CHAPTER XXVII. AN EFFECT OF LOGARITHMS ON MORALS--AN OBSCURATION, ADISSERTATION, AND A CALCULATION.
The house had not long adjourned before Captain Poke and myself werefavored with a visit from our colleague Mr. Downright, who came on anaffair of absorbing interest. He carried in his hand a small pamphlet;and the usual salutations were scarcely over, before he directed ourattention to a portion of its contents. It would seem that Leaplow wason the eve of experiencing a great moral eclipse. The periods and datesof the phenomenon (if that can be called a phenomenon which was of toofrequent occurrence) had been calculated, with surprising accuracy, bythe Academy of Leaphigh, and sent, through its minister, as an especialfavor, to our beloved country in order that we should not be taken bysurprise. The account of the affair read as follows:--
"On the third day of the season of nuts, there will be the commencementof a great moral eclipse, in that portion of the monikin region whichlies immediately about the pole. The property in eclipse will be thegreat moral postulate usually designated by the term Principle; and theintervening body will be the great immoral postulate, usually knownas Interest. The frequent occurrence of the conjunction of these twoimportant postulates has caused our moral mathematicians to be rathernegligent of their calculations on this subject of late years; but, toatone for this inexcusable indifference to one of the most importantconcerns of life, the calculating committee was instructed to payunusual attention to all the obscurations of the present year, and thisphenomenon, one of the most decided of our age, has been calculated withthe utmost nicety and care. We give the results.
"The eclipse will commence by a motive of monikin vanity coming incontact with the sub-postulate of charity, at 1 A. M. The postulate inquestion will be totally hid from view, in the course of 6 h. 17 m.from the moment of contact. The passage of a political intrigue willinstantly follow, when the several sub-postulates of truth, honesty,disinterestedness, and patriotism, will all be obscured in succession,beginning with the lower limb of the first, and ending with all thelimbs of the whole of them, in 3 h. 42 m. from the moment of contact.The shadow of vanity and political intrigue will first be deepenedby the approach of prosperity, and this will be soon succeeded by thecontact of a great pecuniary interest, at 10 h. 2 m. 1s.; and in exactly2 m. and 3-7 s., the whole of the great moral postulate of Principlewill be totally hid from view. In consequence of this early passage ofthe darkest shadow that is ever cast by Interest, the passages of therespective shadows of ambition, hatred, jealousy, and all the otherminor satellites of Interest, will be invisible.
"The country principally affected by this eclipse will be the Republicof Leaplow, a community whose known intelligence and virtues are perhapsbetter qualified to resist its influence than any other. The time ofoccultation will be 9 y. 7 m. 26 d. 4 h. 16 m. 2 s. Principle will beginto reappear to the moral eye at the end of this period, first by theapproach of Misfortune, whose atmosphere being much less dense than thatof Interest, will allow of imperfect views of the obscured postulate;but the radiance of the latter will not be completely restored until thearrival of Misery, whose chastening colors invariably permit all truthsto be discernible, although through a sombre medium. To resume:
"Beginning of eclipse, 1 A. M.
Ecliptic opposition, in 4 y. 6 m. 12 d. 9 h. from beginning of eclipse.
Middle, in 4 y. 9 m. 0 d. 7 h. 9 m. from beginning of eclipse.
End of eclipse, 9 y. 11 m. 20 d. 3 h. 2 m. from beginning.
Period of occultation, 9 y. 7 m. 26 d. 4 h. 16 m. 2 s."
I gazed at the brigadier in admiration and awe. There was nothingremarkable in the eclipse itself, which was quite an every-day affair;but the precision with which it had been calculated added to its otherphenomena the terrible circumstance of obtaining a glimpse into thefuture, I now began to perceive the immense difference between livingconsciously under a moral shadow, and living under it unconsciously. Thelatter was evidently a trifle compared with the former. Providence hadmost kindly provided for our happiness in denying the ability to seebeyond the present moment.
