Читать книгу The Life of Sophia Jex-Blake - Graham Travers - Страница 17

Table of Contents

It is the great miracle of life—that first glow and uplifting of the soul in touch with the Unseen. “The immediate consciousness of the religious man,” said Hegel, “has in it an infinite worth, because an infinite content.” For the moment it seems as if all the difficulties of life were swept away, as if nothing temporal could matter any more. But if the world at large is to be ennobled and spiritualised by these individual experiences, the inspiration has got to be worked out in “the commonplace clay with which the world provides us.”

And here comes in an all-important point, to which, on the whole, far too little significance has been attached. To some of those who have the vision, Fate gives a tractable, malleable lump of clay, limited in mass, fine in texture, ready to respond to the lightest touch of the potter: and so we get sweet and saintly characters whose lives will bear the minutest inspection—such characters as Maurice and Eugénie de Guérin, or the wonderful family described in Le Récit d’une Soeur. But there are some to whose lot a very different problem falls. The big and rough jobs of the world-spirit have to be tackled somehow. There are unwieldy masses of clay, full of grit and impurities, masses that do not seem to respond to the creative impulse at all. Rough handling, bold tunnelling may be required; and if it be true—as it is—that the first beauty of the spiritual vision seems degraded in any attempt at realization, how much more is this the case when the seer is baffled and thwarted at every turn by the sheer inertness and stupidity of the lump, so to speak, when he is forced to resort to almost brutal methods in order to get his idea expressed at all.

God gives man the vision and the lump of clay; and many a man who escapes the censure of his fellows gives back the two separately to God, like the talent wrapped in a napkin: some men are privileged to return a piece of work that all eyes can value in a trice: and some, “with aching hands and bleeding feet” have merely blocked out a great conception, have half-unconsciously drafted the rough outline of one of the Almighty’s big schemes, an outline on the details of which smaller souls will be abundantly occupied for generations to come.

Before we judge of the finish of a man’s life, before we judge of its correspondence with what he believes to be his inspiration, let us ask—What was the extent of the problem it had to grapple with?—What was the mass and what the condition of the clay?—What, in a word, was the man’s task?

There must, of course, be some sort of affinity, some mesmeric attraction—even if this should seem to show itself in an actual distaste—between the man and the task. So far as human stupidity makes this possible, we must believe that God Almighty chooses His man, and the work of the Almighty would be singularly limited in range if He chose for His purpose only those whose natural endowments are such as to make them an unqualified credit to any cause they may espouse.

All this must be specially borne in mind in judging the subsequent life of S. J.-B. We are bound, of course, to ask how she worked out in life this beautiful vision of her adolescence—bound to ask how she realized in practice the “infinite (potential) worth and content” of that first radiant consciousness; but before we attempt to answer the question, we must take into full account the extent and the difficulty of the task that fell to her share, and we must give full weight to the natural attributes which were the tools placed at her disposal.

It is clear that there was about her a doggedness, a high-handedness, a disregard of tradition, an actual—if superficial—roughness, which are not common qualities among the highly-educated of either sex, and which were never admired in her own. On the other hand, the reader of the foregoing pages will no longer need to be told of her tenderness and sensitiveness—of a capacity for loving and for suffering only commensurate with her power of inspiring love, of incurring suffering. In a sense she was a born fighter, but it is a very nice question how far she enjoyed a fight. Thousands of times throughout life she might truly have repeated the extract from her diary quoted on p. 46:

“This brought down an awful storm of wonder, reasoning, etc., till at length I got off to bed so tired.”

The diary continues after the extract quoted in the last chapter:

“And now to turn to the outer facts of life.

Here I am, my London College life over, with all its pleasures, all its cares, all its responsibilities, all its glorious delight at times.

Ten terms have I kept—ten passed since the beginning of that second volume of mine! How sorrowfully meagre seems the record. Yet ‘the world could scarcely contain’ what might have been written.

My rooms in Nottingham Place given up (first and second floors let to Vs.). The world before me. Alice only bound to me. My life in Scotland to begin whenever rested. Wants sufficient resolution to make that ‘when.’ Yet I expect very needful.

I suppose the shock to my whole being of the last three months could not be easily reckoned. Two months today since I left N.P.!

Again the burden has been lightened since my resolve (how inadequately worked out!) of Sunday night. Not only Watch, but Work and wait! …

By-the-bye, Frid’s lovely Christmas gift—Christ on the Cross. The Child Christ and verses (her’s?)

