Chapter XXXII: A Model Talker 328 (8)

This double-tongued talker is not unfrequently met with in public meetings. Especially is he heard in "moving votes of thanks," and "drinking toasts." Fulsome praises and glowing eulogiums are poured out by him in rich abundance, which, as soon as the meetings are over, are eaten up again by the same person, but of course in the absence of his much-admired gods.

It would not be difficult to go on with instances illustrative of these double-tongued exercises. They are almost as universal as the multifarious phases of society. They are met with in the street, in the shop, in the family, in the church, in the court, in the palace and cottage, among the rich and poor.

Addison, in writing of this fault in talking in his times, gives a letter which he says was written in King Charles the Second's reign by the "ambassador of Bantam to his royal master a little after his arrival in England." The following is a copy, which will show how in those days the double-tongued talked, and how the writer, a stranger in this country, was impressed by it.

"MASTER,--The people where I now am have tongues further from their
hearts than from London to Bantam, and thou knowest the inhabitants
of one of these places do not know what is done in the other. They
call thee and thy subjects barbarians, because we speak what we
mean, and account themselves a civilized people because they speak
one thing and mean another; truth they call barbarity, and
falsehood politeness. Upon my first landing, one, who was sent by
the king of this place to meet me, told me that he was extremely
sorry for the storm I had met with just before my arrival. I was
troubled to hear him grieve and afflict himself on my account; but
in less than a quarter of an hour he smiled, and was as merry as if
nothing had happened. Another who came with him told me, by my
interpreter, he should be glad to do me any service that lay in his
power; upon which I desired him to carry one of my portmanteaux for
me; but, instead of serving me according to his promise, he
laughed, and bid another do it. I lodged the first week at the
house of one who desired me to think myself at home, and to
consider his house as my own. Accordingly I the next morning began
to knock down one of the walls of it, in order to let in the fresh
air, and had packed up some of the household goods, of which I
intended to have made thee a present; but the false varlet no
sooner saw me falling to work but he sent me word to desire me to
give over, for that he would have no such doings in his house. I
had not been long in this nation before I was told by one for whom
I had asked a certain favour from the chief of the king's servants,
whom they here call the lord-treasurer, that I had eternally
obliged him. I was so surprised at his gratitude that I could not
forbear saying, 'What service is there which one man can do for
another that can oblige him to all eternity?' However, I only asked
him, for my reward, that he would lend me his eldest daughter
during my stay in this country; but I quickly found that he was as
treacherous as the rest of his countrymen.

"At my first going to court, one of the great men almost put me out
of countenance by asking ten thousand pardons of me for only
treading by accident upon my toe. They call this kind of lie a
compliment; for when they are civil to a great man, they tell him
untruths, for which thou wouldst order any of thy officers of
state to receive a hundred blows on his foot. I do not know how I
shall negotiate anything with this people, since there is so little
credit to be given to them. When I go to see the king's scribe, I
am generally told that he is not at home, though perhaps I saw him
go into his house almost the very moment before. Thou wouldst fancy
that the whole nation are physicians, for the first question they
always ask me is, how I do; I have this question put to me above a
hundred times a day; nay, they are not only thus inquisitive after
my health, but wish it in a more solemn manner, with a full glass
in their hands, every time I sit with them at the table, though at
the same time they would persuade me to drink their liquors in such
quantities as I have found by experience will make me sick.

"They often pretend to pray for thy health also in the same manner;
but I have more reason to expect it from the goodness of thy
constitution than the sincerity of their wishes. May thy slave
escape in safety from this double-tongued race of men, and live to
lay himself once more at thy feet in the royal city of Bantam."

This double-tonguedness of which we have spoken is anything but creditable to an age that makes claim to such a high state of civilisation, to say nothing of Christianity. It shows a gilded or superficial state of things, which cannot but end in consequences disastrous and irremediable.

The finical and fashionable may call the candid speaker a boar, and shun him. He may be an outcast from their society: but, after all, his honesty and candour will wear better and longer than their sham and shoddy. His "Nay, nay," and "Yea, yea," will outlast and outshine their double-tongued prevarication and flattery. Better a boar--if you know him to be such--than a wolf in sheep's clothing. A rough friend is more valuable than a hypocritical sycophant.

