HARVARD
CLASSICS

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THE HARVARD CLASSICS

The Five-Foot Shelf of Books

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THE HARVARD CLASSICS
EDITED BY CHARLES W. ELIOT, LL.D.

Essays
English and American

W//^ Introductions and Notes
Volume 28

P. F. Collier & Son Corporation

NEW YORK

Copyright, 1910
By p. F. Collier & Son

Copyright, 1886
By James Russell Lowell

By arrangement with
Houghton Mifflin Company

Copyright, 1889

By The Travelers Insurance Company

of Hartford, Conn.

Copyright, 1891 and 1899
By The Travelers Insurance Company

manufacturkd in u. s. a.

CONTENTS

PAGE

JONATHAN SWIFT 7

William Makepeace Thackeray

THE IDEA OF A UNIVERSITY

I. WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY? 31

II. SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 40

III. UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 51

John Henry Newman

THE STUDY OF POETRY 65

Matthew Arnold

SESAME AND LILIES
LECTURE I.— SESAME: OF KINGS' TREASURIES ... 93
LECTURE II.— LILIES: OF QUEENS' GARDENS . . .135
John Ruskin

JOHN MILTON 165

Walter Bagehot

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 209

Thomas Henry Huxley

RACE AND LANGUAGE 227

Edward Augustus Freeman

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 277

SAMUEL PEPYS 285

Robert Louis Stevenson

ON THE ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES . .311
William Ellery Channing

2 CONTENTS

PACE

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 371

Edgar Allan Poe

WALKING 395

Henry David Thoreau

ABRAHAM LINCOLN -429

DEMOCRACY 451

James Russell Lowell

JONATHAN SWIFT

BY
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

William Makepeace Thackeray, one of the greatest of English novel-
ists, was born at Calcutta, India, on July i8, 1811, where his father held
an administrative position. He was sent to England at six for his educa-
tion, which he received at the Charterhouse and Cambridge, after which
he began, but did not prosecute, the study of law. Having lost his means,
in part by gambling, he made up his mind to earn his living as an artist,
and went to Paris to study. He had some natural gift for drawing,
which he had already employed in caricature, but, though he made
interesting and amusing illustrations for his books, he never acquired any
marked technical skill.

He now turned to literature, and, on the strength of an appointment
as Paris correspondent of a short-lived radical newspaper, he married.
On the failure of the newspaper he took to miscellaneous journalism and
the reviewing of books and pictures, his most important work appearing
in Fraser's Magazine and Punch. In 1840 his wife's mind became clouded,
and, though she never recovered, she lived on till 1894.

Success came to Thackeray very slowly. "Catherine," "The Great
Hoggarty Diamond," "Barry Lyndon," and several volumes of travel
had failed to gain much attention before the "Snob Papers," issued in
Punch in 1846, brought him fame. In the January of the next year
"Vanity Fair" began to appear in monthly numbers, and by the time it
was finished Thackeray had taken his place in the front rank of his profes-
sion. "Pendennis" followed in 1850, and sustained the prestige he had
won.

The next year he began lecturing, and delivered in London the lectures
on "The English Humourists," which he repeated the following winter
in America with much success. "Esmond" had appeared on the eve of
his setting sail, and revealed his style at its highest point of perfection,
and a tenderer if less powerful touch than "Vanity Fair" had displayed.
In 1855 "The Newcomes" appeared, and was followed by a second
trip to America, when he lectured on "The Four Georges." After an
unsuccessful attempt to enter Parliament, the novelist resumed his writ-
ing with "The Virginians" (1857-59), '^^ which he availed himself of
his American experiences.

In January of i860 the Cornhill Magazine was founded, with Thack-
eray as first editor, and launched on a distinguished career. Most of his
later work was published in its pages, but "Lovel the Widower" and

6 INTRODUCTION

the "Adventures of Philip" have not taken a place beside his greater
work. In the essays constituting the "Roundabout Papers," however, he
appeared at his easiest and most charming. After a litde more than two
years he resigned the editorship; and on December 23, 1863, he died.

Thackeray's greatest distinction is, of course, as a novelist, and an
estimate of his work in this field is not in place here. But as an essayist
he is also great. The lectures on "The English Humourists," of which
the following paper on "Swift" was the first, were the fruit of an intimate
knowledge of the time of Queen Anne, and a warm sympathy with its
spirit. And here, as in all his mature work, Thackeray is the master of
a style that for ease, suppleness, and range of effect has seldom been
equaled in English.

JONATHAN SWIFT^

By William Makepeace Thackeray

IN treating of the English humourists of the past age, it is of the
men and of their Hves, rather than of their books, that I ask
permission to speak to you; and in doing so, you are aware
that I cannot hope to entertain you with a merely humorous or
facetious story. Harlequin without his mask is known to present
a very sober countenance, and was himself, the story goes, the
melancholy patient whom the Doctor advised to go and see Harle-
quin — a man full of cares and perplexities like the rest of us, whose
Self must always be serious to him, under whatever mask or dis-
guise or uniform he presents it to the public. And as all of you
here must needs be grave when you think of your own past and
present, you will not look to find, in the histories of those whose
lives and feelings I am going to try and describe to you, a story
that is otherwise than serious, and often very sad. If Humour
only meant laughter, you would scarcely feel more interest about
humorous writers than about the private life of poor Harlequin
just mentioned, who possesses in common with these the power
of making you laugh. But the men regarding whose lives and
stories your kind presence here shows that you have curiosity and
sympathy, appeal to a great number of our other faculties, besides
our mere sense of ridicule. The humorous writer professes to awaken
and direct your love, your pity, your kindness — your scorn for
untruth, pretension, imposture — your tenderness for the weak, the
poor, the oppressed, the unhappy. To the best of his means and
ability he comments on all the ordinary actions and passions of life
almost. He takes upon himself to be the week-day preacher, so to
speak. Accordingly, as he finds, and speaks, and feels the truth best
we regard him, esteem him — sometimes love him. And, as his

' From "The English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century."
7

8 THACKERAY

business is to mark other people's lives and peculiarities, we moralize
upon his life when he is gone — and yesterday's preacher becomes the
text for to-day's sermon.

Of English parents, and of a good English family of clergymen,
Swift was born in Dublin in 1667, seven months after the death of
his father, who had come to practise there as a lawyer. The boy
went to school at Kilkenny, and afterwards to Trinity College,
Dublin, where he got a degree with difficulty, and was wild, and
witty, and poor. In 1688, by the recommendation of his mother.
Swift was received into the family of Sir William Temple, who had
known Mrs. Swift in Ireland. He left his patron in 1694, and the
next year took orders in Dublin. But he threw up the small Irish
preferment which he got and returned to Temple, in whose family
he remained until Sir William's death in 1699. His hopes of
advancement in England failing. Swift returned to Ireland, and
took the living of Laracor. Hither he invited Hester Johnson,
Temple's natural daughter, with whom he had contracted a tender
friendship, while they were both dependants of Temple's. And
with an occasional visit to England, Swift now passed nine years
at home.

In 1709 he came to England, and, with a brief visit to Ireland, dur-
ing which he took possession of his deanery of St. Patrick, he now
passed five years in England, taking the most distinguished part in
the political transactions which terminated with the death of Queen
Anne. After her death, his party disgraced, and his hopes of ambition
over, Swift returned to Dublin, where he remained twelve years.
In this time he wrote the famous "Drapier's Letters" and "Gulliver's
Travels." He married Hester Johnson, Stella, and buried Esther
Vanhomrigh, Vanessa, who had followed him to Ireland from Lon-
don, where she had contracted a violent passion for him. In 1726
and 1727 Swift was in England, which he quitted for the last time
on hearing of his wife's illness. Stella died in January, 1728, and
Swift not until 1745, having passed the last five of the seventy-eight
years of his life with an impaired intellect and keepers to watch him.

You know, of course, that Swift has had many biographers; his
life has been told by the kindest and most good-natured of men,
Scott, who admires but can't bring himself to love him; and by stout

SWIFT 9

old Johnson, who, forced to admit him into the company of poets,
receives the famous Irishman, and takes off his hat to him with a
bow of surly recognition, scans him from head to foot, and passes
over to the other side of the street. Dr. Wilde of Dublin, who has
written a most interesting volume on the closing years of Swift's
life, calls Johnson "the most malignant of his biographers": it is
not easy for an English critic to please Irishmen — ^perhaps to try and
please them. And yet Johnson truly admires Swift: Johnson does
not quarrel with Swift's change of politics, or doubt his sincerity of
religion: about the famous Stella and Vanessa controversy the
Doctor does not bear very hardly on Swift. But he could not give
the Dean that honest hand of his; the stout old man puts it into
his breast, and moves off from him.

Would we have liked to live with him ? That is a question which,
in dealing with these people's works, and thinking of their lives and
peculiarities, every reader of biographies must put to himself. Would
you have liked to be a friend of the great Dean? I should like to
have been Shakspeare's shoeblack — just to have lived in his house,
just to have worshipped him — to have run on his errands, and seen
that sweet serene face. I should like, as a young man, to have lived
on Fielding's staircase in the Temple, and after helping him up to
bed perhaps, and opening his door with his latch-key, to have shaken
hands with him in the morning, and heard him talk and crack
jokes over his breakfast and his mug of small beer. Who would not
give something to pass a night at the club with Johnson, and Gold-
smith, and James Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck? The charm of
Addison's companionship and conversation has passed to us by
fond tradition — but Swift? If you had been his inferior in parts
(and that, with a great respect for all persons present, I fear is only
very likely), his equal in mere social station, he would have bullied,
scorned, and insulted you; if, undeterred by his great reputation, you
had met him like a man, he would have quailed before you, and not
had the pluck to reply, and gone home, and years after written a
foul epigram about you — watched for you in a sewer, and come out
to assail you with a coward's blow and a dirty bludgeon. If you had
been a lord with a blue riband, who flattered his vanity, or could help
his ambition, he would have been the most delightful company in the

10 THACKERAY

world. He would have been so manly, so sarcastic, so bright, odd,
and original, that you might think he had no object in view but the
indulgence of his humour and that he was the most reckless, simple
creature in the world. How he would have torn your enemies to
pieces for you! and made fun of the Opposition! His servility was
so boisterous that it looked like independence; he would have done
your errands, but with the air of patronizing you, and after fighting
your battles, masked, in the street or the press, would have kept
on his hat before your wife and daughters in the drawing-room,
content to take that sort of pay for his tremendous services as a bravo.

He says as much himself in one of his letters to Bolingbroke : — "All
my endeavours to distinguish myself were only for want of a great
title and fortune, that I might be used like a lord by those who have
an opinion of my parts; whether right or wrong is no great matter.
And so the reputation of wit and great learning does the office of a
blue riband or a coach and six."

Could there be a greater candour? It is an outlaw, who says,
"These are my brains; with these I'll win titles and compete with
fortune. These are my bullets; these I'll turn into gold"; and he
hears the sound of coaches and six, takes the road like Macheath,
and makes society stand and deliver. They are all on their knees
before him. Down go my lord bishop's apron, and his Grace's blue
riband, and my lady's brocade petticoat in the mud. He eases the
one of a living, the other of a patent place, the third of a little snug
post about the Court, and gives them over to followers of his own.
The great prize has not come yet. The coach with the mitre and
crosier in it, which he intends to have for his share, has been delayed
on the way from St. James's; and he waits and waits until nightfall,
when his runners come and tell him that the coach has taken a dif-
ferent road, and escaped him. So he fires his pistols into the air with
a curse, and rides away into his own country.

Swift's seems to me to be as good a name to point a moral or adorn
a tale of ambition, as any hero's that ever lived and failed. But we
must remember that the morality was lax — that other gentlemen
besides himself took the road in his day — that public society was in a
strange disordered condition, and the State was ravaged by other
condottieri. The Boyne was being fought and won, and lost — the

SWIFT II

bells rung in William's victory, in the very same tone with which
they would have pealed for James's. Men were loose upon politics,
and had to shift for themselves. They, as well as old beliefs and
institutions, had lost their moorings and gone adrift in the storm.
As in the South Sea Bubble, almost everybody gambled; as in the
Railway mania — not many centuries ago — almost every one took his
unlucky share: a man of that time, of the vast talents and ambition
of Swift, could scarce do otherwise than grasp at his prize, and make
his spring at his opportunity. His bitterness, his scorn, his rage, his
subsequent misanthropy, are ascribed by some panegyrists to a
deliberate conviction of mankind's unworthiness, and a desire to
amend them by castigating. His youth was bitter, as that of a great
genius bound down by ignoble ties, and powerless in a mean
dependence; his age was bitter, like that of a great genius that had
fought the battle and nearly won it, and lost it, and thought of it
afterwards writhing in a lonely exile. A man may attribute to the
gods, if he likes, what is caused by his own fury, or disappointment,
or self-will. What public man — what statesman projecting a coup —
what king determined on an invasion of his neighbour — what satirist
meditating an onslaught on society or an individual, can't give a
pretext for his move? There was a French general the other day
who proposed to march into this country and put it to sack and
pillage, in revenge for humanity outraged by our conduct at Copen-
hagen: there is always some excuse for men of the aggressive turn.
They are of their nature warlike, predatory, eager for fight, plunder,
dominion.

As fierce a beak and talon as ever struck — as strong a wing as ever
beat, belonged to Swift. I am glad, for one, that fate wrested the
prey out of his claws, and cut his wings and chained him. One can
gaze, and not without awe and pity, at the lonely eagle chained
behind the bars.

That Swift was born at No. 7, Hoey's Court, Dublin, on the 30th
November, 1667, is a certain fact, of which nobody will deny the
sister island the honour and glory; but, it seems to me, he was no
more an Irishman than a man born of English parents at Calcutta
is a Hindoo. Goldsmith was an Irishman, and always an Irishman:
Steele was an Irishman, and always an Irishman: Swift's heart was

12 THACKERAY

English and in England, his habits English, his logic eminently
English; his statement is elaborately simple; he shuns tropes and
metaphors, and uses his ideas and words with a wise thrift and
economy, as he used his money: with which he could be generous
and splendid upon great occasions, but which he husbanded when
there was no need to spend it. He never indulges in needless extrava-
gance of rhetoric, lavish epithets, profuse imagery. He lays his
opinion before you with a grave simplicity and a perfect neatness.
Dreading ridicule too, as a man of his humour — above all an Eng-
lishman of his humour — certainly would, he is afraid to use the
poetical power which he really possessed; one often fancies in reading
him that he dares not be eloquent when he might; that he does not
speak above his voice, as it were, and the tone of society.

His initiation into politics, his knowledge of business, his knowl-
edge of polite life, his acquaintance with literature even, which he
could not have pursued very sedulously during that reckless career
at Dublin, Swift got under the roof of Sir William Temple. He was
fond of telling in after life what quantities of books he devoured
there, and how King William taught him to cut asparagus in the
Dutch fashion. It was at Shene and at Moor Park, with a salary of
twenty pounds and a dinner at the upper servants' table, that this
great and lonely Swift passed a ten years' apprenticeship — wore a
cassock that was only not a livery — bent down a knee as proud as
Lucifer's to supplicate my lady's good graces, or run on his honour's
errands. It was here, as he was writing at Temple's table, or follow-
ing his patron's walk, that he saw and heard the men who had
governed the great world — measured himself with them, looking
up from his silent corner, gauged their brains, weighed their wits,
turned them, and tried them, and marked them. Ah! what platitudes
he must have heard! what feeble jokes' what pompous common-
places! what small men they must have seemed under those enor-
mous periwigs, to the swarthy, uncouth, silent Irish secretary. I
wonder whether it ever struck Temple, that that Irishman was his
master? I suppose that dismal conviction did not present itself
under the ambrosial wig, or Temple could never have lived with

SWIFT 13

Swift. Swift sickened, rebelled, left the service — ate humble pie
and came back again; and so for ten years went on, gathering learn-
ing, swallowing scorn, and submitting with a stealthy rage to his
fortune.

Temple's style is the perfection o£ practised and easy good-
breeding. If he does not penetrate very deeply into a subject, he
professes a very gentlemanly acquaintance with it; if he makes
rather a parade of Latin, it was the custom of his day, as it was the
custom for a gentleman to envelope his head in a periwig and his
hands in lace ruffles. If he wears buckles and square-toed shoes, he
steps in them with a consummate grace, and you never hear their
creak, or find them treading upon any lady's train or any rival's
heels in the Court crowd. When that grows too hot or too agitated
for him, he politely leaves it. He retires to his retreat of Shene or
Moor Park; and lets the King's party and the Prince of Orange's
party battle it out among themselves. He reveres the Sovereign (and
no man perhaps ever testified to his loyalty by so elegant a bow) ;
he admires the Prince of Orange; but there is one person whose
ease and comfort he loves more than all the princes in Christendom,
and that valuable member of society is himself, Gulielmus Temple,
Baronettus. One sees him in his retreat; between his study-chair and
his tulip-beds, clipping his apricots and pruning his essays, — the
statesman, the ambassador no more; but the philosopher, the Epi-
curean, the fine gentleman and courtier at St. James's as at Shene;
where in place of kings and fair ladies, he pays his court to the
Ciceronian majesty; or walks a minuet with the Epic Muse; or
dallies by the south wall with the ruddy nymph of gardens.

Temple seems to have received and exacted a prodigious deal of
veneration from his household, and to have been coaxed, and
warmed, and cuddled by the people round about him, as delicately
as any of the plants which he loved. When he fell ill in 1693, the
household was aghast at his indisposition: mild Dorothea, his wife,
the best companion of the best of men —

"Mild Dorothea, peaceful, wise, and great,
Trembling beheld the doubtful hand of fate."

14 THACKERAY

As for Dorinda, his sister, —

"Those who would grief describe, might come and trace
Its watery footsteps in Dorinda's face.
To see her weep, joy every face forsook,
And grief flung sables on each menial look.
The humble tribe mourned for the quickening soul,
That furnished spirit and motion through the whole."

Isn't that line in which grief is described as putting the menials into
a mourning livery, a fine image.'' One of the menials wrote it, who
did not like that Temple livery nor those twenty-pound wages.
Cannot one fancy the uncouth young servitor, with downcast eyes,
books and papers in hand, following at his honour's heels in the
garden walk; or taking his honour's orders as he stands by the great
chair, where Sir William has the gout, and his feet all blistered with
moxa-f" When Sir William has the gout or scolds it must be hard
work at the second table; the Irish secretary owned as much after-
wards: and when he came to dinner, how he must have lashed and
growled and torn the household with his gibes and scorn! What
would the steward say about the pride of them Irish schollards —
and this one had got no great credit even at his Irish college, if the
truth were known — and what a contempt his Excellency's own
gentleman must have had for Parson Teague from Dublin. (The
valets and chaplains were always at war. It is hard to say which
Swift thought the more contemptible.) And what must have been
the sadness, the sadness and terror, of the housekeeper's little daugh-
ter with the curling black ringlets and the sweet smiling face, when
the secretary who teaches her to read and write, and whom she
loves and reverences above all things — above mother, above mild
Dorothea, above that tremendous Sir William in his square-toes
and periwig, — when Mr. Swift comes down from his master with
rage in his heart, and has not a kind word even for little Hester
Johnson .''

Perhaps, for the Irish secretary, his Excellency's condescension was
even more cruel than his frowns. Sir William would perpetually
quote Latin and the ancient classics apropos of his gardens and his
Dutch statues and plates-bandes, and talk about Epicurus and
Diogenes Laertius, Julius Caesar, Semiramis, and the gardens of the

SWIFT 15

Hesperides, Maecenas, Strabo describing Jericho, and the Assyrian
kings. Apropos of beans, he would mention Pythagoras's precept
to abstain from beans, and that this precept probably meant that wise
men should abstain from public affairs. He is a placid Epicurean;
he is a Pythagorean philosopher; he is a wise man — that is the
deduction. Does not Swift think so? One can imagine the down-
cast eyes lifted up for a moment, and the flash of scorn which they
emit. Swift's eyes were as azure as the heavens; Pope says nobly
(as everything Pope said and thought of his friend was good and
noble), "His eyes are as azure as the heavens, and have a charming
archness in them." And one person in that household, that pompous,
stately, kindly Moor Park, saw heaven nowhere else.

But the Temple amenities and solemnities did not agree with
Swift. He was half killed with a surfeit of Shene pippins; and in a
garden-seat which he devised for himself at Moor Park, and where
he devoured greedily the stock of books within his reach, he caught
a vertigo and deafness which punished and tormented him through
life. He could not bear the place or the servitude. Even in that
poem of courtly condolence, from which we have quoted a few lines
of mock melancholy, he breaks out of the funereal procession with a
mad shriek, as it were, and rushes away crying his own grief, cursing
his own fate, foreboding madness, and forsaken by fortune, and even
hope.

I don't know anything more melancholy than the letter to Tem-
ple, in which, after having broke from his bondage, the poor wretch
crouches piteously towards his cage again, and deprecates his mas-
ter's anger. He asks for testimonials for orders. "The particulars
required of me are what relate to morals and learning; and the
reasons of quitting your honour's family — that is, whether the last
was occasioned by any ill action. They are left entirely to your
honour's mercy, though in the first I think I cannot reproach myself
for anything further than for infirmities. This is all I dare at
present beg from your honour, under circumstances of life not
worth your regard: what is left me to wish (next to the health and
prosperity of your honour and family) is that Heaven would one
day allow me the opportunity of leaving my acknowledgments at
your feet. I beg my most humble duty and service be presented to

l6 THACKERAY

my ladies, your honour's lady and sister." — Can prostration fall
deeper? could a slave bow lower?

Twenty years afterwards Bishop Kennet, describing the same
man, says, "Dr. Swift came into the coffee-house and had a bow
from everybody but me. When I came to the antechamber [at
Court] to wait before prayers, Dr. Swift was the principal man of
talk and business. He was soliciting the Earl of Arran to speak
to his brother, the Duke of Ormond, to get a place for a clergyman.
He was promising Mr. Thorold to undertake, with my Lord Treas-
urer, that he should obtain a salary of 200/. per annum as member of
the English Church at Rotterdam. He stopped F. Gwynne, Esq.,
going into the Queen with the red bag, and told him aloud, he had
something to say to him from my Lord Treasurer. He took out
his gold watch, and telling the time of day, complained that it was
very late. A gentleman said he was too fast. 'How can I help it,'
says the Doctor, 'if the courtiers give me a watch that won't go
right?' Then he instructed a young nobleman, that the best poet in
England was Mr. Pope (a Papist), who had begun a translation of
Homer into English, for which he would have them all subscribe:
'For,' says he, 'he shall not begin to print till I have a thousand
guineas for him.' Lord Treasurer, after leaving the Queen, came
through the room, beckoning Dr. Swift to follow him, — both went
off just before prayers." There's a little malice in the Bishop's "just
before prayers."

This picture of the great Dean seems a true one, and is harsh,
though not altogether unpleasant. He was doing good, and to
deserving men too, in the midst of these intrigues and triumphs.
His journals and a thousand anecdotes of him relate his kind acts
and rough manners. His hand was constantly stretched out to
relieve an honest man — he was cautious about his money, but
ready. — If you were in a strait would you like such a benefactor?
I think I would rather have had a potato and a friendly word from
Goldsmith than have been beholden to the Dean for a guinea and
a dinner. He insulted a man as he served him, made women cry,
guests look foolish, bullied unlucky friends, and flung his benefac-
tions into poor men's faces. No; the Dean was no Irishman — ^no
Irishman ever gave but with a kind word and a kind heart.

SWIFT 17

It is told, as if it were to Swift's credit, that the Dean of St.
Patrick's performed his family devotions every morning regularly,
but with such secrecy that the guests in his house were never in the
least aware of the ceremony. There was no need surely why a
church dignitary should assemble his family privily in a crypt, and
as if he was afraid of heathen persecution. But I think the world
was right, and the bishops who advised Queen Anne, when they
counselled her not to appoint the author of the "Tale of a Tub" to
a bishopric, gave perfectly good advice. The man who wrote the
arguments and illustrations in that wild book, could not but be
aware what must be the sequel of the propositions which he laid
down. The boon companion of Pope and Bolingbroke, who chose
these as the friends of his life, and the recipients of his confidence
and affection, must have heard many an argument, and joined in
many a conversation over Pope's port, or St. John's burgundy, which
would not bear to be repeated at other men's boards.

I know of few things more conclusive as to the sincerity of
Swift's religion than his advice to poor John Gay to turn clergyman,
and look out for a seat on the Bench. Gay, the author of the
"Beggar's Opera" — Gay, the wildest of the wits about town — it was
this man that Jonathan Swift advised to take orders — to invest in
a cassock and bands — just as he advised him to husband his shil-
lings and put his thousand pounds out at interest. The Queen,
and the bishops, and the world, were right in mistrusting the re-
ligion of that man.

I am not here, of course, to speak of any man's religious views,
except in so far as they influence his literary character, his life, his
humour. The most notorious sinners of all those fellow-mortals
whom it is our business to discuss — Harry Fielding and Dick Steele,
were especially loud, and I believe really fervent, in their expres-
sions of belief; they belaboured freethinkers, and stoned imaginary
atheists on all sorts of occasions, going out of their way to bawl
their own creed, and persecute their neighbour's, and if they sinned
and stumbled, as they constantly did with debt, with drink, with
all sorts of bad behaviour, they got upon their knees and cried
"Peccavi" with a most sonorous orthodoxy. Yes; poor Harry Field-
ing and poor Dick Steele were trusty and undoubting Church of

1 8 THACKERAY

England men; they abhorred Popery, Atheism, and wooden shoes,
and idolatries in general; and hiccupped Church and State with
fervour.

But Swift? His mind had had a different schooling, and pos-
sessed a very different logical power. He was not bred up in a tipsy
guard-room, and did not learn to reason in a Covent Garden tavern.
He could conduct an argument from beginning to end. He could
see forward with a fatal clearness. In his old age, looking at the
"Tale of a Tub," when he said, "Good God, what a genius I had
when I wrote that book!" I think he was admiring not the genius,
but the consequences to which the genius had brought him — a vast
genius, a magnificent genius, a genius wonderfully bright, and
dazzling, and strong, — to seize, to know, to see, to flash upon false-
hood and scorch it into perdition, to penetrate into the hidden
motives, and expose the black thoughts of men, — an awful, an evil
spirit.

Ah man! you, educated in Epicurean Temple's library, you whose
friends were Pope and St. John — what made you to swear to fatal
vows, and bind yourself to a life-long hypocrisy before the Heaven
which you adored with such real wonder, humility, and reverence?
For Swift was a reverent, was a pious spirit — for Swift could love
and could pray. Through the storms and tempests of his furious
mind, the stars of religion and love break out in the blue, shining
serenely, though hidden by the driving clouds and the maddened
hurricane of his life.

It is my belief that he suffered frightfully from the consciousness
of his own scepticism, and that he had bent his pride so far down
as to put his apostasy out to hire. The paper left behind him, called
"Thoughts on Religion," is merely a set of excuses for not pro-
fessing disbelief. He says of his sermons that he preached pamphlets :
they have scarce a Christian characteristic; they might be preached
from the steps of a synagogue, or the floor of a mosque, or the box
of a coffee-house almost. There is little or no cant — he is too great
and too proud for that; and, in so far as the badness of his sermons
goes, he is honest. But having put that cassock on, it poisoned him:
he was strangled in his bands. He goes through life, tearing, like
a man possessed with a devil. Like Abudah in the Arabian story,

SWIFT 19

he is always looking out for the Fury, and knows that the night
will come and the inevitable hag with it. What a night, my God,
it was! what a lonely rage and long agony — what a vulture that tore
the heart of that giant! It is awful to think of the great sufferings
of this great man. Through life he always seems alone, somehow.
Goethe was so. I can't fancy Shakspeare otherwise. The giants must
live apart. The kings can have no company. But this man suffered
so; and deserved so to suffer. One hardly reads anywhere of such
a pain.

The "saeva indignatio" of which he spoke as lacerating his heart,
and which he dares to inscribe on his tombstone — as if the wretch
who lay under that stone waiting God's judgment had a right to
be angry, — breaks out from him in a thousand pages of his writing,
and tears and rends him. Against men in office, he having been
overthrown; against men in England, he having lost his chance of
preferment there, the furious exile never fails to rage and curse.
Is it fair to call the famous "Drapier's Letters" patriotism.? They
are masterpieces of dreadful humour and invective: they are rea-
soned logically enough too, but the proposition is as monstrous and
fabulous as the Lilliputian island. It is not that the grievance is so
great, but there is his enemy — the assault is wonderful for its activity
and terrible rage. It is Samson, with a bone in his hand, rushing
on his enemies and felling them : one admires not the cause so much
as the strength, the anger, the fury of the champion. As is the case
with madmen, certain subjects provoke him, and awaken his fits
of wrath. Marriage is one of these; in a hundred passages in his
writings he rages against it; rages against children; an object of
constant satire, even more contemptible in his eyes than a lord's
chaplain, is a poor curate with a large family. The idea of this
luckless paternity never fails to bring down from him gibes and
foul language. Could Dick Steele, or Goldsmith, or Fielding, in
his most reckless moment of satire, have written anything like the
Dean's famous "modest proposal" for eating children.? Not one of
these but melts at the thoughts of childhood, fondles and caresses it.
Mr. Dean has no such softness, and enters the nursery with the
tread and gaiety of an ogre. "I have been assured," says he in the
"Modest Proposal," "by a very knowing American of my acquaint-

20 THACKERAY

ance in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a
year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether
stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt it will
equally serve in a ragout." And taking up this pretty joke, as his
way is, he argues it with perfect gravity and logic. He turns and
twists this subject in a score of different ways: he hashes it; and he
serves it up cold; and he garnishes it; and relishes it always. He
describes the little animal as "dropped from its dam," advising
that the mother should let it suck plentifully in the last month, so
as to render it plump and fat for a good table!

"A child," says his Reverence, "will make two dishes at an enter-
tainment for friends; and when the family dines alone, the fore or
hind quarter will make a reasonable dish," and so on; and, the
subject being so delightful that he can't leave it, he proceeds to
recommend, in place of venison for squires' tables, "the bodies of
young lads and maidens not exceeding fourteen or under twelve."
Amiable humourist! laughing castigator of morals! There was a
process well known and practised in the Dean's gay days: when a
lout entered the coffee-house, the wags proceeded to what they
called "roasting" him. This is roasting a subject with a vengeance.
The Dean had a native genius for it. As the "Almanach des Gour-
mands" says. On nait rotisseur.

And it was not merely by the sarcastic method that Swift exposed
the unreasonableness of loving and having children. In Gulliver,
the folly of love and marriage is urged by graver arguments and
advice. In the famous Lilliputian kingdom. Swift speaks with ap-
proval of the practice of instantly removing children from their
parents and educating them by the State; and amongst his favourite
horses, a pair of foals are stated to be the very utmost a well-regu-
lated equine couple would permit themselves. In fact, our great
satirist was of opinion that conjugal love was unadvisable, and
illustrated the theory by his own practice and example — God help
him — which made him about the most wretched being in God's
world.

The grave and logical conduct of an absurd proposition, as exem-
plified in the cannibal proposal just mentioned, is our author's con-
stant method through all his works of humour. Given a country

SWIFT 21

of people six inches or sixty feet high, and by the mere process
of the logic, a thousand wonderful absurdities are evolved, at so
many stages of the calculation. Turning to the first minister who
waited behind him with a white staff near as tall as the mainmast
of the "Royal Sovereign," the King of Brobdingnag observes how
contemptible a thing human grandeur is, as represented by such
a contemptible little creature as Gulliver. "The Emperor of Lilliput's
features are strong and masculine" (what a surprising humour there
is in this description!) — "The Emperor's features," Gulliver says,
"are strong and masculine, with an Austrian lip, an arched nose, his
complexion olive, his countenance erect, his body and limbs well
proportioned, and his deportment majestic. He is taller by the
breadth of my nail than any of his court, which alone is enough to
strike an awe into beholders."

What a surprising humour there is in these descriptions! How
noble the satire is here! how just and honest! How perfect the
image! Mr. Macaulay has quoted the charming lines of the poet,
where the king of the pigmies is measured by the same standard.
We have all read in Milton of the spear that was like "the mast
of some tall admiral," but these images are surely likely to come
to the comic poet originally. The subject is before him. He is turn-
ing it in a thousand ways. He is full of it. The figure suggests itself
naturally to him, and comes out of his subject, as in that wonderful
passage when Gulliver's box having been dropped by the eagle
into the sea, and Gulliver having been received into the ship's cabin,
he calls upon the crew to bring the box into the cabin, and put it on
the table, the cabin being only a quarter the size of the box. It is
the veracity of the blunder which is so admirable. Had a man
come from such a country as Brobdingnag he would have blun-
dered so.

But the best stroke of humour, if there be a best in that abound-
ing book, is that where Gulliver, in the unpronounceable country,
describes his parting from his master the horse. "I took," he says,
"a second leave of my master, but as I was going to prostrate myself
to kiss his hoof, he did me the honour to raise it gently to my mouth.
I am not ignorant how much I have been censured for mentioning
this last particular. Detractors are pleased to think it improbable

22 THACKERAY

that so illustrious a person should descend to give so great a mark
of distinction to a creature so inferior as I. Neither have I forgotten
how apt some travellers are to boast of extraordinary favours they
have received. But if these censurers were better acquainted with
the noble and courteous disposition of the Houyhnhnms they would
soon change their opinion."

The surprise here, the audacity of circumstantial evidence, the
astounding gravity of the speaker, who is not ignorant how much
he has been censured, the nature of the favour conferred, and the
respectful exultation at the receipt of it, are surely complete; it is
truth topsy-turvy, entirely logical and absurd.

As for the humour and conduct of this famous fable, I suppose
there is no person who reads but must admire; as for the moral, I
think it horrible, shameful, unmanly, blasphemous; and giant and
great as this Dean is, I say we should hoot him. Some of this
audience mayn't have read the last part of Gulliver, and to such
I would recall the advice of the venerable Mr. Punch to persons
about to marry, and say "Don't." When GulHver first lands among
the Yahoos, the naked howling wretches clamber up trees and
assault him, and he describes himself as "almost stifled with the filth
which fell about him." The reader of the fourth part of "Gulliver's
Travels" is like the hero himself in this instance. It is Yahoo lan-
guage: a monster gibbering shrieks, and gnashing imprecations
against mankind — tearing down all shreds of modesty, past all sense
of manliness and shame; filthy in word, filthy in thought, furious,
raging, obscene.

And dreadful it is to think that Swift knew the tendency of his
creed — the fatal rocks towards which his logic desperately drifted.
That last part of "Gulliver" is only a consequence of what has gone
before; and the worthlessness of all mankind, the pettiness, cruelty,
pride, imbecility, the general vanity, the foolish pretension, the
mock greatness, the pompous dulness, the mean aims, the base
successes — all these were present to him; it was with the din of
these curses of the world, blasphemies against heaven, shrieking
in his ears, that he began to write his dreadful allegory — of which
the meaning is that man is utterly wicked, desperate and imbecile,
and his passions are so monstrous, and his boasted powers so mean,

SWIFT 23

that he is and deserves to be the slave of brutes, and ignorance is
better than his vaunted reason. What had this man done? what
secret remorse was rankUng at his heart? what fever was boihng
in him, that he should see all the world bloodshot? We view the
world with our own eyes, each of us; and we make from within
us the world we see. A weary heart gets no gladness out of sun-
shine; a selfish man is sceptical about friendship, as a man with
no ear doesn't care for music. A frightful self-consciousness it must
have been, which looked on mankind so darkly through those keen
eyes of Swift.

A remarkable story is told by Scott, of Delany, who interrupted
Archbishop King and Swift in a conversation which left the prelate
in tears, and from which Swift rushed away with marks of strong
terror and agitation in his countenance, upon which the Archbishop
said to Delany, "You have just met the most unhappy man on earth;
but on the subject of his wretchedness you must never ask a ques-
tion."

The most unhappy man on earth; — Miserrimus — what a character
of him! And at this time all the great wits of England had been
at his feet. All Ireland had shouted after him, and worshipped him
as a liberator, a saviour, the greatest Irish patriot and citizen. Dean
Drapier BickerstafI Gulliver — the most famous statesmen, and the
greatest poets of his day, had applauded him, and done him homage;
and at this time, writing over to Bolingbroke from Ireland, he says,
"It is time for me to have done with the world, and so I would if I
could get into a better before I was called into the best, and not
die here in a rage, lil^e a poisoned rat in a hole."

We have spoken about the men, and Swift's behaviour to them;
and now it behoves us not to forget that there are certain other
persons in the creation who had rather intimate relations with the
great Dean. Two women whom he loved and injured are known
by every reader of books so familiarly that if we had seen them, or
if they had been relatives of our own, we scarcely could have known
them better. Who hasn't in his mind an image of Stella? Who
does not love her? Fair and tender creature: pure and affectionate
heart! Boots it to you, now that you have been at rest for a hundred
and twenty years, not divided in death from the cold heart which

24 THACKERAY

caused yours, whilst it beat, such faithful pangs of love and grief —
boots it to you now, that the whole world loves and deplores you?
Scarce any man, I believe, ever thought of that grave, that did not
cast a flower of pity on it, and write over it a sweet epitaph. Gentle
lady, so lovely, so loving, so unhappy! you have had countless cham-
pions; millions of manly hearts mourning for you. From generation
to generation we take up the fond tradition of your beauty; we
watch and follow your tragedy, your bright morning love and
purity, your constancy, your grief, your sweet martyrdom. We
know your legend by heart. You are one of the saints of English
story.

And if Stella's love and innocence are charming to contemplate,
I will say that in spite of ill-usage, in spite of drawbacks, in spite
of mysterious separation and union, of hope delayed and sickened
heart — ^in the teeth of Vanessa, and that little episodical aberration
which plunged Swift into such woful pitfalls and quagmires of
amorous perplexity — ^in spite of the verdicts of most women, I be-
lieve, who, as far as my experience and conversation go, generally
take Vanessa's part in the controversy — in spite of the tears which
Swift caused Stella to shed, and the rocks and barriers which fate
and temper interposed, and which prevented the pure course of
that true love from running smoothly — the brightest part of Swift's
story, the pure star in that dark and tempestuous life of Swift's, is
his love for Hester Johnson. It has been my business, professionally
of course, to go through a deal of sentimental reading in my time,
and to acquaint myself with love-making, as it has been described
in various languages, and at various ages of the world; and I know
of nothing more manly, more tender, more exquisitely touching,
than some of these brief notes, written in what Swift calls "his little
language" in his journal to Stella.

He writes to her night and morning often. He never sends away
a letter to her but he begins a new one on the same day. He can't
bear to let go her kind little hand, as it were. He knows that she
is thinking of him, and longing for him far away in Dublin yonder.
He takes her letters from under his pillow and talks to them, famil-
iarly, paternally, with fond epithets and pretty caresses — as he would
to the sweet and artless creature who loved him. "Stay," he writes

SWIFT 25

one morning — it is the 14th of December, 1710 — "Stay, I will answer
some of your letter this morning in bed. Let me see. Come and
appear, little letter! Here I am, says he, and what say you to Stella
this morning fresh and fasting? And can Stella read this writing
without hurting her dear eyes?" he goes on, after more kind prattle
and fond whispering. The dear eyes shine clearly upon him then —
the good angel of his life is with him and blessing him. Ah, it was
a hard fate that wrung from them so many tears, and stabbed
pitilessly that pure and tender bosom. A hard fate: but would she
have changed it? I have heard a woman say that she would have
taken Swift's cruelty to have had his tenderness. He had a sort of
worship for her whilst he wounded her. He speaks of her after she
is gone; of her wit, of her kindness, of her grace, of her beauty,
with a simple love and reverence that are indescribably touching;
in contemplation of her goodness his hard heart melts into pathos;
his cold rhyme kindles and glows into poetry, and he falls down
on his knees, so to speak, before the angel whose life he had em-
bittered, confesses his own wretchedness and unworthiness, and
adores her with cries of remorse and love: —
"When on my sickly couch I lay.

Impatient both of night and day.

And groaning in unmanly strains,

Called every power to ease my pains.

Then Stella ran to my relief.

With cheerful face and inward grief.

And though by heaven's severe decree

She suffers hourly more than me.

No cruel master could require

From slaves employed for daily hire,

What Stella, by her friendship warmed,

With vigour and delight performed.

Now, with a soft and silent tread,

Unheard she moves about my bed:

My sinking spirits now supplies

With cordials in her hands and eyes.

Best pattern of true friends! beware;

You pay too dearly for your care

If, while your tenderness secures

My life, it must endanger yours:

For such a fool was never found

26 THACKERAY

Who pulled a palace to the ground.
Only to have the ruins made
Materials for a house decayed."

One little triumph Stella had in her life — one dear little piece of
injustice was performed in her favour, for which I confess, for my
part, i can't help thanking fate and the Dean. That other person
was sacrificed to her — that — that young woman, who lived five doors
from Dr. Swift's lodgings in Bury Street, and who flattered him, and
made love to him in such an outrageous manner — ^Vanessa was
thrown over.

Swift did not keep Stella's letters to him in reply to those he
wrote to her. He kept Bolingbroke's, and Pope's, and Harley's, and
Peterborough's: but Stella, "very carefully," the Lives say, kept
Swift's. Of course: that is the way of the world: and we cannot tell
what her style was, or of what sort were the little letters which the
Doctor placed there at night, and bade to appear from under his
pillow of a morning. But in Letter IV. of that famous collection he
describes his lodging in Bury Street, where he has the first floor, a
dining-room and bed-chamber, at eight shillings a week; and in
Letter VI. he says "he has visited a lady just come to town," whose
name somehow is not mentioned; and in Letter VIII. he enters
a query of Stella's — "What do you mean 'that boards near me, that
I dine with now and then'? What the deuce! You know whom
I have dined with every day since I left you, better than I do." Of
course she does. Of course Swift has not the slightest idea of what
she means. But in a few letters more it turns out that the Doctor
has been to dine "gravely" with a Miss Vanhomrigh: then that he
has been to "his neighbour": then that he has been unwell, and
means to dine for the whole week with his neighbour! Stella was
quite right in her previsions. She saw from the very first hint,
what was going to happen; and scented Vanessa in the air. The
rival is at the Dean's feet. The pupil and teacher are reading to-
gether, and drinking tea together, and going to prayers together,
and learning Latin together, and conjugating amo, atnas, amavi
together. The little language is over for poor Stella. By the rule
of grammar and the course of conjugation, doesn't amavi come
after amo and amas?

SWIFT 27

The loves o£ Cadenus and Vanessa you may peruse in Cadenus's
own poem on the subject, and in poor Vanessa's vehement expostu-
latory verses and letters to him; she adores him, implores him,
admires him, thinks him something godlike, and only prays to be
admitted to lie at his feet. As they are bringing him home from
church, those divine feet of Dr. Swift's are found pretty often in
Vanessa's parlour. He likes to be admired and adored. He finds
Miss Vanhomrigh to be a woman of great taste and spirit, and
beauty and wit, and a fortune too. He sees her every day; he does
not tell Stella about the business: until the impetuous Vanessa be-
comes too fond of him, until the Doctor is quite frightened by the
young woman's ardour, and confounded by her warmth. He wanted
to marry neither of them — that I believe was the truth; but if he had
not married Stella, Vanessa would have had him in spite of himself.
When he went back to Ireland, his Ariadne, not content to remain in
her isle, pursued the fugitive Dean. In vain he protested, he vowed,
he soothed, and bullied; the news of the Dean's marriage with Stella
at last came to her, and it killed her — she died of that passion.

And when she died, and Stella heard that Swift had written
beautifully regarding her, "That doesn't surprise me," said Mrs.
Stella, "for we all know the Dean could write beautifully about a
broomstick." A woman — a true woman! Would you have had one
of them forgive the other.?

In a note in his biography, Scott says that his friend Dr. Tuke of
Dublin has a lock of Stella's hair, enclosed in a paper by Swift, on
which are written, in the Dean's hand, the words: "Only a woman's
hair." An instance, says Scott, of the Dean's desire to veil his feelings
under the mask of cynical indifference.

See the various notions of critics! Do those words indicate indiffer-
ence or an attempt to hide feeling ? Did you ever hear or read four
words more pathetic ? Only a woman's hair : only love, only fidelity,
only purity, innocence, beauty; only the tenderest heart in the world
stricken and wounded, and passed away now out of reach of pangs
of hope deferred, love insulted, and pitiless desertion: — only that
lock of hair left; and memory and remorse, for the guilty, lonely
wretch, shuddering over the grave of his victim.

And yet to have had so much love, he must have given some.

28 THACKERAY

Treasures o£ wit and wisdom, and tenderness, too, must that man
have had locked up in the caverns of his gloomy heart, and shown
fitfully to one or two whom he took in there. But it was not good
to visit that place. People did not remain there long, and suffered
for having been there. He shrank away from all afJections sooner
or later. Stella and Vanessa both died near him, and away from
him. He had not heart enough to see them die. He broke from his
fastest friend, Sheridan; he slunk away from his fondest admirer,
Pope. His laugh jars on one's ear after seven score years. He was
always alone — alone and gnashing in the darkness, except when
Stella's sweet smile came and shone upon him. When that went,
silence and utter night closed over him. An immense genius; an
awful downfall and ruin. So great a man he seems to me, that
thinking of him is like thinking of an empire falling. We have
other great names to mention — none I think, however, so great or
so gloomy.

THE IDEA OF A UNIVERSITY

BY

JOHN HENRY NEWMAN

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

John Henry Newman was born in London, February 21, 1801. Going
up to Oxford at sixteen, he gained a scholarship at Trinity College, and
after graduation became fellow and tutor of Oriel, then the most alive,
intellectually, of the Oxford colleges. He took orders, and in 1828 was
appointed vicar of St. Mary's, the university church. In 1832 he had to
resign his tutorship on account of a difference of opinion with the head
of the college as to his duties and responsibilities, Newman regarding
his function as one of a "substantially religious nature."

Returning to Oxford the next year from a journey on the Continent,
he began, in cooperation with R. H. Froude and others, the publication
of the "Tracts for the Times," a series of pamphlets which gave a name
to the "Tractarian" or "Oxford" movement for the defence of the "doc-
trine of apostolical succession and the integrity of the Prayer-Book."
After several years of agitation, during which Newman came to exercise
an extraordinary influence in Oxford, the movement and its leader fell
under the official ban of the university and of the Anglican bishops, and
Newman withdrew from Oxford, feeling that the Anglican Church had
herself destroyed the defences which he had sought to build for her. In
October, 1845, he was received into the Roman Church.

The next year he went to Rome, and on his return introduced into
England the institute of the Oratory. In 1854 he went to Dublin for
four years as rector of the new Catholic university, and while there wrote
his volume on "The Idea of a University," in which he expounds with
wonderful clearness of thought and beauty of language his view of the
aim of education. In 1879 he was created cardinal in recognition of his
services to the cause of religion in England, and in 1890 he died. Of
the history of Newman's religious opinions and influence no hint can be
given here. The essays which follow do, indeed, imply important and
fundamental elements of his system of belief; but they can be taken in
detachment as the exposition of a view of the nature and value of culture
by a man who was himself the fine flower of English university training
and a master of English prose.

THE IDEA OF A UNIVERSITY

I. WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY?

IF I were asked to describe as briefly and popularly as I could,
what a University was, I should draw my answer from its
ancient designation of a Studium Generale, or "School of Uni-
versal Learning." This description implies the assemblage of stran-
gers from all parts in one spot; — from all parts; else, how will you
find professors and students for every department of knowledge?
and in one spot; else, how can there be any school at all? Accord-
ingly, in its simple and rudimental form, it is a school of knowledge
of every kind, consisting of teachers and learners from every quarter.
Many things are requisite to complete and satisfy the idea embodied
in this description; but such as this a University seems to be in its
essence, a place for the communication and circulation of thought,
by means of personal intercourse, through a wide extent of country.
There is nothing far-fetched or unreasonable in the idea thus
presented to us; and if this be a University, then a University does
but contemplate a necessity of our nature, and is but one specimen
in a particular medium, out of many which might be adduced in
others, of a provision for that necessity. Mutual education, in a
large sense of the word, is one of the great and incessant occupa-
tions of human society, carried on partly with set purpose, and
partly not. One generation forms another; and the existing genera-
tion is ever acting and reacting upon itself in the persons of its
individual members. Now, in this process, books, I need scarcely
say, that is, the liter a scripta, are one special instrument. It is true;
and emphatically so in this age. Considering the prodigious powers
of the press, and how they are developed at this time in the never-
intermitting issue of periodicals, tracts, pamphlets, works in series,
and light literature, we must allow there never was a time which

31

32 NEWMAN

promised fairer for dispensing with every other means of informa-
tion and instruction. What can we want more, you will say, for
the intellectual education of the whole man, and for every man,
than so exuberant and diversified and persistent a promulgation of
all kinds of knowledge? Why, you will ask, need we go up to
knowledge, when knowledge comes down to us? The Sibyl wrote
her prophecies upon the leaves of the forest, and wasted them; but
here such careless profusion might be prudently indulged, for it
can be afforded without loss, in consequence of the almost fabulous
fecundity of the instrument which these latter ages have invented.
We have sermons in stones, and books in the running brooks; works
larger and more comprehensive than those which have gained for
ancients an immortality, issue forth every morning, and are pro-
jected onwards to the ends of the earth at the rate of hundreds
of miles a day. Our seats are strewed, our pavements are powdered,
with swarms of little tracts; and the very bricks of 'our city walls
preach wisdom, by informing us by their placards where we can at
once cheaply purchase it.

I allow all this, and much more; such certainly is our popular
education, and its effects are remarkable. Nevertheless, after all,
even in this age, whenever men are really serious about getting what,
in the language of trade, is called "a good article," when they aim at
something precise, something refined, something really luminous,
something really large, something choice, they go to another market;
they avail themselves, in some shape or other, of the rival method,
the ancient method, of oral instruction, of present communication
between man and man, of teachers instead of learning, of the per-
sonal influence of a master, and the humble initiation of a disciple,
and, in consequence, of great centres of pilgrimage and throng,
which such a method of education necessarily involves. This, I think,
will be found to hold good in all those departments or aspects of
society, which possess an interest sufficient to bind men together, or
to constitute what is called "a world." It holds in the political world,
and in the high world, and in the religious world; and it holds also
in the literary and scientific world.

If the actions of men may be taken as any test of their convictions,
then we have reason for saying this, viz.: — that the province and the

WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY? 33

inestimable benefit of tlie litera scripta is that of being a record of
truth, and an authority of appeal, and an instrument of teaching in
the hands of a teacher; but that, if we wish to become exact and
fully furnished in any branch of knowledge which is diversified
and complicated, we must consult the living man and listen to his
living voice. I am not bound to investigate the cause of this, and
anything I may say will, I am conscious, be short of its full analysis; —
perhaps we may suggest, that no books can get through the number
of minute questions which it is possible to ask on any extended
subject, or can hit upon the very difficulties which are severally
felt by each reader in succession. Or again, that no book can convey
the special spirit and delicate peculiarities of its subject with that
rapidity and certainty which attend on the sympathy of mind with
mind, through the eyes, the look, the accent, and the manner, in
casual expressions thrown off at the moment, and the unstudied
turns of familiar conversation. But I am already dwelling too long
on what is but an incidental portion of my main subject. What-
ever be the cause, the fact is undeniable. The general principles
of any study you may learn by books at home; but the detail, the
colour, the tone, the air, the life which makes it live in us, you must
catch all these from those in whom it lives already. You must
imitate the student in French or German, who is not content with
his grammar, but goes to Paris or Dresden: you must take example
from the young artist, who aspires to visit the great Masters in
Florence and in Rome. Till we have discovered some intellectual
daguerreotype, which takes off the course of thought, and the form,
lineaments, and features of truth, as completely and minutely as
the optical instrument reproduces the sensible object, we must come
to the teachers of wisdom to learn wisdom, we must repair to the
fountain, and drink there. Portions of it may go from thence to
the ends of the earth by means of books; but the fulness is in one
place alone. It is in such assemblages and congregations of intellect
that books themselves, the masterpieces of human genius, are writ-
ten, or at least originated.

The principle on which I have been insisting is so obvious, and
instances in point are so ready, that I should think it tiresome to
proceed with the subject, except that one or two illustrations may

34 NEWMAN

serve to explain my own language about it, which may not have

done justice to the doctrine which it has been intended to enforce.

For instance, the polished manners and high-bred bearing which
are so difficult of attainment, and so strictly personal when attained,
— which are so much admired in society, from society are acquired.
All that goes to constitute a gentleman, — the carriage, gait, address,
gestures, voice; the ease, the self-possession, the courtesy, the power
of conversing, the talent of not offending; the lofty principle, the
delicacy of thought, the happiness of expression, the taste and pro-
priety, the generosity and forbearance, the candour and considera-
tion, the openness of hajid; — ^these qualities, some of them come by
nature, some of them may be found in any rank, some of them are
a direct precept of Christianity; but the full assemblage of them,
bound up in the unity of an individual character, do we expect they
can be learned from books ? are they not necessarily acquired, where
they are to be found, in high society? The very nature of the case
leads us to say so; you cannot fence without an antagonist, nor
challenge all comers in disputation before you have supported a
thesis; and in like manner, it stands to reason, you cannot learn to
converse till you have the world to converse with; you cannot un-
learn your natural bashf ulness, or awkwardness, or stiffness, or other
besetting deformity, till you serve your time in some school of
manners. Well, and is it not so in matter of fact? The metropolis,
the court, the great houses of the land, are the centres to which at
stated times the country comes up, as to shrines of refinement and
good taste; and then in due time the country goes back again
home, enriched with a portion of the social accomplishments, which
those very visits serve to call out and heighten in the gracious dis-
pensers of them. We are unable to conceive how the "gentleman-
like" can otherwise be maintained; and maintained in this way it is.

And now a second instance: and here too I am going to speak
without personal experience of the subject I am introducing. I
admit I have not been in Parliament, any more than I have figured
in the beau monde; yet I cannot but think that statesmanship, as well
as high breeding, is learned, not by books, but in certain centres of
education. If it be not presumption to say so. Parliament puts a
clever man au courant with politics and affairs of state in a way

WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY? 35

surprising to himself. A member of the Legislature, if tolerably
observant, begins to see things with new eyes, even though his
views undergo no change. Words have a meaning now, and ideas
a reality, such as they had not before. He hears a vast deal in pub-
lic speeches and private conversation, which is never put into print.
The bearings of measures and events, the action of parties, and the
persons of friends and enemies, are brought out to the man who is
in the midst of them with a distinctness, which the most diligent
perusal of newspapers will fail to impart to them. It is access to the
fountain-heads of political wisdom and experience, it is daily inter-
course, of one kind or another, with the multitude who go up to
them, it is familiarity with business, it is access to the contributions
of fact and opinion thrown together by many witnesses from many
quarters, which does this for him. However, I need not account
for a fact, to which it is sufficient to appeal; that the Houses of
Parliament and the atmosphere around them are a sort of University
of politics.

As regards the world of science, we find a remarkable instance of
the principle which I am illustrating, in the periodical meetings for
its advance, which have arisen in the course of the last twenty years,
such as the British Association. Such gatherings would to many
persons appear at first sight simply preposterous. Above all subjects
of study. Science is conveyed, is propagated, by books, or by private
teaching; experiments and investigations are conducted in silence;
discoveries are made in solitude. What have philosophers to do with
festive celebrities, and panegyrical solemnities with mathematical
and physical truth? Yet on a closer attention to the subject, it is
found that not even scientific thought can dispense with the sug-
gestions, the instruction, the stimulus, the sympathy, the intercourse
with mankind on a large scale, which such meetings secure. A fine
time of year is chosen, when days are long, skies are bright, the
earth smiles, and all nature rejoices; a city or town is taken by turns,
of ancient name or modern opulence, where buildings are spacious
and hospitality hearty. The novelty of place and circumstance, the
excitement of strange, or the refreshment of well-known faces, the
majesty of rank or of genius, the amiable charities of men pleased
both with themselves and with each other; the elevated spirits, the

36 NEWMAN

circulation of thought, the curiosity; the morning sections, the out-
door exercise, the well-furnished, well-earned board, the not ungrace-
ful hilarity, the evening circle; the brilliant lecture, the discussions
or collisions or guesses of great men one with another, the narratives
of scientific processes, of hopes, disappointments, conflicts, and suc-
cesses, the splendid eulogistic orations; these and the like constituents
of the annual celebration, are considered to do something real and
substantial for the advance of knowledge which can be done in no
other way. Of course they can but be occasional; they answer to the
annual Act, or Commencement, or Commemoration of a University,
not to its ordinary condition; but they are of a University nature;
and I can well believe in their utility. They issue in the promotion
of a certain living and, as it were, bodily communication of knowl-
edge from one to another, of a general interchange of ideas, and a
comparison and adjustment of science with science, of an enlarge-
ment of mind, intellectual and social, of an ardent love of the par-
ticular study, which may be chosen by each individual, and a noble
devotion to its interests.

Such meetings, I repeat, are but periodical, and only partially
represent the idea of a University. The bustle and whirl which are
their usual concomitants, are in ill keeping with the order and grav-
ity of earnest intellectual education. We desiderate means of in-
struction which involve no interruption of our ordinary habits; nor
need we seek it long, for the natural course of things brings it
about, while we debate over it. In every great country, the metrop-
olis itself becomes a sort of necessary University, whether we will
or no. As the chief city is the seat of the court, of high society, of
politics, and of law, so as a matter of course is it the seat of letters
also; and at this time, for a long term of years, London and Paris
are in fact and in operation Universities, though in Paris its famous
University is no more, and in London a University scarcely exists
except as a board of administration. The newspapers, magazines,
reviews, journals, and periodicals of all kinds, the publishing trade,
the libraries, museums, and academies there found, the learned and
scientific societies, necessarily invest it with the functions of a Uni-
versity; and that atmosphere of intellect, which in a former age
hung over Oxford or Bologna or Salamanca, has, with the change

WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY? 37

o£ times, moved away to the centre of civil govermnent. Thither
come up youths from all parts of the country, the students of law,
medicine, and the fine arts, and the employes and attaches of litera-
ture. There they live, as chance determines; and they are satisfied
with their temporary home, for they find in it all that was promised
to them there. They have not come in vain, as far as their own
object in coming is concerned. They have not learned any particular
religion, but they have learned their own particular profession well.
They have, moreover, become acquainted with the habits, manners,
and opinions of their place of sojourn, and done their part in main-
taining the tradition of them. We cannot then be without virtual
Universities; a metropolis is such: the simple question is, whether
the education sought and given should be based on principle, formed
upon rule, directed to the highest ends, or left to the random suc-
cession of masters and schools, one after another, with a melancholy
waste of thought and an extreme hazard of truth.

Religious teaching itself affords us an illustration of our subject
to a certain point. It does not indeed seat itself merely in centres of
the world; this is impossible from the nature of the case. It is in-
tended for the many, not the few; its subject matter is truth neces-
sary for us, not truth recondite and rare; but it concurs in the
principle of a University so far as this, that its great instrument,
or rather organ, has ever been that which nature prescribes in all
education, the personal presence of a teacher, or, in theological lan-
guage. Oral Tradition. It is the living voice, the breathing form,
the expressive countenance, which preaches, which catechizes. Truth,
a subtle, invisible, manifold spirit, is poured into the mind of the
scholar by his eyes and ears, through his affections, imagination,
and reason; it is poured into his mind and is sealed up there in per-
petuity, by propounding and repeating it, by questioning and re-
questioning, by correcting and explaining, by progressing and then
recurring to first principles, by all those ways which are implied
in the word "catechizing." In the first ages, it was a work of long
time; months, sometimes years, were devoted to the arduous task
of disabusing the mind of the incipient Christian of its pagan
errors, and of moulding it upon the Christian faith. The Scriptures
indeed were at hand for the study of those who could avail them-

38 NEWMAN

selves of them; but St. Irenaeus does not hesitate to speak of whole
races, who had been converted to Christianity, without being able
to read them. To be unable to read or write was in those times no
evidence of want of learning: the hermits of the deserts were, in
this sense of the word, illiterate; yet the great St. Anthony, though
he knew not letters, was a match in disputation for the learned phi-
losophers who came to try him. Didymus again, the great Alex-
andrian theologian, was blind. The ancient discipline, called the
Disciplina Arcani, involved the same principle. The more sacred
doctrines of Revelation were not committed to books but passed on
by successive tradition. The teaching on the Blessed Trinity and the
Eucharist appears to have been so handed down for some hundred
years; and when at length reduced to writing, it has filled many
folios, yet has not been exhausted.

But I have said more than enough in illustration; I end as I began;
— a University is a place of concourse, whither students come from
every quarter for every kind of knowledge. You cannot have the
best of every kind everywhere; you must go to some great city or
emporium for it. There you have all the choicest productions of
nature and art all together, which you find each in its own separate
place elsewhere. All the riches of the land, and of the earth, are
carried up thither; there are the best markets, and there the best
workmen. It is the centre of trade, the supreme court of fashion,
the umpire of rival talents, and the standard of things rare and
precious. It is the place for seeing galleries of first-rate pictures,
and for hearing wonderful voices and performers of transcendent
skill. It is the place for great preachers, great orators, great nobles,
great statesmen. In the nature of things, greatness and unity go
together; excellence implies a centre. And such, for the third or
fourth time, is a University; I hope I do not weary out the reader
by repeating it. It is the place to which a thousand schools make
contributions; in which the intellect may safely range and speculate,
sure to find its equal in some antagonist activity, and its judge in
the tribunal of truth. It is a place where inquiry is pushed forward,
and discoveries verified and perfected, and rashness rendered in-
nocuous, and error exposed, by the collision of mind with mind,
and knowledge with knowledge. It is the place where the professor

WHAT IS A UNIVERSITY? 39

becomes eloquent, and is a missionary and a preacher, displaying
his science in its most complete and most winning form, pouring it
forth with the zeal of enthusiasm, and lighting up his own love
of it in the breasts of his hearers. It is the place where the catechist
makes good his ground as he goes, treading in the truth day by day
into the ready memory, and wedging and tightening it into the
expanding reason. It is a place which wins the admiration of the
young by its celebrity, kindles the affections of the middle-aged by
its beauty, and rivets the fidelity of the old by its associations. It
is a seat of wisdom, a light of the world, a minister of the faith,
an Alma Mater of the rising generation. It is this and a great deal
more, and demands a somewhat better head and hand than mine
to describe it well.

Such is a University in its idea and in its purpose; such in good
measure has it before now been in fact. Shall it ever be again? We
are going forward in the strength of the Cross, under the patronage
of the Blessed Virgin, in the name of St. Patrick, to attempt it.

II. SITE OF A UNIVERSITY

IF we would know what a University is, considered in its ele-
mentary idea, we must betake ourselves to the first and most
celebrated home of European literature and source of European
civilization, to the bright and beautiful Athens, — Athens, whose
schools drew to her bosom, and then sent back again to the business
of life, the youth of the Western World for a long thousand years.
Seated on the verge of the continent, the city seemed hardly suited
for the duties of a central metropolis of knowledge; yet, what it lost
in convenience of approach, it gained in its neighbourhood to the
traditions of the mysterious East, and in the loveliness of the region
in which it lay. Hither, then, as to a sort of ideal land, where all
archetypes of the great and the fair were found in substantial being,
and all departments of truth explored, and all diversities of intellec-
tual power exhibited, where taste and philosophy were majestically
enthroned as in a royal court, where there was no sovereignty but
that of mind, and no nobility but that of genius, where professors
were rulers, and princes did homage, hither flocked continually from
the very corners of the orbis terrarum, the many-tongued generation,
just rising, or just risen into manhood, in order to gain wisdom.

Pisistratus had in an early age discovered and nursed the infant
genius of his people, and Cimon, after the Persian war, had given it
a home. That war had established the naval supremacy of Athens;
she had become an imperial state; and the lonians, bound to her
by the double chain of kindred and of subjection, were importing
into her both their merchandize and their civilization. The arts and
philosophy of the Asiatic coast were easily carried across the sea,
and there was Cimon, as I have said, with his ample fortune, ready
to receive them with due honours. Not content with patronizing
their professors, he built the first of those noble porticos, of which
we hear so much in Athens, and he formed the groves, which in
process of time became the celebrated Academy. Planting is one
of the most graceful, as in Athens it was one of the most beneficent,

40

SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 4 1

of employments. Cimon took in hand the wild wood, pruned and
dressed it, and laid it out with handsome walks and welcome foun-
tains. Nor, while hospitable to the authors of the city's civilization,
was he ungrateful to the instruments of her prosperity. His trees
extended their cool, umbrageous branches over the merchants, who
assembled in the Agora, for many generations.

Those merchants certainly had deserved that act of bounty; for all
the while their ships had been carrying forth the intellectual fame
of Athens to the western world. Then commenced what may be
called her University existence. Pericles, who succeeded Cimon both
in the government and in the patronage of art, is said by Plutarch
to have entertained the idea of making Athens the capital of fed-
erated Greece: in this he failed, but his encouragement of such men
as Phidias and Anaxagoras led the way to her acquiring a far more
lasting sovereignty over a far wider empire. Little understanding
the sources of her own greatness, Athens would go to war: peace
is the interest of a seat of commerce and the arts; but to war she
went; yet to her, whether peace or war, it mattered not. The political
power of Athens waned and disappeared; kingdoms rose and fell;
centuries rolled away, — they did but bring fresh triumphs to the
city of the poet and the sage. There at length the swarthy Moor
and Spaniard were seen to meet the blue-eyed Gaul; and the Cappa-
docian, late subject of Mithridates, gazed without alarm at the
haughty conquering Roman. Revolution after revolution passed over
the face of Europe, as well as of Greece, but still she was there, —
Athens, the city of mind, — as radiant, as splendid, as delicate, as
young, as ever she had been.

Many a more fruitful coast or isle is washed by the blue ^gean,
many a spot is there more beautiful or sublime to see, many a terri-
tory more ample; but there was one charm in Attica, which in the
same perfection was nowhere else. The deep pastures of Arcadia,
the plain of Argos, the Thessalian vale, these had not the gift;
Bceotia, which lay to its immediate north, was notorious for its very
want of it. The heavy atmosphere of that Bceotia might be good
for vegetation, but it was associated in popular belief with the
dulness of the Boeotian intellect: on the contrary, the special purity,
elasticity, clearness, and salubrity of the air of Attica, lit concomitant

42 NEWMAN

and emblem of its genius, did that for it which earth did not; — it
brought out every bright hue and tender shade of the landscape over
which it was spread, and would have illuminated the face even of a
more bare and rugged country.

A confined triangle, perhaps fifty miles its greatest length, and
thirty its greatest breadth; two elevated rocky barriers, meeting at an
angle; three prominent mountains, commanding the plain, — Parnes,
Pentelicus, and Hymettus; an unsatisfactory soil; some streams, not
always full; — such is about the report which the agent of a London
company would have made of Attica. He would report that the
climate was mild; the hills were limestone; there was plenty of
good marble; more pasture land than at first survey might have
been expected, sufficient certainly for sheep and goats; fisheries pro-
ductive; silver mines once, but long since worked out; figs fair;
oil first-rate; olives in profusion. But what he would not think of
noting down, was, that that olive tree was so choice in nature and
so noble in shape, that it excited a religious veneration; and that it
took so kindly to the light soil, as to expand into woods upon the
open plain, and to climb up and fringe the hills. He would not
think of writing word to his employers, how that clear air, of which
I have spoken, brought out, yet blended and subdued the colours on
the marble, till they had a softness and harmony, for all their rich-
ness, which in a picture looks exaggerated, yet is after all within
the truth. He would not tell, how that same delicate and brilliant
atmosphere freshened up the pale olive, till the olive forgot its
monotony, and its cheek glowed like the arbutus or beech of the
Umbrian hills. He would say nothing of the thyme and thousand
fragrant herbs which carpeted Hymettus; he would hear nothing
of the hum of its bees; nor take much account of the rare flavour
of its honey, since Gozo and Minorca were sufficient for the English
demand. He would look over the ^Egean from the height he had
ascended; he would follow with his eye the chain of islands, which,
starting from the Sunian headland, seemed to offer the fabled divin-
ities of Attica, when they would visit their Ionian cousins, a sort of
viaduct thereto across the sea; but that fancy would not occur to
him, nor any admiration of the dark violet billows with their white
edges down below; nor of those graceful, fanlike jets of silver upon

SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 43

the rocks, which slowly rise aloft like water spirits from the deep,
then shiver, and break, and spread, and shroud themselves, and
disappear, in a soft mist of foam; nor of the gentle, incessant heaving
and panting of the whole liquid plain; nor of the long waves, keep-
ing steady time, like a line of soldiery, as they resound upon the
hollow shore, — he would not deign to notice that restless Hving
element at all, except to bless his stars that he was not upon it. Nor
the distinct detail, nor the refined colouring, nor the graceful outline
and roseate golden hue of the jutting crags, nor the bold shadows
cast from Otus or Laurium by the declining sun; — our agent of a
mercantile firm would not value these matters even at a low figure.
Rather we must turn for the sympathy we seek to yon pilgrim
student come from a semi-barbarous land to that small corner of
the earth, as to a shrine, where he might take his fill of gazing on
those emblems and coruscations of invisible unoriginate perfection.
It was the stranger from a remote province, from Britain or from
Mauritania, who in a scene so different from that of his chilly, woody
swamps, or of his fiery, choking sands, learned at once what a real
University must be, by coming to understand the sort of country,
which was its suitable home.

Nor was this all that a University required, and found in Athens.
No one, even there, could live on poetry. If the students at that
famous place had nothing better than bright hues and soothing
sounds, they would not have been able or disposed to turn their
residence there to much account. Of course they must have the
means of living, nay, in a certain sense, of enjoyment, if Athens
was to be an Alma Mater at the time, or to remain afterwards a
pleasant thought in their memory. And so they had: be it recollected
Athens was a port, and a mart of trade, perhaps the first in Greece;
and this was very much to the point, when a number of strangers
were ever flocking to it, whose combat was to be with intellectual,
not physical difficulties, and who claimed to have their bodily wants
supplied, that they might be at leisure to set about furnishing their
minds. Now, barren as was the soil of Attica, and bare the face
of the country, yet it had only too many resources for an elegant,
nay luxurious abode there. So abundant were the imports of the
place, that it was a common saying, that the productions, which

44 NEWMAN

were found singly elsewhere, were brought all together in Athens.
Corn and wine, the staple o£ subsistence in such a climate, came
from the isles of the ^gean; fine wool and carpeting from Asia
Minor; slaves, as now, from the Euxine, and timber too; and iron
and brass from the coasts of the Mediterranean. The Athenian did
not condescend to manufactures himself, but encouraged them in
others; and a population of foreigners caught at the lucrative occu-
pation both for home consumption and for exportation. Their cloth,
and other textures for dress and furniture, and their hardware — for
instance, armour — were in great request. Labour was cheap; stone
and marble in plenty; and the taste and skill, which at first were
devoted to public buildings, as temples and porticos, were in course
of time applied to the mansions of public men. If nature did much
for Athens, it is undeniable that art did much more.

Here some one will interrupt me with the remark: "By the bye,
where are we, and whither are we going? — what has all this to do
with a University? at least what has it to do with education? It is
instructive doubtless; but still how much has it to do with your
subject?" Now I beg to assure the reader that I am most conscien-
tiously employed upon my subject; and I should have thought
every one would have seen this: however, since the objection is
made, I may be allowed to pause awhile, and show distinctly the
drift of what I have been saying, before I go farther. What has this
to do with my subject! why, the question of the site is the very first
that comes into consideration, when a Stadium Generale is con-
templated; for that site should be a liberal and noble one; who will
deny it? All authorities agree in this, and very little reflection will
be sufficient to make it clear. I recollect a conversation I once had
on this very subject with a very eminent man. I was a youth of
eighteen, and was leaving my University for the Long Vacation,
when I found myself in company in a public conveyance with a
middle-aged person, whose face was strange to me. However, it
was the great academical luminary of the day, whom afterwards I
knew very well. Luckily for me, I did not suspect it; and luckily
too, it was a fancy of his, as his friends knew, to make himself on
easy terms especially with stage-coach companions. So, what with
my flippancy and his condescension, I managed to hear many things

SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 45

which were novel to me at the time; and one point which he was
strong upon, and was evidently fond of urging, was the material
pomp and circumstance which should environ a great seat of learn-
ing. He considered it was worth the consideration of the govern-
ment, whether Oxford should not stand in a domain of its own. An
ample range, say four miles in diameter, should be turned into wood
and meadow, and the University should be approached on all sides
by a magnificent park, with fine trees in groups and groves and
avenues, and with glimpses and views of the fair city, as the traveller
drew near it. There is nothing surely absurd in the idea, though it
would cost a round sum to realize it. What has a better claim to
the purest and fairest possessions of nature, than the seat of wisdom ?
So thought my coach companion; and he did but express the tradi-
tion of ages and the instinct of mankind.

For instance, take the great University of Paris. That famous
school engrossed as its territory the whole south bank of the Seine,
and occupied one half, and that the pleasanter half, of the city. King
Louis had the island pretty well as his own, — it was scarcely more
than a fortification; and the north of the river was given over to the
nobles and citizens to do what they could with its marshes; but the
eligible south, rising from the stream, which swept around its base,
to the fair summit of St. Genevieve, with its broad meadows, its
vineyards and its gardens, and with the sacred elevation of Mont-
martre confronting it, all this was the inheritance of the University.
There was that pleasant Pratum, stretching along the river's bank,
in which the students for centuries took their recreation, which
Alcuin seems to mention in his farewell verses to Paris, and which
has given a name to the great Abbey of St. Germain-des-Pres. For
long years it was devoted to the purposes of innocent and healthy
enjoyment; but evil times came on the University; disorder arose
within its precincts, and the fair meadow became the scene of party
brawls; heresy stalked through Europe, and Germany and England
no longer sending their contingent of students, a heavy debt was the
consequence to the academical body. To let their land was the only
resource left to them: buildings rose upon it, and spread along the
green sod, and the country at length became town. Great was the
grief and indignation of the doctors and masters, when this catas-

46 NEWMAN

trophe occurred. "A wretched sight," said the Proctor of the Ger-
man nation, "a wretched sight, to witness the sale of that ancient
manor, whither the Muses were wont to wander for retirement and
pleasure. Whither shall the youthful student now betake himself,
what relief will he find for his eyes, wearied with intense reading,
now that the pleasant stream is taken from him?" Two centuries
and more have passed since this complaint was uttered; and time
has shown that the outward calamity, which it recorded, was but the
emblem of the great moral revolution, which was to follow; till the
institution itself has followed its green meadows, into the region of
things which once were and now are not.

And in like manner, when they were first contemplating a Uni-
versity in Belgium, some centuries ago, "Many," says Lipsius, "sug-
gested Mechlin, as an abode salubrious and clean, but Louvain was
preferred, as for other reasons, so because no city seemed from the
disposition of place and people, more suitable for learned leisure.
Who will not approve the decision? Can a site be healthier or
more pleasant ? The atmosphere pure and cheerful ; the spaces open
and delightful; meadows, fields, vines, groves, nay, I may say, a
rus in urbe. Ascend and walk round the walls; what do you look
down upon ? Does not the wonderful and delightful variety smooth
the brow and soothe the mind? You have corn, and apples, and
grapes; sheep and oxen; and birds chirping or singing. Now carry
your feet or your eyes beyond the walls; there are streamlets, the
river meandering along; country-houses, convents, the superb for-
tress; copses or woods fill up the scene, and spots for simple enjoy-
ment." And then he breaks out into poetry:

Salvete Athenac nostrae, Athenae Belgicae,
Te Gallus, te Germanus, et te Sarmata
Invisit, et Britannus, et te duplicis
Hispaniae alumnus, etc.

Extravagant, then, and wayward as might be the thought of my
learned coach companion, when, in the nineteenth century, he imag-
ined, Norman-wise, to turn a score of villages into a park or pleas-
aunce, still, the waywardness of his fancy is excused by the justness
of his principle; for certainly, such as he would have made it, a Uni-

SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 47

versity ought to be. Old Antony-a-Wood, discoursing on the de-
mands of a University, had expressed the same sentiment long before
him; as Horace in ancient times, with reference to Athens itself,
when he spoke of seeking truth "in the groves of Academe." And
to Athens, as will be seen, Wood himself appeals, when he would
discourse of Oxford. Among "those things which are required to
make a University," he puts down, —

"First, a good and pleasant site, where there is a wholesome and
temperate constitution of the air; composed with waters, springs or
wells, woods and pleasant fields; which being obtained, those com-
modities are enough to invite students to stay and abide there. As
the Athenians in ancient times were happy for their conveniences,
so also were the Britons, when by a remnant of the Grecians that
came amongst them, they or their successors selected such a place
in Britain to plant a school or schools therein, which for its pleasant
situation was afterwards called Bellositum or Bellosite, now Oxford,
privileged with all those conveniences before mentioned."

By others the local advantages of that University have been more
philosophically analyzed; — for instance, with a reference to its posi-
tion in the middle of southern England; its situation on several
islands in a broad plain, through which many streams flowed; the
surrounding marshes, which, in times when it was needed, protected
the city from invaders; its own strength as a military position; its
easy communication with London, nay with the sea, by means of
the Thames; while the London fortifications hindered pirates from
ascending the stream, which all the time was so ready and con-
venient for a descent.

Alas! for centuries past that city has lost its prime honour and
boast, as a servant and soldier of the Truth. Once named the second
school of the Church, second only to Paris, the foster-mother of St.
Edmund, St. Richard, St. Thomas Cantilupe, the theatre of great
intellects, of Scotus the subtle Doctor, of Hales the irrefragable, of
Occam the special, of Bacon the admirable, of Middleton the solid,
and of Bradwardine the profound, Oxford has now lapsed to that
level of mere human loveliness, which in its highest perfection we
admire in Athens. Nor would it have a place, now or hereafter,
in these pages, nor would it occur to me to speak its name, except

48 NEWMAN

that, even in its sorrowful deprivation, it still retains so much of
that outward lustre, which, like the brightness on the prophet's face,
ought to be a ray from an illumination within, as to afford me an
illustration of the point on which I am engaged, viz., what should
be the material dwelling-place and appearance, the local circum-
stances, and the secular concomitants of a great University. Pictures
are drawn in tales of romance, of spirits seemingly too beautiful
in their fall to be really fallen, and the holy Pope at Rome, Gregory,
in fact, and not in fiction, looked upon the blue eyes and golden
hair of the fierce Saxon youth in the slave market, and pronounced
them Angels, not Angles; and the spell which this once loyal daugh-
ter of the Church still exercises upon the foreign visitor, even now
when her true glory is departed, suggests to us how far more majestic
and more touching, how brimful of indescribable influence would
be the presence of a University, which was planted within, not with-
out Jerusalem, — an influence, potent as her truth is strong, wide as
her sway is world-wide, and growing, not lessening, by the extent
of space over which its attraction would be exerted.

Let the reader then listen to the words of the last learned German,
who has treated of Oxford, and judge for himself if they do not
bear me out, in what I have said of the fascination which the very
face and smile of a University possess over those who come within
its range.

"There is scarce a spot in the world," says Huber, "that bears an
historical stamp so deep and varied as Oxford; where so many noble
memorials of moral and material power cooperating to an honour-
able end, meet the eye all at once. He who can be proof against the
strong emotions which the whole aspect and genius of the place tend
to inspire, must be dull, thoughtless, uneducated, or of very per-
verted views. Others will bear us witness, that, even side by side with
the Eternal Rome, the Alma Mater of Oxford may be fitly named,
as producing a deep, a lasting, and peculiar impression.

"In one of the most fertile districts of the Queen of the Seas, whom
nature has so richly blessed, whom for centuries past no footstep
of foreign armies has desecrated, lies a broad green vale, where the
Cherwell and the Isis mingle their full, clear waters. Here and there
primeval elms and oaks overshadow them; while in their various

SITE OF A UNIVERSITY 49

windings they encircle gardens, meadows, and fields, villages, cot-
tages, farm-houses, and country-seats, in motley mixture. In the
midst rises a mass of mighty buildings, the general character of
which varies between convent, palace, and castle. Some few Gothic
church-towers and Romaic domes, it is true, break through the
horizontal lines; yet the general impression at a distance and at
first sight, is essentially different from that of any of the towns of
the middle ages. The outlines are far from being so sharp, so
angular, so irregular, so fantastical; a certain softness, a peculiar
repose, reigns in those broader, terrace-like rising masses. Only in
the creations of Claude Lorraine or Poussin could we expect to find
a spot to compare with the prevailing character of this picture,
especially when lit up by a favourable light. The principal masses
consist of Colleges, the University buildings, and the city churches;
and by the side of these the city itself is lost on distant view. But on
entering the streets, we find around us all the signs of an active
and prosperous trade. Rich and elegant shops in profusion afford
a sight to be found nowhere but in England; but with all this
glitter and show, they sink into a modest, and, as it were, a menial
attitude, by the side of the grandly severe memorials of the higher
intellectual life, memorials which have been growing out of that life
from almost the beginning of Christianity itself. Those rich and
elegant shops are, as it were, the domestic offices of these palaces of
learning, which ever rivet the eye of the observer, while all besides
seems perforce to be subservient to them. Each of the larger and
more ancient Colleges looks like a separate whole — an entire town,
whose walls and monuments proclaim the vigorous growth of many
centuries; and the town itself has happily escaped the lot of modern
beautifying, and in this respect harmonizes with the Colleges."

There are those who, having felt the influence of this ancient
School, and being smit with its splendour and its sweetness, ask
wistfully, if never again it is to be Catholic, or whether at least
some footing for Catholicity may not be found there. All honour
and merit to the charitable and zealous hearts who so inquire! Nor
can we dare to tell what in time to come may be the inscrutable
purposes of that grace, which is ever more comprehensive than
human hope and aspiration. But for me, from the day I left its

50 NEWMAN

walls, I never, for good or bad, have had anticipation of its future;
and never for a moment have I had a wish to see again a place,
which I have never ceased to love, and where I lived for nearly
thirty years. Nay, looking at the general state of things at this day,
I desiderate for a School of the Church, if an additional School is
to be granted to us, a more central position than Oxford has to show.
Since the age of Alfred and of the first Henry, the world has grown,
from the west and south of Europe, into four or five continents; and
I look for a city less inland than that old sanctuary, and a country
closer upon the highway of the seas. I look towards a land both old
and young; old in its Christianity, young in the promise of its future;
a nation, which received grace before the Saxon came to Britain, and
which has never quenched it; a Church, which comprehends in its
history the rise and fall of Canterbury and York, which Augustine
and Paulinus found, and Pole and Fisher left behind them. I con-
template a people which has had a long night, and will have an
inevitable day. I am turning my eyes towards a hundred years to
come, and I dimly see the island I am gazing on, become the road
of passage and union between two hemispheres, and the centre of
the world. I see its inhabitants rival Belgium in populousness, France
in vigour, and Spain in enthusiasm; and I see England taught by
advancing years to exercise in its behalf that good sense which is
her characteristic towards every one else. The capital of that pros-
perous and hopeful land is situate in a beautiful bay and near a
romantic region; and in it I see a flourishing University, which for
a while had to struggle with fortune, but which, when its first
founders and servants were dead and gone, had successes far exceed-
ing their anxieties. Thither, as to a sacred soil, the home of their
fathers, and the fountain-head of their Christianity, students are
flocking from East, West, and South, from America and Australia
and India, from Egypt and Asia Minor, with the ease and rapidity
of a locomotion not yet discovered, and last, though not least, from
England, — all speaking one tongue, all owning one faith, all eager
for one large true wisdom; and thence, when their stay is over,
going back again to carry over all the earth "peace to men of good
will."

III. UNIVERSITY LIFE AT
ATHENS

HOWEVER apposite may have been the digression into
which I was led when I had got about half through the
foregoing Chapter, it has had the inconvenience of what
may be called running me off the rails; and now that I wish to pro-
ceed from the point at which it took place, I shall find some trouble,
if I may continue the metaphor, in getting up the steam again, or if
I may change it, in getting into the swing of my subject.

It has been my desire, were I able, to bring before the reader what
Athens may have been, viewed as what we have since called a Uni-
versity; and to do this, not with any purpose of writing a panegyric
on a heathen city, or of denying its many deformities, or of con-
cealing what was morally base in what was intellectually great, but
just the contrary, of representing things as they really were; so far,
that is, as to enable him to see what a University is, in the very
constitution of society and in its own idea, what is its nature and
object, and what it needs of aid and support external to itself to
complete that nature and to secure that object.

So now let us fancy our Scythian, or Armenian, or African, or
Italian, or Gallic student, after tossing on the Saronic waves, which
would be his more ordinary course to Athens, at last casting anchor
at Pirsus. He is of any condition or rank of life you please, and
may be made to order, from a prince to a peasant. Perhaps he is
some Cleanthes, who has been a boxer in the public games. How
did it ever cross his brain to betake himself to Athens in search of
wisdom? or, if he came thither by accident, how did the love of it
ever touch his heart? But so it was, to Athens he came with three
drachms in his girdle, and he got his livelihood by drawing water,
carrying loads, and the like servile occupations. He attached him-
self, of all philosophers, to Zeno the Stoic, — to Zeno, the most high-
minded, the most haughty of speculators; and out of his daily earn-

51

52 NEWMAN

ings the poor scholar brought his master the daily sum o£ an obolus.
in payment for attending his lectures. Such progress did he make,
that on Zeno's death he actually was his successor in his school; and,
if my memory does not play me false, he is the author of a hymn
to the Supreme Being, which is one of the noblest effusions of the
kind in classical poetry. Yet, even when he was the head of a school,
he continued in his illiberal toil as if he had been a monk; and it
is said that once, when the wind took his pallium, and blew it aside,
he was discovered to have no other garment at all; — something like
the German student who came up to Heidelberg with nothing upon
him but a greatcoat and a pair of pistols.

Or it is another disciple of the Porch, — Stoic by nature, earlier
than by profession, — who is entering the city; but in what different
fashion he comes! It is no other than Marcus, Emperor of Rome and
philosopher. Professors long since were summoned from Athens
for his service, when he was a youth, and now he comes, after his
victories in the battlefield, to make his acknowledgments, at the end
of life, to the city of wisdom, and to submit himself to an initiation
into the Eleusinian mysteries.

Or it is a young man of great promise as an orator, were it not
for his weakness of chest, which renders it necessary that he should
acquire the art of speaking without over-exertion, and should adopt
a delivery sufficient for the display of his rhetorical talents on the
one hand, yet merciful to his physical resources on the other. He is
called Cicero; he will stop but a short time, and will pass over to
Asia Minor and its cities, before he returns to continue a career
which will render his name immortal; and he will like his short so-
journ at Athens so well, that he will take good care to send his son
thither at an earlier age than he visited it himself.

But see where comes from Alexandria (for we need not be very
solicitous about anachronisms) , a young man from twenty to twenty-
two, who has narrowly escaped drowning on his voyage, and is to
remain at Athens as many as eight or ten years, yet in the course
of that time will not learn a line of Latin, thinking it enough to
become accomplished in Greek composition, and in that he will
succeed. He is a grave person, and difficult to make out; some
say he is a Christian, something or other in the Christian line his

UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 53

father is for certain. His name is Gregory, he is by country a Cappa-
docian, and will in time become preeminently a theologian, and one
of the principal Doctors of the Greek Church.

Or it is one Horace, a youth of low stature and black hair, whose
father has given him an education at Rome above his rank in life,
and now is sending him to finish it at Athens; he is said to have a
turn for poetry: a hero he is not, and it were well if he knew it;
but he is caught by the enthusiasm of the hour, and goes off cam-
paigning with Brutus and Cassius, and will leave his shield behind
him on the field of Philippi.

Or it is a mere boy of fifteen: his name Eunapius; though the
voyage was not long, seasickness, or confinement, or bad living on
board the vessel, threw him into a fever, and, when the passengers
landed in the evening at Piraeus, he could not stand. His country-
men who accompanied him, took him up among them and carried
him to the house of the great teacher of the day, Projeresius, who
was a friend of the captain's, and whose fame it was which drew
the enthusiastic youth to Athens. His companions understand the
sort of place they are in, and, with the licence of academic students,
they break into the philosopher's house, though he appears to have
retired for the night, and proceed to make themselves free of it,
with an absence of ceiemony, which is only not impudence, because
Proasresius takes it so easily. Strange introduction for our stranger
to a seat of learning, but not out of keeping with Athens; for what
could you expect of a place where there was a mob of youths and
not even the pretence of control; where the poorer lived any how,
and got on as they could, and the teachers themselves had no pro-
tection from the humours and caprices of the students who filled
their lecture-halls.? However, as to this Eunapius, Proarresius took
a fancy to the boy, and told him curious stories about Athenian life.
He himself had come up to the University with one Hephaestion,
and they were even worse off than Cleanthes the Stoic; for they had
only one cloak between them, and nothing whatever besides, except
some old bedding; so when Proaeresius went abroad, Hephaestion
lay in bed, and practised himself in oratory; and then Hephxstion
put on the cloak, and Proseresius crept under the coverlet. At another
time there was so fierce a feud between what would be called "town

54 NEWMAN

and gown" in an English University, that the Professors did not dare
lecture in public, for fear of ill treatment.

But a freshman like Eunapius soon got experience for himself of
the ways and manners prevalent in Athens. Such a one as he had
hardly entered the city, when he was caught hold of by a party of
the academic youth, who proceeded to practise on his awkwardness
and his ignorance. At first sight one wonders at their childishness;
but the like conduct obtained in the medieval Universities; and not
many months have passed away since the journals have told us of
sober Englishmen, given to matter-of-fact calculations, and to the
anxieties of money-making, pelting each other with snowballs on
their own sacred territory, and defying the magistracy, when they
would interfere with their privilege of becoming boys. So I suppose
we must attribute it to something or other in human nature. Mean-
while, there stands the new-comer, surrounded by a circle of his new
associates, who forthwith proceed to frighten, and to banter, and
to make a fool of him, to the extent of their wit. Some address him
with mock politeness, others with fierceness; and so they conduct
him in solemn procession across the Agora to the Baths; and as
they approach, they dance about him like madmen. But this was to
be the end of his trial, for the Bath was a sort of initiation; he
thereupon received the pallium, or University gown, and was suf-
fered by his tormentors to depart in peace. One alone is recorded
as having been exempted from this persecution; it was a youth
graver and loftier than even St. Gregory himself: but it was not from
his force of character, but at the instance of Gregory, that he escaped.
Gregory was his bosom-friend, and was ready in Athens to shelter
him when he came. It was another Saint and Doctor; the great
Basil, then, (it would appear,) as Gregory, but a catechumen of the
Church.

But to return to our freshman. His troubles are not at an end,
though he has got his gown upon him. Where is he to lodge ? whom
is he to attend ? He finds himself seized, before he well knows where
he is, by another party of men, or three or four parties at once, like
foreign porters at a landing, who seize on the baggage of the
perplexed stranger, and thrust half a dozen cards into his unwilling
hands. Our youth is plied by the hangers-on of professor this, or

UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 55

sophist that, each of whom wishes the fame or the profit of having
a houseful. We will say that he escapes from their hands, — ^but then
he will have to choose for himself where he will put up; and, to
tell the truth, with all the praise I have already given, and the praise
I shall have to give, to the city of mind, nevertheless, between our-
selves, the brick and wood which formed it, the actual tenements,
where flesh and blood had to lodge (always excepting the mansions
of great men of the place), do not seem to have been much better
than those of Greek or Turkish towns which are at this moment
a topic of interest and ridicule in the public prints. A lively picture
has lately been set before us of Gallipoli. Take, says the writer, a
multitude of the dilapidated outhouses found in farm-yards in Eng-
land, of the rickety old wooden tenements, the cracked, shutterless
structures of planks and tiles, the sheds and stalls, which our by-lanes,
or fish-markets, or river-sides can supply; tumble them down on the
declivity of a bare bald hill; let the spaces between house and house,
thus accidentally determined, be understood to form streets, winding
of course for no reason, and with no meaning, up and down the
town; the roadway always narrow, the breadth never uniform, the
separate houses bulging or retiring below, as circumstances may have
determined, and leaning forward till they meet overhead; — and you
have a good idea of Gallipoli. I question whether this picture would
not nearly correspond to the special seat of the Muses in ancient
times. Learned writers assure us distinctly that the houses of Athens
were for the most part small and mean; that the streets were crooked
and narrow; that the upper stories projected over the roadway; and
that staircases, balustrades, and doors that opened outwards, ob-
structed it; — a remarkable coincidence of description. I do not doubt
at all, though history is silent, that that roadway was jolting to car-
riages, and all but impassable; and that it was traversed by drains,
as freely as any Turkish town now. Athens seems in these respects
to have been below the average cities of its time. "A stranger," says
an ancient, "might doubt, on the sudden view, if really he saw
Athens."

I grant all this, and much more, if you will; but, recollect, Athens
was the home of the intellectual, and beautiful; not of low mechan-
ical contrivances, and material organization. Why stop within your

56 NEWMAN

lodgings counting the rents in your wall or the holes in your tiling,
when nature and art call you away? You must put up with such
a chamber, and a table, and a stool, and a sleeping board, anywhere
else in the three continents; one place does not differ from another
indoors; your magalia in Africa, or your grottos in Syria, are not
perfection. I suppose you did not come to Athens to swarm up a
ladder, or to grope about a closet: you came to see and to hear,
what hear and see you could not elsewhere. What food for the
intellect is it possible to procure indoors, that you stay there looking
about you? do you think to read there? where are your books? do
you expect to purchase books at Athens ? — you are much out in your
calculations. True it is, we at this day, who live in the nineteenth
century, have the books of Greece as a perpetual memorial; and
copies there have been, since the time that they were written; but
you need not go to Athens to procure them, nor would you find
them in Athens. Strange to say, strange to the nineteenth century,
that in the age of Plato and Thucydides, there was not, it is said,
a bookshop in the whole place: nor was the book trade in existence
till the very time of Augustus. Libraries, I suspect, were the bright
invention of Attalus or the Ptolemies; I doubt whether Athens had
a library till the reign of Hadrian. It was what the student gazed
on, what he heard, what he caught by the magic of sympathy, not
what he read, which was the education furnished by Athens.

He leaves his narrow lodging early in the morning; and not till
night, if even then, will he return. It is but a crib or kennel, — ^in
which he sleeps when the weather is inclement or the ground damp;
in no respect a home. And he goes out of doors, not to read the day's
newspaper, or to buy the gay shilling volume, but to imbibe the
invisible atmosphere of genius, and to learn by heart the oral tradi-
tions of taste. Out he goes; and, leaving the tumble-down town
behind him, he mounts the Acropolis to the right, or he turns to the
Areopagus on the left. He goes to the Parthenon to study the sculp-
tures of Phidias; to the temple of the Dioscuri to see the paintings
of Polygnotus. We indeed take our Sophocles or ^schylus out of
our coat-pocket; but, if our sojourner at Athens would understand
how a tragic poet can write, he must betake himself to the theatre
on the south, and see and hear the drama literally in action. Or let

UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 57

him go westward to the Agora, and there he will hear Lysias or
Andocides pleading, or Demosthenes haranguing. He goes farther
west still, along the shade of those noble planes, which Cimon has
planted there; and he looks around him at the statues and porticos
and vestibules, each by itself a work of genius and skill, enough to
be the making of another city. He passes through the city gate,
and then he is at the famous Ceramicus; here are the tombs of the
mighty dead; and here, we will suppose, is Pericles himself, the
most elevated, the most thrilling of orators, converting a funeral
oration over the slain into a philosophical panegyric of the living.

Onwards he proceeds still; and now he has come to that still more
celebrated Academe, which has bestowed its own name on Uni-
versities down to this day; and there he sees a sight which will be
graven on his memory till he dies. Many are the beauties of the
place, the groves, and the statues, and the temple, and the stream
of the Cephissus flowing by; many are the lessons which will be
taught him day after day by teacher or by companion; but his eye
is just now arrested by one object; it is the very presence of Plato.
He does not hear a word that he says; he does not care to hear; he
asks neither for discourse nor disputation; what he sees is a whole,
complete in itself, not to be increased by addition, and greater than
anything else. It will be a point in the history of his life; a stay for
his memory to rest on, a burning thought in his heart, a bond of
union with men of like mind, ever afterwards. Such is the spell
which the living man exerts on his fellows, for good or for evil.
How nature impels us to lean upon others, making virtue, or genius,
or name, the qualification for our doing so! A Spaniard is said to
have travelled to Italy, simply to see Livy; he had his fill of gazing,
and then went back again home. Had our young stranger got noth-
ing by his voyage but the sight of the breathing and moving Plato,
had he entered no lecture-room to hear, no gymnasium to converse,
he had got some measure of education, and something to tell of to
his grandchildren.

But Plato is not the only sage, nor the sight of him the only lesson
to be learned in this wonderful suburb. It is the region and the realm
of philosophy. Colleges were the inventions of many centuries later;
and they imply a sort of cloistered life, or at least a life of rule,

58 NEWMAN

scarcely natural to an Athenian. It was the boast of the philosophic
statesman of Athens, that his countrymen achieved by the mere force
of nature and the love of the noble and the great, what other people
aimed at by laborious discipline; and all who came among them
were submitted to the same method of education. We have traced
our student on his wanderings from the Acropolis to the Sacred
Way; and now he is in the region of the schools. No awful arch,
no window of many-coloured lights marks the seats of learning
there or elsewhere; philosophy lives out of doors. No close atmos-
phere oppresses the brain or inflames the eyelid; no long session
stiffens the limbs. Epicurus is reclining in his garden; Zeno looks
like a divinity in his porch; the restless Aristotle, on the other side
of the city, as if in antagonism to Plato, is walking his pupils off
their legs in his Lyceum by the Ilyssus. Our student has determined
on entering himself as a disciple of Theophrastus, a teacher of mar-
vellous popularity, who has brought together two thousand pupils
from all parts of the world. He himself is of Lesbos; for masters,
as well as students, come hither from all regions of the earth, — as
befits a University. How could Athens have collected hearers in
such numbers, unless she had selected teachers of such power? it
was the range of territory, which the notion of a University implies,
which furnished both the quantity of the one, and the quality of the
other. Anaxagoras was from Ionia, Carneades from Africa, Zeno
from Cyprus, Protagoras from Thrace, and Gorgias from Sicily.
Andromachus was a Syrian, Proa^resius an Armenian, Hilarius a
Bithynian, Philiscus a Thessalian, Hadrian a Syrian. Rome is cele-
brated for her liberaUty in civil matters; Athens was as liberal in
intellectual. There was no narrow jealousy, directed against a Pro-
fessor, because he was not an Athenian; genius and talent were the
qualifications; and to bring them to Athens, was to do homage
to it as a University. There was a brotherhood and a citizenship of
mind.

Mind came first, and was the foundation of the academical polity;
but it soon brought along with it, and gathered round itself, the
gifts of fortune and the prizes of life. As time went on, wisdom was
not always sentenced to the bare cloak of Cleanthes; but beginning
in rags, it ended in fine linen. The Professors became honourable

UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 59

and rich; and the students ranged themselves under their names,
and were proud of caUing themselves their countrymen. The Uni-
versity was divided into four great nations, as the medieval anti-
quarian would style them; and in the middle of the fourth century,
Proaeresius was the leader or proctor of the Attic, Hephaestion of
the Oriental, Epiphanius of the Arabic, and Diophantus of the Pon-
tic. Thus the Professors were both patrons of clients, and hosts and
proxeni of strangers and visitors, as well as masters of the schools:
and the Cappadocian, Syrian, or Sicilian youth who came to one
or other of them, would be encouraged to study by his protection,
and to aspire by his example.

Even Plato, when the schools of Athens were not a hundred years
old, was in circumstances to enjoy the otium cum dignitate. He had
a villa out at Heraclea; and he left his patrimony to his school, in
whose hands it remained, not only safe, but fructifying, a marvellous
phenomenon in tumultuous Greece, for the long space of eight hun-
dred years. Epicurus too had the property of the Gardens where
he lectured; and these too became the property of his sect. But in
Roman times the chairs of grammar, rhetoric, politics, and the
four philosophies, were handsomely endowed by the State; some
of the Professors were themselves statesmen or high functionaries,
and brought to their favourite study senatorial rank or Asiatic opu-
lence.

Patrons such as these can compensate to the freshman, in whom
we have interested ourselves, for the poorness of his lodging and the
turbulence of his companions. In every thing there is a better side
and a worse; in every place a disreputable set and a respectable, and
the one is hardly known at all to the other. Men come away from
the same University at this day, with contradictory impressions and
contradictory statements, according to the society they have found
there; if you believe the one, nothing goes on there as it should be:
if you believe the other, nothing goes on as it should not. Virtue,
however, and decency are at least in the niinority everywhere, and
under some sort of a cloud or disadvantage; and this being the
case, it is so much gain whenever an Herodes Atticus is found, to
throw the influence of wealth and station on the side even of a dec-
orous philosophy. A consular man, and the heir of an ample for-

60 NEWMAN

tune, this Herod was content to devote his Hfe to a professorship,
and his fortune to the patronage of hterature. He gave the sophist
Polemo about eight thousand pounds, as the sum is calculated, for
three declamations. He built at Athens a stadium six hundred feet
long, entirely of white marble, and capable of admitting the whole
population. His theatre, erected to the memory of his wife, was
made of cedar wood curiously carved. He had two villas, one at
Marathon, the place of his birth, about ten miles from Athens, the
other at Cephissia, at the distance of six; and thither he drew to him
the elite, and at times the whole body of the students. Long arcades,
groves of trees, clear pools for the bath, delighted and recruited the
summer visitor. Never was so brilliant a lecture-room as his evening
banqueting-hall; highly connected students from Rome mixed with
the sharp-witted provincial of Greece or Asia Minor; and the flippant
sciolist, and the nondescript visitor, half philosopher, half tramp,
met with a reception, courteous always, but suitable to his deserts.
Herod was noted for his repartees; and we have instances on record
of his setting down, according to the emergency, both the one and
the other.

