“Selon la loy, et ly prophetes,
Qui a charité parfaicte
Il ayme Dieu sur toute rien
De cueur, de force, et d’ame nette;
Celui devons-nous tous de debte
Comme soy-mesmes, son prochain;
Qu’on dit qui in ayme, ayme mon chien.
De tel pierre, et de tel merrien
Est ès cieulx nostre maison faicte
Car nulz ne peut dire, ‘c’est mien,’
Fors ce qu’il a mis en ce bien;
Tout le remenant est retraicte.”
According to the Law and the Prophets,
He who has perfect charity,
Loves God above everything,
With heart, with flesh, and with spirit pure.
Him also, our neighbour, we are all in debt
To love as ourselves;
For one says, Who loves me, loves my dog.
Of such stone, and of such crossbeam,
Is in the heavens our house made;
For no one can say, ‘It is mine,’
Beyond what he has put into that good,
All the rest is taken away.
One day last November, at Oxford, as I was going in at the private door
of the University galleries, to give a lecture on the Fine Arts in
Florence, I was hindered for a moment by a nice little girl, whipping a
top on the pavement. She was a very nice little girl; and rejoiced
wholly in her whip, and top; but could not inflict the reviving
chastisement with all the activity that was in her, because she had on
a large and dilapidated pair of woman’s shoes, which projected the full
length of her own little foot behind it and before; and being securely
fastened to her ancles in the manner of mocassins, admitted, indeed, of
dextrous glissades, and other modes of progress quite sufficient for
ordinary purposes; but not conveniently of all the evolutions proper to
the pursuit of a whipping-top.
There were some worthy people at my lecture, and I think the lecture
was one of my best. It gave some really trustworthy information about
art in Florence six hundred years ago. But all the time I was speaking,
I knew that nothing spoken about art, either by myself or other people,
could be of the least use to anybody there. For their primary business,
and mine, was with art in Oxford, now; not with art in Florence, then;
and art in Oxford now was absolutely dependent on our power of solving
the question—which I knew that my audience would not even allow to be
proposed for solution—“Why have our little girls large shoes?”
Indeed, my great difficulty, of late, whether in lecturing or writing,
is in the intensely practical and matter-of-fact character of my own
mind as opposed to the loquacious and speculative disposition, not only
of the British public, but of all my quondam friends. I am left utterly
stranded, and alone, in life, and thought. Life and knowledge, I ought
to say; for I have done what thinking was needful for me long ago, and
know enough to act upon, for the few days, or years, I may have yet to
live. I find some of my friends greatly agitated in mind, for instance,
about Responsibility, Free-will, and the like. I settled all those
matters for myself, before I was ten years old, by jumping up and down
an awkward turn of four steps in my nursery-stairs, and considering
whether it was likely that God knew whether I should jump only three,
or the whole four at a time. Having settled it in my mind that He knew
quite well, though I didn’t, which I should do; and also whether I
should fall or not in the course of the performance,—though I was
altogether responsible for taking care not to,—I never troubled my head
more on the matter, from that day to this. But my friends keep buzzing
and puzzling about it, as if they had to order the course of the world
themselves; and won’t attend to me for an instant, if I ask why little
girls have large shoes.
I don’t suppose any man, with a tongue in his head, and zeal to use it,
was ever left so entirely unattended to, as he grew old, by his early
friends; and it is doubly and trebly strange to me, because I have lost
none of my power of sympathy with them. Some are chemists; and I am
always glad to hear of the last new thing in elements; some are
palæontologists, and I am no less happy to know of any lately unburied
beast peculiar in his bones; the lawyers and clergymen can always
interest me with any story out of their courts or parishes;—but not one
of them ever asks what I am about myself. If they chance to meet me in
the streets of Oxford, they ask whether I am staying there. When I say,
yes, they ask how I like it; and when I tell them I don’t like it at
all, and don’t think little girls should have large shoes, they tell me
I ought to read the ‘Cours de Philosophie Positive.’ As if a man who
had lived to be fifty-four, content with what philosophy was needful to
assure him that salt was savoury, and pepper hot, could ever be made
positive in his old age, in the impertinent manner of these youngsters.
But positive in a pertinent and practical manner, I have been, and
shall be, with such stern and steady wedge of fact and act as time may
let me drive into the gnarled blockheadism of the British mob.
