The Way of All Flesh

Ernest returns from elsewhere just in time to see Ellen leaving in the carriage driven by the coachman, John. Seeing the cook crying, he asks what happened. After swearing him to secrecy, she tells him. Feeling sorry for Ellen, Ernest runs after the carriage, taking a shortcut and catching up to it several miles from the house. He offers the little money he has, along with a knife and a watch that Alethea gave him, to Ellen. At the John’s insistence, she accepts.

As he waits to catch the carriage on its return journey, Ernest wonders what to tell his parents. He decides to say that he lost his watch and went looking for it.

Ernest returns home to find Theobald angry that he missed dinner. Ernest tells his story. Relieved that his absence apparently had nothing to do with Ellen, Theobald lets him off easy. Fearful that he might be found out at some point, Ernest remains anxious over the next few days. Noticing this, Christina sits Ernest down on the sofa for a talk, as she did many times in the past. When she asks about Ellen, Ernest responds indignantly, convincing Christina of his innocence.

After an unsuccessful search for Ernest’s watch, Theobald agrees to buy him another one. He returns from a trip to town looking angry.

Ernest waits in the dining room for Theobald to return from some church business. When he does, Theobald explains that he went to several shops looking for a watch. In one, he came across the very watch that Ernest claimed he lost. Theobald learned from the shopkeeper that Ellen sold the watch after testifying that it was given to her, not stolen. Ernest admits the truth. Theobald calls for John, whom he fires for covering up what happened. Before he leaves, John threatens Theobald, warning him not to treat Ernest badly. Theobald states he will “leave Master Ernest […] to the reproaches of his own conscience” (138), a reply that Christina likes so much that she imagines it being performed in a play. Theobald and Christina treat Ernest coldly throughout the remainder of the holiday, and he begins to realize for the first time how much he dislikes them.

Theobald restores Alethea’s watch to Ernest but deducts the price from Ernest’s pocket money. Like many other boys at the school, Ernest is not particularly careful about his money and often runs up small debts. When Theobald sees Ernest’s disappointment at his reduction in pocket money, he soon draws out the truth: that Ernest’s reduced allowance will not cover his debts. Theobald interrogates Ernest about his and the other students’ financial habits. Under pressure, Ernest reluctantly reveals almost he knows about illicit activities at the school, including the name of the boys involved in smoking, drinking, and foul language. Stressed and exhausted, Ernest faints, ending the interview.

Theobald compiles the information he learned from Ernest into a report.

Theobald delivers the report to Skinner who takes note of it but burns the comments on individual boys. As the term begins, Skinner declares several shops named by Ernest to be out of bounds and speaks out against bad language. When Ernest is placed on detention for the length of the term, the other boys realize that he must have informed on them. Ernest admits and apologizes, and the boys forgive him.

According to tradition, the boys burn a dummy each year on November 5. This year, they decide to burn the likeness of Theobald for revealing their illicit activities to Skinner. After participating in a religious ceremony earlier that day, Ernest hesitates, but he decides to attend the bonfire after all, and feels “none the worse” (145) for doing so.

For a while, the older students, whose activities are not restricted, buy items for the younger students from the now-forbidden shops. Gradually, the restrictions fall away, and the school returns to normal.

Ernest advances to the grade level taught by Skinner himself. His academic performance remains mediocre, and only on one occasion does Skinner detect “some faint symptoms of improvement” (146) in his work. Overton quotes the adult Ernest as saying that he was glad he never let Skinner influence him. Instead of resenting his teachers, he now pities them.

One Ernest’s last day at school, he leaves without any lingering resentment toward Skinner, who gifts him a book about Athenian politics. Ernest plays the church organ one last time before catching a train. On the train, he looks at the cloud-covered son and laughs aloud after thinking of his misfortunes; a man across from him jokes that he must not “carry on conversations with people in the sun” (150) in public. Ernest blushes.

Ernest enters Emmanuel College at the University of Cambridge, where he is delighted to have a room to himself. Newly independent, he is happier than ever and maintains friendship with several of his peers from Roughborough. As his morale improves, so does his schoolwork, and he receives a modest scholarship. He joins a boating club and learns not to drink too much. Following Theobald’s guidance, he plans to enter the clergy.