A higher line, though a rarer one, was that allotted to the youthful
Basil. He was one of those men who seem by a sort of fascination
to draw others around them even without wishing it. One might
have deemed that his gravity and his reserve would have kept them
at a distance; but, almost in spite of himself, he was the centre of a
knot of youths, who, pagans as most of them were, used Athens
honestly for the purpose for which they professed to seek it; and,
disappointed and displeased with the place himself, he seems never-
theless to have been the means of their profiting by its advantages.
One of these was Sophronius, who afterwards held a high office in
the State: Eusebius was another, at that time the bosom-friend of
Sophronius, and afterwards a Bishop. Celsus too is named, who
afterwards was raised to the government of Cilicia by the Emperor
Julian. Julian himself, in the sequel of unhappy memory, was then
at Athens, and known at least to St. Gregory. Another Julian is
also mentioned, who was afterwards commissioner of the land tax.
Here we have a glimpse of the better kind of society among the
students of Athens; and it is to the credit of the parties composing

UNIVERSITY LIFE AT ATHENS 6 1

it, that such young men as Gregory and Basil, men as intimately
connected with Christianity as they were well known in the world,
should hold so high a place in their esteem and love. When the two
saints were departing, their companions came around them with the
hope of changing their purpose. Basil persevered; but Gregory
relented, and turned back to Athens for a season.

THE STUDY OF POETRY

BY
MATTHEW ARNOLD

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Matthew Arnold was the son of the well-known English school-
master, Thomas Arnold of Rugby. He was born at Laleham in 1822,
and went to school at Winchester and Rugby. Going up to Balliol
College, Oxford, in 1841, he won a scholarship, took the Newdigate
prize for English verse, and was elected fellow of Oriel in 1845. After
some years as a private secretary, he became an Inspector of Schools and
performed the routine duties of this office for thirty-five years. For ten
years he was Professor of Poetry at Oxford, and in 1883-84 he lectured
in America. He died in 1888.

Arnold is notable among modern men of letters as being almost equally
distinguished in poetry and prose. His poetical work belongs to the
earlier part of his career, and was practically finished by 1867. At the
time of its first publication it appealed to only a narrow public; but it
rose steadily in esteem through Arnold's life, though he ceased to add
to it, and now many critics hold that it will outlive his prose. The best
of it is refined in feeling, lofty in thought, and exquisite in expression;
its prevailing note, a subdued melancholy.

In prose Arnold wrote on many themes — educational, social, political,
and, especially, literary and religious. His attacks on dogmatic Chris-
tianity promise to be the most short-lived of his works; and perhaps
deservedly so, as here Arnold was dealing with technical matters in which
he was not an expert. In literary criticism he has been and still is a vital
influence, urging especially the value of an outlook over the literatures
of other countries and the cultivating of an intimacy with the great
classics of the past. In the following essay on "The Study of Poetry,"
one of the most famous of his utterances, there may be found exemplified
his characteristically vivacious and memorable style, his delicate appre-
ciations brilliantly and precisely expressed, his concrete and persuasive
argument. Perhaps no single critical document of our time has con-
tributed so many phrases to the current literary vocabulary, or has stim-
ulated so many readers to the use of lofty and definite standards of judg-
ment.

THE STUDY OF POETRY'

THE future of poetry is immense, because in poetry, where
it is worthy of its high destinies, our race, as time goes on,
will find an ever surer and surer stay. There is not a creed
which is not shaken, not an accredited dogma which is not shown
to be questionable, not a received tradition which does not threaten
to dissolve. Our religion has materialised itself in the fact, in the
supposed fact; it has attached its emotion to the fact, and now the
fact is failing it. But for poetry the idea is everything; the rest is a
world of illusion, of divine illusion. Poetry attaches its emotion to
the idea; the idea is the fact. The strongest part of our religion to-day
is its unconscious poetry.'

Let me be permitted to quote these words of my own, as uttering
the thought which should, in my opinion, go with us and govern
us in all our study of poetry. In the present work it is the course of
one great contributory stream to the world-river of poetry that we
are invited to follow. We are here invited to trace the stream of
English poetry. But whether we set ourselves, as here, to follow
only one of the several streams that make the mighty river of poetry,
or whether we seek to know them all, our governing thought should
be the same. We should conceive of poetry worthily, and more
highly than it has been the custom to conceive of it. We should
conceive of it as capable of higher uses, and called to higher destinies,
than those which in general men have assigned to it hitherto. More
and more mankind will discover that we have to turn to poetry
to interpret life for us, to console us, to sustain us. Without poetry,
our science will appear incomplete; and most of what now passes
with us for religion and philosophy will be replaced by poetry.
Science, I say, will appear incomplete without it. For finely and
truly does Wordsworth call poetry 'the impassioned expression which

'Published in 1880 as the General Introduction to 'The English Poets,' edited by
T. H. Ward.

65

66 ARNOLD

is in the countenance of all science'; and what is a countenance with-
out its expression ? Again, Wordsworth finely and truly calls poetry
'the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge'; our religion, parading
evidences such as those on which the popular mind relies now; our
philosophy, pluming itself on its reasonings about causation and
finite and infinite being; what are they but the shadows and dreams
and false shows of knowledge? The day will come when we shall
wonder at ourselves for having trusted to them, for having taken
them seriously; and the more we perceive their hollo wness, the
more we shall prize 'the breath and finer spirit of knowledge'
offered to us by poetry.

But if we conceive thus highly of the destinies of poetry, we must
also set our standard for poetry high, since poetry, to be capable of
fulfilling such high destinies, must be poetry of a high order of
excellence. We must accustom ourselves to a high standard and to
a strict judgment. Sainte-Beuve relates that Napoleon one day said,
when somebody was spoken of in his presence as a charlatan : 'Char-
latan as much as you please; but where is there not charlatanism?'
— 'Yes,' answers Sainte-Beuve, 'in politics, in the art of governing
mankind, that is perhaps true. But in the order of thought, in art,
the glory, the eternal honour is that charlatanism shall find no en-
trance; herein lies the inviolableness of that noble portion of man's
being.' It is admirably said, and let us hold fast to it. In poetry,
which is thought and art in one, it is the glory, the eternal honour,
that charlatanism shall find no entrance; that this noble sphere be
kept inviolate and inviolable. Charlatanism is for confusing or
obliterating the distinctions between excellent and inferior, sound
and unsound or only half-sound, true and untrue or only half-true.
It is charlatanism, conscious or unconscious, whenever we confuse
or obliterate these. And in poetry, more than anywhere else, it is
unpermissible to confuse or obliterate them. For in poetry the dis-
tinction between excellent and inferior, sound and unsound or only
half-sound, true and untrue or only half-true, is of paramount im-
portance. It is of paramount importance because of the high destinies
of poetry. In poetry, as in criticism of life under the conditions fixed
for such a criticism by the laws of poetic truth and poetic beauty,
the spirit of our race will find, we have said, as time goes on and

THE STUDY OF POETRY 67

as other helps fail, its consolation and stay. But the consolation and
stay will be of power in proportion to the power of the criticism of
life. And the criticism of life will be of power in proportion as the
poetry conveying it is excellent rather than inferior, sound rather
than unsound or half-sound, true rather than untrue or half-true.

The best poetry is what we want; the best poetry will be found to
have a power of forming, sustaining, and delighting us, as nothing
else can. A clearer, deeper sense of the best in poetry, and of the
strength and joy to be drawn from it, is the most precious benefit
which we can gather from a poetical collection such as the present.
And yet in the very nature and conduct of such a collection there is
inevitably something which tends to obscure in us the consciousness
of what our benefit should be, and to distract us from the pursuit
of it. We should therefore steadily set it before our minds at the
outset, and should compel ourselves to revert constantly to the
thought of it as we proceed.

Yes; constantly in reading poetry, a sense for the best, the really
excellent, and of the strength and joy to be drawn from it, should be
present in our minds and should govern our estimate of what we
read. But this real estimate, the only true one, is liable to be super-
seded, if we are not watchful, by two other kinds of estimate, the
historic estimate and the personal estimate, both of which are falla-
cious. A poet or a poem may count to us historically, they may count
to us on grounds personal to ourselves, and they may count to us
really. They may count to us historically. The course of develop-
ment of a nation's language, thought, and poetry, is profoundly
interesting; and by regarding a poet's work as a stage in this course
of development we may easily bring ourselves to make it of more
importance as poetry than in itself it really is, we may come to use
a language of quite exaggerated praise in criticising it; in short, to
overrate it. So arises in our poetic judgments the fallacy caused by
the estimate which we may call historic. Then, again, a poet or
poem may count to us on grounds personal to ourselves. Our per-
sonal affinities, likings and circumstances, have great power to sway
our estimate of this or that poet's work, and to make us attach
more importance to it as poetry than in itself it really possesses,
because to us it is, or has been, of high importance. Here also we

68 ARNOLD

overrate the object of our interest, and apply to it a language of
praise which is quite exaggerated. And thus we get the source of a
second fallacy in our poetic judgments — the fallacy caused by an
estimate which we may call personal.

Both fallacies are natural. It is evident how naturally the study
of the history and development of poetry may incline a man to
pause over reputations arid works once conspicuous but now obscure,
and to quarrel with a careless public for skipping, in obedience to
mere tradition and habit, from one famous name or work in its
national poetry to another, ignorant of what it misses, and of the
reason for keeping what it keeps, and of the whole process of growth
in its poetry. The French have become diligent students of their
own early poetry, which they long neglected; the study makes many
of them dissatisfied with their so-called classical poetry, the court-
tragedy of the seventeenth century, a poetry which Pellisson long
ago reproached with its want of the true poetic stamp, with its
politesse sterile et rampante, but which nevertheless has reigned
in France as absolutely as if it had been the perfection of classical
poetry indeed. The dissatisfaction is natural; yet a lively and accom-
plished critic, M. Charles d'Hericault, the editor of Clement Marot,
goes too far when he says that 'the cloud of glory playing round a
classic is a mist as dangerous to the future of a literature as it is
intolerable for the purposes of history.' 'It hinders,' he goes on, 'it
hinders us from seeing more than one single point, the culminating
and exceptional point; the summary, fictitious and arbitrary, of a
thought and of a work. It substitutes a halo for a physiognomy, it
puts a statue where there was once a man, and hiding from us all
trace of the labour, the attempts, the weaknesses, the failures, it
claims not study but veneration; it does not show us how the thing
is done, it imposes upon us a model. Above all, for the historian
this creation of classic personages is inadmissible; for it withdraws
the poet from his time, from his proper life, it breaks historical
relationships, it blinds criticism by conventional admiration, and
renders the investigation of literary origins unacceptable. It gives
us a human personage no longer but a God seated immovable amidst
His perfect work, like Jupiter on Olympus; and hardly will it be
possible for the young student to whom such work is exhibited at

THE STUDY OF POETRY 69

such a distance from him, to beUeve that it did not issue ready-made
from that divine head.'

All this is brilliantly and tellingly said, but we must plead for a
distinction. Everything depends on the reality of a poet's classic
character. If he is a dubious classic, let us sift him; if he is a false
classic, let us explode him. But if he is a real classic, if his work
belongs to the class of the very best (for this is the true and right
meaning of the word classic, classical), then the great thing for us is
to feel and enjoy his work as deeply as ever we can, and to appreciate
the wide difference between it and all work which has not the same
high character. This is what is salutary, this is what is formative;
this is the great benefit to be got from the study of poetry. Every-
thing which interferes with it, which hinders it, is injurious. True,
we must read our classic with open eyes, and not with eyes blinded
with superstition; we must perceive when his work comes short,
when it drops out of the class of the very best, and we must rate it,
in such cases, at its proper value. But the use of this negative criti-
cism is not in itself, it is entirely in its enabling us to have a clearer
sense and a deeper enjoyment of what is truly excellent. To trace
the labour, the attempts, the weaknesses, the failures of a genuine
classic, to acquaint oneself with his time and his life and his his-
torical relationships, is mere literary dilettantism unless it has that
clear sense and deeper enjoyment for its end. It may be said that the
more we know about a classic the better we shall enjoy him; and,
if we lived as long as Methuselah and had all of us heads of perfect
clearness and wills of perfect steadfastness, this might be true in fact
as it is plausible in theory. But the case here is much the same as the
case with the Greek and Latin studies of our schoolboys. The
elaborate philological groundwork which we require them to lay
is in theory an admirable preparation for appreciating the Greek and
Latin authors worthily. The more thoroughly we lay the ground-
work, the better we shall be able, it may be said, to enjoy the authors.
True, if time were not so short, and schoolboys' wits not so soon tired
and their power of attention exhausted; only, as it is, the elaborate
philological preparation goes on, but the authors are little known
and less enjoyed. So with the investigator of 'historic origins' in
poetry. He ought to enjoy the true classic all the better for his

70 ARNOLD

investigations; he often is distracted from the enjoyment of the best,
and with the less good he overbusies himself, and is prone to over-
rate it in proportion to the trouble which it has cost him.

The idea of tracing historic origins and historical relationships
cannot be absent from a compilation like the present. And naturally
the poets to be exhibited in it will be assigned to those persons for
exhibition who are known to prize them highly, rather than to those
who have no special inclination towards them. Moreover, the very
occupation with an author, and the business of exhibiting him, dis-
poses us to affirm and amplify his importance. In the present work,
therefore, we are sure of frequent temptation to adopt the historic
estimate, or the personal estimate, and to forget the real estimate;
which latter, nevertheless, we must employ if we are to make f)oetry
yield us its full benefit. So high is that benefit, the benefit of clearly
feeling and of deeply enjoying the really excellent, the truly classic
in poetry, that we do well, I say, to set it fixedly before our minds
as our object in studying poets and poetry, and to make the desire
of attaining it the one principle to which, as the Imitation says, what-
ever we may read or come to know, we always return. Cum multa
legeris et cognoveris, ad unum semper oportet redire principium.

The historic estimate is likely in especial to affect our judgment
and our language when we are dealing with ancient poets; the
personal estimate when we are dealing with poets our contempo-
raries, or at any rate modern. The exaggerations due to the historic
estimate are not in themselves, perhaps, of very much gravity. Their
report hardly enters the general ear; probably they do not always
impose even on the literary men who adopt them. But they lead
to a dangerous abuse of language. So we hear Caedmon, amongst
our own poets, compared to Milton. I have already noticed the
enthusiasm of one accomplished French critic for 'historic origins.'
Another eminent French critic, M. Vitet, comments upon that
famous document of the early poetry of his nation, the Chanson de
Roland. It is indeed a most interesting document. The joculator or
jongleur Taillefer, who was with William the Conqueror's army
at Hastings, marched before the Norman troops, so said the tradi-
tion, singing 'of Charlemagne and of Roland and of Oliver, and of
the vassals who died at Roncevaux'; and it is suggested that in the

THE STUDY OF POETRY 7I

Chanson de Roland by one Turoldus or Theroulde, a poem pre-
served in a manuscript o£ the twelfth century in the Bodleian Li-
brary at Oxford, we have certainly the matter, perhaps even some
of the words, of the chant which Taillefer sang. The poem has
vigour and freshness; it is not without pathos. But M. Vitet is not
satisfied with seeing in it a document of some poetic value, and of
very high historic and linguistic value; he sees in it a grand and
beautiful work, a monument of epic genius. In its general design
he finds the grandiose conception, in its details he finds the constant
union of simplicity with greatness, which are the marks, he truly
says, of the genuine epic, and distinguish it from the artificial epic
of literary ages. One thinks of Homer; this is the sort of praise
which is given to Homer, and justly given. Higher praise there can-
not well be, and it is the praise due to epic poetry of the highest
order only, and to no other. Let us try, then, the Chanson de Roland
at its best. Roland, mortally wounded, lay himself down under a
pine-tree, with his face turned towards Spain and the enemy —

'De plusurs choses a remembrer li prist,
De tantes teres cume li hers cunquist,
De dulce France, des Humes de sun Hgn,
De Carlemagne sun seignor ki I'nurrit.' ^

That is primitive work, I repeat, with an undeniable poetic quality
of its own. It deserves such praise, and such praise is sufficient for
it. But now turn to Homer —

"Qj ipkro- TOW S' fj5ri Karextv tpval^oos oXa,
kv AaKidalfiovi avdi, ip'Ovg iv xorpiSt yaly.'

We are here in another world, another order of poetry altogether;
here is rightly due such supreme praise as that which M. Vitet gives
to the Chanson de Roland. If our words are to have any meaning,
if our judgments are to have any solidity, we must not heap that
supreme praise upon poetry of an order immeasurably inferior.

^ 'Then began he to call many things to remembrance, — all the lands which his
valour conquered, and pleasant France, and the men of his lineage, and Charlemagne
his liege lord who nourished him.' — 'Chanson de Roland,' iii. 939—942.
' 'So said she; they long since in Earth's soft arms were reposing.
There, in their own dear land, their fatherland, Lacedxmon.'

— 'Iliad,' iii. 243, 244 (translated by Dr. Hawtrey).

72 ARNOLD

Indeed there can be no more useful help for discovering what
poetry belongs to the class of the truly excellent, and can therefore
do us most good, than to have always in one's mind lines and ex-
pressions of the great masters, and to apply them as a touchstone to
other poetry. Of course we are not to require this other poetry to
resemble them; it may be very dissimilar. But if we have any tact
we shall find them, when v/e have lodged them well in our minds,
an infallible touchstone for detecting the presence or absence of high
poetic quality, and also the degree of this quality, in all other poetry
which we may place beside them. Short passages, even single lines,
will serve our turn quite sufficiently. Take the two lines which I have
just quoted from Homer, the poet's comment on Helen's mention
of her brothers; — or take his

'A SetXo), tI c^pCi'i Sd/iev JJrfKfj'i avaKTi
OvqrQ ; ii/i€ts 5' kcFTOv ayripo} t' adavaroo re.
^ Iva 8vaTrivoi.cn fier' AvSpaaLV &\7t' ex'?'"'"' j*

the address of Zeus to the horses of Peleus; — or take finally his
.Kai ci, ykpov, ri irplv flip h,Koboixa> S\0u)v tlvat.-*

the words of Achilles to Priam, a suppliant before him. Take that
incomparable line and a half of Dante, Ugolino's tremendous
words —

'lo no piangeva; si dentro impietrai.

Piangevan elli ..." *

take the lovely words of Beatrice to Virgil —

'lo son fatta da Die, sua merce, tale,
Che la vostra miseria non mi tange,
Ne fiamma d'esto incendio non m'assale .,.'''

take the simple, but perfect, single line —

'In la sua volontade e nostra pace.' '
■•'Ah, unhappy pair, why gave we you to King Peleus, to a mortal? but ye are
without old age, and immortal. Was it that with men born to misery ye might have
sorrow?' — 'Iliad,' xvii. 443-445.

* 'Nay, and thou too, old man, in former days wast, as we hear, happy.' — 'Iliad,'
xxiv. 543.

8 'I wailed not, so of stone grew I within; — they wailed.' — 'Inferno,' xxxiii. 39, 40.
' 'Of such sort hath God, thanked be His mercy, made me, that your misery toucheth
me not, neither doth the tlame of this fire strike me." — 'Inferno,' ii. 91-93.

* 'In His will is our peace.' — 'Paradiso,' iii. 85.

THE STUDY OF POETRY 73

Take of Shakespeare a line or two of Henry the Fourth's expostula
lation with sleep —

'Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the shipboy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge . . .'

and take, as well, Hamlet's dying request to Horatio —

'If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain
To tell my story . . .'

Take of Milton that Miltonic passage:

'Darken'd so, yet shone
Above them all the archangel; but his face
Deep scars of thunder had intrench'd, and care
Sat on his faded cheek . . .'

add two such lines as —

'And courage never to submit or yield
And what is else not to be overcome . . .*

and finish with the exquisite close to the loss of Proserpine, the loss

' . . , which cost Ceres all that pain
To seek her through the world.'

These few lines, if we have tact and can use them, are enough even
of themselves to keep clear and sound our judgments about poetry,
to save us from fallacious estimates of it, to conduct us to a real
estimate.

The specimens I have quoted differ widely from one another, but
they have in common this : the possession of the very highest poetical
quality. If we are thoroughly penetrated by their power, we shall
find that we have acquired a sense enabling us, whatever poetry
may be laid before us, to feel the degree in which a high poetical
quality is present or wanting there. Critics give themselves great
labour to draw out what in the abstract constitutes the characters
of a high quality of poetry. It is much better simply to have recourse
to concrete examples; — to take specimens of poetry of the high, the
very highest quality, and to say: The characters of a high quality

74 ARNOLD

of poetry are what is expressed there. They are far better recognised
by being felt in the verse of the master, than by being perused in
the prose of the critic. Nevertheless if we are urgently pressed to give
some critical account of them, we may safely, perhaps, venture on
laying down, not indeed how and why the characters arise, but
where and in what they arise. They are in the matter and substance
of the poetry, and they are in its manner and style. Both of these,
the substance and matter on the one hand, the style and manner on
the other, have a mark, an accent, of high beauty, worth, and power.
But if we are asked to define this mark and accent in the abstract,
our answer must be: No, for we should thereby be darkening the
question, not clearing it. The mark and accent are as given by the
substance and matter of that poetry, by the style and manner of
that poetry, and of all other poetry which is akin to it in quality.

Only one thing we may add as to the substance and matter of
poetry, guiding ourselves by Aristotle's profound observation that the
superiority of poetry over history consists in its possessing a higher
truth and a higher seriousness {<piKoao(puiTipov koI a-KovbaioTepov). Let
us add, therefore, to what we have said, this: that the substance
and matter of the best poetry acquire their special character from
possessing, in an eminent degree, truth and seriousness. We may
add yet further, what is in itself evident, that to the style and manner
of the best poetry their special character, their accent, is given by
their diction, and, even yet more, by their movement. And though
we distinguish between the two characters, the two accents, of
superiority, yet they are nevertheless vitally connected one with the
other. The superior character of truth and seriousness, in the matter
and substance of the best poetry, is inseparable from the superiority
of diction and movement marking its style and manner. The two
superiorities are closely related, and are in steadfast proportion one
to the other. So far as high poetic truth and seriousness are wanting
to a poet's matter and substance, so far also, we may be sure, will a
high poetic stamp of diction and movement be wanting to his style
and manner. In proportion as this high stamp of diction and move-
ment, again, is absent from a poet's style and manner, we shall find,
also, that high poetic truth and seriousness are absent from his
substance and matter.

THE STUDY OF POETRY 75

So stated, these are but dry generalities; their whole force lies in
their application. And I could wish every student of poetry to make
the application of them for himself. Made by himself, the applica-
tion would impress itself upon his mind far more deeply than made
by me. Neither will my limits allow me to make any full application
of the generalities above propounded; but in the hope of bringing
out, at any rate, some significance in them, and of establishing an
important principle more firmly by their means, I will, in the space
which remains to me, follow rapidly from the commencement the
course of our English poetry with them in my view.

Once more I return to the early poetry of France, with which our
own poetry, in its origins, is indissolubly connected. In the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries, that seedtime of all modern language and
literature, the poetry of France had a clear predominance in Europe.
Of the two divisions of that poetry, its productions in the langue
d'oil and its productions in the langue d'oc, the poetry of the langue
d'oc, of southern France, of the troubadours, is of importance because
of its effect on Italian literature; — the first literature of modern
Europe to strike the true and grand note, and to bring forth, as in
Dante and Petrarch it brought forth, classics. But the predominance
of French poetry in Europe, during the twelfth and thirteenth cen-
turies, is due to its poetry of the langue d'oil, the poetry of northern
France and of the tongue which is now the French language. In
the twelfth century the bloom of this romance-poetry was earlier
and stronger in England, at the court of our Anglo-Norman kings,
than in France itself. But it was a bloom of French poetry; and as
our native poetry formed itself, it formed itself out of this. The
romance-poems which took possession of the heart and imagination
of Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries are French; 'they
are,' as Southey justly says, 'the pride of French literature, nor have
we anything which can be placed in competition with them.'
Themes were supplied from all quarters; but the romance-setting
which was common to them all, and which gained the ear of
Europe, was French. This constituted for the French poetry, litera-
ture, and language, at the height of the Middle Age, an unchal-
lenged predominance. The Italian Brunetto Latini, the master of
Dante, wrote his Treasure in French because, he says, 'la parleure

76 ARNOLD

en est plus delitable et plus commune a toutes gens.' In the same
century, the thirteenth, the French romance-writer, Christian of
Troyes, formulates the claims, in chivalry and letters, of France, his
native country, as follows: —

'Or vous art par ce livre apris.
Que Gresse ot de chevalerie
Le premier los et de clergie;
Puis vint chevalerie a Rome,
Et de la clergie la some,
Qui ore est en France venue.
Diex doinst qu'ele i soit retenue,
Et que li lius li abelisse
Tant que de France n'isse
L'onor qui s'i est arestee!'

'Now by this book you will learn that first Greece had the renown
for chivalry and letters: then chivalry and the primacy in letters
passed to Rome, and now it is come to France. God grant it may
be kept there; and that the place may please it so well, that the
honour which has come to make stay in France may never depart
thence!'

Yet it is now all gone, this French romance-poetry of which the
weight of substance and the power of style are not unfairly repre-
sented by this extract from Christian of Troyes. Only by means
of the historic estimate can we persuade ourselves not to think that
any of it is of poetical importance.

But in the fourteenth century there comes an Englishman nour-
ished on this poetry, taught his trade by this poetry, getting words,
rhyme, metre from this poetry; for even of that stanza which the
Italians used, and which Chaucer derived immediately from the
Italians, the basis and suggestion was probably given in France.
Chaucer (I have already named him) fascinated his contemporaries,
but so too did Christian of Troyes and Wolfram of Eschenbach.
Chaucer's power of fascination, however, is enduring; his poetical
importance does not need the assistance of the historic estimate; it
is real. He is a genuine source of joy and strength, which is flowing
still for us and will flow always. He will be read, as time goes on,
far more generally than he is read now. His language is a cause of

THE STUDY OF POETRY ']']

difficulty for us; but so also, and I think in quite as great a degree,
is the language of Burns. In Chaucer's case, as in that of Burns,
it is a difficulty to be unhesitatingly accepted and overcome.

If we ask ourselves wherein consists the immense superiority of
Chaucer's poetry over the romance-poetry — why it is that in passing
from this to Chaucer we suddenly feel ourselves to be in another
world, we shall find that his superiority is both in the substance
of his poetry and in the style of his poetry. His superiority in sub-
stance is given by his large, free, simple, clear yet kindly view of
human life, — so unlike the total want, in the romance-poets, of all
intelligent command of it. Chaucer has not their helplessness; he
has gained the power to survey the world from a central, a truly
human point of view. We have only to call to mind the Prologue to
The Canterbury Tales. The right comment upon it is Dryden's:
'It is sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is God's
plenty.' And again : 'He is a perpetual fountain of good sense.' It is
by a large, free, sound representation of things, that poetry, this
high criticism of life, has truth of substance; and Chaucer's poetry
has truth of substance.

Of his style and manner, if we think first of the romance-poetry
and then of Chaucer's divine liquidness of diction, his divine fluid-
ity of movement, it is difficult to speak temperately. They are irre-
sistible, and justify all the rapture with which his successors speak
of his 'gold dew-drops of speech.' Johnson misses the point entirely
when he finds fault with Dryden for ascribing to Chaucer the first
refinement of our numbers, and says that Gower also can show
smooth numbers and easy rhymes. The refinement of our numbers
means something far more than this. A nation may have versifiers
with smooth numbers and easy rhymes, and yet may have no real
poetry at all. Chaucer is the father of our splendid English poetry;
he is our 'well of English undefiled,' because by the lovely charm
of his diction, the lovely charm of his movement, he makes an
epoch and founds a tradition. In Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton,
Keats, we can follow the tradition of the liquid diction, the fluid
movement of Chaucer; at one time it is his liquid diction of which
in these poets we feel the virtue, and at another time it is his fluid
movement. And the virtue is irresistible.

78 ARNOLD

Bounded as is my space, I must yet find room for an example of
Chaucer's virtue, as I have given examples to show the virtue of
the great classics. I feel disposed to say that a single line is enough to
show the charm of Chaucer's verse; that merely one line like this —

'O martyr souded' in virginitee!'

has a virtue of manner and movement such as we shall not find in
all the verse of romance-poetry; — ^but this is saying nothing. The
virtue is such as we shall not find, perhaps, in all English poetry,
outside the poets whom I have named as the special inheritors of
Chaucer's tradition. A single line, however, is too little if we have
not the strain of Chaucer's verse well in our memory; let us take a
stanza. It is from The Prioress's Tale, the story of the Christian child
murdered in a Jewry —

'My throte is cut unto my nekke-bone
Saide this child, and as by way of kinde
I should have deyd, yea, longe time agone;
But Jesu Christ, as ye in bookes finde,
Will that his glory last and be in minde.
And for the worship of his mother dare
Yet may I sing O Alma loud and clere.'

Wordsworth has modernised this Tale, and to feel how delicate and
evanescent is the charm of verse, we have only to read Wordsworth's
first three lines of this stanza after Chaucer's —

'My throat is cut unto the bone, I trow.
Said this young child, and by the law of kind
I should have died, yea, many hours ago.'

The charm is departed. It is often said that the power of liquidness
and fluidity in Chaucer's verse was dependent upon a free, a licen-
tious dealing with language, such as is now impossible; upon a lib-
erty, such as Burns too enjoyed, of making words like nec\, bird, into
a dissyllable by adding to them, and words like cause, rhyme, into a
dissyllable by sounding the e mute. It is true that Chaucer's fluidity
is conjoined with this liberty, and is admirably served by it; but we
ought not to say that it was dependent upon it. It was dependent
^ The French sonde; soldered, fixed fast.

THE STUDY OF POETRY 79

upon his talent. Other poets with a Hke Hberty do not attain to the
fluidity of Chaucer; Burns himself does not attain to it. Poets, again,
who have a talent akin to Chaucer's, such as Shakespeare or Keats,
have known how to attain his fluidity without the like liberty.

And yet Chaucer is not one of the great classics. His poetry tran-
scends and effaces, easily and without effort, all the romance-poetry
of Catholic Christendom; it transcends and effaces all the English
poetry contemporary with it, it transcends and effaces all the English
poetry subsequent to it down to the age of Elizabeth. Of such avail
is poetic truth of substance, in its natural and necessary union with
poetic truth of style. And yet, I say, Chaucer is not one of the great
classics. He has not their accent. What is wanting to him is sug-
gested by the mere mention of the name of the first great classic of
Christendom, the immortal poet who died eighty years before Chau-
cer, — Dante. The accent of such verse as

'In la sua volontade e nostra pace . . .'

is altogether beyond Chaucer's reach; we praise him, but we feel
that this accent is out of the question for him. It may be said that
it was necessarily out of the reach of any poet in the England of that
stage of growth. Possibly; but we are to adopt a real, not a historic,
estimate of poetry. However we may account for its absence, some-
thing is wanting, then, to the poetry of Chaucer, which poetry must
have before it can be placed in the glorious class of the best. And
there is no doubt what that something is. It is the trirouSatoTTjs, the
high and excellent seriousness, which Aristotle assigns as one of the
grand virtues of poetry. The substance of Chaucer's poetry, his view
of things and his criticism of life, has largeness, freedom,
shrewdness, benignity; but it has not this high seriousness. Homer's
criticism of life has it, Dante's has it, Shakespeare's has it. It is this
chiefly which gives to our spirits what they can rest upon; and with
the increasing demands of our modern ages upon poetry, this virtue
of giving us what we can rest upon will be more and more highly
esteemed. A voice from the slums of Paris, fifty or sixty years after
Chaucer, the voice of poor Villon out of his life of riot and crime, has
at its happy moments (as, for instance, in the last stanza of La Belle

8o ARNOLD

Heaulmiere^") more of this important poetic virtue of seriousness
than all the productions of Chaucer. But its apparition in Villon, and
in men like Villon, is fitful; the greatness of the great poets, the
power of their criticism of life, is that their virtue is sustained.

To our praise, therefore, of Chaucer as a poet there must be this
limitation; he lacks the high seriousness of the great classics, and
therewith an important part of their virtue. Still, the main fact for
us to bear in mind about Chaucer is his sterling value according to
that real estimate which we firmly adopt for all poets. He has poetic
truth of substance, though he has not high poetic seriousness, and
corresponding to his truth of substance he has an exquisite virtue of
style and manner. With him is born our real poetry.

For my present purpose I need not dwell on our Elizabethan
poetry, or on the continuation and close of this poetry in Milton. We
all of us profess to be agreed in the estimate of this poetry; we all of
us recognise it as great poetry, our greatest, and Shakespeare and Mil-
ton as our poetical classics. The real estimate, here, has universal cur-
rency. With the next age of our poetry divergency and difficulty be-
gin. An historic estimate of that poetry has established itself; and the
question is, whether it will be found to coincide with the real esti-
mate.

The age of Dryden, together with our whole eighteenth century
which followed it, sincerely believed itself to have produced poetical
classics of its own, and even to have made advance, in poetry, beyond
all its predecessors. Dryden regards as not seriously disputable the
opinion 'that the sweetness of English verse was never understood or

'"The name Heaulmiire is said to be derived from a head-dress (helm) worn as
a mark by courtesans. In Villon's ballad, a poor old creature of this class laments her
days of youth and beauty. The last stanza of the ballad runs thus —

'Ainsi le bon temps regretons

Entre nous, pauvres vieilles sottes,

Assises bas, a croppetons.

Tout en ung tas comme pelottes;

A petit feu de chenevottes

Tost allum^es, tost estainctes.

Et jadis fusmes si mignottes!

Ainsi en prend a maintz et maintes.'
'Thus amongst ourselves we regret the good time, poor silly old things, low-seated
on our heels, all in a heap like so many balls; by a litde fire of hemp-stalks, soon
lighted, soon spent. And once we were such darlings! So fares it with many and
many a one.'

THE STUDY OF POETRY 8 1

practised by our fathers.' Cowley could see nothing at all in Chau-
cer's poetry. Dryden heartily admired it, and, as we have seen,
praised its matter admirably; but of its exquisite manner and move-
ment all he can find to say is that 'there is the rude sweetness of a
Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect.'
Addison, wishing to praise Chaucer's numbers, compares them with
Dryden's own. And all through the eighteenth century, and down
even into our own times, the stereotyped phrase of approbation
for good verse found in our early poetry has been, that it even
approached the verse of Dryden, Addison, Pope, and Johnson.

Are Dryden and Pope poetical classics? Is the historic estimate,
which represents them as such, and which has been so long estab-
lished that it cannot easily give way, the real estimate? Words-
worth and Coleridge, as is well known, denied it; but the authority
of Wordsworth and Coleridge does not weigh much with the young
generation, and there are many signs to show that the eighteenth
century and its judgments are coming into favour again. Are the
favourite poets of the eighteenth century classics?

It is impossible within my present limits to discuss the question
fully. And what man of letters would not shrink from seeming to
dispose dictatorially of the claims of two men who are, at any rate,
such masters in letters as Dryden and Pope; two men of such ad-
mirable talent, both of them, and one of them, Dryden, a man, on
all sides, of such energetic and genial power ? And yet, if we are to
gain the full benefit from poetry, we must have the real estimate of
it. I cast about for some mode of arriving, in the present case, at
such an estimate without offence. And perhaps the best way is to
begin, as it is easy to begin, with cordial praise.

When we find Chapman, the Elizabethan translator of Homer,
expressing himself in his preface thus: 'Though truth in her very
nakedness sits in so deep a pit, that from Gades to Aurora and Gan-
ges few eyes can sound her, I hope yet those few here will so discover
and confirm that, the date being out of her darkness in this morning
of our poet, he shall now gird his temples with the sun,' — we pro-
nounce that such a prose is intolerable. When we find Milton writ-
ing: 'And long it was not after, when I was confirmed in this opin-
ion, that he, who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well

82 ARNOLD

hereafter in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem,' — ^we
pronounce that such a prose has its own grandeur, but that it is obso-
lete and inconvenient. But when we find Dryden telling us: 'What
Virgil wrote in the vigour of his age, in plenty and at ease, I have
undertaken to translate in my declining years; struggling with
wants, oppressed with sickness, curbed in my genius, liable to be
misconstrued in all I write,' — 'then we exclaim that here at last
we have the true English prose, a prose such as we would all
gladly use if we only knew how. Yet Dryden was Milton's con-
temporary.

But after the Restoration the time had come when our nation felt
the imperious need of a fit prose. So, too, the time had hkewise
come when our nation felt the imperious need of freeing itself
from the absorbing preoccupation which religion in the Puritan age
had exercised. It was impossible that this freedom should be brought
about without some negative excess, without some neglect and im-
pairment of the religious life of the soul; and the spiritual history
of the eighteenth century shows us that the freedom was not
achieved without them. Still, the freedom was achieved; the pre-
occupation, an undoubtedly baneful and retarding one if it had
continued, was got rid of. And as with religion amongst us at that
period, so it was also with letters. A fit prose was a necessity; but it
was impossible that a fit prose should establish itself amongst us
without some touch of frost to the imaginative life of the soul. The
needful qualities for a fit prose are regularity, uniformity, precision,
balance. The men of letters, whose destiny it may be to bring their
nation to the attainment of a fit prose, must of necessity, whether
they work in prose or in verse, give a predominating, an almost
exclusive attention to the qualities of regularity, uniformity, pre-
cision, balance. But an almost exclusive attention to these qualities
involves some repression and silencing of poetry.

We are to regard Dryden as the puissant and glorious founder.
Pope as the splendid high priest, of our age of prose and reason, of
our excellent and indispensable eighteenth century. For the purposes
of their mission and destiny their poetry, like their prose, is admi-
rable. Do you ask me whether Dryden's verse, take it almost where
you will, is not good?

THE STUDY OF POETRY 83

'A milk-white Hind, immortal and unchanged,
Fed on the lawns and in the forest ranged.'

I answer: Admirable for the purposes of the inaugurator of an age
of prose and reason. Do you ask me whether Pope's verse, take it
almost where you will, is not good.?

'To Hounslow Heath I point, and Banstead Down;
Thence comes your mutton, and these chicks my own.'

I answer: Admirable for the purposes of the high priest of an age
of prose and reason. But do you ask me whether such verse proceeds
from men with an adequate poetic criticism of life, from men whose
criticism of life has a high seriousness, or even, without that high
seriousness, has poetic largeness, freedom, insight, benignity.? Do
you ask me whether the application of ideas to life in the verse of
these men, often a powerful application, no doubt, is a powerful
poetic application } Do you ask me whether the poetry of these men
has either the matter or the inseparable manner of such an adequate
poetic criticism; whether it has the accent of

or of
or of

'Absent thee from felicity awhile . . .'
'And what is else not to be overcome .
'O martyr souded in virginitee!'

I answer: It has not and cannot have them; it is the poetry of the
builders of an age of prose and reason. Though they may write in
verse, though they may in a certain sense be masters of the art of
versification, Dryden and Pope are not classics of our poetry, they
are classics of our prose.

Gray is our poetical classic of that literature and age; the position
of Gray is singular, and demands a word of notice here. He has not
the volume or the power of poets who, coming in times more favour-
able, have attained to an independent criticism of life. But he lived
with the great poets, he lived, above all, with the Greeks, through
perpetually studying and enjoying them; and he caught their poetic

84 ARNOLD

point of view for regarding life, caught their poetic manner. The
point of view and the manner are not self-sprung in him, he caught
them of others; and he had not the free and abundant use of them.
But, whereas Addison and Pope never had the use of them, Gray
had the use of them at times. He is the scantiest and frailest of
classics in our poetry, but he is a classic.

And now, after Gray, we are met, as we draw towards the end of
the eighteenth century, we are met by the great name of Burns.
We enter now on times where the personal estimate of poets begins
to be rife, and where the real estimate of them is not reached without
difficulty. But in spite of the disturbing pressures of personal par-
tiality, of national partiality, let us try to reach a real estimate of the
poetry of Burns.

By his English poetry Burns in general belongs to the eighteenth
century, and has little importance for us.

'Mark ruffian Violence, distain'd with crimes.

Rousing elate in these degenerate times;

View unsuspecting Innocence a prey,

As guileful Fraud points out the erring way;

While subtle Litigation's pliant tongue

The life-blood equal sucks of Right and Wrong!'

Evidently this is not the real Burns, or his name and fame would have
disappeared long ago. Nor is Clarinda's love-poet, Sylvander, the
real Burns either. But he tells us himself: 'These English songs
gravel me to death. I have not the command of the language that I
have of my native tongue. In fact, I think that my ideas are more
barren in English than in Scotch. I have been at Duncan Gray to
dress it in English, but all I can do is desperately stupid.' We Eng-
lish turn naturally, in Burns, to the poems in our own language,
because we can read them easily; but in those poems we have not
the real Burns.

The real Burns is of course in his Scotch poems. Let us boldly
say that of much of this poetry, a poetry dealing perpetually with
Scotch drink, Scotch religion, and Scotch manners, a Scotchman's
estimate is apt to be personal. A Scotchman is used to this world of
Scotch drink, Scotch religion, and Scotch manners; he has a tender-
ness for it; he meets its poet halfway. In this tender mood he reads

THE STUDY OF POETRY 85

pieces like the Holy Fair or Halloween. But this world of Scotch
drink, Scotch religion, and Scotch manners is against a poet, not
for him, when it is not a partial countryman who reads him; for in
itself it is not a beautiful world, and no one can deny that it is of
advantage to a poet to deal with a beautiful world. Burns's world of
Scotch drink, Scotch religion, and Scotch manners, is often a harsh,
a sordid, a repulsive world: even the world of his Cotter's Saturday
Night is not a beautiful world. No doubt a poet's criticism of life
may have such truth and power that it triumphs over its world and
delights us. Burns may triumph over his world, often he does
triumph over his world, but let us observe how and where. Burns
is the first case we have had where the bias of the personal estimate
tends to mislead; let us look at him closely, he can bear it.

Many of his admirers will tell us that we have Burns, convivial,
genuine, delightful, here —

'Leeze me on drink! it gies us mair

Than either school or college;
It kindles wit, it waukens lair,

It pangs us fou o' knowledge.
Be't whisky gill or penny wheep

Or ony stronger potion.
It never fails, on drinking deep,

To kittle up our notion

By night or day.*

There is a great deal of that sort of thing in Burns, and it is unsatis-
factory, not because it is bacchanalian poetry, but because it has not
that accent of sincerity which bacchanalian poetry, to do it justice,
very often has. There is something in it of bravado, something
which makes us feel that we have not the man speaking to us with
his real voice; something, therefore, poetically unsound.

With still more confidence will his admirers tell us that we have
the genuine Burns, the great poet, when his strain asserts the inde-
pendence, equality, dignity, of men, as in the famous song For a'
that, and a' that —

'A prince can mak' a belted knight,

A marquis, duke, and a' that;
But an honest man's aboon his might,

Guid faith he mauna fa' that!

86 ARNOLD

For a' that, and a' that,

Their dignities, and a' that,
The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth,

Are higher rank than a' that.'

Here they find his grand, genuine touches; and still more, when
this puissant genius, who so often set morality at defiance, falls
moralising —

'The sacred lowe o' weel-placed love

Luxuriantly indulge it;
But never tempt th' illicit rove,

The' naething should divulge it.
I waive the quantum o' the sin,

The hazard o' concealing.
But och! it hardens a' within,

And petrifies the feeling.'

Or in a higher strain —

'Who made the heart, 'tis He alone
~ Decidedly can try us;

He knows each chord, its various tone;

Each spring, its various bias.
Then at the balance let's be mute.

We never can adjust it;
What's done we pardy may compute,

But know not what's resisted.'

Or in a better strain yet, a strain, his admirers will say, unsur-
passable —

'To make a happy fireside clime
To weans and wife.
That's the true pathos and sublime
Of human life.'

There is criticism of life for you, the admirers of Burns will say to
us; there is the application of ideas to life! There is, undoubtedly.
The doctrine of the last-quoted lines coincides almost exactly with
what was the aim and end, Xenophon tells us, of all the teaching of
Socrates. And the application is a powerful one; made by a man of
vigorous understanding, and (need I say?) a master of language.

But for supreme poetical success more is required than the power-
ful application of ideas to life; it must be an application under the

THE STUDY OF POETRY 87

conditions fixed by the laws of poetic truth and poetic beauty. Those
laws fix as an essential condition, in the poet's treatment of such
matters as are here in question, high seriousness; — the high serious-
ness which comes from absolute sincerity. The accent of high
seriousness, born of absolute sincerity, is what gives to such verse as

'In la sua volontade e nostra pace . . .'

to such criticism of life as Dante's, its power. Is this accent felt in
the passages which I have been quoting from Burns? Surely not;
surely, if our sense is quick, we must perceive that we have not in
those passages a voice from the very inmost soul of the genuine
Burns; he is not speaking to us from these depths, he is more or
less preaching. And the compensation for admiring such passages
less, from missing the perfect poetic accent in them, will be that
we shall admire more the poetry where that accent is found.

No; Burns, like Chaucer, comes short of the high seriousness of
the great classics, and the virtue of matter and manner which goes
with that high seriousness is wanting to his work. At moments he
touches it in a profound and passionate melancholy, as in those four
immortal lines taken by Byron as a motto for The Bride of Abydos,
but which have in them a depth of poetic quality such as resides
in no verse of Byron's own —

'Had we never loved sae kindly.
Had we never loved sae blindly.
Never met, or never parted,
We had ne'er been broken-hearted.'

But a whole poem of that quality Burns cannot make; the rest, in
the Farewell to Nancy, is verbiage.

We arrive best at the real estimate of Burns, I think, by con-
ceiving his work as having truth of matter and truth of manner, but
not the accent or the poetic virtue of the highest masters. His
genuine criticism of life, when the sheer poet in him speaks, is
ironic; it is not —

'Thou Power Supreme, whose mighty scheme

These woes of mine fulfil.
Here firm I rest, they must be best

Because they are Thy will!'

88 ARNOLD

It is far rather: Whistle owre the lave o'tl Yet we may say of him
as of Chaucer, that of life and the world, as they come before him,
his view is large, free, shrewd, benignant, — truly poetic therefore;
and his manner of rendering what he sees is to match. But we must
note, at the same time, his great difference from Chaucer. The free-
dom of Chaucer is heightened, in Burns, by a fiery, reckless energy;
the benignity of Chaucer deepens, in Burns, into an overwhelming
sense of the pathos of things; — of the pathos of human nature, the
pathos, also, of non-human nature. Instead of the fluidity of Chau-
cer's manner, the manner of Burns has spring, boundless swiftness.
Burns is by far the greater force, though he has perhaps less charm.
The world of Chaucer is fairer, richer, more significant than that of
Burns; but when the largeness and freedom of Burns get full sweep,
as in Tarn o' Shunter, or still more in that puissant and splendid
production, "The ]olly Beggars, his world may be what it will, his
poetic genius triumphs over it. In the world of The Jolly Beggars
there is more than hideousness and squalor, there is bestiality; yet
the piece is a superb poetic success. It has a breadth, truth, and power
which make the famous scene in Auerbach's Cellar, of Goethe's
Faust, seem artificial and tame beside it, and which are only matched
by Shakespeare and Aristophanes.

Here, where his largeness and freedom serve him so admirably,
and also in those poems and songs where to shrewdness he adds
infinite archness and wit, and to benignity infinite pathos, where his
manner is flawless, and a perfect poetic whole is the result, — in
things like the address to the mouse whose home he had ruined, in
things like Duncan Gray, Tarn Glen, Whistle and I'll come to you,
my Lad, Auld Lang Syne (this list might be made much longer) , —
here we have the genuine Burns, of whom the real estimate must
be high indeed. Not a classic, nor with the excellent aTovbaibr-qs of
the great classics, nor with a verse rising to a criticism of life and a
virtue like theirs; but a poet with thorough truth of substance and
an answering truth of style, giving us a poetry sound to the core.
We all of us have a leaning towards the pathetic, and may be in-
clined perhaps to prize Burns most for his touches of piercing, some-
times almost intolerable, pathos; for verse like —

THE STUDY OF POETRY 89

'We twa hae paidl't i' the burn

From mornin' sun till dine;
But seas between us braid hae roar'd

Sin auld lang syne ..."

where he is as lovely as he is sound. But perhaps it is by the per-
fection of soundness of his lighter and archer masterpieces that he is
poetically most wholesome for us. For the votary misled by a per-
sonal estimate of Shelley, as so many of us have been, are, and will
be, — of that beautiful spirit building his many-coloured haze of
words and images

'Pinnacled dim in the intense inane' —

no contact can be wholesomer than the contact with Burns at his
archest and soundest. Side by side with the

'On the brink of the night and the morning

My coursers are wont to respire,
But the Earth has just whispered a warning

That their flight must be swifter than iire . . .'

of Prometheus Unbound, how salutary, how very salutary, to place
this from Tarn Glen —

'My minnie does constantly deave me

And bids me beware o' young men;
They flatter, she says, to deceive me;

But wha can think sae o' Tarn Glen?'

But we enter on burning ground as we approach the poetry of
times so near to us — poetry like that of Byron, Shelley, and Words-
worth — of which the estimates are so often not only personal, but
personal with passion. For my purpose, it is enough to have taken
the single case of Burns, the first poet we come to of whose work
the estimate formed is evidently apt to be personal, and to have
suggested how we may proceed, using the poetry of the great classics
as a sort of touchstone, to correct this estimate, as we had previously
corrected by the same means the historic estimate where we met with
it. A collection like the present, with its succession of celebrated
names and celebrated poems, offers a good opportunity to us for
resolutely endeavouring to make our estimates of poetry real. I
have sought to point out a method which will help us in making

90 ARNOLD

them so, and to exhibit it in use so far as to put any one who Ukes
in a way of applying it for himself.

At any rate the end to which the method and the estimate are
designed to lead, and from leading to which, if they do lead to it,
they get their whole value,— the benefit of being able clearly to
feel and deeply to enjoy the best, the truly classic, in poetry, — is an
end, let me say it once more at parting, of supreme importance. We
are often told that an era is opening in which we are to see multi-
tudes of a common sort of readers, and masses of a common sort
of literature; that such readers do not want and could not relish
anything better than such literature, and that to provide it is becom-
ing a vast and profitable industry. Even if good literature entirely
lost currency with the world, it would still be abundantly worth
while to continue to enjoy it by oneself. But it never will lose cur-
rency with the world, in spite of monetary appearances; it never
will lose supremacy. Currency and supremacy are insured to it, not
indeed by the world's deliberate and conscious choice, but by some-
thing far deeper, — by the instinct of self-preservation in humanity.

SESAME AND LILIES

BY
JOHN RUSKIN

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

John Ruskin (1819-1900), the greatest master of ornate prose in the
English language, was born in London and educated at Oxford. He
studied painting, and became a graceful and accurate draftsman, but he
early transferred his main energies from the production to the criticism
and teaching of art. In 1843 appeared the first volume of "Modern
Painters," and succeeding volumes continued to be published till it was
completed by the fifth in i860. The startling originality of this work,
both in style and in the nature of its esthetic theories, brought the author
at once into prominence, though for some time he was more attacked
than followed. Meanwhile he extended his scope to include other fields.
In "The Seven Lamps of Architecture" (1849) and "The Stones of
Venice" (1851-53) he applied his theories to architecture; in "Pre-
Raphaelitism" (1851) he came to the defense of the new school of art
then beginning to agitate England; in "Unto this Last" (1861) and
many other writings he attacked the current political economy.

In spite of the great variety of the themes of Ruskin's numerous vol-
umes, there are to be found, underlying the eloquent argument, exposi-
tion, and exhortation of all, a few persistent principles. The application
of these principles in one place is often inconsistent with that in another,
and Ruskin frankly reversed his opinion with great frequency in suc-
cessive editions of the same work; yet he continued to use a dogmatic
tone which is at once his strength and his weakness.

The two lectures which constitute "Sesame and Lilies" deal ostensibly
with the reading of books; but in characteristic fashion the author brings
into the discussion his favorite ideas on ethics, esthetics, economics, and
many other subjects. It thus gives a fairly comprehensive idea of the
nature of the widespread influence which he exerted on English life and
thought during the whole of the second half of the nineteenth century.
Its style also, in its earnestness, its richness, and its lofty eloquence, exem-
plifies the pitch to which he brought the tradition of the highly decorated
prose cultivated by De Quincey in the previous generation, a pitch of
gorgeousness in color and cadence which has been surpassed by none.

SESAME AND LILIES

LECTURE I.— SESAME: OF
KINGS' TREASURIES'

"You shall each have a cake of sesame, — and ten jxsund."

Lucian: The Fisherman.

M' first duty this evening is to ask your pardon for the am-
biguity of title under which the subject of lecture has been
announced: for indeed I am not going to talk of kings,
known as regnant, nor of treasuries, understood to contain wealth;
but of quite another order of royalty, and another material of riches,
than those usually acknowledged, I had even intended to ask your
attention for a little while on trust, and (as sometimes one contrives,
in taking a friend to see a favorite piece of scenery) to hide what I
wanted most to show, with such imperfect cunning as I might, until
we unexpectedly reached the best point of view by winding paths.
But — and as also I have heard it said, by men practised in public
address, that hearers are never so much fatigued as by the endeavor
to follow a speaker who gives them no clue to his purposes, — I will
take the slight mask off at once, and tell you plainly that I want to
speak to you about the treasures hidden in books; and about the way
we find them, and the way we lose them. A grave subject, you will
say; and a wide one! Yes; so wide that I shall make no effort to
touch the compass of it. I will try only to bring before you a few
simple thoughts about reading, which press themselves upon me
every day more deeply, as I watch the course of the public mind with
respect to our daily enlarging means of education; and the answer-
ingly wider spreading on the levels, of the irrigation of literature.

2. It happens that I have practically some connection with schools
for different classes of youth; and I receive many letters from parents

'This lecture was given December 6, 1864, at Rusholme Town Hall, Manchester,
in aid of a library fund for the Rusholme Institute.

93

94 RUSKIN

respecting the education of tbieir children. In the mass of these let-
ters I am always struck by the precedence which the idea of a "posi-
tion in life" takes above all other thoughts in the parents' — more
especially in the mothers' — minds. "The education befitting such
and such a station in life" — this is the phrase, this the object, always.
They never seek, as far as I can make out, an education good in it-
self; even the conception of abstract Tightness in training rarely
seems reached by the writers. But an education "which shall keep
a good coat on my son's back; — which shall enable him to ring with
confidence the visitors' bell at double-belled doors; which shall re-
sult ultimately in establishment of a double-belled door to his own
house; — in a word, which shall lead to 'advancement in life'; — this
we pray for on bent knees — and this is all we pray for." It never
seems to occur to the parents that there may be an education which,
in itself, is advancement in Life; — that any other than that may per-
haps be advancement in Death; and that this essential education
might be more easily got, or given, than they fancy, if they set about
it in the right way; while it is for no price, and by no favor, to be
got, if they set about it in the wrong.

3. Indeed, among the ideas most prevalent and effective in the
mind of this busiest of countries, I suppose the first — at least that
which is confessed with the greatest frankness, and put forward as
the fittest stimulus to youthful exertion — ^is this of "Advancement in
Life." May I ask you to consider with me what this idea practically
includes, and what it should include?

Practically, then, at present, "advancement in life" means, becom-
ing conspicuous in life; — obtaining a position which shall be
acknowledged by others to be respectable or honorable. We do not
understand by this advancement in general, the mere making of
money, but the being known to have made it; not the accomplish-
ment of any great aim, but the being seen to have accomplished it.
In a word, we mean the gratiiication of our thirst for applause. That
thirst, if the last infirmity of noble minds, is also the first infirmity
of weak ones; and, on the whole, the strongest impulsive influence
of average humanity : the greatest efforts of the race have always been
traceable to the love of praise, as its greatest catastrophes to the love
of pleasure.

sesame: of kings' treasuries 95

4. I am not about to attack or defend this impulse. I want you
only to feel how it lies at the root of effort; especially of all modern
effort. It is the gratification of vanity which is, with us, the stimulus
of toil, and balm of repose; so closely does it touch the very springs
of life that the wounding of our vanity is always spoken of (and
truly) as in its measure mortal; we call it "mortification," using the
same expression which we should apply to a gangrenous and incur-
able bodily hurt. And although few of us may be physicians enough
to recognize the various effect of this passion upon health and en-
ergy, I believe most honest men know, and would at once acknowl-
edge, its leading power with them as a motive. The seaman does
not commonly desire to be made captain only because he knows he
can manage the ship better than any other sailor on board. He wants
to be made captain that he may be called captain. The clergyman
does not usually want to be made a bishop only because he believes
no other hand can, as firmly as his, direct the diocese through its
difficulties. He wants to be made bishop primarily that he may be
called "My Lord." And a prince does not usually desire to enlarge,
or a subject to gain, a kingdom, because he believes that no one else
can as well serve the State, upon its throne; but, briefly, because he
wishes to be addressed as "Your Majesty," by as many lips as may
be brought to such utterance.

5. This, then, being the main idea of "advancement in life," the
force of it applies, for all of us, according to our station, particularly
to that secondary result of such advancement which we call "getting
into good society." We want to get into good society, not that we
may have it, but that we may be seen in it; and our notion of its
goodness depends primarily on its conspicuousness.

Will you pardon me if I pause for a moment to put what I fear
you may think an impertinent question? I never can go on with
an address unless I feel, or know, that my audience are either with
me or against me: I do not much care which, in beginning; but I
must know where they are; and I would fain find out, at this in-
stant, whether you think I am putting the motives of popular action
too low. I am resolved, to-night, to state them low enough to be
admitted as probable; for whenever, in my writings on Political
Economy, I assume that a little honesty, or generosity — or what used

96 RUSKIN

to be called "virtue" — may be calculated upon as a human motive o£
action, people always answer me, saying, "You must not calculate
on that: that is not in human nature: you must not assume anything
to be common to men but acquisitiveness and jealousy; no other
feeling ever has influence on them, except accidentally, and in mat-
ters out of the way of business." I begin, accordingly, to-night low in
the scale of motives; but I must know if you think me right in doing
so. Therefore, let me ask those who admit the love of praise to be
usually the strongest motive in men's minds in seeking advancement,
and the honest desire of doing any kind of duty to be an entirely
secondary one, to hold up their hands. {About a dozen hands held
up — the audience, partly not being sure the lecturer is serious, and,
partly, shy of expressing opinion.) I am quite serious — I really do
want to know what you think; however, I can judge by putting the
reverse question. Will those who think that duty is generally the
first, and love of praise the second, motive, hold up their hands?
(0«<? hand reported to have been held up, behind the lecturer.)
Very good; I see you are with me, and that you think I have not
begun too near the ground. Now, without teasing you by putting
farther question, I venture to assume that you will admit duty as at
least a secondary or tertiary motive. You think that the desire of
doing something useful, or obtaining some real good, is indeed an
existent collateral idea, though a secondary one, in most men's desire
of advancement. You will grant that moderately honest men desire
place and office, at least in some measure, for the sake of beneficent
power; and would wish to associate rather with sensible and well-
informed persons than with fools and ignorant persons, whether
they are seen in the company of the sensible ones or not. And finally,
without being troubled by repetition of any common truisms about
the preciousness of friends, and the influence of companions, you
will admit, doubtless, that according to the sincerity of our desire
that our friends may be true, and our companions wise, — and
in proportion to the earnestness and discretion with which we
choose both, will be the general chances of our happiness and use-
fulness.

6. But, granting that we had both the will and the sense to choose
our friends well, how few of us have the power! or, at least, how

>

sesame: of kings treasuries 97

limited, for most, is the sphere of choice! Nearly all our associations
are determined by chance, or necessity; and restricted within a nar-
row circle. We cannot know whom we would; and those whom we
know, we cannot have at our side when we most need them. All the
higher circles of human intelligence are, to those beneath, only
momentarily and partially open. We may, by good fortune, obtain
a glimpse of a great poet, and hear the sound of his voice; or put a
question to a man of science, and be answered good-humoredly. We
may intrude ten minutes' talk on a cabinet minister, answered
probably with words worse than silence, being deceptive; or snatch,
once or twice in our lives, the privilege of throwing a bouquet in
the path of a Princess, or arresting the kind glance of a Queen. And
yet these momentary chances we covet; and spend our years, and
passions, and powers in pursuit of little more than these; while,
meantime, there is a society continually open to us, of people who
will talk to us as long as we like, whatever our rank or occupation ; —
talk to us in the best words they can choose, and of the things near-
est their hearts. And this society, because it is so numerous and so
gentle, and can be kept waiting round us all day long, — kings and
statesmen lingering patiently, not to grant audience, but to gain it! —
in those plainly furnished and narrow anterooms, our bookcase
shelves, — we make no account of that company, — perhaps never
listen to a word they would say, all day long!

7. You may tell me, perhaps, or think within yourselves, that the
apathy with which we regard this company of the noble, who are
praying us to listen to them; and the passion with which we pursue
the company, probably of the ignoble who despise us, or who have
nothing to teach us, are grounded in this, — that we can see the faces
of the living men, and it is themselves, and not their sayings, with
which we desire to become familiar. But it is not so. Suppose you
never were to see their faces; — suppose you could be put behind a
screen in the statesman's cabinet, or the prince's chamber, would you
not be glad to listen to their words, though you were forbidden to
advance beyond the screen? And when the screen is only a little
less, folded in two instead of four, and you can be hidden behind
the cover of the two boards that bind a book, and listen all day long,
not to the casual talk, but to the studied, determined,chosen addresses

98 RUSKIN

o£ the wisest of men; — ^this station of audience, and honorable privy
council, you despisel

8. But perhaps you will say that it is because the living people
talk of things that are passing, and are of immediate interest to you,
that you desire to hear them. Nay; that cannot be so, for the living
people will themselves tell you about passing matters much better in
their writings than in their careless talk. But I admit that this motive
does influence you, so far as you prefer those rapid and ephemeral
writings to slow and enduring writings, — books, properly so called.
For all books are divisible into two classes, the books of the hour,
and the books of all time. Mark this distinction — it is not one of
quality only. It is not merely the bad book that does not last, and
the good one that does. It is a distinction of species. There are good
books for the hour, and good ones for all time; bad books for the
hour, and bad ones for all time. I must define the two kinds before
I go farther.

9. The good book of the hour, then, — I do not speak of the bad
ones, — is simply the useful or pleasant talk of some person whom
you cannot otherwise converse with, printed for you. Very useful
often, telling you what you need to know; very pleasant often, as a
sensible friend's present talk would be. These bright accounts of
travels; good-humored and witty discussions of question; lively or
pathetic story-telling in the form of novel; firm fact-telling, by the
real agents concerned in the events of passing history; — all these
books of the hour, multiplying among us as education becomes more
general, are a peculiar possession of the present age; we ought to be
entirely thankful for them, and entirely ashamed of ourselves if we
make no good use of them. But we make the worst possible use if
we allow them to usurp the place of true books: for strictly speak-
ing, they are not books at all, but merely letters or newspapers in
good print. Our friend's letter may be delightful, or necessary,
to-day : whether worth keeping or not, is to be considered. The news-
paper may be entirely proper at breakfast time, but assuredly it is
not reading for all day. So, though bound up in a volume, the long
letter which gives you so pleasant an account of the inns, and roads,
and weather last year at such a place, or which tells you that amusing
story, or gives you the real circumstances of such and such events.

sesame: of kings treasuries 99

however valuable for occasional reference, may not be, in the real
sense of the word, a "book" at all, nor in the real sense, to be "read."
A book is essentially not a talked thing, but a written thing; and
written, not with the view of mere communication, but of perma-
nence. The book of talk is printed only because its author cannot
speak to thousands of people at once; if he could, he would — the
volume is mere multiplication of his voice. You cannot talk to your
friend in India; if you could, you would; you write instead: that is
mere conveyance of voice. But a book is written, not to multiply the
voice merely, not to carry it merely, but to perpetuate it. The author
has something to say which he perceives to be true and useful, or
helpfully beautiful. So far as he knows, no one has yet said it; so
far as he knows, no one else can say it. He is bound to say it, clearly
and melodiously if he may; clearly, at all events. In the sum of his
life he finds this to be the thing, or group of things, manifest to him;
— this, the piece of true knowledge, or sight, which his share of sun-
shine and earth has permitted him to seize. He would fain set it
down forever; engrave it on rock, if he could; saying, "This is the
best of me; for the rest, I ate, and drank, and slept, loved, and hated,
like another; my life was as the vapor and is not; but this I saw and
knew: this, if anything of mine, is worth your memory." That is his
"writing"; it is, in his small human way, and with whatever degree
of true inspiration is in him, his inscription, or scripture. That is a
"Book."

10. Perhaps you think no books were ever so written.

But, again, I ask you, do you at all believe in honesty, or at all in
kindness ? or do you think there is never any honesty or benevolence
in wise people ? None of us, I hope, are so unhappy as to think that.
Well, whatever bit of a wise man's work is honestly and benevolently
done, that bit is his book, or his piece of art.^ It is mixed always with
evil fragments — ill-done, redundant, affected work. But if you read
rightly, you will easily discover the true bits, and those are the book.

11. Now books of this kind have been written in all ages by their
greatest men : — by great readers, great statesmen, and great thinkers.
These are all at your choice; and Life is short. You have heard as
much before; — yet have you measured and mapped out this short

*Note this sentence carefully, and compare the "Queen of the Air," § io6.

100 RUSKIN

life and its possibilities? Do you know, if you read this, that you
cannot read that — that what you lose to-day you cannot gain to-mor-
row? Will you go and gossip with your housemaid, or your stable-
boy, when you may talk with queens and kings; or flatter yourselves
that it is with any worthy consciousness of your own claims to respect
that you jostle with the hungry and common crowd for entree here,
and audience there, when all the while this eternal court is open to
you, with its society, wide as the world, multitudinous as its days,
the chosen, and the mighty, of every place and time ? Into that you
may enter always ; in that you may take fellowship and rank accord-
ing to your wish; from that, once entered into it, you can never be
outcast but by your own fault; by your aristocracy of companionship
there, your own inherent aristocracy will be assuredly tested, and
the motives with which you strive to take high place in the society
of the living, measured, as to all the truth and sincerity that are
in them, by the place you desire to take in this company of the
Dead.

12. "The place you desire," and the place you fit yourself for, I
must also say; because, observe, this court of the past differs from all
living aristocracy in this: — it is open to labor and to merit, but to
nothing else. No wealth will bribe, no name overawe, no artifice
deceive, the guardian of those Elysian gates. In the deep sense, no
vile or vulgar person ever enters there. At the portieres of that silent
Faubourg St. Germain, there is but brief question : — "Do you deserve
to enter? Pass. Do you ask to be the companion of nobles? Make
yourself noble, and you shall be. Do you long for the conversation
of the wise? Learn to understand it, and you shall hear it. But on
other terms ? — no. If you will not rise to us, we cannot stoop to you.
The living lord may assume courtesy, the living philosopher explain
his thought to you with considerate pain; but here we neither feign
nor interpret; you must rise to the level of our thoughts if you would
be gladdened by them, and share our feelings, if you would recognize
our presence."

13. This, then, is what you have to do, and I admit that it is much.
You must, in a word, love these people, if you are to be among them.
No ambition is of any use. They scorn your ambition. You must
love them, and show your love in these two following ways:

sesame: of kings' treasuries ioi

I. — ^First, by a true desire to be taught by them, and to enter into
their thoughts. To enter into theirs, observe; not to find your own
expressed by them. If the person who wrote the book is not wiser
than you, you need not read it; if he be, he will think differently
from you in many respects.

Very ready we are to say of a book, "How good this is — that's
exactly what I think!" But the right feeling is, "How strange that
is! I never thought of that before, and yet I see it is true; or if I
do not now, I hope I shall, some day." But whether thus submis-
sively or not, at least be sure that you go to the author to get at his
meaning, not to find yours. Judge it afterwards, if you think your-
self qualified to do so; but ascertain it first. And be sure also, if
the author is worth anything, that you will not get at his meaning
all at once; — nay, that at his whole meaning you will not for a long
time arrive in any wise. Not that he does not say what he means,
and in strong words too; but he cannot say it all; and what is more
strange, will not, but in a hidden way and in parables, in order that
he may be sure you want it. I cannot quite see the reason of this,
nor analyze that cruel reticence in the breasts of wise men which
makes them always hide their deeper thought. They do not give it
to you by way of help, but of reward; and will make themselves
sure that you deserve it before they allow you to reach it. But it is
the same with the physical type of wisdom, gold. There seems, to
you and me, no reason why the electric forces of the earth should not
carry whatever there is of gold within it at once to the mountain
tops, so that kings and people might know that all the gold they
could get was there; and without any trouble of digging, or anxiety,
or chance, or waste of time, cut it away, and coin as much as they
needed. But Nature does not manage it so. She puts it in little fis-
sures in the earth, nobody knows where: you may dig long and find
none; you must dig painfully to find any.

14. And it is just the same with men's best wisdom. When you
come to a good book, you must ask yourself, "Am I inclined to work
as an Australian miner would? Are my pickaxes and shovels in
good order, and am I in good trim myself, my sleeves well up to the
elbow, and my breath good, and my temper?" And, keeping the
figure a little longer, even at the cost of tiresomeness, for it is a thor-

102 RUSKIN

oughly useful one, the metal you are in search of being the author's
mind or meaning, his words are as the rock which you have to crush
and smelt in order to get at it. And your pickaxes are your own
care, wit, and learning; your smel ting-furnace is your own thought-
ful soul. Do not hope to get at any good author's meaning with-
out those tools and that fire; often you will need sharpest, finest chis-
eling, and patientest fusing, before you can gather one grain of the
metal.

15. And therefore, first of all, I tell you, earnestly and authorita-
tively (I know I am right in this), you must get into the habit of
looking intensely at words, and assuring yourself of their meaning,
syllable by syllable — nay, letter by letter. For though it is only by
reason of the opposition of letters in the function of signs, to sounds
in the function of signs, that the study of books is called "literature,"
and that a man versed in it is called, by the consent of nations, a
man of letters instead of a man of books, or of words, you may yet
connect with that accidental nomenclature this real fact: — that you
might read all the books in the British Museum (if you could live
long enough) and remain an utterly "illiterate," uneducated person;
but that if you read ten pages of a good book, letter by letter, — that
is to say, with real accuracy, — you are forevermore in some measure
an educated person. The entire difference between education and
non-education (as regards the merely intellectual part of it) con-
sists in this accuracy. A well-educated gentleman may not know
many languages, — may not be able to speak any but his own, — may
have read very few books. But whatever language he knows, he
knows precisely; whatever word he pronounces, he pronounces
rightly; above all, he is learned in the peerage of words; knows the
words of true descent and ancient blood at a glance, from words of
modern canaille; remembers all their ancestry, their inter-marriages,
distant relationships, and the extent to which they were admitted,
and offices they held, among the national noblesse of words at any
time, and in any country. But an uneducated person may know, by
memory, many languages, and talk them all, and yet truly know
not a word of any, — not a word even of his own. An ordinarily
clever and sensible seaman will be able to make his way ashore at
most ports; yet he has only to speak a sentence of any language to

'sesame: of kings treasuries 103

be known for an illiterate person: so also the accent, or turn of
expression of a single sentence, will at once mark a scholar. And
this is so strongly felt, so conclusively admitted by educated persons,
that a false accent or a mistaken syllable is enough, in the parliament
of any civilized nation, to assign to a man a certain degree of inferior
standing forever.

16. And this is right; but it is a pity that the accuracy insisted on
is not greater, and required to a serious purpose. It is right that a
false Latin quantity should excite a smile in the House of Commons;
but it is wrong that a false English meaning should not excite a
frown there. Let the accent of words be watched; and closely: let
their meaning be watched more closely still, and fewer will do the
work. A few words well chosen and distinguished, will do work
that a thousand cannot, when every one is acting, equivocally, in
the function of another. Yes; and words, if they are not watched,
will do deadly work sometimes. There are masked words droning
and skulking about us in Europe just now, — (there never were so
many, owing to the spread of a shallow, blotching, blundering, infec-
tious "information," or rather deformation, everywhere, and to the
teaching of catechisms and phrases at schools instead of human mean-
ings) — there are masked words abroad, I say, which nobody under-
stands, but which everybody uses, and most people will also fight for,
live for, or even die for, fancying they mean this or that, or the other,
of things dear to them: for such words wear chameleon cloaks —
"ground-lion" cloaks, of the color of the ground of any man's fancy:
on that ground they lie in wait, and rend him with a spring from it.
There never were creatures of prey so mischievous, never diploma-
tists so cunning, never poisoners so deadly, as these masked words;
they are the unjust stewards of all men's ideas: whatever fancy or
favorite instinct a man most cherishes, he gives to his favorite masked
word to take care of for him; the word at last comes to have an infi-
nite power over him, — you cannot get at him but by its ministry.

17. And in languages so mongrel in breed as the English, there is
a fatal power of equivocation put into men's hands, almost whether
they will or no, in being able to use Greek or Latin words for an
idea when they want it to be awful; and Saxon or otherwise com-
mon words when they want it to be vulgar. What a singular and

104 RUSKIN

salutary effect, for instance, would be produced on the minds of
people who are in the habit of taking the Form of the "Word" they
live by, for the Power of which that Word tells them, if we always
either retained, or refused, the Greek form "biblos," or "biblion,"
as the right expression for "book" — instead of employing it only in
the one instance in which we wish to give dignity to the idea, and
translating it into English everywhere else. How wholesome it
would be for many simple persons, if, in such places (for instance)
as Acts xix, 19, we retained the Greek expression, instead of trans-
lating it, and they had to read — "Many of them also which used
curious arts, brought their bibles together, and burnt them before
all men; and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty
thousand pieces of silver"! Or if, on the other hand, we translated
where we retain it, and always spoke of "The Holy Book," instead
of "Holy Bible," it might come into more heads than it does at
present, that the Word of God, by which the heavens were, of old,
and by which they are now kept in store,' cannot be made a present
of to anybody in morocco binding; nor sown on any wayside by
help either of steam plough or steam press; but is nevertheless being
offered to us daily, and by us with contumely refused; and sown in
us daily, and by us, as instantly as may be, choked.

18. So, again, consider what effect has been produced on the Eng-
lish vulgar mind by the use of the sonorous Latin form "damno," in
translating the Greek KaraKpLvco, when people charitably wish to
make it forcible; and the substitution of the temperate "condemn"
for it, when they choose to keep it gentle; and what notable sermons
have been preached by illiterate clergymen on — "He that believeth
not shall be damned"; though they would shrink with horror from
translating Heb. xi. 7, "The saving of his house, by which he damned
the world"; or John viii. 10, 11, "Woman, hath no man damned thee?
She saith, No man, Lord. Jesus answered her, Neither do I damn
thee; go and sin no more." And divisions in the mind of Europe,
which have cost seas of blood and in the defense of which the noblest
souls of men have been cast away in frantic desolation, countless as
forest leaves — though, in the heart of them, founded on deeper

' 2 Peter iii. 5-7.

sesame: of kings' treasuries 105

causes — ^have nevertheless been rendered practicably possible, namely,
by the European adoption of the Greek word for a public meeting,
"ecclesia," to give peculiar respectability to such meetings, when held
for religious purposes; and other collateral equivocations, such as the
vulgar English one of using the word "priest" as a contraction for
"presbyter."

19. Now, in order to deal with words rightly, this is the habit you
must form. Nearly every word in your language has been first a
word of some other language — of Saxon, German, French, Latin,
or Greek (not to speak of eastern and primitive dialects). And many
words have been all these; — that is to say, have been Greek first,
Latin next, French and German next, and English last: undergoing
a certain change of sense and use on the lips of each nation; but
retaining a deep vital meaning, which all good scholars feel in
employing them, even at this day. If you do not know the Greek
alphabet, learn it; young or old — girl or boy — whoever you may be,
if you think of reading seriously (which, of course, implies that you
have some leisure at command), learn your Greek alphabet; then
get good dictionaries of all these languages, and whenever you are
in doubt about a word, hunt it down patiently. Read Max Miiller's
lectures thoroughly, to begin with; and, after that, never let a word
escape you that looks suspicious. It is severe work; but you will find
it, even at first, interesting, and at last, endlessly amusing. And the
general gain to your character, in power and precision, will be quite
incalculable.

Mind, this does not imply knowing, or trying to know, Greek or
Latin, or French. It takes a whole life to learn any language per-
fectly. But you can easily ascertain the meanings through which the
English word has passed; and those which in a good writer's work
it must still bear.

20. And now, merely for example's sake, I will, with your per-
mission, read a few lines of a true book with you, carefully; and
see what will come out of them. I will take a book perfectly known
to you all. No English words are more familiar to us, yet few per-
haps have been read with less sincerity. I will take these few follow-
ing lines of "Lycidas":

I06 RUSKIN

"Last came, and last did go,
The pilot of the Galilean lake;
Two massy keys he bore of metals twain
(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain),
He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake,
'How well could I have spar'd for thee, young swain,
Enow of such as for their bellies' sake
Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold!
Of other care they little reckoning make,
Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast.
And shove away the worthy bidden guest;
Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A sheep-hook, or have learn'd aught else, the least
That to the faithful herdsman's art belongs!
What recks it them ? What need they? They are sped;
And when they list, their lean and flashy songs
Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed.
But, swoln with wind, and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread;
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing said.' "

Let US think over this passage, and examine its words.

First, is it not singular to find Milton assigning to St. Peter, not
only his full episcopal function, but the very types of it which Protes-
tants usually refuse most passionately? His "mitred" locks! Milton
was no Bishop-lover; how comes St. Peter to be "mitred"? "Two
massy keys he bore." Is this, then, the power of the keys claimed by
the Bishops of Rome, and is it acknowledged here by Milton only in
a poetical license, for the sake of its picturesqueness, that he may get
the gleam of the golden keys to help his effect? Do not think it.
Great men do not play stage tricks with doctrines of life and death :
only little men do that. Milton means what he says; and means it
with his might too — is going to put the whole strength of his spirit
presently into the saying of it. For though not a lover of false bish-
ops, he was a lover of true ones; and the Lake-pilot is here, in his
thoughts, the type and head of true episcopal power. For Milton
reads that text, "I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of
heaven" quite honestly. Puritan though he be, he would not blot it
out of the book because there have been bad bishops; nay, in order

sesame: of kings treasuries 107

to understand him, we must understand that verse first; it will not
do to eye it askance, or whisper it under our breath, as if it were a
weapon of an adverse sect. It is a solemn, universal assertion, deeply
to be kept in mind by all sects. But perhaps we shall be better able
to reason on it if we go on a little farther, and come back to it. For
clearly this marked insistence on the power of the true episcopate is
to make us feel more weightily what is to be charged against the
false claimants of episcopate; or generally, against false claimants
of power and rank in the body of the clergy; they who, "for their
belhes' sake, creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold."

21. Never think Milton uses those three words to fill up his verse,
as a loose writer would. He needs all the three; especially those three,
and no more than those — "creep," and "intrude," and "climb"; no
other words would or could serve the turn, and no more could be
added. For they exhaustively comprehend the three classes, corre-
spondent to the three characters, of men who dishonestly seek ecclesi-
astical power. First, those who "creep" into the fold; who do not
care for office, nor name, but for secret influence, and do all things
occultly and cunningly, consenting to any servility of office or con-
duct, so only that they may intimately discern, and unawares direct,
the minds of men. Then those who "intrude" (thrust, that is)
themselves into the fold, who by natural insolence of heart, and
stout eloquence of tongue, and fearlessly perseverant self-assertion,
obtain hearing and authority with the common crowd. Lastly, those
who "chmb," who by labor and learning, both stout and sound, but
selfishly exerted in the cause of their own ambition, gain high digni-
ties and authorities, and become "lords over the heritage," though not
"ensamples to the flock."

22. Now go on : —

"Of other care they Htde reckoning make,
Than how to scramble at the shearers' feast.
Blind mouths — "

I pause again, for this is a strange expression; a broken metaphor,
one might think, careless and unscholarly.

Not so: its very audacity and pithiness are intended to make us
look close at the phrase and remember it. Those two monosyllables

I08 RUSKIN

express the precisely accurate contraries of right character, in the
two great offices of the Church — those of bishop and pastor.

A "Bishop" means a "person who sees."

A "Pastor" means a "person who feeds."

The most unbishoply character a man can have is therefore to be
BUnd.

The most unpastoral is, instead of feeding, to want to be fed, —
to be a Mouth.

Take the two reverses together, and you have "blind mouths."
We may advisably follow out this idea a little. Nearly all the evils
in the Church have arisen from bishops desiring power more than
light. They want authority, not outlook. Whereas their real office
is not to rule; though it may be vigorously to exhort and rebuke;
it is the king's office to rule; the bishop's office is to oversee the flock;
to number it, sheep by sheep; to be ready always to give full account
of it. Now it is clear he cannot give account of the souls, if he has
not so much as numbered the bodies of his flock. The first thing,
therefore, that a bishop has to do is at least to put himself in a posi-
tion in which, at any moment, he can obtain the history, from
childhood, of every living soul in his diocese, and of its present state.
Down in that back street. Bill and Nancy, knocking each other's
teeth out! — Does the bishop know all about it? Has he his eye upon
them? Has he had his eye upon them? Can he circumstantially
explain to us how Bill got into the habit of beating Nancy about the
head ? If he cannot, he is no bishop, though he had a mitre as high
as Salisbury steeple; he is no bishop, — he has sought to be at the
helm instead of the masthead; he has no sight of things. "Nay," you
say, "it is not his duty to look after Bill in the back street." What!
the fat sheep that have full fleeces — you think it is only those he
should look after, while (go back to your Milton) "the hungry sheep
look up, and are not fed, besides what the grim wolf with privy
paw" (bishops knowing nothing about it) "daily devours apace, and
nothing said"?

"But that's not our idea of a bishop."^ Perhaps not; but it was
St. Paul's; and it was Milton's. They may be right, or we may be;
* Compare the 13th Letter in "Time and Tide."

sesame: of kings treasuries 109

but we must not think we are reading either one or the other by
putting our meaning into their words.
23. I go on.

"But, swoln with wind, and the rank, mist they draw."

This is to meet the vulgar answer that "if the poor are not looked
after in their bodies, they are in their souls; they have spiritual food."

And Milton says, "They have no such thing as spiritual food; they
are only swollen with wind." At first you may think that is a coarse
type, and an obscure one. But again, it is a quite literally accurate
one. Take up your Latin and Greek dictionaries, and find out the
meaning of "Spirit." It is only a contraction of the Latin word
"breath," and an indistinct translation of the Greek word for "wind."
The same word is used in writing, "The wind bloweth where it
listeth"; and in writing, "So is every one that is born of the Spirit";
born of the breath, that is; for it means the breath of God, in soul
and body. We have the true sense of it in our words "inspiration"
and "expire." Now, there are two kinds of breath with which the
flock may be filled; God's breath, and man's. The breath of God is
health, and life, and peace to them, as the air of heaven is to the
flocks on the hills; but man's breath — the word which he calls
spiritual, — is disease and contagion to them, as the fog of the fen.
They rot inwardly with it; they are puffed up by it, as a dead body
by the vapors of its own decomposition. This is literally true of all
false religious teaching; the first and last, and fatalest sign of it
is that "puffing up." Your converted children, who teach their par-
ents; your converted convicts, who teach honest men; your converted
dunces, who, having lived in cretinous stupefaction half their lives,
suddenly awakening to the fact of there being a God, fancy them-
selves therefore His peculiar people and messengers; your sectarians
of every species, small and great, Catholic or Protestant, of high
church or low, in so far as they think themselves exclusively in the
right and others wrong; and preeminently, in every sect, those who
hold that men can be saved by thinking rightly instead of doing
rightly, by word instead of act, and wish instead of work: — these
are the true fog children — clouds, these, without water; bodies, these,

no RUSKIN

of putrescent vapor and skin, without blood or flesh: blown bag-
pipes for the fiends to pipe with — corrupt, and corrupting, — "Swollen
with wind, and the rank mist they draw."

24. Lastly, let us return to the lines respecting the power of the
keys, for now we can understand them. Note the difference between
Milton and Dante in their interpretation of this power: for once,
the latter is weaker in thought; he supposes both the keys to be of
the gate of heaven; one is of gold, the other of silver: they are given
by St. Peter to the sentinel angel; and it is not easy to determine the
meaning either of the substances of the three steps of the gate, or of
the two keys. But Milton makes one, of gold, the key of heaven;
the other, of iron, the key of the prison in which the wicked teachers
are to be bound who "have taken away the key of knowledge, yet
entered not in themselves."

We have seen that the duties of bishop and pastor are to see and
feed; and of all who do so it is said, "He that watereth, shall be
watered also himself." But the reverse is truth also. He that watereth
not, shall be withered himself, and he that seeth not, shall himself be
shut out of sight — shut into the perpetual prison-house. And that
prison opens here, as well as hereafter: he who is to be bound in
heaven must first be bound on earth. That command to the strong
angels, of which the rock-apostle is the image, "Take him, and bind
him hand and foot, and cast him out," issues, in its measure, against
the teacher, for every help withheld, and for every truth refused, and
for every falsehood enforced; so that he is more strictly fettered the
more he fetters, and farther outcast, as he more and more misleads,
till at last the bars of the iron cage close upon him, and as "the
golden opes, the iron shuts amain."

25. We have got something out of the lines, I think, and much
more is yet to be found in them; but we have done enough by way
of example of the kind of word-by-word examination of your author
which is rightly called "reading"; watching every accent and expres-
sion, and putting ourselves always in the author's place, annihilating
our own personality, and seeking to enter into his, so as to be able
assuredly to say, "Thus Milton thought," not "Thus / thought, in
mis-reading Milton." And by this process you will gradually come
to attach less weight to your own "Thus I thought" at other times.

sesame: of kings' treasuries hi

You will begin to perceive that what you thought was a matter of
no serious importance; — that your thoughts on any subject are not
perhaps the clearest and wisest that could be arrived at thereupon : —
in fact, that unless you are a very singular person, you cannot be said
to have any "thoughts" at all; that you have no materials for them,
in any serious matters;^ — no right to "think," but only to try to
learn more of the facts. Nay, most probably all your life (unless, as
I said, you are a singular person) you will have no legitimate right
to an "opinion" on any business, except that instantly under your
hand. What must of necessity be done, you can always find out,
beyond question, how to do. Have you a house to keep in order, a
commodity to sell, a field to plough, a ditch to cleanse ? There need
be no two opinions about these proceedings; it is at your peril if you
have not much more than an "opinion" on the way to manage such
matters. And also, outside of your own business, there are one or
two subjects on which you are bound to have but one opinion. That
roguery and lying are objectionable, and are instantly to be flogged
out of the way whenever discovered; — ^that covetousness and love of
quarreling are dangerous dispositions even in children, and deadly
dispositions in men and nations; — that in the end, the God of heaven
and earth loves active, modest, and kind people, and hates idle,
proud, greedy, and cruel ones; — on these general facts you are bound
to have but one, and that a very strong, opinion. For the rest, respect-
ing religions, governments, sciences, arts, you will find that, on the
whole, you can know nothing, — judge nothing; that the best you
can do, even though you may be a well-educated person, is to be
silent, and strive to be wiser every day, and to understand a little
more of the thoughts of others, which so soon as you try to do hon-
estly, you will discover that the thoughts even of the wisest are very
little more than pertinent questions. To put the difficulty into a
clear shape, and exhibit to you the grounds for /'^decision, that is all
they can generally do for you! — and well for them and for us, if
indeed they are able "to mix the music with our thoughts, and sad-
den us with heavenly doubts." This writer, from whom I have been
reading to you, is not among the first or wisest: he sees shrewdly as

' Modern "education" for the most part signifies giving people the faculty of
thinking wrong on every conceivable subject of importance to them.

112 RUSKIN

far as he sees, and therefore it is easy to find out his full meaning;
but with the greater men, you cannot fathom their meaning; they
do not even wholly measure it themselves, — it is so wide. Suppose
I had asked you, for instance, to seek for Shakespeare's opinion,
instead of Milton's, on this matter of Church authority? — or for
Dante's? Have any of you, at this instant, the least idea what either
thought about it? Have you ever balanced the scene with the bishops
in "Richard III." against the character of Cranmer? the description
of St. Francis and St. Dominic against that of him who made Virgil
wonder to gaze upon him, — "disteso, tanto vilmente, nell' eterno
esilio"; or of him whom Dante stood beside, "come '1 frate che con-
fessa lo perfido assassin?"* Shakespeare and Alighieri knew men
better than most of us, I presume! They were both in the midst of
the main struggle between the temporal and spiritual powers. They
had an opinion, we may guess. But where is it? Bring it into court!
Put Shakespeare's or Dante's creed into articles, and send it up for
trial by the Ecclesiastical Courts!

26. You will not be able, I tell you again, for many and many a
day, to come at the real purposes and teaching of these great men;
but a very little honest study of them will enable you to perceive that
what you took for your own "judgment" was mere chance prejudice,
and drifted, helpless, entangled weed of castaway thought: nay, you
will see that most men's minds are indeed little better than rough
heath wilderness, neglected and stubborn, partly barren, partly over-
grown with pestilent brakes, and venomous, wind-sown herbage of
evil surmise; that the first thing you have to do for them, and your-
self, is eagerly and scornfully to set fire to this; burn all the jungle
into wholesome ash heaps, and then plough and sow. All the true
literary work before you, for life, must begin with obedience to that
order, "Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns."

27. II.' — Having then faithfully listened to the great teachers, that
you may enter into their Thoughts, you have yet this higher advance
to make; — you have to enter into their Hearts. As you go to them
first for clear sight, so you must stay with them, that you may share
at last their just and mighty Passion. Passion, or "sensation." I am

'"Inferno," xxiii. 125, 126; xix. 49, 50.
^Compare § 13 above.

sesame: of kings treasuries 113

not afraid of the word; still less of the thing. You have heard many
outcries against sensation lately; but, I can tell you, it is not less
sensation we want, but more. The ennobling difference between
one man and another, — ^between one animal and another, — is pre-
cisely in this, that one feels more than another. If we were sponges,
perhaps sensation might not be easily got for us; if we were earth-
worms, liable at every instant to be cut in two by the spade, perhaps
too much sensation might not be good for us. But, being human
creatures, // is good for us; nay, we are only human in so far as we
are sensitive, and our honor is precisely in proportion to our passion.

28. You know I said of that great and pure society of the dead, that
it would allow "no vain or vulgar person to enter there." What do
you think I meant by a "vulgar" person? What do you yourselves
mean by "vulgarity"? You will find it a fruitful subject of thought;
but, briefly, the essence of all vulgarity lies in want of sensation.
Simple and innocent vulgarity is merely an untrained and undevel-
oped bluntness of body and mind; but in true inbred vulgarity, there
is a deathful callousness, which, in extremity, becomes capable of
every sort of bestial habit and crime, without fear, without pleasure,
without horror, and without pity. It is in the blunt hand and the
dead heart, in the diseased habit, in the hardened conscience, that
men become vulgar; they are forever vulgar, precisely in proportion
as they are incapable of sympathy, — of quick understanding, — of all
that, in deep insistence on the common, but most accurate term, may
be called the "tact" or "touch-faculty" of body and soul; that tact
which the Mimosa has in trees, which the pure woman has above all
creatures; — fineness and fullness of sensation beyond reason; — the
guide and sanctifier of reason itself. Reason can but determine what
is true: — it is the God-given passion of humanity which alone can
recognize what God has made good.

29. We come then to the great concourse of the Dead, not merely
to know from them what is True, but chiefly to feel with them what
is just. Now, to feel with them, we must be like them; and none of
us can become that without pains. As the true knowledge is disci-
plined and tested knowledge, — not the first thought that comes, — so
the true passion is disciplined and tested passion, — not the first pas-
sion that comes. The first that come are the vain, the false, the

114 RUSKIN

treacherous; i£ you yield to them they will lead you wildly and far
in vain pursuit, in hollow enthusiasm, till you have no true purpose
and no true passion left. Not that any feeling possible to humanity
is in itself wrong, but only wrong when undisciplined. Its nobility
is in its force and justice; it is wrong when it is weak, and felt for
paltry cause. There is a mean wonder, as of a child who sees a jug-
gler tossing golden balls, and this is base, if you will. But do you
think that the wonder is ignoble, or the sensation less, with which
every human soul is called to watch the golden balls of heaven tossed
through the night by the Hand that made them? There is a mean
curiosity, as of a child opening a forbidden door, or a servant prying
into her master's business; — and a noble curiosity, questioning, in
the front of danger, the source of the great river beyond the sand, —
the place of the great continents beyond the sea; — a nobler curiosity
still, which questions of the source of the River of Life, and of the
space of the Continent of Heaven, — things which "the angels desire
to look into." So the anxiety is ignoble, with which you linger over
the course and catastrophe of an idle tale; but do you think the
anxiety is less, or greater, with which you watch, or ought to watch,
the dealings of fate and destiny with the life of an agonized nation }
Alas! it is the narrowness, selfishness, minuteness, of your sensation
that you have to deplore in England at this day; — sensation which
spends itself in bouquets and speeches; in revelings and junketings;
in sham fights and gay puppet shows, while you can look on and
see noble nations murdered, man by man, without an effort or a tear.
30. I said "minuteness" and "selfishness" of sensation, but in a
word, I ought to have said "injustice" or "unrighteousness" of sen-
sation. For as in nothing is a gentleman better to be discerned from
a vulgar person, so in nothing is a gentle nation (such nations have
been) better to be discerned from a mob, than in this, — that their
feelings are constant and just, results of due contemplation, and of
equal thought. You can talk a mob into anything; its feelings may
be — usually are — on the whole, generous and right; but it has no
foundation for them, no hold of them; you may tease or tickle it
into any, at your pleasure; it thinks by infection, for the most part,
catching an opinion like a cold, and there is nothing so little that it
will not roar itself wild about, when the fit is on; — nothing so great

sesame: of kings treasuries 115

but it will forget in an hour, when the fit is past. But a gentleman's,
or a gentle nation's, passions are just, measured, and continuous. A
great nation, for instance, does not spend its entire national wits for
a couple of months in weighing evidence of a single ruffian's having
done a single murder; and for a couple of years see its own children
murder each other by their thousands or tens of thousands a day,
considering only what the effect is likely to be on the price of cotton,
and caring nowise to determine which side of battle is in the wrong.
Neither does a great nation send its poor little boys to jail for stealing
six walnuts; and allow its bankrupts to steal their hundreds or
thousands with a bow, and its bankers, rich with poor men's sav-
ings, to close their doors "under circumstances over which they have
no control," with a "by your leave"; and large landed estates to be
bought by men who have made their money by going with armed
steamers up and down the China Seas, selling opium at the cannon's
mouth, and altering, for the benefit of the foreign nation, the com-
mon highwayman's demand of "your money or your life," into that
of "your money and your life." Neither does a great nation allow
the lives of its innocent poor to be parched out of them by fog fever,
and rotted out of them by dunghill plague, for the sake of sixpence
a life extra per week to its landlords;" and then debate, with driveling
tears, and diabolical sympathies, whether it ought not piously to
save, and nursingly cherish, the lives of its murderers. Also, a great
nation, having made up its mind that hanging is quite the whole-
somest process for its homicides in general, can yet with mercy
distinguish between the degrees of guilt in homicides; and does not
yelp like a pack of frost-pinched wolf-cubs on the blood-track of an
unhappy crazed boy, or gray-haired clodpate Othello, "perplexed i'
the extreme," at the very moment that it is sending a Minister of the
Crown to make polite speeches to a man who is bayoneting young
girls in their father's sight, and killing noble youths in cool blood,
faster than a country butcher kills lambs in spring. And, lastly, a
great nation does not mock Heaven and its Powers, by pretending
belief in a revelation which asserts the love of money to be the root
of all evil, and declaring, at the same time, that it is actuated, and

* See note at end of lecture. I have put it in large type, because the course of matters
since it was written has made it perhaps better worth attention.

Il6 RUSKIN

intends to be actuated, in all chief national deeds and measures, by
no other love.

31. My friends, I do not know why any of us should talk about
reading. We want some sharper discipline than that of reading; but,
at all events, be assured, we cannot read. No reading is possible for
a people with its mind in this state. No sentence of any great writer
is intelligible to them. It is simply and sternly impossible for the
English public, at this moment, to understand any thoughtful writ-
ing, — so incapable of thought has it become in its insanity of avarice.
Happily, our disease is, as yet, little worse than this incapacity of
thought; it is not corruption of the inner nature; we ring true still,
when anything strikes home to us; and though the idea that every-
thing should "pay" has infected our every purpose so deeply, that
even when we would play the good Samaritan, we never take out
our twopence and give them to the host without saying, "When I
come again, thou shalt give me fourpence," there is a capacity of
noble passion left in our hearts' core. We show it in our work, — in
our war, — even in those unjust domestic affections which make us
furious at a small private wrong, while we are polite to a boundless
public one: we are still industrious to the last hour of the day,
though we add the gambler's fury to the laborer's patience; we
are still brave to the death, though incapable of discerning true cause
for battle; and are still true in affection to our own flesh, to the
death, as the sea-monsters are, and the rock-eagles. And there is
hope for a nation while this can be still said of it. As long as it holds
its life in its hand, ready to give it for its honor (though a foolish
honor), for its love (though a selfish love), and for its business
(though a base business), there is hope for it. But hope only; for
this instinctive, reckless virtue cannot last. No nation cart last, which
has made a mob of itself, however generous at heart. It must dis-
cipline its passions, and direct them, or they will discipline it, one
day, with scorpion whips. Above all a nation cannot last as a money-
making mob: it cannot with impunity, — it cannot with existence, —
go on despising literature, despising science, despising art, despising
nature, despising compassion, and concentrating its soul on Pence.
Do you think these are harsh or wild words? Have patience with

_»

sesame: of kings treasuries 117

me but a little longer. I will prove their truth to you, clause by
clause.

32. I. — I say first we have despised literature. What do we, as a
nation, care about books? How much do you think we spend alto-
gether on our libraries, public or private, as compared with what we
spend on our horses? If a man spends lavishly on his library you
call him mad — a bibliomaniac. But you never call any one a horse-
maniac, though men ruin themselves every day by their horses, and
you do not hear of people ruining themselves by their books. Or,
to go lower still, how much do you think the contents of the book-
shelves of the United Kingdom, public and private, would fetch, as
compared with the contents of its wine-cellars? What position
would its expenditure on literature take, as compared with its
expenditure on luxurious eating? We talk of food for the mind,
as of food for the body; now a good book contains such food inex-
haustibly; it IS a provision for life, and for the best part of us; yet
how long most people would look at the best book before they would
give the price of a large turbot for it! though there have been men
who have pinched their stomachs and bared their backs to buy a
book, whose libraries were cheaper to them, I think, in the end, than
most men's dinners are. We are few of us put to such trial, and
more the pity; for, indeed, a precious thing is all the more precious
to us if it has been won by work or economy; and if public libraries
were half as costly as public dinners, or books cost the tenth part
of what bracelets do, even foolish men and women might sometimes
suspect there was good in reading, as well as in munching and
sparkling; whereas the very cheapness of literature is making even
wise people forget that if a book is worth reading, it is worth buying.
No book is worth anything which is not worth much; nor is it
serviceable, until it has been read, and reread, and loved, and loved
again; and marked, so that you can refer to the passages you want in
it as a soldier can seize the weapon he needs in an armory, or a house-
wife bring the spice she needs from her store. Bread of flour is good:
but there is bread, sweet as honey, if we would eat it, in a good book;
and the family must be poor indeed which, once in their lives, can-
not, for such multipliable barley-loaves, pay their baker's bill. We

Il8 RUSKIN

call ourselves a rich nation, and we are filthy and fooUsh enough to
thumb each other's books out of circulating libraries!

33. II. — I say we have despised science. "What!" you exclaim, "are
we not foremost in all discovery,' and is not the whole world giddy
by reason, or unreason, of our inventions?" Yes; but do you suppose
that is national work? That work is all done in spite of the nation;
by private people's zeal and money. We are glad enough, indeed, to
make our profit of science; we snap up anything in the way of a
scientific bone that has meat on it, eagerly enough; but if the scien-
tific man comes for a bone or a crust to us, that is another story.
What have we publicly done for science? We are obliged to know
what o'clock it is, for the safety of our ships, and therefore we pay for
an observatory; and we allow ourselves, in the person of our Parlia-
ment, to be annually tormented into doing something, in a slovenly
way, for the British Museum; sullenly apprehending that to be a
place for keeping stuffed birds in, to amuse our children. If any-
body will pay for his own telescope, and resolve another nebula, we
cackle over the discernment as if it were our own; if one in ten
thousand of our hunting squires suddenly perceives that the earth
was indeed made to be something else than a portion for foxes, and
burrows in it himself, and tells us where the gold is, and where the
coals, we understand that there is some use in that; and very properly
knight him; but is the accident of his having found out how to
employ himself usefully any credit to us? (The negation of such
discovery among his brother squires may perhaps be some ^^wcredit
to us, if we would consider of it.) But if you doubt these generalities,
here is one fact for us all to meditate upon, illustrative of our love of
science. Two years ago there was a collection of the fossils of Solen-
hofen to be sold in Bavaria; the best in existence, containing many
specimens unique for perfectness, and one unique as an example of
a species (a whole kingdom of unknown living creatures being
announced by that fossil). This collection, of which the mere mar-
ket worth, among private buyers, would probably have been some
thousand or twelve hundred pounds, was offered to the English
nation for seven hundred; but we would not give seven hundred,

' Since this was written, the answer has become definitely- — No; we have surrendered
the field of Arctic discovery to the Continental nations, as being ourselves too poor
to pay for ships.

sesame: of kings' treasuries 119

and the whole series would have been in the Munich Museum at
this moment, if Professor Owen'" had not with loss of his own time,
and patient tormenting of the British public in person of its repre-
sentatives, got leave to give four hundred pounds at once, and him-
self become answerable for the other three! which the said public
will doubtless pay him eventually, but sulkily, and caring nothing
about the matter all the while; only always ready to cackle if any
credit comes of it. Consider, I beg of you, arithmetically, what this
fact means. Your annual expenditure for public purposes (a third of
it for military apparatus) is at least fifty millions. Now 700/. is to
50,000,000/., roughly, as seven pence to two thousand pounds. Sup-
pose, then, a gentleman of unknown income, but whose wealth was
to be conjectured from the fact that he spent two thousand a year
on his park-walls and footmen only, professes himself fond of
science; and that one of his servants comes eagerly to tell him that
an unique collection of fossils, giving clue to a new era of creation,
is to be had for the sum of seven pence sterling; and that the gentle-
man, who is fond of science, and spends two thousand a year on his
park, answers, after keeping his servant waiting several months,
"Well! I'll give you four pence for them, if you will be answerable
for the extra three pence yourself, till next year!"

