Complete Works of Lewis Carroll

by Lewis Carroll

  ‘Well, of course, when you hear any one talk fluently—you, for instance—you can see how desperately un-shy she is—not to say saucy! But the shyest and most intermittent talker must seem fluent in letter-writing. He may have taken half-an-hour to compose his second sentence; but there it is, close after the first!’

  ‘Then letters don’t express all that they might express?’

  ‘That’s merely because our system of letter-writing is incomplete. A shy writer ought to be able to show that he is so. Why shouldn’t he make pauses in writing, just as he would do in speaking? He might leave blank spaces—say half a page at a time.

  And a very shy girl—if there is such a thing—might write a sentence on the first sheet of her letter—then put in a couple of blank sheets—then a sentence on the fourth sheet: and so on.’

  ‘I quite foresee that we—I mean this clever little boy and myself—’ Lady Muriel said to me, evidently with the kind wish to bring me into the conversation, ‘—are going to become famous—of course all our inventions are common property now—for a new Code of Rules for Letter-writing! Please invent some more, little boy!’

  ‘Well, another thing greatly needed, little girl, is some way of expressing that we don’t mean anything.’

  ‘Explain yourself, little boy! Surely you can find no difficulty in expressing a total absence of meaning?’

  ‘I mean that you should be able, when you don’t mean a thing to be taken seriously, to express that wish. For human nature is so constituted that whatever you write seriously is taken as a joke, and whatever you mean as a joke is taken seriously! At any rate, it is so in writing to a lady!’

  ‘Ah! you’re not used to writing to ladies!’ Lady Muriel remarked, leaning back in her chair, and gazing thoughtfully into the sky.

  ‘You should try.’

  ‘Very good,’ said Arthur ‘How many ladies may I begin writing to? As many as I can count on the fingers of both hands?’

  ‘As many as you can count on the thumbs of one hand!’ his lady-love replied with much severity. ‘What a very naughty little boy he is! Isn’t he?’ (with an appealing glance at me).

  ‘He’s a little fractious,’ I said. ‘Perhaps he’s cutting a tooth.’ While to myself I said ‘How exactly like Sylvie talking to Bruno!’

  ‘He wants his tea.’ (The naughty little boy volunteered the information.) ‘He’s getting very tired, at the mere prospect of the great party to-morrow!’

  ‘Then he shall have a good rest before-hand!’ she soothingly replied. ‘The tea isn’t made yet. Come, little boy, lean well back in your chair, and think about nothing—or about me, whichever you prefer!’

  ‘All the same, all the same!’ Arthur sleepily murmured, watching her with loving eyes, as she moved her chair away to the tea table, and began to make the tea. ‘Then he’ll wait for his tea, like a good, patient little boy!’

  ‘Shall I bring you the London Papers?’ said Lady Muriel. ‘I saw them lying on the table as I came out, but my father said there was nothing in them, except that horrid murder-trial.’ (Society was just then enjoying its daily thrill of excitement in studying the details of a specially sensational murder in a thieves’ den in the East of London.)

  ‘I have no appetite for horrors,’ Arthur replied. ‘But I hope we have learned the lesson they should teach us—though we are very apt to read it backwards!’

  ‘You speak in riddles,’ said Lady Muriel. ‘Please explain yourself. See now,’ suiting the action to the word, ‘I am sitting at your feet, just as if you were a second Gamaliel! Thanks, no.’ (This was to me, who had risen to bring her chair back to its former place.) ‘Pray don’t disturb yourself. This tree and the grass make a very nice easy-chair. What is the lesson that one always reads wrong?’

  Arthur was silent for a minute. ‘I would like to be clear what it is I mean,’ he said, slowly and thoughtfully, ‘before I say anything to you—because you think about it.’

  Anything approaching to a compliment was so unusual an utterance for Arthur, that it brought a flush of pleasure to her cheek, as she replied ‘It is you, that give me the ideas to think about.’

  ‘One’s first thought,’ Arthur proceeded, ‘in reading anything specially vile or barbarous, as done by a fellow-creature, is apt to be that we see a new depth of Sin revealed beneath us: and we seem to gaze down into that abyss from some higher ground, far apart from it.’