"As thistles wear the softest down
To hide their prickles till they're grown,
And then declare themselves, and tear
Whatever ventures to come near;
So a smooth knave does greater feats
Than one that idly rails and threats;
And all the mischief that he meant,
Does, like the rattlesnake, prevent."

Archbishop Tillotson, in speaking of this subject in his day, says, "The old English plainness and sincerity, that generous integrity of nature and honesty of disposition, which always argues true greatness of mind, and is usually accompanied with undaunted courage and resolution, is in a great measure lost amongst us.

"It is hard to say whether it should more provoke our contempt or our pity to hear what solemn expressions of respect and kindness will pass between men almost upon no occasion; how great honour and esteem they will declare for one whom, perhaps, they never saw before; and how entirely they are all on a sudden devoted to his service and interest, for no reason; how infinitely and eternally obliged to him, for no benefit; and how extremely they will be concerned for him, yea, and afflicted too, for no cause. I know it is said in justification of this hollow kind of conversation that there is no harm, no real deceit in compliment, but the matter is well enough so long as we understand one another; words are like money, and when the current value of them is generally understood, no man is cheated by them. This is something, if such words were anything; but being brought into the account they are mere cyphers. However, it is a just matter of complaint that sincerity and plainness are out of fashion, and that our language is running into a lie; that men have almost quite perverted the use of speech, and made words to signify nothing; that the greatest part of the conversation of mankind is little else but driving a trade of dissimulation.

"If the show of anything be good for anything, I am sure sincerity is better: for why does any man dissemble, or seem to be that which he is not, but because he thinks it good to have such a quality as he pretends to? Now the best way in the world to seem to be anything is really to be what he would seem to be. Besides that, it is many times as troublesome to make good the pretence of a good quality as to have it; and if a man have it not, it is ten to one but he is discovered to want it; and then all his pains and labour to seem to have it are lost."

XXVII.

_THE DUBIOUS._

"Man, on the dubious waves of error tossed,
His ship half-foundered, and his compass lost,
Sees, far as human optics may command,
A sleeping fog, and fancies it dry land:
Spreads all his canvas, every sinew plies;
Pants for 't, aims at it, enters it, and dies!"
COWPER.

This is a talker of an opposite stamp to the dogmatist. The one knows and asserts with imperial positiveness, the other with childish trepidation and hesitancy. "It is so, it can't be otherwise, and you must believe it," is the dictatorial spirit of the dogmatist. "It may be so, I am not certain, I cannot vouch for its truthfulness: in fact, I am rather inclined to doubt it, but I would not deny nor affirm, or say one word to dispose you either way," is the utterance of the spirit of Dubious. He is an oscillator, a pendulum, a wave of the sea, a weathercock. He has no certain dwelling-place within the whole domain of knowledge, in which to rest the sole of his feet with permanency. He sees, hears, smells, tastes, and feels nothing with certainty, and hence he knows nothing by his senses but what is enveloped in the clouds of doubtfulness. He tenaciously guards himself in the utterance of any sentiment, story, or rumour, lest he expose himself to apprehension. His own existence is a fact of which he speaks with caution. His consciousness _may be_ a reality of which he can say a word. As to his soul, he does not like to speak of that with any assurance. The being of a God is a doctrine in the clouds, and he cannot affirm it with confidence. There _may be_ such places as China, India, Africa, etc.; but as he has never seen them, he dare not venture his full belief in their existence. Whatever he has seen, and whatever he has _not_ seen, seem to stand on the same ground as to the exercise of his faith. Things worldly and religious, simple and profound, plain and mysterious, practical and theoretical, human and divine, personal and relative, present and future, near and afar off,--all seem to crowd around him with a hazy appearance, and he has no definite or certain knowledge respecting them of which to speak. All the things he has ever read or heard he seems to have forgotten, or to hold them with a vague and uncertain tenure. There is nothing within him to rely upon but doubts, fears, and _may bes_. He lives, moves, and has his being in uncertainties. He will not positively affirm whether his face is black or white, his nose long or short, his own or some other person's. He "guesses" that two and two make four, and that four and three do not make eight. He "guesses" that blue is not red, and that green is neither blue nor red. He "guesses" that the earth is globular, but would not like to assert that it is not a plain. He "guesses" that the sun gives light by day and the moon by night; but as for affirming either the one or the other, he would not like to commit himself to such positiveness. His talk is full of "hopes," "presumes," "may bes," "trusts," "guesses," and such-like expressions. He is certainly a _doubtful_ man to have anything to do with in conversation. I do not say he is _dangerous_. Far from this, for he has not confidence enough in your actual materiality to make an assault upon your person; and he has not _certain_ knowledge sufficient to contend with your opinions, so that there is no need of apprehension upon either the mental or physical question. It is difficult to acquire any information from him, for who likes to add that to his stock of knowledge which is shrouded in doubts, and to which the communicator will not give the seal of his affirmation? Of course some knowledge must be held and communicated problematically. Such we are willing to take in its legitimate character. But our Dubious talker appears to destroy all distinction and difference, and to arrange all knowledge in the probable or doubtful category, and hence he has nothing but doubtful information to impart, which in reality is no information. To enter into conversation with _Dubious_, therefore, is no actual benefit to the intellect or the faith. It is harassing, perplexing, provoking to the man who possesses belief in the certainty of things. It is to him time lost, and words uttered in vanity. He retires from the scene with dissatisfaction and disgust. He pities the man who _knows_ nothing, whose intellect revolves in universal haziness, and whose soul is steeped in the quagmires of unrestrained scepticism.

