MUSHROOMS ON THE MOOR

by

F. W. BOREHAM

Author of 'Mountains in the Mist, ' 'The Other Side of the Hill, ' 'The Golden Milestone, ' 'The Silver Shadow, ' 'The Luggage of Life, ' 'Faces in the Fire, ' etc. , etc. 

The Abingdon PressNew York ------ Cincinnati

First American Edition Printed May, 1919Reprinted August, 1919; May, 1920; July 1921

CONTENTS

PART I

CHAP. 

 I. A SLICE OF INFINITY II. READY-MADE CLOTHES III. THE HIDDEN GOLD IV. 'SUCH A LOVELY BITE!' V. LANDLORD AND TENANT VI. THE CORNER CUPBOARD VII. WITH THE WOLVES IN THE WILD VIII. DICK SUNSHINE IX. FORTY! X. A WOMAN'S REASON

PART II

 I. THE HANDICAP II. GOG AND MAGOG III. MY WARDROBE IV. 'PITY MY SIMPLICITY!' V. TUNING FROM THE BASS VI. A FRUITLESS DEPUTATION VII. TRAMP! TRAMP! TRAMP! VIII. THE FIRST MATE

PART III

CHAP. 

 I. WHEN THE COWS COME HOME II. MUSHROOMS ON THE MOOR III. ONIONS IV. ON GETTING OVER THINGS V. NAMING THE BABY VI. THE MISTRESS OF THE MARGIN VII. LILY

BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION

I have allowed the Mushrooms on the Moor to throw the glamour of theirname over the entire volume because, in some respects, they are themost typical and representative things in it. They express so littlebut suggest so much! What fun we had, in the days of auld lang syne, when we scoured the dewy fields in search of them! And yet how small aproportion of our enjoyment the mushrooms themselves represented! Ourflushed cheeks, our prodigious appetites, and our boisterous merrimenttold of gains immensely greater than any that our baskets could haveheld. What a contrast, for example, between mushrooms from the moor onthe one hand and mushrooms from the market on the other! What memoriesof the soft summer mornings; the fresh and fragrant air; the diffusedand misty sunshine; the sparkle of the dew on the tall wisps ofspeargrass; the beaded and shining cobwebs; the scamper, barefooted, across the glittering green! It was part of childhood's wild romance. And, in the sterner days that have followed those tremendous frolics, we have learned that life is full of just such suggestive things. As Iglance back upon the years that lie behind me, I find that they havebeen almost equally divided between two hemispheres. But I havediscovered that, under any stars, There's part o' the sun in an apple; There's part o' the moon in a rose; There's part o' the flaming Pleiades In every leaf that grows. 

And I shall reckon this book no failure if some of the ideas that Ihave tried to suggest are found to point at all steadily to thatconclusion. 

FRANK W. BOREHAM. 

HOBART, TASMANIA, JUNE, 1915. 

PART I

I

A SLICE OF INFINITY

I

Really, as I sit here in this quiet study, and glance round at thebooks upon the shelves, I can scarcely refrain from laughing at the funwe have had together. And to think of the way in which they came intomy possession! It seems like a fairy story or a chapter from romance. If a man wants to spend an hour or so as delightfully as it is possibleto spend it, let him invite to his fireside some old and valued friend, the companion of many a frolic and the sharer of many a sorrow; let himseat his old comrade there in the place of honour on the opposite sideof the hearth, and then let them talk. 'Do you remember, Tom, the waywe met for the first time?' 'My word, I do! Shall I ever forget it?'And Tom slaps his knee at the memory of it, and they enjoy a long andhearty laugh together. It is not that the circumstances under whichthey met were so ludicrous or dramatic; it is that they were socommonplace. It seems, on looking back, the oddest chance in the worldthat first brought them together, the merest whim of chance, theveriest freak of circumstance; and yet how all life has taken itscolour and drawn its enrichment from that casual meeting! Theyhappened to enter the same compartment of a railway train; or they satnext each other on the tramcar; or they walked home together from apolitical meeting; or they caught each other admiring the same rose ata flower show. Neither sought the other; neither felt the slightestdesire for the other; neither knew, until that moment, of the existenceof the other; and yet there it is! They met; and out of thatapparently accidental meeting there has sprung up a friendship thatmany changes cannot change, and a love that many waters cannot quench. Either would cross all the continents and oceans of the world to-day tofind the other; but as they remember how they met for the first time itseems too queer to be credible. And they lie back in their easy chairsand laugh again. 

II

That is why I laugh at my books. Some day I intend to draw up a listof them and divide them into classes. In one class I shall put thebooks that I bought, once upon a time, because I was given tounderstand that they were the right sort of books to have. Everybodyelse had them; and my shelves would therefore be scarcely decentwithout them. I purchased them, accordingly, and they have stood onthe shelves there ever since. As far as I know they have done nobodythe slightest harm in all their long untroubled lives. Indeed, theyhave imparted such an air of gravity, and such an odour of sanctity, tothe establishment as must have had a steadying effect on their lesssombre companions. But it is not at these formidable volumes that I amlaughing. I would not dare. I glance at them with reverential awe, and am more than half afraid of them. Then, again, there are otherbooks that I bought because I felt that I needed them. And so I did, more than perhaps I guessed when I bore them proudly home. Glorioustimes I have had with them. I look up at them gratefully and lovingly. It is not at these that I am laughing. But there are others, old andtrusted friends, that came into my life in the oddest possible way. Ido not mean that I stole them. I mean rather that they stole me. Theyseemed to pounce out at me, and before I knew what had happened Ibelonged to them: I certainly did not seek them. In some cases I neverheard of their existence until after they became my own. They havesince proved invaluable to me, and I can scarcely review our longcompanionship without emotion. Yet when I glance up at them, andremember the whimsical way in which we met for the first time, I canscarce restrain my laughter. 

III

It was like this. Years ago I went to an auction sale. A library wasbeing submitted to the hammer. The books were all tied up in lots. The work had evidently been done by somebody who knew as much aboutbooks as a Hottentot knows about icebergs. John Bunyan was tiedtightly to Nat Gould, and Thomas Carlyle was firmly fastened to CharlesGarvice. I looked round; took a note of the numbers of those lots thatcontained books that I wanted, and waited for the auctioneer to get tobusiness. In due time I became the purchaser of half a dozen lots. Ihad bought six books that I wanted, and thirty that I didn't. Now thequestion arose: What shall I do with these thirty waifs and strays? Iglanced over them and took pity on them. Many of them dealt withmatters in which I had never taken the slightest interest. But werethey to blame for that? or was I? I saw at once that the fault wasentirely mine, and that these unoffending volumes had absolutelynothing to be ashamed of. I vowed that I would read the lot, and Idid. From one or two of them I derived as far as I know, no profit atall. But these were the exceptions. Some of these volumes have beenthe delight of my life during all the days of my pilgrimage. And as Ilook tenderly up at them, as they stand in their very familiar placesbefore me, I salute them as the two old comrades saluted each otheracross the hearthstone. But I cannot help laughing at the odd mannerof our first acquaintance. It was thus that I learned one of the mostvaluable lessons that experience ever taught me. It is sometimes afine thing to sample infinity. 

IV

When I was a small boy I dreaded the policeman; when I grew older Ifeared the bookseller. And as the years go by I find that my dread ofthe policeman has quite evaporated, but my fear of the bookseller growsupon me. I had an idea as a boy that one day a policeman, mistaking myidentity, would snatch me up and hurl me into some horrid littledungeon, where I might languish for many a long day. But since I havegrown up I have discovered that it is only the bookseller who does thatsort of thing. And in his case he does it deliberately and of maliceaforethought. It is no case of mistaken identity; he knows who youare, and he knows you are innocent. But he has his dungeon ready. Thebookseller is a very dangerous person, and every member of thecommunity should guard against his blandishments. It is not that hewill sell you too many books. He will probably not sell you half asmany as are good for you. But he will sell you the wrong books. Hewill sell you the books you least need, and keep on his own shelves theintellectual pabulum for which your soul is starving. And all with aview to getting you at last into his wretched little dungeon. See howhe goes about it. A friend of yours goes to the West Indies. Yousuddenly wake up to the fact that you know very little about thatwonderful region. You go to your bookseller and ask for the latestreliable work on the West Indies. You buy it, and he, the rascal, takes a mental note of the fact. Next time you walk into the shop heis at you like a flash. 

'Good afternoon, sir. You are specially interested, I know, in theWest Indies. We have a very fine thing coming out now in monthly parts. . . '

And so on. His attribution to you of special interest in the WestIndies is no empty flattery. The book you bought on your first visithas charmed you, and you are most deeply and sincerely interested inthose fascinating islands. You order the monthly parts and theinterest deepens. The bookseller does the thing so slyly that you donot notice that he is boxing you up in the West Indies. He is doing insober fact what the policeman did in childish imagination. He isdriving us into a blind alley, and, unless we are very careful, he willhave us cribb'd, cabin'd, and confined before we know where we are. 

V

It was my experience in the auction-room that saved me. When I hadread all these books which I should never have bought if I could havehelped it, I discovered the folly of buying books that interest you. If a book appeals to me at first sight it is probably because I know agood deal about the subject with which it deals. But, as against that, see how many subjects there are of which I know nothing at all! Andjust look at all these books that have no attraction for me! And tellme this: Why do they not appeal to me? Only one answer is possible. They do not appeal to me because I am so grossly, wofully, culpablyignorant of the subjects whereof they treat. If, therefore, mybookseller approaches me, with a nice new book under his arm, andobserves coaxingly that he knows I am interested in history, I alwaysask him to be good enough to show me the latest work on psychology. Ifhe reminds me of my fondness for astronomy, I ask him for a handbook ofbotany. If he refers to my predilection for agriculture, I inquire ifthere is anything new in the way of poetry; and if he politely refersto my weakness for the West Indies, I ask him to bring me somethingdealing with Lapland. The bookseller must be circumvented, defeated, and crushed at any cost. He is too clever at trapping us in his narrowlittle cell. If a man wants to feel that the world is wide, and a goodplace to live in, he must be for ever and for ever sampling infinity. He must shun the books that he dearly wants to buy, and buy the bookshe would do anything to shun. 

VI

Yes, I bought thirty-six books that day in the auction-room; six that Iwanted and thirty that I didn't. And some of those thirty volumes havebeen the charmers of my solitude and the classics of my soul eversince. I do not advise any man to rush off to the nearest auction martand repeat my experiment. We must not gamble with life. Infinity mustbe sampled intelligently. But, if a man is to keep himself alive in aworld like this, infinity must be sampled. Like a dog on a countryroad I must poke into as many holes as I can. If I am naturally fondof music, I had better study mining. If I love painting, I shall bewise to go in for gardening. If I glory in the seaside, I must make apoint of climbing mountains and scouring the bush. If I am attached tothe things just under my nose, I must be careful to read books dealingwith distant lands. If I am deeply interested in contemporary affairs, I must at once read the records of the days of long ago and explore theannals of the splendid past. I must be faithful to old friends, but Imust get to know new people and to know them well. If I hold to oneopinion, I must studiously cultivate the acquaintance of men who holdthe opposite view, and investigate the hidden recesses of their mindswith scientific and painstaking diligence. Above all must I beconstantly sampling infinity in matters of faith. If I find that theEpistles are gaining a commanding influence upon my mind, I must atonce set out to explore the prophets. If I find some special phase oftruth powerfully attracting me, I must, without shunning it, payincreasing attention to all other aspects. 'The Lord has yet moretruth to break from out His Word!' said John Robinson; and I must tryto find it. Mr. Goodman is a splendid fellow; but he fell in love withone lonely little truth one day, and now he never thinks or reads orpreaches of any other. It would be his salvation, and the salvation ofhis people, if he would set out to climb the peaks that have noattraction for him. He would find, when he stood on their sunlitsummits, that they too are part of God's great world. He would havethe time of his life if he would only commence to sample infinity. Hispeople are accustomed to seeing him every now and again in a new suitof clothes. If he begins to-day to sample infinity, they will nextweek experience a fresh sensation. They will see the same suit ofclothes with a new man inside it. 

II

READY-MADE CLOTHES

Carlyle, as everybody knows, once wrote a Philosophy of Clothes, andcalled it _Sartor Resartus_. He did his work so thoroughly and soexhaustively and so well that, from that day to this, nobody else hascared to tackle the theme. It is high time, however, that it waspointed out that with one important aspect of his tremendous subject hedoes not attempt to deal. Surely there ought to have been a chapter onReady-made Clothes!

I am surprised that Henry Drummond never drew attention to the glaringomission, for, if Drummond hated one thing more than another, heloathed and detested ready-made clothes. They were his pet aversion. Ready-made clothes, he used to say, were things that were made to fiteverybody, and they fitted nobody. Men are not made by machinery andin sizes; and it follows as a natural consequence that clothes that areso made will not fit men. The man who is an exact duplicate of thetailor's model has not yet been born. How Carlyle's omission escapedthe censure of Drummond I cannot imagine. It is true that Drummond wasnot particularly attracted by Carlyle; he preferred Emerson. I amcertain that if Drummond had read _Sartor Resartus_ at all carefully hewould have exposed the discrepancy, and Carlyle is therefore to becongratulated on a very narrow escape. 

Drummond's hatred of ready-made clothes is the essential thing abouthim. I happened to be lecturing on Drummond the other evening, and Ifelt it my duty to point out that Drummond would take his place inhistory, not as a scientist nor as an evangelist, nor as a traveller, nor as an author, but as the uncompromising and relentless assailant ofready-made clothes. Unless you grasp this, you will never understandhim. He scorned all affectations and imitations. He would adopt nostyle of dress simply because it was usual under certain conditions. 'He was, ' as an eye-witness of his ordination remarks, 'the last manwhom you could place by the woman's canon of dress. And yet his dresswas a marvel of adaptation to the part he happened to be playing. Onhis ordination day, when most men assume a garb severely clerical, hewas dressed like a country squire, thus proclaiming to fathers andbrethren, and to all the world, that he was not going to allowordination to play havoc with his chosen career. Now this was typical, and it is its typical quality that is important. It applied not todress alone. It applied to speech. Drummond would affect no style ofaddress simply on the ground that it was usual upon certain platformsor in certain rostrums. Did it fit him? Was it simple, natural, easy, effective? If not, he would not use it. Nor would he adopt a courseof procedure simply because it was customary and was consideredcorrect. If, to him, it seemed like wearing ready-made clothes, hewould have none of it. Here you have the key to his whole life. Everything had to fit him like a glove, or he would have nothing to dowith it. His scientific lectures, his evangelistic addresses, hispersonal interviews with students, even his public prayers, weremodelled on no regulation standard, on no established precedent; theywere couched in the language, and expressed in the style, that mostperfectly suited his own charming and magnetic individuality. 

Professor James, of Harvard, said of Henri Bergson, the Parisianphilosopher, that his utterance fitted his thought like that elasticsilk underclothing which follows every movement of the skin. Drummondwould have considered that the ideal. Generally speaking, he wasimpervious to criticism; but if you had told him that a single phraserang hollow, or that some expression had savoured of artificiality, orthat even a gesture appeared like affectation, you would have stabbedhim to the quick. It was a great question in his day as to whether hewas orthodox or heterodox. Drummond regarded all standards oforthodoxy and of heterodoxy as so many tailors' models. Orthodoxy andheterodoxy stand related to truth just as those wonderful wickerworkstands and plaster busts that adorn every dressmaker's establishmentstand related to the grace and beauty of the female form. If you hadasked Drummond to what school of thought he belonged, he would havetold you that he never wore ready-made clothes. 

I tremble lest, one of these days, these notions of mine on the subjectof ready-made clothes should assume the proportions of a sermon, anddemand pulpit utterance. There will at any rate be no difficulty inproviding them with a text. The classical instance of the contemptuousrejection of ready-made clothing was, of course, David's refusal towear Saul's armour. There is a world of significance in that old-worldstory. Saul's armour is a very fine thing--_for Saul_! But if Davidfeels that he can do better work with a sling, then, in the name of allthat is reasonable, give him a sling! If he has to fight Goliath, whyhamper him with ready-made clothes? I began by saying that Carlyleomitted to deal, in _Sartor Resartus_, with this profound branch of hissubject. But he saw the importance of it for all that. In his_Frederick the Great_, he tells us how the young prince's iron-handedfather employed a learned university professor to teach the boytheology. The doctor dosed his youthful pupil with creeds andcatechisms until his brain whirled with meaningless tags and phrases. And in recording the story Carlyle bursts out upon the dry-as-dustprofessor. 'In heaven's name, ' he cries, 'teach the boy nothing atall, or else teach him something that he will know, as long as helives, to be eternally and indisputably true!'

Now what is this fine outburst of thunderous wrath but an emphaticprotest against the use of ready-made clothes? A man's faith shouldfit him like the clothes for which he has been most carefully measured, if not like the elastic silk to which the Harvard professor refers. Aman might as well try to wear his father's clothes as try to wear hisfather's faith. It will never really fit him. There is a greatexpression near the end of the brief Epistle of Jude that always seemsto me very striking. 'But ye, beloved, ' says the writer, 'building upyourselves on your most holy faith. ' That is the only satisfactory wayof building--to build on your own site. If I build my house on anotherman's piece of ground, it is sure to cause trouble sooner or later. Build your own character on your own faith, says the apostle; and thereis sound sense in the injunction. It is better for me to build a verymodest little house of my own on a little bit of land that reallybelongs to me than to build a palace on somebody else's soil. It isbetter for me to build up my character, very unpretentiously, perhaps, on my own faith, than to erect a much more imposing structure onanother man's creed. That is the philosophy of ready-made clothes, disguised under a slight change of metaphor. 

I have heard that some people spend their time in church inspectingother people's clothes. If that is so, they must be profoundlyimpressed by the amazing proportion of misfits. The souls of thousandsare quite obviously clad in ready-made garments. Here is the spirit ofa bright young girl decked out in all the contents of her grandmother'sspiritual wardrobe. The clothes fitted the grandmother perfectly; theold lady looked charming in them; but the grand-daughter looksridiculous. I was once at a testimony meeting. The thing that mostimpressed me was the continual repetition of certain phrases. Speakerafter speaker rang the changes on the same stereotyped expressions. Isaw at once that I had fallen among a people who went in for ready-madeclothes. 

The thing takes even more objectionable forms. Those who are half asfond as I am of Mark Rutherford will have already recalled Frank Palmerin _Clara Hopgood_. 'He accepted willingly, ' we are told, 'thehousehold conclusions on religion and politics, but they were notproperly his, for he accepted them merely as conclusions and withoutthe premisses, and it was often even a little annoying to hear himexpress some free opinion on religious questions in a way which showedthat it was not a growth, but something picked up. ' Everybody who hasread the story remembers the moral tragedy that followed. What elsecould you expect? There is always trouble if a man builds his house onanother man's site. The souls of men were never meant to be attired inready-made clothes. Somebody has finely said that Truth must be bornagain in the secret silence of each individual life. 

For the matter of that, the philosophy of ready-made clothes applies asmuch to unbelief as to faith. Now and then one meets a mind distractedby genuine doubt, and it is refreshing and stimulating to grapple withits problems. One respects the doubter because the doubt fits him likethe elastic silk; it seems a part and parcel of his personality. Butat other times one can see at a glance that the doubter is all toggedout in ready-made clothes, and, like a bird in borrowed plumes, isinordinately proud of them. Here are the same old questions, put inthe same old way, and with a certain effrontery that knows nothing ofinner anguish or even deep sincerity. One feels that his visitor hasseen this gaudy mental outfit cheaply displayed at the street corner, and has snapped it up at once in order to impress you with the gorgeousspectacle. How often, too, one is made to feel that the blatancy ofthe infidel lecturer, or the flippancy of the sceptical debater, issimply a matter of ready-made clothes. The awful grandeur of thesubjects of which they treat has evidently never appealed to them. They are merely echoing quibbles that are as old as the hills; they arewearing clothes that may have fitted Hobbes, Paine, or Voltaire, butthat certainly were not made to fit their more meagre stature. Doubtis a very human and a very sacred thing, but the doubt that is merelyassumed is, of all affectations, the most repellent. 

If some suspicious reader thinks that I am overestimating the danger ofwearing ready-made clothes, I need only remind him that even suchgigantic humans as James Chalmers, of New Guinea, and Robert LouisStevenson feared that ready-made clothes might yet stand between theChurch and her conquest of the world. Some of the missionariesinsisted in clothing the natives of New Guinea in the garb of OldEngland, but Chalmers protested, and protested vigorously. 'I amopposed to it, ' he exclaimed. 'My experience is that clothing nativesis nearly as bad as introducing spirits among them. Wherever clothinghas been introduced, the natives are disappearing before variousdiseases, especially consumption, and I am fully convinced that thesame will happen in New Guinea. Our civilization, whatever it is, isunfitted for them in their present state, and no attempt should be madeto force it upon them. '

With this, Robert Louis Stevenson most cordially concurred. Nobody whoknows him will suspect Stevenson of any lack of gallantry, but healways eyed the arrival of the missionary's wife with a certain amountof apprehension. 'The married missionary, ' says Stevenson, 'may offerto the native what he is much in want of--a higher picture of domesticlife; but the woman at the missionary's elbow tends to keep him intouch with Europe, and out of touch with Polynesia, and threatens toperpetuate, and even to ingrain, parochial decencies far bestforgotten. The mind of the lady missionary tends to be continuallybusied about dress. She can be taught with extreme difficulty to thinkany costume decent but that to which she grew accustomed on ClaphamCommon; and to gratify her prejudice, the native is put to uselessexpense, his mind is tainted with the morbidities of Europe, and hishealth is set in danger. ' We remember the pride with which poor JohnWilliams, the martyr missionary of Erromanga, viewed the introductionof bonnets among the women of Raratonga; but it was not the greatest ofhis triumphs after all. The bonnets have vanished long ago, but thefragrant influence of John Williams abides perpetually. We sometimesforget that our immaculate tweed trousers and our dainty skirts andblouses are no essential part of the Christian gospel. As a matter offact, that gospel was first revealed to a people who knew nothing ofsuch trappings. We do not necessarily hasten the millennium byintroducing among untutored races a carnival of ready-made clothes. 

And it is just as certain that you do not bring the soul nearer to itshighest goal by forcing on it a fashion for which it is totallyunsuited. And here I come back to Drummond. During his last illnessat Tunbridge Wells, he remarked that, at the age of twelve, he made aconscientious study of Bonar's _God's Way of Peace_. 'I fear, ' hesaid, 'that the book did me more harm than good. I tried to force myinner experience into the mould represented by that book, and it wasimpossible. ' In one of Moody's after-meetings in London, Drummond wasdealing with a young girl who was earnestly seeking the Saviour. Atlast he startled her by exclaiming, 'You must give up reading James's_Anxious Enquirer_. ' She wondered how he had guessed that she had beenreading it; but he had detected from her conversation that she wasmaking his own earlier mistake. She was trying to think as John AngellJames thought, to weep as he wept, and to find her way to faithprecisely as he found his. Drummond told her to read nothing but theNew Testament, and, he said later on, 'A fortnight of that put herright!'

There lies the whole secret. Our souls no more resemble each otherthan our bodies; they are not made in a mould and turned out by themillion. No two are exactly alike. Ready-made clothes will neverexactly fit. Bonar and James, Bunyan and Law, Doddridge and Wesley, Müller and Spurgeon, may help me amazingly. They may help me byshowing me how they--each for himself--found their way into thepresence of the Eternal and, like Christian at the Palace Beautiful, were robed and armed for pilgrimage. But if they lead me to supposethat I must experience their sensations, enjoy their elations, passthrough their depressions, struggle and laugh and weep and sing just asthey did, they have done me serious damage. They have led me away fromthose secret chambers in which the King adorns the soul in beautifuland comely garments, and they have left me a mere wearer of ready-madeclothes. 

III

THE HIDDEN GOLD

I was enjoying the very modest but very satisfying pleasures of a ridein a tramcar when the following adventure befell me. It was a bright, sunny winter's day; the scenery on either hand was extremelydelightful; and I was cogitating upon the circumstance that so muchfelicity could be obtained in return for so small an expenditure. Butmy admiration of mountain and river and bush was suddenly and rudelyinterrupted. A lady fellow passenger reported that, since entering thecar, three sovereigns had been extracted from her purse. That she hadthem when she stepped into the car she knew for certain, for sheremembered seeing them when she opened the purse to pay her fare. Shehad taken out the two pennies, inserted the ticket in their place, andreturned the purse to her handbag, which had been lying on the seatbeside her. The inspector had now boarded the car; she had opened herpurse to take out the ticket, and, lo, the gold had gone! It was amost embarrassing situation. I was ruefully speculating as to how Ishould again face my congregation after being shadowed by such a darksuspicion. When, as abruptly as it had arisen, the mystery happilycleared. With the most profuse apologies, the lady explained that itwas her birthday; her daughter had that morning presented her with anew purse; the compartments of this receptacle were more elaborate andingenious than she had noticed; and she had found the sovereignsreposing in a division of the purse which had eluded her previousobservation. There was no more to be said. We wished the poorbeflustered soul many happy returns of the day; she left the car at thenext corner; and I once more abandoned myself to the charms of thelandscape. 

Now, this sort of thing is very common. We are continually fancyingthat we have been robbed of the precious things we still possess. Theold lady who searches everywhere for the spectacles that adorn hertemples; the clerk who ransacks the office for the pen behind his ear;and the boy who charges his brother with the theft of the pen-knifethat lurks in the mysterious depths of his own fearful and wonderfulpocket--these are each of them typical of much. 

I happened the other evening to saunter into a room in which a certaindebating society was holding its weekly meeting. The paper out ofwhich the discussion arose had been read before my arrival. But Igathered from the remarks of the speakers that it had dealt with ascientific subject, and that questions of antiquity, geology, andevolution were involved. After the fashion of debating societies, theentire universe was promptly subjected to a complete overhaul. If thetruth must be told, I am afraid that I must confess to having forgottenthe eloquent contentions of the different speakers; but out of thehurly-burly of that wordy conflict one utterance comes back to me. Itappealed to me at the time as being very curious, very pathetic, andvery striking. It made upon my mind an indelible impression. A tallyoung fellow rose, and, in the shortest speech of the debate, impartedto the discussion the only touch of real feeling by which it wasillumined. I do not know what it was that had struck so deep a chordin his soul and set it all vibrating. It is wonderful how some straysound or sight or scent will sometimes summon to the mind a rush ofsacred memories. After a preliminary platitude or two, this speakersuddenly referred to the connexion between science and faith. His eyesflashed with manifest feeling; his whole being took on the tone of aman in deadly earnest; his voice quivered with emotion. In one vividsentence he graphically described his aged grandfather as the old mandonned his spectacles and devoutly read--his faith unclouded by anyshadow of doubt--his morning chapter from the well-worn, large-typeBible. And then, with a ring of such genuine passion that it soundedto me like the cry of a creature in pain, he exclaimed, 'And, gentlemen, I would give both my hands, and give them cheerfully, if Icould believe as my old grandfather believed!' He immediately satdown. One or two members coughed. I could see from the faces of theothers that they all felt that the debate was getting out of bounds. The world was wide, and the solar system fairly extensive; but thisspeaker had wandered beyond the remotest frontiers of the universe. And yet to me the utterance to which they had just listened was thespeech of the evening, the one speech to be remembered: '_Gentlemen, Iwould give both my hands, and give them cheerfully, if I could believeas my grandfather believed!_'

Now this was very pathetic, this pair of eager eyes suddenly turnedinward; this discovery of an empty soul; this comparison with hisgrandfather's golden hoard; and this pitiful confession of abjectpoverty. I felt sorry for him, just as I felt sorry for the lady inthe tramcar. The lady in the tramcar looked into a purse that shethought to be empty, and suffered all the agony of a great loss. Theyoung fellow in the debating society looked into the recesses of hisown spirit, and cried out that there was nothing there. And it was alla mistake--in both cases. The sovereigns were in the purse after all. And faith was in the apparently empty soul after all. But neither ofthe victims knew that they possessed what they lamented. They wereboth exactly like the old lady with the spectacles on her temples, likethe clerk with his pen behind his ear, like the boy with the penknifein his pocket. In the case of the lady in the car the similitude isclear enough. I aspire to show that the analogy applies just as surelyto the young fellow and his faith. And to that end let me raise acloud of questions as a dog might start a covey of birds. 

Why does this young man sigh for his grandfather's faith? Was hisgrandfather's a true faith or a false faith? If his grandfather'sfaith was a false faith, why does he himself so passionately covet it?Does not the very fact that he so earnestly desires his grandfather'sfaith as his own faith prove that he is certain that his grandfather'sfaith was true? And if, in the very soul of him, he feels that hisgrandfather's faith was true, does it not follow that he has alreadyset his seal to the faith of his grandfather? Is he not proving mostconclusively by his flashing eyes, his fervent manner, and hisquivering voice that he believes most firmly in his grandfather'sfaith? And, if that is so, is it not a case of the lady in the tramcarover again? Is he not crying out that his soul is empty, whilst, in asecret and unexplored recess of that same soul, there reposes the veryfaith for which he cries?

When I was a very small boy I believed in the Man in the Moon; Ibelieved in Santa Claus; I believed in old Mother Hubbard; I believedin the Fairy Godmother; I believed in ghosts and brownies and witchesand trolls. It was a wonderful creed, that creed of my infancy. Ithas gone now, and it has gone unwept and unsung. I never catch myselfsaying that I would give my two hands, and give them cheerfully, if Icould believe in those things all over again. That puerile faith was afalse faith; and because I now know it to have been fictitious I smileat it to-day, and never dream of wishing that I still believed in theMan in the Moon. And, when, on the contrary, I catch a man saying withwet eyes that he would give both his hands, and give them cheerfully, if he could believe as his grandfather did, I see before me indubitableevidence of the fact that, all unconsciously, grandsire and grandsonhave both subscribed with fervour to the selfsame stately faith. 

But, to save us from the sin of prosiness, let us indulge in a littleromance. Harry and Edith are lovers; but last evening, in the courseof a stroll by the side of the sea, a dark cloud swept over the goldentranquillity of their enchantment. They parted at length--not as theyusually do. When poor ruffled little Edith reached her dainty room, she flung herself in a tempest of tears upon the snowy counterpane, andsobbed again and again and again, 'I would give anything if I couldlove him as I loved him yesterday!' And all the while Harry, withwhite and tearless face, and his soul in a tumult of agitation, islying back in his chair before the fire, his hands in his pockets, saying to himself over and over again, 'I would give anything if Icould love her as I loved her yesterday!' Now here are a pair offascinating specimens for psychological analysis! Why is Edith soanxious to love Harry as she loved him yesterday? Why is Harry soeager to love Edith as he loved her yesterday? You do not passionatelydesire to love a person whom you do not love. The secret is out!Edith sobs to herself, 'I would give anything to love Harry as I lovedhim yesterday!' because, being the silly little goose that she is, shedoes not recognize that she does love Harry as she loved him yesterday. And Harry, logical in everything but in love, does not see, as he sitsthere muttering, that his very anxiety to love Edith just as he lovedher yesterday is the best proof that he could possibly have that hislove for Edith has undergone no change. Each is peering into a pursethat appears to be empty; each is crying for the gold that seems tohave gone; and each is ignorant of the fact that their wealth is stillwith them, but is for a moment eluding their agitated scrutiny. 

The philosophy that the new purse revealed to me is capable of aninfinity of applications. The fact is that faith is always the unknowndimension. A man may know how many children he has, and how much moneyhe has; but no man knows how much faith he has. Everybody who has readCarlyle's _History of Frederick the Great_ remembers the pettysquabbles of Voltaire, Maupertius, and the other thinkers who movedabout the person of that famous prince. They seemed to have been forever twitting each other with getting ill, and, notwithstanding theirphilosophy, sending for a priest to minister beside their supposeddeathbeds. I have heard sceptics and infidels charged with hypocrisyon the ground that, in the face of sudden terror, they had been knownto call upon that God whose very existence they denied. I am bound tosay that I do not think the evidence sufficient to substantiate thecharge. There was no hypocrisy, but the sudden discovery ofunsuspected faith. In the tumult of emotion induced by sudden fear, asecret compartment of the soul was opened, and the faith that wasregarded as lost was found to be tranquilly reposing there. 

Perhaps it was just as well that the lady in the tramcar had thisembarrassing experience. It was good for her to have felt the anguishof imaginary loss, for it led her to discover that her purse was a morecomplicated thing than she had supposed. It will do my friend of thedebating society a world of good to make the same discovery. The soulis not so simple as it seems. You cannot press a spring at a givenmoment, and take in all its contents at one glance. And it wascertainly good for my lady fellow traveller to find that the gold wasstill there. She needed it, or its loss would not have thrown her intosuch a fever. That is the thing that strikes me about my friend thedebater. He evidently needed the faith for which he cried sopassionately. Faith, like gold, is for use and not for ornament. Yes, he needed the faith that he could not find; needed it, perhaps, moresorely than he knew. And now that I have proved to him that, in somesecret recess, the treasure still lurks, I am hopeful that, like thelady in the car, he will smile at his former anguish, and live like alord on the wealth that he has found. 

IV

'SUCH A LOVELY BITE!'

