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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/1637-0.txt b/1637-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a4fad24 --- /dev/null +++ b/1637-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6426 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays, by +Charles Kingsley + + +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: Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays + + +Author: Charles Kingsley + + + +Release Date: February 23, 2013 [eBook #1637] +[This file was first posted on September 17, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SANITARY AND SOCIAL LECTURES AND +ESSAYS*** + + +Transcribed from the 1880 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price, email +ccx074@pglaf.org + + + + + + SANITARY AND SOCIAL + LECTURES AND ESSAYS + + + * * * * * + + BY + CHARLES KINGSLEY + + * * * * * + + London: + MACMILLAN AND CO. + 1880. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + PAGE +Woman’s Work in a Country Parish 3 +The Science of Health 21 +The Two Breaths 49 +Thrift 77 +Nausicaa in London; or, the Lower Education of Women 107 +The Air-Mothers 131 +The Tree of Knowledge 167 +Great Cities and their Influence for Good and Evil 187 +Heroism 225 +The Massacre of the Innocents 257 +“A mad world, my masters.” 271 + + + + +WOMAN’S WORK IN A COUNTRY PARISH. {3} + + +I HAVE been asked to speak a few words to you on a lady’s work in a +country parish. I shall confine myself rather to principles than to +details; and the first principle which I would impress on you is, that we +must all be just before we are generous. I must, indeed, speak plainly +on this point. A woman’s first duties are to her own family, her own +servants. Be not deceived: if anyone cannot rule her own household, she +cannot rule the Church of God. If anyone cannot sympathise with the +servants with whom she is in contact all day long, she will not really +sympathise with the poor whom she sees once a week. I know the +temptation not to believe this is very great. It seems so much easier to +women to do something for the poor, than for their own ladies’ maids, and +house-maids, and cooks. And why? Because they can treat the poor as +_things_: but they _must_ treat their servants as persons. A lady can go +into a poor cottage, lay down the law to the inhabitants, reprove them +for sins to which she has never been tempted; tell them how to set things +right, which, if she had the doing of them, I fear she would do even more +confusedly and slovenly than they. She can give them a tract, as she +might a pill; and then a shilling, as something sweet after the medicine; +and she can go out again and see no more of them till her benevolent mood +recurs: but with the servants it is not so. She knows their characters; +and, what is more, they know hers; they know her private history, her +little weaknesses. Perhaps she is a little in their power, and she is +shy with them. She is afraid of beginning a good work with them, +because, if she does, she will be forced to carry it out; and it cannot +be cold, dry, perfunctory, official: it must be hearty, living, loving, +personal. She must make them her friends; and perhaps she is afraid of +doing that, for fear they should take liberties, as it is called—which +they very probably will do, unless she keeps up a very high standard of +self-restraint and earnestness in her own life—and that involves a great +deal of trouble, and so she is tempted, when she wishes to do good, to +fall back on the poor people in the cottages outside, who, as she +fancies, know nothing about her, and will never find out whether or not +she acts up to the rules which she lays down for them. Be not deceived, +I say, in this case also. Fancy not that they know nothing about you. +There is nothing secret which shall not be made manifest; and what you do +in the closet is surely proclaimed (and often with exaggeration enough +and to spare) on the house-top. These poor folks at your gate know well +enough, through servants and tradesmen, what you are, how you treat your +servants, how you pay your bills, what sort of temper you have; and they +form a shrewd, hard estimate of your character, in the light of which +they view all that you do and say to them; and believe me, that if you +wish to do any real good to them, you must begin by doing good to those +who lie still nearer to you than them. And believe me, too, that if you +shrink from a hearty patriarchal sympathy with your own servants, because +it would require too much personal human intercourse with them, you are +like a man who, finding that he had not powder enough to fire off a +pocket-pistol, should try to better matters by using the same quantity of +ammunition in an eighty-four pound gun. For it is this human friendship, +trust, affection, which is the very thing you have to employ towards the +poor, and to call up in them. Clubs, societies, alms, lending libraries +are but dead machinery, needful, perhaps, but, like the iron tube without +the