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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/16769-0.txt b/16769-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1bef230 --- /dev/null +++ b/16769-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5890 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. Chesterton + +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: Orthodoxy + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: September 28, 2005 [EBook #16769] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ORTHODOXY *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Clare Coney and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + + +ORTHODOXY + +_by_ + +G.K. CHESTERTON + + + +JOHN LANE + +THE BODLEY HEAD LTD + +_First published in_.......................... 1908 + +_printed_..................................... 1908 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1909 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1911 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1915 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1919 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1921 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1924 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1926 + +_First published in "The Week-End Library" in_ 1927 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1934 + + +MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, +LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + +_TO MY MOTHER_ + + + + +_CONTENTS_ + + + _Chap._ _Page_ + + I. INTRODUCTION IN DEFENCE OF EVERYTHING ELSE 11 + + II. THE MANIAC ................................ 20 + + III. THE SUICIDE OF THOUGHT ................... 50 + + IV. THE ETHICS OF ELFLAND ..................... 76 + + V. THE FLAG OF THE WORLD ...................... 117 + + VI. THE PARADOXES OF CHRISTIANITY ............. 146 + + VII. THE ETERNAL REVOLUTION ................... 186 + + VIII. THE ROMANCE OF ORTHODOXY ................ 228 + + IX. AUTHORITY AND THE ADVENTURER .............. 259 + + + + +_ORTHODOXY_ + + + + + +CHAPTER I.--_Introduction in Defence of Everything Else_ + + +The only possible excuse for this book is that it is an answer to a +challenge. Even a bad shot is dignified when he accepts a duel. When +some time ago I published a series of hasty but sincere papers, under +the name of "Heretics," several critics for whose intellect I have a +warm respect (I may mention specially Mr. G.S. Street) said that it was +all very well for me to tell everybody to affirm his cosmic theory, but +that I had carefully avoided supporting my precepts with example. "I +will begin to worry about my philosophy," said Mr. Street, "when Mr. +Chesterton has given us his." It was perhaps an incautious suggestion to +make to a person only too ready to write books upon the feeblest +provocation. But after all, though Mr. Street has inspired and created +this book, he need not read it. If he does read it, he will find that in +its pages I have attempted in a vague and personal way, in a set of +mental pictures rather than in a series of deductions, to state the +philosophy in which I have come to believe. I will not call it my +philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made +me. + +I have often had a fancy for writing a romance about an English +yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England +under the impression that it was a new island in the South Seas. I +always find, however, that I am either too busy or too lazy to write +this fine work, so I may as well give it away for the purposes of +philosophical illustration. There will probably be a general impression +that the man who landed (armed to the teeth and talking by signs) to +plant the British flag on that barbaric temple which turned out to be +the Pavilion at Brighton, felt rather a fool. I am not here concerned to +deny that he looked a fool. But if you imagine that he felt a fool, or +at any rate that the sense of folly was his sole or his dominant +emotion, then you have not studied with sufficient delicacy the rich +romantic nature of the hero of this tale. His mistake was really a most +enviable mistake; and he knew it, if he was the man I take him for. What +could be more delightful than to have in the same few minutes all the +fascinating terrors of going abroad combined with all the humane +security of coming home again? What could be better than to have all +the fun of discovering South Africa without the disgusting necessity of +landing there? What could be more glorious than to brace one's self up +to discover New South Wales and then realize, with a gush of happy +tears, that it was really old South Wales. This at least seems to me the +main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of +this book. How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and +yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged +citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give +us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour +of being our own town? To show that a faith or a philosophy is true from +every standpoint would be too big an undertaking even for a much bigger +book than this; it is necessary to follow one path of argument; and this +is the path that I here propose to follow. I wish to set forth my faith +as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that +mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly +named romance. For the very word "romance" has in it the mystery and +ancient meaning of Rome. Any one setting out to dispute anything ought +always to begin by saying what he does not dispute. Beyond stating what +he proposes to prove he should always state what he does not propose to +prove. The thing I do not propose to prove, the thing I propose to take +as common ground between myself and any average reader, is this +desirability of an active and imaginative life, picturesque and full of +a poetical curiosity, a life such as western man at any rate always +seems to have desired. If a man says that extinction is better than +existence or blank existence better than variety and adventure, then he +is not one of the ordinary people to whom I am talking. If a man prefers +nothing I can give him nothing. But nearly all people I have ever met in +this western society in which I live would agree to the general +proposition that we need this life of practical romance; the combination +of something that is strange with something that is secure. We need so +to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of +welcome. We need to be happy in this wonderland without once being +merely comfortable. It is _this_ achievement of my creed that I shall +chiefly pursue in these pages. + +But I have a peculiar reason for mentioning the man in a yacht, who +discovered England. For I am that man in a yacht. I discovered England. +I do not see how this book can avoid being egotistical; and I do not +quite see (to tell the truth) how it can avoid being dull. Dullness +will, however, free me from the charge which I most lament; the charge +of being flippant. Mere light sophistry is the thing that I happen to +despise most of all things, and it is perhaps a wholesome fact that this +is the thing of which I am generally accused. I know nothing so +contemptible as a mere paradox; a mere ingenious defence of the +indefensible. If it were true (as has been said) that Mr. Bernard Shaw +lived upon paradox, then he ought to be a mere common millionaire; for a +man of his mental activity could invent a sophistry every six minutes. +It is as easy as lying; because it is lying. The truth is, of course, +that Mr. Shaw is cruelly hampered by the fact that he cannot tell any +lie unless he thinks it is the truth. I find myself under the same +intolerable bondage. I never in my life said anything merely because I +thought it funny; though, of course, I have had ordinary human +vain-glory, and may have thought it funny because I had said it. It is +one thing to describe an interview with a gorgon or a griffin, a +creature who does not exist. It is another thing to discover that the +rhinoceros does exist and then take pleasure in the fact that he looks +as if he didn't. One searches for truth, but it may be that one pursues +instinctively the more extraordinary truths. And I offer this book with +the heartiest sentiments to all the jolly people who hate what I write, +and regard it (very justly, for all I know), as a piece of poor clowning +or a single tiresome joke. + +For if this book is a joke it is a joke against me. I am the man who +with the utmost daring discovered what had been discovered before. If +there is an element of farce in what follows, the farce is at my own +expense; for this book explains how I fancied I was the first to set +foot in Brighton and then found I was the last. It recounts my +elephantine adventures in pursuit of the obvious. No one can think my +case more ludicrous than I think it myself; no reader can accuse me here +of trying to make a fool of him: I am the fool of this story, and no +rebel shall hurl me from my throne. I freely confess all the idiotic +ambitions of the end of the nineteenth century. I did, like all other +solemn little boys, try to be in advance of the age. Like them I tried +to be some ten minutes in advance of the truth. And I found that I was +eighteen hundred years behind it. I did strain my voice with a painfully +juvenile exaggeration in uttering my truths. And I was punished in the +fittest and funniest way, for I have kept my truths: but I have +discovered, not that they were not truths, but simply that they were not +mine. When I fancied that I stood alone I was really in the ridiculous +position of being backed up by all Christendom. It may be, Heaven +forgive me, that I did try to be original; but I only succeeded in +inventing all by myself an inferior copy of the existing traditions of +civilized religion. The man from the yacht thought he was the first to +find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to +found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I +discovered that it was orthodoxy. + +It may be that somebody will be entertained by the account of this happy +fiasco. It might amuse a friend or an enemy to read how I gradually +learnt from the truth of some stray legend or from the falsehood of some +dominant philosophy, things that I might have learnt from my +catechism--if I had ever learnt it. There may or may not be some +entertainment in reading how I found at last in an anarchist club or a +Babylonian temple what I might have found in the nearest parish church. +If any one is entertained by learning how the flowers of the field or +the phrases in an omnibus, the accidents of politics or the pains of +youth came together in a certain order to produce a certain conviction +of Christian orthodoxy, he may possibly read this book. But there is in +everything a reasonable division of labour. I have written the book, and +nothing on earth would induce me to read it. + +I add one purely pedantic note which comes, as a note naturally should, +at the beginning of the book. These essays are concerned only to discuss +the actual fact that the central Christian theology (sufficiently +summarized in the Apostles' Creed) is the best root of energy and sound +ethics. They are not intended to discuss the very fascinating but quite +different question of what is the present seat of authority for the +proclamation of that creed. When the word "orthodoxy" is used here it +means the Apostles' Creed, as understood by everybody calling himself +Christian until a very short time ago and the general historic conduct +of those who held such a creed. I have been forced by mere space to +confine myself to what I have got from this creed; I do not touch the +matter much disputed among modern Christians, of where we ourselves got +it. This is not an ecclesiastical treatise but a sort of slovenly +autobiography. But if any one wants my opinions about the actual nature +of the authority, Mr. G.S. Street has only to throw me another +challenge, and I will write him another book. + + + + +CHAPTER II.--_The Maniac_ + + +Thoroughly worldly people never understand even the world; they rely +altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true. Once I remember +walking with a prosperous publisher, who made a remark which I had often +heard before; it is, indeed, almost a motto of the modern world. Yet I +had heard it once too often, and I saw suddenly that there was nothing +in it. The publisher said of somebody, "That man will get on; he +believes in himself." And I remember that as I lifted my head to listen, +my eye caught an omnibus on which was written "Hanwell." I said to him, +"Shall I tell you where the men are who believe most in themselves? For +I can tell you. I know of men who believe in themselves more colossally +than Napoleon or Caesar. I know where flames the fixed star of certainty +and success. I can guide you to the thrones of the Super-men. The men +who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums." He said +mildly that there were a good many men after all who believed in +themselves and who were not in lunatic asylums. "Yes, there are," I +retorted, "and you of all men ought to know them. That drunken poet from +whom you would not take a dreary tragedy, he believed in himself. That +elderly minister with an epic from whom you were hiding in a back room, +he believed in himself. If you consulted your business experience +instead of your ugly individualistic philosophy, you would know that +believing in himself is one of the commonest signs of a rotter. Actors +who can't act believe in themselves; and debtors who won't pay. It would +be much truer to say that a man will certainly fail because he believes +in himself. Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete +self-confidence is a weakness. Believing utterly in one's self is a +hysterical and superstitious belief like believing in Joanna Southcote: +the man who has it has 'Hanwell' written on his face as plain as it is +written on that omnibus." And to all this my friend the publisher made +this very deep and effective reply, "Well, if a man is not to believe in +himself, in what is he to believe?" After a long pause I replied, "I +will go home and write a book in answer to that question." This is the +book that I have written in answer to it. + +But I think this book may well start where our argument started--in the +neighbourhood of the mad-house. Modern masters of science are much +impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The +ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that +necessity. They began with the fact of sin--a fact as practical as +potatoes. Whether or no man could be washed in miraculous waters, there +was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing. But certain religious +leaders in London, not mere materialists, have begun in our day not to +deny the highly disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. +Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of +Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of the +Reverend R.J. Campbell, in their almost too fastidious spirituality, +admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. +But they essentially deny human sin, which they can see in the street. +The strongest saints and the strongest sceptics alike took positive evil +as the starting-point of their argument. If it be true (as it certainly +is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the +religious philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must +either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny +the present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new +theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the +cat. + +In this remarkable situation it is plainly not now possible (with any +hope of a universal appeal) to start, as our fathers did, with the fact +of sin. This very fact which was to them (and is to me) as plain as a +pikestaff, is the very fact that has been specially diluted or denied. +But though moderns deny the existence of sin, I do not think that they +have yet denied the existence of a lunatic asylum. We all agree still +that there is a collapse of the intellect as unmistakable as a falling +house. Men deny hell, but not, as yet, Hanwell. For the purpose of our +primary argument the one may very well stand where the other stood. I +mean that as all thoughts and theories were once judged by whether they +tended to make a man lose his soul, so for our present purpose all +modern thoughts and theories may be judged by whether they tend to make +a man lose his wits. + +It is true that some speak lightly and loosely of insanity as in itself +attractive. But a moment's thought will show that if disease is +beautiful, it is generally some one else's disease. A blind man may be +picturesque; but it requires two eyes to see the picture. And similarly +even the wildest poetry of insanity can only be enjoyed by the sane. To +the insane man his insanity is quite prosaic, because it is quite true. +A man who thinks himself a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a +chicken. A man who thinks he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as +a bit of glass. It is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, +and which makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea +that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see the +irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short, oddities +only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is +why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are +always complaining of the dulness of life. This is also why the new +novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The +old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures +that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the +modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not +central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, +and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among +dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses +what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of +to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world. + +Let us begin, then, with the mad-house; from this evil and fantastic inn +let us set forth on our intellectual journey. Now, if we are to glance +at the philosophy of sanity, the first thing to do in the matter is to +blot out one big and common mistake. There is a notion adrift everywhere +that imagination, especially mystical imagination, is dangerous to man's +mental balance. Poets are commonly spoken of as psychologically +unreliable; and generally there is a vague association between wreathing +laurels in your hair and sticking straws in it. Facts and history +utterly contradict this view. Most of the very great poets have been not +only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever really +held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to hold them. +Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is +reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go +mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will +be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does +lie in logic, not in imagination. Artistic paternity is as wholesome as +physical paternity. Moreover, it is worthy of remark that when a poet +really was morbid it was commonly because he had some weak spot of +rationality on his brain. Poe, for instance, really was morbid; not +because he was poetical, but because he was specially analytical. Even +chess was too poetical for him; he disliked chess because it was full of +knights and castles, like a poem. He avowedly preferred the black discs +of draughts, because they were more like the mere black dots on a +diagram. Perhaps the strongest case of all is this: that only one great +English poet went mad, Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by +logic, by the ugly and alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the +disease, but the medicine; poetry partly kept him in health. He could +sometimes forget the red and thirsty hell to which his hideous +necessitarianism dragged him among the wide waters and the white flat +lilies of the Ouse. He was damned by John Calvin; he was almost saved by +John Gilpin. Everywhere we see that men do not go mad by dreaming. +Critics are much madder than poets. Homer is complete and calm enough; +it is his critics who tear him into extravagant tatters. Shakespeare is +quite himself; it is only some of his critics who have discovered that +he was somebody else. And though St. John the Evangelist saw many +strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his +own commentators. The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it +floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite +sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the +physical exhaustion of Mr. Holbein. To accept everything is an exercise, +to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and +expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his +head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens +into his head. And it is his head that splits. + +It is a small matter, but not irrelevant, that this striking mistake is +commonly supported by a striking misquotation. We have all heard people +cite the celebrated line of Dryden as "Great genius is to madness near +allied." But Dryden did not say that great genius was to madness near +allied. Dryden was a great genius himself, and knew better. It would +have been hard to find a man more romantic than he, or more sensible. +What Dryden said was this, "Great wits are oft to madness near allied"; +and that is true. It is the pure promptitude of the intellect that is in +peril of a breakdown. Also people might remember of what sort of man +Dryden was talking. He was not talking of any unworldly visionary like +Vaughan or George Herbert. He was talking of a cynical man of the world, +a sceptic, a diplomatist, a great practical politician. Such men are +indeed to madness near allied. Their incessant calculation of their own +brains and other people's brains is a dangerous trade. It is always +perilous to the mind to reckon up the mind. A flippant person has asked +why we say, "As mad as a hatter." A more flippant person might answer +that a hatter is mad because he has to measure the human head. + +And if great reasoners are often maniacal, it is equally true that +maniacs are commonly great reasoners. When I was engaged in a +controversy with the _Clarion_ on the matter of free will, that able +writer Mr. R.B. Suthers said that free will was lunacy, because it meant +causeless actions, and the actions of a lunatic would be causeless. I do +not dwell here upon the disastrous lapse in determinist logic. Obviously +if any actions, even a lunatic's, can be causeless, determinism is done +for. If the chain of causation can be broken for a madman, it can be +broken for a man. But my purpose is to point out something more +practical. It was natural, perhaps, that a modern Marxian Socialist +should not know anything about free will. But it was certainly +remarkable that a modern Marxian Socialist should not know anything +about lunatics. Mr. Suthers evidently did not know anything about +lunatics. The last thing that can be said of a lunatic is that his +actions are causeless. If any human acts may loosely be called +causeless, they are the minor acts of a healthy man; whistling as he +walks; slashing the grass with a stick; kicking his heels or rubbing his +hands. It is the happy man who does the useless things; the sick man is +not strong enough to be idle. It is exactly such careless and causeless +actions that the madman could never understand; for the madman (like the +determinist) generally sees too much cause in everything. The madman +would read a conspiratorial significance into those empty activities. He +would think that the lopping of the grass was an attack on private +property. He would think that the kicking of the heels was a signal to +an accomplice. If the madman could for an instant become careless, he +would become sane. Every one who has had the misfortune to talk with +people in the heart or on the edge of mental disorder, knows that their +most sinister quality is a horrible clarity of detail; a connecting of +one thing with another in a map more elaborate than a maze. If you argue +with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get the worst of +it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker for not being +delayed by the things that go with good judgment. He is not hampered by +a sense of humour or by charity, or by the dumb certainties of +experience. He is the more logical for losing certain sane affections. +Indeed, the common phrase for insanity is in this respect a misleading +one. The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is +the man who has lost everything except his reason. + +The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and often in a +purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more strictly, the +insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable; this +may be observed specially in the two or three commonest kinds of +madness. If a man says (for instance) that men have a conspiracy against +him, you cannot dispute it except by saying that all the men deny that +they are conspirators; which is exactly what conspirators would do. His +explanation covers the facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he +is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that +the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England +that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or if +a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him that the +world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's. + +Nevertheless he is wrong. But if we attempt to trace his error in exact +terms, we shall not find it quite so easy as we had supposed. Perhaps +the nearest we can get to expressing it is to say this: that his mind +moves in a perfect but narrow circle. A small circle is quite as +infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is +not so large. In the same way the insane explanation is quite as +complete as the sane one, but it is not so large. A bullet is quite as +round as the world, but it is not the world. There is such a thing as a +narrow universality; there is such a thing as a small and cramped +eternity; you may see it in many modern religions. Now, speaking quite +externally and empirically, we may say that the strongest and most +unmistakable _mark_ of madness is this combination between a logical +completeness and a spiritual contraction. The lunatic's theory explains +a large number of things, but it does not explain them in a large way. I +mean that if you or I were dealing with a mind that was growing morbid, +we should be chiefly concerned not so much to give it arguments as to +give it air, to convince it that there was something cleaner and cooler +outside the suffocation of a single argument. Suppose, for instance, it +were the first case that I took as typical; suppose it were the case of +a man who accused everybody of conspiring against him. If we could +express our deepest feelings of protest and appeal against this +obsession, I suppose we should say something like this: "Oh, I admit +that you have your case and have it by heart, and that many things do +fit into other things as you say. I admit that your explanation explains +a great deal; but what a great deal it leaves out! Are there no other +stories in the world except yours; and are all men busy with your +business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps when the man in the +street did not seem to see you it was only his cunning; perhaps when the +policeman asked you your name it was only because he knew it already. +But how much happier you would be if you only knew that these people +cared nothing about you! How much larger your life would be if your self +could become smaller in it; if you could really look at other men with +common curiosity and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are +in their sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would +begin to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you. +You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your own +little plot is always being played, and you would find yourself under a +freer sky, in a street full of splendid strangers." Or suppose it were +the second case of madness, that of a man who claims the crown, your +impulse would be to answer, "All right! Perhaps you know that you are +the King of England; but why do you care? Make one magnificent effort +and you will be a human being and look down on all the kings of the +earth." Or it might be the third case, of the madman who called himself +Christ. If we said what we felt, we should say, "So you are the Creator +and Redeemer of the world: but what a small world it must be! What a +little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than butterflies! +How sad it must be to be God; and an inadequate God! Is there really no +life fuller and no love more marvellous than yours; and is it really in +your small and painful pity that all flesh must put its faith? How much +happier you would be, how much more of you there would be, if the hammer +of a higher God could smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like +spangles, and leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as +well as down!" + +And it must be remembered that the most purely practical science does +take this view of mental evil; it does not seek to argue with it like a +heresy, but simply to snap it like a spell. Neither modern science nor +ancient religion believes in complete free thought. Theology rebukes +certain thoughts by calling them blasphemous. Science rebukes certain +thoughts by calling them morbid. For example, some religious societies +discouraged men more or less from thinking about sex. The new scientific +society definitely discourages men from thinking about death; it is a +fact, but it is considered a morbid fact. And in dealing with those +whose morbidity has a touch of mania, modern science cares far less for +pure logic than a dancing Dervish. In these cases it is not enough that +the unhappy man should desire truth; he must desire health. Nothing can +save him but a blind hunger for normality, like that of a beast. A man +cannot think himself out of mental evil; for it is actually the organ of +thought that has become diseased, ungovernable, and, as it were, +independent. He can only be saved by will or faith. The moment his mere +reason moves, it moves in the old circular rut; he will go round and +round his logical circle, just as a man in a third-class carriage on the +Inner Circle will go round and round the Inner Circle unless he performs +the voluntary, vigorous, and mystical act of getting out at Gower +Street. Decision is the whole business here; a door must be shut for +ever. Every remedy is a desperate remedy. Every cure is a miraculous +cure. Curing a madman is not arguing with a philosopher; it is casting +out a devil. And however quietly doctors and psychologists may go to +work in the matter, their attitude is profoundly intolerant--as +intolerant as Bloody Mary. Their attitude is really this: that the man +must stop thinking, if he is to go on living. Their counsel is one of +intellectual amputation. If thy _head_ offend thee, cut it off; for it +is better, not merely to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child, but to +enter it as an imbecile, rather than with your whole intellect to be +cast into hell--or into Hanwell. + +Such is the madman of experience; he is commonly a reasoner, frequently +a successful reasoner. Doubtless he could be vanquished in mere reason, +and the case against him put logically. But it can be put much more +precisely in more general and even æsthetic terms. He is in the clean +and well-lit prison of one idea: he is sharpened to one painful point. +He is without healthy hesitation and healthy complexity. Now, as I +explain in the introduction, I have determined in these early chapters +to give not so much a diagram of a doctrine as some pictures of a point +of view. And I have described at length my vision of the maniac for this +reason: that just as I am affected by the maniac, so I am affected by +most modern thinkers. That unmistakable mood or note that I hear from +Hanwell, I hear also from half the chairs of science and seats of +learning to-day; and most of the mad doctors are mad doctors in more +senses than one. They all have exactly that combination we have noted: +the combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason with a contracted +common sense. They are universal only in the sense that they take one +thin explanation and carry it very far. But a pattern can stretch for +ever and still be a small pattern. They see a chess-board white on +black, and if the universe is paved with it, it is still white on black. +Like the lunatic, they cannot alter their standpoint; they cannot make a +mental effort and suddenly see it black on white. + +Take first the more obvious case of materialism. As an explanation of +the world, materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has just the +quality of the madman's argument; we have at once the sense of it +covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out. +Contemplate some able and sincere materialist, as, for instance, Mr. +McCabe, and you will have exactly this unique sensation. He understands +everything, and everything does not seem worth understanding. His cosmos +may be complete in every rivet and cog-wheel, but still his cosmos is +smaller than our world. Somehow his scheme, like the lucid scheme of the +madman, seems unconscious of the alien energies and the large +indifference of the earth; it is not thinking of the real things of the +earth, of fighting peoples or proud mothers, or first love or fear upon +the sea. The earth is so very large, and the cosmos is so very small. +The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in. + +It must be understood that I am not now discussing the relation of +these creeds to truth; but, for the present, solely their relation to +health. Later in the argument I hope to attack the question of objective +verity; here I speak only of a phenomenon of psychology. I do not for +the present attempt to prove to Haeckel that materialism is untrue, any +more than I attempted to prove to the man who thought he was Christ that +he was labouring under an error. I merely remark here on the fact that +both cases have the same kind of completeness and the same kind of +incompleteness. You can explain a man's detention at Hanwell by an +indifferent public by saying that it is the crucifixion of a god of whom +the world is not worthy. The explanation does explain. Similarly you may +explain the order in the universe by saying that all things, even the +souls of men, are leaves inevitably unfolding on an utterly unconscious +tree--the blind destiny of matter. The explanation does explain, though +not, of course, so completely as the madman's. But the point here is +that the normal human mind not only objects to both, but feels to both +the same objection. Its approximate statement is that if the man in +Hanwell is the real God, he is not much of a god. And, similarly, if the +cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it is not much of a +cosmos. The thing has shrunk. The deity is less divine than many men; +and (according to Haeckel) the whole of life is something much more +grey, narrow, and trivial than many separate aspects of it. The parts +seem greater than the whole. + +For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or +not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. In one sense, of +course, all intelligent ideas are narrow. They cannot be broader than +themselves. A Christian is only restricted in the same sense that an +atheist is restricted. He cannot think Christianity false and continue +to be a Christian; and the atheist cannot think atheism false and +continue to be an atheist. But as it happens, there is a very special +sense in which materialism has more restrictions than spiritualism. Mr. +McCabe thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in +determinism. I think Mr. McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to +believe in fairies. But if we examine the two vetoes we shall see that +his is really much more of a pure veto than mine. The Christian is quite +free to believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and +inevitable development in the universe. But the materialist is not +allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of +spiritualism or miracle. Poor Mr. McCabe is not allowed to retain even +the tiniest imp, though it might be hiding in a pimpernel. The Christian +admits that the universe is manifold and even miscellaneous, just as a +sane man knows that he is complex. The sane man knows that he has a +touch of the beast, a touch of the devil, a touch of the saint, a touch +of the citizen. Nay, the really sane man knows that he has a touch of +the madman. But the materialist's world is quite simple and solid, just +as the madman is quite sure he is sane. The materialist is sure that +history has been simply and solely a chain of causation, just as the +interesting person before mentioned is quite sure that he is simply and +solely a chicken. Materialists and madmen never have doubts. + +Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do materialistic +denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not think about it. But +if I disbelieve in immortality I must not think about it. In the first +case the road is open and I can go as far as I like; in the second the +road is shut. But the case is even stronger, and the parallel with +madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive +and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually +destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions +of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his +humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, +initiative, all that is human. For instance, when materialism leads men +to complete fatalism (as it generally does), it is quite idle to pretend +that it is in any sense a liberating force. It is absurd to say that you +are especially advancing freedom when you only use free thought to +destroy free will. The determinists come to bind, not to loose. They may +well call their law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that +ever fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if you +like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that this is just +as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language when applied to a +man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if you like, that the man is +free to think himself a poached egg. But it is surely a more massive and +important fact that if he is a poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, +sleep, walk, or smoke a cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, +that the bold determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the +reality of the will. But it is a much more massive and important fact +that he is not free to praise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, +to punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year +resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say "thank +you" for the mustard. + +In passing from this subject I may note that there is a queer fallacy to +the effect that materialistic fatalism is in some way favourable to +mercy, to the abolition of cruel punishments or punishments of any kind. +This is startlingly the reverse of the truth. It is quite tenable that +the doctrine of necessity makes no difference at all; that it leaves the +flogger flogging and the kind friend exhorting as before. But obviously +if it stops either of them it stops the kind exhortation. That the sins +are inevitable does not prevent punishment; if it prevents anything it +prevents persuasion. Determinism is quite as likely to lead to cruelty +as it is certain to lead to cowardice. Determinism is not inconsistent +with the cruel treatment of criminals. What it is (perhaps) inconsistent +with is the generous treatment of criminals; with any appeal to their +better feelings or encouragement in their moral struggle. The +determinist does not believe in appealing to the will, but he does +believe in changing the environment. He must not say to the sinner, "Go +and sin no more," because the sinner cannot help it. But he can put him +in boiling oil; for boiling oil is an environment. Considered as a +figure, therefore, the materialist has the fantastic outline of the +figure of the madman. Both take up a position at once unanswerable and +intolerable. + +Of course it is not only of the materialist that all this is true. The +same would apply to the other extreme of speculative logic. There is a +sceptic far more terrible than he who believes that everything began in +matter. It is possible to meet the sceptic who believes that everything +began in himself. He doubts not the existence of angels or devils, but +the existence of men and cows. For him his own friends are a mythology +made up by himself. He created his own father and his own mother. This +horrible fancy has in it something decidedly attractive to the somewhat +mystical egoism of our day. That publisher who thought that men would +get on if they believed in themselves, those seekers after the Superman +who are always looking for him in the looking-glass, those writers who +talk about impressing their personalities instead of creating life for +the world, all these people have really only an inch between them and +this awful emptiness. Then when this kindly world all round the man has +been blackened out like a lie; when friends fade into ghosts, and the +foundations of the world fail; then when the man, believing in nothing +and in no man, is alone in his own nightmare, then the great +individualistic motto shall be written over him in avenging irony. The +stars will be only dots in the blackness of his own brain; his mother's +face will be only a sketch from his own insane pencil on the walls of +his cell. But over his cell shall be written, with dreadful truth, "He +believes in himself." + +All that concerns us here, however, is to note that this panegoistic +extreme of thought exhibits the same paradox as the other extreme of +materialism. It is equally complete in theory and equally crippling in +practice. For the sake of simplicity, it is easier to state the notion +by saying that a man can believe that he is always in a dream. Now, +obviously there can be no positive proof given to him that he is not in +a dream, for the simple reason that no proof can be offered that might +not be offered in a dream. But if the man began to burn down London and +say that his housekeeper would soon call him to breakfast, we should +take him and put him with other logicians in a place which has often +been alluded to in the course of this chapter. The man who cannot +believe his senses, and the man who cannot believe anything else, are +both insane, but their insanity is proved not by any error in their +argument, but by the manifest mistake of their whole lives. They have +both locked themselves up in two boxes, painted inside with the sun and +stars; they are both unable to get out, the one into the health and +happiness of heaven, the other even into the health and happiness of the +earth. Their position is quite reasonable; nay, in a sense it is +infinitely reasonable, just as a threepenny bit is infinitely circular. +But there is such a thing as a mean infinity, a base and slavish +eternity. It is amusing to notice that many of the moderns, whether +sceptics or mystics, have taken as their sign a certain eastern symbol, +which is the very symbol of this ultimate nullity. When they wish to +represent eternity, they represent it by a serpent with his tail in his +mouth. There is a startling sarcasm in the image of that very +unsatisfactory meal. The eternity of the material fatalists, the +eternity of the eastern pessimists, the eternity of the supercilious +theosophists and higher scientists of to-day is, indeed, very well +presented by a serpent eating his tail, a degraded animal who destroys +even himself. + +This chapter is purely practical and is concerned with what actually is +the chief mark and element of insanity; we may say in summary that it is +reason used without root, reason in the void. The man who begins to +think without the proper first principles goes mad, the man who begins +to think at the wrong end. And for the rest of these pages we have to +try and discover what is the right end. But we may ask in conclusion, if +this be what drives men mad, what is it that keeps them sane? By the end +of this book I hope to give a definite, some will think a far too +definite, answer. But for the moment it is possible in the same solely +practical manner to give a general answer touching what in actual human +history keeps men sane. Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have +mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity. +The ordinary man has always been sane because the ordinary man has +always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has always had +one foot in earth and the other in fairyland. He has always left himself +free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of to-day) free also +to believe in them. He has always cared more for truth than for +consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to contradict each other, +he would take the two truths and the contradiction along with them. His +spiritual sight is stereoscopic, like his physical sight: he sees two +different pictures at once and yet sees all the better for that. Thus he +has always believed that there was such a thing as fate, but such a +thing as free will also. Thus he believed that children were indeed the +kingdom of heaven, but nevertheless ought to be obedient to the kingdom +of earth. He admired youth because it was young and age because it was +not. It is exactly this balance of apparent contradictions that has been +the whole buoyancy of the healthy man. The whole secret of mysticism is +this: that man can understand everything by the help of what he does not +understand. The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and +succeeds in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to +be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. The determinist makes +the theory of causation quite clear, and then finds that he cannot say +"if you please" to the housemaid. The Christian permits free will to +remain a sacred mystery; but because of this his relations with the +housemaid become of a sparkling and crystal clearness. He puts the seed +of dogma in a central darkness; but it branches forth in all directions +with abounding natural health. As we have taken the circle as the symbol +of reason and madness, we may very well take the cross as the symbol at +once of mystery and of health. Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity +is centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in +its nature; but it is fixed for ever in its size; it can never be larger +or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a +contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its +shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre it can grow without +changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens +its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travellers. + +Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this deep +matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express +sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The one +created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the light of +which we look at everything. Like the sun at noonday, mysticism +explains everything else by the blaze of its own victorious +invisibility. Detached intellectualism is (in the exact sense of a +popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light without heat, and it is +secondary light, reflected from a dead world. But the Greeks were right +when they made Apollo the god both of imagination and of sanity; for he +was both the patron of poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary +dogmas and a special creed I shall speak later. But that +transcendentalism by which all men live has primarily much the position +of the sun in the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid +confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a blaze +and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and unmistakable, as +recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid on a blackboard. For +the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon is the mother of lunatics +and has given to them all her name. + + + + +CHAPTER III.--_The Suicide of Thought_ + + +The phrases of the street are not only forcible but subtle: for a figure +of speech can often get into a crack too small for a definition. Phrases +like "put out" or "off colour" might have been coined by Mr. Henry James +in an agony of verbal precision. And there is no more subtle truth than +that of the everyday phrase about a man having "his heart in the right +place." It involves the idea of normal proportion; not only does a +certain function exist, but it is rightly related to other functions. +Indeed, the negation of this phrase would describe with peculiar +accuracy the somewhat morbid mercy and perverse tenderness of the most +representative moderns. If, for instance, I had to describe with +fairness the character of Mr. Bernard Shaw, I could not express myself +more exactly than by saying that he has a heroically large and generous +heart; but not a heart in the right place. And this is so of the typical +society of our time. + +The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too +good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is +shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not +merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, +and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and +the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. +The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The +virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other +and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their +truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their +pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. For example, Mr. +Blatchford attacks Christianity because he is mad on one Christian +virtue: the merely mystical and almost irrational virtue of charity. He +has a strange idea that he will make it easier to forgive sins by saying +that there are no sins to forgive. Mr. Blatchford is not only an early +Christian, he is the only early Christian who ought really to have been +eaten by lions. For in his case the pagan accusation is really true: his +mercy would mean mere anarchy. He really is the enemy of the human +race--because he is so human. As the other extreme, we may take the +acrid realist, who has deliberately killed in himself all human pleasure +in happy tales or in the healing of the heart. Torquemada tortured +people physically for the sake of moral truth. Zola tortured people +morally for the sake of physical truth. But in Torquemada's time there +was at least a system that could to some extent make righteousness and +peace kiss each other. Now they do not even bow. But a much stronger +case than these two of truth and pity can be found in the remarkable +case of the dislocation of humility. + +It is only with one aspect of humility that we are here concerned. +Humility was largely meant as a restraint upon the arrogance and +infinity of the appetite of man. He was always out-stripping his mercies +with his own newly invented needs. His very power of enjoyment destroyed +half his joys. By asking for pleasure, he lost the chief pleasure; for +the chief pleasure is surprise. Hence it became evident that if a man +would make his world large, he must be always making himself small. Even +the haughty visions, the tall cities, and the toppling pinnacles are the +creations of humility. Giants that tread down forests like grass are the +creations of humility. Towers that vanish upwards above the loneliest +star are the creations of humility. For towers are not tall unless we +look up at them; and giants are not giants unless they are larger than +we. All this gigantesque imagination, which is, perhaps, the mightiest +of the pleasures of man, is at bottom entirely humble. It is impossible +without humility to enjoy anything--even pride. + +But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty +has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ +of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be +doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been +exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is +exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself. The part he doubts is +exactly the part he ought not to doubt--the Divine Reason. Huxley +preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is +so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should be wrong +if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. +The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it +so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the +wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that +prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him +from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his +efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a +man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working +altogether. + +At any street corner we may meet a man who utters the frantic and +blasphemous statement that he may be wrong. Every day one comes across +somebody who says that of course his view may not be the right one. Of +course his view must be the right one, or it is not his view. We are on +the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in +the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who +doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of +old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be +convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are +too meek even to claim their inheritance. It is exactly this +intellectual helplessness which is our second problem. + +The last chapter has been concerned only with a fact of observation: +that what peril of morbidity there is for man comes rather from his +reason than his imagination. It was not meant to attack the authority of +reason; rather it is the ultimate purpose to defend it. For it needs +defence. The whole modern world is at war with reason; and the tower +already reels. + +The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of +religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the +answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like +children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful +assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, +for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no +reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart +from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical +cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or +unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present +one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to +attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of +religious authority are like men who should attack the police without +ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril +to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it +religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And +against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race +is to avoid ruin. + +That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just +as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next +generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one +set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching +the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought. It +is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is +itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our +thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a +sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should +_anything_ go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good +logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the +brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to +think for myself." But the old sceptic, the complete sceptic, says, "I +have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all." + +There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that +ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all +religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent +ages like our own: and already Mr. H.G. Wells has raised its ruinous +banner; he has written a delicate piece of scepticism called "Doubts of +the Instrument." In this he questions the brain itself, and endeavours +to remove all reality from all his own assertions, past, present, and to +come. But it was against this remote ruin that all the military systems +in religion were originally ranked and ruled. The creeds and the +crusades, the hierarchies and the horrible persecutions were not +organized, as is ignorantly said, for the suppression of reason. They +were organized for the difficult defence of reason. Man, by a blind +instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could +be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve, the authority +of popes to define the authority, even of inquisitors to terrify: these +were all only dark defences erected round one central authority, more +undemonstrable, more supernatural than all--the authority of a man to +think. We know now that this is so; we have no excuse for not knowing +it. For we can hear scepticism crashing through the old ring of +authorities, and at the same moment we can see reason swaying upon her +throne. In so far as religion is gone, reason is going. For they are +both of the same primary and authoritative kind. They are both methods +of proof which cannot themselves be proved. And in the act of +destroying the idea of Divine authority we have largely destroyed the +idea of that human authority by which we do a long-division sum. With a +long and sustained tug we have attempted to pull the mitre off +pontifical man; and his head has come off with it. + +Lest this should be called loose assertion, it is perhaps desirable, +though dull, to run rapidly through the chief modern fashions of thought +which have this effect of stopping thought itself. Materialism and the +view of everything as a personal illusion have some such effect; for if +the mind is mechanical, thought cannot be very exciting, and if the +cosmos is unreal, there is nothing to think about. But in these cases +the effect is indirect and doubtful. In some cases it is direct and +clear; notably in the case of what is generally called evolution. + +Evolution is a good example of that modern intelligence which, if it +destroys anything, destroys itself. Evolution is either an innocent +scientific description of how certain earthly things came about; or, if +it is anything more than this, it is an attack upon thought itself. If +evolution destroys anything, it does not destroy religion but +rationalism. If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an +ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is +stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well +do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he +were outside time. But if it means anything more, it means that there is +no such thing as an ape to change, and no such thing as a man for him to +change into. It means that there is no such thing as a thing. At best, +there is only one thing, and that is a flux of everything and anything. +This is an attack not upon the faith, but upon the mind; you cannot +think if there are no things to think about. You cannot think if you are +not separate from the subject of thought. Descartes said, "I think; +therefore I am." The philosophic evolutionist reverses and negatives the +epigram. He says, "I am not; therefore I cannot think." + +Then there is the opposite attack on thought: that urged by Mr. H.G. +Wells when he insists that every separate thing is "unique," and there +are no categories at all. This also is merely destructive. Thinking +means connecting things, and stops if they cannot be connected. It need +hardly be said that this scepticism forbidding thought necessarily +forbids speech; a man cannot open his mouth without contradicting it. +Thus when Mr. Wells says (as he did somewhere), "All chairs are quite +different," he utters not merely a misstatement, but a contradiction in +terms. If all chairs were quite different, you could not call them "all +chairs." + +Akin to these is the false theory of progress, which maintains that we +alter the test instead of trying to pass the test. We often hear it +said, for instance, "What is right in one age is wrong in another." This +is quite reasonable, if it means that there is a fixed aim, and that +certain methods attain at certain times and not at other times. If +women, say, desire to be elegant, it may be that they are improved at +one time by growing fatter and at another time by growing thinner. But +you cannot say that they are improved by ceasing to wish to be elegant +and beginning to wish to be oblong. If the standard changes, how can +there be improvement, which implies a standard? Nietzsche started a +nonsensical idea that men had once sought as good what we now call evil; +if it were so, we could not talk of surpassing or even falling short of +them. How can you overtake Jones if you walk in the other direction? You +cannot discuss whether one people has succeeded more in being miserable +than another succeeded in being happy. It would be like discussing +whether Milton was more puritanical than a pig is fat. + +It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object +or ideal. But as an ideal, change itself becomes unchangeable. If the +change-worshipper wishes to estimate his own progress, he must be +sternly loyal to the ideal of change; he must not begin to flirt gaily +with the ideal of monotony. Progress itself cannot progress. It is worth +remark, in passing, that when Tennyson, in a wild and rather weak +manner, welcomed the idea of infinite alteration in society, he +instinctively took a metaphor which suggests an imprisoned tedium. He +wrote-- + + "Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change." + +He thought of change itself as an unchangeable groove; and so it is. +Change is about the narrowest and hardest groove that a man can get +into. + +The main point here, however, is that this idea of a fundamental +alteration in the standard is one of the things that make thought about +the past or future simply impossible. The theory of a complete change of +standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure +of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and +aristocratic pleasure of despising them. + +This bald summary of the thought-destroying forces of our time would not +be complete without some reference to pragmatism; for though I have here +used and should everywhere defend the pragmatist method as a preliminary +guide to truth, there is an extreme application of it which involves the +absence of all truth whatever. My meaning can be put shortly thus. I +agree with the pragmatists that apparent objective truth is not the +whole matter; that there is an authoritative need to believe the things +that are necessary to the human mind. But I say that one of those +necessities precisely is a belief in objective truth. The pragmatist +tells a man to think what he must think and never mind the Absolute. But +precisely one of the things that he must think is the Absolute. This +philosophy, indeed, is a kind of verbal paradox. Pragmatism is a matter +of human needs; and one of the first of human needs is to be something +more than a pragmatist. Extreme pragmatism is just as inhuman as the +determinism it so powerfully attacks. The determinist (who, to do him +justice, does not pretend to be a human being) makes nonsense of the +human sense of actual choice. The pragmatist, who professes to be +specially human, makes nonsense of the human sense of actual fact. + +To sum up our contention so far, we may say that the most characteristic +current philosophies have not only a touch of mania, but a touch of +suicidal mania. The mere questioner has knocked his head against the +limits of human thought; and cracked it. This is what makes so futile +the warnings of the orthodox and the boasts of the advanced about the +dangerous boyhood of free thought. What we are looking at is not the +boyhood of free thought; it is the old age and ultimate dissolution of +free thought. It is vain for bishops and pious bigwigs to discuss what +dreadful things will happen if wild scepticism runs its course. It has +run its course. It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great +truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have +seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself. +You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask +themselves if they have any selves. You cannot fancy a more sceptical +world than that in which men doubt if there is a world. It might +certainly have reached its bankruptcy more quickly and cleanly if it had +not been feebly hampered by the application of indefensible laws of +blasphemy or by the absurd pretence that modern England is Christian. +But it would have reached the bankruptcy anyhow. Militant atheists are +still unjustly persecuted; but rather because they are an old minority +than because they are a new one. Free thought has exhausted its own +freedom. It is weary of its own success. If any eager freethinker now +hails philosophic freedom as the dawn, he is only like the man in Mark +Twain who came out wrapped in blankets to see the sun rise and was just +in time to see it set. If any frightened curate still says that it will +be awful if the darkness of free thought should spread, we can only +answer him in the high and powerful words of Mr. Belloc, "Do not, I +beseech you, be troubled about the increase of forces already in +dissolution. You have mistaken the hour of the night: it is already +morning." We have no more questions left to ask. We have looked for +questions in the darkest corners and on the wildest peaks. We have found +all the questions that can be found. It is time we gave up looking for +questions and began looking for answers. + +But one more word must be added. At the beginning of this preliminary +negative sketch I said that our mental ruin has been wrought by wild +reason, not by wild imagination. A man does not go mad because he makes +a statue a mile high, but he may go mad by thinking it out in square +inches. Now, one school of thinkers has seen this and jumped at it as a +way of renewing the pagan health of the world. They see that reason +destroys; but Will, they say, creates. The ultimate authority, they say, +is in will, not in reason. The supreme point is not why a man demands a +thing, but the fact that he does demand it. I have no space to trace or +expound this philosophy of Will. It came, I suppose, through Nietzsche, +who preached something that is called egoism. That, indeed, was +simple-minded enough; for Nietzsche denied egoism simply by preaching +it. To preach anything is to give it away. First, the egoist calls life +a war without mercy, and then he takes the greatest possible trouble to +drill his enemies in war. To preach egoism is to practise altruism. But +however it began, the view is common enough in current literature. The +main defence of these thinkers is that they are not thinkers; they are +makers. They say that choice is itself the divine thing. Thus Mr. +Bernard Shaw has attacked the old idea that men's acts are to be judged +by the standard of the desire of happiness. He says that a man does not +act for his happiness, but from his will. He does not say, "Jam will +make me happy," but "I want jam." And in all this others follow him with +yet greater enthusiasm. Mr. John Davidson, a remarkable poet, is so +passionately excited about it that he is obliged to write prose. He +publishes a short play with several long prefaces. This is natural +enough in Mr. Shaw, for all his plays are prefaces: Mr. Shaw is (I +suspect) the only man on earth who has never written any poetry. But +that Mr. Davidson (who can write excellent poetry) should write instead +laborious metaphysics in defence of this doctrine of will, does show +that the doctrine of will has taken hold of men. Even Mr. H.G. Wells has +half spoken in its language; saying that one should test acts not like a +thinker, but like an artist, saying, "I _feel_ this curve is right," or +"that line _shall_ go thus." They are all excited; and well they may be. +For by this doctrine of the divine authority of will, they think they +can break out of the doomed fortress of rationalism. They think they can +escape. + +But they cannot escape. This pure praise of volition ends in the same +break up and blank as the mere pursuit of logic. Exactly as complete +free thought involves the doubting of thought itself, so the acceptation +of mere "willing" really paralyzes the will. Mr. Bernard Shaw has not +perceived the real difference between the old utilitarian test of +pleasure (clumsy, of course, and easily misstated) and that which he +propounds. The real difference between the test of happiness and the +test of will is simply that the test of happiness is a test and the +other isn't. You can discuss whether a man's act in jumping over a cliff +was directed towards happiness; you cannot discuss whether it was +derived from will. Of course it was. You can praise an action by saying +that it is calculated to bring pleasure or pain to discover truth or to +save the soul. But you cannot praise an action because it shows will; +for to say that is merely to say that it is an action. By this praise of +will you cannot really choose one course as better than another. And yet +choosing one course as better than another is the very definition of the +will you are praising. + +The worship of will is the negation of will. To admire mere choice is to +refuse to choose. If Mr. Bernard Shaw comes up to me and says, "Will +something," that is tantamount to saying, "I do not mind what you +will," and that is tantamount to saying, "I have no will in the matter." +You cannot admire will in general, because the essence of will is that +it is particular. A brilliant anarchist like Mr. John Davidson feels an +irritation against ordinary morality, and therefore he invokes +will--will to anything. He only wants humanity to want something. But +humanity does want something. It wants ordinary morality. He rebels +against the law and tells us to will something or anything. But we have +willed something. We have willed the law against which he rebels. + +All the will-worshippers, from Nietzsche to Mr. Davidson, are really +quite empty of volition. They cannot will, they can hardly wish. And if +any one wants a proof of this, it can be found quite easily. It can be +found in this fact: that they always talk of will as something that +expands and breaks out. But it is quite the opposite. Every act of will +is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. +In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose +anything, you reject everything else. That objection, which men of this +school used to make to the act of marriage, is really an objection to +every act. Every act is an irrevocable selection and exclusion. Just as +when you marry one woman you give up all the others, so when you take +one course of action you give up all the other courses. If you become +King of England, you give up the post of Beadle in Brompton. If you go +to Rome, you sacrifice a rich suggestive life in Wimbledon. It is the +existence of this negative or limiting side of will that makes most of +the talk of the anarchic will-worshippers little better than nonsense. +For instance, Mr. John Davidson tells us to have nothing to do with +"Thou shalt not"; but it is surely obvious that "Thou shalt not" is only +one of the necessary corollaries of "I will." "I will go to the Lord +Mayor's Show, and thou shalt not stop me." Anarchism adjures us to be +bold creative artists, and care for no laws or limits. But it is +impossible to be an artist and not care for laws and limits. Art is +limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame. If you draw a +giraffe, you must draw him with a long neck. If, in your bold creative +way, you hold yourself free to draw a giraffe with a short neck, you +will really find that you are not free to draw a giraffe. The moment you +step into the world of facts, you step into a world of limits. You can +free things from alien or accidental laws, but not from the laws of +their own nature. You may, if you like, free a tiger from his bars; but +do not free him from his stripes. Do not free a camel of the burden of +his hump: you may be freeing him from being a camel. Do not go about as +a demagogue, encouraging triangles to break out of the prison of their +three sides. If a triangle breaks out of its three sides, its life comes +to a lamentable end. Somebody wrote a work called "The Loves of the +Triangles"; I never read it, but I am sure that if triangles ever were +loved, they were loved for being triangular. This is certainly the case +with all artistic creation, which is in some ways the most decisive +example of pure will. The artist loves his limitations: they constitute +the _thing_ he is doing. The painter is glad that the canvas is flat. +The sculptor is glad that the clay is colourless. + +In case the point is not clear, an historic example may illustrate it. +The French Revolution was really an heroic and decisive thing, because +the Jacobins willed something definite and limited. They desired the +freedoms of democracy, but also all the vetoes of democracy. They wished +to have votes and _not_ to have titles. Republicanism had an ascetic +side in Franklin or Robespierre as well as an expansive side in Danton +or Wilkes. Therefore they have created something with a solid substance +and shape, the square social equality and peasant wealth of France. But +since then the revolutionary or speculative mind of Europe has been +weakened by shrinking from any proposal because of the limits of that +proposal. Liberalism has been degraded into liberality. Men have tried +to turn "revolutionise" from a transitive to an intransitive verb. The +Jacobin could tell you not only the system he would rebel against, but +(what was more important) the system he would _not_ rebel against, the +system he would trust. But the new rebel is a sceptic, and will not +entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be +really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really +gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation +implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist +doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which +he denounces it. Thus he writes one book complaining that imperial +oppression insults the purity of women, and then he writes another book +(about the sex problem) in which he insults it himself. He curses the +Sultan because Christian girls lose their virginity, and then curses +Mrs. Grundy because they keep it. As a politician, he will cry out that +war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is +waste of time. A Russian pessimist will denounce a policeman for killing +a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that +the peasant ought to have killed himself. A man denounces marriage as a +lie, and then denounces aristocratic profligates for treating it as a +lie. He calls a flag a bauble, and then blames the oppressors of Poland +or Ireland because they take away that bauble. The man of this school +goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are +treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and +goes on to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically +are beasts. In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite +sceptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on +politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics +he attacks morality for trampling on men. Therefore the modern man in +revolt has become practically useless for all purposes of revolt. By +rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against +anything. + +It may be added that the same blank and bankruptcy can be observed in +all fierce and terrible types of literature, especially in satire. +Satire may be mad and anarchic, but it presupposes an admitted +superiority in certain things over others; it presupposes a standard. +When little boys in the street laugh at the fatness of some +distinguished journalist, they are unconsciously assuming a standard of +Greek sculpture. They are appealing to the marble Apollo. And the +curious disappearance of satire from our literature is an instance of +the fierce things fading for want of any principle to be fierce about. +Nietzsche had some natural talent for sarcasm: he could sneer, though he +could not laugh; but there is always something bodiless and without +weight in his satire, simply because it has not any mass of common +morality behind it. He is himself more preposterous than anything he +denounces. But, indeed, Nietzsche will stand very well as the type of +the whole of this failure of abstract violence. The softening of the +brain which ultimately overtook him was not a physical accident. If +Nietzsche had not ended in imbecility, Nietzscheism would end in +imbecility. Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. +Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have +softening of the brain. + +This last attempt to evade intellectualism ends in intellectualism, and +therefore in death. The sortie has failed. The wild worship of +lawlessness and the materialist worship of law end in the same void. +Nietzsche scales staggering mountains, but he turns up ultimately in +Tibet. He sits down beside Tolstoy in the land of nothing and Nirvana. +They are both helpless--one because he must not grasp anything, and the +other because he must not let go of anything. The Tolstoyan's will is +frozen by a Buddhist instinct that all special actions are evil. But the +Nietzscheite's will is quite equally frozen by his view that all special +actions are good; for if all special actions are good, none of them are +special. They stand at the cross-roads, and one hates all the roads and +the other likes all the roads. The result is--well, some things are not +hard to calculate. They stand at the cross-roads. + +Here I end (thank God) the first and dullest business of this book--the +rough review of recent thought. After this I begin to sketch a view of +life which may not interest my reader, but which, at any rate, interests +me. In front of me, as I close this page, is a pile of modern books that +I have been turning over for the purpose--a pile of ingenuity, a pile of +futility. By the accident of my present detachment, I can see the +inevitable smash of the philosophies of Schopenhauer and Tolstoy, +Nietzsche and Shaw, as clearly as an inevitable railway smash could be +seen from a balloon. They are all on the road to the emptiness of the +asylum. For madness may be defined as using mental activity so as to +reach mental helplessness; and they have nearly reached it. He who +thinks he is made of glass, thinks to the destruction of thought; for +glass cannot think. So he who wills to reject nothing, wills the +destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but +the rejection of almost everything. And as I turn and tumble over the +clever, wonderful, tiresome, and useless modern books, the title of one +of them rivets my eye. It is called "Jeanne d'Arc," by Anatole France. I +have only glanced at it, but a glance was enough to remind me of Renan's +"Vie de Jésus." It has the same strange method of the reverent sceptic. +It discredits supernatural stories that have some foundation, simply by +telling natural stories that have no foundation. Because we cannot +believe in what a saint did, we are to pretend that we know exactly what +he felt. But I do not mention either book in order to criticise it, but +because the accidental combination of the names called up two startling +images of sanity which blasted all the books before me. Joan of Arc was +not stuck at the cross-roads, either by rejecting all the paths like +Tolstoy, or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path, and +went down it like a thunderbolt. Yet Joan, when I came to think of her, +had in her all that was true either in Tolstoy or Nietzsche, all that +was even tolerable in either of them. I thought of all that is noble in +Tolstoy, the pleasure in plain things, especially in plain pity, the +actualities of the earth, the reverence for the poor, the dignity of the +bowed back. Joan of Arc had all that and with this great addition, that +she endured poverty as well as admiring it; whereas Tolstoy is only a +typical aristocrat trying to find out its secret. And then I thought of +all that was brave and proud and pathetic in poor Nietzsche, and his +mutiny against the emptiness and timidity of our time. I thought of his +cry for the ecstatic equilibrium of danger, his hunger for the rush of +great horses, his cry to arms. Well, Joan of Arc had all that, and again +with this difference, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We +_know_ that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche, for all we +know, was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant; she was +the peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior; she was the warrior. +She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals; she was more gentle +than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly +practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who +do nothing. It was impossible that the thought should not cross my mind +that she and her faith had perhaps some secret of moral unity and +utility that has been lost. And with that thought came a larger one, and +the colossal figure of her Master had also crossed the theatre of my +thoughts. The same modern difficulty which darkened the subject-matter +of Anatole France also darkened that of Ernest Renan. Renan also divided +his hero's pity from his hero's pugnacity. Renan even represented the +righteous anger at Jerusalem as a mere nervous breakdown after the +idyllic expectations of Galilee. As if there were any inconsistency +between having a love for humanity and having a hatred for inhumanity! +Altruists, with thin, weak voices, denounce Christ as an egoist. Egoists +(with even thinner and weaker voices) denounce Him as an altruist. In +our present atmosphere such cavils are comprehensible enough. The love +of a hero is more terrible than the hatred of a tyrant. The hatred of a +hero is more generous than the love of a philanthropist. There is a huge +and heroic sanity of which moderns can only collect the fragments. There +is a giant of whom we see only the lopped arms and legs walking about. +They have torn the soul of Christ into silly strips, labelled egoism and +altruism, and they are equally puzzled by His insane magnificence and +His insane meekness. They have parted His garments among them, and for +His vesture they have cast lots; though the coat was without seam woven +from the top throughout. + + + + +CHAPTER IV--_The Ethics of Elfland_ + + +When the business man rebukes the idealism of his office-boy, it is +commonly in some such speech as this: "Ah, yes, when one is young, one +has these ideals in the abstract and these castles in the air; but in +middle age they all break up like clouds, and one comes down to a belief +in practical politics, to using the machinery one has and getting on +with the world as it is." Thus, at least, venerable and philanthropic +old men now in their honoured graves used to talk to me when I was a +boy. But since then I have grown up and have discovered that these +philanthropic old men were telling lies. What has really happened is +exactly the opposite of what they said would happen. They said that I +should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical +politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in +fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my old +childlike faith in practical politics. I am still as much concerned as +ever about the Battle of Armageddon; but I am not so much concerned +about the General Election. As a babe I leapt up on my mother's knee at +the mere mention of it. No; the vision is always solid and reliable. The +vision is always a fact. It is the reality that is often a fraud. As +much as I ever did, more than I ever did, I believe in Liberalism. But +there was a rosy time of innocence when I believed in Liberals. + +I take this instance of one of the enduring faiths because, having now +to trace the roots of my personal speculation, this may be counted, I +think, as the only positive bias. I was brought up a Liberal, and have +always believed in democracy, in the elementary liberal doctrine of a +self-governing humanity. If any one finds the phrase vague or +threadbare, I can only pause for a moment to explain that the principle +of democracy, as I mean it, can be stated in two propositions. The first +is this: that the things common to all men are more important than the +things peculiar to any men. Ordinary things are more valuable than +extraordinary things; nay, they are more extraordinary. Man is something +more awful than men; something more strange. The sense of the miracle of +humanity itself should be always more vivid to us than any marvels of +power, intellect, art, or civilization. The mere man on two legs, as +such, should be felt as something more heart-breaking than any music +and more startling than any caricature. Death is more tragic even than +death by starvation. Having a nose is more comic even than having a +Norman nose. + +This is the first principle of democracy: that the essential things in +men are the things they hold in common, not the things they hold +separately. And the second principle is merely this: that the political +instinct or desire is one of these things which they hold in common. +Falling in love is more poetical than dropping into poetry. The +democratic contention is that government (helping to rule the tribe) is +a thing like falling in love, and not a thing like dropping into poetry. +It is not something analogous to playing the church organ, painting on +vellum, discovering the North Pole (that insidious habit), looping the +loop, being Astronomer Royal, and so on. For these things we do not wish +a man to do at all unless he does them well. It is, on the contrary, a +thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own +nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them +badly. I am not here arguing the truth of any of these conceptions; I +know that some moderns are asking to have their wives chosen by +scientists, and they may soon be asking, for all I know, to have their +noses blown by nurses. I merely say that mankind does recognize these +universal human functions, and that democracy classes government among +them. In short, the democratic faith is this: that the most terribly +important things must be left to ordinary men themselves--the mating of +the sexes, the rearing of the young, the laws of the state. This is +democracy; and in this I have always believed. + +But there is one thing that I have never from my youth up been able to +understand. I have never been able to understand where people got the +idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious +that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting +to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or +arbitrary record. The man who quotes some German historian against the +tradition of the Catholic Church, for instance, is strictly appealing to +aristocracy. He is appealing to the superiority of one expert against +the awful authority of a mob. It is quite easy to see why a legend is +treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of +history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the +village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in +the village who is mad. Those who urge against tradition that men in the +past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with +the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for +us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in +great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no +reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or +fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. +Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our +ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit +to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be +walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the +accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the +accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's +opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a +good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot +separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to +me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. +The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It +is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot +papers, are marked with a cross. + +I have first to say, therefore, that if I have had a bias, it was always +a bias in favour of democracy, and therefore of tradition. Before we +come to any theoretic or logical beginnings I am content to allow for +that personal equation; I have always been more inclined to believe the +ruck of hard-working people than to believe that special and troublesome +literary class to which I belong. I prefer even the fancies and +prejudices of the people who see life from the inside to the clearest +demonstrations of the people who see life from the outside. I would +always trust the old wives' fables against the old maids' facts. As long +as wit is mother wit it can be as wild as it pleases. + +Now, I have to put together a general position, and I pretend to no +training in such things. I propose to do it, therefore, by writing down +one after another the three or four fundamental ideas which I have found +for myself, pretty much in the way that I found them. Then I shall +roughly synthesise them, summing up my personal philosophy or natural +religion; then I shall describe my startling discovery that the whole +thing had been discovered before. It had been discovered by +Christianity. But of these profound persuasions which I have to recount +in order, the earliest was concerned with this element of popular +tradition. And without the foregoing explanation touching tradition and +democracy I could hardly make my mental experience clear. As it is, I do +not know whether I can make it clear, but I now propose to try. + +My first and last philosophy, that which I believe in with unbroken +certainty, I learnt in the nursery. I generally learnt it from a nurse; +that is, from the solemn and star-appointed priestess at once of +democracy and tradition. The things I believed most then, the things I +believe most now, are the things called fairy tales. They seem to me to +be the entirely reasonable things. They are not fantasies: compared with +them other things are fantastic. Compared with them religion and +rationalism are both abnormal, though religion is abnormally right and +rationalism abnormally wrong. Fairyland is nothing but the sunny country +of common sense. It is not earth that judges heaven, but heaven that +judges earth; so for me at least it was not earth that criticised +elfland, but elfland that criticised the earth. I knew the magic +beanstalk before I had tasted beans; I was sure of the Man in the Moon +before I was certain of the moon. This was at one with all popular +tradition. Modern minor poets are naturalists, and talk about the bush +or the brook; but the singers of the old epics and fables were +supernaturalists, and talked about the gods of brook and bush. That is +what the moderns mean when they say that the ancients did not +"appreciate Nature," because they said that Nature was divine. Old +nurses do not tell children about the grass, but about the fairies that +dance on the grass; and the old Greeks could not see the trees for the +dryads. + +But I deal here with what ethic and philosophy come from being fed on +fairy tales. If I were describing them in detail I could note many noble +and healthy principles that arise from them. There is the chivalrous +lesson of "Jack the Giant Killer"; that giants should be killed because +they are gigantic. It is a manly mutiny against pride as such. For the +rebel is older than all the kingdoms, and the Jacobin has more tradition +than the Jacobite. There is the lesson of "Cinderella," which is the +same as that of the Magnificat--_exaltavit humiles._ There is the great +lesson of "Beauty and the Beast"; that a thing must be loved _before_ +it is loveable. There is the terrible allegory of the "Sleeping Beauty," +which tells how the human creature was blessed with all birthday gifts, +yet cursed with death; and how death also may perhaps be softened to a +sleep. But I am not concerned with any of the separate statutes of +elfland, but with the whole spirit of its law, which I learnt before I +could speak, and shall retain when I cannot write. I am concerned with a +certain way of looking at life, which was created in me by the fairy +tales, but has since been meekly ratified by the mere facts. + +It might be stated this way. There are certain sequences or developments +(cases of one thing following another), which are, in the true sense of +the word, reasonable. They are, in the true sense of the word, +necessary. Such are mathematical and merely logical sequences. We in +fairyland (who are the most reasonable of all creatures) admit that +reason and that necessity. For instance, if the Ugly Sisters are older +than Cinderella, it is (in an iron and awful sense) _necessary_ that +Cinderella is younger than the Ugly Sisters. There is no getting out of +it. Haeckel may talk as much fatalism about that fact as he pleases: it +really must be. If Jack is the son of a miller, a miller is the father +of Jack. Cold reason decrees it from her awful throne: and we in +fairyland submit. If the three brothers all ride horses, there are six +animals and eighteen legs involved: that is true rationalism, and +fairyland is full of it. But as I put my head over the hedge of the +elves and began to take notice of the natural world, I observed an +extraordinary thing. I observed that learned men in spectacles were +talking of the actual things that happened--dawn and death and so on--as +if _they_ were rational and inevitable. They talked as if the fact that +trees bear fruit were just as _necessary_ as the fact that two and one +trees make three. But it is not. There is an enormous difference by the +test of fairyland; which is the test of the imagination. You cannot +_imagine_ two and one not making three. But you can easily imagine trees +not growing fruit; you can imagine them growing golden candlesticks or +tigers hanging on by the tail. These men in spectacles spoke much of a +man named Newton, who was hit by an apple, and who discovered a law. But +they could not be got to see the distinction between a true law, a law +of reason, and the mere fact of apples falling. If the apple hit +Newton's nose, Newton's nose hit the apple. That is a true necessity: +because we cannot conceive the one occurring without the other. But we +can quite well conceive the apple not falling on his nose; we can fancy +it flying ardently through the air to hit some other nose, of which it +had a more definite dislike. We have always in our fairy tales kept this +sharp distinction between the science of mental relations, in which +there really are laws, and the science of physical facts, in which there +are no laws, but only weird repetitions. We believe in bodily miracles, +but not in mental impossibilities. We believe that a Bean-stalk climbed +up to Heaven; but that does not at all confuse our convictions on the +philosophical question of how many beans make five. + +Here is the peculiar perfection of tone and truth in the nursery tales. +The man of science says, "Cut the stalk, and the apple will fall"; but +he says it calmly, as if the one idea really led up to the other. The +witch in the fairy tale says, "Blow the horn, and the ogre's castle will +fall"; but she does not say it as if it were something in which the +effect obviously arose out of the cause. Doubtless she has given the +advice to many champions, and has seen many castles fall, but she does +not lose either her wonder or her reason. She does not muddle her head +until it imagines a necessary mental connection between a horn and a +falling tower. But the scientific men do muddle their heads, until they +imagine a necessary mental connection between an apple leaving the tree +and an apple reaching the ground. They do really talk as if they had +found not only a set of marvellous facts, but a truth connecting those +facts. They do talk as if the connection of two strange things +physically connected them philosophically. They feel that because one +incomprehensible thing constantly follows another incomprehensible thing +the two together somehow make up a comprehensible thing. Two black +riddles make a white answer. + +In fairyland we avoid the word "law"; but in the land of science they +are singularly fond of it. Thus they will call some interesting +conjecture about how forgotten folks pronounced the alphabet, Grimm's +Law. But Grimm's Law is far less intellectual than Grimm's Fairy Tales. +The tales are, at any rate, certainly tales; while the law is not a law. +A law implies that we know the nature of the generalisation and +enactment; not merely that we have noticed some of the effects. If there +is a law that pick-pockets shall go to prison, it implies that there is +an imaginable mental connection between the idea of prison and the idea +of picking pockets. And we know what the idea is. We can say why we take +liberty from a man who takes liberties. But we cannot say why an egg can +turn into a chicken any more than we can say why a bear could turn into +a fairy prince. As _ideas_, the egg and the chicken are further off each +other than the bear and the prince; for no egg in itself suggests a +chicken, whereas some princes do suggest bears. Granted, then, that +certain transformations do happen, it is essential that we should regard +them in the philosophic manner of fairy tales, not in the unphilosophic +manner of science and the "Laws of Nature." When we are asked why eggs +turn to birds or fruits fall in autumn, we must answer exactly as the +fairy godmother would answer if Cinderella asked her why mice turned to +horses or her clothes fell from her at twelve o'clock. We must answer +that it is _magic_. It is not a "law," for we do not understand its +general formula. It is not a necessity, for though we can count on it +happening practically, we have no right to say that it must always +happen. It is no argument for unalterable law (as Huxley fancied) that +we count on the ordinary course of things. We do not count on it; we bet +on it. We risk the remote possibility of a miracle as we do that of a +poisoned pancake or a world-destroying comet. We leave it out of +account, not because it is a miracle, and therefore an impossibility, +but because it is a miracle, and therefore an exception. All the terms +used in the science books, "law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and +so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis +which we do not possess. The only words that ever satisfied me as +describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," +"spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and +its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a _magic_ tree. Water runs +downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is +bewitched. + +I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have +some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is +simply rational and agnostic. It is the only way I can express in words +my clear and definite perception that one thing is quite distinct from +another; that there is no logical connection between flying and laying +eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who +is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a +sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he +is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen +birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, +tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A +forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so +the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both +cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A +sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, +by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the +materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a +sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, +apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from +fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not +grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country. + +This elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the +fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived +from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct +of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of +the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that +when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need +tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by +being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of +three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like +romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales--because they find them +romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to +whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This +proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of +interest and amazement. These tales say that apples were golden only to +refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They +make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, +that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and +even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher +agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in +scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who +has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and +appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every +man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may +understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than +any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know +thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all +forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that +we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism +only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we +have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstacy only means +that for one awful instant we remember that we forget. + +But though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the +streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. +It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder +has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be +definitely marked on our road through fairyland. I shall speak in the +next chapter about optimists and pessimists in their intellectual +aspect, so far as they have one. Here I am only trying to describe the +enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion +was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstacy +because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an +opportunity. The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact +that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a +fairy tale. The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, +though I hardly knew to whom. Children are grateful when Santa Claus +puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful +to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous +legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can +I thank no one for the birthday present of birth? + +There were, then, these two first feelings, indefensible and +indisputable. The world was a shock, but it was not merely shocking; +existence was a surprise, but it was a pleasant surprise. In fact, all +my first views were exactly uttered in a riddle that stuck in my brain +from boyhood. The question was, "What did the first frog say?" And the +answer was, "Lord, how you made me jump!" That says succinctly all that +I am saying. God made the frog jump; but the frog prefers jumping. But +when these things are settled there enters the second great principle +of the fairy philosophy. + +Any one can see it who will simply read "Grimm's Fairy Tales" or the +fine collections of Mr. Andrew Lang. For the pleasure of pedantry I will +call it the Doctrine of Conditional Joy. Touchstone talked of much +virtue in an "if"; according to elfin ethics all virtue is in an "if." +The note of the fairy utterance always is, "You may live in a palace of +gold and sapphire, _if_ you do not say the word 'cow'"; or "You may live +happily with the King's daughter, _if_ you do not show her an onion." +The vision always hangs upon a veto. All the dizzy and colossal things +conceded depend upon one small thing withheld. All the wild and whirling +things that are let loose depend upon one thing that is forbidden. Mr. +W.B. Yeats, in his exquisite and piercing elfin poetry, describes the +elves as lawless; they plunge in innocent anarchy on the unbridled +horses of the air-- + + "Ride on the crest of the dishevelled tide, + And dance upon the mountains like a flame." + +It is a dreadful thing to say that Mr. W.B. Yeats does not understand +fairyland. But I do say it. He is an ironical Irishman, full of +intellectual reactions. He is not stupid enough to understand +fairyland. Fairies prefer people of the yokel type like myself; people +who gape and grin and do as they are told. Mr. Yeats reads into elfland +all the righteous insurrection of his own race. But the lawlessness of +Ireland is a Christian lawlessness, founded on reason and justice. The +Fenian is rebelling against something he understands only too well; but +the true citizen of fairyland is obeying something that he does not +understand at all. In the fairy tale an incomprehensible happiness rests +upon an incomprehensible condition. A box is opened, and all evils fly +out. A word is forgotten, and cities perish. A lamp is lit, and love +flies away. A flower is plucked, and human lives are forfeited. An apple +is eaten, and the hope of God is gone. + +This is the tone of fairy tales, and it is certainly not lawlessness or +even liberty, though men under a mean modern tyranny may think it +liberty by comparison. People out of Portland Gaol might think Fleet +Street free; but closer study will prove that both fairies and +journalists are the slaves of duty. Fairy godmothers seem at least as +strict as other godmothers. Cinderella received a coach out of +Wonderland and a coachman out of nowhere, but she received a +command--which might have come out of Brixton--that she should be back +by twelve. Also, she had a glass slipper; and it cannot be a coincidence +that glass is so common a substance in folk-lore. This princess lives in +a glass castle, that princess on a glass hill; this one sees all things +in a mirror; they may all live in glass houses if they will not throw +stones. For this thin glitter of glass everywhere is the expression of +the fact that the happiness is bright but brittle, like the substance +most easily smashed by a housemaid or a cat. And this fairy-tale +sentiment also sank into me and became my sentiment towards the whole +world. I felt and feel that life itself is as bright as the diamond, but +as brittle as the window-pane; and when the heavens were compared to the +terrible crystal I can remember a shudder. I was afraid that God would +drop the cosmos with a crash. + +Remember, however, that to be breakable is not the same as to be +perishable. Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do +not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years. Such, it seemed, was +the joy of man, either in elfland or on earth; the happiness depended on +_not doing something_ which you could at any moment do and which, very +often, it was not obvious why you should not do. Now, the point here is +that to _me_ this did not seem unjust. If the miller's third son said to +the fairy, "Explain why I must not stand on my head in the fairy +palace," the other might fairly reply, "Well, if it comes to that, +explain the fairy palace." If Cinderella says, "How is it that I must +leave the ball at twelve?" her godmother might answer, "How is it that +you are going there till twelve?" If I leave a man in my will ten +talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the +conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not +look a winged horse in the mouth. And it seemed to me that existence was +itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not +understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand +the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture. The +veto might well be as wild as the vision; it might be as startling as +the sun, as elusive as the waters, as fantastic and terrible as the +towering trees. + +For this reason (we may call it the fairy godmother philosophy) I never +could join the young men of my time in feeling what they called the +general sentiment of _revolt_. I should have resisted, let us hope, any +rules that were evil, and with these and their definition I shall deal +in another chapter. But I did not feel disposed to resist any rule +merely because it was mysterious. Estates are sometimes held by foolish +forms, the breaking of a stick or the payment of a peppercorn: I was +willing to hold the huge estate of earth and heaven by any such feudal +fantasy. It could not well be wilder than the fact that I was allowed to +hold it at all. At this stage I give only one ethical instance to show +my meaning. I could never mix in the common murmur of that rising +generation against monogamy, because no restriction on sex seemed so odd +and unexpected as sex itself. To be allowed, like Endymion, to make love +to the moon and then to complain that Jupiter kept his own moons in a +harem seemed to me (bred on fairy tales like Endymion's) a vulgar +anti-climax. Keeping to one woman is a small price for so much as seeing +one woman. To complain that I could only be married once was like +complaining that I had only been born once. It was incommensurate with +the terrible excitement of which one was talking. It showed, not an +exaggerated sensibility to sex, but a curious insensibility to it. A man +is a fool who complains that he cannot enter Eden by five gates at +once. Polygamy is a lack of the realization of sex; it is like a man +plucking five pears in mere absence of mind. The æsthetes touched the +last insane limits of language in their eulogy on lovely things. The +thistledown made them weep; a burnished beetle brought them to their +knees. Yet their emotion never impressed me for an instant, for this +reason, that it never occurred to them to pay for their pleasure in any +sort of symbolic sacrifice. Men (I felt) might fast forty days for the +sake of hearing a blackbird sing. Men might go through fire to find a +cowslip. Yet these lovers of beauty could not even keep sober for the +blackbird. They would not go through common Christian marriage by way of +recompense to the cowslip. Surely one might pay for extraordinary joy in +ordinary morals. Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because +we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for +sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde. + +Well, I left the fairy tales lying on the floor of the nursery, and I +have not found any books so sensible since. I left the nurse guardian of +tradition and democracy, and I have not found any modern type so sanely +radical or so sanely conservative. But the matter for important comment +was here, that when I first went out into the mental atmosphere of the +modern world, I found that the modern world was positively opposed on +two points to my nurse and to the nursery tales. It has taken me a long +time to find out that the modern world is wrong and my nurse was right. +The really curious thing was this: that modern thought contradicted this +basic creed of my boyhood on its two most essential doctrines. I have +explained that the fairy tales founded in me two convictions; first, +that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been +quite different, but which is quite delightful; second, that before this +wildness and delight one may well be modest and submit to the queerest +limitations of so queer a kindness. But I found the whole modern world +running like a high tide against both my tendernesses; and the shock of +that collision created two sudden and spontaneous sentiments, which I +have had ever since and which, crude as they were, have since hardened +into convictions. + +First, I found the whole modern world talking scientific fatalism; +saying that everything is as it must always have been, being unfolded +without fault from the beginning. The leaf on the tree is green because +it could never have been anything else. Now, the fairy-tale philosopher +is glad that the leaf is green precisely because it might have been +scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked +at it. He is pleased that snow is white on the strictly reasonable +ground that it might have been black. Every colour has in it a bold +quality as of choice; the red of garden roses is not only decisive but +dramatic, like suddenly spilt blood. He feels that something has been +_done_. But the great determinists of the nineteenth century were +strongly against this native feeling that something had happened an +instant before. In fact, according to them, nothing ever really had +happened since the beginning of the world. Nothing ever had happened +since existence had happened; and even about the date of that they were +not very sure. + +The modern world as I found it was solid for modern Calvinism, for the +necessity of things being as they are. But when I came to ask them I +found they had really no proof of this unavoidable repetition in things +except the fact that the things were repeated. Now, the mere repetition +made the things to me rather more weird than more rational. It was as +if, having seen a curiously shaped nose in the street and dismissed it +as an accident, I had then seen six other noses of the same astonishing +shape. I should have fancied for a moment that it must be some local +secret society. So one elephant having a trunk was odd; but all +elephants having trunks looked like a plot. I speak here only of an +emotion, and of an emotion at once stubborn and subtle. But the +repetition in Nature seemed sometimes to be an excited repetition, like +that of an angry schoolmaster saying the same thing over and over again. +The grass seemed signalling to me with all its fingers at once; the +crowded stars seemed bent upon being understood. The sun would make me +see him if he rose a thousand times. The recurrences of the universe +rose to the maddening rhythm of an incantation, and I began to see an +idea. + +All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests +ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that +if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of +clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; +if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation +to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought +into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off +of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some +slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he +is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. +But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to +Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to +Sheerness. The very speed and ecstasy of his life would have the +stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every +morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my +inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true +that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His +routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The +thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some +game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs +rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have +abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, +therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do +it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly +dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. +But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible +that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every +evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity +that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy +separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He +has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, +and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a +mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical _encore_. Heaven may _encore_ +the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth +a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, +the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life +or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that +they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every +human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition +may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it +may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and +yet each birth be his positively last appearance. + +This was my first conviction; made by the shock of my childish emotions +meeting the modern creed in mid-career. I had always vaguely felt facts +to be miracles in the sense that they are wonderful: now I began to +think them miracles in the stricter sense that they were _wilful_. I +mean that they were, or might be, repeated exercises of some will. In +short, I had always believed that the world involved magic: now I +thought that perhaps it involved a magician. And this pointed a profound +emotion always present and sub-conscious; that this world of ours has +some purpose; and if there is a purpose, there is a person. I had always +felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a +story-teller. + +But modern thought also hit my second human tradition. It went against +the fairy feeling about strict limits and conditions. The one thing it +loved to talk about was expansion and largeness. Herbert Spencer would +have been greatly annoyed if any one had called him an imperialist, and +therefore it is highly regrettable that nobody did. But he was an +imperialist of the lowest type. He popularized this contemptible notion +that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma +of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any +more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of +God, then a whale may be the image of God; a somewhat formless image; +what one might call an impressionist portrait. It is quite futile to +argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small +compared to the nearest tree. But Herbert Spencer, in his headlong +imperialism, would insist that we had in some way been conquered and +annexed by the astronomical universe. He spoke about men and their +ideals exactly as the most insolent Unionist talks about the Irish and +their ideals. He turned mankind into a small nationality. And his evil +influence can be seen even in the most spirited and honourable of later +scientific authors; notably in the early romances of Mr. H.G. Wells. +Many moralists have in an exaggerated way represented the earth as +wicked. But Mr. Wells and his school made the heavens wicked. We should +lift up our eyes to the stars from whence would come our ruin. + +But the expansion of which I speak was much more evil than all this. I +have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in +the prison of one thought. These people seemed to think it singularly +inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large. The size of +this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went +on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be +anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness +or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added +nothing to it. It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he +would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county. The +warder would have nothing to show the man except more and more long +corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human. +So these expanders of the universe had nothing to show us except more +and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of +all that is divine. + +In fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for +the definition of a law is something that can be broken. But the +machinery of this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; +for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery. We were either +unable to do things or we were destined to do them. The idea of the +mystical condition quite disappeared; one can neither have the firmness +of keeping laws nor the fun of breaking them. The largeness of this +universe had nothing of that freshness and airy outbreak which we have +praised in the universe of the poet. This modern universe is literally +an empire; that is, it is vast, but it is not free. One went into larger +and larger windowless rooms, rooms big with Babylonian perspective; but +one never found the smallest window or a whisper of outer air. + +Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all +good things come to a point, swords for instance. So finding the boast +of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue +about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even +shallower than could have been expected. According to these people the +cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule. Only (they would +say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is. Why, +then, should one worry particularly to call it large? There is nothing +to compare it with. It would be just as sensible to call it small. A man +may say, "I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its +crowd of varied creatures." But if it comes to that why should not a man +say, "I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars +and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see"? One is as good +as the other; they are both mere sentiments. It is mere sentiment to +rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a +sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses +to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not +choose to have an emotion about its smallness? + +It happened that I had that emotion. When one is fond of anything one +addresses it by diminutives, even if it is an elephant or a +lifeguardsman. The reason is, that anything, however huge, that can be +conceived of as complete, can be conceived of as small. If military +moustaches did not suggest a sword or tusks a tail, then the object +would be vast because it would be immeasurable. But the moment you can +imagine a guardsman you can imagine a small guardsman. The moment you +really see an elephant you can call it "Tiny." If you can make a statue +of a thing you can make a statuette of it. These people professed that +the universe was one coherent thing; but they were not fond of the +universe. But I was frightfully fond of the universe and wanted to +address it by a diminutive. I often did so; and it never seemed to mind. +Actually and in truth I did feel that these dim dogmas of vitality were +better expressed by calling the world small than by calling it large. +For about infinity there was a sort of carelessness which was the +reverse of the fierce and pious care which I felt touching the +pricelessness and the peril of life. They showed only a dreary waste; +but I felt a sort of sacred thrift. For economy is far more romantic +than extravagance. To them stars were an unending income of halfpence; +but I felt about the golden sun and the silver moon as a schoolboy feels +if he has one sovereign and one shilling. + +These subconscious convictions are best hit off by the colour and tone +of certain tales. Thus I have said that stories of magic alone can +express my sense that life is not only a pleasure but a kind of +eccentric privilege. I may express this other feeling of cosmic cosiness +by allusion to another book always read in boyhood, "Robinson Crusoe," +which I read about this time, and which owes its eternal vivacity to the +fact that it celebrates the poetry of limits, nay, even the wild romance +of prudence. Crusoe is a man on a small rock with a few comforts just +snatched from the sea: the best thing in the book is simply the list of +things saved from the wreck. The greatest of poems is an inventory. +Every kitchen tool becomes ideal because Crusoe might have dropped it +in the sea. It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to +look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy +one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the +solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all +things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from +a wreck. Every man has had one horrible adventure: as a hidden untimely +birth he had not been, as infants that never see the light. Men spoke +much in my boyhood of restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was +common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it is a +more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great +Might-Not-Have-Been. + +But I really felt (the fancy may seem foolish) as if all the order and +number of things were the romantic remnant of Crusoe's ship. That there +are two sexes and one sun, was like the fact that there were two guns +and one axe. It was poignantly urgent that none should be lost; but +somehow, it was rather fun that none could be added. The trees and the +planets seemed like things saved from the wreck: and when I saw the +Matterhorn I was glad that it had not been overlooked in the confusion. +I felt economical about the stars as if they were sapphires (they are +called so in Milton's Eden): I hoarded the hills. For the universe is a +single jewel, and while it is a natural cant to talk of a jewel as +peerless and priceless, of this jewel it is literally true. This cosmos +is indeed without peer and without price: for there cannot be another +one. + +Thus ends, in unavoidable inadequacy, the attempt to utter the +unutterable things. These are my ultimate attitudes towards life; the +soils for the seeds of doctrine. These in some dark way I thought before +I could write, and felt before I could think: that we may proceed more +easily afterwards, I will roughly recapitulate them now. I felt in my +bones; first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a +miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, +with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, +if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural +explanations I have heard. The thing is magic, true or false. Second, I +came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have some +one to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work +of art; whatever it meant it meant violently. Third, I thought this +purpose beautiful in its old design, in spite of its defects, such as +dragons. Fourth, that the proper form of thanks to it is some form of +humility and restraint: we should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not +drinking too much of them. We owed, also, an obedience to whatever made +us. And last, and strangest, there had come into my mind a vague and +vast impression that in some way all good was a remnant to be stored and +held sacred out of some primordial ruin. Man had saved his good as +Crusoe saved his goods: he had saved them from a wreck. All this I felt +and the age gave me no encouragement to feel it. And all this time I had +not even thought of Christian theology. + + + + +CHAPTER V.--_The Flag of the World_ + + +When I was a boy there were two curious men running about who were +called the optimist and the pessimist. I constantly used the words +myself, but I cheerfully confess that I never had any very special idea +of what they meant. The only thing which might be considered evident was +that they could not mean what they said; for the ordinary verbal +explanation was that the optimist thought this world as good as it could +be, while the pessimist thought it as bad as it could be. Both these +statements being obviously raving nonsense, one had to cast about for +other explanations. An optimist could not mean a man who thought +everything right and nothing wrong. For that is meaningless; it is like +calling everything right and nothing left. Upon the whole, I came to the +conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the +pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except +himself. It would be unfair to omit altogether from the list the +mysterious but suggestive definition said to have been given by a little +girl, "An optimist is a man who looks after your eyes, and a pessimist +is a man who looks after your feet." I am not sure that this is not the +best definition of all. There is even a sort of allegorical truth in it. +For there might, perhaps, be a profitable distinction drawn between that +more dreary thinker who thinks merely of our contact with the earth from +moment to moment, and that happier thinker who considers rather our +primary power of vision and of choice of road. + +But this is a deep mistake in this alternative of the optimist and the +pessimist. The assumption of it is that a man criticises this world as +if he were house-hunting, as if he were being shown over a new suite of +apartments. If a man came to this world from some other world in full +possession of his powers he might discuss whether the advantage of +midsummer woods made up for the disadvantage of mad dogs, just as a man +looking for lodgings might balance the presence of a telephone against +the absence of a sea view. But no man is in that position. A man belongs +to this world before he begins to ask if it is nice to belong to it. He +has fought for the flag, and often won heroic victories for the flag +long before he has ever enlisted. To put shortly what seems the +essential matter, he has a loyalty long before he has any admiration. + +In the last chapter it has been said that the primary feeling that this +world is strange and yet attractive is best expressed in fairy tales. +The reader may, if he likes, put down the next stage to that bellicose +and even jingo literature which commonly comes next in the history of a +boy. We all owe much sound morality to the penny dreadfuls. Whatever the +reason, it seemed and still seems to me that our attitude towards life +can be better expressed in terms of a kind of military loyalty than in +terms of criticism and approval. My acceptance of the universe is not +optimism, it is more like patriotism. It is a matter of primary loyalty. +The world is not a lodging-house at Brighton, which we are to leave +because it is miserable. It is the fortress of our family, with the flag +flying on the turret, and the more miserable it is the less we should +leave it. The point is not that this world is too sad to love or too +glad not to love; the point is that when you do love a thing, its +gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving +it more. All optimistic thoughts about England and all pessimistic +thoughts about her are alike reasons for the English patriot. Similarly, +optimism and pessimism are alike arguments for the cosmic patriot. + +Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing--say Pimlico. +If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of +thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitary. It is not +enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico: in that case he will merely +cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a +man to approve of Pimlico: for then it will remain Pimlico, which would +be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love +Pimlico: to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly +reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise +into ivory towers and golden pinnacles; Pimlico would attire herself as +a woman does when she is loved. For decoration is not given to hide +horrible things; but to decorate things already adorable. A mother does +not give her child a blue bow because he is so ugly without it. A lover +does not give a girl a necklace to hide her neck. If men loved Pimlico +as mothers love children, arbitarily, because it is _theirs_ Pimlico in +a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that +this is a mere fantasy. I answer that this is the actual history of +mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the +darkest roots of civilisation and you will find them knotted round some +sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to +a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because +she was great. She was great because they had loved her. + +The eighteenth-century theories of the social contract have been exposed +to much clumsy criticism in our time; in so far as they meant that there +is at the back of all historic government an idea of content and +co-operation, they were demonstrably right. But they really were wrong +in so far as they suggested that men had ever aimed at order or ethics +directly by a conscious exchange of interests. Morality did not begin by +one man saying to another, "I will not hit you if you do not hit me"; +there is no trace of such a transaction. There _is_ a trace of both men +having said, "We must not hit each other in the holy place." They gained +their morality by guarding their religion. They did not cultivate +courage. They fought for the shrine, and found they had become +courageous. They did not cultivate cleanliness. They purified themselves +for the altar, and found that they were clean. The history of the Jews +is the only early document known to most Englishmen, and the facts can +be judged sufficiently from that. The Ten Commandments which have been +found substantially common to mankind were merely military commands; a +code of regimental orders, issued to protect a certain ark across a +certain desert. Anarchy was evil because it endangered the sanctity. And +only when they made a holy day for God did they find they had made a +holiday for men. + +If it be granted that this primary devotion to a place or thing is a +source of creative energy, we can pass on to a very peculiar fact. Let +us reiterate for an instant that the only right optimism is a sort of +universal patriotism. What is the matter with the pessimist? I think it +can be stated by saying that he is the cosmic anti-patriot. And what is +the matter with the anti-patriot? I think it can be stated, without +undue bitterness, by saying that he is the candid friend. And what is +the matter with the candid friend? There we strike the rock of real life +and immutable human nature. + +I venture to say that what is bad in the candid friend is simply that he +is not candid. He is keeping something back--his own gloomy pleasure in +saying unpleasant things. He has a secret desire to hurt, not merely to +help. This is certainly, I think, what makes a certain sort of +anti-patriot irritating to healthy citizens. I do not speak (of course) +of the anti-patriotism which only irritates feverish stockbrokers and +gushing actresses; that is only patriotism speaking plainly. A man who +says that no patriot should attack the Boer War until it is over is not +worth answering intelligently; he is saying that no good son should warn +his mother off a cliff until she has fallen over it. But there is an +anti-patriot who honestly angers honest men, and the explanation of him +is, I think, what I have suggested: he is the uncandid candid friend; +the man who says, "I am sorry to say we are ruined," and is not sorry at +all. And he may be said, without rhetoric, to be a traitor; for he is +using that ugly knowledge which was allowed him to strengthen the army, +to discourage people from joining it. Because he is allowed to be +pessimistic as a military adviser he is being pessimistic as a +recruiting sergeant. Just in the same way the pessimist (who is the +cosmic anti-patriot) uses the freedom that life allows to her +counsellors to lure away the people from her flag. Granted that he +states only facts, it is still essential to know what are his emotions, +what is his motive. It may be that twelve hundred men in Tottenham are +down with smallpox; but we want to know whether this is stated by some +great philosopher who wants to curse the gods, or only by some common +clergyman who wants to help the men. + +The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, +but that he does not love what he chastises--he has not this primary and +supernatural loyalty to things. What is the evil of the man commonly +called an optimist? Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to +defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible. He is the +jingo of the universe; he will say, "My cosmos, right or wrong." He will +be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of +front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing every one with +assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world. All +this (which is true of a type of optimist) leads us to the one really +interesting point of psychology, which could not be explained without +it. + +We say there must be a primal loyalty to life: the only question is, +shall it be a natural or a supernatural loyalty? If you like to put it +so, shall it be a reasonable or an unreasonable loyalty? Now, the +extraordinary thing is that the bad optimism (the whitewashing, the weak +defence of everything) comes in with the reasonable optimism. Rational +optimism leads to stagnation: it is irrational optimism that leads to +reform. Let me explain by using once more the parallel of patriotism. +The man who is most likely to ruin the place he loves is exactly the man +who loves it with a reason. The man who will improve the place is the +man who loves it without a reason. If a man loves some feature of +Pimlico (which seems unlikely), he may find himself defending that +feature against Pimlico itself. But if he simply loves Pimlico itself, +he may lay it waste and turn it into the New Jerusalem. I do not deny +that reform may be excessive; I only say that it is the mystic patriot +who reforms. Mere jingo self-contentment is commonest among those who +have some pedantic reason for their patriotism. The worst jingoes do not +love England, but a theory of England. If we love England for being an +empire, we may overrate the success with which we rule the Hindoos. But +if we love it only for being a nation, we can face all events: for it +would be a nation even if the Hindoos ruled us. Thus also only those +will permit their patriotism to falsify history whose patriotism depends +on history. A man who loves England for being English will not mind how +she arose. But a man who loves England for being Anglo-Saxon may go +against all facts for his fancy. He may end (like Carlyle and Freeman) +by maintaining that the Norman Conquest was a Saxon Conquest. He may end +in utter unreason--because he has a reason. A man who loves France for +being military will palliate the army of 1870. But a man who loves +France for being France will improve the army of 1870. This is exactly +what the French have done, and France is a good instance of the working +paradox. Nowhere else is patriotism more purely abstract and arbitrary; +and nowhere else is reform more drastic and sweeping. The more +transcendental is your patriotism, the more practical are your politics. + +Perhaps the most everyday instance of this point is in the case of +women; and their strange and strong loyalty. Some stupid people started +the idea that because women obviously back up their own people through +everything, therefore women are blind and do not see anything. They can +hardly have known any women. The same women who are ready to defend +their men through thick and thin are (in their personal intercourse with +the man) almost morbidly lucid about the thinness of his excuses or the +thickness of his head. A man's friend likes him but leaves him as he is: +his wife loves him and is always trying to turn him into somebody else. +Women who are utter mystics in their creed are utter cynics in their +criticism. Thackeray expressed this well when he made Pendennis' mother, +who worshipped her son as a god, yet assume that he would go wrong as a +man. She underrated his virtue, though she overrated his value. The +devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a +sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is +bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind. + +This at least had come to be my position about all that was called +optimism, pessimism, and improvement. Before any cosmic act of reform we +must have a cosmic oath of allegiance. A man must be interested in life, +then he could be disinterested in his views of it. "My son give me thy +heart"; the heart must be fixed on the right thing: the moment we have a +fixed heart we have a free hand. I must pause to anticipate an obvious +criticism. It will be said that a rational person accepts the world as +mixed of good and evil with a decent satisfaction and a decent +endurance. But this is exactly the attitude which I maintain to be +defective. It is, I know, very common in this age; it was perfectly put +in those quiet lines of Matthew Arnold which are more piercingly +blasphemous than the shrieks of Schopenhauer-- + + "Enough we live:--and if a life, + With large results so little rife, + Though bearable, seem hardly worth + This pomp of worlds, this pain of birth." + +I know this feeling fills our epoch, and I think it freezes our epoch. +For our Titanic purposes of faith and revolution, what we need is not +the cold acceptance of the world as a compromise, but some way in which +we can heartily hate and heartily love it. We do not want joy and anger +to neutralise each other and produce a surly contentment; we want a +fiercer delight and a fiercer discontent. We have to feel the universe +at once as an ogre's castle, to be stormed, and yet as our own cottage, +to which we can return at evening. + +No one doubts that an ordinary man can get on with this world: but we +demand not strength enough to get on with it, but strength enough to get +it on. Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to +think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without +once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without +once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist +and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is +he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to +die to it? In this combination, I maintain, it is the rational optimist +who fails, the irrational optimist who succeeds. He is ready to smash +the whole universe for the sake of itself. + +I put these things not in their mature logical sequence, but as they +came: and this view was cleared and sharpened by an accident of the +time. Under the lengthening shadow of Ibsen, an argument arose whether +it was not a very nice thing to murder one's self. Grave moderns told us +that we must not even say "poor fellow," of a man who had blown his +brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out +because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even +suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot +machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I +found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and +humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and +absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the +refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, +kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is +concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically +considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all +buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; +but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by +the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the +things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults +everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by +refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the +cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a +tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: +for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be +pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and +there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and +the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and +philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven +through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. +There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is +different from other crimes--for it makes even crimes impossible. + +About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he +said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of +this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite +of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside +him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares +so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of +everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to +end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he +renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this +ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that +something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link +with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the +universe. And then I remembered the stake and the cross-roads, and the +queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the +suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. +Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of +carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. +The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. +They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave +afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very +poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the cross-roads to show +what Christianity thought of the pessimist. + +This was the first of the long train of enigmas with which Christianity +entered the discussion. And there went with it a peculiarity of which I +shall have to speak more markedly, as a note of all Christian notions, +but which distinctly began in this one. The Christian attitude to the +martyr and the suicide was not what is so often affirmed in modern +morals. It was not a matter of degree. It was not that a line must be +drawn somewhere, and that the self-slayer in exaltation fell within the +line, the self-slayer in sadness just beyond it. The Christian feeling +evidently was not merely that the suicide was carrying martyrdom too +far. The Christian feeling was furiously for one and furiously against +the other: these two things that looked so much alike were at opposite +ends of heaven and hell. One man flung away his life; he was so good +that his dry bones could heal cities in pestilence. Another man flung +away life; he was so bad that his bones would pollute his brethren's. I +am not saying this fierceness was right; but why was it so fierce? + +Here it was that I first found that my wandering feet were in some +beaten track. Christianity had also felt this opposition of the martyr +to the suicide: had it perhaps felt it for the same reason? Had +Christianity felt what I felt, but could not (and cannot) express--this +need for a first loyalty to things, and then for a ruinous reform of +things? Then I remembered that it was actually the charge against +Christianity that it combined these two things which I was wildly trying +to combine. Christianity was accused, at one and the same time, of being +too optimistic about the universe and of being too pessimistic about the +world. The coincidence made me suddenly stand still. + +An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such +and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. +Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not +credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain +philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on +Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was +suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a +man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the +century. If a man believes in unalterable natural law, he cannot believe +in any miracle in any age. If a man believes in a will behind law, he +can believe in any miracle in any age. Suppose, for the sake of +argument, we are concerned with a case of thaumaturgic healing. A +materialist of the twelfth century could not believe it any more than a +materialist of the twentieth century. But a Christian Scientist of the +twentieth century can believe it as much as a Christian of the twelfth +century. It is simply a matter of a man's theory of things. Therefore in +dealing with any historical answer, the point is not whether it was +given in our time, but whether it was given in answer to our question. +And the more I thought about when and how Christianity had come into the +world, the more I felt that it had actually come to answer this +question. + +It is commonly the loose and latitudinarian Christians who pay quite +indefensible compliments to Christianity. They talk as if there had +never been any piety or pity until Christianity came, a point on which +any mediæval would have been eager to correct them. They represent that +the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to +preach simplicity or self-restraint, or inwardness and sincerity. They +will think me very narrow (whatever that means) if I say that the +remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach +Christianity. Its peculiarity was that it was peculiar, and simplicity +and sincerity are not peculiar, but obvious ideals for all mankind. +Christianity was the answer to a riddle, not the last truism uttered +after a long talk. Only the other day I saw in an excellent weekly paper +of Puritan tone this remark, that Christianity when stripped of its +armour of dogma (as who should speak of a man stripped of his armour of +bones), turned out to be nothing but the Quaker doctrine of the Inner +Light. Now, if I were to say that Christianity came into the world +specially to destroy the doctrine of the Inner Light, that would be an +exaggeration. But it would be very much nearer to the truth. The last +Stoics, like Marcus Aurelius, were exactly the people who did believe in +the Inner Light. Their dignity, their weariness, their sad external care +for others, their incurable internal care for themselves, were all due +to the Inner Light, and existed only by that dismal illumination. Notice +that Marcus Aurelius insists, as such introspective moralists always do, +upon small things done or undone; it is because he has not hate or love +enough to make a moral revolution. He gets up early in the morning, just +as our own aristocrats living the Simple Life get up early in the +morning; because such altruism is much easier than stopping the games of +the amphitheatre or giving the English people back their land. Marcus +Aurelius is the most intolerable of human types. He is an unselfish +egoist. An unselfish egoist is a man who has pride without the excuse of +passion. Of all conceivable forms of enlightenment the worst is what +these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most +horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body +knows how it would work; any one who knows any one from the Higher +Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god +within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. +Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; +let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, +but not the god within. Christianity came into the world firstly in +order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, +but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a +divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian +was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely +recognised an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible +as an army with banners. + +All the same, it will be as well if Jones does not worship the sun and +moon. If he does, there is a tendency for him to imitate them; to say, +that because the sun burns insects alive, he may burn insects alive. He +thinks that because the sun gives people sun-stroke, he may give his +neighbour measles. He thinks that because the moon is said to drive men +mad, he may drive his wife mad. This ugly side of mere external optimism +had also shown itself in the ancient world. About the time when the +Stoic idealism had begun to show the weaknesses of pessimism, the old +nature worship of the ancients had begun to show the enormous weaknesses +of optimism. Nature worship is natural enough while the society is +young, or, in other words, Pantheism is all right as long as it is the +worship of Pan. But Nature has another side which experience and sin are +not slow in finding out, and it is no flippancy to say of the god Pan +that he soon showed the cloven hoof. The only objection to Natural +Religion is that somehow it always becomes unnatural. A man loves Nature +in the morning for her innocence and amiability, and at nightfall, if he +is loving her still, it is for her darkness and her cruelty. He washes +at dawn in clear water as did the Wise Man of the Stoics, yet, somehow +at the dark end of the day, he is bathing in hot bull's blood, as did +Julian the Apostate. The mere pursuit of health always leads to +something unhealthy. Physical nature must not be made the direct object +of obedience; it must be enjoyed, not worshipped. Stars and mountains +must not be taken seriously. If they are, we end where the pagan nature +worship ended. Because the earth is kind, we can imitate all her +cruelties. Because sexuality is sane, we can all go mad about sexuality. +Mere optimism had reached its insane and appropriate termination. The +theory that everything was good had become an orgy of everything that +was bad. + +On the other side our idealist pessimists were represented by the old +remnant of the Stoics. Marcus Aurelius and his friends had really given +up the idea of any god in the universe and looked only to the god +within. They had no hope of any virtue in nature, and hardly any hope of +any virtue in society. They had not enough interest in the outer world +really to wreck or revolutionise it. They did not love the city enough +to set fire to it. Thus the ancient world was exactly in our own +desolate dilemma. The only people who really enjoyed this world were +busy breaking it up; and the virtuous people did not care enough about +them to knock them down. In this dilemma (the same as ours) Christianity +suddenly stepped in and offered a singular answer, which the world +eventually accepted as _the_ answer. It was the answer then, and I think +it is the answer now. + +This answer was like the slash of a sword; it sundered; it did not in +any sense sentimentally unite. Briefly, it divided God from the cosmos. +That transcendence and distinctness of the deity which some Christians +now want to remove from Christianity, was really the only reason why any +one wanted to be a Christian. It was the whole point of the Christian +answer to the unhappy pessimist and the still more unhappy optimist. As +I am here only concerned with their particular problem I shall indicate +only briefly this great metaphysical suggestion. All descriptions of +the creating or sustaining principle in things must be metaphorical, +because they must be verbal. Thus the pantheist is forced to speak of +God _in_ all things as if he were in a box. Thus the evolutionist has, +in his very name, the idea of being unrolled like a carpet. All terms, +religious and irreligious, are open to this charge. The only question is +whether all terms are useless, or whether one can, with such a phrase, +cover a distinct _idea_ about the origin of things. I think one can, and +so evidently does the evolutionist, or he would not talk about +evolution. And the root phrase for all Christian theism was this, that +God was a creator, as an artist is a creator. A poet is so separate from +his poem that he himself speaks of it as a little thing he has "thrown +off." Even in giving it forth he has flung it away. This principle that +all creation and procreation is a breaking off is at least as consistent +through the cosmos as the evolutionary principle that all growth is a +branching out. A woman loses a child even in having a child. All +creation is separation. Birth is as solemn a parting as death. + +It was the prime philosophic principle of Christianity that this divorce +in the divine act of making (such as severs the poet from the poem or +the mother from the new-born child) was the true description of the act +whereby the absolute energy made the world. According to most +philosophers, God in making the world enslaved it. According to +Christianity, in making it, He set it free. God had written, not so much +a poem, but rather a play; a play he had planned as perfect, but which +had necessarily been left to human actors and stage-managers, who had +since made a great mess of it. I will discuss the truth of this theorem +later. Here I have only to point out with what a startling smoothness it +passed the dilemma we have discussed in this chapter. In this way at +least one could be both happy and indignant without degrading one's self +to be either a pessimist or an optimist. On this system one could fight +all the forces of existence without deserting the flag of existence. One +could be at peace with the universe and yet be at war with the world. +St. George could still fight the dragon, however big the monster bulked +in the cosmos, though he were bigger than the mighty cities or bigger +than the everlasting hills. If he were as big as the world he could yet +be killed in the name of the world. St. George had not to consider any +obvious odds or proportions in the scale of things, but only the +original secret of their design. He can shake his sword at the dragon, +even if it is everything; even if the empty heavens over his head are +only the huge arch of its open jaws. + +And then followed an experience impossible to describe. It was as if I +had been blundering about since my birth with two huge and unmanageable +machines, of different shapes and without apparent connection--the world +and the Christian tradition. I had found this hole in the world: the +fact that one must somehow find a way of loving the world without +trusting it; somehow one must love the world without being worldly. I +found this projecting feature of Christian theology, like a sort of hard +spike, the dogmatic insistence that God was personal, and had made a +world separate from Himself. The spike of dogma fitted exactly into the +hole in the world--it had evidently been meant to go there--and then the +strange thing began to happen. When once these two parts of the two +machines had come together, one after another, all the other parts +fitted and fell in with an eerie exactitude. I could hear bolt after +bolt over all the machinery falling into its place with a kind of click +of relief. Having got one part right, all the other parts were +repeating that rectitude, as clock after clock strikes noon. Instinct +after instinct was answered by doctrine after doctrine. Or, to vary the +metaphor, I was like one who had advanced into a hostile country to take +one high fortress. And when that fort had fallen the whole country +surrendered and turned solid behind me. The whole land was lit up, as it +were, back to the first fields of my childhood. All those blind fancies +of boyhood which in the fourth chapter I have tried in vain to trace on +the darkness, became suddenly transparent and sane. I was right when I +felt that roses were red by some sort of choice: it was the divine +choice. I was right when I felt that I would almost rather say that +grass was the wrong colour than say that it must by necessity have been +that colour: it might verily have been any other. My sense that +happiness hung on the crazy thread of a condition did mean something +when all was said: it meant the whole doctrine of the Fall. Even those +dim and shapeless monsters of notions which I have not been able to +describe, much less defend, stepped quietly into their places like +colossal caryatides of the creed. The fancy that the cosmos was not vast +and void, but small and cosy, had a fulfilled significance now, for +anything that is a work of art must be small in the sight of the artist; +to God the stars might be only small and dear, like diamonds. And my +haunting instinct that somehow good was not merely a tool to be used, +but a relic to be guarded, like the goods from Crusoe's ship--even that +had been the wild whisper of something originally wise, for, according +to Christianity, we were indeed the survivors of a wreck, the crew of a +golden ship that had gone down before the beginning of the world. + +But the important matter was this, that it entirely reversed the reason +for optimism. And the instant the reversal was made it felt like the +abrupt ease when a bone is put back in the socket. I had often called +myself an optimist, to avoid the too evident blasphemy of pessimism. But +all the optimism of the age had been false and disheartening for this +reason, that it had always been trying to prove that we fit in to the +world. The Christian optimism is based on the fact that we do _not_ fit +in to the world. I had tried to be happy by telling myself that man is +an animal, like any other which sought its meat from God. But now I +really was happy, for I had learnt that man is a monstrosity. I had +been right in feeling all things as odd, for I myself was at once worse +and better than all things. The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it +dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was +poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in the light of +the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again +that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in +acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the _wrong_ place, and my +soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. The knowledge found out and +illuminated forgotten chambers in the dark house of infancy. I knew now +why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a +giant, and why I could feel homesick at home. + + + + +CHAPTER VI.