Chapter II: Four First Years At Eton

"The 18th of May, 1808, was the important day when first I left my
father's house. With a noble equipage, my father and mother took my
brother Frederick and me to the house of the Rev. Richard Godley,
whom they had chosen to be our private tutor at Eton. He lived, with
his family, at a place called the Wharf, about half a mile from the
college buildings, which we had to go to for school and chapel
across the playing-fields. Oh! how interesting are my recollections
whilst I recall the joys and sorrows of Eton days; but I must not
expatiate on them, as my own feelings would lead me to do with
pleasure. What I have to do now is to record how the circumstances
in which I was then placed have contributed to influence my
religions principles, and formed some links in the chain of events
by which I have arrived at my present state, so different from all
that might then have been anticipated. Mr. Godley I consider to have
been, what I believe my parents likewise regarded him, a strictly
conscientious and deeply religious man; and I must always account it
one of the greatest blessings for which, under God, I am indebted to
their wisdom and affection, that I was placed in such hands at so
critical a time. I do not intend, in all points, to declare my
approbation of the system which he pursued with us: but how can I be
too grateful for having been under the strict vigilance of one who
did, I am convinced, reckon the preservation of my innocence, and
the salvation of my soul, his chief concern with me? I remained with
Mr. Godley till the Midsummer holidays of 1812. My brother left Eton
and went to sea in the year 1811.

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"Those who know what our public schools are, will reckon it, I
believe, almost incredible that I should be four years at Eton, and
remain, as I did, still almost ignorant of what the language of
wickedness meant. Mr. Godley's yoke I certainly thought at the time
to be a heavy one. Several times each day we were obliged to go
across the playing-fields to school, to chapel, or to absence (which
was the term by which Etonians will yet understand the calling over
the names of the boys at certain times); so that during the daytime,
when in health, we could never be more than three hours together
without appearing with the boys of the school. Mr. Godley, however,
was inexorable in his rule that we should invariably come home
immediately after each of these occasions: by this we were kept from
much intercourse with other boys. Most grievous then appeared my
unhappy lot, in the summer months especially, when we had to pass
through the playing-fields, crowded with cricketers, to whom a lower
boy, to fag for them and stop their balls, was sure to be an
important prize, whose wrath we incurred if we dared despise their
call, and run on our way; whilst, if we were but a few minutes late,
the yet more terrible sight awaited us of Mr. Godley's angry
countenance. We had not exemption from one of these musters, as most
boys had who lived at a distance from the school, yet none of them
were bound like us to a speedy return home. It seemed like an
Egyptian bondage, from which there was no escape; and doubtless the
effect was not altogether good upon my character. As might be
expected, the more we were required to observe rules and customs
different from others, the more did a certain class of big bullies
in the school seem to count it their business to watch over us, as
though they might be our evil geniuses. A certain set of faces,
consequently, I looked upon with a kind of mysterious dread; and I
was under a constant sense of being as though in an enemy's country,
obliged to guard against dangers on all sides. Shrinking and
skulking became my occupation beyond the ordinary lot of little
schoolboys, and my natural disposition to be cowardly and spiritless
was perhaps increased. I say _perhaps_, for other {8} circumstances
might have made me worse; for what I was in the eyes of the masters
of public opinion in the school, I really was--a chicken-hearted
creature, what, in Eton language, is called a _sawney_. It may be,
that had I been from the first in free intercourse among the boys,
instead of being a good innocent one, I might have been, what I
suppose must be reckoned one of the worst varieties of public-school
characters, a mean, dishonourable one. Whatever I may have lost from
not being trained, from the first of my Eton life, in the perfect
spirit of the place, could I possibly have escaped during that time
in any other way the utter corruption of my morals, at least the
filling of my mind with familiar images of all the most foul
iniquity? For, alas! where is the child from the age of eight till
twelve who, without one compassionate friend, already strong in
virtue to countenance and to encourage him, shall maintain the
profession of modesty and holiness against a persecution as
inveterate and merciless in its way as that which Lot had to bear at
Sodom? Was not the angel of God with me when He preserved me for so
long from all attacks of this kind in such a place as Eton was in my
time? How can I remember Godley but with veneration and gratitude,
who, though, it may be, not so considerately and wisely as might be
possible (for who is as wise as he might be?), kept me, I might say,
almost alone untainted in the midst of so much corruption.

