directly through society. At the suitable age their sisters, their
mothers, and even their grandmothers have formally "come out," and have
at once been overwhelmed with invitations to the best houses in the
city. If such a girl has it in her mind to rebel against precedents she
would do well to consider carefully what Holmes has said in another
connection: "There are those who step out of the ordinary ranks by
reason of strength; there are others who fall out by reason of
weakness." For instance, a girl is painfully conscious of her plainness.
Her sister was a beauty and made a sensation when she was introduced.
The plain girl dreads the comparisons which will be made, and shrinks
from the social failure which she foresees. Her feeling would justify
her in making no attempt to get into society if she were outside the
charmed circle, but it would probably be a weakness to yield to it
since she is already within. Her objection is not to society but to the
place she is likely to fill in it. Probably the finest discipline of her
life will be in accepting her place. If she can forget herself, or, at
least, remember that it makes no real difference what others think of
her, she will soon gain the quiet ease which is sometimes even more
winning than beauty. This will be an attribute of character, and every
person's influence is needed in society who commands interest by
essential rather than non-essential qualities. Then, if she is a
wall-flower she is sure to have time to relieve the misery of some other
wall-flower, and as there are always a good many uninteresting people at
any party she will find her mission increasing upon her hands. When she
has thoroughly conquered her dread of society she will have a right to
reconsider the question and decide whether she can use her time to
better advantage. If she retires before fighting her battle she will
probably always look upon her beautiful sister's love of balls with
self-righteous pity; but long before she gains her victory she will be
likely to acknowledge that if she were pretty she would love balls too.
It is not lovely for any girl to assume that she is better than her
parents. Many girls are better than their parents, and sometimes so much
better that they would be blind indeed if they did not see it; but they
ought to be very slow to act upon such a truth.
As a general thing they are not nearly so superior as they suppose they
are. They think "Irreverence for the dreams of youth" always comes from
"the hardening of the heart." But youth has some fantastic as well as
some noble dreams, so that docility is a better quality than
independence in a very young person. If a worldly minded mother
inculcates worldliness in her daughter, the daughter certainly ought to
stand firm against the teaching; but if the daughter merely thinks she
would rather read Browning than go to a party which her mother wishes
her to attend, I think it is best for her to go to the party, even if
she is conscious that her mother's motive is a worldly one. I speak only
of young daughters. If a girl follows her mother's wishes about society
till she is twenty-four or five, and still retains her first aversion to
it, it seems to me she has earned the right to be the judge of her own
actions, and if she had been really docile and sweet-tempered all the
way through, I believe the most worldly minded mother would be ready to
yield. It is only when the daughter has combated her parents all the
time that they believe her to be unreasonable and obstinate and
deserving of coercion. The point is, that she must make her stand for a
principle and not for a whim.
One reason that some girls fear society is that they feel awkward and
have nothing to say. This is often the case with intellectual girls.
They will not descend to the silly conversation which is more pleasing
than it ought to be from the pretty girls of their set, and they know it
would be out of place to talk of anything which really interests them.
They do not want to be called blue-stockings even by young men they
despise. But the agonies such girls suffer in society are unnecessary.
There is no reason why any girl should talk very much. Of course if she
is not a beauty or a graceful dancer she has no other way of attracting
attention, but it is not necessary to attract attention. If she is quiet
and unobtrusive and sweet-tempered she need not suffer from
mortification even if she does not find much to enjoy. I remember a
young girl whose great shyness made it a terror to her to meet any
strangers. Besides this, she felt so little interest in commonplace
people that she had no sufficient motive to subdue her fear. At last as
she was on the point of refusing to go to a very small and informal tea
party a friend not much older than herself talked seriously to her,
explaining that her course would seem morbid and selfish to others, and
might be so in truth. The young girl respected her friend, and making a
heroic effort to control herself determined to accept the invitation. "I
am going," she said to herself, "to show Ellen that I am not too
obstinate to take her advice, and I don't care how I appear." So she sat
still in a corner and listened to the conversation, which was indeed
preternaturally stupid. She felt perfectly at her ease and was quite
unconcerned about "making conversation." If anybody asked her a question
she answered simply without cudgeling her brains for any wise or witty
reply. By and by something was said which did attract her notice, and
she actually made a spontaneous remark herself. She realized then that
the worst was over. She never again felt such terror on entering a room,
and though I never heard that she shone in society, she was always able
after that to carry on her share of a conversation without anxiety. She
simply laid herself aside for the time being and paid attention to what
was going on.
