ODE ON THE SPRING.
SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY A MAN OF FASHION.
I.
LO! where the party-giving dames,
Fair Fashion’s train, appear;
Disclose the long-expected games,
And wake the modish year:
The opera-warbler pours her throat,
Responsive to the actor’s note,
The dear-bought harmony of Spring;
While, beaming pleasure as they fly,
Bright flambeaus through the murky sky
Their welcome fragrance fling.
Where’er the rout’s full myriads close
The staircase and the door,
Where’er thick files of belles and beaus
Perspire through ev’ry pore:
Beside some faro-table’s brink,
With me the Muse shall stand and think,
(Hemm’d sweetly in by squeeze of state,)
How vast the comfort of the crowd,
How condescending are the proud,
How happy are the great!
III.
Still is the toiling hand of Care,
The drays and hacks repose;
But, hark, how through the vacant air
The rattling clamour glows!
The wanton Miss and rakish Blade,
Eager to join the masquerade,
Through streets and squares pursue their fun:
Home in the dusk some bashful skim;
Some, ling’ring late, their motley trim
Exhibit to the sun.
IV.
To Dissipation’s playful eye,
Such is the life for man;
And they that halt, and they that fly,
Should have no other plan:
Alike the busy and the gay
Should sport all night till break of day,
In Fashion’s varying colours drest;
Till seiz’d for debt through rude mischance,
Or chill’d by age, they leave the dance,
In gaol or dust—to rest.
Methinks I hear, in accents low,
Some sober quiz reply,
Poor child of Folly! what art thou?
A Bond-Street Butterfly!
Thy choice nor Health nor Nature greets,
No taste hast thou of vernal sweets,
Enslav’d by noise, and dress, and play:
Ere thou art to the country flown,
The sun will scorch, the Spring be gone,—
Then leave the town in May.
CHAP. VII.
HAPPINESS OF THE PEOPLE ESTIMATED.
I trust my reader is by this time sufficiently acquainted with the general outline of Fashionable life: it would only be accumulating observations unnecessarily to enter further into the subject: I shall therefore devote the present chapter to a brief investigation of the state of happiness among a people who, it must be observed, claim to be considered—the happiest of their species.
Happiness is, as moralists agree, a relative expression; and indicates the excess of the aggregate of good over that of evil in any given condition. The foundation of happiness therefore must be traced to the ideas which those, upon whose condition the question turns, are accustomed to entertain, of good and evil. So that if we wished to ascertain the amount of happiness in a life of Fashion, we must make our calculation out of those things, which constitute respectively good and evil in a Fashionable estimation. I have had occasion to observe before, that a Fashionable life is a life of sense; consequently all the sources of happiness in such a condition must be confined to the pleasures of sense. Now, it must be considered, that the pains of sense are at least as numerous as its pleasures; and that, by a law of Providence subject to very few exceptions, those who will have the one, must take their proportion of the other with them.
This observation is abundantly confirmed by what occurs in the experience of the parties under consideration. The pleasures which men of Fashion derive from the gratification of their animal appetites at the table, the gaming-house, and the brothel, have a very ample set-off in the inconveniences which they suffer from arthritic, nervous, and a thousand other, painful and retributive complaints. Nor are the gay and dissipated of the other sex exempted from the same contingency of constitutional suffering. Beside the common lot of human nature, they have a class of evils of their own procuring; and, by excesses as imprudent as they are immoral, they bring upon themselves a variety of diseases, for which neither a name nor a remedy can be found. There are those, it is true, who avoid much of this inconvenience, by mixing some discretion with their folly, and setting some bounds to their favourite gratifications: but then it is to be remembered, that these are restraints which render persons of licentious minds singularly uneasy; and they may therefore be considered as administering to pain, nearly in proportion as they abridge indulgence.
