Cecilia, Memoirs of an Heiress, vol 1 | Page 6

with his guest, thought it most expedient to
allow them none with himself; and therefore, disguising his displeasure
under an appearance of facetiousness, he called out, "Come, Morrice,
you that love Christmas sports, what say you to the game of move-
all?"
"I like it of all things!" answered Morrice, and starting from his chair,
he skipped to another.
"So should I too," cried Mr Monckton, instantly taking his place, "were
I to remove from any seat but this."
Morrice, though he felt himself outwitted, was the first to laugh, and
seemed as happy in the change as Mr Monckton himself.
Mr Monckton now, addressing himself to Cecilia, said, "We are going
to lose you, and you seem concerned at leaving us; yet, in a very few
months you will forget Bury, forget its inhabitants, and forget its
environs."

"If you think so," answered Cecilia, "must I not thence infer that Bury,
its inhabitants, and its environs, will in a very few months forget me?"
"Ay, ay, and so much the better!" said Lady Margaret, muttering
between her teeth, "so much the better!" "I am sorry you think so,
madam," cried Cecilia, colouring at her ill-breeding.
"You will find," said Mr Monckton, affecting the same ignorance of her
meaning that Cecilia really felt, "as you mix with the world, you will
find that Lady Margaret has but expressed what by almost every body
is thought: to neglect old friends, and to court new acquaintance,
though perhaps not yet avowedly delivered as a precept from parents to
children, is nevertheless so universally recommended by example, that
those who act differently, incur general censure for affecting
singularity."
"It is happy then, for me," answered Cecilia, "that neither my actions
nor myself will be sufficiently known to attract public observation."
"You intend, then, madam," said Mr Belfield, "in defiance of these
maxims of the world, to be guided by the light of your own
understanding."
"And such," returned Mr Monckton, "at first setting out in life, is the
intention of every one. The closet reasoner is always refined in his
sentiments, and always confident in his virtue; but when he mixes with
the world, when he thinks less and acts more, he soon finds the
necessity of accommodating himself to such customs as are already
received, and of pursuing quietly the track that is already marked out."
"But not," exclaimed Mr Belfield, "if he has the least grain of spirit! the
beaten track will be the last that a man of parts will deign to tread,
For common rules were ne'er designed Directors of a noble mind."
"A pernicious maxim! a most pernicious maxim!" cried the old
gentleman, who sat frowning in a corner of the room.

"Deviations from common rules," said Mr Monckton, without taking
any notice of this interruption, "when they proceed from genius, are not
merely pardonable, but admirable; and you, Belfield, have a peculiar
right to plead their merits; but so little genius as there is in the world,
you must surely grant that pleas of this sort are very rarely to be urged."
"And why rarely," cried Belfield, "but because your general rules, your
appropriated customs, your settled forms, are but so many absurd
arrangements to impede not merely the progress of genius, but the use
of understanding? If man dared act for himself, if neither worldly views,
contracted prejudices, eternal precepts, nor compulsive examples,
swayed his better reason and impelled his conduct, how noble indeed
would he be! how infinite in faculties! in apprehension how like a
God!" [Footnote: Hamlet.]
"All this," answered Mr Monckton, "is but the doctrine of a lively
imagination, that looks upon impossibilities simply as difficulties, and
upon difficulties as mere invitations to victory. But experience teaches
another lesson; experience shows that the opposition of an individual to
a community is always dangerous in the operation, and seldom
successful in the event;--never, indeed, without a concurrence strange
as desirable, of fortunate circumstances with great abilities."
"And why is this," returned Belfield, "but because the attempt is so
seldom made? The pitiful prevalence of general conformity extirpates
genius, and murders originality; the man is brought up, not as if he
were 'the noblest work of God,' but as a mere ductile machine of human
formation: he is early taught that he must neither consult his
understanding, nor pursue his inclinations, lest, unhappily for his
commerce with the world, his understanding should be averse to fools,
and provoke him to despise them; and his inclinations to the tyranny of
perpetual restraint, and give him courage to abjure it."
"I am ready enough to allow," answered Mr Monckton, "that an
eccentric genius, such, for example, as yours, may murmur at the
tediousness of complying with the customs of the world, and wish,
unconfined, and at large, to range