It is a keen, clear, frosty winter's night, and I am sitting here in acheerfully lighted dining-room only a few feet from a roaring fire. Animmense chasm sometimes yawns between afternoon and evening, and itseems scarcely credible that, only an hour or two ago, I was out on theriver in an open boat, fishing. It was a glorious sunny afternoon whenwe pushed off; the great hills around were at their greenest; and theonly reminder vouchsafed to us that to-morrow is midwinter's day wasthe glitter of snow away on the top of the mountain. The water aroundus, reflecting the cloudless sky above, was a sea of sapphire, out ofwhich our oars seemed to beat up pearls and silver. Arrived at ourfavourite fishing grounds, we lay quietly at anchor, and for a whilethe sport was excellent. But, later on, things quietened down. Thefish forsook us, or became too dainty for our blandishments. The sunwent down over the massive ridges. A hint of evening brooded over us. The blue died out of the water, and the greenness vanished from thehills. Everything was grey and cold. As though to match the gloomaround us, we ourselves grew silent. Conversation languished, andlaughter was dead. We turned up the collars of our coats, and grimlybent over our lines. But the cod and the perch were proof against allour cajolery, and would not be enticed. At length my hands grew socold and numb that I could scarcely feel the line. My enthusiasm sankwith the temperature, and I suggested, not without trepidation, that weshould give it up. My companions assented to the abstract proposition;but, with that wistful half-expectancy so characteristic of anglers, did not at once commence to wind up their lines. I was, therefore, just on the point of setting them an example when one of them exclaimedexcitedly, 'Wait a second; I had _such a lovely bite_!' That was all;but it gave us a fresh lease of life. For half an hour we forgot thehardening cold and the deepening gloom, and chatted again as merrily aswhen we baited our hooks for the first time. It was a bite; that wasall. But, oh, the thrill of a bite when patience is flagging andendurance ebbing out!

It is because of a certain cynical tendency to deride the value of abite that I have decided to spend the evening with my pen. 'A bite!'says somebody, with a fine guffaw. 'And what on earth is the good of abite, I should like to know? A bite is neither fish, flesh, fowl, norgood red herring! A bite is of no use for breakfast, dinner, tea, orsupper! Bites can neither be fried nor boiled, measured nor weighed. A bite, indeed!'--and once more the cynic loses himself in laughter. That is all he knows about it, and it merely supplies us with anotherevidence of the superficiality of cynicism. The critic is sometimesright, but the cynic is never right; and the roar of laughter that Ihear from the cynic's chair, as he talks about bites, is, therefore, rightly translated and interpreted, a kind of thunderous applause. Why, in some respects, a bite is better than a fish. Only veryoccasionally does a fish look as well on the bank or in the boat as itappeared to the excited imagination of the angler when he first feltthe flutter on the line. I have caught thousands of fish in my time;but most of them I have dismissed from memory as soon as they wentflapping into the basket. But some of the bites that I have had! Icatch myself wondering now what beauteous monsters they can have been. 

'Well, and how many did you catch?' I am regularly asked on my return. 

'Oh, a couple of dozen or so; but, oh, I had such a bite! . . . '

And so on. It is the bite that lingers fondly in the memory, thathaunts the fancy for days afterwards, and that rushes back upon theangler in his dreams. 

'Oh, I've lost him!' one of my companions called out from the other endof the boat this afternoon. 'He got off the line just after I startedto draw him in; such a lovely bite; I'm sure it was the biggest fishwe've had round here this afternoon!'

Of course it was! The bite is always the biggest fish. There issomething very charming--something of which the cynic knows nothing atall--about this propensity of ours to attribute superlative qualitiesto the unrealized. It is a species of philosophic chivalry. It is acourtesy that we extend to the unknown. We do not know whether thejoys that never visited us were really great or small, so we gallantlyallow them the benefit of the doubt. The geese that came waddling overthe hill are geese, all of them, and as geese we write them down; butthe geese that never came over the hill are swans every one, and noswans that we have fed beside the lake glided hither and thither halfas gracefully. 

A young girl comes to my study. She is tall and comely, and her facereveals a quiet beauty. But she is dressed in black, and the marks ofa great sorrow are stamped upon her pale, drawn countenance. My heartgoes out to her as she tells her story. It was so entirely unexpected, so totally unthought of, this sudden loss of her lover. Just as shewas dreaming of orange-blossoms for her own hair, her fingers wereemployed upon a wreath of lilies for his bier. As she sat in thechurch on that dark and dreadful day, the organ that she fanciedgreeting her with a wedding march set all the aisles shuddering to adirge. And her unfinished bridal array had all been laid aside thatshe might garb her graceful form in gloom. As I looked into her sadeyes, swollen with weeping, I fancied that I could see into her verysoul, and scan the secret pictures she had painted there. The happywedding, with all its nonsense and solemnity, its laughter and itstears; the pretty little home, with his chair of honour, like a throne, facing hers; his homecoming evening by evening, and the welcome shewould give him; the children, too--the sons so handsome and the girlsso fair! What art gallery contains paintings so perfect? I saw themall--these lovely visions hung with crape! And as I saw them, Ireverenced our sweet human habit of attributing impossible glories tothe unrealized. 

And what about the parents of the baby I buried yesterday? Are thereno pictures in these stricken souls worth viewing? As you pass throughthese chambers of imagery, and view one of these exquisitely paintedpictures after another, you have the whole splendid career mapped outbefore you. Such triumphs, such honours, such laurels for his brow!The glory of the life that would have been is spread out before theirfancy, sketched in the fairest colours! Thus tenderly do we set a haloon the forehead of the unrealized! Thus charitably do we let the fancyplay about the fish we never caught! Let the cynic hush hissacrilegious laughter! There is something about all this that is veryhuman, and very beautiful. 

And just because it is so beautiful, it is worth analysing, this thrillof joy that I feel when the fish tugs at my line. I shall try to takethe sensation to pieces, in order that I may find out exactly of whatit consists. I suppose that, really, the secret is: I am pleased tofeel that my bait has some attraction for the fish that I now know tobe there. It is horrid to keep on fishing whilst your mind is hauntedby the suspicion that your hooks are bare, or that they are baited insuch a way that they make no appeal to the fish that may be swarmingaround you. The sudden bite settles all that, and you feel everyfaculty start up to vigorous life once more. 

Now, as a matter of fact, there are few things more pathetic than thefeeling that sometimes steals over the best of men, that there isnothing in them to attract the affection, the friendship, and theconfidence of others. The classical instance is the case of MarkRutherford. How his lonely soul ached for comradeship! 'I wanted afriend, ' he says. 'How the dream haunted me! It made me restless andanxious at the sight of every new face, wondering whether at last I hadfound that for which I searched as if for the kingdom of heaven. Godknows that I would have stood against a wall and have been shot for anyman whom I loved as cheerfully as I would have gone to bed, but nobodyseemed to wish for such a love or to know what to do with it!' Here isthe poor fisherman, who feels that he has no bait that the fish want. It was not as though he caught the perch whilst the cod fought shy ofhim. 'I was avoided, ' he says elsewhere, 'both by the commonplace andby those who had talent. Commonplace persons avoided me because I didnot chatter, and persons of talent because I stood for nothing--_therewas nothing in me_!' But, just as he was giving up, Mark Rutherfordfelt the line tremble, and knew the ecstasy of a bite! He was suddenlybefriended. 'Oh, the transport of it!' he exclaims. 'It was as ifwater had been poured on a burnt hand, or some miraculous Messiah hadsoothed the delirium of a fever-stricken sufferer, and replaced hisvisions of torment with dreams of Paradise. ' The world holds more ofthis sort of thing than we think. A writer who cannot get readers, apreacher who cannot get hearers, a tradesman who cannot getcustomers--it is the same old trouble. Fishing, fishing, fishing, until the whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. Fishing, fishing, fishing, until the whole world seems to be pouring itscontempt upon the unhappy fisherman. Fishing, fishing, fishing, untila man feels that there is nothing in him, nothing in him, _nothing inhim_; and the contempt of his fellows leads to the anguish and hollowlaughter of self-derision. Oh, what a bite means at such an hour!'Blessed are they, ' exclaims poor Mark Rutherford, 'who heal us of ourself-despisings! Of all services which can be done to man, I know ofnone more precious. '

But even a bite may do a man a great deal of harm unless he thinks itout very carefully. It is certainly very annoying, after waiting solong, to feel that the fish has come--and gone again! A fisherman mustguard against being soured and embittered just at that point. It wasthe tragedy of Miss Havisham. Everybody who has read _GreatExpectations_ remembers Miss Havisham. In some respects she isDickens' most striking and dramatic character. Poor Miss Havisham hadbeen disappointed on her wedding-day; and, in revenge, she remained forthe rest of her life dressed just as she was dressed when the blowstaggered her. When Pip came upon her, years afterwards, she was stillwearing her faded wedding-dress. She still had the withered flowers inher hair, although her hair was whiter than the dress itself. For thedress was yellow with age, and everything she wore had long since lostits lustre. 'I saw, too, ' says Pip, 'that the bride within thebridal-dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and hadno brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw thatthe dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young woman, andthat the figure, upon which it now hung loose, had shrunk to skin andbone. Once I had been taken to see some ghastly waxwork at the Fair, representing I know not what impossible personage lying in state. OnceI had been taken to one of our old marsh churches to see a skeleton inthe ashes of a rich dress that had been dug out of a vault under thechurch pavement. Now, waxwork and skeleton seemed to have dark eyesthat moved and looked at me. ' Poor Pip! And poor Miss Havisham! MissHavisham had lost her fish just as she was in the very act of landinghim. And she had let it sour and spoil her, and Pip was frightened atthe havoc it had wrought. 

The peril touches life at every point. It especially affects those ofus who are called to be fishers of men. It is a great art, this humanangling, and needs infinite tact, and infinite subtilty, and infinitepatience. And, above all, it needs a resolute determination never onany account whatever to be soured by disappointment. When I am temptedto wind up my line, and give the whole thing up in despair, I revive myflagging enthusiasm by recalling the rapture of my earlier catches. What angler ever forgets the wild transport of landing his firstsalmon? What minister ever forgets the spot on which he knelt with hisfirst convert? In the long and tedious hours when the waiting isweary, and the nibblings vexatious, and the bites disappointing, lethim live on these wealthy memories as the bees live in the winter onthe honey that they gathered in the summer-time. Yes, let him thinkabout those unforgettable triumphs, and let him talk about them. Theymake great talking. And as he recalls and recites the thrilling story, the leaden moments will simply fly, the old glow will steal back intohis fainting soul, and, long before he has finished his tale, he willfind his fingers busy with another glorious prize. 

V

LANDLORD AND TENANT

I heard a capital story the other evening under the most astonishingcircumstances. It was at a public meeting connected with a religiousconference. A certain minister rose to address us. We knew from pastexperience that we should have a most suggestive and stimulatingaddress. But, somehow, it did not occur to us that we should befavoured with a story. And when this grave and sedate member of ourassembly suddenly launched out into the intricacies of his tale, it wasas great a surprise as though the haildrops turned out to be diamonds, or Vesuvius had begun to pour forth gold. Before we knew what hadhappened, we were electrified by the story of a man who dwelt in a verycomfortable house, with a large, light, airy cellar. The river rannear by. One day the river overflowed, the cellar was flooded, and allthe hens that he kept in it were drowned. The next day he bounced offto see the landlord. 

'I have come, ' he said, 'to give you notice. I wish to leave thehouse. '

'How is that?' asked the astonished landlord. 'I thought you liked itso much. It is a very comfortable, well-built house, and cheap. '

'Oh, yes, ' the tenant replied, 'but the river has overflowed into mycellar, and all my hens are drowned. '

'Oh, don't let that make you give up the house, ' the landlord reasoned;'try ducks!'

I entirely forget--I most fervently hope that my friend will never seethis lamentable confession of mine!--I entirely forget what he made ofthis delightful story. But, looking back on it now, I can see quiteclearly that half the philosophy of life is wrapped up in its deliciousfolds. It raises the question at the very outset as to how far I amunder any obligation to endure the slings and arrows of outrageousfortune. The river has flooded my cellar and drowned all my hens. Very well. Now two courses are open to me. Shall I grin and bear it?or shall I make a change? I must remember that it is very nice livingon the banks of the river. There is the boat-house at the foot of thegarden. What delightful hours we have spent gliding up and down thebends and reaches of the tranquil stream, watching the reflections inthe water, and picnicking under the willows on its grassy banks! Howthe children love to come down here and feed the swans as the gracefulcreatures glide proudly hither and thither, seeming to be consciousthat their beauty richly deserves all the homage that is paid to it!The fishing, too! The whirr of the line, and the bend of the rod, andthe splash of the trout; why, there was more concentrated excitement insome of those tremendous moments than in all the politics and battlessince the world began! And the bathing! On those hot summer days whenthe very air seemed to scorch the skin, how exquisite those swirlingwaters seemed! Am I to give up all this enjoyment because, once infive years perhaps, the swollen stream floods my cellar and drowns myhens? That is the question, and it is a live question too. 

Now the trouble is a little deeper than appears on the surface. For ifI persuade myself that it is my duty to bounce off down to the owner ofthe house and give him notice to quit, I shall soon find myselfspending a considerable proportion of my time in waiting upon mylandlords. In the next house to which I go I shall not only miss theboating and fishing and bathing, but I shall within six months discoverother disadvantages quite as grave as the occasional flooding of myriverside cellar. And then I shall have to move again. And movingwill become a habit with me. And, on the whole, it is a bad habit. Itmay be good for the hens; but there are other things to be consideredbesides hens. The solar system is not kept in operation solely for thebenefit of the hens in the cellar. There are the children, and, withall respect for the fowl-yard, children are as much worthy ofconsideration as chickens. It is not good for children to beeverlastingly moving. It is good for them to have sacred and beautifulmemories of the home of their childhood. It is good for them to feedthe swans, and play under the willows, year in and year out, and toretain the swans and the willows as part of the background with whichmemory will always paint the picture of their infancy. It is good forchildren to feel a certain fixity and stability about home and schooland friends. 

George Gissing pathetically tells how the spirit of dereliction stoleinto the life of Godwin Peak. It was all owing to the familygipsyings. 'As a result of the family's removal first from London tothe farm, and then into Twybridge, Godwin had no friends of oldstanding. A boy reaps advantage from the half-parental kindness of menand women who have watched his growth from infancy; in general itaffects him as a steadying influence, keeping before his mind thesocial bonds to which his behaviour owes allegiance. Godwin had noties which bound him strongly to any district. ' He was like a shipthat belongs to no port in particular, and that drifts hither andthither about the world as fugitive commissions may arise. 

The finest of all the fine arts is the art of putting up with nastythings. It is not very nice to have all your hens drowned. You getfond of hens. And apart from the financial loss involved, there is asense of bereavement in seeing all your choice Dorkings, your favouriteLeghorns, your lovely Orpingtons, or your beautiful Silver Wyandottesall lying dead and bedraggled in the muddy cellar. Few things are moredisconcerting. And yet I am writing this article for no other purposethan to assert that the best thing to do, if you must have hens, is tobury these as quickly as possible and send down to the market for afresh supply. It is certainly gratifying to one's pride as a tenant tofeel that one has a grievance and can now show his gloriousindependence of the landlord. There is always a pleasurable piquancyin being able to resign, or dismiss somebody, or give notice. But myinterest is every bit as well worth considering as my dignity. Andwhilst my dignity clamours to get even with the landlord, my interestreminds me of the swans and the willows, the boating and the fishing. My dignity shouts angrily about my dead fens; but my interest whisperssignificantly about my living children. So that, all thingsconsidered, it is better to bury the hens and the hatchet at the sametime. I may quit my riverside residence and have a waterproof fowl-runin another street; but when I see somebody else taking his children outin my old boat, I shall only bite my lip and wish that I had quietlyrestocked my chicken-run. It may be a most iniquitous proceeding onthe part of the landlord to allow the river to flood my cellar but, thinking it over calmly, I am convinced that it is my duty as aChristian to forgive him. And it always pays a man to do his duty. 

I had thought of devoting a paragraph to ministers and deacons. Butperhaps I had better not. These matters are very intricate and verydelicate, and need a tenderer touch than mine. Things will sometimesgo wrong. The river will rise. The cellar gets flooded, and the hensget drowned. But, really, I am certain that, nine times out of ten, perhaps ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it is better to bury thepoor birds quietly and say no more about it. I don't know quite how toapply this parable. I was afraid I should get out of my depth if Iventured into such matters. But suppose that the minister finds somemorning that his cellar is flooded and his pet birds drowned. Ofcourse, it is pleasant to send in your resignation and say that youwill not stand it. And yet, and yet--rivers will rise; it is a waythat rivers have; and the Church Secretary, when he receives theresignation, feels as helpless as the landlord. And has the ministerany guarantee that the next river on the banks of which he builds hisnest will never rise? And, even if he is certain of perfection in thefields to which he flies, is he quite justified in avenging his deadhens by imperilling his living children and his living church?

Or perhaps I have misinterpreted the story. I am really very nervousabout it, and feel that I have plunged into things too high for me. Perhaps the minister is the landlord. It is through his wickednessthat the river has risen and drowned some of the Church's best hens, orat least ruffled the fine feathers of some of the Church's best birds. It is the easiest thing in the world to give him notice to quit. Andit accords magnificently with the dignity of the situation. But are wequite sure that the poor minister made the river rise? That is thequestion the tenant ought to consider. Was it the landlord's fault? Irepeat that rivers will rise at times, generally at storm times. TheNile and the Tigris used to rise in prehistoric times. It is a wayrivers have. I really think that it will be as well to say no moreabout it. Try to smooth down the ruffled feathers and forget. It maynot have been his fault; and, anyhow, we shall be saying good-bye to agood many delightful experiences if we part company. 

And, really, when you think it over quietly, there seems to be a greatdeal in the landlord's suggestion: 'Try ducks!' Of course, ducks arethe very thing for a riverside dwelling. Every change, however small, should be dictated by reason and not by caprice. This was theessential difference between the stupid tenant and the wise landlord. The tenant said, 'I will make a _fundamental_ change, and I will makeit _capriciously_--I will leave the house!' The landlord said, 'Whynot make an _incidental_ change, and make it _reasonably_? Try ducks!'I have in my time seen great numbers of people, among all kinds andconditions of men, throw up their riverside dwellings in high dudgeonbecause their hens were drowned in the cellar. But among my saddestletters I find some from those who tell me how they miss the swans andthe boat-house, the trout and the willows, and how sincerely they wishnow that they had tried ducks. But it is too late; the flashing streamis the paradise of other tenants; and the children's most romanticmemory of childhood twines itself about the fun of getting the pianoand the dining-room table in and out of the different doors. We mayeasily form a stupid habit of giving the landlord notice whenever theriver happens to rise; and we forget that it is from just suchmovements--such goings and such stayings--that life as a whole takesits tint and colour. Destiny is made of trifles. Our weal and our woeare determined by comparatively insignificant issues. Somebody hasfinely said that we make our decisions, and then our decisions turnround and make us. 

Now let nobody suppose that I am deprecating a change. On thecontrary, I am advocating a change. It will never do to let the fowlsdrown, and to take no steps to prevent a recurrence of any suchdisaster. I hold no brief for stagnation. I am merely insisting thatthe change must commend itself to heart and conscience and reason. Itmust be a forward move. Look at this, for example. It is fromStanley's _Life of Arnold_: 'We are all in the midst of confusion, 'Arnold writes from Laleham, 'the books all packed and half thefurniture; and on Tuesday, if God will, we shall leave this dear place, this nine-years' home of such exceeding happiness. But it boots not tolook backwards. Forward, forward, _forward_, should be one's motto. 'And thus Arnold moved to Rugby, and made history! There are times whenthe landlord's gate is the high-road to glory. 

The whole matter is capable of the widest application, and must bescientifically treated. Man is always finding his fowls drowned in thecellar and going the wrong way to put things right. Generallyspeaking, it must be confessed that he is too fond of rushing off tothe landlord. In his _Travels in Russia_, Theophile Gautier has astriking word concerning this perilous proclivity. 'Whatever is ofreal use to man, ' he says, 'was invented from the beginning of theworld, and all the people who have come along since have worn theirbrains out to find something new, but have made no improvements. _Change is far from being progress_; it is not yet proved that steamersare better than sailing-vessels, or railways than horse traffic. Formy part, I believe that men will end in returning to the old methods, which are always the best. ' I do not agree with the first part ofGautier's statement. It is not likely. But when he says that we aregetting back to our starting-point, his contention is indisputable. Inthe beginning, man was alone with his earth; and all that he did, hedid in the sweat of his brow. Then came the craze for machinery, andthe world became a network of wires and a wilderness of whirlingwheels. But we are beginning to recognize that it has been aridiculous mistake. The thing is too clumsy and too complicated. Mr. Marconi has already taught us to feel half ashamed of the wires. AndMr. H. G. Wells predicts that in forty years' time all the activitiesof a larger and busier world will be driven by invisible currents ofpower, and the whole of our industrial machinery will have gone to thescrap-heap. Man will find himself once more alone with his world, butit will be a world that has taken him into its confidence and revealedto him its wonderful secrets. He will look back with a smile on theage of screaming syrens and snorting engines, of racing pistons andwhirling wheels. He will be amazed at his own earlier readiness toresort to such a cumbrous and complicated system when a smallertransition would have ushered him into his kingdom. 

The whole drift of our modern scientific development is away from ourclinking mechanical complexities and back towards the great primalsimplicities. We have been too fond of the drastic and dramaticcourse, too fond of bouncing off to the landlord. We are too apt toinvolve ourselves in a big move when we might have gained our point bysimply trying ducks. We love the things that are burdensome, the waysthat are involved, the paths that lead to headache and heartache. Itis a very ancient and very human tendency. Paul wrote the Epistle tothe Galatians to reprove in them the same sad blunder. 'O foolishGalatians, who hath bewitched you?' They had abandoned thesimplicities under the lure of the complexities. The Church that wasurged by her Lord to return to her first love had made the samemistake. We are too prone to scorn the simple and the obvious. Weforsake the fountain of living water, and hew out to ourselves clumsycisterns. We neglect the majestic simplicities of the gospel, andinvolve our tired brains and hungry hearts in tortuous systems thatlead us a long, long way from home. The landlord is right. Thesimplest course is almost always the safest. 

VI

THE CORNER CUPBOARD

Is there a case on record of a really unsuccessful search? I doubt it. I believe it to be positively and literally true that he that seeketh, findeth. I do not mean that a man will always find what he seeks. Ido not know that the promise implies that. I fancy it covers a farwider range, and embraces a much ampler truth. Yes, I doubt if any manever yet sought without finding. When I was a boy I lost my peg-top. It was a somewhat expensive one, owing partly to the fact that it wouldreally spin. I noticed this peculiarity about it whilst it was stillthe property of its previous possessor. I had several tops; indeed, mypockets bulged out with my ample store, but none of them would spin. After pointing out to the owner of the coveted top the frightfulunsightliness of his treasure, and in other ways seeking to lower theprice likely to be demanded as soon as negotiations opened, I at lengthsecured the top in return for six marbles, a redoubtable horsechestnut, and a knife with a broken blade. My subsequent alarm, onmissing so costly a possession, can be readily imagined. I could notbe expected to endure so serious a deprivation without making adesperate effort to retrieve my fallen fortunes. I thereforeproclaimed to all and sundry my inflexible determination to ransack thehouse from the top brick of the chimney to the darkest recesses of thecellar in quest of my vanished treasure. I began with a queer oldtriangular cupboard that occupied one corner of the kitchen. And inthe deepest and dustiest corner of the top shelf of that cavernous oldcupboard, what should I find but the cricket ball that I had lost theprevious summer? My excitement was so great that I almost fell off thetable on which I was standing. As soon as the flicker of my candlefell on the ball I distinctly remembered putting it there. I arguedthat it was the only place in the house that I could reach, and that mybrother couldn't, and consequently the only place in the house that wasreally safe. The fact that the ball had remained there, untouched, allthrough the cricket season abundantly demonstrated the justice of myconclusion. My jubilation was so exuberant that it drove all thoughtof the peg-top out of my mind. There is such a thing as the expulsivepower of an old affection as well as the expulsive power of a newaffection. My delight over my new-found cricket ball entirelydispelled my grief over my missing peg-top. Indeed, I am not sure tothis day whether I ever saw that peg-top again. I may haveinadvertently deposited it on a shelf that my brother could reach; butafter the lapse of so many years I will endeavour to harbour no darksuspicions. In any case, it does not matter. What is a paltry peg-topcompared with a half-guinea cricket ball? I had sought, and I hadfound. I had not found what I had sought, nor had I sought what I hadfound. Perhaps if I had continued my search for the peg-top with theenthusiasm and assiduity with which I had lugged the kitchen table upto the corner cupboard, I should have found it. Perhaps if I hadsearched for the cricket ball with the same zest that marked my questof the peg-top, I should have found it. But that is not my point. Mypoint is the point with which I set out. I do not believe that a caseof a really unsuccessful search has ever been recorded. He thatseeketh, findeth, depend upon it. 

The days of the peg-top and the cricket ball seem a long way behind menow, and I am glad that the fate of the queer old corner cupboard hasbeen mercifully hidden from my eyes. But, by sea and land, theprinciple that I first discovered when I stood on tiptoe on the kitchentable has followed me all down the years. The secret that I learnedthat day has acted like a talisman, and has turned every spot that Ihave visited into an enchanted ground. Even my study table is notimmune from its magic spell. A more prosaic spectacle never met theeye. The desk, the pigeon-holes, the drawers, and the piles of papersmight have to do with a foundry or a fish-market, so very unromantic dothey appear. And yet, what times I have whenever I manage to losesomething! It is almost worth while losing something just for the funof looking for it! If a catalogue or a circular will only go astray, all the excitements of a chase lie open before me. And the things thatI shall find! I shall come on letters that will make me laugh andletters that will make me cry. Hullo, what's this? Dear me, I mustwrite to so-and-so, or he will think I have forgotten him! And justlook here! I must run round and see what's-his-name this afternoon, and fix this matter up. And so I go on. The probability is that Ishall no more find the catalogue that set me searching than I found thepeg-top in the days of auld lang syne; but what has that to do with it?Look at the things I have found, the memories I have revived, the tasksthat have been suggested! Life has been incalculably enriched by thefruits of this search through the papers on my study table. If I donot find the peg-top-papers for which I sought, I have foundcricket-ball-papers immensely more valuable, and the rapture of mysensational discoveries renders the fate of my poor peg-top-papers amatter of comparative indifference. The series of thrills produced bysuch a search is reminiscent of the emotions with which I enjoyed myfirst magic-lantern entertainment. On they came, one after another, those wonderful, wonderful pictures in the darkness. On they came, oneafter another, these startling surprises from out these musty-fustypiles of papers. A search is really a marvellous experience. Theimagination flies with lightning rapidity from one world of things toanother and another as the papers rustle between the fingers. JohnPloughman used to say that, even if the fowls got nothing by it, it didthem good to scratch. I am not a poultry expert, as I am frequentlyreminded, but I dare say that there is a wealth of wisdom in theobservation. At any rate, I know that, in my own case, the success orfailure of my search expeditions stand in no way related to theoriginal object of my quest. I never remember having set out to lookfor a thing, and afterwards regretted having done so. 

I was wondering the other day if the same principle applied to otherpeople, and I cruelly determined on a little experiment. My girlscollect orchids, and much of their time in the city is spent inrecounting the foraging expeditions that they have conducted in happydays gone by, and in anticipating similar adventures in the goldentimes before them. Some of the pleasantest holidays that we haveenjoyed together have been spent away in the heart of the bush whereNature runs riot and revels in undisturbed profusion. It is delightfulto see them come traipsing along the track through the bush, theirfaces flushed with the excitement of their foray, and their arms filledwith the booty they have gathered. They are tired, evidently, but nottoo tired to run when they catch sight of us. 'Look at this!' criesone; and 'Isn't that a pretty colour?' asks the other. 'Did you eversee one that shape before?' 'Fancy finding one of these!' And so on. And then the evening is spent in pressing and classifying the treasuresthey have gathered. 

One day they came back, earlier than usual, and showed us theirdiscoveries. 

'But, oh, father, it was an awful shame! You know that kind that EllaSimpson showed us once, and told us they were very rare? Well, wefound one of those, a real beauty, away over in that valley beyond thesandhills; and on the way home we lost it. Wasn't it a pity?'

'Do you mean the little pale blue one, with the orange fringe?' Iinquired. 

'Yes, and it was just in full flower, and ready for picking. '

'It was a pity, ' I confessed, 'for, do you know I specially want one ofthose. Do you think you could go back and try hard to find one?'

They agreed. I advised them to search with the greatest care, and topoke into places that they had not disturbed before. They returned anhour later with no further specimen of the blue and orange variety, although on a subsequent date they succeeded in unearthing one, butthey were rejoicing over a number of very rare specimens that are nowconsidered among the most valuable in their collection. 

In _It is Never Too Late to Mend_, Charles Reade has a story that isright into our hands just here. 'Once upon a time, ' he makes one ofhis characters say, 'once upon a time there was an old chap who hadheard about treasure being found in odd places, a pot full of guineasor something; and it took root in his heart. One morning he comes downand says to his wife, "It is all right, old woman; I've found thetreasure!" "No, have you, though?" says she. "Yes, " says he;"leastways, it is as good as found; it is only waiting till I've had mybreakfast, and then I'll go out and fetch it in!" "La, John, but howdid you find it!" "It was revealed to me in a dream, " says John, asgrave as a judge; "it is under a tree in the orchard. " After breakfastthey went to the plantation, but John could not again recognize thetree. "Drat your stupid old head, " cried his wife, "why didn't you puta nick on the right one at the time?" But John was not to be beaten. He resolved to dig under every tree. How the neighbours laughed! Butspringtime came. Out burst the trees. "Wife, " says he, "our bloom isricher than I have known it this many a year; it is richer than ourneighbours'!" Bloom dies, and then out come about a million littlegreen things quite hard. In the autumn the old trees were staggering, and the branches down to the ground with the crop; and so the nextyear, and the next; sometimes more, sometimes less, according to theyear. The trees were old, and wanted a change. His letting in the airto them, and turning the subsoil up to the frost and sun, had renewedtheir youth. ' And so poor John found his treasure. It was not exactlythe pot of guineas that he sought; but it was just as valuable, andprobably afforded him a deeper gratification. He did not find what hesought, but who shall say that his search was unsuccessful? He thatseeketh, findeth. There is no case on record of a really fruitlesssearch. 

Mr. Gilbert West and Lord Lyttelton once undertook to organize acampaign to expose the fictitious character of the biblical narrative. In order to make their attack the more damaging and the more effectivethey agreed to specialize. Mr. West promised to study thoroughly thestory of the Resurrection of Jesus. Lord Lyttelton selected as thepoint of his assault the record of the conversion of Paul. Theyseparated; and each began a careful and exhaustive search forinaccuracies, incongruities, and contradictions in the documents. Theywere engaged in exposing error, they said, and in searching aftertruth. Yes, they were searching after truth, and they sought withearnestness and sincerity. They were searching after truth, and theyfound it. For when, at the appointed time, they met to arrange thedetails of their projected campaign, each had to confess to the otherthat he had become convinced of the authenticity of the records and hadyielded to the claims of Christ! Here was a search! Here was a find!They sought what they never found, and they found what they neversought. Was the search unsuccessful? Seekers after truth, theycalled themselves; and did they not find the Truth? Like the Magi, they followed a star in the firmament with which they were familiar. But, to their amazement, the star led them to the Saviour, and neitherof them ever regretted participating in so astonishing a quest. 

'And thus, ' as Oliver Cromwell finely says, 'to be a seeker is to be ofthe best sect next to a finder, and such an one shall every faithfulhumble seeker be at the end. ' It always seems to me that the oldPuritan's lovely letter to his daughter, the letter from which I havejust quoted, is the gem of Carlyle's great volume. Bridget wastwenty-two at the time. 'Your sister, ' her father tells her, 'isexercised with some perplexed thoughts. She sees her own vanity andcarnal mind, and, bewailing it, she seeks after what will satisfy. Andthus to be a seeker is to be of the best sect next to a finder, andsuch an one shall every faithful humble seeker be at the end. Happyseeker; happy finder! Dear heart, press on! Let not husband, let notanything, cool thy affections after Christ!'

With which strong, tender, fatherly words from an old soldier to hisyoung daughter we may very well take leave of the subject. 'Happyseeker; happy finder! Dear heart, press on!' Oliver Cromwell knewthat there is no such thing as a fruitless search. If we do not comeupon our shining treasure in the exact form that our ignorance hadfancied, we discover it after a similitude that a much higher wisdomhas ordained. But the point is that we do find it. That was thelesson that I learned as I peered into the abysmal darkness of themysterious old cupboard in my childhood, and the longer I live the morecertain I become of its truth. 

VII

WITH THE WOLVES IN THE WILD

I

I like to think that Jesus spent forty nights of His wondrous life outin the Wild with the wolves. 'He was with the wild beasts, ' Mark tellsus, and the statement is not recorded for nothing. Night is the greatleveller. Desert and prairie are indistinguishable in the night. Night folds everything in sable robes, and the loveliest landscape isone with the dreariest prospect. North and South, East and West, areall alike in the night. Here is the Wild of the West. 'A vast silencereigned, ' Jack London tells us. 'The land itself was a desolation, lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold that the spirit of it wasnot even that of sadness. There was a hint in it of laughter--themasterful and incommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at thefutility of life and the effort of life. It was the Wild--the savage, frozen-hearted Northern Wild!' Here, I say, is the Wild. And here isthe life of the Wild: 'Bill opened his mouth to speak, but changed hismind. Instead, he pointed towards the wall of darkness that pressedabout them from every side. There was no suggestion of form in theutter blackness; only could be seen a pair of eyes gleaming like livecoals. Henry indicated with his hand a second pair and a third. Acircle of the gleaming eyes had drawn about their camp. Now and againa pair of eyes moved, or disappeared to appear again a moment later. '

What did it mean--those restless flashing eyes, like fireflies breakingacross the surface of the darkness? It simply meant that they were inthe Wild at night, and they were with the wild beasts. And what doesit mean, this vivid fragment from my Bible? It means that _He_ was inthe Wild at night, night after night for forty nights, and _He_ waswith the wild beasts. He heard the roar of the lion as it awoke theechoes of the slumbering forest. He saw the hyena pass stealthily nearHim in the track of a timid deer, and watched the cheetah prowl throughthe brushwood in pursuit of a young gazelle. He heard the squeal ofthe hare as the crouching fox sprang out; and the flutter of thepartridge as the jackal seized its prey. He heard the slither of theviper as it glided through the grass beside His head; and was startledby the shrieking of the nightbirds, and the flapping of their wings, asthey whirled and swooped about Him. And He too saw the gleaming eyesof the hungry wolves as they drew their fierce cordon around Him. ForHe was out in the Wild for forty nights, and He was with the wildbeasts. 

