The Way of All Flesh

“Not long ago a much esteemed writer informed the world that he felt ‘disposed to cry out with delight’ before a figure by Michelangelo. I wonder whether he would feel disposed to cry out before a real Michelangelo, if the critics had decided that it was not genuine, or before a reputed Michelangelo which was really by someone else.”

Here, Overton suggests that most critics, and perhaps people generally, simply parrot others’ opinions instead of thinking for themselves. This observation also sets up a major character arc in the novel. Ernest’s thinking and behavior is initially determined almost entirely by the influence of his parents. By the end, he shows greater ability to think and act independently.

“How little do we know our thoughts—our reflex actions indeed, yes; but our reflex reflections! Man, forsooth, prides himself on his consciousness! We boast that we differ from the winds and waves and falling stones and plants, which grow they know not why, and from the wandering creatures which go up and down after their prey, as we are pleased to say without the help of reason. […] I fancy there is some truth in the view which is being put forward nowadays, that it is our less conscious thoughts and our less conscious actions which mainly mould our lives and the lives of those who spring from us.”

While discussing George’s treatment of his children, Overton describes George as acting unconsciously. Overton suggests that people are not so different from the plants and animals of the natural world, driven by reflex and instinct more than deliberation. The novel, then, serves as a would-be wake up call to examine and challenge both internal and external influences, as Ernest does.

“In those days people believed with a simple downrightness which I do not observe among educated men and women now.”

Butler notes the trend of increasing secularization, or the abandonment of traditional superstitions for rationalism, which has its roots in the Enlightenment and would continue over the following centuries. The nature and consequences of secularization are evident in Ernest’s experiences, as he turns away from the religious beliefs of his youth and attempts to develop his own moral and scientific understanding in other ways.

“Why should the generations overlap one another at all? Why cannot we be buried as eggs in neat little cells with ten or twenty thousand pounds each wrapped round us in Bank of England notes, and wake up, as the sphex wasp does, to find that its papa and mamma have not only left ample provision at its elbow, but have been eaten by sparrows some weeks before it began to live consciously on its own account?”

This commentary follows a scene in which the aging George lashes out at Christina. Considering the tension that so often rises between generations, Overton wonders whether life would be better if each generation were isolated from those that come before and after, as in some animal species. The benefit to such an approach is hinted at in the last line: the freedom to live on its own account rather than someone else’s.

“All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.”

In evaluating George’s life, Overton holds him to an unusual standard: that of enjoyment. From that perspective, he finds that George has done well. His view contrasts strongly with George’s own professed view, which emphasizes “religious, moral, and social duties” (10), as he inscribes on John’s tombstone.

“I would do with the family among mankind what nature has done with the compound animal, and confine it to the lower and less progressive races. Certainly there is no inherent love for the family system on the part of nature herself.”

Reflecting on his youth, Ernest finds little to recommend the family unit as a worthwhile social institution. Though he presents no immediate alternative, he does highlight several examples from nature of species that thrive without traditional families of the type formed in most human societies. Ernest’s willingness to question the fundamental aspects of society sets him apart from his peers and family members, who unquestioningly accept what they are told.

“O schoolmasters—if any of you read this book—bear in mind when any particularly timid drivelling urchin is brought by his papa into your study, and you treat him with the contempt which he deserves, and afterwards make his life a burden to him for years—bear in mind that it is exactly in the disguise of such a boy as this that your future chronicler will appear.”

In examining Ernest’s childhood, Overton offers him the chance to tell his story in a way that is not flattering to many of the adults who dealt with him. His use of writing to give voice to unpopular or underrepresented viewpoints foreshadows Ernest’s later vocation as a writer. Overton’s implied threat carries real weight to those who, like Skinner, prize their reputation above almost everything.

“Never learn anything until you find you have been made uncomfortable for a good long while by not knowing it; when you find that you have occasion for this or that knowledge, or foresee that you will have occasion for it shortly, the sooner you learn it the better, but till then spend your time in growing bone and muscle.”

Overton’s theory of education is a pragmatic one, prioritizing only useful knowledge. Ernest’s education at Skinner’s school, by contrast, focuses on theoretical and historical content of little interest or use to Ernest. Even worse, his physical development is largely neglected apart from sports, which Ernest finds intimidating. To some extent, Alethea offers Ernest the kind of education he misses at school.

