登陆注册
15422500000149

第149章 OUT OF TUNE (3)

However, I am willing to do my part now. I wonder when you Milton men intend to live. All your lives seem to be spent in gathering together the materials for life.' 'By living, I suppose you mean enjoyment.' 'Yes, enjoyment,--I don't specify of what, because I trust. we should both consider mere pleasure as very poor enjoyment.' 'I would rather have the nature of the enjoyment defined.' 'Well! enjoyment of leisure--enjoyment of the power and influence which money gives. You are all striving for money. What do you want it for?' Mr. Thornton was silent. Then he said, 'I really don't know. But money is not what I strive for.' 'What then?' 'It is a home question. I shall have to lay myself open to such a catechist, and I am not sure that I am prepared to do it.' 'No!' said Mr. Hale; 'don't let us be personal in our catechism. You are neither of you representative men; you are each of you too individual for that.' 'I am not sure whether to consider that as a compliment or not. I should like to be the representative of Oxford, with its beauty and its learning, and its proud old history. What do you say, Margaret; ought I to be flattered?' 'I don't know Oxford. But there is a difference between being the representative of a city and the representative man of its inhabitants.' 'Very true, Miss Margaret. Now I remember, you were against me this morning, and were quite Miltonian and manufacturing in your preferences.' Margaret saw the quick glance of surprise that Mr. Thornton gave her, and she was annoyed at the construction which he might put on this speech of Mr. Bell's.

Mr. Bell went on-- 'Ah! I wish I could show you our High Street--our Radcliffe Square. I am leaving out our colleges, just as I give Mr. Thornton leave to omit his factories in speaking of the charms of Milton. I have a right to abuse my birth-place. Remember I am a Milton man. Mr. Thornton was annoyed more than he ought to have been at all that Mr.

Bell was saying. He was not in a mood for joking. At another time, he could have enjoyed Mr. Bell's half testy condemnation of a town where the life was so at variance with every habit he had formed; but now, he was galled enough to attempt to defend what was never meant to be seriously attacked. 'I don't set up Milton as a model of a town.' 'Not in architecture?' slyly asked Mr. Bell. 'No! We've been too busy to attend to mere outward appearances.' 'Don't say mere outward appearances,' said Mr. Hale, gently. 'They impress us all, from childhood upward--every day of our life.' 'Wait a little while,' said Mr. Thornton. 'Remember, we are of a different race from the Greeks, to whom beauty was everything, and to whom Mr. Bell might speak of a life of leisure and serene enjoyment, much of which entered in through their outward senses. I don't mean to despise them, any more than I would ape them. But I belong to Teutonic blood; it is little mingled in this part of England to what it is in others; we retain much of their language; we retain more of their spirit; we do not look upon life as a time for enjoyment, but as a time for action and exertion. Our glory and our beauty arise out of our inward strength, which makes us victorious over material resistance, and over greater difficulties still. We are Teutonic up here in Darkshire in another way. We hate to have laws made for us at a distance. We wish people would allow us to right ourselves, instead of continually meddling, with their imperfect legislation. We stand up for self-government, and oppose centralisation.' 'In short, you would like the Heptarchy back again. Well, at any rate, I revoke what I said this morning--that you Milton people did not reverence the past. You are regular worshippers of Thor.' 'If we do not reverence the past as you do in Oxford, it is because we want something which can apply to the present more directly. It is fine when the study of the past leads to a prophecy of the future. But to men groping in new circumstances, it would be finer if the words of experience could direct us how to act in what concerns us most intimately and immediately;which is full of difficulties that must be encountered; and upon the mode in which they are met and conquered--not merely pushed aside for the time--depends our future. Out of the wisdom of the past, help us over the present. But no! People can speak of Utopia much more easily than of the next day's duty; and yet when that duty is all done by others, who so ready to cry, "Fie, for shame!"' 'And all this time I don't see what you are talking about. Would you Milton men condescend to send up your to-day's difficulty to Oxford? You have not tried us yet.' Mr. Thornton laughed outright at this. 'I believe I was talking with reference to a good deal that has been troubling us of late; I was thinking of the strikes we have gone through, which are troublesome and injurious things enough, as I am finding to my cost. And yet this last strike, under which I am smarting, has been respectable.' 'A respectable strike!' said Mr. Bell. 'That sounds as if you were far gone in the worship of Thor.' Margaret felt, rather than saw, that Mr. Thornton was chagrined by the repeated turning into jest of what he was feeling as very serious. She tried to change the conversation from a subject about which one party cared little, while, to the other, it was deeply, because personally, interesting.

