AFTER THE STORM
Under the changed conditions in which the French were now living they
began to find time hanging heavily on their hands, so they turned
their attention to the task of providing occupation for their leisure
hours, and as a first step in the realisation of this desirable object
built themselves an assembly-room. This and some other projects kept
them busy for some weeks, and helped to heal the bitterness that the
revolt had created, and, like the Egyptians, if not ready to bury the
past altogether, they were willing enough to let it lie in oblivion,
and, largely influenced by the fact that the destruction of the fleet
had left them locked in the country with no very hopeful possibility
of their being soon able to receive help from France, they set
themselves to get on with the people as well as might be, and included
in their schemes some intended at once to please and gratify the
Cairenes and impress them with a sense of the superiority of the
French.
Among the other devices that it was thought could not fail to serve
these ends and win general applause was the construction of a
Montgolfier balloon. This having been successfully accomplished, the
public were invited to come and see a wonderful contrivance by which
the French were able to communicate with far-off lands, and thus, if
need should arise, seek and obtain help from their native country or
elsewhere. Such an announcement naturally brought the Egyptians, who
are always curious to see and inspect novelties of all kinds, in
crowds to the Esbekieh on the day appointed for the ascent. Fortune,
however, was not generous to the French, and though the balloon was a
success in all things that skill could command, an adverse and
indifferent wind left it loitering in sight until the moment of its
collapse arrived, and it sank ignominiously to earth, to the great
scorn of the people, who derisively styled it a "big kite," and
compared it to the kites that the boys of Egypt had long been wont to
amuse themselves with. The failure was a sad blow to the French, who
had hoped to see the balloon float majestically away and disappear in
the north, as though it were indeed bound for Paris.
A worthier and more successful enterprise that the French engaged in
was the opening of a public library in the district to the south of
the town still known as the Nasrieh. Of this Gabarty, who is not
sparing in his ridicule of the balloon, gives an enthusiastic
description, and records with the most unstinted appreciation his
sense of the high courtesy with which the French received all
visitors. He himself went often, and tells us not only of the delight
with which he enjoyed its wonders, but of the pleasure afforded by
the welcome offered to all visitors, and especially to those who
showed an interest in or knowledge of the sciences. For their
inspection all the treasures of the place were freely produced, and
all help given them to understand the object and worth of what they
were shown. There were many things in the library that the Egyptian
visitors could thoroughly appreciate--rare Oriental manuscripts, maps
and atlases of all parts of the world, illustrated volumes,
astronomical and other scientific diagrams and philological works. For
all these, as well as for the French savants who so freely and
liberally put their time and knowledge at the service of their guests,
Gabarty has unstinted praise and admiration.
Even more successful than the library, from the popular point of view,
was the laboratory that the French threw open to all comers. Popular
science was then in its infancy. The chemistry of to-day was
altogether unknown and undreamt of. Electricity was in its early
babyhood, even the telegraph being yet to come. Steam was an
unharnessed giant. Gas, photography, and a host of things that are
now-a-days among the most commonplace of our surroundings were
unknown, not only in Egypt but in Europe. And by the Nile, where art
and science once flourished, the little knowledge that still survived
was the inheritance and privilege of the Ulema, and was sadly cramped
and debased by the false theology that had elevated religious pedantry
above all other knowledge or desire. It is no wonder, therefore, that
the French were able to astonish their guests beyond measure by
showing them a host of those "experiments in natural science" that in
our own boyhood days we delighted in when presented to us as the
"magic of chemistry," such as the production of a solid by the mixing
of two liquids. The marvels of electricity as then known were also
displayed, and, as Gabarty says with his customary candour, "other
wonders that intelligence like ours could neither understand nor
explain."