  ‘I think I understand you now. You mean that one ought to think—not "God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are"—but "God, be merciful to me also, who might be, but for Thy grace, a sinner as vile as he!"‘

  ‘No,’ said Arthur. ‘I meant a great deal more than that.’

  She looked up quickly, but checked herself, and waited in silence.

  ‘One must begin further back, I think. Think of some other man, the same age as this poor wretch. Look back to the time when they both began life—before they had sense enough to know Right from Wrong. Then, at any rate, they were equal in God’s sight?’

  She nodded assent.

  ‘We have, then, two distinct epochs at which we may contemplate the two men whose lives we are comparing. At the first epoch they are, so far as moral responsibility is concerned, on precisely the same footing: they are alike incapable of doing right or wrong. At the second epoch the one man—I am taking an extreme case, for contrast—has won the esteem and love of all around him: his character is stainless, and his name will be held in honour hereafter: the other man’s history is one unvaried record of crime, and his life is at last forfeited to the outraged laws of his country. Now what have been the causes, in each case, of each man’s condition being what it is at the second epoch? They are of two kinds—one acting from within, the other from without. These two kinds need to be discussed separately—that is, if I have not already tired you with my prosing?’

  ‘On the contrary,’ said Lady Muriel, ‘it is a special delight to me to have a question discussed in this way—analysed and arranged so that one can understand it. Some books, that profess to argue out a question, are to me intolerably wearisome, simply because the ideas are all arranged haphazard—a sort of "first come, first served".’

  ‘You are very encouraging,’ Arthur replied, with a pleased look. ‘The causes, acting from within, which make a man’s character what it is at any given moment, are his successive acts of volition—that is, his acts of choosing whether he will do this or that.’

  ‘We are to assume the existence of Free-Will?’ I said, in order to have that point made quite clear.

  ‘If not,’ was the quiet reply, ‘cadit quaestio: and I have no more to say.’

  ‘We will assume it!’ the rest of the audience—the majority, I may say, looking at it from Arthur’s point of view—imperiously proclaimed. The orator proceeded.

  ‘The causes, acting from without, are his surroundings—what Mr. Herbert Spencer calls his "environment". Now the point I want to make clear is this, that a man is responsible for his act of choosing, but not responsible for his environment. Hence, if these two men make, on some given occasion, when they are exposed to equal temptation, equal efforts to resist and to choose the right, their condition, in the sight of God, must be the same. If He is pleased in the one case, so will He be in the other; if displeased in the one case, so also in the other.’

  ‘That is so, no doubt: I see it quite clearly,’ Lady Muriel put in.

  ‘And yet, owing to their different environments, the one may win a great victory over the temptation, while the other falls into some black abyss of crime.’

  ‘But surely you would not say those men were equally guilty in the sight of God?’

  ‘Either that,’ said Arthur, ‘or else I must give up my belief in God’s perfect justice. But let me put one more case, which will show my meaning even more forcibly. Let the one man be in a high social position—the other, say, a common thief. Let the one be tempted to some trivial act of unfair dealing—something which he can do with the absolu
te certainty that it will never be discovered—something which he can with perfect ease forbear from doing—and which he distinctly knows to be a sin. Let the other be tempted to some terrible crime—as men would consider it—but under an almost overwhelming pressure of motives—of course not quite overwhelming, as that would destroy all responsibility. Now, in this case, let the second man make a greater effort at resistance than the first. Also suppose both to fall under the temptation—I say that the second man is, in God’s sight, less guilty than the other.’

  Lady Muriel drew a long breath. ‘It upsets all one’s ideas of Right and Wrong—just at first! Why, in that dreadful murder-trial, you would say, I suppose, that it was possible that the least guilty man in the Court was the murderer, and that possibly the judge who tried him, by yielding to the temptation of making one unfair remark, had committed a crime outweighing the criminal’s whole career!’

