Talkers: With Illustrations

Fourthly, being entirely devoid of reason, he pursues no point either of morality or instruction, but is ludicrous only for the sake of being so.”

III.

THE FLATTERER

“Who flatters is of all mankind the lowest,
Save him who courts the flattery.”

    Hannah More.

The Flatterer is a false friend clothed in the garb of a true one. He speaks words from a foul heart through fair lips. His eyes affect to see only beauty and perfection, and his tongue pours out streams of sparkling praises. He is enamoured of your appearance, and your general character commands his admiration. You have no fault which he may correct, or delinquency which he may rebuke. The last time he met you in company, your manners pleased him beyond measure; and though you saw it not, yet he observed how all eyes were brightened by seeing you. If you occupy a position of authority whence you can bestow a favour which he requires, you are “most gracious, powerful, and good.” His titles are all in the superlative, and his addresses full of wondering interjections. His object is more to please than to speak the truth. His art is nothing but delightful trickery by means of smoothing words and complacent looks. He would make men fools by teaching them to overrate their abilities. Those who walk in the vale of humility amid the modest flowers of virtue and favoured with the presence of the Holy One, he would lift into the Utopian heights of vanity and pride, that they might fall into the condemnation of the Devil. He gathers all good opinions and approving sentiments that he might carry them to his prey, losing nothing in weight and number during their transit. He is one of Fame’s best friends, helping to furnish her with some of her strongest and richest rumours. But conscience has not a greater adversary; for when it comes forth to do its office in accusation or reproof, he anticipates its work, and bribes her with flattering speech. Like the chamelion, he changes his appearance to suit his purpose. He sometimes affects to be nothing but what pleases the object of his admiration, whose virtues he applauds and whose imperfections he pretends it to be an advantage to imitate. When he walks with his friend, he would feign have him believe that every eye looks at him with interest, and every tongue talks of him with praise – that he to whom he deigns to give his respects is graced with peculiar honour. He tells him he knows not his own worth, lest he should be too happy or vain; and when he informs him of the good opinions of others, with a mock-modesty he interrupts himself in the relation, saying he must not say any more lest he be considered to flatter, making his concealment more insinuating than his speech. He approaches with fictitious humility to the creature of his praise, and hangs with rivetted attention upon his lips, as though he spake with the voice of an oracle. He repeats what phrase or sentence may particularly gratify him, and both hands are little enough to bless him in return. Sometimes he extols the excellencies of his friend in his absence, but it is in the presence of those who he is pretty certain will convey it to his ears. In company, he sometimes whispers his commendations to the one next him, in such a way that his friend may hear him in the other part of the room.

The Flatterer is a talker who insinuates himself into every circle; and there are few but are fond of his fair speech and gaudy praise. He conceals himself with such dexterousness that few recognise him in his true character. Those with whom he has to do too frequently view him as a friend, and confide in his communications. What door is not open to the man who brings the ceremonious compliments of praise in buttery lips and sugared words – who carries in his hand a bouquet of flowers, and in his face the complacent smile, addressing you in words which feed the craving of vanity, and yet withal seem words of sincere friendship and sound judgment?

Where is the man who has the moral courage, the self-abnegation to throw back honied encomiums which come with apparent reality, although from a flatterer? “To tell a man that he cannot be flattered is to flatter him most effectually.”

“Honey’d assent,
How pleasant art thou to the taste of man,
And woman also! flattery direct
Rarely disgusts. They little know mankind
Who doubt its operation: ’tis my key,
And opes the wicket of the human heart.”

“The firmest purpose of a human heart
To well-tim’d artful flattery may yield.”

“’Tis an old maxim in the schools
That flattery’s the food of fools;
Yet now and then your men of wit
Will condescend to take a bit.”

The Flatterer is a lurking foe, a dangerous friend, a subtle destroyer. “A flattering mouth worketh ruin.” “He that speaketh flattery to his friends, even the eyes of his children shall fail.” “A man that flattereth his neighbour spreadeth a net for his feet.” The melancholy results of flattery are patent before the world, both on the page of history and in the experience of mankind. How many thousand young men who once stood in the uprightness of virtue are now debased and ruined through the flattery of the “strange woman,” so graphically described by Solomon in Prov. vii., “With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him. He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks; till a dart strike through his liver; as a bird hasteth to the snare, and knoweth not that it is for his life” (vers. 21-23). “She hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her. Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death” (vers. 26, 27).