“This conscious self of yours, Ernest, is a prig begotten of prigs and trained in priggishness; I will not allow it to shape your actions […] Obey me, your true self and things will go tolerably well with you, but only listen to that outward and visible old husk of yours which is called your father, and I will rend you in pieces even unto the third and fourth generation as one who has hated God; for I, Ernest, am the God who made you.”

In this passage, Ernest’s true, inner self speaks to him and warns him against submitting to outside authority, as exemplified in his father. By positioning this inner being as Ernest’s God, Butler effectively identifies the conflict for control as a religious one. As Ernest begins to worship or follow his internal voice, he must necessarily learn to let go of his submissiveness towards his father.

“But Ernest was not an ideal boy, and he was not strong enough for his surroundings; I doubt how far any boy could withstand the moral pressure which was brought to bear upon him.”

As Ernest’s parents begin to question him regarding his activities at school, Ernest first feebly resists their intrusion. Overton presents his eventual submission to their demands as virtually inevitable. Instead of focusing on the character of a romantic hero, as in many other novels of the era, Overton thus emphasizes the role of environment on Ernest’s development.

“Where, where, he asked himself, was it all to end? Was it to be always sin, shame and sorrow in the future, as it had been in the past, and the ever-watchful eye and protecting hand of his father laying burdens on him greater than he could bear—or was he, too, some day or another to come to feel that he was fairly well and happy?”

As Ernest leaves school in Roughborough, he wonders whether he can or will ever be happy. At this point, he begins to recognize his father’s stifling influence as detrimental to his happiness, though he doesn’t yet see how to free himself from that influence. He also recognizes that religion, as taught and practiced by Theobald, increases an oppressive awareness of sin instead of combatting it.

“Life is like a fugue, everything must grow out of the subject and there must be nothing new. Nor, again, did he see how hard it is to say where one idea ends and another begins, nor yet how closely this is paralleled in the difficulty of saying where a life begins or ends, or an action or indeed anything, there being an unity in spite of infinite multitude, and an infinite multitude in spite of unity.”

Following Ernest’s publication of an essay that features few, if any, truly original ideas, he struggles to find new ideas. Overton suggests that the search for such ideas is a fruitless one because ideas generally form as variations on previously existing ideas. He applies the principle to life itself, implying that, in some ways, Ernest’s life is as much a continuation of that of his ancestors as it is a break from tradition.

“Everyone has a mass of bad work in him which he will have to work off and get rid of before he can do better—and indeed, the more lasting a man’s ultimate good work is, the more sure he is to pass through a time, and perhaps a very long one, in which there seems very little hope for him at all.”

Ernest’s parents tend to see his deviations from the path they set out for him as mistakes to resolve to restore him to good standing. Overton, by contrast, sees Ernest as learning from his mistakes and using them as stepping-stones to eventual success. Overton’s decision to create a biography of Ernest suggests that he views Ernest as having reached a notable point in his life—but only at the cost of significant personal hardship.

“The world was all out of joint, and instead of feeling it to be a cursed spite that he was born to set it right, he thought he was just the kind of person that was wanted for the job.”

This passage is one of many in which Butler alludes to well-known phrases, which he then modifies to suit his purposes. Here, he refers to a line from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, in which Hamlet wishes he did not need to set things right. As a newly ordained curate, Ernest feels just the opposite, showing his arrogance.

“Surely it was the tower of Siloam that was naught rather than those who stood under it; it was the system rather than the people that was at fault.”

Here, Butler refers to an obscure event recorded in the New Testament: the collapse of a tower in Jerusalem on people who were in the act of worshipping. He compares those people to Theobald and Christina, suggesting that they are victims of a broken system. The fact that Ernest nearly ends up working to support that same system shows how difficult it is to assign blame or credit without considering the role of external circumstances.

“Now he was well enough to read he made the New Testament his chief study, going through it in the spirit which Mr. Shaw had desired of him, that is to say as one who wished neither to believe nor disbelieve, but cared only about finding out whether he ought to believe or no.”

