Books: Lessons in Life
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Timothy Titcomb >> Lessons in Life
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It is not the quality of the idea which a man entertains that
kills him. Freedom for every creature that bears God's image--the
breaking of the rod of the oppressor and letting the oppressed go
free--this is a good idea. It is so great, so broad, so full, so
flowing, that a world of men might gather around it for a time as
they do around Niagara, and grow divine in its majestic music and
the vision of the wreath of light which heaven holds above it. If
a man undertake to live upon a single idea, it really makes very
little difference to him whether that idea be a good or a bad one.
A man may as well get scurvy on beans as beef. I suppose a diet of
potatoes would be quite as likely to support life comfortably as a
diet of peaches. It is because the human soul cannot live upon one
thing alone, but demands participation in every expression of the
life of God, that it will dwarf and starve upon even the grandest
and most divine idea.
The agitators and reformers are very ready to see the dwarfing
effect of a single idea or a single range of ideas upon the
Christian ministry, and a large number of Christian men. I admit
the accuracy of their observations in this matter, and, admitting
this, I can certainly ask the question whether they hope to escape
depreciation when the Christian idea--the divinest of all---is
insufficient of itself to make a man, and fill him, and give him
all desirable health and wealth and growth. As I have touched upon
this point, I may say that it is coming to be understood that a
man or a minister, in order to be a Christian, must be something
else--that Christianity received into nature and life is only one
of the elements of manhood--and that a man may become starved and
mean and bigoted and essentially insane by feeding exclusively
upon religion. What means the vision of these sapless, sad, and
sanctimonious Christians--these poor, thin, stingy lives--but
that all ideas save the religious one have been shut out from
them? Is it not notorious that a minister who has fed exclusively
upon religion is a man without power upon the hearts and minds of
men? Is it not true that he has most efficiency in pulpit
ministration who has the largest knowledge of and sympathy with
men, the broadest culture, and the widest acquaintance with all
the ideas that enter as food and motive into human life? Is it not
true that in the life-long, absorbing anxiety and carefulness of
a multitude of souls to secure their salvation, those souls are
constantly becoming less valuable, and thus--to use the language
of the market--less worth saving?
I cannot fail, however unwilling, to see much that is dry and
stiff and unlovely in the style of Christianity around me. It has
no attraction for me. I do not like the people who illustrate it;
and the reason is, not that they have got too much of Christianity,
but that they have not got enough of any thing else. Flour is good,
but flour is not bread. If I am to eat flour, I must eat it as bread;
and either milk or water must be used to make it bread. If a little
milk is used, the bread will be dry and heavy and hard. If a good
deal is used, the flour will be transformed into a soft and plastic mass,
which will rise in the heat, and come to my lips a sweet and fragrant
morsel. Christianity is good, but it wants mixing with humanity before
it will have a practical value. If only a little humanity be mixed with
it, the product will be dry and tasteless; but if it be combined with
the real milk of humanity, and enough of it, the result will be a loaf
fit for the tongues of angels. No: the divinest idea that has yet been
apprehended by the human mind is not enough for the human mind.
That which God made to be fed by various food cannot be fed with
success or safety by a single element. We cannot build a house of
dry bricks. It takes lime and sand and water in their proper proportions
to hold the bricks together.
This selection of a single idea from the great world of ideas to
which the mind is vitally related, and making it food and drink,
and motive and pivotal point of action, and supreme object of
devotion, is mental and moral suicide. It makes that a despotic
king which should be a tributary subject. It enslaves the soul to
a base partisanship. It is right to make money, and it is right to
be rich when wealth is won legitimately; but when money becomes
the supreme object of a man's life, the soul starves as rapidly
as the coffers are filled. It is right to be a temperance man and
an anti-slavery man, and an advocate of any special Christian
reform; but the effect of adopting any one of these reforms as the
supreme object of a man's pursuit, never fails to belittle him.
