Character Part 9

The honest man is naturally antagonistic to fraud, the truthful man to lying, the justice-loving man to oppression, the pureminded man to vice and iniquity. They have to do battle with these conditions, and if possible overcome them. Such men have in all ages represented the moral force of the world. Inspired by benevolence and sustained by courage, they have been the mainstays of all social renovation and progress. But for their continuous antagonism to evil conditions, the world were for the most part given over to the dominion of selfishness and vice.

All the great reformers and martyrs were antagonistic men--enemies to falsehood and evildoing. The Apostles themselves were an organised band of social antagonists, who contended with pride, selfishness, superst.i.tion, and irreligion. And in our own time the lives of such men as Clarkson and Granville Sharpe, Father Mathew and Richard Cobden, inspired by singleness of purpose, have shown what highminded social antagonism can effect.

It is the strong and courageous men who lead and guide and rule the world. The weak and timid leave no trace behind them; whilst the life of a single upright and energetic man is like a track of light. His example is remembered and appealed to; and his thoughts, his spirit, and his courage continue to be the inspiration of succeeding generations.

It is energy--the central element of which is will--that produces the miracles of enthusiasm in all ages. Everywhere it is the mainspring of what is called force of character, and the sustaining power of all great action. In a righteous cause the determined man stands upon his courage as upon a granite block; and, like David, he will go forth to meet Goliath, strong in heart though an host be encamped against him.

Men often conquer difficulties because they feel they can. Their confidence in themselves inspires the confidence of others. When Caesar was at sea, and a storm began to rage, the captain of the s.h.i.+p which carried him became unmanned by fear. "What art thou afraid of?" cried the great captain; "thy vessel carries Caesar!" The courage of the brave man is contagious, and carries others along with it. His stronger nature awes weaker natures into silence, or inspires them with his own will and purpose.

The persistent man will not be baffled or repulsed by opposition.

Diogenes, desirous of becoming the disciple of Antisthenes, went and offered himself to the cynic. He was refused. Diogenes still persisting, the cynic raised his knotty staff, and threatened to strike him if he did not depart. "Strike!" said Diogenes; "you will not find a stick hard enough to conquer my perseverance." Antisthenes, overcome, had not another word to say, but forthwith accepted him as his pupil.

Energy of temperament, with a moderate degree of wisdom, will carry a man further than any amount of intellect without it. Energy makes the man of practical ability. It gives him VIS, force, MOMENTUM. It is the active motive power of character; and if combined with sagacity and self-possession, will enable a man to employ his powers to the best advantage in all the affairs of life.

Hence it is that, inspired by energy of purpose, men of comparatively mediocre powers have often been enabled to accomplish such extraordinary results. For the men who have most powerfully influenced the world have not been so much men of genius as men of strong convictions and enduring capacity for work, impelled by irresistible energy and invincible determination: such men, for example, as were Mahomet, Luther, Knox, Calvin, Loyola, and Wesley.

Courage, combined with energy and perseverance, will overcome difficulties apparently insurmountable. It gives force and impulse to effort, and does not permit it to retreat. Tyndall said of Faraday, that "in his warm moments he formed a resolution, and in his cool ones he made that resolution good." Perseverance, working in the right direction, grows with time, and when steadily practised, even by the most humble, will rarely fail of its reward. Trusting in the help of others is of comparatively little use. When one of Michael Angelo's princ.i.p.al patrons died, he said: "I begin to understand that the promises of the world are for the most part vain phantoms, and that to confide in one's self, and become something of worth and value, is the best and safest course."

Courage is by no means incompatible with tenderness. On the contrary, gentleness and tenderness have been found to characterise the men, not less than the women, who have done the most courageous deeds. Sir Charles Napier gave up sporting, because he could not bear to hurt dumb creatures. The same gentleness and tenderness characterised his brother, Sir William, the historian of the Peninsular War. [1410] Such also was the character of Sir James Outram, p.r.o.nounced by Sir Charles Napier to be "the Bayard of India, SANS PEUR ET SANS REPROCHE"--one of the bravest and yet gentlest of men; respectful and reverent to women, tender to children, helpful of the weak, stern to the corrupt, but kindly as summer to the honest and deserving. Moreover, he was himself as honest as day, and as pure as virtue. Of him it might be said with truth, what Fulke Greville said of Sidney: "He was a true model of worth--a man fit for conquest, reformation, plantation, or what action soever is the greatest and hardest among men; his chief ends withal being above all things the good of his fellows, and the service of his sovereign and country."