But supposing that we were to throw these severer items out of the calculation: there would still remain evils enough in a Fashionable condition, to keep the scale from preponderating on the side of pleasure. To shine in a ball-room, is, no doubt, a high satisfaction; but then to be outshone by another, (which is just as likely to happen,) is at least as great a mortification: to be invited to many modish parties, is really delightful; but then to know those who are invited to more than ourselves, is certainly vexatious: to find one’s-self surrounded by people of the first Fashion, is charming; but then to be dying with heat all the time, is something in the opposite scale; to wear a coat or a head-dress of the newest invention, is indeed a pleasure of the highest order; but then to see, by accident, articles of the same mode on the back of a man-milliner, or the head of a lady’s maid, is a species of vexation not easily endured. An opera, a play, a party, a night passed at a dance, or at a cassino, or a faro-table, are all events, to be sure, of the happiest occurrence; but then, to be disappointed of one, makes a deeper impression on the side of pain, than to be gratified with three, does on that of pleasure: and disappointments will happen, where many objects are pursued, and where the concurrence of many instruments is necessary to their accomplishment. A drunken coachman, a broken pannel, a sick horse, a saucy footman, a mistaken message, a dull play, indifferent company, a head-ach, a heart-burn, an epidemical disease, or the dread of it, a death in the family, Sunday, Fast-day, Passion week, and a thousand other provoking casualties, either deprive these entertainments of their power of pleasing, or even set them wholly aside. I should only weary my reader were I to lay before him in detail half the catalogue of those minor distresses which embarrass the idea of a modish life: he must however perceive, from the little which has been said, that every pleasure has its countervailing pain; and that every sacrifice to diversion and splendour has its correspondent chastisement in vexation and disgrace.
Hitherto those principles have been assumed as the basis of calculation, upon which people of Fashion have some advantages in their favour; but there is another ground upon which (to say the whole truth) it ought to be put, and on which all the advantages are against them.
Man (it is notorious) is a reflecting being; and, do what he will, he must reflect. He may choose an habitual career of sense; but still he must have, whether he seek or shun them, moments of Reflection. This is I admit, extremely inconvenient; but then it is without a remedy. My business, however, is, neither to impugn, nor to vindicate the existence of such a principle; but to show its bearings upon the sort of life which people of Fashion must necessarily lead. Not to enter into particulars, what can constitute a heavier affliction, than for a man of Fashion (or, which is the same thing, a man of the world) to be obliged to think over again the events of his licentious career? To be persecuted with recollecting the property he has squandered, the wine he has drunk, the seduction he has practised, and the duels he has fought? These things were well enough at the time; they had their humour and their reputation, and they were not without their pleasure: but then they were designed to be acted, and not reflected upon. The woman of Fashion is under the same law, and is therefore exposed to the same mental torments. She, too, must trace back (though she would give the world to be excused) the steps she has trodden in the enchanting walks of dissipation. She must live over again every portion of a life which, though too fascinating to be declined, is yet too shocking to be thought of. Her memory, also, must be haunted with frightful scenes, which remind her, at the expence of how much health, and property, and time, and virtue, she has sustained the figure which made her so talked of, and the gaieties which rendered her so happy. Now these are real afflictions; and that Reflection from which they result is, not without reason, felt and acknowledged as the scourge of their existence, by the ingenuous part, at least, of the Fashionable World.
Many expedients have indeed been suggested for laying this busy principle asleep, and many plans struck out for rendering its pangs supportable; but hitherto without success. For though it has been proposed to laugh it away, dance it away, drink it away, or travel it away; yet not one of these projects has answered the end: and Fashionable casuists are as far as ever from finding out a remedy of sufficient potency, to cure, or even abate, in any material degree, the pains of Reflection.
And here I cannot but remark, how grievously the seat of this disease (for such it is considered) has been mistaken by those who have so lightly undertaken to prescribe for its removal. They have manifestly considered it as a disorder of the nerves; and hence all the remedies which they have recommended, are calculated to promote, either by change of scene, or by some other mechanical impulse, a brisker circulation of the animal spirits. The ill success with which each has been attended, sufficiently proclaims the fallacy upon which they all are founded. If Reflection had been only a nervous disturbance, if it had arisen out of any disarrangement of the animal economy, some, at least, of the Fashionable nostrums would have dispersed the complaint: whereas it is notorious, that, under every regimen which has been tried, while the stronger symptoms have disappeared, the disorder has remained in the system; and neither Bath, nor Weymouth, nor Tunbridge, nor Town, has ever effected a cure.
