equality was taken for granted. But the point is that +equality and inequality were ranks--or rights. There were not only +things one was forbidden to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. +A man was not only definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. +The holidays of his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really +meant lingers alive in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a +"chartered" libertine. + +Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every +man's door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes +liberties with everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel +that the wind is always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. +But remember that in the days when free men had charters, they held that +the wind itself was wild by authority; and was only free because it had a +father. + + + +THE CONTENTED MAN + + +The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating +because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the +style of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied +with our countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, +however, has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the "sweet +content" of the poet and the "cubic content" of the mathematician. Some +distinguish these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might +happen to any of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, "Of the +content of the King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be +ignorant"; or "Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, +you are stealing the spoons." And there really is an analogy between the +mathematical and the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation +of which the latter has been much weakened and misused. + +The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far +that the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane +peril of our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of +security; and it is not strange that our workers should often think about +rising above their position, since they have so continually to think +about sinking below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to saving +and simple pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To advise +people to be content with what they have got may or may not be sound +moral philosophy. + +But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece of +impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the creed +of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, it remains +true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine discontent; +discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must always be +the human thing. It may be true that a par-titular man, in his relation +to his master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, will do +well to be fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry justice. But +it is not true, no sane person can call it true, that man as a whole in +his general attitude towards the world, in his posture towards death or +green fields, towards the weather or the baby, will be wise to cultivate +dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly experience, the +great truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet his neighbour's ox +nor his ass nor anything that is his. In highly complex and scientific +civilisations he may sometimes find himself forced into an exceptional +vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and scientific civilisations, +nine times out of ten, he only wants his own ass back. + +But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than +in moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has +been undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other +meaning. It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some +accounts of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + +But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the +idea of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; +for feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. +"Content" ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; +placidly, perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with +bread and cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought to +mean caring for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic content +of the bread and cheese and adding it to your own. Being content with an +attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to +living in it. It ought to mean appreciating what there is to appreciate +in such a position; such as the quaint and elvish slope of the ceiling or +the sublime aerial view of the opposite chimney-pots. And in this sense +contentment is a real and even an active virtue; it is not only +affirmative, but creative. The poet in the attic does not forget the +attic in poetic musings; he remembers whatever the attic has of poetry; +he realises how high, how starry, how cool, how unadorned and simple--in +short, how Attic is the attic. + +True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of +getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and +it is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so cold +and incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been +"through" things; when it is evident that they have come out on the other +side quite unchanged. A man might have gone "through" a plum pudding as +a bullet might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the size of the +pudding--and the man. But the awful and sacred question is "Has the +pudding been through him?" Has he tasted, appreciated, and absorbed the +solid pudding, with its three dimensions and its three thousand tastes +and smells? Can he offer himself to the eyes of men as one who has +cubically conquered and contained a pudding? + +In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through +trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content of +them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a +pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + +Thus the young genius says, "I have lived in my dreary and squalid +village before I found success in Paris or Vienna." The sound +philosopher will answer, "You have never lived in your village, or you +would not call it dreary and squalid." + +Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and +always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, "I've been right away from +these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies." The +sound philosopher will reply, "You have never been in thee islands; you +have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise +you could never have called them either muddy or little." + +Thus the Suffragette will say, "I have passed through the paltry duties +of pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come out +to intellectual liberty." The sound philosopher will answer, "You have +never passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it vulgar. +Wiser and stronger women than you have really seen a poetry in pots and +pans; naturally, because there is a poetry in them." It is right for the +village violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; it is right for +the stray Englishman to climb across the high shoulder of the world; it +is right for the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae or high places +she can allow to her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that any of these +climbers should kick the ladder by which they have climbed. But indeed +these bitter people who record their experiences really record their lack +of experiences. It is the countryman who has not succeeded in being a +countryman who comes up to London. It is the clerk who has not succeeded +in being a clerk who tries (on vegetarian principles) to be a countryman. +And the woman with a past is generally a woman angry about the past she +never had. + +When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and +love it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really +been through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them +back again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because +we have drunk them dry. + + + +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + +I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover a +very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the controversies, +whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather up into this +last article a valedictory violence about all such things; and then pass +to where, beyond these voices, there is peace--or in other words, to the +writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed work. But before I +finally desert the illusions of rationalism for the actualities of +romance, I should very much like to write one last roaring, raging book +telling all the rationalists not to be so utterly irrational. The book +would be simply a string of violent vetoes, like the Ten Commandments. I +would call it "Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things I am Tired Of." + +This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would +begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing +imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might +begin thus:- (1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out +the noun. An adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, +"Give me a patriotism that is free from all boundaries." It is like +saying, "Give me a pork pie with no pork in it." Don't say, "I look +forward to that larger religion that shall have no special dogmas." It +is like saying, "I look forward to that larger quadruped who shall have +no feet." A quadruped means something with four feet; and a religion +means something that commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. +Don't let the meek substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, +exuberant adjective. + +(2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This +practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The +trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable terms, +and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the +simplest form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who +said to his tenants in an election speech, "Of course I'm not going to +threaten you, but if this Budget passes the rents will go up." The thing +can be done in many forms besides this. "I am the last man to mention +party politics; but when I see the Empire rent in pieces by irresponsible +Radicals," etc. "In this hall we welcome all creeds. We have no +hostility against any honest belief; but only against that black +priestcraft and superstition which can accept such a doctrine as," etc. +"I would not say one word that could ruffle our relations with Germany. +But this I will say; that when I see ceaseless and unscrupulous armament, +" etc. Please don't do it. Decide to make a remark or not to make a +remark. But don't fancy that you have somehow softened the saying of a +thing by having just promised not to say it. + +(3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. "Happiness" (let us say) +is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well +know when you haven't. "Progress" is a secondary word; it means the +degree of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But +modern controversies constantly turn on asking, "Does Happiness help +Progress?" Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. +Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. +Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is "spasmodic" (whatever that +means); while our "reactionism is settled and permanent." It never +strikes Mr. Swarm that democracy means something in itself; while +"reactionism" means nothing--except in connection with democracy. You +cannot react except from something. If Mr. Swann thinks I have ever +reacted from the doctrine that the people should rule, I wish he would +give me the reference. + +(4) Don't say, "There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself +right and the others wrong." Probably one of the creeds is right and the +others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must be +wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be +wrong. I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more +desperate sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are +certainly solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts +his shirt on Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other +men putting their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in +them quite as sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are +wrong. But one of them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of +the horses does win; not always even the dark horse which might stand for +Agnosticism, but often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. +Democracy has its occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been +known to come in first. But the point here is that something comes in +first. That there were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there +was one well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the +world is round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular +or oblong does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and +therefore not any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of +imprecation, don't say that the variety of creeds prevents you from +accepting any creed. It is an unintelligent remark. + +(5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), +don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the +majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of +mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The +man who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his +neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not +try to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks +himself Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself +Rockefeller; as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But +madmen never meet. It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, +they can inspire, they can fight, they can found religions; but they +cannot meet. Maniacs can never be the majority; for the simple reason +that they can never be even a minority. If two madmen had ever agreed +they might have conquered the world. + +(6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some men +are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height of +the French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat short. +In the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that +Rockefeller is stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human +equality reposes upon this: That there is no man really clever who has +not found that he is stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt +small. Some men never feel small; but these are the few men who are. + + +(7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman with +a club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male +sparrow knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe +knock down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male have +had to use any violence at any time in order to make the female a female? +Why should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the sow or the +she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these creatures were +creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not talk such bosh. I +implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. Utterly and +absolutely abolish all such bosh--and we may yet begin to discuss these +public questions properly. But I fear my list of protests grows too long; +and I know it could grow longer for ever. The reader must forgive my +elongations and elaborations. I fancied for the moment that I was +writing a book. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton + +
\ No newline at end of file diff --git a/old/miscy10.zip b/old/miscy10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..53b8268 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/miscy10.zip diff --git a/old/miscy11.txt b/old/miscy11.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fffcd29 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/miscy11.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5121 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton +#13 in our series by G. K. Chesterton + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. 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CHESTERTON + + + + +CONTENTS + +THE SUFFRAGIST +THE POET AND THE CHEESE +THE THING +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS +THE NAMELESS MAN +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES +THE MAD OFFICIAL +THE ENCHANTED MAN +THE SUN WORSHIPPER +THE WRONG INCENDIARY +THE FREE MAN +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER +THE PRIEST OF SPRING +THE REAL JOURNALIST +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY +THE FOOL +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS +THE MYSTAGOGUE +THE RED REACTIONARY +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS +THE MUMMER +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER +THE SULTAN +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS +THE MAN ON TOP +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE +THE ELF OF JAPAN +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE +THE CONTENTED MAN +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + + + +THE SUFFRAGIST + + +Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, +can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching those +political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular sentiments, +it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. One part of +it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up her fists to a +man she is putting herself in the only posture in which he is not afraid +of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more of her silence; but +force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon of which he has grown +ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite accurate in any matter +of the instincts. For the things which are the simplest so long as they +are undisputed invariably become the subtlest when once they are disputed: +which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, when he said, "It is not hard to +believe in God if one does not define Him." When the evil instincts of +old Foulon made him say of the poor, "Let them eat grass," the good and +Christian instincts of the poor made them hang him on a lamppost with his +mouth stuffed full of that vegetation. But if a modern vegetarian +aristocrat were to say to the poor, "But why don't you like grass?" their +intelligences would be much more taxed to find such an appropriate +repartee. And this matter of the functions of the sexes is primarily a +matter of the instincts; sex and breathing are about the only two things +that generally work best when they are least worried about. That, I +suppose, is why the same sophisticated age that has poisoned the world +with Feminism is also polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We plunge at +once into a forest of false analogies and bad blundering history; while +almost any man or woman left to themselves would know at least that sex is +quite different from anything else in the world. + +There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and woman +(however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave and +master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the +Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; +these other alien groups never came into contact until they came into +collision. Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards +melted into amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they +like each other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and +sorrows that often come of their mating, it was not such things that made +them meet. It is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern +writers and talkers miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one +would suppose woman a victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, +emancipated woman has, age after age, been knocked silly with a stone axe. +But really there is no fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman was +ever knocked silly; except the fact that she is silly. And that might +have arisen in so many other ways. Real responsible woman has never been +silly; and any one wishing to knock her would be wise (like the +streetboys) to knock and run away. It is ultimately idiotic to compare +this prehistoric participation with any royalties or rebellions. Genuine +royalties wish to crush rebellions. Genuine rebels wish to destroy kings. +The sexes cannot wish to abolish each other; and if we allow them any +sort of permanent opposition it will sink into something as base as a +party system. + +As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, you +cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere collisions +of separate institutions. You could compare it with the emancipation of +negroes from planters--if it were true that a white man in early youth +always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black man. You could compare +it with the revolt of tenants against a landlord--if it were true that +young landlords wrote sonnets to invisible tenants. You could compare it +to the fighting policy of the Fenians-if it were true that every normal +Irishman wanted an Englishman to come and live with him. But as we know +there are no instincts in any of these directions, these analogies are not +only false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not speak of the +comparative comfort or merit of these different things: I say they are +different. It may be that love turned to hate is terribly common in +sexual matters: it may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in the +rivalries of race or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that +begins with anything but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a +fallacy; and all its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and +impertinent as puns. + +But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express or +even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very much +concerned with what literary people call "style" in letters or more vulgar +people call "style" in dress. They are much concerned with how a thing is +done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest elements in their +attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed by stray examples or +sudden images. When Danton was defending himself before the Jacobin +tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard across the Seine, in +quite remote streets on the other side of the river. He must have +bellowed like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would think of that +prodigy except as something poetical and appropriate. None of us would +instinctively feel that Danton was less of a man or even less of a +gentleman, for speaking so in such an hour. But suppose we heard that +Marie Antoinette, when tried before the same tribunal, had howled so that +she could be heard in the Faubourg St. Germain--well, I leave it to the +instincts, if there are any left. It is not wrong to howl. Neither is it +right. It is simply a question of the instant impression on the artistic +and even animal parts of humanity, if the noise were heard suddenly like a +gun. + +Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may he found in the +gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must +always be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the French +committee or the English House of Lords. And "demagogue," in the good +Greek meaning, does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who +leads it: and if you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive +gestures of oratory are gestures of military leadership; pointing the +people to a path or waving them on to an advance. Notice that long sweep +of the arm across the body and outward, which great orators use naturally +and cheap orators artificially. It is almost the exact gesture of the +drawing of a sword. + +The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that +votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so +long as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient +militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd +that is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth +hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points +with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated +finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, +these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. +No honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the +political woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing to +do with any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a desire +exists. A husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown and +proclaimed laws from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles from +the tripod of a priestess; or if she could walk in mystical motherhood +before the procession of some great religious order. But that she should +stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; leaning +forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth open a little +longer and wider than is dignified--well, I only write here of the facts +of natural history; and the fact is that it is this, and not publicity or +importance, that hurts. It is for the modern world to judge whether such +instincts are indeed danger signals; and whether the hurting of moral as +of material nerves is a tocsin and a warning of nature. + + + + +THE POET AND THE CHEESE + + +There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the +white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of +the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even +when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement of +music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with a +shout like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open +arms and warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the +great level lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even +when there are plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. +One's voice seems to break an almost elvish silence, and something +unreasonably weird in the phrase of the nursery tales, "And he went a +little farther and came to another place," comes back into the mind. + +In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and +found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was +one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may +be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass +did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious +impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally +lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of being +so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the air of +something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like a big +yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and railings; +and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that dead hour +of the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, nor anything +else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling that I had +strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in the twenty-four. + +I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost as +private as a private house. Those who talk of "public-houses" as if they +were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with such a +place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an elaborate +cap sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of comfortable +Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) the original +Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat a tall, strong, +and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and a pair of scissors +stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. Two feet behind +them sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like wood painted scarlet, +with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not touched, and probably would +not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there was an equally motionless cat; +and on the table a copy of 'Household Words'. + +I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had met +somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; and yet +it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at once solid +and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in some of +Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness and wonder, +and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was curious; for +Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of the fenlands or +flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water and the mirrored +skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline virtue. Perhaps +that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead of a mountain poet. +Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the whole of that town +was like a cup of water given at morning. + +After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of rustic +courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The old lady +answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued her +needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at her +with a suddenly arrested concern. "I suppose," I said, "that it has +nothing to do with the cheese of that name." "Oh, yes," she answered, +with a staggering indifference, "they used to make it here." + +I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. "But this +place is a Shrine!" I said. "Pilgrims should be pouring into it from +wherever the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a +colossal statue in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton cheese. +There ought to be another colossal statue of the first cow who provided +the foundations of it. There should be a burnished tablet let into the +ground on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton cheese, and +survived. On the top of a neighbouring hill (if there are any +neighbouring hills) there should be a huge model of a Stilton cheese, made +of some rich green marble and engraven with some haughty motto: I suggest +something like 'Ver non semper viret; sed Stiltonia semper virescit.'" +The old lady said, "Yes, sir," and continued her domestic occupations. + +After a strained and emotional silence, I said, "If I take a meal here +tonight can you give me any Stilton?" + +"No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton," said the immovable one, +speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + +"This is awful," I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of England +as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and forgotten, so +to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it yet more symbolic +because from all that old and full and virile life, the great cheese was +gone; and only the beer remained. And even that will be stolen by the +Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. Politely disengaging myself, +I made my way as quickly as possible to the nearest large, noisy, and +nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I sought out the nearest vulgar, +tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + +There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I got +a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote a +sonnet to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my +sonnet is not strictly new; that it contains "echoes" (as they express it) +of some other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, are the +lines I wrote : + +SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE + + +Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour +And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby; +England has need of thee, and so have I-- +She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour, +League after grassy league from Lincoln tower +To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen. +Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men, +Like a tall green volcano rose in power. + +Plain living and long drinking are no more, +And pure religion reading 'Household Words', +And sturdy manhood sitting still all day +Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core; +While my digestion, like the House of Lords, +The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. + +I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that has +haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is +hopeless to disentangle it now. + + + + +THE THING + + +The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like the +war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken free. +For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and +physical, like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing +itself was walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of +beech. + +Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have +been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from its +enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations tend +to perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this we +hear much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the spirit +of religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of the same +stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded that just as +church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are not knowledge, +and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to find people in the +big cities who can read and write quickly enough to be clerks, but who are +actually ignorant of the daily movements of the sun and moon. + +The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one +watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government arose +among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the ancients) +out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. The notion +of self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes of it seem to +think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be consulted as one +consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked a lot of fancy +questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows are to be, +within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. They shall +decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of the spade or +the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the valley shall be +devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the men of the town +shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or splendid with +spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather under a +patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in case the +word "man" be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral atmosphere, +this original soul of self-government, the women always have quite as much +influence as the men. But in modern England neither the men nor the women +have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the moulding of the +landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people are utterly impotent. +They stand and stare at imperial and economic processes going on, as +they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + +Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place which +really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for good or +evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever it is) is +advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the villas advance +in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates into which England +has long been divided are passing out of the hands of the English gentry +into the hands of men who are always upstarts and often actually +foreigners. + +Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was +really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate +whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a +gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps +they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that +the filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof +over his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say in, +if he is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange trend +of recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over and +treat as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa is as +incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all Lancashire +were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium were flooded by the +sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a moneylender is a minor +and exceptional necessity. In reality it is a thing like a German +invasion. Sometimes it is a German invasion. + +Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes +round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It is +believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of +self-government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions +about everything except what he understands. The examination paper of the +Election generally consists of some such queries as these: "I. Are the +green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your opinion +fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the President of +the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you think that the +savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy and hygienic as +the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? IV. Did the +lost Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III reserve the +right of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of what America +thinks of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst thinks of the +state of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the two persons in +frock-coats placed before you at this election." + +Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that +the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions like +these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and +Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether +farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether +stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But these +are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to touch +with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and divine +mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he knows +nothing about. The name of self-government is noisy everywhere: the Thing +is throttled. + +The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; in +scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances of +martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of Napoleon +and all the tongues Of terror with which the Thing has gone forth: the +spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning only a +branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of the great +country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would have +happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + + + + +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + + +The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, if +he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes +nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific or +skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution and +Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But +especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the +writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For +the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + +Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, perhaps, +the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as possible, and from +it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right mode in which all real +results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which is confusing all our +current discussions, especially our discussions about the relations of the +sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I notice an object which is often +mentioned in the higher and subtler of these debates about the sexes: I +mean a poker. I will take a poker and think about it; first forwards and +then backwards; and so, perhaps, show what I mean. + +The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin +somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star +the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, +comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only +naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his +shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He +might almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone bathing +and left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat upon the +beaver and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth for a +waistcoat, and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has no +heat in his hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must look +for light and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is cast. +This is equally true of his soul and of his body; he is the one creature +that has lost his heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a spiritual +sense he has taken leave of his senses; and even in a literal sense he has +been unable to keep his hair on. And just as this external need of his +has lit in his dark brain the dreadful star called religion, so it has lit +in his hand the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red flower called +Fire. Fire, the most magic and startling of all material things, is a +thing known only to man and the expression of his sublime externalism. It +embodies all that is human in his hearths and all that is divine on his +altars. It is the most human thing in the world; seen across wastes of +marsh or medleys of forest, it is veritably the purple and golden flag of +the sons of Eve. But there is about this generous and rejoicing thing an +alien and awful quality: the quality of torture. Its presence is life; +its touch is death. Therefore, it is always necessary to have an +intermediary between ourselves and this dreadful deity; to have a priest +to intercede for us with the god of life and death; to send an ambassador +to the fire. That priest is the poker. Made of a material more merciless +and warlike than the other instruments of domesticity, hammered on the +anvil and born itself in the flame, the poker is strong enough to enter +the burning fiery furnace, and, like the holy children, not be consumed. +In this heroic service it is often battered and twisted, but is the more +honourable for it, like any other soldier who has been under fire. + +Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right +view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong view +of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's children, +or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman jump, as the +clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to the beginning, +and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see things in their +right order, the one depending on the other in degree of purpose and +importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man and the man +for the glory of God. + +This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, +Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in an +opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:- A modern intellectual +comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not begin with any +dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about the mystery of +fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and the first thing +he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, "Poor poker; it's +crooked." Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and is told that there +is a thing in the world (with which his temperament has hitherto left him +unacquainted)--a thing called fire. He points out, very kindly and +clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want a straight poker, to put +it into a chemical combustion which will very probably heat and warp it. +"Let us abolish fire," he says, "and then we shall have perfectly straight +pokers. Why should you want a fire at all?" They explain to him that a +creature called Man wants a fire, because he has no fur or feathers. He +gazes dreamily at the embers for a few seconds, and then shakes his head. +"I doubt if such an animal is worth preserving," he says. "He must +eventually go under in the cosmic struggle when pitted against +well-armoured and warmly protected species, who have wings and trunks and +spires and scales and horns and shaggy hair. If Man cannot live without +these luxuries, you had better abolish Man." At this point, as a rule, the +crowd is convinced; it heaves up all its clubs and axes, and abolishes him. +At least, one of him. + +Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's welfare, +let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a straightforward +way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern movements may be +right; but let them be defended because they are right, not because they +are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the actual woman or man +in the street, who is cold; like mankind before the finding of fire. Do +not let us begin with the end of the last red-hot discussion--like the end +of a redhot poker. Imperialism may be right. But if it is right, it is +right because England has some divine authority like Israel, or some human +authority like Rome; not because we have saddled ourselves with South +Africa, and don't know how to get rid of it. Socialism may be true. But +if it is true, it is true because the tribe or the city can really declare +all land to be common land, not because Harrod's Stores exist and the +commonwealth must copy them. Female suffrage may be just. But if it is +just, it is just because women are women, not because women are sweated +workers and white slaves and all sorts of things that they ought never to +have been. Let not the Imperialist accept a colony because it is there, +nor the Suffragist seize a vote because it is lying about, nor the +Socialist buy up an industry merely because it is for sale. + +Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal +decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies' proved +that we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall +some day want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and +not, in mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female +suffrage, let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as the male +blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be Socialism, let +it be social; that is, as different as possible from all the big +commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman tailor does +not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more cloth. The +really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing conditions, he +denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some deeply planted +tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at last into tiny twigs; +and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is trying to bend the tree +by a twig: to alter England through a distant colony, or to capture the +State through a small State department, or to destroy all voting through a +vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise who resists this temptation of +trivial triumph or surrender, and happy (in an echo of the Roman poet) who +remembers the roots of things. + + + + +THE NAMELESS MAN + + +There are only two forms of government the monarchy or personal government, +and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a government; +England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. But there is one +real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the method of abstract +democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal government politics are +so much more personal. In France and America, where the State is an +abstraction, political argument is quite full of human details--some might +even say of inhuman details. But in England, precisely because we are +ruled by personages, these personages do not permit personalities. In +England names are honoured, and therefore names are suppressed. But in +the republics, in France especially, a man can put his enemies' names into +his article and his own name at the end of it. + + +This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our +anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We +should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, +for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, and +have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, I had +little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for +anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity is +safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact that +you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a proof +that you ought to publish it. + +But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name to +his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and it is +never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a man's name +is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person today is +eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For instance, we all +read with earnestness and patience the pages of the 'Daily Mail', and +there are times when we feel moved to cry, "Bring to us the man who +thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture him, take great care +of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some precious bale of silk, +that we may look upon the face of the man who desires such things to be +printed. Let us know his name; his social and medical pedigree." But in +the modern muddle (it might be said) how little should we gain if those +frankly fatuous sheets were indeed subscribed by the man who had inspired +them. Suppose that after every article stating that the Premier is a +piratical Socialist there were printed the simple word "Northcliffe." What +does that simple word suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul +(uninstructed otherwise) it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in +the wintry seas towards the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the +top of this crag the fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, +of course, I know that the word does not mean this; it means another Fleet +Street journalist like myself or only different from myself in so far as +he has sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a jolly time. + +A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not distinguish. +A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a hiding-place. + +But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not +merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic +titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been +essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in +which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is +nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk +means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the +Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government +or for it. All government is representative government until it begins to +decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to decay +the instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant as +envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in becoming +aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of Norfolk ought +simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + +I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of +Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very high +at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, ought +to end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences with the +word "together"; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus I shall +expect the Duke of Norfolk to say: "I beg to second the motion together"; +or "This is a great constitutional question together." I shall expect him +to know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers above them; to know +about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to know too much about anything +else. Of mountains he must be wildly and ludicrously ignorant. He must +have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even the flatness of Norfolk. He must +remind me of the watery expanses, the great square church towers and the +long level sunsets of East England. If he does not do this, I decline to +know him. + +I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I +lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that +his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot with +romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but clotted +cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna Doone', and be +unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he must regard with +some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I should expect the +Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and dreamy ardour of +the Celtic fringe. + +Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and +that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke +of Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point is +that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do we +find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, his +locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, the +thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a gouty +admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: you will +hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande dame, and +behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These are light +complications of the central fact of the falsification of all names and +ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediaeval knights who should have +exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule seems to be +that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; and that the +Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so long as they are +not Cornish. + +The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England is +an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, as some +say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and paralysis of +China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that it calls cats +dogs and describes the sun as the moon--and is very particular about the +preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and to be carefully wrong, +that is the definition of decadence. The disease called aphasia, in which +people begin by saying tea when they mean coffee, commonly ends in their +silence. Silence of this stiff sort is the chief mark of the powerful +parts of modern society. They all seem straining to keep things in rather +than to let things out. For the kings of finance speechlessness is +counted a way of being strong, though it should rather be counted a way of +being sly. By this time the Parliament does not parley any more than the +Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper editors and proprietors are more +despotic and dangerous by what they do not utter than by what they do. We +have all heard the expression "golden silence." The expression "brazen +silence" is the only adequate phrase for our editors. If we wake out of +this throttled, gaping, and wordless nightmare, we must awake with a yell. +The Revolution that releases England from the fixed falsity of its +present position will be not less noisy than other revolutions. It will +contain, I fear, a great deal of that rude accomplishment described among +little boys as "calling names"; but that will not matter much so long as +they are the right names. + + + + +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + + +Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. Indeed, +the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on +cooperation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French +Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its +proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The +essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by +yourself. + +Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates the +things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and +suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest +approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the +country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached +to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean +the small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized +gardens; who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and who +frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the +characteristics of the true Peasant--especially the characteristics that +people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which is the +consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even disliked +sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because (like Micaiah) +he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The English gardener is +grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even economical. Nor is this +(as the reader's lightning wit will flash back at me) merely because the +English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. The type does exist in pure +South England blood and speech; I have spoken to the type. I was speaking +to the type only the other evening, when a rather odd little incident +occurred. + +It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and +radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it is +of the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and hackneyed +line about coming "before the swallow dares." Spring never is Spring +unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, without +any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in heaven. The +gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is needless to explain +the causes of this difference; it would be to tell the tremendous history +of two souls. It is needless because there is a more immediate +explanation of the case: the gardener and I, if not equal in agreement, +were at least equal in difference. It is quite certain that he would not +have allowed me to touch the garden if I had gone down on my knees to him. +And it is by no means certain that I should have consented to touch the +garden if he had gone down on his knees to me. His activity and my +idleness, therefore, went on steadily side by side through the long sunset +hours. + +And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not +sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about the +earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and the +flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a herald. +He possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while I only +possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than coal-owners know +about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they are brought above the +surface of the earth. I know more about gardens than railway shareholders +seem to know about railways: for at least I know that it needs a man to +make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But as I walked on that grass my +ignorance overwhelmed me--and yet that phrase is false, because it +suggests something like a storm from the sky above. It is truer to say +that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like a mine dug long before; and +indeed it was dug before the beginning of the ages. Green bombs of bulbs +and seeds were bursting underneath me everywhere; and, so far as my +knowledge went, they had been laid by a conspirator. I trod quite +uneasily on this uprush of the earth; the Spring is always only a fruitful +earthquake. With the land all alive under me I began to wonder more and +more why this man, who had made the garden, did not own the garden. If I +stuck a spade into the ground, I should be astonished at what I found +there...and just as I thought this I saw that the gardener was astonished +too. + +Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by +the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It +was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, I +believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + +If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can +explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: +and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came +there I have not a notion--unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his hurry to +get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold recital of +facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under the earth there, +for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a treasure without a +Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it will never be found, +for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams of avarice since I +know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. And, for the other +party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the garden. + +Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw that +answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not belong to +the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than simply putting +the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only underground seed +that I could understand. Only by having a little more of that dull, +battered yellow substance could I manage to be idle while he was active. +I am not altogether idle myself; but the fact remains that the power is in +the thin slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, not in the strong square +and curve of metal which we call the Spade. And then I suddenly +remembered that as I had found gold on my ground by accident, so richer +men in the north and west counties had found coal in their ground, also by +accident. + +I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, +but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and +then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he +would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But +a little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not +get a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering +and unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such +accidental and irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? +Perhaps he dimly felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that +buried treasure is a thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps he +thought there was a curse on such capital: on the coal of the coal-owners, +on the gold of the gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + + + + +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + + +The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was stated +wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best men from +devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a fanatical +conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote themselves to +politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and babies and things +like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in party politics, I wish +there was more of it. The real danger of the two parties with their two +policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of the ordinary citizen. +They make him barren instead of creative, because he is never allowed to +do anything except prefer one existing policy to another. We have not got +real Democracy when the decision depends upon the people. We shall have +real Democracy when the problem depends upon the people. The ordinary man +will decide not only how he will vote, but what he is going to vote about. + +It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations +towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all +questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of the +suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not the +quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting about. A +certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses and the +highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they must go +down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but only which +they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it thus. The +Suffragettes--if one may judge by their frequent ringing of his bell--want +to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion what it is. Let us say +(for the sake of argument) that they want to paint him green. We will +suppose that it is entirely for that simple purpose that they are always +seeking to have private interviews with him; it seems as profitable as any +other end that I can imagine to such an interview. Now, it is possible +that the Government of the day might go in for a positive policy of +painting Mr. Asquith green; might give that reform a prominent place in +their programme. Then the party in opposition would adopt another policy, +not a policy of leaving Mr. Asquith alone (which would be considered +dangerously revolutionary), but some alternative course of action, as, for +instance, painting him red. Then both sides would fling themselves on the +people, they would both cry that the appeal was now to the Caesar of +Democracy. A dark and dramatic air of conflict and real crisis would +arise on both sides; arrows of satire would fly and swords of eloquence +flame. The Greens would say that Socialists and free lovers might well +want to paint Mr. Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole town red. +Socialists would indignantly reply that Socialism was the reverse of +disorder, and that they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red so that he +might resemble the red pillar-boxes which typified State control. The +Greens would passionately deny the charge so often brought against them by +the Reds; they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith green in order that +he might be invisible on the green benches of the Commons, as certain +terrified animals take the colour of their environment. + +There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, +flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, "Keep the +Red Flag Flying," and the other, "The Wearing of the Green." But when the +last effort had been made and the last moment come, when two crowds were +waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the declaration of +the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now for democracy to +do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her head in awful +loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. Yet this +might not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in awful +loneliness and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale blue. +The democracy of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed to make +up a policy for itself, might have desired him to be black with pink spots. +It might even have liked him as he is now. But a huge apparatus of +wealth, power, and printed matter has made it practically impossible for +them to bring home these other proposals, even if they would really prefer +them. No candidates will stand in the spotted interest; for candidates +commonly have to produce money either from their own pockets or the +pasty's; and in such circles spots are not worn. No man in the social +position of a Cabinet Minister, perhaps, will commit himself to the +pale-blue theory of Mr. Asquith; therefore it cannot be a Government +measure, therefore it cannot pass. + +Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will declare +dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes it, that red and +green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE OBSERVER will say: +"No one who knows the solid framework of politics or the emphatic first +principles of an Imperial people can suppose for a moment that there is +any possible compromise to be made in such a matter; we must either fulfill +our manifest racial destiny and crown the edifice of ages with the august +figure of a Green Premier, or we must abandon our heritage, break our +promise to the Empire, fling ourselves into final anarchy, and allow the +flaming and demoniac image of a Red Premier to hover over our dissolution +and our doom." The DAILY MAIL would say: "There is no halfway house in +this matter; it must be green or red. We wish to see every honest +Englishman one colour or the other." And then some funny man in the +popular Press would star the sentence with a pun, and say that the DAILY +MAIL liked its readers to be green and its paper to be read. But no one +would even dare to whisper that there is such a thing as yellow. + +For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly examples +than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But I could +give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which I refer. +In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually insisted in +every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and that it was +only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It was not +inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to make peace +with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with their +conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been better for +us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and prestige, if we +had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a matter of opinion. +What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was not, as was said, +the only possible course; there were plenty of other courses; there were +plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the discussion about +Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind that we must +choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they call +Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean that +anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral philosophy of +the young Horner--and say what a good boy he is for helping himself. + +It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a +Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this +moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary +to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I +should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply +not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal +order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound +scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might +have peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry George; +we might have a number of tiny communes; we might have co-operation; we +might have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred things. I am not +saying that any of these are right, though I cannot imagine that any of +them could be worse than the present social madhouse, with its top-heavy +rich and its tortured poor; but I say that it is an evidence of the stiff +and narrow alternative offered to the civic mind, that the civic mind is +not, generally speaking, conscious of these other possibilities. The +civic mind is not free or alert enough to feel how much it has the world +before it. There are at least ten solutions of the Education question, +and no one knows which Englishmen really want. For Englishmen are only +allowed to vote about the two which are at that moment offered by the +Premier and the Leader of the Opposition. There are ten solutions of the +drink question; and no one knows which the democracy wants; for the +democracy is only allowed to fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + +So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer +questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political +aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably +cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be rather +careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and +self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less +democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of +slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both of +them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification of +taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much +alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold--and then for a +great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + + + + +THE MAD OFFICIAL + + +Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very +nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all my +friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of moderns; +I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of thinking +before he comes to the first chance of living. + +But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man +does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a certain +dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very atmosphere +of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his madness, he +would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel or cryptograms +in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, which are on his +nose night and day. If once he could take off the spectacles he would +smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the Sixth Seal or the +Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible first principle. If +he could once see the first principle, he would see that it is not there. + +This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur +not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard to +pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental +degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a +real test. A nation is not going mad when it doe's extravagant things, so +long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting +their beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other +Harmodius and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these +are wild things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + +But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State +is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, +this would logically allow me to fire off fifty-nine enormous field-guns +day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man doing +it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the +neighbours putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing +merely because it might happen to fulfill the letter of my license. + +Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I know) +to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should not be +surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England there is +practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be surprised even at +the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he lived long under the +English landlord system, might do anything. But I should be surprised at +the people who consented to stand it. I should, in other words, think the +world a little mad if the incident, were received in silence. + +Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every +day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. Ail blows +fall soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a passive +as well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of the nerves to +respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural stimulation. There +are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here and there in history, +which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from glory to insignificance, or +from freedom to slavery, not only in silence, but with serenity. The face +still smiles while the limbs, literally and loathsomely, are dropping from +the body. These are peoples that have lost the power of astonishment at +their own actions. When they give birth to a fantastic fashion or a +foolish law, they do not start or stare at the monster they have brought +forth. They have grown used to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; +and the whirlwind is the breath of their nostrils. These nations are +really in danger of going off their heads en masse; of becoming one vast +vision of imbecility, with toppling cities and crazy country-sides, all +dotted with industrious lunatics. One of these countries is modern +England. + +Now here is an actual instance, a small ease of how our social conscience +really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in realisation; a +thing without the light of mind in it. I take this paragraph from a daily +paper :- "At Epping, yesterday, Thomas Woolbourne, a Lambourne labourer, +and his wife were summoned for neglecting their five children. Dr. Alpin +said he was invited by the inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to visit +defendants' cottage. Both the cottage and the children were dirty. The +children looked exceedingly well in health, but the conditions would be +serious in case of illness. Defendants were stated to be sober. The man +was discharged. The woman, who said she was hampered by the cottage +having no water supply and that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' +imprisonment. The sentence caused surprise, and the woman was removed +crying, 'Lord save me! '" + +I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of +some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces +and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the +accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning +has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago +that can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of +reason to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + +I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman +was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for being +ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a matter of +fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. The doctor was +called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Was +this woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Did the +doctor say she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Was +these any evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of cruelty? Not a rap. +The worse that the doctor could work himself up to saying was that +though the children were "exceedingly" well, the conditions would be +serious in case of illness. If the doctor will tell me any conditions +that would be comic in case of illness, I shall attach more weight to his +argument. + +Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has gone mad. +He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite literally and +practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, Quis docebit +ipsum doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly unnatural thing; +instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect of children is a +natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is a mere difference of +degree that divides extending arms and legs in calisthenics and extending +them on the rack. It is a mere difference of degree that separates any +operation from any torture. The thumb-screw can easily be called Manicure. +Being pulled about by wild horses can easily be called Massage. The +modern problem is not so much what people will endure as what they will +not endure. But I fear I interrupt.... The boiling oil is boiling; and +the Tenth Mandarin is already reciting the "Seventeen Serious Principles +and the Fifty-three Virtues of the Sacred Emperor." + + + + +THE ENCHANTED MAN + + +When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, who +acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, it is +the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very late. +This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late comers +had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English audience +always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and (as I have +found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable taunts rather +than come forward. The English are a modest people; that is why they are +entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to be immodest. In +theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in most playhouses +we find the bored people in front and the eager people behind. + +As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored person; +but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus required to +sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in the dramatic +world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all critics have to +take off their heads. The people behind will have a chance then. And as +it happens, in this case, I had not so much taken off my head as lost it. +I had lost it on the road; on that strange journey that was the cause of +my coming in late. I have a troubled recollection of having seen a very +good play and made a very bad speech; I have a cloudy recollection of +talking to all sorts of nice people afterwards, but talking to them +jerkily and with half a head, as a man talks when he has one eye on a +clock. + +And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, hung +uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure for such +bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I was moonstruck. +A lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had inexplicably got in +between me and all other scenes. If any one had asked me I could not have +said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing had occurred to me; except +the breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge of a hill. It was not an +adventure; it was a vision. + +I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small car +that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as night +blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way +increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. +Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a yet +steeper road like a ladder. + +At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower of +Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, and +the driver saying that "it couldn't be done." I got out of the car and +suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + +From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which I +am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his great +patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts of South +Africa, he made use of the expression "the illimitable veldt." The word +"veldt" is Dutch, and the word "illimitable" is Double Dutch. But the +meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him a sense +of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. Well, +if he never found it in England it was because he never looked for it in +England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable veldts. +I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many different +hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite horizon, free +and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little more desolate +than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as that English hill +was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + +I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if at +a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on +that freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost +fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening +forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an abyss +which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless only +because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries had been +swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the hills. I +could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if I hurled +huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had bewitched +the landscape: but that again does not express the best or worst of it. +All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so inhuman that it +has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on them; that is the +nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking at the back of the +world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the universe in the +rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon an unconscious +creation. + +I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it +is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about +its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in +some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical +phrases of the populace, "a God-forsaken place." Yet something was +present there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. +Then suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. +It had been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales +about princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were in +a land where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The moon +looked at me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; the +one white eye of the world. + +There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a +point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There +were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for they +were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration which is +the transition from life to art. But all the time I was mesmerised by the +moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted things. The poacher shot +pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the wife hid pheasants; they +were all (especially the policeman) as true as death. But there was +something more true to death than true to life about it all: the figures +were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or fear or custom such as does not +cramp the movements of the poor men of other lands. I looked at the +poacher and the policeman and the gun; then at the gun and the policeman +and the poacher; and I could find no name for the fancy that haunted and +escaped me. The poacher believed in the Game Laws as much as the +policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed in the Game Laws, but +protected them as well as him. She got a promise from her husband that he +would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he kept it I doubt; I fancy +he sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. But I am sure he never shot +a policeman. For we live in an enchanted land. + + + + +THE SUN WORSHIPPER + + +There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. +And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in that +sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the warning +to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as fate, if +they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that argument +will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and the slave. +To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, so to speak, +in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern doctrine, +taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is called the +materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: that all the +important things in history are rooted in an economic motive. In short, +history is a science; a science of the search for food. + +Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely untrue, +but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too feebly to +say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would not have any +history if he were only economic. The need for food is certainly +universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows have an economic +motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal delicacies may be in +a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass anywhere and never +eats anything else. In short, the cow does fulfill the materialist theory +of history: that is why the cow has no history. "A History of Cows" would +be one of the simplest and briefest of standard works. But if some cows +thought it wicked to eat long grass and persecuted all who did so; if the +cow with the crumpled horn were worshipped by some cows and gored to death +by others; if cows began to have obvious moral preferences over and above +a desire for grass, then cows would begin to have a history. They would +also begin to have a highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same +thing. + +The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually +outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that +is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men +are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we +have made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended on +economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two legs. +It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a +condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly +a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two +legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or a +coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or no +information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy +romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating +millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported on +legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more +generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much grander +and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the hills and +see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the horizon broken +by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + +So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. +But history--the whole point of history--precisely is that some twolegged +soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical structure, did not. +The whole point of history precisely is: some people (like poets and +tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while others (such as +millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun of bothering about it. +There would be no history if there were only economic history. All the +historical events have been due to the twists and turns given to the +economic instinct by forces that were not economic. For instance, this +theory traces the French war of Edward III to a quarrel about the French +wines. Any one who has even smelt the Middle Ages must feel fifty answers +spring to his lips; but in this cause one will suffice. There would have +been no such war, then, if we all drank water like cows. But when one is +a man one enters the world of historic choice. The act of drinking wine +is one that requires explanation. So is the act of not drinking wine. + +But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + +When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, an +ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said that +they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was eagerly +taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do not see why +it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable uprisings in +history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is generally +rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on the sudden and +mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from captivity. The +English strikers used some barren republican formula (arid as the +definitions of the medieval schoolmen), some academic shibboleth about +being free men and not being forced to work except for a wage accepted by +them. Just in the same way the Israelites in Egypt employed some dry +scholastic quibble about the extreme difficulty of making bricks with +nothing to make them of. But whatever fantastic intellectual excuses they +may have put forward for their strange and unnatural conduct in walking +out when the prison door was open, there can be no doubt that the real +cause was the warm weather. Such a climate notoriously also produces +delusions and horrible fancies, such as Mr. Kipling describes. And it +was while their brains were disordered by the heat that the Jews fancied +that they were founding a nation, that they were led by a prophet, and, in +short, that they were going to be of some importance in the affairs of the +world. + +Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was +pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + +In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself in +accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at these +words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three times), and +I rather think that exceptions might be found to the principle. Yet it is +not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my belief in it. + +No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by +which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of +class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not +leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave +off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high +interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to +what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years ago. +The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking because +they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy confirmation +from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges and other +persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition to strike. +I have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my own; and I +continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to steal a phrase +from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that is other than the +elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + +When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really +time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession of +what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of the +mediaeval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing from a +slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land rather than +the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could not be +raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the lord +rode down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he had the +chance of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the means of +production. + +Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; and +something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is no +doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we have +destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in serfdom; +nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich man has +entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in the modern +industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They can only +find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such competitive +and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + +Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts +inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That +retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows or the +Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more dreamed of +than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. He owned all +the birds that passed over his land: he might as well have owned all the +clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's land to Brown's +land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. The logical +answer to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's land ought to be +able to prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp without a muzzle. + +Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep in +the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A +landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way that +a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or on a +seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense of +fun) as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + +The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings would +fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike or +deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the passerby. +That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A man in +England can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in the name +of God. + +You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor +to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have +still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: that +weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the working +of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had this last +retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat was also +perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. Whereupon +the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at your Boards +and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you opened on +them the eyes of owls, and said, "It must be the sunshine." You could only +go on saying, "The sun, the sun." That was what the man in Ibsen said, +when he had lost his wits. + + + + +THE WRONG INCENDIARY + + +I stood looking at the Coronation Procession--I mean the one in +Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I believe, +had some success in London--and I was seriously impressed. Most of my +life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that I was quite +right. Never before have I realised how right I was in maintaining that +the small area expresses the real patriotism: the smaller the field the +taller the tower. There were things in our local procession that did not +(one might even reverently say, could not) occur in the London procession. +One of the most prominent citizens in our procession (for instance) had +his face blacked. Another rode on a pony which wore pink and blue +trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan affair, and therefore my +assertion is subject to such correction as the eyewitness may always offer +to the absentee. But I believe with some firmness that no such features +occurred in the London pageant. + +But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of +something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my +garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind +of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead +trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, +reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material and +mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the day +when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather +strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any sort +of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + +In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I +supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose +stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out +cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big +stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also +a strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every now +and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew what +it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across two +meadows smote me where I stood. "Oh, my holy aunt," I thought, "they've +mistaken the Coronation Day." + +And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like a +bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close to +the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink with +the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted as black +as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart edged +with a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured like a +scarlet snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of light. + +I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling +noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The +heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if some +giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I had +not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; but +the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered the +grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the last +fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and cavernous; +and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the dark and +magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a rood past me; +then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell him where the +fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought it was the +cottages by the wood-yard. He said, "My God!" and vanished. + +A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and +the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were dim +huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The +fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which +seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a +very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that +most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in +dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of +midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that the +fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard itself. +There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly accidental; +though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and revenge. But +for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a swollen, tragic, +portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something to do with the +crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end of England. It was +not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad daylight next morning +that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight adventure had not +happened outside this world. + +But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or +Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was +feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles of +virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good things were +being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, walkingsticks, +wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for girls I could hear +the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the flames. And then I +thought of that other noble tower of needless things that stood in the +field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of vanities, that is +meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in the meadow, and the +birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and spangled its twigs. +And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, the Bad Fire and the +Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of Bonfire. And the paradox +is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of things that we do not want; +but the Bad Fire is made of good things, of things that we do want; like +all that wealth of wood that might have made dolls and chairs and tables, +but was only making a hueless ash. + +And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there +are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race +between them. Which will happen first--the revolution in which bad things +shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things shall perish +also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most conservative, +really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the face of the +well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the throat of +despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is possible, take +tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into bundles and burn +them. And the other is the disruption that may come prematurely, +negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my little town. + +It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in +it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and fair +ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two +revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway +trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the +tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a +cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout +like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a +blazing pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one could +fancy it visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along the +terraces of the Chiltern Hills. + + + + +THE FREE MAN + + +The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men find +it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally to +the fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save their lives +by law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked Coleridge for +praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun to be free. It +seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the sun. Speaking as +a Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of Joshua stopping the +sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting his daily round in +imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, and his astronomical +act was distinctly revolutionary. For all revolution is the mastering of +matter by the spirit of man, the emergence of that human authority within +us which, in the noble words of Sir Thomas Browne, "owes no homage unto +the sun." + +Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant +merely to receive good laws, good food: or good conditions, like a tree in +a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in selecting +and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning of the trade +of Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real idea of +liberty are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the word "make" +about most of the things in which freedom is essential, as a country walk +or a friendship or a love affair. When a man "makes his way" through a +wood he has really created, he has built a road, like the Romans. When a +man "makes a friend," he makes a man. And in the third case we talk of a +man "making love," as if he were (as, indeed, he is) creating new masses +and colours of that flaming material an awful form of manufacture. In its +primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in man, or, if you like the +word, the artist. + +In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the +citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men +are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the +eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, +bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing the +citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the State. +You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may call the bees a +despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who attempted to +introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a career as curt and +fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm alone. The isolation +of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious character; but it is not +even in humanity by any means equally distributed. The idea that the +State should not only be supported by its children, like the ant-hill, but +should be constantly criticised and reconstructed by them, is an idea +stronger in Christendom than any other part of the planet; stronger in +Western than Eastern Europe. And touching the pure idea of the individual +being free to speak and act within limits, the assertion of this idea, we +may fairly say, has been the peculiar honour of our own country. For my +part I greatly prefer the Jingoism of Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of +The Recessional. I have no objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I +draw the line when she begins to rule the dry land--and such damnably dry +land too--as in Africa. And there was a real old English sincerity in the +vulgar chorus that "Britons never shall be slaves." We had no equality +and hardly any justice; but freedom we were really fond of. And I think +just now it is worth while to draw attention to the old optimistic +prophecy that "Britons never shall be slaves." + +The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than it +has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy to +slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people up. +Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect +highplaced officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts +rather than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished the +Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed a +law (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not +depend upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have +got hold of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty is +in the air. A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square +without a word of accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says that +in his opinion the police are very nice people, and there is an end of the +matter. A Member of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. The +Speaker says he must not criticise a peerage, and there the matter drops. + +Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of criticising +those flexible parts of the State which constantly require reconsideration, +not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, it means the power +of saying the sort of things that a decent but discontented citizen wants +to say. He does not want to spit on the Bible, or to run about without +clothes, or to read the worst page in Zola from the pulpit of St. Paul's. +Therefore the forbidding of these things (whether just or not) is only +tyranny in a secondary and special sense. It restrains the abnormal, not +the normal man. But the normal man, the decent discontented citizen, does +want to protest against unfair law courts. He does want to expose +brutalities of the police. He does want to make game of a vulgar +pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He does want publicly to warn people +against unscrupulous capitalists and suspicious finance. If he is run in +for doing this (as he will be) he does want to proclaim the character or +known prejudices of the magistrate who tries him. If he is sent to prison +(as he will be) he does want to have a clear and civilised sentence, +telling him when he will come out. And these are literally and exactly +the things that he now cannot get. That is the almost cloying humour of +the present situation. I can say abnormal things in modern magazines. It +is the normal things that I am not allowed to say. I can write in some +solemn quarterly an elaborate article explaining that God is the devil; I +can write in some cultured weekly an aesthetic fancy describing how I +should like to eat boiled baby. The thing I must not write is rational +criticism of the men and institutions of my country. + +The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can +say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot say, +for instance, that--But I am afraid I must leave out that instance, +because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my case--because it is so true. + + + + +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + + +We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded that +he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is extreme, and +my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. But I never +quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at least from my +own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught my eye; and thus +the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite constantly walked into +another man's house, thinking it was my own house; my visits became almost +monotonous. But walking into my own house and thinking it was another +man's house is a flight of poetic detachment still beyond me. Something +of the sensations that such an absent-minded man must feel I really felt +the other day; and very pleasant sensations they were. The best parts of +every proper romance are the first chapter and the last chapter; and to +knock at a strange door and find a nice wife would be to concentrate the +beginning and end of all romance. + +Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the same +kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin and +unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was treading +in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty years old. + +It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost +unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were once +great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, as it +says in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is something +singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that were so long a +human property and care fighting for their own hand in the thicket. One +almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the dog evolved into a +wolf. + +This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned out +for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite +threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years +ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone no +farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked +building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or +coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick +of which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a +blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; and +on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white which +always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of some +blind giant. + +I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had +not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought +much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth +walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged +person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off +than childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal +picture, distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I +stood; and I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. +They still stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, as +if they had stood for centuries. + +I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half +slid on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked +off the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but were +still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks off +the tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I had +recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And then +I came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with the +sawdust and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three green +stars of dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding road. + +I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those years +ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this red and +white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more lonesome +than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could only be +full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of the ghosts +of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future as he can +find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediaeval notion of +erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting on it a +miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I thought to +myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built boxes was +indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real miracle play; that +human family that is almost the holy one, and that human death that is +near to the last judgment. + +For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row +especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. +Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; +and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and +solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction +upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the +convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + +As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played the +fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in my pocket, +I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; things +addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had written up in +what I supposed to be the dining-room: + + +James Harrogate, thank God for meat, +Then eat and eat and eat and eat, + + +or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric was +scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something beginning: + + +When laying what you call your head, +O Harrogate, upon your bed, + + +and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite +vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, and the +places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in memory; +for when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century the house +was very different. + +I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its +windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low square +windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream of +lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, was +standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy +sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the +wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that +lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express if +I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red chalk upon +the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to withdraw, a +mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct accents to a +very smart suburban maid, "Does Mr. James Harrogate live here?" + +She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking for +him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I had one +moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then decided not +to look for him at all. + + + + +THE PRIEST OF SPRING + + +The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. +But it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty but +of revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect who will +fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to be +congratulated on fitting in with the Spring--or the Spring on fitting in +with Easter. + +The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a story; +and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed very voluptuous +appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like mathematics, logic, or +chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind are like mere pleasures of +the body. That is, they are mere pleasures, though they may be gigantic +pleasures; they can never by a mere increase of themselves amount to +happiness. A man just about to be hanged may enjoy his breakfast; +especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and in the same way he may +enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, especially if it is his +favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy either of them does not depend +on either of them; it depends upon his spiritual attitude towards a +subsequent event. And that event is really interesting to the soul; +because it is the end of a story and (as some hold) the end of a person. + +Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for our +scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about true +religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of +mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself +to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) +that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis or +Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, they have +got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is sufficiently +interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any particular mystery +or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to disguise them under +the image of a very handsome young man, which is a vastly more interesting +thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall of leaves in autumn and the +return of flowers in spring, the process of thought was quite different. +It is a process of thought which springs up spontaneously in all children +and young artists; it springs up spontaneously in all healthy societies. +It is very difficult to explain in a diseased society. + +The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A +cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a +dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a +daydream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a +start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save +in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its +trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete +phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream +sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting in +of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was +asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to +rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by +certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were always +unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always +intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of "the +survival of the fittest," meaning only the survival of the survivors; or +wherever a man says that the rich "have a stake in the country," as if the +poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or where a +man talks about "going on towards Progress," which only means going on +towards going on; or when a man talks about "government by the wise few," +as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. "The wise few" must +mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very foolish who +think themselves wise. + +There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves +saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am particularly +irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the nineteenth century, +especially in connection with the study of myths and religions. The +fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes the form of saying +"This god or hero really represents the sun." Or "Apollo killing the +Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter." Or "The King dying in +a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting in the west." Now I +should really have thought that even the skeptical professors, whose +skulls are as shallow as frying-pans, might have reflected that human +beings never think or feel like this. Consider what is involved in this +supposition. It presumes that primitive man went out for a walk and saw +with great interest a big burning spot on the sky. He then said to +primitive woman, "My dear, we had better keep this quiet. We mustn't let +it get about. The children and the slaves are so very sharp. They might +discover the sun any day, unless we are very careful. So we won't call +it 'the sun,' but I will draw a picture of a man killing a snake; and +whenever I do that you will know what I mean. The sun doesn't look at all +like a man killing a snake; so nobody can possibly know. It will be a +little secret between us; and while the slaves and the children fancy I am +quite excited with a grand tale Of a writhing dragon and a wrestling +demigod, I shall really MEAN this delicious little discovery, that there +is a round yellow disc up in the air." One does not need to know much +mythology to know that this is a myth. It is commonly called the Solar +Myth. + +Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god was +never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a +hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend +Dombey is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods +and heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw +the sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress +of nightfall, and he' said, "That is how the face of the god would shine +when he had slain the dragon," or "That is how the whole world would bleed +to westward, if the god were slain at last." + +No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No man, +however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man as round +as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however attracted to +an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the Dryad was as lean +and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never worshipped Nature; and +indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all human beings are +superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon Nature, as God has +printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous sun to stand still; +we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more for a star than for a +starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we could not for the time +control, we have conceived great beings in human shape controlling them. +Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the march and victory of +Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is his, and he made it. +In other words, what the savage really said about the sea was, "Only my +fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of mere water." What the +savage really said about the sun was," Only my great great-grandfather +Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown." + +About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. +I say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that one +of them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are no real +ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real bank-notes. +Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to those of us +that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, even a false +god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the second place. When +once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before Him, offering flowers +in spring as flames in winter. "My love is like a red, red rose" does not +mean that the poet is praising roses under the allegory of a young lady. +"My love is an arbutus" does not mean that the author was a botanist so +pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he said he loved it. "Who art +the moon and regent of my sky" does not mean that Juliet invented Romeo to +account for the roundness of the moon. "Christ is the Sun of Easter" does +not mean that the worshipper is praising the sun under the emblem of +Christ. Goddess or god can clothe themselves with the spring or summer; +but the body is more than raiment. Religion takes almost disdainfully the +dress of Nature; and indeed Christianity has done as well with the snows +of Christmas as with the snow-drops of spring. And when I look across +the sun-struck fields, I know in my inmost bones that my joy is not solely +in the spring, for spring alone, being always returning, would be always +sad. There is somebody or something walking there, to be crowned with +flowers: and my pleasure is in some promise yet possible and in the +resurrection of the dead. + + + + +THE REAL JOURNALIST + + +Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of +reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce +between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is done. +I take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. +Nothing looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel +columns, its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its +responsible, polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter of fact, +goes every night through more agonies of adventure, more hairbreadth +escapes, desperate expedients, crucial councils, random compromises, or +barely averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it seems to come +round as automatically as the clock and as silently as the dawn. Seen +from the inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief every +morning to see that it has come out at all; that it has come out without +the leading article upside down or the Pope congratulated on discovering +the North Pole. + +I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) from +the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little episode in +the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and instructive: the tale +of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There are really two stories: +the story as seen from the outside, by a man reading the paper; and the +story seen from the inside, by the journalists shouting and telephoning +and taking notes in shorthand through the night. + +This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The +notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy +pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, long +calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant leader of +the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his fanatic soul. +In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not having the fear +of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote the line "that +wreathes its old fantastic roots so high." This he said because he had +been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because he thought +craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and forgotten +rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that orthodox +gentleman made a howling error; and received some twenty-five letters and +post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the mistake. + +But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it was +a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, and +cried, "What is the joke NOW?" Another professed (and practised, for all +I know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and failed +to find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, asking, as +in confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a noble +collection; but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and +exactitude in the recipient's profession and character which is far from +the truth. Let us pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + +In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same +culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to +Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another +cropper--or whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was printed by +the editor with the justly scornful title, "Mr. Chesterton 'Explains'?" +Any man reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the meaning of the +sarcastic quotation marks. They meant, of course, "Here is a man who +doesn't know Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up and he can't +even spell Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation." That is the +perfectly natural inference of the reader from the letter, the mistake, +and the headline--as seen from the outside. The falsehood was serious; +the editorial rebuke was serious. The stern editor and the sombre, +baffled contributor confront each other as the curtain falls. + +And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly +rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really are. +A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a column +in the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it (which is +always at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded by infants of +all shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and he has to cope +with the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a glorious thing; but +the journalist in question has never understood why it was considered a +soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not of watering little budding +flowers, but of wrestling for hours with gigantic angels and devils. +Moral problems of the most monstrous complexity besiege him incessantly. +He has to decide before the awful eyes of innocence, whether, when a +sister has knocked down a brother's bricks, in revenge for the brother +having taken two sweets out of his turn, it is endurable that the brother +should retaliate by scribbling on the sister's picture book, and whether +such conduct does not justify the sister in blowing out the brother's +unlawfully lighted match. + +Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest morality, +it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday article; +and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly calls to +somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for a messenger; +he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, wondering what +on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on the door outside +and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his thoughts; and he is +able to observe some newspapers and circulars in wrappers lying on the +table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second is a shiny pamphlet +about petrol; the third is a paper called The Christian Commonwealth. He +opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a page a sentence with which he +honestly disagrees. It says that the sense of beauty in Nature is a new +thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A stream of images and pictures +pour through his head, like skies chasing each other or forests running by. +"Not felt before Wordsworth!" he thinks. "Oh, but this won't do... +bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang...night's candles are +burnt out... glowed with living sapphires. leaving their moon-loved +maze...antique roots fantastic... antique roots wreathed high...what is +it in As You Like It?" + +He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children +drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the +messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making the +world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making +Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting "fantastic +roots wreathed high" instead of "antique roots peep out." Then the +journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma of +whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the sister +pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is how an +article is really written. + +The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article +has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: but +the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the paper +and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his friends at +the other end; he knows that they can spell "Gray," as no doubt they can: +but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a pencil scribble and +the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes at the top of the +letter "'G. K. C.' Explains," putting the initials in quotation marks. +The next man passing it for press is bored with these initials (I am with +him there) and crosses them out, substituting with austere civility, "Mr. +Chesterton Explains." But and now he hears the iron laughter of the Fates, +for the blind bolt is about to fall--but he neglects to cross out the +second "quote" (as we call it) and it goes up to press with a "quote" +between the last words. Another quotation mark at the end of "explains" +was the work of one merry moment for the printers upstairs. So the +inverted commas were lifted entirely off one word on to the other and a +totally innocent title suddenly turned into a blasting sneer. But that +would have mattered nothing so far, for there was nothing to sneer at. In +the same dark hour, however, there was a printer who was (I suppose) so +devoted to this Government that he could think of no Gray but Sir Edward +Grey. He spelt it "Grey" by a mere misprint, and the whole tale was +complete: first blunder, second blunder, and final condemnation. + +That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic and +ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might remember it +when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged by the neck on +circumstantial evidence. + + + + +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + + +Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most +romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch +blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; +that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it +is always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that +they have an eye to business. I like that phrase "an eye" to business. + +Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his forehead. +It served him admirably for the only two duties which are demanded in a +modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties of counting sheep +and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out he was done for. +But the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though their best friends +must admit that they are occasionally business-like. They are, quite +fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this is proved by the very +economic argument that is used to prove their harshness and hunger for the +material. The mass of Scots have accepted the industrial civilisation, +with its factory chimneys and its famine prices, with its steam and smoke +and steel--and strikes. The mass of the Irish have not accepted it. The +mass of the Irish have clung to agriculture with claws of iron; and have +succeeded in keeping it. That is because the Irish, though far inferior +to the Scotch in art and literature, are hugely superior to them in +practical politics. You do need to be very romantic to accept the +industrial civilisation. It does really require all the old Gaelic +glamour to make men think that Glasgow is a grand place. Yet the miracle +is achieved; and while I was in Glasgow I shared the illusion. I have +never had the faintest illusion about Leeds or Birmingham. The industrial +dream suited the Scots. Here was a really romantic vista, suited to a +romantic people; a vision of higher and higher chimneys taking hold upon +the heavens, of fiercer and fiercer fires in which adamant could evaporate +like dew. Here were taller and taller engines that began already to +shriek and gesticulate like giants. Here were thunderbolts of +communication which already flashed to and fro like thoughts. It was +unreasonable to expect the rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot to stand still in +such a whirl of wizardry to ask whether he, the ordinary Scot, would be +any the richer. + +He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich +city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich men. +It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, +Manchester, Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, +Munich, or Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, +perhaps, be due to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots +has there been reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence of +the Irish. In any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main +historical fact. The Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal +opportunities of industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The +Irish refused those enormous and unequal opportunities, because the Irish +are clear-sighted. They would not need very clear sight by this time to +see that in England and Scotland the temptation has been a betrayal. The +industrial system has failed. + +I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of +the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and the +widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with the +fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, when he +gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediaeval +diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of +Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in +the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying to +be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full (as its +history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The wageslavery +we live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing-in which the Scotch +are more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, than in their +Scotch wickedness. It is what makes the Master of Ballantrae the most +thrilling of all fictitious villains. It is what makes the Master of +Lovat the most thrilling of all historical villains. It is poetry. It +is an intensity which is on the edge of madness or (what is worse) magic. +Well, the Scotch have managed to apply something of this fierce +romanticism even to the lowest of all lordships and serfdoms; the +proletarian inequality of today. You do meet now and then, in Scotland, +the man you never meet anywhere else but in novels; I mean the self-made +man; the hard, insatiable man, merciless to himself as well as to others. +It is not "enterprise "; it is kleptomania. He is quite mad, and a much +more obvious public pest than any other kind of kleptomaniac; but though +he is a cheat, he is not an illusion. He does exist; I have met quite two +of him. Him alone among modern merchants we do not weakly flatter when we +call him a bandit. Something of the irresponsibility of the true dark +ages really clings about him. Our scientific civilisation is not a +civilisation; it is a smoke nuisance. Like smoke it is choking us; like +smoke it will pass away. Only of one or two Scotsmen, in my experience, +was it true that where there is smoke there is fire. + +But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage of +this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all chronicles, +it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland nearly +everything has always been in revolt--especially loyalty. If these people +are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of wrecking it; and +the thought of my many good friends in that city makes me really doubtful +about which would figure in human memories as the more huge calamity of +the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so weak as to call +themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men weak enough to +believe them. + +As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had +little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies who +used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes] They were not, however, +strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since +they worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked +in the mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment +when I saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. +They were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was +the finest thing they could do. + + + + +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + + +A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are +and should be various, there must be some communication between them if +they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual +formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not +depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all stark with +the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our different +visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees the sun as a +perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is an +impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The +colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to live +under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that there is +nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle (like a +monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is shut up in +the cell of a separate universe. + +But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from the +denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the individual +become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world like a cloud; he +causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. For what happens +is this: that all the shortsighted people come together and build a city +called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for granted and paint +short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted policies. Meanwhile +all the men who can stare at the sun get together on Salisbury Plain and +do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who see a blue moon band +themselves together and assert the blue moon, not once in a blue moon, but +incessantly. So that instead of a small and varied group, you have +enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the liberty of dogma, you have the +tyranny of taste. + +Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; perhaps +the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership by the organ +of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to production. If +a man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be any kind of man he +likes in any other sense--a bookie, a Mahatma, a man about town, an +archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling at the moment +clear-headed Socialists in all of these capacities, it is obvious that a +clear-headed Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a creed) can be a +soldier, like Mr. Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, or a Bathchairman +like Mr. Meeke, or a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, or an artistic +tradesman like the late Mr. William Morris. + +But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by what +they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far more than +this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is: etc., etc. Now +mark their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be tradesmen, +or soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, but become a +particular sort of person who is always the same. When once it has been +discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic formula, it is +also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one particular kind of +clothes, reading one particular kind of books, hanging up one particular +kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases even eating one particular +kind of food. For men must recognise each other somehow. These men will +not know each other by a principle, like fellow citizens. They cannot know +each other by a smell, like dogs. So they have to fall back on general +colouring; on the fact that a man of their sort will have a wife in pale +green and Walter Crane's "Triumph of Labour" hanging in the hall. + +There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost +made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret the +supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but embracing +all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan unity which is +founded rather on certain social habits, certain common notions, both +permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular social pleasures. + + +Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) it +did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a thing +asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical +genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of +Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous +varnish. + +And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a +creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to +believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of +religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; +the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people do +each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, with +heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which alone +holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own kind +outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and call each +other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call themselves +weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker in a general +atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off looking for somebody +else with whom to brawl. + +This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been in +many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having got +beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to get beyond +catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from neglect of the +same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that they may differ on +everything else; that God gave men a law that they might turn it into +liberties. + +There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife and +husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the +contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of +identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent +contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more +incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul cannot +possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first cousin. +There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; they are +generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to think the +same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to think the same +thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at it, in the last +extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing disgrace--this +really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; and it is much better +represented by a common religion than it is by affinities and auras. And +what applies to the family applies to the nation. A nation with a root +religion will be tolerant. A nation with no religion will be bigoted. +Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: that when men come together to +profess a creed, they come courageously, though it is to hide in catacombs +and caves. But when they come together in a clique they come sneakishly, +eschewing all change or disagreement, though it is to dine to a brass band +in a big London hotel. For birds of a feather flock together, but birds +of the white feather most of all. + + + + +THE FOOL + + +For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I had +been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think that he +was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; but +before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of him. +After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline to +think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately most +of them occupying important positions. When I say "him," I mean the +entire idiot. + +I have never been able to discover that "stupid public" of which so many +literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at +tea parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough +so to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have +heard brilliant "conversationalists" conversing with other people, the +conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of +intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other +people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their +stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find +the refreshment of a single fool. + +But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous +brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle +of humour and good sense. The "mostly fools" theory has been used in an +anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I did +not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the +aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite +rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an idea +of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities of his +experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, not that +section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. They are +often cynical, especially about money, but even their boredom tends to +make them a little eager for any real information or originality. If a +man like Mr. Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up his mind for any +reason to attack Syndicalism he would find out what it was first. Not so +the man I found in the club. + +He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black +clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the whole +suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one of those +who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some third +element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His manners +were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. They +involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I suddenly +remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old playgoers who +had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, "If I was the +Government," and then put a cigar in his mouth which he lit carefully with +long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out of his mouth again and +said, "I'd give it 'em," as if it were quite a separate sentence. But +even while his mouth was stopped with the cigar his companion or +interlocutor leaped to his feet and said with great heartiness, snatching +up a hat, "Well, I must be off. Tuesday!". I dislike these dark +suspicions, but I certainly fancied I recognised the sudden geniality with +which one takes leave of a bore. + +When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was to +me that he addressed the belated epigram. "I'd give it 'em." + +"What would you give them," I asked, "the minimum wage?" + +"I'd give them beans," he said. "I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, every +man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's the whole +country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows standing +between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!" +" +That would surely be a little harsh," I pleaded. "After all, they are +not under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have +commissions in the Yeomanry." + +"Commissions in the Yeomanry!" he repeated, and his eyes and face, which +became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me +feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + +"Besides," I continued, "wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their +money?" + +"Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow," he said, "and I'd +confiscate their funds as well." + +"The policy is daring and full of difficulty," I replied, "but I do not +say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But you +must remember that though the facts of property have become quite +fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These coal-owners, +though they have not earned the mines, though they could not work the +mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. Hence your +suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating their property, +raises very--" + +"What do you mean?" asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. +"Who yer talking about?" + +"I'm talking about what you were talking about," I replied; "as you put it +so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing +between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their +own coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those prices, +care as little for national starvation as most merchant princes and +pirates have eared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples that +were enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a bit of +a revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme violence +you suggest. You say--" + +"I say," he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid +energy like that of some noble beast, "I say I'd take all these blasted +miners and--" + +I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood +staring at that mental monster. + +"Oh," I said, "so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal +servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be +shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead they +will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem somewhat +moved.. The fact is, I have just found something. Something I have been +looking for four years." + +"Well," he asked, with no unfriendly stare, "and what have you found?" + +"No," I answered, shaking my head sadly, "I do not think it would be quite +kind to tell you what I have found." + +He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, and +we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the +disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country +sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county +magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important +companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + +The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory this +article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the miner, +who is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He is not +the mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by selling +his coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic +politician, who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic +opportunities. But he is the man who appears in scores of public places +open to the upper middle class or (that less known but more powerful +section) the lower upper class. Men like this all over the country are +really saying whatever comes into their heads in their capacities of +justice of the peace, candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, +old family doctor, Poor Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in +trade disputes. He suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the +brain; he has softened it by always taking the view of everything most +comfortable for his country, his class, and his private personality. He +is a deadly public danger. But as I have given him his name at the +beginning of this article there is no need for me to repeat it at the end. + + + + +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + + +Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And I +think the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to record +as plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on his mind +by anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of any modern +problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike was a flat +meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or two, he will +probably throw more light on the strike by describing this which he has +seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and the bloody +leaders of the mob whom he has never seen--nor any one else either. If he +comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as happened to a friend +of my grandfather) he should still remember that a true account of the day +after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to have. Though he was on +the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being murdered, we should still +like to have the wrong side described in the right way. Upon this +principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or military arrangements, and +have only held my breath like the rest of the world while France and +Germany were bargaining, will tell quite truthfully of a small scene I saw, +one of the thousand scenes that were, so to speak, the anterooms of that +inmost chamber of debate. + +In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares of +a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray and +rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, like the +solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; the sloping +roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping with damp; +and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were scoured with +old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with many doors and +found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. I also found a +notice of services, etc., and among these I found the announcement that at +11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there would be a special service +for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft of young men who were being +taken from their homes in that little town and sent to serve in the French +Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful moment, when the French Army was +encamped at a parting of the ways. There were already a great many people +there when I entered, not only of all kinds, but in all attitudes, +kneeling, sitting, or standing about. And there was that general sense +that strikes every man from a Protestant country, whether he dislikes the +Catholic atmosphere or likes it; I mean, the general sense that the thing +was "going on all the time"; that it was not an occasion, but a perpetual +process, as if it were a sort of mystical inn. + +Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, +when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. They +were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French +conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young +criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so +obviously prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to them +like hell; others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so decent +a place. But it was not so much the mere class variety that most sharply +caught an Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those one or two +kinds of men who would never have become soldiers in any other way. + +There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of +hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it may +be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. But +there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never tend to +soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red hair, +large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across the church +that he had always taken care of his health, not even from thinking about +it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one of those who pass +from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a man. In the row +in front of him there was a very slight and vivid little Jew, of the sort +that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those accidents that make +real life so unlike anything else, he was the one of the company who +seemed especially devout. Behind these stiff or sensitive boys were +ranged the ranks of their mothers and fathers, with knots and bunches of +their little brothers and sisters. + +The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and gaped +at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying their +own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of rain outside +gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church continuously +darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn in odd, rather +strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but only one perpetual +refrain; so that it sounded like + + +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie, +Valdarkararump pour la patrie. + + +Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing +gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child +started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a +French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + +I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline of +its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to +talk about "clericalism" and "militarism." Those who talk like that are +made of the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate +"Socialism." The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God and +the Mother of God were not "clericalists "; or, if they were, they had +forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not +"militarists"--quite the other way just then. The priest made a short +speech; he did not utter any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), he +uttered platitudes. In such circumstances platitudes are the only +possible things to say; because they are true. He began by saying that he +supposed a large number of them would be uncommonly glad not to go. They +seemed to assent to this particular priestly dogma with even more than +their alleged superstitious credulity. He said that war was hateful, and +that we all hated it; but that "in all things reasonable" the law of one's +own commonwealth was the voice of God. He spoke about Joan of Arc; and +how she had managed to be a bold and successful soldier while still +preserving her virtue and practising her religion; then he gave them each +a little paper book. To which they replied (after a brief interval for +reflection): + + +Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie, +Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. + + +which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + +While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded about my +own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening church. +They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I cannot utter +them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me that we were +barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was happening +outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the windows +darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the nature of that +light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and hardly dared to +guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that enemies were +already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were groaning under +their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town itself had been +destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands of years hence, and +that if I opened the door I should come out on a wilderness as flat and +sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the veil of stone and slate +grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to see chasms cloven to the +foundations of all things, and letting up an infernal dawn. Huge things +happily hidden from us had climbed out of the abyss, and were striding +about taller than the clouds. And when the darkness crept from the +sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of St. John I fancied that some +hideous giant was walking round the church and looking in at each window +in turn. + +Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a ship +carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes I +thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron chain +out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the wings +of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young men +inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things +outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + +I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of +limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic +tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and his +mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the passes +of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies and +thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter +it now. + +But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, but +only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters +announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + + + + +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + + +It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by +some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a man +sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State may +remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; when +the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + +The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been +gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not merely +because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an aesthete--that is, +an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other people's bodies; he tortured +his own soul into the same red revolting shapes. Though he came quite +early in Roman Imperial history and was followed by many austere and noble +emperors, yet for us the Roman Empire was never quite cleansed of that +memory of the sexual madman. The populace or barbarians from whom we come +could not forget the hour when they came to the highest place of the earth, +saw the huge pedestal of the earthly omnipotence, read on it Divus Caesar, +and looked up and saw a statue without a head. + +It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from +which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI was a +very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many good business +men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the torturer clung +about everything he did, even when it was right. And just as the great +Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so even the silver +splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, has never painted +out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis XI. Whenever the +unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible savour that humanity +finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the unhealthy man is on top; +but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or mad on statecraft, like +Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our tyrant is not the satyr +or the torturer; but the miser. + +The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; +but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had some +touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected gold--a +substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory or old oak. +An old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the simple ardour, +something of the mystical materialism, of a child who picks out yellow +flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but coloured clay can be +very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is content with far less +genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like the glitter of buttercups, +the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, compared with the dreary +papers and dead calculations which make the hobby of the modern miser. + +The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content +sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the mere +repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs to eggs. +And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many tramps +and savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man could find +some comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But the Yankee +millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his bed-head and +ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's stocking were +safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's ledger are +safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with their +increase depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least collects +coins; his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts collects +nothings. + +It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; +but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The +answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma for +us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is important; +because this special problem is separate from the old general quarrel +about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong books, old +and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers and privileges +have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out of the power of +the moderately rich as well as of the moderately poor. They are out of +the power of everybody except a few millionaires--that is, misers. In +the old normal friction of normal wealth and poverty I am myself on the +Radical side. I think that a Berkshire squire has too much power over his +tenants; that a Brompton builder has too much power over his workmen; that +a West London doctor has too much power over the poor patients in the West +London Hospital. + +But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for +instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper +Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze +everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern +market. The things that change modern history, the big national and +international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, +the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, +the big expenses often incurred in elections--these are getting too big +for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly +fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + +There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about them. +The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the chance +of a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser +aristocracies. The moderately rich include all kinds of people even good +people. Even priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are +sometimes heroes. Some doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their +patients and not by flattering them; some brewers have been known to sell +beer. But among the Very Rich you will never find a really generous man, +even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will never +give themselves away; they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To +be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it. + +Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser is +flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never called +self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called +self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like +Dancer was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A man +like Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his early rising +or his unassuming dress. His "simple" meals, his "simple" clothes, his +"simple" funeral, are all extolled as if they were creditable to him. +They are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful as the tatters and +vermin of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To be in rags for +charity would be the condition of a saint; to be in rags for money was +that of a filthy old fool. Precisely in the same way, to be "simple" for +charity is the state of a saint; to be "simple" for money is that of a +filthy old fool. Of the two I have more respect for the old miser, +gnawing bones in an attic: if he was not nearer to God, he was at least a +little nearer to men. His simple life was a little more like the life of +the real poor. + + + + +THE MYSTAGOGUE + + +Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and +impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your +aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is +perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond +all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all +good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; and +though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is +always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are +that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + +Thus Giotto or Fra Angelieo would have at once admitted theologically that +God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint Him. +And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather quaint old +man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the elves, was +less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him in some way. +That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy pictures and twisted +statues which seem, to many refined persons, more blasphemous than the +secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good is always towards +Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined thinkers who worship +the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the salons of Paris, always +insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, the unutterable character +of the abomination. They call him "horror of emptiness," as did the black +witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they worship him as the unspeakable name; +as the unbearable silence. They think of him as the void in the heart of +the whirlwind; the cloud on the brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets +of vertigo or the endless corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians +who gave the Devil a grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and +spiked tail. It was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. +The Satanists never drew him at all. + +And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity +and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may +separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt from +mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he has an +idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has no idea +will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too subtle to be +explained. The first idea may really be very outree or specialist; it may +really be very difficult to express to ordinary people. But because the +man is trying to express it, it is most probable that there is something +in it, after all. The honest man is he who is always trying to utter the +unutterable, to describe the indescribable; but the quack lives not by +plunging into mystery, but by refusing to come out of it. + +Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the thing +called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that an +attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy +cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that a +landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait painter +only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. And +again it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the pictures +can only express half of them, and that the less important half. Still, +it does express something; the thread is not broken that connects God With +Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The "Mona Lisa" was in +some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her to be. Leonardo's +picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And Walter Pater's rich +description was, in some respects, like the picture. Thus we come to the +consoling reflection that even literature, in the last resort, can express +something other than its own unhappy self. + +Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely +inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being +speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in +Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically the +critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of painting +into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be inadequate--but +so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the first to admit. But +anything which has been intelligently received can at least be +intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent cause for the +cadaverous colour of Botticelli's "Venus Rising from the Sea." Ruskin +does suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying forests and +falsifying landscapes. These two great critics were far too fastidious +for my taste; they urged to excess the idea that a sense of art was a sort +of secret; to be patiently taught and slowly learnt. Still, they thought +it could be taught: they thought it could be learnt. They constrained +themselves, with considerable creative fatigue, to find the exact +adjectives which might parallel in English prose what has been clone in +Italian painting. The same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. Stevenson +and many others in the exposition of Velasquez. They had something to say +about the pictures; they knew it was unworthy of the pictures, but they +said it. + +Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and +Post Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They +are not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt to +translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is +untranslatable--that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, +impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their banner; +they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper on which +Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried to dry it +with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good old +anti-democratic muddlements: that "the public" does not understand these +things; that "the likes of us" cannot dare to question the dark decisions +of our lords. + +I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple +test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, +something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man is +made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt is +as good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go back +and look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, it is +the business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic literary +expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to it. If +they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their eulogies, +as there is nothing except eulogy--then they are quacks or the +high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say nothing about +the artists except that they are good it is because the artists are bad. +They can explain nothing because they have found nothing; and they have +found nothing because there is nothing to be found. + + + + +THE RED REACTIONARY + + +The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and +complete road to anything--even to restoration. Revolution alone can be +not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the dead. + +A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) was +once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated in that +area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great creative crisis +about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its own, and made a +revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down this street he +whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. Gandish, "in his +researches into 'istry," and which had somehow taken his fancy; the song +to which those last sincere loyalists went into battle. I think the +words ran : + +Monsieur de Charette. +Dit au gens d'ici. +Le roi va remettre. +Le fleur de lys. + +My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and +it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic +lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy the +"Dies Irae," or a Protestant to remember "Lillibullero." Yet he was +stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might +get him at least into temporary trouble. + +A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by walking +round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a bonfire +cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot be too loud, +and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I actually +recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a formidable +proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that had been +primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. Some of the +real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such as "Charlie is +My Darling," or "What's a' the steer, kimmer?" songs that men had sung +while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under which we live. +They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present King were swept +aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual words "King +George" occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they were played to +celebrate his very Coronation; played as promptly and innocently as if +they had been "Grandfather's Clock" or "Rule Britannia" or "The +Honeysuckle and the Bee." + +That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between +two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not +really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that +has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. +When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was picked +up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the throne +the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been driven out +of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that the Bourbons +might possibly return that they will take a little trouble to discourage +it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never return that we +actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment to their rivals. +And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the faces of all the +bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: indeed, it is difficult +to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it quite unconsciously; +because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the French have not. We +really believe that the past is past. It is a very doubtful point. + +Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men +free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared +away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who +have preserved everything--we cannot restore anything. Take, for the sake +of argument, the complex and many coloured ritual of the Coronation +recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate centuries; +from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade of culture +or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or even dated. +The fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord "against all +manner of folk" obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; no longer +confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes from some +chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four of our +counties; and when hostile" folk" might live in the next village. The +sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless and +the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great attempt to +make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the Coronation Service +says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. Elaborate local +tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the Manor of Work-sop is +alone allowed to do something or other, these probably belong to the decay +of the Middle Ages, when that great civilisation died out in grotesque +literalism and entangled heraldry. Things like the presentation of the +Bible bear witness to the intellectual outburst at the Reformation; things +like the Declaration against the Mass bear witness to the great wars of +the Puritans; and things like the allegiance of the Bishops bear witness +to the wordy and parenthetical political compromises which (to my deep +regret) ended the wars of religion. + +But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all +that long list of variations there must be, and there are, things which +energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable modification, +to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see again the great +Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique and almost frozen +formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the old passion that +excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc would really prefer the +Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer the Erastian oligarchy of the +eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would probably be disputed (from widely +different motives) by Mr. Rudyard Kipling and Mr. Cunninghame Graham. +But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would win. + +But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is that +none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back to the +Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediaevals; because (alas) +there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for building or +rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can wander back +and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top of them, and +can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without being able to +take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide that their +Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that a Republic +was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French democracy +actually desired every detail of the mediaeval monarchy, they could have +it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If another +Dauphin were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc actually +bore a miraculous banner before him; if mediaeval swords shook and. +blazed in every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every tapestry; +if this were really proved to be the will of France and the purpose of +Providence--such a scene would still be the lasting and final +justification of the French Revolution. + +For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + + + + +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + + +In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in Asiatic +arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we tend nowadays +to do to our own records and our own religion. The first is a tendency to +talk as if certain things were not only present in the higher Orientals, +but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will fall into a habit of +wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, as if no Western +knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern knights had ever +broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full of the praises of +Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no Christians had been +saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the first injustice is to +think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the other injustice is a +failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly Eastern. It is too much +taken for granted that the Eastern sort of idealism is certainly superior +and convincing; whereas in truth it is only separate and peculiar. All +that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in the East is rooted in Pantheism; +but all that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in us is concerned with +denying passionately that Pantheism is either the highest or the purest +religion. + +Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the spirit +of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and curiously +assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with the full +stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so that the +stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung arms. Now in +this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. In so far as +what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all things, the Eastern +artists have no more monopoly of it than they have of hunger and thirst. + +I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit +this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far East +to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even in +other painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that +ornament of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: "Even the most +undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing meditations +not to be exhibited by much weeping." But, I do not therefore admit that +a Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made a somewhat similar remark) +had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere Occidental fable and travesty of +that celebrated figure. I do not deny that Tinishona wrote that exquisite +example of the short Japanese poem entitled "Honourable Chrysanthemum in +Honourable Hole in Wall." But I do not therefore admit that Tennyson's +little verse about the flower in the cranny was not original and even +sincere. + +It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that when +engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster and +chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being much +affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon tablets +of ivory the lines beginning: "Small and unobtrusive blossom with ruby +extremities." But this incident, touching as it is, does not shake my +belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am left with +an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere in their +poetry--and in their prose. + +I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and its +admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go on to +more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say--with the utmost +respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form of Cheek, for +this school to speak in this way about the mother that bore them, the +great civilisation of the West. The West also has its magic landscapes, +only through our incurable materialism they look like landscapes as well +as like magic. The West also has its symbolic figures, only they look +like men as well as symbols. It will be answered (and most justly) that +Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own instinct and tradition; +that its artists are concerned to suggest one thing and our artists +another; that both should be admired in their difference. Profoundly true; +but what is the difference? It is certainly not as the Orientalisers +assert, that we must go to the Far East for a sympathetic and +transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid a long enough toll +of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that disability. + +Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern +mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy of +creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, +like St. Francis, "My brother fire and my sister water "; the former says, +"Myself fire and myself water." Whether you call the Eastern attitude an +extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of oneself into +nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The effect is the same, +an effect which lives and throbs throughout all the exquisite arts of the +East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a pulsation of pattern, or +of ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, but always suggesting the +unification of the individual with the world. But there is quite another +kind of sympathy the sympathy with a thing because it is different. No +one will say that Rembrandt did not sympathise with an old woman; but no +one will say that Rembrandt painted like an old woman. No one will say +that Reynolds did not appreciate children; but no one will say he did it +childishly. The supreme instance of this divine division is sex, and that +explains (what I could never understand in my youth) why Christendom +called the soul the bride of God. For real love is an intense +realisation of the "separateness" of all our souls. The most heroic and +human love-poetry of the world is never mere passion; precisely because +mere passion really is a melting back into Nature, a meeting of the waters. +And water is plunging and powerful; but it is only powerful downhill. +The high and human love-poetry is all about division rather than identity; +and in the great love-poems even the man as he embraces the woman sees her, +in the same instant, afar off; a virgin and a stranger. + +For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if we +grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised in +what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and the +Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the East. +There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even the +superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential +difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; +whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the Dragon. +In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the stories he +not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the Christian +have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, really has an +appetite for cold Christian--and especially for cold Christianity. This +blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of everything and digest it +in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is what is really meant by the +Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The Cosmos as such is cannibal; +as old Time ate his children. The Eastern saints were saints because they +wanted to be swallowed up. The Western saint, like St. George, was +sainted by the Western Church precisely because he refused to be swallowed. +The same process of thought that has prevented nationalities +disappearing in Christendom has prevented the complete appearance of +Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist the idea of being +absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a British, or a Turkish +Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and much more tyrannical, +which free men will resist with even stronger passion. The free man +violently resists being absorbed into the empire which is called the +Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, but still more Home +Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home Rule for himself. He +claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem fatalism. He claims the +right to be damned in spite of theosophical optimism. He refuses to be +the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + + + + +THE MUMMER + + +The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so close +that they might as well have been inside the house instead of just outside; +so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem farther away. +Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who come every year +in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of the old Christmas +play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very Venal Doctor. I will +not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will describe my parallel +sentiments as it passed. + +One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic +revivals of mediaeval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are +elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple society +of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are +mediaevalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The +first is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child +just able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up as +anybody--but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea of being the +King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is generally +suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, from far +deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because it is +Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a ritual +investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the dances +of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries of Persia. +For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the concealment of +the personality combined with the exaggeration of the person. The man +performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and conspicuous. It is +part of that divine madness which all other creatures wonder at in Man, +that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and anonymity. Man is not, +perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, but he is the only +creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do indeed take the +colours of their environment; but that is not in order to be watched, but +in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism of rejoicing, but the +formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose nature is the +unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue because they +lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles powder their hair +to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not dressing up as +kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. Nay, even when +modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is doubted by some +naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping notice. So +merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten and exaggerate +their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, primarily speaking, +in another identity. It is not Acting--that comparatively low +profession-comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; and, as Mr. Kensit would +truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is Mummery. That is, it is the +noble conception of making Man something other and more than himself when +he stands at the limit of human things. It is only careful faddists and +feeble German philosophers who want to wear no clothes; and be "natural" +in their Dionysian revels. Natural men, really vigorous and exultant men, +want to wear more and more clothes when they are revelling. They want +worlds of waistcoats and forests of trousers and pagodas of tall hats +toppling up to the stars. + +Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If our +more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to +reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight (I +do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque and +appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from the best +books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and ornaments +would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my garden door +opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, the appearance +of that champion was slightly different. His face was energetically +blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an aged and very tall top +hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a surplice, and he flourished +a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, talk about "ignorance"; or +suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a very pleasant Ratcatcher, +with a tenor voice) did this because he knew no better. Try to realise +that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of England was not black, and did +not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. The Rat-catcher is not under this +delusion; any more than Paul Veronese thought that very good men have +luminous rings round their heads; any more than the Pope thinks that +Christ washed the feet of the twelve in a Cathedral; any more than the +Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a tabard are like the lions at the Zoo. +These things are denaturalised because they are symbols; because the +extraordinary occasion must hide or even disfigure the ordinary people. +Black faces were to mediaeval mummeries what carved masks were to Greek +plays: it was called being "vizarded." My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently +arrogant to suppose for a moment that he looks like St. George. But he is +sufficiently humble to be convinced that if he looks as little like +himself as he can, he will be on the right road. + +This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in disguise. +There are, of course, other mediaeval elements in it which are also +difficult to explain to the fastidious mediaevalists of to-day. There is, +for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It can best be +defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the faintest desire +to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the trick of turning +on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely believed, merely for +the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling yet careless phrases. When +Tennyson says that King Arthur "drew all the petty princedoms under him," +and "made a realm and ruled," his grave Royalism is quite modern. Many +mediaevals, outside the mediaeval republics, believed in monarchy as +solemnly as Tennyson. But that older verse + +When good King Arthur ruled this land +He was a goodly King-- +He stole three pecks of barley-meal +To make a bag-pudding. + +is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are +other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called +Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediaevals merely +Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, I think, +in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in healthy +darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. If you +cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can carry the +forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk under +universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom a walking +forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very intensity of +the notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a mob of masks? + + + + +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + + +The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the +antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost +unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs of a +hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does not +necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere +unlettered simplicity of mind. + +But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our +decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its +best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many of +the philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God fearing +fisher or a noble mountaineer. His an- tics with donkeys and concertinas, +crowded char-abancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are not so vicious +or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements of the +overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than they are +at a political "At Home," or even an artistic soiree; and if the female +trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed and +underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to be a +donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks men and +women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that wants them +to change heads. + +But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as there +is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity which is +characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very people who +persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the whole society, +and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does things in a +clumsy and unbeautiful way. + +A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to visit +yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of +Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge at +all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray +tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour of +primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and very lonely +Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he missed Stonehenge. +But it does spoil his mood to find Stonehenge--surrounded by a brand-new +fence of barbed wire, with a policeman and a little shop selling picture +post-cards. + +Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer you, +"Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and carve +names and spoil the look of Stonehenge." It does not seem to occur to +them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of Stonehenge. +The scratching of a name, particularly when performed with blunt penknife +or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board education, can be trusted +in a little while to be indistinguishable from the grayest hieroglyphic by +the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could get a modern policeman into +the same picture with a Druid. This really vital piece of vandalism was +done by the educated, not the uneducated; it was done by the influence of +the artists or antiquaries who wanted to preserve the antique beauty of +Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to preserve your lady's beauty from +freckles by blacking her face all over; or to protect the pure whiteness +of your wedding garment by dyeing it green. + +And if you ask, "But what else could any one have done, what could the +most artistic age have done to save the monument?" I reply, "There are +hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediaevals might have done; and I have +no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in +their whole society they would have done something that was decent and +serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or +warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so +their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; not +deliberately--they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious order +such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of guard would +protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all sorts of +rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you mere raving +superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me one twentieth part +so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as calmly making a spot +hideous in order to keep it beautiful." + +The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to live +in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles down in a +place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar personal cases, of +course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, the Jew is a genuine +peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering cad. He is a highly +civilised man in a highly difficult position; the world being divided, and +his own nation being divided, about whether he can do anything else except +wander. + +The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated +Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by +calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen are +extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. The +truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude Englishman. +What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is the polite +Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders for Rembrandts, +and he treats the great nations that made these things courteously--as he +would treat the custodians of any museum. It does not seem to strike him +that the Italian is not the custodian of the pictures, but the creator of +them. He can afford to look down on such nations--when he can paint such +pictures. + +That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. If, +living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian +character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire +Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. +It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will +often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality of +the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without +discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If +you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians--you are a cheap +tripper. + +The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere +that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, coming +among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is caddish +to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a wine taster; and +then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink and squint at the +colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; and then refuse to +buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a thing and not use it. +But the main point is that one has no right to see Stonehenge without +Salisbury Plain and Salisbury: One has no right to respect the dead +Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no right to visit a +Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea fishes--fed along a +lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing the sights without +breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + + + + +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + + +It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story that +the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is almost +peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, of their +nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even phrases invented +for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new while it is nearly +a thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old while they were +still new. + +The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, they +are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive +inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an offender; +they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been convicted of +murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous rebellion, when +his offence has really been a sleek submission to the powers that be. +They must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his eloquence to rouse the +mob, whereas he has really shown considerable cleverness in damping it +down. It was probably under the same impulse towards a mysterious misfit +of names that people denounced Dr. Inge as "the Gloomy Dean." + +Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there +anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but +sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives have +made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him this +erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern +capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared to +anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that +gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very +curious state of things. + +When Dr. Inge was called "the Gloomy Dean" a great injustice was done him. +He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against the +forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism rather +than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have suffered no +wrong, or that employers have done no wrong--such a man is not a Gloomy +Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A man who can feel +satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with a mysterious +fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not less curious; +because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom reposes on his +having said that our worker's demand high wages, while the placid people +of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + +This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much +difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low +wages for the same reason that they will submit to "the punishment known +as Li, or Slicing"; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy and +suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to the +husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their temples +with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they sometimes seem +to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual perversion. They +do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with traditions different +from ours about the limits of endurance and the gestures of self-respect. +They may be very much better than we are in hundreds of other ways; and I +can quite understand a man (though hardly a Dean) really preferring their +historic virtues to those of Christendom. A man may perhaps feel more +comfortable among his Asiatic coolies than among his European comrades: +and as we are to allow the Broadest Thought in the Church, Dr. Inge has as +much right to his heresy as anybody else. It is true that, as Dr. Inge +says, there are numberless Orientals who will do a great deal of work for +very little money; and it is most undoubtedly true that there are several +high-placed and prosperous Europeans who like to get work done and pay as +little as possible for it. + +But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and +traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which he +has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of +years of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge +admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced the +sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious deduction +is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen Chinese. +Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he ought to be +at the head of a great mission in London for converting the English to +Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties of paganism +would have free and natural play; his style would improve; his mind would +begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all sorts of little +irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the most Conservative +Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + +In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism +and public change which is the note of all our history springs from a +certain spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; +nay, it may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the +special defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the +ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It +will often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice +though the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the +formula of the great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that all +men were free and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the formula +of the peasant who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there were but +one slave in England, and he did all the work while the rest of us made +merry, this spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to God night and +day. Whether or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly works with, a +creed which postulates a humanised God and a vividly personal immortality. +Men must not be busy merely like a swarm, or even happy merely like a +herd; for it is not a question of men, but of a man. A man's meals may be +poor, but they must not be bestial; there must always be that about the +meal which permits of its comparison to the sacrament. A man's bed may +be hard, but it must not be abject or unclean: there must always be about +the bed something of the decency of the death-bed. + +This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible +murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil that +threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot encourage +the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. Christendom will +continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being Christian: it is the +Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had absent-mindedly +strayed into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I advise him to +chuck it. + +But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian +temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. +Inge is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. +Such a man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being "court +chaplains of King Demos" or about his own superb valour in defying the +democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. We should +not expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that Demos has +never been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; we should +not expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains they would +be uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; he +considers himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New Theologian; +that is, he is liberal in theology--and nothing else. He is apparently +in sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy with those who would +soften the superior claim of our creed by urging the rival creeds of the +East; with those who would absorb the virtues of Buddhism or of Islam. He +holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of Religions where all +believers respect each other's unbelief. + +Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When next +you hear the "liberal" Christian say that we should take what is best in +Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people like Dr. +Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge propose to +take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of the Moslem. +You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of the Hindoo. +The more you study the "broad" movement of today, the more you will find +that these people want something much less like Chinese metaphysics, and +something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find the levelling of +creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of wages. Dr. Inge is +the typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never more so than when he +appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as the apostle of the +blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely among the prosperous and +polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or Mohammedanism practically means +this--that the poor must be as meek as Buddhists, while the rich may be as +ruthless as Mohammedans. That is what they call the reunion of all +religions. + + + + +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + + +The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of washing; +and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore +comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. +Rain, that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities +of these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists +are eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public +bath; it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons +coming fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished or +dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when +coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an +enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: it +scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry +rafters and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring cleaning. + +If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble at +the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are +constantly told that we should leave our little special possessions and +join in the enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social +machinery. I offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It +disregards that degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman to +take his shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because it +is public and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls the +string. + +As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the +neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water +drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and debauch +of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative intoxication of +the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret or the golden +clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such scenes of apocalypse, +towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne falls like fire from +heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with the terrible colours +of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as he rolls in the long +soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, and listens to the +roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who ought to be the true +bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are drinking water. +Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the trees rave and reel +to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs as revellers clash cups; +they roar undying thirst and howl the health of the world. + +All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes a +noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count it +Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I +complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all +living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every +weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, +their need is greater than mine--especially for water. + +There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild +Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an +incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel a +tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he puts +on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying all umbrella; +it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of despots in the +dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable walkingstick; +open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no taste for +pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my hat, and +precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against wet, it must +be by some closer and more careless protection, something that I can +forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be that yet +more Highland thing, a mackintosh. + +And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military qualities +of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and white sheen +as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think of it as the +uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty raids. I like +to think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, descending on some +doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs flashing in the sun or moon. +For indeed this is one of the real beauties of rainy weather, that while +the amount of original and direct light is commonly lessened, the number +of things that reflect light is unquestionably increased. There is less +sunshine; but there are more shiny things; such beautifully shiny things +as pools and puddles and mackintoshes. It is like moving in a world of +mirrors. + +And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual works +of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it doubles it. +If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the roads (to the +sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. Shallow lakes of +water reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we dwell in a double +universe. Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous pavements, wet under +numerous lamps, a man seems a black blot on all that golden looking-glass, +and could fancy he was flying in a yellow sky. But wherever trees and +towns hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, the sense of Celestial +topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, dazzling confusion of shape +and shadow, of reality and reflection, will appeal strongly to any one +with the transcendental instinct about this dreamy and dual life of ours. +It will always give a man the strange sense of looking down at the skies. + + + + +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + + +When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) +to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is amusing to +ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours especially, +when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of one weakness +this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + +This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares +more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its "methods" more +than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good +communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are +precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean a +hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good +communications may in practice be very like those evil communications +which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a +"scientific age," which wants to know whether the train is in the +timetable, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one +instance in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the +case of photography. + +Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, and +the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so that +he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted or +suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head +thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and +slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, a +definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I should +have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, with a +profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + +Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great +many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, if +seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland +Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and dark +emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic or +whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked like some +swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of coalblack +hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately under his +eyes his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have been painted +scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one under the lower, +seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches of Mephistopheles. +His eyes had that "dancing madness" in them which Stevenson saw in the +Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes distorted the expression by +screwing a monstrous monocle into one of them. A man more unmistakable +would have been hard to find. You could have picked him out in any +crowd--so long as you had not seen his photograph. + +But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and +conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits of +photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring of cheek +and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the darkness +out of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The framing and +limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; and the +devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write poetry made +him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people do when they +are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never held it +normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated his slight +figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished by a button +and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature has been more +delicately and dexterously omitted than they could have been by the most +namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest water-colours, on the +smoothest ivory. + +I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of which +depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents an utterly +incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate language the +license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it strictly safe +and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They would have +clapped me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate Max's caricature. +But the caricature would have been far more likely to find the man. + +This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific civilisation. +It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man that it never +asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, seemingly most +detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever since I was a boy. +We were told that in some row Boer policemen had shot an Englishman, a +British subject, an English citizen. A long time afterwards we were quite +casually informed that the English citizen was quite black. Well, it +makes no difference to the moral question; black men should be shot on the +same ethical principles as white men. But it makes one distrust +scientific communications which permitted so startling an alteration of +the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a photographic negative in +which a black man came out white. Later we were told that an Englishman +had fought for the Boers against his own flag, which would have been a +disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted that he was an Irishman; +which is exactly as different as if he had been a Pole. Common sense, +with all the facts before it, does see that black is not white, and that a +nation that has never submitted has a right to moral independence. But +why does it so seldom have all the facts before it? Why are the big +aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic wrath, always left +out in such official communications, as they were left out in the +photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an African and eyes +as fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation drop all four of the +facts? Its error is to omit the arresting thing--which might really +arrest the criminal. It strikes first the chilling note of science, +demanding a man "above the middle height, chin shaven, with gray moustache," +etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir Redvers Buller. It does not +seize the first fact of impression, as that a man is obviously a sailor or +a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a nigger or an albino or a +prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. These are the realities by +which the people really recognise each other. They are almost always left +out of the inquiry., + + + + +THE SULTAN + + +There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial +cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter +far you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in +something dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you +find your butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you +find your ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread +them among your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. +There are numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is +this. That we have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we +have Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + +I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise +out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, and +like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not that, +like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that he +committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and errors +in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the ideas they +could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand for +Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the world. +He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the principles +that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs of a +Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. That +the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the +fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could +not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which he +lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old bachelor +of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently quoted in the +Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his time. It was not +his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill somewhere in South +Africa "his church." It was not his fault, I mean, that he could not see +that a church all to oneself is not a church at all. It is a madman's +cell. It was not his fault that he "figured out that God meant as much of +the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible." Many evolutionists much wiser +had "figured out" things even more babyish. He was an honest and humble +recipient of the plodding popular science of his time; he spread no ideas +that any cockney clerk in Streatham could not have spread for him. But it +was exactly because he had no ideas to spread that he invoked slaughter, +violated justice, and ruined republics to spread them. + +But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not +only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are +actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to +extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented as +seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our Imperialist +aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the East. For +that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism has been +deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + +The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of +politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first to +steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial +cynic who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself +submitted to Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism and +destiny. + +There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of Rhodes. +The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that Africa is +still chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in the South +confronting savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, Arabs, and +Soudanese, and then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: "It is +inevitable fate that all this should be changed; and I should like to be +the agent of fate." That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine idea; and +it is an Oriental idea. + +Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial +position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and +barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. +We are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to +teach a Turk to say "Kismet "; which he has said since his cradle. We are +to deny Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in order +to teach an Arab to believe he is "an agent of fate," when he has never +believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true (which +fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia or +Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in billycocks, +instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. The best +Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a doubtful and +romantic future in which all things may happen--this essential Western +idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he says himself) he did +not believe in it. + +It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress in +addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of King +is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant to be +vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and Moon, +the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in the +days of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather a +religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. He +was not merely a conqueror, but a father--yes, even when he was a bad +father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local affections +and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the King, but the +Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic of money, of +luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen race. Indeed +Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to the Sultan, +from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + + + + +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + + +The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion +which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic +architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained in +most of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic +eclipses the classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once +lively and mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally +rich and complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No man +ever got out of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a cathedral +tower. Over all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India there is the +presence of something stiff and heartless, of something tortured and +silent. Dwarfed trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers and hunchbacked +birds accentuate by the very splendour and contrast of their colour the +servility and monotony of their shapes. It is like the vision of a +sneering sage, who sees the whole universe as a pattern. Certainly no one +ever felt like this about Gothic, even if he happens to dislike it. Or, +again, some will say that it is the liberty of the Middle Ages in the use +of the comic or even the coarse that makes the Gothic more interesting +than the Greek. There is more truth in this; indeed, there is real truth +in it. Few of the old Christian cathedrals would have passed the Censor +of Plays. We talk of the inimitable grandeur of the old cathedrals; but +indeed it is rather their gaiety that we do not dare to imitate. We +should be rather surprised if a chorister suddenly began singing "Bill +Bailey" in church. Yet that would be only doing in music what the +mediaevals did in sculpture. They put into a Miserere seat the very +scenes that we put into a music hall song: comic domestic scenes similar to +the spilling of the beer and the hanging out of the washing. But though +the gaiety of Gothic is one of its features, it also is not the secret of +its unique effect. We see a domestic topsy-turvydom in many Japanese +sketches. But delightful as these are, with their fairy tree-tops, paper +houses, and toddling, infantile inhabitants, the pleasure they give is of +a kind quite different from the joy and energy of the gargoyles. Some +have even been so shallow and illiterate as to maintain that our pleasure +in medieval building is a mere pleasure in what is barbaric, in what is +rough, shapeless, or crumbling like the rocks. This can be dismissed +after the same fashion; South Sea idols, with painted eyes and radiating +bristles, are a delight to the eye; but they do not affect it in at all +the same way as Westminster Abbey. Some again (going to another and +almost equally foolish extreme) ignore the coarse and comic in +mediaevalism; and praise the pointed arch only for its utter purity and +simplicity, as of a saint with his hands joined in prayer. Here, again, +the uniqueness is missed. There are Renaissance things (such as the +ethereal silvery drawings of Raphael), there are even pagan things (such +as the Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere a piety. None of +these explanations explain. And I never saw what was the real point about +Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw it behind a row of +furniture-vans. + +I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the +smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall +cut off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the +yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across +that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the +more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it +like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this +ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly +coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond that +the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, +straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as +the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + +As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; +what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not +variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, +but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man +of our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or an +Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had +mistaken for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this +gave to my eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving +towards the right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across +the plain like the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with the +clouds. Then I saw what it was. + +The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that it is +on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting +architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are +stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear the +arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty and +numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of imperial +elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners going into +battle; the silence was deafening with ail the mingled noises of a +military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up its +thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from all +the roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in the core +of the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his wings of +brass, + +And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in +the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; the +voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of spears. +I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; and I knew +indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in either hand the +trowel and the sword. + +I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had +marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. +Some Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of the +desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been woke +at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the tall +pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every snake or +sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner of the +architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally in the +flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like torches across +dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of music and darkness +and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln hill. So for some +hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of the Gothic; then the +last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw only a church tower in a +quiet English town, round which the English birds were floating. + + + + +THE MAN ON TOP + + +There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be stated +too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not trusted +simply because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite clearly seen +and said without any reference to our several passions or partisanships. +It does not follow that we think such a distrust a wise sentiment to +express; it does not even follow that we think it a good sentiment to +entertain. But such is the sentiment, simply because such is the fact. +The distinction can be quite easily defined in an example. I do not +think that private workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their employer. +But I do think that patriotic soldiers owe a more or less indefinite +loyalty to their leader in battle. But even if they ought to trust their +captain, the fact remains that they often do not trust him; and the fact +remains that he often is not fit to be trusted. + +Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very +muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to put +employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should have +thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has +nothing to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; it +is a distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more +elegance and poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment +under Lord Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the +atmosphere, but in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order to +pay Lord Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and +philanthropic, did exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the +shopkeeper it failed as a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he is +underpaid, but only if he is defeated. The object of the Army is the +safety of the nation from one particular class of perils; therefore, since +all citizens owe loyalty to the nation, all citizens who are soldiers owe +loyalty to the Army. But nobody has any obligation to make some +particular rich man richer. A man is bound, of course, to consider the +indirect re-suits of his action in a strike; but he is bound to consider +that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, or a smoking concert; in his wildest +holiday or his most private conversation. But direct responsibility like +that of a soldier he has none. He need not aim solely and directly at the +good of the shop; for the simple reason that the shop is not aiming solely +and directly at the good of the nation. The shopman is, under decent +restraints, let us hope, trying to get what he can out of the nation; the +shop assistant may, under the same decent restraints, get what he can out +of the shopkeeper. All this distinction is very obvious. At least I +should have thought so. + +But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the +military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious +shop assistant "disloyal"--that leaves exactly where it was the question +of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. Granted that +all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the cloven pennon +of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true that the pennon +may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that all Barney Barnato's +workers ought to have followed him to death or glory, it is still a +Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was likely to lead them to. +Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for his master's medicines, we +may still hold an inquest to find out if he died of them. While we +forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may still wish the general +were shot. + +The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. +Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are +worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. +The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are +accidents--or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is a +generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A revolutionist +would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next to nothing about +coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners know next to +nothing about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend the nature of +their own monopoly with any consistent and courageous policy, however +wicked, as did the old aristocrats with the monopoly of land. They have +not the virtues nor even the vices of tyrants; they have only their powers. +It is the same with all the powerful of to-day; it is the same, for +instance, with the high-placed and high-paid official. Not only is the +judge not judicial, but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. The arbiter +decides, not by some gust of justice or injustice in his soul like the old +despot dooming men under a tree, but by the permanent climate of the class +to which he happens to belong. The ancient wig of the judge is often +indistinguishable from the old wig of the flunkey. + +To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one +must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against +details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just +judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such as +Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. Seen +close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and +impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can tell +if the Tower leans. + +Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, we +shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole +governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will see +some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the employer +often comes there early in the morning; that he has great organising power; +that if he works over the colossal accumulation of wealth he also works +over its wise distribution. All this may be true of many employers, and +it is practically said of all. + +But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply ask +what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the +capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and +solid result of the reign of the employers has been--unemployment. +Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot upon +which the whole process turns. + +Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great +squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense +or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care for +the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see much +cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts of the +estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has been the +actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is plain. At +the end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the land. The +practical effect of having landlords is not having tenants. The practical +effect of having employers is that men are not employed. The unrest of +the populace is therefore more than a murmur against tyranny; it is +against a sort of treason. It is the suspicion that even at the top of +the tree, even in the seats of the mighty, our very success is +unsuccessful. + + + + +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + + +There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are some +who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again--or snore again. +There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration Courts as to +the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the day that they +look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + +The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may +incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things +for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when +the States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or when +all the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of +Washington. It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The real +democratic unrest at this moment is not an extension of the representative +process, but rather a revolt against it. It is no good giving those now +in revolt more boards and committees and compulsory regulations. It is +against these very things that they are revolting. Men are not only +rising against their oppressors, but against their representatives or, as +they would say, their misrepresentatives. The inner and actual spirit of +workaday England is coming out not in applause, but in anger, as a god who +should come out of his tabernacle to rebuke and confound his priests. + +There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom +we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of +whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't have. +She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger and +exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than the +modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the horror +of bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; and it is +quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort of industry +natural to the classes from which men can climb into great wealth. He has +grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, accustomed to have +dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without discomfort. He regards +cleanliness as a kind of separate and special costume; to be put on for +great festivals. He has several really curious characteristics, which +would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they had any eyes. For +instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in marked contrast to his +actual spirit, which is generally patient and civil. He has an odd way of +using certain words of really horrible meaning, but using them quite +innocently and without the most distant taint of the evils to which they +allude. He is rather sentimental; and, like most sentimental people, not +devoid of snobbishness. At the same time, he believes the ordinary manly +commonplaces of freedom and fraternity as he believes most of the decent +traditions of Christian men: he finds it very difficult to act according +to them, but this difficulty is not confined to him. He has a strong and +individual sense of humour, and not much power of corporate or militant +action. He is not a Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to +a Labour Member than he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This +is the Common Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at +last. + +See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it is +his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to cure, +and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including two of +his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal Commission to +consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike upon the +railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, any of the +gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to Mr. Henderson, +whom I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of confusing with that +of a railway-porter. I do not think that any old gentleman, however +absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, let us say, to hand +his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to reward that politician +with twopence. Of the others I can only judge by the facts about their +status as set forth in the public Press. The Chairman, Sir David Harrell, +appeared to be an ex-official distinguished in (of all things in the +world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no earthly reason to doubt that the +Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not talking about what men mean to be, +but about what they are. The police in Ireland are practically an army of +occupation; a man serving in them or directing them is practically a +soldier; and, of course, he must do his duty as such. But it seems truly +extraordinary to select as one likely to sympathise with the democracy of +England a man whose whole business in life it has been to govern against +its will the democracy of Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers +were offered the sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police +in Finland or Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised +world sees Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time +we did. The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct +and habit akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the +Commissioners actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then came Mr. +Henderson (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, "By your leave."), +and then another less known gentleman who had "corresponded" with the +Board of Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to represent the +very poor. + +Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough report, +and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of that kind are +tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably business-like. But if +any one supposes that men of that kind can conceivably quiet any real +'quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the man whom I first described, +it is frantic. The common worker is angry exactly because he has found +out that all these boards consist of the same well-dressed Kind of Man, +whether they are called Governmental or Capitalist. If any one hopes that +he will reconcile the poor, I say, as I said at the beginning, that such a +one has not looked on the light of day or dwelt in the land of the living. + +But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical and +urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man of +whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern +England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would be +offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost +incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This +Kind of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be +represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind +of Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the +middle class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, +he must remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + +Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory +powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the first +Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you drove him +with a whip. + + + + +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN + + +I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King John. + +But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he +believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a +whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not +sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or +merely a humdrum respectability. + +I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is a +protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a +particular attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always +hunting and Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, +and Charles I always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in +rotation making his people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and King +John pulling out Jews' teeth with the celerity and industry of an American +dentist. Anything is good that shakes all this stiff simplification, and +makes us remember that these men were once alive; that is, mixed, free, +flippant, and inconsistent. It gives the mind a healthy kick to know that +Alfred had fits, that Charles I prevented enclosures, that Rufus was +really interested in architecture, that Henry VIII was really interested +in theology. + +And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid imagination +of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are on the right +side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a Puritan, and +John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they were people whom +we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think that John was a +nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of him is all wrong. +Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had what commonly makes +them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and hotheaded decision. +But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, but which we +misunderstand. + +The mediaeval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In their +social system the mediaevals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as their +heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings of guild +or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of man as +standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While they +clad and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly and +quaintly for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have of the +freedom of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an eagle +in the heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern as +most fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + +For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute +description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused the +apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been in an +unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have decided +the other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of another world, +a world that now can never be. + +This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way can be +felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and ballad. +It is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy intellectual +forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the physical science +of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have taught, have +darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of bad men as +something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of people. The +Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It brought the +villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version of King John. +But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that about him, even +when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to be a man of mixed +passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil passions to have much +too good a time of it. They might have spoken of him as a man in +considerable danger of going to hell; but they would have not talked of +him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of Percy or Robin Hood +it frequently happens that the King comes upon the scene, and his ultimate +decision makes the climax of the tale. But we do not feel, as we do in +the Byronic or modern romance, that there is a definite stage direction +"Enter Tyrant." Nor do we behold a deus ex machina who is certain to do +all that is mild and just. The King in the ballad is in a state of virile +indecision. Sometimes he will pass from a towering passion to the most +sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; sometimes he will begin an act of +vengeance and be turned from it by a jest. Yet this august levity is not +moral indifference; it is moral freedom. It is the strong sense in the +writer that the King, being the type of man with power, will probably +sometimes use it badly and sometimes well. In this sense John is +certainly misrepresented, for he is pictured as something that none of his +own friends or enemies saw. In that sense he was certainly not so black +as he is painted, for he lived in a world where every one was piebald. + +King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind of +degenerate; a shifty-eyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's backbone +and green blood in his veins. The mediaevals were quite capable of +boiling him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable of +despairing of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori case +is that of the strange mediaeval legend of Robert the Devil. Robert was +represented as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman actually in +answer to prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are simply those of +the infernal fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he can be called +almost literally a child of hell, yet the climax of the story is his +repentance at Rome and his great reparation. That is the paradox of +mediaeval morals: as it must appear to the moderns. We must try to +conceive a race of men who hated John, and sought his blood, and believed +every abomination about him, who would have been quite capable of +assassinating or torturing him in the extremity of their anger. And yet +we must admit that they would not really have been fundamentally surprised +if he had shaved his head in humiliation, given all his goods to the poor, +embraced the lepers in a lazar-house, and been canonised as a saint in +heaven. So strongly did they hold that the pivot of Will should turn +freely, which now is rusted, and sticks. + +For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our +public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a +noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit +that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the +powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and +rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect him +to go on maddening them--and us. We do not expect him, let us say, +suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of repentance; +especially in public things; that is why we cannot really get rid of our +great national abuses of economic tyranny and aristocratic avarice. +Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal drudge; and mostly consists +of being moved on by the police. We move on because we are not allowed to +move back. But the really ragged prophets, the real revolutionists who +held high language in the palaces of kings, they did not confine +themselves to saying, "Onward, Christian soldiers," still less, "Onward, +Futurist soldiers"; what they said to high emperors and to whole empires +was, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?" + + + + +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + + +Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there are +even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to most modern +books. A detective story generally describes six living men discussing +how it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story generally +describes six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be alive. But +those who have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted one thing, that +when the murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. "That, " says +Sherlock Holmes, "is the advantage of being a private detective"; after he +has caught he can set free. The Christian Church can best be defined as +an enormous private detective, correcting that official detective--the +State. This, indeed, is one of the injustices done to historic +Christianity; injustices which arise from looking at complex exceptions +and not at the large and simple fact. We are constantly being told that +theologians used racks and thumbscrews, and so they did. Theologians +used racks and thumbscrews just as they used thimbles and three-legged +stools, because everybody else used them. Christianity no more created +the mediaeval tortures than it did the Chinese tortures; it inherited them +from any empire as heathen as the Chinese. + +The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and +employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, if +we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real difference +between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The State, in all +lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, more bloody and +brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal everywhere. The +Church is the only institution that ever attempted to create a machinery +of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever attempted by system to +pursue and discover crimes, not in order to avenge, but in order to +forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the weaknesses of the +religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the world. Its +speciality--or, if you like, its oddity--was this merciless mercy; the +unrelenting sleuthhound who seeks to save and not slay. + +I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays on +somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in America. +The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent experiment, +dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure as he passes +through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to make cheap fun +of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; that is a point +of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions have been abrupt. +This saviour's method of making people good is to tell them how good they +are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, whose moral backs are +broken, and who are soaked with sincere self-contempt, I can imagine that +this might be quite the right way. I should not deliver this message to +authors or members of Parliament, because they would so heartily agree +with it. + +Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. +Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a +detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of +tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. +Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine thing, +though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be faced, even +in order to be forgiven; the great objection to "letting sleeping dogs +lie" is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. Jerome's +Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine detective, +pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a sort of divine +dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not see anything that is +going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, "Tout comprendre est tout +pardonner." But it is much more evidently true to say, "Rien comprendre +est rien Pardonner," and the "Third Floor Back" does not seem to +comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite selfish +sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his neighbours. +There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been deceived. The +heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived. + +When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play which +I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. I mean Mr. +Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which sprawls over so +many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned with a dim, yet +evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a whole group of +persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; in fact, it is +a very fine play indeed; but there is nothing aesthetic or fastidious +about it. It is as much or more than the other sensational, democratic, +and (I use the word in a sound and good sense) Salvationist. + +But the difference lies precisely in this--that the Christ of Mr. +Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; he +declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons evil, +but he will not ignore it. In other words, be is a Christian, and not a +Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained by the +problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes Christ to be +trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, is naturally a +simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying to save the +reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief characters in +The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous vicar, universally +respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. It would have been no +good to tell these people they had some good in them--for that was what +they were telling themselves all day long. They had to be reminded that +they had some bad in them--instinctive idolatries and silent treasons +which they always tried to forget. It is in connection with these crimes +of wealth and culture that we face the real problem of positive evil. The +whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy about sin was vitiated throughout by +one's consciousness that whenever he wrote the word "sinner" he thought of +a man in rags. But here, again, we can find truth merely by referring to +vulgar literature--its unfailing fountain. Whoever read a detective +story about poor people? The poor have crimes; but the poor have no +secrets. And it is because the proud have secrets that they need to be +detected before they are forgiven. + + + + +THE ELF OF JAPAN + + +There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I love +them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but +psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me +as examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from +another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he +might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about +cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral +independence and readiness to scratch anybody "if he does not behave +himself." Others, like Mr. Belloe, regard the cat as cruel and secret, a +fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, +poisoned food, "so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and +humility." For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats +as I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They +are both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And +this abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called Love; +for it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it is a +vision. It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for nothing +in return. I love all the eats in the street as St. Francis of Assisi +loved all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not so much, +of course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to bridle a +bird and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. He did +not wish to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the name +"Francis," and the address "Assisi"--as one does with a dog. He did not +wish them to belong to him or himself to belong to them; in fact, it would +be a very awkward experience to belong to a lot of fishes. But a man does +belong to his dog, in another but an equally real sense with that in which +the dog belongs to him. The two bonds of obedience and responsibility +vary very much with the dogs and the men; but they are both bonds. In +other words, a man does not merely love a dog; as he might (in a mystical +moment) love any sparrow that perched on his windowsill or any rabbit that +ran across his path. A man likes a dog; and that is a serious matter. + +To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a +cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is so +mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like +Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is really +cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men of old +time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those magnificent +old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which one really +loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and within reason) +loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man feels himself--no, +not absorbed into the unity of all things (a loathsome fancy)--but +delighting in the difference of all things. At the moment when a man +really knows he is a man he will feel, however faintly, a kind of +fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is a crocodile. All the +more will he exult in the things that are more evidently beautiful than +crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and eats--which are more beautiful +than either. But it does not follow that he will wish to pick all the +flowers or to cage all the birds or to own all the cats. + +No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit +that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful +analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of +such fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like +eats in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I feel it +about certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the Japanese. +The exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall see no more, +now Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a quality that was +infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures were really +rather like pictures made by cats. They were full of feathery softness +and of sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will wander in some +gallery fortunate enough to have a fine collection of those slight +water-colour sketches on rice paper which come from the remote East, he +will observe many elements in them which a fanciful person might consider +feline. There is, for instance, that odd enjoyment of the tops of trees; +those airy traceries of forks and fading twigs, up to which certainly no +artist, but only a cat could climb. There is that elvish love of the full +moon, as large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, hung in these tenuous +branches. That moon is so large and luminous that one can imagine a +hundred cats howling under it. Then there is the exhaustive treatment of +the anatomy of birds and fish; subjects in which cats are said to be +interested. Then there is the slanting cat-like eye of all these Eastern +gods and men--but this is getting altogether too coincident. We shall +have another racial theory in no time (beginning "Are the Japs Cats?"), +and though I shall not believe in my theory, somebody else might. There +are people among my esteemed correspondents who might believe anything. +It is enough for me to say here that in this small respect Japs affect me +like cats. I mean that I love them. I love their quaint and native +poetry, their instinct of easy civilisation, their unique unreplaceable +art, the testimony they bear to the bustling, irrepressible activities of +nature and man. If I were a real mystic looking down on them from a real +mountain, I am sure I should love them more even than the strong winged and +unwearied birds or the fruitful, ever multiplying fish. But, as for liking +them, as one likes a dog--that is quite another matter. That would mean +trusting them. + +In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much +in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not +specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; +but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give +the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would +happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always +a fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as wedding +cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as lanterns! .. +. but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the paper) that the +assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture was a mere matter +of verbal translation. "The Japanese would not call twisting the thumbs +back 'torture.'" + + + + +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + + +I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark +in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming a +peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist asceticism +to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an atheist and an +ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious to see one's +country thus losing her special point of honour about asylum and liberty. +It will be quite a new departure if we begin to protect and whitewash +foreign policemen. I always understood it was only English policemen who +were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, however, have begun to feel +with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities and officials are being +questioned. But there is one most graphic and extraordinary fact, which +it did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch upon, but which somebody really +must seize and emphasise. It is this: that at the very time when we are +all beginning to doubt these authorities, we are letting laws pass to +increase their most capricious powers. All our commissions, petitions, +and letters to the papers are asking whether these authorities can give an +account of their stewardship. And at the same moment all our laws are +decreeing that they shall not give any account of their stewardship, but +shall become yet more irresponsible stewards. Bills like the +Feeble-Minded Bill and the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate names for +them) actually arm with scorpions the hand that has chastised the +Malatestas and Maleckas with whips. The inspector, the doctor, the police +sergeant, the well-paid person who writes certificates and "passes" this, +that, or the other; this sort of man is being trusted with more authority, +apparently because he is being doubted with more reason. In one room we +are asking why the Government and the great experts between them cannot +sail a ship. In another room we are deciding that the Government and +experts shah be allowed, without trial or discussion, to immure any one's +body, damn any one's soul, and dispose of unborn generations with the +levity of a pagan god. We are putting the official on the throne while he +is still in the dock. + +The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as +when people talk of an author's "message," without thinking whom it is +from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of another +word. It is the excellent mediaeval word "charter." I remember the Act +that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called "The Children's +Charter." Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as lunatics people who +are not lunatics was actually called a "charter" of the feeble-minded. +Now this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the Bills are right. Even +were they right in theory they would be applied only to the poor, like +many better rules about education and cruelty. A woman was lately +punished for cruelty because her children were not washed when it was +proved that she had no water. From that it will be an easy step in +Advanced Thought to punishing a man for wine-bibbing when it is proved +that he had no wine. Rifts in right reason widen down the ages. And +when we have begun by shutting up a confessedly kind person for cruelty, +we may yet come to shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for feeblemindedness. + +But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use +the word "charter." A charter does not mean a thing that does good to +people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. +It may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their cigarettes: +it might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of their cigars. +But I think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much surprised if the +King granted them a new charter (in place of their mediaeval charter), and +it only meant that policemen might pull the cigars out of their mouths. +It may be a good thing that all drunkards should be locked up: and many +acute statesmen ("King John, for instance) would certainly have thought it +a good thing if all aristocrats could be locked up. But even that +somewhat cynical prince would scarcely have granted to the barons a thing +called "the Great Charter" and then locked them all up on the strength of +it. If he had, this interpretation of the word "charter" would have +struck the barons with considerable surprise. I doubt if their narrow +mediaeval minds could have taken it in. + +The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no +Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own +conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them +till he understands this word "charter." I will attempt in a moment to +state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, +practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter +was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last +Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called in +the current jargon "recognition"; the acknowledgment in so many words by +society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If there +had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have been a +railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the King, +defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea still true +and then almost universal: that authority is necessary for nothing so much +as for the granting of liberties. Like everything mediaeval, it ramified +back to a root in religion; and was a sort of small copy of the Christian +idea of man's creation. Man was free, not because there was no God, but +because it needed a God to set him free. By authority he was free. By +authority the craftsmen of the guilds were free. Many other great +philosophers took and take the other view: the Lucretian pagans, the +Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and determinists, all roughly confine +themselves to saying that God gave man a law. The mediaeval Christian +insisted that God gave man a charter. Modern feeling may not sympathise +with its list of liberties, which included the liberty to be damned; but +that has nothing to do with the fact that it was a gift of liberties and +not of laws. This was mirrored, however dimly, in the whole system. +There was a great deal of gross inequality; and in other aspects absolute +equality was taken for granted. But the point is that equality and +inequality were ranks--or rights. There were not only things one was +forbidden to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. A man was not +only definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. The holidays +of his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really meant lingers +alive in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a "chartered" libertine. + +Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every man's +door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes liberties with +everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel that the wind is +always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. But remember that +in the days when free men had charters, they held that the wind itself was +wild by authority; and was only free because it had a father. + + + + +THE CONTENTED MAN + + +The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating +because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the style +of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied with our +countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, however, +has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the "sweet content" of +the poet and the "cubic content" of the mathematician. Some distinguish +these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might happen to any +of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, "Of the content of the +King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be ignorant"; or +"Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, you are stealing +the spoons." And there really is an analogy between the mathematical and +the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation of which the latter +has been much weakened and misused. + +The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far that +the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane peril of +our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of security; and +it is not strange that our workers should often think about rising above +their position, since they have so continually to think about sinking +below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to saving and simple +pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To advise people to be +content with what they have got may or may not be sound moral philosophy. + +But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece of +impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the creed +of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, it remains +true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine discontent; +discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must always be the +human thing. It may be true that a par-titular man, in his relation to +his master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, will do well +to be fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry justice. But it is +not true, no sane person can call it true, that man as a whole in his +general attitude towards the world, in his posture towards death or green +fields, towards the weather or the baby, will be wise to cultivate +dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly experience, the great +truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet his neighbour's ox nor his +ass nor anything that is his. In highly complex and scientific +civilisations he may sometimes find himself forced into an exceptional +vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and scientific civilisations, +nine times out of ten, he only wants his own ass back. + +But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than in +moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has been +undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other meaning. +It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some accounts +of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + +But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the idea +of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; for +feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. +"Content" ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; +placidly, perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with +bread and cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought to +mean caring for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic content +of the bread and cheese and adding it to your own. Being content with an +attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to +living in it. It ought to mean appreciating what there is to appreciate +in such a position; such as the quaint and elvish slope of the ceiling or +the sublime aerial view of the opposite chimney-pots. And in this sense +contentment is a real and even an active virtue; it is not only +affirmative, but creative. The poet in the attic does not forget the +attic in poetic musings; he remembers whatever the attic has of poetry; he +realises how high, how starry, how cool, how unadorned and simple--in +short, how Attic is the attic. + +True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of +getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and +it is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so cold +and incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been +"through" things; when it is evident that they have come out on the other +side quite unchanged. A man might have gone "through" a plum pudding as a +bullet might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the size of the +pudding--and the man. But the awful and sacred question is "Has the +pudding been through him?" Has he tasted, appreciated, and absorbed the +solid pudding, with its three dimensions and its three thousand tastes and +smells? Can he offer himself to the eyes of men as one who has cubically +conquered and contained a pudding? + +In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through +trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content of +them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a +pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + +Thus the young genius says, "I have lived in my dreary and squalid village +before I found success in Paris or Vienna." The sound philosopher will +answer, "You have never lived in your village, or you would not call it +dreary and squalid." + +Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and +always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, "I've been right away from +these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies." The +sound philosopher will reply, "You have never been in thee islands; you +have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise +you could never have called them either muddy or little." + +Thus the Suffragette will say, "I have passed through the paltry duties of +pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come out to +intellectual liberty." The sound philosopher will answer, "You have never +passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it vulgar. Wiser and +stronger women than you have really seen a poetry in pots and pans; +naturally, because there is a poetry in them." It is right for the +village violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; it is right for +the stray Englishman to climb across the high shoulder of the world; it is +right for the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae or high places she +can allow to her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that any of these +climbers should kick the ladder by which they have climbed. But indeed +these bitter people who record their experiences really record their lack +of experiences. It is the countryman who has not succeeded in being a +countryman who comes up to London. It is the clerk who has not succeeded +in being a clerk who tries (on vegetarian principles) to be a countryman. +And the woman with a past is generally a woman angry about the past she +never had. + +When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and love +it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really been +through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them back +again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because we +have drunk them dry. + + + + +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + +I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover a +very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the controversies, +whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather up into this last +article a valedictory violence about all such things; and then pass to +where, beyond these voices, there is peace--or in other words, to the +writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed work. But before I +finally desert the illusions of rationalism for the actualities of romance, +I should very much like to write one last roaring, raging book telling +all the rationalists not to be so utterly irrational. The book would be +simply a string of violent vetoes, like the Ten Commandments. I would +call it "Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things I am Tired Of." + +This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would +begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing +imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might +begin thus:- (1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out +the noun. An adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, "Give +me a patriotism that is free from all boundaries." It is like saying, +"Give me a pork pie with no pork in it." Don't say, "I look forward to +that larger religion that shall have no special dogmas." It is like +saying, "I look forward to that larger quadruped who shall have no feet." +A quadruped means something with four feet; and a religion means something +that commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. Don't let the +meek substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, exuberant adjective. + + +(2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This +practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The +trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable terms, +and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the +simplest form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who +said to his tenants in an election speech, "Of course I'm not going to +threaten you, but if this Budget passes the rents will go up." The thing +can be done in many forms besides this. "I am the last man to mention +party politics; but when I see the Empire rent in pieces by irresponsible +Radicals," etc. "In this hall we welcome all creeds. We have no hostility +against any honest belief; but only against that black priestcraft and +superstition which can accept such a doctrine as," etc. "I would not say +one word that could ruffle our relations with Germany. But this I will +say; that when I see ceaseless and unscrupulous armament, " etc. Please +don't do it. Decide to make a remark or not to make a remark. But don't +fancy that you have somehow softened the saying of a thing by having just +promised not to say it. + +(3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. "Happiness" (let us say) +is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well +know when you haven't. "Progress" is a secondary word; it means the +degree of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But +modern controversies constantly turn on asking, "Does Happiness help +Progress?" Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. +Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. +Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is "spasmodic" (whatever that +means); while our "reactionism is settled and permanent." It never +strikes Mr. Swarm that democracy means something in itself; while +"reactionism" means nothing--except in connection with democracy. You +cannot react except from something. If Mr. Swann thinks I have ever +reacted from the doctrine that the people should rule, I wish he would +give me the reference. + +(4) Don't say, "There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself +right and the others wrong." Probably one of the creeds is right and the +others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must be +wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be wrong. +I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more +desperate sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are +certainly solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts +his shirt on Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other men +putting their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in them +quite as sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are wrong. +But one of them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of the +horses does win; not always even the dark horse which might stand for +Agnosticism, but often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. +Democracy has its occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been +known to come in first. But the point here is that something comes in +first. That there were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there +was one well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the +world is round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular +or oblong does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and +therefore not any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of +imprecation, don't say that the variety of creeds prevents you from +accepting any creed. It is an unintelligent remark. + +(5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), +don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the +majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of +mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The +man who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his +neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not try +to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks +himself Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself +Rockefeller; as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But +madmen never meet. It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, +they can inspire, they can fight, they can found religions; but they +cannot meet. Maniacs can never be the majority; for the simple reason +that they can never be even a minority. If two madmen had ever agreed +they might have conquered the world. + +(6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some men +are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height of +the French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat short. +In the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that +Rockefeller is stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human +equality reposes upon this: That there is no man really clever who has not +found that he is stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt small. +Some men never feel small; but these are the few men who are. + +(7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman with a +club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male sparrow +knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe knock +down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male have had to +use any violence at any time in order to make the female a female? Why +should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the sow or the +she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these creatures were +creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not talk such bosh. I +implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. Utterly and +absolutely abolish all such bosh--and we may yet begin to discuss these +public questions properly. But I fear my list of protests grows too long; +and I know it could grow longer for ever. The reader must forgive my +elongations and elaborations. I fancied for the moment that I was writing +a book. + + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of "A Miscellany of Men" by Chesterton. + diff --git a/old/miscy11.zip b/old/miscy11.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..34c6ece --- /dev/null +++ b/old/miscy11.zip diff --git a/old/miscy12.txt b/old/miscy12.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..60a9c99 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/miscy12.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5205 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton +#13 in our series by G. K. Chesterton + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: A Miscellany of Men + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: December, 1999 [EBook #2015] +[This file was last updated on February 22, 2003] + +Edition: 12 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN *** + + + + +This Etext prepared by Michael Pullen with proofreading assistance +by Michael K. Johnson and Joe Moretti + + + + + +A MISCELLANY OF MEN + +By G. K. CHESTERTON + + + + +CONTENTS + +THE SUFFRAGIST +THE POET AND THE CHEESE +THE THING +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS +THE NAMELESS MAN +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES +THE MAD OFFICIAL +THE ENCHANTED MAN +THE SUN WORSHIPPER +THE WRONG INCENDIARY +THE FREE MAN +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER +THE PRIEST OF SPRING +THE REAL JOURNALIST +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY +THE FOOL +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS +THE MYSTAGOGUE +THE RED REACTIONARY +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS +THE MUMMER +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER +THE SULTAN +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS +THE MAN ON TOP +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE +THE ELF OF JAPAN +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE +THE CONTENTED MAN +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + + + +THE SUFFRAGIST + + +Rightly or wrongly, it is certain that a man both liberal and chivalric, +can and very often does feel a dis-ease and distrust touching those +political women we call Suffragettes. Like most other popular sentiments, +it is generally wrongly stated even when it is rightly felt. One part of +it can be put most shortly thus: that when a woman puts up her fists to a +man she is putting herself in the only posture in which he is not afraid +of her. He can be afraid of her speech and still more of her silence; but +force reminds him of a rusted but very real weapon of which he has grown +ashamed. But these crude summaries are never quite accurate in any matter +of the instincts. For the things which are the simplest so long as they +are undisputed invariably become the subtlest when once they are disputed: +which was what Joubert meant, I suppose, when he said, "It is not hard to +believe in God if one does not define Him." When the evil instincts of +old Foulon made him say of the poor, "Let them eat grass," the good and +Christian instincts of the poor made them hang him on a lamppost with his +mouth stuffed full of that vegetation. But if a modern vegetarian +aristocrat were to say to the poor, "But why don't you like grass?" their +intelligences would be much more taxed to find such an appropriate +repartee. And this matter of the functions of the sexes is primarily a +matter of the instincts; sex and breathing are about the only two things +that generally work best when they are least worried about. That, I +suppose, is why the same sophisticated age that has poisoned the world +with Feminism is also polluting it with Breathing Exercises. We plunge at +once into a forest of false analogies and bad blundering history; while +almost any man or woman left to themselves would know at least that sex is +quite different from anything else in the world. + +There is no kind of comparison possible between a quarrel of man and woman +(however right the woman may be) and the other quarrels of slave and +master, of rich and poor, or of patriot and invader, with which the +Suffragists deluge us every day. The difference is as plain as noon; +these other alien groups never came into contact until they came into +collision. Races and ranks began with battle, even if they afterwards +melted into amity. But the very first fact about the sexes is that they +like each other. They seek each other: and awful as are the sins and +sorrows that often come of their mating, it was not such things that made +them meet. It is utterly astounding to note the way in which modern +writers and talkers miss this plain, wide, and overwhelming fact: one +would suppose woman a victim and nothing else. By this account ideal, +emancipated woman has, age after age, been knocked silly with a stone axe. +But really there is no fact to show that ideal, emancipated woman was +ever knocked silly; except the fact that she is silly. And that might +have arisen in so many other ways. Real responsible woman has never been +silly; and any one wishing to knock her would be wise (like the +streetboys) to knock and run away. It is ultimately idiotic to compare +this prehistoric participation with any royalties or rebellions. Genuine +royalties wish to crush rebellions. Genuine rebels wish to destroy kings. +The sexes cannot wish to abolish each other; and if we allow them any +sort of permanent opposition it will sink into something as base as a +party system. + +As marriage, therefore, is rooted in an aboriginal unity of instincts, you +cannot compare it, even in its quarrels, with any of the mere collisions +of separate institutions. You could compare it with the emancipation of +negroes from planters--if it were true that a white man in early youth +always dreamed of the abstract beauty of a black man. You could compare +it with the revolt of tenants against a landlord--if it were true that +young landlords wrote sonnets to invisible tenants. You could compare it +to the fighting policy of the Fenians--if it were true that every normal +Irishman wanted an Englishman to come and live with him. But as we know +there are no instincts in any of these directions, these analogies are not +only false but false on the cardinal fact. I do not speak of the +comparative comfort or merit of these different things: I say they are +different. It may be that love turned to hate is terribly common in +sexual matters: it may be that hate turned to love is not uncommon in the +rivalries of race or class. But any philosophy about the sexes that +begins with anything but the mutual attraction of the sexes, begins with a +fallacy; and all its historical comparisons are as irrelevant and +impertinent as puns. + +But to expose such cold negation of the instincts is easy: to express or +even half express the instincts is very hard. The instincts are very much +concerned with what literary people call "style" in letters or more vulgar +people call "style" in dress. They are much concerned with how a thing is +done, as well as whether one may do it: and the deepest elements in their +attraction or aversion can often only be conveyed by stray examples or +sudden images. When Danton was defending himself before the Jacobin +tribunal he spoke so loud that his voice was heard across the Seine, in +quite remote streets on the other side of the river. He must have +bellowed like a bull of Bashan. Yet none of us would think of that +prodigy except as something poetical and appropriate. None of us would +instinctively feel that Danton was less of a man or even less of a +gentleman, for speaking so in such an hour. But suppose we heard that +Marie Antoinette, when tried before the same tribunal, had howled so that +she could be heard in the Faubourg St. Germain--well, I leave it to the +instincts, if there are any left. It is not wrong to howl. Neither is it +right. It is simply a question of the instant impression on the artistic +and even animal parts of humanity, if the noise were heard suddenly like a +gun. + +Perhaps the nearest verbal analysis of the instinct may be found in the +gestures of the orator addressing a crowd. For the true orator must +always be a demagogue: even if the mob be a small mob, like the French +committee or the English House of Lords. And "demagogue," in the good +Greek meaning, does not mean one who pleases the populace, but one who +leads it: and if you will notice, you will see that all the instinctive +gestures of oratory are gestures of military leadership; pointing the +people to a path or waving them on to an advance. Notice that long sweep +of the arm across the body and outward, which great orators use naturally +and cheap orators artificially. It is almost the exact gesture of the +drawing of a sword. + +The point is not that women are unworthy of votes; it is not even that +votes are unworthy of women. It is that votes are unworthy of men, so +long as they are merely votes; and have nothing in them of this ancient +militarism of democracy. The only crowd worth talking to is the crowd +that is ready to go somewhere and do something; the only demagogue worth +hearing is he who can point at something to be done: and, if he points +with a sword, will only feel it familiar and useful like an elongated +finger. Now, except in some mystical exceptions which prove the rule, +these are not the gestures, and therefore not the instincts, of women. +No honest man dislikes the public woman. He can only dislike the +political woman; an entirely different thing. The instinct has nothing to +do with any desire to keep women curtained or captive: if such a desire +exists. A husband would be pleased if his wife wore a gold crown and +proclaimed laws from a throne of marble; or if she uttered oracles from +the tripod of a priestess; or if she could walk in mystical motherhood +before the procession of some great religious order. But that she should +stand on a platform in the exact altitude in which he stands; leaning +forward a little more than is graceful and holding her mouth open a little +longer and wider than is dignified--well, I only write here of the facts +of natural history; and the fact is that it is this, and not publicity or +importance, that hurts. It is for the modern world to judge whether such +instincts are indeed danger signals; and whether the hurting of moral as +of material nerves is a tocsin and a warning of nature. + + + + +THE POET AND THE CHEESE + + +There is something creepy in the flat Eastern Counties; a brush of the +white feather. There is a stillness, which is rather of the mind than of +the bodily senses. Rapid changes and sudden revelations of scenery, even +when they are soundless, have something in them analogous to a movement of +music, to a crash or a cry. Mountain hamlets spring out on us with a +shout like mountain brigands. Comfortable valleys accept us with open +arms and warm words, like comfortable innkeepers. But travelling in the +great level lands has a curiously still and lonely quality; lonely even +when there are plenty of people on the road and in the market-place. +One's voice seems to break an almost elvish silence, and something +unreasonably weird in the phrase of the nursery tales, "And he went a +little farther and came to another place," comes back into the mind. + +In some such mood I came along a lean, pale road south of the fens, and +found myself in a large, quiet, and seemingly forgotten village. It was +one of those places that instantly produce a frame of mind which, it may +be, one afterwards decks out with unreal details. I dare say that grass +did not really grow in the streets, but I came away with a curious +impression that it did. I dare say the marketplace was not literally +lonely and without sign of life, but it left the vague impression of being +so. The place was large and even loose in design, yet it had the air of +something hidden away and always overlooked. It seemed shy, like a big +yokel; the low roofs seemed to be ducking behind the hedges and railings; +and the chimneys holding their breath. I came into it in that dead hour +of the afternoon which is neither after lunch nor before tea, nor anything +else even on a half-holiday; and I had a fantastic feeling that I had +strayed into a lost and extra hour that is not numbered in the twenty-four. + +I entered an inn which stood openly in the market-place yet was almost as +private as a private house. Those who talk of "public-houses" as if they +were all one problem would have been both puzzled and pleased with such a +place. In the front window a stout old lady in black with an elaborate +cap sat doing a large piece of needlework. She had a kind of comfortable +Puritanism about her; and might have been (perhaps she was) the original +Mrs. Grundy. A little more withdrawn into the parlour sat a tall, strong, +and serious girl, with a face of beautiful honesty and a pair of scissors +stuck in her belt, doing a small piece of needlework. Two feet behind +them sat a hulking labourer with a humorous face like wood painted scarlet, +with a huge mug of mild beer which he had not touched, and probably would +not touch for hours. On the hearthrug there was an equally motionless cat; +and on the table a copy of 'Household Words'. + +I was conscious of some atmosphere, still and yet bracing, that I had met +somewhere in literature. There was poetry in it as well as piety; and yet +it was not poetry after my particular taste. It was somehow at once solid +and airy. Then I remembered that it was the atmosphere in some of +Wordsworth's rural poems; which are full of genuine freshness and wonder, +and yet are in some incurable way commonplace. This was curious; for +Wordsworth's men were of the rocks and fells, and not of the fenlands or +flats. But perhaps it is the clearness of still water and the mirrored +skies of meres and pools that produces this crystalline virtue. Perhaps +that is why Wordsworth is called a Lake Poet instead of a mountain poet. +Perhaps it is the water that does it. Certainly the whole of that town +was like a cup of water given at morning. + +After a few sentences exchanged at long intervals in the manner of rustic +courtesy, I inquired casually what was the name of the town. The old lady +answered that its name was Stilton, and composedly continued her +needlework. But I had paused with my mug in air, and was gazing at her +with a suddenly arrested concern. "I suppose," I said, "that it has +nothing to do with the cheese of that name." "Oh, yes," she answered, +with a staggering indifference, "they used to make it here." + +I put down my mug with a gravity far greater than her own. "But this +place is a Shrine!" I said. "Pilgrims should be pouring into it from +wherever the English legend has endured alive. There ought to be a +colossal statue in the market-place of the man who invented Stilton cheese. +There ought to be another colossal statue of the first cow who provided +the foundations of it. There should be a burnished tablet let into the +ground on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton cheese, and +survived. On the top of a neighbouring hill (if there are any +neighbouring hills) there should be a huge model of a Stilton cheese, made +of some rich green marble and engraven with some haughty motto: I suggest +something like 'Ver non semper viret; sed Stiltonia semper virescit.'" +The old lady said, "Yes, sir," and continued her domestic occupations. + +After a strained and emotional silence, I said, "If I take a meal here +tonight can you give me any Stilton?" + +"No, sir; I'm afraid we haven't got any Stilton," said the immovable one, +speaking as if it were something thousands of miles away. + +"This is awful," I said: for it seemed to me a strange allegory of England +as she is now; this little town that had lost its glory; and forgotten, so +to speak, the meaning of its own name. And I thought it yet more symbolic +because from all that old and full and virile life, the great cheese was +gone; and only the beer remained. And even that will be stolen by the +Liberals or adulterated by the Conservatives. Politely disengaging myself, +I made my way as quickly as possible to the nearest large, noisy, and +nasty town in that neighbourhood, where I sought out the nearest vulgar, +tawdry, and avaricious restaurant. + +There (after trifling with beef, mutton, puddings, pies, and so on) I got +a Stilton cheese. I was so much moved by my memories that I wrote a +sonnet to the cheese. Some critical friends have hinted to me that my +sonnet is not strictly new; that it contains "echoes" (as they express it) +of some other poem that they have read somewhere. Here, at least, are the +lines I wrote : + +SONNET TO A STILTON CHEESE + + +Stilton, thou shouldst be living at this hour +And so thou art. Nor losest grace thereby; +England has need of thee, and so have I-- +She is a Fen. Far as the eye can scour, +League after grassy league from Lincoln tower +To Stilton in the fields, she is a Fen. +Yet this high cheese, by choice of fenland men, +Like a tall green volcano rose in power. + +Plain living and long drinking are no more, +And pure religion reading 'Household Words', +And sturdy manhood sitting still all day +Shrink, like this cheese that crumbles to its core; +While my digestion, like the House of Lords, +The heaviest burdens on herself doth lay. + +I confess I feel myself as if some literary influence, something that has +haunted me, were present in this otherwise original poem; but it is +hopeless to disentangle it now. + + + + +THE THING + + +The wind awoke last night with so noble a violence that it was like the +war in heaven; and I thought for a moment that the Thing had broken free. +For wind never seems like empty air. Wind always sounds full and +physical, like the big body of something; and I fancied that the Thing +itself was walking gigantic along the great roads between the forests of +beech. + +Let me explain. The vitality and recurrent victory of Christendom have +been due to the power of the Thing to break out from time to time from its +enveloping words and symbols. Without this power all civilisations tend +to perish under a load of language and ritual. One instance of this we +hear much in modern discussion: the separation of the form from the spirit +of religion. But we hear too little of numberless other cases of the same +stiffening and falsification; we are far too seldom reminded that just as +church-going is not religion, so reading and writing are not knowledge, +and voting is not self-government. It would be easy to find people in the +big cities who can read and write quickly enough to be clerks, but who are +actually ignorant of the daily movements of the sun and moon. + +The case of self-government is even more curious, especially as one +watches it for the first time in a country district. Self-government arose +among men (probably among the primitive men, certainly among the ancients) +out of an idea which seems now too simple to be understood. The notion +of self-government was not (as many modern friends and foes of it seem to +think) the notion that the ordinary citizen is to be consulted as one +consults an Encyclopaedia. He is not there to be asked a lot of fancy +questions, to see how he answers them. He and his fellows are to be, +within reasonable human limits, masters of their own lives. They shall +decide whether they shall be men of the oar or the wheel, of the spade or +the spear. The men of the valley shall settle whether the valley shall be +devastated for coal or covered with corn and vines; the men of the town +shall decide whether it shall be hoary with thatches or splendid with +spires. Of their own nature and instinct they shall gather under a +patriarchal chief or debate in a political market-place. And in case the +word "man" be misunderstood, I may remark that in this moral atmosphere, +this original soul of self-government, the women always have quite as much +influence as the men. But in modern England neither the men nor the women +have any influence at all. In this primary matter, the moulding of the +landscape, the creation of a mode of life, the people are utterly impotent. +They stand and stare at imperial and economic processes going on, as +they might stare at the Lord Mayor's Show. + +Round about where I live, for instance, two changes are taking place which +really affect the land and all things that live on it, whether for good or +evil. The first is that the urban civilisation (or whatever it is) is +advancing; that the clerks come out in black swarms and the villas advance +in red battalions. The other is that the vast estates into which England +has long been divided are passing out of the hands of the English gentry +into the hands of men who are always upstarts and often actually +foreigners. + +Now, these are just the sort of things with which self-government was +really supposed to grapple. People were supposed to be able to indicate +whether they wished to live in town or country, to be represented by a +gentleman or a cad. I do not presume to prejudge their decision; perhaps +they would prefer the cad; perhaps he is really preferable. I say that +the filling of a man's native sky with smoke or the selling of his roof +over his head illustrate the sort of things he ought to have some say in, +if he is supposed to be governing himself. But owing to the strange trend +of recent society, these enormous earthquakes he has to pass over and +treat as private trivialities. In theory the building of a villa is as +incidental as the buying of a hat. In reality it is as if all Lancashire +were laid waste for deer forests; or as if all Belgium were flooded by the +sea. In theory the sale of a squire's land to a moneylender is a minor +and exceptional necessity. In reality it is a thing like a German +invasion. Sometimes it is a German invasion. + +Upon this helpless populace, gazing at these prodigies and fates, comes +round about every five years a thing called a General Election. It is +believed by antiquarians to be the remains of some system of +self-government; but it consists solely in asking the citizen questions +about everything except what he understands. The examination paper of the +Election generally consists of some such queries as these: "I. Are the +green biscuits eaten by the peasants of Eastern Lithuania in your opinion +fit for human food? II. Are the religious professions of the President of +the Orange Free State hypocritical or sincere? III. Do you think that the +savages in Prusso-Portuguese East Bunyipland are as happy and hygienic as +the fortunate savages in Franco-British West Bunyipland? IV. Did the +lost Latin Charter said to have been exacted from Henry III reserve the +right of the Crown to create peers? V. What do you think of what America +thinks of what Mr. Roosevelt thinks of what Sir Eldon Gorst thinks of the +state of the Nile? VI. Detect some difference between the two persons in +frock-coats placed before you at this election." + +Now, it never was supposed in any natural theory of self-government that +the ordinary man in my neighbourhood need answer fantastic questions like +these. He is a citizen of South Bucks, not an editor of 'Notes and +Queries'. He would be, I seriously believe, the best judge of whether +farmsteads or factory chimneys should adorn his own sky-line, of whether +stupid squires or clever usurers should govern his own village. But these +are precisely the things which the oligarchs will not allow him to touch +with his finger. Instead, they allow him an Imperial destiny and divine +mission to alter, under their guidance, all the things that he knows +nothing about. The name of self-government is noisy everywhere: the Thing +is throttled. + +The wind sang and split the sky like thunder all the night through; in +scraps of sleep it filled my dreams with the divine discordances of +martyrdom and revolt; I heard the horn of Roland and the drums of Napoleon +and all the tongues of terror with which the Thing has gone forth: the +spirit of our race alive. But when I came down in the morning only a +branch or two was broken off the tree in my garden; and none of the great +country houses in the neighbourhood were blown down, as would have +happened if the Thing had really been abroad. + + + + +THE MAN WHO THINKS BACKWARDS + + +The man who thinks backwards is a very powerful person to-day: indeed, if +he is not omnipotent, he is at least omnipresent. It is he who writes +nearly all the learned books and articles, especially of the scientific or +skeptical sort; all the articles on Eugenics and Social Evolution and +Prison Reform and the Higher Criticism and all the rest of it. But +especially it is this strange and tortuous being who does most of the +writing about female emancipation and the reconsidering of marriage. For +the man who thinks backwards is very frequently a woman. + +Thinking backwards is not quite easy to define abstractedly; and, perhaps, +the simplest method is to take some object, as plain as possible, and from +it illustrate the two modes of thought: the right mode in which all real +results have been rooted; the wrong mode, which is confusing all our +current discussions, especially our discussions about the relations of the +sexes. Casting my eye round the room, I notice an object which is often +mentioned in the higher and subtler of these debates about the sexes: I +mean a poker. I will take a poker and think about it; first forwards and +then backwards; and so, perhaps, show what I mean. + +The sage desiring to think well and wisely about a poker will begin +somewhat as follows: Among the live creatures that crawl about this star +the queerest is the thing called Man. This plucked and plumeless bird, +comic and forlorn, is the butt of all the philosophies. He is the only +naked animal; and this quality, once, it is said, his glory, is now his +shame. He has to go outside himself for everything that he wants. He +might almost be considered as an absent-minded person who had gone bathing +and left his clothes everywhere, so that he has hung his hat upon the +beaver and his coat upon the sheep. The rabbit has white warmth for a +waistcoat, and the glow-worm has a lantern for a head. But man has no +heat in his hide, and the light in his body is darkness; and he must look +for light and warmth in the wild, cold universe in which he is cast. +This is equally true of his soul and of his body; he is the one creature +that has lost his heart as much as he has lost his hide. In a spiritual +sense he has taken leave of his senses; and even in a literal sense he has +been unable to keep his hair on. And just as this external need of his +has lit in his dark brain the dreadful star called religion, so it has lit +in his hand the only adequate symbol of it: I mean the red flower called +Fire. Fire, the most magic and startling of all material things, is a +thing known only to man and the expression of his sublime externalism. It +embodies all that is human in his hearths and all that is divine on his +altars. It is the most human thing in the world; seen across wastes of +marsh or medleys of forest, it is veritably the purple and golden flag of +the sons of Eve. But there is about this generous and rejoicing thing an +alien and awful quality: the quality of torture. Its presence is life; +its touch is death. Therefore, it is always necessary to have an +intermediary between ourselves and this dreadful deity; to have a priest +to intercede for us with the god of life and death; to send an ambassador +to the fire. That priest is the poker. Made of a material more merciless +and warlike than the other instruments of domesticity, hammered on the +anvil and born itself in the flame, the poker is strong enough to enter +the burning fiery furnace, and, like the holy children, not be consumed. +In this heroic service it is often battered and twisted, but is the more +honourable for it, like any other soldier who has been under fire. + +Now all this may sound very fanciful and mystical, but it is the right +view of pokers, and no one who takes it will ever go in for any wrong view +of pokers, such as using them to beat one's wife or torture one's children, +or even (though that is more excusable) to make a policeman jump, as the +clown does in the pantomime. He who has thus gone back to the beginning, +and seen everything as quaint and new, will always see things in their +right order, the one depending on the other in degree of purpose and +importance: the poker for the fire and the fire for the man and the man +for the glory of God. + +This is thinking forwards. Now our modern discussions about everything, +Imperialism, Socialism, or Votes for Women, are all entangled in an +opposite train of thought, which runs as follows:--A modern intellectual +comes in and sees a poker. He is a positivist; he will not begin with any +dogmas about the nature of man, or any day-dreams about the mystery of +fire. He will begin with what he can see, the poker; and the first thing +he sees about the poker is that it is crooked. He says, "Poor poker; it's +crooked." Then he asks how it came to be crooked; and is told that there +is a thing in the world (with which his temperament has hitherto left him +unacquainted)--a thing called fire. He points out, very kindly and +clearly, how silly it is of people, if they want a straight poker, to put +it into a chemical combustion which will very probably heat and warp it. +"Let us abolish fire," he says, "and then we shall have perfectly straight +pokers. Why should you want a fire at all?" They explain to him that a +creature called Man wants a fire, because he has no fur or feathers. He +gazes dreamily at the embers for a few seconds, and then shakes his head. +"I doubt if such an animal is worth preserving," he says. "He must +eventually go under in the cosmic struggle when pitted against +well-armoured and warmly protected species, who have wings and trunks and +spires and scales and horns and shaggy hair. If Man cannot live without +these luxuries, you had better abolish Man." At this point, as a rule, the +crowd is convinced; it heaves up all its clubs and axes, and abolishes him. +At least, one of him. + +Before we begin discussing our various new plans for the people's welfare, +let us make a kind of agreement that we will argue in a straightforward +way, and not in a tail-foremost way. The typical modern movements may be +right; but let them be defended because they are right, not because they +are typical modern movements. Let us begin with the actual woman or man +in the street, who is cold; like mankind before the finding of fire. Do +not let us begin with the end of the last red-hot discussion--like the end +of a red hot poker. Imperialism may be right. But if it is right, it is +right because England has some divine authority like Israel, or some human +authority like Rome; not because we have saddled ourselves with South +Africa, and don't know how to get rid of it. Socialism may be true. But +if it is true, it is true because the tribe or the city can really declare +all land to be common land, not because Harrod's Stores exist and the +commonwealth must copy them. Female suffrage may be just. But if it is +just, it is just because women are women, not because women are sweated +workers and white slaves and all sorts of things that they ought never to +have been. Let not the Imperialist accept a colony because it is there, +nor the Suffragist seize a vote because it is lying about, nor the +Socialist buy up an industry merely because it is for sale. + +Let us ask ourselves first what we really do want, not what recent legal +decisions have told us to want, or recent logical philosophies proved +that we must want, or recent social prophecies predicted that we shall +some day want. If there must be a British Empire, let it be British, and +not, in mere panic, American or Prussian. If there ought to be female +suffrage, let it be female, and not a mere imitation as coarse as the male +blackguard or as dull as the male clerk. If there is to be Socialism, let +it be social; that is, as different as possible from all the big +commercial departments of to-day. The really good journeyman tailor does +not cut his coat according to his cloth; he asks for more cloth. The +really practical statesman does not fit himself to existing conditions, he +denounces the conditions as unfit. History is like some deeply planted +tree which, though gigantic in girth, tapers away at last into tiny twigs; +and we are in the topmost branches. Each of us is trying to bend the tree +by a twig: to alter England through a distant colony, or to capture the +State through a small State department, or to destroy all voting through a +vote. In all such bewilderment he is wise who resists this temptation of +trivial triumph or surrender, and happy (in an echo of the Roman poet) who +remembers the roots of things. + + + + +THE NAMELESS MAN + + +There are only two forms of government the monarchy or personal government, +and the republic or impersonal government. England is not a government; +England is an anarchy, because there are so many kings. But there is one +real advantage (among many real disadvantages) in the method of abstract +democracy, and that is this: that under impersonal government politics are +so much more personal. In France and America, where the State is an +abstraction, political argument is quite full of human details--some might +even say of inhuman details. But in England, precisely because we are +ruled by personages, these personages do not permit personalities. In +England names are honoured, and therefore names are suppressed. But in +the republics, in France especially, a man can put his enemies' names into +his article and his own name at the end of it. + + +This is the essential condition of such candour. If we merely made our +anonymous articles more violent, we should be baser than we are now. We +should only be arming masked men with daggers instead of cudgels. And I, +for one, have always believed in the more general signing of articles, and +have signed my own articles on many occasions when, heaven knows, I had +little reason to be vain of them. I have heard many arguments for +anonymity; but they all seem to amount to the statement that anonymity is +safe, which is just what I complain of. In matters of truth the fact that +you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a proof +that you ought to publish it. + +But there is one answer to my perpetual plea for a man putting his name to +his writing. There is one answer, and there is only one answer, and it is +never given. It is that in the modern complexity very often a man's name +is almost as false as his pseudonym. The prominent person today is +eternally trying to lose a name, and to get a title. For instance, we all +read with earnestness and patience the pages of the 'Daily Mail', and +there are times when we feel moved to cry, "Bring to us the man who +thought these strange thoughts! Pursue him, capture him, take great care +of him. Bring him back to us tenderly, like some precious bale of silk, +that we may look upon the face of the man who desires such things to be +printed. Let us know his name; his social and medical pedigree." But in +the modern muddle (it might be said) how little should we gain if those +frankly fatuous sheets were indeed subscribed by the man who had inspired +them. Suppose that after every article stating that the Premier is a +piratical Socialist there were printed the simple word "Northcliffe." What +does that simple word suggest to the simple soul? To my simple soul +(uninstructed otherwise) it suggests a lofty and lonely crag somewhere in +the wintry seas towards the Orkheys or Norway; and barely clinging to the +top of this crag the fortress of some forgotten chieftain. As it happens, +of course, I know that the word does not mean this; it means another Fleet +Street journalist like myself or only different from myself in so far as +he has sought to secure money while I have sought to secure a jolly time. + +A title does not now even serve as a distinction: it does not distinguish. +A coronet is not merely an extinguisher: it is a hiding-place. + +But the really odd thing is this. This false quality in titles does not +merely apply to the new and vulgar titles, but to the old and historic +titles also. For hundreds of years titles in England have been +essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in +which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is +nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk +means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the +Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government +or for it. All government is representative government until it begins to +decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to decay +the instant it begins to govern. All aristocrats were first meant as +envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in becoming +aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of Norfolk ought +simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. + +I see growing and filling out before me the image of an actual Duke of +Norfolk. For instance, Norfolk men all make their voices run up very high +at the end of a sentence. The Duke of Norfolk's voice, therefore, ought +to end in a perfect shriek. They often (I am told) end sentences with the +word "together"; entirely irrespective of its meaning. Thus I shall +expect the Duke of Norfolk to say: "I beg to second the motion together"; +or "This is a great constitutional question together." I shall expect him +to know much about the Broads and the sluggish rivers above them; to know +about the shooting of water-fowl, and not to know too much about anything +else. Of mountains he must be wildly and ludicrously ignorant. He must +have the freshness of Norfolk; nay, even the flatness of Norfolk. He must +remind me of the watery expanses, the great square church towers and the +long level sunsets of East England. If he does not do this, I decline to +know him. + +I need not multiply such cases; the principle applies everywhere. Thus I +lose all interest in the Duke of Devonshire unless he can assure me that +his soul is filled with that strange warm Puritanism, Puritanism shot with +romance, which colours the West Country. He must eat nothing but clotted +cream, drink nothing but cider, reading nothing but 'Lorna Doone', and be +unacquainted with any town larger than Plymouth, which he must regard with +some awe, as the Central Babylon of the world. Again, I should expect the +Prince of Wales always to be full of the mysticism and dreamy ardour of +the Celtic fringe. + +Perhaps it may be thought that these demands are a little extreme; and +that our fancy is running away with us. Nevertheless, it is not my Duke +of Devonshire who is funny; but the real Duke of Devonshire. The point is +that the scheme of titles is a misfit throughout: hardly anywhere do we +find a modern man whose name and rank represent in any way his type, his +locality, or his mode of life. As a mere matter of social comedy, the +thing is worth noticing. You will meet a man whose name suggests a gouty +admiral, and you will find him exactly like a timid organist: you will +hear announced the name of a haughty and almost heathen grande dame, and +behold the entrance of a nice, smiling Christian cook. These are light +complications of the central fact of the falsification of all names and +ranks. Our peers are like a party of mediaeval knights who should have +exchanged shields, crests, and pennons. For the present rule seems to be +that the Duke of Sussex may lawfully own the whole of Essex; and that the +Marquis of Cornwall may own all the hills and valleys so long as they are +not Cornish. + +The clue to all this tangle is as simple as it is terrible. If England is +an aristocracy, England is dying. If this system IS the country, as some +say, the country is stiffening into more than the pomp and paralysis of +China. It is the final sign of imbecility in a people that it calls cats +dogs and describes the sun as the moon--and is very particular about the +preciseness of these pseudonyms. To be wrong, and to be carefully wrong, +that is the definition of decadence. The disease called aphasia, in which +people begin by saying tea when they mean coffee, commonly ends in their +silence. Silence of this stiff sort is the chief mark of the powerful +parts of modern society. They all seem straining to keep things in rather +than to let things out. For the kings of finance speechlessness is +counted a way of being strong, though it should rather be counted a way of +being sly. By this time the Parliament does not parley any more than the +Speaker speaks. Even the newspaper editors and proprietors are more +despotic and dangerous by what they do not utter than by what they do. We +have all heard the expression "golden silence." The expression "brazen +silence" is the only adequate phrase for our editors. If we wake out of +this throttled, gaping, and wordless nightmare, we must awake with a yell. +The Revolution that releases England from the fixed falsity of its +present position will be not less noisy than other revolutions. It will +contain, I fear, a great deal of that rude accomplishment described among +little boys as "calling names"; but that will not matter much so long as +they are the right names. + + + + +THE GARDENER AND THE GUINEA + + +Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an English Peasant. Indeed, +the type can only exist in community, so much does it depend on +cooperation and common laws. One must not think primarily of a French +Peasant; any more than of a German Measle. The plural of the word is its +proper form; you cannot have a Peasant till you have a peasantry. The +essence of the Peasant ideal is equality; and you cannot be equal all by +yourself. + +Nevertheless, because human nature always craves and half creates the +things necessary to its happiness, there are approximations and +suggestions of the possibility of such a race even here. The nearest +approach I know to the temper of a Peasant in England is that of the +country gardener; not, of course, the great scientific gardener attached +to the great houses; he is a rich man's servant like any other. I mean +the small jobbing gardener who works for two or three moderate-sized +gardens; who works on his own; who sometimes even owns his house; and who +frequently owns his tools. This kind of man has really some of the +characteristics of the true Peasant--especially the characteristics that +people don't like. He has none of that irresponsible mirth which is the +consolation of most poor men in England. The gardener is even disliked +sometimes by the owners of the shrubs and flowers; because (like Micaiah) +he prophesies not good concerning them, but evil. The English gardener is +grim, critical, self-respecting; sometimes even economical. Nor is this +(as the reader's lightning wit will flash back at me) merely because the +English gardener is always a Scotch gardener. The type does exist in pure +South England blood and speech; I have spoken to the type. I was speaking +to the type only the other evening, when a rather odd little incident +occurred. + +It was one of those wonderful evenings in which the sky was warm and +radiant while the earth was still comparatively cold and wet. But it is +of the essence of Spring to be unexpected; as in that heroic and hackneyed +line about coming "before the swallow dares." Spring never is Spring +unless it comes too soon. And on a day like that one might pray, without +any profanity, that Spring might come on earth as it was in heaven. The +gardener was gardening. I was not gardening. It is needless to explain +the causes of this difference; it would be to tell the tremendous history +of two souls. It is needless because there is a more immediate +explanation of the case: the gardener and I, if not equal in agreement, +were at least equal in difference. It is quite certain that he would not +have allowed me to touch the garden if I had gone down on my knees to him. +And it is by no means certain that I should have consented to touch the +garden if he had gone down on his knees to me. His activity and my +idleness, therefore, went on steadily side by side through the long sunset +hours. + +And all the time I was thinking what a shame it was that he was not +sticking his spade into his own garden, instead of mine: he knew about the +earth and the underworld of seeds, the resurrection of Spring and the +flowers that appear in order like a procession marshalled by a herald. +He possessed the garden intellectually and spiritually, while I only +possessed it politically. I know more about flowers than coal-owners know +about coal; for at least I pay them honour when they are brought above the +surface of the earth. I know more about gardens than railway shareholders +seem to know about railways: for at least I know that it needs a man to +make a garden; a man whose name is Adam. But as I walked on that grass my +ignorance overwhelmed me--and yet that phrase is false, because it +suggests something like a storm from the sky above. It is truer to say +that my ignorance exploded underneath me, like a mine dug long before; and +indeed it was dug before the beginning of the ages. Green bombs of bulbs +and seeds were bursting underneath me everywhere; and, so far as my +knowledge went, they had been laid by a conspirator. I trod quite +uneasily on this uprush of the earth; the Spring is always only a fruitful +earthquake. With the land all alive under me I began to wonder more and +more why this man, who had made the garden, did not own the garden. If I +stuck a spade into the ground, I should be astonished at what I found +there...and just as I thought this I saw that the gardener was astonished +too. + +Just as I was wondering why the man who used the spade did not profit by +the spade, he brought me something he had found actually in my soil. It +was a thin worn gold piece of the Georges, of the sort which are called, I +believe, Spade Guineas. Anyhow, a piece of gold. + +If you do not see the parable as I saw it just then, I doubt if I can +explain it just now. He could make a hundred other round yellow fruits: +and this flat yellow one is the only sort that I can make. How it came +there I have not a notion--unless Edmund Burke dropped it in his hurry to +get back to Butler's Court. But there it was: this is a cold recital of +facts. There may be a whole pirate's treasure lying under the earth there, +for all I know or care; for there is no interest in a treasure without a +Treasure Island to sail to. If there is a treasure it will never be found, +for I am not interested in wealth beyond the dreams of avarice since I +know that avarice has no dreams, but only insomnia. And, for the other +party, my gardener would never consent to dig up the garden. + +Nevertheless, I was overwhelmed with intellectual emotions when I saw that +answer to my question; the question of why the garden did not belong to +the gardener. No better epigram could be put in reply than simply putting +the Spade Guinea beside the Spade. This was the only underground seed +that I could understand. Only by having a little more of that dull, +battered yellow substance could I manage to be idle while he was active. +I am not altogether idle myself; but the fact remains that the power is in +the thin slip of metal we call the Spade Guinea, not in the strong square +and curve of metal which we call the Spade. And then I suddenly +remembered that as I had found gold on my ground by accident, so richer +men in the north and west counties had found coal in their ground, also by +accident. + +I told the gardener that as he had found the thing he ought to keep it, +but that if he cared to sell it to me it could be valued properly, and +then sold. He said at first, with characteristic independence, that he +would like to keep it. He said it would make a brooch for his wife. But +a little later he brought it back to me without explanation. I could not +get a ray of light on the reason of his refusal; but he looked lowering +and unhappy. Had he some mystical instinct that it is just such +accidental and irrational wealth that is the doom of all peasantries? +Perhaps he dimly felt that the boy's pirate tales are true; and that +buried treasure is a thing for robbers and not for producers. Perhaps he +thought there was a curse on such capital: on the coal of the coal-owners, +on the gold of the gold-seekers. Perhaps there is. + + + + +THE VOTER AND THE TWO VOICES + + +The real evil of our Party System is commonly stated wrong. It was stated +wrong by Lord Rosebery, when he said that it prevented the best men from +devoting themselves to politics, and that it encouraged a fanatical +conflict. I doubt whether the best men ever would devote themselves to +politics. The best men devote themselves to pigs and babies and things +like that. And as for the fanatical conflict in party politics, I wish +there was more of it. The real danger of the two parties with their two +policies is that they unduly limit the outlook of the ordinary citizen. +They make him barren instead of creative, because he is never allowed to +do anything except prefer one existing policy to another. We have not got +real Democracy when the decision depends upon the people. We shall have +real Democracy when the problem depends upon the people. The ordinary man +will decide not only how he will vote, but what he is going to vote about. + +It is this which involves some weakness in many current aspirations +towards the extension of the suffrage; I mean that, apart from all +questions of abstract justice, it is not the smallness or largeness of the +suffrage that is at present the difficulty of Democracy. It is not the +quantity of voters, but the quality of the thing they are voting about. A +certain alternative is put before them by the powerful houses and the +highest political class. Two roads are opened to them; but they must go +down one or the other. They cannot have what they choose, but only which +they choose. To follow the process in practice we may put it thus. The +Suffragettes--if one may judge by their frequent ringing of his bell--want +to do something to Mr. Asquith. I have no notion what it is. Let us say +(for the sake of argument) that they want to paint him green. We will +suppose that it is entirely for that simple purpose that they are always +seeking to have private interviews with him; it seems as profitable as any +other end that I can imagine to such an interview. Now, it is possible +that the Government of the day might go in for a positive policy of +painting Mr. Asquith green; might give that reform a prominent place in +their programme. Then the party in opposition would adopt another policy, +not a policy of leaving Mr. Asquith alone (which would be considered +dangerously revolutionary), but some alternative course of action, as, for +instance, painting him red. Then both sides would fling themselves on the +people, they would both cry that the appeal was now to the Caesar of +Democracy. A dark and dramatic air of conflict and real crisis would +arise on both sides; arrows of satire would fly and swords of eloquence +flame. The Greens would say that Socialists and free lovers might well +want to paint Mr. Asquith red; they wanted to paint the whole town red. +Socialists would indignantly reply that Socialism was the reverse of +disorder, and that they only wanted to paint Mr. Asquith red so that he +might resemble the red pillar-boxes which typified State control. The +Greens would passionately deny the charge so often brought against them by +the Reds; they would deny that they wished Mr. Asquith green in order that +he might be invisible on the green benches of the Commons, as certain +terrified animals take the colour of their environment. + +There would be fights in the street perhaps, and abundance of ribbons, +flags, and badges, of the two colours. One crowd would sing, "Keep the +Red Flag Flying," and the other, "The Wearing of the Green." But when the +last effort had been made and the last moment come, when two crowds were +waiting in the dark outside the public building to hear the declaration of +the poll, then both sides alike would say that it was now for democracy to +do exactly what it chose. England herself, lifting her head in awful +loneliness and liberty, must speak and pronounce judgment. Yet this +might not be exactly true. England herself, lifting her head in awful +loneliness and liberty, might really wish Mr. Asquith to be pale blue. +The democracy of England in the abstract, if it had been allowed to make +up a policy for itself, might have desired him to be black with pink spots. +It might even have liked him as he is now. But a huge apparatus of +wealth, power, and printed matter has made it practically impossible for +them to bring home these other proposals, even if they would really prefer +them. No candidates will stand in the spotted interest; for candidates +commonly have to produce money either from their own pockets or the +pasty's; and in such circles spots are not worn. No man in the social +position of a Cabinet Minister, perhaps, will commit himself to the +pale-blue theory of Mr. Asquith; therefore it cannot be a Government +measure, therefore it cannot pass. + +Nearly all the great newspapers, both pompous and frivolous, will declare +dogmatically day after day, until every one half believes it, that red and +green are the only two colours in the paint-box. THE OBSERVER will say: +"No one who knows the solid framework of politics or the emphatic first +principles of an Imperial people can suppose for a moment that there is +any possible compromise to be made in such a matter; we must either fulfill +our manifest racial destiny and crown the edifice of ages with the august +figure of a Green Premier, or we must abandon our heritage, break our +promise to the Empire, fling ourselves into final anarchy, and allow the +flaming and demoniac image of a Red Premier to hover over our dissolution +and our doom." The DAILY MAIL would say: "There is no halfway house in +this matter; it must be green or red. We wish to see every honest +Englishman one colour or the other." And then some funny man in the +popular Press would star the sentence with a pun, and say that the DAILY +MAIL liked its readers to be green and its paper to be read. But no one +would even dare to whisper that there is such a thing as yellow. + +For the purposes of pure logic it is clearer to argue with silly examples +than with sensible ones: because silly examples are simple. But I could +give many grave and concrete cases of the kind of thing to which I refer. +In the later part of the Boer War both parties perpetually insisted in +every speech and pamphlet that annexation was inevitable and that it was +only a question whether Liberals or Tories should do it. It was not +inevitable in the least; it would have been perfectly easy to make peace +with the Boers as Christian nations commonly make peace with their +conquered enemies. Personally I think that it would have been better for +us in the most selfish sense, better for our pocket and prestige, if we +had never effected the annexation at all; but that is a matter of opinion. +What is plain is that it was not inevitable; it was not, as was said, +the only possible course; there were plenty of other courses; there were +plenty of other colours in the box. Again, in the discussion about +Socialism, it is repeatedly rubbed into the public mind that we must +choose between Socialism and some horrible thing that they call +Individualism. I don't know what it means, but it seems to mean that +anybody who happens to pull out a plum is to adopt the moral philosophy of +the young Horner--and say what a good boy he is for helping himself. + +It is calmly assumed that the only two possible types of society are a +Collectivist type of society and the present society that exists at this +moment and is rather like an animated muck-heap. It is quite unnecessary +to say that I should prefer Socialism to the present state of things. I +should prefer anarchism to the present state of things. But it is simply +not the fact that Collectivism is the only other scheme for a more equal +order. A Collectivist has a perfect right to think it the only sound +scheme; but it is not the only plausible or possible scheme. We might +have peasant proprietorship; we might have the compromise of Henry George; +we might have a number of tiny communes; we might have co-operation; we +might have Anarchist Communism; we might have a hundred things. I am not +saying that any of these are right, though I cannot imagine that any of +them could be worse than the present social madhouse, with its top-heavy +rich and its tortured poor; but I say that it is an evidence of the stiff +and narrow alternative offered to the civic mind, that the civic mind is +not, generally speaking, conscious of these other possibilities. The +civic mind is not free or alert enough to feel how much it has the world +before it. There are at least ten solutions of the Education question, +and no one knows which Englishmen really want. For Englishmen are only +allowed to vote about the two which are at that moment offered by the +Premier and the Leader of the Opposition. There are ten solutions of the +drink question; and no one knows which the democracy wants; for the +democracy is only allowed to fight about one Licensing Bill at a time. + +So that the situation comes to this: The democracy has a right to answer +questions, but it has no right to ask them. It is still the political +aristocracy that asks the questions. And we shall not be unreasonably +cynical if we suppose that the political aristocracy will always be rather +careful what questions it asks. And if the dangerous comfort and +self-flattery of modern England continues much longer there will be less +democratic value in an English election than in a Roman saturnalia of +slaves. For the powerful class will choose two courses of action, both of +them safe for itself, and then give the democracy the gratification of +taking one course or the other. The lord will take two things so much +alike that he would not mind choosing from them blindfold--and then for a +great jest he will allow the slaves to choose. + + + + +THE MAD OFFICIAL + + +Going mad is the slowest and dullest business in the world. I have very +nearly done it more than once in my boyhood, and so have nearly all my +friends, born under the general doom of mortals, but especially of moderns; +I mean the doom that makes a man come almost to the end of thinking +before he comes to the first chance of living. + +But the process of going mad is dull, for the simple reason that a man +does not know that it is going on. Routine and literalism and a certain +dry-throated earnestness and mental thirst, these are the very atmosphere +of morbidity. If once the man could become conscious of his madness, he +would cease to be man. He studies certain texts in Daniel or cryptograms +in Shakespeare through monstrously magnifying spectacles, which are on his +nose night and day. If once he could take off the spectacles he would +smash them. He deduces all his fantasies about the Sixth Seal or the +Anglo-Saxon Race from one unexamined and invisible first principle. If +he could once see the first principle, he would see that it is not there. + +This slow and awful self-hypnotism of error is a process that can occur +not only with individuals, but also with whole societies. It is hard to +pick out and prove; that is why it is hard to cure. But this mental +degeneration may be brought to one test, which I truly believe to be a +real test. A nation is not going mad when it does extravagant things, so +long as it does them in an extravagant spirit. Crusaders not cutting +their beards till they found Jerusalem, Jacobins calling each other +Harmodius and Epaminondas when their names were Jacques and Jules, these +are wild things, but they were done in wild spirits at a wild moment. + +But whenever we see things done wildly, but taken tamely, then the State +is growing insane. For instance, I have a gun license. For all I know, +this would logically allow me to fire off fifty-nine enormous field-guns +day and night in my back garden. I should not be surprised at a man doing +it; for it would be great fun. But I should be surprised at the +neighbours putting up with it, and regarding it as an ordinary thing +merely because it might happen to fulfill the letter of my license. + +Or, again, I have a dog license; and I may have the right (for all I know) +to turn ten thousand wild dogs loose in Buckinghamshire. I should not be +surprised if the law were like that; because in modern England there is +practically no law to be surprised at. I should not be surprised even at +the man who did it; for a certain kind of man, if he lived long under the +English landlord system, might do anything. But I should be surprised at +the people who consented to stand it. I should, in other words, think the +world a little mad if the incident, were received in silence. + +Now things every bit as wild as this are being received in silence every +day. All strokes slip on the smoothness of a polished wall. All blows +fall soundless on the softness of a padded cell. For madness is a passive +as well as an active state: it is a paralysis, a refusal of the nerves to +respond to the normal stimuli, as well as an unnatural stimulation. There +are commonwealths, plainly to be distinguished here and there in history, +which pass from prosperity to squalor, or from glory to insignificance, or +from freedom to slavery, not only in silence, but with serenity. The face +still smiles while the limbs, literally and loathsomely, are dropping from +the body. These are peoples that have lost the power of astonishment at +their own actions. When they give birth to a fantastic fashion or a +foolish law, they do not start or stare at the monster they have brought +forth. They have grown used to their own unreason; chaos is their cosmos; +and the whirlwind is the breath of their nostrils. These nations are +really in danger of going off their heads en masse; of becoming one vast +vision of imbecility, with toppling cities and crazy country-sides, all +dotted with industrious lunatics. One of these countries is modern +England. + +Now here is an actual instance, a small case of how our social conscience +really works: tame in spirit, wild in result, blank in realisation; a +thing without the light of mind in it. I take this paragraph from a daily +paper:--"At Epping, yesterday, Thomas Woolbourne, a Lambourne labourer, +and his wife were summoned for neglecting their five children. Dr. Alpin +said he was invited by the inspector of the N.S.P.C.C. to visit +defendants' cottage. Both the cottage and the children were dirty. The +children looked exceedingly well in health, but the conditions would be +serious in case of illness. Defendants were stated to be sober. The man +was discharged. The woman, who said she was hampered by the cottage +having no water supply and that she was ill, was sentenced to six weeks' +imprisonment. The sentence caused surprise, and the woman was removed +crying, 'Lord save me!'" + +I know no name for this but Chinese. It calls up the mental picture of +some archaic and changeless Eastern Court, in which men with dried faces +and stiff ceremonial costumes perform some atrocious cruelty to the +accompaniment of formal proverbs and sentences of which the very meaning +has been forgotten. In both cases the only thing in the whole farrago +that can be called real is the wrong. If we apply the lightest touch of +reason to the whole Epping prosecution it dissolves into nothing. + +I here challenge any person in his five wits to tell me what that woman +was sent to prison for. Either it was for being poor, or it was for being +ill. Nobody could suggest, nobody will suggest, nobody, as a matter of +fact, did suggest, that she had committed any other crime. The doctor was +called in by a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Was +this woman guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Did the +doctor say she was guilty of cruelty to children? Not in the least. Was +these any evidence even remotely bearing on the sin of cruelty? Not a rap. +The worse that the doctor could work himself up to saying was that +though the children were "exceedingly" well, the conditions would be +serious in case of illness. If the doctor will tell me any conditions +that would be comic in case of illness, I shall attach more weight to his +argument. + +Now this is the worst effect of modern worry. The mad doctor has gone mad. +He is literally and practically mad; and still he is quite literally and +practically a doctor. The only question is the old one, Quis docebit +ipsum doctorem? Now cruelty to children is an utterly unnatural thing; +instinctively accursed of earth and heaven. But neglect of children is a +natural thing; like neglect of any other duty, it is a mere difference of +degree that divides extending arms and legs in calisthenics and extending +them on the rack. It is a mere difference of degree that separates any +operation from any torture. The thumb-screw can easily be called Manicure. +Being pulled about by wild horses can easily be called Massage. The +modern problem is not so much what people will endure as what they will +not endure. But I fear I interrupt.... The boiling oil is boiling; and +the Tenth Mandarin is already reciting the "Seventeen Serious Principles +and the Fifty-three Virtues of the Sacred Emperor." + + + + +THE ENCHANTED MAN + + +When I arrived to see the performance of the Buckinghamshire Players, who +acted Miss Gertrude Robins's POT LUCK at Naphill a short time ago, it is +the distressing, if scarcely surprising, truth that I entered very late. +This would have mattered little, I hope, to any one, but that late comers +had to be forced into front seats. For a real popular English audience +always insists on crowding in the back part of the hall; and (as I have +found in many an election) will endure the most unendurable taunts rather +than come forward. The English are a modest people; that is why they are +entirely ruled and run by the few of them that happen to be immodest. In +theatrical affairs the fact is strangely notable; and in most playhouses +we find the bored people in front and the eager people behind. + +As far as the performance went I was quite the reverse of a bored person; +but I may have been a boring person, especially as I was thus required to +sit in the seats of the scornful. It will be a happy day in the dramatic +world when all ladies have to take off their hats and all critics have to +take off their heads. The people behind will have a chance then. And as +it happens, in this case, I had not so much taken off my head as lost it. +I had lost it on the road; on that strange journey that was the cause of +my coming in late. I have a troubled recollection of having seen a very +good play and made a very bad speech; I have a cloudy recollection of +talking to all sorts of nice people afterwards, but talking to them +jerkily and with half a head, as a man talks when he has one eye on a +clock. + +And the truth is that I had one eye on an ancient and timeless clock, hung +uselessly in heaven; whose very name has passed into a figure for such +bemused folly. In the true sense of an ancient phrase, I was moonstruck. +A lunar landscape a scene of winter moonlight had inexplicably got in +between me and all other scenes. If any one had asked me I could not have +said what it was; I cannot say now. Nothing had occurred to me; except +the breakdown of a hired motor on the ridge of a hill. It was not an +adventure; it was a vision. + +I had started in wintry twilight from my own door; and hired a small car +that found its way across the hills towards Naphill. But as night +blackened and frost brightened and hardened it I found the way +increasingly difficult; especially as the way was an incessant ascent. +Whenever we topped a road like a staircase it was only to turn into a yet +steeper road like a ladder. + +At last, when I began to fancy that I was spirally climbing the Tower of +Babel in a dream, I was brought to fact by alarming noises, stoppage, and +the driver saying that "it couldn't be done." I got out of the car and +suddenly forgot that I had ever been in it. + +From the edge of that abrupt steep I saw something indescribable, which I +am now going to describe. When Mr. Joseph Chamberlain delivered his great +patriotic speech on the inferiority of England to the Dutch parts of South +Africa, he made use of the expression "the illimitable veldt." The word +"veldt" is Dutch, and the word "illimitable" is Double Dutch. But the +meditative statesman probably meant that the new plains gave him a sense +of largeness and dreariness which he had never found in England. Well, +if he never found it in England it was because he never looked for it in +England. In England there is an illimitable number of illimitable veldts. +I saw six or seven separate eternities in cresting as many different +hills. One cannot find anything more infinite than a finite horizon, free +and lonely and innocent. The Dutch veldt may be a little more desolate +than Birmingham. But I am sure it is not so desolate as that English hill +was, almost within a cannon-shot of High Wycombe. + +I looked across a vast and voiceless valley straight at the moon, as if at +a round mirror. It may have been the blue moon of