When Edward the Black Prince won the Battle of Poictiers, in which he took prisoner the French king and his son, he entertained them in the evening at a banquet, when he insisted on waiting upon and serving them at table. The gallant prince's knightly courtesy and demeanour won the hearts of his captives as completely as his valour had won their persons; for, notwithstanding his youth, Edward was a true knight, the first and bravest of his time--a n.o.ble pattern and example of chivalry; his two mottoes, 'Hochmuth' and 'Ich dien' [14high spirit and reverent service] not inaptly expressing his prominent and pervading qualities.

It is the courageous man who can best afford to be generous; or rather, it is his nature to be so. When Fairfax, at the Battle of Naseby, seized the colours from an ensign whom he had struck down in the fight, he handed them to a common soldier to take care of. The soldier, unable to resist the temptation, boasted to his comrades that he had himself seized the colours, and the boast was repeated to Fairfax. "Let him retain the honour," said the commander; "I have enough beside."

So when Douglas, at the Battle of Bannockburn, saw Randolph, his rival, outnumbered and apparently overpowered by the enemy, he prepared to hasten to his a.s.sistance; but, seeing that Randolph was already driving them back, he cried out, "Hold and halt! We are come too late to aid them; let us not lessen the victory they have won by affecting to claim a share in it."

Quite as chivalrous, though in a very different field of action, was the conduct of Laplace to the young philosopher Biot, when the latter had read to the French Academy his paper, "SUR LES EQUATIONS AUX DIFFERENCE MELEES." The a.s.sembled SAVANS, at its close, felicitated the reader of the paper on his originality. Monge was delighted at his success.

Laplace also praised him for the clearness of his demonstrations, and invited Biot to accompany him home. Arrived there, Laplace took from a closet in his study a paper, yellow with age, and handed it to the young philosopher. To Biot's surprise, he found that it contained the solutions, all worked out, for which he had just gained so much applause. With rare magnanimity, Laplace withheld all knowledge of the circ.u.mstance from Biot until the latter had initiated his reputation before the Academy; moreover, he enjoined him to silence; and the incident would have remained a secret had not Biot himself published it, some fifty years afterwards.

An incident is related of a French artisan, exhibiting the same characteristic of self-sacrifice in another form. In front of a lofty house in course of erection at Paris was the usual scaffold, loaded with men and materials. The scaffold, being too weak, suddenly broke down, and the men upon it were precipitated to the ground--all except two, a young man and a middle-aged one, who hung on to a narrow ledge, which trembled under their weight, and was evidently on the point of giving way. "Pierre," cried the elder of the two, "let go; I am the father of a family." "C'EST JUSTE!" said Pierre; and, instantly letting go his hold, he fell and was killed on the spot. The father of the family was saved.

The brave man is magnanimous as well as gentle. He does not take even an enemy at a disadvantage, nor strike a man when he is down and unable to defend himself. Even in the midst of deadly strife such instances of generosity have not been uncommon. Thus, at the Battle of Dettingen, during the heat of the action, a squadron of French cavalry charged an English regiment; but when the young French officer who led them, and was about to attack the English leader, observed that he had only one arm, with which he held his bridle, the Frenchman saluted him courteously with his sword, and pa.s.sed on. [1411]

It is related of Charles V., that after the siege and capture of Wittenburg by the Imperialist army, the monarch went to see the tomb of Luther. While reading the inscription on it, one of the servile courtiers who accompanied him proposed to open the grave, and give the ashes of the "heretic" to the winds. The monarch's cheek flushed with honest indignation: "I war not with the dead," said he; "let this place be respected."

The portrait which the great heathen, Aristotle, drew of the Magnanimous Man, in other words the True Gentleman, more than two thousand years ago, is as faithful now as it was then. "The magnanimous man," he said, "will behave with moderation under both good fortune and bad. He will know how to be exalted and how to be abased. He will neither be delighted with success nor grieved by failure. He will neither shun danger nor seek it, for there are few things which he cares for. He is reticent, and somewhat slow of speech, but speaks his mind openly and boldly when occasion calls for it. He is apt to admire, for nothing is great to him. He overlooks injuries. He is not given to talk about himself or about others; for he does not care that he himself should be praised, or that other people should be blamed. He does not cry out about trifles, and craves help from none."