‘The love that brings salvation

Shall at last prevail!’

Amen.”

“My life in Scotland to begin whenever rested.”

It is not easy to say what induced S. J.-B. to seek farther education in Scotland, except that she was anxious to extend her experience in every possible way. A few years later, thanks to the efforts of Mrs. Crudelius, Professor Masson, Miss Louisa Stevenson, and others, the University Classes for Women at Shandwick Place were successfully started, but in 1862 there is no reason to think women were better off in Edinburgh than in any other town of the same size. A report seems to have gone forth, however, of the superior advantages offered by some institution, and S. J.-B. went north—accompanied by her faithful maid, Alice—full of hope and ambition. On her last night at home, by an interesting coincidence, she heard a sermon that impressed her on the text: “They have no changes: therefore they fear not God.”

The link that bound her with the world on which she was entering was of the slightest. Mrs. Burn Murdoch (née Miss Dora Monck Mason) was an old schoolfellow, a contemporary of Caroline Jex-Blake, and the traveller carried with her an introduction to Miss Margaret Orr, sister of Captain (now General) Orr who afterwards married one of the Norfolk cousins, Miss Henrietta Cubitt. In these acquaintanceships—both of which were to ripen into lifelong friendships—S. J.-B. was very fortunate; but as far as the immediate object of the pilgrimage was concerned, she was destined to bitter disappointment.

Here is her own account of her first lesson:

“Then went in to the Arithmetic class. Found the first division doing Proportion! And, oh, such teaching! First question:—‘If cloth is bought for 2s. a yard, at what price must it be sold to gain 25 per cent?’ … exhortation following in this style—‘Now say and exameen carefully’ (broad Scotch) ‘I think ye’ll find it need consideration, etc.’ ‘It’s not quite a deerect question, etc., etc.’ ‘Now what will be the third terrm?’ ‘Stand up the ladies who can answer. What, Miss McCreechie! I think ye’ll hardly tell me, but ye can try, etc., etc.’ And, sure enough, long took this abstruse question to solve.

And such a lesson! No explaining—some scolding, some shouting—a good deal of cry and small wool. Then he came to me. ‘Can ye do proportion?’ ‘Yes (!) I want to do Algebra.’ ‘Ay—but that’ll be Friday. But do ye know Fractions?’ I intimated an idea that I did. He didn’t seem at all to believe it—‘did I understand them?’ I felt rather absurd and hypocritical, and again said I did rather decidedly. However not a bit would he believe me—gave me (as a severe test, I suppose) ¾ x ⅝ to do and explain. Well—did it! ‘But why?’ I am sure I shall always hereafter have pity on unfortunate examinees pounced upon. The whole thing seemed so absurd—I was so annoyed,annoyed,—it seemed so silly standing up by that imp of a Sandy with a slate—that I very nearly failed to give any rational explanation. However I did somewhat, and he had rather grudgingly to grant, ‘Ay, I see ye know it.’ Then, when I asked him about the Algebra, it seemed he had none but quite beginners (don’t I pity them?) and ‘it wasn’t his subject’! in fact, clearly enough he didn’t know as much as I did. Amazed at my astounding erudition, ‘Where had I learned?’ ‘Oh, in England.’ ‘Ay?’ (very surprised) ‘the English gairls generally come very bad at Arithmetic—we’ve one just now doesn’t know her tables.’ I laughed out. ‘Well, you mustn’t take her for a specimen.’ He seemed to think that the national average! ‘Ay, but most we’ve had are very bad at it,’ very resolutely. He must be a good judge by the specimen I saw. Well, he kept hovering round me as a sort of strange animal, and told me how the girls changed every year, and how he went through from the First Rules to Decimals as the ne plus ultra.”

Clearly there was nothing to be gained here, so next morning she “explained and apologised” to the Principal, and found him “very nice and pleasant.” Her first impulse was to go straight back to London (in fact arrangements were made for her to live with Miss Wodehouse and study at Bedford College) but in the end wiser counsels prevailed. That arithmetic class was not the high-water mark of Edinburgh achievement even as regarded the education of its women. S. J.-B. made the acquaintance of Miss Blyth, who introduced her to Mr. Begbie, Miss de Dreux and others, so she settled down to a varied course of work, living comfortably in lodgings with Alice to “do for her.” To Mr. Begbie she expresses her gratitude over and over again.