One of the most pitiable objects the world contains is a man of
generous natural impulses grown sour, impatient, bitter, abusive,
uncharitable, and ungracious, by devotion to one idea, and the
failure to impress it upon the world with the strength by which it
possesses himself. Many of these fondly hug the delusion to
themselves that they are martyrs, when, in fact, they are only
suicides. Many of these look forward to the day when posterity
will canonize them, and lift them to the glory of those who were
not received by their age because they were in advance of their
age. So they regard with contempt the pigmy world, wrap the
mantles of their mortified pride about them, and lie down in a
delusive dream of immortality.
Whether the effect of devotion to a single idea be disastrous or
otherwise to the devotees, nothing in all history is better
proved--nothing in all philosophy is more clearly demonstrable--
than the fact that it is a damage to the idea. If I wished to
disgust a community with any special idea, I would set a man
talking about it and advocating it who would talk of nothing
else. If I wished to ruin a cause utterly, I would submit it to
the advocacy of one who would thrust it into every man's face, who
would make every other cause subordinate to it, who would refuse
to see any objections to it, who would accuse all opponents of
unworthy motives, and who would thus exhibit his absolute slavery
to it. Men have an instinct which tells them that such people as
these are not trustworthy--that their sentiments and opinions are
as valueless as those of children. If they talk with a pleasant
spirit, we good-naturedly tolerate them; if they rant and scold
and denounce, we hiss them if we think it worth while, or we
applaud them as we would the feats of a dancing bear. If they say
devilish things in a heavenly sort of way, and clothe their black
malignities in silken phrases, we hear them with a certain kind of
pleasure, and take our revenge in despising them, and feeling
malicious towards the cause they advocate. It would kill us to
drink Cologne water, but the perfume titillates the sense, and so
we sprinkle it upon our handkerchiefs.
No great cause can be forwarded by the advocacy of men who have no
character, and no man can devote himself to an idea without the
loss of character. When a man comes forward to promulgate an idea,
we inquire into his credentials. How large a man is this? How
broad are his sympathies? How wide is his knowledge? What
relation does he bear to the great world of ideas among which
this is only one, and very likely a comparatively unimportant one?
Is he so weak as to be possessed by this idea, or does he possess
it, and entertain a rational comprehension of its relations to
himself and the community? I know that multitudes of good men have
been so disgusted with the one-sided, partisan character of the
advocates of special ideas and special reforms, that they would
have no association with them. We have only to learn that a man
can see nothing but his pet idea, and is really in its possession,
to lose all confidence in his judgment. When in a court of justice
a man testifies upon a point that touches his personal interests
or feelings or relations, we say that his testimony is not
valuable--not reliable. It decides nothing for us. We say that the
evidence does not come from the proper source. We do not expect
candor from him, for we perceive that his interests are too deeply
involved to allow sound judgment and utterly truthful expression.
It is precisely thus with all professional agitators and
reformers--all devotees of single ideas. They are personally so
intimately connected with their idea--have been so enslaved by
their idea--are so interested in its prosperity---that they are
not competent to testify with relation to it.
LESSON XVI.
SHYING PEOPLE.
"It is jealousy's peculiar nature
To swell small things to great; nay, out of naught
To conjure much: and then to lose its reason
Amid the hideous phantoms it has formed." YOUNG.
"I will not shut me from my kind;
And, lest I stiffen into stone,
I will not eat my heart alone,
Nor feed with sighs a passing wind."
TENNYSON.
"Fear is the virtue of slaves; but the heart that loveth is
willing." LONGFELLOW.
Reader, did you ever drive a horse that had the mean habit of
shying? If so, then you will remember how constantly he was on the
lookout for objects that would frighten him. He would never wait
for the bugbear to show its head; but he conjured it up at every
point. Every hair upon his sides seemed transformed into an eye;
and there was not a colored stone, nor a stick of wood, nor a bit
of paper, nor a small dog, nor a shadow across the road, nor any
thing that introduced variety into his passage, that did not seem
to be endowed with some marvellous power of repulsion. First he
dodged to the right, after having foreseen the evil from afar, and
wrought himself up to a fearful pitch of sidelong excitement; and
then he dodged to the left, having been surprised into passing a
cat without alarm; and so, dodging to the right and left, he has
half worried the life out of you. Being constantly on guard, and
always watching for objects of alarm, and suspicious of dangers in
disguise, he has had no difficulty in maintaining a condition of
permanent fright, which has worked itself off in spasms of shying.
