Scrooge & Shylock

Scrooge & Shylock

Avaro acerba poena natura est sua. A miser’s bitter punishment is himself (Publilius Syrus, Maxims, 46). Most students know about the two misers in literature: Ebenezer Scrooge in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol and Shylock in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice. Perhaps less well known are Ebenezer Balfour in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped, Silas Marner in George Eliot’s novel of the same name, and Harpagon in Moliere’s The Miser.

What students come away with is how money can twist a human being into making it a god, drying up one’s humanity, and keeping one from spending it. They can understand Shylock because he was made to endure a lifetime of antisemitic hatred, which may ultimately have driven him mad.

But it is beyond their comprehension why being a Jew could make the Christians of Venice so hateful toward him until the nature of religious bigotry in the West is explained to them, and they are shocked to learn what the Jews have been made to suffer by Christians for centuries. They see his passion for money as a shield he thinks will protect him against the insults he must continually endure. The play is a profound indictment of Christian antisemitism againgst the Jewish people who have done nothing to deserve such inhuman treatment over the centuries.

Readers interested in a theory on the origin of Christian antisemitism are referred to my article, Is the New Testament Antisemitic?, published November 28, 2023 on Medium.

And then there is Scrooge, who is finally cured of his madness.

“At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge,” said the gentleman, taking up a pen, “it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.”

“Are there no prisons?” asked Scrooge.

“Plenty of prisons,” said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

“And the Union workhouses?” demanded Scrooge. “Are they still in operation?”

“They are. Still,” returned the gentleman, “I wish I could say they were not.”

“The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigor, then?” said Scrooge

“Both very busy, sir.”

“Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in t0heir useful course,” said Scrooge. “I am very glad to hear it.”

“Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,” returned the gentleman, “a few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?”

“Nothing!” Scrooge replied.

“You wish to be anonymous?”

“I wish to be left alone,” said Scrooge. “Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don’t make merry myself at Christmas, and I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned — they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.”

“Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.”

“If they would rather die,” said Scrooge, “they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. Besides — excuse me — I don’t know that.”

“But you might know it,” observed the gentleman.

“It’s not my business,” Scrooge returned. “It’s enough for a man to understand his own business, and not to interfere with other people’s. Mine occupies me constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!”

Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point, the gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge resumed his labors with an improved opinion of himself, and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him.

Class discussion then inevitably spills over into why some wealthy individuals act this way and cause so much unnecessary suffering for the poor without it even bothering them or causing them guilt for being so callous. In fact, students are deeply shocked that some in our own government continually cause similar misery to many Americans in the richest nation in the world while at the same time trying to shield the wealthy from having to pay their taxes.

Heredis fletus sub persona risus est. The weeping of an heir is laughter behind a mask (Publilius Syrus, Maxims, 258). Hypocrisy is the homage vice pays to virtue. The hypocrite lives his life on stage. As the recipient of an inheritance, he knows that at the funeral all eyes will be upon him and that he must comport himself in a seemly fashion. His weeping at the passing of his rich relative may move some of the onlookers, while others will think that he has already counted the silverware lest anything be stolen by the hired help.

Frank Breslin is a retired high-school teacher in the New Jersey public school system.