II

And yet He was unhurt! Now why was He unharmed those forty nights withthe scrub around Him alive with claws and talons and fangs? He waswith the wild beasts, Mark tells us, and yet no lion sprang upon Him;no lone wolf slashed at Him with her frightful fangs; no serpent bitHim. 

'Henry, ' said one of Jack London's heroes to the other, as they watchedthe wolfish eyes flashing hither and thither in the darkness, 'it's anawful misfortune to be out of ammunition!'

But _He_ was unarmed and unprotected! No blade was in His hand; noring of fire blazed round about Him to affright the prowling brutes. And yet He was unharmed! Not a tooth nor a claw left scratch or gashupon Him! Why was it? It will never do to fall back upon themiraculous, for the very point of the story of the Temptation is Hissublime refusal to sustain Himself by superhuman aid. By theemployment of miracle He could easily have commanded the stones tobecome bread, and He might thus have grandly answered the taunt of theTempter and have appeased the gnawings of His body's hunger at one andthe same time. But it would have spoiled everything. He went into theWild to be tempted 'like as we are tempted'; and since miracle is notat _our_ disposal He would not let it be at _His_. It is impossible, therefore, to suppose that He scorned the aid of miracle to protect Himfrom hunger, but called in the aid of miracle to protect Him from thebeasts. 

Now in order to solve this problem I turned to my Bible, beginning atthe very beginning. And there, in the very first chapter, I found theexplanation. 'Have dominion, ' God said, 'over the fish of the sea, andover the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth uponthe earth. ' There was nothing really miraculous in Christ's authorityover the fish. I never see a man dangling with a line without a sighfor our lost dominion. There was nothing really miraculous in Christ'simmunity from harm. The wolves did not tear Him; He told them not todo so. He was a man, just such a man as God meant all men to be. Andtherefore He 'had dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowlof the air, and over every living thing that creepeth upon the earth. 'He was unscathed in the midst of the wolves, not because He wassuperhuman, but because He was truly human. We are something less thanhuman, the wrecks and shadows of men. Having forfeited the authorityof our humanity, the fish no longer obey us, and we have perforce todangle for them with hooks and strings. The wolves and the tigers nolonger stand off at our command, and we have to fall back uponcamp-fires and pistols. It is very humiliating! The crown is fallenfrom our heads, and all things finned and furred and feathered mock usin our shame. But Thine, O Man of men, is the power and the dominion, and all the creatures of the Wild obey Thee! 'He was with the wildbeasts. '

III

What did those wild, dumb, eloquent eyes say to Jesus as they lookedwonderingly at Him out there in the Wild? As they bounded out of thethicket, crouched, stared at Him, and slunk away, what did they say toHim, those great lean wolves? And what did He say to them? Animalsare such eloquent things, especially at such times. 'The foxes haveholes, ' Jesus said, long afterwards, remembering as He said it how Hewatched the creatures of the Wild seek out their lairs. 'And the birdsof the air have nests, ' He said, remembering the twittering andfluttering in the boughs above His head as the feathered things settleddown for the night. 'But the Son of Man hath not where to lay Hishead, ' He concluded, as He thought of those long, long nights in thehomeless Wild. Did He mean that the wolves were better off than Hewas? We are all tempted to think so when the conflict is pressing toohardly upon us. There seems to be less choice, and therefore lessresponsibility, among the beasts of the field; less play of right andwrong. 'I think, ' said Walt Whitman--

 I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and self-contained; I stand and look at them sometimes an hour at a stretch. They do not sweat and whine about their condition, They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins, They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God, Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things, Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago, Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth. 

Was some flitting, hovering thought like this part of the Temptation inthe Wild? Is that what Mark means when he says so significantly that'He was with the wild beasts'? Surely; for He was tempted in _all_points like as we are, and we have all been tempted in this. 'Good oldCarlo!' we have said, as we patted the dog's head, looking down out ofour eyes of anguish into his calm, impassive gaze. 'Good old Carlo, you don't know anything of such struggles, old boy!' And we havefancied for a moment that Carlo had the best of it. It was a black andblasphemous thought, and He struck it away, as we should strike at ahawk that fluttered in front of our faces and threatened to pick at oureyes. But for one moment it hovered before Him, and He caught its uglyglance. It is a very ugly glance. Our capacity for great inwardstrife and for great inward suffering is the one proof we have that wewere made in the image of God. 

IV

Was He thinking, I wonder, when He went out to the wolves in the Wildof those who, before so very long, would be torn to pieces by hungrybeasts for His dear sake?

'To-day, ' said Amplonius, a teacher of the persecuted Roman Christians, 'to-day, by the cruel order of Trajan, Ignatius was thrown to the wildbeasts in the arena. He it was, my children, whom Jesus took, when asyet he was but a little child, and set him in the midst of thedisciples and said, "Except ye be converted, and become as littlechildren, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. " And now, from thesame Lord who that day laid His sacred hands upon his head, he hasreceived the martyr crown. But Ignatius did not fear the beasts, mychildren. I have seen a letter which he wrote but yesterday to theaged Polycarp, the angel of the Church of Smyrna. In it he says thatthe hungry creatures have no terrors for him. "Would to God, " he said, "that I were come to the beasts prepared for me. I wish that, withtheir gaping mouths, they were now ready to rush upon me. Let theangry beasts tear asunder my members so that I may win Christ Jesus. "Thus Ignatius wrote but yesterday to the beloved Polycarp; and to-day, with a face like the face of an angel, he gave himself to the wolves. We know not which of us shall suffer next, my children. The people arestill crying wildly, "The Christians to the lions!" It may be that I, your teacher, shall be the next to witness for the faith. But let usremember that for forty days and forty nights Jesus was Himself withthe wild beasts, and not one of them durst harm Him. And He is stillwith the wild beasts wherever we His people, are among them; and theircruel fangs can only tear us so far as it is for our triumph and Hisglory. ' So spake Amplonius, and the Church was comforted. 

And at this hour there is, in the catacomb at St. Callixtus, at Rome, arude old picture of Jesus among the untamed creatures of the Wild. Thethought that lions and leopards crouched at His feet in the days of Hisflesh, and were subject unto Him, was very precious to the hunted andsuffering people. 

V

Sometimes, too, I fancy that He saw, in these savage brutes that harmedHim not, a symbol and a prophecy of His own great conquest. For they, with their hateful fangs and blooded talons, were part of His vastconstituency. 'The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in paintogether, ' Paul declares. Richard Jefferies pointed to a quaint littleEnglish cottage beside a glorious bank of violets. But he could neverbring himself to pluck the fragrant blossoms, for, in the cottage, thedreaded small-pox had once raged. 'It seemed, ' says Jefferies, 'toquite spoil the violet bank. There is something in disease sodestructive; as it were, to flowers. ' And as the violets shared thescourge, so the creatures shared the curse. And as they stared dumblyinto the eyes of the Son of God they seemed to half understand thattheir redemption was drawing nigh. 'In Nature herself, ' as Longfellowsays, 'there is a waiting and hoping, a looking and yearning, after anunknown something. Yes, when above there, on the mountain, the lonelyeagle looks forth into the grey dawn to see if the day comes not; whenby the mountain torrent the brooding raven listens to hear if thechamois is returning from his nightly pasture in the valley; and whenthe rising sun calls out the spicy odours of the Alpine flowers, thenthere awake in Nature an expectation and a longing for a futurerevelation of God's majesty. ' Did He see this brooding sense ofexpectancy in the fierce eyes about Him? And did He rejoice that thehope of the Wild would in Him be gloriously fulfilled? Who knows?

In his _Cloister and the Hearth_, Charles Reade tells of the temptationand triumph of Clement the hermit. 'And one keen frosty night, as hesang the praises of God to his tuneful psaltery, and his hollow caverang with his holy melody, he heard a clear whine, not unmelodious. Itbecame louder. He peeped through the chinks of his rude door, andthere sat a great red wolf moaning melodiously with his nose high inthe air! Clement was delighted. "My sins are going, " he cried, "andthe creatures of God are owning me!" And in a burst of enthusiasm hesang:

 Praise Him, all ye creatures of His! Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord!

And all the time he sang the wolf bayed at intervals. ' Did Jesus, Iwonder, see the going of the world's sin and the departure of itsprimal curse in the faces of the wild things that howled and roaredaround Him? As the fierce things prowled around Him and left Himunharmed, did He see a symbol of His final subjugation of all earth'ssavage and restless elements? Who shall say?

VI

'He was with the wild beasts, ' says Mark, 'and the angels ministeredunto Him. ' Life always hovers between the beasts and the angels; andhowever wolfish may be the eyes that affright us in the day of ourtemptation, we may be sure that our solitary struggle is watched byinvisible spectators, and that, after the baying of the beasts, weshall hear the angels sing. 

VIII

DICK SUNSHINE

Dick Sunshine was not his real name; at least so they said. But thething that they called his real name did not describe him a scrap; itseemed to abandon all attempt at description as hopelessly impossible;but when you called him Dick Sunshine it fitted him like a glove. Thatis the immense advantage that nicknames possess over real names. Ofall real things, real names are the most unreal. There is no life inthem. They stand for nothing; they express nothing; they revealnothing. They bear no kind of relationship to the unfortunateindividuals who are sentenced to wear them, like meaningless badges, for the term of their natural lives. But nicknames, on the other hand, sparkle and flash; they bring the man himself vividly and palpitatinglybefore you; and without more introduction or ado, you know him at oncefor what he is. That is the reason why we prefer to be called by ourreal names. We know in our secret souls that our nicknames are ourtrue names, and that our real names are mere tags and badges; but weprefer the meaningless tag to the too candid truth. There are obviousdisadvantages in being constantly spoken of as Mr. Grump, Mrs. Crosspatch, or Miss Spitfire; whereas Mr. Smith, Mrs. Robinson, or MissJones are much safer and more non-committal. But, for all that, thenicknames, depend upon it, are the true names. Nicknames reveal theman; real names conceal the man. And since, in the case of my presenthero, I desire to reveal everything and to conceal nothing, it isobviously desirable to speak of him by his nickname, which is his truename, rather than by his real name, which is a mere affectation andartificiality. He was always Dick Sunshine to me, and I noticed thatthe children always called him Dick Sunshine, and children are noteasily deceived. Besides, he _was_ Dick Sunshine, so what is the useof beating about the bush?

Who was Dick Sunshine? It is difficult to say. He was partly a grocerand party a consumptive. He spent half his time laughing, and half histime coughing. He only stopped laughing in order to cough; and he onlystopped coughing in order to laugh. You could always tell which he wasdoing at any particular time by taking a glance at the shop. If theshop was open, you knew that Dick was behind the counter laughing. Ifit was closed, you knew that he was in bed coughing. A fine-lookingfellow was Dick, or would have been if only his health had given him achance. Fine wavy golden hair tossed in naïve disorder about his loftyforehead; and a small pointed golden beard set off a frank, cheery, open face. Somehow or other, there was a certain touch of chivalryabout Dick, although it is not easy to say exactly how it made itselffelt. It was a certain knightly bearing, perhaps, a haughty contemptfor his own suffering, a rollicking but resolute refusal of anything inthe shape of pity. Coughing or laughing, there was always a roguishlittle twinkle in the corner of his eye, a kind of danger signal thatkept you on constant guard lest his next sally should take you bysurprise. 

The church at North-East Valley has had its ups and downs, like mostchurches, but as long as Dick was its secretary it never had a gloomychurch meeting. However grave or unexpected might be the crisis, hecame up smiling, and greeted the unseen with a cheer. When things weregoing well, he always made the most of it, and drew attention to theencouraging features in the church's outlook. If things were so-so, hepointed out that they might have been a great deal worse, and that thechurch was putting up a brave fight against heavy odds. If anybodycriticized the minister, Dick was on his feet in a minute. Could theminister do everything? Dick wanted to know. Was he solelyresponsible for the unsatisfactory conditions? Why, anybody whowatches the minister can see that the poor man is doing his best, which, Dick slyly added, is more than can be said for some of us! Andthe ministers of North-East Valley used to tell me that when theythemselves got down in the dumps, Dick treated their collapse as aglorious joke. He would come down to the Manse and laugh until hecoughed, and cough until he could laugh again, and, by the time that hestopped laughing and coughing, the masses of his golden hair weretumbled about his high forehead like shocks of corn blown from thestocks by playful winds in harvest-time; and when he went home tofinish his coughing, the Manse was flooded with the laughter and thesunshine that he had left behind him. 

I was sitting one morning in my study at Mosgiel, when there came aring at the front door bell. On answering it, I found myself standingface to face with Dick. He was laughing so violently that he could atfirst scarcely salute me. He followed me into the study, and assuredme as he sank into a chair that it was the fun of the world. I askedhim to explain the cause of his boisterous merriment. 

'Had to give it up!' he gasped. 'The doctors told me that I should diein a week if I remained in the shop any longer. So I've left it tolook after itself, and come away. No fun in dying in a week, you know!'

I admitted that there was something in that, and inquired what he wasgoing to do now. 

'That's the joke!' he roared, between laughter and coughing. 'I'vecome to stay with you. '

There was nothing for it but to let him take his time, so I patientlyawaited further explanation. At length it came. 

'Just as I was locking up the shop, ' he said, presently, 'I heard thatthe temperance people wanted a lecturer and organizer to work thisdistrict. Except the lecturing, it will be all open-air work, so Iapplied for it, and got it!'

'But, my dear fellow, ' I remonstrated, 'I never knew that you couldlecture. Why, outside the church meeting, you never made a speech inyour life!'

'That's part of the joke!' he cried, going off again into a paroxysm oflaughter. 'But I told them that you would help me at the first, andthey appointed me on that condition. So this is to be my headquarters!'

His duties were to commence the following week, and we arranged that heshould make his debut as a lecturer at a place called Outram, abouteight miles across country from Mosgiel. I promised to accompany him, and to fill up such time as he found it impossible or inconvenient tooccupy. In the meantime he got to work with his visiting andorganizing. The open air suited him, his health improved amazingly, and the Mosgiel Manse simply rocked under the storms of his boisterousgaiety. Sometimes the shadow of the coming ordeal spread itselfheavily over his spirit, and he came to the study with unwonted gravityto ask how this or that point in his maiden effort had better beapproached. To prevent his anxiety under this head from becoming toomuch for his fragile frame, I lent him a book, and sent him out on tothe sunlit verandah to read it. It chanced to be _The Old CuriosityShop_. He had never read anything of Dickens, and it opened a newworld to him. I have never seen anybody fall more completely under thespell of the magician. From the study I would hear him suddenly yellwith laughter, and come rushing through the hall to read me somepassage that had just captivated his fancy. Whenever he came stealingalong like a thief, I knew it was to talk about the lecture; when hecame like an incarnate thunderstorm, I knew it was about the book. 

One passage in the famous story especially appealed to him. It was thepart about Codlin and Short, the Punch and Judy men. In the middle ofdinner, without the slightest provocation or warning, he would suddenlydrop his knife and fork, throw himself back in his chair, slap his lega sounding blow with his hand, and shriek out, 'Codlin's your friend, not Short, ' and then go off into ecstasies of glee as he told the taleall over again. 

Well, Monday--the day of his opening lecture--came at last. During theday he was unusually quiet and taciturn, although, even in face of thegrim test that awaited him, the Punch and Judy men haunted his memoryand led to occasional subdued outbursts of fun. After tea we set out. It was a delicious evening. Few things are sweeter than the earlyevenings of early summer. The sunset is throwing long shadows acrossthe fresh green grass, and the birds are busy in the boughs. Everything about us was clad in its softest and loveliest garb. Wedrove on between massive hedges of fragrant hawthorn, and up hugeavenues of stately blue gum trees, scattering the rabbits before us. Then we caught sight of the river, and drove over the bridge into thequiet little town in which such unsuspected adventures awaited us. Dick was pale and quiet; his sunshine was veiled in banks of cloud, andI found it difficult to rouse him. On arrival at the hall we found itcrowded. I was naturally delighted; his pleasure was more restrained. Indeed, he confided to me, with a look that, for him, was positivelylugubrious, that he would have been more gratified if the horrid placehad been empty. However, there was nothing for it. Not a soul, exceptmyself, knew that Dick was lecturing for the first time in his life;the chairman led us to the platform; and, after a brief introductionrelative to the renown of the speakers, he called upon Dick to addressthe townsfolk. As a maiden effort it was a triumph; his native goodhumour combined with careful preparation to produce a really excellenteffect; and he sat down amidst a thunder of applause. I filled in anodd half-hour, and then the chairman nearly killed Dick at one blow. 

'Would anybody in the audience care to ask either of the speakers aquestion?' he gravely inquired. 

Poor Dick was the picture of abject dismay. This was a flank attackfor which he was totally unprepared. An elderly gentleman, in the bodyof the hall, rose slowly, adjusted his spectacles, and, with gravedeliberation, announced that he wished to submit a question to thefirst speaker. Dick looked like a man whose death-warrant was about tobe signed. The problem was duly enunciated, and it turned out to be acarefully planned and decidedly awkward one. I wondered how on earthpoor Dick would face the music. He paused, as though considering hisreply. Then a sudden light mantled his face. A wicked twinklesparkled in his eye. He rose smartly, looked straight into the face ofhis questioner, and exclaimed confidently:

'Codlin's your friend, not Short!'

The audience was completely mystified. The answer had no more to dowith the question than Dutch cheese has to do with the rings of Saturn. For a fraction of a second you could have heard a pin drop. I saw thatthe only way of saving the situation was by commencing to applaud, andI smote my hands together with a will, and laughed as I have rarelyallowed myself to laugh in public. The sympathetic section of theaudience followed suit. A general impression seemed to exist that, somehow, Dick had made a particularly clever point. The old gentlemanwho had asked the question was manifestly bewildered; he gazedhelplessly round on his cheering fellow citizens, and evidentlyregarded the answer as some recondite allusion of which it would neverdo to display his ignorance. He resumed his seat, discomfited andashamed. When the applause and laughter had somewhat subsided, I roseand moved a vote of thanks to the chairman, which Dick seconded, though, I fancied, without much show of enthusiasm. Thus the meeting, which Dick never forgot, came to an eminently satisfactory end, although I heard privately long afterwards that, as the people tooktheir homeward way along those country roads, many who had applaudedvigorously inquired confidentially of their neighbours the exactbearing of the cryptic reply on the particular matter in hand. 

If Dick lacked laughter on the way across the plains to the meeting, heamply atoned for the deficiency on the way home. How he roared, andyelled, and screamed in his glee!

'I had to say something, ' he exclaimed. 'I hadn't the slightest ideawhat the old gentleman was talking about; and the only thing I couldthink of was the Punch and Judy!'

He laughed and coughed his way through that campaign. Everybody grewwonderfully fond of him, and looked eagerly for his coming. He did aworld of good, and shamed scores of us out of the gloom in which webore our slighter maladies. My mail from New Zealand tells me that, atlast, his cough has proved too much for him, so he has given it up. But I like to fancy that, in the land where coughing is no more heard, Dick Sunshine is laughing still. 

IX

FORTY!

Life moves along so smoothly with most of us that there seems to bevery little difference between one birthday and another; but to thisrule there is one brilliant and outstanding exception. There is onebirthday on which a man should certainly take a holiday, go for a quietstroll, and indulge in a little serious stock-taking. That birthdayis, of course, the fortieth. A man's fortieth birthday is one of thereally great days in his life's little story; and he must make the mostof it. I live in a city which boasts a comparatively meagrepopulation. The number of people who reach their fortieth birthdaysimultaneously must be very small. But in a city of any size somehundreds of people must daily become forty. And if I dwelt in such aplace, I should feel tempted to conduct a service every now and againfor men and women who were celebrating their fortieth birthday. Peopleso circumstanced, naturally impressed by the dignity and solemnity ofthe occasion, would welcome such a service, and the preacher would havea chance of sowing the seed in ground that was well prepared, and ofthe greatest possible promise. The selection of a text would presentno difficulty. I can think of two right off--one in the Old Testament, and one in the New--and there must be scores of others equallyappropriate. At forty a man enters upon middle life. What could bemore helpful to him, then, than a short inspiring word on such a textas Habakkuk's prayer: '_O Lord, revive Thy work in the midst of theyears, in the midst of the years make Thyself known!_'

I have been recalling, this morning, some painful memories. In my timeI have several times known that peculiarly acute species of anguishthat only comes to us when we discover a cherished idol in ruins. Men--some of them ministers--upon whose integrity I would cheerfullyhave staked everything I possessed, suddenly whelmed themselves inshame, and staggered out into the dark. It is an experience that makesa man feel that the very earth is rocking beneath him; it makes himwonder if it is possible for a good man to be somehow caught in a hotgust of devilry and swept clean off his feet. But the thing that hasimpressed me as I have counted such names sadly on my fingers is that, without an exception, they were all in the forties, most of them in theearly forties. Youth, of course, often sins, and sins grievously; butyouth recovers itself, and frequently emerges chastened and ennobled bythe bitter experience; but I can recall no instance of a man who fellin the forties and who ever really recovered himself. Wherefore lethim that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. I remember that, some time ago, Sir W. Robertson Nicoll quoted a brilliant essayist assaying that 'the most dangerous years are the forties--the years whenmen begin to be rich, when they have opportunities of gratifying theirpassions, when they, perhaps, imagine that they have led a starved andmeagre existence. ' And so, as I let my mind play about these old andsaddening memories, and as I reflect upon the essayist's corroborationof my own conclusion, I fancy I could utter, from the very heart of me, a particularly timely and particularly searching word to those who hadjust attained their fortieth birthdays. Or, if I felt that theoccasion was too solemn for speech, I could at least lead them inprayer. And when I led them in prayer, it would certainly beHabakkuk's prayer: 'O Lord, revive Thy work in the midst of the years;in the midst of the years make Thyself known!' It is a prayer forrevival and for revelation. 

The real significance of that prayer lies in the fact that the supremetendency of middle life is towards prosiness. Young people writepoetry and get sentimental: so do old people. But people in theforties--never! A man of forty would as soon be suspected of pickinghis neighbour's pocket as of writing poetry. He would rather be seenwalking down the street without collar or necktie than be seen sheddingtears. Ask a company of young people to select some of their favouritehymns or songs. They will at once call for hymns about heaven or songsabout love. So will old people. But you will never persuademiddle-aged people to sing such songs. They are in the practical orprosy stage of life. The romance of youth has worn off; the romance ofage has not arrived. They are between the poetry of the dawn and thepoetry of the twilight. And midway between the poetry of the dawn andthe poetry of the twilight comes the panting perspiration of noonday. When, therefore, I find myself face to face with my congregation ofpeople who are in the very act of celebrating their fortieth birthday, I shall urge them to pray with the old prophet that, in the midst ofthe years, the youthful romance of their first faith may be revivedwithin them, and that, in the midst of the years, the revelations thatcome at eventide may be delightfully anticipated. 

I said just now, however, that I had an alternative text from the NewTestament. I have an idea that if my first service is a success, Ishall hold another; and, for the sake of variety, I shall addressmyself to this second theme. Concerning the very first apostolicmiracle we are expressly and significantly told that '_the man wasabove forty years old on whom this miracle of healing was showed_. 'Now I cannot imagine why that particular is added unless it is to tellthose of us who are now 'above forty years old' that we are not beyondthe reach of the sensational. We have not outlived the romance of themiraculous. We are not 'too old at forty' to experience all the marveland the wonder of the grace divine. And, even as I write, Iconfidently anticipate the sparkle that will light up the eyes of theseforty-year-olds as I remind them that that man was above forty years ofage upon whom this first triumph of the Church was wrought. 

But there are worse things than prosiness. The mere change from thepoetry of youth to the prose of middle life need not in itself alarmus. Some of the finest classics in our literature are penned in prose. But within this minor peril lies the germ of a major peril. Thetrouble is that prosiness may develop into pessimism. And whenprosiness curdles into pessimism the case of the patient is very grave. I heard a young fellow in his teens telling a much older man of hisimplicit faith in the providence of God. 'Yes, ' said the senior, witha sardonic smile, 'I used to talk like that when I was your age!' Iheard a young girl telling a woman old enough to be her mother of therapture of her soul's experience. 'Ah!' replied the elder lady, 'Youwon't talk like that when you have seen as much of the world as Ihave!' Here, then, at last we have put our finger on the tragedy thatthreatens us in the forties. Why is it?

The reason is not far to seek. The fact is that at forty a man mustdrop something. He has been all his life accumulating until he hasbecome really overloaded. He has maintained his interest in all thethings that occupied his attention in youth; and, all the way along theroad, fresh claims have been made upon him. His position in the worldis a much more responsible one, and makes a greater drain upon histhought and energy. He has married, too, and children have come intohis home. There has been struggle and sickness and anxiety. Interestshave multiplied, and life has increased in seriousness. But, increasing in seriousness, it must not be allowed to increase insordidness. A man's life is like a garden. There is a limit to thethings that it will grow. You cannot pack plants in a garden as youpack sardines in a tin. That is why the farmer thins out the turnips;that is why the orchardist prunes his trees; and that is why thehusbandman pinches the grapebuds off the trailing vines. Life has tobe similarly treated. At forty a man realizes that his garden isgetting overcrowded. It contains all the flowers that he planted inhis sentimental youth and all the vegetables that he set there in hisprosaic manhood. It is too much. There must be a thinning out. And, unless he is very, very careful, he will find that the thinning-outprocess will automatically consist of the sacrifice of all the pansiesand the retention of all the potatoes. 

Now, when I address my congregation of people who are celebrating theirfortieth birthday, I shall make a most fervent appeal on behalf of thepansies. Potatoes are excellent things, and the garden becomesdistinctly wealthier when, in the twenties and thirties, a man beginsto moderate his passion for pansies, and to plant a few potatoes. Buta time comes when he must make a stand on behalf of the pansies, or hewill have no soul for anything beyond potatoes. Round his potato bedslet him jealously retain a border of his finest pansies; and, dependupon it, when he gets into the fifties and the sixties he will be gladthat, all through life, he remained true to the first fondnesses ofyouth. 

Not that he will have to wait for the fifties and the sixties. As soonas a man has faced the situation, taken his stand, and made hisdecision, he begins to congratulate himself upon it. That is one oflife's most subtle laws. Let us, then, see how it operates in anotherfield. Sir Francis Jeune, the great divorce judge, said that theeighth year was the dangerous year in wedded life. More tragediesoccurred in the eighth year than in any other. And Mr. Philip Gibbshas recently written a novel entitled _The Eighth Year_, in which hemakes the heroine declare that, in marriage, the eighth year is thefatal year. 

'"It's a psychological fact, " said Madge. "I work it out in this way. In the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment ofmarriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourthyears she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In thefifth and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes aworking compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In theseventh and eighth years she begins to find out herself. Life hasbecome prosaic. Her home has become a cage to her. In the eighth yearshe must find a way of escape--anyhow, anywhere. And in the eighthyear the one great question is, in what direction will she go? Thereare many ways of escape. "' And so comes the disaster. 

All this seems to show that the eighth year of marriage is like thefortieth year of life. It is the year in which husband and wife arecalled upon to make their supreme stand on behalf of the pansies. Andsupposing they do it? Suppose that they make up their minds thateverything shall not be sacrificed to potatoes; what follows? Why, tobe sure, the best follows. Coventry Patmore, in his _Angel in theHouse_--the classic of all young husbands and young wives--says thatthe years that follow the eighth are the sweetest and the fullest ofall. What, he asks--

 What For sweetness like the ten years' wife, Whose customary love is not Her passion, or her play, but life? With beauties so maturely fair, Affecting, mild, and manifold, May girlish charms no more compare Than apples green with apples gold. Ah, still unpraised Honoria, Heaven, When you into my arms it gave, Left naught hereafter to be given But grace to feel the good I have. 

Here, then, is the crisis reached; the stand successfully made onbehalf of the pansies; and all life fuller and richer for everafterwards in consequence. Every man and woman at forty is called uponfor a similar chivalrous effort. At forty we become the knights of thepansies, and if we let them go we shall find that at fifty it will bedifficult to find even a sprig of heartsease anywhere. 

Whether I take as my text the prophet's prayer for a revival and arevelation in the midst of the years, or the story of the man who wasmore than forty years old when he fell under the spell of themiraculous, I know how I shall close my sermon. I shall close bytelling the story of Dr. Kenn and Maggie Tulliver from _The Mill on theFloss_. It will convince my hearers that folk in the forties have agreat and beautiful and sacred ministry to exercise. Maggie was young, and the perplexities of life were too much for her. Dr. Kenn wasarrested by the expression of anguish in her beautiful eyes. Dr. Kennwas himself neither young nor old, but middle-aged; and Maggie felt achildlike, instinctive relief when she saw that it was Dr. Kenn's facethat was looking into hers. 'That plain, middle-aged face, with agrave, penetrating kindness in it, seeming to tell of a human being whohad reached a firm, safe strand, but was looking with helpful pitytowards the strugglers still tossed by the waves, had an effect onMaggie at this moment which was afterwards remembered by her as if ithad been a promise. ' And then George Eliot makes this trite andsignificant remark. 'The middle-aged, ' she says, 'who have livedthrough their strongest emotions, but are yet in the time when memoryis still half-passionate and not merely contemplative, should surely bea sort of natural priesthood, whom life has disciplined and consecratedto be the refuge and rescue of early stumblers and victims ofself-despair. Most of us, at some moment in our young lives, wouldhave welcomed a priest of that natural order in any sort of canonicalsor uncanonicals, but had to scramble upwards into all the difficultiesof nineteen entirely without such aid. '

And after hearing that fine story my congregation of folk on thethreshold of the forties will return from the quiet church to the busystreet humming the songs that they sang at nineteen; vowing that, comewhat may, the potatoes shall not elbow out all the pansies; andcongratulating themselves that the richest wine in the chalice of lifestill waits their thirsty lips. 

X

A WOMAN'S REASON

"Will you go with me?"

'"No, indeed; you must go alone. I shall not appear at all. "

'"Why, mother?"

'"_Because!_"'

I came across the above passage near the beginning of one of MyrtleReed's stories--_The Master's Violin_--and, towards the end, I foundthis:

'"Iris, I have been miserable ever since I told you I wrote theletters. "

'"Why, dear?"

'"_Because!_"'

And then, in quite another book--Maurice Thompson's _SweetheartManette_--I came upon this:

'"Why can't you tell me?" asked Rowland Hatch. 

'"I don't know that I have the right, " replied Manette. 

'"Why?"

'"_Because!_"'

Now, that word '_because_' is very interesting. 'It is a woman'sreason, ' Miss Reed confides to us. That may, or may not, be so. Iknow nothing about that. It is not my business. I only know that itis the oldest reason, and the safest reason, and by far the strongest. 

Now, really, no man can say why. As Miss Reed says in another passagelying midway between the two quoted: 'We all do things for which we cangive no reason. ' We do them _because_. No man can say why he preferscoffee to cocoa, or mutton to beef. He likes the one better than theother _because_. No man can say why he chose his profession. Hedecided to be a doctor or a carpenter _because_. No man can say why hefell in love with his wife. It would be an affectation to pretend thatshe is really incomparably superior to all other women upon the face ofthe earth. And yet to him she is not only incomparably superior, andincomparably lovelier, and incomparably nobler, but she is absolutelythe one and only woman on the planet or off it. No other swims intothe field of vision. She is first, and every other woman is nowhere. Why? '_Because!_' There is no other reason. 

The fact is that we get into endless confusion when we sail out intothe dark, mysterious seas that lie beyond that 'because. ' Nine timesout of ten our conclusions are unassailable. And nine times out of tenour reasons for reaching those conclusions are absurdly illogical, totally inadequate, or grossly mistaken. Everybody remembers the fableof the bantam cock who assured the admiring farmyard that the sun roseevery morning because of its anxiety to hear him crow! The fact wasindisputable; the sun did certainly rise every morning. It was only atthe attempt to ascribe a specific reason for its rising that theargument broke down. It is always safer to say that the sun risesevery morning _because_. Ministers at least will recall the merrimentthat Hugh Latimer made of Master More. The good man had been appointedto investigate the cause of the Goodwin Sands. He met with smallsuccess in his inquiries. At last he came upon an old man who hadlived in the district nearly a hundred years. The centenarian knew. The secret sparkled in his eyes. Master More approached the prodigy. 'Yes, sir, ' the old man answered, 'I know. Tenterden Steeple is thecause of Goodwin Sands! I remember when they built the steeple. Before that we never heard of sands, or flats, or shallows off thishaven. They built the steeple, and then came the sands. Yes, sir, Tenterden Steeple is the cause of the destruction of Sandwich Harbour!'

