Part 26 (1/2)
”The War as yet is scarcely a week old. It came upon us like a thief in the night, and as yet none of us can tell how far we are blameworthy. We have not the evidence.
”There will be time enough, when we have it, to search out the true reasons for national penitence. I do not believe in being penitent at haphazard: I have too much respect for that spiritual exercise.
Still less do I believe in running up to G.o.d's mercy-seat with a lapful of una.s.sorted sins and the plea, 'Dear Lord, we are doubtless guilty of all these. Being in affliction, we are probably right in believing that one or more of them has provoked Thy displeasure, and are ready to do penance for any if it will please Thee to specify.
Meanwhile, may we suggest horse-racing or profane language?'
We may be sure, _then_, that the sin suggested, as a conjurer forces a card, is not a relevant one. We may be fairly sure also that it is one with which some neighbour is more chargeable than are we ourselves. The priests of Baal were foolish to cut themselves with knives, but it is to be set to their credit that they used real ones.
”You will observe that Isaiah constantly, in his words of highest promise to her, speaks of Zion as to be redeemed, and her glory as something to be restored: which implies that her bliss will lie, not in acquiring some new possession, but in regaining a something she has lost or forfeited. Have we of England in our day built such a Jerusalem that merely _to have it again_ is our dearest hope for the end of this War?
”I come back to my main proposition, and will conclude with one word of immediate practical advice--the best I can offer, as a plain man, in these days when the minds of all are confused.
”My main proposition is that, all knowledge being one in its process, our best chance of reading G.o.d's mind lies in thinking just as practically, rationally, relevantly about divine things as scientific men take care to do about scientific things, and as you or I should take care to do about the ordinary things of life. If we only thought of G.o.d as _important_ enough, we should do that as a matter of course. If _we then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to our children_ . . . We in England to-day are as yet a long way off the philosophy of Jesus Christ. That is too hard for us altogether, it seems. But we ought to be abreast with Isaiah, which is a long way ahead of Joshua and the German Emperor.
”For my word of practical advice--I counsel you, as a people, not to waste time in flurried undiscriminating repentance; not to _fuss_, in short, until, having learnt where and how you ought to repent, you can repent effectually. That knowledge may come soon: more likely it will come late. Meanwhile the danger is instant. Every man in this church,” concluded Mr Hambly, ”has a strong sense--a conviction, which I share--that the cause of England is right, that she is threatened and calls to him as he has never heard her call in his lifetime: and the call is to fight for her, but as men not straying to learn a new gospel of hate, remembering rather what at the best our Country has been, and proud to vindicate that.”
”Silly old rigmarole,” commented Miss Oliver on the way home.
”If you can tell me what it was all about!”
”If 'twas no worse than silly there'd be no harm done. When it comes to hinting that the Almighty hasn't a purpose of His own for typhoid fever, in my opinion it's time some one made a public protest.”
”I don't see what good that would do. On his own showing it 'd lie between the Lord an' Scantlebury, the Sanitary Inspector. He'd no business to speak so pointed: an' I always hate personalities for my part. But I daresay Scantlebury won't mind, if it comes to his ears even--”
”Scantlebury!” exclaimed Mrs Polsue with a sniff. ”He only got the job through his son's being a local preacher and him a freemason.
Do you think Scantlebury could make typhoid fever, if he tried?”
”Well, no; if you put it in that way. A Board School was as high as ever his parents could afford to send him: and then he went into the greengrocery, and at one time was said to be going to fail for over three hundred, when this place was found for him. A fair-spoken little man, but scientific in no sense o' the word.”
There was a pause.
”The silly man collected himself towards the end,” said Mrs Polsue.
”There was sense enough in what he said about every man's duty just now--that it was to fight, not to argue; though, after his manner, he didn't pitch it half strong enough. . . . I've been thinking that very thing over, Charity Oliver, ever since the Vicarage meetin', and it seems to me that if we're to be an Emergency Committee in anything better than name, our first business should be to stir up the young men to enlist. The way these tall fellows be hangin' back, and their country callin' out for them! There's young Seth Minards, for instance; an able-bodied young man if ever there was one. But I don't mind telling you I'm taking some steps to stir up their consciences.”
”I did hear,” said her friend sweetly, ”that you had been stirring up the women. In fact it reached me, dear, that Mrs Penhaligon had already chased you to the door with a besom--and she the mildest woman, which no doubt you reckoned on for a beginning. But if you mean to tackle the young men as well--though I can't call to mind that the Vicarage meetin' set it down as any part of your duties--”
”I don't take my orders from any Vicarage meeting,” snapped Mrs Polsue; ”not at any time, and least of all in an emergency like this, when country and conscience call me together to a plain duty.
As for Mrs Penhaligon, you were misinformed, and I advise you to be more careful how you listen to gossip. The woman was insolent, but she did _not_ chase me--as you vulgarly put it, no doubt repeating your informant's words--she did _not_ chase me out of doors with a besom. On the contrary, she gave me full opportunity to say what I thought of her.”
”Yes; so I understood, dear: and it was after that, and in consequence (as I was told) that she--”
”If you are proposing, Charity Oliver, to retail this story to others, you may drag in a besom if you will. But as a fact Mrs Penhaligon resorted to nothing but bad language, in which she was backed up by her co-habitant, or whatever you prefer to call him, the man Nanjivell.”
”Yes, I heard that he took a hand in it.” ”There you are right. He took a hand in it to the extent of informing me that Mrs Penhaligon was under his charge, if you ever heard anything so brazen. . . .
I have often wondered,” added Mrs Polsue, darkly musing, ”why Polpier has not, before this, become as one of the Cities of the Plain.”
”Have you?” asked Miss Oliver. ”If I let such a thought trouble my head, I'd scarce close an eye when I went to bed.”
”But what puzzles me,” went on Mrs Polsue, ”is how that Nanjivell found the pluck. Every one knows him for next door to a pauper: and yet he spoke up, as if he had pounds an' to spare.”
”Perhaps you irritated him,” suggested Miss Oliver. ”Everybody knows that, poor as folks may be, if you try to set them right beyond a certain point--”