FROM ‘THE WAY OF ALL FLESH’

 

FROM ‘THE WAY OF ALL FLESH’ 

“The Way of All Flesh” is a novel written by Samuel Butler (1835-1902). He is the author of another satirical utopian novel “Erewhon”. The spellings of this word  can be rearranged to mean “Nowhere”.

The first one is a semi-autobiographical novel which celebrates “the ability of humanity to overcome both external and internal threats to the realization of its highest personal and social identities.”

It begins with the life of John Pontifex, a carpenter, and traces four generations of the Pontifex family,  “each of which perpetuates the frustration and unhappiness of its predecessor largely as a result of parental repression.” Only Ernest Pontifex, the great-grandson of John Pontifex succeeds in breaking the cycle.

The short extracts which are given below are taken from the novel because of their social and religious values.

*All animals except man know that the principle business of life is to enjoy it, and they do enjoy it as much as man and other circumstances will allow.

*There are two classes of people in this world --- those who sin, and those who are sinned against; if a man must belong to either, he had better belong to the first than to the second.

*The limits of vice and virtue are wretchedly ill-defined. Half the vices which the world condemns most loudly have seeds of goodness in them and require moderate use rather than total abstinence.

*It is cheaper to buy milk than to keep a cow.

*The flesh has its own mind and desires. If a believer doesn’t crucify the flesh and keep it under control, it will eventually manifest those evil desires.

            What Butler wants to tell his readers is that the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law, indeed it cannot.”  

*******       

G.R.Kanwal

28 December 2024