When we wander beyond that wise word 'because' circumstances seemmalicious; they conspire to deceive us. I remember passing a window inLondon in which a sewing-machine was displayed. The machine wasworking. A large doll sat beside it, its hand on the wheel. Thedoll's hand appeared to be turning the handle. As a matter of fact, the machine was electrically driven, and the wheel turned the hand ofthe doll. In the realm of cause and effect we are frequently the dupesand victims of a very dexterous system of legerdemain. The resultantquantity is invariably clear; the contributing causes are not what theyseem. 

I find myself believing to-day pretty much what I believed twenty yearsago; but I find myself believing the same things for different reasons. As life goes on, a man learns to put more and more confidence in hisconclusions, and to become more and more chary of the reasons that ledto those conclusions. If a certain course seems to him to be right, heautomatically adopts it, and he confidently persists in it even afterthe reasons that first dictated it have fallen under suspicion. 'Morethan once in an emergency at sea, ' says Dr. Grenfell, the hero ofLabrador, 'I have swiftly decided upon a certain line of action. If Ihad waited to hem my reason into a corner before adopting that course, I should not be here to tell the tale. ' We often flatter ourselvesthat we base our conclusions upon our reasons. In reality, we donothing of the kind. The mind works so rapidly that it tricks us. Itis another case of legerdemain. Once more, it is the machine thatturns the doll, and not the doll that turns the machine. Our thinkingfaculties often play at ride-a-cock-horse. We recall Browning's lines:

 When I see boys ride-a-cock-horse, I find it in my heart to embarrass them By hinting that their stick's a mock horse, And they really carry what they say carries them. 

The rugged truth is, that we first of all reach our conclusions. Thatis the starting-point. Then, amazed at our own temerity in doing so, we hasten to tack on a few reasons as a kind of apology to ourselvesfor our own intrepidity, a tardy concession to intellectual decency andgood order. But whether we recognize it or not, we do most things_because_. As Pascal told us long ago, 'the heart has reasons whichthe reason does not know. It is the heart that feels God, not thereason. ' When old Samuel Wesley lay dying in 1735, he turned to hisillustrious son John, saying: 'The inward witness, son, the inwardwitness! That is the proof, the strongest proof of Christianity!' 'Idid not at the time understand him, ' says John, in quoting the wordswith approval long afterwards. But the root of the whole matter liesjust there. 

My reference to Dr. Grenfell reminds me. The good doctor wasquestioned the other day as to his faith in immortality. 'I believe init, ' he replied, 'because I believe in it. I am sure of it, because Iam sure of it. ' Precisely! That is the point. We believe _because_. And then, on our sure faith, we pile up a stupendous avalanche ofChristian evidences. Emerson tells us of two American senators whospent a quarter of a century searching for conclusive evidence of theimmortality of the soul. And Emerson finishes the story by saying thatthe impulse which prompted their long search was itself the strongestproof that they could have had. Of course! Although they knew it not, they already believed. They believed _because_. And then, findingtheir faith naked, and feeling ashamed, they set out to beg, borrow, orsteal a few rags of reasons with which to deck it. It is the problemof Professor Teufelsdrockh and _Sartor Resartus_ over again. It allcomes back to Carlyle's 'Everlasting Yea. ' The shame is mock modesty;and the craving is a false one. A woman's reason is the best reason. As the years go by, we become less and less eager for evidence. We arecontent to believe _because_. 'I was lately looking out of my window, 'Martin Luther wrote from Coburg to a friend, 'and I saw the stars inthe heavens, and God's great beautiful arch over my head, but I couldnot see any pillars on which the great Builder had fixed this arch; andyet the heavens fell not, and the great arch stood firmly. There aresome who are always feeling for the pillars, and longing to touch them. And, because they cannot touch them, they stand trembling, and fearinglest the heavens should fall. If they could only grasp the pillars, then the heavens would stand fast. '

'"But how do you know that there is any Christ? You never saw Him!"said poor Augustine St. Clare, the slave-owner, to Uncle Tom, the slave. 

'"I feel it in my soul, mas'r--feel Him now! Oh, mas'r, the blessedLord Jesus loves you!"

'"But how do you know that, Tom?" said St. Clare. 

'"I feels it in my soul, mas'r; oh, mas'r, the love of Christ thatpasseth knowledge. "

'"But, Tom, you know that I have a great deal more knowledge than you;what if I should tell you that I don't believe your Bible? Wouldn'tthat shake your faith some, Tom?"

'"Not a grain, mas'r!" And St. Clare felt himself borne, on the tideof Tom's faith and feeling, almost to the gate of heaven. 

'"I like to hear you, Tom; and some time I'll talk more. "'

Uncle Tom's argument was the strongest and most convincing after all;if only all we arguers, and debaters, and controversialists could cometo recognize it. He believed _because_. And, now that I come to thinkof it, Miss Myrtle Reed is wrong in calling it a woman's reason. It isa divine argument, the oldest, and sweetest, and strongest of alldivine arguments. I said just now that a man loves a woman just_because_ he loves her, and he could not in a thousand volumes give anintelligent and convincing explanation of his preference. And--let mesay it in a hushed and reverent whisper--God loves in much the sameway. Listen, and let me read: 'The Lord did not set His love upon youbecause ye were more in number than any people, for ye were the fewestof all people; but _because_ the Lord loved you!' He loved _because_He loved. He loved _because_. 

I intend, therefore, to proclaim the magnificent verities of theChristian gospel. I shall talk with absolute certainty, and withunwavering confidence, about the sin of man, the love of God, the Crossof Christ. If my message is met with a 'why' or a 'wherefore, ' I haveonly one reply--'_Because!_' There is nothing else to be said. Thepreacher lives to tell a wonderful love-story. And a love-story isnever arguable. 'God so loved the world that He gave His only begottenSon!' Why? _Because!_

PART II

I

THE HANDICAP

I

It was a sunny autumn afternoon. The leaves were rustling about myfeet, and the first nip of winter was in the air. It was Saturday, andI was out for a stroll. Suddenly a crowd attracted my attention, and, impelled by that curiosity which such a concourse invariably excites, Idrew near to see whether it meant a fire or a fight. It was neither. As I approached I caught sight of young fellows moving in and out amongthe people, wearing light many-coloured garments, and I guessed that arace was about to be run. Almost as soon as I arrived, the men werecalled up, arranged in a long line, and preparations made for thestart. At a signal two or three of them sprang out from the line andbounded with an easy stride along the load. A few seconds later, threeor four more followed; then others; until at last only one was left;and, after a brief period of further waiting, he also left the line andset out in pursuit. It was a handicap, I was told, and this man hadstarted from scratch. It was to be a long race, and it would be sometime before any of the runners could be expected back again. Thecrowd, therefore, dispersed for the time being, breaking up into knotsand groups, each of which strolled off to while away the waiting timeas its own taste suggested. I turned into a lane that led up into thebush on the hillside, and, from that sheltered and sunny eminence, watched for the first sign of the returning runners. 

Sitting there with nothing to do, it flashed upon me that the scene Ihad just witnessed was a reflection, as in a mirror, of all humanexperience and endeavour. Most men are heavily handicapped; it is nogood blinking the fact. Ask a man to undertake some office or assumesome responsibility in connexion with the church, and he will silenceyou at once with a narration of the difficulties that stand in his way. Ask a man to act on some board or committee for the management of somecharitable or philanthropic enterprise, and he will explain to you thathe has not a minute to spare. Ask a man to subscribe to some mostnecessary or deserving object, and he will tell you of the incessantdemands to which he is subjected. Now it is no good putting all thisdown to cant. We have no right to assume that these are merely thelame excuses of men who, in their secret souls, do not desire to assistus. We must not hastily hurl at them the curse that fell upon Merozbecause it came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty. Allthat they say is perfectly true. The difficulties that debar the firstof these men from undertaking the work to which you are calling him areboth real and formidable; the second man has every moment of his timefully occupied; the third man, because he is known to be generous, isbadgered to death with collecting-lists from the first thing in themorning till the last thing at night. We must not judge these men tooharshly. In the uncharitableness of our hearts we imagine that theyhave given us excuses which are not reasons. The fact is that theyhave done exactly the reverse; they have given us reasons which are notexcuses. We are on safer ground when we recognize frankly that it isvery difficult for many men to devote much time, much energy, and muchmoney to the kingdom of God. Many men are heavily handicapped. 

II

'Isn't that one of the runners just coming in sight now?' a friendasked, pointing along the road. I fancied that he was right, so werose and strolled down to the spot from which the race had started. Wemust have been mistaken, for when we emerged from the lane there was nosign of the competitors, I was not sorry, however, that we had returnedprematurely; for I noticed the handicapper strolling idly about, andgot into conversation with him. 

'There seems to me to be very little sense in a race of this kind, ' Isuggested to him. 'If those men win who started first, the honour isvery small in view of the start they received; whilst if the man whostarted last fails to win, he feels it to be no disgrace, and comfortshimself with the reflection that he was too heavily handicapped. Isthat not so?'

'Oh, no, ' replied the handicapper, politely concealing his pity for mysimplicity; 'it works out just the other way. It isn't fair, don't yousee, to keep those chaps that got away first always running in a classby themselves. It does not call out the best that is in them. Butto-day it does them good to feel that they are being matched againstsome of the finest runners in the State, and they will strain everyeffort to try to beat the champions. And it does a man like Brown, whostarted from scratch, no harm to see those fellows all getting ahead ofhim at the start. He knows very well that he can beat any man in thecountry on level terms, and in such races he will only put forth justas much effort as is needed to get ahead of his opponent. But there isnothing to show that he could not do much better still if only hisopponent were more formidable. In a race like this, however, he knowsthat anything may happen. His usual rivals have all got a start ofhim; if he is to defend his good name, he must beat all his previousrecords and bring his utmost power into play. And so every man in therace is put on his mettle. We consider the handicap a very useful raceindeed!'

'Perhaps so, ' I said, feeling that I was beaten, but feebly attemptingto cover my retreat; 'but how do you compute the exact starts andhandicaps which the different men are to take?'

'Ah, ' he said, 'now you've touched the vital question. ' I wasgratified at his recognition of the good order of my retirement. 'Yousee, ' he went on, 'we have to look up the men's previous performancesand work out the differences in their records with mathematicalexactness. But there is something more than that. We have to know themen. You can't adjust the handicaps by rule of three. Anybody who hasseen Jones run must have noticed that he's a bit downhearted. He hasbeen beaten every time, and he goes into a race now expecting to bebeaten, and is therefore beaten before he starts. He needsencouragement, and we have to consider that fact in arranging hishandicap. Then there's Smith. He's too cocksure. He has never hadany difficulty in beating men of his own class. He needs putting onhis mettle. So we increase his handicap accordingly. It takes a lotof working out, and a lot of thinking about, I tell you. But here theycome!'

There was no mistake this time. A batch of runners came into sight allat once, the officials took their places, and the crowd clusteredexcitedly round. As we waited, the remarks to which I had justlistened took powerful hold upon my mind. The handicaps of life mayhave been more carefully calculated and more beneficently designed thanwe have sometimes been inclined to suppose. 

III

It was a fine finish. As the first batch of men drew nearer I waspleased to notice that Brown, the fellow in light blue, who had startedlast, was among them. Gradually he drew out from the rest, and, with amagnificent spurt, asserted his superiority and won the race. A fewminutes later I took the tram citywards. Just as it was starting, Brown also entered the car. I could not resist the opportunity ofcongratulating him. 

'It must have taken the heart out of you, ' I said, 'to see all theother fellows getting away in front of you, and to find yourself leftto the last?'

'Oh, no, ' he replied, with a laugh, 'it's a bit of an honour, isn't it, to see that they think me so much better than everybody else that theyfancy I have a sporting chance under such conditions? And, besides, itspurs a fellow to do his best. When you are accustomed to winningraces, it doesn't feel nice to be beaten, even in a handicap, and toavoid being beaten you've got to go for all you're worth. '

I shook hands and left him. But I felt that he had given me somethingelse to think about. 

'It's a bit of an honour!' he had said. 'And, besides, it spurs afellow to do his best!'

The next time a man tells me that he cannot help me because he is soheavily handicapped, what a tale I shall have to tell him!

IV

My Saturday afternoon experience has convinced me that, in the Church, we have tragically misinterpreted the significance of handicaps. 

'I am very heavily handicapped, ' we say in the Church, 'therefore Imust not attempt this thing!'

'I am very heavily handicapped, ' they say out there at their sports, 'therefore I must put all my strength into it!'

And who can doubt that the philosophy of the Churchmen is false, orthat the philosophy of the sportsmen is sound? There is a great sayingof Bacon's that every handicapped man should learn by heart. 'Whosoever, ' he says, 'hath anything fixed in his person that dothinduce contempt hath also a perpetual spur in himself to rescue anddeliver himself from scorn. ' Is that why so many of the world'sgreatest benefactors were men who bore in their bodies the marks ofphysical affliction--blindness, deafness, disease, and the like? Theyfelt that they were heavily handicapped, and that their handicap calledthem to make a supreme effort 'to rescue and deliver themselves fromscorn. '

When speaking of the difficulty which a black boy experiences inAmerica in competing with his white rivals, Booker Washington tells usthat his own pathetic and desperate struggle taught him that 'successis to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached inlife as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying tosucceed. ' There is a good deal in that. I was once present at ameeting of a certain Borough Council, at which an engineer had toreport on a certain proposal which the municipal authorities werediscussing. The engineer contented himself with remarking that therewere serious difficulties in the way of the execution of the plan. Whereupon the Mayor turned upon the unfortunate engineer and remarked, 'We pay you your salary, Mr. Engineer, not to tell us that difficultiesexist, but to show us how to surmount them!' I thought it rather asevere rebuke at the time, but very often since, when I have beentempted to allow my handicaps to divert me from my duty, I have beenglad that I heard the poor engineer censured. 

I was once deeply and permanently impressed by a chairman's speech at ameeting in Exeter Hall. That noble old auditorium was crowded fromfloor to ceiling for the annual missionary demonstration of theWesleyan Methodist Church. The chair was occupied by Mr. W. E. Knight, of Newark. In the course of a most earnest plea for missionaryenthusiasm, Mr. Knight suddenly became personal. 'I was born in amissionary atmosphere, ' he said. 'I have lived in it ever since; Ihope I shall die in it. Over forty years ago my heart was touched withthe story of the world's needs; when I heard such men as Gervase Smith, Dr. Punshon, Richard Roberts, G. T. Perks, and others, I said, "Lord, here am I, send me. " I came up to London forty-one years ago as acandidate for the Methodist ministry. I offered myself, but the Churchdid not see fit to accept my offer. I remember well coming up to thecollege at Westminster and being told of the decision of the committeeby that sainted man, William Jackson. I went to the little room inwhich I had slept with a broken heart. I despised myself. I wasrejected of men, and I felt that I was forsaken of God. ' Now here is aman heavily handicapped; but let him finish his story. 'In that momentof darkness, ' Mr. Knight continued, 'the deepest darkness of my life, there came to me a voice which has influenced my life from then tillnow. It said. "If you cannot go yourself, send some one else. " I wasa poor boy then; I knew that I could not pay for anybody else to go. But time rolled on. I prospered in business. And to-night I shall layon the altar a sum which I wish the committee to invest, and theinterest on that sum will support a missionary in Africa, not during mylifetime only, but as long as capital is capable of earning interest. And, ladies and gentlemen, I assure you that this is a red-letter dayin my life!'

Of course it was! It was the day on which he had turned his handicapto that account for which all handicaps were intended. 

'My handicap was an honour and a spur!' said the champion in thetramcar. 

'My handicap was an honour and a spur!' said the chairman at ExeterHall. 

Both the champion and the chairman did by means of their handicaps whatthey could never have done without those handicaps. There can be nodoubt about it; handicaps were designed, not as the pitiful excuses ofthe indolent, but as the magnificent inspirations of the brave. 

II

GOG AND MAGOG

Gog and Magog, let it be dearly understood, are the two tallpoplar-trees that keep ceaseless vigil by my gate. I state this factbaldly and unequivocally at the very outset in order to set at rest, once and for ever, all controversies and disputations on thatfascinating point. Historians will reach down the ponderous and dustytomes that litter up their formidable shelves, and will tell me thatGog and Magog were two famous British giants whose life-sized statues, fourteen feet high, have stood for more than two hundred years in theGuildhall in London. But that is all that the historians know aboutit! Theologians, and especially theologians of a certain school, willremind me that Gog and Magog are biblical characters. Are they notmentioned in the prophecy of Ezekiel and in the Book of Revelation?And then, looking gravely over their spectacles, these learned-lookinggentlemen will ask me if I am seriously of opinion that the inspiredwriters were referring to my pair of lofty poplars. I hasten to assurethese nervous and unimaginative gentlemen that I propose to commitmyself to no such heresy. Like Mrs. Gamp, I would not presume. Forages past these cryptic titles have provided my excellent friends withground for interminable speculation, and for the most ingeniousexploits of interpretation. How could I have the heart to exclusivelyallocate to these stately sentinels that guard my gate the titles thathave afforded the interpreters such endless pleasure? I would as soonattempt to snatch from a boy his only peg-top, or from a girl her onlydoll, as embark upon so barbarous an atrocity. How could they everagain declare, with the faintest scrap of confidence, that Gog andMagog represented any particular pair of princes or potentates if Ideliberately anticipate them by walking off with both labels and coollyattaching them to my two poplar-trees? The thing is absurd upon theface of it. And so I repeat that for the purposes of this article, andfor the purposes of this article only, Gog and Magog are the two tallpoplar-trees that keep ceaseless vigil by my gate. 

Trees are very lovable things. We all like Beaconsfield the betterbecause he was so passionately devoted to the trees at Hughenden. Hewas so fond of them that he directed in his will that none of themshould ever be cut down. So I am not ashamed of my tenderness for Gogand Magog. There they stand, down at the gate; the one on the oneside, and the other on the other. Huge giants they are, with a giant'sstrength and a giant's stature, but with more than a giant's grace. From whichever direction I come, they always seem to salute me with awelcome as soon as I come round the bend in the road. It is alwayspleasant when home has something about it that can be seen at adistance. The last half-mile on the homeward road is the half-mile inwhich the climax of weariness is reached. It is like the last strawthat breaks the camel's back. But if there is a light at the window, or some clear landmark that distinguishes the spot, the very sight ofthe familiar object lures the traveller on, and in actual sight of homehe forgets his fatigue. 

It is a very pleasant thing to have two glorious poplars at your gate. They always seem to be craning, straining, towering upward to catch thefirst glimpse of you; and they make home seem nearer as soon as youcome within sight of them. Gog and Magog are such companionablethings. They always have something to say to you. It is true thatthey talk of little but the weather; but then, that is what most peopletalk about. I like to see them in August, when a certain olive sheenmantles their branches and tells you that the swallows will soon behere. I like to see them in October, when they are a towering columnof verdure, every leaf as bright as though it has just been varnished. I even like to see them in April, when they strew the paths with arustling litter of bronze and gold. They tell me that winter iscoming, with its long evenings, its roaring fires, and its insistenceon the superlative attractions of home. There never dawns a day onwhich Gog and Magog are not well worth looking at and well worthlistening to. 

But although I have been speaking of Gog and Magog as though they wereas much alike as two peas, the very reverse is the case. No twothings--not even the two peas--are exactly alike. When God makes athing He breaks the mould. The two peas do not resemble each otherunder a microscope. Macaulay, in his essay on Madame D'Arblay, declares that this extraordinary range of distinctions within verynarrow limits is one of the most notable things in the universe. 'Notwo faces are alike, ' he says, 'and yet very few faces deviate verywidely from the common standard. Among the millions of human beingswho inhabit London, there is not one who could be taken by hisacquaintance for another; yet we may walk from Paddington to Mile Endwithout seeing one person in whom any feature is so overcharged that weturn round to stare at it. An infinite number of varieties liesbetween limits which are not very far asunder. The specimens whichpass those limits on either side form a very small minority. '

So is it with trees. When you first drive up an avenue of poplars youregard each tree as the exact duplicate of all the others. There iscertainly a general similarity, just as, in some households, there is astriking family likeness. But just as, after spending a few days withthat household, you no longer mistake Jack for Charlie, or Jessie forJean, and even laugh at yourself for ever having been so stupid, so, when you get to know the poplars better, you no longer suppose thatthey are all alike. You soon detect the marks of individuality amongthem; and, if one were felled and brought you, you could describe withperfect accuracy the two trees between which it stood. That isparticularly the case with Gog and Magog. A casual visitor wouldremark, as he approached the house, that we had a pair of giganticpoplars at the front gate. It does not occur to him to distinguishbetween them. For aught he knows, or for aught he cares, Gog might beMagog, or Magog might be Gog. But to us the thing is absurd. We knowthem so well that we should as soon think of mistaking one of thechildren for another as of mistaking Gog for Magog, or Magog for Gog. We salute the tall trees every morning when we rise; we pass them withmystic greetings of our own a dozen times a day; and, before retiringat night, we like to peep from the front windows and see their giganticforms grandly silhouetted against the evening sky. Gog is Gog, andMagog is Magog; and the idea of mistaking the one for the other seemsludicrous in the extreme. The solar system is as full of mysteries asa conjurer's portmanteaux; but, of all the mysteries that it contains, the mystery of individuality is surely the most inscrutable of all. 

'What is the difference between Gog and Magog?' somebody wants to know;and I am glad that somebody asked the question, for it gives me theopportunity of pointing out that between Gog and Magog there is all thedifference in the world. There is a difference in girth; there is adifference in height; and there is a difference in fibre. I have justrun a tape round both trees. Magog gives a measurement of just sixfeet; whilst Gog puts those puny proportions to shame with a record ofseven feet six inches. I have not attempted to climb the trees; but Ican see at a glance that Gog is at least eight feet taller than hisbrother. Nor do these measurements sum up the whole of Gog'sadvantage. For you cannot glance at the twins without seeing that Gogis incalculably the sturdier. In the trunk of Magog there is a hugecavity into which a child could creep and be perfectly concealed; butGog is as sound as a bell. Any one who has seen two brothers grow upside by side--the one sturdy, masculine, virile, and full of health;the other, puny, delicate, fragile, and threatened with disease--knowshow I feel whenever I pass between these two sentries at the gate. Iam full of admiration for the glorious strength of Gog; I am touched totenderness by the comparative frailty of poor Magog. It is odd thattwo trees of the same age, growing together under precisely identicalconditions, should have turned out so differently. There must be areason for it. Is there? There is!

The fact is, Gog gets all the wind. I have often watched the stormcome sweeping down on the two tall trees, and it is grand to watchthem. The huge things sway and bend like tossing plumes, and sometimesyou almost fancy that they will break like reeds before the fury of theblast. Great branches are torn off; smaller boughs and piles of twigsare scattered all around like wounded soldiers on a hotly contestedfield; but the trees outlive the storm, and you love them all thebetter for it. But, all the time, you can see that it is Gog that isdoing the fighting. The fearful onslaught breaks first upon him; andthe force of the attack is broken by the time it reaches Magog. It maybe that Gog is very fond of Magog, and, pitying his frailty, seeks toshelter him. It certainly looks like it. But, if so, it is a mistakenkindness. It is just because Gog has had to bear the brunt of so manyattacks that he has sent down his roots so deeply and has become somagnificently strong. It is because Magog has always been protectedand sheltered that he is so feeble, and cuts so sorry a figure besidehis stouter brother. 

And now I find myself sitting at the feet of Gog and Magog, not onlyliterally but metaphorically, and they begin to teach me things. It isnot half a bad thing to be living in a world that has some fight in it. It is a good thing for a man to be buffeted and knocked about. I fancythat Gog and Magog could say some specially comforting things toparents. The tendency among us is to try to secure for our childrenthe kind of life that Magog leads, hidden, sheltered, and protected. Yet nobody can take a second glance at poor Magog--his shorter stature, his smaller girth, his softer fibre--without entertaining the gravestdoubts concerning the wisdom of so apparently considerate a choice. Itis perfectly natural, and altogether creditable to the fond hearts andearnest solicitude of doting parents, that they should seek to reartheir children like hot-house plants, protected from the nipping frostsand frigid blasts of a chilling world. But it can be overdone. Agreat meeting, attended by five thousand people, was recently held inLondon to deal with the White Slave question. And I was greatly struckby the fact that one of the most experienced and observant of thespeakers--the Rev. J. Ernest Rattenbury, of the West LondonMission--declared with deep emotion and impressive emphasis that 'it isthe girls who come from _the sheltered homes_ who stand in the greatestperil. ' Perhaps I shall render the most practical service if I put thetruth the other way. Instead of dwelling so much on Magog, look atGog. I know fathers and mothers who are inclined to break their heartsbecause their boys and girls have had to go out from the shielding careof their homes into the rough and tumble of the great world. Look atGog, I say again, look at Gog!

Was it not Alfred Russel Wallace who tried to help an emperor-moth, andonly harmed it by his ill-considered ministry? He came upon thecreature beating its wings and struggling wildly to force its passagethrough the narrow neck of its cocoon. He admired its fineproportions, eight inches from the tip of one wing to the tip of theother, and thought it a pity that so handsome a creature should besubjected to so severe an ordeal. He therefore took out his lancet andslit the cocoon. The moth came out at once; but its glorious coloursnever developed. The soaring wings never expanded. The indescribablehues and tints and shades that should have adorned them never appeared. The moth crept moodily about; drooped perceptibly; and presently died. The furious struggle with the cocoon was Nature's wise way ofdeveloping the splendid wings and of sending the vital fluids pulsingthrough the frame until every particle blushed with their beauty. Thenaturalist had saved the little creature from the struggle, but hadunintentionally ruined and slain it in the process. It is the story ofGog and Magog over again. 

In my college days I used to go down to a quaint little English villagefor the week-end in order to conduct services in the village chapel onSunday. I was always entertained by a little old lady whose facehaunts me still. It was so very human, and so very wise, and withal sovery beautiful; and the white ringlets on either side completed aperfect picture. She dwelt in a modest little cottage on top of thehill. It was a queer, tumble-down old place with crooked rafters andcrazy lattice windows. Roses and honeysuckle clambered all over theporch, straggled along the walls, and even crept under the eaves intothe cottage itself. The thing that impressed me when I first went wasthe extraordinary number of old Bessie's visitors. On Saturday nightsthey came one after another, young men and sedate matrons, old men andtripping maidens, and each desired to see her alone. She was very old;she had known hunger and poverty; the deeply furrowed brow told of longand bitter trouble. She was a great sufferer, too, and daily wrestledwith her pitiless disease. But, like the sturdier of the poplars by mygate, she had gathered into herself the force of all the cruel windsthat had beaten so savagely upon her. And the result was that her owncharacter had become so strong and so upright and so beautiful that shewas recognized as the high-priestess of that English countryside, andevery man and maiden who needed counsel or succour made a beaten pathto her open door. 

III

MY WARDROBE

Changing your mind is for all the world like changing your clothes. You may easily make a mistake, especially if the process is performedin the dark. And, as a matter of fact, a man is usually more or lessin the dark at the moment in which he changes his mind. Anabsent-minded friend of mine went upstairs the other day to prepare fora social function. To the consternation of his unhappy wife he camedown again wearing his old gardening suit. A man may quite easily makea mistake. Before he enters upon the process of robing he must be sureof three things: (1) He must be quite clear that the clothes heproposes to doff are unsuitable. (2) He must be sure that his wardrobecontains more appropriate apparel. (3) And he must be certain that thefolded garments that he takes from the drawer are actually those thathe made up his mind to wear. It is a good thing, similarly, to changeone's mind. But the thing must be done very deliberately, and evenwith scientific precision, or a man may make himself perfectlyridiculous. Let me produce a pair of illustrations, one from Boswell, which is good; and one from the Bible, which is better. 

(1) Dr. Samuel Johnson was a frequent visitor at the house of Mr. Richardson, the famous novelist. One day, whilst Johnson was there, Hogarth called. Hogarth soon started a discussion with Mr. Richardsonas to the justice of the execution of Dr. Cameron. 'While he wastalking, he perceived a person standing at a window in the room, shaking his head, and rolling himself about in a strange, ridiculousmanner. He concluded that he was _an idiot_, whom his relations hadput under the care of Mr. Richardson, as being a very good man. To hisgreat surprise, however, this figure stalked forwards to where he andMr. Richardson were sitting, and all at once took up the argument. Hedisplayed such a power of eloquence that Hogarth looked at him withastonishment, and actually imagined that he was _inspired_. ' Thus farBoswell. 

(2) Paul was shipwrecked, as everybody knows, at Malta. He wasgathering sticks for the fire, when a viper, thawed by the warm fleshand the fierce flame, fastened on his finger. When the natives saw thesnake hanging on his hand, they regarded it as a judgement, and saidthat no doubt he was a _murderer_. But when they saw that he was nonethe worse for the bite, 'they changed their minds, and said that he was_a god_!'

Hogarth thought Johnson was a _lunatic_. He changed his mind, and saidhe was _inspired_!

The Maltese thought Paul was a _murderer_. They changed their minds, and said he was a _god_!

They were all wrong, and always wrong. It is the case of my poorabsent-minded friend over again. It was quite clear that his clotheswanted changing, but he put on the wrong suit. It was evident thatHogarth's verdict on Johnson wanted revising, but he rushed from Scyllato Charybdis. It was manifest that the Maltese view of Paul neededcorrecting, but they swung, like a pendulum, from one ludicrous extremeto the opposite. In each case, the hero reappears, wearing the wrongclothes. In each case he only makes himself ridiculous. If my mindwants changing, I must be very cautious as to the way in which I do it. 

And, of course, a man _must_ sometimes change both his clothes and hismind--his _mind_ at any rate. How can you go to a conjuringentertainment, for example, without changing your mind a hundred timesin the course of the performance? For a second you think that thevanished billiard ball is _here_. Then, in a trice, you change yourmind, and conclude that it is _there_! First, you believe that, appearances notwithstanding, the magician really has _no_ hat in hishand. Then, in a flash, you change your mind, and you fancy he has_two_! You think for a moment that the clever trick is done in _this_way, and then you become certain that it is done in _that_! I oncewitnessed in London a very clever artist, who walked up and down thestage, passing midway behind a screen. And as he reappeared on theother side, after having been hidden from sight for only a fraction ofa second, he was differently dressed. He stepped behind the screen asoldier, and emerged a policeman. He disappeared a huntsman, hereappeared a clergyman. He went a convict, he came again a sailor. Hewore a score of uniforms in almost as many seconds. 

I began by saying that changing your mind is for all the world likechanging your clothes. It is less tedious, however. I have no ideahow my London friend managed to change his garments many times in aminute. But many a magician has made me change my mind at a lightningpace. Yes, many a magician. For the universe is, after all, a kind ofmagic. The wand of the wizard is at its wonderful work. It is thehighest type of legerdemain. It is very weird and very wonderful, athing of marvel and of mystery. No man can sit down and gaze for fiveminutes with wide open eyes upon God's worlds without changing his mindat least five times. The man who never changes his mind will soondiscover to his shame that he is draped in intellectual rags andtatters. 

I rather think that Macaulay's illustration is as good as any. 'Atraveller, ' he says in his essay on Sir James Mackintosh, 'falls inwith a berry which he has never before seen. He tastes it, and findsit sweet and refreshing. He presses it, and resolves to introduce itinto his own country. But in a few minutes he is taken violently sick;he is convulsed; he is at the point of death. He, of course, changeshis mind, pronounces this delicious food a poison, blames his own follyin tasting it, and cautions his friends against it. After a long andviolent struggle he recovers, and finds himself much exhausted by hissufferings, but free from chronic complaints which had been the tormentof his life. He then changes his mind again, and pronounces this fruita very powerful remedy, which ought to be employed only in extremecases, and with great caution, but which ought not to be absolutelyexcluded from the Pharmacopoeia. Would it not be the height ofabsurdity to call such a man fickle and inconsistent because he hadrepeatedly altered his judgement?' Of course it would. A man cannotgo all through life wearing the same suit of clothes. For two reasons. It will not always fit, and it will wear out. And, in precisely thesame way, and for identically similar reasons, a man must sometimeschange his opinions. It is refreshing to think of Augustine carefullycompiling a list of the mistakes that had crept into his writings, sothat he might take every opportunity of repudiating and correctingthem. I never consult my copies of Archbishop Trench's great works on_The Parables_ and _The Miracles_ without glancing, always with a glowof admiration, at that splendid sentence with which the 'Publisher'sNote' concludes: 'The author never allowed his books to be stereotyped, in order that he might constantly improve them, and permanence has onlybecome possible now that his diligent hand can touch the work no more. 'That always strikes me as being very fine. 

But the thing must be done methodically. Let me not rush upstairs andchange either my clothes or my mind for the mere sake of making achange. Nor must I tumble into the first suit that I happen tofind--in either wardrobe. When I reappear, the change must commenditself to the respect, if not the admiration, of my fellows. I do notwant men to laugh at my change as we have laughed at these Maltesenatives, at old Hogarth, and at my absent-minded friend. I want to bequite sure that the clothes that I doff are the wrong clothes, and thatthe clothes that I don are the right ones. 

Mr. Gladstone once thought out very thoroughly this whole question asto how frequently and how radically a man may change his mental outfitwithout forfeiting the confidence of those who have come to value hisjudgements. And, as a result of that hard thinking, the great manreached half a dozen very clear and very concise conclusions. (1) Heconcluded that a change of front is very often not only permissible butcreditable. 'A change of mind, ' he says, 'is a sign of life. If youare alive, you must change. It is only the dead who remain the same. I have changed my point of view on a score of subjects, and myconvictions as to many of them. ' (2) He concluded that a great change, involving a drastic social cleavage, not unlike a change in religion, should certainly occur not more than once in a lifetime. (3) Heconcluded that a great and cataclysmic change should never be sudden orprecipitate. (4) He concluded that no change ought to be characterizedby a contemptuous repudiation of old memories and old associations. (5) He concluded that no change ought to be regarded as final or worthyof implicit confidence if it involved the convert in temporal gain orworldly advantage. (6) And he concluded that any change, to commandrespect, must be frankly confessed, and not be hooded, slurred over, ordenied. 

