XXI
THE SPIRIT OF COMPETITION

Not a few are there to applaud this spirit of competition, this modern endeavour to do things well, not because they are worth doing, but from the desire to do them better than other people.

Yet it is a canker that eats its way into the heart of everything. Bellwattle, in her happiest mood of distinction, would call it one of the laws of God. But whether it be a law of God or of Nature; whether, in fact, it be a law at all and not simply one of these fungoid growths of civilisation, it is a deceptive matter whichever way you look at it.

You would imagine, whether you were Jesuit or not, that the end would justify the means in such a question as this. You might believe that, so long as the thing were done well, it would matter little, if at all, the motive which prompted its well-doing. Yet this is just where the subtle poison of it lurks. For it is not of necessity doing a thing well, to do it better than any one else. The moment you begin to work like this, you create a false standard, lowering the value of everything you do. It is not the spirit of charity to give more than your next door neighbour. That is the spirit of competition. The spirit of charity it is to give the last penny you can spare. The widow’s mite is charity. The millionaire’s thousand is bombast.

But this confusion of terms—this confusion of motives is so growing into the language we speak that words, which once were so priceless, are become like weapons worn out and blunted. There is but little edge left to any words now. They will cut nothing.

And so this spirit of competition is a fetish to-day. We do not speak of having done a thing as well as we can do it, but of having done it better than this man or that.

“I bet you,” says the actor, “I could play that part better than the man who plays it now.”

“Do you mean to tell me,” says the politician, “that the speech I made last Friday wasn’t as good as Disraeli at his best?”

“That last book of mine,” says the writer, “was nearly as good as ‘The Old Curiosity Shop.’ I think myself that the death-scene was better in a way.”

Ah! but if we only did say these things aloud, instead of thinking them in silence. For ’tis only in silence now—as they would understand it in Ireland—that we say what we really mean.

So is it that there creeps this spirit of working by comparison into the soul and tissue of everything we do. Yet you would think, would you not, that the Church had kept herself free of it? But the Church is more eaten away with the spirit of competition than is many a humble labourer, driven to earn his living wage by making his work better than the rest.

Take this story for what it is worth; apply it as you will. It has only one meaning for me.

In Ireland, they call the wandering beggars, who live an itinerant existence, living from one town to another—they call them tinkers. A certain tinker woman, then, came into the city of Cork. Down one of the quays, seeking the scraps that fall in these places, dragging three wretched children at the frayed hem of her skirt, she was seen by a Protestant vicar.

Shifting one bare foot behind the other, she bobbed him a curtesy.

“For the love an’ honour av God, yeer riv’rance, give a poor ’ooman a copper, that the Almighty blessin’s av God may discind on ye, yeer riv’rance. Oh, sure, God Almighty give ye grace.”

The Vicar stopped.

“Where do you come from?” he asked.

“I’m after walkin’ all the ways from Macroon, yeer riv’rance—an’ I in me feet.”

She held up a bare blistered foot, at the sight of which the Vicar shudderingly closed his eyes.

“Where’s your husband?” he inquired.

“Me husband, yeer riv’rance? Shure, glory be, I haven’t had a sight or a sound av him these two years. ’Twas the day Ginnet’s circus was in Dingarvin, an’ he along wid ’em clanin’ the horses, and faith that was the last I saw av him, good or bad. I’m thinkin’ he’s gone foreign—he has indeed.”

“Why don’t you go to a priest? He’s the person to help you—not me. I’m a Protestant clergyman.”

“Shure, I know that yeer riv’rance—an’ why would I be goin’ to a preyst, an’ I wid me three little children here—the poor darlin’s—they’ve had divil a bit to eat this whole day.”

The competitive instincts of the Vicar cried aloud with a resonant voice in his ear.

“Do you mean to say they haven’t been brought up in the Roman Catholic Church?” he asked quickly.

“They have not indeed. Shure, what good would that be doin’ them?”

“Haven’t they been baptised at all into any Church?”

“They have not.”

The Vicar felt in his pocket and produced a sixpence.

“Get them something to eat,” said he, “and then come and see me. I shudder when I think they haven’t been baptised. Have you?”

“I was when I was a child,” said she, “but I haven’t been to Mass these fifteen years. Glory be to God, what’ud I be doin’ at Mass when I might be gettin’ charity from a grand gintleman like yeerself?”

“My poor woman,” said the Vicar, “it was Christ’s wish that we should help the poor. I’m thinking, too, of the hereafter of those poor little children of yours. What hope of salvation do you think there is for them if they have never been baptised?”

“If ’tis as difficult in this world as it is to get a bite or a sup, ’tis a hard thing indeed. But what good would I be getting to baptise ’em?”

“If you let them come to my church and be baptised, I’ll see that you won’t be forgotten.”

“Will yeer riv’rance give me something the way I cud be goin’ on with?”

“I will, of course.”

“An’ how much?”

“I’ll give you five shillings, my poor woman. You can get a week’s lodging and food with that.”

“Oh—shure I’d want five shillings for each wan of them,” she replied quickly.

The Vicar paused. The tone of this bargaining jarred upon his ears; but yet, as he thought of it—three little souls saved—three little souls caught from the grasp of the Roman Church—three more names upon his baptismal register. And only fifteen shillings! It was money nobly spent, honourably set aside for the great interest and reward hereafter.

“I’ll give you fifteen shillings,” said he, “if you bring them to the church to-morrow morning to be baptised.”

She clasped her hands in ecstasy.

“May the Almighty God give ye the blessings of his Holy Name, and may all the saints be wid ye in the hour of need. Faith, I niver met a finer Christian or a grander gintleman in all me life.”

She caught her children round her and told them the great things that were in store for them. With a warm feeling that the day had not passed in vain, the Vicar hurried away.

Directly he was out of sight, the woman made her way to the presbytery of the first Roman Catholic church she could find.

“I want to see the preyst,” said she, when they opened the door to her knocking.

They looked at her ragged clothes. It was with difficulty that she gained an audience.

“Go round into the chapel,” they said, “and Father —— will be with you in a minute.”

She plunged quickly into her story directly he came.

“Indeed, he was a nice gintleman,” she concluded, “and ’twas fifteen shillings he offered me if I’d bring the three of them to the church to-morrow morning.”

She gazed down at them and they gazed up at her. In some vague way they realised that they were under discussion. Their little mouths were open in wonder.

“’Tis a disgraceful thing, indeed!” said the priest in wrath, “to think ye’d go and sell the souls of yeer own children to one of those Protestant fellas who’d only be too glad the way they could be counting three more names in their Church. I’m ashamed of ye—I am indeed! If I give ye twelve shillings now, will ye bring them here to me?”

“Oh—glory be to God, Father—shure that’s only four shillings for each wan of the pore t’ings. I thought ’twas the way ye’d have offered me a poond at least to save the pore creatures the way they wouldn’t be havin’ their souls damned.”

“Yeer a disgraceful woman,” said he, “to barter the souls of yeer children like that. I’ll give ye seventeen shillings, and I won’t give ye a penny more.”

She clasped her hands again and the tears rolled down her cheeks.

“The blessing av God and av the Blessed Mother be wid ye,” she cried. “Ye’ve saved the souls of three pore creatures this blessed day.”