the proverb; for on +that freezing night the very moon seemed blue with cold. A deathly frost +fastened every branch and blade to its place. The sinking and softening +forests, powdered with a gray frost, fell away underneath me into an abyss +which seemed unfathomable. One fancied the world was soundless only +because it was bottomless: it seemed as if all songs and cries had been +swallowed in some unresisting stillness under the roots of the hills. I +could fancy that if I shouted there would be no echo; that if I hurled +huge stones there would be no noise of reply. A dumb devil had bewitched +the landscape: but that again does not express the best or worst of it. +All those hoary and frosted forests expressed something so inhuman that it +has no human name. A horror of unconsciousness lay on them; that is the +nearest phrase I know. It was as if one were looking at the back of the +world; and the world did not know it. I had taken the universe in the +rear. I was behind the scenes. I was eavesdropping upon an unconscious +creation. + +I shall not express what the place expressed. I am not even sure that it +is a thing that ought to be expressed. There was something heathen about +its union of beauty and death; sorrow seemed to glitter, as it does in +some of the great pagan poems. I understood one of the thousand poetical +phrases of the populace, "a God-forsaken place." Yet something was +present there; and I could not yet find the key to my fixed impression. +Then suddenly I remembered the right word. It was an enchanted place. +It had been put to sleep. In a flash I remembered all the fairy-tales +about princes turned to marble and princesses changed to snow. We were in +a land where none could strive or cry out; a white nightmare. The moon +looked at me across the valley like the enormous eye of a hypnotist; the +one white eye of the world. + +There was never a better play than POT LUCK; for it tells a tale with a +point and a tale that might happen any day among English peasants. There +were never better actors than the local Buckinghamshire Players: for they +were acting their own life with just that rise into exaggeration which is +the transition from life to art. But all the time I was mesmerised by the +moon; I saw all these men and women as enchanted things. The poacher shot +pheasants; the policeman tracked pheasants; the wife hid pheasants; they +were all (especially the policeman) as true as death. But there was +something more true to death than true to life about it all: the figures +were frozen with a magic frost of sleep or fear or custom such as does not +cramp the movements of the poor men of other lands. I looked at the +poacher and the policeman and the gun; then at the gun and the policeman +and the poacher; and I could find no name for the fancy that haunted and +escaped me. The poacher believed in the Game Laws as much as the +policeman. The poacher's wife not only believed in the Game Laws, but +protected them as well as him. She got a promise from her husband that he +would never shoot another pheasant. Whether he kept it I doubt; I fancy +he sometimes shot a pheasant even after that. But I am sure he never shot +a policeman. For we live in an enchanted land. + + + + +THE SUN WORSHIPPER + + +There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt. +And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in that +sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense. But the warning +to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as fate, if +they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that argument +will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and the slave. +To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, so to speak, +in a manner quite startling and insane. I mean that modern doctrine, +taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is called the +materialist theory of history. The theory is, roughly, this: that all the +important things in history are rooted in an economic motive. In short, +history is a science; a science of the search for food. + +Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely untrue, +but actually the reverse of the truth. It is putting it too feebly to +say that the history of man is not only economic. Man would not have any +history if he were only economic. The need for food is certainly +universal, so universal that it is not even human. Cows have an economic +motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal delicacies may be in +a cow) only an economic motive. The cow eats grass anywhere and never +eats anything else. In short, the cow does fulfill the materialist theory +of history: that is why the cow has no history. "A History of Cows" would +be one of the simplest and briefest of standard works. But if some cows +thought it wicked to eat long grass and persecuted all who did so; if the +cow with the crumpled horn were worshipped by some cows and gored to death +by others; if cows began to have obvious moral preferences over and above +a desire for grass, then cows would begin to have a history. They would +also begin to have a highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same +thing. + +The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually +outside all history. It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that +is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive. Men +are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we +have made the art of history. To say that human actions have depended on +economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two legs. +It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a +condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful. Certainly +a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two +legs. But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or a +coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or no +information. In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy +romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating +millionaire. A man must be supported on food as he must be supported on +legs. But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more +generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much grander +and more imaginative scale. A cow can lift up her eyes to the hills and +see uplands and peaks of pure food. Yet we never see the horizon broken +by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese. + +So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage. +But history--the whole point of history--precisely is that some two legged +soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical structure, did not. +The whole point of history precisely is: some people (like poets and +tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while others (such as +millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun of bothering about it. +There would be no history if there were only economic history. All the +historical events have been due to the twists and turns given to the +economic instinct by forces that were not economic. For instance, this +theory traces the French war of Edward III to a quarrel about the French +wines. Any one who has even smelt the Middle Ages must feel fifty answers +spring to his lips; but in this cause one will suffice. There would have +been no such war, then, if we all drank water like cows. But when one is +a man one enters the world of historic choice. The act of drinking wine +is one that requires explanation. So is the act of not drinking wine. + +But the capitalist can get much more fun out of the doctrine. + +When strikes were splitting England right and left a little while ago, an +ingenious writer, humorously describing himself as a Liberal, said that +they were entirely due to the hot weather. The suggestion was eagerly +taken up by other creatures of the same kind, and I really do not see why +it was not carried farther and applied to other lamentable uprisings in +history. Thus, it is a remarkable fact that the weather is generally +rather warm in Egypt; and this cannot but throw a light on the sudden and +mysterious impulse of the Israelites to escape from captivity. The +English strikers used some barren republican formula (and as the +definitions of the medieval schoolmen), some academic shibboleth about +being free men and not being forced to work except for a wage accepted by +them. Just in the same way the Israelites in Egypt employed some dry +scholastic quibble about the extreme difficulty of making bricks with +nothing to make them of. But whatever fantastic intellectual excuses they +may have put forward for their strange and unnatural conduct in walking +out when the prison door was open, there can be no doubt that the real +cause was the warm weather. Such a climate notoriously also produces +delusions and horrible fancies, such as Mr. Kipling describes. And it +was while their brains were disordered by the heat that the Jews fancied +that they were founding a nation, that they were led by a prophet, and, in +short, that they were going to be of some importance in the affairs of the +world. + +Nor can the historical student fail to note that the French monarchy was +pulled down in August; and that August is a month in summer. + +In spite of all this, however, I have some little difficulty myself in +accepting so simple a form of the Materialist Theory of History (at these +words all Marxian Socialists will please bow their heads three times), and +I rather think that exceptions might be found to the principle. Yet it is +not chiefly such exceptions that embarrass my belief in it. + +No; my difficulty is rather in accounting for the strange coincidence by +which the shafts of Apollo split us exclusively along certain lines of +class and of economics. I cannot understand why all solicitors did not +leave off soliciting, all doctors leave off doctoring, all judges leave +off judging, all benevolent bankers leave off lending money at high +interest, and all rising politicians leave off having nothing to add to +what their right honourable friend told the House about eight years ago. +The quaint theoretic plea of the workers, that they were striking because +they were ill paid, seems to receive a sort of wild and hazy confirmation +from the fact that, throughout the hottest weather, judges and other +persons who are particularly well paid showed no disposition to strike. +I have to fall back therefore on metaphysical fancies of my own; and I +continue to believe that the anger of the English poor (to steal a phrase +from Sir Thomas Browne) came from something in man that is other than the +elements and that owes no homage unto the sun. + +When comfortable people come to talking stuff of that sort, it is really +time that the comfortable classes made a short summary and confession of +what they have really done with the very poor Englishman. The dawn of the +mediaeval civilisation found him a serf; which is a different thing from a +slave. He had security; although the man belonged to the land rather than +the land to the man. He could not be evicted; his rent could not be +raised. In practice, it came to something like this: that if the lord +rode down his cabbages he had not much chance of redress; but he had the +chance of growing more cabbages. He had direct access to the means of +production. + +Since then the centuries in England have achieved something different; and +something which, fortunately, is perfectly easy to state. There is no +doubt about what we have done. We have kept the inequality, but we have +destroyed the security. The man is not tied to the land, as in serfdom; +nor is the land tied to the man, as in a peasantry. The rich man has +entered into an absolute ownership of farms and fields; and (in the modern +industrial phrase) he has locked out the English people. They can only +find an acre to dig or a house to sleep in by accepting such competitive +and cruel terms as he chooses to impose. + +Well, what would happen then, over the larger parts of the planet, parts +inhabited by savages? Savages, of course, would hunt and fish. That +retreat for the English poor was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. +Game laws were made to extend over districts like the Arctic snows or the +Sahara. The rich man had property over animals he had no more dreamed of +than a governor of Roman Africa had dreamed of a giraffe. He owned all +the birds that passed over his land: he might as well have owned all the +clouds that passed over it. If a rabbit ran from Smith's land to Brown's +land, it belonged to Brown, as if it were his pet dog. The logical +answer to this would be simple: Any one stung on Brown's land ought to be +able to prosecute Brown for keeping a dangerous wasp without a muzzle. + +Thus the poor man was forced to be a tramp along the roads and to sleep in +the open. That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A +landless man in England can be punished for behaving in the only way that +a landless man can behave: for sleeping under a hedge in Surrey or on a +seat on the Embankment. His sin is described (with a hideous sense of +fun) as that of having no visible means of subsistence. + +The last possibility, of course, is that upon which all human beings would +fall back if they were sinking in a swamp or impaled on a spike or +deserted on an island. It is that of calling out for pity to the passerby. +That retreat was perceived; and that retreat was cut off. A man in +England can be sent to prison for asking another man for help in the name +of God. + +You have done all these things, and by so doing you have forced the poor +to serve the rich, and to serve them on the terms of the rich. They have +still one weapon left against the extremes of insult and unfairness: that +weapon is their numbers and the necessity of those numbers to the working +of that vast and slavish machine. And because they still had this last +retreat (which we call the Strike), because this retreat was also +perceived, there was talk of this retreat being also cut off. Whereupon +the workmen became suddenly and violently angry; and struck at your Boards +and Committees here, there, and wherever they could. And you opened on +them the eyes of owls, and said, "It must be the sunshine." You could only +go on saying, "The sun, the sun." That was what the man in Ibsen said, +when he had lost his wits. + + + + +THE WRONG INCENDIARY + + +I stood looking at the Coronation Procession--I mean the one in +Beaconsfield; not the rather elephantine imitation of it which, I believe, +had some success in London--and I was seriously impressed. Most of my +life is passed in discovering with a deathly surprise that I was quite +right. Never before have I realised how right I was in maintaining that +the small area expresses the real patriotism: the smaller the field the +taller the tower. There were things in our local procession that did not +(one might even reverently say, could not) occur in the London procession. +One of the most prominent citizens in our procession (for instance) had +his face blacked. Another rode on a pony which wore pink and blue +trousers. I was not present at the Metropolitan affair, and therefore my +assertion is subject to such correction as the eyewitness may always offer +to the absentee. But I believe with some firmness that no such features +occurred in the London pageant. + +But it is not of the local celebration that I would speak, but of +something that occurred before it. In the field beyond the end of my +garden the materials for a bonfire had been heaped; a hill of every kind +of rubbish and refuse and things that nobody wants; broken chairs, dead +trees, rags, shavings, newspapers, new religions, in pamphlet form, +reports of the Eugenic Congress, and so on. All this refuse, material and +mental, it was our purpose to purify and change to holy flame on the day +when the King was crowned. The following is an account of the rather +strange thing that really happened. I do not know whether it was any sort +of symbol; but I narrate it just as it befell. + +In the middle of the night I woke up slowly and listened to what I +supposed to be the heavy crunching of a cart-wheel along a road of loose +stones. Then it grew louder, and I thought somebody was shooting out +cartloads of stones; then it seemed as if the shock was breaking big +stones into pieces. Then I realised that under this sound there was also +a strange, sleepy, almost inaudible roar; and that on top of it every now +and then came pigmy pops like a battle of penny pistols. Then I knew what +it was. I went to the window; and a great firelight flung across two +meadows smote me where I stood. "Oh, my holy aunt," I thought, "they've +mistaken the Coronation Day." + +And yet when I eyed the transfigured scene it did not seem exactly like a +bonfire or any ritual illumination. It was too chaotic, and too close to +the houses of the town. All one side of a cottage was painted pink with +the giant brush of flame; the next side, by contrast, was painted as black +as tar. Along the front of this ran a blackening rim or rampart edged +with a restless red ribbon that danced and doubled and devoured like a +scarlet snake; and beyond it was nothing but a deathly fulness of light. + +I put on some clothes and went down the road; all the dull or startling +noises in that din of burning growing louder and louder as I walked. The +heaviest sound was that of an incessant cracking and crunching, as if some +giant with teeth of stone was breaking up the bones of the world. I had +not yet come within sight of the real heart and habitat of the fire; but +the strong red light, like an unnatural midnight sunset, powdered the +grayest grass with gold and flushed the few tall trees up to the last +fingers of their foliage. Behind them the night was black and cavernous; +and one could only trace faintly the ashen horizon beyond the dark and +magic Wilton Woods. As I went, a workman on a bicycle shot a rood past me; +then staggered from his machine and shouted to me to tell him where the +fire was. I answered that I was going to see, but thought it was the +cottages by the wood-yard. He said, "My God!" and vanished. + +A little farther on I found grass and pavement soaking and flooded, and +the red and yellow flames repainted in pools and puddles. Beyond were dim +huddles of people and a small distant voice shouting out orders. The +fire-engines were at work. I went on among the red reflections, which +seemed like subterranean fires; I had a singular sensation of being in a +very important dream. Oddly enough, this was increased when I found that +most of my friends and neighbours were entangled in the crowd. Only in +dreams do we see familiar faces so vividly against a black background of +midnight. I was glad to find (for the workman cyclist's sake) that the +fire was not in the houses by the wood-yard, but in the wood-yard itself. +There was no fear for human life, and the thing was seemingly accidental; +though there were the usual ugly whispers about rivalry and revenge. But +for all that I could not shake off my dream-drugged soul a swollen, tragic, +portentous sort of sensation, that it all had something to do with the +crowning of the English King, and the glory or the end of England. It was +not till I saw the puddles and the ashes in broad daylight next morning +that I was fundamentally certain that my midnight adventure had not +happened outside this world. + +But I was more arrogant than the ancient Emperors Pharaoh or +Nebuchadnezzar; for I attempted to interpret my own dream. The fire was +feeding upon solid stacks of unused beech or pine, gray and white piles of +virgin wood. It was an orgy of mere waste; thousands of good things were +being killed before they had ever existed. Doors, tables, walkingsticks, +wheelbarrows, wooden swords for boys, Dutch dolls for girls I could hear +the cry of each uncreated thing as it expired in the flames. And then I +thought of that other noble tower of needless things that stood in the +field beyond my garden; the bonfire, the mountain of vanities, that is +meant for burning; and how it stood dark and lonely in the meadow, and the +birds hopped on its corners and the dew touched and spangled its twigs. +And I remembered that there are two kinds of fires, the Bad Fire and the +Good Fire the last must surely be the meaning of Bonfire. And the paradox +is that the Good Fire is made of bad things, of things that we do not want; +but the Bad Fire is made of good things, of things that we do want; like +all that wealth of wood that might have made dolls and chairs and tables, +but was only making a hueless ash. + +And then I saw, in my vision, that just as there are two fires, so there +are two revolutions. And I saw that the whole mad modern world is a race +between them. Which will happen first--the revolution in which bad things +shall perish, or that other revolution, in which good things shall perish +also? One is the riot that all good men, even the most conservative, +really dream of, when the sneer shall be struck from the face of the +well-fed; when the wine of honour shall be poured down the throat of +despair; when we shall, so far as to the sons of flesh is possible, take +tyranny and usury and public treason and bind them into bundles and burn +them. And the other is the disruption that may come prematurely, +negatively, and suddenly in the night; like the fire in my little town. + +It may come because the mere strain of modern life is unbearable; and in +it even the things that men do desire may break down; marriage and fair +ownership and worship and the mysterious worth of man. The two +revolutions, white and black, are racing each other like two railway +trains; I cannot guess the issue...but even as I thought of it, the +tallest turret of the timber stooped and faltered and came down in a +cataract of noises. And the fire, finding passage, went up with a spout +like a fountain. It stood far up among the stars for an instant, a +blazing pillar of brass fit for a pagan conqueror, so high that one could +fancy it visible away among the goblin trees of Burnham or along the +terraces of the Chiltern Hills. + + + + +THE FREE MAN + + +The idea of liberty has ultimately a religious root; that is why men find +it so easy to die for and so difficult to define. It refers finally to +the fact that, while the oyster and the palm tree have to save their lives +by law, man has to save his soul by choice. Ruskin rebuked Coleridge for +praising freedom, and said that no man would wish the sun to be free. It +seems enough to answer that no man would wish to be the sun. Speaking as +a Liberal, I have much more sympathy with the idea of Joshua stopping the +sun in heaven than with the idea of Ruskin trotting his daily round in +imitation of its regularity. Joshua was a Radical, and his astronomical +act was distinctly revolutionary. For all revolution is the mastering of +matter by the spirit of man, the emergence of that human authority within +us which, in the noble words of Sir Thomas Browne, "owes no homage unto +the sun." + +Generally, the moral substance of liberty is this: that man is not meant +merely to receive good laws, good food or good conditions, like a tree in +a garden, but is meant to take a certain princely pleasure in selecting +and shaping like the gardener. Perhaps that is the meaning of the trade +of Adam. And the best popular words for rendering the real idea of +liberty are those which speak of man as a creator. We use the word "make" +about most of the things in which freedom is essential, as a country walk +or a friendship or a love affair. When a man "makes his way" through a +wood he has really created, he has built a road, like the Romans. When a +man "makes a friend," he makes a man. And in the third case we talk of a +man "making love," as if he were (as, indeed, he is) creating new masses +and colours of that flaming material an awful form of manufacture. In its +primary spiritual sense, liberty is the god in man, or, if you like the +word, the artist. + +In its secondary political sense liberty is the living influence of the +citizen on the State in the direction of moulding or deflecting it. Men +are the only creatures that evidently possess it. On the one hand, the +eagle has no liberty; he only has loneliness. On the other hand, ants, +bees, and beavers exhibit the highest miracle of the State influencing the +citizen; but no perceptible trace of the citizen influencing the State. +You may, if you like, call the ants a democracy as you may call the bees a +despotism. But I fancy that the architectural ant who attempted to +introduce an art nouveau style of ant-hill would have a career as curt and +fruitless as the celebrated bee who wanted to swarm alone. The isolation +of this idea in humanity is akin to its religious character; but it is not +even in humanity by any means equally distributed. The idea that the +State should not only be supported by its children, like the ant-hill, but +should be constantly criticised and reconstructed by them, is an idea +stronger in Christendom than any other part of the planet; stronger in +Western than Eastern Europe. And touching the pure idea of the individual +being free to speak and act within limits, the assertion of this idea, we +may fairly say, has been the peculiar honour of our own country. For my +part I greatly prefer the Jingoism of Rule Britannia to the Imperialism of +The Recessional. I have no objection to Britannia ruling the waves. I +draw the line when she begins to rule the dry land--and such damnably dry +land too--as in Africa. And there was a real old English sincerity in the +vulgar chorus that "Britons never shall be slaves." We had no equality +and hardly any justice; but freedom we were really fond of. And I think +just now it is worth while to draw attention to the old optimistic +prophecy that "Britons never shall be slaves." + +The mere love of liberty has never been at a lower ebb in England than it +has been for the last twenty years. Never before has it been so easy to +slip small Bills through Parliament for the purpose of locking people up. +Never was it so easy to silence awkward questions, or to protect +highplaced officials. Two hundred years ago we turned out the Stuarts +rather than endanger the Habeas Corpus Act. Two years ago we abolished the +Habeas Corpus Act rather than turn out the Home Secretary. We passed a +law (which is now in force) that an Englishman's punishment shall not +depend upon judge and jury, but upon the governors and jailers who have +got hold of him. But this is not the only case. The scorn of liberty is +in the air. A newspaper is seized by the police in Trafalgar Square +without a word of accusation or explanation. The Home Secretary says that +in his opinion the police are very nice people, and there is an end of the +matter. A Member of Parliament attempts to criticise a peerage. The +Speaker says he must not criticise a peerage, and there the matter drops. + +Political liberty, let us repeat, consists in the power of criticising +those flexible parts of the State which constantly require reconsideration, +not the basis, but the machinery. In plainer words, it means the power +of saying the sort of things that a decent but discontented citizen wants +to say. He does not want to spit on the Bible, or to run about without +clothes, or to read the worst page in Zola from the pulpit of St. Paul's. +Therefore the forbidding of these things (whether just or not) is only +tyranny in a secondary and special sense. It restrains the abnormal, not +the normal man. But the normal man, the decent discontented citizen, does +want to protest against unfair law courts. He does want to expose +brutalities of the police. He does want to make game of a vulgar +pawnbroker who is made a Peer. He does want publicly to warn people +against unscrupulous capitalists and suspicious finance. If he is run in +for doing this (as he will be) he does want to proclaim the character or +known prejudices of the magistrate who tries him. If he is sent to prison +(as he will be) he does want to have a clear and civilised sentence, +telling him when he will come out. And these are literally and exactly +the things that he now cannot get. That is the almost cloying humour of +the present situation. I can say abnormal things in modern magazines. It +is the normal things that I am not allowed to say. I can write in some +solemn quarterly an elaborate article explaining that God is the devil; I +can write in some cultured weekly an aesthetic fancy describing how I +should like to eat boiled baby. The thing I must not write is rational +criticism of the men and institutions of my country. + +The present condition of England is briefly this: That no Englishman can +say in public a twentieth part of what he says in private. One cannot say, +for instance, that--But I am afraid I must leave out that instance, +because one cannot say it. I cannot prove my case--because it is so true. + + + + +THE HYPOTHETICAL HOUSEHOLDER + + +We have read of some celebrated philosopher who was so absent-minded that +he paid a call at his own house. My own absent-mindedness is extreme, and +my philosophy, of course, is the marvel of men and angels. But I never +quite managed to be so absent-minded as that. Some yards at least from my +own door, something vaguely familiar has always caught my eye; and thus +the joke has been spoiled. Of course I have quite constantly walked into +another man's house, thinking it was my own house; my visits became almost +monotonous. But walking into my own house and thinking it was another +man's house is a flight of poetic detachment still beyond me. Something +of the sensations that such an absent-minded man must feel I really felt +the other day; and very pleasant sensations they were. The best parts of +every proper romance are the first chapter and the last chapter; and to +knock at a strange door and find a nice wife would be to concentrate the +beginning and end of all romance. + +Mine was a milder and slighter experience, but its thrill was of the same +kind. For I strolled through a place I had imagined quite virgin and +unvisited (as far as I was concerned), and I suddenly found I was treading +in my own footprints, and the footprints were nearly twenty years old. + +It was one of those stretches of country which always suggests an almost +unnatural decay; thickets and heaths that have grown out of what were once +great gardens. Garden flowers still grow there as wild flowers, as it +says in some good poetic couplet which I forget; and there is something +singularly romantic and disastrous about seeing things that were so long a +human property and care fighting for their own hand in the thicket. One +almost expects to find a decayed dog-kennel; with the dog evolved into a +wolf. + +This desolate garden-land had been even in my youth scrappily planned out +for building. The half-built or empty houses had appeared quite +threateningly on the edge of this heath even when I walked over it years +ago and almost as a boy. I was astonished that the building had gone no +farther; I suppose somebody went bankrupt and somebody else disliked +building. But I remember, especially along one side of this tangle or +coppice, that there had once been a row of half-built houses. The brick +of which they were built was a sort of plain pink; everything else was a +blinding white; the houses smoked with white dust and white sawdust; and +on many of the windows were rubbed those round rough disks of white which +always delighted me as a child. They looked like the white eyes of some +blind giant. + +I could see the crude, parched pink-and-white villas still; though I had +not thought at all of them for a quarter of my life; and had not thought +much of them even when I saw them. Then I was an idle, but eager youth +walking out from London; now I was a most reluctantly busy middle-aged +person, coming in from the country. Youth, I think, seems farther off +than childhood, for it made itself more of a secret. Like a prenatal +picture, distant, tiny, and quite distinct, I saw this heath on which I +stood; and I looked around for the string of bright, half-baked villas. +They still stood there; but they were quite russet and weather-stained, as +if they had stood for centuries. + +I remembered exactly what I had done on that day long ago. I had half +slid on a miry descent; it was still there; a little lower I had knocked +off the top of a thistle; the thistles had not been discouraged, but were +still growing. I recalled it because I had wondered why one knocks off +the tops of thistles; and then I had thought of Tarquin; and then I had +recited most of Macaulay's VIRGINIA to myself, for I was young. And then +I came to a tattered edge where the very tuft had whitened with the +sawdust and brick-dust from the new row of houses; and two or three green +stars of dock and thistle grew spasmodically about the blinding road. + +I remembered how I had walked up this new one-sided street all those years +ago; and I remembered what I had thought. I thought that this red and +white glaring terrace at noon was really more creepy and more lonesome +than a glimmering churchyard at midnight. The churchyard could only be +full of the ghosts of the dead; but these houses were full of the ghosts +of the unborn. And a man can never find a home in the future as he can +find it in the past. I was always fascinated by that mediaeval notion of +erecting a rudely carpentered stage in the street, and acting on it a +miracle play of the Holy Family or the Last Judgment. And I thought to +myself that each of these glaring, gaping, new jerry-built boxes was +indeed a rickety stage erected for the acting of a real miracle play; that +human family that is almost the holy one, and that human death that is +near to the last judgment. + +For some foolish reason the last house but one in that imperfect row +especially haunted me with its hollow grin and empty window-eyes. +Something in the shape of this brick-and-mortar skeleton was attractive; +and there being no workmen about, I strolled into it for curiosity and +solitude. I gave, with all the sky-deep gravity of youth, a benediction +upon the man who was going to live there. I even remember that for the +convenience of meditation I called him James Harrogate. + +As I reflected it crawled back into my memory that I had mildly played the +fool in that house on that distant day. I had some red chalk in my pocket, +I think, and I wrote things on the unpapered plaster walls; things +addressed to Mr. Harrogate. A dim memory told me that I had written up in +what I supposed to be the dining-room: + + +James Harrogate, thank God for meat, +Then eat and eat and eat and eat, + + +or something of that kind. I faintly feel that some longer lyric was +scrawled on the walls of what looked like a bedroom, something beginning: + + +When laying what you call your head, +O Harrogate, upon your bed, + + +and there all my memory dislimns and decays. But I could still see quite +vividly the plain plastered walls and the rude, irregular writing, and the +places where the red chalk broke. I could see them, I mean, in memory; +for when I came down that road again after a sixth of a century the house +was very different. + +I had seen it before at noon, and now I found it in the dusk. But its +windows glowed with lights of many artificial sorts; one of its low square +windows stood open; from this there escaped up the road a stream of +lamplight and a stream of singing. Some sort of girl, at least, was +standing at some sort of piano, and singing a song of healthy +sentimentalism in that house where long ago my blessing had died on the +wind and my poems been covered up by the wallpaper. I stood outside that +lamplit house at dusk full of those thoughts that I shall never express if +I live to be a million any better than I expressed them in red chalk upon +the wall. But after I had hovered a little, and was about to withdraw, a +mad impulse seized me. I rang the bell. I said in distinct accents to a +very smart suburban maid, "Does Mr. James Harrogate live here?" + +She said he didn't; but that she would inquire, in case I was looking for +him in the neighbourhood; but I excused her from such exertion. I had one +moment's impulse to look for him all over the world; and then decided not +to look for him at all. + + + + +THE PRIEST OF SPRING + + +The sun has strengthened and the air softened just before Easter Day. +But it is a troubled brightness which has a breath not only of novelty but +of revolution, There are two great armies of the human intellect who will +fight till the end on this vital point, whether Easter is to be +congratulated on fitting in with the Spring--or the Spring on fitting in +with Easter. + +The only two things that can satisfy the soul are a person and a story; +and even a story must be about a person. There are indeed very voluptuous +appetites and enjoyments in mere abstractions like mathematics, logic, or +chess. But these mere pleasures of the mind are like mere pleasures of +the body. That is, they are mere pleasures, though they may be gigantic +pleasures; they can never by a mere increase of themselves amount to +happiness. A man just about to be hanged may enjoy his breakfast; +especially if it be his favourite breakfast; and in the same way he may +enjoy an argument with the chaplain about heresy, especially if it is his +favourite heresy. But whether he can enjoy either of them does not depend +on either of them; it depends upon his spiritual attitude towards a +subsequent event. And that event is really interesting to the soul; +because it is the end of a story and (as some hold) the end of a person. + +Now it is this simple truth which, like many others, is too simple for our +scientists to see. This is where they go wrong, not only about true +religion, but about false religions too; so that their account of +mythology is more mythical than the myth itself. I do not confine myself +to saying that they are quite incorrect when they state (for instance) +that Christ was a legend of dying and reviving vegetation, like Adonis or +Persephone. I say that even if Adonis was a god of vegetation, they have +got the whole notion of him wrong. Nobody, to begin with, is sufficiently +interested in decaying vegetables, as such, to make any particular mystery +or disguise about them; and certainly not enough to disguise them under +the image of a very handsome young man, which is a vastly more interesting +thing. If Adonis was connected with the fall of leaves in autumn and the +return of flowers in spring, the process of thought was quite different. +It is a process of thought which springs up spontaneously in all children +and young artists; it springs up spontaneously in all healthy societies. +It is very difficult to explain in a diseased society. + +The brain of man is subject to short and strange snatches of sleep. A +cloud seals the city of reason or rests upon the sea of imagination; a +dream that darkens as much, whether it is a nightmare of atheism or a +daydream of idolatry. And just as we have all sprung from sleep with a +start and found ourselves saying some sentence that has no meaning, save +in the mad tongues of the midnight; so the human mind starts from its +trances of stupidity with some complete phrase upon its lips; a complete +phrase which is a complete folly. Unfortunately it is not like the dream +sentence, generally forgotten in the putting on of boots or the putting in +of breakfast. This senseless aphorism, invented when man's mind was +asleep, still hangs on his tongue and entangles all his relations to +rational and daylight things. All our controversies are confused by +certain kinds of phrases which are not merely untrue, but were always +unmeaning; which are not merely inapplicable, but were always +intrinsically useless. We recognise them wherever a man talks of "the +survival of the fittest," meaning only the survival of the survivors; or +wherever a man says that the rich "have a stake in the country," as if the +poor could not suffer from misgovernment or military defeat; or where a +man talks about "going on towards Progress," which only means going on +towards going on; or when a man talks about "government by the wise few," +as if they could be picked out by their pantaloons. "The wise few" must +mean either the few whom the foolish think wise or the very foolish who +think themselves wise. + +There is one piece of nonsense that modern people still find themselves +saying, even after they are more or less awake, by which I am particularly +irritated. It arose in the popularised science of the nineteenth century, +especially in connection with the study of myths and religions. The +fragment of gibberish to which I refer generally takes the form of saying +"This god or hero really represents the sun." Or "Apollo killing the +Python MEANS that the summer drives out the winter." Or "The King dying in +a western battle is a SYMBOL of the sun setting in the west." Now I +should really have thought that even the skeptical professors, whose +skulls are as shallow as frying-pans, might have reflected that human +beings never think or feel like this. Consider what is involved in this +supposition. It presumes that primitive man went out for a walk and saw +with great interest a big burning spot on the sky. He then said to +primitive woman, "My dear, we had better keep this quiet. We mustn't let +it get about. The children and the slaves are so very sharp. They might +discover the sun any day, unless we are very careful. So we won't call +it 'the sun,' but I will draw a picture of a man killing a snake; and +whenever I do that you will know what I mean. The sun doesn't look at all +like a man killing a snake; so nobody can possibly know. It will be a +little secret between us; and while the slaves and the children fancy I am +quite excited with a grand tale of a writhing dragon and a wrestling +demigod, I shall really MEAN this delicious little discovery, that there +is a round yellow disc up in the air." One does not need to know much +mythology to know that this is a myth. It is commonly called the Solar +Myth. + +Quite plainly, of course, the case was just the other way. The god was +never a symbol or hieroglyph representing the sun. The sun was a +hieroglyph representing the god. Primitive man (with whom my friend +Dombey is no doubt well acquainted) went out with his head full of gods +and heroes, because that is the chief use of having a head. Then he saw +the sun in some glorious crisis of the dominance of noon on the distress +of nightfall, and he said, "That is how the face of the god would shine +when he had slain the dragon," or "That is how the whole world would bleed +to westward, if the god were slain at last." + +No human being was ever really so unnatural as to worship Nature. No man, +however indulgent (as I am) to corpulency, ever worshipped a man as round +as the sun or a woman as round as the moon. No man, however attracted to +an artistic attenuation, ever really believed that the Dryad was as lean +and stiff as the tree. We human beings have never worshipped Nature; and +indeed, the reason is very simple. It is that all human beings are +superhuman beings. We have printed our own image upon Nature, as God has +printed His image upon us. We have told the enormous sun to stand still; +we have fixed him on our shields, caring no more for a star than for a +starfish. And when there were powers of Nature we could not for the time +control, we have conceived great beings in human shape controlling them. +Jupiter does not mean thunder. Thunder means the march and victory of +Jupiter. Neptune does not mean the sea; the sea is his, and he made it. +In other words, what the savage really said about the sea was, "Only my +fetish Mumbo could raise such mountains out of mere water." What the +savage really said about the sun was, "Only my great great-grandfather +Jumbo could deserve such a blazing crown." + +About all these myths my own position is utterly and even sadly simple. +I say you cannot really understand any myths till you have found that one +of them is not a myth. Turnip ghosts mean nothing if there are no real +ghosts. Forged bank-notes mean nothing if there are no real bank-notes. +Heathen gods mean nothing, and must always mean nothing, to those of us +that deny the Christian God. When once a god is admitted, even a false +god, the Cosmos begins to know its place: which is the second place. When +once it is the real God the Cosmos falls down before Him, offering flowers +in spring as flames in winter. "My love is like a red, red rose" does not +mean that the poet is praising roses under the allegory of a young lady. +"My love is an arbutus" does not mean that the author was a botanist so +pleased with a particular arbutus tree that he said he loved it. "Who art +the moon and regent of my sky" does not mean that Juliet invented Romeo to +account for the roundness of the moon. "Christ is the Sun of Easter" does +not mean that the worshipper is praising the sun under the emblem of +Christ. Goddess or god can clothe themselves with the spring or summer; +but the body is more than raiment. Religion takes almost disdainfully the +dress of Nature; and indeed Christianity has done as well with the snows +of Christmas as with the snow-drops of spring. And when I look across +the sun-struck fields, I know in my inmost bones that my joy is not solely +in the spring, for spring alone, being always returning, would be always +sad. There is somebody or something walking there, to be crowned with +flowers: and my pleasure is in some promise yet possible and in the +resurrection of the dead. + + + + +THE REAL JOURNALIST + + +Our age which has boasted of realism will fail chiefly through lack of +reality. Never, I fancy, has there been so grave and startling a divorce +between the real way a thing is done and the look of it when it is done. +I take the nearest and most topical instance to hand a newspaper. +Nothing looks more neat and regular than a newspaper, with its parallel +columns, its mechanical printing, its detailed facts and figures, its +responsible, polysyllabic leading articles. Nothing, as a matter of fact, +goes every night through more agonies of adventure, more hairbreadth +escapes, desperate expedients, crucial councils, random compromises, or +barely averted catastrophes. Seen from the outside, it seems to come +round as automatically as the clock and as silently as the dawn. Seen +from the inside, it gives all its organisers a gasp of relief every +morning to see that it has come out at all; that it has come out without +the leading article upside down or the Pope congratulated on discovering +the North Pole. + +I will give an instance (merely to illustrate my thesis of unreality) from +the paper that I know best. Here is a simple story, a little episode in +the life of a journalist, which may be amusing and instructive: the tale +of how I made a great mistake in quotation. There are really two stories: +the story as seen from the outside, by a man reading the paper; and the +story seen from the inside, by the journalists shouting and telephoning +and taking notes in shorthand through the night. + +This is the outside story; and it reads like a dreadful quarrel. The +notorious G. K. Chesterton, a reactionary Torquemada whose one gloomy +pleasure was in the defence of orthodoxy and the pursuit of heretics, long +calculated and at last launched a denunciation of a brilliant leader of +the New Theology which he hated with all the furnace of his fanatic soul. +In this document Chesterton darkly, deliberately, and not having the fear +of God before his eyes, asserted that Shakespeare wrote the line "that +wreathes its old fantastic roots so high." This he said because he had +been kept in ignorance by Priests; or, perhaps, because he thought +craftily that none of his dupes could discover a curious and forgotten +rhyme called 'Elegy in a Country Churchyard'. Anyhow, that orthodox +gentleman made a howling error; and received some twenty-five letters and +post-cards from kind correspondents who pointed out the mistake. + +But the odd thing is that scarcely any of them could conceive that it was +a mistake. The first wrote in the tone of one wearied of epigrams, and +cried, "What is the joke NOW?" Another professed (and practised, for all +I know, God help him) that he had read through all Shakespeare and failed +to find the line. A third wrote in a sort of moral distress, asking, as +in confidence, if Gray was really a plagiarist. They were a noble +collection; but they all subtly assumed an element of leisure and +exactitude in the recipient's profession and character which is far from +the truth. Let us pass on to the next act of the external tragedy. + +In Monday's issue of the same paper appeared a letter from the same +culprit. He ingenuously confessed that the line did not belong to +Shakespeare, but to a poet whom he called Grey. Which was another +cropper--or whopper. This strange and illiterate outbreak was printed by +the editor with the justly scornful title, "Mr. Chesterton 'Explains'?" +Any man reading the paper at breakfast saw at once the meaning of the +sarcastic quotation marks. They meant, of course, "Here is a man who +doesn't know Gray from Shakespeare; he tries to patch it up and he can't +even spell Gray. And that is what he calls an Explanation." That is the +perfectly natural inference of the reader from the letter, the mistake, +and the headline--as seen from the outside. The falsehood was serious; +the editorial rebuke was serious. The stern editor and the sombre, +baffled contributor confront each other as the curtain falls. + +And now I will tell you exactly what really happened. It is honestly +rather amusing; it is a story of what journals and journalists really are. +A monstrously lazy man lives in South Bucks partly by writing a column +in the Saturday Daily News. At the time he usually writes it (which is +always at the last moment) his house is unexpectedly invaded by infants of +all shapes and sizes. His Secretary is called away; and he has to cope +with the invading pigmies. Playing with children is a glorious thing; but +the journalist in question has never understood why it was considered a +soothing or idyllic one. It reminds him, not of watering little budding +flowers, but of wrestling for hours with gigantic angels and devils. +Moral problems of the most monstrous complexity besiege him incessantly. +He has to decide before the awful eyes of innocence, whether, when a +sister has knocked down a brother's bricks, in revenge for the brother +having taken two sweets out of his turn, it is endurable that the brother +should retaliate by scribbling on the sister's picture book, and whether +such conduct does not justify the sister in blowing out the brother's +unlawfully lighted match. + +Just as he is solving this problem upon principles of the highest morality, +it occurs to him suddenly that he has not written his Saturday article; +and that there is only about an hour to do it in. He wildly calls to +somebody (probably the gardener) to telephone to somewhere for a messenger; +he barricades himself in another room and tears his hair, wondering what +on earth he shall write about. A drumming of fists on the door outside +and a cheerful bellowing encourage and clarify his thoughts; and he is +able to observe some newspapers and circulars in wrappers lying on the +table. One is a dingy book catalogue; the second is a shiny pamphlet +about petrol; the third is a paper called The Christian Commonwealth. He +opens it anyhow, and sees in the middle of a page a sentence with which he +honestly disagrees. It says that the sense of beauty in Nature is a new +thing, hardly felt before Wordsworth. A stream of images and pictures +pour through his head, like skies chasing each other or forests running by. +"Not felt before Wordsworth!" he thinks. "Oh, but this won't do... +bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang...night's candles are +burnt out... glowed with living sapphires. leaving their moon-loved +maze...antique roots fantastic... antique roots wreathed high...what is +it in As You Like It?" + +He sits down desperately; the messenger rings at the bell; the children +drum on the door; the servants run up from time to time to say the +messenger is getting bored; and the pencil staggers along, making the +world a present of fifteen hundred unimportant words, and making +Shakespeare a present of a portion of Gray's Elegy; putting "fantastic +roots wreathed high" instead of "antique roots peep out." Then the +journalist sends off his copy and turns his attention to the enigma of +whether a brother should commandeer a sister's necklace because the sister +pinched him at Littlehampton. That is the first scene; that is how an +article is really written. + +The scene now changes to the newspaper office. The writer of the article +has discovered his mistake and wants to correct it by the next day: but +the next day is Sunday. He cannot post a letter, so he rings up the paper +and dictates a letter by telephone. He leaves the title to his friends at +the other end; he knows that they can spell "Gray," as no doubt they can: +but the letter is put down by journalistic custom in a pencil scribble and +the vowel may well be doubtful. The friend writes at the top of the +letter "'G. K. C.' Explains," putting the initials in quotation marks. +The next man passing it for press is bored with these initials (I am with +him there) and crosses them out, substituting with austere civility, "Mr. +Chesterton Explains." But and now he hears the iron laughter of the Fates, +for the blind bolt is about to fall--but he neglects to cross out the +second "quote" (as we call it) and it goes up to press with a "quote" +between the last words. Another quotation mark at the end of "explains" +was the work of one merry moment for the printers upstairs. So the +inverted commas were lifted entirely off one word on to the other and a +totally innocent title suddenly turned into a blasting sneer. But that +would have mattered nothing so far, for there was nothing to sneer at. In +the same dark hour, however, there was a printer who was (I suppose) so +devoted to this Government that he could think of no Gray but Sir Edward +Grey. He spelt it "Grey" by a mere misprint, and the whole tale was +complete: first blunder, second blunder, and final condemnation. + +That is a little tale of journalism as it is; if you call it egotistic and +ask what is the use of it I think I could tell you. You might remember it +when next some ordinary young workman is going to be hanged by the neck on +circumstantial evidence. + + + + +THE SENTIMENTAL SCOT + + +Of all the great nations of Christendom, the Scotch are by far the most +romantic. I have just enough Scotch experience and just enough Scotch +blood to know this in the only way in which a thing can really be known; +that is, when the outer world and the inner world are at one. I know it +is always said that the Scotch are practical, prosaic, and puritan; that +they have an eye to business. I like that phrase "an eye" to business. + +Polyphemus had an eye for business; it was in the middle of his forehead. +It served him admirably for the only two duties which are demanded in a +modern financier and captain of industry: the two duties of counting sheep +and of eating men. But when that one eye was put out he was done for. +But the Scotch are not one-eyed practical men, though their best friends +must admit that they are occasionally business-like. They are, quite +fundamentally, romantic and sentimental, and this is proved by the very +economic argument that is used to prove their harshness and hunger for the +material. The mass of Scots have accepted the industrial civilisation, +with its factory chimneys and its famine prices, with its steam and smoke +and steel--and strikes. The mass of the Irish have not accepted it. The +mass of the Irish have clung to agriculture with claws of iron; and have +succeeded in keeping it. That is because the Irish, though far inferior +to the Scotch in art and literature, are hugely superior to them in +practical politics. You do need to be very romantic to accept the +industrial civilisation. It does really require all the old Gaelic +glamour to make men think that Glasgow is a grand place. Yet the miracle +is achieved; and while I was in Glasgow I shared the illusion. I have +never had the faintest illusion about Leeds or Birmingham. The industrial +dream suited the Scots. Here was a really romantic vista, suited to a +romantic people; a vision of higher and higher chimneys taking hold upon +the heavens, of fiercer and fiercer fires in which adamant could evaporate +like dew. Here were taller and taller engines that began already to +shriek and gesticulate like giants. Here were thunderbolts of +communication which already flashed to and fro like thoughts. It was +unreasonable to expect the rapt, dreamy, romantic Scot to stand still in +such a whirl of wizardry to ask whether he, the ordinary Scot, would be +any the richer. + +He, the ordinary Scot, is very much the poorer. Glasgow is not a rich +city. It is a particularly poor city ruled by a few particularly rich men. +It is not, perhaps, quite so poor a city as Liverpool, London, +Manchester, Birmingham, or Bolton. It is vastly poorer than Rome, Rouen, +Munich, or Cologne. A certain civic vitality notable in Glasgow may, +perhaps, be due to the fact that the high poetic patriotism of the Scots +has there been reinforced by the cutting common sense and independence of +the Irish. In any case, I think there can be no doubt of the main +historical fact. The Scotch were tempted by the enormous but unequal +opportunities of industrialism, because the Scotch are romantic. The +Irish refused those enormous and unequal opportunities, because the Irish +are clear-sighted. They would not need very clear sight by this time to +see that in England and Scotland the temptation has been a betrayal. The +industrial system has failed. + +I was coming the other day along a great valley road that strikes out of +the westland counties about Glasgow, more or less towards the east and the +widening of the Forth. It may, for all I know (I amused myself with the +fancy), be the way along which Wallace came with his crude army, when he +gave battle before Stirling Brig; and, in the midst of mediaeval +diplomacies, made a new nation possible. Anyhow, the romantic quality of +Scotland rolled all about me, as much in the last reek of Glasgow as in +the first rain upon the hills. The tall factory chimneys seemed trying to +be taller than the mountain peaks; as if this landscape were full (as its +history has been full) of the very madness of ambition. The wageslavery +we live in is a wicked thing. But there is nothing in which the Scotch +are more piercing and poetical, I might say more perfect, than in their +Scotch wickedness. It is what makes the Master of Ballantrae the most +thrilling of all fictitious villains. It is what makes the Master of +Lovat the most thrilling of all historical villains. It is poetry. It +is an intensity which is on the edge of madness or (what is worse) magic. +Well, the Scotch have managed to apply something of this fierce +romanticism even to the lowest of all lordships and serfdoms; the +proletarian inequality of today. You do meet now and then, in Scotland, +the man you never meet anywhere else but in novels; I mean the self-made +man; the hard, insatiable man, merciless to himself as well as to others. +It is not "enterprise"; it is kleptomania. He is quite mad, and a much +more obvious public pest than any other kind of kleptomaniac; but though +he is a cheat, he is not an illusion. He does exist; I have met quite two +of him. Him alone among modern merchants we do not weakly flatter when we +call him a bandit. Something of the irresponsibility of the true dark +ages really clings about him. Our scientific civilisation is not a +civilisation; it is a smoke nuisance. Like smoke it is choking us; like +smoke it will pass away. Only of one or two Scotsmen, in my experience, +was it true that where there is smoke there is fire. + +But there are other kinds of fire; and better. The one great advantage of +this strange national temper is that, from the beginning of all chronicles, +it has provided resistance as well as cruelty. In Scotland nearly +everything has always been in revolt--especially loyalty. If these people +are capable of making Glasgow, they are also capable of wrecking it; and +the thought of my many good friends in that city makes me really doubtful +about which would figure in human memories as the more huge calamity of +the two. In Scotland there are many rich men so weak as to call +themselves strong. But there are not so many poor men weak enough to +believe them. + +As I came out of Glasgow I saw men standing about the road. They had +little lanterns tied to the fronts of their caps, like the fairies who +used to dance in the old fairy pantomimes. They were not, however, +strictly speaking, fairies. They might have been called gnomes, since +they worked in the chasms of those purple and chaotic hills. They worked +in the mines from whence comes the fuel of our fires. Just at the moment +when I saw them, moreover, they were not dancing; nor were they working. +They were doing nothing. Which, in my opinion (and I trust yours), was +the finest thing they could do. + + + + +THE SECTARIAN OF SOCIETY + + +A fixed creed is absolutely indispensable to freedom. For while men are +and should be various, there must be some communication between them if +they are to get any pleasure out of their variety. And an intellectual +formula is the only thing that can create a communication that does not +depend on mere blood, class, or capricious sympathy. If we all start with +the agreement that the sun and moon exist, we can talk about our different +visions of them. The strong-eyed man can boast that he sees the sun as a +perfect circle. The shortsighted man may say (or if he is an +impressionist, boast) that he sees the moon as a silver blur. The +colour-blind man may rejoice in the fairy-trick which enables him to live +under a green sun and a blue moon. But if once it be held that there is +nothing but a silver blur in one man's eye or a bright circle (like a +monocle) in the other man's, then neither is free, for each is shut up in +the cell of a separate universe. + +But, indeed, an even worse fate, practically considered, follows from the +denim of the original intellectual formula. Not only does the individual +become narrow, but he spreads narrowness across the world like a cloud; he +causes narrowness to increase and multiply like a weed. For what happens +is this: that all the shortsighted people come together and build a city +called Myopia, where they take short-sightedness for granted and paint +short-sighted pictures and pursue very short-sighted policies. Meanwhile +all the men who can stare at the sun get together on Salisbury Plain and +do nothing but stare at the sun; and all the men who see a blue moon band +themselves together and assert the blue moon, not once in a blue moon, but +incessantly. So that instead of a small and varied group, you have +enormous monotonous groups. Instead of the liberty of dogma, you have the +tyranny of taste. + +Allegory apart, instances of what I mean will occur to every one; perhaps +the most obvious is Socialism. Socialism means the ownership by the organ +of government (whatever it is) of all things necessary to production. If +a man claims to be a Socialist in that sense he can be any kind of man he +likes in any other sense--a bookie, a Mahatma, a man about town, an +archbishop, a Margate nigger. Without recalling at the moment +clear-headed Socialists in all of these capacities, it is obvious that a +clear-headed Socialist (that is, a Socialist with a creed) can be a +soldier, like Mr. Blatchford, or a Don, like Mr. Ball, or a Bathchairman +like Mr. Meeke, or a clergyman like Mr. Conrad Noel, or an artistic +tradesman like the late Mr. William Morris. + +But some people call themselves Socialists, and will not be bound by what +they call a narrow dogma; they say that Socialism means far, far more than +this; all that is high, all that is free, all that is, etc., etc. Now +mark their dreadful fate; for they become totally unfit to be tradesmen, +or soldiers, or clergymen, or any other stricken human thing, but become a +particular sort of person who is always the same. When once it has been +discovered that Socialism does not mean a narrow economic formula, it is +also discovered that Socialism does mean wearing one particular kind of +clothes, reading one particular kind of books, hanging up one particular +kind of pictures, and in the majority of cases even eating one particular +kind of food. For men must recognise each other somehow. These men will +not know each other by a principle, like fellow citizens. They cannot know +each other by a smell, like dogs. So they have to fall back on general +colouring; on the fact that a man of their sort will have a wife in pale +green and Walter Crane's "Triumph of Labour" hanging in the hall. + +There are, of course, many other instances; for modern society is almost +made up of these large monochrome patches. Thus I, for one, regret the +supersession of the old Puritan unity, founded on theology, but embracing +all types from Milton to the grocer, by that newer Puritan unity which is +founded rather on certain social habits, certain common notions, both +permissive and prohibitive, in connection with Particular social pleasures. + + +Thus I, for one, regret that (if you are going to have an aristocracy) it +did not remain a logical one founded on the science of heraldry; a thing +asserting and defending the quite defensible theory that physical +genealogy is the test; instead of being, as it is now, a mere machine of +Eton and Oxford for varnishing anybody rich enough with one monotonous +varnish. + +And it is supremely so in the case of religion. As long as you have a +creed, which every one in a certain group believes or is supposed to +believe, then that group will consist of the old recurring figures of +religious history, who can be appealed to by the creed and judged by it; +the saint, the hypocrite, the brawler, the weak brother. These people do +each other good; or they all join together to do the hypocrite good, with +heavy and repeated blows. But once break the bond of doctrine which alone +holds these people together and each will gravitate to his own kind +outside the group. The hypocrites will all get together and call each +other saints; the saints will get lost in a desert and call themselves +weak brethren; the weak brethren will get weaker and weaker in a general +atmosphere of imbecility; and the brawler will go off looking for somebody +else with whom to brawl. + +This has very largely happened to modern English religion; I have been in +many churches, chapels, and halls where a confident pride in having got +beyond creeds was coupled with quite a paralysed incapacity to get beyond +catchwords. But wherever the falsity appears it comes from neglect of the +same truth: that men should agree on a principle, that they may differ on +everything else; that God gave men a law that they might turn it into +liberties. + +There was hugely more sense in the old people who said that a wife and +husband ought to have the same religion than there is in all the +contemporary gushing about sister souls and kindred spirits and auras of +identical colour. As a matter of fact, the more the sexes are in violent +contrast the less likely they are to be in violent collision. The more +incompatible their tempers are the better. Obviously a wife's soul cannot +possibly be a sister soul. It is very seldom so much as a first cousin. +There are very few marriages of identical taste and temperament; they are +generally unhappy. But to have the same fundamental theory, to think the +same thing a virtue, whether you practise or neglect it, to think the same +thing a sin, whether you punish or pardon or laugh at it, in the last +extremity to call the same thing duty and the same thing disgrace--this +really is necessary to a tolerably happy marriage; and it is much better +represented by a common religion than it is by affinities and auras. And +what applies to the family applies to the nation. A nation with a root +religion will be tolerant. A nation with no religion will be bigoted. +Lastly, the worst effect of all is this: that when men come together to +profess a creed, they come courageously, though it is to hide in catacombs +and caves. But when they come together in a clique they come sneakishly, +eschewing all change or disagreement, though it is to dine to a brass band +in a big London hotel. For birds of a feather flock together, but birds +of the white feather most of all. + + + + +THE FOOL + + +For many years I had sought him, and at last I found him in a club. I had +been told that he was everywhere; but I had almost begun to think that he +was nowhere. I had been assured that there were millions of him; but +before my late discovery I inclined to think that there were none of him. +After my late discovery I am sure that there is one; and I incline to +think that there are several, say, a few hundreds; but unfortunately most +of them occupying important positions. When I say "him," I mean the +entire idiot. + +I have never been able to discover that "stupid public" of which so many +literary men complain. The people one actually meets in trains or at +tea parties seem to me quite bright and interesting; certainly quite enough +so to call for the full exertion of one's own wits. And even when I have +heard brilliant "conversationalists" conversing with other people, the +conversation had much more equality and give and take than this age of +intellectual snobs will admit. I have sometimes felt tired, like other +people; but rather tired with men's talk and variety than with their +stolidity or sameness; therefore it was that I sometimes longed to find +the refreshment of a single fool. + +But it was denied me. Turn where I would I found this monotonous +brilliancy of the general intelligence, this ruthless, ceaseless sparkle +of humour and good sense. The "mostly fools" theory has been used in an +anti-democratic sense; but when I found at last my priceless ass, I did +not find him in what is commonly called the democracy; nor in the +aristocracy either. The man of the democracy generally talks quite +rationally, sometimes on the anti-democratic side, but always with an idea +of giving reasons for what he says and referring to the realities of his +experience. Nor is it the aristocracy that is stupid; at least, not that +section of the aristocracy which represents it in politics. They are +often cynical, especially about money, but even their boredom tends to +make them a little eager for any real information or originality. If a +man like Mr. Winston Churchill or Mr. Wyndham made up his mind for any +reason to attack Syndicalism he would find out what it was first. Not so +the man I found in the club. + +He was very well dressed; he had a heavy but handsome face; his black +clothes suggested the City and his gray moustaches the Army; but the whole +suggested that he did not really belong to either, but was one of those +who dabble in shares and who play at soldiers. There was some third +element about him that was neither mercantile nor military. His manners +were a shade too gentlemanly to be quite those of a gentleman. They +involved an unction and over-emphasis of the club-man: then I suddenly +remembered feeling the same thing in some old actors or old playgoers who +had modelled themselves on actors. As I came in he said, "If I was the +Government," and then put a cigar in his mouth which he lit carefully with +long intakes of breath. Then he took the cigar out of his mouth again and +said, "I'd give it 'em," as if it were quite a separate sentence. But +even while his mouth was stopped with the cigar his companion or +interlocutor leaped to his feet and said with great heartiness, snatching +up a hat, "Well, I must be off. Tuesday!". I dislike these dark +suspicions, but I certainly fancied I recognised the sudden geniality with +which one takes leave of a bore. + +When, therefore, he removed the narcotic stopper from his mouth it was to +me that he addressed the belated epigram. "I'd give it 'em." + +"What would you give them," I asked, "the minimum wage?" + +"I'd give them beans," he said. "I'd shoot 'em down shoot 'em down, every +man Jack of them. I lost my best train yesterday, and here's the whole +country paralysed, and here's a handful of obstinate fellows standing +between the country and coal. I'd shoot 'em down!" + +"That would surely be a little harsh," I pleaded. "After all, they are +not under martial law, though I suppose two or three of them have +commissions in the Yeomanry." + +"Commissions in the Yeomanry!" he repeated, and his eyes and face, which +became startling and separate, like those of a boiled lobster, made me +feel sure that he had something of the kind himself. + +"Besides," I continued, "wouldn't it be quite enough to confiscate their +money?" + +"Well, I'd send them all to penal servitude, anyhow," he said, "and I'd +confiscate their funds as well." + +"The policy is daring and full of difficulty," I replied, "but I do not +say that it is wholly outside the extreme rights of the republic. But you +must remember that though the facts of property have become quite +fantastic, yet the sentiment of property still exists. These coal-owners, +though they have not earned the mines, though they could not work the +mines, do quite honestly feel that they own the mines. Hence your +suggestion of shooting them down, or even of confiscating their property, +raises very--" + +"What do you mean?" asked the man with the cigar, with a bullying eye. +"Who yer talking about?" + +"I'm talking about what you were talking about," I replied; "as you put it +so perfectly, about the handful of obstinate fellows who are standing +between the country and the coal. I mean the men who are selling their +own coal for fancy prices, and who, as long as they can get those prices, +care as little for national starvation as most merchant princes and +pirates have cared for the provinces that were wasted or the peoples that +were enslaved just before their ships came home. But though I am a bit of +a revolutionist myself, I cannot quite go with you in the extreme violence +you suggest. You say--" + +"I say," he cried, bursting through my speech with a really splendid +energy like that of some noble beast, "I say I'd take all these blasted +miners and--" + +I had risen slowly to my feet, for I was profoundly moved; and I stood +staring at that mental monster. + +"Oh," I said, "so it is the miners who are all to be sent to penal +servitude, so that we may get more coal. It is the miners who are to be +shot dead, every man Jack of them; for if once they are all shot dead they +will start mining again...You must forgive me, sir; I know I seem somewhat +moved. The fact is, I have just found something. Something I have been +looking for four years." + +"Well," he