“Our elaborate schemes for helping people are making us forget,” said
the Doctor one day, “that the one thing human beings want is human
sympathy.”
To this I assented readily.
“In the first place,” she continued, with a thoughtful air, “through all
this machinery of leagues and clubs and organizations we are beginning
to lose our sense of individual responsibility. As soon as we find an
act of charity that ought to be done, we start a society to do it for
us.”
“But when,” I protested, “has a sense of individual responsibility in
regard to the poor been so strong? Social problems have never been so
closely studied as they are to-day. Look at the seriousness of our young
men and women! Think of Barnet House, and the College Settlement!”
“Yes, think of them,” said the Doctor. “The only trouble with the
residents at Barnet House is that they have too great a sense of
responsibility about other people’s lives, and too little about their
own. Society has, I presume, as just a claim to a man’s best work as the
poor have to his interest. Those young men do not belong to society at
all, because they do not share its burdens. ‘Two men I honour, and no
third,’—the man who works with his hands, and the man who works at a
necessary profession. But the man who gives up all regular occupation
just out of sheer benevolence I do not understand.
“And I hope,” the Doctor added grimly, “that these young socialists may
be spared to share the labour of the era they are trying to usher in.
There will be no more of the _dolce-far-niente_ of doing good then, only
pick-axes and spades all round, with maybe an hour off at noon! If
socialism means work by all for all, I fail to see why those who
advocate it should devote themselves to an existence made of a little
study, a little lecturing, and much visiting, for scientific purposes,
of popular amusements.”
“Do you consider that just?” I demanded. “I do not know any men who work
harder than some of those residents at Barnet House. Whether their
effort is mistaken is not for us to decide.”
“No, I was not fair,” said the Doctor, penitently, “but I have been
meditating a long time on the relation of the man with a mission to the
public at large. It seems to me that no one ought to throw the burden of
his support on benevolent societies. You can’t take doing good as a
profession: you have got to do good work. We have no right to palm off
an interest in the lives of others as a substitute for living
ourselves.”
“You have given much criticism, and very telling criticism of our
methods of work,” I remarked in a tone that anger made only the more
polite. “Now won’t you suggest some way in which things ought to be
done?”
“I haven’t finished my criticism yet,” said the Doctor, undaunted. “I am
finding fault with myself too. In a way we all fail, and to go back to
what I said first, it is largely because of a lack of sympathy. We
forget that this is all-important, and keep thrusting our ideals between
us and human beings. Each one of us has an abstract standard to which
mankind must conform. It is equally fatal when the idea is cleanliness
and when it is godliness. I suppose that it will take a thousand years
for us to learn that we are responsible to humanity and not to notions.”
My silence did not indicate that I had nothing to say.
“The trouble with the world is,” the Doctor went on, “that it has
suffered from too much lofty thought. If there had been less of that,
there might have been more lofty action, and closer sympathy between man
and man. We shouldn’t be allowed to try to impress on our fellow-beings
pure, cold abstract notions. The only legitimate way of presenting our
theories to the world is by working them out in our own lives. We
haven’t any right to ideals for other people. I am more and more
convinced that we ought to keep our thoughts to ourselves, and give the
world simply the benefit of our actions.”
“That is the first constructive suggestion that you have given,” I
muttered. “It is good. I like it.”
“We are making our problem too hard.” The Doctor was very much in
earnest as she said this. “It is perfectly simple, after all. We must
take care of people ourselves. No organization should be allowed to
relieve us of our share of responsibility. The distress of those who
suffer must remain with every man a standing personal problem. So long
as the poor are with us, and any one of them needs a cup of cold water,
it is for us to give it, and with our own hands.”
“That idea is very beautiful,” I commented, with hypocritical sweetness.
“Human sympathy is the one thing we all want. If one cultivate it long
enough, it may become so far-reaching as to extend to one’s
fellow-philanthropists, and even to one’s friends!”
This was unkind, but the Doctor deserved it.