Noah took the affair even more at heart than myself. He told me, with arueful and prognosticating countenance, that we were fast drawing nearto the autumnal equinox, when we should reach the commencement of anatural night of six months' duration; and although the benevolentsubstitute of steam might certainly in some degree lessen the evil, thatit was a furious evil, after all, to exist for a period so weary withoutenjoying the light of the sun. He found the external glare of day badenough, but he did not believe he should be able to endure its totalabsence. "Natur' had made him a 'watch and watch' critter. As for thetwilight of which so much was said, it was worse than nothin', beingneither one thing nor the other. For his part, he liked things 'made outof whole cloth.' Then he had sent the ship round to a distant roadstead,in order that there might be no more post-captains and rear-admiralsamong the people; and here had he been as much as four days on nothingbut nuts. Nuts might do for the philosophy of a monkey, but he found,on trial, that it played the devil with the philosophy of a man. Thingswere bad enough as they were. He pined for a little pork--he carednot who knew it; it might not be very sentimental, he knew, but it wascapital sea-food; his natur' was pretty much pork; he believed most menhad, in some way or other, more or less pork in their human natur's;nuts might do for monikin natur', but human natur' loved meat; ifmonikins did not like it, monikins need not eat it; there would beso much the more for those who did like it--he pined for his naturalaliment, and as for living nine years in an eclipse, it was quite outof the question. The longest Stunnin'tun eclipses seldom went over threehours--he once knew Deacon Spiteful pray quite through one, from apogeeto perigee. He therefore proposed that Sir John and he should resigntheir seats without delay, and that they should try to get the Walrusto the north'ard as quick as possible, lest they should be caught in thepolar night. As for the Hon. Robert Smut, he wished him no better luckthan to remain where he was all his life, and to receive his eightdollars a day in acorns."
Although it was impossible not to hear, and, having heard, not torecord the sentiments of Noah, still my attention was much more stronglyattracted by the demeanor of the brigadier, than by the jeremiad of thesealer. To an anxious inquiry if he were not well, our worthy colleagueanswered plaintively, that he mourned over the misfortune of hiscountry.
"I have often witnessed the passage of the passions, and of the minormotives, across the disc of the great moral postulate, Principle; butan occultation of its light by a pecuniary Interest, and for so long aperiod, is fearful! Heaven only knows what will become of us!"
"Are not these eclipses, after all, so many mere illustrations of thesocial-stake system? I confess this occultation, of which you seem tohave so much dread, is not so formidable a thing, on reflection, as itat first appeared to be."
"You are quite right, Sir John, as to the character of the eclipseitself, which, as a matter of course, must depend on the character ofthe intervening body. But the wisest and best of our philosophers holdthat the entire system of which we are but insignificant parts, isbased on certain immutable truths of a divine origin. The premises,or postulates, of all these truths, are so many moral guides in themanagement of monikin affairs; and, the moment they are lost sight of,as will be the case during these frightful nine years that are to come,we shall be abandoned entirely to selfishness. Now selfishness isonly too formidable when restrained by Principle; but left to its owngrasping desires and audacious sophisms, to me the moral perspective isterrible. We are only too much addicted to turn our eyes from Principle,when it is shining in heavenly radiance, and in full glory, beforeus; it is not difficult, therefore, to foresee the nature of theconsequences which are to follow its total and protracted obscuration."
"You then conceive there is a rule superior to interest, which ought tobe respected in the control of monikin affairs?"
"Beyond a doubt; else in what should we differ from the beasts of prey?"
"I do not exactly see whether t
his does, or does not accord with thenotions of the political economists of the social-stake system."
"As you say, Sir John, it does, and it does not. Your social-stakesystem supposes that he who has what is termed a distinct and prominentinterest in society, will be the most likely to conduct its affairswisely, justly, and disinterestedly. This would be true, if those greatprinciples which lie at the root of all happiness were respected; butunluckily, the stake in question, instead of being a stake in justiceand virtue, is usually reduced to be merely a stake in property. Now,all experience shows that the great property-incentives are to increaseproperty, protect property, and to buy with property those advantageswhich ought to be independent of property, viz., honors, dignities,power, and immunities. I cannot say how it is with men, but ourhistories are eloquent on this head. We have had the property-principlecarried out thoroughly in our practice, and the result has shown thatits chief operation is to render property as intact as possible, and thebones, and sinews, and marrow of all who do not possess it, its slaves.In short, the time has been, when the rich were even exempt fromcontributing to the ordinary exigencies of the state. But it is quiteuseless to theorize on this subject, for, by that cry in the streets,the lower limb of the great postulate is beginning to be obscured, and,alas! we shall soon have too much practical information."
