The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain and Other Tales Part 18

_Worthy._ Pray Mr. Bragwell, what should you think of a man who would dip his hand into a bag and take out a few guineas?

_Bragwell._ Think? why I think that he should be hanged, to be sure.

_Worthy._ But suppose that bag stood in the king's treasury?

_Bragwell._ In the king's treasury! worse and worse! What! rob the king's treasury! Well, I hope if any one has done it, the robber will be taken up and executed; for I suppose we shall be taxed to pay the damage.

_Worthy._ Very true. If one man takes money out of the treasury, others must be obliged to pay the more into it. But what think you if the fellow should be found to have stopped some money _in its way_ to the treasury, instead of taking it out of the bag after it got there?

_Bragwell._ Guilty, Mr. Worthy; it is all the same in my opinion. If I were judge I would hang him without benefit of clergy.

_Worthy._ Hark ye, Mr. Bragwell, he that deals in smuggled brandy is the man who takes to himself the king's money in its way to the treasury, and he as much robs the government as if he dipped his hand into a bag of guineas in the treasury chamber. It comes to the same thing exactly. Here Bragwell seemed a little offended, and exclaimed, "What, Mr. Worthy! do you pretend to say I am not an honest man because I like to get my brandy as cheap as I can? and because I like to save a shilling to my family? Sir, I repeat it; I do my duty to G.o.d and my neighbor. I say the Lord's prayer most days, I go to church on Sundays, I repeat my creed, and keep the ten commandments; and though I now and then get a little brandy cheap, yet upon the whole, I will venture to say, I do as much as can be expected of any man, and more than the generality."

_Worthy._ Come then, since you say you keep the commandments, you can not be offended if I ask you whether you understand them.

_Bragwell._ To be sure I do. I dare say I do: look ye, Mr. Worthy, I don't pretend to much reading, I was not bred to it as you were. If my father had been a parson, I fancy I should have made as good a figure as some other folks, but I hope good sense and _a good heart_ may teach a man his duty without much scholarship.

_Worthy._ To come to the point; let us now go through the ten commandments, and let us take along with us those explanations of them which our Saviour gave us in his sermon on the mount.

_Bragwell._ Sermon on the mount! why the ten commandments are in the 20th chapter of Exodus. Come, come, Mr. Worthy, I know where to find the commandments as well as you do; for it happens that I am churchwarden, and I can see from the altar-piece where the ten commandments are, without your telling me, for my pew directly faces it.

_Worthy._ But I advise you to read the sermon on the mount, that you may see the full meaning of them.

_Bragwell._ What! do you want to make me believe there are two ways of keeping the commandments?

_Worthy._ No; but there may be two ways of understanding them.

_Bragwell._ Well, I am not afraid to be put to the proof; I defy any man to say I do not keep at least all the four first that are on the left side of the altar-piece.

_Worthy._ If you can prove that, I shall be more ready to believe you observe those of the other table; for he who does his duty to G.o.d, will be likely to do his duty to his neighbor also.

_Bragwell._ What! do you think that I serve two G.o.ds? Do you think then that I make graven images, and worship stocks or stones? Do you take me for a papist or an idolater?

_Worthy._ Don't triumph quite so soon, Master Bragwell. Pray is there nothing in the world you prefer to G.o.d, and thus make an idol of? Do you not love your money, or your lands, or your crops, or your cattle, or your own will, or your own way, rather better than you love G.o.d? Do you never think of these with more pleasure than you think of him, and follow them more eagerly than your religious duty?

_Bragwell._ Oh! there's nothing about that in the 20th chapter of Exodus.

_Worthy._ But Jesus Christ has said, "He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." Now it is certainly a man's duty to love his father and his mother; nay, it would be wicked not to love them, and yet we must not love even these more than our Creator and our Saviour. Well, I think on this principle, your heart pleads guilty to the breach of the first and second commandments; let us proceed to the third.

_Bragwell._ That is about swearing, is it not?

Mr. Worthy, who had observed Bragwell guilty of much profaneness in using the name of his Maker (though all such offensive words have been avoided in writing this history), now told him that he had been waiting the whole day for an opportunity to reprove him for his frequent breach of the third commandment.

"Good L--d! I break the third commandment!" said Bragwell; "no indeed, hardly ever; I once used to swear a little, to be sure, but I vow I never do it now, except now and then when I happen to be in a pa.s.sion: and in such a case, why, good G--d, you know the sin is with those who provoke me, and not with me; but upon my soul, I don't think I have sworn an oath these three months; no, not I, faith, as I hope to be saved."

_Worthy._ And yet you have broken this holy law not less than five or six times in the last speech you have made.

_Bragwell._ Lord bless me! Sure you mistake. Good heavens, Mr.

Worthy, I call G--d to witness, I have neither cursed nor swore since I have been in the house.

