Chapter 20 Chapter Twenty

Philip was in sixth form, but now he hated school from the bottom of his heart.With no goal to strive for, he was discouraged and felt that it didn't matter whether he learned his lessons well or poorly.He woke up every morning with a heavy heart, because he had to go through another boring day.Now he was bored with everything, because it was all other people asked him to do.He was extremely disgusted with the various restrictions imposed by the school, not because these restrictions were unreasonable, but because they were the rules and regulations that bound people's minds and bodies.He longed for relief.He hated the teacher repeating what he already knew; he was also tired of the teacher sometimes explaining some things over and over again in order to cater for the mentally retarded students, which he understood at a glance.

Students can listen to Mr. Perkins's lectures as they like.When Mr. Perkins lectured, he was eager and thoughtful.The sixth-grade classroom was in a restored old monastery. There was a Gothic window in the classroom. Philip drew the window again and again during class, trying to amuse himself; sometimes he sketched it from memory. The main tower of the cathedral, or depict the aisle leading to the church grounds.He can really draw two strokes.Aunt Louisa painted some watercolors when she was young, and now she still has several albums, which are full of her masterpieces, including paintings of churches, ancient bridges, and farm scenes.When tea parties are held in the pastor's mansion, these picture albums are often taken out for guests to look at.She once gave Philip a box of paints for Christmas, and Philip had learned to paint by copying his aunt's water-colours.He copied it very well, beyond anyone's expectations.Before long, he began to conceive and paint on his own.Mrs. Carey encouraged him to learn to paint, thinking that this would save him from being mischievous, and that Philip's paintings might be sold for charity someday.He has two or three pictures framed and hanging in his bedroom.

But one day, just after the morning class, Philip was lazily walking out of the classroom, when Mr. Perkins stopped him suddenly. "I have something to tell you, Carey." Philip waited.Mr. Perkins, holding his beard in his thin fingers, looked at Philip intently, as if trying to decide what to say to the boy. "What's wrong with you, Carey?" he asked at the beginning. Philip flushed, and cast a quick glance at Mr Perkins.But he was now familiar with Mr. Perkins's temper, so he was in no hurry to answer, but waited for him to go on. "I am very dissatisfied with your recent performance. You are always so slack and inattentive, as if you are not interested in your homework at all. The homework is sloppy and perfunctory."

"I'm sorry, sir," said Philip. "Is that all?" Philip looked sullenly at the ground.How could he really tell Mr. Perkins that everything here bored him to death? ! "You know, instead of improving your studies this semester, you have regressed. You can't expect to get a report card with excellent grades." Philip secretly wondered how the master would feel if he knew what happened to the school report.In fact, the school report card had arrived home earlier, and Mr. Carey glanced at it nonchalantly, and handed it to Philip. "It's your report card. You'd better see what's written on it," he said, peeling off the cover of the old catalog with his fingers.

Philip looked at the report card. "How are your grades?" asked Aunt Louisa. "It doesn't reflect my actual grades," replied Philip, grinning, and handed the report card to his aunt. "I'll see it later with my glasses on," she said. But after breakfast Mary Ann came in to say the butcher was coming, so she put the matter out of the blue. . . At this point Mr. Perkins continued: "You're such a disappointment to me. It's beyond comprehension. I know you can do something if you want to, and it looks like you don't want to work on it anymore. I was going to have you as class president next term." , but now I think we'll wait."

Philip blushed, and felt disconcerted at the thought of being looked down upon.He bit his lip. "One more thing. Now you have to start thinking about your scholarship. Unless you study hard now, you're not going to get any." Philip was annoyed by this reprimand.He was angry with the headmaster as much as he was angry with himself. "I don't think I'm going to go to Oxford anymore," he said. "Why? I suppose you're planning to be a priest someday." "I've changed my mind." "why?" Philip made no answer.Mr. Perkins posed in an odd habitual pose, resembling a character in Perugino's painting, stroking his beard thoughtfully. He looked at Philip, as if trying to read the boy's mind. After a while, he told Philip suddenly that he could go.

