Chapter X: English Life In Naples

The English who wintered in Naples at the same time with the Spencer family seemed to have formed, as they generally do, a special caste. They dined together, drove out together, they laughed at the churches, and crowded the opera. Their conduct in the latter place did not seem to be very edifying to the Neapolitans, who, perhaps, may have thought it was an English custom to see a nobleman "tumbling tipsy one night into Earl Spencer's box," to the no small disedification of the whole family, who were models of sobriety and decorum. The English, by forming their own circles in this exclusive manner, and by their external deportment on various occasions, keep away the higher and more pious grades of society in Catholic cities. The scoffers at monachism and priestly rule are freely admitted within the English pale, and pay for their hospitality, by catering to the worst prejudices of their entertainers, and maligning their neighbours. It is very often a repetition of the fable of the sour grapes. For this we have ample testimony in the writings of our contemporaries, which we will strengthen by quoting Father Ignatius's own words a little later. The better Italians sometimes laugh at all this, so that John Bull is become a by-word among them for exclusiveness and arrogant, selfish pride. The blame lies with the English.

They sometimes found disagreeable incidents from the clashing of tastes and customs. On the 8th of December they made the round of the churches, but were sorely piqued that the Neapolitans had too much respect for our Blessed Lady to open the operas and theatres on the evening {66} of the Feast of her Immaculate Conception, so they had to content themselves with whist, and discordant notes from George's guitar. Another of these crosses occurred a few days after. George made a lame excursion to Vesuvius, and when groaning from toothache on his return, heard that the father of his bosom friend, Sir Thomas Fremantle, senior, was dead. To make matters worse, the remains could not be interred in a cemetery, and the _Inglesi_ had to pay the last sad rites to their friend in a private garden. On Christmas Day they had service at the Consul's, and then they walked about, and had their whist for the rest of the day. The old year was danced out at a grand quadrille party, of which more hereafter; and George tells us very carefully that "a set of us drank in the new year in _diavolone_." How remarkable, at every turn, and even by such chance and off-hand expressions, to note the contrast between the George Spencer of that day and the subject of divine grace he afterwards became!

It is a relief to begin the new year 1820 with recording an exception made to the general custom above. George was presented by his father to King Ferdinand, and all the _nobili Inglesi_ were invited to join in the festivities with which it was customary to usher in the new year. For the rest, the evenings and early part of the mornings are spent in a continual whirl of amusement, and it would require a page to number up the balls and dances he figured in. He visits also the Carthusian and Camaldolese monasteries, but makes no comments. He goes two or three times to see Vesuvius and the crater and the lava, of which he gives a very nice description; after this he is allowed, by special favour, to be at the Royal chase: this puts him in great humour, for, besides the sport it afforded in the way of getting shots at such choice game as wild boars, it gave him an opportunity of seeing the "King and all his court, to which nothing can be similar."

Towards the end of January, Lord and Lady Spencer determined on returning to England, and offered to leave George to travel through the sights of Southern Italy. He perceives, in a few days, the tokens of an inclination in his {67} parents to have his company, and goes straightway to the Honourable Augustus Barrington, who was to be his fellow-traveller, and breaks off the plan they had formed. It was only after very pressing instances from his father and mother that he could be persuaded to take up the first plan anew. A portion of his autobiography will throw some light upon many things we have only just touched upon, and, therefore, it is better to quote it here, though it might come in more opportunely at the conclusion of his first tour abroad.

"It is extraordinary, indeed, that I should have remained a whole
year on the Continent and never once have seriously taken into
consideration the subject of the Catholic religion. Such was the
case; and I returned to England, as far as I can remember, without
one doubt having crossed my mind whether this was the true religion
or not. ...

