literary transcript
CHAPTER II
From A.B.'s diary.
Five words sum up every biography. Video meliora proboque;
deteriora sequor. Like all other
human beings, I know what I ought to do, but continue to do what I know I
oughtn't to do. This afternoon, for
example, I went to see poor Beppo, miserably convalescent from 'flu. I knew I ought to have sat with him and let
him pour out his complaints about youth's ingratitude and cruelty, his terror
of advancing old age and loneliness, his awful suspicions that people are
beginning to find him a bore, no longer à la page. The Bolinskys had given a party without
inviting him, Hagworm hadn't asked him to a weekend since November ... I knew I
ought to have listened sympathetically, and proffered good advice, implored him
not to make himself miserable over inevitabilities and trifles. The advice, no doubt, wouldn't have been
accepted – as usual; but still, one never knows, therefore ought never to fail
to give it. Instead of which I squared
conscience in advance by buying him a pound of expensive grapes and told a lie
about some committee I had to run off to, almost immediately. The truth being that I simply couldn't face a
repetition of poor B's self-commiserations.
I justified my behaviour, as well as my five bob's worth of fruit, by
righteous thoughts: at fifty, the man ought to know better than continue to attach
importance to love affairs and invitations to dinner and meeting the right
people. He oughtn't to be such an ass;
therefore (impeccable logic) it wasn't incumbent on me to do what I knew I
should do. And so I hurried off after
only a quarter of an hour with him – leaving the poor wretch to solitude and
his festering self-pity. Shall go to him tomorrow for at least two hours.
'Besetting
sin' – can one still use the term?
No. It has too many
unsatisfactory overtones and implications – blood of lamb, terrible thing to
fall into hands of living God, hell fire, obsession with sex, offences, chastity instead of charity. (Note that poor old Beppo,
turned inside out = Comstock or
No,
one can't use the phrase, nor think in the terms it implies. But that doesn't mean, of course, that
persistent tendencies to behave badly don't exist, or that it isn't one's
business to examine them, objectively, and try to do something about them. That remark of old Miller's, as we were
riding to see one of his Indian patients in the mountains: 'Really and by
nature every man's a unity; but you've artificially transformed the unity into
a trinity. One clever man and two idiots
– that's what you've made yourself. An
admirable manipulator of ideas, linked with a person who, so far as
self-knowledge and feeling are concerned, is just a moron; and the pair of you
associated with a half-witted body. A
body that's hopelessly unaware of all it does and feels, that has no accomplishments, that doesn't know how to use itself or
anything else. Two
imbeciles and one intellectual.
But man is a democracy, where the majority rules. You've got to do something about that
majority.' This journal is a first step. Self-knowledge an essential
preliminary to self-change. (Pure science and then applied.) That which
besets me is indifference. I can't be
bothered about people. Or rather,
won't. For I avoid, carefully, all
occasions for being bothered. A
necessary part of the treatment is to embrace all the bothersome occasions one
can, to got out of one's way to create them. Indifference is a form of sloth. For one can work hard, as I've always done,
and yet wallow in sloth, be industrious about one's job, but scandalously lazy
about all that isn't one's job. Because, of course, the job is fun. Whereas the non-job –
personal relations, in my case – is disagreeable and laborious. More and more disagreeable as the habit of
avoiding personal relations ingrains itself with the passage of time. Indifference is a form of sloth, and sloth in
its turn is one of the symptoms of lovelessness. One isn't lazy about what one loves. The problem is: how to love? Once more the word is suspect – greasy from
being fingered by generations of Stigginses.
There ought to be some way of dry-cleaning and disinfecting words. Love, purity, goodness,
spirit – a pile of dirty linen waiting for the laundress. How, then, to – not 'love,' since it's an
unwashed handkerchief – feel, say, persistent affectionate interest in
people? How make the anthropological
approach to them, as old Miller would say?
Not easy to answer.
April
5th.
Worked all morning.
For it would be silly not to put my materials into shape. Into a new shape, of
course. My original conception
was of a vast Bouvard et Pécuchet, constructed
of historical facts. A picture of
futility, apparently objective, scientific, but composed, I realize, in order
to justify my own way of life. If men
had always behaved either like half-wits or baboons, if they couldn't behave otherwise,
then I was justified in sitting comfortably in the stalls with my
opera-glasses. Whereas if there were
something to be done, if the behaviour could be modified ... Meanwhile a
description of the behaviour and an account of the ways of modifying it will be
valuable. Though not
so valuable as to justify complete abstention from all other forms of activity.
In the afternoon to Miller's, where I found a parson, who takes
Christianity seriously and has started an organization of pacifists. Purchas by name. Middle-aged. Slightly the
muscular-jocular Christian manner. (How hard to admit that a man can use
clichés and yet be intelligent!) But a very decent sort of
man. More than
decent, indeed. Rather
impressive.
The
aim is to use and extend Purchas's organization. The unit a small group,
like the early Christian agape, or the communist cell. (Note that all
successful movements have been built up in rowing eights or football elevens.)
Purchas's groups preface meetings with Christian devotions. Empirically, it is found that a devotional atmosphere increases efficiency, intensifies
spirit of co-operation and self-sacrifice.
But devotion in Christian terms will be largely unacceptable. Miller believes possible a non-theological
praxis of meditation. Which he would
like, of course, to couple with training, along F.M. Alexander's lines, in use
of the self, beginning with physical control and achieving through it (since
mind and body are one) control of impulses and feelings. But this is impracticable. The necessary teachers don't exist. 'We must be content to do what we can from
the mental side. The physical will let
us down, of course. The flesh is weak in
so many more ways than we suppose.'
I
agreed to contribute money, prepare some literature and go round speaking to
groups. The last is the most difficult,
as I have always refused to utter in public.
When Purchas had gone, asked Miller if I should take lessons in speaking.
Answer. 'If you take lessons before you're well and
physically co-ordinated, you'll merely be learning yet another way of using
yourself badly. Get well, achieve
co-ordination, use yourself properly; you'll be able to speak in any way you
please. The difficulties, from stage
fright to voice production, will no longer exist.'
Miller
then gave me a lesson in use of the self.
Learning to sit in a chair, to get out of it, to lean
back and forward. He warned me it
might seem a bit pointless at first. But
that interest and understanding would grow with achievement. And that I should find it the solution of the
video meliora proboque, deteriora sequor problem: a technique for
translating good intentions into acts, for being sure of doing what one knows
one ought to do.
Spent the evening with Beppo. After listening to catalogues of miseries,
suggested that there was no cure, only prevention. Avoid the cause. His reaction was passionate anger: I was
robbing life of its point, condemning him to suicide. In answer I hinted that there was more than
one point. He said he would rather die
than give up his point; then changed his mood and wished to God he could give
it up. But for what? I suggested pacifism. But he was a pacifist already, always
been. Yes, I knew that; but a passive
pacifist, a negative one. There was such
a thing as active and positive pacifism.
He listened, said he'd think about it, thought perhaps it might be a way
out.