The crisis through which I passed at Cambridge, inaugurated by the events
I have just related, I find very difficult to portray. It was a religious
crisis, of course, and my most pathetic memory concerning it is of the
vain attempts to connect my yearnings and discontents with the theology I
had been taught; I began in secret to read my Bible, yet nothing I hit
upon seemed to point a way out of my present predicament, to give any
definite clew to the solution of my life. I was not mature enough to
reflect that orthodoxy was a Sunday religion unrelated to a world whose
wheels were turned by the motives of self-interest; that it consisted of
ideals not deemed practical, since no attempt was made to put them into
practice in the only logical manner,--by reorganizing civilization to
conform with them. The implication was that the Christ who had preached
these ideals was not practical.... There were undoubtedly men in the
faculty of the University who might have helped me had I known of them;
who might have given me, even at that time, a clew to the modern, logical
explanation of the Bible as an immortal record of the thoughts and acts
of men who had sought to do just what I was seeking to do,--connect the
religious impulse to life and make it fruitful in life: an explanation,
by the way, a thousand-fold more spiritual than the old. But I was
hopelessly entangled in the meshes of the mystic, the miraculous and
supernatural. If I had analyzed my yearnings, I might have realized that
I wanted to renounce the life I had been leading, not because it was
sinful, but because it was aimless. I had not learned that the Greek word
for sin is "a missing of the mark." Just aimlessness! I had been stirred
with the desire to perform some service for which the world would be
grateful: to write great literature, perchance. But it had never been
suggested to me that such swellings of the soul are religious, that
religion is that kind of feeling, of motive power that drives the writer
and the scientist, the statesman and the sculptor as well as the priest
and the Prophet to serve mankind for the joy of serving: that religion is
creative, or it is nothing: not mechanical, not a force imposed from
without, but a driving power within. The "religion" I had learned was
salvation from sin by miracle: sin a deliberate rebellion, not a pathetic
missing of the mark of life; useful service of man, not the wandering of
untutored souls who had not been shown the way. I felt religious. I
wanted to go to church, I wanted to maintain, when it was on me, that
exaltation I dimly felt as communion with a higher power, with God, and
which also was identical with my desire to write, to create....
I bought books, sets of Wordsworth and Keats, of Milton and Shelley and
Shakespeare, and hid them away in my bureau drawers lest Tom and my
friends should see them. These too I read secretly, making excuses for
not joining in the usual amusements. Once I walked to Mrs. Bolton's and
inquired rather shamefacedly for Hermann Krebs, only to be informed that
he had gone out.... There were lapses, of course, when I went off on the
old excursions,--for the most part the usual undergraduate follies,
though some were of a more serious nature; on these I do not care to
dwell. Sex was still a mystery.... Always I awoke afterwards to bitter
self-hatred and despair.... But my work in English improved, and I earned
the commendation and friendship of Mr. Cheyne. With a wisdom for which I
was grateful he was careful not to give much sign of it in classes, but
the fact that he was "getting soft on me" was evident enough to be
regarded with suspicion. Indeed the state into which I had fallen became
a matter of increasing concern to my companions, who tried every means
from ridicule to sympathy, to discover its cause and shake me out of it.
The theory most accepted was that I was in love.
"Come on now, Hughie--tell me who she is. I won't give you away," Tom
would beg. Once or twice, indeed, I had imagined I was in love with the
sisters of Boston classmates whose dances I attended; to these parties
Tom, not having overcome his diffidence in respect to what he called
"social life," never could be induced to go.
