Fantom, who had no reason to suspect that his friend was going to call upon him for a subscription on this account, ventured to praise them, saying, "I am no enemy to these institutions. I would, indeed, change the object of instruction, but I would have the whole world instructed."
Here Mrs. Fantom, who, with her daughter, had quietly sat by at their work, ventured to put in a word, a liberty she seldom took with her husband, who, in his zeal to make the whole world free and happy, was too prudent to include his wife among the objects on whom he wished to confer freedom and happiness. "Then, my dear," said she, "I wonder you do not let your own servants be taught a little. The maids can scarcely tell a letter, or say the Lord's Prayer, and you know you will not allow them time to learn. William, too, has never been at church since we came out of town. He was at first very orderly and obedient, but now he is seldom sober of an evening; and in the morning, when he should be rubbing the tables in the parlor, he is generally lolling upon them, and reading your little manual of the new philosophy." "Mrs. Fantom," said her husband, angrily, "you know that my labors for the public good leave me little time to think of my own family. I must have a great field; I like to do good to hundreds at once."
"I am very glad of that, papa," said Miss Polly; "for then I hope you will not refuse to subscribe to all those pretty children at the Sunday School, as you did yesterday, when the gentlemen came a begging, because that is the very thing you were wishing for; there are two or three hundred to be done good at once."
Trueman. Well, Mr. Fantom, you are a wonderful man to keep up such a stock of benevolence at so small an expense. To love mankind so dearly, and yet avoid all opportunities of doing them good; to have such a noble zeal for the millions, and to feel so little compassion for the units; to long to free empires and enlighten kingdoms; and yet deny instruction to your own village, and comfort to your own family. Surely none but a philosopher could indulge so much philanthropy and so much frugality at the same time. But come, do assist me in a partition I am making in our poor-house; between the old, whom I want to have better fed, and the young, whom I want to have more worked.
Fantom. Sir, my mind is so engrossed with the partition of Poland, that I can not bring it down to an object of such insignificance. I despise the man whose benevolence is swallowed up in the narrow concerns of his own family, or parish, or country.
Trueman. Well, now I have a notion that it is as well to do one's own duty as the duty of another man; and that to do good at home is as well as to do good abroad. For my part, I had as lieve help Tom Saunders to freedom as a Pole or a South American, though I should be very glad to help them too. But one must begin to love somewhere; and to do good somewhere; and I think it is as natural to love one's own family, and to do good in one's own neighborhood, as to any body else. And if every man in every family, parish, and country, did the same, why then all the schemes would meet, and the end of one parish, where I was doing good, would be the beginning of another parish where somebody else was doing good; so my schemes would jut into my neighbor's; his projects would unite with those of some other local reformer; and all would fit with a sort of dove-tail exactness. And what is better, all would join in forming a living comment on that practical precept; "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thyself."
Fantom. Sir, a man of large views will be on the watch for great occasions to prove his benevolence.
Trueman. Yes, sir; but if they are so distant that he can not reach them, or so vast that he can not grasp them, he may let a thousand little, snug, kind, good actions slip through his fingers in the meanwhile; and so between the great things that he can not do, and the little ones that he will not do, life passes and nothing will be done.
Just at this moment Miss Polly Fantom (whose mother had gone out some time before) started up, let fall her work, and cried out, "O, papa, do but look what a monstrous great fire there is yonder on the common! If it were the fifth of November I should think it were a bonfire. Look how it blazes." "I see plain enough what it is," said Mr. Fantom, sitting down again without the least emotion. "It is Jenkins's cottage on fire." "What, poor John Jenkins, who works in our garden, papa?" said the poor girl, in great terror. "Do not be frightened, child," answered Fantom; "we are safe enough; the wind blows the other way. Why did you disturb us for such a trifle, as it was so distant? Come, Mr. Trueman, sit down." "Sit down!" said Mr. Trueman; "I am not a stock, nor a stone, but a man, made of the same common nature with Jenkins, whose house is burning. Come along—let us fly and help him," continued he, running to the door in such haste that he forgot to take his hat, though it hung just before him. "Come, Mr. Fantom—come, my little dear; I wish your mamma was here; I am sorry she went out just now; we may all do some good; every body may be of some use at a fire. Even you, Miss Polly, may save some of these poor people's things in your apron, while your papa and I hand the buckets." All this he said as he ran along with the young lady in his hand, not doubting but Fantom and his whole family were following close behind him. But the present distress was neither grand enough nor far enough from home to satisfy the wide-stretched benevolence of the philosopher, who sat down within sight of the flames to work at a new pamphlet, which now swallowed up his whole soul, on Universal Benevolence.
His daughter, indeed, who happily was not yet a philosopher, with Mr. Trueman, followed by the maids, reached the scene of distress. William Wilson, the footman, refused to assist, glad of such an opportunity of being revenged on Jenkins, whom he called a surly fellow, for presuming to complain because William always purloined the best fruit for himself before he set it on his master's table. Jenkins, also, whose duty it was to be out of doors, had refused to leave his own work in the garden to do Will's work in the house while he got drunk, or read the Rights of Man.