A CONVERSATION.
Soon after supper Mrs. Worthy left the room with her daughters, at
her husband's desire; for it was his intention to speak more plainly
to Bragwell than was likely to be agreeable to him to hear before
others. The two farmers being seated at their little table, each in
a handsome old-fashioned great chair, Bragwell began:
"It is a great comfort, neighbor Worthy, at a certain time of life
to be got above the world: my notion is, that a man should labor
hard the first part of his days, that he may then sit down and enjoy
himself the remainder. Now, though I hate boasting, yet as you are
my oldest friend, I am about to open my heart to you. Let me tell
you then I reckon I have worked as hard as any man in my time, and
that I now begin to think I have a right to indulge a little. I have
got my money with character, and I mean to spend it with credit. I
pay every one his own, I set a good example, I keep to my church, I
serve God, I honor the king, and I obey the laws of the land."
"This is doing a great deal indeed," replied Mr. Worthy; "but,"
added he, "I doubt that more goes to the making up all these duties
than men are commonly aware of. Suppose then that you and I talk the
matter over coolly; we have the evening before us. What if we sit
down together as two friends and examine one another."
Bragwell, who loved argument, and who was not a little vain both of
his sense and his morality, accepted the challenge, and gave his
word that he would take in good part any thing that should be said
to him. Worthy was about to proceed, when Bragwell interrupted him
for a moment, by saying, "But stop, friend, before we begin I wish
you would remember that we have had a long walk, and I want a little
refreshment; have you no liquor that is stronger than this cider? I
am afraid it will give me a fit of the gout."
Mr. Worthy immediately produced a bottle of wine, and another of
spirits; saying, that though he drank neither spirits nor even wine
himself, yet his wife always kept a little of each as a provision in
case of sickness or accidents.
Farmer Bragwell preferred the brandy, and began to taste it. "Why,"
said he, "this is no better than English; I always use foreign
myself." "I bought this for foreign," said Mr. Worthy. "No, no, it
is English spirits, I assure you; but I can put you into a way to
get foreign nearly as cheap as English." Mr. Worthy replied that he
thought that was impossible.
_Bragwell._ Oh no; there are ways and means--a word to the
wise--there is an acquaintance of mine that lives upon the south
coast--you are a particular friend and I will get you half-a-dozen
gallons for a trifle.
_Worthy._ Not if it be smuggled, Mr. Bragwell, though I should get
it for sixpence a bottle. "Ask no questions," said the other, "I
never say any thing to any one, and who is the wiser?" "And so this
is your way of obeying the laws of the land," said Mr. Worthy, "here
is a fine specimen of your morality."
_Bragwell._ Come, come, don't make a fuss about trifles. If _every
one_ did it indeed it would be another thing; but as to _my_ getting
a little good brandy cheap, why that can't hurt the revenue much.
_Worthy._ Pray Mr. Bragwell, what should you think of a man who
would dip his hand into a bag and take out a few guineas?
_Bragwell._ Think? why I think that he should be hanged, to be sure.
_Worthy._ But suppose that bag stood in the king's treasury?
_Bragwell._ In the king's treasury! worse and worse! What! rob the
king's treasury! Well, I hope if any one has done it, the robber
will be taken up and executed; for I suppose we shall be taxed to
pay the damage.
_Worthy._ Very true. If one man takes money out of the treasury,
others must be obliged to pay the more into it. But what think you
if the fellow should be found to have stopped some money _in its
way_ to the treasury, instead of taking it out of the bag after it
got there?
_Bragwell._ Guilty, Mr. Worthy; it is all the same in my opinion. If
I were judge I would hang him without benefit of clergy.
_Worthy._ Hark ye, Mr. Bragwell, he that deals in smuggled brandy
is the man who takes to himself the king's money in its way to the
treasury, and he as much robs the government as if he dipped his
hand into a bag of guineas in the treasury chamber. It comes to the
same thing exactly. Here Bragwell seemed a little offended, and
exclaimed, "What, Mr. Worthy! do you pretend to say I am not an
honest man because I like to get my brandy as cheap as I can? and
because I like to save a shilling to my family? Sir, I repeat it; I
do my duty to God and my neighbor. I say the Lord's prayer most
days, I go to church on Sundays, I repeat my creed, and keep the ten
commandments; and though I now and then get a little brandy cheap,
yet upon the whole, I will venture to say, I do as much as can be
expected of any man, and more than the generality."