It was Ralph who detected the true cause of my discontent. Typical as no
other man I can recall of the code to which we had dedicated ourselves,
the code that moulded the important part of the undergraduate world and
defied authority, he regarded any defection from it in the light of
treason. An instructor, in a fit of impatience, had once referred to him
as the Mephistopheles of his class; he had fatal attractions, and a
remarkable influence. His favourite pastime was the capricious exercise
of his will on weaker characters, such as his cousin, Ham Durrett; if
they "swore off," Ralph made it his business to get them drunk again, and
having accomplished this would proceed himself to administer a new oath
and see that it was kept. Alcohol seemed to have no effect whatever on
him. Though he was in the class above me, I met him frequently at a club
to which I had the honour to belong, then a suite of rooms over a shop
furnished with a pool and a billiard table, easy-chairs and a bar. It has
since achieved the dignity of a house of its own.
We were having, one evening, a "religious" argument, Cinibar, Laurens and
myself and some others. I can't recall how it began; I think Cinibar had
attacked the institution of compulsory chapel, which nobody defended;
there was something inherently wrong, he maintained, with a religion to
which men had to be driven against their wills. Somewhat to my surprise I
found myself defending a Christianity out of which I had been able to
extract but little comfort and solace. Neither Laurens nor Conybear,
however, were for annihilating it: although they took the other side of
the discussion of a subject of which none of us knew anything, their
attacks were but half-hearted; like me, they were still under the spell
exerted by a youthful training.
We were all of us aware of Ralph, who sat at some distance looking over
the pages of an English sporting weekly. Presently he flung it down.
"Haven't you found out yet that man created God, Hughie?" he inquired.
"And even if there were a personal God, what reason have you to think
that man would be his especial concern, or any concern of his whatever?
The discovery of evolution has knocked your Christianity into a cocked
hat."
I don't remember how I answered him. In spite of the superficiality of
his own arguments, which I was not learned enough to detect, I was
ingloriously routed. Darwin had kicked over the bucket, and that was all
there was to it.... After we had left the club both Conybear and Laurens
admitted they were somewhat disturbed, declaring that Ralph had gone too
far. I spent a miserable night, recalling the naturalistic assertions he
had made so glibly, asking myself again and again how it was that the
religion to which I so vainly clung had no greater effect on my actions
and on my will, had not prevented me from lapses into degradation. And I
hated myself for having argued upon a subject that was still sacred. I
believed in Christ, which is to say that I believed that in some
inscrutable manner he existed, continued to dominate the world and had
suffered on my account.
To whom should I go now for a confirmation of my wavering beliefs? One of
the results--it will be remembered of religion as I was taught it was a
pernicious shyness, and even though I had found a mentor and confessor, I
might have hesitated to unburden myself. This would be different from
arguing with Ralph Hambleton. In my predicament, as I was wandering
through the yard, I came across a notice of an evening talk to students
in Holder Chapel, by a clergyman named Phillips Brooks. This was before
the time, let me say in passing, when his sermons at Harvard were
attended by crowds of undergraduates. Well, I stood staring at the
notice, debating whether I should go, trying to screw up my courage; for
I recognized clearly that such a step, if it were to be of any value,
must mean a distinct departure from my present mode of life; and I recall
thinking with a certain revulsion that I should have to "turn good." My
presence at the meeting would be known the next day to all my friends,
for the idea of attending a religious gathering when one was not forced
to do so by the authorities was unheard of in our set. I should be
classed with the despised "pious ones" who did such things regularly. I
shrank from the ridicule. I had, however, heard of Mr. Brooks from Ned
Symonds, who was by no means of the pious type, and whose parents
attended Mr. Brooks's church in Boston.... I left my decision in
abeyance. But when evening came I stole away from the club table, on the
plea of an engagement, and made my way rapidly toward Holder Chapel. I
had almost reached it--when I caught a glimpse of Symonds and of some
others approaching,--and I went on, to turn again. By this time the
meeting, which was in a room on the second floor, had already begun.
