These are elaborate instances of piety in the eighteenth century; short and general phrases as “I resign my soul into the hands of my Almighty Creator, in the hopes of a glorious resurrection through the merits and mediation of His blessed Son Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Redeemer, ” contained in the will of John Pybus (1789), are frequently to be found. More uncommon is the confession of George Baker (1770), considering the usual tone of contrition and penitence in wills. “In the Name of the Eternal and Everlasting God the great Creator and Disposer of all things, Whose divine law has been my study and His sacred paths my supreme delight, I George Baker, of the Inner Temple, London, Esquire, do make this my last will and testament.”
In Mrs. Gaskell’s “Sylvia’s Lovers” is the following passage: “Has thee put that I’m in my sound mind and seven senses? Then make the sign of the Trinity, and write ‘In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.’” “Is that the right way o’ beginning a will?” said Coulson, a little startled. “My father and my father’s father, and my husband had it atop of theirs, and I’m noane going for to cease fra’ following after them, for they were godly men, though my husband were o’ t’ episcopal persuasion.” It would be necessary to remember how largely tradition and custom count, if we were to examine wills carefully and thoroughly for the purpose of studying the piety of this or that period of English life. Yet it can be seen how valuable these prefaces are. Elaborate or simple, there is much to learn and mark in them. But it is curious to observe that George Herbert (to leave the eighteenth century for a moment), and William Law, two of the most pious souls of their periods, use very few words in their religious dedications. The first says simply: “I George Herbert, recommending my soul and body to Almighty God that made them, do thus dispose of my goods.” William Law, in terms only a little more elaborate, thus begins: “I William Law, of Kings Cliffe, in the County of Northampton, Clerk, being I bless God in good health of body and soundness of mind, do make this my last will and testament in manner and form following, that is to say: Imprimis: I humbly recommend my soul to the mercies of God in Christ Jesus, and my body I commit to the earth to be interred in the Church yard of Kings Cliffe aforesaid, at the discretion of my executrix.”
CHAPTER VIII
THE DEAD HAND
“With this thread from out the tomb my dead hand shall tether thee!”
Francis Thompson.
John Oliver Hobbes, in “The Dream and the Business,” makes Firmalden’s uncle leave to him £5,000 a year, on condition that he should become and remain a Congregational minister. “My uncle meant well by his will,” Firmalden said, “but I must have my independence. That money binds me hand and foot. I have no rage against wealth as wealth. I like it. But I must either earn it or inherit it unconditionally.”
In “Maid’s Money” Mrs. Dudeney makes “old Aunt Eliza” leave to Amy and Sarah, cousins, her wealth and her house in Cornwall on the condition that they always live there together and unmarried. “Listen!” says Diana to David in Mrs. Barclay’s “The Following of the Star.” “There was a codicil to Uncle Falcon’s will—a private codicil known only to Mr. Inglestry and myself, and only to be made known a year after his death, to those whom, if I failed to fulfil its conditions, it might then concern. Riverscourt, and all this wealth, are mine, only on condition that I am married within twelve months of Uncle Falcon’s death. He has been dead eleven.”
Mrs. Craigie’s, Mrs. Dudeney’s, and Mrs. Barclay’s imaginary wills are no less binding and coercive than many real wills seek to be. Conditional legacies are indeed become a byword, and are often of a difficult, not to say preposterous, nature.
G. K. Chesterton in “Orthodoxy” has a fanciful but suggestive passage, in which he conceives of life itself as so strange a legacy that man must not gape or wonder if the conditions too are strange. “If I leave a man in my will ten talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not look a winged horse in the mouth.” Legally, it may be of interest to note in passing, a devise of property on an impossible condition will not take effect. If a man is to inherit lands on condition that he goes from Britain to Rome in an hour, he will not (until flying-machines are more perfect) ever succeed to the lands.