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diff --git a/19980.txt b/19980.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6342448 --- /dev/null +++ b/19980.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6365 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Joy For Ever, by John Ruskin + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Joy For Ever + (And Its Price in the Market) + +Author: John Ruskin + +Release Date: November 30, 2006 [EBook #19980] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A JOY FOR EVER *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif, Paul Murray and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + "A JOY FOR EVER"; + (AND ITS PRICE IN THE MARKET): + BEING + THE SUBSTANCE (WITH ADDITIONS) + OF + TWO LECTURES ON THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART, + _Delivered at Manchester, July 10th and 13th, 1857._ + + BY + + JOHN RUSKIN, LL.D., + + HONORARY STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, AND HONORARY FELLOW + OF CORPUS CHRISTI COLLEGE, OXFORD. + + "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever."--KEATS. + + SIXTEENTH THOUSAND. + LONDON: + GEORGE ALLEN, 156, CHARING CROSS ROAD. + 1904. + [_All rights reserved_] + Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. + At the Ballantyne Press + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE RE-ISSUE OF 1880. + + +The title of this book,--or, more accurately, of its subject;--for no +author was ever less likely than I have lately become, to hope for +perennial pleasure to his readers from what has cost himself the most +pains,--will be, perhaps, recognised by some as the last clause of the +line chosen from Keats by the good folks of Manchester, to be written in +letters of gold on the cornice, or Holy rood, of the great Exhibition +which inaugurated the career of so many,--since organized, by both +foreign governments and our own, to encourage the production of works of +art, which the producing nations, so far from intending to be their "joy +for ever," only hope to sell as soon as possible. Yet the motto was +chosen with uncomprehended felicity: for there never was, nor can be, +any essential beauty possessed by a work of art, which is not based on +the conception of its honoured permanence, and local influence, as a +part of appointed and precious furniture, either in the cathedral, the +house, or the joyful thoroughfare, of nations which enter their gates +with thanksgiving, and their courts with praise. + +"Their" courts--or "His" courts;--in the mind of such races, the +expressions are synonymous: and the habits of life which recognise the +delightfulness, confess also the sacredness, of homes nested round the +seat of a worship unshaken by insolent theory: themselves founded on an +abiding affection for the past, and care for the future; and approached +by paths open only to the activities of honesty, and traversed only by +the footsteps of peace. + +The exposition of these truths, to which I have given the chief energy +of my life, will be found in the following pages first undertaken +systematically and in logical sequence; and what I have since written on +the political influence of the Arts has been little more than the +expansion of these first lectures, in the reprint of which not a +sentence is omitted or changed. + +The supplementary papers added contain, in briefest form, the aphorisms +respecting principles of art-teaching of which the attention I gave to +this subject during the continuance of my Professorship at Oxford +confirms me in the earnest and contented re-assertion. + +JOHN RUSKIN, + +BRANTWOOD, + +_April 29th, 1880._ + + + + +PREFACE + +TO THE 1857 EDITION. + + +The greater part of the following treatise remains in the exact form in +which it was read at Manchester; but the more familiar passages of it, +which were trusted to extempore delivery, have been written with greater +explicitness and fulness than I could give them in speaking; and a +considerable number of notes are added, to explain the points which +could not be sufficiently considered in the time I had at my disposal in +the lecture room. + +Some apology may be thought due to the reader, for an endeavour to +engage his attention on a subject of which no profound study seems +compatible with the work in which I am usually employed. But profound +study is not, in this case, necessary either to writer or readers, +while accurate study, up to a certain point, is necessary for us all. +Political economy means, in plain English, nothing more than "citizen's +economy"; and its first principles ought, therefore, to be understood by +all who mean to take the responsibility of citizens, as those of +household economy by all who take the responsibility of householders. +Nor are its first principles in the least obscure: they are, many of +them, disagreeable in their practical requirements, and people in +general pretend that they cannot understand, because they are unwilling +to obey them: or rather, by habitual disobedience, destroy their +capacity of understanding them. But there is not one of the really great +principles of the science which is either obscure or disputable,--which +might not be taught to a youth as soon as he can be trusted with an +annual allowance, or to a young lady as soon as she is of age to be +taken into counsel by the housekeeper. + +I might, with more appearance of justice, be blamed for thinking it +necessary to enforce what everybody is supposed to know. But this fault +will hardly be found with me, while the commercial events recorded daily +in our journals, and still more the explanations attempted to be given +of them, show that a large number of our so-called merchants are as +ignorant of the nature of money as they are reckless, unjust, and +unfortunate in its employment. + +The statements of economical principles given in the text, though I know +that most, if not all, of them are accepted by existing authorities on +the science, are not supported by references, because I have never read +any author on political economy, except Adam Smith, twenty years ago. +Whenever I have taken up any modern book upon this subject, I have +usually found it encumbered with inquiries into accidental or minor +commercial results, for the pursuit of which an ordinary reader could +have no leisure, and by the complication of which, it seemed to me, the +authors themselves had been not unfrequently prevented from seeing to +the root of the business. + +Finally, if the reader should feel induced to blame me for too sanguine +a statement of future possibilities in political practice, let him +consider how absurd it would have appeared in the days of Edward I. if +the present state of social economy had been then predicted as +necessary, or even described as possible. And I believe the advance from +the days of Edward I. to our own, great as it is confessedly, consists, +not so much in what we have actually accomplished, as in what we are now +enabled to conceive. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +LECTURE I. + PAGE +THE DISCOVERY AND APPLICATION OF ART 1 + +_A Lecture delivered at Manchester, July 10th, 1857._ + + +LECTURE II. + +THE ACCUMULATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF ART 70 + +_Continuation of the previous Lecture; delivered +July 13th, 1857._ + + +ADDENDA. + +NOTE 1.--"FATHERLY AUTHORITY" 151 + " 2.--"RIGHT TO PUBLIC SUPPORT" 159 + " 3.--"TRIAL SCHOOLS" 169 + " 4.--"PUBLIC FAVOUR" 180 + " 5.--"INVENTION OF NEW WANTS" 183 + " 6.--"ECONOMY OF LITERATURE" 187 + " 7.--"PILOTS OF THE STATE" 189 + " 8.--"SILK AND PURPLE" 193 + + +SUPPLEMENTARY ADDITIONAL PAPERS. + +EDUCATION IN ART 213 + +ART SCHOOL NOTES 229 + +SOCIAL POLICY 240 + + + + +"A JOY FOR EVER." + + + + +LECTURE I. + +THE DISCOVERY AND APPLICATION OF ART. + +_A Lecture delivered at Manchester, July 10, 1857._ + + +1. Among the various characteristics of the age in which we live, as +compared with other ages of this not yet _very_ experienced world, one +of the most notable appears to me to be the just and wholesome contempt +in which we hold poverty. I repeat, the _just_ and _wholesome_ contempt; +though I see that some of my hearers look surprised at the expression. I +assure them, I use it in sincerity; and I should not have ventured to +ask you to listen to me this evening, unless I had entertained a +profound respect for wealth--true wealth, that is to say; for, of +course, we ought to respect neither wealth nor anything else that is +false of its kind: and the distinction between real and false wealth is +one of the points on which I shall have a few words presently to say to +you. But true wealth I hold, as I said, in great honour; and sympathize, +for the most part, with that extraordinary feeling of the present age +which publicly pays this honour to riches. + + +2. I cannot, however, help noticing how extraordinary it is, and how +this epoch of ours differs from all bygone epochs in having no +philosophical nor religious worshippers of the ragged godship of +poverty. In the classical ages, not only were there people who +voluntarily lived in tubs, and who used gravely to maintain the +superiority of tub-life to town-life, but the Greeks and Latins seem to +have looked on these eccentric, and I do not scruple to say, absurd +people, with as much respect as we do upon large capitalists and landed +proprietors; so that really, in those days, no one could be described as +purse proud, but only as empty-purse proud. And no less distinct than +the honour which those curious Greek people pay to their conceited poor, +is the disrespectful manner in which they speak of the rich; so that +one cannot listen long either to them, or to the Roman writers who +imitated them, without finding oneself entangled in all sorts of +plausible absurdities; hard upon being convinced of the uselessness of +collecting that heavy yellow substance which we call gold, and led +generally to doubt all the most established maxims of political economy. + + +3. Nor are matters much better in the Middle Ages. For the Greeks and +Romans contented themselves with mocking at rich people, and +constructing merry dialogues between Charon and Diogenes or Menippus, in +which the ferryman and the cynic rejoiced together as they saw kings and +rich men coming down to the shore of Acheron, in lamenting and +lamentable crowds, casting their crowns into the dark waters, and +searching, sometimes in vain, for the last coin out of all their +treasures that could ever be of use to them. + + +4. But these Pagan views of the matter were indulgent, compared with +those which were held in the Middle Ages, when wealth seems to have been +looked upon by the best men not only as contemptible, but as criminal. +The purse round the neck is, then, one of the principal signs of +condemnation in the pictured Inferno; and the Spirit of Poverty is +reverenced with subjection of heart, and faithfulness of affection, like +that of a loyal knight for his lady, or a loyal subject for his queen. +And truly, it requires some boldness to quit ourselves of these +feelings, and to confess their partiality or their error, which, +nevertheless, we are certainly bound to do. For wealth is simply one of +the greatest powers which can be entrusted to human hands: a power, not +indeed to be envied, because it seldom makes us happy; but still less to +be abdicated or despised; while, in these days, and in this country, it +has become a power all the more notable, in that the possessions of a +rich man are not represented, as they used to be, by wedges of gold or +coffers of jewels, but by masses of men variously employed, over whose +bodies and minds the wealth, according to its direction, exercises +harmful or helpful influence, and becomes, in that alternative, Mammon +either of Unrighteousness or of Righteousness. + + +5. Now, it seemed to me that since, in the name you have given to this +great gathering of British pictures, you recognize them as +Treasures--that is, I suppose, as part and parcel of the real wealth of +the country--you might not be uninterested in tracing certain commercial +questions connected with this particular form of wealth. Most persons +express themselves as surprised at its quantity; not having known before +to what an extent good art had been accumulated in England: and it will, +therefore, I should think, be held a worthy subject of consideration, +what are the political interests involved in such accumulations, what +kind of labour they represent, and how this labour may in general be +applied and economized, so as to produce the richest results. + + +6. Now, you must have patience with me, if in approaching the specialty +of this subject, I dwell a little on certain points of general political +science already known or established: for though thus, as I believe, +established, some which I shall have occasion to rest arguments on are +not yet by any means universally accepted; and therefore, though I will +not lose time in any detailed defence of them, it is necessary that I +should distinctly tell you in what form I receive, and wish to argue +from them; and this the more, because there may perhaps be a part of my +audience who have not interested themselves in political economy, as it +bears on ordinary fields of labour, but may yet wish to hear in what way +its principles can be applied to Art. I shall, therefore, take leave to +trespass on your patience with a few elementary statements in the +outset, and with the expression of some general principles, here and +there, in the course of our particular inquiry. + + +7. To begin, then, with one of these necessary truisms: all economy, +whether of states, households, or individuals, may be defined to be the +art of managing labour. The world is so regulated by the laws of +Providence, that a man's labour, well applied, is always amply +sufficient to provide him during his life with all things needful to +him, and not only with those, but with many pleasant objects of luxury; +and yet farther, to procure him large intervals of healthful rest and +serviceable leisure. And a nation's labour, well applied, is, in like +manner, amply sufficient to provide its whole population with good food +and comfortable habitation; and not with those only, but with good +education besides, and objects of luxury, art treasures, such as these +you have around you now. But by those same laws of Nature and +Providence, if the labour of the nation or of the individual be +misapplied, and much more if it be insufficient,--if the nation or man +be indolent and unwise,--suffering and want result, exactly in +proportion to the indolence and improvidence--to the refusal of labour, +or to the misapplication of it. Wherever you see want, or misery, or +degradation, in this world about you, there, be sure, either industry +has been wanting, or industry has been in error. It is not accident, it +is not Heaven-commanded calamity, it is not the original and inevitable +evil of man's nature, which fill your streets with lamentation, and your +graves with prey. It is only that, when there should have been +providence, there has been waste; when there should have been labour, +there has been lasciviousness; and wilfulness, when there should have +been subordination.[1] + +[Note 1: Proverbs xiii. 23: "Much food is in the tillage of the +poor, but there is that is destroyed for want of judgment."] + +8. Now, we have warped the word "economy" in our English language into a +meaning which it has no business whatever to bear. In our use of it, it +constantly signifies merely sparing or saving; economy of money means +saving money--economy of time, sparing time, and so on. But that is a +wholly barbarous use of the word--barbarous in a double sense, for it is +not English, and it is bad Greek; barbarous in a treble sense, for it is +not English, it is bad Greek, and it is worse sense. Economy no more +means saving money than it means spending money. It means, the +administration of a house; its stewardship; spending or saving, that is, +whether money or time, or anything else, to the best possible advantage. +In the simplest and clearest definition of it, economy, whether public +or private, means the wise management of labour; and it means this +mainly in three senses: namely, first, _applying_ your labour +rationally; secondly, _preserving_ its produce carefully; lastly, +_distributing_ its produce seasonably. + + +9. I say first, applying your labour rationally; that is, so as to +obtain the most precious things you can, and the most lasting things, by +it: not growing oats in land where you can grow wheat, nor putting fine +embroidery on a stuff that will not wear. Secondly, preserving its +produce carefully; that is to say, laying up your wheat wisely in +storehouses for the time of famine, and keeping your embroidery +watchfully from the moth: and lastly, distributing its produce +seasonably; that is to say, being able to carry your corn at once to the +place where the people are hungry, and your embroideries to the places +where they are gay; so fulfilling in all ways the Wise Man's +description, whether of the queenly housewife or queenly nation: "She +riseth while it is yet night, and giveth meat to her household, and a +portion to her maidens. She maketh herself coverings of tapestry, her +clothing is silk and purple. Strength and honour are in her clothing, +and she shall rejoice in time to come." + + +10. Now, you will observe that in this description of the perfect +economist, or mistress of a household, there is a studied expression of +the balanced division of her care between the two great objects of +utility and splendour: in her right hand, food and flax, for life and +clothing; in her left hand, the purple and the needlework, for honour +and for beauty. All perfect housewifery or national economy is known by +these two divisions; wherever either is wanting, the economy is +imperfect. If the motive of pomp prevails, and the care of the national +economist is directed only to the accumulation of gold, and of pictures, +and of silk and marble, you know at once that the time must soon come +when all these treasures shall be scattered and blasted in national +ruin. If, on the contrary, the element of utility prevails, and the +nation disdains to occupy itself in any wise with the arts of beauty or +delight, not only a certain quantity of its energy calculated for +exercise in those arts alone must be entirely wasted, which is bad +economy, but also the passions connected with the utilities of property +become morbidly strong, and a mean lust of accumulation merely for the +sake of accumulation, or even of labour merely for the sake of labour, +will banish at last the serenity and the morality of life, as +completely, and perhaps more ignobly, than even the lavishness of pride, +and the likeness of pleasure. And similarly, and much more visibly, in +private and household economy, you may judge always of its perfectness +by its fair balance between the use and the pleasure of its possessions. +You will see the wise cottager's garden trimly divided between its +well-set vegetables, and its fragrant flowers; you will see the good +housewife taking pride in her pretty table-cloth, and her glittering +shelves, no less than in her well-dressed dish, and her full storeroom; +the care in her countenance will alternate with gaiety, and though you +will reverence her in her seriousness, you will know her best by her +smile. + + +11. Now, as you will have anticipated, I am going to address you, on +this and our succeeding evening, chiefly on the subject of that economy +which relates rather to the garden than the farm-yard. I shall ask you +to consider with me the kind of laws by which we shall best distribute +the beds of our national garden, and raise in it the sweetest succession +of trees pleasant to the sight, and (in no forbidden sense) to be +desired to make us wise. But, before proceeding to open this specialty +of our subject, let me pause for a few moments to plead with you for the +acceptance of that principle of government or authority which must be at +the root of all economy, whether for use or for pleasure. I said, a few +minutes ago, that a nation's labour, well applied, was amply sufficient +to provide its whole population with good food, comfortable clothing, +and pleasant luxury. But the good, instant, and constant application is +everything. We must not, when our strong hands are thrown out of work, +look wildly about for want of something to do with them. If ever we feel +that want, it is a sign that all our household is out of order. Fancy a +farmer's wife, to whom one or two of her servants should come at twelve +o'clock at noon, crying that they had got nothing to do; that they did +not know what to do next: and fancy still farther, the said farmer's +wife looking hopelessly about her rooms and yard, they being all the +while considerably in disorder, not knowing where to set the spare +handmaidens to work, and at last complaining bitterly that she had been +obliged to give them their dinner for nothing. That's the type of the +kind of political economy we practise too often in England. Would you +not at once assert of such a mistress that she knew nothing of her +duties? and would you not be certain, if the household were rightly +managed, the mistress would be only too glad at any moment to have the +help of any number of spare hands; that she would know in an instant +what to set them to;--in an instant what part of to-morrow's work might +be most serviceably forwarded, what part of next month's work most +wisely provided for, or what new task of some profitable kind +undertaken; and when the evening came, and she dismissed her servants to +their recreation or their rest, or gathered them to the reading round +the work-table, under the eaves in the sunset, would you not be sure to +find that none of them had been overtasked by her, just because none had +been left idle; that everything had been accomplished because all had +been employed; that the kindness of the mistress had aided her presence +of mind, and the slight labour had been entrusted to the weak, and the +formidable to the strong; and that as none had been dishonoured by +inactivity, so none had been broken by toil? + + +12. Now, the precise counterpart of such a household would be seen in a +nation in which political economy was rightly understood. You complain +of the difficulty of finding work for your men. Depend upon it, the real +difficulty rather is to find men for your work. The serious question for +you is not how many you have to feed, but how much you have to do; it +is our inactivity, not our hunger, that ruins us: let us never fear that +our servants should have a good appetite--our wealth is in their +strength, not in their starvation. Look around this island of yours, and +see what you have to do in it. The sea roars against your harbourless +cliffs--you have to build the breakwater, and dig the port of refuge; +the unclean pestilence ravins in your streets--you have to bring the +full stream from the hills, and to send the free winds through the +thoroughfare; the famine blanches your lips and eats away your +flesh--you have to dig the moor and dry the marsh, to bid the morass +give forth instead of engulfing, and to wring the honey and oil out of +the rock. These things, and thousands such, we have to do, and shall +have to do constantly, on this great farm of ours; for do not suppose +that it is anything else than that. Precisely the same laws of economy +which apply to the cultivation of a farm or an estate, apply to the +cultivation of a province or of an island. Whatever rebuke you would +address to the improvident master of an ill-managed patrimony, +precisely that rebuke we should address to ourselves, so far as we +leave our population in idleness and our country in disorder. What would +you say to the lord of an estate who complained to you of his poverty +and disabilities, and when you pointed out to him that his land was half +of it overrun with weeds, and that his fences were all in ruin, and that +his cattle-sheds were roofless, and his labourers lying under the hedges +faint for want of food, he answered to you that it would ruin him to +weed his land or to roof his sheds--that those were too costly +operations for him to undertake, and that he knew not how to feed his +labourers nor pay them? Would you not instantly answer, that instead of +ruining him to weed his fields, it would save him; that his inactivity +was his destruction, and that to set his labourers to work was to feed +them? Now, you may add acre to acre, and estate to estate, as far as you +like, but you will never reach a compass of ground which shall escape +from the authority of these simple laws. The principles which are right +in the administration of a few fields, are right also in the +administration of a great country from horizon to horizon: idleness +does not cease to be ruinous because it is extensive, nor labour to be +productive because it is universal. + + +13. Nay, but you reply, there is one vast difference between the +nation's economy and the private man's: the farmer has full authority +over his labourers; he can direct them to do what is needed to be done, +whether they like it or not; and he can turn them away if they refuse to +work, or impede others in their working, or are disobedient, or +quarrelsome. There _is_ this great difference; it is precisely this +difference on which I wish to fix your attention, for it is precisely +this difference which you have to do away with. We know the necessity of +authority in farm, or in fleet, or in army; but we commonly refuse to +admit it in the body of the nation. Let us consider this point a little. + + +14. In the various awkward and unfortunate efforts which the French have +made at the development of a social system, they have at least stated +one true principle, that of fraternity or brotherhood. Do not be +alarmed; they got all wrong in their experiments, because they quite +forgot that this fact of fraternity implied another fact quite as +important--that of paternity, or fatherhood. That is to say, if they +were to regard the nation as one family, the condition of unity in that +family consisted no less in their having a head, or a father, than in +their being faithful and affectionate members, or brothers. But we must +not forget this, for we have long confessed it with our lips, though we +refuse to confess it in our lives. For half an hour every Sunday we +expect a man in a black gown, supposed to be telling us truth, to +address us as brethren, though we should be shocked at the notion of any +brotherhood existing among us out of church. And we can hardly read a +few sentences on any political subject without running a chance of +crossing the phrase "paternal government," though we should be utterly +horror-struck at the idea of governments claiming anything like a +father's authority over us. Now, I believe those two formal phrases are +in both instances perfectly binding and accurate, and that the image of +the farm and its servants which I have hitherto used, as expressing a +wholesome national organization, fails only of doing so, not because it +is too domestic, but because it is not domestic enough; because the real +type of a well-organized nation must be presented, not by a farm +cultivated by servants who wrought for hire, and might be turned away if +they refused to labour, but by a farm in which the master was a father, +and in which all the servants were sons; which implied, therefore, in +all its regulations, not merely the order of expediency, but the bonds +of affection and responsibilities of relationship; and in which all acts +and services were not only to be sweetened by brotherly concord, but to +be enforced by fatherly authority.[2] + +[Note 2: See note 1st, in Addenda.] + +15. Observe, I do not mean in the least that we ought to place such an +authority in the hands of any one person, or of any class or body of +persons. But I do mean to say that as an individual who conducts himself +wisely must make laws for himself which at some time or other may appear +irksome or injurious, but which, precisely at the time they appear most +irksome, it is most necessary he should obey, so a nation which means to +conduct itself wisely, must establish authority over itself, vested +either in kings, councils, or laws, which it must resolve to obey, even +at times when the law or authority appears irksome to the body of the +people, or injurious to certain masses of it. And this kind of national +law has hitherto been only judicial; contented, that is, with an +endeavour to prevent and punish violence and crime: but, as we advance +in our social knowledge, we shall endeavour to make our government +paternal as well as judicial; that is, to establish such laws and +authorities as may at once direct us in our occupations, protect us +against our follies, and visit us in our distresses: a government which +shall repress dishonesty, as now it punishes theft; which shall show how +the discipline of the masses may be brought to aid the toils of peace, +as discipline of the masses has hitherto knit the sinews of battle; a +government which shall have its soldiers of the ploughshare as well as +its soldiers of the sword, and which shall distribute more proudly its +golden crosses of industry--golden as the glow of the harvest, than now +it grants its bronze crosses of honour--bronzed with the crimson of +blood. + + +16. I have not, of course, time to insist on the nature or details of +government of this kind; only I wish to plead for your several and +future consideration of this one truth, that the notion of Discipline +and Interference lies at the very root of all human progress or power; +that the "Let-alone" principle is, in all things which man has to do +with, the principle of death; that it is ruin to him, certain and total, +if he lets his land alone--if he lets his fellow-men alone--if he lets +his own soul alone. That his whole life, on the contrary, must, if it is +healthy life, be continually one of ploughing and pruning, rebuking and +helping, governing and punishing; and that therefore it is only in the +concession of some great principle of restraint and interference in +national action that he can ever hope to find the secret of protection +against national degradation. I believe that the masses have a right to +claim education from their government; but only so far as they +acknowledge the duty of yielding obedience to their government. I +believe they have a right to claim employment from their governors; but +only so far as they yield to the governor the direction and discipline +of their labour; and it is only so far as they grant to the men whom +they may set over them the father's authority to check the +childishnesses of national fancy, and direct the waywardnesses of +national energy, that they have a right to ask that none of their +distresses should be unrelieved, none of their weaknesses unwatched; and +that no grief, nor nakedness, nor peril, should exist for them, against +which the father's hand was not outstretched, or the father's shield +uplifted.[3] + +[Note 3: Compare Wordsworth's Essay on the Poor Law Amendment Bill. +I quote one important passage: "But, if it be not safe to touch the +abstract question of man's right in a social state to help himself even +in the last extremity, may we not still contend for the duty of a +Christian government, standing _in loco parentis_ towards all its +subjects, to make such effectual provision that no one shall be in +danger of perishing either through the neglect or harshness of its +legislation? Or, waiving this, is it not indisputable that the claim of +the State to the allegiance, involves the protection of the subject? +And, as all rights in one party impose a correlative duty upon another, +it follows that the right of the State to require the services of its +members, even to the jeopardizing of their lives in the common defence, +establishes a right in the people (not to be gainsaid by utilitarians +and economists) to public support when, from any cause, they may be +unable to support themselves."--(See note 2nd, in Addenda.)] + +17. Now, I have pressed this upon you at more length than is needful or +proportioned to our present purposes of inquiry, because I would not for +the first time speak to you on this subject of political economy without +clearly stating what I believe to be its first grand principle. But its +bearing on the matter in hand is chiefly to prevent you from at once too +violently dissenting from me when what I may state to you as advisable +economy in art appears to imply too much restraint or interference with +the freedom of the patron or artist. We are a little apt, though on the +whole a prudent nation, to act too immediately on our impulses, even in +matters merely commercial; much more in those involving continual +appeals to our fancies. How far, therefore, the proposed systems or +restraints may be advisable, it is for you to judge; only I pray you not +to be offended with them merely because they _are_ systems and +restraints. + + +18. Do you at all recollect that interesting passage of Carlyle, in +which he compares, in this country and at this day, the understood and +commercial value of man and horse; and in which he wonders that the +horse, with its inferior brains and its awkward hoofiness, instead of +handiness, should be always worth so many tens or scores of pounds in +the market, while the man, so far from always commanding his price in +the market, would often be thought to confer a service on the community +by simply killing himself out of their way? Well, Carlyle does not +answer his own question, because he supposes we shall at once see the +answer. The value of the horse consists simply in the fact of your being +able to put a bridle on him. The value of the man consists precisely in +the same thing. If you can bridle him, or, which is better, if he can +bridle himself, he will be a valuable creature directly. Otherwise, in a +commercial point of view, his value is either nothing, or accidental +only. Only, of course, the proper bridle of man is not a leathern one: +what kind of texture it is rightly made of, we find from that command, +"Be ye not as the horse or as the mule which have no understanding, +whose mouths must be held in with bit and bridle." You are not to be +without the reins, indeed; but they are to be of another kind: "I will +guide thee with mine Eye." So the bridle of man is to be the Eye of God; +and if he rejects that guidance, then the next best for him is the +horse's and the mule's, which have no understanding; and if he rejects +that, and takes the bit fairly in his teeth, then there is nothing left +for him than the blood that comes out of the city, up to the +horse-bridles. + + +19. Quitting, however, at last these general and serious laws of +government--or rather bringing them down to our own business in hand--we +have to consider three points of discipline in that particular branch of +human labour which is concerned, not with procuring of food, but the +expression of emotion; we have to consider respecting art: first, how to +apply our labour to it; then, how to accumulate or preserve the results +of labour; and then, how to distribute them. But since in art the labour +which we have to employ is the labour of a particular class of men--men +who have special genius for the business--we have not only to consider +how to apply the labour, but, first of all, how to produce the labourer; +and thus the question in this particular case becomes fourfold: first, +how to get your man of genius; then, how to employ your man of genius; +then, how to accumulate and preserve his work in the greatest quantity; +and, lastly, how to distribute his work to the best national advantage. +Let us take up these questions in succession. + + +20. I. Discovery.--How are we to get our men of genius: that is to say, +by what means may we produce among us, at any given time, the greatest +quantity of effective art-intellect? A wide question, you say, involving +an account of all the best means of art education. Yes, but I do not +mean to go into the consideration of those; I want only to state the few +principles which lie at the foundation of the matter. Of these, the +first is that you have always to find your artist, not to make him; you +can't manufacture him, any more than you can manufacture gold. You can +find him, and refine him: you dig him out as he lies nugget-fashion in +the mountain-stream; you bring him home; and you make him into current +coin, or household plate, but not one grain of him can you originally +produce. A certain quantity of art-intellect is born annually in every +nation, greater or less according to the nature and cultivation of the +nation, or race of men; but a perfectly fixed quantity annually, not +increasable by one grain. You may lose it, or you may gather it; you may +let it lie loose in the ravine, and buried in the sands, or you may make +kings' thrones of it, and overlay temple gates with it, as you choose: +but the best you can do with it is always merely sifting, melting, +hammering, purifying--never creating. + + +21. And there is another thing notable about this artistical gold; not +only is it limited in quantity, but in use. You need not make thrones or +golden gates with it unless you like, but assuredly you can't do +anything else with it. You can't make knives of it, nor armour, nor +railroads. The gold won't cut you, and it won't carry you: put it to a +mechanical use, and you destroy it at once. It is quite true that in the +greatest artists, their proper artistical faculty is united with every +other; and you may make use of the other faculties, and let the +artistical one lie dormant. For aught I know, there may be two or three +Leonardo da Vincis employed at this moment in your harbours and +railroads: but you are not employing their Leonardesque or golden +faculty there,--you are only oppressing and destroying it. And the +artistical gift in average men is not joined with others: your born +painter, if you don't make a painter of him, won't be a first-rate +merchant, or lawyer; at all events, whatever he turns out, his own +special gift is unemployed by you; and in no wise helps him in that +other business. So here you have a certain quantity of a particular sort +of intelligence, produced for you annually by providential laws, which +you can only make use of by setting it to its own proper work, and which +any attempt to use otherwise involves the dead loss of so much human +energy. + + +22. Well then, supposing we wish to employ it, how is it to be best +discovered and refined? It is easily enough discovered. To wish to +employ it is to discover it. All that you need is, a school of trial[4] +in every important town, in which those idle farmers' lads whom their +masters never can keep out of mischief, and those stupid tailors' +'prentices who are always stitching the sleeves in wrong way upwards, +may have a try at this other trade; only this school of trial must not +be entirely regulated by formal laws of art education, but must +ultimately be the workshop of a good master painter, who will try the +lads with one kind of art and another, till he finds out what they are +fit for. + +[Note 4: See note 3rd, in Addenda.] + + +23. Next, after your trial school, you want your easy and secure +employment, which is the matter of chief importance. For, even on the +present system, the boys who have really intense art capacity, generally +make painters of themselves; but then, the best half of their early +energy is lost in the battle of life. Before a good painter can get +employment, his mind has always been embittered, and his genius +distorted. A common mind usually stoops, in plastic chill, to whatever +is asked of it, and scrapes or daubs its way complacently into public +favour.