But while it is usually best for a young girl to go into society which
lies naturally in her way, it is a very different thing to push into
society which lies outside of her path. It is necessary to speak
strongly on this point. In every city the number of inhabitants who have
lived in it since its foundation is, of course, very small, and they
always form an aristocracy, jealous of interlopers. They generally are a
law-abiding, conservative class, with some sterling qualities. They are
superior to a great many people who would like to associate with them,
but inferior to a great many others. Now, just at the circumference of
this circle there is another circle equally good, intelligent, and
refined, who see no reason why they should be shut out from the inner
circle. There is no reason except that they did not first occupy the
central ground. The aristocracy of the city is formed on the principle
of "first come, first served," and the first will never relinquish their
places to the new-comers. Why should the new-comers care? There are
enough among them to make a society as good, intelligent, and refined as
that from which they are shut out. Nevertheless, it is a human failing
to prize what we cannot have, and some of the later comers look
wistfully across the dividing line. They cannot cross it, but sometimes
their daughters can. They send their daughters to the same schools with
the daughters of the "four hundred," and the girls make friends with
each other, and with a little skill the password may be learned and the
young plebeian may find herself indistinguishable from a patrician.
There are fathers and mothers who urge their daughters to make haste to
occupy every coigne of vantage, and gradually advance into the heart of
the enemy's country. I am not speaking now of those who are so vulgar as
to intrigue for invitations, but simply of the ambitious who wish to
accept an invitation given in good faith because it is a step upward in
the social scale. Of course I would not say that such an invitation
should never be accepted, for there is often congeniality between the
hostess and her guest; but it is not worth doing violence to one's
feelings for the sake of accepting it. We say that we do not consider
the "four hundred" really superior to many other hundreds in the city.
In that case let us treat them and their invitations with exactly the
same courtesy and exactly the same indifference that we show to our
other friends and their invitations. I think a young girl is always
justified in objecting to be pushed into society even when her parents
are eager to push her; yet if the matter is urged, it will probably be
best for her to gratify her parents, even at the sacrifice of her own
sensitiveness. It is not for her to judge her parents. Even if they are
wrong, their fault may be like the vanity of a child, because they are
still in the childish stage of education, while the daughter's higher
development is entirely due to their efforts in her behalf.
There are girls whose religious convictions forbid society, and then
they are obliged to withstand their parents from the outset; yet I think
such convictions are uncommon where the parents do not share them. But
there are other girls who sincerely believe that their time can be
better spent than in going to parties and making calls. The conventions
of society seem meaningless to them, and they know if they observe them
all they will have no time or strength for anything else, while if they
do not observe them they will be stigmatized as rude, odd, and even as
self-conceited. One cannot read even the most sensible book on
etiquette without being oppressed with the feeling that a terrible
addition has been made to the moral law in the by-laws which treat of
visiting cards, and every writer on etiquette says mildly but firmly
that there is a reason for all the rules in the very nature of things,
and that if any of us venture to disregard them and substitute our own
reason, we simply show our incapacity for appreciating real refinement.
A part of this is no doubt true. The rules of society are reasonable for
those who give their whole time to society. When a lady has four hundred
people on her visiting list, and a call must be made on each one every
winter on pain of losing the acquaintance altogether, to say nothing of
party calls and receptions and afternoon teas, it is clear that a
language of pasteboard simplifies her duties very much. But for any one
who has a definite work in life outside of society, attention to all
these minor points is impossible, and we must either be shut out of
society altogether or be allowed to enter it on our own terms. The women
who have their living to earn have the matter decided for them. Even in
the few cases where they are welcomed among the _élite_, their work must
always take precedence of society demands. And the same thing ought to
be true in the case of good mothers. The care of one's own children
never ought to be given up for any conventional duty. But the hardest
case is that of young girls who wish their lives to be in earnest, and
who have as yet no imperative duties. No wonder they wish to make duties
for themselves. Is there any guide in deciding how far they are bound to
follow conventions? I know nothing better than the dictum of the
Hegelians. "Make your deed universal, and see what the result will be."