34. III. — I say you have despised Art! "What!" you again answer,
"have we not Art exhibitions, miles long? and do we not pay
thousands of pounds for single pictures? and have we not Art schools
and institutions, more than ever nation had before?" Yes, truly, but
all that is for the sake of the shop. You would fain sell canvas as
well as coals, and crockery as well as iron; you would take every
other nation's bread out of its mouth if you could;" not being able
to do that, your ideal of life is to stand in the thoroughfares of the
world, like Ludgate apprentices, screaming to every passer-by, "What
d'ye lack?" You know nothing of your own faculties or circum-
stances; you fancy that, among your damp, flat fields of clay, you
can have as quick art-fancy as the Frenchman among his bronzed

'"I state this fact without Professor Owen's permission: which of course he could
not with propriety have granted, had I asked it; but I consider it so important that
the public should be aware of the fact that I do what seems to be right, though rude.

" That was our real idea of "Free Trade" — "All the trade to myself." You find
now that by "competition" other people can manage to sell something as well as
you — and now we call for Protection again. Wretches!

120 RUSKIN

vines, or the Italian under his volcanic cliffs; — that Art may be
learned as bookkeeping is, and when learned, -will give you more
books to keep. You care for pictures, absolutely, no more than you
do for the bills pasted on your dead walls. There is always room on
the walls for the bills to be read, — never for the pictures to be seen.
You do not know what pictures you have (by repute) in the country,
nor whether they are false or true, nor whether they are taken care
of or not; in foreign countries, you calmly see the noblest existing
pictures in the world rotting in abandoned wreck — (in Venice you
saw the Austrian guns deliberately pointed at the palaces containing
them), and if you heard that all the fine pictures in Europe were
made into sand-bags to-morrow on the Austrian forts, it would not
trouble you so much as the chance of a brace or two of game less in
your own bags, in a day's shooting. That is your national love of
Art.

35. IV. — You have despised Nature; that is to say, all the deep and
sacred sensations of natural scenery. The French revolutionists made
stables of the cathedrals of France; you have made race-courses of
the cathedrals of the earth. Your one conception of pleasure is to
drive in railroad carriages round their aisles, and eat off their altars.'''
You have put a railroad bridge over the fall of Schaffhausen. You
have tunneled the cliffs of Lucerne by Tell's chapel; you have
destroyed the Clarens shore of the Lake of Geneva; there is not a
quiet valley in England that you have not filled with bellowing fire;
there is no particle left of English land which you have not trampled
coal ashes into" — nor any foreign city in which the spread of your
presence is not marked among its fair old streets and happy gardens
by a consuming white leprosy of new hotels and perfumers' shops:
the Alps themselves, which your own poets used to love so reverently,
you look upon as soaped poles in a bear-garden, which you set your-
selves to climb, and slide down again with "shrieks of delight."
When you are past shrieking, having no human articulate voice to

'2 1 meant that the beautiful places of the world — Switzerland, Italy, South Ger-
many, and so on — are, indeed, the truest cathedrals — ^places to be reverent in, and
to worship in; and that we only care to drive through them, and to eat and drink at
their most sacred places.

1' I was singularly struck, some years ago, by finding all the river shore at Rich-
mond, in Yorkshire, black in its earth, from the mere drift of soot-laden air from
places many miles away.

sesame: of kings treasuries 121

say you are glad with, you fill the quietude of their valleys with gun-
powder blasts, and rush home, red with cutaneous eruption of con-
ceit, and voluble with convulsive hiccough of self-satisfaction. I
think nearly the two sorrowfuUest spectacles I have ever seen in
humanity, taking the deep inner significance of them, are the English
mobs in the valley of Chamouni, amusing themselves with firmg
rusty howitzers; and the Swiss vintagers of Zurich expressing their
Christian thanks for the gift of the vine, by assembling in knots in
the "towers of the vineyards," and slowly loading and firing horse-
pistols from morning till evening. It is pitiful to have dim concep-
tions of duty; more pitiful, it seems to me, to have conceptions like
these, of mirth.

36. Lastly. You despise compassion. There is no need of words
of mine for proof of this. I will merely print one of the newspaper
paragraphs which I am in the habit of cutting out and throwing into
my store-drawer; here is one from a Daily Telegraph of an early
date this year (1867) (date which, though by me carelessly left
unmarked, is easily discoverable; for on the back of the slip, there
is the announcement that "yesterday the seventh of the special serv-
ices of this year was performed by the Bishop of Ripon in St.
Paul's"); it relates only one of such facts as happen now daily; this,
by chance, having taken a form in which it came before the cor-
oner. . . .

"An inquiry was held on Friday by Mr. Richards, deputy coroner,
at the White Horse Tavern, Christ Church, Spitalfields, respecting
the death of Michael Collins, aged 58 years. Mary Collins, a miser-
able-looking woman, said that she lived with the deceased and his
son in a room at 2, Cobb's Court, Christ Church. Deceased was a
'translator' of boots. Witness went out and bought old boots;
deceased and his son made them into good ones, and then witness
sold them for what she could get at the shops, which was very little
indeed. Deceased and his son used to work night and day to try
and get a little bread and tea, and pay for the room (2^. a week), so
as to keep the home together. On Friday night week, deceased got
up from his bench and began to shiver. He threw down the boots,
saying, 'Somebody else must finish them when I am gone, for I can
do no more.' There was no fire, and he said, 'I would be better if I

122 RUSKIN

was warm.' Witness therefore took two pairs of translated boots" to
sell at the shop, but she could only get 14^. for the two pairs, for
the people at the shop said, 'We must have our profit.' Witness got
14 lbs. of coal and a little tea and bread. Her son sat up the whole
night to make the 'translations,' to get money, but deceased died on
Saturday morning. The family never had enough to eat. — Coroner:
'It seems to me deplorable that you did not go into the workhouse.'
Witness: 'We wanted the comforts of our little home.' A juror asked
what the comforts were, for he only saw a little straw in the corner
of the room, the windows of which were broken. The witness began
to cry, and said that they had a quilt and other little things. The
deceased said he never would go into the workhouse. In summer,
when the season was good, they sometimes made as much as los.
profit in a week. They then always saved towards the next week,
which was generally a bad one. In winter they made not half so
much. For three years they had been getting from bad to worse. —
Cornelius Collins said that he had assisted his father since 1847.
They used to work so far into the night that both nearly lost their
eyesight. Witness now had a film over his eyes. Five years ago
deceased applied to the parish for aid. The relieving ofScer gave him
a 4-lb. loaf, and told him if he came again he should 'get the stones.' "

'* One of the things which we must very resolutely enforce, for the good of all
classes, in our future arrangements, must be that they wear no "translated" articles
of dress.

'* This abbreviation of the penalty of useless labor is curiously coincident in verbal
form with a certain passage which some of us may remember. It may, perhaps, be
well to preserve beside this paragraph another cutting out of my store-drawer, from
the Morning Post, of about a parallel date, Friday, March loth, 1865: — "The salons

of Mme. C , who did the honors with clever imitative grace and elegance, were

crowded with princes, dukes, marquises, and counts — in fact, with the same male
company as one meets at the parties of the Princess Metternich and Madame Drouyn
de Lhuys. Some English peers and members of Parliament were present, and appeared
to enjoy the animated and dazzlingly improper scene. On the second floor the supper-
tables were loaded with every delicacy of the season. That your readers may form
some idea of the dainty fare of the Parisian demi-monde, I copy the menu of the
supper, which was served to all the guests (about 200) seated at four o'clock. Choice
Yquem, Johannisberg, Lafitte, Tokay, and champagne of the finest vintages were
served most lavishly throughout the morning. After supper dancing was resumed
with increased animation, and the ball terminated with a chaine diaholiqtie and a
cancan d'enfer at seven in the morning. (Morning-service— 'Ere the fresh lawns
appeared, under the opening eyelids of the Morn. — ') Here is the menu; — 'Consomme
de volaille a la Bagration; 16 hors-d'oeuvres varies. Bouchees ^ la Talleyrand.
Saumons froids, sauce Ravigote. Filets de boeuf en Bellevue, timbales milanaises
chaudfroid de gibier. Dindes truffles. Pat^s de foies gras, buissons d'&revisses, salades
v^n^tiennes, geli'cs blanches aux fruits, gateaux mancini, parisiens et parisiennes.
Fromages glacis. Ananas. Dessert.' "

sesame: of kings treasuries 123

That disgusted deceased, and he would have nothing to do with
them since. They got worse and worse until last Friday week, when
they had not even a halfpenny to buy a candle. Deceased then lay
down on the straw, and said he could not live till morning. — A
juror: 'You are dying of starvation yourself, and you ought to go
into the house until the summer.' Witness : 'If we went in we should
die. When we come out in the summer we should be like people
dropped from the sky. No one would know us, and we would not
have even a room. I could work now if I had food, for my sight
would get better.' Dr. G. P. Walker said deceased died from syn-
cope, from exhaustion, from want of food. The deceased had had no
bedclothes. For four months he had had nothing but bread to eat.
There was not a particle of fat in the body. There was no disease,
but if there had been medical attendance, he might have survived
the syncope or fainting. The coroner having remarked upon the
painful nature of the case, the jury returned the following ver-
dict: 'That deceased died from exhaustion, from want of food
and the common necessaries of life; also through want of medical
aid.' "

37. "Why would witness not go into the workhouse?" you ask.
Well, the poor seem to have a prejudice against the workhouse which
the rich have not; for, of course, every one who takes a pension
from Government goes into the workhouse on a grand scale ;'° only
the workhouses for the rich do not involve the idea of work, and
should be called play-houses. But the poor like to die independently,
it appears; perhaps if we made the play-houses for them pretty and
pleasant enough, or gave them their pensions at home, and allowed
them a little introductory peculation with the public money, their
minds might be reconciled to the conditions. Meantime, here are
the facts : we make our relief either so insulting to them, or so pain-
ful, that they rather die than take it at our hands; or, for third alter-
native, we leave them so untaught and foolish that they starve like
brute creatures, wild and dumb, not knowing what to do, or what
to ask. I say, you despise compassion; if you did not, such a news-
paper paragraph would be as impossible in a Christian country as a

'^Please observe this statement, and think of it, and consider how it happens that
a poor old woman will be ashamed to take a shilling a week from the country — but
no one is ashamed to take a pension of a thousand a year.

124 RUSKIN

deliberate assassination permitted in its public streets." "Christian,"
did I say ? Alas, if we were but wholesomely ww-Christian, it would
be impossible; it is our imaginary Christianity that helps us to com-
mit these crimes, for we revel and luxuriate in our faith, for the
lewd sensation of it; dressing it up, like everything else, in fiction.
The dramatic Christianity of the organ and aisle, of dawn-service
and twilight-revival — the Christianity which we do not fear to mix
the mockery of, pictorially, with our play about the devil, in our
Satanellas,— Roberts, — Fausts; chanting hymns through traceried
windows for background effect, and artistically modulating the
"Dio" through variation on variation of mimicked prayer (while
we distribute tracts, next day, for the benefit of uncultivated
swearers, upon what we suppose to be the signification of the Third
Commandment); — this gas-lighted, and gas-inspired, Christianity,
we are triumphant in, and draw back the hem of our robes from
the touch of the heretics who dispute it. But to do a piece of com-
mon Christian righteousness in a plain English word or deed; to

^^I am heartily glad to see such a paper as the Pall Mall Gazette established; for
the power of the press in the hands of highly educated men, in independent position,
and of honest purpose, may, indeed, become all that it has been hitherto vainly
vaunted to be. Its editor will, therefore, I doubt not, pardon me, in that, by very
reason of my respect for the journal, I do not let pass unnoticed an article in its third
number, page 5, which was wrong in every word of it, with the intense wrongness
which only an honest man can achieve who has taken a false turn of thought in the
outset, and is following it, regardless of consequences. It contained at the end this
notable passage: —

"The bread of affliction, and the water of affliction — aye, and the bedsteads and
blankets of affliction, are the very utmost that the law ought to give to outcasts merely
as outcasts." I merely put beside this expression of the gentlemanly mind of England
in 1865, a part of the message which Isaiah was ordered to "lift up his voice like
a trumpet" in declaring to the genriemen of his day: "Ye fast for strife, and to
smite with the fist of wickedness. Is not this the fast that I have chosen, to deal
thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out (margin,
'afflicted') to thy house?" The falsehood on which the writer had mentally founded
himself, as previously stated by him, was this: "To confound the functions of the
dispensers of the poor-rates which those of the dispensers of a charitable institution
is a great and pernicious error." This sentence is so accurately and exquisitely wrong,
that its substance must be thus reversed in our minds before we can deal with any
existing problem of national distress. "To understand that the dispensers of the
poor-rates are the almoners of the nation, and should distribute its alms with a
gentleness and freedom of hand as much greater and franker than that possible to
individual charity, as the collective national wisdom and power may be supposed
greater than those of any single person, is the foundation of all law respecting
pauperism." (Since this was written the Pall Mall Gazette has become a mere party
paper — like the rest; but it writes well, and does more good than mischief on the
whole.)

sesame: of kings' treasuries 125

make Christian law any rule of life, and found one National act or
hope thereon, — we know too well what our faith comes to for that!
You might sooner get lightning out of incense smoke than true
action or passion out of your modern English religion. You had
better get rid of the smoke, and the organ-pipes, both; leave them,
and the Gothic windows, and the painted glass, to the property-
man; give up your carburetted hydrogen ghost in one healthy
expiration, and look after Lazarus at the doorstep. For there is a
true Church wherever one hand meets another helpfully, and that
is the only holy or Mother Church which ever was, or ever shall be.

38. All these pleasures, then, and all these virtues, I repeat, you
nationally despise. You have, indeed, men among you who do not;
by whose work, by whose strength, by whose life, by whose death,
you live, and never thank them. Your wealth, your amusement,
your pride, would all be alike impossible, but for those whom you
scorn or forget. The policeman, who is walking up and down the
black lane all night to watch the guilt you have created there, and
may have his brains beaten out, and be maimed for life, at any
moment, and never be thanked; the sailor wrestling with the sea's
rage; the quiet student poring over his book or his vial; the com-
mon worker, without praise, and nearly without bread, fulfilling his
task as your horses drag your carts, hopeless, and spurned of all: these
are the men by whom England lives; but they are not the nation;
they are only the body and nervous force of it, acting still from old
habit in a convulsive perseverance, while the mind is gone. Our
National wish and purpose are to be amused; our National religion
is the performance of church ceremonies, and preaching of soporific
truths (or untruths) to keep the mob quietly at work, while we
amuse ourselves; and the necessity for this amusement is fastening
on us as a feverous disease of parched throat and wandering eyes —
senseless, dissolute, merciless. How literally that word Dis-Ease, the
Negation and impossibility of Ease, expresses the entire moral state
of our English Industry and its Amusements!

39. When men are rightly occupied, their amusement grows out
of their work, as the color-petals out of a fruitful flower; — when they
are faithfully helpful and compassionate, all their emotions become
steady, deep, perpetual, and vivifying to the soul as the natural pulse

126 RUSKIN

of the body. But now, having no true business, we pour our whole
masculine energy into the false business of money-making; and
having no true emotion, we must have false emotions dressed up
for us to play with, not innocently, as children with dolls, but guiltily
and darkly, as the idolatrous Jews with their pictures on cavern
walls, which men had to dig to detect. The justice we do not execute,
we mimic in the novel and on the stage; for the beauty we destroy
in nature, we substitute the metamorphosis of the pantomime, and
(the human nature of us imperatively requiring awe and sorrow of
some kind) for the noble grief we should have borne with our fel-
lows, and the pure tears we should have wept with them, we gloat
over the pathos of the police court, and gather the night-dew of the
grave.

40. It is difHcult to estimate the true significance of these things;
the facts are frightful enough; — the measure of national fault
involved in them is, perhaps, not as great as it would at first seem.
We permit, or cause, thousands of deaths daily, but we mean no
harm; we set fire to houses, and ravage peasants' fields; yet we
should be sorry to find we had injured anybody. We are still kind
at heart; still capable of virtue, but only as children are. Chalmers,
at the end of his long life, having had much power with the public,
being plagued in some serious matter by a reference to "public
opinion," uttered the impatient exclamation, "The public is just a
great baby!" And the reason that I have allowed all these graver
subjects of thought to mix themselves up with an inquiry into
methods of reading, is that, the more I see of our national faults and
miseries, the more they resolve themselves into conditions of childish
illiterateness, and want of education in the most ordinary habits
of thought. It is, I repeat, not vice, not selfishness, not dullness of
brain, which we have to lament; but an unreachable schoolboy's
recklessness, only differing from the true schoolboy's in its incapacity
of being helped, because it acknowledges no master.

41. There is a curious type of us given in one of the lovely, neg-
lected works of the last of our great painters. It is a drawing of
Kirkby Lonsdale churchyard, and of its brook, and valley, and hills,
and folded morning sky beyond. And unmindful alike of these, and
of the dead who have left these for other valleys and for other skies,

sesame: of kings treasuries 127

a group of schoolboys have piled their little books upon a grave, to
strike them off with stones. So, also, we play with the words of the
dead that would teach us, and strike them far from us with our
bitter, reckless will; little thinking that those leaves which the wind
scatters had been piled, not only upon a gravestone, but upon the
seal of an enchanted vault — nay, the gate of a great city of sleeping
kings, who would awake for us, and walk with us, if we knew but
how to call them by their names. How often, even if we lift the mar-
ble entrance gate, do we but wander among those old kings in their
repose, and finger the robes they lie in, and stir the crowns on their
foreheads; and still they are silent to us, and seem but a dusty
imagery; because we know not the incantation of the heart that
would wake them; — which, if they once heard, they would start up
to meet us in their power of long ago, narrowly to look upon us, and
consider us; and, as the fallen kings of Hades meet the newly fallen,
saying, "Art thou also become weak as we — art thou also become
one of us?" so would these kings, with their undimmed, unshaken
diadems, meet us, saying, "Art thou also become pure and mighty
of heart as we — art thou also become one of us?"

42. Mighty of heart, mighty of mind — "magnanimous" — to be
this, is, indeed, to be great in life; to become this increasingly, is,
indeed, to "advance in life," — ^in life itself — not in the trappings of it.
My friends, do you remember that old Scythian custom, when the
head of a house died? How he was dressed in his finest dress, and
set in his chariot, and carried about to his friends' houses; and each
of them placed him at his table's head, and all feasted in his pres-
ence ? Suppose it were offered to you, in plain words, as it is offered
to you in dire facts, that you should gain this Scythian honor,
gradually, while you yet thought yourself alive. Suppose the offer
were this: You shall die slowly; your blood shall daily grow cold,
your flesh petrify, your heart beat at last only as a rusted group of
iron valves. Your life shall fade from you, and sink through the
earth into the ice of Caina; but, day by day, your body shall be
dressed more gaily, and set in higher chariots, and have more orders
on its breast — crowns on its head, if you will. Men shall bow before
it, stare and shout round it, crowd after it up and down the streets;
build palaces for it, feast with it at their tables' heads all the night

128 RUSKIN

long; your soul shall stay enough within it to know what they do,
and feel the weight of the golden dress on its shoulders, and the
furrow of the crown-edge on the skull; — no more. Would you take
the oiler, verbally made by the death-angel? Would the meanest
among us take it, think you? Yet practically and verily we grasp
at it, every one of us, in a measure; many of us grasp at it in its full-
ness of horror. Every man accepts it, who desires to advance in
Ufe without knowing what life is; who means only that he is to get
more horses, and more footmen, and more fortune, and more public
honor, and — not more personal soul. He only is advancing in life,
whose heart is getting softer, whose blood warmer, whose brain
quicker, whose spirit is entering into Living peace. And the men
who have this life in them are the true lords or kings of the earth —
they, and they only. All other kingships, so far as they are true, are
only the practical issue and expression of theirs; if less than this, they
are either dramatic royalties, — costly shows, set off, indeed, with real
jewels instead of tinsel, — but still only the toys of nations; or else
they are no royalties at all, but tyrannies, or the mere active and
practical issue of national folly; for which reason I have said of
them elsewhere, "Visible governments are the toys of some nations,
the diseases of others, the harness of some, the burdens of more."

43. But I have no words for the wonder with which I hear King-
hood still spoken of, even among thoughtful men, as if governed
nations were a personal property, and might be bought and sold, or
otherwise acquired, as sheep, of whose flesh their king was to feed,
and whose fleece he was to gather; as if Achilles' indignant epithet
of base kings, "people-eating," were the constant and proper title of
all monarchs; and enlargement of a king's dominion meant the
same thing as the increase of a private man's estate! Kings who
think so, however powerful, can no more be the true kings of the
nation than gadflies are the kings of a horse; they suck it, and may
drive it wild, but do not guide it. They, and their courts, and their
armies are, if one could see clearly, only a large species of marsh
mosquito, with bayonet proboscis and melodious, band-mastered
trumpeting in the summer air; the twilight being, perhaps, some-
times fairer, but hardly more wholesome, for its glittering mists of
midge companies. The true kings, meanwhile, rule quietly, if at

sesame: of kings' treasuries 129

all, and hate ruling; too many of them make "il gran rifiiito";" and
if they do not, the mob, as soon as they are likely to become useful
to it, is pretty sure to make its "gran rifiuto" of them.

44. Yet the visible king may also be a true one, some day, if ever
day comes when he will estimate his dominion by the force of it, —
not the geographical boundaries. It matters very little whether Trent
cuts you a cantel out here, or Rhine rounds you a castle less there.
But it does matter to you, king of men, whether you can verily say
to this man, "Go," and he goeth; and to another, "Come," and he
Cometh. Whether you can turn your people, as you can Trent — and
where it is that you bid them come, and where go. It matters to
you, king of men, whether your people hate you, and die by you, or
love you, and live by you. You may measure your dominion by
multitudes better than by miles; and count degrees of love latitude,
not from, but to, a wonderfully warm and indefinite equator.

45. Measure! nay, you cannot measure. Who shall measure the
difference between the power of those who "do and teach," and who
are greatest in the kingdoms of earth, as of heaven — and the power
of those who undo, and consume — whose power, at the fullest, is
only the power of the moth and the rust? Strange! to think how
the Moth-kings lay up treasures for the moth; and the Rust-kings,
who are to their peoples' strength as rust to armor, lay up treasures
for the rust; and the Robber-kings, treasures for the robber; but how
few kings have ever laid up treasures that needed no guarding —
treasures of which, the more thieves there were, the better! Broidered
robe, only to be rent; helm and sword, only to be dimmed; jewel and
gold, only to be scattered; — there have been three kinds of kings who
have gathered these. Suppose there ever should arise a Fourth order
of kings, who had read, in some obscure writing of long ago, that
there was a Fourth kind of treasure, which the jewel and gold could
not equal, neither should it be valued with pure gold. A web made
fair in the weaving, by Athena's shuttle; an armor, forged in divine
fire by Vulcanian force — a gold to be mined in the sun's red heart,
where he sets over the Delphian cliffs; — deep-pictured tissue,
impenetrable armor, potable gold! — the three great Angels of Con-
duct, Toil, and Thought, still calling to us, and waiting at the posts

" The great renunciation.

130 RUSKIN

of our doors, to lead us, with their winged power, and guide us,
with their unerring eyes, by the path which no fowl knoweth, and
which the vulture's eye has not seen! Suppose kings should ever
arise, who heard and believed this word, and at last gathered and
brought forth treasures of — Wisdom — for their people?

46. Think what an amazing business that would be! How incon-
ceivable, in the state of our present national wisdom! That we
should bring up our peasants to a book exercise instead of a bayonet
exercise! — organize, drill, maintain with pay, and good generalship,
armies of thinkers, instead of armies of stabbers! — find national
amusement in reading-rooms as well as rifle-grounds; give prizes for
a fair shot at a fact, as well as for a leaden splash on a target. What
an absurd idea it seems, put fairly in words, that the wealth of the
capitalists of civilized nations should ever come to support literature
instead of war!

47. Have yet patience with me, while I read you a single sentence
out of the only book, properly to be called a book, that I have yet
written myself, the one that will stand (if anything stand) surest
and longest of all work of mine.

"It is one very awful form of the operation of wealth in Europe
that it is entirely capitalists' wealth that supports unjust wars. Just
wars do not need so much money to support them; for most of the
men who wage such, wage them gratis; but for an unjust war, men's
bodies and souls have both to be bought; and the best tools of war
for them besides, which make such war costly to the maximum; not
to speak of the cost of base fear, and angry suspicion, between nations
which have not grace nor honesty enough in all their multitudes to
buy an hour's peace of mind with; as, at present, France and Eng-
land, purchasing of each other ten millions' sterling worth of con-
sternation, annually (a remarkably light crop, half thorns and half
aspen leaves, sown, reaped, and granaried by the 'science' of the
modern political economist, teaching covetousness instead of truth) .
And, all unjust war being supportable, if not by pillage of the
enemy, only by loans from capitalists, these loans are repaid by subse-
quent taxation of the people, who appear to have no will in the mat-
ter, the capitalists' will being the primary root of the war; but its
real root is the covetousness of the whole nation, rendering it inca-

sesame: of kings' treasuries 131

pable of faith, frankness, or justice, and bringing about, therefore, in
due time, his own separate loss and punishment to each person."

48. France and England literally, observe, buy panic of each other;
they pay, each of them, for ten thousand thousand pounds' worth of
terror, a year. Now suppose, instead of buying these ten millions'
worth of panic annually, they made up their minds to be at peace
with each other, and buy ten millions' worth of knowledge annually;
and that each nation spent its ten thousand thousand pounds a year
in founding royal libraries, royal art galleries, royal museums, royal
gardens, and places of rest. Might it not be better somewhat for
both French and English?

49. It will be long, yet, before that comes to pass. Nevertheless, I
hope it will not be long before royal or national libraries will be
founded in every considerable city, with a royal series of books in
them; the same series in every one of them, chosen books, the best
in every kind, prepared for that national series in the most perfect
way possible; their text printed all on leaves of equal size, broad of
margin, and divided into pleasant volumes, light in the hand, beau-
tiful, and strong, and thorough as examples of binders' work; and
that these great libraries will be accessible to all clean and orderly
persons at all times of the day and evening; strict law being enforced
for this cleanliness and quietness.

50. I could shape for you other plans for art galleries, and for
natural history galleries, and for many precious — many, it seems to
me, needful — things; but this book plan is the easiest and needfullest,
and would prove a considerable tonic to what we call our British
constitution, which has fallen dropsical of late, and has an evil
thirst, and evil hunger, and wants healthier feeding. You have got
its corn laws repealed for it; try if you cannot get corn laws estab-
lished for it dealing in a better bread; — bread made of that old
enchanted Arabian grain, the Sesame, which opens doors; — doors
not of robbers', but of Kings' Treasuries.

NOTE TO §30

Respecting the increase of rent by the deaths of the poor, for
evidence of which see the preface to the Medical officers' report to the
Privy Council, just published, there are suggestions in its preface

132 RUSKIN

which will make some stir among us, I fancy, respecting which let
me note these points following: —

There are two theories on the subject of land now abroad, and in
contention; both false.

The first is that, by Heavenly law, there have always existed, and
must continue to exist, a certain number of hereditarily sacred per-
sons to whom the earth, air, and water of the world belong, as per-
sonal property; of which earth, air, and water, these persons may,
at their pleasure, permit, or forbid, the rest of the human race to
eat, breathe, or to drink. This theory is not for many years longer
tenable. The adverse theory is that a division of the land of the
world among the mob of the world would immediately elevate the
said mob into sacred personages; that houses would then build
themselves, and corn grow of itself; and that everybody would be
able to live, without doing any work for his living. This theory
would also be found highly untenable in practice.

It will, however, require some rough experiments, and rougher
catastrophes, before the generality of persons will be convinced
that no law concerning anything — least of all concerning land, for
either holding or dividing it, or renting it high, or renting it low —
would be of the smallest ultimate use to the people, so long as the
general contest for life, and for the means of life, remains one of
mere brutal competition. That contest, in an unprincipled nation,
will take one deadly form or another, whatever laws you make
against it. For instance, it would be an entirely wholesome law for
England, if it could be carried, that maximum limits should be
assigned to incomes according to classes; and that every nobleman's
income should be paid to him as a fixed salary or pension by the
nation; and not squeezed by him in variable sums, at discretion,
out of the tenants of his land. But if you could get such a law passed
to-morrow, and if, which would be farther necessary, you could
fix the value of the assigned incomes by making a given weight of
pure bread for a given sum, a twelvemonth would not pass before
another currency would have been tacitly established, and the
power of accumulative wealth would have reasserted itself in some

sesame: of kings' treasuries 133

other article, or some other imaginary sign. There is only one cure
for public distress — and that is public education, directed to make
men thoughtful, merciful, and just. There are, indeed, many laws
conceivable which would gradually better and strengthen the na-
tional temper; but, for the most part, they are such as the national
temper must be much bettered before it would bear. A nation
in its youth may be helped by laws, as a weak child by backboards,
but when it is old it cannot that way straighten its crooked spine.
And besides, the problem of land, at its worst, is a bye one; dis-
tribute the earth as you will, the principal question remains inex-
orable, — ^Who is to dig it? Which of us, in brief words, is to do
the hard and dirty work for the rest — and for what pay? Who is
to do the pleasant and clean work, and for what pay? Who is to
do no work, and for what pay? And there are curious moral and
religious questions connected with these. How far is it lawful to
suck a portion of the soul out of a great many persons, in order
to put the abstracted psychical quantities together and make one very
beautiful or ideal soul? If we had to deal with mere blood, instead
of spirit (and the thing might literally be done — as it has been done
with infants before now) — so that it were possible by taking a cer-
tain quantity of blood from the arms of a given number of the
mob, and putting it all into one person, to make a more azure-
blooded gentleman of him, the thing would of course be managed;
but secretly, I should conceive. But now, because it is brain and
soul that we abstract, not visible blood, it can be done quite openly,
and we live, we gentlemen, on delicatest prey, after the manner of
weasels; that is to say, we keep a certain number of clowns digging
and ditching, and generally stupefied, in order that we, being fed
gratis, may have all the thinking and feeling to ourselves. Yet
there is a great deal to be said for this. A highly-bred and trained
English, French, Austrian, or Italian gentleman (much more a
lady) is a great production, — a better production than most statues;
being beautifully colored as well as shaped, and plus all the brains;
a glorious thing to look at, a wonderful thing to talk to; and you
cannot have it, any more than a pyramid or a church, but by

134 RUSKIN

sacrifice of much contributed life. And it is, perhaps, better to build
a beautiful human creature than a beautiful dome or steeple — and
more delightful to look up reverently to a creature far above us,
than to a wall; only the beautiful human creature will have some
duties to do in return — duties of living belfry and rampart — of
which presently.

LECTURE II. — LILIES: OF
QUEENS' GARDENS'

"Be thou glad, oh thirsting Desert; let the desert be made cheerful, and
bloom as the lily; and the barren places of Jordan shall run wild with
wood." — Isaiah xxxv, i. (Septuagint.)

IT will, perhaps, be well, as this Lecture is the sequel of one
previously given, that I should shortly state to you my general
intention in both. The questions specially proposed to you in
the first, namely, How and What to Read, rose out of a far deeper
one, which it was my endeavor to make you propose earnestly to
yourselves, namely, Why to Read. I want you to feel, with me,
that whatever advantages we possess in the present day in the
diffusion of education and of literature, can only be rightly used by
any of us when we have apprehended clearly what education is to
lead to, and literature to teach. I wish you to see that both well-
directed moral training and well-chosen reading lead to the posses-
sion of a power over the ill-guided and illiterate, which is, according
to the measure of it, in the truest sense, \ingly; conferring indeed
the purest kingship that can exist among men: too many other
kingships (however distinguished by visible insignia or material
power) being either spectral or tyrannous; — spectral — that is to
say, aspects and shows only of royalty, hollow as death, and which
only the "likeness of a kingly crown have on"; or else tyrannous —
that is to say, substituting their own will for the law of justice and
love by which all true kings rule.

52. There is, then, I repeat — and as I want to leave this idea
with you, I begin with it, and shall end with it — only one pure kind
of kingship; an inevitable and external kind, crowned or not: the
kingship, namely, which consists in a stronger moral state, and a
truer thoughtful state, than that of others; enabling you, therefore,

'This lecture was given December 14, 1864, at the Town Hall, Manchester, in aid
of the St. Andrew's Schools.

135

136 RUSKIN

to guide, or to raise them. Observe that word "State"; we have
got into a loose way of using it. It means hterally the standing and
stabiHty of a thing; and you have the full force of it in the derived
word "statue" — "the immovable thing." A king's majesty or "state,"
then, and the right of his kingdom to be called a state, depends on
the movelessness of both: — without tremor, without quiver of bal-
ance; established and enthroned upon a foundation of eternal law
which nothing can alter, nor overthrow.

53. Believing that all literature and all education are only useful
so far as they tend to confirm this calm, beneficent, and therefore
kingly, power — first, over ourselves, and, through ourselves, over
all around us, I am now going to ask you to consider with me
farther, what special portion or kind of this royal authority, arising
out of noble education, may rightly be possessed by women; and
how far they also are called to a true queenly power. Not in their
households merely, but over all within their sphere. And in what
sense, if they rightly understood and exercised this royal or gracious
influence, the order and beauty induced by such benignant power
would justify us in speaking of the territories over which each of
them reigned, as "Queens' Gardens."

54. And here, in the very outset, we are met by a far deeper
question, which — strange though this may seem — remains among
many of us yet quite undecided, in spite of its infinite importance.

We cannot determine what the queenly power of women should
be, until we are agreed what their ordinary power should be. We
cannot consider how education may fit them for any widely ex-
tending duty, until we are agreed what is their true constant duty.
And there never was a time when wilder words were spoken, or
more vain imagination permitted, respecting this question — quite
vital to all social happiness. The relations of the womanly to the
manly nature, their different capacities of intellect or of virtue,
seem never to have been yet estimated with entire consent. We
hear of the "mission" and of the "rights" of Woman, as if these
could ever be separate from the mission and the rights of Man; —
as if she and her lord were creatures of independent kind, and of
irreconcilable claim. This, at least, is wrong. And not less wrong —
perhaps even more foolishly wrong (for I will anticipate thus far

lilies: of queens' gardens 137

what I hope to prove) — ^is the idea that woman is only the shadow
and attendant image of her lord, owing him a thoughtless and servile
obedience, and supported altogether in her weakness by the pre-
eminence of his fortitude.

This, I say, is the most foolish of all errors respecting her who
was made to be the helpmate of man. As if he could be helped
effectively by a shadow, or worthily by a slave!

55. I. — ^Let us try, then, whether we cannot get at some clear
and harmonious idea (it must be harmonious if it is true) of what
womanly mind and virtue are in power and office, with respect to
man's; and how their relations, rightly accepted, aid, and increase,
the vigor, and honor, and authority of both.

And now I must repeat one thing I said in the last lecture : namely,
that the first use of education was to enable us to consult with the
wisest and the greatest men on all points of earnest difficulty. That
to use books rightly, was to go to them for help: to appeal to them,
when our own knowledge and power of thought failed: to be led
by them into wider sight — purer conception — than our own, and
receive from them the united sentence of the judges and councils
of all time, against our solitary and unstable opinion.

Let us do this now. Let us see whether the greatest, the wisest,
the purest-hearted of all ages are agreed in any wise on this point:
let us hear the testimony they have left respecting what they held to
be the true dignity of woman, and her mode of help to man.

56. And first let us take Shakespeare.

Note broadly in the outset, Shakespeare has no heroes; — he has
only heroines. There is not one entirely heroic figure in all his
plays, except the slight sketch of Henry the Fifth, exaggerated for
the purposes of the stage: and the still slighter Valentine in "The
Two Gentlemen of Verona." In his labored and perfect plays you
have no hero. Othello would have been one, if his simplicity had
not been so great as to leave him the prey of every base practice
round him; but he is the only example even approximating to the
heroic type. Coriolanus — Caesar — Antony, stand in flawed strength,
and fall by their vanities; — Hamlet is indolent, and drowsily specu-
lative; Romeo an impatient boy; the Merchant of Venice languidly
submissive to adverse fortune; Kent, in King Lear, is entirely noble

138 RUSKIN

at heart, but too rough and unpolished to be of true use at the
critical time, and he sinks into the ofBce of a servant only. Orlando,
no less noble, is yet the despairing toy of chance, followed, com-
forted, saved, by Rosalind. Whereas there is hardly a play that has
not a perfect woman in it, steadfast in grave hope and errorless
purpose: CordeUa, Desdemona, Isabella, Hermione, Imogen, Queen
Katherine, Perdita, Silvia, Viola, Rosalind, Helena, and last, and
perhaps loveliest, Virgilia, are all faultless: conceived in the highest
heroic type of humanity.

57. Then observe, secondly.

The catastrophe of every play is caused always by the folly or
fault of a man; the redemption, if there be any, is by the wisdom
and virtue of a woman, and failing that, there is none. The catas-
trophe of King Lear is owing to his own want of judgment, his
impatient vanity, his misunderstanding of his children; the virtue
of his one true daughter would have saved him from all the
injuries of the others, unless he had cast her away from him; as it
is, she all but saves him.

Of Othello I need not trace the tale; — nor the one weakness of
his so mighty love; nor the inferiority of his perceptive intellect
to that even of the second woman character in the play, the Emilia
who dies in wild testimony against his error: —

"Oh, murderous coxcomb! What should such a fool
Do with so good a wife?"

In "Romeo and Juliet," the wise and brave stratagem of the wife
is brought to ruinous issue by the reckless impatience of her hus-
band. In "Winter's Tale" and in "Cymbeline," the happiness and
existence of two princely households, lost through long years, and
imperiled to the death by the folly and obstinacy of the husbands,
are redeemed at last by the queenly patience and wisdom of the
wives. In "Measure for Measure," the foul injustice of the judge,
and the foul cowardice of the brother, are opposed to the victorious
truth and adamantine purity of a woman. In "Coriolanus," the
mother's counsel, acted upon in time, would have saved her son
from all evil; his momentary forgetfulness of it is his ruin; her
prayer, at last granted, saves him — not, indeed, from death, but
from the curse of living as the destroyer of his country.

lilies: of queens gardens 139

And what shall I say of Julia, constant against the fickleness of
a lover who is a mere wicked child? — of Helena, against the petu-
lance and insult of a careless youth? — of the patience of Hero, the
passion of Beatrice, and the calmly devoted wisdom of the "un-
lessoned girl," who appears among the helplessness, the blindness,
and the vindictive passions of men, as a gentle angel, bringing
courage and safety by her presence, and defeating the worst malig-
nities of crime by what women are fancied most to fail in, — pre-
cision and accuracy of thought.

58. Observe, further, among all the principal figures in Shake-
speare's plays, there is only one weak woman — Ophelia; and it is
because she fails Hamlet at the critical moment, and is not, and
cannot in her nature be, a guide to him when he needs her most,
that all the bitter catastrophe follows. Finally, though there are
three wicked women among the principal figures, Lady Macbeth,
Regan, and Goneril, they are felt at once to be frightful exceptions
to the ordinary laws of life; fatal in their influence also in proportion
to the power for good which they have abandoned.

Such, in broad light, is Shakespeare's testimony to the position
and character of women in human life. He represents them as
infallibly faithful and wise counselors, — incorruptibly just and pure
examples — strong always to sanctify, even when they cannot save.

59. Not as in any wise comparable in knowledge of the nature
of man, — still less in his understanding of the causes and courses of
fate, — ^but only as the writer who has given us the broadest view
of the conditions and modes of ordinary thought in modern society,
I ask you next to receive the witness of Walter Scott.

I put aside his merely romantic prose writings as of no value; and
though the early romantic poetry is very beautiful, its testimony
is of no weight, other than that of a boy's ideal. But his true works,
studied from Scottish life, bear a true witness; and, in the whole
range of these, there are but three men who reach the heroic type^ —

^I ought, in order to make this assertion fully understood, to have noted the
various weaknesses which lower the ideal of other great characters of men in the
Waverley novels — the selfishness and narrowness of thought in Redgauntlet, the weak
religious enthusiasm in Edward Glendinning, and the like; and I ought to have
noticed that there are several quite perfect characters sketched sometimes in the
backgrounds; three — let us accept joyously this courtesy to England and her soldiers
— are English ofiRcers: Colonel Gardiner, Colonel Talbot, and Colonel Mannering.

140 RUSKIN

Dandie Dinmont, Rob Roy, and Claverhouse; o£ these, one is a
border farmer; another a freebooter; the third a soldier in a bad
cause. And these touch the ideal of heroism only in their courage
and faith, together with a strong, but uncultivated, or mistakenly
applied, intellectual power; while his younger men are the gentle-
manly playthings of fantastic fortune, and only by aid (or accident)
of that fortune, survive, not vanquish, the trials they involuntarily
sustain. Of any disciplined, or consistent character, earnest in a
purpose wisely conceived, or dealing with forms of hostile evil,
definitely challenged, and resolutely subdued, there is no trace in
his conceptions of young men. Whereas in his imaginations of
women, — in the characters of Ellen Douglas, of Flora Maclvor,
Rose Bradwardine, Catherine Seyton, Diana Vernon, Lilias Red-
gauntlet, Alice Bridgenorth, Alice Lee, and Jeanie Deans, — with
endless varieties of grace, tenderness, and intellectual power, we
find in all a quite infallible and inevitable sense of dignity and
justice; a fearless, instant, and untiring self-sacrifice to even the
appearance of duty, much more to its real claims; and, finally, a
patient wisdom of deeply restrained affection, which does infinitely
more than protect its objects from a momentary error; it gradually
forms, animates, and exalts the characters of the unworthy lovers,
until, at the close of the tale, we are just able, and no more, to take
patience in hearing of their unmerited success.

So that in all cases, with Scott as with Shakespeare, it is the
woman who watches over, teaches, and guides the youth; it is
never, by any chance, the youth who watches over or educates his
mistress.

60. Next, take, though more briefly, graver testimony — that of
the great ItaHans and Greeks. You know well the plan of Dante's
great poem — that it is a love poem to his dead lady; a song of praise
for her watch over his soul. Stooping only to pity, never to love,
she yet saves him from destruction — saves him from hell. He is
going eternally astray in despair; she comes down from heaven to
his help, and throughout the ascents of Paradise is his teacher, inter-
preting for him the most difficult truths, divine and human, and
leading him, with rebuke upon rebuke, from star to star.

I do not insist upon Dante's conception; if I began I could not
cease; besides, you might think this a wild imagination of one

lilies: of queens gardens 141

poet's heart. So I will rather read to you a few verses of the
deliberate writing of a knight of Pisa to his living lady, wholly
characteristic of the feeling of all the noblest men of the thirteenth,
or early fourteenth, century, preserved among many other such
records of knightly honor and love, which Dante Rossetti has
gathered for us from among the early Italian poets.

"For lo! thy law is passed
That this my love should manifesdy be

To serve and honor thee;
And so I do; and my delight is full.
Accepted for the servant of thy rule.

"Without almost, I am all rapturous.
Since thus my will was set
To serve, thou flower of joy, thine excellence;
Nor ever seems it anything could rouse
A pain or regret,
But on thee dwells mine every thought and sense;
Considering that from thee all virtues spread

As from a fountain head, —
That in thy gift is wisdom's best avail,

And honor without fail;
With whom each sovereign good dwells separate,
Fulfilling the perfection of thy state.

"Lady, since I conceived
That pleasurable aspect in my heart.

My life has been apart
In shining brightness and the place of truth;

Which till that time, good sooth,
Groped among shadows in a darken'd place.

Where many hours and days
It hardly ever had remember'd good.

But now my servitude
Is thine, and I am full of joy and rest.

A man from a wild beast
Thou madest me, since for thy love I lived."

61. You may think, perhaps, a Greek knight would have had a
lower estimate of women than this Christian lover. His spiritual
subjection to them was, indeed, not so absolute; but as regards their
own personal character, it was only because you could not have
followed me so easily, that I did not take the Greek women instead
of Shakespeare's; and instance, for chief ideal types of human

142 RUSKIN

beauty and faith, the simple mother's and wife's heart of An-
dromache; the divine, yet rejected wisdom of Cassandra; the playful
kindness and simple princess-life of happy Nausicaa; the housewifely
calm of that of Penelope, with its watch upon the sea; the ever
patient, fearless, hopelessly devoted piety of the sister and daughter,
in Antigone; the bowing down of Iphigenia, lamblike and silent;
and, finally, the expectation of the resurrection, made clear to the
soul of the Greeks in the return from her grave of that Alcestis,
who, to save her husband, had passed calmly through the bitterness
of death.

62. Now, I could multiply witness upon witness of this kind
upon you if I had time. I would take Chaucer, and show you why
he wrote a Legend of Good Women; but no Legend of Good Men.
I would take Spenser, and show you how all his fairy knights are
sometimes deceived and sometimes vanquished; but the soul of Una
is never darkened, and the spear of Britomart is never broken. Nay,
I could go back into the mythical teaching of the most ancient times,
and show you how the great people, — by one of whose princesses
it was appointed that the Lawgiver of all the earth should be
educated, rather than by his own kindred; — how that great Egyp-
tian people, wisest then of nations, gave to their Spirit of Wisdom
the form of a woman; and into her hand, for a symbol, the
weaver's shuttle; and how the name and the form of that spirit,
adopted, believed, and obeyed by the Greeks, became that Athena
of the olive-helm, and cloudy shield, to faith in whom you owe,
down to this date, whatever you hold most precious in art, in litera-
ture, or in types of national virtue.

63. But I will not wander into this distant and mythical element;
I will only ask you to give its legitimate value to the testimony of
these great poets and men of the world, — consistent, as you see it
is, on this head. I will ask you whether it can be supposed that these
men, in the main work of their lives, are amusing themselves with
a fictitious and idle view of the relations between man and woman; —
nay, worse than fictitious or idle; for a thing may be imaginary,
yet desirable, if it were possible; but this, their ideal of woman, is,
according to our common idea of the marriage relation, wholly
undesirable. The woman, we say, is not to guide, nor even to think

lilies: of queens" gardens 143

for herself. The man is always to be the wiser; he is to be the
thinker, the ruler, the superior in knowledge and discretion, as in
power.

64. Is it not somewhat important to make up our minds on this
matter? Are all these great men mistaken, or are we? Are Shake-
speare and ^schylus, Dante and Homer, merely dressing dolls for
us; or, worse than dolls, unnatural visions, the realization of which,
were it possible, would bring anarchy into all households and ruin
into all affections? Nay, if you could suppose this, take lastly the
evidence of facts, given by the human heart itself. In all Christian
ages which have been remarkable for their purity or progress, there
has been absolute yielding of obedient devotion, by the lover, to his
mistress. I say obedient; — not merely enthusiastic and worshiping
in imagination, but entirely subject, receiving from the beloved
woman, however young, not only the encouragement, the praise,
and the reward of all toil, but so far as any choice is open, or any
question difficult of decision, the direction of all toil. That chivalry,
to the abuse and dishonor of which are attributable primarily what-
ever is cruel in war, unjust in peace, or corrupt and ignoble in domes-
tic relations; and to the original purity and power of which we owe
the defense alike of faith, of law, and of love; — that chivalry, I say,
in its very first conception of honorable life, assumes the subjection
of the young knight to the command — should it even be the
command in caprice — of his lady. It assumes this, because its mas-
ters knew that the first and necessary impulse of every truly taught
and knightly heart is this of blind service to its lady; that where
that true faith and captivity are not, all wayward and wicked
passions must be; and that in this rapturous obedience to the single
love of his youth, is the sanctification of all man's strength, and
the continuance of all his purposes. And this, not because such
obedience would be safe, or honorable, were it ever rendered to
the unworthy; but because it ought to be impossible for every noble
youth — ^it is impossible for every one rightly trained — to love any
one whose gentle counsel he cannot trust, or whose prayerful com-
mand he can hesitate to obey.

65. I do not insist by any farther argument on this, for I think
it should commend itself at once to your knowledge of what has

144 RUSKIN

been and to your feelings of what should be. You cannot think
that the buckling on of the knight's armor by his lady's hand was
a mere caprice of romantic fashion. It is the type of an eternal truth
— that the soul's armor is never well set to the heart unless a woman's
hand has braced it; and it is only when she braces it loosely that
the honor of manhood fails. Know you not those lovely lines — I
would they were learned by all youthful ladies of England: —

"Ah, wasteful woman! — she who may
On her sweet self set her own price,
Knowing he cannot choose but pay —
How has she cheapen'd Paradise!
How given for nought her priceless gift,
How spoiled the bread and spill'd the wine.
Which, spent with due, respective thrift.
Had made brutes men, and men divine!" '

66. Thus much, then, respecting the relations of lovers I believe
you will accept. But what we too often doubt is the fitness of the
continuance of such a relation throughout the whole of human life.
We think it right in the lover and mistress, not in the husband and
wife. That is to say, we think that a reverent and tender duty is
due to one whose affection we still doubt, and whose character we
as yet do but partially and distantly discern; and that this reverence
and duty are to be withdrawn when the affection has become wholly
and limitlessly our own, and the character has been so sifted and
tried that we fear not to entrust it with the happiness of our lives.
Do you not see how ignoble this is, as well as how unreasonable?
Do you not feel that marriage, — when it is marriage at all, — is
only the seal which marks the vowed transition of temporary into
untiring service, and of fitful into eternal love?

67. But how, you will ask, is the idea of this guiding function
of the woman reconcilable with a true wifely subjection? Simply
in that it is a guiding, not a determining, function. Let me try to
show you briefly how these powers seem to be rightly distinguish-
able.

' Coventry Patmore. You cannot read him too often or too carefully; as far as I
know he is the only living poet who always strengthens and purifies; the others
sometimes darken, and nearly always depress and discourage, the imagination they
deeply seize.

lilies: of queens' gardens 145

We are foolish, and without excuse foolish, in speaking of the
"superiority" of one sex to the other, as if they could be compared
in similar things. Each has what the other has not: each completes
the other, and is completed by the other: they are in nothing alike,
and the happiness and perfection of both depends on each asking
and receiving from the other what the other only can give.

68. Now their separate characters are briefly these: The man's
power is active, progressive, defensive. He is eminently the doer,
the creator, the discoverer, the defender. His intellect is for specula-
tion and invention; his energy for adventure, for war, and for
conquest, wherever war is just, wherever conquest necessary. But
the woman's power is for rule, not for battle, — and her intellect is
not for invention or creation, but for sweet ordering, arrangement,
and decision. She sees the qualities of things, their claims, and their
places. Her great function is Praise: she enters into no contest, but
infallibly judges the crown of contest. By her office, and place, she
is protected from all danger and temptation. The man, in his rough
work in open world, must encounter all peril and trial: to him,
therefore, must be the failure, the offense, the inevitable error : often
he must be wounded, or subdued; often misled; and always hard-
ened. But he guards the woman from all this; within his house,
as ruled by her, unless she herself has sought it, need enter no
danger, no temptation, no cause of error or offense. This is the true
nature of home — it is the place of Peace; the shelter, not only from
all injury, but from all terror, doubt, and division. In so far as it
is not this, it is not home: so far as the anxieties of the outer life
penetrate into it, and the inconsistently-minded, unknown, unloved,
or hostile society of the outer world is allowed by either husband
or wife to cross the threshold, it ceases to be home; it is then only
a part of that outer world which you have roofed over, and lighted
fire in. But so far as it is a sacred place, a vestal temple, a temple
of the hearth watched over by Household Gods, before whose faces
none may come but those whom they can receive with love, — so
far as it is this, and roof and fire are types only of a nobler shade
and light, — shade as of the rock in a weary land, and light as of
the Pharos in the stormy sea, — so far it vindicates the name, and
fulfills the praise, of home.

146 RUSKIN

And wherever a true wife comes, this home is always round her.
The stars only may be over her head; the glowworm in the night-
cold grass may be the only fire at her foot: but home is yet wherever
she is; and for a noble woman it stretches far round her, better than
ceiled with cedar, or painted with vermilion, shedding its quiet light
far, for those who else were homeless.

69. This, then, I believe to be, — will you not admit it to be, — the
woman's true place and power? But do not you see that to fulfill
this, she must — as far as one can use such terms of a human creature
— be incapable of error? So far as she rules, all must be right, or
nothing is. She must be enduringly, incorruptibly good; instinc-
tively, infallibly wise — wise, not for self-development, but for self-
renunciation: wise, not that she may set herself above her husband,
but that she may never fail from his side: wise, not with the narrow-
ness of insolent and loveless pride, but with the passionate gentle-
ness of an infinitely variable, because infinitely applicable, modesty
of service — the true changefulness of woman. In that great sense —
"La donna e mobile," not "Qual piiim' al vento"; no, nor yet
"Variable as the shade, by the light quivering aspen made"; but
variable as the light, manifold in fair and serene division, that it
may take the color of all that it falls upon, and exalt it.

70. II. — I have been trying, thus far, to show you what should be
the place, and what the power of woman. Now, secondly, we ask,
What kind of education is to fit her for these ?

And if you indeed think this is a true conception of her office and
dignity, it will not be difficult to trace the course of education which
would fit her for the one, and raise her to the other.

The first of our duties to her — no thoughtful persons now doubt
this — is to secure for her such physical training and exercise as
may confirm her health, and perfect her beauty, the highest refine-
ment of that beauty being unattainable without splendor of activity
and of delicate strength. To perfect her beauty, I say, and increase
its power; it cannot be too powerful, nor shed its sacred light too
far: only remember that all physical freedom is vain to produce
beauty without a corresponding freedom of heart. There are two
passages of that poet who is distinguished, it seems to me, from all
others — not by power, but by exquisite righiness — which point you

lilies: of queens gardens 147

to the source, and describe to you, in a few syllables, the comple-
tion of womanly beauty. I will read the introductory stanzas, but
the last is the one I wish you specially to notice: —

"Three years she grew in sun and shower,
Then Nature said, 'A lovelier flower

On earth was never sown.
This child I to myself will take;
She shall be mine, and I will make

A lady of my own.

" 'Myself will to my darling be

Both law and impulse; and with me

The girl, in rock and plain,
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower.
Shall feel an overseeing power

To kindle, or restrain.

" 'The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her; for her the willow bend;

Nor shall she fail to see
Even in the motions of the storm
Grace that shall mould the maiden's form

By silent sympathy.

" 'And vital feelings of delight

Shall rear her form to stately height.

Her virgin bosom swell.
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give,
While she and I together live.

Here in this happy dell.' " *

"Vital feelings of delight," observe. There are deadly feelings
of delight; but the natural ones are vital, necessary to every life.

And they must be feelings of delight, if they are to be vital. Do
not think you can make a girl lovely, if you do not make her happy.
There is not one restraint you put on a good girl's nature — there is
not one check you give to her instincts of affection or of effort —
which will not be indelibly written on her features, with a hardness
which is all the more painful because it takes away the brightness
from the eyes of innocence, and the charm from the brow of virtue.

* Observe, it is "Nature" who is speaking throughout, and who says,
"While she and I together live."

148 RUSKIN

71. This for the means: now note the end. Take from the same
poet, in two hnes, a perfect description of womanly beauty —

"A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet."

The perfect loveUness of a woman's countenance can only consist
in that majestic peace, which is founded in the memory of happy
and useful years, — full of sweet records; and from the joining of
this with that yet more majestic childishness, which is still full of
change and promise; — opening always — modest at once, and bright,
with hope of better things to be won, and to be bestowed. There
is no old age where there is still that promise.

72. Thus, then, you have first to mould her physical frame, and
then, as the strength she gains will permit you, to fill and temper
her mind with all knowledge and thoughts which tend to confirm
its natural instincts of justice, and refine its natural tact of love.

All such knowledge should be given her as may enable her to
understand, and even to aid, the work of men: and yet it should be
given, not as knowledge, — not as if it were, or could be, for her an
object to know; but only to feel, and to judge. It is of no moment,
as a matter of pride or perfectness in herself, whether she knows
many languages or one; but it is of the utmost, that she should be
able to show kindness to a stranger, and to understand the sweet-
ness of a stranger's tongue. It is of no moment to her own worth
or dignity that she should be acquainted with this science or that;
but it is of the highest that she should be trained in habits of accu-
rate thought; that she should understand the meaning, the in-
evitableness, and the loveliness of natural laws; and follow at least
some one path of scientific attainment, as far as to the threshold
of that bitter Valley of Humiliation, into which only the wisest and
bravest of men can descend, owning themselves forever children,
gathering pebbles on a boundless shore. It is of little consequence
how many positions of cities she knows, or how many dates of
events, or names of celebrated persons — it is not the object of
education to turn a woman into a dictionary; but it is deeply
necessary that she should be taught to enter with her whole per-
sonality into the history she reads; to picture the passages of it vitally
in her own bright imagination; to apprehend, with her fine in-

lilies: of queens gardens 149

stincts, the pathetic circumstances and dramatic relations, which the
historian too often only eclipses by his reasoning, and disconnects
by his arrangement: it is for her to trace the hidden equities of
divine reward, and catch sight, through the darkness, of the fatal
threads of woven fire that connect error with its retribution. But,
chiefly of all, she is to be taught to extend the limits of her sympathy
with respect to that history which is being for her determined as
the moments pass in which she draws her peaceful breath: and
to the contemporary calamity, which, were it but rightly mourned
by her, would recur no more hereafter. She is to exercise herself
in imagining what would be the effects upon her mind and conduct,
if she were daily brought into the presence of the suffering which
is not the less real because shut from her sight. She is to be taught
somewhat to understand the nothingness of the proportion which
that little world in which she lives and loves, bears to the world
in which God lives and loves; — and solemnly she is to be taught to
strive that her thoughts of piety may not be feeble in proportion to
the number they embrace, nor her prayer more languid than it is
for the momentary relief from pain of her husband or her child,
when it is uttered for the multitudes of those who have none to
love them, — and is "for all who are desolate and oppressed."

73. Thus far, I think, I have had your concurrence; perhaps you
will not be with me in what I believe is most needful for me to say.
There is one dangerous science for women — one which they must
indeed beware how they profanely touch — that of theology. Strange,
and miserably strange, that while they are modest enough to doubt
their powers, and pause at the threshold of sciences where every
step is demonstrable and sure, they will plunge headlong, and with-
out one thought of incompetency, into that science in which the
greatest men have trembled, and the wisest erred. Strange, that
they will complacently and pridefully bind up whatever vice or
folly there is in them, whatever arrogance, petulance, or blind in-
comprehensiveness, into one bitter bundle of consecrated myrrh.
Strange, in creatures born to be Love visible, that where they can
know least, they will condemn first, and think to recommend them-
selves to their Master, by scrambling up the steps of His judgment
throne, to divide it with Him. Strangest of all, that they should

150 RUSKIN

think they were led by the Spirit of the Comforter into habits of
mind which have become in them the unmixed elements of home
discomfort; and that they dare to turn the Household Gods of
Christianity into ugly idols of their own; — spiritual dolls, for them
to dress according to their caprice; and from which their husbands
must turn away in grieved contempt, lest they should be shrieked at
for breaking them.

74. I believe, then, with this exception, that a girl's education
should be nearly, in its course and material of study, the same as a
boy's; but quite differently directed. A woman, in any rank of
life, ought to know whatever her husband is likely to know, but
to know it in a different way. His command of it should be
foundational and progressive; hers, general and accomplished for
daily and helpful use. Not but that it would often be wiser in men
to learn things in a womanly sort of way, for present use, and to
seek for the discipline and training of their mental powers in such
branches of study as will be afterwards fittest for social service; but,
speaking broadly, a man ought to know any language or science
he learns, thoroughly — while a woman ought to know the same
language, or science, only so far as may enable her to sympathize in
her husband's pleasures, and in those of his best friends.

75. Yet, observe, with exquisite accuracy as far as she reaches.
There is a wide difference between elementary knowledge and
superficial knowledge — between a firm beginning, and an infirm
attempt at compassing. A woman may always help her husband
by what she knows, however little; by what she half -knows, or mis-
knows, she will only tease him.

And indeed, if there were to be any difference between a girl's
education and a boy's, I should say that of the two the girl should
be earlier led, as her intellect ripens faster, into deep and serious
subjects: and that her range of literature should be, not more, but
less frivolous; calculated to add the qualities of patience and serious-
ness to her natural poignancy of thought and quickness of wit;
and also to keep her in a lofty and pure element of thought. I enter
not now into any question of choice of books; only let us be sure
that her books are not heaped up in her lap as they fall out of the
package of the circulating library, wet with the last and lightest
spray of the fountain of folly.

lilies: of queens gardens 151

76. Or even of the fountain of wit; for with respect to that sore
temptation of novel-reading, it is not the badness of a novel that
we should dread, so much as its overwrought interest. The weakest
romance is not so stupefying as the lower forms of religious exciting
literature, and the worst romance is not so corrupting as false history,
false philosophy, or false political essays. But the best romance
becomes dangerous, if, by its excitement, it renders the ordinary
course of life uninteresting, and increases the morbid thirst for
useless acquaintance with scenes in which we shall never be called
upon to act.

77. I speak therefore of good novels only, and our modern litera-
ture is particularly rich in types of such. Well read, indeed, these
books have serious use, being nothing less than treatises on moral
anatomy and chemistry; studies of human nature in the elements of
it. But I attach little weight to this function: they are hardly ever
read with earnestness enough to permit them to fulfill it. The utmost
they usually do is to enlarge somewhat the charity of a kind reader,
or the bitterness of a malicious one; for each will gather, from the
novel, food for her own disposition. Those who are naturally proud
and envious will learn from Thackeray to despise humanity; those
who are naturally gentle, to pity it; those who are naturally shallow,
to laugh at it. So also, there might be a serviceable power in novels
to bring before us, in vividness, a human truth which we had before
dimly conceived; but the temptation to picturesqueness of state-
ment is so great, that often the best writers of fiction cannot resist
it; and our views are rendered so violent and one-sided, that their
vitality is rather a harm than good.

78. Without, however, venturing here on any attempt at decision
of how much novel-reading should be allowed, let me at least clearly
assert this, that whether novels, or poetry, or history be read, they
should be chosen, not for their freedom from evil, but for their
possession of good. The chance and scattered evil that may here
and there haunt, or hide itself in, a powerful book, never does any
harm to a noble girl; but the emptiness of an author oppresses her,
and his amiable folly degrades her. And if she can have access to
a good library of old and classical books, there need be no choosing
at all. Keep the modern magazine and novel out of your girl's
way; turn her loose into the old library every wet day, and let her

152 RUSKIN

alone. She will find what is good for her; you cannot; for there is
just this difference between the making of a girl's character and a
boy's — you may chisel a boy into shape, as you would a rock, or
hammer him into it, if he be of a better kind, as you would a piece
of bronze. But you cannot hammer a girl into anything. She grows
as a flower does, — she will wither without sun; she will decay in her
sheath, as the narcissus will, if you do not give her air enough; she
may fall, and defile her head in dust, if you leave her without help
at some moments of her life; but you cannot fetter her; she must
take her own fair form and way, if she take any, and in mind as
in body, must have always —

"Her household motions light and free
And steps of virgin liberty."

Let her loose in the library, I say, as you do a fawn in a field. It
knows the bad weeds twenty times better than you; and the good
ones, too, and will eat some bitter and prickly ones, good for it,
which you had not the slightest thought would have been so.

79. Then, in art, keep the finest models before her, and let her
practice in all accomplishments to be accurate and thorough, so as
to enable her to understand more than she accomplishes. I say the
finest models — that is to say, the truest, simplest, usefullest. Note
those epithets: they will range through all the arts. Try them in
music, where you might think them the least applicable. I say the
truest, that in which the notes most closely and faithfully express
the meaning of the words, or the character of intended emotion;
again, the simplest, that in which the meaning and melody are
attained with the fewest and most significant notes possible; and,
finally, the usefullest, that music which makes the best words most
beautiful, which enchants them in our memories each with its own
glory of sound, and which applies them closest to the heart at the
moment we need them.

80. And not only in the material and in the course, but yet more
earnestly in the spirit of it, let a girl's education be as serious as a
boy's. You bring up your girls as if they were meant for sideboard
ornament, and then complain of their frivolity. Give them the
same advantages that you give their brothers — appeal to the same

lilies: of queens' gardens 153

grand instincts of virtue in them; teach them, also, that courage and
truth are the pillars of their being; — do you think that they would
not answer that appeal, brave and true as they are even now, when
you know that there is hardly a girl's school in this Christian king-
dom where the children's courage or sincerity would be thought of
half so much importance as their way of coming in at a door; and
when the whole system of society, as respects the mode of estab-
lishing them in life, is one rotten plague of cowardice and imposture
— cowardice, in not daring to let them live, or love, except as their
neighbors choose; and imposture, in bringing, for the purpose of
our own pride, the full glow of the world's worst vanity upon a
girl's eyes, at the very period when the whole happiness of her
future existence depends upon her remaining undazzled?

81. And give them, lastly, not only noble teachings but noble
teachers. You consider somewhat, before you send your boy to
school, what kind of a man the master is; — whatsoever kind of a
man he is, you at least give him full authority over your son, and
show some respect for him yourself; — if he comes to dine with you,
you do not put him at a side table; you know, also, that at his
college, your child's immediate tutor will be under the direction of
some still higher tutor, for whom you have absolute reverence. You
do not treat the Dean of Christ Church or the Master of Trinity as
your inferiors.

But what teachers do you give your girls, and what reverence
do you show to the teachers you have chosen? Is a girl likely to
think her own conduct, or her own intellect, of much importance,
when you trust the entire formation of her character, moral and
intellectual, to a person whom you let your servants treat with less
respect than they do your housekeeper (as if the soul of your child
were a less charge than jams and groceries), and whom you your-
self think you confer an honor upon by letting her sometimes sit
in the drawing-room in the evening?

82. Thus, then, of literature as her help, and thus of art. There
is one more help which we cannot do without — one which, alone,
has sometimes done more than all other influences besides, — the
help of wild and fair nature. Hear this of the education of Joan
of Arc: —

154 RUSKIN

"The education of this poor girl was mean, according to the
present standard; was ineffably grand, according to a purer philo-
sophic standard; and only not good for our age, because for us it
would be unattainable. . .

"Next after her spiritual advantages, she owed most to the
advantages of her situation. The fountain of Domremy was on the
brink of a boundless forest; and it was haunted to that degree by
fairies, that the parish priest {cure) was obliged to read mass there
once a year, in order to keep them in any decent bounds. . . .

"But the forests of Domremy — those were the glories of the land;
for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets that tow-
ered into tragic strength. Abbeys there were, and abbey windows, —
'like Moorish temples of the Hindoos,' that exercised even princely
power both in Touraine and in the German Diets. These had their
sweet bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or
vespers, and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and scat-
tered enough, were these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the
deep solitude of the region; yet many enough to spread a network
or awning of Christian sanctity over what else might have seemed
a heathen wilderness."'

Now you cannot, indeed, have here in England, woods eighteen
miles deep to the center; but you can, perhaps, keep a fairy or two
for your children yet, if you wish to keep them. But do you wish it?
Suppose you had each, at the back of your houses, a garden large
enough for your children to play in, with just as much lawn as
would give them room to run, — no more — and that you could not
change your abode; but that, if you chose, you could double your
income, or quadruple it, by digging a coal-shaft in the middle of
the lawn, and turning the flower-beds into heaps of coke. Would
you do it? I hope not. I can tell you, you would be wrong if you
did, though it gave you income sixty-fold instead of four-fold.

83. Yet this is what you are doing with all England. The whole
country is but a little garden, not more than enough for your chil-
dren to run on the lawns of, if you would let them all run there.
And this little garden you will turn into furnace-ground, and fill

' "Joan of Arc: in reference to M. Michelet's 'History of France.' " De Quincey's
Works, Vol. III., page 217.

lilies: of queens gardens 155

with heaps of cinders, if you can; and those children of yours, not
you, will suffer for it. For the fairies will not be all banished; there
are fairies of the furnace as of the wood, and their first gifts seem
to be "sharp arrows of the mighty"; but their last gifts are "coals
of juniper."

84. And yet I cannot — though there is no part of my subject that
I feel more — press this upon you; for we made so little use of the
power of nature while we had it, that we shall hardly feel what we
have lost. Just on the other side of the Mersey you have your Snow-
don, and your Menai Straits, and that mighty granite rock beyond
the moors of Anglesea, splendid in its heathery crest, and foot
planted in the deep sea, once thought of as sacred — a divine promon-
tory, looking westward; the Holy Head or Headland, still not
without awe when its red light glares first through storm. These are
the hills, and these the bays and blue inlets, which, among the
Greeks, would have been always loved, always fateful in influence
on the national mind. That Snowdon is your Parnassus; but where
are its Muses? That Holyhead mountain is your Island of iEgina,
but where is its Temple to Minerva ?

85. Shall I read you what the Christian Minerva had achieved
under the shadow of our Parnassus, up to the year 1848? — Here is
a little account of a Welsh school, from page 261 of the report on
Wales, published by the Committee of Council on Education. This
is a school close to a town containing 5,000 persons: —

"I then called up a larger class, most of whom had recently come
to the school. Three girls repeatedly declared that they had never
heard of Christ, and two that they had never heard of God. Two
out of six thought Christ was on earth now" (they might have had
a worse thought, perhaps) ; "three knew nothing about the cruci-
fixion. Four out of seven did not know the names of the months,
nor the number of days in a year. They had no notion of addition
beyond two and two, or three and three; their minds were perfect
blanks."

Oh, ye women of England! from the Princess of that Wales to
the simplest of you, do not think your own children can be brought
into their true fold of rest while these are scattered on the hills, as
sheep having no shepherd. And do not think your daughters can

156 RUSKIN

be trained to the truth of their own human beauty, while the
pleasant places, which God made at once for their schoolroom and
their playground, lie desolate and defiled. You cannot baptize them
rightly in those inch-deep fonts of yours, unless you baptize them
also in the sweet waters which the great Lawgiver strikes forth
forever from the rocks of your native land — waters which a Pagan
would have worshiped in their purity, and you only worship with
pollution. You cannot lead your children faithfully to those narrow
axe-hewn church altars of yours, while the dark azure altars in
heaven — the mountains that sustain your island throne, — mountains
on which a Pagan would have seen the powers of heaven rest in
every wreathed cloud — remain for you without inscription; altars
built, not to, but by, an Unknown God.

86. III. — Thus far, then, of the nature, thus far of the teaching,
of woman, and thus of her household office, and queenliness. We
come now to our last, our widest question, — What is her queenly
office with respect to the state?

Generally we are under an impression that a man's duties are
public, and a woman's private. But this is not altogether so. A man
has a personal work or duty, relating to his own home, and a public
work or duty, which is the expansion of the other, relating to the
state. So a woman has a personal work or duty, relating to her
own home, and a public work or duty, which is also the expansion
of that.

Now the man's work for his own home is, as has been said, to
secure its maintenance, progress, and defense; the woman's to secure
its order, comfort, and loveliness.

Expand both these functions. The man's duty, as a member of
a commonwealth, is to assist in the maintenance, in the advance,
in the defense of the state. The woman's duty, as a member of the
commonwealth, is to assist in the ordering, in the comforting, and
in the beautiful adornment of the state.

What the man is at his own gate, defending it, if need be, against
insult and spoil, that also, not in a less, but in a more devoted
measure, he is to be at the gate of his country, leaving his home,
if need be, even to the spoiler, to do his more incumbent work there.

And, in like manner, what the woman is to be within her gates,
as the center of order, the balm of distress, and the mirror of beauty;

lilies: of queens' gardens 157

that she is also to be without her gates, where order is more diffi-
cult, distress more imminent, loveliness more rare.

And as within the human heart there is always set an instinct
tor all its real duties, — an instinct which you cannot quench, but
only warp and corrupt if you withdraw it from its true purpose; —
as there is the intense instinct of love, which, rightly disciplined,
maintains all the sanctities of life, and, misdirected, undermines
them; and must do either the one or the other; — so there is in the
human heart an inextinguishable instinct, the love of power, which,
rightly directed, maintains all the majesty of law and life, and, mis-
directed, wrecks them.

87. Deep-rooted in the innermost life of the heart of man, and of
the heart of woman, God set it there, and God keeps it there.
Vainly, as falsely, you blame or rebuke the desire of power! — For
Heaven's sake, and for Man's sake, desire it all you can. But what
power? That is all the question. Power to destroy? the lion's limb,
and the dragon's breath? Not so. Power to heal, to redeem, to
guide, and to guard. Power of the scepter and shield; the power
of the royal hand that heals in touching, — that binds the fiend and
looses the captive; the throne that is founded on the rock of Justice,
and descended from only by steps of mercy. Will you not covet such
power as this, and seek such throne as this, and be no more house-
wives, but queens?

88. It is now long since the women of England arrogated, imi-
versally, a title which once belonged to nobility only, and, having
once been in the habit of accepting the simple title of gentlewoman,
as correspondent to that of gentleman, insisted on the privilege of
assuming the title of "Lady," ^ which properly corresponds only to
the title of "Lord."

I do not blame them for this; but only for their narrow motive
in this. I would have them desire and claim the title of Lady,
provided they claim, not merely the title, but the office and duty
signified by it. Lady means "bread-giver" or "loaf-giver," and Lord

^ I wish there were a true order of chivalry instituted for our English youth of
certain ranks, in which both boy and girl should receive, at a given age, their knight-
hood and ladyhood by true title; attainable only by certain probation and trial both
of character and accomplishment; and to be forfeited, on conviction, by their peers,
of any dishonorable act. Such an institution would be entirely, and with all noble
results, possible, in a nation which loved honor. That it would not be possible among
us is not to the discredit of the scheme.

158 RUSKIN

means "maintainer of laws," and both titles have reference, not to
the law which is maintained in the house, nor to the bread which
is given to the household, but to law maintained for the multitude,
and to bread broken among the multitude. So that a Lord has
legal claim only to his title in so far as he is the maintainer of the
justice of the Lord of Lords; and a Lady has legal claim to her
title only so far as she communicates that help to the poor repre-
sentatives of her Master, which women once, ministering to Him of
their substance, were permitted to extend to that Master Himself;
and when she is known, as He Himself once was, in breaking of
bread.

89. And this beneficent and legal dominion, this power of the
Dominus, or House-Lord, and of the Domina, or House-Lady, is
great and venerable, not in the number of those through whom it
has lineally descended, but in the number of those whom it grasps
within its sway; it is always regarded with reverent worship wher-
ever its dynasty is founded on its duty, and its ambition co-relative
with its beneficence. Your fancy is pleased with the thought of
being noble ladies, with a train of vassals. Be it so: you cannot be
too noble, and your train cannot be too great; but see to it that your
train is of vassals whom you serve and feed, not merely of slaves who
serve and feed you; and that the multitude which obeys you is of
those whom you have comforted, not oppressed, — whom you have
redeemed, not led into captivity.

90. And this, which is true of the lower or household dominion,
is equally true of the queenly dominion; — that highest dignity is
open to you, if you will also accept that highest duty. Rex et Regina
— Roi et Reine — "Right-Ao&rs"; they differ but from the Lady and
Lord, in that their power is supreme over the mind as over the
person — that they not only feed and clothe, but direct and teach.
And whether consciously or not, you must be, in many a heart,
enthroned: there is no putting by that crown; queens you must
always be; queens to your lovers; queens to your husbands and
your sons; queens of higher mystery to the world beyond, which
bows itself, and will forever bow, before the myrtle crown, and the
stainless scepter, of womanhood. But, alas! you are too often idle
and careless queens, grasping at majesty in the least things, while

lilies: of queens' gardens 159

you abdicate it in the greatest; and leaving misrule and violence to
work their will among men, in defiance of the power which, holding
straight in gift from the Prince of all Peace, the wicked among you
betray, and the good forget.

91. "Prince of Peace." Note that name. When kings rule in
that name, and nobles, and the judges of the earth, they also, in
their narrow place, and mortal measure, receive the power of it.
There are no other rulers than they: other rule than theirs is but
misrule] they who govern verily "Dei gratia" are all princes, yes, or
princesses, of peace. There is not a war in the world, no, nor an in-
justice, but you women are answerable for it; not in that you have
provoked, but in that you have not hindered. Men, by their nature,
are prone to fight; they will fight for any cause, or for none. It is
for you to choose their cause for them, and to forbid them when
there is no cause. There is no suffering, no injustice, no misery in
the earth, but the guilt of it lies with you. Men can bear the sight
of it, but you should not be able to bear it. Men may tread it down
without sympathy in their own struggle; but men are feeble in
sympathy, and contracted in hope; it is you only who can feel the
depths of pain; and conceive the way of its healing. Instead of
trying to do this, you turn away from it; you shut yourselves within
your park walls and garden gates; and you are content to know that
there is beyond them a whole world in wilderness — a world of
secrets which you dare not penetrate; and of suffering which you
dare not conceive.

92. I tell you that this is to me quite the most amazing among
the phenomena of humanity. I am surprised at no depths to which,
when once warped from its honor, that humanity can be degraded.
I do not wonder at the miser's death, with his hands, as they relax,
dropping gold. I do not wonder at the sensualist's life, with the
shroud wrapped about his feet. I do not wonder at the single-handed
murder of a single victim, done by the assassin in the darkness of
the railway, or reed-shadow of the marsh. I do not even wonder at
the myriad-handed murder of multitudes, done boastfully in the
daylight, by the frenzy of nations, and the immeasurable, unimagi-
nable guilt, heaped up from hell to heaven, of their priests and kings.
But this is wonderful to me — oh, how wonderful! — to see the tender

l60 RUSKIN

and delicate woman among you, with her child at her breast, and a
power, if she would wield it, over it, and over its father, purer
than the air of heaven, and stronger than the seas of earth — nay, a
magnitude of blessing which her husband would not part with for
all that earth itself, though it were made of one entire and perfect
chrysolite: — to see her abdicate this majesty to play at precedence
with her next-door neighbor! This is wonderful — oh, wonderful!
— ^to see her, with every innocent feeling fresh within her, go out
in the morning into her garden to play with the fringes of its
guarded flowers, and lift their heads when they are drooping, with
her happy smile upon her face, and no cloud upon her brow, because
there is a little wall around her place of peace: and yet she knows,
in her heart, if she would only look for its knowledge, that, outside
of that little rose-covered wall, the wild grass, to the horizon, is torn
up by the agony of men, and beat level by the drift of their life-
blood.

93. Have you ever considered what a deep under meaning there
lies, or at least may be read, if we choose, in our custom of strewing
flowers before those whom we think most happy ? Do you suppose
it is merely to deceive them into the hope that happiness is always
to fall thus in showers at their feet? — ^that wherever they pass they
will tread on the herbs of sweet scent, and that the rough ground
will be made smooth for them by depth of roses? So surely as
they beUeve that, they will have, instead, to walk on bitter herbs and
thorns; and the only softness to their feet will be of snow. But it
is not thus intended they should believe; there is a better meaning in
that old custom. The path of a good woman is indeed strewn with
flowers: but they rise behind her steps, not before them. "Her feet
have touched the meadows, and left the daisies rosy."

94. You think that only a lover's fancy; — false and vain! How if
it could be true? You think this also, perhaps, only a poet's fancy —

"Even the light harebell raised its head
Elastic from her airy tread."

But it is little to say of a woman, that she only does not destroy
where she passes. She should revive; the harebells should bloom,
not stoop, as she passes. You think I am rushing into wild hyperbole?

lilies: of queens' gardens i6i

Pardon me, not a whit — I mean what I say in calm EngUsh, spoken
in resolute truth. You have heard it said — (and I believe there is
more than fancy even in that saying, but let it pass for a fanciful
one) — that flowers only flourish rightly in the garden of some one
who loves them. I know you would like that to be true; you would
think it a pleasant magic if you could flush your flowers into brighter
bloom by a kind look upon them : nay, more, if your look had the
power, not only to cheer, but to guard; — if you could bid the black
blight turn away and the knotted caterpillar spare — if you could
bid the dew fall upon them in the drought, and say to the south
wind, in frost — ^"Come, thou south, and breathe upon my garden,
that the spices of it may flow out." This you would think a great
thing? And do you think it not a greater thing, that all this (and
how much more than this!) you can do for fairer flowers than these
— flowers that could bless you for having blessed them, and will love
you for having loved them; — flowers that have thoughts like yours,
and lives like yours; which, once saved, you save forever? Is this
only a little power? Far among the moorlands and the rocks, — ^far
in the darkness of the terrible streets, — these feeble florets are lying,
with all their fresh leaves torn, and their stems broken — will you
never go down to them, nor set them in order in their little fragrant
beds, nor fence them in their trembling, from the fierce wind ? Shall
morning follow morning, for you, but not for them; and the dawn
rise to watch, far away, those frantic Dances of Death,' but no dawn
rise to breathe upon these living banks of wild violet, and woodbine,
and rose; nor call to you, through your casement, — call (not giving
you the name of the English poet's lady, but the name of Dante's
great Matilda, who, on the edge of happy Lethe, stood wreathing
flowers with flowers), saying: —

"Come into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, night, has flown,
And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad
And the musk of the roses blown"?

Will you not go down among them ? — among those sweet living
things, whose new courage, sprung from the earth with the deep
color of heaven upon it, is starting up in strength of goodly spire;

' See note, p. 120.

1 62 RUSKIN

and whose purity, washed from the dust, is opening, bud by bud,
into the flower of promise; — and still they turn to you, and for you,
"The Larkspur listens — I hear, I hear! And the Lily whispers — I
wait."

95. Did you notice that I missed two lines when I read you that
first stanza; and think that I had forgotten them? Hear them
now: —

"Come into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, night, has flown.
Come into the garden, Maud,
I am here at the gate, alone."

Who is it, think you, who stands at the gate of this sweeter garden,
alone, waiting for you.? Did you ever hear, not of a Maud, but a
Madeleine, who went down to her garden in the dawn and found
One waiting at the gate, whom she supposed to be the gardener?
Have you not sought Him often; — sought Him in vain, all through
the night; — sought Him in vain at the gate of that old garden
where the fiery sword is set? He is never there; but at the gate
of this garden He is waiting always — waiting to take your hand —
ready to go down to see the fruits of the valley, to see whether the
vine has flourished, and the pomegranate budded. There you shall
see with Him the little tendrils of the vines that His hand is guiding
— there you shall see the pomegranate springing where His hand
cast the sanguine seed; — more: you shall see the troops of the angel
keepers that, with their wings, wave away the hungry birds from
the pathsides where He has sown, and call to each other between
the vineyard rows, "Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil
the vines, for our vines have tender grapes." Oh — you queens — ^you
queens; among the hills and happy greenwood of this land of yours,
shall the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; and
in your cities, shall the stones cry out against you, that they are the
only pillows where the Son of Man can lay His head?

JOHN MILTON

BY
WALTER BAGEHOT

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Walter Bagehot, economist, journalist, and critic, was born at Lang-
port, Somersetshire, February 3, 1826. He was the son of a banker, and
after graduating at University College, London, and being called to the
bar, he joined his father in business. In 1851 he went to Paris, and was
there during the coup d'etat of Louis Napoleon, of which he gave a
vivacious account in letters to an English journal. Soon after his return
he began to contribute his first series of biographical studies to the Pro-
spective Review and the National Review, of which latter he was for
some time joint-editor. From i860 to 1877 he was editor of the Econ-
omist, and during this period he published his notable work on The
English Constitution, his Physics and Politics, and his Lombard
Street: a Description of the Money Market. He died March 24, 1877.

It is chiefly as one of the most brilliant and original of recent writers
on political philosophy that Bagehot is known, but he holds also a dis-
tinct place as a critic of literature. He did not write criticism like a
professional man of letters, and his production in this field is at times
less fine in workmanship than that of some men of much less abiUty.
But, in compensation, he was free from the tendency to the use of a
technical literary dialect and to the excessive self-consciousness in style
which mars so much modern work in this department. He wrote as a
man of affairs with a vigorous mind and a gift of picturesque speech, a
robust taste and a genuine love of letters. He always had something
definite to say, and no one can read his discussion of such a man as Milton
without feeling braced and stimulated by contact with an intellect of
uncommon strength and incisiveness.

JOHN MILTON'

(1859)

THE "Life of Milton," by Professor Masson, is a difficulty
for the critics. It is very laborious, very learned, and in the
main, we believe, very accurate; it is exceedingly long, —
there are 780 pages in this volume, and there are to be two volumes
more; it touches on very many subjects, and each of these has been
investigated to the very best of the author's ability. No one can
wish to speak with censure of a book on which so much genuine
labor has been expended; and yet we are bound, as true critics, to
say that we think it has been composed upon a principle that is
utterly erroneous. In justice to ourselves we must explain our
meaning.

There are two methods on which biography may consistently be
written. The first of these is what we may call the exhaustive
method. Every fact which is known about the hero may be told us;
everything which he did, everything which he would not do, every-
thing which other people did to him, everything which other people
would not do to him, may be narrated at full length. We may
have a complete picture of all the events of his life; of all which
he underwent, and all which he achieved. We may, as Mr. Carlyle
expresses it, have a complete account "of his effect upon the universe,
and of the effect of the universe upon him."^ We admit that
biographies of this species would be very long, and generally very

• "The Life of John Milton, narrated in connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical,
and Literary History of his time." By David Masson, M.A., Professor of English
Literature in University College, London. Cambridge: Macmillan.

"An Account of the Life, Opinions, and Writings of John Milton." By Thomas
Keightley; with an Introduction to "Paradise Lost." London: Chapman & Hall.

"The Poems of Milton," with Notes by Thomas Keightley. London: Chapman &
Hall.

^ Review of Lockhart's "Scott."

Copyright, 1891, by The Travelers Insurance Company.

Copyright, 1899, by The Travelers Insurance Company.

165

1 66 BAGEHOT

tedious; we know that the world could not contain very many of
them: but nevertheless, the principle on which they may be written
is intelligible.

The second method on which the life of a man may be written
is the selective. Instead of telling everything, we may choose what
we will tell. We may select out of the numberless events, from
among the innumerable actions of his life, those events and those
actions which exemplify his true character, which prove to us what
were the true limits of his talents, what was the degree of his
deficiencies, which were his defects, which his vices; in a word, we
may select the traits and the particulars which seem to give us the
best idea of the man as he lived and as he was. On this side the
Flood, as Sydney Smith would have said, we should have fancied
that this was the only practicable principle on which biographies
can be written about persons of whom many details are recorded.
For ancient heroes the exhaustive method is possible: all that can
be known of them is contained in a few short passages of Greek and
Latin, and it is quite possible to say whatever can be said about
every one of these; the result would not be unreasonably bulky,
though it might be dull. But in the case of men who have lived in
the thick of the crowded modern world, no such course is admissible;
overmuch may be said, and we must choose what we will say.
Biographers, however, are rarely bold enough to adopt the selective
method consistently. They have, we suspect, the fear of the critics
before their eyes. They do not like that it should be said that "the
work of the learned gentleman contains serious omissions : the events
of 1562 are not mentioned; those of October, 1579, are narrated but
very cursorily"; and we fear that in any case such remarks will be
made. Very learned people are pleased to show that they know
what is not in the book; sometimes they may hint that perhaps
the author did not know it, or surely he would have mentioned it.
But a biographer who wishes to write what most people of cultiva-
tion will be pleased to read must be courageous enough to face the
pain of such censures. He must choose, as we have explained, the
characteristic parts of his subject: and all that he has to take care of
besides is, so to narrate them that their characteristic elements shall
be shown; to give such an account of the general career as may

MILTON 167

make it clear what these chosen events really were, — to show their
respective bearings to one another; to delineate what is expressive
in such a manner as to make it expressive.

This plan of biography is, however, by no means that of Mr.
Masson: he has no dread of overgrown bulk and overwhelming
copiousness. He finds indeed what we have called the "exhaustive
method" insufficient: he not only wishes to narrate in full the life
of Milton, but to add those of his contemporaries likewise; he seems
to wish to tell us not only what Milton did, but also what every
one else did in Great Britain during his lifetime. He intends his
book to be not

"merely a biography of Milton, but also in some sort a continuous history
of his time. . . . The suggestions of Milton's life have indeed determined
the tracks of these historical researches and expositions, sometimes
through the literature of the period, sometimes through its civil and
ecclesiastical polidcs; but the extent to which I have pursued them, and
the space which I have assigned to them, have been determined by my
desire to present, by their combination, something like a connected his-
torical view of British thought and British society in general prior to the
great Revolution."

We need not do more than observe that this union of heterogeneous
aims must always end, as it has in this case, in the production of a
work at once overgrown and incomplete. A great deal which has
only a slight bearing on the character of Milton is inserted; much
that is necessary to a true history of "British thought and British
society" is of necessity left out. The period of Milton's Ufe which
is included in the published volume makes the absurdity especially
apparent. In middle life Milton was a great controversialist on
contemporary topics; and though it would not be proper for a
biographer to load his pages with a full account of all such con-
troversies, yet some notice of the most characteristic of them would
be expected from him. In this part of Milton's life some reference
to public events would be necessary; and we should not severely
censure a biographer if the great interest of those events induced
him to stray a little from his topic. But the first thirty years of
Milton's life require a very different treatment. He passed those
years in the ordinary musings of a studious and meditative youth;

1 68 BAGEHOT

it was the period of "Lycidas" and "Comus"; he then dreamed the

"Sights which youthful poets dream

"I

On summer eve by haunted stream.'

We do not wish to have this part of his life disturbed, to a greater
extent than may be necessary, with the harshness of pubHc affairs.
Nor is it necessary that it should be so disturbed: a life of poetic
retirement requires but little reference to anything except itself;
in a biography of Mr. Tennyson we should not expect to hear of
the Reform Bill or the Corn Laws. Mr. Masson is, however, of a
different opinion : he thinks it necessary to tell us, not only all which
Milton did, but everything also that he might have heard of.

The biography of Mr. Keightley is on a very different scale: he
tells the story of Milton's career in about half a small volume.
Probably this is a little too concise, and the narrative is somewhat
dry and bare. It is often, however, acute, and is always clear; and
even were its defects greater than they are, we should think it un-
seemly to criticize the last work of one who has performed so many
useful services to literature with extreme severity.

The bare outline of Milton's life is very well known. We have
all heard that he was born in the latter years of King James, just
when Puritanism was collecting its strength for the approaching
struggle; that his father and mother were quiet good people, in-
clined, but not immoderately, to that persuasion; that he went up
to Cambridge early, and had some kind of dissension with the
authorities there; that the course of his youth was in a singular
degree pure and staid; that in boyhood he was a devourer of books,
and that he early became, and always remained, a severely studious
man; that he married and had difficulties of a peculiar character
with his first wife; that he wrote on divorce; that after the death
of his first wife, he married a second time a lady who died very soon,
and a third time a person who survived him more than fifty years;
that he wrote early poems of singular beauty, which we still read;
that he traveled in Italy, and exhibited his learning in the academies
there; that he plunged deep in the theological and political contro-
versies of his time; that he kept a school, — or rather, in our more

S "L'Allegro."

MILTON 169

modern phrase, took pupils; that he was a repubUcan o£ a peculiar
kind, and of "no church," which Dr. Johnson thought dangerous;*
that he was Secretary for Foreign Languages under the Long
Parliament, and retained that office after the coup d'etat of Crom-
well; that he defended the death of Charles L, and became blind
from writing a book in haste upon that subject; that after the
Restoration he was naturally in a position of some danger and much
difficulty; that in the midst of that difficulty he wrote "Paradise
Lost"; that he did not fail in "heart or hope," * but lived for fourteen
years after the destruction of all for which he had labored, in serene
retirement, "though fallen on evil days, though fallen on evil
times," ' — all this we have heard from our boyhood. How much is
wanting to complete the picture — how many traits, both noble and
painful, might be recovered from the past — we shall never know,
till some biographer skilled in interpreting the details of human
nature shall select this subject for his art. All that we can hope to
do in an essay like this is, to throw together some miscellaneous
remarks on the character of the Puritan poet, and on the peculiarities
of his works; and if in any part of them we may seem to make
unusual criticisms, and to be overready with depreciation or objec-
tion, our excuse must be, that we wish to paint a likeness and that
the harsher features of the subject should have a prominence even
in an outline.

There are two kinds of goodness conspicuous in the world, and
often made the subject of contrast there; for which, however, we
seem to want exact words, and which we are obliged to describe
rather vaguely and incompletely. These characters may in one
aspect be called the "sensuous" and the "ascetic." The character of
the first is that which is almost personified in the poet-king of Israel,
whose actions and whose history have been "improved" so often by
various writers that it now seems trite even to allude to them.
Nevertheless, the particular virtues and the particular career of
David seem to embody the idea of what may be called "sensuous
goodness" far more completely than a living being in general comes

< "Life of Milton." ' Sonnet xix.

' "Though fallen on evil days.
On evil days though fallen, and evil tongues."

— "Paradise Lo»t," Book rii.

170 BAGEHOT

near to an abstract idea. There may have been shades in the actual
man which would have modified the resemblance; but in the por-
trait which has been handed down to us, the traits are perfect and
the approximation exact. The principle of this character is its
sensibility to outward stimulus: it is moved by all which occurs,
stirred by all which happens, open to the influences of whatever it
sees, hears, or meets with. The certain consequence of this mental
constitution is a peculiar liability to temptation. Men are, according
to the divine, "put upon their trial through the senses." It is through
the constant suggestions of the outer world that our minds are
stimulated, that our will has the chance of a choice, that moral life
becomes possible. The sensibility to this external stimulus brings
with it, when men have it to excess, an unusual access of moral
difficulty. Everything acts on them, and everything has a chance
of turning them aside; the most tempting things act upon them very
deeply, and their influence, in consequence, is extreme. Naturally,
therefore, the errors of such men are great. We need not point the
moral: —

"Dizzied faith and guilt and woe,
Loftiest aims by earth defiled,
Gleams of wisdom sin-beguiled,
Sated power's tyrannic mood,
Counsels shared with men of blood.
Sad success, parental tears.
And a dreary gift of years." '

But on the other hand, the excellence of such men has a charm, a
kind of sensuous sweetness, that is its own. Being conscious of
frailty, they are tender to the imperfect; being sensitive to this world,
they sympathize with the world; being familiar with all the moral
incidents of life, their goodness has a richness and a complication:
they fascinate their own age, and in their deaths they are "not
divided" from the love of others. Their peculiar sensibility gives
a depth to their religion: it is at once deeper and more human than
that of other men. As their sympathetic knowledge of those whom
they have seen is great, so it is with their knowledge of Him whom
they have not seen; and as is their knowledge, so is their love: it is
' John Henry Newman's "Call of David."

MILTON 171

deep, from their nature; rich and intimate, from the variety of their
experience; chastened by the ever-present sense of their weakness
and of its consequences.

In extreme opposition to this is the ascetic species of goodness.
This is not, as is sometimes beHeved, a self -produced ideal, — a simply
voluntary result of discipline and restraint. Some men have by
nature what others have to elaborate by effort. Some men have a
repulsion from the world. All of us have, in some degree, a pro-
tective instinct; an impulse, that is to say, to start back from what
may trouble us, to shun what may fascinate us, to avoid what may
tempt us. On the moral side of human nature this preventive check
is occasionally imperious: it holds the whole man under its control, —
makes him recoil from the world, be offended at its amusements,
be repelled by its occupations, be scared by its sins. The consequences
of this tendency, when it is thus in excess, upon the character are
very great and very singular. It secludes a man in a sort of natural
monastery; he lives in a kind of moral solitude: and the effects of
his isolation, for good and for evil, on his disposition are very many.
The best result is a singular capacity for meditative religion. Being
aloof from what is earthly, such persons are shut up with what is
spiritual; being unstirred by the incidents of time, they are alone
with the eternal; rejecting this life, they are alone with what is
beyond. According to the measure of their minds, men of this
removed and secluded excellence become eminent for a settled and
brooding piety, for a strong and predominant religion. In human
life, too, in a thousand ways, their isolated excellence is apparent.
They walk through the whole of it with an abstinence from sense,
a zeal of morality, a purity of ideal, which other men have not;
their religion has an imaginative grandeur, and their life something
of an unusual impeccability: and these are obviously singular excel-
lences. But the deficiencies to which the same character tends are
equally singular. In the first place, their isolation gives them a
certain pride in themselves and an inevitable ignorance of others.
They are secluded by their constitutional Sainoiv from life; they are
repelled from the pursuits which others care for; they are alarmed
at the amusements which others enjoy. In consequence, they trust
in their own thoughts; they come to magnify both them and them-

172 BAGEHOT

selves, — for being able to think and to retain them. The greater the
nature of the man, the greater is this temptation. His thoughts are
greater, and in consequence the greater is his tendency to prize them,
the more extreme is his tendency to overrate them. This pride, too,
goes side by side with a want of sympathy. Being aloof from
others, such a mind is unlike others; and it feels, and sometimes
it feels bitterly, its own unlikeness. Generally, however, it is too
wrapped up in its own exalted thoughts to be sensible of the pain
of moral isolation; it stands apart from others, unknowing and
unknown. It is deprived of moral experience in two ways, — it is
not tempted itself, and it does not comprehend the temptations of
others. And this defect of moral experience is almost certain to
produce two effects, one practical and the other speculative. When
such a man is wrong, he will be apt to believe that he is right. If
his own judgment err, he will not have the habit of checking it by
the judgment of others: he will be accustomed to think most men
wrong; differing from them would be no proof of error, agreeing
with them would rather be a basis for suspicion. He may, too, be
very wrong, for the conscience of no man is perfect on all sides.
The strangeness of secluded excellence will be sometimes deeply
shaded by very strange errors. To be commonly above others, still
more to think yourself above others, is to be below them every now
and then, and sometimes much below. Again, on the speculative
side, this defect of moral experience penetrates into the distinguish-
ing excellence of the character, — its brooding and meditative religion.
Those who see life under only one aspect can see religion under
only one likewise. This world is needful to interpret what is be-
yond; the seen must explain the unseen. It is from a tried and a
varied and a troubled moral life that the deepest and truest idea
of God arises. The ascetic character wants these; therefore in its
religion there will be a harshness of outline, — a bareness, so to say, —
as well as a grandeur. In life we may look for a singular purity; but
also, and with equal probability, for singular self-confidence, a cer-
tain unsympathizing straitness, and perhaps a few singular errors.

The character of the ascetic or austere species of goodness is
almost exactly embodied in Milton. Men, indeed, are formed on no
ideal type: human nature has tendencies too various, and circum-

MILTON 173

Stances too complex; all men's characters have sides and aspects
not to be comprehended in a single definition: but in this case, the
extent to which the character of the man, as we find it delineated,
approaches to the moral abstraction which we sketch from theory
is remarkable. The whole being of Milton may, in some sort, be
summed up in the great commandment of the austere character,
"Reverence thyself." We find it expressed in almost every one of
his singular descriptions of himself, — of those striking passages
which are scattered through all his works, and which add to what-
ever interest may intrinsically belong to them one of the rarest
of artistic charms, that of magnanimous autobiography. They have
been quoted a thousand times, but one of them may perhaps be
quoted again: —

"I had my time, readers, as others have, who have good learning be-
stowed upon them, to be sent to those places where, the opinion was, it
might be soonest attained; and as the manner is, was not unstudied in
those authors which are most commended: whereof some were grave
orators and historians, whose matter methought I loved indeed, but as
my age then was, so I understood them; others were the smooth elegiac
poets, whereof the schools are not scarce, whom both for the pleasing
sound of their numerous writing, which in imitation I found most easy
and most agreeable to nature's part in me, and for their matter, which
what it is, there be few who know not, I was so allured to read, that no
recreation came to me better welcome. For that it was then those years
with me which are excused, though they be least severe, I may be saved
the labor to remember ye. Whence having observed them to account it
the chief glory of their wit, in that they were ablest to judge, to praise,
and by that could esteem themselves worthiest to love, those high per-
fections which under one or other name they took to celebrate, I thought
with myself by every instinct and presage of nature, which is not wont
to be false, that what emboldened them to this task might with such
diligence as they used embolden me; and that what judgment, wit, or
elegance was my share would herein best appear, and best value itself, by
how much more wisely and with more love of virtue I should choose (let
rude ears be absent) the object of not unlike praises. For albeit these
thoughts to some will seem virtuous and commendable, to others only
pardonable, to a third sort perhaps idle, yet the mentioning of them now
will end in serious.