[5] But your great men quarrel with you, and you revenge +yourselves by starving them for the first half of their lives. Precisely +in the degree in which any painter possesses original genius, is at +present the increase of moral certainty that during his early years he +will have a hard battle to fight; and that just at the time when his +conceptions ought to be full and happy, his temper gentle, and his +hopes enthusiastic--just at that most critical period, his heart is full +of anxieties and household cares; he is chilled by disappointments, and +vexed by injustice; he becomes obstinate in his errors, no less than in +his virtues, and the arrows of his aims are blunted, as the reeds of his +trust are broken. + +[Note 5: See note 4th, in Addenda.] + + +24. What we mainly want, therefore, is a means of sufficient and +unagitated employment: not holding out great prizes for which young +painters are to scramble; but furnishing all with adequate support, and +opportunity to display such power as they possess without rejection or +mortification. I need not say that the best field of labour of this kind +would be presented by the constant progress of public works involving +various decoration; and we will presently examine what kind of public +works may thus, advantageously for the nation, be in constant progress. +But a more important matter even than this of steady employment, is the +kind of criticism with which you, the public, receive the works of the +young men submitted to you. You may do much harm by indiscreet praise +and by indiscreet blame; but remember the chief harm is always done by +blame. It stands to reason that a young man's work cannot be perfect. It +_must_ be more or less ignorant; it must be more or less feeble; it is +likely that it may be more or less experimental, and if experimental, +here and there mistaken. If, therefore, you allow yourself to launch out +into sudden barking at the first faults you see, the probability is that +you are abusing the youth for some defect naturally and inevitably +belonging to that stage of his progress; and that you might just as +rationally find fault with a child for not being as prudent as a privy +councillor, or with a kitten for not being as grave as a cat. + + +25. But there is one fault which you may be quite sure is unnecessary, +and therefore a real and blamable fault: that is haste, involving +negligence. Whenever you see that a young man's work is either bold or +slovenly, then you may attack it firmly; sure of being right. If his +work is bold, it is insolent; repress his insolence: if it is slovenly, +it is indolent; spur his indolence. So long as he works in that dashing +or impetuous way, the best hope for him is in your contempt: and it is +only by the fact of his seeming not to seek your approbation that you +may conjecture he deserves it. + + +26. But if he does deserve it, be sure that you give it him, else you +not only run a chance of driving him from the right road by want of +encouragement, but you deprive yourselves of the happiest privilege you +will ever have of rewarding his labour. For it is only the young who can +receive much reward from men's praise: the old, when they are great, get +too far beyond and above you to care what you think of them. You may +urge them then with sympathy, and surround them then with acclamation; +but they will doubt your pleasure, and despise your praise. You might +have cheered them in their race through the asphodel meadows of their +youth; you might have brought the proud, bright scarlet into their +faces, if you had but cried once to them "Well done," as they dashed up +to the first goal of their early ambition. But now, their pleasure is in +memory, and their ambition is in heaven. They can be kind to you, but +you nevermore can be kind to them. You may be fed with the fruit and +fulness of their old age, but you were as the nipping blight to them in +their blossoming, and your praise is only as the warm winds of autumn +to the dying branches. + + +27. There is one thought still, the saddest of all, bearing on this +withholding of early help. It is possible, in some noble natures, that +the warmth and the affections of childhood may remain unchilled, though +unanswered; and that the old man's heart may still be capable of +gladness, when the long-withheld sympathy is given at last. But in these +noble natures it nearly always happens that the chief motive of earthly +ambition has not been to give delight to themselves, but to their +parents. Every noble youth looks back, as to the chiefest joy which this +world's honour ever gave him, to the moment when first he saw his +father's eyes flash with pride, and his mother turn away her head, lest +he should take her tears for tears of sorrow. Even the lover's joy, when +some worthiness of his is acknowledged before his mistress, is not so +great as that, for it is not so pure--the desire to exalt himself in her +eyes mixes with that of giving her delight; but he does not need to +exalt himself in his parents' eyes: it is with the pure hope of giving +them pleasure that he comes to tell them what he has done, or what has +been said of him; and therefore he has a purer pleasure of his own. And +this purest and best of rewards you keep from him if you can: you feed +him in his tender youth with ashes and dishonour; and then you come to +him, obsequious, but too late, with your sharp laurel crown, the dew all +dried from off its leaves; and you thrust it into his languid hand, and +he looks at you wistfully. What shall he do with it? What can he do, but +go and lay it on his mother's grave? + + +28. Thus, then, you see that you have to provide for your young men: +first, the searching or discovering school; then the calm employment; +then the justice of praise: one thing more you have to do for them in +preparing them for full service--namely, to make, in the noble sense of +the word, gentlemen of them; that is to say, to take care that their +minds receive such training, that in all they paint they shall see and +feel the noblest things. I am sorry to say, that of all parts of an +artist's education, this is the most neglected among us; and that even +where the natural taste and feeling of the youth have been pure and +true, where there was the right stuff in him to make a gentleman of, you +may too frequently discern some jarring rents in his mind, and elements +of degradation in his treatment of subject, owing to want of gentle +training, and of the liberal influence of literature. This is quite +visible in our greatest artists, even in men like Turner and +Gainsborough; while in the common grade of our second-rate painters the +evil attains a pitch which is far too sadly manifest to need my dwelling +upon it. Now, no branch of art economy is more important than that of +making the intellect at your disposal pure as well as powerful; so that +it may always gather for you the sweetest and fairest things. The same +quantity of labour from the same man's hand, will, according as you have +trained him, produce a lovely and useful work, or a base and hurtful +one; and depend upon it, whatever value it may possess, by reason of the +painter's skill, its chief and final value, to any nation, depends upon +its being able to exalt and refine, as well as to please; and that the +picture which most truly deserves the name of an art-treasure is that +which has been painted by a good man. + + +29. You cannot but see how far this would lead, if I were to enlarge +upon it. I must take it up as a separate subject some other time: only +noticing at present that no money could be better spent by a nation than +in providing a liberal and disciplined education for its painters, as +they advance into the critical period of their youth; and that, also, a +large part of their power during life depends upon the kind of subjects +which you, the public, ask them for, and therefore the kind of thoughts +with which you require them to be habitually familiar. I shall have more +to say on this head when we come to consider what employment they should +have in public buildings. + + +30. There are many other points of nearly as much importance as these, +to be explained with reference to the development of genius; but I +should have to ask you to come and hear six lectures instead of two if I +were to go into their detail. For instance, I have not spoken of the way +in which you ought to look for those artificers in various manual +trades, who, without possessing the order of genius which you would +desire to devote to higher purposes, yet possess wit, and humour, and +sense of colour, and fancy for form--all commercially valuable as +quantities of intellect, and all more or less expressible in the lower +arts of iron-work, pottery, decorative sculpture, and such like. But +these details, interesting as they are, I must commend to your own +consideration, or leave for some future inquiry. I want just now only to +set the bearings of the entire subject broadly before you, with enough +of detailed illustration to make it intelligible; and therefore I must +quit the first head of it here, and pass to the second--namely, how best +to employ the genius we discover. A certain quantity of able hands and +heads being placed at our disposal, what shall we most advisably set +them upon? + + +31. II. APPLICATION.--There are three main points the economist has to +attend to in this. + +First, To set his men to various work. + +Secondly, To easy work. + +Thirdly, To lasting work. + +I shall briefly touch on the first two, for I want to arrest your +attention on the last. + + +32. I say first to various work. Supposing you have two men of equal +power as landscape painters--and both of them have an hour at your +disposal. You would not set them both to paint the same piece of +landscape. You would, of course, rather have two subjects than a +repetition of one. + +Well, supposing them sculptors, will not the same rule hold? You +naturally conclude at once that it will; but you will have hard work to +convince your modern architects of that. They will put twenty men to +work, to carve twenty capitals; and all shall be the same. If I could +show you the architects' yards in England just now, all open at once, +perhaps you might see a thousand clever men, all employed in carving the +same design. Of the degradation and deathfulness to the art-intellect of +the country involved in such a habit, I have more or less been led to +speak before now; but I have not hitherto marked its definite tendency +to increase the price of _work_, as such. When men are employed +continually in carving the same ornaments, they get into a monotonous +and methodical habit of labour--precisely correspondent to that in which +they would break stones, or paint house-walls. Of course, what they do +so constantly, they do easily; and if you excite them temporarily by an +increase of wages, you may get much work done by them in a little time. +But, unless so stimulated, men condemned to a monotonous exertion, +work--and always, by the laws of human nature, _must_ work--only at a +tranquil rate, not producing by any means a maximum result in a given +time. But if you allow them to vary their designs, and thus interest +their heads and hearts in what they are doing, you will find them become +eager, first, to get their ideas expressed, and then to finish the +expression of them; and the moral energy thus brought to bear on the +matter quickens, and therefore cheapens, the production in a most +important degree. Sir Thomas Deane, the architect of the new Museum at +Oxford, told me, as I passed through Oxford on my way here, that he +found that, owing to this cause alone, capitals of various design could +be executed cheaper than capitals of similar design (the amount of hand +labour in each being the same) by about 30 per cent. + + +33. Well, that is the first way, then, in which you will employ your +intellect well; and the simple observance of this plain rule of +political economy will effect a noble revolution in your architecture, +such as you cannot at present so much as conceive. Then the second way +in which we are to guard against waste is by setting our men to the +easiest, and therefore the quickest, work which will answer the purpose. +Marble, for instance, lasts quite as long as granite, and is much softer +to work; therefore, when you get hold of a good sculptor, give him +marble to carve--not granite. + + +34. That, you say, is obvious enough. Yes; but it is not so obvious how +much of your workmen's time you waste annually in making them cut glass, +after it has got hard, when you ought to make them mould it while it is +soft. It is not so obvious how much expense you waste in cutting +diamonds and rubies, which are the hardest things you can find, into +shapes that mean nothing, when the same men might be cutting sandstone +and freestone into shapes that meant something. It is not so obvious how +much of the artists' time in Italy you waste, by forcing them to make +wretched little pictures for you out of crumbs of stone glued together +at enormous cost, when the tenth of the time would make good and noble +pictures for you out of water-colour. + + +35. I could go on giving you almost numberless instances of this great +commercial mistake; but I should only weary and confuse you. I therefore +commend also this head of our subject to your own meditation, and +proceed to the last I named--the last I shall task your patience with +to-night. You know we are now considering how to apply our genius; and +we were to do it as economists, in three ways:-- + +To _various_ work; + +To _easy_ work; + +To _lasting_ work. + + +36. This lasting of the work, then, is our final question. + +Many of you may perhaps remember that Michael Angelo was once commanded +by Pietro di Medici to mould a statue out of snow, and that he obeyed +the command.[6] I am glad, and we have all reason to be glad, that such +a fancy ever came into the mind of the unworthy prince, and for this +cause: that Pietro di Medici then gave, at the period of one great epoch +of consummate power in the arts, the perfect, accurate, and intensest +possible type of the greatest error which nations and princes can +commit, respecting the power of genius entrusted to their guidance. You +had there, observe, the strongest genius in the most perfect obedience; +capable of iron independence, yet wholly submissive to the patron's +will; at once the most highly accomplished and the most original, +capable of doing as much as man could do, in any direction that man +could ask. And its governor, and guide, and patron sets it to build a +statue in snow--to put itself into the service of annihilation--to make +a cloud of itself, and pass away from the earth. + +[Note 6: See the noble passage on this tradition in "Casa Guidi +Windows."] + + +37. Now this, so precisely and completely done by Pietro di Medici, is +what we are all doing, exactly in the degree in which we direct the +genius under our patronage to work in more or less perishable materials. +So far as we induce painters to work in fading colours, or architects to +build with imperfect structure, or in any other way consult only +immediate ease and cheapness in the production of what we want, to the +exclusion of provident thought as to its permanence and serviceableness +in after ages; so far we are forcing our Michael Angelos to carve in +snow. The first duty of the economist in art is, to see that no +intellect shall thus glitter merely in the manner of hoar-frost; but +that it shall be well vitrified, like a painted window, and shall be set +so between shafts of stone and bands of iron, that it shall bear the +sunshine upon it, and send the sunshine through it, from generation to +generation. + + +38. I can conceive, however, some political economist to interrupt me +here, and say, "If you make your art wear too well, you will soon have +too much of it; you will throw your artists quite out of work. Better +allow for a little wholesome evanescence--beneficent destruction: let +each age provide art for itself, or we shall soon have so many good +pictures that we shall not know what to do with them." + +Remember, my dear hearers, who are thus thinking, that political +economy, like every other subject, cannot be dealt with effectively if +we try to solve two questions at a time instead of one. It is one +question, how to get plenty of a thing; and another, whether plenty of +it will be good for us. Consider these two matters separately; never +confuse yourself by interweaving one with the other. It is one question, +how to treat your fields so as to get a good harvest; another, whether +you wish to have a good harvest, or would rather like to keep up the +price of corn. It is one question, how to graft your trees so as to grow +most apples; and quite another, whether having such a heap of apples in +the storeroom will not make them all rot. + + +39. Now, therefore, that we are talking only about grafting and growing, +pray do not vex yourselves with thinking what you are to do with the +pippins. It may be desirable for us to have much art, or little--we will +examine that by-and-bye; but just now, let us keep to the simple +consideration how to get plenty of good art if we want it. Perhaps it +might be just as well that a man of moderate income should be able to +possess a good picture, as that any work of real merit should cost +500_l._ or 1,000_l._; at all events, it is certainly one of the branches +of political economy to ascertain how, if we like, we can get things in +quantities--plenty of corn, plenty of wine, plenty of gold, or plenty of +pictures. + +It has just been said, that the first great secret is to produce work +that will last. Now, the conditions of work lasting are twofold: it must +not only be in materials that will last, but it must be itself of a +quality that will last--it must be good enough to bear the test of time. +If it is not good, we shall tire of it quickly, and throw it aside--we +shall have no pleasure in the accumulation of it. So that the first +question of a good art-economist respecting any work is, Will it lose +its flavour by keeping? It may be very amusing now, and look much like a +work of genius; but what will be its value a hundred years hence? + +You cannot always ascertain this. You may get what you fancy to be work +of the best quality, and yet find to your astonishment that it won't +keep. But of one thing you may be sure, that art which is produced +hastily will also perish hastily; and that what is cheapest to you now, +is likely to be dearest in the end. + + +40. I am sorry to say, the great tendency of this age is to expend its +genius in perishable art of this kind, as if it were a triumph to burn +its thoughts away in bonfires. There is a vast quantity of intellect and +of labour consumed annually in our cheap illustrated publications; you +triumph in them; and you think it so grand a thing to get so many +woodcuts for a penny. Why, woodcuts, penny and all, are as much lost to +you as if you had invested your money in gossamer. More lost, for the +gossamer could only tickle your face, and glitter in your eyes; it could +not catch your feet and trip you up: but the bad art can, and does; for +you can't like good woodcuts as long as you look at the bad ones. If we +were at this moment to come across a Titian woodcut, or a Duerer woodcut, +we should not like it--those of us at least who are accustomed to the +cheap work of the day. We don't like, and can't like, _that_ long; but +when we are tired of one bad cheap thing, we throw it aside and buy +another bad cheap thing; and so keep looking at bad things all our +lives. Now, the very men who do all that quick bad work for us are +capable of doing perfect work. Only, perfect work can't be hurried, and +therefore it can't be cheap beyond a certain point. But suppose you pay +twelve times as much as you do now, and you have one woodcut for a +shilling instead of twelve; and the one woodcut for a shilling is as +good as art can be, so that you will never tire of looking at it; and is +struck on good paper with good ink, so that you will never wear it out +by handling it; while you are sick of your penny-each cuts by the end of +the week, and have torn them mostly in half too. Isn't your shilling's +worth the best bargain? + + +41. It is not, however, only in getting prints or woodcuts of the best +kind that you will practise economy. There is a certain quality about an +original drawing which you cannot get in a woodcut, and the best part of +the genius of many men is only expressible in original work, whether +with pen or ink--pencil or colours. This is not always the case; but in +general, the best men are those who can only express themselves on paper +or canvas; and you will therefore, in the long run, get most for your +money by buying original work; proceeding on the principle already laid +down, that the best is likely to be the cheapest in the end. Of course, +original work cannot be produced under a certain cost. If you want a +man to make you a drawing which takes him six days, you must, at all +events, keep him for six days in bread and water, fire and lodging; that +is the lowest price at which he can do it for you, but that is not very +dear: and the best bargain which can possibly be made honestly in +art--the very ideal of a cheap purchase to the purchaser--is the +original work of a great man fed for as many days as are necessary on +bread and water, or perhaps we may say with as many onions as will keep +him in good humour. That is the way by which you will always get most +for your money; no mechanical multiplication or ingenuity of commercial +arrangements will ever get you a better penny's worth of art than that. + + +42. Without, however, pushing our calculations quite to this +prison-discipline extreme, we may lay it down as a rule in art-economy, +that original work is, on the whole, cheapest and best worth having. But +precisely in proportion to the value of it as a production, becomes the +importance of having it executed in permanent materials. And here we +come to note the second main error of the day, that we not only ask our +workmen for bad art, but we make them put it into bad substance. We +have, for example, put a great quantity of genius, within the last +twenty years, into water-colour drawing, and we have done this with the +most reckless disregard whether either the colours or the paper will +stand. In most instances, neither will. By accident, it may happen that +the colours in a given drawing have been of good quality, and its paper +uninjured by chemical processes. But you take not the least care to +ensure these being so; I have myself seen the most destructive changes +take place in water-colour drawings within twenty years after they were +painted; and from all I can gather respecting the recklessness of modern +paper manufacture, my belief is, that though you may still handle an +Albert Duerer engraving, two hundred years old, fearlessly, not one-half +of that time will have passed over your modern water-colours, before +most of them will be reduced to mere white or brown rags; and your +descendants, twitching them contemptuously into fragments between finger +and thumb, will mutter against you, half in scorn and half in anger, +"Those wretched nineteenth century people! they kept vapouring and +fuming about the world, doing what they called business, and they +couldn't make a sheet of paper that wasn't rotten." + + +43. And note that this is no unimportant portion of your art economy at +this time. Your water-colour painters are becoming every day capable of +expressing greater and better things; and their material is especially +adapted to the turn of your best artists' minds. The value which you +could accumulate in work of this kind would soon become a most important +item in the national art-wealth, if only you would take the little pains +necessary to secure its permanence. I am inclined to think, myself, that +water-colour ought not to be used on paper at all, but only on vellum, +and then, if properly taken care of, the drawing would be almost +imperishable. Still, paper is a much more convenient material for rapid +work; and it is an infinite absurdity not to secure the goodness of its +quality, when we could do so without the slightest trouble. Among the +many favours which I am going to ask from our paternal government, when +we get it, will be that it will supply its little boys with good paper. +You have nothing to do but to let the government establish a paper +manufactory, under the superintendence of any of our leading chemists, +who should be answerable for the safety and completeness of all the +processes of the manufacture. The government stamp on the corner of your +sheet of drawing-paper, made in the perfect way, should cost you a +shilling, which would add something to the revenue; and when you bought +a water-colour drawing for fifty or a hundred guineas, you would have +merely to look in the corner for your stamp, and pay your extra shilling +for the security that your hundred guineas were given really for a +drawing, and not for a coloured rag. There need be no monopoly or +restriction in the matter; let the paper manufacturers compete with the +government, and if people liked to save their shilling, and take their +chance, let them; only, the artist and purchaser might then be sure of +good material, if they liked, and now they cannot be. + + +44. I should like also to have a government colour manufactory; though +that is not so necessary, as the quality of colour is more within the +artist's power of testing, and I have no doubt that any painter may get +permanent colour from the respectable manufacturers, if he chooses. I +will not attempt to follow the subject out at all as it respects +architecture, and our methods of modern building; respecting which I +have had occasion to speak before now. + + +45. But I cannot pass without some brief notice our habit--continually, +as it seems to me, gaining strength--of putting a large quantity of +thought and work, annually, into things which are either in their nature +necessarily perishable, as dress; or else into compliances with the +fashion of the day, in things not necessarily perishable, as plate. I am +afraid almost the first idea of a young rich couple setting up house in +London, is, that they must have new plate. Their father's plate may be +very handsome, but the fashion is changed. They will have a new service +from the leading manufacturer, and the old plate, except a few apostle +spoons, and a cup which Charles the Second drank a health in to their +pretty ancestress, is sent to be melted down, and made up with new +flourishes and fresh lustre. Now, so long as this is the case--so long, +observe, as fashion has influence on the manufacture of plate--so long +_you cannot have a goldsmith's art in this country_. Do you suppose any +workman worthy the name will put his brains into a cup, or an urn, which +he knows is to go to the melting-pot in half a score years? He will not; +you don't ask or expect it of him. You ask of him nothing but a little +quick handicraft--a clever twist of a handle here, and a foot there, a +convolvulus from the newest school of design, a pheasant from Landseer's +game cards; a couple of sentimental figures for supporters, in the style +of the signs of insurance offices, then a clever touch with the +burnisher, and there's your epergne, the admiration of all the footmen +at the wedding-breakfast, and the torment of some unfortunate youth who +cannot see the pretty girl opposite to him, through its tyrannous +branches. + + +46. But you don't suppose that _that's_ goldsmith's work? Goldsmith's +work is made to last, and made with the men's whole heart and soul in +it; true goldsmith's work, when it exists, is generally the means of +education of the greatest painters and sculptors of the day. Francia was +a goldsmith; Francia was not his own name, but that of his master the +jeweller; and he signed his pictures almost always, "Francia, the +goldsmith," for love of his master; Ghirlandajo was a goldsmith, and was +the master of Michael Angelo; Verrocchio was a goldsmith, and was the +master of Leonardo da Vinci. Ghiberti was a goldsmith, and beat out the +bronze gates which Michael Angelo said might serve for gates of +Paradise.[7] But if ever you want work like theirs again, you must keep +it, though it should have the misfortune to become old-fashioned. You +must not break it up, nor melt it any more. There is no economy in that; +you could not easily waste intellect more grievously. Nature may melt +her goldsmith's work at every sunset if she chooses; and beat it out +into chased bars again at every sunrise; but you must not. The way to +have a truly noble service of plate, is to keep adding to it, not +melting it. At every marriage, and at every birth, get a new piece of +gold or silver if you will, but with noble workmanship on it, done for +all time, and put it among your treasures; that is one of the chief +things which gold was made for, and made incorruptible for. When we know +a little more of political economy, we shall find that none but +partially savage nations need, imperatively, gold for their currency;[8] +but gold has been given us, among other things, that we might put +beautiful work into its imperishable splendour, and that the artists who +have the most wilful fancies may have a material which will drag out, +and beat out, as their dreams require, and will hold itself together +with fantastic tenacity, whatever rare and delicate service they set it +upon. + +[Note 7: Several reasons may account for the fact that goldsmith's +work is so wholesome for young artists: first, that it gives great +firmness of hand to deal for some time with a solid substance; again, +that it induces caution and steadiness--a boy trusted with chalk and +paper suffers an immediate temptation to scrawl upon it and play with +it, but he dares not scrawl on gold, and he cannot play with it; and, +lastly, that it gives great delicacy and precision of touch to work upon +minute forms, and to aim at producing richness and finish of design +correspondent to the preciousness of the material.] + +[Note 8: See note in Addenda on the nature of property.] + + +47. So here is one branch of decorative art in which rich people may +indulge themselves unselfishly; if they ask for good art in it, they may +be sure in buying gold and silver plate that they are enforcing useful +education on young artists. But there is another branch of decorative +art in which I am sorry to say we cannot, at least under existing +circumstances, indulge ourselves, with the hope of doing good to +anybody: I mean the great and subtle art of dress. + + +48. And here I must interrupt the pursuit of our subject for a moment or +two, in order to state one of the principles of political economy, +which, though it is, I believe, now sufficiently understood and asserted +by the leading masters of the science, is not yet, I grieve to say, +acted upon by the plurality of those who have the management of riches. +Whenever we spend money, we of course set people to work: that is the +meaning of spending money; we may, indeed, lose it without employing +anybody; but, whenever we spend it, we set a number of people to work, +greater or less, of course, according to the rate of wages, but, in the +long run, proportioned to the sum we spend. Well, your shallow people, +because they see that however they spend money they are always employing +somebody, and, therefore, doing some good, think and say to themselves, +that it is all one _how_ they spend it--that all their apparently +selfish luxury is, in reality, unselfish, and is doing just as much +good as if they gave all their money away, or perhaps more good; and I +have heard foolish people even declare it as a principle of political +economy, that whoever invented a new want[9] conferred a good on the +community. I have not words strong enough--at least, I could not, +without shocking you, use the words which would be strong enough--to +express my estimate of the absurdity and the mischievousness of this +popular fallacy. So, putting a great restraint upon myself, and using no +hard words, I will simply try to state the nature of it, and the extent +of its influence. + +[Note 9: See note 5th, in Addenda.] + + +49. Granted, that whenever we spend money for whatever purpose, we set +people to work; and passing by, for the moment, the question whether the +work we set them to is all equally healthy and good for them, we will +assume that whenever we spend a guinea we provide an equal number of +people with healthy maintenance for a given time. But, by the way in +which we spend it, we entirely direct the labour of those people during +that given time. We become their masters or mistresses, and we compel +them to produce, within a certain period, a certain article. Now, that +article may be a useful and lasting one, or it may be a useless and +perishable one--it may be one useful to the whole community, or useful +only to ourselves. And our selfishness and folly, or our virtue and +prudence, are shown, not by our spending money, but by our spending it +for the wrong or the right thing; and we are wise and kind, not in +maintaining a certain number of people for a given period, but only in +requiring them to produce during that period, the kind of things which +shall be useful to society, instead of those which are only useful to +ourselves. + + +50. Thus, for instance: if you are a young lady, and employ a certain +number of sempstresses for a given time, in making a given number of +simple and serviceable dresses--suppose, seven; of which you can wear +one yourself for half the winter, and give six away to poor girls who +have none, you are spending your money unselfishly. But if you +employ the same number of sempstresses for the same number of days, +in making four, or five, or six beautiful flounces for your own +ball-dress--flounces which will clothe no one but yourself, and which +you will yourself be unable to wear at more than one ball--you are +employing your money selfishly. You have maintained, indeed, in each +case, the same number of people; but in the one case you have directed +their labour to the service of the community; in the other case you have +consumed it wholly upon yourself. I don't say you are never to do so; I +don't say you ought not sometimes to think of yourselves only, and to +make yourselves as pretty as you can; only do not confuse coquettishness +with benevolence, nor cheat yourselves into thinking that all the finery +you can wear is so much put into the hungry mouths of those beneath you: +it is not so; it is what you yourselves, whether you will or no, must +sometimes instinctively feel it to be--it is what those who stand +shivering in the streets, forming a line to watch you as you step out of +your carriages, _know_ it to be; those fine dresses do not mean that so +much has been put into their mouths, but that so much has been taken out +of their mouths. + + +51. The real politico-economical signification of every one of those +beautiful toilettes, is just this: that you have had a certain number of +people put for a certain number of days wholly under your authority, by +the sternest of slave-masters--hunger and cold; and you have said to +them, "I will feed you, indeed, and clothe you, and give you fuel for so +many days; but during those days you shall work for me only: your little +brothers need clothes, but you shall make none for them: your sick +friend needs clothes, but you shall make none for her: you yourself will +soon need another and a warmer dress, but you shall make none for +yourself. You shall make nothing but lace and roses for me; for this +fortnight to come, you shall work at the patterns and petals, and then I +will crush and consume them away in an hour." You will perhaps +answer--"It may not be particularly benevolent to do this, and we won't +call it so; but at any rate we do no wrong in taking their labour when +we pay them their wages: if we pay for their work, we have a right to +it." + + +52. No;--a thousand times no. The labour which you have paid for, does +indeed become, by the act of purchase, your own labour: you have bought +the hands and the time of those workers; they are, by right and justice, +your own hands, your own time. But have you a right to spend your own +time, to work with your own hands, only for your own advantage?