  ‘Certainly I should,’ Arthur firmly replied. ‘It sounds like a paradox, I admit. But just think what a grievous sin it must be, in God’s sight, to yield to some very slight temptation, which we could have resisted with perfect ease, and to do it deliberately, and in the full light of God’s Law. What penance can atone for a sin like that?’

  ‘I ca’n’t reject your theory,’ I said. ‘But how it seems to widen the possible area of Sin in the world!’

  ‘Is that so?’ Lady Muriel anxiously enquired.

  ‘Oh, not so, not so!’ was the eager reply. ‘To me it seems to clear away much of the cloud that hangs over the world’s history.

  When this view first made itself clear to me, I remember walking out into the fields, repeating to myself that line of Tennyson "There seemed no room for sense of wrong!" The thought, that perhaps the real guilt of the human race was infinitely less than I fancied it—that the millions, whom I had thought of as sunk in hopeless depth of sin, were perhaps, in God’s sight, scarcely sinning at all—was more sweet than words can tell! Life seemed more bright and beautiful, when once that thought had come!

  "A livelier emerald twinkles in the grass, A purer sapphire melts into the sea!" ‘ His voice trembled as he concluded, and the tears stood in his eyes.

  Lady Muriel shaded her face with her hand, and was silent for a minute. ‘It is a beautiful thought,’ she said, looking up at last.

  ‘Thank you—Arthur, for putting it into my head!’

  The Earl returned in time to join us at tea, and to give us the very unwelcome tidings that a fever had broken out in the little harbour-town that lay below us—a fever of so malignant a type that, though it had only appeared a day or two ago, there were already more than a dozen down in it, two or three of whom were reported to be in imminent danger.

  In answer to the eager questions of Arthur—who of course took a deep scientific interest in the matter—he could give very few technical details, though he had met the local doctor. It appeared, however, that it was an almost new disease—at least in this century, though it might prove to be identical with the ‘Plague’ recorded in History—very infectious, and frightfully rapid in its action. ‘It will not, however, prevent our party tomorrow,’ he said in conclusion. ‘None of the guests belong to the infected district, which is, as you know, exclusively peopled by fishermen: so you may come without any fear.’

  Arthur was very silent, all the way back, and, on reaching our lodgings, immediately plunged into medical studies, connected with the alarming malady of whose arrival he had just heard.

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE FAREWELL-PARTY

  ON the following day, Arthur and I reached the Hall in good time, as only a few of the guests—it was to be a party of eighteen—had as yet arrived; and these were talking with the Earl, leaving us the opportunity of a few words apart with our hostess.

  ‘Who is that very learned-looking man with the large spectacles?’ Arthur enquired. ‘I haven’t met him here before, have I?’

  ‘No, he’s a new friend of ours,’ said Lady Muriel: ‘a German, I believe. He is such a dear old thing! And quite the most learned man I ever met—with one exception, of course!’ she added humbly, as Arthur drew himself up with an air of offended dignity.

  ‘And the young lady in blue, just beyond him, talking to that foreign-looking man. Is she learned, too?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Lady Muriel. ‘But I’m told she’s a wonderful pianoforte-player. I hope you’ll hear her tonight. I asked that foreigner to take her in, because he’s very musical, too. He’s a French Count, I believe; and he sings splendidly!’

  ‘Science—music—singing—you have indeed got a complete party!’ said Arthur. ‘I feel quite a privileged person, meeting all these stars. I do love music!’

  ‘But the party isn’t quite complete!’ said Lady Muriel. ‘You haven’t brought us those two beautiful children,’ she went on, turning to me. ‘He brought them here to tea, you know, one day last summer,’ again addressing Arthur: ‘and they are such darlings!’

  ‘They are, indeed,’ I assented.

  ‘But why haven’t you brought them with you? You promised my father you would.’

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ I said; ‘but really it was impossible to bring them with me.’ Here I most certainly meant to conclude the sentence: and it was with a feeling of utter amazement, which I cannot adequately describe, that I heard myself going on speaking. ‘—but they are to join me here in the course of the evening’ were the words, uttered in my voice, and seeming to come from my lips.