asked, with no unfriendly stare, "and what have you found?" + +"No," I answered, shaking my head sadly, "I do not think it would be quite +kind to tell you what I have found." + +He had a hundred virtues, including the capital virtue of good humour, and +we had no difficulty in changing the subject and forgetting the +disagreement. He talked about society, his town friends and his country +sports, and I discovered in the course of it that he was a county +magistrate, a Member of Parliament, and a director of several important +companies. He was also that other thing, which I did not tell him. + +The moral is that a certain sort of person does exist, to whose glory this +article is dedicated. He is not the ordinary man. He is not the miner, +who is sharp enough to ask for the necessities of existence. He is not +the mine-owner, who is sharp enough to get a great deal more, by selling +his coal at the best possible moment. He is not the aristocratic +politician, who has a cynical but a fair sympathy with both economic +opportunities. But he is the man who appears in scores of public places +open to the upper middle class or (that less known but more powerful +section) the lower upper class. Men like this all over the country are +really saying whatever comes into their heads in their capacities of +justice of the peace, candidate for Parliament, Colonel of the Yeomanry, +old family doctor, Poor Law guardian, coroner, or above all, arbiter in +trade disputes. He suffers, in the literal sense, from softening of the +brain; he has softened it by always taking the view of everything most +comfortable for his country, his class, and his private personality. He +is a deadly public danger. But as I have given him his name at the +beginning of this article there is no need for me to repeat it at the end. + + + + +THE CONSCRIPT AND THE CRISIS + + +Very few of us ever see the history of our own time happening. And I +think the best service a modern journalist can do to society is to record +as plainly as ever he can exactly what impression was produced on his mind +by anything he has actually seen and heard on the outskirts of any modern +problem or campaign. Though all he saw of a railway strike was a flat +meadow in Essex in which a train was becalmed for an hour or two, he will +probably throw more light on the strike by describing this which he has +seen than by describing the steely kings of commerce and the bloody +leaders of the mob whom he has never seen--nor any one else either. If he +comes a day too late for the battle of Waterloo (as happened to a friend +of my grandfather) he should still remember that a true account of the day +after Waterloo would be a most valuable thing to have. Though he was on +the wrong side of the door when Rizzio was being murdered, we should still +like to have the wrong side described in the right way. Upon this +principle I, who know nothing of diplomacy or military arrangements, and +have only held my breath like the rest of the world while France and +Germany were bargaining, will tell quite truthfully of a small scene I saw, +one of the thousand scenes that were, so to speak, the anterooms of that +inmost chamber of debate. + +In the course of a certain morning I came into one of the quiet squares of +a small French town and found its cathedral. It was one of those gray and +rainy days which rather suit the Gothic. The clouds were leaden, like the +solid blue-gray lead of the spires and the jewelled windows; the sloping +roofs and high-shouldered arches looked like cloaks drooping with damp; +and the stiff gargoyles that stood out round the walls were scoured with +old rains and new. I went into the round, deep porch with many doors and +found two grubby children playing there out of the rain. I also found a +notice of services, etc., and among these I found the announcement that at +11.30 (that is about half an hour later) there would be a special service +for the Conscripts, that is to say, the draft of young men who were being +taken from their homes in that little town and sent to serve in the French +Army; sent (as it happened) at an awful moment, when the French Army was +encamped at a parting of the ways. There were already a great many people +there when I entered, not only of all kinds, but in all attitudes, +kneeling, sitting, or standing about. And there was that general sense +that strikes every man from a Protestant country, whether he dislikes the +Catholic atmosphere or likes it; I mean, the general sense that the thing +was "going on all the time"; that it was not an occasion, but a perpetual +process, as if it were a sort of mystical inn. + +Several tricolours were hung quite near to the altar, and the young men, +when they came in, filed up the church and sat right at the front. They +were, of course, of every imaginable social grade; for the French +conscription is really strict and universal. Some looked like young +criminals, some like young priests, some like both. Some were so +obviously prosperous and polished that a barrack-room must seem to them +like hell; others (by the look of them) had hardly ever been in so decent +a place. But it was not so much the mere class variety that most sharply +caught an Englishman's eye. It was the presence of just those one or two +kinds of men who would never have become soldiers in any other way. + +There are many reasons for becoming a soldier. It may be a matter of +hereditary luck or abject hunger or heroic virtue or fugitive vice; it may +be an interest in the work or a lack of interest in any other work. But +there would always be two or three kinds of people who would never tend to +soldiering; all those kinds of people were there. A lad with red hair, +large ears, and very careful clothing, somehow conveyed across the church +that he had always taken care of his health, not even from thinking about +it, but simply because he was told, and that he was one of those who pass +from childhood to manhood without any shock of being a man. In the row +in front of him there was a very slight and vivid little Jew, of the sort +that is a tailor and a Socialist. By one of those accidents that make +real life so unlike anything else, he was the one of the company who +seemed especially devout. Behind these stiff or sensitive boys were +ranged the ranks of their mothers and fathers, with knots and bunches of +their little brothers and sisters. + +The children kicked their little legs, wriggled about the seats, and gaped +at the arched roof while their mothers were on their knees praying their +own prayers, and here and there crying. The gray clouds of rain outside +gathered, I suppose, more and more; for the deep church continuously +darkened. The lads in front began to sing a military hymn in odd, rather +strained voices; I could not disentangle the words, but only one perpetual +refrain; so that it sounded like + + +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la patrie, +Valdarkararump pour la patrie. + + +Then this ceased; and silence continued, the coloured windows growing +gloomier and gloomier with the clouds. In the dead stillness a child +started crying suddenly and incoherently. In a city far to the north a +French diplomatist and a German aristocrat were talking. + +I will not make any commentary on the thing that could blur the outline of +its almost cruel actuality. I will not talk nor allow any one else to +talk about "clericalism" and "militarism." Those who talk like that are +made of the same mud as those who call all the angers of the unfortunate +"Socialism." The women who were calling in the gloom around me on God and +the Mother of God were not "clericalists "; or, if they were, they had +forgotten it. And I will bet my boots the young men were not +"militarists"--quite the other way just then. The priest made a short +speech; he did not utter any priestly dogmas (whatever they are), he +uttered platitudes. In such circumstances platitudes are the only +possible things to say; because they are true. He began by saying that he +supposed a large number of them would be uncommonly glad not to go. They +seemed to assent to this particular priestly dogma with even more than +their alleged superstitious credulity. He said that war was hateful, and +that we all hated it; but that "in all things reasonable" the law of one's +own commonwealth was the voice of God. He spoke about Joan of Arc; and +how she had managed to be a bold and successful soldier while still +preserving her virtue and practising her religion; then he gave them each +a little paper book. To which they replied (after a brief interval for +reflection): + + +Pongprongperesklang pour la patrie, +Tambraugtararronc pour la patrie. + + +which I feel sure was the best and most pointed reply. + +While all this was happening feelings quite indescribable crowded about my +own darkening brain, as the clouds crowded above the darkening church. +They were so entirely of the elements and the passions that I cannot utter +them in an idea, but only in an image. It seemed to me that we were +barricaded in this church, but we could not tell what was happening +outside the church. The monstrous and terrible jewels of the windows +darkened or glistened under moving shadow or light, but the nature of that +light and the shapes of those shadows we did not know and hardly dared to +guess. The dream began, I think, with a dim fancy that enemies were +already in the town, and that the enormous oaken doors were groaning under +their hammers. Then I seemed to suppose that the town itself had been +destroyed by fire, and effaced, as it may be thousands of years hence, and +that if I opened the door I should come out on a wilderness as flat and +sterile as the sea. Then the vision behind the veil of stone and slate +grew wilder with earthquakes. I seemed to see chasms cloven to the +foundations of all things, and letting up an infernal dawn. Huge things +happily hidden from us had climbed out of the abyss, and were striding +about taller than the clouds. And when the darkness crept from the +sapphires of Mary to the sanguine garments of St. John I fancied that some +hideous giant was walking round the church and looking in at each window +in turn. + +Sometimes, again, I thought of that church with coloured windows as a ship +carrying many lanterns struggling in a high sea at night. Sometimes I +thought of it as a great coloured lantern itself, hung on an iron chain +out of heaven and tossed and swung to and fro by strong wings, the wings +of the princes of the air. But I never thought of it or the young men +inside it save as something precious and in peril, or of the things +outside but as something barbaric and enormous. + +I know there are some who cannot sympathise with such sentiments of +limitation; I know there are some who would feel no touch of the heroic +tenderness if some day a young man, with red hair, large ears, and his +mother's lozenges in his pocket, were found dead in uniform in the passes +of the Vosges. But on this subject I have heard many philosophies and +thought a good deal for myself; and the conclusion I have come to is +Sacrarterumbrrar pour la Pattie, and it is not likely that I shall alter +it now. + +But when I came out of the church there were none of these things, but +only a lot of Shops, including a paper-shop, on which the posters +announced that the negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily. + + + + +THE MISER AND HIS FRIENDS + + +It is a sign of sharp sickness in a society when it is actually led by +some special sort of lunatic. A mild touch of madness may even keep a man +sane; for it may keep him modest. So some exaggerations in the State may +remind it of its own normal. But it is bad when the head is cracked; when +the roof of the commonwealth has a tile loose. + +The two or three cases of this that occur in history have always been +gibbeted gigantically. Thus Nero has become a black proverb, not merely +because he was an oppressor, but because he was also an aesthete--that is, +an erotomaniac. He not only tortured other people's bodies; he tortured +his own soul into the same red revolting shapes. Though he came quite +early in Roman Imperial history and was followed by many austere and noble +emperors, yet for us the Roman Empire was never quite cleansed of that +memory of the sexual madman. The populace or barbarians from whom we come +could not forget the hour when they came to the highest place of the earth, +saw the huge pedestal of the earthly omnipotence, read on it Divus Caesar, +and looked up and saw a statue without a head. + +It is the same with that ugly entanglement before the Renaissance, from +which, alas, most memories of the Middle Ages are derived. Louis XI was a +very patient and practical man of the world; but (like many good business +men) he was mad. The morbidity of the intriguer and the torturer clung +about everything he did, even when it was right. And just as the great +Empire of Antoninus and Aurelius never wiped out Nero, so even the silver +splendour of the latter saints, such as Vincent de Paul, has never painted +out for the British public the crooked shadow of Louis XI. Whenever the +unhealthy man has been on top, he has left a horrible savour that humanity +finds still in its nostrils. Now in our time the unhealthy man is on top; +but he is not the man mad on sex, like Nero; or mad on statecraft, like +Louis XI; he is simply the man mad on money. Our tyrant is not the satyr +or the torturer; but the miser. + +The modern miser has changed much from the miser of legend and anecdote; +but only because he has grown yet more insane. The old miser had some +touch of the human artist about him in so far that he collected gold--a +substance that can really be admired for itself, like ivory or old oak. +An old man who picked up yellow pieces had something of the simple ardour, +something of the mystical materialism, of a child who picks out yellow +flowers. Gold is but one kind of coloured clay, but coloured clay can be +very beautiful. The modern idolater of riches is content with far less +genuine things. The glitter of guineas is like the glitter of buttercups, +the chink of pelf is like the chime of bells, compared with the dreary +papers and dead calculations which make the hobby of the modern miser. + +The modern millionaire loves nothing so lovable as a coin. He is content +sometimes with the dead crackle of notes; but far more often with the mere +repetition of noughts in a ledger, all as like each other as eggs to eggs. +And as for comfort, the old miser could be comfortable, as many tramps +and savages are, when he was once used to being unclean. A man could find +some comfort in an unswept attic or an unwashed shirt. But the Yankee +millionaire can find no comfort with five telephones at his bed-head and +ten minutes for his lunch. The round coins in the miser's stocking were +safe in some sense. The round noughts in the millionaire's ledger are +safe in no sense; the same fluctuation which excites him with their +increase depresses him with their diminution. The miser at least collects +coins; his hobby is numismatics. The man who collects noughts collects +nothings. + +It may be admitted that the man amassing millions is a bit of an idiot; +but it may be asked in what sense does he rule the modern world. The +answer to this is very important and rather curious. The evil enigma for +us here is not the rich, but the Very Rich. The distinction is important; +because this special problem is separate from the old general quarrel +about rich and poor that runs through the Bible and all strong books, old +and new. The special problem to-day is that certain powers and privileges +have grown so world-wide and unwieldy that they are out of the power of +the moderately rich as well as of the moderately poor. They are out of +the power of everybody except a few millionaires--that is, misers. In +the old normal friction of normal wealth and poverty I am myself on the +Radical side. I think that a Berkshire squire has too much power over his +tenants; that a Brompton builder has too much power over his workmen; that +a West London doctor has too much power over the poor patients in the West +London Hospital. + +But a Berkshire squire has no power over cosmopolitan finance, for +instance. A Brompton builder has not money enough to run a Newspaper +Trust. A West End doctor could not make a corner in quinine and freeze +everybody out. The merely rich are not rich enough to rule the modern +market. The things that change modern history, the big national and +international loans, the big educational and philanthropic foundations, +the purchase of numberless newspapers, the big prices paid for peerages, +the big expenses often incurred in elections--these are getting too big +for everybody except the misers; the men with the largest of earthly +fortunes and the smallest of earthly aims. + +There are two other odd and rather important things to be said about them. +The first is this: that with this aristocracy we do not have the chance +of a lucky variety in types which belongs to larger and looser +aristocracies. The moderately rich include all kinds of people even good +people. Even priests are sometimes saints; and even soldiers are +sometimes heroes. Some doctors have really grown wealthy by curing their +patients and not by flattering them; some brewers have been known to sell +beer. But among the Very Rich you will never find a really generous man, +even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will never +give themselves away; they are egoistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To +be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it. + +Lastly, the most serious point about them is this: that the new miser is +flattered for his meanness and the old one never was. It was never called +self-denial in the old miser that he lived on bones. It is called +self-denial in the new millionaire if he lives on beans. A man like +Dancer was never praised as a Christian saint for going in rags. A man +like Rockefeller is praised as a sort of pagan stoic for his early rising +or his unassuming dress. His "simple" meals, his "simple" clothes, his +"simple" funeral, are all extolled as if they were creditable to him. +They are disgraceful to him: exactly as disgraceful as the tatters and +vermin of the old miser were disgraceful to him. To be in rags for +charity would be the condition of a saint; to be in rags for money was +that of a filthy old fool. Precisely in the same way, to be "simple" for +charity is the state of a saint; to be "simple" for money is that of a +filthy old fool. Of the two I have more respect for the old miser, +gnawing bones in an attic: if he was not nearer to God, he was at least a +little nearer to men. His simple life was a little more like the life of +the real poor. + + + + +THE MYSTAGOGUE + + +Whenever you hear much of things being unutterable and indefinable and +impalpable and unnamable and subtly indescribable, then elevate your +aristocratic nose towards heaven and snuff up the smell of decay. It is +perfectly true that there is something in all good things that is beyond +all speech or figure of speech. But it is also true that there is in all +good things a perpetual desire for expression and concrete embodiment; and +though the attempt to embody it is always inadequate, the attempt is +always made. If the idea does not seek to be the word, the chances are +that it is an evil idea. If the word is not made flesh it is a bad word. + +Thus Giotto or Fra Angelieo would have at once admitted theologically that +God was too good to be painted; but they would always try to paint Him. +And they felt (very rightly) that representing Him as a rather quaint old +man with a gold crown and a white beard, like a king of the elves, was +less profane than resisting the sacred impulse to express Him in some way. +That is why the Christian world is full of gaudy pictures and twisted +statues which seem, to many refined persons, more blasphemous than the +secret volumes of an atheist. The trend of good is always towards +Incarnation. But, on the other hand, those refined thinkers who worship +the Devil, whether in the swamps of Jamaica or the salons of Paris, always +insist upon the shapelessness, the wordlessness, the unutterable character +of the abomination. They call him "horror of emptiness," as did the black +witch in Stevenson's Dynamiter; they worship him as the unspeakable name; +as the unbearable silence. They think of him as the void in the heart of +the whirlwind; the cloud on the brain of the maniac; the toppling turrets +of vertigo or the endless corridors of nightmare. It was the Christians +who gave the Devil a grotesque and energetic outline, with sharp horns and +spiked tail. It was the saints who drew Satan as comic and even lively. +The Satanists never drew him at all. + +And as it is with moral good and evil, so it is also with mental clarity +and mental confusion. There is one very valid test by which we may +separate genuine, if perverse and unbalanced, originality and revolt from +mere impudent innovation and bluff. The man who really thinks he has an +idea will always try to explain that idea. The charlatan who has no idea +will always confine himself to explaining that it is much too subtle to be +explained. The first idea may really be very outree or specialist; it may +really be very difficult to express to ordinary people. But because the +man is trying to express it, it is most probable that there is something +in it, after all. The honest man is he who is always trying to utter the +unutterable, to describe the indescribable; but the quack lives not by +plunging into mystery, but by refusing to come out of it. + +Perhaps this distinction is most comically plain in the case of the thing +called Art, and the people called Art Critics. It is obvious that an +attractive landscape or a living face can only half express the holy +cunning that has made them what they are. It is equally obvious that a +landscape painter expresses only half of the landscape; a portrait painter +only half of the person; they are lucky if they express so much. And +again it is yet more obvious that any literary description of the pictures +can only express half of them, and that the less important half. Still, +it does express something; the thread is not broken that connects God With +Nature, or Nature with men, or men with critics. The "Mona Lisa" was in +some respects (not all, I fancy) what God meant her to be. Leonardo's +picture was, in some respects, like the lady. And Walter Pater's rich +description was, in some respects, like the picture. Thus we come to the +consoling reflection that even literature, in the last resort, can express +something other than its own unhappy self. + +Now the modern critic is a humbug, because he professes to be entirely +inarticulate. Speech is his whole business; and he boasts of being +speechless. Before Botticelli he is mute. But if there is any good in +Botticelli (there is much good, and much evil too) it is emphatically the +critic's business to explain it: to translate it from terms of painting +into terms of diction. Of course, the rendering will be inadequate--but +so is Botticelli. It is a fact he would be the first to admit. But +anything which has been intelligently received can at least be +intelligently suggested. Pater does suggest an intelligent cause for the +cadaverous colour of Botticelli's "Venus Rising from the Sea." Ruskin +does suggest an intelligent motive for Turner destroying forests and +falsifying landscapes. These two great critics were far too fastidious +for my taste; they urged to excess the idea that a sense of art was a sort +of secret; to be patiently taught and slowly learnt. Still, they thought +it could be taught: they thought it could be learnt. They constrained +themselves, with considerable creative fatigue, to find the exact +adjectives which might parallel in English prose what has been clone in +Italian painting. The same is true of Whistler and R. A. M. Stevenson +and many others in the exposition of Velasquez. They had something to say +about the pictures; they knew it was unworthy of the pictures, but they +said it. + +Now the eulogists of the latest artistic insanities (Cubism and +Post Impressionism and Mr. Picasso) are eulogists and nothing else. They +are not critics; least of all creative critics. They do not attempt to +translate beauty into language; they merely tell you that it is +untranslatable--that is, unutterable, indefinable, indescribable, +impalpable, ineffable, and all the rest of it. The cloud is their banner; +they cry to chaos and old night. They circulate a piece of paper on which +Mr. Picasso has had the misfortune to upset the ink and tried to dry it +with his boots, and they seek to terrify democracy by the good old +anti-democratic muddlements: that "the public" does not understand these +things; that "the likes of us" cannot dare to question the dark decisions +of our lords. + +I venture to suggest that we resist all this rubbish by the very simple +test mentioned above. If there were anything intelligent in such art, +something of it at least could be made intelligible in literature. Man is +made with one head, not with two or three. No criticism of Rembrandt is +as good as Rembrandt; but it can be so written as to make a man go back +and look at his pictures. If there is a curious and fantastic art, it is +the business of the art critics to create a curious and fantastic literary +expression for it; inferior to it, doubtless, but still akin to it. If +they cannot do this, as they cannot; if there is nothing in their eulogies, +as there is nothing except eulogy--then they are quacks or the +high-priests of the unutterable. If the art critics can say nothing about +the artists except that they are good it is because the artists are bad. +They can explain nothing because they have found nothing; and they have +found nothing because there is nothing to be found. + + + + +THE RED REACTIONARY + + +The one case for Revolution is that it is the only quite clean and +complete road to anything--even to restoration. Revolution alone can be +not merely a revolt of the living, but also a resurrection of the dead. + +A friend of mine (one, in fact, who writes prominently on this paper) was +once walking down the street in a town of Western France, situated in that +area that used to be called La Vendee; which in that great creative crisis +about 1790 formed a separate and mystical soul of its own, and made a +revolution against a revolution. As my friend went down this street he +whistled an old French air which he had found, like Mr. Gandish, "in his +researches into 'istry," and which had somehow taken his fancy; the song +to which those last sincere loyalists went into battle. I think the +words ran: + +Monsieur de Charette. +Dit au gens d'ici. +Le roi va remettre. +Le fleur de lys. + +My friend was (and is) a Radical, but he was (and is) an Englishman, and +it never occurred to him that there could be any harm in singing archaic +lyrics out of remote centuries; that one had to be a Catholic to enjoy the +"Dies Irae," or a Protestant to remember "Lillibullero." Yet he was +stopped and gravely warned that things so politically provocative might +get him at least into temporary trouble. + +A little time after I was helping King George V to get crowned, by walking +round a local bonfire and listening to a local band. Just as a bonfire +cannot be too big, so (by my theory of music) a band cannot be too loud, +and this band was so loud, emphatic, and obvious, that I actually +recognised one or two of the tunes. And I noticed that quite a formidable +proportion of them were Jacobite tunes; that is, tunes that had been +primarily meant to keep George V out of his throne for ever. Some of the +real airs of the old Scottish rebellion were played, such as "Charlie is +My Darling," or "What's a' the steer, kimmer?" songs that men had sung +while marching to destroy and drive out the monarchy under which we live. +They were songs in which the very kinsmen of the present King were swept +aside as usurpers. They were songs in which the actual words "King +George" occurred as a curse and a derision. Yet they were played to +celebrate his very Coronation; played as promptly and innocently as if +they had been "Grandfather's Clock" or "Rule Britannia" or "The +Honeysuckle and the Bee." + +That contrast is the measure, not only between two nations, but between +two modes of historical construction and development. For there is not +really very much difference, as European history goes, in the time that +has elapsed between us and the Jacobite and between us and the Jacobin. +When George III was crowned the gauntlet of the King's Champion was picked +up by a partisan of the Stuarts. When George III was still on the throne +the Bourbons were driven out of France as the Stuarts had been driven out +of England. Yet the French are just sufficiently aware that the Bourbons +might possibly return that they will take a little trouble to discourage +it; whereas we are so certain that the Stuarts will never return that we +actually play their most passionate tunes as a compliment to their rivals. +And we do not even do it tauntingly. I examined the faces of all the +bandsmen; and I am sure they were devoid of irony: indeed, it is difficult +to blow a wind instrument ironically. We do it quite unconsciously; +because we have a huge fundamental dogma, which the French have not. We +really believe that the past is past. It is a very doubtful point. + +Now the great gift of a revolution (as in France) is that it makes men +free in the past as well as free in the future. Those who have cleared +away everything could, if they liked, put back everything. But we who +have preserved everything--we cannot restore anything. Take, for the sake +of argument, the complex and many coloured ritual of the Coronation +recently completed. That rite is stratified with the separate centuries; +from the first rude need of discipline to the last fine shade of culture +or corruption, there is nothing that cannot be detected or even dated. +The fierce and childish vow of the lords to serve their lord "against all +manner of folk" obviously comes from the real Dark Ages; no longer +confused, even by the ignorant, with the Middle Ages. It comes from some +chaos of Europe, when there was one old Roman road across four of our +counties; and when hostile "folk" might live in the next village. The +sacramental separation of one man to be the friend of the fatherless and +the nameless belongs to the true Middle Ages; with their great attempt to +make a moral and invisible Roman Empire; or (as the Coronation Service +says) to set the cross for ever above the ball. Elaborate local +tomfooleries, such as that by which the Lord of the Manor of Work-sop is +alone allowed to do something or other, these probably belong to the decay +of the Middle Ages, when that great civilisation died out in grotesque +literalism and entangled heraldry. Things like the presentation of the +Bible bear witness to the intellectual outburst at the Reformation; things +like the Declaration against the Mass bear witness to the great wars of +the Puritans; and things like the allegiance of the Bishops bear witness +to the wordy and parenthetical political compromises which (to my deep +regret) ended the wars of religion. + +But my purpose here is only to point out one particular thing. In all +that long list of variations there must be, and there are, things which +energetic modern minds would really wish, with the reasonable modification, +to restore. Dr. Clifford would probably be glad to see again the great +Puritan idealism that forced the Bible into an antique and almost frozen +formality. Dr. Horton probably really regrets the old passion that +excommunicated Rome. In the same way Mr. Belloc would really prefer the +Middle Ages; as Lord Rosebery would prefer the Erastian oligarchy of the +eighteenth century. The Dark Ages would probably be disputed (from widely +different motives) by Mr. Rudyard Kipling and Mr. Cunninghame Graham. +But Mr. Cunninghame Graham would win. + +But the black case against Conservative (or Evolutionary) politics is that +none of these sincere men can win. Dr. Clifford cannot get back to the +Puritans; Mr. Belloc cannot get back to the mediaevals; because (alas) +there has been no Revolution to leave them a clear space for building or +rebuilding. Frenchmen have all the ages behind them, and can wander back +and pick and choose. But Englishmen have all the ages on top of them, and +can only lie groaning under that imposing tower, without being able to +take so much as a brick out of it. If the French decide that their +Republic is bad they can get rid of it; but if we decide that a Republic +was good, we should have much more difficulty. If the French democracy +actually desired every detail of the mediaeval monarchy, they could have +it. I do not think they will or should, but they could. If another +Dauphin were actually crowned at Rheims; if another Joan of Arc actually +bore a miraculous banner before him; if mediaeval swords shook and. +blazed in every gauntlet; if the golden lilies glowed from every tapestry; +if this were really proved to be the will of France and the purpose of +Providence--such a scene would still be the lasting and final +justification of the French Revolution. + +For no such scene could conceivably have happened under Louis XVI. + + + + +THE SEPARATIST AND SACRED THINGS + + +In the very laudable and fascinating extensions of our interest in Asiatic +arts or faiths, there are two incidental injustices which we tend nowadays +to do to our own records and our own religion. The first is a tendency to +talk as if certain things were not only present in the higher Orientals, +but were peculiar to them. Thus our magazines will fall into a habit of +wondering praise of Bushido, the Japanese chivalry, as if no Western +knights had ever vowed noble vows, or as if no Eastern knights had ever +broken them. Or again, our drawing-rooms will be full of the praises of +Indian renunciation and Indian unworldliness, as if no Christians had been +saints, or as if all Buddhists had been. But if the first injustice is to +think of human virtues as peculiarly Eastern, the other injustice is a +failure to appreciate what really is peculiarly Eastern. It is too much +taken for granted that the Eastern sort of idealism is certainly superior +and convincing; whereas in truth it is only separate and peculiar. All +that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in the East is rooted in Pantheism; +but all that is richest, deepest, and subtlest in us is concerned with +denying passionately that Pantheism is either the highest or the purest +religion. + +Thus, in turning over some excellent books recently written on the spirit +of Indian or Chinese art and decoration, I found it quietly and curiously +assumed that the artist must be at his best if he flows with the full +stream of Nature; and identifies himself with all things; so that the +stars are his sleepless eyes and the forests his far-flung arms. Now in +this way of talking both the two injustices will be found. In so far as +what is claimed is a strong sense of the divine in all things, the Eastern +artists have no more monopoly of it than they have of hunger and thirst. + +I have no doubt that the painters and poets of the Far East do exhibit +this; but I rebel at being asked to admit that we must go to the Far East +to find it. Traces of such sentiments can be found, I fancy, even in +other painters and poets. I do not question that the poet Wo Wo (that +ornament of the eighth dynasty) may have written the words: "Even the most +undignified vegetable is for this person capable of producing meditations +not to be exhibited by much weeping." But, I do not therefore admit that +a Western gentleman named Wordsworth (who made a somewhat similar remark) +had plagiarised from Wo Wo, or was a mere Occidental fable and travesty of +that celebrated figure. I do not deny that Tinishona wrote that exquisite +example of the short Japanese poem entitled "Honourable Chrysanthemum in +Honourable Hole in Wall." But I do not therefore admit that Tennyson's +little verse about the flower in the cranny was not original and even +sincere. + +It is recorded (for all I know) of the philanthropic Emperor Bo, that when +engaged in cutting his garden lawn with a mower made of alabaster and +chrysoberyl, he chanced to cut down a small flower; whereupon, being much +affected, he commanded his wise men immediately to take down upon tablets +of ivory the lines beginning: "Small and unobtrusive blossom with ruby +extremities." But this incident, touching as it is, does not shake my +belief in the incident of Robert Burns and the daisy; and I am left with +an impression that poets are pretty much the same everywhere in their +poetry--and in their prose. + +I have tried to convey my sympathy and admiration for Eastern art and its +admirers, and if I have not conveyed them I must give it up and go on to +more general considerations. I therefore proceed to say--with the utmost +respect, that it is Cheek, a rarefied and etherealised form of Cheek, for +this school to speak in this way about the mother that bore them, the +great civilisation of the West. The West also has its magic landscapes, +only through our incurable materialism they look like landscapes as well +as like magic. The West also has its symbolic figures, only they look +like men as well as symbols. It will be answered (and most justly) that +Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own instinct and tradition; +that its artists are concerned to suggest one thing and our artists +another; that both should be admired in their difference. Profoundly true; +but what is the difference? It is certainly not as the Orientalisers +assert, that we must go to the Far East for a sympathetic and +transcendental interpretation of Nature. We have paid a long enough toll +of mystics and even of madmen to be quit of that disability. + +Yet there is a difference, and it is just what I suggested. The Eastern +mysticism is an ecstasy of unity; the Christian mysticism is an ecstasy of +creation, that is of separation and mutual surprise. The latter says, +like St. Francis, "My brother fire and my sister water "; the former says, +"Myself fire and myself water." Whether you call the Eastern attitude an +extension of oneself into everything or a contraction of oneself into +nothing is a matter of metaphysical definition. The effect is the same, +an effect which lives and throbs throughout all the exquisite arts of the +East. This effect is the Sing called rhythm, a pulsation of pattern, or +of ritual, or of colours, or of cosmic theory, but always suggesting the +unification of the individual with the world. But there is quite another +kind of sympathy the sympathy with a thing because it is different. No +one will say that Rembrandt did not sympathise with an old woman; but no +one will say that Rembrandt painted like an old woman. No one will say +that Reynolds did not appreciate children; but no one will say he did it +childishly. The supreme instance of this divine division is sex, and that +explains (what I could never understand in my youth) why Christendom +called the soul the bride of God. For real love is an intense +realisation of the "separateness" of all our souls. The most heroic and +human love-poetry of the world is never mere passion; precisely because +mere passion really is a melting back into Nature, a meeting of the waters. +And water is plunging and powerful; but it is only powerful downhill. +The high and human love-poetry is all about division rather than identity; +and in the great love-poems even the man as he embraces the woman sees her, +in the same instant, afar off; a virgin and a stranger. + +For the first injustice, of which we have spoken, still recurs; and if we +grant that the East has a right to its difference, it is not realised in +what we differ. That nursery tale from nowhere about St. George and the +Dragon really expresses best the relation between the West and the East. +There were many other differences, calculated to arrest even the +superficial eye, between a saint and a dragon. But the essential +difference was simply this: that the Dragon did want to eat St. George; +whereas St. George would have felt a strong distaste for eating the Dragon. +In most of the stories he killed the Dragon. In many of the stories he +not only spared, but baptised it. But in neither case did the Christian +have any appetite for cold dragon. The Dragon, however, really has an +appetite for cold Christian--and especially for cold Christianity. This +blind intention to absorb, to change the shape of everything and digest it +in the darkness of a dragon's stomach; this is what is really meant by the +Pantheism and Cosmic Unity of the East. The Cosmos as such is cannibal; +as old Time ate his children. The Eastern saints were saints because they +wanted to be swallowed up. The Western saint, like St. George, was +sainted by the Western Church precisely because he refused to be swallowed. +The same process of thought that has prevented nationalities +disappearing in Christendom has prevented the complete appearance of +Pantheism. All Christian men instinctively resist the idea of being +absorbed into an Empire; an Austrian, a Spanish, a British, or a Turkish +Empire. But there is one empire, much larger and much more tyrannical, +which free men will resist with even stronger passion. The free man +violently resists being absorbed into the empire which is called the +Universe. He demands Home Rule for his nationality, but still more Home +Rule for his home. Most of all he demands Home Rule for himself. He +claims the right to be saved, in spite of Moslem fatalism. He claims the +right to be damned in spite of theosophical optimism. He refuses to be +the Cosmos; because he refuses to forget it. + + + + +THE MUMMER + + +The night before Christmas Eve I heard a burst of musical voices so close +that they might as well have been inside the house instead of just outside; +so I asked them inside, hoping that they might then seem farther away. +Then I realised that they were the Christmas Mummers, who come every year +in country parts to enact the rather rigid fragments of the old Christmas +play of St. George, the Turkish Knight, and the Very Venal Doctor. I will +not describe it; it is indescribable; but I will describe my parallel +sentiments as it passed. + +One could see something of that half-failure that haunts our artistic +revivals of mediaeval dances, carols, or Bethlehem Plays. There are +elements in all that has come to us from the more morally simple society +of the Middle Ages: elements which moderns, even when they are +mediaevalists, find it hard to understand and harder to imitate. The +first is the primary idea of Mummery itself. If you will observe a child +just able to walk, you will see that his first idea is not to dress up as +anybody--but to dress up. Afterwards, of course, the idea of being the +King or Uncle William will leap to his lips. But it is generally +suggested by the hat he has already let fall over his nose, from far +deeper motives. Tommy does not assume the hat primarily because it is +Uncle William's hat, but because it is not Tommy's hat. It is a ritual +investiture; and is akin to those Gorgon masks that stiffened the dances +of Greece or those towering mitres that came from the mysteries of Persia. +For the essence of such ritual is a profound paradox: the concealment of +the personality combined with the exaggeration of the person. The man +performing a rite seeks to be at once invisible and conspicuous. It is +part of that divine madness which all other creatures wonder at in Man, +that he alone parades this pomp of obliteration and anonymity. Man is not, +perhaps, the only creature who dresses himself, but he is the only +creature who disguises himself. Beasts and birds do indeed take the +colours of their environment; but that is not in order to be watched, but +in order not to be watched; it is not the formalism of rejoicing, but the +formlessness of fear. It is not so with men, whose nature is the +unnatural. Ancient Britons did not stain themselves blue because they +lived in blue forests; nor did Georgian beaux and belles powder their hair +to match an Arctic landscape; the Britons were not dressing up as +kingfishers nor the beaux pretending to be polar bears. Nay, even when +modern ladies paint their faces a bright mauve, it is doubted by some +naturalists whether they do it with the idea of escaping notice. So +merry-makers (or Mummers) adopt their costume to heighten and exaggerate +their own bodily presence and identity; not to sink it, primarily speaking, +in another identity. It is not Acting--that comparatively low +profession-comparatively I mean. It is Mummery; and, as Mr. Kensit would +truly say, all elaborate religious ritual is Mummery. That is, it is the +noble conception of making Man something other and more than himself when +he stands at the limit of human things. It is only careful faddists and +feeble German philosophers who want to wear no clothes; and be "natural" +in their Dionysian revels. Natural men, really vigorous and exultant men, +want to wear more and more clothes when they are revelling. They want +worlds of waistcoats and forests of trousers and pagodas of tall hats +toppling up to the stars. + +Thus it is with the lingering Mummers at Christmas in the country. If our +more refined revivers of Miracle Plays or Morrice Dances tried to +reconstruct the old Mummers' Play of St. George and the Turkish Knight (I +do not know why they do not) they would think at once of picturesque and +appropriate dresses. St. George's panoply would be pictured from the best +books of armour and blazonry: the Turkish Knight's arms and ornaments +would be traced from the finest Saracenic arabesques. When my garden door +opened on Christmas Eve and St. George of England entered, the appearance +of that champion was slightly different. His face was energetically +blacked all over with soot, above which he wore an aged and very tall top +hat; he wore his shirt outside his coat like a surplice, and he flourished +a thick umbrella. Now do not, I beg you, talk about "ignorance"; or +suppose that the Mummer in question (he is a very pleasant Ratcatcher, +with a tenor voice) did this because he knew no better. Try to realise +that even a Ratcatcher knows St. George of England was not black, and did +not kill the Dragon with an umbrella. The Rat-catcher is not under this +delusion; any more than Paul Veronese thought that very good men have +luminous rings round their heads; any more than the Pope thinks that +Christ washed the feet of the twelve in a Cathedral; any more than the +Duke of Norfolk thinks the lions on a tabard are like the lions at the Zoo. +These things are denaturalised because they are symbols; because the +extraordinary occasion must hide or even disfigure the ordinary people. +Black faces were to mediaeval mummeries what carved masks were to Greek +plays: it was called being "vizarded." My Rat-catcher is not sufficiently +arrogant to suppose for a moment that he looks like St. George. But he is +sufficiently humble to be convinced that if he looks as little like +himself as he can, he will be on the right road. + +This is the soul of Mumming; the ostentatious secrecy of men in disguise. +There are, of course, other mediaeval elements in it which are also +difficult to explain to the fastidious mediaevalists of to-day. There is, +for instance, a certain output of violence into the void. It can best be +defined as a raging thirst to knock men down without the faintest desire +to hurt them. All the rhymes with the old ring have the trick of turning +on everything in which the rhymsters most sincerely believed, merely for +the pleasure of blowing off steam in startling yet careless phrases. When +Tennyson says that King Arthur "drew all the petty princedoms under him," +and "made a realm and ruled," his grave Royalism is quite modern. Many +mediaevals, outside the mediaeval republics, believed in monarchy as +solemnly as Tennyson. But that older verse + +When good King Arthur ruled this land +He was a goodly King-- +He stole three pecks of barley-meal +To make a bag-pudding. + +is far more Arthurian than anything in The Idylls of the King. There are +other elements; especially that sacred thing that can perhaps be called +Anachronism. All that to us is Anachronism was to mediaevals merely +Eternity. But the main excellence of the Mumming Play lies still, I think, +in its uproarious secrecy. If we cannot hide our hearts in healthy +darkness, at least we can hide our faces in healthy blacking. If you +cannot escape like a philosopher into a forest, at least you can carry the +forest with you, like a Jack-in-the-Green. It is well to walk under +universal ensigns; and there is an old tale of a tyrant to whom a walking +forest was the witness of doom. That, indeed, is the very intensity of +the notion: a masked man is ominous; but who shall face a mob of masks? + + + + +THE ARISTOCRATIC 'ARRY + + +The Cheap Tripper, pursued by the curses of the aesthetes and the +antiquaries, really is, I suppose, a symptom of the strange and almost +unearthly ugliness of our diseased society. The costumes and customs of a +hundred peasantries are there to prove that such ugliness does not +necessarily follow from mere poverty, or mere democracy, or mere +unlettered simplicity of mind. + +But though the tripper, artistically considered, is a sign of our +decadence, he is not one of its worst signs, but relatively one of its +best; one of its most innocent and most sincere. Compared with many of +the philosophers and artists who denounce him; he looks like a God fearing +fisher or a noble mountaineer. His antics with donkeys and concertinas, +crowded charabancs, and exchanged hats, though clumsy, are not so vicious +or even so fundamentally vulgar as many of the amusements of the +overeducated. People are not more crowded on a char-a-banc than they are +at a political "At Home," or even an artistic soiree; and if the female +trippers are overdressed, at least they are not overdressed and +underdressed at the same time. It is better to ride a donkey than to be a +donkey. It is better to deal with the Cockney festival which asks men and +women to change hats, rather than with the modern Utopia that wants them +to change heads. + +But the truth is that such small, but real, element of vulgarity as there +is indeed in the tripper, is part of a certain folly and falsity which is +characteristic of much modernity, and especially of the very people who +persecute the poor tripper most. There is something in the whole society, +and even especially in the cultured part of it, that does things in a +clumsy and unbeautiful way. + +A case occurs to me in the matter of Stonehenge, which I happened to visit +yesterday. Now to a person really capable of feeling the poetry of +Stonehenge it is almost a secondary matter whether he sees Stonehenge at +all. The vast void roll of the empty land towards Salisbury, the gray +tablelands like primeval altars, the trailing rain-clouds, the vapour of +primeval sacrifices, would all tell him of a very ancient and very lonely +Britain. It would not spoil his Druidic mood if he missed Stonehenge. +But it does spoil his mood to find Stonehenge--surrounded by a brand-new +fence of barbed wire, with a policeman and a little shop selling picture +post-cards. + +Now if you protest against this, educated people will instantly answer you, +"Oh, it was done to prevent the vulgar trippers who chip stones and carve +names and spoil the look of Stonehenge." It does not seem to occur to +them that barbed wire and a policeman rather spoil the look of Stonehenge. +The scratching of a name, particularly when performed with blunt penknife +or pencil by a person of imperfect School Board education, can be trusted +in a little while to be indistinguishable from the grayest hieroglyphic by +the grandest Druid of old. But nobody could get a modern policeman into +the same picture with a Druid. This really vital piece of vandalism was +done by the educated, not the uneducated; it was done by the influence of +the artists or antiquaries who wanted to preserve the antique beauty of +Stonehenge. It seems to me curious to preserve your lady's beauty from +freckles by blacking her face all over; or to protect the pure whiteness +of your wedding garment by dyeing it green. + +And if you ask, "But what else could any one have done, what could the +most artistic age have done to save the monument?" I reply, "There are +hundreds of things that Greeks or Mediaevals might have done; and I have +no notion what they would have chosen; but I say that by an instinct in +their whole society they would have done something that was decent and +serious and suitable to the place. Perhaps some family of knights or +warriors would have the hereditary duty of guarding such a place. If so +their armour would be appropriate; their tents would be appropriate; not +deliberately--they would grow like that. Perhaps some religious order +such as normally employ nocturnal watches and the relieving of guard would +protect such a place. Perhaps it would be protected by all sorts of +rituals, consecrations, or curses, which would seem to you mere raving +superstition and silliness. But they do not seem to me one twentieth part +so silly, from a purely rationalist point of view, as calmly making a spot +hideous in order to keep it beautiful." + +The thing that is really vulgar, the thing that is really vile, is to live +in a good place Without living by its life. Any one who settles down in a +place without becoming part of it is (barring peculiar personal cases, of +course) a tripper or wandering cad. For instance, the Jew is a genuine +peculiar case. The Wandering Jew is not a wandering cad. He is a highly +civilised man in a highly difficult position; the world being divided, and +his own nation being divided, about whether he can do anything else except +wander. + +The best example of the cultured, but common, tripper is the educated +Englishman on the Continent. We can no longer explain the quarrel by +calling Englishmen rude and foreigners polite. Hundreds of Englishmen are +extremely polite, and thousands of foreigners are extremely rude. The +truth of the matter is that foreigners do not resent the rude Englishman. +What they do resent, what they do most justly resent, is the polite +Englishman. He visits Italy for Botticellis or Flanders for Rembrandts, +and he treats the great nations that made these things courteously--as he +would treat the custodians of any museum. It does not seem to strike him +that the Italian is not the custodian of the pictures, but the creator of +them. He can afford to look down on such nations--when he can paint such +pictures. + +That is, in matters of art and travel, the psychology of the cad. If, +living in Italy, you admire Italian art while distrusting Italian +character, you are a tourist, or cad. If, living in Italy, you admire +Italian art while despising Italian religion, you are a tourist, or cad. +It does not matter how many years you have lived there. Tourists will +often live a long time in hotels without discovering the nationality of +the waiters. Englishmen will often live a long time in Italy without +discovering the nationality of the Italians. But the test is simple. If +you admire what Italians did without admiring Italians--you are a cheap +tripper. + +The same, of course, applies much nearer home. I have remarked elsewhere +that country shopkeepers are justly offended by London people, who, coming +among them, continue to order all their goods from London. It is caddish +to wink and squint at the colour of a man's wine, like a wine taster; and +then refuse to drink it. It is equally caddish to wink and squint at the +colour of a man's orchard, like a landscape painter; and then refuse to +buy the apples. It is always an insult to admire a thing and not use it. +But the main point is that one has no right to see Stonehenge without +Salisbury Plain and Salisbury: One has no right to respect the dead +Italians without respecting the live ones. One has no right to visit a +Christian society like a diver visiting the deep-sea fishes--fed along a +lengthy tube by another atmosphere, and seeing the sights without +breathing the air. It is very real bad manners. + + + + +THE NEW THEOLOGIAN + + +It is an old story that names do not fit things; it is an old story that +the oldest forest is called the New Forest, and that Irish stew is almost +peculiar to England. But these are traditional titles that tend, of their +nature, to stiffen; it is the tragedy of to-day that even phrases invented +for to-day do not fit it. The forest has remained new while it is nearly +a thousand years old; but our fashions have grown old while they were +still new. + +The extreme example of this is that when modern wrongs are attacked, they +are almost always attacked wrongly. People seem to have a positive +inspiration for finding the inappropriate phrase to apply to an offender; +they are always accusing a man of theft when he has been convicted of +murder. They must accuse Sir Edward Carson of outrageous rebellion, when +his offence has really been a sleek submission to the powers that be. +They must describe Mr. Lloyd George as using his eloquence to rouse the +mob, whereas he has really shown considerable cleverness in damping it +down. It was probably under the same impulse towards a mysterious misfit +of names that people denounced Dr. Inge as "the Gloomy Dean." + +Now there is nothing whatever wrong about being a Dean; nor is there +anything wrong about being gloomy. The only question is what dark but +sincere motives have made you gloomy. What dark but sincere motives have +made you a Dean. Now the address of Dr. Inge which gained him this +erroneous title was mostly concerned with a defence of the modern +capitalists against the modern strikers, from whose protest he appeared to +anticipate appalling results. Now if we look at the facts about that +gentleman's depression and also about his Deanery, we shall find a very +curious state of things. + +When Dr. Inge was called "the Gloomy Dean" a great injustice was done him. +He had appeared as the champion of our capitalist community against the +forces of revolt; and any one who does that exceeds in optimism rather +than pessimism. A man who really thinks that strikers have suffered no +wrong, or that employers have done no wrong--such a man is not a Gloomy +Dean, but a quite wildly and dangerously happy Dean. A man who can feel +satisfied with modern industrialism must be a man with a mysterious +fountain of high spirits. And the actual occasion is not less curious; +because, as far as I can make out, his title to gloom reposes on his +having said that our worker's demand high wages, while the placid people +of the Far East will quite cheerfully work for less. + +This is true enough, of course, and there does not seem to be much +difficulty about the matter. Men of the Far East will submit to very low +wages for the same reason that they will submit to "the punishment known +as Li, or Slicing"; for the same reason that they will praise polygamy and +suicide; for the same reason that they subject the wife utterly to the +husband or his parents; for the same reason that they serve their temples +with prostitutes for priests; for the same reason that they sometimes seem +to make no distinction between sexual passion and sexual perversion. They +do it, that is, because they are Heathens; men with traditions different +from ours about the limits of endurance and the gestures of self-respect. +They may be very much better than we are in hundreds of other ways; and I +can quite understand a man (though hardly a Dean) really preferring their +historic virtues to those of Christendom. A man may perhaps feel more +comfortable among his Asiatic coolies than among his European comrades: +and as we are to allow the Broadest Thought in the Church, Dr. Inge has as +much right to his heresy as anybody else. It is true that, as Dr. Inge +says, there are numberless Orientals who will do a great deal of work for +very little money; and it is most undoubtedly true that there are several +high-placed and prosperous Europeans who like to get work done and pay as +little as possible for it. + +But I cannot make out why, with his enthusiasm for heathen habits and +traditions, the Dean should wish to spread in the East the ideas which he +has found so dreadfully unsettling in the West. If some thousands of +years of paganism have produced the patience and industry that Dean Inge +admires, and if some thousand years of Christianity have produced the +sentimentality and sensationalism which he regrets, the obvious deduction +is that Dean Inge would be much happier if he were a heathen Chinese. +Instead of supporting Christian missions to Korea or Japan, he ought to be +at the head of a great mission in London for converting the English to +Taoism or Buddhism. There his passion for the moral beauties of paganism +would have free and natural play; his style would improve; his mind would +begin slowly to clear; and he would be free from all sorts of little +irritating scrupulosities which must hamper even the most Conservative +Christian in his full praise of sweating and the sack. + +In Christendom he will never find rest. The perpetual public criticism +and public change which is the note of all our history springs from a +certain spirit far too deep to be defined. It is deeper than democracy; +nay, it may often appear to be non-democratic; for it may often be the +special defence of a minority or an individual. It will often leave the +ninety-and-nine in the wilderness and go after that which is lost. It +will often risk the State itself to right a single wrong; and do justice +though the heavens fall. Its highest expression is not even in the +formula of the great gentlemen of the French Revolution who said that all +men were free and equal. Its highest expression is rather in the formula +of the peasant who said that a man's a man for a' that. If there were but +one slave in England, and he did all the work while the rest of us made +merry, this spirit that is in us would still cry aloud to God night and +day. Whether or no this spirit was produced by, it clearly works with, a +creed which postulates a humanised God and a vividly personal immortality. +Men must not be busy merely like a swarm, or even happy merely like a +herd; for it is not a question of men, but of a man. A man's meals may be +poor, but they must not be bestial; there must always be that about the +meal which permits of its comparison to the sacrament. A man's bed may +be hard, but it must not be abject or unclean: there must always be about +the bed something of the decency of the death-bed. + +This is the spirit which makes the Christian poor begin their terrible +murmur whenever there is a turn of prices or a deadlock of toil that +threatens them with vagabondage or pauperisation; and we cannot encourage +the Dean with any hope that this spirit can be cast out. Christendom will +continue to suffer all the disadvantages of being Christian: it is the +Dean who must be gently but firmly altered. He had absent-mindedly +strayed into the wrong continent and the wrong creed. I advise him to +chuck it. + +But the case is more curious still. To connect the Dean with Confucian +temples or traditions may have appeared fantastic; but it is not. Dr. +Inge is not a stupid old Tory Rector, strict both on Church and State. +Such a man might talk nonsense about the Christian Socialists being "court +chaplains of King Demos" or about his own superb valour in defying the +democracy that rages in the front pews of Anglican churches. We should +not expect a mere old-fashioned country clergyman to know that Demos has +never been king in England and precious seldom anywhere else; we should +not expect him to realise that if King Demos had any chaplains they would +be uncommonly poorly paid. But Dr. Inge is not old-fashioned; he +considers himself highly progressive and advanced. He is a New Theologian; +that is, he is liberal in theology--and nothing else. He is apparently +in sober fact, and not as in any fantasy, in sympathy with those who would +soften the superior claim of our creed by urging the rival creeds of the +East; with those who would absorb the virtues of Buddhism or of Islam. He +holds a high seat in that modern Parliament of Religions where all +believers respect each other's unbelief. + +Now this has a very sharp moral for modern religious reformers. When next +you hear the "liberal" Christian say that we should take what is best in +Oriental faiths, make quite sure what are the things that people like Dr. +Inge call best; what are the things that people like Dr. Inge propose to +take. You will not find them imitating the military valour of the Moslem. +You will not find them imitating the miraculous ecstasy of the Hindoo. +The more you study the "broad" movement of today, the more you will find +that these people want something much less like Chinese metaphysics, and +something much more like Chinese Labour. You will find the levelling of +creeds quite unexpectedly close to the lowering of wages. Dr. Inge is +the typical latitudinarian of to-day; and was never more so than when he +appeared not as the apostle of the blacks, but as the apostle of the +blacklegs. Preached, as it is, almost entirely among the prosperous and +polite, our brotherhood with Buddhism or Mohammedanism practically means +this--that the poor must be as meek as Buddhists, while the rich may be as +ruthless as Mohammedans. That is what they call the reunion of all +religions. + + + + +THE ROMANTIC IN THE RAIN + + +The middle classes of modern England are quite fanatically fond of washing; +and are often enthusiastic for teetotalism. I cannot therefore +comprehend why it is that they exhibit a mysterious dislike of rain. +Rain, that inspiring and delightful thing, surely combines the qualities +of these two ideals with quite a curious perfection. Our philanthropists +are eager to establish public baths everywhere. Rain surely is a public +bath; it might almost be called mixed bathing. The appearance of persons +coming fresh from this great natural lustration is not perhaps polished or +dignified; but for the matter of that, few people are dignified when +coming out of a bath. But the scheme of rain in itself is one of an +enormous purification. It realises the dream of some insane hygienist: it +scrubs the sky. Its giant brooms and mops seem to reach the starry +rafters and Starless corners of the cosmos; it is a cosmic spring cleaning. + +If the Englishman is really fond of cold baths, he ought not to grumble at +the English climate for being a cold bath. In these days we are +constantly told that we should leave our little special possessions and +join in the enjoyment of common social institutions and a common social +machinery. I offer the rain as a thoroughly Socialistic institution. It +disregards that degraded delicacy which has hitherto led each gentleman to +take his shower-bath in private. It is a better shower-bath, because it +is public and communal; and, best of all, because somebody else pulls the +string. + +As for the fascination of rain for the water drinker, it is a fact the +neglect of which I simply cannot comprehend. The enthusiastic water +drinker must regard a rainstorm as a sort of universal banquet and debauch +of his own favourite beverage. Think of the imaginative intoxication of +the wine drinker if the crimson clouds sent down claret or the golden +clouds hock. Paint upon primitive darkness some such scenes of apocalypse, +towering and gorgeous skyscapes in which champagne falls like fire from +heaven or the dark skies grow purple and tawny with the terrible colours +of port. All this must the wild abstainer feel, as he rolls in the long +soaking grass, kicks his ecstatic heels to heaven, and listens to the +roaring rain. It is he, the water drinker, who ought to be the true +bacchanal of the forests; for all the forests are drinking water. +Moreover, the forests are apparently enjoying it: the trees rave and reel +to and fro like drunken giants; they clash boughs as revellers clash cups; +they roar undying thirst and howl the health of the world. + +All around me as I write is a noise of Nature drinking: and Nature makes a +noise when she is drinking, being by no means refined. If I count it +Christian mercy to give a cup of cold water to a sufferer, shall I +complain of these multitudinous cups of cold water handed round to all +living things; a cup of water for every shrub; a cup of water for every +weed? I would be ashamed to grumble at it. As Sir Philip Sidney said, +their need is greater than mine--especially for water. + +There is a wild garment that still carries nobly the name of a wild +Highland clan: a elan come from those hills where rain is not so much an +incident as an atmosphere. Surely every man of imagination must feel a +tempestuous flame of Celtic romance spring up within him whenever he puts +on a mackintosh. I could never reconcile myself to carrying all umbrella; +it is a pompous Eastern business, carried over the heads of despots in the +dry, hot lands. Shut up, an umbrella is an unmanageable walkingstick; +open, it is an inadequate tent. For my part, I have no taste for +pretending to be a walking pavilion; I think nothing of my hat, and +precious little of my head. If I am to be protected against wet, it must +be by some closer and more careless protection, something that I can +forget altogether. It might be a Highland plaid. It might be that yet +more Highland thing, a mackintosh. + +And there is really something in the mackintosh of the military qualities +of the Highlander. The proper cheap mackintosh has a blue and white sheen +as of steel or iron; it gleams like armour. I like to think of it as the +uniform of that ancient clan in some of its old and misty raids. I like +to think of all the Macintoshes, in their mackintoshes, descending on some +doomed Lowland village, their wet waterproofs flashing in the sun or moon. +For indeed this is one of the real beauties of rainy weather, that while +the amount of original and direct light is commonly lessened, the number +of things that reflect light is unquestionably increased. There is less +sunshine; but there are more shiny things; such beautifully shiny things +as pools and puddles and mackintoshes. It is like moving in a world of +mirrors. + +And indeed this is the last and not the least gracious of the casual works +of magic wrought by rain: that while it decreases light, yet it doubles it. +If it dims the sky, it brightens the earth. It gives the roads (to the +sympathetic eye) something of the beauty of Venice. Shallow lakes of +water reiterate every detail of earth and sky; we dwell in a double +universe. Sometimes walking upon bare and lustrous pavements, wet under +numerous lamps, a man seems a black blot on all that golden looking-glass, +and could fancy he was flying in a yellow sky. But wherever trees and +towns hang head downwards in a pigmy puddle, the sense of Celestial +topsy-turvydom is the same. This bright, wet, dazzling confusion of shape +and shadow, of reality and reflection, will appeal strongly to any one +with the transcendental instinct about this dreamy and dual life of ours. +It will always give a man the strange sense of looking down at the skies. + + + + +THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPHER + + +When, as lately, events have happened that seem (to the fancy, at least) +to test if not stagger the force of official government, it is amusing to +ask oneself what is the real weakness of civilisation, ours especially, +when it contends with the one lawless man. I was reminded of one weakness +this morning in turning over an old drawerful of pictures. + +This weakness in civilisation is best expressed by saying that it cares +more for science than for truth. It prides itself on its "methods" more +than its results; it is satisfied with precision, discipline, good +communications, rather than with the sense of reality. But there are +precise falsehoods as well as precise facts. Discipline may only mean a +hundred men making the same mistake at the same minute. And good +communications may in practice be very like those evil communications +which are said to corrupt good manners. Broadly, we have reached a +"scientific age," which wants to know whether the train is in the +timetable, but not whether the train is in the station. I take one +instance in our police inquiries that I happen to have come across: the +case of photography. + +Some years ago a poet of considerable genius tragically disappeared, and +the authorities or the newspapers circulated a photograph of him, so that +he might be identified. The photograph, as I remember it, depicted or +suggested a handsome, haughty, and somewhat pallid man with his head +thrown back, with long distinguished features, colourless thin hair and +slight moustache, and though conveyed merely by the head and shoulders, a +definite impression of height. If I had gone by that photograph I should +have gone about looking for a long soldierly but listless man, with a +profile rather like the Duke of Connaught's. + +Only, as it happened, I knew the poet personally; I had seen him a great +many times, and he had an appearance that nobody could possibly forget, if +seen only once. He had the mark of those dark and passionate Westland +Scotch, who before Burns and after have given many such dark eyes and dark +emotions to the world. But in him the unmistakable strain, Gaelic or +whatever it is, was accentuated almost to oddity; and he looked like some +swarthy elf. He was small, with a big head and a crescent of coalblack +hair round the back of a vast dome of baldness. Immediately under his +eyes his cheekbones had so high a colour that they might have been painted +scarlet; three black tufts, two on the upper lip and one under the lower, +seemed to touch up the face with the fierce moustaches of Mephistopheles. +His eyes had that "dancing madness" in them which Stevenson saw in the +Gaelic eyes of Alan Breck; but he sometimes distorted the expression by +screwing a monstrous monocle into one of them. A man more unmistakable +would have been hard to find. You could have picked him out in any +crowd--so long as you had not seen his photograph. + +But in this scientific picture of him twenty causes, accidental and +conventional, had combined to obliterate him altogether. The limits of +photography forbade the strong and almost melodramatic colouring of cheek +and eyebrow. The accident of the lighting took nearly all the darkness +out of the hair and made him look almost like a fair man. The framing and +limitation of the shoulders made him look like a big man; and the +devastating bore of being photographed when you want to write poetry made +him look like a lazy man. Holding his head back, as people do when they +are being photographed (or shot), but as he certainly never held it +normally, accidentally concealed the bald dome that