Fashionable Philosophy, and Other Sketches Part 1

Fashionable Philosophy.

by Laurence Oliphant.

PREFACE.

That railway travel is not, as a rule, conducive to serious thought, may fairly be inferred from the cla.s.s of literature displayed on the bookstalls at the stations. I have therefore refrained from any attempt to excite the reflective faculties of the reader, excepting in the first and third of the accompanying sketches, and even in these have only ventured to suggest ideas, the full scope and pregnancy of which it must be left to his own idiosyncrasy to appreciate and develop, the more especially as they bear upon a certain current of investigation which has recently become popular.

I have to express my thanks to the Editor of the 'Nineteenth Century Review' for the kind permission he has granted me to reproduce "The Sisters of Thibet"; and I avail myself of the opportunity thus afforded of removing the impression which, to my surprise, was conveyed to me by letters from numerous correspondents, that the article contained any record of my own personal experiences. The satire was suggested by the work of an author whose sincerity I do not doubt, and for whose motives I have the highest respect, in order to point out what appears to me the defective morality, from an altruistic and practical point of view, of a system of which he is the princ.i.p.al exponent in this country, and which, under the name of Esoteric Buddhism, still seems to possess some fascination for a certain cla.s.s of minds.

The other articles originally appeared in 'Blackwood's Magazine,' and I wish to express my acknowledgments to my publishers for their usual courtesy in allowing me to republish them in this form.

ATHENAEUM CLUB, _January_ 1887.

FASHIONABLE PHILOSOPHY.

SCENE--_A London Drawing-room_. TIME--5 _o'clock_ P.M.

_The afternoon tea apparatus in one corner of the room_, _and_ Lady Fritterly _on a couch in another_. The Hon. Mrs Allmash _is announced_.

_Lady Fritterly_. How too kind, dear, of you to come, and so early, too!

I've got such a lot of interesting people coming, and we are going to discuss the religion of the future.

_Mrs Allmash_. How quite delightful! I do so long for something more substantial than the theologies of the past! It is becoming quite puzzling to know what to teach one's children: mine are getting old enough now to understand about things, and one ought to teach them something. I was talking about it to that charming Professor Germsell last night.

_Lady Fritterly_. Well, I hope he is coming presently, so you will be able to continue your conversation. Then there is Mr Coldwaite, the celebrated Comtist; and Mr Fussle, who writes those delightful articles on prehistoric aesthetic evolution; and Mr Drygull, the eminent theosophist, whose stories about esoteric Buddhism are quite too extraordinary, and who has promised to bring a Khoja--a most interesting moral specimen, my dear--who has just arrived from Bombay; and Lord Fondleton.

_Mrs Allmash_. Lord Fondleton! I did not know that he was interested in such subjects.

_Lady Fritterly_. He says he is, dear; between ourselves--but this, of course, is strictly _entre nous_--I rather think that it is I who interest him: but I encourage him, poor fellow; it may wean him from the unprofitable life he is leading, and turn his mind to higher things. Oh!

I almost forgot,---then there is my new beauty!

_Mrs Allmash_. Your new beauty!

_Lady Fritterly_. Yes; if you could only have dined with me the other night, you would have met her. I had such a perfect little dinner. Just think! A poet, an actor, a journalist, a painter, a wit, and a new beauty. I'll tell you how I found her. She really belongs at present to Lady Islington and myself; but of course, now we have started her, all the other people will snap her up. We found that we both owed that vulgar upstart, Mrs Houndsley, a visit, and went there together--because I always think two people are less easily bored than one--when suddenly the most perfect apparition you ever beheld stood before us;--an old master dress, an immense pattern, a large hat rim encircling a face, some rich auburn hair inside, and the face a perfect one. Well, you know, it turned out that she was not born in the purple--her husband is just a clerk in Burley's Bank; but we both insisted on being introduced to her--for, you see, my dear, there is no doubt about it, she is a ready- made beauty. The same idea occurred to Lady Islington, so we agreed as we drove away that we would bring her out. The result is, that she went to Islington House on Tuesday, and came to me on Thursday, and created a perfect furor on both occasions; so now she is fairly started.

_Mrs Allmash_. How wonderfully clever and fortunate you are, dear! What is her name?

_Lady Fritterly_. Mrs Gloring.

_Mrs Allmash_. Oh yes; everybody was talking about her at the d.u.c.h.ess's last night. I am dying to see her; but they say that she is rather a fool.

