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DESPONDENCY AND CONSOLATION.
Before I begin to tell you some of the things I have seen and heard,
in both of which I have had to take a share, now from the compulsion
of my office, now from the leading of my own heart, and now from
that destiny which, including both, so often throws the man who
supposed himself a mere on-looker, into the very vortex of
events--that destiny which took form to the old pagans as a gray
mist high beyond the heads of their gods, but to us is known as an
infinite love, revealed in the mystery of man--I say before I begin,
it is fitting that, in the absence of a common friend to do that
office for me, I should introduce myself to your acquaintance, and I
hope coming friendship. Nor can there be any impropriety in my
telling you about myself, seeing I remain concealed behind my own
words. You can never look me in the eyes, though you may look me in
the soul. You may find me out, find my faults, my vanities, my sins,
but you will not SEE me, at least in this world. To you I am but a
voice of revealing, not a form of vision; therefore I am bold behind
the mask, to speak to you heart to heart; bold, I say, just so much
the more that I do not speak to you face to face. And when we meet
in heaven--well, there I know there is no hiding; there, there is no
reason for hiding anything; there, the whole desire will be
alternate revelation and vision.
I am now getting old--faster and faster. I cannot help my gray
hairs, nor the wrinkles that gather so slowly yet ruthlessly; no,
nor the quaver that will come in my voice, not the sense of being
feeble in the knees, even when I walk only across the floor of my
study. But I have not got used to age yet. I do not FEEL one atom
older than I did at three-and-twenty. Nay, to tell all the truth, I
feel a good deal younger.--For then I only felt that a man had to
take up his cross; whereas now I feel that a man has to follow Him;
and that makes an unspeakable difference.--When my voice quavers, I
feel that it is mine and not mine; that it just belongs to me like
my watch, which does not go well-now, though it went well thirty
years ago--not more than a minute out in a month. And when I feel my
knees shake, I think of them with a kind of pity, as I used to think
of an old mare of my father's of which I was very fond when I was a
lad, and which bore me across many a field and over many a fence,
but which at last came to have the same weakness in her knees that I
have in mine; and she knew it too, and took care of them, and so of
herself, in a wise equine fashion. These things are not me--or I,
if the grammarians like it better, (I always feel a strife between
doing as the scholar does and doing as other people do;) they are
not me, I say; I HAVE them--and, please God, shall soon have better.
For it is not a pleasant thing for a young man, or a young woman
either, I venture to say, to have an old voice, and a wrinkled face,
and weak knees, and gray hair, or no hair at all. And if any moral
Philistine, as our queer German brothers over the Northern fish-pond
would call him, say that this is all rubbish, for that we ARE old, I
would answer: "Of all children how can the children of God be old?"
So little do I give in to calling this outside of me, ME, that I
should not mind presenting a minute description of my own person
such as would at once clear me from any suspicion of vanity in so
introducing myself. Not that my honesty would result in the least
from indifference to the external--but from comparative indifference
to the transitional; not to the transitional in itself, which is of
eternal significance and result, but to the particular form of
imperfection which it may have reached at any individual moment of
its infinite progression towards the complete. For no sooner have I
spoken the word NOW, than that NOW is dead and another is dying;
nay, in such a regard, there is no NOW--only a past of which we know
a little, and a future of which we know far less and far more. But I
will not speak at all of this body of my earthly tabernacle, for it
is on the whole more pleasant to forget all about it. And besides, I
do not want to set any of my readers to whom I would have the
pleasure of speaking far more openly and cordially than if they were
seated on the other side of my writing-table--I do not want to set
them wondering whether the vicar be this vicar or that vicar; or
indeed to run the risk of giving the offence I might give, if I were
anything else than "a wandering voice."
I did not feel as I feel now when first I came to this parish. For,
as I have said, I am now getting old very fast. True, I was thirty
when I was made a vicar, an age at which a man might be expected to
be beginning to grow wise; but even then I had much yet to learn.
