pg2084 [108]
Ernest had several Johnian friends, and came thus to hear about the Simeonites and to see some of them, who were pointed out to him as they passed through the courts. They had a repellent attraction for him; he disliked them, but he could not bring himself to leave them alone. On one occasion he had gone so far as to parody one of the tracts they had sent round in the night, and to get a copy dropped into each of the leading Simeonites’ boxes. The subject he had taken was “Personal Cleanliness.” Cleanliness, he said, was next to godliness; he wished to know on which side it was to stand, and concluded by exhorting Simeonites to a freer use of the tub. I cannot commend my hero’s humour in this matter; his tract was not brilliant, but I mention the fact as showing that at this time he was something of a Saul and took pleasure in persecuting the elect, not, as I have said, that he had any hankering after scepticism, but because, like the farmers in his father’s village, though he would not stand seeing the Christian religion made light of, he was not going to see it taken seriously. Ernest’s friends thought his dislike for Simeonites was due to his being the son of a clergyman who, it was known, bullied him; it is more likely, however, that it rose from an unconscious sympathy with them, which, as in St Paul’s case, in the end drew him into the ranks of those whom he had most despised and hated.
CHAPTER XLVIII
Once, recently, when he was down at home after taking his degree, his mother had had a short conversation with him about his becoming a clergyman, set on thereto by Theobald, who shrank from the subject himself. This time it was during a turn taken in the garden, and not on the sofa—which was reserved for supreme occasions.
“You know, my dearest boy,” she said to him, “that papa” (she always called Theobald “papa” when talking to Ernest) “is so anxious you should not go into the Church blindly, and without fully realising the difficulties of a clergyman’s position. He has considered all of them himself, and has been shown how small they are, when they are faced boldly, but he wishes you, too, to feel them as strongly and completely as possible before committing yourself to irrevocable vows, so that you may never, never have to regret the step you will have taken.”
This was the first time Ernest had heard that there were any difficulties, and he not unnaturally enquired in a vague way after their nature.
“That, my dear boy,” rejoined Christina, “is a question which I am not fitted to enter upon either by nature or education. I might easily unsettle your mind without being able to settle it again. Oh, no! Such questions are far better avoided by women, and, I should have thought, by men, but papa wished me to speak to you upon the subject, so that there might be no mistake hereafter, and I have done so. Now, therefore, you know all.”
The conversation ended here, so far as this subject was concerned, and Ernest thought he did know all. His mother would not have told him he knew all—not about a matter of that sort—unless he actually did know it; well, it did not come to very much; he supposed there were some difficulties, but his father, who at any rate was an excellent scholar and a learned man, was probably quite right here, and he need not trouble himself more about them. So little impression did the conversation make on him, that it was not till