"Yet, till the last year of my stay with him, I did not learn
decidedly to love religion. It was still my task and not my
pleasure. At length, my brother Frederick being gone to sea, and two
other boys, Mr. Godley's stepsons, who were with us under his
instructions, being sent to school elsewhere, I remained his only
pupil, and, I may almost say, his chief care and joy. He felt with
me and for me in the desolation of my little heart, at being parted
from my first and hitherto inseparable mate, and I became his almost
constant companion. It is not difficult to gain the confidence of a
simple child: he spoke almost continually of religious subjects, and
I learnt to take his view of things. I certainly did not begin to
lose my pleasure in life. Death {9} was an idea which still was
strange to me; and I did not come to an understanding of the great
doctrines of Revelation. I remember not to have taken much notice of
any peculiar articles of faith; but still believed implicitly,
without argument or inquiry, what I was taught. I can now hardly
give an account of what were the religious ideas and impressions
which began so greatly to engage my mind, except that I took my
chief delight in hearing Mr. Godley speak about religion, that I had
a great abhorrence and dread of wickedness, thought with pleasure of
my being intended to be a clergyman, as I was always told I should
be, and admired and loved all whom I was taught to look upon as
religious people. All these simple feelings of piety, which were
often accompanied with pure delight, were greatly increased in a
visit of six weeks which I paid, with Mr. Godley, to his mother and
sisters at Chester. He was a Prebendary of that cathedral, and of
course had to spend some time there every year in residence.
Usually, when he went from home, from time to time, he was used to
get one of the other tutors at Eton to hear my brother's and my
lessons, and to look over our exercises; but in the last summer I
staid with him, with my father's consent, he took me with him. Mr.
Godley's sisters, who showed me great kindness, like him, I suppose,
had no wish concerning me than to encourage me in becoming pious and
good, and I got to read a few pious books which they recommended.
'The Pilgrim's Progress,' Doddridge's 'Life of Colonel Gardiner,'
Alleine's 'Alarm,' were some which I remember taking great effect
upon me; so that when I returned from Chester to Eton, though I
cannot recall many particulars of my feelings, I know that the chief
prevailing one was, an ardent desire to keep myself untainted at
Eton, and to keep from all fellowship with the set of boys whom I
knew to be particularly profane mockers of piety. I bought a book of
prayers, and during the three weeks that I yet remained with this
tutor, after our return from Chester, and when first I went home to
the summer holidays, I took no delight like that of being by myself
at prayer. Ah! how grievous would be the thought if we could but
understand how to {10} lament such a calamity as it deserves, of a
pious child's tender, pure soul denied, made forgetful of all its
good, and hardened. O God, grant me wisdom to understand the
magnitude of such an evil, grant me a heart now at length to mourn
over the devastation and uprooting which it was, at this time, Thy
holy will to permit, of all those fair flowers of grace which Thy
hand had planted in my heart; and grant me to mourn my fall, that I
may now once at last recover that simplicity of childlike piety, the
feelings of which I now recollect, indeed, though faintly, but never
have since again enjoyed. Oh! God, if a child's love, pure through
ignorance of sin, is never to be mine again, oh! give me at least
that depth of penance for which my fall has given me such ample
matter.

"It occurred not to my mind to consider whether the new thoughts
which occupied my mind, and the books in which I took such pleasure,
would be approved of at home. I took them with me to the holidays.
It was judged, as was to be expected, by my parents, that Mr.
Godley's views of religion were not such as they would wish to be
instilled into me; and it was determined that I should leave his
house and be placed with one of the public tutors at Eton. It is a
difficult thing to classify religious Protestants, and so I do not
here pronounce Mr. Godley and his sisters to have been Evangelical,
or Calvinistic, nor give them any distinctive title. They did not,
as far as I remember, inculcate upon me any peculiar notions of
religion, but they certainly were not in the way which is usually
called orthodox Church of England religion, though indeed it is
difficult to define exactly what this is. It was likely, or rather
morally certain, that while with Mr. Godley, I should follow his
guidance, and take his views; so I was to be placed among the other
boys, as I imagine with the idea likewise, that I should gain in
this way more of the advantages supposed to belong to the rough
discipline of a public school. I do not understand how it was that I
received the intimation of this change with so little sadness.
Distant evils, as we all know, lose their sting strangely; and,
having the holidays before me when this change was declared, I {11}
felt no trouble about it then. It is easy to talk a docile child
into agreement with any plan made for him by those whom he is used
to confide in; and so I remember no difficulty when my books were
taken away, and I had no more persons by to bring my former thoughts
to remembrance, in quietly discontinuing my fervent practices."

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