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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/14653-0.txt b/14653-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3e839c0 --- /dev/null +++ b/14653-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1235 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14653 *** + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + +A Christmas Book + +by + +ARNOLD BENNETT + +Author of _The Old Wives' Tale_, _Buried Alive_, etc., etc. + +New York +George H. Doran Company + +1911 + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER + + I. THE FACT + II. THE REASON + III. THE SOLSTICE AND GOODWILL + IV. THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + V. DEFENCE OF FEASTING + VI. TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + VII. THE GIFT OF ONESELF +VIII. THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + IX. THE REACTION + X. ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + + + + +ONE + +THE FACT + + +Something has happened to Christmas, or to our hearts; or to both. In +order to be convinced of this it is only necessary to compare the +present with the past. In the old days of not so long ago the festival +began to excite us in November. For weeks the house rustled with +charming and thrilling secrets, and with the furtive noises of paper +parcels being wrapped and unwrapped; the house was a whispering gallery. +The tension of expectancy increased to such a point that there was a +positive danger of the cord snapping before it ought to snap. On the +Eve we went to bed with no hope of settled sleep. We knew that we should +be wakened and kept awake by the waits singing in the cold; and we were +glad to be kept awake so. On the supreme day we came downstairs hiding +delicious yawns, and cordially pretending that we had never been more +fit. The day was different from other days; it had a unique romantic +quality, tonic, curative of all ills. On that day even the tooth-ache +vanished, retiring far into the wilderness with the spiteful word, the +venomous thought, and the unlovely gesture. We sang with gusto +"Christians awake, salute the happy morn." We did salute the happy morn. +And when all the parcels were definitely unpacked, and the secrets of +all hearts disclosed, we spent the rest of the happy morn in waiting, +candidly greedy, for the first of the great meals. And then we ate, and +we drank, and we ate again; with no thought of nutrition, nor of +reasonableness, nor of the morrow, nor of dyspepsia. We ate and drank +without fear and without shame, in the sheer, abandoned ecstasy of +celebration. And by means of motley paper headgear, fit only for a +carnival, we disguised ourselves in the most absurd fashions, and yet +did not make ourselves seriously ridiculous; for ridicule is in the +vision, not in what is seen. And we danced and sang and larked, until we +could no more. And finally we chanted a song of ceremony, and separated; +ending the day as we had commenced it, with salvoes of good wishes. And +the next morning we were indisposed and enfeebled; and we did not care; +we suffered gladly; we had our pain's worth, and more. This was the +past. + + * * * * * + +Even today the spirit and rites of ancient Christmas are kept up, more +or less in their full rigour and splendour, by a race of beings that is +scattered over the whole earth. This race, mysterious, masterful, +conservative, imaginative, passionately sincere, arriving from we know +not where, dissolving before our eyes we know not how, has its way in +spite of us. I mean the children. By virtue of the children's faith, the +reindeer are still tramping the sky, and Christmas Day is still +something above and beyond a day of the week; it is a day out of the +week. We have to sit and pretend; and with disillusion in our souls we +do pretend. At Christmas, it is not the children who make-believe; it +is ourselves. Who does not remember the first inkling of a suspicion +that Christmas Day was after all a day rather like any other day? In the +house of my memories, it was the immemorial duty of my brother on +Christmas morning, before anything else whatever happened, to sit down +to the organ and perform "Christians Awake" with all possible stops +drawn. He had to do it. Tradition, and the will that emanated from the +best bedroom, combined to force him to do it. One Christmas morning, as +he was preparing the stops, he glanced aside at me with a supercilious +curl of the lips, and the curl of my lips silently answered. It was as +if he had said: "I condescend to this," and as if I had said: "So do I." + +Such a moment comes to most of us of this generation. And thenceforward +the change in us is extraordinarily rapid. The next thing we know is +that the institution of waits is a rather annoying survival which at +once deprives us of sleep and takes money out of our pockets. And then +Christmas is gluttony and indigestion and expensiveness and quarter-day, +and Christmas cards are a tax and a nuisance, and present-giving is a +heavier tax and a nuisance. And we feel self-conscious and foolish as we +sing "Auld Lang Syne." And what a blessing it will be when the +"festivities" (as they are misleadingly called) are over, and we can +settle down into commonsense again! + + * * * * * + +I do not mean that our hearts are black with despair on Christmas Day. +I do not mean that we do not enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. There is +no doubt that, with the inspiriting help of the mysterious race, and by +the force of tradition, and by our own gift of pretending, we do still +very much enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. What I mean to insinuate, +and to assert, is that beneath this enjoyment is the disconcerting and +distressing conviction of unreality, of non-significance, of exaggerated +and even false sentiment. What I mean is that we have to brace and force +ourselves up to the enjoyment of Christmas. We have to induce +deliberately the "Christmas feeling." We have to remind ourselves that +"it will never do" to let the heartiness of Christmas be impaired. The +peculiarity of our attitude towards Christmas, which at worst is a +vacation, may be clearly seen by contrasting it with our attitude +towards another vacation--the summer holiday. We do not have to brace +and force ourselves up to the enjoyment of the summer holiday. We +experience no difficulty in inducing the holiday feeling. There is no +fear of the institution of the summer holiday losing its heartiness. Nor +do we need the example of children to aid us in savouring the August +"festivities." + + * * * * * + +If any person here breaks in with the statement that I am deceived and +the truth is not in me, and that Christmas stands just where it did in +the esteem of all right-minded people, and that he who casts a doubt on +the heartiness of Christmas is not right-minded, let that person read no +more. This book is not written for him. And if any other person, +kindlier, condescendingly protests that there is nothing wrong with +Christmas except my advancing age, let that person read no more. This +book is not written for him, either. It is written for persons who can +look facts cheerfully in the face. That Christmas has lost some of its +magic is a fact that the common sense of the western hemisphere will not +dispute. To blink the fact is infantile. To confront it, to try to +understand it, to reckon with it, and to obviate any evil that may +attach to it--this course alone is meet for an honest man. + + + + + +TWO + +THE REASON + + +If the decadence of Christmas were a purely subjective phenomenon, +confined to the breasts of those of us who have ceased to be children +then it follows that Christmas has always been decadent, because people +have always been ceasing to be children. It follows also that the +festival was originally got up by disillusioned adults, for the benefit +of the children. Which is totally absurd. Adults have never yet invented +any institution, festival or diversion specially for the benefit of +children. The egoism of adults makes such an effort impossible, and the +ingenuity and pliancy of children make it unnecessary. The pantomime, +for example, which is now pre-eminently a diversion for children, was +created by adults for the amusement of adults. Children have merely +accepted it and appropriated it. Children, being helpless, are of course +fatalists and imitators. They take what comes, and they do the best they +can with it. And when they have made something their own that was adult, +they stick to it like leeches. + +They are terrific Tories, are children; they are even reactionary! They +powerfully object to changes. What they most admire in a pantomime is +the oldest part of it, the only true pantomime--the harlequinade! Hence +the very nature of children is a proof that what Christmas is now to +them, it was in the past to their elders. If they now feel and exhibit +faith and enthusiasm in the practice of the festival, be sure that, at +one time, adults felt and exhibited the same faith and enthusiasm--yea, +and more! For in neither faith nor enthusiasm can a child compete with a +convinced adult. No child could believe in anything as passionately as +the modern millionaire believes in money, or as the modern social +reformer believes in the virtue of Acts of Parliament. + +Another and a crowning proof that Christmas has been diminished in our +hearts lies in the fiery lyrical splendour of the old Christmas hymns. +Those hymns were not written by people who made-believe at Christmas for +the pleasure of youngsters. They were written by devotees. And this age +could not have produced them. + + * * * * * + +No! The decay of the old Christmas spirit among adults is undeniable, +and its cause is fairly plain. It is due to the labours of a set of +idealists--men who cared not for money, nor for glory, nor for anything +except their ideal. Their ideal was to find out the truth concerning +nature and concerning human history; and they sacrificed all--they +sacrificed the peace of mind of whole generations--to the pleasure of +slaking their ardour for truth. For them the most important thing in the +world was the satisfaction of their curiosity. They would leave naught +alone; and they scorned consequences. Useless to cry to them: "That is +holy. Touch it not!" I mean the great philosophers and men of +science--especially the geologists--of the nineteenth century. I mean +such utterly pure-minded men as Lyell, Spencer, Darwin and Huxley. They +inaugurated the mighty age of doubt and scepticism. They made it +impossible to believe all manner of things which before them none had +questioned. The movement spread until uneasiness was everywhere in the +realm of thought, and people walked about therein fearsomely, as in a +land subject to earthquakes. It was as if people had said: "We don't +know what will topple next. Let's raze everything to the ground, and +then we shall feel safer." And there came a moment after which nobody +could ever look at a picture of the Nativity in the old way. Pictures of +the Nativity were admired perhaps as much as ever, but for the exquisite +beauty of their naïveté, the charm of their old-world simplicity, not +as artistic renderings of fact. + + * * * * * + +An age of scepticism has its faults, like any other age, though certain +persons have pretended the contrary. Having been compelled to abandon +its belief in various statements of alleged fact, it lumps principles +and ideals with alleged facts, and hastily decides not to believe in +anything at all. It gives up faith, it despises faith, in spite of the +warning of its greatest philosophers, including Herbert Spencer, that +faith of some sort is necessary to a satisfactory existence in a +universe full of problems which science admits it can never solve. None +were humbler than the foremost scientists about the narrowness of the +field of knowledge, as compared with the immeasurability of the field +of faith. But the warning has been ignored, as warnings nearly always +are. Faith is at a discount. And the qualities which go with faith are +at a discount; such as enthusiasm, spontaneity, ebullition, lyricism, +and self-expression in general. Sentimentality is held in such horror +that people are afraid even of sentiment. Their secret cry is: "Give us +something in which we can believe." + + * * * * * + +They forget, in their confusion, that the great principles, spiritual +and moral, remain absolutely intact. They forget that, after all the +shattering discoveries of science and conclusions of philosophy, mankind +has still to live with dignity amid hostile nature, and in the presence +of an unknowable power and that mankind can only succeed in this +tremendous feat by the exercise of faith and of that mutual goodwill +which is based in sincerity and charity. They forget that, while facts +are nothing, these principles are everything. And so, at that epoch of +the year which nature herself has ordained for the formal recognition of +the situation of mankind in the universe and of its resulting duties to +itself and to the Unknown--at that epoch, they bewail, sadly or +impatiently or cynically: "Oh! The bottom has been knocked out of +Christmas!" + + * * * * * + +But the bottom has not been knocked out of Christmas. And people know +it. Somewhere, in the most central and mysterious fastness of their +hearts, they know it. If they were not, in spite of themselves, +convinced of it, why should they be so pathetically anxious to keep +alive in themselves, and to foster in their children, the Christmas +spirit? Obviously, a profound instinct is for ever reminding them that, +without the Christmas spirit, they are lost. The forms of faith change, +but the spirit of faith, which is the Christmas spirit, is immortal amid +its endless vicissitudes. At a crisis of change, faith is weakened for +the majority; for the majority it may seem to be dead. It is conserved, +however, in the hearts of the few supremely great and in the hearts of +the simple. The supremely great are hidden from the majority; but the +simple are seen of all men, and them we encourage, often without knowing +why, to be the depositaries of that which we cannot ourselves guard, but +which we dimly feel to be indispensable to our safety. + + + + + +THREE + +THE SOLSTICE AND GOOD WILL + + +In order to see that there is underlying Christmas an idea of faith +which will at any rate last as long as the planet lasts, it is only +necessary to ask and answer the question: "Why was the Christmas feast +fixed for the twenty-fifth of December?" For it is absolutely certain, +and admitted by everybody of knowledge, that Christ was not born on the +twenty-fifth of December. Those disturbing impassioned inquirers after +truth, who will not leave us peaceful in our ignorance, have settled +that for us, by pointing out, among other things, that the twenty-fifth +of December falls in the very midst of the Palestine rainy season, and +that, therefore, shepherds were assuredly not on that date watching +their flocks by night. + + * * * * * + +Christians were not, at first, united in the celebration of Christmas. +Some kept Christmas in January, others in April, others in May. It was a +pre-Christian force which drove them all into agreement upon the +twenty-fifth of December. Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree +from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from +the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when +mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, +when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when the +year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over. No more +suitably symbolic moment could have been chosen for a festival of faith, +goodwill and joy. And the appositeness of the moment is just as perfect +in this era of electric light and central heating, as it was in the era +of Virgil, who, by the way, described a Christmas tree. We shall say +this year, with exactly the same accents of relief and hope as our pagan +ancestors used, and as the woaded savage used: "The days will begin to +lengthen now!" For, while we often falsely fancy that we have subjugated +nature to our service, the fact is that we are as irremediably as ever +at the mercy of nature. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, the attitude of us moderns towards the forces by which our +existence is governed ought to be, and probably is, more reverent and +awe-struck than that of the earlier world. The discoveries of science +have at once quickened our imagination and compelled us to admit that +what we know is the merest trifle. The pagan in his ignorance explained +everything. Our knowledge has only deepened the mystery, and all that we +shall learn will but deepen it further. We can explain the solstice. We +are aware with absolute certitude that the solstice and the equinox and +the varying phenomena of the seasons are due to the fact that the plane +of the equator is tilted at a slight angle to the plane of the ecliptic. +When we put on the first overcoat in autumn, and when we give orders to +let the furnace out in spring, we know that we are arranging our lives +in accordance with that angle. And we are quite duly proud of our +knowledge. And much good does our knowledge do us! + + * * * * * + +Well, it does do us some good, and in a spiritual way, too! For nobody +can even toy with astronomy without picturing to himself, more clearly +and startlingly than would be otherwise possible, a revolving globe that +whizzes through elemental space around a ball of fire: which, in turn, +is rushing with all its satellites at an inconceivable speed from +nowhere to nowhere; and to the surface of the revolving, whizzing globe +a multitude of living things desperately clinging, and these living +things, in the midst of cataclysmic danger, and between the twin enigmas +of birth and death, quarrelling and hating and calling themselves kings +and queens and millionaires and beautiful women and aristocrats and +geniuses and lackeys and superior persons! Perhaps the highest value of +astronomy is that it renders more vivid the ironical significance of +such a vision, and thus brings home to us the truth that in spite of all +the differences which we have invented, mankind is a fellowship of +brothers, overshadowed by insoluble and fearful mysteries, and dependent +upon mutual goodwill and trust for the happiness it may hope to achieve. +* * * Let us remember that Christmas is, among other things, the winter +solstice, and that the bottom has not yet been knocked out of the winter +solstice, nor is likely to be in the immediate future! + + * * * * * + +It is a curious fact that the one faith which really does flourish and +wax in these days should be faith in the idea of social justice. For +social justice simply means the putting into practice of goodwill and +the recognition of the brotherhood of mankind. Formerly, people were +enthusiastic and altruistic for a theological idea, for a national idea, +for a political idea. You could see men on the rack for the sake of a +dogma; you could see men of a great nation fitting out regiments and +ruining themselves and going forth to save a small nation from +destruction. You could see men giving their lives to the aggrandisement +of an empire. And the men who did these things had the best brains and +the quickest wits and the warmest hearts of their time. But today, +whenever you meet a first-class man who is both enthusiastic and +altruistic, you may be sure that his pet scheme is neither theological, +military nor political; you may be sure that he has got into his head +the notion that some class of persons somewhere are not being treated +fairly, are not being treated with fraternal goodwill, and that he is +determined to put the matter right, or perish. + + * * * * * + +In England, nearly all the most interesting people are social reformers: +and the only circles of society in which you are not bored, in which +there is real conversation, are the circles of social reform. These +people alone have an abounding and convincing faith. Their faith has, +for example, convinced many of the best literary artists of the day, +with the result that a large proportion of the best modern imaginative +literature has been inspired by the dream of social justice. Take away +that idea from the works of H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and George +Bernard Shaw, and there would be exactly nothing left. Despite any +appearance to the contrary, therefore, the idea of universal goodwill is +really alive upon the continents of this planet: more so, indeed, than +any other idea--for the vitality of an idea depends far less on the +numbers of people who hold it than on the quality of the heart and brain +of the people who hold it. Whether the growth of the idea is due to the +spiritual awe and humility which are the consequence of increased +scientific knowledge, I cannot say, and I do not seriously care. + + + + + +FOUR + +THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + + +"Yes," you say, "I am quite at one with you as to the immense importance +of goodwill in social existence, and I have the same faith in it as you +have. But why a festival? Why eating and drinking and ceremonies? Surely +one can have faith without festivals?" + + * * * * * + +The answer is that one cannot; or at least that in practice, one never +does. A disinclination for festivals, a morbid self-conscious fear of +letting oneself go, is a sure sign of lack of faith. If you have not +enough enthusiasm for the cult of goodwill to make you positively +desire to celebrate the cult, then your faith is insufficient and needs +fostering by study and meditation. Why, if you decide to found a +sailing-club up your creek, your very first thought is to signalise your +faith in the sailing of those particular waters by a dinner and a +jollity, and you take care that the event shall be an annual one! * * * +You have faith in your wife, and in your affection for her. Surely you +don't need a festival to remind you of that faith, you so superior to +human weaknesses? But you do! You insist on having it. And, if the +festival did not happen, you would feel gloomy and discouraged. A +birthday is a device for recalling to you in a formal and impressive +manner that a certain person still lives and is in need of goodwill. It +is a device which experience has proved to be both valuable and +necessary. + + * * * * * + +Real faith effervesces; it shoots forth in every direction; it +communicates itself. And the inevitable result is a festival. The +festival is anticipated with pleasure, and it is remembered with +pleasure. And thus it reacts stimulatingly on that which gave it birth, +as the vitality of children reacts stimulatingly on the vitality of +parents. It provides a concrete symbol of that which is invisible and +intangible, and mankind is not yet so advanced in the path of spiritual +perfection that we can afford to dispense with concrete symbols. Now, if +we maintain festivals and formalities for the healthy continuance and +honour of a pastime or of a personal affection, shall we not maintain a +festival--and a mighty one--in behalf of a faith which makes the +corporate human existence bearable amid the menaces and mysteries that +for ever threaten it,--the faith of universal goodwill and mutual +confidence? + + * * * * * + +If then, there is to be a festival, why should it not be the festival of +Christmas? It can, indeed, be no other. Christmas is most plainly +indicated. It is dignified and made precious by traditions which go back +much further than the Christian era; and it has this tremendous +advantage--it exists! In spite of our declining faith, it has been +preserved to us, and here it is, ready to hand. Not merely does it fall +at the point which uncounted generations have agreed to consider as the +turn of the solar year and as the rebirth of hope! It falls also +immediately before the end of the calendar year, and thus prepares us +for a fresh beginning that shall put the old to shame. It could not be +better timed. Further, its traditional spirit of peace and goodwill is +the very spirit which we desire to foster. And finally its customs--or +at any rate, its main customs--are well designed to symbolize that +spirit. If we have allowed the despatch of Christmas cards to degenerate +into naught but a tedious shuffling of paste-boards and overwork of +post-office officials, the fault is not in the custom but in ourselves. +The custom is a most striking one--so long as we have sufficient +imagination to remember vividly that we are all in the same boat--I +mean, on the same planet--and clinging desperately to the flying ball, +and dependent for daily happiness on one another's good will! A +Christmas card sent by one human being to another human being is more +than a piece of coloured stationery sent by one log of wood to another +log of wood: it is an inspiring and reassuring message of high value. +The mischief is that so many self-styled human beings are just logs of +wood, rather stylishly dressed. + + * * * * * + +And then the custom of present-giving! What better and more convincing +proof of sympathy than a gift? The gift is one of these obvious +contrivances--like the wheel or the lever--which smooth and simplify +earthly life, and the charm of whose utility no obviousness can stale. +But of course any contrivance can be rendered futile by clumsiness or +negligence. There is a sort of Christmas giver who says pettishly: "Oh! +I don't know what to give to So-and-So this Christmas! What a bother! I +shall write and tell her to choose something herself, and send the bill +to me!" And he writes. And though he does not suspect it, what he really +writes, and what So-and-So reads, is this: "Dear So-and-So. It is +nothing to me that you and I are alive together on this planet, and in +various ways mutually dependent. But I am bound by custom to give you a +present. I do not, however, take sufficient interest in your life to +know what object it would give you pleasure to possess; and I do not +want to be put to the trouble of finding out, nor of obtaining the +object and transmitting it to you. Will you, therefore, buy something +for yourself and send the bill to me. Of course, a sense of social +decency will prevent you from spending more than a small sum, and I +shall be spared all exertion beyond signing a cheque. Yours insincerely +and loggishly * * *." So managed, the contrivance of present-giving +becomes positively sinister in its working. But managed with the +sympathetic imagination which is infallibly produced by real faith in +goodwill, its efficacy may approach the miraculous. + + * * * * * + +The Christmas ceremony of good-wishing by word of mouth has never been +in any danger of falling into insincerity. Such is the power of +tradition and virtue of a festival, and such the instinctive +brotherliness of men, that on this day the mere sight of an +acquaintance will soften the voice and warm the heart of the most +superior sceptic and curmudgeon that the age of disillusion has +produced. In spite of himself, faith flickers up in him again, be it +only for a moment. And, during that moment, he is almost like those +whose bright faith the age has never tarnished, like the great and like +the simple, to whom it is quite unnecessary to offer a defence and +explanation of Christmas or to suggest the basis of a new faith therein. + + + + + + +FIVE + +DEFENCE OF FEASTING + + +And now I can hear the superior sceptic disdainfully questioning: "Yes, +but what about the orgy of Christmas? What about all the eating and +drinking?" To which I can only answer that faith causes effervescence, +expansion, joy, and that joy has always, for excellent reasons, been +connected with feasting. The very words 'feast' and 'festival' are +etymologically inseparable. The meal is the most regular and the least +dispensable of daily events; it happens also to be an event which is in +itself almost invariably a source of pleasure, or, at worst, of +satisfaction: and it will continue to have this precious quality so long +as our souls are encased in bodies. What could be more natural, +therefore, than that it should be employed, with due enlargement and +ornamentation, as the kernel of the festival? What more logical than +that the meal should be elevated into a feast? + +"But," exclaims the superior sceptic, "this idea involves the idea of +excess!" What if it does? I would not deny it! Assuredly, a feast means +more than enough, and more than enough means excess. It is only because +a feast means excess that it assists in the bringing about of expansion +and joy. Such is human nature, and it is the case of human nature that +we are discussing. Of course, excess usually exacts its toll, within +twenty-four hours, especially from the weak. But the benefit is worth +its price. The body pays no more than the debt which the soul has +incurred. An occasional change of habit is essential to well-being, and +every change of habit results in temporary derangement and +inconvenience. + +Do not misunderstand me. Do not push my notion of excess to extremes. +When I defend the excess inevitably incident to a feast, I am not +seeking to prove that a man in celebrating Christmas is entitled to +drink champagne in a public restaurant until he becomes an object of +scorn and disgust to the waiters who have travelled from Switzerland in +order to receive his tips. Much less should I be prepared to justify him +if, in his own home, he sank lower than the hog. Nor would I +sympathetically carry him to bed. There is such a thing as excess in +moderation and dignity. Every wise man has practised this. And he who +has not practised it is a fool, and deserves even a harder name. He +ought indeed to inhabit a planet himself, for all his faith in humanity +will be exhausted in believing in himself. * * * So much for the feast! + + * * * * * + +But the accompaniments of the feast are also excessive. For example, you +make a tug-of-war with your neighbour at table, and the rope is a +fragile packet of tinselled paper, which breaks with a report like a +pistol. You open your half of the packet, and discover some doggerel +verse which you read aloud, and also a perfectly idiotic coloured cap, +which you put on your head to the end of looking foolish. And this +ceremony is continued until the whole table is surrounded by +preposterous headgear, and doggerel verse is lying by every plate. +Surely no man in his senses, no woman in hers, would, etc., etc. * * *! +But one of the spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you +beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. +This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly +good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled +that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir +stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the +Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance +which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, followed by +further expansion and ecstasy, which ensues after the putting on. +Everybody who has put on a cap is aware that it is a beneficial thing to +put on a cap. Quite apart from the fact that the mysterious and fanciful +race of children are thereby placated and appeased, the soul of the +capped one is purified by this charming excess. + + * * * * * + +And the Tree! What an excess of the fantastic to pretend that all those +glittering balls, those coloured candles and those variegated parcels +are the blossoms of the absurd tree! How excessively grotesque to tie +all those parcels to the branches, in order to take them off again! +Surely, something less medieval, more ingenious, more modern than this +could be devised--if symbolism is to be indulged in at all! Can you +devise it, O sceptical one, revelling in disillusion? Can you invent a +symbol more natural and graceful than the symbol of the Tree? Perhaps +you would have a shop-counter, and shelves behind it, so as to instill +early into the youthful mind that this is a planet of commerce! Perhaps +you would abolish the doggerel of crackers, and substitute therefor +extracts from the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin! Perhaps you would +exchange the caps for blazonry embroidered with chemical formula, your +object being the advancement of science! Perhaps you would do away with +the orgiastic eating and drinking, and arrange for a formal conversation +about astronomy and the idea of human fraternity, upon strictly +reasonable rations of shredded wheat! You would thus create an original +festival, and eliminate all fear of a dyspeptic morrow. You would +improve the mind. And you would avoid the ridiculous. But also, in +avoiding the ridiculous, you would tumble into the ridiculous, deeply +and hopelessly! And think how your very original festival would delight +the participators, how they would look forward to it with joy, and back +upon it with pleasurable regret; how their minds would dwell sweetly +upon the conception of shredded wheat, and how their faith would be +encouraged and strengthened by the intellectuality of the formal +conversation! + + * * * * * + +He who girds at an ancient established festival should reflect upon +sundry obvious truths before he withers up the said festival by the +sirocco of his contempt. These truths are as follows:--First, a +festival, though based upon intelligence, is not an affair of the +intellect, but an affair of the emotions. Second, the human soul can +only be reached through the human body. Third, it is impossible to +replace an ancient festival by a new one. Robespierre, amongst others, +tried to do so, and achieved the absurd. Reformers, heralds of new +faiths, and rejuvenators of old faiths, have always, when they +succeeded, adopted an ancient festival, with all or most of its forms, +and been content to breathe into it a new spirit to replace the old +spirit which had vanished or was vanishing. Anybody who, persuaded that +Christmas is not what it was, feels that a festival must nevertheless be +preserved, will do well to follow this example. To be content with the +old forms and to vitalize them: that is the problem. Solve it, and the +forms will soon begin to adapt themselves to the process of +vitalization. All history is a witness in proof. + + + + + +SIX + +TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + + +It being agreed, then, that the Christmas festival has lost a great deal +of its old vitality, and that, to many people, it is a source of tedium +and the cause of insincerity; and it being further agreed that the +difficulty cannot be got over by simply abolishing the festival, as no +one really wants it to be abolished; the question remains--what should +be done to vitalize it? The former spirit of faith, the spirit which +made the great Christmas of the golden days, has been weakened; but one +element of it--that which is founded on the conviction that goodwill +among men is a prime necessity of reasonable living--survives with a +certain vigour, though even it has not escaped the general scepticism of +the age. This element unites in agreement all the pugnacious sectaries +who join battle over the other elements of the former faith. This +element has no enemies. None will deny its lasting virtue. Obviously, +therefore, the right course is to concentrate on the cultivation of +goodwill. If goodwill can be consciously increased, the festival of +Christmas will cease to be perfunctory. It will acquire a fresh and more +genuine significance, which, however, will not in any way inconvenience +those who have never let go of the older significance. No tradition will +be overthrown, no shock administered, and nobody will be able to croak +about iconoclasm and new-fangled notions and the sudden end of the +world, and so on. + + * * * * * + +The fancy of some people will at once run to the formation of a grand +international Society for the revivifying of Christmas by the +cultivation of goodwill, with branches in all the chief cities of Europe +and America, and headquarters--of course at the Hague; and committees +and subcommittees, and presidents and vice-presidents; and honorary +secretaries and secretaries paid; and quarterly and annual meetings, and +triennial congresses! And a literary organ or two! And a +badge--naturally a badge, designed by a famous artist in harmonious +tints! + + * * * * * + +But my fancy does not run at all in this direction. I am convinced that +we have already far too many societies for the furtherance of our ends. +To my mind, most societies with a moral aim are merely clumsy machines +for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense and +inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a group +of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very +wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some act +which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate goodwill +in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for saying +your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of performing +acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it necessary to +involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover, a society +means fuss and shouting: two species of disturbance which are both +futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of morals. + +You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by +cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task +of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be +time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other +people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that +this is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you +have bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will +appreciate also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, +indeed, should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your +admirable intentions? Rest assured that any unusual sprouting of the +desired crop will be instantly noticed by the persons interested. + + * * * * * + +The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill? +Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the +whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but a +magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate +goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of +goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical +eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just +beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much +attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out +to embrace the whole of humanity in his goodwill, he will have even +less success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four +sisters at once; and his daily companions--those who see him eat his +bacon and lace his boots and earn his living--will most certainly have a +rough time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your +efforts on quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity +struggle on as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has +hitherto had. + +In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to +go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in +this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of the +group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or your +husband? Not necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who most +frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be your wife. +These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be his butler. +She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you a charming +omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else. Whoever he or she +may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of irritated +superiority, aim at that person in particular. + +The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how +prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at +once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your +excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will +be aware that you have failed in striving. Your successes will appear +effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid +curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of not +wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling that, +if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is being +attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very probably, +almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in fact +doing as you are; some of them--make no doubt--are doing a shade better. +I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill. + + + + + +SEVEN + +THE GIFT OF ONESELF + + +Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories--those who +sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called life; +and those who don't. The second category is much the larger of the two. +Very many people belong to it who think that they belong to the first. +They may deceive themselves, but they cannot deceive a child. Although +you may easily practise upon the credulity of a child in matters of +fact, you cannot cheat his moral and social judgment. He will add you +up, and he will add anybody up, and he will estimate conduct, upon +principles of his own and in a manner terribly impartial. Parents have +no sterner nor more discerning critics than their own children. + +And so you may be polite to a child, and pretend to appreciate his point +of view; but, unless you really do put yourself to the trouble of +understanding him, unless you throw yourself, by the exercise of +imagination, into his world, you will not succeed in being his friend. +To be his friend means an effort on your part, it means that you must +divest yourself of your own mental habit, and, for the time being, adopt +his. And no nice phrases, no gifts of money, sweets or toys, can take +the place of this effort, and this sacrifice of self. With five minutes +of genuine surrender to him, you can win more of his esteem and +gratitude than five hundred pounds would buy. His notion of real +goodwill is the imaginative sharing of his feelings, a convinced +participation in his pains and pleasures. He is well aware that, if you +honestly do this, you will be on his side. + + * * * * * + +Now, adults, of course, are tremendously clever and accomplished persons +and children are no match for them; but still, with all their talents +and omniscience and power, adults seem to lack important pieces of +knowledge which children possess; they seem to forget, and to fail to +profit by, their infantile experience. Else why should adults in general +be so extraordinarily ignorant of the great truth that the secret of +goodwill lies in the sympathetic exercise of the imagination? Since +goodwill is the secret of human happiness, it follows that the secret +of goodwill must be one of the most precious aids to sensible living; +and yet adults, though they once knew it, have gone and forgotten it! +Children may well be excused for concluding that the ways of the adult, +in their capricious irrationality, are past finding out. + +To increase your goodwill for a fellow creature, it is necessary to +imagine that you are he: and nothing else is necessary. This feat is not +easy; but it can be done. Some people have less of the divine faculty of +imagination than others, but nobody is without it, and, like all other +faculties, it improves with use, just as it deteriorates with neglect. +Imagination is a function of the brain. In order to cultivate goodwill +for a person, you must think frequently about that person. You must +inform yourself about all his activities. You must be able in your +mind's eye to follow him hour by hour throughout the day, and you must +ascertain if he sleeps well at night--because this is not a trifle. And +you must reflect upon his existence with the same partiality as you +reflect upon your own. (Why not?) That is to say, you must lay the +fullest stress on his difficulties, disappointments and unhappinesses, +and you must minimise his good fortune. You must magnify his efforts +after righteousness, and forget his failures. You must ever remember +that, after all, he is not to blame for the faults of his character, +which faults, in his case as in yours, are due partly to heredity and +partly to environment. And beyond everything you must always give him +credit for good intentions. Do not you, though sometimes mistakenly, +always act for the best? You know you do! And are you alone among +mortals in rectitude? + + * * * * * + +This mental exercise in relation to another person takes time, and it +involves a fatiguing effort. I repeat that it is not easy. Nor is it +invariably agreeable. You may, indeed, find it tedious, for example, to +picture in vivid detail all the worries that have brought about your +wife's exacerbation--negligent maid, dishonest tradesman, milk in a +thunder storm, hypercritical husband, dirt in the wrong place--but, when +you have faithfully done so, I absolutely defy you to speak to her in +the same tone as you used to employ, and to cherish resentment against +her as you used to do. And I absolutely defy you not to feel less +discontented with yourself than in the past. It is impossible that the +exercise of imagination about a person should not result in goodwill +towards that person. The exercise may put a strain upon you; but its +effect is a scientific certainty. It is the supreme social exercise, for +it is the giving of oneself in the most intimate and complete sense. It +is the suspension of one's individuality in favour of another. It +establishes a new attitude of mind, which, though it may well lead to +specific social acts, is more valuable than any specific act, for it is +ceaselessly translating itself into demeanour. + + * * * * * + +The critic with that terrible English trait, an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, will at this point probably remark to himself, smiling: "I +suppose the time will come, when by dint of regular daily practice, I +shall have achieved perfect goodwill towards the first object of my +attentions. I can then regard that person as 'done.' I can put him on a +shelf, and turn to the next; and, in the end, all my relations, friends +and acquaintances will be 'done' and I can stare at them in a row on the +shelf of my mind, with pride and satisfaction * * *." Except that no +person will ever be quite "done," human nature, still being human, in +spite of the recent advances of civilisation, I do not deprecate this +manner of stating the case. + +The ambitious and resolute man, with an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of +different objects as they were successively achieved. If for example it +was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know +that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by +concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never +acquire any foreign language in absolute perfection. Still, he would +reach a certain stage in a language, and then he would put it aside and +turn to the next one on his programme, and so on. Assuredly, he would +not be ashamed of employing method to reach his end. + +Now all that can be said of the acquirement of foreign languages can be +said of the acquirement of goodwill. In remedying the deficiences of the +heart and character, as in remedying the deficiences of mere knowledge, +the brain is the sole possible instrument, and the best results will be +obtained by using it regularly and scientifically, according to an +arranged method. Why, therefore, if a man be proud of method in +improving his knowledge, should he see something ridiculous in a +deliberate plan for improving his heart--the affair of his heart being +immensely more important, more urgent and more difficult? The reader who +has found even one good answer to the above question, need read no more +of this book, for he will have confounded me and it. + + + + + +EIGHT + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + + +The consequences of the social self-discipline which I have outlined +will be various. A fairly early result will be the gradual decline, and +ultimately the death, of the superior person in oneself. It is true +that the superior person in oneself has nine lives, and is capable of +rising from the dead after even the most fatal blows. But, at worst, +the superior person--(and who among us does not shelter that sinister +inhabitant in his soul?)