religion, which entices with reward and threatens with punishment; and
yet we are apt to forget that, were fate possessed of the most
rudimentary sense of justice, our conception of a lofty, disinterested
morality would fade into thin air. What merit in being just ourselves
if we be not convinced of the absolute injustice of fate? We no longer
believe in the ideals once held by saints, and we are confident that a
wise God will hold of as little account the duty done through hope of
recompense, as the evil done for sake of gain; and this even though the
recompense hoped for be nothing but the self-ensuing peace of mind. We
say that God, who must be at least as high as the highest thoughts He
has implanted in the best of men, will withhold His smile from those
who have desired but to please Him; and that they only who have done
good for the sake of good and as though He existed not, they only who
have loved virtue more than they loved God Himself, shall be allowed to
stand by His side. And yet, and for all this, no sooner does the event
confront us, than we discover that we still are guided by the "moral
maxims" of our childhood. Of more avail would be a "List of chastised
virtues." The soul that is quick with life would find its profit
therein; the cause of virtue would gain in vigour and in majesty. Let
us not forget that it is from the very nonmorality of destiny that a
nobler morality must spring into life; for here, as everywhere, man is
never so strong with his own native strength as when he realises that
he stands entirely alone. As we consider the crowning injustice of
fate, it is the negation of high moral law that disturbs us; but from
this negation there at once arises a moral law that is higher still. He
who no longer believes in reward or punishment must do good for the
sake of good. Even though a moral law seem on the eve of disappearing,
we need have no cause for disquiet; its place will be speedily filled
by a law that is greater still. To attribute morality to fate is but to
lessen the purity of our ideal; to admit the injustice of fate is to
throw open before us the ever-widening fields of a still loftier
morality. Let us not think virtue will crumble, though God Himself seem
unjust. Where shall the virtue of man find more everlasting foundation
than in the seeming injustice of God?
73. Let us not cavil, therefore, at nature's indifference to the sage.
It is only because we are not yet wise enough that this indifference
seems strange; for the first duty of wisdom is to throw into light the
humbleness of the place in the universe that is filled by man.
Within his sphere he seems of importance, as the bee in its cell of
honey; but it were idle to suppose that a single flower the more will
blossom in the fields because the queen bee has proved herself a
heroine in the hive. We need not fear that we depreciate ourselves when
we extol the universe. Whether it be ourselves or the entire world that
we consider great, still will there quicken within our soul the sense
of the infinite, which is of the life-blood of virtue. What is an act
of virtue that we should expect such mighty reward? It is within
ourselves that reward must be found, for the law of gravitation will
not swerve. They only who know not what goodness is are ever clamouring
for the wage of goodness. Above all, let us never forget that an act of
goodness is of itself always an act of happiness. It is the flower of a
long inner life of joy and contentment; it tells of peaceful hours and
days on the sunniest heights of our soul. No reward coming after the
event can compare with the sweet reward that went with it. The upright
man who perished in the catastrophe I mentioned was there because his
soul had found a peace and strength in virtue that not happiness, love,
or glory could have given him. Were the flames to retreat before such
men, were the waters to open and death to hesitate, what were
righteousness or heroism then? Would not the true happiness of virtue
be destroyed? virtue that is happy because it is noble and pure, that
is noble and pure because it desires no reward? There may be human joy
in doing good with definite purpose, but they who do good expecting
nothing in return know a joy that is divine. Where we do evil our
reasons mostly are known to us, but our good deed becomes the purer for
our ignorance of its motive. Would we know how to value the righteous
man, we have but to question him as to the motives of his
righteousness. He will probably be the most truly righteous who is
least ready with his answer. Some may suppose that as intellect widens
many a motive for heroism will be lost to the soul; but it should be
borne in mind that the wider intellect brings with it an ideal of
heroism loftier and more disinterested still. And this much at least is
certain: he who thinks that virtue stands in need of the approval of
destiny or of worlds, has not yet within him the veritable sense of
virtue. Truly to act well we must do good because of our craving for
good, a more intimate knowledge of goodness being all we expect in
return. "With no witness save his heart alone," said St. Just. In the
eyes of a God there must surely be marked distinction between the soul
of the man who believes that the rays of a virtuous deed shall shine
through furthest space, and the soul of the other who knows they
illumine his heart alone. There may be greater momentary strength in
the overambitious truth, but the strength that is brought by the humble
human truth is far more earnest and patient. Is it wiser to be as the
soldier who imagines that each blow he strikes brings victory nearer,
or as the other who knows his little account in the combat but still
fights sturdily on? The upright man would scorn to deceive his
neighbour, but is ever unduly inclined to regard some measure of
self-deception as inseparable from his ideal.
