,transcribed from the #ahid ,george ,allen edition by ,david ,price1 email ccx#jgdpglaf4org ,picture3 ,public domain book cover ,,sesame ,,and ,,lilies ,by ,john ,ruskin ,contents ,lecture ,i4 ,sesame ,lecture ,,ii4 ,lilies ,preface to the ,later ,editions ,lecture ,,iii4 ,the ,mystery of ,life and its ,arts ,preface to the ,later ,editions ,,being now fifty-one years old1 and little likely to change my mind hereafter on any important subject of thought 7unless through weakness of age71 ,i wish to publish a connected series of such parts of my works as now seem to me right1 and likely to be of permanent use4 ,in doing so ,i shall omit much1 but not attempt to mend what ,i think worth reprinting4 ,a young man necessarily writes otherwise than an old one1 and it would be worse than wasted time to try to recast the juvenile language3 nor is it to be thought that ,i am ashamed even of what ,i cancel2 for great part of my earlier work was rapidly written for temporary purposes1 and is now unnecessary1 though true1 even to truism4 ,what ,i wrote about religion1 was1 on the contrary1 painstaking1 and1 ,i think1 forcible1 as compared with most religious writing2 especially in its frankness and fearlessness3 but it was wholly mistaken3 for ,i had been educated in the doctrines of a narrow sect1 and had read history as obliquely as sectarians necessarily must4 ,mingled among these either unnecessary or erroneous statements1 ,i find1 indeed1 some that might be still of value2 but these1 in my earlier books1 disfigured by affected language1 partly through the desire to be thought a fine writer1 and partly1 as in the second volume of #8,modern ,painters1' in the notion of returning as far as ,i could to what ,i thought the better style of old ,english literature1 especially to that of my then favourite1 in prose1 ,richard ,hooker4 ,for these reasons1--though1 as respects either art1 policy1 or morality1 as distinct from religion1 ,i not only still hold1 but would even wish strongly to re-affirm the substance of what ,i said in my earliest books1--,i shall reprint scarcely anything in this series out of the first and second volumes of #8,modern ,painters'2 and shall omit much of the #8,seven ,lamps' and #8,stones of ,venice'2 but all my books written within the last fifteen years will be republished without change1 as new editions of them are called for1 with here and there perhaps an additional note1 and having their text divided1 for convenient reference1 into paragraphs1 consecutive through each volume4 ,i shall also throw together the shorter fragments that bear on each other1 and fill in with such unprinted lectures or studies as seem to me worth preserving1 so as to keep the volumes1 on an average1 composed of about a hundred leaves each4 ,the first book of which a new edition is required chances to be #8,sesame and ,lilies1' from which ,i now detach the whole preface1 about the ,alps1 for use elsewhere2 and to ,i which ,i add a lecture given in ,ireland on a subject closely connected with that of the book itself4 ,i am glad that it should be the first of the complete series1 for many reasons2 though in now looking over these two lectures1 ,i am painfully struck by the waste of good work in them4 ,they cost me much thought1 and much strong emotion2 but it was foolish to suppose that ,i could rouse my audiences in a little while to any sympathy with the temper into which ,i had brought myself by years of thinking over subjects full of pain2 while1 if ,i missed my purpose at the time1 it was little to be hoped ,i could attain it afterwards2 since phrases written for oral delivery become ineffective when quietly read4 ,yet ,i should only take away what good is in them if ,i tried to translate them into the language of books2 nor1 indeed1 could ,i at all have done so at the time of their delivery1 my thoughts then habitually and impatiently putting themselves into forms fit only for emphatic speech2 and thus ,i am startled1 in my review of them1 to find that1 though there is much1 7forgive me the impertinence7 which seems to me accurately and energetically said1 there is scarcely anything put in a form to be generally convincing1 or even easily intelligible3 and ,i can well imagine a reader laying down the book without being at all moved by it1 still less guided1 to any definite course of action4 ,i think1 however1 if ,i now say briefly and clearly what ,i meant my hearers to understand1 and what ,i wanted1 and still would fain have1 them to do1 there may afterwards be found some better service in the passionately written text4 ,the first lecture says1 or tries to say1 that1 life being very short1 and the quiet hours of it few1 we ought to waste none of them in reading valueless books2 and that valuable books should1 in a civilized country1 be within the reach of every one1 printed in excellent form1 for a just price2 but not in any vile1 vulgar1 or1 by reason of smallness of type1 physically injurious form1 at a vile price4 ,for we none of us need many books1 and those which we need ought to be clearly printed1 on the best paper1 and strongly bound4 ,and though we are1 indeed1 now1 a wretched and poverty-struck nation1 and hardly able to keep soul and body together1 still1 as no person in decent circumstances would put on his table confessedly bad wine1 or bad meat1 without being ashamed1 so he need not have on his shelves ill-printed or loosely and wretchedly-stitched books2 for though few can be rich1 yet every man who honestly exerts himself may1 ,i think1 still provide1 for himself and his family1 good shoes1 good gloves1 strong harness for his cart or carriage horses1 and stout leather binding for his books4 ,and ,i would urge upon every young man1 as the beginning of his due and wise provision for his household1 to obtain as soon as he can1 by the severest economy1 a restricted1 serviceable1 and steadily--however slowly--increasing1 series of books for use through life2 making his little library1 of all the furniture in his room1 the most studied and decorative piece2 every volume having its assigned place1 like a little statue in its niche1 and one of the earliest and strictest lessons to the children of the house being how to turn the pages of their own literary possessions lightly and deliberately1 with no chance of tearing or dog's ears4 ,that is my notion of the founding of ,kings' ,treasuries2 and the first lecture is intended to show somewhat the use and preciousness of their treasures3 but the two following ones have wider scope1 being written in the hope of awakening the youth of ,england1 so far as my poor words might have any power with them1 to take some thought of the purposes of the life into which they are entering1 and the nature of the world they have to conquer4 ,these two lectures are fragmentary and ill-arranged1 but not1 ,i think1 diffuse or much compressible4 ,the entire gist and conclusion of them1 however1 is in the last six paragraphs of the third lecture1 which ,i would beg the reader to look over not once nor twice1 7rather than any other part of the book17 for they contain the best expression ,i have yet been able to put in words of what1 so far as is within my power1 ,i mean henceforward both to do myself1 and to plead with all over whom ,i have any influence1 to do also according to their means3 the letters begun on the first day of this year1 to the workmen of ,england1 having the object of originating1 if possible1 this movement among them1 in true alliance with whatever trustworthy element of help they can find in the higher classes4 ,after these paragraphs1 let me ask you to read1 by the fiery light of recent events1 the fable at p4 #agj #a1 and then paragraphs #abi-aca #b2 and observe1 my statement respecting the famine at ,orissa is not rhetorical1 but certified by official documents as within the truth4 ,five hundred thousand persons1 at least1 died by starvation in our ,british dominions1 wholly in consequence of carelessness and want of forethought4 ,keep that well in your memory2 and note it as the best possible illustration of modern political economy in true practice1 and of the relations it has accomplished between ,supply and ,demand4 ,then begin the second lecture1 and all will read clear enough1 ,i think1 to the end2 only1 since that second lecture was written1 questions have arisen respecting the education and claims of women which have greatly troubled simple minds and excited restless ones4 ,i am sometimes asked my thoughts on this matter1 and ,i suppose that some girl readers of the second lecture may at the end of it desire to be told summarily what ,i would have them do and desire in the present state of things4 ,this1 then1 is what ,i would say to any girl who had confidence enough in me to believe what ,i told her1 or to do what ,i asked her4 ,first1 be quite sure of one thing1 that1 however much you may know1 and whatever advantages you may possess1 and however good you may be1 you have not been singled out1 by the ,god who made you1 from all the other girls in the world1 to be especially informed respecting ,his own nature and character4 ,you have not been born in a luminous point upon the surface of the globe1 where a perfect theology might be expounded to you from your youth up1 and where everything you were taught would be true1 and everything that was enforced upon you1 right4 ,of all the insolent1 all the foolish persuasions that by any chance could enter and hold your empty little heart1 this is the proudest and foolishest1--that you have been so much the darling of the ,heavens1 and favourite of the ,fates1 as to be born in the very nick of time1 and in the punctual place1 when and where pure ,divine truth had been sifted from the errors of the ,nations2 and that your papa had been providentially disposed to buy a house in the convenient neighbourhood of the steeple under which that ,immaculate and final verity would be beautifully proclaimed4 ,do not think it1 child2 it is not so4 ,this1 on the contrary1 is the fact1--unpleasant you may think it2 pleasant1 it seems to me1--that you1 with all your pretty dresses1 and dainty looks1 and kindly thoughts1 and saintly aspirations1 are not one whit more thought of or loved by the great ,maker and ,master than any poor little red1 black1 or blue savage1 running wild in the pestilent woods1 or naked on the hot sands of the earth3 and that1 of the two1 you probably know less about ,god than she does2 the only difference being that she thinks little of ,him that is right1 and you much that is wrong4 ,that1 then1 is the first thing to make sure of2--that you are not yet perfectly well informed on the most abstruse of all possible subjects1 and that if you care to behave with modesty or propriety1 you had better be silent about it4 ,the second thing which you may make sure of is1 that however good you may be1 you have faults2 that however dull you may be1 you can find out what some of them are2 and that however slight they may be1 you had better make some--not too painful1 but patient--effort to get quit of them4 ,and so far as you have confidence in me at all1 trust me for this1 that how many soever you may find or fancy your faults to be1 there are only two that are of real consequence1--,idleness and ,cruelty4 ,perhaps you may be proud4 ,well1 we can get much good out of pride1 if only it be not religious4 ,perhaps you may be vain2 it is highly probable2 and very pleasant for the people who like to praise you4 ,perhaps you are a little envious3 that is really very shocking2 but then--so is everybody else4 ,perhaps1 also1 you are a little malicious1 which ,i am truly concerned to hear1 but should probably only the more1 if ,i knew you1 enjoy your conversation4 ,but whatever else you may be1 you must not be useless1 and you must not be cruel4 ,if there is any one point which1 in six thousand years of thinking about right and wrong1 wise and good men have agreed upon1 or successively by experience discovered1 it is that ,god dislikes idle and cruel people more than any others3--that ,his first order is1 8,work while you have light20 and ,his second1 8,be merciful while you have mercy40 8,work while you have light10 especially while you have the light of morning4 ,there are few things more wonderful to me than that old people never tell young ones how precious their youth is4 ,they sometimes sentimentally regret their own earlier days2 sometimes prudently forget them2 often foolishly rebuke the young1 often more foolishly indulge1 often most foolishly thwart and restrain2 but scarcely ever warn or watch them4 ,remember1 then1 that ,i1 at least1 have warned you1 that the happiness of your life1 and its power1 and its part and rank in earth or in heaven1 depend on the way you pass your days now4 ,they are not to be sad days3 far from that1 the first duty of young people is to be delighted and delightful2 but they are to be in the deepest sense solemn days4 ,there is no solemnity so deep1 to a rightly-thinking creature1 as that of dawn4 ,but not only in that beautiful sense1 but in all their character and method1 they are to be solemn days4 ,take your ,latin dictionary1 and look out 8solennis10 and fix the sense of the word well in your mind1 and remember that every day of your early life is ordaining irrevocably1 for good or evil1 the custom and practice of your soul2 ordaining either sacred customs of dear and lovely recurrence1 or trenching deeper and deeper the furrows for seed of sorrow4 ,now1 therefore1 see that no day passes in which you do not make yourself a somewhat better creature3 and in order to do that1 find out1 first1 what you are now4 ,do not think vaguely about it2 take pen and paper1 and write down as accurate a description of yourself as you can1 with the date to it4 ,if you dare not do so1 find out why you dare not1 and try to get strength of heart enough to look yourself fairly in the face in mind as well as body4 ,i do not doubt but that the mind is a less pleasant thing to look at than the face1 and for that very reason it needs more looking at2 so always have two mirrors on your toilet table1 and see that with proper care you dress body and mind before them daily4 ,after the dressing is once over for the day1 think no more about it3 as your hair will blow about your ears1 so your temper and thoughts will get ruffled with the day's work1 and may need1 sometimes1 twice dressing2 but ,i don't want you to carry about a mental pocket-comb2 only to be smooth braided always in the morning4 ,write down then1 frankly1 what you are1 or1 at least1 what you think yourself1 not dwelling upon those inevitable faults which ,i have just told you are of little consequence1 and which the action of a right life will shake or smooth away2 but that you may determine to the best of your intelligence what you are good for and can be made into4 ,you will find that the mere resolve not to be useless1 and the honest desire to help other people1 will1 in the quickest and delicatest ways1 improve yourself4 ,thus1 from the beginning1 consider all your accomplishments as means of assistance to others2 read attentively1 in this volume1 paragraphs #gd1 #ge1 #ai1 and #gi1 #c and you will understand what ,i mean1 with respect to languages and music4 ,in music especially you will soon find what personal benefit there is in being serviceable3 it is probable that1 however limited your powers1 you have voice and ear enough to sustain a note of moderate compass in a concerted piece2--that1 then1 is the first thing to make sure you can do4 ,get your voice disciplined and clear1 and think only of accuracy2 never of effect or expression3 if you have any soul worth expressing1 it will show itself in your singing2 but most likely there are very few feelings in you1 at present1 needing any particular expression2 and the one thing you have to do is to make a clear-voiced little instrument of yourself1 which other people can entirely depend upon for the note wanted4 ,so1 in drawing1 as soon as you can set down the right shape of anything1 and thereby explain its character to another person1 or make the look of it clear and interesting to a child1 you will begin to enjoy the art vividly for its own sake1 and all your habits of mind and powers of memory will gain precision3 but if you only try to make showy drawings for praise1 or pretty ones for amusement1 your drawing will have little of real interest for you1 and no educational power whatever4 ,then1 besides this more delicate work1 resolve to do every day some that is useful in the vulgar sense4 ,learn first thoroughly the economy of the kitchen2 the good and bad qualities of every common article of food1 and the simplest and best modes of their preparation3 when you have time1 go and help in the cooking of poorer families1 and show them how to make as much of everything as possible1 and how to make little1 nice2 coaxing and tempting them into tidy and pretty ways1 and pleading for well-folded table-cloths1 however coarse1 and for a flower or two out of the garden to strew on them4 ,if you manage to get a clean table-cloth1 bright plates on it1 and a good dish in the middle1 of your own cooking1 you may ask leave to say a short grace2 and let your religious ministries be confined to that much for the present4 ,again1 let a certain part of your day 7as little as you choose1 but not to be broken in upon7 be set apart for making strong and pretty dresses for the poor4 ,learn the sound qualities of all useful stuffs1 and make everything of the best you can get1 whatever its price4 ,i have many reasons for desiring you to do this1--too many to be told just now1--trust me1 and be sure you get everything as good as can be3 and if1 in the villainous state of modern trade1 you cannot get it good at any price1 buy its raw material1 and set some of the poor women about you to spin and weave1 till you have got stuff that can be trusted3 and then1 every day1 make some little piece of useful clothing1 sewn with your own fingers as strongly as it can be stitched2 and embroider it or otherwise beautify it moderately with fine needlework1 such as a girl may be proud of having done4 ,and accumulate these things by you until you hear of some honest persons in need of clothing1 which may often too sorrowfully be2 and1 even though you should be deceived1 and give them to the dishonest1 and hear of their being at once taken to the pawnbroker's1 never mind that1 for the pawnbroker must sell them to some one who has need of them4 ,that is no business of yours2 what concerns you is only that when you see a half-naked child1 you should have good and fresh clothes to give it1 if its parents will let it be taught to wear them4 ,if they will not1 consider how they came to be of such a mind1 which it will be wholesome for you beyond most subjects of inquiry to ascertain4 ,and after you have gone on doing this a little while1 you will begin to understand the meaning of at least one chapter of your ,bible1 ,proverbs xxxi41 without need of any laboured comment1 sermon1 or meditation4 ,in these1 then 7and of course in all minor ways besides1 that you can discover in your own household71 you must be to the best of your strength usefully employed during the greater part of the day1 so that you may be able at the end of it to say1 as proudly as any peasant1 that you have not eaten the bread of idleness4 ,then1 secondly1 ,i said1 you are not to be cruel4 ,perhaps you think there is no chance of your being so2 and indeed ,i hope it is not likely that you should be deliberately unkind to any creature2 but unless you are deliberately kind to every creature1 you will often be cruel to many4 ,cruel1 partly through want of imagination1 7a far rarer and weaker faculty in women than men17 and yet more1 at the present day1 through the subtle encouragement of your selfishness by the religious doctrine that all which we now suppose to be evil will be brought to a good end2 doctrine practically issuing1 not in less earnest efforts that the immediate unpleasantness may be averted from ourselves1 but in our remaining satisfied in the contemplation of its ultimate objects1 when it is inflicted on others4 ,it is not likely that the more accurate methods of recent mental education will now long permit young people to grow up in the persuasion that1 in any danger or distress1 they may expect to be themselves saved by the ,providence of ,god1 while those around them are lost by ,his improvidence3 but they may be yet long restrained from rightly kind action1 and long accustomed to endure both their own pain occasionally1 and the pain of others always1 with an unwise patience1 by misconception of the eternal and incurable nature of real evil4 ,observe1 therefore1 carefully in this matter2 there are degrees of pain1 as degrees of faultfulness1 which are altogether conquerable1 and which seem to be merely forms of wholesome trial or discipline4 ,your fingers tingle when you go out on a frosty morning1 and are all the warmer afterwards2 your limbs are weary with wholesome work1 and lie down in the pleasanter rest2 you are tried for a little while by having to wait for some promised good1 and it is all the sweeter when it comes4 ,but you cannot carry the trial past a certain point4 ,let the cold fasten on your hand in an extreme degree1 and your fingers will moulder from their sockets4 ,fatigue yourself1 but once1 to utter exhaustion1 and to the end of life you shall not recover the former vigour of your frame4 ,let heart-sickness pass beyond a certain bitter point1 and the heart loses its life for ever4 ,now1 the very definition of evil is in this irremediableness4 ,it means sorrow1 or sin1 which ends in death2 and assuredly1 as far as we know1 or can conceive1 there are many conditions both of pain and sin which cannot but so end4 ,of course we are ignorant and blind creatures1 and we cannot know what seeds of good may be in present suffering1 or present crime2 but with what we cannot know we are not concerned4 ,it is conceivable that murderers and liars may in some distant world be exalted into a higher humanity than they could have reached without homicide or falsehood2 but the contingency is not one by which our actions should be guided4 ,there is1 indeed1 a better hope that the beggar1 who lies at our gates in misery1 may1 within gates of pearl1 be comforted2 but the ,master1 whose words are our only authority for thinking so1 never ,himself inflicted disease as a blessing1 nor sent away the hungry unfed1 or the wounded unhealed4 ,believe me then1 the only right principle of action here1 is to consider good and evil as defined by our natural sense of both2 and to strive to promote the one1 and to conquer the other1 with as hearty endeavour as if there were1 indeed1 no other world than this4 ,above all1 get quit of the absurd idea that ,heaven will interfere to correct great errors1 while allowing its laws to take their course in punishing small ones4 ,if you prepare a dish of food carelessly1 you do not expect ,providence to make it palatable2 neither if1 through years of folly1 you misguide your own life1 need you expect ,divine interference to bring round everything at last for the best4 ,i tell you1 positively1 the world is not so constituted3 the consequences of great mistakes are just as sure as those of small ones1 and the happiness of your whole life1 and of all the lives over which you have power1 depend as literally on your own common sense and discretion as the excellence and order of the feast of a day4 ,think carefully and bravely over these things1 and you will find them true3 having found them so1 think also carefully over your own position in life4 ,i assume that you belong to the middle or upper classes1 and that you would shrink from descending into a lower sphere4 ,you may fancy you would not3 nay1 if you are very good1 strong-hearted1 and romantic1 perhaps you really would not2 but it is not wrong that you should4 ,you have1 then1 ,i suppose1 good food1 pretty rooms to live in1 pretty dresses to wear1 power of obtaining every rational and wholesome pleasure2 you are1 moreover1 probably gentle and grateful1 and in the habit of every day thanking ,god for these things4 ,but why do you thank ,him8 ,is it because1 in these matters1 as well as in your religious knowledge1 you think ,he has made a favourite of you8 ,is the essential meaning of your thanksgiving1 8,lord1 ,i thank ,thee that ,i am not as other girls are1 not in that ,i fast twice in the week while they feast1 but in that ,i feast seven times a week while they fast10 and are you quite sure this is a pleasing form of thanksgiving to your ,heavenly ,father8 ,suppose you saw one of your own true earthly sisters1 ,lucy or ,emily1 cast out of your mortal father's house1 starving1 helpless1 heartbroken2 and that every morning when you went into your father's room1 you said to him1 8,how good you are1 father1 to give me what you don't give ,lucy10 are you sure that1 whatever anger your parent might have just cause for1 against your sister1 he would be pleased by that thanksgiving1 or flattered by that praise8 ,nay1 are you even sure that you are so much the favourite8--suppose that1 all this while1 he loves poor ,lucy just as well as you1 and is only trying you through her pain1 and perhaps not angry with her in anywise1 but deeply angry with you1 and all the more for your thanksgivings8 ,would it not be well that you should think1 and earnestly too1 over this standing of yours2 and all the more if you wish to believe that text1 which clergymen so much dislike preaching on1 8,how hardly shall they that have riches enter into the ,kingdom of ,god08 ,you do not believe it now1 or you would be less complacent in your state2 and you cannot believe it at all1 until you know that the ,kingdom of ,god means1--8not meat and drink1 but justice1 peace1 and joy in the ,holy ,ghost10 nor until you know also that such joy is not by any means1 necessarily1 in going to church1 or in singing hymns2 but may be joy in a dance1 or joy in a jest1 or joy in anything you have deserved to possess1 or that you are willing to give2 but joy in nothing that separates you1 as by any strange favour1 from your fellow-creatures1 that exalts you through their degradation--exempts you from their toil--or indulges you in time of their distress4 ,think1 then1 and some day1 ,i believe1 you will feel also1--no morbid passion of pity such as would turn you into a black ,sister of ,charity1 but the steady fire of perpetual kindness which will make you a bright one4 ,i speak in no disparagement of them2 ,i know well how good the ,sisters of ,charity are1 and how much we owe to them2 but all these professional pieties 7except so far as distinction or association may be necessary for effectiveness of work7 are in their spirit wrong1 and in practice merely plaster the sores of disease that ought never to have been permitted to exist2 encouraging at the same time the herd of less excellent women in frivolity1 by leading them to think that they must either be good up to the black standard1 or cannot be good for anything4 ,wear a costume1 by all means1 if you like2 but let it be a cheerful and becoming one2 and be in your heart a ,sister of ,charity always1 without either veiled or voluble declaration of it4 ,as ,i pause1 before ending my preface--thinking of one or two more points that are difficult to write of--,i find a letter in #8,the ,times1' from a ,french lady1 which says all ,i want so beautifully1 that ,i will print it just as it stands3-- ,,sir1--,it is often said that one example is worth many sermons4 ,shall ,i be judged presumptuous if ,i point out one1 which seems to me so striking just now1 that1 however painful1 ,i cannot help dwelling upon it8 ,it is the share1 the sad and large share1 that ,french society and its recent habits of luxury1 of expenses1 of dress1 of indulgence in every kind of extravagant dissipation1 has to lay to its own door in its actual crisis of ruin1 misery1 and humiliation4 ,if our mnagres can be cited as an example to ,english housewives1 so1 alas6 can other classes of our society be set up as an example--not to be followed4 ,bitter must be the feelings of many a ,french woman whose days of luxury and expensive habits are at an end1 and whose bills of bygone splendour lie with a heavy weight on her conscience1 if not on her purse6 ,with us the evil has spread high and low4 ,everywhere have the examples given by the highest ladies in the land been followed but too successfully4 ,every year did dress become more extravagant1 entertainments more costly1 expenses of every kind more considerable4 ,lower and lower became the tone of society1 its good breeding1 its delicacy4 ,more and more were monde and demi-monde associated in newspaper accounts of fashionable doings1 in scandalous gossip1 on racecourses1 in premires reprsentations1 in imitation of each other's costumes1 mobiliers and slang4 ,living beyond one's means became habitual--almost necessary--for every one to keep up with1 if not to go beyond1 every one else4 ,what the result of all this has been we now see in the wreck of our prosperity1 in the downfall of all that seemed brightest and highest4 ,deeply and fearfully impressed by what my own country has incurred and is suffering1 ,i cannot help feeling sorrowful when ,i see in ,england signs of our besetting sins appearing also4 ,paint and chignons1 slang and vaudevilles1 knowing 8,anonymas0 by name1 and reading doubtfully moral novels1 are in themselves small offences1 although not many years ago they would have appeared very heinous ones1 yet they are quick and tempting conveyances on a very dangerous high-road4 ,i would that all ,englishwomen knew how they are looked up to from abroad--what a high opinion1 what honour and reverence we foreigners have for their principles1 their truthfulness1 the fresh and pure innocence of their daughters1 the healthy youthfulness of their lovely children4 ,may ,i illustrate this by a short example which happened very near me8 ,during the days of the meutes of #ahdh1 all the houses in ,paris were being searched for firearms by the mob4 ,the one ,i was living in contained none1 as the master of the house repeatedly assured the furious and incredulous ,republicans4 ,they were going to lay violent hands on him when his wife1 an ,english lady1 hearing the loud discussion1 came bravely forward and assured them that no arms were concealed4 8,vous tes anglaise1 nous vous croyons2 les anglaises disent toujours la vrit10 was the immediate answer1 and the rioters quietly left4 ,now1 ,sir1 shall ,i be accused of unjustified criticism if1 loving and admiring your country1 as these lines will prove1 certain new features strike me as painful discrepancies in ,english life8 ,far be it from me to preach the contempt of all that can make life lovable and wholesomely pleasant4 ,i love nothing better than to see a woman nice1 neat1 elegant1 looking her best in the prettiest dress that her taste and purse can afford1 or your bright1 fresh young girls fearlessly and perfectly sitting their horses1 or adorning their houses as pretty sic2 it is not quite grammar1 but it is better than if it were2 as care1 trouble1 and refinement can make them4 ,it is the degree beyond that which to us has proved so fatal1 and that ,i would our example could warn you from as a small repayment for your hospitality and friendliness to us in our days of trouble4 ,may ,englishwomen accept this in a kindly spirit as a ,new-year's wish from ,a ,,french ,,lady4 ,dec4 #bi4 ,that1 then1 is the substance of what ,i would fain say convincingly1 if it might be1 to my girl friends2 at all events with certainty in my own mind that ,i was thus far a safe guide to them4 ,for other and older readers it is needful ,i should write a few words more1 respecting what opportunity ,i have had to judge1 or right ,i have to speak1 of such things2 for1 indeed1 too much of what ,i have said about women has been said in faith only4 ,a wise and lovely ,english lady told me1 when #8,sesame and ,lilies' first appeared1 that she was sure the #8,sesame' would be useful1 but that in the #8,lilies' ,i had been writing of what ,i knew nothing about4 ,which was in a measure too true1 and also that it is more partial than my writings are usually3 for as ,ellesmere spoke his speech on the -- intervention1 not1 indeed1 otherwise than he felt1 but yet altogether for the sake of ,gretchen1 so ,i wrote the #8,lilies' to please one girl2 and were it not for what ,i remember of her1 and of few besides1 should now perhaps recast some of the sentences in the #8,lilies' in a very different tone3 for as years have gone by1 it has chanced to me1 untowardly in some respects1 fortunately in others 7because it enables me to read history more clearly71 to see the utmost evil that is in women1 while ,i have had but to believe the utmost good4 ,the best women are indeed necessarily the most difficult to know2 they are recognized chiefly in the happiness of their husbands and the nobleness of their children2 they are only to be divined1 not discerned1 by the stranger2 and1 sometimes1 seem almost helpless except in their homes2 yet without the help of one of them1 #d to whom this book is dedicated1 the day would probably have come before now1 when ,i should have written and thought no more4 ,on the other hand1 the fashion of the time renders whatever is forward1 coarse1 or senseless1 in feminine nature1 too palpable to all men3--the weak picturesqueness of my earlier writings