--will have a very poor time in the soul of him +who steadily practises the imaginative understanding of other people. +In the first place, the mere exercise of the imagination on others +absolutely scotches egotism as long as it lasts, and leaves it weakened +afterwards. And, in the second and more important place, an improved +comprehension of others (which means an intensified sympathy with them) +must destroy the illusion, so widespread, that one's own case is +unique. The amicable study of one's neighbours on the planet inevitably +shows that the same troubles, the same fortitudes, the same feats of +intelligence, the same successes and failures, are constantly happening +everywhere. One can, indeed, see oneself in nearly everybody else, and, +in particular, one is struck by the fact that the quality in which one +took most pride is simply spread abroad throughout humanity in heaps! +It is only in sympathetically contemplating others that one can get +oneself in a true perspective. Yet probably the majority of human +beings never do contemplate others, save with the abstracted gaze which +proves that the gazer sees nothing but his own dream. + + * * * * * + +Another result of the discipline is an immensely increased interest in +one's friends. One regards them even with a sort of proprietary +interest, for, by imagination, one has come into sympathetic possession +of them. Further, one has for them that tender feeling which always +follows the conferring of a benefit, especially the secret conferring of +a benefit. It is the benefactor, not the person benefited, who is +grateful. The benefit which one has conferred is, of course, the gift of +oneself. The resulting emotion is independent of any sympathy rendered +by the other; and where the sympathy is felt to be mutual, friendship +acquires a new significance. The exercise of sympathetic imagination +will cause one to look upon even a relative as a friend--a startling +achievement! It will provide a new excitement and diversion in life. + +When the month of December dawns, there need be no sensation of weary +apprehension about the difficulty of choosing a present that will suit a +friend. Certainly it will not be necessary, from sheer indifference and +ignorance, to invite the friend to choose his own present. On the +contrary, one will be, in secret, so intimate with the friend's +situation and wants and desires, that sundry rival schemes for +pleasuring him will at once offer themselves. And when he receives the +present finally selected, he will have the conviction, always +delightfully flattering to a donee, that he has been the object of a +particular attention and insight. * * * And when the cards of greeting +are despatched, formal phrases will go forth charged, in the +consciousness of the sender, with a genuine meaning, with the force of a +climax, as though the sender had written thereon, in invisible ink: "I +have had you well in mind during the last twelve months; I think I +understand your difficulties and appreciate your efforts better than I +did, and so it is with a peculiar sympathetic knowledge that I wish you +good luck. I have guessed what particular kind of good luck you require, +and I wish accordingly. My wish is not vague and perfunctory only." + + * * * * * + +And on the day of festival itself one feels that one really has +something to celebrate. The occasion has a basis, if it had no basis +for one before; and if a basis previously existed, then it is widened +and strengthened. The festival becomes a public culmination to a private +enterprise. One is not reminded by Christmas of goodwill, because the +enterprise of imaginative sympathy has been a daily affair throughout +the year; but Christmas provides an excuse for taking satisfaction in +the success of the enterprise and new enthusiasm to correct its +failures. The symbolism of the situation of Christmas, at the turn of +the year, develops an added impressiveness, and all the Christmas +customs, apt to produce annoyance in the breasts of the unsentimental, +are accepted with indulgence, even with eagerness, because their +symbolism also is shown in a clearer light. Christmas becomes as +personal as a birthday. One eats and drinks to excess, not because it +is the custom to eat and drink to excess, but from sheer effervescent +faith in an idea. And as one sits with one's friends, possessing them in +the privacy of one's heart, permeated by a sense of the value of +sympathetic comprehension in this formidable adventure of existence on a +planet that rushes eternally through the night of space; assured indeed +that companionship and mutual understanding alone make the adventure +agreeable,--one sees in a flash that Christmas, whatever else it may be, +is and must be the Feast of St. Friend, and a day on that account +supreme among the days of the year. + + * * * * * + +The third and greatest consequence of the systematic cultivation of +goodwill now grows blindingly apparent. To state it earlier in all its +crudity would have been ill-advised; and I purposely refrained from +doing so. It is the augmentation of one's own happiness. The increase of +amity, the diminution of resentment and annoyance, the regular +maintenance of an attitude mildly benevolent towards mankind,--these +things are the surest way to happiness. And it is because they are the +surest way to happiness, that the most enlightened go after them. All +real motives are selfish motives; were it otherwise humanity would be +utterly different from what it is. A man may perform some act which will +benefit another while working some striking injury to himself. But his +reason for doing it is that he prefers the evil of the injury to the +deeper evil of the fundamental dissatisfaction which would torment him +if he did not perform the act. Nobody yet sought the good of another +save as a means to his own good. And it is in accordance with common +sense that this should be so. There is, however, a lower egotism and a +higher. It is the latter which we call unselfishness. And it is the +latter of which Christmas is the celebration. We shall legitimately bear +in mind, therefore, that Christmas, in addition to being the Feast of +St. Friend, is even more profoundly the feast of one's own welfare. + + + + + +NINE + +THE REACTION + + +A reaction sets in between Christmas and the New Year. It is inevitable; +and I should be writing basely if I did not devote to it a full chapter. +In those few dark days of inactivity, between a fete and the resumption +of the implacable daily round, when the weather is usually cynical, and +we are paying in our tissues the fair price of excess, we see life and +the world in a grey and sinister light, which we imagine to be the only +true light. Take the case of the average successful man of thirty-five. +What is he thinking as he lounges about on the day after Christmas? + +His thoughts probably run thus: "Even if I live to a good old age, +which is improbable, as many years lie behind me as before me. I have +lived half my life, and perhaps more than half my life. I have realised +part of my worldly ambition. I have made many good resolutions, and kept +one or two of them in k more or less imperfect manner. I cannot, as a +commonsense person, hope to keep a larger proportion of good resolutions +in the future than I have kept in the past. I have tried to understand +and sympathise with my fellow creatures, and though I have not entirely +failed to do so, I have nearly failed. I am not happy and I am not +content. And if, after all these years, I am neither happy nor content, +what chance is there of my being happy and content in the second half +of my life? The realisation of part of my worldly ambition has not made +me any happier, and, therefore, it is unlikely that the realisation of +the whole of my ambition will make me any happier. My strength cannot +improve; it can only weaken; and my health likewise. I in my turn am +coming to believe--what as a youth I rejected with disdain--namely, that +happiness is what one is not, and content is what one has not. Why, +then, should I go on striving after the impossible? Why should I not let +things slide?" + +Thus reflects the average successful man, and there is not one of us, +successful or unsuccessful, ambitious or unambitious, whose reflections +have not often led him to a conclusion equally dissatisfied. Why should +I or anybody pretend that this is not so? + + * * * * * + +And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest +vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving. +He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine +conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved. Positive though he +may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same +dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue +to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a +fact. It must be accepted. Conduct must be adjusted to it. The struggle +being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be +carried through. It will not end brilliantly, but precautions can be +taken against it ending disgracefully. These precautions consist in the +devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a +series of resolutions: which resolutions are generally made at or +immediately before the beginning of a New Year. Without these the +struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it +is with them. Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than +unorganised effort. + + * * * * * + +A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised: but an ideal cannot +be attained--if it could, it would not be an ideal. The virtue of an +ideal is its unattainability. It seems, when it is first formed, just as +attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a +means to it. After twenty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained. +After forty-eight, it is a little farther off. After a week, it has +receded still further. After a month it is far away; and towards the end +of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is +definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere. And then, such is the +divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse +for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame +in yet another organised effort. Such is the annual circle of the ideal, +the effort, the failure and the shame. A rather pitiful history it may +appear! And yet it is also rather a splendid history! For the failure +and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity +of our faith in ourselves. It is only in comparison with our ideal that +we have fallen low. We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we +should have been if we had not attempted to rise. + + * * * * * + +There are those who will say: "At any rate, we might moderate somewhat +the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that +there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the +achievement. Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common +sense! Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment +caused by sterile endeavour!" It would. But just try to moderate the +ideal and the self-conceit! And you will find, in spite of all your sad +experiences, that you cannot. If there is the stuff of a man in you, you +simply cannot! The truth, is that, in the supreme things, a man does +not act under the rules of earthly common sense. He transcends them, +because there is a quality in him which compels him to do so. Common +sense may persuade him to attempt to keep down the ideal, and +self-conceit may pretend to agree. But all the time, self-conceit will +be whispering: "I can go one better than that." And lo! the ideal is +furtively raised again. + +A man really has little scientific control over the height of his ideal +and the intensity of his belief in himself. He is born with them, as he +is born with a certain pulse and a certain reflex action. He can neglect +the ideal, so that it almost dissolves, but he cannot change its height. +He can maim his belief in himself by persistent abandonment to folly, +but he cannot lower its flame by an effort of the will, as he might +lower the flame of a gas by a calculated turn of the hand. In the secret +and inmost constitution of humanity it is ordained that the disparity +between the aim and the achievement shall seem grotesque; it is ordained +that there shall be an enormous fuss about pretty nearly nothing; it is +ordained that the mountain shall bring forth a mouse. But it is also +ordained that men shall go blithely on just the same, ignoring in +practice the ridiculousness which they admit in theory, and drawing +renewed hope and conceit from some magic, exhaustless source. And this +is the whole philosophy of the New Year's resolution. + + + + + +TEN + +ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + +There are few people who arrive at a true understanding of life, even in +the calm and disillusioned hours of reflection that come between the end +of one annual period and the beginning of another. Nearly everybody has +an idea at the back of his head that if only he could conquer certain +difficulties and embarrassments, he might really start to live properly, +in the full sense of living. And if he has pluck he says to himself: "I +_will_ smooth things out, and then I'll really live." In the same way, +nearly everybody, regarding the spectacle of the world, sees therein a +principle which he calls Evil; and he thinks: "If only we could get rid +of this Evil, if only we could set things right, how splendid the world +would be!" Now, in the meaning usually attached to it, there is no such +positive principle as Evil. Assuming that there is such a positive +principle in a given phenomenon--such as the character of a particular +man--you must then admit that there is the same positive principle +everywhere, for just as the character of no man is so imperfect that you +could not conceive a worse, so the character of no man is so perfect +that you could not conceive a better. Do away with Evil from the world, +and you would not merely abolish certain specially distressing matters, +you would change everything. You would in fact achieve perfection. And +when we say that one thing is evil and another good, all that we mean +is that one thing is less advanced than another in the way of +perfection. Evil cannot therefore be a positive principle; it signifies +only the falling short of perfection. + +And supposing that the desires of mankind were suddenly fulfilled, and +the world was rendered perfect! There would be no motive for effort, no +altercation of conflicting motives in the human heart; nothing to do, no +one to befriend, no anxiety, no want unsatisfied. Equilibrium would be +established. A cheerful world! You can see instantly how amusing it +would be. It would have only one drawback--that of being dead. Its +reason for being alive would have ceased to operate. Life means change +through constant development. But you cannot develop the perfect. The +perfect can merely expire. + +That average successful man whom I have previously cited feels all this +by instinct, though he does not comprehend it by reason. He reaches his +ambition, and retires from the fight in order to enjoy life,--and what +does he then do? He immediately creates for himself a new series of +difficulties and embarrassments, either by undertaking the management of +a large estate, or by some other device. If he does not maintain for +himself conditions which necessitate some kind of struggle, he quickly +dies--spiritually or physically, often both. The proportion of men who, +having established an equilibrium, proceed to die on the spot, is +enormous. Continual effort, which means, of course, continual +disappointment, is the _sine qua non_--without it there is literally +nothing vital. Its abolition is the abolition of life. Hence, people, +who, failing to savour the struggle itself, anticipate the end of the +struggle as the beginning of joy and happiness--these people are simply +missing life; they are longing to exchange life for death. The hemlock +would save them a lot of weary waiting. + + * * * * * + +We shall now perceive, I think, what is wrong with the assumptions of +the average successful man as set forth in the previous chapter. In +postulating that happiness is what one is not, he has got hold of a +mischievous conception of happiness. Let him examine his conception of +happiness, and he will find that it consists in the enjoyment of love +and luxury, and in the freedom from enforced effort. He generally wants +all three ingredients. Now passionate love does not mean happiness; it +means excitement, apprehension and continually renewed desire. And +affectionate love, from which the passion has faded, means something +less than happiness, for, mingled with its gentle tranquility is a +disturbing regret for the more fiery past. Luxury, according to the +universal experience of those who have had it, has no connection +whatever with happiness. And as for freedom from enforced effort, it +means simply death. + +Happiness as it is dreamed of cannot possibly exist save for brief +periods of self-deception which are followed by terrible periods of +reaction. Real, practicable happiness is due primarily not to any kind +of environment, but to an inward state of mind. Real happiness consists +first in acceptance of the fact that discontent is a condition of life, +and, second, in an honest endeavour to adjust conduct to an ideal. Real +happiness is not an affair of the future; it is an affair of the +present. Such as it is, if it cannot be obtained now, it can never be +obtained. Real happiness lives in patience, having comprehended that if +very little is accomplished towards perfection, so a man's existence is +a very little moment in the vast expanse of the universal life, and +having also comprehended that it is the struggle which is vital, and +that the end of the struggle is only another name for death. + + * * * * * + +"Well," I hear you exclaiming, "if this is all we can look forward to, +if this is all that real, practicable happiness amounts to, is life +worth living?" That is a question which each person has to answer for +himself. If he answers it in the negative, no argument, no persuasion, +no sentimentalisation of the facts of life, will make him alter his +opinion. Most people, however, answer it in the affirmative. Despite all +the drawbacks, despite all the endless disappointments, they decide that +life is worth living. There are two species of phenomena which bring +them to this view. The first may be called the golden moments of life, +which seem somehow in their transient brevity to atone for the dull +exasperation of interminable mediocre hours: moments of triumph in the +struggle, moments of fierce exultant resolve; moments of joy in +nature--moments which defy oblivion in the memory, and which, being +priceless, cannot be too dearly bought. + +The second species of compensatory phenomena are all the agreeable +experiences connected with human friendship; the general feeling, under +diverse forms, that one is not alone in the world. It is for the +multiplication and intensification of these phenomena that Christmas, +the Feast of St. Friend, exists. And, on the last day of the year, on +the eve of a renewed effort, our thoughts may profitably be centered +upon a plan of campaign whose execution shall result in a less imperfect +intercourse. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14653 *** diff --git a/14653-h/14653-h.htm b/14653-h/14653-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7d75afd --- /dev/null +++ b/14653-h/14653-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1403 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Feast of St. Friend, by Arnold Bennett</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + .bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + .bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + .br {border-right: solid 2px;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span {display: block; margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em;} + hr.full { width: 100%; } + a:link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:visited {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:hover {color:red} + pre {font-size: 8pt;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14653 ***</div> +<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Feast of St. Friend, by Arnold Bennett</h1> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<h1>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</h1> + +<h2>A CHRISTMAS BOOK</h2> + +<div class="center"> +<a name='image1' id='image1'></a> +<img src='images/image1.png' +alt="text decoration" title="text decoration" /> +</div> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> +<h4>Author of <i>The Old Wives' Tale</i>, +<i>Buried Alive</i>, etc., etc.</h4> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<h6><i>New York</i><br /> +George H. Doran Company</h6> + +<h4>1911</h4> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS" />CONTENTS:</h2> +<div><br /></div> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> + +<div style="margin-left: 25%; margin-right: 25%;"> + + <a href="#ONE"><b>THE FACT</b></a><br /> + <a href="#TWO"><b>THE REASON</b></a><br /> + <a href="#THREE"><b>THE SOLSTICE AND GOODWILL</b></a><br /> + <a href="#FOUR"><b>THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS</b></a><br /> + <a href="#FIVE"><b>DEFENCE OF FEASTING</b></a><br /> + <a href="#SIX"><b>TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL</b></a><br /> + <a href="#SEVEN"><b>THE GIFT OF ONESELF</b></a><br /> + <a href="#EIGHT"><b>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</b></a><br /> + <a href="#NINE"><b>THE REACTION</b></a><br /> + <a href="#TEN"><b>ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR</b></a><br /> + +</div> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="ONE" id="ONE" />ONE<a name="Page_1" id="Page_1" /></h2> + +<h2>THE FACT</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>Something has happened to Christmas, or to our hearts; or to both. In +order to be convinced of this it is only necessary to compare the +present with the past. In the old days of not so long ago the festival +began to excite us in November. For weeks the house rustled with +charming and thrilling secrets, and with the furtive noises of paper +parcels being wrapped and unwrapped; the house was a whispering gallery. +The tension of expectancy increased to such a point that there was a +positive danger of the cord snapping before it ought to snap. On <a name="Page_2" id="Page_2" />the +Eve we went to bed with no hope of settled sleep. We knew that we should +be wakened and kept awake by the waits singing in the cold; and we were +glad to be kept awake so. On the supreme day we came downstairs hiding +delicious yawns, and cordially pretending that we had never been more +fit. The day was different from other days; it had a unique romantic +quality, tonic, curative of all ills. On that day even the tooth-ache +vanished, retiring far into the wilderness with the spiteful word, the +venomous thought, and the unlovely gesture. We sang with gusto +"Christians awake, salute the happy morn." We did salute the happy morn. +And when all the parcels were definitely unpacked, and the secrets of +all hearts disclosed, we spent the rest of the happy morn in waiting, +candidly <a name="Page_3" id="Page_3" />greedy, for the first of the great meals. And then we ate, and +we drank, and we ate again; with no thought of nutrition, nor of +reasonableness, nor of the morrow, nor of dyspepsia. We ate and drank +without fear and without shame, in the sheer, abandoned ecstasy of +celebration. And by means of motley paper headgear, fit only for a +carnival, we disguised ourselves in the most absurd fashions, and yet +did not make ourselves seriously ridiculous; for ridicule is in the +vision, not in what is seen. And we danced and sang and larked, until we +could no more. And finally we chanted a song of ceremony, and separated; +ending the day as we had commenced it, with salvoes of good wishes. And +the next morning we were indisposed and enfeebled; and we did not care; +we suffered gladly; we <a name="Page_4" id="Page_4" />had our pain's worth, and more. This was the +past.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Even today the spirit and rites of ancient Christmas are kept up, more +or less in their full rigour and splendour, by a race of beings that is +scattered over the whole earth. This race, mysterious, masterful, +conservative, imaginative, passionately sincere, arriving from we know +not where, dissolving before our eyes we know not how, has its way in +spite of us. I mean the children. By virtue of the children's faith, the +reindeer are still tramping the sky, and Christmas Day is still +something above and beyond a day of the week; it is a day out of the +week. We have to sit and pretend; and with disillusion in our souls we +do pretend. At Christmas, it is not the <a name="Page_5" id="Page_5" />children who make-believe; it +is ourselves. Who does not remember the first inkling of a suspicion +that Christmas Day was after all a day rather like any other day? In the +house of my memories, it was the immemorial duty of my brother on +Christmas morning, before anything else whatever happened, to sit down +to the organ and perform "Christians Awake" with all possible stops +drawn. He had to do it. Tradition, and the will that emanated from the +best bedroom, combined to force him to do it. One Christmas morning, as +he was preparing the stops, he glanced aside at me with a supercilious +curl of the lips, and the curl of my lips silently answered. It was as +if he had said: "I condescend to this," and as if I had said: "So do I."</p> + +<p>Such a moment comes to most of us <a name="Page_6" id="Page_6" />of this generation. And thenceforward +the change in us is extraordinarily rapid. The next thing we know is +that the institution of waits is a rather annoying survival which at +once deprives us of sleep and takes money out of our pockets. And then +Christmas is gluttony and indigestion and expensiveness and quarter-day, +and Christmas cards are a tax and a nuisance, and present-giving is a +heavier tax and a nuisance. And we feel self-conscious and foolish as we +sing "Auld Lang Syne." And what a blessing it will be when the +"festivities" (as they are misleadingly called) are over, and we can +settle down into commonsense again!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>I do not mean that our hearts are black with despair on Christmas Day.<a name="Page_7" id="Page_7" /> +I do not mean that we do not enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. There is +no doubt that, with the inspiriting help of the mysterious race, and by +the force of tradition, and by our own gift of pretending, we do still +very much enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. What I mean to insinuate, +and to assert, is that beneath this enjoyment is the disconcerting and +distressing conviction of unreality, of non-significance, of exaggerated +and even false sentiment. What I mean is that we have to brace and force +ourselves up to the enjoyment of Christmas. We have to induce +deliberately the "Christmas feeling." We have to remind ourselves that +"it will never do" to let the heartiness of Christmas be impaired. The +peculiarity of our attitude towards Christmas, which at worst is a +vaca<a name="Page_8" id="Page_8" />tion, may be clearly seen by contrasting it with our attitude +towards another vacation—the summer holiday. We do not have to brace +and force ourselves up to the enjoyment of the summer holiday. We +experience no difficulty in inducing the holiday feeling. There is no +fear of the institution of the summer holiday losing its heartiness. Nor +do we need the example of children to aid us in savouring the August +"festivities."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>If any person here breaks in with the statement that I am deceived and +the truth is not in me, and that Christmas stands just where it did in +the esteem of all right-minded people, and that he who casts a doubt on +the heartiness of Christmas is not right-minded, let that person read no +more. This <a name="Page_9" id="Page_9" />book is not written for him. And if any other person, +kindlier, condescendingly protests that there is nothing wrong with +Christmas except my advancing age, let that person read no more. This +book is not written for him, either. It is written for persons who can +look facts cheerfully in the face. That Christmas has lost some of its +magic is a fact that the common sense of the western hemisphere will not +dispute. To blink the fact is infantile. To confront it, to try to +understand it, to reckon with it, and to obviate any evil that may +attach to it—this course alone is meet for an honest man.<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10" /><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="TWO" id="TWO" /><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12" /><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13" />TWO</h2> + +<h2>THE REASON</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>If the decadence of Christmas were a purely subjective phenomenon, +confined to the breasts of those of us who have ceased to be children +then it follows that Christmas has always been decadent, because people +have always been ceasing to be children. It follows also that the +festival was originally got up by disillusioned adults, for the benefit +of the children. Which is totally absurd. Adults have never yet invented +any institution, festival or diversion specially for the benefit of +children. The egoism of adults makes such an effort impos<a name="Page_14" id="Page_14" />sible, and the +ingenuity and pliancy of children make it unnecessary. The pantomime, +for example, which is now pre-eminently a diversion for children, was +created by adults for the amusement of adults. Children have merely +accepted it and appropriated it. Children, being helpless, are of course +fatalists and imitators. They take what comes, and they do the best they +can with it. And when they have made something their own that was adult, +they stick to it like leeches.</p> + +<p>They are terrific Tories, are children; they are even reactionary! They +powerfully object to changes. What they most admire in a pantomime is +the oldest part of it, the only true pantomime—the harlequinade! Hence +the very nature of children is a proof that what Christmas is now to +them, it was <a name="Page_15" id="Page_15" />in the past to their elders. If they now feel and exhibit +faith and enthusiasm in the practice of the festival, be sure that, at +one time, adults felt and exhibited the same faith and enthusiasm—yea, +and more! For in neither faith nor enthusiasm can a child compete with a +convinced adult. No child could believe in anything as passionately as +the modern millionaire believes in money, or as the modern social +reformer believes in the virtue of Acts of Parliament.</p> + +<p>Another and a crowning proof that Christmas has been diminished in our +hearts lies in the fiery lyrical splendour of the old Christmas hymns. +Those hymns were not written by people who made-believe at Christmas for +the pleasure of youngsters. They were <a name="Page_16" id="Page_16" />written by devotees. And this age +could not have produced them.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>No! The decay of the old Christmas spirit among adults is undeniable, +and its cause is fairly plain. It is due to the labours of a set of +idealists—men who cared not for money, nor for glory, nor for anything +except their ideal. Their ideal was to find out the truth concerning +nature and concerning human history; and they sacrificed all—they +sacrificed the peace of mind of whole generations—to the pleasure of +slaking their ardour for truth. For them the most important thing in the +world was the satisfaction of their curiosity. They would leave naught +alone; and they scorned consequences. Useless to cry to them: "That is +holy. Touch it not!" I mean the great philosophers and men <a name="Page_17" id="Page_17" />of +science—especially the geologists—of the nineteenth century. I mean +such utterly pure-minded men as Lyell, Spencer, Darwin and Huxley. They +inaugurated the mighty age of doubt and scepticism. They made it +impossible to believe all manner of things which before them none had +questioned. The movement spread until uneasiness was everywhere in the +realm of thought, and people walked about therein fearsomely, as in a +land subject to earthquakes. It was as if people had said: "We don't +know what will topple next. Let's raze everything to the ground, and +then we shall feel safer." And there came a moment after which nobody +could ever look at a picture of the Nativity in the old way. Pictures of +the Nativity were admired perhaps as much as ever, but for the exquisite +<a name="Page_18" id="Page_18" />beauty of their naïveté, the charm of their old-world simplicity, not +as artistic renderings of fact.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>An age of scepticism has its faults, like any other age, though certain +persons have pretended the contrary. Having been compelled to abandon +its belief in various statements of alleged fact, it lumps principles +and ideals with alleged facts, and hastily decides not to believe in +anything at all. It gives up faith, it despises faith, in spite of the +warning of its greatest philosophers, including Herbert Spencer, that +faith of some sort is necessary to a satisfactory existence in a +universe full of problems which science admits it can never solve. None +were humbler than the foremost scientists about the narrowness of the +field of knowledge, as <a name="Page_19" id="Page_19" />compared with the immeasurability of the field +of faith. But the warning has been ignored, as warnings nearly always +are. Faith is at a discount. And the qualities which go with faith are +at a discount; such as enthusiasm, spontaneity, ebullition, lyricism, +and self-expression in general. Sentimentality is held in such horror +that people are afraid even of sentiment. Their secret cry is: "Give us +something in which we can believe."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>They forget, in their confusion, that the great principles, spiritual +and moral, remain absolutely intact. They forget that, after all the +shattering discoveries of science and conclusions of philosophy, mankind +has still to live with dignity amid hostile nature, and in the presence +of an unknowable <a name="Page_20" id="Page_20" />power and that mankind can only succeed in this +tremendous feat by the exercise of faith and of that mutual goodwill +which is based in sincerity and charity. They forget that, while facts +are nothing, these principles are everything. And so, at that epoch of +the year which nature herself has ordained for the formal recognition of +the situation of mankind in the universe and of its resulting duties to +itself and to the Unknown—at that epoch, they bewail, sadly or +impatiently or cynically: "Oh! The bottom has been knocked out of +Christmas!"</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But the bottom has not been knocked out of Christmas. And people know +it. Somewhere, in the most central and mysterious fastness of their +hearts, they know it. If they were not, in spite of themselves, +convinced of it, why <a name="Page_21" id="Page_21" />should they be so pathetically anxious to keep +alive in themselves, and to foster in their children, the Christmas +spirit? Obviously, a profound instinct is for ever reminding them that, +without the Christmas spirit, they are lost. The forms of faith change, +but the spirit of faith, which is the Christmas spirit, is immortal amid +its endless vicissitudes. At a crisis of change, faith is weakened for +the majority; for the majority it may seem to be dead. It is conserved, +however, in the hearts of the few supremely great and in the hearts of +the simple. The supremely great are hidden from the majority; but the +simple are seen of all men, and them we encourage, often without knowing +why, to be the depositaries of that which we cannot ourselves guard, but +which we dimly feel to be indispensable to our safety.<a name="Page_22" id="Page_22" /><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="THREE" id="THREE" /><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24" /><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25" />THREE</h2> + +<h2>THE SOLSTICE AND GOOD WILL</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>In order to see that there is underlying Christmas an idea of faith +which will at any rate last as long as the planet lasts, it is only +necessary to ask and answer the question: "Why was the Christmas feast +fixed for the twenty-fifth of December?" For it is absolutely certain, +and admitted by everybody of knowledge, that Christ was not born on the +twenty-fifth of December. Those disturbing impassioned inquirers after +truth, who will not leave us peaceful in our ignorance, have settled +that for us, by pointing out, among other things, that the <a name="Page_26" id="Page_26" />twenty-fifth +of December falls in the very midst of the Palestine rainy season, and +that, therefore, shepherds were assuredly not on that date watching +their flocks by night.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Christians were not, at first, united in the celebration of Christmas. +Some kept Christmas in January, others in April, others in May. It was a +pre-Christian force which drove them all into agreement upon the +twenty-fifth of December. Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree +from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from +the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when +mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, +when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when <a name="Page_27" id="Page_27" />the +year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over. No more +suitably symbolic moment could have been chosen for a festival of faith, +goodwill and joy. And the appositeness of the moment is just as perfect +in this era of electric light and central heating, as it was in the era +of Virgil, who, by the way, described a Christmas tree. We shall say +this year, with exactly the same accents of relief and hope as our pagan +ancestors used, and as the woaded savage used: "The days will begin to +lengthen now!" For, while we often falsely fancy that we have subjugated +nature to our service, the fact is that we are as irremediably as ever +at the mercy of nature.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Indeed, the attitude of us moderns towards the forces by which our +exist<a name="Page_28" id="Page_28" />ence is governed ought to be, and probably is, more reverent and +awe-struck than that of the earlier world. The discoveries of science +have at once quickened our imagination and compelled us to admit that +what we know is the merest trifle. The pagan in his ignorance explained +everything. Our knowledge has only deepened the mystery, and all that we +shall learn will but deepen it further. We can explain the solstice. We +are aware with absolute certitude that the solstice and the equinox and +the varying phenomena of the seasons are due to the fact that the plane +of the equator is tilted at a slight angle to the plane of the ecliptic. +When we put on the first overcoat in autumn, and when we give orders to +let the furnace out in spring, we know that we are arranging our lives +in ac<a name="Page_29" id="Page_29" />cordance with that angle. And we are quite duly proud of our +knowledge. And much good does our knowledge do us!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Well, it does do us some good, and in a spiritual way, too! For nobody +can even toy with astronomy without picturing to himself, more clearly +and startlingly than would be otherwise possible, a revolving globe that +whizzes through elemental space around a ball of fire: which, in turn, +is rushing with all its satellites at an inconceivable speed from +nowhere to nowhere; and to the surface of the revolving, whizzing globe +a multitude of living things desperately clinging, and these living +things, in the midst of cataclysmic danger, and between the twin enigmas +of birth and death, quarrelling and hating and calling themselves kings +and <a name="Page_30" id="Page_30" />queens and millionaires and beautiful women and aristocrats and +geniuses and lackeys and superior persons! Perhaps the highest value of +astronomy is that it renders more vivid the ironical significance of +such a vision, and thus brings home to us the truth that in spite of all +the differences which we have invented, mankind is a fellowship of +brothers, overshadowed by insoluble and fearful mysteries, and dependent +upon mutual goodwill and trust for the happiness it may hope to achieve. +* * * Let us remember that Christmas is, among other things, the winter +solstice, and that the bottom has not yet been knocked out of the winter +solstice, nor is likely to be in the immediate future!