第 15 节
作者:
套牢 更新:2021-02-21 16:40 字数:9322
Howard is not the only benefactor that has worked without money for us; there have been some more;and will be; I hope! For the Destinies are opulent; and send here and there a man into the world to do work; for which they do not mean to pay him in money。 And they smite him beneficently with sore afflictions; and blight his world all into grim frozen ruins round him;and can make a wandering Exile of their Dante; and not a soft…bedded Podesta of Florence; if they wish to get a _Divine Comedy_ out of him。 Nay that rather is their way; when they have worthy work for such a man; they scourge him manifoldly to the due pitch; sometimes nearly of despair; that he may search desperately for his work; and find it; they urge him on still with beneficent stripes when needful; as is constantly the case between whiles; and; in fact; have privately decided to reward him with beneficent death by and by; and not with money at all。 O my benevolent friend; I honor Howard very much; but it is on this side idolatry a long way; not to an infinite; but to a decidedly finite extent! And you;put not the modest noble Howard; a truly modest man; to the blush; by forcing these reflections on us!
Cholera Doctors; hired to dive into black dens of infection and despair; they; rushing about all day from lane to lane; with their life in their hand; are found to do their function; which is a much more rugged one than Howard's。 Or what say we; Cholera Doctors? Ragged losels gathered by beat of drum from the overcrowded streets of cities; and drilled a little and dressed in red; do not they stand fire in an uncensurable manner; and handsomely give their life; if needful; at the rate of a shilling per day? Human virtue; if we went down to the roots of it; is not so rare。 The materials of human virtue are everywhere abundant as the light of the sun: raw materials;O woe; and loss; and scandal thrice and threefold; that they so seldom are elaborated; and built into a result! that they lie yet unelaborated; and stagnant in the souls of wide…spread dreary millions; fermenting; festering; and issue at last as energetic vice instead of strong practical virtue! A Mrs。 Manning 〃dying game;〃alas; is not that the foiled potentiality of a kind of heroine too? Not a heroic Judith; not a mother of the Gracchi now; but a hideous murderess; fit to be the mother of hyenas! To such extent can potentialities be foiled。 Education; kingship; command;where is it; whither has it fled? Woe a thousand times; that this; which is the task of all kings; captains; priests; public speakers; land…owners; book…writers; mill…owners; and persons possessing or pretending to possess authority among mankind;is left neglected among them all; and instead of it so little done but protocolling; black…or…white surplicing; partridge…shooting; parliamentary eloquence and popular twaddle…literature; with such results as we see!
Howard abated the Jail…fever; but it seems to me he has been the innocent cause of a far more distressing fever which rages high just now; what we may call the Benevolent…Platform Fever。 Howard is to be regarded as the unlucky fountain of that tumultuous frothy ocean…tide of benevolent sentimentality; 〃abolition of punishment;〃 all…absorbing 〃prison…discipline;〃 and general morbid sympathy; instead of hearty hatred; for scoundrels; which is threatening to drown human society as in deluges; and leave; instead of an 〃edifice of society〃 fit for the habitation of men; a continent of fetid ooze inhabitable only by mud…gods and creatures that walk upon their belly。 Few things more distress a thinking soul at this time。
Most sick am I; O friends; of this sugary disastrous jargon of philanthropy; the reign of love; new era of universal brotherhood; and not Paradise to the Well…deserving but Paradise to All…and…sundry; which possesses the benighted minds of men and women in our day。 My friends; I think you are much mistaken about Paradise! 〃No Paradise for anybody: he that cannot do without Paradise; go his ways:〃 suppose you tried that for a while! I reckon that the safer version。 Unhappy sugary brethren; this is all untrue; this other; contrary to the fact; not a tatter of it will hang together in the wind and weather of fact。 In brotherhood with the base and foolish I; for one; do not mean to live。 Not in brotherhood with them was life hitherto worth much to me; in pity; in hope not yet quite swallowed of disgust;otherwise in enmity that must last through eternity; in unappeasable aversion shall I have to live with these! Brotherhood? No; be the thought far from me。 