brought me acquainted with much of their emptiest enthusiasm2 and the chances of later life gave me opportunities of watching women in states of degradation and vindictiveness which opened to me the gloomiest secrets of ,greek and ,syrian tragedy4 ,i have seen them betray their household charities to lust1 their pledged love to devotion2 ,i have seen mothers dutiful to their children1 as ,medea2 and children dutiful to their parents1 as the daughter of ,herodias3 but my trust is still unmoved in the preciousness of the natures that are so fatal in their error1 and ,i leave the words of the #8,lilies' unchanged2 believing1 yet1 that no man ever lived a right life who had not been chastened by a woman's love1 strengthened by her courage1 and guided by her discretion4 ,what ,i might myself have been1 so helped1 ,i rarely indulge in the idleness of thinking2 but what ,i am1 since ,i take on me the function of a teacher1 it is well that the reader should know1 as far as ,i can tell him4 ,not an unjust person2 not an unkind one2 not a false one2 a lover of order1 labour1 and peace4 ,that1 it seems to me1 is enough to give me right to say all ,i care to say on ethical subjects2 more1 ,i could only tell definitely through details of autobiography such as none but prosperous and 7in the simple sense of the word7 faultless lives could justify2--and mine has been neither4 ,yet1 if any one1 skilled in reading the torn manuscripts of the human soul1 cares for more intimate knowledge of me1 he may have it by knowing with what persons in past history ,i have most sympathy4 ,i will name three4 ,in all that is strongest and deepest in me1--that fits me for my work1 and gives light or shadow to my being1 ,i have sympathy with ,guido ,guinicelli4 ,in my constant natural temper1 and thoughts of things and of people1 with ,marmontel4 ,in my enforced and accidental temper1 and thoughts of things and of people1 with ,dean ,swift4 ,any one who can understand the natures of those three men1 can understand mine2 and having said so much1 ,i am content to leave both life and work to be remembered or forgotten1 as their uses may deserve4 ,,denmark ,,hill1 #ast ,january1 #ahga4 ,lecture ,i4 ,sesame4 ,of ,king's ,treasuries 8,you shall each have a cake of sesame1--and ten pound40 ,,lucian3 ,the ,fisherman4 ,,my first duty this evening is to ask your pardon for the ambiguity of title under which the subject of lecture has been announced3 for indeed ,i am not going to talk of kings1 known as regnant1 nor of treasuries1 understood to contain wealth2 but of quite another order of royalty1 and another material of riches1 than those usually acknowledged4 ,i had even intended to ask your attention for a little while on trust1 and 7as sometimes one contrives1 in taking a friend to see a favourite piece of scenery7 to hide what ,i wanted most to show1 with such imperfect cunning as ,i might1 until we unexpectedly reached the best point of view by winding paths4 ,but--and as also ,i have heard it said1 by men practised in public address1 that hearers are never so much fatigued as by the endeavour to follow a speaker who gives them no clue to his purpose1--,i will take the slight mask off at once1 and tell you plainly that ,i want to speak to you about the treasures hidden in books2 and about the way we find them1 and the way we lose them4 ,a grave subject1 you will say2 and a wide one6 ,yes2 so wide that ,i shall make no effort to touch the compass of it4 ,i will try only to bring before you a few simple thoughts about reading1 which press themselves upon me every day more deeply1 as ,i watch the course of the public mind with respect to our daily enlarging means of education2 and the answeringly wider spreading on the levels1 of the irrigation of literature4 ,it happens that ,i have practically some connexion with schools for different classes of youth2 and ,i receive many letters from parents respecting the education of their children4 ,in the mass of these letters ,i am always struck by the precedence which the idea of a 8position in life0 takes above all other thoughts in the parents'--more especially in the mothers'--minds4 8,the education befitting such and such a station in life0--this is the phrase1 this the object1 always4 ,they never seek1 as far as ,i can make out1 an education good in itself2 even the conception of abstract rightness in training rarely seems reached by the writers4 ,but1 an education 8which shall keep a good coat on my son's back2--which shall enable him to ring with confidence the visitors' bell at double-belled doors2 which shall result ultimately in establishment of a double-belled door to his own house2--in a word1 which shall lead to advancement in life2--this we pray for on bent knees--and this is all we pray for40 ,it never seems to occur to the parents that there may be an education which1 in itself1 is advancement in ,life2--that any other than that may perhaps be advancement in ,death2 and that this essential education might be more easily got1 or given1 than they fancy1 if they set about it in the right way2 while it is for no price1 and by no favour1 to be got1 if they set about it in the wrong4 ,indeed1 among the ideas most prevalent and effective in the mind of this busiest of countries1 ,i suppose the first--at least that which is confessed with the greatest frankness1 and put forward as the fittest stimulus to youthful exertion--is this of 8,advancement in life40 ,may ,i ask you to consider with me1 what this idea practically includes1 and what it should include8 ,practically1 then1 at present1 8advancement in life0 means1 becoming conspicuous in life2 obtaining a position which shall be acknowledged by others to be respectable or honourable4 ,we do not understand by this advancement1 in general1 the mere making of money1 but the being known to have made it2 not the accomplishment of any great aim1 but the being seen to have accomplished it4 ,in a word1 we mean the gratification of our thirst for applause4 ,that thirst1 if the last infirmity of noble minds1 is also the first infirmity of weak ones2 and1 on the whole1 the strongest impulsive influence of average humanity3 the greatest efforts of the race have always been traceable to the love of praise1 as its greatest catastrophes to the love of pleasure4 ,i am not about to attack or defend this impulse4 ,i want you only to feel how it lies at the root of effort2 especially of all modern effort4 ,it is the gratification of vanity which is1 with us1 the stimulus of toil and balm of repose2 so closely does it touch the very springs of life that the wounding of our vanity is always spoken of 7and truly7 as in its measure mortal2 we call it 8mortification10 using the same expression which we should apply to a gangrenous and incurable bodily hurt4 ,and although a few of us may be physicians enough to recognise the various effect of this passion upon health and energy1 ,i believe most honest men know1 and would at once acknowledge1 its leading power with them as a motive4 ,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 board4 ,he wants to be made captain that he may be called captain4 ,the clergyman does not usually want to be made a bishop only because he believes that no other hand can1 as firmly as his1 direct the diocese through its difficulties4 ,he wants to be made bishop primarily that he may be called 8,my ,lord40 ,and a prince does not usually desire to enlarge1 or a subject to gain1 a kingdom1 because he believes no one else can as well serve the ,state1 upon its throne2 but1 briefly1 because he wishes to be addressed as 8,your ,majesty10 by as many lips as may be brought to such utterance4 ,this1 then1 being the main idea of 8advancement in life10 the force of it applies1 for all of us1 according to our station1 particularly to that secondary result of such advancement which we call 8getting into good society40 ,we want to get into good society1 not that we may have it1 but that we may be seen in it2 and our notion of its goodness depends primarily on its conspicuousness4 ,will you pardon me if ,i pause for a moment to put what ,i fear you may think an impertinent question8 ,i never can go on with an address unless ,i feel1 or know1 that my audience are either with me or against me3 ,i do not much care which1 in beginning2 but ,i must know where they are2 and ,i would fain find out1 at this instant1 whether you think ,i am putting the motives of popular action too low4 ,i am resolved1 to-night1 to state them low enough to be admitted as probable2 for whenever1 in my writings on ,political ,economy1 ,i assume that a little honesty1 or generosity1--or what used to be called 8virtue10--may be calculated upon as a human motive of action1 people always answer me1 saying1 8,you must not calculate on that3 that is not in human nature3 you must not assume anything to be common to men but acquisitiveness and jealousy2 no other feeling ever has influence on them1 except accidentally1 and in matters out of the way of business40 ,i begin1 accordingly1 to-night low in the scale of motives2 but ,i must know if you think me right in doing so4 ,therefore1 let me ask those who admit the love of praise to be usually the strongest motive in men's minds in seeking advancement1 and the honest desire of doing any kind of duty to be an entirely secondary one1 to hold up their hands4 7,about a dozen hands held up--the audience1 partly1 not being sure the lecturer is serious1 and1 partly1 shy of expressing opinion47 ,i am quite serious--,i really do want to know what you think2 however1 ,i can judge by putting the reverse question4 ,will those who think that duty is generally the first1 and love of praise the second1 motive1 hold up their hands8 7,one hand reported to have been held up behind the lecturer47 ,very good3 ,i see you are with me1 and that you think ,i have not begun too near the ground4 ,now1 without teasing you by putting farther question1 ,i venture to assume that you will admit duty as at least a secondary or tertiary motive4 ,you think that the desire of doing something useful1 or obtaining some real good1 is indeed an existent collateral idea1 though a secondary one1 in most men's desire of advancement4 ,you will grant that moderately honest men desire place and office1 at least in some measure for the sake of beneficent power2 and would wish to associate rather with sensible and well-informed persons than with fools and ignorant persons1 whether they are seen in the company of the sensible ones or not4 ,and finally1 without being troubled by repetition of any common truisms about the preciousness of friends1 and the influence of companions1 you will admit1 doubtless1 that according to the sincerity of our desire that our friends may be true1 and our companions wise1--and in proportion to the earnestness and discretion with which we choose both1--will be the general chances of our happiness and usefulness4 ,but1 granting that we had both the will and the sense to choose our friends well1 how few of us have the power6 or1 at least1 how limited1 for most1 is the sphere of choice6 ,nearly all our associations are determined by chance or necessity2 and restricted within a narrow circle4 ,we cannot know whom we would2 and those whom we know1 we cannot have at our side when we most need them4 ,all the higher circles of human intelligence are1 to those beneath1 only momentarily and partially open4 ,we may1 by good fortune1 obtain a glimpse of a great poet1 and hear the sound of his voice2 or put a question to a man of science1 and be answered good-humouredly4 ,we may intrude ten minutes' talk on a cabinet minister1 answered probably with words worse than silence1 being deceptive2 or snatch1 once or twice in our lives1 the privilege of throwing a bouquet in the path of a princess1 or arresting the kind glance of a queen4 ,and yet these momentary chances we covet2 and spend our years1 and passions1 and powers1 in pursuit of little more than these2 while1 meantime1 there is a society continually open to us1 of people who will talk to us as long as we like1 whatever our rank or occupation2--talk to us in the best words they can choose1 and of the things nearest their hearts4 ,and this society1 because it is so numerous and so gentle1 and can be kept waiting round us all day long1--kings and statesmen lingering patiently1 not to grant audience1 but to gain it6--in those plainly furnished and narrow ante-rooms1 our bookcase shelves1--we make no account of that company1--perhaps never listen to a word they would say1 all day long6 ,you may tell me1 perhaps1 or think within yourselves1 that the apathy with which we regard this company of the noble1 who are praying us to listen to them2 and the passion with which we pursue the company1 probably of the ignoble1 who despise us1 or who have nothing to teach us1 are grounded in this1--that we can see the faces of the living men1 and it is themselves1 and not their sayings1 with which we desire to become familiar4 ,but it is not so4 ,suppose you never were to see their faces2--suppose you could be put behind a screen in the statesman's cabinet1 or the prince's chamber1 would you not be glad to listen to their words1 though you were forbidden to advance beyond the screen8 ,and when the screen is only a little less1 folded in two instead of four1 and you can be hidden behind the cover of the two boards that bind a book1 and listen all day long1 not to the casual talk1 but to the studied1 determined1 chosen addresses of the wisest of men2--this station of audience1 and honourable privy council1 you despise6 ,but perhaps you will say that it is because the living people talk of things that are passing1 and are of immediate interest to you1 that you desire to hear them4 ,nay2 that cannot be so1 for the living people will themselves tell you about passing matters much better in their writings than in their careless talk4 ,yet ,i admit that this motive does influence you1 so far as you prefer those rapid and ephemeral writings to slow and enduring writings--books1 properly so called4 ,for all books are divisible into two classes1 the books of the hour1 and the books of all time4 ,mark this distinction--it is not one of quality only4 ,it is not merely the bad book that does not last1 and the good one that does4 ,it is a distinction of species4 ,there are good books for the hour1 and good ones for all time2 bad books for the hour1 and bad ones for all time4 ,i must define the two kinds before ,i go farther4 ,the good book of the hour1 then1--,i do not speak of the bad ones1--is simply the useful or pleasant talk of some person whom you cannot otherwise converse with1 printed for you4 ,very useful often1 telling you what you need to know2 very pleasant often1 as a sensible friend's present talk would be4 ,these bright accounts of travels2 good-humoured and witty discussions of question2 lively or pathetic story-telling in the form of novel2 firm fact-telling1 by the real agents concerned in the events of passing history2--all these books of the hour1 multiplying among us as education becomes more general1 are a peculiar possession of the present age3 we ought to be entirely thankful for them1 and entirely ashamed of ourselves if we make no good use of them4 ,but we make the worst possible use if we allow them to usurp the place of true books3 for1 strictly speaking1 they are not books at all1 but merely letters or newspapers in good print4 ,our friend's letter may be delightful1 or necessary1 to-day3 whether worth keeping or not1 is to be considered4 ,the newspaper may be entirely proper at breakfast time1 but assuredly it is not reading for all day4 ,so1 though bound up in a volume1 the long letter which gives you so pleasant an account of the inns1 and roads1 and weather1 last year at such a place1 or which tells you that amusing story1 or gives you the real circumstances of such and such events1 however valuable for occasional reference1 may not be1 in the real sense of the word1 a 8book0 at all1 nor1 in the real sense1 to be 8read40 ,a book is essentially not a talking thing1 but a written thing2 and written1 not with a view of mere communication1 but of permanence4 ,the book of talk is printed only because its author cannot speak to thousands of people at once2 if he could1 he would--the volume is mere multiplication of his voice4 ,you cannot talk to your friend in ,india2 if you could1 you would2 you write instead3 that is mere conveyance of voice4 ,but a book is written1 not to multiply the voice merely1 not to carry it merely1 but to perpetuate it4 ,the author has something to say which he perceives to be true and useful1 or helpfully beautiful4 ,so far as he knows1 no one has yet said it2 so far as he knows1 no one else can say it4 ,he is bound to say it1 clearly and melodiously if he may2 clearly at all events4 ,in the sum of his life he finds this to be the thing1 or group of things1 manifest to him2--this1 the piece of true knowledge1 or sight1 which his share of sunshine and earth has permitted him to seize4 ,he would fain set it down for ever2 engrave it on rock1 if he could2 saying1 8,this is the best of me2 for the rest1 ,i ate1 and drank1 and slept1 loved1 and hated1 like another2 my life was as the vapour1 and is not2 but this ,i saw and knew3 this1 if anything of mine1 is worth your memory40 ,that is his 8writing20 it is1 in his small human way1 and with whatever degree of true inspiration is in him1 his inscription1 or scripture4 ,that is a 8,book40 ,perhaps you think no books were ever so written8 ,but1 again1 ,i ask you1 do you at all believe in honesty1 or at all in kindness1 or do you think there is never any honesty or benevolence in wise people8 ,none of us1 ,i hope1 are so unhappy as to think that4 ,well1 whatever bit of a wise man's work is honestly and benevolently done1 that bit is his book or his piece of art4 #e ,it is mixed always with evil fragments--ill-done1 redundant1 affected work4 ,but if you read rightly1 you will easily discover the true bits1 and those are the book4 ,now books of this kind have been written in all ages by their greatest men3--by great readers1 great statesmen1 and great thinkers4 ,these are all at your choice2 and ,life is short4 ,you have heard as much before2--yet have you measured and mapped out this short life and its possibilities8 ,do you know1 if you read this1 that you cannot read that--that what you lose to-day you cannot gain to-morrow8 ,will you go and gossip with your housemaid1 or your stable-boy1 when you may talk with queens and kings2 or flatter yourself that it is with any worthy consciousness of your own claims to respect1 that you jostle with the hungry and common crowd for entree here1 and audience there1 when all the while this eternal court is open to you1 with its society1 wide as the world1 multitudinous as its days1 the chosen1 and the mighty1 of every place and time8 ,into that you may enter always2 in that you may take fellowship and rank according to your wish2 from that1 once entered into it1 you can never be outcast but by your own fault2 by your aristocracy of companionship there1 your own inherent aristocracy will be assuredly tested1 and the motives with which you strive to take high place in the society of the living1 measured1 as to all the truth and sincerity that are in them1 by the place you desire to take in this company of the ,dead4 8,the place you desire10 and the place you fit yourself for1 ,i must also say2 because1 observe1 this court of the past differs from all living aristocracy in this3--it is open to labour and to merit1 but to nothing else4 ,no wealth will bribe1 no name overawe1 no artifice deceive1 the guardian of those ,elysian gates4 ,in the deep sense1 no vile or vulgar person ever enters there4 ,at the portires of that silent ,faubourg ,st4 ,germain1 there is but brief question3--8,do you deserve to enter8 ,pass4 ,do you ask to be the companion of nobles8 ,make yourself noble1 and you shall be4 ,do you long for the conversation of the wise8 ,learn to understand it1 and you shall hear it4 ,but on other terms8--no4 ,if you will not rise to us1 we cannot stoop to you4 ,the living lord may assume courtesy1 the living philosopher explain his thought to you with considerate pain2 but here we neither feign nor interpret2 you must rise to the level of our thoughts if you would be gladdened by them1 and share our feelings1 if you would recognise our presence40 ,this1 then1 is what you have to do1 and ,i admit that it is much4 ,you must1 in a word1 love these people1 if you are to be among them4 ,no ambition is of any use4 ,they scorn your ambition4 ,you must love them1 and show your love in these two following ways4 7#a7 ,first1 by a true desire to be taught by them1 and to enter into their thoughts4 ,to enter into theirs1 observe2 not to find your own expressed by them4 ,if the person who wrote the book is not wiser than you1 you need not read it2 if he be1 he will think differently from you in many respects4 7#b7 ,very ready we are to say of a book1 8,how good this is--that's exactly what ,i think60 ,but the right feeling is1 8,how strange that is6 ,i never thought of that before1 and yet ,i see it is true2 or if ,i do not now1 ,i hope ,i shall1 some day40 ,but whether thus submissively or not1 at least be sure that you go to the author to get at his meaning1 not to find yours4 ,judge it afterwards if you think yourself qualified to do so2 but ascertain it first4 ,and be sure1 also1 if the author is worth anything1 that you will not get at his meaning all at once2--nay1 that at his whole meaning you will not for a long time arrive in any wise4 ,not that he does not say what he means1 and in strong words too2 but he cannot say it all2 and what is more strange1 will not1 but in a hidden way and in parables1 in order that he may be sure you want it4 ,i cannot quite see the reason of this1 nor analyse that cruel reticence in the breasts of wise men which makes them always hide their deeper thought4 ,they do not give it you by way of help1 but of reward2 and will make themselves sure that you deserve it before they allow you to reach it4 ,but it is the same with the physical type of wisdom1 gold4 ,there seems1 to you and me1 no reason why the electric forces of the earth should not carry whatever there is of gold within it at once to the mountain tops1 so that kings and people might know that all the gold they could get was there2 and without any trouble of digging1 or anxiety1 or chance1 or waste of time1 cut it away1 and coin as much as they needed4 ,but ,nature does not manage it so4 ,she puts it in little fissures in the earth1 nobody knows where3 you may dig long and find none2 you must dig painfully to find any4 ,and it is just the same with men's best wisdom4 ,when you come to a good book1 you must ask yourself1 8,am ,i inclined to work as an ,australian miner would8 ,are my pickaxes and shovels in good order1 and am ,i in good trim myself1 my sleeves well up to the elbow1 and my breath good1 and my temper80 ,and1 keeping the figure a little longer1 even at cost of tiresomeness1 for it is a thoroughly useful one1 the metal you are in search of being the author's mind or meaning1 his words are as the rock which you have to crush and smelt in order to get at it4 ,and your pickaxes are your own care1 wit1 and learning2 your smelting furnace is your own thoughtful soul4 ,do not hope to get at any good author's meaning without those tools and that fire2 often you will need sharpest1 finest chiselling1 and patientest fusing1 before you can gather one grain of the metal4 ,and1 therefore1 first of all1 ,i tell you earnestly and authoritatively 7,i know ,i am right in this71 you must get into the habit of looking intensely at words1 and assuring yourself of their meaning1 syllable by syllable--nay1 letter by letter4 ,for though it is only by reason of the opposition of letters in the function of signs1 to sounds in the function of signs1 that the study of books is called 8literature10 and that a man versed in it is called1 by the consent of nations1 a man of letters instead of a man of books1 or of words1 you may yet connect with that accidental nomenclature this real fact3--that you might read all the books in the ,british ,museum 7if you could live long enough71 and remain an utterly 8illiterate10 uneducated person2 but that if you read ten pages of a good book1 letter by letter1--that is to say1 with real accuracy1--you are for evermore in some measure an educated person4 ,the entire difference between education and non-education 7as regards the merely intellectual part of it71 consists in this accuracy4 ,a well-educated gentleman may not know many languages1--may not be able to speak any but his own1--may have read very few books4 ,but whatever language he knows1 he knows precisely2 whatever word he pronounces1 he pronounces rightly2 above all1 he is learned in the peerage of words2 knows the words of true descent and ancient blood1 at a glance1 from words of modern canaille2 remembers all their ancestry1 their intermarriages1 distant relationships1 and the extent to which they were admitted1 and offices they held1 among the national noblesse of words at any time1 and in any country4 ,but an uneducated person may know1 by memory1 many languages1 and talk them all1 and yet truly know not a word of any1--not a word even of his own4 ,an ordinarily clever and sensible seaman will be able to make his way ashore at most ports2 yet he has only to speak a sentence of any language to be known for an illiterate person3 so also the accent1 or turn of expression of a single sentence1 will at once mark a scholar4 ,and this is so strongly felt1 so conclusively admitted1 by educated persons1 that a false accent or a mistaken syllable is enough1 in the parliament of any civilized nation1 to assign to a man a certain degree of inferior standing for ever4 ,and this is right2 but it is a pity that the accuracy insisted on is not greater1 and required to a serious purpose4 ,it is right that a false ,latin quantity should excite a smile in the ,house of ,commons2 but it is wrong that a false ,english meaning should not excite a frown there4 ,let the accent of words be watched2 and closely3 let their meaning be watched more closely still1 and fewer will do the work4 ,a few words well chosen1 and distinguished1 will do work that a thousand cannot1 when every one is acting1 equivocally1 in the function of another4 ,yes2 and words1 if they are not watched1 will do deadly work sometimes4 ,there are masked words droning and skulking about us in ,europe just now1--7there never were so many1 owing to the spread of a shallow1 blotching1 blundering1 infectious 8information10 or rather deformation1 everywhere1 and to the teaching of catechisms and phrases at school instead of human meanings7--there are masked words abroad1 ,i say1 which nobody understands1 but which everybody uses1 and most people will also fight for1 live for1 or even die for1 fancying they mean this or that1 or the other1 of things dear to them3 for such words wear chameleon cloaks--8ground-lion0 cloaks1 of the colour of the ground of any man's fancy3 on that ground they lie in wait1 and rend them with a spring from it4 ,there never were creatures of prey so mischievous1 never diplomatists so cunning1 never poisoners so deadly1 as these masked words2 they are the unjust stewards of all men's ideas3 whatever fancy or favourite instinct a man most cherishes1 he gives to his favourite masked word to take care of for him2 the word at last comes to have an infinite power over him1--you cannot get at him but by its ministry4 ,and in languages so mongrel in breed as the ,english1 there is a fatal power of equivocation put into men's hands1 almost whether they will or no1 in being able to use ,greek or ,latin words for an idea when they want it to be awful2 and ,saxon or otherwise common words when they want it to be vulgar4 ,what a singular and salutary effect1 for instance1 would be produced on the minds of people who are in the habit of taking the ,form of the 8,word0 they live by1 for the ,power of which that ,word tells them1 if we always either retained1 or refused1 the ,greek form 8biblos10 or 8biblion10 as the right expression for 8book0--instead of employing it only in the one instance in which we wish to give dignity to the idea1 and translating it into ,english everywhere else4 ,how wholesome it would be for many simple persons if1 in such places 7for instance7 as ,acts xix4 #ai1 we retained the ,greek expression1 instead of translating it1 and they had to read--8,many of them also which used curious arts1 brought their bibles together1 and burnt them before all men2 and they counted the price of them1 and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver06 ,or if1 on the other hand1 we translated where we retain it1 and always spoke of 8,the ,holy ,book10 instead of 8,holy ,bible10 it might come into more heads than it does at present1 that the ,word of ,god1 by which the heavens were1 of old1 and by which they are now kept in store1 #f cannot be made a present of to anybody in morocco binding2 nor sown on any wayside by help either of steam plough or steam press2 but is nevertheless being offered to us daily1 and by us with contumely refused2 and sown in us daily1 and by us1 as instantly as may be1 choked4 ,so1 again1 consider what effect has been produced on the ,english vulgar mind by the use of the sonorous ,latin form 8damno10 in translating the ,greek 1 when people charitably wish to make it forcible2 and the substitution of the temperate 8condemn0 for it1 when they choose to keep it gentle2 and what notable sermons have been preached by illiterate clergymen on--8,he that believeth not shall be damned20 though they would shrink with horror from translating ,heb4 xi4 #g1 8,the saving of his house1 by which he damned the world10 or ,john viii4 #aj-aa1 8,woman1 hath no man damned thee8 ,she saith1 ,no man1 ,lord4 ,jesus answered her1 ,neither do ,i damn thee3 go and sin no more40 ,and divisions in the mind of ,europe1 which have cost seas of blood1 and in the defence of which the noblest souls of men have been cast away in frantic desolation1 countless as forest-leaves--though1 in the heart of them1 founded on deeper causes--have nevertheless been rendered practically possible1 mainly1 by the ,european adoption of the ,greek word for a public meeting1 8ecclesia10 to give peculiar respectability to such meetings1 when held for religious purposes2 and other collateral equivocations1 such as the vulgar ,english one of using the word 8,priest0 as a contraction for 8presbyter40 ,now1 in order to deal with words rightly1 this is the habit you must form4 ,nearly every word in your language has been first a word of some other language--of ,saxon1 ,german1 ,french1 ,latin1 or ,greek2 7not to speak of eastern and primitive dialects74 ,and many words have been all these--that is to say1 have been ,greek first1 ,latin next1 ,french or ,german next1 and ,english last3 undergoing a certain change of sense and use on the lips of each nation2 but retaining a deep vital meaning1 which all good scholars feel in employing them1 even at this day4 ,if you do not know the ,greek alphabet1 learn it2 young or old--girl or boy--whoever you may be1 if you think of reading seriously 7which1 of course1 implies that you have some leisure at command71 learn your ,greek alphabet2 then get good dictionaries of all these languages1 and whenever you are in doubt about a word1 hunt it down patiently4 ,read ,max ,mller's lectures thoroughly1 to begin with2 and1 after that1 never let a word escape you that looks suspicious4 ,it is severe work2 but you will find it1 even at first1 interesting1 and at last endlessly amusing4 ,and the general gain to your character1 in power and precision1 will be quite incalculable4 ,mind1 this does not imply knowing1 or trying to know1 ,greek or ,latin1 or ,french4 ,it takes a whole life to learn any language perfectly4 ,but you can easily ascertain the meanings through which the ,english word has passed2 and those which in a good writer's work it must still bear4 ,and now1 merely for example's sake1 ,i will1 with your permission1 read a few lines of a true book with you1 carefully2 and see what will come out of them4 ,i will take a book perfectly known to you all4 ,no ,english words are more familiar to us1 yet few perhaps have been read with less sincerity4 ,i will take these few following lines of ,lycidas3-- 8,last came1 and last did go1 ,the pilot of the ,galilean lake4 ,two massy keys he bore of metals twain1 7,the golden opes1 the iron shuts amain17 ,he shook his mitred locks1 and stern bespake1 #8,how well could ,i have spared for thee1 young swain1 ,enow of such as for their bellies' sake ,creep1 and intrude1 and climb into the fold6 ,of other care they little reckoning make1 ,than how to scramble at the shearers' feast1 ,and shove away the worthy bidden guest2 ,blind mouths6 that scarce themselves know how to hold ,a sheep-hook1 or have learn'd aught else1 the least ,that to the faithful herdman's art belongs6 ,what recks it them8 ,what need they8 ,they are sped2 ,and when they list1 their lean and flashy songs ,grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw2 ,the hungry sheep look up1 and are not fed1 ,but1 swoln with wind1 and the rank mist they draw1 ,rot inwardly1 and foul contagion spread2 ,besides what the grim wolf with privy paw ,daily devours apace1 and nothing said4'0 ,let us think over