The Way We Live Now (75 page)

‘Clap-trap!' said Roger, who in his present mood was very bitter.

‘The money is not clap-trap, my friend. I presume that the money is really paid.'

‘I don't feel at all sure of that.'

‘Our collectors for clerical charities are usually stern men – very ready to make known defalcations on the part of promising subscribers. I think they would take care to get the money during the election.'

‘And you think that money got in that way redounds to his credit?'

‘Such a gift shows him to be a useful member of society – and I am always for encouraging useful men.'

‘Even though their own objects may be vile and pernicious?'

‘There you beg ever so many questions, Mr Carbury. Mr Melmotte wishes to get into Parliament, and if there would vote on the side which you at any rate approve. I do not know that his object in that respect is pernicious. And as a seat in Parliament has been a matter of ambition to the best of our countrymen for centuries, I do not know why we should say that it is vile in this man.' Roger frowned and shook his head. ‘Of course Mr Melmotte is not the sort of gentleman whom you have been accustomed to regard as a fitting member for a Conservative constituency. But the country is changing.'

‘It's going to the dogs, I think – about as fast as it can go.'

‘We build churches much faster than we used to do.'

‘Do we say our prayers in them when we have built them?' asked the squire.

‘It is very hard to see into the minds of men,' said the bishop; ‘but we can see the results of their minds' work. I think that men on the whole do live better lives than they did a hundred years ago.
²
There is a wider
spirit of justice abroad, more of mercy from one to another, a more lively charity, and if less of religious enthusiasm, less also of superstition. Men will hardly go to heaven, Mr Carbury, by following forms only because their fathers followed the same forms before them.'

‘I suppose men will go to heaven, my lord, by doing as they would be done by.'

‘There can be no safer lesson. But we must hope that some may be saved even if they have not practised at all times that grand self-denial. Who comes up to that teaching? Do you not wish for, nay, almost demand, instant pardon for any trespass that you may commit – of temper, or manner, for instance? and are you always ready to forgive in that way yourself? Do you not writhe with indignation at being wrongly judged by others who condemn you without knowing your actions or the causes of them; and do you never judge others after that fashion?'

‘I do not put myself forward as an example.'

‘I apologize for the personal form of my appeal. A clergyman is apt to forget that he is not in the pulpit Of course I speak of men in general. Taking society as a whole, the big and the little, the rich and the poor, I think that it grows better from year to year, and not worse. I think, too, that they who grumble at the times, as Horace did, and declare that each age is worse than its forerunner, look only at the small things beneath their eyes, and ignore the course of the world at large.'

‘But Roman freedom and Roman manners were going to the dogs when Horace wrote.'

‘But Christ was about to be born, and men were already being made fit by wider intelligence for Christ's teaching. And as for freedom, has not freedom grown, almost every year, from that to this?'

‘In Rome they were worshipping just such men as this Melmotte. Do you remember the man who sat upon the seats of the knights and scoured the Via Sacra with his toga, though he had been scourged from pillar to post for his villainies? I always think of that man when I hear Melmotte's name mentioned.
Hoc, hoc tribuno militum
!
³
Is this the man to be Conservative member for Westminster?'

‘Do you know of the scourges, as a fact?'

‘I think I know that they are deserved.'

‘That is hardly doing to others as you would be done by. If the man is what you say, he will surely be found out at last, and the day of his punishment will come. Your friend in the ode probably had a bad time of it, in spite of his farms and his horses. The world perhaps is managed more justly than you think, Mr Carbury.'

‘My lord, I believe you're a Radical at heart,' said Roger, as he took his leave.

‘Very likely – very likely. Only don't say so to the Prime Minister, or I shall never get any of the better things which may be going.'

