of ambition, the question comes in as to how far it should be used as a
motive for the young, by those who are entrusted with educational
responsibilities. It is one of the most difficult things to decide as
to what extent it is permissible to use motives that are lower than the
highest, because they may possess a greater effectiveness in the case
of immature minds. It is easy enough to say sincerely that one ought
always to appeal to the highest possible motive; but when one is
conscious that the highest motive is quite out of the horizon of the
person concerned, and practically is no motive at all, is it not merely
pedantry to insist upon appealing to the highest motive for one's own
satisfaction? It is not perhaps so difficult where the lower reason for
a course of action is still a sound reason in itself, as, for instance,
if one is trying to help a man out of drunken habits. The highest
motive to appeal to is the truth that in yielding to sensual impulses,
in such a matter, a man is falling short of his best ideal; but a more
practical motive is to point out the loss of health and respectability
that results from the practice. Yet when one appeals to a boy's
ambition, and encourages him to be ambitious, one cannot be quite
certain whether one is not appealing to a false motive altogether. The
excuse for using it is the hope that, when for the sake of ambition he
has learnt diligence and perseverance, he may grow to perceive that the
competitive instinct, which in its barest form is the desire to obtain
desirable things at the expense of others, is not in reality a good
motive at all. With immature characters part of the joy of success is
that others have been beaten, the pride of having carried off a prize
which others are disappointed of obtaining. And if one talks to an
ambitious boy, and tries to inculcate the principle that one should do
one's best without caring about results, one is generally conscious
that he believes it to be only a tiresome professional platitude, the
kind of sentiment in which older people think fit to indulge for the
purpose, if possible, of throwing cold water on innocent enjoyment.
Yet, after all, how very few people there are who do learn the further
lesson! The successful man generally continues to show to the end of
his life a contempt for unsuccessful persons, which is only
good-humoured because of the consciousness of his own triumph; how
rare, again, it is to find an unsuccessful person who does not attempt,
if he can, to belittle the attainments of his successful rival, or who
at least, if he overcomes that temptation from a sense of propriety,
feels entitled to nourish a secret satisfaction at any indication of
failure on the part of the man who has obtained the prize that he
himself coveted in vain. Yet if one has ever seen, as I have, the
astonishing change of both work and even character which may come over
a boy or a young man who is perhaps diffident and indolent, if one can
get him to do a successful piece of work, or push an opportunity in his
way and help him to seize it, one hesitates before ruling out the use
of ambition as an incentive. Perhaps it is uneasy and casuistical
morality to shrink from using this incentive, so long as one faithfully
puts the higher side of the question before a boy as well. But when one
is quite sure that the larger aspect of the case will fall on deaf
ears, and that only the lower stimulus will be absorbed, one is apt to
hesitate. I am inclined, however, to think that such hesitation is on
the whole misplaced, and that in dealing with immature minds one must
be content to use immature motives. There is a temptation to try and
keep the education of people too much in one's own hands, and to feel
oneself to be too responsible in the matter. I have a friend who errs
in this respect, and who is apt to assume too wide a responsibility in
dealing with others, who was gently rebuked by a wise-hearted teacher
of wide and deep experience, who said on one occasion, when
over-anxiety had spoilt the effect of my friend's attempts, that he
ought to be content to leave something for God to do.
But for oneself, one must try to learn the large lesson in the course
of time, to learn that the sense of ambition is often, in reality, only
a sense of personal vanity and self-confidence disguised; and that the
one possible attitude of mind is to go humbly and patiently forward,
desiring the best, labouring faithfully and abundantly, neither seeking
nor avoiding great opportunities, not failing in courage nor giving way
to rash impulses, and realizing the truth of the wise old Greek proverb
that the greatest of all disasters for a man is to be opened and found
to be empty; the wise application of which to life is not to avoid the
occasions of opening, but to make sure that if the opening comes
inevitably, we shall be found not to have devoted ourselves to the
adorning of the casket, but to have piled with careful hands the
treasure high within.