To a man who has driven a horse up to a locomotive without danger
or fear, such an animal as this seems to be unworthy of the name
of a horse; and to one who has read of the spirit and fearlessness
of the war-horse, a shying horse seems to be the most contemptible
of his race.
Well, I have met shying men, and I meet them upon the sidewalk
almost every day. I have watched them from afar, and known by
their eyes and a certain preparatory nervousness of body, that
they would "shy" at me. I have been conscious, however, that there
was nothing in me to shy at. I have had no pistols in my pocket,
and no Bowie knife under my coat-collar. I have been innocent of
any intention to leap upon and throttle them. I have had no
purpose to trip their heels by a sudden "flank movement," and not
even the desire to knock their hats off. Indeed, I have felt
toward them a degree of friendliness and kindness which I would
have been very glad to express, had they afforded me an
opportunity; but they were shying men by nature, or by habit, or
by whim. So far as I have been able to ascertain the causes of
their infirmity, it is the result of a suspicion that they are not
quite as good as other people, and a belief that other people
understand the fact. Far be it from me to deny that their
suspicions touching themselves are well-grounded; but that is no
reason why other people should not speak to them politely. There
is a class of men and women who are always looking out for, and
expecting, slights from those whom they suppose to be their
superiors. They get a suspicion that a certain man feels above
them; so when they pass him in the street, they shy at him--go
around him--will not give him an opportunity to be polite to them.
They are martyrs, as they suppose, to unjust social distinctions.
They act as if they were painfully uncertain as to whether they
are men and women or spaniels.
Now by the side of the person who carries an unsuspicious,
self-respectful, open face, into any presence, such people as
these seem unworthy of the race to which they belong. It is not
the bold, brassy, self-asserting man who is their superior, because
his sort of offensive forwardness originates in even a worse state
of mind and heart than the habit of shying. When a man shies, he
only suspects that he is inferior to his surroundings. When a man
offensively puts himself forward, and talks loudly among his
betters, he knows he is mean, and knows that he is not where he
belongs. You will find a professional gambler to be a loudmouthed
man, who not only does not shy at his betters, but who seeks all
convenient opportunities for associating with them, and claiming
an equality with them. The shying man is one who has not much
respect for himself, who is envious and jealous of others, and
who, however strongly he may protest against the charge, has the
most abject respect for social position and arbitrary social
distinctions. If he see a man who either assumes or seems to be
above him, it is a reason in his mind why that man should not
notice him. The result is that decent men soon take him at his own
valuation, and notice him no more than they would a dog; and they
serve him right.
I know of no more thankless task than the attempt to assure shying
people that we love them, respect them, and are glad to continue
their acquaintance. The instances in which old school-mates meet
in the journey of life with a sickening coolness, in consequence
of changed circumstances and relations, are of every-day
occurrence. Two persons who separated at the school-house door in
dawning manhood, with equal prospects, come together later in
life. One has risen in the world, has won hosts of friends, has
been put forward by them into public office, perhaps, and has
acquired a competence. The other has remained upon the old
homestead, has had a hard life, and has won neither distinction
nor wealth. The fortunate man grasps the hand of the other with
all the cordiality of his nature and of his honest friendship; but
he meets a reserve which may be almost sullen. He strives to call
up the scenes gone by--the old school-sports--the school
companions, boys and girls--the old neighborhood friendships--but
they will not come. All attempts to touch the heart of his former
schoolmate, and bring him into sympathy through the power of
association, fail. The poor fool suspects his friend of
patronizing him, and he will not be patronized. Feeling that his
friend has got along in the world better than himself, he cannot
understand why he should not be regarded as an inferior, and
treated as such. Thenceforward, the fortunate man must seek the
society of the unfortunate man, or he will never have it. The
former may give practical recognition of entire equality, to the
best of his ability, but it will avail nothing, for the latter
will not "toady" to his friend, nor be "patronized" by him. At
last the fortunate man becomes tired of the effort to make his
unfortunate friend understand him, and he kicks him and his memory
aside, and calls it a friendship closed forever, without fault
upon his part.