The bishop was not hopelessly in love with a young lady, and was therefore less inclined to take a melancholy view of things in general than Roger Carbury. To Roger everything seemed to be out of joint. He had that morning received a letter from Lady Carbury, reminding him of the promise of a loan, should a time come to her of great need. It had come very quickly. Roger Carbury did not in the least begrudge the hundred pounds which he had already sent to his cousin; but he did begrudge any furtherance afforded to the iniquitous schemes of Sir Felix. He felt all but sure that the foolish mother had given her son money for his abortive attempt, and that therefore this appeal had been made to him. He alluded to no such fear in his letter. He simply enclosed the cheque, and expressed a hope that the amount might suffice for the present emergency. But he was disheartened and disgusted by all the circumstances of the Carbury family. There was Paul Montague, bringing a woman such as Mrs Hurtle down to Lowestoffe, declaring his purpose of continuing his visits to her, and, as Roger thought, utterly unable to free himself from her toils – and yet, on this man's account, Hetta was cold and hard to him. He was conscious of the honesty of his own love, sure that he could make her happy – confident, not in himself, but in the fashion and ways of his own life. What would be Hetta's lot if her heart was really given to Paul Montague?

When he got home, he found Father Barham sitting in his library. An accident had lately happened at Father Barham's own establishment. The wind had blown the roof off his cottage; and Roger Carbury, though his affection for the priest was waning, had offered him shelter while the damage was being repaired. Shelter at Carbury Manor was very much more comfortable than the priest's own establishment, even with the roof on, and Father Barham was in clover. Father Barham was reading his own favourite newspaper,
The Surplice
, when Roger entered the room. ‘Have you seen this, Mr Carbury?' he said.

‘What's this? I am not likely to have seen anything that belongs peculiarly to
The Surplice!
.'

‘That's the prejudice of what you are pleased to call the Anglican Church. Mr Melmotte is a convert to our faith. He is a great man, and will perhaps be one of the greatest known on the face of the globe.'

‘Melmotte a convert to Romanism! I'll make you a present of him,
and thank you to take him; but I don't believe that we've any such good riddance.'

Then Father Barham read a paragraph out of
The Surplice.
‘Mr Augustus Melmotte, the great financier and capitalist, has presented a hundred guineas towards the erection of an altar for the new church of St Fabricius, in Tothill Fields. The donation was accompanied by a letter from Mr Melmotte's secretary, which leaves but little doubt that the new member for Westminster will be a member, and no inconsiderable member, of the Catholic party in the House, during the next session.'

‘That's another dodge, is it?' said Carbury.

‘What do you mean by a dodge, Mr Carbury? Because money is given for a pious object of which you do not happen to approve, must it be a dodge?'

‘But, my dear Father Barham, the day before the same great man gave two hundred pounds to the Protestant Curates' Aid Society. I have just left the bishop exulting in this great act of charity.'

‘I don't believe a word of it – or it may be a parting gift to the Church to which he belonged in his darkness.'

‘And you would be really proud of Mr Melmotte as a convert?'

‘I would be proud of the lowest human being that has a soul,' said the priest; ‘but of course we are glad to welcome the wealthy and the great.'

‘The great! oh dear!'

‘A man is great who has made for himself such a position as that of Mr Melmotte. And when such a one leaves your Church and joins our own, it is a great sign to us that the Truth is prevailing.' Roger Carbury, without another word, took his candle and went to bed.

