THE GOOD-NATURED MAN ACT THE FIRST Scene, AN APARTMENT IN YOUNG HONEYWOOD'S HOUSE. Sir William. Good Jarvis, make no apologies for Jarvis. I can't help being blunt, and being very angry, too, when I hear you talk of disinheriting so good, so worthy a young gentleman as your nephew, my master. All the world loves him.1 Sir William. Say rather, that he loves all the world; that is his fault. Jarvis. I am sure there is no part of it more dear to him than you are, though he has not seen you since he was a child. Sir William. What signifies this affection to me, or how can I be proud of a place in a heart where every sharper and coxcomb find an easy entrance? Jarvis. I grant you that he is rather too goodnatured; that he 's too much every man's man; that he laughs this minute with one, and cries the next with another; but whose instructions may he thank for all this? Sir William. Not mine, sure? My letters to him 1 All the world loves him: In Mr. Burchell's account of the character of Sir William Thornhill in The Vicar of Wakefield (chap. iii), similar sentiments are expressed. K 6 during my employment in Italy taught him only that philosophy which might prevent, not defend, his errors. Jarvis. Faith, begging your honor's pardon, I'm sorry they taught him any philosophy at all; it has only served to spoil him. This same philosophy is a good horse in the stable, but an arrant jade on a journey. For my own part, whenever I hear him mention the name on 't, I'm always sure he 's going to play the fool. Sir William. Don't let us ascribe his faults to his philosophy, I entreat you. No, Jarvis, his good nature arises rather from his fears of offending the importunate, than his desire of making the deserving happy. Jarvis. What it rises from, I don't know. But, to be sure, everybody has it that asks for it. 1 Sir William. Ay, or that does not ask it. I have been now for some time a concealed spectator of his follies, and find them as boundless as his dissipation. Jarvis. And yet, faith, he has some fine name or other for them all. He calls his extravagance generosity; and his trusting everybody, universal benevolence. It was but last week he went security for a fellow whose face he scarce knew, and that he called an act of exalted mu mu munificence; ay, that was the name he gave it. Sir William. And upon that I proceed, as my last effort, though with very little hopes to reclaim him. That very fellow has just absconded, and I have taken up the security. Now, my intention is to involve him in fictitious distress, before he has plunged himself into real calamity; to arrest him for that very debt; 2 1 concealed spectator: Note the similarity here to The Vicar of Wakefield, in which also there is an uncle named Sir William who secretly watches the fortunes of his family. 2 arrest him for . . . debt: Goldsmith himself had been to clap an officer upon him, and then let him see which of his friends will come to his relief. Jarvis. Well, if I could but any way see him thoroughly vexed, every groan of his would be music to me; yet, faith, I believe it impossible. I have tried to fret him myself every morning these three years; but instead of being angry, he sits as calmly to hear me scold, as he does to his hair-dresser. Sir William. We must try him once more, however, and I'll go this instant to put my scheme into execution; and I don't despair of succeeding, as, by your means, I can have frequent opportunities of being about him, without being known. What a pity it is, Jarvis, that any man's good-will to others should produce so much neglect of himself as to require correction! Yet we must touch his weaknesses with a delicate hand. There are some faults so nearly allied to excellence, that we can scarce weed out the vice without eradicating the virtue. [Exit. Jarvis. Well, go thy ways, Sir William Honeywood. It is not without reason, that the world allows thee to be the best of men. But here comes his hopeful nephew; the strange, good-natured, foolish, openhearted And yet, all his faults are such that one loves him still the better for them. Enter Honeywood. Honeywood. Well, Jarvis, what messages from my friends this morning? Jarvis. You have no friends. Honeywood. Well, from my acquaintance then? Jarvis. (Pulling out bills.) A few of our usual cards of compliment, that's all. This bill from your arrested for debt in 1764, and was held prisoner in his own house until released by the good offices of Johnson. tailor; this from your mercer; and this from the little broker in Crooked-lane.1 He says he has been at a great deal of trouble to get back the money you borrowed. Honeywood. That I don't know; but I am sure we were at a great deal of trouble in getting him to lend it. Jarvis. He has lost all patience. Honeywood. Then he has lost a very good thing. Jarvis. There's that ten guineas you were sending to the poor gentleman and his children in the Fleet." I believe they would stop his mouth for a while at least. Honeywood. Ay, Jarvis, but what will fill their mouths in the mean time? Must I be cruel because he happens to be importunate; and, to relieve his avarice, leave them to insupportable distress? Jarvis. 'Sdeath! Sir, the relieve yourself; yourself. question now is how to Have n't I reason to be out of my senses, when I see things going at sixes and sevens? Honeywood. Whatever reason you may have for being out of your senses, I hope you'll allow that I'm not quite unreasonable for continuing in mine. Jarvis. You are the only man alive in your present situation that could do so. Everything upon the waste! There's Miss Richland and her fine fortune gone already, and upon the point of being given to your rival. Honeywood. I'm no man's rival. 1 Crooked-lane: Cannon Street, London; a street of small shops, mentioned also in She Stoops to Conquer (Act II). 2 the Fleet: A famous London prison dating from very early times. |