At Large | Page 7

ought to be a thing complete in itself, and ought to be spent, partly in gathering materials, and partly in drawing inferences, is apt to be a hurried accumulation lasting to the edge of the tomb. We are put into the world, I cannot help feeling, to BE rather than to DO. We excuse our thirst for action by pretending to ourselves that our own doing may minister to the being of others; but all that it often effects is to inoculate others with the same restless and feverish bacteria.
And anyhow, as I said, it is but an experiment. I can terminate it whenever I have the wish to do so. Even if it is a failure, it will at all events have been an experiment, and others may learn wisdom by my mistake; because it must be borne in mind that a failure in a deliberate experiment in life is often more fruitful than a conventional success. People as a rule are so cautious; and it is of course highly disagreeable to run a risk, and to pay the penalty. Life is too short, one feels, to risk making serious mistakes; but, on the other hand, the cautious man often has the catastrophe, without even having had the pleasure of a run for his money. Jowett, the high priest of worldly wisdom, laid down as a maxim, "Never resign"; but I have found myself that there is no pleasure comparable to disentangling oneself from uncongenial surroundings, unless it be the pleasure of making mild experiments and trying unconventional schemes.

II
CONTENTMENT

I have attempted of late, in more than one book, to depict a certain kind of tranquil life, a life of reflection rather than of action, of contemplation rather than of business; and I have tried to do this from different points of view, though the essence has been the same. I endeavoured at first to do it anonymously, because I have no desire to recommend these ideas as being my own theories. The personal background rather detracts from than adds to the value of the thoughts, because people can compare my theories with my practice, and show how lamentably I fail to carry them out. But time after time I have been pulled reluctantly out of my burrow, by what I still consider a wholly misguided zeal for publicity, till I have decided that I will lurk no longer. It was in this frame of mind that I published, under my own name, a book called Beside Still Waters, a harmless enough volume, I thought, which was meant to be a deliberate summary or manifesto of these ideas. It depicted a young man who, after a reasonable experience of practical life, resolved to retire into the shade, who in that position indulged profusely in leisurely reverie. The book was carefully enough written, and I have been a good deal surprised to find that it has met with considerable disapproval, and even derision, on the part of many reviewers. It has been called morbid and indolent, and decadent, and half a hundred more ugly adjectives. Now I do not for an instant question the right of a single one of these conscientious persons to form whatever opinion they like about my book, and to express it in any terms they like; they say, and obviously feel, that the thought of the book is essentially thin, and that the vein in which it is written is offensively egotistical. I do not dispute the possibility of their being perfectly right. An artist who exhibits his paintings, or a writer who publishes his books, challenges the criticisms of the public; and I am quite sure that the reviewers who frankly disliked my book, and said so plainly, thought that they were doing their duty to the public, and warning them against teaching which they believed to be insidious and even immoral. I honour them for doing this, and I applaud them, especially if they did violence to their own feelings of courtesy and urbanity in doing so. Then there were some good-natured reviewers who practically said that the book was simply a collection of amiable platitudes; but that if the public liked to read such stuff, they were quite at liberty to do so. I admire these reviewers for a different reason, partly for their tolerant permission to the public to read what they choose, and still more because I like to think that there are so many intelligent people in the world who are wearisomely familiar with ideas which have only slowly and gradually dawned upon myself. I have no intention of trying to refute or convince my critics, and I beg them with all my heart to say what they think about my books, because only by the frank interchange of ideas