CHAPTER XVII. — THE EVIL PRINCIPLE.
Heretofore, I have spoken of the blind hearts of others—of Mr. Clifford and his wilful wife—I have yet said little to show the blindness of my own. This task is now before me, and, with whatever reluctance, the exhibition shall resolutely be made. I have described a couple newly wed—eminently happy—blessed with tolerable independence—resources from without and within—dwelling in the smiles of Heaven, and not uncheered by the friendly countenance of man. I am to display the cloud, which hangs small at first, a mere speck, but which is to grow to a gloomy tempest that is to swallow up the loveliness of the sky, and blacken with gloom and sorrow the fairest aspects of the earth. I am to show the worm in the bud which is to bring blight—the serpent in the garden which is to spoil the Eden. Wo, beyond all other woes, that this serpent should be engendered in one's own heart, producing its blindness, and finally working its bane! Yet, so it is! The story is a painful one to tell; the task is one of self-humiliation. But the truth may inform others—may warn, may strengthen, may save—before their hearts shall be utterly given up to that blindness which must end in utter desperation and irretrievable overthrow.
If the reader has not been utterly unmindful of certain moral suggestions which have been thrown out passingly in my previous narrative, he will have seen that, constitutionally, I am of an ardent, impetuous temper—an active mind, ready, earnest, impatient of control—seeking the difficult for its own sake, and delighting in the conquest which is unexpected by others.
Such a nature is usually frank and generous. It believes in the affections—it depends upon them. It freely gives its own, but challenges the equally free and spontaneous gift of yours in return. It has little faith in the things which fill the hearts of the mere worldlings. Worldly honors may delight it, but not worldly toys. It has no veneration for gewgaws. The shows of furniture and of dress it despises. The gorgeous equipage is an encumbrance to it; the imposing jewel it would not wear, lest it might subtract something from that homage which it prefers should be paid to the wearer. It is all selfish—thoroughly selfish—but not after the world's fashion of selfishness. It hoards nothing, and gives quite as much as it asks. What does it ask? What? It asks for love—devoted attachment; the homage of the loved one and the friends; the implicit confidence of all around it! Ah! can anything be more exacting? Cruelly exacting, if it be not worthy of that it asks!
Imagine such a nature, denied from the beginning! The parents of its youth are gone!—the brother and the sister—the father and the friend! It is destitute, utterly, of these! It is also destitute of those resources of fortune which are supposed to be sufficient to command them. It is thrown upon the protection, the charge of strangers. Not strangers—no! From strangers, perhaps, but little could be expected. It is thrown upon the care of relatives—a father's brother! Could the tie be nearer? Not well! But it had been better if strangers had been its guardians. Then it might have learned to endure more patiently. At least, it would have felt less keenly the pangs inflicted by neglect, contumely, injustice. In this situation it grows up, like some sapling torn from its parent forest, its branches hacked off, its limbs lacerated! It grows up in a stranger soil. The sharp winds assail it from every quarter. But still it lives—it grows. It grows wildly, rudely, ungracefully; but it is strong and tough, in consequence of its exposure and its trials. Its vitality increases with every collision which shakes and rends it; until, in the pathetic language of relatives unhappily burdened with such encumbrances, “it seems impossible to kill it!”
I will not say that mine tried to kill me, but I do say that they took precious little care that I was not killed. The effect upon my body was good, however—the effect of their indifference. This roughening process is a part of physical training which very few parents understand. It is essential—should be insisted on—but it must not be accompanied with a moral roughening, which forces upon the mind of the pupil the conviction that the ordeal is meant for his destruction rather than for his good. There will be a recoil of the heart—a cruel recoil from the humanities—if such a conviction once fills the mind. It was this recoil which I felt! With warm affections seeking for objects of love—with feelings of hope and veneration, imploring for altars to which to attach themselves—I was commanded to go alone. The wilderness alone was open to me: what wonder if my heart grew wild and capricious even as that of the savage who dwells only amid their cheerless recesses? With a smile judiciously bestowed—with a kind word, a gentle tone, an occasional voice of earnest encouragement—my uncle and aunt might have fashioned my heart at their pleasure. I should have been as clay in the hands of the potter—a pliant willow in the grasp of the careful trainer. A nature constituted like mine is, of all others, the most flexible; but it is also, of all others, the most resisting and incorrigible. Approach it with a judicious regard to its affections, and you do with it what you please. Let it but fancy that it is the victim of your injustice, however slight, and the war is an interminable one between you!
Thus did I learn the first lessons of suspiciousness. They attended me to the schoolhouse; they governed and made me watchful there. The schoolhouse, the play-places—the very regions of earnest faith and unlimited confidence—produced no such effects in me. They might have done so, had I ceased, on going to school, to see my relatives any longer. But the daily presence of my uncle and aunt, with their system of continued injustice, at length rendered my suspicious moods habitual. I became shy. I approached nobody, or approached them with doubt and watchfulness. I learned, at the earliest period, to look into character, to analyze conduct, to pry into the mysterious involutions of the working minds around me. I traced, or fancied that I traced, the performance to the unexpressed and secret motive in which it had its origin. I discovered, or believed that I discovered, that the world was divided into banditti and hypocrites. At that day I made little allowance for the existence of that larger class than all, who happen to be the victims. Unless this were the larger class, the other two must very much and very rapidly diminish. My infant philosophy did not carry me very deeply into the recesses of my own heart. It was enough that I felt some of its dearest rights to be outraged—I did not care to inquire whether it was altogether right itself.