They are Adam's children;alas yes; I well remember that; and never shall forget it; hence this rage and sorrow。 But they have gone over to the dragons; they have quitted the Father's house; and set up with the Old Serpent: till they return; how can they be brothers? They are enemies; deadly to themselves and to me and to you; till then; till then; while hope yet lasts; I will treat them as brothers fallen insane;when hope has ended; with tears grown sacred and wrath grown sacred; I will cut them off in the name of God! It is at my peril if I do not。 With the servant of Satan I dare not continue in partnership。 Him I must put away; resolutely and forever; 〃lest;〃 as it is written; 〃I become partaker of his plagues。〃
Beautiful Black Peasantry; who have fallen idle and have got the Devil at your elbow; interesting White Felonry; who are not idle; but have enlisted into the Devil's regiments of the line;know that my benevolence for you is comparatively trifling! What I have of that divine feeling is due to others; not to you。 A 〃universal Sluggard…and…Scoundrel Protection Society〃 is not the one I mean to institute in these times; where so much wants protection; and is sinking to sad issues for want of it! The scoundrel needs no protection。 The scoundrel that will hasten to the gallows; why not rather clear the way for him! Better he reach _his_ goal and outgate by the natural proclivity; than be so expensively dammed up and detained; poisoning everything as he stagnates and meanders along; to arrive at last a hundred times fouler; and swollen a hundred times bigger! Benevolent men should reflect on this。And you Quashee; my pumpkin;(not a bad fellow either; this poor Quashee; when tolerably guided!)idle Quashee; I say you must get the Devil _sent away_ from your elbow; my poor dark friend! In this world there will be no existence for you otherwise。 No; not as the brother of your folly will I live beside you。 Please to withdraw out of my way; if I am not to contradict your folly; and amend it; and put it in the stocks if it will not amend。 By the Eternal Maker; it is on that footing alone that you and I can live together! And if you had respectable traditions dated from beyond Magna Charta; or from beyond the Deluge; to the contrary; and written sheepskins that would thatch the face of the world;behold I; for one individual; do not believe said respectable traditions; nor regard said written sheepskins except as things which _you_; till you grow wiser; will believe。 Adieu; Quashee; I will wish you better guidance than you have had of late。
On the whole; what a reflection is it that we cannot bestow on an unworthy man any particle of our benevolence; our patronage; or whatever resource is ours;without withdrawing it; it and all that will grow of it; from one worthy; to whom it of right belongs! We cannot; I say; impossible; it is the eternal law of things。 Incompetent Duncan M'Pastehorn; the hapless incompetent mortal to whom I give the cobbling of my boots;and cannot find in my heart to refuse it; the poor drunken wretch having a wife and ten children; he _withdraws_ the job from sober; plainly competent; and meritorious Mr。 Sparrowbill; generally short of work too; discourages Sparrowbill; teaches him that he too may as well drink and loiter and bungle; that this is not a scene for merit and demerit at all; but for dupery; and whining flattery; and incompetent cobbling of every description;clearly tending to the ruin of poor Sparrowbill! What harm had Sparrowbill done me that I should so help to ruin him? And I couldn't save the insalvable M'Pastehorn; I merely yielded him; for insufficient work; here and there a half…crown;which he oftenest drank。 And now Sparrowbill also is drinking!
Justice; Justice: woe betides us everywhere when; for this reason or for that; we fail to do justice! No beneficence; benevolence; or other virtuous contribution will make good the want。 And in what a rate of terrible geometrical progression; far beyond our poor computation; any act of Injustice once done by us grows; rooting itself ever anew; spreading ever anew; like a banyan…tree;blasting all life under it; for it is a poison…tree! There is but one thing needed for the world; but that one is indispensable。 Justice; Justice; in the name of Heaven; give us Justice; and we live; give us only counterfeits of it; or succedanea for it; and we die!
Oh; this universal syllabub of philanthropic twaddle! My friend; it is very sad; now when Christianity is as good as extinct in all hearts; to meet this ghastly…Phantasm of Christianity parading through almost all。 〃I will clean your foul thoro