The brigadier was right. On referring to the clocks, it was found that,in truth, the eclipse had commenced some time before, and that we wereon the verge of an absolute occultation of Principle, by the basest andmost sordid of all motives, pecuniary Interest.
The first proof that was given of the true state of things, was in thelanguage of the people. The word Interest was in every monikin's mouth,while the word Principle, as indeed was no more than suitable, seemed tobe quite blotted out of the Leaplow vocabulary. To render a local terminto English, half of the vernacular of the country appeared tobe compressed into the single word "dollar."
"Dollar--dollar--dollar"--nothing but "dollar! Fifty thousanddollars--twenty thousand dollars--a hundred thousand dollars"--met oneat every turn. The words rang at the corners--in the public ways--at theexchange--in the drawing-rooms--ay, even in the churches. If a templehad been reared for the worship of the Creator, the first question was,how much did it cost? If an artist submitted the fruits of his labors tothe taste of his fellow-citizens, conjectures were whispered among thespectators, touching its value in the current coin of the republic. Ifan author presented the offspring of his genius to the same arbiters,its merits were settled by a similar standard; and one divine, whohad made a strenuous, but an ill-timed appeal to the charity of hiscountrymen, by setting forth the beauties as well as the rewards ofthe god-like property, was fairly put down by a demonstration that hisproposition involved a considerable outlay, while it did not clearlyshow much was to be gained by going to heaven!
Brigadier Downright had good reasons for his sombre anticipations, forall the acquirements, knowledge, and experience, obtained in many yearsof travel, were now found to be worse than useless. If my honorablecolleague and covoyager ventured a remark on the subject of foreignpolicy, a portion of politics to which he had given considerableattention, it was answered by a quotation from the stock market; anobservation on a matter of taste was certain to draw forth a nicedistinction between the tastes of certain liquors, together with ashrewd investigation of their several prices; and once, when the worthymonikin undertook to show, from what struck me to be singularly gooddata, that the foreign relations of the country were in a condition torequire great firmness, a proper prudence, and much foresight, he wascompletely silenced by an antagonist showing, from the last sales, thehigh value of lots up town!
In short, there was no dealing with any subject that could notresolve itself into dollars, by means of the customary exchanges.The infatuation spread from father to son; from husband to wife; frombrother to sister; and from one collateral to another, until it prettyeffectually assailed the whole of what is usually termed "society." Noahswore bitterly at this antagonist state of things. He affirmed that hecould not even crack a walnut in a corner, but every monikin that passedappeared to grudge him the satisfaction, small as it was; and thatStunin'tun, though a scramble-penny place as any he knew, was paradiseto Leaplow, in the present state of things.
It was melancholy to remark how the lustre of the ordinary virtues grewdim, as the period of occultation continued, and the eye graduallygot to be accustomed to the atmosphere cast by the shadow of pecuniaryinterest. I involuntarily shuddered at the open and undisguised mannerin which individuals, who might otherwise pass for respectable monikins,spoke of the means that they habitually employed in effecting theirobjects, and laid bare their utter forgetfulness of the great postulatethat was hid. One coolly vaunted how much cleverer he was than the law;another proved to demonstration that he had outwitted his neighbor;while a third, more daring or more expert, applied the same grounds ofexultation to the entire neighborhood. This had the merit of cunning;that of dissimulation; another of deception, and all of success!
The shadow cast its malign influence on every interest connected withmonikin life. Temples were raised to God on speculation; the governmentwas perverted to a money-investment, in which profit, and not justiceand security, was the object; holy wedlock fast took the aspect ofbuying and selling, and few prayed who did not identify spiritualbenefits with gold and silver.
The besetting propensity of my ancestor soon began to appear in Leaplow.Many of those pure and unsophisticated republicans shouted, "Property isin danger!" as stoutly as it was ever roared by Sir Joseph Job, and darkallusions were made to "revolutions" and "bayonets." But certain proofof the prevalence of the eclipse, and that the shadow of pecuniaryinterest lay dark on the land, was to be found in the language of whatare called the "few." They began to throw dirt at all opposed to them,like so many fish-women: a sure symptom that the spirit of selfishnesswas thoroughly awakened. From much experience, I hold this sign to beinfallible, that the sentiment of aristocracy is active and vigilant.I never yet visited a country in which a minority got into its headthe crotchet it was alone fit to dictate to the rest of itsfellow-creatures, that it did not, without delay, set about proving itsposition, by reviling and calling names. In this particular "the few"are like women, who, conscious of their weakness, seldom fail to make upfor the want of vigor in their limbs, by having recourse to the vigor ofthe tongue. The "one" hangs; the "many" command by the dignity of force;the "few" vituperate and scold. This is, I believe, the case all overthe world, except in those peculiar instances in which the "few" happenalso to enjoy the privilege of hanging.