--_The Paradoxes of Christianity_ + + +The real trouble with this world of ours is not that it is an +unreasonable world, nor even that it is a reasonable one. The commonest +kind of trouble is that it is nearly reasonable, but not quite. Life is +not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians. It looks just a +little more mathematical and regular than it is; its exactitude is +obvious, but its inexactitude is hidden; its wildness lies in wait. I +give one coarse instance of what I mean. Suppose some mathematical +creature from the moon were to reckon up the human body; he would at +once see that the essential thing about it was that it was duplicate. A +man is two men, he on the right exactly resembling him on the left. +Having noted that there was an arm on the right and one on the left, a +leg on the right and one on the left, he might go further and still find +on each side the same number of fingers, the same number of toes, twin +eyes, twin ears, twin nostrils, and even twin lobes of the brain. At +last he would take it as a law; and then, where he found a heart on one +side, would deduce that there was another heart on the other. And just +then, where he most felt he was right, he would be wrong. + +It is this silent swerving from accuracy by an inch that is the uncanny +element in everything. It seems a sort of secret treason in the +universe. An apple or an orange is round enough to get itself called +round, and yet is not round after all. The earth itself is shaped like +an orange in order to lure some simple astronomer into calling it a +globe. A blade of grass is called after the blade of a sword, because it +comes to a point; but it doesn't. Everywhere in things there is this +element of the quiet and incalculable. It escapes the rationalists, but +it never escapes till the last moment. From the grand curve of our earth +it could easily be inferred that every inch of it was thus curved. It +would seem rational that as a man has a brain on both sides, he should +have a heart on both sides. Yet scientific men are still organizing +expeditions to find the North Pole, because they are so fond of flat +country. Scientific men are also still organising expeditions to find a +man's heart; and when they try to find it, they generally get on the +wrong side of him. + +Now, actual insight or inspiration is best tested by whether it guesses +these hidden malformations or surprises. If our mathematician from the +moon saw the two arms and the two ears, he might deduce the two +shoulder-blades and the two halves of the brain. But if he guessed that +the man's heart was in the right place, then I should call him something +more than a mathematician. Now, this is exactly the claim which I have +since come to propound for Christianity. Not merely that it deduces +logical truths, but that when it suddenly becomes illogical, it has +found, so to speak, an illogical truth. It not only goes right about +things, but it goes wrong (if one may say so) exactly where the things +go wrong. Its plan suits the secret irregularities, and expects the +unexpected. It is simple about the simple truth; but it is stubborn +about the subtle truth. It will admit that a man has two hands, it will +not admit (though all the Modernists wail to it) the obvious deduction +that he has two hearts. It is my only purpose in this chapter to point +this out; to show that whenever we feel there is something odd in +Christian theology, we shall generally find that there is something odd +in the truth. + +I have alluded to an unmeaning phrase to the effect that such and such a +creed cannot be believed in our age. Of course, anything can be +believed in any age. But, oddly enough, there really is a sense in which +a creed, if it is believed at all, can be believed more fixedly in a +complex society than in a simple one. If a man finds Christianity true +in Birmingham, he has actually clearer reasons for faith than if he had +found it true in Mercia. For the more complicated seems the coincidence, +the less it can be a coincidence. If snowflakes fell in the shape, say, +of the heart of Midlothian, it might be an accident. But if snowflakes +fell in the exact shape of the maze at Hampton Court, I think one might +call it a miracle. It is exactly as of such a miracle that I have since +come to feel of the philosophy of Christianity. The complication of our +modern world proves the truth of the creed more perfectly than any of +the plain problems of the ages of faith. It was in Notting Hill and +Battersea that I began to see that Christianity was true. This is why +the faith has that elaboration of doctrines and details which so much +distresses those who admire Christianity without believing in it. When +once one believes in a creed, one is proud of its complexity, as +scientists are proud of the complexity of science. It shows how rich it +is in discoveries. If it is right at all, it is a compliment to say +that it's elaborately right. A stick might fit a hole or a stone a +hollow by accident. But a key and a lock are both complex. And if a key +fits a lock, you know it is the right key. + +But this involved accuracy of the thing makes it very difficult to do +what I now have to do, to describe this accumulation of truth. It is +very hard for a man to defend anything of which he is entirely +convinced. It is comparatively easy when he is only partially convinced. +He is partially convinced because he has found this or that proof of the +thing, and he can expound it. But a man is not really convinced of a +philosophic theory when he finds that something proves it. He is only +really convinced when he finds that everything proves it. And the more +converging reasons he finds pointing to this conviction, the more +bewildered he is if asked suddenly to sum them up. Thus, if one asked an +ordinary intelligent man, on the spur of the moment, "Why do you prefer +civilisation to savagery?" he would look wildly round at object after +object, and would only be able to answer vaguely, "Why, there is that +bookcase ... and the coals in the coal-scuttle ... and pianos ... and +policemen." The whole case for civilisation is that the case for it is +complex. It has done so many things. But that very multiplicity of proof +which ought to make reply overwhelming makes reply impossible. + +There is, therefore, about all complete conviction a kind of huge +helplessness. The belief is so big that it takes a long time to get it +into action. And this hesitation chiefly arises, oddly enough, from an +indifference about where one should begin. All roads lead to Rome; which +is one reason why many people never get there. In the case of this +defence of the Christian conviction I confess that I would as soon begin +the argument with one thing as another; I would begin it with a turnip +or a taximeter cab. But if I am to be at all careful about making my +meaning clear, it will, I think, be wiser to continue the current +arguments of the last chapter, which was concerned to urge the first of +these mystical coincidences, or rather ratifications. All I had hitherto +heard of Christian theology had alienated me from it. I was a pagan at +the age of twelve, and a complete agnostic by the age of sixteen; and I +cannot understand any one passing the age of seventeen without having +asked himself so simple a question. I did, indeed, retain a cloudy +reverence for a cosmic deity and a great historical interest in the +Founder of Christianity. But I certainly regarded Him as a man; though +perhaps I thought that, even in that point, He had an advantage over +some of His modern critics. I read the scientific and sceptical +literature of my time--all of it, at least, that I could find written in +English and lying about; and I read nothing else; I mean I read nothing +else on any other note of philosophy. The penny dreadfuls which I also +read were indeed in a healthy and heroic tradition of Christianity; but +I did not know this at the time. I never read a line of Christian +apologetics. I read as little as I can of them now. It was Huxley and +Herbert Spencer and Bradlaugh who brought me back to orthodox theology. +They sowed in my mind my first wild doubts of doubt. Our grandmothers +were quite right when they said that Tom Paine and the free-thinkers +unsettled the mind. They do. They unsettled mine horribly. The +rationalist made me question whether reason was of any use whatever; and +when I had finished Herbert Spencer I had got as far as doubting (for +the first time) whether evolution had occurred at all. As I laid down +the last of Colonel Ingersoll's atheistic lectures the dreadful thought +broke across my mind, "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." I +was in a desperate way. + +This odd effect of the great agnostics in arousing doubts deeper than +their own might be illustrated in many ways. I take only one. As I read +and re-read all the non-Christian or anti-Christian accounts of the +faith, from Huxley to Bradlaugh, a slow and awful impression grew +gradually but graphically upon my mind--the impression that Christianity +must be a most extraordinary thing. For not only (as I understood) had +Christianity the most flaming vices, but it had apparently a mystical +talent for combining vices which seemed inconsistent with each other. It +was attacked on all sides and for all contradictory reasons. No sooner +had one rationalist demonstrated that it was too far to the east than +another demonstrated with equal clearness that it was much too far to +the west. No sooner had my indignation died down at its angular and +aggressive squareness than I was called up again to notice and condemn +its enervating and sensual roundness. In case any reader has not come +across the thing I mean, I will give such instances as I remember at +random of this self-contradiction in the sceptical attack. I give four +or five of them; there are fifty more. + +Thus, for instance, I was much moved by the eloquent attack on +Christianity as a thing of inhuman gloom; for I thought (and still +think) sincere pessimism the unpardonable sin. Insincere pessimism is a +social accomplishment, rather agreeable than otherwise; and fortunately +nearly all pessimism is insincere. But if Christianity was, as these +people said, a thing purely pessimistic and opposed to life, then I was +quite prepared to blow up St. Paul's Cathedral. But the extraordinary +thing is this. They did prove to me in Chapter I. (to my complete +satisfaction) that Christianity was too pessimistic; and then, in +Chapter II., they began to prove to me that it was a great deal too +optimistic. One accusation against Christianity was that it prevented +men, by morbid tears and terrors, from seeking joy and liberty in the +bosom of Nature. But another accusation was that it comforted men with a +fictitious providence, and put them in a pink-and-white nursery. One +great agnostic asked why Nature was not beautiful enough, and why it was +hard to be free. Another great agnostic objected that Christian +optimism, "the garment of make-believe woven by pious hands," hid from +us the fact that Nature was ugly, and that it was impossible to be free. +One rationalist had hardly done calling Christianity a nightmare before +another began to call it a fool's paradise. This puzzled me; the charges +seemed inconsistent. Christianity could not at once be the black mask on +a white world, and also the white mask on a black world. The state of +the Christian could not be at once so comfortable that he was a coward +to cling to it, and so uncomfortable that he was a fool to stand it. If +it falsified human vision it must falsify it one way or another; it +could not wear both green and rose-coloured spectacles. I rolled on my +tongue with a terrible joy, as did all young men of that time, the +taunts which Swinburne hurled at the dreariness of the creed-- + + "Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilæan, the world has grown gray + with Thy breath." + +But when I read the same poet's accounts of paganism (as in "Atalanta"), +I gathered that the world was, if possible, more gray before the +Galilæan breathed on it than afterwards. The poet maintained, indeed, in +the abstract, that life itself was pitch dark. And yet, somehow, +Christianity had darkened it. The very man who denounced Christianity +for pessimism was himself a pessimist. I thought there must be something +wrong. And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that, perhaps, +those might not be the very best judges of the relation of religion to +happiness who, by their own account, had neither one nor the other. + +It must be understood that I did not conclude hastily that the +accusations were false or the accusers fools. I simply deduced that +Christianity must be something even weirder and wickeder than they made +out. A thing might have these two opposite vices; but it must be a +rather queer thing if it did. A man might be too fat in one place and +too thin in another; but he would be an odd shape. At this point my +thoughts were only of the odd shape of the Christian religion; I did not +allege any odd shape in the rationalistic mind. + +Here is another case of the same kind. I felt that a strong case against +Christianity lay in the charge that there is something timid, monkish, +and unmanly about all that is called "Christian," especially in its +attitude towards resistance and fighting. The great sceptics of the +nineteenth century were largely virile. Bradlaugh in an expansive way, +Huxley in a reticent way, were decidedly men. In comparison, it did seem +tenable that there was something weak and over patient about Christian +counsels. The Gospel paradox about the other cheek, the fact that +priests never fought, a hundred things made plausible the accusation +that Christianity was an attempt to make a man too like a sheep. I read +it and believed it, and if I had read nothing different, I should have +gone on believing it. But I read something very different. I turned the +next page in my agnostic manual, and my brain turned up-side down. Now I +found that I was to hate Christianity not for fighting too little, but +for fighting too much. Christianity, it seemed, was the mother of wars. +Christianity had deluged the world with blood. I had got thoroughly +angry with the Christian, because he never was angry. And now I was told +to be angry with him because his anger had been the most huge and +horrible thing in human history; because his anger had soaked the earth +and smoked to the sun. The very people who reproached Christianity with +the meekness and non-resistance of the monastries were the very people +who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades. It +was the fault of poor old Christianity (somehow or other) both that +Edward the Confessor did not fight and that Richard Coeur de Lion did. +The Quakers (we were told) were the only characteristic Christians; and +yet the massacres of Cromwell and Alva were characteristic Christian +crimes. What could it all mean? What was this Christianity which always +forbade war and always produced wars? What could be the nature of the +thing which one could abuse first because it would not fight, and second +because it was always fighting? In what world of riddles was born this +monstrous murder and this monstrous meekness? The shape of Christianity +grew a queerer shape every instant. + +I take a third case; the strangest of all, because it involves the one +real objection to the faith. The one real objection to the Christian +religion is simply that it is one religion. The world is a big place, +full of very different kinds of people. Christianity (it may reasonably +be said) is one thing confined to one kind of people; it began in +Palestine, it has practically stopped with Europe. I was duly impressed +with this argument in my youth, and I was much drawn towards the +doctrine often preached in Ethical Societies--I mean the doctrine that +there is one great unconscious church of all humanity founded on the +omnipresence of the human conscience. Creeds, it was said, divided men; +but at least morals united them. The soul might seek the strangest and +most remote lands and ages and still find essential ethical common +sense. It might find Confucius under Eastern trees, and he would be +writing "Thou shalt not steal." It might decipher the darkest +hieroglyphic on the most primeval desert, and the meaning when +deciphered would be "Little boys should tell the truth." I believed this +doctrine of the brotherhood of all men in the possession of a moral +sense, and I believe it still--with other things. And I was thoroughly +annoyed with Christianity for suggesting (as I supposed) that whole ages +and empires of men had utterly escaped this light of justice and reason. +But then I found an astonishing thing. I found that the very people who +said that mankind was one church from Plato to Emerson were the very +people who said that morality had changed altogether, and that what was +right in one age was wrong in another. If I asked, say, for an altar, I +was told that we needed none, for men our brothers gave us clear oracles +and one creed in their universal customs and ideals. But if I mildly +pointed out that one of men's universal customs was to have an altar, +then my agnostic teachers turned clean round and told me that men had +always been in darkness and the superstitions of savages. I found it was +their daily taunt against Christianity that it was the light of one +people and had left all others to die in the dark. But I also found that +it was their special boast for themselves that science and progress were +the discovery of one people, and that all other peoples had died in the +dark. Their chief insult to Christianity was actually their chief +compliment to themselves, and there seemed to be a strange unfairness +about all their relative insistence on the two things. When considering +some pagan or agnostic, we were to remember that all men had one +religion; when considering some mystic or spiritualist, we were only to +consider what absurd religions some men had. We could trust the ethics +of Epictetus, because ethics had never changed. We must not trust the +ethics of Bossuet, because ethics had changed. They changed in two +hundred years, but not in two thousand. + +This began to be alarming. It looked not so much as if Christianity was +bad enough to include any vices, but rather as if any stick was good +enough to beat Christianity with. What again could this astonishing +thing be like which people were so anxious to contradict, that in doing +so they did not mind contradicting themselves? I saw the same thing on +every side. I can give no further space to this discussion of it in +detail; but lest any one supposes that I have unfairly selected three +accidental cases I will run briefly through a few others. Thus, certain +sceptics wrote that the great crime of Christianity had been its attack +on the family; it had dragged women to the loneliness and contemplation +of the cloister, away from their homes and their children. But, then, +other sceptics (slightly more advanced) said that the great crime of +Christianity was forcing the family and marriage upon us; that it doomed +women to the drudgery of their homes and children, and forbade them +loneliness and contemplation. The charge was actually reversed. Or, +again, certain phrases in the Epistles or the Marriage Service, were +said by the anti-Christians to show contempt for woman's intellect. But +I found that the anti-Christians themselves had a contempt for woman's +intellect; for it was their great sneer at the Church on the Continent +that "only women" went to it. Or again, Christianity was reproached with +its naked and hungry habits; with its sackcloth and dried peas. But the +next minute Christianity was being reproached with its pomp and its +ritualism; its shrines of porphyry and its robes of gold. It was abused +for being too plain and for being too coloured. Again Christianity had +always been accused of restraining sexuality too much, when Bradlaugh +the Malthusian discovered that it restrained it too little. It is often +accused in the same breath of prim respectability and of religious +extravagance. Between the covers of the same atheistic pamphlet I have +found the faith rebuked for its disunion, "One thinks one thing, and one +another," and rebuked also for its union, "It is difference of opinion +that prevents the world from going to the dogs." In the same +conversation a free-thinker, a friend of mine, blamed Christianity for +despising Jews, and then despised it himself for being Jewish. + +I wished to be quite fair then, and I wish to be quite fair now; and I +did not conclude that the attack on Christianity was all wrong. I only +concluded that if Christianity was wrong, it was very wrong indeed. Such +hostile horrors might be combined in one thing, but that thing must be +very strange and solitary. There are men who are misers, and also +spendthrifts; but they are rare. There are men sensual and also ascetic; +but they are rare. But if this mass of mad contradictions really +existed, quakerish and bloodthirsty, too gorgeous and too thread-bare, +austere, yet pandering preposterously to the lust of the eye, the enemy +of women and their foolish refuge, a solemn pessimist and a silly +optimist, if this evil existed, then there was in this evil something +quite supreme and unique. For I found in my rationalist teachers no +explanation of such exceptional corruption. Christianity (theoretically +speaking) was in their eyes only one of the ordinary myths and errors of +mortals. _They_ gave me no key to this twisted and unnatural badness. +Such a paradox of evil rose to the stature of the supernatural. It was, +indeed, almost as supernatural as the infallibility of the Pope. An +historic institution, which never went right, is really quite as much of +a miracle as an institution that cannot go wrong. The only explanation +which immediately occurred to my mind was that Christianity did not come +from heaven, but from hell. Really, if Jesus of Nazareth was not Christ, +He must have been Antichrist. + +And then in a quiet hour a strange thought struck me like a still +thunderbolt. There had suddenly come into my mind another explanation. +Suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were +puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall and some too short; +some objected to his fatness, some lamented his leanness; some thought +him too dark, and some too fair. One explanation (as has been already +admitted) would be that he might be an odd shape. But there is another +explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might +feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall. Old +bucks who are growing stout might consider him insufficiently filled +out; old beaux who were growing thin might feel that he expanded beyond +the narrow lines of elegance. Perhaps Swedes (who have pale hair like +tow) called him a dark man, while negroes considered him distinctly +blonde. Perhaps (in short) this extraordinary thing is really the +ordinary thing; at least the normal thing, the centre. Perhaps, after +all, it is Christianity that is sane and all its critics that are +mad--in various ways. I tested this idea by asking myself whether there +was about any of the accusers anything morbid that might explain the +accusation. I was startled to find that this key fitted a lock. For +instance, it was certainly odd that the modern world charged +Christianity at once with bodily austerity and with artistic pomp. But +then it was also odd, very odd, that the modern world itself combined +extreme bodily luxury with an extreme absence of artistic pomp. The +modern man thought Becket's robes too rich and his meals too poor. But +then the modern man was really exceptional in history; no man before +ever ate such elaborate dinners in such ugly clothes. The modern man +found the church too simple exactly where modern life is too complex; he +found the church too gorgeous exactly where modern life is too dingy. +The man who disliked the plain fasts and feasts was mad on _entrées_. +The man who disliked vestments wore a pair of preposterous trousers. And +surely if there was any insanity involved in the matter at all it was in +the trousers, not in the simply falling robe. If there was any insanity +at all, it was in the extravagant _entrées_, not in the bread and wine. + +I went over all the cases, and I found the key fitted so far. The fact +that Swinburne was irritated at the unhappiness of Christians and yet +more irritated at their happiness was easily explained. It was no longer +a complication of diseases in Christianity, but a complication of +diseases in Swinburne. The restraints of Christians saddened him simply +because he was more hedonist than a healthy man should be. The faith of +Christians angered him because he was more pessimist than a healthy man +should be. In the same way the Malthusians by instinct attacked +Christianity; not because there is anything especially anti-Malthusian +about Christianity, but because there is something a little anti-human +about Malthusianism. + +Nevertheless it could not, I felt, be quite true that Christianity was +merely sensible and stood in the middle. There was really an element in +it of emphasis and even frenzy which had justified the secularists in +their superficial criticism. It might be wise, I began more and more to +think that it was wise, but it was not merely worldly wise; it was not +merely temperate and respectable. Its fierce crusaders and meek saints +might balance each other; still, the crusaders were very fierce and the +saints were very meek, meek beyond all decency. Now, it was just at this +point of the speculation that I remembered my thoughts about the martyr +and the suicide. In that matter there had been this combination between +two almost insane positions which yet somehow amounted to sanity. This +was just such another contradiction; and this I had already found to be +true. This was exactly one of the paradoxes in which sceptics found the +creed wrong; and in this I had found it right. Madly as Christians might +love the martyr or hate the suicide, they never felt these passions more +madly than I had felt them long before I dreamed of Christianity. Then +the most difficult and interesting part of the mental process opened, +and I began to trace this idea darkly through all the enormous thoughts +of our theology. The idea was that which I had outlined touching the +optimist and the pessimist; that we want not an amalgam or compromise, +but both things at the top of their energy; love and wrath both burning. +Here I shall only trace it in relation to ethics. But I need not remind +the reader that the idea of this combination is indeed central in +orthodox theology. For orthodox theology has specially insisted that +Christ was not a being apart from God and man, like an elf, nor yet a +being half human and half not, like a centaur, but both things at once +and both things thoroughly, very man and very God. Now let me trace this +notion as I found it. + +All sane men can see that sanity is some kind of equilibrium; that one +may be mad and eat too much, or mad and eat too little. Some moderns +have indeed appeared with vague versions of progress and evolution which +seeks to destroy the μεσον or balance of Aristotle. They seem to suggest +that we are meant to starve progressively, or to go on eating larger and +larger breakfasts every morning for ever. But the great truism of the +μεσον remains for all thinking men, and these people have not upset any +balance except their own. But granted that we have all to keep a +balance, the real interest comes in with the question of how that +balance can be kept. That was the problem which Paganism tried to solve: +that was the problem which I think Christianity solved and solved in a +very strange way. + +Paganism declared that virtue was in a balance; Christianity declared it +was in a conflict: the collision of two passions apparently opposite. Of +course they were not really inconsistent; but they were such that it was +hard to hold simultaneously. Let us follow for a moment the clue of the +martyr and the suicide; and take the case of courage. No quality has +ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely +rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a +strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that +will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism +for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or +mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. +This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly +or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if +he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by +continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by +enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire +for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely +cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He +must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will +not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to +it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine. No +philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with +adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity +has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the +suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the +sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying. And it has held +up ever since above the European lances the banner of the mystery of +chivalry: the Christian courage, which is a disdain of death; not the +Chinese courage, which is a disdain of life. + +And now I began to find that this duplex passion was the Christian key +to ethics everywhere. Everywhere the creed made a moderation out of the +still crash of two impetuous emotions. Take, for instance, the matter of +modesty, of the balance between mere pride and mere prostration. The +average pagan, like the average agnostic, would merely say that he was +content with himself, but not insolently self-satisfied, that there were +many better and many worse, that his deserts were limited, but he would +see that he got them. In short, he would walk with his head in the air; +but not necessarily with his nose in the air. This is a manly and +rational position, but it is open to the objection we noted against the +compromise between optimism and pessimism--the "resignation" of Matthew +Arnold. Being a mixture of two things, it is a dilution of two things; +neither is present in its full strength or contributes its full colour. +This proper pride does not lift the heart like the tongue of trumpets; +you cannot go clad in crimson and gold for this. On the other hand, this +mild rationalist modesty does not cleanse the soul with fire and make it +clear like crystal; it does not (like a strict and searching humility) +make a man as a little child, who can sit at the feet of the grass. It +does not make him look up and see marvels; for Alice must grow small if +she is to be Alice in Wonderland. Thus it loses both the poetry of +being proud and the poetry of being humble. Christianity sought by this +same strange expedient to save both of them. + +It separated the two ideas and then exaggerated them both. In one way +Man was to be haughtier than he had ever been before; in another way he +was to be humbler than he had ever been before. In so far as I am Man I +am the chief of creatures. In so far as I am _a_ man I am the chief of +sinners. All humility that had meant pessimism, that had meant man +taking a vague or mean view of his whole destiny--all that was to go. We +were to hear no more the wail of Ecclesiastes that humanity had no +pre-eminence over the brute, or the awful cry of Homer that man was only +the saddest of all the beasts of the field. Man was a statue of God +walking about the garden. Man had pre-eminence over all the brutes; man +was only sad because he was not a beast, but a broken god. The Greek had +spoken of men creeping on the earth, as if clinging to it. Now Man was +to tread on the earth as if to subdue it. Christianity thus held a +thought of the dignity of man that could only be expressed in crowns +rayed like the sun and fans of peacock plumage. Yet at the same time it +could hold a thought about the abject smallness of man that could only +be expressed in fasting and fantastic submission, in the grey ashes of +St. Dominic and the white snows of St. Bernard. When one came to think +of _one's self_, there was vista and void enough for any amount of bleak +abnegation and bitter truth. There the realistic gentleman could let +himself go--as long as he let himself go at himself. There was an open +playground for the happy pessimist. Let him say anything against himself +short of blaspheming the original aim of his being; let him call himself +a fool and even a damned fool (though that is Calvinistic); but he must +not say that fools are not worth saving. He must not say that a man, +_quâ_ man, can be valueless. Here again, in short, Christianity got over +the difficulty of combining furious opposites, by keeping them both, and +keeping them both furious. The Church was positive on both points. One +can hardly think too little of one's self. One can hardly think too much +of one's soul. + +Take another case: the complicated question of charity, which some +highly uncharitable idealists seem to think quite easy. Charity is a +paradox, like modesty and courage. Stated baldly, charity certainly +means one of two things--pardoning unpardonable acts, or loving +unlovable people. But if we ask ourselves (as we did in the case of +pride) what a sensible pagan would feel about such a subject, we shall +probably be beginning at the bottom of it. A sensible pagan would say +that there were some people one could forgive, and some one couldn't: a +slave who stole wine could be laughed at; a slave who betrayed his +benefactor could be killed, and cursed even after he was killed. In so +far as the act was pardonable, the man was pardonable. That again is +rational, and even refreshing; but it is a dilution. It leaves no place +for a pure horror of injustice, such as that which is a great beauty in +the innocent. And it leaves no place for a mere tenderness for men as +men, such as is the whole fascination of the charitable. Christianity +came in here as before. It came in startlingly with a sword, and clove +one thing from another. It divided the crime from the criminal. The +criminal we must forgive unto seventy times seven. The crime we must not +forgive at all. It was not enough that slaves who stole wine inspired +partly anger and partly kindness. We must be much more angry with theft +than before, and yet much kinder to thieves than before. There was room +for wrath and love to run wild. And the more I considered Christianity, +the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the +chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild. + +Mental and emotional liberty are not so simple as they look. Really they +require almost as careful a balance of laws and conditions as do social +and political liberty. The ordinary æsthetic anarchist who sets out to +feel everything freely gets knotted at last in a paradox that prevents +him feeling at all. He breaks away from home limits to follow poetry. +But in ceasing to feel home limits he has ceased to feel the "Odyssey." +He is free from national prejudices and outside patriotism. But being +outside patriotism he is outside "Henry V." Such a literary man is +simply outside all literature: he is more of a prisoner than any bigot. +For if there is a wall between you and the world, it makes little +difference whether you describe yourself as locked in or as locked out. +What we want is not the universality that is outside all normal +sentiments; we want the universality that is inside all normal +sentiments. It is all the difference between being free from them, as a +man is free from a prison, and being free of them as a man is free of a +city. I am free from Windsor Castle (that is, I am not forcibly detained +there), but I am by no means free of that building. How can man be +approximately free of fine emotions, able to swing them in a clear space +without breakage or wrong? _This_ was the achievement of this Christian +paradox of the parallel passions. Granted the primary dogma of the war +between divine and diabolic, the revolt and ruin of the world, their +optimism and pessimism, as pure poetry, could be loosened like +cataracts. + +St. Francis, in praising all good, could be a more shouting optimist +than Walt Whitman. St. Jerome, in denouncing all evil, could paint the +world blacker than Schopenhauer. Both passions were free because both +were kept in their place. The optimist could pour out all the praise he +liked on the gay music of the march, the golden trumpets, and the purple +banners going into battle. But he must not call the fight needless. The +pessimist might draw as darkly as he chose the sickening marches or the +sanguine wounds. But he must not call the fight hopeless. So it was with +all the other moral problems, with pride, with protest, and with +compassion. By defining its main doctrine, the Church not only kept +seemingly inconsistent things side by side, but, what was more, allowed +them to break out in a sort of artistic violence otherwise possible only +to anarchists. Meekness grew more dramatic than madness. Historic +Christianity rose into a high and strange _coup de théatre_ of +morality--things that are to virtue what the crimes of Nero are to vice. +The spirits of indignation and of charity took terrible and attractive +forms, ranging from that monkish fierceness that scourged like a dog the +first and greatest of the Plantagenets, to the sublime pity of St. +Catherine, who, in the official shambles, kissed the bloody head of the +criminal. Poetry could be acted as well as composed. This heroic and +monumental manner in ethics has entirely vanished with supernatural +religion. They, being humble, could parade themselves; but we are too +proud to be prominent. Our ethical teachers write reasonably for prison +reform; but we are not likely to see Mr. Cadbury, or any eminent +philanthropist, go into Reading Gaol and embrace the strangled corpse +before it is cast into the quicklime. Our ethical teachers write mildly +against the power of millionaires; but we are not likely to see Mr. +Rockefeller, or any modern tyrant, publicly whipped in Westminster +Abbey. + +Thus, the double charges of the secularists, though throwing nothing +but darkness and confusion on themselves, throw a real light on the +faith. It _is_ true that the historic Church has at once emphasised +celibacy and emphasised the family; has at once (if one may put it so) +been fiercely for having children and fiercely for not having children. +It has kept them side by side like two strong colours, red and white, +like the red and white upon the shield of St. George. It has always had +a healthy hatred of pink. It hates that combination of two colours which +is the feeble expedient of the philosophers. It hates that evolution of +black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey. In fact, the whole +theory of the Church on virginity might be symbolized in the statement +that white is a colour: not merely the absence of a colour. All that I +am urging here can be expressed by saying that Christianity sought in +most of these cases to keep two colours co-existent but pure. It is not +a mixture like russet or purple; it is rather like a shot silk, for a +shot silk is always at right angles, and is in the pattern of the cross. + +So it is also, of course, with the contradictory charges of the +anti-Christians about submission and slaughter. It _is_ true that the +Church told some men to fight and others not to fight; and it _is_ true +that those who fought were like thunderbolts and those who did not fight +were like statues. All this simply means that the Church preferred to +use its Supermen and to use its Tolstoyans. There must be _some_ good in +the life of battle, for so many good men have enjoyed being soldiers. +There must be _some_ good in the idea of non-resistance, for so many +good men seem to enjoy being Quakers. All that the Church did (so far as +that goes) was to prevent either of these good things from ousting the +other. They existed side by side. The Tolstoyans, having all the +scruples of monks, simply became monks. The Quakers became a club +instead of becoming a sect. Monks said all that Tolstoy says; they +poured out lucid lamentations about the cruelty of battles and the +vanity of revenge. But the Tolstoyans are not quite right enough to run +the whole world; and in the ages of faith they were not allowed to run +it. The world did not lose the last charge of Sir James Douglas or the +banner of Joan the Maid. And sometimes this pure gentleness and this +pure fierceness met and justified their juncture; the paradox of all the +prophets was fulfilled, and, in the soul of St. Louis, the lion lay down +with the lamb. But remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. +It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that +when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But +that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That +is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the +lamb. The real problem is--Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still +retain his royal ferocity? _That_ is the problem the Church attempted; +_that_ is the miracle she achieved. + +This is what I have called guessing the hidden eccentricities of life. +This is knowing that a man's heart is to the left and not in the middle. +This is knowing not only that the earth is round, but knowing exactly +where it is flat. Christian doctrine detected the oddities of life. It +not only discovered the law, but it foresaw the exceptions. Those +underrate Christianity who say that it discovered mercy; any one might +discover mercy. In fact every one did. But to discover a plan for being +merciful and also severe--_that_ was to anticipate a strange need of +human nature. For no one wants to be forgiven for a big sin as if it +were a little one. Any one might say that we should be neither quite +miserable nor quite happy. But to find out how far one _may_ be quite +miserable without making it impossible to be quite happy--that was a +discovery in psychology. Any one might say, "Neither swagger nor +grovel"; and it would have been a limit. But to say, "Here you can +swagger and there you can grovel"--that was an emancipation. + +This was the big fact about Christian ethics; the discovery of the new +balance. Paganism had been like a pillar of marble, upright because +proportioned with symmetry. Christianity was like a huge and ragged and +romantic rock, which, though it sways on its pedestal at a touch, yet, +because its exaggerated excrescences exactly balance each other, is +enthroned there for a thousand years. In a Gothic cathedral the columns +were all different, but they were all necessary. Every support seemed an +accidental and fantastic support; every buttress was a flying buttress. +So in Christendom apparent accidents balanced. Becket wore a hair shirt +under his gold and crimson, and there is much to be said for the +combination; for Becket got the benefit of the hair shirt while the +people in the street got the benefit of the crimson and gold. It is at +least better than the manner of the modern millionaire, who has the +black and the drab outwardly for others, and the gold next his heart. +But the balance was not always in one man's body as in Becket's; the +balance was often distributed over the whole body of Christendom. +Because a man prayed and fasted on the Northern snows, flowers could be +flung at his festival in the Southern cities; and because fanatics drank +water on the sands of Syria, men could still drink cider in the orchards +of England. This is what makes Christendom at once so much more +perplexing and so much more interesting than the Pagan empire; just as +Amiens Cathedral is not better but more interesting than the Parthenon. +If any one wants a modern proof of all this, let him consider the +curious fact that, under Christianity, Europe (while remaining a unity) +has broken up into individual nations. Patriotism is a perfect example +of this deliberate balancing of one emphasis against another emphasis. +The instinct of the Pagan empire would have said, "You shall all be +Roman citizens, and grow alike; let the German grow less slow and +reverent; the Frenchmen less experimental and swift." But the instinct +of Christian Europe says, "Let the German remain slow and reverent, that +the Frenchman may the more safely be swift and experimental. We will +make an equipoise out of these excesses. The absurdity called Germany +shall correct the insanity called France." + +Last and most important, it is exactly this which explains what is so +inexplicable to all the modern critics of the history of Christianity. I +mean the monstrous wars about small points of theology, the earthquakes +of emotion about a gesture or a word. It was only a matter of an inch; +but an inch is everything when you are balancing. The Church could not +afford to swerve a hair's breadth on some things if she was to continue +her great and daring experiment of the irregular equilibrium. Once let +one idea become less powerful and some other idea would become too +powerful. It was no flock of sheep the Christian shepherd was leading, +but a herd of bulls and tigers, of terrible ideals and devouring +doctrines, each one of them strong enough to turn to a false religion +and lay waste the world. Remember that the Church went in specifically +for dangerous ideas; she was a lion tamer. The idea of birth through a +Holy Spirit, of the death of a divine being, of the forgiveness of sins, +or the fulfilment of prophecies, are ideas which, any one can see, need +but a touch to turn them into something blasphemous or ferocious. The +smallest link was let drop by the artificers of the Mediterranean, and +the lion of ancestral pessimism burst his chain in the forgotten forests +of the north. Of these theological equalisations I have to speak +afterwards. Here it is enough to notice that if some small mistake were +made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness. A +sentence phrased wrong about the nature of symbolism would have broken +all the best statues in Europe. A slip in the definitions might stop all +the dances; might wither all the Christmas trees or break all the Easter +eggs. Doctrines had to be defined within strict limits, even in order +that man might enjoy general human liberties. The Church had to be +careful, if only that the world might be careless. + +This is the thrilling romance of Orthodoxy. People have fallen into a +foolish habit of speaking of orthodoxy as something heavy, humdrum, and +safe. There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy. +It was sanity: and to be sane is more dramatic than to be mad. It was +the equilibrium of a man behind madly rushing horses, seeming to stoop +this way and to sway that, yet in every attitude having the grace of +statuary and the accuracy of arithmetic. The Church in its early days +went fierce and fast with any warhorse; yet it is utterly unhistoric to +say that she merely went mad along one idea, like a vulgar fanaticism. +She swerved to left and right, so as exactly to avoid enormous +obstacles. She left on one hand the huge bulk of Arianism, buttressed by +all the worldly powers to make Christianity too worldly. The next +instant she was swerving to avoid an orientalism, which would have made +it too unworldly. The orthodox Church never took the tame course or +accepted the conventions; the orthodox Church was never respectable. It +would have been easier to have accepted the earthly power of the Arians. +It would have been easy, in the Calvinistic seventeenth century, to fall +into the bottomless pit of predestination. It is easy to be a madman: it +is easy to be a heretic. It is always easy to let the age have its head; +the difficult thing is to keep one's own. It is always easy to be a +modernist; as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those +open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion and +sect after sect set along the historic path of Christendom--that would +indeed have been simple. It is always simple to fall; there are an +infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands. To +have fallen into any one of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian +Science would indeed have been obvious and tame. But to have avoided +them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly +chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling +and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect. + + + + +CHAPTER VII.--_The Eternal Revolution_ + + +The following propositions have been urged: First, that some faith in +our life is required even to improve it; second, that some +dissatisfaction with things as they are is necessary even in order to be +satisfied; third, that to have this necessary content and necessary +discontent it is not sufficient to have the obvious equilibrium of the +Stoic. For mere resignation has neither the gigantic levity of pleasure +nor the superb intolerance of pain. There is a vital objection to the +advice merely to grin and bear it. The objection is that if you merely +bear it, you do not grin. Greek heroes do not grin; but gargoyles +do--because they are Christian. And when a Christian is pleased, he is +(in the most exact sense) frightfully pleased; his pleasure is +frightful. Christ prophesied the whole of Gothic architecture in that +hour when nervous and respectable people (such people as now object to +barrel organs) objected to the shouting of the gutter-snipes of +Jerusalem. He said, "If these were silent, the very stones would cry +out." Under the impulse of His spirit arose like a clamorous chorus the +facades of the mediæval cathedrals, thronged with shouting faces and +open mouths. The prophecy has fulfilled itself: the very stones cry out. + +If these things be conceded, though only for argument, we may take up +where we left it the thread of the thought of the natural man, called by +the Scotch (with regrettable familiarity), "The Old Man." We can ask the +next question so obviously in front of us. Some satisfaction is needed +even to make things better. But what do we mean by making things better? +Most modern talk on this matter is a mere argument in a circle--that +circle which we have already made the symbol of madness and of mere +rationalism. Evolution is only good if it produces good; good is only +good if it helps evolution. The elephant stands on the tortoise, and the +tortoise on the elephant. + +Obviously, it will not do to take our ideal from the principle in +nature; for the simple reason that (except for some human or divine +theory), there is no principle in nature. For instance, the cheap +anti-democrat of to-day will tell you solemnly that there is no equality +in nature. He is right, but he does not see the logical addendum. There +is no equality in nature; also there is no inequality in nature. +Inequality, as much as equality, implies a standard of value. To read +aristocracy into the anarchy of animals is just as sentimental as to +read democracy into it. Both aristocracy and democracy are human ideals: +the one saying that all men are valuable, the other that some men are +more valuable. But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than +mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that +the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior +because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the +effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German +pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. +He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first. Or +he might feel that he had actually inflicted frightful punishment on the +cat by keeping him alive. Just as a microbe might feel proud of +spreading a pestilence, so the pessimistic mouse might exult to think +that he was renewing in the cat the torture of conscious existence. It +all depends on the philosophy of the mouse. You cannot even say that +there is victory or superiority in nature unless you have some doctrine +about what things are superior. You cannot even say that the cat scores +unless there is a system of scoring. You cannot even say that the cat +gets the best of it unless there is some best to be got. + +We cannot, then, get the ideal itself from nature, and as we follow here +the first and natural speculation, we will leave out (for the present) +the idea of getting it from God. We must have our own vision. But the +attempts of most moderns to express it are highly vague. + +Some fall back simply on the clock: they talk as if mere passage through +time brought some superiority; so that even a man of the first mental +calibre carelessly uses the phrase that human morality is never up to +date. How can anything be up to date? a date has no character. How can +one say that Christmas celebrations are not suitable to the twenty-fifth +of a month? What the writer meant, of course, was that the majority is +behind his favourite minority--or in front of it. Other vague modern +people take refuge in material metaphors; in fact, this is the chief +mark of vague modern people. Not daring to define their doctrine of what +is good, they use physical figures of speech without stint or shame, +and, what is worst of all, seem to think these cheap analogies are +exquisitely spiritual and superior to the old morality. Thus they think +it intellectual to talk about things being "high." It is at least the +reverse of intellectual; it is a mere phrase from a steeple or a +weathercock. "Tommy was a good boy" is a pure philosophical statement, +worthy of Plato or Aquinas. "Tommy lived the higher life" is a gross +metaphor from a ten-foot rule. + +This, incidentally, is almost the whole weakness of Nietzsche, whom some +are representing as a bold and strong thinker. No one will deny that he +was a poetical and suggestive thinker; but he was quite the reverse of +strong. He was not at all bold. He never put his own meaning before +himself in bald abstract words: as did Aristotle and Calvin, and even +Karl Marx, the hard, fearless men of thought. Nietzsche always escaped a +question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, +"beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more +good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil." Had he +faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was +nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say, "the +purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are +ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man," or "over man," a +physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly +a very timid thinker. He does not really know in the least what sort of +man he wants evolution to produce. And if he does not know, certainly +the ordinary evolutionists, who talk about things being "higher," do not +know either. + +Then again, some people fall back on sheer submission and sitting still. +Nature is going to do something some day; nobody knows what, and nobody +knows when. We have no reason for acting, and no reason for not acting. +If anything happens it is right: if anything is prevented it was wrong. +Again, some people try to anticipate nature by doing something, by doing +anything. Because we may possibly grow wings they cut off their legs. +Yet nature may be trying to make them centipedes for all they know. + +Lastly, there is a fourth class of people who take whatever it is that +they happen to want, and say that that is the ultimate aim of evolution. +And these are the only sensible people. This is the only really healthy +way with the word evolution, to work for what you want, and to call +_that_ evolution. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance +can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish +to make the whole world like that vision. If you like to put it so, the +essence of the doctrine is that what we have around us is the mere +method and preparation for something that we have to create. This is not +a world, but rather the materials for a world. God has given us not so +much the colours of a picture as the colours of a palette. But He has +also given us a subject, a model, a fixed vision. We must be clear about +what we want to paint. This adds a further principle to our previous +list of principles. We have said we must be fond of this world, even in +order to change it. We now add that we must be fond of another world +(real or imaginary) in order to have something to change it to. + +We need not debate about the mere words evolution or progress: +personally I prefer to call it reform. For reform implies form. It +implies that we are trying to shape the world in a particular image; to +make it something that we see already in our minds. Evolution is a +metaphor from mere automatic unrolling. Progress is a metaphor from +merely walking along a road--very likely the wrong road. But reform is a +metaphor for reasonable and determined men: it means that we see a +certain thing out of shape and we mean to put it into shape. And we +know what shape. + +Now here comes in the whole collapse and huge blunder of our age. We +have mixed up two different things, two opposite things. Progress should +mean that we are always changing the world to suit the vision. Progress +does mean (just now) that we are always changing the vision. It should +mean that we are slow but sure in bringing justice and mercy among men: +it does mean that we are very swift in doubting the desirability of +justice and mercy: a wild page from any Prussian sophist makes men doubt +it. Progress should mean that we are always walking towards the New +Jerusalem. It does mean that the New Jerusalem is always walking away +from us. We are not altering the real to suit the ideal. We are altering +the ideal: it is easier. + +Silly examples are always simpler; let us suppose a man wanted a +particular kind of world; say, a blue world. He would have no cause to +complain of the slightness or swiftness of his task; he might toil for a +long time at the transformation; he could work away (in every sense) +until all was blue. He could have heroic adventures; the putting of the +last touches to a blue tiger. He could have fairy dreams; the dawn of a +blue moon. But if he worked hard, that high-minded reformer would +certainly (from his own point of view) leave the world better and bluer +than he found it. If he altered a blade of grass to his favourite colour +every day, he would get on slowly. But if he altered his favourite +colour every day, he would not get on at all. If, after reading a fresh +philosopher, he started to paint everything red or yellow, his work +would be thrown away: there would be nothing to show except a few blue +tigers walking about, specimens of his early bad manner. This is exactly +the position of the average modern thinker. It will be said that this is +avowedly a preposterous example. But it is literally the fact of recent +history. The great and grave changes in our political civilization all +belonged to the early nineteenth century, not to the later. They +belonged to the black and white epoch when men believed fixedly in +Toryism, in Protestantism, in Calvinism, in Reform, and not unfrequently +in Revolution. And whatever each man believed in he hammered at +steadily, without scepticism: and there was a time when the Established +Church might have fallen, and the House of Lords nearly fell. It was +because Radicals were wise enough to be constant and consistent; it was +because Radicals were wise enough to be Conservative. But in the +existing atmosphere there is not enough time and tradition in Radicalism +to pull anything down. There is a great deal of truth in Lord Hugh +Cecil's suggestion (made in a fine speech) that the era of change is +over, and that ours is an era of conservation and repose. But probably +it would pain Lord Hugh Cecil if he realised (what is certainly the +case) that ours is only an age of conservation because it is an age of +complete unbelief. Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish +institutions to remain the same. The more the life of the mind is +unhinged, the more the machinery of matter will be left to itself. The +net result of all our political suggestions, Collectivism, Tolstoyanism, +Neo-Feudalism, Communism, Anarchy, Scientific Bureaucracy--the plain +fruit of all of them is that the Monarchy and the House of Lords will +remain. The net result of all the new religions will be that the Church +of England will not (for heaven knows how long) be disestablished. It +was Karl Marx, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Cunninghame Grahame, Bernard Shaw and +Auberon Herbert, who between them, with bowed gigantic backs, bore up +the throne of the Archbishop of Canterbury. + +We may say broadly that free thought is the best of all the safeguards +against freedom. Managed in a modern style the emancipation of the +slave's mind is the best way of preventing the emancipation of the +slave. Teach him to worry about whether he wants to be free, and he will +not free himself. Again, it may be said that this instance is remote or +extreme. But, again, it is exactly true of the men in the streets around +us. It is true that the negro slave, being a debased barbarian, will +probably have either a human affection of loyalty, or a human affection +for liberty. But the man we see every day--the worker in Mr. Gradgrind's +factory, the little clerk in Mr. Gradgrind's office--he is too mentally +worried to believe in freedom. He is kept quiet with revolutionary +literature. He is calmed and kept in his place by a constant succession +of wild philosophies. He is a Marxian one day, a Nietzscheite the next +day, a Superman (probably) the next day; and a slave every day. The only +thing that remains after all the philosophies is the factory. The only +man who gains by all the philosophies is Gradgrind. It would be worth +his while to keep his commercial helotry supplied with sceptical +literature. And now I come to think of it, of course, Gradgrind is +famous for giving libraries. He shows his sense. All modern books are on +his side. As long as the vision of heaven is always changing, the vision +of earth will be exactly the same. No ideal will remain long enough to +be realised, or even partly realised. The modern young man will never +change his environment; for he will always change his mind. + +This, therefore, is our first requirement about the ideal towards which +progress is directed; it must be fixed. Whistler used to make many rapid +studies of a sitter; it did not matter if he tore up twenty portraits. +But it would matter if he looked up twenty times, and each time saw a +new person sitting placidly for his portrait. So it does not matter +(comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; +for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully +matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old +failures are fruitless. The question therefore becomes this: How can we +keep the artist discontented with his pictures while preventing him from +being vitally discontented with his art? How can we make a man always +dissatisfied with his work, yet always satisfied with working? How can +we make sure that the portrait painter will throw the portrait out of +window instead of taking the natural and more human course of throwing +the sitter out of window? + +A strict rule is not only necessary for ruling; it is also necessary for +rebelling. This fixed and familiar ideal is necessary to any sort of +revolution. Man will sometimes act slowly upon new ideas; but he will +only act swiftly upon old ideas. If I am merely to float or fade or +evolve, it may be towards something anarchic; but if I am to riot, it +must be for something respectable. This is the whole weakness of certain +schools of progress and moral evolution. They suggest that there has +been a slow movement towards morality, with an imperceptible ethical +change in every year or at every instant. There is only one great +disadvantage in this theory. It talks of a slow movement towards +justice; but it does not permit a swift movement. A man is not allowed +to leap up and declare a certain state of things to be intrinsically +intolerable. To make the matter clear, it is better to take a specific +example. Certain of the idealistic vegetarians, such as Mr. Salt, say +that the time has now come for eating no meat; by implication they +assume that at one time it was right to eat meat, and they suggest (in +words that could be quoted) that some day it may be wrong to eat milk +and eggs. I do not discuss here the question of what is justice to +animals. I only say that whatever is justice ought, under given +conditions, to be prompt justice. If an animal is wronged, we ought to +be able to rush to his rescue. But how can we rush if we are, perhaps, +in advance of our time? How can we rush to catch a train which may not +arrive for a few centuries? How can I denounce a man for skinning cats, +if he is only now what I may possibly become in drinking a glass of +milk? A splendid and insane Russian sect ran about taking all the cattle +out of all the carts. How can I pluck up courage to take the horse out +of my hansom-cab, when I do not know whether my evolutionary watch is +only a little fast or the cabman's a little slow? Suppose I say to a +sweater, "Slavery suited one stage of evolution." And suppose he +answers, "And sweating suits this stage of evolution." How can I answer +if there is no eternal test? If sweaters can be behind the current +morality, why should not philanthropists be in front of it? What on +earth is the current morality, except in its literal sense--the morality +that is always running away? + +Thus we may say that a permanent ideal is as necessary to the innovator +as to the conservative; it is necessary whether we wish the king's +orders to be promptly executed or whether we only wish the king to be +promptly executed. The guillotine has many sins, but to do it justice +there is nothing evolutionary about it. The favourite evolutionary +argument finds its best answer in the axe. The Evolutionist says, "Where +do you draw the line?" the Revolutionist answers, "I draw it _here_: +exactly between your head and body." There must at any given moment be +an abstract right and wrong if any blow is to be struck; there must be +something eternal if there is to be anything sudden. Therefore for all +intelligible human purposes, for altering things or for keeping things +as they are, for founding a system for ever, as in China, or for +altering it every month as in the early French Revolution, it is equally +necessary that the vision should be a fixed vision. This is our first +requirement. + +When I had written this down, I felt once again the presence of +something else in the discussion: as a man hears a church bell above the +sound of the street. Something seemed to be saying, "My ideal at least +is fixed; for it was fixed before the foundations of the world. My +vision of perfection assuredly cannot be altered; for it is called +Eden. You may alter the place to which you are going; but you cannot +alter the place from which you have come. To the orthodox there must +always be a case for revolution; for in the hearts of men God has been +put under the feet of Satan. In the upper world hell once rebelled +against heaven. But in this world heaven is rebelling against hell. For +the orthodox there can always be a revolution; for a revolution is a +restoration. At any instant you may strike a blow for the perfection +which no man has seen since Adam. No unchanging custom, no changing +evolution can make the original good anything but good. Man may have had +concubines as long as cows have had horns: still they are not a part of +him if they are sinful. Men may have been under oppression ever since +fish were under water; still they ought not to be, if oppression is +sinful. The chain may seem as natural to the slave, or the paint to the +harlot, as does the plume to the bird or the burrow to the fox; still +they are not, if they are sinful. I lift my prehistoric legend to defy +all your history. Your vision is not merely a fixture: it is a fact." I +paused to note the new coincidence of Christianity: but I passed on. + +I passed on to the next necessity of any ideal of progress. Some people +(as we have said) seem to believe in an automatic and impersonal +progress in the nature of things. But it is clear that no political +activity can be encouraged by saying that progress is natural and +inevitable; that is not a reason for being active, but rather a reason +for being lazy. If we are bound to improve, we need not trouble to +improve. The pure doctrine of progress is the best of all reasons for +not being a progressive. But it is to none of these obvious comments +that I wish primarily to call attention. + +The only arresting point is this: that if we suppose improvement to be +natural, it must be fairly simple. The world might conceivably be +working towards one consummation, but hardly towards any particular +arrangement of many qualities. To take our original simile: Nature by +herself may be growing more blue; that is, a process so simple that it +might be impersonal. But Nature cannot be making a careful picture made +of many picked colours, unless Nature is personal. If the end of the +world were mere darkness or mere light it might come as slowly and +inevitably as dusk or dawn. But if the end of the world is to be a piece +of elaborate and artistic chiaroscuro, then there must be design in it, +either human or divine. The world, through mere time, might grow black +like an old picture, or white like an old coat; but if it is turned +into a particular piece of black and white art--then there is an artist. + +If the distinction be not evident, I give an ordinary instance. We +constantly hear a particularly cosmic creed from the modern +humanitarians; I use the word humanitarian in the ordinary sense, as +meaning one who upholds the claims of all creatures against those of +humanity. They suggest that through the ages we have been growing more +and more humane, that is to say, that one after another, groups or +sections of beings, slaves, children, women, cows, or what not, have +been gradually admitted to mercy or to justice. They say that we once +thought it right to eat men (we didn't); but I am not here concerned +with their history, which is highly unhistorical. As a fact, +anthropophagy is certainly a decadent thing, not a primitive one. It is +much more likely that modern men will eat human flesh out of affectation +than that primitive man ever ate it out of ignorance. I am here only +following the outlines of their argument, which consists in maintaining +that man has been progressively more lenient, first to citizens, then +to slaves, then to animals, and then (presumably) to plants. I think it +wrong to sit on a man. Soon, I shall think it wrong to sit on a horse. +Eventually (I suppose) I shall think it wrong to sit on a chair. That is +the drive of the argument. And for this argument it can be said that it +is possible to talk of it in terms of evolution or inevitable progress. +A perpetual tendency to touch fewer and fewer things might, one feels, +be a mere brute unconscious tendency, like that of a species to produce +fewer and fewer children. This drift may be really evolutionary, because +it is stupid. + +Darwinism can be used to back up two mad moralities, but it cannot be +used to back up a single sane one. The kinship and competition of all +living creatures can be used as a reason for being insanely cruel or +insanely sentimental; but not for a healthy love of animals. On the +evolutionary basis you may be inhumane, or you may be absurdly humane; +but you cannot be human. That you and a tiger are one may be a reason +for being tender to a tiger. Or it may be a reason for being as cruel as +the tiger. It is one way to train the tiger to imitate you, it is a +shorter way to imitate the tiger. But in neither case does evolution +tell you how to treat a tiger reasonably, that is, to admire his +stripes while avoiding his claws. + +If you want to treat a tiger reasonably, you must go back to the garden +of Eden. For the obstinate reminder continued to recur: only the +supernatural has taken a sane view of Nature. The essence of all +pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really in this +proposition: that Nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard +Nature as a mother, you discover that she is a step-mother. The main +point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is +our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same +father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to +imitate. This gives to the typically Christian pleasure in this earth a +strange touch of lightness that is almost frivolity. Nature was a solemn +mother to the worshippers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother +to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of +Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is a sister, and +even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as +well as loved. + +This, however, is hardly our main point at present; I have admitted it +only in order to show how constantly, and as it were accidentally, the +key would fit the smallest doors. Our main point is here, that if there +be a mere trend of impersonal improvement in Nature, it must presumably +be a simple trend towards some simple triumph. One can imagine that some +automatic tendency in biology might work for giving us longer and longer +noses. But the question is, do we want to have longer and longer noses? +I fancy not; I believe that we most of us want to say to our noses, +"Thus far, and no farther; and here shall thy proud point be stayed": we +require a nose of such length as may ensure an interesting face. But we +cannot imagine a mere biological trend towards producing interesting +faces; because an interesting face is one particular arrangement of +eyes, nose, and mouth, in a most complex relation to each other. +Proportion cannot be a drift: it is either an accident or a design. So +with the ideal of human morality and its relation to the humanitarians +and the anti-humanitarians. It is conceivable that we are going more and +more to keep our hands off things: not to drive horses; not to pick +flowers. We may eventually be bound not to disturb a man's mind even by +argument; not to disturb the sleep of birds even by coughing. The +ultimate apotheosis would appear to be that of a man sitting quite +still, not daring to stir for fear of disturbing a fly, nor to eat for +fear of incommoding a microbe. To so crude a consummation as that we +might perhaps unconsciously drift. But do we want so crude a +consummation? Similarly, we might unconsciously evolve along the +opposite or Nietzscheian line of development--superman crushing superman +in one tower of tyrants until the universe is smashed up for fun. But do +we want the universe smashed up for fun? Is it not quite clear that what +we really hope for is one particular management and proposition of these +two things; a certain amount of restraint and respect, a certain amount +of energy and mastery. If our life is ever really as beautiful as a +fairy-tale, we shall have to remember that all the beauty of a +fairy-tale lies in this: that the prince has a wonder which just stops +short of being fear. If he is afraid of the giant, there is an end of +him; but also if he is not astonished at the giant, there is an end of +the fairy-tale. The whole point depends upon his being at once humble +enough to wonder, and haughty enough to defy. So our attitude to the +giant of the world must not merely be increasing delicacy or increasing +contempt: it must be one particular proportion of the two--which is +exactly right. We must have in us enough reverence for all things +outside us to make us tread fearfully on the grass. We must also have +enough disdain for all things outside us, to make us, on due occasion, +spit at the stars. Yet these two things (if we are to be good or happy) +must be combined, not in any combination, but in one particular +combination. The perfect happiness of men on the earth (if it ever +comes) will not be a flat and solid thing, like the satisfaction of +animals. It will be an exact and perilous balance; like that of a +desperate romance. Man must have just enough faith in himself to have +adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them. + +This, then, is our second requirement for the ideal of progress. First, +it must be fixed; second, it must be composite. It must not (if it is to +satisfy our souls) be the mere victory of some one thing swallowing up +everything else, love or pride or peace or adventure; it must be a +definite picture composed of these elements in their best proportion and +relation. I am not concerned at this moment to deny that some such good +culmination may be, by the constitution of things, reserved for the +human race. I only point out that if this composite happiness is fixed +for us it must be fixed by some mind; for only a mind can place the +exact proportions of a composite happiness. If the beatification of the +world is a mere work of nature, then it must be as simple as the +freezing of the world, or the burning up of the world. But if the +beatification of the world is not a work of nature but a work of art, +then it involves an artist. And here again my contemplation was cloven +by the ancient voice which said, "I could have told you all this a long +time ago. If there is any certain progress it can only be my kind of +progress, the progress towards a complete city of virtues and +dominations where righteousness and peace contrive to kiss each other. +An impersonal force might be leading you to a wilderness of perfect +flatness or a peak of perfect height. But only a personal God can +possibly be leading you (if, indeed, you are being led) to a city with +just streets and architectural proportions, a city in which each of you +can contribute exactly the right amount of your own colour to the +many-coloured coat of Joseph." + +Twice again, therefore, Christianity had come in with the exact answer +that I required. I had said, "The ideal must be fixed," and the Church +had answered, "Mine is literally fixed, for it existed before anything +else." I said secondly, "It must be artistically combined, like a +picture"; and the Church answered, "Mine is quite literally a picture, +for I know who painted it." Then I went on to the third thing, which, as +it seemed to me, was needed for an Utopia or goal of progress. And of +all the three it is infinitely the hardest to express. Perhaps it might +be put thus: that we need watchfulness even in Utopia, lest we fall from +Utopia as we fell from Eden. + +We have remarked that one reason offered for being a progressive is that +things naturally tend to grow better. But the only real reason for being +a progressive is that things naturally tend to grow worse. The +corruption in things is not only the best argument for being +progressive; it is also the only argument against being conservative. +The conservative theory would really be quite sweeping and unanswerable +if it were not for this one fact. But all conservatism is based upon the +idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you +do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change. +If you leave a white post alone it will soon be a black post. If you +particularly want it to be white you must be always painting it again; +that is, you must be always having a revolution. Briefly, if you want +the old white post you must have a new white post. But this which is +true even of inanimate things is in a quite special and terrible sense +true of all human things. An almost unnatural vigilance is really +required of the citizen because of the horrible rapidity with which +human institutions grow old. It is the custom in passing romance and +journalism to talk of men suffering under old tyrannies. But, as a fact, +men have almost always suffered under new tyrannies; under tyrannies +that had been public liberties hardly twenty years before. Thus England +went mad with joy over the patriotic monarchy of Elizabeth; and then +(almost immediately afterwards) went mad with rage in the trap of the +tyranny of Charles the First. So, again, in France the monarchy became +intolerable, not just after it had been tolerated, but just after it had +been adored. The son of Louis the well-beloved was Louis the +guillotined. So in the same way in England in the nineteenth century the +Radical manufacturer was entirely trusted as a mere tribune of the +people, until suddenly we heard the cry of the Socialist that he was a +tyrant eating the people like bread. So again, we have almost up to the +last instant trusted the newspapers as organs of public opinion. Just +recently some of us have seen (not slowly, but with a start) that they +are obviously nothing of the kind. They are, by the nature of the case, +the hobbies of a few rich men. We have not any need to rebel against +antiquity; we have to rebel against novelty. It is the new rulers, the +capitalist or the editor, who really hold up the modern world. There is +no fear that a modern king will attempt to override the constitution; it +is more likely that he will ignore the constitution and work behind its +back; he will take no advantage of his kingly power; it is more likely +that he will take advantage of his kingly powerlessness, of the fact +that he is free from criticism and publicity. For the king is the most +private person of our time. It will not be necessary for any one to +fight again against the proposal of a censorship of the press. We do not +need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship by the press. + +This startling swiftness with which popular systems turn oppressive is +the third fact for which we shall ask our perfect theory of progress to +allow. It must always be on the look out for every privilege being +abused, for every working right becoming a wrong. In this matter I am +entirely on the side of the revolutionists. They are really right to be +always suspecting human institutions; they are right not to put their +trust in princes nor in any child of man. The chieftain chosen to be the +friend of the people becomes the enemy of the people; the newspaper +started to tell the truth now exists to prevent the truth being told. +Here, I say, I felt that I was really at last on the side of the +revolutionary. And then I caught my breath again: for I remembered that +I was once again on the side of the orthodox. + +Christianity spoke again and said, "I have always maintained that men +were naturally backsliders; that human virtue tended of its own nature +to rust or to rot; I have always said that human beings as such go +wrong, especially happy human beings, especially proud and prosperous +human beings. This eternal revolution, this suspicion sustained through +centuries, you (being a vague modern) call the doctrine of progress. If +you were a philosopher you would call it, as I do, the doctrine of +original sin. You may call it the cosmic advance as much as you like; I +call it what it is--the Fall. + +I have spoken of orthodoxy coming in like a sword; here I confess it +came in like a battle-axe. For really (when I came to think of it) +Christianity is the only thing left that has any real right to question +the power of the well-nurtured or the well-bred. I have listened often +enough to Socialists, or even to democrats, saying that the physical +conditions of the poor must of necessity make them mentally and morally +degraded. I have listened to scientific men (and there are still +scientific men not opposed to democracy) saying that if we give the poor +healthier conditions vice and wrong will disappear. I have listened to +them with a horrible attention, with a hideous fascination. For it was +like watching a man energetically sawing from the tree the branch he is +sitting on. If these happy democrats could prove their case, they would +strike democracy dead. If the poor are thus utterly demoralized, it may +or may not be practical to raise them. But it is certainly quite +practical to disfranchise them. If the man with a bad bedroom cannot +give a good vote, then the first and swiftest deduction is that he shall +give no vote. The governing class may not unreasonably say, "It may take +us some time to reform his bedroom. But if he is the brute you say, it +will take him very little time to ruin our country. Therefore we will +take your hint and not give him the chance." It fills me with horrible +amusement to observe the way in which the earnest Socialist +industriously lays the foundation of all aristocracy, expatiating +blandly upon the evident unfitness of the poor to rule. It is like +listening to somebody at an evening party apologising for entering +without evening dress, and explaining that he had recently been +intoxicated, had a personal habit of taking off his clothes in the +street, and had, moreover, only just changed from prison uniform. At any +moment, one feels, the host might say that really, if it was as bad as +that, he need not come in at all. So it is when the ordinary Socialist, +with a beaming face, proves that the poor, after their smashing +experiences, cannot be really trustworthy. At any moment the rich may +say, "Very well, then, we won't trust them," and bang the door in his +face. On the basis of Mr. Blatchford's view of heredity and environment, +the case for the aristocracy is quite overwhelming. If clean homes and +clean air make clean souls, why not give the power (for the present at +any rate) to those who undoubtedly have the clean air? If better +conditions will make the poor more fit to govern themselves, why should +not better conditions already make the rich more fit to govern them? On +the ordinary environment argument the matter is fairly manifest. The +comfortable class must be merely our vanguard in Utopia. + +Is there any answer to the proposition that those who have had the best +opportunities will probably be our best guides? Is there any answer to +the argument that those who have breathed clean air had better decide +for those who have breathed foul? As far as I know, there is only one +answer, and that answer is Christianity. Only the Christian Church can +offer any rational objection to a complete confidence in the rich. For +she has maintained from the beginning that the danger was not in man's +environment, but in man. Further, she has maintained that if we come to +talk of a dangerous environment, the most dangerous environment of all +is the commodious environment. I know that the most modern manufacture +has been really occupied in trying to produce an abnormally large +needle. I know that the most recent biologists have been chiefly anxious +to discover a very small camel. But if we diminish the camel to his +smallest, or open the eye of the needle to its largest--if, in short, +we assume the words of Christ to have meant the very least that they +could mean, His words must at the very least mean this--that rich men +are not very likely to be morally trustworthy. Christianity even when +watered down is hot enough to boil all modern society to rags. The mere +minimum of the Church would be a deadly ultimatum to the world. For the +whole modern world is absolutely based on the assumption, not that the +rich are necessary (which is tenable), but that the rich are +trustworthy, which (for a Christian) is not tenable. You will hear +everlastingly, in all discussions about newspapers, companies, +aristocracies, or party politics, this argument that the rich man cannot +be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has +been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man. The whole case for +Christianity is that a man who is dependent upon the luxuries of this +life is a corrupt man, spiritually corrupt, politically corrupt, +financially corrupt. There is one thing that Christ and all the +Christian saints have said with a sort of savage monotony. They have +said simply that to be rich is to be in peculiar danger of moral wreck. +It is not demonstrably un-Christian to kill the rich as violators of +definable justice. It is not demonstrably un-Christian to crown the +rich as convenient rulers of society. It is not certainly un-Christian +to rebel against the rich or to submit to the rich. But it is quite +certainly un-Christian to trust the rich, to regard the rich as more +morally safe than the poor. A Christian may consistently say, "I respect +that man's rank, although he takes bribes." But a Christian cannot say, +as all modern men are saying at lunch and breakfast, "a man of that rank +would not take bribes." For it is a part of Christian dogma that any man +in any rank may take bribes. It is a part of Christian dogma; it also +happens by a curious coincidence that it is a part of obvious human +history. When people say that a man "in that position" would be +incorruptible, there is no need to bring Christianity into the +discussion. Was Lord Bacon a bootblack? Was the Duke of Marlborough a +crossing sweeper? In the best Utopia, I must be prepared for the moral +fall of _any_ man in _any_ position at _any_ moment; especially for my +fall from my position at this moment. + +Much vague and sentimental journalism has been poured out to the effect +that Christianity is akin to democracy, and most of it is scarcely +strong or clear enough to refute the fact that the two things have often +quarrelled. The real ground upon which Christianity and democracy are +one is very much deeper. The one specially and peculiarly un-Christian +idea is the idea of Carlyle--the idea that the man should rule who feels +that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is heathen. If our +faith comments on government at all, its comment must be this--that the +man should rule who does _not_ think that he can rule. Carlyle's hero +may say, "I will be king"; but the Christian saint must say, "Nolo +episcopari." If the great paradox of Christianity means anything, it +means this--that we must take the crown in our hands, and go hunting in +dry places and dark corners of the earth until we find the one man who +feels himself unfit to wear it. Carlyle was quite wrong; we have not got +to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown +the much more exceptional man who knows he can't. + +Now, this is one of the two or three vital defences of working +democracy. The mere machinery of voting is not democracy, though at +present it is not easy to effect any simpler democratic method. But even +the machinery of voting is profoundly Christian in this practical +sense--that it is an attempt to get at the opinion of those who would be +too modest to offer it. It is a mystical adventure; it is specially +trusting those who do not trust themselves. That enigma is strictly +peculiar to Christendom. There is nothing really humble about the +abnegation of the Buddhist; the mild Hindoo is mild, but he is not meek. +But there is something psychologically Christian about the idea of +seeking for the opinion of the obscure rather than taking the obvious +course of accepting the opinion of the prominent. To say that voting is +particularly Christian may seem somewhat curious. To say that canvassing +is Christian may seem quite crazy. But canvassing is very Christian in +its primary idea. It is encouraging the humble; it is saying to the +modest man, "Friend, go up higher." Or if there is some slight defect in +canvassing, that is in its perfect and rounded piety, it is only because +it may possibly neglect to encourage the modesty of the canvasser. + +Aristocracy is not an institution: aristocracy is a sin; generally a +very venial one. It is merely the drift or slide of men into a sort of +natural pomposity and praise of the powerful, which is the most easy and +obvious affair in the world. + +It is one of the hundred answers to the fugitive perversion of modern +"force" that the promptest and boldest agencies are also the most +fragile or full of sensibility. The swiftest things are the softest +things. A bird is active, because a bird is soft. A stone is helpless, +because a stone is hard. The stone must by its own nature go downwards, +because hardness is weakness. The bird can of its nature go upwards, +because fragility is force. In perfect force there is a kind of +frivolity, an airiness that can maintain itself in the air. Modern +investigators of miraculous history have solemnly admitted that a +characteristic of the great saints is their power of "levitation." They +might go further; a characteristic of the great saints is their power of +levity. Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly. This +has been always the instinct of Christendom, and especially the instinct +of Christian art. Remember how Fra Angelico represented all his angels, +not only as birds, but almost as butterflies. Remember how the most +earnest mediæval art was full of light and fluttering draperies, of +quick and capering feet. It was the one thing that the modern +Pre-raphaelites could not imitate in the real Pre-raphaelites. +Burne-Jones could never recover the deep levity of the Middle Ages. In +the old Christian pictures the sky over every figure is like a blue or +gold parachute. Every figure seems ready to fly up and float about in +the heavens. The tattered cloak of the beggar will bear him up like the +rayed plumes of the angels. But the kings in their heavy gold and the +proud in their robes of purple will all of their nature sink downwards, +for pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward +drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One "settles down" into a +sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay +self-forgetfulness. A man "falls" into a brown study; he reaches up at a +blue sky. Seriousness is not a virtue. It would be a heresy, but a much +more sensible heresy, to say that seriousness is a vice. It is really a +natural trend or lapse into taking one's self gravely, because it is the +easiest thing to do. It is much easier to write a good _Times_ leading +article than a good joke in _Punch_. For solemnity flows out of men +naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be +light. Satan fell by the force of gravity. + +Now, it is the peculiar honour of Europe since it has been Christian +that while it has had aristocracy it has always at the back of its heart +treated aristocracy as a weakness--generally as a weakness that must be +allowed for. If any one wishes to appreciate this point, let him go +outside Christianity into some other philosophical atmosphere. Let him, +for instance, compare the classes of Europe with the castes of India. +There aristocracy is far more awful, because it is far more +intellectual. It is seriously felt that the scale of classes is a scale +of spiritual values; that the baker is better than the butcher in an +invisible and sacred sense. But no Christianity, not even the most +ignorant or perverse, ever suggested that a baronet was better than a +butcher in that sacred sense. No Christianity, however ignorant or +extravagant, ever suggested that a duke would not be damned. In pagan +society there may have been (I do not know) some such serious division +between the free man and the slave. But in Christian society we have +always thought the gentleman a sort of joke, though I admit that in some +great crusades and councils he earned the right to be called a practical +joke. But we in Europe never really and at the root of our souls took +aristocracy seriously. It is only an occasional non-European alien (such +as Dr. Oscar Levy, the only intelligent Nietzscheite) who can even +manage for a moment to take aristocracy seriously. It may be a mere +patriotic bias, though I do not think so, but it seems to me that the +English aristocracy is not only the type, but is the crown and flower of +all actual aristocracies; it has all the oligarchical virtues as well as +all the defects. It is casual, it is kind, it is courageous in obvious +matters; but it has one great merit that overlaps even these. The great +and very obvious merit of the English aristocracy is that nobody could +possibly take it seriously. + +In short, I had spelled out slowly, as usual, the need for an equal law +in Utopia; and, as usual, I found that Christianity had been there +before me. The whole history of my Utopia has the same amusing sadness. +I was always rushing out of my architectural study with plans for a new +turret only to find it sitting up there in the sunlight, shining, and a +thousand years old. For me, in the ancient and partly in the modern +sense, God answered the prayer, "Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings." +Without vanity, I really think there was a moment when I could have +invented the marriage vow (as an institution) out of my own head; but I +discovered, with a sigh, that it had been invented already. But, since +it would be too long a business to show how, fact by fact and inch by +inch, my own conception of Utopia was only answered in the New +Jerusalem, I will take this one case of the matter of marriage as +indicating the converging drift, I may say the converging crash of all +the rest. + +When the ordinary opponents of Socialism talk about impossibilities and +alterations in human nature they always miss an important distinction. +In modern ideal conceptions of society there are some desires that are +possibly not attainable: but there are some desires that are not +desirable. That all men should live in equally beautiful houses is a +dream that may or may not be attained. But that all men should live in +the same beautiful house is not a dream at all; it is a nightmare. That +a man should love all old women is an ideal that may not be attainable. +But that a man should regard all old women exactly as he regards his +mother is not only an unattainable ideal, but an ideal which ought not +to be attained. I do not know if the reader agrees with me in these +examples; but I will add the example which has always affected me most. +I could never conceive or tolerate any Utopia which did not leave to me +the liberty for which I chiefly care, the liberty to bind myself. +Complete anarchy would not merely make it impossible to have any +discipline or fidelity; it would also make it impossible to have any +fun. To take an obvious instance, it would not be worth while to bet if +a bet were not binding. The dissolution of all contracts would not only +ruin morality but spoil sport. Now betting and such sports are only the +stunted and twisted shapes of the original instinct of man for adventure +and romance, of which much has been said in these pages. And the perils, +rewards, punishments, and fulfilments of an adventure must be _real_, or +the adventure is only a shifting and heartless nightmare. If I bet I +must be made to pay, or there is no poetry in betting. If I challenge I +must be made to fight, or there is no poetry in challenging. If I vow to +be faithful I must be cursed when I am unfaithful, or there is no fun in +vowing. You could not even make a fairy tale from the experiences of a +man who, when he was swallowed by a whale, might find himself at the top +of the Eiffel Tower, or when he was turned into a frog might begin to +behave like a flamingo. For the purpose even of the wildest romance, +results must be real; results must be irrevocable. Christian marriage is +the great example of a real and irrevocable result; and that is why it +is the chief subject and centre of all our romantic writing. And this +is my last instance of the things that I should ask, and ask +imperatively, of any social paradise; I should ask to be kept to my +bargain, to have my oaths and engagements taken seriously; I should ask +Utopia to avenge my honour on myself. + +All my modern Utopian friends look at each other rather doubtfully, for +their ultimate hope is the dissolution of all special ties. But again I +seem to hear, like a kind of echo, an answer from beyond the world. "You +will have real obligations, and therefore real adventures when you get +to my Utopia. But the hardest obligation and the steepest adventure is +to get there." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII.--_The Romance of Orthodoxy_ + + +It is customary to complain of the bustle and strenuousness of our +epoch. But in truth the chief mark of our epoch is a profound laziness +and fatigue; and the fact is that the real laziness is the cause of the +apparent bustle. Take one quite external case; the streets are noisy +with taxicabs and motor-cars; but this is not due to human activity but +to human repose. There would be less bustle if there were more activity, +if people were simply walking about. Our world would be more silent if +it were more strenuous. And this which is true of the apparent physical +bustle is true also of the apparent bustle of the intellect. Most of the +machinery of modern language is labour-saving machinery; and it saves +mental labour very much more than it ought. Scientific phrases are used +like scientific wheels and piston-rods to make swifter and smoother yet +the path of the comfortable. Long words go rattling by us like long +railway trains. We know they are carrying thousands who are too tired or +too indolent to walk and think for themselves. It is a good exercise to +try for once in a way to express any opinion one holds in words of one +syllable. If you say "The social utility of the indeterminate sentence +is recognised by all criminologists as a part of our sociological +evolution towards a more humane and scientific view of punishment," you +can go on talking like that for hours with hardly a movement of the grey +matter inside your skull. But if you begin "I wish Jones to go to gaol +and Brown to say when Jones shall come out," you will discover, with a +thrill of horror, that you are obliged to think. The long words are not +the hard words, it is the short words that are hard. There is much more +metaphysical subtlety in the word "damn" than in the word +"degeneration." + +But these long comfortable words that save modern people the toil of +reasoning have one particular aspect in which they are especially +ruinous and confusing. This difficulty occurs when the same long word is +used in different connections to mean quite different things. Thus, to +take a well-known instance, the word "idealist" has one meaning as a +piece of philosophy and quite another as a piece of moral rhetoric. In +the same way the scientific materialists have had just reason to +complain of people mixing up "materialist" as a term of cosmology with +"materialist" as a moral taunt. So, to take a cheaper instance, the man +who hates "progressives" in London always calls himself a "progressive" +in South Africa. + +A confusion quite as unmeaning as this has arisen in connection with the +word "liberal" as applied to religion and as applied to politics and +society. It is often suggested that all Liberals ought to be +freethinkers, because they ought to love everything that is free. You +might just as well say that all idealists ought to be High Churchmen, +because they ought to love everything that is high. You might as well +say that Low Churchmen ought to like Low Mass, or that Broad Churchmen +ought to like broad jokes. The thing is a mere accident of words. In +actual modern Europe a free-thinker does not mean a man who thinks for +himself. It means a man who, having thought for himself, has come to one +particular class of conclusions, the material origin of phenomena, the +impossibility of miracles, the improbability of personal immortality and +so on. And none of these ideas are particularly liberal. Nay, indeed +almost all these ideas are definitely illiberal, as it is the purpose of +this chapter to show. + +In the few following pages I propose to point out as rapidly as +possible that on every single one of the matters most strongly insisted +on by liberalisers of theology their effect upon social practice would +be definitely illiberal. Almost every contemporary proposal to bring +freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the +world. For freeing the church now does not even mean freeing it in all +directions. It means freeing that peculiar set of dogmas loosely called +scientific, dogmas of monism, of pantheism, or of Arianism, or of +necessity. And every one of these (and we will take them one by one) can +be shown to be the natural ally of oppression. In fact, it is a +remarkable circumstance (indeed not so very remarkable when one comes to +think of it) that most things are the allies of oppression. There is +only one thing that can never go past a certain point in its alliance +with oppression--and that is orthodoxy. I may, it is true, twist +orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a +German philosophy to justify him entirely. + +Now let us take in order the innovations that are the notes of the new +theology or the modernist church. We concluded the last chapter with the +discovery of one of them. The very doctrine which is called the most +old-fashioned was found to be the only safeguard of the new democracies +of the earth. The doctrine seemingly most unpopular was found to be the +only strength of the people. In short, we found that the only logical +negation of oligarchy was in the affirmation of original sin. So it is, +I maintain, in all the other cases. + +I take the most obvious instance first, the case of miracles. For some +extraordinary reason, there is a fixed notion that it is more liberal to +disbelieve in miracles than to believe in them. Why, I cannot imagine, +nor can anybody tell me. For some inconceivable cause a "broad" or +"liberal" clergyman always means a man who wishes at least to diminish +the number of miracles; it never means a man who wishes to increase that +number. It always means a man who is free to disbelieve that Christ came +out of His grave; it never means a man who is free to believe that his +own aunt came out of her grave. It is common to find trouble in a parish +because the parish priest cannot admit that St. Peter walked on water; +yet how rarely do we find trouble in a parish because the clergyman says +that his father walked on the Serpentine? And this is not because (as +the swift secularist debater would immediately retort) miracles cannot +be believed in our experience. It is not because "miracles do not +happen," as in the dogma which Matthew Arnold recited with simple faith. +More supernatural things are _alleged_ to have happened in our time than +would have been possible eighty years ago. Men of science believe in +such marvels much more than they did: the most perplexing, and even +horrible, prodigies of mind and spirit are always being unveiled in +modern psychology. Things that the old science at least would frankly +have rejected as miracles are hourly being asserted by the new science. +The only thing which is still old-fashioned enough to reject miracles is +the New Theology. But in truth this notion that it is "free" to deny +miracles has nothing to do with the evidence for or against them. It is +a lifeless verbal prejudice of which the original life and beginning was +not in the freedom of thought, but simply in the dogma of materialism. +The man of the nineteenth century did not disbelieve in the Resurrection +because his liberal Christianity allowed him to doubt it. He disbelieved +in it because his very strict materialism did not allow him to believe +it. Tennyson, a very typical nineteenth-century man, uttered one of the +instinctive truisms of his contemporaries when he said that there was +faith in their honest doubt. There was indeed. Those words have a +profound and even a horrible truth. In their doubt of miracles there was +a faith in a fixed and godless fate; a deep and sincere faith in the +incurable routine of the cosmos. The doubts of the agnostic were only +the dogmas of the monist. + +Of the fact and evidence of the supernatural I will speak afterwards. +Here we are only concerned with this clear point; that in so far as the +liberal idea of freedom can be said to be on either side in the +discussion about miracles, it is obviously on the side of miracles. +Reform or (in the only tolerable sense) progress means simply the +gradual control of matter by mind. A miracle simply means the swift +control of matter by mind. If you wish to feed the people, you may think +that feeding them miraculously in the wilderness is impossible--but you +cannot think it illiberal. If you really want poor children to go to the +seaside, you cannot think it illiberal that they should go there on +flying dragons; you can only think it unlikely. A holiday, like +Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the +liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you +cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea. The Catholic +Church believed that man and God both had a sort of spiritual freedom. +Calvinism took away the freedom from man, but left it to God. Scientific +materialism binds the Creator Himself; it chains up God as the +Apocalypse chained the devil. It leaves nothing free in the universe. +And those who assist this process are called the "liberal theologians." + +This, as I say, is the lightest and most evident case. The assumption +that there is something in the doubt of miracles akin to liberality or +reform is literally the opposite of the truth. If a man cannot believe +in miracles there is an end of the matter; he is not particularly +liberal, but he is perfectly honourable and logical, which are much +better things. But if he can believe in miracles, he is certainly the +more liberal for doing so; because they mean first, the freedom of the +soul, and secondly, its control over the tyranny of circumstance. +Sometimes this truth is ignored in a singularly naive way, even by the +ablest men. For instance, Mr. Bernard Shaw speaks with a hearty +old-fashioned contempt for the idea of miracles, as if they were a sort +of breach of faith on the part of nature: he seems strangely +unconscious that miracles are only the final flowers of his own +favourite tree, the doctrine of the omnipotence of will. Just in the +same way he calls the desire for immortality a paltry selfishness, +forgetting that he has just called the desire for life a healthy and +heroic selfishness. How can it be noble to wish to make one's life +infinite and yet mean to wish to make it immortal? No, if it is +desirable that man should triumph over the cruelty of nature or custom, +then miracles are certainly desirable; we will discuss afterwards +whether they are possible. + +But I must pass on to the larger cases of this curious error; the notion +that the "liberalising" of religion in some way helps the liberation of +the world. The second example of it can be found in the question of +pantheism--or rather of a certain modern attitude which is often called +immanentism, and which often is Buddhism. But this is so much more +difficult a matter that I must approach it with rather more preparation. + +The things said most confidently by advanced persons to crowded +audiences are generally those quite opposite to the fact; it is actually +our truisms that are untrue. Here is a case. There is a phrase of facile +liberality uttered again and again at ethical societies and parliaments +of religion: "the religions of the earth differ in rites and forms, but +they are the same in what they teach." It is false; it is the opposite +of the fact. The religions of the earth do _not_ greatly differ in rites +and forms; they do greatly differ in what they teach. It is as if a man +were to say, "Do not be misled by the fact that the _Church Times_ and +the _Freethinker_ look utterly different, that one is painted on vellum +and the other carved on marble, that one is triangular and the other +hectagonal; read them and you will see that they say the same thing." +The truth is, of course, that they are alike in everything except in the +fact that they don't say the same thing. An atheist stockbroker in +Surbiton looks exactly like a Swedenborgian stockbroker in Wimbledon. +You may walk round and round them and subject them to the most personal +and offensive study without seeing anything Swedenborgian in the hat or +anything particularly godless in the umbrella. It is exactly in their +souls that they are divided. So the truth is that the difficulty of all +the creeds of the earth is not as alleged in this cheap maxim: that they +agree in meaning, but differ in machinery. It is exactly the opposite. +They agree in machinery; almost every great religion on earth works +with the same external methods, with priests, scriptures, altars, sworn +brotherhoods, special feasts. They agree in the mode of teaching; what +they differ about is the thing to be taught. Pagan optimists and Eastern +pessimists would both have temples, just as Liberals and Tories would +both have newspapers. Creeds that exist to destroy each other both have +scriptures, just as armies that exist to destroy each other both have +guns. + +The great example of this alleged identity of all human religions is the +alleged spiritual identity of Buddhism and Christianity. Those who adopt +this theory generally avoid the ethics of most other creeds, except, +indeed, Confucianism, which they like because it is not a creed. But +they are cautious in their praises of Mahommedanism, generally confining +themselves to imposing its morality only upon the refreshment of the +lower classes. They seldom suggest the Mahommedan view of marriage (for +which there is a great deal to be said), and towards Thugs and fetish +worshippers their attitude may even be called cold. But in the case of +the great religion of Gautama they feel sincerely a similarity. + +Students of popular science, like Mr. Blatchford, are always insisting +that Christianity and Buddhism are very much alike, especially +Buddhism. This is generally believed, and I believed it myself until I +read a book giving the reasons for it. The reasons were of two kinds: +resemblances that meant nothing because they were common to all +humanity, and resemblances which were not resemblances at all. The +author solemnly explained that the two creeds were alike in things in +which all creeds are alike, or else he described them as alike in some +point in which they are quite obviously different. Thus, as a case of +the first class, he said that both Christ and Buddha were called by the +divine voice coming out of the sky, as if you would expect the divine +voice to come out of the coal-cellar. Or, again, it was gravely urged +that these two Eastern teachers, by a singular coincidence, both had to +do with the washing of feet. You might as well say that it was a +remarkable coincidence that they both had feet to wash. And the other +class of similarities were those which simply were not similar. Thus +this reconciler of the two religions draws earnest attention to the fact +that at certain religious feasts the robe of the Lama is rent in pieces +out of respect, and the remnants highly valued. But this is the reverse +of a resemblance, for the garments of Christ were not rent in pieces +out of respect, but out of derision; and the remnants were not highly +valued except for what they would fetch in the rag shops. It is rather +like alluding to the obvious connection between the two ceremonies of +the sword: when it taps a man's shoulder, and when it cuts off his head. +It is not at all similar for the man. These scraps of puerile pedantry +would indeed matter little if it were not also true that the alleged +philosophical resemblances are also of these two kinds, either proving +too much or not proving anything. That Buddhism approves of mercy or of +self-restraint is not to say that it is specially like Christianity; it +is only to say that it is not utterly unlike all human existence. +Buddhists disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess because all sane +human beings disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess. But to say that +Buddhism and Christianity give the same philosophy of these things is +simply false. All humanity does agree that we are in a net of sin. Most +of humanity agrees that there is some way out. But as to what is the way +out, I do not think that there are two institutions in the universe +which contradict each other so flatly as Buddhism and Christianity. + +Even when I thought, with most other well-informed, though unscholarly, +people, that Buddhism and Christianity were alike, there was one thing +about them that always perplexed me; I mean the startling difference in +their type of religious art. I do not mean in its technical style of +representation, but in the things that it was manifestly meant to +represent. No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint +in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The +opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of +it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the +Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a +sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. +The mediæval saint's body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are +frightfully alive. There cannot be any real community of spirit between +forces that produced symbols so different as that. Granted that both +images are extravagances, are perversions of the pure creed, it must be +a real divergence which could produce such opposite extravagances. The +Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is +staring with a frantic intentness outwards. If we follow that clue +steadily we shall find some interesting things. + +A short time ago Mrs. Besant, in an interesting essay, announced that +there was only one religion in the world, that all faiths were only +versions or perversions of it, and that she was quite prepared to say +what it was. According to Mrs. Besant this universal Church is simply +the universal self. It is the doctrine that we are really all one +person; that there are no real walls of individuality between man and +man. If I may put it so, she does not tell us to love our neighbours; +she tells us to be our neighbours. That is Mrs. Besant's thoughtful and +suggestive description of the religion in which all men must find +themselves in agreement. And I never heard of any suggestion in my life +with which I more violently disagree. I want to love my neighbour not +because he is I, but precisely because he is not I. I want to adore the +world, not as one likes a looking-glass, because it is one's self, but +as one loves a woman, because she is entirely different. If souls are +separate love is possible. If souls are united love is obviously +impossible. A man may be said loosely to love himself, but he can hardly +fall in love with himself, or, if he does, it must be a monotonous +courtship. If the world is full of real selves, they can be really +unselfish selves. But upon Mrs. Besant's principle the whole cosmos is +only one enormously selfish person. + +It is just here that Buddhism is on the side of modern pantheism and +immanence. And it is just here that Christianity is on the side of +humanity and liberty and love. Love desires personality; therefore love +desires division. It is the instinct of Christianity to be glad that God +has broken the universe into little pieces, because they are living +pieces. It is her instinct to say "little children love one another" +rather than to tell one large person to love himself. This is the +intellectual abyss between Buddhism and Christianity; that for the +Buddhist or Theosophist personality is the fall of man, for the +Christian it is the purpose of God, the whole point of his cosmic idea. +The world-soul of the Theosophists asks man to love it only in order +that man may throw himself into it. But the divine centre of +Christianity actually threw man out of it in order that he might love +it. The oriental deity is like a giant who should have lost his leg or +hand and be always seeking to find it; but the Christian power is like +some giant who in a strange generosity should cut off his right hand, so +that it might of its own accord shake hands with him. We come back to +the same tireless note touching the nature of Christianity; all modern +philosophies are chains which connect and fetter; Christianity is a +sword which separates and sets free. No other philosophy makes God +actually rejoice in the separation of the universe into living souls. +But according to orthodox Christianity this separation between God and +man is sacred, because this is eternal. That a man may love God it is +necessary that there should be not only a God to be loved, but a man to +love him. All those vague theosophical minds for whom the universe is an +immense melting-pot are exactly the minds which shrink instinctively +from that earthquake saying of our Gospels, which declare that the Son +of God came not with peace but with a sundering sword. The saying rings +entirely true even considered as what it obviously is; the statement +that any man who preaches real love is bound to beget hate. It is as +true of democratic fraternity as of divine love; sham love ends in +compromise and common philosophy; but real love has always ended in +bloodshed. Yet there is another and yet more awful truth behind the +obvious meaning of this utterance of our Lord. According to Himself the +Son was a sword separating brother and brother that they should for an +æon hate each other. But the Father also was a sword, which in the +black beginning separated brother and brother, so that they should love +each other at last. + +This is the meaning of that almost insane happiness in the eyes of the +mediæval saint in the picture. This is the meaning of the sealed eyes of +the superb Buddhist image. The Christian saint is happy because he has +verily been cut off from the world; he is separate from things and is +staring at them in astonishment. But why should the Buddhist saint be +astonished at things? since there is really only one thing, and that +being impersonal can hardly be astonished at itself. There have been +many pantheist poems suggesting wonder, but no really successful ones. +The pantheist cannot wonder, for he cannot praise God or praise anything +as really distinct from himself. Our immediate business here however is +with the effect of this Christian admiration (which strikes outwards, +towards a deity distinct from the worshipper) upon the general need for +ethical activity and social reform. And surely its effect is +sufficiently obvious. There is no real possibility of getting out of +pantheism any special impulse to moral action. For pantheism implies in +its nature that one thing is as good as another; whereas action implies +in its nature that one thing is greatly preferable to another. +Swinburne in the high summer of his scepticism tried in vain to wrestle +with this difficulty. In "Songs before Sunrise," written under the +inspiration of Garibaldi and the revolt of Italy, he proclaimed the +newer religion and the purer God which should wither up all the priests +of the world. + + "What doest thou now + Looking Godward to cry + I am I, thou art thou, + I am low, thou art high, + I am thou that thou seekest to find him, find thou + but thyself, thou art I." + +Of which the immediate and evident deduction is that tyrants are as much +the sons of God as Garibaldis; and that King Bomba of Naples having, +with the utmost success, "found himself" is identical with the ultimate +good in all things. The truth is that the western energy that dethrones +tyrants has been directly due to the western theology that says "I am I, +thou art thou." The same spiritual separation which looked up and saw a +good king in the universe looked up and saw a bad king in Naples. The +worshippers of Bomba's god dethroned Bomba. The worshippers of +Swinburne's god have covered Asia for centuries and have never +dethroned a tyrant. The Indian saint may reasonably shut his eyes +because he is looking at that which is I and Thou and We and They and +It. It is a rational occupation: but it is not true in theory and not +true in fact that it helps the Indian to keep an eye on Lord Curzon. +That external vigilance which has always been the mark of Christianity +(the command that we should _watch_ and pray) has expressed itself both +in typical western orthodoxy and in typical western politics: but both +depend on the idea of a divinity transcendent, different from ourselves, +a deity that disappears. Certainly the most sagacious creeds may suggest +that we should pursue God into deeper and deeper rings of the labyrinth +of our own ego. But only we of Christendom have said that we should hunt +God like an eagle upon the mountains: and we have killed all monsters in +the chase. + +Here again, therefore, we find that in so far as we value democracy and +the self-renewing energies of the west, we are much more likely to find +them in the old theology than the new. If we want reform, we must adhere +to orthodoxy: especially in this matter (so much disputed in the +counsels of Mr. R.J. Campbell), the matter of insisting on the immanent +or the transcendent deity. By insisting specially on the immanence of +God we get introspection, self-isolation, quietism, social +indifference--Tibet. By insisting specially on the transcendence of God +we get wonder, curiosity, moral and political adventure, righteous +indignation--Christendom. Insisting that God is inside man, man is +always inside himself. By insisting that God transcends man, man has +transcended himself. + +If we take any other doctrine that has been called old-fashioned we +shall find the case the same. It is the same, for instance, in the deep +matter of the Trinity. Unitarians (a sect never to be mentioned without +a special respect for their distinguished intellectual dignity and high +intellectual honour) are often reformers by the accident that throws so +many small sects into such an attitude. But there is nothing in the +least liberal or akin to reform in the substitution of pure monotheism +for the Trinity. The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an +enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the +mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet. +The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern +king. The _heart_ of humanity, especially of European humanity, is +certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that +gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy +pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort of liberty and +variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world. For Western +religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not well for man to be +alone." The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the +Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the Western idea of +monks. So even asceticism became brotherly; and the Trappists were +sociable even when they were silent. If this love of a living complexity +be our test, it is certainly healthier to have the Trinitarian religion +than the Unitarian. For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with +reverence)--to us God Himself is a society. It is indeed a fathomless +mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with +it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here. Suffice it to say +here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an +English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly +quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and the +dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely God; the real +Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world. For it +is not well for God to be alone. + +Again, the same is true of that difficult matter of the danger of the +soul, which has unsettled so many just minds. To hope for all souls is +imperative; and it is quite tenable that their salvation is inevitable. +It is tenable, but it is not specially favourable to activity or +progress. Our fighting and creative society ought rather to insist on +the danger of everybody, on the fact that every man is hanging by a +thread or clinging to a precipice. To say that all will be well anyhow +is a comprehensible remark: but it cannot be called the blast of a +trumpet. Europe ought rather to emphasise possible perdition; and Europe +always has emphasised it. Here its highest religion is at one with all +its cheapest romances. To the Buddhist or the eastern fatalist existence +is a science or a plan, which must end up in a certain way. But to a +Christian existence is a _story_, which may end up in any way. In a +thrilling novel (that purely Christian product) the hero is not eaten by +cannibals; but it is essential to the existence of the thrill that he +_might_ be eaten by cannibals. The hero must (so to speak) be an eatable +hero. So Christian morals have always said to the man, not that he +would lose his soul, but that he must take care that he didn't. In +Christian morals, in short, it is wicked to call a man "damned": but it +is strictly religious and philosophic to call him damnable. + +All Christianity concentrates on the man at the cross-roads. The vast +and shallow philosophies, the huge syntheses of humbug, all talk about +ages and evolution and ultimate developments. The true philosophy is +concerned with the instant. Will a man take this road or that? that is +the only thing to think about, if you enjoy thinking. The æons are easy +enough to think about, any one can think about them. The instant is +really awful: and it is because our religion has intensely felt the +instant, that it has in literature dealt much with battle and in +theology dealt much with hell. It is full of _danger_ like a boy's book: +it is at an immortal crisis. There is a great deal of real similarity +between popular fiction and the religion of the western people. If you +say that popular fiction is vulgar and tawdry, you only say what the +dreary and well-informed say also about the images in the Catholic +churches. Life (according to the faith) is very like a serial story in a +magazine: life ends with the promise (or menace) "to be continued in our +next." Also, with a noble vulgarity, life imitates the serial and +leaves off at the exciting moment. For death is distinctly an exciting +moment. + +But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong +an element of will, of what theology calls free-will. You cannot finish +a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When +somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one +Differential Calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed +Romeo he might have married him to Juliet's old nurse if he had felt +inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly +because it has insisted on the theological free-will. It is a large +matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately +here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk +about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic +environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. +The fallacy of the whole thing is that evil is a matter of active +choice, whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a +profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, +"Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be +Profligates." A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must +not lie still if he wants to be cured of a sin; on the contrary, he must +get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly +expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; "patient" +is in the passive mood; "sinner" is in the active. If a man is to be +saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from +forging, he must be not a patient but an _impatient_. He must be +personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the +active not the passive will. + +Here again we reach the same substantial conclusion. In so far as we +desire the definite reconstructions and the dangerous revolutions which +have distinguished European civilisation, we shall not discourage the +thought of possible ruin; we shall rather encourage it. If we want, like +the Eastern saints, merely to contemplate how right things are, of +course we shall only say that they must go right. But if we particularly +want to _make_ them go right, we must insist that they may go wrong. + +Lastly, this truth is yet again true in the case of the common modern +attempts to diminish or to explain away the divinity of Christ. The +thing may be true or not; that I shall deal with before I end. But if +the divinity is true it is certainly terribly revolutionary. That a good +man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already; but +that God could have his back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents +for ever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that +omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone has felt that God, +to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all +creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. +For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that +the soul passes a breaking point--and does not break. In this indeed I +approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I +apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent +touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly +feared to approach. But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a +distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some +unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is +written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy +God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in +Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted +God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of +pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it +was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which +confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists +choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the +world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of +unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been +in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows too difficult for human speech) but +let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one +divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which +God seemed for an instant to be an atheist. + +These can be called the essentials of the old orthodoxy, of which the +chief merit is that it is the natural fountain of revolution and reform; +and of which the chief defect is that it is obviously only an abstract +assertion. Its main advantage is that it is the most adventurous and +manly of all theologies. Its chief disadvantage is simply that it is a +theology. It can always be urged against it that it is in its nature +arbitrary and in the air. But it is not so high in the air but that +great archers spend their whole lives in shooting arrows at it--yes, and +their last arrows; there are men who will ruin themselves and ruin their +civilisation if they may ruin also this old fantastic tale. This is the +last and most astounding fact about this faith; that its enemies will +use any weapon against it, the swords that cut their own fingers, and +the firebrands that burn their own homes. Men who begin to fight the +Church for the sake of freedom and humanity end by flinging away freedom +and humanity if only they may fight the Church. This is no exaggeration; +I could fill a book with the instances of it. Mr. Blatchford set out, as +an ordinary Bible-smasher, to prove that Adam was guiltless of sin +against God; in manoeuvring so as to maintain this he admitted, as a +mere side issue, that all the tyrants, from Nero to King Leopold, were +guiltless of any sin against humanity. I know a man who has such a +passion for proving that he will have no personal existence after death +that he falls back on the position that he has no personal existence +now. He invokes Buddhism and says that all souls fade into each other; +in order to prove that he cannot go to heaven he proves that he cannot +go to Hartlepool. I have known people who protested against religious +education with arguments against any education, saying that the child's +mind must grow freely or that the old must not teach the young. I have +known people who showed that there could be no divine judgment by +showing that there can be no human judgment, even for practical +purposes. They burned their own corn to set fire to the church; they +smashed their own tools to smash it; any stick was good enough to beat +it with, though it were the last stick of their own dismembered +furniture. We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks +this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic +who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very +existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims +not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the +emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by +which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon some +one who never lived at all. + +And yet the thing hangs in the heavens unhurt. Its opponents only +succeed in destroying all that they themselves justly hold dear. They do +not destroy orthodoxy; they only destroy political courage and common +sense. They do not prove that Adam was not responsible to God; how could +they prove it? They only prove (from their premises) that the Czar is +not responsible to Russia. They do not prove that Adam should not have +been punished by God; they only prove that the nearest sweater should +not be punished by men. With their oriental doubts about personality +they do not make certain that we shall have no personal life hereafter; +they only make certain that we shall not have a very jolly or complete +one here. With their paralysing hints of all conclusions coming out +wrong they do not tear the book of the Recording Angel; they only make +it a little harder to keep the books of Marshall and Snelgrove. Not only +is the faith the mother of all worldly energies, but its foes are the +fathers of all worldly confusion. The secularists have not wrecked +divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that +is any comfort to them. The Titans did not scale heaven; but they laid +waste the world. + + + + +CHAPTER IX.--_Authority and the Adventurer_ + + +The last chapter has been concerned with the contention that orthodoxy +is not only (as is often urged) the only safe guardian of morality or +order, but is also the only logical guardian of liberty, innovation and +advance. If we wish to pull down the prosperous oppressor we cannot do +it with the new doctrine of human perfectibility; we can do it with the +old doctrine of Original Sin. If we want to uproot inherent cruelties or +lift up lost populations we cannot do it with the scientific theory that +matter precedes mind; we can do it with the supernatural theory that +mind precedes matter. If we wish specially to awaken people to social +vigilance and tireless pursuit of practise, we cannot help it much by +insisting on the Immanent God and the Inner Light: for these are at best +reasons for contentment; we can help it much by insisting on the +transcendant God and the flying and escaping gleam; for that means +divine discontent. If we wish particularly to assert the idea of a +generous balance against that of a dreadful autocracy we shall +instinctively be Trinitarian rather than Unitarian. If we desire +European civilisation to be a raid and a rescue, we shall insist rather +that souls are in real peril than that their peril is ultimately unreal. +And if we wish to exalt the outcast and the crucified, we shall rather +wish to think that a veritable God was crucified, rather than a mere +sage or hero. Above all, if we wish to protect the poor we shall be in +favour of fixed rules and clear dogmas. The _rules_ of a club are +occasionally in favour of the poor member. The drift of a club is always +in favour of the rich one. + +And now we come to the crucial question which truly concludes the whole +matter. A reasonable agnostic, if he has happened to agree with me so +far, may justly turn round and say, "You have found a practical +philosophy in the doctrine of the Fall; very well. You have found a side +of democracy now dangerously neglected wisely asserted in Original Sin; +all right. You have found a truth in the doctrine of hell; I +congratulate you. You are convinced that worshippers of a personal God +look outwards and are progressive; I congratulate them. But even +supposing that those doctrines do include those truths, why cannot you +take the truths and leave the doctrines? Granted that all modern +society is trusting the rich too much because it does not allow for +human weakness; granted that orthodox ages have had a great advantage +because (believing in the Fall) they did allow for human weakness, why +cannot you simply allow for human weakness without believing in the +Fall? If you have discovered that the idea of damnation represents a +healthy idea of danger, why can you not simply take the idea of danger +and leave the idea of damnation? If you see clearly the kernel of +common-sense in the nut of Christian orthodoxy, why cannot you simply +take the kernel and leave the nut? Why cannot you (to use that cant +phrase of the newspapers which I, as a highly scholarly agnostic, am a +little ashamed of using) why cannot you simply take what is good in +Christianity, what you can define as valuable, what you can comprehend, +and leave all the rest, all the absolute dogmas that are in their nature +incomprehensible?" This is the real question; this is the last question; +and it is a pleasure to try to answer it. + +The first answer is simply to say that I am a rationalist. I like to +have some intellectual justification for my intuitions. If I am treating +man as a fallen being it is an intellectual convenience to me to +believe that he fell; and I find, for some odd psychological reason, +that I can deal better with a man's exercise of freewill if I believe +that he has got it. But I am in this matter yet more definitely a +rationalist. I do not propose to turn this book into one of ordinary +Christian apologetics; I should be glad to meet at any other time the +enemies of Christianity in that more obvious arena. Here I am only +giving an account of my own growth in spiritual certainty. But I may +pause to remark that the more I saw of the merely abstract arguments +against the Christian cosmology the less I thought of them. I mean that +having found the moral atmosphere of the Incarnation to be common sense, +I then looked at the established intellectual arguments against the +Incarnation and found them to be common nonsense. In case the argument +should be thought to suffer from the absence of the ordinary apologetic +I will here very briefly summarise my own arguments and conclusions on +the purely objective or scientific truth of the matter. + +If I am asked, as a purely intellectual question, why I believe in +Christianity, I can only answer, "For the same reason that an +intelligent agnostic disbelieves in Christianity." I believe in it +quite rationally upon the evidence. But the evidence in my case, as in +that of the intelligent agnostic, is not really in this or that alleged +demonstration; it is in an enormous accumulation of small but unanimous +facts. The secularist is not to be blamed because his objections to +Christianity are miscellaneous and even scrappy; it is precisely such +scrappy evidence that does convince the mind. I mean that a man may well +be less convinced of a philosophy from four books, than from one book, +one battle, one landscape, and one old friend. The very fact that the +things are of different kinds increases the importance of the fact that +they all point to one conclusion. Now, the non-Christianity of the +average educated man to-day is almost always, to do him justice, made up +of these loose but living experiences. I can only say that my evidences +for Christianity are of the same vivid but varied kind as his evidences +against it. For when I look at these various anti-Christian truths, I +simply discover that none of them are true. I discover that the true +tide and force of all the facts flows the other way. Let us take cases. +Many a sensible modern man must have abandoned Christianity under the +pressure of three such converging convictions as these: first, that +men, with their shape, structure, and sexuality, are, after all, very +much like beasts, a mere variety of the animal kingdom; second, that +primeval religion arose in ignorance and fear; third, that priests have +blighted societies with bitterness and gloom. Those three anti-Christian +arguments are very different; but they are all quite logical and +legitimate; and they all converge. The only objection to them (I +discover) is that they are all untrue. If you leave off looking at books +about beasts and men, if you begin to look at beasts and men then (if +you have any humour or imagination, any sense of the frantic or the +farcical) you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man +is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his +divergence that requires an explanation. That man and brute are like is, +in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so +insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands +is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having +hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle-bones or +the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of +barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build +colossal temples of ivory even in a roccoco style; camels do not paint +even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many +camel's-hair brushes. Certain modern dreamers say that ants and bees +have a society superior to ours. They have, indeed, a civilisation; but +that very truth only reminds us that it is an inferior civilisation. Who +ever found an ant-hill decorated with the statues of celebrated ants? +Who has seen a bee-hive carved with the images of gorgeous queens of +old? No; the chasm between man and other creatures may have a natural +explanation, but it is a chasm. We talk of wild animals; but man is the +only wild animal. It is man that has broken out. All other animals are +tame animals; following the rugged respectability of the tribe or type. +All other animals are domestic animals; man alone is ever undomestic, +either as a profligate or a monk. So that this first superficial reason +for materialism is, if anything, a reason for its opposite; it is +exactly where biology leaves off that all religion begins. + +It would be the same if I examined the second of the three chance +rationalist arguments; the argument that all that we call divine began +in some darkness and terror. When I did attempt to examine the +foundations of this modern idea I simply found that there were none. +Science knows nothing whatever about pre-historic man; for the excellent +reason that he is pre-historic. A few professors choose to conjecture +that such things as human sacrifice were once innocent and general and +that they gradually dwindled; but there is no direct evidence of it, and +the small amount of indirect evidence is very much the other way. In the +earliest legends we have, such as the tales of Isaac and of Iphigenia, +human sacrifice is not introduced as something old, but rather as +something new; as a strange and frightful exception darkly demanded by +the gods. History says nothing; and legends all say that the earth was +kinder in its earliest time. There is no tradition of progress; but the +whole human race has a tradition of the Fall. Amusingly enough, indeed, +the very dissemination of this idea is used against its authenticity. +Learned men literally say that this pre-historic calamity cannot be true +because every race of mankind remembers it. I cannot keep pace with +these paradoxes. + +And if we took the third chance instance, it would be the same; the view +that priests darken and embitter the world. I look at the world and +simply discover that they don't. Those countries in Europe which are +still influenced by priests, are exactly the countries where there is +still singing and dancing and coloured dresses and art in the open-air. +Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of +a playground. Christianity is the only frame which has preserved the +pleasure of Paganism. We might fancy some children playing on the flat +grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall +round the cliff's edge they could fling themselves into every frantic +game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries. But the walls were +knocked down, leaving the naked peril of the precipice. They did not +fall over; but when their friends returned to them they were all huddled +in terror in the centre of the island; and their song had ceased. + +Thus these three facts of experience, such facts as go to make an +agnostic, are, in this view, turned totally round. I am left saying, +"Give me an explanation, first, of the towering eccentricity of man +among the brutes; second, of the vast human tradition of some ancient +happiness; third, of the partial perpetuation of such pagan joy in the +countries of the Catholic Church." One explanation, at any rate, covers +all three: the theory that twice was the natural order interrupted by +some explosion or revelation such as people now call "psychic." Once +Heaven came upon the earth with a power or seal called the image of God, +whereby man took command of Nature; and once again (when in empire after +empire men had been found wanting) Heaven came to save mankind in the +awful shape of a man. This would explain why the mass of men always look +backwards; and why the only corner where they in any sense look forwards +is the little continent where Christ has His Church. I know it will be +said that Japan has become progressive. But how can this be an answer +when even in saying "Japan has become progressive," we really only mean, +"Japan has become European"? But I wish here not so much to insist on my +own explanation as to insist on my original remark. I agree with the +ordinary unbelieving man in the street in being guided by three or four +odd facts all pointing to something; only when I came to look at the +facts I always found they pointed to something else. + +I have given an imaginary triad of such ordinary anti-Christian +arguments; if that be too narrow a basis I will give on the spur of the +moment another. These are the kind of thoughts which in combination +create the impression that Christianity is something weak and diseased. +First, for instance, that Jesus was a gentle creature, sheepish and +unworldly, a mere ineffectual appeal to the world; second, that +Christianity arose and flourished in the dark ages of ignorance, and +that to these the Church would drag us back; third, that the people +still strongly religious or (if you will) superstitious--such people as +the Irish--are weak, unpractical, and behind the times. I only mention +these ideas to affirm the same thing: that when I looked into them +independently I found, not that the conclusions were unphilosophical, +but simply that the facts were not facts. Instead of looking at books +and pictures about the New Testament I looked at the New Testament. +There I found an account, not in the least of a person with his hair +parted in the middle or his hands clasped in appeal, but of an +extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, +flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy +of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a +being who often acted like an angry god--and always like a god. Christ +had even a literary style of his own, not to be found, I think, +elsewhere; it consists of an almost furious use of the _a fortiori_. +His "how much more" is piled one upon another like castle upon castle in +the clouds. The diction used _about_ Christ has been, and perhaps +wisely, sweet and submissive. But the diction used by Christ is quite +curiously gigantesque; it is full of camels leaping through needles and +mountains hurled into the sea. Morally it is equally terrific; he called +himself a sword of slaughter, and told men to buy swords if they sold +their coats for them. That he used other even wilder words on the side +of non-resistance greatly increases the mystery; but it also, if +anything, rather increases the violence. We cannot even explain it by +calling such a being insane; for insanity is usually along one +consistent channel. The maniac is generally a monomaniac. Here we must +remember the difficult definition of Christianity already given; +Christianity is a superhuman paradox whereby two opposite passions may +blaze beside each other. The one explanation of the Gospel language that +does explain it, is that it is the survey of one who from some +supernatural height beholds some more startling synthesis. + +I take in order the next instance offered: the idea that Christianity +belongs to the dark ages. Here I did not satisfy myself with reading +modern generalisations; I read a little history. And in history I found +that Christianity, so far from belonging to the dark ages, was the one +path across the dark ages that was not dark. It was a shining bridge +connecting two shining civilisations. If any one says that the faith +arose in ignorance and savagery the answer is simple: it didn't. It +arose in the Mediterranean civilisation in the full summer of the Roman +Empire. The world was swarming with sceptics, and pantheism was as plain +as the sun, when Constantine nailed the cross to the mast. It is +perfectly true that afterwards the ship sank; but it is far more +extraordinary that the ship came up again: repainted and glittering, +with the cross still at the top. This is the amazing thing the religion +did: it turned a sunken ship into a submarine. The ark lived under the +load of waters; after being buried under the débris of dynasties and +clans, we arose and remembered Rome. If our faith had been a mere fad of +the fading empire, fad would have followed fad in the twilight, and if +the civilisation ever re-emerged (and many such have never re-emerged) +it would have been under some new barbaric flag. But the Christian +Church was the last life of the old society and was also the first life +of the new. She took the people who were forgetting how to make an arch +and she taught them to invent the Gothic arch. In a word, the most +absurd thing that could be said of the Church is the thing we have all +heard said of it. How can we say that the Church wishes to bring us back +into the Dark Ages? The Church was the only thing that ever brought us +out of them. + +I added in this second trinity of objections an idle instance taken from +those who feel such people as the Irish to be weakened or made stagnant +by superstition. I only added it because this is a peculiar case of a +statement of fact that turns out to be a statement of falsehood. It is +constantly said of the Irish that they are impractical. But if we +refrain for a moment from looking at what is said about them and look at +what is _done_ about them, we shall see that the Irish are not only +practical, but quite painfully successful. The poverty of their country, +the minority of their members are simply the conditions under which they +were asked to work; but no other group in the British Empire has done so +much with such conditions. The Nationalists were the only minority that +ever succeeded in twisting the whole British Parliament sharply out of +its path. The Irish peasants are the only poor men in these islands who +have forced their masters to disgorge. These people, whom we call +priest-ridden, are the only Britons who will not be squire-ridden. And +when I came to look at the actual Irish character, the case was the +same. Irishmen are best at the specially _hard_ professions--the trades +of iron, the lawyer, and the soldier. In all these cases, therefore, I +came back to the same conclusion: the sceptic was quite right to go by +the facts, only he had not looked at the facts. The sceptic is too +credulous; he believes in newspapers or even in encyclopædias. Again the +three questions left me with three very antagonistic questions. The +average sceptic wanted to know how I explained the namby-pamby note in +the Gospel, the connection of the creed with mediæval darkness and the +political impracticability of the Celtic Christians. But I wanted to +ask, and to ask with an earnestness amounting to urgency, "What is this +incomparable energy which appears first in one walking the earth like a +living judgment and this energy which can die with a dying civilisation +and yet force it to a resurrection from the dead; this energy which last +of all can inflame a bankrupt peasantry with so fixed a faith in justice +that they get what they ask, while others go empty away; so that the +most helpless island of the Empire can actually help itself?" + +There is an answer: it is an answer to say that the energy is truly from +outside the world; that it is psychic, or at least one of the results of +a real psychical disturbance. The highest gratitude and respect are due +to the great human civilisations such as the old Egyptian or the +existing Chinese. Nevertheless it is no injustice for them to say that +only modern Europe has exhibited incessantly a power of self-renewal +recurring often at the shortest intervals and descending to the smallest +facts of building or costume. All other societies die finally and with +dignity. We die daily. We are always being born again with almost +indecent obstetrics. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that there is +in historic Christendom a sort of unnatural life: it could be explained +as a supernatural life. It could be explained as an awful galvanic life +working in what would have been a corpse. For our civilisation _ought_ +to have died, by all parallels, by all sociological probability, in the +Ragnorak of the end of Rome. That is the weird inspiration of our +estate: you and I have no business to be here at all. We are all +_revenants_; all living Christians are dead pagans walking about. Just +as Europe was about to be gathered in silence to Assyria and Babylon, +something entered into its body. And Europe has had a strange life--it +is not too much to say that it has had the _jumps_--ever since. + +I have dealt at length with such typical triads of doubt in order to +convey the main contention--that my own case for Christianity is +rational; but it is not simple. It is an accumulation of varied facts, +like the attitude of the ordinary agnostic. But the ordinary agnostic +has got his facts all wrong. He is a non-believer for a multitude of +reasons; but they are untrue reasons. He doubts because the Middle Ages +were barbaric, but they weren't; because Darwinism is demonstrated, but +it isn't; because miracles do not happen, but they do; because monks +were lazy, but they were very industrious; because nuns are unhappy, but +they are particularly cheerful; because Christian art was sad and pale, +but it was picked out in peculiarly bright colours and gay with gold; +because modern science is moving away from the supernatural, but it +isn't, it is moving towards the supernatural with the rapidity of a +railway train. + +But among these million facts all flowing one way there is, of course, +one question sufficiently solid and separate to be treated briefly, but +by itself; I mean the objective occurrence of the supernatural. In +another chapter I have indicated the fallacy of the ordinary supposition +that the world must be impersonal because it is orderly. A person is +just as likely to desire an orderly thing as a disorderly thing. But my +own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than +material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call +it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere +emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a +_primary_ intellectual conviction like the certainty of self or the good +of living. Any one who likes, therefore, may call my belief in God +merely mystical; the phrase is not worth fighting about. But my belief +that miracles have happened in human history is not a mystical belief at +all; I believe in them upon human evidence as I do in the discovery of +America. Upon this point there is a simple logical fact that only +requires to be stated and cleared up. Somehow or other an extraordinary +idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly +and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection +with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in +miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence +for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) +because they have a doctrine against them. The open, obvious, democratic +thing is to believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony to a +miracle, just as you believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony +to a murder. The plain, popular course is to trust the peasant's word +about the ghost exactly as far as you trust the peasant's word about the +landlord. Being a peasant he will probably have a great deal of healthy +agnosticism about both. Still you could fill the British Museum with +evidence uttered by the peasant, and given in favour of the ghost. If it +comes to human testimony there is a choking cataract of human testimony +in favour of the supernatural. If you reject it, you can only mean one +of two things. You reject the peasant's story about the ghost either +because the man is a peasant or because the story is a ghost story. That +is, you either deny the main principle of democracy, or you affirm the +main principle of materialism--the abstract impossibility of miracle. +You have a perfect right to do so; but in that case you are the +dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence--it is you +rationalists who refuse actual evidence, being constrained to do so by +your creed. But I am not constrained by any creed in the matter, and +looking impartially into certain miracles of mediæval and modern times, +I have come to the conclusion that they occurred. All argument against +these plain facts is always argument in a circle. If I say, "Mediæval +documents attest certain miracles as much as they attest certain +battles," they answer, "But mediævals were superstitious"; if I want to +know in what they were superstitious, the only ultimate answer is that +they believed in the miracles. If I say "a peasant saw a ghost," I am +told, "But peasants are so credulous." If I ask, "Why credulous?" the +only answer is--that they see ghosts. Iceland is impossible because only +stupid sailors have seen it; and the sailors are only stupid because +they say they have seen Iceland. It is only fair to add that there is +another argument that the unbeliever may rationally use against +miracles, though he himself generally forgets to use it. + +He may say that there has been in many miraculous stories a notion of +spiritual preparation and acceptance: in short, that the miracle could +only come to him who believed in it. It may be so, and if it is so how +are we to test it? If we are inquiring whether certain results follow +faith, it is useless to repeat wearily that (if they happen) they do +follow faith. If faith is one of the conditions, those without faith +have a most healthy right to laugh. But they have no right to judge. +Being a believer may be, if you like, as bad as being drunk; still if we +were extracting psychological facts from drunkards, it would be absurd +to be always taunting them with having been drunk. Suppose we were +investigating whether angry men really saw a red mist before their eyes. +Suppose sixty excellent householders swore that when angry they had seen +this crimson cloud: surely it would be absurd to answer "Oh, but you +admit you were angry at the time." They might reasonably rejoin (in a +stentorian chorus), "How the blazes could we discover, without being +angry, whether angry people see red?" So the saints and ascetics might +rationally reply, "Suppose that the question is whether believers can +see visions--even then, if you are interested in visions it is no point +to object to believers." You are still arguing in a circle--in that old +mad circle with which this book began. + +The question of whether miracles ever occur is a question of common +sense and of ordinary historical imagination: not of any final physical +experiment. One may here surely dismiss that quite brainless piece of +pedantry which talks about the need for "scientific conditions" in +connection with alleged spiritual phenomena. If we are asking whether a +dead soul can communicate with a living it is ludicrous to insist that +it shall be under conditions in which no two living souls in their +senses would seriously communicate with each other. The fact that ghosts +prefer darkness no more disproves the existence of ghosts than the fact +that lovers prefer darkness disproves the existence of love. If you +choose to say, "I will believe that Miss Brown called her _fiancé_ a +periwinkle or any other endearing term, if she will repeat the word +before seventeen psychologists," then I shall reply, "Very well, if +those are your conditions, you will never get the truth, for she +certainly will not say it." It is just as unscientific as it is +unphilosophical to be surprised that in an unsympathetic atmosphere +certain extraordinary sympathies do not arise. It is as if I said that I +could not tell if there was a fog because the air was not clear enough; +or as if I insisted on perfect sunlight in order to see a solar eclipse. + +As a common-sense conclusion, such as those to which we come about sex +or about midnight (well knowing that many details must in their own +nature be concealed) I conclude that miracles do happen. I am forced to +it by a conspiracy of facts: the fact that the men who encounter elves +or angels are not the mystics and the morbid dreamers, but fishermen, +farmers, and all men at once coarse and cautious; the fact that we all +know men who testify to spiritualist incidents but are not +spiritualists; the fact that science itself admits such things more and +more every day. Science will even admit the Ascension if you call it +Levitation, and will very likely admit the Resurrection when it has +thought of another word for it. I suggest the Regalvanisation. But the +strongest of all is the dilemma above mentioned, that these supernatural +things are never denied except on the basis either of anti-democracy or +of materialist dogmatism--I may say materialist mysticism. The sceptic +always takes one of the two positions; either an ordinary man need not +be believed, or an extraordinary event must not be believed. For I hope +we may dismiss the argument against wonders attempted in the mere +recapitulation of frauds, of swindling mediums or trick miracles. That +is not an argument at all, good or bad. A false ghost disproves the +reality of ghosts exactly as much as a forged banknote disproves the +existence of the Bank of England--if anything, it proves its existence. + +Given this conviction that the spiritual phenomena do occur (my evidence +for which is complex but rational), we then collide with one of the +worst mental evils of the age. The greatest disaster of the nineteenth +century was this: that men began to use the word "spiritual" as the same +as the word "good." They thought that to grow in refinement and +uncorporeality was to grow in virtue. When scientific evolution was +announced, some feared that it would encourage mere animality. It did +worse: it encouraged mere spirituality. It taught men to think that so +long as they were passing from the ape they were going to the angel. But +you can pass from the ape and go to the devil. A man of genius, very +typical of that time of bewilderment, expressed it perfectly. Benjamin +Disraeli was right when he said he was on the side of the angels. He was +indeed; he was on the side of the fallen angels. He was not on the side +of any mere appetite or animal brutality; but he was on the side of all +the imperialism of the princes of the abyss; he was on the side of +arrogance and mystery, and contempt of all obvious good. Between this +sunken pride and the towering humilities of heaven there are, one must +suppose, spirits of shapes and sizes. Man, in encountering them, must +make much the same mistakes that he makes in encountering any other +varied types in any other distant continent. It must be hard at first to +know who is supreme and who is subordinate. If a shade arose from the +under world, and stared at Piccadilly, that shade would not quite +understand the idea of an ordinary closed carriage. He would suppose +that the coachman on the box was a triumphant conqueror, dragging behind +him a kicking and imprisoned captive. So, if we see spiritual facts for +the first time, we may mistake who is uppermost. It is not enough to +find the gods; they are obvious; we must find God, the real chief of the +gods. We must have a long historic experience in supernatural +phenomena--in order to discover which are really natural. In this light +I find the history of Christianity, and even of its Hebrew origins, +quite practical and clear. It does not trouble me to be told that the +Hebrew god was one among many. I know he was, without any research to +tell me so. Jehovah and Baal looked equally important, just as the sun +and the moon looked the same size. It is only slowly that we learn that +the sun is immeasurably our master, and the small moon only our +satellite. Believing that there is a world of spirits, I shall walk in +it as I do in the world of men, looking for the thing that I like and +think good. Just as I should seek in a desert for clean water, or toil +at the North Pole to make a comfortable fire, so I shall search the land +of void and vision until I find something fresh like water, and +comforting like fire; until I find some place in eternity, where I am +literally at home. And there is only one such place to be found. + +I have now said enough to show (to any one to whom such an explanation +is essential) that I have in the ordinary arena of apologetics, a ground +of belief. In pure records of experiment (if these be taken +democratically without contempt or favour) there is evidence first, that +miracles happen, and second that the nobler miracles belong to our +tradition. But I will not pretend that this curt discussion is my real +reason for accepting Christianity instead of taking the moral good of +Christianity as I should take it out of Confucianism. + +I have another far more solid and central ground for submitting to it as +a faith, instead of merely picking up hints from it as a scheme. And +that is this: that the Christian Church in its practical relation to my +soul is a living teacher, not a dead one. It not only certainly taught +me yesterday, but will almost certainly teach me to-morrow. Once I saw +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the cross; some day I may see +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the mitre. One fine morning I saw +why windows were pointed; some fine morning I may see why priests were +shaven. Plato has told you a truth; but Plato is dead. Shakespeare has +startled you with an image; but Shakespeare will not startle you with +any more. But imagine what it would be to live with such men still +living, to know that Plato might break out with an original lecture +to-morrow, or that at any moment Shakespeare might shatter everything +with a single song. The man who lives in contact with what he believes +to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and +Shakespeare to-morrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some +truth that he has never seen before. There is one only other parallel to +this position; and that is the parallel of the life in which we all +began. When your father told you, walking about the garden, that bees +stung or that roses smelt sweet, you did not talk of taking the best +out of his philosophy. When the bees stung you, you did not call it an +entertaining coincidence. When the rose smelt sweet you did not say "My +father is a rude, barbaric symbol, enshrining (perhaps unconsciously) +the deep delicate truths that flowers smell." No: you believed your +father, because you had found him to be a living fountain of facts, a +thing that really knew more than you; a thing that would tell you truth +to-morrow, as well as to-day. And if this was true of your father, it +was even truer of your mother; at least it was true of mine, to whom +this book is dedicated. Now, when society is in a rather futile fuss +about the subjection of women, will no one say how much every man owes +to the tyranny and privilege of women, to the fact that they alone rule +education until education becomes futile: for a boy is only sent to be +taught at school when it is too late to teach him anything. The real +thing has been done already, and thank God it is nearly always done by +women. Every man is womanised, merely by being born. They talk of the +masculine woman; but every man is a feminised man. And if ever men walk +to Westminster to protest against this female privilege, I shall not +join their procession. + +For I remember with certainty this fixed psychological fact; that the +very time when I was most under a woman's authority, I was most full of +flame and adventure. Exactly because when my mother said that ants bit +they did bite, and because snow did come in winter (as she said); +therefore the whole world was to me a fairyland of wonderful +fulfilments, and it was like living in some Hebraic age, when prophecy +after prophecy came true. I went out as a child into the garden, and it +was a terrible place to me, precisely because I had a clue to it: if I +had held no clue it would not have been terrible, but tame. A mere +unmeaning wilderness is not even impressive. But the garden of childhood +was fascinating, exactly because everything had a fixed meaning which +could be found out in its turn. Inch by inch I might discover what was +the object of the ugly shape called a rake; or form some shadowy +conjecture as to why my parents kept a cat. + +So, since I have accepted Christendom as a mother and not merely as a +chance example, I have found Europe and the world once more like the +little garden where I stared at the symbolic shapes of cat and rake; I +look at everything with the old elvish ignorance and expectancy. This or +that rite or doctrine may look as ugly and extraordinary as a rake; but +I have found by experience that such things end somehow in grass and +flowers. A clergyman may be apparently as useless as a cat, but he is +also as fascinating, for there must be some strange reason for his +existence. I give one instance out of a hundred; I have not myself any +instinctive kinship with that enthusiasm for physical virginity, which +has certainly been a note of historic Christianity. But when I look not +at myself but at the world, I perceive that this enthusiasm is not only +a note of Christianity, but a note of Paganism, a note of high human +nature in many spheres. The Greeks felt virginity when they carved +Artemis, the Romans when they robed the vestals, the worst and wildest +of the great Elizabethan playwrights clung to the literal purity of a +woman as to the central pillar of the world. Above all, the modern world +(even while mocking sexual innocence) has flung itself into a generous +idolatry of sexual innocence--the great modern worship of children. For +any man who loves children will agree that their peculiar beauty is hurt +by a hint of physical sex. With all this human experience, allied with +the Christian authority, I simply conclude that I am wrong, and the +church right; or rather that I am defective, while the church is +universal. It takes all sorts to make a church; she does not ask me to +be celibate. But the fact that I have no appreciation of the celibates, +I accept like the fact that I have no ear for music. The best human +experience is against me, as it is on the subject of Bach. Celibacy is +one flower in my father's garden, of which I have not been told the +sweet or terrible name. But I may be told it any day. + +This, therefore, is, in conclusion, my reason for accepting the religion +and not merely the scattered and secular truths out of the religion. I +do it because the thing has not merely told this truth or that truth, +but has revealed itself as a truth-telling thing. All other philosophies +say the things that plainly seem to be true; only this philosophy has +again and again said the thing that does not seem to be true, but is +true. Alone of all creeds it is convincing where it is not attractive; +it turns out to be right, like my father in the garden. Theosophists, +for instance, will preach an obviously attractive idea like +re-incarnation; but if we wait for its logical results, they are +spiritual superciliousness and the cruelty of caste. For if a man is a +beggar by his own pre-natal sins, people will tend to despise the +beggar. But Christianity preaches an obviously unattractive idea, such +as original sin; but when we wait for its results, they are pathos and +brotherhood, and a thunder of laughter and pity; for only with original +sin we can at once pity the beggar and distrust the king. Men of science +offer us health, an obvious benefit; it is only afterwards that we +discover that by health, they mean bodily slavery and spiritual tedium. +Orthodoxy makes us jump by the sudden brink of hell; it is only +afterwards that we realise that jumping was an athletic exercise highly +beneficial to our health. It is only afterwards that we realise that +this danger is the root of all drama and romance. The strongest argument +for the divine grace is simply its ungraciousness. The unpopular parts +of Christianity turn out when examined to be the very props of the +people. The outer ring of Christianity is a rigid guard of ethical +abnegations and professional priests; but inside that inhuman guard you +will find the old human life dancing like children, and drinking wine +like men; for Christianity is the only frame for pagan freedom. But in +the modern philosophy the case is opposite; it is its outer ring that +is obviously artistic and emancipated; its despair is within. + +And its despair is this, that it does not really believe that there is +any meaning in the universe; therefore it cannot hope to find any +romance; its romances will have no plots. A man cannot expect any +adventures in the land of anarchy. But a man can expect any number of +adventures if he goes travelling in the land of authority. One can find +no meanings in a jungle of scepticism; but the man will find more and +more meanings who walks through a forest of doctrine and design. Here +everything has a story tied to its tail, like the tools or pictures in +my father's house; for it is my father's house. I end where I began--at +the right end. I have entered at least the gate of all good philosophy. +I have come into my second childhood. + +But this larger and more adventurous Christian universe has one final +mark difficult to express; yet as a conclusion of the whole matter I +will attempt to express it. All the real argument about religion turns +on the question of whether a man who was born upside down can tell when +he comes right way up. The primary paradox of Christianity is that the +ordinary condition of man is not his sane or sensible condition; that +the normal itself is an abnormality. That is the inmost philosophy of +the Fall. In Sir Oliver Lodge's interesting new Catechism, the first two +questions were: "What are you?" and "What, then, is the meaning of the +Fall of Man?" I remember amusing myself by writing my own answers to the +questions; but I soon found that they were very broken and agnostic +answers. To the question, "What are you?" I could only answer, "God +knows." And to the question, "What is meant by the Fall?" I could answer +with complete sincerity, "That whatever I am, I am not myself." This is +the prime paradox of our religion; something that we have never in any +full sense known, is not only better than ourselves, but even more +natural to us than ourselves. And there is really no test of this except +the merely experimental one with which these pages began, the test of +the padded cell and the open door. It is only since I have known +orthodoxy that I have known mental emancipation. But, in conclusion, it +has one special application to the ultimate idea of joy. + +It is said that Paganism is a religion of joy and Christianity of +sorrow; it would be just as easy to prove that Paganism is pure sorrow +and Christianity pure joy. Such conflicts mean nothing and lead +nowhere. Everything human must have in it both joy and sorrow; the only +matter of interest is the manner in which the two things are balanced or +divided. And the really interesting thing is this, that the pagan was +(in the main) happier and happier as he approached the earth, but sadder +and sadder as he approached the heavens. The gaiety of the best +Paganism, as in the playfulness of Catullus or Theocritus, is, indeed, +an eternal gaiety never to be forgotten by a grateful humanity. But it +is all a gaiety about the facts of life, not about its origin. To the +pagan the small things are as sweet as the small brooks breaking out of +the mountain; but the broad things are as bitter as the sea. When the +pagan looks at the very core of the cosmos he is struck cold. Behind the +gods, who are merely despotic, sit the fates, who are deadly. Nay, the +fates are worse than deadly; they are dead. And when rationalists say +that the ancient world was more enlightened than the Christian, from +their point of view they are right. For when they say "enlightened" they +mean darkened with incurable despair. It is profoundly true that the +ancient world was more modern than the Christian. The common bond is in +the fact that ancients and moderns have both been miserable about +existence, about everything, while mediævals were happy about that at +least. I freely grant that the pagans, like the moderns, were only +miserable about everything--they were quite jolly about everything else. +I concede that the Christians of the Middle Ages were only at peace +about everything--they were at war about everything else. But if the +question turn on the primary pivot of the cosmos, then there was more +cosmic contentment in the narrow and bloody streets of Florence than in +the theatre of Athens or the open garden of Epicurus. Giotto lived in a +gloomier town than Euripides, but he lived in a gayer universe. + +The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but +sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my last dogma defiantly) +it is not native to man to be so. Man is more himself, man is more +manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the +superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and +fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the +soul. Pessimism is at best an emotional half-holiday; joy is the +uproarious labour by which all things live. Yet, according to the +apparent estate of man as seen by the pagan or the agnostic, this +primary need of human nature can never be fulfilled. Joy ought to be +expansive; but for the agnostic it must be contracted, it must cling to +one corner of the world. Grief ought to be a concentration; but for the +agnostic its desolation is spread through an unthinkable eternity. This +is what I call being born upside down. The sceptic may truly be said to +be topsy-turvy; for his feet are dancing upwards in idle ecstacies, +while his brain is in the abyss. To the modern man the heavens are +actually below the earth. The explanation is simple; he is standing on +his head; which is a very weak pedestal to stand on. But when he has +found his feet again he knows it. Christianity satisfies suddenly and +perfectly man's ancestral instinct for being the right way up; satisfies +it supremely in this; that by its creed joy becomes something gigantic +and sadness something special and small. The vault above us is not deaf +because the universe is an idiot; the silence is not the heartless +silence of an endless and aimless world. Rather the silence around us is +a small and pitiful stillness like the prompt stillness in a sick room. +We are perhaps permitted tragedy as a sort of merciful comedy: because +the frantic energy of divine things would knock us down like a drunken +farce. We can take our own tears more lightly than we could take the +tremendous levities of the angels. So we sit perhaps in a starry chamber +of silence, while the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to +hear. + +Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret +of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the +strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again +haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the +Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the +thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, +almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing +their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His +open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. +Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists +are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He +flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how +they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained +something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering +personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something +that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was +something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous +isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show +us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it +was His mirth. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/16769-0.zip b/16769-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..60bdc6b --- /dev/null +++ b/16769-0.zip diff --git a/16769-8.txt b/16769-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..36f92ef --- /dev/null +++ b/16769-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5886 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. Chesterton + +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: Orthodoxy + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: September 28, 2005 [EBook #16769] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ORTHODOXY *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Clare Coney and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + + +ORTHODOXY + +_by_ + +G.K. CHESTERTON + + + +JOHN LANE + +THE BODLEY HEAD LTD + +_First published in_.......................... 1908 + +_printed_..................................... 1908 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1909 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1911 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1915 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1919 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1921 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1924 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1926 + +_First published in "The Week-End Library" in_ 1927 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1934 + + +MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, +LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + +_TO MY MOTHER_ + + + + +_CONTENTS_ + + + _Chap._ _Page_ + + I. INTRODUCTION IN DEFENCE OF EVERYTHING ELSE 11 + + II. THE MANIAC ................................ 