Cowper does admirable justice to this talker in the following lines:--

"_Dubious_ is such a scrupulous good man--
Yes--you may catch him tripping if you can:
He would not with a peremptory tone
Assert the nose upon his face his own;
With hesitation admirably slow,
He humbly hopes--presumes--it may be so.
His evidence, if he were called by law
To swear to some enormity he saw,
For want of prominence and just relief,
Would hang an honest man and save a thief.
Through constant dread of giving truth offence,
He ties up all his hearers in suspense;
Knows what he knows as if he knew it not;
What he remembers, seems to have forgot;
His sole opinion, whatsoe'er befall,
Centring at last in having none at all.
Yet, though he tease and baulk your listening ear,
He makes one useful point exceeding clear;
Howe'er ingenious on his darling theme
A sceptic in philosophy may seem,
Reduced to practice, his beloved rule
Would only prove him a consummate fool;
Useless in him alike both brain and speech,
Fate having placed all truth above his reach,
His ambiguities his total sum,
He might as well be blind, and deaf, and dumb."

XXVIII.

_THE SUSPICIOUS._

"Foul suspicion! thou turnest love divine
To joyless dread, and mak'st the loving heart
With hateful thoughts to languish and repine,
And feed itself with self-consuming smart;
Of all the passions of the mind thou vilest art."
SPENCER.

The words of his mouth live with a spirit of doubt, incredulity, and jealousy. Actions, thoughts, motives, are questioned as to their reality and disinterestedness. Good counsel given in time of perplexity is attributed to some ulterior purpose which is kept out of view. Gifts of beneficence are said to be deeds of selfishness--patronage is expected in an affair you have on hand, or you anticipate as much or more in return in some other ways. A family visited with a severe affliction is suspected to have the cause in some secret moral delinquency in the father, or mother, or elder son or daughter. A merchant meets with reverses in his business, and he is suspected of something wrong, for which these reverses are sent as punishment. A traveller meets with an accident, by which a member of his body is fractured or life taken away: he is suspected of having been a great sinner before God, for which His vengeance now visits him.

The suspicious talker may be found in one or other phase of his character in almost every class and grade of society. How often the husband suspects the wife, and the wife the husband; the master the servant, and the servant the master; brothers suspect brothers; sisters sisters; neighbours neighbours; the rich the poor; the poor the rich.