I have often wished that it could be understood by these people
who are so uncertain in regard to their position, and so
suspicious that everybody has the disposition to slight them, and
so much afraid of being patronized, and so averse to the thought
of "toadying" that they stand stiffly aloof from the society which
they envy, and so much offended with people for feeling above
them, that their sentiments and feelings are sufficient reasons
for society to hold them in contempt. There is a lack of
self-respect--a meanness--in their position, that is really a
sufficient apology for treating them with entire social neglect.
They habitually misconstrue those among whom they move; they are
exacting of attention to the last degree; they are always
uncomfortable, and they are ready to take offense at the smallest
fancied provocation. I have now in my mind an artisan whom I had
occasion to get acquainted with a dozen years ago; and I have
compelled him to speak to me every time I have met him since. I
really do not know what he had done to make him regard himself so
contemptuously, but I think he has never to this day fully
believed that I have the slightest respect for him. He has tried
to dodge me. He has shied repeatedly, but I have compelled him to
make me a good-natured bow, till he begins to like it, I think--
till he expects it, at least.
Many children are bred to the idea that certain families are
socially above them. They are taught from their cradles to
consider themselves in a certain sense inferior. How few American
children are taught that there is no degradation in poverty, and
that a humble employment and an obscure position are entirely
consistent with self-respect, under all circumstances, in whatever
society. I do not mean to say that they have not heard their
parents remark that they were "as good as anybody." There is
enough of this talk; and it is precisely this which teaches
children that they are born to what their parents consider
dishonor,--inferiority to their neighbors. It is impossible for
children who have been bred in this way ever to outgrow, entirely,
their feeling of inferiority. The people who are entirely
self-respectful never have any thing to say about their position in
the presence of their children; and it is a cruel thing to teach a
child, not that there is a grade of society which is actually
above him, but that the persons who occupy that grade look down
upon him--and, in the constitution of society, have the right to
look down upon him--with contempt. To see an honest lad in humble
clothing actually awed by finding himself in the presence of a
well-dressed child of affluence, is very pitiful; and there are
thousands of these poor boys who, having won wealth and
distinction, never in their consciousness lose their early estate
sufficiently to feel at home with those among whom the advance of
fortune has brought them.
A thoroughly self-respectful person will command respect anywhere.
A man who carries into the world an unsuspecting, unassuming face,
who is polite to everybody, minds his own business, and does not
show by his demeanor that he bears about with him a sense of
degradation and inferiority, and who gives evidence that he
considers himself a man, and expects the treatment due to a man,
will secure politeness and respect from every true gentleman and
gentlewoman in the world. The man who shies, and suspects, and
envies, and is full of petty jealousies, and is always afraid that
he shall not get all that is due to him in the way of polite
attention, and manifests a feeling of great uncertainty and
anxiety concerning his own social position, is sure to be shunned
at last, and he will well deserve his fate. No real gentleman, and
no true gentlewoman, ever has feelings like these. It is only
those who are neither, and who do not deserve the position of
either, that are troubled in this way. I give it as a deliberate
judgment that there is far less of contempt for the poor and
obscure among what are denominated the higher classes of society
than there is of envy and hatred of the rich and renowned among
the poor and humble; and that the principal bar to a more cordial
and gentle intercourse between the two classes, is the lack of
self-respect which pervades the latter, and the mean, degrading
humility which they manifest in all their relations with those
whom they consider above their level.