20 + + III. THE SUICIDE OF THOUGHT ................... 50 + + IV. THE ETHICS OF ELFLAND ..................... 76 + + V. THE FLAG OF THE WORLD ...................... 117 + + VI. THE PARADOXES OF CHRISTIANITY ............. 146 + + VII. THE ETERNAL REVOLUTION ................... 186 + + VIII. THE ROMANCE OF ORTHODOXY ................ 228 + + IX. AUTHORITY AND THE ADVENTURER .............. 259 + + + + +_ORTHODOXY_ + + + + +CHAPTER I.--_Introduction in Defence of Everything Else_ + + +The only possible excuse for this book is that it is an answer to a +challenge. Even a bad shot is dignified when he accepts a duel. When +some time ago I published a series of hasty but sincere papers, under +the name of "Heretics," several critics for whose intellect I have a +warm respect (I may mention specially Mr. G.S. Street) said that it was +all very well for me to tell everybody to affirm his cosmic theory, but +that I had carefully avoided supporting my precepts with example. "I +will begin to worry about my philosophy," said Mr. Street, "when Mr. +Chesterton has given us his." It was perhaps an incautious suggestion to +make to a person only too ready to write books upon the feeblest +provocation. But after all, though Mr. Street has inspired and created +this book, he need not read it. If he does read it, he will find that in +its pages I have attempted in a vague and personal way, in a set of +mental pictures rather than in a series of deductions, to state the +philosophy in which I have come to believe. I will not call it my +philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made +me. + +I have often had a fancy for writing a romance about an English +yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England +under the impression that it was a new island in the South Seas. I +always find, however, that I am either too busy or too lazy to write +this fine work, so I may as well give it away for the purposes of +philosophical illustration. There will probably be a general impression +that the man who landed (armed to the teeth and talking by signs) to +plant the British flag on that barbaric temple which turned out to be +the Pavilion at Brighton, felt rather a fool. I am not here concerned to +deny that he looked a fool. But if you imagine that he felt a fool, or +at any rate that the sense of folly was his sole or his dominant +emotion, then you have not studied with sufficient delicacy the rich +romantic nature of the hero of this tale. His mistake was really a most +enviable mistake; and he knew it, if he was the man I take him for. What +could be more delightful than to have in the same few minutes all the +fascinating terrors of going abroad combined with all the humane +security of coming home again? What could be better than to have all +the fun of discovering South Africa without the disgusting necessity of +landing there? What could be more glorious than to brace one's self up +to discover New South Wales and then realize, with a gush of happy +tears, that it was really old South Wales. This at least seems to me the +main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of +this book. How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and +yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged +citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give +us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour +of being our own town? To show that a faith or a philosophy is true from +every standpoint would be too big an undertaking even for a much bigger +book than this; it is necessary to follow one path of argument; and this +is the path that I here propose to follow. I wish to set forth my faith +as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that +mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly +named romance. For the very word "romance" has in it the mystery and +ancient meaning of Rome. Any one setting out to dispute anything ought +always to begin by saying what he does not dispute. Beyond stating what +he proposes to prove he should always state what he does not propose to +prove. The thing I do not propose to prove, the thing I propose to take +as common ground between myself and any average reader, is this +desirability of an active and imaginative life, picturesque and full of +a poetical curiosity, a life such as western man at any rate always +seems to have desired. If a man says that extinction is better than +existence or blank existence better than variety and adventure, then he +is not one of the ordinary people to whom I am talking. If a man prefers +nothing I can give him nothing. But nearly all people I have ever met in +this western society in which I live would agree to the general +proposition that we need this life of practical romance; the combination +of something that is strange with something that is secure. We need so +to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of +welcome. We need to be happy in this wonderland without once being +merely comfortable. It is _this_ achievement of my creed that I shall +chiefly pursue in these pages. + +But I have a peculiar reason for mentioning the man in a yacht, who +discovered England. For I am that man in a yacht. I discovered England. +I do not see how this book can avoid being egotistical; and I do not +quite see (to tell the truth) how it can avoid being dull. Dullness +will, however, free me from the charge which I most lament; the charge +of being flippant. Mere light sophistry is the thing that I happen to +despise most of all things, and it is perhaps a wholesome fact that this +is the thing of which I am generally accused. I know nothing so +contemptible as a mere paradox; a mere ingenious defence of the +indefensible. If it were true (as has been said) that Mr. Bernard Shaw +lived upon paradox, then he ought to be a mere common millionaire; for a +man of his mental activity could invent a sophistry every six minutes. +It is as easy as lying; because it is lying. The truth is, of course, +that Mr. Shaw is cruelly hampered by the fact that he cannot tell any +lie unless he thinks it is the truth. I find myself under the same +intolerable bondage. I never in my life said anything merely because I +thought it funny; though, of course, I have had ordinary human +vain-glory, and may have thought it funny because I had said it. It is +one thing to describe an interview with a gorgon or a griffin, a +creature who does not exist. It is another thing to discover that the +rhinoceros does exist and then take pleasure in the fact that he looks +as if he didn't. One searches for truth, but it may be that one pursues +instinctively the more extraordinary truths. And I offer this book with +the heartiest sentiments to all the jolly people who hate what I write, +and regard it (very justly, for all I know), as a piece of poor clowning +or a single tiresome joke. + +For if this book is a joke it is a joke against me. I am the man who +with the utmost daring discovered what had been discovered before. If +there is an element of farce in what follows, the farce is at my own +expense; for this book explains how I fancied I was the first to set +foot in Brighton and then found I was the last. It recounts my +elephantine adventures in pursuit of the obvious. No one can think my +case more ludicrous than I think it myself; no reader can accuse me here +of trying to make a fool of him: I am the fool of this story, and no +rebel shall hurl me from my throne. I freely confess all the idiotic +ambitions of the end of the nineteenth century. I did, like all other +solemn little boys, try to be in advance of the age. Like them I tried +to be some ten minutes in advance of the truth. And I found that I was +eighteen hundred years behind it. I did strain my voice with a painfully +juvenile exaggeration in uttering my truths. And I was punished in the +fittest and funniest way, for I have kept my truths: but I have +discovered, not that they were not truths, but simply that they were not +mine. When I fancied that I stood alone I was really in the ridiculous +position of being backed up by all Christendom. It may be, Heaven +forgive me, that I did try to be original; but I only succeeded in +inventing all by myself an inferior copy of the existing traditions of +civilized religion. The man from the yacht thought he was the first to +find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to +found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I +discovered that it was orthodoxy. + +It may be that somebody will be entertained by the account of this happy +fiasco. It might amuse a friend or an enemy to read how I gradually +learnt from the truth of some stray legend or from the falsehood of some +dominant philosophy, things that I might have learnt from my +catechism--if I had ever learnt it. There may or may not be some +entertainment in reading how I found at last in an anarchist club or a +Babylonian temple what I might have found in the nearest parish church. +If any one is entertained by learning how the flowers of the field or +the phrases in an omnibus, the accidents of politics or the pains of +youth came together in a certain order to produce a certain conviction +of Christian orthodoxy, he may possibly read this book. But there is in +everything a reasonable division of labour. I have written the book, and +nothing on earth would induce me to read it. + +I add one purely pedantic note which comes, as a note naturally should, +at the beginning of the book. These essays are concerned only to discuss +the actual fact that the central Christian theology (sufficiently +summarized in the Apostles' Creed) is the best root of energy and sound +ethics. They are not intended to discuss the very fascinating but quite +different question of what is the present seat of authority for the +proclamation of that creed. When the word "orthodoxy" is used here it +means the Apostles' Creed, as understood by everybody calling himself +Christian until a very short time ago and the general historic conduct +of those who held such a creed. I have been forced by mere space to +confine myself to what I have got from this creed; I do not touch the +matter much disputed among modern Christians, of where we ourselves got +it. This is not an ecclesiastical treatise but a sort of slovenly +autobiography. But if any one wants my opinions about the actual nature +of the authority, Mr. G.S. Street has only to throw me another +challenge, and I will write him another book. + + + + +CHAPTER II.--_The Maniac_ + + +Thoroughly worldly people never understand even the world; they rely +altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true. Once I remember +walking with a prosperous publisher, who made a remark which I had often +heard before; it is, indeed, almost a motto of the modern world. Yet I +had heard it once too often, and I saw suddenly that there was nothing +in it. The publisher said of somebody, "That man will get on; he +believes in himself." And I remember that as I lifted my head to listen, +my eye caught an omnibus on which was written "Hanwell." I said to him, +"Shall I tell you where the men are who believe most in themselves? For +I can tell you. I know of men who believe in themselves more colossally +than Napoleon or Caesar. I know where flames the fixed star of certainty +and success. I can guide you to the thrones of the Super-men. The men +who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums." He said +mildly that there were a good many men after all who believed in +themselves and who were not in lunatic asylums. "Yes, there are," I +retorted, "and you of all men ought to know them. That drunken poet from +whom you would not take a dreary tragedy, he believed in himself. That +elderly minister with an epic from whom you were hiding in a back room, +he believed in himself. If you consulted your business experience +instead of your ugly individualistic philosophy, you would know that +believing in himself is one of the commonest signs of a rotter. Actors +who can't act believe in themselves; and debtors who won't pay. It would +be much truer to say that a man will certainly fail because he believes +in himself. Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete +self-confidence is a weakness. Believing utterly in one's self is a +hysterical and superstitious belief like believing in Joanna Southcote: +the man who has it has 'Hanwell' written on his face as plain as it is +written on that omnibus." And to all this my friend the publisher made +this very deep and effective reply, "Well, if a man is not to believe in +himself, in what is he to believe?" After a long pause I replied, "I +will go home and write a book in answer to that question." This is the +book that I have written in answer to it. + +But I think this book may well start where our argument started--in the +neighbourhood of the mad-house. Modern masters of science are much +impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The +ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that +necessity. They began with the fact of sin--a fact as practical as +potatoes. Whether or no man could be washed in miraculous waters, there +was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing. But certain religious +leaders in London, not mere materialists, have begun in our day not to +deny the highly disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. +Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of +Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of the +Reverend R.J. Campbell, in their almost too fastidious spirituality, +admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. +But they essentially deny human sin, which they can see in the street. +The strongest saints and the strongest sceptics alike took positive evil +as the starting-point of their argument. If it be true (as it certainly +is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the +religious philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must +either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny +the present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new +theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the +cat. + +In this remarkable situation it is plainly not now possible (with any +hope of a universal appeal) to start, as our fathers did, with the fact +of sin. This very fact which was to them (and is to me) as plain as a +pikestaff, is the very fact that has been specially diluted or denied. +But though moderns deny the existence of sin, I do not think that they +have yet denied the existence of a lunatic asylum. We all agree still +that there is a collapse of the intellect as unmistakable as a falling +house. Men deny hell, but not, as yet, Hanwell. For the purpose of our +primary argument the one may very well stand where the other stood. I +mean that as all thoughts and theories were once judged by whether they +tended to make a man lose his soul, so for our present purpose all +modern thoughts and theories may be judged by whether they tend to make +a man lose his wits. + +It is true that some speak lightly and loosely of insanity as in itself +attractive. But a moment's thought will show that if disease is +beautiful, it is generally some one else's disease. A blind man may be +picturesque; but it requires two eyes to see the picture. And similarly +even the wildest poetry of insanity can only be enjoyed by the sane. To +the insane man his insanity is quite prosaic, because it is quite true. +A man who thinks himself a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a +chicken. A man who thinks he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as +a bit of glass. It is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, +and which makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea +that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see the +irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short, oddities +only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is +why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are +always complaining of the dulness of life. This is also why the new +novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The +old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures +that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the +modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not +central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, +and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among +dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses +what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of +to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world. + +Let us begin, then, with the mad-house; from this evil and fantastic inn +let us set forth on our intellectual journey. Now, if we are to glance +at the philosophy of sanity, the first thing to do in the matter is to +blot out one big and common mistake. There is a notion adrift everywhere +that imagination, especially mystical imagination, is dangerous to man's +mental balance. Poets are commonly spoken of as psychologically +unreliable; and generally there is a vague association between wreathing +laurels in your hair and sticking straws in it. Facts and history +utterly contradict this view. Most of the very great poets have been not +only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever really +held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to hold them. +Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is +reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go +mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will +be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does +lie in logic, not in imagination. Artistic paternity is as wholesome as +physical paternity. Moreover, it is worthy of remark that when a poet +really was morbid it was commonly because he had some weak spot of +rationality on his brain. Poe, for instance, really was morbid; not +because he was poetical, but because he was specially analytical. Even +chess was too poetical for him; he disliked chess because it was full of +knights and castles, like a poem. He avowedly preferred the black discs +of draughts, because they were more like the mere black dots on a +diagram. Perhaps the strongest case of all is this: that only one great +English poet went mad, Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by +logic, by the ugly and alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the +disease, but the medicine; poetry partly kept him in health. He could +sometimes forget the red and thirsty hell to which his hideous +necessitarianism dragged him among the wide waters and the white flat +lilies of the Ouse. He was damned by John Calvin; he was almost saved by +John Gilpin. Everywhere we see that men do not go mad by dreaming. +Critics are much madder than poets. Homer is complete and calm enough; +it is his critics who tear him into extravagant tatters. Shakespeare is +quite himself; it is only some of his critics who have discovered that +he was somebody else. And though St. John the Evangelist saw many +strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his +own commentators. The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it +floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite +sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the +physical exhaustion of Mr. Holbein. To accept everything is an exercise, +to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and +expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his +head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens +into his head. And it is his head that splits. + +It is a small matter, but not irrelevant, that this striking mistake is +commonly supported by a striking misquotation. We have all heard people +cite the celebrated line of Dryden as "Great genius is to madness near +allied." But Dryden did not say that great genius was to madness near +allied. Dryden was a great genius himself, and knew better. It would +have been hard to find a man more romantic than he, or more sensible. +What Dryden said was this, "Great wits are oft to madness near allied"; +and that is true. It is the pure promptitude of the intellect that is in +peril of a breakdown. Also people might remember of what sort of man +Dryden was talking. He was not talking of any unworldly visionary like +Vaughan or George Herbert. He was talking of a cynical man of the world, +a sceptic, a diplomatist, a great practical politician. Such men are +indeed to madness near allied. Their incessant calculation of their own +brains and other people's brains is a dangerous trade. It is always +perilous to the mind to reckon up the mind. A flippant person has asked +why we say, "As mad as a hatter." A more flippant person might answer +that a hatter is mad because he has to measure the human head. + +And if great reasoners are often maniacal, it is equally true that +maniacs are commonly great reasoners. When I was engaged in a +controversy with the _Clarion_ on the matter of free will, that able +writer Mr. R.B. Suthers said that free will was lunacy, because it meant +causeless actions, and the actions of a lunatic would be causeless. I do +not dwell here upon the disastrous lapse in determinist logic. Obviously +if any actions, even a lunatic's, can be causeless, determinism is done +for. If the chain of causation can be broken for a madman, it can be +broken for a man. But my purpose is to point out something more +practical. It was natural, perhaps, that a modern Marxian Socialist +should not know anything about free will. But it was certainly +remarkable that a modern Marxian Socialist should not know anything +about lunatics. Mr. Suthers evidently did not know anything about +lunatics. The last thing that can be said of a lunatic is that his +actions are causeless. If any human acts may loosely be called +causeless, they are the minor acts of a healthy man; whistling as he +walks; slashing the grass with a stick; kicking his heels or rubbing his +hands. It is the happy man who does the useless things; the sick man is +not strong enough to be idle. It is exactly such careless and causeless +actions that the madman could never understand; for the madman (like the +determinist) generally sees too much cause in everything. The madman +would read a conspiratorial significance into those empty activities. He +would think that the lopping of the grass was an attack on private +property. He would think that the kicking of the heels was a signal to +an accomplice. If the madman could for an instant become careless, he +would become sane. Every one who has had the misfortune to talk with +people in the heart or on the edge of mental disorder, knows that their +most sinister quality is a horrible clarity of detail; a connecting of +one thing with another in a map more elaborate than a maze. If you argue +with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get the worst of +it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker for not being +delayed by the things that go with good judgment. He is not hampered by +a sense of humour or by charity, or by the dumb certainties of +experience. He is the more logical for losing certain sane affections. +Indeed, the common phrase for insanity is in this respect a misleading +one. The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is +the man who has lost everything except his reason. + +The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and often in a +purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more strictly, the +insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable; this +may be observed specially in the two or three commonest kinds of +madness. If a man says (for instance) that men have a conspiracy against +him, you cannot dispute it except by saying that all the men deny that +they are conspirators; which is exactly what conspirators would do. His +explanation covers the facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he +is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that +the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England +that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or if +a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him that the +world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's. + +Nevertheless he is wrong. But if we attempt to trace his error in exact +terms, we shall not find it quite so easy as we had supposed. Perhaps +the nearest we can get to expressing it is to say this: that his mind +moves in a perfect but narrow circle. A small circle is quite as +infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is +not so large. In the same way the insane explanation is quite as +complete as the sane one, but it is not so large. A bullet is quite as +round as the world, but it is not the world. There is such a thing as a +narrow universality; there is such a thing as a small and cramped +eternity; you may see it in many modern religions. Now, speaking quite +externally and empirically, we may say that the strongest and most +unmistakable _mark_ of madness is this combination between a logical +completeness and a spiritual contraction. The lunatic's theory explains +a large number of things, but it does not explain them in a large way. I +mean that if you or I were dealing with a mind that was growing morbid, +we should be chiefly concerned not so much to give it arguments as to +give it air, to convince it that there was something cleaner and cooler +outside the suffocation of a single argument. Suppose, for instance, it +were the first case that I took as typical; suppose it were the case of +a man who accused everybody of conspiring against him. If we could +express our deepest feelings of protest and appeal against this +obsession, I suppose we should say something like this: "Oh, I admit +that you have your case and have it by heart, and that many things do +fit into other things as you say. I admit that your explanation explains +a great deal; but what a great deal it leaves out! Are there no other +stories in the world except yours; and are all men busy with your +business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps when the man in the +street did not seem to see you it was only his cunning; perhaps when the +policeman asked you your name it was only because he knew it already. +But how much happier you would be if you only knew that these people +cared nothing about you! How much larger your life would be if your self +could become smaller in it; if you could really look at other men with +common curiosity and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are +in their sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would +begin to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you. +You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your own +little plot is always being played, and you would find yourself under a +freer sky, in a street full of splendid strangers." Or suppose it were +the second case of madness, that of a man who claims the crown, your +impulse would be to answer, "All right! Perhaps you know that you are +the King of England; but why do you care? Make one magnificent effort +and you will be a human being and look down on all the kings of the +earth." Or it might be the third case, of the madman who called himself +Christ. If we said what we felt, we should say, "So you are the Creator +and Redeemer of the world: but what a small world it must be! What a +little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than butterflies! +How sad it must be to be God; and an inadequate God! Is there really no +life fuller and no love more marvellous than yours; and is it really in +your small and painful pity that all flesh must put its faith? How much +happier you would be, how much more of you there would be, if the hammer +of a higher God could smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like +spangles, and leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as +well as down!" + +And it must be remembered that the most purely practical science does +take this view of mental evil; it does not seek to argue with it like a +heresy, but simply to snap it like a spell. Neither modern science nor +ancient religion believes in complete free thought. Theology rebukes +certain thoughts by calling them blasphemous. Science rebukes certain +thoughts by calling them morbid. For example, some religious societies +discouraged men more or less from thinking about sex. The new scientific +society definitely discourages men from thinking about death; it is a +fact, but it is considered a morbid fact. And in dealing with those +whose morbidity has a touch of mania, modern science cares far less for +pure logic than a dancing Dervish. In these cases it is not enough that +the unhappy man should desire truth; he must desire health. Nothing can +save him but a blind hunger for normality, like that of a beast. A man +cannot think himself out of mental evil; for it is actually the organ of +thought that has become diseased, ungovernable, and, as it were, +independent. He can only be saved by will or faith. The moment his mere +reason moves, it moves in the old circular rut; he will go round and +round his logical circle, just as a man in a third-class carriage on the +Inner Circle will go round and round the Inner Circle unless he performs +the voluntary, vigorous, and mystical act of getting out at Gower +Street. Decision is the whole business here; a door must be shut for +ever. Every remedy is a desperate remedy. Every cure is a miraculous +cure. Curing a madman is not arguing with a philosopher; it is casting +out a devil. And however quietly doctors and psychologists may go to +work in the matter, their attitude is profoundly intolerant--as +intolerant as Bloody Mary. Their attitude is really this: that the man +must stop thinking, if he is to go on living. Their counsel is one of +intellectual amputation. If thy _head_ offend thee, cut it off; for it +is better, not merely to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child, but to +enter it as an imbecile, rather than with your whole intellect to be +cast into hell--or into Hanwell. + +Such is the madman of experience; he is commonly a reasoner, frequently +a successful reasoner. Doubtless he could be vanquished in mere reason, +and the case against him put logically. But it can be put much more +precisely in more general and even æsthetic terms. He is in the clean +and well-lit prison of one idea: he is sharpened to one painful point. +He is without healthy hesitation and healthy complexity. Now, as I +explain in the introduction, I have determined in these early chapters +to give not so much a diagram of a doctrine as some pictures of a point +of view. And I have described at length my vision of the maniac for this +reason: that just as I am affected by the maniac, so I am affected by +most modern thinkers. That unmistakable mood or note that I hear from +Hanwell, I hear also from half the chairs of science and seats of +learning to-day; and most of the mad doctors are mad doctors in more +senses than one. They all have exactly that combination we have noted: +the combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason with a contracted +common sense. They are universal only in the sense that they take one +thin explanation and carry it very far. But a pattern can stretch for +ever and still be a small pattern. They see a chess-board white on +black, and if the universe is paved with it, it is still white on black. +Like the lunatic, they cannot alter their standpoint; they cannot make a +mental effort and suddenly see it black on white. + +Take first the more obvious case of materialism. As an explanation of +the world, materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has just the +quality of the madman's argument; we have at once the sense of it +covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out. +Contemplate some able and sincere materialist, as, for instance, Mr. +McCabe, and you will have exactly this unique sensation. He understands +everything, and everything does not seem worth understanding. His cosmos +may be complete in every rivet and cog-wheel, but still his cosmos is +smaller than our world. Somehow his scheme, like the lucid scheme of the +madman, seems unconscious of the alien energies and the large +indifference of the earth; it is not thinking of the real things of the +earth, of fighting peoples or proud mothers, or first love or fear upon +the sea. The earth is so very large, and the cosmos is so very small. +The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in. + +It must be understood that I am not now discussing the relation of +these creeds to truth; but, for the present, solely their relation to +health. Later in the argument I hope to attack the question of objective +verity; here I speak only of a phenomenon of psychology. I do not for +the present attempt to prove to Haeckel that materialism is untrue, any +more than I attempted to prove to the man who thought he was Christ that +he was labouring under an error. I merely remark here on the fact that +both cases have the same kind of completeness and the same kind of +incompleteness. You can explain a man's detention at Hanwell by an +indifferent public by saying that it is the crucifixion of a god of whom +the world is not worthy. The explanation does explain. Similarly you may +explain the order in the universe by saying that all things, even the +souls of men, are leaves inevitably unfolding on an utterly unconscious +tree--the blind destiny of matter. The explanation does explain, though +not, of course, so completely as the madman's. But the point here is +that the normal human mind not only objects to both, but feels to both +the same objection. Its approximate statement is that if the man in +Hanwell is the real God, he is not much of a god. And, similarly, if the +cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it is not much of a +cosmos. The thing has shrunk. The deity is less divine than many men; +and (according to Haeckel) the whole of life is something much more +grey, narrow, and trivial than many separate aspects of it. The parts +seem greater than the whole. + +For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or +not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. In one sense, of +course, all intelligent ideas are narrow. They cannot be broader than +themselves. A Christian is only restricted in the same sense that an +atheist is restricted. He cannot think Christianity false and continue +to be a Christian; and the atheist cannot think atheism false and +continue to be an atheist. But as it happens, there is a very special +sense in which materialism has more restrictions than spiritualism. Mr. +McCabe thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in +determinism. I think Mr. McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to +believe in fairies. But if we examine the two vetoes we shall see that +his is really much more of a pure veto than mine. The Christian is quite +free to believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and +inevitable development in the universe. But the materialist is not +allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of +spiritualism or miracle. Poor Mr. McCabe is not allowed to retain even +the tiniest imp, though it might be hiding in a pimpernel. The Christian +admits that the universe is manifold and even miscellaneous, just as a +sane man knows that he is complex. The sane man knows that he has a +touch of the beast, a touch of the devil, a touch of the saint, a touch +of the citizen. Nay, the really sane man knows that he has a touch of +the madman. But the materialist's world is quite simple and solid, just +as the madman is quite sure he is sane. The materialist is sure that +history has been simply and solely a chain of causation, just as the +interesting person before mentioned is quite sure that he is simply and +solely a chicken. Materialists and madmen never have doubts. + +Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do materialistic +denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not think about it. But +if I disbelieve in immortality I must not think about it. In the first +case the road is open and I can go as far as I like; in the second the +road is shut. But the case is even stronger, and the parallel with +madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive +and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually +destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions +of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his +humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, +initiative, all that is human. For instance, when materialism leads men +to complete fatalism (as it generally does), it is quite idle to pretend +that it is in any sense a liberating force. It is absurd to say that you +are especially advancing freedom when you only use free thought to +destroy free will. The determinists come to bind, not to loose. They may +well call their law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that +ever fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if you +like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that this is just +as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language when applied to a +man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if you like, that the man is +free to think himself a poached egg. But it is surely a more massive and +important fact that if he is a poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, +sleep, walk, or smoke a cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, +that the bold determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the +reality of the will. But it is a much more massive and important fact +that he is not free to praise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, +to punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year +resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say "thank +you" for the mustard. + +In passing from this subject I may note that there is a queer fallacy to +the effect that materialistic fatalism is in some way favourable to +mercy, to the abolition of cruel punishments or punishments of any kind. +This is startlingly the reverse of the truth. It is quite tenable that +the doctrine of necessity makes no difference at all; that it leaves the +flogger flogging and the kind friend exhorting as before. But obviously +if it stops either of them it stops the kind exhortation. That the sins +are inevitable does not prevent punishment; if it prevents anything it +prevents persuasion. Determinism is quite as likely to lead to cruelty +as it is certain to lead to cowardice. Determinism is not inconsistent +with the cruel treatment of criminals. What it is (perhaps) inconsistent +with is the generous treatment of criminals; with any appeal to their +better feelings or encouragement in their moral struggle. The +determinist does not believe in appealing to the will, but he does +believe in changing the environment. He must not say to the sinner, "Go +and sin no more," because the sinner cannot help it. But he can put him +in boiling oil; for boiling oil is an environment. Considered as a +figure, therefore, the materialist has the fantastic outline of the +figure of the madman. Both take up a position at once unanswerable and +intolerable. + +Of course it is not only of the materialist that all this is true. The +same would apply to the other extreme of speculative logic. There is a +sceptic far more terrible than he who believes that everything began in +matter. It is possible to meet the sceptic who believes that everything +began in himself. He doubts not the existence of angels or devils, but +the existence of men and cows. For him his own friends are a mythology +made up by himself. He created his own father and his own mother. This +horrible fancy has in it something decidedly attractive to the somewhat +mystical egoism of our day. That publisher who thought that men would +get on if they believed in themselves, those seekers after the Superman +who are always looking for him in the looking-glass, those writers who +talk about impressing their personalities instead of creating life for +the world, all these people have really only an inch between them and +this awful emptiness. Then when this kindly world all round the man has +been blackened out like a lie; when friends fade into ghosts, and the +foundations of the world fail; then when the man, believing in nothing +and in no man, is alone in his own nightmare, then the great +individualistic motto shall be written over him in avenging irony. The +stars will be only dots in the blackness of his own brain; his mother's +face will be only a sketch from his own insane pencil on the walls of +his cell. But over his cell shall be written, with dreadful truth, "He +believes in himself." + +All that concerns us here, however, is to note that this panegoistic +extreme of thought exhibits the same paradox as the other extreme of +materialism. It is equally complete in theory and equally crippling in +practice. For the sake of simplicity, it is easier to state the notion +by saying that a man can believe that he is always in a dream. Now, +obviously there can be no positive proof given to him that he is not in +a dream, for the simple reason that no proof can be offered that might +not be offered in a dream. But if the man began to burn down London and +say that his housekeeper would soon call him to breakfast, we should +take him and put him with other logicians in a place which has often +been alluded to in the course of this chapter. The man who cannot +believe his senses, and the man who cannot believe anything else, are +both insane, but their insanity is proved not by any error in their +argument, but by the manifest mistake of their whole lives. They have +both locked themselves up in two boxes, painted inside with the sun and +stars; they are both unable to get out, the one into the health and +happiness of heaven, the other even into the health and happiness of the +earth. Their position is quite reasonable; nay, in a sense it is +infinitely reasonable, just as a threepenny bit is infinitely circular. +But there is such a thing as a mean infinity, a base and slavish +eternity. It is amusing to notice that many of the moderns, whether +sceptics or mystics, have taken as their sign a certain eastern symbol, +which is the very symbol of this ultimate nullity. When they wish to +represent eternity, they represent it by a serpent with his tail in his +mouth. There is a startling sarcasm in the image of that very +unsatisfactory meal. The eternity of the material fatalists, the +eternity of the eastern pessimists, the eternity of the supercilious +theosophists and higher scientists of to-day is, indeed, very well +presented by a serpent eating his tail, a degraded animal who destroys +even himself. + +This chapter is purely practical and is concerned with what actually is +the chief mark and element of insanity; we may say in summary that it is +reason used without root, reason in the void. The man who begins to +think without the proper first principles goes mad, the man who begins +to think at the wrong end. And for the rest of these pages we have to +try and discover what is the right end. But we may ask in conclusion, if +this be what drives men mad, what is it that keeps them sane? By the end +of this book I hope to give a definite, some will think a far too +definite, answer. But for the moment it is possible in the same solely +practical manner to give a general answer touching what in actual human +history keeps men sane. Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have +mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity. +The ordinary man has always been sane because the ordinary man has +always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has always had +one foot in earth and the other in fairyland. He has always left himself +free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of to-day) free also +to believe in them. He has always cared more for truth than for +consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to contradict each other, +he would take the two truths and the contradiction along with them. His +spiritual sight is stereoscopic, like his physical sight: he sees two +different pictures at once and yet sees all the better for that. Thus he +has always believed that there was such a thing as fate, but such a +thing as free will also. Thus he believed that children were indeed the +kingdom of heaven, but nevertheless ought to be obedient to the kingdom +of earth. He admired youth because it was young and age because it was +not. It is exactly this balance of apparent contradictions that has been +the whole buoyancy of the healthy man. The whole secret of mysticism is +this: that man can understand everything by the help of what he does not +understand. The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and +succeeds in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to +be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. The determinist makes +the theory of causation quite clear, and then finds that he cannot say +"if you please" to the housemaid. The Christian permits free will to +remain a sacred mystery; but because of this his relations with the +housemaid become of a sparkling and crystal clearness. He puts the seed +of dogma in a central darkness; but it branches forth in all directions +with abounding natural health. As we have taken the circle as the symbol +of reason and madness, we may very well take the cross as the symbol at +once of mystery and of health. Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity +is centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in +its nature; but it is fixed for ever in its size; it can never be larger +or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a +contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its +shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre it can grow without +changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens +its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travellers. + +Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this deep +matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express +sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The one +created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the light of +which we look at everything. Like the sun at noonday, mysticism +explains everything else by the blaze of its own victorious +invisibility. Detached intellectualism is (in the exact sense of a +popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light without heat, and it is +secondary light, reflected from a dead world. But the Greeks were right +when they made Apollo the god both of imagination and of sanity; for he +was both the patron of poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary +dogmas and a special creed I shall speak later. But that +transcendentalism by which all men live has primarily much the position +of the sun in the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid +confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a blaze +and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and unmistakable, as +recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid on a blackboard. For +the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon is the mother of lunatics +and has given to them all her name. + + + + +CHAPTER III.--_The Suicide of Thought_ + + +The phrases of the street are not only forcible but subtle: for a figure +of speech can often get into a crack too small for a definition. Phrases +like "put out" or "off colour" might have been coined by Mr. Henry James +in an agony of verbal precision. And there is no more subtle truth than +that of the everyday phrase about a man having "his heart in the right +place." It involves the idea of normal proportion; not only does a +certain function exist, but it is rightly related to other functions. +Indeed, the negation of this phrase would describe with peculiar +accuracy the somewhat morbid mercy and perverse tenderness of the most +representative moderns. If, for instance, I had to describe with +fairness the character of Mr. Bernard Shaw, I could not express myself +more exactly than by saying that he has a heroically large and generous +heart; but not a heart in the right place. And this is so of the typical +society of our time. + +The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too +good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is +shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not +merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, +and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and +the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. +The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The +virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other +and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their +truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their +pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. For example, Mr. +Blatchford attacks Christianity because he is mad on one Christian +virtue: the merely mystical and almost irrational virtue of charity. He +has a strange idea that he will make it easier to forgive sins by saying +that there are no sins to forgive. Mr. Blatchford is not only an early +Christian, he is the only early Christian who ought really to have been +eaten by lions. For in his case the pagan accusation is really true: his +mercy would mean mere anarchy. He really is the enemy of the human +race--because he is so human. As the other extreme, we may take the +acrid realist, who has deliberately killed in himself all human pleasure +in happy tales or in the healing of the heart. Torquemada tortured +people physically for the sake of moral truth. Zola tortured people +morally for the sake of physical truth. But in Torquemada's time there +was at least a system that could to some extent make righteousness and +peace kiss each other. Now they do not even bow. But a much stronger +case than these two of truth and pity can be found in the remarkable +case of the dislocation of humility. + +It is only with one aspect of humility that we are here concerned. +Humility was largely meant as a restraint upon the arrogance and +infinity of the appetite of man. He was always out-stripping his mercies +with his own newly invented needs. His very power of enjoyment destroyed +half his joys. By asking for pleasure, he lost the chief pleasure; for +the chief pleasure is surprise. Hence it became evident that if a man +would make his world large, he must be always making himself small. Even +the haughty visions, the tall cities, and the toppling pinnacles are the +creations of humility. Giants that tread down forests like grass are the +creations of humility. Towers that vanish upwards above the loneliest +star are the creations of humility. For towers are not tall unless we +look up at them; and giants are not giants unless they are larger than +we. All this gigantesque imagination, which is, perhaps, the mightiest +of the pleasures of man, is at bottom entirely humble. It is impossible +without humility to enjoy anything--even pride. + +But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty +has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ +of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be +doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been +exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is +exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself. The part he doubts is +exactly the part he ought not to doubt--the Divine Reason. Huxley +preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is +so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should be wrong +if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. +The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it +so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the +wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that +prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him +from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his +efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a +man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working +altogether. + +At any street corner we may meet a man who utters the frantic and +blasphemous statement that he may be wrong. Every day one comes across +somebody who says that of course his view may not be the right one. Of +course his view must be the right one, or it is not his view. We are on +the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in +the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who +doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of +old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be +convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are +too meek even to claim their inheritance. It is exactly this +intellectual helplessness which is our second problem. + +The last chapter has been concerned only with a fact of observation: +that what peril of morbidity there is for man comes rather from his +reason than his imagination. It was not meant to attack the authority of +reason; rather it is the ultimate purpose to defend it. For it needs +defence. The whole modern world is at war with reason; and the tower +already reels. + +The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of +religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the +answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like +children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful +assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, +for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no +reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart +from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical +cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or +unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present +one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to +attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of +religious authority are like men who should attack the police without +ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril +to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it +religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And +against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race +is to avoid ruin. + +That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just +as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next +generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one +set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching +the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought. It +is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is +itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our +thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a +sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should +_anything_ go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good +logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the +brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to +think for myself." But the old sceptic, the complete sceptic, says, "I +have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all." + +There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that +ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all +religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent +ages like our own: and already Mr. H.G. Wells has raised its ruinous +banner; he has written a delicate piece of scepticism called "Doubts of +the Instrument." In this he questions the brain itself, and endeavours +to remove all reality from all his own assertions, past, present, and to +come. But it was against this remote ruin that all the military systems +in religion were originally ranked and ruled. The creeds and the +crusades, the hierarchies and the horrible persecutions were not +organized, as is ignorantly said, for the suppression of reason. They +were organized for the difficult defence of reason. Man, by a blind +instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could +be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve, the authority +of popes to define the authority, even of inquisitors to terrify: these +were all only dark defences erected round one central authority, more +undemonstrable, more supernatural than all--the authority of a man to +think. We know now that this is so; we have no excuse for not knowing +it. For we can hear scepticism crashing through the old ring of +authorities, and at the same moment we can see reason swaying upon her +throne. In so far as religion is gone, reason is going. For they are +both of the same primary and authoritative kind. They are both methods +of proof which cannot themselves be proved. And in the act of +destroying the idea of Divine authority we have largely destroyed the +idea of that human authority by which we do a long-division sum. With a +long and sustained tug we have attempted to pull the mitre off +pontifical man; and his head has come off with it. + +Lest this should be called loose assertion, it is perhaps desirable, +though dull, to run rapidly through the chief modern fashions of thought +which have this effect of stopping thought itself. Materialism and the +view of everything as a personal illusion have some such effect; for if +the mind is mechanical, thought cannot be very exciting, and if the +cosmos is unreal, there is nothing to think about. But in these cases +the effect is indirect and doubtful. In some cases it is direct and +clear; notably in the case of what is generally called evolution. + +Evolution is a good example of that modern intelligence which, if it +destroys anything, destroys itself. Evolution is either an innocent +scientific description of how certain earthly things came about; or, if +it is anything more than this, it is an attack upon thought itself. If +evolution destroys anything, it does not destroy religion but +rationalism. If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an +ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is +stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well +do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he +were outside time. But if it means anything more, it means that there is +no such thing as an ape to change, and no such thing as a man for him to +change into. It means that there is no such thing as a thing. At best, +there is only one thing, and that is a flux of everything and anything. +This is an attack not upon the faith, but upon the mind; you cannot +think if there are no things to think about. You cannot think if you are +not separate from the subject of thought. Descartes said, "I think; +therefore I am." The philosophic evolutionist reverses and negatives the +epigram. He says, "I am not; therefore I cannot think." + +Then there is the opposite attack on thought: that urged by Mr. H.G. +Wells when he insists that every separate thing is "unique," and there +are no categories at all. This also is merely destructive. Thinking +means connecting things, and stops if they cannot be connected. It need +hardly be said that this scepticism forbidding thought necessarily +forbids speech; a man cannot open his mouth without contradicting it. +Thus when Mr. Wells says (as he did somewhere), "All chairs are quite +different," he utters not merely a misstatement, but a contradiction in +terms. If all chairs were quite different, you could not call them "all +chairs." + +Akin to these is the false theory of progress, which maintains that we +alter the test instead of trying to pass the test. We often hear it +said, for instance, "What is right in one age is wrong in another." This +is quite reasonable, if it means that there is a fixed aim, and that +certain methods attain at certain times and not at other times. If +women, say, desire to be elegant, it may be that they are improved at +one time by growing fatter and at another time by growing thinner. But +you cannot say that they are improved by ceasing to wish to be elegant +and beginning to wish to be oblong. If the standard changes, how can +there be improvement, which implies a standard? Nietzsche started a +nonsensical idea that men had once sought as good what we now call evil; +if it were so, we could not talk of surpassing or even falling short of +them. How can you overtake Jones if you walk in the other direction? You +cannot discuss whether one people has succeeded more in being miserable +than another succeeded in being happy. It would be like discussing +whether Milton was more puritanical than a pig is fat. + +It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object +or ideal. But as an ideal, change itself becomes unchangeable. If the +change-worshipper wishes to estimate his own progress, he must be +sternly loyal to the ideal of change; he must not begin to flirt gaily +with the ideal of monotony. Progress itself cannot progress. It is worth +remark, in passing, that when Tennyson, in a wild and rather weak +manner, welcomed the idea of infinite alteration in society, he +instinctively took a metaphor which suggests an imprisoned tedium. He +wrote-- + + "Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change." + +He thought of change itself as an unchangeable groove; and so it is. +Change is about the narrowest and hardest groove that a man can get +into. + +The main point here, however, is that this idea of a fundamental +alteration in the standard is one of the things that make thought about +the past or future simply impossible. The theory of a complete change of +standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure +of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and +aristocratic pleasure of despising them. + +This bald summary of the thought-destroying forces of our time would not +be complete without some reference to pragmatism; for though I have here +used and should everywhere defend the pragmatist method as a preliminary +guide to truth, there is an extreme application of it which involves the +absence of all truth whatever. My meaning can be put shortly thus. I +agree with the pragmatists that apparent objective truth is not the +whole matter; that there is an authoritative need to believe the things +that are necessary to the human mind. But I say that one of those +necessities precisely is a belief in objective truth. The pragmatist +tells a man to think what he must think and never mind the Absolute. But +precisely one of the things that he must think is the Absolute. This +philosophy, indeed, is a kind of verbal paradox. Pragmatism is a matter +of human needs; and one of the first of human needs is to be something +more than a pragmatist. Extreme pragmatism is just as inhuman as the +determinism it so powerfully attacks. The determinist (who, to do him +justice, does not pretend to be a human being) makes nonsense of the +human sense of actual choice. The pragmatist, who professes to be +specially human, makes nonsense of the human sense of actual fact. + +To sum up our contention so far, we may say that the most characteristic +current philosophies have not only a touch of mania, but a touch of +suicidal mania. The mere questioner has knocked his head against the +limits of human thought; and cracked it. This is what makes so futile +the warnings of the orthodox and the boasts of the advanced about the +dangerous boyhood of free thought. What we are looking at is not the +boyhood of free thought; it is the old age and ultimate dissolution of +free thought. It is vain for bishops and pious bigwigs to discuss what +dreadful things will happen if wild scepticism runs its course. It has +run its course. It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great +truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have +seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself. +You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask +themselves if they have any selves. You cannot fancy a more sceptical +world than that in which men doubt if there is a world. It might +certainly have reached its bankruptcy more quickly and cleanly if it had +not been feebly hampered by the application of indefensible laws of +blasphemy or by the absurd pretence that modern England is Christian. +But it would have reached the bankruptcy anyhow. Militant atheists are +still unjustly persecuted; but rather because they are an old minority +than because they are a new one. Free thought has exhausted its own +freedom. It is weary of its own success. If any eager freethinker now +hails philosophic freedom as the dawn, he is only like the man in Mark +Twain who came out wrapped in blankets to see the sun rise and was just +in time to see it set. If any frightened curate still says that it will +be awful if the darkness of free thought should spread, we can only +answer him in the high and powerful words of Mr. Belloc, "Do not, I +beseech you, be troubled about the increase of forces already in +dissolution. You have mistaken the hour of the night: it is already +morning." We have no more questions left to ask. We have looked for +questions in the darkest corners and on the wildest peaks. We have found +all the questions that can be found. It is time we gave up looking for +questions and began looking for answers. + +But one more word must be added. At the beginning of this preliminary +negative sketch I said that our mental ruin has been wrought by wild +reason, not by wild imagination. A man does not go mad because he makes +a statue a mile high, but he may go mad by thinking it out in square +inches. Now, one school of thinkers has seen this and jumped at it as a +way of renewing the pagan health of the world. They see that reason +destroys; but Will, they say, creates. The ultimate authority, they say, +is in will, not in reason. The supreme point is not why a man demands a +thing, but the fact that he does demand it. I have no space to trace or +expound this philosophy of Will. It came, I suppose, through Nietzsche, +who preached something that is called egoism. That, indeed, was +simple-minded enough; for Nietzsche denied egoism simply by preaching +it. To preach anything is to give it away. First, the egoist calls life +a war without mercy, and then he takes the greatest possible trouble to +drill his enemies in war. To preach egoism is to practise altruism. But +however it began, the view is common enough in current literature. The +main defence of these thinkers is that they are not thinkers; they are +makers. They say that choice is itself the divine thing. Thus Mr. +Bernard Shaw has attacked the old idea that men's acts are to be judged +by the standard of the desire of happiness. He says that a man does not +act for his happiness, but from his will. He does not say, "Jam will +make me happy," but "I want jam." And in all this others follow him with +yet greater enthusiasm. Mr. John Davidson, a remarkable poet, is so +passionately excited about it that he is obliged to write prose. He +publishes a short play with several long prefaces. This is natural +enough in Mr. Shaw, for all his plays are prefaces: Mr. Shaw is (I +suspect) the only man on earth who has never written any poetry. But +that Mr. Davidson (who can write excellent poetry) should write instead +laborious metaphysics in defence of this doctrine of will, does show +that the doctrine of will has taken hold of men. Even Mr. H.G. Wells has +half spoken in its language; saying that one should test acts not like a +thinker, but like an artist, saying, "I _feel_ this curve is right," or +"that line _shall_ go thus." They are all excited; and well they may be. +For by this doctrine of the divine authority of will, they think they +can break out of the doomed fortress of rationalism. They think they can +escape. + +But they cannot escape. This pure praise of volition ends in the same +break up and blank as the mere pursuit of logic. Exactly as complete +free thought involves the doubting of thought itself, so the acceptation +of mere "willing" really paralyzes the will. Mr. Bernard Shaw has not +perceived the real difference between the old utilitarian test of +pleasure (clumsy, of course, and easily misstated) and that which he +propounds. The real difference between the test of happiness and the +test of will is simply that the test of happiness is a test and the +other isn't. You can discuss whether a man's act in jumping over a cliff +was directed towards happiness; you cannot discuss whether it was +derived from will. Of course it was. You can praise an action by saying +that it is calculated to bring pleasure or pain to discover truth or to +save the soul. But you cannot praise an action because it shows will; +for to say that is merely to say that it is an action. By this praise of +will you cannot really choose one course as better than another. And yet +choosing one course as better than another is the very definition of the +will you are praising. + +The worship of will is the negation of will. To admire mere choice is to +refuse to choose. If Mr. Bernard Shaw comes up to me and says, "Will +something," that is tantamount to saying, "I do not mind what you +will," and that is tantamount to saying, "I have no will in the matter." +You cannot admire will in general, because the essence of will is that +it is particular. A brilliant anarchist like Mr. John Davidson feels an +irritation against ordinary morality, and therefore he invokes +will--will to anything. He only wants humanity to want something. But +humanity does want something. It wants ordinary morality. He rebels +against the law and tells us to will something or anything. But we have +willed something. We have willed the law against which he rebels. + +All the will-worshippers, from Nietzsche to Mr. Davidson, are really +quite empty of volition. They cannot will, they can hardly wish. And if +any one wants a proof of this, it can be found quite easily. It can be +found in this fact: that they always talk of will as something that +expands and breaks out. But it is quite the opposite. Every act of will +is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. +In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose +anything, you reject everything else. That objection, which men of this +school used to make to the act of marriage, is really an objection to +every act. Every act is an irrevocable selection and exclusion. Just as +when you marry one woman you give up all the others, so when you take +one course of action you give up all the other courses. If you become +King of England, you give up the post of Beadle in Brompton. If you go +to Rome, you sacrifice a rich suggestive life in Wimbledon. It is the +existence of this negative or limiting side of will that makes most of +the talk of the anarchic will-worshippers little better than nonsense. +For instance, Mr. John Davidson tells us to have nothing to do with +"Thou shalt not"; but it is surely obvious that "Thou shalt not" is only +one of the necessary corollaries of "I will." "I will go to the Lord +Mayor's Show, and thou shalt not stop me." Anarchism adjures us to be +bold creative artists, and care for no laws or limits. But it is +impossible to be an artist and not care for laws and limits. Art is +limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame. If you draw a +giraffe, you must draw him with a long neck. If, in your bold creative +way, you hold yourself free to draw a giraffe with a short neck, you +will really find that you are not free to draw a giraffe. The moment you +step into the world of facts, you step into a world of limits. You can +free things from alien or accidental laws, but not from the laws of +their own nature. You may, if you like, free a tiger from his bars; but +do not free him from his stripes. Do not free a camel of the burden of +his hump: you may be freeing him from being a camel. Do not go about as +a demagogue, encouraging triangles to break out of the prison of their +three sides. If a triangle breaks out of its three sides, its life comes +to a lamentable end. Somebody wrote a work called "The Loves of the +Triangles"; I never read it, but I am sure that if triangles ever were +loved, they were loved for being triangular. This is certainly the case +with all artistic creation, which is in some ways the most decisive +example of pure will. The artist loves his limitations: they constitute +the _thing_ he is doing. The painter is glad that the canvas is flat. +The sculptor is glad that the clay is colourless. + +In case the point is not clear, an historic example may illustrate it. +The French Revolution was really an heroic and decisive thing, because +the Jacobins willed something definite and limited. They desired the +freedoms of democracy, but also all the vetoes of democracy. They wished +to have votes and _not_ to have titles. Republicanism had an ascetic +side in Franklin or Robespierre as well as an expansive side in Danton +or Wilkes. Therefore they have created something with a solid substance +and shape, the square social equality and peasant wealth of France. But +since then the revolutionary or speculative mind of Europe has been +weakened by shrinking from any proposal because of the limits of that +proposal. Liberalism has been degraded into liberality. Men have tried +to turn "revolutionise" from a transitive to an intransitive verb. The +Jacobin could tell you not only the system he would rebel against, but +(what was more important) the system he would _not_ rebel against, the +system he would trust. But the new rebel is a sceptic, and will not +entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be +really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really +gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation +implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist +doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which +he denounces it. Thus he writes one book complaining that imperial +oppression insults the purity of women, and then he writes another book +(about the sex problem) in which he insults it himself. He curses the +Sultan because Christian girls lose their virginity, and then curses +Mrs. Grundy because they keep it. As a politician, he will cry out that +war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is +waste of time. A Russian pessimist will denounce a policeman for killing +a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that +the peasant ought to have killed himself. A man denounces marriage as a +lie, and then denounces aristocratic profligates for treating it as a +lie. He calls a flag a bauble, and then blames the oppressors of Poland +or Ireland because they take away that bauble. The man of this school +goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are +treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and +goes on to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically +are beasts. In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite +sceptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on +politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics +he attacks morality for trampling on men. Therefore the modern man in +revolt has become practically useless for all purposes of revolt. By +rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against +anything. + +It may be added that the same blank and bankruptcy can be observed in +all fierce and terrible types of literature, especially in satire. +Satire may be mad and anarchic, but it presupposes an admitted +superiority in certain things over others; it presupposes a standard. +When little boys in the street laugh at the fatness of some +distinguished journalist, they are unconsciously assuming a standard of +Greek sculpture. They are appealing to the marble Apollo. And the +curious disappearance of satire from our literature is an instance of +the fierce things fading for want of any principle to be fierce about. +Nietzsche had some natural talent for sarcasm: he could sneer, though he +could not laugh; but there is always something bodiless and without +weight in his satire, simply because it has not any mass of common +morality behind it. He is himself more preposterous than anything he +denounces. But, indeed, Nietzsche will stand very well as the type of +the whole of this failure of abstract violence. The softening of the +brain which ultimately overtook him was not a physical accident. If +Nietzsche had not ended in imbecility, Nietzscheism would end in +imbecility. Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. +Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have +softening of the brain. + +This last attempt to evade intellectualism ends in intellectualism, and +therefore in death. The sortie has failed. The wild worship of +lawlessness and the materialist worship of law end in the same void. +Nietzsche scales staggering mountains, but he turns up ultimately in +Tibet. He sits down beside Tolstoy in the land of nothing and Nirvana. +They are both helpless--one because he must not grasp anything, and the +other because he must not let go of anything. The Tolstoyan's will is +frozen by a Buddhist instinct that all special actions are evil. But the +Nietzscheite's will is quite equally frozen by his view that all special +actions are good; for if all special actions are good, none of them are +special. They stand at the cross-roads, and one hates all the roads and +the other likes all the roads. The result is--well, some things are not +hard to calculate. They stand at the cross-roads. + +Here I end (thank God) the first and dullest business of this book--the +rough review of recent thought. After this I begin to sketch a view of +life which may not interest my reader, but which, at any rate, interests +me. In front of me, as I close this page, is a pile of modern books that +I have been turning over for the purpose--a pile of ingenuity, a pile of +futility. By the accident of my present detachment, I can see the +inevitable smash of the philosophies of Schopenhauer and Tolstoy, +Nietzsche and Shaw, as clearly as an inevitable railway smash could be +seen from a balloon. They are all on the road to the emptiness of the +asylum. For madness may be defined as using mental activity so as to +reach mental helplessness; and they have nearly reached it. He who +thinks he is made of glass, thinks to the destruction of thought; for +glass cannot think. So he who wills to reject nothing, wills the +destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but +the rejection of almost everything. And as I turn and tumble over the +clever, wonderful, tiresome, and useless modern books, the title of one +of them rivets my eye. It is called "Jeanne d'Arc," by Anatole France. I +have only glanced at it, but a glance was enough to remind me of Renan's +"Vie de Jésus." It has the same strange method of the reverent sceptic. +It discredits supernatural stories that have some foundation, simply by +telling natural stories that have no foundation. Because we cannot +believe in what a saint did, we are to pretend that we know exactly what +he felt. But I do not mention either book in order to criticise it, but +because the accidental combination of the names called up two startling +images of sanity which blasted all the books before me. Joan of Arc was +not stuck at the cross-roads, either by rejecting all the paths like +Tolstoy, or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path, and +went down it like a thunderbolt. Yet Joan, when I came to think of her, +had in her all that was true either in Tolstoy or Nietzsche, all that +was even tolerable in either of them. I thought of all that is noble in +Tolstoy, the pleasure in plain things, especially in plain pity, the +actualities of the earth, the reverence for the poor, the dignity of the +bowed back. Joan of Arc had all that and with this great addition, that +she endured poverty as well as admiring it; whereas Tolstoy is only a +typical aristocrat trying to find out its secret. And then I thought of +all that was brave and proud and pathetic in poor Nietzsche, and his +mutiny against the emptiness and timidity of our time. I thought of his +cry for the ecstatic equilibrium of danger, his hunger for the rush of +great horses, his cry to arms. Well, Joan of Arc had all that, and again +with this difference, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We +_know_ that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche, for all we +know, was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant; she was +the peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior; she was the warrior. +She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals; she was more gentle +than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly +practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who +do nothing. It was impossible that the thought should not cross my mind +that she and her faith had perhaps some secret of moral unity and +utility that has been lost. And with that thought came a larger one, and +the colossal figure of her Master had also crossed the theatre of my +thoughts. The same modern difficulty which darkened the subject-matter +of Anatole France also darkened that of Ernest Renan. Renan also divided +his hero's pity from his hero's pugnacity. Renan even represented the +righteous anger at Jerusalem as a mere nervous breakdown after the +idyllic expectations of Galilee. As if there were any inconsistency +between having a love for humanity and having a hatred for inhumanity! +Altruists, with thin, weak voices, denounce Christ as an egoist. Egoists +(with even thinner and weaker voices) denounce Him as an altruist. In +our present atmosphere such cavils are comprehensible enough. The love +of a hero is more terrible than the hatred of a tyrant. The hatred of a +hero is more generous than the love of a philanthropist. There is a huge +and heroic sanity of which moderns can only collect the fragments. There +is a giant of whom we see only the lopped arms and legs walking about. +They have torn the soul of Christ into silly strips, labelled egoism and +altruism, and they are equally puzzled by His insane magnificence and +His insane meekness. They have parted His garments among them, and for +His vesture they have cast lots; though the coat was without seam woven +from the top throughout. + + + + +CHAPTER IV--_The Ethics of Elfland_ + + +When the business man rebukes the idealism of his office-boy, it is +commonly in some such speech as this: "Ah, yes, when one is young, one +has these ideals in the abstract and these castles in the air; but in +middle age they all break up like clouds, and one comes down to a belief +in practical politics, to using the machinery one has and getting on +with the world as it is." Thus, at least, venerable and philanthropic +old men now in their honoured graves used to talk to me when I was a +boy. But since then I have grown up and have discovered that these +philanthropic old men were telling lies. What has really happened is +exactly the opposite of what they said would happen. They said that I +should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical +politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in +fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my old +childlike faith in practical politics. I am still as much concerned as +ever about the Battle of Armageddon; but I am not so much concerned +about the General Election. As a babe I leapt up on my mother's knee at +the mere mention of it. No; the vision is always solid and reliable. The +vision is always a fact. It is the reality that is often a fraud. As +much as I ever did, more than I ever did, I believe in Liberalism. But +there was a rosy time of innocence when I believed in Liberals. + +I take this instance of one of the enduring faiths because, having now +to trace the roots of my personal speculation, this may be counted, I +think, as the only positive bias. I was brought up a Liberal, and have +always believed in democracy, in the elementary liberal doctrine of a +self-governing humanity. If any one finds the phrase vague or +threadbare, I can only pause for a moment to explain that the principle +of democracy, as I mean it, can be stated in two propositions. The first +is this: that the things common to all men are more important than the +things peculiar to any men. Ordinary things are more valuable than +extraordinary things; nay, they are more extraordinary. Man is something +more awful than men; something more strange. The sense of the miracle of +humanity itself should be always more vivid to us than any marvels of +power, intellect, art, or civilization. The mere man on two legs, as +such, should be felt as something more heart-breaking than any music +and more startling than any caricature. Death is more tragic even than +death by starvation. Having a nose is more comic even than having a +Norman nose. + +This is the first principle of democracy: that the essential things in +men are the things they hold in common, not the things they hold +separately. And the second principle is merely this: that the political +instinct or desire is one of these things which they hold in common. +Falling in love is more poetical than dropping into poetry. The +democratic contention is that government (helping to rule the tribe) is +a thing like falling in love, and not a thing like dropping into poetry. +It is not something analogous to playing the church organ, painting on +vellum, discovering the North Pole (that insidious habit), looping the +loop, being Astronomer Royal, and so on. For these things we do not wish +a man to do at all unless he does them well. It is, on the contrary, a +thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own +nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them +badly. I am not here arguing the truth of any of these conceptions; I +know that some moderns are asking to have their wives chosen by +scientists, and they may soon be asking, for all I know, to have their +noses blown by nurses. I merely say that mankind does recognize these +universal human functions, and that democracy classes government among +them. In short, the democratic faith is this: that the most terribly +important things must be left to ordinary men themselves--the mating of +the sexes, the rearing of the young, the laws of the state. This is +democracy; and in this I have always believed. + +But there is one thing that I have never from my youth up been able to +understand. I have never been able to understand where people got the +idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious +that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting +to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or +arbitrary record. The man who quotes some German historian against the +tradition of the Catholic Church, for instance, is strictly appealing to +aristocracy. He is appealing to the superiority of one expert against +the awful authority of a mob. It is quite easy to see why a legend is +treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of +history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the +village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in +the village who is mad. Those who urge against tradition that men in the +past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with +the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for +us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in +great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no +reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or +fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. +Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our +ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit +to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be +walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the +accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the +accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's +opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a +good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot +separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to +me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. +The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It +is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot +papers, are marked with a cross. + +I have first to say, therefore, that if I have had a bias, it was always +a bias in favour of democracy, and therefore of tradition. Before we +come to any theoretic or logical beginnings I am content to allow for +that personal equation; I have always been more inclined to believe the +ruck of hard-working people than to believe that special and troublesome +literary class to which I belong. I prefer even the fancies and +prejudices of the people who see life from the inside to the clearest +demonstrations of the people who see life from the outside. I would +always trust the old wives' fables against the old maids' facts. As long +as wit is mother wit it can be as wild as it pleases. + +Now, I have to put together a general position, and I pretend to no +training in such things. I propose to do it, therefore, by writing down +one after another the three or four fundamental ideas which I have found +for myself, pretty much in the way that I found them. Then I shall +roughly synthesise them, summing up my personal philosophy or natural +religion; then I shall describe my startling discovery that the whole +thing had been discovered before. It had been discovered by +Christianity. But of these profound persuasions which I have to recount +in order, the earliest was concerned with this element of popular +tradition. And without the foregoing explanation touching tradition and +democracy I could hardly make my mental experience clear. As it is, I do +not know whether I can make it clear, but I now propose to try. + +My first and last philosophy, that which I believe in with unbroken +certainty, I learnt in the nursery. I generally learnt it from a nurse; +that is, from the solemn and star-appointed priestess at once of +democracy and tradition. The things I believed most then, the things I +believe most now, are the things called fairy tales. They seem to me to +be the entirely reasonable things. They are not fantasies: compared with +them other things are fantastic. Compared with them religion and +rationalism are both abnormal, though religion is abnormally right and +rationalism abnormally wrong. Fairyland is nothing but the sunny country +of common sense. It is not earth that judges heaven, but heaven that +judges earth; so for me at least it was not earth that criticised +elfland, but elfland that criticised the earth. I knew the magic +beanstalk before I had tasted beans; I was sure of the Man in the Moon +before I was certain of the moon. This was at one with all popular +tradition. Modern minor poets are naturalists, and talk about the bush +or the brook; but the singers of the old epics and fables were +supernaturalists, and talked about the gods of brook and bush. That is +what the moderns mean when they say that the ancients did not +"appreciate Nature," because they said that Nature was divine. Old +nurses do not tell children about the grass, but about the fairies that +dance on the grass; and the old Greeks could not see the trees for the +dryads. + +But I deal here with what ethic and philosophy come from being fed on +fairy tales. If I were describing them in detail I could note many noble +and healthy principles that arise from them. There is the chivalrous +lesson of "Jack the Giant Killer"; that giants should be killed because +they are gigantic. It is a manly mutiny against pride as such. For the +rebel is older than all the kingdoms, and the Jacobin has more tradition +than the Jacobite. There is the lesson of "Cinderella," which is the +same as that of the Magnificat--_exaltavit humiles._ There is the great +lesson of "Beauty and the Beast"; that a thing must be loved _before_ +it is loveable. There is the terrible allegory of the "Sleeping Beauty," +which tells how the human creature was blessed with all birthday gifts, +yet cursed with death; and how death also may perhaps be softened to a +sleep. But I am not concerned with any of the separate statutes of +elfland, but with the whole spirit of its law, which I learnt before I +could speak, and shall retain when I cannot write. I am concerned with a +certain way of looking at life, which was created in me by the fairy +tales, but has since been meekly ratified by the mere facts. + +It might be stated this way. There are certain sequences or developments +(cases of one thing following another), which are, in the true sense of +the word, reasonable. They are, in the true sense of the word, +necessary. Such are mathematical and merely logical sequences. We in +fairyland (who are the most reasonable of all creatures) admit that +reason and that necessity. For instance, if the Ugly Sisters are older +than Cinderella, it is (in an iron and awful sense) _necessary_ that +Cinderella is younger than the Ugly Sisters. There is no getting out of +it. Haeckel may talk as much fatalism about that fact as he pleases: it +really must be. If Jack is the son of a miller, a miller is the father +of Jack. Cold reason decrees it from her awful throne: and we in +fairyland submit. If the three brothers all ride horses, there are six +animals and eighteen legs involved: that is true rationalism, and +fairyland is full of it. But as I put my head over the hedge of the +elves and began to take notice of the natural world, I observed an +extraordinary thing. I observed that learned men in spectacles were +talking of the actual things that happened--dawn and death and so on--as +if _they_ were rational and inevitable. They talked as if the fact that +trees bear fruit were just as _necessary_ as the fact that two and one +trees make three. But it is not. There is an enormous difference by the +test of fairyland; which is the test of the imagination. You cannot +_imagine_ two and one not making three. But you can easily imagine trees +not growing fruit; you can imagine them growing golden candlesticks or +tigers hanging on by the tail. These men in spectacles spoke much of a +man named Newton, who was hit by an apple, and who discovered a law. But +they could not be got to see the distinction between a true law, a law +of reason, and the mere fact of apples falling. If the apple hit +Newton's nose, Newton's nose hit the apple. That is a true necessity: +because we cannot conceive the one occurring without the other. But we +can quite well conceive the apple not falling on his nose; we can fancy +it flying ardently through the air to hit some other nose, of which it +had a more definite dislike. We have always in our fairy tales kept this +sharp distinction between the science of mental relations, in which +there really are laws, and the science of physical facts, in which there +are no laws, but only weird repetitions. We believe in bodily miracles, +but not in mental impossibilities. We believe that a Bean-stalk climbed +up to Heaven; but that does not at all confuse our convictions on the +philosophical question of how many beans make five. + +Here is the peculiar perfection of tone and truth in the nursery tales. +The man of science says, "Cut the stalk, and the apple will fall"; but +he says it calmly, as if the one idea really led up to the other. The +witch in the fairy tale says, "Blow the horn, and the ogre's castle will +fall"; but she does not say it as if it were something in which the +effect obviously arose out of the cause. Doubtless she has given the +advice to many champions, and has seen many castles fall, but she does +not lose either her wonder or her reason. She does not muddle her head +until it imagines a necessary mental connection between a horn and a +falling tower. But the scientific men do muddle their heads, until they +imagine a necessary mental connection between an apple leaving the tree +and an apple reaching the ground. They do really talk as if they had +found not only a set of marvellous facts, but a truth connecting those +facts. They do talk as if the connection of two strange things +physically connected them philosophically. They feel that because one +incomprehensible thing constantly follows another incomprehensible thing +the two together somehow make up a comprehensible thing. Two black +riddles make a white answer. + +In fairyland we avoid the word "law"; but in the land of science they +are singularly fond of it. Thus they will call some interesting +conjecture about how forgotten folks pronounced the alphabet, Grimm's +Law. But Grimm's Law is far less intellectual than Grimm's Fairy Tales. +The tales are, at any rate, certainly tales; while the law is not a law. +A law implies that we know the nature of the generalisation and +enactment; not merely that we have noticed some of the effects. If there +is a law that pick-pockets shall go to prison, it implies that there is +an imaginable mental connection between the idea of prison and the idea +of picking pockets. And we know what the idea is. We can say why we take +liberty from a man who takes liberties. But we cannot say why an egg can +turn into a chicken any more than we can say why a bear could turn into +a fairy prince. As _ideas_, the egg and the chicken are further off each +other than the bear and the prince; for no egg in itself suggests a +chicken, whereas some princes do suggest bears. Granted, then, that +certain transformations do happen, it is essential that we should regard +them in the philosophic manner of fairy tales, not in the unphilosophic +manner of science and the "Laws of Nature." When we are asked why eggs +turn to birds or fruits fall in autumn, we must answer exactly as the +fairy godmother would answer if Cinderella asked her why mice turned to +horses or her clothes fell from her at twelve o'clock. We must answer +that it is _magic_. It is not a "law," for we do not understand its +general formula. It is not a necessity, for though we can count on it +happening practically, we have no right to say that it must always +happen. It is no argument for unalterable law (as Huxley fancied) that +we count on the ordinary course of things. We do not count on it; we bet +on it. We risk the remote possibility of a miracle as we do that of a +poisoned pancake or a world-destroying comet. We leave it out of +account, not because it is a miracle, and therefore an impossibility, +but because it is a miracle, and therefore an exception. All the terms +used in the science books, "law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and +so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis +which we do not possess. The only words that ever satisfied me as +describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," +"spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and +its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a _magic_ tree. Water runs +downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is +bewitched. + +I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have +some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is +simply rational and agnostic. It is the only way I can express in words +my clear and definite perception that one thing is quite distinct from +another; that there is no logical connection between flying and laying +eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who +is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a +sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he +is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen +birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, +tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A +forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so +the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both +cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A +sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, +by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the +materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a +sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, +apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from +fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not +grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country. + +This elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the +fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived +from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct +of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of +the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that +when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need +tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by +being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of +three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like +romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales--because they find them +romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to +whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This +proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of +interest and amazement. These tales say that apples were golden only to +refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They +make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, +that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and +even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher +agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in +scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who +has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and +appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every +man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may +understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than +any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know +thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all +forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that +we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism +only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we +have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstacy only means +that for one awful instant we remember that we forget. + +But though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the +streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. +It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder +has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be +definitely marked on our road through fairyland. I shall speak in the +next chapter about optimists and pessimists in their intellectual +aspect, so far as they have one. Here I am only trying to describe the +enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion +was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstacy +because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an +opportunity. The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact +that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a +fairy tale. The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, +though I hardly knew to whom. Children are grateful when Santa Claus +puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful +to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous +legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can +I thank no one for the birthday present of birth? + +There were, then, these two first feelings, indefensible and +indisputable. The world was a shock, but it was not merely shocking; +existence was a surprise, but it was a pleasant surprise. In fact, all +my first views were exactly uttered in a riddle that stuck in my brain +from boyhood. The question was, "What did the first frog say?" And the +answer was, "Lord, how you made me jump!" That says succinctly all that +I am saying. God made the frog jump; but the frog prefers jumping. But +when these things are settled there enters the second great principle +of the fairy philosophy. + +Any one can see it who will simply read "Grimm's Fairy Tales" or the +fine collections of Mr. Andrew Lang. For the pleasure of pedantry I will +call it the Doctrine of Conditional Joy. Touchstone talked of much +virtue in an "if"; according to elfin ethics all virtue is in an "if." +The note of the fairy utterance always is, "You may live in a palace of +gold and sapphire, _if_ you do not say the word 'cow'"; or "You may live +happily with the King's daughter, _if_ you do not show her an onion." +The vision always hangs upon a veto. All the dizzy and colossal things +conceded depend upon one small thing withheld. All the wild and whirling +things that are let loose depend upon one thing that is forbidden. Mr. +W.B. Yeats, in his exquisite and piercing elfin poetry, describes the +elves as lawless; they plunge in innocent anarchy on the unbridled +horses of the air-- + + "Ride on the crest of the dishevelled tide, + And dance upon the mountains like a flame." + +It is a dreadful thing to say that Mr. W.B. Yeats does not understand +fairyland. But I do say it. He is an ironical Irishman, full of +intellectual reactions. He is not stupid enough to understand +fairyland. Fairies prefer people of the yokel type like myself; people +who gape and grin and do as they are told. Mr. Yeats reads into elfland +all the righteous insurrection of his own race. But the lawlessness of +Ireland is a Christian lawlessness, founded on reason and justice. The +Fenian is rebelling against something he understands only too well; but +the true citizen of fairyland is obeying something that he does not +understand at all. In the fairy tale an incomprehensible happiness rests +upon an incomprehensible condition. A box is opened, and all evils fly +out. A word is forgotten, and cities perish. A lamp is lit, and love +flies away. A flower is plucked, and human lives are forfeited. An apple +is eaten, and the hope of God is gone. + +This is the tone of fairy tales, and it is certainly not lawlessness or +even liberty, though men under a mean modern tyranny may think it +liberty by comparison. People out of Portland Gaol might think Fleet +Street free; but closer study will prove that both fairies and +journalists are the slaves of duty. Fairy godmothers seem at least as +strict as other godmothers. Cinderella received a coach out of +Wonderland and a coachman out of nowhere, but she received a +command--which might have come out of Brixton--that she should be back +by twelve. Also, she had a glass slipper; and it cannot be a coincidence +that glass is so common a substance in folk-lore. This princess lives in +a glass castle, that princess on a glass hill; this one sees all things +in a mirror; they may all live in glass houses if they will not throw +stones. For this thin glitter of glass everywhere is the expression of +the fact that the happiness is bright but brittle, like the substance +most easily smashed by a housemaid or a cat. And this fairy-tale +sentiment also sank into me and became my sentiment towards the whole +world. I felt and feel that life itself is as bright as the diamond, but +as brittle as the window-pane; and when the heavens were compared to the +terrible crystal I can remember a shudder. I was afraid that God would +drop the cosmos with a crash. + +Remember, however, that to be breakable is not the same as to be +perishable. Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do +not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years. Such, it seemed, was +the joy of man, either in elfland or on earth; the happiness depended on +_not doing something_ which you could at any moment do and which, very +often, it was not obvious why you should not do. Now, the point here is +that to _me_ this did not seem unjust. If the miller's third son said to +the fairy, "Explain why I must not stand on my head in the fairy +palace," the other might fairly reply, "Well, if it comes to that, +explain the fairy palace." If Cinderella says, "How is it that I must +leave the ball at twelve?" her godmother might answer, "How is it that +you are going there till twelve?" If I leave a man in my will ten +talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the +conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not +look a winged horse in the mouth. And it seemed to me that existence was +itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not +understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand +the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture. The +veto might well be as wild as the vision; it might be as startling as +the sun, as elusive as the waters, as fantastic and terrible as the +towering trees. + +For this reason (we may call it the fairy godmother philosophy) I never +could join the young men of my time in feeling what they called the +general sentiment of _revolt_. I should have resisted, let us hope, any +rules that were evil, and with these and their definition I shall deal +in another chapter. But I did not feel disposed to resist any rule +merely because it was mysterious. Estates are sometimes held by foolish +forms, the breaking of a stick or the payment of a peppercorn: I was +willing to hold the huge estate of earth and heaven by any such feudal +fantasy. It could not well be wilder than the fact that I was allowed to +hold it at all. At this stage I give only one ethical instance to show +my meaning. I could never mix in the common murmur of that rising +generation against monogamy, because no restriction on sex seemed so odd +and unexpected as sex itself. To be allowed, like Endymion, to make love +to the moon and then to complain that Jupiter kept his own moons in a +harem seemed to me (bred on fairy tales like Endymion's) a vulgar +anti-climax. Keeping to one woman is a small price for so much as seeing +one woman. To complain that I could only be married once was like +complaining that I had only been born once. It was incommensurate with +the terrible excitement of which one was talking. It showed, not an +exaggerated sensibility to sex, but a curious insensibility to it. A man +is a fool who complains that he cannot enter Eden by five gates at +once. Polygamy is a lack of the realization of sex; it is like a man +plucking five pears in mere absence of mind. The æsthetes touched the +last insane limits of language in their eulogy on lovely things. The +thistledown made them weep; a burnished beetle brought them to their +knees. Yet their emotion never impressed me for an instant, for this +reason, that it never occurred to them to pay for their pleasure in any +sort of symbolic sacrifice. Men (I felt) might fast forty days for the +sake of hearing a blackbird sing. Men might go through fire to find a +cowslip. Yet these lovers of beauty could not even keep sober for the +blackbird. They would not go through common Christian marriage by way of +recompense to the cowslip. Surely one might pay for extraordinary joy in +ordinary morals. Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because +we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for +sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde. + +Well, I left the fairy tales lying on the floor of the nursery, and I +have not found any books so sensible since. I left the nurse guardian of +tradition and democracy, and I have not found any modern type so sanely +radical or so sanely conservative. But the matter for important comment +was here, that when I first went out into the mental atmosphere of the +modern world, I found that the modern world was positively opposed on +two points to my nurse and to the nursery tales. It has taken me a long +time to find out that the modern world is wrong and my nurse was right. +The really curious thing was this: that modern thought contradicted this +basic creed of my boyhood on its two most essential doctrines. I have +explained that the fairy tales founded in me two convictions; first, +that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been +quite different, but which is quite delightful; second, that before this +wildness and delight one may well be modest and submit to the queerest +limitations of so queer a kindness. But I found the whole modern world +running like a high tide against both my tendernesses; and the shock of +that collision created two sudden and spontaneous sentiments, which I +have had ever since and which, crude as they were, have since hardened +into convictions. + +First, I found the whole modern world talking scientific fatalism; +saying that everything is as it must always have been, being unfolded +without fault from the beginning. The leaf on the tree is green because +it could never have been anything else. Now, the fairy-tale philosopher +is glad that the leaf is green precisely because it might have been +scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked +at it. He is pleased that snow is white on the strictly reasonable +ground that it might have been black. Every colour has in it a bold +quality as of choice; the red of garden roses is not only decisive but +dramatic, like suddenly spilt blood. He feels that something has been +_done_. But the great determinists of the nineteenth century were +strongly against this native feeling that something had happened an +instant before. In fact, according to them, nothing ever really had +happened since the beginning of the world. Nothing ever had happened +since existence had happened; and even about the date of that they were +not very sure. + +The modern world as I found it was solid for modern Calvinism, for the +necessity of things being as they are. But when I came to ask them I +found they had really no proof of this unavoidable repetition in things +except the fact that the things were repeated. Now, the mere repetition +made the things to me rather more weird than more rational. It was as +if, having seen a curiously shaped nose in the street and dismissed it +as an accident, I had then seen six other noses of the same astonishing +shape. I should have fancied for a moment that it must be some local +secret society. So one elephant having a trunk was odd; but all +elephants having trunks looked like a plot. I speak here only of an +emotion, and of an emotion at once stubborn and subtle. But the +repetition in Nature seemed sometimes to be an excited repetition, like +that of an angry schoolmaster saying the same thing over and over again. +The grass seemed signalling to me with all its fingers at once; the +crowded stars seemed bent upon being understood. The sun would make me +see him if he rose a thousand times. The recurrences of the universe +rose to the maddening rhythm of an incantation, and I began to see an +idea. + +All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests +ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that +if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of +clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; +if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation +to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought +into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off +of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some +slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he +is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. +But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to +Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to +Sheerness. The very speed and ecstasy of his life would have the +stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every +morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my +inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true +that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His +routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The +thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some +game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs +rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have +abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, +therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do +it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly +dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. +But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible +that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every +evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity +that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy +separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He +has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, +and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a +mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical _encore_. Heaven may _encore_ +the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth +a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, +the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life +or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that +they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every +human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition +may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it +may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and +yet each birth be his positively last appearance. + +This was my first conviction; made by the shock of my childish emotions +meeting the modern creed in mid-career. I had always vaguely felt facts +to be miracles in the sense that they are wonderful: now I began to +think them miracles in the stricter sense that they were _wilful_. I +mean that they were, or might be, repeated exercises of some will. In +short, I had always believed that the world involved magic: now I +thought that perhaps it involved a magician. And this pointed a profound +emotion always present and sub-conscious; that this world of ours has +some purpose; and if there is a purpose, there is a person. I had always +felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a +story-teller. + +But modern thought also hit my second human tradition. It went against +the fairy feeling about strict limits and conditions. The one thing it +loved to talk about was expansion and largeness. Herbert Spencer would +have been greatly annoyed if any one had called him an imperialist, and +therefore it is highly regrettable that nobody did. But he was an +imperialist of the lowest type. He popularized this contemptible notion +that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma +of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any +more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of +God, then a whale may be the image of God; a somewhat formless image; +what one might call an impressionist portrait. It is quite futile to +argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small +compared to the nearest tree. But Herbert Spencer, in his headlong +imperialism, would insist that we had in some way been conquered and +annexed by the astronomical universe. He spoke about men and their +ideals exactly as the most insolent Unionist talks about the Irish and +their ideals. He turned mankind into a small nationality. And his evil +influence can be seen even in the most spirited and honourable of later +scientific authors; notably in the early romances of Mr. H.G. Wells. +Many moralists have in an exaggerated way represented the earth as +wicked. But Mr. Wells and his school made the heavens wicked. We should +lift up our eyes to the stars from whence would come our ruin. + +But the expansion of which I speak was much more evil than all this. I +have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in +the prison of one thought. These people seemed to think it singularly +inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large. The size of +this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went +on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be +anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness +or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added +nothing to it. It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he +would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county. The +warder would have nothing to show the man except more and more long +corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human. +So these expanders of the universe had nothing to show us except more +and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of +all that is divine. + +In fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for +the definition of a law is something that can be broken. But the +machinery of this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; +for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery. We were either +unable to do things or we were destined to do them. The idea of the +mystical condition quite disappeared; one can neither have the firmness +of keeping laws nor the fun of breaking them. The largeness of this +universe had nothing of that freshness and airy outbreak which we have +praised in the universe of the poet. This modern universe is literally +an empire; that is, it is vast, but it is not free. One went into larger +and larger windowless rooms, rooms big with Babylonian perspective; but +one never found the smallest window or a whisper of outer air. + +Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all +good things come to a point, swords for instance. So finding the boast +of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue +about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even +shallower than could have been expected. According to these people the +cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule. Only (they would +say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is. Why, +then, should one worry particularly to call it large? There is nothing +to compare it with. It would be just as sensible to call it small. A man +may say, "I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its +crowd of varied creatures." But if it comes to that why should not a man +say, "I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars +and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see"? One is as good +as the other; they are both mere sentiments. It is mere sentiment to +rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a +sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses +to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not +choose to have an emotion about its smallness? + +It happened that I had that emotion. When one is fond of anything one +addresses it by diminutives, even if it is an elephant or a +lifeguardsman. The reason is, that anything, however huge, that can be +conceived of as complete, can be conceived of as small. If military +moustaches did not suggest a sword or tusks a tail, then the object +would be vast because it would be immeasurable. But the moment you can +imagine a guardsman you can imagine a small guardsman. The moment you +really see an elephant you can call it "Tiny." If you can make a statue +of a thing you can make a statuette of it. These people professed that +the universe was one coherent thing; but they were not fond of the +universe. But I was frightfully fond of the universe and wanted to +address it by a diminutive. I often did so; and it never seemed to mind. +Actually and in truth I did feel that these dim dogmas of vitality were +better expressed by calling the world small than by calling it large. +For about infinity there was a sort of carelessness which was the +reverse of the fierce and pious care which I felt touching the +pricelessness and the peril of life. They showed only a dreary waste; +but I felt a sort of sacred thrift. For economy is far more romantic +than extravagance. To them stars were an unending income of halfpence; +but I felt about the golden sun and the silver moon as a schoolboy feels +if he has one sovereign and one shilling. + +These subconscious convictions are best hit off by the colour and tone +of certain tales. Thus I have said that stories of magic alone can +express my sense that life is not only a pleasure but a kind of +eccentric privilege. I may express this other feeling of cosmic cosiness +by allusion to another book always read in boyhood, "Robinson Crusoe," +which I read about this time, and which owes its eternal vivacity to the +fact that it celebrates the poetry of limits, nay, even the wild romance +of prudence. Crusoe is a man on a small rock with a few comforts just +snatched from the sea: the best thing in the book is simply the list of +things saved from the wreck. The greatest of poems is an inventory. +Every kitchen tool becomes ideal because Crusoe might have dropped it +in the sea. It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to +look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy +one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the +solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all +things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from +a wreck. Every man has had one horrible adventure: as a hidden untimely +birth he had not been, as infants that never see the light. Men spoke +much in my boyhood of restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was +common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it is a +more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great +Might-Not-Have-Been. + +But I really felt (the fancy may seem foolish) as if all the order and +number of things were the romantic remnant of Crusoe's ship. That there +are two sexes and one sun, was like the fact that there were two guns +and one axe. It was poignantly urgent that none should be lost; but +somehow, it was rather fun that none could be added. The trees and the +planets seemed like things saved from the wreck: and when I saw the +Matterhorn I was glad that it had not been overlooked in the confusion. +I felt economical about the stars as if they were sapphires (they are +called so in Milton's Eden): I hoarded the hills. For the universe is a +single jewel, and while it is a natural cant to talk of a jewel as +peerless and priceless, of this jewel it is literally true. This cosmos +is indeed without peer and without price: for there cannot be another +one. + +Thus ends, in unavoidable inadequacy, the attempt to utter the +unutterable things. These are my ultimate attitudes towards life; the +soils for the seeds of doctrine. These in some dark way I thought before +I could write, and felt before I could think: that we may proceed more +easily afterwards, I will roughly recapitulate them now. I felt in my +bones; first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a +miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, +with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, +if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural +explanations I have heard. The thing is magic, true or false. Second, I +came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have some +one to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work +of art; whatever it meant it meant violently. Third, I thought this +purpose beautiful in its old design, in spite of its defects, such as +dragons. Fourth, that the proper form of thanks to it is some form of +humility and restraint: we should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not +drinking too much of them. We owed, also, an obedience to whatever made +us. And last, and strangest, there had come into my mind a vague and +vast impression that in some way all good was a remnant to be stored and +held sacred out of some primordial ruin. Man had saved his good as +Crusoe saved his goods: he had saved them from a wreck. All this I felt +and the age gave me no encouragement to feel it. And all this time I had +not even thought of Christian theology. + + + + +CHAPTER V.--_The Flag of the World_ + + +When I was a boy there were two curious men running about who were +called the optimist and the pessimist. I constantly used the words +myself, but I cheerfully confess that I never had any very special idea +of what they meant. The only thing which might be considered evident was +that they could not mean what they said; for the ordinary verbal +explanation was that the optimist thought this world as good as it could +be, while the pessimist thought it as bad as it could be. Both these +statements being obviously raving nonsense, one had to cast about for +other explanations. An optimist could not mean a man who thought +everything right and nothing wrong. For that is meaningless; it is like +calling everything right and nothing left. Upon the whole, I came to the +conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the +pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except +himself. It would be unfair to omit altogether from the list the +mysterious but suggestive definition said to have been given by a little +girl, "An optimist is a man who looks after your eyes, and a pessimist +is a man who looks after your feet." I am not sure that this is not the +best definition of all. There is even a sort of allegorical truth in it. +For there might, perhaps, be a profitable distinction drawn between that +more dreary thinker who thinks merely of our contact with the earth from +moment to moment, and that happier thinker who considers rather our +primary power of vision and of choice of road. + +But this is a deep mistake in this alternative of the optimist and the +pessimist. The assumption of it is that a man criticises this world as +if he were house-hunting, as if he were being shown over a new suite of +apartments. If a man came to this world from some other world in full +possession of his powers he might discuss whether the advantage of +midsummer woods made up for the disadvantage of mad dogs, just as a man +looking for lodgings might balance the presence of a telephone against +the absence of a sea view. But no man is in that position. A man belongs +to this world before he begins to ask if it is nice to belong to it. He +has fought for the flag, and often won heroic victories for the flag +long before he has ever enlisted. To put shortly what seems the +essential matter, he has a loyalty long before he has any admiration. + +In the last chapter it has been said that the primary feeling that this +world is strange and yet attractive is best expressed in fairy tales. +The reader may, if he likes, put down the next stage to that bellicose +and even jingo literature which commonly comes next in the history of a +boy. We all owe much sound morality to the penny dreadfuls. Whatever the +reason, it seemed and still seems to me that our attitude towards life +can be better expressed in terms of a kind of military loyalty than in +terms of criticism and approval. My acceptance of the universe is not +optimism, it is more like patriotism. It is a matter of primary loyalty. +The world is not a lodging-house at Brighton, which we are to leave +because it is miserable. It is the fortress of our family, with the flag +flying on the turret, and the more miserable it is the less we should +leave it. The point is not that this world is too sad to love or too +glad not to love; the point is that when you do love a thing, its +gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving +it more. All optimistic thoughts about England and all pessimistic +thoughts about her are alike reasons for the English patriot. Similarly, +optimism and pessimism are alike arguments for the cosmic patriot. + +Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing--say Pimlico. +If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of +thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitary. It is not +enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico: in that case he will merely +cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a +man to approve of Pimlico: for then it will remain Pimlico, which would +be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love +Pimlico: to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly +reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise +into ivory towers and golden pinnacles; Pimlico would attire herself as +a woman does when she is loved. For decoration is not given to hide +horrible things; but to decorate things already adorable. A mother does +not give her child a blue bow because he is so ugly without it. A lover +does not give a girl a necklace to hide her neck. If men loved Pimlico +as mothers love children, arbitarily, because it is _theirs_ Pimlico in +a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that +this is a mere fantasy. I answer that this is the actual history of +mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the +darkest roots of civilisation and you will find them knotted round some +sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to +a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because +she was great. She was great because they had loved her. + +The eighteenth-century theories of the social contract have been exposed +to much clumsy criticism in our time; in so far as they meant that there +is at the back of all historic government an idea of content and +co-operation, they were demonstrably right. But they really were wrong +in so far as they suggested that men had ever aimed at order or ethics +directly by a conscious exchange of interests. Morality did not begin by +one man saying to another, "I will not hit you if you do not hit me"; +there is no trace of such a transaction. There _is_ a trace of both men +having said, "We must not hit each other in the holy place." They gained +their morality by guarding their religion. They did not cultivate +courage. They fought for the shrine, and found they had become +courageous. They did not cultivate cleanliness. They purified themselves +for the altar, and found that they were clean. The history of the Jews +is the only early document known to most Englishmen, and the facts can +be judged sufficiently from that. The Ten Commandments which have been +found substantially common to mankind were merely military commands; a +code of regimental orders, issued to protect a certain ark across a +certain desert. Anarchy was evil because it endangered the sanctity. And +only when they made a holy day for God did they find they had made a +holiday for men. + +If it be granted that this primary devotion to a place or thing is a +source of creative energy, we can pass on to a very peculiar fact. Let +us reiterate for an instant that the only right optimism is a sort of +universal patriotism. What is the matter with the pessimist? I think it +can be stated by saying that he is the cosmic anti-patriot. And what is +the matter with the anti-patriot? I think it can be stated, without +undue bitterness, by saying that he is the candid friend. And what is +the matter with the candid friend? There we strike the rock of real life +and immutable human nature. + +I venture to say that what is bad in the candid friend is simply that he +is not candid. He is keeping something back--his own gloomy pleasure in +saying unpleasant things. He has a secret desire to hurt, not merely to +help. This is certainly, I think, what makes a certain sort of +anti-patriot irritating to healthy citizens. I do not speak (of course) +of the anti-patriotism which only irritates feverish stockbrokers and +gushing actresses; that is only patriotism speaking plainly. A man who +says that no patriot should attack the Boer War until it is over is not +worth answering intelligently; he is saying that no good son should warn +his mother off a cliff until she has fallen over it. But there is an +anti-patriot who honestly angers honest men, and the explanation of him +is, I think, what I have suggested: he is the uncandid candid friend; +the man who says, "I am sorry to say we are ruined," and is not sorry at +all. And he may be said, without rhetoric, to be a traitor; for he is +using that ugly knowledge which was allowed him to strengthen the army, +to discourage people from joining it. Because he is allowed to be +pessimistic as a military adviser he is being pessimistic as a +recruiting sergeant. Just in the same way the pessimist (who is the +cosmic anti-patriot) uses the freedom that life allows to her +counsellors to lure away the people from her flag. Granted that he +states only facts, it is still essential to know what are his emotions, +what is his motive. It may be that twelve hundred men in Tottenham are +down with smallpox; but we want to know whether this is stated by some +great philosopher who wants to curse the gods, or only by some common +clergyman who wants to help the men. + +The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, +but that he does not love what he chastises--he has not this primary and +supernatural loyalty to things. What is the evil of the man commonly +called an optimist? Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to +defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible. He is the +jingo of the universe; he will say, "My cosmos, right or wrong." He will +be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of +front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing every one with +assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world. All +this (which is true of a type of optimist) leads us to the one really +interesting point of psychology, which could not be explained without +it. + +We say there must be a primal loyalty to life: the only question is, +shall it be a natural or a supernatural loyalty? If you like to put it +so, shall it be a reasonable or an unreasonable loyalty? Now, the +extraordinary thing is that the bad optimism (the whitewashing, the weak +defence of everything) comes in with the reasonable optimism. Rational +optimism leads to stagnation: it is irrational optimism that leads to +reform. Let me explain by using once more the parallel of patriotism. +The man who is most likely to ruin the place he loves is exactly the man +who loves it with a reason. The man who will improve the place is the +man who loves it without a reason. If a man loves some feature of +Pimlico (which seems unlikely), he may find himself defending that +feature against Pimlico itself. But if he simply loves Pimlico itself, +he may lay it waste and turn it into the New Jerusalem. I do not deny +that reform may be excessive; I only say that it is the mystic patriot +who reforms. Mere jingo self-contentment is commonest among those who +have some pedantic reason for their patriotism. The worst jingoes do not +love England, but a theory of England. If we love England for being an +empire, we may overrate the success with which we rule the Hindoos. But +if we love it only for being a nation, we can face all events: for it +would be a nation even if the Hindoos ruled us. Thus also only those +will permit their patriotism to falsify history whose patriotism depends +on history. A man who loves England for being English will not mind how +she arose. But a man who loves England for being Anglo-Saxon may go +against all facts for his fancy. He may end (like Carlyle and Freeman) +by maintaining that the Norman Conquest was a Saxon Conquest. He may end +in utter unreason--because he has a reason. A man who loves France for +being military will palliate the army of 1870. But a man who loves +France for being France will improve the army of 1870. This is exactly +what the French have done, and France is a good instance of the working +paradox. Nowhere else is patriotism more purely abstract and arbitrary; +and nowhere else is reform more drastic and sweeping. The more +transcendental is your patriotism, the more practical are your politics. + +Perhaps the most everyday instance of this point is in the case of +women; and their strange and strong loyalty. Some stupid people started +the idea that because women obviously back up their own people through +everything, therefore women are blind and do not see anything. They can +hardly have known any women. The same women who are ready to defend +their men through thick and thin are (in their personal intercourse with +the man) almost morbidly lucid about the thinness of his excuses or the +thickness of his head. A man's friend likes him but leaves him as he is: +his wife loves him and is always trying to turn him into somebody else. +Women who are utter mystics in their creed are utter cynics in their +criticism. Thackeray expressed this well when he made Pendennis' mother, +who worshipped her son as a god, yet assume that he would go wrong as a +man. She underrated his virtue, though she overrated his value. The +devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a +sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is +bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind. + +This at least had come to be my position about all that was called +optimism, pessimism, and improvement. Before any cosmic act of reform we +must have a cosmic oath of allegiance. A man must be interested in life, +then he could be disinterested in his views of it. "My son give me thy +heart"; the heart must be fixed on the right thing: the moment we have a +fixed heart we have a free hand. I must pause to anticipate an obvious +criticism. It will be said that a rational person accepts the world as +mixed of good and evil with a decent satisfaction and a decent +endurance. But this is exactly the attitude which I maintain to be +defective. It is, I know, very common in this age; it was perfectly put +in those quiet lines of Matthew Arnold which are more piercingly +blasphemous than the shrieks of Schopenhauer-- + + "Enough we live:--and if a life, + With large results so little rife, + Though bearable, seem hardly worth + This pomp of worlds, this pain of birth." + +I know this feeling fills our epoch, and I think it freezes our epoch. +For our Titanic purposes of faith and revolution, what we need is not +the cold acceptance of the world as a compromise, but some way in which +we can heartily hate and heartily love it. We do not want joy and anger +to neutralise each other and produce a surly contentment; we want a +fiercer delight and a fiercer discontent. We have to feel the universe +at once as an ogre's castle, to be stormed, and yet as our own cottage, +to which we can return at evening. + +No one doubts that an ordinary man can get on with this world: but we +demand not strength enough to get on with it, but strength enough to get +it on. Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to +think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without +once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without +once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist +and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is +he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to +die to it? In this combination, I maintain, it is the rational optimist +who fails, the irrational optimist who succeeds. He is ready to smash +the whole universe for the sake of itself. + +I put these things not in their mature logical sequence, but as they +came: and this view was cleared and sharpened by an accident of the +time. Under the lengthening shadow of Ibsen, an argument arose whether +it was not a very nice thing to murder one's self. Grave moderns told us +that we must not even say "poor fellow," of a man who had blown his +brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out +because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even +suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot +machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I +found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and +humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and +absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the +refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, +kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is +concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically +considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all +buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; +but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by +the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the +things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults +everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by +refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the +cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a +tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: +for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be +pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and +there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and +the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and +philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven +through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. +There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is +different from other crimes--for it makes even crimes impossible. + +About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he +said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of +this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite +of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside +him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares +so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of +everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to +end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he +renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this +ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that +something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link +with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the +universe. And then I remembered the stake and the cross-roads, and the +queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the +suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. +Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of +carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. +The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. +They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave +afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very +poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the cross-roads to show +what Christianity thought of the pessimist. + +This was the first of the long train of enigmas with which Christianity +entered the discussion. And there went with it a peculiarity of which I +shall have to speak more markedly, as a note of all Christian notions, +but which distinctly began in this one. The Christian attitude to the +martyr and the suicide was not what is so often affirmed in modern +morals. It was not a matter of degree. It was not that a line must be +drawn somewhere, and that the self-slayer in exaltation fell within the +line, the self-slayer in sadness just beyond it. The Christian feeling +evidently was not merely that the suicide was carrying martyrdom too +far. The Christian feeling was furiously for one and furiously against +the other: these two things that looked so much alike were at opposite +ends of heaven and hell. One man flung away his life; he was so good +that his dry bones could heal cities in pestilence. Another man flung +away life; he was so bad that his bones would pollute his brethren's. I +am not saying this fierceness was right; but why was it so fierce? + +Here it was that I first found that my wandering feet were in some +beaten track. Christianity had also felt this opposition of the martyr +to the suicide: had it perhaps felt it for the same reason? Had +Christianity felt what I felt, but could not (and cannot) express--this +need for a first loyalty to things, and then for a ruinous reform of +things? Then I remembered that it was actually the charge against +Christianity that it combined these two things which I was wildly trying +to combine. Christianity was accused, at one and the same time, of being +too optimistic about the universe and of being too pessimistic about the +world. The coincidence made me suddenly stand still. + +An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such +and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. +Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not +credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain +philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on +Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was +suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a +man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the +century. If a man believes in unalterable natural law, he cannot believe +in any miracle in any age. If a man believes in a will behind law, he +can believe in any miracle in any age. Suppose, for the sake of +argument, we are concerned with a case of thaumaturgic healing. A +materialist of the twelfth century could not believe it any more than a +materialist of the twentieth century. But a Christian Scientist of the +twentieth century can believe it as much as a Christian of the twelfth +century. It is simply a matter of a man's theory of things. Therefore in +dealing with any historical answer, the point is not whether it was +given in our time, but whether it was given in answer to our question. +And the more I thought about when and how Christianity had come into the +world, the more I felt that it had actually come to answer this +question. + +It is commonly the loose and latitudinarian Christians who pay quite +indefensible compliments to Christianity. They talk as if there had +never been any piety or pity until Christianity came, a point on which +any mediæval would have been eager to correct them. They represent that +the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to +preach simplicity or self-restraint, or inwardness and sincerity. They +will think me very narrow (whatever that means) if I say that the +remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach +Christianity. Its peculiarity was that it was peculiar, and simplicity +and sincerity are not peculiar, but obvious ideals for all mankind. +Christianity was the answer to a riddle, not the last truism uttered +after a long talk. Only the other day I saw in an excellent weekly paper +of Puritan tone this remark, that Christianity when stripped of its +armour of dogma (as who should speak of a man stripped of his armour of +bones), turned out to be nothing but the Quaker doctrine of the Inner +Light. Now, if I were to say that Christianity came into the world +specially to destroy the doctrine of the Inner Light, that would be an +exaggeration. But it would be very much nearer to the truth. The last +Stoics, like Marcus Aurelius, were exactly the people who did believe in +the Inner Light. Their dignity, their weariness, their sad external care +for others, their incurable internal care for themselves, were all due +to the Inner Light, and existed only by that dismal illumination. Notice +that Marcus Aurelius insists, as such introspective moralists always do, +upon small things done or undone; it is because he has not hate or love +enough to make a moral revolution. He gets up early in the morning, just +as our own aristocrats living the Simple Life get up early in the +morning; because such altruism is much easier than stopping the games of +the amphitheatre or giving the English people back their land. Marcus +Aurelius is the most intolerable of human types. He is an unselfish +egoist. An unselfish egoist is a man who has pride without the excuse of +passion. Of all conceivable forms of enlightenment the worst is what +these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most +horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body +knows how it would work; any one who knows any one from the Higher +Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god +within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. +Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; +let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, +but not the god within. Christianity came into the world firstly in +order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, +but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a +divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian +was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely +recognised an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible +as an army with banners. + +All the same, it will be as well if Jones does not worship the sun and +moon. If he does, there is a tendency for him to imitate them; to say, +that because the sun burns insects alive, he may burn insects alive. He +thinks that because the sun gives people sun-stroke, he may give his +neighbour measles. He thinks that because the moon is said to drive men +mad, he may drive his wife mad. This ugly side of mere external optimism +had also shown itself in the ancient world. About the time when the +Stoic idealism had begun to show the weaknesses of pessimism, the old +nature worship of the ancients had begun to show the enormous weaknesses +of optimism. Nature worship is natural enough while the society is +young, or, in other words, Pantheism is all right as long as it is the +worship of Pan. But Nature has another side which experience and sin are +not slow in finding out, and it is no flippancy to say of the god Pan +that he soon showed the cloven hoof. The only objection to Natural +Religion is that somehow it always becomes unnatural. A man loves Nature +in the morning for her innocence and amiability, and at nightfall, if he +is loving her still, it is for her darkness and her cruelty. He washes +at dawn in clear water as did the Wise Man of the Stoics, yet, somehow +at the dark end of the day, he is bathing in hot bull's blood, as did +Julian the Apostate. The mere pursuit of health always leads to +something unhealthy. Physical nature must not be made the direct object +of obedience; it must be enjoyed, not worshipped. Stars and mountains +must not be taken seriously. If they are, we end where the pagan nature +worship ended. Because the earth is kind, we can imitate all her +cruelties. Because sexuality is sane, we can all go mad about sexuality. +Mere optimism had reached its insane and appropriate termination. The +theory that everything was good had become an orgy of everything that +was bad. + +On the other side our idealist pessimists were represented by the old +remnant of the Stoics. Marcus Aurelius and his friends had really given +up the idea of any god in the universe and looked only to the god +within. They had no hope of any virtue in nature, and hardly any hope of +any virtue in society. They had not enough interest in the outer world +really to wreck or revolutionise it. They did not love the city enough +to set fire to it. Thus the ancient world was exactly in our own +desolate dilemma. The only people who really enjoyed this world were +busy breaking it up; and the virtuous people did not care enough about +them to knock them down. In this dilemma (the same as ours) Christianity +suddenly stepped in and offered a singular answer, which the world +eventually accepted as _the_ answer. It was the answer then, and I think +it is the answer now. + +This answer was like the slash of a sword; it sundered; it did not in +any sense sentimentally unite. Briefly, it divided God from the cosmos. +That transcendence and distinctness of the deity which some Christians +now want to remove from Christianity, was really the only reason why any +one wanted to be a Christian. It was the whole point of the Christian +answer to the unhappy pessimist and the still more unhappy optimist. As +I am here only concerned with their particular problem I shall indicate +only briefly this great metaphysical suggestion. All descriptions of +the creating or sustaining principle in things must be metaphorical, +because they must be verbal. Thus the pantheist is forced to speak of +God _in_ all things as if he were in a box. Thus the evolutionist has, +in his very name, the idea of being unrolled like a carpet. All terms, +religious and irreligious, are open to this charge. The only question is +whether all terms are useless, or whether one can, with such a phrase, +cover a distinct _idea_ about the origin of things. I think one can, and +so evidently does the evolutionist, or he would not talk about +evolution. And the root phrase for all Christian theism was this, that +God was a creator, as an artist is a creator. A poet is so separate from +his poem that he himself speaks of it as a little thing he has "thrown +off." Even in giving it forth he has flung it away. This principle that +all creation and procreation is a breaking off is at least as consistent +through the cosmos as the evolutionary principle that all growth is a +branching out. A woman loses a child even in having a child. All +creation is separation. Birth is as solemn a parting as death. + +It was the prime philosophic principle of Christianity that this divorce +in the divine act of making (such as severs the poet from the poem or +the mother from the new-born child) was the true description of the act +whereby the absolute energy made the world. According to most +philosophers, God in making the world enslaved it. According to +Christianity, in making it, He set it free. God had written, not so much +a poem, but rather a play; a play he had planned as perfect, but which +had necessarily been left to human actors and stage-managers, who had +since made a great mess of it. I will discuss the truth of this theorem +later. Here I have only to point out with what a startling smoothness it +passed the dilemma we have discussed in this chapter. In this way at +least one could be both happy and indignant without degrading one's self +to be either a pessimist or an optimist. On this system one could fight +all the forces of existence without deserting the flag of existence. One +could be at peace with the universe and yet be at war with the world. +St. George could still fight the dragon, however big the monster bulked +in the cosmos, though he were bigger than the mighty cities or bigger +than the everlasting hills. If he were as big as the world he could yet +be killed in the name of the world. St. George had not to consider any +obvious odds or proportions in the scale of things, but only the +original secret of their design. He can shake his sword at the dragon, +even if it is everything; even if the empty heavens over his head are +only the huge arch of its open jaws. + +And then followed an experience impossible to describe. It was as if I +had been blundering about since my birth with two huge and unmanageable +machines, of different shapes and without apparent connection--the world +and the Christian tradition. I had found this hole in the world: the +fact that one must somehow find a way of loving the world without +trusting it; somehow one must love the world without being worldly. I +found this projecting feature of Christian theology, like a sort of hard +spike, the dogmatic insistence that God was personal, and had made a +world separate from Himself. The spike of dogma fitted exactly into the +hole in the world--it had evidently been meant to go there--and then the +strange thing began to happen. When once these two parts of the two +machines had come together, one after another, all the other parts +fitted and fell in with an eerie exactitude. I could hear bolt after +bolt over all the machinery falling into its place with a kind of click +of relief. Having got one part right, all the other parts were +repeating that rectitude, as clock after clock strikes noon. Instinct +after instinct was answered by doctrine after doctrine. Or, to vary the +metaphor, I was like one who had advanced into a hostile country to take +one high fortress. And when that fort had fallen the whole country +surrendered and turned solid behind me. The whole land was lit up, as it +were, back to the first fields of my childhood. All those blind fancies +of boyhood which in the fourth chapter I have tried in vain to trace on +the darkness, became suddenly transparent and sane. I was right when I +felt that roses were red by some sort of choice: it was the divine +choice. I was right when I felt that I would almost rather say that +grass was the wrong colour than say that it must by necessity have been +that colour: it might verily have been any other. My sense that +happiness hung on the crazy thread of a condition did mean something +when all was said: it meant the whole doctrine of the Fall. Even those +dim and shapeless monsters of notions which I have not been able to +describe, much less defend, stepped quietly into their places like +colossal caryatides of the creed. The fancy that the cosmos was not vast +and void, but small and cosy, had a fulfilled significance now, for +anything that is a work of art must be small in the sight of the artist; +to God the stars might be only small and dear, like diamonds. And my +haunting instinct that somehow good was not merely a tool to be used, +but a relic to be guarded, like the goods from Crusoe's ship--even that +had been the wild whisper of something originally wise, for, according +to Christianity, we were indeed the survivors of a wreck, the crew of a +golden ship that had gone down before the beginning of the world. + +But the important matter was this, that it entirely reversed the reason +for optimism. And the instant the reversal was made it felt like the +abrupt ease when a bone is put back in the socket. I had often called +myself an optimist, to avoid the too evident blasphemy of pessimism. But +all the optimism of the age had been false and disheartening for this +reason, that it had always been trying to prove that we fit in to the +world. The Christian optimism is based on the fact that we do _not_ fit +in to the world. I had tried to be happy by telling myself that man is +an animal, like any other which sought its meat from God. But now I +really was happy, for I had learnt that man is a monstrosity. I had +been right in feeling all things as odd, for I myself was at once worse +and better than all things. The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it +dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was +poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in the light of +the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again +that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in +acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the _wrong_ place, and my +soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. The knowledge found out and +illuminated forgotten chambers in the dark house of infancy. I knew now +why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a +giant, and why I could feel homesick at home. + + + + +CHAPTER VI.