All the visitors to the library and laboratory were not, of course, as
intelligent or appreciative as the Sheikh Gabarty, and some of the few
historians who condescend to mention things unconnected with the
battles and bloodshed that is their proper subject, record with glee,
as a fitting illustration of the native mind, the story of the Sheikh
who, having beheld with Oriental stolidity all the marvels the French
could show him, asked whether the science of Europe was equal to the
task of enabling him to be present in two places at once, and, being
assured that it could not, expressed his contempt for such lamentably
imperfect science. That the incident really occurred there is no
reason to doubt, but the Sheikh's attitude was not such a childishly
absurd one as our friends the historians would wish us to believe. To
understand it we must go back to the time and the place, though even
from the present we may gain a hint. Not long since an Italian boy
showed me a little booklet that had been given to him by his teacher,
a Catholic priest. It was a short history of the life of a saint, and
recorded how a mule had gone on its knees out of respect for the
"Host." The book had the printed imprimatur of his Holiness the late
Pope. I asked the boy if he really believed the story, and he replied,
"Why not?" Why not, indeed! Luther not only believed in the devil, but
saw him, and threw his ink-bottle at him; notwithstanding which, I,
though not a Christian in any sense, most firmly believe in Luther,
and hold him as one far beyond the world's great hero Bonaparte in all
that constitutes true greatness. I can, therefore, quite understand
how a pious Sheikh in Cairo, in the year of grace 1799, could believe
in the possibility of a man being, by the aid of lawful or unlawful
arts and sciences, both here and there at the same time, for to him,
as to Luther, belief in the supernatural made all things possible,
and, just as Luther had a hundred hearsay traditions of the pious and
godly to justify his interpretation of the hallucination produced by
an overworked brain, so the Sheikh had not only traditions but the
sworn testimony of many eye-witnesses to the possibility of the
impossibility in which he thus expressed his belief. And as it held in
the closing days of the eighteenth century, so in these, the early
years of the twentieth, the Church of Rome still holds as heretic
whoever disputes the truth of the worshipping mule, and in the East
not only are miracles firmly believed in, but do actually, in a sense,
take place. A night's march from Hodeidah, up in the hills of Yemen,
there was in the seventies of the last century a certain saint who
held open court for all who came, and it was the tradition, and, as I
can testify, the verity of the place that when his guests sat down to
meals the more they ate the more was left. I have seen this miracle as
it was, and perhaps still is, commonly accounted, repeated not once,
but again and again during my stay. And this same saint was held by
all the populace of Hodeidah, which in those days did not number a
single Christian among its residents, to have on many occasions
attended the public prayers in Hodeidah and those in Sana'a at one and
the same time. The saint, grown old and bedridden when I saw him, was
a fine old Arab, and though speaking with difficulty, asked me a few
intelligent questions about India and England. Whence, as it seems to
me, having abundance of such evidence before him, and having a
boundless faith in the omnipotence of the Creator and of His regard
for the doings of His people, the mocking Sheikh in the French
laboratory was in fact ridiculing not French science but French
infidelity. In the Cairo of to-day there are but few who have such
simple, honest faith as that old Sheikh. Whether on the whole Cairo or
its people are much the better of the change is a question not
altogether so beyond discussion as my reader probably thinks.
But whether the old Sheikh was serious or ironical in his question, it
is quite certain that the Sheikh Gabarty was perfectly serious in his
comments, and in the records of these things that he has left us there
is much to guide us in forming an idea of the Egyptian of the period,
for though he was one of the "learned," he was essentially one of the
people, and, like them, when under no special restraint, accustomed to
speak his mind clearly and without any other bias than the impulse of
the moment. Born in Cairo in the year 1754, he was like Sayed Mahomed
Kerim, the Governor of Alexandria, of Arab origin, and, like him,
though preserving much of the Arab in his nature, essentially an
Egyptian. Originally from Zeilah on the African coast of the Gulf of
Aden, his family had been settled in Egypt for seven generations, and
had taken the name Jibarty, or, as it is pronounced in Egypt, Gabarty,
from their first home, Jibart being one of the names by which Zeilah
is still known. Claiming descent from the family of Abou Talib, that
uncle of the Prophet of Islam who, though unconverted to the faith of
his nephew, accorded him his protection and sympathy in the days when
he so sorely needed a friend, the Gabarty family had in Egypt been
scarcely less famous for its origin than for its piety, learning, and
wealth. Sheikh Ali, the great-grandfather of the Sheikh Abdu Rahman
Gabarty--the historian of whom I am writing--attained full honours as
a saint, and in the time of Bonaparte his tomb at Edfoo was still a
place of pilgrimage for the pious, not only of Egypt, but of Arabia
and Abyssinia and other lands of Islam.
