6. "Faery lands forlorn." Draw a map of the district in question,
putting in principal towns, and naming exports.
7. Show that, "heaven lies about us in our infancy" must mean "wholesome
maternal influences surround us in our childhood."
You say that is all nonsense? that one cannot express art of any kind in
the terms of rationalism? Well, I agree with you that it _is_ nonsense;
that the tables of weights and measures give no æsthetic guide to the
value of Westminster Abbey; but if we agree on this I am afraid that we
must be content to be called high-flown. Having once for all settled
that "common sense" has nothing to do with literary art, we must be, I
suppose, uncommon, and (apparently) nonsensical if we want to talk about
it to any profit. That is what it comes to, after all. If literature be
a kind of dignified reporting, in which the reporter is at liberty to
invent some incidents and leave out others, and to arrange all in the
order that pleases him best; then, let us have as much "common sense"
and "rationalism" as you please, and the more the better; but if
literature is a mysterious ecstasy, the withdrawal from all common and
ordinary conditions--well, I suppose, we had better be mystics when we
discuss the subject, and frankly confess that with its first principles
logic has nothing to do. I suppose that there are only two parties in
the world: the Rationalists and the Mystics, and one's vote on
literature goes with one's party. One might leave the matter there, and
amiably agree to differ with the other side, but I, personally, have the
ferocity to insist, that my side, the mystical, is wholly right, and the
other, the rationalist, wholly wrong, and moreover I shall be so
indecent as to prove the truth of my position. But, I have done so, and
with that "Examination Paper" I just read out to you. For if rationalism
be the truth, then all literature, all that both sides agree in thinking
the finest literature is simple lunacy, and all the world of the arts
must go into the region of mania. Take the lowest, the simplest
instance. Here is a knife with a wooden handle, and the handle has
certain curious carved designs on it, which do _not_ enable it to be
held better. Why is this knife better, more to be valued, than that
other knife, which is not decorated at all? It does not cut better; it
does not justify its existence and purpose as a knife more than the
other; where is its superiority? Because I find pleasure in seeing those
designs? But _why_ do I find any pleasure in ornament? What is the
rationalistic justification for that pleasure? By logical definition a
knife is an instrument for cutting, and nothing else; the plain cuts as
well as the ornate; _why_ then are you sorry if you lose the one, while
you don't care twopence for the loss of the other? You have at last to
answer that you have a joy which you cannot in any way define in the
purely decorative pattern; and with that answer the whole system of
rationalism topples over. Rationalism may say to you: Either give a
definite reason for going to Mass, or leave off going. You have only to
answer: Your command is based on the premiss that one should do nothing
without being able to give a definite reason for it. But I can give no
definite reason for liking--the Odyssey or a curiously carved knife--and
yet you confess that I am right in liking these things. Then I have
proved the contradictory of your premiss, as you have admitted that
there are things that one may do without being able to give a definite
reason for doing them: _ergo_, I shall not neglect the "parson's bell."
Of course, all this is altogether outside of my business; but I confess
I am fond of carrying things to their limits. You remember how poor S.
T. C. used to talk, humbly and yet proudly, of "my system," though I am
afraid "my system," never emerged from the state of fragments and
_disjecta membra_. And I too, though I have only broken morsels and
ruinous stones to show for the splendid outlines and indicated arches of
Coleridge, still like to follow up an argument whithersoever it will
lead me, regardless of consequences; and this, I am sure, should count
for righteousness with our friends the rationalists. I love to start a
_sorites_, something as follows: I admire that odd but beautiful little
decorative scheme on the seventeenth century chest, and therefore, I
think poetry, as poetry, finer than prose, as prose. Hence I approve of
"Ritualism" in the service of the church, and from the same premiss I
draw the conclusion that Keats was a poet and that Pope was not. Pope
not being a poet, it follows that to "intone" is in every way better
than to "read" the Liturgy and the Offices, and "reading" the service
being wrong, you will easily infer that I dislike Mr Frith's pictures.
And after learning that I do not care for the "Derby Day," you will
scarcely require my opinion as to the (theoretical) righteousness of the
first Reform Bill, and from my attitude towards Lord John Russell's
measure, you can, of course, guess my opinion on the respective merits
of the French and English languages as literary instruments. And French
being vastly inferior to English, it necessarily follows that the
English Reformation was a great (though perhaps unavoidable) misfortune.
Hence, you see, admiring certain lines cut in an old oaken box, I am led
by the strictest logic to dislike the religious policy of Edward VI.,
with all the other consequences in order; and on the other hand if I saw
no sense in that rude ornament I should be an Atheist, or at the
mildest, an attendant at Pleasant Sunday Afternoons, with George Eliot
for my favourite reading.
