It is complete error to suppose that because a thing is vulgar therefore it is not refined; that is, subtle and hard to define. A drawing-room song of my youth which began “In the gloaming, O, my darling,” was vulgar enough as a song; but the connection between human passion and the twilight12 is none the less an exquisite13 and even inscrutable thing. Or to take another obvious instance: the jokes about a mother-in-law are scarcely delicate, but the problem of a mother-in-law is extremely delicate. A mother-in-law is subtle because she is a thing like the twilight. She is a mystical blend of two inconsistent things—law and a mother. The caricatures misrepresent her; but they arise out of a real human enigma14. “Comic Cuts” deals with the difficulty wrongly, but it would need George Meredith at his best to deal with the difficulty rightly. The nearest statement of the problem perhaps is this: it is not that a mother-in-law must be nasty, but that she must be very nice.
But it is best perhaps to take in illustration some daily custom we have all heard despised as vulgar or trite15. Take, for the sake of argument, the custom of talking about the weather. Stevenson calls it “the very nadir16 and scoff17 of good conversationalists.” Now there are very deep reasons for talking about the weather, reasons that are delicate as well as deep; they lie in layer upon layer of stratified sagacity. First of all it is a gesture of primeval worship. The sky must be invoked18; and to begin everything with the weather is a sort of pagan way of beginning everything with prayer. Jones and Brown talk about the weather: but so do Milton and Shelley. Then it is an expression of that elementary idea in politeness—equality. For the very word politeness is only the Greek for citizenship19. The word politeness is akin20 to the word policeman: a charming thought. Properly understood, the citizen should be more polite than the gentleman; perhaps the policeman should be the most courtly and elegant of the three. But all good manners must obviously begin with the sharing of something in a simple style. Two men should share an umbrella; if they have not got an umbrella, they should at least share the rain, with all its rich potentialities of wit and philosophy. “For He maketh His sun to shine....” This is the second element in the weather; its recognition of human equality in that we all have our hats under the dark blue spangled umbrella of the universe. Arising out of this is the third wholesome21 strain in the custom; I mean that it begins with the body and with our inevitable22 bodily brotherhood23. All true friendliness24 begins with fire and food and drink and the recognition of rain or frost. Those who will not begin at the bodily end of things are already prigs and may soon be Christian25 Scientists. Each human soul has in a sense to enact26 for itself the gigantic humility27 of the Incarnation. Every man must descend28 into the flesh to meet mankind.
Briefly29, in the mere observation “a fine day” there is the whole great human idea of comradeship. Now, pure comradeship is another of those broad and yet bewildering things. We all enjoy it; yet when we come to talk about it we almost always talk nonsense, chiefly because we suppose it to be a simpler affair than it is. It is simple to conduct; but it is by no means simple to analyze. Comradeship is at the most only one half of human life; the other half is Love, a thing so different that one might fancy it had been made for another universe. And I do not mean mere sex love; any kind of concentrated passion, maternal30 love, or even the fiercer kinds of friendship are in their nature alien to pure comradeship. Both sides are essential to life; and both are known in differing degrees to everybody of every age or sex. But very broadly speaking it may still be said that women stand for the dignity of love and men for the dignity of comradeship. I mean that the institution would hardly be expected if the males of the tribe did not mount guard over it. The affections in which women excel have so much more authority and intensity31 that pure comradeship would be washed away if it were not rallied and guarded in clubs, corps32, colleges, banquets and regiments34. Most of us have heard the voice in which the hostess tells her husband not to sit too long over the cigars. It is the dreadful voice of Love, seeking to destroy Comradeship.
All true comradeship has in it those three elements which I have remarked in the ordinary exclamation35 about the weather. First, it has a sort of broad philosophy like the common sky, emphasizing that we are all under the same cosmic conditions. We are all in the same boat, the “winged rock” of Mr. Herbert Trench36. Secondly37, it recognizes this bond as the essential one; for comradeship is simply humanity seen in that one aspect in which men are really equal. The old writers were entirely38 wise when they talked of the equality of men; but they were also very wise in not mentioning women. Women are always authoritarian39; they are always above or below; that is why marriage is a sort of poetical40 see-saw. There are only three things in the world that women do not understand; and they are Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. But men (a class little understood in the modern world) find these things the breath of their nostrils41; and our most learned ladies will not even begin to understand them until they make allowance for this kind of cool camaraderie42. Lastly, it contains the third quality of the weather, the insistence43 upon the body and its indispensable satisfaction. No one has even begun to understand comradeship who does not accept with it a certain hearty44 eagerness in eating, drinking, or smoking, an uproarious materialism45 which to many women appears only hoggish46. You may call the thing an orgy or a sacrament; it is certainly an essential. It is at root a resistance to the superciliousness47 of the individual. Nay48, its very swaggering and howling are humble49. In the heart of its rowdiness there is a sort of mad modesty50; a desire to melt the separate soul into the mass of unpretentious masculinity. It is a clamorous51 confession52 of the weakness of all flesh. No man must be superior to the things that are common to men. This sort of equality must be bodily and gross and comic. Not only are we all in the same boat, but we are all seasick53.
