Thomas Wingfold, Curate V2
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George MacDonald >> Thomas Wingfold, Curate V2
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DIVINE SERVICE.
The next day the curate called again on Leopold. But Helen happened
to be otherwise engaged for a few minutes, and Mrs. Ramshorn to be
in the sick-room when the servant brought his name. With her
jealousy of Wingfold's teaching, she would not have admitted him,
but Lingard made such loud protest when he heard her say "Not at
home," insisting on seeing him, that she had to give way, and tell
the maid to show him up. She HAD NO NOTION however of leaving him
alone in the room with the invalid: who could tell what absurd and
extravagant ideas he might not put into the boy's head! He might
make him turn monk, or Socinian, or latter-day-saint, for what she
knew! So she sat, blocking up the sole small window in the youth's
dark dwelling that looked eastward, and damming back the tide of the
dawn from his diseased and tormented soul. Little conversation was
therefore possible. Still the face of his new friend was a comfort
to Leopold, and ere he left him they had managed to fix an hour for
next day, when they would not be thus foiled of their talk.
That same afternoon, Wingfold took the draper to see Polwarth.
Rachel was lying on the sofa in the parlour--a poor little heap,
looking more like a grave disturbed by efforts at a resurrection,
than a form informed with humanity. But she was cheerful and
cordial, receiving Mr. Drew and accepted his sympathy most kindly.
"We'll see what God will do for me," she said in answer to a word
from the curate. Her whole bearing, now as always, was that of one
who perfectly trusted a supreme spirit under whose influences lay
even the rugged material of her deformed dwelling.
Polwarth allowed Wingfold to help him in getting tea, and the
conversation, as will be the case where all are in earnest, quickly
found the right channel.
It is not often in real life that such conversations occur.
Generally, in any talk worth calling conversation, every man has
some point to maintain, and his object is to justify his own thesis
and disprove his neighbour's. I will allow that he may primarily
have adopted his thesis because of some sign of truth in it, but his
mode of supporting it is generally such as to block up every cranny
in his soul at which more truth might enter. In the present case,
unusual as it is for so many as three truth-loving men to come thus
together on the face of this planet, here were three simply set on
uttering truth they had seen, and gaining sight of truth as yet
veiled from them.
I shall attempt only a general impression of the result of their
evening's intercourse, partly recording the utterances of Polwarth.
"I have been trying hard to follow you, Mr. Polwarth," said the
draper, after his host had for a while had the talk to himself, "but
I cannot get a hold of your remarks. One moment I think I have got
the end of the clew, and the next find myself all abroad again.
Would you tell me what you mean by divine service, for I think you
must use the phrase in some different sense from what I have been
accustomed to?"
"Ah! I ought to remember," said Polwarth, "that what has grown
familiar to my mind from much solitary thinking, may not at once
show itself to another, when presented in the forms of a foreign
individuality. I ought to have premised that, when I use the phrase,
DIVINE SERVICE, I mean nothing whatever belonging to the church,
or its observances. I mean by it what it ought to mean--the serving
of God--the doing of something for God. Shall I make of the church
in my foolish imaginations a temple of idolatrous worship by
supposing that it is for the sake of supplying some need that God
has, or of gratifying some taste in him, that I there listen to his
word, say prayers to him, and sing his praises? Shall I be such a
dull mule in the presence of the living Truth? Or, to use a homely
simile, shall I be as the good boy of the nursery rhyme, who, seated
in his corner of selfish complacency, regards the eating of his pie
as a virtuous action, enjoys the contemplation of it, and thinks
what a pleasant object he thus makes of himself to his parents?
Shall I, to take a step farther, degrade the sanctity of the closet,
hallowed in the words of Jesus, by shutting its door in the vain
fancy of there doing something that God requires of me as a sacred
OBSERVANCE? Shall I foolishly imagine that to put in exercise the
highest and loveliest, the most entrancing privilege of existence,
that of pouring forth my whole heart into the heart of him who is
ACCOUNTABLE FOR me, who hath glorified me with his own image--in my
soul, gentlemen, sadly disfigured as it is in my body!--shall I say
that THAT is to do anything for God? Was I serving my father when I
ate the dinner he provided for me? Am I serving my God when I eat
his bread and drink his wine?"
