LETTER I.
TO A YOUNG AUTHOR WHILST HE WAS WRITING HIS FIRST BOOK.
Mr. Galton’s advice to young travellers—That we ought to interest ourselves in the progress of a journey—The same rule applicable in intellectual things—Women in the cabin of a canal boat—Working hastily for temporary purposes—Fevered eagerness to get work done—Beginners have rarely acquired firm intellectual habits—Knowing the range of our own powers—The coolness of accomplished artists—Advice given by Ingres—Balzac’s method of work—Scott, Horace Vernet, John Phillip—Decided workers are deliberate workers.
I read the other day, in Galton’s “Art of Travel,” a little bit which concerns you and all of us, but I made the extract in my commonplace-book for your benefit rather than my own, because the truth it contains has been “borne in upon me” by my own experience, so that what Mr. Galton says did not give me a new conviction, but only confirmed me in an old one. He is speaking to explorers who have not done so much in that way as he has himself, and though the subject of his advice is the conduct of an exploring party (in the wilds of Australia, for example) the advice itself is equally useful if taken metaphorically, and applied to the conduct of intellectual labors and explorations of all kinds.
“Interest yourself,” says Mr. Galton, “chiefly in the progress of your journey, and do not look forward to its end with eagerness. It is better to think of a return to civilization, not as an end to hardship and a haven from ill, but as a thing to be regretted, and as a close to an adventurous and pleasant life. In this way, risking less, you will insensibly creep on, making connections, and learning the capabilities of the country as you advance, which will be found invaluable in the case of a hurried or a disastrous return. And thus, when some months have passed by, you will look back with surprise on the great distance travelled over; for if you average only three miles a day, at the end of the year you will have advanced 1000, which is a very considerable exploration. The fable of the hare and the tortoise seems expressly intended for travellers over wide and unknown tracts.”
Yes, we ought to interest ourselves chiefly in the progress of our work, and not to look forward to its end with eagerness. That eagerness of which Mr. Galton speaks has spoiled many a piece of work besides a geographical exploration, and it not only spoils work, but it does worse, it spoils life also. How am I to enjoy this year as I ought, if I am continually wishing it were over? A truly intellectual philosophy must begin by recognizing the fact that the intellectual paths are infinitely long, that there will always be new horizons behind the horizon that is before us, and that we must accept a gradual advance as the law of our intellectual life. It is our business to move forwards, but we ought to do so without any greater feeling of hurry than that which affects the most stationary of minds. Not a bad example for us is a bargeman’s wife in a canal-boat. She moves; movement is the law of her life; yet she is as tranquil in her little cabin as any goodwife on shore, brewing her tea and preparing her buttered toast without ever thinking about getting to the end of her journey. For if that voyage were ended, another would always succeed to it, and another! In striking contrast to the unhurried bargeman’s wife in her cabin is an irritable Frenchman in the corner of a diligence, looking at his watch every half-hour, and wishing that the dust and rattle were over, and he were in his own easy-chair at home. Those who really lead the intellectual life, and have embraced it for better and for worse, are like the bargeman’s wife; but those who live the life from time to time only, for some special purpose, wishing to be rid of it as soon as that purpose is accomplished, are like the sufferer in the purgatory of the diligence. Is there indeed really any true intellectual life at all when every hour of labor is spoiled by a feverish eagerness to be at the end of the projected task? You cannot take a bit out of another man’s life and live it, without having lived the previous years that led up to it, without having also the assured hopes for the years that lie beyond. The attempt is constantly made by amateurs of all kinds, and by men of temporary purposes, and it always fails. The amateur says when he awakes on some fine summer morning, and draws up his blind, and looks out on the dewy fields: “Ah, the world of nature is beautiful to-day: what if I were to lead the life of an artist?” And after breakfast he seeks up his old box of watercolor and his blockbook, and stool, and white umbrella, and what not, and sallies forth, and fixes himself on the edge of the forest or the banks of the amber stream. The day that he passes there looks like an artist’s day, yet it is not. It has not been preceded by the three or four thousand days which ought to have led up to it; it is not strong in the assured sense of present skill, in the calm knowledge that the hours will bear good fruit. So the chances are that there will be some hurry, and fretfulness, and impatience, under the shadow of that white parasol, and also that when the day is over there will be a disappointment. You cannot put an artist’s day into the life of any one but an artist.