_Lady Fritterly_. Pure spite and jealousy. Yet that is the way these Christian women of society obey the precept of their religion, and love their neighbours as themselves.

[Lord Fondleton _is announced_, _accompanied by a stranger_.

_Lord Fondleton_. How d'ye do, Lady Fritterly? I am sure you will excuse my taking the liberty of introducing Mr Rollestone, a very old friend of mine, to you; he has only just returned to England, after an absence of so many years that he is quite a stranger in London.

[Lady Fritterly _is_ "_delighted_." _The rest of the party arrive in rapid succession_.

_Mrs Allmash_. Dear Mr Germsell, I was just telling Lady Fritterly what an interesting conversation we were having last night when it was unfortunately interrupted. I shall be so glad if you would explain more fully now what you were telling me. I am sure everybody would be interested.

_Lady Fritterly_. Oh do, Mr Germsell; it would be quite too nice of you.

And, Mr Drygull, will you ask the Khoja to--

_Mr Drygull_. My friend's name is Ali Seyyid, Lady Fritterly.

_Lady Fritterly_. Pray excuse my stupidity, Mr Allyside, and come and sit near me. Lord Fondleton, find Mrs Gloring a chair.

_Lord Fondleton_ [_aside to_ Mrs Gloring]. Who's our black friend?

_Mrs Gloring_. I am sure I don't know. I think Lady Fritterly called him a codger.

_Lord Fondleton_. Ah, he looks like it,--and a rum one at that, as our American cousins say.

_Mrs Gloring_. Hush! Mr Germsell is going to begin.

_Mr Germsell_. Mrs Allmash asked me last night whether my thoughts had been directed to the topic which is uppermost just now in so many minds in regard to the religion of the future, and I ventured to tell her that it would be found to be contained in the generalised expediency of the past.

_Mr Fussle_. Pardon me, but the religion of the future must be the result of an evolutionary process, and I don't see how generalisations of past expediency are to help the evolution of humanity.

_Germsell_. They throw light upon it; and the study of the evolutionary process so far teaches us how we may evolve in the future. For instance, you have only got to think of evolution as divided into moral, astronomic, geologic, biologic, psychologic, sociologic, aesthetic, and so forth, and you will find that there is always an evolution of the parts into which it divides itself, and that therefore there is but one evolution going on everywhere after the same manner. The work of science has been not to extend our experience, for that is impossible, but to systematise it; and in that systematisation of it will be found the religion of which we are in search.

_Drygull_. May I ask why you deem it impossible that our experience can be extended?

_Germsell_. Because it has itself defined its limits. The combined experience of humanity, so far as its earliest records go, has been limited by laws, the nature of which have been ascertained: it is impossible that it should be transcended without violation of the conclusions arrived at by positive science.

_Drygull_. I can more easily understand that the conclusions arrived at by men of science should be limited, than that the experience of humanity should be confined by those conclusions; but I fail to perceive why those philosophers should deny the existence of certain human faculties, because they don't happen to possess them themselves. I think I know a Rishi who can produce experiences which would scatter all their conclusions to the winds, when the whole system which is built upon them would collapse.

_Mrs Gloring_ [_aside to_ Lord Fondleton]. Pray, Lord Fondleton, can you tell me what a Rishi is?

_Lord Fondleton_. A man who has got into higher states, you know--what I heard Mr Drygull call a transcendentalist the other day, whatever that may be. I don't understand much about these matters myself, but I take it he is a sort of evolved codger.

_Mrs Allmash_. Oh, how awfully interesting! Dear Mr Drygull, do tell us some of the extraordinary things the Rishi can do.

_Drygull_. If you will only all of you listen attentively, and if Mr Germsell will have the goodness to modify to some degree the prejudiced att.i.tude of mind common to all men of science, you will hear him as plainly as I can at this moment beating a tom-tom in his cottage in the Himalayas.

[Mr Germsell _gets up impatiently_, _and walks to the other end of the back drawing-room_.

_Drygull_ [_casting a compa.s.sionate glance after him_]. Perhaps it is better so. Now please, Lady Fritterly, I must request a few moments of the most profound silence on the part of all. You will not hear the sound as though coming from a distance, but it will seem rather like a m.u.f.fled drumming taking place inside your head, scarcely perceptible at first, when its volume will gradually increase.

_Lord Fondleton_ [_aside to_ Mrs Gloring]. Some bad champagne produced the same phenomenon in my head last night.

_Lady Fritterly_ [_severely_]. Hush! Lord Fondleton.