--_The Paradoxes of Christianity_ + + +The real trouble with this world of ours is not that it is an +unreasonable world, nor even that it is a reasonable one. The commonest +kind of trouble is that it is nearly reasonable, but not quite. Life is +not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians. It looks just a +little more mathematical and regular than it is; its exactitude is +obvious, but its inexactitude is hidden; its wildness lies in wait. I +give one coarse instance of what I mean. Suppose some mathematical +creature from the moon were to reckon up the human body; he would at +once see that the essential thing about it was that it was duplicate. A +man is two men, he on the right exactly resembling him on the left. +Having noted that there was an arm on the right and one on the left, a +leg on the right and one on the left, he might go further and still find +on each side the same number of fingers, the same number of toes, twin +eyes, twin ears, twin nostrils, and even twin lobes of the brain. At +last he would take it as a law; and then, where he found a heart on one +side, would deduce that there was another heart on the other. And just +then, where he most felt he was right, he would be wrong. + +It is this silent swerving from accuracy by an inch that is the uncanny +element in everything. It seems a sort of secret treason in the +universe. An apple or an orange is round enough to get itself called +round, and yet is not round after all. The earth itself is shaped like +an orange in order to lure some simple astronomer into calling it a +globe. A blade of grass is called after the blade of a sword, because it +comes to a point; but it doesn't. Everywhere in things there is this +element of the quiet and incalculable. It escapes the rationalists, but +it never escapes till the last moment. From the grand curve of our earth +it could easily be inferred that every inch of it was thus curved. It +would seem rational that as a man has a brain on both sides, he should +have a heart on both sides. Yet scientific men are still organizing +expeditions to find the North Pole, because they are so fond of flat +country. Scientific men are also still organising expeditions to find a +man's heart; and when they try to find it, they generally get on the +wrong side of him. + +Now, actual insight or inspiration is best tested by whether it guesses +these hidden malformations or surprises. If our mathematician from the +moon saw the two arms and the two ears, he might deduce the two +shoulder-blades and the two halves of the brain. But if he guessed that +the man's heart was in the right place, then I should call him something +more than a mathematician. Now, this is exactly the claim which I have +since come to propound for Christianity. Not merely that it deduces +logical truths, but that when it suddenly becomes illogical, it has +found, so to speak, an illogical truth. It not only goes right about +things, but it goes wrong (if one may say so) exactly where the things +go wrong. Its plan suits the secret irregularities, and expects the +unexpected. It is simple about the simple truth; but it is stubborn +about the subtle truth. It will admit that a man has two hands, it will +not admit (though all the Modernists wail to it) the obvious deduction +that he has two hearts. It is my only purpose in this chapter to point +this out; to show that whenever we feel there is something odd in +Christian theology, we shall generally find that there is something odd +in the truth. + +I have alluded to an unmeaning phrase to the effect that such and such a +creed cannot be believed in our age. Of course, anything can be +believed in any age. But, oddly enough, there really is a sense in which +a creed, if it is believed at all, can be believed more fixedly in a +complex society than in a simple one. If a man finds Christianity true +in Birmingham, he has actually clearer reasons for faith than if he had +found it true in Mercia. For the more complicated seems the coincidence, +the less it can be a coincidence. If snowflakes fell in the shape, say, +of the heart of Midlothian, it might be an accident. But if snowflakes +fell in the exact shape of the maze at Hampton Court, I think one might +call it a miracle. It is exactly as of such a miracle that I have since +come to feel of the philosophy of Christianity. The complication of our +modern world proves the truth of the creed more perfectly than any of +the plain problems of the ages of faith. It was in Notting Hill and +Battersea that I began to see that Christianity was true. This is why +the faith has that elaboration of doctrines and details which so much +distresses those who admire Christianity without believing in it. When +once one believes in a creed, one is proud of its complexity, as +scientists are proud of the complexity of science. It shows how rich it +is in discoveries. If it is right at all, it is a compliment to say +that it's elaborately right. A stick might fit a hole or a stone a +hollow by accident. But a key and a lock are both complex. And if a key +fits a lock, you know it is the right key. + +But this involved accuracy of the thing makes it very difficult to do +what I now have to do, to describe this accumulation of truth. It is +very hard for a man to defend anything of which he is entirely +convinced. It is comparatively easy when he is only partially convinced. +He is partially convinced because he has found this or that proof of the +thing, and he can expound it. But a man is not really convinced of a +philosophic theory when he finds that something proves it. He is only +really convinced when he finds that everything proves it. And the more +converging reasons he finds pointing to this conviction, the more +bewildered he is if asked suddenly to sum them up. Thus, if one asked an +ordinary intelligent man, on the spur of the moment, "Why do you prefer +civilisation to savagery?" he would look wildly round at object after +object, and would only be able to answer vaguely, "Why, there is that +bookcase ... and the coals in the coal-scuttle ... and pianos ... and +policemen." The whole case for civilisation is that the case for it is +complex. It has done so many things. But that very multiplicity of proof +which ought to make reply overwhelming makes reply impossible. + +There is, therefore, about all complete conviction a kind of huge +helplessness. The belief is so big that it takes a long time to get it +into action. And this hesitation chiefly arises, oddly enough, from an +indifference about where one should begin. All roads lead to Rome; which +is one reason why many people never get there. In the case of this +defence of the Christian conviction I confess that I would as soon begin +the argument with one thing as another; I would begin it with a turnip +or a taximeter cab. But if I am to be at all careful about making my +meaning clear, it will, I think, be wiser to continue the current +arguments of the last chapter, which was concerned to urge the first of +these mystical coincidences, or rather ratifications. All I had hitherto +heard of Christian theology had alienated me from it. I was a pagan at +the age of twelve, and a complete agnostic by the age of sixteen; and I +cannot understand any one passing the age of seventeen without having +asked himself so simple a question. I did, indeed, retain a cloudy +reverence for a cosmic deity and a great historical interest in the +Founder of Christianity. But I certainly regarded Him as a man; though +perhaps I thought that, even in that point, He had an advantage over +some of His modern critics. I read the scientific and sceptical +literature of my time--all of it, at least, that I could find written in +English and lying about; and I read nothing else; I mean I read nothing +else on any other note of philosophy. The penny dreadfuls which I also +read were indeed in a healthy and heroic tradition of Christianity; but +I did not know this at the time. I never read a line of Christian +apologetics. I read as little as I can of them now. It was Huxley and +Herbert Spencer and Bradlaugh who brought me back to orthodox theology. +They sowed in my mind my first wild doubts of doubt. Our grandmothers +were quite right when they said that Tom Paine and the free-thinkers +unsettled the mind. They do. They unsettled mine horribly. The +rationalist made me question whether reason was of any use whatever; and +when I had finished Herbert Spencer I had got as far as doubting (for +the first time) whether evolution had occurred at all. As I laid down +the last of Colonel Ingersoll's atheistic lectures the dreadful thought +broke across my mind, "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." I +was in a desperate way. + +This odd effect of the great agnostics in arousing doubts deeper than +their own might be illustrated in many ways. I take only one. As I read +and re-read all the non-Christian or anti-Christian accounts of the +faith, from Huxley to Bradlaugh, a slow and awful impression grew +gradually but graphically upon my mind--the impression that Christianity +must be a most extraordinary thing. For not only (as I understood) had +Christianity the most flaming vices, but it had apparently a mystical +talent for combining vices which seemed inconsistent with each other. It +was attacked on all sides and for all contradictory reasons. No sooner +had one rationalist demonstrated that it was too far to the east than +another demonstrated with equal clearness that it was much too far to +the west. No sooner had my indignation died down at its angular and +aggressive squareness than I was called up again to notice and condemn +its enervating and sensual roundness. In case any reader has not come +across the thing I mean, I will give such instances as I remember at +random of this self-contradiction in the sceptical attack. I give four +or five of them; there are fifty more. + +Thus, for instance, I was much moved by the eloquent attack on +Christianity as a thing of inhuman gloom; for I thought (and still +think) sincere pessimism the unpardonable sin. Insincere pessimism is a +social accomplishment, rather agreeable than otherwise; and fortunately +nearly all pessimism is insincere. But if Christianity was, as these +people said, a thing purely pessimistic and opposed to life, then I was +quite prepared to blow up St. Paul's Cathedral. But the extraordinary +thing is this. They did prove to me in Chapter I. (to my complete +satisfaction) that Christianity was too pessimistic; and then, in +Chapter II., they began to prove to me that it was a great deal too +optimistic. One accusation against Christianity was that it prevented +men, by morbid tears and terrors, from seeking joy and liberty in the +bosom of Nature. But another accusation was that it comforted men with a +fictitious providence, and put them in a pink-and-white nursery. One +great agnostic asked why Nature was not beautiful enough, and why it was +hard to be free. Another great agnostic objected that Christian +optimism, "the garment of make-believe woven by pious hands," hid from +us the fact that Nature was ugly, and that it was impossible to be free. +One rationalist had hardly done calling Christianity a nightmare before +another began to call it a fool's paradise. This puzzled me; the charges +seemed inconsistent. Christianity could not at once be the black mask on +a white world, and also the white mask on a black world. The state of +the Christian could not be at once so comfortable that he was a coward +to cling to it, and so uncomfortable that he was a fool to stand it. If +it falsified human vision it must falsify it one way or another; it +could not wear both green and rose-coloured spectacles. I rolled on my +tongue with a terrible joy, as did all young men of that time, the +taunts which Swinburne hurled at the dreariness of the creed-- + + "Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilæan, the world has grown gray + with Thy breath." + +But when I read the same poet's accounts of paganism (as in "Atalanta"), +I gathered that the world was, if possible, more gray before the +Galilæan breathed on it than afterwards. The poet maintained, indeed, in +the abstract, that life itself was pitch dark. And yet, somehow, +Christianity had darkened it. The very man who denounced Christianity +for pessimism was himself a pessimist. I thought there must be something +wrong. And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that, perhaps, +those might not be the very best judges of the relation of religion to +happiness who, by their own account, had neither one nor the other. + +It must be understood that I did not conclude hastily that the +accusations were false or the accusers fools. I simply deduced that +Christianity must be something even weirder and wickeder than they made +out. A thing might have these two opposite vices; but it must be a +rather queer thing if it did. A man might be too fat in one place and +too thin in another; but he would be an odd shape. At this point my +thoughts were only of the odd shape of the Christian religion; I did not +allege any odd shape in the rationalistic mind. + +Here is another case of the same kind. I felt that a strong case against +Christianity lay in the charge that there is something timid, monkish, +and unmanly about all that is called "Christian," especially in its +attitude towards resistance and fighting. The great sceptics of the +nineteenth century were largely virile. Bradlaugh in an expansive way, +Huxley in a reticent way, were decidedly men. In comparison, it did seem +tenable that there was something weak and over patient about Christian +counsels. The Gospel paradox about the other cheek, the fact that +priests never fought, a hundred things made plausible the accusation +that Christianity was an attempt to make a man too like a sheep. I read +it and believed it, and if I had read nothing different, I should have +gone on believing it. But I read something very different. I turned the +next page in my agnostic manual, and my brain turned up-side down. Now I +found that I was to hate Christianity not for fighting too little, but +for fighting too much. Christianity, it seemed, was the mother of wars. +Christianity had deluged the world with blood. I had got thoroughly +angry with the Christian, because he never was angry. And now I was told +to be angry with him because his anger had been the most huge and +horrible thing in human history; because his anger had soaked the earth +and smoked to the sun. The very people who reproached Christianity with +the meekness and non-resistance of the monastries were the very people +who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades. It +was the fault of poor old Christianity (somehow or other) both that +Edward the Confessor did not fight and that Richard Coeur de Lion did. +The Quakers (we were told) were the only characteristic Christians; and +yet the massacres of Cromwell and Alva were characteristic Christian +crimes. What could it all mean? What was this Christianity which always +forbade war and always produced wars? What could be the nature of the +thing which one could abuse first because it would not fight, and second +because it was always fighting? In what world of riddles was born this +monstrous murder and this monstrous meekness? The shape of Christianity +grew a queerer shape every instant. + +I take a third case; the strangest of all, because it involves the one +real objection to the faith. The one real objection to the Christian +religion is simply that it is one religion. The world is a big place, +full of very different kinds of people. Christianity (it may reasonably +be said) is one thing confined to one kind of people; it began in +Palestine, it has practically stopped with Europe. I was duly impressed +with this argument in my youth, and I was much drawn towards the +doctrine often preached in Ethical Societies--I mean the doctrine that +there is one great unconscious church of all humanity founded on the +omnipresence of the human conscience. Creeds, it was said, divided men; +but at least morals united them. The soul might seek the strangest and +most remote lands and ages and still find essential ethical common +sense. It might find Confucius under Eastern trees, and he would be +writing "Thou shalt not steal." It might decipher the darkest +hieroglyphic on the most primeval desert, and the meaning when +deciphered would be "Little boys should tell the truth." I believed this +doctrine of the brotherhood of all men in the possession of a moral +sense, and I believe it still--with other things. And I was thoroughly +annoyed with Christianity for suggesting (as I supposed) that whole ages +and empires of men had utterly escaped this light of justice and reason. +But then I found an astonishing thing. I found that the very people who +said that mankind was one church from Plato to Emerson were the very +people who said that morality had changed altogether, and that what was +right in one age was wrong in another. If I asked, say, for an altar, I +was told that we needed none, for men our brothers gave us clear oracles +and one creed in their universal customs and ideals. But if I mildly +pointed out that one of men's universal customs was to have an altar, +then my agnostic teachers turned clean round and told me that men had +always been in darkness and the superstitions of savages. I found it was +their daily taunt against Christianity that it was the light of one +people and had left all others to die in the dark. But I also found that +it was their special boast for themselves that science and progress were +the discovery of one people, and that all other peoples had died in the +dark. Their chief insult to Christianity was actually their chief +compliment to themselves, and there seemed to be a strange unfairness +about all their relative insistence on the two things. When considering +some pagan or agnostic, we were to remember that all men had one +religion; when considering some mystic or spiritualist, we were only to +consider what absurd religions some men had. We could trust the ethics +of Epictetus, because ethics had never changed. We must not trust the +ethics of Bossuet, because ethics had changed. They changed in two +hundred years, but not in two thousand. + +This began to be alarming. It looked not so much as if Christianity was +bad enough to include any vices, but rather as if any stick was good +enough to beat Christianity with. What again could this astonishing +thing be like which people were so anxious to contradict, that in doing +so they did not mind contradicting themselves? I saw the same thing on +every side. I can give no further space to this discussion of it in +detail; but lest any one supposes that I have unfairly selected three +accidental cases I will run briefly through a few others. Thus, certain +sceptics wrote that the great crime of Christianity had been its attack +on the family; it had dragged women to the loneliness and contemplation +of the cloister, away from their homes and their children. But, then, +other sceptics (slightly more advanced) said that the great crime of +Christianity was forcing the family and marriage upon us; that it doomed +women to the drudgery of their homes and children, and forbade them +loneliness and contemplation. The charge was actually reversed. Or, +again, certain phrases in the Epistles or the Marriage Service, were +said by the anti-Christians to show contempt for woman's intellect. But +I found that the anti-Christians themselves had a contempt for woman's +intellect; for it was their great sneer at the Church on the Continent +that "only women" went to it. Or again, Christianity was reproached with +its naked and hungry habits; with its sackcloth and dried peas. But the +next minute Christianity was being reproached with its pomp and its +ritualism; its shrines of porphyry and its robes of gold. It was abused +for being too plain and for being too coloured. Again Christianity had +always been accused of restraining sexuality too much, when Bradlaugh +the Malthusian discovered that it restrained it too little. It is often +accused in the same breath of prim respectability and of religious +extravagance. Between the covers of the same atheistic pamphlet I have +found the faith rebuked for its disunion, "One thinks one thing, and one +another," and rebuked also for its union, "It is difference of opinion +that prevents the world from going to the dogs." In the same +conversation a free-thinker, a friend of mine, blamed Christianity for +despising Jews, and then despised it himself for being Jewish. + +I wished to be quite fair then, and I wish to be quite fair now; and I +did not conclude that the attack on Christianity was all wrong. I only +concluded that if Christianity was wrong, it was very wrong indeed. Such +hostile horrors might be combined in one thing, but that thing must be +very strange and solitary. There are men who are misers, and also +spendthrifts; but they are rare. There are men sensual and also ascetic; +but they are rare. But if this mass of mad contradictions really +existed, quakerish and bloodthirsty, too gorgeous and too thread-bare, +austere, yet pandering preposterously to the lust of the eye, the enemy +of women and their foolish refuge, a solemn pessimist and a silly +optimist, if this evil existed, then there was in this evil something +quite supreme and unique. For I found in my rationalist teachers no +explanation of such exceptional corruption. Christianity (theoretically +speaking) was in their eyes only one of the ordinary myths and errors of +mortals. _They_ gave me no key to this twisted and unnatural badness. +Such a paradox of evil rose to the stature of the supernatural. It was, +indeed, almost as supernatural as the infallibility of the Pope. An +historic institution, which never went right, is really quite as much of +a miracle as an institution that cannot go wrong. The only explanation +which immediately occurred to my mind was that Christianity did not come +from heaven, but from hell. Really, if Jesus of Nazareth was not Christ, +He must have been Antichrist. + +And then in a quiet hour a strange thought struck me like a still +thunderbolt. There had suddenly come into my mind another explanation. +Suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were +puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall and some too short; +some objected to his fatness, some lamented his leanness; some thought +him too dark, and some too fair. One explanation (as has been already +admitted) would be that he might be an odd shape. But there is another +explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might +feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall. Old +bucks who are growing stout might consider him insufficiently filled +out; old beaux who were growing thin might feel that he expanded beyond +the narrow lines of elegance. Perhaps Swedes (who have pale hair like +tow) called him a dark man, while negroes considered him distinctly +blonde. Perhaps (in short) this extraordinary thing is really the +ordinary thing; at least the normal thing, the centre. Perhaps, after +all, it is Christianity that is sane and all its critics that are +mad--in various ways. I tested this idea by asking myself whether there +was about any of the accusers anything morbid that might explain the +accusation. I was startled to find that this key fitted a lock. For +instance, it was certainly odd that the modern world charged +Christianity at once with bodily austerity and with artistic pomp. But +then it was also odd, very odd, that the modern world itself combined +extreme bodily luxury with an extreme absence of artistic pomp. The +modern man thought Becket's robes too rich and his meals too poor. But +then the modern man was really exceptional in history; no man before +ever ate such elaborate dinners in such ugly clothes. The modern man +found the church too simple exactly where modern life is too complex; he +found the church too gorgeous exactly where modern life is too dingy. +The man who disliked the plain fasts and feasts was mad on _entrées_. +The man who disliked vestments wore a pair of preposterous trousers. And +surely if there was any insanity involved in the matter at all it was in +the trousers, not in the simply falling robe. If there was any insanity +at all, it was in the extravagant _entrées_, not in the bread and wine. + +I went over all the cases, and I found the key fitted so far. The fact +that Swinburne was irritated at the unhappiness of Christians and yet +more irritated at their happiness was easily explained. It was no longer +a complication of diseases in Christianity, but a complication of +diseases in Swinburne. The restraints of Christians saddened him simply +because he was more hedonist than a healthy man should be. The faith of +Christians angered him because he was more pessimist than a healthy man +should be. In the same way the Malthusians by instinct attacked +Christianity; not because there is anything especially anti-Malthusian +about Christianity, but because there is something a little anti-human +about Malthusianism. + +Nevertheless it could not, I felt, be quite true that Christianity was +merely sensible and stood in the middle. There was really an element in +it of emphasis and even frenzy which had justified the secularists in +their superficial criticism. It might be wise, I began more and more to +think that it was wise, but it was not merely worldly wise; it was not +merely temperate and respectable. Its fierce crusaders and meek saints +might balance each other; still, the crusaders were very fierce and the +saints were very meek, meek beyond all decency. Now, it was just at this +point of the speculation that I remembered my thoughts about the martyr +and the suicide. In that matter there had been this combination between +two almost insane positions which yet somehow amounted to sanity. This +was just such another contradiction; and this I had already found to be +true. This was exactly one of the paradoxes in which sceptics found the +creed wrong; and in this I had found it right. Madly as Christians might +love the martyr or hate the suicide, they never felt these passions more +madly than I had felt them long before I dreamed of Christianity. Then +the most difficult and interesting part of the mental process opened, +and I began to trace this idea darkly through all the enormous thoughts +of our theology. The idea was that which I had outlined touching the +optimist and the pessimist; that we want not an amalgam or compromise, +but both things at the top of their energy; love and wrath both burning. +Here I shall only trace it in relation to ethics. But I need not remind +the reader that the idea of this combination is indeed central in +orthodox theology. For orthodox theology has specially insisted that +Christ was not a being apart from God and man, like an elf, nor yet a +being half human and half not, like a centaur, but both things at once +and both things thoroughly, very man and very God. Now let me trace this +notion as I found it. + +All sane men can see that sanity is some kind of equilibrium; that one +may be mad and eat too much, or mad and eat too little. Some moderns +have indeed appeared with vague versions of progress and evolution which +seeks to destroy the [Greek: meson] or balance of Aristotle. They seem to +suggest that we are meant to starve progressively, or to go on eating +larger and larger breakfasts every morning for ever. But the great truism +of the [Greek: meson] remains for all thinking men, and these people have +not upset any balance except their own. But granted that we have all to +keep a balance, the real interest comes in with the question of how that +balance can be kept. That was the problem which Paganism tried to solve: +that was the problem which I think Christianity solved and solved in a +very strange way. + +Paganism declared that virtue was in a balance; Christianity declared it +was in a conflict: the collision of two passions apparently opposite. Of +course they were not really inconsistent; but they were such that it was +hard to hold simultaneously. Let us follow for a moment the clue of the +martyr and the suicide; and take the case of courage. No quality has +ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely +rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a +strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that +will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism +for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or +mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. +This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly +or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if +he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by +continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by +enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire +for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely +cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He +must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will +not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to +it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine. No +philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with +adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity +has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the +suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the +sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying. And it has held +up ever since above the European lances the banner of the mystery of +chivalry: the Christian courage, which is a disdain of death; not the +Chinese courage, which is a disdain of life. + +And now I began to find that this duplex passion was the Christian key +to ethics everywhere. Everywhere the creed made a moderation out of the +still crash of two impetuous emotions. Take, for instance, the matter of +modesty, of the balance between mere pride and mere prostration. The +average pagan, like the average agnostic, would merely say that he was +content with himself, but not insolently self-satisfied, that there were +many better and many worse, that his deserts were limited, but he would +see that he got them. In short, he would walk with his head in the air; +but not necessarily with his nose in the air. This is a manly and +rational position, but it is open to the objection we noted against the +compromise between optimism and pessimism--the "resignation" of Matthew +Arnold. Being a mixture of two things, it is a dilution of two things; +neither is present in its full strength or contributes its full colour. +This proper pride does not lift the heart like the tongue of trumpets; +you cannot go clad in crimson and gold for this. On the other hand, this +mild rationalist modesty does not cleanse the soul with fire and make it +clear like crystal; it does not (like a strict and searching humility) +make a man as a little child, who can sit at the feet of the grass. It +does not make him look up and see marvels; for Alice must grow small if +she is to be Alice in Wonderland. Thus it loses both the poetry of +being proud and the poetry of being humble. Christianity sought by this +same strange expedient to save both of them. + +It separated the two ideas and then exaggerated them both. In one way +Man was to be haughtier than he had ever been before; in another way he +was to be humbler than he had ever been before. In so far as I am Man I +am the chief of creatures. In so far as I am _a_ man I am the chief of +sinners. All humility that had meant pessimism, that had meant man +taking a vague or mean view of his whole destiny--all that was to go. We +were to hear no more the wail of Ecclesiastes that humanity had no +pre-eminence over the brute, or the awful cry of Homer that man was only +the saddest of all the beasts of the field. Man was a statue of God +walking about the garden. Man had pre-eminence over all the brutes; man +was only sad because he was not a beast, but a broken god. The Greek had +spoken of men creeping on the earth, as if clinging to it. Now Man was +to tread on the earth as if to subdue it. Christianity thus held a +thought of the dignity of man that could only be expressed in crowns +rayed like the sun and fans of peacock plumage. Yet at the same time it +could hold a thought about the abject smallness of man that could only +be expressed in fasting and fantastic submission, in the grey ashes of +St. Dominic and the white snows of St. Bernard. When one came to think +of _one's self_, there was vista and void enough for any amount of bleak +abnegation and bitter truth. There the realistic gentleman could let +himself go--as long as he let himself go at himself. There was an open +playground for the happy pessimist. Let him say anything against himself +short of blaspheming the original aim of his being; let him call himself +a fool and even a damned fool (though that is Calvinistic); but he must +not say that fools are not worth saving. He must not say that a man, +_quâ_ man, can be valueless. Here again, in short, Christianity got over +the difficulty of combining furious opposites, by keeping them both, and +keeping them both furious. The Church was positive on both points. One +can hardly think too little of one's self. One can hardly think too much +of one's soul. + +Take another case: the complicated question of charity, which some +highly uncharitable idealists seem to think quite easy. Charity is a +paradox, like modesty and courage. Stated baldly, charity certainly +means one of two things--pardoning unpardonable acts, or loving +unlovable people. But if we ask ourselves (as we did in the case of +pride) what a sensible pagan would feel about such a subject, we shall +probably be beginning at the bottom of it. A sensible pagan would say +that there were some people one could forgive, and some one couldn't: a +slave who stole wine could be laughed at; a slave who betrayed his +benefactor could be killed, and cursed even after he was killed. In so +far as the act was pardonable, the man was pardonable. That again is +rational, and even refreshing; but it is a dilution. It leaves no place +for a pure horror of injustice, such as that which is a great beauty in +the innocent. And it leaves no place for a mere tenderness for men as +men, such as is the whole fascination of the charitable. Christianity +came in here as before. It came in startlingly with a sword, and clove +one thing from another. It divided the crime from the criminal. The +criminal we must forgive unto seventy times seven. The crime we must not +forgive at all. It was not enough that slaves who stole wine inspired +partly anger and partly kindness. We must be much more angry with theft +than before, and yet much kinder to thieves than before. There was room +for wrath and love to run wild. And the more I considered Christianity, +the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the +chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild. + +Mental and emotional liberty are not so simple as they look. Really they +require almost as careful a balance of laws and conditions as do social +and political liberty. The ordinary æsthetic anarchist who sets out to +feel everything freely gets knotted at last in a paradox that prevents +him feeling at all. He breaks away from home limits to follow poetry. +But in ceasing to feel home limits he has ceased to feel the "Odyssey." +He is free from national prejudices and outside patriotism. But being +outside patriotism he is outside "Henry V." Such a literary man is +simply outside all literature: he is more of a prisoner than any bigot. +For if there is a wall between you and the world, it makes little +difference whether you describe yourself as locked in or as locked out. +What we want is not the universality that is outside all normal +sentiments; we want the universality that is inside all normal +sentiments. It is all the difference between being free from them, as a +man is free from a prison, and being free of them as a man is free of a +city. I am free from Windsor Castle (that is, I am not forcibly detained +there), but I am by no means free of that building. How can man be +approximately free of fine emotions, able to swing them in a clear space +without breakage or wrong? _This_ was the achievement of this Christian +paradox of the parallel passions. Granted the primary dogma of the war +between divine and diabolic, the revolt and ruin of the world, their +optimism and pessimism, as pure poetry, could be loosened like +cataracts. + +St. Francis, in praising all good, could be a more shouting optimist +than Walt Whitman. St. Jerome, in denouncing all evil, could paint the +world blacker than Schopenhauer. Both passions were free because both +were kept in their place. The optimist could pour out all the praise he +liked on the gay music of the march, the golden trumpets, and the purple +banners going into battle. But he must not call the fight needless. The +pessimist might draw as darkly as he chose the sickening marches or the +sanguine wounds. But he must not call the fight hopeless. So it was with +all the other moral problems, with pride, with protest, and with +compassion. By defining its main doctrine, the Church not only kept +seemingly inconsistent things side by side, but, what was more, allowed +them to break out in a sort of artistic violence otherwise possible only +to anarchists. Meekness grew more dramatic than madness. Historic +Christianity rose into a high and strange _coup de théatre_ of +morality--things that are to virtue what the crimes of Nero are to vice. +The spirits of indignation and of charity took terrible and attractive +forms, ranging from that monkish fierceness that scourged like a dog the +first and greatest of the Plantagenets, to the sublime pity of St. +Catherine, who, in the official shambles, kissed the bloody head of the +criminal. Poetry could be acted as well as composed. This heroic and +monumental manner in ethics has entirely vanished with supernatural +religion. They, being humble, could parade themselves; but we are too +proud to be prominent. Our ethical teachers write reasonably for prison +reform; but we are not likely to see Mr. Cadbury, or any eminent +philanthropist, go into Reading Gaol and embrace the strangled corpse +before it is cast into the quicklime. Our ethical teachers write mildly +against the power of millionaires; but we are not likely to see Mr. +Rockefeller, or any modern tyrant, publicly whipped in Westminster +Abbey. + +Thus, the double charges of the secularists, though throwing nothing +but darkness and confusion on themselves, throw a real light on the +faith. It _is_ true that the historic Church has at once emphasised +celibacy and emphasised the family; has at once (if one may put it so) +been fiercely for having children and fiercely for not having children. +It has kept them side by side like two strong colours, red and white, +like the red and white upon the shield of St. George. It has always had +a healthy hatred of pink. It hates that combination of two colours which +is the feeble expedient of the philosophers. It hates that evolution of +black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey. In fact, the whole +theory of the Church on virginity might be symbolized in the statement +that white is a colour: not merely the absence of a colour. All that I +am urging here can be expressed by saying that Christianity sought in +most of these cases to keep two colours co-existent but pure. It is not +a mixture like russet or purple; it is rather like a shot silk, for a +shot silk is always at right angles, and is in the pattern of the cross. + +So it is also, of course, with the contradictory charges of the +anti-Christians about submission and slaughter. It _is_ true that the +Church told some men to fight and others not to fight; and it _is_ true +that those who fought were like thunderbolts and those who did not fight +were like statues. All this simply means that the Church preferred to +use its Supermen and to use its Tolstoyans. There must be _some_ good in +the life of battle, for so many good men have enjoyed being soldiers. +There must be _some_ good in the idea of non-resistance, for so many +good men seem to enjoy being Quakers. All that the Church did (so far as +that goes) was to prevent either of these good things from ousting the +other. They existed side by side. The Tolstoyans, having all the +scruples of monks, simply became monks. The Quakers became a club +instead of becoming a sect. Monks said all that Tolstoy says; they +poured out lucid lamentations about the cruelty of battles and the +vanity of revenge. But the Tolstoyans are not quite right enough to run +the whole world; and in the ages of faith they were not allowed to run +it. The world did not lose the last charge of Sir James Douglas or the +banner of Joan the Maid. And sometimes this pure gentleness and this +pure fierceness met and justified their juncture; the paradox of all the +prophets was fulfilled, and, in the soul of St. Louis, the lion lay down +with the lamb. But remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. +It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that +when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But +that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That +is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the +lamb. The real problem is--Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still +retain his royal ferocity? _That_ is the problem the Church attempted; +_that_ is the miracle she achieved. + +This is what I have called guessing the hidden eccentricities of life. +This is knowing that a man's heart is to the left and not in the middle. +This is knowing not only that the earth is round, but knowing exactly +where it is flat. Christian doctrine detected the oddities of life. It +not only discovered the law, but it foresaw the exceptions. Those +underrate Christianity who say that it discovered mercy; any one might +discover mercy. In fact every one did. But to discover a plan for being +merciful and also severe--_that_ was to anticipate a strange need of +human nature. For no one wants to be forgiven for a big sin as if it +were a little one. Any one might say that we should be neither quite +miserable nor quite happy. But to find out how far one _may_ be quite +miserable without making it impossible to be quite happy--that was a +discovery in psychology. Any one might say, "Neither swagger nor +grovel"; and it would have been a limit. But to say, "Here you can +swagger and there you can grovel"--that was an emancipation. + +This was the big fact about Christian ethics; the discovery of the new +balance. Paganism had been like a pillar of marble, upright because +proportioned with symmetry. Christianity was like a huge and ragged and +romantic rock, which, though it sways on its pedestal at a touch, yet, +because its exaggerated excrescences exactly balance each other, is +enthroned there for a thousand years. In a Gothic cathedral the columns +were all different, but they were all necessary. Every support seemed an +accidental and fantastic support; every buttress was a flying buttress. +So in Christendom apparent accidents balanced. Becket wore a hair shirt +under his gold and crimson, and there is much to be said for the +combination; for Becket got the benefit of the hair shirt while the +people in the street got the benefit of the crimson and gold. It is at +least better than the manner of the modern millionaire, who has the +black and the drab outwardly for others, and the gold next his heart. +But the balance was not always in one man's body as in Becket's; the +balance was often distributed over the whole body of Christendom. +Because a man prayed and fasted on the Northern snows, flowers could be +flung at his festival in the Southern cities; and because fanatics drank +water on the sands of Syria, men could still drink cider in the orchards +of England. This is what makes Christendom at once so much more +perplexing and so much more interesting than the Pagan empire; just as +Amiens Cathedral is not better but more interesting than the Parthenon. +If any one wants a modern proof of all this, let him consider the +curious fact that, under Christianity, Europe (while remaining a unity) +has broken up into individual nations. Patriotism is a perfect example +of this deliberate balancing of one emphasis against another emphasis. +The instinct of the Pagan empire would have said, "You shall all be +Roman citizens, and grow alike; let the German grow less slow and +reverent; the Frenchmen less experimental and swift." But the instinct +of Christian Europe says, "Let the German remain slow and reverent, that +the Frenchman may the more safely be swift and experimental. We will +make an equipoise out of these excesses. The absurdity called Germany +shall correct the insanity called France." + +Last and most important, it is exactly this which explains what is so +inexplicable to all the modern critics of the history of Christianity. I +mean the monstrous wars about small points of theology, the earthquakes +of emotion about a gesture or a word. It was only a matter of an inch; +but an inch is everything when you are balancing. The Church could not +afford to swerve a hair's breadth on some things if she was to continue +her great and daring experiment of the irregular equilibrium. Once let +one idea become less powerful and some other idea would become too +powerful. It was no flock of sheep the Christian shepherd was leading, +but a herd of bulls and tigers, of terrible ideals and devouring +doctrines, each one of them strong enough to turn to a false religion +and lay waste the world. Remember that the Church went in specifically +for dangerous ideas; she was a lion tamer. The idea of birth through a +Holy Spirit, of the death of a divine being, of the forgiveness of sins, +or the fulfilment of prophecies, are ideas which, any one can see, need +but a touch to turn them into something blasphemous or ferocious. The +smallest link was let drop by the artificers of the Mediterranean, and +the lion of ancestral pessimism burst his chain in the forgotten forests +of the north. Of these theological equalisations I have to speak +afterwards. Here it is enough to notice that if some small mistake were +made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness. A +sentence phrased wrong about the nature of symbolism would have broken +all the best statues in Europe. A slip in the definitions might stop all +the dances; might wither all the Christmas trees or break all the Easter +eggs. Doctrines had to be defined within strict limits, even in order +that man might enjoy general human liberties. The Church had to be +careful, if only that the world might be careless. + +This is the thrilling romance of Orthodoxy. People have fallen into a +foolish habit of speaking of orthodoxy as something heavy, humdrum, and +safe. There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy. +It was sanity: and to be sane is more dramatic than to be mad. It was +the equilibrium of a man behind madly rushing horses, seeming to stoop +this way and to sway that, yet in every attitude having the grace of +statuary and the accuracy of arithmetic. The Church in its early days +went fierce and fast with any warhorse; yet it is utterly unhistoric to +say that she merely went mad along one idea, like a vulgar fanaticism. +She swerved to left and right, so as exactly to avoid enormous +obstacles. She left on one hand the huge bulk of Arianism, buttressed by +all the worldly powers to make Christianity too worldly. The next +instant she was swerving to avoid an orientalism, which would have made +it too unworldly. The orthodox Church never took the tame course or +accepted the conventions; the orthodox Church was never respectable. It +would have been easier to have accepted the earthly power of the Arians. +It would have been easy, in the Calvinistic seventeenth century, to fall +into the bottomless pit of predestination. It is easy to be a madman: it +is easy to be a heretic. It is always easy to let the age have its head; +the difficult thing is to keep one's own. It is always easy to be a +modernist; as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those +open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion and +sect after sect set along the historic path of Christendom--that would +indeed have been simple. It is always simple to fall; there are an +infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands. To +have fallen into any one of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian +Science would indeed have been obvious and tame. But to have avoided +them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly +chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling +and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect. + + + + +CHAPTER VII.--_The Eternal Revolution_ + + +The following propositions have been urged: First, that some faith in +our life is required even to improve it; second, that some +dissatisfaction with things as they are is necessary even in order to be +satisfied; third, that to have this necessary content and necessary +discontent it is not sufficient to have the obvious equilibrium of the +Stoic. For mere resignation has neither the gigantic levity of pleasure +nor the superb intolerance of pain. There is a vital objection to the +advice merely to grin and bear it. The objection is that if you merely +bear it, you do not grin. Greek heroes do not grin; but gargoyles +do--because they are Christian. And when a Christian is pleased, he is +(in the most exact sense) frightfully pleased; his pleasure is +frightful. Christ prophesied the whole of Gothic architecture in that +hour when nervous and respectable people (such people as now object to +barrel organs) objected to the shouting of the gutter-snipes of +Jerusalem. He said, "If these were silent, the very stones would cry +out." Under the impulse of His spirit arose like a clamorous chorus the +facades of the mediæval cathedrals, thronged with shouting faces and +open mouths. The prophecy has fulfilled itself: the very stones cry out. + +If these things be conceded, though only for argument, we may take up +where we left it the thread of the thought of the natural man, called by +the Scotch (with regrettable familiarity), "The Old Man." We can ask the +next question so obviously in front of us. Some satisfaction is needed +even to make things better. But what do we mean by making things better? +Most modern talk on this matter is a mere argument in a circle--that +circle which we have already made the symbol of madness and of mere +rationalism. Evolution is only good if it produces good; good is only +good if it helps evolution. The elephant stands on the tortoise, and the +tortoise on the elephant. + +Obviously, it will not do to take our ideal from the principle in +nature; for the simple reason that (except for some human or divine +theory), there is no principle in nature. For instance, the cheap +anti-democrat of to-day will tell you solemnly that there is no equality +in nature. He is right, but he does not see the logical addendum. There +is no equality in nature; also there is no inequality in nature. +Inequality, as much as equality, implies a standard of value. To read +aristocracy into the anarchy of animals is just as sentimental as to +read democracy into it. Both aristocracy and democracy are human ideals: +the one saying that all men are valuable, the other that some men are +more valuable. But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than +mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that +the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior +because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the +effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German +pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. +He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first. Or +he might feel that he had actually inflicted frightful punishment on the +cat by keeping him alive. Just as a microbe might feel proud of +spreading a pestilence, so the pessimistic mouse might exult to think +that he was renewing in the cat the torture of conscious existence. It +all depends on the philosophy of the mouse. You cannot even say that +there is victory or superiority in nature unless you have some doctrine +about what things are superior. You cannot even say that the cat scores +unless there is a system of scoring. You cannot even say that the cat +gets the best of it unless there is some best to be got. + +We cannot, then, get the ideal itself from nature, and as we follow here +the first and natural speculation, we will leave out (for the present) +the idea of getting it from God. We must have our own vision. But the +attempts of most moderns to express it are highly vague. + +Some fall back simply on the clock: they talk as if mere passage through +time brought some superiority; so that even a man of the first mental +calibre carelessly uses the phrase that human morality is never up to +date. How can anything be up to date? a date has no character. How can +one say that Christmas celebrations are not suitable to the twenty-fifth +of a month? What the writer meant, of course, was that the majority is +behind his favourite minority--or in front of it. Other vague modern +people take refuge in material metaphors; in fact, this is the chief +mark of vague modern people. Not daring to define their doctrine of what +is good, they use physical figures of speech without stint or shame, +and, what is worst of all, seem to think these cheap analogies are +exquisitely spiritual and superior to the old morality. Thus they think +it intellectual to talk about things being "high." It is at least the +reverse of intellectual; it is a mere phrase from a steeple or a +weathercock. "Tommy was a good boy" is a pure philosophical statement, +worthy of Plato or Aquinas. "Tommy lived the higher life" is a gross +metaphor from a ten-foot rule. + +This, incidentally, is almost the whole weakness of Nietzsche, whom some +are representing as a bold and strong thinker. No one will deny that he +was a poetical and suggestive thinker; but he was quite the reverse of +strong. He was not at all bold. He never put his own meaning before +himself in bald abstract words: as did Aristotle and Calvin, and even +Karl Marx, the hard, fearless men of thought. Nietzsche always escaped a +question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, +"beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more +good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil." Had he +faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was +nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say, "the +purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are +ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man," or "over man," a +physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly +a very timid thinker. He does not really know in the least what sort of +man he wants evolution to produce. And if he does not know, certainly +the ordinary evolutionists, who talk about things being "higher," do not +know either. + +Then again, some people fall back on sheer submission and sitting still. +Nature is going to do something some day; nobody knows what, and nobody +knows when. We have no reason for acting, and no reason for not acting. +If anything happens it is right: if anything is prevented it was wrong. +Again, some people try to anticipate nature by doing something, by doing +anything. Because we may possibly grow wings they cut off their legs. +Yet nature may be trying to make them centipedes for all they know. + +Lastly, there is a fourth class of people who take whatever it is that +they happen to want, and say that that is the ultimate aim of evolution. +And these are the only sensible people. This is the only really healthy +way with the word evolution, to work for what you want, and to call +_that_ evolution. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance +can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish +to make the whole world like that vision. If you like to put it so, the +essence of the doctrine is that what we have around us is the mere +method and preparation for something that we have to create. This is not +a world, but rather the materials for a world. God has given us not so +much the colours of a picture as the colours of a palette. But He has +also given us a subject, a model, a fixed vision. We must be clear about +what we want to paint. This adds a further principle to our previous +list of principles. We have said we must be fond of this world, even in +order to change it. We now add that we must be fond of another world +(real or imaginary) in order to have something to change it to. + +We need not debate about the mere words evolution or progress: +personally I prefer to call it reform. For reform implies form. It +implies that we are trying to shape the world in a particular image; to +make it something that we see already in our minds. Evolution is a +metaphor from mere automatic unrolling. Progress is a metaphor from +merely walking along a road--very likely the wrong road. But reform is a +metaphor for reasonable and determined men: it means that we see a +certain thing out of shape and we mean to put it into shape. And we +know what shape. + +Now here comes in the whole collapse and huge blunder of our age. We +have mixed up two different things, two opposite things. Progress should +mean that we are always changing the world to suit the vision. Progress +does mean (just now) that we are always changing the vision. It should +mean that we are slow but sure in bringing justice and mercy among men: +it does mean that we are very swift in doubting the desirability of +justice and mercy: a wild page from any Prussian sophist makes men doubt +it. Progress should mean that we are always walking towards the New +Jerusalem. It does mean that the New Jerusalem is always walking away +from us. We are not altering the real to suit the ideal. We are altering +the ideal: it is easier. + +Silly examples are always simpler; let us suppose a man wanted a +particular kind of world; say, a blue world. He would have no cause to +complain of the slightness or swiftness of his task; he might toil for a +long time at the transformation; he could work away (in every sense) +until all was blue. He could have heroic adventures; the putting of the +last touches to a blue tiger. He could have fairy dreams; the dawn of a +blue moon. But if he worked hard, that high-minded reformer would +certainly (from his own point of view) leave the world better and bluer +than he found it. If he altered a blade of grass to his favourite colour +every day, he would get on slowly. But if he altered his favourite +colour every day, he would not get on at all. If, after reading a fresh +philosopher, he started to paint everything red or yellow, his work +would be thrown away: there would be nothing to show except a few blue +tigers walking about, specimens of his early bad manner. This is exactly +the position of the average modern thinker. It will be said that this is +avowedly a preposterous example. But it is literally the fact of recent +history. The great and grave changes in our political civilization all +belonged to the early nineteenth century, not to the later. They +belonged to the black and white epoch when men believed fixedly in +Toryism, in Protestantism, in Calvinism, in Reform, and not unfrequently +in Revolution. And whatever each man believed in he hammered at +steadily, without scepticism: and there was a time when the Established +Church might have fallen, and the House of Lords nearly fell. It was +because Radicals were wise enough to be constant and consistent; it was +because Radicals were wise enough to be Conservative. But in the +existing atmosphere there is not enough time and tradition in Radicalism +to pull anything down. There is a great deal of truth in Lord Hugh +Cecil's suggestion (made in a fine speech) that the era of change is +over, and that ours is an era of conservation and repose. But probably +it would pain Lord Hugh Cecil if he realised (what is certainly the +case) that ours is only an age of conservation because it is an age of +complete unbelief. Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish +institutions to remain the same. The more the life of the mind is +unhinged, the more the machinery of matter will be left to itself. The +net result of all our political suggestions, Collectivism, Tolstoyanism, +Neo-Feudalism, Communism, Anarchy, Scientific Bureaucracy--the plain +fruit of all of them is that the Monarchy and the House of Lords will +remain. The net result of all the new religions will be that the Church +of England will not (for heaven knows how long) be disestablished. It +was Karl Marx, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Cunninghame Grahame, Bernard Shaw and +Auberon Herbert, who between them, with bowed gigantic backs, bore up +the throne of the Archbishop of Canterbury. + +We may say broadly that free thought is the best of all the safeguards +against freedom. Managed in a modern style the emancipation of the +slave's mind is the best way of preventing the emancipation of the +slave. Teach him to worry about whether he wants to be free, and he will +not free himself. Again, it may be said that this instance is remote or +extreme. But, again, it is exactly true of the men in the streets around +us. It is true that the negro slave, being a debased barbarian, will +probably have either a human affection of loyalty, or a human affection +for liberty. But the man we see every day--the worker in Mr. Gradgrind's +factory, the little clerk in Mr. Gradgrind's office--he is too mentally +worried to believe in freedom. He is kept quiet with revolutionary +literature. He is calmed and kept in his place by a constant succession +of wild philosophies. He is a Marxian one day, a Nietzscheite the next +day, a Superman (probably) the next day; and a slave every day. The only +thing that remains after all the philosophies is the factory. The only +man who gains by all the philosophies is Gradgrind. It would be worth +his while to keep his commercial helotry supplied with sceptical +literature. And now I come to think of it, of course, Gradgrind is +famous for giving libraries. He shows his sense. All modern books are on +his side. As long as the vision of heaven is always changing, the vision +of earth will be exactly the same. No ideal will remain long enough to +be realised, or even partly realised. The modern young man will never +change his environment; for he will always change his mind. + +This, therefore, is our first requirement about the ideal towards which +progress is directed; it must be fixed. Whistler used to make many rapid +studies of a sitter; it did not matter if he tore up twenty portraits. +But it would matter if he looked up twenty times, and each time saw a +new person sitting placidly for his portrait. So it does not matter +(comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; +for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully +matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old +failures are fruitless. The question therefore becomes this: How can we +keep the artist discontented with his pictures while preventing him from +being vitally discontented with his art? How can we make a man always +dissatisfied with his work, yet always satisfied with working? How can +we make sure that the portrait painter will throw the portrait out of +window instead of taking the natural and more human course of throwing +the sitter out of window? + +A strict rule is not only necessary for ruling; it is also necessary for +rebelling. This fixed and familiar ideal is necessary to any sort of +revolution. Man will sometimes act slowly upon new ideas; but he will +only act swiftly upon old ideas. If I am merely to float or fade or +evolve, it may be towards something anarchic; but if I am to riot, it +must be for something respectable. This is the whole weakness of certain +schools of progress and moral evolution. They suggest that there has +been a slow movement towards morality, with an imperceptible ethical +change in every year or at every instant. There is only one great +disadvantage in this theory. It talks of a slow movement towards +justice; but it does not permit a swift movement. A man is not allowed +to leap up and declare a certain state of things to be intrinsically +intolerable. To make the matter clear, it is better to take a specific +example. Certain of the idealistic vegetarians, such as Mr. Salt, say +that the time has now come for eating no meat; by implication they +assume that at one time it was right to eat meat, and they suggest (in +words that could be quoted) that some day it may be wrong to eat milk +and eggs. I do not discuss here the question of what is justice to +animals. I only say that whatever is justice ought, under given +conditions, to be prompt justice. If an animal is wronged, we ought to +be able to rush to his rescue. But how can we rush if we are, perhaps, +in advance of our time? How can we rush to catch a train which may not +arrive for a few centuries? How can I denounce a man for skinning cats, +if he is only now what I may possibly become in drinking a glass of +milk? A splendid and insane Russian sect ran about taking all the cattle +out of all the carts. How can I pluck up courage to take the horse out +of my hansom-cab, when I do not know whether my evolutionary watch is +only a little fast or the cabman's a little slow? Suppose I say to a +sweater, "Slavery suited one stage of evolution." And suppose he +answers, "And sweating suits this stage of evolution." How can I answer +if there is no eternal test? If sweaters can be behind the current +morality, why should not philanthropists be in front of it? What on +earth is the current morality, except in its literal sense--the morality +that is always running away? + +Thus we may say that a permanent ideal is as necessary to the innovator +as to the conservative; it is necessary whether we wish the king's +orders to be promptly executed or whether we only wish the king to be +promptly executed. The guillotine has many sins, but to do it justice +there is nothing evolutionary about it. The favourite evolutionary +argument finds its best answer in the axe. The Evolutionist says, "Where +do you draw the line?" the Revolutionist answers, "I draw it _here_: +exactly between your head and body." There must at any given moment be +an abstract right and wrong if any blow is to be struck; there must be +something eternal if there is to be anything sudden. Therefore for all +intelligible human purposes, for altering things or for keeping things +as they are, for founding a system for ever, as in China, or for +altering it every month as in the early French Revolution, it is equally +necessary that the vision should be a fixed vision. This is our first +requirement. + +When I had written this down, I felt once again the presence of +something else in the discussion: as a man hears a church bell above the +sound of the street. Something seemed to be saying, "My ideal at least +is fixed; for it was fixed before the foundations of the world. My +vision of perfection assuredly cannot be altered; for it is called +Eden. You may alter the place to which you are going; but you cannot +alter the place from which you have come. To the orthodox there must +always be a case for revolution; for in the hearts of men God has been +put under the feet of Satan. In the upper world hell once rebelled +against heaven. But in this world heaven is rebelling against hell. For +the orthodox there can always be a revolution; for a revolution is a +restoration. At any instant you may strike a blow for the perfection +which no man has seen since Adam. No unchanging custom, no changing +evolution can make the original good anything but good. Man may have had +concubines as long as cows have had horns: still they are not a part of +him if they are sinful. Men may have been under oppression ever since +fish were under water; still they ought not to be, if oppression is +sinful. The chain may seem as natural to the slave, or the paint to the +harlot, as does the plume to the bird or the burrow to the fox; still +they are not, if they are sinful. I lift my prehistoric legend to defy +all your history. Your vision is not merely a fixture: it is a fact." I +paused to note the new coincidence of Christianity: but I passed on. + +I passed on to the next necessity of any ideal of progress. Some people +(as we have said) seem to believe in an automatic and impersonal +progress in the nature of things. But it is clear that no political +activity can be encouraged by saying that progress is natural and +inevitable; that is not a reason for being active, but rather a reason +for being lazy. If we are bound to improve, we need not trouble to +improve. The pure doctrine of progress is the best of all reasons for +not being a progressive. But it is to none of these obvious comments +that I wish primarily to call attention. + +The only arresting point is this: that if we suppose improvement to be +natural, it must be fairly simple. The world might conceivably be +working towards one consummation, but hardly towards any particular +arrangement of many qualities. To take our original simile: Nature by +herself may be growing more blue; that is, a process so simple that it +might be impersonal. But Nature cannot be making a careful picture made +of many picked colours, unless Nature is personal. If the end of the +world were mere darkness or mere light it might come as slowly and +inevitably as dusk or dawn. But if the end of the world is to be a piece +of elaborate and artistic chiaroscuro, then there must be design in it, +either human or divine. The world, through mere time, might grow black +like an old picture, or white like an old coat; but if it is turned +into a particular piece of black and white art--then there is an artist. + +If the distinction be not evident, I give an ordinary instance. We +constantly hear a particularly cosmic creed from the modern +humanitarians; I use the word humanitarian in the ordinary sense, as +meaning one who upholds the claims of all creatures against those of +humanity. They suggest that through the ages we have been growing more +and more humane, that is to say, that one after another, groups or +sections of beings, slaves, children, women, cows, or what not, have +been gradually admitted to mercy or to justice. They say that we once +thought it right to eat men (we didn't); but I am not here concerned +with their history, which is highly unhistorical. As a fact, +anthropophagy is certainly a decadent thing, not a primitive one. It is +much more likely that modern men will eat human flesh out of affectation +than that primitive man ever ate it out of ignorance. I am here only +following the outlines of their argument, which consists in maintaining +that man has been progressively more lenient, first to citizens, then +to slaves, then to animals, and then (presumably) to plants. I think it +wrong to sit on a man. Soon, I shall think it wrong to sit on a horse. +Eventually (I suppose) I shall think it wrong to sit on a chair. That is +the drive of the argument. And for this argument it can be said that it +is possible to talk of it in terms of evolution or inevitable progress. +A perpetual tendency to touch fewer and fewer things might, one feels, +be a mere brute unconscious tendency, like that of a species to produce +fewer and fewer children. This drift may be really evolutionary, because +it is stupid. + +Darwinism can be used to back up two mad moralities, but it cannot be +used to back up a single sane one. The kinship and competition of all +living creatures can be used as a reason for being insanely cruel or +insanely sentimental; but not for a healthy love of animals. On the +evolutionary basis you may be inhumane, or you may be absurdly humane; +but you cannot be human. That you and a tiger are one may be a reason +for being tender to a tiger. Or it may be a reason for being as cruel as +the tiger. It is one way to train the tiger to imitate you, it is a +shorter way to imitate the tiger. But in neither case does evolution +tell you how to treat a tiger reasonably, that is, to admire his +stripes while avoiding his claws. + +If you want to treat a tiger reasonably, you must go back to the garden +of Eden. For the obstinate reminder continued to recur: only the +supernatural has taken a sane view of Nature. The essence of all +pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really in this +proposition: that Nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard +Nature as a mother, you discover that she is a step-mother. The main +point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is +our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same +father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to +imitate. This gives to the typically Christian pleasure in this earth a +strange touch of lightness that is almost frivolity. Nature was a solemn +mother to the worshippers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother +to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of +Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is a sister, and +even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as +well as loved. + +This, however, is hardly our main point at present; I have admitted it +only in order to show how constantly, and as it were accidentally, the +key would fit the smallest doors. Our main point is here, that if there +be a mere trend of impersonal improvement in Nature, it must presumably +be a simple trend towards some simple triumph. One can imagine that some +automatic tendency in biology might work for giving us longer and longer +noses. But the question is, do we want to have longer and longer noses? +I fancy not; I believe that we most of us want to say to our noses, +"Thus far, and no farther; and here shall thy proud point be stayed": we +require a nose of such length as may ensure an interesting face. But we +cannot imagine a mere biological trend towards producing interesting +faces; because an interesting face is one particular arrangement of +eyes, nose, and mouth, in a most complex relation to each other. +Proportion cannot be a drift: it is either an accident or a design. So +with the ideal of human morality and its relation to the humanitarians +and the anti-humanitarians. It is conceivable that we are going more and +more to keep our hands off things: not to drive horses; not to pick +flowers. We may eventually be bound not to disturb a man's mind even by +argument; not to disturb the sleep of birds even by coughing. The +ultimate apotheosis would appear to be that of a man sitting quite +still, not daring to stir for fear of disturbing a fly, nor to eat for +fear of incommoding a microbe. To so crude a consummation as that we +might perhaps unconsciously drift. But do we want so crude a +consummation? Similarly, we might unconsciously evolve along the +opposite or Nietzscheian line of development--superman crushing superman +in one tower of tyrants until the universe is smashed up for fun. But do +we want the universe smashed up for fun? Is it not quite clear that what +we really hope for is one particular management and proposition of these +two things; a certain amount of restraint and respect, a certain amount +of energy and mastery. If our life is ever really as beautiful as a +fairy-tale, we shall have to remember that all the beauty of a +fairy-tale lies in this: that the prince has a wonder which just stops +short of being fear. If he is afraid of the giant, there is an end of +him; but also if he is not astonished at the giant, there is an end of +the fairy-tale. The whole point depends upon his being at once humble +enough to wonder, and haughty enough to defy. So our attitude to the +giant of the world must not merely be increasing delicacy or increasing +contempt: it must be one particular proportion of the two--which is +exactly right. We must have in us enough reverence for all things +outside us to make us tread fearfully on the grass. We must also have +enough disdain for all things outside us, to make us, on due occasion, +spit at the stars. Yet these two things (if we are to be good or happy) +must be combined, not in any combination, but in one particular +combination. The perfect happiness of men on the earth (if it ever +comes) will not be a flat and solid thing, like the satisfaction of +animals. It will be an exact and perilous balance; like that of a +desperate romance. Man must have just enough faith in himself to have +adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them. + +This, then, is our second requirement for the ideal of progress. First, +it must be fixed; second, it must be composite. It must not (if it is to +satisfy our souls) be the mere victory of some one thing swallowing up +everything else, love or pride or peace or adventure; it must be a +definite picture composed of these elements in their best proportion and +relation. I am not concerned at this moment to deny that some such good +culmination may be, by the constitution of things, reserved for the +human race. I only point out that if this composite happiness is fixed +for us it must be fixed by some mind; for only a mind can place the +exact proportions of a composite happiness. If the beatification of the +world is a mere work of nature, then it must be as simple as the +freezing of the world, or the burning up of the world. But if the +beatification of the world is not a work of nature but a work of art, +then it involves an artist. And here again my contemplation was cloven +by the ancient voice which said, "I could have told you all this a long +time ago. If there is any certain progress it can only be my kind of +progress, the progress towards a complete city of virtues and +dominations where righteousness and peace contrive to kiss each other. +An impersonal force might be leading you to a wilderness of perfect +flatness or a peak of perfect height. But only a personal God can +possibly be leading you (if, indeed, you are being led) to a city with +just streets and architectural proportions, a city in which each of you +can contribute exactly the right amount of your own colour to the +many-coloured coat of Joseph." + +Twice again, therefore, Christianity had come in with the exact answer +that I required. I had said, "The ideal must be fixed," and the Church +had answered, "Mine is literally fixed, for it existed before anything +else." I said secondly, "It must be artistically combined, like a +picture"; and the Church answered, "Mine is quite literally a picture, +for I know who painted it." Then I went on to the third thing, which, as +it seemed to me, was needed for an Utopia or goal of progress. And of +all the three it is infinitely the hardest to express. Perhaps it might +be put thus: that we need watchfulness even in Utopia, lest we fall from +Utopia as we fell from Eden. + +We have remarked that one reason offered for being a progressive is that +things naturally tend to grow better. But the only real reason for being +a progressive is that things naturally tend to grow worse. The +corruption in things is not only the best argument for being +progressive; it is also the only argument against being conservative. +The conservative theory would really be quite sweeping and unanswerable +if it were not for this one fact. But all conservatism is based upon the +idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you +do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change. +If you leave a white post alone it will soon be a black post. If you +particularly want it to be white you must be always painting it again; +that is, you must be always having a revolution. Briefly, if you want +the old white post you must have a new white post. But this which is +true even of inanimate things is in a quite special and terrible sense +true of all human things. An almost unnatural vigilance is really +required of the citizen because of the horrible rapidity with which +human institutions grow old. It is the custom in passing romance and +journalism to talk of men suffering under old tyrannies. But, as a fact, +men have almost always suffered under new tyrannies; under tyrannies +that had been public liberties hardly twenty years before. Thus England +went mad with joy over the patriotic monarchy of Elizabeth; and then +(almost immediately afterwards) went mad with rage in the trap of the +tyranny of Charles the First. So, again, in France the monarchy became +intolerable, not just after it had been tolerated, but just after it had +been adored. The son of Louis the well-beloved was Louis the +guillotined. So in the same way in England in the nineteenth century the +Radical manufacturer was entirely trusted as a mere tribune of the +people, until suddenly we heard the cry of the Socialist that he was a +tyrant eating the people like bread. So again, we have almost up to the +last instant trusted the newspapers as organs of public opinion. Just +recently some of us have seen (not slowly, but with a start) that they +are obviously nothing of the kind. They are, by the nature of the case, +the hobbies of a few rich men. We have not any need to rebel against +antiquity; we have to rebel against novelty. It is the new rulers, the +capitalist or the editor, who really hold up the modern world. There is +no fear that a modern king will attempt to override the constitution; it +is more likely that he will ignore the constitution and work behind its +back; he will take no advantage of his kingly power; it is more likely +that he will take advantage of his kingly powerlessness, of the fact +that he is free from criticism and publicity. For the king is the most +private person of our time. It will not be necessary for any one to +fight again against the proposal of a censorship of the press. We do not +need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship by the press. + +This startling swiftness with which popular systems turn oppressive is +the third fact for which we shall ask our perfect theory of progress to +allow. It must always be on the look out for every privilege being +abused, for every working right becoming a wrong. In this matter I am +entirely on the side of the revolutionists. They are really right to be +always suspecting human institutions; they are right not to put their +trust in princes nor in any child of man. The chieftain chosen to be the +friend of the people becomes the enemy of the people; the newspaper +started to tell the truth now exists to prevent the truth being told. +Here, I say, I felt that I was really at last on the side of the +revolutionary. And then I caught my breath again: for I remembered that +I was once again on the side of the orthodox. + +Christianity spoke again and said, "I have always maintained that men +were naturally backsliders; that human virtue tended of its own nature +to rust or to rot; I have always said that human beings as such go +wrong, especially happy human beings, especially proud and prosperous +human beings. This eternal revolution, this suspicion sustained through +centuries, you (being a vague modern) call the doctrine of progress. If +you were a philosopher you would call it, as I do, the doctrine of +original sin. You may call it the cosmic advance as much as you like; I +call it what it is--the Fall. + +I have spoken of orthodoxy coming in like a sword; here I confess it +came in like a battle-axe. For really (when I came to think of it) +Christianity is the only thing left that has any real right to question +the power of the well-nurtured or the well-bred. I have listened often +enough to Socialists, or even to democrats, saying that the physical +conditions of the poor must of necessity make them mentally and morally +degraded. I have listened to scientific men (and there are still +scientific men not opposed to democracy) saying that if we give the poor +healthier conditions vice and wrong will disappear. I have listened to +them with a horrible attention, with a hideous fascination. For it was +like watching a man energetically sawing from the tree the branch he is +sitting on. If these happy democrats could prove their case, they would +strike democracy dead. If the poor are thus utterly demoralized, it may +or may not be practical to raise them. But it is certainly quite +practical to disfranchise them. If the man with a bad bedroom cannot +give a good vote, then the first and swiftest deduction is that he shall +give no vote. The governing class may not unreasonably say, "It may take +us some time to reform his bedroom. But if he is the brute you say, it +will take him very little time to ruin our country. Therefore we will +take your hint and not give him the chance." It fills me with horrible +amusement to observe the way in which the earnest Socialist +industriously lays the foundation of all aristocracy, expatiating +blandly upon the evident unfitness of the poor to rule. It is like +listening to somebody at an evening party apologising for entering +without evening dress, and explaining that he had recently been +intoxicated, had a personal habit of taking off his clothes in the +street, and had, moreover, only just changed from prison uniform. At any +moment, one feels, the host might say that really, if it was as bad as +that, he need not come in at all. So it is when the ordinary Socialist, +with a beaming face, proves that the poor, after their smashing +experiences, cannot be really trustworthy. At any moment the rich may +say, "Very well, then, we won't trust them," and bang the door in his +face. On the basis of Mr. Blatchford's view of heredity and environment, +the case for the aristocracy is quite overwhelming. If clean homes and +clean air make clean souls, why not give the power (for the present at +any rate) to those who undoubtedly have the clean air? If better +conditions will make the poor more fit to govern themselves, why should +not better conditions already make the rich more fit to govern them? On +the ordinary environment argument the matter is fairly manifest. The +comfortable class must be merely our vanguard in Utopia. + +Is there any answer to the proposition that those who have had the best +opportunities will probably be our best guides? Is there any answer to +the argument that those who have breathed clean air had better decide +for those who have breathed foul? As far as I know, there is only one +answer, and that answer is Christianity. Only the Christian Church can +offer any rational objection to a complete confidence in the rich. For +she has maintained from the beginning that the danger was not in man's +environment, but in man. Further, she has maintained that if we come to +talk of a dangerous environment, the most dangerous environment of all +is the commodious environment. I know that the most modern manufacture +has been really occupied in trying to produce an abnormally large +needle. I know that the most recent biologists have been chiefly anxious +to discover a very small camel. But if we diminish the camel to his +smallest, or open the eye of the needle to its largest--if, in short, +we assume the words of Christ to have meant the very least that they +could mean, His words must at the very least mean this--that rich men +are not very likely to be morally trustworthy. Christianity even when +watered down is hot enough to boil all modern society to rags. The mere +minimum of the Church would be a deadly ultimatum to the world. For the +whole modern world is absolutely based on the assumption, not that the +rich are necessary (which is tenable), but that the rich are +trustworthy, which (for a Christian) is not tenable. You will hear +everlastingly, in all discussions about newspapers, companies, +aristocracies, or party politics, this argument that the rich man cannot +be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has +been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man. The whole case for +Christianity is that a man who is dependent upon the luxuries of this +life is a corrupt man, spiritually corrupt, politically corrupt, +financially corrupt. There is one thing that Christ and all the +Christian saints have said with a sort of savage monotony. They have +said simply that to be rich is to be in peculiar danger of moral wreck. +It is not demonstrably un-Christian to kill the rich as violators of +definable justice. It is not demonstrably un-Christian to crown the +rich as convenient rulers of society. It is not certainly un-Christian +to rebel against the rich or to submit to the rich. But it is quite +certainly un-Christian to trust the rich, to regard the rich as more +morally safe than the poor. A Christian may consistently say, "I respect +that man's rank, although he takes bribes." But a Christian cannot say, +as all modern men are saying at lunch and breakfast, "a man of that rank +would not take bribes." For it is a part of Christian dogma that any man +in any rank may take bribes. It is a part of Christian dogma; it also +happens by a curious coincidence that it is a part of obvious human +history. When people say that a man "in that position" would be +incorruptible, there is no need to bring Christianity into the +discussion. Was Lord Bacon a bootblack? Was the Duke of Marlborough a +crossing sweeper? In the best Utopia, I must be prepared for the moral +fall of _any_ man in _any_ position at _any_ moment; especially for my +fall from my position at this moment. + +Much vague and sentimental journalism has been poured out to the effect +that Christianity is akin to democracy, and most of it is scarcely +strong or clear enough to refute the fact that the two things have often +quarrelled. The real ground upon which Christianity and democracy are +one is very much deeper. The one specially and peculiarly un-Christian +idea is the idea of Carlyle--the idea that the man should rule who feels +that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is heathen. If our +faith comments on government at all, its comment must be this--that the +man should rule who does _not_ think that he can rule. Carlyle's hero +may say, "I will be king"; but the Christian saint must say, "Nolo +episcopari." If the great paradox of Christianity means anything, it +means this--that we must take the crown in our hands, and go hunting in +dry places and dark corners of the earth until we find the one man who +feels himself unfit to wear it. Carlyle was quite wrong; we have not got +to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown +the much more exceptional man who knows he can't. + +Now, this is one of the two or three vital defences of working +democracy. The mere machinery of voting is not democracy, though at +present it is not easy to effect any simpler democratic method. But even +the machinery of voting is profoundly Christian in this practical +sense--that it is an attempt to get at the opinion of those who would be +too modest to offer it. It is a mystical adventure; it is specially +trusting those who do not trust themselves. That enigma is strictly +peculiar to Christendom. There is nothing really humble about the +abnegation of the Buddhist; the mild Hindoo is mild, but he is not meek. +But there is something psychologically Christian about the idea of +seeking for the opinion of the obscure rather than taking the obvious +course of accepting the opinion of the prominent. To say that voting is +particularly Christian may seem somewhat curious. To say that canvassing +is Christian may seem quite crazy. But canvassing is very Christian in +its primary idea. It is encouraging the humble; it is saying to the +modest man, "Friend, go up higher." Or if there is some slight defect in +canvassing, that is in its perfect and rounded piety, it is only because +it may possibly neglect to encourage the modesty of the canvasser. + +Aristocracy is not an institution: aristocracy is a sin; generally a +very venial one. It is merely the drift or slide of men into a sort of +natural pomposity and praise of the powerful, which is the most easy and +obvious affair in the world. + +It is one of the hundred answers to the fugitive perversion of modern +"force" that the promptest and boldest agencies are also the most +fragile or full of sensibility. The swiftest things are the softest +things. A bird is active, because a bird is soft. A stone is helpless, +because a stone is hard. The stone must by its own nature go downwards, +because hardness is weakness. The bird can of its nature go upwards, +because fragility is force. In perfect force there is a kind of +frivolity, an airiness that can maintain itself in the air. Modern +investigators of miraculous history have solemnly admitted that a +characteristic of the great saints is their power of "levitation." They +might go further; a characteristic of the great saints is their power of +levity. Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly. This +has been always the instinct of Christendom, and especially the instinct +of Christian art. Remember how Fra Angelico represented all his angels, +not only as birds, but almost as butterflies. Remember how the most +earnest mediæval art was full of light and fluttering draperies, of +quick and capering feet. It was the one thing that the modern +Pre-raphaelites could not imitate in the real Pre-raphaelites. +Burne-Jones could never recover the deep levity of the Middle Ages. In +the old Christian pictures the sky over every figure is like a blue or +gold parachute. Every figure seems ready to fly up and float about in +the heavens. The tattered cloak of the beggar will bear him up like the +rayed plumes of the angels. But the kings in their heavy gold and the +proud in their robes of purple will all of their nature sink downwards, +for pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward +drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One "settles down" into a +sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay +self-forgetfulness. A man "falls" into a brown study; he reaches up at a +blue sky. Seriousness is not a virtue. It would be a heresy, but a much +more sensible heresy, to say that seriousness is a vice. It is really a +natural trend or lapse into taking one's self gravely, because it is the +easiest thing to do. It is much easier to write a good _Times_ leading +article than a good joke in _Punch_. For solemnity flows out of men +naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be +light. Satan fell by the force of gravity. + +Now, it is the peculiar honour of Europe since it has been Christian +that while it has had aristocracy it has always at the back of its heart +treated aristocracy as a weakness--generally as a weakness that must be +allowed for. If any one wishes to appreciate this point, let him go +outside Christianity into some other philosophical atmosphere. Let him, +for instance, compare the classes of Europe with the castes of India. +There aristocracy is far more awful, because it is far more +intellectual. It is seriously felt that the scale of classes is a scale +of spiritual values; that the baker is better than the butcher in an +invisible and sacred sense. But no Christianity, not even the most +ignorant or perverse, ever suggested that a baronet was better than a +butcher in that sacred sense. No Christianity, however ignorant or +extravagant, ever suggested that a duke would not be damned. In pagan +society there may have been (I do not know) some such serious division +between the free man and the slave. But in Christian society we have +always thought the gentleman a sort of joke, though I admit that in some +great crusades and councils he earned the right to be called a practical +joke. But we in Europe never really and at the root of our souls took +aristocracy seriously. It is only an occasional non-European alien (such +as Dr. Oscar Levy, the only intelligent Nietzscheite) who can even +manage for a moment to take aristocracy seriously. It may be a mere +patriotic bias, though I do not think so, but it seems to me that the +English aristocracy is not only the type, but is the crown and flower of +all actual aristocracies; it has all the oligarchical virtues as well as +all the defects. It is casual, it is kind, it is courageous in obvious +matters; but it has one great merit that overlaps even these. The great +and very obvious merit of the English aristocracy is that nobody could +possibly take it seriously. + +In short, I had spelled out slowly, as usual, the need for an equal law +in Utopia; and, as usual, I found that Christianity had been there +before me. The whole history of my Utopia has the same amusing sadness. +I was always rushing out of my architectural study with plans for a new +turret only to find it sitting up there in the sunlight, shining, and a +thousand years old. For me, in the ancient and partly in the modern +sense, God answered the prayer, "Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings." +Without vanity, I really think there was a moment when I could have +invented the marriage vow (as an institution) out of my own head; but I +discovered, with a sigh, that it had been invented already. But, since +it would be too long a business to show how, fact by fact and inch by +inch, my own conception of Utopia was only answered in the New +Jerusalem, I will take this one case of the matter of marriage as +indicating the converging drift, I may say the converging crash of all +the rest. + +When the ordinary opponents of Socialism talk about impossibilities and +alterations in human nature they always miss an important distinction. +In modern ideal conceptions of society there are some desires that are +possibly not attainable: but there are some desires that are not +desirable. That all men should live in equally beautiful houses is a +dream that may or may not be attained. But that all men should live in +the same beautiful house is not a dream at all; it is a nightmare. That +a man should love all old women is an ideal that may not be attainable. +But that a man should regard all old women exactly as he regards his +mother is not only an unattainable ideal, but an ideal which ought not +to be attained. I do not know if the reader agrees with me in these +examples; but I will add the example which has always affected me most. +I could never conceive or tolerate any Utopia which did not leave to me +the liberty for which I chiefly care, the liberty to bind myself. +Complete anarchy would not merely make it impossible to have any +discipline or fidelity; it would also make it impossible to have any +fun. To take an obvious instance, it would not be worth while to bet if +a bet were not binding. The dissolution of all contracts would not only +ruin morality but spoil sport. Now betting and such sports are only the +stunted and twisted shapes of the original instinct of man for adventure +and romance, of which much has been said in these pages. And the perils, +rewards, punishments, and fulfilments of an adventure must be _real_, or +the adventure is only a shifting and heartless nightmare. If I bet I +must be made to pay, or there is no poetry in betting. If I challenge I +must be made to fight, or there is no poetry in challenging. If I vow to +be faithful I must be cursed when I am unfaithful, or there is no fun in +vowing. You could not even make a fairy tale from the experiences of a +man who, when he was swallowed by a whale, might find himself at the top +of the Eiffel Tower, or when he was turned into a frog might begin to +behave like a flamingo. For the purpose even of the wildest romance, +results must be real; results must be irrevocable. Christian marriage is +the great example of a real and irrevocable result; and that is why it +is the chief subject and centre of all our romantic writing. And this +is my last instance of the things that I should ask, and ask +imperatively, of any social paradise; I should ask to be kept to my +bargain, to have my oaths and engagements taken seriously; I should ask +Utopia to avenge my honour on myself. + +All my modern Utopian friends look at each other rather doubtfully, for +their ultimate hope is the dissolution of all special ties. But again I +seem to hear, like a kind of echo, an answer from beyond the world. "You +will have real obligations, and therefore real adventures when you get +to my Utopia. But the hardest obligation and the steepest adventure is +to get there." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII.--_The Romance of Orthodoxy_ + + +It is customary to complain of the bustle and strenuousness of our +epoch. But in truth the chief mark of our epoch is a profound laziness +and fatigue; and the fact is that the real laziness is the cause of the +apparent bustle. Take one quite external case; the streets are noisy +with taxicabs and motor-cars; but this is not due to human activity but +to human repose. There would be less bustle if there were more activity, +if people were simply walking about. Our world would be more silent if +it were more strenuous. And this which is true of the apparent physical +bustle is true also of the apparent bustle of the intellect. Most of the +machinery of modern language is labour-saving machinery; and it saves +mental labour very much more than it ought. Scientific phrases are used +like scientific wheels and piston-rods to make swifter and smoother yet +the path of the comfortable. Long words go rattling by us like long +railway trains. We know they are carrying thousands who are too tired or +too indolent to walk and think for themselves. It is a good exercise to +try for once in a way to express any opinion one holds in words of one +syllable. If you say "The social utility of the indeterminate sentence +is recognised by all criminologists as a part of our sociological +evolution towards a more humane and scientific view of punishment," you +can go on talking like that for hours with hardly a movement of the grey +matter inside your skull. But if you begin "I wish Jones to go to gaol +and Brown to say when Jones shall come out," you will discover, with a +thrill of horror, that you are obliged to think. The long words are not +the hard words, it is the short words that are hard. There is much more +metaphysical subtlety in the word "damn" than in the word +"degeneration." + +But these long comfortable words that save modern people the toil of +reasoning have one particular aspect in which they are especially +ruinous and confusing. This difficulty occurs when the same long word is +used in different connections to mean quite different things. Thus, to +take a well-known instance, the word "idealist" has one meaning as a +piece of philosophy and quite another as a piece of moral rhetoric. In +the same way the scientific materialists have had just reason to +complain of people mixing up "materialist" as a term of cosmology with +"materialist" as a moral taunt. So, to take a cheaper instance, the man +who hates "progressives" in London always calls himself a "progressive" +in South Africa. + +A confusion quite as unmeaning as this has arisen in connection with the +word "liberal" as applied to religion and as applied to politics and +society. It is often suggested that all Liberals ought to be +freethinkers, because they ought to love everything that is free. You +might just as well say that all idealists ought to be High Churchmen, +because they ought to love everything that is high. You might as well +say that Low Churchmen ought to like Low Mass, or that Broad Churchmen +ought to like broad jokes. The thing is a mere accident of words. In +actual modern Europe a free-thinker does not mean a man who thinks for +himself. It means a man who, having thought for himself, has come to one +particular class of conclusions, the material origin of phenomena, the +impossibility of miracles, the improbability of personal immortality and +so on. And none of these ideas are particularly liberal. Nay, indeed +almost all these ideas are definitely illiberal, as it is the purpose of +this chapter to show. + +In the few following pages I propose to point out as rapidly as +possible that on every single one of the matters most strongly insisted +on by liberalisers of theology their effect upon social practice would +be definitely illiberal. Almost every contemporary proposal to bring +freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the +world. For freeing the church now does not even mean freeing it in all +directions. It means freeing that peculiar set of dogmas loosely called +scientific, dogmas of monism, of pantheism, or of Arianism, or of +necessity. And every one of these (and we will take them one by one) can +be shown to be the natural ally of oppression. In fact, it is a +remarkable circumstance (indeed not so very remarkable when one comes to +think of it) that most things are the allies of oppression. There is +only one thing that can never go past a certain point in its alliance +with oppression--and that is orthodoxy. I may, it is true, twist +orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a +German philosophy to justify him entirely. + +Now let us take in order the innovations that are the notes of the new +theology or the modernist church. We concluded the last chapter with the +discovery of one of them. The very doctrine which is called the most +old-fashioned was found to be the only safeguard of the new democracies +of the earth. The doctrine seemingly most unpopular was found to be the +only strength of the people. In short, we found that the only logical +negation of oligarchy was in the affirmation of original sin. So it is, +I maintain, in all the other cases. + +I take the most obvious instance first, the case of miracles. For some +extraordinary reason, there is a fixed notion that it is more liberal to +disbelieve in miracles than to believe in them. Why, I cannot imagine, +nor can anybody tell me. For some inconceivable cause a "broad" or +"liberal" clergyman always means a man who wishes at least to diminish +the number of miracles; it never means a man who wishes to increase that +number. It always means a man who is free to disbelieve that Christ came +out of His grave; it never means a man who is free to believe that his +own aunt came out of her grave. It is common to find trouble in a parish +because the parish priest cannot admit that St. Peter walked on water; +yet how rarely do we find trouble in a parish because the clergyman says +that his father walked on the Serpentine? And this is not because (as +the swift secularist debater would immediately retort) miracles cannot +be believed in our experience. It is not because "miracles do not +happen," as in the dogma which Matthew Arnold recited with simple faith. +More supernatural things are _alleged_ to have happened in our time than +would have been possible eighty years ago. Men of science believe in +such marvels much more than they did: the most perplexing, and even +horrible, prodigies of mind and spirit are always being unveiled in +modern psychology. Things that the old science at least would frankly +have rejected as miracles are hourly being asserted by the new science. +The only thing which is still old-fashioned enough to reject miracles is +the New Theology. But in truth this notion that it is "free" to deny +miracles has nothing to do with the evidence for or against them. It is +a lifeless verbal prejudice of which the original life and beginning was +not in the freedom of thought, but simply in the dogma of materialism. +The man of the nineteenth century did not disbelieve in the Resurrection +because his liberal Christianity allowed him to doubt it. He disbelieved +in it because his very strict materialism did not allow him to believe +it. Tennyson, a very typical nineteenth-century man, uttered one of the +instinctive truisms of his contemporaries when he said that there was +faith in their honest doubt. There was indeed. Those words have a +profound and even a horrible truth. In their doubt of miracles there was +a faith in a fixed and godless fate; a deep and sincere faith in the +incurable routine of the cosmos. The doubts of the agnostic were only +the dogmas of the monist. + +Of the fact and evidence of the supernatural I will speak afterwards. +Here we are only concerned with this clear point; that in so far as the +liberal idea of freedom can be said to be on either side in the +discussion about miracles, it is obviously on the side of miracles. +Reform or (in the only tolerable sense) progress means simply the +gradual control of matter by mind. A miracle simply means the swift +control of matter by mind. If you wish to feed the people, you may think +that feeding them miraculously in the wilderness is impossible--but you +cannot think it illiberal. If you really want poor children to go to the +seaside, you cannot think it illiberal that they should go there on +flying dragons; you can only think it unlikely. A holiday, like +Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the +liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you +cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea. The Catholic +Church believed that man and God both had a sort of spiritual freedom. +Calvinism took away the freedom from man, but left it to God. Scientific +materialism binds the Creator Himself; it chains up God as the +Apocalypse chained the devil. It leaves nothing free in the universe. +And those who assist this process are called the "liberal theologians." + +This, as I say, is the lightest and most evident case. The assumption +that there is something in the doubt of miracles akin to liberality or +reform is literally the opposite of the truth. If a man cannot believe +in miracles there is an end of the matter; he is not particularly +liberal, but he is perfectly honourable and logical, which are much +better things. But if he can believe in miracles, he is certainly the +more liberal for doing so; because they mean first, the freedom of the +soul, and secondly, its control over the tyranny of circumstance. +Sometimes this truth is ignored in a singularly naive way, even by the +ablest men. For instance, Mr. Bernard Shaw speaks with a hearty +old-fashioned contempt for the idea of miracles, as if they were a sort +of breach of faith on the part of nature: he seems strangely +unconscious that miracles are only the final flowers of his own +favourite tree, the doctrine of the omnipotence of will. Just in the +same way he calls the desire for immortality a paltry selfishness, +forgetting that he has just called the desire for life a healthy and +heroic selfishness. How can it be noble to wish to make one's life +infinite and yet mean to wish to make it immortal? No, if it is +desirable that man should triumph over the cruelty of nature or custom, +then miracles are certainly desirable; we will discuss afterwards +whether they are possible. + +But I must pass on to the larger cases of this curious error; the notion +that the "liberalising" of religion in some way helps the liberation of +the world. The second example of it can be found in the question of +pantheism--or rather of a certain modern attitude which is often called +immanentism, and which often is Buddhism. But this is so much more +difficult a matter that I must approach it with rather more preparation. + +The things said most confidently by advanced persons to crowded +audiences are generally those quite opposite to the fact; it is actually +our truisms that are untrue. Here is a case. There is a phrase of facile +liberality uttered again and again at ethical societies and parliaments +of religion: "the religions of the earth differ in rites and forms, but +they are the same in what they teach." It is false; it is the opposite +of the fact. The religions of the earth do _not_ greatly differ in rites +and forms; they do greatly differ in what they teach. It is as if a man +were to say, "Do not be misled by the fact that the _Church Times_ and +the _Freethinker_ look utterly different, that one is painted on vellum +and the other carved on marble, that one is triangular and the other +hectagonal; read them and you will see that they say the same thing." +The truth is, of course, that they are alike in everything except in the +fact that they don't say the same thing. An atheist stockbroker in +Surbiton looks exactly like a Swedenborgian stockbroker in Wimbledon. +You may walk round and round them and subject them to the most personal +and offensive study without seeing anything Swedenborgian in the hat or +anything particularly godless in the umbrella. It is exactly in their +souls that they are divided. So the truth is that the difficulty of all +the creeds of the earth is not as alleged in this cheap maxim: that they +agree in meaning, but differ in machinery. It is exactly the opposite. +They agree in machinery; almost every great religion on earth works +with the same external methods, with priests, scriptures, altars, sworn +brotherhoods, special feasts. They agree in the mode of teaching; what +they differ about is the thing to be taught. Pagan optimists and Eastern +pessimists would both have temples, just as Liberals and Tories would +both have newspapers. Creeds that exist to destroy each other both have +scriptures, just as armies that exist to destroy each other both have +guns. + +The great example of this alleged identity of all human religions is the +alleged spiritual identity of Buddhism and Christianity. Those who adopt +this theory generally avoid the ethics of most other creeds, except, +indeed, Confucianism, which they like because it is not a creed. But +they are cautious in their praises of Mahommedanism, generally confining +themselves to imposing its morality only upon the refreshment of the +lower classes. They seldom suggest the Mahommedan view of marriage (for +which there is a great deal to be said), and towards Thugs and fetish +worshippers their attitude may even be called cold. But in the case of +the great religion of Gautama they feel sincerely a similarity. + +Students of popular science, like Mr. Blatchford, are always insisting +that Christianity and Buddhism are very much alike, especially +Buddhism. This is generally believed, and I believed it myself until I +read a book giving the reasons for it. The reasons were of two kinds: +resemblances that meant nothing because they were common to all +humanity, and resemblances which were not resemblances at all. The +author solemnly explained that the two creeds were alike in things in +which all creeds are alike, or else he described them as alike in some +point in which they are quite obviously different. Thus, as a case of +the first class, he said that both Christ and Buddha were called by the +divine voice coming out of the sky, as if you would expect the divine +voice to come out of the coal-cellar. Or, again, it was gravely urged +that these two Eastern teachers, by a singular coincidence, both had to +do with the washing of feet. You might as well say that it was a +remarkable coincidence that they both had feet to wash. And the other +class of similarities were those which simply were not similar. Thus +this reconciler of the two religions draws earnest attention to the fact +that at certain religious feasts the robe of the Lama is rent in pieces +out of respect, and the remnants highly valued. But this is the reverse +of a resemblance, for the garments of Christ were not rent in pieces +out of respect, but out of derision; and the remnants were not highly +valued except for what they would fetch in the rag shops. It is rather +like alluding to the obvious connection between the two ceremonies of +the sword: when it taps a man's shoulder, and when it cuts off his head. +It is not at all similar for the man. These scraps of puerile pedantry +would indeed matter little if it were not also true that the alleged +philosophical resemblances are also of these two kinds, either proving +too much or not proving anything. That Buddhism approves of mercy or of +self-restraint is not to say that it is specially like Christianity; it +is only to say that it is not utterly unlike all human existence. +Buddhists disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess because all sane +human beings disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess. But to say that +Buddhism and Christianity give the same philosophy of these things is +simply false. All humanity does agree that we are in a net of sin. Most +of humanity agrees that there is some way out. But as to what is the way +out, I do not think that there are two institutions in the universe +which contradict each other so flatly as Buddhism and Christianity. + +Even when I thought, with most other well-informed, though unscholarly, +people, that Buddhism and Christianity were alike, there was one thing +about them that always perplexed me; I mean the startling difference in +their type of religious art. I do not mean in its technical style of +representation, but in the things that it was manifestly meant to +represent. No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint +in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The +opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of +it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the +Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a +sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. +The mediæval saint's body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are +frightfully alive. There cannot be any real community of spirit between +forces that produced symbols so different as that. Granted that both +images are extravagances, are perversions of the pure creed, it must be +a real divergence which could produce such opposite extravagances. The +Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is +staring with a frantic intentness outwards. If we follow that clue +steadily we shall find some interesting things. + +A short time ago Mrs. Besant, in an interesting essay, announced that +there was only one religion in the world, that all faiths were only +versions or perversions of it, and that she was quite prepared to say +what it was. According to Mrs. Besant this universal Church is simply +the universal self. It is the doctrine that we are really all one +person; that there are no real walls of individuality between man and +man. If I may put it so, she does not tell us to love our neighbours; +she tells us to be our neighbours. That is Mrs. Besant's thoughtful and +suggestive description of the religion in which all men must find +themselves in agreement. And I never heard of any suggestion in my life +with which I more violently disagree. I want to love my neighbour not +because he is I, but precisely because he is not I. I want to adore the +world, not as one likes a looking-glass, because it is one's self, but +as one loves a woman, because she is entirely different. If souls are +separate love is possible. If souls are united love is obviously +impossible. A man may be said loosely to love himself, but he can hardly +fall in love with himself, or, if he does, it must be a monotonous +courtship. If the world is full of real selves, they can be really +unselfish selves. But upon Mrs. Besant's principle the whole cosmos is +only one enormously selfish person. + +It is just here that Buddhism is on the side of modern pantheism and +immanence. And it is just here that Christianity is on the side of +humanity and liberty and love. Love desires personality; therefore love +desires division. It is the instinct of Christianity to be glad that God +has broken the universe into little pieces, because they are living +pieces. It is her instinct to say "little children love one another" +rather than to tell one large person to love himself. This is the +intellectual abyss between Buddhism and Christianity; that for the +Buddhist or Theosophist personality is the fall of man, for the +Christian it is the purpose of God, the whole point of his cosmic idea. +The world-soul of the Theosophists asks man to love it only in order +that man may throw himself into it. But the divine centre of +Christianity actually threw man out of it in order that he might love +it. The oriental deity is like a giant who should have lost his leg or +hand and be always seeking to find it; but the Christian power is like +some giant who in a strange generosity should cut off his right hand, so +that it might of its own accord shake hands with him. We come back to +the same tireless note touching the nature of Christianity; all modern +philosophies are chains which connect and fetter; Christianity is a +sword which separates and sets free. No other philosophy makes God +actually rejoice in the separation of the universe into living souls. +But according to orthodox Christianity this separation between God and +man is sacred, because this is eternal. That a man may love God it is +necessary that there should be not only a God to be loved, but a man to +love him. All those vague theosophical minds for whom the universe is an +immense melting-pot are exactly the minds which shrink instinctively +from that earthquake saying of our Gospels, which declare that the Son +of God came not with peace but with a sundering sword. The saying rings +entirely true even considered as what it obviously is; the statement +that any man who preaches real love is bound to beget hate. It is as +true of democratic fraternity as of divine love; sham love ends in +compromise and common philosophy; but real love has always ended in +bloodshed. Yet there is another and yet more awful truth behind the +obvious meaning of this utterance of our Lord. According to Himself the +Son was a sword separating brother and brother that they should for an +æon hate each other. But the Father also was a sword, which in the +black beginning separated brother and brother, so that they should love +each other at last. + +This is the meaning of that almost insane happiness in the eyes of the +mediæval saint in the picture. This is the meaning of the sealed eyes of +the superb Buddhist image. The Christian saint is happy because he has +verily been cut off from the world; he is separate from things and is +staring at them in astonishment. But why should the Buddhist saint be +astonished at things? since there is really only one thing, and that +being impersonal can hardly be astonished at itself. There have been +many pantheist poems suggesting wonder, but no really successful ones. +The pantheist cannot wonder, for he cannot praise God or praise anything +as really distinct from himself. Our immediate business here however is +with the effect of this Christian admiration (which strikes outwards, +towards a deity distinct from the worshipper) upon the general need for +ethical activity and social reform. And surely its effect is +sufficiently obvious. There is no real possibility of getting out of +pantheism any special impulse to moral action. For pantheism implies in +its nature that one thing is as good as another; whereas action implies +in its nature that one thing is greatly preferable to another. +Swinburne in the high summer of his scepticism tried in vain to wrestle +with this difficulty. In "Songs before Sunrise," written under the +inspiration of Garibaldi and the revolt of Italy, he proclaimed the +newer religion and the purer God which should wither up all the priests +of the world. + + "What doest thou now + Looking Godward to cry + I am I, thou art thou, + I am low, thou art high, + I am thou that thou seekest to find him, find thou + but thyself, thou art I." + +Of which the immediate and evident deduction is that tyrants are as much +the sons of God as Garibaldis; and that King Bomba of Naples having, +with the utmost success, "found himself" is identical with the ultimate +good in all things. The truth is that the western energy that dethrones +tyrants has been directly due to the western theology that says "I am I, +thou art thou." The same spiritual separation which looked up and saw a +good king in the universe looked up and saw a bad king in Naples. The +worshippers of Bomba's god dethroned Bomba. The worshippers of +Swinburne's god have covered Asia for centuries and have never +dethroned a tyrant. The Indian saint may reasonably shut his eyes +because he is looking at that which is I and Thou and We and They and +It. It is a rational occupation: but it is not true in theory and not +true in fact that it helps the Indian to keep an eye on Lord Curzon. +That external vigilance which has always been the mark of Christianity +(the command that we should _watch_ and pray) has expressed itself both +in typical western orthodoxy and in typical western politics: but both +depend on the idea of a divinity transcendent, different from ourselves, +a deity that disappears. Certainly the most sagacious creeds may suggest +that we should pursue God into deeper and deeper rings of the labyrinth +of our own ego. But only we of Christendom have said that we should hunt +God like an eagle upon the mountains: and we have killed all monsters in +the chase. + +Here again, therefore, we find that in so far as we value democracy and +the self-renewing energies of the west, we are much more likely to find +them in the old theology than the new. If we want reform, we must adhere +to orthodoxy: especially in this matter (so much disputed in the +counsels of Mr. R.J. Campbell), the matter of insisting on the immanent +or the transcendent deity. By insisting specially on the immanence of +God we get introspection, self-isolation, quietism, social +indifference--Tibet. By insisting specially on the transcendence of God +we get wonder, curiosity, moral and political adventure, righteous +indignation--Christendom. Insisting that God is inside man, man is +always inside himself. By insisting that God transcends man, man has +transcended himself. + +If we take any other doctrine that has been called old-fashioned we +shall find the case the same. It is the same, for instance, in the deep +matter of the Trinity. Unitarians (a sect never to be mentioned without +a special respect for their distinguished intellectual dignity and high +intellectual honour) are often reformers by the accident that throws so +many small sects into such an attitude. But there is nothing in the +least liberal or akin to reform in the substitution of pure monotheism +for the Trinity. The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an +enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the +mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet. +The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern +king. The _heart_ of humanity, especially of European humanity, is +certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that +gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy +pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort of liberty and +variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world. For Western +religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not well for man to be +alone." The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the +Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the Western idea of +monks. So even asceticism became brotherly; and the Trappists were +sociable even when they were silent. If this love of a living complexity +be our test, it is certainly healthier to have the Trinitarian religion +than the Unitarian. For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with +reverence)--to us God Himself is a society. It is indeed a fathomless +mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with +it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here. Suffice it to say +here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an +English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly +quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and the +dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely God; the real +Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world. For it +is not well for God to be alone. + +Again, the same is true of that difficult matter of the danger of the +soul, which has unsettled so many just minds. To hope for all souls is +imperative; and it is quite tenable that their salvation is inevitable. +It is tenable, but it is not specially favourable to activity or +progress. Our fighting and creative society ought rather to insist on +the danger of everybody, on the fact that every man is hanging by a +thread or clinging to a precipice. To say that all will be well anyhow +is a comprehensible remark: but it cannot be called the blast of a +trumpet. Europe ought rather to emphasise possible perdition; and Europe +always has emphasised it. Here its highest religion is at one with all +its cheapest romances. To the Buddhist or the eastern fatalist existence +is a science or a plan, which must end up in a certain way. But to a +Christian existence is a _story_, which may end up in any way. In a +thrilling novel (that purely Christian product) the hero is not eaten by +cannibals; but it is essential to the existence of the thrill that he +_might_ be eaten by cannibals. The hero must (so to speak) be an eatable +hero. So Christian morals have always said to the man, not that he +would lose his soul, but that he must take care that he didn't. In +Christian morals, in short, it is wicked to call a man "damned": but it +is strictly religious and philosophic to call him damnable. + +All Christianity concentrates on the man at the cross-roads. The vast +and shallow philosophies, the huge syntheses of humbug, all talk about +ages and evolution and ultimate developments. The true philosophy is +concerned with the instant. Will a man take this road or that? that is +the only thing to think about, if you enjoy thinking. The æons are easy +enough to think about, any one can think about them. The instant is +really awful: and it is because our religion has intensely felt the +instant, that it has in literature dealt much with battle and in +theology dealt much with hell. It is full of _danger_ like a boy's book: +it is at an immortal crisis. There is a great deal of real similarity +between popular fiction and the religion of the western people. If you +say that popular fiction is vulgar and tawdry, you only say what the +dreary and well-informed say also about the images in the Catholic +churches. Life (according to the faith) is very like a serial story in a +magazine: life ends with the promise (or menace) "to be continued in our +next." Also, with a noble vulgarity, life imitates the serial and +leaves off at the exciting moment. For death is distinctly an exciting +moment. + +But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong +an element of will, of what theology calls free-will. You cannot finish +a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When +somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one +Differential Calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed +Romeo he might have married him to Juliet's old nurse if he had felt +inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly +because it has insisted on the theological free-will. It is a large +matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately +here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk +about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic +environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. +The fallacy of the whole thing is that evil is a matter of active +choice, whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a +profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, +"Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be +Profligates." A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must +not lie still if he wants to be cured of a sin; on the contrary, he must +get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly +expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; "patient" +is in the passive mood; "sinner" is in the active. If a man is to be +saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from +forging, he must be not a patient but an _impatient_. He must be +personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the +active not the passive will. + +Here again we reach the same substantial conclusion. In so far as we +desire the definite reconstructions and the dangerous revolutions which +have distinguished European civilisation, we shall not discourage the +thought of possible ruin; we shall rather encourage it. If we want, like +the Eastern saints, merely to contemplate how right things are, of +course we shall only say that they must go right. But if we particularly +want to _make_ them go right, we must insist that they may go wrong. + +Lastly, this truth is yet again true in the case of the common modern +attempts to diminish or to explain away the divinity of Christ. The +thing may be true or not; that I shall deal with before I end. But if +the divinity is true it is certainly terribly revolutionary. That a good +man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already; but +that God could have his back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents +for ever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that +omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone has felt that God, +to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all +creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. +For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that +the soul passes a breaking point--and does not break. In this indeed I +approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I +apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent +touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly +feared to approach. But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a +distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some +unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is +written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy +God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in +Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted +God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of +pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it +was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which +confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists +choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the +world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of +unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been +in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows too difficult for human speech) but +let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one +divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which +God seemed for an instant to be an atheist. + +These can be called the essentials of the old orthodoxy, of which the +chief merit is that it is the natural fountain of revolution and reform; +and of which the chief defect is that it is obviously only an abstract +assertion. Its main advantage is that it is the most adventurous and +manly of all theologies. Its chief disadvantage is simply that it is a +theology. It can always be urged against it that it is in its nature +arbitrary and in the air. But it is not so high in the air but that +great archers spend their whole lives in shooting arrows at it--yes, and +their last arrows; there are men who will ruin themselves and ruin their +civilisation if they may ruin also this old fantastic tale. This is the +last and most astounding fact about this faith; that its enemies will +use any weapon against it, the swords that cut their own fingers, and +the firebrands that burn their own homes. Men who begin to fight the +Church for the sake of freedom and humanity end by flinging away freedom +and humanity if only they may fight the Church. This is no exaggeration; +I could fill a book with the instances of it. Mr. Blatchford set out, as +an ordinary Bible-smasher, to prove that Adam was guiltless of sin +against God; in manoeuvring so as to maintain this he admitted, as a +mere side issue, that all the tyrants, from Nero to King Leopold, were +guiltless of any sin against humanity. I know a man who has such a +passion for proving that he will have no personal existence after death +that he falls back on the position that he has no personal existence +now. He invokes Buddhism and says that all souls fade into each other; +in order to prove that he cannot go to heaven he proves that he cannot +go to Hartlepool. I have known people who protested against religious +education with arguments against any education, saying that the child's +mind must grow freely or that the old must not teach the young. I have +known people who showed that there could be no divine judgment by +showing that there can be no human judgment, even for practical +purposes. They burned their own corn to set fire to the church; they +smashed their own tools to smash it; any stick was good enough to beat +it with, though it were the last stick of their own dismembered +furniture. We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks +this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic +who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very +existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims +not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the +emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by +which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon some +one who never lived at all. + +And yet the thing hangs in the heavens unhurt. Its opponents only +succeed in destroying all that they themselves justly hold dear. They do +not destroy orthodoxy; they only destroy political courage and common +sense. They do not prove that Adam was not responsible to God; how could +they prove it? They only prove (from their premises) that the Czar is +not responsible to Russia. They do not prove that Adam should not have +been punished by God; they only prove that the nearest sweater should +not be punished by men. With their oriental doubts about personality +they do not make certain that we shall have no personal life hereafter; +they only make certain that we shall not have a very jolly or complete +one here. With their paralysing hints of all conclusions coming out +wrong they do not tear the book of the Recording Angel; they only make +it a little harder to keep the books of Marshall and Snelgrove. Not only +is the faith the mother of all worldly energies, but its foes are the +fathers of all worldly confusion. The secularists have not wrecked +divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that +is any comfort to them. The Titans did not scale heaven; but they laid +waste the world. + + + + +CHAPTER IX.--_Authority and the Adventurer_ + + +The last chapter has been concerned with the contention that orthodoxy +is not only (as is often urged) the only safe guardian of morality or +order, but is also the only logical guardian of liberty, innovation and +advance. If we wish to pull down the prosperous oppressor we cannot do +it with the new doctrine of human perfectibility; we can do it with the +old doctrine of Original Sin. If we want to uproot inherent cruelties or +lift up lost populations we cannot do it with the scientific theory that +matter precedes mind; we can do it with the supernatural theory that +mind precedes matter. If we wish specially to awaken people to social +vigilance and tireless pursuit of practise, we cannot help it much by +insisting on the Immanent God and the Inner Light: for these are at best +reasons for contentment; we can help it much by insisting on the +transcendant God and the flying and escaping gleam; for that means +divine discontent. If we wish particularly to assert the idea of a +generous balance against that of a dreadful autocracy we shall +instinctively be Trinitarian rather than Unitarian. If we desire +European civilisation to be a raid and a rescue, we shall insist rather +that souls are in real peril than that their peril is ultimately unreal. +And if we wish to exalt the outcast and the crucified, we shall rather +wish to think that a veritable God was crucified, rather than a mere +sage or hero. Above all, if we wish to protect the poor we shall be in +favour of fixed rules and clear dogmas. The _rules_ of a club are +occasionally in favour of the poor member. The drift of a club is always +in favour of the rich one. + +And now we come to the crucial question which truly concludes the whole +matter. A reasonable agnostic, if he has happened to agree with me so +far, may justly turn round and say, "You have found a practical +philosophy in the doctrine of the Fall; very well. You have found a side +of democracy now dangerously neglected wisely asserted in Original Sin; +all right. You have found a truth in the doctrine of hell; I +congratulate you. You are convinced that worshippers of a personal God +look outwards and are progressive; I congratulate them. But even +supposing that those doctrines do include those truths, why cannot you +take the truths and leave the doctrines? Granted that all modern +society is trusting the rich too much because it does not allow for +human weakness; granted that orthodox ages have had a great advantage +because (believing in the Fall) they did allow for human weakness, why +cannot you simply allow for human weakness without believing in the +Fall? If you have discovered that the idea of damnation represents a +healthy idea of danger, why can you not simply take the idea of danger +and leave the idea of damnation? If you see clearly the kernel of +common-sense in the nut of Christian orthodoxy, why cannot you simply +take the kernel and leave the nut? Why cannot you (to use that cant +phrase of the newspapers which I, as a highly scholarly agnostic, am a +little ashamed of using) why cannot you simply take what is good in +Christianity, what you can define as valuable, what you can comprehend, +and leave all the rest, all the absolute dogmas that are in their nature +incomprehensible?" This is the real question; this is the last question; +and it is a pleasure to try to answer it. + +The first answer is simply to say that I am a rationalist. I like to +have some intellectual justification for my intuitions. If I am treating +man as a fallen being it is an intellectual convenience to me to +believe that he fell; and I find, for some odd psychological reason, +that I can deal better with a man's exercise of freewill if I believe +that he has got it. But I am in this matter yet more definitely a +rationalist. I do not propose to turn this book into one of ordinary +Christian apologetics; I should be glad to meet at any other time the +enemies of Christianity in that more obvious arena. Here I am only +giving an account of my own growth in spiritual certainty. But I may +pause to remark that the more I saw of the merely abstract arguments +against the Christian cosmology the less I thought of them. I mean that +having found the moral atmosphere of the Incarnation to be common sense, +I then looked at the established intellectual arguments against the +Incarnation and found them to be common nonsense. In case the argument +should be thought to suffer from the absence of the ordinary apologetic +I will here very briefly summarise my own arguments and conclusions on +the purely objective or scientific truth of the matter. + +If I am asked, as a purely intellectual question, why I believe in +Christianity, I can only answer, "For the same reason that an +intelligent agnostic disbelieves in Christianity." I believe in it +quite rationally upon the evidence. But the evidence in my case, as in +that of the intelligent agnostic, is not really in this or that alleged +demonstration; it is in an enormous accumulation of small but unanimous +facts. The secularist is not to be blamed because his objections to +Christianity are miscellaneous and even scrappy; it is precisely such +scrappy evidence that does convince the mind. I mean that a man may well +be less convinced of a philosophy from four books, than from one book, +one battle, one landscape, and one old friend. The very fact that the +things are of different kinds increases the importance of the fact that +they all point to one conclusion. Now, the non-Christianity of the +average educated man to-day is almost always, to do him justice, made up +of these loose but living experiences. I can only say that my evidences +for Christianity are of the same vivid but varied kind as his evidences +against it. For when I look at these various anti-Christian truths, I +simply discover that none of them are true. I discover that the true +tide and force of all the facts flows the other way. Let us take cases. +Many a sensible modern man must have abandoned Christianity under the +pressure of three such converging convictions as these: first, that +men, with their shape, structure, and sexuality, are, after all, very +much like beasts, a mere variety of the animal kingdom; second, that +primeval religion arose in ignorance and fear; third, that priests have +blighted societies with bitterness and gloom. Those three anti-Christian +arguments are very different; but they are all quite logical and +legitimate; and they all converge. The only objection to them (I +discover) is that they are all untrue. If you leave off looking at books +about beasts and men, if you begin to look at beasts and men then (if +you have any humour or imagination, any sense of the frantic or the +farcical) you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man +is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his +divergence that requires an explanation. That man and brute are like is, +in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so +insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands +is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having +hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle-bones or +the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of +barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build +colossal temples of ivory even in a roccoco style; camels do not paint +even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many +camel's-hair brushes. Certain modern dreamers say that ants and bees +have a society superior to ours. They have, indeed, a civilisation; but +that very truth only reminds us that it is an inferior civilisation. Who +ever found an ant-hill decorated with the statues of celebrated ants? +Who has seen a bee-hive carved with the images of gorgeous queens of +old? No; the chasm between man and other creatures may have a natural +explanation, but it is a chasm. We talk of wild animals; but man is the +only wild animal. It is man that has broken out. All other animals are +tame animals; following the rugged respectability of the tribe or type. +All other animals are domestic animals; man alone is ever undomestic, +either as a profligate or a monk. So that this first superficial reason +for materialism is, if anything, a reason for its opposite; it is +exactly where biology leaves off that all religion begins. + +It would be the same if I examined the second of the three chance +rationalist arguments; the argument that all that we call divine began +in some darkness and terror. When I did attempt to examine the +foundations of this modern idea I simply found that there were none. +Science knows nothing whatever about pre-historic man; for the excellent +reason that he is pre-historic. A few professors choose to conjecture +that such things as human sacrifice were once innocent and general and +that they gradually dwindled; but there is no direct evidence of it, and +the small amount of indirect evidence is very much the other way. In the +earliest legends we have, such as the tales of Isaac and of Iphigenia, +human sacrifice is not introduced as something old, but rather as +something new; as a strange and frightful exception darkly demanded by +the gods. History says nothing; and legends all say that the earth was +kinder in its earliest time. There is no tradition of progress; but the +whole human race has a tradition of the Fall. Amusingly enough, indeed, +the very dissemination of this idea is used against its authenticity. +Learned men literally say that this pre-historic calamity cannot be true +because every race of mankind remembers it. I cannot keep pace with +these paradoxes. + +And if we took the third chance instance, it would be the same; the view +that priests darken and embitter the world. I look at the world and +simply discover that they don't. Those countries in Europe which are +still influenced by priests, are exactly the countries where there is +still singing and dancing and coloured dresses and art in the open-air. +Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of +a playground. Christianity is the only frame which has preserved the +pleasure of Paganism. We might fancy some children playing on the flat +grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall +round the cliff's edge they could fling themselves into every frantic +game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries. But the walls were +knocked down, leaving the naked peril of the precipice. They did not +fall over; but when their friends returned to them they were all huddled +in terror in the centre of the island; and their song had ceased. + +Thus these three facts of experience, such facts as go to make an +agnostic, are, in this view, turned totally round. I am left saying, +"Give me an explanation, first, of the towering eccentricity of man +among the brutes; second, of the vast human tradition of some ancient +happiness; third, of the partial perpetuation of such pagan joy in the +countries of the Catholic Church." One explanation, at any rate, covers +all three: the theory that twice was the natural order interrupted by +some explosion or revelation such as people now call "psychic." Once +Heaven came upon the earth with a power or seal called the image of God, +whereby man took command of Nature; and once again (when in empire after +empire men had been found wanting) Heaven came to save mankind in the +awful shape of a man. This would explain why the mass of men always look +backwards; and why the only corner where they in any sense look forwards +is the little continent where Christ has His Church. I know it will be +said that Japan has become progressive. But how can this be an answer +when even in saying "Japan has become progressive," we really only mean, +"Japan has become European"? But I wish here not so much to insist on my +own explanation as to insist on my original remark. I agree with the +ordinary unbelieving man in the street in being guided by three or four +odd facts all pointing to something; only when I came to look at the +facts I always found they pointed to something else. + +I have given an imaginary triad of such ordinary anti-Christian +arguments; if that be too narrow a basis I will give on the spur of the +moment another. These are the kind of thoughts which in combination +create the impression that Christianity is something weak and diseased. +First, for instance, that Jesus was a gentle creature, sheepish and +unworldly, a mere ineffectual appeal to the world; second, that +Christianity arose and flourished in the dark ages of ignorance, and +that to these the Church would drag us back; third, that the people +still strongly religious or (if you will) superstitious--such people as +the Irish--are weak, unpractical, and behind the times. I only mention +these ideas to affirm the same thing: that when I looked into them +independently I found, not that the conclusions were unphilosophical, +but simply that the facts were not facts. Instead of looking at books +and pictures about the New Testament I looked at the New Testament. +There I found an account, not in the least of a person with his hair +parted in the middle or his hands clasped in appeal, but of an +extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, +flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy +of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a +being who often acted like an angry god--and always like a god. Christ +had even a literary style of his own, not to be found, I think, +elsewhere; it consists of an almost furious use of the _a fortiori_. +His "how much more" is piled one upon another like castle upon castle in +the clouds. The diction used _about_ Christ has been, and perhaps +wisely, sweet and submissive. But the diction used by Christ is quite +curiously gigantesque; it is full of camels leaping through needles and +mountains hurled into the sea. Morally it is equally terrific; he called +himself a sword of slaughter, and told men to buy swords if they sold +their coats for them. That he used other even wilder words on the side +of non-resistance greatly increases the mystery; but it also, if +anything, rather increases the violence. We cannot even explain it by +calling such a being insane; for insanity is usually along one +consistent channel. The maniac is generally a monomaniac. Here we must +remember the difficult definition of Christianity already given; +Christianity is a superhuman paradox whereby two opposite passions may +blaze beside each other. The one explanation of the Gospel language that +does explain it, is that it is the survey of one who from some +supernatural height beholds some more startling synthesis. + +I take in order the next instance offered: the idea that Christianity +belongs to the dark ages. Here I did not satisfy myself with reading +modern generalisations; I read a little history. And in history I found +that Christianity, so far from belonging to the dark ages, was the one +path across the dark ages that was not dark. It was a shining bridge +connecting two shining civilisations. If any one says that the faith +arose in ignorance and savagery the answer is simple: it didn't. It +arose in the Mediterranean civilisation in the full summer of the Roman +Empire. The world was swarming with sceptics, and pantheism was as plain +as the sun, when Constantine nailed the cross to the mast. It is +perfectly true that afterwards the ship sank; but it is far more +extraordinary that the ship came up again: repainted and glittering, +with the cross still at the top. This is the amazing thing the religion +did: it turned a sunken ship into a submarine. The ark lived under the +load of waters; after being buried under the débris of dynasties and +clans, we arose and remembered Rome. If our faith had been a mere fad of +the fading empire, fad would have followed fad in the twilight, and if +the civilisation ever re-emerged (and many such have never re-emerged) +it would have been under some new barbaric flag. But the Christian +Church was the last life of the old society and was also the first life +of the new. She took the people who were forgetting how to make an arch +and she taught them to invent the Gothic arch. In a word, the most +absurd thing that could be said of the Church is the thing we have all +heard said of it. How can we say that the Church wishes to bring us back +into the Dark Ages? The Church was the only thing that ever brought us +out of them. + +I added in this second trinity of objections an idle instance taken from +those who feel such people as the Irish to be weakened or made stagnant +by superstition. I only added it because this is a peculiar case of a +statement of fact that turns out to be a statement of falsehood. It is +constantly said of the Irish that they are impractical. But if we +refrain for a moment from looking at what is said about them and look at +what is _done_ about them, we shall see that the Irish are not only +practical, but quite painfully successful. The poverty of their country, +the minority of their members are simply the conditions under which they +were asked to work; but no other group in the British Empire has done so +much with such conditions. The Nationalists were the only minority that +ever succeeded in twisting the whole British Parliament sharply out of +its path. The Irish peasants are the only poor men in these islands who +have forced their masters to disgorge. These people, whom we call +priest-ridden, are the only Britons who will not be squire-ridden. And +when I came to look at the actual Irish character, the case was the +same. Irishmen are best at the specially _hard_ professions--the trades +of iron, the lawyer, and the soldier. In all these cases, therefore, I +came back to the same conclusion: the sceptic was quite right to go by +the facts, only he had not looked at the facts. The sceptic is too +credulous; he believes in newspapers or even in encyclopædias. Again the +three questions left me with three very antagonistic questions. The +average sceptic wanted to know how I explained the namby-pamby note in +the Gospel, the connection of the creed with mediæval darkness and the +political impracticability of the Celtic Christians. But I wanted to +ask, and to ask with an earnestness amounting to urgency, "What is this +incomparable energy which appears first in one walking the earth like a +living judgment and this energy which can die with a dying civilisation +and yet force it to a resurrection from the dead; this energy which last +of all can inflame a bankrupt peasantry with so fixed a faith in justice +that they get what they ask, while others go empty away; so that the +most helpless island of the Empire can actually help itself?" + +There is an answer: it is an answer to say that the energy is truly from +outside the world; that it is psychic, or at least one of the results of +a real psychical disturbance. The highest gratitude and respect are due +to the great human civilisations such as the old Egyptian or the +existing Chinese. Nevertheless it is no injustice for them to say that +only modern Europe has exhibited incessantly a power of self-renewal +recurring often at the shortest intervals and descending to the smallest +facts of building or costume. All other societies die finally and with +dignity. We die daily. We are always being born again with almost +indecent obstetrics. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that there is +in historic Christendom a sort of unnatural life: it could be explained +as a supernatural life. It could be explained as an awful galvanic life +working in what would have been a corpse. For our civilisation _ought_ +to have died, by all parallels, by all sociological probability, in the +Ragnorak of the end of Rome. That is the weird inspiration of our +estate: you and I have no business to be here at all. We are all +_revenants_; all living Christians are dead pagans walking about. Just +as Europe was about to be gathered in silence to Assyria and Babylon, +something entered into its body. And Europe has had a strange life--it +is not too much to say that it has had the _jumps_--ever since. + +I have dealt at length with such typical triads of doubt in order to +convey the main contention--that my own case for Christianity is +rational; but it is not simple. It is an accumulation of varied facts, +like the attitude of the ordinary agnostic. But the ordinary agnostic +has got his facts all wrong. He is a non-believer for a multitude of +reasons; but they are untrue reasons. He doubts because the Middle Ages +were barbaric, but they weren't; because Darwinism is demonstrated, but +it isn't; because miracles do not happen, but they do; because monks +were lazy, but they were very industrious; because nuns are unhappy, but +they are particularly cheerful; because Christian art was sad and pale, +but it was picked out in peculiarly bright colours and gay with gold; +because modern science is moving away from the supernatural, but it +isn't, it is moving towards the supernatural with the rapidity of a +railway train. + +But among these million facts all flowing one way there is, of course, +one question sufficiently solid and separate to be treated briefly, but +by itself; I mean the objective occurrence of the supernatural. In +another chapter I have indicated the fallacy of the ordinary supposition +that the world must be impersonal because it is orderly. A person is +just as likely to desire an orderly thing as a disorderly thing. But my +own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than +material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call +it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere +emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a +_primary_ intellectual conviction like the certainty of self or the good +of living. Any one who likes, therefore, may call my belief in God +merely mystical; the phrase is not worth fighting about. But my belief +that miracles have happened in human history is not a mystical belief at +all; I believe in them upon human evidence as I do in the discovery of +America. Upon this point there is a simple logical fact that only +requires to be stated and cleared up. Somehow or other an extraordinary +idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly +and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection +with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in +miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence +for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) +because they have a doctrine against them. The open, obvious, democratic +thing is to believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony to a +miracle, just as you believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony +to a murder. The plain, popular course is to trust the peasant's word +about the ghost exactly as far as you trust the peasant's word about the +landlord. Being a peasant he will probably have a great deal of healthy +agnosticism about both. Still you could fill the British Museum with +evidence uttered by the peasant, and given in favour of the ghost. If it +comes to human testimony there is a choking cataract of human testimony +in favour of the supernatural. If you reject it, you can only mean one +of two things. You reject the peasant's story about the ghost either +because the man is a peasant or because the story is a ghost story. That +is, you either deny the main principle of democracy, or you affirm the +main principle of materialism--the abstract impossibility of miracle. +You have a perfect right to do so; but in that case you are the +dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence--it is you +rationalists who refuse actual evidence, being constrained to do so by +your creed. But I am not constrained by any creed in the matter, and +looking impartially into certain miracles of mediæval and modern times, +I have come to the conclusion that they occurred. All argument against +these plain facts is always argument in a circle. If I say, "Mediæval +documents attest certain miracles as much as they attest certain +battles," they answer, "But mediævals were superstitious"; if I want to +know in what they were superstitious, the only ultimate answer is that +they believed in the miracles. If I say "a peasant saw a ghost," I am +told, "But peasants are so credulous." If I ask, "Why credulous?" the +only answer is--that they see ghosts. Iceland is impossible because only +stupid sailors have seen it; and the sailors are only stupid because +they say they have seen Iceland. It is only fair to add that there is +another argument that the unbeliever may rationally use against +miracles, though he himself generally forgets to use it. + +He may say that there has been in many miraculous stories a notion of +spiritual preparation and acceptance: in short, that the miracle could +only come to him who believed in it. It may be so, and if it is so how +are we to test it? If we are inquiring whether certain results follow +faith, it is useless to repeat wearily that (if they happen) they do +follow faith. If faith is one of the conditions, those without faith +have a most healthy right to laugh. But they have no right to judge. +Being a believer may be, if you like, as bad as being drunk; still if we +were extracting psychological facts from drunkards, it would be absurd +to be always taunting them with having been drunk. Suppose we were +investigating whether angry men really saw a red mist before their eyes. +Suppose sixty excellent householders swore that when angry they had seen +this crimson cloud: surely it would be absurd to answer "Oh, but you +admit you were angry at the time." They might reasonably rejoin (in a +stentorian chorus), "How the blazes could we discover, without being +angry, whether angry people see red?" So the saints and ascetics might +rationally reply, "Suppose that the question is whether believers can +see visions--even then, if you are interested in visions it is no point +to object to believers." You are still arguing in a circle--in that old +mad circle with which this book began. + +The question of whether miracles ever occur is a question of common +sense and of ordinary historical imagination: not of any final physical +experiment. One may here surely dismiss that quite brainless piece of +pedantry which talks about the need for "scientific conditions" in +connection with alleged spiritual phenomena. If we are asking whether a +dead soul can communicate with a living it is ludicrous to insist that +it shall be under conditions in which no two living souls in their +senses would seriously communicate with each other. The fact that ghosts +prefer darkness no more disproves the existence of ghosts than the fact +that lovers prefer darkness disproves the existence of love. If you +choose to say, "I will believe that Miss Brown called her _fiancé_ a +periwinkle or any other endearing term, if she will repeat the word +before seventeen psychologists," then I shall reply, "Very well, if +those are your conditions, you will never get the truth, for she +certainly will not say it." It is just as unscientific as it is +unphilosophical to be surprised that in an unsympathetic atmosphere +certain extraordinary sympathies do not arise. It is as if I said that I +could not tell if there was a fog because the air was not clear enough; +or as if I insisted on perfect sunlight in order to see a solar eclipse. + +As a common-sense conclusion, such as those to which we come about sex +or about midnight (well knowing that many details must in their own +nature be concealed) I conclude that miracles do happen. I am forced to +it by a conspiracy of facts: the fact that the men who encounter elves +or angels are not the mystics and the morbid dreamers, but fishermen, +farmers, and all men at once coarse and cautious; the fact that we all +know men who testify to spiritualist incidents but are not +spiritualists; the fact that science itself admits such things more and +more every day. Science will even admit the Ascension if you call it +Levitation, and will very likely admit the Resurrection when it has +thought of another word for it. I suggest the Regalvanisation. But the +strongest of all is the dilemma above mentioned, that these supernatural +things are never denied except on the basis either of anti-democracy or +of materialist dogmatism--I may say materialist mysticism. The sceptic +always takes one of the two positions; either an ordinary man need not +be believed, or an extraordinary event must not be believed. For I hope +we may dismiss the argument against wonders attempted in the mere +recapitulation of frauds, of swindling mediums or trick miracles. That +is not an argument at all, good or bad. A false ghost disproves the +reality of ghosts exactly as much as a forged banknote disproves the +existence of the Bank of England--if anything, it proves its existence. + +Given this conviction that the spiritual phenomena do occur (my evidence +for which is complex but rational), we then collide with one of the +worst mental evils of the age. The greatest disaster of the nineteenth +century was this: that men began to use the word "spiritual" as the same +as the word "good." They thought that to grow in refinement and +uncorporeality was to grow in virtue. When scientific evolution was +announced, some feared that it would encourage mere animality. It did +worse: it encouraged mere spirituality. It taught men to think that so +long as they were passing from the ape they were going to the angel. But +you can pass from the ape and go to the devil. A man of genius, very +typical of that time of bewilderment, expressed it perfectly. Benjamin +Disraeli was right when he said he was on the side of the angels. He was +indeed; he was on the side of the fallen angels. He was not on the side +of any mere appetite or animal brutality; but he was on the side of all +the imperialism of the princes of the abyss; he was on the side of +arrogance and mystery, and contempt of all obvious good. Between this +sunken pride and the towering humilities of heaven there are, one must +suppose, spirits of shapes and sizes. Man, in encountering them, must +make much the same mistakes that he makes in encountering any other +varied types in any other distant continent. It must be hard at first to +know who is supreme and who is subordinate. If a shade arose from the +under world, and stared at Piccadilly, that shade would not quite +understand the idea of an ordinary closed carriage. He would suppose +that the coachman on the box was a triumphant conqueror, dragging behind +him a kicking and imprisoned captive. So, if we see spiritual facts for +the first time, we may mistake who is uppermost. It is not enough to +find the gods; they are obvious; we must find God, the real chief of the +gods. We must have a long historic experience in supernatural +phenomena--in order to discover which are really natural. In this light +I find the history of Christianity, and even of its Hebrew origins, +quite practical and clear. It does not trouble me to be told that the +Hebrew god was one among many. I know he was, without any research to +tell me so. Jehovah and Baal looked equally important, just as the sun +and the moon looked the same size. It is only slowly that we learn that +the sun is immeasurably our master, and the small moon only our +satellite. Believing that there is a world of spirits, I shall walk in +it as I do in the world of men, looking for the thing that I like and +think good. Just as I should seek in a desert for clean water, or toil +at the North Pole to make a comfortable fire, so I shall search the land +of void and vision until I find something fresh like water, and +comforting like fire; until I find some place in eternity, where I am +literally at home. And there is only one such place to be found. + +I have now said enough to show (to any one to whom such an explanation +is essential) that I have in the ordinary arena of apologetics, a ground +of belief. In pure records of experiment (if these be taken +democratically without contempt or favour) there is evidence first, that +miracles happen, and second that the nobler miracles belong to our +tradition. But I will not pretend that this curt discussion is my real +reason for accepting Christianity instead of taking the moral good of +Christianity as I should take it out of Confucianism. + +I have another far more solid and central ground for submitting to it as +a faith, instead of merely picking up hints from it as a scheme. And +that is this: that the Christian Church in its practical relation to my +soul is a living teacher, not a dead one. It not only certainly taught +me yesterday, but will almost certainly teach me to-morrow. Once I saw +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the cross; some day I may see +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the mitre. One fine morning I saw +why windows were pointed; some fine morning I may see why priests were +shaven. Plato has told you a truth; but Plato is dead. Shakespeare has +startled you with an image; but Shakespeare will not startle you with +any more. But imagine what it would be to live with such men still +living, to know that Plato might break out with an original lecture +to-morrow, or that at any moment Shakespeare might shatter everything +with a single song. The man who lives in contact with what he believes +to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and +Shakespeare to-morrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some +truth that he has never seen before. There is one only other parallel to +this position; and that is the parallel of the life in which we all +began. When your father told you, walking about the garden, that bees +stung or that roses smelt sweet, you did not talk of taking the best +out of his philosophy. When the bees stung you, you did not call it an +entertaining coincidence. When the rose smelt sweet you did not say "My +father is a rude, barbaric symbol, enshrining (perhaps unconsciously) +the deep delicate truths that flowers smell." No: you believed your +father, because you had found him to be a living fountain of facts, a +thing that really knew more than you; a thing that would tell you truth +to-morrow, as well as to-day. And if this was true of your father, it +was even truer of your mother; at least it was true of mine, to whom +this book is dedicated. Now, when society is in a rather futile fuss +about the subjection of women, will no one say how much every man owes +to the tyranny and privilege of women, to the fact that they alone rule +education until education becomes futile: for a boy is only sent to be +taught at school when it is too late to teach him anything. The real +thing has been done already, and thank God it is nearly always done by +women. Every man is womanised, merely by being born. They talk of the +masculine woman; but every man is a feminised man. And if ever men walk +to Westminster to protest against this female privilege, I shall not +join their procession. + +For I remember with certainty this fixed psychological fact; that the +very time when I was most under a woman's authority, I was most full of +flame and adventure. Exactly because when my mother said that ants bit +they did bite, and because snow did come in winter (as she said); +therefore the whole world was to me a fairyland of wonderful +fulfilments, and it was like living in some Hebraic age, when prophecy +after prophecy came true. I went out as a child into the garden, and it +was a terrible place to me, precisely because I had a clue to it: if I +had held no clue it would not have been terrible, but tame. A mere +unmeaning wilderness is not even impressive. But the garden of childhood +was fascinating, exactly because everything had a fixed meaning which +could be found out in its turn. Inch by inch I might discover what was +the object of the ugly shape called a rake; or form some shadowy +conjecture as to why my parents kept a cat. + +So, since I have accepted Christendom as a mother and not merely as a +chance example, I have found Europe and the world once more like the +little garden where I stared at the symbolic shapes of cat and rake; I +look at everything with the old elvish ignorance and expectancy. This or +that rite or doctrine may look as ugly and extraordinary as a rake; but +I have found by experience that such things end somehow in grass and +flowers. A clergyman may be apparently as useless as a cat, but he is +also as fascinating, for there must be some strange reason for his +existence. I give one instance out of a hundred; I have not myself any +instinctive kinship with that enthusiasm for physical virginity, which +has certainly been a note of historic Christianity. But when I look not +at myself but at the world, I perceive that this enthusiasm is not only +a note of Christianity, but a note of Paganism, a note of high human +nature in many spheres. The Greeks felt virginity when they carved +Artemis, the Romans when they robed the vestals, the worst and wildest +of the great Elizabethan playwrights clung to the literal purity of a +woman as to the central pillar of the world. Above all, the modern world +(even while mocking sexual innocence) has flung itself into a generous +idolatry of sexual innocence--the great modern worship of children. For +any man who loves children will agree that their peculiar beauty is hurt +by a hint of physical sex. With all this human experience, allied with +the Christian authority, I simply conclude that I am wrong, and the +church right; or rather that I am defective, while the church is +universal. It takes all sorts to make a church; she does not ask me to +be celibate. But the fact that I have no appreciation of the celibates, +I accept like the fact that I have no ear for music. The best human +experience is against me, as it is on the subject of Bach. Celibacy is +one flower in my father's garden, of which I have not been told the +sweet or terrible name. But I may be told it any day. + +This, therefore, is, in conclusion, my reason for accepting the religion +and not merely the scattered and secular truths out of the religion. I +do it because the thing has not merely told this truth or that truth, +but has revealed itself as a truth-telling thing. All other philosophies +say the things that plainly seem to be true; only this philosophy has +again and again said the thing that does not seem to be true, but is +true. Alone of all creeds it is convincing where it is not attractive; +it turns out to be right, like my father in the garden. Theosophists, +for instance, will preach an obviously attractive idea like +re-incarnation; but if we wait for its logical results, they are +spiritual superciliousness and the cruelty of caste. For if a man is a +beggar by his own pre-natal sins, people will tend to despise the +beggar. But Christianity preaches an obviously unattractive idea, such +as original sin; but when we wait for its results, they are pathos and +brotherhood, and a thunder of laughter and pity; for only with original +sin we can at once pity the beggar and distrust the king. Men of science +offer us health, an obvious benefit; it is only afterwards that we +discover that by health, they mean bodily slavery and spiritual tedium. +Orthodoxy makes us jump by the sudden brink of hell; it is only +afterwards that we realise that jumping was an athletic exercise highly +beneficial to our health. It is only afterwards that we realise that +this danger is the root of all drama and romance. The strongest argument +for the divine grace is simply its ungraciousness. The unpopular parts +of Christianity turn out when examined to be the very props of the +people. The outer ring of Christianity is a rigid guard of ethical +abnegations and professional priests; but inside that inhuman guard you +will find the old human life dancing like children, and drinking wine +like men; for Christianity is the only frame for pagan freedom. But in +the modern philosophy the case is opposite; it is its outer ring that +is obviously artistic and emancipated; its despair is within. + +And its despair is this, that it does not really believe that there is +any meaning in the universe; therefore it cannot hope to find any +romance; its romances will have no plots. A man cannot expect any +adventures in the land of anarchy. But a man can expect any number of +adventures if he goes travelling in the land of authority. One can find +no meanings in a jungle of scepticism; but the man will find more and +more meanings who walks through a forest of doctrine and design. Here +everything has a story tied to its tail, like the tools or pictures in +my father's house; for it is my father's house. I end where I began--at +the right end. I have entered at least the gate of all good philosophy. +I have come into my second childhood. + +But this larger and more adventurous Christian universe has one final +mark difficult to express; yet as a conclusion of the whole matter I +will attempt to express it. All the real argument about religion turns +on the question of whether a man who was born upside down can tell when +he comes right way up. The primary paradox of Christianity is that the +ordinary condition of man is not his sane or sensible condition; that +the normal itself is an abnormality. That is the inmost philosophy of +the Fall. In Sir Oliver Lodge's interesting new Catechism, the first two +questions were: "What are you?" and "What, then, is the meaning of the +Fall of Man?" I remember amusing myself by writing my own answers to the +questions; but I soon found that they were very broken and agnostic +answers. To the question, "What are you?" I could only answer, "God +knows." And to the question, "What is meant by the Fall?" I could answer +with complete sincerity, "That whatever I am, I am not myself." This is +the prime paradox of our religion; something that we have never in any +full sense known, is not only better than ourselves, but even more +natural to us than ourselves. And there is really no test of this except +the merely experimental one with which these pages began, the test of +the padded cell and the open door. It is only since I have known +orthodoxy that I have known mental emancipation. But, in conclusion, it +has one special application to the ultimate idea of joy. + +It is said that Paganism is a religion of joy and Christianity of +sorrow; it would be just as easy to prove that Paganism is pure sorrow +and Christianity pure joy. Such conflicts mean nothing and lead +nowhere. Everything human must have in it both joy and sorrow; the only +matter of interest is the manner in which the two things are balanced or +divided. And the really interesting thing is this, that the pagan was +(in the main) happier and happier as he approached the earth, but sadder +and sadder as he approached the heavens. The gaiety of the best +Paganism, as in the playfulness of Catullus or Theocritus, is, indeed, +an eternal gaiety never to be forgotten by a grateful humanity. But it +is all a gaiety about the facts of life, not about its origin. To the +pagan the small things are as sweet as the small brooks breaking out of +the mountain; but the broad things are as bitter as the sea. When the +pagan looks at the very core of the cosmos he is struck cold. Behind the +gods, who are merely despotic, sit the fates, who are deadly. Nay, the +fates are worse than deadly; they are dead. And when rationalists say +that the ancient world was more enlightened than the Christian, from +their point of view they are right. For when they say "enlightened" they +mean darkened with incurable despair. It is profoundly true that the +ancient world was more modern than the Christian. The common bond is in +the fact that ancients and moderns have both been miserable about +existence, about everything, while mediævals were happy about that at +least. I freely grant that the pagans, like the moderns, were only +miserable about everything--they were quite jolly about everything else. +I concede that the Christians of the Middle Ages were only at peace +about everything--they were at war about everything else. But if the +question turn on the primary pivot of the cosmos, then there was more +cosmic contentment in the narrow and bloody streets of Florence than in +the theatre of Athens or the open garden of Epicurus. Giotto lived in a +gloomier town than Euripides, but he lived in a gayer universe. + +The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but +sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my last dogma defiantly) +it is not native to man to be so. Man is more himself, man is more +manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the +superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and +fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the +soul. Pessimism is at best an emotional half-holiday; joy is the +uproarious labour by which all things live. Yet, according to the +apparent estate of man as seen by the pagan or the agnostic, this +primary need of human nature can never be fulfilled. Joy ought to be +expansive; but for the agnostic it must be contracted, it must cling to +one corner of the world. Grief ought to be a concentration; but for the +agnostic its desolation is spread through an unthinkable eternity. This +is what I call being born upside down. The sceptic may truly be said to +be topsy-turvy; for his feet are dancing upwards in idle ecstacies, +while his brain is in the abyss. To the modern man the heavens are +actually below the earth. The explanation is simple; he is standing on +his head; which is a very weak pedestal to stand on. But when he has +found his feet again he knows it. Christianity satisfies suddenly and +perfectly man's ancestral instinct for being the right way up; satisfies +it supremely in this; that by its creed joy becomes something gigantic +and sadness something special and small. The vault above us is not deaf +because the universe is an idiot; the silence is not the heartless +silence of an endless and aimless world. Rather the silence around us is +a small and pitiful stillness like the prompt stillness in a sick room. +We are perhaps permitted tragedy as a sort of merciful comedy: because +the frantic energy of divine things would knock us down like a drunken +farce. We can take our own tears more lightly than we could take the +tremendous levities of the angels. So we sit perhaps in a starry chamber +of silence, while the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to +hear. + +Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret +of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the +strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again +haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the +Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the +thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, +almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing +their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His +open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. +Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists +are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He +flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how +they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained +something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering +personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something +that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was +something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous +isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show +us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it +was His mirth. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. 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K. Chesterton + </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 */ + } + HR { width: 33%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .note {margin-left: 2em; margin-right: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} /* footnote */ + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; padding-left: 1em; font-size: smaller; float: right; clear: right;} + + .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;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. Chesterton + +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: Orthodoxy + +Author: G. K. Chesterton + +Release Date: September 28, 2005 [EBook #16769] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ORTHODOXY *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Clare Coney and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + + + +<h1>ORTHODOXY</h1> + +<h3 align="center"><i>by</i></h3> + +<h3 align="center">G. K. CHESTERTON</h3> + + +<br /> + +<h4 align="center">JOHN LANE<br>THE BODLEY HEAD LTD</h4> +<br><br><br><br><br><br><br> + +<div class="blkquot"> +<p><i>First published in</i>.................................................. 1908</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1908</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1909</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1911</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1915</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1919</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1921</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1924</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1926</p> + +<p><i>First published in "The Week-End Library" in</i> 1927</p> + +<p><i>Reprinted</i>................................................................ 1934</p> +<br /> +</div> + + +<h4 align="center">MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, +LONDON AND BECCLES.</h4> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="TO_MY_MOTHER"></a><h2><i>TO MY MOTHER</i></h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CONTENTS"></a><h2><i>CONTENTS</i></h2> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> +<div class="blkquot"> + <a href="#CHAPTER_I_Introduction_in_Defence_of_Everything_Else"><b>CHAPTER I.—<i>Introduction in Defence of Everything Else</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_II_The_Maniac"><b>CHAPTER II.—<i>The Maniac</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_III_The_Suicide_of_Thought"><b>CHAPTER III.—<i>The Suicide of Thought</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_IV_The_Ethics_of_Elfland"><b>CHAPTER IV—<i>The Ethics of Elfland</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_V_The_Flag_of_the_World"><b>CHAPTER V.—<i>The Flag of the World</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VI_The_Paradoxes_of_Christianity"><b>CHAPTER VI.