On the other hand, mean men admire meanly. They have neither modesty, generosity, nor magnanimity. They are ready to take advantage of the weakness or defencelessness of others, especially where they have themselves succeeded, by unscrupulous methods, in climbing to positions of authority. Sn.o.bs in high places are always much less tolerable than sn.o.bs of low degree, because they have more frequent opportunities of making their want of manliness felt. They a.s.sume greater airs, and are pretentious in all that they do; and the higher their elevation, the more conspicuous is the incongruity of their position. "The higher the monkey climbs," says the proverb, "the more he shows his tail."

Much depends on the way in which a thing is done. An act which might be taken as a kindness if done in a generous spirit, when done in a grudging spirit, may be felt as stingy, if not harsh and even cruel.

When Ben Jonson lay sick and in poverty, the king sent him a paltry message, accompanied by a gratuity. The st.u.r.dy plainspoken poet's reply was: "I suppose he sends me this because I live in an alley; tell him his soul lives in an alley."

From what we have said, it will be obvious that to be of an enduring and courageous spirit, is of great importance in the formation of character.

It is a source not only of usefulness in life, but of happiness. On the other hand, to be of a timid and, still more, of a cowardly nature is one of the greatest misfortunes. A. wise man was accustomed to say that one of the princ.i.p.al objects he aimed at in the education of his sons and daughters was to train them in the habit of fearing nothing so much as fear. And the habit of avoiding fear is, doubtless, capable of being trained like any other habit, such as the habit of attention, of diligence, of study, or of cheerfulness.

Much of the fear that exists is the offspring of imagination, which creates the images of evils which MAY happen, but perhaps rarely do; and thus many persons who are capable of summoning up courage to grapple with and overcome real dangers, are paralysed or thrown into consternation by those which are imaginary. Hence, unless the imagination be held under strict discipline, we are p.r.o.ne to meet evils more than halfway--to suffer them by forestalment, and to a.s.sume the burdens which we ourselves create.

Education in courage is not usually included amongst the branches of female training, and yet it is really of greater importance than either music, French, or the use of the globes. Contrary to the view of Sir Richard Steele, that women should be characterised by a "tender fear,"

and "an inferiority which makes her lovely," we would have women educated in resolution and courage, as a means of rendering them more helpful, more self-reliant, and vastly more useful and happy.

There is, indeed, nothing attractive in timidity, nothing loveable in fear. All weakness, whether of mind or body, is equivalent to deformity, and the reverse of interesting. Courage is graceful and dignified, whilst fear, in any form, is mean and repulsive. Yet the utmost tenderness and gentleness are consistent with courage. Ary Scheffer, the artist, once wrote to his daughter:-"Dear daughter, strive to be of good courage, to be gentle-hearted; these are the true qualities for woman.

'Troubles' everybody must expect. There is but one way of looking at fate--whatever that be, whether blessings or afflictions--to behave with dignity under both. We must not lose heart, or it will be the worse both for ourselves and for those whom we love. To struggle, and again and again to renew the conflict--THIS is life's inheritance." [1412]

In sickness and sorrow, none are braver and less complaining sufferers than women. Their courage, where their hearts are concerned, is indeed proverbial:

"Oh! femmes c'est a tort qu'on vous nommes timides, A la voix de vos coeurs vous etes intrepides."

Experience has proved that women can be as enduring as men, under the heaviest trials and calamities; but too little pains are taken to teach them to endure petty terrors and frivolous vexations with fort.i.tude.

Such little miseries, if petted and indulged, quickly run into sickly sensibility, and become the bane of their life, keeping themselves and those about them in a state of chronic discomfort.

The best corrective of this condition of mind is wholesome moral and mental discipline. Mental strength is as necessary for the development of woman's character as of man's. It gives her capacity to deal with the affairs of life, and presence of mind, which enable her to act with vigour and effect in moments of emergency. Character, in a woman, as in a man, will always be found the best safeguard of virtue, the best nurse of religion, the best corrective of Time. Personal beauty soon pa.s.ses; but beauty of mind and character increases in attractiveness the older it grows.

Ben Jonson gives a striking portraiture of a n.o.ble woman in these lines:--

"I meant she should be courteous, facile, sweet, Free from that solemn vice of greatness, pride; I meant each softed virtue there should meet, Fit in that softer bosom to abide.

Only a learned and a manly soul, I purposed her, that should with even powers, The rock, the spindle, and the shears control Of destiny, and spin her own free hours."