Evidently, Mr. Perkins had more to say.About a week later, Philip came to his study one night to hand in his composition, and he picked up the topic of a few days ago again.But this time he changed the way of talking: instead of lecturing the students as a principal, he was talking with others as an ordinary person.This time, he didn't seem to care about Philip's poor studies, nor did he care that Philip had little chance of winning the scholarship necessary for further studies at Oxford in front of his strong opponents, but the important problem was that Philip had rashly changed his future purpose in life.Mr. Perkins was determined to rekindle in the boy's heart a passion for devotion to the Church.He worked on Philip's feelings with great dexterity, which was relatively easy, for Mr. Perkins himself was genuinely moved.Philip's change of course caused him great pain, and Perkins genuinely believed that Philip had somehow squandered his chances of happiness in life.The tone of his speech is tactful and kind, touching.Philip had always been easily moved by other people's emotions, although outwardly he was often quiet--except for a momentary blush, he rarely expressed his inner feelings.On the one hand, this is because of his natural nature, and on the other hand, it is also a habit developed in school over the years-in essence, he is extremely emotional.At this moment, he was deeply moved by Mr. Principal's earnest talk.He was sincerely grateful for the principal's concern, and felt deeply guilty when he thought that what he had done had brought pain to the principal.Philip was a little flattered to think that Mr. Perkins, as the head of the school, had to think about the affairs of the whole school, so much about his affairs; The third person at his elbow clung desperately to these two words:

"I don't! I don't! I don't!" He felt himself sinking.He was unable to overcome his weakness, and this feeling of weakness seemed to be gradually filling his whole body and mind, like an empty bottle immersed in a basin full of water, and the water was constantly filling in; Repeat these words over and over to yourself: "I don't! I don't! I don't!" At last Mr. Perkins put his hand on Philip's shoulder. "I don't want to persuade you any more," he said. "You have to make up your own mind. Pray to the Almighty God, and ask him to bless you and show you where to go."

It was lightly raining when Philip came out of the headmaster's house.He walked in the archway that led to the churchyard.There was no one around, and the rook quietly perched on the big elm tree.Philip walked about slowly.He was hot all over, and a little rain on his body was just to cool off.He went over every word Mr. Perkins had just said, and now that he had escaped the ecstasy of his own personality, he could think calmly—he was glad that he had not conceded. In the twilight of the night he could only see, vaguely, the gigantic outline of the cathedral: a cathedral which he hated now, because he was compelled to attend various long and tiresome religious ceremonies there.Singing hymns is endless, and you have to stand there dumbfounded all the time; when preaching, the voice is monotonous and low, making it hard to hear clearly, trying to stretch your limbs, but you have to sit there, so your body Twist involuntarily.Philip thought again of the church at Blackstable: twice a Sunday, morning and evening, in an empty church, very dark, with the smell of pomade and starched clothes.The two sermons were presided over by the associate pastor and his uncle respectively.As he grew older, he gradually recognized his uncle's character.Philip was blunt and extreme; he could not comprehend the fact that a man could preach a great truth as a priest and never practice it as a man.This inconsistency of deception filled him with righteous indignation.His uncle was a cowardly, selfish fellow whose chief desire in life was to keep himself out of trouble.

Mr. Perkins spoke to him of the beauty of devoting oneself to the service of God.Philip has an insight into the life of the priests and princes of Gungun in his own corner of East Anglia.Not far from Blackstable is the parish of Whitestone, where the vicar, a bachelor, has lately taken up farming, to keep himself from idleness.The local newspapers kept reporting how he was litigating with this and that in the county court—either the employees accused him of refusing to pay wages, or he accused the merchants of defrauding money; Keep your cows hungry.There was talk of some sort of concerted action against the priest.Then there is the vicar of the parish of Ferney, a manly character with a beard, whose wife has run away from home because he cannot stand his abuse.She told her neighbors a lot about his evil deeds.In Surle, a small village near the sea, people can see the parish priest hang out in a small hotel every night.His mansion is just a stone's throw away from the hotel.The deacons of the church in that area often came to ask Mr. Carey for advice.If you want to talk to someone there, you have to go to a farmer or a fisherman.In the long winter nights, the cold wind howled bitterly in the bare woods; looking around, there were only plowed fields and poverty and desolation.All the hostile factors in people's characters are fully exposed, and nothing can make them moderate.They become narrow-minded and eccentric.All this Philip knew perfectly well.But because of the paranoid psychology unique to children, he didn't want to use this as an excuse.He shuddered at the thought of living that life; no, he would step out into the world.