Another notable member of the family was the Sheikh Abdu Rahman's
father, a man of great learning, a deeply read student of all the
sciences and branches of learning then cultivated in Egypt, a noted
bibliophile and the author of many works covering a wide range of
subjects. The "Standard-bearer of knowledge" and "Moon of Islam and
its followers" are some of the phrases in which his son with filial
piety describes him, and it is certain that, considering his time and
place, he was not unworthy of them. Recognised by the Ulema as the
most accomplished and brilliant scholar of the day, in private life he
was beloved for his affability, generosity, and public spirit, the
latter being evidenced by, among other things, his establishing in his
own house a lending library, which he placed at the free disposal of
all students. As an author he produced a long list of works chiefly of
a controversial character, but some of an eminently practical nature,
such as his guide to the ceremonies of the pilgrimage to Mecca. Nor
was he without inventive skill--an instrument for ascertaining the
kibla, or point to which all Moslems are bound to turn when praying,
and a circular calender covering a long period of time, and supplying
corresponding dates for a number of different eras, such as the
Moslem, Coptic and Greek, being among the more noteworthy. He was also
a great amateur of sundials, and constructed many of various types.
His scientific knowledge, public spirit, and practical nature were all
combined to enable him to carry out single-handed a reform in the
weights and measures of the Cairo markets.
Abdu Rahman, the historian, was a worthy son of this distinguished
man. Like him, a great scholar, though less broad in his reading, an
acute thinker, indefatigable worker, an earnest and conscientious
follower of his religion, and yet free, as his history proves, of all
fanaticism and bigotry, independent in spirit, truthful and candid in
speech and writing, yet withal courteous and generous in his
intercourse with others, it was but natural that he should succeed
his father as one of the foremost of the Sheikhs of the Azhar
University, and that he should have been one of the men chosen to form
the Dewan when Bonaparte asked for the names of the leading men.
Such being the man and his origin, it is not difficult to understand
how bitter to him must have been the events that had followed the
arrival of the French. But he records the history of the time with the
staid reserve of the "Father of History," setting down the good and
the bad with equal fidelity, neither concealing the truth as he saw
it, nor speaking aught in malice. All through his story of the French
occupation one can see how greatly his heart rebelled against it, but,
none the less, he never grudges the invaders his admiration when they
could win it, as in the case of the library and the laboratory, though
he could, when he would, be sarcastic enough, as when laughing at the
fiasco of the balloon, and is capable of righteous indignation, not
only against the French but also against the Moslems who sinned
against that which he held to be the laws of right and truth. So while
he more than hints his belief that many of the "reforms" were but
excuses for the collection of taxes, he readily admits the utility of
the registration of births, marriages, and deaths, sees no harm in the
wearing of the cockade, and admits the benefits of disinfection and
quarantine. His book is therefore what he never intended it to be--a
wonderful picture of the man himself as well as it is that which he
intended it to be--a full and, above all else, a truthful account of
the events of his time. And it is even more than this, for it is to
those who know something of the East and its peoples a valuable guide
to the character of the Egyptians, and, without any intention on his
part, or indeed any idea that he is touching such a subject, he is
constantly showing us how and why the French failed to gain the
goodwill or friendship of the people. And through it all, in the
gathering of the storm as in its burst, and in the days of dire grief
that followed it, we see the man himself placid and calm, with
unfaltering though aching heart, going steadily on, maintaining his
daily life as much as might be unchanged, ever in fear and yet never
in fear; ever in fear that the morrow might bring some new trouble or
vexation, never in fear but that, come what might, in the end all must
be well, for after all was not all this flood of affliction let loose
on the country "that God might accomplish His decrees"?
And as Gabarty thought of all these things, so, in a measure, thought
all the Egyptians. Much as they enjoy peace, comfort, society, and all
the good things of this life, they all sit in the tub of Diogenes and
mock at the power and grandeur of the great. Robert of Sicily in his
magnificent attire may be a very gorgeous spectacle, but they are
quite prepared to see him to-morrow, or the day after, running
"bare-headed and besprent with mire," and so when Bonaparte, who, not
having yet heard the dismal droning of St. Helena's surges, by no
means shared such silly ideas, issued his decrees and warned the
people of the certain destruction that was to overtake all who dared
oppose him, they, though they held their tongues, felt inclined to
reply, as did Akhbar the Great of India's prisoner, "Would it not be
well to say 'With God's permission'?" And of what avail all this
bloodshed and rapine? What madness and utter folly all this tumultuous
turbulence of Beys and Bonapartes! What could they gain by it? Did
they forget "th' inevitable hour"? Were there no graves awaiting them
wherein they would lie and rot while others no wiser than they would
be furiously fighting over the heritage they had left?