--much +more, when, by purchase, you have invested your own person with the +strength of others; and added to your own life, a part of the life of +others? You may, indeed, to a certain extent, use their labour for your +delight: remember, I am making no general assertions against splendour +of dress, or pomp of accessories of life; on the contrary, there are +many reasons for thinking that we do not at present attach enough +importance to beautiful dress, as one of the means of influencing +general taste and character. But I _do_ say, that you must weigh the +value of what you ask these workers to produce for you in its own +distinct balance; that on its own worthiness or desirableness rests the +question of your kindness, and not merely on the fact of your having +employed people in producing it: and I say further, that as long as +there are cold and nakedness in the land around you, so long there can +be no question at all but that splendour of dress is a crime. In due +time, when we have nothing better to set people to work at, it may be +right to let them make lace and cut jewels; but as long as there are any +who have no blankets for their beds, and no rags for their bodies, so +long it is blanket-making and tailoring we must set people to work +at--not lace. + + +53. And it would be strange, if at any great assembly which, while it +dazzled the young and the thoughtless, beguiled the gentler hearts that +beat beneath the embroidery, with a placid sensation of luxurious +benevolence--as if by all that they wore in waywardness of beauty, +comfort had been first given to the distressed, and aid to the indigent; +it would be strange, I say, if, for a moment, the spirits of Truth and +of Terror, which walk invisibly among the masques of the earth, would +lift the dimness from our erring thoughts, and show us how--inasmuch as +the sums exhausted for that magnificence would have given back the +failing breath to many an unsheltered outcast on moor and street--they +who wear it have literally entered into partnership with Death; and +dressed themselves in his spoils. Yes, if the veil could be lifted not +only from your thoughts, but from your human sight, you would see--the +angels do see--on those gay white dresses of yours, strange dark spots, +and crimson patterns that you knew not of--spots of the inextinguishable +red that all the seas cannot wash away; yes, and among the pleasant +flowers that crown your fair heads, and glow on your wreathed hair, you +would see that one weed was always twisted which no one thought of--the +grass that grows on graves. + + +54. It was not, however, this last, this clearest and most appalling +view of our subject, that I intended to ask you to take this evening; +only it is impossible to set any part of the matter in its true light, +until we go to the root of it. But the point which it is our special +business to consider is, not whether costliness of dress is contrary to +charity; but whether it is not contrary to mere worldly wisdom: whether, +even supposing we knew that splendour of dress did not cost suffering or +hunger, we might not put the splendour better in other things than +dress. And, supposing our mode of dress were really graceful or +beautiful, this might be a very doubtful question; for I believe true +nobleness of dress to be an important means of education, as it +certainly is a necessity to any nation which wishes to possess living +art, concerned with portraiture of human nature. No good historical +painting ever yet existed, or ever can exist, where the dresses of the +people of the time are not beautiful: and had it not been for the lovely +and fantastic dressing of the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries, +neither French, nor Florentine, nor Venetian art could have risen to +anything like the rank it reached. Still, even then, the best dressing +was never the costliest; and its effect depended much more on its +beautiful and, in early times, modest, arrangement, and on the simple +and lovely masses of its colour, than on gorgeousness of clasp or +embroidery. + + +55. Whether we can ever return to any of those more perfect types of +form, is questionable; but there can be no more question that all the +money we spend on the forms of dress at present worn, is, so far as any +good purpose is concerned, wholly lost. Mind, in saying this, I reckon +among good purposes the purpose which young ladies are said sometimes +to entertain--of being married; but they would be married quite as soon +(and probably to wiser and better husbands) by dressing quietly, as by +dressing brilliantly: and I believe it would only be needed to lay +fairly and largely before them the real good which might be effected by +the sums they spend in toilettes, to make them trust at once only to +their bright eyes and braided hair for all the mischief they have a +mind to. I wish we could, for once, get the statistics of a London +season. There was much complaining talk in Parliament, last week, +of the vast sum the nation has given for the best Paul Veronese in +Venice--14,000_l._: I wonder what the nation meanwhile has given for its +ball-dresses! Suppose we could see the London milliners' bills, simply +for unnecessary breadths of slip and flounce, from April to July; I +wonder whether 14,000_l._ would cover _them_. But the breadths of slip +and flounce are by this time as much lost and vanished as last year's +snow; only they have done less good: but the Paul Veronese will last for +centuries, if we take care of it; and yet, we grumble at the price given +for the painting, while no one grumbles at the price of pride. + + +56. Time does not permit me to go into any farther illustration of the +various modes in which we build our statue out of snow, and waste our +labour on things that vanish. I must leave you to follow out the subject +for yourselves, as I said I should, and proceed, in our next lecture, to +examine the two other branches of our subject--namely, how to accumulate +our art, and how to distribute it. But, in closing, as we have been much +on the topic of good government, both of ourselves and others, let me +just give you one more illustration of what it means, from that old art +of which, next evening, I shall try to convince you that the value, both +moral and mercantile, is greater than we usually suppose. + + +57. One of the frescoes by Ambrozio Lorenzetti, in the town-hall of +Siena, represents, by means of symbolical figures, the principles of +Good Civic Government and of Good Government in general. The figure +representing this noble Civic Government is enthroned, and surrounded by +figures representing the Virtues, variously supporting or administering +its authority. Now, observe what work is given to each of these +virtues. Three winged ones--Faith, Hope, and Charity--surround the head +of the figure; not in mere compliance with the common and heraldic laws +of precedence among Virtues, such as we moderns observe habitually, but +with peculiar purpose on the part of the painter. Faith, as thus +represented ruling the thoughts of the Good Governor, does not mean +merely religious faith, understood in those times to be necessary to all +persons--governed no less than governors--but it means the faith which +enables work to be carried out steadily, in spite of adverse appearances +and expediencies; the faith in great principles, by which a civic ruler +looks past all the immediate checks and shadows that would daunt a +common man, knowing that what is rightly done will have a right issue, +and holding his way in spite of pullings at his cloak and whisperings in +his ear, enduring, as having in him a faith which is evidence of things +unseen. + + +58. And Hope, in like manner, is here not the heavenward hope which +ought to animate the hearts of all men; but she attends upon Good +Government, to show that all such government is _expectant_ as well as +_conservative_; that if it ceases to be hopeful of better things, it +ceases to be a wise guardian of present things: that it ought never, as +long as the world lasts, to be wholly content with any existing state of +institution or possession, but to be hopeful still of more wisdom and +power; not clutching at it restlessly or hastily, but feeling that its +real life consists in steady ascent from high to higher: conservative, +indeed, and jealously conservative of old things, but conservative of +them as pillars, not as pinnacles--as aids, but not as idols; and +hopeful chiefly, and active, in times of national trial or distress, +according to those first and notable words describing the queenly +nation: "She riseth, _while it is yet night_." + + +59. And again, the winged Charity which is attendant on Good Government +has, in this fresco, a peculiar office. Can you guess what? If you +consider the character of contest which so often takes place among kings +for their crowns, and the selfish and tyrannous means they commonly take +to aggrandize or secure their power, you will, perhaps, be surprised to +hear that the office of Charity is to crown the King. And yet, if you +think of it a little, you will see the beauty of the thought which sets +her in this function: since, in the first place, all the authority of a +good governor should be desired by him only for the good of his people, +so that it is only Love that makes him accept or guard his crown: in the +second place, his chief greatness consists in the exercise of this love, +and he is truly to be revered only so far as his acts and thoughts are +those of kindness; so that Love is the light of his crown, as well as +the giver of it: lastly, because his strength depends on the affections +of his people, and it is only their love which can securely crown him, +and for ever. So that Love is the strength of his crown as well as the +light of it. + + +60. Then, surrounding the King, or in various obedience to him, appear +the dependent virtues, as Fortitude, Temperance, Truth, and other +attendant spirits, of all which I cannot now give account, wishing you +only to notice the one to whom are entrusted the guidance and +administration of the public revenues. Can you guess which it is likely +to be? Charity, you would have thought, should have something to do with +the business; but not so, for she is too hot to attend carefully to it. +Prudence, perhaps, you think of in the next place. No, she is too timid, +and loses opportunities in making up her mind. Can it be Liberality +then? No: Liberality is entrusted with some small sums; but she is a bad +accountant, and is allowed no important place in the exchequer. But the +treasures are given in charge to a virtue of which we hear too little in +modern times, as distinct from others; Magnanimity: largeness of heart: +not softness or weakness of heart, mind you--but capacity of heart--the +great _measuring_ virtue, which weighs in heavenly balances all that may +be given, and all that may be gained; and sees how to do noblest things +in noblest ways: which of two goods comprehends and therefore chooses +the greater: which of two personal sacrifices dares and accepts the +larger: which, out of the avenues of beneficence, treads always that +which opens farthest into the blue fields of futurity: that character, +in fine, which, in those words taken by us at first for the description +of a Queen among the nations, looks less to the present power than to +the distant promise; "Strength and honour are in her clothing,--and she +shall rejoice IN TIME TO COME." + + + + +LECTURE II. + +THE ACCUMULATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF ART. + +_Continuation of the previous Lecture; delivered July 13, 1857._ + + +61. The heads of our subject which remain for our consideration this +evening are, you will remember, the accumulation and the distribution of +works of art. Our complete inquiry fell into four divisions--first, how +to get our genius; then, how to apply our genius; then, how to +accumulate its results; and lastly, how to distribute them. We +considered, last evening, how to discover and apply it;--we have +to-night to examine the modes of its preservation and distribution. + + +62. III. ACCUMULATION.--And now, in the outset, it will be well to face +that objection which we put aside a little while ago; namely, that +perhaps it is not well to have a great deal of good art; and that it +should not be made too cheap. + +"Nay," I can imagine some of the more generous among you exclaiming, "we +will not trouble you to disprove that objection; of course it is a +selfish and base one: good art, as well as other good things, ought to +be made as cheap as possible, and put as far as we can within the reach +of everybody." + + +63. Pardon me, I am not prepared to admit that. I rather side with the +selfish objectors, and believe that art ought not to be made cheap, +beyond a certain point; for the amount of pleasure that you can receive +from any great work, depends wholly on the quantity of attention and +energy of mind you can bring to bear upon it. Now, that attention and +energy depend much more on the freshness of the thing than you would at +all suppose; unless you very carefully studied the movements of your own +minds. If you see things of the same kind and of equal value very +frequently, your reverence for them is infallibly diminished, your +powers of attention get gradually wearied, and your interest and +enthusiasm worn out; and you cannot in that state bring to any given +work the energy necessary to enjoy it. If, indeed, the question were +only between enjoying a great many pictures each a little, or one +picture very much, the sum of enjoyment being in each case the same, you +might rationally desire to possess rather the larger quantity than the +small; both because one work of art always in some sort illustrates +another, and because quantity diminishes the chances of destruction. + + +64. But the question is not a merely arithmetical one of this kind. Your +fragments of broken admirations will not, when they are put together, +make up one whole admiration; two and two, in this case, do not make +four, nor anything like four. Your good picture, or book, or work of art +of any kind, is always in some degree fenced and closed about with +difficulty. You may think of it as of a kind of cocoanut, with very +often rather an unseemly shell, but good milk and kernel inside. Now, if +you possess twenty cocoanuts, and being thirsty, go impatiently from one +to the other, giving only a single scratch with the point of your knife +to the shell of each, you will get no milk from all the twenty. But if +you leave nineteen of them alone, and give twenty cuts to the shell of +one, you will get through it, and at the milk of it. And the tendency of +the human mind is always to get tired before it has made its twenty +cuts; and to try another nut: and moreover, even if it has perseverance +enough to crack its nuts, it is sure to try to eat too many, and to +choke itself. Hence, it is wisely appointed for us that few of the +things we desire can be had without considerable labour, and at +considerable intervals of time. We cannot generally get our dinner +without working for it, and that gives us appetite for it, we cannot get +our holiday without waiting for it, and that gives us zest for it; and +we ought not to get our picture without paying for it, and that gives us +a mind to look at it. + + +65. Nay, I will even go so far as to say that we ought not to get books +too cheaply. No book, I believe, is ever worth half so much to its +reader as one that has been coveted for a year at a bookstall, and +bought out of saved halfpence; and perhaps a day or two's fasting. +That's the way to get at the cream of a book. And I should say more on +this matter, and protest as energetically as I could against the plague +of cheap literature, with which we are just now afflicted, but that I +fear your calling me to order, as being unpractical, because I don't +quite see my way at present to making everybody fast for their books. +But one may see that a thing is desirable and possible, even though one +may not at once know the best way to it,--and in my island of Barataria, +when I get it well into order, I assure you no book shall be sold for +less than a pound sterling; if it can be published cheaper than that, +the surplus shall all go into my treasury, and save my subjects taxation +in other directions; only people really poor, who cannot pay the pound, +shall be supplied with the books they want for nothing, in a certain +limited quantity. I haven't made up my mind about the number yet, and +there are several other points in the system yet unsettled; when they +are all determined, if you will allow me, I will come and give you +another lecture, on the political economy of literature.[10] + +[Note 10: See note 6th, in Addenda.] + + +66. Meantime, returning to our immediate subject, I say to my generous +hearers, who want to shower Titians and Turners upon us, like falling +leaves, "Pictures ought not to be too cheap;" but in much stronger tone +I would say to those who want to keep up the prices of pictorial +property, that pictures ought not to be too dear--that is to say, not as +dear as they are. For, as matters at present stand, it is wholly +impossible for any man in the ordinary circumstances of English life to +possess himself of a piece of great art. A modern drawing of average +merit, or a first-class engraving, may, perhaps, not without some +self-reproach, be purchased out of his savings by a man of narrow +income; but a satisfactory example of first-rate art--masterhands' +work--is wholly out of his reach. And we are so accustomed to look upon +this as the natural course and necessity of things, that we never set +ourselves in any wise to diminish the evil; and yet it is an evil +perfectly capable of diminution. + + +67. It is an evil precisely similar in kind to that which existed in the +Middle Ages, respecting good books, and which everybody then, I suppose, +thought as natural as we do now our small supply of good pictures. You +could not then study the work of a great historian, or great poet, any +more than you can now study that of a great painter, but at heavy cost. +If you wanted a book, you had to get it written out for you, or to write +it out for yourself. But printing came, and the poor man may read his +Dante and his Homer; and Dante and Homer are none the worse for that. +But it is only in literature that private persons of moderate fortune +can possess and study greatness: they can study at home no greatness in +art; and the object of that accumulation which we are at present aiming +at, as our third object in political economy, is to bring great art in +some degree within the reach of the multitude; and, both in larger and +more numerous galleries than we now possess, and by distribution, +according to his wealth and wish, in each man's home, to render the +influence of art somewhat correspondent in extent to that of literature. +Here, then, is the subtle balance which your economist has to strike: to +accumulate so much art as to be able to give the whole nation a supply +of it, according to its need, and yet to regulate its distribution so +that there shall be no glut of it, nor contempt. + + +68. A difficult balance, indeed, for us to hold, if it were left merely +to our skill to poise; but the just point between poverty and profusion +has been fixed for us accurately by the wise laws of Providence. If you +carefully watch for all the genius you can detect, apply it to good +service, and then reverently preserve what it produces, you will never +have too little art; and if, on the other hand, you never force an +artist to work hurriedly, for daily bread, nor imperfectly, because you +would rather have showy works than complete ones, you will never have +too much. Do not force the multiplication of art, and you will not have +it too cheap; do not wantonly destroy it, and you will not have it too +dear. + + +69. "But who wantonly destroys it?" you will ask. Why, we all do. +Perhaps you thought, when I came to this part of our subject, +corresponding to that set forth in our housewife's economy by the +"keeping her embroidery from the moth," that I was going to tell you +only how to take better care of pictures, how to clean them, and varnish +them, and where to put them away safely when you went out of town. Ah, +not at all. The utmost I have to ask of you is, that you will not pull +them to pieces, and trample them under your feet. "What!" you will say, +"when do we do such things? Haven't we built a perfectly beautiful +gallery for all the pictures we have to take care of?" Yes, you have, +for the pictures which are definitely sent to Manchester to be taken +care of. But there are quantities of pictures out of Manchester which it +is your business, and mine too, to take care of no less than of these, +and which we are at this moment employing ourselves in pulling to pieces +by deputy. I will tell you what they are, and where they are, in a +minute; only first let me state one more of those main principles of +political economy on which the matter hinges. + + +70. I must begin a little apparently wide of the mark, and ask you to +reflect if there is any way in which we waste money more in England than +in building fine tombs? Our respect for the dead, when they are _just_ +dead, is something wonderful, and the way we show it more wonderful +still. We show it with black feathers and black horses; we show it with +black dresses and bright heraldries; we show it with costly obelisks and +sculptures of sorrow, which spoil half of our most beautiful cathedrals. +We show it with frightful gratings and vaults, and lids of dismal stone, +in the midst of the quiet grass; and last, and not least, we show it by +permitting ourselves to tell any number of lies we think amiable or +credible, in the epitaph. This feeling is common to the poor as well as +the rich; and we all know how many a poor family will nearly ruin +themselves, to testify their respect for some member of it in his +coffin, whom they never much cared for when he was out of it; and how +often it happens that a poor old woman will starve herself to death, in +order that she may be respectably buried. + + +71. Now, this being one of the most complete and special ways of wasting +money,--no money being less productive of good, or of any percentage +whatever, than that which we shake away from the ends of undertakers' +plumes,--it is of course the duty of all good economists, and kind +persons, to prove and proclaim continually, to the poor as well as the +rich, that respect for the dead is not really shown by laying great +stones on them to tell us where they are laid; but by remembering where +they are laid, without a stone to help us; trusting them to the sacred +grass and saddened flowers; and still more, that respect and love are +shown to them, not by great monuments to them which we build with _our_ +hands, but by letting the monuments stand, which they built with _their +own_. And this is the point now in question. + + +72. Observe, there are two great reciprocal duties concerning industry, +constantly to be exchanged between the living and the dead. We, as we +live and work, are to be always thinking of those who are to come after +us; that what we do may be serviceable, as far as we can make it so, to +them, as well as to us. Then, when we die, it is the duty of those who +come after us to accept this work of ours with thanks and remembrance, +not thrusting it aside or tearing it down the moment they think they +have no use for it. And each generation will only be happy or powerful +to the pitch that it ought to be, in fulfilling these two duties to the +Past and the Future. Its own work will never be rightly done, even for +itself--never good, or noble, or pleasurable to its own eyes--if it does +not prepare it also for the eyes of generations yet to come. And its own +possessions will never be enough for it, and its own wisdom never enough +for it, unless it avails itself gratefully and tenderly of the treasures +and the wisdom bequeathed to it by its ancestors. + + +73. For, be assured, that all the best things and treasures of this +world are not to be produced by each generation for itself; but we are +all intended, not to carve our work in snow that will melt, but each and +all of us to be continually rolling a great white gathering snowball, +higher and higher--larger and larger--along the Alps of human power. +Thus the science of nations is to be accumulative from father to son: +each learning a little more and a little more; each receiving all that +was known, and adding its own gain: the history and poetry of nations +are to be accumulative; each generation treasuring the history and the +songs of its ancestors, adding its own history and its own songs: and +the art of nations is to be accumulative, just as science and history +are; the work of living men is not superseding, but building itself +upon the work of the past. Nearly every great and intellectual race of +the world has produced, at every period of its career, an art with some +peculiar and precious character about it, wholly unattainable by any +other race, and at any other time; and the intention of Providence +concerning that art, is evidently that it should all grow together into +one mighty temple; the rough stones and the smooth all finding their +place, and rising, day by day, in richer and higher pinnacles to heaven. + + +74. Now, just fancy what a position the world, considered as one great +workroom--one great factory in the form of a globe--would have been in +by this time, if it had in the least understood this duty, or been +capable of it. Fancy what we should have had around us now, if, instead +of quarrelling and fighting over their work, the nations had aided each +other in their work, or if even in their conquests, instead of effacing +the memorials of those they succeeded and subdued, they had guarded the +spoils of their victories. Fancy what Europe would be now, if the +delicate statues and temples of the Greeks--if the broad roads and +massy walls of the Romans--if the noble and pathetic architecture of the +middle ages, had not been ground to dust by mere human rage. You talk of +the scythe of Time, and the tooth of Time: I tell you, Time is +scytheless and toothless; it is we who gnaw like the worm--we who smite +like the scythe. It is ourselves who abolish--ourselves who consume: we +are the mildew, and the flame; and the soul of man is to its own work as +the moth that frets when it cannot fly, and as the hidden flame that +blasts where it cannot illuminate. All these lost treasures of human +intellect have been wholly destroyed by human industry of destruction; +the marble would have stood its two thousand years as well in the +polished statue as in the Parian cliff; but we men have ground it to +powder, and mixed it with our own ashes. The walls and the ways would +have stood--it is we who have left not one stone upon another, and +restored its pathlessness to the desert; the great cathedrals of old +religion would have stood--it is we who have dashed down the carved work +with axes and hammers, and bid the mountain-grass bloom upon the +pavement, and the sea-winds chant in the galleries. + + +75. You will perhaps think all this was somehow necessary for the +development of the human race. I cannot stay now to dispute that, though +I would willingly; but do you think it is _still_ necessary for that +development? Do you think that in this nineteenth century it is still +necessary for the European nations to turn all the places where their +principal art-treasures are into battle-fields? For that is what they +are doing even while I speak; the great firm of the world is managing +its business at this moment, just as it has done in past time. Imagine +what would be the thriving circumstances of a manufacturer of some +delicate produce--suppose glass, or china--in whose workshop and +exhibition rooms all the workmen and clerks began fighting at least once +a day, first blowing off the steam, and breaking all the machinery they +could reach; and then making fortresses of all the cupboards, and +attacking and defending the show-tables, the victorious party finally +throwing everything they could get hold of out of the window, by way of +showing their triumph, and the poor manufacturer picking up and putting +away at last a cup here and a handle there. A fine prosperous business +that would be, would it not? and yet that is precisely the way the great +manufacturing firm of the world carries on its business. + + +76. It has so arranged its political squabbles for the last six or seven +hundred years, that not one of them could be fought out but in the midst +of its most precious art; and it so arranges them to this day. For +example, if I were asked to lay my finger, in a map of the world, on the +spot of the world's surface which contained at this moment the most +singular concentration of art-teaching and art-treasure, I should lay it +on the name of the town of Verona. Other cities, indeed, contain more +works of carriageable art, but none contain so much of the glorious +local art, and of the springs and sources of art, which can by no means +be made subjects of package or porterage, nor, I grieve to say, of +salvage. Verona possesses, in the first place, not the largest, but the +most perfect and intelligible Roman amphitheatre that exists, still +unbroken in circle of step, and strong in succession of vault and arch: +it contains minor Roman monuments, gateways, theatres, baths, wrecks of +temples, which give the streets of its suburbs a character of antiquity +unexampled elsewhere, except in Rome itself. But it contains, in the +next place, what Rome does not contain--perfect examples of the great +twelfth-century Lombardic architecture, which was the root of all the +mediaeval art of Italy, without which no Giottos, no Angelicos, no +Raphaels would have been possible: it contains that architecture, not in +rude forms, but in the most perfect and loveliest types it ever +attained--contains those, not in ruins, nor in altered and hardly +decipherable fragments, but in churches perfect from porch to apse, with +all their carving fresh, their pillars firm, their joints unloosened. +Besides these, it includes examples of the great thirteenth and +fourteenth-century Gothic of Italy, not merely perfect, but elsewhere +unrivalled. At Rome, the Roman--at Pisa, the Lombard--architecture may +be seen in greater or in equal nobleness; but not at Rome, nor Pisa, nor +Florence, nor in any city of the world, is there a great mediaeval Gothic +like the Gothic of Verona. Elsewhere, it is either less pure in type or +less lovely in completion: only at Verona may you see it in the +simplicity of its youthful power, and the tenderness of its accomplished +beauty. And Verona possesses, in the last place, the loveliest +Renaissance architecture of Italy, not disturbed by pride, nor defiled +by luxury, but rising in fair fulfilment of domestic service, serenity +of effortless grace, and modesty of home seclusion; its richest work +given to the windows that open on the narrowest streets and most silent +gardens. All this she possesses, in the midst of natural scenery such as +assuredly exists nowhere else in the habitable globe--a wild Alpine +river foaming at her feet, from whose shore the rocks rise in a great +crescent, dark with cypress, and misty with olive: illimitably, from +before her southern gates, the tufted plains of Italy sweep and fade in +golden light; around her, north and west, the Alps crowd in crested +troops, and the winds of Benacus bear to her the coolness of their +snows. + + +77. And this is the city--such, and possessing such things as these--at +whose gates the decisive battles of Italy are fought continually: three +days her towers trembled with the echo of the cannon of Arcola; heaped +pebbles of the Mincio divide her fields to this hour with lines of +broken rampart, whence the tide of war rolled back to Novara; and now on +that crescent of her eastern cliffs, whence the full moon used to rise +through the bars of the cypresses in her burning summer twilights, +touching with soft increase of silver light the rosy marbles of her +balconies,--along the ridge of that encompassing rock, other circles are +increasing now, white and pale; walled towers of cruel strength, +sable-spotted with cannon-courses. I tell you, I have seen, when the +thunderclouds came down on those Italian hills, and all their crags were +dipped in the dark, terrible purple, as if the winepress of the wrath of +God had stained their mountain-raiment--I have seen the hail fall in +Italy till the forest branches stood stripped and bare as if blasted by +the locust; but the white hail never fell from those clouds of heaven as +the black hail will fall from the clouds of hell, if ever one breath of +Italian life stirs again in the streets of Verona. + + +78. Sad as you will feel this to be, I do not say that you can directly +prevent it; you cannot drive the Austrians out of Italy, nor prevent +them from building forts where they choose. But I do say,[11] that you, +and I, and all of us, ought to be both acting and feeling with a full +knowledge and understanding of these things; and that, without trying to +excite revolutions or weaken governments, we may give our own thoughts +and help, so as in a measure to prevent needless destruction. We should +do this, if we only realized the thing thoroughly. You drive out day by +day through your own pretty suburbs, and you think only of making, with +what money you have to spare, your gateways handsomer, and your +carriage-drives wider--and your drawing-rooms more splendid, having a +vague notion that you are all the while patronizing and advancing art; +and you make no effort to conceive the fact that, within a few hours' +journey of you, there are gateways and drawing-rooms which might just as +well be yours as these, all built already; gateways built by the +greatest masters of sculpture that ever struck marble; drawing-rooms, +painted by Titian and Veronese; and you won't accept nor save these as +they are, but you will rather fetch the house-painter from over the way, +and let Titian and Veronese house the rats. + +[Note 11: The reader can hardly but remember Mrs. Browning's +beautiful appeal for Italy, made on the occasion of the first great +Exhibition of Art in England:-- + + Magi of the east and of the west, + Your incense, gold, and myrrh are excellent!-- + What gifts for Christ, then, bring ye with the rest? + Your hands have worked well. Is your courage spent + In handwork only? Have you nothing best, + Which generous souls may perfect and present, + And He shall thank the givers for? no light + Of teaching, liberal nations, for the poor, + Who sit in darkness when it is not night? + No cure for wicked children? Christ,--no cure, + No help for women, sobbing out of sight + Because men made the laws? no brothel-lure + Burnt out by popular lightnings? Hast thou found + No remedy, my England, for such woes? + No outlet, Austria, for the scourged and bound, + No call back for the exiled? no repose, + Russia for knouted Poles worked underground, + And gentle ladies bleached among the snows? + No mercy for the slave, America? + No hope for Rome, free France, chivalric France? + Alas, great nations have great shames, I say. + No pity, O world, no tender utterance + Of benediction, and prayers stretched this way + For poor Italia, baffled by mischance? + O gracious nations, give some ear to me! + You all go to your Fair, and I am one + Who at the roadside of humanity + Beseech your alms,--God's justice to be done. + So, prosper! + +] + + +79. "Yes," of course, you answer; "we want nice houses here, not houses +in Verona. What should we do with houses in Verona?" And I answer, do +precisely what you do with the most expensive part of your possessions +here: take pride in them--only a noble pride. You know well, when you +examine your own hearts, that the greater part of the sums you spend on +possessions is spent for pride. Why are your carriages nicely painted +and finished outside? You don't see the outsides as you sit in them--the +outsides are for other people to see. Why are your exteriors of houses +so well finished, your furniture so polished and costly, but for other +people to see? You are just as comfortable yourselves, writing on your +old friend of a desk, with the white cloudings in his leather, and using +the light of a window which is nothing but a hole in the brick wall. And +all that is desirable to be done in this matter is merely to take pride +in preserving great art, instead of in producing mean art; pride in the +possession of precious and enduring things, a little way off, instead +of slight and perishing things near at hand. You know, in old English +times, our kings liked to have lordships and dukedoms abroad: and why +should not your merchant princes like to have lordships and estates +abroad? Believe me, rightly understood, it would be a prouder, and in +the full sense of our English word, more "respectable" thing to be lord +of a palace at Verona, or of a cloister full of frescoes at Florence, +than to have a file of servants dressed in the finest liveries that ever +tailor stitched, as long as would reach from here to Bolton:--yes, and a +prouder thing to send people to travel in Italy, who would have to say +every now and then, of some fair piece of art, "Ah! this was _kept_ here +for us by the good people of Manchester," than to bring them travelling +all the way here, exclaiming of your various art treasures, "These were +_brought_ here for us, (not altogether without harm) by the good people +of Manchester." + + +80. "Ah!" but you say, "the Art Treasures Exhibition will pay; but +Veronese palaces won't." Pardon me. They _would_ pay, less directly, but +far more richly. Do you suppose it is in the long run good for +Manchester, or good for England, that the Continent should be in the +state it is? Do you think the perpetual fear of revolution, or the +perpetual repression of thought and energy that clouds and encumbers the +nations of Europe, is eventually profitable for _us_? Were we any the +better of the course of affairs in '48? or has the stabling of the +dragoon horses in the great houses of Italy any distinct effect in the +promotion of the cotton-trade? Not so. But every stake that you could +hold in the stability of the Continent, and every effort that you could +make to give example of English habits and principles on the Continent, +and every kind deed that you could do in relieving distress and +preventing despair on the Continent, would have tenfold reaction on the +prosperity of England, and open and urge, in a thousand unforeseen +directions, the sluices of commerce and the springs of industry. + + +81. I could press, if I chose, both these motives upon you, of pride and +self-interest, with more force, but these are not motives which ought to +be urged upon you at all. The only motive that I ought to put before +you is simply that it would be right to do this; that the holding of +property abroad, and the personal efforts of Englishmen to redeem the +condition of foreign nations, are among the most direct pieces of duty +which our wealth renders incumbent upon us. I do not--and in all truth +and deliberateness I say this--I do not know anything more ludicrous +among the self-deceptions of well-meaning people than their notion of +patriotism, as requiring them to limit their efforts to the good of +their own country;--the notion that charity is a geographical virtue, +and that what it is holy and righteous to do for people on one bank of a +river, it is quite improper and unnatural to do for people on the other. +It will be a wonderful thing, some day or other, for the Christian world +to remember, that it went on thinking for two thousand years that +neighbours were neighbours at Jerusalem, but not at Jericho; a wonderful +thing for us English to reflect, in after-years, how long it was before +we could shake hands with anybody across that shallow salt wash, which +the very chalk-dust of its two shores whitens from Folkestone to +Ambleteuse. + + +82. Nor ought the motive of gratitude, as well as that of mercy, to be +without its influence on you, who have been the first to ask to see, and +the first to show to us, the treasures which this poor lost Italy has +given to England. Remember, all these things that delight you here were +hers--hers either in fact or in teaching; hers, in fact, are all the +most powerful and most touching paintings of old time that now glow upon +your walls; hers in teaching are all the best and greatest of descendant +souls--your Reynolds and your Gainsborough never could have painted but +for Venice; and the energies which have given the only true life to your +existing art were first stirred by voices of the dead that haunted the +Sacred Field of Pisa. + +Well, all these motives for some definite course of action on our part +towards foreign countries rest upon very serious facts; too serious, +perhaps you will think, to be interfered with; for we are all of us in +the habit of leaving great things alone, as if Providence would mind +them, and attending ourselves only to little things which we know, +practically, Providence doesn't mind unless we do. We are ready enough +to give care to the growing of pines and lettuces, knowing that they +don't grow Providentially sweet or large unless we look after them; but +we don't give any care to the good of Italy or Germany, because we think +that they will grow Providentially happy without any of our meddling. + + +83. Let us leave the great things, then, and think of little things; not +of the destruction of whole provinces in war, which it may not be any +business of ours to prevent; but of the destruction of poor little +pictures in peace, from which it surely would not be much out of our way +to save them. You know I said, just now, we were all of us engaged in +pulling pictures to pieces by deputy, and you did not believe me. +Consider, then, this similitude of ourselves. Suppose you saw (as I +doubt not you often do see) a prudent and kind young lady sitting at +work, in the corner of a quiet room, knitting comforters for her +cousins, and that just outside, in the hall, you saw a cat and her +kittens at play among the family pictures; amusing themselves especially +with the best Vandykes, by getting on the tops of the frames, and then +scrambling down the canvases by their claws; and on some one's informing +the young lady of these proceedings of the cat and kittens, suppose she +answered that it wasn't her cat, but her sister's, and the pictures +weren't hers, but her uncle's, and she couldn't leave her work, for she +had to make so many pairs of comforters before dinner. Would you not say +that the prudent and kind young lady was, on the whole, answerable for +the additional touches of claw on the Vandykes? + + +84. Now, that is precisely what we prudent and kind English are doing, +only on a larger scale. Here we sit in Manchester, hard at work, very +properly, making comforters for our cousins all over the world. Just +outside there in the hall--that beautiful marble hall of Italy--the cats +and kittens and monkeys are at play among the pictures: I assure you, in +the course of the fifteen years in which I have been working in those +places in which the most precious remnants of European art exist, a +sensation, whether I would or no, was gradually made distinct and deep +in my mind, that I was living and working in the midst of a den of +monkeys;--sometimes amiable and affectionate monkeys, with all manner of +winning ways and kind intentions,--more frequently selfish and +malicious monkeys; but, whatever their disposition, squabbling +continually about nuts, and the best places on the barren sticks of +trees; and that all this monkeys' den was filled, by mischance, with +precious pictures, and the witty and wilful beasts were always wrapping +themselves up and going to sleep in pictures, or tearing holes in them +to grin through; or tasting them and spitting them out again, or +twisting them up into ropes and making swings of them; and that +sometimes only, by watching one's opportunity, and bearing a scratch or +a bite, one could rescue the corner of a Tintoret, or Paul Veronese, and +push it through the bars into a place of safety. + + +85. Literally, I assure you, this was, and this is, the fixed impression +on my mind of the state of matters in Italy. And see how. The professors +of art in Italy, having long followed a method of study peculiar to +themselves, have at last arrived at a form of art peculiar to +themselves; very different from that which was arrived at by Correggio +and Titian. Naturally, the professors like their own form the best; and, +as the old pictures are generally not so startling to the eye as the +modern ones, the dukes and counts who possess them, and who like to see +their galleries look new and fine (and are persuaded also that a +celebrated chef-d'oeuvre ought always to catch the eye at a quarter of a +mile off), believe the professors who tell them their sober pictures are +quite faded, and good for nothing, and should all be brought bright +again; and, accordingly, give the sober pictures to the professors, to +be put right by rules of art. Then, the professors repaint the old +pictures in all the principal places, leaving perhaps only a bit of +background to set off their own work. And thus the professors come to be +generally figured, in my mind, as the monkeys who tear holes in the +pictures, to grin through. Then the picture-dealers, who live by the +pictures, cannot sell them to the English in their old