I well remember the first evening on which I wandered out from the
vicarage to take a look about me--to find out, in short, where I
was, and what aspect the sky and earth here presented. Strangely
enough, I had never been here before; for the presentation had been
made me while I was abroad.--I was depressed. It was depressing
weather. Grave doubts as to whether I was in my place in the church,
would keep rising and floating about, like rain-clouds within me.
Not that I doubted about the church; I only doubted about myself.
"Were my motives pure?" "What were my motives?" And, to tell the
truth, I did not know what my motives were, and therefore I could
not answer about the purity of them. Perhaps seeing we are in this
world in order to become pure, it would be expecting too much of any
young man that he should be absolutely certain that he was pure in
anything. But the question followed very naturally: "Had I then any
right to be in the Church--to be eating her bread and drinking her
wine without knowing whether I was fit to do her work?" To which the
only answer I could find was, "The Church is part of God's world. He
makes men to work; and work of some sort must be done by every
honest man. Somehow or other, I hardly know how, I find myself in
the Church. I do not know that I am fitter for any other work. I see
no other work to do. There is work here which I can do after some
fashion. With God's help I will try to do it well."
This resolution brought me some relief, but still I was depressed.
It was depressing weather.--I may as well say that I was not married
then, and that I firmly believed I never should be married--not from
any ambition taking the form of self-denial; nor yet from any notion
that God takes pleasure in being a hard master; but there was a
lady--Well, I WILL be honest, as I would be.--I had been refused a
few months before, which I think was the best thing ever happened to
me except one. That one, of course, was when I was accepted. But
this is not much to the purpose now. Only it was depressing weather.
For is it not depressing when the rain is falling, and the steam of
it is rising? when the river is crawling along muddily, and the
horses stand stock-still in the meadows with their spines in a
straight line from the ears to where they fail utterly in the tails?
I should only put on goloshes now, and think of the days when I
despised damp. Ah! it was mental waterproof that I needed then; for
let me despise damp as much as I would, I could neither keep it out
of my mind, nor help suffering the spiritual rheumatism which it
occasioned. Now, the damp never gets farther than my goloshes and my
Macintosh. And for that worst kind of rheumatism--I never feel it
now.
But I had begun to tell you about that first evening.--I had
arrived at the vicarage the night before, and it had rained all day,
and was still raining, though not so much. I took my umbrella and
went out.
For as I wanted to do my work well (everything taking far more the
shape of work to me, then, and duty, than it does now--though, even
now, I must confess things have occasionally to be done by the
clergyman because there is no one else to do them, and hardly from
other motive than a sense of duty,--a man not being able to shirk
work because it may happen to be dirty)--I say, as I wanted to do my
work well, or rather, perhaps, because I dreaded drudgery as much as
any poor fellow who comes to the treadmill in consequence--I wanted
to interest myself in it; and therefore I would go and fall in love,
first of all, if I could, with the country round about. And my first
step beyond my own gate was up to the ankles, in mud.
Therewith, curiously enough, arose the distracting thought how I
could possibly preach TWO good sermons a Sunday to the same people,
when one of the sermons was in the afternoon instead of the evening,
to which latter I had been accustomed in the large town in which I
had formerly officiated as curate in a proprietary chapel. I, who
had declaimed indignantly against excitement from without, who had
been inclined to exalt the intellect at the expense even of the
heart, began to fear that there must be something in the darkness,
and the gas-lights, and the crowd of faces, to account for a man's
being able to preach a better sermon, and for servant girls
preferring to go out in the evening. Alas! I had now to preach, as I
might judge with all probability beforehand, to a company of
rustics, of thought yet slower than of speech, unaccustomed in fact
to THINK at all, and that in the sleepiest, deadest part of the day,
when I could hardly think myself, and when, if the weather should be
at all warm, I could not expect many of them to be awake. And what
good might I look for as the result of my labour? How could I hope
in these men and women to kindle that fire which, in the old days of
the outpouring of the Spirit, made men live with the sense of the
kingdom of heaven about them, and the expectation of something
glorious at hand just outside that invisible door which lay between
the worlds?