"Nor blame it, readers, in those years to propose to themselves such a
reward, as the noblest dispositions above other things in this life have
sometimes preferred: whereof not to be sensible when good and fair in

174 BAGEHOT

one person meet, argues both a gross and shallow judgment, and withal
an ungende and swainish breast. For by the firm settling of these per-
suasions, I became, to my best memory, so much a proficient, that if I
found those authors anywhere speaking unworthy things of themselves, or
unchaste of those names which before they had extolled, this effect it
wrought with me, — ^from that time forward their art I still applauded, but
the men I deplored; and above them all, preferred the two famous re-
nowners of Beatrice and Laura, who never write but honor of them to
whom they devote their verse, displaying sublime and pure thoughts
without transgression. And long it was not after, when I was confirmed
in this opinion, — that he who would not be frustrate of his hope to write
well hereafter in laudable things ought himself to be a true poem; that is,
a composition and pattern of the best and honorablest things: not pre-
suming to sing high praises of heroic men or famous cities, unless he
have in himself the experience and the practice of all that which is
praiseworthy." *

It may be fanciful to add, and we may be laughed at, but we
believe that the self-reverencing propensity was a little aided by his
singular personal beauty. All the describers of his youth concur in
telling us that this was very remarkable. Mr. Masson has the
following account of it: —

"When Milton left Cambridge in July, 1632, he was twenty-three years
and eight months old. In stature, therefore, at least, he was already what-
ever he was to be. 'In stature,' he says himself at a later period, when
driven to speak on the subject, 'I confess I am not tall, but still of what
is nearer to middle height than to little; and what if I were of little, of
which stature have often been very great men both in peace and war —
though why should that be called little which is great enough for virtue?'
('Statura, fateor, non sum procera, sed quae mediocri tamen quam parvae
propior sit; sed quid si parva, qua et summi saepe tum pace turn hello
viri fuere — quanquam parva cur dicitur, quae ad virtutem satis magna
est?') This is precise enough; but we have Aubrey's words to the same
effect. 'He was scarce so tall as I am,' says Aubrey; to which, to make it
more intelligible, he appends the marginal note, — 'Qu. Quot feet I am
Jiigh? Resp. Of middle stature': i.e., Milton was a little under middle
height. 'He had light-brown hair,' continues Aubrey, — putting the word
'abrown' (auburn) in the margin by way of synonym for 'light brown';
— 'his complexion exceeding fair; oval face; his eye a dark gray.' "

We are far from accusing Milton of personal vanity : his character
was too enormous, if we may be allowed so to say, for a fault so

* "Apology for Smectymnuus."

MILTON 175

petty. But a little tinge of excessive self-respect will cling to those
who can admire themselves. Ugly men are and ought to be
ashamed of their existence; Milton was not so.

The peculiarities of the austere type of character stand out in
Milton more remarkably than in other men who partake of it,
because of the extreme strength of his nature. In reading him this
is the first thing that strikes us. We seem to have left the little
world of ordinary writers. The words of some authors are said to
have "hands and feet"; they seem, that is, to have a vigor and
animation which only belong to things which live and move.
Milton's words have not this animal life, — there is no rude energy
about them; but on the other hand, they have or seem to have a
soul, a spirit which other words have not. He was early aware that
what he wrote, "by certain vital signs it had," was such as the world
would not "willingly let die." ' After two centuries we feel the same.
There is a solemn and firm music in the lines; a brooding sublimity
haunts them; the spirit of the great writer moves over the face of
the page. In life there seems to have been the same peculiar strength
that his works suggest to us. His moral tenacity is amazing: he
took his own course, and he kept his own course; and we may trace
in his defects the same characteristics. "Energy and ill temper,"
some say, "are the same thing"; and though this is a strong exag-
geration, yet there is a basis of truth in it. People who labor much
will be cross if they do not obtain that for which they labor; those
who desire vehemently will be vexed if they do not obtain that
which they desire. As is the strength of the impelling tendency, so,
other things being equal, is the pain which it will experience if it
be baffled. Those, too, who are set on what is high will be propor-
tionately offended by the intrusion of what is low. Accordingly,
Milton is described by those who knew him as "a harsh and choleric
man." "He had," we are told, "a gravity in his temper, not melan-
choly, or not till the latter part of his life, not sour, not morose or
ill-natured, but a certain severity of mind; a mind not condescend-
ing to little things";'" and this although his daughter remembered
that he was delightful company, the life of conversation, and that
he was so "on account of a flow of subject, and an unaffected cheer-
' "Reason of Church Government," introduction to Book iii. '" Philips.

176 BAGEHOT

fulness and civility." Doubtless this may have been so when he
was at ease, and at home; but there are unmistakable traces of the
harsher tendency in almost all his works.

Some of the peculiarities of the ascetic character were likewise
augmented by his studious disposition. This began very early in
life, and continued till the end. "My father," he says, "destined me
... to the study of polite literature, which I embraced with such
avidity, that from the twelfth year of my age I hardly ever retired to
rest from my studies till midnight; which was the first source of
injury to my eyes, to the natural weakness of which were added
frequent headaches: all of which not retarding my eagerness after
knowledge, he took care to have me instructed," etc." Every page
of his works shows the result of this education. In spite of the
occupations of manhood, and the blindness and melancholy of old
age, he still continued to have his principal pleasure in that "studious
and select" reading, which, though often curiously transmuted, is
perpetually involved in the very texture of his works. We need
not stay to observe how a habit in itself so austere conduces to the
development of an austere character. Deep study, especially deep
study which haunts and rules the imagination, necessarily removes
men from life, absorbs them in themselves; purifies their conduct,
with some risk of isolating their sympathies; develops that loftiness
of mood which is gifted with deep inspirations and indulged with
great ideas, but which tends in its excess to engender a contempt for
others, and a self-appreciation which is even more displeasing to
them.

These same tendencies were aggravated also by two defects which
are exceedingly rare in great English authors, and which perhaps
Milton alone amongst those of the highest class is in a remarkable
degree chargeable with; we mean a deficiency in humor, and a
deficiency in a knowledge of plain human nature. Probably when,
after the lapse of ages, English literature is looked at in its larger
features only, and in comparison with other literatures which have
preceded or which may follow it, the critics will lay down that its
most striking characteristic as a whole is its involution, so to say,
in life; the degree to which its book life resembles real life; the
" Translated by Keighdey from "Defensio Secunda."

MILTON 177

extent to which the motives, dispositions and actions of common
busy persons are represented in a medium which would seem Hkely
to give us pecuUarly the ideas of secluded and the tendencies of
meditative men. It is but an aspect of this fact, that English litera-
ture abounds — some critics will say abounds excessively — with
humor. This is in some sense the imaginative element of ordinary
life, — the relieving charm, partaking at once of contrast and simili-
tude, which gives a human and an intellectual interest to the world
of clowns and cottages, of fields and farmers. The degree to which
Milton is deficient in this element is conspicuous in every page
of his writings where its occurrence could be looked for; and if we
do not always look for it, this is because the subjects of his most
remarkable works are on a removed elevation, where ordinary life,
the world of "cakes and ale," is never thought of and never expected.
It is in his dramas, as we should expect, that Milton shows this
deficiency the most. "Citizens" never talk in his pages, as they do
in Shakespeare. We feel instinctively that Milton's eye had never
rested with the same easy pleasure on the easy, ordinary, shopkeeping
world. Perhaps, such is the complication of art, it is on the most
tragic occasions that we feel this want the most.

It may seem an odd theory, and yet we believe it to be a true
principle, that catastrophes require a comic element. We appear to
feel the same principle in life. We may read solemn descriptions
of great events in history, — say of Lord Strafford's trial, and of his
marvelous speech, and his appeal to his "saint in heaven"; but we
comprehend the whole transaction much better when we learn
from Mr. Baillie, the eyewitness, that people ate nuts and apples,
and talked, and laughed, and betted on the great question of
acquittal and condemnation. Nor is it difficult to understand why
this should be so. It seems to be a law of the imagination, at least
in most men, that it will not bear concentration. It is essentially a
glancing faculty. It goes and comes, and comes and goes, and we
hardly know whence or why. But we most of us know that when
we try to fix it, in a moment it passes away. Accordingly, the proper
procedure of art is to let it go in such a manner as to ensure its
coming back again. The force of artistic contrasts effects exactly
this result: skillfully disposed opposites suggest the notion of each

178 BAGEHOT

other. We realize more perfectly and easily the great idea, the
tragic conception, when we are familiarized with its effects on the
minds of Uttle people, with the petty consequences which it causes
as well as with the enormous forces from which it comes. The
catastrophe of Samson Agonistes discloses Milton's imperfect mastery
of this element of effect. If ever there was an occasion which ad-
mitted its perfect employment, it was this. The kind of catastrophe
is exactly that which is sure to strike, and strike forcibly, the minds
of common persons. If their observations on the occasion were really
given to us, we could scarcely avoid something rather comic. The
eccentricity, so to speak, of ordinary persons shows itself peculiarly
at such times, and they say the queerest things. Shakespeare has
exemplified this principle most skillfully on various occasions: it is
the sort of art which is just in his way. His imagination always
seems to be floating between the contrasts of things; and if his
mind had a resting-place that it liked, it was this ordinary view of
extraordinary events. Milton was under the great[est] obligation
to use this relieving principle of art in the catastrophe of Samson,
because he has made every effort to heighten the strictly tragic
element, which requires that relief. His art, always serious, was
never more serious. His Samson is not the incarnation of physical
strength which the popular fancy embodies in the character; nor
is it the simple and romantic character of the Old Testament. On
the contrary, Samson has become a Puritan: the observations he
makes would have done much credit to a religious pikeman in
Cromwell's army. In consequence, his death requires some light-
ening touches to make it a properly artistic event. The pomp of
seriousness becomes too oppressive.

"At length for intermission sake they led him
Between the pillars; he his guide requested
(For so from such as nearer stood we heard).
As overtired, to let him lean awhile
With both his arms on those two massy pillars
That to the archM roof gave main support.
He unsuspicious led him; which when Samson
Felt in his arms, with head awhile inclined,
And eyes fast fixed, he stood, as one who prayed,
Or some great matter in his mind revolved;

MILTON .179

At last with head erect thus cried aloud:

'Hitherto, lords, what your commands imposed

I have performed, as reason was, obeying.

Not without wonder or delight beheld;

Now of my own accord such other trial

I mean to show you of my strength, yet greater,

As with amaze shall strike all who behold.'

This uttered, straining all his nerves he bowed,

As with the force of winds and waters pent

When mountains tremble, those two massy pillars

With horrible convulsion to and fro.

He tugged, he shook, till down they came, and drew

The whole roof after them, with burst of thunder.

Upon the heads of all who sat beneath, —

Lords, ladies, captains, counselors, or priests,

Their choice nobility and flower, not only

Of this, but each Philistian city round,

Met from all parts to solemnize this feast.

Samson with these immixed, inevitably

Pulled down the same destruction on himself;

The vulgar only 'scaped who stood without.

Chor. O dearly bought revenge, yet glorious!
Living or dying thou hast fulfilled

The work for which thou wast foretold
To Israel, and now liest victorious
Among thy slain self-killed.

Not willingly, but tangled in the fold
Of dire necessity, whose law in death conjoined
Thee with thy slaughtered foes, in number more
Than all thy life had slain before."

This is grave and fine; but Shakespeare would have done it differ-
ently and better.

We need not pause to observe how certainly this deficiency in
humor and in the delineation of ordinary human feeling is con-
nected with a recluse, a solitary, and to some extent an unsympathiz-
ing life. If we combine a certain natural aloofness from common
men with literary habits and an incessantly studious musing, we
shall at once see how powerful a force is brought to bear on an
instinctively austere character, and how sure it will be to develop
the peculiar tendencies of it, both good and evil. It was to no pur-
pose that Milton seems to have practised a sort of professional study

l80 BAGEHOT

of life. No man could rank more highly the importance to a poet
of an intellectual insight into all-important pursuits and "seemly
arts." But it is not by the mere intellect that we can take in the
daily occupations of mankind: we must sympathize with them,
and see them in their human relations. A chimney-sweeper, qud
chimney-sweeper, is not very sentimental: it is in himself that he
is so interesting.

Milton's austere character is in some sort the more evident be-
cause he possessed in large measure a certain relieving element, in
which those who are eminent in that character are very deficient.
Generally such persons have but obtuse senses: we are prone to
attribute the purity of their conduct to the dullness of their sensa-
tions. Milton had no such obtuseness: he had every opportunity
for knowing the "world of eye and ear";" you cannot open his
works without seeing how much he did know of it. The austerity
of his nature was not caused by the deficiency of his senses, but by
an excess of the warning instinct. Even when he professed to deline-
ate the world of sensuous delight, this instinct shows itself. Dr.
Johnson thought he could discern melancholy in "L'Allegro";" if
he had said solitariness, it would have been correct.

The peculiar nature of Milton's character is very conspicuous in
the events of his domestic Hfe, and in the views which he took of
the great public revolutions of his age. We can spare only a very
brief space for the examination of either of these; but we will
endeavor to say a few words upon each of them.

The circumstances of Milton's first marriage are as singular as
any in the strange series of the loves of the poets. The scene opens
with an affair of business. Milton's father, as is well known, was
a scrivener, — a kind of professional money-lender, then well known
in London; and having been early connected with the vicinity of
Oxford, continued afterwards to have pecuniary transactions of a
certain nature with country gentlemen of that neighborhood. In
the course of these he advanced X500 to a certain Mr. Richard
Powell, a squire of fair landed estate, residing at Forest Hill, which
is about four miles from the city of Oxford. The money was lent
on the nth of June, 1627; and a few months afterwards Mr. Milton
12 Wordsworth, "Tintern Abbey." ''"Life of Milton."

MILTON l8l

the elder gave £,2,1:1. of it to his son the poet, who was then a youth
at college, and made a formal memorandum of the same in the
form then usual, which still exists. The debt was never wholly
discharged; "for in 1 650-1 we find Milton asserting on oath that
he had received only about ;^i8o, 'in part satisfaction of my said
just and principal debt, with damages for the same, and my costs
of suit.' " Mr. Keightley supposes him to have taken "many a ride
over to Forest Hill" after he left Cambridge and was living at
Horton, which is not very far distant; but of course this is only
conjecture. We only know that about 1643 "he took," as his nephew
relates, "a journey into the country, nobody about him certainly
knowing the reason, or that it was any more than a journey of
recreation. After a month's stay, home he returns a married man,
that went out a bachelor; his wife being Mary, the eldest daughter
of Mr. Richard Powell, then a justice of the peace" for the county
of Oxford. The suddenness of the event is rather striking; but
Philips was at the time one of Milton's pupils, and it is possible
that some pains may have been taken to conceal the love affair from
the "young gentlemen." Still, as Philips was Milton's nephew, he
was likely to hear such intelligence tolerably early; and as he does
not seem to have done so, the denouement was probably rather
prompt. At any rate, he was certainly married at that time, and
took his bride home to his house in Aldersgate Street; and there
was feasting and gayety according to the usual custom of such
events. A few weeks after, the lady went home to her friends, in
which there was of course nothing remarkable; but it is singular
that when the natural limit of her visit at home was come, she
absolutely refused to return to her husband. The grounds of so
strange a resolution are very difficult to ascertain. Political feeling
ran very high; old Mr. Powell adhered to the side of the king, and
Milton to that of the Parliament: and this might be fancied to have
caused an estrangement. But on the other hand, these circumstances
must have been well known three months before. Nothing had
happened in that quarter of a year to change very materially the
position of the two parties in the state. Some other cause for Mrs.
Milton's conduct must be looked for. She herself is said to have
stated that she did not Uke her husband's "spare diet and hard

1 82 BAGEHOT

Study."" No doubt, too, she found it dull in London: she had
probably always lived in the country, and must have been quite
unaccustomed to the not very pleasant scene in which she found
herself. Still, many young ladies have married schoolmasters, and
many young ladies have gone from Oxfordshire to London; and
nevertheless, no such dissolution of matrimonial harmony is known
to have occurred.

The fact we believe to be, that the bride took a dislike to her
husband. We cannot but have a suspicion that she did not like
him before marriage, and that pecuniary reasons had their influence.
If, however, Mr. Powell exerted his paternal influence, it may be
admitted that he had unusual considerations to advance in favor
of the alliance he proposed. It is not every father whose creditors
are handsome young gentlemen with fair incomes. Perhaps it
seemed no extreme tyranny to press the young lady a little to do
that which some others might have done without pressing. Still
all this is but hypothesis: our evidence as to the love affairs of the
time of King Charles I. is but meager. But whatever the feelings
of Miss Powell may have been, those of Mrs. Milton are exceedingly
certain. She would not return to her husband; she did not answer
his letters; and a messenger whom he sent to bring her back was
handled rather roughly. Unquestionably she was deeply to blame,
by far the most to blame of the two. Whatever may be alleged
against him is as nothing compared with her offense in leaving
him. To defend so startling a course, we must adopt views of
divorce even more extreme than those which Milton was himself
driven to inculcate; and whatever Mrs. Milton's practice may have
been, it may be fairly conjectured that her principles were strictly
orthodox. Yet if she could be examined by a commission to the
ghosts, she would probably have some palliating circumstances to
allege in mitigation of judgment. There were perhaps peculiarities
in Milton's character which a young lady might not improperly
dishke. The austere and ascetic character is of course far less agree-
able to women than the sensuous and susceptible. The self-occupa-
tion, the pride, the abstraction of the former are to the female mind

"Philips.

MILTON 183

disagreeable; studious habits and unusual self-denial seem to it
purpejseless; lofty enthusiasm, public spirit, the solitary pursuit of
an elevated ideal, are quite out of its way: they rest too little on
the visible world to be intelligible, they are too little suggested by
the daily occurrences of life to seem possible. The poet in search
of an imaginary phantom has never been successful with women, —
there are innumerable proofs of that; and the ascetic moralist is
even less interesting. A character combined out of the two — and
this to some extent was Milton's — is singularly likely to meet with
painful failure; with a failure the more painful, that it could never
anticipate or explain it. Possibly he was absorbed in an austere
self-conscious excellence: it may never have occurred to him that
a lady might prefer the trivial detail of daily happiness.

Milton's own view of the matter he has explained to us in his
book on divorce; and it is a very odd one. His complaint was that
his wife would not talk. What he wished in marriage was "an
intimate and speaking help" : he encountered "a mute and spiritless
mate." One of his principal incitements to the "pious necessity of
divorcing" was an unusual deficiency in household conversation.
A certain loquacity in their wives has been the complaint of various
eminent men; but his domestic affliction was a different one. The
"ready and reviving associate," whom he had hoped to find, appeared
to be a "coinhabiting mischief," who was sullen, and perhaps seemed
bored and tired. And at times he is disposed to cast the blame of
his misfortune on the uninstructive nature of youthful virtue. The
"soberest and best-governed men," he says, "are least practised in
these affairs," are not very well aware that "the bashful muteness"
of a young lady "may ofttimes hide all the unliveliness and natural
sloth which is really unfit for conversation," and are rather in too
great haste to "light the nuptial torch": whereas those "who have
lived most loosely, by reason of their bold accustoming, prove most
successful in their matches; because their wild affections, unsettling
at will, have been as so many divorces to teach them experience."
And he rather wishes to infer that the virtuous man should, in
case of mischance, have his resource of divorce likewise.

In truth, Milton's book on divorce — though only containing prin-

184 BAGEHOT

ciples which he continued to beHeve long after he had any personal
reasons for wishing to do so — was clearly suggested at first by the
unusual phenomena of his first marriage. His wife began by not
speaking to him, and finished by running away from him. Accord-
ingly, like most books which spring out of personal circumstances,
his treatises on this subject have a frankness and a mastery of detail
which others on the same topic sometimes want. He is remark-
ably free from one peculiarity of modern writers on such matters.
Several considerate gentlemen are extremely anxious for the "rights
of women"; they think that women will benefit by removing the
bulwarks which the misguided experience of ages has erected for
their protection. A migratory system of domestic existence might
suit Madame Dudevant, and a few cases of singular exception; but
we cannot fancy that it would be, after all, so much to the taste
of most ladies as the present more permanent system. We have
some reminiscence of the stories of the wolf and the lamb, when
we hear amiable men addressing a female auditory (in books, of
course) on the advantages of a freer "development." We are
perhaps wrong, but we cherish an indistinct suspicion that an
indefinite extension of the power of selection would rather tend to
the advantage of the sex which more usually chooses. But we have
no occasion to avow such opinions now. Milton had no such modern
views : he is frankly and honestly anxious for the rights of the man.
Of the doctrine that divorce is only permitted for the help of wives,
he exclaims, "Palpably uxorious! who can be ignorant that woman
was created for man, and not man for woman? . . . What an
injury is it after wedlock not to be beloved! what to be slighted!
what to be contended with in point of house-rule who shall be the
head; not for any parity of wisdom, for that were something rea-
sonable, but out of female pride! 'I suffer not,' saith St. Paul, 'the
woman to usurp authority over the man.' If the Apostle could not
suffer it," he naturally remarks, "into what mold is he mortified
that can?" He had a sincere desire to preserve men from the society
of unsocial and unsympathizing women; and that was his principal
idea.

His theory, to a certain extent, partakes of the same notion. The
following passage contains a perspicuous exposition of it: —

MILTON 185

"Moses, Deut. xxiv. i, established a grave and prudent law, full of
moral equity, full of due consideration towards nature, that cannot be
resisted, a law consenting with the wisest men and civilest nations: that
when a man hath married a wife, if it come to pass that he cannot love
her by reason of some displeasing natural quality or unfitness in her, let
him write her a bill of divorce. The intent of which law undoubtedly
was this: that if any good and peaceable man should discover some help-
less disagreement or dislike, either of mind or body, whereby he could not
cheerfully perform the duty of a husband without the perpetual dis-
sembling of offense and disturbance to his spirit, — rather than to live
uncomfortably and unhappily both to himself and to his wife, rather than
to continue undertaking a duty which he could not possibly discharge, he
might dismiss her whom he could not tolerably, and so not conscionably
retain. And this law the Spirit of God by the mouth of Solomon, Prov.
XXX. 21, 23, testifies to be a good and a necessary law, by granting it that
'a hated woman' (for so the Hebrew word signifies, rather than 'odious,'
though it come all to one), — that 'a hated woman, when she is married,
is a thing that the earth cannot bear.' "

And he complains that the civil law of modern states interferes with
the "domestical prerogative of the husband."

His notion would seem to have been that a husband was bound
not to dismiss his wife, except for a reason really sufficient; such as
a thoroughly incompatible temper, an incorrigible "muteness," and
a desertion like that of Mrs. Milton. But he scarcely liked to admit
that in the use of this power he should be subject to the correction of
human tribunals. He thought that the circumstances of each case
depended upon "utterless facts"; and that it was practically impos-
sible for a civil court to decide on a subject so delicate in its essence,
and so imperceptible in its data. But though amiable men doubtless
suffer much from the deficiencies of their wives, we should hardly
like to entrust them, in their own cases, with a jurisdiction so prompt
and summary.

We are far from being concerned, however, just now, with the
doctrine of divorce on its intrinsic merits: we were only intending
to give such an account of Milton's opinions upon it as might serve
to illustrate his character. We think we have shown that it is pos-
sible there may have been, in his domestic relations, a little over-
weening pride; a tendency to overrate the true extent of masculine
rights, and to dwell on his wife's duty to be social towards him

1 86 BAGEHOT

rather than on his duty to be social towards her, — to be rather sullen
whenever she was not quite cheerful. Still, we are not defending a
lady for leaving her husband for defects of such inferior magnitude.
Few households would be kept together, if the right of transition
were exercised on such trifling occasions. We are but suggesting
that she may share the excuse which our great satirist has suggested
for another unreliable lady: "My mother was an angel; but angels
are not always commodes d vivre!'

This is not a pleasant part of our subject, and we must leave it. It
is more agreeable to relate that on no occasion of his life was the
substantial excellence of Milton's character more conclusively shown
than in his conduct at the last stage of this curious transaction. After
a very considerable interval, and after the publication of his book on
divorce, Mrs. Milton showed a disposition to return to her husband;
and in spite of his theories, he received her with open arms. With
great Christian patience, he received her relations too. The Parlia-
mentary party was then victorious; and old Mr. Powell, who had
suffered very much in the cause of the king, lived until his death
untroubled, and "wholly to his devotion," as we are informed, in
the house of his son-in-law.

Of the other occurrences of Milton's domestic life we have left
ourselves no room to speak; we must turn to our second source of
illustration for his character, — his opinions on the great public events
of his time. It may seem odd, but we believe that a man of austere
character naturally tends both to an excessive party spirit and to an
extreme isolation. Of course the circumstances which develop the
one must be different from those which are necessary to call out the
other: party spirit requires companionship; isolation, if we may be
pardoned so original a remark, excludes it. But though, as we have
shown, this species of character is prone to mental solitude, tends to
an intellectual isolation where it is possible and as soon as it can, yet
when invincible circumstances throw it into mental companionship,
when it is driven into earnest association with earnest men on inter-
esting topics, its zeal becomes excessive. Such a man's mind is at
home only with its own enthusiasm; it is cooped up within the
narrow limits of its own ideas, and it can make no allowance for
those who differ from or oppose them. We may see something of

MILTON 187

this excessive party zeal in Burke. No one's reasons are more philo-
sophical; yet no one who acted with a party went farther in aid of
it or was more violent in support of it. He forgot what could be
said for the tenets of the enemy; his imagination made that enemy
an abstract incarnation of his tenets. A man, too, who knows that
he formed his opinions originally by a genuine and intellectual
process is but little aware of the undue energy those ideas may
obtain from the concurrence of those around. Persons who first
acquired their ideas at second hand are more open to a knowledge
of their own weakness, and better acquainted with the strange force
which there is in the sympathy of others. The isolated mind, when
it acts with the popular feeling, is apt to exaggerate that feeling for
the most part by an almost inevitable consequence of the feelings
which render it isolated. Milton is an example of this remark. In
the commencement of the struggle between Charles I. and the
Parliament, he sympathized strongly with the popular movement,
and carried to what seems now a strange extreme his partisanship.
No one could imagine that the first literary Englishman of his time
could write the following passage on Charles I.: —

"Who can with patience hear this filthy, rascally fool speak so irrev-
erently of persons eminent both in greatness and piety? Dare you com-
pare King David with King Charles: a most religious king and prophet
with a superstitious prince, and who was but a novice in the Christian
religion; a most prudent, wise prince with a weak one; a valiant prince
with a cowardly one; finally, a most just prince with a most unjust one?
Have you the impudence to commend his chastity and sobriety, who is
known to have committed all manner of lewdness in company with his
confidant the Duke of Buckingham? It were to no purpose to inquire
into the private actions of his life, who publicly at plays would embrace
and kiss the ladies." ""

Whatever may be the faults of that ill-fated monarch, — and they
assuredly were not small, — no one would now think this absurd
invective to be even an excusable exaggeration. It misses the true
mark altogether, and is the expression of a strongly imaginative
mind, which has seen something that it did not like, and is unable
in consequence to see anything that has any relation to it distinctly
or correctly. But with the supremacy of the Long Parliament Mil-
15 "Defense of the People of England." Chap. iv.

1 88 BAGEHOT

ton's attachment to their cause ceased. No one has drawn a more
unfavorable picture of the rule which they established. Years after
their supremacy had passed away, and the restoration of the mon-
archy had covered with a new and strange scene the old actors and
the old world, he thrust into a most unlikely part of his "History of
England" [Book iii.] the following attack on them: —

"But when once the superficial zeal and popular fumes that acted their
New Magistracy were cooled and spent in them, straight every one betook
himself (setting the Commonwealth behind, his private ends before) to
do as his own profit or ambition led him. Then was justice delayed, and
soon after denied; spite and favor determined all: hence faction, thence
treachery, both at home and in the field; everywhere wrong and oppres-
sion; foul and horrid deeds committed daily, or maintained, in secret or
in open. Some who had been called from shops and warehouses, with-
out other merit, to sit in supreme councils and committees (as their
breeding was), fell to huckster the Commonwealth. Others did there-
after as men could soothe and humor them best; so he who would give
most, or under covert of hypocritical zeal insinuate basest, enjoyed un-
worthily the rewards of learning and fidelity, or escaped the punishment
of his crimes and misdeeds. Their votes and ordinances, which men
looked should have contained the repealing of bad laws, and the imme-
diate constitution of better, resounded with nothing else but new imposi-
tions, taxes, excises, — yearly, monthly, weekly; not to reckon the offices,
gifts, and preferments bestowed and shared among themselves."

His dislike of this system of committees, and of the generally dull
and unemphatic administration of the Commonwealth, attached
him to the Puritan army and to Cromwell; but in the continuation
of the passage we have referred to, he expresses — with something, let
it be said, of a schoolmaster feeling — an unfavorable judgment on
their career : —

"For Britain, to speak a truth not often spoken, as it is a land fruitful
enough of men stout and courageous in war, so it is naturally not over-
fertile of men able to govern justly and prudently in peace, trusting only
in their mother-wit; who consider not justly that civility, prudence, love
of the public good more than of money or vain honor, are to this soil in
a manner outlandish, — grow not here, but in minds well implanted with
solid and elaborate breeding; too impolitic else and rude, if not head-
strong and intractable to the industry and virtue either of executing or
understanding true civil government. Valiant indeed, and prosperous to
win a field; but to know the end and reason of winning, unjudicious and
unwise: in good or bad success, alike unreachable. For the sun, which

MILTON 189

we want, ripens wits as well as fruits; and as wine and oil are imported
to us from abroad, so must ripe understanding and many civil virtues be
imported into our minds from foreign writings and examples of best
ages; we shall else miscarry still, and come short in the attempts of any
great enterprise. Hence did theif victories prove as fruitless as their
losses dangerous, and left them still, conquering, under the same griev-
ances that men suffer conquered: which was indeed unlikely to go other-
wise, unless men more than vulgar — bred up, as few of them were, in
the knowledge of ancient and illustrious deeds, invincible against many
and vain titles, impartial to friendships and relations — had conducted
their affairs; but then, from the chapman to the retailer, many whose
ignorance was more audacious than the rest were admitted with all their
sordid rudiments to bear no mean sway among them, both in church and
state."

We need not speak of Milton's disapprobation of the Restoration.
Between him and the world of Charles II. the opposition was inevi-
table and infinite. Therefore the general fact remains, that except in
the early struggles, when he exaggerated the popular feeling, he
remained solitary in opinion, and had very little sympathy with any
of the prevailing parties of his time.

Milton's own theory of government is to be learned from his
works. He advocated a free commonwealth, without rule of a single
person or House of Lords; but the form of his projected common-
wealth was peculiar. He thought that a certain perpetual council,
which should be elected by the nation once for all, and the number
of which should be filled up as vacancies might occur, was the best
possible machine of government. He did not confine his advocacy
to abstract theory, but proposed the immediate establishment of
such a council in this country. We need not go into an elaborate
discussion to show the errors of this conclusion. Hardly any one,
then or since, has probably adopted it. The interest of the theoretical
parts of Milton's political works is entirely historical. The tenets
advocated are not of great value, and the arguments by which he
supports them are perhaps of less; but their relation to the times in
which they were written gives them a very singular interest. The
time of the Commonwealth was the only period in English history
in which the fundamental questions of government have been
thrown open for popular discussion in this country. We read in
French literature discussions on the advisability of establishing a

190 BAGEHOT

monarchy, on the advisability of establishing a republic, on the
advisability of establishing an empire; and before we proceed to
examine the arguments, we cannot help being struck at the strange
contrast which this multiplicity of open questions presents to our
own uninquiring acquiescence in the hereditary polity which has
descended to us. "Kings, Lords, and Commons" are, we think,
ordinances of nature. Yet Milton's political writings embody the
reflections of a period when, for a few years, the government of
England was nearly as much a subject of fundamental discussion as
that of France was in 1851. An "invitation to thinkers," to borrow
the phrase of Necker, was given by the circumstances of the time;
and with the habitual facility of philosophical speculation, it was
accepted, and used to the utmost.

Such are not the kind of speculations in which we expect assistance
from Milton. It is not in its transactions with others, in its dealings
with the manifold world, that the isolated and austere mind shows
itself to the most advantage. Its strength lies in itself. It has "a calm
and pleasing solitariness." It hears thoughts which others cannot
hear. It enjoys the quiet and still air of delightful studies; and is
ever conscious of such musing and poetry "as is not to be obtained
by the invocation of Dame Memory and her twin daughters, but by
devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit, who can enrich with all utter-
ance and knowledge, and sends out his seraphim with the hallowed
fire of his altar."

"Descend from heaven, Urania, by that name
If rightly thou art called, whose voice divine
Following, above th' Olympian hill I soar,
Above the flight of Pegasean wing.
The meaning, not the name, I call; for thou
Nor of the Muses nine, nor on the top
Of old Olympus dwell'st, but heavenly born:
Before the hills appeared, or fountain flowed,
Thou with eternal Wisdom didst converse.
Wisdom thy sister, and with her didst play
In presence of th' Almighty Father, pleased
With thy celestial song. Up led by thee,
Into the heaven of heavens I have presumed,
An earthly guest, and drawn empyreal air.
Thy tempering. With like safety guided down,

MILTON 191

Return me to my native element;
Lest from this flying steed unreined (as once
Bellerophon, though from a lower clime),
Dismounted, on th' Aleian field I fall,
Erroneous there to wander, and forlorn.
Half yet remains unsung, but narrower bound
Within the visible diurnal sphere:
Standing on earth, not rapt above the pole,
More safe I sing with mortal voice, unchanged
To hoarse or mute, though fallen on evil days,
On evil days though fallen, and evil tongues;
In darkness, and vi'ith dangers compassed round.
And solitude: yet not alone, while thou
Visit'st my slumbers nightly, or when morn
Purples the east. Still govern thou my song,
Urania, and fit audience find, though few;
But drive far off the barbarous dissonance
Of Bacchus and his revelers, the race
Of that wild rout that tore the Thracian bard
In Rhodope, where woods and rocks had ears
To rapture, till the savage clamor drowned
Both harp and voice, nor could the Muse defend
Her son. So fail not thou, who thee implores;
For thou art heavenly, she an empty dream." '^

"An ancient clergyman of Dorsetshire, Dr. Wright, found John
Milton in a small chamber hung with rusty green, sitting in an
elbow-chair, and dressed neatly in black; pale, but not cadaverous.
. . . He used also to sit in a gray coarse-cloth coat at the door of his
house near Bunhill Fields, in warm, sunny weather";" arid the
common people said he was inspired.

If from the man we turn to his works, we are struck at once with
two singular contrasts. The first of them is this: — The distinction
between ancient and modern art is sometimes said, and perhaps
truly, to consist in the simple bareness of the imaginative concep-
tions which we find in ancient art, and the comparatively complex
clothing in which all modern creations are embodied. If we adopt
this distinction, Milton seems in some sort ancient, and in some sort
modern. Nothing is so simple as the subject-matter of his works.
The two greatest of his creations, the character of Satan and the
■6 "Paradise Lost," Book vii '' Richardson.

192 BAGEHOT

character of Eve, are two of the simplest — the latter probably the
very simplest — in the whole field of literature. On this side Milton's
art is classical. On the other hand, in no writer is the imagery more
profuse, the illustrations more various, the dress altogether more
splendid; and in this respect the style of his art seems romantic and
modern. In real truth, however, it is only ancient art in a modern
disguise: the dress is a mere dress, and can be stripped off when we
will, — we all of us do perhaps in memory strip it off for ourselves.
Notwithstanding the lavish adornments with which her image is
presented, the character of Eve is still the simplest sort of feminine
essence, — the pure embodiment of that inner nature which we believe
and hope that women have. The character of Satan, though it is
not so easily described, has nearly as few elements in it. The most
purely modern conceptions will not bear to be unclothed in this
manner: their romantic garment clings inseparably to them. Hamlet
and Lear are not to be thought of except as complex characters, with
very involved and complicated embodiments. They are as difficult
to draw out in words as the common characters of life are: that of
Hamlet, perhaps, is more so. If we make it, as perhaps we should,
the characteristic of modern and romantic art that it presents us with
creations which we cannot think of or delineate except as very varied
and, so to say, circumstantial, we must not rank Milton among the
masters of romantic art. And without involving the subject in the
troubled sea of an old controversy, we may say that the most striking
of the poetical peculiarities of Milton is the bare simplicity of his
ideas and the rich abundance of his illustrations.

Another of his peculiarities is equally striking. There seems to be
such a thing as second-hand poetry : some poets, musing on the poetry
of other men, have unconsciously shaped it into something of their
own. The new conception is like the original, it would never proba-
bly have existed had not the original existed previously : still, it is suf-
ficiently different from the original to be a new thing, not a copy or a
plagiarism; it is a creation, though, so to say, a suggested creation.

Gray is as good an example as can be found of a poet whose works
abound in this species of semi-original conceptions. Industrious
critics track his best lines back, and find others like them which
doubtless lingered near his fancy while he was writing them. The

MILTON 193

same critics have been equally busy with the works of Milton, and
equally successful. They find traces of his reading in half his works;
not, which any reader could do, in overt similes and distinct illustra-
tions, but also in the very texture of the thought and the expression.
In many cases, doubtless, they discover more than he himself knew.
A mind like his, which has an immense store of imaginative recollec-
tions, can never know which of his own imaginations is exactly
suggested by which recollection. Men awake with their best ideas;
it is seldom worth while to investigate very curiously whence they
came. Our proper business is to adapt and mold and act upon them.
Of poets perhaps this is true even more remarkably than of other
men: their ideas are suggested in modes, and according to laws,
which are even more impossible to specify than the ideas of the rest
of the world. Second-hand poetry, so to say, often seems quite
original to the poet himself; he frequently does not know that he
derived it from an old memory: years afterwards it may strike him
as it does others. Still, in general, such inferior species of creation
is not so likely to be found in minds of singular originality as in
those of less. A brooding, placid, cultivated mind, like that of Gray,
is the place where we should expect to meet with it. Great originality
disturbs the adaptive process, removes the mind of the poet from the
thoughts of other men, and occupies it with its own heated and flash-
ing thoughts. Poetry of the second degree is like the secondary
rocks of modern geology, — a still, gentle, alluvial formation; the
igneous glow of primary genius brings forth ideas like the primeval
granite, simple, astounding, and alone. Milton's case is an exception
to this rule. His mind has marked originality, probably as much of
it as any in literature; but it has as much of molded recollection as
any mind, too. His poetry in consequence is like an artificial park,
green and soft and beautiful, yet with outlines bold, distinct, and
firm, and the eternal rock ever jutting out; or, better still, it is like
our own Lake scenery, where nature has herself the same combina-
tion, where we have Rydal Water side by side with the everlasting
upheaved mountain. Milton has the same union of softened beauty
with unimpaired grandeur; and it is his peculiarity.

These are the two contrasts which puzzle us at first in Milton, and
which distinguish him from other poets in our remembrance after-

194 BAGEHOT

wards. We have a superficial complexity in illustration. and imagery
and metaphor; and in contrast with it we observe a latent simplicity
of idea, an almost rude strength of conception. The underlying
thoughts are few, though the flowers on the surface are so many.
We have likewise the perpetual contrast of the soft poetry of the
memory, and the firm^as it were, fused — and glowing poetry of
the imagination. His words, we may half fancifully say, are like
his character: there is the same austerity in the real essence, the same
exquisiteness of sense, the same delicacy of form which we know that
he had, the same music which we imagine there was in his voice. In
both his character and his poetry there was an ascetic nature in a
sheath of beauty.

No book, perhaps, which has ever been written is more difficult to
criticize than "Paradise Lost." The only way to criticize a work of
the imagination is, to describe its effect upon the mind of the reader,
—at any rate, of the critic; and this can only be adequately delineated
by strong illustrations, apt similes, and perhaps a little exaggeration.
The task is in its very nature not an easy one: the poet paints a pic-
ture on the fancy of the critic, and the critic has in some sort to copy
it on the paper; he must say what it is before he can make remarks
upon it. But in the case of "Paradise Lost" we hardly like to use
illustrations. The subject is one which the imagination rather shrinks
from. At any rate, it requires courage and an effort to compel the
mind to view such a subject as distinctly and vividly as it views other
subjects. Another peculiarity of "Paradise Lost" makes the difficulty
even greater. It does not profess to be a mere work of art; or rather,
it claims to be by no means that and that only. It starts with a
dogmatic aim: it avowedly intends to

"assert eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men."

In this point of view we have always had a sympathy with the Cam-
bridge mathematician who has been so much abused. He said,
"After all, 'Paradise Lost' proves nothing"; and various persons of
poetical tastes and temperament have been very severe on the prosaic
observation. Yet, "after all," he was right : Milton professed to prove
something; he was too profound a critic — rather, he had too pro-

MILTON" 195

found an instinct of those eternal principles of art which criticism
tries to state — not to know that on such a subject he must prove
something. He professed to deal with the great problem of human
destiny: to show why man was created, in what kind of universe
he lives, whence he came and whither he goes. He dealt of necessity
with the greatest of subjects; he had to sketch the greatest of objects.
He was concerned with infinity and eternity even more than with
time and sense : he undertook to delineate the ways and consequently
the character of Providence, as well as the conduct and the tendencies
of man. The essence of success in such an attempt is to satisfy the
religious sense of man ; to bring home to our hearts what we know to
be true; to teach us what we have not seen; to awaken us to what we
have forgotten; to remove the "covering" from all people, and the
"veil" that is spread over all nations : to give us, in a word, such a
conception of things divine and human as we can accept, believe, and
trust. The true doctrine of criticism demands what Milton invites, —
an examination of the degree in which the great epic attains this aim.
And if, in examining it, we find it necessary to use unusual illustra-
tions, and plainer words than are customary, it must be our excuse
that we do not think the subject can be made clear without them.

The defect of "Paradise Lost" is that, after all, it is founded on a
political transaction. The scene is in heaven very early in the history
of the universe, before the creation of man or the fall of Satan. We
have a description of a court [Book v.]. The angels,

"by imperial summons called,"

appear: —

"Under their hierarchs in orders bright
Ten thousand thousand ensigns high advanced;
Standards and gonfalons 'twixt van and rear
Stream in the air, and for distinction serve
Gf hierarchies, or orders, and degrees."

To this assemblage "th' Omnipotent" speaks : —

"Hear, all ye angels, progeny of light.
Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers,
Hear my decree, which unrevoked shall stand:
This day I have begot whom I declare
My only Son, and on this holy hill

196

BAGEHOT

Him have anointed, whom ye now behold
At my right hand; your Head I him appoint:
And by myself have sworn, to him shall bow
All knees in heaven, and shall confess him Lord;
Under his great vicegerent reign abide
United as one individual soul,
Forever happy. Him who disobeys,
Me disobeys, breaks union, and that day.
Cast out from God and blessed vision, falls
Int' utter darkness, deep ingulfed, his place
Ordained without redemption, without end."

This act of patronage was not popular at court; and why should it
have been.'' The religious sense is against it. The worship which
sinful men owe to God is not transferable to lieutenants and vice-
gerents. The whole scene of the court jars upon a true feeling; we
seem to be reading about some emperor of history, who admits his
son to a share in the empire, who confers on him a considerable
jurisdiction, and requires officials, with "standards and gonfalons,"
to bow before him. The orthodoxy of Milton is quite as question-
able as his accuracy; the old Athanasian creed was not made by per-
sons who would allow such a picture as that of Milton to stand before
their imaginations. The generation of the Son was to them a fact
"before all time," an eternal fact. There was no question in their
minds of patronage or promotion: the Son was the Son before all
time, just as the Father was the Father before all time. Milton had
in such matters a bold but not very sensitive imagination. He
accepted the inevitable materialism of Biblical (and to some extent
of all religious) language as distinct revelation. He certainly be-
lieved, in contradiction to the old creed, that God had both "parts
and passions." He imagined that earth is

"but the shadow of heaven, and things therein
Each to other like more than on earth is thought." "

From some passages it would seem that he actually thought of God
as having "the members and form" of a man. Naturally, therefore,
he would have no toleration for the mysterious notions of time and
eternity which are involved in the traditional doctrine. We are not,
however, now concerned with Mihon's belief, but with his represen-
I'Book v., Raphael to Adam.

MILTON 197

tation of his creed, — his picture, so to say, of it in "Paradise Lost";
still, as we cannot but think, that picture is almost irreligious, and
certainly different from that which has been generally accepted in
Christendom. Such phrases as "before all time," "eternal genera-
tion," are doubtless very vaguely interpreted by the mass of men;
nevertheless, no sensitively orthodox man could have drawn the pic-
ture of a generation, not to say an exaltation, in time.

We shall see this more clearly by reading what follows in the
poem: —

"All seemed well pleased; all seemed, but were not all."

One of the archangels, whose name can be guessed, decidedly dis-
approved, and calls a meeting, at which he explains that

"orders and degrees
Jar not with liberty, but well consist";

but still, that the promotion of a new person, on grounds of relation-
ship merely, above — even infinitely above — the old angels, with
imperial titles, was a "new law," and rather tyrannical. Abdiel,

"than whom none with more zeal adored
The Deity, and divine commands obeyed,"

attempts a defense: —

"Grant it thee unjust,
That equal over equals monarch reign:
Thyself, though great and glorious, dost thou count,
Or all angelic nature joined in one.
Equal to him begotten Son? by whom
As by his Word the mighty Father made
All things, even thee, and all the spirits of heaven
By him created in their bright degrees,
Crowned them with glory, and to their glory named
Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers.
Essential Powers; nor by his reign obscured,
But more illustrious made, since he the Head
One of our number thus reduced becomes,
His laws our laws; all honor to him done
Returns our own. Cease then this impious rage,
And tempt not these; but hasten to appease
Th' incensed Father and th' incensed Son,
While pardon may be found, in time besought."

198 BAGEHOT

Yet though Abdiel's intentions were undeniably good, his argument
is rather specious. Acting as an instrument in the process of creation
would scarcely give a valid claim to the obedience o£ the created
being. Power may be shown in the act, no doubt; but mere power
gives no true claim to the obedience of moral beings. It is a kind of
principle of all manner of idolatries and false religions to believe that
it does so. Satan, besides, takes issue on the fact: —

"That we were formed then, say'st thou ? and the work
Of secondary hands, by task transferred
From Father to his Son? Strange point and new!
Doctrine which we would know whence learned."

And we must say that the speech in which the new ruler is intro-
duced to the "Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers,"
is hard to reconcile with Abdiel's exposition. "This day" he seems
to have come into existence, and could hardly have assisted at the
creation of the angels, who are not young, and who converse with
one another like old acquaintances.

We have gone into this part of the subject at length, because it is
the source of the great error which pervades "Paradise Lost" : Satan
is made interesting. This has been the charge of a thousand ortho-
dox and even heterodox writers against Milton. Shelley, on the other
hand, has gloried in it; and fancied, if we remember rightly, that
Milton intentionally ranged himself on the Satanic side of the uni-
verse, just as Shelley himself would have done, and that he wished
to show the falsity of the ordinary theology. But Milton was born
an age too early for such aims, and was far too sincere to have advo-
cated any doctrine in a form so indirect. He believed every word
he said. He was not conscious of the effect his teaching would
produce in an age like this, when skepticism is in the air, and when
it is not possible to help looking coolly on his delineations. Probably
in our boyhood we can recollect a period when any solemn descrip-
tion of celestial events would have commanded our respect; we
should not have dared to read it intelligently, to canvass its details
and see what it meant: it was a religious book; it sounded reverential,
and that would have sufficed. Something like this was the state of
mind of the seventeenth century. Even Milton probably shared in a
vague reverence for religious language; he hardly felt the moral

MILTON 199

effect of the pierures he was drawing. His artistic instinct, too, often
hurries him away. His Satan was to him, as to us, the hero of his
poem: having commenced by making him resist on an occasion
which in an earthly kingdom would have been excusable and proper,
he probably a little sympathized with him, just as his readers do.

The interest of Satan's character is at its height in the first two
books. Colieridge justly compared it to that of Napoleon. There is
the same pride, the same Satanic ability, the same will, the same
egotism. His character seems to grow with his position. He is far
finer after his fall, in misery and suffering, with scarcely any resource
except in himself, than he was originally in heaven; at least, if
Raphael's description of him can be trusted. No portrait which
imagination or history has drawn of a revolutionary anarch is nearly
so perfect; there is all the grandeur of the greatest human mind, and
a certain infinitude in his circumstances which humanity must ever
want. Few EngUshmen feel a profound reverence for Napoleon I.;
there was no French alliance in his time; we have most of us some
tradition of antipathy to him. Yet hardly any Englishman can read
the account of the campaign of 1814 without feeling his interest
in the Emperor to be strong, and without perhaps being conscious of
a latent wish that he may succeed. Our opinion is against him, our
serious wish is of course for England; but the imagination has a
sympathy of its own, and will not give place. We read about the
great general, — never greater than in that last emergency, — showing
resources of genius that seem almost infinite, and that assuredly have
never been surpassed, yet vanquished, yielding to the power of cir-
cumstances, to the combined force of adversaries each of whom
singly he outmatches in strength, and all of whom together he sur-
passes in majesty and in mind.. Something of the same sort of. interest
belongs to the Satan of the first two books of "Paradise Lost." We
know that he will be vanquished; his name is not a recommendation.
Still, we do not imagine distinctly the minds by which he is to be
vanquished; we. do not take the same interest in them that we do in
him; our sympathies, our fancy, are on his side.

Perhaps much of this was inevitable; yet what a defect it is.1
especially what a. defect in Milton's own view, and looked at with
the stern realism with which he regarded it! Suppose that the author

200 BAGEHOT

of evil in the universe were the most attractive being in it; suppose
that the source of all sin were the origin of all interest to us! We
need not dwell upon this.

As we have said, much of this was difficult to avoid, if indeed it
could be avoided in dealing with such a theme. Even Milton shrank,
in some measure, from delineating the Divine character. His imagi-
nation evidently halts when it is required to perform that task. The
more delicate imagination of our modern world would shrink still
more. Any person who will consider what such an attempt must
end in, will find his nerves quiver. But by a curiously fatal error,
Milton has selected for delineation exactly that part of the Divine
nature which is most beyond the reach of the human faculties, and
which is also, when we try to describe our fancy of it, the least
effective to our minds. He has made God argue. Now, the procedure
of the Divine mind from truth to truth must ever be incomprehensi-
ble to us; the notion, indeed, of his proceeding at all is a contradic-
tion : to some extent, at least, it is inevitable that we should use such
language, but we know it is in reaHty inapplicable. A long train of
reasoning in such a connection is so out of place as to be painful; and
yet Milton has many. He relates a series of family prayers in heaven,
with sermons afterwards, which are very tedious. Even Pope was
shocked at the notion of Providence talking like a "school-divine." "
And there is the still worse error, that if you once attribute reasoning
to him, subsequent logicians may discover that he does not reason
very well.

Another way in which Milton has contrived to strengthen our
interest in Satan is the number and insipidity of the good angels.
There are old rules as to the necessity of a supernatural machinery
for an epic poem, worth some fraction of the paper on which they
are written, and derived from the practice of Homer, who believed
his gods and goddesses to be real beings, and would have been rather
harsh with a critic who called them machinery. These rules had
probably an influence with Milton, and induced him to manipulate
these serious angels more than he would have done otherwise. They
appear to be excellent administrators with very little to do; a kind
of grand chamberlains with wings, who fly down to earth and com-

" Imitation of Horace's Epistle to Augustus, Book ii., Ep. i.

MILTON 201

municate information to Adam and Eve. They have no character:
they are essentially messengers, — merely conductors, so to say, of
the Providential will; no one fancies that they have an independent
power of action; they seem scarcely to have minds of their own. No
effect can be more unfortunate. If the struggle of Satan had been
with Deity directly, the natural instincts of religion would have been
awakened; but when an angel possessed of mind is contrasted with
angels possessed only of wings, we sympathize with the former.

In the first two books, therefore, our sympathy with Milton's Satan
is great; we had almost said unqualified. The speeches he delivers
are of well-known excellence. Lord Brougham, no contemptible
judge of emphatic oratory, has laid down that if a person had not
an opportunity of access to the great Attic masterpieces, he had better
choose these for a model. What is to be regretted about the orator
is, that he scarcely acts up to his sentiments. "Better to reign in hell
than serve in heaven," is at any rate an audacious declaration; but
he has no room for exhibiting similar audacity in action. His offen-
sive career is limited; in the nature of the subject, there was scarcely
any opportunity for the fallen archangel to display in the detail of
his operations the surpassing intellect with which Milton has en-
dowed him. He goes across chaos, gets into a few physical difficul-
ties; but these are not much. His grand aim is the conquest of our
first parents; and we are at once struck with the enormous inequality
of the conflict. Two beings just created, without experience, without
guile, without knowledge of good and evil, are expected to contend
with a being on the delineation of whose powers every resource of
art and imagination, every subtle suggestion, every emphatic simile,
has been lavished. The idea in every reader's mind is, and must be,
not surprise that our first parents should yield, but wonder that
Satan should not think it beneath him to attack them. It is as if an
army should invest a cottage.

We have spoken more of theology than we intended; and we
need not say how much the monstrous inequalities attributed to the
combatants affect our estimate of the results of the conflict. The
state of man is what it is, because the defenseless Adam and Eve of
Milton's imagination yielded to the nearly all-powerful Satan whom
he has delineated. Milton has in some sense invented this difficulty;

202 BAGEHOT

for in the book of Genesis there is no such inequaHty. The serpent
may be subtler than any beast of the field; but he is not necessarily
subtler or cleverer than man. So far from Milton having justified
the ways of God to man, he has loaded the common theology with a
new encumbrance.

We may need refreshment after this discussion; and we cannot
find it better than in reading a few remarks of Eve: —

"That day I oft remember, when from sleep
I first awaked, and found myself reposed
Under a shade on flowers, much wondering where
And what I was, whence hither brought, and how.
Not distant far from thence a murmuring sound
Of waters issued from a cave, and spread
Into a liquid plain, then stood unmoved
Pure as th' expanse of heaven; I thither went
With unexperienced thought, and laid me down
On the green bank, to look into the clear
Smooth lake, that to me seemed another sky.
As I bent down to look, just opposite
A shape within the watery gleam appeared.
Bending to look on me. I started back,
It started back: but pleased I soon returned;
Pleased it returned, as soon with answering looks
Of sympathy and love. There I had fixed
Mine eyes till now, and pined with vain desire.
Had not a voice thus warned me: — 'What thou seest,
What there thou seest, fair creature, is thyself;
With thee it came and goes: but follow me.
And I will bring thee where no shadow stays
Thy coming, and thy soft embraces; he
whose image thou art, him thou shalt enjoy
Inseparably thine; to him shalt bear
Multitudes like thyself, and thence be called
Mother of human race.' What could I do
But follow straight, invisibly thus led?
Till I espied thee, fair indeed and tall.
Under a platan; yet methought less fair,
Less winning soft, less amiably mild.
Than that smooth watery image. Back I turned;
Thou following criedst aloud, 'Return, fair Eve;
Whom fly'st thou?' "^^

2»Book iv.

MILTON 203

Eve's character, indeed, is one of the most wonderful efforts of the
human imagination. She is a kind of abstract woman; essentially a
typical being; an official "mother of all living." Yet she is a real
interesting woman, not only full of delicacy and sweetness, but
with all the undefinable fascination, the charm of personality, which
such typical characters hardly ever have. By what consummate
miracle of wit this charm of individuality is preserved, without im-
pairing the general idea which is ever present to us, we cannot
explain, for we do not know.

Adam is far less successful. He has good hair, — "hyacinthine
locks" that "from his parted forelock manly hung"; a "fair large
front" and "eye subHme": but he has little else that we care for.
There is, in truth, no opportunity of displaying manly virtues, even
if he possessed them. He has only to yield to his wife's solicitations,
which he does. Nor are we sure that he does it well: he is very
tedious. He indulges in sermons which are good; but most men
cannot but fear that so delightful a being as Eve must have found
him tiresome. She steps away, however, and goes to sleep at some
of the worst points.

Dr. Johnson remarked that, after all, "Paradise Lost" was one
of the books which no one wished longer : we fear, in this irreverent
generation, some wish it shorter. Hardly any reader would be
sorry if some portions of the latter books had been spared him. Cole-
ridge, indeed, discovered profound mysteries in the last; but in
what could not Coleridge find a mystery if he wished.'' Dry den
more wisely remarked that Milton became tedious when he entered
upon a "track of Scripture." ^' Nor is it surprising that such is the
case. The style of many parts of Scripture is such that it will not
bear addition or subtraction. A word less or an idea more, and the
effect upon the mind is the same no longer. Nothing can be more
tiresome than a sermonic amplification of such passages. It is almost
too much when, as from the pulpit, a paraphrastic commentary is
prepared for our spiritual improvement. In deference to the inten-
tion, we bear it, but we bear it unwillingly; and we cannot endure it
at all when, as in poems, the object is to awaken our fancy rather than
to improve our conduct. The account of the creation in the book

^' "E.ssay on Satire."

204 BAGEHOT

of Genesis is one of the compositions from which no sensitive imagi-
nation would subtract an iota, to which it could not bear to add a
word. Milton's paraphrase is alike copious and ineffective. The
universe is, in railway phrase, "opened," but not created; no green
earth springs in a moment from the indefinite void. Instead, too,
of the simple loneliness of the Old Testament, several angelic offi-
cials are in attendance, who help in nothing, but indicate that heaven
must be plentifully supplied with tame creatures.

There is no difficulty in writing such criticisms, and indeed other
unfavorable criticisms, on "Paradise Lost." There is scarcely any
book in the world which is open to a greater number, or which a
reader who allows plain words to produce a due effect will be less
satisfied with. Yet what book is really greater ? In the best parts the
words have a magic in them; even in the inferior passages you are
hardly sensible of their inferiority till you translate them into your
own language. Perhaps no style ever written by man expressed so
adequately the conceptions of a mind so strong and so peculiar; a
manly strength, a haunting atmosphere of enhancing suggestions, a
firm continuous music, are only some of its excellences. To com-
prehend the whole of the others, you must take the volume down
and read it, — the best defense of Milton, as has been said most truly,
against all objections.

Probably no book shows the transition which our theology has
made since the middle of the seventeenth century, at once so plainly
and so fully. We do not now compose long narratives to "justify the
ways of God to men." The more orthodox we are, the more we
shrink from it, the more we hesitate at such a task, the more we
allege that we have no powers for it. Our most celebrated defenses
of established tenets are in the style of Butler, not in that of Milton.
They do not profess to show a satisfactory explanation of human
destiny: on the contrary, they hint that probably we could not under-
stand such an explanation if it were given us; at any rate, they allow
that it is not given us. Their course is palliative: they suggest an
"analogy of difficulties"; if our minds were greater, so they reason,
we should comprehend these doctrines, — now we cannot explain
analogous facts which we see and know. No style can be more
opposite to the bold argument, the boastful exposition of Milton.

MILTON 205

The teaching of the eighteenth century is in the very atmosphere we
breathe: we read it in the teachings of Oxford; we hear it from the
missionaries of the Vatican. The air of the theology is clarified. We
know our difficulties, at least : we are rather prone to exaggerate the
weight of some than to deny the reality of any.

We cannot continue a line of thought which would draw us on
too far for the patience of our readers. We must, however, make
one more remark, and we shall have finished our criticism on "Para-
dise Lost." It is analogous to that which we have just made. The
scheme of the poem is based on an offense against positive morality.
The offense of Adam was not against nature or conscience, nor
against anything of which we can see the reason or conceive the
obligation, but against an unexplained injunction of the Supreme
Will. The rebellion in heaven, as Milton describes it, was a rebel-
lion not against known ethics or immutable spiritual laws, but
against an arbitrary selection and an unexplained edict. We do not
say that there is no such thing as positive morality, — we do not
think so; even if we did, we should not insert a proposition so
startling at the conclusion of a literary criticism. But we are sure
that wherever a positive moral edict is promulgated, it is no subject,
except perhaps under a very peculiar treatment, for literary art. By
the very nature of it, it cannot satisfy the heart and conscience. It
is a difficulty; we need not attempt to explain it away, — there are
mysteries enough which will never be explained away. But it is con-
trary to every principle of criticism to state the difficulty as if it were
not one; to bring forward the puzzle, yet leave it to itself; to publish
so strange a problem, and give only an untrue solution of it: and
yet such, in its bare statement, is all that Milton has done.

Of Milton's other writings we have left ourselves no room to
speak; and though every one of them, or almost every one of them,
would well repay a careful criticism, yet few of them seem to throw
much additional light on his character, or add much to our essential
notion of his genius, though they may exemplify and enhance it.
"Comus" is the poem which does so the most. Literature has
become so much lighter than it used to be, that we can scarcely
realize the position it occupied in the light literature of our fore-
fathers. We have now in our own language many poems that are

206 BAGEHOT

pleasanter in their subject, more graceful in their execution, more
flowing in their outUne, more easy to read. Dr. Johnson, though per-
haps no very excellent authority on the more intangible graces of
literature, was disposed to deny to Milton the capacity of creating the
lighter literature: "Milton, madam, was a genius that could cut a
colossus from a rock, but could not carve heads upon cherry-stones."
And it would not be surprising if this generation, which has access
to the almost infinite quantity o£ lighter compositions which have
been produced since Johnson's time, were to echo his sentence. In
some degree, perhaps, the popular taste does so. "Comus" has no
longer the peculiar exceptional popularity which it used to have: we
can talk without general odium of its defects; its characters are
nothing, its sentiments are tedious, its story is not interesting. But
it is only when we have realized the magnitude of its deficiencies that
we comprehend the peculiarity of its greatness. Its power is in its
style. A grave and firm music pervades it; it is soft, without a
thought of weakness; harmonious and yet strong; impressive, as
few such poems are, yet covered with a bloom of beauty and a
complexity of charm that few poems have either. We have perhaps
light literature in itself better, that we read oftener and more easily,
that lingers more in our memories; but we have not any, we ques-
tion if there ever will be any, which gives so true a conception of
the capacity and the dignity of the mind by which it was produced.
The breath of solemnity which hovers round the music attaches us
to the writer. Every line, here as elsewhere, in Milton excites the
idea of indefinite power.

And so we must draw to a close. The subject is an infinite one,
and if we pursued it, we should lose ourselves in miscellaneous com-
mentary, and run on far beyond the patience of our readers. What
we have said has at least a defined intention: we have wished to
state the impression which the character of Milton and the greatest
of Milton's works are likely to produce on readers of the present
generation, — a generation different from his own almost more than
any other.

SCIENCE AND CULTURE

BY
THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95) ^^^ ''"''ii 3' Ealing, near London,
and, having studied medicine, went to sea as assistant surgeon in the
navy. After leaving the Government service, he became Professor of
Natural History at the Royal School of Mines, and FuUerian Professor
of Physiology at the Royal Institution, and later held many commissions
and received many distinctions in the scientific world. His special field
was morphology, and in it he produced a large number of monographs
and several comprehensive manuals.

It is not, however, by his original contributions to knowledge that
Huxley's name is best known to readers outside of technical science, but
rather by his labors in popularization and in polemics. He was one of
the foremost and most effective champions of Darwinism, and no scientist
has been more conspicuous in the battle between the doctrine of evolu-
tion and the older religious orthodoxy. Outside of this particular issue,
he was a vigorous opponent of supernaturalism in all its forms, and a
supporter of the agnosticism which demands that nothing shall be be-
lieved "with greater assurance than the evidence warrants" — the evidence
intended being, of course, of the same kind as that admitted in natural
science.

Huxley's interests thus extended from pure science into many adjoining
fields, such as those of theology, philosophy (where he wrote an admi-
rable book on Hume), and education. Of his attitude toward this last, a
clear idea may be gained from the following address on "Science and
Culture," a singularly forcible plea for the importance of natural science
in general education.

In all his writings Huxley commands a style excellently adapted to his
purpose: clear, forcible, free from mannerism, yet telling and often
memorable in phrase. Whatever may be the exact magnitude of his
services to pure science, he was a master in the writing of English for
the purposes of exposition and controversy, and a powerful intellectual
influence on almost all classes in his generation.

SCIENCE AND CULTURE'

SIX years ago, as some of my present hearers may remember, I
had the privilege of addressing a large assemblage of the
inhabitants of this city, who had gathered together to do
honor to the memory of their famous townsman, Joseph Priestley;
and, if any satisfaction attaches to posthumous glory, we may hope
that the manes of the burnt-out philosopher were then finally
appeased.

No man, however, who is endowed with a fair share of common
sense, and not more than a fair share of vanity, will identify either
contemporary or posthumous fame with the highest good; and
Priestley's life leaves no doubt that he, at any rate, set a much higher
value upon the advancement of knowledge, and the promotion of
that freedom of thought which is at once the cause and the conse-
quence of intellectual progress.

Hence I am disposed to think that, if Priestley could be amongst
us to-day, the occasion of our meeting would afford him even greater
pleasure than the proceedings which celebrated the centenary of his
chief discovery. The kindly heart would be moved, the high sense
of social duty would be satisfied, by the spectacle of well-earned
wealth, neither squandered in tawdry luxury and vainglorious show,
nor scattered with the careless charity which blesses neither him
that gives nor him that takes, but expended in the execution of a
well-considered plan for the aid of present and future generations
of those who are willing to help themselves.

We shall all be of one mind thus far. But it is needful to share
Priestley's keen interest in physical science; and to have learned, as
he had learned, the value of scientific training in fields of inquiry
apparently far remote from physical science; in order to appreciate,
as he would have appreciated, the value of the noble gift which Sir

'Originally delivered as an address, in 1880, at the opening of Mason Ck)llege,
Birmingham, England, now the University of Birmingham.

209

210 HUXLEY

Josiah Mason has bestowed upon the inhabitants of the Midland
district.

For us children of the nineteenth century, however, the establish-
ment of a college under the conditions of Sir Josiah Mason's trust
has a significance apart from any which it could have possessed a
hundred years ago. It appears to be an indication that we are reach-
ing the crisis of the battle, or rather of the long series of battles, which
have been fought over education in a campaign which began long
before Priestley's time, and will probably not be finished just yet.

In the last century, the combatants were the champions of ancient
literature, on the one side, and those of modern literature on the
other; but, some thirty years^ ago, the contest became complicated
by the appearance of a third army, ranged round the banner of
physical science.

I am not aware that any one has authority to speak in the name of
this new host. For it must be admitted to be somewhat of a guerilla
force, composed largely of irregulars, each of whom fights pretty
much for his own hand. But the impressions of a full private, who
has seen a good deal of service in the ranks, respecting the present
position of affairs and the conditions of a permanent peace, may not
be devoid of interest; and I do not know that I could make a better
use of the present opportunity than by laying them before you.

From the time that the first suggestion to introduce physical
science into ordinary education was timidly whispered, until now,
the advocates of scientific education have met with opposition of
two kinds. On the one hand, they have been poohpoohed by the
men of business who pride themselves on being the representatives of
practicality; while, on the other hand, they have been excommuni-
cated by the classical scholars, in their capacity of Levites in charge
of the ark of culture and monopolists of liberal education.

The practical men believed that the idol whom they worship —
rule of thumb — has been the source of the past prosperity, and will
suffice for the future welfare of the arts and manufactures. They
were of opinion that science is speculative rubbish; that theory and
practice have nothing to do with one another; and that the scientific

*The advocacy o£ the introduction of physical science into general education by
George Combe and others commenced a good deal earlier; but the movement had
acquired hardly any practical force before the time to which I refer.

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 211

habit of mind is an impediment, rather than an aid, in the conduct
of ordinary affairs.

I have used the past tense in speaking of the practical men — ^for
although they were very formidable thirty years ago, I am not sure
that the pure species has not been extirpated. In fact, so far as mere
argument goes, they have been subjected to such a feu d'enfer that
it is a miracle if any have escaped. But I have remarked that your
typical practical man has an unexpected resemblance to one of Mil-
ton's angels. His spiritual wounds, such as are inflicted by logical
weapons, may be as deep as a well and as wide as a church door, but
beyond shedding a few drops of ichor, celestial or otherwise, he is
no whit the worse. So, if any of these opponents be left, I will not
waste time in vain repetition of the demonstrative evidence of the
practical value of science; but knowing that a parable will sometimes
penetrate where syllogisms fail to effect an entrance, I will offer a
story for their consideration.

Once upon a time, a boy, with nothing to depend upon but his
own vigorous nature, was thrown into the thick of the struggle for
existence in the midst of a great manufacturing population. He
seems to have had a hard fight, inasmuch as, by the time he was
thirty years of age, his total disposable funds amounted to twenty
pounds. Neverdieless, middle life found him giving proof of his
comprehension of the practical problems he had been roughly called
upon to solve, by a career of remarkable prosperity.

Finally, having reached old age with its well-earned surroundings
of "honor, troops of friends," the hero of my story bethought him-
self of those who were making a like start in hfe, and how he could
stretch out a helping hand to them.

After long and anxious reflection this successful practical man of
business could devise nothing better than to provide them with the
means of obtaining "sound, extensive, and practical scientific knowl-
edge." And he devoted a large part of his. wealth and five years of
incessant work to this end.

I need not point the moral of a tale which, as the solid and spacious
fabric of the Scientific College assures us, is no fable, nor can any-
thing which I could say intensify the force of this practical answer
to practical objections.

212 HUXLEY

We may take it for granted then, that, in the opinion of those best
quahfied to judge, the diffusion of thorough scientific education is
an absolutely essential condition of industrial progress; and that the
college which has been opened to-day will confer an inestimable boon
upon those whose livelihood is to be gained by the practice of the
arts and manufactures of the district.

The only question worth discussion is, whether the conditions,
under which the work of the college is to be carried out, are such
as to give it the best possible chance of achieving permanent success.

Sir Josiah Mason, without doubt most wisely, has left very large
freedom of action to the trustees, to whom he proposes ultimately to
commit the administration of the college, so that they may be able
to adjust its arrangements in accordance with the changing condi-
tions of the future. But, with respect to three points, he has laid
most explicit injunctions upon both administrators and teachers.

Party politics are forbidden to enter into the minds of either, so
far as the work of the college is concerned; theology is as sternly
banished from its precincts; and finally, it is especially declared that
the college shall make no provision for "mere literary instruction
and education."

It does not concern me at present to dwell upon the first two
injunctions any longer than may be needful to express my full con-
viction of their wisdom. But the third prohibition brings us face
to face with those other opponents of scientific education, who are
by no means in the moribund condition of the practical man, but
alive, alert, and formidable.

It is not impossible that we shall hear this express exclusion of
"literary instruction and education" from a college which, neverthe-
less, professes to give a high and efficient education, sharply criticised.
Certainly the time was that the Levites of culture would have
sounded their trumpets against its walls as against an educational
Jericho.

How often have we not been told that the study of physical science
is incompetent to confer culture; that it touches none of the higher
problems of life; and, what is worse, that the continual devotion to
scientific studies tends to generate a narrow and bigoted belief in the
applicability of scientific methods to the search after truth of all

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 213

kinds. How frequently one has reason to observe that no reply to a
troublesome argument tells so well as calling its author a "mere
scientific specialist." And, as I am afraid it is not permissible to
speak of this form of opposition to scientific education in the past
tense; may we not expect to be told that this, not only omission, but
prohibition, of "mere literary instruction and education" is a patent
example of scientific narrow-mindedness?

I am not acquainted with Sir Josiah Mason's reasons for the action
which he has taken; but if, as I apprehend is the case, he refers to
the ordinary classical course of our schools and universities by the
name of "mere literary instruction and education," I venture to offer
sundry reasons of my own in support of that action.

For I hold very strongly by two convictions. The first is, that
neither the discipline nor the subject-matter of classical education
is of such direct value to the student of physical science as to justify
the expenditure of valuable time upon either; and the second is,
that for the purpose of attaining real culture, an exclusively scientific
education is at least as effectual as an exclusively literary education.

I need hardly point out to you that these opinions, especially the
latter, are diametrically opposed to those of the great majority of
educated Englishmen, influenced as they are by school and university
traditions. In their belief, culture is obtainable only by a liberal
education; and a liberal education is synonymous, not merely with
education and instruction in literature, but in one particular form
of literature, namely, that of Greek and Roman antiquity. They
hold that the man who has learned Latin and Greek, however little,
is educated; while he who is versed in other branches of knowledge,
however deeply, is a more or less respectable specialist, not admissible
into cultured caste. The stamp of the educated man, the university
degree, is not for him.

I am too well acquainted with the generous catholicity of spirit, the
true sympathy with scientific thought, which pervades the writings
of our chief apostle of culture to identify him with these opinions;
and yet one may cull from one and another of those epistles to the
Philistines, which so much delight all who do not answer to that
name, sentences which lend them some support.

Mr. Arnold tells us that the meaning of culture is "to know the

214 HUXLEY

best that has been thought and said in the world." It is the criticism
of life contained in literature. That criticism regards "Europe as
being, for intellectual and spiritual purposes, one great confederation,
bound to a joint action and working to a common result; and whose
members have, for their common outfit, a knowledge of Greek,
Roman, and Eastern antiquity, and of one another. Special, local,
and temporary advantages being put out of account, that modern
nation will in the intellectual and spiritual sphere make most prog-
ress, which most thoroughly carries out this programme. And what
is that but saying that we too, all of us, as individuals, the more thor-
oughly we carry it out, shall make the more progress?"

We have here to deal with two distinct propositions. The first,
that a criticism of life is the essence of culture; the second, that
hterature contains the materials which suffice for the construction of
such a criticism.

I think that we must all assent to the first proposition. For culture
certainly means something quite different from learning or technical
skill. It implies the possession of an ideal, and the habit of critically
estimating the value of things by comparison with a theoretic stand-
ard. Perfect culture should apply a complete theory of life, based
upon a clear knowledge alike of its possibilities and of its limi-
tations.

But we may agree to all this, and yet strongly dissent from the
assumption that literature alone is competent to supply this knowl-
edge. After having learnt all that Greek, Roman, and Eastern
antiquity have thought and said, and all that modern literatures
have to tell us, it is not self-evident that we have laid a sufficiently
broad and deep foundation for the criticism of life which consti-
tutes culture.

Indeed, to any one acquainted with the scope of physical science,
it is not at all evident. Considering progress only in the "intellectual
and spiritual sphere," I find myself wholly unable to admit that
either nations or individuals will really advance, if their common
outfit draws nothing from the stores of physical science. I should
say that an army, without weapons of precision, and with no par-
ticular base of operations, might more hopefully enter upon a cam-
paign on the Rhine, than a man, devoid of a knowledge of what

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 215

physical science has done in the last century, upon a criticism of life.

When a biologist meets with an anomaly, he instinctively turns
to the study of development to clear it up. The rationale of contra-
dictory opinions may with equal confidence be sought in history.

It is, happily, no new thing that Englishmen should employ their
wealth in building and endowing institutions for educational pur-
poses. But, five or six hundred years ago, deeds of foundation
expressed or impHed conditions as nearly as possible contrary to
those which have been thought expedient by Sir Josiah Mason. That
is to say, physical science was practically ignored, while a certain
literary training was enjoined as a means to the acquirement of
knowledge which was essentially theological.

The reason of this singular contradiction between the actions of
men alike animated by a strong and disinterested desire to promote
the welfare of their fellows, is easily discovered.

At that time, in fact, if any one desired knowledge beyond such
as could be obtained by his own observation, or by common conversa-
tion, his first necessity was to learn the Latin language, inasmuch
as all the higher knowledge of the western world was contained in
works written in that language. Hence, Latin grammar, with logic
and rhetoric, studied through Latin, were the fundamentals of edu-
cation. With respect to the substance of the knowledge imparted
through this channel, the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, as inter-
preted and supplemented by the Romish Church, were held to
contain a complete and infaUibly true body of information.

Theological dicta were, to the thinkers of those days, that which
the axioms and definitions of Euclid are to the geometers of these.
The business of the philosophers of the Middle Ages was to deduce
from the data furnished by the theologians, conclusions in accordance
with ecclesiastical decrees. They were allowed the high privilege of
showing, by logical process, how and why that which the Church
said was true, must be true. And if their demonstrations fell short
of or exceeded this hmit, the Church was maternally ready to check
their aberrations, if need be, by the help of the secular arm.

Between the two, our ancestors were furnished with a compact
and complete criticism of life. They were told how the world began,
and how it would end; they learned that all material existence was

2l6 HUXLEY

but a base and insignificant blot upon the fair face of the spiritual
world, and that nature was, to all intents and purposes, the play-
ground of the devil; they learned that the earth is the centre of the
visible universe, and that man is the cynosure of things terrestrial;
and more especially is it inculcated that the course of nature had no
fixed order, but that it could be, and constantly was, altered by the
agency of innumerable spiritual beings, good and bad, according as
they were moved by the deeds and prayers of men. The sum and
substance of the whole doctrine was to produce the conviction that
the only thing really worth knowing in this world was how to secure
that place in a better, which, under certain conditions, the Church
promised.

Our ancestors had a living belief in this theory of life, and acted
upon it in their dealings with education, as in all other matters.
Culture meant saintliness — after the fashion of the saints of those
days; the education that led to it was, of necessity, theological; and
the way to theology lay through Latin.

That the study of nature — further than was requisite for the
satisfaction of everyday wants — should have any bearing on human
life was far from the thoughts of men thus trained. Indeed, as
nature had been cursed for man's sake, it was an obvious conclusion
that those who meddled with nature were likely to come into pretty
close contact with Satan. And, if any born scientific investigator
followed his instincts, he might safely reckon upon earning the
reputation, and probably upon suffering the fate, of a sorcerer.

Had the western world been left to itself in Chinese isolation, there
is no saying how long this state of things might have endured. But,
happily, it was not left to itself. Even earHer than the thirteenth cen-
tury, the development of Moorish civilization in Spain and the
great movement of the Crusades had introduced the leaven which,
from that day to this, has never ceased to work. At first, through
the intermediation of Arabic translations, afterwards by the study
of the originals, the western nations of Europe became acquainted
with the writings of the ancient philosophers and poets, and, in time,
with the whole of the vast literature of antiquity.

Whatever there was of high intellectual aspiration or dominant
capacity in Italy, France, Germany, and England, spent itself for

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 21 7

centuries in taking possession of the rich inheritance left by the dead
civilization of Greece and Rome. Marvelously aided by the inven-
tion of printing, classical learning spread and flourished. Those who
possessed it prided themselves on having attained the highest culture
then within the reach of mankind.

And justly. For, saving Dante on his solitary pinnacle, there was
no figure in modern literature at the time of the Renaissance to
compare with the men of antiquity; there was no art to compete
with their sculpture; there was no physical science but that which
Greece had created. Above all, there was no other example of per-
fect intellectual freedom — of the unhesitating acceptance of reason
as the sole guide to truth and the supreme arbiter of conduct.

The new learning necessarily soon exerted a profound influence
upon education. The language of the monks and schoolmen seemed
little better than gibberish to scholars fresh from Vergil and Cicero,
and the study of Latin was placed upon a new foundation. More-
over, Latin itself ceased to afford the sole key to knowledge. The
student who sought the highest thought of antiquity found only a
second-hand reflection of it in Roman literature, and turned his face
to the full light of the Greeks. And after a battle, not altogether
dissimilar to that which is at present being fought over the teaching
of physical science, the study of Greek was recognized as an essential
element of all higher education.

Thus the humanists, as they were called, won the day; and the
great reform which they effected was of incalculable service to man-
kind. But the Nemesis of all reformers is finality; and the reformers
of education, like those of religion, fell into the profound, however
common, error of mistaking the beginning for the end of the work
of reformation.

The representatives of the humanists in the nineteenth century
take their stand upon classical education as the sole avenue to cul-
ture, as firmly as if we were still in the age of Renaissance. Yet,
surely, the present intellectual relations of the modern and the
ancient worlds are profoundly different from those which obtained
three centuries ago. Leaving aside the existence of a great and char-
acteristically modern literature, of modern painting, and, especially,
of modern music, there is one feature of the present state of the

2l8 HUXLEY

civilized world which separates it more widely from the Renaissance
than the Renaissance was separated from the Middle Ages.

This distinctive character of our own times lies in the vast and
constantly increasing part which is played by natural knowledge.
Not only is our daily life shaped by it, not only does the prosperity of
millions of men depend upon it, but our whole theory of life has
long been influenced, consciously or unconsciously, by the general
conceptions of the universe, which have been forced upon us by
physical science.

In fact, the most elementary acquaintance with the results of
scientific investigation shows us that they offer a broad and striking
contradiction to the opinions so implicitly credited and taught in the
Middle Ages.

The notions of the beginning and the end of the world entertained
by our forefathers are no longer credible. It is very certain that the
earth is not the chief body in the material universe, and that the
world is not subordinated to man's use. It is even more certain that
nature is the expression of a definite order with which nothing inter-
feres, and that the chief business of mankind is to learn that order
and govern themselves accordingly. Moreover this scientific "criti-
cism of life" presents itself to us with different credentials from any
other. It appeals not to authority, nor to what anybody may have
thought or said, but to nature. It admits that all our interpretations
of natural fact are more or less imperfect and symbolic, and bids the
learner seek for truth not among words but among things. It warns
us that the assertion which outstrips evidence is not only a blunder
but a crime.

The purely classical education advocated by the representatives
of the humanists in our day gives no inkling of all this. A man may
be a better scholar than Erasmus, and know no more of the chief
causes of the present intellectual fermentation than Erasmus did.
Scholarly and pious persons, worthy of all respect, favor us with
allocutions upon the sadness of the antagonism of science to their
mediaeval way of thinking, which betray an ignorance of the first
principles of scientific investigation, an incapacity for understanding
what a man of science means by veracity, and an unconsciousness
of the weight of established scientific truths, which is almost comicaL

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 219

There is no great force in the tu quoque argument, or else the
advocates of scientific education might fairly enough retort upon
the modern humanists that they may be learned specialists, but that
they possess no such sound foundation for a criticism of life as de-
serves the name of culture. And, indeed, if we were disposed to be
cruel, we might urge that the humanists have brought this reproach
upon themselves, not because they are too full of the spirit of the
ancient Greek, but because they lack it.

The period of the Renaissance is commonly called that of the
"Revival of Letters," as if the influences then brought to bear upon
the mind of Western Europe had been wholly exhausted in the field
of literature. I think it is very commonly forgotten that the revival
of science, effected by the same agency, although less conspicuous,
was not less momentous.

In fact, the few and scattered students of nature of that day picked
up the clew to her secrets exactly as it fell from the hands of the
Greeks a thousand years before. The foundations of mathematics
were so well laid by them that our children learn their geometry from
a book written for the schools of Alexandria two thousand years
ago. Modern astronomy is the natural continuation and development
of the work of Hipparchus and of Ptolemy; modern physics of that
of Democritus and of Archimedes; it was long before modern bio-
logical science outgrew the knowledge bequeathed to us by Aristotle,
by Theophrastus, and by Galen.

We cannot know all the best thoughts and sayings of the Greeks
unless we know what they thought about natural phenomena. We
cannot fully apprehend their criticism of life unless we understand
the extent to which that criticism was affected by scientific concep-
tions. We falsely pretend to be the inheritors of their culture, unless
we are penetrated, as the best minds among them were, with an
unhesitating faith that the free employment of reason, in accordance
with scientific method, is the sole method of reaching truth.

Thus I venture to think that the pretensions of our modern hu-
manists to the possession of the monopoly of culture and to the
exclusive inheritance of the spirit of antiquity must be abated, if not
abandoned. But I should be very sorry that anything I have said
should be taken to imply a desire on my part to depreciate the value

220 HUXLEY

of classical education, as it might be and as it sometimes is. The
native capacities of mankind vary no less than their opportunities;
and while culture is one, the road by which one man may best reach
it is widely different from that which is most advantageous to
another. Again, while scientific education is yet inchoate and tenta-
tive, classical education is thoroughly well organized upon the prac-
tical experience of generations of teachers. So that, given ample
time for learning and destination for ordinary life, or for a literary
career, I do not think that a young Englishman in search of culture
can do better than follow the course usually marked out for him,
supplementing its deficiencies by his own efforts.

But for those who mean to make science their serious occupation;
or who intend to follow the profession of medicine; or who have to
enter early upon the business of life; for all these, in my opinion,
classical education is a mistake; and it is for this reason that I am
glad to see "mere literary education and instruction" shut out from
the curriculum of Sir Josiah Mason's college, seeing that its inclu-
sion would probably lead to the introduction of the ordinary smatter-
ing of Latin and Greek.

Nevertheless, I am the last person to question the importance o£
genuine literary education, or to suppose that intellectual culture can
be complete without it. An exclusively scientific training will
bring about a mental twist as surely as an exclusive literary training.
The value of the cargo does not compensate for a ship's being out
of trim; and I should be very sorry to think that the Scientific Col-
lege would turn out none but lop-sided men.

There is no need, however, that such a catastrophe should happen.
Instruction in English, French, and German is provided, and thus
the three greatest literatures of the modern world are made accessible
to the student.

French and German, and especially the latter language, are
absolutely indispensable to those who desire full knowledge in any
department of science. But even supposing that the knowledge of
these languages acquired is not more than sufficient for purely scien-
tific purposes, every Englishman has, in his native tongue, an almost
perfect instrument of literary expression; and, in his own literature,
models of every kind of literary excellence. If an Englishman cannot

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 221

get literary culture out of his Bible, his Shakespeare, his Milton,
neither, in my belief, will the profoundest study of Homer and
Sophocles, Vergil and Horace, give it to him.

Thus, since the constitution of the college makes sufficient provi-
sion for literary as well as for scientific education, and since artistic
instruction is also contemplated, it seems to me that a fairly complete
culture is offered to all who are willing to take advantage of it.

But I am not sure that at this point the "practical" man, scotched
but not slain, may ask what all this talk about culture has to do
with an institution, the object of which is defined to be "to promote
the prosperity of the manufactures and the industry of the country."
He may suggest that what is wanted for this end is not culture, nor
even a purely scientific discipline, but simply a knowledge of applied
science.

I often wish that this phrase, "applied science," had never been
invented. For it suggests that there is a sort of scientific knowledge
of direct practical use, which can be studied apart from another sort
of scientific knowledge, which is of no practical utility, and which
is termed "pure science." But there is no more complete fallacy
than this. What people call applied science is nothing but the appli-
cation of pure science to particular classes of problems. It consists
of deductions from those general principles, established by reasoning
and observation, which constitute pure science. No one can safely
make these deductions until he has a firm grasp of the principles; and
he can obtain that grasp only by personal experience of the operations
of observation and of reasoning on which they are founded.

Almost all the processes employed in the arts and manufactures
fall within the range either of physics or of chemistry. In order to
improve them one must thoroughly understand them; and no one
has a chance of really understanding them, unless he has obtained
that mastery of principles and that habit of dealing with facts which
is given by long-continued and well-directed purely scientific train-
ing in the physical and chemical laboratory. So that there really is
no question as to the necessity of purely scientific discipline, even
if the work of the college were limited by the narrowest interpreta-
tion of its stated aims.

And, as to the desirableness of a wider culture than that yielded

222 HUXLEY

by science alone, it is to be recollected that the improvement o£
manufacturing processes is only one of the conditions which con-
tribute to the prosperity of industry. Industry is a means and not an
end; and mankind work only to get something which they want.
What that something is depends partly on their innate, and partly
on their acquired, desires.

If the wealth resulting from prosperous industry is to be spent
upon the gratification of unworthy desires, if the increasing perfec-
tion of manufacturing processes is to be accompanied by an increas-
ing debasement of those who carry them on, I do not see the good
of industry and prosperity.

Now it is perfectly true that men's views of what is desirable
depend upon their characters; and that the innate proclivities to
which we give that name are not touched by any amount of instruc-
tion. But it does not follow that even mere intellectual education
may not, to an indefinite extent, modify the practical manifestation
of the characters of men in their actions, by supplying them with
motives unknown to the ignorant. A pleasure-loving character will
have pleasure of some sort; but, if you give him the choice, he may
prefer pleasures which do not degrade him to those which do. And
this choice is offered to every man who possesses in literary or artistic
culture a never-failing source of pleasures, which are neither with-
ered by age, nor staled by custom, nor embittered in the recollection
by the pangs of self-reproach.

If the institution opened to-day fulfils the intention of its founder,
the picked intelligences among all classes of the population of this
district will pass through it. No child born in Birmingham, hence-
forward, if he have the capacity to profit by the opportunities offered
to him, first in the primary and other schools, and afterward in the
Scientific College, need fail to obtain, not merely the instruction,
but the culture most appropriate to the conditions of his life.

Within these walls the future employer and the future artisan
may sojourn together for awhile, and carry, through all their lives,
the stamp of the influences then brought to bear upon them. Hence,
it is not beside the mark to remind you that the prosperity of indus-
try depends not merely upon the improvement of manufacturing
processes, not merely upon the ennobling of the individual character.

SCIENCE AND CULTURE 223

but upon a third condition, namely, a clear understanding of the
conditions of social life on the part of both the capitalist and the
operative, and their agreement upon common principles of social
action. They must learn that social phenomena are as much the
expression of natural laws as any others; that no social arrangements
can be permanent unless they harmonize with the requirements of
social statics and dynamics; and that, in the nature of things, there
is an arbiter whose decisions execute themselves.

But this knowledge is only to be obtained by the application of
the methods of investigation adopted in physical researches to the
investigation of the phenomena of society. Hence, I confess I should
like to see one addition made to the excellent scheme of education
propounded for the college, in the shape of provision for the teaching
of sociology. For though we are all agreed that party politics are to
have no place in the instruction of the college; yet in this country,
practically governed as it is now by universal suffrage, every man
who does his duty must exercise political functions. And, if the
evils which are inseparable from the good of political liberty are to
be checked, if the perpetual oscillation of nations between anarchy
and despotism is to be replaced by the steady march of self-restrain-
ing freedom; it will be because men will gradually bring themselves
to deal with political, as they now deal with scientifical questions;
to be as ashamed of undue haste and partisan prejudice in the one
case as in the other; and to believe that the machinery of society is
at least as delicate as that of a spinning-jenny, and as little likely to
be improved by the meddling of those who have not taken the
trouble to master the principles of its action.

In conclusion, I am sure that I make myself the mouthpiece of all
present in offering to the venerable founder of the institution, which
now commences its beneficent career, our congratulations on the
completion of his work; and in expressing the conviction that the
remotest posterity will point to it as a crucial instance of the wisdom
which natural piety leads all men to ascribe to their ancestors.

RACE AND LANGUAGE

BY
EDWARD AUGUSTUS FREEMAN

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Edward Augustus Freeman (1823-92), one of the most distinguished
of recent EngUsh historians, was born at Harborne, in Staffordshire, and
educated at Oxford, where he was a Fellow of Trinity College, and later
Regius Professor of Modern History. His earlier writings show great
interest in architecture, and it was one of his distinctions to be the first
historian to make extensive use in his subject of the evidences and illus-
trations supplied by the study of that art. His most famous and most
elaborate work was his "History of the Norman Conquest" (1867-79), ^
monument which is likely long to remain the great authority on its
period.

Freeman believed in the unity of the study of history, and in the wide
range of his own writings he went far toward realizing the universality
he preached. Outside of the field just mentioned he wrote on ancient
Greece, on Sicily, on the Ottoman Empire, on the United States, on the
methods of historical study, and on many other subjects. His interests
were primarily political, and he took an active part in the politics of his
own day, writing for many years for the Saturday Review. As a teacher
he influenced profoundly the scientific study of history in England.

Of few terms in general use has the average man a less exact or less
accurate comprehension than of the word "race." The speculative phil-
ologists of last century, with their attempts to classify the peoples of the
earth according to linguistic evidences, succeeded, as far as the layman
is concerned, chiefly in adding to the confusion by popularizing prema-
turely facts whose signification was improperly understood. The an-
thropologists of a more recent time, with their study of skull-shapes and
complexions, have sought to correct misapprehensions; but the popular
mind is still in a mist about the whole matter. In the following essay
Freeman brings his knowledge of modern scientific results and his
enormous historical information to the rescue of the bewildered student,
and does much to clear up the perplexing relations of race with language,
custom, and blood.

RACE AND LANGUAGE'

IT is no very great time since the readers o£ the English news-
papers were, perhaps a Uttle amused, perhaps a Httle startled,
at the story of a deputation of Hungarian students going to
Constantinople to present a sword of honor to an Ottoman general.
The address and the answer enlarged on the ancient kindred of
Turks and Magyars, on the long alienation of the dissevered kins-
folk, on the return of both in these later times to a remembrance of
the ancient kindred and to the friendly feelings to which such kin-
dred gave birth. The discourse has a strange sound when we remem-
ber the reigns of Sigismund and Wladislaus, when we think of the
dark days of Nikopohs and Varna, when we think of Huniades
encamped at the foot of Haemus, and of Belgrade beating back
Mahomet the Conqueror from her gates. The Magyar and the
Ottoman embracing with the joy of reunited kinsfolk is a sight
which certainly no man would have looked forward to in the
fourteenth or fifteenth century. At an earlier time the ceremony
might have seemed a degree less wonderful. If a man whose ideas
are drawn wholly from the modern map should sit down to study
the writings of Constantine Porphyrogennetos, he would perhaps be
startled at finding Turks and Franks spoken of as neighbors, at
finding Turcia and Francia — we must not translate TovpKia and
^payyLa by Turkey and France — spoken of as border-lands. A little
study will perhaps show him that the change lies almost wholly in
the names and not in the boundaries. The lands are there still, and
the frontier between them has shifted much less than one might have
looked for in nine hundred years. Nor has there been any great
change in the population of the two countries. The Turks and the
Franks of the Imperial geographer are there still, in the lands which
he calls Turcia and Francia; only we no longer speak of them as
Turks and Franks. The Turks of Constantine are Magyars; the

■ From "Historical Essays," Third Series, 1879.
227

228 FREEMAN

Franks of Constantine are Germans. The Magyar students may not
unlikely have turned over the Imperial pages, and they may have
seen how^ their forefathers stand described there. We can hardly
fancy that the Ottoman general is likely to have given much time
to lore of such a kind. Yet the Ottoman answer was as brimful of
ethnological and antiquarian sympathy as the Magyar address. It
is hardly to be believed that a Turk, left to himself, would by his
own efforts have found out the primeval kindred between Turk
and Magyar. He might remember that Magyar exiles had found a
safe shelter on Ottoman territory; he might look deep enough into
the politics of the present moment to see that the rule of Turk and
Magyar alike is threatened by the growth of Slavonic national life.
But the idea that Magyar and Turk owe each other any love or
any duty, directly on the ground of primeval kindred, is certainly
not likely to have presented itself to the untutored Ottoman mind.
In short, it sounds, as some one said at the time, rather like the dream
of a professor who has run wild with an ethnological craze, than
like the serious thought of a practical man of any nation. Yet the
Magyar students seem to have meant their address quite seriously.
And the Turkish general, if he did not take it seriously, at least
thought it wise to shape his answer as if he did. As a piece of prac-
tical politics, it sounds like Frederick Barbarossa threatening to
avenge the defeat of Crassus upon Saladin, or like the French of the
revolutionary wars making the Pope Pius of those days answerable
for the wrongs of Vercingetorix. The thing sounds like comedy,
almost like conscious comedy. But it is a kind of comedy which may
become tragedy, if the idea from which it springs get so deeply
rooted in men's minds as to lead to any practical consequences. As
long as talk of this kind does not get beyond the world of hot-headed
students, it may pass for a craze. It would be more than a craze, if it
should be so widely taken up on either side that the statesmen on
either side find it expedient to profess to take it up also.

To allege the real or supposed primeval kindred between Magyars
and Ottomans as a ground for political action, or at least for political
sympathy, in the affairs of the present moment, is an extreme case —
some may be inclined to call it a reductio ad absurdum — of a whole
range of doctrines and sentiments which have in modern days gained

RACE AND LANGUAGE 229

a great power over men's minds. They have gained so great a powder
that those who may regret their influence cannot afford to despise
it. To make any practical inference from the primeval kindred of
Magyar and Turk is indeed pushing the doctrine of race, and of
sympathies arising from race, as far as it well can be pushed. With-
out plunging into any very deep mysteries, without committing
ourselves to any dangerous theories in the darker regions of ethno-
logical inquiry, we may perhaps be allowed at starting to doubt
whether there is any real primeval kindred between the Ottoman
and the Finnish Magyar. It is for those who have gone specially
deep into the antiquities of the non-Aryan races to say whether there
is or is not. At all events, as far as the great facts of history go, the
kindred is of the vaguest and most shadowy kind. It comes to little
more than the fact that Magyars and Ottomans are alike non-Aryan
invaders who have made their way into Europe within recorded
times, and that both have, rightly or wrongly, been called by the
name of Turks. These do seem rather slender grounds on which
to build up a fabric of national sympathy between two nations, when
several centuries of living practical history all pull the other way. It
is hard to believe that the kindred of Turk and Magyar was thought
of when a Turkish pacha ruled at Buda. Doubtless Hungarian
Protestants often deemed, and not unreasonably deemed, that the
contemptuous toleration of the Moslem sultan was a lighter yoke
than the persecution of the Catholic emperor. But it was hardly on
grounds of primeval kindred that they made the choice. The ethno-
logical dialogue held at Constantinople does indeed sound like
ethnological theory run mad. But it is the very wildness of the
thing which gives it its importance. The doctrine of race, and of
sympathies springing from race, must have taken very firm hold
indeed of men's minds before it could be carried out in a shape which
we are tempted to call so grotesque as this.

The plain fact is that the new lines of scientific and historical
inquiry which have been opened in modern times have had a distinct
and deep effect upon the politics of the age. The fact may be esti-
mated in many ways, but its existence as a fact cannot be denied.
Not in a merely scientific or literary point of view, but in one strictly
practical, the world is not the same world as it was when men had

230 FREEMAN

not yet dreamed of the kindred between Sanscrit, Greek, and Eng-
lish, when it was looked on as something of a paradox to him that
there was a distinction between Celtic and Teutonic tongues and
nations. Ethnological and philological researches — I do not forget
the distinction between the two, but for the present I must group
them together — have opened the way for new national sympathies,
new national antipathies, such as would have been unintelligible a
hundred years ago. A hundred years ago a man's political likes and
dishkes seldom went beyond the range which was suggested by the
place of his birth or immediate descent. Such birth or descent made
him a member of this or that political community, a subject of this
or that prince, a citizen — perhaps a subject — of this or that common-
wealth. The political community of which he was a member had
its traditional alliances and traditional enmities, and by those alli-
ances and enmities the likes and dislikes of the members of that
community were guided. But those traditional alliances and enmities
were seldom determined by theories about language or race. The
people of this or that place might be discontented under a foreign
government; but, as a rule, they were discontented only if subjection
to that foreign government brought with it personal oppression or
at least political degradation. Regard or disregard of some purely
local privilege or local feeUng went for more than the fact of a gov-
ernment being native or foreign. What we now call the sentiment
of nationality did not go for much; what we call the sentiment of
race went for nothing at all. Only a few men here and there would
have understood the feelings which have led to those two great
events of our own time, the political reunion of the German and
ItaHan nations after their long political dissolution. Not a soul would
have understood the feelings which have allowed Panslavism to be a
great practical agent in the affairs of Europe, and which have made
talk about "the Latin race," if not practical, at least possible. Least
of all, would it have been possible to give any touch of political
importance to what would have then seemed so wild a dream as a
primeval kindred between Magyar and Ottoman.