The talk of the suspicious is bitter, stinging, exasperating. How often it ends in jealousy, strife, quarrels, separations, and other evils of a similar kind!

This talk seldom or ever effects any good. It more frequently excites to the very thing on which the suspicion has fixed its demon eye, but of which the subject of the suspicion was never guilty.

Suspicious talk, like many other kinds, has frequently no foundation to rest upon, excepting the fancy of an enfeebled mind or the ill-nature of an unregenerate heart.

* * * * *

"That was a very nice present which Mr. Muckleton sent you on Christmas-Day," said Mr. Birch to his neighbour.

"O, yes," he replied in a sort of careless way; "I _know_ what he sent it for--that he may get my vote at the next election of town councillors. I can see through it."

"Did not Mr. Shakleton call at your house the other day? and were you not pleased to see him?"

"So far as that goes, I was pleased; but I _know_ what he called for; not to see me or mine. It is not worth saying, but I _know_."

"Has not Mrs. Mount recently joined your church? She is an excellent lady, of very good means and intelligence. I should think you will value her acquisition to your number."

"Well, as for that, I cannot say. I like persons to act from pure motives in all things, especially in religious. Don't you know Mrs. Mount is a widow, and there is in our church that Squire Nance, a bachelor? I needn't say any more."

"The Rev. Mr. Wem has left our church and gone to a church in London."

"Indeed! I was not aware of that, but I guess it is to obtain more salary."

"How do you know that?"

"How do I know it? You may depend he wouldn't have gone unless he could better himself."

"My dear," said Mrs. Park to her husband one evening as they were sitting alone, "Tom has gone with young Munster to the city, and will be back about ten o'clock."

"What has he gone there for?" asked Mr. Park, rather sternly. "No good, I venture to say. You know the temptations that are in the city, and he is not so steady as we would like him to be."

When Tom came home at ten o'clock, he had to endure a good deal of suspicious tongue-flagellation, which rather excited him to speak rashly in return.

"I do really think," said Mrs. Lance, snappishly, to her servant one day, "you are guilty of picking and biting the things of the larder, besides other little tricks. Now, I do not allow such conduct. It is paltry and mean."

Mrs. Lance had no ground for this utterance but her own suspicions. The servant, conscious of her integrity, became righteously angry, and gave notice to leave at once. So Mary left her suspicious mistress. She was not the first nor the sixth servant she had driven away by her suspicious talk in regard to the "larder," the "cupboards," the "drawers," and the "wardrobe."

Squire Nutt one day went a drive of twelve miles in the country to attend "a hunt dinner," promising his wife that he would be home by eleven o'clock at night. This hour came, but no Squire. Twelve struck, and he had not returned. One struck, yea, even two, and no husband. Mrs. Nutt all this time was alone, watching for the Squire, and suspecting with a vivid imagination where he had gone, and what he was doing. At half-past two a sound of wheels was heard coming to the door, and in a few minutes the suspected husband entered the hall, and greeted his little wife with signs of affection. Instead of receiving him kindly in return, and waiting till the effects of the dinner had escaped before she called him to account, she began in a most furiously suspicious way to question him. "Where have you been all this time? Have you been round by Netley Hall? _I know all about what you have been up to._ This is a fine thing, this is, keeping me watching and waiting these hours, while you have been galavanting--ah! _I know where._"

Thus, not within curtains, but within the hall, Mrs. Nutt gave her husband a "caudle" lecture, but with little effect upon him. She had nothing but groundless suspicion; he had the inward satisfaction of a good conscience on the points respecting which she suspected him.

As an illustration of another aspect of this talker we may take the friends who came to talk with Job in his troubles. His wife was bad enough in her utterances, but his "friends" were worse. Coleridge, in speaking of Satan taking away everything he had, but left his wife, says,--

"He took his honours, took his wealth,
He took his children, took his health,
His camels, horses, asses, cows,
And the sly devil did not take his spouse."

