—what is it, we would ask, most magnanimous Sir, in the most delicate manner imaginable, that keeps you standing by the hour together, looking out of the window of your club in Pall Mall, in the utter weariness of your heart, swearing now at the weather, now at the waiter, and, anon, muttering something about your dreaming that you dwelt in marble halls, but that very monotony of civilization which we so much deprecate? Were it not for that, you might be working in this working world—touching the very kernel and core of life, instead of thus feeding on its shell.
And if it be that the soft eye of woman looks down on what we now write, what is it, we would ask, O peerless paragon, O celestial goddess, but the same feeling that makes you put aside the last new novel, and, in shameless defiance of the rules taught in that valuable publication and snob’s vade mecum—“Hints on the Etiquette and the Usages of Society,” actually yawn—aye, yawn, when that gold watch, hanging by your most fairy-like and loveliest of forms, does not tell one hour that does not bear with it from earth to heaven some tragedy acted—some villainy achieved—some heroic thing done: aye, yawn, when before you is spread out the great rôle of life, with its laughter and tears—with its blasts from hell—with its odours coming down from heaven itself. A brave, bold, noble-hearted Miss Nightingale breaks through this monotony, and sails to nurse the wounded or the dying of our army in the East, and “Common Sense” writes in newspapers against such a noble act; and a religious paper saw in it Popery at the very least. What a howl has there been in some quarters because a few clergymen have taken to preaching in theatres! Even, woman’s heart, with its gushing sympathies, has become dead and shrivelled up, where that relentless scourge—that demon of our time, the monotony of civilization—has been suffered to intrude. It is owing to that, that when we look for deeds angels might love to do, our daughters, and sisters, and those whom we most passionately love, scream out Italian songs which neither they
nor we understand, and bring to us, as the result of their noblest energies, a fancy bag or a chain of German wool. Such is the result of what Sir W. Curtis termed the three R’s and the usual accomplishments. Humanity has been stereotyped. We follow one another like a flock of sheep. We have levelled with a vengeance; we have reduced the doctrine of human equality to an absurdity—we live alike, think alike, die alike. A party in a parlour in Belgrave Square, “all silent and all d---d,” is as like a party in a parlour in Hackney as two peas. The beard movement was a failure; so was the great question of hat reform, and for similar reasons. We still scowl upon a man with a wide-a-wake, as we should upon a pick-pocket or a cut-throat. A leaden monotony hangs heavy on us all. Not more does one man or woman differ from another than does policeman A1 differ from policeman A 999. Individuality seems gone: independent life no longer exists. Our very thought and inner life is that of Buggins, who lives next door. The skill of the tailor has made us all one, and man, as God made him, cuts but a sorry figure by the side of man as his tailor made him. This is an undeniable fact: it is not only true but the truth. One motive serves for every variety of deed—for dancing the polka or marrying a wife—for wearing white gloves or worshipping the Most High. “At any rate, my dears,” said a fashionable dame to her daughters when they turned round to go home, on finding that the crowded state of the church to which they repaired would not admit of their worshipping
according to Act of Parliament,—“At any rate, my dears, we have done the genteel thing.” By that mockery to God she had made herself right in the sight of man. Actually we are all so much alike that not very long since in Madrid a journeyman tailor was mistaken for a Prince. It is not always that such extreme cases happen; but the tendency of civilization, as we have it now, is to work us all up into one common, unmeaning whole—to confound all the old distinctions by which classes were marked—to mix up the peasant and the prince, more by bringing down the latter than elevating the former; and thus we all become unmeaning, and monotonous, and common-place. The splendid livery in which “Jeames” rejoices may show that he is footman to a family that dates from the Conquest: it may be that he is footman to the keeper of the ham and beef shop near London Bridge. The uninitiated cannot tell the difference. A man says he is a lord; otherwise we should not take him for one of the nobles of the earth. A man puts on a black gown, and says he is a religious teacher: otherwise we should not take him for one who could understand and enlighten the anxious yearnings of the human heart. The old sublime faith in God and heaven is gone. We have had none of it since the days of old Noll: it went out when Charles and his mistresses came in. But instead, we have a world of propriety and conventionalism. We have a universal worshipping of Mrs. Grundy. A craven fear sits in the hearts of all. Men dare not be generous, high-minded, and true. A