All this is good, as far as it goes. But even Mr. Gladstone must notbe too hard on sudden and cataclysmic changes. What about Saul on theroad to Damascus? What about Augustine that morning in his garden?What about Brother Laurence and the dry tree? What about StephenGrellet in the American forest? What about Luther on Pilate'sstaircase? What about Bunyan and Newton, Wesley and Spurgeon? Whatabout the tales that Harold Begbie tells? And what about the work ofGeneral Booth? Professor James, in his _Varieties of ReligiousExperience_, has a good deal to say that would lead Mr. Gladstone toyet one more change of mind concerning the startling suddenness withwhich the greatest of all changes may be precipitated. 

And this, too, must be said. Every wise man has, locked away in hisheart, a few treasures that he will never either give or sell orexchange. It is a mistake to suppose that all our opinions are open torevision. They are not. There are some things too sacred to be alwaysopen to scrutiny and investigation. No self-respecting man will spendhis time inquiring as to his wife's probity and honour. He makes uphis mind as to that when he marries her; and henceforth that questionis settled. It is not open to review. He would feel insulted if aninvestigation were suggested. It is only the small things of life thatwe are eternally questioning. We are reverently restful and serenelysilent about the biggest things of all. A man does not discuss hiswife's virtue or his soul's salvation on the kerbstone. The martyrsall went to their deaths with brave hearts and morning faces, becausethey were not prepared to reconsider or review the greatest decisionthey had ever made. There are some things on which no wise man willthink of changing his mind. And he will decline to contemplate achange because he knows that his wardrobe holds no better garb. It isof no use doffing the robes of princes to don the rags of paupers. 'Eighty and six years have I served Christ, ' exclaimed the triumphantPolycarp; and he mounted the heavens in wreathing smoke and leapingflame rather than change his mind after so long and so lovely anexperience. 

IV

'PITY MY SIMPLICITY!'

It was a sultry summer's day a hundred and fifty years ago, and JohnWesley was on the rocky road to Dublin. 'The wind being in my face, tempering the heat of the sun, I had a pleasant ride to Dublin. In theevening I began expounding the deepest part of the Holy Scripture, namely, the First Epistle of John, by which, above all other, evenabove all other inspired writings, I advise every young preacher toform his style. Here are sublimity and simplicity together, thestrongest sense and the plainest language! How can any one that wouldspeak as the oracles of God use harder words than are to be foundhere?' With which illuminating extract from the great man's journal wemay dismiss him, the road to Dublin, and the text from which hepreached in the Irish capital, all together. I have no furtherbusiness with any of them. The thing that concerns me is thesuggestive declaration, made by the most experienced preacher of alltime, that _sublimity_ and _simplicity_ always go hand in hand. Here, in this deepest part of Holy Scripture, says the master, are sublimityand simplicity together. 'By this, above all other writings, I adviseevery preacher to form his style. How can any one that would speak asthe oracles of God use harder words than are to be found here?' Suchwords from such a source are like apples of gold in pictures of silver, and I am thankful that I chanced to come upon the great man that hotJuly night in Dublin, and gather this distilled essence of wisdom as itfell from his eloquent lips. 

I have often wondered why we teach children to pray that theirsimplicity may be pitied. 

 Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, Look upon a little child! Pity my simplicity! Suffer me to come to Thee!

Why 'pity my simplicity'? It is the one thing about a little childthat is really sublime, sublimity and simplicity being, as we learnedat Dublin, everlastingly inseparable. Pity my simplicity! Why, it isthe sweet simplicity of a little child that we all admire and love andcovet! Pity my simplicity! Why, it is the unspoiled and sublimesimplicity of this little child of mine that takes my heart by stormand carries everything before it. And, depend upon it, the heart ofthe divine Father is affected not very differently. This soft, sweetlittle white-robed thing that kneels on my knee, with its arms aroundmy neck, lisping its

 Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, Look upon a little child! Pity my simplicity! Suffer me to come to Thee!

shames me by its very sublimity. It outstrips me, transcends me, andleaves me far behind. It soars whilst I grovel; it flies whilst Icreep. That is what Jesus meant when He took a little child and sethim in the midst of the disciples and said, 'Whosoever shall humblehimself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom ofheaven!' The simplest, He meant, is always the sublimest. And it wasbecause the great Methodist had so perfectly caught the spirit of hisgreat Master that he declared so confidently that night at Dublin, 'Simplicity and sublimity lie here together!'

It is always and everywhere the same. In literature sublimity isrepresented by the poet. What could be more sublime than the inspiredimagination of Milton? And yet, and yet! The very greatest of all ourliterary critics, in his essay on Milton, feels it incumbent upon himto point out that imagination is essentially the domain of childhood. 'Of all people, ' he says, 'children are the most imaginative. Theyabandon themselves without reserve to every illusion. Every imagewhich is strongly presented to their mental eye produces on them theeffect of reality. No man, whatever his sensibility may be, is everaffected by Hamlet or Lear as a little girl is affected by the story ofpoor Red Ridinghood. She knows that it is all false, that wolvescannot speak, that there are no wolves in England. Yet, in spite ofthe knowledge, she believes; she weeps; she trembles; she dares not gointo a dark room lest she should feel the teeth of the monster at herthroat. ' And from these premisses, Macaulay proceeds to his inevitableconclusion. 'He who, in an enlightened and literary society, aspiresto be a great poet must, ' he says, 'first become a little child. Hemust take to pieces the whole web of his mind. He must unlearn much ofthat knowledge which has perhaps constituted hitherto his chief titleto superiority. His very talents will be a hindrance to him. Hisdifficulties will be proportioned to his proficiency in the pursuitswhich are fashionable among his contemporaries; and that proficiencywill in general be proportioned to the vigour and activity of hismind. ' Could there be any finer comment on the words of the Master?

'Simplicity and sublimity always go together!' said John Wesley thathot July night at Dublin. 

'Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child, the same is thegreatest in the kingdom of heaven!' said the Master on that memorableday in Galilee. 

'He who aspires to be a great poet must first become a little child!'says Lord Macaulay in his incomparable essay on Milton. 

I have carefully put the Master in His old place. He is _in themidst_, with the very greatest of our modern apostles on the one sideof Him, and the very greatest of our modern historians on the other. But they are all three of them saying the same thing, each in his ownway. It is a pity that we teach our children that the sublimest thingabout them--their simplicity--is a thing of which they need to beashamed. And the way in which their tiny tongues stumble over thegreat word seems to show that, following a true instinct, they do nottake kindly to that clause in their bedtime prayer. 

I am told that, away beyond the Never-Never ranges, there is a churchfrom which the children are excluded before the sermon begins. I wishmy informant had not told me of its existence. I am not often troubledwith nightmare, my supper being quite a frugal affair. But justoccasionally I find myself a victim of the terror by night. And when Iam mercifully awakened, and asked why I am gasping so horribly andperspiring so freely, I have to confess that I was dreaming that I hadsomehow become the minister of that childless congregation. As isusual after nightmare, I look round with a sense of inexpressiblethankfulness on discovering that it was only a horrid dream. Anappointment to such a charge would be to me a most fearsome andterrifying prospect. I could not trust myself. In a way, I envy theman who can hold his own under such circumstances. His transcendentpowers enable him to preserve his sturdy humanness of character, hischarming simplicity of diction, his graphic picturesqueness of phrase, and his exquisite winsomeness of behaviour without the extraneousassistance which the children render to some of us. But _I_ could notdo it. I should go all to pieces. And so, when I dream that I haveentered a pulpit from which I can survey no roguish young faces andmischievous wide-open eyes, I fancy I am ruined and undone. I watchwith consternation as the little people file out during the hymn beforethe sermon, and I know that the sermon is doomed. The children in thecongregation are my salvation. 

I fancy that the custom to which I have referred was in vogue in thechurch to which the Rev. Bruno Leathwaite Chilvers ministered. Everybody knows Mr. Chilvers; at least everybody who loves GeorgeGissing knows that very excellent gentleman. Mr. Chilvers loved toadorn his dainty discourses with certain words of strangelygrandiloquent sound. '"Nullifidian, " "morbific, " "renascent"--thesewere among his favourites. Once or twice he spoke of "psychogenesis"with an emphatic enunciation which seemed to invite respectful wonder. In using Latin words which have become fixed in the English language, he generally corrected the common errors of quantity and pronouncedwords as nobody else did. He often alluded to French and Germanauthors in order that he might recite French and German quotations. 'And so on. Poor Mr. Chilvers! I am sure that the little childrenfiled out during the hymn before the sermon. No man with a scrap ofimagination could look into the dimpled face of a little girl I knowand hurl 'nullifidian' at her. No man could look down into a certainpair of sparkling eyes that are wonderfully familiar to me and talkabout things as 'morbific' or 'renascent. ' If only the little tots hadkept their seats for the sermon, it would have saved poor Mr. Chilversfrom committing such atrocities. As it is, they went and he collapsed. Can anybody imagine John Wesley talking to his summer-evening crowd atDublin about 'nullifidian, ' or quoting German? I will say nothing ofthe Galilean preacher. The common people heard _Him_ gladly. He wasso simple and therefore so sublime. As Sir Edwin Arnold says:

 The simplest sights He met-- The Sower flinging seed on loam and rock; The darnel in the wheat; the mustard-tree That hath its seeds so little, and its boughs Widespreading; and the wandering sheep; and nets Shot in the wimpled waters--drawing forth Great fish and small--these, and a hundred such, Seen by us daily, never seen aright, Were pictures for Him from the page of life, Teaching by parable. 

Therein lay the sublimity of it all. 

A little child, especially a little child of a distinctly restless andmischievous propensity, is really a great help to a minister, and it isa shame to deprive the good man of such assistance. It is only by suchhelp that some of us can hope to approximate to real sublimity. LordBeaconsfield used to say that, in making after-dinner speeches, he kepthis eye on the waiters. If they were unmoved, he knew that he was inthe realms of mediocrity. But when they grew excited and waved theirnapkins, he knew that he was getting home. Lord Cockburn, who was forsome time Lord Chief Justice of Great Britain, when asked for thesecret of his extraordinary success at the bar, replied sagely, 'When Iwas addressing a jury, I invariably picked out the stupidest-lookingfellow of the lot, and addressed myself specially to him--for this goodreason: I knew that if I convinced him I should be sure to carry allthe rest!' Dr. Thomas Guthrie, in addressing gatherings of ministers, used to tell this story of Lord Cockburn with immense relish, andearnestly commended its philosophy to their consideration. I wasreading the other day that Dr. Boyd Carpenter, formerly Bishop of Riponand now Canon of Westminster, on being asked if he felt nervous whenpreaching before Queen Victoria, replied, 'I never address the Queen atall. I know there will be present the Queen, the Princes, thehousehold, and the servants down to the scullery-maid, and _I preach tothe scullery-maid_. ' Little children do not attend political dinnerssuch as Lord Beaconsfield adorned; nor Courts of Justice such as LordCockburn addressed; nor Royal chapels like that in which Dr. BoydCarpenter officiated. And, in the absence of the children, the onlychance of reaching sublimity that offered itself to these unhappyorators lay in making good use of the waiter, the stupid juryman, andthe scullery-maid. If the Rev. Bruno Leathwaite Chilvers really cannotinduce the children to abandon the bad habit in which they have beentrained, I urge him, as a friend and a brother, to adopt the sameingenious expedient. But if he can get on the right side of a littlechild, persuade him to sit the sermon out, and vow that he will lookstraight into that bright little face, and say no word that will notinterest that tiny listener, I promise him that before long people willsay that his sermons are simply sublime. Robert Louis Stevenson knewwhat he was doing when he discussed every sentence of _Treasure Island_with his schoolboy step-son before giving it its final form. It was bythat wise artifice that one of the greatest stories in our languagecame to be written. 

The fact, of course, is that in the soul's sublimest moments it hungersfor simplicity. One of Du Maurier's great _Punch_ cartoons representeda honeymoon conversation between a husband and wife who had bothcovered themselves with glory at Cambridge. And the conversation ranalong these highly intellectual lines:

'What would Lovey do if Dovey died?'

'Oh, Lovey would die too!'

There is a world of philosophy behind the nonsense. We do not makelove in the language of the psychologist; we make love in the languageof the little child. When life approaches to sublimity, it alwaysexpresses itself with simplicity. In the depth of mortal anguish, orat the climax of human joy, we do not use a grandiloquent andincomprehensible phraseology. We talk in monosyllables. As we growold, and draw near to the gates of the grave, we become more and moresimple. In his declining years, John Newton wrote, 'When I was young Iwas sure of many things. There are only two things of which I am surenow; one is that I am a miserable sinner, and the other that Christ isan all-sufficient Saviour. ' What is this but the soul garbing itselfin the most perfect simplicities as the only fitting raiment in whichit can greet the everlasting sublimities?

'Here are sublimity and simplicity together!' exclaimed John Wesley onthat hot July night at Dublin. 'How can any one that would speak asthe oracles of God use harder words than are to be found here? By thisI advise every young preacher to form his style!'

'He who aspires to be a great poet--as sublime as Milton--must firstbecome a little child!' declares the greatest of all littérateurs. 

'Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child, the same isgreatest in the kingdom of heaven!' says the Master Himself, taking alittle child and setting him in the midst of them. 

'_Pity my simplicity!_' pleads this little thing with its soft armsround my neck. 

'_Give me that simplicity!_' say I. 

V

TUNING FROM THE BASS

I am about to say a good word for Fear. Fear is a fine thing, a veryfine thing; and the world would be a poor place without it. Fear wasone of our firmest but gentlest nurses. Terror was one of our sternestbut kindest teachers. A very wise man once said that the fear of theLord is the beginning of wisdom. He might have left out the august andholy Name, and still have stated a tremendous fact; for fear is alwaysthe beginning of wisdom. 

'No fears, no grace!' said James, in the second part of the _Pilgrim'sProgress_, and Mr. Greatheart seemed of pretty much the same opinion. They were discussing poor Mr. Fearing. 

'Mr. Fearing, ' said Greatheart, 'was one that played upon the bass. Some say that the bass is the ground of music. The first string thatthe musician touches is the bass, when he intends to put all in tune. God also plays upon this string first, when He sets the soul in tunefor Himself. Only here was the imperfection of Mr. Fearing: he couldplay upon no other music but this, till towards his latter end. '

Here, then, we have the principle stated as well as it is possible tostate it. You must tune from the bass, for the bass is the basis ofmusic. But you must rise from the bass, as a building must rise fromits foundations, or the music will be a moan and a monotone. The fearof the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; but the wisdom that gets nofarther is like music that rumbles and reverberates in one everlastingbass. 

But the finest exposition of the inestimable value of fear is not byJohn Bunyan. It is by Jack London. _White Fang_ is the greatest storyof the inner life of an animal that has ever been contributed to ourliterature. And Jack London, who seems to have got into the very soulof a wolf, shows us how the wonderful character of White Fang wasmoulded and fashioned by fear. First there was the mere physical fearof Pain; the dread of hurting his tender little nose as the tiny greycub explored the dark recesses of the lair; the horror of his mother'spaw that smote him down whenever he approached the mouth of the cave;and, later on, the fear of the steep bank, learned by a terrible fall;the fear of the yielding water, learned by attempting to walk upon it;and the fear of the ptarmigan's beak and the weasel's teeth, learned byrobbing their respective nests. 

And following on the physical fear of _Pain_ came the reverential fearof _Power_. 'His mother represented Power, ' Jack London says, 'and ashe grew older he felt this power in the sharper admonition of her paw, while the reproving nudge of her nose gave place to the slash of herfangs. For this he respected his mother. ' And afterwards, when hecame upon the Red Indians, and saw men for the first time, a stillgreater fear possessed him. Here were creatures who made the verysticks and stones obey them! They seemed to him as gods, and he feltthat he must worship and serve them. And, later still, when he sawwhite men living, not in wigwams, but in great palaces of stone, hetrembled as he had never trembled before. These were superior gods;and, as everybody knows, White Fang passed from fearing them to knowingthem, and from knowing them to loving them. And at last he becametheir fond, devoted slave. It is true that fear was to White Fang only_the beginning_ of wisdom; but that is precisely what Solomon says. Afterwards the brave old wolf learned fearlessness; but the earlylessons taught by fear were still of priceless value, for to couragethey added caution; and courage wedded to caution is irresistible. 

We are living in times that are wonderfully meek and mild; and Fear, the stern old schoolmaster, is looked upon with suspicion. It iscurious how we reverse the fashions of our ancestors. We flaunt inshameless abandon what they veiled in blushing modesty; but we make upfor it by hiding what they had no hesitation in displaying. Our teeth, for example. It is considered the depth of impropriety to show yourteeth nowadays, except in the sense in which actresses show them onpost cards. But our forefathers were not afraid of showing theirteeth, and they made themselves feared and honoured and loved inconsequence. Yes, feared and honoured and loved; for I gravely doubtif any man ever yet taught others to honour and love him who had notfirst taught them on occasion to fear him. 

The best illustration of what I mean occurs in the story of the Irishmovement. In the politics of the last century there has been nothingso dramatic, nothing so pathetic, and nothing so tragic as the story ofthe rise and fall of Parnell. Lord Morley's tense and vivid chapterson that phase of modern statesmanship are far more thrilling and farmore affecting than a similar number of pages of any novel in theEnglish language. With the tragic fall of the Irish leader we need notnow concern ourselves. But how are we to account for the meteoric riseof Parnell, and for the phenomenal power that he wielded? For years hewas the most effective figure in British politics. There is only oneexplanation; and it is the explanation upon which practically all thehistorians of that period agree. Charles Stewart Parnell made it thefirst article of his creed that he must make himself feared. Hispredecessor in the leadership of the Irish party was Isaac Butt. Mr. Butt believed in conciliation. He was opposed to 'a policy ofexasperation. ' He thought that, if the Irishmen in the House exercisedpatience, and considered the convenience of the two great politicalparties, they would appeal to the good sense of the British people andensure the success of their cause. And in return--to quote from Mr. Winston Churchill's life of his father--the two great parties treatedMr. Butt and the Irish members with 'that form of respect which, beingdevoid of the element of fear, is closely akin to contempt. ' Thenarose Parnell. He held that the Irishmen must make themselves theterror of the nation. They must embarrass and confuse the Englishleaders, and throw the whole political machinery of both partieshopelessly out of gear. And in a few months Mr. Parnell made the Irishquestion the supreme question in the mind of the nation, and became foryears the most hated and the most beloved personality on theparliamentary horizon. Nobody who knows the history of that troubloustime can doubt that, but for the moral shipwreck of Parnell, ashipwreck that nearly broke Mr. Gladstone's heart, the whole Irishquestion would have been settled, for better or for worse, twenty yearsago. With the merits or demerits of his cause I am not now dealing;but everybody who has read Lord Morley's _Life of Gladstone_ or Mr. Barry O'Brien's _Life of Parnell_ must have been impressed by thisstriking and dramatic picture of a lonely and extraordinary manespousing an apparently hopeless cause, deliberately selecting fear asthe weapon of his warfare, and actually leading his little band ofastonished followers within sight of victory. 

It is ridiculous to say that fear possesses no moral value. Whenever Ihear that contention stated, my mind invariably swings back to a greatstory told by Sir Henry Hawkins in his _Reminiscences_. He is tellingof his experiences under Mr. Justice Maule, and is praising thejudicial perspicacity of that judge. In a certain murder case a boy ofeight was called to give evidence, and counsel objected to so youthfula witness being heard. Mr. Justice Maule thought for a minute, andthen beckoned the boy to the bench. 

'"I should like to know, " His Honour observed, "what you have beentaught to believe. What will become of you, my little boy, when youdie, if you are so wicked as to tell a lie?"'

'"Hell-fire!" answered the boy with great promptitude. 

'"But do you mean to say, " the judge went on, "that you would go tohell-fire for telling any lie?"

'"Hell-fire, sir!" the boy replied again. 

'To several similar questions the boy made the same terrible response. 

'"He does not seem to be competent, " said the counsel. 

'"I beg your pardon, " returned the judge. "This boy thinks that forevery wilful fault he will go to hell-fire; and he is very likely whilehe believes that doctrine to be most strict in his observance of truth. If you and I believed that such would be the penalty for every act ofmisconduct we committed, we should be better men than we are. Let theboy be sworn!"'

Sir Henry Hawkins tells the story with evident approval, so that wehave here the valuable testimony of two distinguished judges to themoral value of fear from a purely judicial point of view. Of course, the value is not stable or permanent. The goodness that arises fromfear is like the tameness of a terrified tiger, or the willingness of awolf to leave the deer unharmed when both are flying from before aprairie-fire. When the fear passes, the blood-lust will return. Butthat is not the point. Nobody said that fear was wisdom. What thewise man said was that fear is _the beginning_ of wisdom. And as thebeginning of wisdom it has a certain initial and preparatory value. The sooner that the beginning is developed and brought to a climax, thebetter of course it will be. But meanwhile a beginning is something. It is a step in the right direction. It is the learning of thealphabet. It is the earnest and promise of much that is to come. 

Now if the Church refuses to employ this potent weapon, she is verystupid. A beginning is only a beginning, but it is a beginning. If weignore the element of terror, we are deliberately renouncing a forcewhich, in the wilds and in the world, is of really first-class valueand importance. I am not now saying that the ministry would be untrueto its high calling if it failed to warn men with gravity and withtears. That is a matter of such sacredness and solemnity that Ihesitate to touch it here; although it is obvious that, under anyconceivable method of interpretation, there is a terrible note ofurgency in the New Testament that no pulpit can decline, without graveresponsibility, to echo. But I am content to point out here that, froma purely tactical point of view, the Church would be very foolish toscout this valuable weapon. The element of fear is one of the greatprimal passions, and to all those deep basic human elements the gospelmakes its peculiar appeal. And the fears of men must be excited. Themusic cannot be all bass; but the bass note must not be absent, or themusic will be ruined. 

There are still those who, far from being cowards, may, like Noah, be'moved with fear' to the saving of their houses. Cardinal Manningtells in his Journal how, as a boy at Tetteridge, he read again andagain of the lake that burneth with fire. 'These words, ' he says, 'became fixed in my mind, and kept me as boy and youth and man in themidst of all evil. I owe to them more than will ever be known to thelast day. ' And Archbishop Benson used to tell of a working man who wasseen looking at a placard announcing a series of addresses on 'The FourLast Things. ' After he had read the advertisement he turned to acompanion and asked, 'Where would you and I have been without hell?'And the Archbishop used to inquire whether, if we abandoned thelegitimate appeal to human fear, we should not need some other motivein our preaching to fill the vacant place. 

I know, of course, that all this may be misconstrued. But the wisewill understand. The naturalist will not blame me, for fear is thelife of the forest. The humanitarian can say no word of censure, forfear is intensely human. But the preacher who strikes this deep bassnote must strike it very soulfully. No man should be able to speak onsuch things except with a sob in his throat and tears in his eyes. Wemust warn men to flee from the wrath to come; but that wrath is thewrath of a Lamb. Andrew Bonar one day told Murray McCheyne that he hadjust preached a sermon on hell. 'And were you able to preach it withtenderness?' McCheyne wistfully inquired. Fear is part of thatwondrous instrument on all the chords of which the minister is calledat times to play; but this chord must be struck with trembling fingers. 

No mistake can be more fatal than to set off this aspect of thingsagainst more attractive themes. All truth is related. Some years agoin Scotland an express train stopped abruptly on a curve in the time ofa great flood. Just in front of the train was a roaring chasm fromwhich the viaduct had been swept away. Just behind the train was themangled frame of the girl who had warned the driver. _It is impossibleto understand that sacrifice lying just behind the guard's van unlessyou have seen the yawning chasm just in front of the engine!_

'No fears, no grace!' said James. 

'And this I took very great notice of, ' said Mr. Greatheart, 'that theValley of the Shadow of Death was as quiet while Mr. Fearing wentthrough it as ever I knew it before or since; and when he came to theriver without a bridge, I took notice of what was very remarkable; thewater of that river was lower at this time than ever I saw it in all mylife. So he went over at last, not much above wet shod. '

Fear had done its work, and done it well. The bass notes had provedthe foundation of a music that blended at last with the very harmoniesof heaven. Fear, even with White Fang, led on to love; and perfectlove casteth out fear. 

VI

A FRUITLESS DEPUTATION

It was in New Zealand, and I was attending my first Conference. I hadonly a month or two earlier entered the Christian ministry. I dreadedthe Assembly of my grave and reverend seniors. With becoming modesty, I stole quietly into the hall and occupied a back seat. From thiswelcome seclusion, however, I was rudely summoned to receive the righthand of fellowship from the President. Then I once more plunged intothe outer darkness of oblivion and obscurity. Here I remained untilonce again I was electrified at the sound of my own name. It seemedthat the sorrows of dissension had overtaken a tiny church in a remotebush district. One of the oldest and most revered members, the fatherof a very large family and the leader of the little brotherhood, hadintimated his intention of withdrawing from fellowship and of joininganother denomination. This formidable secession had thrown the littlecongregation into helpless confusion, and an appeal was made to thecourts of the denomination. The letter was read; and the secretarystated briefly and succinctly the facts of the situation. And then, tomy amazement, he closed by moving that Mr. William Forbury and myselfbe appointed a deputation to visit the district, to advise the church, and to report to Conference. Mr. Forbury, he explained, was a fatherin Israel. His grey hairs commanded reverence; whilst his ripeexperience and sound judgement would be invaluable to the small andtroubled community. So far, so good. His reasoning seemedirresistible. But he went on to say that he had included my namebecause I was an absolute stranger. I knew nothing of the internaldisputes that had rent the church. My very freshness would give me aposition of impartiality that older men could not claim. Moreover, heargued, the visit to a bush congregation, and the insight into itspeculiar difficulties, would be a useful experience for me. I feltthat I could not decently decline; but I confidently expected that theproposal would be challenged and probably rejected. To myastonishment, however, it was seconded and carried. And nothingremained but to arrange with Mr. Forbury the date of our delegation. 

The day came, and we set out. It took the train just four hours toconvey us to the lonely station from which we emerged upon a wildernessof green bush and a maze of muddy tracks. Mr. Forbury had visited thedistrict frequently, and knew it well. We called upon several settlersin the course of the afternoon, taking dinner with one, and afternoontea with another. And then we proceeded to the home of the seceder. The place seemed alive with young people. The house swarmed withchildren. 

'How are you, John?' inquired my companion. 

'Ah, William, glad to see you; how are you?'

They made an interesting study, these two old men. Their forms werebent with long years of hard and honourable toil. Their faces wererugged and weatherbeaten, wrinkled with age, and furrowed with care. They had come out together from the Homeland years and years ago. Theyhad borne each other's burdens, and shared each other's confidences, through all the days of their pilgrimage. Their thoughts of each otherwere mingled with all the memories of their courtships, their weddings, and their earlier struggles. A thousand tender and sacred associationswere interwoven, in the mind of each, with the name of the other. Whenfortune had smiled, they had delighted in each other's prosperity. Intimes of shadow, each had hastened to the other's side. They hadwalked together, talked together, laughed together, wept together, and--very, very often--prayed together. They had been as David andJonathan, and the soul of the one was knit to the soul of the other. Hundreds of times, before the one had come to settle in this newdistrict, they had walked to the house of God in company. And now amatter of doctrine had intervened. And, with such men, a matter ofdoctrine is a matter of conscience. And a matter of conscience is themost stubborn of all obstacles to overcome. I looked into their stern, expressive faces, and I saw that they were no triflers. A fad had nocharm for either of them. They looked into each other's faces, andeach read the truth. The breach was irreparable. 

We sat in the great farm kitchen until tea-time. I felt it was nobusiness of mine to broach the affairs that had brought us. Severaltimes I thought that Mr. Forbury was about to touch the matter. Buteach time it was adroitly avoided, and the conversation swerved off inanother direction. Once or twice I felt half inclined to precipitate adiscussion. Indeed, I was in the act of doing so when our hostessbrought in the tea. A snowy cloth, home-made scones, deliciousoat-cake, abundance of cream--how tempting it all was! And howunattractive ecclesiastical controversy in comparison! We sat there inthe twilight for what seemed like an age, talking of everything underthe sun. Of everything, that is to say, save one thing only. Andthere brooded heavily over our spirits the consciousness that we wereavoiding the one and only subject on which we were all really anddeeply thinking. 

After tea came family worship. I was invited to conduct it, and didso. After reading a psalm from the old farm Bible, we all kneeledtogether, the flickering flames of the great log-fire flinging strangeshadows on the whitened wall and rafters as we rose and bowedourselves. I caught myself attempting, even in prayer, to make obscurebut fitting reference to the special circumstances that had brought ustogether. But the reticence of my companion was contagious. It waslike a bridle on my tongue. The sadness of it all haunted me, andparalysed my speech; and I swerved off again at every threatenedallusion. We sat on for awhile, they on either side of the roomyfireplace, and I between them, whilst the good woman and her daughterswashed up the tea-things. The clatter of the dishes, and the babel ofmany voices, made it impossible for us to speak freely on the subjectnearest our hearts. At length we rose to go. I noticed, on the partof my two aged companions, a peculiar reluctance to separate. Eachlonged, yet dreaded, to speak. There was evidently so much to be said, and yet speech seemed so hopeless. 

At last our friend said that he would walk a few steps with us. Wesaid good-bye to the great household and set off into the night. 

I shall never forget that walk! It was a clear, frosty evening. Themoonlight was radiant. Every twig was tipped with silver. Thesmallest object could be seen distinctly. I watched the rabbits asthey popped timidly in and out of the great gorse hedgerows. A harewent scurrying across the field. I felt all at once that I was anintruder. What right had I to be in the company of these two agedbrethren in the very crisis of their lifelong friendship? NoConference on earth could vest me with authority to invade this holyground! I made an excuse, and hurried on, walking some distance infront of them. But the night was so still that, even at that distance, had a word been uttered I must have heard it. I could hear the clatterof hoofs on the hard road two miles ahead. I could hear the dogsbarking at a farmhouse twice as far away. I could hear a rabbitsquealing in a trap on the fringe of the bush far behind us. But noword did I hear. For none was uttered. Side by side they walked onand on in perfect silence. I once paused and allowed them to approach. They were crying like children. Stern old Puritans! They were builtof the stuff that martyrs are made of. Either would have died ahundred deaths rather than have been false to conscience, or to truth, or to the other. Either would have died a hundred deaths to save theother from one. Neither could be coaxed or cowed into betraying onejot or tittle of his heart's best treasure. And each knew, whilst hetrembled for himself, that all this was true of the other as well. Side by side they walked for miles in that pale and silvery moonlight. Not one word was spoken. Grief had paralysed their vocal powers; andtheir eyes were streaming with another eloquence. They wrung eachother's hands at length, and parted without even saying good-night!

At the next Conference it was the junior member of the deputation whopresented the report. He simply stated that the delegation had visitedthe district without having been able to reconcile the differences thathad arisen in the little congregation. The Assembly formally adoptedthe report, and the deputation was thanked for its services. It seemeda very futile business. And yet one member of that deputation hasalways felt that life was strangely enriched by the happenings of thatmemorable night. It puts iron into the blood to spend an hour with mento whom the claim of conscience is supreme, and who love truth with sodeathless an affection that the purest and noblest of other lovescannot dethrone it. 

VII

TRAMP! TRAMP! TRAMP

I

Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp! It was like the regular and rhythmic beatof a great machine. File after file, column after column, I watchedthe troops pass by. Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp! On they went, and on, and on; all in perfect time and step; tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp! Itreminded me of that haunting passage that tells us that 'all these menof war that could keep rank came with a perfect heart to make Davidking over all Israel. ' _They could keep rank_! It is a suggestiverecord. There is more in it than appears on the surface. _They couldkeep rank_! Right! Left! Right! Left! Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp!All these men of war _that could keep rank_ came with a perfect heartto make David king over all Israel. 

II

Half the art of life lies in learning to keep step. It is a greatthing--a very great thing--to be able to get on with other people. Letme indulge in a little autobiography. I once had a most extraordinaryexperience, an experience so altogether amazing that all subsequentexperiences appear like the veriest commonplaces in comparison. Thefact is, I was born. Such a thing had never happened to me before, andI was utterly bewildered. I did not know what to make of it. My firstimpression was that I was all alone and that I had the solar system allto myself. Like Robinson Crusoe, I fancied myself monarch of all Isurveyed. But then, like Robinson Crusoe, I discovered a footprint, and found that the planet on which I had been so mysteriously cast wasinhabited. . There were two of us--myself and The Other Fellow. 

As soon as I could devise means of locomotion, I set out, like RobinsonCrusoe, to find out what The Other Fellow was like. I had a kind ofinstinct that sooner or later I should have to fight him. I found thathe differed from me in one essential particular. He had hundreds ofmillions of heads; I had but one. He had hundreds of millions of feet;hundreds of millions of hands; hundreds of millions of ears and eyes; Ihad but two. But for all that, it never occurred to me that he wasgreater than I. _Myself_ always appeared to me to be vastly moreimportant than _The Other Fellow_. It was nothing to me that hestarved so long as I had plenty of food. It was nothing to me that heshivered so long as I was wrapped up snugly. I do not remember that itever once crossed my mind in the first six months of my existence thatit would be a bad thing if he died, with all his hundreds of millionsof heads, and left me all alone upon the planet. I was first, and hewas nowhere. I was everything, and he was nothing. Why, dear me, Imust have cut my first teeth before it occurred to me that there wasroom on the planet for both of us; and I must have cut my wisdom teethbefore I discovered that the world was on the whole more interesting tome because of his presence on it. And since then I have spent somepains, in a blundering, unskilful kind of a way, in trying to makemyself tolerable to him. And the longer I live the more clearly I seethat, although he is an odd fellow at times, he is very quick torespond to and reciprocate such advances. He is discovering, as I am, that walking in step has a pleasure peculiar to itself. 