“Mathematics not much with S. In answer to Miss de Dreux told the truth. They so nice sensible and honest—teachers born, ‘without respect of persons’. Mr. Begbie glad to hear truth—promises me a better far tomorrow. Mr. Weisse a good teacher—right good. German less formidable than I expected.”

One gathers from the letters that she made an extraordinarily vivid impression on her teachers: several of them refused to take fees, and Mr. Begbie persisted in his refusal.

“Miss de Dreux said my coming and work had given her a fresh impetus and help forward. Isn’t that nice?”

On the whole these first months in Edinburgh though she talks afterwards of their “grey pain,” were perhaps the high-water mark of S. J.-B.’s life as regards sheer balance and beauty of living. She was having, it is true, no physical recreation, but, apart from that, her faculties were all called equally into play. She was working steadily and hard, chiefly at her beloved mathematics: her wider reading included Jane Eyre, Le Juif Errant and Aids to Faith: she was profoundly interested in religious problems and conscientiously attended the churches of the best-known Edinburgh ministers: she was happy in her friendships, and still more in the passing beauty of her relation to her Mother: above all, the flame of her religious life—in which was almost merged at this time her devotion to Miss Octavia Hill—was burning with a clearness that made it easy to ignore the little jars and frictions. Even politics were not crowded out. “Daddy is here,” says Mrs. Jex-Blake in one of her letters, “and says, ‘Tell dearest Sophy I would not have the Times, which she makes such excellent use of, given up on any account.’ ”

One cannot read the record of this period of her life without feeling that it was mainly here and now that her character was made—that it was the resolute determination with which she took to work and stuck to it as the remedy for intolerable heartache—that enabled her in later years to bear the brunt of all she came through.

It is interesting to hear what she herself has to say about the various elements in her life referred to above:

“There never was such a book as Jane Eyre—of its kind. Talk of ‘finding’—that finds me through and through continually. How people dare speak ill of such a book—I suppose they simply can’t understand it. Its grand steadfastness and earnestness and purity, is something glorious. I read and re-read it as I never could another novel, and how it helps one!”

Again:

“Aids to Faith put into my trunk by that dear old Mother who in her weaker moment entertains an uncomfortable kind of desire to proselytize me—and yet can’t be quite dissatisfied.

Immensely interested in Aids to Faith. Read Cook’s Ideology and Subscription, Brown’s ‘Inspiration,’ and am reading Mansel’s ‘Miracles.’ The last gives me a glimpse of light and clearness I never had before. As far as I have read (and remember Essays and Reviews, which I must get) I think this side has it. As to Ideology I don’t understand it and don’t like to take the whole account from the adverse side (though there seems great fairness and scholarlike equity). As to subscription, I think Cook has it—I never could heartily sympathize with the other position, though I know it is held by quite good and honest men. I suppose one real question might arise—Who is to determine the real sense of the Church? For doubtless very grave doubts are found among equally good men.

As to ‘Inspiration,’ though I like the Essay, I hold more with E. and R. a good deal. Most of all with Coleridge as quoted in Aids—‘what finds me’ is its own witness, but why impose upon me what is not, because bound in the same covers?”

One finds among her papers brief notes of sermons by Rainy, Candlish, Guthrie and Pulsford, of whom the last appealed to her most.

“The prayers are what I can’t manage in the Scottish kirk. ‘Other people’s’ need too much effort to approve or disapprove to leave your spirit free to pray. I find more and more the value and rest of the Liturgy. … Saw Unitarian chapel. Shall I go? Don’t expect to be in near such real sympathy as with Church of England. Octa always said so. Bless her!”

For many reasons she was anxious to bring herself into line with the orthodox; she accuses herself of being too ready for an argument with her Calvinistic friends (what earnest spirit is not too ready for an argument at her age?) and at this time she read the Gospels carefully through “with a fresh mind,” taking notes that might have a bearing on dogma. If it distressed her to arrive at an unorthodox conclusion, this was mainly because such a conclusion seemed to separate her from those she loved best.

In the meantime she had made the acquaintance of Mr. Pulsford, and had called to have a talk with him about her difficulties.

“Much helpful sympathy and no horror of my questionings (how helpful that is!) but not much direct word gain. I suppose it must be lived out. He clearly does hold the Trinity, yet not, I think, as some do. Certainly not the vicarious Atonement. He uses nearly Maurice’s words—‘To present humanity perfect to God.’ (I think they are Maurice’s.) He believes Christ the man to have been God, but at first in His manhood unconscious of His Godhead. This seems to me very questionable and not clear. However, as I said—and he agreed thoroughly—not being a question of spirit but of history, it is not vital to me now, and living and desiring to know, we shall know.