_Worthy._ Come then, since you say you keep the commandments, you
can not be offended if I ask you whether you understand them.
_Bragwell._ To be sure I do. I dare say I do: look ye, Mr. Worthy, I
don't pretend to much reading, I was not bred to it as you were. If
my father had been a parson, I fancy I should have made as good a
figure as some other folks, but I hope good sense and _a good heart_
may teach a man his duty without much scholarship.
_Worthy._ To come to the point; let us now go through the ten
commandments, and let us take along with us those explanations of
them which our Saviour gave us in his sermon on the mount.
_Bragwell._ Sermon on the mount! why the ten commandments are in the
20th chapter of Exodus. Come, come, Mr. Worthy, I know where to find
the commandments as well as you do; for it happens that I am
churchwarden, and I can see from the altar-piece where the ten
commandments are, without your telling me, for my pew directly faces
it.
_Worthy._ But I advise you to read the sermon on the mount, that you
may see the full meaning of them.
_Bragwell._ What! do you want to make me believe there are two ways
of keeping the commandments?
_Worthy._ No; but there may be two ways of understanding them.
_Bragwell._ Well, I am not afraid to be put to the proof; I defy any
man to say I do not keep at least all the four first that are on the
left side of the altar-piece.
_Worthy._ If you can prove that, I shall be more ready to believe
you observe those of the other table; for he who does his duty to
God, will be likely to do his duty to his neighbor also.
_Bragwell._ What! do you think that I serve two Gods? Do you think
then that I make graven images, and worship stocks or stones? Do you
take me for a papist or an idolater?
_Worthy._ Don't triumph quite so soon, Master Bragwell. Pray is
there nothing in the world you prefer to God, and thus make an idol
of? Do you not love your money, or your lands, or your crops, or
your cattle, or your own will, or your own way, rather better than
you love God? Do you never think of these with more pleasure than
you think of him, and follow them more eagerly than your religious
duty?
_Bragwell._ Oh! there's nothing about that in the 20th chapter of
Exodus.
_Worthy._ But Jesus Christ has said, "He that loveth father or
mother more than me is not worthy of me." Now it is certainly a
man's duty to love his father and his mother; nay, it would be
wicked not to love them, and yet we must not love even these more
than our Creator and our Saviour. Well, I think on this principle,
your heart pleads guilty to the breach of the first and second
commandments; let us proceed to the third.
_Bragwell._ That is about swearing, is it not?
Mr. Worthy, who had observed Bragwell guilty of much profaneness in
using the name of his Maker (though all such offensive words have
been avoided in writing this history), now told him that he had been
waiting the whole day for an opportunity to reprove him for his
frequent breach of the third commandment.
"Good L--d! I break the third commandment!" said Bragwell; "no
indeed, hardly ever; I once used to swear a little, to be sure, but
I vow I never do it now, except now and then when I happen to be in
a passion: and in such a case, why, good G--d, you know the sin is
with those who provoke me, and not with me; but upon my soul, I
don't think I have sworn an oath these three months; no, not I,
faith, as I hope to be saved."
_Worthy._ And yet you have broken this holy law not less than five
or six times in the last speech you have made.
_Bragwell._ Lord bless me! Sure you mistake. Good heavens, Mr.
Worthy, I call G--d to witness, I have neither cursed nor swore
since I have been in the house.
_Worthy._ Mr. Bragwell, this is the way in which many who call
themselves very good sort of people deceive themselves. What! is it
no profanation of the name of your Maker to use it lightly,
irreverently and familiarly as you have done? Our Saviour has not
only told us not to swear by the immediate name of God, but he has
said, "swear not at all, neither by heaven nor by the earth," and in
order to hinder our inventing any other irreligious exclamations or
expressions, he has even added, "but let your communications be yea,
yea, and nay, nay; for whatsoever is more than this simple
affirmation and denial cometh of evil." Nay, more, so greatly do I
reverence that high and holy name, that I think even some good
people have it too frequently in their mouths; and that they might
convey the idea without the word.