I have learned since, that perhaps I overrated the spirituality of
those times, and underrated, not being myself spiritual enough to
see all about me, the spirituality of these times. I think I have
learned since, that the parson of a parish must be content to keep
the upper windows of his mind open to the holy winds and the pure
lights of heaven; and the side windows of tone, of speech, of
behaviour open to the earth, to let forth upon his fellow-men the
tenderness and truth which those upper influences bring forth in any
region exposed to their operation. Believing in his Master, such a
servant shall not make haste; shall feel no feverous desire to
behold the work of his hands; shall be content to be as his Master,
who waiteth long for the fruits of His earth.
But surely I am getting older than I thought; for I keep wandering
away from my subject, which is this, my first walk in my new cure.
My excuse is, that I want my reader to understand something of the
state of my mind, and the depression under which I was labouring. He
will perceive that I desired to do some work worth calling by the
name of work, and that I did not see how to get hold of a beginning.
I had not gone far from my own gate before the rain ceased, though
it was still gloomy enough for any amount to follow. I drew down my
umbrella, and began to look about me. The stream on my left was so
swollen that I could see its brown in patches through the green of
the meadows along its banks. A little in front of me, the road,
rising quickly, took a sharp turn to pass along an old stone bridge
that spanned the water with a single fine arch, somewhat pointed;
and through the arch I could see the river stretching away up
through the meadows, its banks bordered with pollards. Now, pollards
always made me miserable. In the first place, they look ill-used; in
the next place, they look tame; in the third place, they look very
ugly. I had not learned then to honour them on the ground that they
yield not a jot to the adversity of their circumstances; that, if
they must be pollards, they still will be trees; and what they may
not do with grace, they will yet do with bounty; that, in short,
their life bursts forth, despite of all that is done to repress and
destroy their individuality. When you have once learned to honour
anything, love is not very far off; at least that has always been my
experience. But, as I have said, I had not yet learned to honour
pollards, and therefore they made me more miserable than I was
already.
When, having followed the road, I stood at last on the bridge, and,
looking up and down the river through the misty air, saw two long
rows of these pollards diminishing till they vanished in both
directions, the sight of them took from me all power of enjoying the
water beneath me, the green fields around me, or even the old-world
beauty of the little bridge upon which I stood, although all sorts
of bridges have been from very infancy a delight to me. For I am one
of those who never get rid of their infantile predilections, and to
have once enjoyed making a mud bridge, was to enjoy all bridges for
ever.
I saw a man in a white smock-frock coming along the road beyond, but
I turned my back to the road, leaned my arms on the parapet of the
bridge, and stood gazing where I saw no visions, namely, at those
very poplars. I heard the man's footsteps coming up the crown of the
arch, but I would not turn to greet him. I was in a selfish humour
if ever I was; for surely if ever one man ought to greet another, it
was upon such a comfortless afternoon. The footsteps stopped behind
me, and I heard a voice:--
"I beg yer pardon, sir; but be you the new vicar?"
I turned instantly and answered, "I am. Do you want me?"
"I wanted to see yer face, sir, that was all, if ye'll not take it
amiss."
Before me stood a tall old man with his hat in his hand, clothed as
I have said, in a white smock-frock. He smoothed his short gray hair
with his curved palm down over his forehead as he stood. His face
was of a red brown, from much exposure to the weather. There was a
certain look of roughness, without hardness, in it, which spoke of
endurance rather than resistance, although he could evidently set
his face as a flint. His features were large and a little coarse,
but the smile that parted his lips when he spoke, shone in his gray
eyes as well, and lighted up a countenance in which a man might
trust.
"I wanted to see yer face, sir, if you'll not take it amiss."
"Certainly not," I answered, pleased with the man's address, as he
stood square before me, looking as modest as fearless. "The sight of
a man's face is what everybody has a right to; but, for all that, I
should like to know why you want to see my face."
"Why, sir, you be the new vicar. You kindly told me so when I axed
you."
"Well, then, you'll see my face on Sunday in church--that is, if you
happen to be there."