That feelings such as these, and the practical consequences which
have flowed from them, are distincdy due to scientific and historical
teaching there can, I think, be no doubt. Religious sympathy and

RACE AND LANGUAGE 23 1

purely national sympathy are both feelings of much simpler growth,
which need no deep knowledge nor any special teaching. The cry
which resounded through Christendom when the Holy City was
taken by the Mussulmans, the cry which resounded through Islam
when the same city was taken by the Christians, the spirit which
armed England to support French Huguenots and which armed
Spain to support French Leaguers, all spring from motives which Ue
on the surface. Nor need we seek for any explanation but such as
lies on the surface for the natural wish for closer union which arose
among Germans or Italians who found themselves parted off by
purely dynastic arrangements from men who were their countrymen
in everything else. Such a feeling has to strive with the counter-
feeling which springs from local jealousies and local dislikes; but
it is a perfectly simple feeling, which needs no subtle research either
to arouse or to understand it. So, if we draw our illustrations from
the events of our own time, there is nothing but what is perfectly
simple in the feeling which calls Russia, as the most powerful of
Orthodox states, to the help of her Orthodox brethren everywhere,
and which calls the members of the Orthodox Church everywhere to
look to Russia as their protector. The feeling may have to strive
against a crowd of purely political considerations, and by those
purely political considerations it may be outweighed. But the feel-
ing is in itself altogether simple and natural. So again, the people
of Montenegro and of the neighboring lands in Herzegovina and
by the Bocche of Cattaro feel themselves countrymen in every sense
but the political accident which keeps them asunder. They are drawn
together by a tie which everyone can understand, by the same tie
which would draw together the people of three adjoining English
counties, if any strange political action should part them asunder
in like manner. The feeling here is that of nationality in the strictest
sense, nationality in a purely local or geographical sense. It would
exist all the same if Panslavism had never been heard of; it might
exist though those who feel it had never heard of the Slavonic race
at all. It is altogether another thing when we come to the doctrine
of race, and of sympathies founded on race, in the wider sense. Here
we have a feeling which professes to bind together, and which as a
matter of fact has had a real effect in binding together, men whose

232 FREEMAN

kindred to one another is not so obvious at first sight as the kindred
of Germans, Italians, or Serbs who are kept asunder by nothing but
a purely artificial political boundary. It is a feeling at whose bidding
the call to union goes forth to men whose dwellings are geograph-
ically far apart, to men who may have had no direct dealings with
one another for years or for ages, to men whose languages, though
the scholar may at once see that they are closely akin, may not be
so closely akin as to be mutually intelligible for common purposes.
A hundred years back the Servian might have cried for help to the
Russian on the ground of common Orthodox faith; he would hardly
have called for help on the ground of common Slavonic speech and
origin. If he had done so, it would have been rather by way of
grasping at any chance, however desperate or far-fetched, than as
putting forward a serious and well understood claim which he might
expect to find accepted and acted on by large masses of men. He
might have received help, either out of genuine sympathy springing
from community of faith or from the baser thought that he could
be made use of as a convenient political tool. He would have got
but little help purely on the ground of a community of blood and
speech which had had no practical result for ages. When Russia in
earlier days interfered between the Turk and his Christian subjects,
there is no sign of any sympathy felt or possessed for Slaves as
Slaves. Russia dealt with Montenegro, not, as far as one can see,
out of any Slavonic brotherhood, but because an independent Ortho-
dox State at enmity with the Turk could not fail to be a useful ally.
The earlier dealings of Russia with the subject nations were far
more busy among the Greeks than among the Slaves. In fact, till
quite lately all the Orthodox subjects of the Turk were in most
European eyes looked on as alike Greeks. The Orthodox Church
has been commonly known as the Greek Church; and it has often
been very hard to make people understand that the vast mass of
the members of that so-called Greek Church are not Greek in any
other sense. In truth we may doubt whether, till comparatively
lately, the subject nations themselves were fully alive to the differ-
ences of race and speech among them. A man must in all times
and places know whether he speaks the same language as another
man; but he does not always go on to put his consciousness of differ-

RACE AND LANGUAGE 233

ence into the shape o£ a sharply drawn formula. Still less does he
always make the difference the ground of any practical course of
action. The Englishman in the first days of the Norman Conquest
felt the hardships of foreign rule, and he knew that those hardships
were owing to foreign rule. But he had not learned to put his sense
of hardship into any formula about an oppressed nationality. So,
when the policy of the Turk found that the subtle intellect of the
Greek could be made use of as an instrument of dominion over the
other subject nations, the Bulgarian felt the hardship of the state of
things in which, as it was proverbially said, his body was in bondage
to the Turk and his soul in bondage to the Greek. But we may sus-
pect that this neatly turned proverb dates only from the awakening
of a distinctly national Bulgarian feeling in modern times. The Turk
was felt to be an intruder and an enemy, because his rule was that
of an open oppressor belonging to another creed. The Greek, on the
other hand, though his spiritual dominion brought undoubted
practical evils with it, was not felt to be an intruder and an enemy
in the same sense. His quicker intellect and superior refinement
made him a model. The Bulgarian imitated the Greek tongue and
Greek manners; he was willing in other lands to be himself looked
on as a Greek. It is only in quite modern times, under the direct
influence of the preaching of the doctrine of race, that a hard and
fast line has been drawn between Greeks and Bulgarians. That
doctrine has cut two ways. It has given both nations, Greek and Bul-
garian alike, a renewed national life, national strength, national
hopes, such as neither of them had felt for ages. In so doing, it has
done one of the best and most hopeful works of the age. But in so
doing, it has created one of the most dangerous of immediate political
difficulties. In calling two nations into a renewed being, it has
arrayed them in enmity against each other, and that in the face of
a common enemy in whose presence all lesser differences and jeal-
ousies ought to be hushed into silence.

There is then a distinct doctrine of race, and of sympathies
founded on race, distinct from the feeling of community of religion,
and distinct from the feeling of nationality in the narrower sense.
It is not so simple or easy a feeling as either of those two. It does
not in the same way lie on the surface; it is not in the same way

234 FREEMAN

grounded on obvious facts which are plain to every man's under-
standing. The doctrine of race is essentially an artificial doctrine, a
learned doctrine. It is an inference from facts which the mass of
mankind could never have found out for themselves; facts which,
without a distinctly learned teaching, could never be brought home
to them in any intelligible shape. Now what is the value of such a
doctrine? Does it follow that, because it is confessedly artificial,
because it springs, not from a spontaneous impulse, but from a
learned teaching, it is therefore necessarily foolish, mischievous, per-
haps unnatural? It may perhaps be safer to hold that like many
other doctrines, many other sentiments, it is neither universally good
nor universally bad, neither inherently wise nor inherently foolish.
It may be safer to hold that it may, like other doctrines and senti-
ments, have a range within which it may work for good, while in
some other range it may work for evil. It may in short be a doctrine
which is neither to be rashly accepted, nor rashly cast aside, but one
which may need to be guided, regulated, modified, according to
time, place, and circumstance. I am not now called on so much to
estimate the practical good and evil of the doctrine as to work out
what the doctrine itself is, and to try to explain some difficulties
about it, but I must emphatically say that nothing can be more shal-
low, nothing more foolish, nothing more purely sentimental, than
the talk of those who think that they can simply laugh down or
shriek down any doctrine or sentiment which they themselves do
not understand. A belief or a feeling which has a practical effect on
the conduct of great masses of men, sometimes on the conduct of
whole nations, may be very false and very mischievous; but it is in
every case a great and serious fact, to be looked gravely in the face.
Men who sit at their ease and think that all wisdom is confined to
themselves and their own clique may think themselves vastly supe-
rior to the great emotions which stir our times, as they would doubt-
less have thought themselves vastly superior to. the emotions which
stirred the first Saracens or the first Crusaders. But the emotions
are there all the same, and they do their work all the same. The
most highly educated man in the most highly educated society can-
not sneer them out of being.

RACE AND LANGUAGE 235

But it is time to pass to the more strictly scientific aspect of the
subject. The doctrine of race, in its popular form, is the direct off-
spring of the study of scientific philology; and yet it is just now, in
its popular form at least, somewhat under the ban of scientific philol-
ogers. There is nothing very wonderful in this. It is in fact the
natural course of things which might almost have been reckoned on
beforehand. When the popular mind gets hold of a truth it seldom
gets hold of it with strict scientific precision. It commonly gets hold
of one side of the truth; it puts forth that side of the truth only. It
puts that side forth in a form which may not be in itself distorted
or exaggerated, but which practically becomes distorted and exag-
gerated, because other sides of the same truth are not brought into
their due relation with it. The popular idea thus takes a shape which
is naturally offensive to men of strict precision, and which men of
strict scientific precision have naturally, and from their own point of
view quite rightly, risen up to rebuke. Yet it may often happen that,
while the scientific statement is the only true one for scientific pur-
poses, the popular version may also have a kind of practical truth
for the somewhat rough and ready purposes of a popular version.
In our present case scientific philologers are beginning to complain,
with perfect truth and perfect justice from their own point of view,
that the popular doctrine of race confounds race and language.
They tell us, and they do right to tell us, that language is no certain
test of race, that men who speak the same tongue are not therefore
necessarily men of the same blood. And they tell us further, that
from whatever quarter the alleged popular confusion came, it cer-
tainly did not come from any teaching of scientific philologers.

The truth of all this cannot be called in question. We have too
many instances in recorded history of nations laying aside the use
of one language and taking to the use of another, for anyone who
cares for accuracy to set down language as any sure test of race. In
fact, the studies of the philologer and those of the ethnologer strictly
so called are quite distinct, and they deal with two wholly different
sets of phenomena. The science of the ethnologer is stricdy a physi-
cal science. He has to deal with purely physical phenomena; his
business lies with the different varieties of the human body, and

236 FREEMAN

specially, to take that branch of his inquiries which most impresses
the unlearned, with the various conformations of the human skull.
His researches differ in nothing from those of the zoologist or the
paleontologist, except that he has to deal with the physical phenom-
ena of man, while they deal with the physical phenomena of other
animals. He groups the different races of men exactly as the others
group the genera and species of living or extinct mammals or reptiles.
The student of ethnology as a physical science may indeed strengthen
his conclusions by evidence of other kinds, evidence from arms,
ornaments, pottery, modes of burial. But all these are secondary;
the primary ground of classification is the physical conformation of
man himself. As to language, the ethnological method, left to itself,
can find out nothing whatever. The science of the ethnologer then,
is primarily physical; it is historical only in that secondary sense in
which paleontology, and geology itself, may fairly be called historical.
It arranges the varieties of mankind according to a strictly physical
classification; what the language of each variety may have been, it
leaves to the professors of another branch of study to find out.

The science of the philologer, on the other hand, is strictly his-
torical. There is doubtless a secondary sense in which purely philo-
logical science may be fairly called physical, just as there is a
secondary sense in which pure ethnology may be called historical.
That is to say, philology has to deal with physical phenomena, so
far as it has to deal with the physical aspect of the sounds of which
human language is made up. Its primary business, like the primary
business of any other historical science, is to deal with phenomena
which do not depend on physical laws, but which do depend on the
human will. The science of language is, in this respect, like the
science of human institutions or of human beliefs. Its subject-matter
is not, like that of pure ethnology, what man is, but, like that of
any other historical science, what man does. It is plain that no man's
will can have any direct influence on the shape of his skull. I say
no direct influence, because it is not for me to rule how far habits,
places of abode, modes of life, a thousand things which do come
under the control of the human will, may indirectly affect the physi-
cal conformation of a man himself or of his descendants. Some
observers have made the remark that men of civilized nations who

RACE AND LANGUAGE 237

live in a degraded social state do actually approach to the physical
type of inferior races. However this may be, it is quite certain, that,
as no man can by taking thought add a cubit to his stature, so no
man can by taking thought make his skull brachycephalic or dolicho-
cephalic. But the language which a man speaks does depend upon
his will; he can by taking thought make his speech Romance or
Teutonic. No doubt he has in most cases practically no choice in
the matter. The language which he speaks is practically deter-
mined for him by fashion, habit, early teaching, a crowd of things
over which he has practically no control. But still the control is
not physical and inevitable, as it is in the case of the shape of his
skull. If we say that he cannot help speaking in a particular
way; that is, that he cannot help speaking a particular language,
this simply means that his circumstances are such that no other
way of speaking presents itself to his mind. And in many cases,
he has a real choice between two or more ways of speaking;
that is, between two or more languages. Every word that a man
speaks is the result of a real, though doubtless unconscious, act of his
free will. We are apt to speak of gradual changes in languages,
as in institutions or anything else, as if they were the result of a
physical law, acting upon beings who had no choice in the matter.
Yet every change of the kind is simply the aggregate of various
acts of the will on the part of all concerned. Every change in speech,
every introduction of a new sound or a new word, was really the
result of an act of the will of some one or other. The choice may
have been unconscious; circumstances may have been such as
practically to give him but one choice; still he did choose; he spoke
in one way, when there was no physical hinderance to his speak-
ing in another way, when there was no physical compulsion to
speak at all. The Gauls need not have changed their own language
for Latin; the change was not the result of a physical necessity, but
of a number of acts of the will on the part of this and that Gaul.
Moral causes directed their choice, and determined that Gaul should
become a Latin-speaking land. But whether the skulls of the Gauls
should be long or short, whether their hair should be black or
yellow, those were points over which the Gauls themselves had
no direct control whatever.

238 FREEMAN

The study of men's skulls then is a study which is strictly physical,
a study of facts over which the will of man has no direct control.
The study of men's languages is strictly an historical study, a study
of facts over which the will of man has a direct control. It follows
therefore from the very nature of the two studies that language
cannot be an absolutely certain test of physical descent. A man
cannot, under any circumstances, choose his own skull; he may,
under some circumstances, choose his own language. He must
keep the skull which has been given him by his parents; he cannot,
by any process of taking thought, determine what kind of skull he
will hand on to his own children. But he may give up the use of the
language which he has learned from his parents, and he may deter-
mine what language he will teach to his children. The physical
characteristics of a race are unchangeable, or are changed only by
influences over which the race itself has no direct control. The
language which the race speaks may be changed, either by a con-
scious act of the will or by that power of fashion which is in truth
the aggregate of countless unconscious acts of the will. And, as
the very nature of the case thus shows that language is no sure test
of race, so the facts of recorded history equally prove the same
truth. Both individuals and whole nations do in fact often exchange
the language of their forefathers for some other language. A man
settles in a foreign country. He learns the language of that country;
sometimes he forgets the use of his own language. His children may
perhaps speak both tongues; if they speak one tongue only, it will
be the tongue of the country where they live. In a generation or
two all trace of foreign origin will have passed away. Here then
language is no test of race. If the great-grandchildren speak the
language of their great-grandfathers, it will simply be as they may
speak any other foreign language. Here are men who by speech
belong to one nation, by actual descent to another. If they lose the
physical characteristics of the race to which the original settler
belonged, it will be due to inter-marriage, to climate, to some cause
altogether independent of language. Every nation will have some
adopted children of this kind, more or fewer; men who belong
to it by speech, but who do not belong to it by race. And what
happens in the case of individuals happens in the case of whole

RACE AND LANGUAGE 239

nations. The pages of history are crowded with cases in which
nations have cast aside the tongue of their forefathers, and have
taken instead the tongue of some other people. Greek in the East,
Latin in the West, became the famihar speech of millions who had
not a drop of Greek or Italian blood in their veins. The same has
been the case in later times with Arabic, Persian, Spanish, German,
English. Each of those tongues has become the familiar speech of
vast regions where the mass of the people are not Arabian, Spanish,
or English, otherwise than by adoption. The Briton of Cornwall has,
slowly but in the end thoroughly, adopted the speech of England.
In the American continent full-blooded Indians preside over com-
monwealths which speak the tongue of Cortes and Pizarro. In the
lands to which all eyes are now turned, the Greek, who has been
busily assimilating strangers ever since he first planted his colonies
in Asia and Sicily, goes on busily assimilating his Albanian neigh-
bors. And between renegades, janizaries, and mothers of all nations,
the blood of many a Turk must be physically anything rather than
Turkish. The inherent nature of the case, and the witness of
recorded history, join together to prove that language is no certain
test of race, and that the scientific philologers are doing good service
to accuracy of expression and accuracy of thought by emphatically
calling attention to the fact that language is no such test.

But on the other hand, it is quite possible that the truth to which
our attention is just now most fittingly called may, if put forth
too broadly and without certain qualifications, lead to error quite
as great as the error at which it is aimed. I do not suppose that
anyone ever thought that language was, necessarily and in all cases,
an absolute and certain test. If anybody does think so, he has put
himself altogether out of court by shutting his eyes to the most
manifest facts of the case. But there can be no doubt that many
people have given too much importance to language as a test of
race. Though they have not wholly forgotten the facts which tell
the other way, they have not brought them out with enough
prominence. But I can also believe that many people have written
and spoken on the subject in a way which cannot be justified from
a strictly scientific point of view, but which may have been fully
justified from the point of view of the writers and speakers them-

240 FREEMAN

selves. It may often happen that a way of speaking may not be
scientifically accurate, but may yet be quite near enough to the
truth for the purposes of the matter in hand. It may, for some
practical or even historical purpose, be really more true than the
statement which is scientifically more exact. Language is no certain
test of race; but if a man, struck by this wholesome warning, should
run off into the belief that language and race have absolutely
nothing to do with one another, he had better have gone without
the warning. For in such a case the last error would be worse than the
first. The natural instinct of mankind connects race and language.
It does not assume that language is an infallible test of race; but it
does assume that language and race have something to do with one
another. It assumes, that though language is not an accurately
scientific test of race, yet it is a rough and ready test which does for
many practical purposes. To make something more of an exact
definition, one might say, that though language is not a test of race,
it is, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, a presumption of
race; that though it is not a test of race, yet it is a test of something
which, for many practical purposes, is the same as race.

Professor Max Miiller warned us long ago that we must not speak
of a Celtic skull. Mr. Sayce has more lately warned us that we must
not infer from community of Aryan speech that there is any
kindred in blood between this or that Englishman and this or that
Hindoo. And both warnings are scientifically true. Yet anyone
who begins his studies on these matters with Professor Miiller's
famous Oxford Essay will practically come to another way of look-
ing at things. He will fill his mind with a vivid picture of the great
Aryan family, as yet one, dwelling in one place, speaking one
tongue, having already taken the first steps towards settled society,
recognizing the domestic relations, possessing the first rudiments
of government and religion, and calling all these first elements of
culture by names of which traces still abide here and there among
the many nations of the common stock. He will go on to draw
pictures equally vivid of the several branches of the family parting
off from the primeval home. One great branch he will see going
to the southeast, to become the forefathers of the vast, yet isolated
colony in the Asiatic lands of Persia and India. He watches the

RACE AND LANGUAGE 24 1

remaining mass sending off wave after wave, to become the fore-
fathers of the nations of historical Europe. He traces out how each
branch starts with its own share of the common stock — how the
language, the creed, the institutions, once common to all, grow up
into different, yet kindred, shapes, among the many parted branches
which grew up, each with an independent life and strength of its
own. This is what our instructors set before us as the true origin
of nations and their languages. And, in drawing out the picture,
we cannot avoid, our teachers themselves do not avoid, the use of
words which imply that the strictly family relation, the relation
of community of blood, is at the root of the whole matter. We cannot
help talking about the family and its branches, about parents,
children, brothers, sisters, cousins. The nomenclature of natural
kindred exactly fits the case; it fits it so exactly that no other nomen-
clature could enable us to set forth the case with any clearness. Yet
we cannot be absolutely certain that there was any real community
of blood in the whole story. We really know nothing of the origin
of language or the origin of society. We may make a thousand
ingenious guesses; but we cannot prove any of them. It may be
that the group which came together, and which formed the
primeval society which spoke the primeval Aryan tongue, were
not brought together by community of blood, but by some other
cause which threw them in one another's way. If we accept the
Hebrew genealogies, they need not have had any community of
blood nearer than common descent from Adam and Noah. That
is, they need not have been all children of Shem, of Ham, or of
Japheth; some children of Shem, some of Ham, and some of
Japheth may have been led by some cause to settle together. Or if
we believe in independent creations of men, or in the development
of men out of mollusks, the whole of the original society need not
have been descendants of the same man or the same mollusk. In
short, there is no theory of the origin of man which requires us to
believe that the primeval Aryans were a natural family; they may
have been more like an accidental party of fellow-travelers. And if
we accept them as a natural family, it does not follow that the
various branches which grew into separate races and nations, speak-
ing separate though kindred languages, were necessarily marked

242 FREEMAN

off by more immediate kindred. It may be that there is no nearer
kindred in blood between this or that Persian, this or that Greek,
this or that Teuton, than the general kindred of all Aryans. For,
when this or that party marched off from the common home, it does
not follow that those who marched off together were necessarily
immediate brothers or cousins. The party which grew into Hindoos
or Teutons may not have been made up exclusively of one set of
near kinsfolk. Some of the children of the same parents or fore-
fathers may have marched one way, while others marched another
way, or stayed behind. We may, if we please, indulge our fancy
by conceiving that there may actually be family distinctions older
than distinctions of nation and race. It may be that the Gothic
Amali and the Roman Mmilii — I throw out the idea as a mere
illustration — were branches of a family which had taken a name
before the division of Teuton and Italian. Some of the members
of that family may have joined the band of which came the Goths,
while other members joined the band of which came the Romans.
There is no difference but the length of time to distinguish such
a supposed case from the case of an English family, one branch
of which settled in the seventeenth century at Boston in Massachu-
setts, while another branch stayed behind at Boston in Holland.
Mr, Sayce says truly that the use of a kindred language does not
prove that the Englishman and the Hindoo are really akin in race;
for, as he adds, many Hindoos are men of non-Aryan race who
have simply learned to speak tongues of Sanscrit origin. He might
have gone on to say, with equal truth, that there is no positive
certainty that there was any community in blood among the original
Aryan group itself, and that if we admit such community of blood
in the original Aryan group, it does not follow that there is any
further special kindred between Hindoo and Hindoo or between
Englishman and Englishman. The original group may not have
been a family, but an artificial union. And if it was a family, those
of its members who marched together east or west or north or
south may have had no tie of kindred beyond the common cousin-
ship of all.

Now the tendency of this kind of argument is to lead to some-
thing a good deal more startling than the doctrine that language is

RACE AND LANGUAGE 243

no certain test of race. Its tendency is to go on further, and to show
that race is no certain test of community of blood. And this comes
pretty nearly to saying that there is no such thing as race at all.
For our whole conception of race starts from the idea of community
of blood. If the word "race" does not mean community of blood,
it is hard to see what it does mean. Yet it is certain that there can
be no positive proof of real community of blood, even among those
groups of mankind which we instinctively speak of as families and
races. It is not merely that the blood has been mingled in after-
times; there is no positive proof that there was any community of
blood in the beginning. No living Englishman can prove with
absolute certainty that he comes in the male line of any of the
Teutonic settlers in Britain in the fifth or sixth centuries. I say in
the male line, because anyone who is descended from any English
king can prove such descent, though he can prove it only through
a long and complicated web of female successions. But we may
be sure that in no other case can such a pedigree be proved by the
kind of proof which lawyers would require to make out the title
to an estate or a peerage. The actual forefathers of the modern
Englishman may chance to have been, not true-born Angles or
Saxons, but Britons, Scots, in later days Frenchmen, Flemings, men
of any other nation who learned to speak English and took to them-
selves English names. But supposing that a man could make out
such a pedigree, supposing that he could prove that he came in
the male line of some follower of Hengest or Cerdic, he would be
no nearer to proving original community of blood either in the par-
ticular Teutonic race or in the general Aryan family. If direct
evidence is demanded, we must give up the whole doctrine of
families and races, as far as we take language, manners, institutions,
anything but physical conformation, as the distinguishing marks
of races and families. That is to say, if we wish never to use any
word of whose accuracy we cannot be perfectly certain, we must
leave off speaking of races and families at all from any but the
purely physical side. We must content ourselves with saying that
certain groups of mankind have a common history, that they have
languages, creeds, and institutions in common, but that we have
no evidence whatever to show how they came to have languages,

244 FREEMAN

creeds, and institutions in common. We cannot say for certain what
was the tie which brought the members of the original group
together, any more than we can name the exact time and the exact
place when and where they came together.

We may thus seem to be landed in a howling wilderness of
scientific uncertainty. The result of pushing our inquiries so far
may seem to be to show that we really know nothing at all. But
in truth the uncertainty is no greater than the uncertainty which
attends all inquiries in the historical sciences. Though a historical
fact may be recorded in the most trustworthy documents, though
it may have happened in our own times, though we may have
seen it happen with our own eyes, yet we cannot have the same
certainty about it as the mathematician has about the proposition
which he proves to absolute demonstration. We cannot have even
that lower degree of certainty which the geologist has with regard
to the order of succession between this and that stratum. For in
all historical inquiries we are dealing with facts which themselves
come within the control of human will and human caprice, and
the evidence for which depends on the trustworthiness of human
informants, who may either purposely deceive or unwittingly mis-
lead. A man may lie; he may err. The triangles and the rocks
can neither lie nor err. I may with my own eyes see a certain man
do a certain act; he may tell me himself, or some one else may tell
me, that he is the same man who did some other act; but as to his
statement I cannot have absolute certainty, and no one but myself
can have absolute certainty as to the statement which I make as
to the facts which I saw with my own eyes. Historical evidence
may range through every degree, from the barest likelihood to that
undoubted moral certainty on which every man acts without hesi-
tation in practical affairs. But it cannot get beyond this last
standard. If, then, we are ever to use words like race, family, or even
nation, to denote groups of mankind marked off by any kind of
historical, as distinguished from physical, characteristics, we must
be content to use those words, as we use many other words, without
being able to prove that our use of them is accurate, as mathema-
ticians judge of accuracy. I cannot be quite sure that William the
Conqueror landed at Pevensey, though I have strong reasons for

RACE AND LANGUAGE 245

believing that he did so. And I have strong reasons for beUeving
many facts about race and language about which I am much
further from being quite sure than I am about William's landing
at Pevensey. In short, in all these matters, we must be satisfied to
let presumption very largely take the place of actual proof; and, if
we only let presumption in, most of our difficulties at once fly away.
Language is no certain test of race; but it is a presumption of race.
Community of race, as we commonly understand race, is no certain
proof of original community of blood; but it is a presumption of
original community of blood. The presumption amounts to moral
proof, if only we do not insist on proving such physical community
of blood as would satisfy a genealogist. It amounts to moral proof,
if all that we seek is to establish a relation in which the community
of blood is the leading idea, and in which where natural community
of blood does not exist, its place is supplied by something which by
a legal fiction is looked upon as its equivalent.

If, then, we do not ask for scientific, for what we may call
physical, accuracy, but if we are satisfied with the kind of proof
which is all that we can ever get in the historical sciences — if we are
satisfied to speak in a way which is true for popular and practical
purposes — then we may say that language has a great deal to do
with race, as race is commonly understood, and that race has a
great deal to do with community of blood. If we once admit the
Roman doctrine of adoption, our whole course is clear. The natural
family is the starting-point of everything; but we must give the
natural family the power of artificially enlarging itself by admitting
adoptive members. A group of mankind is thus formed, in which
it does not follow that all the members have any natural community
of blood, but in which community of blood is the starting-point, in
which those who are connected by natural community of blood form
the original body within whose circle the artificial members are
admitted. A group of mankind thus formed is something quite
different from a fortuitous concurrence of atoms. Three or four
brothers by blood, with a fourth or fifth man whom they agree to
look on as filling in everything the same place as a brother by
blood, form a group which is quite unlike a union of four or five
men, none of whom is bound by any tie of blood to any of the

246 FREEMAN

Others. In the latter kind of union the notion of kindred does not
come in at all. In the former kind the notion of kindred is the
groundwork of everything; it determines the character of every
relation and every action, even though the kindred between some
members of the society and others may be owing to a legal fiction
and not to natural descent. All that we know of the growth of
tribes, races, nations, leads us to believe that they grew in this way-
Natural kindred was the groundwork, the leading and determining
idea; but, by one of those legal fictions which have such an influence
on all institutions, adoption was in certain cases allowed to count
as natural kindred.^

The usage of all language shows that community of blood was
the leading idea in forming the greater and smaller groups of man-
kind. Words like <j)v\ov, yevos, gens, natio, \in, all point to the
natural family as the origin of all society. The family in the nar-
rower sense, the children of one father in one house, grew into a
more extended family, the gens. Such were the Alkmaionidai, the
Julii, or the Scyldingas, the real or artificial descendants of a real
or supposed forefather. The nature of the gens has been set forth
often enough. If it is a mistake to fancy that every Julius or Cor-
nelius was the natural kinsman of every other Julius or Cornelius,
it is equally a mistake to think that the gens Julia or Cornelia was
in its origin a mere artificial association, into which the idea of
natural kindred did not enter. It is indeed possible that really
artificial gentes, groups of men of whom it might chance that none
were natural kinsmen, were formed in later times after the model
of the original gentes. Still such imitation would bear witness to
the original conception of the gens. It would be the doctrine of
adoption turned the other way; instead of a father adopting a son,
a number of men would agree to adopt a common father. The
family then grew into the gens; the union of gentes formed the
State, the political community, which in its first form was commonly
a tribe. Then came the nation, formed of a union of tribes. Kin-

^I am here applying to this particular purpose a line of thought which both myself
and others have often applied to other purposes. See, above all, Sir Henry Maine's
lecture "On Kinship as the Basis of Society" in the lectures on the "Early History
of Institutions"; I would refer also to my own lecture on "The State" in "Com-
parative Politics."

RACE AND LANGUAGE 247

dred, real or artificial, is the one basis on which all society and all
government have grown up.

Now it is plain, that as soon as we admit the doctrine o£ artificial
kindred — that is, as soon as we allow the exercise of the law o£
adoption — ^physical purity of race is at an end. Adoption treats a
man as if he were the son of a certain father; it cannot really make
him the son of that father. If a brachycephalic father adopts a
dolichocephalic son, the legal act cannot change the shape of the
adopted son's skull. I will not undertake to say whether, not indeed
the rite of adoption, but the influences and circumstances which
would spring from it, might not, in the course of generations, affect
even the skull of the man who entered a certain gens, tribe, or
nation by artificial adoption only. If by any chance the adopted
son spoke a different language from the adopted father, the rite
of adoption itself would not of itself change his language. But it
would bring him under influences which would make him adopt
the language of his new gens by a conscious act of the will, and
which would make his children adopt it by the same unconscious
act of the will by which each child adopts the language of his
parents. The adopted son, still more the son of the adopted son,
became, in speech, in feelings, in worship, in everything but physical
descent, one with the gens into which he was adopted. He became
one of that gens for all practical, political, historical purposes. It is
only the physiologist who could deny his right to his new position.
The nature of the process is well expressed by a phrase of our own
law. When the nation — the word itself keeps about it the remem-
brance of birth as the groundwork of everything — adopts a new
citizen, that is, a new child of the State, he is said to be naturalized.
That is, a legal process puts him in the same position, and gives him
the same rights, as a man who is a citizen and a son by birth. It is
assumed that the rights of citizenship come by nature — that is, by
birth. The stranger is admitted to them only by a kind of artificial
birth; he is naturaUzed by law; his children are in a generation or
two naturalized in fact. There is now no practical distinction be-
tween the Englishman whose forefathers landed with William, or
even between . the Englishman whose forefathers sought shelter
from Alva or from Louis XIV, and the Englishman whose fore-

248 FREEMAN

fathers landed with Hengest. It is for the physiologist to say whether
any difference can be traced in their several skulls; for all practical
purposes, historical or political, all distinction between these several
classes has passed away.

We may, in short, say that the law of adoption runs through
everything, and that it may be practised on every scale. What
adoption is at the hands of the family, naturalization is at the hands
of the State. And the same process extends itself from adopted
or naturalized individuals to large classes of men, indeed to whole
nations. When the process takes place on this scale, we may best
call it assimilation. Thus Rome assimilated the continental nations
of western Europe to that degree that, allowing for a few survivals
here and there, not only Italy, but Gaul and Spain, became Roman.
The people of those lands, admitted step by step to the Roman
franchise, adopted the name and tongue of Romans. It must soon
have been hard to distinguish the Roman colonist in Gaul or Spain
from the native Gaul or Spaniard who had, as far as in him lay,
put on the guise of a Roman. This process of assimilation has gone
on everywhere and at all times. When two nations come in this
way into close contact with one another, it depends on a crowd of
circumstances which shall assimilate the other, or whether they
shall remain distinct without assimilation either way. Sometimes
the conquerors assimilate their subjects; sometimes they are assimi-
lated by their subjects; sometimes conquerors and subjects remain
distinct forever. When assimilation either way does take place, the
direction which it takes in each particular case will depend, partly
on their respective numbers, partly on their degrees of civilization.
A small number of less civilized conquerors will easily be lost among
a greater number of more civilized subjects, and that even though
they give their name to the land and people which they conquer.
The modern Frenchman represents, not the conquering Frank,
but the conquered Gaul, or, as he called himself, the conquered
Roman. The modern Bulgarian represents, not the Finnish con-
queror, but the conquered Slave. The modern Russian represents,
not the Scandinavian ruler, but the Slave who sent for the Scandi-
navian to rule over him. And so we might go on with endless other
cases. The point is that the process of adoption, naturalization,

RACE AND LANGUAGE 249

assimilation, has gone on everywhere. No nation can boast of abso-
lute purity of blood, though no doubt some nations come much
nearer to it than others. When I speak of purity of blood, I leave
out of sight the darker questions which I have already raised with
regard to the groups of mankind in days before recorded history. I
assume great groups like Celtic, Teutonic, Slavonic, as having what
we may call a real corporate existence, however we may hold that
that corporate existence began. My present point is that no existing
nation is, in the physiologist's sense of purity, purely Celtic, Teu-
tonic, Slavonic, or anything else. All races have assimilated a greater
or less amount of foreign elements. Taking this standard, one
which comes more nearly within the range of our actual knowledge
than the possibilities of unrecorded times, we may again say that,
from the purely scientific or physiological point of view, not only
is language no test of race, but that, at all events among the great
nations of the world, there is no such thing as purity of race
at all.

But, while we admit this truth, while we even insist upon it from
the strictly scientific point of view, we must be allowed to look at
it with different eyes from a more practical standing point. This
is the standing point, whether of history which is the politics of
the past, or of politics which are the history of the present. From
this point of view, we may say unhesitatingly that there are such
things as races and nations, and that to the grouping of those races
and nations language is the best guide. We cannot undertake to
define with any philosophical precision the exact distinction between
race and race, between nation and nation. Nor can we undertake
to define with the like precision in what way the distinctions between
race and race, between nation and nation, began. But all analogy
leads us to believe that tribes, nations, races, were all formed accord-
ing to the original model of the family, the family which starts from
the idea of the community of blood, but which allows artificial
adoption to be its legal equivalent. In all cases of adoption, naturali-
zation, assimilation, whether of individuals or of large classes of
men, the adopted person or class is adopted into an existing com-
munity. Their adoption undoubtedly influences the community
into which they are adopted. It at once destroys any claim on the

250 FREEMAN

part of that community to purity of blood, and it influences the
adopting community in many ways, physical and moral. A family,
a tribe, or a nation, which has largely recruited itself by adopted
members, cannot be the same as one which has never practised
adoption at all, but all whose members come of the original stock.
But the influence which the adopting community exercises upon
its adopted members is far greater than any influence which they
exercise upon it. It cannot change their blood; it cannot give them
new natural forefathers; but it may do everything short of this;
it may make them, in speech, in feeling, in thought, and in habit,
genuine members of the community which has artificially made
them its own. While there is not in any nation, in any race, any
such thing as strict purity of blood, yet there is in each nation, in
each race, a dominant element — or rather something more than an
element — something which is the true essence of the race or nation,
something which sets its standard and determines its character,
something which draws to itself and assimilates to itself all other
elements. It so works that all other elements are not coequal ele-
ments with itself, but mere infusions poured into an already exist-
ing body. Doubtless these infusions do in some measure influence
the body which assimilates them; but the influence which they
exercise is as nothing compared to the influence which they undergo.
We may say that they modify the character of the body into which
they are assimilated; they do not effect its personality. Thus, assum-
ing the great groups of mankind as primary facts, the origin of
which lies beyond our certain knowledge, we may speak of families
and races, of the great Aryan family and of the races into which
it parted, as groups which have a real, practical existence, as groups
founded on the ruling primeval idea of kindred, even though in
many cases the kindred may not be by natural descent, but only
by law of adoption. The Celtic, Teutonic, Slavonic races of man
are real living and abiding groups, the distinction between which
we must accept among the primary facts of history. And they go
on as living and abiding groups, even though we know that each
of them has assimilated many adopted members, sometimes from
other branches of the Aryan family, sometimes from races of men
alien to the whole Aryan stock. These races which, in a strictly

RACE AND LANGUAGE 25 I

physiological point of view, have no existence at all, have a real
existence from the more practical point of view of history and
politics. The Bulgarian calls to the Russian for help, and the Rus-
sian answers to his call for help, on the ground of their being
alike members of the one Slavonic race. It may be that, if we could
trace out the actual pedigree of this or that Bulgarian, of this or
that Russian, we might either find that there was no real kindred
between them, or we might find that there was a real kindred,
but a kindred which must be traced up to another stock than that
of the Slaves. In point of actual blood, instead of both being Slaves,
it may be that one of them comes, it may be that both of them come
of a stock which is not Slavonic or even Aryan. The Bulgarian
may chance to be a Bulgarian in a truer sense than he thinks for;
he may come of the blood of those original Finnish conquerors who
gave the Bulgarian name to the Slaves among whom they were
merged. And if this or that Bulgarian may chance to come of the
stock of Finnish conquerors assimilated by their Slavonic subjects,
this or that Russian may chance to come of the stock of Finnish
subjects assimilated by their Slavonic conquerors. It may then so
happen that the cry for help goes up, and is answered on a ground
of kindred which in the eye of the physiologist has no existence.
Or it may happen that the kindred is real in a way which neither
the suppliant nor his helper thinks of. But in either case, for the
practical purposes of human life, the plea is a good plea; the
kindred on which it is founded is a real kindred. It is good by the
law of adoption. It is good by the law the force of which we all
admit whenever we count a man as an Englishman whose fore-
fathers, two generations or twenty generations back, came to our
shores as strangers. For all practical purposes, for all the purposes
which guide men's actions, public or private, the Russian and the
Bulgarian, kinsmen so long parted, perhaps in very truth no natural
kinsmen at all, are members of the same race, bound together by
the common sentiment of race. They belong to the same race,
exactly as an Englishman whose forefathers came into Britain four-
teen hundred years back, and an Englishman whose forefathers
came only one or two hundred years back, are like members of the
same nation, bound together by a tie of common nationality.

252 FREEMAN

And now, having ruled that races and nations, though largely
formed by the workings of an artificial law, are still real and living
things, groups in which the idea of kindred is the idea around which
everything has grown, how are we to define our races and our
nations? How are we to mark them off one from the other? Bear-
ing in mind the cautions and qualifications which have been already
given, bearing in mind large classes of exceptions which will
presently be spoken of, I say unhesitatingly that for practical pur-
poses there is one test, and one only, and that that test is language.
It is hardly needful to show that races and nations cannot be
defined by the merely political arrangements which group men
under various governments. For some purposes of ordinary lan-
guage, for some purposes of ordinary politics, we are tempted,
sometimes driven, to take this standard. And in some parts of the
world, in our own western Europe for instance, nations and gov-
ernments do, in a rough way, fairly answer to one another. And,
in any case, political divisions are not without their influence on
the formation of national divisions, while national divisions ought
to have the greatest influence on political divisions. That is to say,
prima facie a nation and government should coincide. I say only
prima facie; for this is assuredly no inflexible rule; there are often
good reasons why it should be otherwise; only, whenever it is
otherwise, there should be some good reason forthcoming. It might
even be true that in no case did a government and a nation exactly
coincide, and yet it would none the less be the rule that a government
and a nation should coincide. That is to say, so far as a nation and
a government coincide, we accept it as the natural state of things,
and ask no question as to the cause. So far as they do not coincide,
we mark the case as exceptional, by asking what is the cause. And
by saying that a government and a nation should coincide we mean
that, as far as possible, the boundaries of governments should be so
laid out as to agree with the boundaries of nations. That is, we
assume the nation as something already existing, something pri-
mary, to which the secondary arrangements of government should,
as far as possible, conform. How then do we define the nation,
which is, if there is no especial reason to the contrary, to fix the
limits of a government? Primarily, I say, as a rule, but a rule

RACE AND LANGUAGE 253

subject to exception — as a primd facie standard, subject to special
reasons to the contrary — we define the nation by language. We
may at least apply the test negatively. It would be unsafe to rule
that all speakers of the same language must have a common na-
tionality; but we may safely say that where there is not community
of language, there is no common nationality in the highest sense.
It is true that without community of language there may be an
artificial nationality, a nationality which may be good for all political
purposes, and which may engender a common national feeling.
Still this is not quite the same thing as that fuller national unity
which is felt where there is community of language. In fact, man-
kind instinctively takes language as the badge of nationality. We
so far take it as the badge, that we instinctively assume community
of language in a nation as the rule, and we set down anything that
departs from that rule as an exception. The first idea suggested
by the word Frenchman or German or any other national name, is
that he is a man who speaks French or German as his mother-
tongue. We take for granted, in the absence of anything to make
us think otherwise, that a Frenchman is a speaker of French, and
that a speaker of French is a Frenchman. Where in any case it is
otherwise, we mark that case as an exception, and we ask the
special cause. Again, the rule is none the less the rule, nor the
exceptions the exceptions, because the exceptions may easily out-
number the instances which conform to the rule. The rule is still
the rule, because we take the instances which conform to it as a
matter of course, while in every case which does not conform to it
we ask for the explanation. All the larger countries of Europe pro-
vide us with exceptions; but we treat them all as exceptions. We do
not ask why a native of France speaks French. But when a native
of France speaks as his mother-tongue some other tongue than
French, when French, or something which popularly passes for
French, is spoken as his mother-tongue by someone who is not a
native of France, we at once ask the reason. And the reason will
be found in each case in some special historical cause which with-
draws that case from the operation of the general law. A very good
reason can be given why French, or something which popularly
passes for French, is spoken in parts of Belgium and Switzerland,

254 FREEMAN

whose inhabitants are certainly not Frenchmen. But the reason
has to be given, and it may fairly be asked.

In the like sort, if we turn to our own country, whenever within
the bounds of Great Britain we find any tongue spoken other than
English, we at once ask the reason, and we learn the special historic
cause. In a part of France and a part of Great Britain we find
tongues spoken which differ alike from English and from French,
but which are strongly akin to one another. We find that these are
the survivals of a group of tongues once common to Gaul and
Britain, but which the settlement of other nations, the introduction
and the growth of other tongues, have brought down to the level
of survivals. So again we find islands which both speech and
geographical position seem to mark as French, but which are depen-
dencies, and loyal dependencies, of the English crown. We soon
learn the cause of the phenomenon which seems so strange. Those
islands are the remains of a State and a people which adopted the
French tongue, but which, while it remained one, did not become
a part of the French State. That people brought England by force
of arms under the rule of their own sovereigns. The greater part
of that people were afterward conquered by France, and gradually
became French in feeling as well as in language. But a remnant
clave to their connection with the land which their forefathers had
conquered, and that remnant, while keeping the French tongue,
never became French in feeling. This last case, that of the Norman
islands, is a specially instructive one. Normandy and England were
politically connected, while language and geography pointed rather
to a union between Normandy and France. In the case of conti-
nental Normandy, where the geographical tie was strongest, lan-
guage and geography together could carry the day, and the conti-
nental Norman became a Frenchman. In the islands, where the
geographical tie was less strong, political traditions and manifest
interest carried the day against language and a weaker geographical
tie. The insular Norman did not become a Frenchman. But neither
did he become an Englishman. He alone remained Norman, keep-
ing his own tongue and his own laws, but attached to the English
crown by a tie at once of tradition and of advantage. Between
States of the relative size of England and the Norman islands,

RACE AND LANGUAGE 255

the relation naturally becomes a relation of dependence on the
part of the smaller members of the union. But it is well to remember
that our forefathers never conquered the forefathers of the men
of the Norman islands, but that their forefathers did once conquer
ours.

These instances, and countless others, bear out the position that,
while community of language is the most obvious sign of common
nationality, while it is the main element, or something more than
an element, in the formation of nationality, the rule is open to
exceptions of all kinds, and that the influence of language is at all
times liable to be overruled by other influences. But all the excep-
tions confirm the rule, because we specially remark those cases
which contradict the rule, and we do not specially remark those
cases which do not conform to it.

In the cases which we have just spoken of, the growth of the
nation as marked out by language, and the growth of the exceptions
to the rule of language, have both come through the gradual, un-
conscious working of historical causes. Union under the same
government, or separation under separate governments, has been
among the foremost of those historical causes. The French nation
consists of the people of all that extent of continuous territory
which has been brought under the rule of the French kings. But
the working of the cause has been gradual and unconscious. There
was no moment when anyone deliberately proposed to form a
French nation by joining together all the separate duchies and
countries which spoke the French tongue. Since the French nation
has been formed, men have proposed to annex this or that land on
the ground that its people spoke the French tongue, or perhaps
only some tongue akin to the French tongue. But the formation of
the French nation itself was the work of historical causes, the
work doubtless of a settled policy acting through many generations,
but not the work of any conscious theory about races and lan-
guages. It is a special mark of our time, a special mark of the
influence which doctrines about race and language have had on
men's minds, that we have seen great nations united by processes
in which theories of race and language really have had much to
do with bringing about their union. If statesmen have not been

256 FREEMAN

themselves moved by such theories, they have at least found that
it suited their purpose to make use of such theories as a means of
working on the minds of others. In the reunion of the severed
German and Italian nations the conscious feeling of nationality,
and the acceptance of a common language as the outward badge
of nationality, had no small share. Poets sang of language as the
badge of national union; statesmen made it the badge, so far as
political considerations did not lead them to do anything else. The
revivified kingdom of Italy is very far from taking in all the
speakers of the Italian tongue. Lugano, Trent, Aquileia — to take
places which are clearly Italian, and not to bring in places of more
doubtful nationality, like the cities of Istria and Dalmatia — form no
part of the Italian poUtical body, and Corsica is not under the same
rule as the other two great neighboring islands. But the fact that
all these places do not belong to the Italian body at once suggests
the twofold question, why they do not belong to it, and whether
they ought not to belong to it. History easily answers the first
question; it may perhaps also answer the second question in a
way which will say Yes as regards one place and No as regards
another. Ticino must not lose her higher freedom; Trieste must
remain the needful mouth for southern Germany; Dalmatia must
not be cut off from the Slavonic mainland; Corsica would seem
to have sacrificed national feeling to personal hero-worship. But it
is certainly hard to see why Trent and Aquileia should be kept
apart from the Italian body. On the other hand, the revivified
Italian kingdom contains very little which is not Italian in speech.
It is perhaps by a somewhat elastic view of language that the dialect
of Piedmont and the dialect of Sicily are classed under one head;
still, as a matter of fact, they have a single classical standard, and
they are universally accepted as varieties of the same tongue. But
it is only in a few Alpine valleys that languages are spoken which,
whether Romance or Teutonic, are in any case not Italian. The
reunion of Italy, in short, took in all that was Italian, save when
some political cause hindered the rule of language from being
followed. Of anything not Italian by speech so little has been taken
in that the non-Italian parts of Italy, Burgundian Aosta and the
Seven German Communes — if these last still keep their Teutonic

RACE AND LANGUAGE 257

language — fall under the rule that there are some things too small
for laws to pay heed to.

But it must not be forgotten that all this simply means that in
the lands of which we have just been speaking the process of
adoption has been carried out on the largest scale. Nations, with
languages as their rough practical test, have been formed; but they
have been formed with very little regard to physical purity of
blood. In short, throughout western Europe assimilation has been
the rule. That is to say, in any of the great divisions of Western
Europe, though the land may have been settled and conquered
over and over again, yet the mass of the people of the land have
been drawn to some one national type. Either some one among
the races inhabiting the land has taught the others to put on its
likeness, or else a new national type has arisen which has elements
drawn from several of those races. Thus the modern Frenchman
may be defined as produced by the union of blood which is mainly
Celtic with a speech which is mainly Latin, and with an historical
polity which is mainly Teutonic. That is, he is neither Gaul, Roman,
nor Frank, but a fourth type, which has drawn important elements
from all three. Within modern France this new national type has
so far assimilated all others as to make everything else merely
exceptional. The Fleming of one corner, the Basque of another,
even the far more important Breton of a third corner, have all in
this way become mere exceptions to the general type of the country.
If we pass into our own islands we shall find that the same process
has been at work. If we look to Great Britain only, we shall find
that, though the means have not been the same, yet the end has
been gained hardly less thoroughly than in France. For all real
political purposes, for everything which concerns a nation in the
face of other nations. Great Britain is as thoroughly united as
France is. Englishmen, Scotchmen, Welshmen feel themselves one
people in the general affairs of the world. A secession of Scotland
or Wales is as unlikely as a secession of Normandy or Languedoc.
The part of the island which is not thoroughly assimilated in
language, that part which still speaks Welsh or Gaelic, is larger in
proportion than the non-French part of modern France. But how-
ever much either the northern or the western Briton may, in a fit

258 FREEMAN

of antiquarian politics, declaim against the Saxon, for all practical
political purposes he and the Saxon are one. The distinction between
the southern and the northern English — for the men of Lothian
and Fife must allow me to call them by this last name — is, speaking
politically and without ethnological or linguistic precision, much as
if France and Aquitaine had been two kingdoms united on equal
terms, instead of Aquitaine being merged in France. When we
cross into Ireland, we indeed find another state of things, and one
which comes nearer to some of the phenomena which we shall
come to in other parts of the world. Ireland is, most unhappily, not
so firmly united to Great Britain as the different parts of Great
Britain are to one another. Still even here the division arises quite
as much from geographical and historical causes as from distinc-
tions of race strictly so called. If Ireland had had no wrongs, still
two great islands can never be so thoroughly united as a continuous
territory can be. On the other hand, in point of language, the dis-
contented part of the United Kingdom is much less strongly marked
off than that fraction of the contented part which is not thoroughly
assimilated. Irish is certainly not the language of Ireland in at all
the same degree in which Welsh is the language of Wales. The
Saxon has commonly to be denounced in the Saxon tongue.

In some other parts of Western Europe, as in the Spanish and
Scandinavian peninsulas, the coincidence of language and national-
ity is stronger than it is in France, Britain, or even Italy. No one
speaks Spanish except in Spain or in the colonies of Spain. And
within Spain the proportion of those who do not speak Spanish,
namely the Basque remnant, is smaller than the non-assimilated
element in Britain and France. Here two things are to be marked:
First, the modern Spanish nation has been formed, like the French,
by a great process of assimilation; secondly, the actual national
arrangements of the Spanish peninsula are wholly due to historical
causes, we might almost say historical accidents, and those of very
recent date. Spain and Portugal are separate kingdoms, and we
look on their inhabitants as forming separate nations. But this is
simply because a queen of Castile in the fifteenth century married
a king of Aragon. Had Isabella married a king of Portugal we
should now talk of Spain and Aragon as we now talk of Spain

RACE AND LANGUAGE 259

and Portugal, and we should count Portugal for part of Spain.
In language, in history, in everything else, Aragon was really more
distinct from Castile than Portugal was. The king of Castile was
already spoken of as king of Spain, and Portugal would have
merged in the Spanish kingdom at last as easily as Aragon did. In
Scandinavia, on the other hand, there must have been less assimila-
tion than anywhere else. In the present kingdoms of Norway and
Sweden there must be a nearer approach to actual purity of blood
than in any other part of Europe. One cannot fancy that much
Finnish blood has been assimilated, and there have been no con-
quests or settlements later than that of the Northmen themselves.

When we pass into central Europe we shall find a somewhat
different state of things. The distinctions of race seem to be more
lasting. While the national unity of the German Empire is greater
than that of either France or Great Britain, it has not only subjects
of other languages, but actually discontented subjects, in three
corners, on its French, its Danish, and its Polish frontiers. We ask
the reason, and it will be at once answered that the discontent of
all three is the result of recent conquest, in two cases of very recent
conquest indeed. But this is one of the very points to be marked;
the strong national unity of the German Empire has been largely
the result of assimilation; and these three parts, where recent
conquest has not yet been followed by assimilation, are chiefly
important because in all three cases, the discontented territory is
geographically continuous with a territory of its own speech out-
side the Empire. This does not prove that assimilation can never
take place, but it will undoubtedly make the process longer and
harder.

So again, wherever German-speaking people dwell outside the
bounds of the revived German State, as well as when that revived
German State contains other than German-speaking people, we ask
the reason and we can find it. Political reasons forbade the immedi-
ate annexation of Austria, Tyrol, and Salzburg. Combined political
and geographical reasons, and, if we look a little deeper, ethno-
logical reasons too, forbade the annexation of Courland, Livonia,
and Esthonia. Some reason or other will, it may be hoped, always
be found to hinder the annexation of lands which, like Zurich and

260 FREEMAN

Berne, have reached a higher political level. Outlying brethren in
Transsilvania or at Saratof again come under the rule "De minimis
non curat lex." In all these cases the rule that nationality and lan-
guage should go together yields to unavoidable circumstances. But,
on the other hand, where French or Danish or Slavonic or Lithu-
anian is spoken within the bounds of the new empire, the principle
that language is the badge of nationality, that without community
of language nationality is imperfect, shows itself in another shape.
One main object of modern policy is to bring these exceptional
districts under the general rule by spreading the German language
in them. Everywhere, in short, wherever a power is supposed to
be founded on nationality, the common feeling of mankind in-
stinctively takes language as the test of nationality. We assume
language as the test of a nation, without going into any minute
questions as to the physical purity of blood in that nation. A con-
tinuous territory, living under the same government and speaking
the same tongue, forms a nation for all practical purposes. If some
of its inhabitants do not belong to the original stock of blood, they
at least belong to it by adoption.

The question may now fairly be asked. What is the case in those
parts of the world where people who are confessedly of different
races and languages inhabit a continuous territory and live under
the same government ? How do we define nationality in such cases
as these.' The answer will be very different in different cases,
according to the means by which the different national elements in
such a territory have been brought together. They may form what
I have already called an artificial nation, united by an act of its
own free will. Or it may be simply a case where distinct nations,
distinct in everything which can be looked on as forming a nation,
except the possession of an independent government, are brought
together, by whatever causes, under a common ruler. The former
case is very distinctly an exception which proves the rule, and
the latter is, though in quite another way, an exception which proves
the rule also. Both cases may need somewhat more in the way of
definition. We will begin with the first, the case of a nation which
has been formed out of elements which differ in language, but
which still have been brought together so as to form an artificial
nation. In the growth of the chief nations of western Europe the

RACE AND LANGUAGE 26 1

principle which was consciously or unconsciously followed has been
that the nation should be marked out by language, and the use of
any tongue other than the dominant tongue of the nation should
be at least exceptional. But there is one nation in Europe, one
which has a full right to be called a nation in a political sense,
which has been formed on the directly opposite principle. The Swiss
Confederation has been formed by the union of certain detached
fragments of the German, Italian, and Burgundian nations. It may
indeed be said that the process has been in some sort a process of
adoption, that the Italian and Burgundian elements have been in-
corporated into an already existing German body; that, as those
elements were once subjects or dependents or protected allies, the
case is one of clients or freedmen who have been admitted to the
full privileges of the gens. This is undoubtedly true, and it is
equally true of a large part of the German element itself. Through-
out the Confederation, allies and subjects have been raised to the
rank of confederates. But the former position of the component
elements does not matter for our purpose. As a matter of fact, the
foreign dependencies have all been admitted into the Confederation
on equal terms. German is undoubtedly the language of a great
majority of the Confederation; but the two recognized Romance
languages are each the speech, not of a mere fragment or survival,
like Welsh in Britain or Breton in France, but of a large minority
forming a visible element in the general body. The three languages
are all of them alike recognized as national languages, though,
as if to keep up the universal rule that there should be some excep-
tions to all rules, a fourth language still lives on within the bounds
of the Confederation, which is not admitted to the rights of the
other three, but is left in the state of a fragment or a survival.' Is
such an artificial body as this to be called a nation.'' It is plainly
not a nation by blood or by speech. It can hardly be called a nation
by adoption. For, if we chose to say that the three elements have
all agreed to adopt one another as brethren, yet it has been adoption
without assimilation. Yet surely the Swiss Confederation is a nation.

'While the Swiss Confederation recognizes German, French, and Italian as all alike
national languages, the independent Romance language, which is still used in some
parts of the Canton of Graubiinden, that which is known specially as Romansch,
is not recognized. It is left in the same position in which Welsh and Gaelic are left
in Great Britain, in which Basque, Breton, Provenfal, Walloon, and 1-lemish are left
within the borders of that French kingdom which has grown so as to take them all in.

262 FREEMAN

It is not a mere power, in which various nations are brought to-
gether, whether willingly, or unwillingly, under a common ruler,
but without any further tie of union. For all political purposes the
Swiss Confederation is a nation, a nation capable of as strong and
true national feeling as any other nation. Yet it is a nation purely
artificial, one in no way defined by blood or speech. It thus proves
the rule in two ways. We at once feel that this artificially formed
nation, which has no common language, but each of whose elements
speaks a language common to itself with some other nation, is
something different from those nations which are defined by a
universal or at least a predominant language. We mark it as an
exception, as something different from other cases. And when we
see how nearly this artificial nation comes, in every point but that
of language, to the likeness of those nations which are defined by
language, we see that it is a nation defined by language which sets
the standard, and after the model of which the artificial nation
forms itself. The case of the Swiss Confederation and its claim
to rank as a nation would be like the case of those gentes, if any
such there were, which did not spring even from the expansion of
an original family, but which were artificially formed in imitation
of those which did, and which, instead of a real or traditional fore-
father, chose for themselves an adopted one.

In the Swiss Confederation, then, we have a case of a nation
formed by an artificial process, but which still is undoubtedly a
nation in the face of other nations. We now come to the other class,
in which nationality and language keep the connection which they
have elsewhere, but in which nations do not even in the roughest
way answer to governments. We have only to go into the Eastern
lands of Europe to find a state of things in which the notion of
nationality, as marked out by language and national feeling, has
altogether parted company from the notion of poUtical govern-
ment. It must be remembered that this state of things is not
confined to the nations which are or have lately been under the
yoke of the Turk. It extends also to the nations or fragments of
nations which make up the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. In all
the lands held by these two powers we come across phenomena of
geography, race, and language, which stand out in marked contrast

RACE AND LANGUAGE 263

with anything to which we are used in western Europe. We may
perhaps better understand what these phenomena are if we suppose
a state of things which sounds absurd in the West, but which has
its exact parallel in many parts of the East. Let us suppose that
in a journey through England we came successively to districts,
towns, or villages, where we found, one after another, first, Britons
speaking Welsh; then Romans speaking Latin; then Saxons or
Angles, speaking an older form of our own tongue; then Scandi-
navians speaking Danish; then Normans speaking Old-French;
lastly, perhaps a settlement of Flemings, Huguenots, or Palatines,
still remaining a distinct people and speaking their own tongue. Or
let us suppose a journey through northern France, in which we
found at different stages, the original Gaul, the Roman, the Frank,
the Saxon of Bayeux, the Dane of Coutances, each remaining a
distinct people, each of them keeping the tongue which they first
brought with them into the land. Let us suppose further that, in
many of these cases, a religious distinction was added to a national
distinction. Let us conceive one village Roman Catholic, another
Anglican, others Nonconformist of various types, even if we do not
call up any remnants of the worshippers of Jupiter or of Woden.
All this seems absurd in any Western country, and absurd enough
it is. But the absurdity of the West is the living reality of the East.
There we may still find all the chief races which have ever occupied
the country, still remaining distinct, still keeping separate tongues,
and those for the most part, their own original tongues. Within the
present and late European dominions of the Turk, the original
races, those whom we find there at the first beginnings of history,
are all there still, and two of them keep their original tongues.
They form three distinct nations. First of all there are the Greeks.
We have not here to deal with them as the representatives of that
branch of the Roman Empire which adopted their speech, but
simply as one of the original elements in the population of the
Eastern peninsula. Known almost down to our own day by their
historical name of Romans, they have now fallen back on the name
of Hellenes. And to that name they have a perfecdy good claim.
If the modern Greeks are not all true Hellenes, they are an ag-
gregate of adopted Hellenes gathered round and assimilated to

264 FREEMAN

a true Hellenic kernel. Here we see the oldest recorded inhabi-
tants of a large part of the land abiding, and abiding in a very
different case from the remnants of the Celt and the Iberian in
Western Europe. The Greeks are no survival of a nation; they
are a true and living nation — a nation whose importance is quite
out of proportion to its extent in mere numbers. They still abide,
the predominant race in their own ancient and again independ-
ent land, the predominant race in those provinces of the conti-
nental Turkish dominion which formed part of their ancient
land, the predominant race through all the shores and islands of
the .(Egaean and of part of the Euxine also. In near neighborhood
to the Greeks still live another race of equal antiquity, the Skipetar
or Albanians. These, as I believe is no longer doubted, represent the
ancient lUyrians. The exact degree of their ethnical kindred with
the Greeks is a scientific question which need not here be considered ;
but the facts that they are more largely intermingled with the
Greeks than any of the other neighboring nations, that they show
a special power of identifying themselves with the Greeks — a power,
so to speak, of becoming Greeks and making part of the artificial
Greek nation, are matters of practical history. It must never be
forgotten that, among the worthies of the Greek War of Independ-
ence, some of the noblest were not of Hellenic but Albanian blood.
The Orthodox Albanian easily turns into a Greek; and the Ma-
hometan Albanian is something which is broadly distinguished from
a Turk. He has, as he well may have, a strong national feeling, and
that national feeling has sometimes got the better of religious divi-
sions. If Albania is among the most backward parts of the peninsula,
still it is, by all accounts, the part where there is most hope of men of
different religions joining together against the common enemy.

Here then are two ancient races, the Greeks and another race,
not indeed so advanced, so important, or so widely spread, but a
race which equally keeps a real national being. There is also a
third ancient race which survives as a distinct people, though they
have for ages adopted a foreign language. These are the Vlachs
or Roumans, the surviving representatives of the great race, call it
Thracian or any other, which at the beginning of history held the
great inland mass of the Eastern peninsula, with the Illyrians to

RACE AND LANGUAGE 265

the west of them and the Greeks to the south. Every one knows
that in the modern principahty of Roumania and in the adjoining
parts of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, there is to be seen that
phenomenon so unique in the East, a people who not only, as the
Greeks did till lately, still keep the Roman name, but who speak
neither Greek nor Turkish, neither Slave nor Skipetar, but a dia-
lect of Latin, a tongue akin, not to the tongues of any of their
neighbors, but to the tongues of Gaul, Italy, and Spain. And any
one who has given any real attention to this matter knows that the
same race is to be found, scattered here and there, if in some parts
only as wandering shepherds, in the Slavonic, Albanian, and Greek
lands south of the Danube. The assumption has commonly been
that this outlying Romance people owe their Romance character
to the Roman colonization of Dacia under Trajan. In this view,
the modern Roumans would be the descendants of Trajan's colonists
and of Dacians who had learned of them to adopt the speech and
manners of Rome. But when we remember that Dacia was the
first Roman province to be given up — that the modern Roumania
was for ages the highway of every barbarian tribe on its way from
the East to the West — that the land has been conquered and settled
and forsaken over and over again — it would be passing strange if
this should be the one land, and its people the one race, to keep
the Latin tongue when it has been forgotten in all the neighboring
countries. In fact, this idea has been completely dispersed by modern
research. The establishment of the Roumans in Dacia is of com-
paratively recent date, beginning only in the thirteenth century.
The Roumans of Wallachia, Moldavia, and Transsilvania, are iso-
lated from the scattered Rouman remnant on Pindos and elsewhere.
They represent that part of the inhabitants of the peninsula which
became Latin, while the Greeks remained Greek, and the Illyrians
remained barbarian. Their lands, Moesia, Thrace specially so called,
and Dacia, were added to the empire at various times from Augustus
to Trajan. That they should gradually adopt the Latin language
is in no sort wonderful. Their position with regard to Rome was
exactly the same as that of Gaul and Spain. Where Greek civilization
had been firmly established, Latin could nowhere displace it. Where
Greek civilization was unknown, Latin overcame the barbarian

266 FREEMAN

tongue. It would naturally do so in this part of the East exactly as
it did in the West."

Here then we have in the southeastern peninsula three nations
which have all lived on to all appearances from the very beginnings
of European history, three distinct nations, speaking three distinct
languages. We have nothing answering to this in the West. It needs
no proof that the speakers of Celtic and Basque in Gaul and in
Spain do not hold the same position in western Europe which the
Greeks, Albanians, and Roumans do in eastern Europe. In the
East the most ancient inhabitants of the land are still there, not
as scraps or survivals, not as fragments of nations lingering on in
corners, but as nations in the strictest sense, nations whose national
being forms an element in every modern and political question.
They all have their memories, their grievances, and their hopes;
and their memories, their grievances, and their hopes are all of a
practical and political kind. Highlanders, Welshmen, Bretons,
French Basques, whatever we say of the Spanish brethren, have
doubtless memories, but they have hardly political grievances or
hopes. Ireland may have political grievances; it certainly has politi-
cal hopes; but they are not exactly of the same kind as the griev-
ances or hopes of the Greek, the Albanian, and the Rouman. Let
Home Rule succeed to the extent of setting up an independent king
and parliament of Ireland, yet the language and civilization of that
king and parliament would still be English. Ireland would form
an English State, politically hostile, it may be, to Great Britain, but
still an English State. No Greek, Albanian or Rouman State would
be in the same way either Turkish or Austrian.

On these primitive and abiding races came, as on other parts of
Europe, the Roman conquest. That conquest planted Latin colonies
on the Dalmatian coast, where the Latin tongue still remains in its
Italian variety as the speech of literature and city Ufe; it Romanized
one great part of the earlier inhabitants: it had the great political
effect of all, that of planting the Roman power in a Greek city,
and thereby creating a State, and in the end a nation, which was
Roman on one side, and Greek on the other. Then came the

* On Rouman history I have followed Roesler's "Romanische Studien"and Jirecek's
"Geschichte der Bulgaren."

RACE AND LANGUAGE 267

wandering of the nations, on which, as regards men of our own
race, we need not dwell. The Goths marched at will through the
Eastern Empire; but no Teutonic settlement was ever made within
its bounds, no lasting Teutonic settlement was ever made even on its
border. The part of the Teuton in the West was played, far less
perfectly indeed, by the Slave in the East. He is there what the
Teuton is here, the great representative of what we may call the
modern European races, those whose part in history began after
the establishment of the Rouman power. The differences between
the position of the two races are chiefly these. The Slave in the
East has pre-Roman races standing alongside of him in a way in
which the Teuton has not in the West. On the Greeks and Al-
banians he has had but little influence; on the Rouman and his
language his influence has been far greater, but hardly so great as
the influence of the Teuton on the Romance nations and languages
of western Europe. The Slave too stands alongside of races which
have come in since his own coming, in a way in which the Teuton
in the West is still further from doing. That is to say, besides Greeks,
Albanians, and Roumans, he stands alongside of Bulgarians, Mag-
yars, and Turks, who have nothing to answer to them in the West.
The Slave, in the time of his coming, in the nature of his settle^
ment, answers roughly to the Teuton; his position is what that of
the Teuton would be if western Europe had been brought under
the power of an alien race at some time later than his own settle-
ment. The Slaves undoubtedly form the greatest element in the
population of the Eastern peninsula, and they once reached more
widely still. Taking the Slavonic name in its widest meaning, they
occupy all the lands from the Danube and its great tributaries south-
ward to the strictly Greek border. The exceptions are where earlier
races remain, Greek or Italian on the coast-line, Albanian in the
mountains. The Slaves hold the heart of the peninsula, and they
hold more than the peninsula itself. The Slave lives equally on both
sides of what is or was the frontier of the Austrian and Ottoman
empires; indeed, but for another set of causes which have affected
eastern Europe, the Slave might have reached uninterruptedly from
the Baltic to the ^gaean.
This last set of causes are those which specially distinguish the

268 FREEMAN

histories of eastern and o£ western Europe; a set of causes which,
though exactly twelve hundred years old/ are still fresh and living,
and which are the special causes which have aggravated the special
difficulties of the last five hundred years. In Western Europe, though
we have had plenty of political conquests, we have had no national
migrations since the days of the Teutonic settlements — at least, if we
may extend these last so as to take in the Scandinavian settlements
in Britain and Gaul. The Teuton has pressed to the East at the
expense of the Slave and the Old-Prussian; the borders between the
Romance and the Teutonic nations in the West have fluctuated;
but no third set of nations has come in, strange alike to the Roman
and the Teuton and to the whole Aryan family. As the Huns of
Attila showed themselves in western Europe as passing ravagers,
so did the Magyars at a later day; so did the Ottoman Turks in a
day later still, when they besieged Vienna and laid waste the Vene-
tian mainland. But all these Turanian invaders appeared in western
Europe simply as passing invaders; in eastern Europe their part
has been widely different. Besides the temporary dominion of
Avars, Patzinaks, Chazars, Cumans, and a crowd of others, three
bodies of more abiding settlers, the Bulgarians, the Magyars, and the
Mongol conquerors of Russia, have come in by one path; a fourth,
the Ottoman Turks, have come in by another path. Among all
these invasions we have one case of thorough assimilation, and only
one. The original Finnish Bulgarians have, Hke Western con-
querors, been lost among Slavonic subjects and neighbors. The
geographical function of the Magyar has been to keep the two
great groups of Slavonic nations apart. To his coming, more than
to any other cause, we may attribute the great historical gap which
separates the Slave of the Baltic from his southern kinsfolk. The
work of the Ottoman Turk we all know. These latter settlers
remain alongside of the Slave, just as the Slave remains alongside
of the earlier settlers. The Slavonized Bulgarians are the only
instance of assimilation such as we are used to in the West. All
the other races, old and new, from the Albanian to the Ottoman,

^It should be remembered that, as the year 1879 saw the beginning of the liberated
Bulgarian State, the year 679 saw the beginning of the first Bulgarian kingdom south
of the Danube.

RACE AND LANGUAGE 269

are still there, each keeping its national being and its national
speech. And in one part of the ancient Dacia we must add quite
a distinct element, the element o£ Teutonic occupation in a form
unlike any in which we see it in the West, in the shape of the Saxons
of Transsilvania.

We have thus worked out our point in detail. While in each
Western country some one of the various races which have settled
in it has, speaking roughly, assimilated the others, in the lands
which are left under the rule of the Turk, or which have been lately
delivered from his rule, all the races that have ever settled in the
country still abide side by side. So when we pass into the lands
which form the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, we find that that
composite dominion is just as much opposed as the dominion of
the Turk is to those ideas of nationality towards which Western
Europe has been long feeling its way. We have seen by the example
of Switzerland that it is possible to make an artificial nation out of
fragments which have split off from three several nations. But
the Austro-Hungarian monarchy is not a nation, not even an artifi-
cial nation of this kind. Its elements are not bound together in the
same way as the three elements of the Swiss Confederation. It does
indeed contain one whole nation in the form of the Magyars; we
might say that it contains two, if we reckon the Czechs for a dis-
tinct nation. Of its other elements, we may for the moment set
aside those parts of Germany which are so strangely united with
the crowns of Hungary and Dalmatia. In those parts of the
monarchy which come within the more strictly Eastern lands — the
Roman and the Rouman — we may so distinguish the Romance-
speaking inhabitants of Dalmatia and the Romance-speaking in-
habitants of Transsilvania. The Slave of the north and of the south,
the Magyar conqueror, the Saxon immigrant, all abide as distinct
races. That the Ottoman is not to be added to our list in Hungary,
while he is to be added in lands farther south, is simply because
he has been driven out of Hungary, while he is allowed to abide in
lands farther south. No point is more important to insist on now
than the fact that the Ottoman once held the greater part of Hun-
gary by exactly the same right, the right of the strongest, as that

270 FREEMAN

by which he still holds Macedonia and Epeiros. It is simply the
result of a century of warfare, from Sobieski to Joseph II, which
fixed the boundary which only yesterday seemed eternal to diploma-
tists, but which now seems to have vanished. The boundary has
advanced and gone back over and over again. As Buda once was
Turkish, Belgrade has more than once been Austrian. The whole
of the southeastern lands, Austrian, Turkish, and independent, from
the Carpathian Mountains southward, present the same characteris-
tic of permanence and distinctness among the several races which
occupy them. The several races may lie, here in large continuous
masses, there in small detached settlements; but there they all are
in their distinctness. There is among them plenty of living and
active nationd feeling; but while in the West political arrange-
ments for the most part follow the great lines of national feeling,
in the East the only way in which national feeling can show itself
is by protesting, whether in arms or otherwise, against existing
poHtical arrangements. Save the Magyars alone, the ruling race
in the Hungarian kingdom, there is no case in those lands in which
the whole continuous territory inhabited by speakers of the same
tongue is placed under a separate national government of its own.
And, even in this case, the identity between nation and government
is imperfect in two ways. It is imperfect, because, after all, though
Hungary has a separate national government in internal matters,
yet it is not the Hungarian kingdom, but the Austro-Hungarian
monarchy of which it forms a part, which counts as a power among
the other powers of Europe. And the national character of the
Hungarian government is equally imperfect from the other side.
It is national as regards the Magyar; it is not national as regards
the Slave, the Saxon, and the Rouman. Since the liberation of
part of Bulgaria, no whole European nation is under the rule of
the Turk. No one nation of the southeast peninsula forms a single
national government. One fragment of a nation is free under a
national government, another fragment is ruled by civilized stran-
gers, a third is trampled down by barbarians. The existing States
of Greece, Roumania, and Servia are far from taking in the whole
of the Greek, Rouman, and Servian nations. In all these lands,
Austrian, Turkish, and independent, there is no difficulty in mark-

RACE AND LANGUAGE 27!

ing oflf the several nations; only in no case do the nations answer
to any existing political power.

In all these cases, where nationality and government are alto-
gether divorced, language becomes yet more distinctly the test o£
nationality than it is in Western lands where nationality and gov-
ernment do to some extent coincide. And when nationahty and
language do not coincide in the East, it is owing to another cause,
of which also we know nothing in the West. In many cases religion
takes the place of nationality; or rather the ideas of religion and
nationality can hardly be distinguished. In the West a man's nation-
ality is in no way affected by the religion which he professes, or even
by his change from one religion to another. In the East it is other-
wise. The Christian renegade who embraces Islam becomes for
most practical purposes a Turk. Even if, as in Crete and Bosnia,
he keeps his Greek or Slavonic language, he remains Greek or
Slave only in a secondary sense. For the first principle of the
Mahometan religion, the lordship of the true believer over the
infidel, cuts off the possibility of any true national fellowship be-
tween the true believer and the infidel. Even the Greek or Armenian
who embraces the Latin creed goes far toward parting with his
nationality as well as with his religion. For the adoption of the
Latin creed implies what is in some sort the adoption of a new
allegiance, the accepting of the authority of the Roman bishop. In
the Armenian indeed we are come very near to the phenomena of
the further East, where names like Parsee and Hindoo, names in
themselves as strictly ethnical as Englishman or Frenchman, have
come to express distinctions in which religion and nationality are
absolutely the same thing. Of this whole class of phenomena the
Jew is of course the crowning example. But we speak of these
matters here only as bringing in an element in the definition of
nationality to which we are unused in the West. But it quite comes
within our present subject to give one definition from the south-
eastern lands. What is the Greek? Clearly he who is at once a
Greek in speech and Orthodox in faith. The Hellenic Mussulmans
in Crete, even the Hellenic Latins in some of the other islands, are
at the most imperfect members of the Hellenic body. The utmost
that can be said is that they keep the power of again entering that

272 FREEMAN

body, either by their own return to the national faith, or by such a
change in the state of things as shall make difference in religion no
longer inconsistent with true national fellowship.

Thus, wherever we go, we find language to be the rough practical
test of nationality. The exceptions are many; they may perhaps
outnumber the instances which conform to the rule. Still they are
exceptions. Community of language does not imply community of
blood; it might be added that diversity of language does not imply
diversity of blood. But community of language is, in the absence of
any evidence to the contrary, a presumption of the community of
blood, and it is proof of something which for practical purposes is
the same as community of blood. To talk of "the Latin race" is
in strictness absurd. We know that the so-called race is simply
made up of those nations which adopted the Latin language. The
Celtic, Teutonic, and Slavonic races may conceivably have been
formed by a like artificial process. But the presumption is the other
way; and if such a process ever took place, it took place long before
history began. The Celtic, Teutonic, and Slavonic races come before
us as groups of mankind marked out by the test of language.
Within those races separate nations are again marked out by a
stricter application of the test of language. Within the race we
may have languages which are clearly akin to each other, but which
need not be mutually intelligible. Within the nation we have only
dialects which are mutually intelligible, or which, at all events,
gather round some one central dialect which is intelligible to all.
We take this standard of races and nations, fully aware that it will
not stand a physiological test, but holding that for all practical
purposes adoption must pass as equivalent to natural descent. And,
among the practical purposes which are affected by the facts of race
and nationality, we must, as long as a man is what he is, as long as
he has not been created afresh according to some new scientific
pattern, not shrink from reckoning those generous emotions which,
in the present state of European feeling, are beginning to bind to-
gether the greater as well as the lesser groups of mankind. The
sympathies of men are beginning to reach wider than could have
been dreamed of a century ago. The feeling which was once con-

RACE AND LANGUAGE 273

fined to the mere household extended itself to the tribe or city. From
the tribe or city it extended itself to the nation; from the nation it
is beginning to extend itself to the whole race. In some cases it
can extend itself to the whole race far more easily than in others.
In some cases historical causes have made nations of the same race
bitter enemies, while they have made nations of dillerent races
friendly allies. The same thing happened in earlier days between
tribes and cities of the same nation. But, when hindrances of this
kind do not exist, the feeling of race, as something beyond the
narrower feeling of nationality, is beginning to be a powerful agent
in the feelings and actions of men and of nations. A long series
of mutual wrongs, conquest, and oppression on one side, avenged
by conquest and oppression on the other side, have made the Slave
of Poland and the Slave of Russia the bitterest of enemies. No
such hindrance exists to stop the flow of natural and generous
feeling between the Slave of Russia and the Slave of the southeastern
lands. Those whose statesmanship consists in some hand-to-mouth
shift for the moment, whose wisdom consists in refusing to look
either back to the past or onward to the future, cannot understand
this great fact of our times; and what they cannot understand they
mock at. But the fact exists, and does its work in spite of them.
And it does its work none the less because in some cases the feeling
of sympathy is awakened by a claim of kindred, where, in the sense
of the physiologist or the genealogist, there is no kindred at all.
The practical view, historical or political, will accept as members
of this or that race or nation many members whom the physiologist
would shut out, whom the English lawyer would shut out, but
whom the Roman lawyer would gladly welcome to every privilege
of the stock on which they were grafted. The line of the Scipios,
of the Cxsars, and of the Antonines was continued by adoption;
and for all practical purposes the nations of the earth have agreed
to follow the examples set them by their masters.

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE
SAMUEL PEPYS

BY

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (1850-94), novelist, essayist, and
poet, was descended from a famous family of lighthouse builders. He
was born at lildinburgh, Scotland, and was intended for the ancestral
profession of engineer. Abandoning this, he tried law with no better
success, and finally devoted himself to his destined vocation of letters.

Stevenson began his career with the writing of essays, then issued two
charming volumes of humorous and contemplative travel, "An Inland
Voyage" and "Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes"; then collected
in his "New Arabian Nights" a number of fanciful short stories he had
been publishing in a magazine. In 1883 he first caught the attention of
the larger public with "Treasure Island," one of the best, and probably
the best written, boys' story in the language. His most sensational suc-
cess was "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"; but a much
higher literary quality appears in such novels as "The Master of Ballan-
trae," "Kidnapped," and "Catriona," in which he to some extent follows
the trcidition of Scott, with far greater finish of style, but without Scott's
fine spontaneity and unconsciousness. He published also three small
volumes of verse, some of it of great charm and delicacy.

Stevenson was essentially an artist in words. The modern desire for
subtlety of cadence and for the rendering of fine shades of expression is
seen in a high degree in all he wrote, and his work has the merits and
defects that accompany this extreme preoccupation with style. But he
had also great virtues of matter. He was a superb story-teller, an acute
and sensitive critic, a genial and whole-hearted lover of life. In the
essay on "Truth of Intercourse" will be found an example of his gra-
cious and tactful moralizing; in "Samuel Pepys," a penetrating inter-
pretation of one of the most amazing pieces of self-revelation in the
annals of literature.

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE

AMONG sayings that have a currency in spite of being wholly
LJk false upon the face of them for the sake of a half-truth upon
■A. JL. another subject which is accidentally combined with error,
one of the grossest and broadest conveys the monstrous proposition
that it is easy to tell the truth and hard to tell a lie. I wish heartily
it were. But the truth is one; it has first to be discovered, then justly
and exactly uttered. Even with instruments specially contrived
for such a purpose — with a foot rule, a level, or a theodolite — it is
not easy to be exact; it is easier, alas! to be inexact. From those
who mark the divisions on a scale to those who measure the
boundaries of empires or the distance of the heavenly stars, it is
by careful method and minute, unwearying attention that men
rise even to material exactness or to sure knowledge even of external
and constant things. But it is easier to draw the outline of a
mountain than the changing appearance of a face; and truth in
human relations is of this more intangible and dubious order: hard
to seize, harder to communicate. Veracity to facts in a loose, collo-
quial sense — not to say that I have been in Malabar when as a
matter of fact I was never out of England, not to say that I have
read Cervantes in the original when as a matter of fact I know not
one syllable of Spanish — this, indeed, is easy and to the same degree
unimportant in itself. Lies of this sort, according to circumstances,
may or may not be important; in a certain sense even they may or
may not be false. The habitual liar may be a very honest fellow,
and live truly with his wife and friends; while another man who
never told a formal falsehood in his life may yet be himself one
lie — heart and face, from top to bottom. This is the kind of lie
which poisons intimacy. And, vice versa, veracity to sentiment,
truth in a relation, truth to your own heart and your friends, never
to feign or falsify emotion — that is the truth which makes love
possible and mankind happy.

277

278 STEVENSON

L'art de bien dire is but a drawing-room accomplishment unless
it be pressed into the service of the truth. The difficulty of literature
is not to write, but to write what you mean; not to affect your
reader, but to affect him precisely as you wish. This is commonly
understood in the case of books or set orations; even in making your
will, or writing an explicit letter, some difficulty is admitted by
the world. But one thing you can never make Philistine natures
understand; one thing, which yet lies on the surface, remains as
unseizable to their wits as a high flight of metaphysics — namely,
that the business of life is mainly carried on by means of this
difficult art of literature, and according to a man's proficiency in
that art shall i^e the freedom and the fulness of his intercourse with
other men. Anybody, it is supposed, can say what he means; and,
in spite of their notorious experience to the cpntrary, people so
continue to suppose. Now, I simply open the last book I have been
reading — Mr. Leland's captivating English Gipsies. "It is said,"
I find on page 7, "that those who can converse with Irish peasants
in their own native tongue form far higher opinions of their
appreciation of the beautiful, and of the elements of humour and
pathos in their hearts, than do those who know their thoughts only
through the medium of English. I know from my own observations
that this is quite the case with the Indians of North America, and
it is unquestionably so with the gipsy." In short, where a man has
not a full possession of the language, the most important, because
the most amiable, qualities of his nature have to lie buried and
fallow; for the pleasure of comradeship, and the intellectual part
of love, rest upon these very "elements of humour and pathos."
Here is a man opulent in both, and for lack of a medium he can
put none of it out to interest in the market of affection! But what
is thus made plain to our apprehensions in the case of a foreign
language is partially true even with the tongue we learned in
childhood. Indeed, we all speak different dialects; one shall be
copious and exact, another loose and meagre; but the speech of the
ideal talker shall correspond and fit upon the truth of fact — not
clumsily, obscuring lineaments, like a mantle, but cleanly adhering,
like an athlete's skin. And what is the result? That the one can
open himself more clearly to his friends, and can enjoy more of

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 279

what makes life truly valuable — intimacy with those he loves. An
orator makes a false step; he employs some trivial, some absurd,
some vulgar phrase; in the turn of a sentence, he insults by a side
wind, those whom he is labouring to charm; in speaking to one
sentiment he unconsciously ruffles another in parenthesis; and
you are not surprised, for you know his task to be dehcate and filled
with perils. "O frivolous mind of man, light ignorance!" As if
yourself, when you seek to explain some misunderstanding or excuse
some apparent fault, speaking swiftly and addressing a mind still
recently incensed, were not harnessing for a more perilous adven-
ture; as if yourself required less tact and eloquence; as if an angry
friend or a suspicious lover were not more easy to oifend than a
meeting of indifferent politicians! Nay, and the orator treads in
a beaten round; the matters he discusses have been discussed a
thousand times before; language is ready-shaped to his purpose;
he speaks out of a cut and dry vocabulary. But you — may it not be
that your defence reposes on some subtlety of feeling, not so much
as touched upon in Shakespeare, to express which, like a pioneer,
you must venture forth into zones of thought still unsurveyed, and
become yourself a literary innovator ? For even in love there are
unlovely humours; ambiguous acts, unpardonable woj'ds, may yet
have sprung from a kind sentiment. If the injured one could read
your heart, you may be sure that he would understand and pardon;
but, alas! the heart cannot be shown — it has to be demonstrated in
words. Do you think it is a hard thing to write poetry } Why, that
is to write poetry, and of a high, if not the highest, order.

I should even more admire "the lifelong and heroic literary
labours" of my fellow-men, patiently clearing up in words their
loves and their contentions, and speaking their autobiography daily
to their wives, were it not for a circumstance which lessens their
difficulty and my admiration by equal parts. For life, though largely,
is not entirely carried on by literature. We are subject to physical
passions and contortions; the voice breaks and changes, and speaks
by unconscious and winning inflections; we have legible counte-
nances, like an open book; things that cannot be said look elo-
quently through the eyes; and the soul, not locked into the body
as a dungeon, dwells ever on the threshold with appealing signals.

28o STEVENSON

Groans and tears, looks and gestures, a flush or a paleness, are often
the most clear reporters of the heart, and speak more directly to the
hearts of others. The message flies by these interpreters in the least
space of time, and the misunderstanding is averted in the moment
of its birth. To explain in words takes time and a just and patient
hearing; and in the critical epochs of a close relation, patience and
justice are not qualities on which we can rely. But the look or the
gesture explains things in a breath; they tell their message without
ambiguity; imlike speech, they cannot stumble, by the way, on a
reproach or an allusion that should steel your friend against the
truth; and then they have a higher authority, for they are the direct
expression of the heart, not yet transmitted through the unfaithful
and sophisticating brain. Not long ago I wrote a letter to a friend
which came near involving us in quarrel; but we met, and in
personal talk I repeated the worst of what I had written, and added
worse to that; and with the commentary of the body it seemed not
unfriendly either to hear or say. Indeed, letters are in vain for the
purposes of intimacy; an absence is a dead break in the relation; yet
two who know each other fully and are bent on perpetuity in love,
may so preserve the attitude of their affections that they may meet
on the same terms as they had parted.

Pitiful is the case of the blind, who cannot read the face; pitiful
that of the deaf, who cannot follow the changes of the voice. And
there are others also to be pitied; for there are some of an inert,
uneloquent nature, who have been denied all the symbols of com-
munication, who have neither a lively play of facial expression, nor
speaking gestures, nor a responsive voice, nor yet the gift of frank,
explanatory speech: people truly made of clay, people tied for life
into a bag which no one can undo. They are poorer than the gipsy,
for their heart can speak no language under heaven. Such people
we must learn slowly by the tenor of their acts, or through yea and
nay communications; or we take them on trust on the strength of
a general air. and now and again, when we see the spirit breaking
through in a flash, correct or change our estimate. But these will be
uphill intimacies, without charm or freedom, to the end; and free-
dom is the chief ingredient in confidence. Some minds, romantically
dull, despise physical endowments. That is a doctrine for a mis-

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 28 1

anthrope; to those who Hke their fellow-creatures it must always
be meaningless; and, for my part, I can see few things more
desirable, after the possession of such radical qualities as honour
and humour and pathos, than to have a lively and not a stolid
countenance; to have looks to correspond with every feeling; to be
elegant and delightful in person, so that we shall please even in
the intervals of active pleasing, and may never discredit speech
with uncouth manners or become unconsciously our own burlesques.
But of all unfortunates there is one creature (for I will not call him
man) conspicuous in misfortune. This is he who has forfeited his
birthright of expression, who has cultivated artful intonations, who
has taught his face tricks, like a pet monkey, and on every side
perverted or cut off his means of communication with his fellow-
men. The body is a house of many windows: there we all sit,
showing ourselves and crying on the passers-by to come and love
us. But this fellow has filled his windows with opaque glass, ele-
gantly coloured. His house may be admired for its design, the
crowd may pause before the stained windows, but meanwhile the
poor proprietor must lie languishing within, uncomforted, un-
changeably alone.

Truth of intercourse is something more difficult than to refrain
from open lies. It is possible to avoid falsehood and yet not tell
the truth. It is not enough to answer formal questions. To reach
the truth by yea and nay communications implies a questioner with
a share of inspiration such as is often found in mutual love. Yea and
nay mean nothing; the meaning must have been related in the
question. Many words are often necessary to convey a very simple
statement; for in this sort of exercise we never hit the gold; the
most that we can hope is by many arrows, more or less far off on
different sides, to indicate, in the course of time, for what target
we are aiming, and after an hour's talk, back and forward, to
convey the purport of a single principle or a single thought. And
yet while the curt, pithy speaker misses the point entirely, a wordy,
prolegomenous babbler will often add three new offences in the
process of excusing one. It is really a most delicate affair. The
world was made before the English language, and seemingly upon
a different design. Suppose we held our converse, not in words,

282 STEVENSON

but in music; those who have a bad ear would find themselves cut
off from all near commerce, and no better than foreigners in this
big world. Bui: we do not consider how many have "a bad ear" for
words, nor how often the most eloquent find nothing to reply.
I hate questioners and questions; there are so few that can be
spoken to without a lie. "Do you forgive me?" Madam and sweet-
heart, so far as I have gone in life I have never yet been able to
discover what forgiveness means. "Is it still the same between us?"
Why, how can it be? It is eternally different; and yet you are
still the friend of my heart. "Do you understand me?" God knows;
I should think it highly improbable.

The cruelest lies are often told in silence. A man may have sat
in a room for hours and not opened his teeth, and yet come out of
that room a disloyal friend or a vile calumniator. And how many
loves have perished because, from pride, or spite, or diffidence, or
that unmanly shame which withholds a man from daring to betray
emotion, a lover, at the critical point of the relation, has but hung
his head and held his tongue? And, again, a lie may be told by a
truth, or a truth conveyed through a lie. Truth to facts is not
always truth to sentiment; and part of the truth, as often happens
in answer to a question, may be the foulest calumny. A fact may
be an exception; but the feeling is the law, and it is that which
you must neither garble nor belie. The whole tenor of a conversa-
tion is a part of the meaning of each separate statement; the be-
ginning and the end define and travesty the intermediate con-
versation. You never speak to God; you address a fellow-man, full
of his own tempers; and to tell truth, rightly understood, is not
to state the true facts, but to convey a true impression; truth in
spirit, not truth to letter, is the true veracity. To reconcile averted
friends a Jesuitical discretion is often needful, not so much to gain
a kind hearing as to communicate sober truth. Women have an
ill name in this connection; yet they live in as true relations; the lie
of a good woman is the true index of her heart.

"It takes," says Thoreau, in the noblest and most useful passage
I remember to have read in any modern author,' "two to speak
truth — one to speak and another to hear." He must be very little

' "A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers," Wednesday, p. 283.

TRUTH OF INTERCOURSE 283

experienced, or have no great zeal for truth, who does not recognise
the fact. A grain of anger or a grain of suspicion produces strange
acoustical effects, and makes the ear greedy to remark offence.
Hence we find those who have once quarrelled carry themselves
distantly, and are ever ready to break the truce. To speak truth
there must be moral equality or else no respect; and hence between
parent and child intercourse is apt to degenerate into a verbal
fencing bout, and misapprehensions to become ingrained. And
there is another side to this, for the parent begins with an imperfect
notion of the child's character, formed in early years or during
the equinoctial gales of youth; to this he adheres, noting only the
facts which suit with his preconception; and wherever a person
fancies himself unjustly judged, he at once and finally gives up the
effort to speak truth. With our chosen friends, on the other hand,
and still more between lovers (for mutual understanding is love's
essence), the truth is easily indicated by the one and aptly compre-
hended by the other. A hint taken, a look understood, conveys
the gist of long and delicate explanations; and where the life is
known even yea and nay become luminous. In the closest of all
relations — that of a love well founded and equally shared — speech
is half discarded, like a roundabout, infantile process or a ceremony
or formal etiquette; and the two communicate directly by their
presences, and with few looks and fewer words contrive to share
their good and evil and uphold each other's hearts in joy. For love
rests upon a physical basis; it is a familiarity of nature's making and
apart from voluntary choice. Understanding has in some sort outrun
knowledge, for the affection perhaps began with the acquaintance;
and as it was not made like other relations, so it is not, like them,
to be perturbed or clouded. Each knows more than can be uttered;
each lives by faith, and believes by a natural compulsion; and
between man and wife the language of the body is largely developed
and grown strangely eloquent. The thought that prompted and
was conveyed in a caress would only lose to be set down in words —
ay, although Shakespeare himself should be the scribe.

Yet it is in these dear intimacies, beyond all others, that we must
strive and do battle for the truth. Let but a doubt arise, and alas!
all the previous intimacy and confidence is but another charge

284 STEVENSON

against the person doubted. "What a monstrous dishonesty is this
if I have been deceived so long and so completely!" Let but that
thought gain entrance, and you plead before a deaf tribunal. Appeal
to the past; why, that is your crime! Make all clear, convince the
reason; alas! speciousness is but a proof against you. "// you can
abuse me now, the more lively that you have abused me from the
first."

For a strong affection such moments are worth supporting, and
they will end well; for your advocate is in your lover's heart and
speaks her own language; it is not you but she herself who can
defend and clear you of the charge. But in slighter intimacies, and
for a less stringent union.'' Indeed, is it worth while? We are
all incompris, only more or less concerned for the mischance; all
trying wrongly to do right; all fawning at each other's feet like
dumb, neglected lap-dogs. Sometimes we catch an eye — this is our
opportunity in the ages — and we wag our tail with a poor smile. "Is
that all?" All? If you only knew! But how can they know? They
do not love us; the more fools we to squander life on the indifferent.

But the morality of the thing, you will be glad to hear, is excel-
lent; for it is only by trying to understand others that we can get our
own hearts understood; and in matters of human feeling the
clement judge is the most successful pleader.

SAMUEL PEPYS

IN two books a fresh light has recently been thrown on the
character and position of Samuel Pepys. Mr. Mynors Bright
has given us a new transcription of the Diary, increasing it
in bulk by near a third, correcting many errors, and completing
our knowledge of the man in some curious and important points.
We can only regret that he has taken liberties with the author and
the public. It is no part of the duties of the editor of an established
classic to decide what may or may not be "tedious to the reader."
The book is either an historical document or not, and in condemn-
ing Lord Braybrooke Mr. Bright condemns himself. As for the
time-honored phrase, "unfit for publication," without being cynical,
we may regard it as the sign of a precaution more or less com-
mercial; and we may think, without being sordid, that when we
purchase six huge and distressingly expensive volumes, we are
entitled to be treated rather more like scholars and rather less like
children. But Mr. Bright may rest assured: while we complain,
we are still grateful. Mr. Wheatley, to divide our obligation, brings
together, clearly and with no lost words, a body of illustrative
material. Sometimes we might ask a little more; never, I think, less.
And as a matter of fact, a great part of Mr. Wheatley's volume
might be transferred, by a good editor of Pepys, to the margin of
the text, for it is precisely what the reader wants.

In the light of these two books, at least, we have now to read our
author. Between them they contain all we can expect to learn for,
it may be, many years. Now, if ever, we should be able to form
some notion of that unparalleled figure in the annals of mankind
— unparalleled for three good reasons: first, because he was a man
known to his contemporaries in a halo of almost historical pomp,
and to his remote descendants with an indecent familiarity, like a
tap-room comrade; second, because he has outstripped all competi-
tors in the art or virtue of a conscious honesty about oneself; and,
third, because, being in many ways a very ordinary person, he has

28s

286 STEVENSON

yet placed himself before the public eye with such a fulness and
such an intimacy of detail as might be envied by a genius hke
Montaigne. Not then for his own sake only, but as a character in
a unique position, endowed with a unique talent, and shedding a
unique light upon the lives of the mass of mankind, he is surely
worthy of prolonged and patient study.

THE DIARY

That there should be such a book as Pepys's Diary is incom-
parably strange. Pepys, in a corrupt and idle period, played the
man in public employments, toiling hard and keeping his honor
bright. Much of the little good that is set down to James the
Second comes by right to Pepys; and if it were little for a king, it
is much for a subordinate. To his clear, capable head was owing
somewhat of the greatness of England on the seas. In the exploits
of Hawke, Rodney, or Nelson, this dead Mr. Pepys of the Navy
OiBce had some considerable share. He stood well by his business
in the appalling plague of 1666. He was loved and respected by
some of the best and wisest men in England. He was President of
the Royal Society; and when he came to die, people said of his
conduct in that solemn hour — thinking it needless to say more —
that it was answerable to the greatness of his life. Thus he walked
in dignity, guards of soldiers sometimes attending him in his walks,
subalterns bowing before his periwig; and when he uttered his
thoughts they were suitable to his state and services. On February
8, 1668, we find him writing to Evelyn, his mind bitterly occupied
with the late Dutch war, and some thoughts of the different story
of the repulse of the great Armada: "Sir, you will not wonder at
the backwardness of my thanks for the present you made me, so
many days since, of the Prospect of the Medway, while the Hol-
lander rode master in it, when I have told you that the sight of
it hath led me to such reflections on my particular interest, by my
employment, in the reproach due to that miscarriage, as have given
me little less disquiet than he is fancied to have who found his
face in Michael Angelo's hell. The same should serve me also in
excuse for my silence in celebrating your mastery shown in the
design and draught, did not indignation rather than courtship

SAMUEL PEPYS 287

urge me so far to commend them, as to wish the furniture of our
House of Lords changed from the story of '88 to that of '67 (of
Evelyn's designing), till the pravity of this were reformed to the
temper of that age, wherein God Almighty found his blessings
more operative than, I fear, he doth in ours his judgments."

This is a letter honorable to the writer, where the meaning rather
than the words is eloquent. Such was the account he gave of himself
to his contemporaries; such thoughts he chose to utter, and in such
language: giving himself out for a grave and patriotic public
servant. We turn to the same date in the Diary by which he is
known, after two centuries, to his descendants. The entry begins
in the same key with the letter, blaming the "madness of the House
of Commons" and "the base proceedings, just the epitome of all our
public proceedings in this age, of the House of Lords"; and then,
without the least transition, this is how our diarist proceeds: "To
the Strand, to my bookseller's, and there bought an idle, rogueish
French book, L'escholle des Filles, which I have bought in plain
binding, avoiding the buying of it better bound, because I resolve,
as soon as I have read it, to burn it, that it may not stand in the list
of books, nor among them, to disgrace them, if it should be found."
Even in our day, when responsibility is so much more clearly appre-
hended, the man who wrote the letter would be notable; but what
about the man, I do not say who bought a roguish book, but who
was ashamed of doing so, yet did it, and recorded both the doing
and the shame in the pages of his daily journal ?

We all, whether we write or speak, must somewhat drape ourselves
when we address our fellows; at a given moment we apprehend our
character and acts by some particular side; we are merry with one,
grave with another, as befits the nature and demands of the relation.
Pepys's letter to Evelyn would have little in common with that other
one to Mrs. Knipp which he signed by the pseudonym of Dapper
Dic}{y; yet each would be suitable to the character of his correspond-
ent. There is no untruth in this, for man, being a Protean animal,
swiftly shares and changes with his company and surroundings; and
these changes are the better part of his education in the world. To
strike a posture once for all, and to march through hfe like a drum-
major, is to be highly disagreeable to others and a fool for oneself

288 STEVENSON

into the bargain. To Evelyn and to Knipp we understand the dou-
ble facing; but to whom was he posing in the Diary, and what, in
the name of astonishment, was the nature of the pose? Had he
suppressed all mention of the book, or had he bought it, gloried in
the act, and cheerfully recorded his glorification, in either case we
should have made him out. But no; he is full of precautions to con-
ceal the "disgrace" of the purchase, and yet speeds to chronicle the
whole affair in pen and ink. It is a sort of anomaly in human action,
which we can exactly parallel from another part of the Diary.

Mrs. Pepys had written a paper of her too just complaints against
her husband, and written it in plain and very pungent English.
Pepys, in an agony lest the world should come to see it, brutally
seizes and destroys the tell-tale document; and then — you disbelieve
your eyes — down goes the whole story with unsparing truth and in
the cruellest detail. It seems he has no design but to appear respect-
able, and here he keeps a private book to prove he was not. You
are at first faintly reminded of some of the vagaries of the morbid
religious diarist; but at a moment's thought the resemblance dis-
appears. The design of Pepys is not at all to edify; it is not from
repentance that he chronicles his peccadillos, for he tells us when he
does repent, and, to be just to him, there often follows some improve-
ment. Again, the sins of the religious diarist are of a very formal
pattern, and are told with an elaborate whine. But in Pepys you
come upon good, substantive misdemeanors; beams in his eye of
which he alone remains unconscious; healthy outbreaks of the ani-
mal nature, and laughable subterfuges to himself that always com-
mand belief and often engage the sympathies.

Pepys was a young man for his age, came slowly to himself in
the world, sowed his wild oats late, took late to industry, and pre-
served till nearly forty the headlong gusto of a boy. So, to come
rightly at the spirit in which the Diary was written, we must recall
a class of sentiments which with most of us are over and done before
the age of twelve. In our tender years we still preserve a freshness
of surprise at our prolonged existence; events make an impression
out of all proportion to their consequence; we are unspeakably
touched by our own past adventures; and look forward to our future
personality with sentimental interest. It was something of this, I

SAMUEL PEPYS 289

think, that clung to Pepys. Although not sentimental in the abstract,
he was sweetly sentimental about himself. His own past clung about
his heart, an evergreen. He was the slave of an association. He
could not pass by Islington, where his father used to carry him to
cakes and ale, but he must light at the "King's Head" and eat and
drink "for remembrance of the old house sake." He counted it
good fortune to lie a night at Epsom to renew his old walks, "where
Mrs. Hely and I did use to walk and talk, with whom I had the
first sentiments of love and pleasure in a woman's company, dis-
course and taking her by the hand, she being a pretty woman." He
goes about weighing up the Assurance, which lay near Woolwich
under water, and cries in a parenthesis, "Poor ship, that I have been
twice merry in, in Captain Holland's time"; and after revisiting the
Naseby, now changed into the Charles, he confesses "it was a great
pleasure to myself to see the ship that I began my good fortune in."
The stone that he was cut for he preserved in a case; and to the
Turners he kept alive such gratitude for their assistance that for
years, and after he had begun to mount himself into higher zones,
he continued to have that family to dinner on the anniversary of the
operation. Not Hazlitt nor Rousseau had a more romantic passion
for their past, although at times they might express it more roman-
tically; and if Pepys shared with them this childish fondness, did not
Rousseau, who left behind him the Confessions, or Hazlitt, who
wrote the Liber Amoris, and loaded his essays with loving personal
detail, share with Pepys in his unwearied egotism? For the two
things go hand in hand; or, to be more exact, it is the first that makes
the second either possible or pleasing.