And now for a little recollection of the state of my mind during
this period of travelling, and its moral effects upon me. During all
this time I continued, thank God, wholly convinced that a course of
iniquity would not answer; and had I met with any among the young
men, my associates, who would have dared to speak out fully in
favour of morality, I should, I believe, have been ready to agree
with him. But where were such to be found? I had now grown so far
more independent of the world, that I had not open assaults to bear
continually against for not running with the rest. Many of the young
men who maintained their character as free licentious livers, yet
professed some degree of moderation and restraint in their
indulgences. Some I remember, who professed to keep clear of immoral
practices, and no doubt their sincerity in this might be depended
on; for where no credit but dishonour would be the reward of steady
conduct, there was no temptation to pretend to it falsely. But I
remember now but one who dared to allude in my hearing--and that was
but once, I think, in private--to the consequence of this sin in
another world, and to maintain that it was better to avoid it for
fear of punishment hereafter. While, then, I still knew that the way
of evil was all wrong, and would have been most happy if the fashion
of wickedness could have been at {68} an end; and though I never
once, as far as I know, was the first to introduce immodest
conversation, and hardly ever heard it introduced by others without
inward repugnance, and seldom joined in it; yet I never dared
declare how much I hated it, and was still in the most awful and
desperate state of wishing I had been like the worst, sooner than be
thus subject to the torment of being put to shame before bold
profligates. While with my parents, I have before said, I was under
good surveillance, and could not think of being detected by them in
any evil. How shall I ever be thankful enough for all this? My
father's character was such that though many who were often in his
company were men whom I have known, when out of it, to delight in
most abominable things, I knew of none who ever dared in his sight
to do more than covertly allude to them. I was therefore happy in
this respect whenever he was near; but when once more left to
myself, I again returned to those fearful deliberations of which I
have before spoken of, as it were, selling myself, for a time at
least, to work wickedness without restraint. It may be well
conceived how miserably fallen and corrupt must have been my heart
when such purposes were entertained within it; and if, partly
through some remains of the holy impressions of my childhood, which
still operated on my poor, degraded heart as a kind of habit not yet
quite worn off; partly by a sense of the shame and misery I should
have before my family and some more whom I knew in the world, who
would be themselves most afflicted if they heard of my fall from the
good dispositions which they had known in me; partly from a fear of
ridicule, even from the profligate, if, after all, I was to fell;
partly by the wonderful providence of God, which (I acknowledge)
most wisely and most tenderly, yet strongly interposed at times to
baffle the madness of my designs when about to be accomplished--if,
I say, thus I have been in a degree preserved, God knows I have no
credit due to me: God knows that from my heart I take only shame and
confusion of face to myself in the remembrance, of my very
preservation. Towards the latter part of my stay abroad, I began to
be in some way weary of this uncertain state of mind. I {69} was
always expecting to take Orders when I should reach the age; and as
I knew that then I should not be expected by the world to join in
its fashionable vices, and should even suffer in public estimation
if I did, my thoughts began to be rather better directed, and I took
pains from time to time to overcome some of the evil that was in
me."

"It is wonderful that any good disposition should have lived within
me, when every remembrance of religion seems to have been put out of
my mind. I now could hardly understand how this should have indeed
been the case, if I had not a clear remembrance of certain
circumstances which plainly show what was the state of my mind. On
the 27th January, 1820, I went up Mount Vesuvius with Dr. Wilson,
when, as we were looking into the crater of the volcano, a discharge
of red-hot stones took place. I heard them whistle by me as they
ascended, and though it was of no use to attempt to get out of the
way, I hurried back a few steps by a natural impulse, and
immediately saw a lump of red-hot stuff twice the size of one's head
fall on the spot where I had been standing just before. We
immediately ran down the side of the mountain, and reached a place
about a quarter of a mile distant from the mouth of the crater, from
whence we could see the upper cone of the mountain. Just then a
grand explosion took place, which shook the whole mountain, and a
vast quantity of these masses of fiery red stuff was spouted out
from the crater, which in its return appeared entirely to cover the
whole space over which we had been running five minutes before. Here
was an evident escape which, in a mind possessed with any religion
at all, could not fail of awakening some serious reflections. Alas!
I never thought of the abyss into which I must have fallen had not
the good angel, who watched and guided me through so many perils
which I thought not of, then preserved me. When I came down in the
evening to Naples, the only effect was that I was pleased and vain
at having a good adventure to relate, and showing off a spirit of
bravery and indifference, when some blamed me for my rashness.

"Another circumstance I may record to show how free from all
religious fear my mind was. I have before noticed {70} the fits of
melancholy which became habitual to me during the last part of my
Cambridge life. These came, I think, to their greatest height in the
last half of the time I spent at Naples. The interesting excitement
of our journey, the company of my sister when I first came to
Naples, and the gaieties of which I had my fill there, and which at
first had all the charm of novelty, kept me from much thought of any
kind, and I enjoyed the balls, the concerts, the grand operas, the
enchanting rides of Naples, for a month or six weeks, almost without
a cloud. At least I used always to count that my brightest period in
the way of enjoyments. Unhappy those who have health and spirits and
talents to enable them to please and be pleased long together in
such a round of vanity! To my great vexation I found myself again
attacked with my old enemy, melancholy; do what I would, I could not
drive away those fits of gloom. They were caused partly by the
effect on my health of too much good living, and bad hours; but the
chief cause was the intrinsic worthlessness of all such pleasure,
which will discover itself sooner or later to every one even of its
most devoted lovers, and which happily showed itself to me sooner
than others. Oh! what frivolous causes did my happiness then seem to
depend on! Not dancing to my satisfaction in one quadrille, fancying
that some of my favourite partners were tired of my conversation,
and that the nonsense of some other silly youth pleased her better,
was enough to turn what I flattered myself was about to be a bright
and pleasant evening into gloom and sadness. Sometimes, without an
assignable cause, my spirits failed, as at others an equally
frivolous reason would remove my clouds and make me bright again;
but gradually the gloomy moods gained ground, and grew more dark and
tedious. I remember comparing notes with another young man, who was
like me a victim of the dumps, and finding some satisfaction in the
sympathy of a fellow-sufferer, who, with a smile at the absurdity of
such feelings, of which he was well sensible while he avowed them,
exactly described to me my state of mind when he said that under
them he fancied himself the most unfortunate of mankind, and would
willingly have {71} changed places with the most despicable and
wretched of men, not to say with any animal almost. Poor blind fools
that we were! We could not between us suggest the way to be happy
which is open to all.

