MARGINAL COMMENT
By HAROLD NICOLSON
/N common with all those who believe that education, if it is to remain liberal, must be untainted by any social ideologies or party affiliations, I have been reading with sincere regret the controversy which has arisen over the future of Ashridge College. It is surely regrettable that an institution, designed to become a university for democracy, and having for its purpose (if I may quote Sir Bernard Paget) " the education of public opinion through the spread of knowledge and understanding, and the creation of fellow- ship based on spiritual values and free from the taint of class or party, nationality or colour "—it is regrettable, I say, that an insti- tution designed for such high aims should have been afflicted with internal dissension, and even more regrettable that these private disputes should by sad mischance have been exposed to public gaze. I am unaware whether the suggested "House of Citizenship " would or would not have affected the academic quality of Ashridge, and as a good citizen I can only deplore that the House, from its first inception, should have introduced into the calm university atmosphere of Ashridge that element of strife, or stasis, which the ancient philosophers unanimously condemned as the source of decay in
institutions, communities and States. Being ignorant, in spite of my careful study of the correspondence which has been exchanged, of the real issues involved—having only known Ashridge in the days when it prospered under the name of " The Bonar Law College "—I have refrained from taking sides in the dispute and have confined myself to adopting the position of a sympathetic observer, saddened by the fact that such high national ideals should have been degraded by so many intemperate words. I hope that, now that the fighting is over, some objective historian, such as Mr. Arthur Bryant, will bequeath to posterity an account of the origins of the storm which, from a cloudless sky lashed into fury the placid seas of August, 1949.
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There arc those of course (and I blush to number myself among them) whose sorrow at this tragedy has been relieved by a mean gleam of amusement. It is a strange and discreditable circumstance that even those who are in general benevolent should derive pleasure from the quarrels of the gods. Hcrc you have Lord Davidson, a Companion of Honour, a man who had been Parliamentary Private Secretary to Mr. Bonar Law and Mr. Baldwin, Chairman of the Conservative Party and Chancellor even of the Duchy of Lancaster, surrendering to ill temper in the public prints. Here you have Sir Bernard Paget, a most distinguished general, whose word (for a while and over a given area) was law, replying with equal vigour. Here you have Mr. Arthur Bryant, one of our most industrious and elegant historians, becoming sulky. The spectacle of this titanic and overt combat should, had we all been decent people, have induced us to avert our eyes in pain ; but clearly we are not all of us decent people, since my eyes at least were glued to the combat with delight. It could be argued, I suppose, that this discloses an unhealthy strain of envy and malice. I am not conscious of any such Schadenfreude, nor do I really envy the august ; it is merely that I find it amusing when serious and important people lose their tempers in public. This undoubtedly is what Herbert Spencer meant when he said that laughter is caused by a " descending incongruity," when con- sciousness is suddenly transferred from great things to small, or when something significant or impressive suddenly loses its significance or impressiveness. This makes us laugh.
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In defence of human nature it can be urged that this type of amusement is only aroused when the descent into incongruity is " dangcrless " and unaccompanied by any sensations of pity or dis- tress. Neither Lord Davidson nor Sir Bernard Paget nor Mr. Arthur Bryant will suffer permanently or seriously from the spectacle which they have provided. The feathers which have been disturbed by this ungainly ruffling will in a week or so resume their customary sleekness. Nor after all will the interests of this nation, the Common-
wealth and Empire, be lastingly affected by the eventual success or failure of the House of Citizenship. To the disciples of Mr. John Betjcman it may be a cause of passing sorrow that so fine a mansion should have housed such internecine strife. To myself the future fate of Ashridge is matter of comparative indifference. Much as I appreciate the grandeur of its hall and staircase, I find its Gothic too late Victorian and I detest its rhododendron-infested lawns ; I do not mind over-much whether Ashridge fails to realise its high non-party ideals and becomes a home for incurables. Thus the pleasure which I have derived from this slanging-match is unalloyed by the restraints of sympathy or anxiety such as one experiences when confronted with conflicts which may have a damaging effect either upon the community or upon individuals. I am not, for instance, moved to a smile by the activities and journeys of the Dean of Canterbury or by the unhappy conflict between Professor Bernal and the Council of the British Association. Such episodes leave a sigh and not a smile behind them, since wide misrepresenta- tions and intense personal misunderstanding are the result.
The gradations between agreeable and disagreeable amusement, between derisive and sympathetic laughter, can most clearly be observed in the realm of practical joking. A small and easy practical joke is a quite harmless social amenity, and akin to that amicable teasing which is a symptom of affection and serves as a lubricant to intercourse. Yet to contrive an elaborate practical joke, or one which exposes the victim to any real degree of humiliation or incon- venience, is to manifest insensitiveness or lack of imagination. It requires no great ingenuity or application to prepare an apple-pie bed and much merriment may be expended upon the preparation ; but the effect, in terms of discomfort and hurt feelings, is not in fact worth the effort and creates an expense of spirit in a waste of shame. I should go further and contend that one can estimate the degree of humanism attained by an individual by the degree of pleasure which he or she derives from a successful practical joke. Most people would be filled with horror and disgust by the laughter of Basutos at the spectacle of a mouse soaked in burning petrol. Yet, assuming their level of imagination, is their derision really so far below the sniggers aroused in educated people by some stratagem ingeniously contrived and deliberately intended to expose some friend to extreme embarrassment or humiliation ? No practical joke which does not occur spontaneously, or which requires ingenious manu- facture, strikes me as an amusing deception ; its motive, however disguised, is the desire to humiliate someone by exposing him to ridicule ; and that is a motive which should be left to the Basutos. The only really funny practical jokes are those which fail to come off. The shame is then transferred to the perpetrators.
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These sententious remarks may suggest to my readers, either that I have recently been the victim of a highly successful practical joke (which is not I am glad to say the case), or that I am being incon- sistent in admitting the amusement that I have derived from the " descending incongruity " provided by the Ashridge row. On what can that amusement be based, unless it be upon the lowering, the sudden lowering, of the expected dignity of the three eminent gentle- men concerned ? In what manner does my pleasure differ from that derived by those who rejoice in the humiliation of others ? My • only answer to this' accusation must be that no great degree of humiliation has really been involved. I am assured on all sides that Sir Bernard Paget has done a wonderful piece of work at Ashridgc, and he may be justified in feeling resentment because his conception of the purposes and scope of that institution is becoming blurred by financial and other considerations. Mr. Arthur Bryant, I feel con- vinced, has acted from the best of motives and has shown restraint in circumstances of personal tension and some complexity. And Lord Davidson has for long been accustomed to getting his own way. Yet it is funny somehow when elderly people get so cross.
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