I am free to confess I did not quite know the sort of creature I had to
deal with, when I began, fifteen years ago, nor the quantity of
ingenious resistance to practical reform which could be offered by
theoretical reformers. Look, for instance, at this report of a speech
of Mr. Bright’s in the Times, on the subject of adulteration of food.
[1]
“The noble lord has taken great pains upon this question, and has
brought before the House a great amount of detail in connection
with it. As I listened to his observations I hoped and believed
that there was, though unintentional, no little exaggeration in
them. Although there may be particular cases in which great harm to
health and great fraud may possibly be shown, yet I think that
general statements of this kind, implicating to a large extent the
traders of this country, are dangerous, and are almost certain to
be unjust. Now, my hon. friend (Mr. Pochin) who has just addressed
the House in a speech showing his entire mastery of the question,
has confirmed my opinion, for he has shown—and I dare say he knows
as much of the matter as any present—that there is a great deal of
exaggeration in the opinions which have prevailed in many parts of
the country, and which have even been found to prevail upon the
matter in this House.... Now, I am prepared to show that the
exaggeration of the noble lord—I do not say intentionally, of
course; I am sure he is incapable of that—is just as great in the
matter of weights and measures as in that of adulteration. Probably
he is not aware that in the list of persons employing weights that
are inaccurate—I do not say fraudulent—no distinction is drawn
between those who are intentionally fraudulent and those who are
accidentally inaccurate, and that the penalty is precisely the
same, and the offence is just as eagerly detected, whether there be
a fraud or merely an accident. Now, the noble lord will probably be
surprised when I tell him that many persons are fined annually, not
because their weights are too small, but because they are too
large. In fact, when the weights are inaccurate, but are in favour
of the customer, still the owner and user of the weight is liable
to the penalty, and is fined.... My own impression with regard to
this adulteration is that it arises from the very great, and
perhaps inevitable, competition in business; and that to a great
extent it is promoted by the ignorance of customers. As the
ignorance of customers generally is diminishing, we may hope that
before long the adulteration of food may also diminish. The noble
lord appears to ask that something much more extensive and
stringent should be done by Parliament. The fact is, it is vain to
attempt by the power of Parliament to penetrate into and to track
out evils such as those on which the noble lord has dwelt at such
length. It is quite impossible that you should have the oversight
of the shops of the country by inspectors, and that you should have
persons going into shops to buy sugar, pickles, and Cayenne pepper,
to get them analyzed, and then raise complaints against
shopkeepers, and bring them before the magistrates. If men in their
private businesses were to be tracked by Government officers and
inspectors every hour of the day, life would not be worth having,
and I recommend them to remove to another country, where they would
not be subject to such annoyance.”
Now, I neither know, nor does it matter to the public, what Mr. Bright
actually said; but the report in the Times is the permanent and
universally influential form of his sayings: and observe what the
substance is, of these three or four hundred Parliamentary words, so
reported.
First. That an evil which has been exaggerated ought not to be
prevented.
Secondly. That at present we punish honest men as much as rogues; and
must always continue to do so if we punish anybody.
Thirdly. That life would not be worth having if one’s weights and
measures were liable to inspection.
I can assure Mr. Bright that people who know what life means, can
sustain the calamity of the inspection of their weights and measures
with fortitude. I myself keep a tea-and-sugar shop. I have had my
scales and weights inspected more than once or twice, and am not in the
least disposed to bid my native land good-night on that account. That I
could bid it nothing but good-night—never good-morning, the smoke of it
quenching the sun, and its parliamentary talk, of such quality as the
above, having become darkness voluble, and some of it worse even than
that, a mere watchman’s rattle, sprung by alarmed constituencies of
rascals when an honest man comes in sight,—these are things indeed
which should make any man’s life little worth having, unless he
separate himself from the scandalous crowd; but it must not be in exile
from his country.
I have not hitherto stated, except in general terms, the design to
which these letters point, though it has been again and again defined,
and it seems to me explicitly enough—the highest possible education,
namely, of English men and women living by agriculture in their native
land. Indeed, during these three past years I have not hoped to do more
than make my readers feel what mischiefs they have to conquer. It is
time now to say more clearly what I want them to do.
The substantial wealth of man consists in the earth he cultivates, with
its pleasant or serviceable animals and plants, and in the rightly
produced work of his own hands. I mean to buy, for the St. George’s
Company, the first pieces of ground offered to me at fair price, (when
the subscriptions enable me to give any price),—to put them as rapidly
as possible into order, and to settle upon them as many families as
they can support, of young and healthy persons, on the condition that
they do the best they can for their livelihood with their own hands,
and submit themselves and their children to the rules written for them.