Ernest submits an essay to a magazine containing that publishes the work of undergraduate students, and his essay is selected for publication; Overton inserts the essay, lightly edited, in the text. The essay questions the critical reputation of certain Greek playwrights and includes a passing assertion that some of the psalms of David are undeserving of high regard. The essay creates a small stir, but Ernest struggles to produce any similarly striking work.

Around this time, Ernest comes of age and receives his inheritance from George, which he invests to bring in a moderate income. Ernest fails to realize that he is now independent and remains submissive to his father. He works hard during his final year at Cambridge and finishes better than expected.

Ernest, who to this point never doubted the church’s teachings, returns to Cambridge in May 1858 to prepare for ordination. At that time, skepticism was increasing due to the publication of scientific critiques of theology, though there was something of a lull between 1844 and 1859.

Among the students at the university, there is a group of evangelicals known as Simeonites. The Sims, as they are called, generally come from poor backgrounds, relying on scholarships, and lack social graces. Ernest makes fun of them but also sympathizes with them.

One day, shortly after his graduation, Christina takes Ernest for a walk and vaguely warns him about the difficulties of entering the clergy. Only later does Ernest realize that she did so to ease her and Theobald’s consciences without actually helping him.

Christina also asks Ernest to invite Towneley, an acquaintance from school, to Battersby in the hopes that he will take a liking to Charlotte and marry her. Ernest, who invited friends in the past only to find that the more he liked them, the more Christina disapproved, refuses. Ernest would not want Towneley, whom he admires, to marry his Charlotte, whom he dislikes.

In preparation for ordination, Ernest joins a study group focused on the New Testament and related commentaries. One day, the Simeonites invite the members of the study group to attend a lecture by the visiting Reverend Gideon Hawke at the home of Badcock, one of the most repulsive (to Ernest) Simeonites. They accept.

Hawke opens with prayer, then recites the story of Christ’s life as given in the Bible before inviting his listeners to repent and leave behind “the friendship of this world” in favor of their “eternal welfare” (170). He ends by hinting that a divine voice called him to speak there at that time to reach some “chosen vessel who had need of me” (171). Ernest and the others are deeply impressed by Hawke’s rhetoric, each feeling himself to be the chosen vessel.

The next day, Ernest visits Dawson, another student who attended Hawke’s lecture, and Dawson agrees to help Ernest build his faith. Ernest also encounters Badcock, whom he greets respectfully. Pleased at his elevated status, Badcock says that Hawke asked about Ernest specifically.

Ernest is so impressed by Hawke’s sermon that he decides to give up tobacco, but he gives up after a short period. He also writes a letter home signifying his newfound religious zeal. When he visits Battersby, Ernest expresses his evangelical leanings, which leads Theobald to oppose and correct him. Returning to school, Ernest takes and passes a theological exam before he is ordained a deacon in the fall of 1858, when he is 23 years old.

Ernest takes up work as a junior curate under a London rector and soon feels he made a mistake. Pryer, the senior curate, prefers the high-church mode of worship, which emphasizes ceremony and hierarchy, unlike the low-church, Evangelical movements Ernest prefers. Under Pryer’s influence, Ernest’s views soon shift.

Ernest meets Pryer’s friends, also clergymen, and is surprised to discover them to be in the “same unhappy predicament” (178) as himself. He considers marriage as a possible solution, but Pryer states his belief that clergymen should remain celibate.

One day, Ernest and Pryer take a walk. Pryer suggests that the Catholic Church is much better than the Church of England at systematizing the spiritual treatment of individuals on an almost scientific basis. He compares priests to medical doctors, in that they must diagnose and treat spiritual diseases. Pryer suggests that priests must study sin in detail, at the risk of losing their souls, to advance spiritual understanding. When Ernest counters that the Bible offers sufficient guidance, Pryer describes the Bible as “unreliable” and expresses his faith in the “living voice of the Church” (182).

Overton describes Ernest as an “embryo mind” passing through various stages before taking on his ultimate form. Latching onto Pryer’s ideas, writes to Dawson explaining his and Pryer’s idea for a “College of Spiritual Pathology” (183) to study sin from a scientific perspective. To raise money, they plan to invest Ernest’s money in the stock exchange.

Inspired by literature, Ernest moves into a poor neighborhood.