And so also for smaller things. Why worry and fret about these
reforms? They may be good and beneficial in their way, but peace and
quiet were better. And if the French really desired reforms, why not
give the people the reforms they did really long for? To live in peace
and quiet and be left to seek their own welfare in their own manner?
These were things to be sought after and, if possible, attained:
things worth some little sacrifice. Give them these and leave them
free to enjoy their lives as they would, and they would pay willingly
enough whatever reasonable taxes you might desire, even though these
pressed a little heavily upon them.
And these being the ideals of the Egyptians, it should be easy for the
reader to see that after all for them the French, as rulers of the
land, were scarcely as desirable as the Beys. Instead of giving the
people liberty, this was just what they took from them. Under the
French they felt all the horror that convicts have told us they have
felt in English and other jails at the knowledge that they were always
under restraint and observation. The French complained that the
Egyptians were ungrateful, but it is not easy for a man to be grateful
for a benefit of which he is unconscious. That the French were in many
things their superiors the Egyptians could plainly see; that they were
far beyond them in the arts and sciences and manufactures; that their
ideas of governing and administering the town and country were better
than those of the Turks, or Mamaluks: all these were things that the
Egyptians could and did admit, but they could not and would not admit
that the benefit to be derived from these was worth anything like the
price the French asked them to pay. From the days of the Pharaohs they
had carried their bricks and their mortar in hods on their heads or on
their shoulders. The French wheelbarrows were ingenious and useful
things, and there was no reason why the Egyptians should not avail
themselves of these or any other of the endless conveniences that they
were now seeing for the first time, provided that the employment of
these things was not to be made a burden, and that they were employed
to lighten and not to increase the labourer's task. And it was so in
higher things and among the higher classes. It was good to register
births and deaths--was it not the custom of the Arabs themselves from
the very earliest days?--but it was not good to tie people down to
making their records in a certain way, at a certain time, at a certain
place, or to put them under pains and penalties for any failure in
conforming to the burthensome rules the French had laid down with
respect to such matters.
It was thus that Gabarty and his countrymen reasoned then and it is
thus that the Egyptian still reasons, and while they so reasoned and
so reason it was and is impossible for the European and the Egyptian
to coalesce socially or politically. The ultimate aim of the French
and of the Egyptians was one and the same thing--the happiness of the
people; but their conceptions of happiness were radically distinct,
nor were their ideas as to the means whereby happiness was to be
attained less irreconcilable. Throughout the world, turn where we
will, we find all men engaged in the same pursuit, carrying on the
same struggle. The silly-pated fools lounging at the bars of London
and the hard-handed labourer toiling at his daily work, the Salvation
Army lass tending the sick and poor, and the Buddhist fanatic burning
himself alive--these and the million types that range between these
extremes, these are all seeking the same goal, struggling each in his
or her own way for the attainment of the same end, the realisation of
their own ideal of happiness. I have in an earlier chapter tried to
show why the Egyptian and the English characters are of necessity so
different, and in doing that I have, to some extent at least, shown
why the French and the Egyptians were so opposed in their valuation of
the reforms that Bonaparte was so assiduous in introducing. That
Bonaparte cared the value of a brass farthing for the welfare of Egypt
or the happiness of the Egyptians is simply inconceivable, but that he
really and earnestly desired to see both these things realised is
certain. Had an overwhelming inundation swept Egypt and the Egyptians
into the sea, Bonaparte's chief regret would have been that he had
neither ships nor men with which to avail himself of this new and most
convenient route to India. But so long as their existence was
conducive, or might possibly be made conducive, to his own interests
he certainly desired that the country should prosper, that he might
reap the benefit, and that the people should be happy, or at least
content, so that he need not waste his resources in combating or
providing against hostility on their part. This is the debt, and this
only, that Egypt owes to the goodwill of Bonaparte.