The courage of woman is not the less true because it is for the most part pa.s.sive. It is not encouraged by the cheers of the world, for it is mostly exhibited in the recesses of private life. Yet there are cases of heroic patience and endurance on the part of women which occasionally come to the light of day. One of the most celebrated instances in history is that of Gertrude Von der Wart. Her husband, falsely accused of being an accomplice in the murder of the Emperor Albert, was condemned to the most frightful of all punishments--to be broken alive on the wheel. With most profound conviction of her husband's innocence the faithful woman stood by his side to the last, watching over him during two days and nights, braving the empress's anger and the inclemency of the weather, in the hope of contributing to soothe his dying agonies. [1413]

But women have not only distinguished themselves for their pa.s.sive courage: impelled by affection, or the sense of duty, they have occasionally become heroic. When the band of conspirators, who sought the life of James II. of Scotland, burst into his lodgings at Perth, the king called to the ladies, who were in the chamber outside his room, to keep the door as well as they could, and give him time to escape. The conspirators had previously destroyed the locks of the doors, so that the keys could not be turned; and when they reached the ladies'

apartment, it was found that the bar also had been removed. But, on hearing them approach, the brave Catherine Douglas, with the hereditary courage of her family, boldly thrust her arm across the door instead of the bar; and held it there until, her arm being broken, the conspirators burst into the room with drawn swords and daggers, overthrowing the ladies, who, though unarmed, still endeavoured to resist them.

The defence of Lathom House by Charlotte de la Tremouille, the worthy descendant of William of Na.s.sau and Admiral Coligny, was another striking instance of heroic bravery on the part of a n.o.ble woman. When summoned by the Parliamentary forces to surrender, she declared that she had been entrusted by her husband with the defence of the house, and that she could not give it up without her dear lord's orders, but trusted in G.o.d for protection and deliverance. In her arrangements for the defence, she is described as having "left nothing with her eye to be excused afterwards by fortune or negligence, and added to her former patience a most resolved fort.i.tude." The brave lady held her house and home good against the enemy for a whole year--during three months of which the place was strictly besieged and bombarded--until at length the siege was raised, after a most gallant defence, by the advance of the Royalist army.

Nor can we forget the courage of Lady Franklin, who persevered to the last, when the hopes of all others had died out, in prosecuting the search after the Franklin Expedition. On the occasion of the Royal Geographical Society determining to award the Founder's Medal to Lady Franklin, Sir Roderick Murchison observed, that in the course of a long friends.h.i.+p with her, he had abundant opportunities of observing and testing the sterling qualities of a woman who had proved herself worthy of the admiration of mankind. "Nothing daunted by failure after failure, through twelve long years of hope deferred, she had persevered, with a singleness of purpose and a sincere devotion which were truly unparalleled. And now that her one last expedition of the FOX, under the gallant M'Clintock, had realised the two great facts--that her husband had traversed wide seas unknown to former navigators, and died in discovering a north-west pa.s.sage--then, surely, the adjudication of the medal would be hailed by the nation as one of the many recompences to which the widow of the ill.u.s.trious Franklin was so eminently ent.i.tled."

But that devotion to duty which marks the heroic character has more often been exhibited by women in deeds of charity and mercy. The greater part of these are never known, for they are done in private, out of the public sight, and for the mere love of doing good. Where fame has come to them, because of the success which has attended their labours in a more general sphere, it has come unsought and unexpected, and is often felt as a burden. Who has not heard of Mrs. Fry and Miss Carpenter as prison visitors and reformers; of Mrs. Chisholm and Miss Rye as promoters of emigration; and of Miss Nightingale and Miss Garrett as apostles of hospital nursing?

That these women should have emerged from the sphere of private and domestic life to become leaders in philanthropy, indicates no small, degree of moral courage on their part; for to women, above all others, quiet and ease and retirement are most natural and welcome. Very few women step beyond the boundaries of home in search of a larger field of usefulness. But when they have desired one, they have had no difficulty in finding it. The ways in which men and women can help their neighbours are innumerable. It needs but the willing heart and ready hand. Most of the philanthropic workers we have named, however, have scarcely been influenced by choice. The duty lay in their way--it seemed to be the nearest to them--and they set about doing it without desire for fame, or any other reward but the approval of their own conscience.

Among prison-visitors, the name of Sarah Martin is much less known than that of Mrs. Fry, although she preceded her in the work. How she was led to undertake it, furnishes at the same time an ill.u.s.tration of womanly trueheartedness and earnest womanly courage.