But his wife was kind and considerate to what his _friends_ were. She spake as one of the "foolish women;" but his friends came as philosophers, the wise ones, to converse with him; and yet, when they spoke to him, they had nothing but suspicions and doubts to utter as to his sincerity, motives, and purity; told him not to plead innocence in his circumstances, but confess all with candour, and show that he had been a profound hypocrite, and that God had visited him with His sore judgments as a punishment for his sins; for _they_ knew that all these things could not have come upon him if there had not been some "secret thing" with him.

Although Job sometimes spoke "unadvisedly with his lips" in reply to the unjustifiable suspicions of his "friends," God stands on his side, and defends him in his rectitude and integrity. He rebukes with severity Bildad the Shuhite and his two companions, because of their uncharitable suspicions uttered against His servant. He was "angry" that they had not spoken truthfully "as His servant Job;" "and they were to go," as one says, "to this servant Job to be prayed for, and eat humble pie, and a good large slice of it too (I should like to have seen their faces while they were munching it), else their leisurely and inhuman philosophy would have got them into a scrape."

* * * * *

Suspicion in talking is a disposition which renders its subject unacceptable to others and unhappy in himself. Persons will have as little as possible to say to him or do with him, lest they fall under his ruling power; and this is what no one with self-respect cares to do. Who likes to have himself, in his motives and deeds, put through the crucible of his narrow, prickly, stingy soul? He cannot see an inch from himself to judge you by. He "measures your cloth by his yard," and weighs your goods in his scales, and judges your colours through his spectacles; and of the justice and trueness of these nothing need be said.

"Suspicion overturns what confidence builds;
And he that dares but doubt when there's no ground,
Is neither to himself nor others sound."

The true remedy for suspicion in talking is more knowledge in the head and more love in the heart. As bats fly before the light, so suspicions before knowledge and love. Throw open the windows of the soul, and admit the truth. Be generous and noble in thoughts of others. Give credit for purity of intention and disinterestedness of motives. Build no fabric of fancies and surmises in the imagination without a solid basis. Be pure in yourself in all things. "The more virtuous any man is in himself," says Cicero, "the less easily does he suspect others to be vicious."

XXIX.

_THE POETIC._

"I begin shrewdly to suspect the young man of a terrible
taint--poetry; with which idle disease, if he be infected, there is
no hope of him in a state course."--BEN JONSON.

Scraps of poetry picked up from Burns, or Thomson, or Shakespeare, or Tennyson, are ready to hand for every occasion, so that you may calculate upon a piece, in or out of place, in course of conversation. If you will do the prose, rely upon it he will do the poetic, much to his own satisfaction, if not to your entertainment. In walking he will gently lay his finger on your shoulder, saying, as he gathers up his recollection, and raising his head, "Hear what my favourite poet says upon the subject."

Sometimes the poetic afflatus falls upon him as he converses, and he will impromptu favour you with an original effusion of rhyme or blank verse, much to the strengthening of his self-complacency, and to the gratification of your sense of the ludicrous.

Talking with Mr. Smythe, a young student, some time ago, I found he was so full of poetic quotations that I began to think whether all his lessons at college had not consisted in the learning of odds and ends from "Gems" and "Caskets" and "Gleanings."

Speaking about the man who is not enslaved to sects and parties, but free in his religious habits, he paused and said, "You remind me, Mr. Bond, of what Pope says,--

'Slave to no sect, who takes no private road,
But looks through nature up to nature's God.'"

The subject of _music_ was introduced, when, after a few words of prose he broke out in evident emotion,--

"Music! oh, how faint, how weak,
Language fades before thy spell!
Why should feeling ever speak
When thou canst breathe her soul so well?
Friendship's balmy words may pain,
Love's are e'en more false than they--
Oh! 'tis only music's strain
Can sweetly soothe and not betray."

"Those are very beautiful lines, Mr. Smythe," I observed; "can you tell me whose they are?"

Placing his hand to his head, he answered, "Really, Mr. Bond, I do not now remember."

"They are Moore's," I replied.

"Oh yes, yes, so they are. I could give you numberless other pieces, Mr. Bond, equally fine and touching."

"Thank you, that will do for the present, Mr. Smythe."