He again spoke strongly of not talking to people who can’t understand.”

The contrast of the next paragraph in the diary is irresistible:

“A mouse caught at last. Odd, how it annoys me! ‘Shall I drown it, ma’am?’ ‘Oh, let it eat its cheese first!’ How Octa’d laugh! Faugh!—poor little thing, how it struggled for its life—and how my heart beat! It was some courage to resolve it shouldn’t suffer longer than need be.”

About her friends she has much to say as usual. On March 31st she writes to Cousin Ellie:

“Now for friends. I think I really may put that word to Dora Burn Murdoch and Margaret Orr, short as the time seems in days since I have known them; but then days sometimes go for weeks and they have both been so kind to me. ‘I was a stranger and they took me in.’ [Dora’s] charity for others is something quite beautiful, her unconsciousness of other people’s inferiority to her—her width of thought, and power of understanding those differing most widely from herself—most admirable. You never hear her by any chance say a harsh thing, a spiteful thing or a narrow thing—neither do you ever hear a weak one.”

She speaks many times in her diary of the rest and refreshment derived from visits to Mrs. Burn Murdoch. But she was working too hard, and Mrs. Jex-Blake’s letters at this time take on an even deeper note than usual of love, appreciation and solicitude. Varieties of note-paper were not great in those days, so S. J.-B. had possessed herself of a large quantity of common brown envelopes (similar to those used for the delivery of telegrams) in order that her Mother might see at a glance—without putting on her spectacles!—whether the postman had brought the all-important thing. Many are Mrs. Jex-Blake’s references to “the precious brown envelope,” “the dear brown letters”; and well might she prize them. Indeed one does not know which to admire more—the painstaking labour with which S. J.-B., at the end of a hard day’s work, strove to keep her Mother informed of all she was thinking and doing and trying to do—or the painstaking labour with which her Mother strove to understand and sympathize. She writes at great length about Jane Eyre, about the higher education of women, and she enters into her daughter’s religious arguments with a largeness of soul that is simply uplifting:

“I expect,” she says, “I quoted in commas the very words you wrote about the Atonement. The rest was, of course, my able and learned commentary. I think I did take your words in your sense, though I couldn’t help their expanding—you will perhaps say, narrowing—in my view. He will guide us both into all truth.”

The following extracts give some idea how these beautiful letters go on:

May 6th. “I don’t think I ever had a letter from you that I did not enjoy and enter into sympathy with, because I never will open them till I can enjoy them. Sometimes one has come at dinner time with others when Mr. O. has been here, and he has said—‘Why don’t you open the brown letter? I know it interests you.’ I answer, ‘Just because I can’t fully enjoy it’.”

May 7th. “You have a glorious field of usefulness before you. No one can guess to what extent you may be permitted to be useful to the generations to come. Plod on; expect rough waves that seem ready to overwhelm your best energies, and almost quench life; but One sitteth above the water floods Who will always bear you through.”

May 8th. “My heart’s desire is that you should know the truth of God, whether it be what I believe or not, and that I should know it too.” (Previously she had written—“I was thinking today how surely God would guide you into all truth—this text confirming the thought—‘If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God.’)

I think my cup of blessing would be fuller than I could bear did we two fully agree on that which must be all-absorbing and by far the most interesting of subjects. Though C. and I essentially agree, we cannot communicate with each other—our natures are so different. I don’t think I do her justice or fully understand her.”

May 9th. “We“We do well to struggle against that weary powerless feeling, because, given way to, it might overcome all power of energy, but I quite believe it is sometimes part of appointed discipline, and it is no use to quarrel with ourselves for it. Still I do incline to believe in your present case it proceeds from exhaustion of the nervous system, occasioned by a shock struggled against with all your power. You will be better when Dora is back, and you get real interchange of thought and loving sympathy. God bless her for giving it to my darling. Try not to allow yourself to think on getting up—‘How long will it be before I lie down to rest again?’ Remember you desire to give yourself to service, though not so active just now, for others. Remember as a help how many bless you for having sped them on their way. Your want just now is someone to be helped and braced for usefulness.”

(“Never fail,” writes Mr. Jex-Blake, “to tell me of any case you know of like that of the suffering governess; it is blessed to receive in such cases, but doubly blessed to give.”)