Chapter XIV

by William Somerset Maugham

　　During the journey back to England I thought much ofStrickland. I tried to set in order what I had to tell his wife.It was unsatisfactory, and I could not imagine that shewould be content with me; I was not content with myself.Strickland perplexed me. I could not understand his motives.When I had asked him what first gave him the idea of being apainter, he was unable or unwilling to tell me. I could makenothing of it. I tried to persuade myself than an obscurefeeling of revolt had been gradually coming to a head in hisslow mind, but to challenge this was the undoubted fact thathe had never shown any impatience with the monotony of his life.If, seized by an intolerable boredom, he had determinedto be a painter merely to break with irksome ties, it wouldhave been comprehensible, and commonplace; but commonplace isprecisely what I felt he was not. At last, because I wasromantic, I devised an explanation which I acknowledged to befar-fetched, but which was the only one that in any waysatisfied me. It was this: I asked myself whether there wasnot in his soul some deep-rooted instinct of creation, whichthe circumstances of his life had obscured, but which grewrelentlessly, as a cancer may grow in the living tissues,till at last it took possession of his whole being and forcedhim irresistibly to action. The cuckoo lays its egg in thestrange bird's nest, and when the young one is hatched itshoulders its foster-brothers out and breaks at last the nestthat has sheltered it.But how strange it was that the creative instinct should seizeupon this dull stockbroker, to his own ruin, perhaps, and tothe misfortune of such as were dependent on him; and yet nostranger than the way in which the spirit of God has seized men,powerful and rich, pursuing them with stubborn vigilancetill at last, conquered, they have abandoned the joy of theworld and the love of women for the painful austerities ofthe cloister. Conversion may come under many shapes, and it maybe brought about in many ways. With some men it needs acataclysm, as a stone may be broken to fragments by the furyof a torrent; but with some it comes gradually, as a stone maybe worn away by the ceaseless fall of a drop of water.Strickland had the directness of the fanatic and the ferocityof the apostle.But to my practical mind it remained to be seen whether thepassion which obsessed him would be justified of its works.When I asked him what his brother-students at the nightclasses he had attended in London thought of his painting,he answered with a grin:"They thought it a joke.""Have you begun to go to a studio here?""Yes. The blighter came round this morning -- the master,you know; when he saw my drawing he just raised his eyebrowsand walked on."Strickland chuckled. He did not seem discouraged.He was independent of the opinion of his fellows.And it was just that which had most disconcerted me in mydealings with him. When people say they do not care whatothers think of them, for the most part they deceive themselves.Generally they mean only that they will do asthey choose, in the confidence that no one will know theirvagaries; and at the utmost only that they are willing to actcontrary to the opinion of the majority because they aresupported by the approval of their neighbours. It is notdifficult to be unconventional in the eyes of the world whenyour unconventionality is but the convention of your set.It affords you then an inordinate amount of self-esteem.You have the self-satisfaction of courage without theinconvenience of danger. But the desire for approbation isperhaps the most deeply seated instinct of civilised man.No one runs so hurriedly to the cover of respectability as theunconventional woman who has exposed herself to the slings andarrows of outraged propriety. I do not believe the people whotell me they do not care a row of pins for the opinion oftheir fellows. It is the bravado of ignorance. They meanonly that they do not fear reproaches for peccadillos whichthey are convinced none will discover.But here was a man who sincerely did not mind what peoplethought of him, and so convention had no hold on him; he waslike a wrestler whose body is oiled; you could not get a gripon him; it gave him a freedom which was an outrage.I remember saying to him:"Look here, if everyone acted like you, the world couldn't go on.""That's a damned silly thing to say. Everyone doesn't want toact like me. The great majority are perfectly content to dothe ordinary thing."And once I sought to be satirical."You evidently don't believe in the maxim: Act so that everyone of your actions is capable of being made into a universal rule.""I never heard it before, but it's rotten nonsense.""Well, it was Kant who said it.""I don't care; it's rotten nonsense."Nor with such a man could you expect the appeal to conscienceto be effective. You might as well ask for a reflectionwithout a mirror. I take it that conscience is the guardianin the individual of the rules which the community has evolvedfor its own preservation. It is the policeman in all ourhearts, set there to watch that we do not break its laws.It is the spy seated in the central stronghold of the ego.Man's desire for the approval of his fellows is so strong, his dreadof their censure so violent, that he himself has brought hisenemy within his gates; and it keeps watch over him, vigilantalways in the interests of its master to crush any half-formeddesire to break away from the herd. It will force him toplace the good of society before his own. It is the verystrong link that attaches the individual to the whole.And man, subservient to interests he has persuaded himself aregreater than his own, makes himself a slave to his taskmaster.He sits him in a seat of honour. At last, like a courtierfawning on the royal stick that is laid about his shoulders,he prides himself on the sensitiveness of his conscience.Then he has no words hard enough for the man who does notrecognise its sway; for, a member of society now, he realisesaccurately enough that against him he is powerless. When Isaw that Strickland was really indifferent to the blame hisconduct must excite, I could only draw back in horror as froma monster of hardly human shape.The last words he said to me when I bade him good-night were:"Tell Amy it's no good coming after me. Anyhow, I shallchange my hotel, so she wouldn't be able to find me.""My own impression is that she's well rid of you," I said."My dear fellow, I only hope you'll be able to make her see it.But women are very unintelligent."