I do not care where the land is, nor of what quality. I would rather it
should be poor, for I want space more than food. I will make the best
of it that I can, at once, by wage-labour, under the best agricultural
advice. It is easy now to obtain good counsel, and many of our
landlords would willingly undertake such operations occasionally, but
for the fixed notion that every improvement of land should at once pay,
whereas the St. George’s Company is to be consistently monastic in its
principles of labour, and to work for the redemption of any desert
land, without other idea of gain than the certainty of future good to
others. I should best like a bit of marsh land of small value, which I
would trench into alternate ridge and canal, changing it all into solid
land, and deep water, to be farmed in fish. If, instead, I get a rocky
piece, I shall first arrange reservoirs for rain, then put what earth
is sprinkled on it into workable masses; and ascertaining, in either
case, how many mouths the gained spaces of ground will easily feed, put
upon them families chosen for me by old landlords, who know their
people, and can send me cheerful and honest ones, accustomed to obey
orders, and live in the fear of God. Whether the fear be Catholic, or
Church-of-England, or Presbyterian, I do not in the least care, so that
the family be capable of any kind of sincere devotion; and conscious of
the sacredness of order. If any young couples of the higher classes
choose to accept such rough life, I would rather have them for tenants
than any others.
Tenants, I say, and at long lease, if they behave well: with power
eventually to purchase the piece of land they live on for themselves,
if they can save the price of it; the rent they pay, meanwhile, being
the tithe of the annual produce, to St. George’s fund. The modes of the
cultivation of the land are to be under the control of the overseer of
the whole estate, appointed by the Trustees of the fund; but the
tenants shall build their own houses to their own minds, under certain
conditions as to materials and strength; and have for themselves the
entire produce of the land, except the tithe aforesaid.
The children will be required to attend training schools for bodily
exercise, and music, with such other education as I have already
described. Every household will have its library, given it from the
fund, and consisting of a fixed number of volumes,—some constant, the
others chosen by each family out of a list of permitted books, from
which they afterwards may increase their library if they choose. The
formation of this library for choice, by a republication of classical
authors in standard forms, has long been a main object with me. No
newspapers, nor any books but those named in the annually renewed
lists, are to be allowed in any household. In time I hope to get a
journal published, containing notice of any really important matters
taking place in this or other countries, in the closely sifted truth of
them.
The first essential point in the education given to the children will
be the habit of instant, finely accurate, and totally unreasoning,
obedience to their fathers, mothers, and tutors; the same precise and
unquestioning submission being required from heads of families to the
officers set over them. The second essential will be the understanding
of the nature of honour, making the obedience solemn and constant; so
that the slightest wilful violation of the laws of the society may be
regarded as a grave breach of trust, and no less disgraceful than a
soldier’s recoiling from his place in a battle.
In our present state of utter moral disorganization, it might indeed
seem as if it would be impossible either to secure obedience, or
explain the sensation of honour; but the instincts of both are native
in man, and the roots of them cannot wither, even under the dust-heap
of modern liberal opinions. My settlers, you observe, are to be young
people, bred on old estates; my commandants will be veteran soldiers;
and it will be soon perceived that pride based on servitude to the will
of another is far loftier and happier than pride based on servitude to
humour of one’s own.
Each family will at first be put on its trial for a year, without any
lease of the land: if they behave well, they shall have a lease for
three years; if through that time they satisfy their officers, a
life-long lease, with power to purchase.
I have already stated that no machines moved by artificial power are to
be used on the estates of the society; wind, water, and animal force
are to be the only motive powers employed, and there is to be as little
trade or importation as possible; the utmost simplicity of life, and
restriction of possession, being combined with the highest attainable
refinement of temper and thought. Everything that the members of any
household can sufficiently make for themselves, they are so to make,
however clumsily; but the carpenter and smith, trained to perfectest
work in wood and iron, are to be employed on the parts of houses and
implements in which finish is essential to strength. The ploughshare
and spade must be made by the smith, and the roof and floors by a
carpenter; but the boys of the house must be able to make either a
horseshoe, or a table.
Simplicity of life without coarseness, and delight in life without
lasciviousness, are, under such conditions, not only possible to human
creatures, but natural to them. I do not pretend to tell you
straightforwardly all laws of nature respecting the conduct of men; but
some of those laws I know, and will endeavour to get obeyed; others, as
they are needful, will be in the sequel of such obedience ascertained.