For, although some might think it the more dignified way, I could
not take it as a matter of course that he would be at church. A man
might have better reasons for staying away from church than I had
for going, even though I was the parson, and it was my business.
Some clergymen separate between themselves and their office to a
degree which I cannot understand. To assert the dignities of my
office seems to me very like exalting myself; and when I have had a
twinge of conscience about it, as has happened more than once, I
have then found comfort in these two texts: "The Son of man came not
to be ministered unto but to minister;" and "It is enough that the
servant should be as his master." Neither have I ever been able to
see the very great difference between right and wrong in a
clergyman, and right and wrong in another man. All that I can
pretend to have yet discovered comes to this: that what is right in
another man is right in a clergyman; and what is wrong in another
man is much worse in a clergyman. Here, however, is one more proof
of approaching age. I do not mean the opinion, but the digression.
"Well, then," I said, "you'll see my face in church on Sunday, if
you happen to be there."
"Yes, sir; but you see, sir, on the bridge here, the parson is the
parson like, and I'm Old Rogers; and I looks in his face, and he
looks in mine, and I says to myself, 'This is my parson.' But o'
Sundays he's nobody's parson; he's got his work to do, and it mun be
done, and there's an end on't."
That there was a real idea in the old man's mind was considerably
clearer than the logic by which he tried to bring it out.
"Did you know parson that's gone, sir?" he went on.
"No," I answered.
"Oh, sir! he wur a good parson. Many's the time he come and sit at
my son's bedside--him that's dead and gone, sir--for a long hour, on
a Saturday night, too. And then when I see him up in the desk the
next mornin', I'd say to myself, 'Old Rogers, that's the same man as
sat by your son's bedside last night. Think o' that, Old Rogers!'
But, somehow, I never did feel right sure o' that same. He didn't
seem to have the same cut, somehow; and he didn't talk a bit the
same. And when he spoke to me after sermon, in the church-yard, I
was always of a mind to go into the church again and look up to the
pulpit to see if he war really out ov it; for this warn't the same
man, you see. But you'll know all about it better than I can tell
you, sir. Only I always liked parson better out o' the pulpit, and
that's how I come to want to make you look at me, sir, instead o'
the water down there, afore I see you in the church to-morrow
mornin'."
The old man laughed a kindly laugh; but he had set me thinking, and
I did not know what to say to him all at once. So after a short
pause, he resumed--
"You'll be thinking me a queer kind of a man, sir, to speak to my
betters before my betters speaks to me. But mayhap you don't know
what a parson is to us poor folk that has ne'er a friend more larned
than theirselves but the parson. And besides, sir, I'm an old
salt,--an old man-o'-war's man,--and I've been all round the world,
sir; and I ha' been in all sorts o' company, pirates and all, sir;
and I aint a bit frightened of a parson. No; I love a parson, sir.
And I'll tell you for why, sir. He's got a good telescope, and he
gits to the masthead, and he looks out. And he sings out, 'Land
ahead!' or 'Breakers ahead!' and gives directions accordin'. Only I
can't always make out what he says. But when he shuts up his
spyglass, and comes down the riggin', and talks to us like one man
to another, then I don't know what I should do without the parson.
Good evenin' to you, sir, and welcome to Marshmallows."
The pollards did not look half so dreary. The river began to glimmer
a little; and the old bridge had become an interesting old bridge.
The country altogether was rather nice than otherwise. I had found a
friend already!--that is, a man to whom I might possibly be of some
use; and that was the most precious friend I could think of in my
present situation and mood. I had learned something from him too;
and I resolved to try all I could to be the same man in the pulpit
that I was out of it. Some may be inclined to say that I had better
have formed the resolution to be the same man out of the pulpit that
I was in it. But the one will go quite right with the other. Out of
the pulpit I would be the same man I was in it--seeing and feeling
the realities of the unseen; and in the pulpit I would be the same
man I was out of it--taking facts as they are, and dealing with
things as they show themselves in the world.
One other occurrence before I went home that evening, and I shall
close the chapter. I hope I shall not write another so dull as this.