—<i>The Paradoxes of Christianity</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VII_The_Eternal_Revolution"><b>CHAPTER VII.—<i>The Eternal Revolution</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VIII_The_Romance_of_Orthodoxy"><b>CHAPTER VIII.—<i>The Romance of Orthodoxy</i></b></a><br /> + <a href="#CHAPTER_IX_Authority_and_the_Adventurer"><b>CHAPTER IX.—<i>Authority and the Adventurer</i></b></a><br /> +</div> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_I_Introduction_in_Defence_of_Everything_Else"></a><h2>CHAPTER I.—<i>Introduction in Defence of Everything Else</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>The only possible excuse for this book is that it is an answer to a +challenge. Even a bad shot is dignified when he accepts a duel. When +some time ago I published a series of hasty but sincere papers, under +the name of "Heretics," several critics for whose intellect I have a +warm respect (I may mention specially Mr. G.S. Street) said that it was +all very well for me to tell everybody to affirm his cosmic theory, but +that I had carefully avoided supporting my precepts with example. "I +will begin to worry about my philosophy," said Mr. Street, "when Mr. +Chesterton has given us his." It was perhaps an incautious suggestion to +make to a person only too ready to write books upon the feeblest +provocation. But after all, though Mr. Street has inspired and created +this book, he need not read it. If he does read it, he will find that in +its pages I have attempted in a vague and personal way, in a set of +mental pictures rather than in a series of deductions, to state the +philosophy in which I have come to believe. I will not call it my +philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made +me.</p> + +<p>I have often had a fancy for writing a romance about an English +yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England +under the impression that it was a new island in the South Seas. I +always find, however, that I am either too busy or too lazy to write +this fine work, so I may as well give it away for the purposes of +philosophical illustration. There will probably be a general impression +that the man who landed (armed to the teeth and talking by signs) to +plant the British flag on that barbaric temple which turned out to be +the Pavilion at Brighton, felt rather a fool. I am not here concerned to +deny that he looked a fool. But if you imagine that he felt a fool, or +at any rate that the sense of folly was his sole or his dominant +emotion, then you have not studied with sufficient delicacy the rich +romantic nature of the hero of this tale. His mistake was really a most +enviable mistake; and he knew it, if he was the man I take him for. What +could be more delightful than to have in the same few minutes all the +fascinating terrors of going abroad combined with all the humane +security of coming home again? What could be better than to have all +the fun of discovering South Africa without the disgusting necessity of +landing there? What could be more glorious than to brace one's self up +to discover New South Wales and then realize, with a gush of happy +tears, that it was really old South Wales. This at least seems to me the +main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of +this book. How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and +yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged +citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give +us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour +of being our own town? To show that a faith or a philosophy is true from +every standpoint would be too big an undertaking even for a much bigger +book than this; it is necessary to follow one path of argument; and this +is the path that I here propose to follow. I wish to set forth my faith +as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that +mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly +named romance. For the very word "romance" has in it the mystery and +ancient meaning of Rome. Any one setting out to dispute anything ought +always to begin by saying what he does not dispute. Beyond stating what +he proposes to prove he should always state what he does not propose to +prove. The thing I do not propose to prove, the thing I propose to take +as common ground between myself and any average reader, is this +desirability of an active and imaginative life, picturesque and full of +a poetical curiosity, a life such as western man at any rate always +seems to have desired. If a man says that extinction is better than +existence or blank existence better than variety and adventure, then he +is not one of the ordinary people to whom I am talking. If a man prefers +nothing I can give him nothing. But nearly all people I have ever met in +this western society in which I live would agree to the general +proposition that we need this life of practical romance; the combination +of something that is strange with something that is secure. We need so +to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of +welcome. We need to be happy in this wonderland without once being +merely comfortable. It is <i>this</i> achievement of my creed that I shall +chiefly pursue in these pages.</p> + +<p>But I have a peculiar reason for mentioning the man in a yacht, who +discovered England. For I am that man in a yacht. I discovered England. +I do not see how this book can avoid being egotistical; and I do not +quite see (to tell the truth) how it can avoid being dull. Dullness +will, however, free me from the charge which I most lament; the charge +of being flippant. Mere light sophistry is the thing that I happen to +despise most of all things, and it is perhaps a wholesome fact that this +is the thing of which I am generally accused. I know nothing so +contemptible as a mere paradox; a mere ingenious defence of the +indefensible. If it were true (as has been said) that Mr. Bernard Shaw +lived upon paradox, then he ought to be a mere common millionaire; for a +man of his mental activity could invent a sophistry every six minutes. +It is as easy as lying; because it is lying. The truth is, of course, +that Mr. Shaw is cruelly hampered by the fact that he cannot tell any +lie unless he thinks it is the truth. I find myself under the same +intolerable bondage. I never in my life said anything merely because I +thought it funny; though, of course, I have had ordinary human +vain-glory, and may have thought it funny because I had said it. It is +one thing to describe an interview with a gorgon or a griffin, a +creature who does not exist. It is another thing to discover that the +rhinoceros does exist and then take pleasure in the fact that he looks +as if he didn't. One searches for truth, but it may be that one pursues +instinctively the more extraordinary truths. And I offer this book with +the heartiest sentiments to all the jolly people who hate what I write, +and regard it (very justly, for all I know), as a piece of poor clowning +or a single tiresome joke.</p> + +<p>For if this book is a joke it is a joke against me. I am the man who +with the utmost daring discovered what had been discovered before. If +there is an element of farce in what follows, the farce is at my own +expense; for this book explains how I fancied I was the first to set +foot in Brighton and then found I was the last. It recounts my +elephantine adventures in pursuit of the obvious. No one can think my +case more ludicrous than I think it myself; no reader can accuse me here +of trying to make a fool of him: I am the fool of this story, and no +rebel shall hurl me from my throne. I freely confess all the idiotic +ambitions of the end of the nineteenth century. I did, like all other +solemn little boys, try to be in advance of the age. Like them I tried +to be some ten minutes in advance of the truth. And I found that I was +eighteen hundred years behind it. I did strain my voice with a painfully +juvenile exaggeration in uttering my truths. And I was punished in the +fittest and funniest way, for I have kept my truths: but I have +discovered, not that they were not truths, but simply that they were not +mine. When I fancied that I stood alone I was really in the ridiculous +position of being backed up by all Christendom. It may be, Heaven +forgive me, that I did try to be original; but I only succeeded in +inventing all by myself an inferior copy of the existing traditions of +civilized religion. The man from the yacht thought he was the first to +find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to +found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I +discovered that it was orthodoxy.</p> + +<p>It may be that somebody will be entertained by the account of this happy +fiasco. It might amuse a friend or an enemy to read how I gradually +learnt from the truth of some stray legend or from the falsehood of some +dominant philosophy, things that I might have learnt from my +catechism—if I had ever learnt it. There may or may not be some +entertainment in reading how I found at last in an anarchist club or a +Babylonian temple what I might have found in the nearest parish church. +If any one is entertained by learning how the flowers of the field or +the phrases in an omnibus, the accidents of politics or the pains of +youth came together in a certain order to produce a certain conviction +of Christian orthodoxy, he may possibly read this book. But there is in +everything a reasonable division of labour. I have written the book, and +nothing on earth would induce me to read it.</p> + +<p>I add one purely pedantic note which comes, as a note naturally should, +at the beginning of the book. These essays are concerned only to discuss +the actual fact that the central Christian theology (sufficiently +summarized in the Apostles' Creed) is the best root of energy and sound +ethics. They are not intended to discuss the very fascinating but quite +different question of what is the present seat of authority for the +proclamation of that creed. When the word "orthodoxy" is used here it +means the Apostles' Creed, as understood by everybody calling himself +Christian until a very short time ago and the general historic conduct +of those who held such a creed. I have been forced by mere space to +confine myself to what I have got from this creed; I do not touch the +matter much disputed among modern Christians, of where we ourselves got +it. This is not an ecclesiastical treatise but a sort of slovenly +autobiography. But if any one wants my opinions about the actual nature +of the authority, Mr. G.S. Street has only to throw me another +challenge, and I will write him another book.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_II_The_Maniac"></a><h2>CHAPTER II.—<i>The Maniac</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>Thoroughly worldly people never understand even the world; they rely +altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true. Once I remember +walking with a prosperous publisher, who made a remark which I had often +heard before; it is, indeed, almost a motto of the modern world. Yet I +had heard it once too often, and I saw suddenly that there was nothing +in it. The publisher said of somebody, "That man will get on; he +believes in himself." And I remember that as I lifted my head to listen, +my eye caught an omnibus on which was written "Hanwell." I said to him, +"Shall I tell you where the men are who believe most in themselves? For +I can tell you. I know of men who believe in themselves more colossally +than Napoleon or Caesar. I know where flames the fixed star of certainty +and success. I can guide you to the thrones of the Super-men. The men +who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums." He said +mildly that there were a good many men after all who believed in +themselves and who were not in lunatic asylums. "Yes, there are," I +retorted, "and you of all men ought to know them. That drunken poet from +whom you would not take a dreary tragedy, he believed in himself. That +elderly minister with an epic from whom you were hiding in a back room, +he believed in himself. If you consulted your business experience +instead of your ugly individualistic philosophy, you would know that +believing in himself is one of the commonest signs of a rotter. Actors +who can't act believe in themselves; and debtors who won't pay. It would +be much truer to say that a man will certainly fail because he believes +in himself. Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete +self-confidence is a weakness. Believing utterly in one's self is a +hysterical and superstitious belief like believing in Joanna Southcote: +the man who has it has 'Hanwell' written on his face as plain as it is +written on that omnibus." And to all this my friend the publisher made +this very deep and effective reply, "Well, if a man is not to believe in +himself, in what is he to believe?" After a long pause I replied, "I +will go home and write a book in answer to that question." This is the +book that I have written in answer to it.</p> + +<p>But I think this book may well start where our argument started—in the +neighbourhood of the mad-house. Modern masters of science are much +impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The +ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that +necessity. They began with the fact of sin—a fact as practical as +potatoes. Whether or no man could be washed in miraculous waters, there +was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing. But certain religious +leaders in London, not mere materialists, have begun in our day not to +deny the highly disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. +Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of +Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of the +Reverend R.J. Campbell, in their almost too fastidious spirituality, +admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. +But they essentially deny human sin, which they can see in the street. +The strongest saints and the strongest sceptics alike took positive evil +as the starting-point of their argument. If it be true (as it certainly +is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the +religious philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must +either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny +the present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new +theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the +cat.</p> + +<p>In this remarkable situation it is plainly not now possible (with any +hope of a universal appeal) to start, as our fathers did, with the fact +of sin. This very fact which was to them (and is to me) as plain as a +pikestaff, is the very fact that has been specially diluted or denied. +But though moderns deny the existence of sin, I do not think that they +have yet denied the existence of a lunatic asylum. We all agree still +that there is a collapse of the intellect as unmistakable as a falling +house. Men deny hell, but not, as yet, Hanwell. For the purpose of our +primary argument the one may very well stand where the other stood. I +mean that as all thoughts and theories were once judged by whether they +tended to make a man lose his soul, so for our present purpose all +modern thoughts and theories may be judged by whether they tend to make +a man lose his wits.</p> + +<p>It is true that some speak lightly and loosely of insanity as in itself +attractive. But a moment's thought will show that if disease is +beautiful, it is generally some one else's disease. A blind man may be +picturesque; but it requires two eyes to see the picture. And similarly +even the wildest poetry of insanity can only be enjoyed by the sane. To +the insane man his insanity is quite prosaic, because it is quite true. +A man who thinks himself a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a +chicken. A man who thinks he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as +a bit of glass. It is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, +and which makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea +that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see the +irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short, oddities +only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is +why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are +always complaining of the dulness of life. This is also why the new +novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The +old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures +that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the +modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not +central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, +and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among +dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses +what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of +to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world.</p> + +<p>Let us begin, then, with the mad-house; from this evil and fantastic inn +let us set forth on our intellectual journey. Now, if we are to glance +at the philosophy of sanity, the first thing to do in the matter is to +blot out one big and common mistake. There is a notion adrift everywhere +that imagination, especially mystical imagination, is dangerous to man's +mental balance. Poets are commonly spoken of as psychologically +unreliable; and generally there is a vague association between wreathing +laurels in your hair and sticking straws in it. Facts and history +utterly contradict this view. Most of the very great poets have been not +only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever really +held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to hold them. +Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is +reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go +mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will +be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does +lie in logic, not in imagination. Artistic paternity is as wholesome as +physical paternity. Moreover, it is worthy of remark that when a poet +really was morbid it was commonly because he had some weak spot of +rationality on his brain. Poe, for instance, really was morbid; not +because he was poetical, but because he was specially analytical. Even +chess was too poetical for him; he disliked chess because it was full of +knights and castles, like a poem. He avowedly preferred the black discs +of draughts, because they were more like the mere black dots on a +diagram. Perhaps the strongest case of all is this: that only one great +English poet went mad, Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by +logic, by the ugly and alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the +disease, but the medicine; poetry partly kept him in health. He could +sometimes forget the red and thirsty hell to which his hideous +necessitarianism dragged him among the wide waters and the white flat +lilies of the Ouse. He was damned by John Calvin; he was almost saved by +John Gilpin. Everywhere we see that men do not go mad by dreaming. +Critics are much madder than poets. Homer is complete and calm enough; +it is his critics who tear him into extravagant tatters. Shakespeare is +quite himself; it is only some of his critics who have discovered that +he was somebody else. And though St. John the Evangelist saw many +strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his +own commentators. The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it +floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite +sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the +physical exhaustion of Mr. Holbein. To accept everything is an exercise, +to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and +expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his +head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens +into his head. And it is his head that splits.</p> + +<p>It is a small matter, but not irrelevant, that this striking mistake is +commonly supported by a striking misquotation. We have all heard people +cite the celebrated line of Dryden as "Great genius is to madness near +allied." But Dryden did not say that great genius was to madness near +allied. Dryden was a great genius himself, and knew better. It would +have been hard to find a man more romantic than he, or more sensible. +What Dryden said was this, "Great wits are oft to madness near allied"; +and that is true. It is the pure promptitude of the intellect that is in +peril of a breakdown. Also people might remember of what sort of man +Dryden was talking. He was not talking of any unworldly visionary like +Vaughan or George Herbert. He was talking of a cynical man of the world, +a sceptic, a diplomatist, a great practical politician. Such men are +indeed to madness near allied. Their incessant calculation of their own +brains and other people's brains is a dangerous trade. It is always +perilous to the mind to reckon up the mind. A flippant person has asked +why we say, "As mad as a hatter." A more flippant person might answer +that a hatter is mad because he has to measure the human head.</p> + +<p>And if great reasoners are often maniacal, it is equally true that +maniacs are commonly great reasoners. When I was engaged in a +controversy with the <i>Clarion</i> on the matter of free will, that able +writer Mr. R.B. Suthers said that free will was lunacy, because it meant +causeless actions, and the actions of a lunatic would be causeless. I do +not dwell here upon the disastrous lapse in determinist logic. Obviously +if any actions, even a lunatic's, can be causeless, determinism is done +for. If the chain of causation can be broken for a madman, it can be +broken for a man. But my purpose is to point out something more +practical. It was natural, perhaps, that a modern Marxian Socialist +should not know anything about free will. But it was certainly +remarkable that a modern Marxian Socialist should not know anything +about lunatics. Mr. Suthers evidently did not know anything about +lunatics. The last thing that can be said of a lunatic is that his +actions are causeless. If any human acts may loosely be called +causeless, they are the minor acts of a healthy man; whistling as he +walks; slashing the grass with a stick; kicking his heels or rubbing his +hands. It is the happy man who does the useless things; the sick man is +not strong enough to be idle. It is exactly such careless and causeless +actions that the madman could never understand; for the madman (like the +determinist) generally sees too much cause in everything. The madman +would read a conspiratorial significance into those empty activities. He +would think that the lopping of the grass was an attack on private +property. He would think that the kicking of the heels was a signal to +an accomplice. If the madman could for an instant become careless, he +would become sane. Every one who has had the misfortune to talk with +people in the heart or on the edge of mental disorder, knows that their +most sinister quality is a horrible clarity of detail; a connecting of +one thing with another in a map more elaborate than a maze. If you argue +with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get the worst of +it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker for not being +delayed by the things that go with good judgment. He is not hampered by +a sense of humour or by charity, or by the dumb certainties of +experience. He is the more logical for losing certain sane affections. +Indeed, the common phrase for insanity is in this respect a misleading +one. The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is +the man who has lost everything except his reason.</p> + +<p>The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and often in a +purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more strictly, the +insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable; this +may be observed specially in the two or three commonest kinds of +madness. If a man says (for instance) that men have a conspiracy against +him, you cannot dispute it except by saying that all the men deny that +they are conspirators; which is exactly what conspirators would do. His +explanation covers the facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he +is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that +the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England +that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or if +a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him that the +world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless he is wrong. But if we attempt to trace his error in exact +terms, we shall not find it quite so easy as we had supposed. Perhaps +the nearest we can get to expressing it is to say this: that his mind +moves in a perfect but narrow circle. A small circle is quite as +infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is +not so large. In the same way the insane explanation is quite as +complete as the sane one, but it is not so large. A bullet is quite as +round as the world, but it is not the world. There is such a thing as a +narrow universality; there is such a thing as a small and cramped +eternity; you may see it in many modern religions. Now, speaking quite +externally and empirically, we may say that the strongest and most +unmistakable <i>mark</i> of madness is this combination between a logical +completeness and a spiritual contraction. The lunatic's theory explains +a large number of things, but it does not explain them in a large way. I +mean that if you or I were dealing with a mind that was growing morbid, +we should be chiefly concerned not so much to give it arguments as to +give it air, to convince it that there was something cleaner and cooler +outside the suffocation of a single argument. Suppose, for instance, it +were the first case that I took as typical; suppose it were the case of +a man who accused everybody of conspiring against him. If we could +express our deepest feelings of protest and appeal against this +obsession, I suppose we should say something like this: "Oh, I admit +that you have your case and have it by heart, and that many things do +fit into other things as you say. I admit that your explanation explains +a great deal; but what a great deal it leaves out! Are there no other +stories in the world except yours; and are all men busy with your +business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps when the man in the +street did not seem to see you it was only his cunning; perhaps when the +policeman asked you your name it was only because he knew it already. +But how much happier you would be if you only knew that these people +cared nothing about you! How much larger your life would be if your self +could become smaller in it; if you could really look at other men with +common curiosity and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are +in their sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would +begin to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you. +You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your own +little plot is always being played, and you would find yourself under a +freer sky, in a street full of splendid strangers." Or suppose it were +the second case of madness, that of a man who claims the crown, your +impulse would be to answer, "All right! Perhaps you know that you are +the King of England; but why do you care? Make one magnificent effort +and you will be a human being and look down on all the kings of the +earth." Or it might be the third case, of the madman who called himself +Christ. If we said what we felt, we should say, "So you are the Creator +and Redeemer of the world: but what a small world it must be! What a +little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than butterflies! +How sad it must be to be God; and an inadequate God! Is there really no +life fuller and no love more marvellous than yours; and is it really in +your small and painful pity that all flesh must put its faith? How much +happier you would be, how much more of you there would be, if the hammer +of a higher God could smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like +spangles, and leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as +well as down!"</p> + +<p>And it must be remembered that the most purely practical science does +take this view of mental evil; it does not seek to argue with it like a +heresy, but simply to snap it like a spell. Neither modern science nor +ancient religion believes in complete free thought. Theology rebukes +certain thoughts by calling them blasphemous. Science rebukes certain +thoughts by calling them morbid. For example, some religious societies +discouraged men more or less from thinking about sex. The new scientific +society definitely discourages men from thinking about death; it is a +fact, but it is considered a morbid fact. And in dealing with those +whose morbidity has a touch of mania, modern science cares far less for +pure logic than a dancing Dervish. In these cases it is not enough that +the unhappy man should desire truth; he must desire health. Nothing can +save him but a blind hunger for normality, like that of a beast. A man +cannot think himself out of mental evil; for it is actually the organ of +thought that has become diseased, ungovernable, and, as it were, +independent. He can only be saved by will or faith. The moment his mere +reason moves, it moves in the old circular rut; he will go round and +round his logical circle, just as a man in a third-class carriage on the +Inner Circle will go round and round the Inner Circle unless he performs +the voluntary, vigorous, and mystical act of getting out at Gower +Street. Decision is the whole business here; a door must be shut for +ever. Every remedy is a desperate remedy. Every cure is a miraculous +cure. Curing a madman is not arguing with a philosopher; it is casting +out a devil. And however quietly doctors and psychologists may go to +work in the matter, their attitude is profoundly intolerant—as +intolerant as Bloody Mary. Their attitude is really this: that the man +must stop thinking, if he is to go on living. Their counsel is one of +intellectual amputation. If thy <i>head</i> offend thee, cut it off; for it +is better, not merely to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child, but to +enter it as an imbecile, rather than with your whole intellect to be +cast into hell—or into Hanwell.</p> + +<p>Such is the madman of experience; he is commonly a reasoner, frequently +a successful reasoner. Doubtless he could be vanquished in mere reason, +and the case against him put logically. But it can be put much more +precisely in more general and even æsthetic terms. He is in the clean +and well-lit prison of one idea: he is sharpened to one painful point. +He is without healthy hesitation and healthy complexity. Now, as I +explain in the introduction, I have determined in these early chapters +to give not so much a diagram of a doctrine as some pictures of a point +of view. And I have described at length my vision of the maniac for this +reason: that just as I am affected by the maniac, so I am affected by +most modern thinkers. That unmistakable mood or note that I hear from +Hanwell, I hear also from half the chairs of science and seats of +learning to-day; and most of the mad doctors are mad doctors in more +senses than one. They all have exactly that combination we have noted: +the combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason with a contracted +common sense. They are universal only in the sense that they take one +thin explanation and carry it very far. But a pattern can stretch for +ever and still be a small pattern. They see a chess-board white on +black, and if the universe is paved with it, it is still white on black. +Like the lunatic, they cannot alter their standpoint; they cannot make a +mental effort and suddenly see it black on white.</p> + +<p>Take first the more obvious case of materialism. As an explanation of +the world, materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has just the +quality of the madman's argument; we have at once the sense of it +covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out. +Contemplate some able and sincere materialist, as, for instance, Mr. +McCabe, and you will have exactly this unique sensation. He understands +everything, and everything does not seem worth understanding. His cosmos +may be complete in every rivet and cog-wheel, but still his cosmos is +smaller than our world. Somehow his scheme, like the lucid scheme of the +madman, seems unconscious of the alien energies and the large +indifference of the earth; it is not thinking of the real things of the +earth, of fighting peoples or proud mothers, or first love or fear upon +the sea. The earth is so very large, and the cosmos is so very small. +The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in.</p> + +<p>It must be understood that I am not now discussing the relation of +these creeds to truth; but, for the present, solely their relation to +health. Later in the argument I hope to attack the question of objective +verity; here I speak only of a phenomenon of psychology. I do not for +the present attempt to prove to Haeckel that materialism is untrue, any +more than I attempted to prove to the man who thought he was Christ that +he was labouring under an error. I merely remark here on the fact that +both cases have the same kind of completeness and the same kind of +incompleteness. You can explain a man's detention at Hanwell by an +indifferent public by saying that it is the crucifixion of a god of whom +the world is not worthy. The explanation does explain. Similarly you may +explain the order in the universe by saying that all things, even the +souls of men, are leaves inevitably unfolding on an utterly unconscious +tree—the blind destiny of matter. The explanation does explain, though +not, of course, so completely as the madman's. But the point here is +that the normal human mind not only objects to both, but feels to both +the same objection. Its approximate statement is that if the man in +Hanwell is the real God, he is not much of a god. And, similarly, if the +cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it is not much of a +cosmos. The thing has shrunk. The deity is less divine than many men; +and (according to Haeckel) the whole of life is something much more +grey, narrow, and trivial than many separate aspects of it. The parts +seem greater than the whole.</p> + +<p>For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or +not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. In one sense, of +course, all intelligent ideas are narrow. They cannot be broader than +themselves. A Christian is only restricted in the same sense that an +atheist is restricted. He cannot think Christianity false and continue +to be a Christian; and the atheist cannot think atheism false and +continue to be an atheist. But as it happens, there is a very special +sense in which materialism has more restrictions than spiritualism. Mr. +McCabe thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in +determinism. I think Mr. McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to +believe in fairies. But if we examine the two vetoes we shall see that +his is really much more of a pure veto than mine. The Christian is quite +free to believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and +inevitable development in the universe. But the materialist is not +allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of +spiritualism or miracle. Poor Mr. McCabe is not allowed to retain even +the tiniest imp, though it might be hiding in a pimpernel. The Christian +admits that the universe is manifold and even miscellaneous, just as a +sane man knows that he is complex. The sane man knows that he has a +touch of the beast, a touch of the devil, a touch of the saint, a touch +of the citizen. Nay, the really sane man knows that he has a touch of +the madman. But the materialist's world is quite simple and solid, just +as the madman is quite sure he is sane. The materialist is sure that +history has been simply and solely a chain of causation, just as the +interesting person before mentioned is quite sure that he is simply and +solely a chicken. Materialists and madmen never have doubts.</p> + +<p>Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do materialistic +denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not think about it. But +if I disbelieve in immortality I must not think about it. In the first +case the road is open and I can go as far as I like; in the second the +road is shut. But the case is even stronger, and the parallel with +madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive +and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually +destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions +of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his +humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, +initiative, all that is human. For instance, when materialism leads men +to complete fatalism (as it generally does), it is quite idle to pretend +that it is in any sense a liberating force. It is absurd to say that you +are especially advancing freedom when you only use free thought to +destroy free will. The determinists come to bind, not to loose. They may +well call their law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that +ever fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if you +like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that this is just +as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language when applied to a +man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if you like, that the man is +free to think himself a poached egg. But it is surely a more massive and +important fact that if he is a poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, +sleep, walk, or smoke a cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, +that the bold determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the +reality of the will. But it is a much more massive and important fact +that he is not free to praise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, +to punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year +resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say "thank +you" for the mustard.</p> + +<p>In passing from this subject I may note that there is a queer fallacy to +the effect that materialistic fatalism is in some way favourable to +mercy, to the abolition of cruel punishments or punishments of any kind. +This is startlingly the reverse of the truth. It is quite tenable that +the doctrine of necessity makes no difference at all; that it leaves the +flogger flogging and the kind friend exhorting as before. But obviously +if it stops either of them it stops the kind exhortation. That the sins +are inevitable does not prevent punishment; if it prevents anything it +prevents persuasion. Determinism is quite as likely to lead to cruelty +as it is certain to lead to cowardice. Determinism is not inconsistent +with the cruel treatment of criminals. What it is (perhaps) inconsistent +with is the generous treatment of criminals; with any appeal to their +better feelings or encouragement in their moral struggle. The +determinist does not believe in appealing to the will, but he does +believe in changing the environment. He must not say to the sinner, "Go +and sin no more," because the sinner cannot help it. But he can put him +in boiling oil; for boiling oil is an environment. Considered as a +figure, therefore, the materialist has the fantastic outline of the +figure of the madman. Both take up a position at once unanswerable and +intolerable.</p> + +<p>Of course it is not only of the materialist that all this is true. The +same would apply to the other extreme of speculative logic. There is a +sceptic far more terrible than he who believes that everything began in +matter. It is possible to meet the sceptic who believes that everything +began in himself. He doubts not the existence of angels or devils, but +the existence of men and cows. For him his own friends are a mythology +made up by himself. He created his own father and his own mother. This +horrible fancy has in it something decidedly attractive to the somewhat +mystical egoism of our day. That publisher who thought that men would +get on if they believed in themselves, those seekers after the Superman +who are always looking for him in the looking-glass, those writers who +talk about impressing their personalities instead of creating life for +the world, all these people have really only an inch between them and +this awful emptiness. Then when this kindly world all round the man has +been blackened out like a lie; when friends fade into ghosts, and the +foundations of the world fail; then when the man, believing in nothing +and in no man, is alone in his own nightmare, then the great +individualistic motto shall be written over him in avenging irony. The +stars will be only dots in the blackness of his own brain; his mother's +face will be only a sketch from his own insane pencil on the walls of +his cell. But over his cell shall be written, with dreadful truth, "He +believes in himself."</p> + +<p>All that concerns us here, however, is to note that this panegoistic +extreme of thought exhibits the same paradox as the other extreme of +materialism. It is equally complete in theory and equally crippling in +practice. For the sake of simplicity, it is easier to state the notion +by saying that a man can believe that he is always in a dream. Now, +obviously there can be no positive proof given to him that he is not in +a dream, for the simple reason that no proof can be offered that might +not be offered in a dream. But if the man began to burn down London and +say that his housekeeper would soon call him to breakfast, we should +take him and put him with other logicians in a place which has often +been alluded to in the course of this chapter. The man who cannot +believe his senses, and the man who cannot believe anything else, are +both insane, but their insanity is proved not by any error in their +argument, but by the manifest mistake of their whole lives. They have +both locked themselves up in two boxes, painted inside with the sun and +stars; they are both unable to get out, the one into the health and +happiness of heaven, the other even into the health and happiness of the +earth. Their position is quite reasonable; nay, in a sense it is +infinitely reasonable, just as a threepenny bit is infinitely circular. +But there is such a thing as a mean infinity, a base and slavish +eternity. It is amusing to notice that many of the moderns, whether +sceptics or mystics, have taken as their sign a certain eastern symbol, +which is the very symbol of this ultimate nullity. When they wish to +represent eternity, they represent it by a serpent with his tail in his +mouth. There is a startling sarcasm in the image of that very +unsatisfactory meal. The eternity of the material fatalists, the +eternity of the eastern pessimists, the eternity of the supercilious +theosophists and higher scientists of to-day is, indeed, very well +presented by a serpent eating his tail, a degraded animal who destroys +even himself.</p> + +<p>This chapter is purely practical and is concerned with what actually is +the chief mark and element of insanity; we may say in summary that it is +reason used without root, reason in the void. The man who begins to +think without the proper first principles goes mad, the man who begins +to think at the wrong end. And for the rest of these pages we have to +try and discover what is the right end. But we may ask in conclusion, if +this be what drives men mad, what is it that keeps them sane? By the end +of this book I hope to give a definite, some will think a far too +definite, answer. But for the moment it is possible in the same solely +practical manner to give a general answer touching what in actual human +history keeps men sane. Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have +mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity. +The ordinary man has always been sane because the ordinary man has +always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has always had +one foot in earth and the other in fairyland. He has always left himself +free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of to-day) free also +to believe in them. He has always cared more for truth than for +consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to contradict each other, +he would take the two truths and the contradiction along with them. His +spiritual sight is stereoscopic, like his physical sight: he sees two +different pictures at once and yet sees all the better for that. Thus he +has always believed that there was such a thing as fate, but such a +thing as free will also. Thus he believed that children were indeed the +kingdom of heaven, but nevertheless ought to be obedient to the kingdom +of earth. He admired youth because it was young and age because it was +not. It is exactly this balance of apparent contradictions that has been +the whole buoyancy of the healthy man. The whole secret of mysticism is +this: that man can understand everything by the help of what he does not +understand. The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and +succeeds in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to +be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. The determinist makes +the theory of causation quite clear, and then finds that he cannot say +"if you please" to the housemaid. The Christian permits free will to +remain a sacred mystery; but because of this his relations with the +housemaid become of a sparkling and crystal clearness. He puts the seed +of dogma in a central darkness; but it branches forth in all directions +with abounding natural health. As we have taken the circle as the symbol +of reason and madness, we may very well take the cross as the symbol at +once of mystery and of health. Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity +is centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in +its nature; but it is fixed for ever in its size; it can never be larger +or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a +contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its +shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre it can grow without +changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens +its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travellers.</p> + +<p>Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this deep +matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express +sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The one +created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the light of +which we look at everything. Like the sun at noonday, mysticism +explains everything else by the blaze of its own victorious +invisibility. Detached intellectualism is (in the exact sense of a +popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light without heat, and it is +secondary light, reflected from a dead world. But the Greeks were right +when they made Apollo the god both of imagination and of sanity; for he +was both the patron of poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary +dogmas and a special creed I shall speak later. But that +transcendentalism by which all men live has primarily much the position +of the sun in the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid +confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a blaze +and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and unmistakable, as +recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid on a blackboard. For +the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon is the mother of lunatics +and has given to them all her name.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_III_The_Suicide_of_Thought"></a><h2>CHAPTER III.—<i>The Suicide of Thought</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>The phrases of the street are not only forcible but subtle: for a figure +of speech can often get into a crack too small for a definition. Phrases +like "put out" or "off colour" might have been coined by Mr. Henry James +in an agony of verbal precision. And there is no more subtle truth than +that of the everyday phrase about a man having "his heart in the right +place." It involves the idea of normal proportion; not only does a +certain function exist, but it is rightly related to other functions. +Indeed, the negation of this phrase would describe with peculiar +accuracy the somewhat morbid mercy and perverse tenderness of the most +representative moderns. If, for instance, I had to describe with +fairness the character of Mr. Bernard Shaw, I could not express myself +more exactly than by saying that he has a heroically large and generous +heart; but not a heart in the right place. And this is so of the typical +society of our time.</p> + +<p>The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too +good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is +shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not +merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, +and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and +the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. +The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The +virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other +and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their +truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their +pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. For example, Mr. +Blatchford attacks Christianity because he is mad on one Christian +virtue: the merely mystical and almost irrational virtue of charity. He +has a strange idea that he will make it easier to forgive sins by saying +that there are no sins to forgive. Mr. Blatchford is not only an early +Christian, he is the only early Christian who ought really to have been +eaten by lions. For in his case the pagan accusation is really true: his +mercy would mean mere anarchy. He really is the enemy of the human +race—because he is so human. As the other extreme, we may take the +acrid realist, who has deliberately killed in himself all human pleasure +in happy tales or in the healing of the heart. Torquemada tortured +people physically for the sake of moral truth. Zola tortured people +morally for the sake of physical truth. But in Torquemada's time there +was at least a system that could to some extent make righteousness and +peace kiss each other. Now they do not even bow. But a much stronger +case than these two of truth and pity can be found in the remarkable +case of the dislocation of humility.</p> + +<p>It is only with one aspect of humility that we are here concerned. +Humility was largely meant as a restraint upon the arrogance and +infinity of the appetite of man. He was always out-stripping his mercies +with his own newly invented needs. His very power of enjoyment destroyed +half his joys. By asking for pleasure, he lost the chief pleasure; for +the chief pleasure is surprise. Hence it became evident that if a man +would make his world large, he must be always making himself small. Even +the haughty visions, the tall cities, and the toppling pinnacles are the +creations of humility. Giants that tread down forests like grass are the +creations of humility. Towers that vanish upwards above the loneliest +star are the creations of humility. For towers are not tall unless we +look up at them; and giants are not giants unless they are larger than +we. All this gigantesque imagination, which is, perhaps, the mightiest +of the pleasures of man, is at bottom entirely humble. It is impossible +without humility to enjoy anything—even pride.</p> + +<p>But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty +has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ +of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be +doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been +exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is +exactly the part he ought not to assert—himself. The part he doubts is +exactly the part he ought not to doubt—the Divine Reason. Huxley +preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is +so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should be wrong +if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. +The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it +so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the +wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that +prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him +from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his +efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a +man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working +altogether.</p> + +<p>At any street corner we may meet a man who utters the frantic and +blasphemous statement that he may be wrong. Every day one comes across +somebody who says that of course his view may not be the right one. Of +course his view must be the right one, or it is not his view. We are on +the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in +the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who +doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of +old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be +convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are +too meek even to claim their inheritance. It is exactly this +intellectual helplessness which is our second problem.</p> + +<p>The last chapter has been concerned only with a fact of observation: +that what peril of morbidity there is for man comes rather from his +reason than his imagination. It was not meant to attack the authority of +reason; rather it is the ultimate purpose to defend it. For it needs +defence. The whole modern world is at war with reason; and the tower +already reels.</p> + +<p>The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of +religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the +answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like +children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful +assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, +for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no +reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart +from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical +cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or +unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present +one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to +attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of +religious authority are like men who should attack the police without +ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril +to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it +religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And +against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race +is to avoid ruin.</p> + +<p>That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just +as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next +generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one +set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching +the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought. It +is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is +itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our +thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a +sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should +<i>anything</i> go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good +logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the +brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to +think for myself." But the old sceptic, the complete sceptic, says, "I +have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all."</p> + +<p>There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that +ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all +religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent +ages like our own: and already Mr. H.G. Wells has raised its ruinous +banner; he has written a delicate piece of scepticism called "Doubts of +the Instrument." In this he questions the brain itself, and endeavours +to remove all reality from all his own assertions, past, present, and to +come. But it was against this remote ruin that all the military systems +in religion were originally ranked and ruled. The creeds and the +crusades, the hierarchies and the horrible persecutions were not +organized, as is ignorantly said, for the suppression of reason. They +were organized for the difficult defence of reason. Man, by a blind +instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could +be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve, the authority +of popes to define the authority, even of inquisitors to terrify: these +were all only dark defences erected round one central authority, more +undemonstrable, more supernatural than all—the authority of a man to +think. We know now that this is so; we have no excuse for not knowing +it. For we can hear scepticism crashing through the old ring of +authorities, and at the same moment we can see reason swaying upon her +throne. In so far as religion is gone, reason is going. For they are +both of the same primary and authoritative kind. They are both methods +of proof which cannot themselves be proved. And in the act of +destroying the idea of Divine authority we have largely destroyed the +idea of that human authority by which we do a long-division sum. With a +long and sustained tug we have attempted to pull the mitre off +pontifical man; and his head has come off with it.</p> + +<p>Lest this should be called loose assertion, it is perhaps desirable, +though dull, to run rapidly through the chief modern fashions of thought +which have this effect of stopping thought itself. Materialism and the +view of everything as a personal illusion have some such effect; for if +the mind is mechanical, thought cannot be very exciting, and if the +cosmos is unreal, there is nothing to think about. But in these cases +the effect is indirect and doubtful. In some cases it is direct and +clear; notably in the case of what is generally called evolution.</p> + +<p>Evolution is a good example of that modern intelligence which, if it +destroys anything, destroys itself. Evolution is either an innocent +scientific description of how certain earthly things came about; or, if +it is anything more than this, it is an attack upon thought itself. If +evolution destroys anything, it does not destroy religion but +rationalism. If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an +ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is +stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well +do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he +were outside time. But if it means anything more, it means that there is +no such thing as an ape to change, and no such thing as a man for him to +change into. It means that there is no such thing as a thing. At best, +there is only one thing, and that is a flux of everything and anything. +This is an attack not upon the faith, but upon the mind; you cannot +think if there are no things to think about. You cannot think if you are +not separate from the subject of thought. Descartes said, "I think; +therefore I am." The philosophic evolutionist reverses and negatives the +epigram. He says, "I am not; therefore I cannot think."</p> + +<p>Then there is the opposite attack on thought: that urged by Mr. H.G. +Wells when he insists that every separate thing is "unique," and there +are no categories at all. This also is merely destructive. Thinking +means connecting things, and stops if they cannot be connected. It need +hardly be said that this scepticism forbidding thought necessarily +forbids speech; a man cannot open his mouth without contradicting it. +Thus when Mr. Wells says (as he did somewhere), "All chairs are quite +different," he utters not merely a misstatement, but a contradiction in +terms. If all chairs were quite different, you could not call them "all +chairs."</p> + +<p>Akin to these is the false theory of progress, which maintains that we +alter the test instead of trying to pass the test. We often hear it +said, for instance, "What is right in one age is wrong in another." This +is quite reasonable, if it means that there is a fixed aim, and that +certain methods attain at certain times and not at other times. If +women, say, desire to be elegant, it may be that they are improved at +one time by growing fatter and at another time by growing thinner. But +you cannot say that they are improved by ceasing to wish to be elegant +and beginning to wish to be oblong. If the standard changes, how can +there be improvement, which implies a standard? Nietzsche started a +nonsensical idea that men had once sought as good what we now call evil; +if it were so, we could not talk of surpassing or even falling short of +them. How can you overtake Jones if you walk in the other direction? You +cannot discuss whether one people has succeeded more in being miserable +than another succeeded in being happy. It would be like discussing +whether Milton was more puritanical than a pig is fat.</p> + +<p>It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object +or ideal. But as an ideal, change itself becomes unchangeable. If the +change-worshipper wishes to estimate his own progress, he must be +sternly loyal to the ideal of change; he must not begin to flirt gaily +with the ideal of monotony. Progress itself cannot progress. It is worth +remark, in passing, that when Tennyson, in a wild and rather weak +manner, welcomed the idea of infinite alteration in society, he +instinctively took a metaphor which suggests an imprisoned tedium. He +wrote—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He thought of change itself as an unchangeable groove; and so it is. +Change is about the narrowest and hardest groove that a man can get +into.</p> + +<p>The main point here, however, is that this idea of a fundamental +alteration in the standard is one of the things that make thought about +the past or future simply impossible. The theory of a complete change of +standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure +of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and +aristocratic pleasure of despising them.</p> + +<p>This bald summary of the thought-destroying forces of our time would not +be complete without some reference to pragmatism; for though I have here +used and should everywhere defend the pragmatist method as a preliminary +guide to truth, there is an extreme application of it which involves the +absence of all truth whatever. My meaning can be put shortly thus. I +agree with the pragmatists that apparent objective truth is not the +whole matter; that there is an authoritative need to believe the things +that are necessary to the human mind. But I say that one of those +necessities precisely is a belief in objective truth. The pragmatist +tells a man to think what he must think and never mind the Absolute. But +precisely one of the things that he must think is the Absolute. This +philosophy, indeed, is a kind of verbal paradox. Pragmatism is a matter +of human needs; and one of the first of human needs is to be something +more than a pragmatist. Extreme pragmatism is just as inhuman as the +determinism it so powerfully attacks. The determinist (who, to do him +justice, does not pretend to be a human being) makes nonsense of the +human sense of actual choice. The pragmatist, who professes to be +specially human, makes nonsense of the human sense of actual fact.</p> + +<p>To sum up our contention so far, we may say that the most characteristic +current philosophies have not only a touch of mania, but a touch of +suicidal mania. The mere questioner has knocked his head against the +limits of human thought; and cracked it. This is what makes so futile +the warnings of the orthodox and the boasts of the advanced about the +dangerous boyhood of free thought. What we are looking at is not the +boyhood of free thought; it is the old age and ultimate dissolution of +free thought. It is vain for bishops and pious bigwigs to discuss what +dreadful things will happen if wild scepticism runs its course. It has +run its course. It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great +truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have +seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself. +You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask +themselves if they have any selves. You cannot fancy a more sceptical +world than that in which men doubt if there is a world. It might +certainly have reached its bankruptcy more quickly and cleanly if it had +not been feebly hampered by the application of indefensible laws of +blasphemy or by the absurd pretence that modern England is Christian. +But it would have reached the bankruptcy anyhow. Militant atheists are +still unjustly persecuted; but rather because they are an old minority +than because they are a new one. Free thought has exhausted its own +freedom. It is weary of its own success. If any eager freethinker now +hails philosophic freedom as the dawn, he is only like the man in Mark +Twain who came out wrapped in blankets to see the sun rise and was just +in time to see it set. If any frightened curate still says that it will +be awful if the darkness of free thought should spread, we can only +answer him in the high and powerful words of Mr. Belloc, "Do not, I +beseech you, be troubled about the increase of forces already in +dissolution. You have mistaken the hour of the night: it is already +morning." We have no more questions left to ask. We have looked for +questions in the darkest corners and on the wildest peaks. We have found +all the questions that can be found. It is time we gave up looking for +questions and began looking for answers.</p> + +<p>But one more word must be added. At the beginning of this preliminary +negative sketch I said that our mental ruin has been wrought by wild +reason, not by wild imagination. A man does not go mad because he makes +a statue a mile high, but he may go mad by thinking it out in square +inches. Now, one school of thinkers has seen this and jumped at it as a +way of renewing the pagan health of the world. They see that reason +destroys; but Will, they say, creates. The ultimate authority, they say, +is in will, not in reason. The supreme point is not why a man demands a +thing, but the fact that he does demand it. I have no space to trace or +expound this philosophy of Will. It came, I suppose, through Nietzsche, +who preached something that is called egoism. That, indeed, was +simple-minded enough; for Nietzsche denied egoism simply by preaching +it. To preach anything is to give it away. First, the egoist calls life +a war without mercy, and then he takes the greatest possible trouble to +drill his enemies in war. To preach egoism is to practise altruism. But +however it began, the view is common enough in current literature. The +main defence of these thinkers is that they are not thinkers; they are +makers. They say that choice is itself the divine thing. Thus Mr. +Bernard Shaw has attacked the old idea that men's acts are to be judged +by the standard of the desire of happiness. He says that a man does not +act for his happiness, but from his will. He does not say, "Jam will +make me happy," but "I want jam." And in all this others follow him with +yet greater enthusiasm. Mr. John Davidson, a remarkable poet, is so +passionately excited about it that he is obliged to write prose. He +publishes a short play with several long prefaces. This is natural +enough in Mr. Shaw, for all his plays are prefaces: Mr. Shaw is (I +suspect) the only man on earth who has never written any poetry. But +that Mr. Davidson (who can write excellent poetry) should write instead +laborious metaphysics in defence of this doctrine of will, does show +that the doctrine of will has taken hold of men. Even Mr. H.G. Wells has +half spoken in its language; saying that one should test acts not like a +thinker, but like an artist, saying, "I <i>feel</i> this curve is right," or +"that line <i>shall</i> go thus." They are all excited; and well they may be. +For by this doctrine of the divine authority of will, they think they +can break out of the doomed fortress of rationalism. They think they can +escape.</p> + +<p>But they cannot escape. This pure praise of volition ends in the same +break up and blank as the mere pursuit of logic. Exactly as complete +free thought involves the doubting of thought itself, so the acceptation +of mere "willing" really paralyzes the will. Mr. Bernard Shaw has not +perceived the real difference between the old utilitarian test of +pleasure (clumsy, of course, and easily misstated) and that which he +propounds. The real difference between the test of happiness and the +test of will is simply that the test of happiness is a test and the +other isn't. You can discuss whether a man's act in jumping over a cliff +was directed towards happiness; you cannot discuss whether it was +derived from will. Of course it was. You can praise an action by saying +that it is calculated to bring pleasure or pain to discover truth or to +save the soul. But you cannot praise an action because it shows will; +for to say that is merely to say that it is an action. By this praise of +will you cannot really choose one course as better than another. And yet +choosing one course as better than another is the very definition of the +will you are praising.</p> + +<p>The worship of will is the negation of will. To admire mere choice is to +refuse to choose. If Mr. Bernard Shaw comes up to me and says, "Will +something," that is tantamount to saying, "I do not mind what you +will," and that is tantamount to saying, "I have no will in the matter." +You cannot admire will in general, because the essence of will is that +it is particular. A brilliant anarchist like Mr. John Davidson feels an +irritation against ordinary morality, and therefore he invokes +will—will to anything. He only wants humanity to want something. But +humanity does want something. It wants ordinary morality. He rebels +against the law and tells us to will something or anything. But we have +willed something. We have willed the law against which he rebels.</p> + +<p>All the will-worshippers, from Nietzsche to Mr. Davidson, are really +quite empty of volition. They cannot will, they can hardly wish. And if +any one wants a proof of this, it can be found quite easily. It can be +found in this fact: that they always talk of will as something that +expands and breaks out. But it is quite the opposite. Every act of will +is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. +In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose +anything, you reject everything else. That objection, which men of this +school used to make to the act of marriage, is really an objection to +every act. Every act is an irrevocable selection and exclusion. Just as +when you marry one woman you give up all the others, so when you take +one course of action you give up all the other courses. If you become +King of England, you give up the post of Beadle in Brompton. If you go +to Rome, you sacrifice a rich suggestive life in Wimbledon. It is the +existence of this negative or limiting side of will that makes most of +the talk of the anarchic will-worshippers little better than nonsense. +For instance, Mr. John Davidson tells us to have nothing to do with +"Thou shalt not"; but it is surely obvious that "Thou shalt not" is only +one of the necessary corollaries of "I will." "I will go to the Lord +Mayor's Show, and thou shalt not stop me." Anarchism adjures us to be +bold creative artists, and care for no laws or limits. But it is +impossible to be an artist and not care for laws and limits. Art is +limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame. If you draw a +giraffe, you must draw him with a long neck. If, in your bold creative +way, you hold yourself free to draw a giraffe with a short neck, you +will really find that you are not free to draw a giraffe. The moment you +step into the world of facts, you step into a world of limits. You can +free things from alien or accidental laws, but not from the laws of +their own nature. You may, if you like, free a tiger from his bars; but +do not free him from his stripes. Do not free a camel of the burden of +his hump: you may be freeing him from being a camel. Do not go about as +a demagogue, encouraging triangles to break out of the prison of their +three sides. If a triangle breaks out of its three sides, its life comes +to a lamentable end. Somebody wrote a work called "The Loves of the +Triangles"; I never read it, but I am sure that if triangles ever were +loved, they were loved for being triangular. This is certainly the case +with all artistic creation, which is in some ways the most decisive +example of pure will. The artist loves his limitations: they constitute +the <i>thing</i> he is doing. The painter is glad that the canvas is flat. +The sculptor is glad that the clay is colourless.</p> + +<p>In case the point is not clear, an historic example may illustrate it. +The French Revolution was really an heroic and decisive thing, because +the Jacobins willed something definite and limited. They desired the +freedoms of democracy, but also all the vetoes of democracy. They wished +to have votes and <i>not</i> to have titles. Republicanism had an ascetic +side in Franklin or Robespierre as well as an expansive side in Danton +or Wilkes. Therefore they have created something with a solid substance +and shape, the square social equality and peasant wealth of France. But +since then the revolutionary or speculative mind of Europe has been +weakened by shrinking from any proposal because of the limits of that +proposal. Liberalism has been degraded into liberality. Men have tried +to turn "revolutionise" from a transitive to an intransitive verb. The +Jacobin could tell you not only the system he would rebel against, but +(what was more important) the system he would <i>not</i> rebel against, the +system he would trust. But the new rebel is a sceptic, and will not +entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be +really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really +gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation +implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist +doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which +he denounces it. Thus he writes one book complaining that imperial +oppression insults the purity of women, and then he writes another book +(about the sex problem) in which he insults it himself. He curses the +Sultan because Christian girls lose their virginity, and then curses +Mrs. Grundy because they keep it. As a politician, he will cry out that +war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is +waste of time. A Russian pessimist will denounce a policeman for killing +a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that +the peasant ought to have killed himself. A man denounces marriage as a +lie, and then denounces aristocratic profligates for treating it as a +lie. He calls a flag a bauble, and then blames the oppressors of Poland +or Ireland because they take away that bauble. The man of this school +goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are +treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and +goes on to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically +are beasts. In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite +sceptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on +politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics +he attacks morality for trampling on men. Therefore the modern man in +revolt has become practically useless for all purposes of revolt. By +rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against +anything.</p> + +<p>It may be added that the same blank and bankruptcy can be observed in +all fierce and terrible types of literature, especially in satire. +Satire may be mad and anarchic, but it presupposes an admitted +superiority in certain things over others; it presupposes a standard. +When little boys in the street laugh at the fatness of some +distinguished journalist, they are unconsciously assuming a standard of +Greek sculpture. They are appealing to the marble Apollo. And the +curious disappearance of satire from our literature is an instance of +the fierce things fading for want of any principle to be fierce about. +Nietzsche had some natural talent for sarcasm: he could sneer, though he +could not laugh; but there is always something bodiless and without +weight in his satire, simply because it has not any mass of common +morality behind it. He is himself more preposterous than anything he +denounces. But, indeed, Nietzsche will stand very well as the type of +the whole of this failure of abstract violence. The softening of the +brain which ultimately overtook him was not a physical accident. If +Nietzsche had not ended in imbecility, Nietzscheism would end in +imbecility. Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. +Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have +softening of the brain.</p> + +<p>This last attempt to evade intellectualism ends in intellectualism, and +therefore in death. The sortie has failed. The wild worship of +lawlessness and the materialist worship of law end in the same void. +Nietzsche scales staggering mountains, but he turns up ultimately in +Tibet. He sits down beside Tolstoy in the land of nothing and Nirvana. +They are both helpless—one because he must not grasp anything, and the +other because he must not let go of anything. The Tolstoyan's will is +frozen by a Buddhist instinct that all special actions are evil. But the +Nietzscheite's will is quite equally frozen by his view that all special +actions are good; for if all special actions are good, none of them are +special. They stand at the cross-roads, and one hates all the roads and +the other likes all the roads. The result is—well, some things are not +hard to calculate. They stand at the cross-roads.</p> + +<p>Here I end (thank God) the first and dullest business of this book—the +rough review of recent thought. After this I begin to sketch a view of +life which may not interest my reader, but which, at any rate, interests +me. In front of me, as I close this page, is a pile of modern books that +I have been turning over for the purpose—a pile of ingenuity, a pile of +futility. By the accident of my present detachment, I can see the +inevitable smash of the philosophies of Schopenhauer and Tolstoy, +Nietzsche and Shaw, as clearly as an inevitable railway smash could be +seen from a balloon. They are all on the road to the emptiness of the +asylum. For madness may be defined as using mental activity so as to +reach mental helplessness; and they have nearly reached it. He who +thinks he is made of glass, thinks to the destruction of thought; for +glass cannot think. So he who wills to reject nothing, wills the +destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but +the rejection of almost everything. And as I turn and tumble over the +clever, wonderful, tiresome, and useless modern books, the title of one +of them rivets my eye. It is called "Jeanne d'Arc," by Anatole France. I +have only glanced at it, but a glance was enough to remind me of Renan's +"Vie de Jésus." It has the same strange method of the reverent sceptic. +It discredits supernatural stories that have some foundation, simply by +telling natural stories that have no foundation. Because we cannot +believe in what a saint did, we are to pretend that we know exactly what +he felt. But I do not mention either book in order to criticise it, but +because the accidental combination of the names called up two startling +images of sanity which blasted all the books before me. Joan of Arc was +not stuck at the cross-roads, either by rejecting all the paths like +Tolstoy, or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path, and +went down it like a thunderbolt. Yet Joan, when I came to think of her, +had in her all that was true either in Tolstoy or Nietzsche, all that +was even tolerable in either of them. I thought of all that is noble in +Tolstoy, the pleasure in plain things, especially in plain pity, the +actualities of the earth, the reverence for the poor, the dignity of the +bowed back. Joan of Arc had all that and with this great addition, that +she endured poverty as well as admiring it; whereas Tolstoy is only a +typical aristocrat trying to find out its secret. And then I thought of +all that was brave and proud and pathetic in poor Nietzsche, and his +mutiny against the emptiness and timidity of our time. I thought of his +cry for the ecstatic equilibrium of danger, his hunger for the rush of +great horses, his cry to arms. Well, Joan of Arc had all that, and again +with this difference, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We +<i>know</i> that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche, for all we +know, was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant; she was +the peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior; she was the warrior. +She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals; she was more gentle +than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly +practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who +do nothing. It was impossible that the thought should not cross my mind +that she and her faith had perhaps some secret of moral unity and +utility that has been lost. And with that thought came a larger one, and +the colossal figure of her Master had also crossed the theatre of my +thoughts. The same modern difficulty which darkened the subject-matter +of Anatole France also darkened that of Ernest Renan. Renan also divided +his hero's pity from his hero's pugnacity. Renan even represented the +righteous anger at Jerusalem as a mere nervous breakdown after the +idyllic expectations of Galilee. As if there were any inconsistency +between having a love for humanity and having a hatred for inhumanity! +Altruists, with thin, weak voices, denounce Christ as an egoist. Egoists +(with even thinner and weaker voices) denounce Him as an altruist. In +our present atmosphere such cavils are comprehensible enough. The love +of a hero is more terrible than the hatred of a tyrant. The hatred of a +hero is more generous than the love of a philanthropist. There is a huge +and heroic sanity of which moderns can only collect the fragments. There +is a giant of whom we see only the lopped arms and legs walking about. +They have torn the soul of Christ into silly strips, labelled egoism and +altruism, and they are equally puzzled by His insane magnificence and +His insane meekness. They have parted His garments among them, and for +His vesture they have cast lots; though the coat was without seam woven +from the top throughout.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_IV_The_Ethics_of_Elfland"></a><h2>CHAPTER IV—<i>The Ethics of Elfland</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>When the business man rebukes the idealism of his office-boy, it is +commonly in some such speech as this: "Ah, yes, when one is young, one +has these ideals in the abstract and these castles in the air; but in +middle age they all break up like clouds, and one comes down to a belief +in practical politics, to using the machinery one has and getting on +with the world as it is." Thus, at least, venerable and philanthropic +old men now in their honoured graves used to talk to me when I was a +boy. But since then I have grown up and have discovered that these +philanthropic old men were telling lies. What has really happened is +exactly the opposite of what they said would happen. They said that I +should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical +politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in +fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my old +childlike faith in practical politics. I am still as much concerned as +ever about the Battle of Armageddon; but I am not so much concerned +about the General Election. As a babe I leapt up on my mother's knee at +the mere mention of it. No; the vision is always solid and reliable. The +vision is always a fact. It is the reality that is often a fraud. As +much as I ever did, more than I ever did, I believe in Liberalism. But +there was a rosy time of innocence when I believed in Liberals.</p> + +<p>I take this instance of one of the enduring faiths because, having now +to trace the roots of my personal speculation, this may be counted, I +think, as the only positive bias. I was brought up a Liberal, and have +always believed in democracy, in the elementary liberal doctrine of a +self-governing humanity. If any one finds the phrase vague or +threadbare, I can only pause for a moment to explain that the principle +of democracy, as I mean it, can be stated in two propositions. The first +is this: that the things common to all men are more important than the +things peculiar to any men. Ordinary things are more valuable than +extraordinary things; nay, they are more extraordinary. Man is something +more awful than men; something more strange. The sense of the miracle of +humanity itself should be always more vivid to us than any marvels of +power, intellect, art, or civilization. The mere man on two legs, as +such, should be felt as something more heart-breaking than any music +and more startling than any caricature. Death is more tragic even than +death by starvation. Having a nose is more comic even than having a +Norman nose.</p> + +<p>This is the first principle of democracy: that the essential things in +men are the things they hold in common, not the things they hold +separately. And the second principle is merely this: that the political +instinct or desire is one of these things which they hold in common. +Falling in love is more poetical than dropping into poetry. The +democratic contention is that government (helping to rule the tribe) is +a thing like falling in love, and not a thing like dropping into poetry. +It is not something analogous to playing the church organ, painting on +vellum, discovering the North Pole (that insidious habit), looping the +loop, being Astronomer Royal, and so on. For these things we do not wish +a man to do at all unless he does them well. It is, on the contrary, a +thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own +nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them +badly. I am not here arguing the truth of any of these conceptions; I +know that some moderns are asking to have their wives chosen by +scientists, and they may soon be asking, for all I know, to have their +noses blown by nurses. I merely say that mankind does recognize these +universal human functions, and that democracy classes government among +them. In short, the democratic faith is this: that the most terribly +important things must be left to ordinary men themselves—the mating of +the sexes, the rearing of the young, the laws of the state. This is +democracy; and in this I have always believed.</p> + +<p>But there is one thing that I have never from my youth up been able to +understand. I have never been able to understand where people got the +idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious +that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting +to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or +arbitrary record. The man who quotes some German historian against the +tradition of the Catholic Church, for instance, is strictly appealing to +aristocracy. He is appealing to the superiority of one expert against +the awful authority of a mob. It is quite easy to see why a legend is +treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of +history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the +village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in +the village who is mad. Those who urge against tradition that men in the +past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with +the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for +us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in +great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no +reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or +fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. +Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our +ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit +to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be +walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the +accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the +accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's +opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a +good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot +separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to +me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. +The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It +is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot +papers, are marked with a cross.</p> + +<p>I have first to say, therefore, that if I have had a bias, it was always +a bias in favour of democracy, and therefore of tradition. Before we +come to any theoretic or logical beginnings I am content to allow for +that personal equation; I have always been more inclined to believe the +ruck of hard-working people than to believe that special and troublesome +literary class to which I belong. I prefer even the fancies and +prejudices of the people who see life from the inside to the clearest +demonstrations of the people who see life from the outside. I would +always trust the old wives' fables against the old maids' facts. As long +as wit is mother wit it can be as wild as it pleases.</p> + +<p>Now, I have to put together a general position, and I pretend to no +training in such things. I propose to do it, therefore, by writing down +one after another the three or four fundamental ideas which I have found +for myself, pretty much in the way that I found them. Then I shall +roughly synthesise them, summing up my personal philosophy or natural +religion; then I shall describe my startling discovery that the whole +thing had been discovered before. It had been discovered by +Christianity. But of these profound persuasions which I have to recount +in order, the earliest was concerned with this element of popular +tradition. And without the foregoing explanation touching tradition and +democracy I could hardly make my mental experience clear. As it is, I do +not know whether I can make it clear, but I now propose to try.</p> + +<p>My first and last philosophy, that which I believe in with unbroken +certainty, I learnt in the nursery. I generally learnt it from a nurse; +that is, from the solemn and star-appointed priestess at once of +democracy and tradition. The things I believed most then, the things I +believe most now, are the things called fairy tales. They seem to me to +be the entirely reasonable things. They are not fantasies: compared with +them other things are fantastic. Compared with them religion and +rationalism are both abnormal, though religion is abnormally right and +rationalism abnormally wrong. Fairyland is nothing but the sunny country +of common sense. It is not earth that judges heaven, but heaven that +judges earth; so for me at least it was not earth that criticised +elfland, but elfland that criticised the earth. I knew the magic +beanstalk before I had tasted beans; I was sure of the Man in the Moon +before I was certain of the moon. This was at one with all popular +tradition. Modern minor poets are naturalists, and talk about the bush +or the brook; but the singers of the old epics and fables were +supernaturalists, and talked about the gods of brook and bush. That is +what the moderns mean when they say that the ancients did not +"appreciate Nature," because they said that Nature was divine. Old +nurses do not tell children about the grass, but about the fairies that +dance on the grass; and the old Greeks could not see the trees for the +dryads.</p> + +<p>But I deal here with what ethic and philosophy come from being fed on +fairy tales. If I were describing them in detail I could note many noble +and healthy principles that arise from them. There is the chivalrous +lesson of "Jack the Giant Killer"; that giants should be killed because +they are gigantic. It is a manly mutiny against pride as such. For the +rebel is older than all the kingdoms, and the Jacobin has more tradition +than the Jacobite. There is the lesson of "Cinderella," which is the +same as that of the Magnificat—<i>exaltavit humiles.</i> There is the great +lesson of "Beauty and the Beast"; that a thing must be loved <i>before</i> +it is loveable. There is the terrible allegory of the "Sleeping Beauty," +which tells how the human creature was blessed with all birthday gifts, +yet cursed with death; and how death also may perhaps be softened to a +sleep. But I am not concerned with any of the separate statutes of +elfland, but with the whole spirit of its law, which I learnt before I +could speak, and shall retain when I cannot write. I am concerned with a +certain way of looking at life, which was created in me by the fairy +tales, but has since been meekly ratified by the mere facts.</p> + +<p>It might be stated this way. There are certain sequences or developments +(cases of one thing following another), which are, in the true sense of +the word, reasonable. They are, in the true sense of the word, +necessary. Such are mathematical and merely logical sequences. We in +fairyland (who are the most reasonable of all creatures) admit that +reason and that necessity. For instance, if the Ugly Sisters are older +than Cinderella, it is (in an iron and awful sense) <i>necessary</i> that +Cinderella is younger than the Ugly Sisters. There is no getting out of +it. Haeckel may talk as much fatalism about that fact as he pleases: it +really must be. If Jack is the son of a miller, a miller is the father +of Jack. Cold reason decrees it from her awful throne: and we in +fairyland submit. If the three brothers all ride horses, there are six +animals and eighteen legs involved: that is true rationalism, and +fairyland is full of it. But as I put my head over the hedge of the +elves and began to take notice of the natural world, I observed an +extraordinary thing. I observed that learned men in spectacles were +talking of the actual things that happened—dawn and death and so on—as +if <i>they</i> were rational and inevitable. They talked as if the fact that +trees bear fruit were just as <i>necessary</i> as the fact that two and one +trees make three. But it is not. There is an enormous difference by the +test of fairyland; which is the test of the imagination. You cannot +<i>imagine</i> two and one not making three. But you can easily imagine trees +not growing fruit; you can imagine them growing golden candlesticks or +tigers hanging on by the tail. These men in spectacles spoke much of a +man named Newton, who was hit by an apple, and who discovered a law. But +they could not be got to see the distinction between a true law, a law +of reason, and the mere fact of apples falling. If the apple hit +Newton's nose, Newton's nose hit the apple. That is a true necessity: +because we cannot conceive the one occurring without the other. But we +can quite well conceive the apple not falling on his nose; we can fancy +it flying ardently through the air to hit some other nose, of which it +had a more definite dislike. We have always in our fairy tales kept this +sharp distinction between the science of mental relations, in which +there really are laws, and the science of physical facts, in which there +are no laws, but only weird repetitions. We believe in bodily miracles, +but not in mental impossibilities. We believe that a Bean-stalk climbed +up to Heaven; but that does not at all confuse our convictions on the +philosophical question of how many beans make five.</p> + +<p>Here is the peculiar perfection of tone and truth in the nursery tales. +The man of science says, "Cut the stalk, and the apple will fall"; but +he says it calmly, as if the one idea really led up to the other. The +witch in the fairy tale says, "Blow the horn, and the ogre's castle will +fall"; but she does not say it as if it were something in which the +effect obviously arose out of the cause. Doubtless she has given the +advice to many champions, and has seen many castles fall, but she does +not lose either her wonder or her reason. She does not muddle her head +until it imagines a necessary mental connection between a horn and a +falling tower. But the scientific men do muddle their heads, until they +imagine a necessary mental connection between an apple leaving the tree +and an apple reaching the ground. They do really talk as if they had +found not only a set of marvellous facts, but a truth connecting those +facts. They do talk as if the connection of two strange things +physically connected them philosophically. They feel that because one +incomprehensible thing constantly follows another incomprehensible thing +the two together somehow make up a comprehensible thing. Two black +riddles make a white answer.</p> + +<p>In fairyland we avoid the word "law"; but in the land of science they +are singularly fond of it. Thus they will call some interesting +conjecture about how forgotten folks pronounced the alphabet, Grimm's +Law. But Grimm's Law is far less intellectual than Grimm's Fairy Tales. +The tales are, at any rate, certainly tales; while the law is not a law. +A law implies that we know the nature of the generalisation and +enactment; not merely that we have noticed some of the effects. If there +is a law that pick-pockets shall go to prison, it implies that there is +an imaginable mental connection between the idea of prison and the idea +of picking pockets. And we know what the idea is. We can say why we take +liberty from a man who takes liberties. But we cannot say why an egg can +turn into a chicken any more than we can say why a bear could turn into +a fairy prince. As <i>ideas</i>, the egg and the chicken are further off each +other than the bear and the prince; for no egg in itself suggests a +chicken, whereas some princes do suggest bears. Granted, then, that +certain transformations do happen, it is essential that we should regard +them in the philosophic manner of fairy tales, not in the unphilosophic +manner of science and the "Laws of Nature." When we are asked why eggs +turn to birds or fruits fall in autumn, we must answer exactly as the +fairy godmother would answer if Cinderella asked her why mice turned to +horses or her clothes fell from her at twelve o'clock. We must answer +that it is <i>magic</i>. It is not a "law," for we do not understand its +general formula. It is not a necessity, for though we can count on it +happening practically, we have no right to say that it must always +happen. It is no argument for unalterable law (as Huxley fancied) that +we count on the ordinary course of things. We do not count on it; we bet +on it. We risk the remote possibility of a miracle as we do that of a +poisoned pancake or a world-destroying comet. We leave it out of +account, not because it is a miracle, and therefore an impossibility, +but because it is a miracle, and therefore an exception. All the terms +used in the science books, "law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and +so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis +which we do not possess. The only words that ever satisfied me as +describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," +"spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and +its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a <i>magic</i> tree. Water runs +downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is +bewitched.</p> + +<p>I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have +some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is +simply rational and agnostic. It is the only way I can express in words +my clear and definite perception that one thing is quite distinct from +another; that there is no logical connection between flying and laying +eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who +is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a +sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he +is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen +birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, +tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A +forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so +the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both +cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A +sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, +by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the +materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a +sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, +apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from +fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not +grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country.</p> + +<p>This elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the +fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived +from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct +of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of +the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that +when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need +tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by +being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of +three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like +romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales—because they find them +romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to +whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This +proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of +interest and amazement. These tales say that apples were golden only to +refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They +make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, +that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and +even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher +agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in +scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who +has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and +appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every +man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may +understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than +any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know +thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all +forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that +we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism +only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we +have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstacy only means +that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.</p> + +<p>But though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the +streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. +It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder +has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be +definitely marked on our road through fairyland. I shall speak in the +next chapter about optimists and pessimists in their intellectual +aspect, so far as they have one. Here I am only trying to describe the +enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion +was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstacy +because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an +opportunity. The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact +that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a +fairy tale. The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, +though I hardly knew to whom. Children are grateful when Santa Claus +puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful +to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous +legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can +I thank no one for the birthday present of birth?</p> + +<p>There were, then, these two first feelings, indefensible and +indisputable. The world was a shock, but it was not merely shocking; +existence was a surprise, but it was a pleasant surprise. In fact, all +my first views were exactly uttered in a riddle that stuck in my brain +from boyhood. The question was, "What did the first frog say?" And the +answer was, "Lord, how you made me jump!" That says succinctly all that +I am saying. God made the frog jump; but the frog prefers jumping. But +when these things are settled there enters the second great principle +of the fairy philosophy.</p> + +<p>Any one can see it who will simply read "Grimm's Fairy Tales" or the +fine collections of Mr. Andrew Lang. For the pleasure of pedantry I will +call it the Doctrine of Conditional Joy. Touchstone talked of much +virtue in an "if"; according to elfin ethics all virtue is in an "if." +The note of the fairy utterance always is, "You may live in a palace of +gold and sapphire, <i>if</i> you do not say the word 'cow'"; or "You may live +happily with the King's daughter, <i>if</i> you do not show her an onion." +The vision always hangs upon a veto. All the dizzy and colossal things +conceded depend upon one small thing withheld. All the wild and whirling +things that are let loose depend upon one thing that is forbidden. Mr. +W.B. Yeats, in his exquisite and piercing elfin poetry, describes the +elves as lawless; they plunge in innocent anarchy on the unbridled +horses of the air—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Ride on the crest of the dishevelled tide,<br /></span> +<span>And dance upon the mountains like a flame."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It is a dreadful thing to say that Mr. W.B. Yeats does not understand +fairyland. But I do say it. He is an ironical Irishman, full of +intellectual reactions. He is not stupid enough to understand +fairyland. Fairies prefer people of the yokel type like myself; people +who gape and grin and do as they are told. Mr. Yeats reads into elfland +all the righteous insurrection of his own race. But the lawlessness of +Ireland is a Christian lawlessness, founded on reason and justice. The +Fenian is rebelling against something he understands only too well; but +the true citizen of fairyland is obeying something that he does not +understand at all. In the fairy tale an incomprehensible happiness rests +upon an incomprehensible condition. A box is opened, and all evils fly +out. A word is forgotten, and cities perish. A lamp is lit, and love +flies away. A flower is plucked, and human lives are forfeited. An apple +is eaten, and the hope of God is gone.</p> + +<p>This is the tone of fairy tales, and it is certainly not lawlessness or +even liberty, though men under a mean modern tyranny may think it +liberty by comparison. People out of Portland Gaol might think Fleet +Street free; but closer study will prove that both fairies and +journalists are the slaves of duty. Fairy godmothers seem at least as +strict as other godmothers. Cinderella received a coach out of +Wonderland and a coachman out of nowhere, but she received a +command—which might have come out of Brixton—that she should be back +by twelve. Also, she had a glass slipper; and it cannot be a coincidence +that glass is so common a substance in folk-lore. This princess lives in +a glass castle, that princess on a glass hill; this one sees all things +in a mirror; they may all live in glass houses if they will not throw +stones. For this thin glitter of glass everywhere is the expression of +the fact that the happiness is bright but brittle, like the substance +most easily smashed by a housemaid or a cat. And this fairy-tale +sentiment also sank into me and became my sentiment towards the whole +world. I felt and feel that life itself is as bright as the diamond, but +as brittle as the window-pane; and when the heavens were compared to the +terrible crystal I can remember a shudder. I was afraid that God would +drop the cosmos with a crash.</p> + +<p>Remember, however, that to be breakable is not the same as to be +perishable. Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do +not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years. Such, it seemed, was +the joy of man, either in elfland or on earth; the happiness depended on +<i>not doing something</i> which you could at any moment do and which, very +often, it was not obvious why you should not do. Now, the point here is +that to <i>me</i> this did not seem unjust. If the miller's third son said to +the fairy, "Explain why I must not stand on my head in the fairy +palace," the other might fairly reply, "Well, if it comes to that, +explain the fairy palace." If Cinderella says, "How is it that I must +leave the ball at twelve?" her godmother might answer, "How is it that +you are going there till twelve?" If I leave a man in my will ten +talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the +conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not +look a winged horse in the mouth. And it seemed to me that existence was +itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not +understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand +the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture. The +veto might well be as wild as the vision; it might be as startling as +the sun, as elusive as the waters, as fantastic and terrible as the +towering trees.</p> + +<p>For this reason (we may call it the fairy godmother philosophy) I never +could join the young men of my time in feeling what they called the +general sentiment of <i>revolt</i>. I should have resisted, let us hope, any +rules that were evil, and with these and their definition I shall deal +in another chapter. But I did not feel disposed to resist any rule +merely because it was mysterious. Estates are sometimes held by foolish +forms, the breaking of a stick or the payment of a peppercorn: I was +willing to hold the huge estate of earth and heaven by any such feudal +fantasy. It could not well be wilder than the fact that I was allowed to +hold it at all. At this stage I give only one ethical instance to show +my meaning. I could never mix in the common murmur of that rising +generation against monogamy, because no restriction on sex seemed so odd +and unexpected as sex itself. To be allowed, like Endymion, to make love +to the moon and then to complain that Jupiter kept his own moons in a +harem seemed to me (bred on fairy tales like Endymion's) a vulgar +anti-climax. Keeping to one woman is a small price for so much as seeing +one woman. To complain that I could only be married once was like +complaining that I had only been born once. It was incommensurate with +the terrible excitement of which one was talking. It showed, not an +exaggerated sensibility to sex, but a curious insensibility to it. A man +is a fool who complains that he cannot enter Eden by five gates at +once. Polygamy is a lack of the realization of sex; it is like a man +plucking five pears in mere absence of mind. The æsthetes touched the +last insane limits of language in their eulogy on lovely things. The +thistledown made them weep; a burnished beetle brought them to their +knees. Yet their emotion never impressed me for an instant, for this +reason, that it never occurred to them to pay for their pleasure in any +sort of symbolic sacrifice. Men (I felt) might fast forty days for the +sake of hearing a blackbird sing. Men might go through fire to find a +cowslip. Yet these lovers of beauty could not even keep sober for the +blackbird. They would not go through common Christian marriage by way of +recompense to the cowslip. Surely one might pay for extraordinary joy in +ordinary morals. Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because +we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for +sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde.</p> + +<p>Well, I left the fairy tales lying on the floor of the nursery, and I +have not found any books so sensible since. I left the nurse guardian of +tradition and democracy, and I have not found any modern type so sanely +radical or so sanely conservative. But the matter for important comment +was here, that when I first went out into the mental atmosphere of the +modern world, I found that the modern world was positively opposed on +two points to my nurse and to the nursery tales. It has taken me a long +time to find out that the modern world is wrong and my nurse was right. +The really curious thing was this: that modern thought contradicted this +basic creed of my boyhood on its two most essential doctrines. I have +explained that the fairy tales founded in me two convictions; first, +that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been +quite different, but which is quite delightful; second, that before this +wildness and delight one may well be modest and submit to the queerest +limitations of so queer a kindness. But I found the whole modern world +running like a high tide against both my tendernesses; and the shock of +that collision created two sudden and spontaneous sentiments, which I +have had ever since and which, crude as they were, have since hardened +into convictions.</p> + +<p>First, I found the whole modern world talking scientific fatalism; +saying that everything is as it must always have been, being unfolded +without fault from the beginning. The leaf on the tree is green because +it could never have been anything else. Now, the fairy-tale philosopher +is glad that the leaf is green precisely because it might have been +scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked +at it. He is pleased that snow is white on the strictly reasonable +ground that it might have been black. Every colour has in it a bold +quality as of choice; the red of garden roses is not only decisive but +dramatic, like suddenly spilt blood. He feels that something has been +<i>done</i>. But the great determinists of the nineteenth century were +strongly against this native feeling that something had happened an +instant before. In fact, according to them, nothing ever really had +happened since the beginning of the world. Nothing ever had happened +since existence had happened; and even about the date of that they were +not very sure.</p> + +<p>The modern world as I found it was solid for modern Calvinism, for the +necessity of things being as they are. But when I came to ask them I +found they had really no proof of this unavoidable repetition in things +except the fact that the things were repeated. Now, the mere repetition +made the things to me rather more weird than more rational. It was as +if, having seen a curiously shaped nose in the street and dismissed it +as an accident, I had then seen six other noses of the same astonishing +shape. I should have fancied for a moment that it must be some local +secret society. So one elephant having a trunk was odd; but all +elephants having trunks looked like a plot. I speak here only of an +emotion, and of an emotion at once stubborn and subtle. But the +repetition in Nature seemed sometimes to be an excited repetition, like +that of an angry schoolmaster saying the same thing over and over again. +The grass seemed signalling to me with all its fingers at once; the +crowded stars seemed bent upon being understood. The sun would make me +see him if he rose a thousand times. The recurrences of the universe +rose to the maddening rhythm of an incantation, and I began to see an +idea.</p> + +<p>All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests +ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that +if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of +clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; +if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation +to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought +into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off +of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some +slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he +is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. +But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to +Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to +Sheerness. The very speed and ecstasy of his life would have the +stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every +morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my +inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true +that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His +routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The +thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some +game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs +rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have +abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, +therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do +it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly +dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. +But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible +that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every +evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity +that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy +separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He +has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, +and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a +mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical <i>encore</i>. Heaven may <i>encore</i> +the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth +a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, +the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life +or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that +they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every +human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition +may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it +may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and +yet each birth be his positively last appearance.</p> + +<p>This was my first conviction; made by the shock of my childish emotions +meeting the modern creed in mid-career. I had always vaguely felt facts +to be miracles in the sense that they are wonderful: now I began to +think them miracles in the stricter sense that they were <i>wilful</i>. I +mean that they were, or might be, repeated exercises of some will. In +short, I had always believed that the world involved magic: now I +thought that perhaps it involved a magician. And this pointed a profound +emotion always present and sub-conscious; that this world of ours has +some purpose; and if there is a purpose, there is a person. I had always +felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a +story-teller.</p> + +<p>But modern thought also hit my second human tradition. It went against +the fairy feeling about strict limits and conditions. The one thing it +loved to talk about was expansion and largeness. Herbert Spencer would +have been greatly annoyed if any one had called him an imperialist, and +therefore it is highly regrettable that nobody did. But he was an +imperialist of the lowest type. He popularized this contemptible notion +that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma +of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any +more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of +God, then a whale may be the image of God; a somewhat formless image; +what one might call an impressionist portrait. It is quite futile to +argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small +compared to the nearest tree. But Herbert Spencer, in his headlong +imperialism, would insist that we had in some way been conquered and +annexed by the astronomical universe. He spoke about men and their +ideals exactly as the most insolent Unionist talks about the Irish and +their ideals. He turned mankind into a small nationality. And his evil +influence can be seen even in the most spirited and honourable of later +scientific authors; notably in the early romances of Mr. H.G. Wells. +Many moralists have in an exaggerated way represented the earth as +wicked. But Mr. Wells and his school made the heavens wicked. We should +lift up our eyes to the stars from whence would come our ruin.</p> + +<p>But the expansion of which I speak was much more evil than all this. I +have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in +the prison of one thought. These people seemed to think it singularly +inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large. The size of +this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went +on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be +anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness +or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added +nothing to it. It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he +would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county. The +warder would have nothing to show the man except more and more long +corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human. +So these expanders of the universe had nothing to show us except more +and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of +all that is divine.</p> + +<p>In fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for +the definition of a law is something that can be broken. But the +machinery of this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; +for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery. We were either +unable to do things or we were destined to do them. The idea of the +mystical condition quite disappeared; one can neither have the firmness +of keeping laws nor the fun of breaking them. The largeness of this +universe had nothing of that freshness and airy outbreak which we have +praised in the universe of the poet. This modern universe is literally +an empire; that is, it is vast, but it is not free. One went into larger +and larger windowless rooms, rooms big with Babylonian perspective; but +one never found the smallest window or a whisper of outer air.</p> + +<p>Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all +good things come to a point, swords for instance. So finding the boast +of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue +about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even +shallower than could have been expected. According to these people the +cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule. Only (they would +say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is. Why, +then, should one worry particularly to call it large? There is nothing +to compare it with. It would be just as sensible to call it small. A man +may say, "I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its +crowd of varied creatures." But if it comes to that why should not a man +say, "I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars +and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see"? One is as good +as the other; they are both mere sentiments. It is mere sentiment to +rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a +sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses +to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not +choose to have an emotion about its smallness?</p> + +<p>It happened that I had that emotion. When one is fond of anything one +addresses it by diminutives, even if it is an elephant or a +lifeguardsman. The reason is, that anything, however huge, that can be +conceived of as complete, can be conceived of as small. If military +moustaches did not suggest a sword or tusks a tail, then the object +would be vast because it would be immeasurable. But the moment you can +imagine a guardsman you can imagine a small guardsman. The moment you +really see an elephant you can call it "Tiny." If you can make a statue +of a thing you can make a statuette of it. These people professed that +the universe was one coherent thing; but they were not fond of the +universe. But I was frightfully fond of the universe and wanted to +address it by a diminutive. I often did so; and it never seemed to mind. +Actually and in truth I did feel that these dim dogmas of vitality were +better expressed by calling the world small than by calling it large. +For about infinity there was a sort of carelessness which was the +reverse of the fierce and pious care which I felt touching the +pricelessness and the peril of life. They showed only a dreary waste; +but I felt a sort of sacred thrift. For economy is far more romantic +than extravagance. To them stars were an unending income of halfpence; +but I felt about the golden sun and the silver moon as a schoolboy feels +if he has one sovereign and one shilling.</p> + +<p>These subconscious convictions are best hit off by the colour and tone +of certain tales. Thus I have said that stories of magic alone can +express my sense that life is not only a pleasure but a kind of +eccentric privilege. I may express this other feeling of cosmic cosiness +by allusion to another book always read in boyhood, "Robinson Crusoe," +which I read about this time, and which owes its eternal vivacity to the +fact that it celebrates the poetry of limits, nay, even the wild romance +of prudence. Crusoe is a man on a small rock with a few comforts just +snatched from the sea: the best thing in the book is simply the list of +things saved from the wreck. The greatest of poems is an inventory. +Every kitchen tool becomes ideal because Crusoe might have dropped it +in the sea. It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to +look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy +one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the +solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all +things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from +a wreck. Every man has had one horrible adventure: as a hidden untimely +birth he had not been, as infants that never see the light. Men spoke +much in my boyhood of restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was +common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it is a +more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great +Might-Not-Have-Been.</p> + +<p>But I really felt (the fancy may seem foolish) as if all the order and +number of things were the romantic remnant of Crusoe's ship. That there +are two sexes and one sun, was like the fact that there were two guns +and one axe. It was poignantly urgent that none should be lost; but +somehow, it was rather fun that none could be added. The trees and the +planets seemed like things saved from the wreck: and when I saw the +Matterhorn I was glad that it had not been overlooked in the confusion. +I felt economical about the stars as if they were sapphires (they are +called so in Milton's Eden): I hoarded the hills. For the universe is a +single jewel, and while it is a natural cant to talk of a jewel as +peerless and priceless, of this jewel it is literally true. This cosmos +is indeed without peer and without price: for there cannot be another +one.</p> + +<p>Thus ends, in unavoidable inadequacy, the attempt to utter the +unutterable things. These are my ultimate attitudes towards life; the +soils for the seeds of doctrine. These in some dark way I thought before +I could write, and felt before I could think: that we may proceed more +easily afterwards, I will roughly recapitulate them now. I felt in my +bones; first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a +miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, +with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, +if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural +explanations I have heard. The thing is magic, true or false. Second, I +came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have some +one to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work +of art; whatever it meant it meant violently. Third, I thought this +purpose beautiful in its old design, in spite of its defects, such as +dragons. Fourth, that the proper form of thanks to it is some form of +humility and restraint: we should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not +drinking too much of them. We owed, also, an obedience to whatever made +us. And last, and strangest, there had come into my mind a vague and +vast impression that in some way all good was a remnant to be stored and +held sacred out of some primordial ruin. Man had saved his good as +Crusoe saved his goods: he had saved them from a wreck. All this I felt +and the age gave me no encouragement to feel it. And all this time I had +not even thought of Christian theology.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_V_The_Flag_of_the_World"></a><h2>CHAPTER V.—<i>The Flag of the World</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>When I was a boy there were two curious men running about who were +called the optimist and the pessimist. I constantly used the words +myself, but I cheerfully confess that I never had any very special idea +of what they meant. The only thing which might be considered evident was +that they could not mean what they said; for the ordinary verbal +explanation was that the optimist thought this world as good as it could +be, while the pessimist thought it as bad as it could be. Both these +statements being obviously raving nonsense, one had to cast about for +other explanations. An optimist could not mean a man who thought +everything right and nothing wrong. For that is meaningless; it is like +calling everything right and nothing left. Upon the whole, I came to the +conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the +pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except +himself. It would be unfair to omit altogether from the list the +mysterious but suggestive definition said to have been given by a little +girl, "An optimist is a man who looks after your eyes, and a pessimist +is a man who looks after your feet." I am not sure that this is not the +best definition of all. There is even a sort of allegorical truth in it. +For there might, perhaps, be a profitable distinction drawn between that +more dreary thinker who thinks merely of our contact with the earth from +moment to moment, and that happier thinker who considers rather our +primary power of vision and of choice of road.</p> + +<p>But this is a deep mistake in this alternative of the optimist and the +pessimist. The assumption of it is that a man criticises this world as +if he were house-hunting, as if he were being shown over a new suite of +apartments. If a man came to this world from some other world in full +possession of his powers he might discuss whether the advantage of +midsummer woods made up for the disadvantage of mad dogs, just as a man +looking for lodgings might balance the presence of a telephone against +the absence of a sea view. But no man is in that position. A man belongs +to this world before he begins to ask if it is nice to belong to it. He +has fought for the flag, and often won heroic victories for the flag +long before he has ever enlisted. To put shortly what seems the +essential matter, he has a loyalty long before he has any admiration.</p> + +<p>In the last chapter it has been said that the primary feeling that this +world is strange and yet attractive is best expressed in fairy tales. +The reader may, if he likes, put down the next stage to that bellicose +and even jingo literature which commonly comes next in the history of a +boy. We all owe much sound morality to the penny dreadfuls. Whatever the +reason, it seemed and still seems to me that our attitude towards life +can be better expressed in terms of a kind of military loyalty than in +terms of criticism and approval. My acceptance of the universe is not +optimism, it is more like patriotism. It is a matter of primary loyalty. +The world is not a lodging-house at Brighton, which we are to leave +because it is miserable. It is the fortress of our family, with the flag +flying on the turret, and the more miserable it is the less we should +leave it. The point is not that this world is too sad to love or too +glad not to love; the point is that when you do love a thing, its +gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving +it more. All optimistic thoughts about England and all pessimistic +thoughts about her are alike reasons for the English patriot. Similarly, +optimism and pessimism are alike arguments for the cosmic patriot.</p> + +<p>Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing—say Pimlico. +If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of +thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitary. It is not +enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico: in that case he will merely +cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a +man to approve of Pimlico: for then it will remain Pimlico, which would +be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love +Pimlico: to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly +reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise +into ivory towers and golden pinnacles; Pimlico would attire herself as +a woman does when she is loved. For decoration is not given to hide +horrible things; but to decorate things already adorable. A mother does +not give her child a blue bow because he is so ugly without it. A lover +does not give a girl a necklace to hide her neck. If men loved Pimlico +as mothers love children, arbitarily, because it is <i>theirs</i> Pimlico in +a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that +this is a mere fantasy. I answer that this is the actual history of +mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the +darkest roots of civilisation and you will find them knotted round some +sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to +a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because +she was great. She was great because they had loved her.</p> + +<p>The eighteenth-century theories of the social contract have been exposed +to much clumsy criticism in our time; in so far as they meant that there +is at the back of all historic government an idea of content and +co-operation, they were demonstrably right. But they really were wrong +in so far as they suggested that men had ever aimed at order or ethics +directly by a conscious exchange of interests. Morality did not begin by +one man saying to another, "I will not hit you if you do not hit me"; +there is no trace of such a transaction. There <i>is</i> a trace of both men +having said, "We must not hit each other in the holy place." They gained +their morality by guarding their religion. They did not cultivate +courage. They fought for the shrine, and found they had become +courageous. They did not cultivate cleanliness. They purified themselves +for the altar, and found that they were clean. The history of the Jews +is the only early document known to most Englishmen, and the facts can +be judged sufficiently from that. The Ten Commandments which have been +found substantially common to mankind were merely military commands; a +code of regimental orders, issued to protect a certain ark across a +certain desert. Anarchy was evil because it endangered the sanctity. And +only when they made a holy day for God did they find they had made a +holiday for men.</p> + +<p>If it be granted that this primary devotion to a place or thing is a +source of creative energy, we can pass on to a very peculiar fact. Let +us reiterate for an instant that the only right optimism is a sort of +universal patriotism. What is the matter with the pessimist? I think it +can be stated by saying that he is the cosmic anti-patriot. And what is +the matter with the anti-patriot? I think it can be stated, without +undue bitterness, by saying that he is the candid friend. And what is +the matter with the candid friend? There we strike the rock of real life +and immutable human nature.</p> + +<p>I venture to say that what is bad in the candid friend is simply that he +is not candid. He is keeping something back—his own gloomy pleasure in +saying unpleasant things. He has a secret desire to hurt, not merely to +help. This is certainly, I think, what makes a certain sort of +anti-patriot irritating to healthy citizens. I do not speak (of course) +of the anti-patriotism which only irritates feverish stockbrokers and +gushing actresses; that is only patriotism speaking plainly. A man who +says that no patriot should attack the Boer War until it is over is not +worth answering intelligently; he is saying that no good son should warn +his mother off a cliff until she has fallen over it. But there is an +anti-patriot who honestly angers honest men, and the explanation of him +is, I think, what I have suggested: he is the uncandid candid friend; +the man who says, "I am sorry to say we are ruined," and is not sorry at +all. And he may be said, without rhetoric, to be a traitor; for he is +using that ugly knowledge which was allowed him to strengthen the army, +to discourage people from joining it. Because he is allowed to be +pessimistic as a military adviser he is being pessimistic as a +recruiting sergeant. Just in the same way the pessimist (who is the +cosmic anti-patriot) uses the freedom that life allows to her +counsellors to lure away the people from her flag. Granted that he +states only facts, it is still essential to know what are his emotions, +what is his motive. It may be that twelve hundred men in Tottenham are +down with smallpox; but we want to know whether this is stated by some +great philosopher who wants to curse the gods, or only by some common +clergyman who wants to help the men.</p> + +<p>The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, +but that he does not love what he chastises—he has not this primary and +supernatural loyalty to things. What is the evil of the man commonly +called an optimist? Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to +defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible. He is the +jingo of the universe; he will say, "My cosmos, right or wrong." He will +be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of +front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing every one with +assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world. All +this (which is true of a type of optimist) leads us to the one really +interesting point of psychology, which could not be explained without +it.</p> + +<p>We say there must be a primal loyalty to life: the only question is, +shall it be a natural or a supernatural loyalty? If you like to put it +so, shall it be a reasonable or an unreasonable loyalty? Now, the +extraordinary thing is that the bad optimism (the whitewashing, the weak +defence of everything) comes in with the reasonable optimism. Rational +optimism leads to stagnation: it is irrational optimism that leads to +reform. Let me explain by using once more the parallel of patriotism. +The man who is most likely to ruin the place he loves is exactly the man +who loves it with a reason. The man who will improve the place is the +man who loves it without a reason. If a man loves some feature of +Pimlico (which seems unlikely), he may find himself defending that +feature against Pimlico itself. But if he simply loves Pimlico itself, +he may lay it waste and turn it into the New Jerusalem. I do not deny +that reform may be excessive; I only say that it is the mystic patriot +who reforms. Mere jingo self-contentment is commonest among those who +have some pedantic reason for their patriotism. The worst jingoes do not +love England, but a theory of England. If we love England for being an +empire, we may overrate the success with which we rule the Hindoos. But +if we love it only for being a nation, we can face all events: for it +would be a nation even if the Hindoos ruled us. Thus also only those +will permit their patriotism to falsify history whose patriotism depends +on history. A man who loves England for being English will not mind how +she arose. But a man who loves England for being Anglo-Saxon may go +against all facts for his fancy. He may end (like Carlyle and Freeman) +by maintaining that the Norman Conquest was a Saxon Conquest. He may end +in utter unreason—because he has a reason. A man who loves France for +being military will palliate the army of 1870. But a man who loves +France for being France will improve the army of 1870. This is exactly +what the French have done, and France is a good instance of the working +paradox. Nowhere else is patriotism more purely abstract and arbitrary; +and nowhere else is reform more drastic and sweeping. The more +transcendental is your patriotism, the more practical are your politics.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the most everyday instance of this point is in the case of +women; and their strange and strong loyalty. Some stupid people started +the idea that because women obviously back up their own people through +everything, therefore women are blind and do not see anything. They can +hardly have known any women. The same women who are ready to defend +their men through thick and thin are (in their personal intercourse with +the man) almost morbidly lucid about the thinness of his excuses or the +thickness of his head. A man's friend likes him but leaves him as he is: +his wife loves him and is always trying to turn him into somebody else. +Women who are utter mystics in their creed are utter cynics in their +criticism. Thackeray expressed this well when he made Pendennis' mother, +who worshipped her son as a god, yet assume that he would go wrong as a +man. She underrated his virtue, though she overrated his value. The +devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a +sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is +bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind.</p> + +<p>This at least had come to be my position about all that was called +optimism, pessimism, and improvement. Before any cosmic act of reform we +must have a cosmic oath of allegiance. A man must be interested in life, +then he could be disinterested in his views of it. "My son give me thy +heart"; the heart must be fixed on the right thing: the moment we have a +fixed heart we have a free hand. I must pause to anticipate an obvious +criticism. It will be said that a rational person accepts the world as +mixed of good and evil with a decent satisfaction and a decent +endurance. But this is exactly the attitude which I maintain to be +defective. It is, I know, very common in this age; it was perfectly put +in those quiet lines of Matthew Arnold which are more piercingly +blasphemous than the shrieks of Schopenhauer—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Enough we live:—and if a life,<br /></span> +<span>With large results so little rife,<br /></span> +<span>Though bearable, seem hardly worth<br /></span> +<span>This pomp of worlds, this pain of birth."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I know this feeling fills our epoch, and I think it freezes our epoch. +For our Titanic purposes of faith and revolution, what we need is not +the cold acceptance of the world as a compromise, but some way in which +we can heartily hate and heartily love it. We do not want joy and anger +to neutralise each other and produce a surly contentment; we want a +fiercer delight and a fiercer discontent. We have to feel the universe +at once as an ogre's castle, to be stormed, and yet as our own cottage, +to which we can return at evening.</p> + +<p>No one doubts that an ordinary man can get on with this world: but we +demand not strength enough to get on with it, but strength enough to get +it on. Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to +think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without +once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without +once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist +and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is +he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to +die to it? In this combination, I maintain, it is the rational optimist +who fails, the irrational optimist who succeeds. He is ready to smash +the whole universe for the sake of itself.</p> + +<p>I put these things not in their mature logical sequence, but as they +came: and this view was cleared and sharpened by an accident of the +time. Under the lengthening shadow of Ibsen, an argument arose whether +it was not a very nice thing to murder one's self. Grave moderns told us +that we must not even say "poor fellow," of a man who had blown his +brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out +because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even +suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot +machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I +found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and +humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and +absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the +refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, +kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is +concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically +considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all +buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; +but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by +the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the +things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults +everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by +refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the +cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a +tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: +for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be +pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and +there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and +the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and +philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven +through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. +There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is +different from other crimes—for it makes even crimes impossible.</p> + +<p>About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he +said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of +this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite +of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside +him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares +so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of +everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to +end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he +renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this +ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that +something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link +with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the +universe. And then I remembered the stake and the cross-roads, and the +queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the +suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. +Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of +carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. +The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. +They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave +afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very +poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the cross-roads to show +what Christianity thought of the pessimist.</p> + +<p>This was the first of the long train of enigmas with which Christianity +entered the discussion. And there went with it a peculiarity of which I +shall have to speak more markedly, as a note of all Christian notions, +but which distinctly began in this one. The Christian attitude to the +martyr and the suicide was not what is so often affirmed in modern +morals. It was not a matter of degree. It was not that a line must be +drawn somewhere, and that the self-slayer in exaltation fell within the +line, the self-slayer in sadness just beyond it. The Christian feeling +evidently was not merely that the suicide was carrying martyrdom too +far. The Christian feeling was furiously for one and furiously against +the other: these two things that looked so much alike were at opposite +ends of heaven and hell. One man flung away his life; he was so good +that his dry bones could heal cities in pestilence. Another man flung +away life; he was so bad that his bones would pollute his brethren's. I +am not saying this fierceness was right; but why was it so fierce?</p> + +<p>Here it was that I first found that my wandering feet were in some +beaten track. Christianity had also felt this opposition of the martyr +to the suicide: had it perhaps felt it for the same reason? Had +Christianity felt what I felt, but could not (and cannot) express—this +need for a first loyalty to things, and then for a ruinous reform of +things? Then I remembered that it was actually the charge against +Christianity that it combined these two things which I was wildly trying +to combine. Christianity was accused, at one and the same time, of being +too optimistic about the universe and of being too pessimistic about the +world. The coincidence made me suddenly stand still.</p> + +<p>An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such +and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. +Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not +credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain +philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on +Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was +suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a +man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the +century. If a man believes in unalterable natural law, he cannot believe +in any miracle in any age. If a man believes in a will behind law, he +can believe in any miracle in any age. Suppose, for the sake of +argument, we are concerned with a case of thaumaturgic healing. A +materialist of the twelfth century could not believe it any more than a +materialist of the twentieth century. But a Christian Scientist of the +twentieth century can believe it as much as a Christian of the twelfth +century. It is simply a matter of a man's theory of things. Therefore in +dealing with any historical answer, the point is not whether it was +given in our time, but whether it was given in answer to our question. +And the more I thought about when and how Christianity had come into the +world, the more I felt that it had actually come to answer this +question.</p> + +<p>It is commonly the loose and latitudinarian Christians who pay quite +indefensible compliments to Christianity. They talk as if there had +never been any piety or pity until Christianity came, a point on which +any mediæval would have been eager to correct them. They represent that +the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to +preach simplicity or self-restraint, or inwardness and sincerity. They +will think me very narrow (whatever that means) if I say that the +remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach +Christianity. Its peculiarity was that it was peculiar, and simplicity +and sincerity are not peculiar, but obvious ideals for all mankind. +Christianity was the answer to a riddle, not the last truism uttered +after a long talk. Only the other day I saw in an excellent weekly paper +of Puritan tone this remark, that Christianity when stripped of its +armour of dogma (as who should speak of a man stripped of his armour of +bones), turned out to be nothing but the Quaker doctrine of the Inner +Light. Now, if I were to say that Christianity came into the world +specially to destroy the doctrine of the Inner Light, that would be an +exaggeration. But it would be very much nearer to the truth. The last +Stoics, like Marcus Aurelius, were exactly the people who did believe in +the Inner Light. Their dignity, their weariness, their sad external care +for others, their incurable internal care for themselves, were all due +to the Inner Light, and existed only by that dismal illumination. Notice +that Marcus Aurelius insists, as such introspective moralists always do, +upon small things done or undone; it is because he has not hate or love +enough to make a moral revolution. He gets up early in the morning, just +as our own aristocrats living the Simple Life get up early in the +morning; because such altruism is much easier than stopping the games of +the amphitheatre or giving the English people back their land. Marcus +Aurelius is the most intolerable of human types. He is an unselfish +egoist. An unselfish egoist is a man who has pride without the excuse of +passion. Of all conceivable forms of enlightenment the worst is what +these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most +horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body +knows how it would work; any one who knows any one from the Higher +Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god +within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. +Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; +let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, +but not the god within. Christianity came into the world firstly in +order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, +but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a +divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian +was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely +recognised an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible +as an army with banners.</p> + +<p>All the same, it will be as well if Jones does not worship the sun and +moon. If he does, there is a tendency for him to imitate them; to say, +that because the sun burns insects alive, he may burn insects alive. He +thinks that because the sun gives people sun-stroke, he may give his +neighbour measles. He thinks that because the moon is said to drive men +mad, he may drive his wife mad. This ugly side of mere external optimism +had also shown itself in the ancient world. About the time when the +Stoic idealism had begun to show the weaknesses of pessimism, the old +nature worship of the ancients had begun to show the enormous weaknesses +of optimism. Nature worship is natural enough while the society is +young, or, in other words, Pantheism is all right as long as it is the +worship of Pan. But Nature has another side which experience and sin are +not slow in finding out, and it is no flippancy to say of the god Pan +that he soon showed the cloven hoof. The only objection to Natural +Religion is that somehow it always becomes unnatural. A man loves Nature +in the morning for her innocence and amiability, and at nightfall, if he +is loving her still, it is for her darkness and her cruelty. He washes +at dawn in clear water as did the Wise Man of the Stoics, yet, somehow +at the dark end of the day, he is bathing in hot bull's blood, as did +Julian the Apostate. The mere pursuit of health always leads to +something unhealthy. Physical nature must not be made the direct object +of obedience; it must be enjoyed, not worshipped. Stars and mountains +must not be taken seriously. If they are, we end where the pagan nature +worship ended. Because the earth is kind, we can imitate all her +cruelties. Because sexuality is sane, we can all go mad about sexuality. +Mere optimism had reached its insane and appropriate termination. The +theory that everything was good had become an orgy of everything that +was bad.</p> + +<p>On the other side our idealist pessimists were represented by the old +remnant of the Stoics. Marcus Aurelius and his friends had really given +up the idea of any god in the universe and looked only to the god +within. They had no hope of any virtue in nature, and hardly any hope of +any virtue in society. They had not enough interest in the outer world +really to wreck or revolutionise it. They did not love the city enough +to set fire to it. Thus the ancient world was exactly in our own +desolate dilemma. The only people who really enjoyed this world were +busy breaking it up; and the virtuous people did not care enough about +them to knock them down. In this dilemma (the same as ours) Christianity +suddenly stepped in and offered a singular answer, which the world +eventually accepted as <i>the</i> answer. It was the answer then, and I think +it is the answer now.</p> + +<p>This answer was like the slash of a sword; it sundered; it did not in +any sense sentimentally unite. Briefly, it divided God from the cosmos. +That transcendence and distinctness of the deity which some Christians +now want to remove from Christianity, was really the only reason why any +one wanted to be a Christian. It was the whole point of the Christian +answer to the unhappy pessimist and the still more unhappy optimist. As +I am here only concerned with their particular problem I shall indicate +only briefly this great metaphysical suggestion. All descriptions of +the creating or sustaining principle in things must be metaphorical, +because they must be verbal. Thus the pantheist is forced to speak of +God <i>in</i> all things as if he were in a box. Thus the evolutionist has, +in his very name, the idea of being unrolled like a carpet. All terms, +religious and irreligious, are open to this charge. The only question is +whether all terms are useless, or whether one can, with such a phrase, +cover a distinct <i>idea</i> about the origin of things. I think one can, and +so evidently does the evolutionist, or he would not talk about +evolution. And the root phrase for all Christian theism was this, that +God was a creator, as an artist is a creator. A poet is so separate from +his poem that he himself speaks of it as a little thing he has "thrown +off." Even in giving it forth he has flung it away. This principle that +all creation and procreation is a breaking off is at least as consistent +through the cosmos as the evolutionary principle that all growth is a +branching out. A woman loses a child even in having a child. All +creation is separation. Birth is as solemn a parting as death.</p> + +<p>It was the prime philosophic principle of Christianity that this divorce +in the divine act of making (such as severs the poet from the poem or +the mother from the new-born child) was the true description of the act +whereby the absolute energy made the world. According to most +philosophers, God in making the world enslaved it. According to +Christianity, in making it, He set it free. God had written, not so much +a poem, but rather a play; a play he had planned as perfect, but which +had necessarily been left to human actors and stage-managers, who had +since made a great mess of it. I will discuss the truth of this theorem +later. Here I have only to point out with what a startling smoothness it +passed the dilemma we have discussed in this chapter. In this way at +least one could be both happy and indignant without degrading one's self +to be either a pessimist or an optimist. On this system one could fight +all the forces of existence without deserting the flag of existence. One +could be at peace with the universe and yet be at war with the world. +St. George could still fight the dragon, however big the monster bulked +in the cosmos, though he were bigger than the mighty cities or bigger +than the everlasting hills. If he were as big as the world he could yet +be killed in the name of the world. St. George had not to consider any +obvious odds or proportions in the scale of things, but only the +original secret of their design. He can shake his sword at the dragon, +even if it is everything; even if the empty heavens over his head are +only the huge arch of its open jaws.</p> + +<p>And then followed an experience impossible to describe. It was as if I +had been blundering about since my birth with two huge and unmanageable +machines, of different shapes and without apparent connection—the world +and the Christian tradition. I had found this hole in the world: the +fact that one must somehow find a way of loving the world without +trusting it; somehow one must love the world without being worldly. I +found this projecting feature of Christian theology, like a sort of hard +spike, the dogmatic insistence that God was personal, and had made a +world separate from Himself. The spike of dogma fitted exactly into the +hole in the world—it had evidently been meant to go there—and then the +strange thing began to happen. When once these two parts of the two +machines had come together, one after another, all the other parts +fitted and fell in with an eerie exactitude. I could hear bolt after +bolt over all the machinery falling into its place with a kind of click +of relief. Having got one part right, all the other parts were +repeating that rectitude, as clock after clock strikes noon. Instinct +after instinct was answered by doctrine after doctrine. Or, to vary the +metaphor, I was like one who had advanced into a hostile country to take +one high fortress. And when that fort had fallen the whole country +surrendered and turned solid behind me. The whole land was lit up, as it +were, back to the first fields of my childhood. All those blind fancies +of boyhood which in the fourth chapter I have tried in vain to trace on +the darkness, became suddenly transparent and sane. I was right when I +felt that roses were red by some sort of choice: it was the divine +choice. I was right when I felt that I would almost rather say that +grass was the wrong colour than say that it must by necessity have been +that colour: it might verily have been any other. My sense that +happiness hung on the crazy thread of a condition did mean something +when all was said: it meant the whole doctrine of the Fall. Even those +dim and shapeless monsters of notions which I have not been able to +describe, much less defend, stepped quietly into their places like +colossal caryatides of the creed. The fancy that the cosmos was not vast +and void, but small and cosy, had a fulfilled significance now, for +anything that is a work of art must be small in the sight of the artist; +to God the stars might be only small and dear, like diamonds. And my +haunting instinct that somehow good was not merely a tool to be used, +but a relic to be guarded, like the goods from Crusoe's ship—even that +had been the wild whisper of something originally wise, for, according +to Christianity, we were indeed the survivors of a wreck, the crew of a +golden ship that had gone down before the beginning of the world.</p> + +<p>But the important matter was this, that it entirely reversed the reason +for optimism. And the instant the reversal was made it felt like the +abrupt ease when a bone is put back in the socket. I had often called +myself an optimist, to avoid the too evident blasphemy of pessimism. But +all the optimism of the age had been false and disheartening for this +reason, that it had always been trying to prove that we fit in to the +world. The Christian optimism is based on the fact that we do <i>not</i> fit +in to the world. I had tried to be happy by telling myself that man is +an animal, like any other which sought its meat from God. But now I +really was happy, for I had learnt that man is a monstrosity. I had +been right in feeling all things as odd, for I myself was at once worse +and better than all things. The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it +dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was +poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in the light of +the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again +that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in +acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the <i>wrong</i> place, and my +soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. The knowledge found out and +illuminated forgotten chambers in the dark house of infancy. I knew now +why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a +giant, and why I could feel homesick at home.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VI_The_Paradoxes_of_Christianity"></a><h2>CHAPTER VI.—<i>The Paradoxes of Christianity</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>The real trouble with this world of ours is not that it is an +unreasonable world, nor even that it is a reasonable one. The commonest +kind of trouble is that it is nearly reasonable, but not quite. Life is +not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians. It looks just a +little more mathematical and regular than it is; its exactitude is +obvious, but its inexactitude is hidden; its wildness lies in wait. I +give one coarse instance of what I mean. Suppose some mathematical +creature from the moon were to reckon up the human body; he would at +once see that the essential thing about it was that it was duplicate. A +man is two men, he on the right exactly resembling him on the left. +Having noted that there was an arm on the right and one on the left, a +leg on the right and one on the left, he might go further and still find +on each side the same number of fingers, the same number of toes, twin +eyes, twin ears, twin nostrils, and even twin lobes of the brain. At +last he would take it as a law; and then, where he found a heart on one +side, would deduce that there was another heart on the other. And just +then, where he most felt he was right, he would be wrong.</p> + +<p>It is this silent swerving from accuracy by an inch that is the uncanny +element in everything. It seems a sort of secret treason in the +universe. An apple or an orange is round enough to get itself called +round, and yet is not round after all. The earth itself is shaped like +an orange in order to lure some simple astronomer into calling it a +globe. A blade of grass is called after the blade of a sword, because it +comes to a point; but it doesn't. Everywhere in things there is this +element of the quiet and incalculable. It escapes the rationalists, but +it never escapes till the last moment. From the grand curve of our earth +it could easily be inferred that every inch of it was thus curved. It +would seem rational that as a man has a brain on both sides, he should +have a heart on both sides. Yet scientific men are still organizing +expeditions to find the North Pole, because they are so fond of flat +country. Scientific men are also still organising expeditions to find a +man's heart; and when they try to find it, they generally get on the +wrong side of him.</p> + +<p>Now, actual insight or inspiration is best tested by whether it guesses +these hidden malformations or surprises. If our mathematician from the +moon saw the two arms and the two ears, he might deduce the two +shoulder-blades and the two halves of the brain. But if he guessed that +the man's heart was in the right place, then I should call him something +more than a mathematician. Now, this is exactly the claim which I have +since come to propound for Christianity. Not merely that it deduces +logical truths, but that when it suddenly becomes illogical, it has +found, so to speak, an illogical truth. It not only goes right about +things, but it goes wrong (if one may say so) exactly where the things +go wrong. Its plan suits the secret irregularities, and expects the +unexpected. It is simple about the simple truth; but it is stubborn +about the subtle truth. It will admit that a man has two hands, it will +not admit (though all the Modernists wail to it) the obvious deduction +that he has two hearts. It is my only purpose in this chapter to point +this out; to show that whenever we feel there is something odd in +Christian theology, we shall generally find that there is something odd +in the truth.</p> + +<p>I have alluded to an unmeaning phrase to the effect that such and such a +creed cannot be believed in our age. Of course, anything can be +believed in any age. But, oddly enough, there really is a sense in which +a creed, if it is believed at all, can be believed more fixedly in a +complex society than in a simple one. If a man finds Christianity true +in Birmingham, he has actually clearer reasons for faith than if he had +found it true in Mercia. For the more complicated seems the coincidence, +the less it can be a coincidence. If snowflakes fell in the shape, say, +of the heart of Midlothian, it might be an accident. But if snowflakes +fell in the exact shape of the maze at Hampton Court, I think one might +call it a miracle. It is exactly as of such a miracle that I have since +come to feel of the philosophy of Christianity. The complication of our +modern world proves the truth of the creed more perfectly than any of +the plain problems of the ages of faith. It was in Notting Hill and +Battersea that I began to see that Christianity was true. This is why +the faith has that elaboration of doctrines and details which so much +distresses those who admire Christianity without believing in it. When +once one believes in a creed, one is proud of its complexity, as +scientists are proud of the complexity of science. It shows how rich it +is in discoveries. If it is right at all, it is a compliment to say +that it's elaborately right. A stick might fit a hole or a stone a +hollow by accident. But a key and a lock are both complex. And if a key +fits a lock, you know it is the right key.</p> + +<p>But this involved accuracy of the thing makes it very difficult to do +what I now have to do, to describe this accumulation of truth. It is +very hard for a man to defend anything of which he is entirely +convinced. It is comparatively easy when he is only partially convinced. +He is partially convinced because he has found this or that proof of the +thing, and he can expound it. But a man is not really convinced of a +philosophic theory when he finds that something proves it. He is only +really convinced when he finds that everything proves it. And the more +converging reasons he finds pointing to this conviction, the more +bewildered he is if asked suddenly to sum them up. Thus, if one asked an +ordinary intelligent man, on the spur of the moment, "Why do you prefer +civilisation to savagery?" he would look wildly round at object after +object, and would only be able to answer vaguely, "Why, there is that +bookcase ... and the coals in the coal-scuttle ... and pianos ... and +policemen." The whole case for civilisation is that the case for it is +complex. It has done so many things. But that very multiplicity of proof +which ought to make reply overwhelming makes reply impossible.</p> + +<p>There is, therefore, about all complete conviction a kind of huge +helplessness. The belief is so big that it takes a long time to get it +into action. And this hesitation chiefly arises, oddly enough, from an +indifference about where one should begin. All roads lead to Rome; which +is one reason why many people never get there. In the case of this +defence of the Christian conviction I confess that I would as soon begin +the argument with one thing as another; I would begin it with a turnip +or a taximeter cab. But if I am to be at all careful about making my +meaning clear, it will, I think, be wiser to continue the current +arguments of the last chapter, which was concerned to urge the first of +these mystical coincidences, or rather ratifications. All I had hitherto +heard of Christian theology had alienated me from it. I was a pagan at +the age of twelve, and a complete agnostic by the age of sixteen; and I +cannot understand any one passing the age of seventeen without having +asked himself so simple a question. I did, indeed, retain a cloudy +reverence for a cosmic deity and a great historical interest in the +Founder of Christianity. But I certainly regarded Him as a man; though +perhaps I thought that, even in that point, He had an advantage over +some of His modern critics. I read the scientific and sceptical +literature of my time—all of it, at least, that I could find written in +English and lying about; and I read nothing else; I mean I read nothing +else on any other note of philosophy. The penny dreadfuls which I also +read were indeed in a healthy and heroic tradition of Christianity; but +I did not know this at the time. I never read a line of Christian +apologetics. I read as little as I can of them now. It was Huxley and +Herbert Spencer and Bradlaugh who brought me back to orthodox theology. +They sowed in my mind my first wild doubts of doubt. Our grandmothers +were quite right when they said that Tom Paine and the free-thinkers +unsettled the mind. They do. They unsettled mine horribly. The +rationalist made me question whether reason was of any use whatever; and +when I had finished Herbert Spencer I had got as far as doubting (for +the first time) whether evolution had occurred at all. As I laid down +the last of Colonel Ingersoll's atheistic lectures the dreadful thought +broke across my mind, "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." I +was in a desperate way.</p> + +<p>This odd effect of the great agnostics in arousing doubts deeper than +their own might be illustrated in many ways. I take only one. As I read +and re-read all the non-Christian or anti-Christian accounts of the +faith, from Huxley to Bradlaugh, a slow and awful impression grew +gradually but graphically upon my mind—the impression that Christianity +must be a most extraordinary thing. For not only (as I understood) had +Christianity the most flaming vices, but it had apparently a mystical +talent for combining vices which seemed inconsistent with each other. It +was attacked on all sides and for all contradictory reasons. No sooner +had one rationalist demonstrated that it was too far to the east than +another demonstrated with equal clearness that it was much too far to +the west. No sooner had my indignation died down at its angular and +aggressive squareness than I was called up again to notice and condemn +its enervating and sensual roundness. In case any reader has not come +across the thing I mean, I will give such instances as I remember at +random of this self-contradiction in the sceptical attack. I give four +or five of them; there are fifty more.</p> + +<p>Thus, for instance, I was much moved by the eloquent attack on +Christianity as a thing of inhuman gloom; for I thought (and still +think) sincere pessimism the unpardonable sin. Insincere pessimism is a +social accomplishment, rather agreeable than otherwise; and fortunately +nearly all pessimism is insincere. But if Christianity was, as these +people said, a thing purely pessimistic and opposed to life, then I was +quite prepared to blow up St. Paul's Cathedral. But the extraordinary +thing is this. They did prove to me in Chapter I. (to my complete +satisfaction) that Christianity was too pessimistic; and then, in +Chapter II., they began to prove to me that it was a great deal too +optimistic. One accusation against Christianity was that it prevented +men, by morbid tears and terrors, from seeking joy and liberty in the +bosom of Nature. But another accusation was that it comforted men with a +fictitious providence, and put them in a pink-and-white nursery. One +great agnostic asked why Nature was not beautiful enough, and why it was +hard to be free. Another great agnostic objected that Christian +optimism, "the garment of make-believe woven by pious hands," hid from +us the fact that Nature was ugly, and that it was impossible to be free. +One rationalist had hardly done calling Christianity a nightmare before +another began to call it a fool's paradise. This puzzled me; the charges +seemed inconsistent. Christianity could not at once be the black mask on +a white world, and also the white mask on a black world. The state of +the Christian could not be at once so comfortable that he was a coward +to cling to it, and so uncomfortable that he was a fool to stand it. If +it falsified human vision it must falsify it one way or another; it +could not wear both green and rose-coloured spectacles. I rolled on my +tongue with a terrible joy, as did all young men of that time, the +taunts which Swinburne hurled at the dreariness of the creed—</p> + +<blockquote><p>"Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilæan, the world has grown gray + with Thy breath." </p></blockquote> + +<p>But when I read the same poet's accounts of paganism (as in "Atalanta"), +I gathered that the world was, if possible, more gray before the +Galilæan breathed on it than afterwards. The poet maintained, indeed, in +the abstract, that life itself was pitch dark. And yet, somehow, +Christianity had darkened it. The very man who denounced Christianity +for pessimism was himself a pessimist. I thought there must be something +wrong. And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that, perhaps, +those might not be the very best judges of the relation of religion to +happiness who, by their own account, had neither one nor the other.