“ To See Dorsel's as Ithers See Us.”

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXX, Issue XXVI, 27 June 1903, Page 1826

“ To See Dorsel's as Ithers See Us.”

Now, if we had all beeu Irishmen, we should have cultivated wit and potatoes; if we had all been Scotchmen, we should have been canny enough to share their brose; all Englishmen, and the coincidence of roast beef and tenacity would have appealed to us; all Americans, and we should have revelled unconsciously in unconventionalism and twang. Yet far be it from us to see Patrick separated from his brogue, or Brother Jonathan deprived of his power of “reckoning.” Is it not through the very fact that we do not all share such characteristics that they become apparent? Yet, even those of us most given to introspection seldom, I venture to say, cry with Burns, “Oh, wad some power the giftie gie us, to see oursel’s as ithers see us!” We shrink from setting ourselves up as a target for popular opinion, though we are well aware that we shall not, in our turn, escape its verdict. In our youth, and in our prime, we •re engrossed in working out the details of our picture; it is only when we fey aside our brushes that our failing

eyes seek for themselves the general effect. Pile criticisms of the public on our completed handiwork appear in our obituary column. To form an accurate judgment of our own powers and capabilities, is one of the first lessons life teaches us. ?we under-estimate them, we restrict them, and may discover later -that we are afflicted with cramp, or possibly we never make the discovery. If we over-esti-mate them, as doubtless we are more prone to do, we receive timely intimation of the fact, and Pride’s inevitable fall soon convinces us of our error. Now, it has been proved that in external matters, for the detection of peculiarities and idiosyncrasies, the outside observer has the advantage, and just as certainly in matters of conscience each one holds for himself the keys of the wide and straight gates. Rather, then, I am inclined to think, when we do come before the public tribunal, it is satisfied with a modicum of virtue, and the most indifferent of us are generally accorded the benefit of the doubt. Even those in quest of our shortcomings fail to discover the presence of skeletons we keep securely hid. But it is not so with the inward mentor; rarely, indeed, is conscience so warped, or does it deal so treacherously with us, that it neglects to accuse us of the least of our misdeeds, and in our own final inspection of our work we discover how far it falls short of the ideal. Then what is our vanity after all but an idle folly that cannot encroach on the bounds of reason, an outer garment that will be flung to the winds in the face of danger or adversity, a temporary weakness to be considered apart from our sober personality. For example, though their crinolines provoke mirth and ridicule, the wearing of them in no way atlcets our estimate * of our great-grandmotners’ characters, or debars us from paying tribute to their womanly virtues. And we reverence them, those women who never appeared on a public platform, or dreamed of exercising a right to the franchise, or vet inaugurated a society for the pro tection of women and children; we reverence their simplicity almost as we reverence the innocence of childhood. And the new woman, even while she feels thankful that those good souls’ susceptibilities were spared the spectacle of their grand-daughters arrayed in bloomers astride on a wheel, deep down in her heart cherishes a lingering hope -that the compilers of her obituary column may discover she possessed traces of womanly virtue still. Again, in the minds of our great ones there is no room for vanity. The memory of years, perhaps, of increasing labour, striving, heart burning, and selfsurrender, is for them stamped indelibly on their triumphs. The very satisfaction arising from the ultimate accomplishment of their object bears fruit in new-born desire, and acts but as an incentive to further effort. Nor would we seek to change the attitude of our heroes who, having learned humility in the stress of great issues, refute a nation’s adulation with a voice that comes from their inmost souls, “Not unto us be. the praise.” Clearly, then, we would do well neither to entirely disregard the counsels of the Public, nor to put too much faith in its judgment, when the balances weigh in our favour, for it is possible, though all men speak well of us, that ere we pass to a higher court we stand convicted at our own bar.

ELEANOR PONSFORD, A.C.