In Gabarty's picture of the library and laboratory we find Frenchmen
of a very different type to the Corsican. To these men and to others
that were yet to come Egypt owes much. Had there been nothing to
counteract their influence Egypt would indeed have had reason to bless
the day the French arrived, for their patient, courteous, kindly
enthusiasm was just what was needed to give the people a real and
lasting impulse towards better things, and as we see the pettiness and
mean ambitions of Bonaparte for ever blocking this the only true road
to the ends he desired, we cannot but feel that, once in the country,
the best thing he ever did for it was to take himself out of it as he
did, stealing away like a thief in the night, deserting the army that
had served him faithfully and well utterly reckless of the fate that
might await them. That, indeed, was good for Egypt.
But the Frenchmen who would and could have benefited the country had
many difficulties to overcome; had they once been in a position to
set themselves seriously to the task, they would have wrought much
good. But they were forced to act as if the happiness of Egypt was to
be attained by casting its social and political conditions in the
mould of the French Republic. To the Egyptian, not yet being able to
fully comprehend the spirit of these men, and seeing nothing in the
French occupation but the worries and vexations with which the tyranny
of Bonaparte overwhelmed them, the only happiness the French could
offer them was to leave them alone. Their ideals and the French were
altogether different and never could agree. The Egyptian could see
this but the French could not, and least of all Bonaparte. What was
possible was that the Egyptians should learn much and benefit much
from French civilisation and its adaptation to the needs and
circumstances of the country and its people. This and nothing more.
But Bonaparte was of all men the least capable of seeing such a fact
as this, and so he kept stretching the Egyptians on a Procrustean bed
of reform, and was wroth that they did not enjoy the experience.
Yet in the daily life of the people around him, if he could but have
seen it as it was, and not simply as it appeared to him to be, there
were ample facts to guide him in the framing of a policy that might
have attracted and so gained, as far as was possible for him to gain
it, the goodwill of the population. Scattered here and there, in and
out of the city, were the ruined palaces and mouldering mosques of the
Caliphs and Sultans of the past, and of the builders the people knew
little more than their names, if so much, and there were tombs of
men, often of the humblest rank, to which the passer-by turned for a
moment to pray with that indifference to the true teaching of his
religion and boundless faith in his own superstitions that is
characteristic of the lower classes in the country. A most significant
fact this survival of the unfittest, for in truth this is the right
adjective to apply to most of these saints of great popularity in
Egypt. There were indeed among these, men, like the Sheikh Gabarty of
whom I have spoken, who were not unworthy of reverent remembrance, but
these would have been the first to forbid the use of prayers to,
instead of those for, the dead. But the Egyptian, like most men, needs
a hero to worship in some form or other, and since he could not by any
possible stretch of the imagination bring himself to look upon the
Caliphs and Sultans and Beys of the past who should have abundantly
supplied his need as worthy of his reverence, he was in a measure
compelled to accept such paltry makeshift heroes as his "saints."
These he endowed with all the virtues that he would have fain seen the
living rulers of the land practise, and adding an abundance of
miracles to their credit, treated them as the heathen of old did, and
as the Hindoos of to-day still do their gods and goddesses, exalted
them into guardian deities for the locality in which they had lived or
were buried. Folly and superstition, and, for the Moslem, rank heresy
and infidelity, yet most significant and instructive for those who
would understand the people thus wandering from the right way. Most
significant, for after all people, however "stupid" and "silly," do
not wander without some reason, without some object to attract them.
Bonaparte could not understand this, and not only could he not
understand it, but he did precisely the same thing himself in dealing
with the people. Like Mr. Worldly-wise-man, he and they were content
to do as other people did without troubling to consider whether there
were not a better way to be found. As for the people, they enjoyed
their bypath as Christian did his--until he awoke to find himself in
the clutches of Giant Despair; but Bonaparte could get no further than
to wonder at the wholly unprofitable roughness of the path he had
chosen, and the utter unwillingness of the people to cross the stile
and follow his way. Had he stopped to ask what were the chief virtues
with which the people endowed their heroes, he would have found that
first, and so far first that all the rest came lagging almost out of
sight, was that wondrous virtue so esteemed throughout all the East,
and to which the Catholic Church lends its applauding patronage--utter
contempt and indifference to the things of this world. The naked
imbecile wandering among the tombs is to the Eastern not a "man
possessed with a devil," but "el Mubarik." El Mubarik! The Blessed!