_Bragwell._ Well, well, I must take a little more care, I believe. I
vow to heaven I did not know there had been so much harm in it; but
my daughters seldom speak without using some of these words, and yet
they wanted to make me believe the other day that it was monstrous
vulgar to swear.
_Worthy._ Women, even gentlewomen, who ought to correct this evil
habit in their fathers, and husbands, and children, are too apt to
encourage it by their own practice. And indeed they betray the
profaneness of their own minds also by it; for none who venerate the
holy name of God, can either profane in this manner themselves, or
hear others do so without being exceedingly pained at it.
_Bragwell._ Well, since you are so hard upon me, I believe I must
e'en give up this point--so let us pass on to the next, and here I
tread upon sure ground; for as sharp as you are upon me, you can't
accuse me of being a Sabbath breaker, since I go to church every
Sunday of my life, unless on some very extraordinary occasion.
_Worthy._ For those occasions the gospel allows, by saying, "the
Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath." Our own
sickness, or attending on the sickness of others, are lawful
impediments.
_Bragwell._ Yes, and I am now and then obliged to look at a drove of
beasts, or to go a journey, or take some medicine, or perhaps some
friend may call upon me, or it may be very cold, or very hot, or
very rainy.
_Worthy._ Poor excuse! Mr. Bragwell. Do you call these lawful
impediments? I am afraid they will not pass for such on the day of
judgment. But how is the rest of your Sunday spent?
_Bragwell._ O, why, I assure you I often go to church in the
afternoon also, and even if I am ever so sleepy.
_Worthy._ And so you finish your nap at church, I suppose.
_Bragwell._ Why, as to that, to be sure we do contrive to have
something a little nicer than common for dinner on a Sunday: in
consequence of which one eats, you know, a little more than
ordinary; and having nothing to do on that day, has more leisure to
take a cheerful glass; and all these things will make one a little
heavy, you know.
_Worthy._ And don't you take a little ride in the morning, and look
at your sheep when the weather is good; and so fill your mind just
before you go to church with thoughts of them; and when the weather
is bad, don't you settle an account? or write a few letters of
business after church.
_Bragwell._ I can't say but I do; but that is nothing to any body,
as long as I set a good example by keeping to my church.
_Worthy._ And how do you pass your Sunday evenings?
_Bragwell._ My wife and daughters go a visiting Sunday afternoons.
My daughters are glad to get out, at any rate; and as to my wife,
she says that being ready dressed, it is a pity to lose the
opportunity; besides, it saves her time on a week day; so then you
see I have it all my own way, and when I have got rid of the ladies,
who are ready to faint at the smell of tobacco, I can venture to
smoke a pipe, and drink a sober glass of punch with half a dozen
friends.
_Worthy._ Which punch, being made of smuggled brandy, and drank on
the Lord's day, and very vain, as well as profane and worldly
company, you are enabled to break both the law of God, and that of
your country at a stroke: and I suppose when you are got together,
you speak of your cattle, or of your crops, after which perhaps you
talk over a few of your neighbors' faults, and then you brag a
little of your own wealth or your own achievements.
_Bragwell._ Why, you seem to know us so well, that any one would
think you had been sitting behind the curtain; and yet you are a
little mistaken too; for I think we have hardly said a word for
several of our last Sundays on any thing but politics.
_Worthy._ And do you find that you much improve your Christian
charity by that subject?
_Bragwell._ Why to be sure we do quarrel till we are very near
fighting, that is the worst on't.
_Worthy._ And then you call names, and swear a little, I suppose.
_Bragwell._ Why when one is contradicted and put in a passion, you
know, and when people especially if they are one's inferiors, won't
adopt one's opinions, flesh and blood won't bear it.
_Worthy._ And when all your friends are gone home, what becomes of
the rest of the evening?
_Bragwell._ That is just as it happens; sometimes I read the
newspaper; and as one is generally most tired on the days one does
nothing, I go to bed earlier on Sundays than on other days, that I
may be more fit to get up to my business the next morning.
_Worthy._ So you shorten Sunday as much as you can, by cutting off a
bit at both ends, I suppose; for I take it for granted you lie a
little later in the morning.