We began to talk about travelling in Scotland, Switzerland, and other parts, when I gave a little of my experience in plain words, as to the effect of the scenery upon my mind and health, when he suddenly interrupted me and said, "Let me see, what is it the poet says upon that? If I can call it up, I will give it you, Mr. Bond,--

'Go abroad,
Upon the paths of Nature, and, when all
Its voices whisper, and its silent things
Are breathing the deep beauty of the world,
Kneel at its simple altar.'"

I spoke of neglected genius both in Church and State, when he exclaimed with much emphasis, as though the lines had fallen on my ears for the first time,--

"Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air."

A voyage to America, with a few incidents about the sea, were spoken of.

"Ah, ah, Mr. Bond," he said, "I have seen some fine lines by J. G. Percival on that subject,--

'I, too, have been upon thy rolling breast,
Wildest of waters! I have seen thee lie
Calm as an infant pillowed in its rest
On a fond mother's bosom, when the sky,
Not smoother, gave the deep its azure dye,
Till a new heaven was arched and glassed below.'

"And then, Mr. Bond, you are familiar with--

'The sea! the sea! the open sea!
The blue, the fresh, the ever free!
Without a mark, without a bound,
It runneth the earth's wide region round;
It plays with the clouds; it mocks the skies;
Or like a cradled creature lies.'"

I spoke of progress in the age in which we live, when he instantly said, "Ah, that reminds me now of what Tennyson says,--

'Not in vain the distant beacons. Forward, forward, let us range,
Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.
Through the shadow of the globe we sweep into the younger day;
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.'"

The worth of a good name was spoken of, and the words of Solomon quoted in support of what was said. But Solomon was not enough. The poetic spirit of our student was astir instantly within him, and broke forth in the well-known lines of Shakespeare, already quoted in this volume,--

"Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing,
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he who filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed."

Marriage and love were incidentally brought up, when, lo and behold, I found he was so brimful on these, that I was obliged to ask him to forbear, after a few specimens. Having had so long an experience in those happy climes, I found he could not say anything that half came up to the reality. Nevertheless, I am free to say, he did quote some sentiments which on him and the young ladies present seemed to have a most charming effect, especially one from Tupper, who used in those times to be a pet poet with the fair sex and such as our student,--

"Love! what a volume in a word! an ocean in a tear!
A seventh heaven in a glance! a whirlwind in a sigh!
The lightning in a touch--a millennium in a moment!
What concentrated joy, or woe, is blessed or blighted love!"

"Blighted love! Ah," said Mr. Smythe, "that reminds me of Tennyson's words," which he appeared to render with deep feeling,--

"I hold it true, whate'er befall--
I feel it when I sorrow most--
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all."

"These lines remind me," he observed, "and it is astonishing the poetic associations of my mind, Mr. Bond. These kind of pieces seem so linked together in my mind, that when I begin I can scarcely stop myself. Well, I was going to give Shakespeare's words,--

'Ah me! for aught that ever I could read,
Could ever hear of tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth.'"

"But have you not a few lines, Mr. Smythe, on marriage, although you have not as yet entered into that happy state?" said Mr. Bond.

"O dear yes! I have pieces without number. For instance, here is one from Middleton,--

'What a delicious breath marriage sends forth--
The violet's bed not sweeter! Honest wedlock
Is like a banqueting-house built in a garden,
On which the spring flowers take delight
To cast their modest odours.'

"Here are some more," he remarked, "from Cotton,--

'Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle powers,
We who improve his golden hours,
By sweet experience know
That marriage rightly understood
Gives to the tender and the good
A Paradise below.'"

Still going on, he said, "Here are some charming lines, Mr. Bond, from Moore,--

'There's a bliss beyond all that the minstrel has told,
When two that are linked in one heavenly tie,
With heart never changing and brow never cold,
Love on through all ills, and love on till they die.
One hour of a passion so sacred is worth
Whole ages of heartless and wandering bliss;
And oh! if there be an Elysium on earth,
It is this--it is this.'"

At the close of these lines something occurred to stop Mr. Smythe going any further.