During his time in prison, Ernest reconsiders questions he took for granted from childhood, including religious questions. Freed from the pressure and constraints of his home and academic environments, he now analyzes the scriptural text from a less biased standpoint. The experience becomes a turning point for Ernest, as he disavows his previous religious beliefs and begins reconstructing his philosophical ideas from scratch.

“I suppose people almost always want something external to themselves, to reveal to them their own likes and dislikes. Our most assured likings have for the most part been arrived at neither by introspection nor by any process of conscious reasoning, but by the bounding forth of the heart to welcome the gospel proclaimed to it by another.”

As an imprisoned Ernest realizes, to his surprise, how little he enjoyed being a clergyman, Overton observes that most people are quick to let others influence their opinions. It takes a crisis for Ernest to question his assumptions, but for those, like Theobald and Christina, who never experience such a crisis, similar introspection might never take place. Ernest’s newfound open-mindedness paves the way for his success as a writer, in which capacity he continues to address difficult questions.

“I mean that very few care two straws about truth, or have any confidence that it is righter and better to believe what is true than what is untrue. […] Yet it is only these few who can be said to believe anything at all; the rest are simply unbelievers in disguise.”

Overton suggests that many people prefer a life of convenience to knowing the truth. Those who choose convenience rather than acknowledging or seeking truth are, in his view, living in unbelief because they don’t really consider truthfulness as significant. Overton’s inversion of what it means to be a believer reflects his search for a post-Christian morality.

“He who takes the highest and most self-respecting view of his own welfare which it is in his power to conceive, and adheres to it in spite of unconventionality, is a Christian whether he knows it and calls himself one, or whether he does not.”

Rather than abandoning the idea of Christ as a model figure, Overton finds parallels between Christ and Ernest. Both pursue their own unconventional views and purposes in search of an ultimate good that is hard for others to comprehend. By redefining what it means to be Christian, Overton opens the possibility of embracing whatever useful truth is found in Christianity while distancing himself from the traditions built up in various churches.

“Like myself, she was vexed at his getting married. […] ‘But after all,’ she concluded, ‘it ain’t you and it ain’t me, and it ain’t him and it ain’t her. It’s what you must call the fortunes of matterimony, for there ain’t no other word for it.’”

Mrs. Jupp agrees with Overton in opposing Ernest’s marriage to Ellen. In her typically direct manner, she points to the system of marriage as being problematic rather than faulting any individuals involved. Her concerns prove justified, as Ernest’s fortunes within matrimony take a turn for the worse.

“She had now pretty well forgotten the hard times she had known when she had been on her own resources and reproached him downright with having married her—on that moment the scales fell from Ernest’s eyes as they had fallen when Towneley had said, ‘No, no, no.’ He said nothing, but he woke up once for all to the fact that he had made a mistake in marrying. A touch had again come which had revealed him to himself.”

Ernest’s marriage to Ellen proves is a turning point for him, this time, against the institution of marriage. Notably, Overton characterizes this discovery as a revelation of “him to himself,” showing that Ernest is learning about himself, not just marriage. What exactly Ernest learns about himself and marriage is not specified, suggesting that some things can be understood only through experience.

“‘I shall be just as unkind to my children,’ he said, ‘as my grandfather was to my father, or my father to me. If they did not succeed in making their children love them, neither shall I. I say to myself that I should like to do so, but so did they.’”

Ernest decides to put his and Ellen’s children up for adoption on the grounds that he cannot make them happy. He breaks the cycle of discontented children that recurred in recent generations of his family. Despite his qualms about marriage and family, he does find a happy home for his children. The question of why and how some marriages and families are dysfunctional while others succeed remains an open one for Ernest, and he soon travels the world to seek answers.

“The more I see the more sure I am that it does not matter why people do the right thing so long only as they do it, nor why they may have done the wrong if they have done it. The result depends upon the thing done and the motive goes for nothing.”

Using Ernest as an example, Overton warns against overthinking and instead suggests that instinct usually dictates the best course of action. In Ernest’s case, towards the end of the novel, he closes himself off from previous acquaintances, thinking himself fallen. While Overton questions Ernest’s motives for doing so, he finds that the results of Ernest’s choice are good. Contrasted with Ernest’s experience are those of his parents, whose positive desires and motives lead them to commit acts, such as strict punishment of their children, which lead to unfavorable outcomes.