III

I said a moment ago that half the air of life lies in learning to keepstep. Conversely, half the tragedy of life consists in our failure soto do. Here are Mr. And Mrs. Cardew. All lovers of Mark Rutherfordknow them well. They were both of them really excellent people; aminister and his wife; deeply attached to one another; and yet aswretched as wretched could be. How are you going to account for it?It is vastly important just because it is so common. Domesticdifficulties rarely arise out of downright wickedness. Husband andwife may be as free from all outward fault as poor Mr. And Mrs. Cardew. Mark Rutherford thinks that Mr. Cardew was chiefly to blame, and hisverdict is probably just. A man takes a considerably longer stridethan a woman; but, for all that, it is still possible, even in thesedays of hobble skirts, for man and maid to walk in step, as all truelovers know. But it can only be managed by his moderating his ungainlystride to her more modest one, and, perhaps, by her unconsciouslylengthening her step under the invigorating influence of his support. Which is a parable. Mark Rutherford says that 'Mr. Cardew had notlearned the art of being happy with his wife; he did not know thathappiness is an art; he rather did everything he could do to make therelationship intolerable. He demanded payment in coin stamped from hisown mint, and if bullion and jewels had been poured before him he wouldhave taken no heed of them. He did not take into account that what hiswife said and what she felt might not be the same; that persons whohave no great command over language are obliged to make one word doduty for a dozen; and that, if his wife was defective at one point, there were in her whole regions of unexplored excellence, of facultiesnever encouraged, and an affection to which he offered no response. 'There is more philosophy in the cunning way in which those happy loversin the lane accommodate their strides to the comfort of each other thanwe have been accustomed to suspect. It is done very easily; it is donealmost unconsciously; but they must be very careful to go on doing itlong after they have left the leafy old lane behind them. 

IV

I do not mean to suggest that husbands and wives are sinners above allpeople on the face of the earth. By no means. Is there a club, asociety, an office, or a church in the wide, wide world that does notshelter a most excellent individual whose one and only fault is that hecannot get on with anybody else? That is, of course, my way of puttingit. It is not his. He would say that nobody else can get on with him. Which again takes our minds back to the troops. A raw Scotch ladjoined the expeditionary force, and on the first parade day his motherand sister came proudly down to see him march. Jock, sad to say, wasout of step. At least that is my way of putting it. But it is not theonly way. 'Look, mother!' said his fond sister, 'look, they're a' ooto' step but our Jock!' It is not for me to decide whether Jock isright or whether the others are. But since the others are all in stepwith each other, I am afraid the presumptive evidence is rather heavilyagainst Jock. And Jock is well known to all of us. Nobody likes him, and nobody knows why they don't like him. In many respects he is aparagon of goodness. He loves his church, or he would not have stuckto it year in and year out as he has done. He is not self-assertive;he is quite willing to efface his own personality and be invisible. Heis generous to a fault. Nobody is more eager to do anything for thegeneral good. And yet nobody likes him. The only thing against him isthat he has never disciplined himself to get on with other people. Hehas never tried to accommodate himself to their stride. He can't keeprank. They're a' oot o' step but our Jock! Poor Jock!

V

I know that out of all this a serious problem emerges. The problem isthis: why should Jock destroy his own personality in order to renderhimself an exact replica of every other man in the regiment? Isindividuality an evil thing that must be wiped out and obliterated?The answer to this objection is that Jock is not asked to sacrifice hispersonality; he is asked to sacrifice his angularity. The ideal ofBritish discipline is, not to turn men into machines, but to preserveindividuality and initiative; and yet, at the same time, to make eachman of as great value to his comrades as is by any means possible. Inthe church we do the same. Brown means well, but he is all gush. Youask him to do a thing. 'Oh, certainly, with the greatest pleasure inthe world!' But you have an awkward feeling that he will undertake athousand other duties in the same airy way, and that the chances of hisdoing the work, and doing it well, are not rosy. Smith, on the otherhand, is cautious. He, too, means well; but he is unduly scared ofpromising more than he can creditably fulfil; and, as a matter of fact, this bogy frightens him out of doing as much as he might and should. Now here you have Brown running and Smith crawling. You know perfectlywell that Brown will exhaust himself quite prematurely, and that Smithwill never get there. And between Brown's excited scamper and Smith'sexasperating crawl the main host jogs along at a medium pace. NowBrown's personality is a delightful thing. You can't help loving him. His willingness is charming, and his enthusiasm contagious. AndSmith's steady persistence and extreme conscientiousness are mostadmirable. They do us all good. But if, whilst preserving anddeveloping their personalities, we could strip them of theirangularities, and get them to walk in step at one steady and regularpace--tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp!--we should surely stand a betterchance of making David king over all Israel!

VI

It is all a matter of discipline. The ploughman comes up from thecountry with a long ungainly stride. The city man, accustomed tocrowded pavements, comes with a short and mincing step. They aredrilled for a fortnight side by side, and away they go. Right! Left!Right! Left! Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp! The harmony is perfect. Jock must submit himself to the same rigid process of training. He maybe firmly convinced that the stride of the regiment is too short or toolong. But if, on that ground, he adopts a different one, nobody buthis gentle and admiring little sister will believe that he is right andthey are wrong. Jock's isolated attitude invariably reflects uponhimself. 'The whole regiment is out of step!' he declares, drawingattention to his different stride. That is too often the trouble withJock. 'The members of our Church do not read the Bible!' he says. Itmay be sadly true; but it sounds, put in that way, like a claim that heis the one conscientious and regular Bible-reader among them. 'Themembers of our Church do not pray!' he exclaims sadly. It may be thata call to prayer is urgently needed; but poor Jock puts the thing insuch a light that it appears to be a claim on his part that he aloneknows the way to the Throne of Grace. 'Among the faithless faithfulonly he!' 'The members of our Church are not spiritually-minded!' hebemoans; but somehow, said as he says it, it sounds suspiciously likean echo of little Jack Horner's 'What a good boy am I!'

In the correspondence of Elizabeth Fry there occurs a very striking andsuggestive passage. When Mrs. Fry began to meet with great success inher work among the English prisons, some of the Quakers feared that hertriumphs would engender pride in her own soul and destroy herspirituality. At last the thing became nauseous and intolerable, andshe wrote, 'The prudent fears that the good have for me try me morethan most things, and I find that it calls for Christian forbearancenot to be a little put out by them. I am confident that we often seethe Martha spirit of criticism enter in, even about spiritual things. _O Lord, enable us to keep our ranks in righteousness!_'

Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp!

VII

'And Enoch walked with God. '

'And Noah walked with God. '

'And Abraham walked with God. '

'And Moses walked with God. '

Tramp! tramp! tramp! tramp!

'All these men of war _that could keep rank_ came with a perfect heartto make David king over all Israel. '

'O Lord, enable us to keep our ranks in righteousness!'

VIII

THE FIRST MATE

'First officers are often worse than skippers, ' remarked the nightwatchman in Mr. W. W. Jacobs' _Light Freights_. 'In the first place, they know they ain't skippers, and that alone is enough to put 'em in abad temper, especially if they've 'ad their certificate a good manyyears, and can't get a vacancy. ' I fancy there is something in thenight watchman's philosophy; and I am therefore writing a word or twofor the special benefit of first mates. I am half inclined to addressit 'to first mates only, ' for to second mates, third mates, and otherinferior officers I have nothing to say. But the first mate evokes oursympathy on the ground that the night watchman states so forcibly, 'First mates know they ain't skippers, and that alone is enough to put'em in a bad temper. ' It is horribly vexatious to be next door togreatness. An old proverb tells us that a miss is as good as a mile;but like most proverbs, it is as false as false can be. A mile is everso much better than a miss. 

I am fond of cricket, and am president of a certain club. I invariablyattend the matches unless the house happens to be on fire. I haveenough of the sporting instinct to be able to take defeatcheerfully--if the defeat falls within certain limits. It must not beso crushing as to be a positive humiliation, nor must it be by so finea margin as to constitute itself a tantalization. Of the two, I preferthe former to the latter. The former can be dismissed under certainrecognized forms. 'The glorious uncertainty of cricket!' you say toyourself. 'It's all in the game; and the best side in the worldsometimes has an off day!' But, if, after a great struggle, you loseby a run, you go home thinking uncharitable thoughts of the bowler whomight have prevented the other fellow from making a certain boundaryhit, of the wicket-keeper who might have saved a bye, or of the batsmanwho might easily have got a few more runs if he hadn't played such aridiculously fluky stroke. To be beaten by a hundred runs is bad, butbearable; to be beaten by an innings and a hundred runs is humiliatingand horrible; to be beaten by a single run is exasperating andintolerable. 

The same thing meets us at every turn. A few minutes ago I picked upthe _Life of Lord Randolph Churchill_, by his son. In the very firstchapter there is a letter written by Dr. Creighton to the Duchess ofMarlborough commiserating her ladyship on the fact that Lord Randolphhad been placed in the second class at the December examinations atOxford. 'I must own, ' the Bishop writes, 'that I was sorry when Iheard how narrowly Lord Randolph missed the first class; a few morequestions answered, and a few more omissions in some of his papers, andhe would have secured it. He was, I am told by the examiners, the bestman who was put into the second class; and the great hardship is, asyour Grace observes, that he should be in the same class with so manywho are greatly his inferior in knowledge and ability. It is rathertantalizing to think that he came so near; _if he had been farther offI should have been more content_. ' Now that is exactly the misery ofthe first mate. He is so near to being a skipper, so very near. Heeven carries continually in his pocket the official papers that certifythat he is fully qualified to be a skipper. And yet, for all that, heis not a skipper. Sometimes, indeed, he fancies that he will never bea skipper. It is very trying. I am sorry--genuinely sorry--for thefirst mate. What can I say to help him?

Perhaps the thing that he will most appreciate is a reminder of thetremendous debt that the world owes to its first mates. I was readingthe other day Dasent's great _Life of Delane_. Among the most strikingdocuments printed in these five volumes are the letters that Delanewrote from the seat of war during the struggle in the Crimea to thesubstitute who occupied his own editorial chair in the office of _TheTimes_. And the whole burden of those letters is to show that Englandwas saved in those days by a first mate. 'The admiral, ' he says in oneletter, 'is by no means up to his position. The real commander isLyons, who is just another Nelson--full of energy and activity. ' Twodays later, he says again, 'Nothing but the energy and determination ofSir E. Lyons overcame the difficulties and "impossibilities" raised bythose who seem to have always a consistent objection to doing anythinguntil their "to-morrow" shall arrive. All the credit is due to him, and to him alone, for our admiral never left his ship, which wasanchored three miles from the shore, and contented himself with sendingthe same contingent of men and boats as the other ships. ' And, writingagain after the landing had been effected, Delane says, 'Rememberalways, that, in the great credit which the success of this landingdeserves, Dundas has no share. Lyons has done all, and this in spiteof discouragement such as a smaller man would have resented. Nelsoncould not have done better, and, indeed, his case at Copenhagen nearlyresembles this. ' Here, then, is a feather in the cap of the firstmate. He may often save a vital situation which, in the hands of adilatory skipper, might easily have been lost. The skipper is skipper, and knows it. He is at the top of the tree, and there remains nothingto struggle after. He is apt to rest on his laurels and lose hisenergy. This subtle tendency is the first mate's opportunity. Theship must not be lost because the skipper goes to sleep. Everything, at such an hour, depends on the first mate. 

Nor is it only in time of war and of crisis that the first mate comesto his own. In the arts of peace the selfsame principle holds good. What could our literature have done without the first mate? And in therepublic of letters the first mate is usually a woman. It is onlyquite lately that women have, to any appreciable extent, appliedthemselves to the tasks and responsibilities of authorship. Until wellinto the eighteenth century, Mrs. Grundy scowled out of countenance anyintrepid female who threatened to invade the sacred domain. In 1778, however, Miss Fanny Burney braved the old lady's wrath, published_Evelina_, and became the pioneer of a new epoch. One of these days, perhaps on the bi-centenary of that event, the army of women who wieldthe pen will erect a statue to the memory of that courageous andbrilliant pathfinder. When they do so, two memorable scenes in thelife of their heroine will probably be represented in bas-relief uponthe pedestal. The one will portray Miss Burney, hopeless of everinducing a biased public to read a woman's work, making a bonfire ofthe manuscripts to which she had devoted such patient care. The otherwill illustrate the famous scene when Miss Burney danced a jig to DaddyCrisp round the great mulberry-tree at Chessington. It was, her diarytells us, the uncontrollable outcome of her exhilaration on learning ofthe praise which the great Dr. Johnson bestowed on _Evelina_. 'It gaveme such a flight of spirits, ' she says, 'that I danced a jig to Mr. Crisp, without any preparation, music, or explanation, to his no smallamazement and diversion. ' Macaulay declared that Miss Burney did forthe English novel what Jeremy Collier did for the English drama; andshe did it in a better way. 'She first showed that a tale might bewritten in which both the fashionable and the vulgar life of Londonmight be exhibited with great force, and with broad comic humour, andwhich should yet contain not a single line inconsistent with rigidmorality, or even with virgin delicacy. She took away the reproachwhich lay on a most useful and delightful species of composition. 'Prejudice, however, dies hard; and the same writer tells us in anotheressay that seventy years later, some reviewers were still of opinionthat a lady who dares to publish a book renounces by that act thefranchises appertaining to her sex, and can claim no exemption from theutmost rigour of critical procedure. 

But, however strong may have been the prejudice against a womanbecoming captain, and taking her place upon the bridge, nobody couldobject to her becoming first mate; and it is as first mate that womanhas rendered the most valuable service. A few, like Fanny Burney andJane Austen and Charlotte Brontë and George Eliot, may have becomeskippers; but we could better afford to lose all the works of suchwriters than lose the influence which women have exerted over captainswhom they served in the capacity of first mate. It was a saying ofEmerson's that a man is entitled to credit, not only for what hehimself does, but for all that he inspires others to do. To no subjectdoes this axiom apply with greater force than to this. It would be afatal mistake to suppose that the contribution of women to the republicof letters begins and ends with the works that bear feminine names upontheir title-pages. Our literature is adorned by a few examples ofacknowledged collaboration between a man and a woman, and only in veryrare instances is the woman the minor contributor. But, in addition tothese, there are innumerable records of men whose names stand in theforemost rank among our laureates and teachers yet whose work wouldhave been simply impossible but for the woman in the background. Froma host of examples that naturally rush to mind we may instance, almostat random, the cases of Wordsworth, Carlyle, and Robert LouisStevenson. In the days of his restless youth, when Wordsworth was indanger of entangling himself in the military and political tumults ofthe time, it was his sister who recalled him to his desk and pointedhim along the road that led to destiny. 'It is, ' Miss Masson remarks, 'in moments such as this that men, especially those who feed on theirfeelings, become desperate, and think and do desperate acts. It was atthis critical moment for Wordsworth that his sister Dorothy steppedinto his life and saved him. ' 'She soothed his mind, ' the same writersays again, banished from it both contemporary politics and religiousdoubts, and infused instead love of beauty and dependence on faith, andso she re-awoke craving for poetic expression. '

 She, in the midst of all, preserved him still A poet; made him seek beneath that name, And that alone, his office upon earth. 

Poor Dorothy! She accompanied her brother on more than half hiswanderings; she pointed out to him more than half the loveliness thatis embalmed in his verses; she suggested to him half his themes. Asthe poet himself confessed:

 She gave me eyes, she gave me ears, And humble cares, and delicate fears; A heart, the fountain of sweet tears; And love, and thought, and joy. 

Yes, the world owes more than it will ever know to first mates as loyaland true and helpful as Dorothy Wordsworth. The skipper stands on thebridge and gets all the glory, but only he and the first mate know howmuch was due to the figure in the background. Think, too, of thatbright spring day, nearly fifty years ago now, when a lady, drivingthrough Hyde Park to see the beauty of the crocuses and the snowdrops, was seen to lurch suddenly forward in her carriage, and a moment afterwas found to be dead. 'It was a loss unspeakable in its intensity forCarlyle, ' Mr. Maclean Watt says in his monograph. 'This woman was oneof the bravest and brightest influences in his life, though, perhaps, it was entirely true that he was not aware of his indebtedness untilthe Veil of Silence fell between. ' The skipper never is aware of hisindebtedness to the first mate; that is an essential feature of therelationship. It is the glory of the first mate that he works withoutthought of recognition or reward; glad if he can keep the ship true toher course; and ever proud to see the skipper crowned with all theglory. Carlyle's debt to his wife is one of the most tragic stories inthe history of letters. 'In the ruined nave of the old Abbey Kirk, 'the sage tells us, 'with the skies looking down on her, there sleeps mylittle Jeannie, and the light of her face will never shine on me more. I say deliberately her part in the stern battle (and except myself noneknows how stern) was brighter and braver than my own. '

And in Stevenson's case the obligation is even more marked. 'What adebt he owed to women!' one of his biographers exclaims. 'In his puny, ailing infancy, his mother and his nurse Cummie had soothed and tendedhim; in his troubled hour of youth he had found an inspirer, consoler, and guide in Mrs. Sitwell to teach him belief in himself; in his momentof failure, and struggle with poverty and death itself, he had marrieda wife capable of being his comrade, his critic, and his nurse. ' Weowe all the best part of Stevenson's work to the presence by his sideof a wife who possessed, as Sir Sidney Colvin testifies, 'a characteras strong, interesting, and romantic as his own. She was theinseparable sharer of all his thoughts; the staunch companion of allhis adventures; the most open-hearted of friends to all who loved him;the most shrewd and stimulating critic of his work; and in sickness, despite her own precarious health, the most devoted and most efficientof nurses. '

Dorothy Wordsworth, Jane Carlyle, and Fanny Stevenson arerepresentatives of a great host of brave and brilliant women withoutwhom our literature would have been poor indeed. Some day we shallopen a Pantheon in which we shall place splendid monuments to our firstmates. At present we fill our Westminster Abbeys with the statues ofskippers. But, depend upon it, injustice cannot last for ever. Someday the world will ask, not only, 'Was this man great?' but also, 'Whomade this man so great?' And when this old world of ours takes it intoits head to ask such questions, the day of the first mate will at lasthave dawned. 

One other word ought to be said, although it seems a cruel kindness tosay it. It is this. There are people who succeed brilliantly as firstmates, but who fail ignominiously as skippers. Aaron is, of course, the classical example. As long as Moses was skipper, and Aaron firstmate, everything went well. But Moses withdrew for awhile, and thenAaron took command. 'And the Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down;for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, havecorrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the waywhich I commanded them; they have made a molten calf, and haveworshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thygods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt!'As long, I say, as Moses was skipper and Aaron first mate, Aaron didmagnificently. But when Aaron took command, he was, as Dr. Whyte says, 'a mere reed shaken with the wind; as weak and as evil as any otherman. Those forty days that Moses spent on the mount brought out, amongother things, both Moses' greatness and Aaron's littleness and weaknessin a way that nothing else could have done. "Up, make us gods, whichshall go before us; for, as for this Moses, we know not what is becomeof him. " And Aaron went down like a broken reed before the idolatrousclamour of the revolted people. ' The day of judgement, depend upon it, will be a day of tremendous surprises. And not least among itsastonishments will be the disclosure of the immense debt that the worldowes to its first mates. And the first mates who never become skipperswill in that great day understand the reason why. And when they knowthe reason why, they will be among the most thankful of the thankful. It will be so much better for me to be applauded at the last as a goodand faithful first mate than to have to confess that, as skipper, Idrove the vessel on the rocks. 

PART III

I

WHEN THE COWS COME HOME

I can see them now as they come, very slowly and in single file, downthe winding old lane. The declining sun is shining through the tops ofthe poplars, the zest of daytime begins to soften into the hush andcool of evening, when they come leisurely sauntering through the grassthat grows luxuriously beside the road. One after another they comequietly along--Cherry and Brindle, Blossom and Darkie, Beauty andCrinkle, Daisy and Pearl. A stranger watching them as they appearround the bend of the pretty old lane fancies each of them to be thelast, and has just abandoned all hope of seeing another, when the nextpair of horns makes its unexpected appearance. They never hurry home;they just come. A particularly tempting wisp in the long sweet grassunder the hedge will induce an instant halt. The least thing passingalong the road stops the whole procession; and they stare fixedly atthe intruder till he is well on his way. And then, with no attempt tomake up for lost time, they jog along at the same old pace once more. It is good to watch them. When the whirl of life is too much for me;when my brain reels and my temples throb; when the hurry around medistracts my spirit and disturbs my peace; when I get caught in thetumult and the bustle and the rush--then I like to throw myself back inmy chair for a moment and close my eyes. I am back once more in thedear old lane among the haws and the filberts. I catch once more thesmell of the brier. I see again the squirrel up there in the oak andthe rabbit under the hedge. I listen as of old to the chirp of thegrasshopper in the stubble, to the hum of the bees among the foxgloves, to the song of the blackbird on the hawthorn, and, best of all--yes, best of all for brain unsteadied and nerve unstrung--I see the cowscoming home. 

It is a great thing to be able to believe the whole day long that, whenevening comes, the cows will all come home. That is the faith of themilkmaid. As the day drags on she looks through the lattice window andcatches occasional glimpses of Cherry and Brindle, Blossom and Darkie, Beauty and Crinkle, Daisy and Pearl. They are always wandering fartherand farther away across the fields; but she keeps a quiet heart. Inher deepest soul she cherishes a lovely secret. She knows that, whenthe sunbeams slant through the tall poplar spires, the cows will allcome home. She does not pretend to understand the mysterious instinctthat will later on turn the faces of Cherry and Brindle towards her. She cannot explain the wondrous force that will direct Blossom andDarkie into the old lane, and guide them along its folds to the whitegate down by the byre. But where she cannot trace she trusts. And allday long she clings to her sunny faith without wavering. She neverdoubts for a moment that the cows will all come home. 

Is there anything in the wide world more beautiful than the confidenceof a good woman in the salvation of her children? For years theycluster round her knee; she reads with them; prays with them; welcomestheir childish confidences. Then, one by one, away they go! The heatof the day may bring waywardness, and even shame; but, like themilkmaid watching the cows through the lattice, she is sure they willall come home. Think of Susanna Wesley with her great family ofnineteen children around her. What a wonderful story it is, the taleof her personal care and individual solicitude for the spiritualwelfare of each of them! And what a picture it is that Sir A. T. Quiller-Couch has painted of the holy woman's deathbed! John arrivesand is welcomed at the door by poor Hetty, the prodigal daughter. 

'"The end is very near--a few hours perhaps!" Hetty tells him. 

'"And she is happy?"

'"Ah, so happy!" Hetty's eyes brimmed with tears and she turned away. 

'"Sister, that happiness is for you, too. Why have you, alone of us, so far rejected it?"

'Hetty stepped to the door with a feeble gesture of the hands. Sheknew that, worn as he was with his journey, if she gave him the chancehe would grasp it and pause, even while his mother panted her last, towrestle for and win a soul--not because she, Hetty, was his sister, butsimply because hers was a soul to be saved. Yes, and she foresaw thatsooner or later he would win; that she would be swept into the flame ofhis conquest. She craved only to be let alone; she feared all newexperience; she distrusted even the joy of salvation. Life had beentoo hard for Hetty. ' And on another page we have an extract fromCharles's journal. 'I prayed by my sister, a gracious, tender, trembling soul; a bruised reed which the Lord will not break. '

The cows had all come home. The milkmaid's faith had not failed. 

The happiest people in the world, and the best, are the people who gothrough life as the milkmaid goes through the day, believing thatbefore night the cows will all come home. It is a faith that does notlend itself to apologetics, but, like the coming of the cows, it seemsto work out with amazing regularity. It is what Myrtle Reed would call'a woman's reasoning. ' It is _because_ it is. The cows will all comehome _because_ the cows will all come home. 

 'Good wife, what are you singing for? you know we've lost the hay, And what we'll do with horse and kye is more than I can say; While, like as not, with storm and rain, we'll lose both corn and wheat. ' She looked up with a pleasant face, and answered low and sweet, There is a Heart, there is a Hand, we feel but cannot see; We've always been provided for, and we shall always be. '

 'That's like a woman's reasoning, we must because we must!' She softly said, 'I reason not, I only work and trust; The harvest may redeem the hay, keep heart whate'er betide; When one door's shut I've always found another open wide. There is a Heart, there is a Hand, we feel but cannot see We've always been provided for, and we shall always be. '

The fact is that the milkmaid has a kind of understanding withProvidence. She is in league with the Eternal. And Providence has away of its own of keeping faith with trustful hearts like hers. I wasreading the other day Commander J. W. Gambier's _Links in my Life_, andwas amused at the curious inconsistency which led the author first tosneer at Providence and then to bear striking witness to its fidelity. As a young fellow the Commander came to Australia and worked on away-back station, but he had soon had enough. 'I was to try whatfortune could do for a poor man; but I believed in personal endeavourand the recognition of it by Providence. _I did not know Providence_. '

'I did not know Providence!' sneers our young bushman. 

'The cows will all come home, ' says the happy milkmaid. 

But on the very same page that contains the sneer Commander Gambiertells this story. When he was leaving England the old cabman who drovehim to the station said to him, 'If you see my son Tom in Australia, ask him to write home and tell us how he's getting on. ' 'I explained, 'the Commander tells us, 'that Australia was a big country, and askedhim if he had any idea of the name of the place his son had gone to. He had not. ' As soon as Commander Gambier arrived at Newcastle, in NewSouth Wales, he met an exceptionally ragged ostler. As the ostlerhanded him his horse, Mr. Gambier felt an irresistible thoughinexplicable conviction that this was the old cabman's son. He feltabsolutely sure of it; so he said:

'Your name is Fowles, isn't it?'

He looked amazed, and seemed to think that his questioner had somespecial reason for asking him, and was at first disinclined to answer. But Mr. Gambier pressed him and said, 'Your father, the Cheltenhamcab-driver, asked me to look you up. '

He then admitted that he was the man, and Mr. Gambier urged him towrite to his father. All this on the selfsame page as the ugly sneerabout Providence!

And a dozen pages farther on I came upon a still more striking story. Commander Gambier was very unfortunate, very homesick, and verymiserable in Australia. He could not make up his mind whether to stayhere or return to England. 'At last, ' he says, 'I resolved to _leaveit to fate_. ' The only difference that I can discover between the'_Providence_' whom Commander Gambier could not trust, and the '_fate_'to which he was prepared to submit all his fortunes, is that the formeris spelt with a capital letter and the latter with a small one! But tothe story. 'On the road where I stood was a small bush grog-shop, andthe coaches pulled up here to refresh the ever-thirsty bush traveller. At this spot the up-country and down-country coaches met, and Iresolved that I would get into whichever came in first, _leaving it todestiny_ to settle. Looking down the long, straight track over whichthe up-country coach must come, I saw a cloud of dust, and well can Iremember the curious sensation I had that I was about to turn my backupon England for ever! But in the other direction a belt of scrub hidthe view, the road making a sharp turn. And then, almostsimultaneously, I heard a loud crack of a whip, and round this corner, at full gallop, came the down coach, pulling up at the shanty not threeminutes before the other! I felt like a man reprieved, for my heartwas really set on going home; and I jumped up into the down coach witha great sense of relief!' And thus Mr. Gambier returned to England, became a Commander in the British Navy, and one of the mostdistinguished ornaments of the service. He sneers at '_Providence_, 'yet trusts to '_fate_, ' and leaves everything to '_destiny_'! Themilkmaid's may be an inexplicable confidence; but this is aninexplicable confusion. Both are being guided by the same Hand--theHand that leads the cows home. She sees it and sings. He scouts itand sneers. That is the only difference. 

Carlyle spent the early years of his literary life, until he was nearlyforty, among the mosshags and isolation of Craigenputtock. It was, Froude says, the dreariest spot in all the British dominions. Thehouse was gaunt and hungry-looking, standing like an island in a sea ofmorass. When he felt the lure of London, and determined to flinghimself into its tumult, he took 'one of the biggest plunges that a manmight take. ' But in that hour of crisis he built his faith on onegreat golden word. 'All things work together for good to them thatlove God, ' he wrote to his brother. And, later on, when his mother wasin great distress at the departure of her son, Alick, for America, Carlyle sent her the same text. 'You have had much to suffer, dearmother, ' he wrote, 'and are grown old in this Valley of Tears; but yousay always, as all of us should say, "Have we not many mercies too?"Is there not above all, and in all, a Father watching over us, throughwhom all sorrows shall yet work together for good? Yes, it is even so. Let us try to hold by _that_ as an anchor both sure and steadfast. 'Which is another way of saying, 'It is all right, mother mine. Letthem wander as they will whilst the sun is high; when it slants throughthe poplars the cows will all come home!'

The homeward movement of the cows is part of the harmony of theuniverse. Man himself goeth forth, the psalmist says, unto his workand to his labour until the evening. Until the evening--and then, likethe cows, he comes home. It is this sense of harmony between thecoming of the cows on the one hand, and all their environment on theother, that gave Gray the opening thought for his 'Elegy in a CountryChurchyard':

 The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea, The ploughman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. 

Here are two pictures--the tired ploughman and the lowing herd bothcoming home; and the two together make up a perfect harmony. It is astroke of poetic genius. We are made to feel the weariness of thetired ploughman in order that we may be able to appreciate therestfulness of the evening, the solitude of the quiet churchyard, andthe cows coming slowly home. I blamed myself at the beginning forsometimes getting caught in the fever and tumult of life; but then, ifI never knew such exhausting experiences, I should never be able toenjoy the delicious stillness of the evening, I should never be able tosee the beauty of the herd winding so slowly o'er the lea. It is justbecause the ploughman has toiled so hard, and done his work so well, that his weariness blends so perfectly with the restfulness of thedusk. For it is only those who have bravely borne the burden and heatof the day who can relish the sweetness and peace of the twilight. Itis a man's duty to keep things in their right place. I do not meanmerely that he should keep his hat in the hall, and his book on theshelf. I mean that, as far as possible, a man ought to keep his toilto the daylight, and his rest to the dusk. 

Dr. Chalmers held that our three-score years and ten are really sevendecades corresponding with the seven days of the week. Six of them, hesaid, should be spent in strenuous endeavour. But the seventh is theSabbath of the Lord thy God, and should be spent in Sabbatic quiet. That ideal is not always capable of realization. For the matter ofthat, it is not always possible to abstain from work on the Lord's Day. But it is good to keep it before us as an ideal. We may at leastdetermine that, on the Sunday, we will perform only deeds of necessityand mercy. And, in the same way, we may resolve that we will leave aslittle work as possible to be done in the twilight of life. It was oneof the chiefest of the prophets who told us that 'it is good for a manto bear the yoke in his youth. ' If I were the director of a lifeinsurance company, I should have that great word blazoned over theportal of the office. If, by straining an extra nerve in the heyday ofhis powers, a man may ensure to himself some immunity from care in theevening, he is under a solemn obligation to do so. The weary ploughmanhas no right to labour after the cows come home. 

For, in some respects, the sweetest part of the day follows the comingof the cows. I have a notion that most of the old folk would say so. During the day they fancied that the cows had gone, to return no more. But they all came home. 'And now, ' says old Margaret Ogilvy, 'and nowit has all come true like a dream. I can call to mind not one littlething I ettled for in my lusty days that hasna' been put into my handsin my auld age. I sit here useless, surrounded by the gratification ofall my wishes and all my ambitions; and at times I'm near terrified, for it's as if God had mista'en me for some other woman. ' Theywandered long, that is to say, and they wandered far. But they allcame home--Cherry and Brindle, Blossom and Darkie, Beauty and Crinkle, Daisy and Pearl--they all came home. Happy are all they who sing intheir souls the milkmaid's song, and never, never doubt that, when thetwilight gathers round them, the cows will all come home!

II

MUSHROOMS ON THE MOOR

Mr. G. K. Chesterton does not like mushrooms. That is the mostarresting fact that I have gleaned from reading, carefully and withdelight, his _Victorian Age in Literature_. In his treatment ofDickens, he writes very contemptuously of 'that Little Bethel to whichKit's mother went, ' and he likens it to '_a monstrous mushroom_ thatgrows in the moonshine and dies in the dawn. ' Now no man who wasreally fond of the esculent and homely fungus would have employed sucha metaphor by way of disparagement. I can only infer that Mr. Chesterton thinks mushrooms very nasty. His opinion of Little Betheldoes not concern me. It is neither here nor there. But Mr. Chestertondoes not like _mushrooms_! I cannot get over that!