"But," said Drew, "is not God pleased that a man should pour out his
soul to him?"
"Yes, doubtless; but what would you think of a child who said, 'I am
very useful to my father, for when I ask him for anything, or tell
him I love him, it gives him--oh, such pleasure!'?"
"I should say he was an unendurable prig. Better he had to be
whipped for stealing!" said the curate.
"There would be more hope of his future," returned Polwarth. "--Is
the child," he continued, "who sits by his father's knee and looks
up into his father's face, SERVING that father, because the heart of
the father delights to look down upon his child? And shall the
moment of my deepest repose and bliss, the moment when I serve
myself with the very life of the universe, be called a serving of my
God? It is communion with God; he holds it with me, else never could
I hold it with him. I am as the foam-froth upon his infinite ocean,
but of the water of the ocean is the bubble on its waves."
Not the eyes only, but the whole face of the man, which had grown of
a pure, semi-transparent whiteness, appeared to Wingfold to emit
light.
"When my child would serve me," he went on," he spies out some need
I have, springs from his seat at my knee, finds that which will meet
my necessity, and is my eager, happy servant, of consequence in his
own eyes inasmuch as he has done something for his father. His seat
by my knee is love, delight, well-being, peace--not service, however
pleasing in my eyes.--'Why do you seat yourself at my knee, my son?'
'To please you, father.' 'Nay then, my son! go from me, and come
again when it shall be to please thyself.'--'Why do you cling to my
chair, my daughter? 'Because I want to be near you, father. It makes
me so happy!' 'Come nearer still--come to my bosom, my child, and be
yet happier.'--Talk not of public worship as divine service; it is a
mockery. Search the prophets and you will find the observances,
fasts and sacrifices and solemn feasts, of the temple by them
regarded with loathing and scorn, just because by the people they
were regarded as DIVINE SERVICE."
"But," said Mr. Drew, while Wingfold turned towards him with some
anxiety lest he should break the mood of the little prophet, "I
can't help thinking I have you! for how are poor creatures like
us--weak, blundering creatures, sometimes most awkward when
best-intentioned--how are we to minister to a perfect God--perfect
in wisdom, strength, and everything--of whom Paul says that he is
not worshipped with men's hands as though he needed anything? I
cannot help thinking that you are fighting merely with a word.
Certainly, if the phrase ever was used in that sense, there is no
meaning of the kind attached to it now: it stands merely for the
forms of public worship."
"Were there no such thing as Divine Service in the true sense of the
word, then, indeed it would scarcely be worth while to quarrel with
its misapplication. But I assert that true and genuine service may
be rendered to the living God; and, for the development of the
divine nature in man, it is necessary that he should do something
for God. Nor is it hard to discover how; for God is in every
creature that he has made, and in their needs he is needy, and in
all their afflictions he is afflicted. Therefore Jesus says that
whatever is done to one of his little ones is done to him. And if
the soul of a man be the temple of the Spirit, then is the place of
that man's labour, his shop, his counting-house, his laboratory, the
temple of Jesus Christ, where the spirit of the man is incarnate in
work.--Mr. Drew!"--Here the gate-keeper stood up, and held out both
his hands, palms upward, towards the draper on the other side of the
table.--"Mr. Drew! your shop is the temple of your service where the
Lord Christ, the only image of the Father is, or ought to be
throned; your counter is, or ought to be his altar; and everything
thereon laid, with intent of doing as well as you can for your
neighbour, in the name of THE man Christ Jesus, is a true sacrifice
offered to Him, a service done to the eternal creating Love of the
universe."
The little prophet's head as he stood, did not reach the level of
the draper's as he sat, but at this Drew dropped his head on his
hands upon the table, as if bowed down by a weight of thought and
feeling and worship.
"I say not," Polwarth went on, "that so doing you will grow a rich
man, but I say that so doing you will be saved from growing too
rich, and that you will be a fellow-worker with God for the
salvation of his world."