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>It is a curious fact that the one faith which really does flourish and +wax in <a name="Page_31" id="Page_31" />these days should be faith in the idea of social justice. For +social justice simply means the putting into practice of goodwill and +the recognition of the brotherhood of mankind. Formerly, people were +enthusiastic and altruistic for a theological idea, for a national idea, +for a political idea. You could see men on the rack for the sake of a +dogma; you could see men of a great nation fitting out regiments and +ruining themselves and going forth to save a small nation from +destruction. You could see men giving their lives to the aggrandisement +of an empire. And the men who did these things had the best brains and +the quickest wits and the warmest hearts of their time. But today, +whenever you meet a first-class man who is both enthusiastic and +altruistic, you may be sure that his pet <a name="Page_32" id="Page_32" />scheme is neither theological, +military nor political; you may be sure that he has got into his head +the notion that some class of persons somewhere are not being treated +fairly, are not being treated with fraternal goodwill, and that he is +determined to put the matter right, or perish.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>In England, nearly all the most interesting people are social reformers: +and the only circles of society in which you are not bored, in which +there is real conversation, are the circles of social reform. These +people alone have an abounding and convincing faith. Their faith has, +for example, convinced many of the best literary artists of the day, +with the result that a large proportion of the best modern imaginative +literature has been inspired by the dream of <a name="Page_33" id="Page_33" />social justice. Take away +that idea from the works of H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and George +Bernard Shaw, and there would be exactly nothing left. Despite any +appearance to the contrary, therefore, the idea of universal goodwill is +really alive upon the continents of this planet: more so, indeed, than +any other idea—for the vitality of an idea depends far less on the +numbers of people who hold it than on the quality of the heart and brain +of the people who hold it. Whether the growth of the idea is due to the +spiritual awe and humility which are the consequence of increased +scientific knowledge, I cannot say, and I do not seriously care.<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34" /><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + + +<h2><a name="FOUR" id="FOUR" /><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36" /><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37" />FOUR</h2> + +<h2>THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>"Yes," you say, "I am quite at one with you as to the immense importance +of goodwill in social existence, and I have the same faith in it as you +have. But why a festival? Why eating and drinking and ceremonies? Surely +one can have faith without festivals?"</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The answer is that one cannot; or at least that in practice, one never +does. A disinclination for festivals, a morbid self-conscious fear of +letting oneself go, is a sure sign of lack of faith. If you have not +enough enthusiasm for the <a name="Page_38" id="Page_38" />cult of goodwill to make you positively +desire to celebrate the cult, then your faith is insufficient and needs +fostering by study and meditation. Why, if you decide to found a +sailing-club up your creek, your very first thought is to signalise your +faith in the sailing of those particular waters by a dinner and a +jollity, and you take care that the event shall be an annual one! * * * +You have faith in your wife, and in your affection for her. Surely you +don't need a festival to remind you of that faith, you so superior to +human weaknesses? But you do! You insist on having it. And, if the +festival did not happen, you would feel gloomy and discouraged. A +birthday is a device for recalling to you in a formal and impressive +manner that a certain person still lives and is in need of <a name="Page_39" id="Page_39" />goodwill. It +is a device which experience has proved to be both valuable and +necessary.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Real faith effervesces; it shoots forth in every direction; it +communicates itself. And the inevitable result is a festival. The +festival is anticipated with pleasure, and it is remembered with +pleasure. And thus it reacts stimulatingly on that which gave it birth, +as the vitality of children reacts stimulatingly on the vitality of +parents. It provides a concrete symbol of that which is invisible and +intangible, and mankind is not yet so advanced in the path of spiritual +perfection that we can afford to dispense with concrete symbols. Now, if +we maintain festivals and formalities for the healthy continuance and +honour of a pastime or of a per<a name="Page_40" id="Page_40" />sonal affection, shall we not maintain a +festival—and a mighty one—in behalf of a faith which makes the +corporate human existence bearable amid the menaces and mysteries that +for ever threaten it,—the faith of universal goodwill and mutual +confidence?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>If then, there is to be a festival, why should it not be the festival of +Christmas? It can, indeed, be no other. Christmas is most plainly +indicated. It is dignified and made precious by traditions which go back +much further than the Christian era; and it has this tremendous +advantage—it exists! In spite of our declining faith, it has been +preserved to us, and here it is, ready to hand. Not merely does it fall +at the point which uncounted generations have agreed to consider as the +turn of <a name="Page_41" id="Page_41" />the solar year and as the rebirth of hope! It falls also +immediately before the end of the calendar year, and thus prepares us +for a fresh beginning that shall put the old to shame. It could not be +better timed. Further, its traditional spirit of peace and goodwill is +the very spirit which we desire to foster. And finally its customs—or +at any rate, its main customs—are well designed to symbolize that +spirit. If we have allowed the despatch of Christmas cards to degenerate +into naught but a tedious shuffling of paste-boards and overwork of +post-office officials, the fault is not in the custom but in ourselves. +The custom is a most striking one—so long as we have sufficient +imagination to remember vividly that we are all in the same boat—I +mean, on the same planet—and clinging des<a name="Page_42" id="Page_42" />perately to the flying ball, +and dependent for daily happiness on one another's good will! A +Christmas card sent by one human being to another human being is more +than a piece of coloured stationery sent by one log of wood to another +log of wood: it is an inspiring and reassuring message of high value. +The mischief is that so many self-styled human beings are just logs of +wood, rather stylishly dressed.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And then the custom of present-giving! What better and more convincing +proof of sympathy than a gift? The gift is one of these obvious +contrivances—like the wheel or the lever—which smooth and simplify +earthly life, and the charm of whose utility no obviousness can stale. +But of course any <a name="Page_43" id="Page_43" />contrivance can be rendered futile by clumsiness or +negligence. There is a sort of Christmas giver who says pettishly: "Oh! +I don't know what to give to So-and-So this Christmas! What a bother! I +shall write and tell her to choose something herself, and send the bill +to me!" And he writes. And though he does not suspect it, what he really +writes, and what So-and-So reads, is this: "Dear So-and-So. It is +nothing to me that you and I are alive together on this planet, and in +various ways mutually dependent. But I am bound by custom to give you a +present. I do not, however, take sufficient interest in your life to +know what object it would give you pleasure to possess; and I do not +want to be put to the trouble of finding out, nor of obtaining the +object and transmitting it to you. Will you, <a name="Page_44" id="Page_44" />therefore, buy something +for yourself and send the bill to me. Of course, a sense of social +decency will prevent you from spending more than a small sum, and I +shall be spared all exertion beyond signing a cheque. Yours insincerely +and loggishly * * *." So managed, the contrivance of present-giving +becomes positively sinister in its working. But managed with the +sympathetic imagination which is infallibly produced by real faith in +goodwill, its efficacy may approach the miraculous.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The Christmas ceremony of good-wishing by word of mouth has never been +in any danger of falling into insincerity. Such is the power of +tradition and virtue of a festival, and such the instinctive +brotherliness of men, that on this day the mere sight of an +<a name="Page_45" id="Page_45" />acquaintance will soften the voice and warm the heart of the most +superior sceptic and curmudgeon that the age of disillusion has +produced. In spite of himself, faith flickers up in him again, be it +only for a moment. And, during that moment, he is almost like those +whose bright faith the age has never tarnished, like the great and like +the simple, to whom it is quite unnecessary to offer a defence and +explanation of Christmas or to suggest the basis of a new faith therein.<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46" /><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="FIVE" id="FIVE" /><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48" /><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49" />FIVE</h2> + +<h2>DEFENCE OF FEASTING</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>And now I can hear the superior sceptic disdainfully questioning: "Yes, +but what about the orgy of Christmas? What about all the eating and +drinking?" To which I can only answer that faith causes effervescence, +expansion, joy, and that joy has always, for excellent reasons, been +connected with feasting. The very words 'feast' and 'festival' are +etymologically inseparable. The meal is the most regular and the least +dispensable of daily events; it happens also to be an event which is in +itself almost invariably a source of pleasure, or, at worst, <a name="Page_50" id="Page_50" />of +satisfaction: and it will continue to have this precious quality so long +as our souls are encased in bodies. What could be more natural, +therefore, than that it should be employed, with due enlargement and +ornamentation, as the kernel of the festival? What more logical than +that the meal should be elevated into a feast?</p> + +<p>"But," exclaims the superior sceptic, "this idea involves the idea of +excess!" What if it does? I would not deny it! Assuredly, a feast means +more than enough, and more than enough means excess. It is only because +a feast means excess that it assists in the bringing about of expansion +and joy. Such is human nature, and it is the case of human nature that +we are discussing. Of course, excess usually exacts its toll, within +twenty-<a name="Page_51" id="Page_51" />four hours, especially from the weak. But the benefit is worth +its price. The body pays no more than the debt which the soul has +incurred. An occasional change of habit is essential to well-being, and +every change of habit results in temporary derangement and +inconvenience.</p> + +<p>Do not misunderstand me. Do not push my notion of excess to extremes. +When I defend the excess inevitably incident to a feast, I am not +seeking to prove that a man in celebrating Christmas is entitled to +drink champagne in a public restaurant until he becomes an object of +scorn and disgust to the waiters who have travelled from Switzerland in +order to receive his tips. Much less should I be prepared to justify him +if, in his own home, he sank lower than the hog. Nor would I +sympathetically <a name="Page_52" id="Page_52" />carry him to bed. There is such a thing as excess in +moderation and dignity. Every wise man has practised this. And he who +has not practised it is a fool, and deserves even a harder name. He +ought indeed to inhabit a planet himself, for all his faith in humanity +will be exhausted in believing in himself. * * * So much for the feast!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But the accompaniments of the feast are also excessive. For example, you +make a tug-of-war with your neighbour at table, and the rope is a +fragile packet of tinselled paper, which breaks with a report like a +pistol. You open your half of the packet, and discover some doggerel +verse which you read aloud, and also a perfectly idiotic coloured cap, +which you put on your head <a name="Page_53" id="Page_53" />to the end of looking foolish. And this +ceremony is continued until the whole table is surrounded by +preposterous headgear, and doggerel verse is lying by every plate. +Surely no man in his senses, no woman in hers, would, etc., etc. * * *! +But one of the spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you +beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. +This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly +good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled +that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir +stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the +Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance +which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, <a name="Page_54" id="Page_54" />followed by +further expansion and ecstasy, which ensues after the putting on. +Everybody who has put on a cap is aware that it is a beneficial thing to +put on a cap. Quite apart from the fact that the mysterious and fanciful +race of children are thereby placated and appeased, the soul of the +capped one is purified by this charming excess.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And the Tree! What an excess of the fantastic to pretend that all those +glittering balls, those coloured candles and those variegated parcels +are the blossoms of the absurd tree! How excessively grotesque to tie +all those parcels to the branches, in order to take them off again! +Surely, something less medieval, more ingenious, more modern than this +could be devised—if symbolism is to be indulged in at all! Can <a name="Page_55" id="Page_55" />you +devise it, O sceptical one, revelling in disillusion? Can you invent a +symbol more natural and graceful than the symbol of the Tree? Perhaps +you would have a shop-counter, and shelves behind it, so as to instill +early into the youthful mind that this is a planet of commerce! Perhaps +you would abolish the doggerel of crackers, and substitute therefor +extracts from the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin! Perhaps you would +exchange the caps for blazonry embroidered with chemical formula, your +object being the advancement of science! Perhaps you would do away with +the orgiastic eating and drinking, and arrange for a formal conversation +about astronomy and the idea of human fraternity, upon strictly +reasonable rations of shredded wheat! You would thus create an <a name="Page_56" id="Page_56" />original +festival, and eliminate all fear of a dyspeptic morrow. You would +improve the mind. And you would avoid the ridiculous. But also, in +avoiding the ridiculous, you would tumble into the ridiculous, deeply +and hopelessly! And think how your very original festival would delight +the participators, how they would look forward to it with joy, and back +upon it with pleasurable regret; how their minds would dwell sweetly +upon the conception of shredded wheat, and how their faith would be +encouraged and strengthened by the intellectuality of the formal +conversation!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>He who girds at an ancient established festival should reflect upon +sundry obvious truths before he withers up the said festival by the +sirocco of his <a name="Page_57" id="Page_57" />contempt. These truths are as follows:—First, a +festival, though based upon intelligence, is not an affair of the +intellect, but an affair of the emotions. Second, the human soul can +only be reached through the human body. Third, it is impossible to +replace an ancient festival by a new one. Robespierre, amongst others, +tried to do so, and achieved the absurd. Reformers, heralds of new +faiths, and rejuvenators of old faiths, have always, when they +succeeded, adopted an ancient festival, with all or most of its forms, +and been content to breathe into it a new spirit to replace the old +spirit which had vanished or was vanishing. Anybody who, persuaded that +Christmas is not what it was, feels that a festival must nevertheless be +preserved, will do well to follow this example. To be <a name="Page_58" id="Page_58" />content with the +old forms and to vitalize them: that is the problem. Solve it, and the +forms will soon begin to adapt themselves to the process of +vitalization. All history is a witness in proof.<a name="Page_59" id="Page_59" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="SIX" id="SIX" /><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60" /><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61" />SIX</h2> + +<h2>TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>It being agreed, then, that the Christmas festival has lost a great deal +of its old vitality, and that, to many people, it is a source of tedium +and the cause of insincerity; and it being further agreed that the +difficulty cannot be got over by simply abolishing the festival, as no +one really wants it to be abolished; the question remains—what should +be done to vitalize it? The former spirit of faith, the spirit which +made the great Christmas of the golden days, has been weakened; but one +element of it—that which is founded on the conviction that goodwill +among <a name="Page_62" id="Page_62" />men is a prime necessity of reasonable living—survives with a +certain vigour, though even it has not escaped the general scepticism of +the age. This element unites in agreement all the pugnacious sectaries +who join battle over the other elements of the former faith. This +element has no enemies. None will deny its lasting virtue. Obviously, +therefore, the right course is to concentrate on the cultivation of +goodwill. If goodwill can be consciously increased, the festival of +Christmas will cease to be perfunctory. It will acquire a fresh and more +genuine significance, which, however, will not in any way inconvenience +those who have never let go of the older significance. No tradition will +be overthrown, no shock administered, and nobody will be able to croak +about iconoclasm and <a name="Page_63" id="Page_63" />new-fangled notions and the sudden end of the +world, and so on.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The fancy of some people will at once run to the formation of a grand +international Society for the revivifying of Christmas by the +cultivation of goodwill, with branches in all the chief cities of Europe +and America, and headquarters—of course at the Hague; and committees +and subcommittees, and presidents and vice-presidents; and honorary +secretaries and secretaries paid; and quarterly and annual meetings, and +triennial congresses! And a literary organ or two! And a +badge—naturally a badge, designed by a famous artist in harmonious +tints!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But my fancy does not run at all in this direction. I am convinced that +we <a name="Page_64" id="Page_64" />have already far too many societies for the furtherance of our ends. +To my mind, most societies with a moral aim are merely clumsy machines +for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense and +inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a group +of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very +wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some act +which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate goodwill +in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for saying +your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of performing +acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it necessary to +involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover, a society +means fuss and <a name="Page_65" id="Page_65" />shouting: two species of disturbance which are both +futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of morals.</p> + +<p>You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by +cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task +of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be +time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other +people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that +this is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you +have bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will +appreciate also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, +indeed, should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your +admirable intentions? Rest assured <a name="Page_66" id="Page_66" />that any unusual sprouting of the +desired crop will be instantly noticed by the persons interested.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill? +Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the +whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but a +magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate +goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of +goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical +eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just +beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much +attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out +to embrace the whole of <a name="Page_67" id="Page_67" />humanity in his goodwill, he will have even +less success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four +sisters at once; and his daily companions—those who see him eat his +bacon and lace his boots and earn his living—will most certainly have a +rough time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your +efforts on quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity +struggle on as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has +hitherto had.</p> + +<p>In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to +go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in +this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of the +group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or your +husband? Not <a name="Page_68" id="Page_68" />necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who most +frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be your wife. +These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be his butler. +She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you a charming +omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else. Whoever he or she +may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of irritated +superiority, aim at that person in particular.</p> + +<p>The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how +prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at +once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your +excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will +be aware that you have failed <a name="Page_69" id="Page_69" />in striving. Your successes will appear +effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid +curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of not +wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling that, +if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is being +attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very probably, +almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in fact +doing as you are; some of them—make no doubt—are doing a shade better. +I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill.<a name="Page_70" id="Page_70" /><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="SEVEN" id="SEVEN" /><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72" /><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73" />SEVEN</h2> + +<h2>THE GIFT OF ONESELF</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories—those who +sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called life; +and those who don't. The second category is much the larger of the two. +Very many people belong to it who think that they belong to the first. +They may deceive themselves, but they cannot deceive a child. Although +you may easily practise upon the credulity of a child in matters of +fact, you cannot cheat his moral and social judgment. He will add you +up, and he will add anybody up, and he will estimate con<a name="Page_74" id="Page_74" />duct, upon +principles of his own and in a manner terribly impartial. Parents have +no sterner nor more discerning critics than their own children.</p> + +<p>And so you may be polite to a child, and pretend to appreciate his point +of view; but, unless you really do put yourself to the trouble of +understanding him, unless you throw yourself, by the exercise of +imagination, into his world, you will not succeed in being his friend. +To be his friend means an effort on your part, it means that you must +divest yourself of your own mental habit, and, for the time being, adopt +his. And no nice phrases, no gifts of money, sweets or toys, can take +the place of this effort, and this sacrifice of self. With five minutes +of genuine surrender to him, you can win more of his esteem and +gratitude than five hun<a name="Page_75" id="Page_75" />dred pounds would buy. His notion of real +goodwill is the imaginative sharing of his feelings, a convinced +participation in his pains and pleasures. He is well aware that, if you +honestly do this, you will be on his side.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Now, adults, of course, are tremendously clever and accomplished persons +and children are no match for them; but still, with all their talents +and omniscience and power, adults seem to lack important pieces of +knowledge which children possess; they seem to forget, and to fail to +profit by, their infantile experience. Else why should adults in general +be so extraordinarily ignorant of the great truth that the secret of +goodwill lies in the sympathetic exercise of the imagination? Since +goodwill is the secret of human happi<a name="Page_76" id="Page_76" />ness, it follows that the secret +of goodwill must be one of the most precious aids to sensible living; +and yet adults, though they once knew it, have gone and forgotten it! +Children may well be excused for concluding that the ways of the adult, +in their capricious irrationality, are past finding out.</p> + +<p>To increase your goodwill for a fellow creature, it is necessary to +imagine that you are he: and nothing else is necessary. This feat is not +easy; but it can be done. Some people have less of the divine faculty of +imagination than others, but nobody is without it, and, like all other +faculties, it improves with use, just as it deteriorates with neglect. +Imagination is a function of the brain. In order to cultivate goodwill +for a person, you must think frequently about that person. You must +in<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77" />form yourself about all his activities. You must be able in your +mind's eye to follow him hour by hour throughout the day, and you must +ascertain if he sleeps well at night—because this is not a trifle. And +you must reflect upon his existence with the same partiality as you +reflect upon your own. (Why not?) That is to say, you must lay the +fullest stress on his difficulties, disappointments and unhappinesses, +and you must minimise his good fortune. You must magnify his efforts +after righteousness, and forget his failures. You must ever remember +that, after all, he is not to blame for the faults of his character, +which faults, in his case as in yours, are due partly to heredity and +partly to environment. And beyond everything you must always give him +credit for good intentions. Do not you, <a name="Page_78" id="Page_78" />though sometimes mistakenly, +always act for the best? You know you do! And are you alone among +mortals in rectitude?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>This mental exercise in relation to another person takes time, and it +involves a fatiguing effort. I repeat that it is not easy. Nor is it +invariably agreeable. You may, indeed, find it tedious, for example, to +picture in vivid detail all the worries that have brought about your +wife's exacerbation—negligent maid, dishonest tradesman, milk in a +thunder storm, hypercritical husband, dirt in the wrong place—but, when +you have faithfully done so, I absolutely defy you to speak to her in +the same tone as you used to employ, and to cherish resentment against +her as you used to do. And I absolutely <a name="Page_79" id="Page_79" />defy you not to feel less +discontented with yourself than in the past. It is impossible that the +exercise of imagination about a person should not result in goodwill +towards that person. The exercise may put a strain upon you; but its +effect is a scientific certainty. It is the supreme social exercise, for +it is the giving of oneself in the most intimate and complete sense. It +is the suspension of one's individuality in favour of another. It +establishes a new attitude of mind, which, though it may well lead to +specific social acts, is more valuable than any specific act, for it is +ceaselessly translating itself into demeanour.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The critic with that terrible English trait, an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, will at this point probably re<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80" />mark to himself, smiling: "I +suppose the time will come, when by dint of regular daily practice, I +shall have achieved perfect goodwill towards the first object of my +attentions. I can then regard that person as 'done.' I can put him on a +shelf, and turn to the next; and, in the end, all my relations, friends +and acquaintances will be 'done' and I can stare at them in a row on the +shelf of my mind, with pride and satisfaction * * *." Except that no +person will ever be quite "done," human nature, still being human, in +spite of the recent advances of civilisation, I do not deprecate this +manner of stating the case.</p> + +<p>The ambitious and resolute man, with an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of +different ob<a name="Page_81" id="Page_81" />jects as they were successively achieved. If for example it +was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know +that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by +concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never +acquire any foreign language in absolute perfection. Still, he would +reach a certain stage in a language, and then he would put it aside and +turn to the next one on his programme, and so on. Assuredly, he would +not be ashamed of employing method to reach his end.</p> + +<p>Now all that can be said of the acquirement of foreign languages can be +said of the acquirement of goodwill. In remedying the deficiences of the +heart and character, as in remedying the deficiences of mere knowledge, +the brain is the sole possible instrument, <a name="Page_82" id="Page_82" />and the best results will be +obtained by using it regularly and scientifically, according to an +arranged method. Why, therefore, if a man be proud of method in +improving his knowledge, should he see something ridiculous in a +deliberate plan for improving his heart—the affair of his heart being +immensely more important, more urgent and more difficult? The reader who +has found even one good answer to the above question, need read no more +of this book, for he will have confounded me and it.<a name="Page_83" id="Page_83" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="EIGHT" id="EIGHT" /><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84" /><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85" />EIGHT</h2> + +<h2>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>The consequences of the social self-discipline which I have outlined +will be various. A fairly early result will be the gradual decline, and +ultimately the death, of the superior person in oneself. It is true that +the superior person in oneself has nine lives, and is capable of rising +from the dead after even the most fatal blows. But, at worst, the +superior person—(and who among us does not shelter that sinister +inhabitant in his soul?)—will have a very poor time in the soul of him +who steadily practises the imaginative understanding of other people. In +the first place, <a name="Page_86" id="Page_86" />the mere exercise of the imagination on others +absolutely scotches egotism as long as it lasts, and leaves it weakened +afterwards. And, in the second and more important place, an improved +comprehension of others (which means an intensified sympathy with them) +must destroy the illusion, so widespread, that one's own case is unique. +The amicable study of one's neighbours on the planet inevitably shows +that the same troubles, the same fortitudes, the same +feats of intelligence, the same successes and failures, are constantly +happening everywhere. One can, indeed, see oneself in nearly everybody +else, and, in particular, one is struck by the fact that the quality in +which one took most pride is simply spread abroad throughout humanity in +heaps! It is only in sympathetically contemplating others that one can +get <a name="Page_87" id="Page_87" />oneself in a true perspective. Yet probably the majority of human +beings never do contemplate others, save with the abstracted gaze which +proves that the gazer sees nothing but his own dream.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Another result of the discipline is an immensely increased interest in +one's friends. One regards them even with a sort of proprietary +interest, for, by imagination, one has come into sympathetic possession +of them. Further, one has for them that tender feeling which always +follows the conferring of a benefit, especially the secret conferring of +a benefit. It is the benefactor, not the person benefited, who is +grateful. The benefit which one has conferred is, of course, the gift of +oneself. The resulting emotion is independent of any sympathy rendered +by the other; <a name="Page_88" id="Page_88" />and where the sympathy is felt to be mutual, friendship +acquires a new significance. The exercise of sympathetic imagination +will cause one to look upon even a relative as a friend—a startling +achievement! It will provide a new excitement and diversion in life.</p> + +<p>When the month of December dawns, there need be no sensation of weary +apprehension about the difficulty of choosing a present that will suit a +friend. Certainly it will not be necessary, from sheer indifference and +ignorance, to invite the friend to choose his own present. On the +contrary, one will be, in secret, so intimate with the friend's +situation and wants and desires, that sundry rival schemes for +pleasuring him will at once offer themselves. And when he receives the +present finally selected, he will have the conviction, always +delightfully flattering <a name="Page_89" id="Page_89" />to a donee, that he has been the object of a +particular attention and insight. * * * And when the cards of greeting +are despatched, formal phrases will go forth charged, in the +consciousness of the sender, with a genuine meaning, with the force of a +climax, as though the sender had written thereon, in invisible ink: "I +have had you well in mind during the last twelve months; I think I +understand your difficulties and appreciate your efforts better than I +did, and so it is with a peculiar sympathetic knowledge that I wish you +good luck. I have guessed what particular kind of good luck you require, +and I wish accordingly. My wish is not vague and perfunctory only."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And on the day of festival itself one feels that one really has +something to <a name="Page_90" id="Page_90" />celebrate. The occasion has a basis, if it had no basis +for one before; and if a basis previously existed, then it is widened +and strengthened. The festival becomes a public culmination to a private +enterprise. One is not reminded by Christmas of goodwill, because the +enterprise of imaginative sympathy has been a daily affair throughout +the year; but Christmas provides an excuse for taking satisfaction in +the success of the enterprise and new enthusiasm to correct its +failures. The symbolism of the situation of Christmas, at the turn of +the year, develops an added impressiveness, and all the Christmas +customs, apt to produce annoyance in the breasts of the unsentimental, +are accepted with indulgence, even with eagerness, because their +symbolism also is shown in a clearer light. Christmas becomes as +<a name="Page_91" id="Page_91" />personal as a birthday. One eats and drinks to excess, not because it +is the custom to eat and drink to excess, but from sheer effervescent +faith in an idea. And as one sits with one's friends, possessing them in +the privacy of one's heart, permeated by a sense of the value of +sympathetic comprehension in this formidable adventure of existence on a +planet that rushes eternally through the night of space; assured indeed +that companionship and mutual understanding alone make the adventure +agreeable,—one sees in a flash that Christmas, whatever else it may be, +is and must be the Feast of St. Friend, and a day on that account +supreme among the days of the year.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The third and greatest consequence of the systematic cultivation of +<a name="Page_92" id="Page_92" />goodwill now grows blindingly apparent. To state it earlier in all its +crudity would have been ill-advised; and I purposely refrained from +doing so. It is the augmentation of one's own happiness. The increase of +amity, the diminution of resentment and annoyance, the regular +maintenance of an attitude mildly benevolent towards mankind,—these +things are the surest way to happiness. And it is because they are the +surest way to happiness, that the most enlightened go after them. All +real motives are selfish motives; were it otherwise humanity would be +utterly different from what it is. A man may perform some act which will +benefit another while working some striking injury to himself. But his +reason for doing it is that he prefers the evil of the injury to the +deeper evil of the <a name="Page_93" id="Page_93" />fundamental dissatisfaction which would torment him +if he did not perform the act. Nobody yet sought the good of another +save as a means to his own good. And it is in accordance with common +sense that this should be so. There is, however, a lower egotism and a +higher. It is the latter which we call unselfishness. And it is the +latter of which Christmas is the celebration. We shall legitimately bear +in mind, therefore, that Christmas, in addition to being the Feast of +St. Friend, is even more profoundly the feast of one's own welfare.<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94" /><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + + +<h2><a name="NINE" id="NINE" /><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96" /><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97" />NINE</h2> + +<h2>THE REACTION</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>A reaction sets in between Christmas and the New Year. It is inevitable; +and I should be writing basely if I did not devote to it a full chapter. +In those few dark days of inactivity, between a fete and the resumption +of the implacable daily round, when the weather is usually cynical, and +we are paying in our tissues the fair price of excess, we see life and +the world in a grey and sinister light, which we imagine to be the only +true light. Take the case of the average successful man of thirty-five. +What is he thinking as he lounges about on the day after Christmas?</p> + +<p><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98" />His thoughts probably run thus: "Even if I live to a good old age, +which is improbable, as many years lie behind me as before me. I have +lived half my life, and perhaps more than half my life. I have realised +part of my worldly ambition. I have made many good resolutions, and kept +one or two of them in k more or less imperfect manner. I cannot, as a +commonsense person, hope to keep a larger proportion of good resolutions +in the future than I have kept in the past. I have tried to understand +and sympathise with my fellow creatures, and though I have not entirely +failed to do so, I have nearly failed. I am not happy and I am not +content. And if, after all these years, I am neither happy nor content, +what chance is there of my being happy and <a name="Page_99" id="Page_99" />content in the second half +of my life? The realisation of part of my worldly ambition has not made +me any happier, and, therefore, it is unlikely that the realisation of +the whole of my ambition will make me any happier. My strength cannot +improve; it can only weaken; and my health likewise. I in my turn am +coming to believe—what as a youth I rejected with disdain—namely, that +happiness is what one is not, and content is what one has not. Why, +then, should I go on striving after the impossible? Why should I not let +things slide?"</p> + +<p>Thus reflects the average successful man, and there is not one of us, +successful or unsuccessful, ambitious or unambitious, whose reflections +have not often led him to a conclusion equally dis<a name="Page_100" id="Page_100" />satisfied. Why should +I or anybody pretend that this is not so?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest +vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving. +He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine +conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved. Positive though he +may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same +dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue +to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a +fact. It must be accepted. Conduct must be adjusted to it. The struggle +being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be +carried through. It will not end brilliantly, but precautions <a name="Page_101" id="Page_101" />can be +taken against it ending disgracefully. These precautions consist in the +devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a +series of resolutions: which resolutions are generally made at or +immediately before the beginning of a New Year. Without these the +struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it +is with them. Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than +unorganised effort.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised: but an ideal cannot +be attained—if it could, it would not be an ideal. The virtue of an +ideal is its unattainability. It seems, when it is first formed, just as +attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a +means to it. After twen<a name="Page_102" id="Page_102" />ty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained. +After forty-eight, it is a little farther off. After a week, it has +receded still further. After a month it is far away; and towards the end +of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is +definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere. And then, such is the +divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse +for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame +in yet another organised effort. Such is the annual circle of the ideal, +the effort, the failure and the shame. A rather pitiful history it may +appear! And yet it is also rather a splendid history! For the failure +and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity +of our faith in ourselves. It is only in com<a name="Page_103" id="Page_103" />parison with our ideal that +we have fallen low. We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we +should have been if we had not attempted to rise.