Poetic quotations in conversation are all very well, when given aptly and wisely; but coming, as they often do, as the fruits of affectation and pedantry, they are repulsive. One wishes in these circumstances that the talker had a few thoughts of his own in prose besides those of the poets which he so lavishly pours into one's jaded ears.

XXX.

_"YES" AND "NO."_

"Let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is
more than these cometh of evil."--JESUS CHRIST.

Although in length "yes" and "no" are among the smallest and shortest words of the English language, yet they often involve an importance far beyond "the most centipedal polysyllables that crawl over the pages of Johnson's dictionary." Did persons stop to reflect upon the full import of these monosyllables, so easily uttered, they would undoubtedly use them with less frequency and more caution.

I shall make no apology for quoting on this subject from a letter out of the "Correspondence of R. E. H. Greyson, Esq.," written by him to Miss Mary Greyson.

"You remember the last pleasant evening in my last visit to Shirley, when I accompanied you to the party at Mrs. Austin's. Something occurred there which I had no opportunity of _improving_ for your benefit. So as you invite reproof--an invitation which who that is mortal and senior can refuse?--I will enlarge a little.

"The good lady, our hostess, expressed, if you recollect, a fear that the light of the unshaded camphine was too bright, in the position in which you sat, for your eyes. Though I saw you blinking with positive pain, yet, out of a foolish timidity, you protested, 'No; oh no; not at all!' Now that was a very unneighbourly act of the tongue, thus to set at nought the eye; the selfish thing must have forgotten that 'if one member suffer, all the others must suffer with it.' My dear, never sacrifice your eyes to any organ whatever; at all events, not to the tongue,--least of all when it does not tell the truth. Of the two, you had better be dumb than blind.

"Now, if I had not interposed, and said that you _were_ suffering, whether you knew it or not, you would have played the martyr all the evening to a sort of a--a--what shall I call it?--it must out--a sort of fashionable fib. You may answer, perhaps, that you did not like to make a fuss, or seem squeamish, or discompose the company; and so, from timidity, you said 'the thing that was not.' Very true; but this is the very thing I want you to guard against; I want you to have such presence of mind that the thought of absolute truth shall so preoccupy you as to defy surprise and anticipate even the most hurried utterances.

"The incident is very trifling in itself; I have noticed it because I think I have observed on other occasions that, from a certain timidity of character, and an amiable desire not to give trouble, or make a fuss, as you call it (there, now, Mary, I am sure the medicine is nicely mixed--that spoonful of syrup ought to make it go down), you have evinced a disposition to say, from pure want of thinking, what is not precise truth. Weigh well, my dear girl, and ever act on, that precept of the Great Master, which, like all His precepts, is of deepest import, and, in spirit, of the utmost generality of application, 'Let your yea be yea, and your nay, nay.'

"Let truth--absolute truth--take precedence of everything; let it be more precious to you than anything else. Sacrifice not a particle of it at the bidding of indolence, vanity, interest, cowardice, or shame; least of all, to those tawdry idols of stuffed straw and feathers--the idols of fashion and false honour.

"It is often said that the great lesson for a young man or a young woman to learn is how to say 'no.' It would be better to say that they should learn aright how to use both 'yes' and 'no,'--for both are equally liable to abuse.

"The modes in which they are employed often give an infallible criterion of character.

"Some say both doubtfully and hesitatingly, drawling out each letter--'y-e-s,' 'n-o,'--that one might swear to their indecision of character at once. Others repeat them with such facility of assent or dissent, taking their tone from the previous question, that one is equally assured of the same conclusion, or, what is as bad, that they never reflect at all. They are a sort of parrots.

"One very important observation is this--be pleased to remember, my dear, that 'yes,' in itself, always means 'yes,' and 'no' always means 'no.'

"I fancy you will smile at such a profound remark; nevertheless, many act as if they never knew it, both in uttering these monosyllables themselves and in interpreting them as uttered by others. Young ladies, for example, when _the_ question, as it is called, _par excellence_ (as if it were more important than the whole catechism together) is put to them, often say 'no' when they really mean 'yes.' It is a singular happiness for them that the young gentlemen to whom they reply in this contradictory sort of way have a similar incapacity of understanding 'yes' and 'no;' nay, a greater; for these last often persist in thinking 'no' means 'yes,' even when it really means what it says.

