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<h3>CHAPTER XL.</h3>
<h4>WHAT SIR THOMAS THOUGHT ABOUT IT.<br/> </h4>
<p>Sir Thomas Underwood had been engaged upon a very great piece of work
ever since he had been called to the Bar in the twenty-fifth year of
his life. He had then devoted himself to the writing of a life of
Lord Verulam, and had been at it ever since. But as yet he had not
written a word. In early life, that is, up to his fortieth year, he
had talked freely enough about his opus magnum to those of his
compeers with whom he had been intimate; but of late Bacon's name had
never been on his lips. Patience, at home, was aware of the name and
nature of her father's occupation, but Clarissa had not yet learned
to know that he who had been the great philosopher and little Lord
Chancellor was not to be lightly mentioned. To Stemm the matter had
become so serious, that in speaking of books, papers, and documents
he would have recourse to any periphrasis rather than mention in his
master's hearing the name of the fallen angel. And yet Sir Thomas was
always talking to himself about Sir Francis Bacon, and was always
writing his life.</p>
<p>There are men who never dream of great work, who never realise to
themselves the need of work so great as to demand a lifetime, but who
themselves never fail in accomplishing those second-class tasks with
which they satisfy their own energies. Men these are who to the world
are very useful. Some few there are, who seeing the beauty of a great
work and believing in its accomplishment within the years allotted to
man, are contented to struggle for success, and struggling, fail.
Here and there comes one who struggles and succeeds. But the men are
many who see the beauty, who adopt the task, who promise themselves
the triumph, and then never struggle at all. The task is never
abandoned; but days go by and weeks; and then months and years,—and
nothing is done. The dream of youth becomes the doubt of middle life,
and then the despair of age. In building a summer-house it is so easy
to plant the first stick, but one does not know where to touch the
sod when one begins to erect a castle. So it had been with Sir Thomas
Underwood and his life of Bacon. It would not suffice to him to
scrape together a few facts, to indulge in some fiction, to tell a
few anecdotes, and then to call his book a biography. Here was a man
who had risen higher and was reported to have fallen lower,—perhaps
than any other son of Adam. With the finest intellect ever given to a
man, with the purest philanthropy and the most enduring energy, he
had become a by-word for greed and injustice. Sir Thomas had resolved
that he would tell the tale as it had never yet been told, that he
would unravel facts that had never seen the light, that he would let
the world know of what nature really had been this man,—and that he
would write a book that should live. He had never abandoned his
purpose; and now at sixty years of age, his purpose remained with
him, but not one line of his book was written.</p>
<p>And yet the task had divorced him in a measure from the world. He had
not been an unsuccessful man in life. He had made money, and had
risen nearly to the top of his profession. He had been in Parliament,
and was even now a member. But yet he had been divorced from the
world, and Bacon had done it. By Bacon he had justified to
himself,—or rather had failed to justify to himself,—a seclusion
from his family and from the world which had been intended for
strenuous work, but had been devoted to dilettante idleness. And he
had fallen into those mistakes which such habits and such pursuits
are sure to engender. He thought much, but he thought nothing out,
and was consequently at sixty still in doubt about almost everything.
Whether Christ did or did not die to save sinners was a question with
him so painfully obscure that he had been driven to obtain what
comfort he might from not thinking of it. The assurance of belief
certainly was not his to enjoy;—nor yet that absence from fear which
may come from assured unbelief. And yet none who knew him could say
that he was a bad man. He robbed no one. He never lied. He was not
self-indulgent. He was affectionate. But he had spent his life in an
intention to write the life of Lord Verulam, and not having done it,
had missed the comfort of self-respect. He had intended to settle for
himself a belief on subjects which are, of all, to all men the most
important; and, having still postponed the work of inquiry, had never
attained the security of a faith. He was for ever doubting, for ever
intending, and for ever despising himself for his doubts and
unaccomplished intentions. Now, at the age of sixty, he had thought
to lessen these inward disturbances by returning to public life, and
his most unsatisfactory alliance with Mr. Griffenbottom had been the
result.</p>
<p>They who know the agonies of an ambitious, indolent, doubting,
self-accusing man,—of a man who has a skeleton in his cupboard as to
which he can ask for sympathy from no one,—will understand what
feelings were at work within the bosom of Sir Thomas when his
Percycross friends left him alone in his chamber. The moment that he
knew that he was alone he turned the lock of the door, and took from
out a standing desk a whole heap of loose papers. These were the
latest of his notes on the great Bacon subject. For though no line of
the book had ever been written,—nor had his work even yet taken such
form as to enable him to write a line,—nevertheless, he always had
by him a large assemblage of documents, notes, queries, extracts
innumerable, and references which in the course of years had become
almost unintelligible to himself, upon which from time to time he
would set himself to work. Whenever he was most wretched he would fly
at his papers. When the qualms of his conscience became very severe,