If there were profit in virtue, then would the noblest of men be
compelled to seek happiness elsewhere; and God would destroy their main
object in life were He to reward them often. Nothing is indispensable,
perhaps, or even necessary; and it may be that if the joy of doing good
for sake of good were taken from the soul, it would find other, purer
joys; but in the meantime, it is the most beautiful joy we know,
therefore let us respect it. Let us not resent the misfortunes that
sometimes befall virtue, lest we at the same time disturb the limpid
essence of its happiness. The soul that has this happiness dreams no
more of reward, than others expect punishment because of their
wickedness. They only are ever clamouring for justice who know it not
in their lives.
74. There is wisdom in the Hindu saying: "Work as they work, who are
ambitious. Respect life, as they respect it who desire it. Be happy, as
they are happy who live for happiness alone."
And this is indeed the central point of human wisdom--to act as though
each deed must bear wondrous, everlasting, fruit, and yet to realise
the insignificance of a just action before the universe; to grasp the
disproportion of things, and yet to march onwards as though the
proportions were established by man; to keep our eyes fixed on the
great sphere, and ourselves to move in the little sphere with as much
confidence and earnestness, with as much assurance and satisfaction, as
though the great sphere were contained within it.
Is there need of illusion to keep alive our desire for good? then must
this desire stand confessed as foreign to the nature of man. It is a
mistake to imagine that the heart will long cherish within it the ideas
that reason has banished; but within the heart there is much that
reason may take to itself. And at last the heart becomes the refuge to
which reason is apt to fly, ever more and more simply, each time that
the night steals upon it; for it is to the heart as a young,
clairvoyant girl, who still at times needs advice from her blind, but
smiling, mother. There comes a moment in life when moral beauty seems
more urgent, more penetrating, than intellectual beauty; when all that
the mind has treasured must be bathed in the greatness of soul, lest it
perish in the sandy desert, forlorn as a river that seeks in vain for
the sea.
75. But let us exaggerate nothing when dealing with wisdom, though it
be wisdom itself. The external forces, we know, will not yield to the
righteous man; but still he is absolute lord of most of the inner
powers; and these are for ever spinning the web of nearly all our
happiness and sorrow. We have said elsewhere that the sage, as he
passes by, intervenes in countless dramas. Indeed his mere presence
suffices to arrest most of the calamities that arise from error or
evil. They cannot approach him, or even those who are near him. A
chance meeting with creature endowed with simple and loving wisdom has
stayed the hands of men who else had committed countless acts of folly
or wickedness; for in life most characters are subordinate, and it is
chance alone that determines whether the track which they are to follow
shall be that of suffering or peace. The atmosphere around Jean-Jacques
Rousseau was heavy with lamentation and treachery, delirium, deceit,
and cunning; whereas Jean Paul moved in the midst of loyalty and
nobility, the centre of peace and love. We subdue that in others which
we have learned to subdue in ourselves. Around the upright man there is
drawn a wide circle of peace, within which the arrows of evil soon
cease to fall; nor have his fellows the power to inflict moral
suffering upon him. For indeed if our tears can flow because of our
enemies' malice, it is only because we ourselves would fain make our
enemies weep. If the shafts of envy can wound and draw blood, it is
only because we ourselves have shafts that we wish to throw; if
treachery can wring a groan from us, we must be disloyal ourselves,
Only those weapons can wound the soul that it has not yet sacrificed on
the altar of Love.
76. The dramas of virtue are played on a stage whose mysteries not even
the wisest can fathom. It is only as the last word is spoken that the
curtain is raised for an instant; we know nothing of all that preceded,
of the brightness or gloom that enwrapped it. But of one thing at least
the just man may be certain; it will be in an act of charity, or
justice, that his destiny will meet him face to face. The blow must
inevitably find him prepared, in a state of grace, as the Christian
calls it; in other words, in a state of inner happiness. And that in
itself bars the door on evil destiny within us, and closes most of the
gates by which external misfortune can enter. As our conception of duty
and happiness gains in dignity, so does the sway of moral suffering
become the more restricted and purer. And is not moral suffering the
most tyrannical weapon in the armoury of destiny? Our happiness mainly
depends on the freedom that reigns within us; a freedom that widens
with every good deed, and contracts beneath acts of evil. Not
metaphorically, but literally, does Marcus Aurelius free himself each
time he discovers a new truth in indulgence, each time that he pardons,
each time he reflects. Still less of a metaphor is it to declare that
Macbeth enchains himself anew with every fresh crime. And if this be
true of the great crimes of kings and the virtues of heroes, it is no
less true of the humblest faults and most hidden virtues of ordinary
life. Many a youthful Marcus Aurelius is still about us; many a
Macbeth, who never stirs from his room. However imperfect our
conception of virtue, still let us cling to it; for a moment's
forgetfulness exposes us to all the malignant forces from without. The
simplest lie to myself, buried though it may be in the silence of my
soul, may yet be as dangerous to my inner liberty as an act of
treachery on the marketplace. And from the moment that my inner liberty
is threatened, destiny prowls around my external liberty as stealthily
as a beast of prey that has long been tracking its victim.