But, to be quite in sympathy with Pepys, we must return once
more to the experience of children. I can remember to have written,
in the fly-leaf of more than one book, the date and the place where
I then was — if, for instance, I was ill in bed or sitting in a certain
garden; these were jottings for my future self; if I should chance on
such a note in after years, I thought it would cause me a particular
thrill to recognize myself across the intervening distance. Indeed,
I might come upon them now, and not be moved one tittle — which
shows that I have comparatively failed in life, and grown older than
Samuel Pepys. For in the Diary we can find more than one such

290 STEVENSON

note of perfect childish egotism; as when he explains that his candle
is going out, "which makes me write thus slobberingly" ; or as in this
incredible particularity, "To my study, where I only wrote thus
much of this day's passages to this,* and so out again"; or lastly, as
here, with more of circumstance: "I staid up till the bellman came by
with his bell under my window, as I was writing of this very line,
and cried, 'Past one of the clock, and a cold, frosty, windy morning.' "
Such passages are not to be misunderstood. The appeal to Samuel
Pepys years hence is unmistakable. He desires that dear, though
unknown, gentleman keenly to realize his predecessor; to remember
why a passage was uncleanly written; to recall (let us fancy, with
a sigh) the tones of the bellman, the chill of the early, windy morn-
ing, and the very line his own romantic self was scribing at the
moment. The man, you will perceive, was making reminiscences — a
sort of pleasure by ricochet, which comforts many in distress, and
turns some others into sentimental libertines: and the whole book,
if you will but look at it in that way, is seen to be a work of art to
Pepys's own address.

Here, then, we have the key to that remarkable attitude preserved
by him throughout his Diary, to that unflinching — I had almost said,
that unintelligent — sincerity which makes it a miracle among human
books. He was not unconscious of his errors — far from it; he was
often startled into shame, often reformed, often made and broke his
vows of change. But whether he did ill or well, he was still his own
unequalled self; still that entrancing ego of whom alone he cared to
write; and still sure of his own affectionate indulgence, when the
parts should be changed, and the writer come to read what he had
written. Whatever he did, or said, or thought, or suffered, it was
still a trait of Pepys, a character of his career; and as, to himself, he
was more interesting than Moses or than Alexander, so all should
be faithfully set down. I have called his Diary a work of art. Now
when the artist has found something, word or deed, exactly proper
to a favorite character in play or novel, he will neither suppress nor
diminish it, though the remark be silly or the act mean. The hesita-
tion of Hamlet, the credulity of Othello, the baseness of Emma
Bovary, or the irregularities of Mr. Swiveller, caused neither disap-
pointment nor disgust to their creators. And so with Pepys and his

SAMUEL PEPYS 29 1

adored protagonist: adored not blindly, but with trenchant insight
and enduring, human toleration. I have gone over and over the
greater part of the Diary; and the points where, to the most sus-
picious scrutiny, he has seemed not perfectly sincere, are so few, so
doxibtful, and so petty, that I am ashamed to name them. It may
be said that we all of us write such a diary in airy characters upon
our brain; but I fear there is a distinction to be made; I fear that as
we render to our consciousness an account of our daily fortunes and
behavior, we too often weave a tissue of romantic compliments and
dull excuses; and even if Pepys were the ass and coward that men
call him, we must take rank as sillier and more cowardly than he.
The bald truth about oneself, what we are all too timid to admit
when we are not too dull to see it, that was what he saw clearly and
set down unsparingly.

It is improbable that the Diary can have been carried on in the
same single spirit in which it was begun. Pepys was not such an
ass, but he must have perceived, as he went on, the extraordinary
nature of the work he was producing. He was a great reader, and
he knew what other books were like. It must, at least, have crossed
his mind that some one might ultimately decipher the manuscript,
and he himself, with all his pains and pleasures, be resuscitated in
some later day; and the thought, although discouraged, must have
warmed his heart. He was not such an ass, besides, but he must
have been conscious of the deadly explosives, the guncotton and the
giant powder, he was hoarding in his drawer. Let some contempo-
rary light upon the Journal, and Pepys was plunged forever in social
and political disgrace. We can trace the growth of his terrors by
two facts. In 1660, while the Diary was still in its youth, he tells
about it, as a matter of course, to a lieutenant in the navy; but in
1669, when it was already near an end, he could have bitten his
tongue out, as the saying is, because he had let slip his secret to one
so grave and friendly as Sir William Coventry. And from two other
facts I think we may infer that he had entertained, even if he had
not acquiesced in, the thought of a far-distant pubUcity. The first
is of capital importance: the Diary was not destroyed. The second —
that he took unusual precautions to confound the cipher in "ro-
guish" passages — proves, beyond question, that he was thinking of

292 STEVENSON

some other reader besides himself. Perhaps while his friends were ad-
miring the "greatness of his behavior" at the approach of death, he
may have had a twinkling hope of immortality. Mens cujusque is est
quisque, said his chosen motto; and, as he had stamped his mind with
every crook and foible in the pages of the Diary, he might feel that
what he left behind him was indeed himself. There is perhaps no
other instance so remarkable of the desire of man for publicity and an
enduring name. The greatness of his life was open, yet he longed
to communicate its smallness also; and, while contemporaries bowed
before him, he must buttonhole posterity with the news that his
periwig was once alive with nits. But this thought, although I cannot
doubt he had it, was neither his first nor his deepest; it did not color
one word that he wrote; the Diary, for as long as he kept it, re-
mained what it was when he began, a private pleasure for himself.
It was his bosom secret; it added a zest to all his pleasures; he lived
in and for it, and might well write these solemn words, when he
closed that confidant forever : "And so I betake myself to that course
which is almost as much as to see myself go into the grave; for which,
and all the discomforts that will accompany my being blind, the good
God prepare me."

A LIBERAL GENIUS

Pepys spent part of a certain winter Sunday, when he had taken
physic, composing "a song in praise of a liberal genius (such as I take
my own to be) to all studies and pleasures." The song was unsuc-
cessful, but the Diary is, in a sense, the very song that he was seeking;
and his portrait by Hales, so admirably reproduced in Mynors
Bright's edition, is a confirmation of the Diary. Hales it would
appear, had known his business; and though he put his sitter to a
deal of trouble, almost breaking his neck "to have the portrait full
of shadows," and draping him in an Indian gown hired expressly
for the purpose, he was preoccupied about no merely picturesque
effects, but to portray the essence of the man. Whether we read the
picture by the Diary or the Diary by the picture, we shall at least
agree that Hales was among the number of those who can "surprise
the manners in the face." Here we have a mouth pouting, moist with
desires; eyes greedy, protuberant, and yet apt for weeping too; a

SAMUEL PEPYS 293

nose great alike in character and dimensions; and altogether a most
fleshly, melting countenance. The face is attractive by its promise of
reciprocity. I have used the word greedy, but the reader must not
suppose that he can change it for that closely kindred one of hungry;
for there is here no aspiration, no waiting for better things, but an
animal joy in all that comes. It could never be the face of an artist;
it is the face of a viveur — kindly, pleased and pleasing, protected
from excess and upheld in contentment by the shifting versatility of
his desires. For a single desire is more rightly to be called a lust;
but there is health in a variety, where one may balance and control
another.

The whole world, town or country, was to Pepys a garden of
Armida. Wherever he went, his steps were winged with the most
eager expectation; whatever he did, it was done with the most lively
pleasure. An insatiable curiosity in all the shows of the world and
all the secrets of knowledge, filled him brimful of the longing to
travel, and supported him in the toils of study. Rome was the dream
of his life; he was never happier than when he read or talked of the
Eternal City. When he was in Holland, he was "with child" to see
any strange thing. Meeting some friends and singing with them in
a palace near The Hague, his pen fails him to express his passion of
delight, "the more so because in a heaven of pleasure and in a strange
country." He must go to see all famous executions. He must needs
visit the body of a murdered man, defaced "with a broad wound,"
he says, "that makes my hand now shake to write of it." He learned
to dance, and was "like to make a dancer." He learned to sing, and
walked about Gray's Inn Fields "humming to myself (which is now
my constant practice) the trillo." He learned to play the lute, the
flute, the flageolet, and the theorbo, and it was not the fault of his
intention if he did not learn the harpsichord or the spinet. He learned
to compose songs, and burned to give forth "a scheme and theory of
music not yet ever made in the world." When he heard "a fellow
whistle like a bird exceeding well," he promised to return another
day and give an angel for a lesson in the art. Once, he writes, "I took
the Bezan back with me, and with a brave gale and tide reached up
that night to the Hope, taking great pleasure in learning the sea-
men's manner of singing when they sound the depths." If he found

294 STEVENSON

himself rusty in his Latin grammar, he must fall to it like a school-
boy. He was a member of Harrington's Club till its dissolution, and
of the Royal Society before it had received the name. Boyle's Hydro-
statics was "of infinite delight" to him, walking in Barnes Elms. We
find him comparing Bible concordances, a captious judge of ser-
mons, deep in Descartes and Aristotle. We find him, in a single year,
studying timber and thie measurement of timber; tar and oil, hemp,
and the process of preparing cordage; mathematics and accounting;
the hull and the rigging of ships from a model; and "looking and
improving himself of the (naval) stores with" — hark to the fellow! —
"great delight." His familiar spirit of delight was not the same with
Shelley's; but how true it was to him through life! He is only copy-
ing something, and behold,he "takes great pleasure to rule the lines,
and have the capital words wrote with red ink"; he has only had his
coal-cellar emptied and cleaned, and behold, "it do please him ex-
ceedingly." A hog's harslett is "a piect of meat he loves." He cannot
ride home in my Lord Sandwich's coach, but he must exclaim, with
breathless gusto, "his noble, rich coach." When he is bound for a
supper party, he anticipates a "glut of pleasure." When he has a new
watch, "to see my childishness," says he, "I could not forbear carry-
ing it in my hand and seeing what o'clock it was an hundred times."
To go to Vauxhall, he says, and "to hear the nightingales and other
birds, hear fiddles, and there a harp and here a Jew's trump, and
here laughing, and there fine people walking, is mighty divertising."
And the nightingales, I take it, were particularly dear to him; and it
was again "with great pleasure" that he paused to hear them as he
walked to Woolwich, while the fog was rising and the April sun
broke through.

He must always be doing something agreeable, and, by preference,
two agreeable things at once. In his house he had a box of carpen-
ter's tools, two dogs, an eagle, a canary, and a blackbird that whistled
tunes, lest, even in that full life, he should chance upon an empty
moment. If he had to wait for a dish of poached eggs, he must put
in the time by playing on the flageolet; if a sermon were dull, he
must read in the book of Tobit or divert his mind with sly advances
on the nearest women. When he walked, it must be with a book in
his pocket to beguile the way in case the nightingales were silent;

SAMUEL PEPYS 295

and even along the streets of London, with so many pretty faces to
be spied for and dignitaries to be saluted, his trail was marked by lit-
tle debts "for wine, pictures, etc.," the true headmark of a life intoler-
ant of any joyless passage. He had a kind of idealism in pleasure; like
the princess in the fairy story, he was conscious of a rose-leaf out of
place. Dearly as he loved to talk, he could not enjoy nor shine in a
conversation when he thought himself unsuitably dressed. Dearly
as he loved eating, he "knew not how to eat alone;" pleasure for him
must heighten pleasure; and the eye and ear must be flattered like
the palate ere he avow himself content. He had no zest in a good
dinner when it fell to be eaten "in a bad street and in a periwig-
maker's house"; and a collation was spoiled for him by indifferent
music. His body was indefatigable, doing him yeoman service in
this breathless chase of pleasures. On April 11, 1662, he mentions that
he went to bed "weary, which I seldom am"; and already over thirty,
he would sit up all night cheerfully to see a comet. But it is never
pleasure that exhausts the pleasure-seeker; for in that career, as in
all others, it is failure that kills. The man who enjoys so wholly and
bears so impatiently the slightest widowhood from joy, is just the
man to lose a night's rest over some paltry question of his right to
fiddle on the leads, or to be "vexed to the blood" by a solecism in his
wife's attire; and we find in consequence that he was always peevish
when he was hungry, and that his head "aked mightily" after a dis-
pute. But nothing could divert him from his aim in life; his remedy
in care was the same as his delight in prosperity; it was with pleasure,
and with pleasure only, that he sought to drive out sorrow; and,
whether he was jealous of his wife or skulking from a bailiff, he
would equally take refuge in the theatre. There, if the house be
full and the company noble, if the songs be tunable, the actors per-
fect, and the play diverting, this old hero of the secret Diary, this
private self-adorer, will speedily be healed of his distresses.

Equally pleased with a watch, a coach, a piece of meat, a tune
upon the fiddle, or a fact in hydrostatics, Pepys was pleased yet more
by the beauty, the worth, the mirth, or the mere scenic attitude in
life of his fellow-creatures. He shows himself throughout a sterling
humanist. Indeed, he who loves himself, not in idle vanity, but with
a plenitude of knowledge, is the best equipped of all to love his

296 STEVENSON

neighbors. And perhaps it is in this sense that charity may be most
properly said to begin at home. It does not matter what quality a
person has: Pepys can appreciate and love him for it. He "fills his
eyes" with the beauty of Lady Castlemaine; indeed, he may be said
to dote upon the thought of her for years; if a woman be good-look-
ing and not painted, he will walk miles to have another sight of her;
and even when a lady by a mischance spat upon his clothes, he was
immediately consoled when he had observed that she was pretty.
But, on the other hand, he is delighted to see Mrs. Pett upon her
knees, and speaks thus of his Aunt James: "a poor, religious, well-
meaning, good soul, talking of nothing but God Almighty, and
that with so much innocence that mightily pleased me." He is taken
with Pen's merriment and loose songs, but not less taken with the
sterling worth of Coventry. He is jolly with a drunken sailor, but
listens with interest and patience, as he rides the Essex roads, to the
story of a Quaker's spiritual trials and convictions. He lends a critical
ear to the discourse of kings and royal dukes. He spends an evening
at Vauxhall with "Killigrew and young Newport — loose company,"
says he, "but worth a man's being in for once, to know the nature
of it, and their manner of talk and lives." And when a rag-boy lights
him home, he examines him about his business and other ways of
livelihood for destitute children. This is almost half-way to the be-
ginning of philanthropy; had it only been the fashion, as it is at
present, Pepys had perhaps been a man famous for good deeds. And
it is through this quality that he rises, at times, superior to his sur-
prising egotism; his interest in the love affairs of others is, indeed,
impersonal; he is filled with concern for my Lady Castlemaine, whom
he only knows by sight, shares in her very jealousies, joys with her
in her successes; and it is not untrue, however strange it seems in
his abrupt presentment, that he loved his maid Jane because she
was in love with his man Tom.

Let us hear him, for once, at length: "So the women and W.
Hewer and I walked upon the Downes, where a flock of sheep was;
and the most pleasant and innocent sight that ever I saw in my life.
We found a shepherd and his Uttle boy reading, far from any houses
or sight of people, the Bible to him ; so I make the boy to read to me,
which he did with the forced tone that children do usually read, that

SAMUEL PEPYS 297

was mighty pretty; and then I did give him something, and went
to the father, and talked with him. He did content himself mightily
in my liking his boy's reading, and did bless God for him, the most
like one of the old patriarchs that ever I saw in my life, and it brought
those thoughts of the old age of the world in my mind for two or
three days after. We took notice of his woollen knit stockings of two
colors mixed, and of his shoes shod with iron, both at the toe and
heels, and with great nails in the soles of his feet, which was mighty
pretty; and taking notice of them, 'Why,' says the poor man, 'the
downes, you see, are full of stones, and we are faine to shoe ourselves
thus; and these,' says he, 'will make the stones fly till they ring
before me.' I did give the poor man something, for which he was
mighty thankful, and I tried to cast stones with his home crooke. He
values his dog mightily, that would turn a sheep any way which he
would have him, when he goes to fold them; told me there was
about eighteen score sheep in his flock, and that he hath four shill-
ings a week the year round for keeping of them; and Mrs. Turner,
in the common fields here, did gather one of the prettiest nosegays
that ever I saw in my life."

And so the story rambles on to the end of that day's pleasuring;
with cups of milk, and glow-worms, and people walking at sundown
with their wives and children, and all the way home Pepys still
dreaming "of the old age of the world" and the early innocence of
man. This was how he walked through life, his eyes and ears wide
open, and his hand, you will observe, not shut; and thus he observed
the lives, the speech, and the manners of his fellow-men, with prose
fidelity of detail and yet a lingering glamour of romance.

It was "two or three days after" that he extended this passage in
the pages of his Journal, and the style has thus the benefit of some
reflection. It is generally supposed that, as a writer, Pepys must
rank at the bottom of the scale of merit. But a style which is inde-
fatigably lively, telling, and picturesque through six large volumes
of everyday experience, which deals with the whole matter of a life,
and yet is rarely wearisome, which condescends to the most fastidi-
ous particulars, and yet sweeps all away in the forthright current of
the narrative, — such a style may be ungrammatical, it may be inele-
gant, it may be one tissue of mistakes, but it can never be devoid of

298 STEVENSON

merit. The first and the true function of the writer has been thor-
oughly performed throughout; and though the manner of his utter-
ance may be childishly awkward, the matter has been transformed
and assimilated by his unfeigned interest and delight. The gusto of
the man speaks out fierily after all these years. For the difference
between Pepys and Shelley, to return to that half whimsical approxi-
mation, is one of quality but not one of degree; in his sphere, Pepys
felt as keenly, and his is the true prose of poetry — prose because the
spirit of the man was narrow and earthly, but poetry because he was
dehghtedly alive. Hence, in such a passage as this about the Epsom
shepherd, the result upon the reader's mind is entire conviction and
unmingled pleasure. So, you feel, the thing fell out, not otherwise;
and you would no more change it than you would change a sub-
limity of Shakespeare's, a homely touch of Bunyan's, or a favored
reminiscence of your own.

There never was a man nearer being an artist, who yet was not
one. The tang was in the family; while he was writing the journal
for our enjoyment in his comely house in Navy Gardens, no fewer
than two of his cousins were tramping the fens, kit under arm, to
make music to the country girls. But he himself, though he could
play so many instruments and pass judgment in so many fields of
art, remained an amateur. It is not given to any one so keenly to
enjoy, without some greater power to understand. That he did not
like Shakespeare as an artist for the stage may be a fault, but it is
not without either parallel or excuse. He certainly admired him as
a poet; he was the first beyond mere actors on the rolls of that
innumerable army who have got "To be or not to be" by heart. Nor
was he content with that; it haunted his mind; he quoted it to him-
self in the pages of the Diary, and, rushing in where angels fear to
tread, he set it to music. Nothing, indeed, is more notable than the
heroic quality of the verses that our little sensualist in a periwig
chose out to marry with his own mortal strains. Some gust from
brave Elizabethan times must have warmed his spirit, as he sat tun-
ing his sublime theorbo. "To be or not to be. Whether 'tis nobler"
— "Beauty retire, thou dost my pity move" — "It is decreed, nor shall
thy fate, O Rome"; — open and dignified in the sound, various and
majestic in the sentiment, it was no inapt, as it was certainly no timid,

SAMUEL PEPYS 299

spirit that selected such a range of themes. Of "Gaze not on Swans,"
I know no more than these four words; yet that also seems to promise
well. It was, however, not a probable suspicion, the work of his
master, Mr. Berkenshaw — as the drawings that figure at the breaking
up of a young ladies' seminary are the work of the professor attached
to the establishment. Mr. Berkenshaw was not altogether happy in
his pupil. The amateur cannot usually rise into the artist, some
leaven of the world still clogging him; and we find Pepys behaving
Uke a pickthank to the man who taught him composition. In rela-
tion to the stage, which he so warmly loved and understood, he was
not only more hearty, but more generous to others. Thus he encoun-
ters Colonel Reames, "a man," says he, "who understands and loves
a play as well as I, and I love him for it." And again, when he and
his wife had seen a most ridiculous insipid piece, "Glad we were," he
writes, "that Betterton had no part in it." It is by such a zeal and
loyalty to those who labor for his delight that the amateur grows
worthy of the artist. And it should be kept in mind that, not only in
art, but in morals, Pepys rejoiced to recognize his betters. There was
not one speck of envy in the whole human-hearted egotist.

RESPECTABILITY

When writers inveigh against respectability, in the present de-
graded meaning of the word, they are usually suspected of a taste for
clay pipes and beer cellars; and their performances are thought to
hail from the Owl's Nest of the comedy. They have something more,
however, in their eye than the dulness of a round million dinner
parties that sit down yearly in old England. For to do anything
because others do it, and not because the thing is good, or kind, or
honest in its own right, is to resign all moral control and captaincy
upon yourself, and go post-haste to the devil with the greater number.
We smile over the ascendancy of priests; but I had rather follow a
priest than what they call the leaders of society. No life can better
than that of Pepys illustrate the dangers of this respectable theory
of living. For what can be more untoward than the occurrence, at
a critical period and while the habits are still pliable, of such sweep-
ing transformation as the return of Charles the Second ? Round went
the whole fleet of England on the other tack; and while a few tall

300 STEVENSON

pintas, Milton or Pen, still sailed a lonely course by the stars and
their own private compass, the cock-boat, Pepys, must go about with
the majority among "the stupid starers and the loud huzzas."

The respectable are not led so much by any desire of applause as by
a positive need for countenance. The weaker and the tamer the man,
the more will he require this support; and any positive quality re-
lieves him, by just so much, of this dependence. In a dozen ways,
Pepys was quite strong enough to please himself without regard for
others; but his positive qualities were not co-extensive with the field
of conduct; and in many parts of life he followed, with gleeful preci-
sion, in the footprints of the contemporary Mrs. Grundy. In morals,
particularly, he lived by the countenance of others; felt a slight from
another more keenly than a meanness in himself, and then first
repented when he was found out. You could talk of religion or
morality to such a man; and by the artist side of him, by his lively
sympathy and apprehension, he could rise, as it were dramatically,
to the significance of what you said. All that matter in religion
which has been nicknamed other-worldliness was strictly in his
gamut; but a rule of life that should make a man rudely virtuous,
following right in good report and ill report, was foolishness and a
stumbling-block to Pepys. He was much thrown across the Friends;
and nothing can be more instructive than his attitude toward these
most interesting people of that age. I have mentioned how he con-
versed with one as he rode; when he saw some brought from a
meeting under arrest, "I would to God," said he, "they would either
conform, or be more wise and not be catched"; and to a Quaker in
his own office he extended a timid though effectual protection. Mean-
while there was growing up next door to him that beautiful nature,
William Pen. It is odd that Pepys condemned him for a fop; odd,
though natural enough when you see Pen's portrait, that Pepys was
jealous of him with his wife. But the cream of the story is when Pen
publishes his Sandy Foundation Shal^en, and Pepys has it read aloud
by his wife. "I find it," he says, "so well writ as, I think, it is too
good for him ever to have writ it; and it is a serious sort of book, and
not fit for everybody to read." Nothing is more galling to the merely
respectable than to be brought in contact with religious ardor. Pepys
had his own foundations, sandy enough, but dear to him from prac-

SAMUEL PEPYS 3OI

tical considerations, and he would read the book with true uneasiness
of spirit; for conceive the blow if, by some plaguy accident, this
Pen were to convert him! It was a different kind of doctrine that he
judged profitable for himself and others. "A good sermon of Mr.
Giflord's at our church, upon 'Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven.'
A very excellent and persuasive, good and moral sermon. He
showed, like a wise man, that righteousness is a surer moral way
of being rich than sin and villainy." It is thus that respectable people
desire to have their Greathearts address them, telling, in mild ac-
cents, how you may make the best of both worlds, and be a moral
hero without courage, kindness, or troublesome reflection; and thus
the Gospel, cleared of Eastern metaphor, becomes a manual of
worldly prudence, and a handybook for Pepys and the successful
merchant.

The respectability of Pepys was deeply grained. He has no idea
of truth except for the Diary. He has no care that a thing shall be,
if it but appear; gives out that he has inherited a good estate, when
he has seemingly got nothing but a lawsuit; and is pleased to be
thought liberal when he knows he has been mean. He is conscien-
tiously ostentatious. I say conscientiously, with reason. He could
never have been taken for a fop, like Pen, but arrayed himself in a
manner nicely suitable to his position. For long he hesitated to
assume the famous periwig; for a public man should travel gravely
with the fashions, not foppishly before, nor dowdily behind, the
central movement of his age. For long he durst not keep a carriage;
that, in his circumstances, would have been improper; but a time
comes, with the growth of his fortune, when the impropriety has
shifted to the other side, and he is "ashamed to be seen in a hackney."
Pepys talked about being "a Quaker or some very melancholy
thing"; for my part, I can imagine nothing so melancholy, because
nothing half so silly, as to be concerned about such problems. But
so respectability and the duties of society haunt and burden their
poor devotees; and what seems at first the very primrose path of life,
proves difficult and thorny like the rest. And the time comes to
Pepys, as to all the merely respectable, when he must not only order
his pleasures, but even clip his virtuous movements, to the public
patter of the age. There was some juggling among officials to avoid

302 STEVENSON

direct taxation; and Pepys, with a noble impulse, growing ashamed
of this dishonesty, designed to charge himself with ;riooo; but find-
ing none to set him an example, "nobody of our ablest merchants"
with this moderate liking for clean hands, he judged it "not decent";
he feared it would "be thought vain glory"; and, rather than appear
singular, cheerfully remained a thief. One able merchant's coun-
tenance, and Pepys had dared to do an honest act! Had he found
one brave spirit, properly recognized by society, he might have gone
far as a disciple. Mrs. Turner, it is true, can fill him full of sordid
scandal, and make him believe, against the testimony of his senses,
that Pen's venison pasty stank like the devil; but, on the other hand,
Sir William Coventry can raise him by a word into another being.
Pepys, when he is with Coventry, talks in the vein of an old Roman.
What does he care for office or emolument? "Thank God, I have
enough of my own," says he, "to buy me a good book and a good
fiddle, and I have a good wife." And again, we find this pair pro-
jecting an old age when an ungrateful country shall have dismissed
them from the field of public service; Coventry living retired in a
fine house, and Pepys dropping in, "it may be, to read a chapter of
Seneca."

Under this influence, the only good one in his life, Pepys continued
zealous and, for the period, pure in his employment. He would not
be "bribed to be unjust," he says, though he was "not so squeamish
as to refuse a present after," suppose the king to have received no
wrong. His new arrangement for the victualling of Tangier, he
tells us with honest complacency, will save the king a thousand and
gain Pepys three hundred pounds a year, — a statement which exactly
fixes the degree of the age's enlightenment. But for his industry and
capacity no praise can be too high. It was an unending struggle for
the man to stick to his business in such a garden of Armida as he
found this life; and the story of his oaths, so often broken, so cour-
ageously renewed, is worthy rather of admiration than the contempt
it has received.

Elsewhere, and beyond the sphere of Coventry's influence, we find
him losing scruples and daily complying further with the age. When
he began the Journal, he was a trifle prim and puritanic; merry
enough, to be sure, over his private cups, and still remembering

SAMUEL PEPYS 3O3

Magdalene ale and his acquaintance with Mrs. Ainsworth of Cam-
bridge. But youth is a hot season with all; when a man smells April
and May he is apt at times to stumble; and in spite of a disordered
practice, Pepys's theory, the better things that he approved and fol-
lowed after, we may even say were strict. Where there was "tag, rag,
and bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking," he felt "ashamed, and
went away"; and when he slept in church he prayed God forgive
him. In but a little while we find him with some ladies keeping
each other awake "from spite," as though not to sleep in church
were an obvious hardship; and yet later he calmly passes the time
of service, looking about him, with a perspective glass, on all the
pretty women. His favorite ejaculation, "Lord!" occurs but once that
I have observed in 1660, never in '61, twice in '62, and at least five
times in '63; after which the "Lords" may be said to pullulate like
herrings, with here and there a solitary "damned," as it were a
whale among the shoal. He and his wife, once filled with dudgeon
by some innocent freedoms at a marriage, are soon content to go
pleasuring with my Lord Brouncker's mistress, who was not even,
by his own account, the most discreet of mistresses. Tag, rag, and
bobtail, dancing, singing, and drinking become his natural element;
actors and actresses and drunken, roaring courtiers are to be found
in his society; until the man grew so involved with Saturnalian man-
ners and companions that he was shot almost unconsciously into the
grand domestic crash of 1668.

That was the legitimate issue and punishment of years of stag-
gering walk and conversation. The man who has smoked his pipe
for half a century in a powder magazine finds himself at last the
author and the victim of a hideous disaster. So with our pleasant-
minded Pepys and his peccadillos. All of a sudden, as he still trips
dexterously enough among the dangers of a double-faced career,
thinking no great evil, humming to himself the trillo, Fate takes the
further conduct of that matter from his hands, and brings him face
to face with the consequences of his acts. For a man still, after so
many years, the lover, although not the constant lover, of his wife, —
for a man, besides, who was so greatly careful of appearances, — the
revelation of his infidelities was a crushing blow. The tears that he
shed, the indignities that he endured, are not to be measured. A

304 STEVENSON

vulgar woman, and now justly incensed, Mrs. Pepys spared him no
detail of suffering. She was violent, threatening him with the tongs;
she was careless of his honor, driving him to insult the mistress
whom she had driven him to betray and to discard; worst of all,
she was hopelessly inconsequent in word and thought and deed, now
lulling him with reconciliations, and anon flaming forth again with
the original anger. Pepys had not used his wife well; he had
wearied her with jealousies, even while himself unfaithful; he had
grudged her clothes and pleasures, while lavishing both upon him-
self; he had abused her in words; he had bent his fist at her in anger;
he had once blacked her eye; and it is one of the oddest particulars
in that odd Diary of his, that, while the injury is referred to once in
passing, there is no hint as to the occasion or the manner of the
blow. But now, when he is in the wrong, nothing can exceed the
long-suffering affection of this impatient husband. While he was
still sinning and still undiscovered, he seems not to have known a
touch of penitence stronger than what might lead him to take his
wife to the theatre, or for an airing, or to give her a new dress, by
way of compensation. Once found out, however, and he seems to
himself to have lost all claim to decent usage. It is perhaps the
strongest instance of his externality. His wife may do what she
pleases, and though he may groan, it will never occur to him to
blame her; he has no weapon left but tears and the most abject
submission. We should perhaps have respected him more had he not
given away so utterly — above all, had he refused to write, under his
wife's dictation, an insulting letter to his unhappy fellow-culprit,
Miss Willet; but somehow I believe we like him better as he was.

The death of his wife, following so shortly after, must have
stamped the impression of this episode upon his mind. For the
remaining years of his long life we have no Diary to help us, and
we have seen already how little stress is to be laid upon the tenor
of his correspondence; but what with the recollection of the catas-
trophe of his married life, what with the natural influence of his
advancing years and reputation, it seems not unlikely that the period
of gallantry was at an end for Pepys; and it is beyond a doubt that
he sat down at last to an honored and agreeable old age among his
books and music, the correspondent of Sir Isaac Newton, and in one

SAMUEL PEPYS 305

instance at least, the poetical counsellor of Dryden. Through all this
period, that Diary which contained the secret memoirs of his life,
with all its inconsistencies and escapades, had been religiously pre-
served; nor when he came to die, does he appear to have provided
for its destruction. So we may conceive him faithful to the end to
all his dear and early memories; still mindful of Mrs. Hely in the
woods at Epsom; still lighting at Islington for a cup of kindness to
the dead; still, if he heard again that air that once so much disturbed
him, thrilling at the recollection of the love that bound him to his
wife.

ON THE ELEVATION OF THE
LABORING CLASSES

BY
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

William Ellery Channing, the chief apostle of New England Uni-
tarianism, was born at Newport, Rhode Island, April 7, 1780. He grad-
uated from Harvard in 1798, and five years later became minister of the
Federal Street Church in Boston, where he remained for thirty-seven
years. He died October 2, 1842.

Channing was still a child when, in 1785, King's Chapel in Boston,
in revising its liturgy, eliminated the doctrine of the Trinity. For the
next fifty years the movement went on, separating the Congregational
churches in New England into Trinitarian and Unitarian. A sermon
preached by Channing in Baltimore in 1819, at the ordination of Jared
Sparks, is generally regarded as the formulation of the Unitarian creed,
and throughout his life Channing continued a leader in the denomi-
nation.

To the tolerance, the culture, and the high civic and private virtue
that characterized the typical Unitarian of that time, Channing added
an emotional and spiritual quality, and an interest in philosophy,
that make him not merely the greatest of the Unitarian leaders, but in
important respects the first of the Transcendentalists. "The Calvinists," it
has been said, "believed that human nature is totally depraved; the Uni-
tarians denied this, their denial carrying with it the positive implication
that human nature is essentially good; the Transcendentalists believed
that human nature is divine" (Goddard). Judged by this test, Channing
belongs to the third group, for it is in his passionate faith in the divinity
of human nature, apparent in the following lectures "On the Elevation
of the Laboring Classes," as in his writing and preaching in general,
that one finds the characteristic mark of his spirit and the main secret
of his power.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

The following lectures were prepared for two meetings of mechanics,
one of them consisting of apprentices, the other of adults. For want of
strength they were delivered only to the former, though, in preparing
them, I had kept the latter also in view. "The Mechanic Apprentices'
Library Association," at whose request the lectures are published, is an
institution of much promise, not only furnishing a considerable means
of intellectual improvement, but increasing the self-resf)ect and conducing
to the moral safety of the members.

When I entered on this task, I thought of preparing only one lecture
of the usual length. But I soon found that I could not do justice to my
views in so narrow a compass. I therefore determined to write at large,
and to communicate through the press the results of my labor, if they
should be thought worthy of publication. With this purpose, I intro-
duced topics which I did not deliver, and which I thought might be
usefully presented to some who might not hear me. I make this state-
ment to prevent the objection, that the lectures are not, in all things,
adapted to those to whom they were delivered. Whilst written chiefly
for a class, they were also intended for the community.

As the same general subject is discussed in these lectures as in the
"Lecture on Self-Culture," published last winter, there will, of course,
be found in them that coincidence of thoughts which always takes place
in the writings of a man who has the inculcation of certain great prin-
ciples much at heart. Still, the point of view, the mode of discussion,
and the choice of topics, differ much in the two productions; so that my
state of mind would be given very imperfectly were the present lectures
withheld.

This is, probably, the last opportunity I shall have for communicating
with the laboring classes through the press. I may, therefore, be allowed
to express my earnest wishes for their happiness, and my strong hope
that they will justify the confidence of their friends, and will prove by
their example the possibility of joining with labor all the improvements
which do honor to our nature. — W. E. C, Boston, February ii, 1840.

ON THE ELEVATION OF THE
LABORING CLASSES

IT is with no common pleasure that I take part in the present
course of lectures. Such a course is a sign of the times, and
very interesting to all who are interested in the progress of their
fellow-creatures. We hear much of the improvements of our age.
The wonders achieved by machinery are the common talk of every
circle; but I confess that, to me, this gathering of mechanics' appren-
tices, whose chief bond of union is a library, and who come together
weekly to refresh and improve themselves by the best instruction
which the state of society places within their reach, is more encour-
aging than all the miracles of the machinist. In this meeting I see,
what I desire most to see, that the mass of the people are beginning
to comprehend themselves and their true happiness, that they are
catching glimpses of the great work and vocation of human beings,
and are rising to their true place in the social state. The present
meeting indicates a far more radical, more important change in the
world than the steam-engine, or the navigation of the Atlantic in a
fortnight. That members of the laboring class, at the close of a day's
work, should assemble in such a hall as this, to hear lectures on
science, history, ethics, and the most stirring topics of the day, from
men whose education is thought to fit them for the highest offices,
is a proof of a social revolution, to which no bounds can be set, and
from which too much cannot be hoped. I see in it a repeal of the
sentence of degradation passed by ages on the mass of mankind. I
see in it the dawn of a new era, in which it will be understood that
the first object of society is to give incitements and means of progress
to all its members. I see in it the sign of the approaching triumph
of men's spiritual over their outward and material interests. In the
hunger and thirst for knowledge and for refined pleasures which

3"

312 CHANNING

this course of lectures indicates in those who labor, I see that the
spirit of man is not always to be weighed down by toils for animal
life and by the appetite for animal indulgences. I do attach great
importance to this meeting, not for its own sake or its immediate
benefits, but as a token and pledge of a new impulse given to society
through all its conditions. On this account, I take more pleasure in
speaking here than I should feel in being summoned to pronounce
a show-oration before all the kings and nobles on earth. In truth,
it is time to have done with shows. The age is too stirring, we are
pressed on by too solemn interests, to be justified in making speeches
for self-display or mere amusement. He who cannot say something
in sympathy with, or in aid of, the great movements of humanity,
might as well hold his peace.

With these feelings and convictions, I am naturally, almost neces-
sarily, led to address you on a topic which must insure the attention
of such an audience: namely, the elevation of that portion of the
community who subsist by the labor of the hands. This work, I have
said, is going on. I may add, that it is advancing nowhere so rapidly
as in this city. I do not believe that, on the face of the earth, the
spirit of improvement has anywhere seized so strongly on those who
live by the sweat of the brow as among ourselves. Here it is nothing
rare to meet the union of intellectual culture and self-respect with
hard work. Here the prejudice against labor as degrading has very
much given way. This, then, is the place where the subject which
I have proposed should be discussed. We ought to consider in what
the true elevation of the laboring portion consists, how far it is prac-
ticable, and how it may be helped onward. The subject, I am aware,
is surrounded with much prejudice and error. Great principles need
to be brought out, and their application plainly stated. There are
serious objections to be met, fears to be disarmed, and rash hopes to
be crushed. I do not profess to have mastered the topic. But I can
claim one merit, that of coming to the discussion with a feeling of
its importance, and with a deep interest in the class of people whom
it concerns. I trust that this expression of interest will not be set
down as mere words, or as meant to answer any selfish purpose. A
politician who professes attachment to the people is suspected to
love them for their votes. But a man who neither seeks nor would

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 313

accept any place within their gift may hope to be Ustened to as their
friend. As a friend, I would speak plainly. I cannot flatter. I see
defects in the laboring classes. I think that, as yet, the greater part
of them have made little progress; that the prejudices and passions,
the sensuality and selfishness of multitudes among them, are formid-
able barriers to improvement; that multitudes have not waked as
yet to a dim conception of the end for which they are to struggle.
My hopes do not blind me to what exists; and with this clear sense
of the deficiencies of the multitude of men, I cannot, without guilt,
minister to their vanity. Not that they alone are to be charged with
deficiencies. Look where we may, we shall discern in all classes
ground for condemnation; and whoever would do good ought to
speak the truth of all, only remembering that he is to speak with
sympathy, and with a consciousness of his own fallibleness and
infirmity.

In giving my views of the elevation of the laboring multitude, I
wish that it may be understood that I shall often speak prospectively,
or of changes and improvements which are not to be expected imme-
diately, or soon; and this I say, that I may not be set down as a
dreamer, expecting to regenerate the world in a day. I fear, how-
ever, that this explanation will not shield me from this and like
reproaches. There are men who, in the face of all history, of the
great changes wrought in men's condition, and of the new principles
which are now acting on society, maintain that the future is to be a
copy of the past, and probably a faded rather than bright copy.
From such I differ, and did I not differ I would not stand here. Did
I expect nothing better from human nature than I see, I should have
no heart for the present effort, poor as it may be. I see the signs of
a better futurity, and especially signs that the large class by whose
toil we all live are rising from the dust; and this faith is my only
motive to what I now offer.

The elevation of the laboring portion of society: this is our subject.
I shall first consider in what this consists. I shall then consider some
objections to its practicableness, and to this point shall devote no
small part of the discussion; and shall close the subject with giving
some grounds of my faith and hope in regard to the most numerous
class of our fellow-beings.

314 CHANNING

I. What is to be understood by the elevation of the laboring class?
This is our first topic. To prevent misapprehension, I will begin with
stating what is not meant by it, in what it does not consist. — I say,
then, that by the elevation of the laborer, I do not understand that
he is to be raised above the need of labor. I do not expect a series of
improvements, by which he is to be released from his daily work.
Still more, I have no desire to dismiss him from his workshop and
farm, to take the spade and axe from his hand, and to make his life
a long holiday. I have faith in labor, and I see the goodness of God
in placing us in a world where labor alone can keep us alive. I would
not change, if I could, our subjection to physical laws, our exposure
to hunger and cold, and the necessity of constant conflicts with the
material world. I would not, if I could, so temper the elements that
they should infuse into us only grateful sensations, that they should
make vegetation so exuberant as to anticipate every want, and the
minerals so ductile as to offer no resistance to our strength and skill.
Such a world would make a contemptible race. Man owes his
growth, his energy, chiefly to that striving of the will, that conflict
with difficulty, which we call Effort. Easy, pleasant work does not
make robust minds, does not give men a consciousness of their
powers, does not train them to endurance, to perseverance, to steady
force of will, that force without which all other acquisitions avail
nothing. Manual labor is a school in which men are placed to get
energy of purpose and character, a vastly more important endow-
ment than all the learning of all other schools. They are placed,
indeed, under hard masters, physical sufferings and wants, the power
of fearful elements, and the vicissitudes of all human things; but
these stern teachers do a work which no compassionate, indulgent
friend could do for us; and true wisdom will bless Providence for
their sharp ministry. I have great faith in hard work. The material
world does much for the mind by its beauty and order; but it does
more for our minds by the pains it inflicts; by its obstinate resistance
which nothing but patient toil can overcome; by its vast forces, which
nothing but unremitting skill and effort can turn to our use; by its
perils which demand continual vigilance; and by its tendencies to
decay. I believe that difficulties are more important to the human
mind than what we call assistances. Work we all must, if we mean

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 315

to bring out and perfect our nature. Even if we do not work with
the hands, we must undergo equivalent toil in some other direction.
No business or study which does not present obstacles, tasking to the
full the intellect and the will, is worthy of a man. In science, he
who does not grapple with hard questions, who does not concentrate
his whole intellect in vigorous attention, who does not aim to pene-
trate what at first repels him, will never attain to mental force. The
uses of toil reach beyond the present world. The capacity of steady,
earnest labor is, I apprehend, one of our great preparations for
another state of being. When I see the vast amount of toil required
of men, I feel that it must have important connections with their
future existence; and that he who has met this discipline manfully
has laid one essential foundation of improvement, exertion, and
happiness in the world to come. You will here see that to me labor
has great dignity. It is not merely the grand instrument by which
the earth is overspread with fruitfulness and beauty, and the ocean
subdued, and matter wrought into innumerable forms for comfort
and ornament. It has a far higher function, which is to give force
to the will, efficiency, courage, the capacity of endurance, and of
persevering devotion to far-reaching plans. Alas, for the man who
has not learned to work! He is a poor creature. He does not know
himself. He depends on others, with no capacity of making returns
for the support they give; and let him not fancy that he has a
monopoly of enjoyment. Ease, rest, owes its deliciousness to toil;
and no toil is so burdensome as the rest of him who has nothing to
task and quicken his powers.

I do not, then, desire to release the laborer from toil. This is not
the elevation to be sought for him. Manual labor is a great good;
but, in so saying, I must be understood to speak of labor in its just
proportions. In excess it does great harm. It is not a good, when
made the sole work of life. It must be joined with higher means of
improvement, or it degrades instead of exalting. Man has a various
nature, which requires a variety of occupation and discipline for its
growth. Study, meditation, society, and relaxation should be mixed
up with his physical toils. He has intellect, heart, imagination, taste,
as well as bones and muscles; and he is grievously wronged when

3l6 CHANNING

compelled to exclusive drudgery for bodily subsistence. Life should
be an alternation of employments, so diversified as to call the whole
man into action. Unhappily our present civilization is far from
realizing this idea. It tends to increase the amount of manual toil,
at the very time that it renders this toil less favorable to the culture of
the mind. The division of labor, which distinguishes civilized from
savage life, and to which we owe chiefly the perfection of the arts,
tends to dwarf the intellectual powers, by confining the activity of
the individual to a narrow range, to a few details, perhaps to the
heading of pins, the pointing of nails, or the tying together of
broken strings; so that while the savage has his faculties sharpened
by various occupations, and by exposure to various perils, the civi-
lized man treads a monotonous, stupefying round of unthinking toil.
This cannot, must not, always be. Variety of action, corresponding
to the variety of human powers, and fitted to develop all, is the most
important element of human civilization. It should be the aim of
philanthropists. In proportion as Christianity shall spread the spirit '
of brotherhood, there will and must be a more equal distribution of
toils and means of improvement. That system of labor which saps
the health, and shortens life, and famishes intellect, needs, and must
receive, great modification. Still, labor in due proportion is an
important part of our present lot. It is the condition of all outward
comforts and improvements, whilst, at the same time, it conspires
with higher means and influences in ministering to the vigor and
growth of the soul. Let us not fight against it. We need this admo-
nition, because at the present moment there is a general disposition
to shun labor; and this ought to be regarded as a bad sign of our
times. The city is thronged with adventurers from the country, and
the liberal professions are overstocked, in the hope of escaping the
primeval sentence of living by the sweat of the brow; and to this
crowding of men into trade we owe not only the neglect of agricul-
ture, but, what is far worse, the demoralization of the community.
It generates excessive competition, which of necessity generates
fraud. Trade is turned to gambling; and a spirit of mad speculation
exposes public and private interests to a disastrous instability. It is,
then, no part of the philanthropy which would elevate the laboring
body, to exempt them from manual toil. In truth, a wise philan-

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 317

thropy would, if possible, persuade all men of all conditions to mix
up a measure of this toil with their other pursuits. The body as well
as the mind needs vigorous exertion, and even the studious would
be happier were they trained to labor as well as thought. Let us
learn to regard manual toil as the true discipline of a man. Not a
few of the wisest, grandest spirits have toiled at the work-bench and
the plough.

I have said that, by the elevation of the laboring mass, I do not
mean that they are to be released from labor. I add, in the next place,
that this elevation is not to be gained by efforts to force themselves
into what are called the upper ranks of society. I wish them to rise,
but I have no desire to transform them into gentlemen or ladies,
according to the common acceptation of these terms. I desire for
them not an outward and showy, but an inward and real change;
not to give them new titles and an artificial rank, but substantial
improvements and real claims to respect. I have no wish to dress
them from a Parisian tailor's shop, or to teach them manners from a
dancing-school. I have no desire to see them, at the end of the day,
doff their working dress, that they may play a part in richly attired
circles. I have no desire that they should be admitted to luxurious
feasts, or should get a taste for gorgeous upholstery. There is noth-
ing cruel in the necessity which sentences the jnultitude of men to
eat, dress, and lodge plainly and simply, especially where the sentence
is executed so mildly as in this country. In this country, where the
demand for labor is seldom interrupted, and the openings for enter-
prise are numerous beyond precedent, the laboring class, with few
exceptions, may well be satisfied with their accommodations. Very
many of them need nothing but a higher taste for beauty, order, and
neatness, to give an air of refinement and grace as well as comfort
to their establishments. In this country, the mass of laborers have
their share of outward good. Their food, abundant and healthful,
seasoned with the appetite which labor gives, is, on the whole,
sweeter as well as healthier than the elaborate luxuries of the pros-
perous; and their sleep is sounder and more refreshing than falls to
the lot of the less employed. Were it a possible thing, I should be
sorry to see them turned into men and women of fashion. Fashion
is a poor vocation. Its creed, that idleness is a privilege, and work a

3l8 CHANNING

disgrace, is among the deadliest errors. Without depth of thought,
or earnestness of feehng, or strength of purpose, Uving an unreal life,
sacrificing substance to show, substituting the factitious for the
natural, mistaking a crowd for society, finding its chief pleasure in
ridicule, and exhausting its ingenuity in expedients for killing time,
fashion is among the last influences under which a human being,
who respects himself or who comprehends the great end of life,
would desire to be placed. I use strong language, because I would
combat the disposition, too common in the laboring mass, to regard
what is called the upper class with envy or admiration. This dis-
position manifests itself among them in various forms. Thus, when
one of their number prospers he is apt to forget his old acquaintance,
and to work his way, if possible, into a more fashionable caste. As
far, indeed, as he extends his acquaintance among the intelligent,
refined, generous, and truly honorable, he makes a substantial im-
provement of his condition; but if, as is too often the case, he is
admitted by way of favor into a circle which has few claims beyond
those of greater luxury and show, and which bestows on him a
patronizing, condescending notice, in exchange for his old, honor-
able influence among his original associates, he does any thing but
rise. Such is not the elevation I desire for the laborer. I do not de-
sire him to struggle into another rank. Let him not be a servile
copyist of other classes, but aim at something higher than has yet
been realized in any body of men. Let him not associate the idea of
Dignity or Honor with certain modes of living, or certain outward
connections. I would have every man stand on his own ground, and
take his place among men according to personal endowments and
worth, and not according to outward appendages; and I would have
every member of the community furnished with such means of im-
provement, that, if faithful to himself, he may need no outward
appendage to attract the respect of all around him.

I have said, that the people are not to be elevated by escaping
labor, or by pressing into a different rank. Once more, I do not mean
by the elevation of the people, that they should become self-important
politicians; that, as individuals or a class, they should seize on
political power; that by uniting their votes they should triumph over

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 319

the more prosperous; or that they should succeed in bending the
administration o£ government to their particular interests. An indi-
vidual is not elevated by figuring in public affairs, or even by getting
into ofSce. He needs previous elevation to save him from disgrace
in his public relations. To govern one's self, not others, is true glory.
To serve through love, not to rule, is Christian greatness. Office is
not dignity. The lowest men, because most faithless in principle,
most servile to opinion, are to be found in office. I am sorry to say
it, but the truth should be spoken, that, at the present moment,
political action in this country does little to lift up any who are con-
cerned in it. It stands in opposition to a high morality. Politics,
indeed, regarded as the study and pursuit of the true, enduring good
of a community, as the application of great unchangeable principles
to public affairs, is a noble sphere of thought and action; but politics,
in its common sense, or considered as the invention of temporary
shifts, as the playing of a subtile game, as the tactics of party for
gaining power and the spoils of office, and for elevating one set of
men above another, is a paltry and debasing concern. The laboring
class are sometimes stimulated to seek power as a class, and this it is
thought will raise them. But no class, as such, should bear rule
among us. All conditions of society should be represented in the
government, and alike protected by it; nor can any thing be expected
but disgrace to the individual and the country from the success of
any class in grasping at a monopoly of political power. I would by
no means discourage the attention of the people to politics. They
ought to study in earnest the interests of the country, the principles
of our institutions, the tendencies of public measures. But the unhap-
piness is, they do not study; and, until they do, they cannot rise by
political action. A great amount of time, which, if well used, would
form an enlightened population, is now wasted on newspapers and
conversations, which inflame the passions, which unscrupulously
distort the truth, which denounce moral independence as treachery
to one's party, which agitate the country for no higher end than a
triumph over opponents; and thus multitudes are degraded into
men-worshippers or men-haters, into the dupes of the ambitious, or
the slaves of a faction. To rise, the people must substitute reflection
for passion. There is no other way. By these remarks, I do not mean

320 CHANNING

to charge on the laboring class all the passionateness of the country.
All classes partake of the madness, and all are debased by it. The
fiery spirits are not confined to one portion of the community. The
men, whose ravings resound through the halls of Congress, and are
then circulated through the country as eloquence, are not taken from
among those who toil. Party prejudices break out as fiercely on the
exchange, and even in the saloon, as in the workshop. The disease
has spread everywhere. Yet it does not dishearten me, for I see that
it admits of mitigation, if not of cure. I trust that these lectures, and
other sources of intellectual enjoyment now opening to the public,
will abate the fever of political excitement, by giving better occupa-
tion to the mind. Much, too, may be hoped from the growing self-
respect of the people, which will make them shrink indignantly from
the disgrace of being used as blinded partisans and unreflecting tools.
Much also is to be hoped from the discovery, which must sooner or
later be made, that the importance of government is enormously
overrated, that it does not deserve all this stir, that there are vastly
more effectual means of human happiness. Political institutions are
to be less and less deified, and to shrink into a narrower space; and
just in proportion as a wiser estimate of government prevails, the
present frenzy of political excitement will be discovered and put to
shame.

I have now said what I do not mean by the elevation of the labor-
ing classes. It is not an outward change of condition. It is not
release from labor. It is rot struggling for another rank. It is not
political power. I understand something deeper. I know but one
elevation of a human being, and that is elevation of soul. Without
this, it matters nothing where a man stands or what he possesses; and
with it, he towers, he is one of God's nobility, no matter what place
he holds in the social scale. There is but one elevation for a laborer,
and for all other men. There are not different kinds of dignity for
different orders of men, but one and the same to all. The only ele-
vation of a human being consists in the exercise, growth, energy
of the higher principles and powers of his soul. A bird may be shot
upward to the skies by a foreign force; but it rises, in the true sense
of the word, only when it spreads its own wings and soars by its
own living power. So a man may be thrust upward into a conspicu-

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 32I

ous place by outward accidents; but he rises, only in so far as he
exerts himself, and expands his best faculties, and ascends by a free
effort to a nobler region of thought and action. Such is the elevation
I desire for the laborer, and I desire no other. This elevation is indeed
to be aided by an improvement of his outward condition, and in
turn it greatly improves his outward lot; and thus connected, out-
ward good is real and great; but supposing it to exist in separation
from inward growth and life, it would be nothing worth, nor would
I raise a finger to promote it.

I know it will be said that such elevation as I have spoken of is
not and cannot be within the reach of the laboring multitude, and
of consequence they ought not to be tantalized with dreams of its
attainment. It will be said that the principal part of men are plainly
designed to work on matter for the acquisition of material and
corporeal good, and that, in such, the spirit is of necessity too wedded
to matter to rise above it. This objection will be considered by and
by; but I would just observe, in passing, that the objector must
have studied very carelessly the material world, if he suppose that it
is meant to be the grave of the minds of most of those who occupy it.
Matter was made for spirit, body for mind. The mind, the spirit,
is the end of this living organization of flesh and bones, of nerves
and muscles; and the end of this vast system of sea and land, and
air and skies. This unbounded creation of sun, and moon, and
stars, and clouds, and seasons, was not ordained merely to feed and
clothe the body, but first and supremely to awaken, nourish, and
expand the soul, to be the school of the intellect, the nurse of thought
and imagination, the field for the active powers, a revelation of the
Creator, and a bond of social union. We were placed in the mate-
rial creation, not to be its slaves, but to master it, and to make it a
minister to our highest powers. It is interesting to observe how much
the material world does for the mind. Most of the sciences, arts,
professions, and occupations of life, grow out of our connection with
matter. The natural philosopher, the physician, the lawyer, the
artist, and the legislator, find the objects or occasions of their re-
searches in matter. The poet borrows his beautiful imagery from
matter. The sculptor and painter express their noble conceptions
through matter. Material wants rouse the world to activity. The

322 CHANNING

material organs of sense, especially the eye, wake up infinite thoughts
in the mind. To maintain, then, that the mass of men are and must
be so immersed in matter, that their souls cannot rise, is to contra-
dict the great end of their connection with matter. I maintain that
the philosophy which does not see, in the laws and phenomena of
outward nature, the means of awakening mind, is lamentably short-
sighted; and that a state of society which leaves the mass of men to
be crushed and famished in soul by excessive toils on matter is at
war with God's designs, and turns into means of bondage what was
meant to free and exparld the soul.

Elevation of soul, this is to be desired for the laborer as for every
human being; and what does this mean? The phrase, I am aware,
is vague, and often serves for mere declamation. Let me strive to
convey some precise ideas of it; and in doing this, I can use no
language which will save the hearer from the necessity of thought.
The subject is a spiritual one. It carries us into the depths of our own
nature, and I can say nothing about it worth saying, without tasking
your powers of attention, without demanding some mental toil. I
know that these lectures are meant for entertainment rather than
mental labor; but, as I have told you, I have great faith in labor, and
I feel that I cannot be more useful than in exciting the hearer to
some vigorous action of mind.

Elevation of soul, in what does this consist? Without aiming at
philosophical exactness, I shall convey a sufficiently precise idea of
it, by saying that it consists, first, in force of thought exerted for the
acquisition of truth; secondly, in force of pure and generous feeling;
thirdly, in force of moral purpose. Each of these topics needs a lec-
ture for its development. I must confine myself to the first; from
which, however, you may learn in a measure my views of the other
two. — Before entering on this topic, let me offer one preliminary
remark. To every man who would rise in dignity as a man, be he
rich or poor, ignorant or instructed, there is one essential condi-
tion, one effort, one purpose, without which not a step can be
taken. He must resolutely purpose and labor to free himself from
whatever he knows to be wrong in his motives and life. He
who habitually allows himself in any known crime or wrongdoing,
effectually bars his progress towards a higher intellectual and moral
life. On this point every man should deal honestly with himself. If

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 323

he will not listen to his conscience, rebuking him for violations of
plain duty, let him not dream of self-elevation. The foundation is
wanting. He will build, if at all, in sand.

I now proceed to my main subject. I have said that the elevation
of a man is to be sought, or rather consists, first, in force of thought
exerted for the acquisition of truth; and to this I ask your serious
attention. Thought, thought, is the fundamental distinction of mind,
and the great work of life. All that a man does outwardly is but the
expression and completion of his inward thought. To work effec-
tually, he must think clearly. To act nobly, he must think nobly.
Intellectual force is a principal element of the soul's life, and should
be proposed by every man as a principal end of his being. It is com-
mon to distinguish between the intellect and the conscience, between
the power of thought and virtue, and to say that virtuous action is
worth more than strong thinking. But we mutilate our nature by
thus drawing lines between actions or energies of the soul, which are
intimately, indissolubly bound together. The head and the heart
are not more vitally connected than thought and virtue. Does not
conscience include, as a part of itself, the noblest action of the intel-
lect or reason ? Do we not degrade it by making it a mere feeling ?
Is it not something more ? Is it not a wise discernment of the right,
the holy, the good? Take away thought from virtue, and what
remains worthy of a man.'' Is not high virtue more than blind in-
stinct? Is it not founded on, and does it not include clear, bright
perceptions of what is lovely and grand in character and action?
Without power of thought, what we call conscientiousness, or a
desire to do right, shoots out into illusion, exaggeration, pernicious
excess. The most cruel deeds on earth have been perpetrated in the
name of conscience. Men have hated and murdered one another
from a sense of duty. The worst frauds have taken the name of
pious. Thought, intelligence, is the dignity of a man, and no man is
rising but in proportion as he is learning to think clearly and forci-
bly, or directing the energy of his mind to the acquisition of
truth. Every man, in whatsoever condition, is to be a student. No
matter what other vocation he may have, his chief vocation is to
Think.

I say every man is to be a student, a thinker. This does not mean
that he is to shut himself within four walls, and bend his body and

324 CHANNING

mind over books. Men thought before books were written, and
some of the greatest thinkers never entered what we call a study.
Nature, Scripture, society, and life, present perpetual subjects for
thought; and the man who collects, concentrates, employs his facul-
ties on any of these subjects for the purpose of getting the truth, is so
far a student, a thinker, a philosopher, and is rising to the dignity of
a man. It is time that we should cease to limit to professed scholars
the titles of thinkers, philosophers. Whoever seeks truth with an
earnest mind, no matter when or how, belongs to the school of
intellectual men.

In a loose sense of the word, all men may be said to think; that
is, a succession of ideas, notions, passes through their minds from
morning to night; but in as far as this succession is passive, undi-
rected, or governed only by accident and outward impulse, it has
little more claim to dignity than the experience of the brute, who
receives, with like passiveness, sensations from abroad through his
waking hours. Such thought, if thought it may be called, having no
aim, is as useless as the vision of an eye which rests on nothing, which
flies without pause over earth and sky, and of consequence receives
no distinct image. Thought, in its true sense, is an energy of intellect.
In thought, the mind not only receives impressions or suggestions
from without or within, but reacts upon them, collects its attention,
concentrates its forces upon them, breaks them up and analyzes
them like a living laboratory, and then combines them anew, traces
their connections, and thus impresses itself on all the objects which
engage it.

The universe in which we live was plainly meant by God to stir
up such thought as has now been described. It is full of difficulty
and mystery, and can only be penetrated and unravelled by the con-
centration of the intellect. Every object, even the simplest in nature
and society, every event of life, is made up of various elements subtly
bound together; so that, to understand anything, we must reduce it
from its complexity to its parts and principles, and examine their
relations to one another. Nor is this all. Every thing which enters
the mind not only contains a depth of mystery in itself, but is con-
nected by a thousand ties with all other things. The universe is not
a disorderly, disconnected heap, but a beautiful whole, stamped

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 325

throughout with unity, so as to be an image of the One Infinite
Spirit. Nothing stands alone. All things are knit together, each
existing for all and all for each. The humblest object has infinite
connections. The vegetable, which you saw on your table to-day,
came to you from the first plant which God made to grow on the
earth, and was the product of the rains and sunshine of six thousand
years. Such a universe demands thought to be understood; and we
are placed in it to think, to put forth the power within, to look
beneath the surface of things, to look beyond particular facts and
events to their causes and effects, to their reasons and ends, their
mutual influences, their diversities and resemblances, their propor-
tions and harmonies, and the general laws which bind them together.
This is what I mean by thinking; and by such thought the mind rises
to a dignity which humbly represents the greatness of the Divine
intellect; that is, it rises more and more to consistency of views, to
broad general principles, to universal truths, to glimpses of the order
and harmony and infinity of the Divine system, and thus to a deep,
enlightened veneration of the Infinite Father. Do not be startled, as
if I were holding out an elevation of mind utterly to be despaired
of; for all thinking, which aims honestly and earnestly to see things
as they are, to see them in their connections, and to bring the loose,
conflicting ideas of the mind into consistency and harmony, all such
thinking, no matter in what sphere, is an approach to the dignity of
which I speak. You are all capable of the thinking which I recom-
mend. You have all practised it in a degree. The child, who casts
an inquiring eye on a new toy, and breaks it to pieces that he may
discover the mysterious cause of its movements, has begun the work
of which I speak, has begun to be a philosopher, has begun to pene-
trate the unknown, to seek consistency and harmony of thought;
and let him go on as he has begun, and make it one great business of
life to inquire into the elements, connections, and reasons of what-
ever he witnesses in his own breast, or in society, or in outward
nature, and, be his condition what it may, he will rise by degrees to
a freedom and force of thought, to a breadth and unity of views,
which will be to him an inward revelation and promise of the
intellectual greatness for which he was created.
You will observe, that in speaking of force of thought as the ele-

326 CHANNING

vauon of the laborer and of every human being, I have continually
supposed this force to be exerted for the purpose of acquiring truth.
I beg you never to lose sight of this motive, for it is essential to
intellectual dignity. Force of thought may be put forth for other
purposes, to amass wealth for selfish gratification, to give the indi-
vidual power over others, to blind others, to weave a web of
sophistry, to cast a deceitful lustre on vice, to make the worse appear
the better cause. But energy of thought so employed, is suicidal. The
intellect, in becoming a pander to vice, a tool of the passions, an
advocate of lies, becomes not only degraded, but diseased. It loses
the capacity of distinguishing truth from falsehood, good from evil,
right from wrong; it becomes as worthless as an eye which cannot
distinguish between colors or forms. Woe to that mind which wants
the love of truth! For want of this, genius has become a scourge to
the world, its breath a poisonous exhalation, its brightness a seducer
into paths of pestilence and death. Truth is the light of the Infinite
Mind, and the image of God in his creatures. Nothing endures but
truth. The dreams, fictions, theories, which men would substitute
for it, soon die. Without its guidance effort is vain, and hope base-
less. Accordingly, the love of truth, a deep thirst for it, a deliberate
purpose to seek it and hold it fast, may be considered as the very
foundation of human culture and dignity. Precious as thought is,
the love of truth is still more precious; for without it, thought —
thought wanders and wastes itself, and precipitates men into guilt
and misery. There is no greater defect in education and the pulpit
than that they inculcate so little an impartial, earnest, reverential
love of truth, a readiness to toil, to live and die for it. Let the labor-
ing man be imbued in a measure with this spirit; let him learn to
regard himself as endowed with the power of thought, for the very
end of acquiring truth; let him learn to regard truth as more precious
than his daily bread; and the spring of true and perpetual elevation
is touched within him. He has begun to be a man; he becomes one
of the elect of his race. Nor do I despair of this elevation of the
laborer. Unhappily little, almost nothing, has been done as yet to
inspire either rich or poor with the love of truth for its own sake, or
for the life, and inspiration, and dignity it gives to the soul. The
prosperous have as little of this principle as the laboring mass. I

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 327

think, indeed, that the spirit of luxurious, fashionable life, is more
hostile to it than the hardships of the poor. Under a wise culture,
this principle may be awakened in all classes, and wherever awak-
ened, it will form philosophers, successful and noble thinkers. These
remarks seem to me particularly important, as showing how inti-
mate a union subsists between the moral and intellectual nature, and
how both must work together from the beginning. All human cul-
ture rests on a moral foundation, on an impartial, disinterested spirit,
on a willingness to make sacrifices to the truth. Without this moral
power, mere force of thought avails nothing towards our elevation.

I am aware that I shall be told that the work of thought which
I have insisted on is difficult, that to collect and concentrate the mind
for the truth is harder than to toil with the hands. Be it so. But
are we weak enough to hope to rise without toil.? Does any man,
laborer or not, expect to invigorate body or mind without strenuous
effort? Does not the child grow and get strength by throwing a
degree of hardship and vehemence and conflict into his very sports ?
Does not life without difficulty become insipid and joyless? Cannot
a strong interest turn difficulty into pleasure? Let the love of truth,
of which I have spoken, be awakened, and obstacles in the way to it
will whet, not discourage, the mind, and inspire a new delight into
its acquisition.

I have hitherto spoken of force of thought in general. My views
will be given more completely and distinctly, by considering, next,
the objects on which this force is to be exerted. These may be re-
duced to two classes, matter and mind — the physical world which
falls under our eyes, and the spiritual world. The working man
is particularly called to make matter his study, because his business
is to work on it, and he works more wisely, effectually, cheerfully,
and honorably, in proportion as he knows what he acts upon, knows
the laws and forces of which he avails himself, understands the rea-
son of what he does, and can explain the changes which fall under
his eye. Labor becomes a new thing when thought is thrown into
it, when the mind keeps pace with the hands. Every farmer should
study chemistry, so as to understand the elements or ingredients
which enter into soils, vegetation, and manures, and the laws accord-
ing to which they combine with and are loosened from one another.

328 CHANNING

So, the mechanic should understand the mechanical powers, the laws
of motion, and the history and composition of the various substances
which he works on. Let me add, that the farmer and the mechanic
should cultivate the perception of beauty. What a charm and new
value might the farmer add to his grounds and cottage, were he a
man of taste! The product of the mechanic, be it great or small, a
house or a shoe, is worth more, sometimes much more, if he can
succeed in giving it the grace of proportion. In France, it is not un-
common to teach drawing to mechanics, that they may get a quick
eye and a sure hand, and may communicate to their works the
attraction of beauty. Every man should aim to impart this perfec-
tion to his labors. The more of mind we carry into toil, the better.
Without a habit of thought, a man works more like a brute or
machine than like a man. With it, his soul is kept alive amidst his
toils. He learns to fix an observing eye on the processes of his trade,
catches hints which abridge labor, gets glimpses of important dis-
coveries, and is sometimes able to perfect his art. Even now, after
all the miracles of invention which honor our age, we little suspect
what improvements of machinery are to spring from spreading
intelligence and natural science among workmen.

But I do not stop here. Nature is to engage our force of thought,
not simply for the aid which the knowledge of it gives in working,
but for a higher end. Nature should be studied for its own sake,
because so wonderful a work of God, because impressed with his
perfection, because radiant with beauty, and grandeur, and wisdom,
and beneficence. A laborer, like every other man, is to be liberally
educated, that is, he is to get knowledge, not only for his bodily
subsistence, but for the life, and growth, and elevation of his mind.
Am I asked, whether I expect the laborer to traverse the whole circle
of the physical sciences? Certainly not; nor do I expect the merchant,
or the lawyer, or preacher to do it. Nor is this at all necessary to
elevation of soul. The truths of physical science, which give greatest
dignity to the mind, are those general laws of the creation which it
has required ages to unfold, but which an active mind, bent on
self-enlargement, may so far study and comprehend, as to interpret
the changes of nature perpetually taking place around us, as to
see in all the forces of the universe the workings of one Infinite

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 329

Power, and in all its arrangements the manifestation of one unsearch-
able wisdom.

And this leads me to observe the second great object on which
force of thought is to be exerted, and that is mind, spirit, compre-
hending under this word God and all his intelligent offspring.
This is the subject of what are called the metaphysical and moral
sciences. This is the grand field for thought; for the outward,
material world is the shadow of the spiritual, and made to minister
to it. This study is of vast extent. It comprehends theology, meta-
physics, moral philosophy, political science, history, literature. This
is a formidable list, and it may seem to include a vast amount of
knowledge which is necessarily placed beyond the reach of the
laborer. But it is an interesting thought, that the key to these various
sciences is given to every human being in his own nature, so that they
are peculiarly accessible to him. How is it that I get my ideas of God,
of my fellow-creatures, of the deeds, suffering, motives, which make
up universal history? I comprehend all these from the conscious-
ness of what passes in my own soul. The mind within me is a type
representative of all others, and therefore I can understand all.
Whence come my conceptions of the intelligence, and justice, and
goodness, and power of God? It is because my own spirit contains
the germs of these attributes. The ideas of them are first derived
from my own nature, and therefore I comprehend them in other
beings. Thus the foundation of all the sciences which treat of mind
is laid in every man's breast. The good man is exercising in his
business and family, faculties and affections which bear a likeness
to the attributes of the Divinity, and to the energies which have
made the greatest men illustrious; so that in studying himself, in
learning the highest principles and laws of his own soul, he is in
truth studying God, studying all human history, studying the
philosophy which has immortalized the sages of ancient and mod-
ern times. In every man's mind and life all other minds and lives
are more or less represented and wrapped up. To study other
things, I must go into the outward world, and perhaps go far. To
study the science of spirit, I must come home and enter my own
soul. The profoundest books that have ever been written do
nothing more than bring out, place in clear light, what is passing

330 CHANNING

in each of your minds. So near you, so within you, is the grandest
truth.

I have, indeed, no expectation that the laborer is to understand
in detail the various sciences which relate to mind. Few men in
any vocation do so understand them. Nor is it necessary; though,
where time can be commanded, the thorough study of some par-
ticular branch, in which the individual has a special interest, will be
found of great utility. What is needed to elevate the soul is, not
that a man should know all that has been thought and written in
regard to the spiritual nature, not that a man should become an
encyclopaedia, but that the great ideas, in which all discoveries termi-
nate, which sum up all sciences, which the philosopher extracts
from infinite details, may be comprehended and felt. It is not the
quantity, but the quality of knowledge, which determines the mind's
dignity. A man of immense information may, through the want
of large and comprehensive ideas, be far inferior in intellect to a
laborer, who, with little knowledge, has yet seized on great truths.
For example, I do not expect the laborer to study theology in the
ancient languages, in the writings of the Fathers, in the history of
sects, &c., &c.; nor is this needful. All theology, scattered as it is
through countless volumes, is summed up in the idea of God; and
let this idea shine bright and clear in the laborer's soul and he has
the essence of theological libraries, and a far higher light than has
visited thousands of renowned divines. A great mind is formed by
a few great ideas, not by an infinity of loose details. I have known
very learned men who seemed to me very poor in intellect, because
they had no grand thoughts. What avails it that a man has studied
ever so minutely the histories of Greece and Rome, if the great
ideas of freedom, and beauty, and valor, and spiritual energy, have
not been kindled by these records into living fires in his soul? The
illumination of an age does not consist in the amount of its knowl-
edge, but in the broad and noble principles of which that knowledge
is the foundation and inspirer. The truth is, that the most laborious
and successful student is confined in his researches to a very few
of God's works; but this limited knowledge of things may still
suggest universal laws, broad principles, grand ideas, and these
elevate the mind. There are certain thoughts, principles, ideas,

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 33 1

which by their nature rule over all knowledge, which are intrinsi-
cally glorious, quickening, all-comprehending, eternal, and with
these I desire to enrich the mind of the laborer and of every human
being.

To illustrate my meaning, let me give a few examples of the
great ideas which belong to the study or science of mind. Of course,
the first of these, the grandest, the most comprehensive, is the idea
of God, the Parent Mind, the Primitive and Infinite Intelligence.
Every man's elevation is to be measured first and chieily by his
conception of this Great Being; and to attain a just, and bright,
and quickening knowledge of Him, is the highest aim of thought.
In truth, the great end of the universe, of revelation, of life, is to
develop in us the idea of God. Much earnest, patient, laborious
thought is required to see this Infinite Being as He is, to rise above
the low, gross notions of the Divinity, which rush in upon us from
our passions, from our selfish partialities, and from the low-minded
world around us. There is one view of God particularly suited to
elevate us. I mean the view of Him as the "Father of our spirits";
as having created us with great powers to grow up to perfection;
as having ordained all outward things to minister to the progress of
the soul; as always present to inspire and strengthen us, to wake
us up to inward life, and to judge and rebuke our wrong-doing;
as looking with parental joy on our resistance of evil; as desiring to
communicate himself to our minds for ever. This one idea, ex-
panded in the breast of the laborer, is a germ of elevation more
fruitful than all science, no matter how extensive or profound,
which treats only of outward finite things. It places him in the
first rank of human beings. You hear of great theologians. He only
deserves the name, be his condition what it may, who has, by thought
and obedience, purified and enlarged his conception of God.

From the idea of God, I proceed to another grand one, that of
man, of human nature; and this should be the object of serious,
intense thought. Few men know, as yet, what a man is. They
know his clothes, his complexion, his property, his rank, his follies,
and his outward life. But the thought of his inward being, his
proper humanity, has hardly dawned on multitudes; and yet, who
can live a man's life that does not know what is the distinctive

332 CHANNING

worth o£ a human being? It is interesting to observe how faithful
men generally are to their idea of a man; how they act up to it.
Spread the notion that courage is true manhood, and how many
will die rather than fall short of that standard; and hence, the true
idea of a man, brought out in the laborer's mind, elevates him
above every other class who may want it. Am I asked for my
conception of the dignity of a human being? I should say, that
it consists, first, in that spiritual principle, called sometimes the
reason, sometimes the conscience, which, rising above what is local
and temporary, discerns immutable truth and everlasting right;
which, in the midst of imperfect things, conceives of perfectionj
which is universal and impartial, standing in direct opposition to
the partial, selfish principles of human nature; which says to me
with authority, that my neighbor is as precious as myself, and his
rights as sacred as my own ; which commands me to receive all truth,
however it may war with my pride, and to do all justice, however
it may conflict with my interest; and which calls me to rejoice with
love in all that is beautiful, good, holy, happy, in whatever being
these attributes may be found. This principle is a ray of Divinity
in man. We do not know what man is, still something of the
celestial grandeur of this principle in the soul may be discerned.
There is another grand view of man, included indeed in the former,
yet deserving distinct notice. He is a free being; created to act from
a spring in his own breast, to form himself and to decide his own
destiny; connected intimately with nature, but not enslaved to it;
connected still more strongly with God, yet not enslaved even to
the Divinity, but having power to render or withhold the service
due to his Creator; encompassed by a thousand warring forces, by
physical elements which inflict pleasure and pain, by dangers seen
and unseen, by the influences of a tempting, sinful world, yet endued
by God with power to contend with all, to perfect himself by con-
flict with the very forces which threaten to overwhelm him. Such
is the idea of a man. Happy he in whom it is unfolded by earnest
thought!

Had I time, I should be glad to speak of other great ideas
belonging to the science of mind, and which sum up and give
us, in one bright expression, the speculations of ages. The idea of

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 333

human life, of its true end and greatness; the idea of virtue, as
the absolute and ultimate good; the idea of liberty, which is the
highest thought of political science, and which, by its intimate
presence to the minds of the people, is the chief spring of our
country's life and greatness, — all these might be enlarged on; and I
might show how these may be awakened in the laborer, and may give
him an elevation which many who are above labor want. But, leav-
ing all these, I will only refer to another, one of the most important
results of the science of mind, and which the laborer, in common
with every man, may and should receive, and should strengthen
by patient thought. It is the idea of his importance as an individual.
He is to understand that he has a value, not as belonging to a com-
munity, and contributing to a general good which is distinct from
himself, but on his own account. He is not a mere part of a
machine. In a machine the parts are useless, but as conducing to
the end of the whole, for which alone they subsist. Not so a man. He
is not simply a means, but an end, and exists for his own sake,
for the unfolding of his nature, for his own virtue and happiness.
True, he is to work for others, but not servilely, not with a broken
spirit, not so as to degrade himself: he is to work for others from
a wise self-regard, from principles of justice and benevolence, and
in the exercise of a free will and intelligence, by which his own
character is perfected. His individual dignity, not derived from
birth, from success, from wealth, from outward show, but consist-
ing in the indestructible principles of his soul, — this ought to enter
into his habitual consciousness. I do not speak rhetorically or use
the cant of rhapsodists, but I utter my calm, deliberate conviction,
when I say that the laborer ought to regard himself with a self-
respect unknown to the proudest monarch who rests on outward
rank.

I have now illustrated what I mean by the great ideas which
exalt the mind. Their worth and power cannot be exaggerated. They
are the mightiest influences on earth. One great thought breathed
into a man may regenerate him. The idea of freedom in ancient
and modern republics, the idea of inspiration in various religious
sects, the idea of immortality, how have these triumphed over
worldly interests! How many heroes and martyrs have they formed!

334 CHANNING

Great ideas are mightier than the passions. To awaken them is
the highest office of education. As yet it has been Httle thought
of. The education of the mass of the people has consisted in giving
them mechanical habits, in breaking them to current usages and
modes of thinking, in teaching religion and morality as traditions.
It is time that a rational culture should take the place of mechanical;
that men should learn to act more from ideas and principles, and
less from blind impulse and undiscerning imitation.

Am I met here by the constantly recurring objection, that such
great thoughts as have now been treated of are not to be expected
in the multitude of men whose means of culture are so confined?
To this difficulty I shall reply in the next lecture; but I wish to
state a fact, or law of our nature, very cheering to those who, with
few means, still pant for generous improvement. It is this, that
great ideas come to us less from outward, direct, laborious teaching,
than from indirect influences, and from the native working of our
own minds; so that those who want the outward apparatus for
extensive learning are not cut off from them. Thus, laborious
teachers may instruct us for years in God, and virtue, and the soul,
and we may remain nearly as ignorant of them as at the beginning;
whilst a look, a tone, an act of a fellow-creature, who is kindled by
a grand thought, and who is thrown in our path at some susceptible
season of life, will do much to awaken and expand this thought
within us. It is a matter of experience that the greatest ideas often
come to us, when right-minded, we know not how. They flash on
us as lights from heaven. A man seriously given to the culture of
his mind in virtue and truth finds himself under better teaching
than that of man. Revelations of his own soul, of God's intimate
presence, of the grandeur of the creation, of the glory of disinterested-
ness, of the deformity of wrong-doing, of the dignity of universal
justice, of the might of moral principle, of the immutableness of
truth, of immortality, and of the inward sources of happiness;
these revelations, awakening a thirst for something higher than he
is or has, come of themselves to an humble, self-improving man.
Sometimes a common scene in nature, one of the common relations
of life, will open itself to us with a brightness and pregnancy of
meaning unknown before. Sometimes a thought of this kind forms
an era in life. It changes the whole future course. It is a new

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 335

creation. And these great ideas are not confined to men of any
class. They are communications of the Infinite Mind to all minds
which are open to their reception; and labor is a far better condition
for their reception than luxurious or fashionable Ufe. It is even
better than a studious life, when this fosters vanity, pride, and the
spirit of jealous competition. A childlike simplicity attracts these
revelations more than a selfish culture of intellect, however far
extended. — Perhaps a caution should be added to these suggestions.
In speaking of great ideas, as sometimes springing up of them-
selves, as sudden illuminations, I have no thought of teaching that
we are to wait for them passively, or to give up our minds unthink-
ingly to their control. We must prepare ourselves for them by
faithfulness to our own powers, by availing ourselves of all means
of culture within our reach; and, what is more, these illuminations,
if they come, are not distinct, complete, perfect views, but glimpses,
suggestions, flashes, given us, like all notices and impressions from
the outward world, to be thought upon, to be made subjects of
patient reflection, to be brought by our own intellect and activity
into their true connection with all our other thoughts. A great idea,
without reflection, may dazzle and bewilder, may destroy the
balance and proportion of the mind, and impel to dangerous excess.
It is to awaken the free, earnest exertion of our powers, to rouse
us from passiveness to activity and life, that inward inspirations, and ,
the teachings of outward nature, are accorded to the mind.

I have thus spoken at large of that force of thought which the
laborer is to seek as his true elevation; and I will close the subject
with observing, that on whatever objects or for whatever purposes
this force may be exerted, one purpose should be habitually pre-
dominant, and that is, to gain a larger, clearer comprehension of
all the duties of life. Thought cannot take too wide a range; but
its chief aim should be to acquire juster and brighter perceptions
of the right and the good, in every relation and condition in which
we may be placed. Do not imagine that I am here talking pro-
fessionally, or sliding unconsciously, by the force of habit, into the
tone of the pulpit. The subject of duty belongs equally to all pro-
fessions and all conditions. It were as wise to think of Uving without
breath, or of seeing without light, as to exclude moral and religious
principle from the work of self-elevation. And I say this, because

33^ CHANNING

you are in danger o£ mistaking mere knowledge for improvement.
Knowledge fails of its best end when it does not minister to a high
virtue. I do not say that we are never to think, read, or study, but
for the express purpose of learning our duties. The mind must
not be tied down by rigid rules. Curiosity, amusement, natural
tastes, may innocently direct reading and study to a certain extent.
Even in these cases, however, we are bound to improve ourselves
morally as well as intellectually, by seeking truth and rejecting
falsehood, and by watching against the taint which inheres in
almost all human productions. What avails intellectual without
moral power? How little does it avail us to study the outward
world, if its greatness inspire no reverence of its Author, if its
beneficence awaken no kindred love towards our fellow-creatures!
How little does it avail us to study history, if the past do not help
us to comprehend the dangers and duties of the present; if from
the sufferings of those who have gone before us, we do not learn
how to suffer, and from their great and good deeds how to act
nobly; if the development of the human heart, in different ages
and countries, do not give us a better knowledge of ourselves! How
little does literature benefit us, if the sketches of life and character,
the generous sentiments, the testimonies to disinterestedness and
rectitude, with which it abounds, do not incite and guide us to
wiser, purer, and more graceful action! How little substantial
good do we derive from poetry and the fine arts, if the beauty,
which delights the imagination, do not warm and refine the heart,
and raise us to the love and admiration of what is fair, and perfect,
and lofty, in character and life! Let our studies be as wide as our
condition will allow; but let this be their highest aim, to instruct
us in our duty and happiness, in the perfection of our nature, in
the true use of life, in the best direction of our powers. Then is
the culture of intellect an unmixed good, when it is sacredly used
to enlighten the conscience, to feed the flame of generous sentiment,
to perfect us in our common employments, to throw a grace over
our common actions, to make us sources of innocent cheerfulness
and centres of holy influence, and to give us courage, strength,
stability, amidst the sudden changes and sore temptations and trials
of life.

LECTURE 11.

IN my last lecture I invited your attention to a subject of great
interest, the elevation of the laboring portion of the community.
I proposed to consider, first, in what this elevation consists;
secondly the objections which may be made to its practicableness;
thirdly, the circumstances which now favor it, and gives us hope
that it will be more and more accomplished. In considering the
first head, I began with stating in what the elevation of the laboring
class does not consist, and then proceeded to show positively what
it is, what it does consist in. I want time to retrace the ground
over which we then travelled. I must trust to your memories. I
was obliged by my narrow limits to confine myself chiefly to the
consideration of the intellectual elevation which the laborer is to
propose; though, in treating this topic, I showed the moral, religious,
social improvements which enter into his true dignity. I observed
that the laborer was to be a student, a thinker, an intellectual man, as
well as a laborer; and suggested the qualifications of this truth
which are required by this peculiar employment, by his daily
engagement in manual toil. I now come to consider the objections
which spring up in many minds, when such views of the laborer's
destiny are given. This is our second head.

First, it will be objected, that the laboring multitude cannot
command a variety of books, or spend much time in reading; and
how then can they gain the force of thought, and the great ideas,
which were treated of in the former lecture.? This objection grows
out of the prevalent disposition to confound intellectual improve-
ment with book-learning. Some seem to think that there is a kind
of magic in a printed page, that types give a higher knowledge
than can be gained from other sources. Reading is considered as
the royal road to intellectual eminence. This prejudice I have vir-
tually set aside in my previous remarks; but it has taken so strong
a hold of many as to need some consideration. I shall not attempt

337

338 CHANNING

to repel the objection by decrying books. Truly good books are
more than mines to those who can understand them. They are the
breathings of the great souls o£ past times. Genius is not embalmed
in them, as is sometimes said, but lives in them perpetually. But
we need not many books to answer the great ends of reading. A
few are better than many, and a little time given to a faithful
study of the few will be enough to quicken thought and enrich
the mind. The greatest men have not been book-men. Washington,
it has often been said, was no great reader. The learning com-
monly gathered from books is of less worth than the truths we
gain from experience and reflection. Indeed, most of the knowl-
edge from reading, in these days, being acquired with Uttle mental
action, and seldom or never reflected on and turned to use, is very
much a vain show. Events stirring the mind to earnest thought
and vigorous application of its resources, do vastly more to elevate
the mind than most of our studies at the present time. Few of the
books read among us deserve to be read. Most of them have no
principle of life, as is proved by the fact that they die the year of
their birth. They do not come from thinkers, and how can they
awaken thought? A great proportion of the reading of this city
is useless, I had almost said pernicious. I should be sorry to see our
laborers exchanging their toils for the reading of many of our
young ladies and young gentlemen, who look on the intellect as
given them for amusement; who read, as they visit, for amusement,
who discuss no great truths and put forth no energy of thought on
the topics which fly through their minds. With this insensibility
to the dignity of the intellect, and this frittering away of the mind
on superficial reading, I see not with what face they can claim
superiority to the laboring mass, who certainly understand one thing
thoroughly, that is, their own business, and who are doing some-
thing useful for themselves and their fellow-creatures. The great
use of books is to rouse us to thought; to turn us to questions which
great men have been working on for ages; to furnish us with
materials for the exercise of judgment, imagination, and moral
feeling; to breathe into us a moral life from higher spirits than our
own; and this benefit of books may be enjoyed by those who have
not much time for retired study.

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 339

It must not be forgotten, by those who despair of the laboring
classes because they cannot live in libraries, that the highest sources
of truth, light, and elevation of mind, are not libraries, but our
inward and outward experience. Human life, with its joys and
sorrows, its burdens and alleviations, its crimes and virtues, its
deep wants, its solemn changes, and its retributions, always press-
ing on us; what a library is this! and who may not study it? Every
human being is a volume worthy to be studied. The books which
circulate most freely through the community are those which give
us pictures of human life. How much more improving is the
original, did we know how to read it."" The laborer has this page
always open before him; and, still more, the laborer is every day
writing a volume more full of instruction than all human produc-
tions, I mean his own life. No work of the most exalted genius
can teach us so much as the revelation of human nature in the
secrets of our own souls, in the workings of our own passions,
in the operations of our own intelligence, in the retributions which
follow our own good and evil deeds, in the dissatisfaction with
the present, in the spontaneous thoughts and aspirations which
form part of every man's biography. The study of our own history
from childhood, of all the stages of our development, of the good
and bad influences which have beset us, of our mutations of feeling
and purpose, and of the great current which is setting us towards
future happiness or woe, — this is a study to make us nobly wise;
and who of us has not access to this fountain of eternal truth.''
May not the laborer study and understand the pages which he is
writing in his own breast?

In these remarks, I have aimed to remove the false notion into
which the laborers themselves fall, that they can do little towards
acquiring force and fulness of thought, because in want of books.
I shall next turn to prejudices more confined to other classes. A
very common one is, that the many are not to be called to think,
study, improve their minds, because a privileged few are intended
by God to do their thinking for them. "Providence," it is said,
"raises up superior minds, whose office it is to discover truth for
the rest of the race. Thinking and manual toil are not meant to

340 CHANNING

go together. The division of labor is a great law o£ nature. One
man is to serve society by his head, another by his hands. Let each
class keep to its proper work." These doctrines I protest against.
I deny to any individual or class this monopoly of thought. Who
among men can show God's commission to think for his brethren,
to shape passively the intellect of the mass, to stamp his own image
on them as if they were wax ? As well might a few claim a monop-
oly of light and air, of seeing and breathing, as of thought. Is not
the intellect as universal a gift as the organs of sight and respiration ?
Is not truth as freely spread abroad as the atmosphere or the sun's
rays? Can we imagine that God's highest gifts of intelligence,
imagination, and moral power were bestowed to provide only for
animal wants? to be denied the natural means of growth, which
is action ? to be starved by drudgery ? Were the mass of men made
to be monsters? to grow only in a few organs and faculties, and
to pine away and shrivel in others ? or were they made to put forth
all the powers of men, especially the best and most distinguishing?
No man, not the lowest, is all hands, all bones and muscles. The
mind is more essential to human nature, and more enduring, than
the limbs; and was this made to lie dead? Is not thought the right
and duty of all? Is not truth ahke precious to all? Is not truth the
natural aliment of the mind, as plainly as the wholesome grain is
of the body ? Is not the mind adapted to thought, as plainly as the
eye to light, the ear to sound? Who dares to withhold it from its
natural action, its natural element and joy? Undoubtedly some
men are more gifted than others, and are marked out for more
studious lives. But the work of such men is not to do others'
thinking for them, but to help them to think more vigorously and
effectually. Great minds are to make others great. Their superiority
is to be used, not to break the multitude to intellectual vassalage, not
to establish over them a spiritual tyranny, but to rouse them from
lethargy, and to aid them to judge for themselves. The light and
life which spring up in one soul are to be spread far and wide. Of
all treasons against humanity, there is no one worse than his who
employs great intellectual force to keep down the intellect of his
less favored brother.
It is sometimes urged by those who consider the multitude as

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 34I

not intended to think, that at best they can learn but Uttle, and that
this is hkely to harm rather than to do them good. "A little learn-
ing," we are told, "is a dangerous thing." "Shallow draughts" o£
knowledge are worse than ignorance. The mass of the people, it is
said, can go to the bottom of nothing; and the result of stimulating
them to thought will be the formation of a dangerous set of half-
thinkers. To this argument I reply, first, that it has the inconvenience
of proving too much; for, if valid, it shows that none of any class
ought to think. For who, I would ask, can go to the bottom of
anything? Whose "learning" is not "little"? Whose "draughts"
of knowledge are not "shallow"? Who of us has fathomed the
depths of a single product of nature or a single event in history?
Who of us is not baffled by the mysteries in a grain of sand ? How
contracted the range of the widest intellect! But is our knowledge,
because so little, of no worth? Are we to despise the lessons which
are taught us in this nook of creation, in this narrow round of
human experience, because an infinite universe stretches around us,
which we have no means of exploring, and in which the earth, and
sun, and planets dwindle to a point? We should remember that
the known, however little it may be, is in harmony with the
boundless unknown, and a step towards it. We should remember,
too, that the gravest truths may be gathered from a very narrow
compass of information. God is revealed in his smallest work as
truly as in his greatest. The principles of human nature may be
studied better in a family than in the history of the world. The
finite is a manifestation of the infinite. The great ideas, of which
I have formerly spoken, are within the reach of every man who
thirsts for truth, and seeks it with singleness of mind. I will only
add, that the laboring class are not now condemned to draughts
of knowledge so shallow as to merit scorn. Many of them know
more of the outward world than all the philosophers of antiquity;
and Christianity has opened to them mysteries of the spiritual world
which kings and prophets were not privileged to understand. And
are they, then, to be doomed to spiritual inaction, as incapable of
useful thought?

It is sometimes said, that the multitude may think on the common
business of life, but not on higher subjects, and especially on religion.

342 CHANNING

This, it is said, must be received on authority; on this, men in
general can form no judgment of their own. But this is the last
subject on which the individual should be willing to surrender
himself to others' dictation. In nothing has he so strong an interest.
In nothing is it so important that his mind and heart should be
alive and engaged. In nothing has he readier means of judging for
himself. In nothing, as history shows, is he more likely to be led
astray by such as assume the office of thinking for him. Religion
is a subject open to all minds. Its great truths have their foundation
in the soul itself, and their proofs surround us on all sides. God
has not shut up the evidence of his being in a few books, written in
a foreign language, and locked up in the libraries of colleges and
philosophers; but has written his name on the heavens and on the
earth, and even on the minutest animal and plant; and his word,
taught by Jesus Christ, was not given to scribes and lawyers, but
taught to the poor, to the mass of men, on mountains, in streets,
and on the sea-shore. Let me not be told that the multitude do
actually receive religion on authority, or on the word of others. I
reply, that a faith so received seems to me of litde worth. The
precious, the living, the effectual part of a poor man's faith, is that
of which he sees the reasonableness and excellence; that which
approves itself to his intelligence, his conscience, his heart; that which
answers to deep wants in his own soul, and of which he has the
witness in his own inward and outward experience. All other parts
of his belief, those which he takes on blind trust, and in which he
sees no marks of truth and divinity, do him little or no good. Too
often they do him harm, by perplexing his simple reason, by sub-
stituting the fictions and artificial systems of theologians for the
plain precepts of love, and justice, and humility, and fiUal trust in
God. As long as it was supposed that religion is to benefit the world
by laying restraints, awakening fears, and acting as a part of the
system of police, so long it was natural to rely on authority and
tradition as the means of its propagation; so long it was desirable
to stifle thought and inquiry on the subject. But now that we have
learned that the true office of religion is to awaken pure and lofty
sentiments, and to unite man to God by rational homage and
enlightened love, there is something monstrous in placing religion

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 343

beyond the thought and the study o£ the mass of the human race.

I proceed to another prejudice. It is objected, that the distinction
of ranks is essential to social order, and that this will be swept away
by calling forth energy of thought in all men. This objection, indeed,
though exceedingly insisted on in Europe, has nearly died out here;
but still enough of it lingers among us to deserve consideration.
I reply, then, that it is a libel on social order to suppose that it
requires for its support the reduction of the multitude of human
beings to ignorance and servility; and that it is a libel on the Creator
to suppose that he requires, as the foundation of communities, the
systematic depression of the majority of his intelligent offspring.
The supposition is too grossly unreasonable, too monstrous, to
require labored refutation. I see no need of ranks, either for social
order or for any other purpose. A great variety of pursuits and
conditions is indeed to be desired. Men ought to follow their genius,
and to put forth their powers in every useful and lawful way. I do
not ask for a monotonous world. We are far too monotonous now.
The vassalage of fashion, which is a part of rank, prevents con-
tinually the free expansion of men's powers. Let us have the
greatest diversity of occupations. But this does not imply that there
is a need of splitting society into castes or ranks, or that a certain
number should arrogate superiority, and stand apart from the rest
of men as a separate race. Men may work in different departments
of life, and yet recognize their brotherly relation, and honor one
another, and hold friendly communion with one another. Un-
doubtedly, men will prefer as friends and common associates those
with whom they sympathize most. But this is not to form a rank
or caste. For example, the intelligent seek out the intelligent; the
pious, those who reverence God. But suppose the intellectual and
the religious to cut themselves off by some broad, visible distinction
from the rest of society, to form a clan of their own, to refuse
admission • into their houses to people of inferior knowledge and
virtue, and to diminish as far as possible the occasions of inter-
course with them; would not society rise up, as one man, against
this arrogant exclusiveness ? And if intelligence and piety may not
be the foundations of a caste, on what ground shall they, who have

344 CHANNING

no distinction but wealth, superior costume, richer equipages, finer
houses, draw lines around themselves and constitute themselves a
higher class? That some should be richer than others is natural
and is necessary, and could only be prevented by gross violations o£
right. Leave men to the free use of their powers, and some will
accumulate more than their neighbors. But to be prosperous is not
to be superior; and should form no barrier between men. Wealth
ought not to secure to the prosperous the slightest consideration.
The only distinctions which should be recognized are those of the
soul, of strong principle, of incorruptible integrity, of usefulness, of
cultivated intellect, of fidelity in seeking for truth. A man in
proportion as he has these claims, should be honored and welcomed
everywhere. I see not why such a man, however coarsely if neatly
dressed, should not be a respected guest in the most splendid man-
sions, and at the most brilliant meetings. A man is worth infinitely
more than the saloons, and the costumes, and the show of the
universe. He was made to tread all these beneath his feet. What
an insult to humanity is the present deference to dress and uphol-
stery, as if silk-worms, and looms, and scissors, and needles could
produce something nobler than a man! Every good man should
protest against a caste founded on outward prosperity, because it
exalts the outward above the inward, the material above the spiritual;
because it springs from and cherishes a contemptible pride in super-
ficial and transitory distinctions; because it alienates man from
his brother, breaks the tie of common humanity, and breeds jeal-
ousy, scorn, and mutual ill-will. Can this be needed to social order ?
It is true, that in countries where the mass of the people are
ignorant and servile, the existence of a higher and a worshipped
rank tends to keep them from outrage. It infuses a sentiment of
awe, which prevents more or less the need of force and punishment.
But it is worthy of remark that the means of keeping order in one
state of society may become the chief excitement of discontent and
disorder in another, and this is peculiarly true of aristocracy or
high rank. In rude ages, this keeps the people down; but when
the people by degrees have risen to some consciousness of their
rights and essential equality with the rest of the race, the awe of
rank naturally subsides, and passes into suspicion, jealousy, and

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 345

sense of injury, and a disposition to resist. The very institution
which once restrained, now provokes. Through this process the Old
World is now passing. The strange illusion, that a man, because he
wears a garter or a riband, or was born to a title, belongs to another
race, is fading away; and society must pass through a series of revolu-
tions, silent or bloody, until a more natural order takes place of
distinctions which grew originally out of force. Thus aristocracy,
instead of giving order to society, now convulses it. So impossible
is it for arbitrary human ordinations permanently to degrade human
nature or subvert the principles of justice and freedom.

I am aware that it will be said, "that the want of refinement
of manners and taste in the lower classes will necessarily keep them
an inferior caste, even though all political inequalities be removed."
I acknowledge this defect of manners in the multitude, and grant
that it is an obstacle to intercourse with the more improved, though
often exaggerated. But this is a barrier which must and will yield
to the means of culture spread through our community. The evil
is not necessarily associated with any condition of human life. An
intelligent traveller' tells us, that in Norway, a country wanting
many of our advantages, good manners and politeness are spread
through all conditions; and that the "rough way of talking to and
living with each other, characteristic of the lower classes of society
in England, is not found there." Not many centuries ago, the
intercourse of the highest orders in Europe was sullied by indelicacy
and fierceness; but time has worn out these stains, and the same
cause is now removing what is repulsive among those who toil with
their hands. I cannot believe that coarse manners, boisterous con-
versation, slovenly negligence, filthy customs, surliness, indecency,
are to descend by necessity from generation to generation in any
portion of the community. I do not see why neatness, courtesy,
delicacy, ease, and deference to others' feelings, may not be made
the habits of the laboring multitude. A change is certainly going on
among them in respect to manners. Let us hope that it will be
a change for the better; that they will not adopt false notions of
refinement; that they will escape the servile imitation of what is
hollow and insincere, and the substitution of outward shows for
* See Laing's Travels in Norway.

346 CHANNING

genuine natural courtesy. Unhappily they have but imperfect models
on which to form themselves. It is not one class alone which needs
reform in manners. We all need a new social intercourse, which
shall breathe genuine refinement; which shall unite the two great
elements of politeness, self-respect, and a delicate regard to the
rights and feelings of others; which shall be free without rudeness,
and earnest without positiveness; which shall be graceful, yet warm-
hearted; and in which communication shall be frank, unlabored,
overflowing, through the absence of all assumption and pretence,
and through the consciousness of being safe from heartless ridicule.
This grand reform, which I trust is to come, will bring with it a
happiness little known in social life; and whence shall it come?
The wise and disinterested of all conditions must contribute to it;
and I see not why the laboring classes may not take part in the
work. Indeed, when I consider the greater simplicity of their lives
and their greater openness to the spirit of Christianity, I am not
sure but that the "golden age" of manners is to begin among those
who are now despaired of for their want of refinement.

In these remarks, I have given the name of "prejudices" to the
old opinions respecting rank, and respecting the need of keeping
the people from much thought. But allow these opinions to have
a foundation in truth; suppose high fences of rank to be necessary
to refinement of manners; suppose that the happiest of all ages
were the feudal, when aristocracy was in its flower and glory, when
the noble, superior to the laws, committed more murders in one
year than the multitude in twenty. Suppose it best for the laborer
to live and die in thoughtless ignorance. Allow all this, and that
we have reason to look with envy on the past; one thing is plain,
the past is gone, the feudal castle is dismantled, the distance between
classes greatly reduced. Unfortunate as it may be, the people have
begun to think, to ask reasons for what they do and suffer and
believe, and to call the past to account. Old spells are broken, old
reliances gone. Men can no longer be kept down by pageantry,
state-robes, forms, and shows. Allowing it to be best that society
should rest on the depression of the multitude, the multitude will
no longer be quiet when they are trodden under foot, but ask
impatiently for a reason why they too may not have a share in

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 347

social blessings. Such is the state of things, and we must make the
best of what we cannot prevent. Right or wrong, the people will
think; and is it not important that they should think justly? that
they should be inspired with the love of truth, and instructed how
to seek it? that they should be established by wise culture in the
great principles on which religion and society rest, and be pro-
tected from scepticism and wild speculation by intercourse with
enlightened and virtuous men? It is plain that in the actual state
of the world, nothing can avail us but a real improvement of the
mass of the people. No stable foundation can be laid for us but
in men's minds. Alarming as the truth is, it should be told, that
outward institutions cannot now secure us. Mightier powers than
institutions have come into play among us, the judgment, the
opinions, the feelings of the many; and all hopes of stability which
do not rest on the progress of the many, must perish.