he would copy some passage from a dusty book, hardly in the belief
that it might prove to be useful, but with half a hope that he might
cheat himself into so believing. Now, in his misery, he declared that
he would bind himself to his work and never leave it. There, if
anywhere, might consolation be found.</p>
<p>With rapid hands he moved about the papers, and tried to fix his eyes
upon the words. But how was he to fix his thoughts? He could not even
begin not to think of those scoundrels who had so misused him. It was
not a week since they had taken £50 from him for the poor of
Percycross, and now they came to him with a simple statement that he
was absolutely to be thrown over! He had already paid £900 for his
election, and was well aware that the account was not closed. And he
was a man who could not bear to speak about money, or to make any
complaint as to money. Even though he was being so abominably
misused, still he must pay any further claim that might be made on
him in respect of the election that was past. Yes;—he must pay for
those very purchased votes, for that bribery, as to which he had so
loudly expressed his abhorrence, and by reason of which he was now to
lose his seat with ignominy.</p>
<p>But the money was not the worst of it. There was a heavier sorrow
than that arising from the loss of his money. He alone had been just
throughout the contest at Percycross; he alone had been truthful, and
he alone straightforward! And yet he alone must suffer! He began to
believe that Griffenbottom would keep his seat. That he would
certainly lose his own, he was quite convinced. He might lose it by
undergoing an adverse petition, and paying ever so much more
money,—or he might lose it in the manner that Mr. Trigger had so
kindly suggested. In either way there would be disgrace, and
contumely, and hours of the agony of self-reproach in store for him!</p>
<p>What excuse had he for placing himself in contact with such filth? Of
what childishness had he not been the victim when he allowed himself
to dream that he, a pure and scrupulous man, could go among such
impurity as he had found at Percycross, and come out, still clean and
yet triumphant? Then he thought of Griffenbottom as a member of
Parliament, and of that Legislation and that Constitution to which
Griffenbottoms were thought to be essentially necessary. That there
are always many such men in the House he had always known. He had sat
there and had seen them. He had stood shoulder to shoulder with them
through many a division, and had thought about them,—acknowledging
their use. But now that he was brought into personal contact with
such an one, his very soul was aghast. The Griffenbottoms never do
anything in politics. They are men of whom in the lump it may be
surmised that they take up this or that side in politics, not from
any instructed conviction, not from faith in measures or even in men,
nor from adherence either through reason or prejudice to this or that
set of political theories,—but simply because on this side or on
that there is an opening. That gradually they do grow into some shape
of conviction from the moulds in which they are made to live, must be
believed of them; but these convictions are convictions as to
divisions, convictions as to patronage, convictions as to success,
convictions as to Parliamentary management; but not convictions as to
the political needs of the people. So said Sir Thomas to himself as
he sat thinking of the Griffenbottoms. In former days he had told
himself that a pudding cannot be made without suet or dough, and that
Griffenbottoms were necessary if only for the due adherence of the
plums. Whatever most health-bestowing drug the patient may take would
bestow anything but health were it taken undiluted. It was thus in
former days Sir Thomas had apologised to himself for the
Griffenbottoms in the House;—but no such apology satisfied him now.
This log of a man, this lump of suet, this diluting quantity of most
impure water,—'twas thus that Mr. Griffenbottom was spoken of by Sir
Thomas to himself as he sat there with all the Bacon documents before
him,—this politician, whose only real political feeling consisted in
a positive love of corruption for itself, had not only absolutely got
the better of him, who regarded himself at any rate as a man of mind
and thought, but had used him as a puppet, and had compelled him to
do dirty work. Oh,—that he should have been so lost to his own
self-respect as to have allowed himself to be dragged through the
dirt of Percycross!</p>
<p>But he must do something;—he must take some step. Mr. Griffenbottom
had declared that he would put himself to no expense in defending the
seat. Of course he, Sir Thomas, could do the same. He believed that
it might be practicable for him to acknowledge the justice of the
petition, to declare his belief that his own agents had betrayed him,
and to acknowledge that his seat was indefensible. But, as he thought
of it, he found that he was actually ignorant of the law in the
matter. That he would make no such bargain as that suggested to him
by Mr. Trigger,—of so much he thought that he was sure. At any rate
he would do nothing that he himself knew to be dishonourable. He must
consult his own attorney. That was the end of his
self-deliberation,—that, and a conviction that under no
circumstances could he retain his seat.</p>
<p>Then he struggled hard for an hour to keep his mind fixed on the
subject of his great work. He had found an unknown memoir respecting
Bacon, written by a German pen in the Latin language, published at
Leipzig shortly after the date of Bacon's fall. He could translate
that. It is always easiest for the mind to work in such emergencies,
on some matter as to which no creative struggles are demanded from
it.</p>
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