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>There are those who will say: "At any rate, we might moderate somewhat +the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that +there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the +achievement. Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common +sense! Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment +caused by sterile endeavour!" It would. But just try to moderate the +ideal and the self-conceit! And you will find, in spite of all your sad +experiences, that you cannot. If there is the stuff of a man in you, you +<a name="Page_104" id="Page_104" />simply cannot! The truth, is that, in the supreme things, a man does +not act under the rules of earthly common sense. He transcends them, +because there is a quality in him which compels him to do so. Common +sense may persuade him to attempt to keep down the ideal, and +self-conceit may pretend to agree. But all the time, self-conceit will +be whispering: "I can go one better than that." And lo! the ideal is +furtively raised again.</p> + +<p>A man really has little scientific control over the height of his ideal +and the intensity of his belief in himself. He is born with them, as he +is born with a certain pulse and a certain reflex action. He can neglect +the ideal, so that it almost dissolves, but he cannot change its height. +He can maim his belief in himself by persistent abandon<a name="Page_105" id="Page_105" />ment to folly, +but he cannot lower its flame by an effort of the will, as he might +lower the flame of a gas by a calculated turn of the hand. In the secret +and inmost constitution of humanity it is ordained that the disparity +between the aim and the achievement shall seem grotesque; it is ordained +that there shall be an enormous fuss about pretty nearly nothing; it is +ordained that the mountain shall bring forth a mouse. But it is also +ordained that men shall go blithely on just the same, ignoring in +practice the ridiculousness which they admit in theory, and drawing +renewed hope and conceit from some magic, exhaustless source. And this +is the whole philosophy of the New Year's resolution.<a name="Page_106" id="Page_106" /><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="TEN" id="TEN" /><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108" /><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109" />TEN</h2> + +<h2>ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>There are few people who arrive at a true understanding of life, even in +the calm and disillusioned hours of reflection that come between the end +of one annual period and the beginning of another. Nearly everybody has +an idea at the back of his head that if only he could conquer certain +difficulties and embarrassments, he might really start to live properly, +in the full sense of living. And if he has pluck he says to himself: "I +<i>will</i> smooth things out, and then I'll really live." In the same way, +nearly everybody, regarding the spectacle of the world, sees therein a +<a name="Page_110" id="Page_110" />principle which he calls Evil; and he thinks: "If only we could get rid +of this Evil, if only we could set things right, how splendid the world +would be!" Now, in the meaning usually attached to it, there is no such +positive principle as Evil. Assuming that there is such a positive +principle in a given phenomenon—such as the character of a particular +man—you must then admit that there is the same positive principle +everywhere, for just as the character of no man is so imperfect that you +could not conceive a worse, so the character of no man is so perfect +that you could not conceive a better. Do away with Evil from the world, +and you would not merely abolish certain specially distressing matters, +you would change everything. You would in fact achieve perfection. And +when we say <a name="Page_111" id="Page_111" />that one thing is evil and another good, all that we mean +is that one thing is less advanced than another in the way of +perfection. Evil cannot therefore be a positive principle; it signifies +only the falling short of perfection.</p> + +<p>And supposing that the desires of mankind were suddenly fulfilled, and +the world was rendered perfect! There would be no motive for effort, no +altercation of conflicting motives in the human heart; nothing to do, no +one to befriend, no anxiety, no want unsatisfied. Equilibrium would be +established. A cheerful world! You can see instantly how amusing it +would be. It would have only one drawback—that of being dead. Its +reason for being alive would have ceased to operate. Life means change +through constant development. But you cannot develop the perfect. The +perfect can merely expire.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112" />That average successful man whom I have previously cited feels all this +by instinct, though he does not comprehend it by reason. He reaches his +ambition, and retires from the fight in order to enjoy life,—and what +does he then do? He immediately creates for himself a new series of +difficulties and embarrassments, either by undertaking the management of +a large estate, or by some other device. If he does not maintain for +himself conditions which necessitate some kind of struggle, he quickly +dies—spiritually or physically, often both. The proportion of men who, +having established an equilibrium, proceed to die on the spot, is +enormous. Continual effort, which means, of course, continual +disappointment, is the <i>sine qua non</i>—without it there is literally +nothing vital. Its abolition is the abol<a name="Page_113" id="Page_113" />ition of life. Hence, people, +who, failing to savour the struggle itself, anticipate the end of the +struggle as the beginning of joy and happiness—these people are simply +missing life; they are longing to exchange life for death. The hemlock +would save them a lot of weary waiting.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>We shall now perceive, I think, what is wrong with the assumptions of +the average successful man as set forth in the previous chapter. In +postulating that happiness is what one is not, he has got hold of a +mischievous conception of happiness. Let him examine his conception of +happiness, and he will find that it consists in the enjoyment of love +and luxury, and in the freedom from enforced effort. He generally wants +all three ingredients. Now pas<a name="Page_114" id="Page_114" />sionate love does not mean happiness; it +means excitement, apprehension and continually renewed desire. And +affectionate love, from which the passion has faded, means something +less than happiness, for, mingled with its gentle tranquility is a +disturbing regret for the more fiery past. Luxury, according to the +universal experience of those who have had it, has no connection +whatever with happiness. And as for freedom from enforced effort, it +means simply death.</p> + +<p>Happiness as it is dreamed of cannot possibly exist save for brief +periods of self-deception which are followed by terrible periods of +reaction. Real, practicable happiness is due primarily not to any kind +of environment, but to an inward state of mind. Real happiness consists +first in acceptance of the <a name="Page_115" id="Page_115" />fact that discontent is a condition of life, +and, second, in an honest endeavour to adjust conduct to an ideal. Real +happiness is not an affair of the future; it is an affair of the +present. Such as it is, if it cannot be obtained now, it can never be +obtained. Real happiness lives in patience, having comprehended that if +very little is accomplished towards perfection, so a man's existence is +a very little moment in the vast expanse of the universal life, and +having also comprehended that it is the struggle which is vital, and +that the end of the struggle is only another name for death.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>"Well," I hear you exclaiming, "if this is all we can look forward to, +if this is all that real, practicable happiness amounts to, is life +worth living?" That <a name="Page_116" id="Page_116" />is a question which each person has to answer for +himself. If he answers it in the negative, no argument, no persuasion, +no sentimentalisation of the facts of life, will make him alter his +opinion. Most people, however, answer it in the affirmative. Despite all +the drawbacks, despite all the endless disappointments, they decide that +life is worth living. There are two species of phenomena which bring +them to this view. The first may be called the golden moments of life, +which seem somehow in their transient brevity to atone for the dull +exasperation of interminable mediocre hours: moments of triumph in the +struggle, moments of fierce exultant resolve; moments of joy in +nature—moments which defy oblivion in the memory, and which, being +priceless, cannot be too dearly bought.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117" />The second species of compensatory phenomena are all the agreeable +experiences connected with human friendship; the general feeling, under +diverse forms, that one is not alone in the world. It is for the +multiplication and intensification of these phenomena that Christmas, +the Feast of St. Friend, exists. And, on the last day of the year, on +the eve of a renewed effort, our thoughts may profitably be centered +upon a plan of campaign whose execution shall result in a less imperfect +intercourse.</p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<p> </p> +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14653 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/14653-h/images/image1.png b/14653-h/images/image1.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a314aaf --- /dev/null +++ b/14653-h/images/image1.png diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f77bf1d --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #14653 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14653) diff --git a/old/14653-8.txt b/old/14653-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4ee9d8f --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14653-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1626 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Feast of St. Friend, by Arnold Bennett + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Feast of St. Friend + +Author: Arnold Bennett + +Release Date: January 10, 2005 [eBook #14653] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND*** + + +E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Project Gutenberg Beginners +Projects, Melissa Er-Raqabi, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed +Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) + + + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + +A Christmas Book + +by + +ARNOLD BENNETT + +Author of _The Old Wives' Tale_, _Buried Alive_, etc., etc. + +New York +George H. Doran Company + +1911 + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER + + I. THE FACT + II. THE REASON + III. THE SOLSTICE AND GOODWILL + IV. THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + V. DEFENCE OF FEASTING + VI. TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + VII. THE GIFT OF ONESELF +VIII. THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + IX. THE REACTION + X. ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + + + + +ONE + +THE FACT + + +Something has happened to Christmas, or to our hearts; or to both. In +order to be convinced of this it is only necessary to compare the +present with the past. In the old days of not so long ago the festival +began to excite us in November. For weeks the house rustled with +charming and thrilling secrets, and with the furtive noises of paper +parcels being wrapped and unwrapped; the house was a whispering gallery. +The tension of expectancy increased to such a point that there was a +positive danger of the cord snapping before it ought to snap. On the +Eve we went to bed with no hope of settled sleep. We knew that we should +be wakened and kept awake by the waits singing in the cold; and we were +glad to be kept awake so. On the supreme day we came downstairs hiding +delicious yawns, and cordially pretending that we had never been more +fit. The day was different from other days; it had a unique romantic +quality, tonic, curative of all ills. On that day even the tooth-ache +vanished, retiring far into the wilderness with the spiteful word, the +venomous thought, and the unlovely gesture. We sang with gusto +"Christians awake, salute the happy morn." We did salute the happy morn. +And when all the parcels were definitely unpacked, and the secrets of +all hearts disclosed, we spent the rest of the happy morn in waiting, +candidly greedy, for the first of the great meals. And then we ate, and +we drank, and we ate again; with no thought of nutrition, nor of +reasonableness, nor of the morrow, nor of dyspepsia. We ate and drank +without fear and without shame, in the sheer, abandoned ecstasy of +celebration. And by means of motley paper headgear, fit only for a +carnival, we disguised ourselves in the most absurd fashions, and yet +did not make ourselves seriously ridiculous; for ridicule is in the +vision, not in what is seen. And we danced and sang and larked, until we +could no more. And finally we chanted a song of ceremony, and separated; +ending the day as we had commenced it, with salvoes of good wishes. And +the next morning we were indisposed and enfeebled; and we did not care; +we suffered gladly; we had our pain's worth, and more. This was the +past. + + * * * * * + +Even today the spirit and rites of ancient Christmas are kept up, more +or less in their full rigour and splendour, by a race of beings that is +scattered over the whole earth. This race, mysterious, masterful, +conservative, imaginative, passionately sincere, arriving from we know +not where, dissolving before our eyes we know not how, has its way in +spite of us. I mean the children. By virtue of the children's faith, the +reindeer are still tramping the sky, and Christmas Day is still +something above and beyond a day of the week; it is a day out of the +week. We have to sit and pretend; and with disillusion in our souls we +do pretend. At Christmas, it is not the children who make-believe; it +is ourselves. Who does not remember the first inkling of a suspicion +that Christmas Day was after all a day rather like any other day? In the +house of my memories, it was the immemorial duty of my brother on +Christmas morning, before anything else whatever happened, to sit down +to the organ and perform "Christians Awake" with all possible stops +drawn. He had to do it. Tradition, and the will that emanated from the +best bedroom, combined to force him to do it. One Christmas morning, as +he was preparing the stops, he glanced aside at me with a supercilious +curl of the lips, and the curl of my lips silently answered. It was as +if he had said: "I condescend to this," and as if I had said: "So do I." + +Such a moment comes to most of us of this generation. And thenceforward +the change in us is extraordinarily rapid. The next thing we know is +that the institution of waits is a rather annoying survival which at +once deprives us of sleep and takes money out of our pockets. And then +Christmas is gluttony and indigestion and expensiveness and quarter-day, +and Christmas cards are a tax and a nuisance, and present-giving is a +heavier tax and a nuisance. And we feel self-conscious and foolish as we +sing "Auld Lang Syne." And what a blessing it will be when the +"festivities" (as they are misleadingly called) are over, and we can +settle down into commonsense again! + + * * * * * + +I do not mean that our hearts are black with despair on Christmas Day. +I do not mean that we do not enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. There is +no doubt that, with the inspiriting help of the mysterious race, and by +the force of tradition, and by our own gift of pretending, we do still +very much enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. What I mean to insinuate, +and to assert, is that beneath this enjoyment is the disconcerting and +distressing conviction of unreality, of non-significance, of exaggerated +and even false sentiment. What I mean is that we have to brace and force +ourselves up to the enjoyment of Christmas. We have to induce +deliberately the "Christmas feeling." We have to remind ourselves that +"it will never do" to let the heartiness of Christmas be impaired. The +peculiarity of our attitude towards Christmas, which at worst is a +vacation, may be clearly seen by contrasting it with our attitude +towards another vacation--the summer holiday. We do not have to brace +and force ourselves up to the enjoyment of the summer holiday. We +experience no difficulty in inducing the holiday feeling. There is no +fear of the institution of the summer holiday losing its heartiness. Nor +do we need the example of children to aid us in savouring the August +"festivities." + + * * * * * + +If any person here breaks in with the statement that I am deceived and +the truth is not in me, and that Christmas stands just where it did in +the esteem of all right-minded people, and that he who casts a doubt on +the heartiness of Christmas is not right-minded, let that person read no +more. This book is not written for him. And if any other person, +kindlier, condescendingly protests that there is nothing wrong with +Christmas except my advancing age, let that person read no more. This +book is not written for him, either. It is written for persons who can +look facts cheerfully in the face. That Christmas has lost some of its +magic is a fact that the common sense of the western hemisphere will not +dispute. To blink the fact is infantile. To confront it, to try to +understand it, to reckon with it, and to obviate any evil that may +attach to it--this course alone is meet for an honest man. + + + + + +TWO + +THE REASON + + +If the decadence of Christmas were a purely subjective phenomenon, +confined to the breasts of those of us who have ceased to be children +then it follows that Christmas has always been decadent, because people +have always been ceasing to be children. It follows also that the +festival was originally got up by disillusioned adults, for the benefit +of the children. Which is totally absurd. Adults have never yet invented +any institution, festival or diversion specially for the benefit of +children. The egoism of adults makes such an effort impossible, and the +ingenuity and pliancy of children make it unnecessary. The pantomime, +for example, which is now pre-eminently a diversion for children, was +created by adults for the amusement of adults. Children have merely +accepted it and appropriated it. Children, being helpless, are of course +fatalists and imitators. They take what comes, and they do the best they +can with it. And when they have made something their own that was adult, +they stick to it like leeches. + +They are terrific Tories, are children; they are even reactionary! They +powerfully object to changes. What they most admire in a pantomime is +the oldest part of it, the only true pantomime--the harlequinade! Hence +the very nature of children is a proof that what Christmas is now to +them, it was in the past to their elders. If they now feel and exhibit +faith and enthusiasm in the practice of the festival, be sure that, at +one time, adults felt and exhibited the same faith and enthusiasm--yea, +and more! For in neither faith nor enthusiasm can a child compete with a +convinced adult. No child could believe in anything as passionately as +the modern millionaire believes in money, or as the modern social +reformer believes in the virtue of Acts of Parliament. + +Another and a crowning proof that Christmas has been diminished in our +hearts lies in the fiery lyrical splendour of the old Christmas hymns. +Those hymns were not written by people who made-believe at Christmas for +the pleasure of youngsters. They were written by devotees. And this age +could not have produced them. + + * * * * * + +No! The decay of the old Christmas spirit among adults is undeniable, +and its cause is fairly plain. It is due to the labours of a set of +idealists--men who cared not for money, nor for glory, nor for anything +except their ideal. Their ideal was to find out the truth concerning +nature and concerning human history; and they sacrificed all--they +sacrificed the peace of mind of whole generations--to the pleasure of +slaking their ardour for truth. For them the most important thing in the +world was the satisfaction of their curiosity. They would leave naught +alone; and they scorned consequences. Useless to cry to them: "That is +holy. Touch it not!" I mean the great philosophers and men of +science--especially the geologists--of the nineteenth century. I mean +such utterly pure-minded men as Lyell, Spencer, Darwin and Huxley. They +inaugurated the mighty age of doubt and scepticism. They made it +impossible to believe all manner of things which before them none had +questioned. The movement spread until uneasiness was everywhere in the +realm of thought, and people walked about therein fearsomely, as in a +land subject to earthquakes. It was as if people had said: "We don't +know what will topple next. Let's raze everything to the ground, and +then we shall feel safer." And there came a moment after which nobody +could ever look at a picture of the Nativity in the old way. Pictures of +the Nativity were admired perhaps as much as ever, but for the exquisite +beauty of their naïveté, the charm of their old-world simplicity, not +as artistic renderings of fact. + + * * * * * + +An age of scepticism has its faults, like any other age, though certain +persons have pretended the contrary. Having been compelled to abandon +its belief in various statements of alleged fact, it lumps principles +and ideals with alleged facts, and hastily decides not to believe in +anything at all. It gives up faith, it despises faith, in spite of the +warning of its greatest philosophers, including Herbert Spencer, that +faith of some sort is necessary to a satisfactory existence in a +universe full of problems which science admits it can never solve. None +were humbler than the foremost scientists about the narrowness of the +field of knowledge, as compared with the immeasurability of the field +of faith. But the warning has been ignored, as warnings nearly always +are. Faith is at a discount. And the qualities which go with faith are +at a discount; such as enthusiasm, spontaneity, ebullition, lyricism, +and self-expression in general. Sentimentality is held in such horror +that people are afraid even of sentiment. Their secret cry is: "Give us +something in which we can believe." + + * * * * * + +They forget, in their confusion, that the great principles, spiritual +and moral, remain absolutely intact. They forget that, after all the +shattering discoveries of science and conclusions of philosophy, mankind +has still to live with dignity amid hostile nature, and in the presence +of an unknowable power and that mankind can only succeed in this +tremendous feat by the exercise of faith and of that mutual goodwill +which is based in sincerity and charity. They forget that, while facts +are nothing, these principles are everything. And so, at that epoch of +the year which nature herself has ordained for the formal recognition of +the situation of mankind in the universe and of its resulting duties to +itself and to the Unknown--at that epoch, they bewail, sadly or +impatiently or cynically: "Oh! The bottom has been knocked out of +Christmas!" + + * * * * * + +But the bottom has not been knocked out of Christmas. And people know +it. Somewhere, in the most central and mysterious fastness of their +hearts, they know it. If they were not, in spite of themselves, +convinced of it, why should they be so pathetically anxious to keep +alive in themselves, and to foster in their children, the Christmas +spirit? Obviously, a profound instinct is for ever reminding them that, +without the Christmas spirit, they are lost. The forms of faith change, +but the spirit of faith, which is the Christmas spirit, is immortal amid +its endless vicissitudes. At a crisis of change, faith is weakened for +the majority; for the majority it may seem to be dead. It is conserved, +however, in the hearts of the few supremely great and in the hearts of +the simple. The supremely great are hidden from the majority; but the +simple are seen of all men, and them we encourage, often without knowing +why, to be the depositaries of that which we cannot ourselves guard, but +which we dimly feel to be indispensable to our safety. + + + + + +THREE + +THE SOLSTICE AND GOOD WILL + + +In order to see that there is underlying Christmas an idea of faith +which will at any rate last as long as the planet lasts, it is only +necessary to ask and answer the question: "Why was the Christmas feast +fixed for the twenty-fifth of December?" For it is absolutely certain, +and admitted by everybody of knowledge, that Christ was not born on the +twenty-fifth of December. Those disturbing impassioned inquirers after +truth, who will not leave us peaceful in our ignorance, have settled +that for us, by pointing out, among other things, that the twenty-fifth +of December falls in the very midst of the Palestine rainy season, and +that, therefore, shepherds were assuredly not on that date watching +their flocks by night. + + * * * * * + +Christians were not, at first, united in the celebration of Christmas. +Some kept Christmas in January, others in April, others in May. It was a +pre-Christian force which drove them all into agreement upon the +twenty-fifth of December. Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree +from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from +the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when +mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, +when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when the +year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over. No more +suitably symbolic moment could have been chosen for a festival of faith, +goodwill and joy. And the appositeness of the moment is just as perfect +in this era of electric light and central heating, as it was in the era +of Virgil, who, by the way, described a Christmas tree. We shall say +this year, with exactly the same accents of relief and hope as our pagan +ancestors used, and as the woaded savage used: "The days will begin to +lengthen now!" For, while we often falsely fancy that we have subjugated +nature to our service, the fact is that we are as irremediably as ever +at the mercy of nature. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, the attitude of us moderns towards the forces by which our +existence is governed ought to be, and probably is, more reverent and +awe-struck than that of the earlier world. The discoveries of science +have at once quickened our imagination and compelled us to admit that +what we know is the merest trifle. The pagan in his ignorance explained +everything. Our knowledge has only deepened the mystery, and all that we +shall learn will but deepen it further. We can explain the solstice. We +are aware with absolute certitude that the solstice and the equinox and +the varying phenomena of the seasons are due to the fact that the plane +of the equator is tilted at a slight angle to the plane of the ecliptic. +When we put on the first overcoat in autumn, and when we give orders to +let the furnace out in spring, we know that we are arranging our lives +in accordance with that angle. And we are quite duly proud of our +knowledge. And much good does our knowledge do us! + + * * * * * + +Well, it does do us some good, and in a spiritual way, too! For nobody +can even toy with astronomy without picturing to himself, more clearly +and startlingly than would be otherwise possible, a revolving globe that +whizzes through elemental space around a ball of fire: which, in turn, +is rushing with all its satellites at an inconceivable speed from +nowhere to nowhere; and to the surface of the revolving, whizzing globe +a multitude of living things desperately clinging, and these living +things, in the midst of cataclysmic danger, and between the twin enigmas +of birth and death, quarrelling and hating and calling themselves kings +and queens and millionaires and beautiful women and aristocrats and +geniuses and lackeys and superior persons! Perhaps the highest value of +astronomy is that it renders more vivid the ironical significance of +such a vision, and thus brings home to us the truth that in spite of all +the differences which we have invented, mankind is a fellowship of +brothers, overshadowed by insoluble and fearful mysteries, and dependent +upon mutual goodwill and trust for the happiness it may hope to achieve. +* * * Let us remember that Christmas is, among other things, the winter +solstice, and that the bottom has not yet been knocked out of the winter +solstice, nor is likely to be in the immediate future! + + * * * * * + +It is a curious fact that the one faith which really does flourish and +wax in these days should be faith in the idea of social justice. For +social justice simply means the putting into practice of goodwill and +the recognition of the brotherhood of mankind. Formerly, people were +enthusiastic and altruistic for a theological idea, for a national idea, +for a political idea. You could see men on the rack for the sake of a +dogma; you could see men of a great nation fitting out regiments and +ruining themselves and going forth to save a small nation from +destruction. You could see men giving their lives to the aggrandisement +of an empire. And the men who did these things had the best brains and +the quickest wits and the warmest hearts of their time. But today, +whenever you meet a first-class man who is both enthusiastic and +altruistic, you may be sure that his pet scheme is neither theological, +military nor political; you may be sure that he has got into his head +the notion that some class of persons somewhere are not being treated +fairly, are not being treated with fraternal goodwill, and that he is +determined to put the matter right, or perish. + + * * * * * + +In England, nearly all the most interesting people are social reformers: +and the only circles of society in which you are not bored, in which +there is real conversation, are the circles of social reform. These +people alone have an abounding and convincing faith. Their faith has, +for example, convinced many of the best literary artists of the day, +with the result that a large proportion of the best modern imaginative +literature has been inspired by the dream of social justice. Take away +that idea from the works of H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and George +Bernard Shaw, and there would be exactly nothing left. Despite any +appearance to the contrary, therefore, the idea of universal goodwill is +really alive upon the continents of this planet: more so, indeed, than +any other idea--for the vitality of an idea depends far less on the +numbers of people who hold it than on the quality of the heart and brain +of the people who hold it. Whether the growth of the idea is due to the +spiritual awe and humility which are the consequence of increased +scientific knowledge, I cannot say, and I do not seriously care. + + + + + +FOUR + +THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + + +"Yes," you say, "I am quite at one with you as to the immense importance +of goodwill in social existence, and I have the same faith in it as you +have. But why a festival? Why eating and drinking and ceremonies? Surely +one can have faith without festivals?" + + * * * * * + +The answer is that one cannot; or at least that in practice, one never +does. A disinclination for festivals, a morbid self-conscious fear of +letting oneself go, is a sure sign of lack of faith. If you have not +enough enthusiasm for the cult of goodwill to make you positively +desire to celebrate the cult, then your faith is insufficient and needs +fostering by study and meditation. Why, if you decide to found a +sailing-club up your creek, your very first thought is to signalise your +faith in the sailing of those particular waters by a dinner and a +jollity, and you take care that the event shall be an annual one! * * * +You have faith in your wife, and in your affection for her. Surely you +don't need a festival to remind you of that faith, you so superior to +human weaknesses? But you do! You insist on having it. And, if the +festival did not happen, you would feel gloomy and discouraged. A +birthday is a device for recalling to you in a formal and impressive +manner that a certain person still lives and is in need of goodwill. It +is a device which experience has proved to be both valuable and +necessary. + + * * * * * + +Real faith effervesces; it shoots forth in every direction; it +communicates itself. And the inevitable result is a festival. The +festival is anticipated with pleasure, and it is remembered with +pleasure. And thus it reacts stimulatingly on that which gave it birth, +as the vitality of children reacts stimulatingly on the vitality of +parents. It provides a concrete symbol of that which is invisible and +intangible, and mankind is not yet so advanced in the path of spiritual +perfection that we can afford to dispense with concrete symbols. Now, if +we maintain festivals and formalities for the healthy continuance and +honour of a pastime or of a personal affection, shall we not maintain a +festival--and a mighty one--in behalf of a faith which makes the +corporate human existence bearable amid the menaces and mysteries that +for ever threaten it,--the faith of universal goodwill and mutual +confidence? + + * * * * * + +If then, there is to be a festival, why should it not be the festival of +Christmas? It can, indeed, be no other. Christmas is most plainly +indicated. It is dignified and made precious by traditions which go back +much further than the Christian era; and it has this tremendous +advantage--it exists! In spite of our declining faith, it has been +preserved to us, and here it is, ready to hand. Not merely does it fall +at the point which uncounted generations have agreed to consider as the +turn of the solar year and as the rebirth of hope! It falls also +immediately before the end of the calendar year, and thus prepares us +for a fresh beginning that shall put the old to shame. It could not be +better timed. Further, its traditional spirit of peace and goodwill is +the very spirit which we desire to foster. And finally its customs--or +at any rate, its main customs--are well designed to symbolize that +spirit. If we have allowed the despatch of Christmas cards to degenerate +into naught but a tedious shuffling of paste-boards and overwork of +post-office officials, the fault is not in the custom but in ourselves. +The custom is a most striking one--so long as we have sufficient +imagination to remember vividly that we are all in the same boat--I +mean, on the same planet--and clinging desperately to the flying ball, +and dependent for daily happiness on one another's good will! A +Christmas card sent by one human being to another human being is more +than a piece of coloured stationery sent by one log of wood to another +log of wood: it is an inspiring and reassuring message of high value. +The mischief is that so many self-styled human beings are just logs of +wood, rather stylishly dressed. + + * * * * * + +And then the custom of present-giving! What better and more convincing +proof of sympathy than a gift? The gift is one of these obvious +contrivances--like the wheel or the lever--which smooth and simplify +earthly life, and the charm of whose utility no obviousness can stale. +But of course any contrivance can be rendered futile by clumsiness or +negligence. There is a sort of Christmas giver who says pettishly: "Oh! +I don't know what to give to So-and-So this Christmas! What a bother! I +shall write and tell her to choose something herself, and send the bill +to me!" And he writes. And though he does not suspect it, what he really +writes, and what So-and-So reads, is this: "Dear So-and-So. It is +nothing to me that you and I are alive together on this planet, and in +various ways mutually dependent. But I am bound by custom to give you a +present. I do not, however, take sufficient interest in your life to +know what object it would give you pleasure to possess; and I do not +want to be put to the trouble of finding out, nor of obtaining the +object and transmitting it to you. Will you, therefore, buy something +for yourself and send the bill to me. Of course, a sense of social +decency will prevent you from spending more than a small sum, and I +shall be spared all exertion beyond signing a cheque. Yours insincerely +and loggishly * * *." So managed, the contrivance of present-giving +becomes positively sinister in its working. But managed with the +sympathetic imagination which is infallibly produced by real faith in +goodwill, its efficacy may approach the miraculous. + + * * * * * + +The Christmas ceremony of good-wishing by word of mouth has never been +in any danger of falling into insincerity. Such is the power of +tradition and virtue of a festival, and such the instinctive +brotherliness of men, that on this day the mere sight of an +acquaintance will soften the voice and warm the heart of the most +superior sceptic and curmudgeon that the age of disillusion has +produced. In spite of himself, faith flickers up in him again, be it +only for a moment. And, during that moment, he is almost like those +whose bright faith the age has never tarnished, like the great and like +the simple, to whom it is quite unnecessary to offer a defence and +explanation of Christmas or to suggest the basis of a new faith therein. + + + + + + +FIVE + +DEFENCE OF FEASTING + + +And now I can hear the superior sceptic disdainfully questioning: "Yes, +but what about the orgy of Christmas? What about all the eating and +drinking?" To which I can only answer that faith causes effervescence, +expansion, joy, and that joy has always, for excellent reasons, been +connected with feasting. The very words 'feast' and 'festival' are +etymologically inseparable. The meal is the most regular and the least +dispensable of daily events; it happens also to be an event which is in +itself almost invariably a source of pleasure, or, at worst, of +satisfaction: and it will continue to have this precious quality so long +as our souls are encased in bodies. What could be more natural, +therefore, than that it should be employed, with due enlargement and +ornamentation, as the kernel of the festival? What more logical than +that the meal should be elevated into a feast? + +"But," exclaims the superior sceptic, "this idea involves the idea of +excess!" What if it does? I would not deny it! Assuredly, a feast means +more than enough, and more than enough means excess. It is only because +a feast means excess that it assists in the bringing about of expansion +and joy. Such is human nature, and it is the case of human nature that +we are discussing. Of course, excess usually exacts its toll, within +twenty-four hours, especially from the weak. But the benefit is worth +its price. The body pays no more than the debt which the soul has +incurred. An occasional change of habit is essential to well-being, and +every change of habit results in temporary derangement and +inconvenience. + +Do not misunderstand me. Do not push my notion of excess to extremes. +When I defend the excess inevitably incident to a feast, I am not +seeking to prove that a man in celebrating Christmas is entitled to +drink champagne in a public restaurant until he becomes an object of +scorn and disgust to the waiters who have travelled from Switzerland in +order to receive his tips. Much less should I be prepared to justify him +if, in his own home, he sank lower than the hog. Nor would I +sympathetically carry him to bed. There is such a thing as excess in +moderation and dignity. Every wise man has practised this. And he who +has not practised it is a fool, and deserves even a harder name. He +ought indeed to inhabit a planet himself, for all his faith in humanity +will be exhausted in believing in himself. * * * So much for the feast! + + * * * * * + +But the accompaniments of the feast are also excessive. For example, you +make a tug-of-war with your neighbour at table, and the rope is a +fragile packet of tinselled paper, which breaks with a report like a +pistol. You open your half of the packet, and discover some doggerel +verse which you read aloud, and also a perfectly idiotic coloured cap, +which you put on your head to the end of looking foolish. And this +ceremony is continued until the whole table is surrounded by +preposterous headgear, and doggerel verse is lying by every plate. +Surely no man in his senses, no woman in hers, would, etc., etc. * * *! +But one of the spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you +beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. +This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly +good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled +that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir +stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the +Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance +which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, followed by +further expansion and ecstasy, which ensues after the putting on. +Everybody who has put on a cap is aware that it is a beneficial thing to +put on a cap. Quite apart from the fact that the mysterious and fanciful +race of children are thereby placated and appeased, the soul of the +capped one is purified by this charming excess. + + * * * * * + +And the Tree! What an excess of the fantastic to pretend that all those +glittering balls, those coloured candles and those variegated parcels +are the blossoms of the absurd tree! How excessively grotesque to tie +all those parcels to the branches, in order to take them off again! +Surely, something less medieval, more ingenious, more modern than this +could be devised--if symbolism is to be indulged in at all! Can you +devise it, O sceptical one, revelling in disillusion? Can you invent a +symbol more natural and graceful than the symbol of the Tree? Perhaps +you would have a shop-counter, and shelves behind it, so as to instill +early into the youthful mind that this is a planet of commerce! Perhaps +you would abolish the doggerel of crackers, and substitute therefor +extracts from the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin! Perhaps you would +exchange the caps for blazonry embroidered with chemical formula, your +object being the advancement of science! Perhaps you would do away with +the orgiastic eating and drinking, and arrange for a formal conversation +about astronomy and the idea of human fraternity, upon strictly +reasonable rations of shredded wheat! You would thus create an original +festival, and eliminate all fear of a dyspeptic morrow. You would +improve the mind. And you would avoid the ridiculous. But also, in +avoiding the ridiculous, you would tumble into the ridiculous, deeply +and hopelessly! And think how your very original festival would delight +the participators, how they would look forward to it with joy, and back +upon it with pleasurable regret; how their minds would dwell sweetly +upon the conception of shredded wheat, and how their faith would be +encouraged and strengthened by the intellectuality of the formal +conversation! + + * * * * * + +He who girds at an ancient established festival should reflect upon +sundry obvious truths before he withers up the said festival by the +sirocco of his contempt. These truths are as follows:--First, a +festival, though based upon intelligence, is not an affair of the +intellect, but an affair of the emotions. Second, the human soul can +only be reached through the human body. Third, it is impossible to +replace an ancient festival by a new one. Robespierre, amongst others, +tried to do so, and achieved the absurd. Reformers, heralds of new +faiths, and rejuvenators of old faiths, have always, when they +succeeded, adopted an ancient festival, with all or most of its forms, +and been content to breathe into it a new spirit to replace the old +spirit which had vanished or was vanishing. Anybody who, persuaded