XIV
THE SIMPLE LIFE
There is a good deal of talk just now about "the simple life," and
though I would not go so far as to say that there is a movement in the
direction of it, yet the talk that one hears on many sides proves, at
all events, that people take a certain interest in the question.
Part of it is a pose no doubt; there is a distinguished, and I would
add very charming, lady of my acquaintance, who has the subject
constantly on her lips. Her method of practising simplicity is a
delightful one, as all her methods are. In addition to the three
magnificent residences which she already possesses, she has bought a
cottage in a secluded part of the country; she has spent a large sum of
money in adding to it; it is furnished with that stately austerity
which can only be achieved at great expense. She motors down there,
perhaps three times in the year, and spends three days there, on each
visit, with two or three friends who are equally in love with
simplicity; I was fortunate enough, the other day, to be included in
one of these parties; the only signs of simplicity to the complex mind
were that there were only five courses at dinner, that we drank
champagne out of rather old-fashioned long glasses, and that two goats
were tethered in a corner of the lawn. The goats I understood were the
seal and symbol of the simple life. No use was made of them, and they
were decidedly in the way, but without them life would have been
complicated at once.
When we went off again in the motor, my charming hostess waved her hand
at the little cottage, as we turned the corner, with a sigh, as of one
condemned by a stern fate to abjure the rural felicity which she loved,
and then settled down with delighted zest to discuss her programme of
social engagements for the next few weeks.
It had certainly been very delightful; we had talked all day long; we
had wandered, adoring simplicity, on the village green; we had attended
an evening service in the church; we had consumed exquisitely cooked
meals about an hour before the usual time, because to breakfast at
eight and to dine at seven was all part of the pretty game. I ventured
to ask my hostess how she would like to spend six months in her cottage
comparatively alone, and she replied with deep conviction, "I should
adore it; I would give all I possess to be able to do it." "Then it is
nothing," I said, "but a sense of duty that tears you away?" To which
she made no answer except to shake her head mournfully, and to give me
a penetrating smile.
I cannot help wondering whether the people who talk about the simple
life have any idea what it means; I do not think that my fair hostess's
desire for it is altogether a pose. One who lives, as she does, in the
centre of the fashionable world, must inevitably tire of it from time
to time. She meets the same people over and over again, she hears the
same stories, the same jokes; she is not exactly an intellectual woman,
though she has a taste for books and music; the interest for her, in
the world in which she lives, is the changing relations of people,
their affinities, their aversions, their loves and hates, their warmth
and their coldness. What underlies the shifting scene, the endless
entertainments, the country-house visits, the ebb and flow of society,
is really the mystery of sex. People with not very much to do but to
amuse themselves, with no prescribed duties, with few intellectual
interests, become preoccupied in what is the great underlying force in
the world, the passion of love; the talk that goes on, dull and
tiresome as it appears to an outsider, is all charged with the secret
influence; it is not what is said that matters; it is what is implied
by manner and glance and inflection of tone. This atmosphere of
electrical emotion is, for a good many years of their lives, the native
air of these fair and unoccupied women. Men drift into it and out of
it, and it provides for them often no more than a beautiful and
thrilling episode; they become interested in sport, in agriculture, in
politics, in business; but with women it is different; lovers and
husbands, emotional friendships with other women--these constitute the
business of life for a time; and then perhaps the tranquillizing and
purer love of children, the troubles and joys of growing boys and
girls, come in to fill the mind with a serener and kindlier, though not
less passionate an emotion; and so life passes, and age draws near.
It is thus easier for men to lead the simple life than women, because
they find it natural to grow absorbed in some definite and tangible
occupation; and, after all, the essence of the simple life is that it
can be lived in any milieu and under any circumstances. It does not
require a cottage orne and a motor, though these are not inconsistent
with it, if only they are natural.