dominated his slight +figure. Here we have a clockwork picture, begun and finished by a button +and a box of chemicals, from which every projecting feature has been more +delicately and dexterously omitted than they could have been by the most +namby-pamby flatterer, painting in the weakest water-colours, on the +smoothest ivory. + +I happen to possess a book of Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricatures, one of which +depicts the unfortunate poet in question. To say it represents an utterly +incredible hobgoblin is to express in faint and inadequate language the +license of its sprawling lines. The authorities thought it strictly safe +and scientific to circulate the poet's photograph. They would have +clapped me in an asylum if I had asked them to circulate Max's caricature. +But the caricature would have been far more likely to find the man. + +This is a small but exact symbol of the failure of scientific civilisation. +It is so satisfied in knowing it has a photograph of a man that it never +asks whether it has a likeness of him. Thus declarations, seemingly most +detailed, have flashed along the wires of the world ever since I was a boy. +We were told that in some row Boer policemen had shot an Englishman, a +British subject, an English citizen. A long time afterwards we were quite +casually informed that the English citizen was quite black. Well, it +makes no difference to the moral question; black men should be shot on the +same ethical principles as white men. But it makes one distrust +scientific communications which permitted so startling an alteration of +the photograph. I am sorry we got hold of a photographic negative in +which a black man came out white. Later we were told that an Englishman +had fought for the Boers against his own flag, which would have been a +disgusting thing to do. Later, it was admitted that he was an Irishman; +which is exactly as different as if he had been a Pole. Common sense, +with all the facts before it, does see that black is not white, and that a +nation that has never submitted has a right to moral independence. But +why does it so seldom have all the facts before it? Why are the big +aggressive features, such as blackness or the Celtic wrath, always left +out in such official communications, as they were left out in the +photograph? My friend the poet had hair as black as an African and eyes +as fierce as an Irishman; why does our civilisation drop all four of the +facts? Its error is to omit the arresting thing--which might really +arrest the criminal. It strikes first the chilling note of science, +demanding a man "above the middle height, chin shaven, with gray +moustache," etc., which might mean Mr. Balfour or Sir Redvers Buller. +It does not seize the first fact of impression, as that a man is +obviously a sailor or a Jew or a drunkard or a gentleman or a nigger +or an albino or a prize-fighter or an imbecile or an American. These +are the realities by which the people really recognise each other. +They are almost always left out of the inquiry. + + + + +THE SULTAN + + +There is one deep defect in our extension of cosmopolitan and Imperial +cultures. That is, that in most human things if you spread your butter +far you spread it thin. But there is an odder fact yet: rooted in +something dark and irrational in human nature. That is, that when you +find your butter thin, you begin to spread it. And it is just when you +find your ideas wearing thin in your own mind that you begin to spread +them among your fellow-creatures. It is a paradox; but not my paradox. +There are numerous cases in history; but I think the strongest case is +this. That we have Imperialism in all our clubs at the very time when we +have Orientalism in all our drawing-rooms. + +I mean that the colonial ideal of such men as Cecil Rhodes did not arise +out of any fresh creative idea of the Western genius, it was a fad, and +like most fads an imitation. For what was wrong with Rhodes was not that, +like Cromwell or Hildebrand, he made huge mistakes, nor even that he +committed great crimes. It was that he committed these crimes and errors +in order to spread certain ideas. And when one asked for the ideas they +could not be found. Cromwell stood for Calvinism, Hildebrand for +Catholicism: but Rhodes had no principles whatever to give to the world. +He had only a hasty but elaborate machinery for spreading the principles +that he hadn't got. What he called his ideals were the dregs of a +Darwinism which had already grown not only stagnant, but poisonous. That +the fittest must survive, and that any one like himself must be the +fittest; that the weakest must go to the wall, and that any one he could +not understand must be the weakest; that was the philosophy which he +lumberingly believed through life, like many another agnostic old bachelor +of the Victorian era. All his views on religion (reverently quoted in the +Review of Reviews) were simply the stalest ideas of his time. It was not +his fault, poor fellow, that he called a high hill somewhere in South +Africa "his church." It was not his fault, I mean, that he could not see +that a church all to oneself is not a church at all. It is a madman's +cell. It was not his fault that he "figured out that God meant as much of +the planet to be Anglo-Saxon as possible." Many evolutionists much wiser +had "figured out" things even more babyish. He was an honest and humble +recipient of the plodding popular science of his time; he spread no ideas +that any cockney clerk in Streatham could not have spread for him. But it +was exactly because he had no ideas to spread that he invoked slaughter, +violated justice, and ruined republics to spread them. + +But the case is even stronger and stranger. Fashionable Imperialism not +only has no ideas of its own to extend; but such ideas as it has are +actually borrowed from the brown and black peoples to whom it seeks to +extend them. The Crusading kings and knights might be represented as +seeking to spread Western ideas in the East. But all that our Imperialist +aristocrats could do would be to spread Eastern ideas in the East. For +that very governing class which urges Occidental Imperialism has been +deeply discoloured with Oriental mysticism and Cosmology. + +The same society lady who expects the Hindoos to accept her view of +politics has herself accepted their view of religion. She wants first to +steal their earth, and then to share their heaven. The same Imperial +cynic who wishes the Turks to submit to English science has himself +submitted to Turkish philosophy, to a wholly Turkish view of despotism and +destiny. + +There is an obvious and amusing proof of this in a recent life of Rhodes. +The writer admits with proper Imperial gloom the fact that Africa is +still chiefly inhabited by Africans. He suggests Rhodes in the South +confronting savages and Kitchener in the North facing Turks, Arabs, and +Soudanese, and then he quotes this remark of Cecil Rhodes: "It is +inevitable fate that all this should be changed; and I should like to be +the agent of fate." That was Cecil Rhodes's one small genuine idea; and +it is an Oriental idea. + +Here we have evident all the ultimate idiocy of the present Imperial +position. Rhodes and Kitchener are to conquer Moslem bedouins and +barbarians, in order to teach them to believe only in inevitable fate. +We are to wreck provinces and pour blood like Niagara, all in order to +teach a Turk to say "Kismet "; which he has said since his cradle. We are +to deny Christian justice and destroy international equality, all in order +to teach an Arab to believe he is "an agent of fate," when he has never +believed anything else. If Cecil Rhodes's vision could come true (which +fortunately is increasingly improbable), such countries as Persia or +Arabia would simply be filled with ugly and vulgar fatalists in billycocks, +instead of with graceful and dignified fatalists in turbans. The best +Western idea, the idea of spiritual liberty and danger, of a doubtful and +romantic future in which all things may happen--this essential Western +idea Cecil Rhodes could not spread, because (as he says himself) he did +not believe in it. + +It was an Oriental who gave to Queen Victoria the crown of an Empress in +addition to that of a Queen. He did not understand that the title of King +is higher than that of Emperor. For in the East titles are meant to be +vast and wild; to be extravagant poems: the Brother of the Sun and Moon, +the Caliph who lives for ever. But a King of England (at least in the +days of real kings) did not bear a merely poetical title; but rather a +religious one. He belonged to his people and not merely they to him. He +was not merely a conqueror, but a father--yes, even when he was a bad +father. But this sort of solid sanctity always goes with local affections +and limits: and the Cecil Rhodes Imperialism set up not the King, but the +Sultan; with all the typically Eastern ideas of the magic of money, of +luxury without uproar; of prostrate provinces and a chosen race. Indeed +Cecil Rhodes illustrated almost every quality essential to the Sultan, +from the love of diamonds to the scorn of woman. + + + + +THE ARCHITECT OF SPEARS + + +The other day, in the town of Lincoln, I suffered an optical illusion +which accidentally revealed to me the strange greatness of the Gothic +architecture. Its secret is not, I think, satisfactorily explained in +most of the discussions on the subject. It is said that the Gothic +eclipses the classical by a certain richness and complexity, at once +lively and mysterious. This is true; but Oriental decoration is equally +rich and complex, yet it awakens a widely different sentiment. No man +ever got out of a Turkey carpet the emotions that he got from a cathedral +tower. Over all the exquisite ornament of Arabia and India there is the +presence of something stiff and heartless, of something tortured and +silent. Dwarfed trees and crooked serpents, heavy flowers and hunchbacked +birds accentuate by the very splendour and contrast of their colour the +servility and monotony of their shapes. It is like the vision of a +sneering sage, who sees the whole universe as a pattern. Certainly no one +ever felt like this about Gothic, even if he happens to dislike it. Or, +again, some will say that it is the liberty of the Middle Ages in the use +of the comic or even the coarse that makes the Gothic more interesting +than the Greek. There is more truth in this; indeed, there is real truth +in it. Few of the old Christian cathedrals would have passed the Censor +of Plays. We talk of the inimitable grandeur of the old cathedrals; but +indeed it is rather their gaiety that we do not dare to imitate. We +should be rather surprised if a chorister suddenly began singing "Bill +Bailey" in church. Yet that would be only doing in music what the +mediaevals did in sculpture. They put into a Miserere seat the very +scenes that we put into a music hall song: comic domestic scenes similar to +the spilling of the beer and the hanging out of the washing. But though +the gaiety of Gothic is one of its features, it also is not the secret of +its unique effect. We see a domestic topsy-turvydom in many Japanese +sketches. But delightful as these are, with their fairy tree-tops, paper +houses, and toddling, infantile inhabitants, the pleasure they give is of +a kind quite different from the joy and energy of the gargoyles. Some +have even been so shallow and illiterate as to maintain that our pleasure +in medieval building is a mere pleasure in what is barbaric, in what is +rough, shapeless, or crumbling like the rocks. This can be dismissed +after the same fashion; South Sea idols, with painted eyes and radiating +bristles, are a delight to the eye; but they do not affect it in at all +the same way as Westminster Abbey. Some again (going to another and +almost equally foolish extreme) ignore the coarse and comic in +mediaevalism; and praise the pointed arch only for its utter purity and +simplicity, as of a saint with his hands joined in prayer. Here, again, +the uniqueness is missed. There are Renaissance things (such as the +ethereal silvery drawings of Raphael), there are even pagan things (such +as the Praying Boy) which express as fresh and austere a piety. None of +these explanations explain. And I never saw what was the real point about +Gothic till I came into the town of Lincoln, and saw it behind a row of +furniture-vans. + +I did not know they were furniture-vans; at the first glance and in the +smoky distance I thought they were a row of cottages. A low stone wall +cut off the wheels, and the vans were somewhat of the same colour as the +yellowish clay or stone of the buildings around them. I had come across +that interminable Eastern plain which is like the open sea, and all the +more so because the one small hill and tower of Lincoln stands up in it +like a light-house. I had climbed the sharp, crooked streets up to this +ecclesiastical citadel; just in front of me was a flourishing and richly +coloured kitchen garden; beyond that was the low stone wall; beyond that +the row of vans that looked like houses; and beyond and above that, +straight and swift and dark, light as a flight of birds, and terrible as +the Tower of Babel, Lincoln Cathedral seemed to rise out of human sight. + +As I looked at it I asked myself the questions that I have asked here; +what was the soul in all those stones? They were varied, but it was not +variety; they were solemn, but it was not solemnity; they were farcical, +but it was not farce. What is it in them that thrills and soothes a man +of our blood and history, that is not there in an Egyptian pyramid or an +Indian temple or a Chinese pagoda? All of a sudden the vans I had +mistaken for cottages began to move away to the left. In the start this +gave to my eye and mind I really fancied that the Cathedral was moving +towards the right. The two huge towers seemed to start striding across +the plain like the two legs of some giant whose body was covered with the +clouds. Then I saw what it was. + +The truth about Gothic is, first, that it is alive, and second, that it is +on the march. It is the Church Militant; it is the only fighting +architecture. All its spires are spears at rest; and all its stones are +stones asleep in a catapult. In that instant of illusion, I could hear the +arches clash like swords as they crossed each other. The mighty and +numberless columns seemed to go swinging by like the huge feet of imperial +elephants. The graven foliage wreathed and blew like banners going into +battle; the silence was deafening with ail the mingled noises of a +military march; the great bell shook down, as the organ shook up its +thunder. The thirsty-throated gargoyles shouted like trumpets from all +the roofs and pinnacles as they passed; and from the lectern in the core +of the cathedral the eagle of the awful evangelist clashed his wings of +brass, + +And amid all the noises I seemed to hear the voice of a man shouting in +the midst like one ordering regiments hither and thither in the fight; the +voice of the great half-military master-builder; the architect of spears. +I could almost fancy he wore armour while he made that church; and I knew +indeed that, under a scriptural figure, he had borne in either hand the +trowel and the sword. + +I could imagine for the moment that the whole of that house of life had +marched out of the sacred East, alive and interlocked, like an army. +Some Eastern nomad had found it solid and silent in the red circle of the +desert. He had slept by it as by a world-forgotten pyramid; and been woke +at midnight by the wings of stone and brass, the tramping of the tall +pillars, the trumpets of the waterspouts. On such a night every snake or +sea-beast must have turned and twisted in every crypt or corner of the +architecture. And the fiercely coloured saints marching eternally in the +flamboyant windows would have carried their glorioles like torches across +dark lands and distant seas; till the whole mountain of music and darkness +and lights descended roaring on the lonely Lincoln hill. So for some +hundred and sixty seconds I saw the battle-beauty of the Gothic; then the +last furniture-van shifted itself away; and I saw only a church tower in a +quiet English town, round which the English birds were floating. + + + + +THE MAN ON TOP + + +There is a fact at the root of all realities to-day which cannot be stated +too simply. It is that the powers of this world are now not trusted +simply because they are not trustworthy. This can be quite clearly seen +and said without any reference to our several passions or partisanships. +It does not follow that we think such a distrust a wise sentiment to +express; it does not even follow that we think it a good sentiment to +entertain. But such is the sentiment, simply because such is the fact. +The distinction can be quite easily defined in an example. I do not +think that private workers owe an indefinite loyalty to their employer. +But I do think that patriotic soldiers owe a more or less indefinite +loyalty to their leader in battle. But even if they ought to trust their +captain, the fact remains that they often do not trust him; and the fact +remains that he often is not fit to be trusted. + +Most of the employers and many of the Socialists seem to have got a very +muddled ethic about the basis of such loyalty; and perpetually try to put +employers and officers upon the same disciplinary plane. I should have +thought myself that the difference was alphabetical enough. It has +nothing to do with the idealising of war or the materialising of trade; it +is a distinction in the primary purpose. There might be much more +elegance and poetry in a shop under William Morris than in a regiment +under Lord Kitchener. But the difference is not in the persons or the +atmosphere, but in the aim. The British Army does not exist in order to +pay Lord Kitchener. William Morris's shop, however artistic and +philanthropic, did exist to pay William Morris. If it did not pay the +shopkeeper it failed as a shop; but Lord Kitchener does not fail if he is +underpaid, but only if he is defeated. The object of the Army is the +safety of the nation from one particular class of perils; therefore, since +all citizens owe loyalty to the nation, all citizens who are soldiers owe +loyalty to the Army. But nobody has any obligation to make some +particular rich man richer. A man is bound, of course, to consider the +indirect results of his action in a strike; but he is bound to consider +that in a swing, or a giddy-go-round, or a smoking concert; in his wildest +holiday or his most private conversation. But direct responsibility like +that of a soldier he has none. He need not aim solely and directly at the +good of the shop; for the simple reason that the shop is not aiming solely +and directly at the good of the nation. The shopman is, under decent +restraints, let us hope, trying to get what he can out of the nation; the +shop assistant may, under the same decent restraints, get what he can out +of the shopkeeper. All this distinction is very obvious. At least I +should have thought so. + +But the primary point which I mean is this. That even if we do take the +military view of mercantile service, even if we do call the rebellious +shop assistant "disloyal"--that leaves exactly where it was the question +of whether he is, in point of fact, in a good or bad shop. Granted that +all Mr. Poole's employees are bound to follow for ever the cloven pennon +of the Perfect Pair of Trousers, it is all the more true that the pennon +may, in point of fact, become imperfect. Granted that all Barney Barnato's +workers ought to have followed him to death or glory, it is still a +Perfectly legitimate question to ask which he was likely to lead them to. +Granted that Dr. Sawyer's boy ought to die for his master's medicines, we +may still hold an inquest to find out if he died of them. While we +forbid the soldier to shoot the general, we may still wish the general +were shot. + +The fundamental fact of our time is the failure of the successful man. +Somehow we have so arranged the rules of the game that the winners are +worthless for other purposes; they can secure nothing except the prize. +The very rich are neither aristocrats nor self-made men; they are +accidents--or rather calamities. All revolutionary language is a +generation behind the times in talking of their futility. A revolutionist +would say (with perfect truth) that coal-owners know next to nothing about +coal-mining. But we are past that point. Coal-owners know next to +nothing about coal-owning. They do not develop and defend the nature of +their own monopoly with any consistent and courageous policy, however +wicked, as did the old aristocrats with the monopoly of land. They have +not the virtues nor even the vices of tyrants; they have only their powers. +It is the same with all the powerful of to-day; it is the same, for +instance, with the high-placed and high-paid official. Not only is the +judge not judicial, but the arbiter is not even arbitrary. The arbiter +decides, not by some gust of justice or injustice in his soul like the old +despot dooming men under a tree, but by the permanent climate of the class +to which he happens to belong. The ancient wig of the judge is often +indistinguishable from the old wig of the flunkey. + +To judge about success or failure one must see things very simply; one +must see them in masses, as the artist, half closing his eyes against +details, sees light and shade. That is the only way in which a just +judgment can be formed as to whether any departure or development, such as +Islam or the American Republic, has been a benefit upon the whole. Seen +close, such great erections always abound in ingenious detail and +impressive solidity; it is only by seeing them afar off that one can tell +if the Tower leans. + +Now if we thus take in the whole tilt or posture of our modern state, we +shall simply see this fact: that those classes who have on the whole +governed, have on the whole failed. If you go to a factory you will see +some very wonderful wheels going round; you will be told that the employer +often comes there early in the morning; that he has great organising power; +that if he works over the colossal accumulation of wealth he also works +over its wise distribution. All this may be true of many employers, and +it is practically said of all. + +But if we shade our eyes from all this dazzle of detail; if we simply ask +what has been the main feature, the upshot, the final fruit of the +capitalist system, there is no doubt about the answer. The special and +solid result of the reign of the employers has been--unemployment. +Unemployment not only increasing, but becoming at last the very pivot upon +which the whole process turns. + +Or, again, if you visit the villages that depend on one of the great +squires, you will hear praises, often just, of the landlord's good sense +or good nature; you will hear of whole systems of pensions or of care for +the sick, like those of a small and separate nation; you will see much +cleanliness, order, and business habits in the offices and accounts of the +estate. But if you ask again what has been the upshot, what has been the +actual result of the reign of landlords, again the answer is plain. At +the end of the reign of landlords men will not live on the land. The +practical effect of having landlords is not having tenants. The practical +effect of having employers is that men are not employed. The unrest of +the populace is therefore more than a murmur against tyranny; it is +against a sort of treason. It is the suspicion that even at the top of +the tree, even in the seats of the mighty, our very success is +unsuccessful. + + + + +THE OTHER KIND OF MAN + + +There are some who are conciliated by Conciliation Boards. There are some +who, when they hear of Royal Commissions, breathe again--or snore again. +There are those who look forward to Compulsory Arbitration Courts as to +the islands of the blest. These men do not understand the day that they +look upon or the sights that their eyes have seen. + +The almost sacramental idea of representation, by which the few may +incarnate the many, arose in the Middle Ages, and has done great things +for justice and liberty. It has had its real hours of triumph, as when +the States General met to renew France's youth like the eagle's; or when +all the virtues of the Republic fought and ruled in the figure of +Washington. It is not having one of its hours of triumph now. The real +democratic unrest at this moment is not an extension of the representative +process, but rather a revolt against it. It is no good giving those now +in revolt more boards and committees and compulsory regulations. It is +against these very things that they are revolting. Men are not only +rising against their oppressors, but against their representatives or, as +they would say, their misrepresentatives. The inner and actual spirit of +workaday England is coming out not in applause, but in anger, as a god who +should come out of his tabernacle to rebuke and confound his priests. + +There is a certain kind of man whom we see many times in a day, but whom +we do not, in general, bother very much about. He is the kind of man of +whom his wife says that a better husband when he's sober you couldn't have. +She sometimes adds that he never is sober; but this is in anger and +exaggeration. Really he drinks much less and works much more than the +modern legend supposes. But it is quite true that he has not the horror +of bodily outbreak, natural to the classes that contain ladies; and it is +quite true that he never has that alert and inventive sort of industry +natural to the classes from which men can climb into great wealth. He has +grown, partly by necessity, but partly also by temper, accustomed to have +dirty clothes and dirty hands normally and without discomfort. He regards +cleanliness as a kind of separate and special costume; to be put on for +great festivals. He has several really curious characteristics, which +would attract the eyes of sociologists, if they had any eyes. For +instance, his vocabulary is coarse and abusive, in marked contrast to his +actual spirit, which is generally patient and civil. He has an odd way of +using certain words of really horrible meaning, but using them quite +innocently and without the most distant taint of the evils to which they +allude. He is rather sentimental; and, like most sentimental people, not +devoid of snobbishness. At the same time, he believes the ordinary manly +commonplaces of freedom and fraternity as he believes most of the decent +traditions of Christian men: he finds it very difficult to act according +to them, but this difficulty is not confined to him. He has a strong and +individual sense of humour, and not much power of corporate or militant +action. He is not a Socialist. Finally, he bears no more resemblance to +a Labour Member than he does to a City Alderman or a Die-Hard Duke. This +is the Common Labourer of England; and it is he who is on the march at +last. + +See this man in your mind as you see him in the street, realise that it is +his open mind we wish to influence or his empty stomach we wish to cure, +and then consider seriously (if you can) the five men, including two of +his own alleged oppressors, who were summoned as a Royal Commission to +consider his claims when he or his sort went out on strike upon the +railways. I knew nothing against, indeed I knew nothing about, any of the +gentlemen then summoned, beyond a bare introduction to Mr. Henderson, +whom I liked, but whose identity I was in no danger of confusing with that +of a railway-porter. I do not think that any old gentleman, however +absent-minded, would be likely on arriving at Euston, let us say, to hand +his Gladstone-bag to Mr. Henderson or to attempt to reward that politician +with twopence. Of the others I can only judge by the facts about their +status as set forth in the public Press. The Chairman, Sir David Harrell, +appeared to be an ex-official distinguished in (of all things in the +world) the Irish Constabulary. I have no earthly reason to doubt that the +Chairman meant to be fair; but I am not talking about what men mean to be, +but about what they are. The police in Ireland are practically an army of +occupation; a man serving in them or directing them is practically a +soldier; and, of course, he must do his duty as such. But it seems truly +extraordinary to select as one likely to sympathise with the democracy of +England a man whose whole business in life it has been to govern against +its will the democracy of Ireland. What should we say if Russian strikers +were offered the sympathetic arbitration of the head of the Russian Police +in Finland or Poland? And if we do not know that the whole civilised +world sees Ireland with Poland as a typical oppressed nation, it is time +we did. The Chairman, whatever his personal virtues, must be by instinct +and habit akin to the capitalists in the dispute. Two more of the +Commissioners actually were the capitalists in the dispute. Then came Mr. +Henderson (pushing his trolley and cheerily crying, "By your leave."), +and then another less known gentleman who had "corresponded" with the +Board of Trade, and had thus gained some strange claim to represent the +very poor. + +Now people like this might quite possibly produce a rational enough report, +and in this or that respect even improve things. Men of that kind are +tolerably kind, tolerably patriotic, and tolerably business-like. But if +any one supposes that men of that kind can conceivably quiet any real +'quarrel with the Man of the Other Kind, the man whom I first described, +it is frantic. The common worker is angry exactly because he has found +out that all these boards consist of the same well-dressed Kind of Man, +whether they are called Governmental or Capitalist. If any one hopes that +he will reconcile the poor, I say, as I said at the beginning, that such a +one has not looked on the light of day or dwelt in the land of the living. + +But I do not criticise such a Commission except for one most practical and +urgent purpose. It will be answered to me that the first Kind of Man of +whom I spoke could not really be on boards and committees, as modern +England is managed. His dirt, though necessary and honourable, would be +offensive: his speech, though rich and figurative, would be almost +incomprehensible. Let us grant, for the moment, that this is so. This +Kind of Man, with his sooty hair or sanguinary adjectives, cannot be +represented at our committees of arbitration. Therefore, the other Kind +of Man, fairly prosperous, fairly plausible, at home at least with the +middle class, capable at least of reaching and touching the upper class, +he must remain the only Kind of Man for such councils. + +Very well. If then, you give at any future time any kind of compulsory +powers to such councils to prevent strikes, you will be driving the first +Kind of Man to work for a particular master as much as if you drove him +with a whip. + + + + +THE MEDIAEVAL VILLAIN + + +I see that there have been more attempts at the whitewashing of King John. + +But the gentleman who wrote has a further interest in the matter; for he +believes that King John was innocent, not only on this point, but as a +whole. He thinks King John has been very badly treated; though I am not +sure whether he would attribute to that Plantagenet a saintly merit or +merely a humdrum respectability. + +I sympathise with the whitewashing of King John, merely because it is a +protest against our waxwork style of history. Everybody is in a +particular attitude, with particular moral attributes; Rufus is always +hunting and Coeur-de-Lion always crusading; Henry VIII always marrying, +and Charles I always having his head cut off; Alfred rapidly and in +rotation making his people's clocks and spoiling their cakes; and King +John pulling out Jews' teeth with the celerity and industry of an American +dentist. Anything is good that shakes all this stiff simplification, and +makes us remember that these men were once alive; that is, mixed, free, +flippant, and inconsistent. It gives the mind a healthy kick to know that +Alfred had fits, that Charles I prevented enclosures, that Rufus was +really interested in architecture, that Henry VIII was really interested +in theology. + +And as these scraps of reality can startle us into more solid imagination +of events, so can even errors and exaggerations if they are on the right +side. It does some good to call Alfred a prig, Charles I a Puritan, and +John a jolly good fellow; if this makes us feel that they were people whom +we might have liked or disliked. I do not myself think that John was a +nice gentleman; but for all that the popular picture of him is all wrong. +Whether he had any generous qualities or not, he had what commonly makes +them possible, dare-devil courage, for instance, and hotheaded decision. +But, above all, he had a morality which he broke, but which we +misunderstand. + +The mediaeval mind turned centrally upon the pivot of Free Will. In their +social system the mediaevals were too much PARTI-PER-PALE, as their +heralds would say, too rigidly cut up by fences and quarterings of guild +or degree. But in their moral philosophy they always thought of man as +standing free and doubtful at the cross-roads in a forest. While they +clad and bound the body and (to some extent) the mind too stiffly and +quaintly for our taste, they had a much stronger sense than we have of the +freedom of the soul. For them the soul always hung poised like an eagle +in the heavens of liberty. Many of the things that strike a modern as +most fantastic came from their keen sense of the power of choice. + +For instance, the greatest of the Schoolmen devotes folios to the minute +description of what the world would have been like if Adam had refused the +apple; what kings, laws, babies, animals, planets would have been in an +unfallen world. So intensely does he feel that Adam might have decided +the other way that he sees a complete and complex vision of another world, +a world that now can never be. + +This sense of the stream of life in a man that may turn either way can be +felt through all their popular ethics in legend, chronicle, and ballad. +It is a feeling which has been weakened among us by two heavy intellectual +forces. The Calvinism of the seventeenth century and the physical science +of the nineteenth, whatever other truths they may have taught, have +darkened this liberty with a sense of doom. We think of bad men as +something like black men, a separate and incurable kind of people. The +Byronic spirit was really a sort of operatic Calvinism. It brought the +villain upon the stage; the lost soul; the modern version of King John. +But the contemporaries of King John did not feel like that about him, even +when they detested him. They instinctively felt him to be a man of mixed +passions like themselves, who was allowing his evil passions to have much +too good a time of it. They might have spoken of him as a man in +considerable danger of going to hell; but they would have not talked of +him as if he had come from there. In the ballads of Percy or Robin Hood +it frequently happens that the King comes upon the scene, and his ultimate +decision makes the climax of the tale. But we do not feel, as we do in +the Byronic or modern romance, that there is a definite stage direction +"Enter Tyrant." Nor do we behold a deus ex machina who is certain to do +all that is mild and just. The King in the ballad is in a state of virile +indecision. Sometimes he will pass from a towering passion to the most +sweeping magnanimity and friendliness; sometimes he will begin an act of +vengeance and be turned from it by a jest. Yet this august levity is not +moral indifference; it is moral freedom. It is the strong sense in the +writer that the King, being the type of man with power, will probably +sometimes use it badly and sometimes well. In this sense John is +certainly misrepresented, for he is pictured as something that none of his +own friends or enemies saw. In that sense he was certainly not so black +as he is painted, for he lived in a world where every one was piebald. + +King John would be represented in a modern play or novel as a kind of +degenerate; a shifty-eyed moral maniac with a twist in his soul's backbone +and green blood in his veins. The mediaevals were quite capable of +boiling him in melted lead, but they would have been quite incapable of +despairing of his soul in the modern fashion. A striking a fortiori case +is that of the strange mediaeval legend of Robert the Devil. Robert was +represented as a monstrous birth sent to an embittered woman actually in +answer to prayers to Satan, and his earlier actions are simply those of +the infernal fire let loose upon earth. Yet though he can be called +almost literally a child of hell, yet the climax of the story is his +repentance at Rome and his great reparation. That is the paradox of +mediaeval morals: as it must appear to the moderns. We must try to +conceive a race of men who hated John, and sought his blood, and believed +every abomination about him, who would have been quite capable of +assassinating or torturing him in the extremity of their anger. And yet +we must admit that they would not really have been fundamentally surprised +if he had shaved his head in humiliation, given all his goods to the poor, +embraced the lepers in a lazar-house, and been canonised as a saint in +heaven. So strongly did they hold that the pivot of Will should turn +freely, which now is rusted, and sticks. + +For we, whatever our political opinions, certainly never think of our +public men like that. If we hold the opinion that Mr. Lloyd George is a +noble tribune of the populace and protector of the poor, we do not admit +that he can ever have paltered with the truth or bargained with the +powerful. If we hold the equally idiotic opinion that he is a red and +rabid Socialist, maddening mobs into mutiny and theft, then we expect him +to go on maddening them--and us. We do not expect him, let us say, +suddenly to go into a monastery. We have lost the idea of repentance; +especially in public things; that is why we cannot really get rid of our +great national abuses of economic tyranny and aristocratic avarice. +Progress in the modern sense is a very dismal drudge; and mostly consists +of being moved on by the police. We move on because we are not allowed to +move back. But the really ragged prophets, the real revolutionists who +held high language in the palaces of kings, they did not confine +themselves to saying, "Onward, Christian soldiers," still less, "Onward, +Futurist soldiers"; what they said to high emperors and to whole empires +was, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?" + + + + +THE DIVINE DETECTIVE + + +Every person of sound education enjoys detective stories, and there are +even several points on which they have a hearty superiority to most modern +books. A detective story generally describes six living men discussing +how it is that a man is dead. A modern philosophic story generally +describes six dead men discussing how any man can possibly be alive. But +those who have enjoyed the roman policier must have noted one thing, that +when the murderer is caught he is hardly ever hanged. "That," says +Sherlock Holmes, "is the advantage of being a private detective"; after he +has caught he can set free. The Christian Church can best be defined as +an enormous private detective, correcting that official detective--the +State. This, indeed, is one of the injustices done to historic +Christianity; injustices which arise from looking at complex exceptions +and not at the large and simple fact. We are constantly being told that +theologians used racks and thumbscrews, and so they did. Theologians +used racks and thumbscrews just as they used thimbles and three-legged +stools, because everybody else used them. Christianity no more created +the mediaeval tortures than it did the Chinese tortures; it inherited them +from any empire as heathen as the Chinese. + +The Church did, in an evil hour, consent to imitate the commonwealth and +employ cruelty. But if we open our eyes and take in the whole picture, if +we look at the general shape and colour of the thing, the real difference +between the Church and the State is huge and plain. The State, in all +lands and ages, has created a machinery of punishment, more bloody and +brutal in some places than others, but bloody and brutal everywhere. The +Church is the only institution that ever attempted to create a machinery +of pardon. The Church is the only thing that ever attempted by system to +pursue and discover crimes, not in order to avenge, but in order to +forgive them. The stake and rack were merely the weaknesses of the +religion; its snobberies, its surrenders to the world. Its +speciality--or, if you like, its oddity--was this merciless mercy; the +unrelenting sleuthhound who seeks to save and not slay. + +I can best illustrate what I mean by referring to two popular plays on +somewhat parallel topics, which have been successful here and in America. +The Passing of the Third Floor Back is a humane and reverent experiment, +dealing with the influence of one unknown but divine figure as he passes +through a group of Squalid characters. I have no desire to make cheap fun +of the extremely abrupt conversions of all these people; that is a point +of art, not of morals; and, after all, many conversions have been abrupt. +This saviour's method of making people good is to tell them how good they +are already; and in the case of suicidal outcasts, whose moral backs are +broken, and who are soaked with sincere self-contempt, I can imagine that +this might be quite the right way. I should not deliver this message to +authors or members of Parliament, because they would so heartily agree +with it. + +Still, it is not altogether here that I differ from the moral of Mr. +Jerome's play. I differ vitally from his story because it is not a +detective story. There is in it none of this great Christian idea of +tearing their evil out of men; it lacks the realism of the saints. +Redemption should bring truth as well as peace; and truth is a fine thing, +though the materialists did go mad about it. Things must be faced, even +in order to be forgiven; the great objection to "letting sleeping dogs +lie" is that they lie in more senses than one. But in Mr. Jerome's +Passing of the Third Floor Back the redeemer is not a divine detective, +pitiless in his resolve to know and pardon. Rather he is a sort of divine +dupe, who does not pardon at all, because he does not see anything that is +going on. It may, or may not, be true to say, "Tout comprendre est tout +pardonner." But it is much more evidently true to say, "Rien comprendre +est rien Pardonner," and the "Third Floor Back" does not seem to +comprehend anything. He might, after all, be a quite selfish +sentimentalist, who found it comforting to think well of his neighbours. +There is nothing very heroic in loving after you have been deceived. The +heroic business is to love after you have been undeceived. + +When I saw this play it was natural to compare it with another play which +I had not seen, but which I have read in its printed version. I mean Mr. +Rann Kennedy's Servant in the House, the success of which sprawls over so +many of the American newspapers. This also is concerned with a dim, yet +evidently divine, figure changing the destinies of a whole group of +persons. It is a better play structurally than the other; in fact, it is +a very fine play indeed; but there is nothing aesthetic or fastidious +about it. It is as much or more than the other sensational, democratic, +and (I use the word in a sound and good sense) Salvationist. + +But the difference lies precisely in this--that the Christ of Mr. +Kennedy's play insists on really knowing all the souls that he loves; he +declines to conquer by a kind of supernatural stupidity. He pardons evil, +but he will not ignore it. In other words, he is a Christian, and not a +Christian Scientist. The distinction doubtless is partly explained by the +problems severally selected. Mr. Jerome practically supposes Christ to be +trying to save disreputable people; and that, of course, is naturally a +simple business. Mr. Kennedy supposes Him to be trying to save the +reputable people, which is a much larger affair. The chief characters in +The Servant in the House are a popular and strenuous vicar, universally +respected, and his fashionable and forcible wife. It would have been no +good to tell these people they had some good in them--for that was what +they were telling themselves all day long. They had to be reminded that +they had some bad in them--instinctive idolatries and silent treasons +which they always tried to forget. It is in connection with these crimes +of wealth and culture that we face the real problem of positive evil. The +whole of Mr. Blatchford's controversy about sin was vitiated throughout by +one's consciousness that whenever he wrote the word "sinner" he thought of +a man in rags. But here, again, we can find truth merely by referring to +vulgar literature--its unfailing fountain. Whoever read a detective +story about poor people? The poor have crimes; but the poor have no +secrets. And it is because the proud have secrets that they need to be +detected before they are forgiven. + + + + +THE ELF OF JAPAN + + +There are things in this world of which I can say seriously that I love +them but I do not like them. The point is not merely verbal, but +psychologically quite valid. Cats are the first things that occur to me +as examples of the principle. Cats are so beautiful that a creature from +another star might fall in love with them, and so incalculable that he +might kill them. Some of my friends take quite a high moral line about +cats. Some, like Mr. Titterton, I think, admire a cat for its moral +independence and readiness to scratch anybody "if he does not behave +himself." Others, like Mr. Belloe, regard the cat as cruel and secret, a +fit friend for witches; one who will devour everything, except, indeed, +poisoned food, "so utterly lacking is it in Christian simplicity and +humility." For my part, I have neither of these feelings. I admire cats +as I admire catkins; those little fluffy things that hang on trees. They +are both pretty and both furry, and both declare the glory of God. And +this abstract exultation in all living things is truly to be called Love; +for it is a higher feeling than mere affectional convenience; it is a +vision. It is heroic, and even saintly, in this: that it asks for nothing +in return. I love all the eats in the street as St. Francis of Assisi +loved all the birds in the wood or all the fishes in the sea; not so much, +of course, but then I am not a saint. But he did not wish to bridle a +bird and ride on its back, as one bridles and rides on a horse. He did +not wish to put a collar round a fish's neck, marked with the name +"Francis," and the address "Assisi"--as one does with a dog. He did not +wish them to belong to him or himself to belong to them; in fact, it would +be a very awkward experience to belong to a lot of fishes. But a man does +belong to his dog, in another but an equally real sense with that in which +the dog belongs to him. The two bonds of obedience and responsibility +vary very much with the dogs and the men; but they are both bonds. In +other words, a man does not merely love a dog; as he might (in a mystical +moment) love any sparrow that perched on his windowsill or any rabbit that +ran across his path. A man likes a dog; and that is a serious matter. + +To me, unfortunately perhaps (for I speak merely of individual taste), a +cat is a wild animal. A cat is Nature personified. Like Nature, it is so +mysterious that one cannot quite repose even in its beauty. But like +Nature again, it is so beautiful that one cannot believe that it is really +cruel. Perhaps it isn't; and there again it is like Nature. Men of old +time worshipped cats as they worshipped crocodiles; and those magnificent +old mystics knew what they were about. The moment in which one really +loves cats is the same as that in which one (moderately and within reason) +loves crocodiles. It is that divine instant when a man feels himself--no, +not absorbed into the unity of all things (a loathsome fancy)--but +delighting in the difference of all things. At the moment when a man +really knows he is a man he will feel, however faintly, a kind of +fairy-tale pleasure in the fact that a crocodile is a crocodile. All the +more will he exult in the things that are more evidently beautiful than +crocodiles, such as flowers and birds and eats--which are more beautiful +than either. But it does not follow that he will wish to pick all the +flowers or to cage all the birds or to own all the cats. + +No one who still believes in democracy and the rights of man will admit +that any division between men and men can be anything but a fanciful +analogy to the division between men and animals. But in the sphere of +such fanciful analogy there are even human beings whom I feel to be like +eats in this respect: that I can love them without liking them. I feel it +about certain quaint and alien societies, especially about the Japanese. +The exquisite old Japanese draughtsmanship (of which we shall see no more, +now Japan has gone in for Progress and Imperialism) had a quality that was +infinitely attractive and intangible. Japanese pictures were really +rather like pictures made by cats. They were full of feathery softness +and of sudden and spirited scratches. If any one will wander in some +gallery fortunate enough to have a fine collection of those slight +water-colour sketches on rice paper which come from the remote East, he +will observe many elements in them which a fanciful person might consider +feline. There is, for instance, that odd enjoyment of the tops of trees; +those airy traceries of forks and fading twigs, up to which certainly no +artist, but only a cat could climb. There is that elvish love of the full +moon, as large and lucid as a Chinese lantern, hung in these tenuous +branches. That moon is so large and luminous that one can imagine a +hundred cats howling under it. Then there is the exhaustive treatment of +the anatomy of birds and fish; subjects in which cats are said to be +interested. Then there is the slanting cat-like eye of all these Eastern +gods and men--but this is getting altogether too coincident. We shall +have another racial theory in no time (beginning "Are the Japs Cats?"), +and though I shall not believe in my theory, somebody else might. There +are people among my esteemed correspondents who might believe anything. +It is enough for me to say here that in this small respect Japs affect me +like cats. I mean that I love them. I love their quaint and native +poetry, their instinct of easy civilisation, their unique unreplaceable +art, the testimony they bear to the bustling, irrepressible activities of +nature and man. If I were a real mystic looking down on them from a real +mountain, I am sure I should love them more even than the strong winged and +unwearied birds or the fruitful, ever multiplying fish. But, as for liking +them, as one likes a dog--that is quite another matter. That would mean +trusting them. + +In the old English and Scotch ballads the fairies are regarded very much +in the way that I feel inclined to regard Japs and cats. They are not +specially spoken of as evil; they are enjoyed as witching and wonderful; +but they are not trusted as good. You do not say the wrong words or give +the wrong gifts to them; and there is a curious silence about what would +happen to you if you did. Now to me, Japan, the Japan of Art, was always +a fairyland. What trees as gay as flowers and peaks as white as wedding +cakes; what lanterns as large as houses and houses as frail as lanterns! +but... but... the missionary explained (I read in the paper) that the +assertion and denial about the Japanese use of torture was a mere matter +of verbal translation. "The Japanese would not call twisting the thumbs +back 'torture.'" + + + + +THE CHARTERED LIBERTINE + + +I find myself in agreement with Mr. Robert Lynd for his most just remark +in connection with the Malatesta case, that the police are becoming a +peril to society. I have no attraction to that sort of atheist asceticism +to which the purer types of Anarchism tend; but both an atheist and an +ascetic are better men than a spy; and it is ignominious to see one's +country thus losing her special point of honour about asylum and liberty. +It will be quite a new departure if we begin to protect and whitewash +foreign policemen. I always understood it was only English policemen who +were absolutely spotless. A good many of us, however, have begun to feel +with Mr. Lynd, and on all sides authorities and officials are being +questioned. But there is one most graphic and extraordinary fact, which +it did not lie in Mr. Lynd's way to touch upon, but which somebody really +must seize and emphasise. It is this: that at the very time when we are +all beginning to doubt these authorities, we are letting laws pass to +increase their most capricious powers. All our commissions, petitions, +and letters to the papers are asking whether these authorities can give an +account of their stewardship. And at the same moment all our laws are +decreeing that they shall not give any account of their stewardship, but +shall become yet more irresponsible stewards. Bills like the +Feeble-Minded Bill and the Inebriate Bill (very appropriate names for +them) actually arm with scorpions the hand that has chastised the +Malatestas and Maleckas with whips. The inspector, the doctor, the police +sergeant, the well-paid person who writes certificates and "passes" this, +that, or the other; this sort of man is being trusted with more authority, +apparently because he is being doubted with more reason. In one room we +are asking why the Government and the great experts between them cannot +sail a ship. In another room we are deciding that the Government and +experts shall be allowed, without trial or discussion, to immure any one's +body, damn any one's soul, and dispose of unborn generations with the +levity of a pagan god. We are putting the official on the throne while he +is still in the dock. + +The mere meaning of words is now strangely forgotten and falsified; as +when people talk of an author's "message," without thinking whom it is +from; and I have noted in these connections the strange misuse of another +word. It is the excellent mediaeval word "charter." I remember the Act +that sought to save gutter-boys from cigarettes was called "The Children's +Charter." Similarly the Act which seeks to lock up as lunatics people who +are not lunatics was actually called a "charter" of the feeble-minded. +Now this terminology is insanely wrong, even if the Bills are right. Even +were they right in theory they would be applied only to the poor, like +many better rules about education and cruelty. A woman was lately +punished for cruelty because her children were not washed when it was +proved that she had no water. From that it will be an easy step in +Advanced Thought to punishing a man for wine-bibbing when it is proved +that he had no wine. Rifts in right reason widen down the ages. And +when we have begun by shutting up a confessedly kind person for cruelty, +we may yet come to shutting up Mr. Tom Mann for feeblemindedness. + +But even if such laws do good to children or idiots, it is wrong to use +the word "charter." A charter does not mean a thing that does good to +people. It means a thing that grants people more rights and liberties. +It may be a good thing for gutter-boys to be deprived of their cigarettes: +it might be a good thing for aldermen to be deprived of their cigars. +But I think the Goldsmiths' Company would be very much surprised if the +King granted them a new charter (in place of their mediaeval charter), and +it only meant that policemen might pull the cigars out of their mouths. +It may be a good thing that all drunkards should be locked up: and many +acute statesmen (King John, for instance) would certainly have thought it +a good thing if all aristocrats could be locked up. But even that +somewhat cynical prince would scarcely have granted to the barons a thing +called "the Great Charter" and then locked them all up on the strength of +it. If he had, this interpretation of the word "charter" would have +struck the barons with considerable surprise. I doubt if their narrow +mediaeval minds could have taken it in. + +The roots of the real England are in the early Middle Ages, and no +Englishman will ever understand his own language (or even his own +conscience) till he understands them. And he will never understand them +till he understands this word "charter." I will attempt in a moment to +state in older, more suitable terms, what a charter was. In modern, +practical, and political terms, it is quite easy to state what a charter +was. A charter was the thing that the railway workers wanted last +Christmas and did not get; and apparently will never get. It is called in +the current jargon "recognition"; the acknowledgment in so many words by +society of the immunities or freedoms of a certain set of men. If there +had been railways in the Middle Ages there would probably have been a +railwaymen's guild; and it would have had a charter from the King, +defining their rights. A charter is the expression of an idea still true +and then almost universal: that authority is necessary for nothing so much +as for the granting of liberties. Like everything mediaeval, it ramified +back to a root in religion; and was a sort of small copy of the Christian +idea of man's creation. Man was free, not because there was no God, but +because it needed a God to set him free. By authority he was free. By +authority the craftsmen of the guilds were free. Many other great +philosophers took and take the other view: the Lucretian pagans, the +Moslem fatalists, the modern monists and determinists, all roughly confine +themselves to saying that God gave man a law. The mediaeval Christian +insisted that God gave man a charter. Modern feeling may not sympathise +with its list of liberties, which included the liberty to be damned; but +that has nothing to do with the fact that it was a gift of liberties and +not of laws. This was mirrored, however dimly, in the whole system. +There was a great deal of gross inequality; and in other aspects absolute +equality was taken for granted. But the point is that equality and +inequality were ranks--or rights. There were not only things one was +forbidden to do; but things one was forbidden to forbid. A man was not +only definitely responsible, but definitely irresponsible. The holidays +of his soul were immovable feasts. All a charter really meant lingers +alive in that poetic phrase that calls the wind a "chartered" libertine. + +Lie awake at night and hear the wind blowing; hear it knock at every man's +door and shout down every man's chimney. Feel how it takes liberties with +everything, having taken primary liberty for itself; feel that the wind is +always a vagabond and sometimes almost a housebreaker. But remember that +in the days when free men had charters, they held that the wind itself was +wild by authority; and was only free because it had a father. + + + + +THE CONTENTED MAN + + +The word content is not inspiring nowadays; rather it is irritating +because it is dull. It prepares the mind for a little sermon in the style +of the Vicar of Wakefield about how you and I should be satisfied with our +countrified innocence and our simple village sports. The word, however, +has two meanings, somewhat singularly connected; the "sweet content" of +the poet and the "cubic content" of the mathematician. Some distinguish +these by stressing the different syllables. Thus, it might happen to any +of us, at some social juncture, to remark gaily, "Of the content of the +King of the Cannibal Islands' Stewpot I am content to be ignorant"; or +"Not content with measuring the cubic content of my safe, you are stealing +the spoons." And there really is an analogy between the mathematical and +the moral use of the term, for lack of the observation of which the latter +has been much weakened and misused. + +The preaching of contentment is in disrepute, well deserved in so far that +the moral is really quite inapplicable to the anarchy and insane peril of +our tall and toppling cities. Content suggests some kind of security; and +it is not strange that our workers should often think about rising above +their position, since they have so continually to think about sinking +below it. The philanthropist who urges the poor to saving and simple +pleasures deserves all the derision that he gets. To advise people to be +content with what they have got may or may not be sound moral philosophy. + +But to urge people to be content with what they haven't got is a piece of +impudence hard for even the English poor to pardon. But though the creed +of content is unsuited to certain special riddles and wrongs, it remains +true for the normal of mortal life. We speak of divine discontent; +discontent may sometimes be a divine thing, but content must always be the +human thing. It may be true that a particular man, in his relation to +his master or his neighbour, to his country or his enemies, will do well +to be fiercely unsatisfied or thirsting for an angry justice. But it is +not true, no sane person can call it true, that man as a whole in his +general attitude towards the world, in his posture towards death or green +fields, towards the weather or the baby, will be wise to cultivate +dissatisfaction. In a broad estimate of our earthly experience, the great +truism on the tablet remains: he must not covet his neighbour's ox nor his +ass nor anything that is his. In highly complex and scientific +civilisations he may sometimes find himself forced into an exceptional +vigilance. But, then, in highly complex and scientific civilisations, +nine times out of ten, he only wants his own ass back. + +But I wish to urge the case for cubic content; in which (even more than in +moral content) I take a personal interest. Now, moral content has been +undervalued and neglected because of its separation from the other meaning. +It has become a negative rather than a positive thing. In some accounts +of contentment it seems to be little more than a meek despair. + +But this is not the true meaning of the term; it should stand for the idea +of a positive and thorough appreciation of the content of anything; for +feeling the substance and not merely the surface of experience. +"Content" ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased; +placidly, perhaps, but still positively pleased. Being contented with +bread and cheese ought not to mean not caring what you eat. It ought to +mean caring for bread and cheese; handling and enjoying the cubic content +of the bread and cheese and adding it to your own. Being content with an +attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to +living in it. It ought to mean appreciating what there is to appreciate +in such a position; such as the quaint and elvish slope of the ceiling or +the sublime aerial view of the opposite chimney-pots. And in this sense +contentment is a real and even an active virtue; it is not only +affirmative, but creative. The poet in the attic does not forget the +attic in poetic musings; he remembers whatever the attic has of poetry; he +realises how high, how starry, how cool, how unadorned and simple--in +short, how Attic is the attic. + +True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of +getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and +it is rare. The absence of this digestive talent is what makes so cold +and incredible the tales of so many people who say they have been +"through" things; when it is evident that they have come out on the other +side quite unchanged. A man might have gone "through" a plum pudding as a +bullet might go through a plum pudding; it depends on the size of the +pudding--and the man. But the awful and sacred question is "Has the +pudding been through him?" Has he tasted, appreciated, and absorbed the +solid pudding, with its three dimensions and its three thousand tastes and +smells? Can he offer himself to the eyes of men as one who has cubically +conquered and contained a pudding? + +In the same way we may ask of those who profess to have passed through +trivial or tragic experiences whether they have absorbed the content of +them; whether they licked up such living water as there was. It is a +pertinent question in connection with many modern problems. + +Thus the young genius says, "I have lived in my dreary and squalid village +before I found success in Paris or Vienna." The sound philosopher will +answer, "You have never lived in your village, or you would not call it +dreary and squalid." + +Thus the Imperialist, the Colonial idealist (who commonly speaks and +always thinks with a Yankee accent) will say, "I've been right away from +these little muddy islands, and seen God's great seas and prairies." The +sound philosopher will reply, "You have never been in these islands; you +have never seen the weald of Sussex or the plain of Salisbury; otherwise +you could never have called them either muddy or little." + +Thus the Suffragette will say, "I have passed through the paltry duties of +pots and pans, the drudgery of the vulgar kitchen; but I have come out to +intellectual liberty." The sound philosopher will answer, "You have never +passed through the kitchen, or you never would call it vulgar. Wiser and +stronger women than you have really seen a poetry in pots and pans; +naturally, because there is a poetry in them." It is right for the +village violinist to climb into fame in Paris or Vienna; it is right for +the stray Englishman to climb across the high shoulder of the world; it is +right for the woman to climb into whatever cathedrae or high places she +can allow to her sexual dignity. But it is wrong that any of these +climbers should kick the ladder by which they have climbed. But indeed +these bitter people who record their experiences really record their lack +of experiences. It is the countryman who has not succeeded in being a +countryman who comes up to London. It is the clerk who has not succeeded +in being a clerk who tries (on vegetarian principles) to be a countryman. +And the woman with a past is generally a woman angry about the past she +never had. + +When you have really exhausted an experience you always reverence and love +it. The two things that nearly all of us have thoroughly and really been +through are childhood and youth. And though we would not have them back +again on any account, we feel that they are both beautiful, because we +have drunk them dry. + + + + +THE ANGRY AUTHOR: HIS FAREWELL + + +I have republished all these old articles of mine because they cover a +very controversial period, in which I was in nearly all the controversies, +whether I was visible there or no. And I wish to gather up into this last +article a valedictory violence about all such things; and then pass to +where, beyond these voices, there is peace--or in other words, to the +writing of Penny Dreadfuls; a noble and much-needed work. But before I +finally desert the illusions of rationalism for the actualities of romance, +I should very much like to write one last roaring, raging book telling +all the rationalists not to be so utterly irrational. The book would be +simply a string of violent vetoes, like the Ten Commandments. I would +call it "Don'ts for Dogmatists; or Things I am Tired Of." + +This book of intellectual etiquette, like most books of etiquette, would +begin with superficial things; but there would be, I fancy, a wailing +imprecation in the words that could not be called artificial; it might +begin thus:-(1) Don't use a noun and then an adjective that crosses out +the noun. An adjective qualifies, it cannot contradict. Don't say, "Give +me a patriotism that is free from all boundaries." It is like saying, +"Give me a pork pie with no pork in it." Don't say, "I look forward to +that larger religion that shall have no special dogmas." It is like +saying, "I look forward to that larger quadruped who shall have no feet." +A quadruped means something with four feet; and a religion means something +that commits a man to some doctrine about the universe. Don't let the +meek substantive be absolutely murdered by the joyful, exuberant adjective. + + +(2) Don't say you are not going to say a thing, and then say it. This +practice is very flourishing and successful with public speakers. The +trick consists of first repudiating a certain view in unfavourable terms, +and then repeating the same view in favourable terms. Perhaps the +simplest form of it may be found in a landlord of my neighbourhood, who +said to his tenants in an election speech, "Of course I'm not going to +threaten you, but if this Budget passes the rents will go up." The thing +can be done in many forms besides this. "I am the last man to mention +party politics; but when I see the Empire rent in pieces by irresponsible +Radicals," etc. "In this hall we welcome all creeds. We have no hostility +against any honest belief; but only against that black priestcraft and +superstition which can accept such a doctrine as," etc. "I would not say +one word that could ruffle our relations with Germany. But this I will +say; that when I see ceaseless and unscrupulous armament," etc. "Please +don't do it. Decide to make a remark or not to make a remark. But don't +fancy that you have somehow softened the saying of a thing by having just +promised not to say it. + +(3) Don't use secondary words as primary words. "Happiness" (let us say) +is a primary word. You know when you have the thing, and you jolly well +know when you haven't. "Progress" is a secondary word; it means the +degree of one's approach to happiness, or to some such solid ideal. But +modern controversies constantly turn on asking, "Does Happiness help +Progress?" Thus, I see in the New Age this week a letter from Mr. +Egerton Swann, in which he warns the world against me and my friend Mr. +Belloc, on the ground that our democracy is "spasmodic" (whatever that +means); while our "reactionism is settled and permanent." It never +strikes Mr. Swann that democracy means something in itself; while +"reactionism" means nothing--except in connection with democracy. You +cannot react except from something. If Mr. Swann thinks I have ever +reacted from the doctrine that the people should rule, I wish he would +give me the reference. + +(4) Don't say, "There is no true creed; for each creed believes itself +right and the others wrong." Probably one of the creeds is right and the +others are wrong. Diversity does show that most of the views must be +wrong. It does not by the faintest logic show that they all must be wrong. +I suppose there is no subject on which opinions differ with more +desperate sincerity than about which horse will win the Derby. These are +certainly solemn convictions; men risk ruin for them. The man who puts +his shirt on Potosi must believe in that animal, and each of the other men +putting their last garments upon other quadrupeds must believe in them +quite as sincerely. They are all serious, and most of them are wrong. +But one of them is right. One of the faiths is justified; one of the +horses does win; not always even the dark horse which might stand for +Agnosticism, but often the obvious and popular horse of Orthodoxy. +Democracy has its occasional victories; and even the Favourite has been +known to come in first. But the point here is that something comes in +first. That there were many beliefs does not destroy the fact that there +was one well-founded belief. I believe (merely upon authority) that the +world is round. That there may be tribes who believe it to be triangular +or oblong does not alter the fact that it is certainly some shape, and +therefore not any other shape. Therefore I repeat, with the wail of +imprecation, don't say that the variety of creeds prevents you from +accepting any creed. It is an unintelligent remark. + +(5) Don't (if any one calls your doctrine mad, which is likely enough), +don't answer that madmen are only the minority and the sane only the +majority. The sane are sane because they are the corporate substance of +mankind; the insane are not a minority because they are not a mob. The +man who thinks himself a man thinks the next man a man; he reckons his +neighbour as himself. But the man who thinks he is a chicken does not try +to look through the man who thinks he is glass. The man who thinks +himself Jesus Christ does not quarrel with the man who thinks himself +Rockefeller; as would certainly happen if the two had ever met. But +madmen never meet. It is the only thing they cannot do. They can talk, +they can inspire, they can fight, they can found religions; but they +cannot meet. Maniacs can never be the majority; for the simple reason +that they can never be even a minority. If two madmen had ever agreed +they might have conquered the world. + +(6) Don't say that the idea of human equality is absurd, because some men +are tall and some short, some clever and some stupid. At the height of +the French Revolution it was noticed that Danton was tall and Murat short. +In the wildest popular excitement of America it is known that +Rockefeller is stupid and that Bryan is clever. The doctrine of human +equality reposes upon this: That there is no man really clever who has not +found that he is stupid. That there is no big man who has not felt small. +Some men never feel small; but these are the few men who are. + +(7) Don't say (O don't say) that Primitive Man knocked down a woman with a +club and carried her away. Why on earth should he? Does the male sparrow +knock down the female sparrow with a twig? Does the male giraffe knock +down the female giraffe with a palm tree? Why should the male have had to +use any violence at any time in order to make the female a female? Why +should the woman roll herself in the mire lower than the sow or the +she-bear; and profess to have been a slave where all these creatures were +creators; where all these beasts were gods? Do not talk such bosh. I +implore you, I supplicate you not to talk such bosh. Utterly and +absolutely abolish all such bosh--and we may yet begin to discuss these +public questions properly. But I fear my list of protests grows too long; +and I know it could grow longer for ever. The reader must forgive my +elongations and elaborations. I fancied for the moment that I was writing +a book. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Miscellany of Men, by G. K. Chesterton + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MISCELLANY OF MEN *** + +This file should be named miscy12.txt or miscy12.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, miscy13.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, miscy11a.txt + +This Etext prepared by Michael Pullen with proofreading assistance +by Michael K. Johnson and Joe Moretti + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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