this passage1 and examine its words4 ,first1 is it not singular to find ,milton assigning to ,st4 ,peter1 not only his full episcopal function1 but the very types of it which ,protestants usually refuse most passionately8 ,his 8mitred0 locks6 ,milton was no ,bishop-lover2 how comes ,st4 ,peter to be 8mitred08 8,two massy keys he bore40 ,is this1 then1 the power of the keys claimed by the ,bishops of ,rome8 and is it acknowledged here by ,milton only in a poetical licence1 for the sake of its picturesqueness1 that he may get the gleam of the golden keys to help his effect8 ,do not think it4 ,great men do not play stage tricks with the doctrines of life and death3 only little men do that4 ,milton means what he says2 and means it with his might too--is going to put the whole strength of his spirit presently into the saying of it4 ,for though not a lover of false bishops1 he was a lover of true ones2 and the ,lake-pilot is here1 in his thoughts1 the type and head of true episcopal power4 ,for ,milton reads that text1 8,i will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven10 quite honestly4 ,puritan though he be1 he would not blot it out of the book because there have been bad bishops2 nay1 in order to understand him1 we must understand that verse first2 it will not do to eye it askance1 or whisper it under our breath1 as if it were a weapon of an adverse sect4 ,it is a solemn1 universal assertion1 deeply to be kept in mind by all sects4 ,but perhaps we shall be better able to reason on it if we go on a little farther1 and come back to it4 ,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 episcopate2 or generally1 against false claimants of power and rank in the body of the clergy2 they who1 8for their bellies' sake1 creep1 and intrude1 and climb into the fold40 ,never think ,milton uses those three words to fill up his verse1 as a loose writer would4 ,he needs all the three2--especially those three1 and no more than those--8creep10 and 8intrude10 and 8climb20 no other words would or could serve the turn1 and no more could be added4 ,for they exhaustively comprehend the three classes1 correspondent to the three characters1 of men who dishonestly seek ecclesiastical power4 ,first1 those who 8creep0 into the fold2 who do not care for office1 nor name1 but for secret influence1 and do all things occultly and cunningly1 consenting to any servility of office or conduct1 so only that they may intimately discern1 and unawares direct1 the minds of men4 ,then those who 8intrude0 7thrust1 that is7 themselves into the fold1 who by natural insolence of heart1 and stout eloquence of tongue1 and fearlessly perseverant self-assertion1 obtain hearing and authority with the common crowd4 ,lastly1 those who 8climb10 who1 by labour and learning1 both stout and sound1 but selfishly exerted in the cause of their own ambition1 gain high dignities and authorities1 and become 8lords over the heritage10 though not 8ensamples to the flock40 ,now go on3-- 8,of other care they little reckoning make1 ,than how to scramble at the shearers' feast4 ,blind mouths--0 ,i pause again1 for this is a strange expression2 a broken metaphor1 one might think1 careless and unscholarly4 ,not so3 its very audacity and pithiness are intended to make us look close at the phrase and remember it4 ,those two monosyllables express the precisely accurate contraries of right character1 in the two great offices of the ,church--those of bishop and pastor4 ,a 8,bishop0 means 8a person who sees40 ,a 8,pastor0 means 8a person who feeds40 ,the most unbishoply character a man can have is therefore to be ,blind4 ,the most unpastoral is1 instead of feeding1 to want to be fed1--to be a ,mouth4 ,take the two reverses together1 and you have 8blind mouths40 ,we may advisably follow out this idea a little4 ,nearly all the evils in the ,church have arisen from bishops desiring power more than light4 ,they want authority1 not outlook4 ,whereas their real office is not to rule2 though it may be vigorously to exhort and rebuke3 it is the king's office to rule2 the bishop's office is to oversee the flock2 to number it1 sheep by sheep2 to be ready always to give full account of it4 ,now it is clear he cannot give account of the souls1 if he has not so much as numbered the bodies1 of his flock4 ,the first thing1 therefore1 that a bishop has to do is at least to put himself in a position in which1 at any moment1 he can obtain the history1 from childhood1 of every living soul in his diocese1 and of its present state4 ,down in that back street1 ,bill1 and ,nancy1 knocking each other's teeth out6--,does the bishop know all about it8 ,has he his eye upon them8 ,has he had his eye upon them8 ,can he circumstantially explain to us how ,bill got into the habit of beating ,nancy about the head8 ,if he cannot1 he is no bishop1 though he had a mitre as high as ,salisbury steeple2 he is no bishop1--he has sought to be at the helm instead of the masthead2 he has no sight of things4 8,nay10 you say1 8it is not his duty to look after ,bill in the back street40 ,what6 the fat sheep that have full fleeces--you think it is only those he should look after while 7go back to your ,milton7 8the hungry sheep look up1 and are not fed1 besides what the grim wolf1 with privy paw0 7bishops knowing nothing about it71 8daily devours apace1 and nothing said08 8,but that's not our idea of a bishop40 #g ,perhaps not2 but it was ,st4 ,paul's2 and it was ,milton's4 ,they may be right1 or we may be2 but we must not think we are reading either one or the other by putting our meaning into their words4 ,i go on4 8,but swoln with wind1 and the rank mist they draw40 ,this is to meet the vulgar answer that 8if the poor are not looked after in their bodies1 they are in their souls2 they have spiritual food40 ,and ,milton says1 8,they have no such thing as spiritual food2 they are only swollen with wind40 ,at first you may think that is a coarse type1 and an obscure one4 ,but again1 it is a quite literally accurate one4 ,take up your ,latin and ,greek dictionaries1 and find out the meaning of 8,spirit40 ,it is only a contraction of the ,latin word 8breath10 and an indistinct translation of the ,greek word for 8wind40 ,the same word is used in writing1 8,the wind bloweth where it listeth20 and in writing1 8,so is every one that is born of the ,spirit20 born of the breath1 that is2 for it means the breath of ,god1 in soul and body4 ,we have the true sense of it in our words 8inspiration0 and 8expire40 ,now1 there are two kinds of breath with which the flock may be filled1--,god's breath1 and man's4 ,the breath of ,god is health1 and life1 and peace to them1 as the air of heaven is to the flocks on the hills2 but man's breath--the word which he calls spiritual1--is disease and contagion to them1 as the fog of the fen4 ,they rot inwardly with it2 they are puffed up by it1 as a dead body by the vapours of its own decomposition4 ,this is literally true of all false religious teaching2 the first and last1 and fatalest sign of it1 is that 8puffing up40 ,your converted children1 who teach their parents2 your converted convicts1 who teach honest men2 your converted dunces1 who1 having lived in cretinous stupefaction half their lives1 suddenly awaking to the fact of there being a ,god1 fancy themselves therefore ,his peculiar people and messengers2 your sectarians of every species1 small and great1 ,catholic or ,protestant1 of high church or low1 in so far as they think themselves exclusively in the right and others wrong2 and1 pre-eminently1 in every sect1 those who hold that men can be saved by thinking rightly instead of doing rightly1 by word instead of act1 and wish instead of work2--these are the true fog children--clouds1 these1 without water2 bodies1 these1 of putrescent vapour and skin1 without blood or flesh3 blown bag-pipes for the fiends to pipe with--corrupt1 and corrupting1--8 ,swollen with wind1 and the rank mist they draw40 ,lastly1 let us return to the lines respecting the power of the keys1 for now we can understand them4 ,note the difference between ,milton and ,dante in their interpretation of this power3 for once1 the latter is weaker in thought2 he supposes both the keys to be of the gate of heaven2 one is of gold1 the other of silver3 they are given by ,st4 ,peter to the sentinel angel2 and it is not easy to determine the meaning either of the substances of the three steps of the gate1 or of the two keys4 ,but ,milton makes one1 of gold1 the key of heaven2 the other1 of iron1 the key of the prison in which the wicked teachers are to be bound who 8have taken away the key of knowledge1 yet entered not in themselves40 ,we have seen that the duties of bishop and pastor are to see1 and feed2 and of all who do so it is said1 8,he that watereth1 shall be watered also himself40 ,but the reverse is truth also4 ,he that watereth not1 shall be withered himself2 and he that seeth not1 shall himself be shut out of sight--shut into the perpetual prison-house4 ,and that prison opens here1 as well as hereafter3 he who is to be bound in heaven must first be bound on earth4 ,that command to the strong angels1 of which the rock-apostle is the image1 8,take him1 and bind him hand and foot1 and cast him out10 issues1 in its measure1 against the teacher1 for every help withheld1 and for every truth refused1 and for every falsehood enforced2 so that he is more strictly fettered the more he fetters1 and farther outcast as he more and more misleads1 till at last the bars of the iron cage close upon him1 and as 8the golden opes1 the iron shuts amain40 ,we have got something out of the lines1 ,i think1 and much more is yet to be found in them2 but we have done enough by way of example of the kind of word-by-word examination of your author which is rightly called 8reading20 watching every accent and expression1 and putting ourselves always in the author's place1 annihilating our own personality1 and seeking to enter into his1 so as to be able assuredly to say1 8,thus ,milton thought10 not 8,thus ,i thought1 in misreading ,milton40 ,and by this process you will gradually come to attach less weight to your own 8,thus ,i thought0 at other times4 ,you will begin to perceive that what you thought was a matter of no serious importance2--that your thoughts on any subject are not perhaps the clearest and wisest that could be arrived at thereupon3--in fact1 that unless you are a very singular person1 you cannot be said to have any 8thoughts0 at all2 that you have no materials for them1 in any serious matters2 #h--no right to 8think10 but only to try to learn more of the facts4 ,nay1 most probably all your life 7unless1 as ,i said1 you are a singular person7 you will have no legitimate right to an 8opinion0 on any business1 except that instantly under your hand4 ,what must of necessity be done1 you can always find out1 beyond question1 how to do4 ,have you a house to keep in order1 a commodity to sell1 a field to plough1 a ditch to cleanse8 ,there need be no two opinions about these proceedings2 it is at your peril if you have not much more than an 8opinion0 on the way to manage such matters4 ,and also1 outside of your own business1 there are one or two subjects on which you are bound to have but one opinion4 ,that roguery and lying are objectionable1 and are instantly to be flogged out of the way whenever discovered2--that covetousness and love of quarrelling are dangerous dispositions even in children1 and deadly dispositions in men and nations2--that1 in the end1 the ,god of heaven and earth loves active1 modest1 and kind people1 and hates idle1 proud1 greedy1 and cruel ones2--on these general facts you are bound to have but one1 and that a very strong1 opinion4 ,for the rest1 respecting religions1 governments1 sciences1 arts1 you will find that1 on the whole1 you can know ,,nothing1--judge nothing2 that the best you can do1 even though you may be a well-educated person1 is to be silent1 and strive to be wiser every day1 and to understand a little more of the thoughts of others1 which so soon as you try to do honestly1 you will discover that the thoughts even of the wisest are very little more than pertinent questions4 ,to put the difficulty into a clear shape1 and exhibit to you the grounds for indecision1 that is all they can generally do for you6--and well for them and for us1 if indeed they are able 8to mix the music with our thoughts and sadden us with heavenly doubts40 ,this writer1 from whom ,i have been reading to you1 is not among the first or wisest3 he sees shrewdly as far as he sees1 and therefore it is easy to find out its full meaning2 but with the greater men1 you cannot fathom their meaning2 they do not even wholly measure it themselves1--it is so wide4 ,suppose ,i had asked you1 for instance1 to seek for ,shakespeare's opinion1 instead of ,milton's on this matter of ,church authority8--or for ,dante's8 ,have any of you1 at this instant1 the least idea what either thought about it8 ,have you ever balanced the scene with the bishops in #8,richard ,,iii4' against the character of ,cranmer8 the description of ,st4 ,francis and ,st4 ,dominic against that of him who made ,virgil wonder to gaze upon him1--8disteso1 tanto vilmente1 nell' eterno esilio20 or of him whom ,dante stood beside1 8come 'l frate che confessa lo perfido assassin80 #i ,shakespeare and ,alighieri knew men better than most of us1 ,i presume6 ,they were both in the midst of the main struggle between the temporal and spiritual powers4 ,they had an opinion1 we may guess4 ,but where is it8 ,bring it into court6 ,put ,shakespeare's or ,dante's creed into articles1 and send it up for trial by the ,ecclesiastical ,courts6 ,you will not be able1 ,i tell you again1 for many and many a day1 to come at the real purposes and teaching of these great men2 but a very little honest study of them will enable you to perceive that what you took for your own 8judgment0 was mere chance prejudice1 and drifted1 helpless1 entangled weed of castaway thought2 nay1 you will see that most men's minds are indeed little better than rough heath wilderness1 neglected and stubborn1 partly barren1 partly overgrown with pestilent brakes1 and venomous1 wind-sown herbage of evil surmise2 that the first thing you have to do for them1 and yourself1 is eagerly and scornfully to set fire to this2 burn all the jungle into wholesome ash-heaps1 and then plough and sow4 ,all the true literary work before you1 for life1 must begin with obedience to that order1 8,break up your fallow ground1 and sow not among thorns40 ,,ii4 #aj ,having then faithfully listened to the great teachers1 that you may enter into their ,thoughts1 you have yet this higher advance to make2--you have to enter into their ,hearts4 ,as you go to them first for clear sight1 so you must stay with them1 that you may share at last their just and mighty ,passion4 ,passion1 or 8sensation40 ,i am not afraid of the word2 still less of the thing4 ,you have heard many outcries against sensation lately2 but1 ,i can tell you1 it is not less sensation we want1 but more4 ,the ennobling difference between one man and another1--between one animal and another1--is precisely in this1 that one feels more than another4 ,if we were sponges1 perhaps sensation might not be easily got for us2 if we were earth-worms1 liable at every instant to be cut in two by the spade1 perhaps too much sensation might not be good for us4 ,but being human creatures1 it is good for us2 nay1 we are only human in so far as we are sensitive1 and our honour is precisely in proportion to our passion4 ,you know ,i said of that great and pure society of the ,dead1 that it would allow 8no vain or vulgar person to enter there40 ,what do you think ,i meant by a 8vulgar0 person8 ,what do you yourselves mean by 8vulgarity08 ,you will find it a fruitful subject of thought2 but1 briefly1 the essence of all vulgarity lies in want of sensation4 ,simple and innocent vulgarity is merely an untrained and undeveloped bluntness of body and mind2 but in true inbred vulgarity1 there is a dreadful callousness1 which1 in extremity1 becomes capable of every sort of bestial habit and crime1 without fear1 without pleasure1 without horror1 and without pity4 ,it is in the blunt hand and the dead heart1 in the diseased habit1 in the hardened conscience1 that men become vulgar2 they are for ever vulgar1 precisely in proportion as they are incapable of sympathy1--of quick understanding1--of all that1 in deep insistence on the common1 but most accurate term1 may be called the 8tact0 or 8touch-faculty10 of body and soul3 that tact which the ,mimosa has in trees1 which the pure woman has above all creatures2--fineness and fulness of sensation1 beyond reason2--the guide and sanctifier of reason itself4 ,reason can but determine what is true3--it is the ,god-given passion of humanity which alone can recognise what ,god has made good4 ,we come then to that great concourse of the ,dead1 not merely to know from them what is ,true1 but chiefly to feel with them what is just4 ,now1 to feel with them1 we must be like them2 and none of us can become that without pains4 ,as the true knowledge is disciplined and tested knowledge1--not the first thought that comes1 so the true passion is disciplined and tested passion1--not the first passion that comes4 ,the first that come are the vain1 the false1 the treacherous2 if you yield to them they will lead you wildly and far1 in vain pursuit1 in hollow enthusiasm1 till you have no true purpose and no true passion left4 ,not that any feeling possible to humanity is in itself wrong1 but only wrong when undisciplined4 ,its nobility is in its force and justice2 it is wrong when it is weak1 and felt for paltry cause4 ,there is a mean wonder1 as of a child who sees a juggler tossing golden balls2 and this is base1 if you will4 ,but do you think that the wonder is ignoble1 or the sensation less1 with which every human soul is called to watch the golden balls of heaven tossed through the night by the ,hand that made them8 ,there is a mean curiosity1 as of a child opening a forbidden door1 or a servant prying into her master's business2--and a noble curiosity1 questioning1 in the front of danger1 the source of the great river beyond the sand1--the place of the great continents beyond the sea2--a nobler curiosity still1 which questions of the source of the ,river of ,life1 and of the space of the ,continent of ,heaven1--things which 8the angels desire to look into40 ,so the anxiety is ignoble1 with which you linger over the course and catastrophe of an idle tale2 but do you think the anxiety is less1 or greater1 with which you watch1 or ought to watch1 the dealings of fate and destiny with the life of an agonized nation8 ,alas6 it is the narrowness1 selfishness1 minuteness1 of your sensation that you have to deplore in ,england at this day2--sensation which spends itself in bouquets and speeches3 in revellings and junketings2 in sham fights and gay puppet shows1 while you can look on and see noble nations murdered1 man by man1 without an effort or a tear4 ,i said 8minuteness0 and 8selfishness0 of sensation1 but it would have been enough to have said 8injustice0 or 8unrighteousness0 of sensation4 ,for as in nothing is a gentleman better to be discerned from a vulgar person1 so in nothing is a gentle nation 7such nations have been7 better to be discerned from a mob1 than in this1--that their feelings are constant and just1 results of due contemplation1 and of equal thought4 ,you can talk a mob into anything2 its feelings may be--usually are--on the whole1 generous and right2 but it has no foundation for them1 no hold of them2 you may tease or tickle it into any1 at your pleasure2 it thinks by infection1 for the most part1 catching an opinion like a cold1 and there is nothing so little that it will not roar itself wild about1 when the fit is on2--nothing so great but it will forget in an hour1 when the fit is past4 ,but a gentleman's1 or a gentle nation's1 passions are just1 measured1 and continuous4 ,a great nation1 for instance1 does not spend its entire national wits for a couple of months in weighing evidence of a single ruffian's having done a single murder2 and for a couple of years see its own children murder each other by their thousands or tens of thousands a day1 considering only what the effect is likely to be on the price of cotton1 and caring no wise to determine which side of battle is in the wrong4 ,neither does a great nation send its poor little boys to jail for stealing six walnuts2 and allow its bankrupts to steal their hundreds of thousands with a bow1 and its bankers1 rich with poor men's savings1 to close their doors 8under circumstances over which they have no control10 with a 8by your leave20 and large landed estates to be bought by men who have made their money by going with armed steamers up and down the ,china ,seas1 selling opium at the cannon's mouth1 and altering1 for the benefit of the foreign nation1 the common highwayman's demand of 8your money or your life10 into that of 8your money and your life40 ,neither does a great nation allow the lives of its innocent poor to be parched out of them by fog fever1 and rotted out of them by dunghill plague1 for the sake of sixpence a life extra per week to its landlords2 #aa and then debate1 with drivelling tears1 and diabolical sympathies1 whether it ought not piously to save1 and nursingly cherish1 the lives of its murderers4 ,also1 a great nation having made up its mind that hanging is quite the wholesomest process for its homicides in general1 can yet with mercy distinguish between the degrees of guilt in homicides2 and does not yelp like a pack of frost-pinched wolf-cubs on the blood-track of an unhappy crazed boy1 or grey-haired clodpate ,othello1 8perplexed i' the extreme10 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 fathers' sight1 and killing noble youths in cool blood1 faster than a country butcher kills lambs in spring4 ,and1 lastly1 a great nation does not mock ,heaven and its ,powers1 by pretending belief in a revelation which asserts the love of money to be the root of all evil1 and declaring1 at the same time1 that it is actuated1 and intends to be actuated1 in all chief national deeds and measures1 by no other love4 #ab ,my friends1 ,i do not know why any of us should talk about reading4 ,we want some sharper discipline than that of reading2 but1 at all events1 be assured1 we cannot read4 ,no reading is possible for a people with its mind in this state4 ,no sentence of any great writer is intelligible to them4 ,it is simply and sternly impossible for the ,english public1 at this moment1 to understand any thoughtful writing1--so incapable of thought has it become in its insanity of avarice4 ,happily1 our disease is1 as yet1 little worse than this incapacity of thought2 it is not corruption of the inner nature2 we ring true still1 when anything strikes home to us2 and though the idea that everything should 8pay0 has infected our every purpose so deeply1 that even when we would play the good ,samaritan1 we never take out our two pence and give them to the host1 without saying1 8,when ,i come again1 thou shalt give me fourpence10 there is a capacity of noble passion left in our hearts' core4 ,we show it in our work--in our war1--even in those unjust domestic affections which make us furious at a small private wrong1 while we are polite to a boundless public one3 we are still industrious to the last hour of the day1 though we add the gambler's fury to the labourer's patience2 we are still brave to the death1 though incapable of discerning true cause for battle2 and are still true in affection to our own flesh1 to the death1 as the sea-monsters are1 and the rock-eagles4 ,and there is hope for a nation while this can be still said of it4 ,as long as it holds its life in its hand1 ready to give it for its honour 7though a foolish honour71 for its love 7though a selfish love71 and for its business 7though a base business71 there is hope for it4 ,but hope only2 for this instinctive1 reckless virtue cannot last4 ,no nation can last1 which has made a mob of itself1 however generous at heart4 ,it must discipline its passions1 and direct them1 or they will discipline it1 one day1 with scorpion whips4 ,above all1 a nation cannot last as a money-making mob3 it cannot with impunity1--it cannot with existence1--go on despising literature1 despising science1 despising art1 despising nature1 despising compassion1 and concentrating its soul on ,pence4 ,do you think these are harsh or wild words8 ,have patience with me but a little longer4 ,i will prove their truth to you1 clause by clause4 7,i47 ,i say first we have despised literature4 ,what do we1 as a nation1 care about books8 ,how much do you think we spend altogether on our libraries1 public or private1 as compared with what we spend on our horses8 ,if a man spends lavishly on his library1 you call him mad--a bibliomaniac4 ,but you never call any one a horsemaniac1 though men ruin themselves every day by their horses1 and you do not hear of people ruining themselves by their books4 ,or1 to go lower still1 how much do you think the contents of the book-shelves of the ,united ,kingdom1 public and private1 would fetch1 as compared with the contents of its wine-cellars8 ,what position would its expenditure on literature take1 as compared with its expenditure on luxurious eating8 ,we talk of food for the mind1 as of food for the body3 now a good book contains such food inexhaustibly2 it is a provision for life1 and for the best part of us2 yet how long most people would look at the best book before they would give the price of a large turbot for it8 ,though there have been men who have pinched their stomachs and bared their backs to buy a book1 whose libraries were cheaper to them1 ,i think1 in the end1 than most men's dinners are4 ,we are few of us put to such trial1 and more the pity2 for1 indeed1 a precious thing is all the more precious to us if it has been won by work or economy2 and if public libraries were half so costly as public dinners1 or books cost the tenth part of what bracelets do1 even foolish men and women might sometimes suspect there was good in reading1 as well as in munching and sparkling3 whereas the very cheapness of literature is making even wise people forget that if a book is worth reading1 it is worth buying4 ,no book is worth anything which is not worth much2 nor is it serviceable1 until it has been read1 and re-read1 and loved1 and loved again2 and marked1 so that you can refer to the passages you want in it1 as a soldier can seize the weapon he needs in an armoury1 or a housewife bring the spice she needs from her store4 ,bread of flour is good2 but there is bread1 sweet as honey1 if we would eat it1 in a good book2 and the family must be poor indeed1 which1 once in their lives1 cannot1 for1 such multipliable barley-loaves1 pay their baker's bill4 ,we call ourselves a rich nation1 and we are filthy and foolish enough to thumb each other's books out of circulating libraries6 7,,ii47 ,i say we have despised science4 8,what60 you exclaim1 8are we not foremost in all discovery1 #ac and is not the whole world giddy by reason1 or unreason1 of our inventions80 ,yes2 but do you suppose that is national work8 ,that work is all done in spite of the nation2 by private people's zeal and money4 ,we are glad enough1 indeed1 to make our profit of science2 we snap up anything in the way of a scientific bone that has meat on it1 eagerly enough2 but if the scientific man comes for a bone or a crust to us1 that is another story4 ,what have we publicly done for science8 ,we are obliged to know what o'clock it is1 for the safety of our ships1 and therefore we pay for an observatory2 and we allow ourselves1 in the person of our ,parliament1 to be annually tormented into doing something1 in a slovenly way1 for the ,british ,museum2 sullenly apprehending that to be a place for keeping stuffed birds in1 to amuse our children4 ,if anybody will pay for their own telescope1 and resolve another nebula1 we cackle over the discernment as if it were our own2 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 foxes1 and burrows in it himself1 and tells us where the gold is1 and where the coals1 we understand that there is some use in that2 and very properly knight him3 but is the accident of his having found out how to employ himself usefully any credit to us8 7,the negation of such discovery among his brother squires may perhaps be some discredit to us1 if we would consider of it47 ,but if you doubt these generalities1 here is one fact for us all to meditate upon1 illustrative of our love of science4 ,two years ago there was a collection of the fossils of ,solenhofen to be sold in ,bavaria2 the best in existence1 containing many specimens unique for perfectness1 and one unique as an example of a species 7a whole kingdom of unknown living creatures being announced by that fossil74 ,this collection1 of which the mere market worth1 among private buyers1 would probably have been some thousand or twelve hundred pounds1 was offered to the ,english nation for seven hundred3 but we would not give seven hundred1 and the whole series would have been in the ,munich ,museum at this moment1 if ,professor ,owen #ad had not1 with loss of his own time1 and patient tormenting of the ,british public in person of its representatives1 got leave to give four hundred pounds at once1 and himself become answerable for the other three6 which the said public will doubtless pay him eventually1 but sulkily1 and caring nothing about the matter all the while2 only always ready to cackle if any credit comes of it4 ,consider1 ,i beg of you1 arithmetically1 what this fact means4 ,your annual expenditure for public purposes1 7a third of it for military apparatus17 is at least #ej millions4 ,now #gjjl4 is to #ej1jjj1jjjl4 roughly1 as seven pence to two thousand pounds4 ,suppose1 then1 a gentleman of unknown income1 but whose wealth was to be conjectured from the fact that he spent two thousand a year on his park-walls and footmen only1 professes himself fond of science2 and that one of his servants comes eagerly to tell him that an unique collection of fossils1 giving clue to a new era of creation1 is to be had for the sum of seven pence sterling2 and that the gentleman who is fond of science1 and spends two thousand a year on his park1 answers1 after keeping his servant waiting several months1 8,well6 ,i'll give you fourpence for them1 if you will be answerable for the extra threepence yourself1 till next year60 7,,iii47 ,i say you have despised ,art6 8,what60 you again answer1 8have we not ,art exhibitions1 miles long8 and do we not pay thousands of pounds for single pictures8 and have we not ,art schools and institutions1--more than ever nation had before80 ,yes1 truly1 but all that is for the sake of the shop4 ,you would fain sell canvas as well as coals1 and crockery as well as iron2 you would take every other nation's bread out of its mouth if you could2 #ae not being able to do that1 your ideal of life is to stand in the thoroughfares of the world1 like ,ludgate apprentices1 screaming to every passer-by1 8,what d'ye lack80 ,you know nothing of your own faculties or circumstances2 you fancy that1 among your damp1 flat1 fat fields of clay1 you can have as quick art-fancy as the ,frenchman among his bronzed vines1 or the ,italian under his volcanic cliffs2--that ,art may be learned1 as book-keeping is1 and when learned1 will give you more books to keep4 ,you care for pictures1 absolutely1 no more than you do for the bills pasted on your dead walls4 ,there is always room on the walls for the bills to be read1--never for the pictures to be seen4 ,you do not know what pictures you have 7by repute7 in the country1 nor whether they are false or true1 nor whether they are taken care of or not2 in foreign countries1 you calmly see the noblest existing pictures in the world rotting in abandoned wreck--7in ,venice you saw the ,austrian guns deliberately pointed at the palaces containing them71 and if you heard that all the fine pictures in ,europe were made into sand-bags to-morrow on the ,austrian forts1 it would not trouble you so much as the chance of a brace or two of game less in your own bags1 in a day's shooting4 ,that is your national love of ,art4 7,,iv47 ,you have despised ,nature2 that is to say1 all the deep and sacred sensations of natural scenery4 ,the ,french revolutionists made stables of the cathedrals of ,france2 you have made race-courses of the cathedrals of the earth4 ,your one conception of pleasure is to drive in railroad carriages round their aisles1 and eat off their altars4 #af ,you have put a railroad-bridge over the falls of ,schaffhausen4 ,you have tunnelled the cliffs of ,lucerne by ,tell's chapel2 you have destroyed the ,clarens shore of the ,lake of ,geneva2 there is not a quiet valley in ,england that you have not filled with bellowing fire2 there is no particle left of ,english land which you have not trampled coal ashes into #ag--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' shops3 the ,alps themselves1 which your own poets used to love so reverently1 you look upon as soaped poles in a bear-garden1 which you set yourselves to climb and slide down again1 with 8shrieks of delight40 ,when you are past shrieking1 having no human articulate voice to say you are glad with1 you fill the quietude of their valleys with gunpowder blasts1 and rush home1 red with cutaneous eruption of conceit1 and voluble with