American society is mixed--heterogeneous--more so, probably, than
that of any other country. There is no such thing as well-defined
classification. There is no nobility, no gentry, no aristocracy,
no peasantry. The owners of palaces were bred in log cabins; men
of learning are the children of boors; and one can never tell by a
man's position and relations in society into what style of life he
was born. The boy goes into the city from his father's farm,
carrying only a hardy frame, a good heart, and a suit of homespun,
and twenty years frequently suffice to establish him as a man of
fortune, and marry him to a woman of fashion. There is no bar to
progress in any direction for the ambitious man, except lack of
brains and tact. Society erects no barriers of caste which define
the bounds of his liberty. Notwithstanding this, there is always,
in every place, a body of people who assume to be "the best
society." The claim to the title is rarely well substantiated, and
is based on different ideas in different places. We shall find in
some places, that society crystallizes around the idea of wealth;
in others, around the idea of literary culture; in others, around
certain religious views, so that, as it may happen, the "best
society" is constituted of the Presbyterian, or Episcopalian, or
Unitarian, or other sectarian element. In other places, an old
family name is the central power, and, in others still, a certain
style of family life attracts sympathetic materials which assume
the position of "the best society."
Whatever may be the central idea of the self-constituted elite,
they are always the objects of the envy of a large number of
minds. Silly people "lie awake nights" to get into the best
society. Those who are securely in, of course sleep soundly in
their safety and their self-complacency; and those who are too low
to think of rising to it, and those who do not care for it, go
through the six to ten hours of their slumber "without landing,"
as the North River boatmen say. But a middle class, who range
along the ragged edges of society, know no rest. They sail along
in an uncertain way, like the moon on the border of a cloud--
sometimes in and sometimes out--feeling naked and very much
exposed among the stars, and rather foggy and confused in the
cloud, as if, after all, they did not belong there. It is in this
class that we meet with shying men and shying women. It is in this
class that we find heart-burnings, and jealousies, and envyings,
and sensitive misunderstandings. It is a sort of purgatory through
which the rising man and woman pass to reach the paradise of their
hope, and from which an unhappy soul is never lifted. These people
do not stop to inquire whether they have any sympathy, or any
thing in common with the society which they seek--whether they
would be lost, or whether they would be at home in it. They do not
even seem to suspect that much of that which is called the best
society, is the last society that a sensible, good man should
seek.
Let us suppose that wealth is the central idea of the best
society, and then let the aspirant to this society ask himself
whether he has wealth. Has he a fine house and an elegant turnout?
Does he dress expensively, and is he able to give costly
entertainments? Is he prepared to unite, on a plane of perfect
equality, with those who give the law to this society? If so, it
will not be necessary for him to seek it, for the society will
seek him,--that is, if he be an agreeable man. If he be very rich
indeed, why, it is not necessary that he be agreeable at all. But
suppose literary culture be the central force of this society--has
the aspirant any fitness for, or sympathy with it? Can he meet
those who form this society as an equal, or mingle in it as a
thoroughly sympathetic element? Would he feel happy and at home in
a literary atmosphere? Those questions indicate a legitimate
direction of inquiry, touching every case of this kind. Multitudes
of those who are dissatisfied with their position have nothing in
common with the society to which they aspire, and would be so much
out of place there that they would be very unhappy. My idea, then,
is, that so far as society is concerned, men and women naturally
find their own place. A true gentleman and a genuine gentlewoman,
wherever they may appear, and whoever they may be, are as readily
known as any objects; and really good society recognizes its
affinities for them at once. They do not have to seek for a place,
for they fall into their place as naturally as a soldier falls
into, and joins step with, his company.
Now what can be meaner than the jealousy which sits in the circle
where it is really most at home, and regards with its green and
greedy eyes, a circle for which it has no affinities, except the
affinities which envy has for that which it considers above
itself? It is a meanness, too, which has two sides to it. It is
notorious that the black overseer upon the plantation is severer
with his companions in slavery than a white man would be, and it
is just as notorious that the man who has abjectly bowed before
the distinction of wealth and social standing, always becomes
insufferably pretentious when fortune or favor lifts him to the
place of his desire. The man who shies those he esteems his
betters is always a proud man at heart, or if the adjective be
allowable, an aristocratic man; and he is very careful to preserve
his position of comparative respectability with relation to those
below him. He will always be found to be pretentious in his own
circle, and supercilious with relation to those in lower life. Is
it not true that half of the neighborhood quarrels that take
place, and three-quarters of the slander, and all the gossip that
are indulged in, result from these petty jealousies between
circles, and the sensitiveness that is felt regarding social
standing on the part of those who are not quite so high in the
world as they would like to be?
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