If everybody who finds afternoon teas a burden stayed away from them,
would any harm be done? If everybody who objects to making calls refused
to make them, would it not soon simplify life even for those who do like
to make them? If all people who chanced to meet felt at liberty to be as
friendly as they felt like being, without any formal preliminaries, who
would be injured? The question of absolute right is answered when these
questions are answered, and we ought not to let any writer on etiquette
persuade us to the contrary. But it is not so easy to say how far it is
wise for anybody, particularly for young girls, to set themselves
against the customs of their own circle. They then give up the friends
they would naturally make, and it is sometimes hard to find equally
congenial friends in other circles. Many a girl who might have been
happily married if she had not rebelled against conventionalities is
left to lead a lonely life; and that not because young men value
conventionalities, but because society makes people acquainted. She
will some day be likely to regret that she missed her opportunities,
unless she had some more definite reason for her course than the mere
shrinking from the effort society requires.
Duties we make for ourselves are seldom entirely free from affectation.
An ardent, active girl may easily become so interested in her charities
and her studies that she may make a genuine plea that she is too busy
for parties and calls; but perhaps she ought not to give up society
duties until higher duties actually open before her. Is it not possible
that society has some intrinsic worth, or that at all events it might
have worth, if earnest people did their part? There is much to be done
for the poor, but the poor are not the only ones to be helped. Sweetness
of temper and honorable action tell as much sometimes in a game of cards
as in an affair of state. The highest good anybody can ever do is to
inspire others with a higher ideal, to raise the level of character. The
specific act by which this is done matters little; in truth it is
usually the result not of an act, but of a noble character influencing
others unconsciously. One might give all her goods to feed the poor and
not leave the world any better than she found it. On the other hand, I
know a frank, light-hearted girl, whose whole mind seems to be absorbed
in choosing the prettiest dresses she can find for her approaching
_début_, who is sure to be a factor in elevating every company she
enters, because of her scorn of any form of meanness. She would not
trouble herself to say anything bitter if one of her acquaintances did a
mean thing; but the amazed tone in which she would utter the word
"Fancy!" would inflict a punishment no culprit could escape.
Most of what is called society is no doubt poor and weak, and not worth
much time or trouble. I think the girls whose pathway does not lead
directly through it are perhaps to be congratulated. It is to be hoped
that most women who reach the age of twenty-five will find something
better to do than to give themselves up entirely to society. But though,
as now constituted, its exactions are so heavy that it often seems as if
it must be all or nothing, it need not inevitably be so. Society could
be so conducted as to be a beautiful recreation instead of a business,
and those who see this clearly can help to bring it about.
Society ought to give enjoyment in a refined way. Beautiful houses,
beautiful dresses, music, cultivated voices in conversation, delicate
wit, smiling faces, graceful dancing, all these things would make up an
attractive picture to most of us if we could forget ourselves, and not
feel that our shadow was the most prominent part of it. It could not
take the place of our serious daily life, but it ought to supplement it.
The French writer Amiel has given the most beautiful description of
ideal society, and I will quote it here. It would, I think, be a good
plan for every girl who wishes to give up society to consider this
picture well. If society were always like this, would you wish to give
it up? If it is not like this, may it not be possible for you to help to
make it so? Is there any better work laid ready to your hand? If so, do
it, by all means. If not, is not this well worth doing?
