Companionship and Examples : Part 1

Character
by Samuel Smiles

(Page 3 of 18)

"Keep good company, and you shall be of the number." - GEORGE HERBERT.

"For mine own part, I Shall be glad to learn of noble men." - SHAKSPEARE

"Examples preach to th' eye - Care then, mine says, Not how you end but how you spend your days." HENRY MARTEN - 'LAST THOUGHTS.'

"Dis moi qui t'admire, et je dirai qui tu es." - SAINTE-BEUVE

He that means to be a good limner will be sure to draw after the most excellent copies and guide every stroke of his pencil by the better pattern that lays before him; so he that desires that the table of his life may be fair, will be careful to propose the best examples, and will never be content till he equals or excels them." - OWEN FELTHAM

The natural education of the Home is prolonged far into life - indeed, it never entirely ceases. But the time arrives, in the progress of years, when the Home ceases to exercise an exclusive influence on the formation of character; and it is succeeded by the more artificial education of the school and the companionship of friends and comrades, which continue to mould the character by the powerful influence of example.

Men, young and old - but the young more than the old - cannot help imitating those with whom they associate. It was a saying of George Herbert's mother, intended for the guidance of her sons, "that as our bodies take a nourishment suitable to the meat on which we feed, so do our souls as insensibly take in virtue or vice by the example or conversation of good or bad company."

Indeed, it is impossible that association with those about us should not produce a powerful influence in the formation of character. For men are by nature imitators, and all persons are more or less impressed by the speech, the manners, the gait, the gestures, and the very habits of thinking of their companions. "Is example nothing?" said Burke. "It is everything. Example is the school of mankind, and they will learn at no other." Burke's grand motto, which he wrote for the tablet of the Marquis of Rockingham, is worth repeating: it was, "Remember - resemble - persevere."

Imitation is for the most part so unconscious that its effects are almost unheeded, but its influence is not the less permanent on that account. It is only when an impressive nature is placed in contact with an impressionable one, that the alteration in the character becomes recognisable. Yet even the weakest natures exercise some influence upon those about them. The approximation of feeling, thought, and habit is constant, and the action of example unceasing.

Emerson has observed that even old couples, or persons who have been housemates for a course of years, grow gradually like each other; so that, if they were to live long enough, we should scarcely be able to know them apart. But if this be true of the old, how much more true is it of the young, whose plastic natures are so much more soft and impressionable, and ready to take the stamp of the life and conversation of those about them!

"There has been," observed Sir Charles Bell in one of his letters, "a good deal said about education, but they appear to me to put out of sight EXAMPLE, which is all-in-all. My best education was the example set me by my brothers. There was, in all the members of the family, a reliance on self, a true independence, and by imitation I obtained it."

It is in the nature of things that the circumstances which contribute to form the character, should exercise their principal influence during the period of growth. As years advance, example and imitation become custom, and gradually consolidate into habit, which is of so much potency that, almost before we know it, we have in a measure yielded up to it our personal freedom.

It is related of Plato, that on one occasion he reproved a boy for playing at some foolish game. "Thou reprovest me," said the boy, "for a very little thing." "But custom," replied Plato, "is not a little thing." Bad custom, consolidated into habit, is such a tyrant that men sometimes cling to vices even while they curse them. They have become the slaves of habits whose power they are impotent to resist. Hence Locke has said that to create and maintain that vigour of mind which is able to contest the empire of habit, may be regarded as one of the chief ends of moral discipline.

Though much of the education of character by example is spontaneous and unconscious, the young need not necessarily be the passive followers or imitators of those about them. Their own conduct, far more than the conduct of their companions, tends to fix the purpose and form the principles of their life. Each possesses in himself a power of will and of free activity, which, if courageously exercised, will enable him to make his own individual selection of friends and associates. It is only through weakness of purpose that young people, as well as old, become the slaves of their inclinations, or give themselves up to a servile imitation of others.

It is a common saying that men are known by the company they keep. The sober do not naturally associate with the drunken, the refined with the coarse, the decent with the dissolute. To associate with depraved persons argues a low taste and vicious tendencies, and to frequent their society leads to inevitable degradation of character. "The conversation of such persons," says Seneca, "is very injurious; for even if it does no immediate harm, it leaves its seeds in the mind, and follows us when we have gone from the speakers - a plague sure to spring up in future resurrection."

About the Author

Born in Haddington, Smiles was the eldest of eleven children. He left school at the age of 14 and was apprenticed to a doctor, eventually enabling him to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh. While studying and after graduating he campaigned for parliamentary reform, contributing articles to the Edinburgh Weekly Chronicle and the Leeds Times.