French & English

by Philip Gilbert Hamerton

Real success is nothing more, and it is certainly nothing less, than the happy exercise and development of each man’s faculties, whatever they may be. Hence the error of supposing that one can be truly successful by following in the steps of another. Each man has to win his own happiness, or, in religious language, to work out his own salvation. The world’s estimate of him is important only just so far as it enables him to do this, or hinders him from doing it; beyond that it is no more to him than the wind on a distant sea. Now, this happy exercise of gifts may no doubt sometimes depend on money, but it usually depends far more on suitableness of situation. I have mentioned the poor incomes of French priests, the miserable incomes as they will appear to the English reader. The very poverty of these men is, in the best cases, a part of their success. If they want to leave all and follow Christ, a bare subsistence is all that they require for that. Their poverty is a part of the dignity and reality of their office. Success, for a priest, has absolutely nothing to do with money, or even with preferment; it consists in moral and religious influence, and in nothing else. The famous Curé d’Ars had immense success, and remained a poor village priest to the end of his saintly life; what need had he of wealth and dignities? In the army, as elsewhere, success is to be fit for the rank one occupies, and to attain exactly the rank that one is fit for; it is not to get up into a rank above one’s capacity. In literature, success is merely encouragement to express our genuine and best selves; it is not to be splendidly rewarded for producing work adapted for the market. In painting, success is nothing more than encouragement to paint the pictures that form themselves in the mind; it is not successful commerce. Corot, the French landscape painter, produced his own work and succeeded late, yet it was a pure success for him, and he could wait for it patiently on fifty pounds a year. Another instance of real though not apparent success is that of the Englishman David Cox, whom some have commiserated because he did not pocket the thousands that his drawings afterwards attained. One who knew him intimately said there was no occasion for pity, that Cox had enjoyed his life and work, and earned as much as was necessary for his independence.

Epicurean and Stoic Views of Success.

There are two sides to the question whether a successful life must be in every case a pleasant one. The Epicurean philosopher would say that without happiness there can be no success; the Stoic would see the possibility of a high kind of success without anything like happiness; the Christian thinks life successful if it leads to heaven, though it be wretched and miserable upon earth. Both Christian and Epicurean agree in taking happiness as the measure of success, though one places it on the earth and the other elsewhere.

Strong Contrasts in France.

All three are to be found in France in their complete development. The dominant philosophy is the Epicurean, but Stoicism and Christianity have their small and great places with their own theories of success. It is the tendency of the French mind to follow every scheme of life to the extremity of its logical consequences. France is the country of the woman of the world, la mondaine, and of the Carmelite nun, the one living in the utmost luxury, the other in the hardest austerity, and a gleam of hope or a cloud of disappointment in the life of a young lady may determine for her which of the two she is to be. France is the country of conversation and of the silent trappists, the land of wine, and dance, and song, yet at the same time a land where life is often most dull, and dreary, and prosaic.

French Tendency to make Life Agreeable.

Life as a Succession of little Pleasures.

Still, if we consider the French nation broadly, after having given its due place to asceticism, catholic or parsimonious, I think it is evident that the dominant tendency is to make the present life agreeable, even to study to make it so, and to take trouble in order to enjoy a succession of little pleasures. In the care for the agreeableness of the present life there is a very strong contrast between the French and the Highlanders of Scotland, for example. The Highlanders are unsuccessful in making life agreeable, partly on account of their climate, which discourages effort, but also from their temperament, which prefers discomfort to trouble and forethought. The same contrast, in minor degrees, exists between the French and some other inhabitants of the British Islands. The Frenchman’s object is to make life a succession of little pleasures.

The Judicious Epicurean.

If he is able to do this, does that constitute success? It is success of a kind, if it can be carried on indefinitely and without any perceptible injury to health. The judicious Epicurean, who knows the necessity of moderation, arrives at a kind of happiness, and he includes mental pleasures, such as those of art and elegance, in his list.