It is thus that Amiel describes a small evening party: "Thirty people of
the best society, a happy mingling of sexes and ages. Gray heads, young
people, _spirituelle_ faces. All framed in tapestries of Aubusson which
gave a soft distance and a charming background to the groups in full
dress.... In the world it is necessary to have the appearance of living
on ambrosia and of being acquainted with only noble cares. Anxiety,
want, passion do not exist. All realism is suppressed as brutal. In a
word, what is called _le grand monde_ presents for the moment a
flattering illusion, that of being in an ethereal state and of breathing
the life of mythology. That is the reason that all vehemence, every cry
of nature, all true suffering, all careless familiarity, all open marks
of passion, shock and jar in this delicate _milieu_, and destroy in a
moment the whole fabric, the palace of clouds, the magic architecture
raised by the consent of all.
"It is like the harsh cock-crow which causes all enchantment to vanish
and puts the fairies to flight. These choice _réunions_ act
unconsciously towards a concert of eye and ear, towards an improvised
work of art. This instinctive accord is a festival for the mind and
taste, and transports the actors into the sphere of the imagination. It
is a form of poetry, and it is thus that cultivated society renews by
reflection the idyl which has disappeared....
"Paradoxical or not, I believe that these fleeting attempts to
reconstruct a dream which pursues beauty alone are confused
recollections of the age of gold which haunts the human soul, or rather
of aspirations towards the harmony of things which daily reality refuses
to us, and to which we are introduced only by art."
XV.
NARROW LIVES.
What is a narrow life? Its causes almost always lie in character. One
either has a narrow nature, or is subject to some tyrant who has a
narrow nature. In such cases there is little hope of remedy.
But in general circumstances are not responsible for a narrow life.
Illness and poverty indeed are hard to resist, nevertheless I hope to
show by actual examples that broad lives are lived by the sick and poor.
Once at the wish of a friend I was visiting I went to carry some
comforts to a neglected almshouse on a Western prairie. In the insane
ward I found a poor young fellow suffering from epilepsy. There had been
some brutal treatment in the almshouse and he had tried to escape. Being
overtaken he had fought for his liberty, and in consequence he was
afterwards fastened with a chain and ball of many pounds' weight. He
could not be cared for elsewhere, as his family was very poor, and
though usually perfectly sane he had dangerous intervals. The management
of the almshouse was culpably bad, and though about this time
benevolent persons began to bestir themselves, and there was some
amelioration of conditions, yet this young man was certainly placed in
as narrowing circumstances as could surround a human being. He was poor
to the degree of pauperism, he had an incurable disease and he was
almost absolutely in the power of tyrants. Remembering that my friend
wished to lend some books to those of the poor creatures who could read,
I asked him if he liked to read. He said yes, that he was very fond of
reading, but could not get any books. I asked him what kind of books he
would like. "Well," he said slowly, "I should be glad of anything; but I
think I should like best stories or biographies which would tell me how
people who were put in hard places met their lives. For," he added
pathetically, "I want to make the most I can of my life." I felt as he
spoke that these were the most heroic words I had ever heard or that I
ever should hear. I left the town in a few days, and my friend at the
same time changed her residence, so I have never known his fate. But I
am sure no circumstances could make a life inspired with such a feeling
a narrow one.
Fortunately few people are so hemmed in by circumstances. But some of us
think a single misfortune enough to crush us. How, for instance, is a
woman prostrated by disease to make anything of the little life within
her four walls?
I remember a woman who broke down at school and suffered so frequently
from violent hemorrhages all her life, which was prolonged till she was
nearly fifty, that she was seldom able to leave her room. Her home was
on a farm a long distance from the village, so that it at first seemed
as if she could not have even the ordinary alleviation of cheerful
society in her more comfortable days. Another aggravation in her case
was that she had an active temperament and strong mind. She had been
fitting herself to be a teacher, and she had just the qualities which
would have made her an admirable teacher, a clear intellect, quick
observation, firm will, love of children, and a perfectly serene temper.
She had wished to teach, partly because she thought she should find it
an inspiring work, and partly because she wished to help the family. She
saw this was not to be, that in spite of herself she must be a burden on
the family. She met her altered circumstances with the same firm will
and cheerful temper she had shown from childhood. If she must be a
burden on others she would make that burden as light as she could. She
would not suggest that any one should sit in her darkened room all day,
however lonely she might be. She would not call upon others for the
hundred little services not absolutely necessary, but still so very
agreeable to one who is weak and helpless. On the other hand, she would
not exert herself rashly in the vain endeavor to wait on herself when
such an exertion was likely to injure her, and in the end to bring more
care on other people. She always spoke cheerfully even when her voice
could not rise above a whisper. She was ready to admit the sunshine the
moment she could bear the light. As she lay alone she tried to think of
some pleasant thing to say or do when any one should come in, and in
this way she beguiled the tedious hours.