and pure state; +all the good work must be covered with new paint, and varnished so as to +look like one of the professorial pictures in the great gallery, before +it is saleable. And thus the dealers come to be imaged, in my mind, as +the monkeys who make ropes of the pictures, to swing by. Then, every now +and then at some old stable, or wine-cellar, or timber-shed, behind +some forgotten vats or faggots, somebody finds a fresco of Perugino's or +Giotto's, but doesn't think much of it, and has no idea of having people +coming into his cellar, or being obliged to move his faggots; and so he +whitewashes the fresco, and puts the faggots back again; and these kind +of persons, therefore, come generally to be imaged, in my mind, as the +monkeys who taste the pictures, and spit them out, not finding them +nice. While, finally, the squabbling for nuts and apples (called in +Italy "bella liberta") goes on all day long. + + +86. Now, all this might soon be put an end to, if we English, who are so +fond of travelling in the body, would also travel a little in soul! We +think it a great triumph to get our packages and our persons carried at +a fast pace, but we never take the slightest trouble to put any pace +into our perceptions; we stay usually at home in thought, or if we ever +mentally see the world, it is at the old stage-coach or waggon rate. Do +but consider what an odd sight it would be, if it were only quite clear +to you how things are really going on--how, here in England, we are +making enormous and expensive efforts to produce new art of all kinds, +knowing and confessing all the while that the greater part of it is bad, +but struggling still to produce new patterns of wall-papers, and new +shapes of teapots, and new pictures, and statues, and architecture; and +pluming and cackling if ever a teapot or a picture has the least good in +it;--all the while taking no thought whatever of the best possible +pictures, and statues, and wall-patterns already in existence, which +require nothing but to be taken common care of, and kept from damp and +dust: but we let the walls fall that Giotto patterned, and the canvases +rot that Tintoret painted, and the architecture be dashed to pieces that +St. Louis built, while we are furnishing our drawing-rooms with prize +upholstery, and writing accounts of our handsome warehouses to the +country papers. Don't think I use my words vaguely or generally: I speak +of literal facts. Giotto's frescoes at Assisi are perishing at this +moment for want of decent care; Tintoret's pictures in San Sebastian, at +Venice, are at this instant rotting piecemeal into grey rags; St. +Louis's chapel, at Carcassonne, is at this moment lying in shattered +fragments in the market-place. And here we are all cawing and crowing, +poor little half-fledged daws as we are, about the pretty sticks and +wool in our own nests. There's hardly a day passes, when I am at home, +but I get a letter from some well-meaning country clergyman, deeply +anxious about the state of his parish church, and breaking his heart to +get money together that he may hold up some wretched remnant of Tudor +tracery, with one niche in the corner and no statue--when all the while +the mightiest piles of religious architecture and sculpture that ever +the world saw are being blasted and withered away, without one glance of +pity or regret. The country clergyman does not care for _them_--he has a +sea-sick imagination that cannot cross channel. What is it to him, if +the angels of Assisi fade from its vaults, or the queens and kings of +Chartres fall from their pedestals? They are not in his parish. + + +87. "What!" you will say, "are we not to produce any new art, nor take +care of our parish churches?" No, certainly not, until you have taken +proper care of the art you have got already, and of the best churches +out of the parish. Your first and proper standing is not as +churchwardens and parish overseers, in an English county, but as members +of the great Christian community of Europe. And as members of that +community (in which alone, observe, pure and precious ancient art +exists, for there is none in America, none in Asia, none in Africa), you +conduct yourselves precisely as a manufacturer would, who attended to +his looms, but left his warehouse without a roof. The rain floods your +warehouse, the rats frolic in it, the spiders spin in it, the choughs +build in it, the wall-plague frets and festers in it; and still you keep +weave, weave, weaving at your wretched webs, and thinking you are +growing rich, while more is gnawed out of your warehouse in an hour than +you can weave in a twelvemonth. + + +88. Even this similitude is not absurd enough to set us rightly forth. +The weaver would, or might, at least, hope that his new woof was as +stout as the old ones, and that, therefore, in spite of rain and ravage, +he would have something to wrap himself in when he needed it. But _our_ +webs rot as we spin. The very fact that we despise the great art of the +past shows that we cannot produce great art now. If we could do it, we +should love it when we saw it done--if we really cared for it, we should +recognize it and keep it; but we don't care for it. It is not art that +we want; it is amusement, gratification of pride, present gain--anything +in the world but art: let it rot, we shall always have enough to talk +about and hang over our sideboards. + + +89. You will (I hope) finally ask me what is the outcome of all this, +practicable tomorrow morning by us who are sitting here? These are the +main practical outcomes of it: In the first place, don't grumble when +you hear of a new picture being bought by Government at a large price. +There are many pictures in Europe now in danger of destruction which +are, in the true sense of the word, priceless; the proper price is +simply that which it is necessary to give to get and to save them. If +you can get them for fifty pounds, do; if not for less than a hundred, +do; if not for less than five thousand, do; if not for less than twenty +thousand, do; never mind being imposed upon: there is nothing +disgraceful in being imposed upon; the only disgrace is in imposing; +and you can't in general get anything much worth having, in the way of +Continental art, but it must be with the help or connivance of numbers +of people who, indeed, ought to have nothing to do with the matter, but +who practically have, and always will have, everything to do with it; +and if you don't choose to submit to be cheated by them out of a ducat +here and a zecchin there, you will be cheated by them out of your +picture; and whether you are most imposed upon in losing that, or the +zecchins, I think I may leave you to judge; though I know there are many +political economists, who would rather leave a bag of gold on a +garret-table, than give a porter sixpence extra to carry it downstairs. + +That, then, is the first practical outcome of the matter. Never grumble, +but be glad when you hear of a new picture being bought at a large +price. In the long run, the dearest pictures are always the best +bargains; and, I repeat, (for else you might think I said it in mere +hurry of talk, and not deliberately,) there are some pictures which are +without price. You should stand, nationally, at the edge of Dover +cliffs--Shakespeare's--and wave blank cheques in the eyes of the nations +on the other side of the sea, freely offered, for such and such canvases +of theirs. + + +90. Then the next practical outcome of it is--Never buy a copy of a +picture, under any circumstances whatever. All copies are bad; because +no painter who is worth a straw ever _will_ copy. He will make a study +of a picture he likes, for his own use, in his own way; but he won't and +can't copy. Whenever you buy a copy, you buy so much misunderstanding of +the original, and encourage a dull person in following a business he is +not fit for, besides increasing ultimately chances of mistake and +imposture, and farthering, as directly as money _can_ farther, the cause +of ignorance in all directions. You may, in fact, consider yourself as +having purchased a certain quantity of mistakes; and, according to your +power, being engaged in disseminating them. + + +91. I do not mean, however, that copies should never be made. A certain +number of dull persons should always be employed by a Government in +making the most accurate copies possible of all good pictures; these +copies, though artistically valueless, would be historically and +documentarily valuable, in the event of the destruction of the original +picture. The studies also made by great artists for their own use, +should be sought after with the greatest eagerness; they are often to be +bought cheap; and in connection with the mechanical copies, would become +very precious: tracings from frescoes and other large works are also of +great value; for though a tracing is liable to just as many mistakes as +a copy, the mistakes in a tracing are of one kind only, which may be +allowed for, but the mistakes of a common copyist are of all conceivable +kinds: finally, engravings, in so far as they convey certain facts about +the pictures, without pretending adequately to represent or give an idea +of the pictures, are often serviceable and valuable. I can't, of course, +enter into details in these matters just now; only this main piece of +advice I can safely give you--never to buy copies of pictures (for your +private possession) which pretend to give a facsimile that shall be in +any wise representative of, or equal to, the original. Whenever you do +so, you are only lowering your taste, and wasting your money. And if +you are generous and wise, you will be ready rather to subscribe as much +as you would have given for a copy of a great picture towards its +purchase, or the purchase of some other like it, by the nation. There +ought to be a great National Society instituted for the purchase of +pictures; presenting them to the various galleries in our great cities, +and watching there over their safety: but in the meantime, you can +always act safely and beneficially by merely allowing your artist +friends to buy pictures for you, when they see good ones. Never buy for +yourselves, nor go to the foreign dealers; but let any painter whom you +know be entrusted, when he finds a neglected old picture in an old +house, to try if he cannot get it for you; then, if you like it, keep +it; if not, send it to the hammer, and you will find that you do not +lose money on pictures so purchased. + + +92. And the third and chief practical outcome of the matter is this +general one: Wherever you go, whatever you do, act more for +_preservation_ and less for _production_. I assure you, the world is, +generally speaking, in calamitous disorder, and just because you have +managed to thrust some of the lumber aside, and get an available corner +for yourselves, you think you should do nothing but sit spinning in it +all day long--while, as householders and economists, your first thought +and effort should be, to set things more square all about you. Try to +set the ground floors in order, and get the rottenness out of your +granaries. _Then_ sit and spin, but not till then. + + +93. IV. DISTRIBUTION.--And now, lastly, we come to the fourth great head +of our inquiry, the question of the wise distribution of the art we have +gathered and preserved. It must be evident to us, at a moment's thought, +that the way in which works of art are on the whole most useful to the +nation to which they belong, must be by their collection in public +galleries, supposing those galleries properly managed. But there is one +disadvantage attached necessarily to gallery exhibition--namely, the +extent of mischief which may be done by one foolish curator. As long as +the pictures which form the national wealth are disposed in private +collections, the chance is always that the people who buy them will be +just the people who are fond of them; and that the sense of exchangeable +value in the commodity they possess, will induce them, even if they do +not esteem it themselves, to take such care of it as will preserve its +value undiminished. At all events, so long as works of art are scattered +through the nation, no universal destruction of them is possible; a +certain average only are lost by accidents from time to time. But when +they are once collected in a large public gallery, if the appointment of +curator becomes in any way a matter of formality, or the post is so +lucrative as to be disputed by place-hunters, let but one foolish or +careless person get possession of it, and perhaps you may have all your +fine pictures repainted, and the national property destroyed, in a +month. That is actually the case at this moment, in several great +foreign galleries. They are the places of execution of pictures: over +their doors you only want the Dantesque inscription, "Lasciate ogni +speranza, voi che entrate." + + +94. Supposing, however, this danger properly guarded against, as it +would be always by a nation which either knew the value, or understood +the meaning, of painting,[12] arrangement in a public gallery is the +safest, as well as the most serviceable, method of exhibiting pictures; +and it is the only mode in which their historical value can be brought +out, and their historical meaning made clear. But great good is also to +be done by encouraging the private possession of pictures; partly as a +means of study, (much more being always discovered in any work of art by +a person who has it perpetually near him than by one who only sees it +from time to time,) and also as a means of refining the habits and +touching the hearts of the masses of the nation in their domestic life. + +[Note 12: It would be a great point gained towards the preservation +of pictures if it were made a rule that at every operation they +underwent, the exact spots in which they have been repainted should be +recorded in writing.] + + +95. For these last purposes, the most serviceable art is the living art +of the time; the particular tastes of the people will be best met, and +their particular ignorances best corrected, by painters labouring in the +midst of them, more or less guided to the knowledge of what is wanted by +the degree of sympathy with which their work is received. So then, +generally, it should be the object of government, and of all patrons of +art, to collect, as far as may be, the works of dead masters in public +galleries, arranging them so as to illustrate the history of nations, +and the progress and influence of their arts; and to encourage the +private possession of the works of _living_ masters. And the first and +best way in which to encourage such private possession is, of course, to +keep down the prices of them as far as you can. + +I hope there are not a great many painters in the room; if there are, I +entreat their patience for the next quarter of an hour: if they will +bear with me for so long, I hope they will not, finally, be offended by +what I am going to say. + + +96. I repeat, trusting to their indulgence in the interim, that the +first object of our national economy, as respects the distribution of +modern art, should be steadily and rationally to limit its prices, since +by doing so, you will produce two effects: you will make the painters +produce more pictures, two or three instead of one, if they wish to make +money; and you will, by bringing good pictures within the reach of +people of moderate income, excite the general interest of the nation in +them, increase a thousandfold the demand for the commodity, and +therefore its wholesome and natural production. + + +97. I know how many objections must arise in your minds at this moment +to what I say; but you must be aware that it is not possible for me in +an hour to explain all the moral and commercial bearings of such a +principle as this. Only, believe me, I do not speak lightly; I think I +have considered all the objections which could be rationally brought +forward, though I have time at present only to glance at the main +one--namely, the idea that the high prices paid for modern pictures are +either honourable, or serviceable, to the painter. So far from this +being so, I believe one of the principal obstacles to the progress of +modern art to be the high prices given for good modern pictures. For +observe first the action of this high remuneration on the artist's mind. +If he "gets on," as it is called, catches the eye of the public, and +especially of the public of the upper classes, there is hardly any limit +to the fortune he may acquire; so that, in his early years, his mind is +naturally led to dwell on this worldly and wealthy eminence as the main +thing to be reached by his art; if he finds that he is not gradually +rising towards it, he thinks there is something wrong in his work; or, +if he is too proud to think that, still the bribe of wealth and honour +warps him from his honest labour into efforts to attract attention; and +he gradually loses both his power of mind and his rectitude of purpose. +This, according to the degree of avarice or ambition which exists in any +painter's mind, is the necessary influence upon him of the hope of great +wealth and reputation. But the harm is still greater, in so far as the +possibility of attaining fortune of this kind tempts people continually +to become painters who have no real gift for the work; and on whom these +motives of mere worldly interest have exclusive influence;--men who +torment and abuse the patient workers, eclipse or thrust aside all +delicate and good pictures by their own gaudy and coarse ones, corrupt +the taste of the public, and do the greatest amount of mischief to the +schools of art in their day which it is possible for their capacities to +effect; and it is quite wonderful how much mischief may be done even by +small capacity. If you could by any means succeed in keeping the prices +of pictures down, you would throw all these disturbers out of the way at +once. + + +98. You may perhaps think that this severe treatment would do more harm +than good, by withdrawing the wholesome element of emulation, and giving +no stimulus to exertion; but I am sorry to say that artists will always +be sufficiently jealous of one another, whether you pay them large or +low prices; and as for stimulus to exertion, believe me, no good work in +this world was ever done for money, nor while the slightest thought of +money affected the painter's mind. Whatever idea of pecuniary value +enters into his thoughts as he works, will, in proportion to the +distinctness of its presence, shorten his power. A real painter will +work for you exquisitely, if you give him, as I told you a little while +ago, bread and water and salt; and a bad painter will work badly and +hastily, though you give him a palace to live in, and a princedom to +live upon. Turner got, in his earlier years, half a crown a day and his +supper (not bad pay, neither); and he learned to paint upon that. And I +believe that there is no chance of art's truly flourishing in any +country, until you make it a simple and plain business, providing its +masters with an easy competence, but rarely with anything more. And I +say this, not because I despise the great painter, but because I honour +him; and I should no more think of adding to his respectability or +happiness by giving him riches, than, if Shakespeare or Milton were +alive, I should think we added to _their_ respectability, or were likely +to get better work from them, by making them millionaires. + + +99. But, observe, it is not only the painter himself whom you injure, by +giving him too high prices; you injure all the inferior painters of the +day. If they are modest, they will be discouraged and depressed by the +feeling that their doings are worth so little, comparatively, in your +eyes;--if proud, all their worst passions will be aroused, and the +insult or opprobrium which they will try to cast on their successful +rival will not only afflict and wound him, but at last sour and harden +him: he cannot pass through such a trial without grievous harm. + + +100. That, then, is the effect you produce on the painter of mark, and +on the inferior ones of his own standing. But you do worse than this; +you deprive yourselves, by what you give for the fashionable picture, of +the power of helping the younger men who are coming forward. Be it +admitted, for argument's sake, if you are not convinced by what I have +said, that you do no harm to the great man by paying him well; yet +certainly you do him no special good. His reputation is established, and +his fortune made; he does not care whether you buy or not; he thinks he +is rather doing you a favour than otherwise by letting you have one of +his pictures at all. All the good you do him is to help him to buy a new +pair of carriage horses; whereas, with that same sum which thus you cast +away, you might have relieved the hearts and preserved the health of +twenty young painters; and if, among those twenty, you but chanced on +one in whom a true latent power had been hindered by his poverty, just +consider what a far-branching, far-embracing good you have wrought with +that lucky expenditure of yours. I say, "Consider it," in vain; you +cannot consider it, for you cannot conceive the sickness of heart with +which a young painter of deep feeling toils through his first +obscurity;--his sense of the strong voice within him, which you will not +hear;--his vain, fond, wondering witness to the things you will not +see;--his far-away perception of things that he could accomplish if he +had but peace, and time, all unapproachable and vanishing from him, +because no one will leave him peace or grant him time: all his friends +falling back from him; those whom he would most reverently obey rebuking +and paralysing him; and, last and worst of all, those who believe in him +the most faithfully suffering by him the most bitterly;--the wife's +eyes, in their sweet ambition, shining brighter as the cheek wastes +away; and the little lips at his side parched and pale, which one day, +he knows, though he may never see it, will quiver so proudly when they +call his name, calling him "our father." You deprive yourselves, by your +large expenditure for pictures of mark, of the power of relieving and +redeeming _this_ distress; you injure the painter whom you pay so +largely;--and what, after all, have you done for yourselves or got for +yourselves? It does not in the least follow that the hurried work of a +fashionable painter will contain more for your money than the quiet work +of some unknown man. In all probability, you will find, if you rashly +purchase what is popular at a high price, that you have got one picture +you don't care for, for a sum which would have bought twenty you would +have delighted in. + + +101. For remember always, that the price of a picture by a living artist +never represents, never _can_ represent, the quantity of labour or value +in it. Its price represents, for the most part, the degree of desire +which the rich people of the country have to possess it. Once get the +wealthy classes to imagine that the possession of pictures by a given +artist adds to their "gentility," and there is no price which his work +may not immediately reach, and for years maintain; and in buying at that +price, you are not getting value for your money, but merely disputing +for victory in a contest of ostentation. And it is hardly possible to +spend your money in a worse or more wasteful way; for though you may not +be doing it for ostentation yourself, you are, by your pertinacity, +nourishing the ostentation of others; you meet them in their game of +wealth, and continue it for them; if they had not found an opposite +player, the game would have been done; for a proud man can find no +enjoyment in possessing himself of what nobody disputes with him. So +that by every farthing you give for a picture beyond its fair +price--that is to say, the price which will pay the painter for his +time--you are not only cheating yourself and buying vanity, but you are +stimulating the vanity of others; paying, literally, for the cultivation +of pride. You may consider every pound that you spend above the just +price of a work of art, as an investment in a cargo of mental quick-lime +or guano, which, being laid on the fields of human nature, is to grow a +harvest of pride. You are in fact ploughing and harrowing, in a most +valuable part of your land, in order to reap the whirlwind; you are +setting your hand stoutly to Job's agriculture--"Let thistles grow +instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley." + + +102. Well, but you will say, there is one advantage in high prices, +which more than counter-balances all this mischief, namely, that by +great reward we both urge and enable a painter to produce rather one +perfect picture than many inferior ones: and one perfect picture (so you +tell us, and we believe it) is worth a great number of inferior ones. + +It is so; but you cannot get it by paying for it. A great work is only +done when the painter gets into the humour for it, likes his subject, +and determines to paint it as well as he can, whether he is paid for it +or not; but bad work, and generally the worst sort of bad work, is done +when he is trying to produce a showy picture, or one that shall appear +to have as much labour in it as shall be worth a high price.[13] + +[Note 13: When this lecture was delivered, I gave here some data for +approximate estimates of the average value of good modern pictures of +different classes; but the subject is too complicated to be adequately +treated in writing, without introducing more detail than the reader will +have patience for. But I may state, roughly, that prices above a hundred +guineas are in general extravagant for water-colours, and above five +hundred for oils. An artist almost always does wrong who puts more work +than these prices will remunerate him for into any single canvas--his +talent would be better employed in painting two pictures than one so +elaborate. The water-colour painters also are getting into the habit of +making their drawings too large, and in a measure attaching their price +rather to breadth and extent of touch than to thoughtful labour. Of +course marked exceptions occur here and there, as in the case of John +Lewis, whose drawings are wrought with unfailing precision throughout, +whatever their scale. Hardly any price can be remunerative for such +work.] + + +103. There is, however, another point, and a still more important one, +bearing on this matter of purchase, than the keeping down of prices to +a rational standard. And that is, that you pay your prices into the +hands of living men, and do not pour them into coffins. + +For observe that, as we arrange our payment of pictures at present, no +artist's work is worth half its proper value while he is alive. The +moment he dies, his pictures, if they are good, reach double their +former value; but, that rise of price represents simply a profit made by +the intelligent dealer or purchaser on his past purchases. So that the +real facts of the matter are, that the British public, spending a +certain sum annually in art, determines that, of every thousand it pays, +only five hundred shall go to the painter, or shall be at all concerned +in the production of art; and that the other five hundred shall be paid +merely as a testimonial to the intelligent dealer, who knew what to buy. +Now, testimonials are very pretty and proper things, within due limits; +but testimonial to the amount of a hundred per cent. on the total +expenditure is not good political economy. Do not, therefore, in +general, unless you see it to be necessary for its preservation, buy the +picture of a dead artist. If you fear that it may be exposed to contempt +or neglect, buy it; its price will then, probably, not be high: if you +want to put it into a public gallery, buy it; you are sure, then, that +you do not spend your money selfishly: or, if you loved the man's work +while he was alive, and bought it then, buy it also now, if you can see +no living work equal to it. But if you did not buy it while the man was +living, never buy it after he is dead: you are then doing no good to +him, and you are doing some shame to yourself. Look around you for +pictures that you really like, and in buying which you can help some +genius yet unperished--that is the best atonement you can make to the +one you have neglected--and give to the living and struggling painter at +once wages, and testimonial. + + +104. So far then of the motives which should induce us to keep down the +prices of modern art, and thus render it, as a private possession, +attainable by greater numbers of people than at present. But we should +strive to render it accessible to them in other ways also--chiefly by +the permanent decoration of public buildings; and it is in this field +that I think we may look for the profitable means of providing that +constant employment for young painters of which we were speaking last +evening. + +The first and most important kind of public buildings which we are +always sure to want, are schools: and I would ask you to consider very +carefully, whether we may not wisely introduce some great changes in the +way of school decoration. Hitherto, as far as I know, it has either been +so difficult to give all the education we wanted to our lads, that we +have been obliged to do it, if at all, with cheap furniture and bare +walls; or else we have considered that cheap furniture and bare walls +are a proper part of the means of education; and supposed that boys +learned best when they sat on hard forms, and had nothing but blank +plaster about and above them whereupon to employ their spare attention; +also, that it was as well they should be accustomed to rough and ugly +conditions of things, partly by way of preparing them for the hardships +of life, and partly that there might be the least possible damage done +to floors and forms, in the event of their becoming, during the master's +absence, the fields or instruments of battle. All this is so far well +and necessary, as it relates to the training of country lads, and the +first training of boys in general. But there certainly comes a period in +the life of a well-educated youth, in which one of the principal +elements of his education is, or ought to be, to give him refinement of +habits; and not only to teach him the strong exercises of which his +frame is capable, but also to increase his bodily sensibility and +refinement, and show him such small matters as the way of handling +things properly, and treating them considerately. + + +105. Not only so; but I believe the notion of fixing the attention by +keeping the room empty, is a wholly mistaken one: I think it is just in +the emptiest room that the mind wanders most; for it gets restless, like +a bird, for want of a perch, and casts about for any possible means of +getting out and away. And even if it be fixed, by an effort, on the +business in hand, that business becomes itself repulsive, more than it +need be, by the vileness of its associations; and many a study appears +dull or painful to a boy, when it is pursued on a blotted deal desk, +under a wall with nothing on it but scratches and pegs, which would have +been pursued pleasantly enough in a curtained corner of his father's +library, or at the lattice window of his cottage. Now, my own belief is, +that the best study of all is the most beautiful; and that a quiet glade +of forest, or the nook of a lake shore, are worth all the schoolrooms in +Christendom, when once you are past the multiplication table; but be +that as it may, there is no question at all but that a time ought to +come in the life of a well-trained youth, when he can sit at a +writing-table without wanting to throw the inkstand at his neighbour; +and when also he will feel more capable of certain efforts of mind with +beautiful and refined forms about him than with ugly ones. When that +time comes, he ought to be advanced into the decorated schools; and this +advance ought to be one of the important and honourable epochs of his +life. + + +106. I have not time, however, to insist on the mere serviceableness to +our youth of refined architectural decoration, as such; for I want you +to consider the probable influence of the particular kind of decoration +which I wish you to get for them, namely, historical painting. You know +we have hitherto been in the habit of conveying all our historical +knowledge, such as it is, by the ear only, never by the eye; all our +notion of things being ostensibly derived from verbal description, not +from sight. Now, I have no doubt that, as we grow gradually wiser--and +we are doing so every day--we shall discover at last that the eye is a +nobler organ than the ear; and that through the eye we must, in reality, +obtain, or put into form, nearly all the useful information we are to +have about this world. Even as the matter stands, you will find that the +knowledge which a boy is supposed to receive from verbal description is +only available to him so far as in any underhand way he gets a sight of +the thing you are talking about. I remember well that, for many years of +my life, the only notion I had of the look of a Greek knight was +complicated between recollection of a small engraving in my pocket +Pope's Homer, and reverent study of the Horse Guards. And though I +believe that most boys collect their ideas from more varied sources and +arrange them more carefully than I did; still, whatever sources they +seek must always be ocular: if they are clever boys, they will go and +look at the Greek vases and sculptures in the British Museum, and at the +weapons in our armouries--they will see what real armour is like in +lustre, and what Greek armour was like in form, and so put a fairly true +image together, but still not, in ordinary cases, a very living or +interesting one. + + +107. Now, the use of your decorative painting would be, in myriads of +ways, to animate their history for them, and to put the living aspect of +past things before their eyes as faithfully as intelligent invention +can; so that the master shall have nothing to do but once to point to +the schoolroom walls, and for ever afterwards the meaning of any word +would be fixed in a boy's mind in the best possible way. Is it a +question of classical dress--what a tunic was like, or a chlamys, or a +peplus? At this day, you have to point to some vile woodcut, in the +middle of a dictionary page, representing the thing hung upon a stick; +but then, you would point to a hundred figures, wearing the actual +dress, in its fiery colours, in all actions of various stateliness or +strength; you would understand at once how it fell round the people's +limbs as they stood, how it drifted from their shoulders as they went, +how it veiled their faces as they wept, how it covered their heads in +the day of battle. _Now_, if you want to see what a weapon is like, you +refer, in like manner, to a numbered page, in which there are +spear-heads in rows, and sword-hilts in symmetrical groups; and +gradually the boy gets a dim mathematical notion how one scimitar is +hooked to the right and another to the left, and one javelin has a knob +to it and another none: while one glance at your good picture would show +him,--and the first rainy afternoon in the schoolroom would for ever fix +in his mind,--the look of the sword and spear as they fell or flew; and +how they pierced, or bent, or shattered--how men wielded them, and how +men died by them. + + +108. But far more than all this, is it a question not of clothes or +weapons, but of men? how can we sufficiently estimate the effect on the +mind of a noble youth, at the time when the world opens to him, of +having faithful and touching representations put before him of the acts +and presences of great men--how many a resolution, which would alter and +exalt the whole course of his after-life, might be formed, when in some +dreamy twilight he met, through his own tears, the fixed eyes of those +shadows of the great dead, unescapable and calm, piercing to his soul; +or fancied that their lips moved in dread reproof or soundless +exhortation? And if but for one out of many this were true--if yet, in a +few, you could be sure that such influence had indeed changed their +thoughts and destinies, and turned the eager and reckless youth, who +would have cast away his energies on the race-horse or the +gambling-table, to that noble life-race, that holy life-hazard, which +should win all glory to himself and all good to his country,--would not +that, to some purpose, be "political economy of art"? + + +109. And observe, there could be no monotony, no exhaustibleness, in the +scenes required to be thus portrayed. Even if there were, and you +wanted for every school in the kingdom, one death of Leonidas; one +battle of Marathon; one death of Cleobis and Bito; there need not +therefore be more monotony in your art than there was in the repetition +of a given cycle of subjects by the religious painters of Italy. But we +ought not to admit a cycle at all. For though we had as many great +schools as we have great cities (one day I hope we _shall_ have), +centuries of painting would not exhaust, in all the number of them, the +noble and pathetic subjects which might be chosen from the history of +even one noble nation. But, beside this, you will not, in a little +while, limit your youths' studies to so narrow fields as you do now. +There will come a time--I am sure of it--when it will be found that the +same practical results, both in mental discipline and in political +philosophy, are to be attained by the accurate study of mediaeval and +modern as of ancient history; and that the facts of mediaeval and modern +history are, on the whole, the most important to us. And among these +noble groups of constellated schools which I foresee arising in our +England, I foresee also that there will be divided fields of thought; +and that while each will give its scholars a great general idea of the +world's history, such as all men should possess--each will also take +upon itself, as its own special duty, the closer study of the course of +events in some given place or time. It will review the rest of history, +but it will exhaust its own special field of it; and found its moral and +political teaching on the most perfect possible analysis of the results +of human conduct in one place, and at one epoch. And then, the galleries +of that school will be painted with the historical scenes belonging to +the age which it has chosen for its special study. + + +110. So far, then, of art as you may apply it to that great series of +public buildings which you devote to the education of youth. The next +large class of public buildings in which we should introduce it, is one +which I think a few years more of national progress will render more +serviceable to us than they have been lately. I mean, buildings for the +meetings of guilds of trades. + +And here, for the last time, I must again interrupt the course of our +chief inquiry, in order to state one other principle of political +economy, which is perfectly simple and indisputable; but which, +nevertheless, we continually get into commercial embarrassments for want +of understanding; and not only so, but suffer much hindrance in our +commercial discoveries, because many of our business men do not +practically admit it. + +Supposing half a dozen or a dozen men were cast ashore from a wreck on +an uninhabited island, and left to their own resources, one of course, +according to his capacity, would be set to one business and one to +another; the strongest to dig and cut wood, and to build huts for the +rest: the most dexterous to make shoes out of bark and coats out of +skins; the best educated to look for iron or lead in the rocks, and to +plan the channels for the irrigation of the fields. But though their +labours were thus naturally severed, that small group of shipwrecked men +would understand well enough that the speediest progress was to be made +by helping each other,--not by opposing each other: and they would know +that this help could only be properly given so long as they were frank +and open in their relations, and the difficulties which each lay under +properly explained to the rest. So that any appearance of secrecy or +separateness in the actions of any of them would instantly, and justly, +be looked upon with suspicion by the rest, as the sign of some selfish +or foolish proceeding on the part of the individual. If, for instance, +the scientific man were found to have gone out at night, unknown to the +rest, to alter the sluices, the others would think, and in all +probability rightly think, that he wanted to get the best supply of +water to his own field; and if the shoemaker refused to show them where +the bark grew which he made the sandals of, they would naturally think, +and in all probability rightly think, that he didn't want them to see +how much there was of it, and that he meant to ask from them more corn +and potatoes in exchange for his sandals than the trouble of making them +deserved. And thus, although each man would have a portion of time to +himself in which he was allowed to do what he chose without let or +inquiry,--so long as he was working in that particular business which he +had undertaken for the common benefit, any secrecy on his part would be +immediately supposed to mean mischief; and would require to be accounted +for, or put an end to: and this all the more because whatever the work +might be, certainly there would be difficulties about it which, when +once they were well explained, might be more or less done away with by +the help of the rest; so that assuredly every one of them would advance +with his labour not only more happily, but more profitably and quickly, +by having no secrets, and by frankly bestowing, and frankly receiving, +such help as lay in his way to get or to give. + + +111. And, just as the best and richest result of wealth and happiness to +the whole of them would follow on their perseverance in such a system of +frank communication and of helpful labour;--so precisely the worst and +poorest result would be obtained by a system of secrecy and of enmity; +and each man's happiness and wealth would assuredly be diminished in +proportion to the degree in which jealousy and concealment became their +social and economical principles. It would not, in the long run, bring +good, but only evil, to the man of science, if, instead of telling +openly where he had found good iron, he carefully concealed every new +bed of it, that he might ask, in exchange for the rare ploughshare, more +corn from the farmer, or, in exchange for the rude needle, more labour +from the sempstress: and it would not ultimately bring good, but only +evil, to the farmers, if they sought to burn each other's cornstacks, +that they might raise the value of their grain, or if the sempstresses +tried to break each other's needles, that each might get all the +stitching to herself. + + +112. Now, these laws of human action are precisely as authoritative in +their application to the conduct of a million of men, as to that of six +or twelve. All enmity, jealousy, opposition, and secrecy are wholly, and +in all circumstances, destructive in their nature--not productive; and +all kindness, fellowship, and communicativeness are invariably +productive in their operation,--not destructive; and the evil principles +of opposition and exclusiveness are not rendered less fatal, but more +fatal, by their acceptance among large masses of men; more fatal, I say, +exactly in proportion as their influence is more secret. For though the +opposition does always its own simple, necessary, direct quantity of +harm, and withdraws always its own simple, necessary, measurable +quantity of wealth from the sum possessed by the community, yet, in +proportion to the size of the community, it does another and more +refined mischief than this, by concealing its own fatality under aspects +of mercantile complication and expediency, and giving rise to multitudes +of false theories based on a mean belief in narrow and immediate +appearances of good done here and there by things which have the +universal and everlasting nature of evil. So that the time and powers of +the nation are wasted, not only in wretched struggling against each +other, but in vain complaints, and groundless discouragements, and empty +investigations, and useless experiments in laws, and elections, and +inventions; with hope always to pull wisdom through some new-shaped slit +in a ballot-box, and to drag prosperity down out of the clouds along +some new knot of electric wire; while all the while Wisdom stands +calling at the corners of the streets, and the blessing of Heaven waits +ready to rain down upon us, deeper than the rivers and broader than the +dew, if only we will obey the first plain principles of humanity, and +the first plain precepts of the skies: "Execute true judgment, and show +mercy and compassion, every man to his brother; and let none of you +imagine evil against his brother in your heart."