I would try to trace what I believe the essence of the simple life to
be; it lies very far down in the spirit, among the roots of life. The
first requisite is a perfect sincerity of character. This implies many
things: it means a joyful temperance of soul, a certain clearness and
strength of temperament. The truly simple person must not be vague and
indeterminate, swayed by desire or shifting emotion; he must meet
others with a candid frankness, he must have no petty ambitions, he
must have wide and genial interests, he must be quick to discern what
is beautiful and wise; he must have a clear and straightforward point
of view; he must act on his own intuitions and beliefs, not simply try
to find out what other people are thinking and try to think it too; he
must in short be free from conventionality. The essence of the really
simple character is that a man should accept his environment and
circle; if he is born in the so-called world, he need not seek to fly
from it. Such a character as I have described has a marvellous power of
evoking what is sincere and simple in other natures; such a one will
tend to believe that other people are as straightforward and genuine as
himself; and he will not be wholly mistaken, because when they are with
him, they will be simple too. The simple person will have a strong, but
not a Pharisaical, sense of duty; he will probably credit other people
with the same sense of duty, and he will not often feel himself bound
to disapprove of others, reserving his indignation for any instances of
cruelty, meanness, falseness, and selfishness that he may encounter. He
will not be suspicious or envious. Yet he will not necessarily be what
is called a religious man, because his religion will be rather vital
than technical. To be religious in the technical sense of the word--to
care, that is, for religious services and solemnities, for priestly
influences, for intricate doctrinal emotions--implies a strong artistic
sense, and is often very far removed from any simplicity of conduct.
But on the other hand the simple man will have a strong sense of
responsibility, a deep confidence in the Will of God and His high
purposes.
And thus the simple man will scarcely be a man of leisure, because
there is so much that he will desire to do, and which he will feel
called upon to do. Whatever he considers to be his work, he will do
with a cheerful energy, which will sustain him far beyond the threshold
of fatigue. His personal wants will be few; he will not care for
spending money for the sake of spending it, but he will be liberal and
generous whenever there is need. He will be uneasy in luxury. He will
be a lover of the open air and of the country, but his aim will be
exercise, and the sense of health and vigour, rather than amusement. He
will never be reduced to asking himself how he is going to spend the
day, for the present day, and a long perspective of days ahead, will
already be full by anticipation. He will take work, amusement, people,
as they come, and he will not be apt to make plans or to arrange
parties, because he will expect to find in ordinary life the amusement
and the interest that he desires. He will be above all things
tender-hearted, kind, and fearless. He will not take fancies to people,
or easily discard a friend; but he will be courteous, kind to all
weakness, compassionate to awkwardness, fond of children, good-natured,
loving laughter and peacefulness; he will not be easily disappointed,
and he will have no time to be fretful, if things do not turn out
exactly as he desires.
I have known such persons in every rank of life. They are the people
who can be depended upon to do what they undertake, to understand the
difficulties of others, to sympathize, to help. The essence of it all
is a great absence of self-consciousness, and such people as I have
described would be genuinely surprised, as a rule, if they were told
that they were living a different life from the lives of others.
This simplicity of nature is not often found in conjunction with very
great artistic or intellectual gifts; but when it is so found, it is
one of the most perfect combinations in the world.
The one thing that is entirely fatal to simplicity is the desire to
stimulate the curiosity of others in the matter. The most conspicuous
instance of this, in literature, is the case of Thoreau, who is by many
regarded as the apostle of the simple life. Thoreau was a man of
extremely simple tastes, it is true. He ate pulse, whatever that may
be, and drank water; he was deeply interested in the contemplation of
nature, and he loved to disembarrass himself of all the apparatus of
life. It was really that he hated trouble more than anything in the
world; he found that by working six weeks in the year, he could earn
enough to enable him to live in a hut in a wood for the rest of the
twelvemonth; he did his household work himself, and his little stock of
money sufficed to buy him food and clothes, and to meet his small
expenses. But Thoreau was indolent rather than simple; and what spoilt
his simplicity was that he was for ever hoping that he would be
observed and admired; he was for ever peeping out of the corner of his
eye, to see if inquisitive strangers were hovering about to observe the
hermit at his contemplation. If he had really loved simplicity best, he
would have lived his life and not troubled himself about what other
people thought of him; but instead of that he found his own simplicity
a deeply interesting and refreshing subject of contemplation. He was
for ever looking at himself in the glass, and describing to others the
rugged, sunbrowned, slovenly, solemn person that he saw there.