convulsive hiccough of self-satisfaction4 ,i think nearly the two sorrowfullest spectacles ,i have ever seen in humanity1 taking the deep inner significance of them1 are the ,english mobs in the valley of ,chamouni1 amusing themselves with firing rusty howitzers2 and the ,swiss vintagers of ,zurich expressing their ,christian thanks for the gift of the vine1 by assembling in knots in the 8towers of the vineyards10 and slowly loading and firing horse-pistols from morning till evening4 ,it is pitiful1 to have dim conceptions of duty2 more pitiful1 it seems to me1 to have conceptions like these1 of mirth4 ,lastly4 ,you despise compassion4 ,there is no need of words of mine for proof of this4 ,i will merely print one of the newspaper paragraphs which ,i am in the habit of cutting out and throwing into my store-drawer2 here is one from a #8,daily ,telegraph' of an early date this year 7#ahfg72 7date which1 though by me carelessly left unmarked1 is easily discoverable2 for on the back of the slip there is the announcement that 8yesterday the seventh of the special services of this year was performed by the ,bishop of ,ripon in ,st4 ,paul's027 it relates only one of such facts as happen now daily2 this by chance having taken a form in which it came before the coroner4 ,i will print the paragraph in red4 ,be sure1 the facts themselves are written in that colour1 in a book which we shall all of us1 literate or illiterate1 have to read our page of1 some day4 ,an inquiry was held on ,friday by ,mr4 ,richards1 deputy coroner1 at the ,white ,horse ,tavern1 ,christ ,church1 ,spitalfields1 respecting the death of ,michael ,collins1 aged #eh years4 ,mary ,collins1 a miserable-looking woman1 said that she lived with the deceased and his son in a room at #b1 ,cobb's ,court1 ,christ ,church4 ,deceased was a 8translator0 of boots4 ,witness went out and bought old boots2 deceased and his son made them into good ones1 and then witness sold them for what she could get at the shops1 which was very little indeed4 ,deceased and his son used to work night and day to try and get a little bread and tea1 and pay for the room 7#bs4 a week71 so as to keep the home together4 ,on ,friday-night-week deceased got up from his bench and began to shiver4 ,he threw down the boots1 saying1 8,somebody else must finish them when ,i am gone1 for ,i can do no more40 ,there was no fire1 and he said1 8,i would be better if ,i was warm40 ,witness therefore took two pairs of translated boots #ah to sell at the shop1 but she could only get #ad;d4 for the two pairs1 for the people at the shop said1 8,we must have our profit40 ,witness got #adlb4 of coal1 and a little tea and bread4 ,her son sat up the whole night to make the 8translations10 to get money1 but deceased died on ,saturday morning4 ,the family never had enough to eat4--,coroner3 8,it seems to me deplorable that you did not go into the workhouse40 ,witness3 8,we wanted the comforts of our little home40 ,a juror asked what the comforts were1 for he only saw a little straw in the corner of the room1 the windows of which were broken4 ,the witness began to cry1 and said that they had a quilt and other little things4 ,the deceased said he never would go into the workhouse4 ,in summer1 when the season was good1 they sometimes made as much as #ajs4 profit in the week4 ,they then always saved towards the next week1 which was generally a bad one4 ,in winter they made not half so much4 ,for three years they had been getting from bad to worse4--,cornelius ,collins said that he had assisted his father since #ahdg4 ,they used to work so far into the night that both nearly lost their eyesight4 ,witness now had a film over his eyes4 ,five years ago deceased applied to the parish for aid4 ,the relieving officer gave him a #dlb4 loaf1 and told him if he came again he should 8get the stones40 #ai ,that disgusted deceased1 and he would have nothing to do with them since4 ,they got worse and worse until last ,friday week1 when they had not even a half-penny to buy a candle4 ,deceased then lay down on the straw1 and said he could not live till morning4--,a juror3 8,you are dying of starvation yourself1 and you ought to go into the house until the summer40--,witness3 8,if we went in we should die4 ,when we come out in the summer we should be like people dropped from the sky4 ,no one would know us1 and we would not have even a room4 ,i could work now if ,i had food1 for my sight would get better40 ,dr4 ,g4 ,p4 ,walker said deceased died from syncope1 from exhaustion from want of food4 ,the deceased had had no bedclothes4 ,for four months he had had nothing but bread to eat4 ,there was not a particle of fat in the body4 ,there was no disease1 but1 if there had been medical attendance1 he might have survived the syncope or fainting4 ,the ,coroner having remarked upon the painful nature of the case1 the jury returned the following verdict3 8,that deceased died from exhaustion from want of food and the common necessaries of life2 also through want of medical aid40 8,why would witness not go into the workhouse80 you ask4 ,well1 the poor seem to have a prejudice against the workhouse which the rich have not2 for of course everyone who takes a pension from ,government goes into the workhouse on a grand scale3 #bj only the workhouses for the rich do not involve the idea of work1 and should be called play-houses4 ,but the poor like to die independently1 it appears2 perhaps if we made the play-houses for them pretty and pleasant enough1 or gave them their pensions at home1 and allowed them a little introductory peculation with the public money1 their minds might be reconciled to the conditions4 ,meantime1 here are the facts3 we make our relief either so insulting to them1 or so painful1 that they rather die than take it at our hands2 or1 for third alternative1 we leave them so untaught and foolish that they starve like brute creatures1 wild and dumb1 not knowing what to do1 or what to ask4 ,i say1 you despise compassion2 if you did not1 such a newspaper paragraph would be as impossible in a ,christian country as a deliberate assassination permitted in its public streets4 #ba 8,christian10 did ,i say8 ,alas6 if we were but wholesomely un-,christian1 it would be impossible3 it is our imaginary ,christianity that helps us to commit these crimes1 for we revel and luxuriate in our faith1 for the lewd sensation of it2 dressing it up1 like everything else1 in fiction4 ,the dramatic ,christianity of the organ and aisle1 of dawn-service and twilight-revival--the ,christianity1 which we do not fear to mix the mockery of1 pictorially1 with our play about the devil1 in our ,satanellas1--,roberts1--,fausts2 chanting hymns through traceried windows for background effect1 and artistically modulating the 8,dio0 through variation on variation of mimicked prayer3 7while we distribute tracts1 next day1 for the benefit of uncultivated swearers1 upon what we suppose to be the signification of the ,third ,commandment2--7 this gas-lighted1 and gas-inspired ,christianity1 we are triumphant in1 and draw back the hem of our robes from the touch of the heretics who dispute it4 ,but to do a piece of common ,christian righteousness in a plain ,english word or deed2 to make ,christian law any rule of life1 and found one ,national act or hope thereon1--we know too well what our faith comes to for that6 ,you might sooner get lightning out of incense smoke than true action or passion out of your modern ,english religion4 ,you had better get rid of the smoke1 and the organ pipes1 both3 leave them1 and the ,gothic windows1 and the painted glass1 to the property man2 give up your carburetted hydrogen ghost in one healthy expiration1 and look after ,lazarus at the doorstep4 ,for there is a true ,church wherever one hand meets another helpfully1 and that is the only holy or ,mother ,church which ever was1 or ever shall be4 ,all these pleasures then1 and all these virtues1 ,i repeat1 you nationally despise4 ,you have1 indeed1 men among you who do not2 by whose work1 by whose strength1 by whose life1 by whose death1 you live1 and never thank them4 ,your wealth1 your amusement1 your pride1 would all be alike impossible1 but for those whom you scorn or forget4 ,the policeman1 who is walking up and down the black lane all night to watch the guilt you have created there2 and may have his brains beaten out1 and be maimed for life1 at any moment1 and never be thanked2 the sailor wrestling with the sea's rage2 the quiet student poring over his book or his vial2 the common worker1 without praise1 and nearly without bread1 fulfilling his task as your horses drag your carts1 hopeless1 and spurned of all3 these are the men by whom ,england lives2 but they are not the nation2 they are only the body and nervous force of it1 acting still from old habit in a convulsive perseverance1 while the mind is gone4 ,our ,national wish and purpose are only to be amused2 our ,national religion is the performance of church ceremonies1 and preaching of soporific truth 7or untruths7 to keep the mob quietly at work1 while we amuse ourselves2 and the necessity for this amusement is fastening on us1 as a feverous disease of parched throat and wandering eyes--senseless1 dissolute1 merciless4 ,how literally that word ,dis-,ease1 the ,negation and impossibility of ,ease1 expresses the entire moral state of our ,english ,industry and its ,amusements6 ,when men are rightly occupied1 their amusement grows out of their work1 as the colour-petals out of a fruitful flower2--when they are faithfully helpful and compassionate1 all their emotions become steady1 deep1 perpetual1 and vivifying to the soul as the natural pulse to the body4 ,but now1 having no true business1 we pour our whole masculine energy into the false business of money-making2 and having no true emotion1 we must have false emotions dressed up for us to play with1 not innocently1 as children with dolls1 but guiltily and darkly1 as the idolatrous ,jews with their pictures on cavern walls1 which men had to dig to detect4 ,the justice we do not execute1 we mimic in the novel and on the stage2 for the beauty we destroy in nature1 we substitute the metamorphosis of the pantomime1 and 7the human nature of us imperatively requiring awe and sorrow of some kind7 for the noble grief we should have borne with our fellows1 and the pure tears we should have wept with them1 we gloat over the pathos of the police court1 and gather the night-dew of the grave4 ,it is difficult to estimate the true significance of these things2 the facts are frightful enough2--the measure of national fault involved in them is perhaps not as great as it would at first seem4 ,we permit1 or cause1 thousands of deaths daily1 but we mean no harm2 we set fire to houses1 and ravage peasants' fields1 yet we should be sorry to find we had injured anybody4 ,we are still kind at heart2 still capable of virtue1 but only as children are4 ,chalmers1 at the end of his long life1 having had much power with the public1 being plagued in some serious matter by a reference to 8public opinion10 uttered the impatient exclamation1 8,the public is just a great baby60 ,and the reason that ,i have allowed all these graver subjects of thought to mix themselves up with an inquiry into methods of reading1 is that1 the more ,i see of our national faults or miseries1 the more they resolve themselves into conditions of childish illiterateness and want of education in the most ordinary habits of thought4 ,it is1 ,i repeat1 not vice1 not selfishness1 not dulness of brain1 which we have to lament2 but an unreachable schoolboy's recklessness1 only differing from the true schoolboy's in its incapacity of being helped1 because it acknowledges no master4 ,there is a curious type of us given in one of the lovely1 neglected works of the last of our great painters4 ,it is a drawing of ,kirkby ,lonsdale churchyard1 and of its brook1 and valley1 and hills1 and folded morning sky beyond4 ,and unmindful alike of these1 and of the dead who have left these for other valleys and for other skies1 a group of schoolboys have piled their little books upon a grave1 to strike them off with stones4 ,so1 also1 we play with the words of the dead that would teach us1 and strike them far from us with our bitter1 reckless will2 little thinking that those leaves which the wind scatters had been piled1 not only upon a gravestone1 but upon the seal of an enchanted vault--nay1 the gate of a great city of sleeping kings1 who would awake for us and walk with us1 if we knew but how to call them by their names4 ,how often1 even if we lift the marble entrance gate1 do we but wander among those old kings in their repose1 and finger the robes they lie in1 and stir the crowns on their foreheads2 and still they are silent to us1 and seem but a dusty imagery2 because we know not the incantation of the heart that would wake them2--which1 if they once heard1 they would start up to meet us in their power of long ago1 narrowly to look upon us1 and consider us2 and1 as the fallen kings of ,hades meet the newly fallen1 saying1 8,art thou also become weak as we--art thou also become one of us80 so would these kings1 with their undimmed1 unshaken diadems1 meet us1 saying1 8,art thou also become pure and mighty of heart as we--art thou also become one of us80 ,mighty of heart1 mighty of mind--8magnanimous0--to be this1 is indeed to be great in life2 to become this increasingly1 is1 indeed1 to 8advance in life10--in life itself--not in the trappings of it4 ,my friends1 do you remember that old ,scythian custom1 when the head of a house died8 ,how he was dressed in his finest dress1 and set in his chariot1 and carried about to his friends' houses2 and each of them placed him at his table's head1 and all feasted in his presence8 ,suppose it were offered to you in plain words1 as it is offered to you in dire facts1 that you should gain this ,scythian honour1 gradually1 while you yet thought yourself alive4 ,suppose the offer were this3 ,you shall die slowly2 your blood shall daily grow cold1 your flesh petrify1 your heart beat at last only as a rusted group of iron valves4 ,your life shall fade from you1 and sink through the earth into the ice of ,caina2 but1 day by day1 your body shall be dressed more gaily1 and set in higher chariots1 and have more orders on its breast--crowns on its head1 if you will4 ,men shall bow before it1 stare and shout round it1 crowd after it up and down the streets2 build palaces for it1 feast with it at their tables' heads all the night long2 your soul shall stay enough within it to know what they do1 and feel the weight of the golden dress on its shoulders1 and the furrow of the crown-edge on the skull2--no more4 ,would you take the offer1 verbally made by the death-angel8 ,would the meanest among us take it1 think you8 ,yet practically and verily we grasp at it1 every one of us1 in a measure2 many of us grasp at it in its fulness of horror4 ,every man accepts it1 who desires to advance in life without knowing what life is2 who means only that he is to get more horses1 and more footmen1 and more fortune1 and more public honour1 and--not more personal soul4 ,he only is advancing in life1 whose heart is getting softer1 whose blood warmer1 whose brain quicker1 whose spirit is entering into ,living #bb peace4 ,and the men who have this life in them are the true lords or kings of the earth--they1 and they only4 ,all other kingships1 so far as they are true1 are only the practical issue and expression of theirs2 if less than this1 they are either dramatic royalties1--costly shows1 set off1 indeed1 with real jewels1 instead of tinsel--but still only the toys of nations2 or else they are no royalties at all1 but tyrannies1 or the mere active and practical issue of national folly2 for which reason ,i have said of them elsewhere1 8,visible governments are the toys of some nations1 the diseases of others1 the harness of some1 the burdens of more40 ,but ,i have no words for the wonder with which ,i hear ,kinghood still spoken of1 even among thoughtful men1 as if governed nations were a personal property1 and might be bought and sold1 or otherwise acquired1 as sheep1 of whose flesh their king was to feed1 and whose fleece he was to gather2 as if ,achilles' indignant epithet of base kings1 8people-eating10 were the constant and proper title of all monarchs2 and the enlargement of a king's dominion meant the same thing as the increase of a private man's estate6 ,kings who think so1 however powerful1 can no more be the true kings of the nation than gadflies are the kings of a horse2 they suck it1 and may drive it wild1 but do not guide it4 ,they1 and their courts1 and their armies are1 if one could see clearly1 only a large species of marsh mosquito1 with bayonet proboscis and melodious1 band-mastered trumpeting1 in the summer air2 the twilight being1 perhaps1 sometimes fairer1 but hardly more wholesome1 for its glittering mists of midge companies4 ,the true kings1 meanwhile1 rule quietly1 if at all1 and hate ruling2 too many of them make 8il gran rifiuto20 and if they do not1 the mob1 as soon as they are likely to become useful to it1 is pretty sure to make its 8gran rifiuto0 of them4 ,yet the visible king may also be a true one1 some day1 if ever day comes when he will estimate his dominion by the force of it1--not the geographical boundaries4 ,it matters very little whether ,trent cuts you a cantel out here1 or ,rhine rounds you a castle less there4 ,but it does matter to you1 king of men1 whether you can verily say to this man1 8,go10 and he goeth2 and to another1 8,come10 and he cometh4 ,whether you can turn your people1 as you can ,trent--and where it is that you bid them come1 and where go4 ,it matters to you1 king of men1 whether your people hate you1 and die by you1 or love you1 and live by you4 ,you may measure your dominion by multitudes1 better than by miles2 and count degrees of love-latitude1 not from1 but to1 a wonderfully warm and infinite equator4 ,measure6--nay1 you cannot measure4 ,who shall measure the difference between the power of those who 8do and teach10 and who are greatest in the kingdoms of earth1 as of heaven--and the power of those who undo1 and consume--whose power1 at the fullest1 is only the power of the moth and the rust8 ,strange6 to think how the ,moth-kings lay up treasures for the moth2 and the ,rust-kings1 who are to their peoples' strength as rust to armour1 lay up treasures for the rust2 and the ,robber-kings1 treasures for the robber2 but how few kings have ever laid up treasures that needed no guarding--treasures of which1 the more thieves there were1 the better6 ,broidered robe1 only to be rent2 helm and sword1 only to be dimmed2 jewel and gold1 only to be scattered2--there have been three kinds of kings who have gathered these4 ,suppose there ever should arise a ,fourth order of kings1 who had read1 in some obscure writing of long ago1 that there was a ,fourth kind of treasure1 which the jewel and gold could not equal1 neither should it be valued with pure gold4 ,a web made fair in the weaving1 by ,athena's shuttle2 an armour1 forged in divine fire by ,vulcanian force2 a gold to be mined in the very sun's red heart1 where he sets over the ,delphian cliffs2--deep-pictured tissue2--impenetrable armour2--potable gold6--the three great ,angels of ,conduct1 ,toil1 and ,thought1 still calling to us1 and waiting at the posts of our doors1 to lead us1 with their winged power1 and guide us1 with their unerring eyes1 by the path which no fowl knoweth1 and which the vulture's eye has not seen6 ,suppose kings should ever arise1 who heard and believed this word1 and at last gathered and brought forth treasures of--,wisdom--for their people8 ,think what an amazing business that would be6 ,how inconceivable1 in the state of our present national wisdom6 ,that we should bring up our peasants to a book exercise instead of a bayonet exercise6--organise1 drill1 maintain with pay1 and good generalship1 armies of thinkers1 instead of armies of stabbers6--find national amusement in reading-rooms as well as rifle-grounds2 give prizes for a fair shot at a fact1 as well as for a leaden splash on a target4 ,what an absurd idea it seems1 put fairly in words1 that the wealth of the capitalists of civilised nations should ever come to support literature instead of war6 ,have yet patience with me1 while ,i read you a single sentence out of the only book1 properly to be called a book1 that ,i have yet written myself1 the one that will stand 7if anything stand71 surest and longest of all work of mine4 8,it is one very awful form of the operation of wealth in ,europe that it is entirely capitalists' wealth which supports unjust wars4 ,just wars do not need so much money to support them2 for most of the men who wage such1 wage them gratis2 but for an unjust war1 men's bodies and souls have both to be bought2 and the best tools of war for them besides1 which make such war costly to the maximum2 not to speak of the cost of base fear1 and angry suspicion1 between nations which have not grace nor honesty enough in all their multitudes to buy an hour's peace of mind with2 as1 at present1 ,france and ,england1 purchasing of each other ten millions sterling worth of consternation1 annually 7a remarkably light crop1 half thorns and half aspen leaves1 sown1 reaped1 and granaried by the #8science' of the modern political economist1 teaching covetousness instead of truth74 ,and1 all unjust war being supportable1 if not by pillage of the enemy1 only by loans from capitalists1 these loans are repaid by subsequent taxation of the people1 who appear to have no will in the matter1 the capitalists' will being the primary root of the war2 but its real root is the covetousness of the whole nation1 rendering it incapable of faith1 frankness1 or justice1 and bringing about1 therefore1 in due time1 his own separate loss and punishment to each person40 ,france and ,england literally1 observe1 buy panic of each other2 they pay1 each of them1 for ten thousand-thousand-pounds'-worth of terror1 a year4 ,now suppose1 instead of buying these ten millions' worth of panic annually1 they made up their minds to be at peace with each other1 and buy ten millions' worth of knowledge annually2 and that each nation spent its ten thousand thousand pounds a year in founding royal libraries1 royal art galleries1 royal museums1 royal gardens1 and places of rest4 ,might it not be better somewhat for both ,french and ,english8 ,it will be long1 yet1 before that comes to pass4 ,nevertheless1 ,i hope it will not be long before royal or national libraries will be founded in every considerable city1 with a royal series of books in them2 the same series in every one of them1 chosen books1 the best in every kind1 prepared for that national series in the most perfect way possible2 their text printed all on leaves of equal size1 broad of margin1 and divided into pleasant volumes1 light in the hand1 beautiful1 and strong1 and thorough as examples of binders' work2 and that these great libraries will be accessible to all clean and orderly persons at all times of the day and evening2 strict law being enforced for this cleanliness and quietness4 ,i could shape for you other plans1 for art-galleries1 and for natural history galleries1 and for many precious--many1 it seems to me1 needful--things2 but this book plan is the easiest and needfullest1 and would prove a considerable tonic to what we call our ,british constitution1 which has fallen dropsical of late1 and has an evil thirst1 and evil hunger1 and wants healthier feeding4 ,you have got its corn laws repealed for it2 try if you cannot get corn laws established for it1 dealing in a better bread2--bread made of that old enchanted ,arabian grain1 the ,sesame1 which opens doors2--doors not of robbers'1 but of ,kings' ,treasuries4 ,lecture ,,ii4 ,lilies4 ,of ,queens' ,gardens 8,be thou glad1 oh thirsting ,desert2 let the desert be made cheerful1 and bloom as the lily2 and the barren places of ,jordan shall run wild with wood40--,,isaiah ,,xxxv4 ,i4 7,septuagint47 ,,it will1 perhaps1 be well1 as this ,lecture is the sequel of one previously given1 that ,i should shortly state to you my general intention in both4 ,the questions specially proposed to you in the first1 namely1 ,how and ,what to ,read1 rose out of a far deeper one1 which it was my endeavour to make you propose earnestly to yourselves1 namely1 ,why to ,read4 ,i want you to feel1 with me1 that whatever advantages we possess in the present day in the diffusion of education and of literature1 can only be rightly used by any of us when we have apprehended clearly what education is to lead to1 and literature to teach4 ,i wish you to see that both well-directed moral training and well-chosen reading lead to the possession of a power over the ill-guided and illiterate1 which is1 according to the measure of it1 in the truest sense1 kingly2 conferring indeed the purest kingship that can exist among men3 too many other kingships 7however distinguished by visible insignia or material power7 being either spectral1 or tyrannous2--spectral--that is to say1 aspects and shadows only of royalty1 hollow as death1 and which only the 8likeness of a kingly crown have on30 or else--tyrannous--that is to say1 substituting their own will for the law of justice and love by which all true kings rule4 ,there is1 then1 ,i repeat--and as ,i want to leave this idea with you1 ,i begin with it1 and shall end with it--only one pure kind of kingship2 an inevitable and eternal kind1 crowned or not2 the kingship1 namely1 which consists in a stronger moral state1 and a truer thoughtful state1 than that of others2 enabling you1 therefore1 to guide1 or to raise them4 ,observe that word 8,state20 we have got into a loose way of using it4 ,it means literally the standing and stability of a thing2 and you have the full force of it in the derived word 8statue0--8the immovable thing40 ,a king's majesty or 8state10 then1 and the right of his kingdom to be called a state1 depends on the movelessness of both3--without tremor1 without quiver of balance2 established and enthroned upon a foundation of eternal law which nothing can alter1 nor overthrow4 ,believing that all literature and all education are only useful so far as they tend to confirm this calm1 beneficent1 and therefore kingly1 power--first1 over ourselves1 and1 through ourselves1 over all around us1--,i am now going to ask you to consider with me farther1 what special portion or kind of this royal authority1 arising out of noble education1 may rightly be possessed by women2 and how far they also are called to a true queenly power1--not in their households merely1 but over all within their sphere4 ,and in what sense1 if they rightly understood and exercised this royal or gracious influence1 the order and beauty induced by such benignant power would justify us in speaking of the territories over which each of them reigned1 as 8,queens' ,gardens40 ,and here1 in the very outset1 we are met by a far deeper question1 which--strange though this may seem--remains among many of us yet quite undecided in spite of its infinite importance4 ,we cannot determine what the queenly power of women should be1 until we are agreed what their ordinary power should be4 ,we cannot consider how education may fit them for any widely extending duty1 until we are agreed what is their true constant duty4 ,and there never was a time when wilder words were spoken1 or more vain imagination permitted1 respecting this question--quite vital to all social happiness4 ,the relations of the womanly to the manly nature1 their different capacities of intellect or of virtue1 seem never to have been yet estimated with entire consent4 ,we hear of the 8mission0 and of the 8rights0 of ,woman1 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 kind1 and of irreconcilable claim4 ,this1 at least1 is wrong4 ,and not less wrong--perhaps even more foolishly wrong 7for ,i will anticipate thus far what ,i hope to prove7--is the idea that woman is only the shadow and attendant image of her lord1 owing him a thoughtless and servile obedience1 and supported altogether in her weakness by the pre-eminence of his fortitude4 ,this1 ,i say1 is the most foolish of all errors respecting her who was made to be the helpmate of man4 ,as if he could be helped effectively by a shadow1 or worthily by a slave6 ,let us try1 then1 whether we cannot get at some clear and harmonious idea 7it must be harmonious if it is true7 of what womanly mind and virtue are in power and office1 with respect to man's2 and how their relations1 rightly accepted1 aid and increase the vigour and honour and authority of both4 ,and now ,i must repeat one thing ,i said in the last lecture3 namely1 that the first use of education was to enable us to consult with the wisest and the greatest men on all points of earnest difficulty4 ,that to use books rightly1 was to go to them for help3 to appeal to them1 when our own knowledge and power of thought failed3 to be led by them into wider sight1--purer conception1--than our own1 and receive from them the united sentence of the judges and councils of all time1 against our solitary and unstable opinion4 ,let us do this now4 ,let us see whether the greatest1 the wisest1 the purest-hearted of all ages are agreed in any wise on this point3 let us hear the testimony they have left respecting what they held to be the true dignity of woman1 and her mode of help to man4 ,and first let us take ,shakespeare4 ,note broadly in the outset1 ,shakespeare has no heroes2--he has only heroines4 ,there is not one entirely heroic figure in all his plays1 except the slight sketch of ,henry the ,fifth1 exaggerated for the purposes of the stage2 and the still slighter ,valentine in ,the ,two ,gentlemen of ,verona4 ,in his laboured and perfect plays you have no hero4 ,othello would have been one1 if his simplicity had not been so great as to leave him the prey of every base practice round him2 but he is the only example even approximating to the heroic type4 ,coriolanus--,csar--,antony stand in flawed strength1 and fall by their vanities2--,hamlet is indolent1 and drowsily speculative2 ,romeo an impatient boy2 the ,merchant of ,venice languidly submissive to adverse fortune2 ,kent1 in ,king ,lear1 is entirely noble at heart1 but too rough and unpolished to be of true use at the critical time1 and he sinks into the office of a servant only4 ,orlando1 no less noble1 is yet the despairing toy of chance1 followed1 comforted1 saved by ,rosalind4 ,whereas there is hardly a play that has not a perfect woman in it1 steadfast in grave hope1 and errorless purpose3 ,cordelia1 ,desdemona1 ,isabella1 ,hermione1 ,imogen1 ,queen ,catherine1 ,perdita1 ,sylvia1 ,viola1 ,rosalind1 ,helena1 and last1 and perhaps loveliest1 ,virgilia1 are all faultless2 conceived in the highest heroic type of humanity4 ,then observe1 secondly1 ,the catastrophe of every play is caused always by the folly or fault of a man2 the redemption1 if there be any1 is by the wisdom and virtue of a woman1 and1 failing that1 there is none4 ,the catastrophe of ,king ,lear is owing to his own want of judgment1 his impatient vanity1 his misunderstanding of his children2 the virtue of his one true daughter would have saved him from all the injuries of the others1 unless he had cast her away from him2 as it is1 she all but saves him4 ,of ,othello ,i need not trace the tale2--nor the one weakness of his so mighty love2 nor the inferiority of his perceptive intellect to that even of the second woman character in the play1 the ,emilia who dies in wild testimony against his error3-- 8,oh1 murderous coxcomb6 what should such a fool ,do with so good a wife80 ,in ,romeo and ,juliet1 the wise and brave stratagem of the wife is brought to ruinous issue by the reckless impatience of her husband4 ,in ,winter's ,tale1 and in ,cymbeline1 the happiness and existence of two princely households1 lost through long years1 and imperilled to the death by the folly and obstinacy of the husbands1 are redeemed at last by the queenly patience and wisdom of the wives4 ,in ,measure for ,measure1 the foul injustice of the judge1 and the foul cowardice of the brother1 are opposed to the victorious truth and adamantine purity of a woman4 ,in ,coriolanus1 the mother's counsel1 acted upon in time1 would have saved her son from all evil2 his momentary forgetfulness of it is his ruin2 her prayer1 at last granted1 saves him--not1 indeed1 from death1 but from the curse of living as the destroyer of his country4 ,and what shall ,i say of ,julia1 constant against the fickleness of a lover who is a mere wicked child8--of ,helena1 against the petulance and insult of a careless youth8--of the patience of ,hero1 the passion of ,beatrice1 and the calmly devoted wisdom of the 8unlessoned girl10 who appears among the helplessness1 the blindness1 and the vindictive passions of men1 as a gentle angel1 bringing courage and safety by her presence1 and defeating the worst malignities of crime by what women are fancied most to fail in1--precision and accuracy of thought4 ,observe1 further1 among all the principal figures in ,shakespeare's plays1 there is only one weak woman--,ophelia2 and it is because she fails ,hamlet at the critical moment1 and is not1 and cannot in her nature be1 a guide to him when he needs her most1 that all the bitter catastrophe follows4 ,finally1 though there are three wicked women among the principal figures--,lady ,macbeth1 ,regan1 and ,goneril--they are felt