Sometimes I see small fragments of information in the newspapers which make my heart leap with an irrational8 patriotic9 sympathy. I have had the misfortune to be left comparatively cold by many of the enterprises and proclamations of my country in recent times. But the other day I found in the Tribune the following paragraph, which I may be permitted to set down as an example of the kind of international outrage10 with which I have by far the most instinctive11 sympathy. There is something attractive, too, in the austere12 simplicity13 with which the affair is set forth—
"Geneva, Oct. 31.
"The English schoolboy Allen, who was arrested at Lausanne railway station on Saturday, for having painted red the statue of General Jomini of Payerne, was liberated14 yesterday, after paying a fine of £24. Allen has proceeded to Germany, where he will continue his studies. The people of Payerne are indignant, and clamoured for his detention15 in prison."
Now I have no doubt that ethics17 and social necessity require a contrary attitude, but I will freely confess that my first emotions on reading of this exploit were those of profound and elemental pleasure. There is something so large and simple about the operation of painting a whole stone General a bright red. Of course I can understand that the people of Payerne were indignant. They had passed to their homes at twilight18 through the streets of that beautiful city (or is it a province?), and they had seen against the silver ending of the sunset the grand grey figure of the hero of that land remaining to guard the town under the stars. It certainly must have been a shock to come out in the broad white morning and find a large vermilion General staring under the staring sun. I do not blame them at all for clamouring for the schoolboy's detention in prison; I dare say a little detention in prison would do him no harm. Still, I think the immense act has something about it human and excusable; and when I endeavour to analyse the reason of this feeling I find it to lie, not in the fact that the thing was big or bold or successful, but in the fact that the thing was perfectly19 useless to everybody, including the person who did it. The raid ends in itself; and so Master Allen is sucked back again, having accomplished nothing but an epic.
There is one thing which, in the presence of average modern journalism20, is perhaps worth saying in connection with such an idle matter as this. The morals of a matter like this are exactly like the morals of anything else; they are concerned with mutual21 contract, or with the rights of independent human lives. But the whole modern world, or at any rate the whole modern Press, has a perpetual and consuming terror of plain morals. Men always attempt to avoid condemning22 a thing upon merely moral grounds. If I beat my grandmother to death to-morrow in the middle of Battersea Park, you may be perfectly certain that people will say everything about it except the simple and fairly obvious fact that it is wrong. Some will call it insane; that is, will accuse it of a deficiency of intelligence. This is not necessarily true at all. You could not tell whether the act was unintelligent or not unless you knew my grandmother. Some will call it vulgar, disgusting, and the rest of it; that is, they will accuse it of a lack of manners. Perhaps it does show a lack of manners; but this is scarcely its most serious disadvantage. Others will talk about the loathsome23 spectacle and the revolting scene; that is, they will accuse it of a deficiency of art, or æsthetic beauty. This again depends on the circumstances: in order to be quite certain that the appearance of the old lady has definitely deteriorated24 under the process of being beaten to death, it is necessary for the philosophical25 critic to be quite certain how ugly she was before. Another school of thinkers will say that the action is lacking in efficiency: that it is an uneconomic waste of a good grandmother. But that could only depend on the value, which is again an individual matter. The only real point that is worth mentioning is that the action is wicked, because your grandmother has a right not to be beaten to death. But of this simple moral explanation modern journalism has, as I say, a standing26 fear. It will call the action anything else—mad, bestial27, vulgar, idiotic28, rather than call it sinful.
One example can be found in such cases as that of the prank29 of the boy and the statue. When some trick of this sort is played, the newspapers opposed to it always describe it as "a senseless joke." What is the good of saying that? Every joke is a senseless joke. A joke is by its nature a protest against sense. It is no good attacking nonsense for being successfully nonsensical. Of course it is nonsensical to paint a celebrated30 Italian General a bright red; it is as nonsensical as "Alice in Wonderland." It is also, in my opinion, very nearly as funny. But the real answer to the affair is not to say that it is nonsensical or even to say that it is not funny, but to point out that it is wrong to spoil statues which belong to other people. If the modern world will not insist on having some sharp and definite moral law, capable of resisting the counter-attractions of art and humour, the modern world will simply be given over as a spoil to anybody who can manage to do a nasty thing in a nice way. Every murderer who can murder entertainingly will be allowed to murder. Every burglar who burgles in really humorous attitudes will burgle as much as he likes.
There is another case of the thing that I mean. Why on earth do the newspapers, in describing a dynamite31 outrage or any other political assassination32, call it a "dastardly outrage" or a cowardly outrage? It is perfectly evident that it is not dastardly in the least. It is perfectly evident that it is about as cowardly as the Christians33 going to the lions. The man who does it exposes himself to the chance of being torn in pieces by two thousand people. What the thing is, is not cowardly, but profoundly and detestably wicked. The man who does it is very infamous34 and very brave. But, again, the explanation is that our modern Press would rather appeal to physical arrogance35, or to anything, rather than appeal to right and wrong.
In most of the matters of modern England, the real difficulty is that there is a negative revolution without a positive revolution. Positive aristocracy is breaking up without any particular appearance of positive democracy taking its place. The polished class is becoming less polished without becoming less of a class; the nobleman who becomes a guinea-pig keeps all his privileges but loses some of his tradition; he becomes less of a gentleman without becoming less of a nobleman. In the same way (until some recent and happy revivals) it seemed highly probable that the Church of England would cease to be a religion long before it had ceased to be a Church. And in the same way, the vulgarisation of the old, simple middle class does not even have the advantage of doing away with class distinctions; the vulgar man is always the most distinguished36, for the very desire to be distinguished is vulgar.