The man whom God has blessed by freeing his mind from all the cares
and worries of this life. Astounding ignorance! Degrading
superstition! That, my dear reader, is no doubt how you see it. That
is how Bonaparte saw it, and, it may surprise you to hear, that is how
Gabarty the historian saw it. And I will follow such high authorities
so far as to admit that seeing such things as you do and they did,
only "darkly and as through a glass," your view is a very correct one.
But if the people thus err, there is a reason--a reason that you will
never discover so long as you wrap yourself up in your superior
intelligence, and will not stoop to learn from the facts you so glibly
criticise. Not that the solution of this mystery is either recondite
or difficult of attainment. Far from that. If I could present to your
inspection two maps of the world, one whereon was marked by varying
depths of colour those parts of the world wherein the bulk of the
people find life most burthensome and least attractive, and the other
marked in the same way and in the same colours to show where this
reverence for the imbecile and other kindred follies are most rife,
you would say, "But the two maps are the same!" and you would be
correct, for this "lowest of all superstitions" is but the expression
of the hopeless, helpless longing for freedom from care that comes to
those whose lives are one long burthen, unaided and unrelieved by
strength of mind or healthy training. Of what use to appeal to such
with the arguments that might stir the blood and stimulate the
thoughts of the Frenchman, be he chatelain or sans culotte? Surely so
long as Bonaparte and the French could not see these things, neither
he nor they could do much to lift or elevate the people or to render
their lives happy!
Nor if the lower classes were thus effectually shut out from French
influence were the better informed much less widely separated from
them. Children fighting for garden plots and brass-headed nails!
Ruskin might have written that parable to illustrate the aspect which
French ambitions offered to the Ulema. Garden plots and brass-headed
nails! Things useful and desirable in themselves, but not worth
fighting for. "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity!" that is for ever
the song of the Ulema, and though with Pope they hold that "Not a
vanity is given in vain," yet they will not admit that any given
vanity is worth fighting for. They are ready enough to turn aside in
Vanity Fair and to enjoy its vanities, but they never forget that they
are vanities. As the old Arabic has it, "This world is a place of
going, not a place of staying." Why, then, toil and moil for mere
vanities that we must leave behind us? If we labour at all let it be
for treasures, not vanities--treasures that once they are ours are
ours for all time and all eternity, treasures that all the armies of
all the Bonapartes and Sultans and Beys in the world cannot rob us
of--deeds of charity and deeds of piety, kindly words and kindly acts,
mercy and forgiveness.
This is the philosophy of the Egyptian and of the Eastern, as it is
that of Christ Himself. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God and thy
neighbour as thyself." Christian clergymen of all denominations teach
it and preach it, Christian citizens profess it, Christian
civilisation applauds--and ignores it. That most insignificant-looking
of letters, the Greek iota, was sufficient to split the Christian
Church in twain, but this philosophy has never caused a breath or
whisper of dissent or discord. The Christian priest, the Moslem
Sheikh, the Brahman Guru, the Buddhist Lama, all are agreed in this,
in the dogma, though not all in its application. The Eastern takes it
very literally. The European looks upon it as a pretty ideal, good to
be spoken of now and then, but having nothing whatever to do with the
realities of actual life. Whence Plugson of Undershot, whom Carlyle
places on a level with the Chactaw Indians, with, as I think, scant
justice to the Chactaw, whose ideal is, or rather was, a higher one
that Plugson's, seeing that Plugson has no higher ideal than his own
individual interests, whereas the Chactaw always had the honour of his
tribe in mind, and would, if need be, die for that very unsubstantial
figment, whence it is evident that the Chactaw had in reality advanced
towards the highest real civilisation a full stage further than has
Plugson. For all true civilisation is, in spite of certain
philosophers' opinions, the negation of individualism. The very lowest
type of humanity is the man thinking, acting only for himself, like
the brutes of the forest, knowing no ambition, no need, beyond his own
individual wants or wishes. Such men as these are only possible in a
"highly civilised" community, and will be found most abundantly in the
most civilised and among the highest, or at least the wealthiest
classes of these. Among mere savages, by a merciful provision of
nature, such men wage such ruthless war with each other that it is
well-nigh impossible for two to survive. But if these men exist in and
are a product of civilisation, it is only as the scum floating on the
surface of the molten metal, as base, as mean, and worthless as the
dregs that lie at its bottom.