And as the virtuous young man is thus led into ruin by the flattering tongue of the strange woman; so the virtuous young female is sometimes led into ruin by the flattering tongue of the lurking enemy of beauty and innocence. I cannot give a more striking and pathetic illustration of this than the one portrayed by the incomparable hand of Pollok: —

“Take one example, one of female woe.
Loved by her father, and a mother’s love,
In rural peace she lived, so fair, so light
Of heart, so good and young, that reason scarce
The eye could credit, but would doubt, as she
Did stoop to pull the lily or the rose
From morning’s dew, if it reality
Of flesh and blood, or holy vision, saw,
In imagery of perfect womanhood.
But short her bloom – her happiness was short.
One saw her loveliness, and with desire
Unhallowed, burning, to her ear addressed
Dishonest words: ‘Her favour was his life,
His heaven; her frown his woe, his night, his death.’
With turgid phrase thus wove in flattery’s loom,
He on her womanish nature won, and age
Suspicionless, and ruined and forsook:
For he a chosen villain was at heart,
And capable of deeds that durst not seek
Repentance. Soon her father saw her shame;
His heart grew stone; he drove her forth to want
And wintry winds, and with a horrid curse
Pursued her ear, forbidding her return.
Upon a hoary cliff that watched the sea,
Her babe was found – dead; on its little cheek,
The tear that nature bade it weep had turned
An ice-drop, sparkling in the morning beam;
And to the turf its helpless hands were frozen:
For she, the woeful mother, had gone mad,
And laid it down, regardless of its fate
And of her own. Yet had she many days
Of sorrow in the world, but never wept.
She lived on alms; and carried in her hand
Some withering stalks, she gathered in the spring;
When they asked the cause, she smiled, and said,
They were her sisters, and would come and watch
Her grave when she was dead. She never spoke
Of her deceiver, father, mother, home,
Or child, or heaven, or hell, or God; but still
In lonely places walked, and ever gazed
Upon the withered stalks, and talked to them;
Till wasted to the shadow of her youth,
With woe too wide to see beyond – she died;
Not unatoned for by imputed blood,
Nor by the Spirit that mysterious works,
Unsanctified. Aloud her father cursed
That day his guilty pride which would not own
A daughter whom the God of heaven and earth
Was not ashamed to call His own; and he
Who ruined her read from her holy look,
That pierced him with perdition manifold,
His sentence, burning with vindictive fire.”

The flattering talker possesses a power which turned angels into devils, and men into demons – which beguiled pristine innocence and introduced the curse – which has made half the world crazy with self-esteem and self-admiration. A power which has dethroned princes, involved kingdoms, degraded the noble, humbled the great, impoverished the rich, enslaved the free, polluted the pure, robbed the wise man of his wisdom, the strong man of his strength, the good man of his goodness. It is emphatically the power of the Destroyer, working havoc, devastation, woe, and death wherever it has sway, spreading disappointment, weeping, lamentation, and broken hearts through the habitations of the children of men. “He is,” as an old writer quaintly observes, “the moth of liberal men’s coats, the ear-wig of the mighty, the bane of courts, a friend and slave to the trencher, and good for nothing but to be a factor for the devil.”

Mr. Sharp was a young student of amiable spirit, and promising abilities. Soon after he left college he took charge of an important church in the large village of C – , in the county of M – . He had not been long among his people before he won the good-will of all; and his popularity soon extended beyond the pale of his own church. Meantime, he did not appear to think of himself more than he ought. He was unassuming in his spirit, and devoted to his work, apparently non-affected by the general favour with which he was received.

There was a member of his church whom we shall call Mr. Thoughtless; a man of good education, respectable intelligence, and in circumstances of moderate wealth. He was in the church an officer of considerable importance and weight. He was, however, given to the use of soft words, and complimentary speeches. In fact, he was a flatterer. He used little or no wisdom in his flattery, but generally poured it forth in fulsome measure upon all whom he regarded his friends. Mr. Sharp was a particular favourite with him, and he frequently invited him to his house. He did not observe the failing of his host, but considered him a very kind man, sweet-tempered, one of his best friends, the only member of his Church from whom he received any encouragement in his ministerial labours. Mr. Sharp became increasingly attached to him, and passed the greater part of his leisure hours in his company. The fact was, Mr. Thoughtless did not restrain his expressions of “great satisfaction” and “strong pleasure” in the “character and abilities” of Mr. Sharp. He was the “best minister ever among them” – “every one admired him” – “what a splendid sermon he preached last Sabbath morning” – “the congregations were doubled since he came” – he was “delighted with his general demeanour” – he “really thought his abilities were adequate to a larger Church in a city, than theirs in the country” – but he must not be “considered in speaking these things to flatter, for he should be ashamed to say anything to flatter a young minister whom he esteemed so highly,” and besides, he “thought him beyond the power of flattery.” Such were the flattering words which he poured into the undiscerning mind of Mr. Sharp at different times.

Not long after this close friendship and these frequent visits, Mr. Sharp began to manifest a change in his spirit and conduct, which gradually developed into such proportions that some of the Church could not help noticing it.

“I do not think,” said Mr. Smith – a truly godly man – to Mrs. Lane – who also was in repute for her piety – one day in conversation, “that our young pastor is so unassuming and devoted as when he first came among us.”