</p> + +<p>It must be understood that I did not conclude hastily that the +accusations were false or the accusers fools. I simply deduced that +Christianity must be something even weirder and wickeder than they made +out. A thing might have these two opposite vices; but it must be a +rather queer thing if it did. A man might be too fat in one place and +too thin in another; but he would be an odd shape. At this point my +thoughts were only of the odd shape of the Christian religion; I did not +allege any odd shape in the rationalistic mind.</p> + +<p>Here is another case of the same kind. I felt that a strong case against +Christianity lay in the charge that there is something timid, monkish, +and unmanly about all that is called "Christian," especially in its +attitude towards resistance and fighting. The great sceptics of the +nineteenth century were largely virile. Bradlaugh in an expansive way, +Huxley in a reticent way, were decidedly men. In comparison, it did seem +tenable that there was something weak and over patient about Christian +counsels. The Gospel paradox about the other cheek, the fact that +priests never fought, a hundred things made plausible the accusation +that Christianity was an attempt to make a man too like a sheep. I read +it and believed it, and if I had read nothing different, I should have +gone on believing it. But I read something very different. I turned the +next page in my agnostic manual, and my brain turned up-side down. Now I +found that I was to hate Christianity not for fighting too little, but +for fighting too much. Christianity, it seemed, was the mother of wars. +Christianity had deluged the world with blood. I had got thoroughly +angry with the Christian, because he never was angry. And now I was told +to be angry with him because his anger had been the most huge and +horrible thing in human history; because his anger had soaked the earth +and smoked to the sun. The very people who reproached Christianity with +the meekness and non-resistance of the monastries were the very people +who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades. It +was the fault of poor old Christianity (somehow or other) both that +Edward the Confessor did not fight and that Richard Coeur de Lion did. +The Quakers (we were told) were the only characteristic Christians; and +yet the massacres of Cromwell and Alva were characteristic Christian +crimes. What could it all mean? What was this Christianity which always +forbade war and always produced wars? What could be the nature of the +thing which one could abuse first because it would not fight, and second +because it was always fighting? In what world of riddles was born this +monstrous murder and this monstrous meekness? The shape of Christianity +grew a queerer shape every instant.</p> + +<p>I take a third case; the strangest of all, because it involves the one +real objection to the faith. The one real objection to the Christian +religion is simply that it is one religion. The world is a big place, +full of very different kinds of people. Christianity (it may reasonably +be said) is one thing confined to one kind of people; it began in +Palestine, it has practically stopped with Europe. I was duly impressed +with this argument in my youth, and I was much drawn towards the +doctrine often preached in Ethical Societies—I mean the doctrine that +there is one great unconscious church of all humanity founded on the +omnipresence of the human conscience. Creeds, it was said, divided men; +but at least morals united them. The soul might seek the strangest and +most remote lands and ages and still find essential ethical common +sense. It might find Confucius under Eastern trees, and he would be +writing "Thou shalt not steal." It might decipher the darkest +hieroglyphic on the most primeval desert, and the meaning when +deciphered would be "Little boys should tell the truth." I believed this +doctrine of the brotherhood of all men in the possession of a moral +sense, and I believe it still—with other things. And I was thoroughly +annoyed with Christianity for suggesting (as I supposed) that whole ages +and empires of men had utterly escaped this light of justice and reason. +But then I found an astonishing thing. I found that the very people who +said that mankind was one church from Plato to Emerson were the very +people who said that morality had changed altogether, and that what was +right in one age was wrong in another. If I asked, say, for an altar, I +was told that we needed none, for men our brothers gave us clear oracles +and one creed in their universal customs and ideals. But if I mildly +pointed out that one of men's universal customs was to have an altar, +then my agnostic teachers turned clean round and told me that men had +always been in darkness and the superstitions of savages. I found it was +their daily taunt against Christianity that it was the light of one +people and had left all others to die in the dark. But I also found that +it was their special boast for themselves that science and progress were +the discovery of one people, and that all other peoples had died in the +dark. Their chief insult to Christianity was actually their chief +compliment to themselves, and there seemed to be a strange unfairness +about all their relative insistence on the two things. When considering +some pagan or agnostic, we were to remember that all men had one +religion; when considering some mystic or spiritualist, we were only to +consider what absurd religions some men had. We could trust the ethics +of Epictetus, because ethics had never changed. We must not trust the +ethics of Bossuet, because ethics had changed. They changed in two +hundred years, but not in two thousand.</p> + +<p>This began to be alarming. It looked not so much as if Christianity was +bad enough to include any vices, but rather as if any stick was good +enough to beat Christianity with. What again could this astonishing +thing be like which people were so anxious to contradict, that in doing +so they did not mind contradicting themselves? I saw the same thing on +every side. I can give no further space to this discussion of it in +detail; but lest any one supposes that I have unfairly selected three +accidental cases I will run briefly through a few others. Thus, certain +sceptics wrote that the great crime of Christianity had been its attack +on the family; it had dragged women to the loneliness and contemplation +of the cloister, away from their homes and their children. But, then, +other sceptics (slightly more advanced) said that the great crime of +Christianity was forcing the family and marriage upon us; that it doomed +women to the drudgery of their homes and children, and forbade them +loneliness and contemplation. The charge was actually reversed. Or, +again, certain phrases in the Epistles or the Marriage Service, were +said by the anti-Christians to show contempt for woman's intellect. But +I found that the anti-Christians themselves had a contempt for woman's +intellect; for it was their great sneer at the Church on the Continent +that "only women" went to it. Or again, Christianity was reproached with +its naked and hungry habits; with its sackcloth and dried peas. But the +next minute Christianity was being reproached with its pomp and its +ritualism; its shrines of porphyry and its robes of gold. It was abused +for being too plain and for being too coloured. Again Christianity had +always been accused of restraining sexuality too much, when Bradlaugh +the Malthusian discovered that it restrained it too little. It is often +accused in the same breath of prim respectability and of religious +extravagance. Between the covers of the same atheistic pamphlet I have +found the faith rebuked for its disunion, "One thinks one thing, and one +another," and rebuked also for its union, "It is difference of opinion +that prevents the world from going to the dogs." In the same +conversation a free-thinker, a friend of mine, blamed Christianity for +despising Jews, and then despised it himself for being Jewish.</p> + +<p>I wished to be quite fair then, and I wish to be quite fair now; and I +did not conclude that the attack on Christianity was all wrong. I only +concluded that if Christianity was wrong, it was very wrong indeed. Such +hostile horrors might be combined in one thing, but that thing must be +very strange and solitary. There are men who are misers, and also +spendthrifts; but they are rare. There are men sensual and also ascetic; +but they are rare. But if this mass of mad contradictions really +existed, quakerish and bloodthirsty, too gorgeous and too thread-bare, +austere, yet pandering preposterously to the lust of the eye, the enemy +of women and their foolish refuge, a solemn pessimist and a silly +optimist, if this evil existed, then there was in this evil something +quite supreme and unique. For I found in my rationalist teachers no +explanation of such exceptional corruption. Christianity (theoretically +speaking) was in their eyes only one of the ordinary myths and errors of +mortals. <i>They</i> gave me no key to this twisted and unnatural badness. +Such a paradox of evil rose to the stature of the supernatural. It was, +indeed, almost as supernatural as the infallibility of the Pope. An +historic institution, which never went right, is really quite as much of +a miracle as an institution that cannot go wrong. The only explanation +which immediately occurred to my mind was that Christianity did not come +from heaven, but from hell. Really, if Jesus of Nazareth was not Christ, +He must have been Antichrist.</p> + +<p>And then in a quiet hour a strange thought struck me like a still +thunderbolt. There had suddenly come into my mind another explanation. +Suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were +puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall and some too short; +some objected to his fatness, some lamented his leanness; some thought +him too dark, and some too fair. One explanation (as has been already +admitted) would be that he might be an odd shape. But there is another +explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might +feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall. Old +bucks who are growing stout might consider him insufficiently filled +out; old beaux who were growing thin might feel that he expanded beyond +the narrow lines of elegance. Perhaps Swedes (who have pale hair like +tow) called him a dark man, while negroes considered him distinctly +blonde. Perhaps (in short) this extraordinary thing is really the +ordinary thing; at least the normal thing, the centre. Perhaps, after +all, it is Christianity that is sane and all its critics that are +mad—in various ways. I tested this idea by asking myself whether there +was about any of the accusers anything morbid that might explain the +accusation. I was startled to find that this key fitted a lock. For +instance, it was certainly odd that the modern world charged +Christianity at once with bodily austerity and with artistic pomp. But +then it was also odd, very odd, that the modern world itself combined +extreme bodily luxury with an extreme absence of artistic pomp. The +modern man thought Becket's robes too rich and his meals too poor. But +then the modern man was really exceptional in history; no man before +ever ate such elaborate dinners in such ugly clothes. The modern man +found the church too simple exactly where modern life is too complex; he +found the church too gorgeous exactly where modern life is too dingy. +The man who disliked the plain fasts and feasts was mad on <i>entrées</i>. +The man who disliked vestments wore a pair of preposterous trousers. And +surely if there was any insanity involved in the matter at all it was in +the trousers, not in the simply falling robe. If there was any insanity +at all, it was in the extravagant <i>entrées</i>, not in the bread and wine.</p> + +<p>I went over all the cases, and I found the key fitted so far. The fact +that Swinburne was irritated at the unhappiness of Christians and yet +more irritated at their happiness was easily explained. It was no longer +a complication of diseases in Christianity, but a complication of +diseases in Swinburne. The restraints of Christians saddened him simply +because he was more hedonist than a healthy man should be. The faith of +Christians angered him because he was more pessimist than a healthy man +should be. In the same way the Malthusians by instinct attacked +Christianity; not because there is anything especially anti-Malthusian +about Christianity, but because there is something a little anti-human +about Malthusianism.</p> + +<p>Nevertheless it could not, I felt, be quite true that Christianity was +merely sensible and stood in the middle. There was really an element in +it of emphasis and even frenzy which had justified the secularists in +their superficial criticism. It might be wise, I began more and more to +think that it was wise, but it was not merely worldly wise; it was not +merely temperate and respectable. Its fierce crusaders and meek saints +might balance each other; still, the crusaders were very fierce and the +saints were very meek, meek beyond all decency. Now, it was just at this +point of the speculation that I remembered my thoughts about the martyr +and the suicide. In that matter there had been this combination between +two almost insane positions which yet somehow amounted to sanity. This +was just such another contradiction; and this I had already found to be +true. This was exactly one of the paradoxes in which sceptics found the +creed wrong; and in this I had found it right. Madly as Christians might +love the martyr or hate the suicide, they never felt these passions more +madly than I had felt them long before I dreamed of Christianity. Then +the most difficult and interesting part of the mental process opened, +and I began to trace this idea darkly through all the enormous thoughts +of our theology. The idea was that which I had outlined touching the +optimist and the pessimist; that we want not an amalgam or compromise, +but both things at the top of their energy; love and wrath both burning. +Here I shall only trace it in relation to ethics. But I need not remind +the reader that the idea of this combination is indeed central in +orthodox theology. For orthodox theology has specially insisted that +Christ was not a being apart from God and man, like an elf, nor yet a +being half human and half not, like a centaur, but both things at once +and both things thoroughly, very man and very God. Now let me trace this +notion as I found it.</p> + +<p>All sane men can see that sanity is some kind of equilibrium; that one +may be mad and eat too much, or mad and eat too little. Some moderns +have indeed appeared with vague versions of progress and evolution which +seeks to destroy the μεσον or balance of Aristotle. They seem to suggest +that we are meant to starve progressively, or to go on eating larger and +larger breakfasts every morning for ever. But the great truism of the +μεσον remains for all thinking men, and these people have not upset any +balance except their own. But granted that we have all to keep a +balance, the real interest comes in with the question of how that +balance can be kept. That was the problem which Paganism tried to solve: +that was the problem which I think Christianity solved and solved in a +very strange way.</p> + +<p>Paganism declared that virtue was in a balance; Christianity declared it +was in a conflict: the collision of two passions apparently opposite. Of +course they were not really inconsistent; but they were such that it was +hard to hold simultaneously. Let us follow for a moment the clue of the +martyr and the suicide; and take the case of courage. No quality has +ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely +rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a +strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that +will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism +for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or +mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. +This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly +or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if +he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by +continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by +enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire +for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely +cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He +must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will +not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to +it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine. No +philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with +adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity +has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the +suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the +sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying. And it has held +up ever since above the European lances the banner of the mystery of +chivalry: the Christian courage, which is a disdain of death; not the +Chinese courage, which is a disdain of life.</p> + +<p>And now I began to find that this duplex passion was the Christian key +to ethics everywhere. Everywhere the creed made a moderation out of the +still crash of two impetuous emotions. Take, for instance, the matter of +modesty, of the balance between mere pride and mere prostration. The +average pagan, like the average agnostic, would merely say that he was +content with himself, but not insolently self-satisfied, that there were +many better and many worse, that his deserts were limited, but he would +see that he got them. In short, he would walk with his head in the air; +but not necessarily with his nose in the air. This is a manly and +rational position, but it is open to the objection we noted against the +compromise between optimism and pessimism—the "resignation" of Matthew +Arnold. Being a mixture of two things, it is a dilution of two things; +neither is present in its full strength or contributes its full colour. +This proper pride does not lift the heart like the tongue of trumpets; +you cannot go clad in crimson and gold for this. On the other hand, this +mild rationalist modesty does not cleanse the soul with fire and make it +clear like crystal; it does not (like a strict and searching humility) +make a man as a little child, who can sit at the feet of the grass. It +does not make him look up and see marvels; for Alice must grow small if +she is to be Alice in Wonderland. Thus it loses both the poetry of +being proud and the poetry of being humble. Christianity sought by this +same strange expedient to save both of them.</p> + +<p>It separated the two ideas and then exaggerated them both. In one way +Man was to be haughtier than he had ever been before; in another way he +was to be humbler than he had ever been before. In so far as I am Man I +am the chief of creatures. In so far as I am <i>a</i> man I am the chief of +sinners. All humility that had meant pessimism, that had meant man +taking a vague or mean view of his whole destiny—all that was to go. We +were to hear no more the wail of Ecclesiastes that humanity had no +pre-eminence over the brute, or the awful cry of Homer that man was only +the saddest of all the beasts of the field. Man was a statue of God +walking about the garden. Man had pre-eminence over all the brutes; man +was only sad because he was not a beast, but a broken god. The Greek had +spoken of men creeping on the earth, as if clinging to it. Now Man was +to tread on the earth as if to subdue it. Christianity thus held a +thought of the dignity of man that could only be expressed in crowns +rayed like the sun and fans of peacock plumage. Yet at the same time it +could hold a thought about the abject smallness of man that could only +be expressed in fasting and fantastic submission, in the grey ashes of +St. Dominic and the white snows of St. Bernard. When one came to think +of <i>one's self</i>, there was vista and void enough for any amount of bleak +abnegation and bitter truth. There the realistic gentleman could let +himself go—as long as he let himself go at himself. There was an open +playground for the happy pessimist. Let him say anything against himself +short of blaspheming the original aim of his being; let him call himself +a fool and even a damned fool (though that is Calvinistic); but he must +not say that fools are not worth saving. He must not say that a man, +<i>quâ</i> man, can be valueless. Here again, in short, Christianity got over +the difficulty of combining furious opposites, by keeping them both, and +keeping them both furious. The Church was positive on both points. One +can hardly think too little of one's self. One can hardly think too much +of one's soul.</p> + +<p>Take another case: the complicated question of charity, which some +highly uncharitable idealists seem to think quite easy. Charity is a +paradox, like modesty and courage. Stated baldly, charity certainly +means one of two things—pardoning unpardonable acts, or loving +unlovable people. But if we ask ourselves (as we did in the case of +pride) what a sensible pagan would feel about such a subject, we shall +probably be beginning at the bottom of it. A sensible pagan would say +that there were some people one could forgive, and some one couldn't: a +slave who stole wine could be laughed at; a slave who betrayed his +benefactor could be killed, and cursed even after he was killed. In so +far as the act was pardonable, the man was pardonable. That again is +rational, and even refreshing; but it is a dilution. It leaves no place +for a pure horror of injustice, such as that which is a great beauty in +the innocent. And it leaves no place for a mere tenderness for men as +men, such as is the whole fascination of the charitable. Christianity +came in here as before. It came in startlingly with a sword, and clove +one thing from another. It divided the crime from the criminal. The +criminal we must forgive unto seventy times seven. The crime we must not +forgive at all. It was not enough that slaves who stole wine inspired +partly anger and partly kindness. We must be much more angry with theft +than before, and yet much kinder to thieves than before. There was room +for wrath and love to run wild. And the more I considered Christianity, +the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the +chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild.</p> + +<p>Mental and emotional liberty are not so simple as they look. Really they +require almost as careful a balance of laws and conditions as do social +and political liberty. The ordinary æsthetic anarchist who sets out to +feel everything freely gets knotted at last in a paradox that prevents +him feeling at all. He breaks away from home limits to follow poetry. +But in ceasing to feel home limits he has ceased to feel the "Odyssey." +He is free from national prejudices and outside patriotism. But being +outside patriotism he is outside "Henry V." Such a literary man is +simply outside all literature: he is more of a prisoner than any bigot. +For if there is a wall between you and the world, it makes little +difference whether you describe yourself as locked in or as locked out. +What we want is not the universality that is outside all normal +sentiments; we want the universality that is inside all normal +sentiments. It is all the difference between being free from them, as a +man is free from a prison, and being free of them as a man is free of a +city. I am free from Windsor Castle (that is, I am not forcibly detained +there), but I am by no means free of that building. How can man be +approximately free of fine emotions, able to swing them in a clear space +without breakage or wrong? <i>This</i> was the achievement of this Christian +paradox of the parallel passions. Granted the primary dogma of the war +between divine and diabolic, the revolt and ruin of the world, their +optimism and pessimism, as pure poetry, could be loosened like +cataracts.</p> + +<p>St. Francis, in praising all good, could be a more shouting optimist +than Walt Whitman. St. Jerome, in denouncing all evil, could paint the +world blacker than Schopenhauer. Both passions were free because both +were kept in their place. The optimist could pour out all the praise he +liked on the gay music of the march, the golden trumpets, and the purple +banners going into battle. But he must not call the fight needless. The +pessimist might draw as darkly as he chose the sickening marches or the +sanguine wounds. But he must not call the fight hopeless. So it was with +all the other moral problems, with pride, with protest, and with +compassion. By defining its main doctrine, the Church not only kept +seemingly inconsistent things side by side, but, what was more, allowed +them to break out in a sort of artistic violence otherwise possible only +to anarchists. Meekness grew more dramatic than madness. Historic +Christianity rose into a high and strange <i>coup de théatre</i> of +morality—things that are to virtue what the crimes of Nero are to vice. +The spirits of indignation and of charity took terrible and attractive +forms, ranging from that monkish fierceness that scourged like a dog the +first and greatest of the Plantagenets, to the sublime pity of St. +Catherine, who, in the official shambles, kissed the bloody head of the +criminal. Poetry could be acted as well as composed. This heroic and +monumental manner in ethics has entirely vanished with supernatural +religion. They, being humble, could parade themselves; but we are too +proud to be prominent. Our ethical teachers write reasonably for prison +reform; but we are not likely to see Mr. Cadbury, or any eminent +philanthropist, go into Reading Gaol and embrace the strangled corpse +before it is cast into the quicklime. Our ethical teachers write mildly +against the power of millionaires; but we are not likely to see Mr. +Rockefeller, or any modern tyrant, publicly whipped in Westminster +Abbey.</p> + +<p>Thus, the double charges of the secularists, though throwing nothing +but darkness and confusion on themselves, throw a real light on the +faith. It <i>is</i> true that the historic Church has at once emphasised +celibacy and emphasised the family; has at once (if one may put it so) +been fiercely for having children and fiercely for not having children. +It has kept them side by side like two strong colours, red and white, +like the red and white upon the shield of St. George. It has always had +a healthy hatred of pink. It hates that combination of two colours which +is the feeble expedient of the philosophers. It hates that evolution of +black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey. In fact, the whole +theory of the Church on virginity might be symbolized in the statement +that white is a colour: not merely the absence of a colour. All that I +am urging here can be expressed by saying that Christianity sought in +most of these cases to keep two colours co-existent but pure. It is not +a mixture like russet or purple; it is rather like a shot silk, for a +shot silk is always at right angles, and is in the pattern of the cross.</p> + +<p>So it is also, of course, with the contradictory charges of the +anti-Christians about submission and slaughter. It <i>is</i> true that the +Church told some men to fight and others not to fight; and it <i>is</i> true +that those who fought were like thunderbolts and those who did not fight +were like statues. All this simply means that the Church preferred to +use its Supermen and to use its Tolstoyans. There must be <i>some</i> good in +the life of battle, for so many good men have enjoyed being soldiers. +There must be <i>some</i> good in the idea of non-resistance, for so many +good men seem to enjoy being Quakers. All that the Church did (so far as +that goes) was to prevent either of these good things from ousting the +other. They existed side by side. The Tolstoyans, having all the +scruples of monks, simply became monks. The Quakers became a club +instead of becoming a sect. Monks said all that Tolstoy says; they +poured out lucid lamentations about the cruelty of battles and the +vanity of revenge. But the Tolstoyans are not quite right enough to run +the whole world; and in the ages of faith they were not allowed to run +it. The world did not lose the last charge of Sir James Douglas or the +banner of Joan the Maid. And sometimes this pure gentleness and this +pure fierceness met and justified their juncture; the paradox of all the +prophets was fulfilled, and, in the soul of St. Louis, the lion lay down +with the lamb. But remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. +It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that +when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But +that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That +is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the +lamb. The real problem is—Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still +retain his royal ferocity? <i>That</i> is the problem the Church attempted; +<i>that</i> is the miracle she achieved.</p> + +<p>This is what I have called guessing the hidden eccentricities of life. +This is knowing that a man's heart is to the left and not in the middle. +This is knowing not only that the earth is round, but knowing exactly +where it is flat. Christian doctrine detected the oddities of life. It +not only discovered the law, but it foresaw the exceptions. Those +underrate Christianity who say that it discovered mercy; any one might +discover mercy. In fact every one did. But to discover a plan for being +merciful and also severe—<i>that</i> was to anticipate a strange need of +human nature. For no one wants to be forgiven for a big sin as if it +were a little one. Any one might say that we should be neither quite +miserable nor quite happy. But to find out how far one <i>may</i> be quite +miserable without making it impossible to be quite happy—that was a +discovery in psychology. Any one might say, "Neither swagger nor +grovel"; and it would have been a limit. But to say, "Here you can +swagger and there you can grovel"—that was an emancipation.</p> + +<p>This was the big fact about Christian ethics; the discovery of the new +balance. Paganism had been like a pillar of marble, upright because +proportioned with symmetry. Christianity was like a huge and ragged and +romantic rock, which, though it sways on its pedestal at a touch, yet, +because its exaggerated excrescences exactly balance each other, is +enthroned there for a thousand years. In a Gothic cathedral the columns +were all different, but they were all necessary. Every support seemed an +accidental and fantastic support; every buttress was a flying buttress. +So in Christendom apparent accidents balanced. Becket wore a hair shirt +under his gold and crimson, and there is much to be said for the +combination; for Becket got the benefit of the hair shirt while the +people in the street got the benefit of the crimson and gold. It is at +least better than the manner of the modern millionaire, who has the +black and the drab outwardly for others, and the gold next his heart. +But the balance was not always in one man's body as in Becket's; the +balance was often distributed over the whole body of Christendom. +Because a man prayed and fasted on the Northern snows, flowers could be +flung at his festival in the Southern cities; and because fanatics drank +water on the sands of Syria, men could still drink cider in the orchards +of England. This is what makes Christendom at once so much more +perplexing and so much more interesting than the Pagan empire; just as +Amiens Cathedral is not better but more interesting than the Parthenon. +If any one wants a modern proof of all this, let him consider the +curious fact that, under Christianity, Europe (while remaining a unity) +has broken up into individual nations. Patriotism is a perfect example +of this deliberate balancing of one emphasis against another emphasis. +The instinct of the Pagan empire would have said, "You shall all be +Roman citizens, and grow alike; let the German grow less slow and +reverent; the Frenchmen less experimental and swift." But the instinct +of Christian Europe says, "Let the German remain slow and reverent, that +the Frenchman may the more safely be swift and experimental. We will +make an equipoise out of these excesses. The absurdity called Germany +shall correct the insanity called France."</p> + +<p>Last and most important, it is exactly this which explains what is so +inexplicable to all the modern critics of the history of Christianity. I +mean the monstrous wars about small points of theology, the earthquakes +of emotion about a gesture or a word. It was only a matter of an inch; +but an inch is everything when you are balancing. The Church could not +afford to swerve a hair's breadth on some things if she was to continue +her great and daring experiment of the irregular equilibrium. Once let +one idea become less powerful and some other idea would become too +powerful. It was no flock of sheep the Christian shepherd was leading, +but a herd of bulls and tigers, of terrible ideals and devouring +doctrines, each one of them strong enough to turn to a false religion +and lay waste the world. Remember that the Church went in specifically +for dangerous ideas; she was a lion tamer. The idea of birth through a +Holy Spirit, of the death of a divine being, of the forgiveness of sins, +or the fulfilment of prophecies, are ideas which, any one can see, need +but a touch to turn them into something blasphemous or ferocious. The +smallest link was let drop by the artificers of the Mediterranean, and +the lion of ancestral pessimism burst his chain in the forgotten forests +of the north. Of these theological equalisations I have to speak +afterwards. Here it is enough to notice that if some small mistake were +made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness. A +sentence phrased wrong about the nature of symbolism would have broken +all the best statues in Europe. A slip in the definitions might stop all +the dances; might wither all the Christmas trees or break all the Easter +eggs. Doctrines had to be defined within strict limits, even in order +that man might enjoy general human liberties. The Church had to be +careful, if only that the world might be careless.</p> + +<p>This is the thrilling romance of Orthodoxy. People have fallen into a +foolish habit of speaking of orthodoxy as something heavy, humdrum, and +safe. There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy. +It was sanity: and to be sane is more dramatic than to be mad. It was +the equilibrium of a man behind madly rushing horses, seeming to stoop +this way and to sway that, yet in every attitude having the grace of +statuary and the accuracy of arithmetic. The Church in its early days +went fierce and fast with any warhorse; yet it is utterly unhistoric to +say that she merely went mad along one idea, like a vulgar fanaticism. +She swerved to left and right, so as exactly to avoid enormous +obstacles. She left on one hand the huge bulk of Arianism, buttressed by +all the worldly powers to make Christianity too worldly. The next +instant she was swerving to avoid an orientalism, which would have made +it too unworldly. The orthodox Church never took the tame course or +accepted the conventions; the orthodox Church was never respectable. It +would have been easier to have accepted the earthly power of the Arians. +It would have been easy, in the Calvinistic seventeenth century, to fall +into the bottomless pit of predestination. It is easy to be a madman: it +is easy to be a heretic. It is always easy to let the age have its head; +the difficult thing is to keep one's own. It is always easy to be a +modernist; as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those +open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion and +sect after sect set along the historic path of Christendom—that would +indeed have been simple. It is always simple to fall; there are an +infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands. To +have fallen into any one of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian +Science would indeed have been obvious and tame. But to have avoided +them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly +chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling +and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VII_The_Eternal_Revolution"></a><h2>CHAPTER VII.—<i>The Eternal Revolution</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>The following propositions have been urged: First, that some faith in +our life is required even to improve it; second, that some +dissatisfaction with things as they are is necessary even in order to be +satisfied; third, that to have this necessary content and necessary +discontent it is not sufficient to have the obvious equilibrium of the +Stoic. For mere resignation has neither the gigantic levity of pleasure +nor the superb intolerance of pain. There is a vital objection to the +advice merely to grin and bear it. The objection is that if you merely +bear it, you do not grin. Greek heroes do not grin; but gargoyles +do—because they are Christian. And when a Christian is pleased, he is +(in the most exact sense) frightfully pleased; his pleasure is +frightful. Christ prophesied the whole of Gothic architecture in that +hour when nervous and respectable people (such people as now object to +barrel organs) objected to the shouting of the gutter-snipes of +Jerusalem. He said, "If these were silent, the very stones would cry +out." Under the impulse of His spirit arose like a clamorous chorus the +facades of the mediæval cathedrals, thronged with shouting faces and +open mouths. The prophecy has fulfilled itself: the very stones cry out.</p> + +<p>If these things be conceded, though only for argument, we may take up +where we left it the thread of the thought of the natural man, called by +the Scotch (with regrettable familiarity), "The Old Man." We can ask the +next question so obviously in front of us. Some satisfaction is needed +even to make things better. But what do we mean by making things better? +Most modern talk on this matter is a mere argument in a circle—that +circle which we have already made the symbol of madness and of mere +rationalism. Evolution is only good if it produces good; good is only +good if it helps evolution. The elephant stands on the tortoise, and the +tortoise on the elephant.</p> + +<p>Obviously, it will not do to take our ideal from the principle in +nature; for the simple reason that (except for some human or divine +theory), there is no principle in nature. For instance, the cheap +anti-democrat of to-day will tell you solemnly that there is no equality +in nature. He is right, but he does not see the logical addendum. There +is no equality in nature; also there is no inequality in nature. +Inequality, as much as equality, implies a standard of value. To read +aristocracy into the anarchy of animals is just as sentimental as to +read democracy into it. Both aristocracy and democracy are human ideals: +the one saying that all men are valuable, the other that some men are +more valuable. But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than +mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that +the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior +because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the +effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German +pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. +He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first. Or +he might feel that he had actually inflicted frightful punishment on the +cat by keeping him alive. Just as a microbe might feel proud of +spreading a pestilence, so the pessimistic mouse might exult to think +that he was renewing in the cat the torture of conscious existence. It +all depends on the philosophy of the mouse. You cannot even say that +there is victory or superiority in nature unless you have some doctrine +about what things are superior. You cannot even say that the cat scores +unless there is a system of scoring. You cannot even say that the cat +gets the best of it unless there is some best to be got.</p> + +<p>We cannot, then, get the ideal itself from nature, and as we follow here +the first and natural speculation, we will leave out (for the present) +the idea of getting it from God. We must have our own vision. But the +attempts of most moderns to express it are highly vague.</p> + +<p>Some fall back simply on the clock: they talk as if mere passage through +time brought some superiority; so that even a man of the first mental +calibre carelessly uses the phrase that human morality is never up to +date. How can anything be up to date? a date has no character. How can +one say that Christmas celebrations are not suitable to the twenty-fifth +of a month? What the writer meant, of course, was that the majority is +behind his favourite minority—or in front of it. Other vague modern +people take refuge in material metaphors; in fact, this is the chief +mark of vague modern people. Not daring to define their doctrine of what +is good, they use physical figures of speech without stint or shame, +and, what is worst of all, seem to think these cheap analogies are +exquisitely spiritual and superior to the old morality. Thus they think +it intellectual to talk about things being "high." It is at least the +reverse of intellectual; it is a mere phrase from a steeple or a +weathercock. "Tommy was a good boy" is a pure philosophical statement, +worthy of Plato or Aquinas. "Tommy lived the higher life" is a gross +metaphor from a ten-foot rule.</p> + +<p>This, incidentally, is almost the whole weakness of Nietzsche, whom some +are representing as a bold and strong thinker. No one will deny that he +was a poetical and suggestive thinker; but he was quite the reverse of +strong. He was not at all bold. He never put his own meaning before +himself in bald abstract words: as did Aristotle and Calvin, and even +Karl Marx, the hard, fearless men of thought. Nietzsche always escaped a +question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, +"beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more +good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil." Had he +faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was +nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say, "the +purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are +ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man," or "over man," a +physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly +a very timid thinker. He does not really know in the least what sort of +man he wants evolution to produce. And if he does not know, certainly +the ordinary evolutionists, who talk about things being "higher," do not +know either.</p> + +<p>Then again, some people fall back on sheer submission and sitting still. +Nature is going to do something some day; nobody knows what, and nobody +knows when. We have no reason for acting, and no reason for not acting. +If anything happens it is right: if anything is prevented it was wrong. +Again, some people try to anticipate nature by doing something, by doing +anything. Because we may possibly grow wings they cut off their legs. +Yet nature may be trying to make them centipedes for all they know.</p> + +<p>Lastly, there is a fourth class of people who take whatever it is that +they happen to want, and say that that is the ultimate aim of evolution. +And these are the only sensible people. This is the only really healthy +way with the word evolution, to work for what you want, and to call +<i>that</i> evolution. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance +can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish +to make the whole world like that vision. If you like to put it so, the +essence of the doctrine is that what we have around us is the mere +method and preparation for something that we have to create. This is not +a world, but rather the materials for a world. God has given us not so +much the colours of a picture as the colours of a palette. But He has +also given us a subject, a model, a fixed vision. We must be clear about +what we want to paint. This adds a further principle to our previous +list of principles. We have said we must be fond of this world, even in +order to change it. We now add that we must be fond of another world +(real or imaginary) in order to have something to change it to.</p> + +<p>We need not debate about the mere words evolution or progress: +personally I prefer to call it reform. For reform implies form. It +implies that we are trying to shape the world in a particular image; to +make it something that we see already in our minds. Evolution is a +metaphor from mere automatic unrolling. Progress is a metaphor from +merely walking along a road—very likely the wrong road. But reform is a +metaphor for reasonable and determined men: it means that we see a +certain thing out of shape and we mean to put it into shape. And we +know what shape.</p> + +<p>Now here comes in the whole collapse and huge blunder of our age. We +have mixed up two different things, two opposite things. Progress should +mean that we are always changing the world to suit the vision. Progress +does mean (just now) that we are always changing the vision. It should +mean that we are slow but sure in bringing justice and mercy among men: +it does mean that we are very swift in doubting the desirability of +justice and mercy: a wild page from any Prussian sophist makes men doubt +it. Progress should mean that we are always walking towards the New +Jerusalem. It does mean that the New Jerusalem is always walking away +from us. We are not altering the real to suit the ideal. We are altering +the ideal: it is easier.</p> + +<p>Silly examples are always simpler; let us suppose a man wanted a +particular kind of world; say, a blue world. He would have no cause to +complain of the slightness or swiftness of his task; he might toil for a +long time at the transformation; he could work away (in every sense) +until all was blue. He could have heroic adventures; the putting of the +last touches to a blue tiger. He could have fairy dreams; the dawn of a +blue moon. But if he worked hard, that high-minded reformer would +certainly (from his own point of view) leave the world better and bluer +than he found it. If he altered a blade of grass to his favourite colour +every day, he would get on slowly. But if he altered his favourite +colour every day, he would not get on at all. If, after reading a fresh +philosopher, he started to paint everything red or yellow, his work +would be thrown away: there would be nothing to show except a few blue +tigers walking about, specimens of his early bad manner. This is exactly +the position of the average modern thinker. It will be said that this is +avowedly a preposterous example. But it is literally the fact of recent +history. The great and grave changes in our political civilization all +belonged to the early nineteenth century, not to the later. They +belonged to the black and white epoch when men believed fixedly in +Toryism, in Protestantism, in Calvinism, in Reform, and not unfrequently +in Revolution. And whatever each man believed in he hammered at +steadily, without scepticism: and there was a time when the Established +Church might have fallen, and the House of Lords nearly fell. It was +because Radicals were wise enough to be constant and consistent; it was +because Radicals were wise enough to be Conservative. But in the +existing atmosphere there is not enough time and tradition in Radicalism +to pull anything down. There is a great deal of truth in Lord Hugh +Cecil's suggestion (made in a fine speech) that the era of change is +over, and that ours is an era of conservation and repose. But probably +it would pain Lord Hugh Cecil if he realised (what is certainly the +case) that ours is only an age of conservation because it is an age of +complete unbelief. Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish +institutions to remain the same. The more the life of the mind is +unhinged, the more the machinery of matter will be left to itself. The +net result of all our political suggestions, Collectivism, Tolstoyanism, +Neo-Feudalism, Communism, Anarchy, Scientific Bureaucracy—the plain +fruit of all of them is that the Monarchy and the House of Lords will +remain. The net result of all the new religions will be that the Church +of England will not (for heaven knows how long) be disestablished. It +was Karl Marx, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Cunninghame Grahame, Bernard Shaw and +Auberon Herbert, who between them, with bowed gigantic backs, bore up +the throne of the Archbishop of Canterbury.</p> + +<p>We may say broadly that free thought is the best of all the safeguards +against freedom. Managed in a modern style the emancipation of the +slave's mind is the best way of preventing the emancipation of the +slave. Teach him to worry about whether he wants to be free, and he will +not free himself. Again, it may be said that this instance is remote or +extreme. But, again, it is exactly true of the men in the streets around +us. It is true that the negro slave, being a debased barbarian, will +probably have either a human affection of loyalty, or a human affection +for liberty. But the man we see every day—the worker in Mr. Gradgrind's +factory, the little clerk in Mr. Gradgrind's office—he is too mentally +worried to believe in freedom. He is kept quiet with revolutionary +literature. He is calmed and kept in his place by a constant succession +of wild philosophies. He is a Marxian one day, a Nietzscheite the next +day, a Superman (probably) the next day; and a slave every day. The only +thing that remains after all the philosophies is the factory. The only +man who gains by all the philosophies is Gradgrind. It would be worth +his while to keep his commercial helotry supplied with sceptical +literature. And now I come to think of it, of course, Gradgrind is +famous for giving libraries. He shows his sense. All modern books are on +his side. As long as the vision of heaven is always changing, the vision +of earth will be exactly the same. No ideal will remain long enough to +be realised, or even partly realised. The modern young man will never +change his environment; for he will always change his mind.</p> + +<p>This, therefore, is our first requirement about the ideal towards which +progress is directed; it must be fixed. Whistler used to make many rapid +studies of a sitter; it did not matter if he tore up twenty portraits. +But it would matter if he looked up twenty times, and each time saw a +new person sitting placidly for his portrait. So it does not matter +(comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; +for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully +matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old +failures are fruitless. The question therefore becomes this: How can we +keep the artist discontented with his pictures while preventing him from +being vitally discontented with his art? How can we make a man always +dissatisfied with his work, yet always satisfied with working? How can +we make sure that the portrait painter will throw the portrait out of +window instead of taking the natural and more human course of throwing +the sitter out of window?</p> + +<p>A strict rule is not only necessary for ruling; it is also necessary for +rebelling. This fixed and familiar ideal is necessary to any sort of +revolution. Man will sometimes act slowly upon new ideas; but he will +only act swiftly upon old ideas. If I am merely to float or fade or +evolve, it may be towards something anarchic; but if I am to riot, it +must be for something respectable. This is the whole weakness of certain +schools of progress and moral evolution. They suggest that there has +been a slow movement towards morality, with an imperceptible ethical +change in every year or at every instant. There is only one great +disadvantage in this theory. It talks of a slow movement towards +justice; but it does not permit a swift movement. A man is not allowed +to leap up and declare a certain state of things to be intrinsically +intolerable. To make the matter clear, it is better to take a specific +example. Certain of the idealistic vegetarians, such as Mr. Salt, say +that the time has now come for eating no meat; by implication they +assume that at one time it was right to eat meat, and they suggest (in +words that could be quoted) that some day it may be wrong to eat milk +and eggs. I do not discuss here the question of what is justice to +animals. I only say that whatever is justice ought, under given +conditions, to be prompt justice. If an animal is wronged, we ought to +be able to rush to his rescue. But how can we rush if we are, perhaps, +in advance of our time? How can we rush to catch a train which may not +arrive for a few centuries? How can I denounce a man for skinning cats, +if he is only now what I may possibly become in drinking a glass of +milk? A splendid and insane Russian sect ran about taking all the cattle +out of all the carts. How can I pluck up courage to take the horse out +of my hansom-cab, when I do not know whether my evolutionary watch is +only a little fast or the cabman's a little slow? Suppose I say to a +sweater, "Slavery suited one stage of evolution." And suppose he +answers, "And sweating suits this stage of evolution." How can I answer +if there is no eternal test? If sweaters can be behind the current +morality, why should not philanthropists be in front of it? What on +earth is the current morality, except in its literal sense—the morality +that is always running away?</p> + +<p>Thus we may say that a permanent ideal is as necessary to the innovator +as to the conservative; it is necessary whether we wish the king's +orders to be promptly executed or whether we only wish the king to be +promptly executed. The guillotine has many sins, but to do it justice +there is nothing evolutionary about it. The favourite evolutionary +argument finds its best answer in the axe. The Evolutionist says, "Where +do you draw the line?" the Revolutionist answers, "I draw it <i>here</i>: +exactly between your head and body." There must at any given moment be +an abstract right and wrong if any blow is to be struck; there must be +something eternal if there is to be anything sudden. Therefore for all +intelligible human purposes, for altering things or for keeping things +as they are, for founding a system for ever, as in China, or for +altering it every month as in the early French Revolution, it is equally +necessary that the vision should be a fixed vision. This is our first +requirement.</p> + +<p>When I had written this down, I felt once again the presence of +something else in the discussion: as a man hears a church bell above the +sound of the street. Something seemed to be saying, "My ideal at least +is fixed; for it was fixed before the foundations of the world. My +vision of perfection assuredly cannot be altered; for it is called +Eden. You may alter the place to which you are going; but you cannot +alter the place from which you have come. To the orthodox there must +always be a case for revolution; for in the hearts of men God has been +put under the feet of Satan. In the upper world hell once rebelled +against heaven. But in this world heaven is rebelling against hell. For +the orthodox there can always be a revolution; for a revolution is a +restoration. At any instant you may strike a blow for the perfection +which no man has seen since Adam. No unchanging custom, no changing +evolution can make the original good anything but good. Man may have had +concubines as long as cows have had horns: still they are not a part of +him if they are sinful. Men may have been under oppression ever since +fish were under water; still they ought not to be, if oppression is +sinful. The chain may seem as natural to the slave, or the paint to the +harlot, as does the plume to the bird or the burrow to the fox; still +they are not, if they are sinful. I lift my prehistoric legend to defy +all your history. Your vision is not merely a fixture: it is a fact." I +paused to note the new coincidence of Christianity: but I passed on.</p> + +<p>I passed on to the next necessity of any ideal of progress. Some people +(as we have said) seem to believe in an automatic and impersonal +progress in the nature of things. But it is clear that no political +activity can be encouraged by saying that progress is natural and +inevitable; that is not a reason for being active, but rather a reason +for being lazy. If we are bound to improve, we need not trouble to +improve. The pure doctrine of progress is the best of all reasons for +not being a progressive. But it is to none of these obvious comments +that I wish primarily to call attention.</p> + +<p>The only arresting point is this: that if we suppose improvement to be +natural, it must be fairly simple. The world might conceivably be +working towards one consummation, but hardly towards any particular +arrangement of many qualities. To take our original simile: Nature by +herself may be growing more blue; that is, a process so simple that it +might be impersonal. But Nature cannot be making a careful picture made +of many picked colours, unless Nature is personal. If the end of the +world were mere darkness or mere light it might come as slowly and +inevitably as dusk or dawn. But if the end of the world is to be a piece +of elaborate and artistic chiaroscuro, then there must be design in it, +either human or divine. The world, through mere time, might grow black +like an old picture, or white like an old coat; but if it is turned +into a particular piece of black and white art—then there is an artist.</p> + +<p>If the distinction be not evident, I give an ordinary instance. We +constantly hear a particularly cosmic creed from the modern +humanitarians; I use the word humanitarian in the ordinary sense, as +meaning one who upholds the claims of all creatures against those of +humanity. They suggest that through the ages we have been growing more +and more humane, that is to say, that one after another, groups or +sections of beings, slaves, children, women, cows, or what not, have +been gradually admitted to mercy or to justice. They say that we once +thought it right to eat men (we didn't); but I am not here concerned +with their history, which is highly unhistorical. As a fact, +anthropophagy is certainly a decadent thing, not a primitive one. It is +much more likely that modern men will eat human flesh out of affectation +than that primitive man ever ate it out of ignorance. I am here only +following the outlines of their argument, which consists in maintaining +that man has been progressively more lenient, first to citizens, then +to slaves, then to animals, and then (presumably) to plants. I think it +wrong to sit on a man. Soon, I shall think it wrong to sit on a horse. +Eventually (I suppose) I shall think it wrong to sit on a chair. That is +the drive of the argument. And for this argument it can be said that it +is possible to talk of it in terms of evolution or inevitable progress. +A perpetual tendency to touch fewer and fewer things might, one feels, +be a mere brute unconscious tendency, like that of a species to produce +fewer and fewer children. This drift may be really evolutionary, because +it is stupid.</p> + +<p>Darwinism can be used to back up two mad moralities, but it cannot be +used to back up a single sane one. The kinship and competition of all +living creatures can be used as a reason for being insanely cruel or +insanely sentimental; but not for a healthy love of animals. On the +evolutionary basis you may be inhumane, or you may be absurdly humane; +but you cannot be human. That you and a tiger are one may be a reason +for being tender to a tiger. Or it may be a reason for being as cruel as +the tiger. It is one way to train the tiger to imitate you, it is a +shorter way to imitate the tiger. But in neither case does evolution +tell you how to treat a tiger reasonably, that is, to admire his +stripes while avoiding his claws.</p> + +<p>If you want to treat a tiger reasonably, you must go back to the garden +of Eden. For the obstinate reminder continued to recur: only the +supernatural has taken a sane view of Nature. The essence of all +pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really in this +proposition: that Nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard +Nature as a mother, you discover that she is a step-mother. The main +point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is +our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same +father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to +imitate. This gives to the typically Christian pleasure in this earth a +strange touch of lightness that is almost frivolity. Nature was a solemn +mother to the worshippers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother +to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of +Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is a sister, and +even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as +well as loved.</p> + +<p>This, however, is hardly our main point at present; I have admitted it +only in order to show how constantly, and as it were accidentally, the +key would fit the smallest doors. Our main point is here, that if there +be a mere trend of impersonal improvement in Nature, it must presumably +be a simple trend towards some simple triumph. One can imagine that some +automatic tendency in biology might work for giving us longer and longer +noses. But the question is, do we want to have longer and longer noses? +I fancy not; I believe that we most of us want to say to our noses, +"Thus far, and no farther; and here shall thy proud point be stayed": we +require a nose of such length as may ensure an interesting face. But we +cannot imagine a mere biological trend towards producing interesting +faces; because an interesting face is one particular arrangement of +eyes, nose, and mouth, in a most complex relation to each other. +Proportion cannot be a drift: it is either an accident or a design. So +with the ideal of human morality and its relation to the humanitarians +and the anti-humanitarians. It is conceivable that we are going more and +more to keep our hands off things: not to drive horses; not to pick +flowers. We may eventually be bound not to disturb a man's mind even by +argument; not to disturb the sleep of birds even by coughing. The +ultimate apotheosis would appear to be that of a man sitting quite +still, not daring to stir for fear of disturbing a fly, nor to eat for +fear of incommoding a microbe. To so crude a consummation as that we +might perhaps unconsciously drift. But do we want so crude a +consummation? Similarly, we might unconsciously evolve along the +opposite or Nietzscheian line of development—superman crushing superman +in one tower of tyrants until the universe is smashed up for fun. But do +we want the universe smashed up for fun? Is it not quite clear that what +we really hope for is one particular management and proposition of these +two things; a certain amount of restraint and respect, a certain amount +of energy and mastery. If our life is ever really as beautiful as a +fairy-tale, we shall have to remember that all the beauty of a +fairy-tale lies in this: that the prince has a wonder which just stops +short of being fear. If he is afraid of the giant, there is an end of +him; but also if he is not astonished at the giant, there is an end of +the fairy-tale. The whole point depends upon his being at once humble +enough to wonder, and haughty enough to defy. So our attitude to the +giant of the world must not merely be increasing delicacy or increasing +contempt: it must be one particular proportion of the two—which is +exactly right. We must have in us enough reverence for all things +outside us to make us tread fearfully on the grass. We must also have +enough disdain for all things outside us, to make us, on due occasion, +spit at the stars. Yet these two things (if we are to be good or happy) +must be combined, not in any combination, but in one particular +combination. The perfect happiness of men on the earth (if it ever +comes) will not be a flat and solid thing, like the satisfaction of +animals. It will be an exact and perilous balance; like that of a +desperate romance. Man must have just enough faith in himself to have +adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them.</p> + +<p>This, then, is our second requirement for the ideal of progress. First, +it must be fixed; second, it must be composite. It must not (if it is to +satisfy our souls) be the mere victory of some one thing swallowing up +everything else, love or pride or peace or adventure; it must be a +definite picture composed of these elements in their best proportion and +relation. I am not concerned at this moment to deny that some such good +culmination may be, by the constitution of things, reserved for the +human race. I only point out that if this composite happiness is fixed +for us it must be fixed by some mind; for only a mind can place the +exact proportions of a composite happiness. If the beatification of the +world is a mere work of nature, then it must be as simple as the +freezing of the world, or the burning up of the world. But if the +beatification of the world is not a work of nature but a work of art, +then it involves an artist. And here again my contemplation was cloven +by the ancient voice which said, "I could have told you all this a long +time ago. If there is any certain progress it can only be my kind of +progress, the progress towards a complete city of virtues and +dominations where righteousness and peace contrive to kiss each other. +An impersonal force might be leading you to a wilderness of perfect +flatness or a peak of perfect height. But only a personal God can +possibly be leading you (if, indeed, you are being led) to a city with +just streets and architectural proportions, a city in which each of you +can contribute exactly the right amount of your own colour to the +many-coloured coat of Joseph."</p> + +<p>Twice again, therefore, Christianity had come in with the exact answer +that I required. I had said, "The ideal must be fixed," and the Church +had answered, "Mine is literally fixed, for it existed before anything +else." I said secondly, "It must be artistically combined, like a +picture"; and the Church answered, "Mine is quite literally a picture, +for I know who painted it." Then I went on to the third thing, which, as +it seemed to me, was needed for an Utopia or goal of progress. And of +all the three it is infinitely the hardest to express. Perhaps it might +be put thus: that we need watchfulness even in Utopia, lest we fall from +Utopia as we fell from Eden.</p> + +<p>We have remarked that one reason offered for being a progressive is that +things naturally tend to grow better. But the only real reason for being +a progressive is that things naturally tend to grow worse. The +corruption in things is not only the best argument for being +progressive; it is also the only argument against being conservative. +The conservative theory would really be quite sweeping and unanswerable +if it were not for this one fact. But all conservatism is based upon the +idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you +do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change. +If you leave a white post alone it will soon be a black post. If you +particularly want it to be white you must be always painting it again; +that is, you must be always having a revolution. Briefly, if you want +the old white post you must have a new white post. But this which is +true even of inanimate things is in a quite special and terrible sense +true of all human things. An almost unnatural vigilance is really +required of the citizen because of the horrible rapidity with which +human institutions grow old. It is the custom in passing romance and +journalism to talk of men suffering under old tyrannies. But, as a fact, +men have almost always suffered under new tyrannies; under tyrannies +that had been public liberties hardly twenty years before. Thus England +went mad with joy over the patriotic monarchy of Elizabeth; and then +(almost immediately afterwards) went mad with rage in the trap of the +tyranny of Charles the First. So, again, in France the monarchy became +intolerable, not just after it had been tolerated, but just after it had +been adored. The son of Louis the well-beloved was Louis the +guillotined. So in the same way in England in the nineteenth century the +Radical manufacturer was entirely trusted as a mere tribune of the +people, until suddenly we heard the cry of the Socialist that he was a +tyrant eating the people like bread. So again, we have almost up to the +last instant trusted the newspapers as organs of public opinion. Just +recently some of us have seen (not slowly, but with a start) that they +are obviously nothing of the kind. They are, by the nature of the case, +the hobbies of a few rich men. We have not any need to rebel against +antiquity; we have to rebel against novelty. It is the new rulers, the +capitalist or the editor, who really hold up the modern world. There is +no fear that a modern king will attempt to override the constitution; it +is more likely that he will ignore the constitution and work behind its +back; he will take no advantage of his kingly power; it is more likely +that he will take advantage of his kingly powerlessness, of the fact +that he is free from criticism and publicity. For the king is the most +private person of our time. It will not be necessary for any one to +fight again against the proposal of a censorship of the press. We do not +need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship by the press.</p> + +<p>This startling swiftness with which popular systems turn oppressive is +the third fact for which we shall ask our perfect theory of progress to +allow. It must always be on the look out for every privilege being +abused, for every working right becoming a wrong. In this matter I am +entirely on the side of the revolutionists. They are really right to be +always suspecting human institutions; they are right not to put their +trust in princes nor in any child of man. The chieftain chosen to be the +friend of the people becomes the enemy of the people; the newspaper +started to tell the truth now exists to prevent the truth being told. +Here, I say, I felt that I was really at last on the side of the +revolutionary. And then I caught my breath again: for I remembered that +I was once again on the side of the orthodox.</p> + +<p>Christianity spoke again and said, "I have always maintained that men +were naturally backsliders; that human virtue tended of its own nature +to rust or to rot; I have always said that human beings as such go +wrong, especially happy human beings, especially proud and prosperous +human beings. This eternal revolution, this suspicion sustained through +centuries, you (being a vague modern) call the doctrine of progress. If +you were a philosopher you would call it, as I do, the doctrine of +original sin. You may call it the cosmic advance as much as you like; I +call it what it is—the Fall.</p> + +<p>I have spoken of orthodoxy coming in like a sword; here I confess it +came in like a battle-axe. For really (when I came to think of it) +Christianity is the only thing left that has any real right to question +the power of the well-nurtured or the well-bred. I have listened often +enough to Socialists, or even to democrats, saying that the physical +conditions of the poor must of necessity make them mentally and morally +degraded. I have listened to scientific men (and there are still +scientific men not opposed to democracy) saying that if we give the poor +healthier conditions vice and wrong will disappear. I have listened to +them with a horrible attention, with a hideous fascination. For it was +like watching a man energetically sawing from the tree the branch he is +sitting on. If these happy democrats could prove their case, they would +strike democracy dead. If the poor are thus utterly demoralized, it may +or may not be practical to raise them. But it is certainly quite +practical to disfranchise them. If the man with a bad bedroom cannot +give a good vote, then the first and swiftest deduction is that he shall +give no vote. The governing class may not unreasonably say, "It may take +us some time to reform his bedroom. But if he is the brute you say, it +will take him very little time to ruin our country. Therefore we will +take your hint and not give him the chance." It fills me with horrible +amusement to observe the way in which the earnest Socialist +industriously lays the foundation of all aristocracy, expatiating +blandly upon the evident unfitness of the poor to rule. It is like +listening to somebody at an evening party apologising for entering +without evening dress, and explaining that he had recently been +intoxicated, had a personal habit of taking off his clothes in the +street, and had, moreover, only just changed from prison uniform. At any +moment, one feels, the host might say that really, if it was as bad as +that, he need not come in at all. So it is when the ordinary Socialist, +with a beaming face, proves that the poor, after their smashing +experiences, cannot be really trustworthy. At any moment the rich may +say, "Very well, then, we won't trust them," and bang the door in his +face. On the basis of Mr. Blatchford's view of heredity and environment, +the case for the aristocracy is quite overwhelming. If clean homes and +clean air make clean souls, why not give the power (for the present at +any rate) to those who undoubtedly have the clean air? If better +conditions will make the poor more fit to govern themselves, why should +not better conditions already make the rich more fit to govern them? On +the ordinary environment argument the matter is fairly manifest. The +comfortable class must be merely our vanguard in Utopia.</p> + +<p>Is there any answer to the proposition that those who have had the best +opportunities will probably be our best guides? Is there any answer to +the argument that those who have breathed clean air had better decide +for those who have breathed foul? As far as I know, there is only one +answer, and that answer is Christianity. Only the Christian Church can +offer any rational objection to a complete confidence in the rich. For +she has maintained from the beginning that the danger was not in man's +environment, but in man. Further, she has maintained that if we come to +talk of a dangerous environment, the most dangerous environment of all +is the commodious environment. I know that the most modern manufacture +has been really occupied in trying to produce an abnormally large +needle. I know that the most recent biologists have been chiefly anxious +to discover a very small camel. But if we diminish the camel to his +smallest, or open the eye of the needle to its largest—if, in short, +we assume the words of Christ to have meant the very least that they +could mean, His words must at the very least mean this—that rich men +are not very likely to be morally trustworthy. Christianity even when +watered down is hot enough to boil all modern society to rags. The mere +minimum of the Church would be a deadly ultimatum to the world. For the +whole modern world is absolutely based on the assumption, not that the +rich are necessary (which is tenable), but that the rich are +trustworthy, which (for a Christian) is not tenable. You will hear +everlastingly, in all discussions about newspapers, companies, +aristocracies, or party politics, this argument that the rich man cannot +be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has +been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man. The whole case for +Christianity is that a man who is dependent upon the luxuries of this +life is a corrupt man, spiritually corrupt, politically corrupt, +financially corrupt. There is one thing that Christ and all the +Christian saints have said with a sort of savage monotony. They have +said simply that to be rich is to be in peculiar danger of moral wreck. +It is not demonstrably un-Christian to kill the rich as violators of +definable justice. It is not demonstrably un-Christian to crown the +rich as convenient rulers of society. It is not certainly un-Christian +to rebel against the rich or to submit to the rich. But it is quite +certainly un-Christian to trust the rich, to regard the rich as more +morally safe than the poor. A Christian may consistently say, "I respect +that man's rank, although he takes bribes." But a Christian cannot say, +as all modern men are saying at lunch and breakfast, "a man of that rank +would not take bribes." For it is a part of Christian dogma that any man +in any rank may take bribes. It is a part of Christian dogma; it also +happens by a curious coincidence that it is a part of obvious human +history. When people say that a man "in that position" would be +incorruptible, there is no need to bring Christianity into the +discussion. Was Lord Bacon a bootblack? Was the Duke of Marlborough a +crossing sweeper? In the best Utopia, I must be prepared for the moral +fall of <i>any</i> man in <i>any</i> position at <i>any</i> moment; especially for my +fall from my position at this moment.</p> + +<p>Much vague and sentimental journalism has been poured out to the effect +that Christianity is akin to democracy, and most of it is scarcely +strong or clear enough to refute the fact that the two things have often +quarrelled. The real ground upon which Christianity and democracy are +one is very much deeper. The one specially and peculiarly un-Christian +idea is the idea of Carlyle—the idea that the man should rule who feels +that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is heathen. If our +faith comments on government at all, its comment must be this—that the +man should rule who does <i>not</i> think that he can rule. Carlyle's hero +may say, "I will be king"; but the Christian saint must say, "Nolo +episcopari." If the great paradox of Christianity means anything, it +means this—that we must take the crown in our hands, and go hunting in +dry places and dark corners of the earth until we find the one man who +feels himself unfit to wear it. Carlyle was quite wrong; we have not got +to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown +the much more exceptional man who knows he can't.</p> + +<p>Now, this is one of the two or three vital defences of working +democracy. The mere machinery of voting is not democracy, though at +present it is not easy to effect any simpler democratic method. But even +the machinery of voting is profoundly Christian in this practical +sense—that it is an attempt to get at the opinion of those who would be +too modest to offer it. It is a mystical adventure; it is specially +trusting those who do not trust themselves. That enigma is strictly +peculiar to Christendom. There is nothing really humble about the +abnegation of the Buddhist; the mild Hindoo is mild, but he is not meek. +But there is something psychologically Christian about the idea of +seeking for the opinion of the obscure rather than taking the obvious +course of accepting the opinion of the prominent. To say that voting is +particularly Christian may seem somewhat curious. To say that canvassing +is Christian may seem quite crazy. But canvassing is very Christian in +its primary idea. It is encouraging the humble; it is saying to the +modest man, "Friend, go up higher." Or if there is some slight defect in +canvassing, that is in its perfect and rounded piety, it is only because +it may possibly neglect to encourage the modesty of the canvasser.</p> + +<p>Aristocracy is not an institution: aristocracy is a sin; generally a +very venial one. It is merely the drift or slide of men into a sort of +natural pomposity and praise of the powerful, which is the most easy and +obvious affair in the world.</p> + +<p>It is one of the hundred answers to the fugitive perversion of modern +"force" that the promptest and boldest agencies are also the most +fragile or full of sensibility. The swiftest things are the softest +things. A bird is active, because a bird is soft. A stone is helpless, +because a stone is hard. The stone must by its own nature go downwards, +because hardness is weakness. The bird can of its nature go upwards, +because fragility is force. In perfect force there is a kind of +frivolity, an airiness that can maintain itself in the air. Modern +investigators of miraculous history have solemnly admitted that a +characteristic of the great saints is their power of "levitation." They +might go further; a characteristic of the great saints is their power of +levity. Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly. This +has been always the instinct of Christendom, and especially the instinct +of Christian art. Remember how Fra Angelico represented all his angels, +not only as birds, but almost as butterflies. Remember how the most +earnest mediæval art was full of light and fluttering draperies, of +quick and capering feet. It was the one thing that the modern +Pre-raphaelites could not imitate in the real Pre-raphaelites. +Burne-Jones could never recover the deep levity of the Middle Ages. In +the old Christian pictures the sky over every figure is like a blue or +gold parachute. Every figure seems ready to fly up and float about in +the heavens. The tattered cloak of the beggar will bear him up like the +rayed plumes of the angels. But the kings in their heavy gold and the +proud in their robes of purple will all of their nature sink downwards, +for pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward +drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One "settles down" into a +sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay +self-forgetfulness. A man "falls" into a brown study; he reaches up at a +blue sky. Seriousness is not a virtue. It would be a heresy, but a much +more sensible heresy, to say that seriousness is a vice. It is really a +natural trend or lapse into taking one's self gravely, because it is the +easiest thing to do. It is much easier to write a good <i>Times</i> leading +article than a good joke in <i>Punch</i>. For solemnity flows out of men +naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be +light. Satan fell by the force of gravity.</p> + +<p>Now, it is the peculiar honour of Europe since it has been Christian +that while it has had aristocracy it has always at the back of its heart +treated aristocracy as a weakness—generally as a weakness that must be +allowed for. If any one wishes to appreciate this point, let him go +outside Christianity into some other philosophical atmosphere. Let him, +for instance, compare the classes of Europe with the castes of India. +There aristocracy is far more awful, because it is far more +intellectual. It is seriously felt that the scale of classes is a scale +of spiritual values; that the baker is better than the butcher in an +invisible and sacred sense. But no Christianity, not even the most +ignorant or perverse, ever suggested that a baronet was better than a +butcher in that sacred sense. No Christianity, however ignorant or +extravagant, ever suggested that a duke would not be damned. In pagan +society there may have been (I do not know) some such serious division +between the free man and the slave. But in Christian society we have +always thought the gentleman a sort of joke, though I admit that in some +great crusades and councils he earned the right to be called a practical +joke. But we in Europe never really and at the root of our souls took +aristocracy seriously. It is only an occasional non-European alien (such +as Dr. Oscar Levy, the only intelligent Nietzscheite) who can even +manage for a moment to take aristocracy seriously. It may be a mere +patriotic bias, though I do not think so, but it seems to me that the +English aristocracy is not only the type, but is the crown and flower of +all actual aristocracies; it has all the oligarchical virtues as well as +all the defects. It is casual, it is kind, it is courageous in obvious +matters; but it has one great merit that overlaps even these. The great +and very obvious merit of the English aristocracy is that nobody could +possibly take it seriously.</p> + +<p>In short, I had spelled out slowly, as usual, the need for an equal law +in Utopia; and, as usual, I found that Christianity had been there +before me. The whole history of my Utopia has the same amusing sadness. +I was always rushing out of my architectural study with plans for a new +turret only to find it sitting up there in the sunlight, shining, and a +thousand years old. For me, in the ancient and partly in the modern +sense, God answered the prayer, "Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings." +Without vanity, I really think there was a moment when I could have +invented the marriage vow (as an institution) out of my own head; but I +discovered, with a sigh, that it had been invented already. But, since +it would be too long a business to show how, fact by fact and inch by +inch, my own conception of Utopia was only answered in the New +Jerusalem, I will take this one case of the matter of marriage as +indicating the converging drift, I may say the converging crash of all +the rest.</p> + +<p>When the ordinary opponents of Socialism talk about impossibilities and +alterations in human nature they always miss an important distinction. +In modern ideal conceptions of society there are some desires that are +possibly not attainable: but there are some desires that are not +desirable. That all men should live in equally beautiful houses is a +dream that may or may not be attained. But that all men should live in +the same beautiful house is not a dream at all; it is a nightmare. That +a man should love all old women is an ideal that may not be attainable. +But that a man should regard all old women exactly as he regards his +mother is not only an unattainable ideal, but an ideal which ought not +to be attained. I do not know if the reader agrees with me in these +examples; but I will add the example which has always affected me most. +I could never conceive or tolerate any Utopia which did not leave to me +the liberty for which I chiefly care, the liberty to bind myself. +Complete anarchy would not merely make it impossible to have any +discipline or fidelity; it would also make it impossible to have any +fun. To take an obvious instance, it would not be worth while to bet if +a bet were not binding. The dissolution of all contracts would not only +ruin morality but spoil sport. Now betting and such sports are only the +stunted and twisted shapes of the original instinct of man for adventure +and romance, of which much has been said in these pages. And the perils, +rewards, punishments, and fulfilments of an adventure must be <i>real</i>, or +the adventure is only a shifting and heartless nightmare. If I bet I +must be made to pay, or there is no poetry in betting. If I challenge I +must be made to fight, or there is no poetry in challenging. If I vow to +be faithful I must be cursed when I am unfaithful, or there is no fun in +vowing. You could not even make a fairy tale from the experiences of a +man who, when he was swallowed by a whale, might find himself at the top +of the Eiffel Tower, or when he was turned into a frog might begin to +behave like a flamingo. For the purpose even of the wildest romance, +results must be real; results must be irrevocable. Christian marriage is +the great example of a real and irrevocable result; and that is why it +is the chief subject and centre of all our romantic writing. And this +is my last instance of the things that I should ask, and ask +imperatively, of any social paradise; I should ask to be kept to my +bargain, to have my oaths and engagements taken seriously; I should ask +Utopia to avenge my honour on myself.</p> + +<p>All my modern Utopian friends look at each other rather doubtfully, for +their ultimate hope is the dissolution of all special ties. But again I +seem to hear, like a kind of echo, an answer from beyond the world. "You +will have real obligations, and therefore real adventures when you get +to my Utopia. But the hardest obligation and the steepest adventure is +to get there."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_VIII_The_Romance_of_Orthodoxy"></a><h2>CHAPTER VIII.—<i>The Romance of Orthodoxy</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>It is customary to complain of the bustle and strenuousness of our +epoch. But in truth the chief mark of our epoch is a profound laziness +and fatigue; and the fact is that the real laziness is the cause of the +apparent bustle. Take one quite external case; the streets are noisy +with taxicabs and motor-cars; but this is not due to human activity but +to human repose. There would be less bustle if there were more activity, +if people were simply walking about. Our world would be more silent if +it were more strenuous. And this which is true of the apparent physical +bustle is true also of the apparent bustle of the intellect. Most of the +machinery of modern language is labour-saving machinery; and it saves +mental labour very much more than it ought. Scientific phrases are used +like scientific wheels and piston-rods to make swifter and smoother yet +the path of the comfortable. Long words go rattling by us like long +railway trains. We know they are carrying thousands who are too tired or +too indolent to walk and think for themselves. It is a good exercise to +try for once in a way to express any opinion one holds in words of one +syllable. If you say "The social utility of the indeterminate sentence +is recognised by all criminologists as a part of our sociological +evolution towards a more humane and scientific view of punishment," you +can go on talking like that for hours with hardly a movement of the grey +matter inside your skull. But if you begin "I wish Jones to go to gaol +and Brown to say when Jones shall come out," you will discover, with a +thrill of horror, that you are obliged to think. The long words are not +the hard words, it is the short words that are hard. There is much more +metaphysical subtlety in the word "damn" than in the word +"degeneration."</p> + +<p>But these long comfortable words that save modern people the toil of +reasoning have one particular aspect in which they are especially +ruinous and confusing. This difficulty occurs when the same long word is +used in different connections to mean quite different things. Thus, to +take a well-known instance, the word "idealist" has one meaning as a +piece of philosophy and quite another as a piece of moral rhetoric. In +the same way the scientific materialists have had just reason to +complain of people mixing up "materialist" as a term of cosmology with +"materialist" as a moral taunt. So, to take a cheaper instance, the man +who hates "progressives" in London always calls himself a "progressive" +in South Africa.</p> + +<p>A confusion quite as unmeaning as this has arisen in connection with the +word "liberal" as applied to religion and as applied to politics and +society. It is often suggested that all Liberals ought to be +freethinkers, because they ought to love everything that is free. You +might just as well say that all idealists ought to be High Churchmen, +because they ought to love everything that is high. You might as well +say that Low Churchmen ought to like Low Mass, or that Broad Churchmen +ought to like broad jokes. The thing is a mere accident of words. In +actual modern Europe a free-thinker does not mean a man who thinks for +himself. It means a man who, having thought for himself, has come to one +particular class of conclusions, the material origin of phenomena, the +impossibility of miracles, the improbability of personal immortality and +so on. And none of these ideas are particularly liberal. Nay, indeed +almost all these ideas are definitely illiberal, as it is the purpose of +this chapter to show.</p> + +<p>In the few following pages I propose to point out as rapidly as +possible that on every single one of the matters most strongly insisted +on by liberalisers of theology their effect upon social practice would +be definitely illiberal. Almost every contemporary proposal to bring +freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the +world. For freeing the church now does not even mean freeing it in all +directions. It means freeing that peculiar set of dogmas loosely called +scientific, dogmas of monism, of pantheism, or of Arianism, or of +necessity. And every one of these (and we will take them one by one) can +be shown to be the natural ally of oppression. In fact, it is a +remarkable circumstance (indeed not so very remarkable when one comes to +think of it) that most things are the allies of oppression. There is +only one thing that can never go past a certain point in its alliance +with oppression—and that is orthodoxy. I may, it is true, twist +orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a +German philosophy to justify him entirely.</p> + +<p>Now let us take in order the innovations that are the notes of the new +theology or the modernist church. We concluded the last chapter with the +discovery of one of them. The very doctrine which is called the most +old-fashioned was found to be the only safeguard of the new democracies +of the earth. The doctrine seemingly most unpopular was found to be the +only strength of the people. In short, we found that the only logical +negation of oligarchy was in the affirmation of original sin. So it is, +I maintain, in all the other cases.</p> + +<p>I take the most obvious instance first, the case of miracles. For some +extraordinary reason, there is a fixed notion that it is more liberal to +disbelieve in miracles than to believe in them. Why, I cannot imagine, +nor can anybody tell me. For some inconceivable cause a "broad" or +"liberal" clergyman always means a man who wishes at least to diminish +the number of miracles; it never means a man who wishes to increase that +number. It always means a man who is free to disbelieve that Christ came +out of His grave; it never means a man who is free to believe that his +own aunt came out of her grave. It is common to find trouble in a parish +because the parish priest cannot admit that St. Peter walked on water; +yet how rarely do we find trouble in a parish because the clergyman says +that his father walked on the Serpentine? And this is not because (as +the swift secularist debater would immediately retort) miracles cannot +be believed in our experience. It is not because "miracles do not +happen," as in the dogma which Matthew Arnold recited with simple faith. +More supernatural things are <i>alleged</i> to have happened in our time than +would have been possible eighty years ago. Men of science believe in +such marvels much more than they did: the most perplexing, and even +horrible, prodigies of mind and spirit are always being unveiled in +modern psychology. Things that the old science at least would frankly +have rejected as miracles are hourly being asserted by the new science. +The only thing which is still old-fashioned enough to reject miracles is +the New Theology. But in truth this notion that it is "free" to deny +miracles has nothing to do with the evidence for or against them. It is +a lifeless verbal prejudice of which the original life and beginning was +not in the freedom of thought, but simply in the dogma of materialism. +The man of the nineteenth century did not disbelieve in the Resurrection +because his liberal Christianity allowed him to doubt it. He disbelieved +in it because his very strict materialism did not allow him to believe +it. Tennyson, a very typical nineteenth-century man, uttered one of the +instinctive truisms of his contemporaries when he said that there was +faith in their honest doubt. There was indeed. Those words have a +profound and even a horrible truth. In their doubt of miracles there was +a faith in a fixed and godless fate; a deep and sincere faith in the +incurable routine of the cosmos. The doubts of the agnostic were only +the dogmas of the monist.</p> + +<p>Of the fact and evidence of the supernatural I will speak afterwards. +Here we are only concerned with this clear point; that in so far as the +liberal idea of freedom can be said to be on either side in the +discussion about miracles, it is obviously on the side of miracles. +Reform or (in the only tolerable sense) progress means simply the +gradual control of matter by mind. A miracle simply means the swift +control of matter by mind. If you wish to feed the people, you may think +that feeding them miraculously in the wilderness is impossible—but you +cannot think it illiberal. If you really want poor children to go to the +seaside, you cannot think it illiberal that they should go there on +flying dragons; you can only think it unlikely. A holiday, like +Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the +liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you +cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea. The Catholic +Church believed that man and God both had a sort of spiritual freedom. +Calvinism took away the freedom from man, but left it to God. Scientific +materialism binds the Creator Himself; it chains up God as the +Apocalypse chained the devil. It leaves nothing free in the universe. +And those who assist this process are called the "liberal theologians."</p> + +<p>This, as I say, is the lightest and most evident case. The assumption +that there is something in the doubt of miracles akin to liberality or +reform is literally the opposite of the truth. If a man cannot believe +in miracles there is an end of the matter; he is not particularly +liberal, but he is perfectly honourable and logical, which are much +better things. But if he can believe in miracles, he is certainly the +more liberal for doing so; because they mean first, the freedom of the +soul, and secondly, its control over the tyranny of circumstance. +Sometimes this truth is ignored in a singularly naive way, even by the +ablest men. For instance, Mr. Bernard Shaw speaks with a hearty +old-fashioned contempt for the idea of miracles, as if they were a sort +of breach of faith on the part of nature: he seems strangely +unconscious that miracles are only the final flowers of his own +favourite tree, the doctrine of the omnipotence of will. Just in the +same way he calls the desire for immortality a paltry selfishness, +forgetting that he has just called the desire for life a healthy and +heroic selfishness. How can it be noble to wish to make one's life +infinite and yet mean to wish to make it immortal? No, if it is +desirable that man should triumph over the cruelty of nature or custom, +then miracles are certainly desirable; we will discuss afterwards +whether they are possible.</p> + +<p>But I must pass on to the larger cases of this curious error; the notion +that the "liberalising" of religion in some way helps the liberation of +the world. The second example of it can be found in the question of +pantheism—or rather of a certain modern attitude which is often called +immanentism, and which often is Buddhism. But this is so much more +difficult a matter that I must approach it with rather more preparation.</p> + +<p>The things said most confidently by advanced persons to crowded +audiences are generally those quite opposite to the fact; it is actually +our truisms that are untrue. Here is a case. There is a phrase of facile +liberality uttered again and again at ethical societies and parliaments +of religion: "the religions of the earth differ in rites and forms, but +they are the same in what they teach." It is false; it is the opposite +of the fact. The religions of the earth do <i>not</i> greatly differ in rites +and forms; they do greatly differ in what they teach. It is as if a man +were to say, "Do not be misled by the fact that the <i>Church Times</i> and +the <i>Freethinker</i> look utterly different, that one is painted on vellum +and the other carved on marble, that one is triangular and the other +hectagonal; read them and you will see that they say the same thing." +The truth is, of course, that they are alike in everything except in the +fact that they don't say the same thing. An atheist stockbroker in +Surbiton looks exactly like a Swedenborgian stockbroker in Wimbledon. +You may walk round and round them and subject them to the most personal +and offensive study without seeing anything Swedenborgian in the hat or +anything particularly godless in the umbrella. It is exactly in their +souls that they are divided. So the truth is that the difficulty of all +the creeds of the earth is not as alleged in this cheap maxim: that they +agree in meaning, but differ in machinery. It is exactly the opposite. +They agree in machinery; almost every great religion on earth works +with the same external methods, with priests, scriptures, altars, sworn +brotherhoods, special feasts. They agree in the mode of teaching; what +they differ about is the thing to be taught. Pagan optimists and Eastern +pessimists would both have temples, just as Liberals and Tories would +both have newspapers. Creeds that exist to destroy each other both have +scriptures, just as armies that exist to destroy each other both have +guns.</p> + +<p>The great example of this alleged identity of all human religions is the +alleged spiritual identity of Buddhism and Christianity. Those who adopt +this theory generally avoid the ethics of most other creeds, except, +indeed, Confucianism, which they like because it is not a creed. But +they are cautious in their praises of Mahommedanism, generally confining +themselves to imposing its morality only upon the refreshment of the +lower classes. They seldom suggest the Mahommedan view of marriage (for +which there is a great deal to be said), and towards Thugs and fetish +worshippers their attitude may even be called cold. But in the case of +the great religion of Gautama they feel sincerely a similarity.</p> + +<p>Students of popular science, like Mr. Blatchford, are always insisting +that Christianity and Buddhism are very much alike, especially +Buddhism. This is generally believed, and I believed it myself until I +read a book giving the reasons for it. The reasons were of two kinds: +resemblances that meant nothing because they were common to all +humanity, and resemblances which were not resemblances at all. The +author solemnly explained that the two creeds were alike in things in +which all creeds are alike, or else he described them as alike in some +point in which they are quite obviously different. Thus, as a case of +the first class, he said that both Christ and Buddha were called by the +divine voice coming out of the sky, as if you would expect the divine +voice to come out of the coal-cellar. Or, again, it was gravely urged +that these two Eastern teachers, by a singular coincidence, both had to +do with the washing of feet. You might as well say that it was a +remarkable coincidence that they both had feet to wash. And the other +class of similarities were those which simply were not similar. Thus +this reconciler of the two religions draws earnest attention to the fact +that at certain religious feasts the robe of the Lama is rent in pieces +out of respect, and the remnants highly valued. But this is the reverse +of a resemblance, for the garments of Christ were not rent in pieces +out of respect, but out of derision; and the remnants were not highly +valued except for what they would fetch in the rag shops. It is rather +like alluding to the obvious connection between the two ceremonies of +the sword: when it taps a man's shoulder, and when it cuts off his head. +It is not at all similar for the man. These scraps of puerile pedantry +would indeed matter little if it were not also true that the alleged +philosophical resemblances are also of these two kinds, either proving +too much or not proving anything. That Buddhism approves of mercy or of +self-restraint is not to say that it is specially like Christianity; it +is only to say that it is not utterly unlike all human existence. +Buddhists disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess because all sane +human beings disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess. But to say that +Buddhism and Christianity give the same philosophy of these things is +simply false. All humanity does agree that we are in a net of sin. Most +of humanity agrees that there is some way out. But as to what is the way +out, I do not think that there are two institutions in the universe +which contradict each other so flatly as Buddhism and Christianity.</p> + +<p>Even when I thought, with most other well-informed, though unscholarly, +people, that Buddhism and Christianity were alike, there was one thing +about them that always perplexed me; I mean the startling difference in +their type of religious art. I do not mean in its technical style of +representation, but in the things that it was manifestly meant to +represent. No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint +in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The +opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of +it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the +Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a +sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. +The mediæval saint's body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are +frightfully alive. There cannot be any real community of spirit between +forces that produced symbols so different as that. Granted that both +images are extravagances, are perversions of the pure creed, it must be +a real divergence which could produce such opposite extravagances. The +Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is +staring with a frantic intentness outwards. If we follow that clue +steadily we shall find some interesting things.</p> + +<p>A short time ago Mrs. Besant, in an interesting essay, announced that +there was only one religion in the world, that all faiths were only +versions or perversions of it, and that she was quite prepared to say +what it was. According to Mrs. Besant this universal Church is simply +the universal self. It is the doctrine that we are really all one +person; that there are no real walls of individuality between man and +man. If I may put it so, she does not tell us to love our neighbours; +she tells us to be our neighbours. That is Mrs. Besant's thoughtful and +suggestive description of the religion in which all men must find +themselves in agreement. And I never heard of any suggestion in my life +with which I more violently disagree. I want to love my neighbour not +because he is I, but precisely because he is not I. I want to adore the +world, not as one likes a looking-glass, because it is one's self, but +as one loves a woman, because she is entirely different. If souls are +separate love is possible. If souls are united love is obviously +impossible. A man may be said loosely to love himself, but he can hardly +fall in love with himself, or, if he does, it must be a monotonous +courtship. If the world is full of real selves, they can be really +unselfish selves. But upon Mrs. Besant's principle the whole cosmos is +only one enormously selfish person.</p> + +<p>It is just here that Buddhism is on the side of modern pantheism and +immanence. And it is just here that Christianity is on the side of +humanity and liberty and love. Love desires personality; therefore love +desires division. It is the instinct of Christianity to be glad that God +has broken the universe into little pieces, because they are living +pieces. It is her instinct to say "little children love one another" +rather than to tell one large person to love himself. This is the +intellectual abyss between Buddhism and Christianity; that for the +Buddhist or Theosophist personality is the fall of man, for the +Christian it is the purpose of God, the whole point of his cosmic idea. +The world-soul of the Theosophists asks man to love it only in order +that man may throw himself into it. But the divine centre of +Christianity actually threw man out of it in order that he might love +it. The oriental deity is like a giant who should have lost his leg or +hand and be always seeking to find it; but the Christian power is like +some giant who in a strange generosity should cut off his right hand, so +that it might of its own accord shake hands with him. We come back to +the same tireless note touching the nature of Christianity; all modern +philosophies are chains which connect and fetter; Christianity is a +sword which separates and sets free. No other philosophy makes God +actually rejoice in the separation of the universe into living souls. +But according to orthodox Christianity this separation between God and +man is sacred, because this is eternal. That a man may love God it is +necessary that there should be not only a God to be loved, but a man to +love him. All those vague theosophical minds for whom the universe is an +immense melting-pot are exactly the minds which shrink instinctively +from that earthquake saying of our Gospels, which declare that the Son +of God came not with peace but with a sundering sword. The saying rings +entirely true even considered as what it obviously is; the statement +that any man who preaches real love is bound to beget hate. It is as +true of democratic fraternity as of divine love; sham love ends in +compromise and common philosophy; but real love has always ended in +bloodshed. Yet there is another and yet more awful truth behind the +obvious meaning of this utterance of our Lord. According to Himself the +Son was a sword separating brother and brother that they should for an +æon hate each other. But the Father also was a sword, which in the +black beginning separated brother and brother, so that they should love +each other at last.</p> + +<p>This is the meaning of that almost insane happiness in the eyes of the +mediæval saint in the picture. This is the meaning of the sealed eyes of +the superb Buddhist image. The Christian saint is happy because he has +verily been cut off from the world; he is separate from things and is +staring at them in astonishment. But why should the Buddhist saint be +astonished at things? since there is really only one thing, and that +being impersonal can hardly be astonished at itself. There have been +many pantheist poems suggesting wonder, but no really successful ones. +The pantheist cannot wonder, for he cannot praise God or praise anything +as really distinct from himself. Our immediate business here however is +with the effect of this Christian admiration (which strikes outwards, +towards a deity distinct from the worshipper) upon the general need for +ethical activity and social reform. And surely its effect is +sufficiently obvious. There is no real possibility of getting out of +pantheism any special impulse to moral action. For pantheism implies in +its nature that one thing is as good as another; whereas action implies +in its nature that one thing is greatly preferable to another. +Swinburne in the high summer of his scepticism tried in vain to wrestle +with this difficulty. In "Songs before Sunrise," written under the +inspiration of Garibaldi and the revolt of Italy, he proclaimed the +newer religion and the purer God which should wither up all the priests +of the world.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"What doest thou now<br /></span> +<span>Looking Godward to cry<br /></span> +<span>I am I, thou art thou,<br /></span> +<span>I am low, thou art high,<br /></span> +<span>I am thou that thou seekest to find him, find thou<br /></span> +<span class="i4">but thyself, thou art I,"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Of which the immediate and evident deduction is that tyrants are as much +the sons of God as Garibaldis; and that King Bomba of Naples having, +with the utmost success, "found himself" is identical with the ultimate +good in all things. The truth is that the western energy that dethrones +tyrants has been directly due to the western theology that says "I am I, +thou art thou." The same spiritual separation which looked up and saw a +good king in the universe looked up and saw a bad king in Naples. The +worshippers of Bomba's god dethroned Bomba. The worshippers of +Swinburne's god have covered Asia for centuries and have never +dethroned a tyrant. The Indian saint may reasonably shut his eyes +because he is looking at that which is I and Thou and We and They and +It. It is a rational occupation: but it is not true in theory and not +true in fact that it helps the Indian to keep an eye on Lord Curzon. +That external vigilance which has always been the mark of Christianity +(the command that we should <i>watch</i> and pray) has expressed itself both +in typical western orthodoxy and in typical western politics: but both +depend on the idea of a divinity transcendent, different from ourselves, +a deity that disappears. Certainly the most sagacious creeds may suggest +that we should pursue God into deeper and deeper rings of the labyrinth +of our own ego. But only we of Christendom have said that we should hunt +God like an eagle upon the mountains: and we have killed all monsters in +the chase.</p> + +<p>Here again, therefore, we find that in so far as we value democracy and +the self-renewing energies of the west, we are much more likely to find +them in the old theology than the new. If we want reform, we must adhere +to orthodoxy: especially in this matter (so much disputed in the +counsels of Mr. R.J. Campbell), the matter of insisting on the immanent +or the transcendent deity. By insisting specially on the immanence of +God we get introspection, self-isolation, quietism, social +indifference—Tibet. By insisting specially on the transcendence of God +we get wonder, curiosity, moral and political adventure, righteous +indignation—Christendom. Insisting that God is inside man, man is +always inside himself. By insisting that God transcends man, man has +transcended himself.</p> + +<p>If we take any other doctrine that has been called old-fashioned we +shall find the case the same. It is the same, for instance, in the deep +matter of the Trinity. Unitarians (a sect never to be mentioned without +a special respect for their distinguished intellectual dignity and high +intellectual honour) are often reformers by the accident that throws so +many small sects into such an attitude. But there is nothing in the +least liberal or akin to reform in the substitution of pure monotheism +for the Trinity. The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an +enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the +mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet. +The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern +king. The <i>heart</i> of humanity, especially of European humanity, is +certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that +gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy +pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort of liberty and +variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world. For Western +religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not well for man to be +alone." The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the +Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the Western idea of +monks. So even asceticism became brotherly; and the Trappists were +sociable even when they were silent. If this love of a living complexity +be our test, it is certainly healthier to have the Trinitarian religion +than the Unitarian. For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with +reverence)—to us God Himself is a society. It is indeed a fathomless +mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with +it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here. Suffice it to say +here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an +English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly +quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and the +dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely God; the real +Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world. For it +is not well for God to be alone.</p> + +<p>Again, the same is true of that difficult matter of the danger of the +soul, which has unsettled so many just minds. To hope for all souls is +imperative; and it is quite tenable that their salvation is inevitable. +It is tenable, but it is not specially favourable to activity or +progress. Our fighting and creative society ought rather to insist on +the danger of everybody, on the fact that every man is hanging by a +thread or clinging to a precipice. To say that all will be well anyhow +is a comprehensible remark: but it cannot be called the blast of a +trumpet. Europe ought rather to emphasise possible perdition; and Europe +always has emphasised it. Here its highest religion is at one with all +its cheapest romances. To the Buddhist or the eastern fatalist existence +is a science or a plan, which must end up in a certain way. But to a +Christian existence is a <i>story</i>, which may end up in any way. In a +thrilling novel (that purely Christian product) the hero is not eaten by +cannibals; but it is essential to the existence of the thrill that he +<i>might</i> be eaten by cannibals. The hero must (so to speak) be an eatable +hero. So Christian morals have always said to the man, not that he +would lose his soul, but that he must take care that he didn't. In +Christian morals, in short, it is wicked to call a man "damned": but it +is strictly religious and philosophic to call him damnable.</p> + +<p>All Christianity concentrates on the man at the cross-roads. The vast +and shallow philosophies, the huge syntheses of humbug, all talk about +ages and evolution and ultimate developments. The true philosophy is +concerned with the instant. Will a man take this road or that? that is +the only thing to think about, if you enjoy thinking. The æons are easy +enough to think about, any one can think about them. The instant is +really awful: and it is because our religion has intensely felt the +instant, that it has in literature dealt much with battle and in +theology dealt much with hell. It is full of <i>danger</i> like a boy's book: +it is at an immortal crisis. There is a great deal of real similarity +between popular fiction and the religion of the western people. If you +say that popular fiction is vulgar and tawdry, you only say what the +dreary and well-informed say also about the images in the Catholic +churches. Life (according to the faith) is very like a serial story in a +magazine: life ends with the promise (or menace) "to be continued in our +next." Also, with a noble vulgarity, life imitates the serial and +leaves off at the exciting moment. For death is distinctly an exciting +moment.</p> + +<p>But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong +an element of will, of what theology calls free-will. You cannot finish +a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When +somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one +Differential Calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed +Romeo he might have married him to Juliet's old nurse if he had felt +inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly +because it has insisted on the theological free-will. It is a large +matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately +here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk +about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic +environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. +The fallacy of the whole thing is that evil is a matter of active +choice, whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a +profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, +"Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be +profligates." A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must +not lie still if he wants to be cured of a sin; on the contrary, he must +get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly +expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; "patient" +is in the passive mood; "sinner" is in the active. If a man is to be +saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from +forging, he must be not a patient but an <i>impatient</i>. He must be +personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the +active not the passive will.</p> + +<p>Here again we reach the same substantial conclusion. In so far as we +desire the definite reconstructions and the dangerous revolutions which +have distinguished European civilisation, we shall not discourage the +thought of possible ruin; we shall rather encourage it. If we want, like +the Eastern saints, merely to contemplate how right things are, of +course we shall only say that they must go right. But if we particularly +want to <i>make</i> them go right, we must insist that they may go wrong.</p> + +<p>Lastly, this truth is yet again true in the case of the common modern +attempts to diminish or to explain away the divinity of Christ. The +thing may be true or not; that I shall deal with before I end. But if +the divinity is true it is certainly terribly revolutionary. That a good +man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already; but +that God could have his back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents +for ever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that +omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone has felt that God, +to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all +creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. +For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that +the soul passes a breaking point—and does not break. In this indeed I +approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I +apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent +touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly +feared to approach. But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a +distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some +unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is +written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy +God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in +Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted +God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of +pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it +was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which +confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists +choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the +world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of +unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been +in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows too difficult for human speech) but +let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one +divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which +God seemed for an instant to be an atheist.</p> + +<p>These can be called the essentials of the old orthodoxy, of which the +chief merit is that it is the natural fountain of revolution and reform; +and of which the chief defect is that it is obviously only an abstract +assertion. Its main advantage is that it is the most adventurous and +manly of all theologies. Its chief disadvantage is simply that it is a +theology. It can always be urged against it that it is in its nature +arbitrary and in the air. But it is not so high in the air but that +great archers spend their whole lives in shooting arrows at it—yes, and +their last arrows; there are men who will ruin themselves and ruin their +civilisation if they may ruin also this old fantastic tale. This is the +last and most astounding fact about this faith; that its enemies will +use any weapon against it, the swords that cut their own fingers, and +the firebrands that burn their own homes. Men who begin to fight the +Church for the sake of freedom and humanity end by flinging away freedom +and humanity if only they may fight the Church. This is no exaggeration; +I could fill a book with the instances of it. Mr. Blatchford set out, as +an ordinary Bible-smasher, to prove that Adam was guiltless of sin +against God; in manoeuvring so as to maintain this he admitted, as a +mere side issue, that all the tyrants, from Nero to King Leopold, were +guiltless of any sin against humanity. I know a man who has such a +passion for proving that he will have no personal existence after death +that he falls back on the position that he has no personal existence +now. He invokes Buddhism and says that all souls fade into each other; +in order to prove that he cannot go to heaven he proves that he cannot +go to Hartlepool. I have known people who protested against religious +education with arguments against any education, saying that the child's +mind must grow freely or that the old must not teach the young. I have +known people who showed that there could be no divine judgment by +showing that there can be no human judgment, even for practical +purposes. They burned their own corn to set fire to the church; they +smashed their own tools to smash it; any stick was good enough to beat +it with, though it were the last stick of their own dismembered +furniture. We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks +this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic +who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very +existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims +not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the +emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by +which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon some +one who never lived at all.</p> + +<p>And yet the thing hangs in the heavens unhurt. Its opponents only +succeed in destroying all that they themselves justly hold dear. They do +not destroy orthodoxy; they only destroy political courage and common +sense. They do not prove that Adam was not responsible to God; how could +they prove it? They only prove (from their premises) that the Czar is +not responsible to Russia. They do not prove that Adam should not have +been punished by God; they only prove that the nearest sweater should +not be punished by men. With their oriental doubts about personality +they do not make certain that we shall have no personal life hereafter; +they only make certain that we shall not have a very jolly or complete +one here. With their paralysing hints of all conclusions coming out +wrong they do not tear the book of the Recording Angel; they only make +it a little harder to keep the books of Marshall and Snelgrove. Not only +is the faith the mother of all worldly energies, but its foes are the +fathers of all worldly confusion. The secularists have not wrecked +divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that +is any comfort to them. The Titans did not scale heaven; but they laid +waste the world.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHAPTER_IX_Authority_and_the_Adventurer"></a><h2>CHAPTER IX.—<i>Authority and the Adventurer</i></h2> +<br /> + +<p>The last chapter has been concerned with the contention that orthodoxy +is not only (as is often urged) the only safe guardian of morality or +order, but is also the only logical guardian of liberty, innovation and +advance. If we wish to pull down the prosperous oppressor we cannot do +it with the new doctrine of human perfectibility; we can do it with the +old doctrine of Original Sin. If we want to uproot inherent cruelties or +lift up lost populations we cannot do it with the scientific theory that +matter precedes mind; we can do it with the supernatural theory that +mind precedes matter. If we wish specially to awaken people to social +vigilance and tireless pursuit of practise, we cannot help it much by +insisting on the Immanent God and the Inner Light: for these are at best +reasons for contentment; we can help it much by insisting on the +transcendant God and the flying and escaping gleam; for that means +divine discontent. If we wish particularly to assert the idea of a +generous balance against that of a dreadful autocracy we shall +instinctively be Trinitarian rather than Unitarian. If we desire +European civilisation to be a raid and a rescue, we shall insist rather +that souls are in real peril than that their peril is ultimately unreal. +And if we wish to exalt the outcast and the crucified, we shall rather +wish to think that a veritable God was crucified, rather than a mere +sage or hero. Above all, if we wish to protect the poor we shall be in +favour of fixed rules and clear dogmas. The <i>rules</i> of a club are +occasionally in favour of the poor member. The drift of a club is always +in favour of the rich one.</p> + +<p>And now we come to the crucial question which truly concludes the whole +matter. A reasonable agnostic, if he has happened to agree with me so +far, may justly turn round and say, "You have found a practical +philosophy in the doctrine of the Fall; very well. You have found a side +of democracy now dangerously neglected wisely asserted in Original Sin; +all right. You have found a truth in the doctrine of hell; I +congratulate you. You are convinced that worshippers of a personal God +look outwards and are progressive; I congratulate them. But even +supposing that those doctrines do include those truths, why cannot you +take the truths and leave the doctrines? Granted that all modern +society is trusting the rich too much because it does not allow for +human weakness; granted that orthodox ages have had a great advantage +because (believing in the Fall) they did allow for human weakness, why +cannot you simply allow for human weakness without believing in the +Fall? If you have discovered that the idea of damnation represents a +healthy idea of danger, why can you not simply take the idea of danger +and leave the idea of damnation? If you see clearly the kernel of +common-sense in the nut of Christian orthodoxy, why cannot you simply +take the kernel and leave the nut? Why cannot you (to use that cant +phrase of the newspapers which I, as a highly scholarly agnostic, am a +little ashamed of using) why cannot you simply take what is good in +Christianity, what you can define as valuable, what you can comprehend, +and leave all the rest, all the absolute dogmas that are in their nature +incomprehensible?" This is the real question; this is the last question; +and it is a pleasure to try to answer it.</p> + +<p>The first answer is simply to say that I am a rationalist. I like to +have some intellectual justification for my intuitions. If I am treating +man as a fallen being it is an intellectual convenience to me to +believe that he fell; and I find, for some odd psychological reason, +that I can deal better with a man's exercise of freewill if I believe +that he has got it. But I am in this matter yet more definitely a +rationalist. I do not propose to turn this book into one of ordinary +Christian apologetics; I should be glad to meet at any other time the +enemies of Christianity in that more obvious arena. Here I am only +giving an account of my own growth in spiritual certainty. But I may +pause to remark that the more I saw of the merely abstract arguments +against the Christian cosmology the less I thought of them. I mean that +having found the moral atmosphere of the Incarnation to be common sense, +I then looked at the established intellectual arguments against the +Incarnation and found them to be common nonsense. In case the argument +should be thought to suffer from the absence of the ordinary apologetic +I will here very briefly summarise my own arguments and conclusions on +the purely objective or scientific truth of the matter.</p> + +<p>If I am asked, as a purely intellectual question, why I believe in +Christianity, I can only answer, "For the same reason that an +intelligent agnostic disbelieves in Christianity." I believe in it +quite rationally upon the evidence. But the evidence in my case, as in +that of the intelligent agnostic, is not really in this or that alleged +demonstration; it is in an enormous accumulation of small but unanimous +facts. The secularist is not to be blamed because his objections to +Christianity are miscellaneous and even scrappy; it is precisely such +scrappy evidence that does convince the mind. I mean that a man may well +be less convinced of a philosophy from four books, than from one book, +one battle, one landscape, and one old friend. The very fact that the +things are of different kinds increases the importance of the fact that +they all point to one conclusion. Now, the non-Christianity of the +average educated man to-day is almost always, to do him justice, made up +of these loose but living experiences. I can only say that my evidences +for Christianity are of the same vivid but varied kind as his evidences +against it. For when I look at these various anti-Christian truths, I +simply discover that none of them are true. I discover that the true +tide and force of all the facts flows the other way. Let us take cases. +Many a sensible modern man must have abandoned Christianity under the +pressure of three such converging convictions as these: first, that +men, with their shape, structure, and sexuality, are, after all, very +much like beasts, a mere variety of the animal kingdom; second, that +primeval religion arose in ignorance and fear; third, that priests have +blighted societies with bitterness and gloom. Those three anti-Christian +arguments are very different; but they are all quite logical and +legitimate; and they all converge. The only objection to them (I +discover) is that they are all untrue. If you leave off looking at books +about beasts and men, if you begin to look at beasts and men then (if +you have any humour or imagination, any sense of the frantic or the +farcical) you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man +is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his +divergence that requires an explanation. That man and brute are like is, +in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so +insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands +is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having +hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle-bones or +the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of +barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build +colossal temples of ivory even in a roccoco style; camels do not paint +even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many +camel's-hair brushes. Certain modern dreamers say that ants and bees +have a society superior to ours. They have, indeed, a civilisation; but +that very truth only reminds us that it is an inferior civilisation. Who +ever found an ant-hill decorated with the statues of celebrated ants? +Who has seen a bee-hive carved with the images of gorgeous queens of +old? No; the chasm between man and other creatures may have a natural +explanation, but it is a chasm. We talk of wild animals; but man is the +only wild animal. It is man that has broken out. All other animals are +tame animals; following the rugged respectability of the tribe or type. +All other animals are domestic animals; man alone is ever undomestic, +either as a profligate or a monk. So that this first superficial reason +for materialism is, if anything, a reason for its opposite; it is +exactly where biology leaves off that all religion begins.</p> + +<p>It would be the same if I examined the second of the three chance +rationalist arguments; the argument that all that we call divine began +in some darkness and terror. When I did attempt to examine the +foundations of this modern idea I simply found that there were none. +Science knows nothing whatever about pre-historic man; for the excellent +reason that he is pre-historic. A few professors choose to conjecture +that such things as human sacrifice were once innocent and general and +that they gradually dwindled; but there is no direct evidence of it, and +the small amount of indirect evidence is very much the other way. In the +earliest legends we have, such as the tales of Isaac and of Iphigenia, +human sacrifice is not introduced as something old, but rather as +something new; as a strange and frightful exception darkly demanded by +the gods. History says nothing; and legends all say that the earth was +kinder in its earliest time. There is no tradition of progress; but the +whole human race has a tradition of the Fall. Amusingly enough, indeed, +the very dissemination of this idea is used against its authenticity. +Learned men literally say that this pre-historic calamity cannot be true +because every race of mankind remembers it. I cannot keep pace with +these paradoxes.</p> + +<p>And if we took the third chance instance, it would be the same; the view +that priests darken and embitter the world. I look at the world and +simply discover that they don't. Those countries in Europe which are +still influenced by priests, are exactly the countries where there is +still singing and dancing and coloured dresses and art in the open-air. +Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of +a playground. Christianity is the only frame which has preserved the +pleasure of Paganism. We might fancy some children playing on the flat +grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall +round the cliff's edge they could fling themselves into every frantic +game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries. But the walls were +knocked down, leaving the naked peril of the precipice. They did not +fall over; but when their friends returned to them they were all huddled +in terror in the centre of the island; and their song had ceased.</p> + +<p>Thus these three facts of experience, such facts as go to make an +agnostic, are, in this view, turned totally round. I am left saying, +"Give me an explanation, first, of the towering eccentricity of man +among the brutes; second, of the vast human tradition of some ancient +happiness; third, of the partial perpetuation of such pagan joy in the +countries of the Catholic Church." One explanation, at any rate, covers +all three: the theory that twice was the natural order interrupted by +some explosion or revelation such as people now call "psychic." Once +Heaven came upon the earth with a power or seal called the image of God, +whereby man took command of Nature; and once again (when in empire after +empire men had been found wanting) Heaven came to save mankind in the +awful shape of a man. This would explain why the mass of men always look +backwards; and why the only corner where they in any sense look forwards +is the little continent where Christ has His Church. I know it will be +said that Japan has become progressive. But how can this be an answer +when even in saying "Japan has become progressive," we really only mean, +"Japan has become European"? But I wish here not so much to insist on my +own explanation as to insist on my original remark. I agree with the +ordinary unbelieving man in the street in being guided by three or four +odd facts all pointing to something; only when I came to look at the +facts I always found they pointed to something else.</p> + +<p>I have given an imaginary triad of such ordinary anti-Christian +arguments; if that be too narrow a basis I will give on the spur of the +moment another. These are the kind of thoughts which in combination +create the impression that Christianity is something weak and diseased. +First, for instance, that Jesus was a gentle creature, sheepish and +unworldly, a mere ineffectual appeal to the world; second, that +Christianity arose and flourished in the dark ages of ignorance, and +that to these the Church would drag us back; third, that the people +still strongly religious or (if you will) superstitious—such people as +the Irish—are weak, unpractical, and behind the times. I only mention +these ideas to affirm the same thing: that when I looked into them +independently I found, not that the conclusions were unphilosophical, +but simply that the facts were not facts. Instead of looking at books +and pictures about the New Testament I looked at the New Testament. +There I found an account, not in the least of a person with his hair +parted in the middle or his hands clasped in appeal, but of an +extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, +flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy +of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a +being who often acted like an angry god—and always like a god. Christ +had even a literary style of his own, not to be found, I think, +elsewhere; it consists of an almost furious use of the <i>a fortiori</i>. +His "how much more" is piled one upon another like castle upon castle in +the clouds. The diction used <i>about</i> Christ has been, and perhaps +wisely, sweet and submissive. But the diction used by Christ is quite +curiously gigantesque; it is full of camels leaping through needles and +mountains hurled into the sea. Morally it is equally terrific; he called +himself a sword of slaughter, and told men to buy swords if they sold +their coats for them. That he used other even wilder words on the side +of non-resistance greatly increases the mystery; but it also, if +anything, rather increases the violence. We cannot even explain it by +calling such a being insane; for insanity is usually along one +consistent channel. The maniac is generally a monomaniac. Here we must +remember the difficult definition of Christianity already given; +Christianity is a superhuman paradox whereby two opposite passions may +blaze beside each other. The one explanation of the Gospel language that +does explain it, is that it is the survey of one who from some +supernatural height beholds some more startling synthesis.</p> + +<p>I take in order the next instance offered: the idea that Christianity +belongs to the dark ages. Here I did not satisfy myself with reading +modern generalisations; I read a little history. And in history I found +that Christianity, so far from belonging to the dark ages, was the one +path across the dark ages that was not dark. It was a shining bridge +connecting two shining civilisations. If any one says that the faith +arose in ignorance and savagery the answer is simple: it didn't. It +arose in the Mediterranean civilisation in the full summer of the Roman +Empire. The world was swarming with sceptics, and pantheism was as plain +as the sun, when Constantine nailed the cross to the mast. It is +perfectly true that afterwards the ship sank; but it is far more +extraordinary that the ship came up again: repainted and glittering, +with the cross still at the top. This is the amazing thing the religion +did: it turned a sunken ship into a submarine. The ark lived under the +load of waters; after being buried under the débris of dynasties and +clans, we arose and remembered Rome. If our faith had been a mere fad of +the fading empire, fad would have followed fad in the twilight, and if +the civilisation ever re-emerged (and many such have never re-emerged) +it would have been under some new barbaric flag. But the Christian +Church was the last life of the old society and was also the first life +of the new. She took the people who were forgetting how to make an arch +and she taught them to invent the Gothic arch. In a word, the most +absurd thing that could be said of the Church is the thing we have all +heard said of it. How can we say that the Church wishes to bring us back +into the Dark Ages? The Church was the only thing that ever brought us +out of them.</p> + +<p>I added in this second trinity of objections an idle instance taken from +those who feel such people as the Irish to be weakened or made stagnant +by superstition. I only added it because this is a peculiar case of a +statement of fact that turns out to be a statement of falsehood. It is +constantly said of the Irish that they are impractical. But if we +refrain for a moment from looking at what is said about them and look at +what is <i>done</i> about them, we shall see that the Irish are not only +practical, but quite painfully successful. The poverty of their country, +the minority of their members are simply the conditions under which they +were asked to work; but no other group in the British Empire has done so +much with such conditions. The Nationalists were the only minority that +ever succeeded in twisting the whole British Parliament sharply out of +its path. The Irish peasants are the only poor men in these islands who +have forced their masters to disgorge. These people, whom we call +priest-ridden, are the only Britons who will not be squire-ridden. And +when I came to look at the actual Irish character, the case was the +same. Irishmen are best at the specially <i>hard</i> professions—the trades +of iron, the lawyer, and the soldier. In all these cases, therefore, I +came back to the same conclusion: the sceptic was quite right to go by +the facts, only he had not looked at the facts. The sceptic is too +credulous; he believes in newspapers or even in encyclopædias. Again the +three questions left me with three very antagonistic questions. The +average sceptic wanted to know how I explained the namby-pamby note in +the Gospel, the connection of the creed with mediæval darkness and the +political impracticability of the Celtic Christians. But I wanted to +ask, and to ask with an earnestness amounting to urgency, "What is this +incomparable energy which appears first in one walking the earth like a +living judgment and this energy which can die with a dying civilisation +and yet force it to a resurrection from the dead; this energy which last +of all can inflame a bankrupt peasantry with so fixed a faith in justice +that they get what they ask, while others go empty away; so that the +most helpless island of the Empire can actually help itself?"</p> + +<p>There is an answer: it is an answer to say that the energy is truly from +outside the world; that it is psychic, or at least one of the results of +a real psychical disturbance. The highest gratitude and respect are due +to the great human civilisations such as the old Egyptian or the +existing Chinese. Nevertheless it is no injustice for them to say that +only modern Europe has exhibited incessantly a power of self-renewal +recurring often at the shortest intervals and descending to the smallest +facts of building or costume. All other societies die finally and with +dignity. We die daily. We are always being born again with almost +indecent obstetrics. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that there is +in historic Christendom a sort of unnatural life: it could be explained +as a supernatural life. It could be explained as an awful galvanic life +working in what would have been a corpse. For our civilisation <i>ought</i> +to have died, by all parallels, by all sociological probability, in the +Ragnorak of the end of Rome. That is the weird inspiration of our +estate: you and I have no business to be here at all. We are all +<i>revenants</i>; all living Christians are dead pagans walking about. Just +as Europe was about to be gathered in silence to Assyria and Babylon, +something entered into its body. And Europe has had a strange life—it +is not too much to say that it has had the <i>jumps</i>—ever since.</p> + +<p>I have dealt at length with such typical triads of doubt in order to +convey the main contention—that my own case for Christianity is +rational; but it is not simple. It is an accumulation of varied facts, +like the attitude of the ordinary agnostic. But the ordinary agnostic +has got his facts all wrong. He is a non-believer for a multitude of +reasons; but they are untrue reasons. He doubts because the Middle Ages +were barbaric, but they weren't; because Darwinism is demonstrated, but +it isn't; because miracles do not happen, but they do; because monks +were lazy, but they were very industrious; because nuns are unhappy, but +they are particularly cheerful; because Christian art was sad and pale, +but it was picked out in peculiarly bright colours and gay with gold; +because modern science is moving away from the supernatural, but it +isn't, it is moving towards the supernatural with the rapidity of a +railway train.</p> + +<p>But among these million facts all flowing one way there is, of course, +one question sufficiently solid and separate to be treated briefly, but +by itself; I mean the objective occurrence of the supernatural. In +another chapter I have indicated the fallacy of the ordinary supposition +that the world must be impersonal because it is orderly. A person is +just as likely to desire an orderly thing as a disorderly thing. But my +own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than +material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call +it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere +emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a +<i>primary</i> intellectual conviction like the certainty of self or the good +of living. Any one who likes, therefore, may call my belief in God +merely mystical; the phrase is not worth fighting about. But my belief +that miracles have happened in human history is not a mystical belief at +all; I believe in them upon human evidence as I do in the discovery of +America. Upon this point there is a simple logical fact that only +requires to be stated and cleared up. Somehow or other an extraordinary +idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly +and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection +with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in +miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence +for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) +because they have a doctrine against them. The open, obvious, democratic +thing is to believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony to a +miracle, just as you believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony +to a murder. The plain, popular course is to trust the peasant's word +about the ghost exactly as far as you trust the peasant's word about the +landlord. Being a peasant he will probably have a great deal of healthy +agnosticism about both. Still you could fill the British Museum with +evidence uttered by the peasant, and given in favour of the ghost. If it +comes to human testimony there is a choking cataract of human testimony +in favour of the supernatural. If you reject it, you can only mean one +of two things. You reject the peasant's story about the ghost either +because the man is a peasant or because the story is a ghost story. That +is, you either deny the main principle of democracy, or you affirm the +main principle of materialism—the abstract impossibility of miracle. +You have a perfect right to do so; but in that case you are the +dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence—it is you +rationalists who refuse actual evidence, being constrained to do so by +your creed. But I am not constrained by any creed in the matter, and +looking impartially into certain miracles of mediæval and modern times, +I have come to the conclusion that they occurred. All argument against +these plain facts is always argument in a circle. If I say, "Mediæval +documents attest certain miracles as much as they attest certain +battles," they answer, "But mediævals were superstitious"; if I want to +know in what they were superstitious, the only ultimate answer is that +they believed in the miracles. If I say "a peasant saw a ghost," I am +told, "But peasants are so credulous." If I ask, "Why credulous?" the +only answer is—that they see ghosts. Iceland is impossible because only +stupid sailors have seen it; and the sailors are only stupid because +they say they have seen Iceland. It is only fair to add that there is +another argument that the unbeliever may rationally use against +miracles, though he himself generally forgets to use it.</p> + +<p>He may say that there has been in many miraculous stories a notion of +spiritual preparation and acceptance: in short, that the miracle could +only come to him who believed in it. It may be so, and if it is so how +are we to test it? If we are inquiring whether certain results follow +faith, it is useless to repeat wearily that (if they happen) they do +follow faith. If faith is one of the conditions, those without faith +have a most healthy right to laugh. But they have no right to judge. +Being a believer may be, if you like, as bad as being drunk; still if we +were extracting psychological facts from drunkards, it would be absurd +to be always taunting them with having been drunk. Suppose we were +investigating whether angry men really saw a red mist before their eyes. +Suppose sixty excellent householders swore that when angry they had seen +this crimson cloud: surely it would be absurd to answer "Oh, but you +admit you were angry at the time." They might reasonably rejoin (in a +stentorian chorus), "How the blazes could we discover, without being +angry, whether angry people see red?" So the saints and ascetics might +rationally reply, "Suppose that the question is whether believers can +see visions—even then, if you are interested in visions it is no point +to object to believers." You are still arguing in a circle—in that old +mad circle with which this book began.</p> + +<p>The question of whether miracles ever occur is a question of common +sense and of ordinary historical imagination: not of any final physical +experiment. One may here surely dismiss that quite brainless piece of +pedantry which talks about the need for "scientific conditions" in +connection with alleged spiritual phenomena. If we are asking whether a +dead soul can communicate with a living it is ludicrous to insist that +it shall be under conditions in which no two living souls in their +senses would seriously communicate with each other. The fact that ghosts +prefer darkness no more disproves the existence of ghosts than the fact +that lovers prefer darkness disproves the existence of love. If you +choose to say, "I will believe that Miss Brown called her <i>fiancé</i> a +periwinkle or any other endearing term, if she will repeat the word +before seventeen psychologists," then I shall reply, "Very well, if +those are your conditions, you will never get the truth, for she +certainly will not say it." It is just as unscientific as it is +unphilosophical to be surprised that in an unsympathetic atmosphere +certain extraordinary sympathies do not arise. It is as if I said that I +could not tell if there was a fog because the air was not clear enough; +or as if I insisted on perfect sunlight in order to see a solar eclipse.</p> + +<p>As a common-sense conclusion, such as those to which we come about sex +or about midnight (well knowing that many details must in their own +nature be concealed) I conclude that miracles do happen. I am forced to +it by a conspiracy of facts: the fact that the men who encounter elves +or angels are not the mystics and the morbid dreamers, but fishermen, +farmers, and all men at once coarse and cautious; the fact that we all +know men who testify to spiritualist incidents but are not +spiritualists; the fact that science itself admits such things more and +more every day. Science will even admit the Ascension if you call it +Levitation, and will very likely admit the Resurrection when it has +thought of another word for it. I suggest the Regalvanisation. But the +strongest of all is the dilemma above mentioned, that these supernatural +things are never denied except on the basis either of anti-democracy or +of materialist dogmatism—I may say materialist mysticism. The sceptic +always takes one of the two positions; either an ordinary man need not +be believed, or an extraordinary event must not be believed. For I hope +we may dismiss the argument against wonders attempted in the mere +recapitulation of frauds, of swindling mediums or trick miracles. That +is not an argument at all, good or bad. A false ghost disproves the +reality of ghosts exactly as much as a forged banknote disproves the +existence of the Bank of England—if anything, it proves its existence.</p> + +<p>Given this conviction that the spiritual phenomena do occur (my evidence +for which is complex but rational), we then collide with one of the +worst mental evils of the age. The greatest disaster of the nineteenth +century was this: that men began to use the word "spiritual" as the same +as the word "good." They thought that to grow in refinement and +uncorporeality was to grow in virtue. When scientific evolution was +announced, some feared that it would encourage mere animality. It did +worse: it encouraged mere spirituality. It taught men to think that so +long as they were passing from the ape they were going to the angel. But +you can pass from the ape and go to the devil. A man of genius, very +typical of that time of bewilderment, expressed it perfectly. Benjamin +Disraeli was right when he said he was on the side of the angels. He was +indeed; he was on the side of the fallen angels. He was not on the side +of any mere appetite or animal brutality; but he was on the side of all +the imperialism of the princes of the abyss; he was on the side of +arrogance and mystery, and contempt of all obvious good. Between this +sunken pride and the towering humilities of heaven there are, one must +suppose, spirits of shapes and sizes. Man, in encountering them, must +make much the same mistakes that he makes in encountering any other +varied types in any other distant continent. It must be hard at first to +know who is supreme and who is subordinate. If a shade arose from the +under world, and stared at Piccadilly, that shade would not quite +understand the idea of an ordinary closed carriage. He would suppose +that the coachman on the box was a triumphant conqueror, dragging behind +him a kicking and imprisoned captive. So, if we see spiritual facts for +the first time, we may mistake who is uppermost. It is not enough to +find the gods; they are obvious; we must find God, the real chief of the +gods. We must have a long historic experience in supernatural +phenomena—in order to discover which are really natural. In this light +I find the history of Christianity, and even of its Hebrew origins, +quite practical and clear. It does not trouble me to be told that the +Hebrew god was one among many. I know he was, without any research to +tell me so. Jehovah and Baal looked equally important, just as the sun +and the moon looked the same size. It is only slowly that we learn that +the sun is immeasurably our master, and the small moon only our +satellite. Believing that there is a world of spirits, I shall walk in +it as I do in the world of men, looking for the thing that I like and +think good. Just as I should seek in a desert for clean water, or toil +at the North Pole to make a comfortable fire, so I shall search the land +of void and vision until I find something fresh like water, and +comforting like fire; until I find some place in eternity, where I am +literally at home. And there is only one such place to be found.</p> + +<p>I have now said enough to show (to any one to whom such an explanation +is essential) that I have in the ordinary arena of apologetics, a ground +of belief. In pure records of experiment (if these be taken +democratically without contempt or favour) there is evidence first, that +miracles happen, and second that the nobler miracles belong to our +tradition. But I will not pretend that this curt discussion is my real +reason for accepting Christianity instead of taking the moral good of +Christianity as I should take it out of Confucianism.</p> + +<p>I have another far more solid and central ground for submitting to it as +a faith, instead of merely picking up hints from it as a scheme. And +that is this: that the Christian Church in its practical relation to my +soul is a living teacher, not a dead one. It not only certainly taught +me yesterday, but will almost certainly teach me to-morrow. Once I saw +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the cross; some day I may see +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the mitre. One fine morning I saw +why windows were pointed; some fine morning I may see why priests were +shaven. Plato has told you a truth; but Plato is dead. Shakespeare has +startled you with an image; but Shakespeare will not startle you with +any more. But imagine what it would be to live with such men still +living, to know that Plato might break out with an original lecture +to-morrow, or that at any moment Shakespeare might shatter everything +with a single song. The man who lives in contact with what he believes +to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and +Shakespeare to-morrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some +truth that he has never seen before. There is one only other parallel to +this position; and that is the parallel of the life in which we all +began. When your father told you, walking about the garden, that bees +stung or that roses smelt sweet, you did not talk of taking the best +out of his philosophy. When the bees stung you, you did not call it an +entertaining coincidence. When the rose smelt sweet you did not say "My +father is a rude, barbaric symbol, enshrining (perhaps unconsciously) +the deep delicate truths that flowers smell." No: you believed your +father, because you had found him to be a living fountain of facts, a +thing that really knew more than you; a thing that would tell you truth +to-morrow, as well as to-day. And if this was true of your father, it +was even truer of your mother; at least it was true of mine, to whom +this book is dedicated. Now, when society is in a rather futile fuss +about the subjection of women, will no one say how much every man owes +to the tyranny and privilege of women, to the fact that they alone rule +education until education becomes futile: for a boy is only sent to be +taught at school when it is too late to teach him anything. The real +thing has been done already, and thank God it is nearly always done by +women. Every man is womanised, merely by being born. They talk of the +masculine woman; but every man is a feminised man. And if ever men walk +to Westminster to protest against this female privilege, I shall not +join their procession.</p> + +<p>For I remember with certainty this fixed psychological fact; that the +very time when I was most under a woman's authority, I was most full of +flame and adventure. Exactly because when my mother said that ants bit +they did bite, and because snow did come in winter (as she said); +therefore the whole world was to me a fairyland of wonderful +fulfilments, and it was like living in some Hebraic age, when prophecy +after prophecy came true. I went out as a child into the garden, and it +was a terrible place to me, precisely because I had a clue to it: if I +had held no clue it would not have been terrible, but tame. A mere +unmeaning wilderness is not even impressive. But the garden of childhood +was fascinating, exactly because everything had a fixed meaning which +could be found out in its turn. Inch by inch I might discover what was +the object of the ugly shape called a rake; or form some shadowy +conjecture as to why my parents kept a cat.</p> + +<p>So, since I have accepted Christendom as a mother and not merely as a +chance example, I have found Europe and the world once more like the +little garden where I stared at the symbolic shapes of cat and rake; I +look at everything with the old elvish ignorance and expectancy. This or +that rite or doctrine may look as ugly and extraordinary as a rake; but +I have found by experience that such things end somehow in grass and +flowers. A clergyman may be apparently as useless as a cat, but he is +also as fascinating, for there must be some strange reason for his +existence. I give one instance out of a hundred; I have not myself any +instinctive kinship with that enthusiasm for physical virginity, which +has certainly been a note of historic Christianity. But when I look not +at myself but at the world, I perceive that this enthusiasm is not only +a note of Christianity, but a note of Paganism, a note of high human +nature in many spheres. The Greeks felt virginity when they carved +Artemis, the Romans when they robed the vestals, the worst and wildest +of the great Elizabethan playwrights clung to the literal purity of a +woman as to the central pillar of the world. Above all, the modern world +(even while mocking sexual innocence) has flung itself into a generous +idolatry of sexual innocence—the great modern worship of children. For +any man who loves children will agree that their peculiar beauty is hurt +by a hint of physical sex. With all this human experience, allied with +the Christian authority, I simply conclude that I am wrong, and the +church right; or rather that I am defective, while the church is +universal. It takes all sorts to make a church; she does not ask me to +be celibate. But the fact that I have no appreciation of the celibates, +I accept like the fact that I have no ear for music. The best human +experience is against me, as it is on the subject of Bach. Celibacy is +one flower in my father's garden, of which I have not been told the +sweet or terrible name. But I may be told it any day.</p> + +<p>This, therefore, is, in conclusion, my reason for accepting the religion +and not merely the scattered and secular truths out of the religion. I +do it because the thing has not merely told this truth or that truth, +but has revealed itself as a truth-telling thing. All other philosophies +say the things that plainly seem to be true; only this philosophy has +again and again said the thing that does not seem to be true, but is +true. Alone of all creeds it is convincing where it is not attractive; +it turns out to be right, like my father in the garden. Theosophists, +for instance, will preach an obviously attractive idea like +re-incarnation; but if we wait for its logical results, they are +spiritual superciliousness and the cruelty of caste. For if a man is a +beggar by his own pre-natal sins, people will tend to despise the +beggar. But Christianity preaches an obviously unattractive idea, such +as original sin; but when we wait for its results, they are pathos and +brotherhood, and a thunder of laughter and pity; for only with original +sin we can at once pity the beggar and distrust the king. Men of science +offer us health, an obvious benefit; it is only afterwards that we +discover that by health, they mean bodily slavery and spiritual tedium. +Orthodoxy makes us jump by the sudden brink of hell; it is only +afterwards that we realise that jumping was an athletic exercise highly +beneficial to our health. It is only afterwards that we realise that +this danger is the root of all drama and romance. The strongest argument +for the divine grace is simply its ungraciousness. The unpopular parts +of Christianity turn out when examined to be the very props of the +people. The outer ring of Christianity is a rigid guard of ethical +abnegations and professional priests; but inside that inhuman guard you +will find the old human life dancing like children, and drinking wine +like men; for Christianity is the only frame for pagan freedom. But in +the modern philosophy the case is opposite; it is its outer ring that +is obviously artistic and emancipated; its despair is within.</p> + +<p>And its despair is this, that it does not really believe that there is +any meaning in the universe; therefore it cannot hope to find any +romance; its romances will have no plots. A man cannot expect any +adventures in the land of anarchy. But a man can expect any number of +adventures if he goes travelling in the land of authority. One can find +no meanings in a jungle of scepticism; but the man will find more and +more meanings who walks through a forest of doctrine and design. Here +everything has a story tied to its tail, like the tools or pictures in +my father's house; for it is my father's house. I end where I began—at +the right end. I have entered at least the gate of all good philosophy. +I have come into my second childhood.</p> + +<p>But this larger and more adventurous Christian universe has one final +mark difficult to express; yet as a conclusion of the whole matter I +will attempt to express it. All the real argument about religion turns +on the question of whether a man who was born upside down can tell when +he comes right way up. The primary paradox of Christianity is that the +ordinary condition of man is not his sane or sensible condition; that +the normal itself is an abnormality. That is the inmost philosophy of +the Fall. In Sir Oliver Lodge's interesting new Catechism, the first two +questions were: "What are you?" and "What, then, is the meaning of the +Fall of Man?" I remember amusing myself by writing my own answers to the +questions; but I soon found that they were very broken and agnostic +answers. To the question, "What are you?" I could only answer, "God +knows." And to the question, "What is meant by the Fall?" I could answer +with complete sincerity, "That whatever I am, I am not myself." This is +the prime paradox of our religion; something that we have never in any +full sense known, is not only better than ourselves, but even more +natural to us than ourselves. And there is really no test of this except +the merely experimental one with which these pages began, the test of +the padded cell and the open door. It is only since I have known +orthodoxy that I have known mental emancipation. But, in conclusion, it +has one special application to the ultimate idea of joy.</p> + +<p>It is said that Paganism is a religion of joy and Christianity of +sorrow; it would be just as easy to prove that Paganism is pure sorrow +and Christianity pure joy. Such conflicts mean nothing and lead +nowhere. Everything human must have in it both joy and sorrow; the only +matter of interest is the manner in which the two things are balanced or +divided. And the really interesting thing is this, that the pagan was +(in the main) happier and happier as he approached the earth, but sadder +and sadder as he approached the heavens. The gaiety of the best +Paganism, as in the playfulness of Catullus or Theocritus, is, indeed, +an eternal gaiety never to be forgotten by a grateful humanity. But it +is all a gaiety about the facts of life, not about its origin. To the +pagan the small things are as sweet as the small brooks breaking out of +the mountain; but the broad things are as bitter as the sea. When the +pagan looks at the very core of the cosmos he is struck cold. Behind the +gods, who are merely despotic, sit the fates, who are deadly. Nay, the +fates are worse than deadly; they are dead. And when rationalists say +that the ancient world was more enlightened than the Christian, from +their point of view they are right. For when they say "enlightened" they +mean darkened with incurable despair. It is profoundly true that the +ancient world was more modern than the Christian. The common bond is in +the fact that ancients and moderns have both been miserable about +existence, about everything, while mediævals were happy about that at +least. I freely grant that the pagans, like the moderns, were only +miserable about everything—they were quite jolly about everything else. +I concede that the Christians of the Middle Ages were only at peace +about everything—they were at war about everything else. But if the +question turn on the primary pivot of the cosmos, then there was more +cosmic contentment in the narrow and bloody streets of Florence than in +the theatre of Athens or the open garden of Epicurus. Giotto lived in a +gloomier town than Euripides, but he lived in a gayer universe.</p> + +<p>The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but +sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my last dogma defiantly) +it is not native to man to be so. Man is more himself, man is more +manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the +superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and +fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the +soul. Pessimism is at best an emotional half-holiday; joy is the +uproarious labour by which all things live. Yet, according to the +apparent estate of man as seen by the pagan or the agnostic, this +primary need of human nature can never be fulfilled. Joy ought to be +expansive; but for the agnostic it must be contracted, it must cling to +one corner of the world. Grief ought to be a concentration; but for the +agnostic its desolation is spread through an unthinkable eternity. This +is what I call being born upside down. The sceptic may truly be said to +be topsy-turvy; for his feet are dancing upwards in idle ecstacies, +while his brain is in the abyss. To the modern man the heavens are +actually below the earth. The explanation is simple; he is standing on +his head; which is a very weak pedestal to stand on. But when he has +found his feet again he knows it. Christianity satisfies suddenly and +perfectly man's ancestral instinct for being the right way up; satisfies +it supremely in this; that by its creed joy becomes something gigantic +and sadness something special and small. The vault above us is not deaf +because the universe is an idiot; the silence is not the heartless +silence of an endless and aimless world. Rather the silence around us is +a small and pitiful stillness like the prompt stillness in a sick room. +We are perhaps permitted tragedy as a sort of merciful comedy: because +the frantic energy of divine things would knock us down like a drunken +farce. We can take our own tears more lightly than we could take the +tremendous levities of the angels. So we sit perhaps in a starry chamber +of silence, while the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to +hear.</p> + +<p>Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret +of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the +strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again +haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the +Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the +thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, +almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing +their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His +open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. +Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists +are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He +flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how +they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained +something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering +personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something +that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was +something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous +isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show +us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it +was His mirth.