What final relations may take place between masters and servants,
labourers and employers, old people and young, useful people and
useless, in such a society, only experience can conclude; nor is there
any reason to anticipate the conclusion. Some few things the most
obstinate will admit, and the least credulous believe: that washed
faces are healthier than dirty ones, whole clothes decenter than ragged
ones, kind behaviour more serviceable than malicious, and pure air
pleasanter than foul. Upon that much of ‘philosophie positive’ I mean
to act; and, little by little, to define in these letters the processes
of action. That it should be left to me to begin such a work, with only
one man in England—Thomas Carlyle—to whom I can look for steady
guidance, is alike wonderful and sorrowful to me; but as the thing is
so, I can only do what seems to me necessary, none else coming forward
to do it. For my own part, I entirely hate the whole business: I
dislike having either power or responsibility; am ashamed to ask for
money, and plagued in spending it. I don’t want to talk, nor to write,
nor to advise or direct anybody. I am far more provoked at being
thought foolish by foolish people, than pleased at being thought
sensible by sensible people; and the average proportion of the numbers
of each is not to my advantage. If I could find any one able to carry
on the plan instead of me, I never should trouble myself about it more;
and even now, it is only with extreme effort and chastisement of my
indolence that I go on: but, unless I am struck with palsy, I do not
seriously doubt my perseverance, until I find somebody able to take up
the matter in the same mind, and with a better heart.
The laws required to be obeyed by the families living on the land will
be,—with some relaxation and modification, so as to fit them for
English people,—those of Florence in the fourteenth century. In what
additional rules may be adopted, I shall follow, for the most part,
Bacon, or Sir Thomas More, under sanction always of the higher
authority which of late the English nation has wholly set its strength
to defy—that of the Founder of its Religion; nor without due acceptance
of what teaching was given to the children of God by their Father,
before the day of Christ, of which, for present ending, read and attend
to these following quiet words. [2]
“‘In what point of view, then, and on what ground shall a man be
profited by injustice or intemperance or other baseness, even though he
acquire money or power?’
‘There is no ground on which this can be maintained.’
‘What shall he profit if his injustice be undetected? for he who is
undetected only gets worse, whereas he who is detected and punished has
the brutal part of his nature silenced and humanized; the greater
element in him is liberated, and his whole soul is perfected and
ennobled by the acquirement of justice and temperance and wisdom, more
than the body ever is by receiving gifts of beauty, strength, and
health, in proportion as the soul is more honourable than the body.’
‘Certainly,’ he said.
‘Will not, then, the man of understanding, gather all that is in him,
and stretch himself like a bent bow to this aim of life; and, in the
first place, honour studies which thus chastise and deliver his soul in
perfection; and despise others?’
‘Clearly,’ he said.
‘In the next place, he will keep under his body, and so far will he be
from yielding to brutal and irrational pleasure, [3] that he will not
even first look to bodily health as his main object, nor desire to be
fair, or strong, or well, unless he is likely thereby to gain
temperance; but he will be always desirous of preserving the harmony of
the body for the sake of the concord of the soul?’
‘Certainly,’ he replied, ‘that he will, if he is indeed taught by the
Muses.’
‘And he will also observe the principle of classing and concord in the
acquisition of wealth; and will not, because the mob beatify him,
increase his endless load of wealth to his own infinite harm?’
‘I think not,’ he said.
‘He will look at the city which is within him, and take care to avoid
any change of his own institutions, such as might arise either from
abundance or from want; and he will duly regulate his acquisition and
expense, in so far as he is able?’
‘Very true.’
‘And, for the same reason, he will accept such honours as he deems
likely to make him a better man; but those which are likely to loosen
his possessed habit, whether private or public honours, he will avoid?’
‘Then, if this be his chief care, he will not be a politician?’
‘By the dog of Egypt, he will! in the city which is his own, though in
his native country perhaps not, unless some providential accident
should occur.’
‘I understand; you speak of that city of which we are the founders, and
which exists in idea only, for I do not think there is such an one
anywhere on earth?’
‘In heaven,’ I replied, ‘there is laid up a pattern of such a city; and
he who desires may behold this, and, beholding, govern himself
accordingly. But whether there really is, or ever will be, such an one,
is of no importance to him, for he will act accordingly to the laws of
that city and of no other?’
‘True,’ he said.”