The plain truth is, (whatever may be insinuated to the contrary by these Médecins à-la-mode,) that the disease is altogether moral; and, consequently, the seat of it is not in the nerves, but in the Conscience. There is, in fact, nothing new in the complaint: it is inseparably connected with a Fashionable career; and has been more or less the scourge of all, in every age, who have declined the duties which they owe “to God and their inferiors.” I take it to have been a malady of the very same description which afflicted Herod in his communication with the Baptist, and which made Felix tremble under the reasoning of Paul. It is not a little remarkable, that both these men of Fashion (for such no doubt they were) fell into the error which has been condemned, in the treatment of their disease; and each, there is reason to believe, carried it with him to his grave.
If my reader now adverts to the particulars which have been stated, he will be compelled to draw conclusions not a little humbling to the lofty pretensions of a Fashionable life. In few states of society, under its present imperfection, is happiness very high: and it might not perhaps be easy to assign the particular condition which embraces it in the greatest proportion. But surely after the discoveries which this discussion has made, we run no risk in affirming, that a life of Fashion is not that condition. The lot of mankind would be wretched indeed, if those were the happiest of the species, who, without exemption from the pains of sense, are excluded from the pleasures of Reflection: and who, as the price of enjoyments derived from the one, become subject to the chastisement inflicted by both.
CHAP. VIII.
DEFECT OF THE SYSTEM—PLANS OF REFORM—CONCLUSION.
A system which does so little for the happiness of its members, as that which has been unfolded in the course of this work, must have some radical defect; and it is worthy of consideration, whether some steps should not be speedily taken, in order to discover the nature of that defect, and to provide a competent remedy for it.
I am perfectly aware, that it would be most decorous, to let such a measure of enquiry originate in the community to which it primarily relates; and if I thought there was any chance of the affair being taken up by the body, I should satisfy myself with having intimated the necessity of such a procedure, and leave the people of Fashion to reform themselves.
But I will honestly confess, that I see not at present any prospect of such an event. It has not, so far as I can understand, been hinted, in those assemblies which legislate for the body, that the system of Fashion requires any revision: nor can I discover, among the projected arrangements for future seasons, any thing like a committee of reform. There is, on the contrary, every reason to believe, that designs of a very different nature occupy the minds of those who influence the community. I very much mistake, if it is not their intention, to carry the system more extensively into effect; to make still further conquests upon the puny domains of Wisdom and Virtue; and to evince, by new modes of dissipation and new excuses for adopting them, the endless perfectibility of Folly and Vice. Under such circumstances, it will scarcely be imputed to me as a trespass upon their privileges, if I venture to perform that office for them, which they are never likely to do for themselves.
I scruple not then to affirm, that INCONSISTENCY is the radical fault of the Fashionable system. This truth is demonstrated by every thing that has been said upon their polity and laws, their religion and morals, their plans of education, and their institutes of life. Under every view which has been taken of this people, they have exhibited appearances truly paradoxical; and been found involved, from the beginning to the end of their career, in the most palpable and extraordinary contradictions. The fact indeed is, as their history has shown, that the principles upon which they act, are essentially at variance with each other; and the effect which these principles have upon their conduct and their feelings, is only such as might be expected, from an everlasting struggle for mastery among them. The hand of this people is given to Self-denial, but their heart to Sensuality; and the manner in which they are obliged to equivocate with both, will not allow them the complete enjoyment of either. The libertinism they practise shows them nothing but this world, the piety they profess hides every thing from them but the world to come: thus alternately impelled and restrained, deluded and undeceived, they follow what they love, and condemn what they follow: neither blind enough to be wholly led, nor discerning enough to see their path;—with too much religion to let them be happy here, and too little to make them so hereafter.
Now I see but two ways by which this INCONSISTENCY can be removed; and as I wish to make my work of some use to the people of whom it treats, I shall briefly propose them in their order.