"I must live; I cannot give my goods away!" murmured Mr. Drew,
thinkingly, as one that sought enlightenment.
"That would be to go direct against the order of his world, "said
Polwarth." No; a harder task is yours, Mr. Drew--to make your
business a gain to you, and at the same time to be not only what is
commonly counted just, but interested in, and careful of, and caring
for your neighbour, as a servant of the God of bounty who giveth to
all men liberally. Your calling is to do the best for your neighbour
that you reasonably can."
"But who is to fix what is reasonable?" asked Drew.
"The man himself, thinking in the presence of Jesus Christ. There is
a holy moderation which is of God."
"There won't be many fortunes--great fortunes--made after that rule,
Mr. Polwarth."
"Very few."
"Then do you say that no great fortunes have been righteously made?"
"If RIGHTEOUSLY means AFTER THE FASHION OF JESUS CHRIST.--But I will
not judge: that is for the God-enlightened conscience of the man
himself to do--not for his neighbour's. Why should I be judged by
another man's conscience?--But you see, Mr. Drew,--and this is what
I was driving at--that you have it in your power to SERVE God,
through the needs of his children, all the working day, from morning
to night, so long as there is a customer in your shop."
"I do think you are right, sir," said the linen-draper. "I had a
glimpse of the same thing the other night myself. And yet it seems
as if you spoke of a purely ideal state--one that could not be
realised in this world."
"Purely ideal or not, one thing is certain: it will never be reached
by one who is so indifferent to it as to believe it impossible.
Whether it may be reached in this world or not, that is a question
of NO consequence; whether a man has begun to REACH AFTER it, is of
the utmost awfulness of import. And should it be ideal, which I
doubt, what else than the ideal have the followers of the ideal man
to do with?"
"Can a man reach anything ideal before he has God dwelling in
him--filling every cranny of his soul?" asked the curate with
shining eyes.
"Nothing, I do most solemnly believe," answered Polwarth. "It weighs
on me heavily sometimes," he resumed, after a pause, "to think how
far all but a few are from being able even to entertain the idea of
the indwelling in them of the original power of their life. True,
God is in every man, else how could he live the life he does live?
but that life God keeps alive for the hour when he shall inform the
will, the aspiration, the imagination of the man. When the man
throws wide his door to the Father of his spirit, when his
individual being is thus supplemented--to use a poor miserable
word--with the individuality that originated it, then is the man a
whole, healthy, complete existence. Then indeed, and then only, will
he do no wrong, think no wrong, love perfectly, and be right merry.
Then will he scarce think of praying, because God is in every
thought and enters anew with every sensation. Then will he forgive,
and endure, and pour out his soul for the beloved who yet grope
their way in doubt and passion. Then every man will be dear and
precious to him, even the worst, for in him also lies an unknown
yearning after the same peace wherein he rests and loves."
He sat down suddenly, and a deep silence filled the room.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
A SHOP IN HEAVEN.
"Uncle," said Rachel, "may I read your visions of the shops in
heaven?"
"Oh no, Rachel. You are not able to read to-night," said her uncle
deprecatingly.
"I think I am, uncle. I should like to try. It will let the
gentlemen see what you WOULD think an ideal state of things.--It is
something, Mr. Wingfold, my uncle once dictated to me, and I wrote
down just as he said it. He can always do better dictating than
writing, but this time he was so ill with asthma that he could not
talk much faster than I could write; and yet to be so ill I never
saw him show so little suffering; his thinking seemed to make him
forget it.--Mayn't I read it, uncle? I know the gentlemen would
like to hear it."
"That we should," said both men at once.
"I will fetch it you then," said Polwarth, "if you will tell me
where to find it."
Rachel gave him the needful directions, and presently he brought a
few sheets of paper, and handed them to her.
"This is no dream, Mr. Wingfold," he said. "It is something I
thought fairly out before I began to dictate it. But the only fit
form I could find for it was that of a vision--like the Vision of
Mirza, you know.--Now read, Rachel, and I will hold my tongue."