</p> + + + + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. 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Chesterton + +Release Date: September 28, 2005 [EBook #16769] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ORTHODOXY *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Clare Coney and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + + +ORTHODOXY + +_by_ + +G.K. CHESTERTON + + + +JOHN LANE + +THE BODLEY HEAD LTD + +_First published in_.......................... 1908 + +_printed_..................................... 1908 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1909 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1911 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1915 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1919 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1921 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1924 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1926 + +_First published in "The Week-End Library" in_ 1927 + +_Reprinted_................................... 1934 + + +MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, +LONDON AND BECCLES. + + + + +_TO MY MOTHER_ + + + + +_CONTENTS_ + + + _Chap._ _Page_ + + I. INTRODUCTION IN DEFENCE OF EVERYTHING ELSE 11 + + II. THE MANIAC ................................ 20 + + III. THE SUICIDE OF THOUGHT ................... 50 + + IV. THE ETHICS OF ELFLAND ..................... 76 + + V. THE FLAG OF THE WORLD ...................... 117 + + VI. THE PARADOXES OF CHRISTIANITY ............. 146 + + VII. THE ETERNAL REVOLUTION ................... 186 + + VIII. THE ROMANCE OF ORTHODOXY ................ 228 + + IX. AUTHORITY AND THE ADVENTURER .............. 259 + + + + +_ORTHODOXY_ + + + + +CHAPTER I.--_Introduction in Defence of Everything Else_ + + +The only possible excuse for this book is that it is an answer to a +challenge. Even a bad shot is dignified when he accepts a duel. When +some time ago I published a series of hasty but sincere papers, under +the name of "Heretics," several critics for whose intellect I have a +warm respect (I may mention specially Mr. G.S. Street) said that it was +all very well for me to tell everybody to affirm his cosmic theory, but +that I had carefully avoided supporting my precepts with example. "I +will begin to worry about my philosophy," said Mr. Street, "when Mr. +Chesterton has given us his." It was perhaps an incautious suggestion to +make to a person only too ready to write books upon the feeblest +provocation. But after all, though Mr. Street has inspired and created +this book, he need not read it. If he does read it, he will find that in +its pages I have attempted in a vague and personal way, in a set of +mental pictures rather than in a series of deductions, to state the +philosophy in which I have come to believe. I will not call it my +philosophy; for I did not make it. God and humanity made it; and it made +me. + +I have often had a fancy for writing a romance about an English +yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England +under the impression that it was a new island in the South Seas. I +always find, however, that I am either too busy or too lazy to write +this fine work, so I may as well give it away for the purposes of +philosophical illustration. There will probably be a general impression +that the man who landed (armed to the teeth and talking by signs) to +plant the British flag on that barbaric temple which turned out to be +the Pavilion at Brighton, felt rather a fool. I am not here concerned to +deny that he looked a fool. But if you imagine that he felt a fool, or +at any rate that the sense of folly was his sole or his dominant +emotion, then you have not studied with sufficient delicacy the rich +romantic nature of the hero of this tale. His mistake was really a most +enviable mistake; and he knew it, if he was the man I take him for. What +could be more delightful than to have in the same few minutes all the +fascinating terrors of going abroad combined with all the humane +security of coming home again? What could be better than to have all +the fun of discovering South Africa without the disgusting necessity of +landing there? What could be more glorious than to brace one's self up +to discover New South Wales and then realize, with a gush of happy +tears, that it was really old South Wales. This at least seems to me the +main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of +this book. How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and +yet at home in it? How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged +citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give +us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour +of being our own town? To show that a faith or a philosophy is true from +every standpoint would be too big an undertaking even for a much bigger +book than this; it is necessary to follow one path of argument; and this +is the path that I here propose to follow. I wish to set forth my faith +as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that +mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly +named romance. For the very word "romance" has in it the mystery and +ancient meaning of Rome. Any one setting out to dispute anything ought +always to begin by saying what he does not dispute. Beyond stating what +he proposes to prove he should always state what he does not propose to +prove. The thing I do not propose to prove, the thing I propose to take +as common ground between myself and any average reader, is this +desirability of an active and imaginative life, picturesque and full of +a poetical curiosity, a life such as western man at any rate always +seems to have desired. If a man says that extinction is better than +existence or blank existence better than variety and adventure, then he +is not one of the ordinary people to whom I am talking. If a man prefers +nothing I can give him nothing. But nearly all people I have ever met in +this western society in which I live would agree to the general +proposition that we need this life of practical romance; the combination +of something that is strange with something that is secure. We need so +to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of +welcome. We need to be happy in this wonderland without once being +merely comfortable. It is _this_ achievement of my creed that I shall +chiefly pursue in these pages. + +But I have a peculiar reason for mentioning the man in a yacht, who +discovered England. For I am that man in a yacht. I discovered England. +I do not see how this book can avoid being egotistical; and I do not +quite see (to tell the truth) how it can avoid being dull. Dullness +will, however, free me from the charge which I most lament; the charge +of being flippant. Mere light sophistry is the thing that I happen to +despise most of all things, and it is perhaps a wholesome fact that this +is the thing of which I am generally accused. I know nothing so +contemptible as a mere paradox; a mere ingenious defence of the +indefensible. If it were true (as has been said) that Mr. Bernard Shaw +lived upon paradox, then he ought to be a mere common millionaire; for a +man of his mental activity could invent a sophistry every six minutes. +It is as easy as lying; because it is lying. The truth is, of course, +that Mr. Shaw is cruelly hampered by the fact that he cannot tell any +lie unless he thinks it is the truth. I find myself under the same +intolerable bondage. I never in my life said anything merely because I +thought it funny; though, of course, I have had ordinary human +vain-glory, and may have thought it funny because I had said it. It is +one thing to describe an interview with a gorgon or a griffin, a +creature who does not exist. It is another thing to discover that the +rhinoceros does exist and then take pleasure in the fact that he looks +as if he didn't. One searches for truth, but it may be that one pursues +instinctively the more extraordinary truths. And I offer this book with +the heartiest sentiments to all the jolly people who hate what I write, +and regard it (very justly, for all I know), as a piece of poor clowning +or a single tiresome joke. + +For if this book is a joke it is a joke against me. I am the man who +with the utmost daring discovered what had been discovered before. If +there is an element of farce in what follows, the farce is at my own +expense; for this book explains how I fancied I was the first to set +foot in Brighton and then found I was the last. It recounts my +elephantine adventures in pursuit of the obvious. No one can think my +case more ludicrous than I think it myself; no reader can accuse me here +of trying to make a fool of him: I am the fool of this story, and no +rebel shall hurl me from my throne. I freely confess all the idiotic +ambitions of the end of the nineteenth century. I did, like all other +solemn little boys, try to be in advance of the age. Like them I tried +to be some ten minutes in advance of the truth. And I found that I was +eighteen hundred years behind it. I did strain my voice with a painfully +juvenile exaggeration in uttering my truths. And I was punished in the +fittest and funniest way, for I have kept my truths: but I have +discovered, not that they were not truths, but simply that they were not +mine. When I fancied that I stood alone I was really in the ridiculous +position of being backed up by all Christendom. It may be, Heaven +forgive me, that I did try to be original; but I only succeeded in +inventing all by myself an inferior copy of the existing traditions of +civilized religion. The man from the yacht thought he was the first to +find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to +found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I +discovered that it was orthodoxy. + +It may be that somebody will be entertained by the account of this happy +fiasco. It might amuse a friend or an enemy to read how I gradually +learnt from the truth of some stray legend or from the falsehood of some +dominant philosophy, things that I might have learnt from my +catechism--if I had ever learnt it. There may or may not be some +entertainment in reading how I found at last in an anarchist club or a +Babylonian temple what I might have found in the nearest parish church. +If any one is entertained by learning how the flowers of the field or +the phrases in an omnibus, the accidents of politics or the pains of +youth came together in a certain order to produce a certain conviction +of Christian orthodoxy, he may possibly read this book. But there is in +everything a reasonable division of labour. I have written the book, and +nothing on earth would induce me to read it. + +I add one purely pedantic note which comes, as a note naturally should, +at the beginning of the book. These essays are concerned only to discuss +the actual fact that the central Christian theology (sufficiently +summarized in the Apostles' Creed) is the best root of energy and sound +ethics. They are not intended to discuss the very fascinating but quite +different question of what is the present seat of authority for the +proclamation of that creed. When the word "orthodoxy" is used here it +means the Apostles' Creed, as understood by everybody calling himself +Christian until a very short time ago and the general historic conduct +of those who held such a creed. I have been forced by mere space to +confine myself to what I have got from this creed; I do not touch the +matter much disputed among modern Christians, of where we ourselves got +it. This is not an ecclesiastical treatise but a sort of slovenly +autobiography. But if any one wants my opinions about the actual nature +of the authority, Mr. G.S. Street has only to throw me another +challenge, and I will write him another book. + + + + +CHAPTER II.--_The Maniac_ + + +Thoroughly worldly people never understand even the world; they rely +altogether on a few cynical maxims which are not true. Once I remember +walking with a prosperous publisher, who made a remark which I had often +heard before; it is, indeed, almost a motto of the modern world. Yet I +had heard it once too often, and I saw suddenly that there was nothing +in it. The publisher said of somebody, "That man will get on; he +believes in himself." And I remember that as I lifted my head to listen, +my eye caught an omnibus on which was written "Hanwell." I said to him, +"Shall I tell you where the men are who believe most in themselves? For +I can tell you. I know of men who believe in themselves more colossally +than Napoleon or Caesar. I know where flames the fixed star of certainty +and success. I can guide you to the thrones of the Super-men. The men +who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums." He said +mildly that there were a good many men after all who believed in +themselves and who were not in lunatic asylums. "Yes, there are," I +retorted, "and you of all men ought to know them. That drunken poet from +whom you would not take a dreary tragedy, he believed in himself. That +elderly minister with an epic from whom you were hiding in a back room, +he believed in himself. If you consulted your business experience +instead of your ugly individualistic philosophy, you would know that +believing in himself is one of the commonest signs of a rotter. Actors +who can't act believe in themselves; and debtors who won't pay. It would +be much truer to say that a man will certainly fail because he believes +in himself. Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete +self-confidence is a weakness. Believing utterly in one's self is a +hysterical and superstitious belief like believing in Joanna Southcote: +the man who has it has 'Hanwell' written on his face as plain as it is +written on that omnibus." And to all this my friend the publisher made +this very deep and effective reply, "Well, if a man is not to believe in +himself, in what is he to believe?" After a long pause I replied, "I +will go home and write a book in answer to that question." This is the +book that I have written in answer to it. + +But I think this book may well start where our argument started--in the +neighbourhood of the mad-house. Modern masters of science are much +impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The +ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that +necessity. They began with the fact of sin--a fact as practical as +potatoes. Whether or no man could be washed in miraculous waters, there +was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing. But certain religious +leaders in London, not mere materialists, have begun in our day not to +deny the highly disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. +Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of +Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of the +Reverend R.J. Campbell, in their almost too fastidious spirituality, +admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. +But they essentially deny human sin, which they can see in the street. +The strongest saints and the strongest sceptics alike took positive evil +as the starting-point of their argument. If it be true (as it certainly +is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the +religious philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must +either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny +the present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new +theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the +cat. + +In this remarkable situation it is plainly not now possible (with any +hope of a universal appeal) to start, as our fathers did, with the fact +of sin. This very fact which was to them (and is to me) as plain as a +pikestaff, is the very fact that has been specially diluted or denied. +But though moderns deny the existence of sin, I do not think that they +have yet denied the existence of a lunatic asylum. We all agree still +that there is a collapse of the intellect as unmistakable as a falling +house. Men deny hell, but not, as yet, Hanwell. For the purpose of our +primary argument the one may very well stand where the other stood. I +mean that as all thoughts and theories were once judged by whether they +tended to make a man lose his soul, so for our present purpose all +modern thoughts and theories may be judged by whether they tend to make +a man lose his wits. + +It is true that some speak lightly and loosely of insanity as in itself +attractive. But a moment's thought will show that if disease is +beautiful, it is generally some one else's disease. A blind man may be +picturesque; but it requires two eyes to see the picture. And similarly +even the wildest poetry of insanity can only be enjoyed by the sane. To +the insane man his insanity is quite prosaic, because it is quite true. +A man who thinks himself a chicken is to himself as ordinary as a +chicken. A man who thinks he is a bit of glass is to himself as dull as +a bit of glass. It is the homogeneity of his mind which makes him dull, +and which makes him mad. It is only because we see the irony of his idea +that we think him even amusing; it is only because he does not see the +irony of his idea that he is put in Hanwell at all. In short, oddities +only strike ordinary people. Oddities do not strike odd people. This is +why ordinary people have a much more exciting time; while odd people are +always complaining of the dulness of life. This is also why the new +novels die so quickly, and why the old fairy tales endure for ever. The +old fairy tale makes the hero a normal human boy; it is his adventures +that are startling; they startle him because he is normal. But in the +modern psychological novel the hero is abnormal; the centre is not +central. Hence the fiercest adventures fail to affect him adequately, +and the book is monotonous. You can make a story out of a hero among +dragons; but not out of a dragon among dragons. The fairy tale discusses +what a sane man will do in a mad world. The sober realistic novel of +to-day discusses what an essential lunatic will do in a dull world. + +Let us begin, then, with the mad-house; from this evil and fantastic inn +let us set forth on our intellectual journey. Now, if we are to glance +at the philosophy of sanity, the first thing to do in the matter is to +blot out one big and common mistake. There is a notion adrift everywhere +that imagination, especially mystical imagination, is dangerous to man's +mental balance. Poets are commonly spoken of as psychologically +unreliable; and generally there is a vague association between wreathing +laurels in your hair and sticking straws in it. Facts and history +utterly contradict this view. Most of the very great poets have been not +only sane, but extremely business-like; and if Shakespeare ever really +held horses, it was because he was much the safest man to hold them. +Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is +reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go +mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will +be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does +lie in logic, not in imagination. Artistic paternity is as wholesome as +physical paternity. Moreover, it is worthy of remark that when a poet +really was morbid it was commonly because he had some weak spot of +rationality on his brain. Poe, for instance, really was morbid; not +because he was poetical, but because he was specially analytical. Even +chess was too poetical for him; he disliked chess because it was full of +knights and castles, like a poem. He avowedly preferred the black discs +of draughts, because they were more like the mere black dots on a +diagram. Perhaps the strongest case of all is this: that only one great +English poet went mad, Cowper. And he was definitely driven mad by +logic, by the ugly and alien logic of predestination. Poetry was not the +disease, but the medicine; poetry partly kept him in health. He could +sometimes forget the red and thirsty hell to which his hideous +necessitarianism dragged him among the wide waters and the white flat +lilies of the Ouse. He was damned by John Calvin; he was almost saved by +John Gilpin. Everywhere we see that men do not go mad by dreaming. +Critics are much madder than poets. Homer is complete and calm enough; +it is his critics who tear him into extravagant tatters. Shakespeare is +quite himself; it is only some of his critics who have discovered that +he was somebody else. And though St. John the Evangelist saw many +strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his +own commentators. The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it +floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite +sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the +physical exhaustion of Mr. Holbein. To accept everything is an exercise, +to understand everything a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and +expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet only asks to get his +head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens +into his head. And it is his head that splits. + +It is a small matter, but not irrelevant, that this striking mistake is +commonly supported by a striking misquotation. We have all heard people +cite the celebrated line of Dryden as "Great genius is to madness near +allied." But Dryden did not say that great genius was to madness near +allied. Dryden was a great genius himself, and knew better. It would +have been hard to find a man more romantic than he, or more sensible. +What Dryden said was this, "Great wits are oft to madness near allied"; +and that is true. It is the pure promptitude of the intellect that is in +peril of a breakdown. Also people might remember of what sort of man +Dryden was talking. He was not talking of any unworldly visionary like +Vaughan or George Herbert. He was talking of a cynical man of the world, +a sceptic, a diplomatist, a great practical politician. Such men are +indeed to madness near allied. Their incessant calculation of their own +brains and other people's brains is a dangerous trade. It is always +perilous to the mind to reckon up the mind. A flippant person has asked +why we say, "As mad as a hatter." A more flippant person might answer +that a hatter is mad because he has to measure the human head. + +And if great reasoners are often maniacal, it is equally true that +maniacs are commonly great reasoners. When I was engaged in a +controversy with the _Clarion_ on the matter of free will, that able +writer Mr. R.B. Suthers said that free will was lunacy, because it meant +causeless actions, and the actions of a lunatic would be causeless. I do +not dwell here upon the disastrous lapse in determinist logic. Obviously +if any actions, even a lunatic's, can be causeless, determinism is done +for. If the chain of causation can be broken for a madman, it can be +broken for a man. But my purpose is to point out something more +practical. It was natural, perhaps, that a modern Marxian Socialist +should not know anything about free will. But it was certainly +remarkable that a modern Marxian Socialist should not know anything +about lunatics. Mr. Suthers evidently did not know anything about +lunatics. The last thing that can be said of a lunatic is that his +actions are causeless. If any human acts may loosely be called +causeless, they are the minor acts of a healthy man; whistling as he +walks; slashing the grass with a stick; kicking his heels or rubbing his +hands. It is the happy man who does the useless things; the sick man is +not strong enough to be idle. It is exactly such careless and causeless +actions that the madman could never understand; for the madman (like the +determinist) generally sees too much cause in everything. The madman +would read a conspiratorial significance into those empty activities. He +would think that the lopping of the grass was an attack on private +property. He would think that the kicking of the heels was a signal to +an accomplice. If the madman could for an instant become careless, he +would become sane. Every one who has had the misfortune to talk with +people in the heart or on the edge of mental disorder, knows that their +most sinister quality is a horrible clarity of detail; a connecting of +one thing with another in a map more elaborate than a maze. If you argue +with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get the worst of +it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker for not being +delayed by the things that go with good judgment. He is not hampered by +a sense of humour or by charity, or by the dumb certainties of +experience. He is the more logical for losing certain sane affections. +Indeed, the common phrase for insanity is in this respect a misleading +one. The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is +the man who has lost everything except his reason. + +The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and often in a +purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more strictly, the +insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable; this +may be observed specially in the two or three commonest kinds of +madness. If a man says (for instance) that men have a conspiracy against +him, you cannot dispute it except by saying that all the men deny that +they are conspirators; which is exactly what conspirators would do. His +explanation covers the facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he +is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that +the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England +that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or if +a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him that the +world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's. + +Nevertheless he is wrong. But if we attempt to trace his error in exact +terms, we shall not find it quite so easy as we had supposed. Perhaps +the nearest we can get to expressing it is to say this: that his mind +moves in a perfect but narrow circle. A small circle is quite as +infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is +not so large. In the same way the insane explanation is quite as +complete as the sane one, but it is not so large. A bullet is quite as +round as the world, but it is not the world. There is such a thing as a +narrow universality; there is such a thing as a small and cramped +eternity; you may see it in many modern religions. Now, speaking quite +externally and empirically, we may say that the strongest and most +unmistakable _mark_ of madness is this combination between a logical +completeness and a spiritual contraction. The lunatic's theory explains +a large number of things, but it does not explain them in a large way. I +mean that if you or I were dealing with a mind that was growing morbid, +we should be chiefly concerned not so much to give it arguments as to +give it air, to convince it that there was something cleaner and cooler +outside the suffocation of a single argument. Suppose, for instance, it +were the first case that I took as typical; suppose it were the case of +a man who accused everybody of conspiring against him. If we could +express our deepest feelings of protest and appeal against this +obsession, I suppose we should say something like this: "Oh, I admit +that you have your case and have it by heart, and that many things do +fit into other things as you say. I admit that your explanation explains +a great deal; but what a great deal it leaves out! Are there no other +stories in the world except yours; and are all men busy with your +business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps when the man in the +street did not seem to see you it was only his cunning; perhaps when the +policeman asked you your name it was only because he knew it already. +But how much happier you would be if you only knew that these people +cared nothing about you! How much larger your life would be if your self +could become smaller in it; if you could really look at other men with +common curiosity and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are +in their sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would +begin to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you. +You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your own +little plot is always being played, and you would find yourself under a +freer sky, in a street full of splendid strangers." Or suppose it were +the second case of madness, that of a man who claims the crown, your +impulse would be to answer, "All right! Perhaps you know that you are +the King of England; but why do you care? Make one magnificent effort +and you will be a human being and look down on all the kings of the +earth." Or it might be the third case, of the madman who called himself +Christ. If we said what we felt, we should say, "So you are the Creator +and Redeemer of the world: but what a small world it must be! What a +little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than butterflies! +How sad it must be to be God; and an inadequate God! Is there really no +life fuller and no love more marvellous than yours; and is it really in +your small and painful pity that all flesh must put its faith? How much +happier you would be, how much more of you there would be, if the hammer +of a higher God could smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like +spangles, and leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as +well as down!" + +And it must be remembered that the most purely practical science does +take this view of mental evil; it does not seek to argue with it like a +heresy, but simply to snap it like a spell. Neither modern science nor +ancient religion believes in complete free thought. Theology rebukes +certain thoughts by calling them blasphemous. Science rebukes certain +thoughts by calling them morbid. For example, some religious societies +discouraged men more or less from thinking about sex. The new scientific +society definitely discourages men from thinking about death; it is a +fact, but it is considered a morbid fact. And in dealing with those +whose morbidity has a touch of mania, modern science cares far less for +pure logic than a dancing Dervish. In these cases it is not enough that +the unhappy man should desire truth; he must desire health. Nothing can +save him but a blind hunger for normality, like that of a beast. A man +cannot think himself out of mental evil; for it is actually the organ of +thought that has become diseased, ungovernable, and, as it were, +independent. He can only be saved by will or faith. The moment his mere +reason moves, it moves in the old circular rut; he will go round and +round his logical circle, just as a man in a third-class carriage on the +Inner Circle will go round and round the Inner Circle unless he performs +the voluntary, vigorous, and mystical act of getting out at Gower +Street. Decision is the whole business here; a door must be shut for +ever. Every remedy is a desperate remedy. Every cure is a miraculous +cure. Curing a madman is not arguing with a philosopher; it is casting +out a devil. And however quietly doctors and psychologists may go to +work in the matter, their attitude is profoundly intolerant--as +intolerant as Bloody Mary. Their attitude is really this: that the man +must stop thinking, if he is to go on living. Their counsel is one of +intellectual amputation. If thy _head_ offend thee, cut it off; for it +is better, not merely to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child, but to +enter it as an imbecile, rather than with your whole intellect to be +cast into hell--or into Hanwell. + +Such is the madman of experience; he is commonly a reasoner, frequently +a successful reasoner. Doubtless he could be vanquished in mere reason, +and the case against him put logically. But it can be put much more +precisely in more general and even aesthetic terms. He is in the clean +and well-lit prison of one idea: he is sharpened to one painful point. +He is without healthy hesitation and healthy complexity. Now, as I +explain in the introduction, I have determined in these early chapters +to give not so much a diagram of a doctrine as some pictures of a point +of view. And I have described at length my vision of the maniac for this +reason: that just as I am affected by the maniac, so I am affected by +most modern thinkers. That unmistakable mood or note that I hear from +Hanwell, I hear also from half the chairs of science and seats of +learning to-day; and most of the mad doctors are mad doctors in more +senses than one. They all have exactly that combination we have noted: +the combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason with a contracted +common sense. They are universal only in the sense that they take one +thin explanation and carry it very far. But a pattern can stretch for +ever and still be a small pattern. They see a chess-board white on +black, and if the universe is paved with it, it is still white on black. +Like the lunatic, they cannot alter their standpoint; they cannot make a +mental effort and suddenly see it black on white. + +Take first the more obvious case of materialism. As an explanation of +the world, materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has just the +quality of the madman's argument; we have at once the sense of it +covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out. +Contemplate some able and sincere materialist, as, for instance, Mr. +McCabe, and you will have exactly this unique sensation. He understands +everything, and everything does not seem worth understanding. His cosmos +may be complete in every rivet and cog-wheel, but still his cosmos is +smaller than our world. Somehow his scheme, like the lucid scheme of the +madman, seems unconscious of the alien energies and the large +indifference of the earth; it is not thinking of the real things of the +earth, of fighting peoples or proud mothers, or first love or fear upon +the sea. The earth is so very large, and the cosmos is so very small. +The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in. + +It must be understood that I am not now discussing the relation of +these creeds to truth; but, for the present, solely their relation to +health. Later in the argument I hope to attack the question of objective +verity; here I speak only of a phenomenon of psychology. I do not for +the present attempt to prove to Haeckel that materialism is untrue, any +more than I attempted to prove to the man who thought he was Christ that +he was labouring under an error. I merely remark here on the fact that +both cases have the same kind of completeness and the same kind of +incompleteness. You can explain a man's detention at Hanwell by an +indifferent public by saying that it is the crucifixion of a god of whom +the world is not worthy. The explanation does explain. Similarly you may +explain the order in the universe by saying that all things, even the +souls of men, are leaves inevitably unfolding on an utterly unconscious +tree--the blind destiny of matter. The explanation does explain, though +not, of course, so completely as the madman's. But the point here is +that the normal human mind not only objects to both, but feels to both +the same objection. Its approximate statement is that if the man in +Hanwell is the real God, he is not much of a god. And, similarly, if the +cosmos of the materialist is the real cosmos, it is not much of a +cosmos. The thing has shrunk. The deity is less divine than many men; +and (according to Haeckel) the whole of life is something much more +grey, narrow, and trivial than many separate aspects of it. The parts +seem greater than the whole. + +For we must remember that the materialist philosophy (whether true or +not) is certainly much more limiting than any religion. In one sense, of +course, all intelligent ideas are narrow. They cannot be broader than +themselves. A Christian is only restricted in the same sense that an +atheist is restricted. He cannot think Christianity false and continue +to be a Christian; and the atheist cannot think atheism false and +continue to be an atheist. But as it happens, there is a very special +sense in which materialism has more restrictions than spiritualism. Mr. +McCabe thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in +determinism. I think Mr. McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to +believe in fairies. But if we examine the two vetoes we shall see that +his is really much more of a pure veto than mine. The Christian is quite +free to believe that there is a considerable amount of settled order and +inevitable development in the universe. But the materialist is not +allowed to admit into his spotless machine the slightest speck of +spiritualism or miracle. Poor Mr. McCabe is not allowed to retain even +the tiniest imp, though it might be hiding in a pimpernel. The Christian +admits that the universe is manifold and even miscellaneous, just as a +sane man knows that he is complex. The sane man knows that he has a +touch of the beast, a touch of the devil, a touch of the saint, a touch +of the citizen. Nay, the really sane man knows that he has a touch of +the madman. But the materialist's world is quite simple and solid, just +as the madman is quite sure he is sane. The materialist is sure that +history has been simply and solely a chain of causation, just as the +interesting person before mentioned is quite sure that he is simply and +solely a chicken. Materialists and madmen never have doubts. + +Spiritual doctrines do not actually limit the mind as do materialistic +denials. Even if I believe in immortality I need not think about it. But +if I disbelieve in immortality I must not think about it. In the first +case the road is open and I can go as far as I like; in the second the +road is shut. But the case is even stronger, and the parallel with +madness is yet more strange. For it was our case against the exhaustive +and logical theory of the lunatic that, right or wrong, it gradually +destroyed his humanity. Now it is the charge against the main deductions +of the materialist that, right or wrong, they gradually destroy his +humanity; I do not mean only kindness, I mean hope, courage, poetry, +initiative, all that is human. For instance, when materialism leads men +to complete fatalism (as it generally does), it is quite idle to pretend +that it is in any sense a liberating force. It is absurd to say that you +are especially advancing freedom when you only use free thought to +destroy free will. The determinists come to bind, not to loose. They may +well call their law the "chain" of causation. It is the worst chain that +ever fettered a human being. You may use the language of liberty, if you +like, about materialistic teaching, but it is obvious that this is just +as inapplicable to it as a whole as the same language when applied to a +man locked up in a mad-house. You may say, if you like, that the man is +free to think himself a poached egg. But it is surely a more massive and +important fact that if he is a poached egg he is not free to eat, drink, +sleep, walk, or smoke a cigarette. Similarly you may say, if you like, +that the bold determinist speculator is free to disbelieve in the +reality of the will. But it is a much more massive and important fact +that he is not free to praise, to curse, to thank, to justify, to urge, +to punish, to resist temptations, to incite mobs, to make New Year +resolutions, to pardon sinners, to rebuke tyrants, or even to say "thank +you" for the mustard. + +In passing from this subject I may note that there is a queer fallacy to +the effect that materialistic fatalism is in some way favourable to +mercy, to the abolition of cruel punishments or punishments of any kind. +This is startlingly the reverse of the truth. It is quite tenable that +the doctrine of necessity makes no difference at all; that it leaves the +flogger flogging and the kind friend exhorting as before. But obviously +if it stops either of them it stops the kind exhortation. That the sins +are inevitable does not prevent punishment; if it prevents anything it +prevents persuasion. Determinism is quite as likely to lead to cruelty +as it is certain to lead to cowardice. Determinism is not inconsistent +with the cruel treatment of criminals. What it is (perhaps) inconsistent +with is the generous treatment of criminals; with any appeal to their +better feelings or encouragement in their moral struggle. The +determinist does not believe in appealing to the will, but he does +believe in changing the environment. He must not say to the sinner, "Go +and sin no more," because the sinner cannot help it. But he can put him +in boiling oil; for boiling oil is an environment. Considered as a +figure, therefore, the materialist has the fantastic outline of the +figure of the madman. Both take up a position at once unanswerable and +intolerable. + +Of course it is not only of the materialist that all this is true. The +same would apply to the other extreme of speculative logic. There is a +sceptic far more terrible than he who believes that everything began in +matter. It is possible to meet the sceptic who believes that everything +began in himself. He doubts not the existence of angels or devils, but +the existence of men and cows. For him his own friends are a mythology +made up by himself. He created his own father and his own mother. This +horrible fancy has in it something decidedly attractive to the somewhat +mystical egoism of our day. That publisher who thought that men would +get on if they believed in themselves, those seekers after the Superman +who are always looking for him in the looking-glass, those writers who +talk about impressing their personalities instead of creating life for +the world, all these people have really only an inch between them and +this awful emptiness. Then when this kindly world all round the man has +been blackened out like a lie; when friends fade into ghosts, and the +foundations of the world fail; then when the man, believing in nothing +and in no man, is alone in his own nightmare, then the great +individualistic motto shall be written over him in avenging irony. The +stars will be only dots in the blackness of his own brain; his mother's +face will be only a sketch from his own insane pencil on the walls of +his cell. But over his cell shall be written, with dreadful truth, "He +believes in himself." + +All that concerns us here, however, is to note that this panegoistic +extreme of thought exhibits the same paradox as the other extreme of +materialism. It is equally complete in theory and equally crippling in +practice. For the sake of simplicity, it is easier to state the notion +by saying that a man can believe that he is always in a dream. Now, +obviously there can be no positive proof given to him that he is not in +a dream, for the simple reason that no proof can be offered that might +not be offered in a dream. But if the man began to burn down London and +say that his housekeeper would soon call him to breakfast, we should +take him and put him with other logicians in a place which has often +been alluded to in the course of this chapter. The man who cannot +believe his senses, and the man who cannot believe anything else, are +both insane, but their insanity is proved not by any error in their +argument, but by the manifest mistake of their whole lives. They have +both locked themselves up in two boxes, painted inside with the sun and +stars; they are both unable to get out, the one into the health and +happiness of heaven, the other even into the health and happiness of the +earth. Their position is quite reasonable; nay, in a sense it is +infinitely reasonable, just as a threepenny bit is infinitely circular. +But there is such a thing as a mean infinity, a base and slavish +eternity. It is amusing to notice that many of the moderns, whether +sceptics or mystics, have taken as their sign a certain eastern symbol, +which is the very symbol of this ultimate nullity. When they wish to +represent eternity, they represent it by a serpent with his tail in his +mouth. There is a startling sarcasm in the image of that very +unsatisfactory meal. The eternity of the material fatalists, the +eternity of the eastern pessimists, the eternity of the supercilious +theosophists and higher scientists of to-day is, indeed, very well +presented by a serpent eating his tail, a degraded animal who destroys +even himself. + +This chapter is purely practical and is concerned with what actually is +the chief mark and element of insanity; we may say in summary that it is +reason used without root, reason in the void. The man who begins to +think without the proper first principles goes mad, the man who begins +to think at the wrong end. And for the rest of these pages we have to +try and discover what is the right end. But we may ask in conclusion, if +this be what drives men mad, what is it that keeps them sane? By the end +of this book I hope to give a definite, some will think a far too +definite, answer. But for the moment it is possible in the same solely +practical manner to give a general answer touching what in actual human +history keeps men sane. Mysticism keeps men sane. As long as you have +mystery you have health; when you destroy mystery you create morbidity. +The ordinary man has always been sane because the ordinary man has +always been a mystic. He has permitted the twilight. He has always had +one foot in earth and the other in fairyland. He has always left himself +free to doubt his gods; but (unlike the agnostic of to-day) free also +to believe in them. He has always cared more for truth than for +consistency. If he saw two truths that seemed to contradict each other, +he would take the two truths and the contradiction along with them. His +spiritual sight is stereoscopic, like his physical sight: he sees two +different pictures at once and yet sees all the better for that. Thus he +has always believed that there was such a thing as fate, but such a +thing as free will also. Thus he believed that children were indeed the +kingdom of heaven, but nevertheless ought to be obedient to the kingdom +of earth. He admired youth because it was young and age because it was +not. It is exactly this balance of apparent contradictions that has been +the whole buoyancy of the healthy man. The whole secret of mysticism is +this: that man can understand everything by the help of what he does not +understand. The morbid logician seeks to make everything lucid, and +succeeds in making everything mysterious. The mystic allows one thing to +be mysterious, and everything else becomes lucid. The determinist makes +the theory of causation quite clear, and then finds that he cannot say +"if you please" to the housemaid. The Christian permits free will to +remain a sacred mystery; but because of this his relations with the +housemaid become of a sparkling and crystal clearness. He puts the seed +of dogma in a central darkness; but it branches forth in all directions +with abounding natural health. As we have taken the circle as the symbol +of reason and madness, we may very well take the cross as the symbol at +once of mystery and of health. Buddhism is centripetal, but Christianity +is centrifugal: it breaks out. For the circle is perfect and infinite in +its nature; but it is fixed for ever in its size; it can never be larger +or smaller. But the cross, though it has at its heart a collision and a +contradiction, can extend its four arms for ever without altering its +shape. Because it has a paradox in its centre it can grow without +changing. The circle returns upon itself and is bound. The cross opens +its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travellers. + +Symbols alone are of even a cloudy value in speaking of this deep +matter; and another symbol from physical nature will express +sufficiently well the real place of mysticism before mankind. The one +created thing which we cannot look at is the one thing in the light of +which we look at everything. Like the sun at noonday, mysticism +explains everything else by the blaze of its own victorious +invisibility. Detached intellectualism is (in the exact sense of a +popular phrase) all moonshine; for it is light without heat, and it is +secondary light, reflected from a dead world. But the Greeks were right +when they made Apollo the god both of imagination and of sanity; for he +was both the patron of poetry and the patron of healing. Of necessary +dogmas and a special creed I shall speak later. But that +transcendentalism by which all men live has primarily much the position +of the sun in the sky. We are conscious of it as of a kind of splendid +confusion; it is something both shining and shapeless, at once a blaze +and a blur. But the circle of the moon is as clear and unmistakable, as +recurrent and inevitable, as the circle of Euclid on a blackboard. For +the moon is utterly reasonable; and the moon is the mother of lunatics +and has given to them all her name. + + + + +CHAPTER III.--_The Suicide of Thought_ + + +The phrases of the street are not only forcible but subtle: for a figure +of speech can often get into a crack too small for a definition. Phrases +like "put out" or "off colour" might have been coined by Mr. Henry James +in an agony of verbal precision. And there is no more subtle truth than +that of the everyday phrase about a man having "his heart in the right +place." It involves the idea of normal proportion; not only does a +certain function exist, but it is rightly related to other functions. +Indeed, the negation of this phrase would describe with peculiar +accuracy the somewhat morbid mercy and perverse tenderness of the most +representative moderns. If, for instance, I had to describe with +fairness the character of Mr. Bernard Shaw, I could not express myself +more exactly than by saying that he has a heroically large and generous +heart; but not a heart in the right place. And this is so of the typical +society of our time. + +The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too +good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is +shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not +merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, +and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and +the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. +The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The +virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other +and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their +truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their +pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. For example, Mr. +Blatchford attacks Christianity because he is mad on one Christian +virtue: the merely mystical and almost irrational virtue of charity. He +has a strange idea that he will make it easier to forgive sins by saying +that there are no sins to forgive. Mr. Blatchford is not only an early +Christian, he is the only early Christian who ought really to have been +eaten by lions. For in his case the pagan accusation is really true: his +mercy would mean mere anarchy. He really is the enemy of the human +race--because he is so human. As the other extreme, we may take the +acrid realist, who has deliberately killed in himself all human pleasure +in happy tales or in the healing of the heart. Torquemada tortured +people physically for the sake of moral truth. Zola tortured people +morally for the sake of physical truth. But in Torquemada's time there +was at least a system that could to some extent make righteousness and +peace kiss each other. Now they do not even bow. But a much stronger +case than these two of truth and pity can be found in the remarkable +case of the dislocation of humility. + +It is only with one aspect of humility that we are here concerned. +Humility was largely meant as a restraint upon the arrogance and +infinity of the appetite of man. He was always out-stripping his mercies +with his own newly invented needs. His very power of enjoyment destroyed +half his joys. By asking for pleasure, he lost the chief pleasure; for +the chief pleasure is surprise. Hence it became evident that if a man +would make his world large, he must be always making himself small. Even +the haughty visions, the tall cities, and the toppling pinnacles are the +creations of humility. Giants that tread down forests like grass are the +creations of humility. Towers that vanish upwards above the loneliest +star are the creations of humility. For towers are not tall unless we +look up at them; and giants are not giants unless they are larger than +we. All this gigantesque imagination, which is, perhaps, the mightiest +of the pleasures of man, is at bottom entirely humble. It is impossible +without humility to enjoy anything--even pride. + +But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty +has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ +of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be +doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth; this has been +exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is +exactly the part he ought not to assert--himself. The part he doubts is +exactly the part he ought not to doubt--the Divine Reason. Huxley +preached a humility content to learn from Nature. But the new sceptic is +so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should be wrong +if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. +The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it +so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the +wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that +prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him +from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his +efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a +man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working +altogether. + +At any street corner we may meet a man who utters the frantic and +blasphemous statement that he may be wrong. Every day one comes across +somebody who says that of course his view may not be the right one. Of +course his view must be the right one, or it is not his view. We are on +the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in +the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who +doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of +old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be +convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are +too meek even to claim their inheritance. It is exactly this +intellectual helplessness which is our second problem. + +The last chapter has been concerned only with a fact of observation: +that what peril of morbidity there is for man comes rather from his +reason than his imagination. It was not meant to attack the authority of +reason; rather it is the ultimate purpose to defend it. For it needs +defence. The whole modern world is at war with reason; and the tower +already reels. + +The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of +religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the +answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like +children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful +assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, +for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no +reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart +from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical +cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or +unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present +one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to +attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of +religious authority are like men who should attack the police without +ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril +to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it +religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And +against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race +is to avoid ruin. + +That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just +as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next +generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one +set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching +the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought. It +is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is +itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our +thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a +sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should +_anything_ go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good +logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the +brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to +think for myself." But the old sceptic, the complete sceptic, says, "I +have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all." + +There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that +ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all +religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent +ages like our own: and already Mr. H.G. Wells has raised its ruinous +banner; he has written a delicate piece of scepticism called "Doubts of +the Instrument." In this he questions the brain itself, and endeavours +to remove all reality from all his own assertions, past, present, and to +come. But it was against this remote ruin that all the military systems +in religion were originally ranked and ruled. The creeds and the +crusades, the hierarchies and the horrible persecutions were not +organized, as is ignorantly said, for the suppression of reason. They +were organized for the difficult defence of reason. Man, by a blind +instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could +be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve, the authority +of popes to define the authority, even of inquisitors to terrify: these +were all only dark defences erected round one central authority, more +undemonstrable, more supernatural than all--the authority of a man to +think. We know now that this is so; we have no excuse for not knowing +it. For we can hear scepticism crashing through the old ring of +authorities, and at the same moment we can see reason swaying upon her +throne. In so far as religion is gone, reason is going. For they are +both of the same primary and authoritative kind. They are both methods +of proof which cannot themselves be proved. And in the act of +destroying the idea of Divine authority we have largely destroyed the +idea of that human authority by which we do a long-division sum. With a +long and sustained tug we have attempted to pull the mitre off +pontifical man; and his head has come off with it. + +Lest this should be called loose assertion, it is perhaps desirable, +though dull, to run rapidly through the chief modern fashions of thought +which have this effect of stopping thought itself. Materialism and the +view of everything as a personal illusion have some such effect; for if +the mind is mechanical, thought cannot be very exciting, and if the +cosmos is unreal, there is nothing to think about. But in these cases +the effect is indirect and doubtful. In some cases it is direct and +clear; notably in the case of what is generally called evolution. + +Evolution is a good example of that modern intelligence which, if it +destroys anything, destroys itself. Evolution is either an innocent +scientific description of how certain earthly things came about; or, if +it is anything more than this, it is an attack upon thought itself. If +evolution destroys anything, it does not destroy religion but +rationalism. If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an +ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is +stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well +do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he +were outside time. But if it means anything more, it means that there is +no such thing as an ape to change, and no such thing as a man for him to +change into. It means that there is no such thing as a thing. At best, +there is only one thing, and that is a flux of everything and anything. +This is an attack not upon the faith, but upon the mind; you cannot +think if there are no things to think about. You cannot think if you are +not separate from the subject of thought. Descartes said, "I think; +therefore I am." The philosophic evolutionist reverses and negatives the +epigram. He says, "I am not; therefore I cannot think." + +Then there is the opposite attack on thought: that urged by Mr. H.G. +Wells when he insists that every separate thing is "unique," and there +are no categories at all. This also is merely destructive. Thinking +means connecting things, and stops if they cannot be connected. It need +hardly be said that this scepticism forbidding thought necessarily +forbids speech; a man cannot open his mouth without contradicting it. +Thus when Mr. Wells says (as he did somewhere), "All chairs are quite +different," he utters not merely a misstatement, but a contradiction in +terms. If all chairs were quite different, you could not call them "all +chairs." + +Akin to these is the false theory of progress, which maintains that we +alter the test instead of trying to pass the test. We often hear it +said, for instance, "What is right in one age is wrong in another." This +is quite reasonable, if it means that there is a fixed aim, and that +certain methods attain at certain times and not at other times. If +women, say, desire to be elegant, it may be that they are improved at +one time by growing fatter and at another time by growing thinner. But +you cannot say that they are improved by ceasing to wish to be elegant +and beginning to wish to be oblong. If the standard changes, how can +there be improvement, which implies a standard? Nietzsche started a +nonsensical idea that men had once sought as good what we now call evil; +if it were so, we could not talk of surpassing or even falling short of +them. How can you overtake Jones if you walk in the other direction? You +cannot discuss whether one people has succeeded more in being miserable +than another succeeded in being happy. It would be like discussing +whether Milton was more puritanical than a pig is fat. + +It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object +or ideal. But as an ideal, change itself becomes unchangeable. If the +change-worshipper wishes to estimate his own progress, he must be +sternly loyal to the ideal of change; he must not begin to flirt gaily +with the ideal of monotony. Progress itself cannot progress. It is worth +remark, in passing, that when Tennyson, in a wild and rather weak +manner, welcomed the idea of infinite alteration in society, he +instinctively took a metaphor which suggests an imprisoned tedium. He +wrote-- + + "Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change." + +He thought of change itself as an unchangeable groove; and so it is. +Change is about the narrowest and hardest groove that a man can get +into. + +The main point here, however, is that this idea of a fundamental +alteration in the standard is one of the things that make thought about +the past or future simply impossible. The theory of a complete change of +standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure +of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and +aristocratic pleasure of despising them. + +This bald summary of the thought-destroying forces of our time would not +be complete without some reference to pragmatism; for though I have here +used and should everywhere defend the pragmatist method as a preliminary +guide to truth, there is an extreme application of it which involves the +absence of all truth whatever. My meaning can be put shortly thus. I +agree with the pragmatists that apparent objective truth is not the +whole matter; that there is an authoritative need to believe the things +that are necessary to the human mind. But I say that one of those +necessities precisely is a belief in objective truth. The pragmatist +tells a man to think what he must think and never mind the Absolute. But +precisely one of the things that he must think is the Absolute. This +philosophy, indeed, is a kind of verbal paradox. Pragmatism is a matter +of human needs; and one of the first of human needs is to be something +more than a pragmatist. Extreme pragmatism is just as inhuman as the +determinism it so powerfully attacks. The determinist (who, to do him +justice, does not pretend to be a human being) makes nonsense of the +human sense of actual choice. The pragmatist, who professes to be +specially human, makes nonsense of the human sense of actual fact. + +To sum up our contention so far, we may say that the most characteristic +current philosophies have not only a touch of mania, but a touch of +suicidal mania. The mere questioner has knocked his head against the +limits of human thought; and cracked it. This is what makes so futile +the warnings of the orthodox and the boasts of the advanced about the +dangerous boyhood of free thought. What we are looking at is not the +boyhood of free thought; it is the old age and ultimate dissolution of +free thought. It is vain for bishops and pious bigwigs to discuss what +dreadful things will happen if wild scepticism runs its course. It has +run its course. It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great +truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have +seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself. +You cannot call up any wilder vision than a city in which men ask +themselves if they have any selves. You cannot fancy a more sceptical +world than that in which men doubt if there is a world. It might +certainly have reached its bankruptcy more quickly and cleanly if it had +not been feebly hampered by the application of indefensible laws of +blasphemy or by the absurd pretence that modern England is Christian. +But it would have reached the bankruptcy anyhow. Militant atheists are +still unjustly persecuted; but rather because they are an old minority +than because they are a new one. Free thought has exhausted its own +freedom. It is weary of its own success. If any eager freethinker now +hails philosophic freedom as the dawn, he is only like the man in Mark +Twain who came out wrapped in blankets to see the sun rise and was just +in time to see it set. If any frightened curate still says that it will +be awful if the darkness of free thought should spread, we can only +answer him in the high and powerful words of Mr. Belloc, "Do not, I +beseech you, be troubled about the increase of forces already in +dissolution. You have mistaken the hour of the night: it is already +morning." We have no more questions left to ask. We have looked for +questions in the darkest corners and on the wildest peaks. We have found +all the questions that can be found. It is time we gave up looking for +questions and began looking for answers. + +But one more word must be added. At the beginning of this preliminary +negative sketch I said that our mental ruin has been wrought by wild +reason, not by wild imagination. A man does not go mad because he makes +a statue a mile high, but he may go mad by thinking it out in square +inches. Now, one school of thinkers has seen this and jumped at it as a +way of renewing the pagan health of the world. They see that reason +destroys; but Will, they say, creates. The ultimate authority, they say, +is in will, not in reason. The supreme point is not why a man demands a +thing, but the fact that he does demand it. I have no space to trace or +expound this philosophy of Will. It came, I suppose, through Nietzsche, +who preached something that is called egoism. That, indeed, was +simple-minded enough; for Nietzsche denied egoism simply by preaching +it. To preach anything is to give it away. First, the egoist calls life +a war without mercy, and then he takes the greatest possible trouble to +drill his enemies in war. To preach egoism is to practise altruism. But +however it began, the view is common enough in current literature. The +main defence of these thinkers is that they are not thinkers; they are +makers. They say that choice is itself the divine thing. Thus Mr. +Bernard Shaw has attacked the old idea that men's acts are to be judged +by the standard of the desire of happiness. He says that a man does not +act for his happiness, but from his will. He does not say, "Jam will +make me happy," but "I want jam." And in all this others follow him with +yet greater enthusiasm. Mr. John Davidson, a remarkable poet, is so +passionately excited about it that he is obliged to write prose. He +publishes a short play with several long prefaces. This is natural +enough in Mr. Shaw, for all his plays are prefaces: Mr. Shaw is (I +suspect) the only man on earth who has never written any poetry. But +that Mr. Davidson (who can write excellent poetry) should write instead +laborious metaphysics in defence of this doctrine of will, does show +that the doctrine of will has taken hold of men. Even Mr. H.G. Wells has +half spoken in its language; saying that one should test acts not like a +thinker, but like an artist, saying, "I _feel_ this curve is right," or +"that line _shall_ go thus." They are all excited; and well they may be. +For by this doctrine of the divine authority of will, they think they +can break out of the doomed fortress of rationalism. They think they can +escape. + +But they cannot escape. This pure praise of volition ends in the same +break up and blank as the mere pursuit of logic. Exactly as complete +free thought involves the doubting of thought itself, so the acceptation +of mere "willing" really paralyzes the will. Mr. Bernard Shaw has not +perceived the real difference between the old utilitarian test of +pleasure (clumsy, of course, and easily misstated) and that which he +propounds. The real difference between the test of happiness and the +test of will is simply that the test of happiness is a test and the +other isn't. You can discuss whether a man's act in jumping over a cliff +was directed towards happiness; you cannot discuss whether it was +derived from will. Of course it was. You can praise an action by saying +that it is calculated to bring pleasure or pain to discover truth or to +save the soul. But you cannot praise an action because it shows will; +for to say that is merely to say that it is an action. By this praise of +will you cannot really choose one course as better than another. And yet +choosing one course as better than another is the very definition of the +will you are praising. + +The worship of will is the negation of will. To admire mere choice is to +refuse to choose. If Mr. Bernard Shaw comes up to me and says, "Will +something," that is tantamount to saying, "I do not mind what you +will," and that is tantamount to saying, "I have no will in the matter." +You cannot admire will in general, because the essence of will is that +it is particular. A brilliant anarchist like Mr. John Davidson feels an +irritation against ordinary morality, and therefore he invokes +will--will to anything. He only wants humanity to want something. But +humanity does want something. It wants ordinary morality. He rebels +against the law and tells us to will something or anything. But we have +willed something. We have willed the law against which he rebels. + +All the will-worshippers, from Nietzsche to Mr. Davidson, are really +quite empty of volition. They cannot will, they can hardly wish. And if +any one wants a proof of this, it can be found quite easily. It can be +found in this fact: that they always talk of will as something that +expands and breaks out. But it is quite the opposite. Every act of will +is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. +In that sense every act is an act of self-sacrifice. When you choose +anything, you reject everything else. That objection, which men of this +school used to make to the act of marriage, is really an objection to +every act. Every act is an irrevocable selection and exclusion. Just as +when you marry one woman you give up all the others, so when you take +one course of action you give up all the other courses. If you become +King of England, you give up the post of Beadle in Brompton. If you go +to Rome, you sacrifice a rich suggestive life in Wimbledon. It is the +existence of this negative or limiting side of will that makes most of +the talk of the anarchic will-worshippers little better than nonsense. +For instance, Mr. John Davidson tells us to have nothing to do with +"Thou shalt not"; but it is surely obvious that "Thou shalt not" is only +one of the necessary corollaries of "I will." "I will go to the Lord +Mayor's Show, and thou shalt not stop me." Anarchism adjures us to be +bold creative artists, and care for no laws or limits. But it is +impossible to be an artist and not care for laws and limits. Art is +limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame. If you draw a +giraffe, you must draw him with a long neck. If, in your bold creative +way, you hold yourself free to draw a giraffe with a short neck, you +will really find that you are not free to draw a giraffe. The moment you +step into the world of facts, you step into a world of limits. You can +free things from alien or accidental laws, but not from the laws of +their own nature. You may, if you like, free a tiger from his bars; but +do not free him from his stripes. Do not free a camel of the burden of +his hump: you may be freeing him from being a camel. Do not go about as +a demagogue, encouraging triangles to break out of the prison of their +three sides. If a triangle breaks out of its three sides, its life comes +to a lamentable end. Somebody wrote a work called "The Loves of the +Triangles"; I never read it, but I am sure that if triangles ever were +loved, they were loved for being triangular. This is certainly the case +with all artistic creation, which is in some ways the most decisive +example of pure will. The artist loves his limitations: they constitute +the _thing_ he is doing. The painter is glad that the canvas is flat. +The sculptor is glad that the clay is colourless. + +In case the point is not clear, an historic example may illustrate it. +The French Revolution was really an heroic and decisive thing, because +the Jacobins willed something definite and limited. They desired the +freedoms of democracy, but also all the vetoes of democracy. They wished +to have votes and _not_ to have titles. Republicanism had an ascetic +side in Franklin or Robespierre as well as an expansive side in Danton +or Wilkes. Therefore they have created something with a solid substance +and shape, the square social equality and peasant wealth of France. But +since then the revolutionary or speculative mind of Europe has been +weakened by shrinking from any proposal because of the limits of that +proposal. Liberalism has been degraded into liberality. Men have tried +to turn "revolutionise" from a transitive to an intransitive verb. The +Jacobin could tell you not only the system he would rebel against, but +(what was more important) the system he would _not_ rebel against, the +system he would trust. But the new rebel is a sceptic, and will not +entirely trust anything. He has no loyalty; therefore he can never be +really a revolutionist. And the fact that he doubts everything really +gets in his way when he wants to denounce anything. For all denunciation +implies a moral doctrine of some kind; and the modern revolutionist +doubts not only the institution he denounces, but the doctrine by which +he denounces it. Thus he writes one book complaining that imperial +oppression insults the purity of women, and then he writes another book +(about the sex problem) in which he insults it himself. He curses the +Sultan because Christian girls lose their virginity, and then curses +Mrs. Grundy because they keep it. As a politician, he will cry out that +war is a waste of life, and then, as a philosopher, that all life is +waste of time. A Russian pessimist will denounce a policeman for killing +a peasant, and then prove by the highest philosophical principles that +the peasant ought to have killed himself. A man denounces marriage as a +lie, and then denounces aristocratic profligates for treating it as a +lie. He calls a flag a bauble, and then blames the oppressors of Poland +or Ireland because they take away that bauble. The man of this school +goes first to a political meeting, where he complains that savages are +treated as if they were beasts; then he takes his hat and umbrella and +goes on to a scientific meeting, where he proves that they practically +are beasts. In short, the modern revolutionist, being an infinite +sceptic, is always engaged in undermining his own mines. In his book on +politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics +he attacks morality for trampling on men. Therefore the modern man in +revolt has become practically useless for all purposes of revolt. By +rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against +anything. + +It may be added that the same blank and bankruptcy can be observed in +all fierce and terrible types of literature, especially in satire. +Satire may be mad and anarchic, but it presupposes an admitted +superiority in certain things over others; it presupposes a standard. +When little boys in the street laugh at the fatness of some +distinguished journalist, they are unconsciously assuming a standard of +Greek sculpture. They are appealing to the marble Apollo. And the +curious disappearance of satire from our literature is an instance of +the fierce things fading for want of any principle to be fierce about. +Nietzsche had some natural talent for sarcasm: he could sneer, though he +could not laugh; but there is always something bodiless and without +weight in his satire, simply because it has not any mass of common +morality behind it. He is himself more preposterous than anything he +denounces. But, indeed, Nietzsche will stand very well as the type of +the whole of this failure of abstract violence. The softening of the +brain which ultimately overtook him was not a physical accident. If +Nietzsche had not ended in imbecility, Nietzscheism would end in +imbecility. Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. +Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have +softening of the brain. + +This last attempt to evade intellectualism ends in intellectualism, and +therefore in death. The sortie has failed. The wild worship of +lawlessness and the materialist worship of law end in the same void. +Nietzsche scales staggering mountains, but he turns up ultimately in +Tibet. He sits down beside Tolstoy in the land of nothing and Nirvana. +They are both helpless--one because he must not grasp anything, and the +other because he must not let go of anything. The Tolstoyan's will is +frozen by a Buddhist instinct that all special actions are evil. But the +Nietzscheite's will is quite equally frozen by his view that all special +actions are good; for if all special actions are good, none of them are +special. They stand at the cross-roads, and one hates all the roads and +the other likes all the roads. The result is--well, some things are not +hard to calculate. They stand at the cross-roads. + +Here I end (thank God) the first and dullest business of this book--the +rough review of recent thought. After this I begin to sketch a view of +life which may not interest my reader, but which, at any rate, interests +me. In front of me, as I close this page, is a pile of modern books that +I have been turning over for the purpose--a pile of ingenuity, a pile of +futility. By the accident of my present detachment, I can see the +inevitable smash of the philosophies of Schopenhauer and Tolstoy, +Nietzsche and Shaw, as clearly as an inevitable railway smash could be +seen from a balloon. They are all on the road to the emptiness of the +asylum. For madness may be defined as using mental activity so as to +reach mental helplessness; and they have nearly reached it. He who +thinks he is made of glass, thinks to the destruction of thought; for +glass cannot think. So he who wills to reject nothing, wills the +destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but +the rejection of almost everything. And as I turn and tumble over the +clever, wonderful, tiresome, and useless modern books, the title of one +of them rivets my eye. It is called "Jeanne d'Arc," by Anatole France. I +have only glanced at it, but a glance was enough to remind me of Renan's +"Vie de Jesus." It has the same strange method of the reverent sceptic. +It discredits supernatural stories that have some foundation, simply by +telling natural stories that have no foundation. Because we cannot +believe in what a saint did, we are to pretend that we know exactly what +he felt. But I do not mention either book in order to criticise it, but +because the accidental combination of the names called up two startling +images of sanity which blasted all the books before me. Joan of Arc was +not stuck at the cross-roads, either by rejecting all the paths like +Tolstoy, or by accepting them all like Nietzsche. She chose a path, and +went down it like a thunderbolt. Yet Joan, when I came to think of her, +had in her all that was true either in Tolstoy or Nietzsche, all that +was even tolerable in either of them. I thought of all that is noble in +Tolstoy, the pleasure in plain things, especially in plain pity, the +actualities of the earth, the reverence for the poor, the dignity of the +bowed back. Joan of Arc had all that and with this great addition, that +she endured poverty as well as admiring it; whereas Tolstoy is only a +typical aristocrat trying to find out its secret. And then I thought of +all that was brave and proud and pathetic in poor Nietzsche, and his +mutiny against the emptiness and timidity of our time. I thought of his +cry for the ecstatic equilibrium of danger, his hunger for the rush of +great horses, his cry to arms. Well, Joan of Arc had all that, and again +with this difference, that she did not praise fighting, but fought. We +_know_ that she was not afraid of an army, while Nietzsche, for all we +know, was afraid of a cow. Tolstoy only praised the peasant; she was +the peasant. Nietzsche only praised the warrior; she was the warrior. +She beat them both at their own antagonistic ideals; she was more gentle +than the one, more violent than the other. Yet she was a perfectly +practical person who did something, while they are wild speculators who +do nothing. It was impossible that the thought should not cross my mind +that she and her faith had perhaps some secret of moral unity and +utility that has been lost. And with that thought came a larger one, and +the colossal figure of her Master had also crossed the theatre of my +thoughts. The same modern difficulty which darkened the subject-matter +of Anatole France also darkened that of Ernest Renan. Renan also divided +his hero's pity from his hero's pugnacity. Renan even represented the +righteous anger at Jerusalem as a mere nervous breakdown after the +idyllic expectations of Galilee. As if there were any inconsistency +between having a love for humanity and having a hatred for inhumanity! +Altruists, with thin, weak voices, denounce Christ as an egoist. Egoists +(with even thinner and weaker voices) denounce Him as an altruist. In +our present atmosphere such cavils are comprehensible enough. The love +of a hero is more terrible than the hatred of a tyrant. The hatred of a +hero is more generous than the love of a philanthropist. There is a huge +and heroic sanity of which moderns can only collect the fragments. There +is a giant of whom we see only the lopped arms and legs walking about. +They have torn the soul of Christ into silly strips, labelled egoism and +altruism, and they are equally puzzled by His insane magnificence and +His insane meekness. They have parted His garments among them, and for +His vesture they have cast lots; though the coat was without seam woven +from the top throughout. + + + + +CHAPTER IV--_The Ethics of Elfland_ + + +When the business man rebukes the idealism of his office-boy, it is +commonly in some such speech as this: "Ah, yes, when one is young, one +has these ideals in the abstract and these castles in the air; but in +middle age they all break up like clouds, and one comes down to a belief +in practical politics, to using the machinery one has and getting on +with the world as it is." Thus, at least, venerable and philanthropic +old men now in their honoured graves used to talk to me when I was a +boy. But since then I have grown up and have discovered that these +philanthropic old men were telling lies. What has really happened is +exactly the opposite of what they said would happen. They said that I +should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical +politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in +fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my old +childlike faith in practical politics. I am still as much concerned as +ever about the Battle of Armageddon; but I am not so much concerned +about the General Election. As a babe I leapt up on my mother's knee at +the mere mention of it. No; the vision is always solid and reliable. The +vision is always a fact. It is the reality that is often a fraud. As +much as I ever did, more than I ever did, I believe in Liberalism. But +there was a rosy time of innocence when I believed in Liberals. + +I take this instance of one of the enduring faiths because, having now +to trace the roots of my personal speculation, this may be counted, I +think, as the only positive bias. I was brought up a Liberal, and have +always believed in democracy, in the elementary liberal doctrine of a +self-governing humanity. If any one finds the phrase vague or +threadbare, I can only pause for a moment to explain that the principle +of democracy, as I mean it, can be stated in two propositions. The first +is this: that the things common to all men are more important than the +things peculiar to any men. Ordinary things are more valuable than +extraordinary things; nay, they are more extraordinary. Man is something +more awful than men; something more strange. The sense of the miracle of +humanity itself should be always more vivid to us than any marvels of +power, intellect, art, or civilization. The mere man on two legs, as +such, should be felt as something more heart-breaking than any music +and more startling than any caricature. Death is more tragic even than +death by starvation. Having a nose is more comic even than having a +Norman nose. + +This is the first principle of democracy: that the essential things in +men are the things they hold in common, not the things they hold +separately. And the second principle is merely this: that the political +instinct or desire is one of these things which they hold in common. +Falling in love is more poetical than dropping into poetry. The +democratic contention is that government (helping to rule the tribe) is +a thing like falling in love, and not a thing like dropping into poetry. +It is not something analogous to playing the church organ, painting on +vellum, discovering the North Pole (that insidious habit), looping the +loop, being Astronomer Royal, and so on. For these things we do not wish +a man to do at all unless he does them well. It is, on the contrary, a +thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own +nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them +badly. I am not here arguing the truth of any of these conceptions; I +know that some moderns are asking to have their wives chosen by +scientists, and they may soon be asking, for all I know, to have their +noses blown by nurses. I merely say that mankind does recognize these +universal human functions, and that democracy classes government among +them. In short, the democratic faith is this: that the most terribly +important things must be left to ordinary men themselves--the mating of +the sexes, the rearing of the young, the laws of the state. This is +democracy; and in this I have always believed. + +But there is one thing that I have never from my youth up been able to +understand. I have never been able to understand where people got the +idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious +that tradition is only democracy extended through time. It is trusting +to a consensus of common human voices rather than to some isolated or +arbitrary record. The man who quotes some German historian against the +tradition of the Catholic Church, for instance, is strictly appealing to +aristocracy. He is appealing to the superiority of one expert against +the awful authority of a mob. It is quite easy to see why a legend is +treated, and ought to be treated, more respectfully than a book of +history. The legend is generally made by the majority of people in the +village, who are sane. The book is generally written by the one man in +the village who is mad. Those who urge against tradition that men in the +past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with +the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for +us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in +great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no +reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or +fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. +Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our +ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit +to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be +walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the +accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the +accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's +opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a +good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot +separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to +me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. +The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It +is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot +papers, are marked with a cross. + +I have first to say, therefore, that if I have had a bias, it was always +a bias in favour of democracy, and therefore of tradition. Before we +come to any theoretic or logical beginnings I am content to allow for +that personal equation; I have always been more inclined to believe the +ruck of hard-working people than to believe that special and troublesome +literary class to which I belong. I prefer even the fancies and +prejudices of the people who see life from the inside to the clearest +demonstrations of the people who see life from the outside. I would +always trust the old wives' fables against the old maids' facts. As long +as wit is mother wit it can be as wild as it pleases. + +Now, I have to put together a general position, and I pretend to no +training in such things. I propose to do it, therefore, by writing down +one after another the three or four fundamental ideas which I have found +for myself, pretty much in the way that I found them. Then I shall +roughly synthesise them, summing up my personal philosophy or natural +religion; then I shall describe my startling discovery that the whole +thing had been discovered before. It had been discovered by +Christianity. But of these profound persuasions which I have to recount +in order, the earliest was concerned with this element of popular +tradition. And without the foregoing explanation touching tradition and +democracy I could hardly make my mental experience clear. As it is, I do +not know whether I can make it clear, but I now propose to try. + +My first and last philosophy, that which I believe in with unbroken +certainty, I learnt in the nursery. I generally learnt it from a nurse; +that is, from the solemn and star-appointed priestess at once of +democracy and tradition. The things I believed most then, the things I +believe most now, are the things called fairy tales. They seem to me to +be the entirely reasonable things. They are not fantasies: compared with +them other things are fantastic. Compared with them religion and +rationalism are both abnormal, though religion is abnormally right and +rationalism abnormally wrong. Fairyland is nothing but the sunny country +of common sense. It is not earth that judges heaven, but heaven that +judges earth; so for me at least it was not earth that criticised +elfland, but elfland that criticised the earth. I knew the magic +beanstalk before I had tasted beans; I was sure of the Man in the Moon +before I was certain of the moon. This was at one with all popular +tradition. Modern minor poets are naturalists, and talk about the bush +or the brook; but the singers of the old epics and fables were +supernaturalists, and talked about the gods of brook and bush. That is +what the moderns mean when they say that the ancients did not +"appreciate Nature," because they said that Nature was divine. Old +nurses do not tell children about the grass, but about the fairies that +dance on the grass; and the old Greeks could not see the trees for the +dryads. + +But I deal here with what ethic and philosophy come from being fed on +fairy tales. If I were describing them in detail I could note many noble +and healthy principles that arise from them. There is the chivalrous +lesson of "Jack the Giant Killer"; that giants should be killed because +they are gigantic. It is a manly mutiny against pride as such. For the +rebel is older than all the kingdoms, and the Jacobin has more tradition +than the Jacobite. There is the lesson of "Cinderella," which is the +same as that of the Magnificat--_exaltavit humiles._ There is the great +lesson of "Beauty and the Beast"; that a thing must be loved _before_ +it is loveable. There is the terrible allegory of the "Sleeping Beauty," +which tells how the human creature was blessed with all birthday gifts, +yet cursed with death; and how death also may perhaps be softened to a +sleep. But I am not concerned with any of the separate statutes of +elfland, but with the whole spirit of its law, which I learnt before I +could speak, and shall retain when I cannot write. I am concerned with a +certain way of looking at life, which was created in me by the fairy +tales, but has since been meekly ratified by the mere facts. + +It might be stated this way. There are certain sequences or developments +(cases of one thing following another), which are, in the true sense of +the word, reasonable. They are, in the true sense of the word, +necessary. Such are mathematical and merely logical sequences. We in +fairyland (who are the most reasonable of all creatures) admit that +reason and that necessity. For instance, if the Ugly Sisters are older +than Cinderella, it is (in an iron and awful sense) _necessary_ that +Cinderella is younger than the Ugly Sisters. There is no getting out of +it. Haeckel may talk as much fatalism about that fact as he pleases: it +really must be. If Jack is the son of a miller, a miller is the father +of Jack. Cold reason decrees it from her awful throne: and we in +fairyland submit. If the three brothers all ride horses, there are six +animals and eighteen legs involved: that is true rationalism, and +fairyland is full of it. But as I put my head over the hedge of the +elves and began to take notice of the natural world, I observed an +extraordinary thing. I observed that learned men in spectacles were +talking of the actual things that happened--dawn and death and so on--as +if _they_ were rational and inevitable. They talked as if the fact that +trees bear fruit were just as _necessary_ as the fact that two and one +trees make three. But it is not. There is an enormous difference by the +test of fairyland; which is the test of the imagination. You cannot +_imagine_ two and one not making three. But you can easily imagine trees +not growing fruit; you can imagine them growing golden candlesticks or +tigers hanging on by the tail. These men in spectacles spoke much of a +man named Newton, who was hit by an apple, and who discovered a law. But +they could not be got to see the distinction between a true law, a law +of reason, and the mere fact of apples falling. If the apple hit +Newton's nose, Newton's nose hit the apple. That is a true necessity: +because we cannot conceive the one occurring without the other. But we +can quite well conceive the apple not falling on his nose; we can fancy +it flying ardently through the air to hit some other nose, of which it +had a more definite dislike. We have always in our fairy tales kept this +sharp distinction between the science of mental relations, in which +there really are laws, and the science of physical facts, in which there +are no laws, but only weird repetitions. We believe in bodily miracles, +but not in mental impossibilities. We believe that a Bean-stalk climbed +up to Heaven; but that does not at all confuse our convictions on the +philosophical question of how many beans make five. + +Here is the peculiar perfection of tone and truth in the nursery tales. +The man of science says, "Cut the stalk, and the apple will fall"; but +he says it calmly, as if the one idea really led up to the other. The +witch in the fairy tale says, "Blow the horn, and the ogre's castle will +fall"; but she does not say it as if it were something in which the +effect obviously arose out of the cause. Doubtless she has given the +advice to many champions, and has seen many castles fall, but she does +not lose either her wonder or her reason. She does not muddle her head +until it imagines a necessary mental connection between a horn and a +falling tower. But the scientific men do muddle their heads, until they +imagine a necessary mental connection between an apple leaving the tree +and an apple reaching the ground. They do really talk as if they had +found not only a set of marvellous facts, but a truth connecting those +facts. They do talk as if the connection of two strange things +physically connected them philosophically. They feel that because one +incomprehensible thing constantly follows another incomprehensible thing +the two together somehow make up a comprehensible thing. Two black +riddles make a white answer. + +In fairyland we avoid the word "law"; but in the land of science they +are singularly fond of it. Thus they will call some interesting +conjecture about how forgotten folks pronounced the alphabet, Grimm's +Law. But Grimm's Law is far less intellectual than Grimm's Fairy Tales. +The tales are, at any rate, certainly tales; while the law is not a law. +A law implies that we know the nature of the generalisation and +enactment; not merely that we have noticed some of the effects. If there +is a law that pick-pockets shall go to prison, it implies that there is +an imaginable mental connection between the idea of prison and the idea +of picking pockets. And we know what the idea is. We can say why we take +liberty from a man who takes liberties. But we cannot say why an egg can +turn into a chicken any more than we can say why a bear could turn into +a fairy prince. As _ideas_, the egg and the chicken are further off each +other than the bear and the prince; for no egg in itself suggests a +chicken, whereas some princes do suggest bears. Granted, then, that +certain transformations do happen, it is essential that we should regard +them in the philosophic manner of fairy tales, not in the unphilosophic +manner of science and the "Laws of Nature." When we are asked why eggs +turn to birds or fruits fall in autumn, we must answer exactly as the +fairy godmother would answer if Cinderella asked her why mice turned to +horses or her clothes fell from her at twelve o'clock. We must answer +that it is _magic_. It is not a "law," for we do not understand its +general formula. It is not a necessity, for though we can count on it +happening practically, we have no right to say that it must always +happen. It is no argument for unalterable law (as Huxley fancied) that +we count on the ordinary course of things. We do not count on it; we bet +on it. We risk the remote possibility of a miracle as we do that of a +poisoned pancake or a world-destroying comet. We leave it out of +account, not because it is a miracle, and therefore an impossibility, +but because it is a miracle, and therefore an exception. All the terms +used in the science books, "law," "necessity," "order," "tendency," and +so on, are really unintellectual, because they assume an inner synthesis +which we do not possess. The only words that ever satisfied me as +describing Nature are the terms used in the fairy books, "charm," +"spell," "enchantment." They express the arbitrariness of the fact and +its mystery. A tree grows fruit because it is a _magic_ tree. Water runs +downhill because it is bewitched. The sun shines because it is +bewitched. + +I deny altogether that this is fantastic or even mystical. We may have +some mysticism later on; but this fairy-tale language about things is +simply rational and agnostic. It is the only way I can express in words +my clear and definite perception that one thing is quite distinct from +another; that there is no logical connection between flying and laying +eggs. It is the man who talks about "a law" that he has never seen who +is the mystic. Nay, the ordinary scientific man is strictly a +sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he +is soaked and swept away by mere associations. He has so often seen +birds fly and lay eggs that he feels as if there must be some dreamy, +tender connection between the two ideas, whereas there is none. A +forlorn lover might be unable to dissociate the moon from lost love; so +the materialist is unable to dissociate the moon from the tide. In both +cases there is no connection, except that one has seen them together. A +sentimentalist might shed tears at the smell of apple-blossom, because, +by a dark association of his own, it reminded him of his boyhood. So the +materialist professor (though he conceals his tears) is yet a +sentimentalist, because, by a dark association of his own, +apple-blossoms remind him of apples. But the cool rationalist from +fairyland does not see why, in the abstract, the apple tree should not +grow crimson tulips; it sometimes does in his country. + +This elementary wonder, however, is not a mere fancy derived from the +fairy tales; on the contrary, all the fire of the fairy tales is derived +from this. Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct +of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of +the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that +when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need +tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by +being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of +three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like +romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales--because they find them +romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to +whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. This +proves that even nursery tales only echo an almost pre-natal leap of +interest and amazement. These tales say that apples were golden only to +refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They +make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, +that they run with water. I have said that this is wholly reasonable and +even agnostic. And, indeed, on this point I am all for the higher +agnosticism; its better name is Ignorance. We have all read in +scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who +has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and +appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every +man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may +understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than +any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know +thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all +forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that +we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism +only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we +have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstacy only means +that for one awful instant we remember that we forget. + +But though (like the man without memory in the novel) we walk the +streets with a sort of half-witted admiration, still it is admiration. +It is admiration in English and not only admiration in Latin. The wonder +has a positive element of praise. This is the next milestone to be +definitely marked on our road through fairyland. I shall speak in the +next chapter about optimists and pessimists in their intellectual +aspect, so far as they have one. Here I am only trying to describe the +enormous emotions which cannot be described. And the strongest emotion +was that life was as precious as it was puzzling. It was an ecstacy +because it was an adventure; it was an adventure because it was an +opportunity. The goodness of the fairy tale was not affected by the fact +that there might be more dragons than princesses; it was good to be in a +fairy tale. The test of all happiness is gratitude; and I felt grateful, +though I hardly knew to whom. Children are grateful when Santa Claus +puts in their stockings gifts of toys or sweets. Could I not be grateful +to Santa Claus when he put in my stockings the gift of two miraculous +legs? We thank people for birthday presents of cigars and slippers. Can +I thank no one for the birthday present of birth? + +There were, then, these two first feelings, indefensible and +indisputable. The world was a shock, but it was not merely shocking; +existence was a surprise, but it was a pleasant surprise. In fact, all +my first views were exactly uttered in a riddle that stuck in my brain +from boyhood. The question was, "What did the first frog say?" And the +answer was, "Lord, how you made me jump!" That says succinctly all that +I am saying. God made the frog jump; but the frog prefers jumping. But +when these things are settled there enters the second great principle +of the fairy philosophy. + +Any one can see it who will simply read "Grimm's Fairy Tales" or the +fine collections of Mr. Andrew Lang. For the pleasure of pedantry I will +call it the Doctrine of Conditional Joy. Touchstone talked of much +virtue in an "if"; according to elfin ethics all virtue is in an "if." +The note of the fairy utterance always is, "You may live in a palace of +gold and sapphire, _if_ you do not say the word 'cow'"; or "You may live +happily with the King's daughter, _if_ you do not show her an onion." +The vision always hangs upon a veto. All the dizzy and colossal things +conceded depend upon one small thing withheld. All the wild and whirling +things that are let loose depend upon one thing that is forbidden. Mr. +W.B. Yeats, in his exquisite and piercing elfin poetry, describes the +elves as lawless; they plunge in innocent anarchy on the unbridled +horses of the air-- + + "Ride on the crest of the dishevelled tide, + And dance upon the mountains like a flame." + +It is a dreadful thing to say that Mr. W.B. Yeats does not understand +fairyland. But I do say it. He is an ironical Irishman, full of +intellectual reactions. He is not stupid enough to understand +fairyland. Fairies prefer people of the yokel type like myself; people +who gape and grin and do as they are told. Mr. Yeats reads into elfland +all the righteous insurrection of his own race. But the lawlessness of +Ireland is a Christian lawlessness, founded on reason and justice. The +Fenian is rebelling against something he understands only too well; but +the true citizen of fairyland is obeying something that he does not +understand at all. In the fairy tale an incomprehensible happiness rests +upon an incomprehensible condition. A box is opened, and all evils fly +out. A word is forgotten, and cities perish. A lamp is lit, and love +flies away. A flower is plucked, and human lives are forfeited. An apple +is eaten, and the hope of God is gone. + +This is the tone of fairy tales, and it is certainly not lawlessness or +even liberty, though men under a mean modern tyranny may think it +liberty by comparison. People out of Portland Gaol might think Fleet +Street free; but closer study will prove that both fairies and +journalists are the slaves of duty. Fairy godmothers seem at least as +strict as other godmothers. Cinderella received a coach out of +Wonderland and a coachman out of nowhere, but she received a +command--which might have come out of Brixton--that she should be back +by twelve. Also, she had a glass slipper; and it cannot be a coincidence +that glass is so common a substance in folk-lore. This princess lives in +a glass castle, that princess on a glass hill; this one sees all things +in a mirror; they may all live in glass houses if they will not throw +stones. For this thin glitter of glass everywhere is the expression of +the fact that the happiness is bright but brittle, like the substance +most easily smashed by a housemaid or a cat. And this fairy-tale +sentiment also sank into me and became my sentiment towards the whole +world. I felt and feel that life itself is as bright as the diamond, but +as brittle as the window-pane; and when the heavens were compared to the +terrible crystal I can remember a shudder. I was afraid that God would +drop the cosmos with a crash. + +Remember, however, that to be breakable is not the same as to be +perishable. Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do +not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years. Such, it seemed, was +the joy of man, either in elfland or on earth; the happiness depended on +_not doing something_ which you could at any moment do and which, very +often, it was not obvious why you should not do. Now, the point here is +that to _me_ this did not seem unjust. If the miller's third son said to +the fairy, "Explain why I must not stand on my head in the fairy +palace," the other might fairly reply, "Well, if it comes to that, +explain the fairy palace." If Cinderella says, "How is it that I must +leave the ball at twelve?" her godmother might answer, "How is it that +you are going there till twelve?" If I leave a man in my will ten +talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the +conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not +look a winged horse in the mouth. And it seemed to me that existence was +itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not +understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand +the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture. The +veto might well be as wild as the vision; it might be as startling as +the sun, as elusive as the waters, as fantastic and terrible as the +towering trees. + +For this reason (we may call it the fairy godmother philosophy) I never +could join the young men of my time in feeling what they called the +general sentiment of _revolt_. I should have resisted, let us hope, any +rules that were evil, and with these and their definition I shall deal +in another chapter. But I did not feel disposed to resist any rule +merely because it was mysterious. Estates are sometimes held by foolish +forms, the breaking of a stick or the payment of a peppercorn: I was +willing to hold the huge estate of earth and heaven by any such feudal +fantasy. It could not well be wilder than the fact that I was allowed to +hold it at all. At this stage I give only one ethical instance to show +my meaning. I could never mix in the common murmur of that rising +generation against monogamy, because no restriction on sex seemed so odd +and unexpected as sex itself. To be allowed, like Endymion, to make love +to the moon and then to complain that Jupiter kept his own moons in a +harem seemed to me (bred on fairy tales like Endymion's) a vulgar +anti-climax. Keeping to one woman is a small price for so much as seeing +one woman. To complain that I could only be married once was like +complaining that I had only been born once. It was incommensurate with +the terrible excitement of which one was talking. It showed, not an +exaggerated sensibility to sex, but a curious insensibility to it. A man +is a fool who complains that he cannot enter Eden by five gates at +once. Polygamy is a lack of the realization of sex; it is like a man +plucking five pears in mere absence of mind. The aesthetes touched the +last insane limits of language in their eulogy on lovely things. The +thistledown made them weep; a burnished beetle brought them to their +knees. Yet their emotion never impressed me for an instant, for this +reason, that it never occurred to them to pay for their pleasure in any +sort of symbolic sacrifice. Men (I felt) might fast forty days for the +sake of hearing a blackbird sing. Men might go through fire to find a +cowslip. Yet these lovers of beauty could not even keep sober for the +blackbird. They would not go through common Christian marriage by way of +recompense to the cowslip. Surely one might pay for extraordinary joy in +ordinary morals. Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because +we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for +sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde. + +Well, I left the fairy tales lying on the floor of the nursery, and I +have not found any books so sensible since. I left the nurse guardian of +tradition and democracy, and I have not found any modern type so sanely +radical or so sanely conservative. But the matter for important comment +was here, that when I first went out into the mental atmosphere of the +modern world, I found that the modern world was positively opposed on +two points to my nurse and to the nursery tales. It has taken me a long +time to find out that the modern world is wrong and my nurse was right. +The really curious thing was this: that modern thought contradicted this +basic creed of my boyhood on its two most essential doctrines. I have +explained that the fairy tales founded in me two convictions; first, +that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been +quite different, but which is quite delightful; second, that before this +wildness and delight one may well be modest and submit to the queerest +limitations of so queer a kindness. But I found the whole modern world +running like a high tide against both my tendernesses; and the shock of +that collision created two sudden and spontaneous sentiments, which I +have had ever since and which, crude as they were, have since hardened +into convictions. + +First, I found the whole modern world talking scientific fatalism; +saying that everything is as it must always have been, being unfolded +without fault from the beginning. The leaf on the tree is green because +it could never have been anything else. Now, the fairy-tale philosopher +is glad that the leaf is green precisely because it might have been +scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked +at it. He is pleased that snow is white on the strictly reasonable +ground that it might have been black. Every colour has in it a bold +quality as of choice; the red of garden roses is not only decisive but +dramatic, like suddenly spilt blood. He feels that something has been +_done_. But the great determinists of the nineteenth century were +strongly against this native feeling that something had happened an +instant before. In fact, according to them, nothing ever really had +happened since the beginning of the world. Nothing ever had happened +since existence had happened; and even about the date of that they were +not very sure. + +The modern world as I found it was solid for modern Calvinism, for the +necessity of things being as they are. But when I came to ask them I +found they had really no proof of this unavoidable repetition in things +except the fact that the things were repeated. Now, the mere repetition +made the things to me rather more weird than more rational. It was as +if, having seen a curiously shaped nose in the street and dismissed it +as an accident, I had then seen six other noses of the same astonishing +shape. I should have fancied for a moment that it must be some local +secret society. So one elephant having a trunk was odd; but all +elephants having trunks looked like a plot. I speak here only of an +emotion, and of an emotion at once stubborn and subtle. But the +repetition in Nature seemed sometimes to be an excited repetition, like +that of an angry schoolmaster saying the same thing over and over again. +The grass seemed signalling to me with all its fingers at once; the +crowded stars seemed bent upon being understood. The sun would make me +see him if he rose a thousand times. The recurrences of the universe +rose to the maddening rhythm of an incantation, and I began to see an +idea. + +All the towering materialism which dominates the modern mind rests +ultimately upon one assumption; a false assumption. It is supposed that +if a thing goes on repeating itself it is probably dead; a piece of +clockwork. People feel that if the universe was personal it would vary; +if the sun were alive it would dance. This is a fallacy even in relation +to known fact. For the variation in human affairs is generally brought +into them, not by life, but by death; by the dying down or breaking off +of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some +slight element of failure or fatigue. He gets into an omnibus because he +is tired of walking; or he walks because he is tired of sitting still. +But if his life and joy were so gigantic that he never tired of going to +Islington, he might go to Islington as regularly as the Thames goes to +Sheerness. The very speed and ecstasy of his life would have the +stillness of death. The sun rises every morning. I do not rise every +morning; but the variation is due not to my activity, but to my +inaction. Now, to put the matter in a popular phrase, it might be true +that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His +routine might be due, not to a lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The +thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some +game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs +rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have +abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, +therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do +it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly +dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. +But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible +that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every +evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity +that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy +separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He +has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, +and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a +mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical _encore_. Heaven may _encore_ +the bird who laid an egg. If the human being conceives and brings forth +a human child instead of bringing forth a fish, or a bat, or a griffin, +the reason may not be that we are fixed in an animal fate without life +or purpose. It may be that our little tragedy has touched the gods, that +they admire it from their starry galleries, and that at the end of every +human drama man is called again and again before the curtain. Repetition +may go on for millions of years, by mere choice, and at any instant it +may stop. Man may stand on the earth generation after generation, and +yet each birth be his positively last appearance. + +This was my first conviction; made by the shock of my childish emotions +meeting the modern creed in mid-career. I had always vaguely felt facts +to be miracles in the sense that they are wonderful: now I began to +think them miracles in the stricter sense that they were _wilful_. I +mean that they were, or might be, repeated exercises of some will. In +short, I had always believed that the world involved magic: now I +thought that perhaps it involved a magician. And this pointed a profound +emotion always present and sub-conscious; that this world of ours has +some purpose; and if there is a purpose, there is a person. I had always +felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a +story-teller. + +But modern thought also hit my second human tradition. It went against +the fairy feeling about strict limits and conditions. The one thing it +loved to talk about was expansion and largeness. Herbert Spencer would +have been greatly annoyed if any one had called him an imperialist, and +therefore it is highly regrettable that nobody did. But he was an +imperialist of the lowest type. He popularized this contemptible notion +that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma +of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any +more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of +God, then a whale may be the image of God; a somewhat formless image; +what one might call an impressionist portrait. It is quite futile to +argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small +compared to the nearest tree. But Herbert Spencer, in his headlong +imperialism, would insist that we had in some way been conquered and +annexed by the astronomical universe. He spoke about men and their +ideals exactly as the most insolent Unionist talks about the Irish and +their ideals. He turned mankind into a small nationality. And his evil +influence can be seen even in the most spirited and honourable of later +scientific authors; notably in the early romances of Mr. H.G. Wells. +Many moralists have in an exaggerated way represented the earth as +wicked. But Mr. Wells and his school made the heavens wicked. We should +lift up our eyes to the stars from whence would come our ruin. + +But the expansion of which I speak was much more evil than all this. I +have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in +the prison of one thought. These people seemed to think it singularly +inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large. The size of +this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went +on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be +anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness +or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added +nothing to it. It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he +would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county. The +warder would have nothing to show the man except more and more long +corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human. +So these expanders of the universe had nothing to show us except more +and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of +all that is divine. + +In fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for +the definition of a law is something that can be broken. But the +machinery of this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; +for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery. We were either +unable to do things or we were destined to do them. The idea of the +mystical condition quite disappeared; one can neither have the firmness +of keeping laws nor the fun of breaking them. The largeness of this +universe had nothing of that freshness and airy outbreak which we have +praised in the universe of the poet. This modern universe is literally +an empire; that is, it is vast, but it is not free. One went into larger +and larger windowless rooms, rooms big with Babylonian perspective; but +one never found the smallest window or a whisper of outer air. + +Their infernal parallels seemed to expand with distance; but for me all +good things come to a point, swords for instance. So finding the boast +of the big cosmos so unsatisfactory to my emotions I began to argue +about it a little; and I soon found that the whole attitude was even +shallower than could have been expected. According to these people the +cosmos was one thing since it had one unbroken rule. Only (they would +say) while it is one thing it is also the only thing there is. Why, +then, should one worry particularly to call it large? There is nothing +to compare it with. It would be just as sensible to call it small. A man +may say, "I like this vast cosmos, with its throng of stars and its +crowd of varied creatures." But if it comes to that why should not a man +say, "I like this cosy little cosmos, with its decent number of stars +and as neat a provision of live stock as I wish to see"? One is as good +as the other; they are both mere sentiments. It is mere sentiment to +rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a +sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses +to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not +choose to have an emotion about its smallness? + +It happened that I had that emotion. When one is fond of anything one +addresses it by diminutives, even if it is an elephant or a +lifeguardsman. The reason is, that anything, however huge, that can be +conceived of as complete, can be conceived of as small. If military +moustaches did not suggest a sword or tusks a tail, then the object +would be vast because it would be immeasurable. But the moment you can +imagine a guardsman you can imagine a small guardsman. The moment you +really see an elephant you can call it "Tiny." If you can make a statue +of a thing you can make a statuette of it. These people professed that +the universe was one coherent thing; but they were not fond of the +universe. But I was frightfully fond of the universe and wanted to +address it by a diminutive. I often did so; and it never seemed to mind. +Actually and in truth I did feel that these dim dogmas of vitality were +better expressed by calling the world small than by calling it large. +For about infinity there was a sort of carelessness which was the +reverse of the fierce and pious care which I felt touching the +pricelessness and the peril of life. They showed only a dreary waste; +but I felt a sort of sacred thrift. For economy is far more romantic +than extravagance. To them stars were an unending income of halfpence; +but I felt about the golden sun and the silver moon as a schoolboy feels +if he has one sovereign and one shilling. + +These subconscious convictions are best hit off by the colour and tone +of certain tales. Thus I have said that stories of magic alone can +express my sense that life is not only a pleasure but a kind of +eccentric privilege. I may express this other feeling of cosmic cosiness +by allusion to another book always read in boyhood, "Robinson Crusoe," +which I read about this time, and which owes its eternal vivacity to the +fact that it celebrates the poetry of limits, nay, even the wild romance +of prudence. Crusoe is a man on a small rock with a few comforts just +snatched from the sea: the best thing in the book is simply the list of +things saved from the wreck. The greatest of poems is an inventory. +Every kitchen tool becomes ideal because Crusoe might have dropped it +in the sea. It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to +look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy +one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the +solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all +things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from +a wreck. Every man has had one horrible adventure: as a hidden untimely +birth he had not been, as infants that never see the light. Men spoke +much in my boyhood of restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was +common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it is a +more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great +Might-Not-Have-Been. + +But I really felt (the fancy may seem foolish) as if all the order and +number of things were the romantic remnant of Crusoe's ship. That there +are two sexes and one sun, was like the fact that there were two guns +and one axe. It was poignantly urgent that none should be lost; but +somehow, it was rather fun that none could be added. The trees and the +planets seemed like things saved from the wreck: and when I saw the +Matterhorn I was glad that it had not been overlooked in the confusion. +I felt economical about the stars as if they were sapphires (they are +called so in Milton's Eden): I hoarded the hills. For the universe is a +single jewel, and while it is a natural cant to talk of a jewel as +peerless and priceless, of this jewel it is literally true. This cosmos +is indeed without peer and without price: for there cannot be another +one. + +Thus ends, in unavoidable inadequacy, the attempt to utter the +unutterable things. These are my ultimate attitudes towards life; the +soils for the seeds of doctrine. These in some dark way I thought before +I could write, and felt before I could think: that we may proceed more +easily afterwards, I will roughly recapitulate them now. I felt in my +bones; first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a +miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, +with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, +if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural +explanations I have heard. The thing is magic, true or false. Second, I +came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have some +one to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work +of art; whatever it meant it meant violently. Third, I thought this +purpose beautiful in its old design, in spite of its defects, such as +dragons. Fourth, that the proper form of thanks to it is some form of +humility and restraint: we should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not +drinking too much of them. We owed, also, an obedience to whatever made +us. And last, and strangest, there had come into my mind a vague and +vast impression that in some way all good was a remnant to be stored and +held sacred out of some primordial ruin. Man had saved his good as +Crusoe saved his goods: he had saved them from a wreck. All this I felt +and the age gave me no encouragement to feel it. And all this time I had +not even thought of Christian theology. + + + + +CHAPTER V.--_The Flag of the World_ + + +When I was a boy there were two curious men running about who were +called the optimist and the pessimist. I constantly used the words +myself, but I cheerfully confess that I never had any very special idea +of what they meant. The only thing which might be considered evident was +that they could not mean what they said; for the ordinary verbal +explanation was that the optimist thought this world as good as it could +be, while the pessimist thought it as bad as it could be. Both these +statements being obviously raving nonsense, one had to cast about for +other explanations. An optimist could not mean a man who thought +everything right and nothing wrong. For that is meaningless; it is like +calling everything right and nothing left. Upon the whole, I came to the +conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the +pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except +himself. It would be unfair to omit altogether from the list the +mysterious but suggestive definition said to have been given by a little +girl, "An optimist is a man who looks after your eyes, and a pessimist +is a man who looks after your feet." I am not sure that this is not the +best definition of all. There is even a sort of allegorical truth in it. +For there might, perhaps, be a profitable distinction drawn between that +more dreary thinker who thinks merely of our contact with the earth from +moment to moment, and that happier thinker who considers rather our +primary power of vision and of choice of road. + +But this is a deep mistake in this alternative of the optimist and the +pessimist. The assumption of it is that a man criticises this world as +if he were house-hunting, as if he were being shown over a new suite of +apartments. If a man came to this world from some other world in full +possession of his powers he might discuss whether the advantage of +midsummer woods made up for the disadvantage of mad dogs, just as a man +looking for lodgings might balance the presence of a telephone against +the absence of a sea view. But no man is in that position. A man belongs +to this world before he begins to ask if it is nice to belong to it. He +has fought for the flag, and often won heroic victories for the flag +long before he has ever enlisted. To put shortly what seems the +essential matter, he has a loyalty long before he has any admiration. + +In the last chapter it has been said that the primary feeling that this +world is strange and yet attractive is best expressed in fairy tales. +The reader may, if he likes, put down the next stage to that bellicose +and even jingo literature which commonly comes next in the history of a +boy. We all owe much sound morality to the penny dreadfuls. Whatever the +reason, it seemed and still seems to me that our attitude towards life +can be better expressed in terms of a kind of military loyalty than in +terms of criticism and approval. My acceptance of the universe is not +optimism, it is more like patriotism. It is a matter of primary loyalty. +The world is not a lodging-house at Brighton, which we are to leave +because it is miserable. It is the fortress of our family, with the flag +flying on the turret, and the more miserable it is the less we should +leave it. The point is not that this world is too sad to love or too +glad not to love; the point is that when you do love a thing, its +gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving +it more. All optimistic thoughts about England and all pessimistic +thoughts about her are alike reasons for the English patriot. Similarly, +optimism and pessimism are alike arguments for the cosmic patriot. + +Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing--say Pimlico. +If we think what is really best for Pimlico we shall find the thread of +thought leads to the throne of the mystic and the arbitary. It is not +enough for a man to disapprove of Pimlico: in that case he will merely +cut his throat or move to Chelsea. Nor, certainly, is it enough for a +man to approve of Pimlico: for then it will remain Pimlico, which would +be awful. The only way out of it seems to be for somebody to love +Pimlico: to love it with a transcendental tie and without any earthly +reason. If there arose a man who loved Pimlico, then Pimlico would rise +into ivory towers and golden pinnacles; Pimlico would attire herself as +a woman does when she is loved. For decoration is not given to hide +horrible things; but to decorate things already adorable. A mother does +not give her child a blue bow because he is so ugly without it. A lover +does not give a girl a necklace to hide her neck. If men loved Pimlico +as mothers love children, arbitarily, because it is _theirs_ Pimlico in +a year or two might be fairer than Florence. Some readers will say that +this is a mere fantasy. I answer that this is the actual history of +mankind. This, as a fact, is how cities did grow great. Go back to the +darkest roots of civilisation and you will find them knotted round some +sacred stone or encircling some sacred well. People first paid honour to +a spot and afterwards gained glory for it. Men did not love Rome because +she was great. She was great because they had loved her. + +The eighteenth-century theories of the social contract have been exposed +to much clumsy criticism in our time; in so far as they meant that there +is at the back of all historic government an idea of content and +co-operation, they were demonstrably right. But they really were wrong +in so far as they suggested that men had ever aimed at order or ethics +directly by a conscious exchange of interests. Morality did not begin by +one man saying to another, "I will not hit you if you do not hit me"; +there is no trace of such a transaction. There _is_ a trace of both men +having said, "We must not hit each other in the holy place." They gained +their morality by guarding their religion. They did not cultivate +courage. They fought for the shrine, and found they had become +courageous. They did not cultivate cleanliness. They purified themselves +for the altar, and found that they were clean. The history of the Jews +is the only early document known to most Englishmen, and the facts can +be judged sufficiently from that. The Ten Commandments which have been +found substantially common to mankind were merely military commands; a +code of regimental orders, issued to protect a certain ark across a +certain desert. Anarchy was evil because it endangered the sanctity. And +only when they made a holy day for God did they find they had made a +holiday for men. + +If it be granted that this primary devotion to a place or thing is a +source of creative energy, we can pass on to a very peculiar fact. Let +us reiterate for an instant that the only right optimism is a sort of +universal patriotism. What is the matter with the pessimist? I think it +can be stated by saying that he is the cosmic anti-patriot. And what is +the matter with the anti-patriot? I think it can be stated, without +undue bitterness, by saying that he is the candid friend. And what is +the matter with the candid friend? There we strike the rock of real life +and immutable human nature. + +I venture to say that what is bad in the candid friend is simply that he +is not candid. He is keeping something back--his own gloomy pleasure in +saying unpleasant things. He has a secret desire to hurt, not merely to +help. This is certainly, I think, what makes a certain sort of +anti-patriot irritating to healthy citizens. I do not speak (of course) +of the anti-patriotism which only irritates feverish stockbrokers and +gushing actresses; that is only patriotism speaking plainly. A man who +says that no patriot should attack the Boer War until it is over is not +worth answering intelligently; he is saying that no good son should warn +his mother off a cliff until she has fallen over it. But there is an +anti-patriot who honestly angers honest men, and the explanation of him +is, I think, what I have suggested: he is the uncandid candid friend; +the man who says, "I am sorry to say we are ruined," and is not sorry at +all. And he may be said, without rhetoric, to be a traitor; for he is +using that ugly knowledge which was allowed him to strengthen the army, +to discourage people from joining it. Because he is allowed to be +pessimistic as a military adviser he is being pessimistic as a +recruiting sergeant. Just in the same way the pessimist (who is the +cosmic anti-patriot) uses the freedom that life allows to her +counsellors to lure away the people from her flag. Granted that he +states only facts, it is still essential to know what are his emotions, +what is his motive. It may be that twelve hundred men in Tottenham are +down with smallpox; but we want to know whether this is stated by some +great philosopher who wants to curse the gods, or only by some common +clergyman who wants to help the men. + +The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, +but that he does not love what he chastises--he has not this primary and +supernatural loyalty to things. What is the evil of the man commonly +called an optimist? Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to +defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible. He is the +jingo of the universe; he will say, "My cosmos, right or wrong." He will +be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of +front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing every one with +assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world. All +this (which is true of a type of optimist) leads us to the one really +interesting point of psychology, which could not be explained without +it. + +We say there must be a primal loyalty to life: the only question is, +shall it be a natural or a supernatural loyalty? If you like to put it +so, shall it be a reasonable or an unreasonable loyalty? Now, the +extraordinary thing is that the bad optimism (the whitewashing, the weak +defence of everything) comes in with the reasonable optimism. Rational +optimism leads to stagnation: it is irrational optimism that leads to +reform. Let me explain by using once more the parallel of patriotism. +The man who is most likely to ruin the place he loves is exactly the man +who loves it with a reason. The man who will improve the place is the +man who loves it without a reason. If a man loves some feature of +Pimlico (which seems unlikely), he may find himself defending that +feature against Pimlico itself. But if he simply loves Pimlico itself, +he may lay it waste and turn it into the New Jerusalem. I do not deny +that reform may be excessive; I only say that it is the mystic patriot +who reforms. Mere jingo self-contentment is commonest among those who +have some pedantic reason for their patriotism. The worst jingoes do not +love England, but a theory of England. If we love England for being an +empire, we may overrate the success with which we rule the Hindoos. But +if we love it only for being a nation, we can face all events: for it +would be a nation even if the Hindoos ruled us. Thus also only those +will permit their patriotism to falsify history whose patriotism depends +on history. A man who loves England for being English will not mind how +she arose. But a man who loves England for being Anglo-Saxon may go +against all facts for his fancy. He may end (like Carlyle and Freeman) +by maintaining that the Norman Conquest was a Saxon Conquest. He may end +in utter unreason--because he has a reason. A man who loves France for +being military will palliate the army of 1870. But a man who loves +France for being France will improve the army of 1870. This is exactly +what the French have done, and France is a good instance of the working +paradox. Nowhere else is patriotism more purely abstract and arbitrary; +and nowhere else is reform more drastic and sweeping. The more +transcendental is your patriotism, the more practical are your politics. + +Perhaps the most everyday instance of this point is in the case of +women; and their strange and strong loyalty. Some stupid people started +the idea that because women obviously back up their own people through +everything, therefore women are blind and do not see anything. They can +hardly have known any women. The same women who are ready to defend +their men through thick and thin are (in their personal intercourse with +the man) almost morbidly lucid about the thinness of his excuses or the +thickness of his head. A man's friend likes him but leaves him as he is: +his wife loves him and is always trying to turn him into somebody else. +Women who are utter mystics in their creed are utter cynics in their +criticism. Thackeray expressed this well when he made Pendennis' mother, +who worshipped her son as a god, yet assume that he would go wrong as a +man. She underrated his virtue, though she overrated his value. The +devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a +sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is +bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind. + +This at least had come to be my position about all that was called +optimism, pessimism, and improvement. Before any cosmic act of reform we +must have a cosmic oath of allegiance. A man must be interested in life, +then he could be disinterested in his views of it. "My son give me thy +heart"; the heart must be fixed on the right thing: the moment we have a +fixed heart we have a free hand. I must pause to anticipate an obvious +criticism. It will be said that a rational person accepts the world as +mixed of good and evil with a decent satisfaction and a decent +endurance. But this is exactly the attitude which I maintain to be +defective. It is, I know, very common in this age; it was perfectly put +in those quiet lines of Matthew Arnold which are more piercingly +blasphemous than the shrieks of Schopenhauer-- + + "Enough we live:--and if a life, + With large results so little rife, + Though bearable, seem hardly worth + This pomp of worlds, this pain of birth." + +I know this feeling fills our epoch, and I think it freezes our epoch. +For our Titanic purposes of faith and revolution, what we need is not +the cold acceptance of the world as a compromise, but some way in which +we can heartily hate and heartily love it. We do not want joy and anger +to neutralise each other and produce a surly contentment; we want a +fiercer delight and a fiercer discontent. We have to feel the universe +at once as an ogre's castle, to be stormed, and yet as our own cottage, +to which we can return at evening. + +No one doubts that an ordinary man can get on with this world: but we +demand not strength enough to get on with it, but strength enough to get +it on. Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to +think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without +once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without +once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist +and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is +he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to +die to it? In this combination, I maintain, it is the rational optimist +who fails, the irrational optimist who succeeds. He is ready to smash +the whole universe for the sake of itself. + +I put these things not in their mature logical sequence, but as they +came: and this view was cleared and sharpened by an accident of the +time. Under the lengthening shadow of Ibsen, an argument arose whether +it was not a very nice thing to murder one's self. Grave moderns told us +that we must not even say "poor fellow," of a man who had blown his +brains out, since he was an enviable person, and had only blown them out +because of their exceptional excellence. Mr. William Archer even +suggested that in the golden age there would be penny-in-the-slot +machines, by which a man could kill himself for a penny. In all this I +found myself utterly hostile to many who called themselves liberal and +humane. Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and +absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the +refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, +kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is +concerned he wipes out the world. His act is worse (symbolically +considered) than any rape or dynamite outrage. For it destroys all +buildings: it insults all women. The thief is satisfied with diamonds; +but the suicide is not: that is his crime. He cannot be bribed, even by +the blazing stones of the Celestial City. The thief compliments the +things he steals, if not the owner of them. But the suicide insults +everything on earth by not stealing it. He defiles every flower by +refusing to live for its sake. There is not a tiny creature in the +cosmos at whom his death is not a sneer. When a man hangs himself on a +tree, the leaves might fall off in anger and the birds fly away in fury: +for each has received a personal affront. Of course there may be +pathetic emotional excuses for the act. There often are for rape, and +there almost always are for dynamite. But if it comes to clear ideas and +the intelligent meaning of things, then there is much more rational and +philosophic truth in the burial at the cross-roads and the stake driven +through the body, than in Mr. Archer's suicidal automatic machines. +There is a meaning in burying the suicide apart. The man's crime is +different from other crimes--for it makes even crimes impossible. + +About the same time I read a solemn flippancy by some free thinker: he +said that a suicide was only the same as a martyr. The open fallacy of +this helped to clear the question. Obviously a suicide is the opposite +of a martyr. A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside +him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares +so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of +everything. One wants something to begin: the other wants everything to +end. In other words, the martyr is noble, exactly because (however he +renounces the world or execrates all humanity) he confesses this +ultimate link with life; he sets his heart outside himself: he dies that +something may live. The suicide is ignoble because he has not this link +with being: he is a mere destroyer; spiritually, he destroys the +universe. And then I remembered the stake and the cross-roads, and the +queer fact that Christianity had shown this weird harshness to the +suicide. For Christianity had shown a wild encouragement of the martyr. +Historic Christianity was accused, not entirely without reason, of +carrying martyrdom and asceticism to a point, desolate and pessimistic. +The early Christian martyrs talked of death with a horrible happiness. +They blasphemed the beautiful duties of the body: they smelt the grave +afar off like a field of flowers. All this has seemed to many the very +poetry of pessimism. Yet there is the stake at the cross-roads to show +what Christianity thought of the pessimist. + +This was the first of the long train of enigmas with which Christianity +entered the discussion. And there went with it a peculiarity of which I +shall have to speak more markedly, as a note of all Christian notions, +but which distinctly began in this one. The Christian attitude to the +martyr and the suicide was not what is so often affirmed in modern +morals. It was not a matter of degree. It was not that a line must be +drawn somewhere, and that the self-slayer in exaltation fell within the +line, the self-slayer in sadness just beyond it. The Christian feeling +evidently was not merely that the suicide was carrying martyrdom too +far. The Christian feeling was furiously for one and furiously against +the other: these two things that looked so much alike were at opposite +ends of heaven and hell. One man flung away his life; he was so good +that his dry bones could heal cities in pestilence. Another man flung +away life; he was so bad that his bones would pollute his brethren's. I +am not saying this fierceness was right; but why was it so fierce? + +Here it was that I first found that my wandering feet were in some +beaten track. Christianity had also felt this opposition of the martyr +to the suicide: had it perhaps felt it for the same reason? Had +Christianity felt what I felt, but could not (and cannot) express--this +need for a first loyalty to things, and then for a ruinous reform of +things? Then I remembered that it was actually the charge against +Christianity that it combined these two things which I was wildly trying +to combine. Christianity was accused, at one and the same time, of being +too optimistic about the universe and of being too pessimistic about the +world. The coincidence made me suddenly stand still. + +An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such +and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. +Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not +credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain +philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on +Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was +suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a +man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the +century. If a man believes in unalterable natural law, he cannot believe +in any miracle in any age. If a man believes in a will behind law, he +can believe in any miracle in any age. Suppose, for the sake of +argument, we are concerned with a case of thaumaturgic healing. A +materialist of the twelfth century could not believe it any more than a +materialist of the twentieth century. But a Christian Scientist of the +twentieth century can believe it as much as a Christian of the twelfth +century. It is simply a matter of a man's theory of things. Therefore in +dealing with any historical answer, the point is not whether it was +given in our time, but whether it was given in answer to our question. +And the more I thought about when and how Christianity had come into the +world, the more I felt that it had actually come to answer this +question. + +It is commonly the loose and latitudinarian Christians who pay quite +indefensible compliments to Christianity. They talk as if there had +never been any piety or pity until Christianity came, a point on which +any mediaeval would have been eager to correct them. They represent that +the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to +preach simplicity or self-restraint, or inwardness and sincerity. They +will think me very narrow (whatever that means) if I say that the +remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach +Christianity. Its peculiarity was that it was peculiar, and simplicity +and sincerity are not peculiar, but obvious ideals for all mankind. +Christianity was the answer to a riddle, not the last truism uttered +after a long talk. Only the other day I saw in an excellent weekly paper +of Puritan tone this remark, that Christianity when stripped of its +armour of dogma (as who should speak of a man stripped of his armour of +bones), turned out to be nothing but the Quaker doctrine of the Inner +Light. Now, if I were to say that Christianity came into the world +specially to destroy the doctrine of the Inner Light, that would be an +exaggeration. But it would be very much nearer to the truth. The last +Stoics, like Marcus Aurelius, were exactly the people who did believe in +the Inner Light. Their dignity, their weariness, their sad external care +for others, their incurable internal care for themselves, were all due +to the Inner Light, and existed only by that dismal illumination. Notice +that Marcus Aurelius insists, as such introspective moralists always do, +upon small things done or undone; it is because he has not hate or love +enough to make a moral revolution. He gets up early in the morning, just +as our own aristocrats living the Simple Life get up early in the +morning; because such altruism is much easier than stopping the games of +the amphitheatre or giving the English people back their land. Marcus +Aurelius is the most intolerable of human types. He is an unselfish +egoist. An unselfish egoist is a man who has pride without the excuse of +passion. Of all conceivable forms of enlightenment the worst is what +these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most +horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body +knows how it would work; any one who knows any one from the Higher +Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god +within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. +Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; +let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, +but not the god within. Christianity came into the world firstly in +order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, +but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a +divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian +was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely +recognised an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible +as an army with banners. + +All the same, it will be as well if Jones does not worship the sun and +moon. If he does, there is a tendency for him to imitate them; to say, +that because the sun burns insects alive, he may burn insects alive. He +thinks that because the sun gives people sun-stroke, he may give his +neighbour measles. He thinks that because the moon is said to drive men +mad, he may drive his wife mad. This ugly side of mere external optimism +had also shown itself in the ancient world. About the time when the +Stoic idealism had begun to show the weaknesses of pessimism, the old +nature worship of the ancients had begun to show the enormous weaknesses +of optimism. Nature worship is natural enough while the society is +young, or, in other words, Pantheism is all right as long as it is the +worship of Pan. But Nature has another side which experience and sin are +not slow in finding out, and it is no flippancy to say of the god Pan +that he soon showed the cloven hoof. The only objection to Natural +Religion is that somehow it always becomes unnatural. A man loves Nature +in the morning for her innocence and amiability, and at nightfall, if he +is loving her still, it is for her darkness and her cruelty. He washes +at dawn in clear water as did the Wise Man of the Stoics, yet, somehow +at the dark end of the day, he is bathing in hot bull's blood, as did +Julian the Apostate. The mere pursuit of health always leads to +something unhealthy. Physical nature must not be made the direct object +of obedience; it must be enjoyed, not worshipped. Stars and mountains +must not be taken seriously. If they are, we end where the pagan nature +worship ended. Because the earth is kind, we can imitate all her +cruelties. Because sexuality is sane, we can all go mad about sexuality. +Mere optimism had reached its insane and appropriate termination. The +theory that everything was good had become an orgy of everything that +was bad. + +On the other side our idealist pessimists were represented by the old +remnant of the Stoics. Marcus Aurelius and his friends had really given +up the idea of any god in the universe and looked only to the god +within. They had no hope of any virtue in nature, and hardly any hope of +any virtue in society. They had not enough interest in the outer world +really to wreck or revolutionise it. They did not love the city enough +to set fire to it. Thus the ancient world was exactly in our own +desolate dilemma. The only people who really enjoyed this world were +busy breaking it up; and the virtuous people did not care enough about +them to knock them down. In this dilemma (the same as ours) Christianity +suddenly stepped in and offered a singular answer, which the world +eventually accepted as _the_ answer. It was the answer then, and I think +it is the answer now. + +This answer was like the slash of a sword; it sundered; it did not in +any sense sentimentally unite. Briefly, it divided God from the cosmos. +That transcendence and distinctness of the deity which some Christians +now want to remove from Christianity, was really the only reason why any +one wanted to be a Christian. It was the whole point of the Christian +answer to the unhappy pessimist and the still more unhappy optimist. As +I am here only concerned with their particular problem I shall indicate +only briefly this great metaphysical suggestion. All descriptions of +the creating or sustaining principle in things must be metaphorical, +because they must be verbal. Thus the pantheist is forced to speak of +God _in_ all things as if he were in a box. Thus the evolutionist has, +in his very name, the idea of being unrolled like a carpet. All terms, +religious and irreligious, are open to this charge. The only question is +whether all terms are useless, or whether one can, with such a phrase, +cover a distinct _idea_ about the origin of things. I think one can, and +so evidently does the evolutionist, or he would not talk about +evolution. And the root phrase for all Christian theism was this, that +God was a creator, as an artist is a creator. A poet is so separate from +his poem that he himself speaks of it as a little thing he has "thrown +off." Even in giving it forth he has flung it away. This principle that +all creation and procreation is a breaking off is at least as consistent +through the cosmos as the evolutionary principle that all growth is a +branching out. A woman loses a child even in having a child. All +creation is separation. Birth is as solemn a parting as death. + +It was the prime philosophic principle of Christianity that this divorce +in the divine act of making (such as severs the poet from the poem or +the mother from the new-born child) was the true description of the act +whereby the absolute energy made the world. According to most +philosophers, God in making the world enslaved it. According to +Christianity, in making it, He set it free. God had written, not so much +a poem, but rather a play; a play he had planned as perfect, but which +had necessarily been left to human actors and stage-managers, who had +since made a great mess of it. I will discuss the truth of this theorem +later. Here I have only to point out with what a startling smoothness it +passed the dilemma we have discussed in this chapter. In this way at +least one could be both happy and indignant without degrading one's self +to be either a pessimist or an optimist. On this system one could fight +all the forces of existence without deserting the flag of existence. One +could be at peace with the universe and yet be at war with the world. +St. George could still fight the dragon, however big the monster bulked +in the cosmos, though he were bigger than the mighty cities or bigger +than the everlasting hills. If he were as big as the world he could yet +be killed in the name of the world. St. George had not to consider any +obvious odds or proportions in the scale of things, but only the +original secret of their design. He can shake his sword at the dragon, +even if it is everything; even if the empty heavens over his head are +only the huge arch of its open jaws. + +And then followed an experience impossible to describe. It was as if I +had been blundering about since my birth with two huge and unmanageable +machines, of different shapes and without apparent connection--the world +and the Christian tradition. I had found this hole in the world: the +fact that one must somehow find a way of loving the world without +trusting it; somehow one must love the world without being worldly. I +found this projecting feature of Christian theology, like a sort of hard +spike, the dogmatic insistence that God was personal, and had made a +world separate from Himself. The spike of dogma fitted exactly into the +hole in the world--it had evidently been meant to go there--and then the +strange thing began to happen. When once these two parts of the two +machines had come together, one after another, all the other parts +fitted and fell in with an eerie exactitude. I could hear bolt after +bolt over all the machinery falling into its place with a kind of click +of relief. Having got one part right, all the other parts were +repeating that rectitude, as clock after clock strikes noon. Instinct +after instinct was answered by doctrine after doctrine. Or, to vary the +metaphor, I was like one who had advanced into a hostile country to take +one high fortress. And when that fort had fallen the whole country +surrendered and turned solid behind me. The whole land was lit up, as it +were, back to the first fields of my childhood. All those blind fancies +of boyhood which in the fourth chapter I have tried in vain to trace on +the darkness, became suddenly transparent and sane. I was right when I +felt that roses were red by some sort of choice: it was the divine +choice. I was right when I felt that I would almost rather say that +grass was the wrong colour than say that it must by necessity have been +that colour: it might verily have been any other. My sense that +happiness hung on the crazy thread of a condition did mean something +when all was said: it meant the whole doctrine of the Fall. Even those +dim and shapeless monsters of notions which I have not been able to +describe, much less defend, stepped quietly into their places like +colossal caryatides of the creed. The fancy that the cosmos was not vast +and void, but small and cosy, had a fulfilled significance now, for +anything that is a work of art must be small in the sight of the artist; +to God the stars might be only small and dear, like diamonds. And my +haunting instinct that somehow good was not merely a tool to be used, +but a relic to be guarded, like the goods from Crusoe's ship--even that +had been the wild whisper of something originally wise, for, according +to Christianity, we were indeed the survivors of a wreck, the crew of a +golden ship that had gone down before the beginning of the world. + +But the important matter was this, that it entirely reversed the reason +for optimism. And the instant the reversal was made it felt like the +abrupt ease when a bone is put back in the socket. I had often called +myself an optimist, to avoid the too evident blasphemy of pessimism. But +all the optimism of the age had been false and disheartening for this +reason, that it had always been trying to prove that we fit in to the +world. The Christian optimism is based on the fact that we do _not_ fit +in to the world. I had tried to be happy by telling myself that man is +an animal, like any other which sought its meat from God. But now I +really was happy, for I had learnt that man is a monstrosity. I had +been right in feeling all things as odd, for I myself was at once worse +and better than all things. The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it +dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was +poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in the light of +the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again +that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in +acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the _wrong_ place, and my +soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. The knowledge found out and +illuminated forgotten chambers in the dark house of infancy. I knew now +why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a +giant, and why I could feel homesick at home. + + + + +CHAPTER VI.