DEAR HENDRICK,--This is not going to be a pleasant letter,--though it may have interest for you. I don't hesitate to tell my friends about shadows as well as lights, and I rather think the latter alone would cease to be interesting. Besides, we are all most interested in what most closely relates to the realities of life; and the realities of life are ugly to no small degree. Dreams are realities--of desire for things out of reach; but the diet of dreams is not substantial enough for the sense of friendship to live upon. So here goes for the lamentations,--or as a Frenchman would say, a _jérémiade_....
I might cite a fourth, a fifth;--but happily there are lights. I made one delightful friend here, Professor Chamberlain, and I told you about Major McDonald....
I am perfectly conscious that to a thorough man of the world I must be only a contemptible fool. Even to a friend like you who are not spoiled and cannot be spoiled by your _milieu_, I must seem something of a fool. Be that as it may,--here I am. Now what is this fool to do?...
Suppose I should seek a place as teacher of English literature. Everybody thinks he can teach English literature, and the public doesn't care particularly: it takes its pabulum largely on trust. On whose trust? Oh! the trust of the trustees,--and the respectable people. Now I am not respectable. I am under the _odium theologicum_ of every Christian faith. Small and mean as I am, I am spotted. Don't imagine this is vanity! It doesn't require any greatness to be spotted. It is just like a prostitute trying to become an honest woman, or a convicted thief endeavouring to get employment. There is nothing great about it. If I had any position worth hunting up, the cry would be raised that an atheist, a debauchee, a disreputable ex-reporter was corrupting the morals of the young under pretence of teaching literature. That is position No. 3. As Fiske says, the heretic is not now burned at the stake; but there is an organized policy to starve him by injuring his reputation and lying about him. And even Fiske (because he is poor) dares not take the whole position of Spencer.
But I don't want to pretend myself a martyr for any worthy cause. I am not. I am _not respectable_: that is the whole matter,--and the pardoning influence of women would never be exerted for me, because I am physically disagreeable,--and what I could win by my own merit I could not keep, because I have no aggressiveness and no cunning. And I am only now learning all this,--with my hair grey. There is no chance of becoming independent, as I will never be allowed to hold a position that pays well. I shall never be able to do my best in literary matters; for I shall never have the leisure, the means, or the opportunities of travel I want....