And then, too, it was easier for Thoreau to make money than it would be
for the ordinary artisan. When Thoreau wrote his famous maxim, "To
maintain oneself on this earth is not a hardship but a pastime," he did
not add that he was himself a man of remarkable mechanical gifts; he
made, when he was disposed, admirable pencils, he was an excellent
land-surveyor, and an author as well; moreover, he was a celibate by
nature. He would no doubt have found, if he had had a wife and
children, and no aptitude for skilled labour, that he would have had to
work as hard as any one else.
Thoreau had, too, a quality which is in itself an economical thing. He
did not care in the least for society. He said that he would rather
"keep bachelor's hall in hell than go to board in heaven." He was not a
sociable man, and sociability is in itself expensive. He had, it is
true, some devoted friends, but it seems that he would have done
anything for them except see them. He was a man of many virtues and no
vices, but he was most at his ease with faddists. Not that he avoided
his fellow-men; he was always ready to see people, to talk, to play
with children, but on the other hand society was not essential to him.
Yet, just and virtuous as he was, there was something radically
unamiable about him: "I love Henry," one of his friends said of him,
"but I cannot like him; and as for taking his arm I should as soon
think of taking the arm of an elm-tree." He was in fact an egotist with
strong fancies and preferences; and, though he was an ascetic by
preference, he cannot be called a simple-minded man, because the
essence of simplicity is not to ride a hobby hard. He thought and
talked too much about simplicity; and the fact is that simplicity, like
humility, cannot exist side by side with self-consciousness. The moment
that a man is conscious that he is simple and humble, he is simple and
humble no longer. You cannot become humble by reminding people
constantly, like Uriah Heep, of your humility; similarly you cannot
become simple, by doing elaborately, and making a parade of doing, the
things that the simple man would do without thinking about them.
It is almost true to say that the people who are most in love with
simplicity are often the most complicated natures. They become weary of
their own complexity, and they fancy that by acting on a certain
regimen they can arrive at tranquillity of soul. It is in reality just
the other way. One must become simple in soul first, and the simple
setting follows as a matter of course. If a man can purge himself of
ambition, and social pride, and ostentation, and the desire of praise,
his life falls at once into a simple mould, because keeping up
appearances is the most expensive thing in the world; to begin with
eating pulse and drinking water, is as if a man were to wear his hair
like Tennyson, and expect to become a poet thereby. Asceticism is the
sign and not the cause of simplicity. The simple life will become easy
and common enough when people have simple minds and hearts, when they
do the duties that lie ready to their hand, and do not crave for
recognition.
Neither can simplicity be brought about by a movement. There is nothing
which is more fatal to it than that people should meet to discuss the
subject; it can only be done by individuals, and in comparative
isolation. A friend of mine dreamed the other day that she was
discussing the subject of mission services with a stranger; she
defended them in her dream with great warmth and rhetoric: when she had
done, her companion said, "Well, to tell you the truth, I don't believe
in people being inspired IN ROWS." This oracular saying has a profound
truth in it--that salvation is not to be found in public meetings; and
that to assemble a number of persons, and to address them on the
subject of simplicity, is the surest way to miss the charm of that
secluded virtue.
The worst of it is that the real, practical, moral simplicity of which
I have been speaking is not an attractive thing to a generation fond of
movement and excitement; what they desire is a picturesque
mise-en-scene, a simplicity which comes as a little pretty interlude to
busy life; they do not desire it in its entirety and continuously. They
would find it dull, triste, ennuyant.