But a more serious objection than any yet considered, to the
intellectual elevation of the laboring class, remains to be stated. It
is said, "that the laborer can gain subsistence for himself and his
family only by a degree of labor which forbids the use of means of
improvement. His necessary toils leave no time or strength for
thought. Political economy, by showing that population outstrips
the means of improvement, passes an irrepealable sentence of
ignorance and degradation on the laborer. He can live but for
one end, which is to keep himself alive. He cannot give time and
strength to intellectual, social, and moral culture, without starving
his family, and impoverishing the community. Nature has laid this
heavy law on the mass of the people, and it is idle to set up our
theories and dreams of improvement against nature."

This objection applies with great force to Europe, and is not
without weight here. But it does not discourage me. I reply, first,
to this objection, that it generally comes from a suspicious source.
It comes generally from men who abound, and are at ease; who
think more of property than of any other human interest; who
have Uttle concern for the mass of their fellow-creatures; who are
willing that others should bear all the burdens of life, and that
any social order should continue which secures to themselves per-

348 CHANNING

sonal comfort or gratification. The selfish epicure and the thriving
man of business easily discover a natural necessity for that state of
things which accumulates on themselves all the blessings, and on
their neighbor all the evils, of life. But no man can judge what is
good or necessary for the multitude but he who feels for them, and
whose equity and benevolence are shocked by the thought that all
advantages are to be monopolized by one set of men, and all dis-
advantages by another. I wait for the judgment of profound
thinkers and earnest philanthropists on this point, — a judgment
formed after patient study of political economy, and human nature
and human history; nor even on such authority shall I readily
despair of the multitude of my race.

In the next place, the objection under consideration is very much
a repetition of the old doctrine, that what has been must be; that
the future is always to repeat the past, and society to tread for ever
the beaten path. But can any thing be plainer than that the present
condition of the world is peculiar, unprecedented ? that new powers
and new principles are at work? that the application of science to
art is accomplishing a stupendous revolution? that the condition of
the laborer is in many places greatly improved, and his intellectual
aids increased? that abuses, once thought essential to society, and
which seemed entwined with all its fibres, have been removed ? Do
the mass of men stand where they did a few centuries ago? And
do not new circumstances, if they make us fearful, at the same time
keep us from despair? The future, be it what it may, will not
resemble the past. The present has new elements, which must work
out new weal or woe. We have no right, then, on the ground of
the immutableness of human affairs, to quench, as far as we have
power, the hope of social progress.

Another consideration, in reply to the objection that the neces-
sary toils of life exclude improvement, may be drawn not only
from general history, but from the experience of this country in
particular. The working classes here have risen and are still rising
intellectually, and yet there are no signs of starvation, nor are we
becoming the poorest people on earth. By far the most interesting
view of this country is the condition of the working multitude.

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 349

Nothing among us deserves the attention of the traveller so much
as the force of thought and character, and the self-respect awakened
by our history and institutions in the mass of the people. Our pros-
perous classes are much like the same classes abroad, though, as
we hope, of purer morals; but the great working multitude leave
far behind them the laborers of other countries. No man of ob-
servation and benevolence can converse with them without being
struck and delighted with the signs they give of strong and sound
intellect and manly principle. And who is authorized to set bounds
to this progress? In improvement the first steps are the hardest.
The difficulty is to wake up men's souls, not to continue their
action. Every accession of light and strength is a help to new
acquisitions.

Another consideration, in reply to the objection, is, that as yet
no community has seriously set itself to the work of improving
all its members, so that what is possible remains to be ascertained.
No experiment has been made to determine how far liberal provision
can be made at once for the body and mind of the laborer. The
highest social art is yet in its infancy. Great minds have nowhere
solemnly, earnestly undertaken to resolve the problem, how the
multitude of men may be elevated. The trial is to come. Still
more, the multitude have nowhere comprehended distinctly the
true idea of progress, and resolved deliberately and solemnly to
reduce it to reality. This great thought, however, is gradually
opening on them, and it is destined to work wonders. From them-
selves their salvation must chiefly come. Little can be done for
them by others, till a spring is touched in their own breasts; and
this being done, they cannot fail. The people, as history shows us,
can accomplish miracles under the power of a great idea. How
much have they often done and suffered in critical moments for
country, for religion! The great idea of their own elevation is only
beginning to unfold itself within them, and its energy is not to be
foretold. A lofty conception of this kind, were it once distinctly
seized, would be a new life breathed into them. Under this impulse
they would create time and strength for their high calling, and
would not only regenerate themselves, but the community.

350 CHANNING

Again, I am not discouraged by the objection, that the laborer,
if encouraged to give time and strength to the elevation of his
mind, will starve himself and impoverish the country, when I con-
sider the energy and efficiency of mind. The highest force in the
universe is mind. This created the heavens and earth. This has
changed the wilderness into fruitfulness, and linked distant coun-
tries in a beneficent ministry to one another's wants. It is not to
brute force, to physical strength, so much as to art, to skill, to intel-
lectual and moral energy, that men owe their mastery over the
world. It is mind which has conquered matter. To fear, then,
that by calling forth a people's mind, we shall impoverish and
starve them, is to be frightened at a shadow. I believe, that with
the growth of intellectual and moral power in the community, its
productive power will increase, that industry will become more
efficient, that a wiser economy will accumulate wealth, that un-
imagined resources of art and nature will be discovered. I believe
that the means of living will grow easier, in proportion as a people
shall become enlightened, self-respecting, resolute, and just. Bodily
or material forces can be measured, but not the forces of the soul;
nor can the results of increased mental energy be foretold. Such a
community will tread down obstacles now deemed invincible, and
turn them into helps. The inward moulds the outward. The
power of a people lies in its mind; and this mind, if fortified and
enlarged, will bring external things into harmony with itself. It
will create a new world around it, corresponding to itself. If, how-
ever, I err in this belief; if, by securing time and means for improve-
ment to the multitude, industry and capital should become less
productive, I still say, Sacrifice the wealth, and not the mind of
a people. Nor do I believe that the physical good of a community
would in this way be impaired. The diminution of a country's
wealth, occasioned by general attention to intellectual and moral
culture, would be followed by very different effects from those
which would attend an equal diminution brought about by sloth,
intemperance, and ignorance. There would indeed be less produc-
tion in such a country, but the character and spirit of the people
would effect a much more equal distribution of what would be
produced; and the happiness of a community depends vastly more

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 35 1

on the distribution than on the amount o£ its wealth. In thus
speaking of the future, I do not claim any special prophetical gift.
As a general rule, no man is able to foretell distinctly the ultimate,
permanent results of any great social change. But as to the case
before us, we ought not to doubt. It is a part of rehgion to believe
that by nothing can a country so effectually gain happiness and
lasting prosperity as by the elevation of all classes of its citizens.
To question this seems an approach to crime.

"If this fail.
The pillar'd firmament is rottenness.
And earth's base built on stubble."

I am aware that, in reply to all that has been said in favor of the
possibility of uniting self-improvement with labor, discouraging
facts may be brought forward from our daily experience. It
may be said that in this country, under advantages unknown in
other lands, there is a considerable number on whom the burden
of toil presses very heavily, who can scarcely live with all their
efforts, and who are cut off by their hard condition from the means
of intellectual culture; and if this take place now, what are we to
expect hereafter in a more crowded population.'' I acknowledge
that we have a number of depressed laborers, whose state is exceed-
ingly unpropitious to the education of the mind; but this argument
will lose much of its power when we inquire into the causes of
this evil. We shall then see that it comes, not from outward neces-
sity, not from the irresistible obstacles abroad, but chiefly from
the fault or ignorance of the sufferers themselves; so that the
elevation of the mind and character of the laborer tends directly
to reduce, if not remove, the evil. Of consequence, this elevation
finds support in what is urged against it. In confirmation of these
views, allow me just to hint at the causes of that depression of
many laborers which is said to show that labor and self-improve-
ment cannot go on together.

First, how much of this depression is to be traced to intemperance ?
What a great amount of time, and strength, and money, might
multitudes gain for self -improvement, by a strict sobriety! That
cheap remedy, pure water, would cure the chief evils in very many

352 CHANNING

families of the ignorant and poor. Were the sums which are still
lavished on ardent spirits appropriated wisely to the elevation of
the people, what a new world we should live in! Intemperance
not only wastes the earnings, but the health and the minds of men.
How many, were they to exchange what they call moderate drinking
for water, would be surprised to learn that they had been living
under a cloud, in half-stupefaction, and would become conscious
of an intellectual energy of which they had not before dreamed!
Their labors would exhaust them less; and less labor would be
needed for their support; and thus their inability to cultivate their
high nature would in a great measure be removed. The working
class, above all men, have an interest in the cause of temperance,
and they ought to look on the individual who lives by scattering
the means and excitements of drunkenness not only as the general
enemy of his race, but as their own worst foe.

In the next place, how much of the depression of laborers may
be traced to the want of a strict economy! The prosperity of this
country has produced a wastefulness that has extended to the labor-
ing multitude. A man, here, turns with scorn from fare that in
many countries would be termed luxurious. It is, indeed, important
that the standard of living in all classes should be high; that is, it
should include the comforts of life, the means of neatness and order
in our dwellings, and such supplies of our wants as are fitted to
secure vigorous health. But how many waste their earnings on
indulgences which may be spared, and thus have no resource for
a dark day, and are always trembling on the brink of pauperism!
Needless expenses keep many too poor for self-improvement. And
here let me say, that expensive habits among the more prosperous
laborers often interfere with the mental culture of themselves and
their families. How many among them sacrifice improvement to
appetite! How many sacrifice it to the love of show, to the desire
of outstripping others, and to habits of expense which grow out
of this insatiable passion! In a country so thriving and luxurious
as ours, the laborer is in danger of contracting artificial wants and
diseased tastes; and to gratify these he gives himself wholly to
accumulation, and sells his mind for gain. Our unparalleled pros-

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 353

parity has not been an unmixed good. It has inflamed cupidity, has
diseased the imagination with dreams of boundless success, and
plunged a vast multitude into excessive toils, feverish competitions,
and exhausting cares. A laborer, having secured a neat home and a
wholesome table, should ask nothing more for the senses; but
should consecrate his leisure, and what may be spared of his earn-
ings, to the culture of himself and his family, to the best books, to
the best teaching, to pleasant and profitable intercourse, to sympathy
and the offices of humanity, and to the enjoyment of the beautiful
in nature and art. Unhappily, the laborer, if prosperous, is anxious
to ape the rich man, instead of trying to rise above him, as he often
may, by noble acquisitions. The young in particular, the apprentice
and the female domestic, catch a taste for fashion, and on this altar
sacrifice too often their uprightness, and almost always the spirit
of improvement, dooming themselves to ignorance, if not to vice,
for a vain show. Is this evil without remedy? Is human nature
always to be sacrificed to outward decoration? Is the outward
always to triumph over the inward man ? Is nobleness of sentiment
never to spring up among us ? May not a reform in this particular
begin in the laboring class, since it seems so desperate among the
more prosperous? Cannot the laborer, whose condition calls him
so loudly to simplicity of taste and habits, take his stand against
that love of dress which dissipates and corrupts so many minds
among the opulent? Cannot the laboring class refuse to measure
men by outward success, and pour utter scorn on all pretensions
founded on outward show or condition? Sure I am, that, were
they to study plainness of dress and simplicity of living, for the
purpose of their own true elevation, they would surpass in intellect,
in taste, in honorable qualities, and in present enjoyment, that
great proportion of the prosperous who are softened into indulgence
or enslaved to empty show. By such self-denial, how might the
burden of labor be lightened, and time and strength redeemed for
improvement!

Another cause of the depressed condition of not a few laborers,
as I believe, is their ignorance on the subject of health. Health is
the working man's fortune, and he ought to watch over it more

354 CHANNING

than the capitalist over his largest investments. Health lightens
the efforts of body and mind. It enables a man to crowd much
work into a narrow compass. Without it, little can be earned, and
that little by slow, exhausting toil. For these reasons I cannot but
look on it as a good omen that the press is circulating among us
cheap works, in which much useful knowledge is given of the
structure, and functions, and laws of the human body. It is in no
small measure through our own imprudence that disease and
debility are incurred, and one remedy is to be found in knowledge.
Once let the mass of the people be instructed in their own frames;
let them understand clearly that disease is not an accident, but has
fixed causes, many of which they can avert, and a great amount of
suffering, want, and consequent intellectual depression will be
removed. — I hope I shall not be thought to digress too far, when I
add, that were the mass of the community more enlightened on
these points, they would apply their knowledge, not only to their
private habits, but to the government of the city, and would insist
on municipal regulations favoring general health. This they owe
to themselves. They ought to require a system of measures for
effectually cleansing the city; for supplying it with pure water,
either at public expense or by a private corporation; and for pro-
hibiting the erection or the letting of such buildings as must
generate disease. What a sad thought is it, that in this metropolis,
the blessings which God pours forth profusely on bird and beast,
the blessings of air, and light, and water, should, in the case of
many families, be so stinted or so mixed with impurities, as to
injure instead of invigorating the frame! With what face can the
great cities of Europe and America boast of their civilization, when
within their limits thousands and ten thousands perish for want of
God's freest, most lavish gifts! Can we expect improvement among
people who are cut off from nature's common bounties, and want
those cheering influences of the elements which even savages enjoy.?
In this city, how much health, how many lives are sacrificed to
the practice of letting cellars and rooms which cannot be ventilated,
which want the benefits of light, free air, and pure water, and the
means of removing filth! We forbid by law the selling of putrid

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 355

meat in the market. Why do we not forbid the renting of rooms
in which putrid, damp and noisome vapors are working as sure
destruction as the worst food? Did people understand that they
are as truly poisoned in such dens as by tainted meat and decaying
vegetables, would they not appoint commissioners for houses as
truly as commissioners for markets? Ought not the renting of
imtenantable rooms, and the crowding of such numbers into a
single room as must breed disease, and may infect a neighborhood,
be as much forbidden as the importation of a pestilence? I have
enlarged on this point, because I am persuaded that the morals,
manners, decencies, self-respect, and intellectual improvement, as
well as the health and physical comforts of a people, depend on no
outward circumstances more than on the quality of the houses
in which they live. The remedy of the grievance now stated lies
with the people themselves. The laboring people must require that
the health of the city shall be a leading object of the municipal
administration, and in so doing they will protect at once the body
and the mind.

I will mention one more cause of the depressed condition of
many laborers, and that is, sloth, "the sin which doth most easily
beset us." How many are there who, working languidly and re-
luctantly, bring little to pass, spread the work of one hour over
many, shrink from difficulties which ought to excite them, keep
themselves poor, and thus doom their families to ignorance as well
as to wanti

In these remarks I have endeavored to show that the great
obstacles to the improvement of the laboring classes are in them-
selves, and may therefore be overcome. They want nothing but
the will. Outward difficulty will shrink and vanish before them,
just as far as they are bent on progress, just as far as the great idea
of their own elevation shall take possession of their minds. I know
that many will smile at the suggestion, that the laborer may be
brought to practise thrift and self-denial, for the purpose of becom-
ing a nobler being. But such sceptics, having never experienced
the power of a grand thought or generous purpose, are no judges
of others. They may be assured, however, that enthusiasm is not

356 CHANNING

wholly a dream, and that it is not wholly unnatural for individuals
or bodies to get the idea of something higher and more inspiring
than their past attainments.

III. Having now treated of the elevation of the laborer, and
examined the objections to it, I proceed, in the last place, to consider
some of the circumstances of the times which encourage hopes of
the progress of the mass of the people. My limits oblige me to
confine myself to very few. — And, first, it is an encouraging cir-
cumstance, that the respect for labor is increasing, or rather that
the old prejudices against manual toil, as degrading a man or
putting him in a lower sphere, are wearing away; and the cause
of this change is full of promise; for it is to be found in the progress
of intelligence, Christianity, and freedom, all of which cry aloud
against the old barriers created between the different classes, and
challenge especial sympathy and regard for those who bear the
heaviest burdens, and create most of the comforts of social life.
The contempt of labor of which I have spoken is a relic of the old
aristocratic prejudices which formerly proscribed trade as unworthy
of a gentleman, and must die out with other prejudices of the same
low origin. And the results must be happy. It is hard for a class
of men to respect themselves who are denied respect by all around
them. A vocation looked on as degrading will have a tendency to
degrade those who follow it. Away, then, wdth the idea of some-
thing low in manual labor. There is something shocking to a
religious man in the thought that the employment which God has
ordained for the vast majority of the human race should be unworthy
of any man, even to the highest. If, indeed, there were an employ-
ment which could not be dispensed with, and which yet tended to
degrade such as might be devoted to it, I should say that it ought
to be shared by the whole race, and thus neutralized by extreme
division, instead of being laid, as the sole vocation, on one man
or a few. Let no human being be broken in spirit or trodden under
foot for the outward prosperity of the State. So far is manual labor
from meriting contempt or slight, that it will probably be found,
when united with true means of spiritual culture, to foster a sounder
judgment, a keener observation, a more creative imagination, and

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 357

a purer taste, than any other vocation. Man thinks of the few, God
of the many; and the many will be found at length to have within
their reach the most effectual means of progress.

Another encouraging circumstance of the times is the creation of
a popular literature, which puts within the reach of the laboring
class the means of knowledge in whatever branch they wish to
cultivate. Amidst the worthless volumes which are every day sent
from the press for mere amusement, there are books of great value
in all departments, published for the benefit of the mass of readers.
Mines of inestimable truth are thus open to all who are resolved
to think and learn. Literature is now adapting itself to all wants;
and I have little doubt that a new form of it will soon appear for
the special benefit of the laboring classes. This will have for its
object, to show the progress of the various useful arts, and to
preserve the memory of their founders, and of men who have laid
the world under obligation by great inventions. Every trade has
distinguished names in its history. Some trades can number, among
those who have followed them, philosophers, poets, men of true
genius. I would suggest to the members of this Association whether
a course of lectures, intended to illustrate the history of the more
important trades, and of the great blessings they have conferred
on society, and of the eminent individuals who have practised them,
might not do much to instruct, and, at the same time, to elevate
them. Such a course would carry them far into the past, would
open to them much interesting information, and at the same time
introduce them to men whom they may well make their models.
I would go farther. I should be pleased to see the members of an
important trade setting apart an anniversary for the commemora-
tion of those who have shed lustre on it by their virtues, their
discoveries, their genius. It is time that honor should be awarded
on higher principles than have governed the judgment of past ages.
Surely the inventor of the press, the discoverer of the compass, the
men who have applied the power of steam to machinery, have
brought the human race more largely into their debt than the
bloody race of conquerors, and even than many beneficent princes.
Antiquity exalted into divinities the first cultivators of wheat and

358 CHANNING

the useful plants, and the first forgers of metals; and we, in these
maturer ages of the world, have still greater names to boast in
the records of useful art. Let their memory be preserved to kindle
a generous emulation in those who have entered into their labors.

Another circumstance, encouraging the hope of progress in the
laboring class, is to be found in the juster views they are beginning
to adopt in regard to the education of their children. On this
foundation, indeed, our hope for all classes must chiefly rest. All
are to rise chiefly by the care bestowed on the young. Not that I
would say, as is sometimes rashly said, that none but the young
can improve. I give up no age as desperate. Men who have lived
thirty, or fifty years, are not to feel as if the door was shut upon
them. Every man who thirsts to become something better has in
that desire a pledge that his labor will not be in vain. None are too
old to learn. The world, from our first to our last hour, is our
school, and the whole of life has but one great purpose, education.
Still, the child, uncorrupted, unhardened, is the most hopeful sub-
ject; and vastly more, I believe, is hereafter to be done for children,
than ever before, by the gradual spread of a simple truth, almost too
simple, one would think, to need exposition, yet up to this day
wilfully neglected, namely, that education is a sham, a cheat, unless
carried on by able, accomplished teachers. The dignity of the
vocation of a teacher is beginning to be understood; the idea is
dawning on us that no office can compare in solemnity and im-
portance with that of training the child ; that skill to form the young
to energy, truth, and virtue, is worth more than the knowledge
of all other arts and sciences; and that, of consequence, the encourage-
ment of excellent teachers is the first duty which a community
owes to itself. I say the truth is dawning, and it must make its way.
The instruction of the children of all classes, especially of the
laboring class, has as yet been too generally committed to unpre-
pared, unskilful hands, and of course the school is in general little
more than a name. The whole worth of a school lies in the teacher.
You may accumulate the most expensive apparatus for instruction;
but without an intellectual, gifted teacher, it is little better than
rubbish; and such a teacher, without apparatus, may effect the

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 359

happiest results. Our university boasts, and with justice, of its library,
cabinets, and philosophical instruments; but these are lifeless, profit-
less, except as made effectual by the men who use them. A few
eminent men, skilled to understand, reach, and quicken the minds
of the pupils, are worth all these helps. And I say this, because it
is commonly thought that the children of the laboring class cannot
be advanced, in consequence of the inability of parents to furnish
a variety of books and other apparatus. But in education, various
books and implements are not the great requisites, but a high order
of teachers. In truth, a few books do better than many. The object
of education is not so much to give a certain amount of knowledge,
as to awaken the faculties, and give the pupil the use of his own
mind; and one book, taught by a man who knows how to accom-
plish these ends, is worth more than libraries as usually read. It is
not necessary that much should be taught in youth, but that a litde
should be taught philosophically, profoundly, livingly. For example,
it is not necessary that the pupil be carried over the history of the
world from the deluge to the present day. Let him be helped to
read a single history wisely, to apply the principles of historical
evidence to its statements, to trace the causes and effects of events,
to penetrate into the motives of actions, to observe the workings
of human nature in what is done and suffered, to judge impartially
of action and character, to sympathize with what is noble, to detect
the spirit of an age in different forms from our own, to seize the
great truths which are wrapped up in details, and to discern a moral
Providence, a retribution, amidst all corruptions and changes; let
him learn to read a single history thus, and he has learned to read
all histories; he is prepared to study, as he may have time in future
hfe, the whole course of human events; he is better educated by
this one book than he would be by all the histories in all languages
as commonly taught. The education of the laborer's children need
never stop for want of books and apparatus. More of them would
do good, but enough may be easily obtained. What we want is,
a race of teachers acquainted with the philosophy of the mind,
gifted men and women, who shall respect human nature in the
child, and strive to touch and gently bring out his best powers and
sympathies; and who shall devote themselves to this as the great

360 CHANNING

end of life. This good, I trust, is to come, but it comes slowly. The
estabUshment of normal schools shows that the want of it begins
to be felt. This good requires that education shall be recognized by
the community as its highest interest and duty. It requires that the
instructors of youth shall take precedence of the money-getting
classes, and that the woman of fashion shall fall behind the female
teacher. It requires that parents shall sacrifice show and pleasure to
the acquisition of the best possible helps and guides for their chil-
dren. Not that a great pecuniary compensation is to create good
teachers; these must be formed by individual impulse, by a genuine
interest in education; but good impulse must be seconded by out-
ward circumstances; and the means of education will always bear a
proportion to the respect in which the office of teacher is held in the
community.

Happily, in this country, the true idea of education, of its nature
and supreme importance, is silently working and gains ground.
Those of us who look back on half a century, see a real, great
improvement in schools and in the standard of instruction. What
should encourage this movement in this country is, that nothing
is wanting here to the intellectual elevation of the laboring class
but that a spring should be given to the child, and that the art of
thinking justly and strongly should be formed in early life; for,
this preparation being made, the circumstances of future life will
almost of themselves carry on the work of improvement. It is one
of the inestimable benefits of free institutions, that they are con-
stant stimulants to the intellect; that they furnish, in rapid succes-
sion, quickening subjects of thought and discussion. A whole people
at the same moment are moved to reflect, reason, judge, and act on
matters of deep and universal concern; and where the capacity of
thought has received wise culture, the intellect, unconsciously, by
an almost irresistible sympathy, is kept perpetually alive. The mind,
like the body, depends on the climate it lives in, on the air it
breathes; and the air of freedom is bracing, exhilarating, expanding,
to a degree not dreamed of under a despotism. This stimulus of
liberty, however, avails little, except where the mind has learned
to think for the acquisition of truth. The unthinking and passionate
are hurried by it into ruinous excess.

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 36 1

The last ground of hope for the elevation of the laborer, and the
chief and the most sustaining, is the clearer development of the
principles of Christianity. The future influences of this religion
are not to be judged from the past. Up to this time it has been made
a political engine, and in other ways perverted. But its true spirit,
the spirit of brotherhood and freedom, is beginning to be understood,
and this will undo the work which opposite principles have been
carrying on for ages. Christianity is the only effectual remedy for
the fearful evils of modern civilization, — a system which teaches its
members to grasp at everything, and to rise above everybody, as
the great aims of life. Of such a civilization the natural fruits are,
contempt of others' rights, fraud, oppression, a gambling spirit in
trade, reckless adventure, and commercial convulsions, all tending
to impoverish the laborer and to render every condition insecure.
Relief is to come, and can only come, from the new application of
Christian principles, of universal justice and universal love, to
social institutions, to commerce, to business, to active life. This
application has begun, and the laborer, above all men, is to feel
its happy and exalting influences.

Such are some of the circumstances which inspire hopes of the
elevation of the laboring classes. To these might be added other
strong grounds of encouragement, to be found in the principles of
human nature, in the perfections and providence of God, and in
the prophetic intimations of his word. But these I pass over. From
all I derive strong hopes for the mass of men. I do not, cannot see,
why manual toil and self-improvement may not go on in friendly
union. I do not see why the laborer may not attain to refined habits
and manners as truly as other men. I do not see why conversation
under his humble roof may not be cheered by wit and exalted by
intelligence. I do not see why, amidst his toils, he may not cast his
eye around him on God's glorious creation, and be strengthened
and refreshed by the sight. I do not see why. the great ideas which
exalt humanity — those of the Infinite Father, of perfection, of our
nearness to God, and of the purpose of our being — may not grow
bright and strong in the laborer's mind. Society, I trust, is tending
towards a condition in which it will look back with astonishment
at the present neglect or perversion of human powers. In the

362 CHANNING

development of a more enlarged philanthropy, in the diffusion of
the Christian spirit of brotherhood, in the recognition of the equal
rights of every human being, we have the dawn and promise of a
better age, when no man will be deprived of the means of elevation
but by his own fault; when the evil doctrine, worthy of the arch-
fiend, that social order demands the depression of the mass of men,
will be rejected with horror and scorn; when the great object of
the community will be to accumulate means and influences for
awakening and expanding the best powers of all classes; when far
less will be expended on the body and far more on the mind; when
men of uncommon gifts for the instruction of their race will be
sent forth to carry light and strength into every sphere of human
life; when spacious libraries, collections of the fine arts, cabinets of
natural history, and all the institutions by which the people may
be refined and ennobled, will be formed and thrown open to all;
and when the toils of life, by a wise intermixture of these higher
influences, will be made the instruments of human elevation.

Such are my hopes of the intellectual, moral, religious, social
elevation of the laboring class. I should not, however, be true to
myself, did I not add that I have fears as well as hopes. Time is
not left me to enlarge on this point; but without a reference to it I
should not give you the whole truth. I would not disguise from
myself or others the true character of the world we live in. Human
imperfection throws an uncertainty over the future. Society, like
the natural world, holds in its bosom fearful elements. Who can
hope that the storms which have howled over past ages have
spent all their force ? It is possible that the laboring classes, by their
recklessness, their passionateness, their jealousies of the more pros-
perous, and their subserviency to parties and political leaders, may
turn all their bright prospects into darkness, may blight the hopes
which philanthropy now cherishes of a happier and holier social
state. It is also possible, in this mysterious state of things, that evil
may come to them from causes which are thought to promise them
nothing but good. The present anxiety and universal desire is to
make the country rich, and it is taken for granted that its growing
wealth is necessarily to benefit all conditions. But is this consequence
sure.'' May not a country be rich, and yet great numbers of the

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 363

people be wofully depressed? In England, the richest nation under
heaven, how sad, how degraded the state of the agricultural and
manufacturing classes! It is thought that the institutions of this
country give an assurance that growing wealth will here equally
benefit and carry forward all portions of the community. I hope
so; but I am not sure. At the present time a momentous change is
taking place in our condition. The improvement in steam naviga-
tion has half annihilated the space between Europe and America,
and by the progress of invention the two continents are to be more
and more placed side by side. We hail this triumph of the arts
with exultation. We look forward to the approaching spring, when
this metropolis is to be linked with England by a line of steamboats,
as a proud era in our history. That a great temporary excitement
will be given to industry, and that our wealth and numbers will
increase, admits no dispute; but this is a small matter. The great
question is, Will the mass of the people be permanently advanced
in the comforts of life, and, still more, in intelligence and character,
in the culture of their highest powers and affections? It is not
enough to grow, if our growth is to resemble that of other populous
places. Better continue as we are, better even decline, than tread
in the steps of any great city, whether of past or present times. I
doubt not that, under God's providence, the approximation of
Europe and America is ultimately to be a blessing to both; but
without our vigilance, the nearer effects may be more or less disas-
trous. It cannot be doubted that for a time many among us, espe-
cially in the prosperous classes, will be more and more infected from
abroad, will sympathize more with the institutions, and catch
more the spirit and manners, of the Old World. As a people we
want moral independence. We bow to "the great" of other countries,
and we shall become for a time more and more servile in our imita-
tion. But this, though bad, may not be the worst result. I would
ask, What is to be the effect of bringing the laboring classes of
Europe twice as near us as they now are? Is there no danger of a
competition that is to depress the laboring classes here? Can the
workman here stand his ground against the half-famished, ignorant
workmen of Europe, who will toil for any wages, and who never
think of redeeming an hour for personal improvement? Is there

364 CHANNING

no danger that, with increasing intercourse with Europe, we shall
import the striking, fearful contrasts which there divide one people
into separate nations? Sooner than that our laboring class should
become a European populace, a good man would almost wish that
perpetual hurricanes, driving every ship from the ocean, should
sever wholly the two hemispheres from each other. Heaven preserve
us from the anticipated benefits of nearer connection with Europe,
if with these must come the degradation which we see or read of
among the squalid poor of her great cities, among the overworked
operatives of her manufactories, among her ignorant and half-
brutalized peasants. Any thing, every thing should be done to save
us from the social evils which deform the Old World, and to build
up here an intelligent, right-minded, self-respecting population. If
this end should require us to change our present modes of life, to
narrow our foreign connections, to desist from the race of com-
mercial and manufacturing competition with Europe; if it should
require that our great cities should cease to grow, and that a large
portion of our trading population should return to labor, these
requisitions ought to be obeyed. One thing is plain, that our present
civilization contains strong tendencies to the intellectual and moral
depression of a large portion of the community; and this influence
ought to be thought of, studied, watched, withstood, with a stern
solemn purpose of withholding no sacrifice by which it may be
counteracted.

Perhaps the fears now expressed may be groundless. I do not ask
you to adopt them. My end will be gained if I can lead you to study,
habitually and zealously, the influence of changes and measures on
the character and condition of the laboring class. There is no subject
on which your thoughts should turn more frequently than on this.
Many of you busy yourselves with other questions, such as the
probable result of the next election of President, or the prospects
of this or that party. But these are insignificant, compared with the
great question, Whether the laboring classes here are destined to
the ignorance and depression of the lower ranks of Europe, or
whether they can secure to themselves the means of intellectual and
moral progress. You are cheated, you are false to yourselves, when
you suffer politicians to absorb you in their selfish purposes, and

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 365

to draw you away from this great question. Give the first place in
your thoughts to this. Carry it away with you from the present
lecture; discuss it together; study it when alone; let your best heads
work on it; resolve that nothing shall be wanting on your part
to secure the means of intellectual and moral well-being to your-
selves, and to those who may come after you.

In these lectures, I have expressed a strong interest in the laboring
portion of the community; but I have no partiality to them con-
sidered merely as laborers. My mind is attracted to them because
they constitute the majority of the human race. My great interest
is in human nature, and in the working classes as its most numerous
representatives. To those who look on this nature with contempt
or utter distrust, such language may seem a mere form, or may be
construed as a sign of the predominance of imagination and feeling
over the judgment. No matter. The pity of these sceptics I can
return. Their wonder at my credulity cannot surpass the sorrow-
ful astonishment with which I look on their indifference to the
fortunes of their race. In spite of all their doubts and scoffs, human
nature is still most dear to me. When I behold it manifested in its
perfect proportions in Jesus Christ, I cannot but revere it as the true
temple of the Divinity. When I see it as revealed in the great and
good of all times, I bless God for those multipHed and growing
proofs of its high destiny. When I see it bruised, beaten down,
stifled by ignorance and vice, by oppression, injustice, and grinding
toil, I weep for it, and feel that every man should be ready to
suffer for its redemption. I do and I must hope for its progress.
But in saying this, I am not blind to its immediate dangers. I am
not sure that dark clouds and desolating storms are not even now
gathering over the world. When we look back on the mysterious
history of the human race, we see that Providence has made use of
fearful revolutions as the means of sweeping away the abuses of
ages, and of bringing forward mankind to their present improve-
ment. Whether such revolutions may not be in store for our own
times, I know not. The present civilization of the Christian world
presents much to awaken doubt and apprehension. It stands in
direct hostility to the great ideas of Christianity. It is selfish, mer-
cenary, sensual. Such a civilization cannot, must not, endure for

366 CHANNING

ever. How it is to be supplanted, I know not. I hope, however,
that it is not doomed, like the old Roman civilization, to be quenched
in blood. I trust that the works of ages are not to be laid low by
violence, rapine, and the all-devouring sword. I trust that the exist-
ing social state contains in its bosom something better than it has
yet unfolded. I trust that a brighter future is to come, not from
the desolation, but from gradual, meliorating changes of the present.
Among the changes to which I look for the salvation of the modern
world, one of the chief is the intellectual and moral elevation of the
laboring class. The impulses which are to reform and quicken
society are probably to come, not from its more conspicuous, but
from its obscurer divisions; and among these I see with joy new
wants, principles, and aspirations beginning to unfold themselves.
Let what is already won give us courage. Let faith in a parental
Providence give us courage; and if we are to be disappointed in
the present, let us never doubt that the great interests of human
nature are still secure under the eye and care of an Almighty Friend.
Note for the third head. — ^Under the third head of the lectures,
in which some of the encouraging circumstances of the times are
stated, I might have spoken of the singular advantages and means
of progress enjoyed by the laborer in this metropolis. It is believed
that there cannot be found another city in the world in which the
laboring classes are as much improved, possess as many helps, enjoy
as much consideration, exert as much influence, as in this place.
Had I pursued this subject, I should have done what I often wished
to do; I should have spoken of the obligations of our city to my
excellent friend, James Savage, Esq., to whose unwearied efforts
we are chiefly indebted for two inestimable institutions, the Provi-
dent Institution for Savings and the Primary Schools; the former
giving to the laborer the means of sustaining himself in times of
pressure, and the latter placing almost at his door the means of
instruction for his children from the earliest age. The union of the
Primary Schools with the Grammar Schools and the High Schools
in this place, constitutes a system of public education unparalleled,
it is believed, in any country. It would not be easy to name an
individual to whom our city is under greater obligations than to
Mr. Savage. In the enterprises which I have named, he was joined

ELEVATION OF THE LABORING CLASSES 367

and greatly assisted by the late Elisha Ticknor, Esq., whose name
ought also to be associated with the Provident Institution and the
Primary Schools. The subject o£ these lectures brings to my mind
the plan of an institution which was laid before me by Mr. Ticknor,
for teaching at once agriculture and the mechanic arts. He believed
that a boy might be made a thorough farmer, both in theory and
practice, and might at the same time learn a trade, and that by
being skilled in both vocations he would be more useful, and
would multiply his chances of comfortable subsistence. I was
interested by the plan, and Mr. Ticknor's practical wisdom led me
to believe that it might be accomplished.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE

BY

EDGAR ALLAN POE

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-49) was born in Boston, the child of actors
who died while he was very young. He was adopted by a Virginian
gentleman, Mr. John Allan, who put him to school in England for five
years, then in Richmond, and finally sent him to the University of Vir-
ginia. He remained there only a short time, and after finding that he
disliked business, and publishing a volume of poems, he enlisted in the
army. Mr. Allan had him discharged and placed him in West Point,
from which he got himself dismissed. After that he supported himself
in a hand-to-mouth fashion by writing for and editing newspapers and
periodicals, living successively in Baltimore, Richmond, Philadelphia, and
New York. The publication of his remarkable poem, "The Raven," in
1845, brought him fame, and for a short time he was a literary lion. But
in 1847 his wife died, and his two remaining years were a gradual
descent.

Poe's work falls into three divisions: poems, tales, and criticism. The
poems are chiefly remarkable for the amazing technical skill with which
haunting rhythms and studied successions of vowel and consonant sounds
are made to suggest atmospheres and emotional moods, with a minimum
of thought. In the writing of fiction, Poe is the great master of the weird
tale, no writer having surpassed him in the power of shaking the reader's
nerves with suggestions of the supernatural and the horrible. In these
stories, as in the poems, he shows an extraordinary sense of form, and his
effects are produced not merely by the violently sensational, but by care-
fully calculated attacks upon the reader's imaginative sensibilities.

In criticism Poe was, if not a scholarly, at least a stimulating and sug-
gestive, writer, with a fine ear and, within his range, keen insight. His
essay on "The Poetic Principle" is his poetic confession of faith. He
makes clear and defends his conception of poetry; a conception which
excludes many great kinds of verse, but which, illuminated as it is by
abundant examples of his favorite poems, throws light in turn upon some
of the fundamental elements of poetry.

It is worth noting that no American author seems to have enjoyed so
great a European vogue as Poe.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE

IN speaking of the Poetic Principle, I have no design to be
either thorough or profound. While discussing, very much at
random, the essentiality of what we call Poetry, my principal
purpose will be to cite for consideration some few of those minor
English or American poems which best suit my own taste, or which
upon my own fancy have left the most definite impression. By
"minor poems" I mean, of course, poems of little length. And here
in the beginning permit me to say a few words in regard to a
somewhat peculiar principle, which, whether rightfully or wrong-
fully, has always had its influence in my own critical estimate of the
poem. I hold that a long poem does not exist. I maintain that the
phrase, "a long poem," is simply a flat contradiction in terms.

I need scarcely observe that a poem deserves its title only inas-
much as it excites, by elevating the soul. The value of the poem is
in the ratio of this elevating excitement. But all excitements are,
through a psychal necessity, transient. That degree of excitement
which would entitle a poem to be so called at all, cannot be sus-
tained throughout a composition of any great length. After the
lapse of half an hour, at the very utmost, it flags — fails — a revulsion
ensues — and then the poem is, in effect, and in fact, no longer such.

There are, no doubt, many who have found difficulty in recon-
ciling the critical dictum that the "Paradise Lost" is to be devoutly
admired throughout, with the absolute impossibility of maintaining
for it, during perusal, the amount of enthusiasm which that critical
dictum would demand. The great work, in fact, is to be regarded
as poetical, only when, losing sight of that vital requisite in all
works of Art, Unity, we view it merely as a series of minor poems.
If, to preserve its Unity — its totality of effect or impression — we read
it (as would be necessary) at a single sitting, the result is but a
constant alternation of excitement and depression. After a passage
of what we feel to be true poetry, there follows, inevitably, a passage

371

372 POE

of platitude which no critical prejudgment can force us to admire;
but if, upon completing the work, we read it again, omitting the
first book (that is to say, commencing with the second), we shall
be surprised at now finding that admirable which we before con-
demned — that damnable which we had previously so much admired.
It follows from all this that the ultimate, aggregate, or absolute effect
of even the best epic under the sun is a nullity; — and this is precisely
the fact.

In regard to the "Iliad," we have, if not positive proof, at least
very good reason for believing it intended as a series of lyrics; but,
granting the epic intention, I can say only that the work is based
in an imperfect sense of art. The modern epic is, of the supposititious
ancient model, but an inconsiderate and blindfold imitation. But
the day of these artistic anomalies is over. If, at any time, any very
long poems were popular in reality — which I doubt — ^it is at least
clear that no very long poem will ever be popular again.

That the extent of a poetical work is, ceteris paribus, the measure
of its merit, seems undoubtedly, when we thus state it, a proposition
sufficiently absurd — yet we are indebted for it to the Quarterly
Reviews. Surely there can be nothing in mere size, abstractly con-
sidered — there can be nothing in mere bul\, so far as a volume is
concerned which has so continuously elicited admiration from these
saturnine pamphlets! A mountain, to be sure, by the mere senti-
ment of physical magnitude which it conveys, does impress us with
a sense of the sublime — ^but no man is impressed after this fashion
by the material grandeur of even "The Columbiad." Even the
Quarterlies have not instructed us to be so impressed by it. As yet,
they have not insisted on our estimating Lamartine by the cubic
foot, or Pollok by the pound — but what else are we to in^er from
their continual prating about "sustained effort"? If, by "sustained
effort," any little gentleman has accomplished an epic, let us frankly
commend him for the effort, — if this indeed be a thing commend-
able, — ^but let us forbear praising the epic on the effort's account.
It is to be hoped that common sense, in the time to come, will prefer
deciding upon a work of Art, rather by the impression it makes —
by the effect it produces — than by the time it took to impress the
effect, or by the amount of "sustained effort" which had been

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 373

found necessary in effecting the impression. The fact is, that per-
severance is one thing and genius quite another; nor can all the
Quarterlies in Christendom confound them. By and by, this propo-
sition, with many which I have been just urging, will be received
as self-evident. In the mean time, by being generally condemned
as falsities, they will not be essentially damaged as truths.

On the other hand, it is clear that a poem may be improperly
brief. Undue brevity degenerates into mere epigrammatism. A very
short poem, while now and then producing a brilliant or vivid,
never produces a profound or enduring, effect. There must be the
steady pressing down of the stamp upon the wax. Beranger has
wrought innumerable things, pungent and spirit-stirring; but, in
general, they have been too imponderous to stamp themselves deeply
into the public opinion, and thus, as so many feathers of fancy, have
been blown aloft only to be whistled down the wind.

A remarkable instance of the effect of undue brevity in depressing
a poem — in keeping it out of the popular view — is afforded by the
following exquisite litde serenade: —

"I arise from dreams of thee

In the first sweet sleep of night,
When the winds are breathing low,

And the stars are shining bright:
I arise from dreams of thee.

And a spirit in my feet
Hath led me — who knows how! —

To thy chamber-window. Sweet!

"The wandering airs they faint

On the dark, the silent stream;
And the champak odors fail

Like sweet thoughts in a dream;
The nightingale's complaint.

It dies upon her heart,
As I must on thine.

Oh, beloved as thou art!

"Oh, lift me from the grass!
I die! I faint! I fail!
Let thy love in kisses rain
On my lips and eyelids pale.

374 POE

My cheek is cold and white, alas!

My heart beats loud and fast;
Oh! press it to thine own again,

Where it will break at last!"

Very few, perhaps, are familiar with these lines — ^yet no less a
poet than Shelley is their author. There warm, yet delicate and
ethereal imagination will be appreciated by all; but by none so
thoroughly as by him who has himself arisen from sweet dreams
of one beloved to bathe in the aromatic air of a southern midsummer
night.

One of the finest poems by Willis — the very best, in my opinion,
which he has ever written — has, no doubt, through this same defect
of undue brevity, been kept back from its proper position, not less
in the critical than in the popular view.

"The shadows lay along Broadway,

Twas near the twilight-tide —
And slowly there a lady fair

Was walking in her pride.
Alone walked she; but, viewlessly,

Walked spirits at her side.

"Peace charmed the street beneath her feet,

And Honor charmed the air;
And all astir looked kind on her,

And called her good as fair;
For all God ever gave to her

She kept with chary care.

"She kept with care her beauties rare

From lovers warm and true, —
For her heart was cold to all but gold.

And the rich came not to woo, —
But honored well are charms to sell

If priests the selling do.

"Now walking there was one more fair —
A slight girl, lily-pale;
And she had unseen company

To make the spirit quail:
'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn.
And nothing could avail.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 375

"No mercy now can dear her brow
For this world's peace to pray;
For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air,

Her woman's heart gave way! —
But the sin forgiven by Christ in Heaven
By man is cursed alwayl"

In this composition we find it difficult to recognize the Willis who
has written so many mere "verses o£ society." The lines are not only
richly ideal, but full of energy, while they breathe an earnestness —
an evident sincerity of sentiment — for which we look in vain
throughout all the other works of this author.

While the epic mania — while the idea that, to merit in poetry,
prolixity is indispensable — ^has, for some years past, been gradually
dying out of the public mind by mere dint of its own absurdity — we
find it succeeded by a heresy too palpably false to be long tolerated,
but one which, in the brief period it has already endured, may be
said to have accomplished more in the corruption of our Poetical
Literature than all its other enemies combined. I allude to the heresy
of The Didactic. It has been assumed, tacitly and avowedly, directly
and indirectly, that the ultimate object of all Poetry is Truth. Every
poem, it is said, should inculcate a moral; and by this moral is the
poetical merit of the work to be adjudged. We Americans, espe-
cially, have patronized this happy idea; and we Bostonians, very
especially, have developed it in full. We have taken it into our heads
that to write a poem simply for the poem's sake, and to acknowledge
such to have been our design, would be to confess ourselves radically
wanting in the true Poetic dignity and force; but the simple fact is,
that, would we but permit ourselves to look into our own souls, we
should immediately there discover that under the sun there neither
exists nor can exist any work more thoroughly dignified, more
supremely noble, than this very poem — this poem per se — ^this poem
which is a poem and nothing more — this poem written solely for
the poem's sake.

With as deep a reverence for the True as ever inspired the bosom
of man, I would, nevertheless, limit in some measure its modes of
inculcation. I would limit to enforce them. I would not enfeeble
them by dissipation. The demands of Truth are severe; she has no

376 POE

sympathy with the myrtles. All that which is so indispensable in
Song is precisely all that with which she has nothing whatever to
do. It is but making her a flaunting paradox to wreathe her in gems
and flowers. In enforcing a truth we need severity rather than efflo-
rescence of language. We must be simple, precise, terse. We must
be cool, calm, unimpassioned. In a word, we must be in that mood,
which, as nearly as possible, is the exact converse of the poetical. He
must be blind, indeed, who does not perceive the radical and chasmal
differences between the truthful and the poetical modes of incul-
cation. He must be theory-mad beyond redemption who, in spite
of these differences, shall still persist in attempting to reconcile the
obstinate oils and waters of Poetry and Truth.

Dividing the world of mind into its three most immediately
obvious distinctions, we have the Pure Intellect, Taste, and the Moral
Sense. I place Taste in the middle, because it is just this position
which in the mind it occupies. It holds intimate relations with either
extreme, but from the Moral Sense is separated by so faint a differ-
ence that Aristotle has not hesitated to place some of its operations
among the virtues themselves. Nevertheless, we find the offices of
the trio marked with a sufficient distinction. Just as the intellect
concerns itself with Truth, so Taste informs us of the Beautiful,
while the Moral Sense is regardful of Duty. Of this latter, while
Conscience teaches the obligation, and Reason the expediency. Taste
contents herself with displaying the charms : — waging war upon Vice
solely on the ground of her deformity — her disproportion — her ani-
mosity to the fitting, to the appropriate, to the harmonious — in a
word, to Beauty.

An immortal instinct, deep within the spirit of man, is thus,
plainly, a sense of the Beautiful. This it is which administers to his
delight in the manifold forms, and sounds, and odors, and senti-
ments, amid which he exists. And just as the lily is repeated in the
lake, or the eyes of Amaryllis in the mirror, so is the mere oral or
written repetition of these forms, and sounds, and colors, and odors,
and sentiments, a duplicate source of delight. But this mere repeti-
tion is not poetry. He who shall simply sing, with however glowing
enthusiasm, or with however vivid a truth of description, of the
sights, and sounds, and odors, and colors, and sentiments, which

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 377

greet him in common with all mankind — he, I say, has yet failed to
prove his divine title. There is still a something in the distance
which he has been unable to attain. We have still a thirst unquench-
able, to allay which he has not shown us the crystal springs. This
thirst belongs to the immortality of Man. It is at once a consequence
and an indication of his perennial existence. It is the desire of the
moth for the star. It is no mere appreciation of the Beauty before
us, but a wild effort to reach the Beauty above. Inspired by an
ecstatic prescience of the glories beyond the grave, we struggle, by
multiform combinations among the things and thoughts of Time,
to attain a portion of that Loveliness whose very elements, per-
haps, appertain to eternity alone. And thus when by Poetry — or
when by Music, the most entrancing of the Poetic moods — we find
ourselves melted into tears not as the Abbate Gravia supposes
through excess of pleasure, but through a certain petulant, impatient
sorrow at our inability to grasp now, wholly, here on earth, at once
and forever, those divine and rapturous joys, of which through the
poem, or through the music, we attain to but brief and indeterminate
glimpses.

The struggle to apprehend the supernal Loveliness — this struggle,
on the part of souls fittingly constituted — has given to the world all
that which it (the world) has ever been enabled at once to under-
stand and to feel as poetic.

The Poetic Sentiment, of course, may develop itself in various
modes — in Painting, in Sculpture, in Architecture, in the Dance —
very especially in Music, — and very peculiarly and with a wide field,
in the composition of the Landscape Garden. Our present theme,
however, has regard only to its manifestation in words. And here
let me speak briefly on the topic of rhythm. Contenting myself with
the certainty that Music, in its various modes of metre, rhythm, and
rhyme, is of so vast a moment in Poetry as never to be wisely rejected
— is so vitally important an adjunct, that he is simply silly who de-
clines its assistance — I will not now pause to maintain its absolute
essentiality. It is in Music, perhaps, that the soul most nearly attains
the great end for which, when inspired by the Poetic Sentiment, it
struggles — the creation of supernal Beauty. It may be, indeed, that
here this sublime end is, now and then, attained in fact. We are

378 POE

often made to feel, with a shivering delight, that from an earthly
harp are stricken notes which cannot have been unfamiliar to the
angels. And thus there can be little doubt that in the union of
Poetry with Music in its popular sense we shall find the widest field
for the Poetic development. The old Bards and Minnesingers had
advantages which we do not possess — and Thomas Moore, singing
his own songs, was, in the most legitimate manner, perfecting them
as poems.

To recapitulate, then: — I would define, in brief, the Poetry of
words as The Rhythmical Creation of Beauty. Its sole arbiter is
Taste. With the Intellect or with the Conscience, it has only collat-
eral relations. Unless incidentally, it has no concern whatever either
with Duty or with Truth.

A few words, however, in explanation. That pleasure which is at
once the most pure, the most elevating, and the most intense, is
derived, I maintain, from the contemplation of the Beautiful. In
the contemplation of Beauty we alone find it possible to attain that
pleasurable elevation, or excitement, 0/ the soul, which we recognize
as the Poetic Sentiment, and which is so easily distinguished from
Truth, which is the satisfaction of the Reason, or from Passion,
which is the excitement of the Heart. I make Beauty, therefore, —
using the word as inclusive of the sublime, — I make Beauty the
province of the poem, simply because it is an obvious rule of Art that
effects should be made to spring as directly as possible from their
causes — no one as yet having been weak enough to deny that the
peculiar elevation in question is at least most readily attainable in the
poem. It by no means follows, however, that the incitements of
Passion, or the precepts of Duty, or even the lessons of Truth, may
not be introduced into a poem and with advantage; for they may
subserve, incidentally, in various ways, the general purposes of the
work; but the true artist will always contrive to tone them down in
proper subjection to that Beauty which is the atmosphere and the
real essence of the poem.

I cannot better introduce the few poems which I shall present for
your consideration, than by the citation of the "Proem" to Mr. Long-
fellow's "Waif":

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 379

"The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.

"I see the lights of the village

Gleam through the rain and the mist,
And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me,
That my soul cannot resist:

"A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain.
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.

"Come, read to me some poem.

Some simple and heartfelt lay.
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.

"Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.

"For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life's endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.

"Read from some humbler poet.

Whose songs gushed from his heart.
As showers from the clouds of summer.
Or tears from the eyelids start;

"Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease.
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

"Such songs have power to quiet

The restless pulse of care.

And come like the benediction

That follows after prayer.

380 POE

"Then read from the treasured volume

The poem of thy choice,
And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.

"And the night shall be filled with music.
And the cares, that infest the day.
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away."

With no great range of imagination, these lines have been justly
admired for their delicacy of expression. Some of the images are
very effective. Nothing can be better than —

"the bards sublime.
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time."

The idea of the last quatrain is also very effective. The poem, on the
whole, however, is chiefly to be admired for the graceful insouciance
of its metre, so well in accordance with the character of the senti-
ments, and especially for the ease of the general manner. This
"ease," or naturalness, in a literary style, it has long been the fashion
to regard as ease in appearance alone — as a point of really difficult
attainment. But not so; a natural manner is difficult only to him who
should never meddle with it — to the unnatural. It is but the result
of writing with the understanding, or with the instinct, that the tone,
in composition, should always be that which the mass of mankind
would adopt — and must perpetually vary, of course, with the occa-
sion. The author who, after the fashion of the "North American
Review," should be, upon all occasions, merely "quiet," must neces-
sarily, upon many occasions, be simply silly, or stupid; and has no
more right to be considered "easy," or "natural," than a Cockney
exquisite, or than the sleeping Beauty in the wax-works.

Among the minor poems of Bryant, none has so much impressed
me as the one which he entitles "June." I quote only a portion of it: —

"There, through the long, long summer hours.

The golden light should lie.
And thick, young herbs and groups of flowers
Stand in their beauty by.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 38 1

The oriole should build and tell
His love-tale, close beside my cell;

The idle butterfly
Should rest him there, and there be heard
The housewife-bee and humming-bird.

"And what, if cheerful shouts at noon,

Come, from the village sent.
Or songs of maids, beneath the moon,

With fairy laughter blent?
And what, if in the evening light,
Betrothed lovers walk in sight

Of my low monument?
I would the lovely scene around
Might know no sadder sight nor sound.

"I know that I no more should see

The season's glorious show.
Nor would its brightness shine for me.

Nor its wild music flow;
But if, around my place of sleep.
The friends I love should come to weep.

They might not haste to go.
Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom
Should keep them, lingering by my tomb.

"These to their softened hearts should bear

The thought of what has been,
And speak of one who cannot share

The gladness of the scene;
Whose part, in all the pomp that fills
The circuit of the summer hills,

Is — that his grave is green;
And deeply would their hearts rejoice
To hear again his living voice."

The rhythmical flow, here, is even voluptuous — nothing could be
more melodious. The poem has always affected me in a remarkable
manner. The intense melancholy, which seem to well up, perforce,
to the surface of all the poet's cheerful sayings about his grave, we
find thrilling us to the soul, while there is the truest poetic elevation
in the thrill. The impression left is one of a pleasurable sadness.

382 POE

And i£, in the remaining compositions which I shall introduce to
you, there be more or less of a similar tone always apparent, let me
remind you that (how or why we know not) this certain taint of
sadness is inseparably connected with all the higher manifestations
of true Beauty. It is, nevertheless,

"A feeling of sadness and longing
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only

As the mist resembles the rain."

The taint of which I speak is clearly perceptible even in a poem so
full of brilliancy and spirit as the "Health" of Edward C. Pinkney: —

"I fill this cup to one made up

Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gende sex

The seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements

And kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that, like the air,

'Tis less of earth than heaven.

"Her every tone is music's own,

Like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody

Dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they,

And from her lips each flows
As one may see the burdened bee

Forth issue from the rose.

"Affecdons are as thoughts to her.

The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,

The freshness of young flowers;
And lovely passions, changing oft,

So fill her, she appears
The image of themselves by turns, —

The idol of past years!

"Of her bright face one glance will trace

A picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain;

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 383

But memory, such as mine of her,

So very much endears,
When death is nigh, my latest sigh

Will not be life's, but hers.

"I fill this cup to one made up

Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex

The seeming paragon —
Her health! and would on earth there stood

Some more of such a frame.
That life might be all poetry.

And weariness a name."

It was the misfortune of Mr. Pinkney to have been born too far
south. Had he been a New Englander, it is probable that he would
have been ranked as the first of American lyrists by that magnani-
mous cabal which has so long controlled the destinies of American
Letters, in conducting the thing called the "North American Re-
view." The poem just cited is especially beautiful; but the poetic
elevation which it induces we must refer chiefly to our sympathy in
the poet's enthusiasm. We pardon his hyperboles for the evident
earnestness with which they are uttered.

It was by no means my design, however, to expatiate upon the
merits of what I should read you. These will necessarily speak for
themselves. Boccalini, in his "Advertisements from Parnassus," tells
us that Zoilus once presented Apollo a very caustic criticism upon
a very admirable book; whereupon the god asked him for the
beauties of the work. He replied that he only busied himself about
the errors. On hearing this, Apollo, handing him a sack of unwin-
nowed wheat, bade him pick out all the chaff for his reward.

Now this fable answers very well as a hit at the critics; but I am
by no means sure that the god was in the right. I am by no means
certain that the true limits of the critical duty are not grossly mis-
understood. Excellence, in a poem especially, may be considered in
the light of an axiom, which need only be properly put, to become
self-evident. It is not excellence if it requires to be demonstrated as
such; and thus, to point out too particularly the merits of a work of
Art, is to admit that they are not merits altogether.

384 POE

Among the "Melodies* of Thomas Moore, is one whose distin-
guished character as a poem proper seems to have been singularly
left out of view. I allude to his lines beginning: "Come, rest in this
bosom." The intense energy of their expression is not surpassed by
anything in Byron. There are two of the lines in which a sentiment
is conveyed that embodies the all in all of the divine passion of love —
a sentiment which, perhaps, has found its echo in more, and in more
passionate, human hearts than any other single sentiment ever
embodied in words: —

"Come, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer.
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home is still here;
Here still is the smile than no cloud can o'ercast.
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last.

"Oh! what was love made for, if 'tis not the same
Through joy and through torment, through glory and shame?
I know not, I ask not, if guilt's in that heart,
I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art.

"Thou hast called me thy angel in moments of bliss.
And thy angel I'll be, 'mid the horrors of this, —
Through the furnace, unshrinking, thy steps to pursue,
And shield thee, and save thee, — or perish there too!"

It has been the fashion, of late days, to deny Moore imagination,
while granting him fancy — a distinction originating with Coleridge
— than whom no man more fully comprehended the great powers
of Moore. The fact is that the fancy of this poet so far predominates
over all his other faculties, and over the fancy of all other men, as
to have induced, very naturally, the idea that he is fanciful only. But
never was there a greater mistake. Never was a grosser wrong done
the fame of a true poet. In the compass of the English language I
can call to mind no poem more profoundly, more weirdly imagina-
tive, in the best sense, than the lines commencing: "I would I were
by that dim lake," which are the composition of Thomas Moore. I
regret that I am unable to remember them.

One of the noblest — and, speaking of fancy, one of the most
singularly fanciful — of modern poets, was Thomas Hood. His "Fair
Ines" had always, for me, an inexpressible charm: —

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 385

"O saw ye not fair Ines?

She's gone into the West,
To dazzle when the sun is down,

And rob the world of rest;
She took our daylight with her,

The smiles that we love best,
With morning blushes on her cheek.

And pearls upon her breast.

"O turn again, fair Ines,

Before the fall of night,
For fear the moon should shine alone,

And stars unrivalled bright;
And blessed will the lover be

That walks beneath their light,
And breathes the love against thy cheek

I dare not even write!

"Would I had been, fair Ines,

That gallant cavalier.
Who rode so gayly by thy side,

And whispered thee so near!
Were there no bonny dames at home,

Or no true lovers here.
That he should cross the seas to win

The dearest of the dear?

"I saw thee, lovely Ines,

Descend along the shore.
With bands of noble gentlemen,

And banners waved before;
And gentle youth and maidens gay,

And snowy plumes they wore;
It would have been a beauteous dream —

If it had been no more!

"Alas, alas, fair Ines!

She went away with song,
With Music waiting on her steps.

And shoutings of the throng;
But some were sad and felt no mirth.

But only Music's wrong.
In sounds that sang Farewell, Farewell,

To her you've loved so long.

386 POE

"Farewell, farewell, fair Ines!

That vessel never bore
So fair a lady on its deck.

Nor danced so light before, —
Alas, for pleasure on the sea.

And sorrow on the shore!
The smile that blest one lover's heart

Has broken many more!"

"The Haunted House," by the same author, is one o£ the truest
poems ever written; one o£ the truest, one of the most unexception-
able, one of the most thoroughly artistic both in its theme and in its
execution. It is, moreover, powerfully ideal, imaginative. I regret
that its length renders it unsuitable for the purposes of this Lecture.
In place of it, permit me to offer the universally appreciated "Bridge
of Sighs."

"One more Unfortunate,

Weary of breath,

Rashly importunate,

Gone to her death!

"Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care:
Fashioned so slenderly,
Young, and so fair!

"Look at her garments
Clinging like cerements;
Whilst the wave constandy
Drips from her clothing;
Take her up instantly.
Loving, not loathing

"Touch her not scornfully;
Think of her mournfully.
Gently and humanly;
Not of the stains of her, —
All that remains of her
Now is pure womanly.

"Make no deep scrutiny
Into her mutiny
Rash and undutiful:
Past all dishonor.
Death has left on her
Only the beautiful.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 387

"Still, for all slips of hers.
One of Eve's family —
Wipe those poor lips of hers
Oozing so clammily,

"Loop up her tresses
Escaped from the comb,
Her fair auburn tresses;
Whilst wonderment guesses
Where was her home ?

"Who was her father ?
Who was her mother?
Had she a sister?
Had she a brother?
Or was there a dearer one
Still, and a nearer one
Yet, than all other?

"Alas! for the rarity
Of Christian charity
Under the sun!
Oh, it was pitiful!
Near a whole city full.
Home she had none.

"Sisterly, brotherly,
Fatherly, motherly
Feelings had changed;
Love, by harsh evidence.
Thrown from its eminence;
Even God's providence
Seeming estranged.

"Where the lamps quiver
So far in the river.
With many a light
From window and casement,
From garret to basement.
She stood, with amazement.
Houseless by night.

"The bleak wind of March
Made her tremble and shiver.
But not the dark arch.
Or the black flowing river:

388

POE

"Mad from life's history,
Glad to death's mystery,
Swift to be hurled —
Anywhere, anywhere
Out of the world!

"In she plunged boldly,
No matter how coldly
The rough river ran, —
Over the brink of it,
Picture it — think of it,
Dissolute man!
Lave in it, drink of it.
Then, if you can!

"Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care;
Fashioned so slenderly,
Young, and so fair!

"Ere her limbs frigidly
Stiffen too rigidly,
Decently — kindly —
Smoothe and compose them:
And her eyes, close them.
Staring so blindly!

"Dreadfully staring
Through muddy impurity,
As when with the daring
Last look of despairing
Fixed on futurity.

"Perishing gloomily.
Spurred by contumely,
Cold inhumanity.
Burning insanity,
Into her rest. —
Cross her hands humbly.
As if praying dumbly.
Over her breast!

"Owning her weakness.
Her evil behavior,
And leaving, with meekness.
Her sins to her Saviour!"

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 389

The vigor of this poem is no less remarkable than its pathos. The
versification, although carrying the fanciful to the very verge of the
fantastic, is nevertheless admirably adapted to the wild insanity which
is the thesis of the poem.

Among the minor poems of Lord Byron, is one which has never
received from the critics the praise which it undoubtedly deserves: —

"Though the day of my destiny's over.

And the star of my fate hath declined.
Thy soft heart refused to discover

The faults which so many could find;
Though thy soul with my grief was acquainted,

It shrunk not to share it with me,
And the love which my spirit hath painted

It never hath found but in thee.

"Then when nature around me is smiling.

The last smile which answers to mine,
I do not believe it beguiling,

Because it reminds me of thine;
And when winds are at war with the ocean.

As the breasts I believed in with me.
If their billows excite an emotion.

It is that they bear me from thee.

"Though the rock of my last hope is shivered.

And its fragments are sunk in the wave.
Though I feel that my soul is delivered

To pain — it shall not be its slave.
There is many a pang to pursue me;

They may crush, but they shall not contemn;
They may torture, but shall not subdue me;

Tis of thee that I think — not of them.

"Though human, thou didst not deceive me;

Though woman, thou didst not forsake;
Though loved, thou forborest to grieve me;

Though slandered, thou never couldst shake;
Though trusted, thou didst not disclaim me;

Though parted, it was not to fly;
Though watchful, 'twas not to defame me;

Nor mute, that the world might belie.

39© poE

"Yet I blame not the world, nor despise it,

Nor the war of the many with one —
If my soul was not fitted to prize it,

'T was folly not sooner to shun;
And if dearly that error hath cost me.

And more than I once could foresee,
I have found that, whatever it lost me,

It could not deprive me of thee.

"From the wreck of the past, which hath perished.

Thus much I at least may recall:
It hath taught me that what I most cherished

Deserved to be dearest of all.
In the desert a fountain is springing,

In the wide waste there still is a tree.
And a bird in the solitude singing,

Which speaks to my spirit of thee."

Although the rhythm here is one of the most difficult, the versifica-
tion could scarcely be improved. No nobler theme ever engaged the
pen of poet. It is the soul-elevating idea, that no man can consider
himself entitled to complain of Fate while, in his adversity, he still
retains the unwavering love of woman.

From Alfred Tennyson — although in perfect sincerity I regard
him as the noblest poet that ever lived — I have left myself time to
cite only a very brief specimen. I call him, and thin\ him, the noblest
of poets, not because the impressions he produces are, at all times,
the most profound, not because the poetical excitement which he
induces is, at all times, the most intense, but because it is, at all times,
the most ethereal — in other words, the most elevating and the most
pure. No poet is so little of the earth, earthy. What I am about to
read is from his last long poem, "The Princess": —

"Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes.
In looking on the happy autumn fields.
And thinking of the days that are no more.

"Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail
That brings our friends up from the underworld;
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge;
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.

THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 39I

"Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square;
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.

"Dear as remembered kisses after death.
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others; deep as love,
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret;
O Death in Life, the days that are no more."

Thus, although in a very cursory and imperfect manner, I have
endeavored to convey to you my conception of the Poetic Principle.
It has been my purpose to suggest that, while this Principle itself is,
strictly and simply, the Human Aspiration for Supernal Beauty, the
manifestation of the Principle is always found in an elevating excite-
ment of the Soul, quite independent of that passion which is the
intoxication of the Heart, or of that Truth which is the satisfaction
of the Reason. For, in regard to Passion, alas! its tendency is to
degrade rather than elevate the Soul. Love, on the contrary — ^Love,
the true, the divine Eros, the Uranian as distinguished from the
Dionaean Venus — is unquestionably the purest and truest of all
poetical themes. And in regard to Truth — if, to be sure, through the
attainment of a truth we are led to perceive a harmony where none
was apparent before, we experience, at once the true poetical effect;
but this effect is referable to the harmony alone, and not in the least
degree to the truth which merely served to render the harmony
manifest.

We shall reach, however, more immediately a distinct conception
of what the true Poetry is, by mere reference to a few of the simple
elements which induce in the Poet himself the true poetical effect.
He recognizes the ambrosia, which nourishes his soul, in the bright
orbs that shine in Heaven, in the volutes of the flower, in the cluster-
ing of low shrubberies, in the waving of the grain-fields, in the
slanting of the tall. Eastern trees, in the blue distance of mountains,
in the grouping of clouds, in the twinkling of half-hidden brooks, in
the gleaming of silver rivers, in the repose of sequestered lakes, in
the star-mirroring depths of lonely wells. He perceives it in the

392 POE

songs of birds, in the harp of ^olus, in the sighing of the night-wind,
in the repining voice of the forest, in the surf that complains to the
shore, in the fresh breath of the woods, in the scent of the violet, in
the voluptuous perfume of the hyacinth, in the suggestive odor that
comes to him at eventide from far-distant, undiscovered islands, over
dim oceans, illimitable and unexplored. He owns it in all noble
thoughts, in all unworldly motives, in all holy impulses, in all
chivalrous, generous, and self-sacrificing deeds. He feels it in the
beauty of woman, in the grace of her step, in the lustre of her eye,
in the melody of her voice, in her soft laughter, in her sigh, in the
harmony of the rustling of her robes. He deeply feels it in her win-
ning endearments, in her burning enthusiasms, in her gentle chari-
ties, in her meek and devotional endurances; but above all — ah! far
above all — he kneels to it, he worships it in the faith, in the purity,
in the strength, in the altogether divine majesty of her love.

Let me conclude by the recitation of yet another brief poem — one
very different in character from any that I have before quoted. It is
by Motherwell, and is called "The Song of the Cavalier." With our
modern and altogether rational ideas of the absurdity and impiety
of warfare, we are not precisely in that frame of mind best adapted
to sympathize with the sentiments, and thus to appreciate the real
excellence, of the poem. To do this fully, we must identify ourselves,
in fancy, with the soul of the old cavalier.

"Then mounte! then mounte, brave gallants, all,

And don your helmes amaine:
Deathe's couriers, Fame and Honor, call

Us to the field againe.
No shrewish teares shall fill our eye

When the sword-hilt's in our hand;
Heart-whole we'll part and no whit sighe

For the fayrest of the land;
Let piping swaine, and craven wight,

Thus weepe and puling crye.
Our business is like men to fight.

And hero-like to die!"

WALKING

BY
HENRY DAVID THOREAU

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

Henry David Thoreau was born at Concord, Massachusetts, July 12,
1817, and died there May 6, 1862. He was one of the most markedly
individual of that group of philosophers and men of letters which has
made the name of the little Massachusetts town so notable in the intel-
lectual history of America.

Thoreau came of a family of French descent, and was educated at
Harvard. "He was bred," says his friend Emerson, "to no profession;
he never married; he lived alone; he never went to church; he never
voted; he refused to pay a tax to the State; he ate no flesh, he drank no
wine, he never knew the use of tobacco; and, though a naturalist, he
used neither trap nor gun." The individualism which is implied in these
facts was the most prominent characteristic of this remarkable person.
Holding that "a man is rich in proportion to the number of things which
he can afford to let alone," he found that a small part of his time, devoted
to making lead-pencils, carpentering, and surveying, gave him enough
for his simple needs, and left him free for the rest of the year to observe
nature, to think, and to write.

In 1845 Thoreau built himself a hut on the edge of Walden Pond, and
for over two years lived there in solitude, composing his "Week on the
Concord and Merrimac Rivers." During these years he kept a journal,
from which he later drew the volume called "Walden," and these are
his only two books published during his lifetime. From articles in
magazines and manuscripts, some eight more volumes have been com-
piled since his death.

Interesting as is the philosophy which permeates the work of this
solitary, his books have found readers rather on account of their minute
and sympathetic observation of nature and the beauty of their style.
The following essay on "Walking" represents all three elements; and
in its charming discursiveness, in the absence of any structure to hinder
the writer's pen from wandering at will, and in the responsiveness which
it exhibits to the moods and suggestions of nature, it is a characteristic
expression of its author's spirit.

WALKING

[1862]

I WISH to speak a word for Nature, for absolute freedom and
wildness, as contrasted with a freedom and culture merely civil,
— to regard man as an inhabitant, or a part and parcel of Nature,
rather than a member of society. I wish to make an extreme state-
ment, if so I may make an emphatic one, for there are enough
champions of civilization : the minister and the school committee and
every one of you will take care of that.

I have met with but one or two persons in the course of my life
who understood the art of Walking, that is, of taking walks, — who
had a genius, so to speak, for sauntering: which word is beautifully
derived from "idle people who roved about the country, in the Mid-
dle Ages, and asked charity, under pretence of going a la Sainte
Terre," to the Holy Land, till the children exclaimed, "There goes
a Sainte-Terrer," a Saunterer, a Holy-Lander. They who never go
to the Holy Land in their walks, as they pretend, are indeed mere
idlers and vagabonds; but they who do go there are saunterers in the
good sense, such as I mean. Some, however, would derive the word
from sans terre, without land or a home, which, therefore, in the
good sense, will mean, having no particular home, but equally at
home everywhere. For this is the secret of successful sauntering.
He who sits still in a house all the time may be the greatest vagrant
of all; but the saunterer, in the good sense, is no more vagrant than
the meandering river, which is all the while sedulously seeking the
shortest course to the sea. But I prefer the first, which, indeed, is
the most probable derivation. For every walk is a sort of crusade,
preached by some Peter the Hermit in us, to go forth and reconquer
this Holy Land from the hands of the Infidels.

It is true, we are but faint-hearted crusaders, even the walkers,
nowadays, who undertake no persevering, never-eading enterprizes.

395

396 THOREAU

Our expeditions are but tours, and come round again at evening to
the old hearth-side from which we set out. Half the walk is but
retracing our steps. We should go forth on the shortest walk, per-
chance, in the spirit of undying adventure, never to return — pre-
pared to send back our embalmed hearts only as relics to our desolate
kingdoms. If you are ready to leave father and mother, and brother
and sister, and wife and child and friends, and never see them again
— if you have paid your debts, and made your will, and settled all
your affairs, and are a free man, then you are ready for a walk.

To come down to my own experience, my companion and I, for
I sometimes have a companion, take pleasure in fancying ourselves
knights of a new, or rather an old, order — not Equestrians or Cheva-
liers, not Ritters or riders, but Walkers, a still more ancient and
honourable class, I trust. The chivalric and heroic spirit which once
belonged to the Rider seems now to reside in, or perchance to have
subsided into, the Walker, — not the Knight, but Walker, Errant.
He is a sort of fourth estate, outside of Church and State and
People.

We have felt that we almost alone hereabouts practised this noble
art; though, to tell the truth, at least, if their own assertions are to
be received, most of my townsmen would fain walk sometimes, as
I do, but they cannot. No wealth can buy the requisite leisure, free-
dom, and independence which are the capital in this profession. It
comes only by the grace of God. It requires a direct dispensation
from Heaven to become a walker. You must be born into the family
of the Walkers. Ambulator nascitur, non fit. Some of my townsmen,
it is true, can remember and have described to me some walks which
they took ten years ago, in which they were so blessed as to lose
themselves for half an hour in the woods; but I know very well that
they have confined themselves to the highway ever since, whatever
pretensions they may make to belong to this select class. No doubt
they were elevated for a moment as by the reminiscence of a previous
state of existence, when even they were foresters and outlaws.

"When he came to grene wode,

In a mery mornynge,
There he herde the notes small
Of byrdes mery syngynge.

WALKING 397

"It is ferre gone, sayd Robyn,

That I was last here;
Me lyste a lytell for to shote
At the donne dere."

I think that I cannot preserve my health and spirits, unless I
spend four hours a day at least, — and it is commonly more than that,
— sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields,
absolutely free from all worldly engagements. You may safely say,
A penny for your thoughts, or a thousand pounds. When sometimes
I am reminded that the mechanics and shopkeepers stay in their
shops not only all the forenoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting
with crossed legs, so many of them — as if the legs were made to sit
upon, and not to stand or walk upon — I think that they deserve some
credit for not having all committed suicide long ago.

I, who cannot stay in my chamber for a single day without acquir-
ing some rust, and when sometimes I have stolen forth for a walk
at the eleventh hour or four o'clock in the afternoon, too late to re-
deem the day, when the shades of night were already beginning to
be mingled with the daylight, have felt as if I had committed some
sin to be atoned for, — I confess that I am astonished at the power of
endurance, to say nothing of the moral insensibility, of my neigh-
bours who confine themselves to shops and offices the whole day for
weeks and months, ay, and years almost together. I know not what
manner of stuff they are of — sitting there now at three o'clock in the
afternoon, as if it were three o'clock in the morning. Bonaparte may
talk of the three-o'clock-in-the-morning courage, but it is nothing to
the courage which can sit down cheerfully at this hour in the after-
noon over against one's self whom you have known all the morning,
to starve out a garrison to whom you are bound by such strong ties of
sympathy. I wonder that about this time, or say between four and
five o'clock in the afternoon, too late for the morning papers and
too early for the evening ones, there is not a general explosion heard
up and down the street, scattering a legion of antiquated and house-
bred notions and whims to the four winds for an airing — and so the
evil cure itself.

How womankind, who are confined to the house still more than
men, stand it I do not know; but I have ground to suspect that most

398 THOREAU

of them do not stand it at all. When, early in a summer afternoon,
we have been shaking the dust of the village from the skirts of our
garments, making haste past those houses with purely Doric or
Gothic fronts, which have such an air of repose about them, my com-
panion whispers that probably about these times their occupants are
all gone to bed. Then it is that I appreciate the beauty and the glory
of architecture, which itself never turns in, but forever stands out
and erect, keeping watch over the slumberers.

No doubt temperament, and, above all, age, have a good deal to do
with it. As a man grows older, his ability to sit still and follow indoor
occupations increases. He grows vespertinal in his habits as the
evening of life approaches, till at last he comes forth only j ust before
sundown, and gets all the walk that he requires in half an hour.

But the walking of which I speak has nothing in it akin to taking
exercise, as it is called, as the sick take medicine at stated hours — as
the swinging of dumb-bells or chairs; but is itself the enterprise and
adventure of the day. If you would get exercise, go in search of the
springs of life. Think of a man's swinging dumb-bells for his
health, when those springs are bubbling up in far-off pastures un-
sought by him!

Moreover, you must walk like a camel, which is said to be the
only beast which ruminates when walking. When a traveller asked
Wordsworth's servant to show him her master's study, she answered,
"Here is his library, but his study is out of doors."

Living much out of doors, in the sun and wind, will no doubt
produce a certain roughness of character — will cause a thicker cuticle
to grow over some of the finer qualities of our nature, as on the face
and hands, or as severe manual labor robs the hands of some of their
delicacy of touch. So staying in the house, on the other hand, may
produce a softness and smoothness, not to say thinness of skin, accom-
panied by an increased sensibility to certain impressions. Perhaps
we should be more susceptible to some influences important to our
intellectual and moral growth, if the sun had shone and the wind
blown on us a little less; and no doubt it is a nice matter to propor-
tion rightly the thick and thin skin. But methinks that is a scurf that
will fall off fast enough — that the natural remedy is to be found in
the proportion which the night bears to the day, the winter to the

WALKING 399

summer, thought to experience. There will be so much the more
air and sunshine in our thoughts. The callous palms of the laborer
are conversant with finer tissues of self-respect and heroism, whose
touch thrills the heart, than the languid fingers of idleness. That
is mere sentimentality that lies abed by day and thinks itself white,
far from the tan and callus of experience.

When we walk, we naturally go to the fields and woods: what
would become of us if we walked only in a garden or a mall ? Even
some sects of philosophers have felt the necessity of importing the
woods to themselves, since they did not go to the woods. "They
planted groves and walks of Platanes," where they took subdiales
ambulationes in porticos open to the air. Of course it is of no use
to direct our steps to the woods, if they do not carry us thither. I
am alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the
woods bodily, without getting there in spirit. In my afternoon walk I
would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to
society. But it sometimes happens that I cannot easily shake off the
village. The thought of some work will run in my head and I am
not where my body is — I am out of my senses. In my walks I would
fain return to my senses. What business have I in the woods, if I
am thinking of something out of the woods ? I suspect myself, and
cannot help a shudder, when I find myself so implicated even in
what are called good works — for this may sometimes happen.

My vicinity affords many good walks; and though for so many
years I have walked almost every day, and sometimes for several
days together, I have not yet exhausted them. An absolutely new
prospect is a great happiness, and I can still get this any afternoon.
Two or three hours' walking will carry me to as strange a country
as I expect ever to see. A single farmhouse which I had not seen
before is sometimes as good as the dominions of the King of
Dahomey. There is in fact a sort of harmony discoverable between
the capabilities of the landscape within a circle of ten miles' radius,
or the limits of an afternoon walk, and the threescore years and ten
of human life. It will never become quite familiar to you.

Nowadays almost all man's improvements, so called, as the build-
ing of houses, and the cutting down of the forest and of all large
trees, simply deform the landscape, and make it more and more tame

400 THOREAU

and cheap. A people who would begin by burning the fences and
let the forest stand! I saw the fences half consumed, their ends lost
in the middle of the prairie, and some worldly miser with a surveyor
looking after his bounds, while heaven had taken place around him,
and he did not see the angels going to and fro, but was looking for
an old post-hole in the midst of paradise. I looked again, and saw
him standing in the middle of a boggy stygian fen, surrounded by
devils, and he had found his bounds without a doubt, three little
stones, where a stake had been driven, and looking nearer, I saw
that the Prince of Darkness was his surveyor.

I can easily walk ten, fifteen, twenty, any number of miles, com-
mencing at my own door, without going by any house, without
crossing a road except where the fox and the mink do: first along
by the river, and then the brook, and then the meadow and the
wood-side. There are square miles in my vicinity which have no
inhabitant. From many a hill I can see civilisation and the abodes of
man afar. The farmers and their works are scarcely more obvious
than woodchucks and their burrows. Man and his affairs, church
and state and school, trade and commerce, and manufactures and
agriculture, even politics, the most alarming of them all, — I am
pleased to see how little space they occupy in the landscape. Politics
is but a narrow field, and that still narrower highway yonder leads
to it. I sometimes direct the traveller thither. If you would go to the
political world, follow the great road — follow that market-man, keep
his dust in your eyes, and it will lead you straight to it; for it, too,
has its place merely, and does not occupy all space. I pass from it
as from a bean-field into the forest, and it is forgotten. In one half-
hour I can walk off to some portion of the earth's surface where a
man does not stand from one year's end to another, and there, con-
sequently, politics are not, for they are but as the cigar-smoke of a
man.

The village is the place to which the roads tend, a sort of expan-
sion of the highway, as a lake of a river. It is the body of which roads
are the arms and legs — a trivial or quadrivial place, the thorough-
fare and ordinary of travellers. The word is from the Latin villa,
which together with via, a way, or more anciently ved and vella,
Varro derives from veho, to carry, because the villa is the place to and
from which things are carried. They who got their living by team-

WALKING 401

ing were said vellaturam jacere. Hence, too, apparently, the Latin
word vilis and our vile; also villain. This suggests what kind o£
degeneracy villagers are liable to. They are wayworn by the travel
that goes by and over them, without travelling themselves.

Some do not walk at all; others walk in the highways; a few walk
across lots. Roads are made for horses and men of business. I do
not travel in them much, comparatively, because I am not in a
hurry to get to any tavern or grocery or livery-stable or depot to
which they lead. I am a good horse to travel, but not from choice
a roadster. The landscape-painter uses the figures of men to mark
a road. He would not make that use of my figure. I walk out into
a Nature such as the old prophets and poets. Menu, Moses, Homer,
Chaucer, walked in. You may name it America, but it is not
America: neither Americus Vespucius, nor Columbus, nor the rest
were the discoverers of it. There is a truer account of it in mythology
than in any history of America, so called, that I have seen.

However, there are a few old roads that may be trodden with
profit, as if they led somewhere now that they are nearly discon-
tinued. There is the Old Marlborough Road, which does not go
to Marlborough now, methinks, unless that is Marlborough where it
carries me. I am the bolder to speak of it here, because I presume
that there are one or two such roads in every town.

THE OLD MARLBOROUGH ROAD

Where they once dug for money,

Where sometimes Martial Miles

But never found any;

Singly files,

And Elijah Wood,

I fear for no good:

No other man,

Save Elisha Dugan, —

O man of wild habits,

Partridges and rabbits.

Who hast no cares

Only to set snares,

Who liv'st all alone,

Close to the bone,

And where life is sweetest

Constandy eatest.

402 THOREAU

When the spring stirs my blood
With the instinct to travel
I can get enough gravel

On the Old Marlborough Road.
Nobody repairs it,
For nobody wears it;
It is a living way,
As the Christians say.

Not many there be
Who enter therein,

Only the guests of the
Irishman Quin.

What is it, what is it,
But a direction out there,

And the bare possibility
Of going somewhere?
Great guide-boards of stone.
But travellers none;
Cenotaphs of the towns
Named on their crowns.
It is worth going to see
Where you might be.
What king
Did the thing,
I am still wondering;
Set up how or when.
By what selectmen,
Gourgas or Lee,
Clark or Darby?
They're a great endeavor
To be something forever;
Blank tablets of stone,
Where a traveller might groan,
And in one sentence
Grave all that is known;
Which another might read.
In his extreme need.
I know one or two
Lines that would do.
Literature that might stand
All over the land,
Which a man could remember
Till next December,
And read again in the Spring,

WALKING 403

After the thawing.
If with fancy unfurled

You leave your abode,
You may go round the world

By the Old Marlborough Road.

At present, in this vicinity, the best part of the land is not private
property; the landscape is not owned, and the walker enjoys com-
parative freedom. But possibly the day will come when it will be
partitioned off into so-called pleasure-grounds, in which a few will
take a narrow and exclusive pleasure only, — when fences shall be
multiplied, and man-traps and other engines invented to confine men
to the public road, and walking over the surface of God's earth shall
be construed to mean trespassing on some gentleman's grounds. To
enjoy a thing exclusively is commonly to exclude yourself from the
true enjoyment of it. Let us improve our opportunities, then, before
the evil days come.

What is it that makes it so hard sometimes to determine whither
we will walk ? I believe that there is a subtle magnetism in Nature,
which, if we unconsciously yield to it, will direct us aright. It is not
indifferent to us which way we walk. There is a right way; but we
are very liable from heedlessness and stupidity to take the wrong one.
We would fain take that walk, never yet taken by us through this
actual world, which is perfectly symbolical of the path which we
love to travel in the interior and ideal world; and sometimes, no
doubt, we find it difficult to choose our direction, because it does
not yet exist distinctly in our idea.

When I go out of the house for a walk, uncertain as yet whither I
will bend my steps, and submit myself to my instinct to decide for
me, I find, strange and whimsical as it may seem, that I finally and
inevitably settle southwest, toward some particular wood or meadow
or deserted pasture or hill in that direction. My needle is slow to
settle, — varies a few degrees, and does not always point due south-
west, it is true, and it has good authority for this variation, but it
always settles between west and south-southwest. The future lies
that way to me, and the earth seems more unexhausted and richer
on that side. The outline which would bound my walks would be.

404 THOREAU

not a circle, but a parabola, or rather like one of those cometary orbits
which have been thought to be non-returning curves, in this case
opening westward, in which my house occupies the place of the sun.
I turn round and round irresolute sometimes for a quarter of an
hour, until I decide, for a thousandth time, that I will walk into the
southwest or west. Eastward I go only by force; but westward I go
free. Thither no business leads me. It is hard for me to believe that
I shall find fair landscapes or sufficient wildness and freedom behind
the eastern horizon. I am not excited by the prospect of a walk
thither; but I believe that the forest which I see in the western
horizon stretches uninterruptedly toward the setting sun, and there
are no towns nor cities in it of enough consequence to disturb me.
Let me live where I will, on this side is the city, on that the wilder-
ness, and ever I am leaving the city more and more, and withdraw-
ing into the wilderness. I should not lay so much stress on this fact,
if I did not believe that something like this is the prevailing tendency
of my countrymen. I must walk toward Oregon, and not toward
Europe. And that way the nation is moving, and I may say that
mankind progress from east to west. Within a few years we have
witnessed the phenomenon of a south-eastward migration, in the
settlement of Australia; but this affects us as a retrograde movement,
and, judging from the moral and physical character of the first gen-
eration of Australians, has not yet proved a successful experiment.
The eastern Tartars think that there is nothing west beyond Thibet.
"The world ends there," say they; "beyond there is nothing but a
shoreless sea." It is unmitigated East where they live.

We go eastward to realise history and study the works of art and
literature, retracing the steps of the race; we go westward as into
the future, with a spirit of enterprise and adventure. The Atlantic
is a Lethean stream, in our passage over which we have had an
opportunity to forget the Old World and its institutions. If we do
not succeed this time, there is perhaps one more chance for the race
left before it arrives on the banks of the Styx; and that is in the Lethe
of the Pacific, which is three times as wide.

I know not how significant it is, or how far it is an evidence of
singularity, that an individual should thus consent in his pettiest
walk with the general movement of the race; but I know that some-

WALKING 405

thing akin to the migratory instinct in birds and quadrupeds, —
which, in some instances, is known to have affected the squirrel
tribe, impelling them to a general and mysterious movement, in
which they were seen, say some, crossing the broadest rivers, each
on its particular chip, with its tail raised for a sail, and bridging
narrower streams with their dead, — that something like the juror
which affects the domestic cattle in the spring, and which is referred
to a worm in their tails, — affects both nations and individuals, either
perennially or from time to time. Not a flock of wild geese cackles
over our town, but it to some extent unsettles the value of real estate
here, and if I were a broker I should probably take that disturbance
into account.

"Than longen folk to gon on pilgrimages,
And palmares for to seken strange strondes."

Every sunset which I witness inspires me with the desire to go to
a West as distant and as fair as that into which the sun goes down.
He appears to migrate westward daily, and tempts us to follow him.
He is the Great Western Pioneer whom the nations follow. We
dream all night of those mountain-ridges in the horizon, though
they may be of vapor only, which were last gilded by his rays. The
island of Adantis, and the islands and gardens of the Hesperides,
a sort of terrestrial paradise, appear to have been the Great West of
the ancients, enveloped in mystery and poetry. Who has not seen
in imagination, when looking into the sunset sky, the gardens of the
Hesperides, and the foundation of all those fables.'*

Columbus felt the westward tendency more strongly than any
before. He obeyed it, and found a New World for Castile and Leon.
The herd of men in those days scented fresh pastures from afar.

"And now the sun had stretched out all the hills,
And now was dropped into the western bay;
At last he rose, and twitched his mantle blue;
To-morrow to fresh woods and pastures new."

Where on the globe can there be found an area of equal extent
with that occupied by the bulk of our States, so fertile and so rich
and varied in its productions, and at the same time so habitable by

406 THOREAU

the European, as this is? Michaux, who knew but part of them, says
that "the species of large trees are much more numerous in North
America than in Europe; in the United States there are more than
one hundred and forty species that exceed thirty feet in height; in
France there are but thirty that attain this size." Later botanists
more than confirm his observations. Humboldt came to America to
reahze his youthful dreams of a tropical vegetation, and he beheld
it in its greatest perfection in the primitive forests of the Amazon,
the most gigantic wilderness on the earth, which he has so eloquently
described. The geographer Guyot, himself a European, goes farther
— farther than I am ready to follow him; yet not when he says: "As
the plant is made for the animal, as the vegetable world is made for
the animal world, America is made for the man of the Old World.
. . . The man of the Old World sets out upon his way. Leaving
the highlands of Asia, he descends from station to station towards
Europe. Each of his steps is marked by a new civilization superior
to the preceding, by a greater power of development. Arrived at the
Atlantic, he pauses on the shore of this unknown ocean, the bounds
of which he knows not, and turns upon his footprints for an instant."
When he has exhausted the rich soil of Europe, and reinvigorated
himself, "then recommences his adventurous career westward as in
the earliest ages." So far Guyot.

From this western impulse coming in contact with the barrier of
the Atlantic sprang the commerce and enterprise of modern times.
The younger Michaux, in his "Travels West of the Alleghanies in
1802," says that the common inquiry in the newly settled West was,
" 'From what part of the world have you come?' As if these vast and
fertile regions would naturally be the place of meeting and common
country of all the inhabitants of the globe."

To use an obsolete Latin word, I might say, Ex Oriente lux; ex
Occidente frux. From the East light; from the West fruit.

Sir Francis Head, an English traveller and a Governor-General
of Canada, tells us that "in both the northern and southern hemi-
spheres of the New World, Nature has not only outlined her works
on a larger scale, but has painted the whole picture with brighter and
more costly colors than she used in delineating and in beautifying
the Old World. . . . The heavens of America appear infinitely

WALKING 4C7

higher, the sky is bluer, the air is fresher, the cold is intenser, the
moon looks larger, the stars are brighter, the thunder is louder, the
lightning is vivider, the wind is stronger, the rain is heavier, the
mountains are higher, the rivers longer, the forests bigger, the plains
broader." This statement will do at least to set against BufEon's
account of this part of the world and its productions.

Linn^us said long ago, "Nescio qu2 facies lata, glabra plantis
Americanis: I know not what there is of joyous and smooth in the
aspect of American plants;" and I think that in this country there
are no, or at most very few, Ajricance bestice, African beasts, as the
Romans called them, and that in this respect also it is peculiarly
fitted for the habitation of man. We are told that within three miles
of the centre of the East Indian city of Singapore, some of the inhabi-
tants are annually carried off by tigers; but the traveller can lie down
in the woods at night almost anywhere in North America without
fear of wild beasts.

These are encouraging testimonies. If the moon looks larger here
than in Europe, probably the sun looks larger also. If the heavens
of America appear infinitely higher, and the stars brighter, I trust
that these facts are symbolical of the height to which the philosophy
and poetry and religion of her inhabitants may one day soar. At
length, perchance, the immaterial heaven will appear as much higher
to the American mind, and the intimations that star it as much
brighter. For I believe that climate does thus react on man — as there
is something in the mountain air that feeds the spirit and inspires.
Will not man grow to greater perfection intellectually as well as
physically under these influences? Or is it unimportant how many
foggy days there are in his life? I trust that we shall be more imagi-
native, that our thoughts will be clearer, fresher, and more ethereal,
as our sky — our understanding more comprehensive and broader,
like our plains — our intellect generally on a grander scale, like our
thunder and lightning, our rivers and mountains and forests — and
our hearts shall even correspond in breadth and depth and grandeur
to our inland seas. Perchance there will appear to the traveller some-
thing, he knows not what, of Iceta and glabra, of joyous and serene,
in our very faces. Else to what end does the world go on, and why
was America discovered ?

408 THOREAU

To Americans I hardly need to say —

"Westward the star of empire takes its way."

As a true patriot, I should be ashamed to think that Adam in para-
dise was more favourably situated on the whole than the backwoods-
man in this country.

Our sympathies in Massachusetts are not confined to New Eng-
land; though we may be estranged from the South, we sympathize
with the West. There is the home of the younger sons, as among
the Scandinavians they took to the sea for their inheritance. It is too
late to be studying Hebrew; it is more important to understand even
the slang of to-day.

Some months ago I went to see a panorama of the Rhine. It was
like a dream of the Middle Ages. I floated down its historic stream
in something more than imagination, under bridges built by the
Romans, and repaired by later heroes, past cities and castles whose
very names were music to my ears, and each of which was the subject
of a legend. There were Ehrenbreitstein and Rolandseck and Cob-
lentz, which I knew only in history. They were ruins that interested
me chiefly. There seemed to come up from its waters and its vine-
clad hills and valleys a hushed music as of Crusaders departing for
the Holy Land. I floated along under the spell of enchantment, as
if I had been transported to an heroic age, and breathed an atmos-
phere of chivalry.

Soon after, I went to see a panorama of the Mississippi, and as I
worked my way up the river in the light of to-day and saw the steam-
boats wooding up, counted the rising cities, gazed on the fresh ruins
of Nauvoo, beheld the Indians moving west across the stream, and,
as before I had looked up the Moselle, now looked up the Ohio and
the Missouri and heard the legends of Dubuque and of Wenona's
Cliff, — still thinking more of the future than of the past or present,
— I saw that this was a Rhine stream of a different kind; that the
foundations of castles were yet to be laid, and the famous bridges
were yet to be thrown over the river; and I felt that this was the
heroic age itself, though we know it not, for the hero is commonly
the simplest and obscurest of men.

WALKING 409

The West of which I speak is but another name for the Wild; and
what I have been preparing to say is, that in Wildness is the preserva-
tion of the World. Every tree sends its fibres forth in search of the
Wild. The cities import it at any price. Men plough and sail for it.
From the forest and wilderness come the tonics and barks which
brace mankind. Our ancestors were savages. The story of Romulus
and Remus being suckled by a wolf is not a meaningless fable. The
founders of every state which has risen to eminence have drawn their
nourishment and vigor from a similar wild source. It was because
the children of the Empire were not suckled by the wolf that they
were conquered and displaced by the children of the northern for-
ests who were.

I believe in the forest, and in the meadow, and in the night in
which the corn grows. We require an infusion of hemlock-spruce
or arbor-vitae in our tea. There is a difference between eating and
drinking for strength and from mere gluttony. The Hottentots
eagerly devour the marrow of the koodoo and other antelopes raw,
as a matter of course. Some of our Northern Indians eat raw the
marrow of the Arctic reindeer, as well as various other parts, includ-
ing the summits of the anders, as long as they are soft. And herein,
perchance, they have stolen a march on the cooks of Paris. They get
what usually goes to feed the fire. This is probably better than stall-
fed beef and slaughter-house pork to make a man of. Give me a
wildness whose glance no civilization can endure — ^as if we lived on
the marrow of koodoos devoured raw.

There are some intervals which border the strain of the wood-
thrush, to which I would migrate, — wild lands where no settler has
squatted; to which, methinks, I am already acclimated.

The African hunter Gumming tells us that the skin of the eland,
as well as that of most other antelopes just killed, emits the most
delicious perfume of trees and grass. I would have every man so
much like a wild antelope, so much a part and parcel of Nature, that
his very person should thus sweetly advertise our senses of his pres-
ence, and remind us of those parts of Nature which he most haunts.
I feel no disposition to be satirical, when the trapper's coat emits the
odour of musquash even; it is a sweeter scent to me than that which

410 THOREAU

commonly exhales from the merchant's or the scholar's garments.
When I go into their wardrobes and handle their vestments, I am
reminded of no grassy plains and flowery meads which they have
frequented, but of dusty merchants' exchanges and libraries rather.

A tanned skin is something more than respectable, and perhaps
olive is a fitter color than white for a man — a denizen of the woods.
"The pale white man!" Ido not wonder that the African pitied him.
Darwin the naturalist says, "A white man bathing by the side of a
Tahitian was like a plant bleached by the gardener's art, compared
with a fine, dark green one, growing vigorously in the open fields."

Ben Jonson exclaims, —

"How near to good is what is fair!"

So I would say —

How near to good is what is wild!

Life consists with wildness. The most alive is the wildest. Not yet
subdued to man, its presence refreshes him. One who pressed for-
ward incessantly and never rested from his labors, who grew fast
and made infinite demands on life, would always find himself in a
new country or wilderness, and surrounded by the raw material of
life. He would be climbing over the prostrate stems of primitive
forest trees.

Hope and the future for me are not in lawns and cultivated fields,
not in towns and cities, but in the impervious and quaking swamps.
When, formerly, I have analyzed my partiality for some farm which
I had contemplated purchasing, I have frequently found that I was
attracted solely by a few square rods of impermeable and unfathom-
able bog — a natural sink in one corner of it. That was the jewel
which dazzled me. I derive more of my subsistence from the swamps
which surround my native town than from the cultivated gardens
in the village. There are no richer parterres to my eyes than the
dense beds of dwarf andromeda (Cassandra calyculata) which cover
these tender places on the earth's surface. Botany cannot go farther
than tell me the names of the shrubs which grow there — the high-
blueberry, panicled andromeda, lamb-kill, azalea, and rhodora — all
standing in the quaking sphagnum. I often think that I should like

WALKING 411

to have my house front on this mass of dull red bushes, omitting
other flower plots and borders, transplanted spruce and trim box;
even graveled walks — to have this fertile spot under my windows,
not a few imported barrow-fulls of soil only to cover the sand which
was thrown out in digging the cellar. Why not put my house, my
parlour, behind this plot, instead of behind that meagre assemblage
of curiosities, that poor apology for a Nature and Art, which I call
my front-yard ? It is an effort to clear up and make a decent appear-
ance when the carpenter and mason have departed, though done as
much for the passer-by as the dweller within. The most tasteful
front-yard fence was never an agreeable object of study to me; the
most elaborate ornaments, acorn-tops, or what not, soon wearied and
disgusted me. Bring your sills up to the very edge of the swamp,
then (though it may not be the best place for a dry cellar), so that
there be no access on that side to citizens. Front-yards are not made
to walk in, but, at most, through, and you could go in the back way.

Yes, though you may think me perverse, if it were proposed to me
to dwell in the neighborhood of the most beautiful garden that ever
human art contrived, or else of a Dismal Swamp, I should certainly
decide for the swamp. How vain, then, have been all your labors,
citizens, for me!

My spirits infallibly rise in proportion to the outward dreariness.
Give me the ocean, the desert, or the wilderness! In the desert, pure
air and solitude compensate for want of moisture and fertility. The
traveller Burton says of it — "Your morale improves; you become
frank and cordial, hospitable and single-minded. ... In the desert,
spirituous liquors excite only disgust. There is a keen enjoyment in
a mere animal existence." They who have been travelling long on the
steppes of Tartary say : "On reentering cultivated lands, the agitation,
perplexity, and turmoil of civilization oppressed and suffocated us;
the air seemed to fail us, and we felt every moment as if about to
die of asphyxia." When I would recreate myself, I seek the darkest
wood, the thickest and most interminable and, to the citizen, most
dismal swamp. I enter a swamp as a sacred place, — a sanctum sanc-
torum. There is the strength, the marrow of Nature. The wild-wood
covers the virgin mould, — and the same soil is good for men and
for trees. A man's health requires as many acres of meadow to his

412 THOREAU

prospect as his farm does loads of muck. There are the strong meats
on which he feeds. A town is saved, not more by the righteous men
in it than by the woods and swamps that surround it. A township
where one primitive forest waves above while another primitive
forest rots below, — such a town is fitted to raise not only corn and
potatoes, but poets and philosophers for the coming ages. In such
a soil grew Homer and Confucius and the rest, and out of such a
wilderness comes the Reformer eating locusts and wild honey.

To preserve wild animals implies generally the creation of a for-
est for them to dwell in or resort to. So it is with man. A hundred
years ago they sold bark in our streets peeled from our own woods.
In the very aspect of those primitive and rugged trees there was,
methinks, a tanning principle which hardened and consolidated
the fibres of men's thoughts. Ah! already I shudder for these com-
paratively degenerate days of my native village, when you cannot
collect a load of bark of good thickness; and we no longer produce
tar and turpentine.