Yes, I like my theories to "work through," and I confess that my belief
in the truth of "my system" is very much strengthened by the fact that
it does "work through," that it seems to me justified by the facts of
life. I mean that the premiss which enables me to declare Keats to be a
poet and Pope not to be a poet does really enable me to pronounce
democracy to be a bad system in theory; and the premiss baldly stated is
simply this: that logic does not cover life, or in other words, that
life cannot be judged by the rules of logic, of common sense.
But yet I am using logic all the time, you say? Certainly, but I am
using it in its right place, to do the work for which it is competent.
If I say that a scythe is not exactly the instrument for performing a
surgical operation, I am not therefore bound to have my meadow mown with
a bistoury? A microscope is good and a telescope is good, but it is the
microscope that one uses in bacteriology. You know, don't you, that ever
since that unhappy Reformation of ours people have been talking nonsense
about the Aristotelian logic, and fumbling, in the most grotesque
manner, for some "new" logic. Our great false prophet Bacon (a wretch
infinitely more guilty than Hobbes) began it in England with his "Novum
Organum"; and if you wish to really estimate "educated" folly, to touch
the bottom of the incredible depths to which a man of information may
sink, read Macaulay's comparison of the "old" philosophy and the "new"
philosophy. The essayist says that the "old" philosophy was no good,
because it never led up to the steam-engine and the telegraph post.
Isn't it almost humiliating to think that we have to acknowledge
ourselves of the same genus as that "brilliant" Macaulay? But if I told
you that the Greek Alphabet was no good because it has never grilled a
single steak you would probably get uneasy and make for the door, and if
you were charitable you would tell the landlady that I ought to be
"taken care of." But such a remark as that is no whit more lunatic than
Macaulay's "comparison" between philosophy, properly so called, and
physical science applied to utilitarian purposes. Well, all the
portentous stuff that has been written about logic is nonsense of
exactly the same kind. The scholastic logic, people said, won't discover
the truth. That is perfectly true, but then the scholastic logic was not
intended to discover truth. It will draw conclusions from truths already
discovered, from premisses granted, but it wont make premisses any more
than a scythe will make grass. And, it is, curiously enough, the very
class of people who despise the formal logic, who insist on your giving
logical reasons for actions and emotions which are altogether outside
the jurisdiction of logic. With one breath they say: Aristotle is
useless, because the "Organon" could never have led men to discover the
stomach-pump; and with the next breath they ask you what you mean by
admiring the "Ode on a Grecian Urn" if you can't give any logical reason
for your admiration. Your religion doesn't rest on a logical foundation,
they say. But does anything of any consequence rest on a logical
foundation? Can you reduce the "Morte d'Arthur" into valid syllogisms in
_Barbara_, can you "disprove" Salisbury Cathedral by the aid of
_Celarent_. What is the "rational" explanation of our wonder and joy at
the vision of the hills? Are a great symphony, the swell and triumph of
the organ, the voices of the choristers, to be tested by the process of
the understanding? But perhaps I am misjudging the people who ask these
questions. When they say that logic does not discover truth, they
doubtless mean by logic that formal analysis of the ratiocinative
process that is rightly so called; but I am inclined to think that when
they condemn religious or artistic emotions because they are
"illogical," they mean by "illogical" that which does not conduce to the
ease and comfort of the digestive apparatus or the money-making faculty.
They are terrible fellows, you know, some of these persons. For example,
I asked, with a tone of undue triumph, I am afraid, for the "reason why"
we experience awe and delight in the presence of the hills. But in
certain quarters my problem would be very quickly solved. I should be
told, more in sorrow than in anger, that my emotion at the sight of
certain shapes of earth was due to the fact that hill air was highly
ozonised, and that the human race had acquired an instinctive pleasure
in breathing it, greatly to its digestive profit. And if I tried to turn
the tables by declaring that I experienced an equal, though a different
delight in the spectacle of a desolate, smoking marsh, where a red sun
sinks from a world of shivering reeds, I suppose I should hear that some
remote ancestor of mine had found in some such place "pterodactyls
plentiful and strong on the wing." And if I like the woods, it was
because a monkey sat at the root of my family tree, and if I love an
ancient garden it is because I am "second cousin to the worm."
There: I confess it is difficult to keep one's temper with these people,
but one must try to do so. Do you remember how Trunnion's marriage was
delayed? The bridegroom set out bravely with his retinue for the
parish-church, where the bride waited a whole half hour--in vain. A
messenger was sent who saw:
"The whole troop disposed in a long field, crossing the road obliquely,
and headed by the bridegroom and his friend Hatchway, who finding
himself hindered by a hedge from proceeding farther in the same
direction, fired a pistol and stood over to the other side, making an
obtuse angle with the line of his former course; and the rest of the
squadron followed his example, keeping always in the rear of each other
like a flight of wild geese.