77. Can we conceive a situation in life wherein a man who is truly wise
and noble can be made to suffer as profoundly as the man who follows
evil? In this world it is far more certain that vice will be punished,
than that virtue will meet with reward; yet we must bear in mind that
it is the habit of crime to shriek aloud beneath its punishment,
whereas virtue rewards itself in the silence that is the walled garden
of its happiness. Evil drags horrid catastrophe behind it; but an act
of virtue is only a silent offering to the profoundest laws of life;
and therefore, doubtless, does the balance of mighty justice seem more
ready to incline beneath deeds of darkness than beneath those of light.
But if we can scarcely believe that "happiness in crime" be possible,
have we more warrant for faith in the "unhappiness of virtue"? We know
that the executioner can stretch Spinoza on the rack, and that terrible
disease will spare Antoninus Pius no more than Goneril or Regan; but
pain such as this belongs to the animal, not the human, side of man.
Wisdom has indeed sent science, the youngest of her sisters, into the
realm of destiny, with the mission to bring the zone of physical
suffering within ever-narrowing limits; but there are inaccessible
regions within that realm, where disaster ever will rule. Some stricken
ones there will always be, victims to irreducible injustice; and yet
will the true wisdom, in the midst of its sorrow, only be fortified
thereby, only gain in self-reliance and humanity all that it, may lose
in more mystic qualities. We become truly just only when it is finally
borne home to us that we must search within ourselves for our model of
justice. Again, it is the injustice of destiny that restores man to his
place in the universe. It is not well that he should for ever be
pasting anxious glances about him, like the child that has strayed from
its mother's side. Nor need we believe that these disillusions must
necessarily give rise to moral discouragement; for the truth that seems
discouraging does in reality only transform the courage of those strong
enough to accept it; and, in any event, a truth that disheartens,
because it is true, is still of far more value than the most
stimulating of falsehoods. But indeed no truth can discourage, whereas
much that passes as courage only bears the semblance thereof. The thing
that enfeebles the weak will but help to strengthen the strong. "Do you
remember the day," wrote a woman to her lover, "when we sat together by
the window that looked on to the sea, and watched the meek procession
of white-sailed ships as they followed each other into harbour? . . .
Ah! how that day comes back to me! . . . Do you remember that one ship
had a sail that was nearly black, and that she was the last to come in?
And do you remember, too, that the hour of separation was upon us, and
that the arrival of the last boat of all was to be our signal for
departure? We might perhaps have found cause for sadness in the gloomy
sail that fluttered at her mast; but we who loved each other had
'accepted' life, and we only smiled as we once more recognised the
kinship of our thoughts." Yes, it is thus we should act; and though we
cannot always smile as the black sail heaves in sight, yet is it
possible for us to find in our life something that shall absorb us to
the exclusion of sadness, as her love absorbed the woman whose words I
have quoted. Complaints of injustice grow less frequent as the brain
and the heart expand. It is well to remind ourselves that in this
world, whose fruit we are, all that concerns us must necessarily be
more conformable with our existence than the most beneficent law of our
imagination. The time has arrived perhaps when man must learn to place
the centre of his joys and pride elsewhere than within himself. As this
idea takes firmer root within us, so do we become more conscious of our
helplessness beneath its overwhelming force; yet is it at the same time
borne home to us that of this force we ourselves form part; and even as
we writhe beneath it, we are compelled to admire, as the youthful
Telemachus admired the power of his father's arm. Our own instinctive
actions awaken within us an eager curiosity, an affectionate, pleased
surprise: why should we not train ourselves thus to regard the
instinctive actions of nature? We love to throw the dim light of our
reason on to our unconsciousness: why not let it play on what we term
the unconsciousness of the universe? We are no less deeply concerned
with the one than the other. "After he has become acquainted with the
power that is in him," said a philosopher, "one of the highest
privileges of man is to realise his individual powerlessness. Out of
the very disproportion between the infinite which kills us and this
nothing that we are, there arises within us a sensation that is not
without grandeur; we feel that we would rather be crushed by a mountain
than done to death by a pebble, as in war we would rather succumb
beneath the charge of thousands than fall victim to a single arm. And
as our intellect lays bare to us the immensity of our helplessness, so
does it rob defeat of its sting." Who knows? We are already conscious
of moments when the something that has conquered us seems nearer to
ourselves than the part of us that has yielded. Of all our
characteristics, self-esteem is the one that most readily changes its
home, for we are instinctively aware that it has never truly formed
part of us. The self-esteem of the courtier who waits on the mighty
king soon finds more splendid lodging in the king's boundless power;
and the disgrace that may befall him will wound his pride the less for
that it has descended from the height of a throne. Were nature to
become less indifferent, it would no longer appear so vast. Our
unfettered sense of the infinite cannot afford to dispense with one
particle of the infinite, with one particle of its indifference; and
there will ever remain something within our soul that would rather weep
at times in a world that knows no limit, than enjoy perpetual happiness
in a world that is hemmed in.