Thus it must fall into the hands of individuals to practise it, who are
sincerely enamoured of quietness and peace. The simple man must have a
deep fund of natural joy and zest; he must bring his own seasoning to
the plain fare of life; but if he loves the face of nature, and books,
and his fellow-men, and above all, work, there is no need for him to go
out into the wilderness in pursuit of a transcendental ideal. But those
whose spirits flag and droop in solitude; who open their eyes upon the
world, and wonder what they will find to do; who love talk and laughter
and amusement; who crave for alcoholic mirth, and the song of them that
feast, had better make no pretence of pursuing a spirit which haunts
the country lane and the village street, the rough pasture beside the
brimming stream, the forest glade, with the fragrant breeze blowing
cool out of the wood. Simplicity, to be successfully attained, must be
the result of a passionate instinct, not of a picturesque curiosity;
and it is useless to lament that one has no time to possess one's soul,
if, when one visits the innermost chamber, there is nothing there but
cobwebs and ugly dust.
XV
GAMES
It requires almost more courage to write about games nowadays than it
does to write about the Decalogue, because the higher criticism is
tending to make a belief in the Decalogue a matter of taste, while to
the ordinary Englishman a belief in games is a matter of faith and
morals.
I will begin by saying frankly that I do not like games; but I say it,
not because any particular interest attaches to my own dislikes and
likes, but to raise a little flag of revolt against a species of social
tyranny. I believe that there are a good many people who do not like
games, but who do not dare to say so. Perhaps it may be thought that I
am speaking from the point of view of a person who has never been able
to play them. A vision rises in the mind of a spectacled owlish man,
trotting feebly about a football field, and making desperate attempts
to avoid the proximity of the ball; or joining in a game of cricket,
and fielding a drive with the air of a man trying to catch an insect on
the ground, or sitting in a boat with the oar fixed under his chin,
being forced backwards with an air of smiling and virtuous confusion. I
hasten to say that this is not a true picture. I arrived at a
reasonable degree of proficiency in several games: I was a competent,
though not a zealous, oar; I captained a college football team, and I
do not hesitate to say that I have derived more pleasure from football
than from any other form of exercise. I have climbed some mountains,
and am even a member of the Alpine Club; I may add that I am a keen,
though not a skilful, sportsman, and am indeed rather a martyr to
exercise and open air. I make these confessions simply to show that I
do not approach the subject from the point of view of a sedentary
person but indeed rather the reverse. No weather appears to me to be
too bad to go out in, and I do not suppose there are a dozen days in
the year in which I do not contrive to get exercise.
But exercise in the open air is one thing, and games are quite another.
It seems to me that when a man has reached an age of discretion, he
ought no longer to need the stimulus of competition, the desire to hit
or kick balls about, the wish to do such things better than other
people. It seems to me that the elaborate organization of athletics is
a really rather serious thing, because it makes people unable to get on
without some species of excitement. I was staying the other day at a
quiet house in the country, where there was nothing particular to do;
there was not, strange to say, even a golf course within reach. There
came to stay there for a few days an eminent golfer, who fell into a
condition of really pitiable dejection. The idea of taking a walk or
riding a bicycle was insupportable to him; and I think he never left
the house except for a rueful stroll in the garden. When I was a
schoolmaster it used to distress me to find how invariably the parents
of boys discoursed with earnestness and solemnity about a boy's games;
one was told that a boy was a good field, and really had the makings of
an excellent bat; eager inquiries were made as to whether it was
possible for the boy to get some professional coaching; in the case of
more philosophically inclined parents it generally led on to a
statement of the social advantages of being a good cricketer, and often
to the expression of a belief that virtue was in some way indissolubly
connected with keenness in games. For one parent who said anything
about a boy's intellectual interests, there were ten whose
preoccupation in the boy's athletics was deep and vital.