at once to be frightful exceptions to the ordinary laws of life2 fatal in their influence also1 in proportion to the power for good which they have abandoned4 ,such1 in broad light1 is ,shakespeare's testimony to the position and character of women in human life4 ,he represents them as infallibly faithful and wise counsellors1--incorruptibly just and pure examples--strong always to sanctify1 even when they cannot save4 ,not as in any wise comparable in knowledge of the nature of man1--still less in his understanding of the causes and courses of fate1--but only as the writer who has given us the broadest view of the conditions and modes of ordinary thought in modern society1 ,i ask you next to receive the witness of ,walter ,scott4 ,i put aside his merely romantic prose writings as of no value1 and though the early romantic poetry is very beautiful1 its testimony is of no weight1 other than that of a boy's ideal4 ,but his true works1 studied from ,scottish life1 bear a true witness2 and in the whole range of these1 there are but three men who reach the heroic type #bc--;,dandie ,dinmont1 ,rob ,roy1 and ,claverhouse2 of these1 one is a border farmer2 another a freebooter2 the third a soldier in a bad cause4 ,and these touch the ideal of heroism only in their courage and faith1 together with a strong1 but uncultivated1 or mistakenly applied1 intellectual power2 while his younger men are the gentlemanly play-things of fantastic fortune1 and only by aid 7or accident7 of that fortune1 survive1 not vanquish1 the trials they involuntarily sustain4 ,of any disciplined1 or consistent character1 earnest in a purpose wisely conceived1 or dealing with forms of hostile evil1 definitely challenged and resolutely subdued1 there is no trace in his conceptions of young men4 ,whereas in his imaginations of women1--in the characters of ,ellen ,douglas1 of ,flora ,mac,ivor1 ,rose ,bradwardine1 ,catherine ,seyton1 ,diana ,vernon1 ,lilias ,redgauntlet1 ,alice ,bridgenorth1 ,alice ,lee1 and ,jeanie ,deans1--with endless varieties of grace1 tenderness1 and intellectual power1 we find in all a quite infallible sense of dignity and justice2 a fearless1 instant1 and untiring self-sacrifice1 to even the appearance of duty1 much more to its real claims2 and1 finally1 a patient wisdom of deeply-restrained affection1 which does infinitely more than protect its objects from a momentary error2 it gradually forms1 animates1 and exalts the characters of the unworthy lovers1 until1 at the close of the tale1 we are just able1 and no more1 to take patience in hearing of their unmerited success4 ,so that1 in all cases1 with ,scott as with ,shakespeare1 it is the woman who watches over1 teaches1 and guides the youth2 it is never1 by any chance1 the youth who watches over1 or educates1 his mistress4 ,next take1 though more briefly1 graver testimony--that of the great ,italians and ,greeks4 ,you know well the plan of ,dante's great poem--that it is a love-poem to his dead lady2 a song of praise for her watch over his soul4 ,stooping only to pity1 never to love1 she yet saves him from destruction--saves him from hell4 ,he is going eternally astray in despair2 she comes down from heaven to his help1 and throughout the ascents of ,paradise is his teacher1 interpreting for him the most difficult truths1 divine and human2 and leading him1 with rebuke upon rebuke1 from star to star4 ,i do not insist upon ,dante's conception2 if ,i began ,i could not cease3 besides1 you might think this a wild imagination of one poet's heart4 ,so ,i will rather read to you a few verses of the deliberate writing of a knight of ,pisa to his living lady1 wholly characteristic of the feeling of all the noblest men of the thirteenth1 or early fourteenth1 century1 preserved among many other such records of knightly honour and love1 which ,dante ,rossetti has gathered for us from among the early ,italian poets4 8,for lo6 thy law is passed ,that this my love should manifestly be ,to serve and honour thee3 ,and so ,i do2 and my delight is full1 ,accepted for the servant of thy rule4 8,without almost1 ,i am all rapturous1 ,since thus my will was set ,to serve1 thou flower of joy1 thine excellence3 ,nor ever seems it anything could rouse ,a pain or a regret4 ,but on thee dwells my every thought and sense2 ,considering that from thee all virtues spread ,as from a fountain head1-- ,that in thy gift is wisdom's best avail1 ,and honour without fail1 ,with whom each sovereign good dwells separate1 ,fulfilling the perfection of thy state4 8,lady1 since ,i conceived ,thy pleasurable aspect in my heart1 ,my life has been apart ,in shining brightness and the place of truth2 ,which till that time1 good sooth1 ,groped among shadows in a darken'd place1 ,where many hours and days ,it hardly ever had remember'd good4 ,but now my servitude ,is thine1 and ,i am full of joy and rest4 ,a man from a wild beast ,thou madest me1 since for thy love ,i lived40 ,you may think perhaps a ,greek knight would have had a lower estimate of women than this ,christian lover4 ,his spiritual subjection to them was indeed not so absolute2 but as regards their own personal character1 it was only because you could not have followed me so easily1 that ,i did not take the ,greek women instead of ,shakespeare's2 and instance1 for chief ideal types of human beauty and faith1 the simple mother's and wife's heart of ,andromache2 the divine1 yet rejected wisdom of ,cassandra2 the playful kindness and simple princess-life of happy ,nausicaa2 the housewifely calm of that of ,penelope1 with its watch upon the sea2 the ever patient1 fearless1 hopelessly devoted piety of the sister1 and daughter1 in ,antigone2 the bowing down of ,iphigenia1 lamb-like and silent2 and finally1 the expectation of the resurrection1 made clear to the soul of the ,greeks in the return from her grave of that ,alcestis1 who1 to save her husband1 had passed calmly through the bitterness of death4 ,now ,i could multiply witness upon witness of this kind upon you if ,i had time4 ,i would take ,chaucer1 and show you why he wrote a ,legend of ,good ,women2 but no ,legend of ,good ,men4 ,i would take ,spenser1 and show you how all his fairy knights are sometimes deceived and sometimes vanquished2 but the soul of ,una is never darkened1 and the spear of ,britomart is never broken4 ,nay1 ,i could go back into the mythical teaching of the most ancient times1 and show you how the great people1--by one of whose princesses it was appointed that the ,lawgiver of all the earth should be educated1 rather than by his own kindred2--how that great ,egyptian people1 wisest then of nations1 gave to their ,spirit of ,wisdom the form of a ,woman2 and into her hand1 for a symbol1 the weaver's shuttle2 and how the name and the form of that spirit1 adopted1 believed1 and obeyed by the ,greeks1 became that ,athena of the olive-helm1 and cloudy shield1 to faith in whom you owe1 down to this date1 whatever you hold most precious in art1 in literature1 or in types of national virtue4 ,but ,i will not wander into this distant and mythical element2 ,i will only ask you to give its legitimate value to the testimony of these great poets and men of the world1--consistent1 as you see it is1 on this head4 ,i will ask you whether it can be supposed that these men1 in the main work of their lives1 are amusing themselves with a fictitious and idle view of the relations between man and woman2--nay1 worse than fictitious or idle2 for a thing may be imaginary1 yet desirable1 if it were possible3 but this1 their ideal of woman1 is1 according to our common idea of the marriage relation1 wholly undesirable4 ,the woman1 we say1 is not to guide1 nor even to think for herself4 ,the man is always to be the wiser2 he is to be the thinker1 the ruler1 the superior in knowledge and discretion1 as in power4 ,is it not somewhat important to make up our minds on this matter8 ,are all these great men mistaken1 or are we8 ,are ,shakespeare and schylus1 ,dante and ,homer1 merely dressing dolls for us2 or1 worse than dolls1 unnatural visions1 the realization of which1 were it possible1 would bring anarchy into all households and ruin into all affections8 ,nay1 if you can suppose this1 take lastly the evidence of facts1 given by the human heart itself4 ,in all ,christian ages which have been remarkable for their purity or progress1 there has been absolute yielding of obedient devotion1 by the lover1 to his mistress4 ,i say obedient2--not merely enthusiastic and worshipping in imagination1 but entirely subject1 receiving from the beloved woman1 however young1 not only the encouragement1 the praise1 and the reward of all toil1 but1 so far as any choice is open1 or any question difficult of decision1 the direction of all toil4 ,that chivalry1 to the abuse and dishonour of which are attributable primarily whatever is cruel in war1 unjust in peace1 or corrupt and ignoble in domestic relations2 and to the original purity and power of which we owe the defence alike of faith1 of law1 and of love2 that chivalry1 ,i say1 in its very first conception of honourable life1 assumes the subjection of the young knight to the command--should it even be the command in caprice--of his lady4 ,it assumes this1 because its masters knew that the first and necessary impulse of every truly taught and knightly heart is this of blind service to its lady3 that where that true faith and captivity are not1 all wayward and wicked passion must be2 and that in this rapturous obedience to the single love of his youth1 is the sanctification of all man's strength1 and the continuance of all his purposes4 ,and this1 not because such obedience would be safe1 or honourable1 were it ever rendered to the unworthy2 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 trust1 or whose prayerful command he can hesitate to obey4 ,i do not insist by any farther argument on this1 for ,i think it should commend itself at once to your knowledge of what has been and to your feeling of what should be4 ,you cannot think that the buckling on of the knight's armour by his lady's hand was a mere caprice of romantic fashion4 ,it is the type of an eternal truth--that the soul's armour is never well set to the heart unless a woman's hand has braced it2 and it is only when she braces it loosely that the honour of manhood fails4 ,know you not those lovely lines--,i would they were learned by all youthful ladies of ,england3-- 8,ah1 wasteful woman6--she who may ,on her sweet self set her own price1 ,knowing he cannot choose but pay-- ,how has she cheapen'd ,paradise6 ,how given for nought her priceless gift1 ,how spoiled the bread and spill'd the wine1 ,which1 spent with due respective thrift1 ,had made brutes men1 and men divine60 #bd ,thus much1 then1 respecting the relations of lovers ,i believe you will accept4 ,but what we too often doubt is the fitness of the continuance of such a relation throughout the whole of human life4 ,we think it right in the lover and mistress1 not in the husband and wife4 ,that is to say1 we think that a reverent and tender duty is due to one whose affection we still doubt1 and whose character we as yet do but partially and distantly discern2 and that this reverence and duty are to be withdrawn when the affection has become wholly and limitlessly our own1 and the character has been so sifted and tried that we fear not to entrust it with the happiness of our lives4 ,do you not see how ignoble this is1 as well as how unreasonable8 ,do you not feel that marriage1--when it is marriage at all1--is only the seal which marks the vowed transition of temporary into untiring service1 and of fitful into eternal love8 ,but how1 you will ask1 is the idea of this guiding function of the woman reconcilable with a true wifely subjection8 ,simply in that it is a guiding1 not a determining1 function4 ,let me try to show you briefly how these powers seem to be rightly distinguishable4 ,we are foolish1 and without excuse foolish1 in speaking of the 8superiority0 of one sex to the other1 as if they could be compared in similar things4 ,each has what the other has not3 each completes the other1 and is completed by the other3 they are in nothing alike1 and the happiness and perfection of both depends on each asking and receiving from the other what the other only can give4 ,now their separate characters are briefly these4 ,the man's power is active1 progressive1 defensive4 ,he is eminently the doer1 the creator1 the discoverer1 the defender4 ,his intellect is for speculation and invention2 his energy for adventure1 for war1 and for conquest1 wherever war is just1 wherever conquest necessary4 ,but the woman's power is for rule1 not for battle1--and her intellect is not for invention or creation1 but for sweet ordering1 arrangement1 and decision4 ,she sees the qualities of things1 their claims1 and their places4 ,her great function is ,praise2 she enters into no contest1 but infallibly adjudges the crown of contest4 ,by her office1 and place1 she is protected from all danger and temptation4 ,the man1 in his rough work in open world1 must encounter all peril and trial2--to him1 therefore1 must be the failure1 the offence1 the inevitable error3 often he must be wounded1 or subdued2 often misled2 and always hardened4 ,but he guards the woman from all this2 within his house1 as ruled by her1 unless she herself has sought it1 need enter no danger1 no temptation1 no cause of error or offence4 ,this is the true nature of home--it is the place of ,peace2 the shelter1 not only from all injury1 but from all terror1 doubt1 and division4 ,in so far as it is not this1 it is not home2 so far as the anxieties of the outer life penetrate into it1 and the inconsistently-minded1 unknown1 unloved1 or hostile society of the outer world is allowed by either husband or wife to cross the threshold1 it ceases to be home2 it is then only a part of that outer world which you have roofed over1 and lighted fire in4 ,but so far as it is a sacred place1 a vestal temple1 a temple of the hearth watched over by ,household ,gods1 before whose faces none may come but those whom they can receive with love1--so far as it is this1 and roof and fire are types only of a nobler shade and light1--shade as of the rock in a weary land1 and light as of the ,pharos in the stormy sea2--so far it vindicates the name1 and fulfils the praise1 of ,home4 ,and wherever a true wife comes1 this home is always round her4 ,the stars only may be over her head2 the glowworm in the night-cold grass may be the only fire at her foot2 but home is yet wherever she is2 and for a noble woman it stretches far round her1 better than ceiled with cedar1 or painted with vermilion1 shedding its quiet light far1 for those who else were homeless4 ,this1 then1 ,i believe to be1--will you not admit it to be1--the woman's true place and power8 ,but do not you see that1 to fulfil this1 she must--as far as one can use such terms of a human creature--be incapable of error8 ,so far as she rules1 all must be right1 or nothing is4 ,she must be enduringly1 incorruptibly good2 instinctively1 infallibly wise--wise1 not for self-development1 but for self-renunciation3 wise1 not that she may set herself above her husband1 but that she may never fail from his side3 wise1 not with the narrowness of insolent and loveless pride1 but with the passionate gentleness of an infinitely variable1 because infinitely applicable1 modesty of service--the true changefulness of woman4 ,in that great sense--8,la donna mobile10 not 8,qual pim' al vento02 no1 nor yet 8,variable as the shade1 by the light quivering aspen made02 but variable as the light1 manifold in fair and serene division1 that it may take the colour of all that it falls upon1 and exalt it4 7,,ii47 ,i have been trying1 thus far1 to show you what should be the place1 and what the power of woman4 ,now1 secondly1 we ask1 ,what kind of education is to fit her for these8 ,and if you indeed think this a true conception of her office and dignity1 it will not be difficult to trace the course of education which would fit her for the one1 and raise her to the other4 ,the first of our duties to her--no thoughtful persons now doubt this1--is to secure for her such physical training and exercise as may confirm her health1 and perfect her beauty2 the highest refinement of that beauty being unattainable without splendour of activity and of delicate strength4 ,to perfect her beauty1 ,i say1 and increase its power2 it cannot be too powerful1 nor shed its sacred light too far3 only remember that all physical freedom is vain to produce beauty without a corresponding freedom of heart4 ,there are two passages of that poet who is distinguished1 it seems to me1 from all others--not by power1 but by exquisite rightness--which point you to the source1 and describe to you1 in a few syllables1 the completion of womanly beauty4 ,i will read the introductory stanzas1 but the last is the one ,i wish you specially to notice3- 8,three years she grew in sun and shower1 ,then ,nature said1 #8,a lovelier flower ,on earth was never sown2 ,this child ,i to myself will take2 ,she shall be mine1 and ,i will make ,a lady of my own4' #8,myself will to my darling be ,both law and impulse2 and with me ,the girl1 in rock and plain1 ,in earth and heaven1 in glade and bower1 ,shall feel an overseeing power ,to kindle1 or restrain4' #8,the floating clouds their state shall lend ,to her1 for her the willow bend2 ,nor shall she fail to see1 ,even in the motions of the storm1 ,grace that shall mould the maiden's form ,by silent sympathy4' #8,and vital feelings of delight ,shall rear her form to stately height1-- ,her virgin bosom swell4 ,such thoughts to ,lucy ,i will give1 ,while she and ,i together live1 ,here in this happy dell4'0 #be 8,vital feelings of delight10 observe4 ,there are deadly feelings of delight2 but the natural ones are vital1 necessary to very life4 ,and they must be feelings of delight1 if they are to be vital4 ,do not think you can make a girl lovely1 if you do not make her happy4 ,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 features1 with a hardness which is all the more painful because it takes away the brightness from the eyes of innocence1 and the charm from the brow of virtue4 ,this for the means3 now note the end4 ,take from the same poet1 in two lines1 a perfect description of womanly beauty-- 8,a countenance in which did meet ,sweet records1 promises as sweet40 ,the perfect loveliness of a woman's countenance can only consist in that majestic peace1 which is founded in the memory of happy and useful years1--full of sweet records2 and from the joining of this with that yet more majestic childishness1 which is still full of change and promise2--opening always--modest at once1 and bright1 with hope of better things to be won1 and to be bestowed4 ,there is no old age where there is still that promise4 ,thus1 then1 you have first to mould her physical frame1 and then1 as the strength she gains will permit you1 to fill and temper her mind with all knowledge and thoughts which tend to confirm its natural instincts of justice1 and refine its natural tact of love4 ,all such knowledge should be given her as may enable her to understand1 and even to aid1 the work of men3 and yet it should be given1 not as knowledge1--not as if it were1 or could be1 for her an object to know2 but only to feel1 and to judge4 ,it is of no moment1 as a matter of pride or perfectness in herself1 whether she knows many languages or one2 but it is of the utmost1 that she should be able to show kindness to a stranger1 and to understand the sweetness of a stranger's tongue4 ,it is of no moment to her own worth or dignity that she should be acquainted with this science or that2 but it is of the highest that she should be trained in habits of accurate thought2 that she should understand the meaning1 the inevitableness1 and the loveliness of natural laws2 and follow at least some one path of scientific attainment1 as far as to the threshold of that bitter ,valley of ,humiliation1 into which only the wisest and bravest of men can descend1 owning themselves for ever children1 gathering pebbles on a boundless shore4 ,it is of little consequence how many positions of cities she knows1 or how many dates of events1 or names of celebrated persons--it is not the object of education to turn the woman into a dictionary2 but it is deeply necessary that she should be taught to enter with her whole personality into the history she reads2 to picture the passages of it vitally in her own bright imagination2 to apprehend1 with her fine instincts1 the pathetic circumstances and dramatic relations1 which the historian too often only eclipses by his reasoning1 and disconnects by his arrangement3 it is for her to trace the hidden equities of divine reward1 and catch sight1 through the darkness1 of the fateful threads of woven fire that connect error with retribution4 ,but1 chiefly of all1 she is to be taught to extend the limits of her sympathy with respect to that history which is being for ever determined as the moments pass in which she draws her peaceful breath2 and to the contemporary calamity1 which1 were it but rightly mourned by her1 would recur no more hereafter4 ,she is to exercise herself in imagining what would be the effects upon her mind and conduct1 if she were daily brought into the presence of the suffering which is not the less real because shut from her sight4 ,she is to be taught somewhat to understand the nothingness of the proportion which that little world in which she lives and loves1 bears to the world in which ,god lives and loves2--and solemnly she is to be taught to strive that her thoughts of piety may not be feeble in proportion to the number they embrace1 nor her prayer more languid than it is for the momentary relief from pain of her husband or her child1 when it is uttered for the multitudes of those who have none to love them1--and is 8for all who are desolate and oppressed40 ,thus far1 ,i think1 ,i have had your concurrence2 perhaps you will not be with me in what ,i believe is most needful for me to say4 ,there is one dangerous science for women--one which they must indeed beware how they profanely touch--that of theology4 ,strange1 and miserably strange1 that while they are modest enough to doubt their powers1 and pause at the threshold of sciences where every step is demonstrable and sure1 they will plunge headlong1 and without one thought of incompetency1 into that science in which the greatest men have trembled1 and the wisest erred4 ,strange1 that they will complacently and pridefully bind up whatever vice or folly there is in them1 whatever arrogance1 petulance1 or blind incomprehensiveness1 into one bitter bundle of consecrated myrrh4 ,strange1 in creatures born to be ,love visible1 that where they can know least1 they will condemn1 first1 and think to recommend themselves to their ,master1 by crawling up the steps of ,his judgment-throne to divide it with ,him4 ,strangest of all that they should think they were led by the ,spirit of the ,comforter into habits of mind which have become in them the unmixed elements of home discomfort2 and that they dare to turn the ,household ,gods of ,christianity into ugly idols of their own2--spiritual dolls1 for them to dress according to their caprice2 and from which their husbands must turn away in grieved contempt1 lest they should be shrieked at for breaking them4 ,i believe1 then1 with this exception1 that a girl's education should be nearly1 in its course and material of study1 the same as a boy's2 but quite differently directed4 ,a woman1 in any rank of life1 ought to know whatever her husband is likely to know1 but to know it in a different way4 ,his command of it should be foundational and progressive2 hers1 general and accomplished for daily and helpful use4 ,not but that it would often be wiser in men to learn things in a womanly sort of way1 for present use1 and to seek for the discipline and training of their mental powers in such branches of study as will be afterwards fittest for social service2 but1 speaking broadly1 a man ought to know any language or science he learns1 thoroughly--while a woman ought to know the same language1 or science1 only so far as may enable her to sympathise in her husband's pleasures1 and in those of his best friends4 ,yet1 observe1 with exquisite accuracy as far as she reaches4 ,there is a wide difference between elementary knowledge and superficial knowledge--between a firm beginning1 and an infirm attempt at compassing4 ,a woman may always help her husband by what she knows1 however little2 by what she half-knows1 or mis-knows1 she will only tease him4 ,and indeed1 if there were to be any difference between a girl's education and a boy's1 ,i should say that of the two the girl should be earlier led1 as her intellect ripens faster1 into deep and serious subjects3 and that her range of literature should be1 not more1 but less frivolous2 calculated to add the qualities of patience and seriousness to her natural poignancy of thought and quickness of wit2 and also to keep her in a lofty and pure element of thought4 ,i enter not now into any question of choice of books2 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 library1 wet with the last and lightest spray of the fountain of folly4 ,or even of the fountain of wit2 for with respect to the sore temptation of novel reading1 it is not the badness of a novel that we should dread1 so much as its over-wrought interest4 ,the weakest romance is not so stupefying as the lower forms of religious exciting literature1 and the worst romance is not so corrupting as false history1 false philosophy1 or false political essays4 ,but the best romance becomes dangerous1 if1 by its excitement1 it renders the ordinary course of life uninteresting1 and increases the morbid thirst for useless acquaintance with scenes in which we shall never be called upon to act4 ,i speak therefore of good novels only2 and our modern literature is particularly rich in types of such4 ,well read1 indeed1 these books have serious use1 being nothing less than treatises on moral anatomy and chemistry2 studies of human nature in the elements of it4 ,but ,i attach little weight to this function3 they are hardly ever read with earnestness enough to permit them to fulfil it4 ,the utmost they usually do is to enlarge somewhat the charity of a kind reader1 or the bitterness of a malicious one2 for each will gather1 from the novel1 food for her own disposition4 ,those who are naturally proud and envious will learn from ,thackeray to despise humanity2 those who are naturally gentle1 to pity it2 those who are naturally shallow1 to laugh at it4 ,so1 also1 there might be a serviceable power in novels to bring before us1 in vividness1 a human truth which we had before dimly conceived2 but the temptation to picturesqueness of statement is so great1 that often the best writers of fiction cannot resist it2 and our views are rendered so violent and one-sided1 that their vitality is rather a harm than good4 ,without1 however1 venturing here on any attempt at decision how much novel reading should be allowed1 let me at least clearly assert this1--that whether novels1 or poetry1 or history be read1 they should be chosen1 not for their freedom from evil1 but for their possession of good4 ,the chance and scattered evil that may here and there haunt1 or hide itself in1 a powerful book1 never does any harm to a noble girl2 but the emptiness of an author oppresses her1 and his amiable folly degrades her4 ,and if she can have access to a good library of old and classical books1 there need be no choosing at all4 ,keep the modern magazine and novel out of your girl's way3 turn her loose into the old library every wet day1 and let her alone4 ,she will find what is good for her2 you cannot3 for there is just this difference between the making of a girl's character and a boy's--you may chisel a boy into shape1 as you would a rock1 or hammer him into it1 if he be of a better kind1 as you would a piece of bronze4 ,but you cannot hammer a girl into anything4 ,she grows as a flower does1--she will wither without sun2 she will decay in her sheath1 as a narcissus will1 if you do not give her air enough2 she may fall1 and defile her head in dust1 if you leave her without help at some moments of her life2 but you cannot fetter her2 she must take her own fair form and way1 if she take any1 and in mind as in body1 must have always 8,her household motions light and free ,and steps of virgin liberty40 ,let her loose in the library1 ,i say1 as you do a fawn in a field4 ,it knows the bad weeds twenty times better than you2 and the good ones too1 and will eat some bitter and prickly ones1 good for it1 which you had not the slightest thought would have been so4 ,then1 in art1 keep the finest models before her1 and let her practice in all accomplishments be accurate and thorough1 so as to enable her to understand more than she accomplishes4 ,i say the finest models--that is to say1 the truest1 simplest1 usefullest4 ,note those epithets3 they will range through all the arts4 ,try them in music1 where you might think them the least applicable4 ,i say the truest1 that in which the notes most closely and faithfully express the meaning of the words1 or the character of intended emotion2 again1 the simplest1 that in which the meaning and melody are attained with the fewest and most significant notes possible2 and1 finally1 the usefullest1 that music which makes the best words most beautiful1 which enchants them in our memories each with its own glory of sound1 and which applies them closest to the heart at the moment we need them4 ,and not only in the material and in the course1 but yet more earnestly in the spirit of it1 let a girl's education be as serious as a boy's4 ,you bring up your girls as if they were meant for sideboard ornaments1 and then complain of their frivolity4 ,give them the same advantages that you give their brothers--appeal to the same grand instincts of virtue in them2 teach them1 also1 that courage and truth are the pillars of their being3--do you think that they would not answer that appeal1 brave and true as they are even now1 when you know that there is hardly a girls' school in this ,christian kingdom where the children's courage or sincerity would be thought of half so much importance as their way of coming in at a door2 and when the whole system of society1 as respects the mode of establishing them in life1 is one rotten plague of cowardice and imposture--cowardice1 in not daring to let them live1 or love1 except as their neighbours choose2 and imposture1 in bringing1 for the purposes of our own pride1 the full glow of the world's worst vanity upon a girl's eyes1 at the very period when the whole happiness of her future existence depends upon her remaining undazzled8 ,and give them1 lastly1 not only noble teachings1 but noble teachers4 ,you consider somewhat before you send your boy to school1 what kind of a man the master is2--whatsoever kind of a man he is1 you at least give him full authority over your son1 and show some respect to him yourself2--if he comes to dine with you1 you do not put him at a side table3 you know also that1 at college1 your child's immediate tutor will be under the direction of some still higher tutor1--for whom you have absolute reverence4 ,you do not treat the ,dean of ,christ ,church or the ,master of ,trinity as your inferiors4 ,but what teachers do you give your girls1 and what reverence do you show to the teachers you have chosen8 ,is a girl likely to think her own conduct1 or her own intellect1 of much importance1 when you trust the entire formation of her character1 moral and intellectual1 to a person whom you let your servants treat with less respect than they do your housekeeper 7as if the soul of your child were a less charge than jams and groceries71 and whom you yourself think you confer an honour upon by letting her sometimes sit in the drawing-room in the evening8 ,thus1 then1 of literature as her help1 and thus of art4 ,there is one more help which she cannot do without--one which1 alone1 has sometimes done more than all other influences besides1--the help of wild and fair nature4 ,hear this of the education of ,joan of ,arc3-- 8,the education of this poor girl was mean1 according to the present standard2 was ineffably grand1 according to a purer philosophic standard2 and only not good for our age1 because for us it would be unattainable4 8,next after her spiritual advantages1 she owed most to the advantages of her situation4 ,the fountain of ,domrmy was on the brink of a boundless forest2 and it was haunted to that degree by fairies1 that the parish priest 7cur7 was obliged to read mass there once a year1 in order to keep them in decent bounds4 8,but the forests of ,domrmy--those were the glories of the land2 for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets that towered into tragic strength4 ,abbeys there were1 and abbey windows1--#8like ,moorish temples of the ,hindoos1' that exercised even princely power both in ,touraine and in the ,german ,diets4 ,these had their sweet bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or vespers1 and each its own dreamy legend4 ,few enough1 and scattered enough1 were these abbeys1 so as in no degree to disturb the deep solitude of the region2 yet many enough to spread a network or awning of ,christian sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen wilderness40 #bf ,now1 you cannot1 indeed1 have here