“We all rather tend to be bored by a display of regularity and discipline.  Do you remember that letter of Keats, where he confesses his intense irritation at the way in which his walking companion, Brown, I think, always in the evening got out his writing-materials in the same order—­first the paper, then the ink, then the pen.  ‘I say to him,’ says Keats, ‘why not the pen sometimes first?’ We don’t like precision; look at the word ‘Methodist,’ which originally was a nick-name for people of strictly disciplined life.  We like something a little more gay and inconsequent.

“Yet the power of forcing oneself by an act of will to do something unpleasant is one of the finest qualities in the world.  There is a story of a man who became a Bishop.  He was a delicate and sensitive fellow, much affected by a crowd, and particularly by the sight of people passing in front of him.  He began his work by holding an enormous confirmation, and five times in the course of it he actually had to retire to the vestry, where he was physically sick.  That’s a heroic performance; but we admire still more a bland and cheerful Bishop who is not sick, but enjoys a ceremony.”

“Surely that is all right, Father Payne?” said Barthrop.  “When we see a performance, we are concerned with appreciating the merit of it.  A man with a bad headache, however gallant, is not likely to talk as well as a man in perfect health and high spirits; but if we are not considering the performance, but the virtues of the performer, we might admire the man who pumped up talk when he was feeling wretched more than the man from whom it flowed.”

“The judicious Barthrop!” said Father Payne.  “Yes, you are right—­but for all that we do not instinctively admire effort as much as we admire easy brilliance.  We are much more inclined to imitate the brilliant man than we are to imitate the man who has painfully developed an accomplishment.  The truth is, we are all of us afraid of effort; and instinct is generally so much more in the right than reason, that I end by believing that it is better to live freely in our good qualities, than painfully to conquer our bad qualities; not to take up work that we can’t do from a sense of duty, but to take up work that we can do from a sense of pleasure.  I believe in finding our real life more than in sticking to one that is not real for the sake of virtue.  Trained inclination is the secret.  That is why I should never make a soldier.  I love being in a rage—­no one more—­it has all the advantages and none of the disadvantages of getting drunk.  But I can’t do it on the word of command.”

“Isn’t that what is called hedonism?” said Lestrange.

“You must not get in the way of calling names!” said Father Payne; “hedonism is a word invented by Puritans to discourage the children of light.  It is not a question of doing what you like, but of liking what you do.  Of course everyone has got to choose—­you can’t gratify all your impulses, because they thwart each other; but if you freely gratify your finer impulses, you will have much less temptation to indulge your baser inclinations.  It is more important to have the steam up and to use the brake occasionally, than never to have the steam up at all.”