Sarah Martin was the daughter of poor parents, and was left an orphan at an early age. She was brought up by her grandmother, at Caistor, near Yarmouth, and earned her living by going out to families as a.s.sistant-dressmaker, at a s.h.i.+lling a day. In 1819, a woman was tried and sentenced to imprisonment in Yarmouth Gaol, for cruelly beating and illusing her child, and her crime became the talk of the town. The young dressmaker was much impressed by the report of the trial, and the desire entered her mind of visiting the woman in gaol, and trying to reclaim her. She had often before, on pa.s.sing the walls of the borough gaol, felt impelled to seek admission, with the object of visiting the inmates, reading the Scriptures to them, and endeavouring to lead them back to the society whose laws they had violated.

At length she could not resist her impulse to visit the mother. She entered the gaol-porch, lifted the knocker, and asked the gaoler for admission. For some reason or other she was refused; but she returned, repeated her request, and this time she was admitted. The culprit mother shortly stood before her. When Sarah Martin told the motive of her visit, the criminal burst into tears, and thanked her. Those tears and thanks shaped the whole course of Sarah Martin's after-life; and the poor seamstress, while maintaining herself by her needle, continued to spend her leisure hours in visiting the prisoners, and endeavouring to alleviate their condition. She const.i.tuted herself their chaplain and schoolmistress, for at that time they had neither; she read to them from the Scriptures, and taught them to read and write. She gave up an entire day in the week for this purpose, besides Sundays, as well as other intervals of spare time, "feeling," she says, "that the blessing of G.o.d was upon her." She taught the women to knit, to sew, and to cut out; the sale of the articles enabling her to buy other materials, and to continue the industrial education thus begun. She also taught the men to make straw hats, men's and boys' caps, gray cotton s.h.i.+rts, and even patchwork--anything to keep them out of idleness, and from preying on their own thoughts. Out of the earnings of the prisoners in this way, she formed a fund, which she applied to furnis.h.i.+ng them with work on their discharge; thus enabling them again to begin the world honestly, and at the same time affording her, as she herself says, "the advantage of observing their conduct."

By attending too exclusively to this prison-work, however, Sarah Martin's dressmaking business fell off; and the question arose with her, whether in order to recover her business she was to suspend her prison-work. But her decision had already been made. "I had counted the cost," she said, "and my mind, was made up. If, whilst imparting truth to others, I became exposed to temporal want, the privations so momentary to an individual would not admit of comparison with following the Lord, in thus administering to others." She now devoted six or seven hours every day to the prisoners, converting what would otherwise have been a scene of dissolute idleness into a hive of orderly industry.

Newly-admitted prisoners were sometimes refractory, but her persistent gentleness eventually won their respect and co-operation. Men old in years and crime, pert London pickpockets, depraved boys and dissolute sailors, profligate women, smugglers, poachers, and the promiscuous horde of criminals which usually fill the gaol of a seaport and county town, all submitted to the benign influence of this good woman; and under her eyes they might be seen, for the first time in their lives, striving to hold a pen, or to master the characters in a penny primer.

She entered into their confidences--watched, wept, prayed, and felt for all by turns. She strengthened their good resolutions, cheered the hopeless and despairing, and endeavoured to put all, and hold all, in the right road of amendment.

For more than twenty years this good and truehearted woman pursued her n.o.ble course, with little encouragement, and not much help; almost her only means of subsistence consisting in an annual income of ten or twelve pounds left by her grandmother, eked out by her little earnings at dressmaking. During the last two years of her ministrations, the borough magistrates of Yarmouth, knowing that her self-imposed labours saved them the expense of a schoolmaster and chaplain [14which they had become bound by law to appoint], made a proposal to her of an annual salary of 12L. a year; but they did it in so indelicate a manner as greatly to wound her sensitive feelings. She shrank from becoming the salaried official of the corporation, and bartering for money those serviced which had throughout been labours of love. But the Gaol Committee coa.r.s.ely informed her, "that if they permitted her to visit the prison she must submit to their terms, or be excluded." For two years, therefore, she received the salary of 12L. a year--the acknowledgment of the Yarmouth corporation for her services as gaol chaplain and schoolmistress! She was now, however, becoming old and infirm, and the unhealthy atmosphere of the gaol did much towards finally disabling her. While she lay on her deathbed, she resumed the exercise of a talent she had occasionally practised before in her moments of leisure--the composition of sacred poetry. As works of art, they may not excite admiration; yet never were verses written truer in spirit, or fuller of Christian love. But her own life was a n.o.bler poem than any she ever wrote--full of true courage, perseverance, charity, and wisdom. It was indeed a commentary upon her own words:

"The high desire that others may be blest Savours of heaven."

CHAPTER VI.--SELF-CONTROL.