PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND FREAK SCHOOLS
The Radical--and by the Radical we mean any one who sees that life for
the majority at the present time is not as fine and happy as it should
be, and who is determined to leave no stone unturned to make it
so--commonly looks askance at the public schools. He thinks of them,
rightly, as the stronghold of those in possession, the class which, as
a whole, not only opposes such fundamental reforms as would result in a
fairer distribution of wealth, but also itself has failed to do what
might conceivably justify its favoured position, to keep alive, by
virtue of special opportunities such as would disappear in a society
based on equality, the finest ideas of which the race is capable.
Individual and national power, privilege, commercialism--it is on these
things that it has set its eyes in its leadership of the nation. And
so our fellow-radicals have more than once said to us, "If you are
really keen on education, why don't you start a school of your own?"
Now it is, no doubt, difficult for any one who has fallen under the
sway of a public school, and who has been so caught up by its
fascination as to feel for it a love more compelling than anything in
his life, to be certain that personal predilections do not dictate a
reply unjustified by intellectual considerations. Yet for all that we
give our answer without hesitation. For the multiplication of what may
be conveniently, if somewhat unkindly, classed together as "freak"
schools, breaks no fresh ground at all. Boys who have been brought up
in an "intellectualist" atmosphere, and those alone, are sent there;
and even if there were no schools to which they could be sent, home
influence would turn them out intellectualists still. The ranks of the
intellectualists, in fact, are recruited from three main sources.
First, there are the sons of intellectualists, sent either to a freak
school or to no school at all; secondly, sons of intellectualists of a
slightly different type, sent to a public school yet nevertheless
retaining in the new environment their own peculiar stamp; and,
thirdly, the clever sons of "ordinary" parents, sent to a public school
and becoming intellectualists by revolt against the philistinism of it
and of their homes. The community thus composed leads a life as
distinct and separate from that of the rest of the nation as was ever
lived by the "Intelligentzia" in Russia's darkest hour. It has hardly
a point of contact with the average Englishman; it does not understand
his revues and musical comedies, his novels and cinemas, his hunting
and race meetings; it speaks a different language, thinks altogether
different thoughts. And being itself not in the least understood, it
has acquired a certain hardness of mind, a certain contempt for
ordinary people and ordinary things, which has widened the gulf, and
led to mutual suspicion and sometimes even hatred. Inevitably its
mental health has been affected by such a situation. Feeling itself
different, it has consciously made itself as different as possible;
intellectual extravagances indulged in from mere bravado, these and
similar stigmata of balance lost and sanity impaired have made their
appearance in varying degrees at one time or another. Under a
different set of circumstances--those of the war, for instance, so far
as concerns a section of the group of which we are speaking--there has
been a pitiful relapse into mere boredom, cynicism, and inactivity;
remote from the passions of the crowd, and unable to give service to a
cause in which they disbelieve, some of our cleverest men have provided
an English parallel with the vodka-drinking, bridge-playing, and
unutterably tired community of highly-developed intellects which
Tchekoff describes so brilliantly.
Now, in saying all this we would not have it thought that we are
bringing a sweeping accusation against one section of the nation. For
the fault lies, not mainly with them, but with the lack of culture,
idealism, and genuine education which characterises England (and most
other countries) to-day. In a country in which regard for things of
the mind and spirit was the rule and not the exception, these men would
form the backbone of the nation; they would develop along healthy
lines, be marked by love and sympathy instead of contempt, use their
great powers to the full in the public service. What they are to be
blamed for is their failure to see their real duty; their failure to
understand that it is among the philistines, and not in their own
exclusive set, that their most important work lies. Some of them, of
course, do understand this, and spend their lives in an unselfish
attempt to spread light in the darkness. But even so they commonly
speak a language which is not understood; and inevitably they fail to
achieve any widespread result.
It is not, then, in the multiplication of schools designed to cater for
intellectualists that we see the best hope for the progress of the
nation. We see it rather in the creation of an army of missionaries
from among the ordinary men themselves; missionaries of thought about
the great problems of life and society, fashioned out of those who are
of the people and understand and sympathise with their emotions. When
once the average, revue-loving, thoughtless, "sporting" public school
boy has been taught to think vigorously about politics and sociology;
when once he has been so fired with enthusiasm for these things that he
will teach and talk to others of his kind: then, at last, slowly and
painfully no doubt, but none the less inevitably, will war, poverty,
and materialism vanish altogether from a world not meant for them.
That is why we have ventured to urge all those who both are idealists
and love the public schools--but those alone--to break in on them and
help to awaken the great sleeping instrument of salvation.
And they will find good material awaiting them. The English public
school boy shares with all the youth of all the nations an immense
store of latent idealism, which can be brought to a splendid fruition
if atrophy and decay are not allowed to overtake it. But he possesses
other things also, over and above this common heritage. The
intellectualist has often got beyond the big ideas, if such a paradox
may be allowed; they have been for so long the platitudes of his caste,
and he has grown so hopeless of their general acceptance, that he has
turned to a search after subtle refinements and intellectual novelties,
in the course of which much generous breadth of vision has been lost.
Again, many working-class reformers--can it be wondered?--not only
bring to their task a bitterness against the world which has so misused
them and their fellows, but also have inevitably been cut off from
those gentle manners of life which have been gradually evolved by the
more fortunate to express, however imperfectly, the feeling for grace
and beauty which it should be our aim, not to crush, but to extend to
all. But with the public school boy all is different. Once he has
begun to think in any real sense of the word, his intellectual life
develops as joyfully and naturally as does the physical life of the
beasts of the field. Freshly and spontaneously, and with no trace of
self-consciousness or affectation, he leaps to greet ideas and
principles, between which and his own true nature there is a glorious
bond of kinship. We have seen boy after boy, as he realises, for
instance, the meaning of Liberty, and gets his first glimpse of the
wide country which such a realisation opens up, experiencing an emotion
of happiness which we can only compare to the catch of breath with
which men see great scenes of beauty, or hear of lovely deeds of
generosity and heroism. Given their chance, public school boys (not
one or two, but great masses of average humanity) will rediscover for
themselves the simple things which Christ and Plato taught; and once
that is achieved a general advance all along the line toward the goal
of a worthy human society may begin.