"Surprised at this strange method of journeying, the messenger came up
... and desired he would proceed with more expedition. To this message
Mr Trunnion replied, 'Hark ye, brother, don't you see we make all
possible speed? Go back, and tell those who sent you, that the wind has
shifted since we weighed anchor, and that we are obliged to make short
trips in tacking, by reason of the narrowness of the channel; and that,
as we lie within six points of the wind, they must make some allowance
for variation and leeway.' 'Lord, sir!' said the valet, 'what occasion
have you to go zig-zag in that manner? Do but clap spurs to your horses,
and ride straight forward, and I'll engage you shall be at the church
porch in less than a quarter of an hour.' 'What! right in the wind's
eye?' answered the commander. 'Ahey! brother, where did you learn your
navigation?'"
You see Commodore Trunnion's "logic" was perfect, only it was the logic
of seamanship and not of riding to church on horseback. There are a good
many people at the present day who are quite unable to get to church in
time, for "reasons" as valid as Trunnion's; and when I hear of "the
scientific basis of literature" I am always a little reminded of those
scarecrows straggling in short tacks from one side of the lane to the
other on their way to the wedding. The moral is, you know, that they
didn't get there.
I tackled a materialist once on very similar lines. He began by saying
that time and thought devoted to religion (they never see that art and
religion stand or fall together, religion being the foundation of the fine
arts) were an utter waste of time as they only diverted us from
consideration of the present world, which we ought to study to the utmost;
and he went on to praise some saying of Confucius on the folly of
troubling about the future things. Then I went for him. He had to admit
that agriculture is good, and I pointed out to him that England was
changed from a savage wilderness into a pleasant garden by the monastic
houses. He agreed that to found and endow hospitals and alms-houses was
not precisely a waste of time, and I showed him that such institutions
were begun by the religion of the past and carried on by the religion of
the present. Then he allowed, in response to my Socratic question, that
painting was something, and I demonstrated that all painting arose from
the religious impulse, that the greatest paintings in the world were meant
to adorn churches. Then he admitted the value of architecture, and he got
the Parthenon, all the mediæval cathedrals, and the wonderful mound
temples of Ceylon right at his head. He granted me that travel civilised,
and I rubbed in the pilgrimage; he confessed that he liked to read the
Latin and Greek classics--sometimes--and he received from me information
as to the monastic scriptorium, and its part in the preservation of the
old literature. As for the blessedness of forming one's character on the
teaching of Confucius; there happened to be an article in the morning's
paper on the Mandarin class! Well, my rationalist hadn't anything to say
to it at all, with the exception of some vague remark that the Romans made
roads, which, considering the state of England in the sixth century, was
about as helpful as the somewhat similar remark of Mr F's. Aunt--that
there are milestones on the Dover Road. I told him that the only Roman
civilisation which contributed to the making of our country was that
brought over by St Austin; and he had to allow that his statement that
religion was a waste of time, an elaborate form of idleness, was, to put
it mildly, not proven. Then he said kindly but firmly that religion wasn't
rational, and I used up most of the arguments that I have used to-night; I
mean, I showed him that it is good to paint pictures, to write poems, to
devise romances, and to compose symphonies, and that it is also good to
meditate and enjoy all these things. Hence, he was forced to admit, that
his suppressed premiss had been disproved, and that he must no longer
say: "that which is not rational is absurd."
And then, I think, the fun really began. I carried the war into the very
camp of the enemy; that is, into actual, observable life, into the every
day world of fact and experience. You talk about "reason," I said, and I
presume you won't mind if I substitute, occasionally, "common sense" for
reason, as I think that in your phraseology the two terms are very
fairly equated. Very well, then, don't you think that there is a good
deal of common sense in many of the actions of animals? Take the case of
the small birds who mob an owl all day, in order that their enemy may be
kept awake, and so unable to hoot at night. Take the case of the ants,
who milk the aphides, and go slave-hunting. Take the bees, who rise to
an emergency, and remedy, with singular contrivance, the threatened lack
of a queen. Take the dog, who brought a wounded fellow to the hospital
where he had been cured. All these are instances of common sense, aren't
they, as rational as the telegram "Sell Cobras at once"? Very good;
animals, then, have a plentiful supply of reason, and not of a mere
mechanical reason, but of reason that can rise to the height of
unforeseen cases, and remedy unexpected evils. When the experimenter
tilted the bees' house to one side, so that the equilibrium was in
danger, a sufficient number of bees climbed up, and placed themselves on
the other side so that they constituted a balance; here there was no
mechanism, but a calculated and rational contrivance. Animals, then,
have reason and its effect artifice; the adaptation of means to secure
ends. But, then, how about instinct? By what motion does the swallow
make her nest in spring? Can the bee demonstrate the advantages of the
hexagon cell? Does the fly, laying its eggs, here and there, in this or
in that according to its kind, in meat or in dung, or in the crevices of
a wall, rationally foresee that it is providing for the future grub its
only possible food? No; but then animals, even, perform "irrational"
actions; though they have common sense they do things which must be
troublesome to them, at some instance, which is not common sense. But if
a bluebottle lays her eggs in my beef, and knows not why, perhaps I, a
man, may sing the _Sanctus_, and pray that I may be joined _cum angelis
et archangelis, cum thronis et dominationbus, Cumque omni militiâ
cælestis exercitus_.