The word comradeship just now promises to become as fatuous54 as the word “affinity.” There are clubs of a Socialist55 sort where all the members, men and women, call each other “Comrade.” I have no serious emotions, hostile or otherwise, about this particular habit: at the worst it is conventionality, and at the best flirtation56. I am convinced here only to point out a rational principle. If you choose to lump all flowers together, lilies and dahlias and tulips and chrysanthemums57 and call them all daisies, you will find that you have spoiled the very fine word daisy. If you choose to call every human attachment58 comradeship, if you include under that name the respect of a youth for a venerable prophetess, the interest of a man in a beautiful woman who baffles him, the pleasure of a philosophical59 old fogy in a girl who is impudent60 and innocent, the end of the meanest quarrel or the beginning of the most mountainous love; if you are going to call all these comradeship, you will gain nothing, you will only lose a word. Daisies are obvious and universal and open; but they are only one kind of flower. Comradeship is obvious and universal and open; but it is only one kind of affection; it has characteristics that would destroy any other kind. Anyone who has known true comradeship in a club or in a regiment33, knows that it is impersonal61. There is a pedantic62 phrase used in debating clubs which is strictly63 true to the masculine emotion; they call it “speaking to the question.” Women speak to each other; men speak to the subject they are speaking about. Many an honest man has sat in a ring of his five best friends under heaven and forgotten who was in the room while he explained some system. This is not peculiar64 to intellectual men; men are all theoretical, whether they are talking about God or about golf. Men are all impersonal; that is to say, republican. No one remembers after a really good talk who has said the good things. Every man speaks to a visionary multitude; a mystical cloud, that is called the club.
It is obvious that this cool and careless quality which is essential to the collective affection of males involves disadvantages and dangers. It leads to spitting; it leads to coarse speech; it must lead to these things so long as it is honorable; comradeship must be in some degree ugly. The moment beauty is mentioned in male friendship, the nostrils are stopped with the smell of abominable65 things. Friendship must be physically66 dirty if it is to be morally clean. It must be in its shirt sleeves. The chaos67 of habits that always goes with males when left entirely to themselves has only one honorable cure; and that is the strict discipline of a monastery68. Anyone who has seen our unhappy young idealists in East End Settlements losing their collars in the wash and living on tinned salmon69 will fully70 understand why it was decided71 by the wisdom of St. Bernard or St. Benedict, that if men were to live without women, they must not live without rules. Something of the same sort of artificial exactitude, of course, is obtained in an army; and an army also has to be in many ways monastic; only that it has celibacy72 without chastity. But these things do not apply to normal married men. These have a quite sufficient restraint on their instinctive73 anarchy74 in the savage75 common-sense of the other sex. There is only one very timid sort of man that is not afraid of women.