The civilised nations — Greece, Rome, England — have been sus-
tained by the primitive forests which anciently rotted where they
stand. They survive as long as the soil is not exhausted. Alas for
human culture! little is to be expected of a nation, when the vege-
table mould is exhausted, and it is compelled to make manure of the
bones of its fathers. There the poet sustains himself merely by his
own superfluous fat, and the philosopher comes down on his mar-
rowbones.

It is said to be the task of the American "to work the virgin soil,"
and that "agriculture here already assumes proportions unknown
everywhere else." I think that the farmer displaces the Indian even
because he redeems the meadow, and so makes himself stronger
and in some respects more natural. I was surveying for a man the
other day a single straight line one hundred and thirty-two rods
long, through a swamp, at whose entrance might have been written
the words which Dante read over the entrance to the infernal re-
gions, — "Leave all hope, ye that enter," — that is, of ever getting out
again; where at one time I saw my employer actually up to his neck
and swimming for his life in his property, though it was still winter.
He had another similar swamp which I could not survey at all.

WALKING 413

because it was completely under water, and nevertheless, with
regard to a third swamp, which I did survey from a distance, he
remarked to me, true to his instincts, that he would not part with it
for any consideration, on account of the mud which it contained.
And that man intends to put a girdling ditch round the whole in
the course of forty months, and so redeem it by the magic of his
spade. I refer to him only as the type of a class.

The weapons with which we have gained our most important vic-
tories, which should be handed down as heirlooms from father to
son, are not the sword and the lance, but the bush-whack, the turf-
cutter, the spade, and the bog-hoe, rusted with the blood of many
a meadow, and begrimed with the dust of many a hard-fought field.
The very winds blew the Indian's corn-field into the meadow, and
pointed out the way which he had not the skill to follow. He had
no better implement with which to intrench himself in the land
than a clam-shell. But the farmer is armed with plough and spade.

In Literature it is only the wild that attracts us. Dulness is but
another name for tameness. It is the uncivilized free and wild think-
ing in "Hamlet" and the "Iliad," in all the Scriptures and Mythol-
ogies, not learned in the schools, that delights us. As the wild duck
is more swift and beautiful than the tame, so is the wild — the mallard
— thought, which 'mid falling dews wings its way above the fens.
A truly good book is something as natural, and as unexpectedly and
unaccountably fair and perfect, as a wild flower discovered on the
prairies of the West or in the jungles of the East. Genius is a light
which makes the darkness visible, like the lightning's flash, which
perchance shatters the temple of knowledge itself, — and not a taper
lighted at the hearthstone of the race, which pales before the light
of common day.

English literature, from the days of the minstrels to the Lake
Poets, — Chaucer and Spenser and Milton, and even Shakespeare,
included — breathes no quite fresh and, in this sense, wild strain. It
is an essentially tame and civilized literature, reflecting Greece and
Rome. Her wilderness is a green wood, her wild man, a Robin
Hood. There is plenty of genial love of Nature, but not so much of
Nature herself. Her chronicles inform us when her wild animals, but
not when the wild man In her, became extinct.

414 THOREAU

The science of Humboldt is one thing, poetry is another thing.
The poet to-day, notwithstanding all the discoveries of science, and
the accumulated learning of mankind, enjoys no advantage over
Homer.

Where is the literature which gives expression to Nature? He
would be a poet who could impress the winds and streams into his
service, to speak for him; who nailed words to their primitive senses,
as farmers drive down stakes in the spring, which the frost has
heaved; who derived his words as often as he used them — trans-
planted them to his page with earth adhering to their roots; whose
words were so true and fresh and natural that they would appear
to expand like the buds at the approach of spring, though they lay
half-smothered between two musty leaves in a library, — aye, to bloom
and bear fruit there, after their kind, annually, for the faithful
reader, in sympathy with surrounding Nature.

I do not know of any poetry to quote which adequately expresses
this yearning for the Wild. Approached from this side, the best
poetry is tame. I do not know where to find in any literature,
ancient or modern, any account which contents me of that Nature
with which even I am acquainted. You will perceive that I demand
something which no Augustan nor Elizabethan age, which no cul-
ture, in short, can give. Mythology comes nearer to it than anything.
How much more fertile a Nature, at least, has Grecian mythology
its root in than English literature! Mythology is the crop which the
Old World bore before its soil was exhausted, before the fancy and
imagination were affected with blight; and which it still bears,
wherever its pristine vigor is unabated. All other literatures endure
only as the elms which overshadow our houses; but this is like the
great dragon-tree of the Western Isles, as old as mankind, and,
whether that does or not, will endure as long; for the decay of other
literatures makes the soil in which it thrives.

The West is preparing to add its fables to those of the East. The
valleys of the Ganges, the Nile, and the Rhine having yielded their
crop, it remains to be seen what the valleys of the Amazon, the
Platte, the Orinoco, the St. Lawrence, and the Mississippi will pro-
duce. Perchance, when, in the course of ages, American liberty has
become a fiction of the past — as it is to some extent a fiction of the

WALKING 415

present — the poets of the world will be inspired by American
mythology.

The wildest dreams of wild men, even, are not the less true,
though they may not recommend themselves to the sense which is
most common among Englishmen and Americans to-day. It is not
every truth that recommends itself to the common sense. Nature
has a place for the wild clematis as well as for the cabbage. Some
expressions of truth are reminiscent — others merely sensible, as the
phrase is, — others prophetic. Some forms of disease, even, may proph-
esy forms of health. The geologist has discovered that the figures
of serpents, griffins, flying dragons, and other fanciful embellishments
of heraldry, have their prototypes in the forms of fossil species
which were extinct before man was created, and hence "indicate a
faint and shadowy knowledge of a previous state of organic exist-
ence." The Hindoos dreamed that the earth rested on an elephant,
and the elephant on a tortoise, and the tortoise on a serpent; and
though it may be an unimportant coincidence, it will not be out
of place here to state, that a fossil tortoise has lately been discovered
in Asia large enough to support an elephant. I confess that I am
pardal to these wild fancies, which transcend the order of time and
development. They are the sublimest recreation of the intellect. The
partridge loves peas, but not those that go with her into the pot.

In short, all good things are wild and free. There is something
in a strain of music, whether produced by an instrument or by the
human voice, — take the sound of a bugle in a summer night, for
instance, — which by its wildness, to speak without satire, reminds
me of the cries emitted by wild beasts in their native forests. It is so
much of their wildness as I can understand. Give me for my friends
and neighbors wild men, not tame ones. The wildness of the savage
is but a faint symbol of the awful ferity with which good men and
lovers meet.

I love even to see the domestic animals reassert their native rights,
— any evidence that they have not wholly lost their original wild
habits and vigor; as when my neighbor's cow breaks out of her
pasture early in the spring and boldly swims the river, a cold, grey
tide, twenty-five or thirty rods wide, swollen by the melted snow.
It is the buffalo crossing the Mississippi. This exploit confers some

4l6 THOREAU

dignity on the herd in my eyes — already dignified. The seeds of
instinct are preserved under the thick hides of cattle and horses, like
seeds in the bowels of the earth, an indefinite period.

Any sportiveness in cattle is unexpected. I saw one day a herd of
a dozen bullocks and cows running about and frisking in unwieldy
sport, like huge rats, even like kittens. They shook their heads,
raised their tails, and rushed up and down a hill, and I perceived by
their horns, as well as by their activity, their relation to the deer tribe.
But, alas! a sudden loud Whoal would have damped their ardor at
once, reduced them from venison to beef, and stiffened their sides
and sinews like the locomotive. Who but the Evil One has cried,
"Whoa!" to mankind? Indeed, the life of cattle, like that of many
men, is but a sort of locomotiveness; they move a side at a time, and
man, by his machinery, is meeting the horse and the ox half-way.
Whatever part the whip has touched is thenceforth palsied. Who
would ever think of a side of any of the supple cat tribe, as we speak
of a side of beef?

I rejoice that horses and steers have to be broken before they can
be made the slaves of men, and that men themselves have some wild
oats still left to sow before they become submissive members of
society. Undoubtedly, all men are not equally fit subjects for civiliza-
tion; and because the majority, like dogs and sheep, are tame by
inherited disposition, this is no reason why the others should have
their natures broken that they may be reduced to the same level.
Men are in the main alike, but they were made several in order that
they might be various. If a low use is to be served, one man will do
nearly or quite as well as another; if a high one, individual excellence
is to be regarded. Any man can stop a hole to keep the wind away,
but no other man could serve so rare a use as the author of this
illustration did. Confucius says — "The skins of the tiger and the
leopard, when they are tanned, are as the skins of the dog and the
sheep tanned." But it is not the part of a true culture to tame tigers,
any more than it is to make sheep ferocious; and tanning their skins
for shoes is not the best use to which they can be put.

When looking over a list of men's names in a foreign language,
as of military officers, or of authors who have written on a particular

WALKING 417

subject, I am reminded once more that there is nothing in a name.
The name Menschikoff, for instance, has nothing in it to my ears
more human than a whisker, and it may belong to a rat. As the
names of the Poles and Russians are to us, so are ours to them. It
is as if they had been named by the child's rigmarole — lery wiery
ichery van, tittle-tol-tan. I see in my mind a herd of wild creatures
swarming over the earth, and to each the herdsman has affixed some
barbarous sound in his own dialect. The names of men are of course
as cheap and meaningless as Bose and Tray, the names of dogs.

Methinks it would be some advantage to philosophy, if men were
named merely in the gross, as they are known. It would be neces-
sary only to know the genus and perhaps the race or variety, to
know the individual. We are not prepared to believe that every
private soldier in a Roman army had a name of his own, — ^because
we have not supposed that he had a character of his own.

At present our only true names are nicknames. I knew a boy who,
from his peculiar energy, was called "Buster" by his playmates, and
this rightly supplanted his Christian name. Some travellers tell us
that an Indian had no name given him at first, but earned it, and
his name was his fame: and among some tribes he acquired a new
name with every new exploit. It is pitiful when a man bears a name
for convenience merely, who has earned neither name nor fame.

I will not allow mere names to make distinctions for me, but still
see men in herds for all them. A familiar name cannot make a man
less strange to me. It may be given to a savage who retains in secret
his own wild title earned in the woods. We have a wild savage in
us, and a savage name is perchance somewhere recorded as ours. I
see that my neighbor, who bears the familiar epithet William, or
Edwin, takes it off with his jacket. It does not adhere to him when
asleep or in anger, or aroused by any passion or inspiration. I seem
to hear pronounced by some of his kin at such a time his original
wild name in some jaw-breaking or else melodious tongue.

Here is this vast, savage, howling mother of ours. Nature, lying
all around, with such beauty, and such affection for her children, as
the leopard; and yet we are so early weaned from her breast to soci-
ety, to that culture which is exclusively an interaction of man on

4l8 THOREAU

man — a sort of breeding in and in, which produces at most a merely
English nobility, a civilization destined to have a speedy limit.

In society, in the best institutions of men, it is easy to detect a cer-
tain precocity. When we should still be growing children, we are
already little men. Give me a culture which imports much muck
from the meadows, and deepens the soil — not that which trusts to
heating manures, and improved implements and modes of culture
only!

Many a poor sore-eyed student that I have heard of would grow
faster, both intellectually and physically, if, instead of sitting up so
very late, he honestly slumbered a fool's allowance.

There may be an excess even of informing light. Niepce, a French-
man, discovered "actinism," that power in the sun's rays which pro-
duces a chemical effect; that granite rocks, and stone structures, and
statues of metal, "are all alike destructively acted upon during the
hours of sunshine, and, but for provisions of Nature no less wonder-
ful, would soon perish under the delicate touch of the most subtile
of the agencies of the universe." But he observed that "those bodies
which underwent this change during the daylight possessed the
power of restoring themselves to their original conditions during the
hours of night, when this excitement was no longer influencing
them." Hence it has been inferred that "the hours of darkness are
as necessary to the inorganic creation as we know night and sleep
are to the organic kingdom." Not even does the moon shine every
night, but gives place to darkness.

I would not have every man nor every part of a man cultivated,
any more than I would have every acre of earth cultivated: part
will be tillage, but the greater part will be meadow and forest, not
only serving an immediate use, but preparing a mould against a
distant future, by the annual decay of the vegetation which it sup-
ports.

There are other letters for the child to learn than those which
Cadmus invented. The Spaniards have a good term to express this
wild and dusky knowledge — Gramdtica parda, tawny grammar — a
kind of mother-wit derived from that same leopard to which I have
referred.

We have heard of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowl-

WALKING 419

edge. It is said that knowledge is power; and the like. Methinks!
there is equal need of a Society for the Diffusion of Useful Igno-
rance, what we will call Beautiful Knowledge, a knowledge useful in
a higher sense: for what is most of our boasted so-called knowledge
but a conceit that we know something, which robs us of the advan-
tage of our actual ignorance ? What we call knowledge is often our
positive ignorance; ignorance our negative knowledge. By long
years of patient industry and reading of the newspapers, — for what
are the libraries of science but files of newspapers ? — a man accumu-
lates a myriad facts, lays them up in his memory, and then when in
some spring of his life he saunters abroad into the Great Fields of
thought, he, as it were, goes to grass like a horse and leaves all his
harness behind in the stable. I would say to the Society for the
Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, sometimes, — Go to grass. You have
eaten hay long enough. The spring has come with its green crop.
The very cows are driven to their country pastures before the end of
May; though I have heard of one unnatural farmer who kept his
cow in the barn and fed her on hay all the year round. So, fre-
quently, the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge treats
its cattle.

A man's ignorance some times is not only useful, but beautiful, — •
while his knowledge, so called, is oftentimes worse than useless,
besides being ugly. Which is the best man to deal with, — he who
knows nothing about a subject, and, what is extremely rare, knows
that he knows nothing, or he who really knows something about it,
but thinks that he knows all?

My desire for knowledge is intermittent; but my desire to bathe
my head in atmospheres unknown to my feet is perennial and con-
stant. The highest that we can attain to is not Knowledge, but
Sympathy with Intelligence. I do not know that this higher knowl-
edge amounts to anything more definite than a novel and grand
surprise on a sudden revelation of the insufficiency of all that we
called Knowledge before, — a discovery that there are more things
in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. It is
the lighting up of the mist by the sun. Man cannot ]{now in any
higher sense than this, any more than he can look serenely and with
impunity in the face of the sun: 'Qs rl vodv, ov kuvov wijo-eis, — "You

420 THOREAU

will not perceive that, as perceiving a particular thing," say the
Chaldean Oracles.

There is something servile in the habit of seeking after a law
which we may obey. We may study the laws of matter at and for
our convenience, but a successful life knows no law. It is an unfor-
tunate discovery certainly, that of a law which binds us where we
did not know before that we were bound. Live free, child of the
mist, — and with respect to knowledge we are all children of the
mist. The man who takes the liberty to live is superior to all the
laws, by virtue of his relation to the law-maker. "That is active
duty," says the Vishnu Purana, "which is not for our bondage; that
is knowledge which is for our liberation : all other duty is good only
unto weariness; all other knowledge is only the cleverness of an
artist."

It is remarkable how few events or crises there are in our histories;
how little exercised we have been in our minds; how few experiences
we have had. I would fain be assured that I am growing apace and
rankly, though my very growth disturb this dull equanimity, —
though it be with struggle through long, dark, muggy nights or
seasons of gloom. It would be well, if all our lives were a divine
tragedy even, instead of this trivial comedy or farce. Dante, Bunyan,
and others appear to have been exercised in their minds more than
we: they were subjected to a kind of culture such as our district
schools and colleges do not contemplate. Even Mahomet, though
many may scream at his name, had a good deal more to live for,
aye, and to die for, than they have commonly.

When, at rare intervals, some thought visits one, as perchance he
is walking on a railroad, then indeed the cars go by without his
hearing them. But soon, by some inexorable law, our life goes by
and the cars return.

"Gentle breeze, that wanderest unseen,
And bendest the thistles round Loira of storms.
Traveller of the windy glens,
Why hast thou left my ear so soon?"

While almost all men feel an attraction drawing them to society,
few are attracted strongly to Nature. In their relation to Nature men

WALKING 421

appear to me for the most part, notwithstanding their arts, lower
than the animals. It is not often a beautiful relation, as in the case
of the animals. How little appreciation of the beauty of the land-
scape there is among us! We have to be told that the Greeks called
the world Koc/ioj, Beauty, or Order, but we do not see clearly why
they did so, and we esteem it at best only a curious philological fact.

For my part, I feel that with regard to Nature I hve a sort of
border life, on the confines of a world into which I make occasional
and transient forays only, and my patriotism and allegiance to the
State into whose territories I seem to retreat are those of a moss-
trooper. Unto a life which I call natural I would gladly follow even
a will-o'-the-wisp through bogs and sloughs unimaginable, but no
moon nor firefly has shown me the causeway to it. Nature is a
personality so vast and universal that we have never seen one of
her features. The walker in the familiar fields which stretch around
my native town sometimes finds himself in another land than is
described in their owners' deeds, as it were in some far-away field
on the confines of the actual Concord, where her jurisdiction ceases,
and the idea which the word Concord suggests ceases to be sug-
gested. These farms which I have myself surveyed, these bounds
which I have set up, appear dimly still as through a mist; but they
have no chemistry to fix them; they fade from the surface of the
glass; and the picture which the painter painted stands out dimly
from beneath. The world with which we are commonly acquainted
leaves no trace, and it will have no anniversary.

I took a walk on Spaulding's Farm the other afternoon. I saw the
setting sun lighting up the opposite side of a stately pine wood. Its
golden rays straggled into the aisles of the wood as into some noble
hall. I was impressed as if some ancient and altogether admirable
and shining family had settled there in that part of the land called
Concord, unknown to me, — to whom the sun was servant, — who
had not gone into society in the village, — who had not been called
on. I saw their park, their pleasure-ground, beyond through the
wood, in Spaulding's cranberry-meadow. The pines furnished them
with gables as they grew. Their house was not obvious to vision;
the trees grew through it. I do not know whether I heard the
sounds of a suppressed hilarity or not. They seemed to recline on

422 THOREAU

the sunbeams. They have sons and daughters. They are quite well.
The farmer's cart-path, which leads directly through their hall, does
not in the least put them out, as the muddy bottom of a pool is some-
times seen through the reflected skies. They never heard of Spauld-
ing, and do not know that he is their neighbor, — notwithstanding I
heard him whistle as he drove his team through the house. Noth-
ing can equal the serenity of their lives. Their coat of arms is simply
a lichen. I saw it painted on the pines and oaks. Their attics were
in the tops of the trees. They are of no politics. There was no noise
of labor. I did not perceive that they were weaving or spinning.
Yet I did detect, when the wind lulled and hearing was done away,
the finest imaginable sweet musical hum, — as of a distant hive in
May, which perchance was the sound of their thinking. They had
no idle thoughts, and no one without could see their work, for
their industry was not as in knots and excrescences embayed.

But I find it difficult to remember them. They fade irrevocably
out of my mind even now while I speak and endeavor to recall
them and recollect myself. It is only after a long and serious effort
to recollect my best thoughts that I become again aware of their
cohabitancy. If it were not for such famihes as this, I think I should
move out of Concord.

We are accustomed to say in New England that few and fewer
pigeons visit us every year. Our forests furnish no mast for them.
So, it would seem, few and fewer thoughts visit each growing man
from year to year, for the grove in our minds is laid waste, — sold
to feed unnecessary fires of ambition, or sent to mill, and there is
scarcely a tvwg left for them to perch on. They no longer build
nor breed with us. In some more genial season, perchance, a faint
shadow flits across the landscape of the mind, cast by the wings
of some thought in its vernal or autumnal migration, but, looking
up, we are unable to detect the substance of the thought itself. Our
winged thoughts are turned to poultry. They no longer soar, and
they attain only to a Shanghai and Cochin-China grandeur. Those
gra-a-ate thoughts, those gra-a-ate men you hear of!

We hug the earth, — how rarely we mount! Methinks we might
elevate ourselves a little more. We might climb a tree, at least. I

WALKING 423

found my account In climbing a tree once. It was a tall white pine,
on the top of a hill; and though I got well pitched, I was well paid
for it, for I discovered new mountains in the horizon which I had
never seen before, — so much more of the earth and the heavens.
I might have walked about the foot of the tree for three-score years
and ten, and yet I certainly should never have seen them. But,
above all, I discovered around me, — it was near the end of June, —
on the ends of the topmost branches only, a few minute and delicate
red cone-like blossoms, the fertile flower of the white pine looking
heavenward. I carried straightway to the village the topmost ^ire,
and showed it to stranger jurymen who walked the streets, — for
it was court-week, — and to farmers and lumber-dealers and wood-
choppers and hunters, and not one had ever seen the like before,
but wondered as at a star dropped down. Tell of ancient architects
finishing their works on the tops of columns as perfectly as on
the lower and more visible parts! Nature has from the first expanded
the minute blossoms of the forest only toward the heavens^ above
men's heads and unobserved by them. We see only the flowers
that are under our feet in the meadows. The pines have developed
their delicate blossoms on the highest twigs of the wood every
summer for ages, as well over the heads of Nature's red children
as of her white ones; yet scarcely a farmer or hunter in the land
has ever seen them.

Above all, we cannot afford not to live in the present. He is
blessed over all mortals who loses no moment of the passing life in
remembering the past. Unless our philosophy hears the cock crow
in every barn-yard within our horizon, it is belated. That sound
commonly reminds us that we are growing rusty and andque in
our employments and habits of thought. His philosophy comes
down to a more recent time than ours. There is something sug-
gested by it that is a newer testament, — the gospel according to this
moment. He has not fallen astern; he has got up early and kept up
early, and to be where he is is to be in season, in the foremost rank of
time. It is an expression of the health and soundness of Nature, a
brag for all the world, — healthiness as of a spring burst forth, a
new fountain of the Muses, to celebrate this last inaant of time.

424 THOREAU

Where he lives no fugitive slave laws are passed. Who has not
betrayed his master many times since last he heard that note?

The merit of this bird's strain is in its freedom from all plaintive-
ness. The singer can easily move us to tears or to laughter, but
where is he who can excite in us a pure morning joy? When, in
doleful dumps, breaking the awful stillness of our wooden side-
walk on a Sunday, or, perchance, a watcher in the house of mourn-
ing, I hear a cockerel crow far or near, I think to myself, "There
is one of us well, at any rate," — and with a sudden gush return to
my senses.

We had a remarkable sunset one day last November. I was walk-
ing in a meadow, the source of a small brook, when the sun at last,
just before setting, after a cold gray day, reached a clear stratum
in the horizon, and the softest, brightest morning sunlight fell on
the dry grass and on the stems of the trees in the opposite horizon
and on the leaves of the shrub-oaks on the hillside, while our shadows
stretched long over the meadow eastward, as if we were the only
motes in its beams. It was such a light as we could not have imagined
a moment before, and the air also was so warm and serene that
nothing was wanting to make a paradise of that meadow. When
we reflected that this was not a solitary phenomenon, never to
happen again, but that it would happen forever and ever an infinite
number of evenings, and cheer and reassure the latest child that
walked there, it was more glorious still.

The sun sets on some retired meadow, where no house is visible,
with all the glory and splendor that it lavishes on cities, and per-
chance as it has never set before, — where there is but a solitary
marsh-hawk to have his wings gilded by it, or only a musquash looks
out from his cabin, and there is some little black-veined brook in
the midst of the marsh, just beginning to meander, winding slowly
round a decaying stump. We walked in so pure and bright a light,
gilding the withered grass and leaves, so softly and serenely bright,
I thought I had never bathed in such golden flood, without a ripple
or a murmur to it. The west side of every wood and rising ground
gleamed like the boundary of Elysium, and the sun on our backs
seemed like a gentle herdsman driving us home at evening.

WALKING 425

So we saunter toward the Holy Land, till one day the sun shall
shine more brightly than ever he has done, shall perchance shine
into our minds and hearts, and light up our whole lives with a
great awakening light, as warm and serene and golden as on a
bankside in autumn.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN
DEMOCRACY

BY

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

James Russell Lowell, poet, essayist, diplomatist, and scholar, was
born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, on February 22, 1819, the son of a
Unitarian minister. Educated at Harvard College, he tried the law, but
soon gave it up for literature. His poem on "The Present Crisis," written
in 1844, was his first really notable production, and one that made a
deep impression on the public mind. In the twenty years of troubled
politics that followed, one finds it constantly quoted. The year 1848
saw four volumes from Lowell's pen — a book of "Poems," the "Fable for
Critics," "The Biglow Papers," and the "Vision of Sir Launfal." The
second of these exhibited the author as wit and critic, the third as polit-
ical reformer, the fourth as poet and mystic; and these various sides of
his personality continue to appear with varying prominence throughout
his career.

On the retirement of Longfellow from the chair of belles-lettres at
Harvard in 1854, Lowell was elected to succeed him, and by way of
preparation spent the next two years in Europe studying modern lan-
guages and literatures. In 1857 he became the first editor of the Atlantic
Monthly, and after 1864 he collaborated with Charles Eliot Norton in
the editorship of the North American Review. Throughout the period
of the war Lowell wrote much both in prose and verse on behalf of the
Union; his work on the North American was largely literary criticism.

In 1877 Lowell went to Spain as American Minister, and in 1880 to
London, where for five years he represented the United States with great
distinction, and did much to improve the relations of the two countries.
Six years after his return, on August 12, 1891, he died in Elmwood, the
house in Cambridge where he was born.

Lowell's literary gifts were so various that it is difilcult to say on which
of them his final reputation will rest. But it is certain that he will long
be esteemed for the grace, vivacity, and eloquence of the prose in which
he placed before the world his views of such great American principles
and personalities as are dealt with in the two following essays on "Democ-
racy" and on "Abraham Lincoln."

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

1864-1865

THERE have been many painful crises since the impatient
vanity of South Carolina hurried ten prosperous Common-
wealths into a crime whose assured retribution was to leave
them either at the mercy of the nation they had wronged, or of the
anarchy they had summoned but could not control, when no
thoughtful American opened his morning paper without dreading
to find that he had no longer a country to love and honor. What-
ever the result of the convulsion whose first shocks were beginning
to be felt, there would still be enough square miles of earth for
elbow-room; but that ineffable sentiment made up of memory and
hope, of instinct and tradition, which swells every man's heart and
shapes his thought, though perhaps never present to his conscious-
ness, would be gone from it, leaving it common earth and nothing
more. Men might gather rich crops from it, but that ideal harvest
of priceless associations would be reaped no longer; that fine virtue
which sent up messages of courage and security from every sod of
it would have evaporated beyond recall. We should be irrevocably
cut off from our past, and be forced to splice the ragged ends of
our lives upon whatever new conditions chance might leave dan-
gling for us.

We confess that we had our doubts at first whether the patriotism
of our people were not too narrowly provincial to embrace the
proportions of national peril. We felt an only too natural distrust
of immense public meetings and enthusiastic cheers.

That a reaction should follow the hoHday enthusiasm with which
the war was entered on, that it should follow soon, and that the
slackening of public spirit should be proportionate to the previous
over-tension, might well be foreseen by all who had studied human
nature or history. Men acting gregariously are always in extremes.

By arrangement with Houghton Mifflin Company.
429

430 LOWELL

As they are one moment capable of higher courage, so they are
hable, the next, to baser depression, and it is often a matter of
chance whether numbers shall multiply confidence or discour-
agement. Nor does deception lead more surely to distrust of men
than self-deception to suspicion of principles. The only faith that
wears well and holds its color in all weathers is that which is woven
of conviction and set with the sharp mordant of experience. En-
thusiasm is good material for the orator, but the statesman needs
something more durable to work in, — must be able to rely on the
deliberate reason and consequent firmness of the people, without
which that presence of mind, no less essential in times of moral than
of material peril, will be wanting at the critical moment. Would
this fervor of the Free States hold out? Was it kindled by a just
feeling of the value of constitutional liberty? Had it body enough
to withstand the inevitable dampening of checks, reverses, delays?
Had our population intelligence enough to comprehend that the
choice was between order and anarchy, between the equilibrium of
a government by law and the tussle of misrule by pronunciamiento?
Could a war be maintained without the ordinary stimulus of hatred
and plunder, and with the impersonal loyalty of principle? These
were serious questions, and with no precedent to aid in answering
them.

At the beginning of the war there was, indeed, occasion for the
most anxious apprehension. A President known to be infected with
the political heresies, and suspected of sympathy with the treason,
of the Southern conspirators, had just surrendered the reins, we
will not say of power, but of chaos, to a successor known only as
the representative of a party whose leaders, with long training in
opposition, had none in the conduct of affairs; an empty treasury
was called on to supply resources beyond precedent in the history of
finance; the trees were yet growing and the iron unmined with
which a navy was to be built and armored; officers without discipline
were to make a mob into an army; and, above all, the pubhc
opinion of Europe, echoed and reinforced with every vague hint
and every specious argument of despondency by a powerful faction
at home, was either contemptuously sceptical or actively hostile. It
would be hard to over-estimate the force of this latter element of

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 43 1

disintegration and discouragement among a people where every
citizen at home, and every soldier in the field, is a reader o£ news-
papers. The pedlers of rumor in the North were the most effective
allies of the rebellion. A nation can be liable to no more insidious
treachery than that of the telegraph, sending hourly its electric
thrill of panic along the remotest nerves of the community, till the
excited imagination makes every real danger loom heightened with
its unreal double.

And even if we look only at more palpable difSculties, the problem
to be solved by our civil war was so vast, both in its immediate
relations and its future consequences; the conditions of its solution
were so intricate and so greatly dependent on incalculable and
uncontrollable contingencies; so many of the data, whether for
hope or fear, were, from their novelty, incapable of arrangement
under any of the categories of historical precedent, that there were
moments of crisis when the firmest believer in the strength and
sufficiency of the democratic theory of government might well
hold his breath in vague apprehension of disaster. Our teachers of
political philosophy, solemnly arguing from the precedent of some
petty Grecian, Italian, or Flemish city, whose long periods of aristoc-
racy were broken now and then by awkward parentheses of mob,
had always taught us that democracies were incapable of the senti-
ment of loyalty, of concentrated and prolonged effort, of far-reaching
conceptions; were absorbed in material interests; impatient of
regular, and much more of exceptional restraint; had no natural
nucleus of gravitation, nor any forces but centrifugal; were always
on the verge of civil war, and slunk at last into the natural alms-
house of bankrupt popular government, a military despotism. Here
was indeed a dreary outlook for persons who knew democracy, not
by rubbing shoulders with it lifelong, but merely from books, and
America only by the report of some fellow-Briton, who, having
eaten a bad dinner or lost a carpet-bag here, had written to the
"Times" demanding redress, and drawing a mournful inference of
democratic instability. Nor were men wanting among ourselves
who had so steeped their brains in London literature as to mistake
Cockneyism for European culture, and contempt of their country
for cosmopolitan breadth of view, and who, owing all they had

432 LOWELL

and all they were to democracy, thought it had an air of high-
breeding to join in the shallow epicedium that our bubble had burst.
But beside any disheartening influences which might affect the
timid or the despondent, there were reasons enough of settled gravity
against any over-confidence of hope. A war — which, whether we
consider the expanse of the territory at stake, the hosts brought into
the field, or the reach of the principles involved, may fairly be
reckoned the most momentous of modern times — was to be waged
by a people divided at home, unnerved by fifty years of peace, under
a chief magistrate without experience and without reputation, whose
every measure was sure to be cunningly hampered by a jealous and
unscrupulous minority, and who, while dealing with unheard-of
complications at home, must soothe a hostile neutrality abroad, wait-
ing only a pretext to become war. All this was to be done without
warning and without preparation, while at the same time a social
revolution was to be accomplished in the political condition of four
millions of people, by softening the prejudices, allaying the fears,
and gradually obtaining the cooperation, of their unwilling libera-
tors. Surely, if ever there were an occasion when the heightened
imagination of the historian might see Destiny visibly intervening
in human affairs, here was a knot worthy of her shears. Never,
perhaps, was any system of government tried by so continuous and
searching a strain as ours during the last three years; never has
any shown itself stronger; and never could that strength be so
directly traced to the virtue and intelligence of the people, — to that
general enlightenment and prompt efficiency of public opinion
possible only under the influence of a political framework like our
own. We find it hard to understand how even a foreigner should
be blind to the grandeur of the combat of ideas that has been going
on here, — to the heroic energy, persistency, and self-reliance of a
nation proving that it knows how much dearer greatness is than
mere power; and we own that it is impossible for us to conceive
the mental and moral condition of the American who does not
feel his spirit braced and heightened by being even a spectator of
such qualities and achievements. That a steady purpose and a
definite aim have been given to the jarring forces which, at the be-
ginning of the war, spent themselves in the discussion of schemes

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 433

which could only become operative, if at all, after the war was over;
that a popular excitement has been slowly intensified into an
earnest national will; that a somewhat impracticable moral senti-
ment has been made the unconscious instrument of a practical
moral end; that the treason of covert enemies, the jealousy of rivals,
the unwise zeal of friends, have been made not only useless for
mischief, but even useful for good; that the conscientious sensitive-
ness of England to the horrors of civil conflict has been prevented
from complicating a domestic with a foreign war; — all these results,
any one of which might suffice to prove greatness in a ruler, have
been mainly due to the good sense, the good humor, the sagacity,
the large-mindedpess, and the unselfish honesty of the unknown
man whom a blind fortune, as it seemed, had lifted from the crowd
to the most dangerous and difficult eminence of modern times. It
is by presence of mind in untried emergencies that the native metal
of a man is tested; it is by the sagacity to see, and the fearless honesty
to admit, whatever of truth there may be in an adverse opinion,
in order more convincingly to expose the fallacy that lurks behind
it, that a reasoner at length gains for his mere statement of a fact
the force of argument; it is by a wise forecast which allows hostile
combinations to go so far as by the inevitable reaction to become
elements of his own power, that a politician proves his genius for
statecraft; and especially it is by so gently guiding public sentiment
that he seems to follow it, by so yielding doubtful points that he
can be firm without seeming obstinate in essential ones, and thus
gain the advantages of compromise without the weakness of con-
cession; by so instinctively comprehending the temper and preju-
dices of a people as to make them gradually conscious of the superior
wisdom of his freedom from temper and prejudice, — it is by qualities
such as these that a magistrate shows himself worthy to be chief
in a commonwealth of freemen. And it is for qualities such as
these that we firmly believe History will rank Mr. Lincoln among
the most prudent of statesmen and the most successful of rulers. If
we wish to appreciate him, we have only to conceive the inevitable
chaos in which we should now be weltering, had a weak man or
an unwise one been chosen in his stead.
"Bare is back," says the Norse proverb, "without brother behind

434 LOWELL

it"; and this is, by analogy, true of an elective magistracy. The
hereditary ruler in any critical emergency may reckon on the inex-
haustible resources of prestige, of sentiment, of superstition, of
dependent interest, while the new man must slowly and painfully
create all these out of the unwilling material around him, by supe-
riority of character, by patient singleness of purpose, by sagacious
presentiment of popular tendencies and instinctive sympathy with
the national character. Mr. Lincoln's task was one of peculiar and
exceptional difficulty. Long habit had accustomed the American
people to the notion of a party in power, and of a President as its
creature and organ, while the more vital fact, that the executive
for the time being represents the abstract idea of government as a
permanent principle superior to all party and all private interest,
had gradually become unfamiliar. They had so long seen the public
policy more or less directed by views of party, and often even of
personal advantage, as to be ready to suspect the motives of a chief
magistrate compelled, for the first time in our history, to feel him-
self the head and hand of a great nation, and to act upon the
fundamental maxim, laid down by all publicists, that the first duty
of a government is to defend and maintain its own existence.
Accordingly, a powerful weapon seemed to be put into the hands
of the opposition by the necessity under which the administration
found itself of applying this old truth to new relations. Nor were
the opposition his only nor his most dangerous opponents.

The Republicans had carried the country upon an issue in which
ethics were more directly and visibly mingled with politics than
usual. Their leaders were trained to a method of oratory which
relied for its effect rather on the moral sense than the understanding.
Their arguments were drawn, not so much from experience as from
general principles of right and wrong. When the war came, their
system continued to be applicable and effective, for here again the
reason of the people was to be reached and kindled through their
sentiments. It was one of those periods of excitement, gathering,
contagious, universal, which, while they last, exalt and clarify the
minds of men, giving to the mere words country, human rights,
democracy , a meaning and a force beyond that of sober and logical
argument. They were convictions, maintained and defended by the

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 435

supreme logic of passion. That penetrating fire ran in and roused
those primary instincts that make their lair in the dens and caverns
of the mind. What is called the great popular heart was awakened,
that indefinable something which may be, according to circum-
stances, the highest reason or the most brutish unreason. But en-
thusiasm, once cold, can never be warmed over into anything better
than cant, — and phrases, when once the inspiration that filled them
with beneficent power has ebbed away, retain only that semblance
of meaning which enables them to supplant reason in hasty minds.
Among the lessons taught by the French Revolution there is none
sadder or more striking than this, that you may make everything
else out of the passions of men except a political system that will
work, and that there is nothing so pitilessly and unconsciously cruel
as sincerity formulated into dogma. It is always demoralizing to
extend the domain of sentiment over questions where it has no
legitimate jurisdiction; and perhaps the severest strain upon Mr.
Lincoln was in resisting a tendency of his own supporters which
chimed with his own private desires, while wholly opposed to his
convictions of what would be wise policy.

The change which three years have brought about is too remark-
able to be passed over without comment, too weighty in its lesson
not to be laid to heart. Never did a President enter upon office with
less means at his command, outside his own strength of heart and
steadiness of understanding, for inspiring confidence in the people,
and so winning it for himself, than Mr. Lincoln. All that was
known of him was that he was a good stump-speaker, nominated
for his availability, — that is, because he had no history, — and chosen
by a party with whose more extreme opinions he was not in sym-
pathy. It might well be feared that a man past fifty, against whom
the ingenuity of hostile partisans could rake up no accusation, must
be lacking in manliness of character, in decision of principle, in
strength of will; that a man who was at best only the representative
of a party, and who yet did not fairly represent even that, would
fail of political, much more of popular, support. And certainly no
one ever entered upon office with so few resources of power in the
past, and so many materials of weakness in the present, as Mr.
Lincoln. Even in that half of the Union which acknowledged him

436 LOWELL

as President, there was a large and at that time dangerous minority,
that hardly admitted his claim to the office, and even in the party
that elected him there was also a large minority that suspected him
of being secretly a communicant with the church of Laodicea. All
that he did was sure to be virulently attacked as ultra by one side;
all that he left undone, to be stigmatized as proof of lukewarmness
and backsliding by the other. Meanwhile, he was to carry on a truly
colossal war by means of both; he was to disengage the country
from diplomatic entanglements of unprecedented peril undisturbed
by the help or the hindrance of either, and to win from the crown-
ing dangers of his administration, in the confidence of the people,
the means of his safety and their own. He has contrived to do it,
and perhaps none of our Presidents since Washington has stood so
firm in the confidence of the people as he does after three years of
stormy administration.

Mr. Lincoln's policy was a tentative one, and rightly so. He laid
down no programme which must compel him to be either incon-
sistent or unwise, no cast-iron theorem to which circumstances must
be fitted as they rose, or else be useless to his ends. He seemed to
have chosen Mazarin's motto, Le temps et mot. The moi, to be sure,
was not very prominent at first; but it has grown more and more so,
till the world is beginning to be persuaded that it stands for a
character of marked individuality and capacity of affairs. Time was
his prime-minister, and, we began to think, at one period, his
general-in-chief also. At first he was so slow that he tired out all
those who see no evidence of progress but in blowing up the engine;
then he was so fast, that he took the breath away from those who
think there is no getting on safely while there is a spark of fire
under the boilers. God is the only being who has time enough;
but a prudent man, who knows how to seize occasion, can com-
monly make a shift to find as much as he needs. Mr. Lincoln, as
it seems to us in reviewing his career, though we have sometimes
in our impatience thought otherwise, has always waited, as a wise
man should, till the right moment brought up all his reserves.
Semper nocuit differre paratis is a sound axiom, but the really
efficacious man will also be sure to know when he is not ready, and
be firm against all persuasion and reproach till he is.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 437

One would be apt to think, from some of the criticisms made on
Mr. Lincoln's course by those who mainly agree with him in prin-
ciple, that the chief object of a statesman should be rather to pro-
claim his adhesion to certain doctrines, than to achieve their triumph
by quietly accomplishing his ends. In our opinion, there is no more
unsafe politician than a conscientiously rigid doctrinaire, nothing
more sure to end in disaster than a theoretic scheme of policy that
admits of no pliability for contingencies. True, there is a popular
image of an impossible He, in whose plastic hands the submissive
destinies of mankind become as wax, and to whose commanding
necessity the toughest facts yield with the graceful pliancy of fiction;
but in real life we commonly find that the men who control cir-
cumstances, as it is called, are those who have learned to allow for the
influence of their eddies, and have the nerve to turn them to account
at the happy instant. Mr. Lincoln's perilous task has been to carry
a rather shaky raft through the rapids, making fast the unrulier
logs as he could snatch opportunity, and the country is to be con-
gratulated that he did not think it his duty to run straight at all
hazards, but cautiously to assure himself with his setting-pole where
the main current was, and keep steadily to that. He is still in wild
water, but we have faith that his skill and sureness of eye will
bring him out right at last.

A curious, and, as we think, not inapt parallel might be drawn
between Mr. Lincoln and one of the most striking figures in modern
history, — Henry IV. of France. The career of the latter may be
more picturesque, as that of a daring captain always is; but in all
its vicissitudes there is nothing more romantic than that sudden
change, as by a rub of Aladdin's lamp, from the attorney's office in
a country town of Illinois to the helm of a great nation in times like
these. The analogy between the characters and circumstances of
the two men is in many respects singularly close. Succeeding to a
rebellion rather than a crown, Henry's chief material dependence
was the Huguenot party, whose doctrines sat upon him with a loose-
ness distasteful certainly, if not suspicious, to the more fanatical
among them. King only in name over the greater part of France,
and with his capital barred against him, it yet gradually became clear
to the more far-seeing even of the Catholic party that he was the

438 LOWELL

only centre o£ order and legitimate authority round which France
could reorganize itself. While preachers who held the divine right
of kings made the churches of Paris ring with declamations in favor
of democracy rather than submit to the heretic dog of a Bearnois,
— much as our soi-disant Democrats have lately been preaching the
divine right of slavery, and denouncing the heresies of the Declara-
tion of Independence, — Henry bore both parties in hand till he was
convinced that only one course of action could possibly combine
his own interests and those of France. Meanwhile the Protestants
believed somewhat doubtfully that he was theirs, the Catholics
hoped somewhat doubtfully that he would be theirs, and Henry
himself turned aside remonstrance, advice, and curiosity alike with
a jest or a proverb (if a little high, he liked them none the worse),
joking continually as his manner was. We have seen Mr. Lincoln
contemptuously compared to Sancho Panza by persons incapable
of appreciating one of the deepest pieces of wisdom in the pro-
foundest romance ever written; namely, that, while Don Quixote
was incomparable in theoretic and ideal statesmanship, Sancho,
with his stock of proverbs, the ready money of human experience,
made the best possible practical governor. Henry IV. was as full of
wise saws and modern instances as Mr. Lincoln, but beneath all
this was the thoughtful, practical, humane, and thoroughly earnest
man, around whom the fragments of France were to gather them-
selves till she took her place again as a planet of the first magnitude
in the European system. In one respect Mr. Lincoln was more
fortunate than Henry. However some may think him wanting in
zeal, the most fanatical can find no taint of apostasy in any measure
of his, nor can the most bitter charge him with being influenced by
motives of personal interest. The leading distinction between the
policies of the two is one of circumstances. Henry went over to
the nation; Mr. Lincoln has steadily drawn the nation over to him.
One left a united France; the other, we hope and believe, will leave
a reunited America. We leave our readers to trace the further points
of difference and resemblance for themselves, merely suggesting a
general similarity which has often occurred to us. One only point
of melancholy interest we will allow ourselves to touch upon. That
Mr. Lincoln is not handsome nor elegant, we learn from certain

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 439

English tourists who would consider similar revelations in regard
to Queen Victoria as thoroughly American in their want of
bienseance. It is no concern of ours, nor does it affect his fitness for
the high place he so worthily occupies; but he is certainly as for-
tunate as Henry in the matter of good looks, if we may trust con-
temporary evidence. Mr. Lincoln has also been reproached with
Americanism by some not unfriendly British critics; but, with all
deference, we cannot say that we like him any the worse for it,
or see in it any reason why he should govern Americans the less
wisely.

People of more sensitive organizations may be shocked, but we
are glad that in this our true war of independence, which is to free
us forever from the Old World, we have had at the head of our
affairs a man whom America made, as God made Adam, out of
the very earth, unancestried, unprivileged, unknown, to show us
how much truth, how much magnanimity, and how much state-
craft await the call of opportunity in simple manhood when it
believes in the justice of God and the worth of man. Convention-
alities are all very well in their proper place, but they shrivel at
the touch of nature like stubble in the fire. The genius that sways
a nation by its arbitrary will seems less august to us than that which
multiplies and reinforces itself in the instincts and convictions of an
entire people. Autocracy may have something in it more melo-
dramatic than this, but falls far short of it in human value and
interest.

Experience would have bred in us a rooted distrust of improvised
statesmanship, even if we did not believe politics to be a science,
which, if it cannot always command men of special aptitude and
great powers, at least demands the long and steady application of
the best powers of such men as it can command to master even its
first principles. It is curious, that, in a country which boasts of its
intelligence, the theory should be so generally held that the most
complicated of human contrivances, and one which every day be-
comes more complicated, can be worked at sight by any man able
to talk for an hour or two without stopping to think.

Mr. Lincoln is sometimes claimed as an example of a ready-made
ruler. But no case could well be less in point; for, besides that he

44° LOWELL

was a man of such fair-mindedness as is always the raw material
of wisdom, he had in his profession a training precisely the oppo-
site of that to which a partisan is subjected. His experience as a
lawyer compelled him not only to see that there is a principle under-
lying every phenomenon in human affairs, but that there are always
two sides to every question, both of which must be fully understood
in order to understand either, and that it is of greater advantage
to an advocate to appreciate the strength than the weakness of his
antagonist's position. Nothing is more remarkable than the unerring
tact with which, in his debate with Mr. Douglas, he went straight
to the reason of the question; nor have we ever had a more striking
lesson in political tactics than the fact, that, opposed to a man
exceptionally adroit in using popular prejudice and bigotry to his
purpose, exceptionally unscrupulous in appealing to those baser
motives that turn a meeting of citizens into a mob of barbarians,
he should yet have won his case before a jury of the people. Mr.
Lincoln was as far as possible from an impromptu politician. His
wisdom was made up of a knowledge of things as well as of men;
his sagacity resulted from a clear perception and honest acknowl-
edgment of difficulties, which enabled him to see that the only
durable triumph of political opinion is based, not on any abstract
right, but upon so much of justice, the highest attainable at any
given moment in human affairs, as may be had in the balance of
mutual concession. Doubtless he had an ideal, but it was the ideal
of a practical statesman, — to aim at the best, and to take the next
best, if he is lucky enough to get even that. His slow, but singu-
larly masculine, intelligence taught him that precedent is only an-
other name for embodied experience, and that it counts for even
more in the guidance of communities of men than in that of the
individual life. He was not a man who held it good public economy
to pull down on the mere chance of rebuilding better. Mr. Lincoln's
faith in God was qualified by a very well-founded distrust of the
wisdom of man. Perhaps it was his want of self-confidence that
more than anything else won him the unlimited confidence of the
people, for they felt that there would be no need of retreat from
any position he had deliberately taken. The cautious, but steady,
advance of his policy during the war was like that of a Roman army.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 44 1

He left behind him a firm road on which pubhc confidence could
follow; he took America with him where he went; what he gained
he occupied, and his advanced posts became colonies. The very
homeliness of his genius was its distinction. His kingship was
conspicuous by its workday homespun. Never was ruler so abso-
lute as he, nor so little conscious of it; for he was the incarnate
common-sense of the people. With all that tenderness of nature
whose sweet sadness touched whoever saw him with something of
its own pathos, there was no trace of sentimentalism in his speech
or action. He seems to have had but one rule of conduct, always
that of practical and successful politics, to let himself be guided
by events, when they were sure to bring him out where he wished
to go, though by what seemed to unpractical minds, which let go
the possible to grasp at the desirable, a longer road.

Undoubtedly the highest function of statesmanship is by degrees
to accommodate the conduct of communities to ethical laws, and
to subordinate the conflicting self-interests of the day to higher and
more permanent concerns. But it is on the understanding, and not
on the sentiment, of a nation that all safe legislation must be based.
Voltaire's saying, that "a consideration of petty circumstances is
the tomb of great things," may be true of individual men, but it
certainly is not true of governments. It is by a multitude of such
considerations, each in itself trifling, but all together weighty, that
the framers of policy can alone divine what is practicable and
therefore wise. The imputation of inconsistency is one to which
every sound politician and every honest thinker must sooner or
later subject himself. The foolish and the dead alone never change
their opinion. The course of a great statesman resembles that of
navigable rivers, avoiding immovable obstacles with noble bends of
concession, seeking the broad levels of opinion on which men
soonest settle and longest dwell, following and marking the almost
imperceptible slopes of national tendency, yet always aiming at
direct advances, always recruited from sources nearer heaven, and
sometimes bursting open paths of progress and fruitful human
commerce through what seem the eternal barriers of both. It is
loyalty to great ends, even though forced to combine the small and
opposing motives of selfish men to accomplish them; it is the

442 LOWELL

anchored cling to solid principles of duty and action, which knows
how to swing with the tide, but is never carried away by it, — that
we demand in public men, and not obstinacy in prejudice, same-
ness of policy, or a conscientious persistency in what is impracticable.
For the impracticable, however theoretically enticing, is always
politically unwise, sound statesmanship being the application of
that prudence to the public business which is the safest guide in
that of private men.

No doubt slavery was the most delicate and embarrassing ques-
tion with which Mr. Lincoln was called on to deal, and it was one
which no man in his position, whatever his opinions, could evade;
for, though he might withstand the clamor of partisans, he must
sooner or later yield to the persistent importunacy of circumstances,
which thrust the problem upon him at every turn and in every shape.

It has been brought against us as an accusation abroad and repeated
here by people who measure their country rather by what is thought
of it than by what it is, that our war has not been distinctly and
avowedly for the extinction of slavery, but a war rather for the
preservation of our national power and greatness, in which the
emancipation of the negro has been forced upon us by circumstances
and accepted as a necessity. We are very far from denying this;
nay, we admit that it is so far true that we were slow to renounce
our constitutional obligations even toward those who had absolved
us by their own act from the letter of our duty. We are speaking
of the government which, legally installed for the whole country,
was bound, so long as it was possible, not to overstep the limits of
orderly prescription, and could not, without abnegating its own very
nature, take the lead in making rebellion an excuse for revolution.
There were, no doubt, many ardent and sincere persons who seemed
to think this as simple a thing to do as to lead off a Virginia reel.
They forgot what should be forgotten least of all in a system like
ours, that the administration for the time being represents not only
the majority which elects it, but the minority as well, — a minority
in this case powerful, and so little ready for emancipation that it
was opposed even to war. Mr. Lincoln had not been chosen as
general agent of an antislavery society, but President of the United
States, to perform certain functions exactly defined by law. What-

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 443

ever were his wishes, it was no less duty than poHcy to mark out for
himself a line of action that would not further distract the country,
by raising before their time questions which plainly would soon
enough compel attention, and for which every day was making the
answer more easy.

Meanwhile he must solve the riddle of this new Sphinx, or be
devoured. Though Mr. Lincoln's policy in this critical affair has
not been such as to satisfy those who demand an heroic treatment
for even the most trifling occasion, and who will not cut their coat
according to their cloth, unless they can borrow the scissors of
Atropos, it has been at least not unworthy of the long-headed king
of Ithaca. Mr. Lincoln had the choice of Bassanio offered him.
Which of the three caskets held the prize that was to redeem the
fortunes of the country.'' There was the golden one whose showy
speciousness might have tempted a vain man; the silver of compro-
mise, which might have decided the choice of a merely acute one; and
the leaden, — dull and homely looking, as prudence always is, — yet
with something about it sure to attract the eye of practical wisdom.
Mr. Lincoln dallied with his decision perhaps longer than seemed
needful to those on whom its awful responsibility was not to rest,
but when he made it, it was worthy of his cautious but sure-footed
understanding. The moral of the Sphinx-riddle, and it is a deep
one, lies in the childish simplicity of the solution. Those who fail
in guessing it, fail because they are over-ingenious, and cast about
for an answer that shall suit their own notion of the gravity of the
occasion and of their own dignity, rather than the occasion itself.

In a matter which must be finally settled by public opinion, and in
regard to which the ferment of prejudice and passion on both sides
has not yet subsided to that equilibrium of compromise from which
alone a sound public opinion can result, it is proper enough for
the private citizen to press his own convictions with all possible
force of argument and persuasion; but the popular magistrate,
whose judgment must become action, and whose action involves the
whole country, is bound to wait till the sentiment of the people is
so far advanced toward his own point of view, that what he does
shall find support in it, instead of merely confusing it with new
elements of division. It was not unnatural that men earnestly

444 LOWELL

devoted to the saving of their country, and profoundly convinced
that slavery was its only real enemy, should demand a decided policy
round which all patriots might rally, — and this might have been
the wisest course for an absolute ruler. But in the then unsettled
state of the public mind, with a large party decrying even resistance
to the slaveholder's rebellion as not only unwise, but even unlawful;
with a majority, perhaps, even of the would-be loyal so long accus-
tomed to regard the Constitution as a deed of gift conveying to
the South their own judgment as to policy and instinct as to right,
that they were in doubt at first whether their loyalty were due to
the country or to slavery; and with a respectable body of honest
and influential men who still believed in the possibility of con-
ciliation, — Mr. Lincoln judged wisely, that, in laying down a policy
in deference to one party, he should be giving to the other the very
fulcrum for which their disloyalty had been waiting.

It behooved a clear-headed man in his position not to yield so
far to an honest indignation against the brokers of treason in the
North as to lose sight of the materials for misleading which were
their stock in trade, and to forget that it is not the falsehood of
sophistry which is to be feared, but the grain of truth mingled with
it to make it specious, — that it is not the knavery of the leaders so
much as the honesty of the followers they may seduce, that gives
them power for evil. It was especially his duty to do nothing which
might help the people to forget the true cause of the war in fruitless
disputes about its inevitable consequences.

The doctrine of state rights can be so handled by an adroit
demagogue as easily to confound the distinction between liberty
and lawlessness in the minds of ignorant persons, accustomed always
to be influenced by the sound of certain words, rather than to reflect
upon the principles which give them meaning. For, though Seces-
sion involves the manifest absurdity of denying to a State the right of
making war against any foreign power while permitting it against
the United States; though it supposes a compact of mutual con-
cessions and guaranties among States without any arbiter in case of
dissension; though it contradicts common-sense in assuming that
the men who framed our government did not know what they
meant when they substituted Union for Confederation; though it

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 445

falsifies history, which shows that the main opposition to the adop-
tion of the Constitution was based on the argument that it did not
allow that independence in the several States which alone would
justify them in seceding; — yet, as slavery was universally admitted
to be a reserved right, an inference could be drawn from any direct
attack upon it (though only in self-defence) to a natural right of
resistance, logical enough to satisfy minds untrained to detect fal-
lacy, as the majority of men always are, and now too much disturbed
by the disorder of the times to consider that the order of events had
any legitimate bearing on the argument. Though Mr. Lincoln was
too sagacious to give the Northern allies of the Rebels the occasion
they desired and even strove to provoke, yet from the beginning of
the war the most persistent efforts have been made to confuse the
public mind as to its origin and motives, and to drag the people of
the loyal States down from the national position they had instinc-
tively taken to the old level of party squabbles and antipathies. The
wholly unprovoked rebellion of an oligarchy proclaiming negro
slavery the corner-stone of free institutions, and in the first flush of
over-hasty confidence venturing to parade the logical sequence of
their leading dogma, "that slavery is right in principle, and has
nothing to do with difference of complexion," has been represented
as a legitimate and gallant attempt to maintain the true principles
of democracy. The rightful endeavor of an established government,
the least onerous that ever existed, to defend itself against a treacher-
ous attack on its very existence, has been cunningly made to seem
the wicked effort of a fanatical clique to force its doctrines on an
oppressed population.

Even so long ago as when Mr. Lincoln, not yet convinced of the
danger and magnitude of the crisis, was endeavoring to persuade
himself of Union majorities at the South, and to carry on a war
that was half peace in the hope of a peace that would have been all
war, — while he was still enforcing the Fugitive Slave Law, under
some theory that Secession, however it might absolve States from
their obligations, could not escheat them of their claims under the
Constitution, and that slaveholders in rebellion had alone among
mortals the privilege of having their cake and eating it at the same
time, — the enemies of free government were striving to persuade

446 LOWELL

the people that the war was an Abolition crusade. To rebel without
reason was proclaimed as one o£ the rights of man, while it was
carefully kept out of sight that to suppress rebellion is the first duty
of government. All the evils that have come upon the country have
been attributed to the Abolitionists, though it is hard to see how
any party can become permanently powerful except in one of two
ways, — either by the greater truth of its principles, or the extrava-
gance of the party opposed to it. To fancy the ship of state, riding
safe at her constitutional moorings, suddenly engulfed by a huge
kraken of Abolitionism, rising from unknown depths and grasping
it with slimy tentacles, is to look at the natural history of the matter
with the eyes of Pontoppidan. To believe that the leaders in the
Southern treason feared any danger from Abolitionism would be
to deny them ordinary intelligence, though there can be little doubt
that they made use of it to stir the passions and excite the fears of
their deluded accomplices. They rebelled, not because they thought
slavery weak, but because they believed it strong enough, not to
overthrow the government, but to get possession of it; for it be-
comes daily clearer that they used rebellion only as a means of
revolution, and if they got revolution, though not in the shape they
looked for, is the American people to save them from its conse-
quences at the cost of its own existence? The election of Mr.
Lincoln, which it was clearly in their power to prevent had they
wished, was the occasion merely, and not the cause, of their revolt.
Abolitionism, till within a year or two, was the despised heresy of a
few earnest persons, without political weight enough to carry the
election of a parish constable; and their cardinal principle was dis-
union, because they were convinced that within the Union the
position of slavery was impregnable. In spite of the proverb, great
effects do not follow from small causes, — that is, disproportionately
small, — but from adequate causes acting under certain required
conditions. To contrast the size of the oak with that of the parent
acorn, as if the poor seed had paid all costs from its slender strong-
box, may serve for a child's wonder; but the real miracle lies in
that divine league which bound all the forces of nature to the
service of the tiny germ in fulfilling its destiny. Everything has
been at work for the past ten years in the cause of anti-slavery, but

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 447

Garrison and Phillips have been far less successful propagandists
than the slaveholders themselves, with the constantly growing arro-
gance of their pretensions and encroachments. They have forced
the question upon the attention of every voter in the Free States,
by defiantly putting freedom and democracy on the defensive. But,
even after the Kansas outrages, there was no wide-spread desire
on the part of the North to commit aggressions, though there was
a growing determination to resist them. The popular unanimity in
favor of the war three years ago was but in small measure the
result of anti-slavery sentiment, far less of any zeal for abolition.
But every month of the war, every movement of the allies of slavery
in the Free States, has been making Abolitionists by the thousand.
The masses of any people, however intelligent, are very little moved
by abstract principles of humanity and justice, until those principles
are interpreted for them by the stinging commentary of some in-
fringement upon their own rights, and then their instincts and
passions, once aroused, do indeed derive an incalculable reinforce-
ment of impulse and intensity from those higher ideas, those sublime
traditions, which have no motive political force till they are allied
with a sense of immediate personal wrong or imminent peril. Then
at last the stars in their courses begin to fight against Sisera. Had
any one doubted before that the rights of human nature are unitary,
that oppression is of one hue the world over, no matter what the
color of the oppressed, — had any one failed to see what the real
essence of the contest was, — the efforts of the advocates of slavery
among ourselves to throw discredit upon the fundamental axioms
of the Declaration of Independence and the radical doctrines of
Christianity could not fail to sharpen his eyes.

While every day was bringing the people nearer to the conclusion
which all thinking men saw to be inevitable from the beginning,
it was wise in Mr. Lincoln to leave the shaping of his policy to
events. In this country, where the rough and ready understanding
of the people is sure at last to be the controlling power, a profound
common-sense is the best genius for statesmanship. Hitherto, the
wisdom of the President's measures has been justified by the fact
that they have always resulted in more firmly uniting public opinion.
One of the things particularly admirable in the public utterances

448 LOWELL

of President Lincoln is a certain tone of familiar dignity, which,
while it is perhaps the most difficult attainment of mere style, is
also no doubtful indication of personal character. There must be
something essentially noble in an elective ruler who can descend
to the level of confidential ease without forfeiting respect, some-
thing very manly in one who can break through the etiquette of
his conventional rank and trust himself to the reason and intelli-
gence of those who have elected him. No higher compliment was
ever paid to a nation than the simple confidence, the fireside plain-
ness, with which Mr. Lincoln always addresses himself to the reason
of the American people. This was, indeed, a true democrat, who
grounded himself on the assumption that a democracy can think.
"Come, let us reason together about this matter," has been the tone
of all his addresses to the people; and accordingly we have never
had a chief magistrate who so won to himself the love and at the
same time the judgment of his countrymen. To us, that simple
confidence of his in the right-mindedness of his fellow-men is very
touching, and its success is as strong an argument as we have ever
seen in favor of the theory that men can govern themselves. He
never appeals to any vulgar sentiment, he never alludes to the
humbleness of his origin; it probably never occurred to him, indeed,
that there was anything higher to start from than manhood; and
he put himself on a level with those he addressed, not by going down
to them, but only by taking it for granted that they had brains and
would come up to a common ground of reason. In an article lately
printed in "The Nation," Mr. Bayard Taylor mentions the striking
fact, that in the foulest dens of the Five Points he found the por-
trait of Lincoln. The wretched population that makes its hive there
threw all its votes and more against him, and yet paid this instinctive
tribute to the sweet humanity of his nature. Their ignorance sold
its vote and took its money, but all that was left of manhood in them
recognized its saint and martyr.

Mr. Lincoln is not in the habit of saying, "This is my opinion,
or my theory," but, "This is the conclusion to which, in my judg-
ment, the time has come, and to which, accordingly, the sooner we
come the better for us." His policy has been the policy of public
opinion based on adequate discussion and on a timely recognition

ABRAHAM LINCOLN 449

o£ the influence of passing events in shaping the features of events
to come.

One secret of Mr. Lincoln's remarkable success in captivating the
popular mind is undoubtedly an unconsciousness of self which
enables him, though under the necessity of constantly using the
capital /, to do it without any suggestion of egotism. There is no
single vowel which men's mouths can pronounce with such differ-
ence of effect. That which one shall hide away, as it were, behind
the substance of his discourse, or, if he bring it to the front, shall
use merely to give an agreeable accent of individuality to what he
says, another shall make an offensive challenge to the self-satisfaction
of all his hearers, and an unwarranted intrusion upon each man's
sense of personal importance, irritating every pore of his vanity, like
a dry northeast wind, to a goose-flesh of opposition and hostility.
Mr. Lincoln has never studied Quinctilian; but he has, in the
earnest simplicity and unaffected Americanism of his own charac-
ter, one art of oratory worth all the rest. He forgets himself so
entirely in his object as to give his / the sympathetic and persuasive
effect of We with the great body of his countrymen. Homely,
dispassionate, showing all the rough-edged process of his thought
as it goes along, yet arriving at his conclusions with an honest kind
of every-day logic, he is so eminently our representative man, that,
when he speaks, it seems as if the people were listening to their
own thinking aloud. The dignity of his thought owes nothing to
any ceremonial garb of words, but to the manly movement that
comes of settled purpose and an energy of reason that knows not
what rhetoric means. There has been nothing of Cleon, still less
of Strepsiades striving to underbid him in demagogism, to be found
in the public utterances of Mr. Lincoln. He has always addressed
the intelligence of men, never their prejudice, their passion, or their
ignorance.

On the day of his death, this simple Western attorney, who
according to one party was a vulgar joker, and whom the doc-
trinaires among his own supporters accused of wanting every ele-
ment of statesmanship, was the most absolute ruler in Christendom,
and this solely by the hold his good-humored sagacity had laid
on the hearts and understandings of his countrymen. Nor was

450 LOWELL

this all, for it appeared that he had drawn the great majority, not
only of his fellow-citizens, but of mankind also, to his side. So
strong and so persuasive is honest manliness without a single quality
of romance or unreal sentiment to help it! A civilian during times
of the most captivating military achievement, awkward, wdth no
skill in the lower technicalities of manners, he left behind him a
fame beyond that of any conqueror, the memory of a grace higher
than that of outward person, and of a gentlemanliness deeper than
mere breeding. Never before that startled April morning did such
multitudes of men shed tears for the death of one they had never
seen, as if with him a friendly presence had been taken away from
their lives, leaving them colder and darker. Never was funeral
panegyric so eloquent as the silent look of sympathy which strangers
exchanged when they met on that day. Their common manhood
had lost a kinsman.

DEMOCRACY

Inaugural Address on Assuming the Presidency of the
Birmingham and Midland Institute, Birming-
ham, England, 6 October, 1884

HE must be a born leader or misleader of men, or must have
been sent into the world unfurnished with that modulating
and restraining balance-wheel which we call a sense of
humor, who, in old age, has as strong a confidence in his opinions
and in the necessity of bringing the universe into conformity with
them as he had in youth. In a world the very condition of whose
being is that it should be in perpetual flux, where all seems mirage,
and the one abiding thing is the effort to distinguish realities from
appearances, the elderly man must be indeed of a singularly tough
and valid fibre who is certain that he has any clarified residuum of
experience, any assured verdict of reflection, that deserves to be
called an opinion, or who, even if he had, feels that he is justified
in holding mankind by the button while he is expounding it. And
in a world of daily — nay, almost hourly — journalism, where every
clever man, every man who thinks himself clever, or whom any-
body else thinks clever, is called upon to deliver his judgment point-
blank and at the word of command on every conceivable subject
of human thought, or on what sometimes seems to him very much
the same thing, on every inconceivable display of human want of
thought, there is such a spendthrift waste of all those commonplaces
which furnish the permitted staple of public discourse that there is
little chance of beguiling a new tune out of the one-stringed instru-
ment on which we have been thrumming so long. In this des-
perate necessity one is often tempted to think that, if all the words
of the dictionary were tumbled down in a heap and then all those

Copyright, 1886, by James Russell Lowell.
Published by arrangement with Houghton MifBin Company.

451

452 LOWELL

fortuitous juxtapositions and combinations that made tolerable sense
were picked out and pieced together, we might find among them
some poignant suggestions towards novelty of thought or expres-
sion. But, alas! it is only the great poets who seem to have this
unsolicited profusion of unexpected and incalculable phrase, this
infinite variety of topic. For everybody else everything has been said
before, and said over again after. He who has read his Aristotle
will be apt to think that observation has on most points of general
applicability said its last word, and he who has mounted the tower
of Plato to look abroad from it will never hope to climb another
with so lofty a vantage of speculation. Where it is so simple if
not so easy a thing to hold one's peace, why add to the general
confusion of tongues? There is something disheartening, too, in
being expected to fill up not less than a certain measure of time, as
if the mind were an hour-glass, that need only be shaken and set
on one end or the other, as the case may be, to run its allotted sixty
minutes with decorous exactitude. I recollect being once told by
the late eminent naturalist, Agassiz, that when he was to deliver his
first lecture as professor (at Zurich, I believe) he had grave doubts
of his ability to occupy the prescribed three quarters of an hour. He
was speaking without notes, and glancing anxiously from time to
time at the watch that lay before him on the desk. "When I had
spoken a half hour," he said, "I had told them everything I knew in
the world, everything! Then I began to repeat myself," he added,
roguishly, "and I have done nothing else ever since." Beneath the
humorous exaggeration of the story I seemed to see the face of a
very serious and improving moral. And yet if one were to say only
what he had to say and then stopped, his audience would feel
defrauded of their honest measure. Let us take courage by the
example of the French, whose exportation of Bordeaux wines
increases as the area of their land in vineyards is diminished.

To me, somewhat hopelessly revolving these things, the undelay-
able year has rolled round, and I find myself called upon to say
something in this place, where so many wiser men have spoken
before me. Precluded, in my quality of national guest, by motives
of taste and discretion, from dealing with any question of imme-
diate and domestic concern, it seemed to me wisest, or at any rate

DEMOCRACY 453

most prudent, to choose a topic of comparatively abstract interest,
and to ask your indulgence for a few somewhat generalized re-
marks on a matter concerning which I had some experimental
knowledge, derived from the use of such eyes and ears as Nature
had been pleased to endow me withal, and such report as I had
been able to win from them. The subject which most readily
suggested itself was the spirit and the working of those conceptions
of life and polity which are lumped together, whether for reproach
or commendation, under the name of Democracy. By temperament
and education of a conservative turn, I saw the last years of that
quaint Arcadia which French travellers saw with delighted amaze-
ment a century ago, and have watched the change (to me a sad
one) from an agricultural to a proletary population. The testimony
of Balaam should carry some conviction. I have grown to manhood
and am now growing old with the growth of this system of govern-
ment in my native land, have watched its advances, or what some
would call its encroachments, gradual and irresistible as those of a
glacier, have been an ear-witness to the forebodings of wise and
good and timid men, and have lived to see those forebodings belied
by the course of events, which is apt to show itself humorously
careless of the reputation of prophets. I recollect hearing a sagacious
old gentleman say in 1840 that the doing away with the property
qualification for suffrage twenty years before had been the ruin of
the State of Massachusetts; that it had put public credit and private
estate alike at the mercy of demagogues. I lived to see that Com-
monwealth twenty odd years later paying the interest on her bonds
in gold, though it cost her sometimes nearly three for one to keep
her faith, and that while suffering an unparalleled drain of men
and treasure in helping to sustain the unity and self-respect of the
nation.

If universal suffrage has worked ill in our larger cities, as it
certainly has, this has been mainly because the hands that wielded
it were untrained to its use. There the election of a majority of
the trustees of the public money is controlled by the most ignorant
and vicious of a population which has come to us from abroad,
wholly unpractised in self-government and incapable of assimilation
by American habits and methods. But the finances of our towns,

454 LOWELL

where the native tradition is still dominant and whose affairs are
discussed and settled in a public assembly o£ the people, have been
in general honestly and prudently administered. Even in manu-
facturing towns, where a majority of the voters live by their daily
wages, it is not so often the recklessness as the moderation of public
expenditure that surprises an old-fashioned observer. "The beggar
is in the saddle at last," cries Proverbial Wisdom. "Why, in the
name of all former experience, doesn't he ride to the Devil?" Be-
cause in the very act of mounting he ceased to be a beggar and
became part owner of the piece of property he bestrides. The last
thing we need be anxious about is property. It always has friends
or the means of making them. If riches have wings to fly away
from their owner, they have wings also to escape danger.

I hear America sometimes playfully accused of sending you all
your storms, and am in the habit of parrying the charge by alleging
that we are enabled to do this because, in virtue of our protective
system, we can afford to make better bad weather than anybody
else. And what wiser use could we make of it than to export it in
return for the paupers which some European countries are good
enough to send over to us who have not attained to the same skill
in the manufacture of them? But bad weather is not the worst
thing that is laid at our door. A French gentleman, not long ago,
forgetting Burke's monition of how unwise it is to draw an indict-
ment against a whole people, has charged us with the responsibility
of whatever he finds disagreeable in the morals or manners of his
countrymen. If M. Zola or some other competent witness would
only go into the box and tell us what those morals and manners
were before our example corrupted them! But I confess that I find
little to interest and less to edify me in these international bandyings
of "You're another."

I shall address myself to a single point only in the long list of
offences of which we are more or less gravely accused, because that
really includes all the rest. It is that we are infecting the Old World
with what seems to be thought the entirely new disease of Democ-
racy. It is generally people who are in what are called easy circum-
stances who can afford the leisure to treat themselves to a handsome
complaint, and these experience an immediate alleviation when once

DEMOCRACY 455

they have found a sonorous Greek name to abuse it by. There is
something consolatory also, something flattering to their sense of
personal dignity, and to that conceit of singularity which is the
natural recoil from our uneasy consciousness of being common-
place, in thinking ourselves victims of a malady by which no one
had ever suffered before. Accordingly they find it simpler to class
under one comprehensive heading whatever they find offensive to
their nerves, their taste, their interests, or what they suppose to be
their opinions, and christen it Democracy, much as physicians label
every obscure disease gout, or as cross-grained fellows lay their ill-
temper to the weather. But is it really a new ailment, and, if it be, is
America answerable for it? Even if she were, would it account
for the phylloxera, and hoof-and-mouth disease, and bad harvests,
and bad English, and the German bands, and the Boers, and all
the other discomforts with which these later days have vexed the
souls of them that go in chariots ? Yet I have seen the evil example
of Democracy in America cited as the source and origin of things
quite as heterogeneous and quite as little connected with it by any
sequence of cause and effect. Surely this ferment is nothing new.
It has been at work for centuries, and we are more conscious of it
only because in this age of publicity, where the newspapers offer
a rostrum to whoever has a grievance, or fancies that he has, the
bubbles and scum thrown up by it are more noticeable on the
surface than in those dumb ages when there was a cover of silence
and suppression on the cauldron. Bernardo Navagero, speaking of
the Provinces of Lower Austria in 1546, tells us that "in them there
are five sorts of persons. Clergy, Barons, Nobles, Burghers, and
Peasants. Of these last no account is made, because they have no
voice in the Diet." '

Nor was it among the people that subversive or mistaken doc-
trines had their rise. A Father of the Church said that property
was theft many centuries before Proudhon was born. Bourdaloue

' Below the Peasants, it should be remembered, was still another even more helpless
class, the servile farm-laborers. The same witness informs us that of the extraordinary
imposts the Peasants paid nearly twice as much in proportion to their estimated
property as the Barons, Nobles, and Burghers together. Moreover, the upper classes
were assessed at their own valuation, while they arbitrarily fixed that of the Peasants,
who had no voice, ("Relazioni degli Arabasciatori Veneti," Serie I., tomo i., pp. 378,
379. 389-)

456 LOWELL

reaffirmed it. Montesquieu was the inventor of national workshops,
and of the theory that the State owed every man a living. Nay,
was not the Church herself the first organized Democracy? A few
centuries ago the chief end of man was to keep his soul alive, and
then the little kernel of leaven that sets the gases at work was
religious, and produced the Reformation. Even in that, far-sighted
persons like the Emperor Charles V. saw the germ of political and
social revolution. Now that the chief end of man seems to have be-
come the keeping of the body alive, and as comfortably alive as
possible, the leaven also has become wholly political and social.
But there had also been social upheavals before the Reformation
and contemporaneously with it, especially among men of Teutonic
race. The Reformation gave outlet and direction to an unrest already
existing. Formerly the immense majority of men — our brothers —
knew only their sufferings, their wants, and their desires. They are
beginning now to know their opportunity and their power. All per-
sons who see deeper than their plates are rather inclined to thank
God for it than to bewail it, for the sores of Lazarus have a poison
in them against which Dives has no antidote.

There can be no doubt that the spectacle of a great and pros-
perous Democracy on the other side of the Atlantic must react
powerfully on the aspirations and political theories of men in the
Old World who do not find things to their mind; but, whether for
good or evil, it should not be overlooked that the acorn from which
it sprang was ripened on the British oak. Every successive swarm
that has gone out from this officina gentium has, when left to its
own instincts — may I not call them hereditary instincts? — assumed
a more or less thoroughly democratic form. This would seem to
show, what I believe to be the fact, that the British Constitution,
under whatever disguises of prudence or decorum, is essentially
democratic. England, indeed, may be called a monarchy with demo-
cratic tendencies, the United States a democracy with conservative
instincts. People are continually saying that America is in the air,
and I am glad to think it is, since this means only that a clearer
conception of human claims and human duties is beginning to
be prevalent. The discontent with the existing order of things,
however, pervaded the atmosphere wherever the conditions were

DEMOCRACY 457

favorable, long before Columbus, seeking the back door of Asia,
found himself knocking at the front door of America. I say wher-
ever the conditions were favorable, for it is certain that the germs
of disease do not stick or find a prosperous field for their develop-
ment and noxious activity unless where the simplest sanitary pre-
cautions have been neglected. "For this effect defective comes by
cause," as Polonius said long ago. It is only by instigation of the
wrongs of men that what are called the Rights of Man become
turbulent and dangerous. It is then only that they syllogize unwel-
come truths. It is not the insurrections of ignorance that are danger-
ous, but the revolts of intelligence: —

"The wicked and the weak rebel in vain.
Slaves by their own compulsion."

Had the governing classes in France during the last century paid
as much heed to their proper business as to their pleasures or
manners, the guillotine need never have severed that spinal marrow
of orderly and secular tradition through which in a normally con-
stituted state the brain sympathizes with the extremities and sends
will and impulsion thither. It is only when the reasonable and
practicable are denied that men demand the unreasonable and im-
practicable; only when the possible is made difficult that they fancy
the impossible to be easy. Fairy tales are made out of the dreams
of the poor. No; the sentiment which lies at the root of democracy
is nothing new. I am speaking always of a sentiment, a spirit, and
not of a form of government; for this was but the outgrovrth of
the other and not its cause. This sentiment is merely an expression
of the natural wish of people to have a hand, if need be a controlling
hand, in the management of their own affairs. What is new is that
they are more and more gaining that control, and learning more
and more how to be worthy of it. What we used to call the tendency
or drift — what we are being taught to call more wisely the evolution
of things — has for some time been setting steadily in this direction.
There is no good in arguing with the inevitable. The only argument
available with an east wind is to put on your overcoat. And in this
case, also, the prudent will prepare themselves to encounter what
they cannot prevent. Some people advise us to put on the brakes.

458 LOWELL

as if the movement of which we are conscious were that of a rail-
way train running down an incline. But a metaphor is no argu-
ment, though it be sometimes the gunpowder to drive one home
and imbed it in the memory. Our disquiet comes of what nurses
and other experienced persons call growing-pains, and need not
seriously alarm us. They are what every generation before us —
certainly every generation since the invention of printing — has gone
through with more or less good fortune. To the door of every
generation there comes a knocking, and unless the household, like
the Thane of Cawdor and his wife, have been doing some deed
without a name, they need not shudder. It turns out at worst to be
a poor relation who wishes to come in out of the cold. The porter
always grumbles and is slow to open. "Who's there, in the name
of Beelzebub?" he mutters. Not a change for the better in our
human housekeeping has ever taken place that wise and good men
have not opposed it, — have not prophesied with the alderman that
the world would wake up to find its throat cut in consequence of
it. The world, on the contrary, wakes up, rubs its eyes, yawns,
stretches itself, and goes about its business as if nothing had hap-
pened. Suppression of the slave trade, abolition of slavery, trade
unions, — at all of these excellent people shook their heads despond-
ingly, and murmured "Ichabod." But the trade unions are now
debating instead of conspiring, and we all read their discussions
with comfort and hope, sure that they are learning the business of
citizenship and the difficulties of practical legislation.

One of the most curious of these frenzies of exclusion was that
against the emancipation of the Jews. All share in the government
of the world was denied for centuries to perhaps the ablest, cer-
tainly the most tenacious, race that had ever lived in it — the race
to whom we owed our religion and the purest spiritual stimulus
and consolation to be found in all literature — a race in which ability
seems as natural and hereditary as the curve of their noses, and
whose blood, furtively mingling with the bluest bloods in Europe,
has quickened them with its own indomitable impulsion. We drove
them into a corner, but they had their revenge, as the wronged are
always sure to have it sooner or later. They made their corner the
counter and banking-house of the world, and thence they rule it

DEMOCRACY 459

and us with the ignobler sceptre of finance. Your grandfathers
mobbed Priestley only that you might set up his statue and make
Birmingham the headquarters of English Unitarianism. We hear
it said sometimes that this is an age of transition, as if that made
matters clearer; but can any one point us to an age that was not?
If he could, he would show us an age of stagnation. The question
for us, as it has been for all before us, is to make the transition
gradual and easy, to see that our points are right so that the train
may not come to grief. For we should remember that nothing is
more natural for people whose education has been neglected than to
spell evolution with an initial "r." A great man struggling with
the storms of fate has been called a sublime spectacle; but surely a
great man wrestling with these new forces that have come into the
world, mastering them and controlling them to beneficent ends,
would be a yet sublimer. Here is not a danger, and if there were it
would be only a better school of manhood, a nobler scope for ambi-
tion. I have hinted that what people are afraid of in democracy is
less the thing itself than what they conceive to be its necessary
adjuncts and consequences. It is supposed to reduce all mankind
to a dead level of mediocrity in character and culture, to vulgarize
men's conceptions of life, and therefore their code of morals, man-
ners, and conduct — to endanger the rights of property and posses-
sion. But I believe that the real gravamen of the charges lies in
the habit it has of making itself generally disagreeable by asking
the Powers that Be at the most inconvenient moment whether they
are the powers that ought to be. If the powers that be are in a condi-
tion to give a satisfactory answer to this inevitable question, they
need feel in no way discomfited by it.

Few people take the trouble of trying to find out what democ-
racy really is. Yet this would be a great help, for it is our lawless
and uncertain thoughts, it is the indefiniteness of our impressions,
that fill darkness, whether mental or physical, with spectres and
hobgoblins. Democracy is nothing more than an experiment in
government, more likely to succeed in a new soil, but likely to be
tried in all soils, which must stand or fall on its own merits as
others have done before it. For there is no trick of perpetual motion
in politics any more than in mechanics. President Lincoln defined

460 LOWELL

democracy to be "the government of the people by the people for
the people." This is a sufficiently compact statement of it as a
political arrangement. Theodore Parker said that "Democracy
meant not 'I'm as good as you are,' but 'You're as good as I am.' "
And this is the ethical conception of it, necessary as a complement of
the other; a conception which, could it be made actual and practical,
would easily solve all the riddles that the old sphinx of political and
social economy who sits by the roadside has been proposing to
mankind from the beginning, and which mankind have shown such
a singular talent for answering wrongly. In this sense Christ was
the first true democrat that ever breathed, as the old dramatist
Dekker said he was the first true gentleman. The characters may
be easily doubled, so strong is the likeness between them. A beautiful
and profound parable of the Persian poet Jellaladeen tells us that
"One knocked at the Beloved's door, and a voice asked from within
'Who is there?' and he answered 'It is I.' Then the voice said, 'This
house will not hold me and thee'; and the door was not opened.
Then went the lover into the desert and fasted and prayed in soli-
tude, and after a year he returned and knocked again at the door;
and again the voice asked 'Who is there?' and he said 'It is thy-
self;' and the door was opened to him." But that is idealism, you
will say, and this is an only too practical world. I grant it; but I
am one of those who believe that the real will never find an irre-
movable basis till it rests on the ideal. It used to be thought that
a democracy was possible only in a small territory, and this is doubt-
less true of a democracy strictly defined, for in such all the citizens
decide directly upon every question of public concern in a general
assembly. An example still survives in the tiny Swiss canton of
Appenzell. But this immediate intervention of the people in their
own affairs is not of the essence of democracy; it is not necessary,
nor indeed, in most cases, practicable. Democracies to which Mr.
Lincoln's definition would fairly enough apply have existed, and
now exist, in which, though the supreme authority reside in the
people, yet they can act only indirectly on the national policy. This
generation has seen a democracy with an imperial figurehead, and
in all that have ever existed the body politic has never embraced all

DEMOCRACY 46 1

the inhabitants included within its territory, the right to share in
the direction of affairs has been confined to citizens, and citizenship
has been further restricted by various limitations, sometimes of
property, sometimes of nativity, and always of age and sex.

The framers of the American Constitution were far from wishing
or intending to found a democracy in the strict sense of the word,
though, as was inevitable, every expansion of the scheme of gov-
ernment they elaborated has been in a democratical direction. But
this has been generally the slow result of growth,and not the sudden
innovation of theory; in fact, they had a profound disbelief in theory,
and knew better than to commit the folly of breaking with the past.
They were not seduced by the French fallacy that a new system of
government could be ordered like a new suit of clothes. They would
as soon have thought of ordering a new suit of flesh and skin. It is
only on the roaring loom of time that the stuff is woven for such a
vesture of their thought and experience as they were meditating.
They recognized fully the value of tradition and habit as the great
allies of permanence and stability. They all had that distaste for
innovation which belonged to their race, and many of them a dis-
trust of human nature derived from their creed. The day of senti-
ment was over, and no dithyrambic affirmations or fine-drawn analy-
ses of the Rights of Man would serve their present turn. This was
a practical question, and they addressed themselves to it as men of
knowledge and judgment should. Their problem was how to adapt
English principles and precedents to the new conditions of American
life, and they solved it with singular discretion. They put as many
obstacles as they could contrive, not in the way of the people's will,
but of their whim. With few exceptions they probably admitted the
logic of the then accepted syllogism, — democracy, anarchy, despotism.
But this formula was framed upon the experience of small cities
shut up to stew w^ithin their narrow walls, where the number of
citizens made but an inconsiderable fraction of the inhabitants,
where every passion was reverberated from house to house and
from man to man with gathering rumor till every impulse became
gregarious and therefore inconsiderate, and every popular assembly
needed but an infusion of eloquent sophistry to turn it into a mob.

462 LOWELL

all the more dangerous because sanctified with the formality of law.'
Fortunately their case was wholly different. They were to legis-
late for a widely scattered population and for States already practised
in the discipline of a partial independence. They had an unequalled
opportunity and enormous advantages. The material they had to
work upon was already democratical by instinct and habitude. It
was tempered to their hands by more than a century's schooling
in self-government. They had but to give permanent and conserva-
tive form to a ductile mass. In giving impulse and direction to
their new institutions, especially in supplying them with checks
and balances, they had a great help and safeguard in their federal
organization. The different, sometimes conflicting, interests and
social systems of the several States made existence as a Union and
coalescence into a nation conditional on a constant practice of
moderation and compromise. The very elements of disintegration
were the best guides in political training. Their children learned
the lesson of compromise only too well, and it was the application
of it to a question of fundamental morals that cost us our civil war.
We learned once for all that compromise makes a good umbrella
but a poor roof; that it is a temporary expedient, often wise in party
politics, almost sure to be unwise in statesmanship.

Has not the trial of democracy in America proved, on the whole,
successful? If it had not, would the Old World be vexed with any
fears of its proving contagious? This trial would have been less
severe could it have been made with a people homogeneous in race,
language, and traditions, whereas the United States have been called
on to absorb and assimilate enormous masses of foreign popula-
tion, heterogeneous in all these respects, and drawn mainly from
that class which might fairly say that the world was not their friend,
nor the world's law. The previous condition too often justified the
traditional Irishman, who, landing in New York and asked what
his politics were, inquired if there was a Government there, and on
being told that there was, retorted, "Thin I'm agin it!" We have taken
from Europe the poorest, the most ignorant, the most turbulent of
her people, and have made them over into good citizens, who have

^ The effect of the electric telegraph in reproducing this trooping of emotion and
perhaps of opinion is yet to be measured. The effect of Darwinism as a disintegrator
of humanitarianism is also to be reckoned with.

DEMOCRACY 463

added to our wealth, and who are ready to die in defence of a
country and of institutions which they know to be worth dying for.
The exceptions have been (and they are lamentable exceptions)
where these hordes of ignorance and poverty have coagulated in
great cities. But the social system is yet to seek which has not to
look the same terrible wolf in the eyes. On the other hand, at this
very moment Irish peasants are buying up the worn-out farms of
Massachusetts, and making them productive again by the same
virtues of industry and thrift that once made them profitable to the
English ancestors of the men who are deserting them. To have
achieved even these prosaic results (if you choose to call them so),
and that out of materials the most discordant, — I might say the most
recalcitrant, — argues a certain beneficent virtue in the system that
could do it, and is not to be accounted for by mere luck.

Carlyle said scornfully that America meant only roast turkey
every day for everybody. He forgot that States, as Bacon said of
wars, go on their bellies. As for the security of property, it should
be tolerably well secured in a country where every other man hopes
to be rich, even though the only property qualification be the owner-
ship of two hands that add to the general wealth. Is it not the best
security for anything to interest the largest possible number of per-
sons in its preservation and the smallest in its division? In point
of fact, far-seeing men count the increasing power of wealth and its
combinations as one of the chief dangers with which the institutions
of the United States are threatened in the not distant future. The
right of individual property is no doubt the very corner-stone of
civilization as hitherto understood, but I am a little impatient of
being told that property is entitled to exceptional consideration be-
cause it bears all the burdens of the State. It bears those, indeed,
which can most easily be borne, but poverty pays with its person
the chief expenses of war, pestilence, and famine. Wealth should
not forget this, for poverty is beginning to think of it now and then.
Let me not be misunderstood. I see as clearly as any man possibly
can, and rate as highly, the value of wealth, and of hereditary wealth,
as the security of refinement, the feeder of all those arts that ennoble
and beautify life, and as making a country worth living in. Many
an ancestral hall here in England has been a nursery of that culture

464 LOWELL

which has been of example and benefit to all. Old gold has a civ-
ilizing virtue which new gold must grow old to be capable of
secreting.

I should not think of coming before you to defend or to criticise
any form of government. All have their virtues, all their defects,
and all have illustrated one period or another in the history of the
race, with signal services to humanity and culture. There is not
one that could stand a cynical cross-examination by an experienced
criminal lawyer, except that of a perfectly wise and perfectly good
despot, such as the world has never seen, except in that white-haired
king of Browning's who

"Lived long ago
In the morning of the world,
When Earth was nearer Heaven than now."

The English race, if they did not invent government by discussion,
have at least carried it nearest to perfection in practice. It seems a
very safe and reasonable contrivance for occupying the attention of
the country, and is certainly a better way of settling questions than
by push of pike. Yet, if one should ask it why it should not rather
be called government by gabble, it would have to fumble in its
pocket a good while before it found the change for a convincing
reply. As matters stand, too, it is beginning to be doubtful whether
Parliament and Congress sit at Westminster and Washington or
in the editors' rooms of the leading journals, so thoroughly is every-
thing debated before the authorized and responsible debaters get
on their legs. And what shall we say of government by a majority
of voices? To a person who in the last century would have called
himself an Impartial Observer, a numerical preponderance seems,
on the whole, as clumsy a way of arriving at truth as could well be
devised, but experience has apparently shown it to be a convenient
arrangement for determining what may be expedient or advisable or
practicable at any given moment. Truth, after all, wears a different
face to everybody, and it would be too tedious to wait till all were
agreed. She is said to lie at the bottom of a well, for the very reason,
perhaps, that whoever looks down in search of her sees his own
image at the bottom, and is persuaded not only that he has seen the

DEMOCRACY 465

goddess, but that she is far better-looking than he had imagined.
The arguments against universal suffrage are equally unanswer-
able. "What," we exclaim, "shall Tom, Dick, and Harry have as
much weight in the scale as I?" Of course, nothing could be more
absurd. And yet universal suffrage has not been the instrument of
greater unwisdom than contrivances of a more select description.
Assemblies could be mentioned composed entirely of Masters of
Arts and Doctors in Divinity which have sometimes shown traces
of human passion or prejudice in their votes. Have the Serene
Highnesses and Enlightened Classes carried on the business of
Mankind so well, then, that there is no use in trying a less costly
method? The democratic theory is that those Constitutions are
likely to prove steadiest which have the broadest base, that the right
to vote makes a safety-valve of every voter, and that the best way
of teaching a man how to vote is to give him the chance of practice.
For the question is no longer the academic one, "Is it wise to give
every man the ballot?" but rather the practical one, "Is it prudent
to deprive whole classes of it any longer?" It may be conjectured
that it is cheaper in the long run to lift men up than to hold them
down, and that the ballot in their hands is less dangerous to society
than a sense of wrong in their heads. At any rate this is the dilemma
to which the drift of opinion has been for some time sweeping us,
and in politics a dilemma is a more unmanageable thing to hold
by the horns than a wolf by the ears. It is said that the right of
suffrage is not valued when it is indiscriminately bestowed, and
there may be some truth in this, for I have observed that what men
prize most is a privilege, even if it be that of chief mourner at a
funeral. But is there not danger that it will be valued at more than
its worth if denied, and that some illegitimate way will be sought
to make up for the want of it? Men who have a voice in public
affairs are at once affiliated with one or other of the great parties
between which society is divided, merge their individual hopes and
opinions in its safer, because more generalized, hopes and opinions,
are disciplined by its tactics, and acquire, to a certain degree, the
orderly qualities of an army. They no longer belong to a class, but
to a body corporate. Of one thing, at least, we may be certain, that,
under whatever method of helping things to go wrong man's wit

466 LOWELL

can contrive, those who have the divine right to govern will be
found to govern in the end, and that the highest privilege to which
the majority of mankind can aspire is that of being governed by
those wiser than they. Universal suffrage has in the United States
sometimes been made the instrument of inconsiderate changes, under
the notion of reform, and this from a misconception of the true
meaning of popular government. One of these has been the sub-
stitution in many of the States of popular election for official selec-
tion in the choice of judges. The same system applied to military
officers was the source of much evil during our civil war, and, I
believe, had to be abandoned. But it has been also true that on all
great questions of national policy a reserve of prudence and discre-
tion has been brought out at the critical moment to turn the scale
in favor of a wiser decision. An appeal to the reason of the people
has never been known to fail in the long run. It is, perhaps, true
that, by effacing the principle of passive obedience, democracy, ill
understood, has slackened the spring of that ductility to discipline
which is essential to "the unity and married calm of States." But I
feel assured that experience and necessity will cure this evil, as
they have shown their power to cure others. And under what frame
of policy have evils ever been remedied till they became intolerable,
and shook men out of their indolent indifference through their
fears.''

We are told that the inevitable result of democracy is to sap the
foundations of personal independence, to weaken the principle of
authority, to lessen the respect due to eminence, whether in station,
virtue, or genius. If these things were so, society could not hold
together. Perhaps the best forcing-house of robust individuality
would be where public opinion is inclined to be most overbearing, as
he must be of heroic temper who should walk along Piccadilly at
the height of the season in a soft hat. As for authority, it is one
of the symptoms of the time that the religious reverence for it is
declining everywhere, but this is due partly to the fact that state-
craft is no longer looked upon as a mystery, but as a business, and
partly to the decay of superstition, by which I mean the habit of
respecting what we are told to respect rather than what is respect-
able in itself. There is more rough and tumble in the American

DEMOCRACY 467

democracy than is altogether agreeable to people of sensitive nerves
and refined habits, and the people take their political duties lightly
and laughingly, as is, perhaps, neither unnatural nor unbecoming
in a young giant. Democracies can no more jump away from their
own shadows than the rest of us can. They no doubt sometimes
make mistakes and pay honor to men who do not deserve it. But
they do this because they believe them worthy of it, and though it
be true that the idol is the measure of the worshipper, yet the
worship has in it the germ of a nobler religion. But is it democra-
cies alone that fall into these errors.? I, who have seen it proposed
to erect a statue to Hudson, the railway king, and have heard Louis
Napoleon hailed as the saviour of society by men who certainly had
no democratic associations or leanings, am not ready to think so.
But democracies have likewise their finer instincts. I have also
seen the wisest statesman and most pregnant speaker of our genera-
tion, a man of humble birth and ungainly manners, of little culture
beyond what his own genius supplied, become more absolute in
power than any monarch of modern times through the reverence
of his countrymen for his honesty, his wisdom, his sincerity, his
faith in God and man, and the nobly humane simplicity of his
character. And I remember another whom popular respect envel-
oped as with a halo, the least vulgar of men, the most austerely
genial, and the most independent of opinion. Wherever he went
he never met a stranger, but everywhere neighbors and friends
proud of him as their ornament and decoration. Institutions which
could bear and breed such men as Lincoln and Emerson had surely
some energy for good. No, amid all the fruitless turmoil and mis-
carriage of the world, if there be one thing steadfast and of favor-
able omen, one thing to make optimism distrust its own obscure
distrust, it is the rooted instinct in men to admire what is better
and more beautiful than themselves. The touchstone of political
and social institutions is their ability to supply them with worthy
objects of this sentiment, which is the very tap-root of civilization and
progress. There would seem to be no readier way of feeding it with
the elements of growth and vigor than such an organization of
society as will enable men to respect themselves, and so to justify
them in respecting others.

468 LOWELL

Such a result is quite possible under other conditions than those
of an avowedly democratical Constitution. For I take it that the
real essence of democracy was fairly enough defined by the First
Napoleon when he said that the French Revolution meant "la
carriere ouverte aux talents" — a clear pathway for merit of what-
ever kind. I should be inclined to paraphrase this by calling
democracy that form of society, no matter what its political classifica-
tion, in which every man had a chance and knew that he had it.
If a man can climb, and feels himself encouraged to climb, from a
coalpit to the highest position for which he is fitted, he can well
afford to be indifferent what name is given to the government under
which he lives. The Bailli of Mirabeau, uncle of the more famous
tribune of that name, wrote in 1771: "The English are, in my
opinion, a hundred times more agitated and more unfortunate than
the very Algerines themselves, because they do not know and will
not know till the destruction of their over-swollen power, which I
believe very near, whether they are monarchy, aristocracy, or democ-
racy, and wish to play the part of all three."

England has not been obliging enough to fulfil the Bailli's proph-
ecy, and perhaps it was this very carelessness about the name, and
concern about the substance of popular government, this skill in
getting the best out of things as they are, in utilizing all the motives
which influence men, and in giving one direction to many impulses,
that has been a principal factor of her greatness and power. Perhaps
it is fortunate to have an unwritten Constitution, for men are prone
to be tinkering the work of their own hands, whereas they are
more willing to let time and circumstance mend or modify what
time and circumstance have made. All free governments, whatever
their name, are in reality governments by public opinion, and it is
on the quality of this public opinion that their prosperity depends.
It is, therefore, their first duty to purify the element from which
they draw the breath of life. With the growth of democracy grows
also the fear, if not the danger, that this atmosphere may be cor-
rupted with poisonous exhalations from lower and more malarious
levels, and the question of sanitation becomes more instant and
pressing. Democracy in its best sense is merely the letting in of
light and air. Lord Sherbrooke, with his usual epigrammatic terse-

DEMOCRACY 469

ness, bids you educate your future rulers. But would this alone
be a sufficient safeguard? To educate the intelligence is to enlarge
the horizon of its desires and wants. And it is well that this should
be so. But the enterprise must go deeper and prepare the way for
satisfying those desires and wants in so far as they are legitimate.
What is really ominous of danger to the existing order of things is
not democracy (which, properly understood, is a conservative force),
but the Socialism, which may find a fulcrum in it. If we cannot
equalize conditions and fortunes any more than we can equalize
the brains of men — and a very sagacious person has said that "where
two men ride of a horse one must ride behind" — we can yet, per-
haps, do something to correct those methods and influences that
lead to enormous inequalities, and to prevent their growing more
enormous. It is all very well to pooh-pooh Mr. George and to
prove him mistaken in his political economy. I do not believe that
land should be divided because the quantity of it is limited by
nature. Of what may this not be said ? A fortiori, we might on the
same principle insist on a division of human wit, for I have ob-
served that the quantity of this has been even more inconveniently
limited. Mr. George himself has an inequitably large share of it.
But he is right in his impelling motive; right, also, I am convinced,
in insisting that humanity makes a part, by far the most important
part, of political economy; and in thinking man to be of more
concern and more convincing than the longest columns of figures
in the world. For unless you include human nature in your addition,
your total is sure to be wrong and your deductions from it fallacious.
Communism means barbarism, but Socialism means, or wishes to
mean, cooperation and community of interests, sympathy, the giving
to the hands not so large a share as to the brains, but a larger share
than hitherto in the wealth they must combine to produce — means,
in short, the practical application of Christianity to life, and has in
it the secret of an orderly and benign reconstruction. State Social-
ism would cut off the very roots in personal character — self-help,
forethought, and frugality — which nourish and sustain the trunk and
branches of every vigorous Commonwealth.

I do not believe in violent changes, nor do I expect them. Things
in possession have a very firm grip. One of the strongest cements

470 LOWELL

of society is the conviction of mankind that the state of things into
which they are born is a part of the order of the universe, as natural,
let us say, as that the sun should go round the earth. It is a con-
viction that they will not surrender except on compulsion, and a
wise society should look to it that this compulsion be not put upon
them. For the individual man there is no radical cure, outside of
human nature itself, for the evils to which human nature is heir.
The rule will always hold good that you must

"Be your own palace or the world's your gaol."

But for artificial evils, for evils that spring from want of thought,
thought must find a remedy somewhere. There has been no period
of time in which wealth has been more sensible of its duties than
now. It builds hospitals, it establishes missions among the poor, it
endows schools. It is one of the advantages of accumulated wealth,
and of the leisure it renders possible, that people have time to think
of the wants and sorrows of their fellows. But all these remedies
are partial and palliative merely. It is as if we should apply plasters
to a single pustule of the small-pox with a view of driving out the
disease. The true way is to discover and to extirpate the germs. As
society is now constituted these are in the air it breathes, in the water
it drinks, in things that seem, and which it has always believed, to
be the most innocent and healthful. The evil elements it neglects
corrupt these in their springs and pollute them in their courses. Let
us be of good cheer, however, remembering that the misfortunes
hardest to bear are those which never come. The world has outlived
much, and will outlive a great deal more, and men have contrived
to be happy in it. It has shown the strength of its constitution in
nothing more than in surviving the quack medicines it has tried.
In the scales of the destinies brawn will never weigh so much as
brain. Our healing is not in the storm or in the whirlwind, it is not
in monarchies, or aristocracies, or democracies, but will be revealed
by the still small voice that speaks to the conscience and the heart,
prompting us to a wider and wiser humanity.