It is the
cause of our English spleenfulness, and this spleenfulness, properly
directed, has its uses. It engenders a certain energetic intolerance of
mind. I think the success of our nation is largely due to this
particular quality. If I were an historian I would amuse myself with
proving that we owe not only Magna Charta, but our whole Empire--Canada,
Australia, and all the rest of them--to our costive habits of body. What
befits a nation, however, does not always befit a man. To crush, in a
fit of chronic biliousness, the resistance of Bengal and add its land
to the British Empire, may be a racial virtue. To crush, in a fit of
any kind, the resistance of our next door neighbour Mr. Robinson, and
add his purse to our own, is an individual vice. No! I fail to discover
any personal advantage to be gained from excess of bile. The bilious
eye sees intensely, no doubt, but in a distorted and narrow fashion; it
is incapable of a generous outlook. Cloudy, unserene! A closing-up,
instead of a widening-out.
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