A smooth text to the latter; and, preached from the pulpit, is sure of
a docile audience from the pews lined with satin. It is twice sitting
upon velvet to a foolish squire to be told, that _he_--and not
_perverse nature_, as the homilies would make us imagine, is the true
cause of all the irregularities in his parish. This is striking at the
root of free-will indeed, and denying the originality of sin in any
sense. But men are not such implicit sheep as this comes to. If the
abstinence from evil on the part of the upper classes is to derive
itself from no higher principle, than the apprehension of setting
ill patterns to the lower, we beg leave to discharge them from
all squeamishness on that score: they may even take their fill of
pleasures, where they can find them. The Genius of Poverty, hampered
and straitened as it is, is not so barren of invention but it can
trade upon the staple of its own vice, without drawing upon their
capital. The poor are not quite such servile imitators as they take
them for. Some of them are very clever artists in their way. Here and
there we find an original. Who taught the poor to steal, to pilfer?
They did not go to the great for schoolmasters in these faculties
surely. It is well if in some vices they allow us to be--no copyists.
In no other sense is it true that the poor copy them, than as servants
may be said to _take after_ their masters and mistresses, when
they succeed to their reversionary cold meats. If the master, from
indisposition or some other cause, neglect his food, the servant dines
notwithstanding.
"O, but (some will say) the force of example is great." We knew a lady
who was so scrupulous on this head, that she would put up with the
calls of the most impertinent visitor, rather than let her servant say
she was not at home, for fear of teaching her maid to tell an untruth;
and this in the very face of the fact, which she knew well enough,
that the wench was one of the greatest liars upon the earth without
teaching; so much so, that her mistress possibly never heard two words
of consecutive truth from her in her life. But nature must go for
nothing: example must be every thing. This liar in grain, who never
opened her mouth without a lie, must be guarded against a remote
inference, which she (pretty casuist!) might possibly draw from a form
of words--literally false, but essentially deceiving no one--that
under some circumstances a fib might not be so exceedingly sinful--a
fiction, too, not at all in her own way, or one that she could be
suspected of adopting, for few servant-wenches care to be denied to
visitors.
This word _example_ reminds us of another fine word which is in use
upon these occasions--_encouragement_. "People in our sphere must
not be thought to give encouragement to such proceedings." To such
a frantic height is this principle capable of being carried, that
we have known individuals who have thought it within the scope of
their influence to sanction despair, and give _éclat_ to--suicide. A
domestic in the family of a county member lately deceased, for love,
or some unknown cause, cut his throat, but not successfully. The poor
fellow was otherwise much loved and respected; and great interest was
used in his behalf, upon his recovery, that he might be permitted
to retain his place; his word being first pledged, not without some
substantial sponsors to promise for him, than the like should never
happen again. His master was inclinable to keep him, but his mistress
thought otherwise; and John in the end was dismissed, her ladyship
declaring that she "could not think of encouraging any such doings in
the county."