At length, there was a glimpse of dawn amid all this darkness. The world was not altogether evil. All hearts were not shut against me; and in the sweet smiles of Julia Clifford, in her kind attentions, soothing assurances, and fond entreaties, there was opportunity, at last, for my feelings to overflow. Like a mountain-stream long pent up, which at length breaks through its confinements, my affections rushed into the grateful channel which her pliant heart afforded me. They were wild, and strong, and, devoted, in proportion to their long denial and restraint. Was it not natural enough that I should love with no ordinary attachment—that my love should be an impetuous torrent—all-devoted—struggling, striving—rushing only in the one direction—believing, in truth, that there was none other in the world in which to run?
This was a natural consequence of the long sophistication of my feelings. I knew nothing of the world—of society. I had shared in none of its trusts; I had only felt its exactions. Like some country-boy, or country-girl, for the first time brought into the great world, I surrendered myself wholly to the first gratified impulse. I made no conditions, no qualifications. I set all my hopes of heart upon a single cast of the die, and did not ask what might be the consequences if the throw was unfortunate.
One of the good effects of a free communication of the young with society is, to lessen the exacting nature of the affections. People who live too much to themselves—in their own centre, and for their own single objects—become fastidious to disease. They ask too much from their neighbors. Willing to surrender their OWN affections at a glance, they fancy the world wanting in sensibility when they find that their readiness in this respect fails to produce a corresponding readiness in others. This is the natural history of that enthusiasm which is thrown back upon itself and is chilled by denial. The complaint of coldness and selfishness against the world is very common among very young or very inexperienced men. The world gets a bad character, simply because it refuses to lavish its affections along the highways—simply because it is cautious in giving its trusts, and expects proofs of service and actual sympathy rather than professions. Men like myself, of a warm, impetuous nature, complain of the heartlessness of mankind. They fancy themselves peculiarly the victims of an unkind destiny in this respect; and finally cut their throats in a moment of frenzy, or degenerate into a cynicism that delights in contradictions, in sarcasms, in self-torture, and the bitterest hostility to their neighbors.
Society itself is the only and best corrective of this unhappy disposition. The first gift to the young, therefore, should be the gift of society. By this word society, however, I do not mean a set, a clique, a pitiable little circle. Let the sphere of movement be sufficiently extended—as large as possible—that the means of observation and thought may be sufficiently comprehensive, and no influences from one man or one family shall be suffered to give the bias to the immature mind and inexperienced judgment. In society like this, the errors, prejudices, weaknesses, of one man, are corrected by a totally opposite form of character in another. The mind of the youth hesitates. Hesitation brings circumspection, watchfulness; watchfulness, discrimination; discrimination, choice; and a capacity to choose implies the attainment of a certain degree of deliberateness and judgment with which the youth may be permitted to go upon his way, supposed to be provided for in the difficult respect of being able henceforward to take care of himself.
I had no society—knew nothing of society—saw it at a distance, under suspicious circumstances, and was myself an object of its suspicion. Its attractions were desirable to me, but seemed unattainable. It required some sacrifices to obtain its entrée, and these sacrifices were the very ones which my independence would not allow me to make. My independence was my treasure, duly valued in proportion to the constant strife by which it was assailed. I had that! THAT could not be taken from me. THAT kept me from sinking into the slave the tool, the sycophant, perhaps the brute; THAT prompted me to hard study in secret places; THAT strengthened my heart, when, desolate and striving against necessity, I saw nothing of the smiles of society, and felt nothing of the bounties of life. Then came my final emancipation—my success—my triumph! My independence was assailed no longer. My talents were no longer doubted or denied. My reluctant neighbors sent in their adhesion. My uncle forbore his sneers. Lastly, and now—Julia was mine! My heart's desires were all gratified as completely as my mind's ambition!
Was I happy? The inconsiderate mind will suppose this very probable—will say, I should be. But evil seeds that are planted in the young heart grow up with years—not so rapidly or openly as to offend—and grow to be poisonous weeds with maturity. My feelings were too devoted, too concentrative, too all-absorbing, to leave me happy, even when they seemed gratified. The man who has but a single jewel in the world, is very apt to labor under a constant apprehension of its loss. He who knows but one object of attachment—whose heart's devotion turns evermore but to one star of all the countless thousands in the heavens—wo is he, if that star be shrouded from his gaze in the sudden overflow of storms!—still more wo is he, when that star withdraws, or seems to withdraw, its corresponding gaze, or turns it elsewhere upon another worshipper! See you not the danger which threatened me? See you not that, never having been beloved before—never having loved but the one—I loved that one with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my strength; and required from that one the equal love of heart, soul, strength? See you not that my love—linked with impatient mind, imperious blood, impetuous enthusiasm, and suspicious fear—was a devotion exacting as the grave—searching as fever—as jealous of the thing whose worship it demands as God is said to be of ours?
Mine was eminently a jealous heart! On this subject of jealousy, men rarely judge correctly. They speak of Othello as jealous—Othello, one of the least jealous of all human natures! Jealousy is a quality that needs no cause. It makes its own cause. It will find or make occasion for its exercise, in the most innocent circumstances. The PROOFS that made Othello wretched and revengeful, were sufficient to have deceived any jury under the sun. He had proofs. He had a strong case to go upon. It would have influenced any judgment. He did not seek or find these proofs for himself. He did not wish to find them. He was slow to see them. His was not jealousy. His error was that of pride and self-esteem. He was outraged in both. His mistake was in being too prompt of action in a case which admitted of deliberation. This was the error of a proud man, a soldier, prompt to decide, prompt to act, and to punish if necessary. But never was human character less marked by a jealous mood than that of Othello. His great self-esteem was, of itself, a sufficient security against jealousy. Mine might have been, had it not been so terribly diseased by ill-training.