After a little arranging of the sheets, Rachel began. She read not
without difficulty, but her pleasure in what she read helped her
through.
"'And now, said my guide to me, I will bring thee to a city of the
righteous, and show thee how they buy and sell in this the kingdom
of heaven. So we journeyed a day and another day and half a day, and
I was weary ere we arrived thither. But when I saw the loveliness of
the place, and drew in the healing air thereof, my weariness
vanished as a dream of the night, and I said, IT IS WELL.--I may not
now speak of the houses and the dress and the customs of the
dwellers therein, save what may belong to the buying and selling of
which I have spoken. Gladly would I tell of the streams that went,
some noiselessly gliding, others gurgling, some sweeping, some
rushing and roaring, through every street, all issuing from one
right plenteous fountain in the middle of the city, so that the ear
was for ever filled with the sound of many waters all the day,
ceasing when the night came, that silence might have its perfect
work upon the soul. Gladly too would I tell of the trees and flowers
and grass that grew in every street along the banks of the rivers.
But I must withhold.
"'After I had, I know not for how long, refreshed my soul with what
it was thus given, me to enjoy,--for in all that country there is no
such thing as haste, no darting from one thing to another, but a
calm eternal progress in which unto the day the good thereof is
sufficient--one great noon-day, my conductor led me into a large
place, such as we would call a shop here, although the arrangements
were different, and an air of stateliness dwelt in and around the
house. It was filled with the loveliest silken and woollen stuffs,
of all kinds and colours, a thousand delights to the eye--and to the
thought also, for here was endless harmony, and no discord.
"'I stood in the midst, and my guide stood by me in silence; for all
the time I was in the country, he seldom spoke to me save when first
I asked of him, and yet he never showed any weariness, and often a
half-smile would dwell for a moment upon his countenance.
"'And first I watched the faces of them that sold; and I could read
therein--for be it understood that, according to the degree of his
own capacity, a man there could perfectly read the countenance of
every neighbour, that is, unless it expressed something that was not
in himself--and I could read in them nothing of eagerness, only the
calm of a concentrated ministration. There was no seeking there, but
a strength of giving, a business-like earnestness to supply lack,
enlivened by no haste, and dulled by no weariness, brightened ever
by the reflected content of those who found their wants supplied. As
soon as one buyer was contented they turned graciously to another,
and gave ear until they perfectly understood with what object he had
come to seek their aid. Nor did their countenances change utterly as
they turned away, for upon them lingered the satisfaction as of one
who hath had a success, and by degrees melted into the supervening
content.
"'Then I turned to watch the countenances of them that bought.--And
there in like manner I saw no cupidity and no meanness. They spake
humbly, yet not because they sought a favour, but because they were
humble, for with their humility was mingled the confidence of
receiving that they sought. And truly it was a pleasure to see how
everyone knew what his desire was, making his choice readily and
with decision. I perceived also that everyone spoke not merely
respectfully, but gratefully, to him who served him. And at meeting
and parting such kindly though brief greetings passed as made me
wonder whether every inhabitant of such a mighty city could know
every other that dwelt therein. But I soon saw that it came not of
individual knowledge, but of universal faith and all-embracing love.
"'And as I stood and watched, suddenly it came into my mind that I
had never yet seen the coin of the country, and thereupon I kept my
eyes upon a certain woman who bought silk, that when she paid for
the same I might see the money. But that which she had largely
bought she took in her arms and carried away, and paid not.
Therefore I turned to watch another, who bought for a long journey,
but when he carried away that he bought, neither did he pay any
money. And I said to myself, These are well-known persons, to whom
it is more convenient to pay all at a certain season; and I turned
to a third who bought much fine linen. But behold! he paid not. Then
I began to observe again those that sold; whereupon I thought with
myself, How good must be the air of this land for the remembrance of
things! for these men write down nothing to keep on record the
moneys men owe them on all sides. And I looked and looked again and
yet again, and stood long watching--but so it was throughout the
whole place, which thronged and buzzed and swarmed like the busiest
of bee-hives--no man paid, and no man had a book wherein to write
that which the other owed!