_Worthy._ Mr. Bragwell, this is the way in which many who call themselves very good sort of people deceive themselves. What! is it no profanation of the name of your Maker to use it lightly, irreverently and familiarly as you have done? Our Saviour has not only told us not to swear by the immediate name of G.o.d, but he has said, "swear not at all, neither by heaven nor by the earth," and in order to hinder our inventing any other irreligious exclamations or expressions, he has even added, "but let your communications be yea, yea, and nay, nay; for whatsoever is more than this simple affirmation and denial cometh of evil." Nay, more, so greatly do I reverence that high and holy name, that I think even some good people have it too frequently in their mouths; and that they might convey the idea without the word.

_Bragwell._ Well, well, I must take a little more care, I believe. I vow to heaven I did not know there had been so much harm in it; but my daughters seldom speak without using some of these words, and yet they wanted to make me believe the other day that it was monstrous vulgar to swear.

_Worthy._ Women, even gentlewomen, who ought to correct this evil habit in their fathers, and husbands, and children, are too apt to encourage it by their own practice. And indeed they betray the profaneness of their own minds also by it; for none who venerate the holy name of G.o.d, can either profane in this manner themselves, or hear others do so without being exceedingly pained at it.

_Bragwell._ Well, since you are so hard upon me, I believe I must e'en give up this point--so let us pa.s.s on to the next, and here I tread upon sure ground; for as sharp as you are upon me, you can't accuse me of being a Sabbath breaker, since I go to church every Sunday of my life, unless on some very extraordinary occasion.

_Worthy._ For those occasions the gospel allows, by saying, "the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath." Our own sickness, or attending on the sickness of others, are lawful impediments.

_Bragwell._ Yes, and I am now and then obliged to look at a drove of beasts, or to go a journey, or take some medicine, or perhaps some friend may call upon me, or it may be very cold, or very hot, or very rainy.

_Worthy._ Poor excuse! Mr. Bragwell. Do you call these lawful impediments? I am afraid they will not pa.s.s for such on the day of judgment. But how is the rest of your Sunday spent?

_Bragwell._ O, why, I a.s.sure you I often go to church in the afternoon also, and even if I am ever so sleepy.

_Worthy._ And so you finish your nap at church, I suppose.

_Bragwell._ Why, as to that, to be sure we do contrive to have something a little nicer than common for dinner on a Sunday: in consequence of which one eats, you know, a little more than ordinary; and having nothing to do on that day, has more leisure to take a cheerful gla.s.s; and all these things will make one a little heavy, you know.

_Worthy._ And don't you take a little ride in the morning, and look at your sheep when the weather is good; and so fill your mind just before you go to church with thoughts of them; and when the weather is bad, don't you settle an account? or write a few letters of business after church.

_Bragwell._ I can't say but I do; but that is nothing to any body, as long as I set a good example by keeping to my church.

_Worthy._ And how do you pa.s.s your Sunday evenings?

_Bragwell._ My wife and daughters go a visiting Sunday afternoons.

My daughters are glad to get out, at any rate; and as to my wife, she says that being ready dressed, it is a pity to lose the opportunity; besides, it saves her time on a week day; so then you see I have it all my own way, and when I have got rid of the ladies, who are ready to faint at the smell of tobacco, I can venture to smoke a pipe, and drink a sober gla.s.s of punch with half a dozen friends.

_Worthy._ Which punch, being made of smuggled brandy, and drank on the Lord's day, and very vain, as well as profane and worldly company, you are enabled to break both the law of G.o.d, and that of your country at a stroke: and I suppose when you are got together, you speak of your cattle, or of your crops, after which perhaps you talk over a few of your neighbors' faults, and then you brag a little of your own wealth or your own achievements.

_Bragwell._ Why, you seem to know us so well, that any one would think you had been sitting behind the curtain; and yet you are a little mistaken too; for I think we have hardly said a word for several of our last Sundays on any thing but politics.

_Worthy._ And do you find that you much improve your Christian charity by that subject?

_Bragwell._ Why to be sure we do quarrel till we are very near fighting, that is the worst on't.

_Worthy._ And then you call names, and swear a little, I suppose.

_Bragwell._ Why when one is contradicted and put in a pa.s.sion, you know, and when people especially if they are one's inferiors, won't adopt one's opinions, flesh and blood won't bear it.

_Worthy._ And when all your friends are gone home, what becomes of the rest of the evening?

_Bragwell._ That is just as it happens; sometimes I read the newspaper; and as one is generally most tired on the days one does nothing, I go to bed earlier on Sundays than on other days, that I may be more fit to get up to my business the next morning.

_Worthy._ So you shorten Sunday as much as you can, by cutting off a bit at both ends, I suppose; for I take it for granted you lie a little later in the morning.

_Bragwell._ Come, come, we sha'n't get through the whole ten to-night, if you stand snubbing one at this rate. You may pa.s.s over the fifth; for my father and mother have been dead ever since I was a boy, so I am clear of that sc.r.a.pe.