I dare not promise, though; for this is a new kind of work to me.
Before I left the bridge,--while, in fact, I was contemplating the
pollards with an eye, if not of favour, yet of diminished
dismay,--the sun, which, for anything I knew of his whereabouts,
either from knowledge of the country, aspect of the evening, or
state of my own feelings, might have been down for an hour or two,
burst his cloudy bands, and blazed out as if he had just risen from
the dead, instead of being just about to sink into the grave. Do not
tell me that my figure is untrue, for that the sun never sinks into
the grave, else I will retort that it is just as true of the sun as
of a man; for that no man sinks into the grave. He only disappears.
Life IS a constant sunrise, which death cannot interrupt, any more
than the night can swallow up the sun. "God is not the God of the
dead, but of the living; for all live unto him."
Well, the sun shone out gloriously. The whole sweep of the gloomy
river answered him in gladness; the wet leaves of the pollards
quivered and glanced; the meadows offered up their perfect green,
fresh and clear out of the trouble of the rain; and away in the
distance, upon a rising ground covered with trees, glittered a
weathercock. What if I found afterwards that it was only on the roof
of a stable? It shone, and that was enough. And when the sun had
gone below the horizon, and the fields and the river were dusky once
more, there it glittered still over the darkening earth, a symbol of
that faith which is "the evidence of things not seen," and it made
my heart swell as at a chant from the prophet Isaiah. What matter
then whether it hung over a stable-roof or a church-tower?
I stood up and wandered a little farther--off the bridge, and along
the road. I had not gone far before I passed a house, out of which
came a young woman leading a little boy. They came after me, the boy
gazing at the red and gold and green of the sunset sky. As they
passed me, the child said--
"Auntie, I think I should like to be a painter."
"Why?" returned his companion.
"Because, then," answered the child, "I could help God to paint the
sky."
What his aunt replied I do not know; for they were presently beyond
my hearing. But I went on answering him myself all the way home. Did
God care to paint the sky of an evening, that a few of His children
might see it, and get just a hope, just an aspiration, out of its
passing green, and gold, and purple, and red? and should I think my
day's labour lost, if it wrought no visible salvation in the earth?
But was the child's aspiration in vain? Could I tell him God did not
want his help to paint the sky? True, he could mount no scaffold
against the infinite of the glowing west. But might he not with his
little palette and brush, when the time came, show his brothers and
sisters what he had seen there, and make them see it too? Might he
not thus come, after long trying, to help God to paint this glory of
vapour and light inside the minds of His children? Ah! if any man's
work is not WITH God, its results shall be burned, ruthlessly
burned, because poor and bad.
"So, for my part," I said to myself, as I walked home, "if I can put
one touch of a rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman of my
cure, I shall feel that I have worked with God. He is in no haste;
and if I do what I may in earnest, I need not mourn if I work no
great work on the earth. Let God make His sunsets: I will mottle my
little fading cloud. To help the growth of a thought that struggles
towards the light; to brush with gentle hand the earth-stain from
the white of one snowdrop--such be my ambition! So shall I scale the
rocks in front, not leave my name carved upon those behind me."
People talk about special providences. I believe in the providences,
but not in the specialty. I do not believe that God lets the thread
of my affairs go for six days, and on the seventh evening takes it
up for a moment. The so-called special providences are no exception
to the rule--they are common to all men at all moments. But it is a
fact that God's care is more evident in some instances of it than in
others to the dim and often bewildered vision of humanity. Upon such
instances men seize and call them providences. It is well that they
can; but it would be gloriously better if they could believe that
the whole matter is one grand providence.
I was one of such men at the time, and could not fail to see what I
called a special providence in this, that on my first attempt to
find where I stood in the scheme of Providence, and while I was
discouraged with regard to the work before me, I should fall in with
these two--an old man whom I could help, and a child who could help
me; the one opening an outlet for my labour and my love, and the
other reminding me of the highest source of the most humbling
comfort,--that in all my work I might be a fellow-worker with God.
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