that +Christmas is not what it was, feels that a festival must nevertheless be +preserved, will do well to follow this example. To be content with the +old forms and to vitalize them: that is the problem. Solve it, and the +forms will soon begin to adapt themselves to the process of +vitalization. All history is a witness in proof. + + + + + +SIX + +TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + + +It being agreed, then, that the Christmas festival has lost a great deal +of its old vitality, and that, to many people, it is a source of tedium +and the cause of insincerity; and it being further agreed that the +difficulty cannot be got over by simply abolishing the festival, as no +one really wants it to be abolished; the question remains--what should +be done to vitalize it? The former spirit of faith, the spirit which +made the great Christmas of the golden days, has been weakened; but one +element of it--that which is founded on the conviction that goodwill +among men is a prime necessity of reasonable living--survives with a +certain vigour, though even it has not escaped the general scepticism of +the age. This element unites in agreement all the pugnacious sectaries +who join battle over the other elements of the former faith. This +element has no enemies. None will deny its lasting virtue. Obviously, +therefore, the right course is to concentrate on the cultivation of +goodwill. If goodwill can be consciously increased, the festival of +Christmas will cease to be perfunctory. It will acquire a fresh and more +genuine significance, which, however, will not in any way inconvenience +those who have never let go of the older significance. No tradition will +be overthrown, no shock administered, and nobody will be able to croak +about iconoclasm and new-fangled notions and the sudden end of the +world, and so on. + + * * * * * + +The fancy of some people will at once run to the formation of a grand +international Society for the revivifying of Christmas by the +cultivation of goodwill, with branches in all the chief cities of Europe +and America, and headquarters--of course at the Hague; and committees +and subcommittees, and presidents and vice-presidents; and honorary +secretaries and secretaries paid; and quarterly and annual meetings, and +triennial congresses! And a literary organ or two! And a +badge--naturally a badge, designed by a famous artist in harmonious +tints! + + * * * * * + +But my fancy does not run at all in this direction. I am convinced that +we have already far too many societies for the furtherance of our ends. +To my mind, most societies with a moral aim are merely clumsy machines +for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense and +inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a group +of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very +wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some act +which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate goodwill +in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for saying +your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of performing +acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it necessary to +involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover, a society +means fuss and shouting: two species of disturbance which are both +futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of morals. + +You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by +cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task +of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be +time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other +people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that +this is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you +have bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will +appreciate also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, +indeed, should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your +admirable intentions? Rest assured that any unusual sprouting of the +desired crop will be instantly noticed by the persons interested. + + * * * * * + +The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill? +Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the +whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but a +magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate +goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of +goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical +eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just +beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much +attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out +to embrace the whole of humanity in his goodwill, he will have even +less success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four +sisters at once; and his daily companions--those who see him eat his +bacon and lace his boots and earn his living--will most certainly have a +rough time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your +efforts on quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity +struggle on as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has +hitherto had. + +In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to +go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in +this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of the +group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or your +husband? Not necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who most +frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be your wife. +These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be his butler. +She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you a charming +omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else. Whoever he or she +may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of irritated +superiority, aim at that person in particular. + +The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how +prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at +once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your +excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will +be aware that you have failed in striving. Your successes will appear +effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid +curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of not +wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling that, +if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is being +attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very probably, +almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in fact +doing as you are; some of them--make no doubt--are doing a shade better. +I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill. + + + + + +SEVEN + +THE GIFT OF ONESELF + + +Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories--those who +sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called life; +and those who don't. The second category is much the larger of the two. +Very many people belong to it who think that they belong to the first. +They may deceive themselves, but they cannot deceive a child. Although +you may easily practise upon the credulity of a child in matters of +fact, you cannot cheat his moral and social judgment. He will add you +up, and he will add anybody up, and he will estimate conduct, upon +principles of his own and in a manner terribly impartial. Parents have +no sterner nor more discerning critics than their own children. + +And so you may be polite to a child, and pretend to appreciate his point +of view; but, unless you really do put yourself to the trouble of +understanding him, unless you throw yourself, by the exercise of +imagination, into his world, you will not succeed in being his friend. +To be his friend means an effort on your part, it means that you must +divest yourself of your own mental habit, and, for the time being, adopt +his. And no nice phrases, no gifts of money, sweets or toys, can take +the place of this effort, and this sacrifice of self. With five minutes +of genuine surrender to him, you can win more of his esteem and +gratitude than five hundred pounds would buy. His notion of real +goodwill is the imaginative sharing of his feelings, a convinced +participation in his pains and pleasures. He is well aware that, if you +honestly do this, you will be on his side. + + * * * * * + +Now, adults, of course, are tremendously clever and accomplished persons +and children are no match for them; but still, with all their talents +and omniscience and power, adults seem to lack important pieces of +knowledge which children possess; they seem to forget, and to fail to +profit by, their infantile experience. Else why should adults in general +be so extraordinarily ignorant of the great truth that the secret of +goodwill lies in the sympathetic exercise of the imagination? Since +goodwill is the secret of human happiness, it follows that the secret +of goodwill must be one of the most precious aids to sensible living; +and yet adults, though they once knew it, have gone and forgotten it! +Children may well be excused for concluding that the ways of the adult, +in their capricious irrationality, are past finding out. + +To increase your goodwill for a fellow creature, it is necessary to +imagine that you are he: and nothing else is necessary. This feat is not +easy; but it can be done. Some people have less of the divine faculty of +imagination than others, but nobody is without it, and, like all other +faculties, it improves with use, just as it deteriorates with neglect. +Imagination is a function of the brain. In order to cultivate goodwill +for a person, you must think frequently about that person. You must +inform yourself about all his activities. You must be able in your +mind's eye to follow him hour by hour throughout the day, and you must +ascertain if he sleeps well at night--because this is not a trifle. And +you must reflect upon his existence with the same partiality as you +reflect upon your own. (Why not?) That is to say, you must lay the +fullest stress on his difficulties, disappointments and unhappinesses, +and you must minimise his good fortune. You must magnify his efforts +after righteousness, and forget his failures. You must ever remember +that, after all, he is not to blame for the faults of his character, +which faults, in his case as in yours, are due partly to heredity and +partly to environment. And beyond everything you must always give him +credit for good intentions. Do not you, though sometimes mistakenly, +always act for the best? You know you do! And are you alone among +mortals in rectitude? + + * * * * * + +This mental exercise in relation to another person takes time, and it +involves a fatiguing effort. I repeat that it is not easy. Nor is it +invariably agreeable. You may, indeed, find it tedious, for example, to +picture in vivid detail all the worries that have brought about your +wife's exacerbation--negligent maid, dishonest tradesman, milk in a +thunder storm, hypercritical husband, dirt in the wrong place--but, when +you have faithfully done so, I absolutely defy you to speak to her in +the same tone as you used to employ, and to cherish resentment against +her as you used to do. And I absolutely defy you not to feel less +discontented with yourself than in the past. It is impossible that the +exercise of imagination about a person should not result in goodwill +towards that person. The exercise may put a strain upon you; but its +effect is a scientific certainty. It is the supreme social exercise, for +it is the giving of oneself in the most intimate and complete sense. It +is the suspension of one's individuality in favour of another. It +establishes a new attitude of mind, which, though it may well lead to +specific social acts, is more valuable than any specific act, for it is +ceaselessly translating itself into demeanour. + + * * * * * + +The critic with that terrible English trait, an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, will at this point probably remark to himself, smiling: "I +suppose the time will come, when by dint of regular daily practice, I +shall have achieved perfect goodwill towards the first object of my +attentions. I can then regard that person as 'done.' I can put him on a +shelf, and turn to the next; and, in the end, all my relations, friends +and acquaintances will be 'done' and I can stare at them in a row on the +shelf of my mind, with pride and satisfaction * * *." Except that no +person will ever be quite "done," human nature, still being human, in +spite of the recent advances of civilisation, I do not deprecate this +manner of stating the case. + +The ambitious and resolute man, with an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of +different objects as they were successively achieved. If for example it +was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know +that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by +concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never +acquire any foreign language in absolute perfection. Still, he would +reach a certain stage in a language, and then he would put it aside and +turn to the next one on his programme, and so on. Assuredly, he would +not be ashamed of employing method to reach his end. + +Now all that can be said of the acquirement of foreign languages can be +said of the acquirement of goodwill. In remedying the deficiences of the +heart and character, as in remedying the deficiences of mere knowledge, +the brain is the sole possible instrument, and the best results will be +obtained by using it regularly and scientifically, according to an +arranged method. Why, therefore, if a man be proud of method in +improving his knowledge, should he see something ridiculous in a +deliberate plan for improving his heart--the affair of his heart being +immensely more important, more urgent and more difficult? The reader who +has found even one good answer to the above question, need read no more +of this book, for he will have confounded me and it. + + + + + +EIGHT + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + + +The consequences of the social self-discipline which I have outlined +will be various. A fairly early result will be the gradual decline, and +ultimately the death, of the superior person in oneself. It is true +that the superior person in oneself has nine lives, and is capable of +rising from the dead after even the most fatal blows. But, at worst, +the superior person--(and who among us does not shelter that sinister +inhabitant in his soul?)--will have a very poor time in the soul of him +who steadily practises the imaginative understanding of other people. +In the first place, the mere exercise of the imagination on others +absolutely scotches egotism as long as it lasts, and leaves it weakened +afterwards. And, in the second and more important place, an improved +comprehension of others (which means an intensified sympathy with them) +must destroy the illusion, so widespread, that one's own case is +unique. The amicable study of one's neighbours on the planet inevitably +shows that the same troubles, the same fortitudes, the same feats of +intelligence, the same successes and failures, are constantly happening +everywhere. One can, indeed, see oneself in nearly everybody else, and, +in particular, one is struck by the fact that the quality in which one +took most pride is simply spread abroad throughout humanity in heaps! +It is only in sympathetically contemplating others that one can get +oneself in a true perspective. Yet probably the majority of human +beings never do contemplate others, save with the abstracted gaze which +proves that the gazer sees nothing but his own dream. + + * * * * * + +Another result of the discipline is an immensely increased interest in +one's friends. One regards them even with a sort of proprietary +interest, for, by imagination, one has come into sympathetic possession +of them. Further, one has for them that tender feeling which always +follows the conferring of a benefit, especially the secret conferring of +a benefit. It is the benefactor, not the person benefited, who is +grateful. The benefit which one has conferred is, of course, the gift of +oneself. The resulting emotion is independent of any sympathy rendered +by the other; and where the sympathy is felt to be mutual, friendship +acquires a new significance. The exercise of sympathetic imagination +will cause one to look upon even a relative as a friend--a startling +achievement! It will provide a new excitement and diversion in life. + +When the month of December dawns, there need be no sensation of weary +apprehension about the difficulty of choosing a present that will suit a +friend. Certainly it will not be necessary, from sheer indifference and +ignorance, to invite the friend to choose his own present. On the +contrary, one will be, in secret, so intimate with the friend's +situation and wants and desires, that sundry rival schemes for +pleasuring him will at once offer themselves. And when he receives the +present finally selected, he will have the conviction, always +delightfully flattering to a donee, that he has been the object of a +particular attention and insight. * * * And when the cards of greeting +are despatched, formal phrases will go forth charged, in the +consciousness of the sender, with a genuine meaning, with the force of a +climax, as though the sender had written thereon, in invisible ink: "I +have had you well in mind during the last twelve months; I think I +understand your difficulties and appreciate your efforts better than I +did, and so it is with a peculiar sympathetic knowledge that I wish you +good luck. I have guessed what particular kind of good luck you require, +and I wish accordingly. My wish is not vague and perfunctory only." + + * * * * * + +And on the day of festival itself one feels that one really has +something to celebrate. The occasion has a basis, if it had no basis +for one before; and if a basis previously existed, then it is widened +and strengthened. The festival becomes a public culmination to a private +enterprise. One is not reminded by Christmas of goodwill, because the +enterprise of imaginative sympathy has been a daily affair throughout +the year; but Christmas provides an excuse for taking satisfaction in +the success of the enterprise and new enthusiasm to correct its +failures. The symbolism of the situation of Christmas, at the turn of +the year, develops an added impressiveness, and all the Christmas +customs, apt to produce annoyance in the breasts of the unsentimental, +are accepted with indulgence, even with eagerness, because their +symbolism also is shown in a clearer light. Christmas becomes as +personal as a birthday. One eats and drinks to excess, not because it +is the custom to eat and drink to excess, but from sheer effervescent +faith in an idea. And as one sits with one's friends, possessing them in +the privacy of one's heart, permeated by a sense of the value of +sympathetic comprehension in this formidable adventure of existence on a +planet that rushes eternally through the night of space; assured indeed +that companionship and mutual understanding alone make the adventure +agreeable,--one sees in a flash that Christmas, whatever else it may be, +is and must be the Feast of St. Friend, and a day on that account +supreme among the days of the year. + + * * * * * + +The third and greatest consequence of the systematic cultivation of +goodwill now grows blindingly apparent. To state it earlier in all its +crudity would have been ill-advised; and I purposely refrained from +doing so. It is the augmentation of one's own happiness. The increase of +amity, the diminution of resentment and annoyance, the regular +maintenance of an attitude mildly benevolent towards mankind,--these +things are the surest way to happiness. And it is because they are the +surest way to happiness, that the most enlightened go after them. All +real motives are selfish motives; were it otherwise humanity would be +utterly different from what it is. A man may perform some act which will +benefit another while working some striking injury to himself. But his +reason for doing it is that he prefers the evil of the injury to the +deeper evil of the fundamental dissatisfaction which would torment him +if he did not perform the act. Nobody yet sought the good of another +save as a means to his own good. And it is in accordance with common +sense that this should be so. There is, however, a lower egotism and a +higher. It is the latter which we call unselfishness. And it is the +latter of which Christmas is the celebration. We shall legitimately bear +in mind, therefore, that Christmas, in addition to being the Feast of +St. Friend, is even more profoundly the feast of one's own welfare. + + + + + +NINE + +THE REACTION + + +A reaction sets in between Christmas and the New Year. It is inevitable; +and I should be writing basely if I did not devote to it a full chapter. +In those few dark days of inactivity, between a fete and the resumption +of the implacable daily round, when the weather is usually cynical, and +we are paying in our tissues the fair price of excess, we see life and +the world in a grey and sinister light, which we imagine to be the only +true light. Take the case of the average successful man of thirty-five. +What is he thinking as he lounges about on the day after Christmas? + +His thoughts probably run thus: "Even if I live to a good old age, +which is improbable, as many years lie behind me as before me. I have +lived half my life, and perhaps more than half my life. I have realised +part of my worldly ambition. I have made many good resolutions, and kept +one or two of them in k more or less imperfect manner. I cannot, as a +commonsense person, hope to keep a larger proportion of good resolutions +in the future than I have kept in the past. I have tried to understand +and sympathise with my fellow creatures, and though I have not entirely +failed to do so, I have nearly failed. I am not happy and I am not +content. And if, after all these years, I am neither happy nor content, +what chance is there of my being happy and content in the second half +of my life? The realisation of part of my worldly ambition has not made +me any happier, and, therefore, it is unlikely that the realisation of +the whole of my ambition will make me any happier. My strength cannot +improve; it can only weaken; and my health likewise. I in my turn am +coming to believe--what as a youth I rejected with disdain--namely, that +happiness is what one is not, and content is what one has not. Why, +then, should I go on striving after the impossible? Why should I not let +things slide?" + +Thus reflects the average successful man, and there is not one of us, +successful or unsuccessful, ambitious or unambitious, whose reflections +have not often led him to a conclusion equally dissatisfied. Why should +I or anybody pretend that this is not so? + + * * * * * + +And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest +vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving. +He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine +conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved. Positive though he +may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same +dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue +to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a +fact. It must be accepted. Conduct must be adjusted to it. The struggle +being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be +carried through. It will not end brilliantly, but precautions can be +taken against it ending disgracefully. These precautions consist in the +devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a +series of resolutions: which resolutions are generally made at or +immediately before the beginning of a New Year. Without these the +struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it +is with them. Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than +unorganised effort. + + * * * * * + +A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised: but an ideal cannot +be attained--if it could, it would not be an ideal. The virtue of an +ideal is its unattainability. It seems, when it is first formed, just as +attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a +means to it. After twenty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained. +After forty-eight, it is a little farther off. After a week, it has +receded still further. After a month it is far away; and towards the end +of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is +definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere. And then, such is the +divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse +for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame +in yet another organised effort. Such is the annual circle of the ideal, +the effort, the failure and the shame. A rather pitiful history it may +appear! And yet it is also rather a splendid history! For the failure +and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity +of our faith in ourselves. It is only in comparison with our ideal that +we have fallen low. We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we +should have been if we had not attempted to rise. + + * * * * * + +There are those who will say: "At any rate, we might moderate somewhat +the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that +there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the +achievement. Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common +sense! Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment +caused by sterile endeavour!" It would. But just try to moderate the +ideal and the self-conceit! And you will find, in spite of all your sad +experiences, that you cannot. If there is the stuff of a man in you, you +simply cannot! The truth, is that, in the supreme things, a man does +not act under the rules of earthly common sense. He transcends them, +because there is a quality in him which compels him to do so. Common +sense may persuade him to attempt to keep down the ideal, and +self-conceit may pretend to agree. But all the time, self-conceit will +be whispering: "I can go one better than that." And lo! the ideal is +furtively raised again. + +A man really has little scientific control over the height of his ideal +and the intensity of his belief in himself. He is born with them, as he +is born with a certain pulse and a certain reflex action. He can neglect +the ideal, so that it almost dissolves, but he cannot change its height. +He can maim his belief in himself by persistent abandonment to folly, +but he cannot lower its flame by an effort of the will, as he might +lower the flame of a gas by a calculated turn of the hand. In the secret +and inmost constitution of humanity it is ordained that the disparity +between the aim and the achievement shall seem grotesque; it is ordained +that there shall be an enormous fuss about pretty nearly nothing; it is +ordained that the mountain shall bring forth a mouse. But it is also +ordained that men shall go blithely on just the same, ignoring in +practice the ridiculousness which they admit in theory, and drawing +renewed hope and conceit from some magic, exhaustless source. And this +is the whole philosophy of the New Year's resolution. + + + + + +TEN + +ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + +There are few people who arrive at a true understanding of life, even in +the calm and disillusioned hours of reflection that come between the end +of one annual period and the beginning of another. Nearly everybody has +an idea at the back of his head that if only he could conquer certain +difficulties and embarrassments, he might really start to live properly, +in the full sense of living. And if he has pluck he says to himself: "I +_will_ smooth things out, and then I'll really live." In the same way, +nearly everybody, regarding the spectacle of the world, sees therein a +principle which he calls Evil; and he thinks: "If only we could get rid +of this Evil, if only we could set things right, how splendid the world +would be!" Now, in the meaning usually attached to it, there is no such +positive principle as Evil. Assuming that there is such a positive +principle in a given phenomenon--such as the character of a particular +man--you must then admit that there is the same positive principle +everywhere, for just as the character of no man is so imperfect that you +could not conceive a worse, so the character of no man is so perfect +that you could not conceive a better. Do away with Evil from the world, +and you would not merely abolish certain specially distressing matters, +you would change everything. You would in fact achieve perfection. And +when we say that one thing is evil and another good, all that we mean +is that one thing is less advanced than another in the way of +perfection. Evil cannot therefore be a positive principle; it signifies +only the falling short of perfection. + +And supposing that the desires of mankind were suddenly fulfilled, and +the world was rendered perfect! There would be no motive for effort, no +altercation of conflicting motives in the human heart; nothing to do, no +one to befriend, no anxiety, no want unsatisfied. Equilibrium would be +established. A cheerful world! You can see instantly how amusing it +would be. It would have only one drawback--that of being dead. Its +reason for being alive would have ceased to operate. Life means change +through constant development. But you cannot develop the perfect. The +perfect can merely expire. + +That average successful man whom I have previously cited feels all this +by instinct, though he does not comprehend it by reason. He reaches his +ambition, and retires from the fight in order to enjoy life,--and what +does he then do? He immediately creates for himself a new series of +difficulties and embarrassments, either by undertaking the management of +a large estate, or by some other device. If he does not maintain for +himself conditions which necessitate some kind of struggle, he quickly +dies--spiritually or physically, often both. The proportion of men who, +having established an equilibrium, proceed to die on the spot, is +enormous. Continual effort, which means, of course, continual +disappointment, is the _sine qua non_--without it there is literally +nothing vital. Its abolition is the abolition of life. Hence, people, +who, failing to savour the struggle itself, anticipate the end of the +struggle as the beginning of joy and happiness--these people are simply +missing life; they are longing to exchange life for death. The hemlock +would save them a lot of weary waiting. + + * * * * * + +We shall now perceive, I think, what is wrong with the assumptions of +the average successful man as set forth in the previous chapter. In +postulating that happiness is what one is not, he has got hold of a +mischievous conception of happiness. Let him examine his conception of +happiness, and he will find that it consists in the enjoyment of love +and luxury, and in the freedom from enforced effort. He generally wants +all three ingredients. Now passionate love does not mean happiness; it +means excitement, apprehension and continually renewed desire. And +affectionate love, from which the passion has faded, means something +less than happiness, for, mingled with its gentle tranquility is a +disturbing regret for the more fiery past. Luxury, according to the +universal experience of those who have had it, has no connection +whatever with happiness. And as for freedom from enforced effort, it +means simply death. + +Happiness as it is dreamed of cannot possibly exist save for brief +periods of self-deception which are followed by terrible periods of +reaction. Real, practicable happiness is due primarily not to any kind +of environment, but to an inward state of mind. Real happiness consists +first in acceptance of the fact that discontent is a condition of life, +and, second, in an honest endeavour to adjust conduct to an ideal. Real +happiness is not an affair of the future; it is an affair of the +present. Such as it is, if it cannot be obtained now, it can never be +obtained. Real happiness lives in patience, having comprehended that if +very little is accomplished towards perfection, so a man's existence is +a very little moment in the vast expanse of the universal life, and +having also comprehended that it is the struggle which is vital, and +that the end of the struggle is only another name for death. + + * * * * * + +"Well," I hear you exclaiming, "if this is all we can look forward to, +if this is all that real, practicable happiness amounts to, is life +worth living?" That is a question which each person has to answer for +himself. If he answers it in the negative, no argument, no persuasion, +no sentimentalisation of the facts of life, will make him alter his +opinion. Most people, however, answer it in the affirmative. Despite all +the drawbacks, despite all the endless disappointments, they decide that +life is worth living. There are two species of phenomena which bring +them to this view. The first may be called the golden moments of life, +which seem somehow in their transient brevity to atone for the dull +exasperation of interminable mediocre hours: moments of triumph in the +struggle, moments of fierce exultant resolve; moments of joy in +nature--moments which defy oblivion in the memory, and which, being +priceless, cannot be too dearly bought. + +The second species of compensatory phenomena are all the agreeable +experiences connected with human friendship; the general feeling, under +diverse forms, that one is not alone in the world. It is for the +multiplication and intensification of these phenomena that Christmas, +the Feast of St. Friend, exists. And, on the last day of the year, on +the eve of a renewed effort, our thoughts may profitably be centered +upon a plan of campaign whose execution shall result in a less imperfect +intercourse. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND*** + + +******* This file should be named 14653-8.txt or 14653-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/6/5/14653 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: The Feast of St. Friend</p> +<p>Author: Arnold Bennett</p> +<p>Release Date: January 10, 2005 [eBook #14653]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3>E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland,<br /> + Project Gutenberg Beginners Projects,<br /> + Melissa Er-Raqabi,<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (https://www.pgdp.net)</h3> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<h1>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</h1> + +<h2>A CHRISTMAS BOOK</h2> + +<div class="center"> +<a name='image1' id='image1'></a> +<img src='images/image1.png' +alt="text decoration" title="text decoration" /> +</div> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> +<h4>Author of <i>The Old Wives' Tale</i>, +<i>Buried Alive</i>, etc., etc.</h4> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<h6><i>New York</i><br /> +George H. Doran Company</h6> + +<h4>1911</h4> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS" />CONTENTS:</h2> +<div><br /></div> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> + +<div style="margin-left: 25%; margin-right: 25%;"> + + <a href="#ONE"><b>THE FACT</b></a><br /> + <a href="#TWO"><b>THE REASON</b></a><br /> + <a href="#THREE"><b>THE SOLSTICE AND GOODWILL</b></a><br /> + <a href="#FOUR"><b>THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS</b></a><br /> + <a href="#FIVE"><b>DEFENCE OF FEASTING</b></a><br /> + <a href="#SIX"><b>TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL</b></a><br /> + <a href="#SEVEN"><b>THE GIFT OF ONESELF</b></a><br /> + <a href="#EIGHT"><b>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</b></a><br /> + <a href="#NINE"><b>THE REACTION</b></a><br /> + <a href="#TEN"><b>ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR</b></a><br /> + +</div> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="ONE" id="ONE" />ONE<a name="Page_1" id="Page_1" /></h2> + +<h2>THE FACT</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>Something has happened to Christmas, or to our hearts; or to both. In +order to be convinced of this it is only necessary to compare the +present with the past. In the old days of not so long ago the festival +began to excite us in November. For weeks the house rustled with +charming and thrilling secrets, and with the furtive noises of paper +parcels being wrapped and unwrapped; the house was a whispering gallery. +The tension of expectancy increased to such a point that there was a +positive danger of the cord snapping before it ought to snap. On <a name="Page_2" id="Page_2" />the +Eve we went to bed with no hope of settled sleep. We knew that we should +be wakened and kept awake by the waits singing in the cold; and we were +glad to be kept awake so. On the supreme day we came downstairs hiding +delicious yawns, and cordially pretending that we had never been more +fit. The day was different from other days; it had a unique romantic +quality, tonic, curative of all ills. On that day even the tooth-ache +vanished, retiring far into the wilderness with the spiteful word, the +venomous thought, and the unlovely gesture. We sang with gusto +"Christians awake, salute the happy morn." We did salute the happy morn. +And when all the parcels were definitely unpacked, and the secrets of +all hearts disclosed, we spent the rest of the happy morn in waiting, +candidly <a name="Page_3" id="Page_3" />greedy, for the first of the great meals. And then we ate, and +we drank, and we ate again; with no thought of nutrition, nor of +reasonableness, nor of the morrow, nor of dyspepsia. We ate and drank +without fear and without shame, in the sheer, abandoned ecstasy of +celebration. And by means of motley paper headgear, fit only for a +carnival, we disguised ourselves in the most absurd fashions, and yet +did not make ourselves seriously ridiculous; for ridicule is in the +vision, not in what is seen. And we danced and sang and larked, until we +could no more. And finally we chanted a song of ceremony, and separated; +ending the day as we had commenced it, with salvoes of good wishes. And +the next morning we were indisposed and enfeebled; and we did not care; +we suffered gladly; we <a name="Page_4" id="Page_4" />had our pain's worth, and more. This was the +past.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Even today the spirit and rites of ancient Christmas are kept up, more +or less in their full rigour and splendour, by a race of beings that is +scattered over the whole earth. This race, mysterious, masterful, +conservative, imaginative, passionately sincere, arriving from we know +not where, dissolving before our eyes we know not how, has its way in +spite of us. I mean the children. By virtue of the children's faith, the +reindeer are still tramping the sky, and Christmas Day is still +something above and beyond a day of the week; it is a day out of the +week. We have to sit and pretend; and with disillusion in our souls we +do pretend. At Christmas, it is not the <a name="Page_5" id="Page_5" />children who make-believe; it +is ourselves. Who does not remember the first inkling of a suspicion +that Christmas Day was after all a day rather like any other day? In the +house of my memories, it was the immemorial duty of my brother on +Christmas morning, before anything else whatever happened, to sit down +to the organ and perform "Christians Awake" with all possible stops +drawn. He had to do it. Tradition, and the will that emanated from the +best bedroom, combined to force him to do it. One Christmas morning, as +he was preparing the stops, he glanced aside at me with a supercilious +curl of the lips, and the curl of my lips silently answered. It was as +if he had said: "I condescend to this," and as if I had said: "So do I."</p> + +<p>Such a moment comes to most of us <a name="Page_6" id="Page_6" />of this generation. And thenceforward +the change in us is extraordinarily rapid. The next thing we know is +that the institution of waits is a rather annoying survival which at +once deprives us of sleep and takes money out of our pockets. And then +Christmas is gluttony and indigestion and expensiveness and quarter-day, +and Christmas cards are a tax and a nuisance, and present-giving is a +heavier tax and a nuisance. And we feel self-conscious and foolish as we +sing "Auld Lang Syne." And what a blessing it will be when the +"festivities" (as they are misleadingly called) are over, and we can +settle down into commonsense again!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>I do not mean that our hearts are black with despair on Christmas Day.<a name="Page_7" id="Page_7" /> +I do not mean that we do not enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. There is +no doubt that, with the inspiriting help of the mysterious race, and by +the force of tradition, and by our own gift of pretending, we do still +very much enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. What I mean to insinuate, +and to assert, is that beneath this enjoyment is the disconcerting and +distressing conviction of unreality, of non-significance, of exaggerated +and even false sentiment. What I mean is that we have to brace and force +ourselves up to the enjoyment of Christmas. We have to induce +deliberately the "Christmas feeling." We have to remind ourselves that +"it will never do" to let the heartiness of Christmas be impaired. The +peculiarity of our attitude towards Christmas, which at worst is a +vaca<a name="Page_8" id="Page_8" />tion, may be clearly seen by contrasting it with our attitude +towards another vacation—the summer holiday. We do not have to brace +and force ourselves up to the enjoyment of the summer holiday. We +experience no difficulty in inducing the holiday feeling. There is no +fear of the institution of the summer holiday losing its heartiness. Nor +do we need the example of children to aid us in savouring the August +"festivities."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>If any person here breaks in with the statement that I am deceived and +the truth is not in me, and that Christmas stands just where it did in +the esteem of all right-minded people, and that he who casts a doubt on +the heartiness of Christmas is not right-minded, let that person read no +more. This <a name="Page_9" id="Page_9" />book is not written for him. And if any other person, +kindlier, condescendingly protests that there is nothing wrong with +Christmas except my advancing age, let that person read no more. This +book is not written for him, either. It is written for persons who can +look facts cheerfully in the face. That Christmas has lost some of its +magic is a fact that the common sense of the western hemisphere will not +dispute. To blink the fact is infantile. To confront it, to try to +understand it, to reckon with it, and to obviate any evil that may +attach to it—this course alone is meet for an honest man.<a name="Page_10" id="Page_10" /><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="TWO" id="TWO" /><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12" /><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13" />TWO</h2> + +<h2>THE REASON</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>If the decadence of Christmas were a purely subjective phenomenon, +confined to the breasts of those of us who have ceased to be children +then it follows that Christmas has always been decadent, because people +have always been ceasing to be children. It follows also that the +festival was originally got up by disillusioned adults, for the benefit +of the children. Which is totally absurd. Adults have never yet invented +any institution, festival or diversion specially for the benefit of +children. The egoism of adults makes such an effort impos<a name="Page_14" id="Page_14" />sible, and the +ingenuity and pliancy of children make it unnecessary. The pantomime, +for example, which is now pre-eminently a diversion for children, was +created by adults for the amusement of adults. Children have merely +accepted it and appropriated it. Children, being helpless, are of course +fatalists and imitators. They take what comes, and they do the best they +can with it. And when they have made something their own that was adult, +they stick to it like leeches.