[14] + +[Note 14: It would be well if, instead of preaching continually +about the doctrine of faith and good works, our clergymen would simply +explain to their people a little what good works mean. There is not a +chapter in all the book we profess to believe, more specially and +directly written for England than the second of Habakkuk, and I never in +all my life heard one of its practical texts preached from. I suppose +the clergymen are all afraid, and know their flocks, while they will sit +quite politely to hear syllogisms out of the epistle to the Romans, +would get restive directly if they ever pressed a practical text home to +them. But we should have no mercantile catastrophes, and no distressful +pauperism, if we only read often, and took to heart, those plain +words:--"Yea, also, because he is a proud man, neither keepeth at home, +who enlargeth his desire as hell, and cannot be satisfied,--Shall not +all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against +him, and say, 'Woe to him that increaseth that which is not his: and to +him that _ladeth himself with thick clay_'?" (What a glorious history in +one metaphor, of the life of a man greedy of fortune!) "Woe to him that +coveteth an evil covetousness that he may set his nest on high. Woe to +him that buildeth a town with blood, and establisheth a city by +iniquity. Behold, is it not of the Lord of Hosts that the people shall +labour in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves for very +vanity?" + +The Americans, who have been sending out ships with sham bolt-heads on +their timbers, and only half their bolts, may meditate on that "buildeth +a town with blood."] + + +113. Therefore, I believe most firmly, that as the laws of national +prosperity get familiar to us, we shall more and more cast our toil into +social and communicative systems; and that one of the first means of our +doing so, will be the re-establishing guilds of every important trade in +a vital, not formal, condition;--that there will be a great council or +government house for the members of every trade, built in whatever town +of the kingdom occupies itself principally in such trade, with minor +council-halls in other cities; and to each council-hall, officers +attached, whose first business may be to examine into the circumstances +of every operative, in that trade, who chooses to report himself to them +when out of work, and to set him to work, if he is indeed able and +willing, at a fixed rate of wages, determined at regular periods in the +council-meetings; and whose next duty may be to bring reports before the +council of all improvements made in the business, and means of its +extension: not allowing private patents of any kind, but making all +improvements available to every member of the guild, only allotting, +after successful trial of them, a certain reward to the inventors. + + +114. For these, and many other such purposes, such halls will be again, +I trust, fully established, and then, in the paintings and decorations +of them, especial effort ought to be made to express the worthiness and +honourableness of the trade for whose members they are founded. For I +believe one of the worst symptoms of modern society to be, its notion of +great inferiority, and ungentlemanliness, as necessarily belonging to +the character of a tradesman. I believe tradesmen may be, ought to +be--often are, more gentlemen than idle and useless people: and I +believe that art may do noble work by recording in the hall of each +trade, the services which men belonging to that trade have done for +their country, both preserving the portraits, and recording the +important incidents in the lives, of those who have made great advances +in commerce and civilization. I cannot follow out this subject--it +branches too far, and in too many directions; besides, I have no doubt +you will at once see and accept the truth of the main principle, and be +able to think it out for yourselves. I would fain also have said +something of what might be done, in the same manner, for almshouses and +hospitals, and for what, as I shall try to explain in notes to this +lecture, we may hope to see, some day, established with a different +meaning in their name than that they now bear--work-houses; but I have +detained you too long already, and cannot permit myself to trespass +further on your patience except only to recapitulate, in closing, the +simple principles respecting wealth which we have gathered during the +course of our inquiry; principles which are nothing more than the +literal and practical acceptance of the saying which is in all good +men's mouths--namely, that they are stewards or ministers of whatever +talents are entrusted to them. + + +115. Only, is it not a strange thing, that while we more or less accept +the meaning of that saying, so long as it is considered metaphorical, we +never accept its meaning in its own terms? You know the lesson is given +us under the form of a story about money. Money was given to the +servants to make use of: the unprofitable servant dug in the earth, and +hid his lord's money. Well, we, in our political and spiritual +application of this, say, that of course money doesn't mean money: it +means wit, it means intellect, it means influence in high quarters, it +means everything in the world except itself. And do not you see what a +pretty and pleasant come-off there is for most of us, in this spiritual +application? Of course, if we had wit, we would use it for the good of +our fellow-creatures. But we haven't wit. Of course, if we had influence +with the bishops, we would use it for the good of the Church; but we +haven't any influence with the bishops. Of course, if we had political +power, we would use it for the good of the nation; but we have no +political power; we have no talents entrusted to us of any sort or kind. +It is true we have a little money, but the parable can't possibly mean +anything so vulgar as money; our money's our own. + + +116. I believe, if you think seriously of this matter, you will feel +that the first and most literal application is just as necessary a one +as any other--that the story does very specially mean what it +says--plain money; and that the reason we don't at once believe it does +so, is a sort of tacit idea that while thought, wit, and intellect, and +all power of birth and position, are indeed _given_ to us, and, +therefore, to be laid out for the Giver--our wealth has not been given +to us; but we have worked for it, and have a right to spend it as we +choose. I think you will find that is the real substance of our +understanding in this matter. Beauty, we say, is given by God--it is a +talent; strength is given by God--it is a talent; position is given by +God--it is a talent; but money is proper wages for our day's work--it is +not a talent, it is a due. We may justly spend it on ourselves, if we +have worked for it. + + +117. And there would be some shadow of excuse for this, were it not that +the very power of making the money is itself only one of the +applications of that intellect or strength which we confess to be +talents. Why is one man richer than another? Because he is more +industrious, more persevering, and more sagacious. Well, who made him +more persevering or more sagacious than others? That power of endurance, +that quickness of apprehension, that calmness of judgment, which enable +him to seize the opportunities that others lose, and persist in the +lines of conduct in which others fail--are these not talents?--are they +not, in the present state of the world, among the most distinguished and +influential of mental gifts? And is it not wonderful, that while we +should be utterly ashamed to use a superiority of body, in order to +thrust our weaker companions aside from some place of advantage, we +unhesitatingly use our superiorities of mind to thrust them back from +whatever good that strength of mind can attain? You would be indignant +if you saw a strong man walk into a theatre or a lecture-room, and, +calmly choosing the best place, take his feeble neighbour by the +shoulder, and turn him out of it into the back seats, or the street. You +would be equally indignant if you saw a stout fellow thrust himself up +to a table where some hungry children were being fed, and reach his arm +over their heads and take their bread from them. But you are not the +least indignant if, when a man has stoutness of thought and swiftness of +capacity, and, instead of being long-armed only, has the much greater +gift of being long-headed--you think it perfectly just that he should +use his intellect to take the bread out of the mouths of all the other +men in the town who are of the same trade with him; or use his breadth +and sweep of sight to gather some branch of the commerce of the country +into one great cobweb, of which he is himself to be the central spider, +making every thread vibrate with the points of his claws, and commanding +every avenue with the facets of his eyes. You see no injustice in this. + + +118. But there is injustice; and, let us trust, one of which honourable +men will at no very distant period disdain to be guilty. In some degree, +however, it is indeed not unjust; in some degree, it is necessary and +intended. It is assuredly just that idleness should be surpassed by +energy; that the widest influence should be possessed by those who are +best able to wield it; and that a wise man, at the end of his career, +should be better off than a fool. But for that reason, is the fool to be +wretched, utterly crushed down, and left in all the suffering which his +conduct and capacity naturally inflict?--Not so. What do you suppose +fools were made for? That you might tread upon them, and starve them, +and get the better of them in every possible way? By no means. They were +made that wise people might take care of them. That is the true and +plain fact concerning the relations of every strong and wise man to the +world about him. He has his strength given him, not that he may crush +the weak, but that he may support and guide them. In his own household +he is to be the guide and the support of his children; out of his +household he is still to be the father--that is, the guide and +support--of the weak and the poor; not merely of the meritoriously weak +and the innocently poor, but of the guiltily and punishably poor; of the +men who ought to have known better--of the poor who ought to be ashamed +of themselves. It is nothing to give pension and cottage to the widow +who has lost her son; it is nothing to give food and medicine to the +workman who has broken his arm, or the decrepit woman wasting in +sickness. But it is something to use your time and strength to war with +the waywardness and thoughtlessness of mankind; to keep the erring +workman in your service till you have made him an unerring one; and to +direct your fellow-merchant to the opportunity which his dulness would +have lost. This is much; but it is yet more, when you have fully +achieved the superiority which is due to you, and acquired the wealth +which is the fitting reward of your sagacity, if you solemnly accept the +responsibility of it, as it is the helm and guide of labour far and +near. + + +119. For you who have it in your hands are in reality the pilots of the +power and effort of the State. It is entrusted to you as an authority to +be used for good or evil, just as completely as kingly authority was +ever given to a prince, or military command to a captain. And, according +to the quantity of it that you have in your hands, you are the arbiters +of the will and work of England; and the whole issue, whether the work +of the State shall suffice for the State or not, depends upon you. You +may stretch out your sceptre over the heads of the English labourers, +and say to them, as they stoop to its waving, "Subdue this obstacle that +has baffled our fathers, put away this plague that consumes our +children; water these dry places, plough these desert ones, carry this +food to those who are in hunger; carry this light to those who are in +darkness; carry this life to those who are in death;" or on the other +side you may say to her labourers: "Here am I; this power is in my hand; +come, build a mound here for me to be throned upon, high and wide; come, +make crowns for my head, that men may see them shine from far away; +come, weave tapestries for my feet, that I may tread softly on the silk +and purple; come, dance before me, that I may be gay; and sing sweetly +to me, that I may slumber; so shall I live in joy, and die in honour." +And better than such an honourable death it were that the day had +perished wherein we were born, and the night in which it was said there +is a child conceived. + + +120. I trust that in a little while there will be few of our rich men +who, through carelessness or covetousness, thus forfeit the glorious +office which is intended for their hands. I said, just now, that wealth +ill-used was as the net of the spider, entangling and destroying: but +wealth well used is as the net of the sacred fisher who gathers souls of +men out of the deep. A time will come--I do not think even now it is +far from us--when this golden net of the world's wealth will be spread +abroad as the flaming meshes of morning cloud are over the sky; bearing +with them the joy of light and the dew of the morning, as well as the +summons to honourable and peaceful toil. What less can we hope from your +wealth than this, rich men of England, when once you feel fully how, by +the strength of your possessions--not, observe, by the exhaustion, but +by the administration of them and the power,--you can direct the +acts--command the energies--inform the ignorance--prolong the existence, +of the whole human race; and how, even of worldly wisdom, which man +employs faithfully, it is true, not only that her ways are pleasantness, +but that her paths are peace; and that, for all the children of men, as +well as for those to whom she is given, Length of days is in her right +hand, as in her left hand Riches and Honour? + + + + +ADDENDA + +Note, p. 18.--"_Fatherly authority._" + + +121. This statement could not, of course, be heard without displeasure +by a certain class of politicians; and in one of the notices of these +lectures given in the Manchester journals at the time, endeavour was +made to get quit of it by referring to the Divine authority, as the only +Paternal power with respect to which men were truly styled "brethren." +Of course it is so, and, equally of course, all human government is +nothing else than the executive expression of this Divine authority. The +moment government ceases to be the practical enforcement of Divine law, +it is tyranny; and the meaning which I attach to the words "paternal +government," is, in more extended terms, simply this--"The executive +fulfilment, by formal human methods, of the will of the Father of +mankind respecting His children." I could not give such a definition of +Government as this in a popular lecture; and even in written form, it +will necessarily suggest many objections, of which I must notice and +answer the most probable. + +Only, in order to avoid the recurrence of such tiresome phrases as "it +may be answered in the second place," and "it will be objected in the +third place," etc., I will ask the reader's leave to arrange the +discussion in the form of simple dialogue, letting _O._ stand for +objector, and _R._ for response. + + +122. _O._--You define your paternal government to be the executive +fulfilment, by formal human methods, of the Divine will. But, assuredly, +that will cannot stand in need of aid or expression from human laws. It +cannot fail of its fulfilment. + + +_R._ 122. In the final sense it cannot; and in that sense, men who are +committing murder and stealing are fulfilling the will of God as much as +the best and kindest people in the world. But in the limited and present +sense, the only sense with which _we_ have anything to do, God's will +concerning man is fulfilled by some men, and thwarted by others. And +those men who either persuade or enforce the doing of it, stand towards +those who are rebellious against it exactly in the position of faithful +children in a family, who, when the father is out of sight, either +compel or persuade the rest to do as their father would have them, were +he present; and in so far as they are expressing and maintaining, for +the time, the paternal authority, they exercise, in the exact sense in +which I mean the phrase to be understood, paternal government over the +rest. + +_O._--But, if Providence has left a liberty to man in many things in +order to prove him, why should human law abridge that liberty, and take +upon itself to compel what the great Lawgiver does not compel? + + +123. _R._--It is confessed, in the enactment of any law whatsoever, that +human lawgivers have a right to do this. For, if you have no right to +abridge any of the liberty which Providence has left to man, you have no +right to punish any one for committing murder or robbery. You ought to +leave them to the punishment of God and Nature. But if you think +yourself under obligation to punish, as far as human laws can, the +violation of the will of God by these great sins, you are certainly +under the same obligation to punish, with proportionately less +punishment, the violation of His will in less sins. + +_O._--No; you must not attempt to punish less sins by law, because you +cannot properly define nor ascertain them. Everybody can determine +whether murder has been committed or not, but you cannot determine how +far people have been unjust or cruel in minor matters, and therefore +cannot make or execute laws concerning minor matters. + +_R._--If I propose to you to punish faults which cannot be defined, or +to execute laws which cannot be made equitable, reject the laws I +propose. But do not generally object to the principle of law. + +_O._--Yes; I generally object to the principle of law as applied to +minor things; because, if you could succeed (which you cannot) in +regulating the entire conduct of men by law in little things as well as +great, you would take away from human life all its probationary +character, and render many virtues and pleasures impossible. You would +reduce virtue to the movement of a machine, instead of the act of a +spirit. + + +124. _R._--You have just said, parenthetically, and I fully and +willingly admit it, that it is impossible to regulate all minor matters +by law. Is it not probable, therefore, that the degree in which it is +_possible_ to regulate them by it, is also the degree in which it is +_right_ to regulate them by it? Or what other means of judgment will you +employ, to separate the things which ought to be formally regulated from +the things which ought not? You admit that great sins should be legally +repressed; but you say that small sins should not be legally repressed. +How do you distinguish between great and small sins? and how do you +intend to determine, or do you in practice of daily life determine, on +what occasions you should compel people to do right, and on what +occasions you should leave them the option of doing wrong? + +_O._--I think you cannot make any accurate or logical distinction in +such matters; but that common sense and instinct have, in all civilised +nations, indicated certain crimes of great social harmfulness, such as +murder, theft, adultery, slander, and such like, which it is proper to +repress legally; and that common sense and instinct indicate also the +kind of crimes which it is proper for laws to let alone, such as +miserliness, ill-natured speaking, and many of those commercial +dishonesties which I have a notion you want your paternal government to +interfere with. + +_R._--Pray do not alarm yourself about what my paternal government is +likely to interfere with, but keep to the matter in hand. You say that +"common sense and instinct" have, in all civilised nations, +distinguished between the sins that ought to be legally dealt with and +that ought not. Do you mean that the laws of all civilised nations are +perfect? + +_O._--No; certainly not. + +_R._--Or that they are perfect at least in their discrimination of what +crimes they should deal with, and what crimes they should let alone? + +_O._--No; not exactly. + +_R._--What _do_ you mean, then? + + +125. _O._--I mean that the general tendency is right in the laws of +civilised nations; and that, in due course of time, natural sense and +instinct point out the matters they should be brought to bear upon. And +each question of legislation must be made a separate subject of inquiry +as it presents itself: you cannot fix any general principles about what +should be dealt with legally, and what should not. + +_R._--Supposing it to be so, do you think there are any points in which +our English legislation is capable of amendment, as it bears on +commercial and economical matters, in this present time? + +_O._--Of course I do. + +_R._--Well, then, let us discuss these together quietly; and if the +points that I want amended seem to you incapable of amendment, or not in +need of amendment, say so: but don't object, at starting, to the mere +proposition of applying law to things which have not had law applied to +them before. You have admitted the fitness of my expression, "paternal +government": it only has been, and remains, a question between us, how +far such government should extend. Perhaps you would like it only to +regulate, among the children, the length of their lessons; and perhaps I +should like it also to regulate the hardness of their cricket-balls: but +cannot you wait quietly till you know what I want it to do, before +quarrelling with the thing itself? + +_O._--No; I cannot wait quietly; in fact, I don't see any use in +beginning such a discussion at all, because I am quite sure from the +first, that you want to meddle with things that you have no business +with, and to interfere with healthy liberty of action in all sorts of +ways; and I know that you can't propose any laws that would be of real +use.[15] + +[Note 15: If the reader is displeased with me for putting this +foolish speech into his mouth, I entreat his pardon; but he may be +assured that it is a speech which would be made by many people, and the +substance of which would be tacitly felt by many more, at this point of +the discussion. I have really tried, up to this point, to make the +objector as intelligent a person as it is possible for an author to +imagine anybody to be who differs with him.] + + +126. _R._--If you indeed know that, you would be wrong to hear me any +farther. But if you are only in painful doubt about me, which makes you +unwilling to run the risk of wasting your time, I will tell you +beforehand what I really do think about this same liberty of action, +namely, that whenever we can make a perfectly equitable law about any +matter, or even a law securing, on the whole, more just conduct than +unjust, we ought to make that law; and that there will yet, on these +conditions, always remain a number of matters respecting which legalism +and formalism are impossible; enough, and more than enough, to exercise +all human powers of individual judgment, and afford all kinds of scope +to individual character. I think this; but of course it can only be +proved by separate examination of the possibilities of formal restraint +in each given field of action; and these two lectures are nothing more +than a sketch of such a detailed examination in one field, namely, that +of art. You will find, however, one or two other remarks on such +possibilities in the next note. + + * * * * * + +Note 2nd, p. 21.--"_Right to public support._" + + +127. It did not appear to me desirable, in the course of the spoken +lecture, to enter into details or offer suggestions on the questions of +the regulation of labour and distribution of relief, as it would have +been impossible to do so without touching on many disputed or disputable +points, not easily handled before a general audience. But I must now +supply what is wanting to make my general statement clear. + +I believe, in the first place, that no Christian nation has any business +to see one of its members in distress without helping him, though, +perhaps, at the same time punishing him: help, of course--in nine cases +out of ten--meaning guidance, much more than gift, and, therefore, +interference with liberty. When a peasant mother sees one of her +careless children fall into a ditch, her first proceeding is to pull him +out; her second, to box his ears; her third, ordinarily, to lead him +carefully a little way by the hand, or send him home for the rest of the +day. The child usually cries, and very often would clearly prefer +remaining in the ditch; and if he understood any of the terms of +politics, would certainly express resentment at the interference with +his individual liberty: but the mother has done her duty. Whereas the +usual call of the mother nation to any of her children, under such +circumstances, has lately been nothing more than the foxhunter's,--"Stay +still there; I shall clear you." And if we always _could_ clear them, +their requests to be left in muddy independence might be sometimes +allowed by kind people, or their cries for help disdained by unkind +ones. But we can't clear them. The whole nation is, in fact, bound +together, as men are by ropes on a glacier--if one falls, the rest must +either lift him or drag him along with them[16] as dead weight, not +without much increase of danger to themselves. And the law of right +being manifestly in this--as, whether manifestly or not, it is always, +the law of prudence--the only question is, how this wholesome help and +interference are to be administered. + +[Note 16: It is very curious to watch the efforts of two +shop-keepers to ruin each other, neither having the least idea that his +ruined neighbour must eventually be supported at his own expense, with +an increase of poor rates; and that the contest between them is not in +reality which shall get everything for himself, but which shall first +take upon himself and his customers the gratuitous maintenance of the +other's family.] + + +128. The first interference should be in education. In order that men +may be able to support themselves when they are grown, their strength +must be properly developed while they are young; and the State should +always see to this--not allowing their health to be broken by too early +labour, nor their powers to be wasted for want of knowledge. Some +questions connected with this matter are noticed farther on under the +head "trial schools": one point I must notice here, that I believe all +youths, of whatever rank, ought to learn some manual trade thoroughly; +for it is quite wonderful how much a man's views of life are cleared by +the attainment of the capacity of doing any one thing well with his +hands and arms. For a long time, what right life there was in the upper +classes of Europe depended in no small degree on the necessity which +each man was under of being able to fence; at this day, the most useful +things which boys learn at public schools are, I believe, riding, +rowing, and cricketing. But it would be far better that members of +Parliament should be able to plough straight, and make a horseshoe, than +only to feather oars neatly or point their toes prettily in stirrups. +Then, in literary and scientific teaching, the great point of economy is +to give the discipline of it through knowledge which will immediately +bear on practical life. Our literary work has long been economically +useless to us because too much concerned with dead languages; and our +scientific work will yet, for some time, be a good deal lost, because +scientific men are too fond or too vain of their systems, and waste the +student's time in endeavouring to give him large views, and make him +perceive interesting connections of facts; when there is not one +student, no, nor one man, in a thousand, who can feel the beauty of a +system, or even take it clearly into his head; but nearly all men can +understand, and most will be interested in, the facts which bear on +daily life. Botanists have discovered some wonderful connection between +nettles and figs, which a cowboy who will never see a ripe fig in his +life need not be at all troubled about; but it will be interesting to +him to know what effect nettles have on hay, and what taste they will +give to porridge; and it will give him nearly a new life if he can be +got but once, in a spring time, to look well at the beautiful circlet of +white nettle blossom, and work out with his schoolmaster the curves of +its petals, and the way it is set on its central mast. So, the principle +of chemical equivalents, beautiful as it is, matters far less to a +peasant boy, and even to most sons of gentlemen, than their knowing how +to find whether the water is wholesome in the back-kitchen cistern, or +whether the seven-acre field wants sand or chalk. + + +129. Having, then, directed the studies of our youth so as to make them +practically serviceable men at the time of their entrance into life, +that entrance should always be ready for them in cases where their +private circumstances present no opening. There ought to be government +establishments for every trade, in which all youths who desired it +should be received as apprentices on their leaving school; and men +thrown out of work received at all times. At these government +manufactories the discipline should be strict, and the wages steady, not +varying at all in proportion to the demand for the article, but only in +proportion to the price of food; the commodities produced being laid up +in store to meet sudden demands, and sudden fluctuations in prices +prevented:--that gradual and necessary fluctuation only being allowed +which is properly consequent on larger or more limited supply of raw +material and other natural causes. When there was a visible tendency to +produce a glut of any commodity, that tendency should be checked by +directing the youth at the government schools into other trades; and the +yearly surplus of commodities should be the principal means of +government provisions for the poor. That provision should be large, and +not disgraceful to them. At present there are very strange notions in +the public mind respecting the receiving of alms: most people are +willing to take them in the form of a pension from government, but +unwilling to take them in the form of a pension from their parishes. +There may be some reason for this singular prejudice, in the fact of the +government pension being usually given as a definite acknowledgment of +some service done to the country;--but the parish pension is, or ought +to be, given precisely on the same terms. A labourer serves his country +with his spade, just as a man in the middle ranks of life serves it with +his sword, pen, or lancet: if the service is less, and therefore the +wages during health less, then the reward, when health is broken, may be +less, but not, therefore, less honourable; and it ought to be quite as +natural and straight-forward a matter for a labourer to take his +pension from his parish, because he has deserved well of his parish, as +for a man in higher rank to take his pension from his country, because +he has deserved well of his country. + + +130. If there be any disgrace in coming to the parish, because it may +imply improvidence in early life, much more is there disgrace in coming +to the government: since improvidence is far less justifiable in a +highly educated than in an imperfectly educated man; and far less +justifiable in a high rank, where extravagance must have been luxury, +than in a low rank, where it may only have been comfort. So that the +real fact of the matter is, that people will take alms delightedly, +consisting of a carriage and footmen, because those do not look like +alms to the people in the street; but they will not take alms consisting +only of bread and water and coals, because everybody would understand +what those meant. Mind, I do not want any one to refuse the carriage who +ought to have it; but neither do I want them to refuse the coals. I +should indeed be sorry if any change in our views on these subjects +involved the least lessening of self-dependence in the English mind: but +the common shrinking of men from the acceptance of public charity is +not self-dependence, but mere base and selfish pride. It is not that +they are unwilling to live at their neighbours' expense, but that they +are unwilling to confess they do: it is not dependence they wish to +avoid, but gratitude. They will take places in which they know there is +nothing to be done--they will borrow money they know they cannot +repay--they will carry on a losing business with other people's +capital--they will cheat the public in their shops, or sponge on their +friends at their houses; but to say plainly they are poor men, who need +the nation's help and go into an almshouse,--this they loftily +repudiate, and virtuously prefer being thieves to being paupers. + + +131. I trust that these deceptive efforts of dishonest men to appear +independent, and the agonizing efforts of unfortunate men to remain +independent, may both be in some degree checked by a better +administration and understanding of laws respecting the poor. But the +ordinances for relief and the ordinances for labour must go together; +otherwise distress caused by misfortune will always be confounded, as +it is now, with distress caused by idleness, unthrift, and fraud. It is +only when the State watches and guides the middle life of men, that it +can, without disgrace to them, protect their old age, acknowledging in +that protection that they have done their duty, or at least some portion +of their duty, in better days. + +I know well how strange, fanciful, or impracticable these suggestions +will appear to most of the business men of this day; men who conceive +the proper state of the world to be simply that of a vast and +disorganized mob, scrambling each for what he can get, trampling down +its children and old men in the mire, and doing what work it finds +_must_ be done with any irregular squad of labourers it can bribe or +inveigle together, and afterwards scatter to starvation. A great deal +may, indeed, be done in this way by a nation strong-elbowed and +strong-hearted as we are--not easily frightened by pushing, nor +discouraged by falls. But it is still not the right way of doing things, +for people who call themselves Christians. Every so named soul of man +claims from every other such soul, protection and education in +childhood,--help or punishment in middle life,--reward or relief, if +needed, in old age; all of these should be completely and unstintingly +given; and they can only be given by the organization of such a system +as I have described. + + * * * * * + + +Note 3rd, p. 27.