  ‘I’m so glad!’ Lady Muriel joyfully replied. ‘I shall enjoy introducing them to some of my friends here! When do you expect them?’

  I took refuge in silence. The only honest reply would have been ‘That was not my remark. I didn’t say it, and it isn’t true!’ But I had not the moral courage to make such a confession. The character of a ‘lunatic’ is not, I believe, very difficult to acquire; but it is amazingly difficult to get rid of: and it seemed quite certain that any such speech as that would quite justify the issue of a writ ‘de lunatico inquirendo’.

  Lady Muriel evidently thought I had failed to hear her question, and turned to Arthur with a remark on some other subject; and I had time to recover from my shock of surprise—or to awake out of my momentary ‘eerie’ condition, whichever it was.

  When things around me seemed once more to be real, Arthur was saying ‘I’m afraid there’s no help for it: they must be finite in number.’

  ‘I should be sorry to have to believe it,’ said Lady Muriel. ‘Yet, when one comes to think of it, there are no new melodies, now-a-days. What people talk of as "the last new song" always recalls to me some tune I’ve known as a child!’

  ‘The day must come—if the world lasts long enough—’ said Arthur, ‘when every possible tune will have been composed—every possible pun perpetrated—’ (Lady Muriel wrung her hands, like a tragedy-queen) ‘and, worse than that, every possible book written! For the number of words is finite.’

  ‘It’ll make very little difference to the authors,’ I suggested. ‘Instead of saying "what book shall I write?" an author will ask himself "which book shall I write?" A mere verbal distinction!’

  Lady Muriel gave me an approving smile. ‘But lunatics would always write new books, surely?’ she went on. ‘They couldn’t write the sane books over again!’

  ‘True,’ said Arthur. ‘But their books would come to an end, also. The number of lunatic books is as finite as the number of lunatics.’

  ‘And that number is becoming greater every year,’ said a pompous man, whom I recognized as the self-appointed showman on the day of the picnic.

  ‘So they say,’ replied Arthur. ‘And, when ninety per cent. of us are lunatics,’ (he seemed to be in a wildly nonsensical mood)

  ‘the asylums will be put to their proper use.’

  ‘And that is—?’ the pompous man gravely enquired.

  ‘To shelter the sane!’ said Arthur. ‘We shall bar ourselves in. The lunatics will have it all their own way, outside. They’ll do it a
little queerly, no doubt. Railway-collisions will be always happening: steamers always blowing up: most of the towns will be burnt down: most of the ships sunk—’

  ‘And most of the men killed!’ murmured the pompous man, who was evidently hopelessly bewildered.

  ‘Certainly,’ Arthur assented. ‘Till at last there will be fewer lunatics than sane men. Then we come out: they go in: and things return to their normal condition!’

  The pompous man frowned darkly, and bit his lip, and folded his arms vainly trying to think it out. ‘He is jesting!’ he muttered to himself at last, in a tone of withering contempt, as he stalked away.

  By this time the other guests had arrived; and dinner was announced. Arthur of course took down Lady Muriel: and I was pleased to find myself seated at her other side, with a severe-looking old lady (whom I had not met before, and whose name I had, as is usual in introductions, entirely failed to catch, merely gathering that it sounded like a compound-name) as my partner for the banquet.

  She appeared, however, to be acquainted with Arthur, and confided to me in a low voice her opinion that he was ‘a very argumentative young man’. Arthur, for his part, seemed well inclined to show himself worthy of the character she had given him, and, hearing her say ‘I never take wine with my soup!’ (this was not a confidence to me, but was launched upon Society, as a matter of general interest), he at once challenged a combat by asking her ‘when would you say that property commence in a plate of soup?’

  ‘This is my soup,’ she sternly replied: ‘and what is before you is yours.’

  ‘No doubt,’ said Arthur: ‘but when did I begin to own it? Up to the moment of its being put into the plate, it was the property of our host: while being offered round the table, it was, let us say, held in trust by the waiter: did it become mine when I accepted it? Or when it was placed before me? Or when I took the first spoonful?’