您的位置 : 首页 > 英文著作
Way of All Flesh, The
CHAPTER XX
Samuel Butler
下载:Way of All Flesh, The.txt
本书全文检索:
       _ The birth of his son opened Theobald's eyes to a good deal which he
       had but faintly realised hitherto. He had had no idea how great a
       nuisance a baby was. Babies come into the world so suddenly at the
       end, and upset everything so terribly when they do come: why cannot
       they steal in upon us with less of a shock to the domestic system?
       His wife, too, did not recover rapidly from her confinement; she
       remained an invalid for months; here was another nuisance and an
       expensive one, which interfered with the amount which Theobald liked
       to put by out of his income against, as he said, a rainy day, or to
       make provision for his family if he should have one. Now he was
       getting a family, so that it became all the more necessary to put
       money by, and here was the baby hindering him. Theorists may say
       what they like about a man's children being a continuation of his
       own identity, but it will generally be found that those who talk in
       this way have no children of their own. Practical family men know
       better.
       About twelve months after the birth of Ernest there came a second,
       also a boy, who was christened Joseph, and in less than twelve
       months afterwards, a girl, to whom was given the name of Charlotte.
       A few months before this girl was born Christina paid a visit to the
       John Pontifexes in London, and, knowing her condition, passed a good
       deal of time at the Royal Academy exhibition looking at the types of
       female beauty portrayed by the Academicians, for she had made up her
       mind that the child this time was to be a girl. Alethea warned her
       not to do this, but she persisted, and certainly the child turned
       out plain, but whether the pictures caused this or no I cannot say.
       Theobald had never liked children. He had always got away from them
       as soon as he could, and so had they from him; oh, why, he was
       inclined to ask himself, could not children be born into the world
       grown up? If Christina could have given birth to a few full-grown
       clergymen in priest's orders--of moderate views, but inclining
       rather to Evangelicalism, with comfortable livings and in all
       respects facsimiles of Theobald himself--why, there might have been
       more sense in it; or if people could buy ready-made children at a
       shop of whatever age and sex they liked, instead of always having to
       make them at home and to begin at the beginning with them--that
       might do better, but as it was he did not like it. He felt as he
       had felt when he had been required to come and be married to
       Christina--that he had been going on for a long time quite nicely,
       and would much rather continue things on their present footing. In
       the matter of getting married he had been obliged to pretend he
       liked it; but times were changed, and if he did not like a thing
       now, he could find a hundred unexceptionable ways of making his
       dislike apparent.
       It might have been better if Theobald in his younger days had kicked
       more against his father: the fact that he had not done so
       encouraged him to expect the most implicit obedience from his own
       children. He could trust himself, he said (and so did Christina),
       to be more lenient than perhaps his father had been to himself; his
       danger, he said (and so again did Christina), would be rather in the
       direction of being too indulgent; he must be on his guard against
       this, for no duty could be more important than that of teaching a
       child to obey its parents in all things.
       He had read not long since of an Eastern traveller, who, while
       exploring somewhere in the more remote parts of Arabia and Asia
       Minor, had come upon a remarkably hardy, sober, industrious little
       Christian community--all of them in the best of health--who had
       turned out to be the actual living descendants of Jonadab, the son
       of Rechab; and two men in European costume, indeed, but speaking
       English with a broken accent, and by their colour evidently
       Oriental, had come begging to Battersby soon afterwards, and
       represented themselves as belonging to this people; they had said
       they were collecting funds to promote the conversion of their fellow
       tribesmen to the English branch of the Christian religion. True,
       they turned out to be impostors, for when he gave them a pound and
       Christina five shillings from her private purse, they went and got
       drunk with it in the next village but one to Battersby; still, this
       did not invalidate the story of the Eastern traveller. Then there
       were the Romans--whose greatness was probably due to the wholesome
       authority exercised by the head of a family over all its members.
       Some Romans had even killed their children; this was going too far,
       but then the Romans were not Christians, and knew no better.
       The practical outcome of the foregoing was a conviction in
       Theobald's mind, and if in his, then in Christina's, that it was
       their duty to begin training up their children in the way they
       should go, even from their earliest infancy. The first signs of
       self-will must be carefully looked for, and plucked up by the roots
       at once before they had time to grow. Theobald picked up this numb
       serpent of a metaphor and cherished it in his bosom.
       Before Ernest could well crawl he was taught to kneel; before he
       could well speak he was taught to lisp the Lord's prayer, and the
       general confession. How was it possible that these things could be
       taught too early? If his attention flagged or his memory failed
       him, here was an ill weed which would grow apace, unless it were
       plucked out immediately, and the only way to pluck it out was to
       whip him, or shut him up in a cupboard, or dock him of some of the
       small pleasures of childhood. Before he was three years old he
       could read and, after a fashion, write. Before he was four he was
       learning Latin, and could do rule of three sums.
       As for the child himself, he was naturally of an even temper, he
       doted upon his nurse, on kittens and puppies, and on all things that
       would do him the kindness of allowing him to be fond of them. He
       was fond of his mother, too, but as regards his father, he has told
       me in later life he could remember no feeling but fear and
       shrinking. Christina did not remonstrate with Theobald concerning
       the severity of the tasks imposed upon their boy, nor yet as to the
       continual whippings that were found necessary at lesson times.
       Indeed, when during any absence of Theobald's the lessons were
       entrusted to her, she found to her sorrow that it was the only thing
       to do, and she did it no less effectually than Theobald himself,
       nevertheless she was fond of her boy, which Theobald never was, and
       it was long before she could destroy all affection for herself in
       the mind of her first-born. But she persevered. _