_Bragwell._ Come, come, we sha'n't get through the whole ten
to-night, if you stand snubbing one at this rate. You may pass over
the fifth; for my father and mother have been dead ever since I was
a boy, so I am clear of that scrape.
_Worthy._ There are, however, many relative duties included in that
commandment; unkindness to all kindred is forbidden.
_Bragwell._ O, if you mean my turning off my nephew Tom, the
plowboy, you must not blame me for that, it was all my wife's fault.
He was as good a lad as ever lived to be sure, and my own brother's
son; but my wife could not bear that a boy in a carter's frock
should be about the house, calling her aunt. We quarreled like dog
and cat about it; and when he was turned away she and I did not
speak for a week.
_Worthy._ Which was a fresh breach of the commandment; a worthy
nephew turned out of doors, and a wife not spoken to for a week, are
no very convincing proofs of your observance of the fifth
commandment.
_Bragwell._ Well, I long to come to the sixth, for you don't think I
commit murder, I hope.
_Worthy._ I am not sure of that.
_Bragwell._ Murder! what, I kill any body?
_Worthy._ Why, the laws of the land, indeed, and the disgrace
attending it, are almost enough to keep any man from actual murder;
let me ask, however, do you never give way to unjust anger, and
passion, and revenge? as for instance, do you never feel your
resentment kindle against some of the politicians who contradict you
on a Sunday night? and do you never push your animosity against
somebody that has affronted you, further than the occasion can
justify?
_Bragwell._ Hark'ee, Mr. Worthy, I am a man of substance, and no man
shall offend me without my being even with him. So as to injuring a
man, if he affronts me first, there's nothing but good reason in
that.
_Worthy._ Very well! only bear in mind, that you willfully break
this commandment, whether you abuse your servant, are angry at your
wife, watch for a moment to revenge an injury on your neighbor, or
even wreak your passion on a harmless beast; for you have then the
seeds of murder working in your breast; and if there were no law, no
gibbet, to check you, and no fear of disgrace neither, I am not sure
where you would stop.
_Bragwell._ Why, Mr. Worthy, you have a strange way of explaining
the commandments; so you set me down for a murderer, merely because
I bear hatred to a man who has done me a hurt, and am glad to do him
a like injury in my turn. I am sure I should want spirit if I did
not.
_Worthy._ I go by the Scripture rule, which says, "he that hateth
his brother is a murderer," and again, "pray for them that
despitefully use you and persecute you." Besides, Mr. Bragwell, you
made it a part of your boast that you said the Lord's prayer every
day, wherein you pray to God to forgive you your trespasses as you
forgive them that trespass against you. If therefore you do not
forgive them that trespass against you, in that case you daily pray
that your own trespasses may never be forgiven. Now own the truth;
did you last night lie down in a spirit of forgiveness and charity
with the whole world?
_Bragwell._ Yes, I am in charity with the whole world in general;
because the greater part of it has never done me any harm. But I
won't forgive old Giles, who broke down my new hedge yesterday for
firing--Giles, who used to be so honest.
_Worthy._ And yet you expect that God will forgive you who have
broken down his sacred laws, and have so often robbed him of his
right--you have robbed him of the honor due unto his name--you have
robbed him of his holy day by doing your own work, and finding your
own pleasure in it--you have robbed his poor, particularly in the
instance of Giles, by withholding from them, as overseer, such
assistance as should prevent their being driven to the sin of
stealing.
_Bragwell._ Why, you are now charging me with other men's sins as
well as my own.
_Worthy._ Perhaps the sins which we cause other men to commit,
through injustice, inconsideration, and evil example, may dreadfully
swell the sum of our responsibility in the great day of account.
_Bragwell._ Well, come, let us make haste and get through these
commandments. The next is, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." Thank
God, neither I nor my family can be said to break the seventh
commandment.
_Worthy._ Here again, remember how Christ himself hath said, "whoso
looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed
adultery with her in his heart." These are no far-fetched
expressions of mine, Mr. Bragwell, they are the words of Jesus
Christ. I hope you will not charge him with having carried this too
far; for if you do, you charge him with being mistaken in the
religion he taught; and this can only be accounted for, by supposing
him an impostor.