I feel very sorry for Mr. Chesterton. It is not merely a matter oftaste. I would not presume to set my opinion in a matter of this kindover against his. But the authorities are with me. I have looked upthe Encyclopaedia Britannica, and its opening sentence on the subjectaffirms that 'there are few more delicious members of the vegetablekingdom than the common mushroom. ' I suppose that in these mattersassociation has a lot to do with it. I cannot forget those delicioussummer mornings in England when we boys, rising with the lark, stoleout of the house like so many burglars, and scampered with our basketsacross the fragrant meadows to gather the white buttons that dotted thesparkling, dew-drenched grass. It was, as I have said in theintroduction to this book, a large part of childhood's radiant romance!What tales our fancy wove into the fairy-rings under the elm-trees! Welifted each moist fungus half expecting to see the brownies and theelves fly from beneath it! And what fearsome care we took to includeno single hypocritical toadstool among our treasures! I am reallyafraid that Mr. Chesterton would have been less conscientious. Mushrooms and toadstools are all alike to him. He can never have hadsuch frolics in the fields as we enjoyed in those ecstatic summermornings. And he never, therefore, knew the fierce joy of thebreakfast that followed when, hungry as hunters, we returned withflushed faces to feast upon the spoils of our boisterous foray. Oversuch brave memories Mr. Chesterton cannot fondly linger. For Mr. Chesterton does not like mushrooms. 

What would the Harvester have said to Mr. Chesterton? For, to GeneStratton Porter's hero, mushrooms were half-way to destiny. 'In themorning, brilliant sunshine awoke him, and he arose to find the earthsteaming. 

'"If ever there was a perfect mushroom morning!" he said to his dog. "We must hurry and feed the stock and ourselves, and gather some!" TheHarvester breakfasted, fed the stock, hitched Betsy to the springwagon, and went into the dripping, steamy woods. If any one had askedhim that morning concerning his idea of heaven, he would never havedreamed of describing gold-paved streets, crystal pillars, jewelledgates, and thrones of ivory. He would have told you that the woods ona damp sunny May morning was heaven. He only opened his soul tobeauty, and steadily climbed the hill to the crest, and then down theother side to the rich, half-shaded, half-open spaces, where big, roughmushrooms sprang in a night. '

Yes, a mushroom morning was heaven to the Harvester. And it was themushrooms that led him the first step of the way towards the discoveryof his dream-girl. The mushrooms represented the first of those goldenstairs by which he climbed to his paradise. And Mr. Chesterton doesnot like mushrooms! What would the Harvester have said to Mr. Chesterton?

One faint, struggling glimmer of hope I am delighted to discover. Mr. Chesterton likens _Little_ Bethel to a _monstrous_ mushroom. There canbe only one reason for this inartistic mixture of analogy andantithesis. Mr. Chesterton evidently knows that a large mushroom isnot so sweet or so toothsome as a small one. A 'monstrous mushroom, 'even to those who like mushrooms, is coarse and less tasty. Now thegleam of hope lies in the circumstance that Mr. Chesterton knows thefine gradations of niceness (or nastiness) that distinguish mushroomsof one size from mushrooms of another. As a rule, if you get to know athing, you get to like it. Mr. Chesterton is coming to know mushrooms. He will soon be ordering them for breakfast. He may even come, likecertain tribes mentioned in the _Encyclopaedia_, to eat nothing else!And by that time he may have come to know Little Bethel. And if hecomes to know it, he may come to like it. He will still liken it to amushroom. But we shall be able to tell, by the way he says it, that hemeans that it is very good. We shall see at once that Mr. Chestertonlikes mushrooms. At present, however, the stern fact remains. Mr. Chesterton does _not_ like mushrooms. Richard Jefferies, in his_Amateur Poacher_, says that mushrooms are good either raw or cooked. The great naturalist is therefore altogether on the side of the_Encyclopaedia_. 'Some eat mushrooms raw, fresh as taken from theground, with a little salt; but to me the taste is then too strong. 'Perhaps that is how Mr. Chesterton has taken his mushrooms--_and LittleBethel_!' Of the many ways of cooking mushrooms, ' Richard Jefferiesgoes on, 'the simplest is the best; that is, on a gridiron. ' Mr. Chesterton gives the impression that that is precisely how he wouldprefer his mushrooms--_and Little Bethel_! For Mr. Chesterton does notlike mushrooms. 

The really extraordinary feature of the whole thing is that I likemushrooms all the better for the very reason that leads Mr. Chestertonto pour upon them his most withering and pitiless contempt. He hatesthem because they spring up in the night. Little Bethel is a'monstrous mushroom that grows in the moonshine. ' It is perfectly truethat Little Bethel, like the mushrooms, flourished in the darkness. Like Mark Tapley, she was at her brightest when her surroundings weremost dreary. In this respect both the meeting-house and the mushroomsare in excellent company. Many fine things grow in the night. Indeed, Sir James Crichton-Browne, the great doctor, in his lecture on 'Sleep, 'argues that all things that grow at all grow in the night. Night isNature's growing-time. Now Michael Fairless shared Richard Jefferies'fondness for mushrooms. Every reader of _The Roadmender_ will recallthe night in the woods. 'Through the still night I heard thenightingales calling, calling, calling, until I could bear it nolonger, and went softly out into the luminous dark. The wood wasmanifold with sound. I heard my little brothers who move by nightrustling in grass and tree; and above and through it all thenightingales sang and sang and sang! The night wind bent the listeningtrees, and the stars yearned earthwards to hear the song of deathlesslove. Louder and louder the wonderful notes rose and fell in a passionof melody, and then sank to rest on that low thrilling call which it issaid Death once heard and stayed his hand. At last there was silence. The grey dawn awoke and stole with trailing robes across earth's floor. Gathering a pile of mushrooms--_children of the night_--I hasten home. '

The nightingales--the _singers_ of the night!

The mushrooms--the _children_ of the night!

These _singers_ of the night, and these '_children_ of the night, 'almost remind me of Faber:

 Angels of Jesus, angels of light, Singing to welcome the pilgrims of the night!

But Mr. Chesterton does not like 'the _children_ of the night. '

Now we must really learn better manners. It will not do to treatthings contemptuously either because they spring up suddenly, orbecause they spring up in the night. In this matter we Australianslive in glass houses and must not throw stones. Mr. Chesterton istreading on our pet corns. For Australia and America are the two most'monstrous mushrooms' on the face of the earth! Like the nations ofwhich the prophet wrote, they were 'born in a day. ' Think of whathappened in America in the ten short years between 1830 and 1840! Nonation in the history of the world can produce so astounding a record!In 1830 America had 23 miles of railway; in 1840 she had 800. In 1830the country presented all the wilder characteristics of early colonialsettlement; in 1840 it was a great and populous nation. In 1830Chicago was a frontier fort; in 1840 Chicago was a city. In 1830 thepopulation of Michigan was 32, 000; in 1840 it was 212, 000. It wasduring this sensational decade, too, that the first steamships crossedthe Atlantic. And the spirit of the age reflected itself in theliterary wealth of which America became possessed at that extraordinarytime. Whittier and Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes and NathanielHawthorne, Emerson and Bancroft, Poe and Prescott, all arose duringthat eventful period, and made for themselves names that have becomeclassical and immortal. Here is a monstrous mushroom for you! Or, topass from the things of yesterday to the things of to-day, see how, under the shadow of the Rocky Mountains, Canadian cities are in our owntime shooting up with positively incredible swiftness. No, no; Mr. Chesterton must not speak disparagingly of mushrooms!

And look at the rapidity at which these young nations beneath theSouthern Cross sprang into existence! I remember standing on thesea-shore in New Zealand talking to a couple of old whalers, who toldme of the times they spent before the first emigrant ships arrived, when they were the only white men for hundreds of miles around. Andnow! Why, in their own lifetime these men had seen a great nationspring into being! Here, I say again, are mushrooms for you!

But do mushrooms really spring up as suddenly as they appear to do?Dan Crawford tells us that, in Central Africa, if a young missionaryattempts to prove the existence of God, the natives laugh, and, pointing to the wonders of Nature around, exclaim, '_No rain, nomushrooms!_' In effect they mean to say, without some adequate cause. If there were no God, whence came the forest and the fauna? Now thatAfrican proverb is very suggestive. 'No rain, no mushrooms. ' Themushroom, that is to say, has its roots away back in old rainstorms, infallen forests, and in ancient climatic experiences too subtle totrace. I have been reading Dr. Cooke's text-book, and he and Mr. Cuthill have convinced me that it takes about a million years to grow amushroom. The conditions out of which the fungus suddenly springs areas old as the world itself. And that same consideration saves Americaand Australia from contempt. For both America and Australia--thesemushroom nations--are very, very old. Dr. Stanley Hall, the Presidentof the Clark University, was speaking on this aspect of things theother day. 'In a very pregnant psychological sense, ' he said, 'ours isan unhistoric land. Our very constitution had a Minerva birth. ' (Thatis a classical way of saying that it had a mushroom birth. ) 'Ourliterature, customs, fashions, institutions, and legislation wereinherited or copied, and our religion was not a gradual indigenousgrowth, but both its spirit and its forms were imported ready-made fromHolland, Rome, England, and Palestine. No country is so precociouslyold for its years. ' It follows, therefore, that Australia is as old asthe Empire. And the Empire has its roots away back where the first mandelved. We must not allow ourselves to be duped by the trickery ofappearances. These new things are very ancient. 'How long did it takeyou to paint that picture?' somebody asked Sir Joshua Reynolds. '_Allmy life!_' he replied. 

Anybody can grow fine flowers in the daytime. But what can you grow inthe dark? That is the challenge of the mushrooms--_what can you growin the dark_? 'The nights are the test!' as Charlotte Brontë used tosay. When things were as black as black could be, poor Charlottewrote: 'The days pass in a slow, dark march; the nights are the test;the sudden wakings from restless sleep, the revived knowledge that onesister lies in her grave, and another not at my side, but in a separateand sick-bed. _The nights are the test_. ' They are indeed. Tell me:Can you grow faith, and restfulness, and patience, and a quiet heart inthe darkness? If so, you will never speak contemptuously of mushroomsagain. 

Why, dear me, some of the very finest things in this world of oursspring up suddenly, like the mushroom, and spring up in the dark! DeanHole used to tell how he became a preacher. For years he could notlift his eyes from his manuscript. Then, one Sunday evening, the lightsuddenly failed. His manuscript was useless, and he found himselfspeaking heart to heart to his people. The eloquence for which he wasafterwards famed appeared in a moment, and appeared in the dark! And Iam very fond of that story of the old American soldier. He was stoneblind, but very happy, and always wore his medal on his breast. 

'What do you do in these days of darkness?' somebody asked him. 

'Do?' he replied almost scornfully. 'Why, I thank God that for fiftyyears I had the gift of sight. I saw Abraham Lincoln, and heard thebugles call for the victory of Truth and Righteousness. I go back tothose scenes now, and realize them anew. I have lost my sight, but_memory has been born again in the dark_. '

If, therefore, we allow mushrooms to be treated with contempt, simplybecause they spring up suddenly, and spring up in the night, we shallsoon find other beautiful things, much more precious, brought under thesame cruel condemnation. And what of a sudden conversion? Think of_Down in Water Street_, and _Broken Earthenware_, and _Varieties ofReligious Experience_! What of that tremendous happening on the roadto Damascus? The Philippian jailer, too! See him, with a grim smileof satisfaction, locking the apostles in their terrible dungeon; yetbefore the night is through, he is tenderly bathing their stripes andministering to them with all the gentle graces of Christian courtesyand compassion!' A monstrous mushroom that grew in the night, ' wouldyou call it? At any rate, it did not die with the dawn. 'Minervabirths' these, with a vengeance. As for me, I have nothing butreverence for the mushrooms. They are among the wonders of a verywondrous world. 

III

ONIONS

Just along the old rut-riddled road that winds through the bush on itsway to Bulman's Gully there lives a poor old man who fancies that he isof no use in the world. I am going to send him an onion. I amconvinced that it will cure him of his most distressing malady. Ishall wrap it up in tissue paper, pack it in a dainty box, tie it withsilk ribbons, and post it without delay. No gift could be moreappropriate. The good man's argument is very plausible, but an onionwill draw out all its defects. He thinks, because he never hears anyvoice trumpeting his fame or chanting his praise, that he is thereforewithout any real worth or value to his fellow men. Could anything bemore preposterous? Who ever heard a panegyric in praise of onions? Atwhat concert was the song of the onion sung? Roses and violets, daisies and daffodils, are the theme of every warbler; but when doesthe onion come in for adulation? Run through your great poets and showme the epic, or even the sonnet, addressed to the onion! Are we, therefore, to assume that onions have no value in a world like this?What a wealth of appetizing piquancy would vanish from our tables ifthe onion were to come no more! As a relish, as a food, and as amedicine, the onion is simply invaluable; yet no orator ever loseshimself in rhetorical transports in honour of onions! It is clearlynot safe to assume that because we are not much praised, we aretherefore of not much profit. And so I repeat my suggestion that ifany man is known to be depressed over his apparent uselessness, itwould be a service to humanity in general, and to that member of therace in particular, to post him an onion. 

'I always bless God for making anything so strong as an onion!'exclaimed William Morris, in a fine and characteristic burst offervour. That is the point: an onion is so strong. The very strengthof a thing often militates against applause. If a strong man lifted abag of potatoes we should think no more about it; but if a schoolboypicked it up and ran off with it we should be speechless withamazement. We take the strength of the strong for granted; it is thestrength of the weak that we applaud. If a man is known to be good oruseful or great, we treat his goodness or usefulness or greatness asone of the given factors of life's intricate problem, and straightwaydismiss it from our minds. It is when goodness or usefulness orgreatness breaks out in unexpected places or in unexpected people thatwe vociferously shout our praise. We applaud the singers at a concertbecause it appeals to us as such an amazing and delightful incongruitythat so practical and prosaic a creature as Man should suddenly burstinto melody; but when the angels sang at Bethlehem the shepherds neverthought of clapping. The onion is therefore in company with theangels. I am not surprised that the Egyptians accorded the oniondivine honours and carved its image on their monuments. I am preparedto admit that onions do not move in the atmosphere of sentiment and ofpoetry. Tears have been shed over onions, as every housewife knows. Shakespeare speaks of the tears that live in an onion. But, asShakespeare implies, they are crocodile tears--without tenderness andwithout emotion. Old John Wolcott, the satirist, tells how

 . . . . . . Master Broadbrim Pored o'er his father's will and dropped the onioned tear. 

And Bernard Shaw writes of 'the undertaker's handkerchief, duly onionedwith some pathetic phrase. ' No, onions do not lend themselves topassion or to pathos. You would scarcely decorate the church withonions for your sister's wedding, or plant a row of onions on a hero'sgrave. And yet I scarcely know why. For, in a suitable setting, atouch of warm romance may light up even so apparently prosaic a theme. The coming of the swallows in the spring is scarcely a more delightfulevent in Cornwall than the annual arrival of the onion-sellers fromBrittany. What a picturesque world we invade when we get among thosedreamy old fishing-villages that dot the Cornish coast!

 Gold mists upon the sea and sky, The hills are wrapped in silver veils, The fishing-boats at anchor lie, Nor flap their idle orange sails. 

The wild and rugged sea-front is itself suggestive of rich romance andreminiscent of bold adventure. The smugglers, the pirates, thewreckers, and the Spanish mariners knew every bluff and headlandperfectly. And, however the world beyond may have changed, these tinyhamlets have triumphantly defied the teeth of time. They know noalteration. The brogue of the people is strange but rhythmic, and, though pleasant to hear, very hard for ordinary mortals to understand. The fisherfolk, with their strapping and stalwart forms, their bronzedand weather-beaten features, their dark, idyllic eyes, their tanned andswarthy skins, their odd and old-world garb, together with theirgeneral air of being the daughters of the ocean and the sons of thestorm, seem to be a race by themselves. And he who tarries long enoughamong them to become infected by the charm of their secluded andwell-ordered lives knows that one of the events of their uneventfulyear is the coming of the onion-sellers from over the sea. Thehistoric connexion between Cornwall and Brittany is very ancient, andis a romance in itself. The English and French coasts, as they faceeach other there, are very much alike--broken, precipitous, and grand. The peoples live pretty much the same kind of lives on either side ofthe Channel. And when the onion-sellers come from France they aregreeted with enthusiasm by the Cornish people, and although they speaktheir own tongue, they are perfectly understood. See! there is one ofthe Breton onion-sellers lounging among a knot of fishermen near thedoor of yonder picturesque old Cornish cottage, whilst the wife standsin the open doorway, arms a-kimbo, listening as the foreigner tells ofthe things that he has seen across the Channel since last he visitedthis coast. And up the hill there, on the rickety old settle, beneaththe creaking signboard of the village inn, is another such group. As Igaze upon these masculine but kindly faces I am half inclined towithdraw my too hasty admission that onions have nothing about them ofsentiment, poetry, or romance. 

It always strikes me as a funny thing about onions that, however fond aman may be of the onions themselves, he detests things that are_oniony_. Give him onions, and he will devour them with magnificentrelish. But, through some slip in the kitchen, let his porridge or histea taste of onions, and his wry face is a sight worth seeing! Afriend of mine keeps a large apiary. One summer he was in great gleeat the immense stores of honey that his bees were collecting. Then, one dreadful day, he tasted it. The dainty little square of comb, oozing with the exuding fluid, was passed round the table. Horror satupon every face! It turned out that the bees had discovered a largeonion plantation some distance away, and had gathered their heavystores from that odorous and tainted source! What could be moreabominable, even to a lover of onions, than oniony honey? We rememberThackeray and his oniony sandwiches. Now why is it possible for me tolove onions and to hate all things oniony? The fact is that the worldhas a few vigorous, decided, elementary things that absolutely declineto be modified or watered down. 'Onions is onions!' as a well-knowncharacter in fiction remarked on a memorable occasion, and there is aworld of significance in the bald assertion. There are some thingsthat are as old as the world, and as universal as man, and that are toovivid and pronounced to humble their pride or compromise their owndistinctive glory. The exquisite shock of the bather as his naked bodyplunges into the flowing tide; the instinctive recoil on seeing for thefirst time a dead human body; the delicious thrill with which the loverpresses for the first time his lady's lips; the terrifying roar of alion, the flaunting scarlet of a poppy, and the inimitable flavour ofan onion--these are among the world's most familiar quantities, thethings that decline to be modified or changed. You might as well askfor an ice-cream with the chill off as ask for a diluted edition of anyof these vivid and primitive things. Onions may be regarded by a manas simply delicious, but oniony honey or oniony tea! The bather'splunge is a rapture to every stinging and startled nerve in his body, but to stand ankle-deep in the surf, shivering with folded arms in thebreeze that scatters the spray! Life is full of delightful things thatare a transport to the soul if we take them as they are, but thatbecome a torment and an abomination if we water them down. And it isjust because Christianity itself is so distinctive, so outstanding, soboldly pronounced a thing, that we insist on its being unadulterated. Even a worldling feels that a Christian, to be tolerable, must be outand out. The man who waters down his religion is like the shiveringbather who, feeling the cold, cold waters tickling his toes, cannotmuster up the courage to plunge; he is like the man who wants anice-cream with the chill off; he is like oniony honey or oniony tea!

A man cannot, of course, live upon onions. Onions have their place andtheir purpose, and, as I have said, are simply invaluable. But theymust be kept to that place and to that purpose. The modern tendency isto eat nothing but onions. We are fast becoming the victims of aperfect passion for piquancy. Time was when we expected our newspapersto tell us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Wedon't care a rap about the truth now, so long as they'll give us athrill. We must have onions. We used to demand of the novelist alove-story; now he must be morbidly sexual and grimly sensational. Ourgrandfathers went to a magic lantern entertainment and thought it afurious frolic. And on Sundays they prayed. 'From lightning andtempest; from plague, pestilence, and famine; from battle and murder, and from sudden death, Good Lord, deliver us!' Their grandchildrenpray, 'From all churches and chapels, Good Lord, deliver us!' And, during the week, they like to see all the blood-curdling horrors oflightning and tempest; of plague, pestilence, and famine; of battle, murder, and of sudden death, enacted before their starting eyes withnever a flicker to remind them that the film is only a film. Thedramas, the dances, and the dresses of the period fortify mycontention. The cry is for onions, and the stronger the better. It isnot a healthy sign. Mr. H. G. Wells, in his graphic description of thechanges that overcame Bromstead, and turned it from green fields intofilthy slums, says that he noticed that 'there seemed to be more boardsby the railway every time I passed, advertising pills and pickles, tonics and condiments, and such-like solicitudes of a people with nonatural health or appetite left in them. ' The pills, that is to say, kept pace with the pickles. The more pickles Bromstead ate, the morepills Bromstead wanted. That is the worst of the passion for piquancy. The soul grows sick if fed on sensations. Onions are splendid things, but you cannot live upon onions. Pickles inevitably lead to pills. 

But that is not all. For the trouble is that, if I develop aninordinate appetite for onions, I lose all relish for more delicatelyflavoured foods. The most impressive instance of such a dietarytragedy is recorded in my Bible. 'The children of Israel wept andsaid, "We remember the _onions_, but now there is nothing except _thismanna_ before our eyes!"' Onions seem to have a special connexion withEgypt. Herodotus tells us that the men who built the Pyramids fed upononions, although the priests were forbidden to touch them. 'Weremember the onions!' cried the children of Israel, looking wistfullyback at Egypt, 'but now we have nothing but this manna!' The onionsactually destroyed their appetite for angels' food! That, I repeat, isthe most mournful aspect of our modern and insatiable passion forpiquancy. If I let my soul absorb itself in the sensational novel, thehair-raising drama, and the blood-curdling film, I find myself losingappreciation for the finer and gentler things in life. I no longerglory, as I used to do, in the sweetness of the morning air and theglitter of the dew-drenched grass; in the purling stream and thefern-draped hills; in the curling waves and the twinkling stars. Thebound of the hare and the flight of the sea-bird lose their charm forme. The world is robbed of its wonder and its witchery when my eyesgrow accustomed to the gaudy blinding glare. Jenny Lind was asked whyshe renounced the stage. She was sitting at the moment on the sands bythe seaside, with her Bible on her knee. She pointed her questioner tothe setting sun, transforming the ocean into a sea of glory. 'Ifound, ' she said, 'that I was losing my taste for that, and'--holdingup her Bible--'my taste for this; so I gave it up!' She was a wisewoman. Onions are fine things in their own way. God has undoubtedlyleft a place in His world for the strong, vivid, elemental things. Butthey must be kept to that place. God has strewn the ground around mewith the food that angels eat, and I must allow nothing on earth todestroy my taste for such sublime and wondrous fare. 

IV

ON GETTING OVER THINGS

We get over things. It is the most amazing faculty that we possess. War or pestilence; drought or famine; fire or flood; it does notmatter. However devastating the catastrophe, however frightful theslaughter, however total the eclipse, we surmount our sorrows and findourselves still smiling when the storm is overpast. I remember oncepenetrating into the wild and desolate interior of New Zealand. From ajagged and lonely eminence I surveyed a landscape that almostfrightened one. Not a house was in sight, nor a road, nor one livingcreature, nor any sign of civilization. I looked in every direction atwhat seemed to have been the work of angry Titans. Far as the eyecould see, the earth around me appeared to have been a battle-field onwhich an army of giants had pelted each other with mountains. Thewhole country was broken, weird, precipitous, and grand. In everydirection huge cliffs towered perpendicularly about you; bottomlessabysses yawned at your feet; and every scarped pinnacle and beetlingcrag scowled menacingly at your littleness and scowled defiance at yourapproach. One wondered by what titanic forces the country had been soruthlessly crushed and crumbled and torn to shreds. Did any startledeye witness this volcanic frolic? What a sight it must have been tohave watched these towering ranges split and scattered; to have seenthe placid snowclad heights shivered, like fragile vases, to fragments;to have beheld the mountains tossed about like pebbles; to have seenthe valleys torn and rent and twisted; and the rivers flung back interror to make for themselves new channels as best they could! It musthave been a fearsome and wondrous spectacle to have observed theslumbering forces of the universe in such a burst of passion! Naturemust have despaired of her quiet and sylvan landscape. 'It is ruined, 'she sobbed; 'it can never be the same again!' No, it can never be thesame again. The bright colours of the kaleidoscope do not form thesame mosaic a second time. But Nature has got over her grief, for allthat. For see! All up these tortured and angular valleys the greatevergreen bush is growing in luxurious profusion. Every slope isdensely clothed with a glorious tangle of magnificent forestry. Fromthe branches that wave triumphantly from the dizzy heights above, tothose that mingle with the delicate mosses in the valley, the verdurenowhere knows a break. Even on the steep rocky faces the persistentvegetation somehow finds for itself a precarious foothold; and wherethe trees fear to venture the lichen atones for their absence. Upthrough every crack and cranny the ferns are pushing their gracefulfronds. It is a marvellous recovery. Indeed, the landscape is reallybetter worth seeing to-day than in those tranquil days, centuries ago, before the Titans lost their temper, and began to splinter the summits. 

Travellers in South America frequently comment upon the samephenomenon. Prescott tells us how Cortes, on his historic march toMexico, passed through regions that had once gleamed with volcanicfires. The whole country had been swept by the flames, and torn by thefury of these frightful eruptions. As the traveller presses on, hisroad passes along vast tracts of lava, bristling in the innumerablefantastic forms into which the fiery torrent has been thrown by theobstacles in its career. But as he casts his eye down some steepslope, or almost unfathomable ravine, on the margin of the road, hesees their depths glowing with the rich blooms and enamelled vegetationof the tropics. His vision sweeps across plains of exuberantfertility, almost impervious from thickets of aromatic shrubs and wildflowers, in the midst of which tower up trees of that magnificentgrowth which is found only in these latitudes. It is an intoxicatingpanorama of brilliant colour and sweetest perfume. Kingsley andWallace, too, remark upon these great volcanic rents and gashes thathave been healed by verdure of rare magnificence and orchids ofsurpassing loveliness. 'Even the gardens of England were a desert incomparison! All around them were orange- and lemon-trees, the fruit ofwhich, in that strange coloured light of the fireflies, flashed intheir eyes like balls of burnished gold and emerald; while great whitetassels, swinging from every tree in the breeze which swept the glade, tossed in their faces a fragrant snow of blossoms and glittering dropsof perfumed dew. ' It is thus that, like the oyster that conceals itsscar beneath a pearl, Nature heals her wounds with loveliness. Shegets over things. 

And so do we. For, after all, the world about us is but a shadow, atransitory and flickering shadow, of the actual and greater worldwithin us. Yes, the incomparably greater world within us; for what isa world of grass and granite compared with a world of blood and tears?What is the cleaving of an Alp compared with the breaking of a heart?What is the sweep of a tornado, the roar of a prairie-fire, or thebooming thunder of an avalanche, compared with the cry of a child inpain?' All visible things, ' as Carlyle has taught us, 'are emblems. What thou seest is not there on its own account; strictly speaking isnot there at all. Matter exists only spiritually, and to representsome idea and body it forth. ' The soul is liable to great volcanicprocesses. There come to it tragic and tremendous hours when all itsdepths are broken up, all its landmarks shattered, and all its streamsturned rudely back. For weal or for woe everything is suddenly andstrangely changed. Amidst the crash of ruin and the loss of all, thesoul sobs out its pitiful lament. 'Everything has gone!' it cries. 'Ican never be the same again! I can never get over it!' But Time is agreat healer. His touch is so gentle that the poor patient is notconscious of its pressure. The days pass, and the weeks, and themonths, and the years. Like the trees that start from the rocky faces, and the ferns that creep out of every cranny in the ruined horizon, newinterests steal imperceptibly into life. There come new faces, newloves, new thoughts, and new sympathies. The heart responds to freshinfluences and bravely declines to die. And whilst the days that aredead are embalmed in costliest spices, and lie in the most holy placeof the temple of memory, the soul discovers with surprise that it hassurmounted the cruel shock of earlier shipwreck, and can once moregreet the sea. 

I am writing in days of war. The situation is without precedent. Adozen nations are in death-grips with each other. Twenty million menare in the field. Every hour brings us news of ships that have beensunk, regiments that have been annihilated, thousands of brave men whohave been slaughtered. Never since the world began were so many menwrithing in mortal anguish, so many women weeping, so many childrenfatherless. And whilst a hundred thousand women know that they willsee no more the face that was all the world to them, millions of othersare sleepless with haunting fear and terrible anxiety. And every day Ihear good men moan that the world can never be the same again. 'Weshall never get over it!' they tell me. It is the old mistake, themistake that we always make in the hour of our sad and bitter grief. 'We shall never get over it!' Of course we shall! And as the fieldsare sweeter, and the flowers exhale a richer perfume, after thethunder-clouds have broken and the storm has spent its strength, so weshall find ourselves living in a kindlier world when the anguish ofto-day is over-past. Much of our old civilization, with its veneer ofpoliteness and its heart of barbarism, will have been riven as theranges were riven by the earthquake. But out of the wreckage shallcome the healthier day. The wounds will heal as they always heal, andthe scars will stay as they always stay; but they will stay to warn usagainst perpetuating our ancient follies. Empires will never againregard their militarism as their pride. 

Surely this torrent of blood that is streaming through the trenches andcrimsoning the seas is sacrificial blood! It is an ancient principle, and of loftiest sanction, that it is sometimes good for one man to diethat many may be saved from destruction. If, out of its present agony, the world emerges into the peace and sunshine of a holier day, everyman who laid down his life in the awful struggle will have died in thatsacred and vicarious way. This generation will have wept and bled andsuffered that unborn generations may go scatheless. It is the oldstory:

 No mortal born without the dew Of solemn pain on mother's brow; No harvest's golden yield save through The toil and tearing of the plough. 

It was only through the Cross that the Saviour of men found a way intothe joy that was set before Him, and the world therefore cannot expectto come to its own along a bloodless road. 

The recuperative forces that lurk within us are the divinest thingsabout us. I cut my hand; and, before the knife is well out of thegash, a million invisible agents are at work to repair the damage. Itis our irrepressible faculty for getting over things. No minister canhave failed, at some time or other, to stand in amazement before it. We have all known men who were not only wicked, but who bore in theirbody the marks of their vice. It was stamped upon the face; it wasevident in the stoop of the frame; it betrayed itself in the shufflethat should have been a stride. We have known such men, I say, andheard their pitiful confessions. And the most heartrending thing aboutthem was their despair. They could believe that the love of God wasvast enough to find room for them; but just look! 'Look at me!' a mansaid to me one night, remembering what he once was and surveying thewreckage that remained, 'look at me!' And truly it was a sight to makeangels weep. 'I can never be the same again, ' he said in effect, 'Ican never get over it!' But he did; and there is as much differencebetween the man that I saw that night and the man who greets me to-dayas there was between the man whom he remembered and the man he thensurveyed. It is wonderful how the old light returns to the eye, theold grace to the form, the old buoyancy to the step, and how, withthese, a new softness creeps into the countenance and a new gentlenessinto the voice when the things that wound are thrown away and thehealing powers get their chance. It is only then that we reallydiscover the marvel of getting over things. 

Indeed, unless we are on our guard this magical faculty will be ourundoing. The tendency is, as we have seen, to return to our earlierstate, to recover from the change. And the forces that work in thatdirection do not pause to ask if the change that has come about is achange for the better or a change for the worse. They only know that acataclysmic change has been effected, and that it is their business tohelp us back to our first and natural condition. But there are changesthat sometimes overtake us from which we do not wish to recover; and wemust be on ceaseless vigil against the well-meaning forces that onlylive to abolish all signs of alteration. No man ever yet threw on hisold self and entered into new life without being conscious thatmillions of invisible toilers were at work to undo the change that hadbeen effected. They are helping him to get over it, and he must firmlydecline their misdirected offices. 

'"Father!" said young Dr. Ralph Dexter to the old doctor in _TheSpinner in the Sun_, "father! it may be because I'm young, but I holdbefore me, very strongly, the ideals of our profession. It seems to mea very beautiful and wonderful life that is opening up before me, always to help, to give, to heal. I feel as though I had beendedicated to some sacred calling, some lifelong service. And servicemeans brotherhood. "

'"_You'll get over that!_" returned the old doctor curtly, yet notwithout a certain secret admiration. "_You'll get over that_ whenyou've had to engage a lawyer to collect your modest wages for youruplifting work, the healed not being sufficiently grateful to pay thehealer. When you've gone ten miles in the dead of winter, at midnight, to take a pin out of a squalling baby's back, why, you may change yourmind!"'

And later on in the same story Myrtle Reed gives us another dialoguebetween the two doctors. 

'"I may be wrong, " remarked Ralph, "but I've always believed thatnothing is so bad that it can't be made better. "

'"The unfailing earmark of youth, " the old man replies; "_you'll getover that!_"'

Old Dr. Dexter is quite right. Good or bad, the tendency is to getover things. Many a man has entered his business or profession withthe highest and most roseate ideals, and the tragedy of his life lay inthe fact that he recovered from them. 

Yes, there is nothing that we cannot get over. Our recuperativefaculties know no limit. None of our diseases are incurable. I knewan old lady who really thought that her malady was fatal. She fanciedthat she could never recover. She even told me that the doctor hadinformed her that her case was hopeless. She lay back upon her pillow, and her snowy hair shamed the whiteness about her. 'I shall never getover it, ' she sighed, '_I shall never get over it!_' But she did. Wesang 'Rock of Ages' beside her sunlit grave this afternoon. 

V

NAMING THE BABY

Wild horses shall not drag from me the wonderful secret that suggestedmy theme. Suffice it to say that it had to do with the naming of ababy. And the naming of a baby is really one of the most momentousevents upon which the sentinel stars look down. There is more in itthan a cursory observer would suppose. Tennyson recognized this whenhis first son was born, the son who was destined to become thebiographer of his distinguished sire and the Governor-General of ourAustralian Commonwealth. Whilst revelling in the proud ecstasies ofearly fatherhood, he sought the companionship of his intimate friend, Henry Hallam, the historian. They were strolling together one day in abeautiful English churchyard. 

'What name do you mean to give him?' asked Hallam. 

'Well, we thought of calling him Hallam, ' replied the poet. 

'Oh! had you not better call him Alfred, after yourself?' suggested thehistorian. 