She forced herself to say something. 'Edith says she finds the printed calicoes in Corfu better and cheaper than in London.' 'Does she?' said her father. 'I think that must be one of Edith's exaggerations.

Are you sure of it, Margaret?' 'I am sure she says so, papa.' 'Then I am sure of the fact,' said Mr. Bell. 'Margaret, I go so far in my idea of your truthfulness, that it shall cover your cousin's character.

I don't believe a cousin of yours could exaggerate.' 'Is Miss Hale so remarkable for truth?' said Mr. Thornton, bitterly. The moment he had done so, he could have bitten his tongue out. What was he?

同类推荐
  • 霁后贻马十二巽

    霁后贻马十二巽

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 防海纪略

    防海纪略

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 北平录

    北平录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 洞真太上三九素语玉清真诀

    洞真太上三九素语玉清真诀

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 三余赘笔

    三余赘笔

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 注定皇妃

    注定皇妃

    或许,这一刻只是个悲伤……付出,也是一种悲哀……爱恋,也是一种伤残……默许,也是一种承诺……
  • 傲娇甜妻去哪里

    傲娇甜妻去哪里

    五年前,她因恨逃避,因爱犯错;五年后,知晓真相,她重拾心底挚爱,爱情却没在原地等她。他冷漠,增添的风流多情独独吝啬于她。她洒脱,决然闯入他的生活,为爱一博。有大叔爱的萝莉像个宝,幸福享不了;没大叔爱的萝莉是棵草,幸福哪里找?!
  • 混迹天涯

    混迹天涯

    你有你的规矩,我有我的道理。没见过,谁知是善是恶;悠悠口,管他谁对谁错。活一个叫无悔,混一个叫无忌。不是因为人在江湖,而是因为,年少本该轻狂。
  • 校园的小小爱恋

    校园的小小爱恋

    主人公以为愧疚,迟迟没有表达出对她的感情,直到当她只能活到十八岁的时候才后悔莫及,为了拯救女友,秦鹏不惜爱上一个自己不喜欢的女孩(唐莹)等到心爱的女孩醒来的时候,一切却都变了,她居然记不起然后之前的事情,以及和他的海誓山盟……
  • 惹情

    惹情

    1988年的一起震惊海城的歼灭事件,让年幼的文海城从小留下了一个念头。“你给我灌输的思想,我通通运用到了。”可直到时间流逝到2013年,仅仅一年的时间,才发现自己已经没有了回旋的余地,即使因为你的出现……
  • 穿越古代当二师兄

    穿越古代当二师兄

    三无女生因不小心掉进下水道,穿越到一不知名得古代时空,变成男人,从此过上了...得生活。
  • 神宵天师

    神宵天师

    姜辰出生之时受宿世恶鬼缠身,危在旦夕,幸得恩师相救,习成道法,浪迹都市,遭遇各类灵异事件
  • 圣魔缘

    圣魔缘

    三百年前,人皇之女与魔君后人的感人恋情引发一场空前绝后的大战,五大域界,数十位顶尖种族于白水荒原之上连续大战五天五夜,这对恋人凭借燃烧神魂之力,力拼五域顶尖强者,伤敌无数,他们也终因神魂耗损过度,湮灭世间。三百年后,一名身具逆天血脉的少年开始展露峥嵘,闯荡五大界域,当他渐渐地揭开当年事实真相,等待他的又会是怎样的抉择。历史总是惊人的相似,他与海域皇族公主相爱,同样的悲剧是否会再度上演,圣又如何?魔又如何?我之一生只愿能与心爱之人畅游天地,随心所欲;我这一生,只为守护身边至亲至爱之人;我之一生,誓要精彩绝艳,脚踏众生;我之一生,注定演绎圣魔传说!逆天战魔!屠戮圣皇!天妖为宠!诛尽鬼魅!
  • 九幽圣王

    九幽圣王

    幼时他家破人亡,十年之后他以强势之姿而崛起,他要为他的族人报仇,他励志要登上大陆的顶峰。一切精彩内容经在九幽圣王等你而来。
  • 风去枫来

    风去枫来

    原本的棋圣,现在的茶馆老板。原本的名牌大学毕业生,现在的茶馆打工仔。小小的北京胡同小茶馆,能有什么事情发生呢。