KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



191 



duct only one of its compressed lumps of 

 deliciousness ; but in a short time after this, 

 music and Mozart (which are synonymous) 

 were proposed, and all the company left the 

 supper-room for the music-parlour, with the 

 exception, for two loitering moments, of the 

 hospitable host and myself : it was in that 

 short time that I fell from the heaven of my 

 high exaltation, and proved myself of the 

 " earth, earthy." 



The basket of figs still stood before me. 

 They were sweet as the lips of beauty, and 

 tempting as the apples of Eden ; and I was 

 born of Eve, and inherited her " pugging 

 tooth." It is no matter where temptation 

 comes from, whether from Turkey or Para- 

 dise ; if the man Adam to be tempted is ripe 

 for ruin, any wind may shake him off the 

 tree of stedfastness. Every man has his 

 moment of weakness : I had two, and in 

 those I fell. 



" I really must take the other fig" said I, 

 taking it before the words were out. I had no 

 sooner possessed myself of it than I blushed 

 with the consciousness that I had committed 

 something like a sin against self-restraint ; 

 and this confusion was increased by observ- 

 ing that the eyes of mine host had followed 

 the act, as if they would inquire into it, and 

 ascertain its true meaning, and perhaps set 

 it down over against the credit side of my 

 character. I was ever afraid that I had the 

 weakness of too much covetousness of the 

 "creature"comforts inmydisposition, and that 

 I had now betrayed it to a man who, though 

 lenient and charitable, and inclined to think 

 well of slight faults, would nevertheless 

 weigh it in the balance of estimation, and 

 think of it and me accordingly. I deserved 

 to blush for it, and I did, to the bottom of 

 the stairs, as I descended with him chewing 

 the sweet fruit of my offence, and the bitter 

 consequence of it — an uneasy sense of 

 shame. 



But out of the greatest evil we may de- 

 duce good ; and from the knowledge of our 

 weakness derive strength. One thing com- 

 forted me in my disgrace : I had the courage 

 to resist making an equivocatory apology 

 for the act, which I was, for a moment, 

 tempted to make. "No," I whispered, 

 " there is more comeliness in a naked fault 

 than in the best-attired lie in the world ; so 

 I'll even let it stand naked as its mother 

 Eve, who was the first weak creature that 

 took the other fig." I did " well " for 

 once. 



I have never forgotten this little incident 

 of my incidental life ; it has served as a mo- 

 ral check when I have coveted things which 

 I did not want. And now, when I learn that 

 some one, always famous for his covetous- 

 ness, has at last been detected in a flagrant 

 dereliction from honesty, I do not wonder at 



it, for I attribute it to an unrestrained habit 

 of taking the other fig. 



When I am told that a great gourmand of 

 my acquaintance has died over his dessert- 

 table, I am not surprised, for I have myself 

 noticed that he always would eat the other 



fig- 



When I hear that a man, once celebrated 

 for the luxuriousness of his living, now wants 

 a plain dinner, I say, " It's a pity ; but he 

 always would have the other fig on table." 



When I see a sensible man staggering 

 through the streets in a drunken forgetful- 

 ness of himself, and of " the divine property 

 of his being," or behold him wallowing in 

 "a sensual stye," and degrading the Godlike 

 uprightness of man to the grovelling attitude 

 of the brute, I sigh, and say, "This fellow, 

 too, cannot refrain from the other fig ." 



W r hen I look on the miser, who, though 

 possessed of gold and land, lives without 

 money or house, using not the one as it 

 should be used, and enjoying not the other 

 as it should be enjoyed ; and when I see 

 that, though having more than he uses, he 

 covets more, that he may have still more 

 than he can use, I scorn him as a robber of 

 the poor, not to make himself richer than 

 they, but poorer, more thankless and com- 

 fortless ; and I pity the rich poor wretch, 

 still grasping at the other fig. 



When I hear of some wealthy trader with 

 the four quarters of the world venturing 

 forth again from the ark of safety and the 

 home of his old age, on his promised last 

 voyage, and perishing through the peril of 

 the way, I cannot but pity the man who 

 could not lie quietly in the safe harbour of 

 home — because he still craved after the other 



fig- 



When I behold some heavy -pursed game- 

 ster enter one of those temples where for- 

 tune snatches the golden offerings from the 

 altars of her blind fools, to fling them at the 

 feet of her knaves who have eyes ; and be- 

 hold him issuing thence without a " beggarly 

 denier " to bless him with a dinner or a rope, 

 I cannot help pitying him, that he should 

 risk the fortune he had for the other fig which 

 he has lost. 



When I see a mighty conqueror, having 

 many thrones under his dominion, and many 

 sceptres in his hand, struggling for new 

 thrones and sceptres, and one after the other 

 losing those he held, in his rapacious eager- 

 ness to snatch at those he would have, I can- 

 not pity him if he loses so many fine figs in 

 the hand, to possess the other fig on the 

 tree. 



When I behold a rich merchant, made 

 poor by the extravagance and boldness of his 

 trading speculations, when, if he could have 

 been content with the wealth he had, he 

 might have lived sumptuously and died rich, 