in ,england1 woods eighteen miles deep to the centre2 but you can1 perhaps1 keep a fairy or two for your children yet1 if you wish to keep them4 ,but do you wish it8 ,suppose you had each1 at the back of your houses1 a garden1 large enough for your children to play in1 with just as much lawn as would give them room to run1--no more--and that you could not change your abode2 but that1 if you chose1 you could double your income1 or quadruple it1 by digging a coal shaft in the middle of the lawn1 and turning the flower-beds into heaps of coke4 ,would you do it8 ,i hope not4 ,i can tell you1 you would be wrong if you did1 though it gave you income sixty-fold instead of four-fold4 ,yet this is what you are doing with all ,england4 ,the whole country is but a little garden1 not more than enough for your children to run on the lawns of1 if you would let them all run there4 ,and this little garden you will turn into furnace ground1 and fill with heaps of cinders1 if you can2 and those children of yours1 not you1 will suffer for it4 ,for the fairies will not be all banished2 there are fairies of the furnace as of the wood1 and their first gifts seem to be 8sharp arrows of the mighty20 but their last gifts are 8coals of juniper40 ,and yet ,i cannot--though there is no part of my subject that ,i feel more--press this upon you2 for we made so little use of the power of nature while we had it that we shall hardly feel what we have lost4 ,just on the other side of the ,mersey you have your ,snowdon1 and your ,menai ,straits1 and that mighty granite rock beyond the moors of ,anglesea1 splendid in its heathery crest1 and foot planted in the deep sea1 once thought of as sacred--a divine promontory1 looking westward2 the ,holy ,head or ,headland1 still not without awe when its red light glares first through storm4 ,these are the hills1 and these the bays and blue inlets1 which1 among the ,greeks1 would have been always loved1 always fateful in influence on the national mind4 ,that ,snowdon is your ,parnassus2 but where are its ,muses8 ,that ,holyhead mountain is your ,island of gina2 but where is its ,temple to ,minerva8 ,shall ,i read you what the ,christian ,minerva had achieved under the shadow of our ,parnassus up to the year #ahdh8--;,here is a little account of a ,welsh school1 from page #bfa of the ,report on ,wales1 published by the ,committee of ,council on ,education4 ,this is a school close to a town containing #e1jjj persons3-- 8,i then called up a larger class1 most of whom had recently come to the school4 ,three girls repeatedly declared they had never heard of ,christ1 and two that they had never heard of ,god4 ,two out of six thought ,christ was on earth now0 7they might have had a worse thought perhaps71 8three knew nothing about the ,crucifixion4 ,four out of seven did not know the names of the months nor the number of days in a year4 ,they had no notion of addition beyond two and two1 or three and three2 their minds were perfect blanks40 ,oh1 ye women of ,england6 from the ,princess of that ,wales to the simplest of you1 do not think your own children can be brought into their true fold of rest1 while these are scattered on the hills1 as sheep having no shepherd4 ,and do not think your daughters can be trained to the truth of their own human beauty1 while the pleasant places1 which ,god made at once for their schoolroom and their playground1 lie desolate and defiled4 ,you cannot baptize them rightly in those inch-deep fonts of yours1 unless you baptize them also in the sweet waters which the great ,lawgiver strikes forth for ever from the rocks of your native land--waters which a ,pagan would have worshipped in their purity1 and you worship only with pollution4 ,you cannot lead your children faithfully to those narrow axe-hewn church altars of yours1 while the dark azure altars in heaven--the mountains that sustain your island throne1--mountains on which a ,pagan would have seen the powers of heaven rest in every wreathed cloud--remain for you without inscription2 altars built1 not to1 but by an ,unknown ,god4 7,,iii47 ,thus far1 then1 of the nature1 thus far of the teaching1 of woman1 and thus of her household office1 and queenliness4 ,we now come to our last1 our widest question4--,what is her queenly office with respect to the state8 ,generally1 we are under an impression that a man's duties are public1 and a woman's private4 ,but this is not altogether so4 ,a man has a personal work or duty1 relating to his own home1 and a public work or duty1 which is the expansion of the other1 relating to the state4 ,so a woman has a personal work or duty1 relating to her own home1 and a public work or duty1 which is also the expansion of that4 ,now the man's work for his own home is1 as has been said1 to secure its maintenance1 progress1 and defence2 the woman's to secure its order1 comfort1 and loveliness4 ,expand both these functions4 ,the man's duty as a member of a commonwealth1 is to assist in the maintenance1 in the advance1 in the defence of the state4 ,the woman's duty1 as a member of the commonwealth1 is to assist in the ordering1 in the comforting1 and in the beautiful adornment of the state4 ,what the man is at his own gate1 defending it1 if need be1 against insult and spoil1 that also1 not in a less1 but in a more devoted measure1 he is to be at the gate of his country1 leaving his home1 if need be1 even to the spoiler1 to do his more incumbent work there4 ,and1 in like manner1 what the woman is to be within her gates1 as the centre of order1 the balm of distress1 and the mirror of beauty3 that she is also to be without her gates1 where order is more difficult1 distress more imminent1 loveliness more rare4 ,and as within the human heart there is always set an instinct for all its real duties1--an instinct which you cannot quench1 but only warp and corrupt if you withdraw it from its true purpose3--as there is the intense instinct of love1 which1 rightly disciplined1 maintains all the sanctities of life1 and1 misdirected1 undermines them2 and must do either the one or the other2--so there is in the human heart an inextinguishable instinct1 the love of power1 which1 rightly directed1 maintains all the majesty of law and life1 and1 misdirected1 wrecks them4 ,deep rooted in the innermost life of the heart of man1 and of the heart of woman1 ,god set it there1 and ,god keeps it there4--,vainly1 as falsely1 you blame or rebuke the desire of power6--,for ,heaven's sake1 and for ,man's sake1 desire it all you can4 ,but what power8 ,that is all the question4 ,power to destroy8 the lion's limb1 and the dragon's breath8 ,not so4 ,power to heal1 to redeem1 to guide1 and to guard4 ,power of the sceptre and shield2 the power of the royal hand that heals in touching1--that binds the fiend1 and looses the captive2 the throne that is founded on the rock of ,justice1 and descended from only by steps of ,mercy4 ,will you not covet such power as this1 and seek such throne as this1 and be no more housewives1 but queens8 ,it is now long since the women of ,england arrogated1 universally1 a title which once belonged to nobility only2 and1 having once been in the habit of accepting the simple title of gentlewoman as correspondent to that of gentleman1 insisted on the privilege of assuming the title of 8,lady10 #bg which properly corresponds only to the title of 8,lord40 ,i do not blame them for this2 but only for their narrow motive in this4 ,i would have them desire and claim the title of ,lady1 provided they claim1 not merely the title1 but the office and duty signified by it4 ,lady means 8bread-giver0 or 8loaf-giver10 and ,lord means 8maintainer of laws10 and both titles have reference1 not to the law which is maintained in the house1 nor to the bread which is given to the household2 but to law maintained for the multitude1 and to bread broken among the multitude4 ,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 lords2 and a ,lady has legal claim to her title only so far as she communicates that help to the poor representatives of her ,master1 which women once1 ministering to ,him of their substance1 were permitted to extend to that ,master ,himself2 and when she is known1 as ,he ,himself once was1 in breaking of bread4 ,and this beneficent and legal dominion1 this power of the ,dominus1 or ,house-,lord1 and of the ,domina1 or ,house-,lady1 is great and venerable1 not in the number of those through whom it has lineally descended1 but in the number of those whom it grasps within its sway2 it is always regarded with reverent worship wherever its dynasty is founded on its duty1 and its ambition correlative with its beneficence4 ,your fancy is pleased with the thought of being noble ladies1 with a train of vassals4 ,be it so2 you cannot be too noble1 and your train cannot be too great2 but see to it that your train is of vassals whom you serve and feed1 not merely of slaves who serve and feed you2 and that the multitude which obeys you is of those whom you have comforted1 not oppressed1--whom you have redeemed1 not led into captivity4 ,and this1 which is true of the lower or household dominion1 is equally true of the queenly dominion2 that highest dignity is open to you1 if you will also accept that highest duty4 ,rex et ,regina--,roi et ,reine--8,right-doers20 they differ but from the ,lady and ,lord1 in that their power is supreme over the mind as over the person--that they not only feed and clothe1 but direct and teach4 ,and whether consciously or not1 you must be1 in many a heart1 enthroned3 there is no putting by that crown2 queens you must always be3 queens to your lovers2 queens to your husbands and your sons2 queens of higher mystery to the world beyond1 which bows itself1 and will for ever bow1 before the myrtle crown and the stainless sceptre of womanhood4 ,but1 alas6 you are too often idle and careless queens1 grasping at majesty in the least things1 while you abdicate it in the greatest2 and leaving misrule and violence to work their will among men1 in defiance of the power which1 holding straight in gift from the ,prince of all ,peace1 the wicked among you betray1 and the good forget4 8,prince of ,peace40 ,note that name4 ,when kings rule in that name1 and nobles1 and the judges of the earth1 they also1 in their narrow place1 and mortal measure1 receive the power of it4 ,there are no other rulers than they2 other rule than theirs is but misrule2 they who govern verily 8,dei ,grati0 are all princes1 yes1 or princesses of ,peace4 ,there is not a war in the world1 no1 nor an injustice1 but you women are answerable for it2 not in that you have provoked1 but in that you have not hindered4 ,men1 by their nature1 are prone to fight2 they will fight for any cause1 or for none4 ,it is for you to choose their cause for them1 and to forbid them when there is no cause4 ,there is no suffering1 no injustice1 no misery1 in the earth1 but the guilt of it lies with you4 ,men can bear the sight of it1 but you should not be able to bear it4 ,men may tread it down without sympathy in their own struggle2 but men are feeble in sympathy1 and contracted in hope2 it is you only who can feel the depths of pain1 and conceive the way of its healing4 ,instead of trying to do this1 you turn away from it2 you shut yourselves within your park walls and garden gates2 and you are content to know that there is beyond them a whole world in wilderness--a world of secrets which you dare not penetrate2 and of suffering which you dare not conceive4 ,i tell you that this is to me quite the most amazing among the phenomena of humanity4 ,i am surprised at no depths to which1 when once warped from its honour1 that humanity can be degraded4 ,i do not wonder at the miser's death1 with his hands1 as they relax1 dropping gold4 ,i do not wonder at the sensualist's life1 with the shroud wrapped about his feet4 ,i do not wonder at the single-handed murder of a single victim1 done by the assassin in the darkness of the railway1 or reed shadow of the marsh4 ,i do not even wonder at the myriad-handed murder of multitudes1 done boastfully in the daylight1 by the frenzy of nations1 and the immeasurable1 unimaginable guilt heaped up from hell to heaven1 of their priests1 and kings4 ,but this is wonderful to me--oh1 how wonderful6--to see the tender and delicate woman among you1 with her child at her breast1 and a power1 if she would wield it1 over it1 and over its father1 purer than the air of heaven1 and stronger than the seas of earth--nay1 a magnitude of blessing which her husband would not part with for all that earth itself1 though it were made of one entire and perfect chrysolite3--to see her abdicate this majesty to play at precedence with her next-door neighbour6 ,this is wonderful--oh1 wonderful6--to see her1 with every innocent feeling fresh within her1 go out in the morning into her garden to play with the fringes of its guarded flowers1 and lift their heads when they are drooping1 with her happy smile upon her face1 and no cloud upon her brow1 because there is a little wall around her place of peace3 and yet she knows1 in her heart1 if she would only look for its knowledge1 that1 outside of that little rose-covered wall1 the wild grass1 to the horizon1 is torn up by the agony of men1 and beat level by the drift of their life-blood4 ,have you ever considered what a deep under meaning there lies1 or at least may be read1 if we choose1 in our custom of strewing flowers before those whom we think most happy8 ,do you suppose it is merely to deceive them into the hope that happiness is always to fall thus in showers at their feet8--that wherever they pass they will tread on herbs of sweet scent1 and that the rough ground will be made smooth for them by depths of roses8 ,so surely as they believe that1 they will have1 instead1 to walk on bitter herbs and thorns2 and the only softness to their feet will be of snow4 ,but it is not thus intended they should believe2 there is a better meaning in that old custom4 ,the path of a good woman is indeed strewn with flowers2 but they rise behind her steps1 not before them4 8,her feet have touched the meadows1 and left the daisies rosy40 ,you think that only a lover's fancy2--false and vain6 ,how if it could be true8 ,you think this also1 perhaps1 only a poet's fancy-- 8,even the light harebell raised its head ,elastic from her airy tread40 ,but it is little to say of a woman1 that she only does not destroy where she passes4 ,she should revive2 the harebells should bloom1 not stoop1 as she passes4 ,you think ,i am rushing into wild hyperbole6 ,pardon me1 not a whit--,i mean what ,i say in calm ,english1 spoken in resolute truth4 ,you have heard it said--7and ,i believe there is more than fancy even in that saying1 but let it pass for a fanciful one7--that flowers only flourish rightly in the garden of some one who loves them4 ,i know you would like that to be true2 you would think it a pleasant magic if you could flush your flowers into brighter bloom by a kind look upon them3 nay1 more1 if your look had the power1 not only to cheer1 but to guard2--if you could bid the black blight turn away1 and the knotted caterpillar spare--if you could bid the dew fall upon them in the drought1 and say to the south wind1 in frost--8,come1 thou south1 and breathe upon my garden1 that the spices of it may flow out40 ,this you would think a great thing8 ,and do you think it not a greater thing1 that all this1 7and how much more than this67 you can do1 for fairer flowers than these--flowers that could bless you for having blessed them1 and will love you for having loved them2 flowers that have thoughts like yours1 and lives like yours2 and which1 once saved1 you save for ever8 ,is this only a little power8 ,far among the moorlands and the rocks1--far in the darkness of the terrible streets1--these feeble florets are lying1 with all their fresh leaves torn1 and their stems broken3 will you never go down to them1 nor set them in order in their little fragrant beds1 nor fence them in their trembling1 from the fierce wind8 ,shall morning follow morning1 for you1 but not for them2 and the dawn rise to watch1 far away1 those frantic ,dances of ,death2 #bh but no dawn rise to breathe upon these living banks of wild violet1 and woodbine1 and rose2 nor call to you1 through your casement--call 7not giving you the name of the ,english poet's lady1 but the name of ,dante's great ,matilda1 who1 on the edge of happy ,lethe1 stood1 wreathing flowers with flowers71 saying3-- 8,come into the garden1 ,maud1 ,for the black bat1 night1 has flown1 ,and the woodbine spices are wafted abroad1 ,and the musk of the roses blown08 ,will you not go down among them8--among those sweet living things1 whose new courage1 sprung from the earth with the deep colour of heaven upon it1 is starting up in strength of goodly spire2 and whose purity1 washed from the dust1 is opening1 bud by bud1 into the flower of promise2--and still they turn to you1 and for you1 8,the ,larkspur listens--,i hear1 ,i hear6 ,and the ,lily whispers--,i wait40 ,did you notice that ,i missed two lines when ,i read you that first stanza2 and think that ,i had forgotten them8 ,hear them now3-- 8,come into the garden1 ,maud1 ,for the black bat1 night1 has flown1 ,come into the garden1 ,maud1 ,i am here at the gate1 alone40 ,who is it1 think you1 who stands at the gate of this sweeter garden alone1 waiting for you8 ,did you ever hear1 not of a ,maud1 but a ,madeleine1 who went down to her garden in the dawn1 and found ,one waiting at the gate1 whom she supposed to be the gardener8 ,have you not sought ,him often2--sought ,him in vain1 all through the night2--sought ,him in vain at the gate of that old garden where the fiery sword is set8 ,he is never there2 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 valley1 to see whether the vine has flourished1 and the pomegranate budded4 ,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 seed2--more3 you shall see the troops of the angel keepers that1 with their wings1 wave away the hungry birds from the path-sides where ,he has sown1 and call to each other between the vineyard rows1 8,take us the foxes1 the little foxes1 that spoil the vines1 for our vines have tender grapes40 ,oh--you queens--you queens6 among the hills and happy greenwood of this land of yours1 shall the foxes have holes1 and the birds of the air have nests2 and in your cities1 shall the stones cry out against you1 that they are the only pillows where the ,son of ,man can lay ,his head8 ,lecture ,,iii4 ,the ,mystery of ,life and its ,arts ,lecture delivered in the theatre of the ,royal ,college of ,science1 ,dublin1 #ahfh4 ,,when ,i accepted the privilege of addressing you to-day1 ,i was not aware of a restriction with respect to the topics of discussion which may be brought before this ,society #bi--;a restriction which1 though entirely wise and right under the circumstances contemplated in its introduction1 would necessarily have disabled me1 thinking as ,i think1 from preparing any lecture for you on the subject of art in a form which might be permanently useful4 ,pardon me1 therefore1 in so far as ,i must transgress such limitation2 for indeed my infringement will be of the letter--not of the spirit--of your commands4 ,in whatever ,i may say touching the religion which has been the foundation of art1 or the policy which has contributed to its power1 if ,i offend one1 ,i shall offend all2 for ,i shall take no note of any separations in creeds1 or antagonisms in parties3 neither do ,i fear that ultimately ,i shall offend any1 by proving--or at least stating as capable of positive proof--the connection of all that is best in the crafts and arts of man1 with the simplicity of his faith1 and the sincerity of his patriotism4 ,but ,i speak to you under another disadvantage1 by which ,i am checked in frankness of utterance1 not here only1 but everywhere3 namely1 that ,i am never fully aware how far my audiences are disposed to give me credit for real knowledge of my subject1 or how far they grant me attention only because ,i have been sometimes thought an ingenious or pleasant essayist upon it4 ,for ,i have had what1 in many respects1 ,i boldly call the misfortune1 to set my words sometimes prettily together2 not without a foolish vanity in the poor knack that ,i had of doing so3 until ,i was heavily punished for this pride1 by finding that many people thought of the words only1 and cared nothing for their meaning4 ,happily1 therefore1 the power of using such pleasant language--if indeed it ever were mine--is passing away from me2 and whatever ,i am now able to say at all1 ,i find myself forced to say with great plainness4 ,for my thoughts have changed also1 as my words have2 and whereas in earlier life1 what little influence ,i obtained was due perhaps chiefly to the enthusiasm with which ,i was able to dwell on the beauty of the physical clouds1 and of their colours in the sky2 so all the influence ,i now desire to retain must be due to the earnestness with which ,i am endeavouring to trace the form and beauty of another kind of cloud than those2 the bright cloud of which it is written--8,what is your life8 ,it is even as a vapour that appeareth for a little time1 and then vanisheth away40 ,i suppose few people reach the middle or latter period of their age1 without having1 at some moment of change or disappointment1 felt the truth of those bitter words2 and been startled by the fading of the sunshine from the cloud of their life into the sudden agony of the knowledge that the fabric of it was as fragile as a dream1 and the endurance of it as transient as the dew4 ,but it is not always that1 even at such times of melancholy surprise1 we can enter into any true perception that this human life shares in the nature of it1 not only the evanescence1 but the mystery of the cloud2 that its avenues are wreathed in darkness1 and its forms and courses no less fantastic1 than spectral and obscure2 so that not only in the vanity which we cannot grasp1 but in the shadow which we cannot pierce1 it is true of this cloudy life of ours1 that 8man walketh in a vain shadow1 and disquieteth himself in vain40 ,and least of all1 whatever may have been the eagerness of our passions1 or the height of our pride1 are we able to understand in its depth the third and most solemn character in which our life is like those clouds of heaven2 that to it belongs not only their transcience1 not only their mystery1 but also their power2 that in the cloud of the human soul there is a fire stronger than the lightning1 and a grace more precious than the rain2 and that though of the good and evil it shall one day be said alike1 that the place that knew them knows them no more1 there is an infinite separation between those whose brief presence had there been a blessing1 like the mist of ,eden that went up from the earth to water the garden1 and those whose place knew them only as a drifting and changeful shade1 of whom the heavenly sentence is1 that they are 8wells without water2 clouds that are carried with a tempest1 to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever40 ,to those among us1 however1 who have lived long enough to form some just estimate of the rate of the changes which are1 hour by hour in accelerating catastrophe1 manifesting themselves in the laws1 the arts1 and the creeds of men1 it seems to me1 that now at least1 if never at any former time1 the thoughts of the true nature of our life1 and of its powers and responsibilities1 should present themselves with absolute sadness and sternness4 ,and although ,i know that this feeling is much deepened in my own mind by disappointment1 which1 by chance1 has attended the greater number of my cherished purposes1 ,i do not for that reason distrust the feeling itself1 though ,i am on my guard against an exaggerated degree of it3 nay1 ,i rather believe that in periods of new effort and violent change1 disappointment is a wholesome medicine2 and that in the secret of it1 as in the twilight so beloved by ,titian1 we may see the colours of things with deeper truth than in the most dazzling sunshine4 ,and because these truths about the works of men1 which ,i want to bring to-day before you1 are most of them sad ones1 though at the same time helpful2 and because also ,i believe that your kind ,irish hearts will answer more gladly to the truthful expression of a personal feeling1 than to the exposition of an abstract principle1 ,i will permit myself so much unreserved speaking of my own causes of regret1 as may enable you to make just allowance for what1 according to your sympathies1 you will call either the bitterness1 or the insight1 of a mind which has surrendered its best hopes1 and been foiled in its favourite aims4 ,i spent the ten strongest years of my life1 7from twenty to thirty17 in endeavouring to show the excellence of the work of the man whom ,i believed1 and rightly believed1 to be the greatest painter of the schools of ,england since ,reynolds4 ,i had then perfect faith in the power of every great truth of beauty to prevail ultimately1 and take its right place in usefulness and honour2 and ,i strove to bring the painter's work into this due place1 while the painter was yet alive4 ,but he knew1 better than ,i1 the uselessness of talking about what people could not see for themselves4 ,he always discouraged me scornfully1 even when he thanked me--and he died before even the superficial effect of my work was visible4 ,i went on1 however1 thinking ,i could at least be of use to the public1 if not to him1 in proving his power4 ,my books got talked about a little4 ,the prices of modern pictures1 generally1 rose1 and ,i was beginning to take some pleasure in a sense of gradual victory1 when1 fortunately or unfortunately1 an opportunity of perfect trial undeceived me at once1 and for ever4 ,the ,trustees of the ,national ,gallery commissioned me to arrange the ,turner drawings there1 and permitted me to prepare three hundred examples of his studies from nature1 for exhibition at ,kensington4 ,at ,kensington they were1 and are1 placed for exhibition2 but they are not exhibited1 for the room in which they hang is always empty4 ,well--this showed me at once1 that those ten years of my life had been1 in their chief purpose1 lost4 ,for that1 ,i did not so much care2 ,i had1 at least1 learned my own business thoroughly1 and should be able1 as ,i fondly supposed1 after such a lesson1 now to use my knowledge with better effect4 ,but what ,i did care for was the--to me frightful--discovery1 that the most splendid genius in the arts might be permitted by ,providence to labour and perish uselessly2 that in the very fineness of it there might be something rendering it invisible to ordinary eyes2 but that1 with this strange excellence1 faults might be mingled which would be as deadly as its virtues were vain2 that the glory of it was perishable1 as well as invisible1 and the gift and grace of it might be to us as snow in summer and as rain in harvest4 ,that was the first mystery of life to me4 ,but1 while my best energy was given to the study of painting1 ,i had put collateral effort1 more prudent if less enthusiastic1 into that of architecture2 and in this ,i could not complain of meeting with no sympathy4 ,among several personal reasons which caused me to desire that ,i might give this1 my closing lecture on the subject of art here1 in ,ireland1 one of the chief was1 that in reading it1 ,i should stand near the beautiful building1--the engineer's school of your college1--which was the first realization ,i had the joy to see1 of the principles ,i had1 until then1 been endeavouring to teach6 but which1 alas1 is now1 to me1 no more than the richly canopied monument of one of the most earnest souls that ever gave itself to the arts1 and one of my truest and most loving friends1 ,benjamin ,woodward4 ,nor was it here in ,ireland only that ,i received the help of ,irish sympathy and genius4 ,when to another friend1 ,sir ,thomas ,deane1 with ,mr4 ,woodward1 was entrusted the building of the museum at ,oxford1 the best details of the work were executed by sculptors who had been born and trained here2 and the first window of the faade of the building1 in which was inaugurated the study of natural science in ,england1 in true fellowship with literature1 was carved from my design by an ,irish sculptor4 ,you may perhaps think that no man ought to speak of disappointment1 to whom1 even in one branch of labour1 so much success was granted4 ,had ,mr4 ,woodward now been beside me1 ,i had not so spoken2 but his gentle and passionate spirit was cut off from the fulfilment of its purposes1 and the work we did together is now become vain4 ,it may not be so in future2 but the architecture we endeavoured to introduce is inconsistent alike with the reckless luxury1 the deforming mechanism1 and the squalid misery of modern cities2 among the formative fashions of the day1 aided1 especially in ,england1 by ecclesiastical sentiment1 it indeed obtained notoriety2 and sometimes behind an engine furnace1 or a railroad bank1 you may detect the pathetic discord of its momentary grace1 and1 with toil1 decipher its floral carvings choked with soot4 ,i felt answerable to the schools ,i loved1 only for their injury4 ,i perceived that this new portion of my strength had also been spent in vain2 and from amidst streets of iron1 and palaces of crystal1 shrank back at last to the carving of the mountain and colour of the flower4 ,and still ,i could tell of failure1 and failure repeated1 as years went on2 but ,i have trespassed enough on your patience to show you1 in part1 the causes of my discouragement4 ,now let me more deliberately tell you its results4 ,you know there is a tendency in the minds of many men1 when they are heavily disappointed in the main purposes of their life1 to feel1 and perhaps in warning1 perhaps in mockery1 to declare1 that life itself is a vanity4 ,because it has disappointed them1 they think its nature is of disappointment always1 or at best1 of pleasure that can be grasped by imagination only2 that the cloud of it has no strength nor fire within2 but is a painted cloud only1 to be delighted in1 yet despised4 ,you know how beautifully ,pope has expressed this particular phase of thought3-- 8,meanwhile opinion gilds1 with varying rays1 ,these painted clouds that beautify our days2 ,each want of happiness by hope supplied1 ,and each vacuity of sense1 by pride4 ,hope builds as fast as ,knowledge can destroy2 ,in ,folly's cup1 still laughs the bubble joy4 ,one pleasure past1 another still we gain1 ,and not a vanity is given in vain40 ,but the effect of failure upon my own mind has been just the reverse of this4 ,the more that my life disappointed me1 the more solemn and wonderful it became to me4 ,it seemed1 contrarily to ,pope's saying1 that the vanity of it was indeed given in vain2 but that there was something behind the veil of it1 which was not vanity4 ,it became to me not a painted cloud1 but a terrible and impenetrable one3 not a mirage1 which vanished as ,i drew near1 but a pillar of darkness1 to which ,i was forbidden to draw near4 ,for ,i saw that both my own failure1 and such success in petty things as in its poor triumph seemed to me worse than failure1 came from the want of sufficiently earnest effort to understand the whole law and meaning of existence1 and to bring it to noble and due end2 as1 on the other hand1 ,i saw more and more clearly that all enduring success in the arts1 or in any other occupation1 had come from the ruling of lower purposes1 not by a conviction of their nothingness1 but by a solemn faith in the advancing power of human nature1 or in the promise1 however dimly apprehended1 that the mortal part of it would one day be swallowed up in immortality2 and that1 indeed1 the arts themselves never had reached any vital strength or honour1 but in the effort to proclaim this immortality1 and in the service either of great and just religion1 or of some unselfish patriotism1 and law of such national life as must be the foundation of religion4 ,nothing that ,i have ever said is more true or necessary--nothing has been more misunderstood or misapplied--than my strong assertion that the arts can never be right themselves1 unless their motive is right4 ,it is misunderstood this way3 weak painters1 who have never learned their business1 and cannot lay a true line1 continually come to me1 crying out--8,look at this picture of mine2 it must be good1 ,i had such a lovely motive4 ,i have put my whole heart into it1 and taken years to think over its treatment40 ,well1 the only answer for these people is--if one had the cruelty to make it--8,sir1 you cannot think over anything in any number of years1--you haven't the head to do it2 and though you had fine motives1 strong enough to make you burn yourself in a slow fire1 if only first you could paint a picture1 you can't paint one1 nor half an inch of one2 you haven't the hand to do it40 ,but1 far more decisively we have to say to the men who do know their business1 or may know it if they choose--8,sir1 you have this gift1 and a mighty one2 see that you serve your nation faithfully with it4 ,it is a greater trust than ships and armies3 you might cast them away1 if you were their captain1 with less treason to your people than in casting your own glorious power away1 and serving the devil with it instead of men4 ,ships and armies you may replace if they are lost1 but a great intellect1 once abused1 is a curse to the earth for ever40 ,this1 then1 ,i meant by saying that