1. The first plan of melioration which I would submit to the Fashionable World, is that of renouncing the Christian religion. In recommending this step, I proceed upon a supposition, that the government and laws and manners which now prevail, must at all events be retained: and upon such a supposition, I contend, that renouncing the Christian religion is a measure of indispensable necessity. For surely if duels must be fought, what can be so preposterous as to swear allegiance to a law which says—“Thou shalt not kill?” If injuries must not be forgiven, where is the propriety of employing a prayer in which the petitioner declares, that he does forgive them? If the passions are to be gratified, what end is answered by doing homage to those Scriptures which so peremptorily declare, that they must be mortified? In a word, if swearing, prevarication, and sensuality; if a neglect of “the duties to God and inferiors,” be necessary, or even allowable, parts of a Fashionable character; where is the policy, the virtue, or even the decency, of connecting it with a religion which stamps these several qualities with the deepest guilt, and threatens them with the severest retribution? If a religion of some sort be absolutely necessary, let such an one be chosen as may possess a correspondence with the other parts of the system: let it be a religion in which pride, and resentment, and lust, may have their necessary scope; a religion, in short, in which the God of this world may be the idol, and the men of this world the worshippers. Such an arrangement will go a great way towards establishing consistency: it will dissolve a union by which both parties are sufferers; and liberate at once the people of Fashion from a profession which involves them in contradiction, and Christianity from a connexion which covers her with disgrace.
2. If, on the contrary, it should be thought material (as I trust it will) to retain Christianity at all events, the plan of reform must be exactly inverted; and the sacrifices taken from those laws, and maxims, and habits, which interfere with the spirit and the injunctions of that holy religion. It is altogether out of the character of Christianity to act a subservient or an accommodating part. Her nature, her office, and her object, are all decidedly adverse to that base alliance into which it has been attempted to degrade her. Pure and spotless as her native skies, she delights in holiness; because God, from whose bosom she came, is holy. Girt with power, and designed for dominion, she claims the heart as her throne, and all the affections as the ministers of her will: nor does she consider her object accomplished until she has cast down every lofty imagination, extinguished every rebellious lust, and brought into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. It is obvious, therefore, that if she is to be retained at all, it must be upon her own terms; and those terms will manifestly require an utter renunciation of every measure which, under the former plan, it was proposed to retain. Duels must now no longer be fought, nor injuries resentfully pursued, nor licentious passions deliberately gratified. Swearing must be banished from the lips, prevarication from the thoughts, sensuality from the heart; and that law be expunged, which dispenses with “the duties to God and inferiors,” in order to make way for that immutable statute which enjoins them.
It must not be dissembled, that, in the progress of such a reform, certain inconveniences will be unavoidably encountered; but these will be speedily and effectually compensated by an influx of real and permanent advantages. The pangs which accompanied the “death unto sin,” will soon be forgotten in the pleasures which result from a “life unto righteousness;” and the peace and hope which abound in the way, will efface the recollection of those agonistic efforts by which it was entered.
In the mean time, all things will be done with decency and order. The whole economy of life and conduct will be scrupulously consulted; and such arrangements introduced, as will make the several parts and details correspond and harmonize with each other. Duty and recreation will have their proper characters, and times, and places, and limits. Every thing, in short, will be preserved in the system, which can facilitate intercourse without impairing virtue; and nothing be struck out but what administers to vanity, duplicity, and vice.
Whether changes of such magnitude as those which I have described, will ever take place upon an extensive scale, I cannot pretend to conjecture; but certain I am, that, if ever they should, not only the Fashionable World, but society at large, will be very much the better for them. Greatly as I wish the “Reformation of Manners,” and “the Suppression of Vice,” I see insuperable obstacles to each of these events, while rank, and station, and wealth, throw their mighty influence into the opposite scale. Then—and not till then—will Christianity receive the homage she deserves, and produce the blessings she has promised—when “the makers of our manners” shall submit to her authority; and the PEOPLE of Fashion become the PEOPLE of God.
THE END.
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