_Bragwell._ Why, upon my word, Mr. Worthy, I don't like these
sayings of his which you quote upon me so often, and that is the
truth of it, and I can't say I feel much disposed to believe them.
_Worthy._ I hope you believe in Jesus Christ. I hope you believe
that creed of yours, which you also boasted of repeating so
regularly.
_Bragwell._ Well, well, I'll believe any thing you say, rather than
stand quarreling with you.
_Worthy._ I hope then, you will allow, that since it is adultery to
look at a woman with even an irregular thought, it follows from the
same rule, that all immodest dress in your daughters, or indecent
jests and double meanings in yourself; all loose songs or novels;
and all diversions also which have a like dangerous tendency, are
forbidden by the seventh commandment; for it is most plain from
what Christ has said, that it takes in not only the act, but the
inclination, the desire, the indulged imagination; the act is only
the last and highest degree of any sin; the topmost round, as it
were, of a ladder, to which all the lower rounds are only as so many
steps and stages.
_Bragwell._ Strict indeed! Mr. Worthy; but let us go on to the next;
you won't pretend to say _I steal_; Mr. Bragwell, I trust, was never
known to rob on the highway, to break open his neighbor's house, or
to use false weights or measures.
_Worthy._ No, nor have you ever been under any temptation to do it,
and yet there are a thousand ways of breaking the eighth commandment
besides actual stealing. For instance do you never hide the faults
of the goods you sell, and heighten the faults of those you buy? Do
you never take advantage of an ignorant dealer, and ask more for a
thing than it is worth? Do you never turn the distressed
circumstances of a man who has something to sell, to your unfair
benefit; and thus act as unjustly by him as if you had stolen? Do
you never cut off a shilling from a workman's wages, under the
pretense which your conscience can't justify? Do you never pass off
an unsound horse for a sound one? Do you never conceal the real rent
of your estate from the overseers, and thereby rob the poor-rates of
their legal due?
_Bragwell._ Pooh! these things are done every day. I sha'n't go to
set up for being better than my neighbors in these sort of things;
these little matters will pass muster--I don't set up for a
reformer--if I am as good as the rest of my neighbors, no man can
call me to account: I am not worse, I trust, and don't pretend to be
better.
_Worthy._ You must be tried hereafter at the bar of God, and not by
a jury of your fellow-creatures; and the Scriptures are given us, in
order to show by what rule we shall be judged. How many or how few
do as you do, is quite aside from the question; Jesus Christ has
even told us to strive to enter in at the _strait_ gate; so we ought
rather to take fright, from our being like the common run of people,
than to take comfort from our being so.
_Bragwell._ Come, I don't like all this close work--it makes a man
feel I don't know how--I don't find myself so happy as I did--I
don't like this fishing in troubled waters; I'm as merry as the day
is long when I let these things alone. I'm glad we are got to the
ninth. But I suppose I shall be lugged in there too, head and
shoulders. Any one now who did not know me, would really think I was
a great sinner, by your way of putting things; I don't bear false
witness, however.
_Worthy._ You mean, I suppose, you would not swear away any man's
life falsely before a magistrate, but do you take equal care not to
slander or backbite him? Do you never represent a good action of a
man you have quarreled with, as if it were a bad one? or do you
never make a bad one worse than it is, by your manner of telling it?
Even when you invent no false circumstances, do you never give such
a color to those you relate, as to leave a false impression on the
mind of the hearers? Do you never twist a story so as to make it
tell a little better for yourself, and a little worse for your
neighbor, than truth and justice warrant?
_Bragwell._ Why, as to that matter, all this is only natural.
_Worthy._ Ay, much too natural to be right, I doubt. Well, now we
have got to the last of the commandments.
_Bragwell._ Yes, I have run the gauntlet finely through them all;
you will bring me in guilty here, I suppose, for the pleasure of
going through with it; for you condemn without judge or jury, Master
Worthy.
_Worthy._ The culprit, I think, has hitherto pleaded guilty to the
evidence brought against him. The tenth commandment, however, goes
to the root and principle of evil, it dives to the bottom of things;
this command checks the first rising of sin in the heart; teaches us
to strangle it in the birth, as it were, before it breaks out in
those acts which are forbidden: as, for instance, every man covets
before he proceeds to steal; nay, many covet, knowing they can do it
with impunity, who dare not steal, lest they should suffer for it.