At the same time, it must be remembered that when a class has a morality it does not follow that it is an adequate morality. The middle-class ethic16 was inadequate37 for some purposes; so is the public-school ethic, the ethic of the upper classes. On this last matter of the public schools Dr. Spenser, the Head Master of University College School, has lately made some valuable observations. But even he, I think, overstates the claim of the public schools. "The strong point of the English public schools," he says, "has always lain in their efficiency as agencies for the formation of character and for the inculcation of the great notion of obligation which distinguishes a gentleman. On the physical and moral sides the public-school men of England are, I believe, unequalled." And he goes on to say that it is on the mental side that they are defective38. But, as a matter of fact, the public-school training is in the strict sense defective upon the moral side also; it leaves out about half of morality. Its just claim is that, like the old middle class (and the Zulus), it trains some virtues39 and therefore suits some people for some situations. Put an old English merchant to serve in an army and he would have been irritated and clumsy. Put the men from English public schools to rule Ireland, and they make the greatest hash in human history.
Touching40 the morality of the public schools, I will take one point only, which is enough to prove the case. People have got into their heads an extraordinary idea that English public-school boys and English youth generally are taught to tell the truth. They are taught absolutely nothing of the kind. At no English public school is it even suggested, except by accident, that it is a man's duty to tell the truth. What is suggested is something entirely41 different: that it is a man's duty not to tell lies. So completely does this mistake soak through all civilisation42 that we hardly ever think even of the difference between the two things. When we say to a child, "You must tell the truth," we do merely mean that he must refrain from verbal inaccuracies. But the thing we never teach at all is the general duty of telling the truth, of giving a complete and fair picture of anything we are talking about, of not misrepresenting, not evading43, not suppressing, not using plausible44 arguments that we know to be unfair, not selecting unscrupulously to prove an ex parte case, not telling all the nice stories about the Scotch45, and all the nasty stories about the Irish, not pretending to be disinterested46 when you are really angry, not pretending to be angry when you are really only avaricious47. The one thing that is never taught by any chance in the atmosphere of public schools is exactly that—that there is a whole truth of things, and that in knowing it and speaking it we are happy.
If any one has the smallest doubt of this neglect of truth in public schools he can kill his doubt with one plain question. Can any one on earth believe that if the seeing and telling of the whole truth were really one of the ideals of the English governing class, there could conceivably exist such a thing as the English party system? Why, the English party system is founded upon the principle that telling the whole truth does not matter. It is founded upon the principle that half a truth is better than no politics. Our system deliberately48 turns a crowd of men who might be impartial49 into irrational partisans50. It teaches some of them to tell lies and all of them to believe lies. It gives every man an arbitrary brief that he has to work up as best he may and defend as best he can. It turns a room full of citizens into a room full of barristers. I know that it has many charms and virtues, fighting and good-fellowship; it has all the charms and virtues of a game. I only say that it would be a stark51 impossibility in a nation which believed in telling the truth.
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1
aggression
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| n.进攻，侵略，侵犯，侵害 | |
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brawl
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| n.大声争吵，喧嚷；v.吵架，对骂 | |
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annex
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| vt.兼并，吞并；n.附属建筑物 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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militant
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| adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士 | |
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accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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epic
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| n.史诗，叙事诗；adj.史诗般的，壮丽的 | |
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irrational
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| adj.无理性的，失去理性的 | |
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patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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outrage
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| n.暴行，侮辱，愤怒；vt.凌辱，激怒 | |
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11
instinctive
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| adj.(出于)本能的；直觉的；(出于)天性的 | |
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austere
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| adj.艰苦的；朴素的，朴实无华的；严峻的 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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14
liberated
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| a.无拘束的，放纵的 | |
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detention
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| n.滞留，停留；拘留，扣留；(教育)留下 | |
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ethic
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| n.道德标准，行为准则 | |
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ethics
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| n.伦理学；伦理观，道德标准 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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journalism
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| n.新闻工作，报业 | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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condemning
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| v.（通常因道义上的原因而）谴责( condemn的现在分词 )；宣判；宣布…不能使用；迫使…陷于不幸的境地 | |
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loathsome
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| adj.讨厌的，令人厌恶的 | |
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deteriorated
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| 恶化，变坏( deteriorate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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philosophical
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| adj.哲学家的，哲学上的，达观的 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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bestial
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| adj.残忍的；野蛮的 | |
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idiotic
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| adj.白痴的 | |
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prank
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| n.开玩笑，恶作剧；v.装饰；打扮；炫耀自己 | |
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celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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31
dynamite
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| n./vt.(用)炸药(爆破) | |
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32
assassination
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| n.暗杀；暗杀事件 | |
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33
Christians
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| n.基督教徒( Christian的名词复数 ) | |
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34
infamous
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| adj.声名狼藉的，臭名昭著的，邪恶的 | |
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arrogance
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| n.傲慢，自大 | |
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36
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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inadequate
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| adj.(for,to)不充足的，不适当的 | |
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defective
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| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
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virtues
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| 美德( virtue的名词复数 )； 德行； 优点； 长处 | |
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touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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41
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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42
civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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43
evading
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| 逃避( evade的现在分词 )； 避开； 回避； 想不出 | |
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plausible
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| adj.似真实的，似乎有理的，似乎可信的 | |
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45
scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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46
disinterested
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| adj.不关心的，不感兴趣的 | |
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47
avaricious
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| adj.贪婪的，贪心的 | |
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48
deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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49
impartial
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| adj.(in,to)公正的，无偏见的 | |
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50
partisans
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| 游击队员( partisan的名词复数 )； 党人； 党羽； 帮伙 | |
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51
stark
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| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
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