It is worthy of remark that the terms, "rabble," "disorganizers,""jacobins," and "agrarians," [Footnote: It is scarcely necessary to tellthe intelligent reader there is no proof that any political communitywas ever so bent on self-destruction as to enact agrarian laws, inthe vulgar sense in which it has suited the arts of narrow-mindedpoliticians to represent them ever since the revival of letters. Thecelebrated agrarian laws of Rome did not essentially differ from thedistribution of our own military lands, or perhaps the similitude isgreater to the modern Russian military colonies. Those who feel aninterest in this subject would do well to consult Niebuhr. NOTE BY THEEDITOR.] were bandied from one to the other, in Leaplow, under thismalign influence, with precisely the same justice, discrimination,and taste, as they had been used by my ancestor in London, a few yearsbefore. Like causes notoriously produce like effects; and there is noone thing so much like an Englishman under the property-fever, as aLeaplow monikin suffering under the same malady.
The effect produced on the state of parties by the passage of theshadow of Pecuniary Interest, was so singular as to deserve our notice.Patriots who had long been known for an indomitable resolution tosupport their friends, openly abandoned their claims on the rewards ofthe little wheel, and went over to the enemy; and this, too, withoutrecourse to the mysteries of the "flapjack." Judge People's Friend wascompletely annihilated for the moment--so much so, ind
eed, as to thinkseriously of taking another mission--for, during these eclipses, longservice, public virtue, calculated amenity, and all the other blandqualities of your patriot, pass for nothing, when weighed in the scaleagainst profit and loss. It was fortunate the Leapthrough question was,in its essence, so well disposed of, though the uneasiness of those whobought and sold land by the inch, pushed even that interest before thepublic again by insisting that a few millions should be expended indestroying the munitions of war, lest the nation might improvidentlybe tempted to make use of them in the natural way. The cruisers wereaccordingly hauled into the stream and converted into tide-mills,the gun-barrels were transformed into gas-pipes, and the forts wereconverted, as fast as possible, into warehouses and tea-gardens. Afterthis, it was much the fashion to affirm that the advanced state ofcivilization had rendered all future wars quite out of the question.Indeed, the impetus that was given, by the effects of the shadow, inthis way, to humanity in gross, was quite as remarkable as were itscontrary tendencies on humanity in detail.
Public opinion was not backward in showing how completely it was actingunder the influence of the shadow. Virtue began to be estimated byrent-rolls. The affluent, without hesitation, or, indeed, opposition,appropriated to themselves the sole use of the word respectable, whiletaste, judgment, honesty, and wisdom, dropped like so many heirloomsquietly into the possession of those who had money. The Leaplowers area people of great acuteness, and of singular knowledge of details.Every considerable man in Bivouac soon had his social stationassigned him, the whole community being divided into classes of"hundred-thousand-dollar monikins"--"fifty-thousand-dollarmonikins"--"twenty-thousand-dollar monikins." Great conciseness inlanguage was a consequence of this state of feeling. The old questionsof "is he honest?" "is he capable?" "is he enlightened?" "is he wise?""is he good?" being all comprehended in the single interrogatory of "ishe rich?"
There was one effect of this very unusual state of things, that I hadnot anticipated. All the money-getting classes, without exception,showed a singular predilection in favor of what is commonly called astrong government; being not only a republic, but virtually a democracy,I found that much the larger portion of this highly respectable classof citizens, were not at all backward in expressing their wish for achange.
"How is this?" I demanded of the brigadier, whom I rarely quitted;for his advice and opinions were of great moment to me, just at thisparticular crisis--"how is this, my good friend? I have always been ledto think trade is especially favorable to liberty; and here are allyour commercial interests the loudest in their declamations against theinstitutions."