Palpitating, I climbed the steps; the door of the room was slightly ajar;
I looked in; I recall a distinct sensation of surprise,--the atmosphere
of that meeting was so different from what I had expected. Not a "pious"
atmosphere at all! I saw a very tall and heavy gentleman, dressed in
black, who sat, wholly at ease, on the table! One hand was in his pocket,
one foot swung clear of the ground; and he was not preaching, but talking
in an easy, conversational tone to some forty young men who sat intent on
his words. I was too excited to listen to what he was saying, I was
making a vain attempt to classify him. But I remember the thought, for it
struck me with force,--that if Christianity were so thoroughly
discredited by evolution, as Ralph Hambleton and other agnostics would
have one believe, why should this remarkably sane and able-looking person
be standing up for it as though it were still an established and
incontrovertible fact?
He had not, certainly, the air of a dupe or a sentimentalist, but
inspired confidence by his very personality. Youthlike, I watched him
narrowly for flaws, for oratorical tricks, for all kinds of histrionic
symptoms. Again I was near the secret; again it escaped me. The argument
for Christianity lay not in assertions about it, but in being it. This
man was Christianity.... I must have felt something of this, even though
I failed to formulate it. And unconsciously I contrasted his strength,
which reinforced the atmosphere of the room, with that of Ralph
Hambleton, who was, a greater influence over me than I have recorded, and
had come to sway me more and more, as he had swayed others. The strength
of each was impressive, yet this Mr. Brooks seemed to me the bodily
presentment of a set of values which I would have kept constantly before
my eyes.... I felt him drawing me, overcoming my hesitation, belittling
my fear of ridicule. I began gently to open the door--when something
happened,--one of those little things that may change the course of a
life. The door made little noise, yet one of the men sitting in the back
of the room chanced to look around, and I recognized Hermann Krebs. His
face was still sunken from his recent illness. Into his eyes seemed to
leap a sudden appeal, an appeal to which my soul responded yet I hurried
down the stairs and into the street. Instantly I regretted my retreat, I
would have gone back, but lacked the courage; and I strayed unhappily for
hours, now haunted by that look of Krebs, now wondering what the
remarkably sane-looking and informal clergyman whose presence dominated
the little room had been talking about. I never learned, but I did live
to read his biography, to discover what he might have talked about,--for
he if any man believed that life and religion are one, and preached
consecration to life's task.
Of little use to speculate whether the message, had I learned it then,
would have fortified and transformed me!
In spite of the fact that I was unable to relate to a satisfying
conception of religion my new-born determination, I made up my mind, at
least, to renounce my tortuous ways. I had promised my father to be a
lawyer; I would keep my promise, I would give the law a fair trial; later
on, perhaps, I might demonstrate an ability to write. All very
praiseworthy! The season was Lent, a fitting time for renunciations and
resolves. Although I had more than once fallen from grace, I believed
myself at last to have settled down on my true course--when something
happened. The devil interfered subtly, as usual--now in the person of
Jerry Kyme. It should be said in justice to Jerry that he did not look
the part. He had sunny-red, curly hair, mischievous blue eyes with long
lashes, and he harboured no respect whatever for any individual or
institution, sacred or profane; he possessed, however, a shrewd sense of
his own value, as many innocent and unsuspecting souls discovered as
early as our freshman year, and his method of putting down the
presumptuous was both effective and unique. If he liked you, there could
be no mistake about it.
One evening when I was engaged in composing a theme for Mr. Cheyne on no
less a subject than the interpretation of the work of William Wordsworth,
I found myself unexpectedly sprawling on the floor, in my descent kicking
the table so vigorously as to send the ink-well a foot or two toward the
ceiling. This, be it known, was a typical proof of Jerry's esteem. For he
had entered noiselessly, jerking the back of my chair, which chanced to
be tilted, and stood with his hands in his pockets, surveying the ruin he
had wrought, watching the ink as it trickled on the carpet. Then he
picked up the book.
"Poetry, you darned old grind!" he exclaimed disgustedly. "Say, Parry, I
don't know what's got into you, but I want you to come home with me for
the Easter holidays. It'll do you good. We'll be on the Hudson, you know,
and we'll manage to make life bearable somehow."