The Recreations of A Country Parson | Page 3

at Damascus, struggling to get free
from the prejudices and convictions of all his past years, and
resolving--on the course he would pursue in the years to come.
I know that in all professions and occupations to which men can devote
themselves, there is such a thing as com petition: and wherever there is
competition, there will be the temptation to envy, jealousy, and

detraction, as regards a man's competitors: and so there will be the need
of that labour and exertion which lie in resolutely trampling that
temptation down. You are quite certain, rny friend, as you go on
through life, to have to make up your mind to failure and
disappointment on your own part, and to seeing other men preferred
before you. When these tilings come, there are two ways of meeting
them. One is, to hate and vilify those who surpass you, either in merit
or in success: to detract from their merit and under-rate their success: or,
if you must admit some merit, to bestow upon it very faint praise. Now,
all this is natural enough; but assuredly it is neither a right nor a happy
course to follow. The other and better way is, to fight these tendencies
to the death: to struggle against them, to pray against them: to resign
yourself to God's good will: to admire and love the man who beats you.
This course is the right one, and the happy one. I believe the greatest
blessing God can send a man, is disappointment, rightly met and used.
There is no more ennobling discipline: there is no discipline that results
in a happier or kindlier temper of mind. And in honestly fighting
against the evil impulses which have been mentioned, you will
assuredly get help and strength to vanquish them. I have seen the plain
features look beautiful, when man or woman was faithfully by God's
grace resisting wrong feelings and tendencies, such as these. It is a
noble end to attain, and it is well worth all the labour it costs, to
resolutely be resigned, cheerful, and kind, when you feel a strong
inclination to be discontented, moody, and bitter of heart. Well said a
very wise mortal, 'Better is he that ruleth his spirit, than he that taketh a
city.' And that ruling of the spirit which is needful to rightly meet
disappointment, brings out the best and noblest qualities that can be
found in man.
Sometimes, indeed, even in the parson's quiet life, he may know
something of the first perplexity of which we have been thinking: the
perplexity of the man who is struggling to make up his mind where he
is to settle down for the remainder of life. And it is not long since such
a perplexity came my way. For I had reached a spot in my onward path
at which I must make a decided choice. I must go either to the right or
the left: for, as Goldsmith has remarked with great force, when the road
you are pursuing parts into several roads, you must be careful to follow
only one. And I had to decide between country and town. I had to

resolve whether I was to remain in that quiet cure of souls about which
I formerly told you; or go into the hard work and hurry of a large parish
in a certain great city.
I had been for more than five years in that sweet country place: it
seemed a very long time as the days passed over. Even slow-growing
ivy grew feet longer in that time, and climbing roses covered yards and
yards of wall. And for very many months I thought that here I was to
live and die, and never dreamt of change. Not indeed that my tastes
were always such. At the beginning of that term of years, when I went
down each Sunday morning to preach in the plain little church to a
handful of quiet rustic people, I used to think of a grand edifice where
once upon a time, at my first start in my profession, I had preached
each afternoon for many months to a very large congregation of
educated folk; and I used to wonder whether my old friends
remembered and missed me. Once there was to me a fascination about
that grand church, and all connected with it: now it is to me no more
than it is to every one else, and I pass near it almost every day and
hardly look at it. Other men have taken my old place in it, and had the
like feelings, and got over them. Several of these men I never saw: how
much I should like to shake each man's hand! But all these fancies were
long, long ago: I was