"'Pray, my dear,' said a mamma to her daughter of eighteen, 'what was your cousin saying to you when I met you blushing so in the garden?'

"'He told me that he loved me, mamma, and asked if I could love him.'

"'Upon my word! And what did you say to _him_, my dear?'

"'I said yes, mamma.'

"'My dear, how could you be so----'

"'Why, mamma, what else _could_ I say? it was the--_truth_.'

"Now I consider this a model for all love-passages: and when it comes to your turn, my dear, pray follow this truth-loving young lady's example, and do not trust to your lover's powers of interpretation to translate a seeming 'no' into a genuine 'yes.' He might be one of those simple, worthy folk who are so foolish as to think that a negative is really a negative!

"I grant that there are a thousand conventional cases in which 'yes' means 'no,' and 'no' means 'yes;' and they are so ridiculously common that every one is supposed, in politeness, not to mean what he says, or, rather, is not doubted to mean the contrary of what he says. In fact, quite apart from positive lying--that is, any intention to deceive--the honest words are so often interchanged, that if 'no' were to prosecute 'yes,' and 'yes' 'no,' for trespass, I know not which would have most causes in court. Have nothing to do with these absurd conventionalisms, my dear. 'Let your yea be yea, and your nay, nay.' If you are asked whether you are cold, hungry, tired, never, for fear of giving trouble, say the contrary of what you feel. Decline giving the trouble if you like, by all means; but do not assign any false reason for so doing. These are trifles, you will say; and so they are. But it is only by austere regard to truth, even in trifles, that we shall keep the love of it spotless and pure. 'Take care of the pence' of truth, 'and the pounds will take care of themselves.'

"Not only let your utterance be simple truth, as you apprehend it, but let it be decisive and unambiguous, according to those apprehensions. Some persons speak as falteringly as if they thought the text I have cited ran, 'Let your yea be nay, and your nay, yea.' And so they are apt to assent or dissent, according to the tenor of the last argument: 'Yes--no--yes--no.' It is just like listening to the pendulum of a clock.

"It is a great aggravation of the misuse of 'yes' and 'no,' that the young are apt to lose all true apprehension of their meaning, and think, in certain cases, that 'yes' cannot mean 'yes,' nor 'no' 'no.'

"I have known a lad, whose mother's 'no' had generally ended in 'yes,' completely ruined, because when his father said 'no' in reply to a request for unreasonable aid, and threatened to leave him to his own devices if he persisted in extravagance, could not believe that his father meant what he said, or could prevail on justice to turn nature out of doors. But his father meant 'no,' and stuck to it, and the lad was ruined, simply because, you see, he had not noticed that father and mother differed in their dialects--that his father's 'no' always meant 'no,' and nothing else. You have read 'Rob Roy,' and may recollect that that amiable young gentleman, Mr. F. Osbaldistone, with less reason, very nearly made an equally fatal mistake; for every word his father had ever uttered, and every muscle in his face, every gesture, every step, ought to have convinced him that his father always meant what he said.

"In fine, learn to apply these little words aright and honestly, and, little though they be, you will keep the love of truth pure and unsullied.

"Ah me! what worlds of joy and sorrow, what maddening griefs and ecstacies have these poor monosyllables conveyed! More than any other words in the whole dictionary have they enraptured or saddened the human heart; rung out the peal of joy, or sounded the knell of hope. And yet not so often as at first sight might appear, for these blunt and honest words are, both, kindly coy in scenes of agony.

"There are occasions--and those the most terrible in life--when the lips are fairly absolved from using them, and when, if the eye cannot express what the muffled tongue refuses to tell, the tongue seeks any stammering compassionate circumlocution rather than utter the dreaded syllable. 'Is there no hope?' says the mother, hanging over her dying child, to the physician, in whose looks are life and death. He dare not say 'yes;' but to such a question silence and dejection can alone say 'no.'"

XXXI.

_A GROUP OF TALKERS._