the arts must have noble motive4 ,this also ,i said respecting them1 that they never had prospered1 nor could prosper1 but when they had such true purpose1 and were devoted to the proclamation of divine truth or law4 ,and yet ,i saw also that they had always failed in this proclamation--that poetry1 and sculpture1 and painting1 though only great when they strove to teach us something about the gods1 never had taught us anything trustworthy about the gods1 but had always betrayed their trust in the crisis of it1 and1 with their powers at the full reach1 became ministers to pride and to lust4 ,and ,i felt also1 with increasing amazement1 the unconquerable apathy in ourselves and hearers1 no less than in these the teachers2 and that while the wisdom and rightness of every act and art of life could only be consistent with a right understanding of the ends of life1 we were all plunged as in a languid dream--our hearts fat1 and our eyes heavy1 and our ears closed1 lest the inspiration of hand or voice should reach us--lest we should see with our eyes1 and understand with our hearts1 and be healed4 ,this intense apathy in all of us is the first great mystery of life2 it stands in the way of every perception1 every virtue4 ,there is no making ourselves feel enough astonishment at it4 ,that the occupations or pastimes of life should have no motive1 is understandable2 but--,that life itself should have no motive--that we neither care to find out what it may lead to1 nor to guard against its being for ever taken away from us--here is a mystery indeed4 ,for just suppose ,i were able to call at this moment to any one in this audience by name1 and to tell him positively that ,i knew a large estate had been lately left to him on some curious conditions2 but that though ,i knew it was large1 ,i did not know how large1 nor even where it was--whether in the ,east ,indies or the ,west1 or in ,england1 or at the ,antipodes4 ,i only knew it was a vast estate1 and that there was a chance of his losing it altogether if he did not soon find out on what terms it had been left to him4 ,suppose ,i were able to say this positively to any single man in this audience1 and he knew that ,i did not speak without warrant1 do you think that he would rest content with that vague knowledge1 if it were anywise possible to obtain more8 ,would he not give every energy to find some trace of the facts1 and never rest till he had ascertained where this place was1 and what it was like8 ,and suppose he were a young man1 and all he could discover by his best endeavour was that the estate was never to be his at all1 unless he persevered1 during certain years of probation1 in an orderly and industrious life2 but that1 according to the rightness of his conduct1 the portion of the estate assigned to him would be greater or less1 so that it literally depended on his behaviour from day to day whether he got ten thousand a year1 or thirty thousand a year1 or nothing whatever--would you not think it strange if the youth never troubled himself to satisfy the conditions in any way1 nor even to know what was required of him1 but lived exactly as he chose1 and never inquired whether his chances of the estate were increasing or passing away8 ,well1 you know that this is actually and literally so with the greater number of the educated persons now living in ,christian countries4 ,nearly every man and woman in any company such as this1 outwardly professes to believe--and a large number unquestionably think they believe--much more than this2 not only that a quite unlimited estate is in prospect for them if they please the ,holder of it1 but that the infinite contrary of such a possession--an estate of perpetual misery--is in store for them if they displease this great ,land-,holder1 this great ,heaven-,holder4 ,and yet there is not one in a thousand of these human souls that cares to think1 for ten minutes of the day1 where this estate is or how beautiful it is1 or what kind of life they are to lead in it1 or what kind of life they must lead to obtain it4 ,you fancy that you care to know this3 so little do you care that1 probably1 at this moment many of you are displeased with me for talking of the matter6 ,you came to hear about the ,art of this world1 not about the ,life of the next1 and you are provoked with me for talking of what you can hear any ,sunday in church4 ,but do not be afraid4 ,i will tell you something before you go about pictures1 and carvings1 and pottery1 and what else you would like better to hear of than the other world4 ,nay1 perhaps you say1 8,we want you to talk of pictures and pottery1 because we are sure that you know something of them1 and you know nothing of the other world40 ,well--,i don't4 ,that is quite true4 ,but the very strangeness and mystery of which ,i urge you to take notice1 is in this--that ,i do not2--nor you either4 ,can you answer a single bold question unflinchingly about that other world8--,are you sure there is a heaven8 ,sure there is a hell8 ,sure that men are dropping before your faces through the pavements of these streets into eternal fire1 or sure that they are not8 ,sure that at your own death you are going to be delivered from all sorrow1 to be endowed with all virtue1 to be gifted with all felicity1 and raised into perpetual companionship with a ,king1 compared to whom the kings of the earth are as grass-hoppers1 and the nations as the dust of ,his feet8 ,are you sure of this8 or1 if not sure1 do any of us so much as care to make it sure8 and1 if not1 how can anything that we do be right--how can anything we think be wise8 what honour can there be in the arts that amuse us1 or what profit in the possessions that please8 ,is not this a mystery of life8 ,but farther1 you may1 perhaps1 think it a beneficent ordinance for the generality of men that they do not1 with earnestness or anxiety1 dwell on such questions of the future because the business of the day could not be done if this kind of thought were taken by all of us for the morrow4 ,be it so3 but at least we might anticipate that the greatest and wisest of us1 who were evidently the appointed teachers of the rest1 would set themselves apart to seek out whatever could be surely known of the future destinies of their race2 and to teach this in no rhetorical or ambiguous manner1 but in the plainest and most severely earnest words4 ,now1 the highest representatives of men who have thus endeavoured1 during the ,christian era1 to search out these deep things1 and relate them1 are ,dante and ,milton4 ,there are none who for earnestness of thought1 for mastery of word1 can be classed with these4 ,i am not at present1 mind you1 speaking of persons set apart in any priestly or pastoral office1 to deliver creeds to us1 or doctrines2 but of men who try to discover and set forth1 as far as by human intellect is possible1 the facts of the other world4 ,divines may perhaps teach us how to arrive there1 but only these two poets have in any powerful manner striven to discover1 or in any definite words professed to tell1 what we shall see and become there2 or how those upper and nether worlds are1 and have been1 inhabited4 ,and what have they told us8 ,milton's account of the most important event in his whole system of the universe1 the fall of the angels1 is evidently unbelievable to himself2 and the more so1 that it is wholly founded on1 and in a great part spoiled and degraded from1 ,hesiod's account of the decisive war of the younger gods with the ,titans4 ,the rest of his poem is a picturesque drama1 in which every artifice of invention is visibly and consciously employed2 not a single fact being1 for an instant1 conceived as tenable by any living faith4 ,dante's conception is far more intense1 and1 by himself1 for the time1 not to be escaped from2 it is indeed a vision1 but a vision only1 and that one of the wildest that ever entranced a soul--a dream in which every grotesque type or phantasy of heathen tradition is renewed1 and adorned2 and the destinies of the ,christian ,church1 under their most sacred symbols1 become literally subordinate to the praise1 and are only to be understood by the aid1 of one dear ,florentine maiden4 ,i tell you truly that1 as ,i strive more with this strange lethargy and trance in myself1 and awake to the meaning and power of life1 it seems daily more amazing to me that men such as these should dare to play with the most precious truths1 7or the most deadly untruths17 by which the whole human race listening to them could be informed1 or deceived2--all the world their audiences for ever1 with pleased ear1 and passionate heart2--and yet1 to this submissive infinitude of souls1 and evermore succeeding and succeeding multitude1 hungry for bread of life1 they do but play upon sweetly modulated pipes2 with pompous nomenclature adorn the councils of hell2 touch a troubadour's guitar to the courses of the suns2 and fill the openings of eternity1 before which prophets have veiled their faces1 and which angels desire to look into1 with idle puppets of their scholastic imagination1 and melancholy lights of frantic faith in their lost mortal love4 ,is not this a mystery of life8 ,but more4 ,we have to remember that these two great teachers were both of them warped in their temper1 and thwarted in their search for truth4 ,they were men of intellectual war1 unable1 through darkness of controversy1 or stress of personal grief1 to discern where their own ambition modified their utterances of the moral law2 or their own agony mingled with their anger at its violation4 ,but greater men than these have been--innocent-hearted--too great for contest4 ,men1 like ,homer and ,shakespeare1 of so unrecognised personality1 that it disappears in future ages1 and becomes ghostly1 like the tradition of a lost heathen god4 ,men1 therefore1 to whose unoffended1 uncondemning sight1 the whole of human nature reveals itself in a pathetic weakness1 with which they will not strive2 or in mournful and transitory strength1 which they dare not praise4 ,and all ,pagan and ,christian ,civilization thus becomes subject to them4 ,it does not matter how little1 or how much1 any of us have read1 either of ,homer or ,shakespeare2 everything round us1 in substance1 or in thought1 has been moulded by them4 ,all ,greek gentlemen were educated under ,homer4 ,all ,roman gentlemen1 by ,greek literature4 ,all ,italian1 and ,french1 and ,english gentlemen1 by ,roman literature1 and by its principles4 ,of the scope of ,shakespeare1 ,i will say only1 that the intellectual measure of every man since born1 in the domains of creative thought1 may be assigned to him1 according to the degree in which he has been taught by ,shakespeare4 ,well1 what do these two men1 centres of mortal intelligence1 deliver to us of conviction respecting what it most behoves that intelligence to grasp8 ,what is their hope--their crown of rejoicing8 what manner of exhortation have they for us1 or of rebuke8 what lies next their own hearts1 and dictates their undying words8 ,have they any peace to promise to our unrest--any redemption to our misery8 ,take ,homer first1 and think if there is any sadder image of human fate than the great ,homeric story4 ,the main features in the character of ,achilles are its intense desire of justice1 and its tenderness of affection4 ,and in that bitter song of the ,iliad1 this man1 though aided continually by the wisest of the gods1 and burning with the desire of justice in his heart1 becomes yet1 through ill-governed passion1 the most unjust of men3 and1 full of the deepest tenderness in his heart1 becomes yet1 through ill-governed passion1 the most cruel of men4 ,intense alike in love and in friendship1 he loses1 first his mistress1 and then his friend2 for the sake of the one1 he surrenders to death the armies of his own land2 for the sake of the other1 he surrenders all4 ,will a man lay down his life for his friend8 ,yea--even for his dead friend1 this ,achilles1 though goddess-born1 and goddess-taught1 gives up his kingdom1 his country1 and his life--casts alike the innocent and guilty1 with himself1 into one gulf of slaughter1 and dies at last by the hand of the basest of his adversaries4 ,is not this a mystery of life8 ,but what1 then1 is the message to us of our own poet1 and searcher of hearts1 after fifteen hundred years of ,christian faith have been numbered over the graves of men8 ,are his words more cheerful than the ,heathen's--is his hope more near--his trust more sure--his reading of fate more happy8 ,ah1 no6 ,he differs from the ,heathen poet chiefly in this--that he recognizes1 for deliverance1 no gods nigh at hand2 and that1 by petty chance--by momentary folly--by broken message--by fool's tyranny--or traitor's snare1 the strongest and most righteous are brought to their ruin1 and perish without word of hope4 ,he indeed1 as part of his rendering of character1 ascribes the power and modesty of habitual devotion to the gentle and the just4 ,the death-bed of ,katharine is bright with visions of angels2 and the great soldier-king1 standing by his few dead1 acknowledges the presence of the ,hand that can save alike by many or by few4 ,but observe that from those who with deepest spirit1 meditate1 and with deepest passion1 mourn1 there are no such words as these2 nor in their hearts are any such consolations4 ,instead of the perpetual sense of the helpful presence of the ,deity1 which1 through all heathen tradition1 is the source of heroic strength1 in battle1 in exile1 and in the valley of the shadow of death1 we find only in the great ,christian poet1 the consciousness of a moral law1 through which 8the gods are just1 and of our pleasant vices make instruments to scourge us20 and of the resolved arbitration of the destinies1 that conclude into precision of doom what we feebly and blindly began2 and force us1 when our indiscretion serves us1 and our deepest plots do pall1 to the confession1 that 8there's a divinity that shapes our ends1 rough hew them how we will40 ,is not this a mystery of life8 ,be it so1 then4 ,about this human life that is to be1 or that is1 the wise religious men tell us nothing that we can trust2 and the wise contemplative men1 nothing that can give us peace4 ,but there is yet a third class1 to whom we may turn--the wise practical men4 ,we have sat at the feet of the poets who sang of heaven1 and they have told us their dreams4 ,we have listened to the poets who sang of earth1 and they have chanted to us dirges and words of despair4 ,but there is one class of men more3--men1 not capable of vision1 nor sensitive to sorrow1 but firm of purpose--practised in business2 learned in all that can be1 7by handling17 known4 ,men1 whose hearts and hopes are wholly in this present world1 from whom1 therefore1 we may surely learn1 at least1 how1 at present1 conveniently to live in it4 ,what will they say to us1 or show us by example8 ,these kings--these councillors--these statesmen and builders of kingdoms--these capitalists and men of business1 who weigh the earth1 and the dust of it1 in a balance4 ,they know the world1 surely2 and what is the mystery of life to us1 is none to them4 ,they can surely show us how to live1 while we live1 and to gather out of the present world what is best4 ,i think ,i can best tell you their answer1 by telling you a dream ,i had once4 ,for though ,i am no poet1 ,i have dreams sometimes3--,i dreamed ,i was at a child's ,mayday party1 in which every means of entertainment had been provided for them1 by a wise and kind host4 ,it was in a stately house1 with beautiful gardens attached to it2 and the children had been set free in the rooms and gardens1 with no care whatever but how to pass their afternoon rejoicingly4 ,they did not1 indeed1 know much about what was to happen next day2 and some of them1 ,i thought1 were a little frightened1 because there was a chance of their being sent to a new school where there were examinations2 but they kept the thoughts of that out of their heads as well as they could1 and resolved to enjoy themselves4 ,the house1 ,i said1 was in a beautiful garden1 and in the garden were all kinds of flowers2 sweet1 grassy banks for rest2 and smooth lawns for play2 and pleasant streams and woods2 and rocky places for climbing4 ,and the children were happy for a little while1 but presently they separated themselves into parties2 and then each party declared it would have a piece of the garden for its own1 and that none of the others should have anything to do with that piece4 ,next1 they quarrelled violently which pieces they would have2 and at last the boys took up the thing1 as boys should do1 8practically10 and fought in the flower-beds till there was hardly a flower left standing2 then they trampled down each other's bits of the garden out of spite2 and the girls cried till they could cry no more2 and so they all lay down at last breathless in the ruin1 and waited for the time when they were to be taken home in the evening4 #cj ,meanwhile1 the children in the house had been making themselves happy also in their manner4 ,for them1 there had been provided every kind of indoor pleasure3 there was music for them to dance to2 and the library was open1 with all manner of amusing books2 and there was a museum full of the most curious shells1 and animals1 and birds2 and there was a workshop1 with lathes and carpenter's tools1 for the ingenious boys2 and there were pretty fantastic dresses1 for the girls to dress in2 and there were microscopes1 and kaleidoscopes2 and whatever toys a child could fancy2 and a table1 in the dining-room1 loaded with everything nice to eat4 ,but1 in the midst of all this1 it struck two or three of the more 8practical0 children1 that they would like some of the brass-headed nails that studded the chairs2 and so they set to work to pull them out4 ,presently1 the others1 who were reading1 or looking at shells1 took a fancy to do the like2 and1 in a little while1 all the children1 nearly1 were spraining their fingers1 in pulling out brass-headed nails4 ,with all that they could pull out1 they were not satisfied2 and then1 everybody wanted some of somebody else's4 ,and at last1 the really practical and sensible ones declared1 that nothing was of any real consequence1 that afternoon1 except to get plenty of brass-headed nails2 and that the books1 and the cakes1 and the microscopes were of no use at all in themselves1 but only1 if they could be exchanged for nail-heads4 ,and at last they began to fight for nail-heads1 as the others fought for the bits of garden4 ,only here and there1 a despised one shrank away into a corner1 and tried to get a little quiet with a book1 in the midst of the noise2 but all the practical ones thought of nothing else but counting nail-heads all the afternoon--even though they knew they would not be allowed to carry so much as one brass knob away with them4 ,but no--it was--8,who has most nails8 ,i have a hundred1 and you have fifty2 or1 ,i have a thousand1 and you have two4 ,i must have as many as you before ,i leave the house1 or ,i cannot possibly go home in peace40 ,at last1 they made so much noise that ,i awoke1 and thought to myself1 8,what a false dream that is1 of children60 ,the child is the father of the man2 and wiser4 ,children never do such foolish things4 ,only men do4 ,but there is yet one last class of persons to be interrogated4 ,the wise religious men we have asked in vain2 the wise contemplative men1 in vain2 the wise worldly men1 in vain4 ,but there is another group yet4 ,in the midst of this vanity of empty religion--of tragic contemplation--of wrathful and wretched ambition1 and dispute for dust1 there is yet one great group of persons1 by whom all these disputers live--the persons who have determined1 or have had it by a beneficent ,providence determined for them1 that they will do something useful2 that whatever may be prepared for them hereafter1 or happen to them here1 they will1 at least1 deserve the food that ,god gives them by winning it honourably3 and that1 however fallen from the purity1 or far from the peace1 of ,eden1 they will carry out the duty of human dominion1 though they have lost its felicity2 and dress and keep the wilderness1 though they no more can dress or keep the garden4 ,these1--hewers of wood1 and drawers of water1--these1 bent under burdens1 or torn of scourges--these1 that dig and weave--that plant and build2 workers in wood1 and in marble1 and in iron--by whom all food1 clothing1 habitation1 furniture1 and means of delight are produced1 for themselves1 and for all men beside2 men1 whose deeds are good1 though their words may be few2 men1 whose lives are serviceable1 be they never so short1 and worthy of honour1 be they never so humble2--from these1 surely1 at least1 we may receive some clear message of teaching2 and pierce1 for an instant1 into the mystery of life1 and of its arts4 ,yes2 from these1 at last1 we do receive a lesson4 ,but ,i grieve to say1 or rather--for that is the deeper truth of the matter--,i rejoice to say--this message of theirs can only be received by joining them--not by thinking about them4 ,you sent for me to talk to you of art2 and ,i have obeyed you in coming4 ,but the main thing ,i have to tell you is1--that art must not be talked about4 ,the fact that there is talk about it at all1 signifies that it is ill done1 or cannot be done4 ,no true painter ever speaks1 or ever has spoken1 much of his art4 ,the greatest speak nothing4 ,even ,reynolds is no exception1 for he wrote of all that he could not himself do1 and was utterly silent respecting all that he himself did4 ,the moment a man can really do his work he becomes speechless about it4 ,all words become idle to him--all theories4 ,does a bird need to theorize about building its nest1 or boast of it when built8 ,all good work is essentially done that way--without hesitation1 without difficulty1 without boasting2 and in the doers of the best1 there is an inner and involuntary power which approximates literally to the instinct of an animal--nay1 ,i am certain that in the most perfect human artists1 reason does not supersede instinct1 but is added to an instinct as much more divine than that of the lower animals as the human body is more beautiful than theirs2 that a great singer sings not with less instinct than the nightingale1 but with more--only more various1 applicable1 and governable2 that a great architect does not build with less instinct than the beaver or the bee1 but with more--with an innate cunning of proportion that embraces all beauty1 and a divine ingenuity of skill that improvises all construction4 ,but be that as it may--be the instinct less or more than that of inferior animals--like or unlike theirs1 still the human art is dependent on that first1 and then upon an amount of practice1 of science1--and of imagination disciplined by thought1 which the true possessor of it knows to be incommunicable1 and the true critic of it1 inexplicable1 except through long process of laborious' years4 ,that journey of life's conquest1 in which hills over hills1 and ,alps on ,alps arose1 and sank1--do you think you can make another trace it painlessly1 by talking8 ,why1 you cannot even carry us up an ,alp1 by talking4 ,you can guide us up it1 step by step1 no otherwise--even so1 best silently4 ,you girls1 who have been among the hills1 know how the bad guide chatters and gesticulates1 and it is 8,put your foot here20 and 8,mind how you balance yourself there20 but the good guide walks on quietly1 without a word1 only with his eyes on you when need is1 and his arm like an iron bar1 if need be4 ,in that slow way1 also1 art can be taught--if you have faith in your guide1 and will let his arm be to you as an iron bar when need is4 ,but in what teacher of art have you such faith8 ,certainly not in me2 for1 as ,i told you at first1 ,i know well enough it is only because you think ,i can talk1 not because you think ,i know my business1 that you let me speak to you at all4 ,if ,i were to tell you anything that seemed to you strange you would not believe it1 and yet it would only be in telling you strange things that ,i could be of use to you4 ,i could be of great use to you--infinite use--with brief saying1 if you would believe it2 but you would not1 just because the thing that would be of real use would displease you4 ,you are all wild1 for instance1 with admiration of ,gustave ,dor4 ,well1 suppose ,i were to tell you1 in the strongest terms ,i could use1 that ,gustave ,dor's art was bad--bad1 not in weakness1--not in failure1--but bad with dreadful power--the power of the ,furies and the ,harpies mingled1 enraging1 and polluting2 that so long as you looked at it1 no perception of pure or beautiful art was possible for you4 ,suppose ,i were to tell you that6 ,what would be the use8 ,would you look at ,gustave ,dor less8 ,rather1 more1 ,i fancy4 ,on the other hand1 ,i could soon put you into good humour with me1 if ,i chose4 ,i know well enough what you like1 and how to praise it to your better liking4 ,i could talk to you about moonlight1 and twilight1 and spring flowers1 and autumn leaves1 and the ,madonnas of ,raphael--how motherly6 and the ,sibyls of ,michael ,angelo--how majestic6 and the ,saints of ,angelico--how pious6 and the ,cherubs of ,correggio--how delicious6 ,old as ,i am1 ,i could play you a tune on the harp yet1 that you would dance to4 ,but neither you nor ,i should be a bit the better or wiser2 or1 if we were1 our increased wisdom could be of no practical effect4 ,for1 indeed1 the arts1 as regards teachableness1 differ from the sciences also in this1 that their power is founded not merely on facts which can be communicated1 but on dispositions which require to be created4 ,art is neither to be achieved by effort of thinking1 nor explained by accuracy of speaking4 ,it is the instinctive and necessary result of power1 which can only be developed through the mind of successive generations1 and which finally burst into life under social conditions as slow of growth as the faculties they regulate4 ,whole ras of mighty history are summed1 and the passions of dead myriads are concentrated1 in the existence of a noble art1 and if that noble art were among us1 we should feel it and rejoice2 not caring in the least to hear lectures on it2 and since it is not among us1 be assured we have to go back to the root of it1 or1 at least1 to the place where the stock of it is yet alive1 and the branches began to die4 ,and now1 may ,i have your pardon for pointing out1 partly with reference to matters which are at this time of greater moment than the arts--that if we undertook such recession to the vital germ of national arts that have decayed1 we should find a more singular arrest of their power in ,ireland than in any other ,european country8 ,for in the eighth century ,ireland possessed a school of art in her manuscripts and sculpture1 which1 in many of its qualities--apparently in all essential qualities of decorative invention--was quite without rival2 seeming as if it might have advanced to the highest triumphs in architecture and in painting4 ,but there was one fatal flaw in its nature1 by which it was stayed1 and stayed with a conspicuousness of pause to which there is no parallel3 so that1 long ago1 in tracing the progress of ,european schools from infancy to strength1 ,i chose for the students of ,kensington1 in a lecture since published1 two characteristic examples of early art1 of equal skill2 but in the one case1 skill which was progressive--in the other1 skill which was at pause4 ,in the one case1 it was work receptive of correction--hungry for correction2 and in the other1 work which inherently rejected correction4 ,i chose for them a corrigible ,eve1 and an incorrigible ,angel1 and ,i grieve to say that the incorrigible ,angel was also an ,irish ,angel6 #ca ,and the fatal difference lay wholly in this4 ,in both pieces of art there was an equal falling short of the needs of fact2 but the ,lombardic ,eve knew she was in the wrong1 and the ,irish ,angel thought himself all right4 ,the eager ,lombardic sculptor1 though firmly insisting on his childish idea1 yet showed in the irregular broken touches of the features1 and the imperfect struggle for softer lines in the form1 a perception of beauty and law that he could not render2 there was the strain of effort1 under conscious imperfection1 in every line4 ,but the ,irish missal-painter had drawn his angel with no sense of failure1 in happy complacency1 and put red dots into the palm of each hand1 and rounded the eyes into perfect circles1 and1 ,i regret to say1 left the mouth out altogether1 with perfect satisfaction to himself4 ,may ,i without offence ask you to consider whether this mode of arrest in ancient ,irish art may not be indicative of points of character which even yet1 in some measure1 arrest your national power8 ,i have seen much of ,irish character1 and have watched it closely1 for ,i have also much loved it4 ,and ,i think the form of failure to which it is most liable is this1--that being generous-hearted1 and wholly intending always to do right1 it does not attend to the external laws of right1 but thinks it must necessarily do right because it means to do so1 and therefore does wrong without finding it out2 and then1 when the consequences of its wrong come upon it1 or upon others connected with it1 it cannot conceive that the wrong is in anywise of its causing or of its doing1 but flies into wrath1 and a strange agony of desire for justice1 as feeling itself wholly innocent1 which leads it farther astray1 until there is nothing that it is not capable of doing with a good conscience4 ,but mind1 ,i do not mean to say that1 in past or present relations between ,ireland and ,england1 you have been wrong1 and we right4 ,far from that1 ,i believe that in all great questions of principle1 and in all details of administration of law1 you have been usually right1 and we wrong2 sometimes in misunderstanding you1 sometimes in resolute iniquity to you4 ,nevertheless1 in all disputes between states1 though the stronger is nearly always mainly in the wrong1 the weaker is often so in a minor degree2 and ,i think we sometimes admit the possibility of our being in error1 and you never do4 ,and now1 returning to the broader question1 what these arts and labours of life have to teach us of its mystery1 this is the first of their lessons--that the more beautiful the art1 the more it is essentially the work of people who feel themselves wrong2--who are striving for the fulfilment of a law1 and the grasp of a loveliness1 which they have not yet attained1 which they feel even farther and farther from attaining the more they strive for it4 ,and yet1 in still deeper sense1 it is the work of people who know also that they are right4 ,the very sense of inevitable error from their purpose marks the perfectness of that purpose1 and the continued sense of failure arises from the continued opening of the eyes more clearly to all the sacredest laws of truth4 ,this is one lesson4 ,the second is a very plain1 and greatly precious one3 namely--that whenever the arts and labours of life are fulfilled in this spirit of striving against misrule1 and doing whatever we have to do1 honourably and perfectly1 they invariably bring happiness1 as much as seems possible to the nature of man4 ,in all other paths by which that happiness is pursued there is disappointment1 or destruction3 for ambition and for passion there is no rest--no fruition2 the fairest pleasures of youth perish in a darkness greater than their past light3 and the loftiest and purest love too often does but inflame the cloud of life with endless fire of pain4 ,but1 ascending from lowest to highest1 through every scale of human industry1 that industry worthily followed1 gives peace4 ,ask the labourer in the field1 at the forge1 or in the mine2 ask the patient1 delicate-fingered artisan1 or the strong-armed1 fiery-hearted worker in bronze1 and in marble1 and with the colours of light2 and none of these1 who are true workmen1 will ever tell you1 that they have found the law of heaven an unkind one--that in the sweat of their face they should eat bread1 till they return to the ground2 nor that they ever found it an unrewarded obedience1 if1 indeed1 it was rendered faithfully to the command--8,whatsoever thy hand findeth to do--do it with thy might40 ,these are the two great and constant lessons which our labourers teach us of the mystery of life4 ,but there is another1 and a sadder one1 which they cannot teach us1 which we must read on their tombstones4 8,do it with thy might40 ,there have been myriads upon myriads of human creatures who have obeyed this law--who have put every breath and nerve of their being into its toil--who have devoted every hour1 and exhausted every faculty--who have bequeathed their unaccomplished thoughts at death--who1 being dead1 have yet spoken1 by majesty of memory1 and strength of example4 ,and1 at last1 what has all this 8,might0 of humanity accomplished1 in six thousand years of labour and sorrow8 ,what has it done8 ,take the three chief occupations and arts of men1 one by one1 and count their achievements4 ,begin with the first--the lord of them all--,agriculture4 ,six thousand years have passed since we were set to till the ground1 from which we were taken4 ,how much of it is tilled8 ,how much of that which is1 wisely or well8 ,in the very centre and chief garden of ,europe--where the two forms of parent ,christianity have had their fortresses--where the noble ,catholics