The Altar Fire

by Arthur Christopher Benson

March 14, 1889.

The question that haunts me, the problem I cannot disentangle, is what is or what ought our purpose to be? What is our duty in life? Ought we to discern a duty which lies apart from our own desires and inclinations? The moralist says that it ought to be to help other people; but surely that is because the people, whom by some instinct we deem the highest, have had the irresistible desire to help others? How many people has one ever known who have taken up philanthropy merely from a sense of rectitude? The people who have done most to help the world along have been the people who have had an overwhelming natural tenderness, an overflowing love for helpless, weak, and unhappy people. That is a thing which cannot be simulated. One knows quite well, to put the matter simply, the extent of one's own limitations. There are courses of action which seem natural and easy; others which seem hard, but just possible; others again which are frankly impossible. However noble a life, for instance, I thought the life of a missionary or of a doctor to be, I could not under any circumstances adopt the role of either. There are certain things which I might force myself to do which I do not do, and which I practically know I shall not do. And the number of people is very small who, when circumstances suggest one course, resolutely carry out another. The artistic life is a very hard one to analyse, because at the outset it seems so frankly selfish a life. One does what one most desires to do, one develops one's own nature, its faculties and powers. If one is successful, the most one can claim is that one has perhaps added a little to the sum of happiness, of innocent enjoyment, that one has perhaps increased or fed in a few people the perception of beauty. Of course the difficulty is increased by the conventional belief that any career is justified by success in that career. And as long as a man attains a certain measure of renown we do not question very much the nature of his aims.

Then, again, if we put that all aside, and look upon life as a thing that is given us to teach us something, it is easy to think that it does not matter very much what we do; we take the line of least resistance, and think that we shall learn our lesson somehow.

It is difficult to believe that our one object ought to be to thwart all our own desires and impulses, to abstain from doing what we desire to do, and to force ourselves continually to do what we have no impulse to do. That is a philosophical and stoical business, and would end at best in a patient and courteous dreariness of spirit.

Neither does it seem a right solution to say: "I will parcel out my energies—so much will I give to myself, so much to others." It ought to be a larger, more generous business than that; yet the people who give themselves most freely away too often end by having very little to give; instead of having a store of ripe and wise reflection, they have generally little more than an official smile, a kindly tolerance, a voluble stream of commonplaces.

And then, too, it is hard to see, to speak candidly, what God is doing in the matter. One sees useful careers cut ruthlessly short, generous qualities nullified by bad health or minute faults, promise unfulfilled, men and women bound in narrow, petty, uncongenial spheres, the whole matter in a sad disorder. One sees one man's influence spoilt by over-confidence, by too strong a sense of his own significance, and another man made ineffective by diffidence and self-distrust. The best things of life, the most gracious opportunities, such as love and marriage, cannot be entered upon from a sense of duty, but only from an overpowering and instinctive impulse.

Is it not possible to arrive at some tranquil harmony of life, some self-evolution, which should at the same time be ardent and generous? In my own sad unrest of spirit, I seem to be alike incapable of working for the sake of others and working to please myself. Perhaps that is but the symptom of a moral disease, a malady of the soul. Yet if that is so, and if one once feels that disease and, suffering is not a part of the great and gracious purpose of God—if it is but a failure in His design—the struggle is hopeless. One sees all around one men and women troubled by no misgivings, with no certain aim, just doing whatever the tide of life impels them to do. My neighbour here is a man who for years has gone up to town every day to his office. He is perfectly contented, absolutely happy. He has made more money than he will ever need or spend, and he will leave his children a considerable fortune. He is kind, respectable, upright; he is considered a thoroughly enviable man, and indeed, if prosperity and contentment are the sign and seal of God's approbation, such a man is the highest work of God, and has every reason to be an optimist. He would think my questionings morbid and my desires moonshine. He is not necessarily right any more than I; but his theory of life works out a good deal better for him than mine for me.

Well, we drift, we drift! Sometimes the sun shines bright on the wave, and the wheeling birds dip and hover, and our heart is full of song. But sometimes we plunge on rising billows, with the wind wailing, and the rain pricking the surface with needle-points; we are weary and uncomforted; and we do not know why we suffer, or why we are glad. Sometimes I have a far-off hope that I shall know, that I shall understand and be satisfied; but sometimes, alas, I fear that my soul will flare out upon the darkness, and know no more either of weal or woe.