Knuckle Under To Them, And They Will Perhaps
Condescend To Patronise You; Have Any Individuality Of Your Own,
And They Know Neither Scruple Nor Remorse In Their Attempts To Get
You Out Of Their Way.
"Il prete," they say, with a significant
look, "e sempre prete.
For the future let us have professors and
men of science instead of priests." I smile to myself at this
last, and reply, that I am a foreigner come among them for
recreation, and anxious to keep clear of their internal discords.
I do not wish to cut myself off from one side of their national
character - a side which, in some respects, is no less interesting
than the one with which I suppose I am on the whole more
sympathetic. If I were an Italian, I should feel bound to take a
side; as it is, I wish to leave all quarrelling behind me, having
as much of that in England as suffices to keep me in good health
and temper.
In old times people gave their spiritual and intellectual sop to
Nemesis. Even when most positive, they admitted a percentage of
doubt. Mr. Tennyson has said well, "There lives more doubt" - I
quote from memory - "in honest faith, believe me, than in half the"
systems of philosophy, or words to that effect. The victor had a
slave at his ear during his triumph; the slaves during the Roman
Saturnalia dressed in their masters' clothes, sat at meat with
them, told them of their faults, and blacked their faces for them.
They made their masters wait upon them.
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