1. Oil and water would sooner mix than Jacob and Esau, and the weakness in Esau's character which makes him so striking a contrast to his brother is his inconstancy.
That one error
Fills him with faults; makes him run through all the sins.
By firmness of will Jacob could in the end win any quality that Esau had; whereas Esau, having no strength of will, might lose everything he possessed. It depended solely on how the winds and the tides of life led, how much he kept, how much he lost. Esau is led by impulse, betrayed by appetite, everything by turns and nothing long. To-day despising his birthright, to-morrow breaking his heart for its loss; to-day vowing he will murder his brother, to-morrow falling on his neck and kissing him; a man one cannot reckon upon, and of too shallow a nature for anything to root itself deeply in.
2. Esau is the type of man who, without any deliberate intention to do evil, is too careless to do what is right. His good points were simply such as were natural to him, and consequently were no trouble to him. In them he was but little tempted. There is no trace of any discipline in his life. He has no struggle at all. He simply gives the rein to his impulse and follows it wherever it leads. Whatever he fancies, he will have, regardless of cost. The right or the wrong of the thing is not considered-he simply desires it, and he will have it. Does his old father express a wish about his marriage? He will go straightway and oppose it. Does his fancy lead him to desire a bowl of appetising lentil soup? Then he will have it, if he has to pay the price of his birthright for it.
I see them troop away; I ask
Were they in sooth mine enemies-
Terror, the doubt, the lash, the task?
What heart has my new housemate, Ease?
How am I left, at last, alive,
To make a stranger of a tear?
What did I do one day to drive
From me the vigilant angel, Fear?
The diligent angel, Labour? Ay,
The inexorable angel, Pain?
Menace me, lest indeed I die,
Sloth! Turn; crush, teach me fear again!1 [Note: Alice Meynell, Poems (1913), 113.]
3. Esau had made his own misfortune, and when it came upon him, he broke out into the exceeding bitter cry, “Hast thou but one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, O my father!” Very pitiful, it is true, but we cannot help a touch of scorn coming with the pity. We see that the exceeding bitter cry is nothing more than the same passion, on another matter, which broke out with equal violence when he would have the pottage as the only good in life, and our lip cannot help curling with contempt. And feeble and violent as it was, it did not last, at least the bitterness and remorse in it passed away. It was too deep a feeling for that weak heart to retain, and it changed into anger with Jacob, whose life he threatened when his father's death should come. But even this did not endure; Esau had not the power of will to keep his thought of vengeance to himself, he went muttering it about the encampment, and when Rebekah heard of it she smiled. “Go,” she said to Jacob, with a fine irony, “until thy brother's anger turn away, and he forget that which thou hast done to him.” And it did turn away. The passion of Esau was not worth a thought, it swept over him like the April shower on a stormy day which is dried up in a few hours. But the character which is worth knowing and having, and which will move others and fulfil its aim, is his whom passion inundates, so that its flood, not drying up, but sinking down into the soil of the heart, forms, deep below, springs that slowly change into sweet waters, and rise long afterwards to the surface, to fertilize the later autumn of life.
People say: “You cannot change the basis of character.” But you may combine opposites to almost any extent: and it is the combination of opposites which makes greatness. The art is to add age to youth and youth to age, to be all you ever were, and to add on something more (as far as physical strength will allow). Distinctly to recognize: “I have a certain character; I will add to that new qualities.”1 [Note: Letters of Benjamin Jowett, 242.]
