261: Taking Responsibility (“The Hardest Nut to Crack”)

Good Friends,

We begin today with reprises of a pair of Ruskin’s paragraphs that appear near the end of Unto this Last, his masterpiece outlining the laws of humane trade, published in 1860. The little book, which consists of four lectures, regular readers will recall, ignited a firestorm of protest because, in it, the author, advanced one of the first of his “no holds barred” critiques of laissez-faire capitalism and the horrific inhumanities it, as a matter of course. perpetrated on vast numbers of human beings, as we all participate in various acquisitive markets. To a significant degree, the outrage he instigated was a product of his audience–which included many of the richest, most powerful, and famous members of society–being shocked that their adored art critic would have the gall to label them “thieves,” and “murderers” (which he had done for the first time two years before in his lecture, “The Work of Iron” (see posts 256 and 258). They did not take well to his characterization of them who, because of their insatiable desire to be rich, caused, either directly or subtly, virtually all the human suffering surrounding them–the millions of impoverished, wholly uneducated, and distained, living in hovels, beset by physical and mental diseases of every unhappy variety.

Ruskin was, of course, well aware that his negative characterizations of his privileged audience would likely consequence in angry ears, and so, while not modifying his analysis and conclusions in any way, he explained to told his readers how, with little change to their inmost thinking and values, they could effect positive change and, in by so doing, begin to ameliorate the terrible conditions encircling them. Which brings us to the first of the two paragraphs mentioned above:

All true economy is [founded on the] “law of the house.” Strive to make that law strict, simple, generous. Waste nothing, grudge nothing. Care in nowise to make more of money, but care to make much of it; remembering always the great, palpable, inevitable fact—the rule and root of all economy: that what one person has, another cannot have; and that every atom of substance, of whatever kind, used or consumed, is so much human life spent— which, if it issue in the saving [of] present life or gaining more, is well spent; but, if not, is either so much life prevented, or so much slain.

It was, as is easy to see, a plea for each person to take responsibility for the kind of world we create in our buying and selling, a plea that we recognize that, in all such activities, always, real human beings are involved, and that by buying certain things, whether we think about it or not (usually we do not), there follow, like the night following the day, inevitable and real consequences for those from whom we buy and for ourselves who do the buying. A simple example should make it clear. It is now widely accepted around the world that consuming cigarettes, cigars, and, indeed, all things associated with tobacco, does harm. In buying tobacco products, for example, we are putting in an order, in effect, to the producer of such products to produce more of them. Then, by consuming these products, we damage the life-force in ourselves, and, by extension, in all those we touch–even to the point of killing ourselves painfully and painfully, thereby depriving our families and those who love us and are dependent on us of our goodness and spirit. And still more: given that the knowledge of the life-damaging effects of consuming tobacco is now common knowledge, to consume tobacco is not only to put in an order that more such harmful product be created but ask that the producer of them, in full awareness of the damage the products do, undertake more life-harming activities. Like it or not, Ruskin would say (he was an opponent of tobacco consumption all his life), by willfully creating a demand for what we know to be human-harming products we enter into a kind of collusion to damage yet more life and, with these producers, bear the responsibility for the damage which later consumption occasions. Better then, Ruskin argues, knowing such, to simply cease-and-desist from participation in any tobacco-producing and consuming behavior altogether. Only in this way can we rest assured that we have done nothing to harm ourselves, others or the world. The second of our paragraphs for today, sums up his recommendations perfectly.

In all buying [therefore], consider, first, what condition of existence you cause in the producers of what you buy; secondly, whether the sum you have paid is just to the producer, and, in due proportion, lodged in his hands; thirdly, to how much clear use for food, knowledge, or joy this that you have bought can be put; and fourthly, to whom and in what way it can be most speedily and serviceably distributed. In all dealings whatsoever insisting on entire openness and stern fulfilment; and in all doings, on perfection and loveliness of accomplishment; especially on fineness and purity–watching, at the same time, for all ways of gaining or teaching powers of simple pleasure; and of showing. The sum of enjoyment depending not on the quantity of things tasted, but on the vivacity and patience of taste!

But the fate of these marvelous paragraphs, however heartfelt and wise they may have been (and they are both and so remain), was not – and still is not – what the author of them would have liked to have witnessed. For, it has been my long experience in reading, thinking about, and recommending Ruskin, that most people simply will not take these paragraphs to heart in any serious way, choosing, instead, to regard them as belonging to a species of noble sentiment that has nothing to do with themselves!

Yes,” serious readers are willing to acknowledge, “such exploitation and cruelty and willful life-harming effects as Ruskin describes do exist and are always lamentable and reprehensible when they do; there are always a few bad apples in any barrel. But, as to myself, such allegations do not apply. I am a good and responsible person, going about my daily doings in an effort to benefit myself and those who depend upon me for their well-being. Naturally, I try, as does everyone, to gain as much for myself and my dependents as I can honestly and legally can in the course of such doings. I admit (though I am embarrassed to do so!) that sometimes I may lie a little, sometimes peddle a little, sometimes cut a few corners on trade agreements, sometimes pay my employees something less than they deserve, but I never set out, as a matter of personal policy, to disadvantage others, and, certainly, I never consciously plot to deprive such others of what they need to live decently!” Others perhaps can be rightfully accused of such attitudes and practices, but not me!”

In short, most people are glad, even eager, to live in a state of what psychologists call “denial,” are willing to subscribe to what might be called the “Not Me Response;” are willing to accede to the fact that they are responsible beings but that, in the first and last analysis, it is not they who are responsible for the unhappy fact that, somewhere people starve, are unjustly treated, or killed or maimed in an elementary school shooting. Someone–someone surely dastardly is responsible for such awful things, but “not me!”

During the first half of the 17^th century, the poet and philosopher, John Donne, was widely praised as one of the brightest lights shining in England. His verse was lauded and, while few read that verse now, one of his poems– which Ruskin knew well and which is infused with our subject’s unwavering insistence that each person bears a portion of the responsibility for mitigating human distress during the span of her or his life–surfaces and remains familiar to our memory when it does: Wrote Donne: “No man is an island/Entire of itself./Every man is a piece of the Continent,/A part of the main./If a clod be washed away by the sea,/Europe is the less;/As well as if a promontory were;/As well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were./Every man’s death diminishes me,/Because I am involved in mankind./And therefore, never send to know for whom the bell tolls,/It tolls for thee.”“

“John Ruskin: Pen and Ink Drawing” (1879-1880) Hubert von Herkomer, Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)

Until next time, good friends, please do continue well out there!

cheers,

Jim