The brigadier smiled; it was but a melancholy smile, after all; for hisspirits appeared to have quite deserted him.
"There are three great divisions among politicians," he said--"they whodo not like liberty at all--they who like it, as low down as theirown particular class--and they who like it for the sake of theirfellow-creatures. The first are not numerous, but powerful by meansof combinations; the second is a very irregular corps, including, asa matter of course, nearly everybody, but is wanting, of necessity, inconcert and discipline, since no one descends below his own level; thethird are but few, alas, how few! and are composed of those who lookbeyond their own selfishness. Now, your merchants, dwelling in towns,and possessing concert, means, and identity of interests, have been ableto make themselves remarkable for contending with despotic power, afact which has obtained for them a cheap reputation for liberality ofopinion; but, so far as monikin experience goes--men may have provedto be better disposed--no government that is essentially influenced bycommerce has ever been otherwise than exclusive, or aristocratic."
I bethought me of Venice, Genoa, Pisa, the Hanse Towns, and all theother remarkable places of this character in Europe, and I felt thejustice of my friend's distinction, at the same time I could not butobserve how much more the minds of men are under the influence of namesand abstractions than under the influence of positive things. To thisopinion the brigadier very readily assented, remarking, at the sametime, that a well-wrought theory had generally more effect on opinionthan fifty facts; a result that he attributed to the circumstanceof monikins having a besetting predisposition to save themselves thetrouble of thinking.
I was, in particular, struck with the effect of the occultation ofPrinciple on motives. I had often remarked that it was by no means safeto depend on one's own motives, for two sufficient reasons; first,that we did not always know what our own motives were; and secondly,admitting that we did, it was quite unreasonable to suppose that ourfriends would believe them what we thought them to be ourselves. Inthe present instance, every monikin seemed perfectly aware of thedifficulty; and, instead of waiting for his acquaintances to attributesome moral enormity as his governing reason, he prudently adopted amoderately selfish inducement for his acts, which he proclaimed witha simplicity and frankness that generally obtained credit. Indeed, thefact once conceded that the motive was not offensively disinterested andjust, no one was indisposed to listen to the projects of his friend,who usually rose in estimation, as he was found to be ingenious,calculating, and shrewd. The effect of all this was to render societysingularly sincere and plain-spoken; and one unaccustomed to so muchingenuousness, or who was ignorant of the cause, might, plausiblyenough, suppose, at times, that accident had thrown him into anextraordinary association with so many ARTISTES, who, as it is commonlyexpressed, lived by their wits. I will avow that, had it been thefashion to wear pockets at Leaplow, I should often have been concernedfor their contents; for sentiments so purely unsophisticated, wereso openly advanced under the influence of the shadow, that one wasinevitably led, oftener than was pleasant, to think of the relationsbetween meum and tuum, as well as of the unexpected causes by which theywere sometimes disturbed.
A vacancy occurred, the second day of the eclipse, among therepresentatives of Bivouac, and the candidate of the Horizontals wouldcertainly have been chosen to fill it, but for a contretemps connectedwith this affair of motives. The individual in question had latelyperformed that which, in most other countries, and under othercircumstances, would have passed for an act of creditable nationalfeeling; but which, quite as a matter of course, was eagerly presentedto the electors, by his opponents, as a proof of his utter unfitness tobe intrusted with their interests. The friends of the candidate tookthe alarm, and indignantly denied the charges of the Perpendiculars,affirming that their monikin had been well paid for what he had done.In an evil hour, the candidate undertook to explain, by means of ahandbill, in which he stated that he had been influenced by no othermotive than a desire to do that which he believed to be right. Such aperson was deemed to be wanting in natural abilities, and, as a matterof course, he was defeated; for your Leaplow elector was not such an assas to confide the care of his interests to one who knew so little how totake care of his own.
About this time, too, a celebrated dramatist produced a piece in whichthe hero performed prodigies under the excitement of patriotism, and thelabor of his pen was incontinently damned for his pains; both pit andboxes--the galleries dissenting--deciding that it was out of all natureto represent a monikin incurring danger in this unheard-of manner,without a motive. The unhappy wight altered the last scene, by causinghis hero to be rewarded by a good, round sum of money, when the piecehad a very respectable run for the rest of the season, though I questionif it ever were as popular as it would have been, had this precautionbeen taken before it was first acted.
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