_Bragwell._ Why, look'ee, Mr. Worthy, I don't understand these new
fashioned explanations; one should not have a grain of sheer
goodness left, if every thing one does is to be fritted away at this
rate. I am not, I own, quite so good as I thought, but if what you
say were true, I should be so miserable, I should not know what to
do with myself. Why, I tell you all the world may be said to break
the commandments at this rate.
_Worthy._ Very true. All the world, and I myself also, are but too
apt to break them, if not in the letter, at least in the spirit of
them. Why, then, all the world are (as the Scripture expresses it)
"guilty before God." And if guilty, they should own they are guilty,
and not stand up and justify themselves, as you do, Mr. Bragwell.
_Bragwell._ Well, according to my notion, I am a very honest man,
and honesty is the sum and substance of all religion, say I.
_Worthy._ All truth, honesty, justice, order, and obedience grow out
of the Christian religion. The true Christian acts at all times, and
on all occasions, from the pure and spiritual principle of love to
God and Christ. On this principle he is upright in his dealings,
true to his word, kind to the poor, helpful to the oppressed. In
short, if he truly loves God, he _must_ do justice, and _can't_ help
loving mercy. Christianity is a uniform consistent thing. It does
not allow us to make up for the breach of one part of God's law, by
our strictness in observing another. There is no sponge in one duty,
that can wipe out the spot of another sin.
_Bragwell._ Well, but at this rate, I should be always puzzling and
blundering, and should never know for certain whether I was right or
not; whereas I am now quite satisfied with myself, and have no
doubts to torment me.
_Worthy._ One way of knowing whether we really desire to obey the
whole law of God is this; when we find we have as great a regard to
that part of it, the breach of which does not touch our own
interest, as to that part which does. For instance, a man robs me; I
am in a violent passion with him, and when it is said to me, doest
thou well to be angry? I answer, I do well. _Thou shalt not steal_
is a law of God, and this fellow has broken that law. Ay, but says
conscience, 'tis _thy own property_ which is in question. He has
broken _thy_ hedge, he has stolen _thy_ sheep, he has taken _thy_
purse. Art thou therefore sure whether it is his violation of thy
property, or of God's law which provokes thee? I will put a second
case: I hear another swear most grievously; or I meet him coming
drunk out of an ale-house; or I find him singing a loose, profane
song. If I am not as much grieved for this blasphemer, or this
drunkard, as I was for this robber; if I do not take the same pains
to bring him to a sense of his sin, which I did to bring the robber
to justice, "how dwelleth the love of God in me?" Is it not clear
that I value my own sheep more than God's commandments? That I prize
my purse more than I love my Maker? In short, whenever I find out
that I am more jealous for my own property than for God's law; more
careful about my own reputation than _his_ honor, I always suspect I
have got upon wrong ground, and that even my right actions are not
proceeding from a right principle.
_Bragwell._ Why, what in the world would you have me do? It would
distract me, if I must run up every little action to its spring, in
this manner.
_Worthy._ You must confess that your sins _are_ sins. You must not
merely call them sins, while you see no guilt in them; but you must
confess them so as to hate and detest them; so as to be habitually
humbled under the sense of them; so as to trust for salvation not in
your freedom from them, but in the mercy of a Saviour; and so as to
make it the chief business of your life to contend against them, and
in the main to forsake them. And remember, that if you seek for a
deceitful gayety, rather than a well-grounded cheerfulness; if you
prefer a false security to final safety, and now go away to your
cattle and your farm, and dismiss the subject from your thoughts,
lest it should make you uneasy, I am not sure that this simple
discourse may not appear against you at the day of account, as a
fresh proof that you "loved darkness rather than light," and so
increase your condemnation.
Mr. Bragwell was more affected than he cared to own. He went to bed
with less spirits and more humility than usual. He did not, however,
care to let Mr. Worthy see the impression which it had made upon
him; but at parting next morning, he shook him by the hand more
cordially than usual, and made him promise to return his visit in a
short time.
What befell Mr. Bragwell and his family on his going home may,
perhaps, make the subject of a future part of this history.