I have not touched upon the confusions due to the decline of the
intellectual powers. In that case the reason is to be sought for in the
condition of the brain, and there is, I believe, no remedy. In healthy
people, enjoying the complete vigor of their faculties, confusions are
simply the result of carelessness and indolence, and are proper subjects
for sarcasm. With senile confusions the case is very different. To treat
them with hard, sharp, decided correction, as is so often done by people
of vigorous intellect, is a most cruel abuse of power. Yet it is difficult
to say what ought to be done when an old person falls into manifest errors
of this kind. Simple acquiescence is in this case a pardonable abandonment
of truth, but there are situations in which it is not possible. Then you
find yourself compelled to show where the confusion lies. You do it as
gently as may be, but you fail to convince, and awaken that tenacious,
unyielding opposition which is a characteristic of decline in its earlier
stages. All that can be said is, that when once it has become evident that
confusions are not careless but senile, they ought to be passed over if
possible, and if not, then treated with the very utmost delicacy and
gentleness.
ESSAY XXI.
THE NOBLE BOHEMIANISM.
Amongst the common injustices of the world there have been few more
complete than its reprobation of the state of mind and manner of life that
have been called Bohemianism; and so closely is that reprobation attached
to the word that I would gladly have substituted some other term for the
better Bohemianism had the English language provided me with one. It may,
however, be a gain to justice itself that we should be compelled to use
the same expression, qualified only by an adjective, for two states of
existence that are the good and the bad conditions of the same, as it will
tend to make us more charitable to those whom we must always blame, and
yet may blame with a more or less perfect understanding of the causes that
led them into error.
The lower forms of Bohemianism are associated with several kinds of vice,
and are therefore justly disliked by people who know the value of a
well-regulated life, and, when at the worst, regarded by them with
feelings of positive abhorrence. The vices connected with these forms of
Bohemianism are idleness, irregularity, extravagance, drunkenness, and
immorality; and besides these vices the worst Bohemianism is associated
with many repulsive faults that may not be exactly vices, and yet are
almost as much disliked by decent people. These faults are slovenliness,
dirt, a degree of carelessness in matters of business, often scarcely to
be distinguished from dishonesty, and habitual neglect of the decorous
observances that are inseparable from a high state of civilization.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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