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1 precisely | |
adv.恰好,正好,精确地,细致地 | |
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2 monstrous | |
adj.巨大的;恐怖的;可耻的,丢脸的 | |
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3 prodigy | |
n.惊人的事物,奇迹,神童,天才,预兆 | |
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4 mere | |
adj.纯粹的;仅仅,只不过 | |
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5 dealing | |
n.经商方法,待人态度 | |
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6 awe | |
n.敬畏,惊惧;vt.使敬畏,使惊惧 | |
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7 memento | |
n.纪念品,令人回忆的东西 | |
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8 itch | |
n.痒,渴望,疥癣;vi.发痒,渴望 | |
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9 dread | |
vt.担忧,忧虑;惧怕,不敢;n.担忧,畏惧 | |
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10 touching | |
adj.动人的,使人感伤的 | |
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11 analyze | |
vt.分析,解析 (=analyse) | |
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12 twilight | |
n.暮光,黄昏;暮年,晚期,衰落时期 | |
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13 exquisite | |
adj.精美的;敏锐的;剧烈的,感觉强烈的 | |
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14 enigma | |
n.谜,谜一样的人或事 | |
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15 trite | |
adj.陈腐的 | |
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16 nadir | |
n.最低点,无底 | |
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17 scoff | |
n.嘲笑,笑柄,愚弄;v.嘲笑,嘲弄,愚弄,狼吞虎咽 | |
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18 invoked | |
v.援引( invoke的过去式和过去分词 );行使(权利等);祈求救助;恳求 | |
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19 citizenship | |
n.市民权,公民权,国民的义务(身份) | |
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20 akin | |
adj.同族的,类似的 | |
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21 wholesome | |
adj.适合;卫生的;有益健康的;显示身心健康的 | |
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22 inevitable | |
adj.不可避免的,必然发生的 | |
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23 brotherhood | |
n.兄弟般的关系,手中情谊 | |
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24 friendliness | |
n.友谊,亲切,亲密 | |
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25 Christian | |
adj.基督教徒的;n.基督教徒 | |
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26 enact | |
vt.制定(法律);上演,扮演 | |
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27 humility | |
n.谦逊,谦恭 | |
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28 descend | |
vt./vi.传下来,下来,下降 | |
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29 briefly | |
adv.简单地,简短地 | |
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30 maternal | |
adj.母亲的,母亲般的,母系的,母方的 | |
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31 intensity | |
n.强烈,剧烈;强度;烈度 | |
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32 corps | |
n.(通信等兵种的)部队;(同类作的)一组 | |
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33 regiment | |
n.团,多数,管理;v.组织,编成团,统制 | |
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34 regiments | |
(军队的)团( regiment的名词复数 ); 大量的人或物 | |
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35 exclamation | |
n.感叹号,惊呼,惊叹词 | |
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36 trench | |
n./v.(挖)沟,(挖)战壕 | |
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37 secondly | |
adv.第二,其次 | |
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38 entirely | |
ad.全部地,完整地;完全地,彻底地 | |
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39 authoritarian | |
n./adj.专制(的),专制主义者,独裁主义者 | |
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40 poetical | |
adj.似诗人的;诗一般的;韵文的;富有诗意的 | |
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41 nostrils | |
鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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42 camaraderie | |
n.同志之爱,友情 | |
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43 insistence | |
n.坚持;强调;坚决主张 | |
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44 hearty | |
adj.热情友好的;衷心的;尽情的,纵情的 | |
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45 materialism | |
n.[哲]唯物主义,唯物论;物质至上 | |
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46 hoggish | |
adj.贪婪的 | |
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47 superciliousness | |
n.高傲,傲慢 | |
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48 nay | |
adv.不;n.反对票,投反对票者 | |
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49 humble | |
adj.谦卑的,恭顺的;地位低下的;v.降低,贬低 | |
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50 modesty | |
n.谦逊,虚心,端庄,稳重,羞怯,朴素 | |
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51 clamorous | |
adj.吵闹的,喧哗的 | |
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52 confession | |
n.自白,供认,承认 | |
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53 seasick | |
adj.晕船的 | |
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54 fatuous | |
adj.愚昧的;昏庸的 | |
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55 socialist | |
n.社会主义者;adj.社会主义的 | |
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56 flirtation | |
n.调情,调戏,挑逗 | |
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57 chrysanthemums | |
n.菊花( chrysanthemum的名词复数 ) | |
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58 attachment | |
n.附属物,附件;依恋;依附 | |
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59 philosophical | |
adj.哲学家的,哲学上的,达观的 | |
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60 impudent | |
adj.鲁莽的,卑鄙的,厚颜无耻的 | |
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61 impersonal | |
adj.无个人感情的,与个人无关的,非人称的 | |
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62 pedantic | |
adj.卖弄学问的;迂腐的 | |
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63 strictly | |
adv.严厉地,严格地;严密地 | |
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64 peculiar | |
adj.古怪的,异常的;特殊的,特有的 | |
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65 abominable | |
adj.可厌的,令人憎恶的 | |
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66 physically | |
adj.物质上,体格上,身体上,按自然规律 | |
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67 chaos | |
n.混乱,无秩序 | |
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68 monastery | |
n.修道院,僧院,寺院 | |
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69 salmon | |
n.鲑,大马哈鱼,橙红色的 | |
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70 fully | |
adv.完全地,全部地,彻底地;充分地 | |
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71 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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72 celibacy | |
n.独身(主义) | |
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73 instinctive | |
adj.(出于)本能的;直觉的;(出于)天性的 | |
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74 anarchy | |
n.无政府状态;社会秩序混乱,无秩序 | |
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75 savage | |
adj.野蛮的;凶恶的,残暴的;n.未开化的人 | |
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