If destiny were invariably just in her dealings with the wise, then
doubtless would the existence of such a law furnish sufficient proof of
its excellence; but as it is wholly indifferent, it is better so, and
perhaps even greater; for what the actions of the soul may lose in
importance thereby does but go to swell the dignity of the universe.
And loss of grandeur to the sage there is none; for he is as profoundly
sensitive to the greatness of nature as to the greatness that lurks
within man. Why harass our soul with endeavour to locate the infinite?
As much of it as can be given to man will go to him who has learned to
wonder.
78. Do you know a novel of Balzac, belonging to the "Celibataires"
series, called Pierrette? It is not one of Balzac's masterpieces, but
it has points of much interest for us. It is the story of an orphaned
Breton girl, a sweet, innocent child, who is suddenly snatched away, by
her evil star, from the grandparents who adore her, and transferred to
the care of an aunt and uncle. Monsieur Rogron and his sister Sylvia. A
hard, gloomy couple, these two; retired shopkeepers, who live in a
dreary house in the back streets of a dreary country town. Their
celibacy weighs heavily upon them; they are miserly, and absurdly vain;
morose, and instinctively full of hatred.
The poor inoffensive girl has hardly set foot in the house before her
martyrdom begins. There are terrible questions of money and economy,
ambitions to be gratified, marriages to be prevented, inheritances to
be turned aside: complications of every kind. The neighbours and
friends of the Rogrons behold the long and painful sufferings of the
victim with unruffled tranquillity, for their every natural instinct
leads them to applaud the success of the stronger. And at last
Pierrette dies, as unhappily as she has lived; while the others all
triumph--the Rogrons, the detestable lawyer Vinet, and all those who
had helped them; and the subsequent happiness of these wretches remains
wholly untroubled. Fate would even seem to smile upon them; and Balzac,
carried away in spite of himself by the reality of it all, ends his
story, almost regretfully, with these words: "How the social villainies
of this world would thrive under our laws if there were no God!"
We need not go to fiction for tragedies of this kind; there are many
houses in which they are matters of daily occurrence. I have borrowed
this instance from Balzac's pages because the story lay there ready to
hand; the chronicle, day by day, of the triumph of injustice. The very
highest morality is served by such instances, and a great lesson is
taught; and perhaps the moralists are wrong who try to weaken this
lesson by finding excuses for the iniquities of fate. Some are
satisfied that God will give innocence its due reward. Others tell us
that in this case it is not the victim who has the greatest claim upon
our sympathy. And these are doubtless right, from many points of view;
for little Pierrette, miserable though she was, and cruelly tormented,
did yet experience joys that her tyrants never would know. In the midst
of her sorrow, she remained gentle, and tender, and loving; and therein
lies greater happiness than in hiding cruelty, hatred, and selfishness
beneath a smile. It is sad to love and be unloved, but sadder still to
be unable to love. And how great is the difference between the petty,
sordid desires, the grotesque delights, of the Rogrons, and the mighty
longing that filled the child's soul as she looked forward to the time
when injustice at last should cease! Little wistful Pierrette was
perhaps no wiser than those about her; but before such as must bear
unmerited suffering there stretches a wide horizon, which here and
again takes in the joys that only the loftiest know; even as the
horizon of the earth, though not seen from the mountain peak, would
appear at times to be one with the corner-stone of heaven. The
injustice we commit speedily reduces us to petty, material pleasures;
but, as we revel in these, we envy our victim; for our tyranny has
thrown open the door to joys whereof we cannot deprive him--joys that
are wholly beyond our reach, joys that are purely spiritual. And the
door that opens wide to the victim is sealed in the tyrant's soul; and
the sufferer breathes a purer air than he who has made him suffer. In
the hearts of the persecuted there is radiance, where those who
persecute have only gloom; and is it not on the light within us that
the wellbeing of happiness depends? He who brings sorrow with him
stifles more happiness within himself than in the man he overwhelms.
Which of us, had he to choose, but would rather be Pierrette than
Rogron? The instinct of happiness within us needs no telling that he
who is morally right must be happier than he who is wrong, though the
wrong be done from the height of a throne. And, even though the Rogrons
be unaware of their Injustice, it alters nothing; for, be we aware or
unaware of the evil we commit, the air we breathe will still be heavily
charged. Nay, more--to him who knows he does wrong there may come,
perhaps, the desire to escape from his prison; but the other will die
in his cell, without even his thoughts having travelled beyond the
gloomy walls that conceal from him the true destiny of man.