--_The Paradoxes of Christianity_ + + +The real trouble with this world of ours is not that it is an +unreasonable world, nor even that it is a reasonable one. The commonest +kind of trouble is that it is nearly reasonable, but not quite. Life is +not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians. It looks just a +little more mathematical and regular than it is; its exactitude is +obvious, but its inexactitude is hidden; its wildness lies in wait. I +give one coarse instance of what I mean. Suppose some mathematical +creature from the moon were to reckon up the human body; he would at +once see that the essential thing about it was that it was duplicate. A +man is two men, he on the right exactly resembling him on the left. +Having noted that there was an arm on the right and one on the left, a +leg on the right and one on the left, he might go further and still find +on each side the same number of fingers, the same number of toes, twin +eyes, twin ears, twin nostrils, and even twin lobes of the brain. At +last he would take it as a law; and then, where he found a heart on one +side, would deduce that there was another heart on the other. And just +then, where he most felt he was right, he would be wrong. + +It is this silent swerving from accuracy by an inch that is the uncanny +element in everything. It seems a sort of secret treason in the +universe. An apple or an orange is round enough to get itself called +round, and yet is not round after all. The earth itself is shaped like +an orange in order to lure some simple astronomer into calling it a +globe. A blade of grass is called after the blade of a sword, because it +comes to a point; but it doesn't. Everywhere in things there is this +element of the quiet and incalculable. It escapes the rationalists, but +it never escapes till the last moment. From the grand curve of our earth +it could easily be inferred that every inch of it was thus curved. It +would seem rational that as a man has a brain on both sides, he should +have a heart on both sides. Yet scientific men are still organizing +expeditions to find the North Pole, because they are so fond of flat +country. Scientific men are also still organising expeditions to find a +man's heart; and when they try to find it, they generally get on the +wrong side of him. + +Now, actual insight or inspiration is best tested by whether it guesses +these hidden malformations or surprises. If our mathematician from the +moon saw the two arms and the two ears, he might deduce the two +shoulder-blades and the two halves of the brain. But if he guessed that +the man's heart was in the right place, then I should call him something +more than a mathematician. Now, this is exactly the claim which I have +since come to propound for Christianity. Not merely that it deduces +logical truths, but that when it suddenly becomes illogical, it has +found, so to speak, an illogical truth. It not only goes right about +things, but it goes wrong (if one may say so) exactly where the things +go wrong. Its plan suits the secret irregularities, and expects the +unexpected. It is simple about the simple truth; but it is stubborn +about the subtle truth. It will admit that a man has two hands, it will +not admit (though all the Modernists wail to it) the obvious deduction +that he has two hearts. It is my only purpose in this chapter to point +this out; to show that whenever we feel there is something odd in +Christian theology, we shall generally find that there is something odd +in the truth. + +I have alluded to an unmeaning phrase to the effect that such and such a +creed cannot be believed in our age. Of course, anything can be +believed in any age. But, oddly enough, there really is a sense in which +a creed, if it is believed at all, can be believed more fixedly in a +complex society than in a simple one. If a man finds Christianity true +in Birmingham, he has actually clearer reasons for faith than if he had +found it true in Mercia. For the more complicated seems the coincidence, +the less it can be a coincidence. If snowflakes fell in the shape, say, +of the heart of Midlothian, it might be an accident. But if snowflakes +fell in the exact shape of the maze at Hampton Court, I think one might +call it a miracle. It is exactly as of such a miracle that I have since +come to feel of the philosophy of Christianity. The complication of our +modern world proves the truth of the creed more perfectly than any of +the plain problems of the ages of faith. It was in Notting Hill and +Battersea that I began to see that Christianity was true. This is why +the faith has that elaboration of doctrines and details which so much +distresses those who admire Christianity without believing in it. When +once one believes in a creed, one is proud of its complexity, as +scientists are proud of the complexity of science. It shows how rich it +is in discoveries. If it is right at all, it is a compliment to say +that it's elaborately right. A stick might fit a hole or a stone a +hollow by accident. But a key and a lock are both complex. And if a key +fits a lock, you know it is the right key. + +But this involved accuracy of the thing makes it very difficult to do +what I now have to do, to describe this accumulation of truth. It is +very hard for a man to defend anything of which he is entirely +convinced. It is comparatively easy when he is only partially convinced. +He is partially convinced because he has found this or that proof of the +thing, and he can expound it. But a man is not really convinced of a +philosophic theory when he finds that something proves it. He is only +really convinced when he finds that everything proves it. And the more +converging reasons he finds pointing to this conviction, the more +bewildered he is if asked suddenly to sum them up. Thus, if one asked an +ordinary intelligent man, on the spur of the moment, "Why do you prefer +civilisation to savagery?" he would look wildly round at object after +object, and would only be able to answer vaguely, "Why, there is that +bookcase ... and the coals in the coal-scuttle ... and pianos ... and +policemen." The whole case for civilisation is that the case for it is +complex. It has done so many things. But that very multiplicity of proof +which ought to make reply overwhelming makes reply impossible. + +There is, therefore, about all complete conviction a kind of huge +helplessness. The belief is so big that it takes a long time to get it +into action. And this hesitation chiefly arises, oddly enough, from an +indifference about where one should begin. All roads lead to Rome; which +is one reason why many people never get there. In the case of this +defence of the Christian conviction I confess that I would as soon begin +the argument with one thing as another; I would begin it with a turnip +or a taximeter cab. But if I am to be at all careful about making my +meaning clear, it will, I think, be wiser to continue the current +arguments of the last chapter, which was concerned to urge the first of +these mystical coincidences, or rather ratifications. All I had hitherto +heard of Christian theology had alienated me from it. I was a pagan at +the age of twelve, and a complete agnostic by the age of sixteen; and I +cannot understand any one passing the age of seventeen without having +asked himself so simple a question. I did, indeed, retain a cloudy +reverence for a cosmic deity and a great historical interest in the +Founder of Christianity. But I certainly regarded Him as a man; though +perhaps I thought that, even in that point, He had an advantage over +some of His modern critics. I read the scientific and sceptical +literature of my time--all of it, at least, that I could find written in +English and lying about; and I read nothing else; I mean I read nothing +else on any other note of philosophy. The penny dreadfuls which I also +read were indeed in a healthy and heroic tradition of Christianity; but +I did not know this at the time. I never read a line of Christian +apologetics. I read as little as I can of them now. It was Huxley and +Herbert Spencer and Bradlaugh who brought me back to orthodox theology. +They sowed in my mind my first wild doubts of doubt. Our grandmothers +were quite right when they said that Tom Paine and the free-thinkers +unsettled the mind. They do. They unsettled mine horribly. The +rationalist made me question whether reason was of any use whatever; and +when I had finished Herbert Spencer I had got as far as doubting (for +the first time) whether evolution had occurred at all. As I laid down +the last of Colonel Ingersoll's atheistic lectures the dreadful thought +broke across my mind, "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." I +was in a desperate way. + +This odd effect of the great agnostics in arousing doubts deeper than +their own might be illustrated in many ways. I take only one. As I read +and re-read all the non-Christian or anti-Christian accounts of the +faith, from Huxley to Bradlaugh, a slow and awful impression grew +gradually but graphically upon my mind--the impression that Christianity +must be a most extraordinary thing. For not only (as I understood) had +Christianity the most flaming vices, but it had apparently a mystical +talent for combining vices which seemed inconsistent with each other. It +was attacked on all sides and for all contradictory reasons. No sooner +had one rationalist demonstrated that it was too far to the east than +another demonstrated with equal clearness that it was much too far to +the west. No sooner had my indignation died down at its angular and +aggressive squareness than I was called up again to notice and condemn +its enervating and sensual roundness. In case any reader has not come +across the thing I mean, I will give such instances as I remember at +random of this self-contradiction in the sceptical attack. I give four +or five of them; there are fifty more. + +Thus, for instance, I was much moved by the eloquent attack on +Christianity as a thing of inhuman gloom; for I thought (and still +think) sincere pessimism the unpardonable sin. Insincere pessimism is a +social accomplishment, rather agreeable than otherwise; and fortunately +nearly all pessimism is insincere. But if Christianity was, as these +people said, a thing purely pessimistic and opposed to life, then I was +quite prepared to blow up St. Paul's Cathedral. But the extraordinary +thing is this. They did prove to me in Chapter I. (to my complete +satisfaction) that Christianity was too pessimistic; and then, in +Chapter II., they began to prove to me that it was a great deal too +optimistic. One accusation against Christianity was that it prevented +men, by morbid tears and terrors, from seeking joy and liberty in the +bosom of Nature. But another accusation was that it comforted men with a +fictitious providence, and put them in a pink-and-white nursery. One +great agnostic asked why Nature was not beautiful enough, and why it was +hard to be free. Another great agnostic objected that Christian +optimism, "the garment of make-believe woven by pious hands," hid from +us the fact that Nature was ugly, and that it was impossible to be free. +One rationalist had hardly done calling Christianity a nightmare before +another began to call it a fool's paradise. This puzzled me; the charges +seemed inconsistent. Christianity could not at once be the black mask on +a white world, and also the white mask on a black world. The state of +the Christian could not be at once so comfortable that he was a coward +to cling to it, and so uncomfortable that he was a fool to stand it. If +it falsified human vision it must falsify it one way or another; it +could not wear both green and rose-coloured spectacles. I rolled on my +tongue with a terrible joy, as did all young men of that time, the +taunts which Swinburne hurled at the dreariness of the creed-- + + "Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilaean, the world has grown gray + with Thy breath." + +But when I read the same poet's accounts of paganism (as in "Atalanta"), +I gathered that the world was, if possible, more gray before the +Galilaean breathed on it than afterwards. The poet maintained, indeed, in +the abstract, that life itself was pitch dark. And yet, somehow, +Christianity had darkened it. The very man who denounced Christianity +for pessimism was himself a pessimist. I thought there must be something +wrong. And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that, perhaps, +those might not be the very best judges of the relation of religion to +happiness who, by their own account, had neither one nor the other. + +It must be understood that I did not conclude hastily that the +accusations were false or the accusers fools. I simply deduced that +Christianity must be something even weirder and wickeder than they made +out. A thing might have these two opposite vices; but it must be a +rather queer thing if it did. A man might be too fat in one place and +too thin in another; but he would be an odd shape. At this point my +thoughts were only of the odd shape of the Christian religion; I did not +allege any odd shape in the rationalistic mind. + +Here is another case of the same kind. I felt that a strong case against +Christianity lay in the charge that there is something timid, monkish, +and unmanly about all that is called "Christian," especially in its +attitude towards resistance and fighting. The great sceptics of the +nineteenth century were largely virile. Bradlaugh in an expansive way, +Huxley in a reticent way, were decidedly men. In comparison, it did seem +tenable that there was something weak and over patient about Christian +counsels. The Gospel paradox about the other cheek, the fact that +priests never fought, a hundred things made plausible the accusation +that Christianity was an attempt to make a man too like a sheep. I read +it and believed it, and if I had read nothing different, I should have +gone on believing it. But I read something very different. I turned the +next page in my agnostic manual, and my brain turned up-side down. Now I +found that I was to hate Christianity not for fighting too little, but +for fighting too much. Christianity, it seemed, was the mother of wars. +Christianity had deluged the world with blood. I had got thoroughly +angry with the Christian, because he never was angry. And now I was told +to be angry with him because his anger had been the most huge and +horrible thing in human history; because his anger had soaked the earth +and smoked to the sun. The very people who reproached Christianity with +the meekness and non-resistance of the monastries were the very people +who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades. It +was the fault of poor old Christianity (somehow or other) both that +Edward the Confessor did not fight and that Richard Coeur de Lion did. +The Quakers (we were told) were the only characteristic Christians; and +yet the massacres of Cromwell and Alva were characteristic Christian +crimes. What could it all mean? What was this Christianity which always +forbade war and always produced wars? What could be the nature of the +thing which one could abuse first because it would not fight, and second +because it was always fighting? In what world of riddles was born this +monstrous murder and this monstrous meekness? The shape of Christianity +grew a queerer shape every instant. + +I take a third case; the strangest of all, because it involves the one +real objection to the faith. The one real objection to the Christian +religion is simply that it is one religion. The world is a big place, +full of very different kinds of people. Christianity (it may reasonably +be said) is one thing confined to one kind of people; it began in +Palestine, it has practically stopped with Europe. I was duly impressed +with this argument in my youth, and I was much drawn towards the +doctrine often preached in Ethical Societies--I mean the doctrine that +there is one great unconscious church of all humanity founded on the +omnipresence of the human conscience. Creeds, it was said, divided men; +but at least morals united them. The soul might seek the strangest and +most remote lands and ages and still find essential ethical common +sense. It might find Confucius under Eastern trees, and he would be +writing "Thou shalt not steal." It might decipher the darkest +hieroglyphic on the most primeval desert, and the meaning when +deciphered would be "Little boys should tell the truth." I believed this +doctrine of the brotherhood of all men in the possession of a moral +sense, and I believe it still--with other things. And I was thoroughly +annoyed with Christianity for suggesting (as I supposed) that whole ages +and empires of men had utterly escaped this light of justice and reason. +But then I found an astonishing thing. I found that the very people who +said that mankind was one church from Plato to Emerson were the very +people who said that morality had changed altogether, and that what was +right in one age was wrong in another. If I asked, say, for an altar, I +was told that we needed none, for men our brothers gave us clear oracles +and one creed in their universal customs and ideals. But if I mildly +pointed out that one of men's universal customs was to have an altar, +then my agnostic teachers turned clean round and told me that men had +always been in darkness and the superstitions of savages. I found it was +their daily taunt against Christianity that it was the light of one +people and had left all others to die in the dark. But I also found that +it was their special boast for themselves that science and progress were +the discovery of one people, and that all other peoples had died in the +dark. Their chief insult to Christianity was actually their chief +compliment to themselves, and there seemed to be a strange unfairness +about all their relative insistence on the two things. When considering +some pagan or agnostic, we were to remember that all men had one +religion; when considering some mystic or spiritualist, we were only to +consider what absurd religions some men had. We could trust the ethics +of Epictetus, because ethics had never changed. We must not trust the +ethics of Bossuet, because ethics had changed. They changed in two +hundred years, but not in two thousand. + +This began to be alarming. It looked not so much as if Christianity was +bad enough to include any vices, but rather as if any stick was good +enough to beat Christianity with. What again could this astonishing +thing be like which people were so anxious to contradict, that in doing +so they did not mind contradicting themselves? I saw the same thing on +every side. I can give no further space to this discussion of it in +detail; but lest any one supposes that I have unfairly selected three +accidental cases I will run briefly through a few others. Thus, certain +sceptics wrote that the great crime of Christianity had been its attack +on the family; it had dragged women to the loneliness and contemplation +of the cloister, away from their homes and their children. But, then, +other sceptics (slightly more advanced) said that the great crime of +Christianity was forcing the family and marriage upon us; that it doomed +women to the drudgery of their homes and children, and forbade them +loneliness and contemplation. The charge was actually reversed. Or, +again, certain phrases in the Epistles or the Marriage Service, were +said by the anti-Christians to show contempt for woman's intellect. But +I found that the anti-Christians themselves had a contempt for woman's +intellect; for it was their great sneer at the Church on the Continent +that "only women" went to it. Or again, Christianity was reproached with +its naked and hungry habits; with its sackcloth and dried peas. But the +next minute Christianity was being reproached with its pomp and its +ritualism; its shrines of porphyry and its robes of gold. It was abused +for being too plain and for being too coloured. Again Christianity had +always been accused of restraining sexuality too much, when Bradlaugh +the Malthusian discovered that it restrained it too little. It is often +accused in the same breath of prim respectability and of religious +extravagance. Between the covers of the same atheistic pamphlet I have +found the faith rebuked for its disunion, "One thinks one thing, and one +another," and rebuked also for its union, "It is difference of opinion +that prevents the world from going to the dogs." In the same +conversation a free-thinker, a friend of mine, blamed Christianity for +despising Jews, and then despised it himself for being Jewish. + +I wished to be quite fair then, and I wish to be quite fair now; and I +did not conclude that the attack on Christianity was all wrong. I only +concluded that if Christianity was wrong, it was very wrong indeed. Such +hostile horrors might be combined in one thing, but that thing must be +very strange and solitary. There are men who are misers, and also +spendthrifts; but they are rare. There are men sensual and also ascetic; +but they are rare. But if this mass of mad contradictions really +existed, quakerish and bloodthirsty, too gorgeous and too thread-bare, +austere, yet pandering preposterously to the lust of the eye, the enemy +of women and their foolish refuge, a solemn pessimist and a silly +optimist, if this evil existed, then there was in this evil something +quite supreme and unique. For I found in my rationalist teachers no +explanation of such exceptional corruption. Christianity (theoretically +speaking) was in their eyes only one of the ordinary myths and errors of +mortals. _They_ gave me no key to this twisted and unnatural badness. +Such a paradox of evil rose to the stature of the supernatural. It was, +indeed, almost as supernatural as the infallibility of the Pope. An +historic institution, which never went right, is really quite as much of +a miracle as an institution that cannot go wrong. The only explanation +which immediately occurred to my mind was that Christianity did not come +from heaven, but from hell. Really, if Jesus of Nazareth was not Christ, +He must have been Antichrist. + +And then in a quiet hour a strange thought struck me like a still +thunderbolt. There had suddenly come into my mind another explanation. +Suppose we heard an unknown man spoken of by many men. Suppose we were +puzzled to hear that some men said he was too tall and some too short; +some objected to his fatness, some lamented his leanness; some thought +him too dark, and some too fair. One explanation (as has been already +admitted) would be that he might be an odd shape. But there is another +explanation. He might be the right shape. Outrageously tall men might +feel him to be short. Very short men might feel him to be tall. Old +bucks who are growing stout might consider him insufficiently filled +out; old beaux who were growing thin might feel that he expanded beyond +the narrow lines of elegance. Perhaps Swedes (who have pale hair like +tow) called him a dark man, while negroes considered him distinctly +blonde. Perhaps (in short) this extraordinary thing is really the +ordinary thing; at least the normal thing, the centre. Perhaps, after +all, it is Christianity that is sane and all its critics that are +mad--in various ways. I tested this idea by asking myself whether there +was about any of the accusers anything morbid that might explain the +accusation. I was startled to find that this key fitted a lock. For +instance, it was certainly odd that the modern world charged +Christianity at once with bodily austerity and with artistic pomp. But +then it was also odd, very odd, that the modern world itself combined +extreme bodily luxury with an extreme absence of artistic pomp. The +modern man thought Becket's robes too rich and his meals too poor. But +then the modern man was really exceptional in history; no man before +ever ate such elaborate dinners in such ugly clothes. The modern man +found the church too simple exactly where modern life is too complex; he +found the church too gorgeous exactly where modern life is too dingy. +The man who disliked the plain fasts and feasts was mad on _entrees_. +The man who disliked vestments wore a pair of preposterous trousers. And +surely if there was any insanity involved in the matter at all it was in +the trousers, not in the simply falling robe. If there was any insanity +at all, it was in the extravagant _entrees_, not in the bread and wine. + +I went over all the cases, and I found the key fitted so far. The fact +that Swinburne was irritated at the unhappiness of Christians and yet +more irritated at their happiness was easily explained. It was no longer +a complication of diseases in Christianity, but a complication of +diseases in Swinburne. The restraints of Christians saddened him simply +because he was more hedonist than a healthy man should be. The faith of +Christians angered him because he was more pessimist than a healthy man +should be. In the same way the Malthusians by instinct attacked +Christianity; not because there is anything especially anti-Malthusian +about Christianity, but because there is something a little anti-human +about Malthusianism. + +Nevertheless it could not, I felt, be quite true that Christianity was +merely sensible and stood in the middle. There was really an element in +it of emphasis and even frenzy which had justified the secularists in +their superficial criticism. It might be wise, I began more and more to +think that it was wise, but it was not merely worldly wise; it was not +merely temperate and respectable. Its fierce crusaders and meek saints +might balance each other; still, the crusaders were very fierce and the +saints were very meek, meek beyond all decency. Now, it was just at this +point of the speculation that I remembered my thoughts about the martyr +and the suicide. In that matter there had been this combination between +two almost insane positions which yet somehow amounted to sanity. This +was just such another contradiction; and this I had already found to be +true. This was exactly one of the paradoxes in which sceptics found the +creed wrong; and in this I had found it right. Madly as Christians might +love the martyr or hate the suicide, they never felt these passions more +madly than I had felt them long before I dreamed of Christianity. Then +the most difficult and interesting part of the mental process opened, +and I began to trace this idea darkly through all the enormous thoughts +of our theology. The idea was that which I had outlined touching the +optimist and the pessimist; that we want not an amalgam or compromise, +but both things at the top of their energy; love and wrath both burning. +Here I shall only trace it in relation to ethics. But I need not remind +the reader that the idea of this combination is indeed central in +orthodox theology. For orthodox theology has specially insisted that +Christ was not a being apart from God and man, like an elf, nor yet a +being half human and half not, like a centaur, but both things at once +and both things thoroughly, very man and very God. Now let me trace this +notion as I found it. + +All sane men can see that sanity is some kind of equilibrium; that one +may be mad and eat too much, or mad and eat too little. Some moderns +have indeed appeared with vague versions of progress and evolution which +seeks to destroy the [Greek: meson] or balance of Aristotle. They seem to +suggest that we are meant to starve progressively, or to go on eating +larger and larger breakfasts every morning for ever. But the great truism +of the [Greek: meson] remains for all thinking men, and these people have +not upset any balance except their own. But granted that we have all to +keep a balance, the real interest comes in with the question of how that +balance can be kept. That was the problem which Paganism tried to solve: +that was the problem which I think Christianity solved and solved in a +very strange way. + +Paganism declared that virtue was in a balance; Christianity declared it +was in a conflict: the collision of two passions apparently opposite. Of +course they were not really inconsistent; but they were such that it was +hard to hold simultaneously. Let us follow for a moment the clue of the +martyr and the suicide; and take the case of courage. No quality has +ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely +rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a +strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that +will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism +for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or +mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. +This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly +or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if +he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by +continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by +enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire +for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely +cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He +must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will +not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to +it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine. No +philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with +adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity +has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the +suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the +sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying. And it has held +up ever since above the European lances the banner of the mystery of +chivalry: the Christian courage, which is a disdain of death; not the +Chinese courage, which is a disdain of life. + +And now I began to find that this duplex passion was the Christian key +to ethics everywhere. Everywhere the creed made a moderation out of the +still crash of two impetuous emotions. Take, for instance, the matter of +modesty, of the balance between mere pride and mere prostration. The +average pagan, like the average agnostic, would merely say that he was +content with himself, but not insolently self-satisfied, that there were +many better and many worse, that his deserts were limited, but he would +see that he got them. In short, he would walk with his head in the air; +but not necessarily with his nose in the air. This is a manly and +rational position, but it is open to the objection we noted against the +compromise between optimism and pessimism--the "resignation" of Matthew +Arnold. Being a mixture of two things, it is a dilution of two things; +neither is present in its full strength or contributes its full colour. +This proper pride does not lift the heart like the tongue of trumpets; +you cannot go clad in crimson and gold for this. On the other hand, this +mild rationalist modesty does not cleanse the soul with fire and make it +clear like crystal; it does not (like a strict and searching humility) +make a man as a little child, who can sit at the feet of the grass. It +does not make him look up and see marvels; for Alice must grow small if +she is to be Alice in Wonderland. Thus it loses both the poetry of +being proud and the poetry of being humble. Christianity sought by this +same strange expedient to save both of them. + +It separated the two ideas and then exaggerated them both. In one way +Man was to be haughtier than he had ever been before; in another way he +was to be humbler than he had ever been before. In so far as I am Man I +am the chief of creatures. In so far as I am _a_ man I am the chief of +sinners. All humility that had meant pessimism, that had meant man +taking a vague or mean view of his whole destiny--all that was to go. We +were to hear no more the wail of Ecclesiastes that humanity had no +pre-eminence over the brute, or the awful cry of Homer that man was only +the saddest of all the beasts of the field. Man was a statue of God +walking about the garden. Man had pre-eminence over all the brutes; man +was only sad because he was not a beast, but a broken god. The Greek had +spoken of men creeping on the earth, as if clinging to it. Now Man was +to tread on the earth as if to subdue it. Christianity thus held a +thought of the dignity of man that could only be expressed in crowns +rayed like the sun and fans of peacock plumage. Yet at the same time it +could hold a thought about the abject smallness of man that could only +be expressed in fasting and fantastic submission, in the grey ashes of +St. Dominic and the white snows of St. Bernard. When one came to think +of _one's self_, there was vista and void enough for any amount of bleak +abnegation and bitter truth. There the realistic gentleman could let +himself go--as long as he let himself go at himself. There was an open +playground for the happy pessimist. Let him say anything against himself +short of blaspheming the original aim of his being; let him call himself +a fool and even a damned fool (though that is Calvinistic); but he must +not say that fools are not worth saving. He must not say that a man, +_qua_ man, can be valueless. Here again, in short, Christianity got over +the difficulty of combining furious opposites, by keeping them both, and +keeping them both furious. The Church was positive on both points. One +can hardly think too little of one's self. One can hardly think too much +of one's soul. + +Take another case: the complicated question of charity, which some +highly uncharitable idealists seem to think quite easy. Charity is a +paradox, like modesty and courage. Stated baldly, charity certainly +means one of two things--pardoning unpardonable acts, or loving +unlovable people. But if we ask ourselves (as we did in the case of +pride) what a sensible pagan would feel about such a subject, we shall +probably be beginning at the bottom of it. A sensible pagan would say +that there were some people one could forgive, and some one couldn't: a +slave who stole wine could be laughed at; a slave who betrayed his +benefactor could be killed, and cursed even after he was killed. In so +far as the act was pardonable, the man was pardonable. That again is +rational, and even refreshing; but it is a dilution. It leaves no place +for a pure horror of injustice, such as that which is a great beauty in +the innocent. And it leaves no place for a mere tenderness for men as +men, such as is the whole fascination of the charitable. Christianity +came in here as before. It came in startlingly with a sword, and clove +one thing from another. It divided the crime from the criminal. The +criminal we must forgive unto seventy times seven. The crime we must not +forgive at all. It was not enough that slaves who stole wine inspired +partly anger and partly kindness. We must be much more angry with theft +than before, and yet much kinder to thieves than before. There was room +for wrath and love to run wild. And the more I considered Christianity, +the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the +chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild. + +Mental and emotional liberty are not so simple as they look. Really they +require almost as careful a balance of laws and conditions as do social +and political liberty. The ordinary aesthetic anarchist who sets out to +feel everything freely gets knotted at last in a paradox that prevents +him feeling at all. He breaks away from home limits to follow poetry. +But in ceasing to feel home limits he has ceased to feel the "Odyssey." +He is free from national prejudices and outside patriotism. But being +outside patriotism he is outside "Henry V." Such a literary man is +simply outside all literature: he is more of a prisoner than any bigot. +For if there is a wall between you and the world, it makes little +difference whether you describe yourself as locked in or as locked out. +What we want is not the universality that is outside all normal +sentiments; we want the universality that is inside all normal +sentiments. It is all the difference between being free from them, as a +man is free from a prison, and being free of them as a man is free of a +city. I am free from Windsor Castle (that is, I am not forcibly detained +there), but I am by no means free of that building. How can man be +approximately free of fine emotions, able to swing them in a clear space +without breakage or wrong? _This_ was the achievement of this Christian +paradox of the parallel passions. Granted the primary dogma of the war +between divine and diabolic, the revolt and ruin of the world, their +optimism and pessimism, as pure poetry, could be loosened like +cataracts. + +St. Francis, in praising all good, could be a more shouting optimist +than Walt Whitman. St. Jerome, in denouncing all evil, could paint the +world blacker than Schopenhauer. Both passions were free because both +were kept in their place. The optimist could pour out all the praise he +liked on the gay music of the march, the golden trumpets, and the purple +banners going into battle. But he must not call the fight needless. The +pessimist might draw as darkly as he chose the sickening marches or the +sanguine wounds. But he must not call the fight hopeless. So it was with +all the other moral problems, with pride, with protest, and with +compassion. By defining its main doctrine, the Church not only kept +seemingly inconsistent things side by side, but, what was more, allowed +them to break out in a sort of artistic violence otherwise possible only +to anarchists. Meekness grew more dramatic than madness. Historic +Christianity rose into a high and strange _coup de theatre_ of +morality--things that are to virtue what the crimes of Nero are to vice. +The spirits of indignation and of charity took terrible and attractive +forms, ranging from that monkish fierceness that scourged like a dog the +first and greatest of the Plantagenets, to the sublime pity of St. +Catherine, who, in the official shambles, kissed the bloody head of the +criminal. Poetry could be acted as well as composed. This heroic and +monumental manner in ethics has entirely vanished with supernatural +religion. They, being humble, could parade themselves; but we are too +proud to be prominent. Our ethical teachers write reasonably for prison +reform; but we are not likely to see Mr. Cadbury, or any eminent +philanthropist, go into Reading Gaol and embrace the strangled corpse +before it is cast into the quicklime. Our ethical teachers write mildly +against the power of millionaires; but we are not likely to see Mr. +Rockefeller, or any modern tyrant, publicly whipped in Westminster +Abbey. + +Thus, the double charges of the secularists, though throwing nothing +but darkness and confusion on themselves, throw a real light on the +faith. It _is_ true that the historic Church has at once emphasised +celibacy and emphasised the family; has at once (if one may put it so) +been fiercely for having children and fiercely for not having children. +It has kept them side by side like two strong colours, red and white, +like the red and white upon the shield of St. George. It has always had +a healthy hatred of pink. It hates that combination of two colours which +is the feeble expedient of the philosophers. It hates that evolution of +black into white which is tantamount to a dirty grey. In fact, the whole +theory of the Church on virginity might be symbolized in the statement +that white is a colour: not merely the absence of a colour. All that I +am urging here can be expressed by saying that Christianity sought in +most of these cases to keep two colours co-existent but pure. It is not +a mixture like russet or purple; it is rather like a shot silk, for a +shot silk is always at right angles, and is in the pattern of the cross. + +So it is also, of course, with the contradictory charges of the +anti-Christians about submission and slaughter. It _is_ true that the +Church told some men to fight and others not to fight; and it _is_ true +that those who fought were like thunderbolts and those who did not fight +were like statues. All this simply means that the Church preferred to +use its Supermen and to use its Tolstoyans. There must be _some_ good in +the life of battle, for so many good men have enjoyed being soldiers. +There must be _some_ good in the idea of non-resistance, for so many +good men seem to enjoy being Quakers. All that the Church did (so far as +that goes) was to prevent either of these good things from ousting the +other. They existed side by side. The Tolstoyans, having all the +scruples of monks, simply became monks. The Quakers became a club +instead of becoming a sect. Monks said all that Tolstoy says; they +poured out lucid lamentations about the cruelty of battles and the +vanity of revenge. But the Tolstoyans are not quite right enough to run +the whole world; and in the ages of faith they were not allowed to run +it. The world did not lose the last charge of Sir James Douglas or the +banner of Joan the Maid. And sometimes this pure gentleness and this +pure fierceness met and justified their juncture; the paradox of all the +prophets was fulfilled, and, in the soul of St. Louis, the lion lay down +with the lamb. But remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. +It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that +when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But +that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That +is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the +lamb. The real problem is--Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still +retain his royal ferocity? _That_ is the problem the Church attempted; +_that_ is the miracle she achieved. + +This is what I have called guessing the hidden eccentricities of life. +This is knowing that a man's heart is to the left and not in the middle. +This is knowing not only that the earth is round, but knowing exactly +where it is flat. Christian doctrine detected the oddities of life. It +not only discovered the law, but it foresaw the exceptions. Those +underrate Christianity who say that it discovered mercy; any one might +discover mercy. In fact every one did. But to discover a plan for being +merciful and also severe--_that_ was to anticipate a strange need of +human nature. For no one wants to be forgiven for a big sin as if it +were a little one. Any one might say that we should be neither quite +miserable nor quite happy. But to find out how far one _may_ be quite +miserable without making it impossible to be quite happy--that was a +discovery in psychology. Any one might say, "Neither swagger nor +grovel"; and it would have been a limit. But to say, "Here you can +swagger and there you can grovel"--that was an emancipation. + +This was the big fact about Christian ethics; the discovery of the new +balance. Paganism had been like a pillar of marble, upright because +proportioned with symmetry. Christianity was like a huge and ragged and +romantic rock, which, though it sways on its pedestal at a touch, yet, +because its exaggerated excrescences exactly balance each other, is +enthroned there for a thousand years. In a Gothic cathedral the columns +were all different, but they were all necessary. Every support seemed an +accidental and fantastic support; every buttress was a flying buttress. +So in Christendom apparent accidents balanced. Becket wore a hair shirt +under his gold and crimson, and there is much to be said for the +combination; for Becket got the benefit of the hair shirt while the +people in the street got the benefit of the crimson and gold. It is at +least better than the manner of the modern millionaire, who has the +black and the drab outwardly for others, and the gold next his heart. +But the balance was not always in one man's body as in Becket's; the +balance was often distributed over the whole body of Christendom. +Because a man prayed and fasted on the Northern snows, flowers could be +flung at his festival in the Southern cities; and because fanatics drank +water on the sands of Syria, men could still drink cider in the orchards +of England. This is what makes Christendom at once so much more +perplexing and so much more interesting than the Pagan empire; just as +Amiens Cathedral is not better but more interesting than the Parthenon. +If any one wants a modern proof of all this, let him consider the +curious fact that, under Christianity, Europe (while remaining a unity) +has broken up into individual nations. Patriotism is a perfect example +of this deliberate balancing of one emphasis against another emphasis. +The instinct of the Pagan empire would have said, "You shall all be +Roman citizens, and grow alike; let the German grow less slow and +reverent; the Frenchmen less experimental and swift." But the instinct +of Christian Europe says, "Let the German remain slow and reverent, that +the Frenchman may the more safely be swift and experimental. We will +make an equipoise out of these excesses. The absurdity called Germany +shall correct the insanity called France." + +Last and most important, it is exactly this which explains what is so +inexplicable to all the modern critics of the history of Christianity. I +mean the monstrous wars about small points of theology, the earthquakes +of emotion about a gesture or a word. It was only a matter of an inch; +but an inch is everything when you are balancing. The Church could not +afford to swerve a hair's breadth on some things if she was to continue +her great and daring experiment of the irregular equilibrium. Once let +one idea become less powerful and some other idea would become too +powerful. It was no flock of sheep the Christian shepherd was leading, +but a herd of bulls and tigers, of terrible ideals and devouring +doctrines, each one of them strong enough to turn to a false religion +and lay waste the world. Remember that the Church went in specifically +for dangerous ideas; she was a lion tamer. The idea of birth through a +Holy Spirit, of the death of a divine being, of the forgiveness of sins, +or the fulfilment of prophecies, are ideas which, any one can see, need +but a touch to turn them into something blasphemous or ferocious. The +smallest link was let drop by the artificers of the Mediterranean, and +the lion of ancestral pessimism burst his chain in the forgotten forests +of the north. Of these theological equalisations I have to speak +afterwards. Here it is enough to notice that if some small mistake were +made in doctrine, huge blunders might be made in human happiness. A +sentence phrased wrong about the nature of symbolism would have broken +all the best statues in Europe. A slip in the definitions might stop all +the dances; might wither all the Christmas trees or break all the Easter +eggs. Doctrines had to be defined within strict limits, even in order +that man might enjoy general human liberties. The Church had to be +careful, if only that the world might be careless. + +This is the thrilling romance of Orthodoxy. People have fallen into a +foolish habit of speaking of orthodoxy as something heavy, humdrum, and +safe. There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy. +It was sanity: and to be sane is more dramatic than to be mad. It was +the equilibrium of a man behind madly rushing horses, seeming to stoop +this way and to sway that, yet in every attitude having the grace of +statuary and the accuracy of arithmetic. The Church in its early days +went fierce and fast with any warhorse; yet it is utterly unhistoric to +say that she merely went mad along one idea, like a vulgar fanaticism. +She swerved to left and right, so as exactly to avoid enormous +obstacles. She left on one hand the huge bulk of Arianism, buttressed by +all the worldly powers to make Christianity too worldly. The next +instant she was swerving to avoid an orientalism, which would have made +it too unworldly. The orthodox Church never took the tame course or +accepted the conventions; the orthodox Church was never respectable. It +would have been easier to have accepted the earthly power of the Arians. +It would have been easy, in the Calvinistic seventeenth century, to fall +into the bottomless pit of predestination. It is easy to be a madman: it +is easy to be a heretic. It is always easy to let the age have its head; +the difficult thing is to keep one's own. It is always easy to be a +modernist; as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those +open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion and +sect after sect set along the historic path of Christendom--that would +indeed have been simple. It is always simple to fall; there are an +infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands. To +have fallen into any one of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian +Science would indeed have been obvious and tame. But to have avoided +them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly +chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling +and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect. + + + + +CHAPTER VII.--_The Eternal Revolution_ + + +The following propositions have been urged: First, that some faith in +our life is required even to improve it; second, that some +dissatisfaction with things as they are is necessary even in order to be +satisfied; third, that to have this necessary content and necessary +discontent it is not sufficient to have the obvious equilibrium of the +Stoic. For mere resignation has neither the gigantic levity of pleasure +nor the superb intolerance of pain. There is a vital objection to the +advice merely to grin and bear it. The objection is that if you merely +bear it, you do not grin. Greek heroes do not grin; but gargoyles +do--because they are Christian. And when a Christian is pleased, he is +(in the most exact sense) frightfully pleased; his pleasure is +frightful. Christ prophesied the whole of Gothic architecture in that +hour when nervous and respectable people (such people as now object to +barrel organs) objected to the shouting of the gutter-snipes of +Jerusalem. He said, "If these were silent, the very stones would cry +out." Under the impulse of His spirit arose like a clamorous chorus the +facades of the mediaeval cathedrals, thronged with shouting faces and +open mouths. The prophecy has fulfilled itself: the very stones cry out. + +If these things be conceded, though only for argument, we may take up +where we left it the thread of the thought of the natural man, called by +the Scotch (with regrettable familiarity), "The Old Man." We can ask the +next question so obviously in front of us. Some satisfaction is needed +even to make things better. But what do we mean by making things better? +Most modern talk on this matter is a mere argument in a circle--that +circle which we have already made the symbol of madness and of mere +rationalism. Evolution is only good if it produces good; good is only +good if it helps evolution. The elephant stands on the tortoise, and the +tortoise on the elephant. + +Obviously, it will not do to take our ideal from the principle in +nature; for the simple reason that (except for some human or divine +theory), there is no principle in nature. For instance, the cheap +anti-democrat of to-day will tell you solemnly that there is no equality +in nature. He is right, but he does not see the logical addendum. There +is no equality in nature; also there is no inequality in nature. +Inequality, as much as equality, implies a standard of value. To read +aristocracy into the anarchy of animals is just as sentimental as to +read democracy into it. Both aristocracy and democracy are human ideals: +the one saying that all men are valuable, the other that some men are +more valuable. But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than +mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that +the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior +because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the +effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German +pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. +He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first. Or +he might feel that he had actually inflicted frightful punishment on the +cat by keeping him alive. Just as a microbe might feel proud of +spreading a pestilence, so the pessimistic mouse might exult to think +that he was renewing in the cat the torture of conscious existence. It +all depends on the philosophy of the mouse. You cannot even say that +there is victory or superiority in nature unless you have some doctrine +about what things are superior. You cannot even say that the cat scores +unless there is a system of scoring. You cannot even say that the cat +gets the best of it unless there is some best to be got. + +We cannot, then, get the ideal itself from nature, and as we follow here +the first and natural speculation, we will leave out (for the present) +the idea of getting it from God. We must have our own vision. But the +attempts of most moderns to express it are highly vague. + +Some fall back simply on the clock: they talk as if mere passage through +time brought some superiority; so that even a man of the first mental +calibre carelessly uses the phrase that human morality is never up to +date. How can anything be up to date? a date has no character. How can +one say that Christmas celebrations are not suitable to the twenty-fifth +of a month? What the writer meant, of course, was that the majority is +behind his favourite minority--or in front of it. Other vague modern +people take refuge in material metaphors; in fact, this is the chief +mark of vague modern people. Not daring to define their doctrine of what +is good, they use physical figures of speech without stint or shame, +and, what is worst of all, seem to think these cheap analogies are +exquisitely spiritual and superior to the old morality. Thus they think +it intellectual to talk about things being "high." It is at least the +reverse of intellectual; it is a mere phrase from a steeple or a +weathercock. "Tommy was a good boy" is a pure philosophical statement, +worthy of Plato or Aquinas. "Tommy lived the higher life" is a gross +metaphor from a ten-foot rule. + +This, incidentally, is almost the whole weakness of Nietzsche, whom some +are representing as a bold and strong thinker. No one will deny that he +was a poetical and suggestive thinker; but he was quite the reverse of +strong. He was not at all bold. He never put his own meaning before +himself in bald abstract words: as did Aristotle and Calvin, and even +Karl Marx, the hard, fearless men of thought. Nietzsche always escaped a +question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, +"beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more +good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil." Had he +faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was +nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say, "the +purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are +ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man," or "over man," a +physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly +a very timid thinker. He does not really know in the least what sort of +man he wants evolution to produce. And if he does not know, certainly +the ordinary evolutionists, who talk about things being "higher," do not +know either. + +Then again, some people fall back on sheer submission and sitting still. +Nature is going to do something some day; nobody knows what, and nobody +knows when. We have no reason for acting, and no reason for not acting. +If anything happens it is right: if anything is prevented it was wrong. +Again, some people try to anticipate nature by doing something, by doing +anything. Because we may possibly grow wings they cut off their legs. +Yet nature may be trying to make them centipedes for all they know. + +Lastly, there is a fourth class of people who take whatever it is that +they happen to want, and say that that is the ultimate aim of evolution. +And these are the only sensible people. This is the only really healthy +way with the word evolution, to work for what you want, and to call +_that_ evolution. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance +can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish +to make the whole world like that vision. If you like to put it so, the +essence of the doctrine is that what we have around us is the mere +method and preparation for something that we have to create. This is not +a world, but rather the materials for a world. God has given us not so +much the colours of a picture as the colours of a palette. But He has +also given us a subject, a model, a fixed vision. We must be clear about +what we want to paint. This adds a further principle to our previous +list of principles. We have said we must be fond of this world, even in +order to change it. We now add that we must be fond of another world +(real or imaginary) in order to have something to change it to. + +We need not debate about the mere words evolution or progress: +personally I prefer to call it reform. For reform implies form. It +implies that we are trying to shape the world in a particular image; to +make it something that we see already in our minds. Evolution is a +metaphor from mere automatic unrolling. Progress is a metaphor from +merely walking along a road--very likely the wrong road. But reform is a +metaphor for reasonable and determined men: it means that we see a +certain thing out of shape and we mean to put it into shape. And we +know what shape. + +Now here comes in the whole collapse and huge blunder of our age. We +have mixed up two different things, two opposite things. Progress should +mean that we are always changing the world to suit the vision. Progress +does mean (just now) that we are always changing the vision. It should +mean that we are slow but sure in bringing justice and mercy among men: +it does mean that we are very swift in doubting the desirability of +justice and mercy: a wild page from any Prussian sophist makes men doubt +it. Progress should mean that we are always walking towards the New +Jerusalem. It does mean that the New Jerusalem is always walking away +from us. We are not altering the real to suit the ideal. We are altering +the ideal: it is easier. + +Silly examples are always simpler; let us suppose a man wanted a +particular kind of world; say, a blue world. He would have no cause to +complain of the slightness or swiftness of his task; he might toil for a +long time at the transformation; he could work away (in every sense) +until all was blue. He could have heroic adventures; the putting of the +last touches to a blue tiger. He could have fairy dreams; the dawn of a +blue moon. But if he worked hard, that high-minded reformer would +certainly (from his own point of view) leave the world better and bluer +than he found it. If he altered a blade of grass to his favourite colour +every day, he would get on slowly. But if he altered his favourite +colour every day, he would not get on at all. If, after reading a fresh +philosopher, he started to paint everything red or yellow, his work +would be thrown away: there would be nothing to show except a few blue +tigers walking about, specimens of his early bad manner. This is exactly +the position of the average modern thinker. It will be said that this is +avowedly a preposterous example. But it is literally the fact of recent +history. The great and grave changes in our political civilization all +belonged to the early nineteenth century, not to the later. They +belonged to the black and white epoch when men believed fixedly in +Toryism, in Protestantism, in Calvinism, in Reform, and not unfrequently +in Revolution. And whatever each man believed in he hammered at +steadily, without scepticism: and there was a time when the Established +Church might have fallen, and the House of Lords nearly fell. It was +because Radicals were wise enough to be constant and consistent; it was +because Radicals were wise enough to be Conservative. But in the +existing atmosphere there is not enough time and tradition in Radicalism +to pull anything down. There is a great deal of truth in Lord Hugh +Cecil's suggestion (made in a fine speech) that the era of change is +over, and that ours is an era of conservation and repose. But probably +it would pain Lord Hugh Cecil if he realised (what is certainly the +case) that ours is only an age of conservation because it is an age of +complete unbelief. Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish +institutions to remain the same. The more the life of the mind is +unhinged, the more the machinery of matter will be left to itself. The +net result of all our political suggestions, Collectivism, Tolstoyanism, +Neo-Feudalism, Communism, Anarchy, Scientific Bureaucracy--the plain +fruit of all of them is that the Monarchy and the House of Lords will +remain. The net result of all the new religions will be that the Church +of England will not (for heaven knows how long) be disestablished. It +was Karl Marx, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, Cunninghame Grahame, Bernard Shaw and +Auberon Herbert, who between them, with bowed gigantic backs, bore up +the throne of the Archbishop of Canterbury. + +We may say broadly that free thought is the best of all the safeguards +against freedom. Managed in a modern style the emancipation of the +slave's mind is the best way of preventing the emancipation of the +slave. Teach him to worry about whether he wants to be free, and he will +not free himself. Again, it may be said that this instance is remote or +extreme. But, again, it is exactly true of the men in the streets around +us. It is true that the negro slave, being a debased barbarian, will +probably have either a human affection of loyalty, or a human affection +for liberty. But the man we see every day--the worker in Mr. Gradgrind's +factory, the little clerk in Mr. Gradgrind's office--he is too mentally +worried to believe in freedom. He is kept quiet with revolutionary +literature. He is calmed and kept in his place by a constant succession +of wild philosophies. He is a Marxian one day, a Nietzscheite the next +day, a Superman (probably) the next day; and a slave every day. The only +thing that remains after all the philosophies is the factory. The only +man who gains by all the philosophies is Gradgrind. It would be worth +his while to keep his commercial helotry supplied with sceptical +literature. And now I come to think of it, of course, Gradgrind is +famous for giving libraries. He shows his sense. All modern books are on +his side. As long as the vision of heaven is always changing, the vision +of earth will be exactly the same. No ideal will remain long enough to +be realised, or even partly realised. The modern young man will never +change his environment; for he will always change his mind. + +This, therefore, is our first requirement about the ideal towards which +progress is directed; it must be fixed. Whistler used to make many rapid +studies of a sitter; it did not matter if he tore up twenty portraits. +But it would matter if he looked up twenty times, and each time saw a +new person sitting placidly for his portrait. So it does not matter +(comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; +for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully +matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old +failures are fruitless. The question therefore becomes this: How can we +keep the artist discontented with his pictures while preventing him from +being vitally discontented with his art? How can we make a man always +dissatisfied with his work, yet always satisfied with working? How can +we make sure that the portrait painter will throw the portrait out of +window instead of taking the natural and more human course of throwing +the sitter out of window? + +A strict rule is not only necessary for ruling; it is also necessary for +rebelling. This fixed and familiar ideal is necessary to any sort of +revolution. Man will sometimes act slowly upon new ideas; but he will +only act swiftly upon old ideas. If I am merely to float or fade or +evolve, it may be towards something anarchic; but if I am to riot, it +must be for something respectable. This is the whole weakness of certain +schools of progress and moral evolution. They suggest that there has +been a slow movement towards morality, with an imperceptible ethical +change in every year or at every instant. There is only one great +disadvantage in this theory. It talks of a slow movement towards +justice; but it does not permit a swift movement. A man is not allowed +to leap up and declare a certain state of things to be intrinsically +intolerable. To make the matter clear, it is better to take a specific +example. Certain of the idealistic vegetarians, such as Mr. Salt, say +that the time has now come for eating no meat; by implication they +assume that at one time it was right to eat meat, and they suggest (in +words that could be quoted) that some day it may be wrong to eat milk +and eggs. I do not discuss here the question of what is justice to +animals. I only say that whatever is justice ought, under given +conditions, to be prompt justice. If an animal is wronged, we ought to +be able to rush to his rescue. But how can we rush if we are, perhaps, +in advance of our time? How can we rush to catch a train which may not +arrive for a few centuries? How can I denounce a man for skinning cats, +if he is only now what I may possibly become in drinking a glass of +milk? A splendid and insane Russian sect ran about taking all the cattle +out of all the carts. How can I pluck up courage to take the horse out +of my hansom-cab, when I do not know whether my evolutionary watch is +only a little fast or the cabman's a little slow? Suppose I say to a +sweater, "Slavery suited one stage of evolution." And suppose he +answers, "And sweating suits this stage of evolution." How can I answer +if there is no eternal test? If sweaters can be behind the current +morality, why should not philanthropists be in front of it? What on +earth is the current morality, except in its literal sense--the morality +that is always running away? + +Thus we may say that a permanent ideal is as necessary to the innovator +as to the conservative; it is necessary whether we wish the king's +orders to be promptly executed or whether we only wish the king to be +promptly executed. The guillotine has many sins, but to do it justice +there is nothing evolutionary about it. The favourite evolutionary +argument finds its best answer in the axe. The Evolutionist says, "Where +do you draw the line?" the Revolutionist answers, "I draw it _here_: +exactly between your head and body." There must at any given moment be +an abstract right and wrong if any blow is to be struck; there must be +something eternal if there is to be anything sudden. Therefore for all +intelligible human purposes, for altering things or for keeping things +as they are, for founding a system for ever, as in China, or for +altering it every month as in the early French Revolution, it is equally +necessary that the vision should be a fixed vision. This is our first +requirement. + +When I had written this down, I felt once again the presence of +something else in the discussion: as a man hears a church bell above the +sound of the street. Something seemed to be saying, "My ideal at least +is fixed; for it was fixed before the foundations of the world. My +vision of perfection assuredly cannot be altered; for it is called +Eden. You may alter the place to which you are going; but you cannot +alter the place from which you have come. To the orthodox there must +always be a case for revolution; for in the hearts of men God has been +put under the feet of Satan. In the upper world hell once rebelled +against heaven. But in this world heaven is rebelling against hell. For +the orthodox there can always be a revolution; for a revolution is a +restoration. At any instant you may strike a blow for the perfection +which no man has seen since Adam. No unchanging custom, no changing +evolution can make the original good anything but good. Man may have had +concubines as long as cows have had horns: still they are not a part of +him if they are sinful. Men may have been under oppression ever since +fish were under water; still they ought not to be, if oppression is +sinful. The chain may seem as natural to the slave, or the paint to the +harlot, as does the plume to the bird or the burrow to the fox; still +they are not, if they are sinful. I lift my prehistoric legend to defy +all your history. Your vision is not merely a fixture: it is a fact." I +paused to note the new coincidence of Christianity: but I passed on. + +I passed on to the next necessity of any ideal of progress. Some people +(as we have said) seem to believe in an automatic and impersonal +progress in the nature of things. But it is clear that no political +activity can be encouraged by saying that progress is natural and +inevitable; that is not a reason for being active, but rather a reason +for being lazy. If we are bound to improve, we need not trouble to +improve. The pure doctrine of progress is the best of all reasons for +not being a progressive. But it is to none of these obvious comments +that I wish primarily to call attention. + +The only arresting point is this: that if we suppose improvement to be +natural, it must be fairly simple. The world might conceivably be +working towards one consummation, but hardly towards any particular +arrangement of many qualities. To take our original simile: Nature by +herself may be growing more blue; that is, a process so simple that it +might be impersonal. But Nature cannot be making a careful picture made +of many picked colours, unless Nature is personal. If the end of the +world were mere darkness or mere light it might come as slowly and +inevitably as dusk or dawn. But if the end of the world is to be a piece +of elaborate and artistic chiaroscuro, then there must be design in it, +either human or divine. The world, through mere time, might grow black +like an old picture, or white like an old coat; but if it is turned +into a particular piece of black and white art--then there is an artist. + +If the distinction be not evident, I give an ordinary instance. We +constantly hear a particularly cosmic creed from the modern +humanitarians; I use the word humanitarian in the ordinary sense, as +meaning one who upholds the claims of all creatures against those of +humanity. They suggest that through the ages we have been growing more +and more humane, that is to say, that one after another, groups or +sections of beings, slaves, children, women, cows, or what not, have +been gradually admitted to mercy or to justice. They say that we once +thought it right to eat men (we didn't); but I am not here concerned +with their history, which is highly unhistorical. As a fact, +anthropophagy is certainly a decadent thing, not a primitive one. It is +much more likely that modern men will eat human flesh out of affectation +than that primitive man ever ate it out of ignorance. I am here only +following the outlines of their argument, which consists in maintaining +that man has been progressively more lenient, first to citizens, then +to slaves, then to animals, and then (presumably) to plants. I think it +wrong to sit on a man. Soon, I shall think it wrong to sit on a horse. +Eventually (I suppose) I shall think it wrong to sit on a chair. That is +the drive of the argument. And for this argument it can be said that it +is possible to talk of it in terms of evolution or inevitable progress. +A perpetual tendency to touch fewer and fewer things might, one feels, +be a mere brute unconscious tendency, like that of a species to produce +fewer and fewer children. This drift may be really evolutionary, because +it is stupid. + +Darwinism can be used to back up two mad moralities, but it cannot be +used to back up a single sane one. The kinship and competition of all +living creatures can be used as a reason for being insanely cruel or +insanely sentimental; but not for a healthy love of animals. On the +evolutionary basis you may be inhumane, or you may be absurdly humane; +but you cannot be human. That you and a tiger are one may be a reason +for being tender to a tiger. Or it may be a reason for being as cruel as +the tiger. It is one way to train the tiger to imitate you, it is a +shorter way to imitate the tiger. But in neither case does evolution +tell you how to treat a tiger reasonably, that is, to admire his +stripes while avoiding his claws. + +If you want to treat a tiger reasonably, you must go back to the garden +of Eden. For the obstinate reminder continued to recur: only the +supernatural has taken a sane view of Nature. The essence of all +pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really in this +proposition: that Nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard +Nature as a mother, you discover that she is a step-mother. The main +point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is +our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same +father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to +imitate. This gives to the typically Christian pleasure in this earth a +strange touch of lightness that is almost frivolity. Nature was a solemn +mother to the worshippers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother +to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of +Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is a sister, and +even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as +well as loved. + +This, however, is hardly our main point at present; I have admitted it +only in order to show how constantly, and as it were accidentally, the +key would fit the smallest doors. Our main point is here, that if there +be a mere trend of impersonal improvement in Nature, it must presumably +be a simple trend towards some simple triumph. One can imagine that some +automatic tendency in biology might work for giving us longer and longer +noses. But the question is, do we want to have longer and longer noses? +I fancy not; I believe that we most of us want to say to our noses, +"Thus far, and no farther; and here shall thy proud point be stayed": we +require a nose of such length as may ensure an interesting face. But we +cannot imagine a mere biological trend towards producing interesting +faces; because an interesting face is one particular arrangement of +eyes, nose, and mouth, in a most complex relation to each other. +Proportion cannot be a drift: it is either an accident or a design. So +with the ideal of human morality and its relation to the humanitarians +and the anti-humanitarians. It is conceivable that we are going more and +more to keep our hands off things: not to drive horses; not to pick +flowers. We may eventually be bound not to disturb a man's mind even by +argument; not to disturb the sleep of birds even by coughing. The +ultimate apotheosis would appear to be that of a man sitting quite +still, not daring to stir for fear of disturbing a fly, nor to eat for +fear of incommoding a microbe. To so crude a consummation as that we +might perhaps unconsciously drift. But do we want so crude a +consummation? Similarly, we might unconsciously evolve along the +opposite or Nietzscheian line of development--superman crushing superman +in one tower of tyrants until the universe is smashed up for fun. But do +we want the universe smashed up for fun? Is it not quite clear that what +we really hope for is one particular management and proposition of these +two things; a certain amount of restraint and respect, a certain amount +of energy and mastery. If our life is ever really as beautiful as a +fairy-tale, we shall have to remember that all the beauty of a +fairy-tale lies in this: that the prince has a wonder which just stops +short of being fear. If he is afraid of the giant, there is an end of +him; but also if he is not astonished at the giant, there is an end of +the fairy-tale. The whole point depends upon his being at once humble +enough to wonder, and haughty enough to defy. So our attitude to the +giant of the world must not merely be increasing delicacy or increasing +contempt: it must be one particular proportion of the two--which is +exactly right. We must have in us enough reverence for all things +outside us to make us tread fearfully on the grass. We must also have +enough disdain for all things outside us, to make us, on due occasion, +spit at the stars. Yet these two things (if we are to be good or happy) +must be combined, not in any combination, but in one particular +combination. The perfect happiness of men on the earth (if it ever +comes) will not be a flat and solid thing, like the satisfaction of +animals. It will be an exact and perilous balance; like that of a +desperate romance. Man must have just enough faith in himself to have +adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them. + +This, then, is our second requirement for the ideal of progress. First, +it must be fixed; second, it must be composite. It must not (if it is to +satisfy our souls) be the mere victory of some one thing swallowing up +everything else, love or pride or peace or adventure; it must be a +definite picture composed of these elements in their best proportion and +relation. I am not concerned at this moment to deny that some such good +culmination may be, by the constitution of things, reserved for the +human race. I only point out that if this composite happiness is fixed +for us it must be fixed by some mind; for only a mind can place the +exact proportions of a composite happiness. If the beatification of the +world is a mere work of nature, then it must be as simple as the +freezing of the world, or the burning up of the world. But if the +beatification of the world is not a work of nature but a work of art, +then it involves an artist. And here again my contemplation was cloven +by the ancient voice which said, "I could have told you all this a long +time ago. If there is any certain progress it can only be my kind of +progress, the progress towards a complete city of virtues and +dominations where righteousness and peace contrive to kiss each other. +An impersonal force might be leading you to a wilderness of perfect +flatness or a peak of perfect height. But only a personal God can +possibly be leading you (if, indeed, you are being led) to a city with +just streets and architectural proportions, a city in which each of you +can contribute exactly the right amount of your own colour to the +many-coloured coat of Joseph." + +Twice again, therefore, Christianity had come in with the exact answer +that I required. I had said, "The ideal must be fixed," and the Church +had answered, "Mine is literally fixed, for it existed before anything +else." I said secondly, "It must be artistically combined, like a +picture"; and the Church answered, "Mine is quite literally a picture, +for I know who painted it." Then I went on to the third thing, which, as +it seemed to me, was needed for an Utopia or goal of progress. And of +all the three it is infinitely the hardest to express. Perhaps it might +be put thus: that we need watchfulness even in Utopia, lest we fall from +Utopia as we fell from Eden. + +We have remarked that one reason offered for being a progressive is that +things naturally tend to grow better. But the only real reason for being +a progressive is that things naturally tend to grow worse. The +corruption in things is not only the best argument for being +progressive; it is also the only argument against being conservative. +The conservative theory would really be quite sweeping and unanswerable +if it were not for this one fact. But all conservatism is based upon the +idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you +do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change. +If you leave a white post alone it will soon be a black post. If you +particularly want it to be white you must be always painting it again; +that is, you must be always having a revolution. Briefly, if you want +the old white post you must have a new white post. But this which is +true even of inanimate things is in a quite special and terrible sense +true of all human things. An almost unnatural vigilance is really +required of the citizen because of the horrible rapidity with which +human institutions grow old. It is the custom in passing romance and +journalism to talk of men suffering under old tyrannies. But, as a fact, +men have almost always suffered under new tyrannies; under tyrannies +that had been public liberties hardly twenty years before. Thus England +went mad with joy over the patriotic monarchy of Elizabeth; and then +(almost immediately afterwards) went mad with rage in the trap of the +tyranny of Charles the First. So, again, in France the monarchy became +intolerable, not just after it had been tolerated, but just after it had +been adored. The son of Louis the well-beloved was Louis the +guillotined. So in the same way in England in the nineteenth century the +Radical manufacturer was entirely trusted as a mere tribune of the +people, until suddenly we heard the cry of the Socialist that he was a +tyrant eating the people like bread. So again, we have almost up to the +last instant trusted the newspapers as organs of public opinion. Just +recently some of us have seen (not slowly, but with a start) that they +are obviously nothing of the kind. They are, by the nature of the case, +the hobbies of a few rich men. We have not any need to rebel against +antiquity; we have to rebel against novelty. It is the new rulers, the +capitalist or the editor, who really hold up the modern world. There is +no fear that a modern king will attempt to override the constitution; it +is more likely that he will ignore the constitution and work behind its +back; he will take no advantage of his kingly power; it is more likely +that he will take advantage of his kingly powerlessness, of the fact +that he is free from criticism and publicity. For the king is the most +private person of our time. It will not be necessary for any one to +fight again against the proposal of a censorship of the press. We do not +need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship by the press. + +This startling swiftness with which popular systems turn oppressive is +the third fact for which we shall ask our perfect theory of progress to +allow. It must always be on the look out for every privilege being +abused, for every working right becoming a wrong. In this matter I am +entirely on the side of the revolutionists. They are really right to be +always suspecting human institutions; they are right not to put their +trust in princes nor in any child of man. The chieftain chosen to be the +friend of the people becomes the enemy of the people; the newspaper +started to tell the truth now exists to prevent the truth being told. +Here, I say, I felt that I was really at last on the side of the +revolutionary. And then I caught my breath again: for I remembered that +I was once again on the side of the orthodox. + +Christianity spoke again and said, "I have always maintained that men +were naturally backsliders; that human virtue tended of its own nature +to rust or to rot; I have always said that human beings as such go +wrong, especially happy human beings, especially proud and prosperous +human beings. This eternal revolution, this suspicion sustained through +centuries, you (being a vague modern) call the doctrine of progress. If +you were a philosopher you would call it, as I do, the doctrine of +original sin. You may call it the cosmic advance as much as you like; I +call it what it is--the Fall. + +I have spoken of orthodoxy coming in like a sword; here I confess it +came in like a battle-axe. For really (when I came to think of it) +Christianity is the only thing left that has any real right to question +the power of the well-nurtured or the well-bred. I have listened often +enough to Socialists, or even to democrats, saying that the physical +conditions of the poor must of necessity make them mentally and morally +degraded. I have listened to scientific men (and there are still +scientific men not opposed to democracy) saying that if we give the poor +healthier conditions vice and wrong will disappear. I have listened to +them with a horrible attention, with a hideous fascination. For it was +like watching a man energetically sawing from the tree the branch he is +sitting on. If these happy democrats could prove their case, they would +strike democracy dead. If the poor are thus utterly demoralized, it may +or may not be practical to raise them. But it is certainly quite +practical to disfranchise them. If the man with a bad bedroom cannot +give a good vote, then the first and swiftest deduction is that he shall +give no vote. The governing class may not unreasonably say, "It may take +us some time to reform his bedroom. But if he is the brute you say, it +will take him very little time to ruin our country. Therefore we will +take your hint and not give him the chance." It fills me with horrible +amusement to observe the way in which the earnest Socialist +industriously lays the foundation of all aristocracy, expatiating +blandly upon the evident unfitness of the poor to rule. It is like +listening to somebody at an evening party apologising for entering +without evening dress, and explaining that he had recently been +intoxicated, had a personal habit of taking off his clothes in the +street, and had, moreover, only just changed from prison uniform. At any +moment, one feels, the host might say that really, if it was as bad as +that, he need not come in at all. So it is when the ordinary Socialist, +with a beaming face, proves that the poor, after their smashing +experiences, cannot be really trustworthy. At any moment the rich may +say, "Very well, then, we won't trust them," and bang the door in his +face. On the basis of Mr. Blatchford's view of heredity and environment, +the case for the aristocracy is quite overwhelming. If clean homes and +clean air make clean souls, why not give the power (for the present at +any rate) to those who undoubtedly have the clean air? If better +conditions will make the poor more fit to govern themselves, why should +not better conditions already make the rich more fit to govern them? On +the ordinary environment argument the matter is fairly manifest. The +comfortable class must be merely our vanguard in Utopia. + +Is there any answer to the proposition that those who have had the best +opportunities will probably be our best guides? Is there any answer to +the argument that those who have breathed clean air had better decide +for those who have breathed foul? As far as I know, there is only one +answer, and that answer is Christianity. Only the Christian Church can +offer any rational objection to a complete confidence in the rich. For +she has maintained from the beginning that the danger was not in man's +environment, but in man. Further, she has maintained that if we come to +talk of a dangerous environment, the most dangerous environment of all +is the commodious environment. I know that the most modern manufacture +has been really occupied in trying to produce an abnormally large +needle. I know that the most recent biologists have been chiefly anxious +to discover a very small camel. But if we diminish the camel to his +smallest, or open the eye of the needle to its largest--if, in short, +we assume the words of Christ to have meant the very least that they +could mean, His words must at the very least mean this--that rich men +are not very likely to be morally trustworthy. Christianity even when +watered down is hot enough to boil all modern society to rags. The mere +minimum of the Church would be a deadly ultimatum to the world. For the +whole modern world is absolutely based on the assumption, not that the +rich are necessary (which is tenable), but that the rich are +trustworthy, which (for a Christian) is not tenable. You will hear +everlastingly, in all discussions about newspapers, companies, +aristocracies, or party politics, this argument that the rich man cannot +be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has +been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man. The whole case for +Christianity is that a man who is dependent upon the luxuries of this +life is a corrupt man, spiritually corrupt, politically corrupt, +financially corrupt. There is one thing that Christ and all the +Christian saints have said with a sort of savage monotony. They have +said simply that to be rich is to be in peculiar danger of moral wreck. +It is not demonstrably un-Christian to kill the rich as violators of +definable justice. It is not demonstrably un-Christian to crown the +rich as convenient rulers of society. It is not certainly un-Christian +to rebel against the rich or to submit to the rich. But it is quite +certainly un-Christian to trust the rich, to regard the rich as more +morally safe than the poor. A Christian may consistently say, "I respect +that man's rank, although he takes bribes." But a Christian cannot say, +as all modern men are saying at lunch and breakfast, "a man of that rank +would not take bribes." For it is a part of Christian dogma that any man +in any rank may take bribes. It is a part of Christian dogma; it also +happens by a curious coincidence that it is a part of obvious human +history. When people say that a man "in that position" would be +incorruptible, there is no need to bring Christianity into the +discussion. Was Lord Bacon a bootblack? Was the Duke of Marlborough a +crossing sweeper? In the best Utopia, I must be prepared for the moral +fall of _any_ man in _any_ position at _any_ moment; especially for my +fall from my position at this moment. + +Much vague and sentimental journalism has been poured out to the effect +that Christianity is akin to democracy, and most of it is scarcely +strong or clear enough to refute the fact that the two things have often +quarrelled. The real ground upon which Christianity and democracy are +one is very much deeper. The one specially and peculiarly un-Christian +idea is the idea of Carlyle--the idea that the man should rule who feels +that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is heathen. If our +faith comments on government at all, its comment must be this--that the +man should rule who does _not_ think that he can rule. Carlyle's hero +may say, "I will be king"; but the Christian saint must say, "Nolo +episcopari." If the great paradox of Christianity means anything, it +means this--that we must take the crown in our hands, and go hunting in +dry places and dark corners of the earth until we find the one man who +feels himself unfit to wear it. Carlyle was quite wrong; we have not got +to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown +the much more exceptional man who knows he can't. + +Now, this is one of the two or three vital defences of working +democracy. The mere machinery of voting is not democracy, though at +present it is not easy to effect any simpler democratic method. But even +the machinery of voting is profoundly Christian in this practical +sense--that it is an attempt to get at the opinion of those who would be +too modest to offer it. It is a mystical adventure; it is specially +trusting those who do not trust themselves. That enigma is strictly +peculiar to Christendom. There is nothing really humble about the +abnegation of the Buddhist; the mild Hindoo is mild, but he is not meek. +But there is something psychologically Christian about the idea of +seeking for the opinion of the obscure rather than taking the obvious +course of accepting the opinion of the prominent. To say that voting is +particularly Christian may seem somewhat curious. To say that canvassing +is Christian may seem quite crazy. But canvassing is very Christian in +its primary idea. It is encouraging the humble; it is saying to the +modest man, "Friend, go up higher." Or if there is some slight defect in +canvassing, that is in its perfect and rounded piety, it is only because +it may possibly neglect to encourage the modesty of the canvasser. + +Aristocracy is not an institution: aristocracy is a sin; generally a +very venial one. It is merely the drift or slide of men into a sort of +natural pomposity and praise of the powerful, which is the most easy and +obvious affair in the world. + +It is one of the hundred answers to the fugitive perversion of modern +"force" that the promptest and boldest agencies are also the most +fragile or full of sensibility. The swiftest things are the softest +things. A bird is active, because a bird is soft. A stone is helpless, +because a stone is hard. The stone must by its own nature go downwards, +because hardness is weakness. The bird can of its nature go upwards, +because fragility is force. In perfect force there is a kind of +frivolity, an airiness that can maintain itself in the air. Modern +investigators of miraculous history have solemnly admitted that a +characteristic of the great saints is their power of "levitation." They +might go further; a characteristic of the great saints is their power of +levity. Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly. This +has been always the instinct of Christendom, and especially the instinct +of Christian art. Remember how Fra Angelico represented all his angels, +not only as birds, but almost as butterflies. Remember how the most +earnest mediaeval art was full of light and fluttering draperies, of +quick and capering feet. It was the one thing that the modern +Pre-raphaelites could not imitate in the real Pre-raphaelites. +Burne-Jones could never recover the deep levity of the Middle Ages. In +the old Christian pictures the sky over every figure is like a blue or +gold parachute. Every figure seems ready to fly up and float about in +the heavens. The tattered cloak of the beggar will bear him up like the +rayed plumes of the angels. But the kings in their heavy gold and the +proud in their robes of purple will all of their nature sink downwards, +for pride cannot rise to levity or levitation. Pride is the downward +drag of all things into an easy solemnity. One "settles down" into a +sort of selfish seriousness; but one has to rise to a gay +self-forgetfulness. A man "falls" into a brown study; he reaches up at a +blue sky. Seriousness is not a virtue. It would be a heresy, but a much +more sensible heresy, to say that seriousness is a vice. It is really a +natural trend or lapse into taking one's self gravely, because it is the +easiest thing to do. It is much easier to write a good _Times_ leading +article than a good joke in _Punch_. For solemnity flows out of men +naturally; but laughter is a leap. It is easy to be heavy: hard to be +light. Satan fell by the force of gravity. + +Now, it is the peculiar honour of Europe since it has been Christian +that while it has had aristocracy it has always at the back of its heart +treated aristocracy as a weakness--generally as a weakness that must be +allowed for. If any one wishes to appreciate this point, let him go +outside Christianity into some other philosophical atmosphere. Let him, +for instance, compare the classes of Europe with the castes of India. +There aristocracy is far more awful, because it is far more +intellectual. It is seriously felt that the scale of classes is a scale +of spiritual values; that the baker is better than the butcher in an +invisible and sacred sense. But no Christianity, not even the most +ignorant or perverse, ever suggested that a baronet was better than a +butcher in that sacred sense. No Christianity, however ignorant or +extravagant, ever suggested that a duke would not be damned. In pagan +society there may have been (I do not know) some such serious division +between the free man and the slave. But in Christian society we have +always thought the gentleman a sort of joke, though I admit that in some +great crusades and councils he earned the right to be called a practical +joke. But we in Europe never really and at the root of our souls took +aristocracy seriously. It is only an occasional non-European alien (such +as Dr. Oscar Levy, the only intelligent Nietzscheite) who can even +manage for a moment to take aristocracy seriously. It may be a mere +patriotic bias, though I do not think so, but it seems to me that the +English aristocracy is not only the type, but is the crown and flower of +all actual aristocracies; it has all the oligarchical virtues as well as +all the defects. It is casual, it is kind, it is courageous in obvious +matters; but it has one great merit that overlaps even these. The great +and very obvious merit of the English aristocracy is that nobody could +possibly take it seriously. + +In short, I had spelled out slowly, as usual, the need for an equal law +in Utopia; and, as usual, I found that Christianity had been there +before me. The whole history of my Utopia has the same amusing sadness. +I was always rushing out of my architectural study with plans for a new +turret only to find it sitting up there in the sunlight, shining, and a +thousand years old. For me, in the ancient and partly in the modern +sense, God answered the prayer, "Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings." +Without vanity, I really think there was a moment when I could have +invented the marriage vow (as an institution) out of my own head; but I +discovered, with a sigh, that it had been invented already. But, since +it would be too long a business to show how, fact by fact and inch by +inch, my own conception of Utopia was only answered in the New +Jerusalem, I will take this one case of the matter of marriage as +indicating the converging drift, I may say the converging crash of all +the rest. + +When the ordinary opponents of Socialism talk about impossibilities and +alterations in human nature they always miss an important distinction. +In modern ideal conceptions of society there are some desires that are +possibly not attainable: but there are some desires that are not +desirable. That all men should live in equally beautiful houses is a +dream that may or may not be attained. But that all men should live in +the same beautiful house is not a dream at all; it is a nightmare. That +a man should love all old women is an ideal that may not be attainable. +But that a man should regard all old women exactly as he regards his +mother is not only an unattainable ideal, but an ideal which ought not +to be attained. I do not know if the reader agrees with me in these +examples; but I will add the example which has always affected me most. +I could never conceive or tolerate any Utopia which did not leave to me +the liberty for which I chiefly care, the liberty to bind myself. +Complete anarchy would not merely make it impossible to have any +discipline or fidelity; it would also make it impossible to have any +fun. To take an obvious instance, it would not be worth while to bet if +a bet were not binding. The dissolution of all contracts would not only +ruin morality but spoil sport. Now betting and such sports are only the +stunted and twisted shapes of the original instinct of man for adventure +and romance, of which much has been said in these pages. And the perils, +rewards, punishments, and fulfilments of an adventure must be _real_, or +the adventure is only a shifting and heartless nightmare. If I bet I +must be made to pay, or there is no poetry in betting. If I challenge I +must be made to fight, or there is no poetry in challenging. If I vow to +be faithful I must be cursed when I am unfaithful, or there is no fun in +vowing. You could not even make a fairy tale from the experiences of a +man who, when he was swallowed by a whale, might find himself at the top +of the Eiffel Tower, or when he was turned into a frog might begin to +behave like a flamingo. For the purpose even of the wildest romance, +results must be real; results must be irrevocable. Christian marriage is +the great example of a real and irrevocable result; and that is why it +is the chief subject and centre of all our romantic writing. And this +is my last instance of the things that I should ask, and ask +imperatively, of any social paradise; I should ask to be kept to my +bargain, to have my oaths and engagements taken seriously; I should ask +Utopia to avenge my honour on myself. + +All my modern Utopian friends look at each other rather doubtfully, for +their ultimate hope is the dissolution of all special ties. But again I +seem to hear, like a kind of echo, an answer from beyond the world. "You +will have real obligations, and therefore real adventures when you get +to my Utopia. But the hardest obligation and the steepest adventure is +to get there." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII.--_The Romance of Orthodoxy_ + + +It is customary to complain of the bustle and strenuousness of our +epoch. But in truth the chief mark of our epoch is a profound laziness +and fatigue; and the fact is that the real laziness is the cause of the +apparent bustle. Take one quite external case; the streets are noisy +with taxicabs and motor-cars; but this is not due to human activity but +to human repose. There would be less bustle if there were more activity, +if people were simply walking about. Our world would be more silent if +it were more strenuous. And this which is true of the apparent physical +bustle is true also of the apparent bustle of the intellect. Most of the +machinery of modern language is labour-saving machinery; and it saves +mental labour very much more than it ought. Scientific phrases are used +like scientific wheels and piston-rods to make swifter and smoother yet +the path of the comfortable. Long words go rattling by us like long +railway trains. We know they are carrying thousands who are too tired or +too indolent to walk and think for themselves. It is a good exercise to +try for once in a way to express any opinion one holds in words of one +syllable. If you say "The social utility of the indeterminate sentence +is recognised by all criminologists as a part of our sociological +evolution towards a more humane and scientific view of punishment," you +can go on talking like that for hours with hardly a movement of the grey +matter inside your skull. But if you begin "I wish Jones to go to gaol +and Brown to say when Jones shall come out," you will discover, with a +thrill of horror, that you are obliged to think. The long words are not +the hard words, it is the short words that are hard. There is much more +metaphysical subtlety in the word "damn" than in the word +"degeneration." + +But these long comfortable words that save modern people the toil of +reasoning have one particular aspect in which they are especially +ruinous and confusing. This difficulty occurs when the same long word is +used in different connections to mean quite different things. Thus, to +take a well-known instance, the word "idealist" has one meaning as a +piece of philosophy and quite another as a piece of moral rhetoric. In +the same way the scientific materialists have had just reason to +complain of people mixing up "materialist" as a term of cosmology with +"materialist" as a moral taunt. So, to take a cheaper instance, the man +who hates "progressives" in London always calls himself a "progressive" +in South Africa. + +A confusion quite as unmeaning as this has arisen in connection with the +word "liberal" as applied to religion and as applied to politics and +society. It is often suggested that all Liberals ought to be +freethinkers, because they ought to love everything that is free. You +might just as well say that all idealists ought to be High Churchmen, +because they ought to love everything that is high. You might as well +say that Low Churchmen ought to like Low Mass, or that Broad Churchmen +ought to like broad jokes. The thing is a mere accident of words. In +actual modern Europe a free-thinker does not mean a man who thinks for +himself. It means a man who, having thought for himself, has come to one +particular class of conclusions, the material origin of phenomena, the +impossibility of miracles, the improbability of personal immortality and +so on. And none of these ideas are particularly liberal. Nay, indeed +almost all these ideas are definitely illiberal, as it is the purpose of +this chapter to show. + +In the few following pages I propose to point out as rapidly as +possible that on every single one of the matters most strongly insisted +on by liberalisers of theology their effect upon social practice would +be definitely illiberal. Almost every contemporary proposal to bring +freedom into the church is simply a proposal to bring tyranny into the +world. For freeing the church now does not even mean freeing it in all +directions. It means freeing that peculiar set of dogmas loosely called +scientific, dogmas of monism, of pantheism, or of Arianism, or of +necessity. And every one of these (and we will take them one by one) can +be shown to be the natural ally of oppression. In fact, it is a +remarkable circumstance (indeed not so very remarkable when one comes to +think of it) that most things are the allies of oppression. There is +only one thing that can never go past a certain point in its alliance +with oppression--and that is orthodoxy. I may, it is true, twist +orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a +German philosophy to justify him entirely. + +Now let us take in order the innovations that are the notes of the new +theology or the modernist church. We concluded the last chapter with the +discovery of one of them. The very doctrine which is called the most +old-fashioned was found to be the only safeguard of the new democracies +of the earth. The doctrine seemingly most unpopular was found to be the +only strength of the people. In short, we found that the only logical +negation of oligarchy was in the affirmation of original sin. So it is, +I maintain, in all the other cases. + +I take the most obvious instance first, the case of miracles. For some +extraordinary reason, there is a fixed notion that it is more liberal to +disbelieve in miracles than to believe in them. Why, I cannot imagine, +nor can anybody tell me. For some inconceivable cause a "broad" or +"liberal" clergyman always means a man who wishes at least to diminish +the number of miracles; it never means a man who wishes to increase that +number. It always means a man who is free to disbelieve that Christ came +out of His grave; it never means a man who is free to believe that his +own aunt came out of her grave. It is common to find trouble in a parish +because the parish priest cannot admit that St. Peter walked on water; +yet how rarely do we find trouble in a parish because the clergyman says +that his father walked on the Serpentine? And this is not because (as +the swift secularist debater would immediately retort) miracles cannot +be believed in our experience. It is not because "miracles do not +happen," as in the dogma which Matthew Arnold recited with simple faith. +More supernatural things are _alleged_ to have happened in our time than +would have been possible eighty years ago. Men of science believe in +such marvels much more than they did: the most perplexing, and even +horrible, prodigies of mind and spirit are always being unveiled in +modern psychology. Things that the old science at least would frankly +have rejected as miracles are hourly being asserted by the new science. +The only thing which is still old-fashioned enough to reject miracles is +the New Theology. But in truth this notion that it is "free" to deny +miracles has nothing to do with the evidence for or against them. It is +a lifeless verbal prejudice of which the original life and beginning was +not in the freedom of thought, but simply in the dogma of materialism. +The man of the nineteenth century did not disbelieve in the Resurrection +because his liberal Christianity allowed him to doubt it. He disbelieved +in it because his very strict materialism did not allow him to believe +it. Tennyson, a very typical nineteenth-century man, uttered one of the +instinctive truisms of his contemporaries when he said that there was +faith in their honest doubt. There was indeed. Those words have a +profound and even a horrible truth. In their doubt of miracles there was +a faith in a fixed and godless fate; a deep and sincere faith in the +incurable routine of the cosmos. The doubts of the agnostic were only +the dogmas of the monist. + +Of the fact and evidence of the supernatural I will speak afterwards. +Here we are only concerned with this clear point; that in so far as the +liberal idea of freedom can be said to be on either side in the +discussion about miracles, it is obviously on the side of miracles. +Reform or (in the only tolerable sense) progress means simply the +gradual control of matter by mind. A miracle simply means the swift +control of matter by mind. If you wish to feed the people, you may think +that feeding them miraculously in the wilderness is impossible--but you +cannot think it illiberal. If you really want poor children to go to the +seaside, you cannot think it illiberal that they should go there on +flying dragons; you can only think it unlikely. A holiday, like +Liberalism, only means the liberty of man. A miracle only means the +liberty of God. You may conscientiously deny either of them, but you +cannot call your denial a triumph of the liberal idea. The Catholic +Church believed that man and God both had a sort of spiritual freedom. +Calvinism took away the freedom from man, but left it to God. Scientific +materialism binds the Creator Himself; it chains up God as the +Apocalypse chained the devil. It leaves nothing free in the universe. +And those who assist this process are called the "liberal theologians." + +This, as I say, is the lightest and most evident case. The assumption +that there is something in the doubt of miracles akin to liberality or +reform is literally the opposite of the truth. If a man cannot believe +in miracles there is an end of the matter; he is not particularly +liberal, but he is perfectly honourable and logical, which are much +better things. But if he can believe in miracles, he is certainly the +more liberal for doing so; because they mean first, the freedom of the +soul, and secondly, its control over the tyranny of circumstance. +Sometimes this truth is ignored in a singularly naive way, even by the +ablest men. For instance, Mr. Bernard Shaw speaks with a hearty +old-fashioned contempt for the idea of miracles, as if they were a sort +of breach of faith on the part of nature: he seems strangely +unconscious that miracles are only the final flowers of his own +favourite tree, the doctrine of the omnipotence of will. Just in the +same way he calls the desire for immortality a paltry selfishness, +forgetting that he has just called the desire for life a healthy and +heroic selfishness. How can it be noble to wish to make one's life +infinite and yet mean to wish to make it immortal? No, if it is +desirable that man should triumph over the cruelty of nature or custom, +then miracles are certainly desirable; we will discuss afterwards +whether they are possible. + +But I must pass on to the larger cases of this curious error; the notion +that the "liberalising" of religion in some way helps the liberation of +the world. The second example of it can be found in the question of +pantheism--or rather of a certain modern attitude which is often called +immanentism, and which often is Buddhism. But this is so much more +difficult a matter that I must approach it with rather more preparation. + +The things said most confidently by advanced persons to crowded +audiences are generally those quite opposite to the fact; it is actually +our truisms that are untrue. Here is a case. There is a phrase of facile +liberality uttered again and again at ethical societies and parliaments +of religion: "the religions of the earth differ in rites and forms, but +they are the same in what they teach." It is false; it is the opposite +of the fact. The religions of the earth do _not_ greatly differ in rites +and forms; they do greatly differ in what they teach. It is as if a man +were to say, "Do not be misled by the fact that the _Church Times_ and +the _Freethinker_ look utterly different, that one is painted on vellum +and the other carved on marble, that one is triangular and the other +hectagonal; read them and you will see that they say the same thing." +The truth is, of course, that they are alike in everything except in the +fact that they don't say the same thing. An atheist stockbroker in +Surbiton looks exactly like a Swedenborgian stockbroker in Wimbledon. +You may walk round and round them and subject them to the most personal +and offensive study without seeing anything Swedenborgian in the hat or +anything particularly godless in the umbrella. It is exactly in their +souls that they are divided. So the truth is that the difficulty of all +the creeds of the earth is not as alleged in this cheap maxim: that they +agree in meaning, but differ in machinery. It is exactly the opposite. +They agree in machinery; almost every great religion on earth works +with the same external methods, with priests, scriptures, altars, sworn +brotherhoods, special feasts. They agree in the mode of teaching; what +they differ about is the thing to be taught. Pagan optimists and Eastern +pessimists would both have temples, just as Liberals and Tories would +both have newspapers. Creeds that exist to destroy each other both have +scriptures, just as armies that exist to destroy each other both have +guns. + +The great example of this alleged identity of all human religions is the +alleged spiritual identity of Buddhism and Christianity. Those who adopt +this theory generally avoid the ethics of most other creeds, except, +indeed, Confucianism, which they like because it is not a creed. But +they are cautious in their praises of Mahommedanism, generally confining +themselves to imposing its morality only upon the refreshment of the +lower classes. They seldom suggest the Mahommedan view of marriage (for +which there is a great deal to be said), and towards Thugs and fetish +worshippers their attitude may even be called cold. But in the case of +the great religion of Gautama they feel sincerely a similarity. + +Students of popular science, like Mr. Blatchford, are always insisting +that Christianity and Buddhism are very much alike, especially +Buddhism. This is generally believed, and I believed it myself until I +read a book giving the reasons for it. The reasons were of two kinds: +resemblances that meant nothing because they were common to all +humanity, and resemblances which were not resemblances at all. The +author solemnly explained that the two creeds were alike in things in +which all creeds are alike, or else he described them as alike in some +point in which they are quite obviously different. Thus, as a case of +the first class, he said that both Christ and Buddha were called by the +divine voice coming out of the sky, as if you would expect the divine +voice to come out of the coal-cellar. Or, again, it was gravely urged +that these two Eastern teachers, by a singular coincidence, both had to +do with the washing of feet. You might as well say that it was a +remarkable coincidence that they both had feet to wash. And the other +class of similarities were those which simply were not similar. Thus +this reconciler of the two religions draws earnest attention to the fact +that at certain religious feasts the robe of the Lama is rent in pieces +out of respect, and the remnants highly valued. But this is the reverse +of a resemblance, for the garments of Christ were not rent in pieces +out of respect, but out of derision; and the remnants were not highly +valued except for what they would fetch in the rag shops. It is rather +like alluding to the obvious connection between the two ceremonies of +the sword: when it taps a man's shoulder, and when it cuts off his head. +It is not at all similar for the man. These scraps of puerile pedantry +would indeed matter little if it were not also true that the alleged +philosophical resemblances are also of these two kinds, either proving +too much or not proving anything. That Buddhism approves of mercy or of +self-restraint is not to say that it is specially like Christianity; it +is only to say that it is not utterly unlike all human existence. +Buddhists disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess because all sane +human beings disapprove in theory of cruelty or excess. But to say that +Buddhism and Christianity give the same philosophy of these things is +simply false. All humanity does agree that we are in a net of sin. Most +of humanity agrees that there is some way out. But as to what is the way +out, I do not think that there are two institutions in the universe +which contradict each other so flatly as Buddhism and Christianity. + +Even when I thought, with most other well-informed, though unscholarly, +people, that Buddhism and Christianity were alike, there was one thing +about them that always perplexed me; I mean the startling difference in +their type of religious art. I do not mean in its technical style of +representation, but in the things that it was manifestly meant to +represent. No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint +in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The +opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of +it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the +Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a +sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. +The mediaeval saint's body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are +frightfully alive. There cannot be any real community of spirit between +forces that produced symbols so different as that. Granted that both +images are extravagances, are perversions of the pure creed, it must be +a real divergence which could produce such opposite extravagances. The +Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is +staring with a frantic intentness outwards. If we follow that clue +steadily we shall find some interesting things. + +A short time ago Mrs. Besant, in an interesting essay, announced that +there was only one religion in the world, that all faiths were only +versions or perversions of it, and that she was quite prepared to say +what it was. According to Mrs. Besant this universal Church is simply +the universal self. It is the doctrine that we are really all one +person; that there are no real walls of individuality between man and +man. If I may put it so, she does not tell us to love our neighbours; +she tells us to be our neighbours. That is Mrs. Besant's thoughtful and +suggestive description of the religion in which all men must find +themselves in agreement. And I never heard of any suggestion in my life +with which I more violently disagree. I want to love my neighbour not +because he is I, but precisely because he is not I. I want to adore the +world, not as one likes a looking-glass, because it is one's self, but +as one loves a woman, because she is entirely different. If souls are +separate love is possible. If souls are united love is obviously +impossible. A man may be said loosely to love himself, but he can hardly +fall in love with himself, or, if he does, it must be a monotonous +courtship. If the world is full of real selves, they can be really +unselfish selves. But upon Mrs. Besant's principle the whole cosmos is +only one enormously selfish person. + +It is just here that Buddhism is on the side of modern pantheism and +immanence. And it is just here that Christianity is on the side of +humanity and liberty and love. Love desires personality; therefore love +desires division. It is the instinct of Christianity to be glad that God +has broken the universe into little pieces, because they are living +pieces. It is her instinct to say "little children love one another" +rather than to tell one large person to love himself. This is the +intellectual abyss between Buddhism and Christianity; that for the +Buddhist or Theosophist personality is the fall of man, for the +Christian it is the purpose of God, the whole point of his cosmic idea. +The world-soul of the Theosophists asks man to love it only in order +that man may throw himself into it. But the divine centre of +Christianity actually threw man out of it in order that he might love +it. The oriental deity is like a giant who should have lost his leg or +hand and be always seeking to find it; but the Christian power is like +some giant who in a strange generosity should cut off his right hand, so +that it might of its own accord shake hands with him. We come back to +the same tireless note touching the nature of Christianity; all modern +philosophies are chains which connect and fetter; Christianity is a +sword which separates and sets free. No other philosophy makes God +actually rejoice in the separation of the universe into living souls. +But according to orthodox Christianity this separation between God and +man is sacred, because this is eternal. That a man may love God it is +necessary that there should be not only a God to be loved, but a man to +love him. All those vague theosophical minds for whom the universe is an +immense melting-pot are exactly the minds which shrink instinctively +from that earthquake saying of our Gospels, which declare that the Son +of God came not with peace but with a sundering sword. The saying rings +entirely true even considered as what it obviously is; the statement +that any man who preaches real love is bound to beget hate. It is as +true of democratic fraternity as of divine love; sham love ends in +compromise and common philosophy; but real love has always ended in +bloodshed. Yet there is another and yet more awful truth behind the +obvious meaning of this utterance of our Lord. According to Himself the +Son was a sword separating brother and brother that they should for an +aeon hate each other. But the Father also was a sword, which in the +black beginning separated brother and brother, so that they should love +each other at last. + +This is the meaning of that almost insane happiness in the eyes of the +mediaeval saint in the picture. This is the meaning of the sealed eyes of +the superb Buddhist image. The Christian saint is happy because he has +verily been cut off from the world; he is separate from things and is +staring at them in astonishment. But why should the Buddhist saint be +astonished at things? since there is really only one thing, and that +being impersonal can hardly be astonished at itself. There have been +many pantheist poems suggesting wonder, but no really successful ones. +The pantheist cannot wonder, for he cannot praise God or praise anything +as really distinct from himself. Our immediate business here however is +with the effect of this Christian admiration (which strikes outwards, +towards a deity distinct from the worshipper) upon the general need for +ethical activity and social reform. And surely its effect is +sufficiently obvious. There is no real possibility of getting out of +pantheism any special impulse to moral action. For pantheism implies in +its nature that one thing is as good as another; whereas action implies +in its nature that one thing is greatly preferable to another. +Swinburne in the high summer of his scepticism tried in vain to wrestle +with this difficulty. In "Songs before Sunrise," written under the +inspiration of Garibaldi and the revolt of Italy, he proclaimed the +newer religion and the purer God which should wither up all the priests +of the world. + + "What doest thou now + Looking Godward to cry + I am I, thou art thou, + I am low, thou art high, + I am thou that thou seekest to find him, find thou + but thyself, thou art I." + +Of which the immediate and evident deduction is that tyrants are as much +the sons of God as Garibaldis; and that King Bomba of Naples having, +with the utmost success, "found himself" is identical with the ultimate +good in all things. The truth is that the western energy that dethrones +tyrants has been directly due to the western theology that says "I am I, +thou art thou." The same spiritual separation which looked up and saw a +good king in the universe looked up and saw a bad king in Naples. The +worshippers of Bomba's god dethroned Bomba. The worshippers of +Swinburne's god have covered Asia for centuries and have never +dethroned a tyrant. The Indian saint may reasonably shut his eyes +because he is looking at that which is I and Thou and We and They and +It. It is a rational occupation: but it is not true in theory and not +true in fact that it helps the Indian to keep an eye on Lord Curzon. +That external vigilance which has always been the mark of Christianity +(the command that we should _watch_ and pray) has expressed itself both +in typical western orthodoxy and in typical western politics: but both +depend on the idea of a divinity transcendent, different from ourselves, +a deity that disappears. Certainly the most sagacious creeds may suggest +that we should pursue God into deeper and deeper rings of the labyrinth +of our own ego. But only we of Christendom have said that we should hunt +God like an eagle upon the mountains: and we have killed all monsters in +the chase. + +Here again, therefore, we find that in so far as we value democracy and +the self-renewing energies of the west, we are much more likely to find +them in the old theology than the new. If we want reform, we must adhere +to orthodoxy: especially in this matter (so much disputed in the +counsels of Mr. R.J. Campbell), the matter of insisting on the immanent +or the transcendent deity. By insisting specially on the immanence of +God we get introspection, self-isolation, quietism, social +indifference--Tibet. By insisting specially on the transcendence of God +we get wonder, curiosity, moral and political adventure, righteous +indignation--Christendom. Insisting that God is inside man, man is +always inside himself. By insisting that God transcends man, man has +transcended himself. + +If we take any other doctrine that has been called old-fashioned we +shall find the case the same. It is the same, for instance, in the deep +matter of the Trinity. Unitarians (a sect never to be mentioned without +a special respect for their distinguished intellectual dignity and high +intellectual honour) are often reformers by the accident that throws so +many small sects into such an attitude. But there is nothing in the +least liberal or akin to reform in the substitution of pure monotheism +for the Trinity. The complex God of the Athanasian Creed may be an +enigma for the intellect; but He is far less likely to gather the +mystery and cruelty of a Sultan than the lonely god of Omar or Mahomet. +The god who is a mere awful unity is not only a king but an Eastern +king. The _heart_ of humanity, especially of European humanity, is +certainly much more satisfied by the strange hints and symbols that +gather round the Trinitarian idea, the image of a council at which mercy +pleads as well as justice, the conception of a sort of liberty and +variety existing even in the inmost chamber of the world. For Western +religion has always felt keenly the idea "it is not well for man to be +alone." The social instinct asserted itself everywhere as when the +Eastern idea of hermits was practically expelled by the Western idea of +monks. So even asceticism became brotherly; and the Trappists were +sociable even when they were silent. If this love of a living complexity +be our test, it is certainly healthier to have the Trinitarian religion +than the Unitarian. For to us Trinitarians (if I may say it with +reverence)--to us God Himself is a society. It is indeed a fathomless +mystery of theology, and even if I were theologian enough to deal with +it directly, it would not be relevant to do so here. Suffice it to say +here that this triple enigma is as comforting as wine and open as an +English fireside; that this thing that bewilders the intellect utterly +quiets the heart: but out of the desert, from the dry places and the +dreadful suns, come the cruel children of the lonely God; the real +Unitarians who with scimitar in hand have laid waste the world. For it +is not well for God to be alone. + +Again, the same is true of that difficult matter of the danger of the +soul, which has unsettled so many just minds. To hope for all souls is +imperative; and it is quite tenable that their salvation is inevitable. +It is tenable, but it is not specially favourable to activity or +progress. Our fighting and creative society ought rather to insist on +the danger of everybody, on the fact that every man is hanging by a +thread or clinging to a precipice. To say that all will be well anyhow +is a comprehensible remark: but it cannot be called the blast of a +trumpet. Europe ought rather to emphasise possible perdition; and Europe +always has emphasised it. Here its highest religion is at one with all +its cheapest romances. To the Buddhist or the eastern fatalist existence +is a science or a plan, which must end up in a certain way. But to a +Christian existence is a _story_, which may end up in any way. In a +thrilling novel (that purely Christian product) the hero is not eaten by +cannibals; but it is essential to the existence of the thrill that he +_might_ be eaten by cannibals. The hero must (so to speak) be an eatable +hero. So Christian morals have always said to the man, not that he +would lose his soul, but that he must take care that he didn't. In +Christian morals, in short, it is wicked to call a man "damned": but it +is strictly religious and philosophic to call him damnable. + +All Christianity concentrates on the man at the cross-roads. The vast +and shallow philosophies, the huge syntheses of humbug, all talk about +ages and evolution and ultimate developments. The true philosophy is +concerned with the instant. Will a man take this road or that? that is +the only thing to think about, if you enjoy thinking. The aeons are easy +enough to think about, any one can think about them. The instant is +really awful: and it is because our religion has intensely felt the +instant, that it has in literature dealt much with battle and in +theology dealt much with hell. It is full of _danger_ like a boy's book: +it is at an immortal crisis. There is a great deal of real similarity +between popular fiction and the religion of the western people. If you +say that popular fiction is vulgar and tawdry, you only say what the +dreary and well-informed say also about the images in the Catholic +churches. Life (according to the faith) is very like a serial story in a +magazine: life ends with the promise (or menace) "to be continued in our +next." Also, with a noble vulgarity, life imitates the serial and +leaves off at the exciting moment. For death is distinctly an exciting +moment. + +But the point is that a story is exciting because it has in it so strong +an element of will, of what theology calls free-will. You cannot finish +a sum how you like. But you can finish a story how you like. When +somebody discovered the Differential Calculus there was only one +Differential Calculus he could discover. But when Shakespeare killed +Romeo he might have married him to Juliet's old nurse if he had felt +inclined. And Christendom has excelled in the narrative romance exactly +because it has insisted on the theological free-will. It is a large +matter and too much to one side of the road to be discussed adequately +here; but this is the real objection to that torrent of modern talk +about treating crime as disease, about making a prison merely a hygienic +environment like a hospital, of healing sin by slow scientific methods. +The fallacy of the whole thing is that evil is a matter of active +choice, whereas disease is not. If you say that you are going to cure a +profligate as you cure an asthmatic, my cheap and obvious answer is, +"Produce the people who want to be asthmatics as many people want to be +Profligates." A man may lie still and be cured of a malady. But he must +not lie still if he wants to be cured of a sin; on the contrary, he must +get up and jump about violently. The whole point indeed is perfectly +expressed in the very word which we use for a man in hospital; "patient" +is in the passive mood; "sinner" is in the active. If a man is to be +saved from influenza, he may be a patient. But if he is to be saved from +forging, he must be not a patient but an _impatient_. He must be +personally impatient with forgery. All moral reform must start in the +active not the passive will. + +Here again we reach the same substantial conclusion. In so far as we +desire the definite reconstructions and the dangerous revolutions which +have distinguished European civilisation, we shall not discourage the +thought of possible ruin; we shall rather encourage it. If we want, like +the Eastern saints, merely to contemplate how right things are, of +course we shall only say that they must go right. But if we particularly +want to _make_ them go right, we must insist that they may go wrong. + +Lastly, this truth is yet again true in the case of the common modern +attempts to diminish or to explain away the divinity of Christ. The +thing may be true or not; that I shall deal with before I end. But if +the divinity is true it is certainly terribly revolutionary. That a good +man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already; but +that God could have his back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents +for ever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that +omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone has felt that God, +to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all +creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. +For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that +the soul passes a breaking point--and does not break. In this indeed I +approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I +apologise in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent +touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly +feared to approach. But in that terrific tale of the Passion there is a +distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some +unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is +written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy +God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in +Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted +God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of +pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it +was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which +confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists +choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the +world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of +unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been +in revolt. Nay, (the matter grows too difficult for human speech) but +let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one +divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which +God seemed for an instant to be an atheist. + +These can be called the essentials of the old orthodoxy, of which the +chief merit is that it is the natural fountain of revolution and reform; +and of which the chief defect is that it is obviously only an abstract +assertion. Its main advantage is that it is the most adventurous and +manly of all theologies. Its chief disadvantage is simply that it is a +theology. It can always be urged against it that it is in its nature +arbitrary and in the air. But it is not so high in the air but that +great archers spend their whole lives in shooting arrows at it--yes, and +their last arrows; there are men who will ruin themselves and ruin their +civilisation if they may ruin also this old fantastic tale. This is the +last and most astounding fact about this faith; that its enemies will +use any weapon against it, the swords that cut their own fingers, and +the firebrands that burn their own homes. Men who begin to fight the +Church for the sake of freedom and humanity end by flinging away freedom +and humanity if only they may fight the Church. This is no exaggeration; +I could fill a book with the instances of it. Mr. Blatchford set out, as +an ordinary Bible-smasher, to prove that Adam was guiltless of sin +against God; in manoeuvring so as to maintain this he admitted, as a +mere side issue, that all the tyrants, from Nero to King Leopold, were +guiltless of any sin against humanity. I know a man who has such a +passion for proving that he will have no personal existence after death +that he falls back on the position that he has no personal existence +now. He invokes Buddhism and says that all souls fade into each other; +in order to prove that he cannot go to heaven he proves that he cannot +go to Hartlepool. I have known people who protested against religious +education with arguments against any education, saying that the child's +mind must grow freely or that the old must not teach the young. I have +known people who showed that there could be no divine judgment by +showing that there can be no human judgment, even for practical +purposes. They burned their own corn to set fire to the church; they +smashed their own tools to smash it; any stick was good enough to beat +it with, though it were the last stick of their own dismembered +furniture. We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks +this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic +who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very +existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims +not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the +emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by +which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon some +one who never lived at all. + +And yet the thing hangs in the heavens unhurt. Its opponents only +succeed in destroying all that they themselves justly hold dear. They do +not destroy orthodoxy; they only destroy political courage and common +sense. They do not prove that Adam was not responsible to God; how could +they prove it? They only prove (from their premises) that the Czar is +not responsible to Russia. They do not prove that Adam should not have +been punished by God; they only prove that the nearest sweater should +not be punished by men. With their oriental doubts about personality +they do not make certain that we shall have no personal life hereafter; +they only make certain that we shall not have a very jolly or complete +one here. With their paralysing hints of all conclusions coming out +wrong they do not tear the book of the Recording Angel; they only make +it a little harder to keep the books of Marshall and Snelgrove. Not only +is the faith the mother of all worldly energies, but its foes are the +fathers of all worldly confusion. The secularists have not wrecked +divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that +is any comfort to them. The Titans did not scale heaven; but they laid +waste the world. + + + + +CHAPTER IX.--_Authority and the Adventurer_ + + +The last chapter has been concerned with the contention that orthodoxy +is not only (as is often urged) the only safe guardian of morality or +order, but is also the only logical guardian of liberty, innovation and +advance. If we wish to pull down the prosperous oppressor we cannot do +it with the new doctrine of human perfectibility; we can do it with the +old doctrine of Original Sin. If we want to uproot inherent cruelties or +lift up lost populations we cannot do it with the scientific theory that +matter precedes mind; we can do it with the supernatural theory that +mind precedes matter. If we wish specially to awaken people to social +vigilance and tireless pursuit of practise, we cannot help it much by +insisting on the Immanent God and the Inner Light: for these are at best +reasons for contentment; we can help it much by insisting on the +transcendant God and the flying and escaping gleam; for that means +divine discontent. If we wish particularly to assert the idea of a +generous balance against that of a dreadful autocracy we shall +instinctively be Trinitarian rather than Unitarian. If we desire +European civilisation to be a raid and a rescue, we shall insist rather +that souls are in real peril than that their peril is ultimately unreal. +And if we wish to exalt the outcast and the crucified, we shall rather +wish to think that a veritable God was crucified, rather than a mere +sage or hero. Above all, if we wish to protect the poor we shall be in +favour of fixed rules and clear dogmas. The _rules_ of a club are +occasionally in favour of the poor member. The drift of a club is always +in favour of the rich one. + +And now we come to the crucial question which truly concludes the whole +matter. A reasonable agnostic, if he has happened to agree with me so +far, may justly turn round and say, "You have found a practical +philosophy in the doctrine of the Fall; very well. You have found a side +of democracy now dangerously neglected wisely asserted in Original Sin; +all right. You have found a truth in the doctrine of hell; I +congratulate you. You are convinced that worshippers of a personal God +look outwards and are progressive; I congratulate them. But even +supposing that those doctrines do include those truths, why cannot you +take the truths and leave the doctrines? Granted that all modern +society is trusting the rich too much because it does not allow for +human weakness; granted that orthodox ages have had a great advantage +because (believing in the Fall) they did allow for human weakness, why +cannot you simply allow for human weakness without believing in the +Fall? If you have discovered that the idea of damnation represents a +healthy idea of danger, why can you not simply take the idea of danger +and leave the idea of damnation? If you see clearly the kernel of +common-sense in the nut of Christian orthodoxy, why cannot you simply +take the kernel and leave the nut? Why cannot you (to use that cant +phrase of the newspapers which I, as a highly scholarly agnostic, am a +little ashamed of using) why cannot you simply take what is good in +Christianity, what you can define as valuable, what you can comprehend, +and leave all the rest, all the absolute dogmas that are in their nature +incomprehensible?" This is the real question; this is the last question; +and it is a pleasure to try to answer it. + +The first answer is simply to say that I am a rationalist. I like to +have some intellectual justification for my intuitions. If I am treating +man as a fallen being it is an intellectual convenience to me to +believe that he fell; and I find, for some odd psychological reason, +that I can deal better with a man's exercise of freewill if I believe +that he has got it. But I am in this matter yet more definitely a +rationalist. I do not propose to turn this book into one of ordinary +Christian apologetics; I should be glad to meet at any other time the +enemies of Christianity in that more obvious arena. Here I am only +giving an account of my own growth in spiritual certainty. But I may +pause to remark that the more I saw of the merely abstract arguments +against the Christian cosmology the less I thought of them. I mean that +having found the moral atmosphere of the Incarnation to be common sense, +I then looked at the established intellectual arguments against the +Incarnation and found them to be common nonsense. In case the argument +should be thought to suffer from the absence of the ordinary apologetic +I will here very briefly summarise my own arguments and conclusions on +the purely objective or scientific truth of the matter. + +If I am asked, as a purely intellectual question, why I believe in +Christianity, I can only answer, "For the same reason that an +intelligent agnostic disbelieves in Christianity." I believe in it +quite rationally upon the evidence. But the evidence in my case, as in +that of the intelligent agnostic, is not really in this or that alleged +demonstration; it is in an enormous accumulation of small but unanimous +facts. The secularist is not to be blamed because his objections to +Christianity are miscellaneous and even scrappy; it is precisely such +scrappy evidence that does convince the mind. I mean that a man may well +be less convinced of a philosophy from four books, than from one book, +one battle, one landscape, and one old friend. The very fact that the +things are of different kinds increases the importance of the fact that +they all point to one conclusion. Now, the non-Christianity of the +average educated man to-day is almost always, to do him justice, made up +of these loose but living experiences. I can only say that my evidences +for Christianity are of the same vivid but varied kind as his evidences +against it. For when I look at these various anti-Christian truths, I +simply discover that none of them are true. I discover that the true +tide and force of all the facts flows the other way. Let us take cases. +Many a sensible modern man must have abandoned Christianity under the +pressure of three such converging convictions as these: first, that +men, with their shape, structure, and sexuality, are, after all, very +much like beasts, a mere variety of the animal kingdom; second, that +primeval religion arose in ignorance and fear; third, that priests have +blighted societies with bitterness and gloom. Those three anti-Christian +arguments are very different; but they are all quite logical and +legitimate; and they all converge. The only objection to them (I +discover) is that they are all untrue. If you leave off looking at books +about beasts and men, if you begin to look at beasts and men then (if +you have any humour or imagination, any sense of the frantic or the +farcical) you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man +is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his +divergence that requires an explanation. That man and brute are like is, +in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so +insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands +is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having +hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle-bones or +the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of +barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build +colossal temples of ivory even in a roccoco style; camels do not paint +even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many +camel's-hair brushes. Certain modern dreamers say that ants and bees +have a society superior to ours. They have, indeed, a civilisation; but +that very truth only reminds us that it is an inferior civilisation. Who +ever found an ant-hill decorated with the statues of celebrated ants? +Who has seen a bee-hive carved with the images of gorgeous queens of +old? No; the chasm between man and other creatures may have a natural +explanation, but it is a chasm. We talk of wild animals; but man is the +only wild animal. It is man that has broken out. All other animals are +tame animals; following the rugged respectability of the tribe or type. +All other animals are domestic animals; man alone is ever undomestic, +either as a profligate or a monk. So that this first superficial reason +for materialism is, if anything, a reason for its opposite; it is +exactly where biology leaves off that all religion begins. + +It would be the same if I examined the second of the three chance +rationalist arguments; the argument that all that we call divine began +in some darkness and terror. When I did attempt to examine the +foundations of this modern idea I simply found that there were none. +Science knows nothing whatever about pre-historic man; for the excellent +reason that he is pre-historic. A few professors choose to conjecture +that such things as human sacrifice were once innocent and general and +that they gradually dwindled; but there is no direct evidence of it, and +the small amount of indirect evidence is very much the other way. In the +earliest legends we have, such as the tales of Isaac and of Iphigenia, +human sacrifice is not introduced as something old, but rather as +something new; as a strange and frightful exception darkly demanded by +the gods. History says nothing; and legends all say that the earth was +kinder in its earliest time. There is no tradition of progress; but the +whole human race has a tradition of the Fall. Amusingly enough, indeed, +the very dissemination of this idea is used against its authenticity. +Learned men literally say that this pre-historic calamity cannot be true +because every race of mankind remembers it. I cannot keep pace with +these paradoxes. + +And if we took the third chance instance, it would be the same; the view +that priests darken and embitter the world. I look at the world and +simply discover that they don't. Those countries in Europe which are +still influenced by priests, are exactly the countries where there is +still singing and dancing and coloured dresses and art in the open-air. +Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of +a playground. Christianity is the only frame which has preserved the +pleasure of Paganism. We might fancy some children playing on the flat +grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall +round the cliff's edge they could fling themselves into every frantic +game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries. But the walls were +knocked down, leaving the naked peril of the precipice. They did not +fall over; but when their friends returned to them they were all huddled +in terror in the centre of the island; and their song had ceased. + +Thus these three facts of experience, such facts as go to make an +agnostic, are, in this view, turned totally round. I am left saying, +"Give me an explanation, first, of the towering eccentricity of man +among the brutes; second, of the vast human tradition of some ancient +happiness; third, of the partial perpetuation of such pagan joy in the +countries of the Catholic Church." One explanation, at any rate, covers +all three: the theory that twice was the natural order interrupted by +some explosion or revelation such as people now call "psychic." Once +Heaven came upon the earth with a power or seal called the image of God, +whereby man took command of Nature; and once again (when in empire after +empire men had been found wanting) Heaven came to save mankind in the +awful shape of a man. This would explain why the mass of men always look +backwards; and why the only corner where they in any sense look forwards +is the little continent where Christ has His Church. I know it will be +said that Japan has become progressive. But how can this be an answer +when even in saying "Japan has become progressive," we really only mean, +"Japan has become European"? But I wish here not so much to insist on my +own explanation as to insist on my original remark. I agree with the +ordinary unbelieving man in the street in being guided by three or four +odd facts all pointing to something; only when I came to look at the +facts I always found they pointed to something else. + +I have given an imaginary triad of such ordinary anti-Christian +arguments; if that be too narrow a basis I will give on the spur of the +moment another. These are the kind of thoughts which in combination +create the impression that Christianity is something weak and diseased. +First, for instance, that Jesus was a gentle creature, sheepish and +unworldly, a mere ineffectual appeal to the world; second, that +Christianity arose and flourished in the dark ages of ignorance, and +that to these the Church would drag us back; third, that the people +still strongly religious or (if you will) superstitious--such people as +the Irish--are weak, unpractical, and behind the times. I only mention +these ideas to affirm the same thing: that when I looked into them +independently I found, not that the conclusions were unphilosophical, +but simply that the facts were not facts. Instead of looking at books +and pictures about the New Testament I looked at the New Testament. +There I found an account, not in the least of a person with his hair +parted in the middle or his hands clasped in appeal, but of an +extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, +flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy +of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a +being who often acted like an angry god--and always like a god. Christ +had even a literary style of his own, not to be found, I think, +elsewhere; it consists of an almost furious use of the _a fortiori_. +His "how much more" is piled one upon another like castle upon castle in +the clouds. The diction used _about_ Christ has been, and perhaps +wisely, sweet and submissive. But the diction used by Christ is quite +curiously gigantesque; it is full of camels leaping through needles and +mountains hurled into the sea. Morally it is equally terrific; he called +himself a sword of slaughter, and told men to buy swords if they sold +their coats for them. That he used other even wilder words on the side +of non-resistance greatly increases the mystery; but it also, if +anything, rather increases the violence. We cannot even explain it by +calling such a being insane; for insanity is usually along one +consistent channel. The maniac is generally a monomaniac. Here we must +remember the difficult definition of Christianity already given; +Christianity is a superhuman paradox whereby two opposite passions may +blaze beside each other. The one explanation of the Gospel language that +does explain it, is that it is the survey of one who from some +supernatural height beholds some more startling synthesis. + +I take in order the next instance offered: the idea that Christianity +belongs to the dark ages. Here I did not satisfy myself with reading +modern generalisations; I read a little history. And in history I found +that Christianity, so far from belonging to the dark ages, was the one +path across the dark ages that was not dark. It was a shining bridge +connecting two shining civilisations. If any one says that the faith +arose in ignorance and savagery the answer is simple: it didn't. It +arose in the Mediterranean civilisation in the full summer of the Roman +Empire. The world was swarming with sceptics, and pantheism was as plain +as the sun, when Constantine nailed the cross to the mast. It is +perfectly true that afterwards the ship sank; but it is far more +extraordinary that the ship came up again: repainted and glittering, +with the cross still at the top. This is the amazing thing the religion +did: it turned a sunken ship into a submarine. The ark lived under the +load of waters; after being buried under the debris of dynasties and +clans, we arose and remembered Rome. If our faith had been a mere fad of +the fading empire, fad would have followed fad in the twilight, and if +the civilisation ever re-emerged (and many such have never re-emerged) +it would have been under some new barbaric flag. But the Christian +Church was the last life of the old society and was also the first life +of the new. She took the people who were forgetting how to make an arch +and she taught them to invent the Gothic arch. In a word, the most +absurd thing that could be said of the Church is the thing we have all +heard said of it. How can we say that the Church wishes to bring us back +into the Dark Ages? The Church was the only thing that ever brought us +out of them. + +I added in this second trinity of objections an idle instance taken from +those who feel such people as the Irish to be weakened or made stagnant +by superstition. I only added it because this is a peculiar case of a +statement of fact that turns out to be a statement of falsehood. It is +constantly said of the Irish that they are impractical. But if we +refrain for a moment from looking at what is said about them and look at +what is _done_ about them, we shall see that the Irish are not only +practical, but quite painfully successful. The poverty of their country, +the minority of their members are simply the conditions under which they +were asked to work; but no other group in the British Empire has done so +much with such conditions. The Nationalists were the only minority that +ever succeeded in twisting the whole British Parliament sharply out of +its path. The Irish peasants are the only poor men in these islands who +have forced their masters to disgorge. These people, whom we call +priest-ridden, are the only Britons who will not be squire-ridden. And +when I came to look at the actual Irish character, the case was the +same. Irishmen are best at the specially _hard_ professions--the trades +of iron, the lawyer, and the soldier. In all these cases, therefore, I +came back to the same conclusion: the sceptic was quite right to go by +the facts, only he had not looked at the facts. The sceptic is too +credulous; he believes in newspapers or even in encyclopaedias. Again the +three questions left me with three very antagonistic questions. The +average sceptic wanted to know how I explained the namby-pamby note in +the Gospel, the connection of the creed with mediaeval darkness and the +political impracticability of the Celtic Christians. But I wanted to +ask, and to ask with an earnestness amounting to urgency, "What is this +incomparable energy which appears first in one walking the earth like a +living judgment and this energy which can die with a dying civilisation +and yet force it to a resurrection from the dead; this energy which last +of all can inflame a bankrupt peasantry with so fixed a faith in justice +that they get what they ask, while others go empty away; so that the +most helpless island of the Empire can actually help itself?" + +There is an answer: it is an answer to say that the energy is truly from +outside the world; that it is psychic, or at least one of the results of +a real psychical disturbance. The highest gratitude and respect are due +to the great human civilisations such as the old Egyptian or the +existing Chinese. Nevertheless it is no injustice for them to say that +only modern Europe has exhibited incessantly a power of self-renewal +recurring often at the shortest intervals and descending to the smallest +facts of building or costume. All other societies die finally and with +dignity. We die daily. We are always being born again with almost +indecent obstetrics. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that there is +in historic Christendom a sort of unnatural life: it could be explained +as a supernatural life. It could be explained as an awful galvanic life +working in what would have been a corpse. For our civilisation _ought_ +to have died, by all parallels, by all sociological probability, in the +Ragnorak of the end of Rome. That is the weird inspiration of our +estate: you and I have no business to be here at all. We are all +_revenants_; all living Christians are dead pagans walking about. Just +as Europe was about to be gathered in silence to Assyria and Babylon, +something entered into its body. And Europe has had a strange life--it +is not too much to say that it has had the _jumps_--ever since. + +I have dealt at length with such typical triads of doubt in order to +convey the main contention--that my own case for Christianity is +rational; but it is not simple. It is an accumulation of varied facts, +like the attitude of the ordinary agnostic. But the ordinary agnostic +has got his facts all wrong. He is a non-believer for a multitude of +reasons; but they are untrue reasons. He doubts because the Middle Ages +were barbaric, but they weren't; because Darwinism is demonstrated, but +it isn't; because miracles do not happen, but they do; because monks +were lazy, but they were very industrious; because nuns are unhappy, but +they are particularly cheerful; because Christian art was sad and pale, +but it was picked out in peculiarly bright colours and gay with gold; +because modern science is moving away from the supernatural, but it +isn't, it is moving towards the supernatural with the rapidity of a +railway train. + +But among these million facts all flowing one way there is, of course, +one question sufficiently solid and separate to be treated briefly, but +by itself; I mean the objective occurrence of the supernatural. In +another chapter I have indicated the fallacy of the ordinary supposition +that the world must be impersonal because it is orderly. A person is +just as likely to desire an orderly thing as a disorderly thing. But my +own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than +material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call +it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere +emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a +_primary_ intellectual conviction like the certainty of self or the good +of living. Any one who likes, therefore, may call my belief in God +merely mystical; the phrase is not worth fighting about. But my belief +that miracles have happened in human history is not a mystical belief at +all; I believe in them upon human evidence as I do in the discovery of +America. Upon this point there is a simple logical fact that only +requires to be stated and cleared up. Somehow or other an extraordinary +idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly +and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection +with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in +miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence +for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) +because they have a doctrine against them. The open, obvious, democratic +thing is to believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony to a +miracle, just as you believe an old apple-woman when she bears testimony +to a murder. The plain, popular course is to trust the peasant's word +about the ghost exactly as far as you trust the peasant's word about the +landlord. Being a peasant he will probably have a great deal of healthy +agnosticism about both. Still you could fill the British Museum with +evidence uttered by the peasant, and given in favour of the ghost. If it +comes to human testimony there is a choking cataract of human testimony +in favour of the supernatural. If you reject it, you can only mean one +of two things. You reject the peasant's story about the ghost either +because the man is a peasant or because the story is a ghost story. That +is, you either deny the main principle of democracy, or you affirm the +main principle of materialism--the abstract impossibility of miracle. +You have a perfect right to do so; but in that case you are the +dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence--it is you +rationalists who refuse actual evidence, being constrained to do so by +your creed. But I am not constrained by any creed in the matter, and +looking impartially into certain miracles of mediaeval and modern times, +I have come to the conclusion that they occurred. All argument against +these plain facts is always argument in a circle. If I say, "Mediaeval +documents attest certain miracles as much as they attest certain +battles," they answer, "But mediaevals were superstitious"; if I want to +know in what they were superstitious, the only ultimate answer is that +they believed in the miracles. If I say "a peasant saw a ghost," I am +told, "But peasants are so credulous." If I ask, "Why credulous?" the +only answer is--that they see ghosts. Iceland is impossible because only +stupid sailors have seen it; and the sailors are only stupid because +they say they have seen Iceland. It is only fair to add that there is +another argument that the unbeliever may rationally use against +miracles, though he himself generally forgets to use it. + +He may say that there has been in many miraculous stories a notion of +spiritual preparation and acceptance: in short, that the miracle could +only come to him who believed in it. It may be so, and if it is so how +are we to test it? If we are inquiring whether certain results follow +faith, it is useless to repeat wearily that (if they happen) they do +follow faith. If faith is one of the conditions, those without faith +have a most healthy right to laugh. But they have no right to judge. +Being a believer may be, if you like, as bad as being drunk; still if we +were extracting psychological facts from drunkards, it would be absurd +to be always taunting them with having been drunk. Suppose we were +investigating whether angry men really saw a red mist before their eyes. +Suppose sixty excellent householders swore that when angry they had seen +this crimson cloud: surely it would be absurd to answer "Oh, but you +admit you were angry at the time." They might reasonably rejoin (in a +stentorian chorus), "How the blazes could we discover, without being +angry, whether angry people see red?" So the saints and ascetics might +rationally reply, "Suppose that the question is whether believers can +see visions--even then, if you are interested in visions it is no point +to object to believers." You are still arguing in a circle--in that old +mad circle with which this book began. + +The question of whether miracles ever occur is a question of common +sense and of ordinary historical imagination: not of any final physical +experiment. One may here surely dismiss that quite brainless piece of +pedantry which talks about the need for "scientific conditions" in +connection with alleged spiritual phenomena. If we are asking whether a +dead soul can communicate with a living it is ludicrous to insist that +it shall be under conditions in which no two living souls in their +senses would seriously communicate with each other. The fact that ghosts +prefer darkness no more disproves the existence of ghosts than the fact +that lovers prefer darkness disproves the existence of love. If you +choose to say, "I will believe that Miss Brown called her _fiance_ a +periwinkle or any other endearing term, if she will repeat the word +before seventeen psychologists," then I shall reply, "Very well, if +those are your conditions, you will never get the truth, for she +certainly will not say it." It is just as unscientific as it is +unphilosophical to be surprised that in an unsympathetic atmosphere +certain extraordinary sympathies do not arise. It is as if I said that I +could not tell if there was a fog because the air was not clear enough; +or as if I insisted on perfect sunlight in order to see a solar eclipse. + +As a common-sense conclusion, such as those to which we come about sex +or about midnight (well knowing that many details must in their own +nature be concealed) I conclude that miracles do happen. I am forced to +it by a conspiracy of facts: the fact that the men who encounter elves +or angels are not the mystics and the morbid dreamers, but fishermen, +farmers, and all men at once coarse and cautious; the fact that we all +know men who testify to spiritualist incidents but are not +spiritualists; the fact that science itself admits such things more and +more every day. Science will even admit the Ascension if you call it +Levitation, and will very likely admit the Resurrection when it has +thought of another word for it. I suggest the Regalvanisation. But the +strongest of all is the dilemma above mentioned, that these supernatural +things are never denied except on the basis either of anti-democracy or +of materialist dogmatism--I may say materialist mysticism. The sceptic +always takes one of the two positions; either an ordinary man need not +be believed, or an extraordinary event must not be believed. For I hope +we may dismiss the argument against wonders attempted in the mere +recapitulation of frauds, of swindling mediums or trick miracles. That +is not an argument at all, good or bad. A false ghost disproves the +reality of ghosts exactly as much as a forged banknote disproves the +existence of the Bank of England--if anything, it proves its existence. + +Given this conviction that the spiritual phenomena do occur (my evidence +for which is complex but rational), we then collide with one of the +worst mental evils of the age. The greatest disaster of the nineteenth +century was this: that men began to use the word "spiritual" as the same +as the word "good." They thought that to grow in refinement and +uncorporeality was to grow in virtue. When scientific evolution was +announced, some feared that it would encourage mere animality. It did +worse: it encouraged mere spirituality. It taught men to think that so +long as they were passing from the ape they were going to the angel. But +you can pass from the ape and go to the devil. A man of genius, very +typical of that time of bewilderment, expressed it perfectly. Benjamin +Disraeli was right when he said he was on the side of the angels. He was +indeed; he was on the side of the fallen angels. He was not on the side +of any mere appetite or animal brutality; but he was on the side of all +the imperialism of the princes of the abyss; he was on the side of +arrogance and mystery, and contempt of all obvious good. Between this +sunken pride and the towering humilities of heaven there are, one must +suppose, spirits of shapes and sizes. Man, in encountering them, must +make much the same mistakes that he makes in encountering any other +varied types in any other distant continent. It must be hard at first to +know who is supreme and who is subordinate. If a shade arose from the +under world, and stared at Piccadilly, that shade would not quite +understand the idea of an ordinary closed carriage. He would suppose +that the coachman on the box was a triumphant conqueror, dragging behind +him a kicking and imprisoned captive. So, if we see spiritual facts for +the first time, we may mistake who is uppermost. It is not enough to +find the gods; they are obvious; we must find God, the real chief of the +gods. We must have a long historic experience in supernatural +phenomena--in order to discover which are really natural. In this light +I find the history of Christianity, and even of its Hebrew origins, +quite practical and clear. It does not trouble me to be told that the +Hebrew god was one among many. I know he was, without any research to +tell me so. Jehovah and Baal looked equally important, just as the sun +and the moon looked the same size. It is only slowly that we learn that +the sun is immeasurably our master, and the small moon only our +satellite. Believing that there is a world of spirits, I shall walk in +it as I do in the world of men, looking for the thing that I like and +think good. Just as I should seek in a desert for clean water, or toil +at the North Pole to make a comfortable fire, so I shall search the land +of void and vision until I find something fresh like water, and +comforting like fire; until I find some place in eternity, where I am +literally at home. And there is only one such place to be found. + +I have now said enough to show (to any one to whom such an explanation +is essential) that I have in the ordinary arena of apologetics, a ground +of belief. In pure records of experiment (if these be taken +democratically without contempt or favour) there is evidence first, that +miracles happen, and second that the nobler miracles belong to our +tradition. But I will not pretend that this curt discussion is my real +reason for accepting Christianity instead of taking the moral good of +Christianity as I should take it out of Confucianism. + +I have another far more solid and central ground for submitting to it as +a faith, instead of merely picking up hints from it as a scheme. And +that is this: that the Christian Church in its practical relation to my +soul is a living teacher, not a dead one. It not only certainly taught +me yesterday, but will almost certainly teach me to-morrow. Once I saw +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the cross; some day I may see +suddenly the meaning of the shape of the mitre. One fine morning I saw +why windows were pointed; some fine morning I may see why priests were +shaven. Plato has told you a truth; but Plato is dead. Shakespeare has +startled you with an image; but Shakespeare will not startle you with +any more. But imagine what it would be to live with such men still +living, to know that Plato might break out with an original lecture +to-morrow, or that at any moment Shakespeare might shatter everything +with a single song. The man who lives in contact with what he believes +to be a living Church is a man always expecting to meet Plato and +Shakespeare to-morrow at breakfast. He is always expecting to see some +truth that he has never seen before. There is one only other parallel to +this position; and that is the parallel of the life in which we all +began. When your father told you, walking about the garden, that bees +stung or that roses smelt sweet, you did not talk of taking the best +out of his philosophy. When the bees stung you, you did not call it an +entertaining coincidence. When the rose smelt sweet you did not say "My +father is a rude, barbaric symbol, enshrining (perhaps unconsciously) +the deep delicate truths that flowers smell." No: you believed your +father, because you had found him to be a living fountain of facts, a +thing that really knew more than you; a thing that would tell you truth +to-morrow, as well as to-day. And if this was true of your father, it +was even truer of your mother; at least it was true of mine, to whom +this book is dedicated. Now, when society is in a rather futile fuss +about the subjection of women, will no one say how much every man owes +to the tyranny and privilege of women, to the fact that they alone rule +education until education becomes futile: for a boy is only sent to be +taught at school when it is too late to teach him anything. The real +thing has been done already, and thank God it is nearly always done by +women. Every man is womanised, merely by being born. They talk of the +masculine woman; but every man is a feminised man. And if ever men walk +to Westminster to protest against this female privilege, I shall not +join their procession. + +For I remember with certainty this fixed psychological fact; that the +very time when I was most under a woman's authority, I was most full of +flame and adventure. Exactly because when my mother said that ants bit +they did bite, and because snow did come in winter (as she said); +therefore the whole world was to me a fairyland of wonderful +fulfilments, and it was like living in some Hebraic age, when prophecy +after prophecy came true. I went out as a child into the garden, and it +was a terrible place to me, precisely because I had a clue to it: if I +had held no clue it would not have been terrible, but tame. A mere +unmeaning wilderness is not even impressive. But the garden of childhood +was fascinating, exactly because everything had a fixed meaning which +could be found out in its turn. Inch by inch I might discover what was +the object of the ugly shape called a rake; or form some shadowy +conjecture as to why my parents kept a cat. + +So, since I have accepted Christendom as a mother and not merely as a +chance example, I have found Europe and the world once more like the +little garden where I stared at the symbolic shapes of cat and rake; I +look at everything with the old elvish ignorance and expectancy. This or +that rite or doctrine may look as ugly and extraordinary as a rake; but +I have found by experience that such things end somehow in grass and +flowers. A clergyman may be apparently as useless as a cat, but he is +also as fascinating, for there must be some strange reason for his +existence. I give one instance out of a hundred; I have not myself any +instinctive kinship with that enthusiasm for physical virginity, which +has certainly been a note of historic Christianity. But when I look not +at myself but at the world, I perceive that this enthusiasm is not only +a note of Christianity, but a note of Paganism, a note of high human +nature in many spheres. The Greeks felt virginity when they carved +Artemis, the Romans when they robed the vestals, the worst and wildest +of the great Elizabethan playwrights clung to the literal purity of a +woman as to the central pillar of the world. Above all, the modern world +(even while mocking sexual innocence) has flung itself into a generous +idolatry of sexual innocence--the great modern worship of children. For +any man who loves children will agree that their peculiar beauty is hurt +by a hint of physical sex. With all this human experience, allied with +the Christian authority, I simply conclude that I am wrong, and the +church right; or rather that I am defective, while the church is +universal. It takes all sorts to make a church; she does not ask me to +be celibate. But the fact that I have no appreciation of the celibates, +I accept like the fact that I have no ear for music. The best human +experience is against me, as it is on the subject of Bach. Celibacy is +one flower in my father's garden, of which I have not been told the +sweet or terrible name. But I may be told it any day. + +This, therefore, is, in conclusion, my reason for accepting the religion +and not merely the scattered and secular truths out of the religion. I +do it because the thing has not merely told this truth or that truth, +but has revealed itself as a truth-telling thing. All other philosophies +say the things that plainly seem to be true; only this philosophy has +again and again said the thing that does not seem to be true, but is +true. Alone of all creeds it is convincing where it is not attractive; +it turns out to be right, like my father in the garden. Theosophists, +for instance, will preach an obviously attractive idea like +re-incarnation; but if we wait for its logical results, they are +spiritual superciliousness and the cruelty of caste. For if a man is a +beggar by his own pre-natal sins, people will tend to despise the +beggar. But Christianity preaches an obviously unattractive idea, such +as original sin; but when we wait for its results, they are pathos and +brotherhood, and a thunder of laughter and pity; for only with original +sin we can at once pity the beggar and distrust the king. Men of science +offer us health, an obvious benefit; it is only afterwards that we +discover that by health, they mean bodily slavery and spiritual tedium. +Orthodoxy makes us jump by the sudden brink of hell; it is only +afterwards that we realise that jumping was an athletic exercise highly +beneficial to our health. It is only afterwards that we realise that +this danger is the root of all drama and romance. The strongest argument +for the divine grace is simply its ungraciousness. The unpopular parts +of Christianity turn out when examined to be the very props of the +people. The outer ring of Christianity is a rigid guard of ethical +abnegations and professional priests; but inside that inhuman guard you +will find the old human life dancing like children, and drinking wine +like men; for Christianity is the only frame for pagan freedom. But in +the modern philosophy the case is opposite; it is its outer ring that +is obviously artistic and emancipated; its despair is within. + +And its despair is this, that it does not really believe that there is +any meaning in the universe; therefore it cannot hope to find any +romance; its romances will have no plots. A man cannot expect any +adventures in the land of anarchy. But a man can expect any number of +adventures if he goes travelling in the land of authority. One can find +no meanings in a jungle of scepticism; but the man will find more and +more meanings who walks through a forest of doctrine and design. Here +everything has a story tied to its tail, like the tools or pictures in +my father's house; for it is my father's house. I end where I began--at +the right end. I have entered at least the gate of all good philosophy. +I have come into my second childhood. + +But this larger and more adventurous Christian universe has one final +mark difficult to express; yet as a conclusion of the whole matter I +will attempt to express it. All the real argument about religion turns +on the question of whether a man who was born upside down can tell when +he comes right way up. The primary paradox of Christianity is that the +ordinary condition of man is not his sane or sensible condition; that +the normal itself is an abnormality. That is the inmost philosophy of +the Fall. In Sir Oliver Lodge's interesting new Catechism, the first two +questions were: "What are you?" and "What, then, is the meaning of the +Fall of Man?" I remember amusing myself by writing my own answers to the +questions; but I soon found that they were very broken and agnostic +answers. To the question, "What are you?" I could only answer, "God +knows." And to the question, "What is meant by the Fall?" I could answer +with complete sincerity, "That whatever I am, I am not myself." This is +the prime paradox of our religion; something that we have never in any +full sense known, is not only better than ourselves, but even more +natural to us than ourselves. And there is really no test of this except +the merely experimental one with which these pages began, the test of +the padded cell and the open door. It is only since I have known +orthodoxy that I have known mental emancipation. But, in conclusion, it +has one special application to the ultimate idea of joy. + +It is said that Paganism is a religion of joy and Christianity of +sorrow; it would be just as easy to prove that Paganism is pure sorrow +and Christianity pure joy. Such conflicts mean nothing and lead +nowhere. Everything human must have in it both joy and sorrow; the only +matter of interest is the manner in which the two things are balanced or +divided. And the really interesting thing is this, that the pagan was +(in the main) happier and happier as he approached the earth, but sadder +and sadder as he approached the heavens. The gaiety of the best +Paganism, as in the playfulness of Catullus or Theocritus, is, indeed, +an eternal gaiety never to be forgotten by a grateful humanity. But it +is all a gaiety about the facts of life, not about its origin. To the +pagan the small things are as sweet as the small brooks breaking out of +the mountain; but the broad things are as bitter as the sea. When the +pagan looks at the very core of the cosmos he is struck cold. Behind the +gods, who are merely despotic, sit the fates, who are deadly. Nay, the +fates are worse than deadly; they are dead. And when rationalists say +that the ancient world was more enlightened than the Christian, from +their point of view they are right. For when they say "enlightened" they +mean darkened with incurable despair. It is profoundly true that the +ancient world was more modern than the Christian. The common bond is in +the fact that ancients and moderns have both been miserable about +existence, about everything, while mediaevals were happy about that at +least. I freely grant that the pagans, like the moderns, were only +miserable about everything--they were quite jolly about everything else. +I concede that the Christians of the Middle Ages were only at peace +about everything--they were at war about everything else. But if the +question turn on the primary pivot of the cosmos, then there was more +cosmic contentment in the narrow and bloody streets of Florence than in +the theatre of Athens or the open garden of Epicurus. Giotto lived in a +gloomier town than Euripides, but he lived in a gayer universe. + +The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but +sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my last dogma defiantly) +it is not native to man to be so. Man is more himself, man is more +manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the +superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and +fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the +soul. Pessimism is at best an emotional half-holiday; joy is the +uproarious labour by which all things live. Yet, according to the +apparent estate of man as seen by the pagan or the agnostic, this +primary need of human nature can never be fulfilled. Joy ought to be +expansive; but for the agnostic it must be contracted, it must cling to +one corner of the world. Grief ought to be a concentration; but for the +agnostic its desolation is spread through an unthinkable eternity. This +is what I call being born upside down. The sceptic may truly be said to +be topsy-turvy; for his feet are dancing upwards in idle ecstacies, +while his brain is in the abyss. To the modern man the heavens are +actually below the earth. The explanation is simple; he is standing on +his head; which is a very weak pedestal to stand on. But when he has +found his feet again he knows it. Christianity satisfies suddenly and +perfectly man's ancestral instinct for being the right way up; satisfies +it supremely in this; that by its creed joy becomes something gigantic +and sadness something special and small. The vault above us is not deaf +because the universe is an idiot; the silence is not the heartless +silence of an endless and aimless world. Rather the silence around us is +a small and pitiful stillness like the prompt stillness in a sick room. +We are perhaps permitted tragedy as a sort of merciful comedy: because +the frantic energy of divine things would knock us down like a drunken +farce. We can take our own tears more lightly than we could take the +tremendous levities of the angels. So we sit perhaps in a starry chamber +of silence, while the laughter of the heavens is too loud for us to +hear. + +Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret +of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the +strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again +haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the +Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the +thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, +almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing +their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His +open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. +Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists +are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He +flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how +they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained +something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering +personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something +that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was +something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous +isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show +us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it +was His mirth. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Orthodoxy, by G. K. 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