As to the Egyptian, neither a Plugson nor yet a Chactaw, he is rather
to be compared to poor old Abbot Hugo, or some of his patient,
faithful monks, striving in a certain halting, faltering, wholly
incompetent, and yet withal more or less earnest way to do right--very
prone, like Christian himself, to be tempted over the stile into the
pleasant-looking byways of the road, and to start back at the sight of
the lions at Mr. Interpreter's house, and yet, like Faithful, resolute
enough to stand unabashed in the pillories of Vanity Fair and to face
undaunted the terrors of the Valley of the Shadow. How could such men
as these fall down and worship the golden calf of the French Republic?
How could the French, whose farthest horizon was no further off than
the short limits of "the average duration of life," comprehend the
Egyptian?
The first brief fraternising of the two peoples had been as the
momentary intermixing of water and oil suddenly thrown into a common
receptacle; thereafter their inherent mutual repugnance inevitably
drove them apart, and in the calm that followed the riot the
separation became daily more and more complete. Hence it was that
Gabarty and all his kind, while they could admire and wonder at the
marvels the French showed them, and could and did appreciate much of
the law, order, and good discipline they obeyed, yet, weighing these
things in the balance of man's relations to the infinite as they
conceived these to be, rejected them.
It is not to be supposed that the Egyptians measured in any such way
as I have done the difference between themselves and the French, or
that they thought of, or were even aware of, the philosophy by which
they were guided. They simply looked upon the French from a very
simple, practical, everyday point of view, first as usurping
foreigners, and secondly as men with a wholly unaccountable,
extraordinary, and irrational conception of life and its needs; a
people showing a strange indifference to that oldest and most
indisputable of all truths--that man is mortal, and who, giving all
their thoughts and energies to vain theories and ambitions, were
hopelessly bewildered and befogged by their own cleverness, madly
bartering true happiness for a brilliant but worthless imitation; a
people the more mad and the more foolish that there was no need for
them to make such an unprofitable trade. For in the French conception
of civilisation and happiness there was little if anything absolutely
irreconcilable with the Egyptian view. There was no reason why men
should not profit to the utmost from all the arts, sciences,
knowledge, or progress of any kind, but these things should be sought
as the complement and completion of better things and not as the
ultimate good, and they could be sought much better if the people were
not worried by the endless forms and formalities, needless rules and
regulations, and idle and burthensome restraints the French put upon
them.
This was, and is, the Egyptian's ideal of civilisation--not unlike
that of Carlyle and Ruskin: civilisation as a means and not as an
end--an ideal of which we at home seem at last to be getting a faint,
glimmering perception, as evidenced by the victory of the "living
wage" verity over the "supply and demand" falsity--a victory whereby
English civilisation has been advanced a long step towards the
Egyptian and Islamic ideal for which the rabbit-brained "smart set"
and other puerilities and senilities have so much contempt.
Unfortunately the Egyptian fails to see the duty that his ideal
imposes upon him, and thus only too well justifies the criticisms of
those who take the imperfections of the man as those of his ideals.
They did not, and they as yet do not, clearly see that however high
and noble a man's ideal may be, it is useless and vain unless it be
converted into action. The best of seed kept in a glass case for men
to admire is but an unprofitable perfection. That it may be prolific,
beneficial to men, it is needful to take it from its case and plant it
in the soil to grow. So with our ideals--however perfect, however
beautiful, they are worthless unless planted in the soil of that
strenuous effort President Roosevelt has so rightly lauded. Perhaps
some day, when Englishmen in general begin to see these things more
clearly, when we begin to understand that after all the swelling of
the budget and the filling of our individual pockets are not the
highest, nor indeed high aims at all, when we can openly accept and
act upon the creed of Burns, that "the rank is but the guinea's
stamp," then perhaps we may be able to help the Egyptian also to a
higher and purer conception of true civilisation. At present, not
possessing that article, it is scarcely possible for us to transfer it
to or share it with the Egyptian or any one else.