--"_Trial Schools._" + + +132. It may be seriously questioned by the reader how much of painting +talent we really lose on our present system,[17] and how much we should +gain by the proposed trial schools. For it might be thought that, as +matters stand at present, we have more painters than we ought to have, +having so many bad ones, and that all youths who had true painters' +genius forced their way out of obscurity. + +[Note 17: It will be observed that, in the lecture, it is _assumed_ +that works of art are national treasures; and that it is desirable to +withdraw all the hands capable of painting or carving from other +employments, in order that they may produce this kind of wealth. I do +not, in assuming this, mean that works of art add to the monetary +resources of a nation, or form part of its wealth, in the vulgar sense. +The result of the sale of a picture in the country itself is merely that +a certain sum of money is transferred from the hands of B, the +purchaser, to those of A, the producer; the sum ultimately to be +distributed remaining the same, only A ultimately spending it instead of +B, while the labour of A has been in the meantime withdrawn from +productive channels; he has painted a picture which nobody can live +upon, or live in, when he might have grown corn or built houses: when +the sale therefore is effected in the country itself, it does not add +to, but diminishes, the monetary resources of the country, except only +so far as it may appear probable, on other grounds, that A is likely to +spend the sum he receives for his picture more rationally and usefully +than B would have spent it. If, indeed, the picture, or other work of +art, be sold in foreign countries, either the money or the useful +products of the foreign country being imported in exchange for it, such +sale adds to the monetary resources of the selling, and diminishes those +of the purchasing nation. But sound political economy, strange as it may +at first appear to say so, has nothing whatever to do with separations +between national interests. Political economy means the management of +the affairs of _citizens_; and it either regards exclusively the +administration of the affairs of one nation, or the administration of +the affairs of the world considered as one nation. So when a transaction +between individuals which enriches A impoverishes B in precisely the +same degree, the sound economist considers it an unproductive +transaction between the individuals; and if a trade between two nations +which enriches one, impoverishes the other in the same degree, the sound +economist considers it an unproductive trade between the nations. It is +not a general question of political economy, but only a particular +question of local expediency, whether an article, in itself valueless, +may bear a value of exchange in transactions with some other nation. The +economist considers only the actual value of the thing done or produced; +and if he sees a quantity of labour spent, for instance, by the Swiss, +in producing woodwork for sale to the English, he at once sets the +commercial impoverishment of the English purchaser against the +commercial enrichment of the Swiss seller; and considers the whole +transaction productive only as far as the woodwork itself is a real +addition to the wealth of the world. For the arrangement of the laws of +a nation so as to procure the greatest advantages to itself, and leave +the smallest advantages to other nations, is not a part of the science +of political economy, but merely a broad application of the science of +fraud. Considered thus in the abstract, pictures are not an _addition_ +to the monetary wealth of the world, except in the amount of pleasure or +instruction to be got out of them day by day: but there is a certain +protective effect on wealth exercised by works of high art which must +always be included in the estimate of their value. Generally speaking, +persons who decorate their houses with pictures will not spend so much +money in papers, carpets, curtains, or other expensive and perishable +luxuries as they would otherwise. Works of good art, like books, +exercise a conservative effect on the rooms they are kept in; and the +wall of the library or picture gallery remains undisturbed, when those +of other rooms are repapered or re-panelled. Of course this effect is +still more definite when the picture is on the walls themselves, either +on canvas stretched into fixed shapes on their panels, or in fresco; +involving, of course, the preservation of the building from all +unnecessary and capricious alteration. And, generally speaking, the +occupation of a large number of hands in painting or sculpture in any +nation may be considered as tending to check the disposition to indulge +in perishable luxury. I do not, however, in my assumption that works of +art are treasures, take much into consideration this collateral monetary +result. I consider them treasures, merely as permanent means of pleasure +and instruction; and having at other times tried to show the several +ways in which they can please and teach, assume here that they are thus +useful, and that it is desirable to make as many painters as we can.] + +This is not so. It is difficult to analyse the characters of mind which +cause youths to mistake their vocation, and to endeavour to become +artists, when they have no true artist's gift. But the fact is, that +multitudes of young men do this, and that by far the greater number of +living artists are men who have mistaken their vocation. The peculiar +circumstances of modern life, which exhibit art in almost every form to +the sight of the youths in our great cities, have a natural tendency to +fill their imaginations with borrowed ideas, and their minds with +imperfect science; the mere dislike of mechanical employments, either +felt to be irksome, or believed to be degrading, urges numbers of young +men to become painters, in the same temper in which they would enlist or +go to sea; others, the sons of engravers or artists, taught the business +of the art by their parents, and having no gift for it themselves, +follow it as the means of livelihood, in an ignoble patience; or, if +ambitious, seek to attract regard, or distance rivalry, by fantastic, +meretricious, or unprecedented applications of their mechanical skill; +while finally, many men, earnest in feeling, and conscientious in +principle, mistake their desire to be useful for a love of art, and +their quickness of emotion for its capacity, and pass their lives in +painting moral and instructive pictures, which might almost justify us +in thinking nobody could be a painter but a rogue. On the other hand, I +believe that much of the best artistical intellect is daily lost in +other avocations. Generally, the temper which would make an admirable +artist is humble and observant, capable of taking much interest in +little things, and of entertaining itself pleasantly in the dullest +circumstances. Suppose, added to these characters, a steady +conscientiousness which seeks to do its duty wherever it may be placed, +and the power, denied to few artistical minds, of ingenious invention in +almost any practical department of human skill, and it can hardly be +doubted that the very humility and conscientiousness which would have +perfected the painter, have in many instances prevented his becoming +one; and that in the quiet life of our steady craftsmen--sagacious +manufacturers, and uncomplaining clerks--there may frequently be +concealed more genius than ever is raised to the direction of our +public works, or to be the mark of our public praises. + + +133. It is indeed probable, that intense disposition for art will +conquer the most formidable obstacles, if the surrounding circumstances +are such as at all to present the idea of such conquest to the mind; but +we have no ground for concluding that Giotto would ever have been more +than a shepherd, if Cimabue had not by chance found him drawing; or that +among the shepherds of the Apennines there were no other Giottos, +undiscovered by Cimabue. We are too much in the habit of considering +happy accidents as what are called 'special Providences'; and thinking +that when any great work needs to be done, the man who is to do it will +certainly be pointed out by Providence, be he shepherd or seaboy; and +prepared for his work by all kinds of minor providences, in the best +possible way. Whereas all the analogies of God's operations in other +matters prove the contrary of this; we find that "of thousand seeds, He +often brings but one to bear," often not one; and the one seed which He +appoints to bear is allowed to bear crude or perfect fruit according to +the dealings of the husbandman with it. And there cannot be a doubt in +the mind of any person accustomed to take broad and logical views of the +world's history, that its events are ruled by Providence in precisely +the same manner as its harvests; that the seeds of good and evil are +broadcast among men, just as the seeds of thistles and fruits are; and +that according to the force of our industry, and wisdom of our +husbandry, the ground will bring forth to us figs or thistles. So that +when it seems needed that a certain work should be done for the world, +and no man is there to do it, we have no right to say that God did not +wish it to be done; and therefore sent no men able to do it. The +probability (if I wrote my own convictions, I should say certainty) is, +that He sent many men, hundreds of men, able to do it; and that we have +rejected them, or crushed them; by our previous folly of conduct or of +institution, we have rendered it impossible to distinguish, or +impossible to reach them; and when the need for them comes, and we +suffer for the want of them, it is not that God refuses to send us +deliverers, and specially appoints all our consequent sufferings; but +that He has sent, and we have refused, the deliverers; and the pain is +then wrought out by His eternal law, as surely as famine is wrought out +by eternal law for a nation which will neither plough nor sow. No less +are we in error in supposing, as we so frequently do, that if a man be +found, he is sure to be in all respects fitted for the work to be done, +as the key is to the lock: and that every accident which happened in the +forging him, only adapted him more truly to the wards. It is pitiful to +hear historians beguiling themselves and their readers, by tracing in +the early history of great men the minor circumstances which fitted them +for the work they did, without ever taking notice of the other +circumstances which as assuredly unfitted them for it; so concluding +that miraculous interposition prepared them in all points for +everything, and that they did all that could have been desired or hoped +for from them; whereas the certainty of the matter is that, throughout +their lives, they were thwarted and corrupted by some things as +certainly as they were helped and disciplined by others; and that, in +the kindliest and most reverent view which can justly be taken of them, +they were but poor mistaken creatures, struggling with a world more +profoundly mistaken than they;--assuredly sinned against or sinning in +thousands of ways, and bringing out at last a maimed result--not what +they might or ought to have done, but all that could be done against the +world's resistance, and in spite of their own sorrowful falsehood to +themselves. + + +134. And this being so, it is the practical duty of a wise nation, first +to withdraw, as far as may be, its youth from destructive +influences;--then to try its material as far as possible, and to lose +the use of none that is good. I do not mean by "withdrawing from +destructive influences" the keeping of youths out of trials; but the +keeping them out of the way of things purely and absolutely mischievous. +I do not mean that we should shade our green corn in all heat, and +shelter it in all frost, but only that we should dyke out the inundation +from it, and drive the fowls away from it. Let your youth labour and +suffer; but do not let it starve, nor steal, nor blaspheme. + + +135. It is not, of course, in my power here to enter into details of +schemes of education; and it will be long before the results of +experiments now in progress will give data for the solution of the most +difficult questions connected with the subject, of which the principal +one is the mode in which the chance of advancement in life is to be +extended to all, and yet made compatible with contentment in the pursuit +of lower avocations by those whose abilities do not qualify them for the +higher. But the general principle of trial schools lies at the root of +the matter--of schools, that is to say, in which the knowledge offered +and discipline enforced shall be all a part of a great assay of the +human soul, and in which the one shall be increased, the other directed, +as the tried heart and brain will best bear, and no otherwise. One +thing, however, I must say, that in this trial I believe all emulation +to be a false motive, and all giving of prizes a false means. All that +you can depend upon in a boy, as significative of true power, likely to +issue in good fruit, is his will to work for the work's sake, not his +desire to surpass his school-fellows; and the aim of the teaching you +give him ought to be, to prove to him and strengthen in him his own +separate gift, not to puff him into swollen rivalry with those who are +everlastingly greater than he: still less ought you to hang favours and +ribands about the neck of the creature who is the greatest, to make the +rest envy him. Try to make them love him and follow him, not struggle +with him. + + +136. There must, of course, be examination to ascertain and attest both +progress and relative capacity; but our aim should be to make the +students rather look upon it as a means of ascertaining their own true +positions and powers in the world, than as an arena in which to carry +away a present victory. I have not, perhaps, in the course of the +lecture, insisted enough on the nature of relative capacity and +individual character, as the roots of all real _value_ in Art. We are +too much in the habit, in these days, of acting as if Art worth a price +in the market were a commodity which people could be generally taught to +produce, and as if the _education_ of the artist, not his _capacity_, +gave the sterling value to his work. No impression can possibly be more +absurd or false. Whatever people can teach each other to do, they will +estimate, and ought to estimate, only as common industry; nothing will +ever fetch a high price but precisely that which cannot be taught, and +which nobody can do but the man from whom it is purchased. No state of +society, nor stage of knowledge, ever does away with the natural +pre-eminence of one man over another; and it is that pre-eminence, and +that only, which will give work high value in the market, or which ought +to do so. It is a bad sign of the judgment, and bad omen for the +progress, of a nation, if it supposes itself to possess many artists of +equal merit. Noble art is nothing less than the expression of a great +soul; and great souls are not common things. If ever we confound their +work with that of others, it is not through liberality, but through +blindness. + + * * * * * + + +Note 4th, p. 28.--"_Public favour._" + + +137. There is great difficulty in making any short or general statement +of the difference between great and ignoble minds in their behaviour to +the 'public.' It is by no means _universally_ the case that a mean mind, +as stated in the text, will bend itself to what you ask of it: on the +contrary, there is one kind of mind, the meanest of all, which +perpetually complains of the public, and contemplates and proclaims +itself as a 'genius,' refuses all wholesome discipline or humble office, +and ends in miserable and revengeful ruin; also, the greatest minds are +marked by nothing more distinctly than an inconceivable humility, and +acceptance of work or instruction in any form, and from any quarter. +They will learn from everybody, and do anything that anybody asks of +them, so long as it involves only toil, or what other men would think +degradation. But the point of quarrel, nevertheless, assuredly rises +some day between the public and them, respecting some matter, not of +humiliation, but of Fact. Your great man always at last comes to see +something the public don't see. This something he will assuredly persist +in asserting, whether with tongue or pencil, to be as _he_ sees it, not +as _they_ see it; and all the world in a heap on the other side, will +not get him to say otherwise. Then, if the world objects to the saying, +he may happen to get stoned or burnt for it, but that does not in the +least matter to him; if the world has no particular objection to the +saying, he may get leave to mutter it to himself till he dies, and be +merely taken for an idiot; that also does not matter to him--mutter it +he will, according to what he perceives to be fact, and not at all +according to the roaring of the walls of Red Sea on the right hand or +left of him. Hence the quarrel, sure at some time or other to be started +between the public and him; while your mean man, though he will spit and +scratch spiritedly at the public, while it does not attend to him, will +bow to it for its clap in any direction, and say anything when he has +got its ear, which he thinks will bring him another clap; and thus, as +stated in the text, he and it go on smoothly together. + +There are, however, times when the obstinacy of the mean man looks very +like the obstinacy of the great one; but if you look closely into the +matter, you will always see that the obstinacy of the first is in the +pronunciation of "I;" and of the second, in the pronunciation of "It." + + * * * * * + + +Note 5th, p. 56.--"_Invention of new wants._" + + +138. It would have been impossible for political economists long to have +endured the error spoken of in the text,[18] had they not been confused +by an idea, in part well founded, that the energies and refinements, as +well as the riches of civilised life, arose from imaginary wants. It is +quite true, that the savage who knows no needs but those of food, +shelter, and sleep, and after he has snared his venison and patched the +rents of his hut, passes the rest of his time in animal repose, is in a +lower state than the man who labours incessantly that he may procure for +himself the luxuries of civilisation; and true also, that the difference +between one and another nation in progressive power depends in great +part on vain desires; but these idle motives are merely to be +considered as giving exercise to the national body and mind; they are +not sources of wealth, except so far as they give the habits of industry +and acquisitiveness. If a boy is clumsy and lazy, we shall do good if we +can persuade him to carve cherry-stones and fly kites; and this use of +his fingers and limbs may eventually be the cause of his becoming a +wealthy and happy man; but we must not therefore argue that +cherry-stones are valuable property, or that kite-flying is a profitable +mode of passing time. In like manner, a nation always wastes its time +and labour _directly_, when it invents a new want of a frivolous kind, +and yet the invention of such a want may be the sign of a healthy +activity, and the labour undergone to satisfy the new want may lead, +_indirectly_, to useful discoveries or to noble arts; so that a nation +is not to be discouraged in its fancies when it is either too weak or +foolish to be moved to exertion by anything but fancies, or has attended +to its serious business first. If a nation will not forge iron, but +likes distilling lavender, by all means give it lavender to distil; only +do not let its economists suppose that lavender is as profitable to it +as oats, or that it helps poor people to live, any more than the +schoolboy's kite provides him his dinner. Luxuries, whether national or +personal, must be paid for by labour withdrawn from useful things; and +no nation has a right to indulge in them until all its poor are +comfortably housed and fed. + +[Note 18: I have given the political economist too much credit in +saying this. Actually, while these sheets are passing through the press, +the blunt, broad, unmitigated fallacy is enunciated, formally and +precisely, by the common councilmen of New York, in their report on the +present commercial crisis. Here is their collective opinion, published +in the _Times_ of November 23rd, 1857:--"Another erroneous idea is that +luxurious living, extravagant dressing, splendid turn-outs and fine +houses, are the cause of distress to a nation. No more erroneous +impression could exist. Every extravagance that the man of 100,000 or +1,000,000 dollars indulges in adds to the means, the support, the wealth +of ten or a hundred who had little or nothing else but their labour, +their intellect, or their taste. If a man of 1,000,000 dollars spends +principal and interest in ten years, and finds himself beggared at the +end of that time, he has actually made a hundred who have catered to his +extravagance, employers or employed, so much richer by the division of +his wealth. He may be ruined, but the nation is better off and richer, +for one hundred minds and hands, with 10,000 dollars apiece, are far +more productive than one with the whole." + +Yes, gentlemen of the common council; but what has been doing in the +time of the transfer? The spending of the fortune has taken a certain +number of years (suppose ten), and during that time 1,000,000 dollars' +worth of work has been done by the people, who have been paid that sum +for it. Where is the product of that work? By your own statements, +wholly consumed; for the man for whom it has been done is now a beggar. +You have given therefore, as a nation, 1,000,000 dollars' worth of work, +and ten years of time, and you have produced, as ultimate result, one +beggar. Excellent economy, gentlemen! and sure to conduce, in due +sequence, to the production of _more_ than one beggar. Perhaps the +matter may be made clearer to you, however, by a more familiar instance. +If a schoolboy goes out in the morning with five shillings in his +pocket, and comes home penniless, having spent his all in tarts, +principal and interest are gone, and fruiterer and baker are enriched. +So far so good. But suppose the schoolboy, instead, has bought a book +and a knife; principal and interest are gone, and book-seller and cutler +are enriched. But the schoolboy is enriched also, and may help his +school-fellows next day with knife and book, instead of lying in bed and +incurring a debt to the doctor.] + + +139. The enervating influence of luxury, and its tendencies to increase +vice, are points which I keep entirely out of consideration in the +present essay; but, so far as they bear on any question discussed, they +merely furnish additional evidence on the side which I have taken. Thus, +in the present case, I assume that the luxuries of civilized life are in +possession harmless, and in acquirement serviceable as a motive for +exertion; and even on those favourable terms, we arrive at the +conclusion that the nation ought not to indulge in them except under +severe limitations. Much less ought it to indulge in them if the +temptation consequent on their possession, or fatality incident to their +manufacture, more than counter-balances the good done by the effort to +obtain them. + + * * * * * + + +Note 6th, p. 74.--"_Economy of literature._" + + +140. I have been much impressed lately by one of the results of the +quantity of our books; namely, the stern impossibility of getting +anything understood, that required patience to understand. I observe +always, in the case of my own writings, that if ever I state anything +which has cost me any trouble to ascertain, and which, therefore, will +probably require a minute or two of reflection from the reader before it +can be accepted,--that statement will not only be misunderstood, but in +all probability taken to mean something very nearly the reverse of what +it does mean. Now, whatever faults there may be in my modes of +expression, I know that the words I use will always be found, by +Johnson's dictionary, to bear, first of all, the sense I use them in; +and that the sentences, whether awkwardly turned or not, will, by the +ordinary rules of grammar, bear no other interpretation than that I mean +them to bear; so that the misunderstanding of them must result, +ultimately, from the mere fact that their matter sometimes requires a +little patience. And I see the same kind of misinterpretation put on +the words of other writers, whenever they require the same kind of +thought. + + +141. I was at first a little despondent about this; but, on the whole, I +believe it will have a good effect upon our literature for some time to +come; and then, perhaps, the public may recover its patience again. For +certainly it is excellent discipline for an author to feel that he must +say all he has to say in the fewest possible words, or his reader is +sure to skip them; and in the plainest possible words, or his reader +will certainly misunderstand them. Generally, also, a downright fact may +be told in a plain way; and we want downright facts at present more than +anything else. And though I often hear moral people complaining of the +bad effects of want of thought, for my part, it seems to me that one of +the worst diseases to which the human creature is liable is its disease +of thinking. If it would only just _look_[19] at a thing instead of +thinking what it must be like, or _do_ a thing instead of thinking it +cannot be done, we should all get on far better. + +[Note 19: There can be no question, however, of the mischievous +tendency of the hurry of the present day, in the way people undertake +this very _looking_. I gave three years' close and incessant labour to +the examination of the chronology of the architecture of Venice; two +long winters being wholly spent in the drawing of details on the spot; +and yet I see constantly that architects who pass three or four days in +a gondola going up and down the Grand Canal, think that their first +impressions are just as likely to be true as my patiently wrought +conclusions. Mr. Street, for instance, glances hastily at the facade of +the Ducal Palace--so hastily that he does not even see what its pattern +is, and misses the alternation of red and black in the centres of its +squares--and yet he instantly ventures on an opinion on the chronology +of its capitals, which is one of the most complicated and difficult +subjects in the whole range of Gothic archaeology. It may, nevertheless, +be ascertained with very fair probability of correctness by any person +who will give a month's hard work to it, but it can be ascertained no +otherwise.] + + * * * * * + + +Note 7th, p. 147.--"_Pilots of the State._" + + +142. While, however, undoubtedly, these responsibilities attach to every +person possessed of wealth, it is necessary both to avoid any stringency +of statement respecting the benevolent modes of spending money, and to +admit and approve so much liberty of spending it for selfish pleasures +as may distinctly make wealth a personal _reward_ for toil, and secure +in the minds of all men the right of property. For although, without +doubt, the purest pleasures it can procure are not selfish, it is only +as a means of personal gratification that it will be desired by a large +majority of workers; and it would be no less false ethics than false +policy to check their energy by any forms of public opinion which bore +hardly against the wanton expenditure of honestly got wealth. It would +be hard if a man who has passed the greater part of his life at the desk +or counter could not at last innocently gratify a caprice; and all the +best and most sacred ends of almsgiving would be at once disappointed, +if the idea of a moral claim took the place of affectionate gratitude in +the mind of the receiver. + + +143. Some distinction is made by us naturally in this respect between +earned and inherited wealth; that which is inherited appearing to +involve the most definite responsibilities, especially when consisting +in revenues derived from the soil. The form of taxation which +constitutes rental of lands places annually a certain portion of the +national wealth in the hands of the nobles, or other proprietors of the +soil, under conditions peculiarly calculated to induce them to give +their best care to its efficient administration. The want of +instruction in even the simplest principles of commerce and economy, +which hitherto has disgraced our schools and universities, has indeed +been the cause of ruin or total inutility of life to multitudes of our +men of estate; but this deficiency in our public education cannot exist +much longer, and it appears to be highly advantageous for the State that +a certain number of persons distinguished by race should be permitted to +set examples of wise expenditure, whether in the advancement of science, +or in patronage of art and literature; only they must see to it that +they take their right standing more firmly than they have done hitherto, +for the position of a rich man in relation to those around him is, in +our present real life, and is also contemplated generally by political +economists as being, precisely the reverse of what it ought to be. A +rich man ought to be continually examining how he may spend his money +for the advantage of others: at present, others are continually plotting +how they may beguile him into spending it apparently for his own. The +aspect which he presents to the eyes of the world is generally that of +a person holding a bag of money with a staunch grasp, and resolved to +part with none of it unless he is forced, and all the people about him +are plotting how they may force him: that is to say, how they may +persuade him that he wants this thing or that; or how they may produce +things that he will covet and buy. One man tries to persuade him that he +wants perfumes; another that he wants jewellery; another that he wants +sugarplums; another that he wants roses at Christmas. Anybody who can +invent a new want for him is supposed to be a benefactor to society: and +thus the energies of the poorer people about him are continually +directed to the production of covetable, instead of serviceable, things; +and the rich man has the general aspect of a fool, plotted against by +the world. Whereas the real aspect which he ought to have is that of a +person wiser than others, entrusted with the management of a larger +quantity of capital, which he administers for the profit of all, +directing each man to the labour which is most healthy for him, and most +serviceable for the community. + + * * * * * + + +Note 8th, p. 148.--"_Silk and purple._" + + +144. In various places throughout these lectures I have had to allude to +the distinction between productive and unproductive labour, and between +true and false wealth. I shall here endeavour, as clearly as I can, to +explain the distinction I mean. + +Property may be divided generally into two kinds; that which produces +life, and that which produces the objects of life. That which produces +or maintains life consists of food, in so far as it is nourishing; of +furniture and clothing, in so far as they are protective or cherishing; +of fuel; and of all land, instruments, or materials necessary to produce +food, houses, clothes, and fuel. It is specially and rightly called +useful property. + +The property which produces the objects of life consists of all that +gives pleasure or suggests and preserves thought: of food, furniture, +and land, in so far as they are pleasing to the appetite or the eye; of +luxurious dress, and all other kinds of luxuries; of books, pictures, +and architecture. But the modes of connection of certain minor forms of +property with human labour render it desirable to arrange them under +more than these two heads. Property may therefore be conveniently +considered as of five kinds. + + +145. (1) Property necessary to life, but not producible by labour, and +therefore belonging of right, in a due measure, to every human being as +soon as he is born, and morally inalienable. As for instance, his proper +share of the atmosphere, without which he cannot breathe, and of water, +which he needs to quench his thirst. As much land as he needs to feed +from is also inalienable; but in well-regulated communities this +quantity of land may often be represented by other possessions, or its +need supplied by wages and privileges. + +(2) Property necessary to life, but only producible by labour, and of +which the possession is morally connected with labour, so that no person +capable of doing the work necessary for its production has a right to it +until he has done that work;--"he that will not work, neither should he +eat." It consists of simple food, clothing, and habitation, with their +seeds and materials, or instruments and machinery, and animals used for +necessary draught or locomotion, etc. It is to be observed of this kind +of property, that its increase cannot usually be carried beyond a +certain point, because it depends not on labour only, but on things of +which the supply is limited by nature. The possible accumulation of corn +depends on the quantity of corn-growing land possessed or commercially +accessible; and that of steel, similarly on the accessible quantity of +coal and iron-stone. It follows from this natural limitation of supply +that the accumulation of property of this kind in large masses at one +point, or in one person's hands, commonly involves, more or less, the +scarcity of it at another point and in other persons' hands; so that the +accidents or energies which may enable one man to procure a great deal +of it, may, and in all likelihood will, partially prevent other men +procuring a sufficiency of it, however willing they may be to work for +it; therefore, the modes of its accumulation and distribution need to be +in some degree regulated by law and by national treaties, in order to +secure justice to all men. + +Another point requiring notice respecting this sort of property is, that +no work can be wasted in producing it, provided only the kind of it +produced be preservable and distributable, since for every grain of such +commodities we produce we are rendering so much more life possible on +earth.[20] But though we are sure, thus, that we are employing people +well, we cannot be sure we might not have employed them _better_; for it +is possible to direct labour to the production of life, until little or +none is left for that of the objects of life, and thus to increase +population at the expense of civilization, learning, and morality: on +the other hand, it is just as possible--and the error is one to which +the world is, on the whole, more liable--to direct labour to the objects +of life till too little is left for life, and thus to increase luxury or +learning at the expense of population. Right political economy holds its +aim poised justly between the two extremes, desiring neither to crowd +its dominions with a race of savages, nor to found courts and colleges +in the midst of a desert. + +[Note 20: This point has sometimes been disputed; for instance, +opening Mill's 'Political Economy' the other day, I chanced on a passage +in which he says that a man who makes a coat, if the person who wears +the coat does nothing useful while he wears it, has done no more good to +society than the man who has only raised a pineapple. But this is a +fallacy induced by endeavour after too much subtlety. None of us have a +right to say that the life of a man is of no use to _him_, though it may +be of no use to _us_; and the man who made the coat, and thereby +prolonged another man's life, has done a gracious and useful work, +whatever may come of the life so prolonged. We may say to the wearer of +the coat, "You who are wearing coats, and doing nothing in them, are at +present wasting your own life and other people's;" but we have no right +to say that his existence, however wasted, is wasted _away_. It may be +just dragging itself on, in its thin golden line, with nothing dependent +upon it, to the point where it is to strengthen into good chain cable, +and have thousands of other lives dependent on it. Meantime, the simple +fact respecting the coat-maker is, that he has given so much life to the +creature, the results of which he cannot calculate; they may be--in all +probability will be--infinite results in some way. But the raiser of +pines, who has only given a pleasant taste in the mouth to some one, may +see with tolerable clearness to the end of the taste in the mouth, and +of all conceivable results therefrom.] + + +146. (3) The third kind of property is that which conduces to bodily +pleasures and conveniences, without directly tending to sustain life; +perhaps sometimes indirectly tending to destroy it. All dainty (as +distinguished from nourishing) food, and means of producing it; all +scents not needed for health; substances valued only for their +appearance and rarity (as gold and jewels); flowers of difficult +culture; animals used for delight (as horses for racing), and such +like, form property of this class; to which the term 'luxury,' or +'luxuries,' ought exclusively to belong. + +Respecting which we have to note, first, that all such property is of +doubtful advantage even to its possessor. Furniture tempting to +indolence, sweet odours, and luscious food, are more or less injurious +to health: while jewels, liveries, and other such common belongings of +wealthy people, certainly convey no pleasure to their owners +proportionate to their cost. + +Farther, such property, for the most part, perishes in the using. Jewels +form a great exception--but rich food, fine dresses, horses and +carriages, are consumed by the owner's use. It ought much oftener to be +brought to the notice of rich men what sums of interest of money they +are paying towards the close of their lives, for luxuries consumed in +the middle of them. It would be very interesting, for instance, to know +the exact sum which the money spent in London for ices, at its desserts +and balls, during the last twenty years, had it been saved and put out +at compound interest, would at this moment have furnished for useful +purposes. + +Also, in most cases, the enjoyment of such property is wholly selfish, +and limited to its possessor. Splendid dress and equipage, however, when +so arranged as to produce real beauty of effect, may often be rather a +generous than a selfish channel of expenditure. They will, however, +necessarily in such cases involve some of the arts of design; and +therefore take their place in a higher category than that of luxuries +merely. + + +147. (4) The fourth kind of property is that which bestows intellectual +or emotional pleasure, consisting of land set apart for purposes of +delight more than for agriculture, of books, works of art, and objects +of natural history. + +It is, of course, impossible to fix an accurate limit between property +of the last class and of this class, since things which are a mere +luxury to one person are a means of intellectual occupation to another. +Flowers in a London ball-room are a luxury; in a botanical garden, a +delight of the intellect; and in their native fields, both; while the +most noble works of art are continually made material of vulgar luxury +or of criminal pride; but, when rightly used, property of this fourth +class is the only kind which deserves the name of _real_ property, it is +the only kind which a man can truly be said to 'possess.' What a man +eats, or drinks, or wears, so long as it is only what is needful for +life, can no more be thought of as his possession than the air he +breathes. The air is as needful to him as the food; but we do not talk +of a man's wealth of air, and what food or clothing a man possesses more +than he himself requires must be for others to use (and, to him, +therefore, not a real property in itself, but only a means of obtaining +some real property in exchange for it). Whereas the things that give +intellectual or emotional enjoyment may be accumulated, and do not +perish in using; but continually supply new pleasures and new powers of +giving pleasures to others. And these, therefore, are the only things +which can rightly be thought of as giving 'wealth' or 'well being.' Food +conduces only to 'being,' but these to '_well_ being.' And there is not +any broader general distinction between lower and higher orders of men +than rests on their possession of this real property. The human race +may be properly divided by zoologists into "men who have gardens, +libraries, or works of art; and those who have none;" and the former +class will include all noble persons, except only a few who make the +world their garden or museum; while the people who have not, or, which +is the same thing, do not care for gardens or libraries, but care for +nothing but money or luxuries, will include none but ignoble persons: +only it is necessary to understand that I mean by the term 'garden' as +much the Carthusian's plot of ground fifteen feet square between his +monastery buttresses, as I do the grounds of Chatsworth or Kew; and I +mean by the term 'art' as much the old sailor's print of the _Arethusa_ +bearing up to engage the _Belle Poule_, as I do Raphael's "Disputa," and +even rather more; for when abundant, beautiful possessions of this kind +are almost always associated with vulgar luxury, and become then +anything but indicative of noble character in their possessors. The +ideal of human life is a union of Spartan simplicity of manners with +Athenian sensibility and imagination; but in actual results, we are +continually mistaking ignorance for simplicity, and sensuality for +refinement. + + +148. (5) The fifth kind of property is representative property, +consisting of documents or money, or rather documents only--for money +itself is only a transferable document, current among societies of men, +giving claim, at sight, to some definite benefit or advantage, most +commonly to a certain share of real property existing in those +societies. The