Those who will deny the working of a conscious Providence in human affairs, are led into their errors through an inability to grasp the complexity of the world around them. They would have each good deed immediately rewarded, and rewarded after its own kind; they would have every evil punished in some direct and manifest way, forgetting that such a punishment would not complete the episode, but would itself originate a chain of further effects.
It is not thus that Immanent Justice informs and balances the lives of men. But if we observe a group of human activities for any length of time, we discover a network of reactions in which is soon manifest an astonishing unity of design. This charity, that heroism will bear far off, and in some wholly unexpected portion of the scheme, a fruit which is also its compensation; such and such a piece of cruelty or weakness, seemingly unrequited, may be traced through a succession of consequences, ever creating of itself its own retribution until at last it has paid, just where the payment was most needed, the full debt incurred to whatever governs the world.
This novel and illuminating thought, for which I am indebted to Dr M’Manus’ “Persecution of the Irish Protestants,” has thrown a religious light over all the chief experiences of my life. The learned divine exemplifies his philosophy by references to James II. and the history of his own romantic Belfast: I prove its truth by a consideration of the only considerable political movement with which I have been brought into touch, I mean the Development of the M’Korio Delta.
Mr Barnett, meeting Mr Harbury years ago in his father’s quiet Oriental vicarage, had recognised his talents, and had attached him to his fortunes. It was an accident, but an accident of kindness.
Mr Burden, my friend, acquired long ago, with little thought of gain, the control of such small trade as could be driven with the naked and debased aborigines of a fetid African river. It barely affected the considerable profits of his business; he gave it little thought. It was an accident, but that accident had in it a vein, however slight, of patriotic motives destined in time to yield, even in this life, a thousandfold.
Mrs Burden had ever desired that Cosmo should be sent to the University. Before his fifth birthday, she had discovered in her child aptitudes of no common order. His father had nourished a secret design to put him at once from school into the business; during his wife’s last illness he had abandoned his own will, and promised her that the boy should enjoy the advantages she implored. That also was an active, if a slight, example of self-denial and of love.
Lastly, and most especially, Mr Harbury, by one fine act of enlightened good nature, had bound in gratitude the reserved and somewhat difficult affections of the lad upon whom so much depended.
Observe how great an issue lay in these little things: these little and obscure good deeds! What man save Mr Barnett had understood, or could understand, the full meaning of the M’Korio? What chances had any vision of his against the opposition of all that limited, monied, hard “good sense” whereby Mr Burden despised the wealth latent in the colony with which he alone traded? And yet Mr Burden’s voice in this matter would certainly lead the city! What ambassador could have been found to persuade a merchant of Mr Burden’s kind that the future of a great province depended upon such a man as Mr Barnett, whose character could not but have affected him as alien, and perhaps as repulsive?
Cosmo alone could bridge that gulf. His lethargy, if I may use the term, would have proved an insuperable obstacle, and all that he had heard from his young associates of “honour” would have confused his judgment, had not that closer tie been created in a few predestined hours by Mr Harbury’s trained, courteous, and ready heart.
Each of us to-day in whatever way we have immixed with that Imperial adventure as shareholders or plain citizens; as preachers, journalists, or perhaps in some sweet womanly way; every soldier who has returned without stain from the Delta; every administrator of every grade, nay, every holder of every salaried office in the M’Korio, owes something to that half hour when so considerable a sum as £1250 was lent without any kind of fee or troublesome inquiry at a nominal rate of fifteen per cent. to rescue a fellow-being from dishonour.