"'Then I turned to my guide and said: How lovely is honesty! and
truly from what a labour it absolveth men! for here I see every man
keepeth in his mind his own debts, and not the debts of others, so
that time is not spent in paying of small sums, neither in the
keeping of account of such; but he that buyeth counteth up, and
doubtless when the day of reckoning arrives, each cometh and casteth
the money he oweth into the merchant's coffer, and both are
satisfied.
"'Then my conductor smiled, and said, Watch yet a while.
"'And I did as he said unto me, and stood and watched. But the same
thing went on everywhere; and I said to myself, Lo, I see nothing
new!--Suddenly, at my side, a man dropped upon his knees, and bowed
his head to the ground. And those that stood nigh him dropped also
upon their knees, and there arose a sound as of soft thunder; and
lo! everyone in the place had dropped upon his knees, and spread his
hands out before him. Every voice and every noise was hushed, every
movement had ceased, and I and my guide alone were left standing.
"'Then I whispered in his ear, It is the hour of prayer: shall we
not kneel also? And my guide answered, No man in this city kneeleth
because others do, and no man is judged if he kneeleth not. If thou
hast any grief or pain upon thee, then kneel; if not, then love God
in thy heart and be thankful, and kneel when thou goest into thy
chamber. Then said I, I will not kneel, but will watch and see.--It
is well, said my guide; and I stood.
"'For certain moments all was utter stillness--every man and woman
kneeling, with hands outstretched, save him who had first kneeled,
and his hands hung by his sides and his head was still bowed to the
earth. At length he rose up, and lo! his face was wet with tears;
and all the people rose also, and with a noise throughout the place;
and the man made a low obeisance to them that were nigh him, the
which they returned with equal reverence, and then with downcast
eyes he walked slowly from the shop. The moment he was gone, the
business of the place, without a word of remark on any side
concerning what had passed, began again and went on as before.
People came and went, some more eager and outward, some more staid
and inward, but all contented and cheerful. At length a bell
somewhere rang sweet and shrill, and after that no one entered the
place, and what was in progress began to be led to a decorous
conclusion. In three or four minutes the floor was empty, and the
people also of the shop had gone, each about his own affairs,
without shutting door or window.
"'I went out last with my guide, and we seated ourselves under a
tree of the willow-kind on the bank of one of the quieter streams,
and straightway I began to question him. Tell me, sir, I said, the
purport of what I have seen, for not yet have I understood how these
happy people do their business and pass from hand to hand not a
single coin I And he answered, Where greed and ambition and
self-love rule, money must be: where there is neither greed nor
ambition nor self-love, money is needless. And I asked, Is it then
by the same ancient mode of barter that they go about their affairs?
Truly I saw no exchange of any sort.--Bethink thee, said my guide,
if thou hadst gone into any other shop throughout the whole city,
thou wouldst have seen the same thing. I see not how that should
make the matter plainer to me, I answered.--Where neither greed nor
ambition nor selfishness reigneth, said my guide, there need and
desire have free scope, for they work no evil.--But even now I
understand you not, sir, I said.--Hear me then, answered my guide,
for I will speak to thee more plainly. Wherefore do men take money
in their hands when they go where things are?--Because they may not
have the things without giving the money.--And where they may have
things without giving money, there they take no money in their
hands?--Truly no, sir, if there be such a place.--Then such a place
is this, and so is it here.--But how can men give of their goods
and receive nought in return?--By receiving everything in return.