money is only genuine when the property it gives claim to +is real, or the advantages it gives claim to certain; otherwise, it is +false money, and may be considered as much 'forged' when issued by a +government, or a bank, as when by an individual. Thus, if a dozen of +men, cast ashore on a desert island, pick up a number of stones, put a +red spot on each stone, and pass a law that every stone marked with a +red spot shall give claim to a peck of wheat;--so long as no wheat +exists, or can exist, on the island, the stones are not money. But the +moment as much wheat exists as shall render it possible for the society +always to give a peck for every spotted stone, the spotted stones would +become money, and might be exchanged by their possessors for whatever +other commodities they chose, to the value of the peck of wheat which +the stones represented. If more stones were issued than the quantity of +wheat could answer the demand of, the value of the stone coinage would +be depreciated, in proportion to its increase above the quantity needed +to answer it. + + +149. Again, supposing a certain number of the men so cast ashore were +set aside by lot, or any other convention, to do the rougher labour +necessary for the whole society, they themselves being maintained by the +daily allotment of a certain quantity of food, clothing, etc. Then, if +it were agreed that the stones spotted with red should be signs of a +Government order for the labour of these men; and that any person +presenting a spotted stone at the office of the labourers, should be +entitled to a man's work for a week or a day, the red stones would be +money; and might--probably would--immediately pass current in the island +for as much food, or clothing, or iron, or any other article, as a man's +work for the period secured by the stone was worth. But if the +Government issued so many spotted stones that it was impossible for the +body of men they employed to comply with the orders,--as, suppose, if +they only employed twelve men, and issued eighteen spotted stones daily, +ordering a day's work each,--then the six extra stones would be forged +or false money; and the effect of this forgery would be the depreciation +of the value of the whole coinage by one-third, that being the period of +shortcoming which would, on the average, necessarily ensue in the +execution of each order. Much occasional work may be done in a state or +society, by help of an issue of false money (or false promises) by way +of stimulants; and the fruit of this work, if it comes into the +promiser's hands, may sometimes enable the false promises at last to be +fulfilled: hence the frequent issue of false money by governments and +banks, and the not unfrequent escapes from the natural and proper +consequences of such false issues, so as to cause a confused conception +in most people's minds of what money really is. I am not sure whether +some quantity of such false issue may not really be permissible in a +nation, accurately proportioned to the minimum average produce of the +labour it excites; but all such procedures are more or less unsound; +and the notion of unlimited issue of currency is simply one of the +absurdest and most monstrous that ever came into disjointed human wits. + + +150. The use of objects of real or supposed value for currency, as gold, +jewellery, etc., is barbarous; and it always expresses either the +measure of the distrust in the society of its own government, or the +proportion of distrustful or barbarous nations with whom it has to deal. +A metal not easily corroded or imitated, it is a desirable medium of +currency for the sake of cleanliness and convenience, but, were it +possible to prevent forgery, the more worthless the metal itself, the +better. The use of worthless media, unrestrained by the use of valuable +media, has always hitherto involved, and is therefore supposed to +involve necessarily, unlimited, or at least improperly extended, issue; +but we might as well suppose that a man must necessarily issue unlimited +promises because his words cost nothing. Intercourse with foreign +nations must, indeed, for ages yet to come, at the world's present rate +of progress, be carried on by valuable currencies; but such +transactions are nothing more than forms of barter. The gold used at +present as a currency is not, in point of fact, currency at all, but the +real property[21] which the currency gives claim to, stamped to measure +its quantity, and mingling with the real currency occasionally by +barter. + + +151. The evils necessarily resulting from the use of baseless currencies +have been terribly illustrated while these sheets have been passing +through the press; I have not had time to examine the various conditions +of dishonest or absurd trading which have led to the late 'panic' in +America and England; this only I know, that no merchant deserving the +name ought to be more liable to 'panic' than a soldier should; for his +name should never be on more paper than he can at any instant meet the +call of, happen what will. I do not say this without feeling at the same +time how difficult it is to mark, in existing commerce, the just limits +between the spirit of enterprise and of speculation. Something of the +same temper which makes the English soldier do always all that is +possible, and attempt more than is possible, joins its influence with +that of mere avarice in tempting the English merchant into risks which +he cannot justify, and efforts which he cannot sustain; and the same +passion for adventure which our travellers gratify every summer on +perilous snow wreaths, and cloud-encompassed precipices, surrounds with +a romantic fascination the glittering of a hollow investment, and gilds +the clouds that curl round gulfs of ruin. Nay, a higher and a more +serious feeling frequently mingles in the motley temptation; and men +apply themselves to the task of growing rich, as to a labour of +providential appointment, from which they cannot pause without +culpability, nor retire without dishonour. Our large trading cities +bear to me very nearly the aspect of monastic establishments in which +the roar of the mill-wheel and the crane takes the place of other +devotional music; and in which the worship of Mammon or Moloch is +conducted with a tender reverence and an exact propriety; the merchant +rising to his Mammon matins with the self-denial of an anchorite, and +expiating the frivolities into which he may be beguiled in the course of +the day by late attendance at Mammon vespers. But, with every allowance +that can be made for these conscientious and romantic persons, the fact +remains the same, that by far the greater number of the transactions +which lead to these times of commercial embarrassment may be ranged +simply under two great heads--gambling and stealing; and both of these +in their most culpable form, namely, gambling with money which is not +ours, and stealing from those who trust us. I have sometimes thought a +day might come, when the nation would perceive that a well-educated man +who steals a hundred thousand pounds, involving the entire means of +subsistence of a hundred families, deserves, on the whole, as severe a +punishment as an ill-educated man who steals a purse from a pocket, or +a mug from a pantry. + +[Note 21: Or rather, equivalent to such real property, because +everybody has been accustomed to look upon it as valuable; and therefore +everybody is willing to give labour or goods for it. But real property +does ultimately consist only in things that nourish body or mind; gold +would be useless to us if we could not get mutton or books for it. +Ultimately all commercial mistakes and embarrassments result from people +expecting to get goods without working for them, or wasting them after +they have got them. A nation which labours, and takes care of the fruits +of labour, would be rich and happy though there were no gold in the +universe. A nation which is idle, and wastes the produce of what work it +does, would be poor and miserable, though all its mountains were of +gold, and had glens filled with diamond instead of glacier.] + + +152. But without hoping for this excess of clear-sightedness, we may at +least labour for a system of greater honesty and kindness in the minor +commerce of our daily life; since the great dishonesty of the great +buyers and sellers is nothing more than the natural growth and outcome +from the little dishonesty of the little buyers and sellers. Every +person who tries to buy an article for less than its proper value, or +who tries to sell it at more than its proper value--every consumer who +keeps a tradesman waiting for his money, and every tradesman who bribes +a consumer to extravagance by credit, is helping forward, according to +his own measure of power, a system of baseless and dishonourable +commerce, and forcing his country down into poverty and shame. And +people of moderate means and average powers of mind would do far more +real good by merely carrying out stern principles of justice and honesty +in common matters of trade, than by the most ingenious schemes of +extended philanthropy, or vociferous declarations of theological +doctrine. There are three weighty matters of the law--justice, mercy, +and truth; and of these the Teacher puts truth last, because that cannot +be known but by a course of acts of justice and love. But men put, in +all their efforts, truth first, because they mean by it their own +opinions; and thus, while the world has many people who would suffer +martyrdom in the cause of what they call truth, it has few who will +suffer even a little inconvenience, in that of justice and mercy. + +SUPPLEMENTARY ADDITIONAL PAPERS. + +EDUCATION IN ART. + +ART SCHOOL NOTES. + +SOCIAL POLICY. + + + + +EDUCATION IN ART. + +(_Read for the author before the National Association for the Promotion +of Social Science in the autumn of 1858; and printed in the Transactions +of the Society for that year, pp. 311-16._) + + +153. I will not attempt in this paper to enter into any general +consideration of the possible influence of art on the masses of the +people. The inquiry is one of great complexity, involved with that into +the uses and dangers of luxury; nor have we as yet data enough to +justify us in conjecturing how far the practice of art may be compatible +with rude or mechanical employments. But the question, however +difficult, lies in the same light as that of the uses of reading or +writing; for drawing, so far as it is possible to the multitude, is +mainly to be considered as a means of obtaining and communicating +knowledge. He who can accurately represent the form of an object, and +match its colour, has unquestionably a power of notation and +description greater in most instances than that of words; and this +science of notation ought to be simply regarded as that which is +concerned with the record of form, just as arithmetic is concerned with +the record of number. Of course abuses and dangers attend the +acquirement of every power. We have all of us probably known persons +who, without being able to read or write, discharged the important +duties of life wisely and faithfully; as we have also without doubt +known others able to read and write whose reading did little good to +themselves and whose writing little good to any one else. But we do not +therefore doubt the expediency of acquiring those arts, neither ought we +to doubt the expediency of acquiring the art of drawing, if we admit +that it may indeed become practically useful. + + +154. Nor should we long hesitate in admitting this, it we were not in +the habit of considering instruction in the arts chiefly as a means of +promoting what we call "taste" or dilettanteism, and other habits of +mind which in their more modern developments in Europe have certainly +not been advantageous to nations, or indicative of worthiness in them. +Nevertheless, true taste, or the instantaneous preference of the noble +thing to the ignoble, is a necessary accompaniment of high worthiness in +nations or men; only it is not to be acquired by seeking it as our chief +object, since the first question, alike for man and for multitude, is +not at all what they are to like, but what they are to do; and +fortunately so, since true taste, so far as it depends on original +instinct, is not equally communicable to all men; and, so far as it +depends on extended comparison, is unattainable by men employed in +narrow fields of life. We shall not succeed in making a peasant's +opinion good evidence on the merits of the Elgin and Lycian marbles; nor +is it necessary to dictate to him in his garden the preference of +gillyflower or of rose; yet I believe we may make art a means of giving +him helpful and happy pleasure, and of gaining for him serviceable +knowledge. + + +155. Thus, in our simplest codes of school instruction, I hope some day +to see local natural history assume a principal place, so that our +peasant children may be taught the nature and uses of the herbs that +grow in their meadows, and may take interest in observing and +cherishing, rather than in hunting or killing, the harmless animals of +their country. Supposing it determined that this local natural history +should be taught, drawing ought to be used to fix the attention, and +test, while it aided, the memory. "Draw such and such a flower in +outline, with its bell towards you. Draw it with its side towards you. +Paint the spots upon it. Draw a duck's head--her foot. Now a robin's--a +thrush's--now the spots upon the thrush's breast." These are the kinds +of tasks which it seems to me should be set to the young peasant +student. Surely the occupation would no more be thought contemptible +which was thus subservient to knowledge and to compassion; and perhaps +we should find in process of time that the Italian connexion of art with +_diletto_, or delight, was both consistent with, and even mainly +consequent upon, a pure Greek connexion of art with _arete_, or virtue. + + +156. It may perhaps be thought that the power of representing in any +sufficient manner natural objects such as those above instanced would be +of too difficult attainment to be aimed at in elementary instruction. +But I have had practical proof that it is not so. From workmen who had +little time to spare, and that only after they were jaded by the day's +labour, I have obtained, in the course of three or four months from +their first taking a pencil in hand, perfectly useful, and in many +respects admirable, drawings of natural objects. It is, however, +necessary, in order to secure this result, that the student's aim should +be absolutely restricted to the representation of visible fact. All more +varied or elevated practice must be deferred until the powers of true +sight and just representation are acquired in simplicity; nor, in the +case of children belonging to the lower classes, does it seem to me +often advisable to aim at anything more. At all events, their drawing +lessons should be made as recreative as possible. Undergoing due +discipline of hard labour in other directions, such children should be +painlessly initiated into employments calculated for the relief of toil. +It is of little consequence that they should know the principles of art, +but of much that their attention should be pleasurably excited. In our +higher public schools, on the contrary, drawing should be taught +rightly; that is to say, with due succession and security of preliminary +steps,--it being here of little consequence whether the student attains +great or little skill, but of much that he should perceive distinctly +what degree of skill he has attained, reverence that which surpasses it, +and know the principles of right in what he has been able to accomplish. +It is impossible to make every boy an artist or a connoisseur, but quite +possible to make him understand the meaning of art in its rudiments, and +to make him modest enough to forbear expressing, in after life, +judgments which he has not knowledge enough to render just. + + +157. There is, however, at present this great difficulty in the way of +such systematic teaching--that the public do not believe the principles +of art are determinable, and, in no wise, matters of opinion. They do +not believe that good drawing is good, and bad drawing bad, whatever any +number of persons may think or declare to the contrary--that there is a +right or best way of laying colours to produce a given effect, just as +there is a right or best way of dyeing cloth of a given colour, and +that Titian and Veronese are not merely accidentally admirable but +eternally right. + + +158. The public, of course, cannot be convinced of this unity and +stability of principle until clear assertion of it is made to them by +painters whom they respect; and the painters whom they respect are +generally too modest, and sometimes too proud, to make it. I believe the +chief reason for their not having yet declared at least the fundamental +laws of labour as connected with art-study is a kind of feeling on their +part that "_cela va sans dire_." Every great painter knows so well the +necessity of hard and systematized work, in order to attain even the +lower degrees of skill, that he naturally supposes if people use no +diligence in drawing, they do not care to acquire the power of it, and +that the toil involved in wholesome study being greater than the mass of +people have ever given, is also greater than they would ever be willing +to give. Feeling, also, as any real painter feels, that his own +excellence is a gift, no less than the reward of toil, perhaps slightly +disliking to confess the labour it has cost him to perfect it, and +wholly despairing of doing any good by the confession, he +contemptuously leaves the drawing-master to do the best he can in his +twelve lessons, and with courteous unkindness permits the young women of +England to remain under the impression that they can learn to draw with +less pains than they can learn to dance. I have had practical experience +enough, however, to convince me that this treatment of the amateur +student is unjust. Young girls will work with steadiest perseverance +when once they understand the need of labour, and are convinced that +drawing is a kind of language which may for ordinary purposes be learned +as easily as French or German; this language, also, having its grammar +and its pronunciation, to be conquered or acquired only by persistence +in irksome exercise--an error in a form being as entirely and simply an +error as a mistake in a tense, and an ill-drawn line as reprehensible as +a vulgar accent. + + +159. And I attach great importance to the sound education of our younger +females in art, thinking that in England the nursery and the +drawing-room are perhaps the most influential of academies. We address +ourselves in vain to the education of the artist while the demand for +his work is uncertain or unintelligent; nor can art be considered as +having any serious influence on a nation while gilded papers form the +principal splendour of the reception room, and ill-wrought though costly +trinkets the principal entertainment of the boudoir. + +It is surely, therefore, to be regretted that the art-education of our +Government schools is addressed so definitely to the guidance of the +artizan, and is therefore so little acknowledged hitherto by the general +public, especially by its upper classes. I have not acquaintance enough +with the practical working of that system to venture any expression of +opinion respecting its general expediency; but it is my conviction that, +so far as references are involved in it to the designing of patterns +capable of being produced by machinery, such references must materially +diminish its utility considered as a general system of instruction. + + +160. We are still, therefore, driven to the same point,--the need of an +authoritative recommendation of some method of study to the public; a +method determined upon by the concurrence of some of our best painters, +and avowedly sanctioned by them, so as to leave no room for hesitation +in its acceptance. + +Nor need it be thought that, because the ultimate methods of work +employed by painters vary according to the particular effects produced +by each, there would be any difficulty in obtaining their collective +assent to a system of elementary precept. The facts of which it is +necessary that the student should be assured in his early efforts, are +so simple, so few, and so well known to all able draughtsmen that, as I +have just said, it would be rather doubt of the need of stating what +seemed to them self-evident, than reluctance to speak authoritatively on +points capable of dispute, that would stand in the way of their giving +form to a code of general instruction. To take merely two instances: It +will perhaps appear hardly credible that among amateur students, however +far advanced in more showy accomplishments, there will not be found one +in a hundred who can make an accurate drawing to scale. It is much if +they can copy anything with approximate fidelity of its real size. Now, +the inaccuracy of eye which prevents a student from drawing to scale is +in fact nothing else than an entire want of appreciation of proportion, +and therefore of composition. He who alters the relations of dimensions +to each other in his copy, shows that he does not enjoy those relations +in the original--that is to say, that all appreciation of noble design +(which is based on the most exquisite relations of magnitude) is +impossible to him. To give him habits of mathematical accuracy in +transference of the outline of complex form, is therefore among the +first, and even among the most important, means of educating his taste. +A student who can fix with precision the cardinal points of a bird's +wing, extended in any fixed position, and can then draw the curves of +its individual plumes without measurable error, has advanced further +towards a power of understanding the design of the great masters than he +could by reading many volumes of criticism, or passing many months in +undisciplined examination of works of art. + + +161. Again, it will be found that among amateur students there is almost +universal deficiency in the power of expressing the roundness of a +surface. They frequently draw with considerable dexterity and vigour, +but never attain the slightest sense of those modulations in form which +can only be expressed by gradations in shade. They leave sharp edges to +their blots of colour, sharp angles in their contours of lines, and +conceal from themselves their incapacity of completion by redundance of +object. The assurance to such persons that no object could be rightly +seen or drawn until the draughtsman had acquired the power of modulating +surfaces by gradations wrought with some pointed instrument (whether +pen, pencil, or chalk), would at once prevent much vain labour, and put +an end to many errors of that worst kind which not only retard the +student, but blind him; which prevent him from either attaining +excellence himself, or understanding it in others. + + +162. It would be easy, did time admit it, to give instances of other +principles which it is equally essential that the student should know, +and certain that all painters of eminence would sanction; while even +those respecting which some doubt may exist in their application to +consummate practice, are yet perfectly determinable, so far as they are +needed to guide a beginner. It may, for instance, be a question how far +local colour should be treated as an element of chiaroscuro in a +master's drawing of the human form. But there can be no question that it +must be so treated in a boy's study of a tulip or a trout. + + +163. A still more important point would be gained if authoritative +testimony of the same kind could be given to the merit and exclusive +sufficiency of any series of examples of works of art, such as could at +once be put within the reach of masters of schools. For the modern +student labours under heavy disadvantages in what at first sight might +appear an assistance to him, namely, the number of examples of many +different styles which surround him in galleries or museums. His mind is +disturbed by the inconsistencies of various excellences, and by his own +predilection for false beauties in second or third-rate works. He is +thus prevented from observing any one example long enough to understand +its merit, or following any one method long enough to obtain facility in +its practice. It seems, therefore, very desirable that some such +standard of art should be fixed for all our schools,--a standard which, +it must be remembered, need not necessarily be the highest possible, +provided only it is the rightest possible. It is not to be hoped that +the student should imitate works of the most exalted merit, but much to +be desired that he should be guided by those which have fewest faults. + + +164. Perhaps, therefore, the most serviceable examples which could be +set before youth might be found in the studies or drawings, rather than +in the pictures, of first-rate masters; and the art of photography +enables us to put renderings of such studies, which for most practical +purposes are as good as the originals, on the walls of every school in +the kingdom. Supposing (I merely name these as examples of what I mean), +the standard of manner in light-and-shade drawing fixed by Leonardo's +study, No. 19, in the collection of photographs lately published from +drawings in the Florence Gallery; the standard of pen drawing with a +wash, fixed by Titian's sketch, No. 30 in the same collection; that of +etching, fixed by Rembrandt's spotted shell; and that of point work with +the pure line, by Duerer's crest with the cock; every effort of the +pupil, whatever the instrument in his hand, would infallibly tend in a +right direction, and the perception of the merits of these four works, +or of any others like them, once attained thoroughly, by efforts, +however distant or despairing, to copy portions of them, would lead +securely in due time to the appreciation of other modes of excellence. + + +165. I cannot, of course, within the limits of this paper, proceed to +any statement of the present requirements of the English operative as +regards art education. But I do not regret this, for it seems to me very +desirable that our attention should for the present be concentrated on +the more immediate object of general instruction. Whatever the public +demand the artist will soon produce; and the best education which the +operative can receive is the refusal of bad work and the acknowledgment +of good. There is no want of genius among us, still less of industry. +The least that we do is laborious, and the worst is wonderful. But there +is a want among us, deep and wide, of discretion in directing toil, and +of delight in being led by imagination. In past time, though the masses +of the nation were less informed than they are now, they were for that +very reason simpler judges and happier gazers; it must be ours to +substitute the gracious sympathy of the understanding for the bright +gratitude of innocence. An artist can always paint well for those who +are lightly pleased or wisely displeased, but he cannot paint for those +who are dull in applause and false in condemnation. + + + + +REMARKS ADDRESSED + +TO THE MANSFIELD ART NIGHT CLASS + +_Oct. 14th, 1873._[22] + + +166. It is to be remembered that the giving of prizes can only be +justified on the ground of their being the reward of superior diligence +and more obedient attention to the directions of the teacher. They must +never be supposed, because practically they never can become, +indications of superior genius; unless in so far as genius is likely to +be diligent and obedient, beyond the strength and temper of the dull. + +[Note 22: This address was written for the Art Night Class, +Mansfield, but not delivered by me. In my absence--I forget from what +cause, but inevitable--the Duke of St. Albans honoured me by reading it +to the meeting.] + +But it so frequently happens that the stimulus of vanity, acting on +minds of inferior calibre, produces for a time an industry surpassing +the tranquil and self-possessed exertion of real power, that it may be +questioned whether the custom of bestowing prizes at all may not +ultimately cease in our higher Schools of Art, unless in the form of +substantial assistance given to deserving students who stand in need of +it: a kind of prize, the claim to which, in its nature, would depend +more on accidental circumstances, and generally good conduct, than on +genius. + + +167. But, without any reference to the opinion of others, and without +any chance of partiality in your own, there is one test by which you can +all determine the rate of your real progress. + +Examine, after every period of renewed industry, how far you have +enlarged your faculty of _admiration_. + +Consider how much more you can see, to reverence, in the work of +masters; and how much more to love, in the work of nature. + +This is the only constant and infallible test of progress. That you +wonder more at the work of great men, and that you care more for natural +objects. + +You have often been told by your teachers to expect this last result: +but I fear that the tendency of modern thought is to reject the idea of +that essential difference in rank between one intellect and another, of +which increasing reverence is the wise acknowledgment. + +You may, at least in early years, test accurately your power of doing +anything in the least rightly, by your increasing conviction that you +never will be able to do it as well as it has been done by others. + + +168. That is a lesson, I repeat, which differs much, I fear, from the +one you are commonly taught. The vulgar and incomparably false saying of +Macaulay's, that the intellectual giants of one age become the +intellectual pigmies of the next, has been the text of too many sermons +lately preached to you. + +You think you are going to do better things--each of you--than Titian +and Phidias--write better than Virgil--think more wisely than Solomon. + +My good young people, this is the foolishest, quite +pre-eminently--perhaps almost the harmfullest--notion that could +possibly be put into your empty little eggshells of heads. There is not +one in a million of you who can ever be great in _any_ thing. To be +greater than the greatest that _have_ been, is permitted perhaps to one +man in Europe in the course of two or three centuries. But because you +cannot be Handel and Mozart--is it any reason why you should not learn +to sing "God save the Queen" properly, when you have a mind to? Because +a girl cannot be prima donna in the Italian Opera, is it any reason that +she should not learn to play a jig for her brothers and sisters in good +time, or a soft little tune for her tired mother, or that she should not +sing to please herself, among the dew, on a May morning? Believe me, +joy, humility, and usefulness, always go together: as insolence with +misery, and these both with destructiveness. You may learn with proud +teachers how to throw down the Vendome Column, and burn the Louvre, but +never how to lay so much as one touch of safe colour, or one layer of +steady stone: and if indeed there be among you a youth of true genius, +be assured that he will distinguish himself first, not by petulance or +by disdain, but by discerning firmly what to admire, and whom to obey. + + +169. It will, I hope, be the result of the interest lately awakened in +art through our provinces, to enable each town of importance to obtain, +in permanent possession, a few--and it is desirable there should be no +more than a few--examples of consummate and masterful art: an engraving +or two by Duerer--a single portrait by Reynolds--a fifteenth century +Florentine drawing--a thirteenth century French piece of painted glass, +and the like; and that, in every town occupied in a given manufacture, +examples of unquestionable excellence in that manufacture should be made +easily accessible in its civic museum. + +I must ask you, however, to observe very carefully that I use the word +_manufacture_ in its literal and proper sense. It means the making of +things _by the hand_. It does not mean the making them by machinery. +And, while I plead with you for a true humility in rivalship with the +works of others, I plead with you also for a just pride in what you +really can honestly do yourself. + +You must neither think your work the best ever done by man:--nor, on the +other hand, think that the tongs and poker can do better--and that, +although you are wiser than Solomon, all this wisdom of yours can be +outshone by a shovelful of coke. + + +170. Let me take, for instance, the manufacture of lace, for which, I +believe, your neighbouring town of Nottingham enjoys renown. There is +still some distinction between machine-made and hand-made lace. I will +suppose that distinction so far done away with, that, a pattern once +invented, you can spin lace as fast as you now do thread. Everybody then +might wear, not only lace collars, but lace gowns. Do you think they +would be more comfortable in them than they are now in plain stuff--or +that, when everybody could wear them, anybody would be proud of wearing +them? A spider may perhaps be rationally proud of his own cobweb, even +though all the fields in the morning are covered with the like, for he +made it himself--but suppose a machine spun it for him? + +Suppose all the gossamer were Nottingham-made, would a sensible spider +be either prouder, or happier, think you? + +A sensible spider! You cannot perhaps imagine such a creature. Yet +surely a spider is clever enough for his own ends? + +You think him an insensible spider, only because he cannot understand +yours--and is apt to impede yours. Well, be assured of this, sense in +human creatures is shown also, not by cleverness in promoting their own +ends and interests, but by quickness in understanding other people's +ends and interests, and by putting our own work and keeping our own +wishes in harmony with theirs. + + +171. But I return to my point, of cheapness. You don't think that it +would be convenient, or even creditable, for women to wash the doorsteps +or dish the dinners in lace gowns? Nay, even for the most ladylike +occupations--reading, or writing, or playing with her children--do you +think a lace gown, or even a lace collar, so great an advantage or +dignity to a woman? If you think of it, you will find the whole value of +lace, as a possession, depends on the fact of its having a beauty which +has been the reward of industry and attention. + +That the thing itself is a prize--a thing which everybody cannot have. +That it proves, by the _look_ of it, the _ability_ of its _maker_; that +it proves, by the _rarity_ of it, the _dignity_ of its _wearer_--either +that she has been so industrious as to save money, which can buy, say, +a piece of jewellery, of gold tissue, or of fine lace--or else, that she +is a noble person, to whom her neighbours concede, as an honour, the +privilege of wearing finer dresses than they. + +If they all choose to have lace too--if it ceases to be a prize--it +becomes, does it not, only a cobweb? + +The real good of a piece of lace, then, you will find, is that it should +show, first, that the designer of it had a pretty fancy; next, that the +maker of it had fine fingers; lastly, that the wearer of it has +worthiness or dignity enough to obtain what is difficult to obtain, and +common sense enough not to wear it on all occasions. I limit myself, in +what farther I have to say, to the question of the manufacture--nay, of +one requisite in the manufacture: that which I have just called a pretty +fancy. + + +172. What do you suppose I mean by a pretty fancy? Do you think that, by +learning to draw, and looking at flowers, you will ever get the ability +to design a piece of lace beautifully? By no means. If that were so, +everybody would soon learn to draw--everybody would design lace +prettily--and then,--nobody would be paid for designing it. To some +extent, that will indeed be the result of modern endeavour to teach +design. But against all such endeavours, mother-wit, in the end, will +hold her own. + +But anybody who _has_ this mother-wit, may make the exercise of it more +pleasant to themselves, and more useful to other people, by learning to +draw. + +An Indian worker in gold, or a Scandinavian worker in iron, or an old +French worker in thread, could produce indeed beautiful design out of +nothing but groups of knots and spirals: but you, when you are rightly +educated, may render your knots and spirals infinitely more interesting +by making them suggestive of natural forms, and rich in elements of true +knowledge. + + +173. You know, for instance, the pattern which for centuries has been +the basis of ornament in Indian shawls--the bulging leaf ending in a +spiral. The Indian produces beautiful designs with nothing but that +spiral. You cannot better his powers of design, but you may make them +more civil and useful by adding knowledge of nature to invention. + +Suppose you learn to draw rightly, and, therefore, to know correctly the +spirals of springing ferns--not that you may give ugly names to all the +species of them--but that you may understand the grace and vitality of +every hour of their existence. Suppose you have sense and cleverness +enough to translate the essential character of this beauty into forms +expressible by simple lines--therefore expressible by thread--you might +then have a series of fern-patterns which would each contain points of +distinctive interest and beauty, and of scientific truth, and yet be +variable by fancy, with quite as much ease as the meaningless Indian +one. Similarly, there is no form of leaf, of flower, or of insect, which +might not become suggestive to you, and expressible in terms of +manufacture, so as to be interesting, and useful to others. + + +174. Only don't think that this kind of study will ever "pay" in the +vulgar sense. + +It will make you wiser and happier. But do you suppose that it is the +law of God, or nature, that people shall be paid in money for becoming +wiser and happier? They are so, by that law, for honest work; and as all +honest work makes people wiser and happier, they are indeed, in some +sort, paid in money for becoming wise. + +But if you seek wisdom only that you may get money, believe me, you are +exactly on the foolishest of all fools' errands. "She is more precious +than rubies"--but do you think that is only because she will help you to +buy rubies? + +"All the things thou canst desire are not to be compared to her." Do you +think that is only because she will enable you to get all the things you +desire? She is offered to you as a blessing _in herself_. She is the +reward of kindness, of modesty, of industry. She is the prize of +Prizes--and alike in poverty or in riches--the strength of your Life +now, the earnest of whatever Life is to come. + + + + +SOCIAL POLICY + +BASED ON NATURAL SELECTION. + +_Paper read before the Metaphysical Society, May 11th, 1875._[23] + + +175. It has always seemed to me that Societies like this of ours, happy +in including members not a little diverse in thought and various in +knowledge, might be more useful to the public than perhaps they can +fairly be said to have approved themselves hitherto, by using their +variety of power rather to support intellectual conclusions by +concentric props, than to shake them with rotatory storms of wit; and +modestly endeavouring to initiate the building of walls for the Bridal +city of Science, in which no man will care to identify the particular +stones he lays, rather than complying farther with the existing +picturesque, but wasteful, practice of every knight to throw up a feudal +tower of his own opinions, tenable only by the most active pugnacity, +and pierced rather with arrow-slits from which to annoy his neighbours, +than windows to admit light or air. + +[Note 23: I trust that the Society will not consider its privileges +violated by the publication of an essay, which, for such audience, I +wrote with more than ordinary care.] + + +176. The paper read at our last meeting was unquestionably, within the +limits its writer had prescribed to himself, so logically sound, that +(encouraged also by the suggestion of some of our most influential +members), I shall endeavour to make the matter of our to-night's debate +consequent upon it, and suggestive of possibly further advantageous +deductions. + +It will be remembered that, in reference to the statement in the Bishop +of Peterborough's Paper, of the moral indifference of certain courses of +conduct on the postulate of the existence only of a Mechanical