Our impatiences come mainly, I think, from an amateurish doubt about our own capacity, which is accompanied by a fevered eagerness to see the work done, because we are tormented both by hopes and fears so long as it is in progress. We have fears that it may not turn out as it ought to do, and we have at the same time hopes for its success. Both these causes produce eagerness, and deprive us of the tranquillity which distinguishes the thorough workman, and which is necessary to thoroughness in the work itself. Now please observe that I am not advising you to set aside these hopes and fears by an effort of the will; when you have them they are the inevitable result of your state of culture, and the will can no more get rid of them than it can get rid of an organic disease. When you have a limited amount of power and of culture, and are not quite clear in your own mind as to where the limits lie, it is natural on the one hand that you should fear the insufficiency of what you possess, and on the other that in more sanguine moments you should indulge in hopes which are only extravagant because your powers have not yet been accurately measured. You will alternate between fear and hope, according to the temporary predominance of saddening or cheerful ideas, but both these feelings will urge you to complete the work in hand, that you may see your own powers reflected in it, and measure them more exactly. This is the main cause of the eagerness of young authors, and the reason why they often launch work upon the sea of publicity which is sure to go immediately to the bottom, from the unworkmanlike haste with which it has been put together. But beyond this there is another cause, which is, that beginners in literature have rarely acquired firm intellectual habits, that they do not yet lead the tranquil intellectual life, so that such a piece of work as the composition of a book keeps them in an unwholesome state of excitement. When you feel this coming upon you, pray remember Mr. Galton’s wise traveller in unknown tracts, or the bargeman’s wife in the canal-boat.
Amongst the many advantages of experience, one of the most valuable is that we come to know the range of our own powers, and if we are wise we keep contentedly within them. This relieves us from the malady of eagerness; we know pretty accurately beforehand what our work will be when it is done, and therefore we are not in a hurry to see it accomplished. The coolness of old hands in all departments of labor is due in part to the cooling of the temperament by age, but it is due even more to the fulness of acquired experience, for we do not find middle-aged men so cool in situations where they feel themselves incompetent. The conduct of the most experienced painters in the management of their work is a good example of this masterly coolness, because we can see them painting in their studios whereas we cannot so easily see or so justly estimate the coolness of scientific or literary workmen. A painter of great experience will have, usually, several pictures at a time upon his easels, and pass an hour upon one, or an hour upon the other, simple as the state of the pigment invites him without ever being tempted to risk anything by hurrying a process. The ugly preparatory daubing which irritates the impatience of the beginner does not disturb his equanimity; he has laid it with a view to the long-foreseen result, and it satisfies him temporarily as the right thing for the time being. If you know what is the right thing for the time being, and always do it, you are sure of the calm of the thorough workman. All his touches, except the very last touch on each work, are touches of preparation, leading gradually up to his result. Ingres used to counsel his pupils to sketch always, to sketch upon and within the first sketch till the picture came right in the end; and this was strictly Balzac’s method in literature. The literary and artistic labors of these two men did not proceed so much upon the principle of travelling as upon that of cultivation. They took an idea in the rough, as a settler takes a tract from wild nature, and then they went over it repeatedly, each time pushing the cultivation of it a little farther. Scott, Horace Vernet, John Phillip, and many others, have worked rather on the principle of travelling, passing over the ground once, and leaving it, never coming back again to correct the mistakes of yesterday. Both methods of work require deliberation, but the latter needs it in the supreme degree. All very decided workers, men who did not correct, have been at the same time very deliberate workers—rapid, in the sense of accomplishing much in the course of the year, or the life, but cautious and slow and observant whilst they actually labored, thinking out very carefully every sentence before they wrote it, every touch of paint before they laid it.