It was considered to be a great thing to catch the Roman Catholic vote in Westminster. For many years it has been considered a great thing both in the House and out of the House to ‘catch' Roman Catholic votes. There are two modes of catching these votes. This or that individual Roman Catholic may be promoted to place, so that he
personally may be made secure; or the right hand of fellowship may be extended to the people of the Pope generally, so that the people of the Pope may be taught to think that a general step is being made towards the reconversion of the nation. The first measure is the easier, but the effect is but slight and soon passes away. The promoted one, though as far as his prayers go he may remain as good a Catholic as ever, soon ceases to be one of the party to be conciliated, and is apt after a while to be regarded by them as an enemy. But the other mode, if a step be well taken, may be very efficacious. It has now and then occurred that every Roman Catholic in Ireland and England has been brought to believe that the nation is coming round to them – and in this or that borough the same conviction has been made to grow. To catch the Protestant – that is the peculiarly Protestant – vote and the Roman Catholic vote at the same instant is a feat difficult of accomplishment; but it has been attempted before, and was attempted now by Mr Melmotte and his friends. It was perhaps thought by his friends that the Protestants would not notice the £100 given for the altar to St Fabricius; but Mr Alf was wide awake, and took care that Mr Melmotte's religious opinions should be a matter of interest to the world at large. During all that period of newspaper excitement there was perhaps no article that created so much general interest as that which appeared in the
Evening Pulpit
, with a special question asked at the head of it, ‘For Priest or Parson?' In this article, which was more than usually delightful as being pungent from the beginning to the end and as being unalloyed with any dry didactic wisdom, Mr Alf's man, who did that business, declared that it was really important that the nation at large and especially the electors of Westminster should know what was the nature of Mr Melmotte's faith. That he was a man of a highly religious temperament was most certain by his munificent charities on behalf of religion. Two noble donations, which by chance had been made just at this crisis, were doubtless no more than the regular continuation of his ordinary flow of Christian benevolence. The
Evening Pulpit
by no means insinuated that the gifts were intended to have any reference to the approaching election. Far be it from the
Evening Pulpit
to imagine that so great a man as Mr Melmotte looked for any return in this world from his charitable generosity. But still, as Protestants naturally desired to be represented in Parliament by a Protestant member, and as Roman Catholics as naturally desired to be represented by a Roman Catholic, perhaps Mr Melmotte would not object to declare his creed.

This was biting, and of course did mischief; but Mr Melmotte and his
manager were not foolish enough to allow it to actuate them in any way. He had thrown his bread upon the waters, assisting St Fabricius with one hand and the Protestant curates with the other, and must leave the results to take care of themselves. If the Protestants chose to believe that he was hyper-protestant, and the Catholics that he was tending towards papacy, so much the better for him. Any enthusiastic religionists wishing to enjoy such convictions would not allow themselves to be enlightened by the manifestly interested malignity of Mr Alf's newspaper.

It may be doubted whether the donation to the Curates' Aid Society did have much effect. It may perhaps have induced a resolution in some few to go to the poll whose minds were active in regard to religion and torpid as to politics. But the donation to St Fabricius certainly had results. It was taken up and made much of by the Roman Catholic party generally, till a report got itself spread abroad and almost believed that Mr Melmotte was going to join the Church of Rome. These manoeuvres require most delicate handling, or evil may follow instead of good. On the second afternoon after the question had been asked in the
Evening Pulpit
, an answer to it appeared, ‘For Priest and not for Parson'. Therein various assertions made by Roman Catholic organs and repeated in Roman Catholic speeches were brought together, so as to show that Mr Melmotte really had at last made up his mind on this important question. All the world knew now, said Mr Alf's writer, that with that keen sense of honesty which was the Great Financier's peculiar characteristic – the Great Financier was the name which Mr Alf had specially invented for Mr Melmotte – he had doubted, till the truth was absolutely borne in upon him, whether he could serve the nation best as a Liberal or as a Conservative. He had solved that doubt with wisdom. And now this other doubt had passed through the crucible, and by the aid of fire a golden certainty had been produced. The world of Westminster at last knew that Mr Melmotte was a Roman Catholic. Now nothing was clearer than this – that though catching the Catholic vote would greatly help a candidate, no real Roman Catholic could hope to be returned. This last article vexed Mr Melmotte, and he proposed to his friends to send a letter to the
Breakfast Table
asserting that he adhered to the Protestant faith of his ancestors. But, as it was suspected by many, and was now being whispered to the world at large, that Melmotte had been born a Jew, this assurance would perhaps have been too strong. ‘Do nothing of the kind,' said Mr Beauchamp Beauclerk. ‘If any one asks you a question at any meeting, say that you are a Protestant. But it isn't likely, as we have none but our own people. Don't go writing letters.'