Tell me, said my guide, why do men take money for their goods?--That
they may have wherewithal to go and buy other things which they need
for themselves.--But if they also may go to this place or that
place where the things are the which they need, and receive of those
things without money and without price, is there then good cause why
they should take money in their hands?--Truly no, I answered; and I
begin, methinks, to see how the affair goeth. Yet are there some
things still whereupon I would gladly be resolved. And first of all,
how cometh it that men are moved to provide these and those goods for
the supply of the wants of their neighbours, when they are drawn thereto
by no want in themselves, and no advantage to themselves?--Thou reasonest,
said my guide, as one of thine own degree, who to the eyes of the
full-born ever look like chrysalids, closed round in a web of their
own weaving; and who shall blame thee until thou thyself shinest within
thyself? Understand that it is never advantage to himself that moveth
a man in this kingdom to undertake this or that. The thing that alone
advantageth a man here is the thing which he doth without thought unto
that advantage. To your world, this world goeth by contraries. The man
here that doeth most service, that aideth others the most to the
obtaining of their honest desires, is the man who standeth highest
with the Lord of the place, and his reward and honour is, to be enabled
to the spending of himself yet more for the good of his fellows. There
goeth a rumour amongst us even now that one shall ere long be ripe for
the carrying of a message from the King to the spirits that are in
prison. Thinkest thou it is a less potent stirring up of thought and
energy to desire and seek and find the things that will please the
eye, and cheer the brain, and gladden the heart of the people of
this great city, so that when one prayeth, 'Give me, friend, of thy
loaves,' a man may answer, 'Take of them, friend, as many as thou
needest'--is that, I say, an incentive to diligence less potent
than the desire to hoard or to excel? Is it not to share the bliss
of God who hoardeth nothing, but ever giveth liberally? The joy of a
man here is to enable another to lay hold upon that which is of his
own kind and be glad and grow thereby--doctrine strange and
unbelievable to the man in whom the well of life is yet sealed.
Never have they been many at a time in the old world who could thus
enter into the joy of their Lord. And yet, if thou bethink thee,
thou wilt perceive that such bliss is not unknown amongst thy
fellows. Knowest thou no musician who would find it joy enough for a
night, to scale the tower of a hundred bells, and send the great
meteors of music-light flying over the care-tortured city? Would
everyone even of thy half-created race reason with himself and say:
Truly it is in the night, and no one can see who it is that
ministereth; the sounds alone will go forth nor bear my image; I
shall reap no honour; I will not rise and go? Thou knowest, I say,
some in thy world who would not speak thus in their hearts, but
would willingly consent to be as nothing, so to give life to their
fellows. In this city so is it with all--in shop or workshop, in
study or theatre, all seek to spend and be spent for the lovely all.
--And I said, One thing tell me, sir--how much a man may have for
the asking.--What he will--that is, what he can well use.--Who then
shall be the judge thereof?--Who but the man himself?--What if he
should turn to greed, and begin to hoard and spare?--Sawest thou not
the man this day because of whom all business ceased for a time?--to
that man had come a thought of accumulation instead of growth, and
he dropped upon his knees in shame and terror. And thou sawest how
all business ceased, and straightway that of the shop was made what
below they call a church; for everyone hastened to the poor man's
help, the air was filled with praying breath, and the atmosphere of
God-loving souls was around him; the foul thought fled, and the man
went forth glad and humble, and to-morrow he will return for that
which he needeth. If thou shouldst be present then, thou wilt see
him more tenderly ministered unto than all the rest.--And if such a
man prayed not?--If such a man slept ere he repented, he would wake
with hatred in his heart towards the city and everyone therein, and
would straightway flee into the wilderness. And the angel of the
Lord would go out after him, and smite him with a word, and he would
vanish from amongst us, and his life would be the life of one of
those least of living things that are in your world born of the
water; and there must he grow up again, crawling through the
channels of thousand-folded difference, from animal to animal, until
at length a human brain be given him, and after generations he
become once again capable of being born of the spirit into the
kingdom of liberty. Then shall all his past life open upon him, and
in shame and dismay will he repent a thousand-fold, and will sin no
more. Such, at least, are thoughts of our wise men upon the matter;
but truly we know not.--It is good, I said. But how are men guided
as to what lies to them to provide for the general good?--Every man
doeth what thing he can, and the more his labour is desired, the
more he rejoices.--If a man should desire that he could no where
find in the city?--Then would he straightway do his endeavour to
provide that thing for all in the city who might after him desire
the same.--Now, sir, methinks I know and understand, I answered. And
we rose and went farther.'"
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