But let us not meekly accept these
narrowing axioms, and while we dig a neat canal for the emotion with
one hand, claim with the other that the peaceful current has all the
splendour and volume of the resistless river foaming from rock to rock,
and leaping from the sheltered valley to the boundless sea.
III
People often talk as if human beings were crushed by sorrows and
misfortunes and tragic events. It is not so! We are crushed by
temperament. Just as Dr. Johnson said about writing, that no man was
ever written down but by himself, so we are the victims not of
circumstances but of disposition. Those who succumb to tragic events
are those who, like Mrs. Gummidge, feel them more than other people.
The characters that break down under brutalising influences, evil
surroundings, monotonous toil, are those neurotic temperaments which
under favourable circumstances would have been what is called artistic,
who depend upon stimulus and excitement, upon sunshine and pleasure. Of
course, a good deal of what, in our ignorance of the working of
psychological laws, we are accustomed to call chance or luck, enters
into the question. Ill-health, dull surroundings, loveless lives cause
people to break down in the race, who in averagely prosperous
circumstances might have lived pleasantly and reputably. But the deeper
we plunge into nature, the deeper we explore life, the more immutable
we find the grip of law.
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