Of course she had her reward. No one could be unwilling to take care of
one so unexacting. Moreover, although she often unavoidably taxed the
strength of her friends, she did so much to make them happy that nursing
her was a pleasant task. Her mother and sisters wished to be in her room
as much as possible, not for her sake, but for their own enjoyment. She
never asked them to read aloud to her, for instance, but she was such an
appreciative listener that they could never be quite satisfied with
reading any interesting book to themselves. They enjoyed it doubly with
her wise and witty comments. She had a keen sense of humor which it has
always seemed to me goes a long way in broadening any life,--and
naturally everybody saved the best jokes to relate in her room. She was
frequently too ill to laugh without danger of a hemorrhage, but she soon
learned to control herself so that she laughed with her eyes alone. The
girls from the village, instead of feeling it a duty to visit her in
her sickness, considered it a privilege to be admitted to her room.
When she was able to sit up they would come by twos and threes and bring
their work and chat until she was tired. She had the kind of character
which made gossip impossible with her, so that she always got at the
very best her visitors had to give, and the _very best_ of even a
shallow girl is often worth something. Her friends, however, felt it was
she who gave to them because of her uplifting power.
She was sometimes able to read and she carried on her education
systematically, though necessarily with many interruptions. She had a
gift for drawing and amused herself often in that way, though, it was
always a sorrow to her that she had had too little instruction to
produce anything of value to others. She was not altogether shut out
from beauty. Her room gave her a view of the sunset every day, and she
purposely left her curtain up for an hour in the evening to watch the
march of the stars. She had the unspotted beauty of the snow in the
winter, and of the grass and flowers in the summer. Sometimes she was
even able to walk about the dooryard a little and gather flowers for
herself. She always had a few house plants in which she took a strong
interest, and which accordingly flourished.
She was a public-spirited woman and was glad to be made one of the
trustees of the Public Library. She was one of the most efficient
members of the board, though she was seldom strong enough to be driven
as far as the library building.
She was determined that her sisters' lives should not be trammeled by
her weakness. The fact that she could not go to a place was all the more
reason why her sisters should go and tell her about it. One sister was a
teacher who at first wished to take the neighboring district school
rather than a much finer position in a distant city simply for the sake
of being constantly with the beloved invalid. But the latter would not
allow this. "I shall never be able to go West myself, you know," she
said cheerfully, "but if you go and I have your letters every week, I
shall know exactly what it is like. And you will be so much more
entertaining in vacations than if you stay at home."
By the same course of reasoning the sick sister persuaded the teacher to
go abroad to study a year when the opportunity came. "The photographs
you bring home will mean a great deal more to me than any I could buy,"
she said. "I shall almost feel as if I had seen the pictures
themselves." Every letter which came from the absent sister did inclose
some imponderable unmounted photograph, with comments. The sister at
home, studying these one by one, learned almost more of the meaning of
the pictures than the one who saw their visible beauty. One of my
friends says, "There is nothing which so destroys the æsthetic sense as
to see too many beautiful pictures at once." This truth, perhaps,
explains why so many people see all the great paintings of the world and
yet have so little appreciation of any of them. At all events, our
invalid did gain both happiness and spiritual insight from the hints of
beauty she found in these humble little photographs.
I have before said that she was not left without companions. She also
had friends in the highest sense. Having the leisure to make friendship
a chief business of life she was able to be so much to her friends that
however busy they might be they could not afford to neglect her. The day
of leisurely letter writing seems to have passed by. But she had long
hours by herself when she could write out the good and pleasant things
she was thinking about. Her letters were lovely, and strong, and
helpful, and each was written with such exquisite penmanship, with such
easy lines of beauty, that it was like a work of art in itself.