And consider our own human life; the great _coups_ of war, commerce,
diplomacy, of all the conduct of life, are often, or usually, the result
of "intuitions," that is of irrational and inexplicable mental
processes, which elude all analysis. If the knowledge, the successful
and triumphant knowledge of men and affairs and strategy were a
"rational" product; then, indeed, Carlyle's dictum were true, and each
one of us were, at choice, a man of genius in diplomacy, or business, or
battle. We know that it is not so, and that no man by taking thought can
make himself, say, a Stonewall Jackson. And we have all heard of the
"woman's reason"--"I don't know why I am sure that x = a, but I am
sure"--and this extremely irrational process often corresponds with the
truth. So, I finished up, your "reason" far from being the despot of the
world, turns out to be a humble, though useful, deputy-assistant
councillor-general, and is by no means a prerogative force, even in
affairs of common, everyday existence. Why, "reason," alone and
unassisted, won't enable you to make a decent living by selling ribbons
and laces, and you have been trying to make me accept its dictation in
the highest affairs of the soul. You have been appealing from the
King's Majesty in Council to the Magistrates of Little Pedlington in
Petty Sessions assembled!
Then my rationalist made a point. You know, he said, that some men seem
to have an almost miraculous skill in solving mathematical problems:
would you, therefore, give up teaching the ordinary arithmetic? I was
not alarmed; I pointed out that the analogy was not quite perfect. The
case, I said, was this. A certain number of "problems" were,
confessedly, beyond the jurisdiction of the "ordinary arithmetic"
altogether, but offered no difficulties to the "lightning calculator,"
who obtained results that were demonstratively correct, and I therefore
thought it well to trust to him in all problems of a similar character,
even though the "ordinary arithmetic," confessedly incompetent, assured
me that his answers were wholly unreliable--a case of a schoolboy, well
on in Colenso, scouting the Binomial Theorem because one couldn't prove
it by Practice or the Rule of Three. I left then, unanswered, and I
suppose my friend passed the rest of the evening in showing that
Salisbury Cathedral was "opposed" to the facts of Biology, and that
Sisters of Charity are to be classed with criminal lunatics.
But, you know, I was the real lunatic. You would not have "argued" with
me if I _had_ disparaged the Greek alphabet, because it never grilled a
single steak; I hinted the course you would probably have pursued if I
had chanced to make such an alarming remark. And why should I argue with
the sect of Macaulay, with the tribe which utters such stuff as this:
"Assuredly if the tree which Socrates planted and Plato watered is to be
judged of by its flowers and leaves, it is the noblest of trees. But if
we take the homely test of Bacon--if we judge the tree by its
_fruits_--our opinion of it may be less favourable. When we sum up the
useful truths which we owe to that philosophy, to what do they
amount.... But when we look for something more--for something which adds
to the comfort or alleviates the calamities of the human race--we are
forced to own ourselves disappointed."
No; there is, really, nothing to be said. If the Learned Pig found voice
and articulate speech and expressed his scorn of the poet's art, since
it added nothing to the pleasures of the wash-tub, we might wonder but
we should not argue; and it were idle to contend with a Laughing
Jackass, contemptuously amused by the chanting of the cathedral choir.
And, perhaps, you are wondering what all this talk of mine has to do
with our main subject--literature? But don't you see that all the while
I have merely been reiterating our old conclusions in a new phraseology?
I may have appeared to you to be the last of the Cavaliers, gallantly
contending for the rights of Holy Church, but, in reality, I have been
showing, at every step, that Jane Austen's works are not literature.
Yes, but it is so. If the science of life, if philosophy, consisted of a
series of mathematical propositions, capable of rational demonstration,
then, "Pride and Prejudice" would be the highest pinnacle of the
literary art; but if not, but oh! if we, being wondrous, journey through
a wonderful world, if all our joys are from above, from the other world
where the Shadowy Companion walks, then no mere making of the likeness
of the external shape will be our art, no veracious document will be our
truth; but to us, initiated, the Symbol will be offered, and we shall
take the Sign and adore, beneath the outward and perhaps unlovely
accidents, the very Presence and eternal indwelling of God.
We have tracked Ecstasy by many strange paths, in divers strange
disguises, but I think that now, and only now, we have discovered its
full and perfect definition. For Artifice is of Time, but Art is of
Eternity.