</p> + +<p>They are terrific Tories, are children; they are even reactionary! They +powerfully object to changes. What they most admire in a pantomime is +the oldest part of it, the only true pantomime—the harlequinade! Hence +the very nature of children is a proof that what Christmas is now to +them, it was <a name="Page_15" id="Page_15" />in the past to their elders. If they now feel and exhibit +faith and enthusiasm in the practice of the festival, be sure that, at +one time, adults felt and exhibited the same faith and enthusiasm—yea, +and more! For in neither faith nor enthusiasm can a child compete with a +convinced adult. No child could believe in anything as passionately as +the modern millionaire believes in money, or as the modern social +reformer believes in the virtue of Acts of Parliament.</p> + +<p>Another and a crowning proof that Christmas has been diminished in our +hearts lies in the fiery lyrical splendour of the old Christmas hymns. +Those hymns were not written by people who made-believe at Christmas for +the pleasure of youngsters. They were <a name="Page_16" id="Page_16" />written by devotees. And this age +could not have produced them.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>No! The decay of the old Christmas spirit among adults is undeniable, +and its cause is fairly plain. It is due to the labours of a set of +idealists—men who cared not for money, nor for glory, nor for anything +except their ideal. Their ideal was to find out the truth concerning +nature and concerning human history; and they sacrificed all—they +sacrificed the peace of mind of whole generations—to the pleasure of +slaking their ardour for truth. For them the most important thing in the +world was the satisfaction of their curiosity. They would leave naught +alone; and they scorned consequences. Useless to cry to them: "That is +holy. Touch it not!" I mean the great philosophers and men <a name="Page_17" id="Page_17" />of +science—especially the geologists—of the nineteenth century. I mean +such utterly pure-minded men as Lyell, Spencer, Darwin and Huxley. They +inaugurated the mighty age of doubt and scepticism. They made it +impossible to believe all manner of things which before them none had +questioned. The movement spread until uneasiness was everywhere in the +realm of thought, and people walked about therein fearsomely, as in a +land subject to earthquakes. It was as if people had said: "We don't +know what will topple next. Let's raze everything to the ground, and +then we shall feel safer." And there came a moment after which nobody +could ever look at a picture of the Nativity in the old way. Pictures of +the Nativity were admired perhaps as much as ever, but for the exquisite +<a name="Page_18" id="Page_18" />beauty of their naïveté, the charm of their old-world simplicity, not +as artistic renderings of fact.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>An age of scepticism has its faults, like any other age, though certain +persons have pretended the contrary. Having been compelled to abandon +its belief in various statements of alleged fact, it lumps principles +and ideals with alleged facts, and hastily decides not to believe in +anything at all. It gives up faith, it despises faith, in spite of the +warning of its greatest philosophers, including Herbert Spencer, that +faith of some sort is necessary to a satisfactory existence in a +universe full of problems which science admits it can never solve. None +were humbler than the foremost scientists about the narrowness of the +field of knowledge, as <a name="Page_19" id="Page_19" />compared with the immeasurability of the field +of faith. But the warning has been ignored, as warnings nearly always +are. Faith is at a discount. And the qualities which go with faith are +at a discount; such as enthusiasm, spontaneity, ebullition, lyricism, +and self-expression in general. Sentimentality is held in such horror +that people are afraid even of sentiment. Their secret cry is: "Give us +something in which we can believe."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>They forget, in their confusion, that the great principles, spiritual +and moral, remain absolutely intact. They forget that, after all the +shattering discoveries of science and conclusions of philosophy, mankind +has still to live with dignity amid hostile nature, and in the presence +of an unknowable <a name="Page_20" id="Page_20" />power and that mankind can only succeed in this +tremendous feat by the exercise of faith and of that mutual goodwill +which is based in sincerity and charity. They forget that, while facts +are nothing, these principles are everything. And so, at that epoch of +the year which nature herself has ordained for the formal recognition of +the situation of mankind in the universe and of its resulting duties to +itself and to the Unknown—at that epoch, they bewail, sadly or +impatiently or cynically: "Oh! The bottom has been knocked out of +Christmas!"</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But the bottom has not been knocked out of Christmas. And people know +it. Somewhere, in the most central and mysterious fastness of their +hearts, they know it. If they were not, in spite of themselves, +convinced of it, why <a name="Page_21" id="Page_21" />should they be so pathetically anxious to keep +alive in themselves, and to foster in their children, the Christmas +spirit? Obviously, a profound instinct is for ever reminding them that, +without the Christmas spirit, they are lost. The forms of faith change, +but the spirit of faith, which is the Christmas spirit, is immortal amid +its endless vicissitudes. At a crisis of change, faith is weakened for +the majority; for the majority it may seem to be dead. It is conserved, +however, in the hearts of the few supremely great and in the hearts of +the simple. The supremely great are hidden from the majority; but the +simple are seen of all men, and them we encourage, often without knowing +why, to be the depositaries of that which we cannot ourselves guard, but +which we dimly feel to be indispensable to our safety.<a name="Page_22" id="Page_22" /><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="THREE" id="THREE" /><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24" /><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25" />THREE</h2> + +<h2>THE SOLSTICE AND GOOD WILL</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>In order to see that there is underlying Christmas an idea of faith +which will at any rate last as long as the planet lasts, it is only +necessary to ask and answer the question: "Why was the Christmas feast +fixed for the twenty-fifth of December?" For it is absolutely certain, +and admitted by everybody of knowledge, that Christ was not born on the +twenty-fifth of December. Those disturbing impassioned inquirers after +truth, who will not leave us peaceful in our ignorance, have settled +that for us, by pointing out, among other things, that the <a name="Page_26" id="Page_26" />twenty-fifth +of December falls in the very midst of the Palestine rainy season, and +that, therefore, shepherds were assuredly not on that date watching +their flocks by night.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Christians were not, at first, united in the celebration of Christmas. +Some kept Christmas in January, others in April, others in May. It was a +pre-Christian force which drove them all into agreement upon the +twenty-fifth of December. Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree +from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from +the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when +mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, +when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when <a name="Page_27" id="Page_27" />the +year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over. No more +suitably symbolic moment could have been chosen for a festival of faith, +goodwill and joy. And the appositeness of the moment is just as perfect +in this era of electric light and central heating, as it was in the era +of Virgil, who, by the way, described a Christmas tree. We shall say +this year, with exactly the same accents of relief and hope as our pagan +ancestors used, and as the woaded savage used: "The days will begin to +lengthen now!" For, while we often falsely fancy that we have subjugated +nature to our service, the fact is that we are as irremediably as ever +at the mercy of nature.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Indeed, the attitude of us moderns towards the forces by which our +exist<a name="Page_28" id="Page_28" />ence is governed ought to be, and probably is, more reverent and +awe-struck than that of the earlier world. The discoveries of science +have at once quickened our imagination and compelled us to admit that +what we know is the merest trifle. The pagan in his ignorance explained +everything. Our knowledge has only deepened the mystery, and all that we +shall learn will but deepen it further. We can explain the solstice. We +are aware with absolute certitude that the solstice and the equinox and +the varying phenomena of the seasons are due to the fact that the plane +of the equator is tilted at a slight angle to the plane of the ecliptic. +When we put on the first overcoat in autumn, and when we give orders to +let the furnace out in spring, we know that we are arranging our lives +in ac<a name="Page_29" id="Page_29" />cordance with that angle. And we are quite duly proud of our +knowledge. And much good does our knowledge do us!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Well, it does do us some good, and in a spiritual way, too! For nobody +can even toy with astronomy without picturing to himself, more clearly +and startlingly than would be otherwise possible, a revolving globe that +whizzes through elemental space around a ball of fire: which, in turn, +is rushing with all its satellites at an inconceivable speed from +nowhere to nowhere; and to the surface of the revolving, whizzing globe +a multitude of living things desperately clinging, and these living +things, in the midst of cataclysmic danger, and between the twin enigmas +of birth and death, quarrelling and hating and calling themselves kings +and <a name="Page_30" id="Page_30" />queens and millionaires and beautiful women and aristocrats and +geniuses and lackeys and superior persons! Perhaps the highest value of +astronomy is that it renders more vivid the ironical significance of +such a vision, and thus brings home to us the truth that in spite of all +the differences which we have invented, mankind is a fellowship of +brothers, overshadowed by insoluble and fearful mysteries, and dependent +upon mutual goodwill and trust for the happiness it may hope to achieve. +* * * Let us remember that Christmas is, among other things, the winter +solstice, and that the bottom has not yet been knocked out of the winter +solstice, nor is likely to be in the immediate future!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>It is a curious fact that the one faith which really does flourish and +wax in <a name="Page_31" id="Page_31" />these days should be faith in the idea of social justice. For +social justice simply means the putting into practice of goodwill and +the recognition of the brotherhood of mankind. Formerly, people were +enthusiastic and altruistic for a theological idea, for a national idea, +for a political idea. You could see men on the rack for the sake of a +dogma; you could see men of a great nation fitting out regiments and +ruining themselves and going forth to save a small nation from +destruction. You could see men giving their lives to the aggrandisement +of an empire. And the men who did these things had the best brains and +the quickest wits and the warmest hearts of their time. But today, +whenever you meet a first-class man who is both enthusiastic and +altruistic, you may be sure that his pet <a name="Page_32" id="Page_32" />scheme is neither theological, +military nor political; you may be sure that he has got into his head +the notion that some class of persons somewhere are not being treated +fairly, are not being treated with fraternal goodwill, and that he is +determined to put the matter right, or perish.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>In England, nearly all the most interesting people are social reformers: +and the only circles of society in which you are not bored, in which +there is real conversation, are the circles of social reform. These +people alone have an abounding and convincing faith. Their faith has, +for example, convinced many of the best literary artists of the day, +with the result that a large proportion of the best modern imaginative +literature has been inspired by the dream of <a name="Page_33" id="Page_33" />social justice. Take away +that idea from the works of H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and George +Bernard Shaw, and there would be exactly nothing left. Despite any +appearance to the contrary, therefore, the idea of universal goodwill is +really alive upon the continents of this planet: more so, indeed, than +any other idea—for the vitality of an idea depends far less on the +numbers of people who hold it than on the quality of the heart and brain +of the people who hold it. Whether the growth of the idea is due to the +spiritual awe and humility which are the consequence of increased +scientific knowledge, I cannot say, and I do not seriously care.<a name="Page_34" id="Page_34" /><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + + +<h2><a name="FOUR" id="FOUR" /><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36" /><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37" />FOUR</h2> + +<h2>THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>"Yes," you say, "I am quite at one with you as to the immense importance +of goodwill in social existence, and I have the same faith in it as you +have. But why a festival? Why eating and drinking and ceremonies? Surely +one can have faith without festivals?"</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The answer is that one cannot; or at least that in practice, one never +does. A disinclination for festivals, a morbid self-conscious fear of +letting oneself go, is a sure sign of lack of faith. If you have not +enough enthusiasm for the <a name="Page_38" id="Page_38" />cult of goodwill to make you positively +desire to celebrate the cult, then your faith is insufficient and needs +fostering by study and meditation. Why, if you decide to found a +sailing-club up your creek, your very first thought is to signalise your +faith in the sailing of those particular waters by a dinner and a +jollity, and you take care that the event shall be an annual one! * * * +You have faith in your wife, and in your affection for her. Surely you +don't need a festival to remind you of that faith, you so superior to +human weaknesses? But you do! You insist on having it. And, if the +festival did not happen, you would feel gloomy and discouraged. A +birthday is a device for recalling to you in a formal and impressive +manner that a certain person still lives and is in need of <a name="Page_39" id="Page_39" />goodwill. It +is a device which experience has proved to be both valuable and +necessary.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Real faith effervesces; it shoots forth in every direction; it +communicates itself. And the inevitable result is a festival. The +festival is anticipated with pleasure, and it is remembered with +pleasure. And thus it reacts stimulatingly on that which gave it birth, +as the vitality of children reacts stimulatingly on the vitality of +parents. It provides a concrete symbol of that which is invisible and +intangible, and mankind is not yet so advanced in the path of spiritual +perfection that we can afford to dispense with concrete symbols. Now, if +we maintain festivals and formalities for the healthy continuance and +honour of a pastime or of a per<a name="Page_40" id="Page_40" />sonal affection, shall we not maintain a +festival—and a mighty one—in behalf of a faith which makes the +corporate human existence bearable amid the menaces and mysteries that +for ever threaten it,—the faith of universal goodwill and mutual +confidence?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>If then, there is to be a festival, why should it not be the festival of +Christmas? It can, indeed, be no other. Christmas is most plainly +indicated. It is dignified and made precious by traditions which go back +much further than the Christian era; and it has this tremendous +advantage—it exists! In spite of our declining faith, it has been +preserved to us, and here it is, ready to hand. Not merely does it fall +at the point which uncounted generations have agreed to consider as the +turn of <a name="Page_41" id="Page_41" />the solar year and as the rebirth of hope! It falls also +immediately before the end of the calendar year, and thus prepares us +for a fresh beginning that shall put the old to shame. It could not be +better timed. Further, its traditional spirit of peace and goodwill is +the very spirit which we desire to foster. And finally its customs—or +at any rate, its main customs—are well designed to symbolize that +spirit. If we have allowed the despatch of Christmas cards to degenerate +into naught but a tedious shuffling of paste-boards and overwork of +post-office officials, the fault is not in the custom but in ourselves. +The custom is a most striking one—so long as we have sufficient +imagination to remember vividly that we are all in the same boat—I +mean, on the same planet—and clinging des<a name="Page_42" id="Page_42" />perately to the flying ball, +and dependent for daily happiness on one another's good will! A +Christmas card sent by one human being to another human being is more +than a piece of coloured stationery sent by one log of wood to another +log of wood: it is an inspiring and reassuring message of high value. +The mischief is that so many self-styled human beings are just logs of +wood, rather stylishly dressed.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And then the custom of present-giving! What better and more convincing +proof of sympathy than a gift? The gift is one of these obvious +contrivances—like the wheel or the lever—which smooth and simplify +earthly life, and the charm of whose utility no obviousness can stale. +But of course any <a name="Page_43" id="Page_43" />contrivance can be rendered futile by clumsiness or +negligence. There is a sort of Christmas giver who says pettishly: "Oh! +I don't know what to give to So-and-So this Christmas! What a bother! I +shall write and tell her to choose something herself, and send the bill +to me!" And he writes. And though he does not suspect it, what he really +writes, and what So-and-So reads, is this: "Dear So-and-So. It is +nothing to me that you and I are alive together on this planet, and in +various ways mutually dependent. But I am bound by custom to give you a +present. I do not, however, take sufficient interest in your life to +know what object it would give you pleasure to possess; and I do not +want to be put to the trouble of finding out, nor of obtaining the +object and transmitting it to you. Will you, <a name="Page_44" id="Page_44" />therefore, buy something +for yourself and send the bill to me. Of course, a sense of social +decency will prevent you from spending more than a small sum, and I +shall be spared all exertion beyond signing a cheque. Yours insincerely +and loggishly * * *." So managed, the contrivance of present-giving +becomes positively sinister in its working. But managed with the +sympathetic imagination which is infallibly produced by real faith in +goodwill, its efficacy may approach the miraculous.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The Christmas ceremony of good-wishing by word of mouth has never been +in any danger of falling into insincerity. Such is the power of +tradition and virtue of a festival, and such the instinctive +brotherliness of men, that on this day the mere sight of an +<a name="Page_45" id="Page_45" />acquaintance will soften the voice and warm the heart of the most +superior sceptic and curmudgeon that the age of disillusion has +produced. In spite of himself, faith flickers up in him again, be it +only for a moment. And, during that moment, he is almost like those +whose bright faith the age has never tarnished, like the great and like +the simple, to whom it is quite unnecessary to offer a defence and +explanation of Christmas or to suggest the basis of a new faith therein.<a name="Page_46" id="Page_46" /><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="FIVE" id="FIVE" /><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48" /><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49" />FIVE</h2> + +<h2>DEFENCE OF FEASTING</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>And now I can hear the superior sceptic disdainfully questioning: "Yes, +but what about the orgy of Christmas? What about all the eating and +drinking?" To which I can only answer that faith causes effervescence, +expansion, joy, and that joy has always, for excellent reasons, been +connected with feasting. The very words 'feast' and 'festival' are +etymologically inseparable. The meal is the most regular and the least +dispensable of daily events; it happens also to be an event which is in +itself almost invariably a source of pleasure, or, at worst, <a name="Page_50" id="Page_50" />of +satisfaction: and it will continue to have this precious quality so long +as our souls are encased in bodies. What could be more natural, +therefore, than that it should be employed, with due enlargement and +ornamentation, as the kernel of the festival? What more logical than +that the meal should be elevated into a feast?</p> + +<p>"But," exclaims the superior sceptic, "this idea involves the idea of +excess!" What if it does? I would not deny it! Assuredly, a feast means +more than enough, and more than enough means excess. It is only because +a feast means excess that it assists in the bringing about of expansion +and joy. Such is human nature, and it is the case of human nature that +we are discussing. Of course, excess usually exacts its toll, within +twenty-<a name="Page_51" id="Page_51" />four hours, especially from the weak. But the benefit is worth +its price. The body pays no more than the debt which the soul has +incurred. An occasional change of habit is essential to well-being, and +every change of habit results in temporary derangement and +inconvenience.</p> + +<p>Do not misunderstand me. Do not push my notion of excess to extremes. +When I defend the excess inevitably incident to a feast, I am not +seeking to prove that a man in celebrating Christmas is entitled to +drink champagne in a public restaurant until he becomes an object of +scorn and disgust to the waiters who have travelled from Switzerland in +order to receive his tips. Much less should I be prepared to justify him +if, in his own home, he sank lower than the hog. Nor would I +sympathetically <a name="Page_52" id="Page_52" />carry him to bed. There is such a thing as excess in +moderation and dignity. Every wise man has practised this. And he who +has not practised it is a fool, and deserves even a harder name. He +ought indeed to inhabit a planet himself, for all his faith in humanity +will be exhausted in believing in himself. * * * So much for the feast!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But the accompaniments of the feast are also excessive. For example, you +make a tug-of-war with your neighbour at table, and the rope is a +fragile packet of tinselled paper, which breaks with a report like a +pistol. You open your half of the packet, and discover some doggerel +verse which you read aloud, and also a perfectly idiotic coloured cap, +which you put on your head <a name="Page_53" id="Page_53" />to the end of looking foolish. And this +ceremony is continued until the whole table is surrounded by +preposterous headgear, and doggerel verse is lying by every plate. +Surely no man in his senses, no woman in hers, would, etc., etc. * * *! +But one of the spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you +beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. +This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly +good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled +that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir +stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the +Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance +which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, <a name="Page_54" id="Page_54" />followed by +further expansion and ecstasy, which ensues after the putting on. +Everybody who has put on a cap is aware that it is a beneficial thing to +put on a cap. Quite apart from the fact that the mysterious and fanciful +race of children are thereby placated and appeased, the soul of the +capped one is purified by this charming excess.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And the Tree! What an excess of the fantastic to pretend that all those +glittering balls, those coloured candles and those variegated parcels +are the blossoms of the absurd tree! How excessively grotesque to tie +all those parcels to the branches, in order to take them off again! +Surely, something less medieval, more ingenious, more modern than this +could be devised—if symbolism is to be indulged in at all! Can <a name="Page_55" id="Page_55" />you +devise it, O sceptical one, revelling in disillusion? Can you invent a +symbol more natural and graceful than the symbol of the Tree? Perhaps +you would have a shop-counter, and shelves behind it, so as to instill +early into the youthful mind that this is a planet of commerce! Perhaps +you would abolish the doggerel of crackers, and substitute therefor +extracts from the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin! Perhaps you would +exchange the caps for blazonry embroidered with chemical formula, your +object being the advancement of science! Perhaps you would do away with +the orgiastic eating and drinking, and arrange for a formal conversation +about astronomy and the idea of human fraternity, upon strictly +reasonable rations of shredded wheat! You would thus create an <a name="Page_56" id="Page_56" />original +festival, and eliminate all fear of a dyspeptic morrow. You would +improve the mind. And you would avoid the ridiculous. But also, in +avoiding the ridiculous, you would tumble into the ridiculous, deeply +and hopelessly! And think how your very original festival would delight +the participators, how they would look forward to it with joy, and back +upon it with pleasurable regret; how their minds would dwell sweetly +upon the conception of shredded wheat, and how their faith would be +encouraged and strengthened by the intellectuality of the formal +conversation!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>He who girds at an ancient established festival should reflect upon +sundry obvious truths before he withers up the said festival by the +sirocco of his <a name="Page_57" id="Page_57" />contempt. These truths are as follows:—First, a +festival, though based upon intelligence, is not an affair of the +intellect, but an affair of the emotions. Second, the human soul can +only be reached through the human body. Third, it is impossible to +replace an ancient festival by a new one. Robespierre, amongst others, +tried to do so, and achieved the absurd. Reformers, heralds of new +faiths, and rejuvenators of old faiths, have always, when they +succeeded, adopted an ancient festival, with all or most of its forms, +and been content to breathe into it a new spirit to replace the old +spirit which had vanished or was vanishing. Anybody who, persuaded that +Christmas is not what it was, feels that a festival must nevertheless be +preserved, will do well to follow this example. To be <a name="Page_58" id="Page_58" />content with the +old forms and to vitalize them: that is the problem. Solve it, and the +forms will soon begin to adapt themselves to the process of +vitalization. All history is a witness in proof.<a name="Page_59" id="Page_59" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="SIX" id="SIX" /><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60" /><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61" />SIX</h2> + +<h2>TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>It being agreed, then, that the Christmas festival has lost a great deal +of its old vitality, and that, to many people, it is a source of tedium +and the cause of insincerity; and it being further agreed that the +difficulty cannot be got over by simply abolishing the festival, as no +one really wants it to be abolished; the question remains—what should +be done to vitalize it? The former spirit of faith, the spirit which +made the great Christmas of the golden days, has been weakened; but one +element of it—that which is founded on the conviction that goodwill +among <a name="Page_62" id="Page_62" />men is a prime necessity of reasonable living—survives with a +certain vigour, though even it has not escaped the general scepticism of +the age. This element unites in agreement all the pugnacious sectaries +who join battle over the other elements of the former faith. This +element has no enemies. None will deny its lasting virtue. Obviously, +therefore, the right course is to concentrate on the cultivation of +goodwill. If goodwill can be consciously increased, the festival of +Christmas will cease to be perfunctory. It will acquire a fresh and more +genuine significance, which, however, will not in any way inconvenience +those who have never let go of the older significance. No tradition will +be overthrown, no shock administered, and nobody will be able to croak +about iconoclasm and <a name="Page_63" id="Page_63" />new-fangled notions and the sudden end of the +world, and so on.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The fancy of some people will at once run to the formation of a grand +international Society for the revivifying of Christmas by the +cultivation of goodwill, with branches in all the chief cities of Europe +and America, and headquarters—of course at the Hague; and committees +and subcommittees, and presidents and vice-presidents; and honorary +secretaries and secretaries paid; and quarterly and annual meetings, and +triennial congresses! And a literary organ or two! And a +badge—naturally a badge, designed by a famous artist in harmonious +tints!</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>But my fancy does not run at all in this direction. I am convinced that +we <a name="Page_64" id="Page_64" />have already far too many societies for the furtherance of our ends. +To my mind, most societies with a moral aim are merely clumsy machines +for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense and +inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a group +of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very +wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some act +which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate goodwill +in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for saying +your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of performing +acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it necessary to +involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover, a society +means fuss and <a name="Page_65" id="Page_65" />shouting: two species of disturbance which are both +futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of morals.</p> + +<p>You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by +cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task +of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be +time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other +people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that +this is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you +have bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will +appreciate also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, +indeed, should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your +admirable intentions? Rest assured <a name="Page_66" id="Page_66" />that any unusual sprouting of the +desired crop will be instantly noticed by the persons interested.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill? +Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the +whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but a +magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate +goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of +goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical +eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just +beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much +attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out +to embrace the whole of <a name="Page_67" id="Page_67" />humanity in his goodwill, he will have even +less success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four +sisters at once; and his daily companions—those who see him eat his +bacon and lace his boots and earn his living—will most certainly have a +rough time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your +efforts on quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity +struggle on as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has +hitherto had.</p> + +<p>In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to +go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in +this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of the +group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or your +husband? Not <a name="Page_68" id="Page_68" />necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who most +frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be your wife. +These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be his butler. +She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you a charming +omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else. Whoever he or she +may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of irritated +superiority, aim at that person in particular.</p> + +<p>The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how +prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at +once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your +excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will +be aware that you have failed <a name="Page_69" id="Page_69" />in striving. Your successes will appear +effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid +curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of not +wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling that, +if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is being +attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very probably, +almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in fact +doing as you are; some of them—make no doubt—are doing a shade better. +I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill.<a name="Page_70" id="Page_70" /><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="SEVEN" id="SEVEN" /><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72" /><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73" />SEVEN</h2> + +<h2>THE GIFT OF ONESELF</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories—those who +sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called life; +and those who don't. The second category is much the larger of the two. +Very many people belong to it who think that they belong to the first. +They may deceive themselves, but they cannot deceive a child. Although +you may easily practise upon the credulity of a child in matters of +fact, you cannot cheat his moral and social judgment. He will add you +up, and he will add anybody up, and he will estimate con<a name="Page_74" id="Page_74" />duct, upon +principles of his own and in a manner terribly impartial. Parents have +no sterner nor more discerning critics than their own children.</p> + +<p>And so you may be polite to a child, and pretend to appreciate his point +of view; but, unless you really do put yourself to the trouble of +understanding him, unless you throw yourself, by the exercise of +imagination, into his world, you will not succeed in being his friend. +To be his friend means an effort on your part, it means that you must +divest yourself of your own mental habit, and, for the time being, adopt +his. And no nice phrases, no gifts of money, sweets or toys, can take +the place of this effort, and this sacrifice of self. With five minutes +of genuine surrender to him, you can win more of his esteem and +gratitude than five hun<a name="Page_75" id="Page_75" />dred pounds would buy. His notion of real +goodwill is the imaginative sharing of his feelings, a convinced +participation in his pains and pleasures. He is well aware that, if you +honestly do this, you will be on his side.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Now, adults, of course, are tremendously clever and accomplished persons +and children are no match for them; but still, with all their talents +and omniscience and power, adults seem to lack important pieces of +knowledge which children possess; they seem to forget, and to fail to +profit by, their infantile experience. Else why should adults in general +be so extraordinarily ignorant of the great truth that the secret of +goodwill lies in the sympathetic exercise of the imagination? Since +goodwill is the secret of human happi<a name="Page_76" id="Page_76" />ness, it follows that the secret +of goodwill must be one of the most precious aids to sensible living; +and yet adults, though they once knew it, have gone and forgotten it! +Children may well be excused for concluding that the ways of the adult, +in their capricious irrationality, are past finding out.</p> + +<p>To increase your goodwill for a fellow creature, it is necessary to +imagine that you are he: and nothing else is necessary. This feat is not +easy; but it can be done. Some people have less of the divine faculty of +imagination than others, but nobody is without it, and, like all other +faculties, it improves with use, just as it deteriorates with neglect. +Imagination is a function of the brain. In order to cultivate goodwill +for a person, you must think frequently about that person. You must +in<a name="Page_77" id="Page_77" />form yourself about all his activities. You must be able in your +mind's eye to follow him hour by hour throughout the day, and you must +ascertain if he sleeps well at night—because this is not a trifle. And +you must reflect upon his existence with the same partiality as you +reflect upon your own. (Why not?) That is to say, you must lay the +fullest stress on his difficulties, disappointments and unhappinesses, +and you must minimise his good fortune. You must magnify his efforts +after righteousness, and forget his failures. You must ever remember +that, after all, he is not to blame for the faults of his character, +which faults, in his case as in yours, are due partly to heredity and +partly to environment. And beyond everything you must always give him +credit for good intentions. Do not you, <a name="Page_78" id="Page_78" />though sometimes mistakenly, +always act for the best? You know you do! And are you alone among +mortals in rectitude?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>This mental exercise in relation to another person takes time, and it +involves a fatiguing effort. I repeat that it is not easy. Nor is it +invariably agreeable. You may, indeed, find it tedious, for example, to +picture in vivid detail all the worries that have brought about your +wife's exacerbation—negligent maid, dishonest tradesman, milk in a +thunder storm, hypercritical husband, dirt in the wrong place—but, when +you have faithfully done so, I absolutely defy you to speak to her in +the same tone as you used to employ, and to cherish resentment against +her as you used to do. And I absolutely <a name="Page_79" id="Page_79" />defy you not to feel less +discontented with yourself than in the past. It is impossible that the +exercise of imagination about a person should not result in goodwill +towards that person. The exercise may put a strain upon you; but its +effect is a scientific certainty. It is the supreme social exercise, for +it is the giving of oneself in the most intimate and complete sense. It +is the suspension of one's individuality in favour of another. It +establishes a new attitude of mind, which, though it may well lead to +specific social acts, is more valuable than any specific act, for it is +ceaselessly translating itself into demeanour.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The critic with that terrible English trait, an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, will at this point probably re<a name="Page_80" id="Page_80" />mark to himself, smiling: "I +suppose the time will come, when by dint of regular daily practice, I +shall have achieved perfect goodwill towards the first object of my +attentions. I can then regard that person as 'done.' I can put him on a +shelf, and turn to the next; and, in the end, all my relations, friends +and acquaintances will be 'done' and I can stare at them in a row on the +shelf of my mind, with pride and satisfaction * * *." Except that no +person will ever be quite "done," human nature, still being human, in +spite of the recent advances of civilisation, I do not deprecate this +manner of stating the case.</p> + +<p>The ambitious and resolute man, with an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of +different ob<a name="Page_81" id="Page_81" />jects as they were successively achieved. If for example it +was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know +that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by +concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never +acquire any foreign language in absolute perfection. Still, he would +reach a certain stage in a language, and then he would put it aside and +turn to the next one on his programme, and so on. Assuredly, he would +not be ashamed of employing method to reach his end.</p> + +<p>Now all that can be said of the acquirement of foreign languages can be +said of the acquirement of goodwill. In remedying the deficiences of the +heart and character, as in remedying the deficiences of mere knowledge, +the brain is the sole possible instrument, <a name="Page_82" id="Page_82" />and the best results will be +obtained by using it regularly and scientifically, according to an +arranged method. Why, therefore, if a man be proud of method in +improving his knowledge, should he see something ridiculous in a +deliberate plan for improving his heart—the affair of his heart being +immensely more important, more urgent and more difficult? The reader who +has found even one good answer to the above question, need read no more +of this book, for he will have confounded me and it.<a name="Page_83" id="Page_83" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="EIGHT" id="EIGHT" /><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84" /><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85" />EIGHT</h2> + +<h2>THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>The consequences of the social self-discipline which I have outlined +will be various. A fairly early result will be the gradual decline, and +ultimately the death, of the superior person in oneself. It is true that +the superior person in oneself has nine lives, and is capable of rising +from the dead after even the most fatal blows. But, at worst, the +superior person—(and who among us does not shelter that sinister +inhabitant in his soul?)—will have a very poor time in the soul of him +who steadily practises the imaginative understanding of other people. In +the first place, <a name="Page_86" id="Page_86" />the mere exercise of the imagination on others +absolutely scotches egotism as long as it lasts, and leaves it weakened +afterwards. And, in the second and more important place, an improved +comprehension of others (which means an intensified sympathy with them) +must destroy the illusion, so widespread, that one's own case is unique. +The amicable study of one's neighbours on the planet inevitably shows +that the same troubles, the same fortitudes, the same +feats of intelligence, the same successes and failures, are constantly +happening everywhere. One can, indeed, see oneself in nearly everybody +else, and, in particular, one is struck by the fact that the quality in +which one took most pride is simply spread abroad throughout humanity in +heaps! It is only in sympathetically contemplating others that one can +get <a name="Page_87" id="Page_87" />oneself in a true perspective. Yet probably the majority of human +beings never do contemplate others, save with the abstracted gaze which +proves that the gazer sees nothing but his own dream.