man dares not act otherwise than the class by which he is surrounded: he must conform to their regulations or die; outside the pale there is no hope. If he would not be as others are, it were better that a millstone were hung round his neck and that he were cast into the sea. If, as a tradesman, he will not devote his energies to money-making—if he will not rise up early and sit up late—if he will not starve the mind—if he will not violate the conditions by which the physical and mental powers are sustained—he will find that in Christian England, in the nineteenth century, there is no room for such as he. The externals which men in their ignorance have come to believe essential to happiness, he will see another’s. Great city “feeds”—white-bait dinners at Blackwall, and “genteel residences,” within a few miles of the Bank or the bridges—fat coachmen and fiery steeds—corporation honours and emoluments,—a man may seek in vain if he will not take first, the ledger for his Gospel, and mammon for his God. It is just the same with the professions. Would the “most distinguished counsel” ever have a brief were he to scorn to employ the powers God has given him to obtain impunity for the man whose heart’s life has become polluted with crime beyond the power of reform. Many a statesman has to thank a similar laxity of conscience for his place and power.
CHAPTER XI.
THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.
I am not in the best of humours. The wind and weather of the last few months have been bad enough to vex the temper and destroy the patience of a saint. I wish the papers would write a little more about reforms at home, and not trouble themselves about the Emperor of the French. I wish country gentlemen, when airing their vocabularies at agricultural dinners, would not talk so much of our friends across the water being desirous to avenge the disgrace of Waterloo, as if there were any disgrace to France, after having been a match, single-handed, for all Europe for a generation, in being compelled to succumb at last. I wish we could be content with trading with China, without sending ambassadors to Pekin, and endeavouring by fair means or foul to make that ancient city, as regards red-tapeism and diplomatic quarrels, as great a nuisance as Constantinople is now. I wish Mr. George Augustus Sala, with that wonderful talent of his for imitating Dickens and Thackeray, would quite forget there was such
gentlemen in the world, and write independently of them. And I wish the little essayists, who copy Mr. George Augustus Sala, and are so very smart and facetious by his aid, would either swim without corks, or not swim at all. Thank heaven, none of them are permanent, and most of them speedily sink down into limbo. Where are the gaudily-covered miscellanies, and other light productions of this class? if not dead, why on every second-hand book-stall in London, in vain seeking a sale at half-price, and dear at the money. But the spirit of which they are the symptom, of which they are the outward and visible sign, lives. Directly you take up one of these books, you know what is coming. But after all, why quarrel with these butterflies, who, at any rate, have a good conceit of themselves, if they have but a poor opinion of others? Fontaine tells of a motherly crab, who exclaimed against the obliquity of her daughter’s gait, and asked whether she could not walk straight. The young crab pleaded, very reasonably, the similarity of her parent’s manner of stepping, and asked whether she could be expected to walk differently from the rest of the family?
This fable throws me back on general principles; our writers—our preachers—our statesmen, are fearful, and tremble at the appearance of originality. The age overrules us all, society is strong, and the individual is consequently weak. We have no patrons now, but, instead, we have a mob. Attend a public meeting,—the speaker who is the most applauded, is the man most
given to exaggeration. Listen to a popular preacher,—is he not invariably the most commonplace, and in his sermons least suggestive, of men? When a new periodical is projected, what care is taken that it shall contain nothing to offend, as if a man or writer were worth a rap that did not come into collision with some prejudices, and trample on some corns. In describing some ceremony where beer had been distributed, a teetotal reporter, writing for a teetotal public, omitted all mention of the beer. This is ridiculous, but such things are done every day in all classes. Society exercises a censorship over the press of the most distinctive character. The song says,