'Aye!' replied the naïve bard, '_but what if he should turn out to be afool?_'

Ah, there's the rub. It turned out all right, as it happened. The boywas no fool, as the world very well knows; but if you examine the storyunder a microscope you will discover that it is encrusted with a goldenwealth of philosophy. For the point is that the baby's name setsbefore the baby a certain standard of achievement. The baby's namecommits the baby to something. Names, even in the ordinary life of thehome and the street, are infinitely more than mere tags attached to usfor purposes of convenience and identification. 

In describing the striking experiences through which he passed on beingmade a freeman, Booker T. Washington, the slave who carved his way tostatesmanship, tells us that his greatest difficulty lay in regard to aname. Slaves have no names; no authentic genealogy; no family history;no ancestral traditions. They have, therefore, nothing to live up to. Mr. Booker Washington himself invented his own name. 'More than once, 'he says 'I tried to picture myself in the position of a boy or man withan honoured and distinguished ancestry. As it is, I have no idea whomy grandmother was. The very fact that the white boy is consciousthat, if he fails, he will disgrace the whole family record is oftremendous value in helping him to resist temptations. And the factthat the individual has behind him a proud family history serves as astimulus to help him to overcome obstacles when striving for success. 'Every student of biography knows how frequently men have beenrestrained from doing evil, or inspired to lofty achievement, by thehonour in which a cherished memory has compelled them to hold the namesthey are allowed to bear. Every schoolboy knows the story of theGrecian coward whose name was Alexander. His cowardice seemed the morecontemptible because of his distinguished name; and his commander, Alexander the Great, ordered him either to change his name or to provehimself brave. 

I notice that the American people have lately been rudely awakened to arecognition of the fact that a nation that can boast of a splendidgalaxy of illustrious names stands involved, not only in a great andpriceless heritage, but also in a weighty national responsibility. Three citizens of the United States, bearing three of the mostdistinguished names in American history, have recently figured withpainful prominence before the criminal courts of that country. 'It isnot rarely, ' as a leading American journal remarks, 'that a man who hasacquired credit and reputation ruins his own good name by some act offraud or passion. It is much rarer that the case appears of one whosoils the good name of a distinguished father. But it is withoutparallel that three names, borne by men the most famous in our annals, should all have been so foully soiled by their sons. ' And the pitiableelement in the case is not relieved by the circumstance that theseunhappy men have clearly inherited, with their fathers' names, something of their fathers' genius. The fact is that American soil hasproved singularly congenial to the growth of greatness. The length ofAmerica's scroll of fame is altogether out of proportion to the brevityof her history. The stirring epochs of her short career have developeda phenomenal wealth of leaders in all the arts and crafts of nationallife. In statesmanship, in arms, in letters, and in inventive science, she can produce a record of which many nations, very much older, mightbe pardonably proud. And she therefore displays a perfectly naturaland honourable solicitude when she looks with serious concern on theuntoward happenings that have recently smudged some of those fair nameswhich she so justly regards as the shining hoard and cherished legacywhich have been bequeathed to her by a singularly eventful past. 

'Names!' exclaims Carlyle's Teufelsdrockh. 'Could I unfold theinfluence of names, I were a second greater Trismegistus!' Namesoccupy a place in literature peculiarly their own. From Homerdownwards, all great writers have recognized their magical value. Themost superficial readers of the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_ must havenoticed how liberally every page is sprinkled with capital letters. The name of a god or of a hero blazes like an oriflamme in almost everyline. And Macaulay, in accounting for the peculiar charm of Milton, says that none of his poems are more generally known or more frequentlyrepeated than those that are little more than muster-rolls of names. 'They are not always more appropriate, ' he says, 'or more melodiousthan other names. But they are charmed names. Every one of them isthe first link in a long chain of associated ideas. Like thedwelling-place of our infancy revisited in manhood, like the song ofour country heard in a strange land, these names produce upon us aneffect wholly independent of their intrinsic value. One transports usback to a remote period of history. Another places us among the novelscenes and manners of a distant region. A third evokes all the dear, classical recollections of childhood--the schoolroom, the dog-earedVirgil, the holiday, and the prize. A fourth brings before us thesplendid phantoms of chivalrous romance--the trophied lists, theembroidered housings, the quaint devices, the haunted forests, theenchanted gardens, the achievements of enamoured knights, and thesmiles of rescued princesses. '

To tell the whole truth, I rather suspect that Macaulay appreciatedthis subtle art so highly in Milton because he himself had mastered thetrick so thoroughly. He knew what magic slumbered in that wondrouswand. His own dexterity in conjuring with heroic names is at least asmarvellous as Milton's. In his _Victorian Age in Literature_, Mr. G. K. Chesterton says that Macaulay felt and used names like trumpets. 'The reader's greatest joy is in the writer's own joy, ' he says, 'whenhe can let his last phrase fall like a hammer on some resounding names, such as Hildebrand or Charlemagne, the eagles of Rome or the pillars ofHercules. As with Sir Walter Scott, some of the best things in hisprose and poetry are the surnames that he did not make. That isexactly where Macaulay is great. He is almost Homeric. The wholetriumph turns upon mere names. ' We have all wondered at the uncannyingenuity that Bunyan and Dickens displayed in the manufacture of namesto suit their droll and striking characters; but we are compelled toconfess that Homer and Milton and Macaulay reveal a still higher phaseof genius, for they succeed in marshalling with rhythmic and dramaticeffect the actual names that living men have borne, and in weavingthose names into glorious pageants of extraordinary impressiveness andsplendour. 

It is very odd, the way in which history and prophecy meet and minglein the naming of the baby. A friend of mine has just named his childafter John Wesley. He has clearly done so in the fond hope that theaugust virtues of the great Methodist may be duplicated and revived ina generation that is coming. It is an ingenious device fortransferring the moral excellences of the remote past to the dim anddistant regions of an unborn future. The phenomenon sometimes becomespositively pathetic. I remember reading, in the stirring annals of theMelanesian Mission, of a native boy whom Bishop John Selwyn had intraining at Norfolk Island. He had been brought from one of the mostbarbarous of the South Sea peoples, and did not promise particularlywell. One day Bishop Selwyn had occasion to rebuke him for hisstubborn and refractory behaviour. The boy instantly flew into apassion and struck the Bishop a cruel blow in the face. It was anunheard-of incident, and all who saw it stood aghast. The Bishop saidnothing, but turned and walked quietly away. The conduct of the ladcontinued to be most recalcitrant, and he was at last returned to hisown island as incorrigible. There he soon relapsed into all thedebasements of a savage and cannibal people. Many years afterwards amissionary on that island was summoned post-haste to visit a sick man. It proved to be Dr. Selwyn's old student. He was dying, and desiredChristian baptism. The missionary asked him by what name he would liketo be known. 'Call me John Selwyn, ' the dying man replied, 'because_he taught me what Christ was like_ that day when I struck him. '

We have a wonderful way of associating certain qualities with certainnames. The name becomes fragrant, not as the rose is fragrant, but asthe clay is fragrant that has long lain with the rose. I see that twoEuropean newspapers have recently taken a vote as to the most popularname for a boy and the most popular name for a girl. And in the resultthe names of John and Mary hopelessly outdistanced all competitors. But why? There is nothing in the name of John or in that of Mary toaccount for such general attachment. Some names, like Lily, or Rose, or Violet, suggest beautiful images, and are loved on that account. But the name of John and the name of Mary suggest nothing but thememory of certain wearers. How, then, are we to account for it? Theriddle is easily read. Long, long ago, on a green hill far away, therestood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and the disciple whom Jesusloved. And, when Mary left that awful and tragic scene, she left it, as Jesus Himself desired that she should leave it, leaning on the armof John. And because those two were first in the human love of Jesus, their names have occupied a place of special fondness in the hearts ofall men ever since. Like the fly held in the amber, the memory ofgreat and sterling qualities is encased and perpetuated in the verynames we bear. 

I like to dwell on that memorable scene that took place at the burialof Longfellow. A notable company gathered at the poet's funeral; and, among them, Emerson came up from Concord. His brilliant and majesticpowers were in ruins. He stood for a long, long time looking down intothe quiet, dead face of Longfellow, but said nothing. At last heturned sadly away, and, as he did so, he remarked to those who stoodreverently by, 'The gentleman we are burying to-day was a sweet andbeautiful soul, _but I forget his name!_' Yes, that is the beauty ofit all. The name perpetuates and celebrates the memory of thegoodness; but the memory of the goodness lingers after the memory ofthe name is lost. I shall enjoy the fragrance of the roses over mylattice when I can no longer recall the names by which they aredistinguished. 

Mrs. Booth used to love to tell a beautiful story of a man whosesaintly life left its permanent and gracious impress upon her own. Heseemed to grow in grace and charm and in all nobleness with every dayhe lived. At the last he could speak of nothing but the glories of hisSaviour, and his face was radiant with awe and affection whenever hementioned that holy name. It chanced that, as he was dying, a documentwas discovered that imperatively required his signature. He held thepen for one brief moment, wrote, and fell back upon the pillows, dead. And on the paper he had written, not his own name, but the Name that isabove every name. Within sight of the things within the veil, thatseemed to be the only name that mattered. 

VI

THE MISTRESS OF THE MARGIN

I love a margin. There is something delicious, luxurious, glorious inthe spacious field of creamy paper bounded by the black letterpress onthe one side and the gilt edges on the other. Could anything be moreabominable than a book that is printed to the uttermost extremities ofevery page? It is an outrage, I aver, on human nature. Indeed, it isan outrage upon Nature herself, for Nature loves her margins even morethan I do. She goes in for margins on a truly stupendous scale. Shewants a bird, so a dozen are hatched. She knows perfectly well thateleven out of the twelve are merely margin. She will throw them to thecats, and the foxes, and the weasels, and the snakes, and only keep thebest of the batch. She wants a tree, so she plants a hundred. Sheknows that ninety and nine are margin, to be browsed down by cattle, but she means to make sure of her one. 'The roe of a cod, ' Grant Alientells me, 'contains nearly ten million eggs; but, if each of those eggsproduced a young fish which arrived at maturity, the whole sea wouldimmediately become a solid mass of closely packed cod-fish. ' ButNature has no intention of turning her bright blue ocean into agigantic box of sardines; she is simply providing herself with amargin. Linnaeus says that a fly may multiply itself ten thousandfoldin a fortnight. If this increase continued during the three summermonths, he says, one fly at the beginning of summer would produce onehundred millions of millions of millions before the three months wereover, and the air would be black with the horror. The probability, however, is that there are never one hundred millions of millions ofmillions of flies in the whole world. Nature is not arranging for arepetition of the plague of Egypt; she is simply gratifying herappetite for a margin. As Tennyson sings in 'In Memoriam, '

 of fifty seeds She often brings but one to bear. 

So I suppose I learned my love of margins from her. At any rate, ifanybody thinks me extravagant, they must quarrel with her and not withme. 

I fancy there's a good deal in it. It is the margin that makes all thedifference. If the work that absolutely must be done occupies everywaking moment of my time, I am a slave; but if it leaves a margin of asingle hour, I am in clover. If my receipts will only just balance myexpenditure, I am living a mere hand-to-mouth existence; but if theyleave me a margin, I jingle the odd coins in my pocket with the prideof a prince. Mr. Micawber's philosophy comes back to us. 'Annualincome--twenty pounds; annual expenditure--nineteen nineteen six;result--_happiness_. Annual income--twenty pounds; annualexpenditure--twenty pounds ought and six; result--_misery_. ' I believethat one of the supreme aims of a man's life should be to secure amargin. Nature does it, and we must copy her. A good life, like agood book, should have a good margin. I hate books whose pages are socrowded that you cannot handle them without putting your thumbs on thetype. And, in exactly the same way, there are very few things morerepelling than the feeling that a man has no time for you. It may be amost excellent book; but if it has no margin, I shall never grow fondof it. He may be a most excellent man; but if he lacks leisure, restfulness, poise, I shall never be able to love him. 

It is difficult to account for it; but the fact most certainly is thatthe most winsome people in the world are the people who make you feelthat they are never in a hurry. The man whom you trust most readily isthe man with a little time to spare, or who makes you think that hehas. When my life gets tangled and twisted, and I want a minister tohelp me, I shall be too timid to approach the man who is always in afluster. I feel instinctively that he is far too busy for poor me. Hetears through life like a superannuated whirlwind. If I meet him onthe street, his coat tails are always flying out behind him; his eyeswear a hunted look; and a sense of feverish haste is stamped upon hiscountenance. He reminds me of poor John Gilpin, for it is always neckor nothing with him. He seems to be everlastingly consulting hiswatch, and is always muttering something about his next engagement. Hegets through an amazing number of odd jobs in the course of a day, andhis diary will be a wonder to posterity. But he would be much betteroff in the long run if he cultivated a margin. He makes people feel atpresent that he is too busy for them. A poor woman, who is in greattrouble about her son, heard him preach last Sunday, and felt that shewould give anything to have a quiet talk with him about her sorrow, andkneel with him as he commended both her and her wayward boy to theThrone of the heavenly grace. But she dreads to be caught in the whirlof his week-a-day flurry, and stays away, her grief eating her heartout the while. A shrinking young girl is in perplexity about her loveaffairs, and she feels sure, from some things he said in his sermon afew weeks ago, that he could help her. But she remembers that in hisstudy he keeps a motto to remind her that his time is precious. If thewords 'Beware of the dog!' were painted on his study door, they couldnot be more terrifying. She fears that, before she has half unfoldedthe tender tale that she scarcely likes to tell, his hand will be uponthe doorknob. The tendency of the time is indisputably towardsflurry--the flurry of business or the flurry of pleasure. I feel verysorry for these busy folk. Their energy is prodigious. But, for allthat, they are losing life's best. Surely William Cowper had a secretin his soul when he told us that, in his mad career, John Gilpin lostthe wine!

 'And now, as he went bowing down, His reeking head full low, The bottles twain behind his back Were shattered at a blow

 Down ran the wine into the road, Most piteous to be seen, Which made his horses' flanks to smoke As they had basted been. 

It is very easy to go too fast. In his _Forest_, Mr. Stewart Whitegives us some lessons in bushmanship. 'As long as you restrainyourself, ' he says, 'to a certain leisurely plodding, you get alongwithout extraordinary effort; but even a slight increase of speed dragsfiercely at your feet. One good step is worth six stumbling steps; goonly fast enough to assure that good one. An expert woods-walker isnever in a hurry. ' I was chatting the other day with the captain of agreat steamship. The vessel is capable of steaming at the rate ofseventeen knots an hour; but I noticed from the log that she neverexceeds fifteen. I asked the reason. 'It is too expensive!' thecaptain answered. And then he told me the difference in theconsumption of coal between steaming at fifteen and steaming atseventeen knots an hour. It was astounding. I recognized at once hiswisdom in keeping the margin. When I next meet my busy brother, Ishall tell him the story--if he can spare the time to listen. For, apart from the expense to himself of driving the engines at that highpressure, and apart from the loss of the wine, I feel sure that thefolk who most need him love the ministry of a man with a margin. Evenas I write, there rush back upon my mind the memories of the greatdoctors and eminent lawyers whose biographies I have read. How carefulthese busy men were to convey a certain impression of leisureliness!It will never do for a doctor to burst in upon his poor feverishpatient, and throw everything into commotion. And see how composedlythe lawyer listens to his client's tale! Wise men these; and I mustnot be too proud to learn from them. 

Great souls have ever been leisurely souls. I have no right to allowthe rush and throb and tear of life to rob me of my restfulness. Imust keep a quiet heart. I must be jealous of my margins. I must findtime to climb the hills, to scour the valleys, to explore the bush, torow on the river, to stroll along the sands, to poke among the rocks, and to fish in the stream. I must cultivate the friendship of thefields and the ferns and the flowers. I must lie back in my easychair, with my feet on the fender, and laugh with my friends. And pityme, men and angels, if I am too busy to romp with the children and totell them a tale if they want it! There are many things in a man'slife that he can give up, just as there are many things in a book thatcan be skipped, but the last thing to go must be the margin. 

Now, rising from my desk for a moment, just to stretch my legs alittle, I glance out of my study window at the busy world outside. Isee men making bargains, reading newspapers, and talking politics. Andreally, when you come to analyse the thing, this matter of the margintouches that bustling world at every point. To begin with, theessential difference between life here in Australia and life in the oldworld is mainly a difference in the breadth of the margin. Here lifeis not so hemmed in and cramped up as it must of necessity be there. Then, too, the whole tendency of modern legislation is in the directionof widening the margin. Everything tends to increase the leisure ofthe people. Early closing has come into its own. Shopkeepers put uptheir shutters quite early in the evening; the hours of the labourerhave been considerably curtailed; and in other ways the leisure of thepeople has been greatly increased. Now in this broadening of life'smargin there lie both tremendous possibilities and tremendous perils. The idleness of an entire community during a considerable proportion ofits waking hours may become a huge national asset or a serious menaceto the general wellbeing. People are too apt to suppose that characteris determined by the main business of life. It is a fallacy. It is, as I have said, the margin that really matters. There is a section oftime that remains to a man after the main business of life has beendealt with. It is the use to which that margin is put that reveals thetrue propensities of the individual and that, in the long run, determines the destiny of the nation. 

Here, for example, are two bricklayers. They walk down the street sideby side on their way to their work. From the time that the hourstrikes for them to commence operations until the time comes to layaside their trowels for the day, they are pretty much alike. The onemay be a philosopher and the other a scoundrel; but these traits willhave small opportunity of betraying themselves as they chip away at thebricks in their hands, and ply their busy tasks. The intellectualproclivities of the one, and the vicious propensities of the other, will be held in the severest restraint as they labour side by side. The inexorable laws of industrial competition will keep their work upto a certain standard of excellence. But the moment that the tools arethrown aside the character of each man stands revealed. He is his ownmaster. He is like a hound unleashed, and will now follow his bentwithout let or hindrance. And the more the State restricts the hoursof toil, and multiplies the hours of leisure, the more does it increasethe possibilities of good in the one case and the perils of evil-doingin the other. It is during that lengthened leisure that the one willapply himself to self-improvement, and, by developing himself, willincrease the value of his citizenship to the State; and it is duringthat prolonged immunity from restraint that the other will compass hisown deterioration and exert his influence for the generalimpoverishment. 

Precisely the same law holds good in relation to the expenditure ofmoney. The way in which a people spends its money represents the mostcrucial test of national character. If a man spends his money wisely, he is a wise man; if he spends his money foolishly, he is a foolishman. But it is not along the main line of expenditure that therevelation is made. The principal items of expenditure are inevitable, and beyond the control of the individual, whoever or whatever he maybe. A man must eat and wear clothes, whether he be a burglar or abishop. The butcher, the baker, the grocer, and the milkman will callat every door; and you cannot argue as to the morals of a man from thefact that he eats bread, that he is fond of beef, or that he takessugar with his porridge. There are certain main lines of expenditurealong which each man, whatever his characteristics and idiosyncrasies, is resistlessly driven. But after he has submitted to this sterncompulsion, and has paid his butcher, his baker, his grocer, and hismilkman, then comes the test. What about the margin? Is there amargin? For upon the margin everything depends. We will suppose that, after paying for the things that he eats and the things that he wears, he still jingles in his pocket a dozen coins, with which he may doexactly as he likes. Now it is in the expenditure of that margin ofmoney--as, in the other case, it was in the expenditure of that marginof leisure--that the real man will reveal himself. It is the use towhich he puts that margin that declares his true character anddetermines the contribution that he, as an individual citizen, willmake to the national weal or woe. 

Now, if this broadening margin means anything at all, it means that theresponsibilities of the Church are increasing. For the Church isessentially the Mistress of the Margin. Concerning the expenditure ofthe hours occupied with labour, and concerning the money spent in theactual requisites of life, the statesman may have something to say. Legislation may deal with the hours of labour and the rate of wages. It may even influence the precise amount of the butcher's or thebaker's bills. But when it comes to the hours that follow toil, and tothe cash that remains after the principal accounts have been paid, thelegislator finds himself in difficulties. He has come to the end ofhis tether. He cannot direct the people as to how to spend their sparecash. And, as we have seen, it is just this spare time and spare cashthat determine everything. It is the dominating and deciding factor inthe whole situation. It is manifest, therefore, that, important as arethe functions of statesmanship, the really fundamental factors ofindividual conduct and of national life elude the most searchingenactments of the most vigilant legislators. As the hours of labourshorten, and the margin of spare cash increases, the authority of thelegislator becomes less and less; and the need for some force thatshall shape the moral tone of the people becomes greater and greater. If the Church cannot supply that force, and become the Mistress of theMargin, the outlook is by no means reassuring. On one phase of thismatter of the margin the Church holds a wonderful secret. She knowsthat there are people who, through no fault of their own, aremarginless. They have neither a moment nor a penny to spare. Sickness, trouble, and the war of the world have been too much forthem. They are right up against the wall; and they know it. But thematter does not end there. I remember once entering a dingy littledwelling in the slums of London. In the squalid room a cripple girlsat sewing, and as she sewed she sang:

 My Father is rich in houses and lands, He holdeth the wealth of the world in His hands! Of rubies and diamonds, of silver and gold, His coffers are full--He has riches untold. I'm the child of a King! the child of a King! With Jesus my Saviour, I'm the child of a King!

What did this mean but that she had discovered that her cramped andnarrow life had a spacious white margin after all? In a recent speechat Glasgow, Mr. Lloyd George told a fine story of a quaint old Welshpreacher who was conducting the funeral service of a poor old fellow, amember of his church, who, through no fault of his own, had had a verybad time of it. They could hardly find a space in the churchyard forhis tomb. At last they got enough to make a brickless grave amidsttowering monuments that pressed upon it, and the old minister, standingabove it, said, 'Well, Davie, vach, you have had a narrow time rightthrough life, and you have a very narrow place in death; but never youmind, old friend, I can see a day dawning for you when you will riseout of your narrow bed, and find plenty of room at the last. Ah!' hecried in a burst of natural eloquence, 'I can see it coming! I can seethe day of the resurrection! I can see the dawn of immortality! Therewill be room, room, room, even for the poor! The light of that morningalready gilds the hilltops!' What did he mean, that old Welshminister, as he shaded his eyes with his hands and looked towards theEast? He was pointing away from life's black and crowded letterpressto the white and spacious margin--the margin with the gilt edge--thatwas all. 

VII

LILY

I was once advised to write a novel. I scouted the suggestion at thetime; I scout it still. If you write a novel, you run a great risk. One of these days somebody may read it--you never know what queerthings people may do nowadays. And if somebody should read it, yoursecret is out, and the paucity of your imagination stands grimlyexposed. No, I shall not write a novel, although this article will besomething in the nature of a novelette. For I have found a heroine, and many a full-blown novelist, having found a heroine, would considerthat he had come upon a novel ready made. My heroine is Lily; andLily--to break the news gently--was a pig. I say _was_ advisedly, forLily is dead, and therein lies the pathos of my story. And so I havemy heroine, and I have my story, and I have my strong suffusion ofsentiment all ready to my hand; and really, I feel half inclined towrite my novel after all. But let me state the facts--for which I amprepared to vouch--and then it will be time enough to see if we canweave them into a great and classical romance. 

Away on the top of a hill, in a rural district of Tasmania, therestands a quaint little cottage. Down the slopes around, and away alongthe distant valleys, are great belts of virgin bush. But here on thehill is our quaint little cottage, and in or about the cottage you willfind a quaint little couple. They may not be able to discuss thelatest aspects of the Balkan question, or the Irish crisis, or theMexican embroglio; but they can discuss questions that are very mucholder and that are likely to last very much longer. For they candiscuss fowls and sheep and pigs; and, depend upon it, fowls and sheepand pigs were discussed long before the Balkan question was dreamed of, and fowls and sheep and pigs will be discussed long after the Balkanquestion is forgotten. And so the old couple make you feel ashamed ofyour simpering superficiality; you are amazed that you can have grownso excited about the things of a moment; and you blush for your ownignorance of the things that were and are and shall be. Yes, John andMary can discuss fowls, for they have a dozen of them, and they calleach bird by name. Whilst poor Mary's back was turned for a moment therooster flew on to the table. 

'Really, Tom, you naughty boy!' she cried, on discovering the outrage. 'I am ashamed of you!' And to impress the whole feathered communitywith the enormity of the offence, she proceeded to drive them all outof the kitchen. 

'Go on, Lucie, ' she cried, a note of sadness betraying itself in hervoice in spite of her assumed severity. 'Go on, Lucie, ' and sheflapped her apron to show that she meant it, much as an advancing armymight defiantly flutter its flag. 'Go on; and you too, Minnie; andNellie, and Kate, and Nancie; you must all go! It was a dreadful thingto do; I don't know what you were thinking of, Tom!' I said that Johnand Mary could discuss sheep; but their flock was a very limited one, for it consisted entirely of Birdie, the pet lamb. I cannottell--probably through some defect in my imagination--why they calledhim 'Birdie, ' nor, for the matter of that, why they called him a lamb. I can imagine that he may have been a lamb once; but of feathers Icould discover no trace at all. Yes, after all, these are prosaicdetails, and only show how incompetent a novelist I should prove to be. I grovel when I ought to soar. John and Mary were very fond of Birdie, and Birdie was very fond of them. He came trotting up when he wascalled, wagging his long tail as though it were proof positive that hewas still a lamb. It was scarcely a triumph of logic on Birdie's part, and yet it was just about as good as the artistic subterfuges by whichlots of us try to convince the world and his wife that we are still inthe charming stage of lamb-like simplicity. And then there was Lily. 

The old couple were very fond of Lily. How carefully they made her bedon cold nights! How considerately they fed her on boiled potatoes, skim milk, and other wondrous delicacies! She, too, came shambling upwhenever she heard her name, and, with a grunt, acknowledged theirbounty. 'Dear old Lily, ' poor Mary exclaimed fervently, as Lily liftedher snout to be rubbed, and looked with queer, piggish eyes into thoseof her doting mistress. 

Yes, Lily was a pig, but she was none the worse for that; and if anyridiculous person objects to my taking a pig for my heroine, I shalltake offence and write no more novels. Lily, I repeat, was none theworse for being a pig. And I am sure that John and Mary were none theworse for loving her. It is always safe to love, for if you love thatwhich cannot profit by your love, your love comes back to you, likeNoah's dove, and you yourself are none the poorer. But I am not at allsure that affection was wasted on Lily. Why should it be? There is nodisgrace in being born a pig. It did not even show bad taste on Lily'spart, for Lily was not asked. She came; and found, on arrival, thatshe was what men called a pig; and as a pig she performed her part sowell that those who knew her grew very fond of her. What more can thebest of us do? And, after all, why this squeamishness? Why thisrevulsion of feeling when I announce that my heroine is a pig? I averthat it is a species of snobbery--a very contemptible species ofsnobbery. Booker Washington used to declare that a high-gradeBerkshire boar, or a Poland China sow, is one of the finest sights onthis planet. And one of our own philosophers has gone into rhapsodiesover the pig. 'Pigs, ' he says, 'always seem to me like a fallen racethat has seen better days. They are able, intellectual, inquisitivecreatures. When they are driven from place to place, they are notgentle or meek, like cows and sheep, who follow the line of leastresistance. The pig is suspicious and cautious; he is sure that thereis some uncomfortable plot on foot, not wholly for his good, which hemust try to thwart if he can. Then, too, he never seems quite at homein his deplorably filthy surroundings; he looks at you, up to the kneesin ooze, out of his little eyes as if he would live in a more cleanlyway if he were permitted. Pigs always remind me of the mariners ofHomer, who were transformed by Circe; there is a dreadful humanityabout them, as if they were trying to endure their base conditionsphilosophically, waiting for their release. ' All this I entreat mycritic to lay well to heart before he judges me too severely forselecting Lily as my heroine. 

I suppose the truth is, if only my supercilious critics could betrusted to tell the whole truth, that Lily is not good-looking enoughfor them. But that, again, is all a question of taste. Beauty isrelative and not absolute. My critics may themselves be at fault. Thereal trouble may be, not want of comeliness in Lily, but a sad lack ofappreciation in themselves. I notice that the champion Yorkshire sowat the Sydney Show this year was Mr. E. Jenkins' 'Queen of Beauty'; andas I gazed upon her photograph and noted her alluring name, I thoughtonce more of Lily and laughed in my sleeve at my critics. I once spenta week with an old Lincolnshire gentleman at Kirwee, in New Zealand;and almost before I had been able to bolt the meal that awaited myarrival, he begged me to come and see the pigs. And at the very firstanimal to which we came my happy host rubbed his hands in an ecstasy ofpride, whilst his eyes fairly sparkled. 'Bean't he a beauty?' he askedme excitedly. And I answered confidently that he was. I could see ata glance that the pig was a beauty _to him_; and if he was a beauty tohim, he _was_ a beauty, and there remained no more to be said. Iremember reading a story of two ministers who met beneath thehospitable roof of an old-fashioned English farm-house. One of them nosooner approached the table than he uttered an exclamation of delight. Picking up one of the cups, he spoke of the wonderful beauty of thechina. He held the plates up to the light and asked the others to seehow thin they were, and went into ecstasies over the wondrous old chinathat had been in the farm-house for many generations. The other tooklittle interest in his talk, and could not be aroused to enthusiasmover the china; but when the farmer took out of his cupboard some oldbooks, one of which was a black-letter commentary, he became excited. He turned the pages over lovingly, and pointed to the quaint initials, and became eloquent over their beauties. The farmer thought both mensilly. Neither the china nor the books seemed precious to him. 'Whata heap o' nonsense ye be talking surely, ' he said. 'Now if ye want tosee something worth seeing, come along o' me, and I'll show you thefinest litter o' pigs in the country. '

I know, of course, that, beaten at every other point, my critics willtake their stand on dietetic grounds. 'How can you have a pig for yourheroine?' they will ask, with their noses turned up in disgust. 'Seewhat a pig _eats_!' Now I confess that this objection did appear to meto be serious until I went into the matter a little more carefully. Before abandoning poor Lily, and consigning her to everlastingobscurity, it seemed to me that I owed it to her, as a matter of commongallantry, to investigate this charge. An author has no more rightthan any other man to toy with feminine affections; and having pledgedmyself to Lily as my heroine, I dared not commit a breach of promise, save on most serious grounds. Into this matter of Lily's diet Itherefore plunged, with results that have surprised myself. I findthat Lily is the most fastidious of eaters. Experiments made in Swedenshow that, out of 575 plants, the goat eats 449, and refuses 126; thesheep, out of 528 plants, eats 387, and refuses 141; the cow, out of494 plants, eats 276, and refuses 218; the horse, out of 474 plants, eats 262, and refuses 212; whilst the pig, out of 243 plants, eats 72, and refuses 171. From all these fiery ordeals my heroine, therefore, emerges triumphant, and her critics cut a sorry figure. Theirs is themelancholy fate of all those who will insist on judging fromappearances. It is the oldest mistake in the world, and it iscertainly the saddest. Many, like Lily, have been judged hastily andfalsely, and, as in Lily's case, the evil thought has clung to them asthough it were a charge established, and under that dark cloud theyhave lived shadowed and embittered lives. Half the pathos of theuniverse lies just there. 

One thing affords me unbounded pleasure. If I take Lily for my heroineafter all, I shall be following a noble precedent--Michael Fairless, in_The Roadmender_, did something very much like it. 'In early spring, 'she says, 'I took a long tramp. Towards afternoon, tired and thirsty, I sought water at a little lonely cottage. Bees worked and sang overthe thyme and marjoram in the garden; and in a homely sty lived asolemn black pig, a pig with a history. It was no common utilitarianpig, but the honoured guest of the old couple who lived there; and thepig knew it. A year before, their youngest and only surviving child, then a man of five-and-twenty, had brought his mother the result of hissavings in the shape of a fine young pig. A week later he lay dead ofthe typhoid. Hence the pig was sacred, cared for, and loved by thisDarby and Joan. 

'"'E be mos' like a child to me and the mother, an' mos' as sensible asa Christian, 'e be, " the old man said. '

What a world of illusion this is, to be sure! It takes a good pair ofeyes to see through its good-humoured trickery. You see a pig turningthis way and that way as he wanders aimlessly about the yard, and younever dream of romance. And yet that pig is none other than Lily! Yousee another pig in a commonplace sty, and you never dream of pathos;but old Joan wipes a tear from her eye with her apron when sheremembers how that pig came into her possession. There is a world ofpoetry in pig-sties. Yes, and pathos, too, of its kind. For, as Isaid, Lily is dead. It was this way. 

John and Mary are not rich; and a pig is a pig. 

'What about Lily, Mary?' John asked awkwardly one day. 'You see, Mary, she's got to die. If we keep her, she'll die. And if we sell her, she'll only die. If we keep her, Mary, she may die of some disease, and we shall see her in pain. If we sell her, she will die suddenly, and feel no pain. And then, Mary, ' he continued slowly, as thoughafraid to introduce so prosaic an aspect of so pathetic a theme, 'andthen, Mary, if she dies here, look at the loss, for Lily's a pig, youknow! And if we sell her, look at the gain! And with part of themoney we can get another pet, and be just as fond of it. '

There were protests and there were tears, but Lily went to market. 

Awhile afterwards John came home from the city with a parcel. 'Mary, 'he said hesitatingly, 'I've brought ye home a bit o' Lily! I thoughtI'd like to see how she'd eat. '

Next morning at breakfast they neither of them ate heartily, but theyboth tasted. There is food that is too sacred for a glut of appetite. 

'Ah, well, ' said John, at last, 'those who eat Lily will none of themsay anything but good of her, that's _one_ comfort. '

And Mary went silently off to see if she could find _another_.