“I? I stay? Ah! sir, I stay, yes! Because like Claude, leaving my home and seeking by wandering to find the true place of my utility, a voice spake that I come at Grande Pointe. Behole me! as far from my childhood home as Claude from his. Friend,—ah! friend, what shall I,—shall Claude,—shall any man do with education! Keep it? Like a miser his gol’? What shall the ship do when she is load’? Dear friend,”—they halted where another road started away through the underbrush at an abrupt angle on their right,—“where leads this narrow road? To Belle Alliance plantation only, or not also to the whole worl’? So is education! That road here once fetch me at Grande Pointe; the same road fetch Claude away. Education came whispering, ‘Claude St. Pierre, come! I have constitute’ you citizen of the worl’. Come, come, forgetting self!’ Oh, dear friend, education is not for self alone! Nay, even self is not for self!”
“Well, den,”—the deep-voiced woodman stood with one boot on a low stump, fiercely trimming a branch that he had struck from the parent stem with one blow of his big, keen clasp-knife,—“self not for self,—for what he gone off and lef’ me in de swamp?”
“Ah, sir!” replied Bonaventure, “what do I unceasingly tell those dear school-chil’run? ‘May we not make the most of self, yet not for self?’” He laid his hand upon St. Pierre’s shoulder. “And who sent Claude hence if not his unselfish father?”
“I was big fool,” said St. Pierre, whittling on.
“Nay, wise! Discovering the great rule of civilize-ation. Every man not for self, but for every other!”
The swamper disclaimed the generous imputation with a shake of the head.
“Naw, I dunno nut’n’ ’bout dat. I look out for me and my boy, me.—And beside,”—he abruptly threw away the staff he had trimmed, shut his knife with a snap, and thrust it into his pocket,—“I dawn’t see ed’cation make no diff’ence. You say ed’cation—priest say religion—me, I dawn’t see neider one make no diff’ence. I see every man look out for hisself and his li’l’ crowd. Not you, but”—He waved his hand bitterly toward the world at large.
“Ah, sir!” cried Bonaventure, “’tis not something what you can see all the time, like the horns on a cow! And yet, sir,—and yet!”—he lifted himself upon tiptoe and ran his fingers through his thin hair—“the education that make’ no difference is but a dead body! and the religion that make’ no difference is a ghost! Behole! behole two thing’ in the worl’, where all is giving and getting, two thing’, contrary, yet resem’ling! ’Tis the left han’—alas, alas!—giving only to get; and the right, blessed of God, getting only to give! How much resem’ling, yet how contrary! The one—han’ of all strife; the other—of all peace. And oh! dear friend, there are those who call the one civilize-ation, and the other religion. Civilize-ation? Religion? They are one! They are body and soul! I care not what religion the priest teach you; in God’s religion is comprise’ the total mécanique of civilize-ation. We are all in it; you, me, Claude, Sidonie; all in it! Each and every at his task, however high, however low, working not to get, but to give, and not to give only to his own li’l’ crowd, but to all, to all!” The speaker ceased, for his hearer was nodding his head with sceptical impatience.
“Yass,” said the woodman, “yass; but look, Bonaventure. Di’n’ you said one time, ‘Knowledge is power’?”
“Yes, truly; and it is.”