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>Another result of the discipline is an immensely increased interest in +one's friends. One regards them even with a sort of proprietary +interest, for, by imagination, one has come into sympathetic possession +of them. Further, one has for them that tender feeling which always +follows the conferring of a benefit, especially the secret conferring of +a benefit. It is the benefactor, not the person benefited, who is +grateful. The benefit which one has conferred is, of course, the gift of +oneself. The resulting emotion is independent of any sympathy rendered +by the other; <a name="Page_88" id="Page_88" />and where the sympathy is felt to be mutual, friendship +acquires a new significance. The exercise of sympathetic imagination +will cause one to look upon even a relative as a friend—a startling +achievement! It will provide a new excitement and diversion in life.</p> + +<p>When the month of December dawns, there need be no sensation of weary +apprehension about the difficulty of choosing a present that will suit a +friend. Certainly it will not be necessary, from sheer indifference and +ignorance, to invite the friend to choose his own present. On the +contrary, one will be, in secret, so intimate with the friend's +situation and wants and desires, that sundry rival schemes for +pleasuring him will at once offer themselves. And when he receives the +present finally selected, he will have the conviction, always +delightfully flattering <a name="Page_89" id="Page_89" />to a donee, that he has been the object of a +particular attention and insight. * * * And when the cards of greeting +are despatched, formal phrases will go forth charged, in the +consciousness of the sender, with a genuine meaning, with the force of a +climax, as though the sender had written thereon, in invisible ink: "I +have had you well in mind during the last twelve months; I think I +understand your difficulties and appreciate your efforts better than I +did, and so it is with a peculiar sympathetic knowledge that I wish you +good luck. I have guessed what particular kind of good luck you require, +and I wish accordingly. My wish is not vague and perfunctory only."</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And on the day of festival itself one feels that one really has +something to <a name="Page_90" id="Page_90" />celebrate. The occasion has a basis, if it had no basis +for one before; and if a basis previously existed, then it is widened +and strengthened. The festival becomes a public culmination to a private +enterprise. One is not reminded by Christmas of goodwill, because the +enterprise of imaginative sympathy has been a daily affair throughout +the year; but Christmas provides an excuse for taking satisfaction in +the success of the enterprise and new enthusiasm to correct its +failures. The symbolism of the situation of Christmas, at the turn of +the year, develops an added impressiveness, and all the Christmas +customs, apt to produce annoyance in the breasts of the unsentimental, +are accepted with indulgence, even with eagerness, because their +symbolism also is shown in a clearer light. Christmas becomes as +<a name="Page_91" id="Page_91" />personal as a birthday. One eats and drinks to excess, not because it +is the custom to eat and drink to excess, but from sheer effervescent +faith in an idea. And as one sits with one's friends, possessing them in +the privacy of one's heart, permeated by a sense of the value of +sympathetic comprehension in this formidable adventure of existence on a +planet that rushes eternally through the night of space; assured indeed +that companionship and mutual understanding alone make the adventure +agreeable,—one sees in a flash that Christmas, whatever else it may be, +is and must be the Feast of St. Friend, and a day on that account +supreme among the days of the year.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>The third and greatest consequence of the systematic cultivation of +<a name="Page_92" id="Page_92" />goodwill now grows blindingly apparent. To state it earlier in all its +crudity would have been ill-advised; and I purposely refrained from +doing so. It is the augmentation of one's own happiness. The increase of +amity, the diminution of resentment and annoyance, the regular +maintenance of an attitude mildly benevolent towards mankind,—these +things are the surest way to happiness. And it is because they are the +surest way to happiness, that the most enlightened go after them. All +real motives are selfish motives; were it otherwise humanity would be +utterly different from what it is. A man may perform some act which will +benefit another while working some striking injury to himself. But his +reason for doing it is that he prefers the evil of the injury to the +deeper evil of the <a name="Page_93" id="Page_93" />fundamental dissatisfaction which would torment him +if he did not perform the act. Nobody yet sought the good of another +save as a means to his own good. And it is in accordance with common +sense that this should be so. There is, however, a lower egotism and a +higher. It is the latter which we call unselfishness. And it is the +latter of which Christmas is the celebration. We shall legitimately bear +in mind, therefore, that Christmas, in addition to being the Feast of +St. Friend, is even more profoundly the feast of one's own welfare.<a name="Page_94" id="Page_94" /><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<div><br /></div> + + +<h2><a name="NINE" id="NINE" /><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96" /><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97" />NINE</h2> + +<h2>THE REACTION</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>A reaction sets in between Christmas and the New Year. It is inevitable; +and I should be writing basely if I did not devote to it a full chapter. +In those few dark days of inactivity, between a fete and the resumption +of the implacable daily round, when the weather is usually cynical, and +we are paying in our tissues the fair price of excess, we see life and +the world in a grey and sinister light, which we imagine to be the only +true light. Take the case of the average successful man of thirty-five. +What is he thinking as he lounges about on the day after Christmas?</p> + +<p><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98" />His thoughts probably run thus: "Even if I live to a good old age, +which is improbable, as many years lie behind me as before me. I have +lived half my life, and perhaps more than half my life. I have realised +part of my worldly ambition. I have made many good resolutions, and kept +one or two of them in k more or less imperfect manner. I cannot, as a +commonsense person, hope to keep a larger proportion of good resolutions +in the future than I have kept in the past. I have tried to understand +and sympathise with my fellow creatures, and though I have not entirely +failed to do so, I have nearly failed. I am not happy and I am not +content. And if, after all these years, I am neither happy nor content, +what chance is there of my being happy and <a name="Page_99" id="Page_99" />content in the second half +of my life? The realisation of part of my worldly ambition has not made +me any happier, and, therefore, it is unlikely that the realisation of +the whole of my ambition will make me any happier. My strength cannot +improve; it can only weaken; and my health likewise. I in my turn am +coming to believe—what as a youth I rejected with disdain—namely, that +happiness is what one is not, and content is what one has not. Why, +then, should I go on striving after the impossible? Why should I not let +things slide?"</p> + +<p>Thus reflects the average successful man, and there is not one of us, +successful or unsuccessful, ambitious or unambitious, whose reflections +have not often led him to a conclusion equally dis<a name="Page_100" id="Page_100" />satisfied. Why should +I or anybody pretend that this is not so?</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest +vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving. +He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine +conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved. Positive though he +may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same +dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue +to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a +fact. It must be accepted. Conduct must be adjusted to it. The struggle +being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be +carried through. It will not end brilliantly, but precautions <a name="Page_101" id="Page_101" />can be +taken against it ending disgracefully. These precautions consist in the +devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a +series of resolutions: which resolutions are generally made at or +immediately before the beginning of a New Year. Without these the +struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it +is with them. Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than +unorganised effort.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised: but an ideal cannot +be attained—if it could, it would not be an ideal. The virtue of an +ideal is its unattainability. It seems, when it is first formed, just as +attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a +means to it. After twen<a name="Page_102" id="Page_102" />ty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained. +After forty-eight, it is a little farther off. After a week, it has +receded still further. After a month it is far away; and towards the end +of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is +definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere. And then, such is the +divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse +for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame +in yet another organised effort. Such is the annual circle of the ideal, +the effort, the failure and the shame. A rather pitiful history it may +appear! And yet it is also rather a splendid history! For the failure +and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity +of our faith in ourselves. It is only in com<a name="Page_103" id="Page_103" />parison with our ideal that +we have fallen low. We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we +should have been if we had not attempted to rise.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>There are those who will say: "At any rate, we might moderate somewhat +the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that +there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the +achievement. Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common +sense! Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment +caused by sterile endeavour!" It would. But just try to moderate the +ideal and the self-conceit! And you will find, in spite of all your sad +experiences, that you cannot. If there is the stuff of a man in you, you +<a name="Page_104" id="Page_104" />simply cannot! The truth, is that, in the supreme things, a man does +not act under the rules of earthly common sense. He transcends them, +because there is a quality in him which compels him to do so. Common +sense may persuade him to attempt to keep down the ideal, and +self-conceit may pretend to agree. But all the time, self-conceit will +be whispering: "I can go one better than that." And lo! the ideal is +furtively raised again.</p> + +<p>A man really has little scientific control over the height of his ideal +and the intensity of his belief in himself. He is born with them, as he +is born with a certain pulse and a certain reflex action. He can neglect +the ideal, so that it almost dissolves, but he cannot change its height. +He can maim his belief in himself by persistent abandon<a name="Page_105" id="Page_105" />ment to folly, +but he cannot lower its flame by an effort of the will, as he might +lower the flame of a gas by a calculated turn of the hand. In the secret +and inmost constitution of humanity it is ordained that the disparity +between the aim and the achievement shall seem grotesque; it is ordained +that there shall be an enormous fuss about pretty nearly nothing; it is +ordained that the mountain shall bring forth a mouse. But it is also +ordained that men shall go blithely on just the same, ignoring in +practice the ridiculousness which they admit in theory, and drawing +renewed hope and conceit from some magic, exhaustless source. And this +is the whole philosophy of the New Year's resolution.<a name="Page_106" id="Page_106" /><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107" /></p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div><br /></div> + +<h2><a name="TEN" id="TEN" /><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108" /><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109" />TEN</h2> + +<h2>ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR</h2> + +<div><br /></div> + +<p>There are few people who arrive at a true understanding of life, even in +the calm and disillusioned hours of reflection that come between the end +of one annual period and the beginning of another. Nearly everybody has +an idea at the back of his head that if only he could conquer certain +difficulties and embarrassments, he might really start to live properly, +in the full sense of living. And if he has pluck he says to himself: "I +<i>will</i> smooth things out, and then I'll really live." In the same way, +nearly everybody, regarding the spectacle of the world, sees therein a +<a name="Page_110" id="Page_110" />principle which he calls Evil; and he thinks: "If only we could get rid +of this Evil, if only we could set things right, how splendid the world +would be!" Now, in the meaning usually attached to it, there is no such +positive principle as Evil. Assuming that there is such a positive +principle in a given phenomenon—such as the character of a particular +man—you must then admit that there is the same positive principle +everywhere, for just as the character of no man is so imperfect that you +could not conceive a worse, so the character of no man is so perfect +that you could not conceive a better. Do away with Evil from the world, +and you would not merely abolish certain specially distressing matters, +you would change everything. You would in fact achieve perfection. And +when we say <a name="Page_111" id="Page_111" />that one thing is evil and another good, all that we mean +is that one thing is less advanced than another in the way of +perfection. Evil cannot therefore be a positive principle; it signifies +only the falling short of perfection.</p> + +<p>And supposing that the desires of mankind were suddenly fulfilled, and +the world was rendered perfect! There would be no motive for effort, no +altercation of conflicting motives in the human heart; nothing to do, no +one to befriend, no anxiety, no want unsatisfied. Equilibrium would be +established. A cheerful world! You can see instantly how amusing it +would be. It would have only one drawback—that of being dead. Its +reason for being alive would have ceased to operate. Life means change +through constant development. But you cannot develop the perfect. The +perfect can merely expire.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112" />That average successful man whom I have previously cited feels all this +by instinct, though he does not comprehend it by reason. He reaches his +ambition, and retires from the fight in order to enjoy life,—and what +does he then do? He immediately creates for himself a new series of +difficulties and embarrassments, either by undertaking the management of +a large estate, or by some other device. If he does not maintain for +himself conditions which necessitate some kind of struggle, he quickly +dies—spiritually or physically, often both. The proportion of men who, +having established an equilibrium, proceed to die on the spot, is +enormous. Continual effort, which means, of course, continual +disappointment, is the <i>sine qua non</i>—without it there is literally +nothing vital. Its abolition is the abol<a name="Page_113" id="Page_113" />ition of life. Hence, people, +who, failing to savour the struggle itself, anticipate the end of the +struggle as the beginning of joy and happiness—these people are simply +missing life; they are longing to exchange life for death. The hemlock +would save them a lot of weary waiting.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>We shall now perceive, I think, what is wrong with the assumptions of +the average successful man as set forth in the previous chapter. In +postulating that happiness is what one is not, he has got hold of a +mischievous conception of happiness. Let him examine his conception of +happiness, and he will find that it consists in the enjoyment of love +and luxury, and in the freedom from enforced effort. He generally wants +all three ingredients. Now pas<a name="Page_114" id="Page_114" />sionate love does not mean happiness; it +means excitement, apprehension and continually renewed desire. And +affectionate love, from which the passion has faded, means something +less than happiness, for, mingled with its gentle tranquility is a +disturbing regret for the more fiery past. Luxury, according to the +universal experience of those who have had it, has no connection +whatever with happiness. And as for freedom from enforced effort, it +means simply death.</p> + +<p>Happiness as it is dreamed of cannot possibly exist save for brief +periods of self-deception which are followed by terrible periods of +reaction. Real, practicable happiness is due primarily not to any kind +of environment, but to an inward state of mind. Real happiness consists +first in acceptance of the <a name="Page_115" id="Page_115" />fact that discontent is a condition of life, +and, second, in an honest endeavour to adjust conduct to an ideal. Real +happiness is not an affair of the future; it is an affair of the +present. Such as it is, if it cannot be obtained now, it can never be +obtained. Real happiness lives in patience, having comprehended that if +very little is accomplished towards perfection, so a man's existence is +a very little moment in the vast expanse of the universal life, and +having also comprehended that it is the struggle which is vital, and +that the end of the struggle is only another name for death.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p>"Well," I hear you exclaiming, "if this is all we can look forward to, +if this is all that real, practicable happiness amounts to, is life +worth living?" That <a name="Page_116" id="Page_116" />is a question which each person has to answer for +himself. If he answers it in the negative, no argument, no persuasion, +no sentimentalisation of the facts of life, will make him alter his +opinion. Most people, however, answer it in the affirmative. Despite all +the drawbacks, despite all the endless disappointments, they decide that +life is worth living. There are two species of phenomena which bring +them to this view. The first may be called the golden moments of life, +which seem somehow in their transient brevity to atone for the dull +exasperation of interminable mediocre hours: moments of triumph in the +struggle, moments of fierce exultant resolve; moments of joy in +nature—moments which defy oblivion in the memory, and which, being +priceless, cannot be too dearly bought.</p> + +<p><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117" />The second species of compensatory phenomena are all the agreeable +experiences connected with human friendship; the general feeling, under +diverse forms, that one is not alone in the world. It is for the +multiplication and intensification of these phenomena that Christmas, +the Feast of St. Friend, exists. And, on the last day of the year, on +the eve of a renewed effort, our thoughts may profitably be centered +upon a plan of campaign whose execution shall result in a less imperfect +intercourse.</p> + +<div><br /></div> +<div><br /></div> + +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 14653-h.txt or 14653-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/4/6/5/14653">https://www.gutenberg.org/1/4/6/5/14653</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +<a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL">https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/GUTINDEX.ALL</a> + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** +</pre> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/old/14653-h/images/image1.png b/old/14653-h/images/image1.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a314aaf --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14653-h/images/image1.png diff --git a/old/14653.txt b/old/14653.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..28d3c66 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14653.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1626 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Feast of St. Friend, by Arnold Bennett + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Feast of St. Friend + +Author: Arnold Bennett + +Release Date: January 10, 2005 [eBook #14653] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND*** + + +E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, Project Gutenberg Beginners +Projects, Melissa Er-Raqabi, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed +Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) + + + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + +A Christmas Book + +by + +ARNOLD BENNETT + +Author of _The Old Wives' Tale_, _Buried Alive_, etc., etc. + +New York +George H. Doran Company + +1911 + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER + + I. THE FACT + II. THE REASON + III. THE SOLSTICE AND GOODWILL + IV. THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + V. DEFENCE OF FEASTING + VI. TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + VII. THE GIFT OF ONESELF +VIII. THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + IX. THE REACTION + X. ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + + + + +ONE + +THE FACT + + +Something has happened to Christmas, or to our hearts; or to both. In +order to be convinced of this it is only necessary to compare the +present with the past. In the old days of not so long ago the festival +began to excite us in November. For weeks the house rustled with +charming and thrilling secrets, and with the furtive noises of paper +parcels being wrapped and unwrapped; the house was a whispering gallery. +The tension of expectancy increased to such a point that there was a +positive danger of the cord snapping before it ought to snap. On the +Eve we went to bed with no hope of settled sleep. We knew that we should +be wakened and kept awake by the waits singing in the cold; and we were +glad to be kept awake so. On the supreme day we came downstairs hiding +delicious yawns, and cordially pretending that we had never been more +fit. The day was different from other days; it had a unique romantic +quality, tonic, curative of all ills. On that day even the tooth-ache +vanished, retiring far into the wilderness with the spiteful word, the +venomous thought, and the unlovely gesture. We sang with gusto +"Christians awake, salute the happy morn." We did salute the happy morn. +And when all the parcels were definitely unpacked, and the secrets of +all hearts disclosed, we spent the rest of the happy morn in waiting, +candidly greedy, for the first of the great meals. And then we ate, and +we drank, and we ate again; with no thought of nutrition, nor of +reasonableness, nor of the morrow, nor of dyspepsia. We ate and drank +without fear and without shame, in the sheer, abandoned ecstasy of +celebration. And by means of motley paper headgear, fit only for a +carnival, we disguised ourselves in the most absurd fashions, and yet +did not make ourselves seriously ridiculous; for ridicule is in the +vision, not in what is seen. And we danced and sang and larked, until we +could no more. And finally we chanted a song of ceremony, and separated; +ending the day as we had commenced it, with salvoes of good wishes. And +the next morning we were indisposed and enfeebled; and we did not care; +we suffered gladly; we had our pain's worth, and more. This was the +past. + + * * * * * + +Even today the spirit and rites of ancient Christmas are kept up, more +or less in their full rigour and splendour, by a race of beings that is +scattered over the whole earth. This race, mysterious, masterful, +conservative, imaginative, passionately sincere, arriving from we know +not where, dissolving before our eyes we know not how, has its way in +spite of us. I mean the children. By virtue of the children's faith, the +reindeer are still tramping the sky, and Christmas Day is still +something above and beyond a day of the week; it is a day out of the +week. We have to sit and pretend; and with disillusion in our souls we +do pretend. At Christmas, it is not the children who make-believe; it +is ourselves. Who does not remember the first inkling of a suspicion +that Christmas Day was after all a day rather like any other day? In the +house of my memories, it was the immemorial duty of my brother on +Christmas morning, before anything else whatever happened, to sit down +to the organ and perform "Christians Awake" with all possible stops +drawn. He had to do it. Tradition, and the will that emanated from the +best bedroom, combined to force him to do it. One Christmas morning, as +he was preparing the stops, he glanced aside at me with a supercilious +curl of the lips, and the curl of my lips silently answered. It was as +if he had said: "I condescend to this," and as if I had said: "So do I." + +Such a moment comes to most of us of this generation. And thenceforward +the change in us is extraordinarily rapid. The next thing we know is +that the institution of waits is a rather annoying survival which at +once deprives us of sleep and takes money out of our pockets. And then +Christmas is gluttony and indigestion and expensiveness and quarter-day, +and Christmas cards are a tax and a nuisance, and present-giving is a +heavier tax and a nuisance. And we feel self-conscious and foolish as we +sing "Auld Lang Syne." And what a blessing it will be when the +"festivities" (as they are misleadingly called) are over, and we can +settle down into commonsense again! + + * * * * * + +I do not mean that our hearts are black with despair on Christmas Day. +I do not mean that we do not enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. There is +no doubt that, with the inspiriting help of the mysterious race, and by +the force of tradition, and by our own gift of pretending, we do still +very much enjoy ourselves on Christmas Day. What I mean to insinuate, +and to assert, is that beneath this enjoyment is the disconcerting and +distressing conviction of unreality, of non-significance, of exaggerated +and even false sentiment. What I mean is that we have to brace and force +ourselves up to the enjoyment of Christmas. We have to induce +deliberately the "Christmas feeling." We have to remind ourselves that +"it will never do" to let the heartiness of Christmas be impaired. The +peculiarity of our attitude towards Christmas, which at worst is a +vacation, may be clearly seen by contrasting it with our attitude +towards another vacation--the summer holiday. We do not have to brace +and force ourselves up to the enjoyment of the summer holiday. We +experience no difficulty in inducing the holiday feeling. There is no +fear of the institution of the summer holiday losing its heartiness. Nor +do we need the example of children to aid us in savouring the August +"festivities." + + * * * * * + +If any person here breaks in with the statement that I am deceived and +the truth is not in me, and that Christmas stands just where it did in +the esteem of all right-minded people, and that he who casts a doubt on +the heartiness of Christmas is not right-minded, let that person read no +more. This book is not written for him. And if any other person, +kindlier, condescendingly protests that there is nothing wrong with +Christmas except my advancing age, let that person read no more. This +book is not written for him, either. It is written for persons who can +look facts cheerfully in the face. That Christmas has lost some of its +magic is a fact that the common sense of the western hemisphere will not +dispute. To blink the fact is infantile. To confront it, to try to +understand it, to reckon with it, and to obviate any evil that may +attach to it--this course alone is meet for an honest man. + + + + + +TWO + +THE REASON + + +If the decadence of Christmas were a purely subjective phenomenon, +confined to the breasts of those of us who have ceased to be children +then it follows that Christmas has always been decadent, because people +have always been ceasing to be children. It follows also that the +festival was originally got up by disillusioned adults, for the benefit +of the children. Which is totally absurd. Adults have never yet invented +any institution, festival or diversion specially for the benefit of +children. The egoism of adults makes such an effort impossible, and the +ingenuity and pliancy of children make it unnecessary. The pantomime, +for example, which is now pre-eminently a diversion for children, was +created by adults for the amusement of adults. Children have merely +accepted it and appropriated it. Children, being helpless, are of course +fatalists and imitators. They take what comes, and they do the best they +can with it. And when they have made something their own that was adult, +they stick to it like leeches. + +They are terrific Tories, are children; they are even reactionary! They +powerfully object to changes. What they most admire in a pantomime is +the oldest part of it, the only true pantomime--the harlequinade! Hence +the very nature of children is a proof that what Christmas is now to +them, it was in the past to their elders. If they now feel and exhibit +faith and enthusiasm in the practice of the festival, be sure that, at +one time, adults felt and exhibited the same faith and enthusiasm--yea, +and more! For in neither faith nor enthusiasm can a child compete with a +convinced adult. No child could believe in anything as passionately as +the modern millionaire believes in money, or as the modern social +reformer believes in the virtue of Acts of Parliament. + +Another and a crowning proof that Christmas has been diminished in our +hearts lies in the fiery lyrical splendour of the old Christmas hymns. +Those hymns were not written by people who made-believe at Christmas for +the pleasure of youngsters. They were written by devotees. And this age +could not have produced them. + + * * * * * + +No! The decay of the old Christmas spirit among adults is undeniable, +and its cause is fairly plain. It is due to the labours of a set of +idealists--men who cared not for money, nor for glory, nor for anything +except their ideal. Their ideal was to find out the truth concerning +nature and concerning human history; and they sacrificed all--they +sacrificed the peace of mind of whole generations--to the pleasure of +slaking their ardour for truth. For them the most important thing in the +world was the satisfaction of their curiosity. They would leave naught +alone; and they scorned consequences. Useless to cry to them: "That is +holy. Touch it not!" I mean the great philosophers and men of +science--especially the geologists--of the nineteenth century. I mean +such utterly pure-minded men as Lyell, Spencer, Darwin and Huxley. They +inaugurated the mighty age of doubt and scepticism. They made it +impossible to believe all manner of things which before them none had +questioned. The movement spread until uneasiness was everywhere in the +realm of thought, and people walked about therein fearsomely, as in a +land subject to earthquakes. It was as if people had said: "We don't +know what will topple next. Let's raze everything to the ground, and +then we shall feel safer." And there came a moment after which nobody +could ever look at a picture of the Nativity in the old way. Pictures of +the Nativity were admired perhaps as much as ever, but for the exquisite +beauty of their naivete, the charm of their old-world simplicity, not +as artistic renderings of fact. + + * * * * * + +An age of scepticism has its faults, like any other age, though certain +persons have pretended the contrary. Having been compelled to abandon +its belief in various statements of alleged fact, it lumps principles +and ideals with alleged facts, and hastily decides not to believe in +anything at all. It gives up faith, it despises faith, in spite of the +warning of its greatest philosophers, including Herbert Spencer, that +faith of some sort is necessary to a satisfactory existence in a +universe full of problems which science admits it can never solve. None +were humbler than the foremost scientists about the narrowness of the +field of knowledge, as compared with the immeasurability of the field +of faith. But the warning has been ignored, as warnings nearly always +are. Faith is at a discount. And the qualities which go with faith are +at a discount; such as enthusiasm, spontaneity, ebullition, lyricism, +and self-expression in general. Sentimentality is held in such horror +that people are afraid even of sentiment. Their secret cry is: "Give us +something in which we can believe." + + * * * * * + +They forget, in their confusion, that the great principles, spiritual +and moral, remain absolutely intact. They forget that, after all the +shattering discoveries of science and conclusions of philosophy, mankind +has still to live with dignity amid hostile nature, and in the presence +of an unknowable power and that mankind can only succeed in this +tremendous feat by the exercise of faith and of that mutual goodwill +which is based in sincerity and charity. They forget that, while facts +are nothing, these principles are everything. And so, at that epoch of +the year which nature herself has ordained for the formal recognition of +the situation of mankind in the universe and of its resulting duties to +itself and to the Unknown--at that epoch, they bewail, sadly or +impatiently or cynically: "Oh! The bottom has been knocked out of +Christmas!" + + * * * * * + +But the bottom has not been knocked out of Christmas. And people know +it. Somewhere, in the most central and mysterious fastness of their +hearts, they know it. If they were not, in spite of themselves, +convinced of it, why should they be so pathetically anxious to keep +alive in themselves, and to foster in their children, the Christmas +spirit? Obviously, a profound instinct is for ever reminding them that, +without the Christmas spirit, they are lost. The forms of faith change, +but the spirit of faith, which is the Christmas spirit, is immortal amid +its endless vicissitudes. At a crisis of change, faith is weakened for +the majority; for the majority it may seem to be dead. It is conserved, +however, in the hearts of the few supremely great and in the hearts of +the simple. The supremely great are hidden from the majority; but the +simple are seen of all men, and them we encourage, often without knowing +why, to be the depositaries of that which we cannot ourselves guard, but +which we dimly feel to be indispensable to our safety. + + + + + +THREE + +THE SOLSTICE AND GOOD WILL + + +In order to see that there is underlying Christmas an idea of faith +which will at any rate last as long as the planet lasts, it is only +necessary to ask and answer the question: "Why was the Christmas feast +fixed for the twenty-fifth of December?" For it is absolutely certain, +and admitted by everybody of knowledge, that Christ was not born on the +twenty-fifth of December. Those disturbing impassioned inquirers after +truth, who will not leave us peaceful in our ignorance, have settled +that for us, by pointing out, among other things, that the twenty-fifth +of December falls in the very midst of the Palestine rainy season, and +that, therefore, shepherds were assuredly not on that date watching +their flocks by night. + + * * * * * + +Christians were not, at first, united in the celebration of Christmas. +Some kept Christmas in January, others in April, others in May. It was a +pre-Christian force which drove them all into agreement upon the +twenty-fifth of December. Just as they wisely took the Christmas tree +from the Roman Saturnalia, so they took the date of their festival from +the universal pre-Christian festival of the winter solstice, Yule, when +mankind celebrated the triumph of the sun over the powers of darkness, +when the night begins to decrease and the day to increase, when the +year turns, and hope is born again because the worst is over. No more +suitably symbolic moment could have been chosen for a festival of faith, +goodwill and joy. And the appositeness of the moment is just as perfect +in this era of electric light and central heating, as it was in the era +of Virgil, who, by the way, described a Christmas tree. We shall say +this year, with exactly the same accents of relief and hope as our pagan +ancestors used, and as the woaded savage used: "The days will begin to +lengthen now!" For, while we often falsely fancy that we have subjugated +nature to our service, the fact is that we are as irremediably as ever +at the mercy of nature. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, the attitude of us moderns towards the forces by which our +existence is governed ought to be, and probably is, more reverent and +awe-struck than that of the earlier world. The discoveries of science +have at once quickened our imagination and compelled us to admit that +what we know is the merest trifle. The pagan in his ignorance explained +everything. Our knowledge has only deepened the mystery, and all that we +shall learn will but deepen it further. We can explain the solstice. We +are aware with absolute certitude that the solstice and the equinox and +the varying phenomena of the seasons are due to the fact that the plane +of the equator is tilted at a slight angle to the plane of the ecliptic. +When we put on the first overcoat in autumn, and when we give orders to +let the furnace out in spring, we know that we are arranging our lives +in accordance with that angle. And we are quite duly proud of our +knowledge. And much good does our knowledge do us! + + * * * * * + +Well, it does do us some good, and in a spiritual way, too! For nobody +can even toy with astronomy without picturing to himself, more clearly +and startlingly than would be otherwise possible, a revolving globe that +whizzes through elemental space around a ball of fire: which, in turn, +is rushing with all its satellites at an inconceivable speed from +nowhere to nowhere; and to the surface of the revolving, whizzing globe +a multitude of living things desperately clinging, and these living +things, in the midst of cataclysmic danger, and between the twin enigmas +of birth and death, quarrelling and hating and calling themselves kings +and queens and millionaires and beautiful women and aristocrats and +geniuses and lackeys and superior persons! Perhaps the highest value of +astronomy is that it renders more vivid the ironical significance of +such a vision, and thus brings home to us the truth that in spite of all +the differences which we have invented, mankind is a fellowship of +brothers, overshadowed by insoluble and fearful mysteries, and dependent +upon mutual goodwill and trust for the happiness it may hope to achieve. +* * * Let us remember that Christmas is, among other things, the winter +solstice, and that the bottom has not yet been knocked out of the winter +solstice, nor is likely to be in the immediate future! + + * * * * * + +It is a curious fact that the one faith which really does flourish and +wax in these days should be faith in the idea of social justice. For +social justice simply means the putting into practice of goodwill and +the recognition of the brotherhood of mankind. Formerly, people were +enthusiastic and altruistic for a theological idea, for a national idea, +for a political idea. You could see men on the rack for the sake of a +dogma; you could see men of a great nation fitting out regiments and +ruining themselves and going forth to save a small nation from +destruction. You could see men giving their lives to the aggrandisement +of an empire. And the men who did these things had the best brains and +the quickest wits and the warmest hearts of their time. But today, +whenever you meet a first-class man who is both enthusiastic and +altruistic, you may be sure that his pet scheme is neither theological, +military nor political; you may be sure that he has got into his head +the notion that some class of persons somewhere are not being treated +fairly, are not being treated with fraternal goodwill, and that he is +determined to put the matter right, or perish. + + * * * * * + +In England, nearly all the most interesting people are social reformers: +and the only circles of society in which you are not bored, in which +there is real conversation, are the circles of social reform. These +people alone have an abounding and convincing faith. Their faith has, +for example, convinced many of the best literary artists of the day, +with the result that a large proportion of the best modern imaginative +literature has been inspired by the dream of social justice. Take away +that idea from the works of H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and George +Bernard Shaw, and there would be exactly nothing left. Despite any +appearance to the contrary, therefore, the idea of universal goodwill is +really alive upon the continents of this planet: more so, indeed, than +any other idea--for the vitality of an idea depends far less on the +numbers of people who hold it than on the quality of the heart and brain +of the people who hold it. Whether the growth of the idea is due to the +spiritual awe and humility which are the consequence of increased +scientific knowledge, I cannot say, and I do not seriously care. + + + + + +FOUR + +THE APPOSITENESS OF CHRISTMAS + + +"Yes," you say, "I am quite at one with you as to the immense importance +of goodwill in social existence, and I have the same faith in it as you +have. But why a festival? Why eating and drinking and ceremonies? Surely +one can have faith without festivals?" + + * * * * * + +The answer is that one cannot; or at least that in practice, one never +does. A disinclination for festivals, a morbid self-conscious fear of +letting oneself go, is a sure sign of lack of faith. If you have not +enough enthusiasm for the cult of goodwill to make you positively +desire to celebrate the cult, then your faith is insufficient and needs +fostering by study and meditation. Why, if you decide to found a +sailing-club up your creek, your very first thought is to signalise your +faith in the sailing of those particular waters by a dinner and a +jollity, and you take care that the event shall be an annual one! * * * +You have faith in your wife, and in your affection for her. Surely you +don't need a festival to remind you of that faith, you so superior to +human weaknesses? But you do! You insist on having it. And, if the +festival did not happen, you would feel gloomy and discouraged. A +birthday is a device for recalling to you in a formal and impressive +manner that a certain person still lives and is in need of goodwill. It +is a device which experience has proved to be both valuable and +necessary. + + * * * * * + +Real faith effervesces; it shoots forth in every direction; it +communicates itself. And the inevitable result is a festival. The +festival is anticipated with pleasure, and it is remembered with +pleasure. And thus it reacts stimulatingly on that which gave it birth, +as the vitality of children reacts stimulatingly on the vitality of +parents. It provides a concrete symbol of that which is invisible and +intangible, and mankind is not yet so advanced in the path of spiritual +perfection that we can afford to dispense with concrete symbols. Now, if +we maintain festivals and formalities for the healthy continuance and +honour of a pastime or of a personal affection, shall we not maintain a +festival--and a mighty one--in behalf of a faith which makes the +corporate human existence bearable amid the menaces and mysteries that +for ever threaten it,--the faith of universal goodwill and mutual +confidence? + + * * * * * + +If then, there is to be a festival, why should it not be the festival of +Christmas? It can, indeed, be no other. Christmas is most plainly +indicated. It is dignified and made