of the ,forest ,cantons1 and the noble ,protestants of the ,vaudois valleys1 have maintained1 for dateless ages1 their faiths and liberties--there the unchecked ,alpine rivers yet run wild in devastation2 and the marshes1 which a few hundred men could redeem with a year's labour1 still blast their helpless inhabitants into fevered idiotism4 ,that is so1 in the centre of ,europe6 ,while1 on the near coast of ,africa1 once the ,garden of the ,hesperides1 an ,arab woman1 but a few sunsets since1 ate her child1 for famine4 ,and1 with all the treasures of the ,east at our feet1 we1 in our own dominion1 could not find a few grains of rice1 for a people that asked of us no more2 but stood by1 and saw five hundred thousand of them perish of hunger4 ,then1 after agriculture1 the art of kings1 take the next head of human arts--,weaving2 the art of queens1 honoured of all noble ,heathen women1 in the person of their virgin goddess--honoured of all ,hebrew women1 by the word of their wisest king--8,she layeth her hands to the spindle1 and her hands hold the distaff2 she stretcheth out her hand to the poor4 ,she is not afraid of the snow for her household1 for all her household are clothed with scarlet4 ,she maketh herself covering of tapestry2 her clothing is silk and purple4 ,she maketh fine linen1 and selleth it1 and delivereth girdles to the merchant40 ,what have we done in all these thousands of years with this bright art of ,greek maid and ,christian matron8 ,six thousand years of weaving1 and have we learned to weave8 ,might not every naked wall have been purple with tapestry1 and every feeble breast fenced with sweet colours from the cold8 ,what have we done8 ,our fingers are too few1 it seems1 to twist together some poor covering for our bodies4 ,we set our streams to work for us1 and choke the air with fire1 to turn our spinning-wheels--and1--are we yet clothed8 ,are not the streets of the capitals of ,europe foul with sale of cast clouts and rotten rags8 ,is not the beauty of your sweet children left in wretchedness of disgrace1 while1 with better honour1 nature clothes the brood of the bird in its nest1 and the suckling of the wolf in her den8 ,and does not every winter's snow robe what you have not robed1 and shroud what you have not shrouded2 and every winter's wind bear up to heaven its wasted souls1 to witness against you hereafter1 by the voice of their ,christ1--8,i was naked1 and ye clothed me not08 ,lastly--take the ,art of ,building--the strongest--proudest--most orderly--most enduring of the arts of man2 that of which the produce is in the surest manner accumulative1 and need not perish1 or be replaced2 but if once well done1 will stand more strongly than the unbalanced rocks--more prevalently than the crumbling hills4 ,the art which is associated with all civic pride and sacred principle2 with which men record their power--satisfy their enthusiasm--make sure their defence--define and make dear their habitation4 ,and in six thousand years of building1 what have we done8 ,of the greater part of all that skill and strength1 no vestige is left1 but fallen stones1 that encumber the fields and impede the streams4 ,but1 from this waste of disorder1 and of time1 and of rage1 what is left to us8 ,constructive and progressive creatures1 that we are1 with ruling brains1 and forming hands1 capable of fellowship1 and thirsting for fame1 can we not contend1 in comfort1 with the insects of the forest1 or1 in achievement1 with the worm of the sea8 ,the white surf rages in vain against the ramparts built by poor atoms of scarcely nascent life2 but only ridges of formless ruin mark the places where once dwelt our noblest multitudes4 ,the ant and the moth have cells for each of their young1 but our little ones lie in festering heaps1 in homes that consume them like graves2 and night by night1 from the corners of our streets1 rises up the cry of the homeless--8,i was a stranger1 and ye took me not in40 ,must it be always thus8 ,is our life for ever to be without profit--without possession8 ,shall the strength of its generations be as barren as death2 or cast away their labour1 as the wild fig-tree casts her untimely figs8 ,is it all a dream then--the desire of the eyes and the pride of life--or1 if it be1 might we not live in nobler dream than this8 ,the poets and prophets1 the wise men1 and the scribes1 though they have told us nothing about a life to come1 have told us much about the life that is now4 ,they have had--they also1--their dreams1 and we have laughed at them4 ,they have dreamed of mercy1 and of justice2 they have dreamed of peace and good-will2 they have dreamed of labour undisappointed1 and of rest undisturbed2 they have dreamed of fulness in harvest1 and overflowing in store2 they have dreamed of wisdom in council1 and of providence in law2 of gladness of parents1 and strength of children1 and glory of grey hairs4 ,and at these visions of theirs we have mocked1 and held them for idle and vain1 unreal and unaccomplishable4 ,what have we accomplished with our realities8 ,is this what has come of our worldly wisdom1 tried against their folly8 this1 our mightiest possible1 against their impotent ideal8 or1 have we only wandered among the spectra of a baser felicity1 and chased phantoms of the tombs1 instead of visions of the ,almighty2 and walked after the imaginations of our evil hearts1 instead of after the counsels of ,eternity1 until our lives--not in the likeness of the cloud of heaven1 but of the smoke of hell--have become 8as a vapour1 that appeareth for a little time1 and then vanisheth away08 ,does it vanish then8 ,are you sure of that8--sure1 that the nothingness of the grave will be a rest from this troubled nothingness2 and that the coiling shadow1 which disquiets itself in vain1 cannot change into the smoke of the torment that ascends for ever8 ,will any answer that they are sure of it1 and that there is no fear1 nor hope1 nor desire1 nor labour1 whither they go8 ,be it so3 will you not1 then1 make as sure of the ,life that now is1 as you are of the ,death that is to come8 ,your hearts are wholly in this world--will you not give them to it wisely1 as well as perfectly8 ,and see1 first of all1 that you have hearts1 and sound hearts1 too1 to give4 ,because you have no heaven to look for1 is that any reason that you should remain ignorant of this wonderful and infinite earth1 which is firmly and instantly given you in possession8 ,although your days are numbered1 and the following darkness sure1 is it necessary that you should share the degradation of the brute1 because you are condemned to its mortality2 or live the life of the moth1 and of the worm1 because you are to companion them in the dust8 ,not so2 we may have but a few thousands of days to spend1 perhaps hundreds only--perhaps tens2 nay1 the longest of our time and best1 looked back on1 will be but as a moment1 as the twinkling of an eye2 still we are men1 not insects2 we are living spirits1 not passing clouds4 8,he maketh the winds ,his messengers2 the momentary fire1 ,his minister20 and shall we do less than these8 ,let us do the work of men while we bear the form of them2 and1 as we snatch our narrow portion of time out of ,eternity1 snatch also our narrow inheritance of passion out of ,immortality--even though our lives be as a vapour1 that appeareth for a little time1 and then vanisheth away4 ,but there are some of you who believe not this--who think this cloud of life has no such close--that it is to float1 revealed and illumined1 upon the floor of heaven1 in the day when ,he cometh with clouds1 and every eye shall see ,him4 ,some day1 you believe1 within these five1 or ten1 or twenty years1 for every one of us the judgment will be set1 and the books opened4 ,if that be true1 far more than that must be true4 ,is there but one day of judgment8 ,why1 for us every day is a day of judgment--every day is a ,dies ,ir1 and writes its irrevocable verdict in the flame of its ,west4 ,think you that judgment waits till the doors of the grave are opened8 ,it waits at the doors of your houses--it waits at the corners of your streets2 we are in the midst of judgment--the insects that we crush are our judges--the moments we fret away are our judges--the elements that feed us1 judge1 as they minister--and the pleasures that deceive us1 judge1 as they indulge4 ,let us1 for our lives1 do the work of ,men while we bear the form of them1 if indeed those lives are ,not as a vapour1 and do ,not vanish away4 8,the work of men0--and what is that8 ,well1 we may any of us know very quickly1 on the condition of being wholly ready to do it4 ,but many of us are for the most part thinking1 not of what we are to do1 but of what we are to get2 and the best of us are sunk into the sin of ,ananias1 and it is a mortal one--we want to keep back part of the price2 and we continually talk of taking up our cross1 as if the only harm in a cross was the weight of it--as if it was only a thing to be carried1 instead of to be--crucified upon4 8,they that are ,his have crucified the flesh1 with the affections and lusts40 ,does that mean1 think you1 that in time of national distress1 of religious trial1 of crisis for every interest and hope of humanity--none of us will cease jesting1 none cease idling1 none put themselves to any wholesome work1 none take so much as a tag of lace off their footmen's coats1 to save the world8 ,or does it rather mean1 that they are ready to leave houses1 lands1 and kindreds--yes1 and life1 if need be8 ,life6--some of us are ready enough to throw that away1 joyless as we have made it4 ,but 8station in ,life0--how many of us are ready to quit that8 ,is it not always the great objection1 where there is question of finding something useful to do--8,we cannot leave our stations in ,life08 ,those of us who really cannot--that is to say1 who can only maintain themselves by continuing in some business or salaried office1 have already something to do2 and all that they have to see to is1 that they do it honestly and with all their might4 ,but with most people who use that apology1 8remaining in the station of life to which ,providence has called them0 means keeping all the carriages1 and all the footmen and large houses they can possibly pay for2 and1 once for all1 ,i say that if ever ,providence did put them into stations of that sort--which is not at all a matter of certainty--,providence is just now very distinctly calling them out again4 ,levi's station in life was the receipt of custom2 and ,peter's1 the shore of ,galilee2 and ,paul's1 the antechambers of the ,high ,priest1--which 8station in life0 each had to leave1 with brief notice4 ,and1 whatever our station in life may be1 at this crisis1 those of us who mean to fulfil our duty ought first to live on as little as we can2 and1 secondly1 to do all the wholesome work for it we can1 and to spend all we can spare in doing all the sure good we can4 ,and sure good is1 first in feeding people1 then in dressing people1 then in lodging people1 and lastly in rightly pleasing people1 with arts1 or sciences1 or any other subject of thought4 ,i say first in feeding2 and1 once for all1 do not let yourselves be deceived by any of the common talk of 8indiscriminate charity40 ,the order to us is not to feed the deserving hungry1 nor the industrious hungry1 nor the amiable and well-intentioned hungry1 but simply to feed the hungry4 ,it is quite true1 infallibly true1 that if any man will not work1 neither should he eat--think of that1 and every time you sit down to your dinner1 ladies and gentlemen1 say solemnly1 before you ask a blessing1 8,how much work have ,i done to-day for my dinner80 ,but the proper way to enforce that order on those below you1 as well as on yourselves1 is not to leave vagabonds and honest people to starve together1 but very distinctly to discern and seize your vagabond2 and shut your vagabond up out of honest people's way1 and very sternly then see that1 until he has worked1 he does not eat4 ,but the first thing is to be sure you have the food to give2 and1 therefore1 to enforce the organization of vast activities in agriculture and in commerce1 for the production of the wholesomest food1 and proper storing and distribution of it1 so that no famine shall any more be possible among civilized beings4 ,there is plenty of work in this business alone1 and at once1 for any number of people who like to engage in it4 ,secondly1 dressing people--that is to say1 urging every one1 within reach of your influence to be always neat and clean1 and giving them means of being so4 ,in so far as they absolutely refuse1 you must give up the effort with respect to them1 only taking care that no children within your sphere of influence shall any more be brought up with such habits2 and that every person who is willing to dress with propriety shall have encouragement to do so4 ,and the first absolutely necessary step towards this is the gradual adoption of a consistent dress for different ranks of persons1 so that their rank shall be known by their dress2 and the restriction of the changes of fashion within certain limits4 ,all which appears for the present quite impossible2 but it is only so far even difficult as it is difficult to conquer our vanity1 frivolity1 and desire to appear what we are not4 ,and it is not1 nor ever shall be1 creed of mine1 that these mean and shallow vices are unconquerable by ,christian women4 ,and then1 thirdly1 lodging people1 which you may think should have been put first1 but ,i put it third1 because we must feed and clothe people where we find them1 and lodge them afterwards4 ,and providing lodgment for them means a great deal of vigorous legislature1 and cutting down of vested interests that stand in the way1 and after that1 or before that1 so far as we can get it1 thorough sanitary and remedial action in the houses that we have2 and then the building of more1 strongly1 beautifully1 and in groups of limited extent1 kept in proportion to their streams1 and walled round1 so that there may be no festering and wretched suburb anywhere1 but clean and busy street within1 and the open country without1 with a belt of beautiful garden and orchard round the walls1 so that from any part of the city perfectly fresh air and grass1 and sight of far horizon1 might be reachable in a few minutes' walk4 ,this the final aim2 but in immediate action every minor and possible good to be instantly done1 when1 and as1 we can2 roofs mended that have holes in them--fences patched that have gaps in them--walls' buttressed that totter--and floors propped that shake2 cleanliness and order enforced with our own hands and eyes1 till we are breathless1 every day4 ,and all the fine arts will healthily follow4 ,i myself have washed a flight of stone stairs all down1 with bucket and broom1 in a ,savoy inn1 where they hadn't washed their stairs since they first went up them2 and ,i never made a better sketch than that afternoon4 ,these1 then1 are the three first needs of civilized life2 and the law for every ,christian man and woman is1 that they shall be in direct service towards one of these three needs1 as far as is consistent with their own special occupation1 and if they have no special business1 then wholly in one of these services4 ,and out of such exertion in plain duty all other good will come2 for in this direct contention with material evil1 you will find out the real nature of all evil2 you will discern by the various kinds of resistance1 what is really the fault and main antagonism to good2 also you will find the most unexpected helps and profound lessons given1 and truths will come thus down to us which the speculation of all our lives would never have raised us up to4 ,you will find nearly every educational problem solved1 as soon as you truly want to do something2 everybody will become of use in their own fittest way1 and will learn what is best for them to know in that use4 ,competitive examination will then1 and not till then1 be wholesome1 because it will be daily1 and calm1 and in practice2 and on these familiar arts1 and minute1 but certain and serviceable knowledges1 will be surely edified and sustained the greater arts and splendid theoretical sciences4 ,but much more than this4 ,on such holy and simple practice will be founded1 indeed1 at last1 an infallible religion4 ,the greatest of all the mysteries of life1 and the most terrible1 is the corruption of even the sincerest religion1 which is not daily founded on rational1 effective1 humble1 and helpful action4 ,helpful action1 observe6 for there is just one law1 which1 obeyed1 keeps all religions pure--forgotten1 makes them all false4 ,whenever in any religious faith1 dark or bright1 we allow our minds to dwell upon the points in which we differ from other people1 we are wrong1 and in the devil's power4 ,that is the essence of the ,pharisee's thanksgiving--8,lord1 ,i thank ,thee that ,i am not as other men are40 ,at every moment of our lives we should be trying to find out1 not in what we differ from other people1 but in what we agree with them2 and the moment we find we can agree as to anything that should be done1 kind or good1 7and who but fools couldn't87 then do it2 push at it together3 you can't quarrel in a side-by-side push2 but the moment that even the best men stop pushing1 and begin talking1 they mistake their pugnacity for piety1 and it's all over4 ,i will not speak of the crimes which in past times have been committed in the name of ,christ1 nor of the follies which are at this hour held to be consistent with obedience to ,him2 but ,i will speak of the morbid corruption and waste of vital power in religious sentiment1 by which the pure strength of that which should be the guiding soul of every nation1 the splendour of its youthful manhood1 and spotless light of its maidenhood1 is averted or cast away4 ,you may see continually girls who have never been taught to do a single useful thing thoroughly2 who cannot sew1 who cannot cook1 who cannot cast an account1 nor prepare a medicine1 whose whole life has been passed either in play or in pride2 you will find girls like these1 when they are earnest-hearted1 cast all their innate passion of religious spirit1 which was meant by ,god to support them through the irksomeness of daily toil1 into grievous and vain meditation over the meaning of the great ,book1 of which no syllable was ever yet to be understood but through a deed2 all the instinctive wisdom and mercy of their womanhood made vain1 and the glory of their pure consciences warped into fruitless agony concerning questions which the laws of common serviceable life would have either solved for them in an instant1 or kept out of their way4 ,give such a girl any true work that will make her active in the dawn1 and weary at night1 with the consciousness that her fellow-creatures have indeed been the better for her day1 and the powerless sorrow of her enthusiasm will transform itself into a majesty of radiant and beneficent peace4 ,so with our youths4 ,we once taught them to make ,latin verses1 and called them educated2 now we teach them to leap and to row1 to hit a ball with a bat1 and call them educated4 ,can they plough1 can they sow1 can they plant at the right time1 or build with a steady hand8 ,is it the effort of their lives to be chaste1 knightly1 faithful1 holy in thought1 lovely in word and deed8 ,indeed it is1 with some1 nay1 with many1 and the strength of ,england is in them1 and the hope2 but we have to turn their courage from the toil of war to the toil of mercy2 and their intellect from dispute of words to discernment of things2 and their knighthood from the errantry of adventure to the state and fidelity of a kingly power4 ,and then1 indeed1 shall abide1 for them and for us1 an incorruptible felicity1 and an infallible religion2 shall abide for us ,faith1 no more to be assailed by temptation1 no more to be defended by wrath and by fear2--shall abide with us ,hope1 no more to be quenched by the years that overwhelm1 or made ashamed by the shadows that betray3--shall abide for us1 and with us1 the greatest of these2 the abiding will1 the abiding name of our ,father4 ,for the greatest of these is ,charity4 ,footnotes4 #a ,the paragraph that begins 8,i think ,i can best tell you their answer 4 4 40 #b ,the paragraph that begins 8,does a bird 4 4 40 #c ,the paragraphs beginning3 #gi--8;,i believe1 then1 with this exception 4 4 40 #ge--8,yet1 observe1 with exquisite accuracy 4 4 40 #ai--8,now1 in order to deal with words rightly1 4 4 40 #gi--8,then1 in art1 keep the finest models 4 4 40 #d 4 #e ,note this sentence carefully1 and compare the #8,queen of the ,air1' paragraph 8,nothing that ,i ever said is more 4 4 40 #f #b ,peter iii4 #e-g4 #g ,compare the #acth ,letter in #8,time and ,tide4' #h ,modern 8,education0 for the most part signifies giving people the faculty of thinking wrong on every conceivable subject of importance to them4 #i ,inf4 xxiii4 #abe1 #abf2 xix4 #di4 #ej4 #aj ,compare with paragraph 8,this1 then1 is what you have to do 4 4 40 #aa ,see note at end of lecture4 ,i have put it in large type1 because the course of matters since it was written has made it perhaps better worth attention4 #ab ,respecting the increase of rent by the deaths of the poor1 for evidence of which see the preface to the ,medical ,officer's report to the ,privy ,council1 just published1 there are suggestions in its preface which will make some stir among us1 ,i fancy1 respecting which let me note these points following3-- ,there are two theories on the subject of land now abroad1 and in contention2 both false4 ,the first is that1 by ,heavenly law1 there have always existed1 and must continue to exist1 a certain number of hereditarily sacred persons to whom the earth1 air1 and water of the world belong1 as personal property2 of which earth1 air1 and water1 these persons may1 at their pleasure1 permit1 or forbid1 the rest of the human race to eat1 to breathe1 or to drink4 ,this theory is not for many years longer tenable4 ,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 personages2 that houses would then build themselves1 and corn grow of itself2 and that everybody would be able to live1 without doing any work for his living4 ,this theory would also be found highly untenable in practice4 ,it will1 however1 require some rough experiments and rougher catastrophes1 before the generality of persons will be convinced that no law concerning anything--least of all concerning land1 for either holding or dividing it1 or renting it high1 or renting it low--would be of the smallest ultimate use to the people1 so long as the general contest for life1 and for the means of life1 remains one of mere brutal competition4 ,that contest1 in an unprincipled nation1 will take one deadly form or another1 whatever laws you make against it4 ,for instance1 it would be an entirely wholesome law for ,england1 if it could be carried1 that maximum limits should be assigned to incomes according to classes2 and that every nobleman's income should be paid to him as a fixed salary or pension by the nation2 and not squeezed by him in variable sums1 at discretion1 out of the tenants of his land4 ,but if you could get such a law passed to-morrow1 and if1 which would be farther necessary1 you could fix the value of the assigned incomes by making a given weight of pure bread for a given sum1 a twelvemonth would not pass before another currency would have been tacitly established1 and the power of accumulated wealth would have re-asserted itself in some other article1 or some other imaginary sign4 ,there is only one cure for public distress--and that is public education1 directed to make men thoughtful1 merciful1 and just4 ,there are1 indeed1 many laws conceivable which would gradually better and strengthen the national temper2 but1 for the most part1 they are such as the national temper must be much bettered before it would bear4 ,a nation in its youth may be helped by laws1 as a weak child by backboards1 but when it is old it cannot that way strengthen its crooked spine4 ,and besides2 the problem of land1 at its worst1 is a bye one2 distribute the earth as you will1 the principal question remains inexorable1--,who is to dig it8 ,which of us1 in brief word1 is to do the hard and dirty work for the rest1 and for what pay8 ,who is to do the pleasant and clean work1 and for what pay8 ,who is do no work1 and for what pay8 ,and there are curious moral and religious questions connected with these4 ,how far is it lawful to suck a portion of the soul out of a great many persons1 in order to put the abstracted psychical quantities together and make one very beautiful or ideal soul8 ,if we had to deal with mere blood instead of spirit1 7and the thing might literally be done--as it has been done with infants before now7--so that it were possible1 by taking a certain quantity of blood from the arms of a given number of the mob1 and putting it all into one person1 to make a more azure-blooded gentleman of him1 the thing would of course be managed2 but secretly1 ,i should conceive4 ,but now1 because it is brain and soul that we abstract1 not visible blood1 it can be done quite openly1 and we live1 we gentlemen1 on delicatest prey1 after the manner of weasels2 that is to say1 we keep a certain number of clowns digging and ditching1 and generally stupefied1 in order that we1 being fed gratis1 may have all the thinking and feeling to ourselves4 ,yet there is a great deal to be said for this4 ,a highly-bred and trained ,english1 ,french1 ,austrian1 or ,italian gentleman 7much more a lady71 is a great production1--a better production than most statues2 being beautifully coloured as well as shaped1 and plus all the brains2 a glorious thing to look at1 a wonderful thing to talk to2 and you cannot have it1 any more than a pyramid or a church1 but by sacrifice of much contributed life4 ,and it is1 perhaps1 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 us1 than to a wall2 only the beautiful human creature will have some duties to do in return--duties of living belfry and rampart--of which presently4 #ac ,since this was written1 the answer has become definitely--,no2 we having surrendered the field of ,arctic discovery to the ,continental nations1 as being ourselves too poor to pay for ships4 #ad ,i state this fact without ,professor ,owen's permission3 which of course he could not with propriety have granted1 had ,i asked it2 but ,i consider it so important that the public should be aware of the fact1 that ,i do what seems to me right1 though rude4 #ae ,that was our real idea of 8,free ,trade0--8,all the trade to myself40 ,you find now that by 8competition0 other people can manage to sell something as well as you--and now we call for ,protection again4 ,wretches6 #af ,i meant that the beautiful places of the world--,switzerland1 ,italy1 ,south ,germany1 and so on--are1 indeed1 the truest cathedrals--places to be reverent in1 and to worship in2 and that we only care to drive through them3 and to eat and drink at their most sacred places4 #ag ,i was singularly struck1 some years ago1 by finding all the river shore at ,richmond1 in ,yorkshire1 black in its earth1 from the mere drift of soot-laden air from places many miles away4 #ah ,one of the things which we must very resolutely enforce1 for the good of all classes1 in our future arrangements1 must be that they wear no 8translated0 articles of dress4 ,see the preface4 #ai ,this abbreviation of the penalty of useless labour is curiously coincident in verbal form with a certain passage which some of us may remember4 ,it may perhaps be well to preserve beside this paragraph another cutting out of my store-drawer1 from the #8,morning ,post1' of about a parallel date1 ,friday1 ,march #ajth1 #ahfe3--8,the salons of ,mme4 ,c--1 who did the honours with clever imitative grace and elegance1 were crowded with princes1 dukes1 marquises1 and counts--in fact1 with the same male company as one meets at the parties of the ,princess ,metternich and ,madame ,drouyn de ,lhuys4 ,some ,english peers and members of ,parliament were present1 and appeared to enjoy the animated and dazzlingly improper scene4 ,on the second floor the supper tables were loaded with every delicacy of the season4 ,that your readers may form some idea of the dainty fare of the ,parisian demi-monde1 ,i copy the menu of the supper1 which was served to all the guests 7about #bjj7 seated at four o'clock4 ,choice ,yquem1 ,johannisberg1 ,laffitte1 ,tokay1 and champagne of the finest vintages were served most lavishly throughout the morning4 ,after supper dancing was resumed with increased animation1 and the ball terminated with a chane diabolique and a cancan d'enfer at seven in the morning4 7,morning service--#8,ere the fresh lawns appeared1 under the opening eyelids of the ,morn4--'7 ,here is the menu3--#8,consomm de volaille la ,bagration3 #af hors-d'uvres varis4 ,bouches la ,talleyrand4 ,saumons froids1 sauce ,ravigote4 ,filets de buf en ,bellevue1 timbales milanaises1 chaudfroid de gibier4 ,dindes truffes4 ,pts de foies gras1 buissons d'crevisses1 salades vntiennes1 geles blanches aux fruits1 gteaux mancini1 parisiens et parisiennes4 ,fromages glacs4 ,ananas4 ,dessert4'0 #bj ,please observe this statement1 and think of it1 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 year4 #ba ,i am heartily glad to see such a paper as the #8,pall ,mall ,gazette' established2 for the power of the press in the hands of highly educated men1 in independent position1 and of honest purpose1 may indeed become all that it has been hitherto vainly vaunted to be4 ,its editor will therefore1 ,i doubt not1 pardon me1 in that1 by very reason of my respect for the journal1 ,i do not let pass unnoticed an article in its third number1 page #e1 which was wrong in every word of it1 with the intense wrongness which only an honest man can achieve who has taken a false turn of thought in the outset1 and is following it1 regardless of consequences4 ,it contained at the end this notable passage3-- 8,the bread of affliction1 and the water of affliction1--aye1 and the bedsteads and blankets of affliction1 are the very utmost that the law ought to give to outcasts merely as outcasts40 ,i merely put beside this expression of the gentlemanly mind of ,england in #ahfe1 a part of the message which ,isaiah was ordered to 8lift up his voice like a trumpet0 in declaring to the gentlemen of his day3 8,ye fast for strife1 and to smite with the fist of wickedness4 ,is not this the fast that ,i have chosen1 to deal thy bread to the hungry1 and that thou bring the poor that are cast out 7margin1 #8afflicted'7 to thy house80 ,the falsehood on which the writer had mentally founded himself1 as previously stated by him1 was this3 8,to confound the functions of the dispensers of the poor-rates with those of the dispensers of a charitable institution is a great and pernicious error40 ,this sentence is so accurately and exquisitely wrong1 that its substance must be thus reversed in our minds before we can deal with any existing problem of national distress4 8,to understand that the dispensers of the poor-rates are the almoners of the nation1 and should distribute its alms with a gentleness and freedom of hand as much greater and franker than that possible to individual charity1 as the collective national wisdom and power may be supposed greater than those of any single person1 is the foundation of all law respecting pauperism40 7,since this was written the #8,pall ,mall ,gazette' has become a mere party paper--like the rest2 but it writes well1 and does more good than mischief on the whole47 #bb 8 40 #bc ,i ought1 in order to make this assertion fully understood1 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 ,redgauntlet1 the weak religious enthusiasm in ,edward ,glendinning1 and the like2 and ,i ought to have noticed that there are several quite perfect characters sketched sometimes in the backgrounds2 three--let us accept joyously this courtesy to ,england and her soldiers--are ,english officers3 ,colonel ,gardiner1 ,colonel ,talbot1 and ,colonel ,mannering4 #bd ,coventry ,patmore4 ,you cannot read him too often or too carefully2 as far as ,i know he is the only living poet who always strengthens and purifies2 the others sometimes darken1 and nearly always depress and discourage1 the imagination they deeply seize4 #be ,observe1 it is 8,nature0 who is speaking throughout1 and who says1 8while she and ,i together live40 #bf 8,joan of ,arc3 in reference to ,m4 ,michelet's #8,history of ,france4'0 ,de ,quincey's ,works4 ,vol4 iii4 p4 #bag4 #bg ,i wish there were a true order of chivalry instituted for our ,english youth of certain ranks1 in which both boy and girl should receive1 at a given age1 their knighthood and ladyhood by true title2 attainable only by certain probation and trial both of character and accomplishment2 and to be forfeited1 on conviction1 by their peers1 of any dishonourable act4 ,such an institution would be entirely1 and with all noble results1 possible1 in a nation which loved honour4 ,that it would not be possible among us1 is not to the discredit of the scheme4 #bh ,see note #ai #bi ,that no reference should be made to religious questions4 #cj ,i have sometimes been asked what this means4 ,i intended it to set forth the wisdom of men in war contending for kingdoms1 and what follows to set forth their wisdom in peace1 contending for wealth4 #ca ,see 8,the ,two ,paths10--paragraph beginning 8,you know ,i said of that great and pure 4 4 40