"I remember well coming home one night from a ball, which, by my
journal, I find to be on the 25th January, when, as I wrote at that
time, I was more miserable than ever I was in that way. I went to
bed, and heard a noise like a creak in the ceiling of my room. I
felt a wish that it would break through and crush me. How I used to
wish at that time I had the sort of bold, firm heart which appeared
through some of the young manly faces which I used daily to meet--to
whom low spirits was a thing unknown. I knew not that I was
quarrelling with the most choice of God's mercies to me, without
which I should probably have been irrevocably lost. I still, to this
day, am used to the visits of my feelings of dejection, but, thank
God, I know better how to receive them; and, far from wishing them
away, I rather fear their departure, and desire they may never leave
me. For if I have within me one bright, heavenly desire, I owe it to
these feelings, which first poisoned my pleasure in the world, and
drew me at length to seek for it elsewhere, and now I wish never to
have peace within my breast while one desire lives there for
anything but God.

"Yet that thought of wishing even to be crushed, that I might escape
from my miserable feelings, shows how far I was at that time from
knowing how great a cause for sorrow I really had in the state of my
soul--which, if I had known it, must have driven away all imaginary
griefs--nor from what quarter I should seek for happiness; and it is
a wonder that it took so long a time, and so many repetitions of the
same lesson, before I began to correspond with the gracious purpose
of my Heavenly Teacher; of Him who was thus correcting me, that I
might at length love Him, and love Him willingly. How was it that I
could have lived so long without being awakened to one sentiment of
religious fear? ...

"But now we must return to the Catholic Faith. The main object of
this memoir being to trace the steps of my {72} progress towards
Catholicity, it would be expected that the period of my residence
for a whole year in Catholic countries must be most interesting.
Indeed it is wonderful that this year of my life should have been,
as it appears to me to have been, quite neutral in its effects. I
certainly made no progress towards my present faith. This would not
be extraordinary; for how many Protestants by their travels abroad
not only make no progress towards Catholicity, but are made its
violent enemies. But, undoubtedly, this was the effect produced on
me. It seems that at this time I was under the influence of
altogether other objects and notions from any connected with
religion. What I sought was, first, my own pleasure--next, only
general information; what I was chiefly controlled by was human
respect. Having no care at all about religion in any form, the
question of which was the right form never troubled me, and so the
observations which I could not help making on the Catholic religious
practices which I saw, were very superficial. It might be
interesting to transcribe a few passages from my journal which show
what was my mind.

"It is remarkable how easily one's mind takes in and rests contented
in the belief of false and prejudicial representations of things. I
never had had much pains taken with me to set me against the
Catholic religion; but though I knew nothing of what it was, I
rested in the conviction that it was full of superstition, and, in
fact, as good as no religion at all. I never opened my mind all the
time I was abroad to the admission of any idea but this; and so I
looked on all the Catholic ceremonies which I saw, in this perverted
light. I did not fall in the way of anyone to set me right; for I
was contented to go on in the stream of the English society with
which almost all the towns in Italy were filled, and if any really
zealous exemplary Catholics are sometimes mingled with them, they do
not find it available or prudent to introduce the mention of
religion; while there will be always some who have no objection to
seek to please them by encouraging their prejudices, which they do
effectually by telling stories--some true, perhaps, some obviously
false--of the Priests and Religious. Such a person, {73} who bore
the title of Abbate, and therefore must have been professedly a true
Catholic, we fell in with at Milan; he assisted my father in his
search after curious books. I remember some of his conversations,
and I find notice in my journal of his dining with us, and being
'very amusing in some stories about the Catholic processions.' The
impression on my mind was that the whole system of religion which we
saw was mere formality, people being taught to content themselves
with fulfilling some external rules, and the clergy making it their
business to keep them in the dark. I took little notice of religious
matters till we entered Italy. There Milan was the first town we
stopped at. On the Sunday after our arrival was the anniversary of
the consecration of the church. I saw the ceremonies in the
Cathedral, the very place where St. Augustine's heart was moved and
his conversion begun, by hearing the strains of holy music, perhaps
the same which I then heard. But very different was the effect on
me; here are the wise remarks inserted in my journal." [Footnote 3]

[Footnote 3: The passage is given in page 60.]

The autobiography breaks off abruptly here; but in order to fit the remarks to the events which they concern, we have kept one or two paragraphs in reserve for another place.

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