precious by traditions which go back +much further than the Christian era; and it has this tremendous +advantage--it exists! In spite of our declining faith, it has been +preserved to us, and here it is, ready to hand. Not merely does it fall +at the point which uncounted generations have agreed to consider as the +turn of the solar year and as the rebirth of hope! It falls also +immediately before the end of the calendar year, and thus prepares us +for a fresh beginning that shall put the old to shame. It could not be +better timed. Further, its traditional spirit of peace and goodwill is +the very spirit which we desire to foster. And finally its customs--or +at any rate, its main customs--are well designed to symbolize that +spirit. If we have allowed the despatch of Christmas cards to degenerate +into naught but a tedious shuffling of paste-boards and overwork of +post-office officials, the fault is not in the custom but in ourselves. +The custom is a most striking one--so long as we have sufficient +imagination to remember vividly that we are all in the same boat--I +mean, on the same planet--and clinging desperately to the flying ball, +and dependent for daily happiness on one another's good will! A +Christmas card sent by one human being to another human being is more +than a piece of coloured stationery sent by one log of wood to another +log of wood: it is an inspiring and reassuring message of high value. +The mischief is that so many self-styled human beings are just logs of +wood, rather stylishly dressed. + + * * * * * + +And then the custom of present-giving! What better and more convincing +proof of sympathy than a gift? The gift is one of these obvious +contrivances--like the wheel or the lever--which smooth and simplify +earthly life, and the charm of whose utility no obviousness can stale. +But of course any contrivance can be rendered futile by clumsiness or +negligence. There is a sort of Christmas giver who says pettishly: "Oh! +I don't know what to give to So-and-So this Christmas! What a bother! I +shall write and tell her to choose something herself, and send the bill +to me!" And he writes. And though he does not suspect it, what he really +writes, and what So-and-So reads, is this: "Dear So-and-So. It is +nothing to me that you and I are alive together on this planet, and in +various ways mutually dependent. But I am bound by custom to give you a +present. I do not, however, take sufficient interest in your life to +know what object it would give you pleasure to possess; and I do not +want to be put to the trouble of finding out, nor of obtaining the +object and transmitting it to you. Will you, therefore, buy something +for yourself and send the bill to me. Of course, a sense of social +decency will prevent you from spending more than a small sum, and I +shall be spared all exertion beyond signing a cheque. Yours insincerely +and loggishly * * *." So managed, the contrivance of present-giving +becomes positively sinister in its working. But managed with the +sympathetic imagination which is infallibly produced by real faith in +goodwill, its efficacy may approach the miraculous. + + * * * * * + +The Christmas ceremony of good-wishing by word of mouth has never been +in any danger of falling into insincerity. Such is the power of +tradition and virtue of a festival, and such the instinctive +brotherliness of men, that on this day the mere sight of an +acquaintance will soften the voice and warm the heart of the most +superior sceptic and curmudgeon that the age of disillusion has +produced. In spite of himself, faith flickers up in him again, be it +only for a moment. And, during that moment, he is almost like those +whose bright faith the age has never tarnished, like the great and like +the simple, to whom it is quite unnecessary to offer a defence and +explanation of Christmas or to suggest the basis of a new faith therein. + + + + + + +FIVE + +DEFENCE OF FEASTING + + +And now I can hear the superior sceptic disdainfully questioning: "Yes, +but what about the orgy of Christmas? What about all the eating and +drinking?" To which I can only answer that faith causes effervescence, +expansion, joy, and that joy has always, for excellent reasons, been +connected with feasting. The very words 'feast' and 'festival' are +etymologically inseparable. The meal is the most regular and the least +dispensable of daily events; it happens also to be an event which is in +itself almost invariably a source of pleasure, or, at worst, of +satisfaction: and it will continue to have this precious quality so long +as our souls are encased in bodies. What could be more natural, +therefore, than that it should be employed, with due enlargement and +ornamentation, as the kernel of the festival? What more logical than +that the meal should be elevated into a feast? + +"But," exclaims the superior sceptic, "this idea involves the idea of +excess!" What if it does? I would not deny it! Assuredly, a feast means +more than enough, and more than enough means excess. It is only because +a feast means excess that it assists in the bringing about of expansion +and joy. Such is human nature, and it is the case of human nature that +we are discussing. Of course, excess usually exacts its toll, within +twenty-four hours, especially from the weak. But the benefit is worth +its price. The body pays no more than the debt which the soul has +incurred. An occasional change of habit is essential to well-being, and +every change of habit results in temporary derangement and +inconvenience. + +Do not misunderstand me. Do not push my notion of excess to extremes. +When I defend the excess inevitably incident to a feast, I am not +seeking to prove that a man in celebrating Christmas is entitled to +drink champagne in a public restaurant until he becomes an object of +scorn and disgust to the waiters who have travelled from Switzerland in +order to receive his tips. Much less should I be prepared to justify him +if, in his own home, he sank lower than the hog. Nor would I +sympathetically carry him to bed. There is such a thing as excess in +moderation and dignity. Every wise man has practised this. And he who +has not practised it is a fool, and deserves even a harder name. He +ought indeed to inhabit a planet himself, for all his faith in humanity +will be exhausted in believing in himself. * * * So much for the feast! + + * * * * * + +But the accompaniments of the feast are also excessive. For example, you +make a tug-of-war with your neighbour at table, and the rope is a +fragile packet of tinselled paper, which breaks with a report like a +pistol. You open your half of the packet, and discover some doggerel +verse which you read aloud, and also a perfectly idiotic coloured cap, +which you put on your head to the end of looking foolish. And this +ceremony is continued until the whole table is surrounded by +preposterous headgear, and doggerel verse is lying by every plate. +Surely no man in his senses, no woman in hers, would, etc., etc. * * *! +But one of the spiritual advantages of feasting is that it expands you +beyond your common sense. One excess induces another, and a finer one. +This acceptance of the ridiculous is good for you. It is particularly +good for an Anglo-Saxon, who is so self-contained and self-controlled +that his soul might stiffen as the unused limb of an Indian fakir +stiffens, were it not for periodical excitements like that of the +Christmas feast. Everybody has experienced the self-conscious reluctance +which precedes the putting on of the cap, and the relief, followed by +further expansion and ecstasy, which ensues after the putting on. +Everybody who has put on a cap is aware that it is a beneficial thing to +put on a cap. Quite apart from the fact that the mysterious and fanciful +race of children are thereby placated and appeased, the soul of the +capped one is purified by this charming excess. + + * * * * * + +And the Tree! What an excess of the fantastic to pretend that all those +glittering balls, those coloured candles and those variegated parcels +are the blossoms of the absurd tree! How excessively grotesque to tie +all those parcels to the branches, in order to take them off again! +Surely, something less medieval, more ingenious, more modern than this +could be devised--if symbolism is to be indulged in at all! Can you +devise it, O sceptical one, revelling in disillusion? Can you invent a +symbol more natural and graceful than the symbol of the Tree? Perhaps +you would have a shop-counter, and shelves behind it, so as to instill +early into the youthful mind that this is a planet of commerce! Perhaps +you would abolish the doggerel of crackers, and substitute therefor +extracts from the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin! Perhaps you would +exchange the caps for blazonry embroidered with chemical formula, your +object being the advancement of science! Perhaps you would do away with +the orgiastic eating and drinking, and arrange for a formal conversation +about astronomy and the idea of human fraternity, upon strictly +reasonable rations of shredded wheat! You would thus create an original +festival, and eliminate all fear of a dyspeptic morrow. You would +improve the mind. And you would avoid the ridiculous. But also, in +avoiding the ridiculous, you would tumble into the ridiculous, deeply +and hopelessly! And think how your very original festival would delight +the participators, how they would look forward to it with joy, and back +upon it with pleasurable regret; how their minds would dwell sweetly +upon the conception of shredded wheat, and how their faith would be +encouraged and strengthened by the intellectuality of the formal +conversation! + + * * * * * + +He who girds at an ancient established festival should reflect upon +sundry obvious truths before he withers up the said festival by the +sirocco of his contempt. These truths are as follows:--First, a +festival, though based upon intelligence, is not an affair of the +intellect, but an affair of the emotions. Second, the human soul can +only be reached through the human body. Third, it is impossible to +replace an ancient festival by a new one. Robespierre, amongst others, +tried to do so, and achieved the absurd. Reformers, heralds of new +faiths, and rejuvenators of old faiths, have always, when they +succeeded, adopted an ancient festival, with all or most of its forms, +and been content to breathe into it a new spirit to replace the old +spirit which had vanished or was vanishing. Anybody who, persuaded that +Christmas is not what it was, feels that a festival must nevertheless be +preserved, will do well to follow this example. To be content with the +old forms and to vitalize them: that is the problem. Solve it, and the +forms will soon begin to adapt themselves to the process of +vitalization. All history is a witness in proof. + + + + + +SIX + +TO REVITALIZE THE FESTIVAL + + +It being agreed, then, that the Christmas festival has lost a great deal +of its old vitality, and that, to many people, it is a source of tedium +and the cause of insincerity; and it being further agreed that the +difficulty cannot be got over by simply abolishing the festival, as no +one really wants it to be abolished; the question remains--what should +be done to vitalize it? The former spirit of faith, the spirit which +made the great Christmas of the golden days, has been weakened; but one +element of it--that which is founded on the conviction that goodwill +among men is a prime necessity of reasonable living--survives with a +certain vigour, though even it has not escaped the general scepticism of +the age. This element unites in agreement all the pugnacious sectaries +who join battle over the other elements of the former faith. This +element has no enemies. None will deny its lasting virtue. Obviously, +therefore, the right course is to concentrate on the cultivation of +goodwill. If goodwill can be consciously increased, the festival of +Christmas will cease to be perfunctory. It will acquire a fresh and more +genuine significance, which, however, will not in any way inconvenience +those who have never let go of the older significance. No tradition will +be overthrown, no shock administered, and nobody will be able to croak +about iconoclasm and new-fangled notions and the sudden end of the +world, and so on. + + * * * * * + +The fancy of some people will at once run to the formation of a grand +international Society for the revivifying of Christmas by the +cultivation of goodwill, with branches in all the chief cities of Europe +and America, and headquarters--of course at the Hague; and committees +and subcommittees, and presidents and vice-presidents; and honorary +secretaries and secretaries paid; and quarterly and annual meetings, and +triennial congresses! And a literary organ or two! And a +badge--naturally a badge, designed by a famous artist in harmonious +tints! + + * * * * * + +But my fancy does not run at all in this direction. I am convinced that +we have already far too many societies for the furtherance of our ends. +To my mind, most societies with a moral aim are merely clumsy machines +for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense and +inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a group +of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very +wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some act +which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate goodwill +in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for saying +your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of performing +acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it necessary to +involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover, a society +means fuss and shouting: two species of disturbance which are both +futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of morals. + +You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by +cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task +of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be +time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other +people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that +this is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you +have bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will +appreciate also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, +indeed, should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your +admirable intentions? Rest assured that any unusual sprouting of the +desired crop will be instantly noticed by the persons interested. + + * * * * * + +The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill? +Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the +whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but a +magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate +goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of +goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical +eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just +beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much +attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out +to embrace the whole of humanity in his goodwill, he will have even +less success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four +sisters at once; and his daily companions--those who see him eat his +bacon and lace his boots and earn his living--will most certainly have a +rough time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your +efforts on quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity +struggle on as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has +hitherto had. + +In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to +go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in +this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of the +group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or your +husband? Not necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who most +frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be your wife. +These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be his butler. +She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you a charming +omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else. Whoever he or she +may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of irritated +superiority, aim at that person in particular. + +The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how +prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at +once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your +excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will +be aware that you have failed in striving. Your successes will appear +effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid +curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of not +wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling that, +if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is being +attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very probably, +almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in fact +doing as you are; some of them--make no doubt--are doing a shade better. +I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill. + + + + + +SEVEN + +THE GIFT OF ONESELF + + +Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories--those who +sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called life; +and those who don't. The second category is much the larger of the two. +Very many people belong to it who think that they belong to the first. +They may deceive themselves, but they cannot deceive a child. Although +you may easily practise upon the credulity of a child in matters of +fact, you cannot cheat his moral and social judgment. He will add you +up, and he will add anybody up, and he will estimate conduct, upon +principles of his own and in a manner terribly impartial. Parents have +no sterner nor more discerning critics than their own children. + +And so you may be polite to a child, and pretend to appreciate his point +of view; but, unless you really do put yourself to the trouble of +understanding him, unless you throw yourself, by the exercise of +imagination, into his world, you will not succeed in being his friend. +To be his friend means an effort on your part, it means that you must +divest yourself of your own mental habit, and, for the time being, adopt +his. And no nice phrases, no gifts of money, sweets or toys, can take +the place of this effort, and this sacrifice of self. With five minutes +of genuine surrender to him, you can win more of his esteem and +gratitude than five hundred pounds would buy. His notion of real +goodwill is the imaginative sharing of his feelings, a convinced +participation in his pains and pleasures. He is well aware that, if you +honestly do this, you will be on his side. + + * * * * * + +Now, adults, of course, are tremendously clever and accomplished persons +and children are no match for them; but still, with all their talents +and omniscience and power, adults seem to lack important pieces of +knowledge which children possess; they seem to forget, and to fail to +profit by, their infantile experience. Else why should adults in general +be so extraordinarily ignorant of the great truth that the secret of +goodwill lies in the sympathetic exercise of the imagination? Since +goodwill is the secret of human happiness, it follows that the secret +of goodwill must be one of the most precious aids to sensible living; +and yet adults, though they once knew it, have gone and forgotten it! +Children may well be excused for concluding that the ways of the adult, +in their capricious irrationality, are past finding out. + +To increase your goodwill for a fellow creature, it is necessary to +imagine that you are he: and nothing else is necessary. This feat is not +easy; but it can be done. Some people have less of the divine faculty of +imagination than others, but nobody is without it, and, like all other +faculties, it improves with use, just as it deteriorates with neglect. +Imagination is a function of the brain. In order to cultivate goodwill +for a person, you must think frequently about that person. You must +inform yourself about all his activities. You must be able in your +mind's eye to follow him hour by hour throughout the day, and you must +ascertain if he sleeps well at night--because this is not a trifle. And +you must reflect upon his existence with the same partiality as you +reflect upon your own. (Why not?) That is to say, you must lay the +fullest stress on his difficulties, disappointments and unhappinesses, +and you must minimise his good fortune. You must magnify his efforts +after righteousness, and forget his failures. You must ever remember +that, after all, he is not to blame for the faults of his character, +which faults, in his case as in yours, are due partly to heredity and +partly to environment. And beyond everything you must always give him +credit for good intentions. Do not you, though sometimes mistakenly, +always act for the best? You know you do! And are you alone among +mortals in rectitude? + + * * * * * + +This mental exercise in relation to another person takes time, and it +involves a fatiguing effort. I repeat that it is not easy. Nor is it +invariably agreeable. You may, indeed, find it tedious, for example, to +picture in vivid detail all the worries that have brought about your +wife's exacerbation--negligent maid, dishonest tradesman, milk in a +thunder storm, hypercritical husband, dirt in the wrong place--but, when +you have faithfully done so, I absolutely defy you to speak to her in +the same tone as you used to employ, and to cherish resentment against +her as you used to do. And I absolutely defy you not to feel less +discontented with yourself than in the past. It is impossible that the +exercise of imagination about a person should not result in goodwill +towards that person. The exercise may put a strain upon you; but its +effect is a scientific certainty. It is the supreme social exercise, for +it is the giving of oneself in the most intimate and complete sense. It +is the suspension of one's individuality in favour of another. It +establishes a new attitude of mind, which, though it may well lead to +specific social acts, is more valuable than any specific act, for it is +ceaselessly translating itself into demeanour. + + * * * * * + +The critic with that terrible English trait, an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, will at this point probably remark to himself, smiling: "I +suppose the time will come, when by dint of regular daily practice, I +shall have achieved perfect goodwill towards the first object of my +attentions. I can then regard that person as 'done.' I can put him on a +shelf, and turn to the next; and, in the end, all my relations, friends +and acquaintances will be 'done' and I can stare at them in a row on the +shelf of my mind, with pride and satisfaction * * *." Except that no +person will ever be quite "done," human nature, still being human, in +spite of the recent advances of civilisation, I do not deprecate this +manner of stating the case. + +The ambitious and resolute man, with an exaggerated sense of the +ridiculous, would see nothing ridiculous in ticking off a number of +different objects as they were successively achieved. If for example it +was part of his scheme to learn various foreign languages, he would know +that he could only succeed by regular application of the brain, by +concentration of thought daily; he would also know that he could never +acquire any foreign language in absolute perfection. Still, he would +reach a certain stage in a language, and then he would put it aside and +turn to the next one on his programme, and so on. Assuredly, he would +not be ashamed of employing method to reach his end. + +Now all that can be said of the acquirement of foreign languages can be +said of the acquirement of goodwill. In remedying the deficiences of the +heart and character, as in remedying the deficiences of mere knowledge, +the brain is the sole possible instrument, and the best results will be +obtained by using it regularly and scientifically, according to an +arranged method. Why, therefore, if a man be proud of method in +improving his knowledge, should he see something ridiculous in a +deliberate plan for improving his heart--the affair of his heart being +immensely more important, more urgent and more difficult? The reader who +has found even one good answer to the above question, need read no more +of this book, for he will have confounded me and it. + + + + + +EIGHT + +THE FEAST OF ST. FRIEND + + +The consequences of the social self-discipline which I have outlined +will be various. A fairly early result will be the gradual decline, and +ultimately the death, of the superior person in oneself. It is true +that the superior person in oneself has nine lives, and is capable of +rising from the dead after even the most fatal blows. But, at worst, +the superior person--(and who among us does not shelter that sinister +inhabitant in his soul?)--will have a very poor time in the soul of him +who steadily practises the imaginative understanding of other people. +In the first place, the mere exercise of the imagination on others +absolutely scotches egotism as long as it lasts, and leaves it weakened +afterwards. And, in the second and more important place, an improved +comprehension of others (which means an intensified sympathy with them) +must destroy the illusion, so widespread, that one's own case is +unique. The amicable study of one's neighbours on the planet inevitably +shows that the same troubles, the same fortitudes, the same feats of +intelligence, the same successes and failures, are constantly happening +everywhere. One can, indeed, see oneself in nearly everybody else, and, +in particular, one is struck by the fact that the quality in which one +took most pride is simply spread abroad throughout humanity in heaps! +It is only in sympathetically contemplating others that one can get +oneself in a true perspective. Yet probably the majority of human +beings never do contemplate others, save with the abstracted gaze which +proves that the gazer sees nothing but his own dream. + + * * * * * + +Another result of the discipline is an immensely increased interest in +one's friends. One regards them even with a sort of proprietary +interest, for, by imagination, one has come into sympathetic possession +of them. Further, one has for them that tender feeling which always +follows the conferring of a benefit, especially the secret conferring of +a benefit. It is the benefactor, not the person benefited, who is +grateful. The benefit which one has conferred is, of course, the gift of +oneself. The resulting emotion is independent of any sympathy rendered +by the other; and where the sympathy is felt to be mutual, friendship +acquires a new significance. The exercise of sympathetic imagination +will cause one to look upon even a relative as a friend--a startling +achievement! It will provide a new excitement and diversion in life. + +When the month of December dawns, there need be no sensation of weary +apprehension about the difficulty of choosing a present that will suit a +friend. Certainly it will not be necessary, from sheer indifference and +ignorance, to invite the friend to choose his own present. On the +contrary, one will be, in secret, so intimate with the friend's +situation and wants and desires, that sundry rival schemes for +pleasuring him will at once offer themselves. And when he receives the +present finally selected, he will have the conviction, always +delightfully flattering to a donee, that he has been the object of a +particular attention and insight. * * * And when the cards of greeting +are despatched, formal phrases will go forth charged, in the +consciousness of the sender, with a genuine meaning, with the force of a +climax, as though the sender had written thereon, in invisible ink: "I +have had you well in mind during the last twelve months; I think I +understand your difficulties and appreciate your efforts better than I +did, and so it is with a peculiar sympathetic knowledge that I wish you +good luck. I have guessed what particular kind of good luck you require, +and I wish accordingly. My wish is not vague and perfunctory only." + + * * * * * + +And on the day of festival itself one feels that one really has +something to celebrate. The occasion has a basis, if it had no basis +for one before; and if a basis previously existed, then it is widened +and strengthened. The festival becomes a public culmination to a private +enterprise. One is not reminded by Christmas of goodwill, because the +enterprise of imaginative sympathy has been a daily affair throughout +the year; but Christmas provides an excuse for taking satisfaction in +the success of the enterprise and new enthusiasm to correct its +failures. The symbolism of the situation of Christmas, at the turn of +the year, develops an added impressiveness, and all the Christmas +customs, apt to produce annoyance in the breasts of the unsentimental, +are accepted with indulgence, even with eagerness, because their +symbolism also is shown in a clearer light. Christmas becomes as +personal as a birthday. One eats and drinks to excess, not because it +is the custom to eat and drink to excess, but from sheer effervescent +faith in an idea. And as one sits with one's friends, possessing them in +the privacy of one's heart, permeated by a sense of the value of +sympathetic comprehension in this formidable adventure of existence on a +planet that rushes eternally through the night of space; assured indeed +that companionship and mutual understanding alone make the adventure +agreeable,--one sees in a flash that Christmas, whatever else it may be, +is and must be the Feast of St. Friend, and a day on that account +supreme among the days of the year. + + * * * * * + +The third and greatest consequence of the systematic cultivation of +goodwill now grows blindingly apparent. To state it earlier in all its +crudity would have been ill-advised; and I purposely refrained from +doing so. It is the augmentation of one's own happiness. The increase of +amity, the diminution of resentment and annoyance, the regular +maintenance of an attitude mildly benevolent towards mankind,--these +things are the surest way to happiness. And it is because they are the +surest way to happiness, that the most enlightened go after them. All +real motives are selfish motives; were it otherwise humanity would be +utterly different from what it is. A man may perform some act which will +benefit another while working some striking injury to himself. But his +reason for doing it is that he prefers the evil of the injury to the +deeper evil of the fundamental dissatisfaction which would torment him +if he did not perform the act. Nobody yet sought the good of another +save as a means to his own good. And it is in accordance with common +sense that this should be so. There is, however, a lower egotism and a +higher. It is the latter which we call unselfishness. And it is the +latter of which Christmas is the celebration. We shall legitimately bear +in mind, therefore, that Christmas, in addition to being the Feast of +St. Friend, is even more profoundly the feast of one's own welfare. + + + + + +NINE + +THE REACTION + + +A reaction sets in between Christmas and the New Year. It is inevitable; +and I should be writing basely if I did not devote to it a full chapter. +In those few dark days of inactivity, between a fete and the resumption +of the implacable daily round, when the weather is usually cynical, and +we are paying in our tissues the fair price of excess, we see life and +the world in a grey and sinister light, which we imagine to be the only +true light. Take the case of the average successful man of thirty-five. +What is he thinking as he lounges about on the day after Christmas? + +His thoughts probably run thus: "Even if I live to a good old age, +which is improbable, as many years lie behind me as before me. I have +lived half my life, and perhaps more than half my life. I have realised +part of my worldly ambition. I have made many good resolutions, and kept +one or two of them in k more or less imperfect manner. I cannot, as a +commonsense person, hope to keep a larger proportion of good resolutions +in the future than I have kept in the past. I have tried to understand +and sympathise with my fellow creatures, and though I have not entirely +failed to do so, I have nearly failed. I am not happy and I am not +content. And if, after all these years, I am neither happy nor content, +what chance is there of my being happy and content in the second half +of my life? The realisation of part of my worldly ambition has not made +me any happier, and, therefore, it is unlikely that the realisation of +the whole of my ambition will make me any happier. My strength cannot +improve; it can only weaken; and my health likewise. I in my turn am +coming to believe--what as a youth I rejected with disdain--namely, that +happiness is what one is not, and content is what one has not. Why, +then, should I go on striving after the impossible? Why should I not let +things slide?" + +Thus reflects the average successful man, and there is not one of us, +successful or unsuccessful, ambitious or unambitious, whose reflections +have not often led him to a conclusion equally dissatisfied. Why should +I or anybody pretend that this is not so? + + * * * * * + +And yet, in the very moment of his discouragement and of his blackest +vision of things, that man knows quite well that he will go on striving. +He knows that his instinct to strive will be stronger than his genuine +conviction that the desired end cannot be achieved. Positive though he +may be that a worldly ambition realised will produce the same +dissatisfaction as Dead Sea fruit in the mouth, he will still continue +to struggle. * * * Now you cannot argue against facts, and this is a +fact. It must be accepted. Conduct must be adjusted to it. The struggle +being inevitable, it must be carried through as well as it can be +carried through. It will not end brilliantly, but precautions can be +taken against it ending disgracefully. These precautions consist in the +devising of a plan of campaign, and the plan of campaign is defined by a +series of resolutions: which resolutions are generally made at or +immediately before the beginning of a New Year. Without these the +struggle would be formless, confused, blind and even more futile than it +is with them. Organised effort is bound to be less ineffective than +unorganised effort. + + * * * * * + +A worldly ambition can be, frequently is, realised: but an ideal cannot +be attained--if it could, it would not be an ideal. The virtue of an +ideal is its unattainability. It seems, when it is first formed, just as +attainable as a worldly ambition which indeed is often schemed as a +means to it. After twenty-four hours, the ideal is all but attained. +After forty-eight, it is a little farther off. After a week, it has +receded still further. After a month it is far away; and towards the end +of a year even the keen eye of hope has almost lost sight of it; it is +definitely withdrawn from the practical sphere. And then, such is the +divine obstinacy of humanity, the turn of the year gives us an excuse +for starting afresh, and forming a new ideal, and forgetting our shame +in yet another organised effort. Such is the annual circle of the ideal, +the effort, the failure and the shame. A rather pitiful history it may +appear! And yet it is also rather a splendid history! For the failure +and the shame are due to the splendour of our ideal and to the audacity +of our faith in ourselves. It is only in comparison with our ideal that +we have fallen low. We are higher, in our failure and our shame, than we +should have been if we had not attempted to rise. + + * * * * * + +There are those who will say: "At any rate, we might moderate somewhat +the splendour of our ideal and the audacity of our self-conceit, so that +there should be a less grotesque disparity between the aim and the +achievement. Surely such moderation would be more in accord with common +sense! Surely it would lessen the spiritual fatigue and disappointment +caused by sterile endeavour!" It would. But just try to moderate the +ideal and the self-conceit! And you will find, in spite of all your sad +experiences, that you cannot. If there is the stuff of a man in you, you +simply cannot! The truth, is that, in the supreme things, a man does +not act under the rules of earthly common sense. He transcends them, +because there is a quality in him which compels him to do so. Common +sense may persuade him to attempt to keep down the ideal, and +self-conceit may pretend to agree. But all the time, self-conceit will +be whispering: "I can go one better than that." And lo! the ideal is +furtively raised again. + +A man really has little scientific control over the height of his ideal +and the intensity of his belief in himself. He is born with them, as he +is born with a certain pulse and a certain reflex action. He can neglect +the ideal, so that it almost dissolves, but he cannot change its height. +He can maim his belief in himself by persistent abandonment to folly, +but he cannot lower its flame by an effort of the will, as he might +lower the flame of a gas by a calculated turn of the hand. In the secret +and inmost constitution of humanity it is ordained that the disparity +between the aim and the achievement shall seem grotesque; it is ordained +that there shall be an enormous fuss about pretty nearly nothing; it is +ordained that the mountain shall bring forth a mouse. But it is also +ordained that men shall go blithely on just the same, ignoring in +practice the ridiculousness which they admit in theory, and drawing +renewed hope and conceit from some magic, exhaustless source. And this +is the whole philosophy of the New Year's resolution. + + + + + +TEN + +ON THE LAST DAY OF THE YEAR + + +There are few people who arrive at a true understanding of life, even in +the calm and disillusioned hours of reflection that come between the end +of one annual period and the beginning of another. Nearly everybody has +an idea at the back of his head that if only he could conquer certain +difficulties and embarrassments, he might really start to live properly, +in the full sense of living. And if he has pluck he says to himself: "I +_will_ smooth things out, and then I'll really live." In the same way, +nearly everybody, regarding the spectacle of the world, sees therein a +principle which he calls Evil; and he thinks: "If only we could get rid +of this Evil, if only we could set things right, how splendid the world +would be!" Now, in the meaning usually attached to it, there is no such +positive principle as Evil. Assuming that there is such a positive +principle in a given phenomenon--such as the character of a particular +man--you must then admit that there is the same positive principle +everywhere, for just as the character of no man is so imperfect that you +could not conceive a worse, so the character of no man is so perfect +that you could not conceive a better. Do away with Evil from the world, +and you would not merely abolish certain specially distressing matters, +you would change everything. You would in fact achieve perfection. And +when we say that one thing is evil and another good, all that we mean +is that one thing is less advanced than another in the way of +perfection. Evil cannot therefore be a positive principle; it signifies +only the falling short of perfection. + +And supposing that the desires of mankind were suddenly fulfilled, and +the world was rendered perfect! There would be no motive for effort, no +altercation of conflicting motives in the human heart; nothing to do, no +one to befriend, no anxiety, no want unsatisfied. Equilibrium would be +established. A cheerful world! You can see instantly how amusing it +would be. It would have only one drawback--that of being dead. Its +reason for being alive would have ceased to operate. Life means change +through constant development. But you cannot develop the perfect. The +perfect can merely expire. + +That average successful man whom I have previously cited feels all this +by instinct, though he does not comprehend it by reason. He reaches his +ambition, and retires from the fight in order to enjoy life,--and what +does he then do? He immediately creates for himself a new series of +difficulties and embarrassments, either by undertaking the management of +a large estate, or by some other device. If he does not maintain for +himself conditions which necessitate some kind of struggle, he quickly +dies--spiritually or physically, often both. The proportion of men who, +having established an equilibrium, proceed to die on the spot, is +enormous. Continual effort, which means, of course, continual +disappointment, is the _sine qua non_--without it there is literally +nothing vital. Its abolition is the abolition of life. Hence, people, +who, failing to savour the struggle itself, anticipate the end of the +struggle as the beginning of joy and happiness--these people are simply +missing life; they are longing to exchange life for death. The hemlock +would save them a lot of weary waiting. + + * * * * * + +We shall now perceive, I think, what is wrong with the assumptions of +the average successful man as set forth in the previous chapter. In +postulating that happiness is what one is not, he has got hold of a +mischievous conception of happiness. Let him examine his conception of +happiness, and he will find that it consists in the enjoyment of love +and luxury, and in the freedom from enforced effort. He generally wants +all three ingredients. Now passionate love does not mean happiness; it +means excitement, apprehension and continually renewed desire. And +affectionate love, from which the passion has faded, means something +less than happiness, for, mingled with its gentle tranquility is a +disturbing regret for the more fiery past. Luxury, according to the +universal experience of those who have had it, has no connection +whatever with happiness. And as for freedom from enforced effort, it +means simply death. + +Happiness as it is dreamed of cannot possibly exist save for brief +periods of self-deception which are followed by terrible periods of +reaction. Real, practicable happiness is due primarily not to any kind +of environment, but to an inward state of mind. Real happiness consists +first in acceptance of the fact that discontent is a condition of life, +and, second, in an honest endeavour to adjust conduct to an ideal. Real +happiness is not an affair of the future; it is an affair of the +present. Such as it is, if it cannot be obtained now, it can never be +obtained. Real happiness lives in patience, having comprehended that if +very little is accomplished towards perfection, so a man's existence is +a very little moment in the vast expanse of the universal life, and +having also comprehended that it is the struggle which is vital, and +that the end of the struggle is only another name for death. + + * * * * * + +"Well," I hear you exclaiming, "if this is all we can look forward to, +if this is all that real, practicable happiness amounts to, is life +worth living?" That is a question which each person has to answer for +himself. If he answers it in the negative, no argument, no persuasion, +no sentimentalisation of the facts of life, will make him alter his +opinion. Most people, however, answer it in the affirmative. Despite all +the drawbacks, despite all the endless disappointments, they decide that +life is worth living. There are two species of phenomena which bring +them to this view. The first may be called the golden moments of life, +which seem somehow in their transient brevity to atone for the dull +exasperation of interminable mediocre hours: moments of triumph in the +struggle, moments of fierce exultant resolve; moments of joy in +nature--moments which defy oblivion in the memory, and which, being +priceless, cannot be too dearly bought. + +The second species of compensatory phenomena are all the agreeable +experiences connected with human friendship; the general feeling, under +diverse forms, that one is not alone in the world. It is for the +multiplication and intensification of these phenomena that Christmas, +the Feast of St. Friend, exists. And, on the last day of the year, on +the eve of a renewed effort, our thoughts may profitably be centered +upon a plan of campaign whose execution shall result in a less imperfect +intercourse. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF ST. 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