base of +Morals, it was observed by Dr. Adam Clarke that, even on such mechanical +basis, the word "moral" might still be applied specially to any course +of action which tended to the development of the human race. Whereupon I +ventured myself to inquire, in what direction such development was to be +understood as taking place; and the discussion of this point being then +dropped for want of time, I would ask the Society's permission to bring +it again before them this evening in a somewhat more extended form; for +in reality the question respecting the development of men is +twofold,--first, namely, in what direction; and secondly, in what social +relations, it is to be sought. + +I would therefore at present ask more deliberately than I could at our +last meeting,--first, in what direction it is desirable that the +development of humanity should take place? Should it, for instance, as +in Greece, be of physical beauty,--emulation, (Hesiod's second +Eris),--pugnacity, and patriotism? or, as in modern England, of physical +ugliness,--envy, (Hesiod's first Eris),--cowardice, and selfishness? or, +as by a conceivably humane but hitherto unexampled education might be +attempted, of physical beauty, humility, courage, and affection, which +should make all the world one native land, and [Greek: pasa ge taphos]? + + +177. I do not doubt but that the first automatic impulse of all our +automatic friends here present, on hearing this sentence, will be +strenuously to deny the accuracy of my definition of the aims of modern +English education. Without attempting to defend it, I would only observe +that this automatic development of solar caloric in scientific minds +must be grounded on an automatic sensation of injustice done to the +members of the School Board, as well as to many other automatically +well-meaning and ingenious persons; and that this sense of the +injuriousness and offensiveness of my definition cannot possibly have +any other basis (if I may be permitted to continue my professional +similitudes) than the fallen remnants and goodly stones, not one now +left on another, but still forming an unremovable cumulus of ruin, and +eternal Birs Nimroud, as it were, on the site of the old belfry of +Christian morality, whose top looked once so like touching Heaven. + +For no offence could be taken at my definition, unless traceable to +adamantine conviction,--that ugliness, however indefinable, envy, +however natural, and cowardice, however commercially profitable, are +nevertheless eternally disgraceful; contrary, that is to say, to the +grace of our Lord Christ, if there be among us any Christ; to the grace +of the King's Majesty, if there be among us any King; and to the grace +even of Christless and Kingless Manhood, if there be among us any +Manhood. + +To this fixed conception of a difference between Better and Worse, or, +when carried to the extreme, between good and evil in conduct, we all, +it seems to me, instinctively and, therefore, rightly, attach the term +of Moral sense;--the sense, for instance, that it would be better if the +members of this Society who are usually automatically absent were, +instead, automatically present; or better, that this Paper, if (which +is, perhaps, too likely) it be thought automatically impertinent, had +been made by the molecular action of my cerebral particles, pertinent. + + +178. Trusting, therefore, without more ado, to the strength of rampart +in this Old Sarum of the Moral sense, however subdued into vague banks +under the modern steam-plough, I will venture to suppose the first of my +two questions to have been answered by the choice on the part at least +of a majority of our Council, of the third direction of development +above specified as being the properly called "moral" one; and will go on +to the second subject of inquiry, both more difficult and of great +practical importance in the political crisis through which Europe is +passing,--namely, what relations between men are to be desired, or with +resignation allowed, in the course of their Moral Development? + +Whether, that is to say, we should try to make some men beautiful at the +cost of ugliness in others, and some men virtuous at the cost of vice in +others,--or rather, all men beautiful and virtuous in the degree +possible to each under a system of equitable education? And evidently +our first business is to consider in what terms the choice is put to us +by Nature. What can we do, if we would? What must we do, whether we will +or not? How high can we raise the level of a diffused Learning and +Morality? and how far shall we be compelled, if we limit, to exaggerate, +the advantages and injuries of our system? And are we prepared, if the +extremity be inevitable, to push to their utmost the relations implied +when we take off our hats to each other, and triple the tiara of the +Saint in Heaven, while we leave the sinner bareheaded in Cocytus? + + +179. It is well, perhaps, that I should at once confess myself to hold +the principle of limitation in its utmost extent; and to entertain no +doubt of the rightness of my ideal, but only of its feasibility. I am +ill at ease, for instance, in my uncertainty whether our greatly +regretted Chairman will ever be Pope, or whether some people whom I +could mention, (not, of course, members of our Society,) will ever be in +Cocytus. + +But there is no need, if we would be candid, to debate the principle in +these violences of operation, any more than the proper methods of +distributing food, on the supposition that the difference between a +Paris dinner and a platter of Scotch porridge must imply that one-half +of mankind are to die of eating, and the rest of having nothing to eat. +I will therefore take for example a case in which the discrimination is +less conclusive. + + +180. When I stop writing metaphysics this morning it will be to arrange +some drawings for a young lady to copy. They are leaves of the best +illuminated MSS. I have, and I am going to spend my whole afternoon in +explaining to her what she is to aim at in copying them. + +Now, I would not lend these leaves to any other young lady that I know +of; nor give up my afternoon to, perhaps, more than two or three other +young ladies that I know of. But to keep to the first-instanced one, I +lend her my books, and give her, for what they are worth, my time and +most careful teaching, because she at present paints butterflies better +than any other girl I know, and has a peculiar capacity for the +softening of plumes and finessing of antennae. Grant me to be a good +teacher, and grant her disposition to be such as I suppose, and the +result will be what might at first appear an indefensible iniquity, +namely, that this girl, who has already excellent gifts, having also +excellent teaching, will become perhaps the best butterfly-painter in +England; while myriads of other girls, having originally inferior +powers, and attracting no attention from the Slade Professor, will +utterly lose their at present cultivable faculties of entomological art, +and sink into the vulgar career of wives and mothers, to which we have +Mr. Mill's authority for holding it a grievous injustice that any girl +should be irrevocably condemned. + + +181. There is no need that I should be careful in enumerating the +various modes, analogous to this, in which the Natural selection of +which we have lately heard, perhaps, somewhat more than enough, provokes +and approves the Professorial selection which I am so bold as to defend; +and if the automatic instincts of equity in us, which revolt against the +great ordinance of Nature and practice of Man, that "to him that hath, +shall more be given," are to be listened to when the possessions in +question are only of wisdom and virtue, let them at least prove their +sincerity by correcting, first, the injustice which has established +itself respecting more tangible and more esteemed property; and +terminating the singular arrangement prevalent in commercial Europe that +to every man with a hundred pounds in his pocket there shall annually be +given three, to every man with a thousand, thirty, and to every man with +nothing, none. + + +182. I am content here to leave under the scrutiny of the evening my +general statement, that as human development, when moral, is with +special effort in a given direction, so, when moral, it is with special +effort in favour of a limited class; but I yet trespass for a few +moments on your patience in order to note that the acceptance of this +second principle still leaves it debatable to what point the disfavour +of the reprobate class, or the privileges of the elect, may advisably +extend. For I cannot but feel for my own part as if the daily bread of +moral instruction might at least be so widely broken among the multitude +as to preserve them from utter destitution and pauperism in virtue; and +that even the simplest and lowest of the rabble should not be so +absolutely sons of perdition, but that each might say for himself,--"For +my part--no offence to the General, or any man of quality--I hope to be +saved." Whereas it is, on the contrary, implied by the habitual +expressions of the wisest aristocrats, that the completely developed +persons whose Justice and Fortitude--poles to the Cardinal points of +virtue--are marked as their sufficient characteristics by the great +Roman moralist in his phrase, "Justus, et tenax propositi," will in the +course of nature be opposed by a civic ardour, not merely of the +innocent and ignorant, but of persons developed in a contrary direction +to that which I have ventured to call "moral," and therefore not merely +incapable of desiring or applauding what is right, but in an evil +harmony, _prava jubentium_, clamorously demanding what is wrong. + + +183. The point to which both Natural and Divine Selection would permit +us to advance in severity towards this profane class, to which the +enduring "Ecce Homo," or manifestation of any properly human sentiment +or person, must always be instinctively abominable, seems to be +conclusively indicated by the order following on the parable of the +Talents,--"Those mine enemies, bring hither, and slay them before me." +Nor does it seem reasonable, on the other hand, to set the limits of +favouritism more narrowly. For even if, among fallible mortals, there +may frequently be ground for the hesitation of just men to award the +punishment of death to their enemies, the most beautiful story, to my +present knowledge, of all antiquity, that of Cleobis and Bito, might +suggest to them the fitness on some occasions, of distributing without +any hesitation the reward of death to their friends. For surely the +logical conclusion of the Bishop of Peterborough, respecting the +treatment due to old women who have nothing supernatural about them, +holds with still greater force when applied to the case of old women who +have everything supernatural about them; and while it might remain +questionable to some of us whether we had any right to deprive an +invalid who had no soul, of what might still remain to her of even +painful earthly existence; it would surely on the most religious grounds +be both our privilege and our duty at once to dismiss any troublesome +sufferer who _had_ a soul, to the distant and inoffensive felicities of +heaven. + + +184. But I believe my hearers will approve me in again declining to +disturb the serene confidence of daily action by these speculations in +extreme; the really useful conclusion which, it seems to me, cannot be +evaded, is that, without going so far as the exile of the inconveniently +wicked, and translation of the inconveniently sick, to their proper +spiritual mansions, we should at least be certain that we do not waste +care in protracting disease which might have been spent in preserving +health; that we do not appease in the splendour of our turreted +hospitals the feelings of compassion which, rightly directed, might +have prevented the need of them; nor pride ourselves on the peculiar +form of Christian benevolence which leaves the cottage roofless to model +the prison, and spends itself with zealous preference where, in the keen +words of Carlyle, if you desire the material on which maximum +expenditure of means and effort will produce the minimum result, "here +you accurately have it." + + +185. I cannot but, in conclusion, most respectfully but most earnestly, +express my hope that measures may be soon taken by the Lords Spiritual +of England to assure her doubting mind of the real existence of that +supernatural revelation of the basis of morals to which the Bishop of +Peterborough referred in the close of his paper; or at least to explain +to her bewildered populace the real meaning and force of the Ten +Commandments, whether written originally by the finger of God or Man. To +me personally, I own, as one of that bewildered populace, that the essay +by one of our most distinguished members on the Creed of Christendom +seems to stand in need of explicit answer from our Divines; but if not, +and the common application of the terms "Word of God" to the books of +Scripture be against all question tenable, it becomes yet more +imperative on the interpreters of that Scripture to see that they are +not made void by our traditions, and that the Mortal sins of +Covetousness, Fraud, Usury, and contention be not the essence of a +National life orally professing submission to the laws of Christ, and +satisfaction in His Love. + +J. RUSKIN. + + "Thou shalt not covet; but tradition + Approves all forms of Competition." + +ARTHUR CLOUGH. + + + + +INDEX. + +[Transcriber's note: entries here of page numbers followed by _n._ +should indicate that references will be found in a note on that page +number. However, most of these references to notes on particular pages +are inaccurate. The direct page number links, however, are accurate.] + +(_The references are made to the numbered paragraphs, not to the pages, +and are thus applicable to every edition of the book since that of +1880._) + +Accumulation of learning, its law, 73. + +Accuracy and depth of study, distinct, 1857 _pref._ + +Admiration, increase of, a test of progress in art, 167. + +Almsgiving, 142. + " parish, &c., 129. + +Almshouses, decoration of, 115. + " prejudice of poor against, 129-30. + +Alpine climbing, risks of, 151. + +Ambition, in youth and age, 26. + +America, absence of great art in, 87. + " bad shipbuilding in, 112 _n._ + " commercial panic in, 151. + +Ancestors, respect for their work insisted on, 72. + +Architecture, Gothic, sculpture to be in easiest materials, 34. + " " to be studied at Verona, 76. + " variety in, to be demanded, 32. + " " cheapens the price, _ib._ + +Arcola, battle of, 77. + +Arethusa, the, and the Belle-Poule engraving, 147. + +[Greek: Arete] and art, 155. + +Art, cheap, its purchase, 40. + " " great art not to be too cheap, and why, 62 _seq._ + " demand for good, and the possibility of having too much, 38. + " dress, beauty of, essential to good art, 54. + " education in (author's paper on), 153 _seq._ + " function of, to exalt as well as to please, 38. + " -gift and art-study, 172. + " good, to be lasting in its materials and power, 39. + " " to be done for and be worthy of all time, 46. + " great, the expression of a great soul, 136. + " has laws, which must be recognised, 157. + " -intellect in a nation, cannot be created, 20-1. + " its debt to Italy, 82. + " labour and, 19. + " " the labour to be various, easy, permanent, 31 _seq._ + " literature and, the cost of, 67. + " love of old, essential to produce new, 88. + " materials of, to be lasting, 39, 42. + " models in art schools, 162-4. + " modern interest in, 168. + " " " objects of, and old pictures, 86. + " original work, the best to buy, 41. + " permanency of--e.g., a painted window, 37. + " -power a gift, 158. + " " in a nation, how to produce, 132. + " " waste of, on perishable things, 45. + " preservation of works of, 73-4. + " " (1857) more important than production, 92. + " price of good, 41. See s. Pictures. + " progress in, tested by increased imagination, 167. + " public to demand noble subjects of, 29. + " " effect of public demand on, 165. + " repetition in, monotonous, 32. + " schools, trial, 22-3. + " " provincial, to have good art-models, 169. + " students, 153 seq. + " -study will not "pay," 174. + " test of good, will it please a century hence? 39. + " value of, depends on artist's capacity, not education, 136. + " variety of work, 32. + " work, hard, needed for, 158. + " works of, illustrate each other, 63. + " works of, property in, 147. + " " provincial distribution of, 169. + " " their conservative effect, 132 _n._ + " " to be lasting, 36. + See s. Admiration, America, Architecture, Arethusa, + Arete, Artist, Beauty, Buildings, Cheapness, Colour, + Criticism, Design, Diletto, Drawing, Dress, Education, + Europe, Florence, France, Genius, Glass, Gold, Goldsmiths, + Historical painting, Indian shawls, Italy, Jewels, Labour, + Lace, Lombard, Marble, Mosaic, Painter, Philosophy, Pictures, + Reverence, Schools, Trade, Wall-paper, War, Water colour, Wealth, Woodcuts. + +Artist, education of the, to be a gentleman--_i.e._, feel nobly, 28. + " encouragement of, in youth, 23. + " goldsmith's work, good training for, 46. + " greatest, have other powers than their art, 21. + " jealousy among, 98. + " modern training of, 132. + " _nascitur non fit_, 20. + " temper of, what, 132. + " to be a good man, 28. + " trial schools to discover, 22-3. + See s. Duerer, Francia, Gainsborough, Ghiberti, + Ghirlandajo, Giotto, Leonardo, Lewis, Lorenzetti, + Michael Angelo, Rembrandt, Reynolds, Tintoret, Titian, + Turner, Veronese, Verrocchio. + +"Asphodel meadows of our youth," 26. + +Athletic games and education, 128. + +Austrians, in Italy, 78. + +Author, his idea of a knight, when a child, 106. + " " teaching young lady to copy old MS., 180. + life of: + at Brantwood, April 29, 1880. + " Manchester, July 10 and 13, 1857, 1, 61. + " Metaphysical Society, 1875, 175. + " Oxford, art teaching, _pref._ ix. + " Working Men's College, 156. + " Venice, 141 _n._ + " teaching of: + misunderstood, 180. + political economy, has read no modern books on, 1857 _pref._ + political influence of art, 1880 _pref._ + true wealth honoured by, 1. + words fail him to express modern folly, 49. + " books of, quoted, &c.: + " A Joy for Ever" contains germs of subsequent work, 1880 _pref._ + " revision for press, 1857 _pref._ + " title, 1880 _pref._ + on his own writings, 140. + they cost him pain, and he does not expect then to give pleasure, + 1880 _pref._ + + +Barataria, the island of ("Don Quixote "), 65. + +Beauty in art, on what based, vi. + +Bible, The, to be realised as (not only called) God's Word 185. + + _Quoted, or referred to._ + Job iii. 3, "Let the day perish wherein I was born ... a child conceived, + 119. + " xxxi. 40, "Let thistles grow instead of wheat," &c., 101. + Ps. xxxii. 8, "I will guide thee with mine eye," 18. + " xxxii. 9, "Be ye not as the horse or mule," 18. + " c. 4, "Enter into His gates with thanksgiving," 1880 _pref._ + Prov. i. 20, "Wisdom uttereth her voice in the streets," 112 _n._ + " iii. 15, "Wisdom more precious than rubies," 174. + " iii. 16, "Length of days are in her right hand," &c., 130. + " iii. 17, "Her ways pleasantness and her paths peace," 120. + " xiii. 23, "Much food is in the tillage of the poor," 7 _n._ + " xxxi. 15, "She riseth while it is yet night," 9, 58. + " xxxi. 25, "Strength and honour are in her clothing," &c., 60. + Hab. ii., its practical lessons, 112 n. + " ii. 6, "Woe to him ... that ladeth himself with thick clay," 112 _n._ + " ii. 12, "Woe to him that buildeth a town with blood," 112 _n._ + " ii. 13, "The people weary themselves for vanity," 112 _n._ + Zach. vii. 9, 10, "Execute true judgment ... and let none imagine evil," + &c., 112 _n._ + Matt. vii. 16, "Gather figs of thistles," 133. + Luke xix. 26, "To him that hath shall be given," 181. + " xix. 27, "Those mine enemies bring hither and slay them before me, 183. + 2 Thess. iii. 10, "If any work not, neither shall he eat," 145. + +Books, not to be too cheap, and why, 65. + " numbers of, nowadays, and the result, 140. + +Botany, what to learn in, 128. + +Bridle of man, the Eye of God, 18. + +Brotherhood--"All men are brothers," what it implies, 14. + " politically and divinely, 121. + +Browning, E. B., on Italy, 78 _n._ + +Buildings, public, their decoration, 104. + + +Capitalist, the, his command over men, 4. + +Carlyle, T., on the value of horses and men, 18. + " "keen words" of, _quoted_, 184. + +Casa Guidi, windows of the, referred to, 36 _n._ + +Charity, crowning kingship (Siena fresco), 59. + " in preserving health, not in protracting disease, 184. + " is guidance, 127. + " not a geographical virtue, 81. + " true, defined, 118. + +Charon, 3. + +Chartres, 86. + +Cheapness not to be considered in producing art, 37. + " of good art, undesirable and why, 62 _seq._ + +Cheating disgraceful, but being cheated is not, 89. + +Church-going and life, 14. + " restoration, mania for, 86-7. + +Clarke, Dr. Adam, at the Metaphysical Society, 176. + +Cleobis and Bito, death of, 109. + " story of, beautiful, 183. + +Clergymen, to preach practically--_e.g._, on trade, 112 _n._ + +Cleverness, best shown in sympathy with the aims of others, 170. + +Clough, Arthur, _quoted_, 185 _n._ + +Cocoa-nut, simile from a, as to the cheapness of good art, 64. + +Colour, good, to be lasting, 44. + " local, as an element of chiaroscuro, 162. + +Commerce, cowardice and, 177. + " frauds of, 151-2. + " modern, 1857 _pref._ xi. + +Competition, a bad thing in education, 135. + +Conservatism, true, 58. + +Country, serving one's, with plough, pen, and sword, 129. + +Cricket, the game of, 128. + +Criticism, mistaken blame worse than mistaken praise, 24. + " public, its effect on artists, 24. + +Currency, national, its nature, 149. + +Dante--_Inferno_, the purse round the neck as a sign of condemnation, 4. + " " _Lasciate ogni speranza_, 93. + +Deane, Sir T., on the Oxford Museum, 32. + +Death, as a reward, 183. + +Design, dependent on proportion, 160. + " study of, 159. + " subjects of, 172-3. + +Development, the direction of human, 175. + +Dialogue on "paternal government," 121. + +Diamond-cutting, waste of time, 34. + +Dictionary of classical antiquities, woodcuts in, 107. + +"Diletto" and art, 155. + +Diogenes, respected, 2-3. + +Discipline the basis of progress, 16. + +Discovery of men of genius, 20. + +Disobedience destroys power of understanding, 1857 _pref._ x. + +Drawing as a means of description, 153. + " lessons, 156. + " to be learnt, as reading or writing, 153, 158. + " to scale, to be learnt, 160. + +Dress, art of, 47. + " beautiful, essential to great art--_e.g._, its portraiture, 54. + " " characteristics of, 54. + " " a means of education, 54. + " best, not the costliest, 54. + " employment of labour--_e.g._, ball-dresses, 50. + " fashion in, wasted power of design, 45. + " fine, the spoils of death, 53. + " " as a subject of expenditure, 146. + " " under what circumstance, right and wrong, 52. + " lace, its value, 171. + +Duerer's engravings, art-models, 169. + " " permanency of, 42. + " " crest with cock, as art-model, 164. + " woodcuts, 40. + + +Economy, its true meaning (application: accumulation: distribution), 8 _seq._ + " the art of managing labour, 7, 8. + " the balance of splendour and utility, 10. + " does not mean saving money, 8. + " simile of farm life, 11. + " the laws of, same for nation and individual, 12 _seq._ + See s. Almsgiving, Author, Capitalist, Charity, Cheating, + Commerce, Currency, Education, Employment, England, Farm, + Gentlemen, Gold, Labour, Land, Luxury, Money, National works, + Panics, Parish relief, Pension, Political Economy, Poor, Poverty, + Property, Trade, Wealth. + +Education, best claimed by offering obedience, 16. + " drawing to be part of, 156. + " dress as a means of, 54. + " eye, the best medium of, 106. + " formative, not reformative only, 15. + " in Art, author's paper on, 153 _seq._ + " liberty to be controlled by, 128. + " manual trade to be learnt by all youths, 128. + " modern, 135. + " " in England, its bad tendency, 177. + " schools of, to be beautiful, 104-5. + " refinement of habits, a part of, 104. + " waste of, on dead languages, 128. + " young men, their, 134. + +Edward I., progress since the days of, 1857 _pref._ + +Emotion, quickness of, is not capacity for it, 132. + +Employment, may be claimed by the obedient, 16. + +England, art-treasures in, their number, 5. + " modern, its ugliness, 176. + " the rich men of, their duty, 118-9. + +English character, impulse and prudence of, 17. + " " self-dependence, 130. + +Envy, vile, 177. + +Europe, no great art, except in, 87. + +Examinations, their educational aim and value, 136. + +Eye, the, nobler than the ear, and a better means of education, 106. + + +Faith, frescoes of, Ambrozio Lorenzetti, Siena, 57. + " kinds of, 57. + +Famine, how it comes, 133. + +Fancy, as essential to fine manufacture, 172. + +Farm, metaphor of a, applied to national economy, 11. + +Fashion, change of, as wasting power of design, 45. + +Florence, art and dress of, 54. + " drawing at, 1400-1500, art-models, 169. + +Fools, the wise to take of the, 118. + +France, art in, great, and beautiful dress, 54. + " English prejudice against, 81. + " social philosophy in, "fraternite" a true principle, 14. + +Francia, a goldsmith, 46. + +Frescoes, whitewashing of Italian, 85. + +Fraternity implies paternity, 14 (cp. Time and Tide, 177). + +Funeral, English love of a "decent," 70. + + +Gainsborough, his want of gentle training, 28. + " learns from Italian art, 82. + +Genius, men of, and art, four questions as to (production, employment, + accumulation, distribution), 19. + " " their early struggles, due to their starting on wrong work, 23. + +Gentlemen, tradesmen to be accounted, 114. + +Ghiberti's gates, M. Angelo on, 46. + " a goldsmith, 46. + +Ghirlandajo, a goldsmith, 46. + " M. Angelo's master, 46. + +Giotto's frescoes, Assisi, perishing for want of care, 86. + " discovered by Cimabue, 133. + +Glass, cut, waste of labour on, 34. + " painted, French 1200-1300, the best, 169. + +God always sends men for the work, but we crush them, 133. + " His work, its fulfilment by men, 122. + +Gold, its uses, as a medium of exchange, 150. + " " incorruptible and to be used for lasting things, 46. + " " not therefore to be used for coinage, 46. + +Goldsmiths, artists who have been, 46. + " educational training for artists, 46 _n._ + " work of, 45 _seq._ + +Government, enforcement of divine law, 121. + " in details, 122 _seq._ + " paternal, 14. + " " "in loco parentis," 16 _n._ + " " defined, 121. + " principles of, at the root of economy, 11 + " " Faith, Hope, Charity, 57. + " to be conservative, but expectant, 58. + " to form, not only reform, 15. + " to give work to all who want it, 129. + +Great men and the public, 137 + " the work they are sent to do, 133 + +Greatness, the humility of, 137. + +Greece, development of physical beauty, 176. + +Guilds of trade, decoration of their buildings, 116 _seq._ + + +Hesiod's "Eris", 176. + +Historians, mistaken way of pointing out how great men are fitted for + their work, 133. + +Historical painting as a means of education, 106-7. + +History, the study of mediaeval, as well as ancient, insisted on, 109. + +Horace, "justus, et propositi tenax," 182. + " "prava jubentium," _ib._ + +Horse and man, bridling of, 18. + +Hospitals, decoration of, 114. + +Housewife, her seriousness and her smile, 10. + +Housewifery, perfect, 10. + +Humility of greatness, 137. + " the companion of joy and usefulness, 168. + + +Illustrations, modern, bad art of, 40. + +Independence, dishonest efforts after, 131. + +Indian shawls, design of, 173. + +Industry, its duty to the past and future, 72. + +Infidelity, modern, 177. + +Invention, national, of new wants, 138. + +Inventors, to be publicly rewarded, but to have no patents, 113. + +Island, desert, analogy of a, and political economy, 110. + +Italy, Austrians in, 78. + " cradle of art, 82. + " destruction of art in modern, 84. + " modern art of, 85. + " state of, 1857, 84. + " thunderclouds in, "the winepress of God's wrath," 77. + +Italian character, 84. + + +Jewels, cutting of, 52. + " modern, bad and costly, 159. + " property in, 146. + +Jews, Christian dislike of, 81. + + +Keats, quoted, "a joy for ever," 1880 _pref._ ix-x. + +King, the virtues of a (Siena fresco), 60. + +Kingship, crowned by charity (Siena fresco), 59. + " modern contempt for, 177. + + +Labour, a claim to property, 145. + " constant, not intermittent, needed, 11. + " end of, is happiness, not money, 174. + " " to bring the whole country under cultivation, 12. + " management of, _is_ economy, 7. + " organisation of, no "out of work" cry, 11-12. + " " under government, planned, 127-31. + " sufficiency of a man's labour for all his needs, 7. + " " " nation's " its " 7. + +Labour, _continued_;-- + " waste of, in various kinds of useless art, cut-glass, mosaic, &c, 34. + " " dress, 50 _seq._ + +Lace-making, 52. + " machine and hand-made, 170. + " value of, in its labour, 171. + +Laissez-aller, a ruinous principle, 16. + +Land, the laws of cultivation, the same for a continent as for an acre, 12. + -owners, their duties, 143. + +Law and liberty, 123. + " most irksome, when most necessary, 15. + " principles of, applied to minor things, 123. + " should regulate everything it can, 126. + " systems of, none perfect, 124. + " to be protective, not merely punitive, 15. + +Legislation, paternal, dialogue on, 121. + +Leonardo da Vinci, an engineer, 21. + " " " pupil of Verrocchio, 46. + " " "work by, at Florence, 164. + +Leonidas' death, 109. + +Lewis, John, his work, and its prices, 102 n. + +Liberalism in government, true, 58. + +Liberty, law and, 123. + " to be interfered with, for good of nation, 123-26. + +Life, battles of early, for men of genius, 23. + " ideal of, simplicity _plus_ imagination, 147. + +Literature, cheap, modern, 65. + +Lombard architecture at Pisa and Verona, 76. + +London season, cost of, in dress, 55. + +Look, people will not, at things, 141. + +Lorenzetti, Ambrozio, his frescoes of "government" at Siena, 57. + +Love and Kingship, _see_ s. Charity. + +Luxury, articles of, as "property," 146. + " does not add to wealth, 48. + " the influences of, 138. + +Macaulay's false saying, "the giants of one age, the pigmies + of the next," 168. + +Magnanimity, the virtue of, its full meaning, 60. + +Mammon worship, in English commercial centres, 151. + +Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition 1858, 5, 69. + " " motto of, "A joy for ever," 1880 _pref._ + +Mansfield Art Night Class, address to, 1873, 166 _seq._ + +Manufacture, defined, 169. + +Marathon, 109. + +Marble, a better material for sculpture than granite, 34. + +Marriage, desire for, in girls, 55. + +Medici, Pietro de, orders M. Angelo's snow-statue, 36. + +Menippus, 3. + +Metaphysical Society, author, May 4, 1875, reads paper at, 175. + +Michael Angelo, author's praise of, 36. + " " Ghirlandajo's pupil, 46. + " " on Ghiberti's gates, 46. + " " snow-statue, 36. + +Mill, J. S., on wealth, 145_n._ + " " on women, 180. + +Misery, always the result of indolence or mistaken industry, 7. + +Mistress, of a house, ideal, described, 9, 10. + +Modernism, contempt for poverty and honour of wealth, 1 seq. + _See_ s. Commerce, Education, England, Italy, Wealth. + +Money, a document of title, 148. + " God's gift and not our own, and why, 116 _seq._ + " great work never done for, 98, 102. + " spending, is to employ labour, 48. + " the way we spend it, important, 48-9. + +Morality, mechanical basis of, 176. + " not to be limited to a class, 182. + +Moral sense, the, defined, 177. + +Mosaic, Florentine, waste of labour, 34. + +Motive, the only real, and rightness, 81. + +Mourning, English love of, 70. + +Museums, provincial, art-models for, 169. + + +National works, as a means of art employment, 24. + +Nations in "brotherly concord and fatherly authority," 14. + " energy of, to be directed, 16. + " laws of, to be protective as well as punitive, 14. + +Natural forms, as subjects of design, 172. + " History, the study of, to be extended, 155. + " Science, and drawing, 156. + +New York, council of, on luxury, 138_n._ + +Nottingham lace, 170. + +Novara, battle of, 77. + + +Obedience, to what we dislike, 1857 _pref._ + +Obstinacy of great men against the public, 137-8. + +Overwork, decried, 11. + +Oxford Museum, Sir T. Deane on the, 32. + + +Painter, poverty of early years, 100. + " prices paid to a, 98. + +Panics, commercial--_e.g._, 1857, 151. + +Paper, necessity of good, for water-colour art, 43. + +Parable, The Ten Talents, its practical application, 114-15. + +Parents, noble delight of pleasing one's, possible only to the young, 27. + +Paris, destruction of, 1870-1, 168. + +Parish relief, no more _infra dig._ than State pensions, 129. + +Patents, no, but private inventions to be publicly rewarded, 113. + +Patriotism, what, 81. + +Pensions, are Government alms, 129. + +Peterborough, Bishop of, paper read at Metaphysical Society, 176, 183, 185. + +Photography, as a means of providing art-models, 164. + " collections of Florentine Gallery photos, _ib._ + +Pictures, copies of, to be made, but not to be bought, 90. + " dealers, and old pictures, 85. + " destruction of, 69. + " galleries, in all great cities, 91. + " " their supervision and curators, 93. + " pictorial method of education, 106 _seq._ + " price of, 101, 38. + +Pictures, price of, _continued_:-- + " " effect of high prices on artists and on art, 97 _seq._ + " " by living artists, shows not value, but demand, 101. + " " by dead and living masters, 103. + " " modern prices, 38. + " " of oil and water-colour, 102 _n._ + " " to be limited but not too cheap, 66, 95-6. + " private possession of, its value, 93-4. + " purchase of, private buyers to buy the works of living artists, + the public those of dead, 103, 94, 5. + " " for ostentation, 101. + " " the government to buy great works, 89. + " restoration of, notes of, to be kept for reference, 94 _n._ + " " in Italy, 85. + " sale of a picture, its politico-economical effect, 132 _n._ + " studies for, tracings, and copies of, to be kept, 90 _seq._ + +Pisa, architecture at, 76. + " Campo Santo, The, 82. + +Plate, changes of fashion in, deplored, 45. + " gold and silver to be gradually accumulated, not melted down and + remodelled, 46. + +Ploughing, boys to learn, 128. + +Political economists, their thrift, 89. + " Economy, modern books on, 1857 _pref._ + " " the aim of true, 145. + " " is citizen's economy, 1857 _pref._ + " " definition and true meaning of, 132 _n._ + " " first principles of, simple but misunderstood, 1857 _pref._ + " " its questions to be dealt with one by one, 38. + " " study of, to be accurate, if not deep, 1857 _pref._ + " " secrecy in trade bad, 110 _seq._ + " " _See_ s. Economy. + +Politics, English, 82. + " European, 1848, 1857, 80. + " _See_ s. Conservatism, Liberalism. + +Poor, the, their right to State education and support, 127. + +Poor, the, _continued_;-- + " are kept at the expense of the rich, 127 _n._ + " to be taken care of, 118. + +Poverty, classical writers on, 2. + " mediaeval view of, 4. + " modern contempt for, just and right, 1 _seq._ + +Posterity, thought for, 72. + +Praise, only the young can enjoy, for the old are above it, + if they deserve it, 26. + +Pride, as a motive of expenditure, 79. + +Prize-giving, a bad thing in education, 135. + " its true value and meaning, 166. + +Productive and unproductive transactions, 132 _n._ + +Progress, modern, since Edward I., 1857 _pref._ + +Property, division of, into things producing (_a_) life, (_b_) the objects of + life, 144 _seq._ + " the right of, to be acknowledged, 142. + +Providence, notion of a special, 133. + +Public, the, favour of, 137. + " great men and, 137. + " impatient of what it cannot understand, 140-1. + +Punishment, the rationale of human, 123. + +Purse-pride, modern and ancient, 2. + + +Railway speed, 86. + +Raphael's Disputation, 147. + +Religion, national, its beauty, _pref._ + +Rembrandt's "spotted shell" as a model in etching, 164. + +Renaissance architecture at Verona, 76. + +Restraint, the law of life, 16. + +Reverence for art, a test of art power, 167. + +Reynolds, Sir J., learns much from Italian art, 82. + " portraits of, models of art, 169. + +Rich, the duty of the strong and, 118. + +Riding, as part of education, 128. + +Rowing, as part of education, 128. + + +St. Albans, Duke of, reads paper for author at Mansfield, 166 _n._ + +St. Louis' chapel at Carcassonne, painting, 86. + +Salvation, not to be limited to a class, 182. + +School Board, the, 177. + +Schools of art, bare schoolrooms do not fix the attention, 105. + " " decoration of, reasons for, 104. + " " proposals for, 132. + +Science, controversy in, too much nowadays, 175. + " education in, 128. + " the bridal city of, 175. + +Selection, Natural, and Social Policy, paper by author, 175. + +Shakespeare's Cliff, 89. + +Siena, frescoes of Antonio Lorenzetti, 57. + +Smith, Adam, 1857 _pref._ + +Soldiers of the ploughshare as well as of the sword, 15. + +Speculation, commercial, 151. + +Spider, web of a, 170. + +Street, Mr., on the Ducal Palace, 141 _n._ + +Students in art, not to aim at being great masters, 168. + +Surfaces, drawing of round, &c., 161. + +Sympathy, the cleverness of, 170. + +Systems, not easily grasped, 128. + + +Taste, defined, 154. + " education of, 160. + +Tennyson, _In Mem._ LV. "Of fifty seeds, she often brings but one to bear," + 133 (_cp._ Time and Tide, 67). + +Thought, not to take the place of fact, 141. + +Time, man is the true destroyer, not, 74. + +_Times_, The, Nov. 23, 1857, referred to, 138 _n._ + +Tintoret's St. Sebastian (Venice), perishing, 86. + +Titian, eternally right, 157. + " sketch by (Florence), 164. + " woodcuts of, 70. + +Tombs, English waste of money on, 78. + +Trade, art-faculty, its employment in design in, 30. + " freedom from rivalry, healthful, 110 _seq._ + " government direction of, 129. + " guilds, decoration of their buildings, 110 _seq._ + +Trade, guilds, _continued_:-- + " " under public management, 114. + " secrecy of, bad, 110 _seq._ + " true co-operation in, what, 112. + " youths to learn some manual, 128. + +Tradesmen, their modern social position wrong, 114. + +Truth, dependent on justice and love, 152. + +Turner, prices of his pictures, when a boy, 98. + " his want of gentle training, 28. + + +Ugliness, is evil, 177. + +Usury, a "mortal sin," 185. + +Utility, not to be the sole object of life, 10. + + +Vellum, for water-colour drawing, 43. + +Venice, art of, aided by beautiful dress, 54. + " Ducal Palace, chronology of the capital, 141 _n._ + +Verona, amphitheatre of, 76. + " battle-fields of, 77. + " greatest art-treasury in the world, 76 _seq._ + " typical of Gothic architecture, 76. + +Veronese, P., eternally right, 157. + " "Family of Darius," purchased by National Gallery, for L14,000, 55. + +Verrocchio, a goldsmith, 46. + " master of Leonardo, 46. + +Virtues, the, fresco of, by A. Lorenzetti, at Siena, 57. + " winged (Siena), _ib._ _seq._ + + +Wages, fixed rate of, advocated, 113, 129. + +Wall-paper, 159. + +Wants, the invention of new, 138. + +War, destruction of works of art by, 75. + +Water-colour drawings, perishable, and why, 42. + " " to be on vellum, not paper, 43. + +Wealth, author's respect for true, 1. + " duty and, 119-20. + " earned and inherited, 143. + +Wealth, _continued_:-- + " freedom of spending, to be allowed, 142. + " how gained, 117. + " means well-being, 147. + " mediaeval view of, 4. + " modern honour paid to, 1, 2. + " power of, 4. + " principles of, 114 _seq._ + " works of art, how far they are, 132 _n._ + +Wealthy, the, "pilots of the State," 119, 142. + " " claims of the poor on, 143. + " " way in which they should spend their money, 143. + +Wisdom, preciousness of, 174. + +Women, education of, drawing, 158-9. + " J. S. Mill on the position of, 180. + +Woodcuts, cheap and nasty, 40. + +Wordsworth's essay on the Poor Law Amendment Bill, 16 _n._ + +Workhouses, to be worthy their name, 114. + +Working-men's College, drawing at the, 156. + + +Youth, encouragement good for, 26 _seq._ + " of a nation, to be guarded, 134. + " work of a, necessarily imperfect, but blameable, if bold or slovenly, 25. + + +THE END. + +Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. + +Edinburgh & London + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Joy For Ever, by John Ruskin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A JOY FOR EVER *** + +***** This file should be named 19980.txt or 19980.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/9/8/19980/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif, Paul Murray and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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