powder, unable to send the bullet forth one single inch; dead and +useless lumber, without humanity; without the smile of the lip, the light +of the eye, the tenderness of the voice, which makes the poor woman feel +that a soul is speaking to her soul, a heart yearning after her heart; +that she is not merely a _thing_ to be improved, but a sister to be made +conscious of the divine bond of her sisterhood, and taught what she means +when she repeats in her Creed, “I believe in the communion of saints.” +This is my text, and my key-note—whatever else I may say to-day is but a +carrying out into details of the one question, How may you go to these +poor creatures as woman to woman? + +Your next duties are to your husband’s or father’s servants and workmen. +It is said that a clergyman’s wife ought to consider the parish as _her_ +flock as well as her husband’s. It may be so: I believe the dogma to be +much overstated just now. But of a landlord’s, or employer’s wife (I am +inclined to say, too, of an officer’s wife), such a doctrine is +absolutely true, and cannot be overstated. A large proportion, +therefore, of your parish work will be to influence the men of your +family to do their duty by their dependants. You wish to cure the evils +under which they labour. The greater proportion of these are in the +hands of your men relatives. It is a mockery, for instance, in you to +visit the fever-stricken cottage, while your husband leaves it in a state +which breeds that fever. Your business is to go to him and say, “_Here +is a wrong_; _right it_!” This, as many a beautiful Middle Age legend +tells us, has been woman’s function in all uncivilised times; not merely +to melt man’s heart to pity, but to awaken it to duty. But the man must +see that the woman is in earnest: that if he will not repair the wrong by +justice, she will, if possible (as in those old legends), by +self-sacrifice. Be sure this method will conquer. Do but say: “If you +will not new-roof that cottage, if you will not make that drain, I will. +I will not buy a new dress till it is done; I will sell the horse you +gave me, pawn the bracelet you gave me, but the thing shall be done.” +Let him see, I say, that you are in earnest, and he will feel that your +message is a divine one, which he must obey for very shame and weariness, +if for nothing else. This is in my eyes the second part of a woman’s +parish work. I entreat you to bear it in mind when you hear, as I trust +you will, lectures in this place upon that _Sanitary Reform_, without +which all efforts for the bettering of the masses are in my eyes not only +useless, but hypocritical. + +I will suppose, then, that you are fulfilling home duties in +self-restraint, and love, and in the fear of God. I will suppose that +you are using all your woman’s influence on the mind of your family, in +behalf of tenants and workmen; and I tell you frankly, that unless this +be first done, you are paying a tithe of mint and anise, and neglecting +common righteousness and mercy. But you wish to do more: you wish for +personal contact with the poor round you, for the pure enjoyment of doing +good to them with your own hands. How are you to set about it? First, +there are clubs—clothing-clubs, shoe-clubs, maternal-clubs; all very good +in their way. But do not fancy that they are the greater part of your +parish work. Rather watch and fear lest they become substitutes for your +real parish work; lest the bustle and amusement of playing at shopkeeper, +or penny-collector, once a week, should blind you to your real power—your +real treasure, by spending which you become all the richer. What you +have to do is to ennoble and purify the _womanhood_ of these poor women; +to make them better daughters, sisters, wives, mothers: and all the clubs +in the world will not do that; they are but palliatives of a great evil, +which they do not touch; cloaks for almsgiving, clumsy means of eking out +insufficient wages; at best, kindly contrivances for tricking into +temporary thriftiness a degraded and reckless peasantry. Miserable, +miserable state of things! out of which the longer I live I see less hope +of escape, saving by an emigration, which shall drain us of all the +healthy, strong, and brave among the lower classes, and leave us, as a +just punishment for our sins, only the cripple, the drunkard, and the +beggar. + +Yet these clubs _must_ be carried on. They make life a little more +possible; they lighten hearts, if but for a moment; they inculcate habits +of order and self-restraint, which may be useful when the poor man finds +himself in Canada or Australia. And it is a cruel utilitarianism to +refuse to palliate the symptoms because you cannot cure the disease +itself. You will give opiates to the suffering, who must die +nevertheless. Let him slip into his grave at least as painlessly as you +can. And so you must use these charitable societies, remembering all +along what a fearful and humbling sign the necessity for them is of the +diseased state of this England, as the sportula and universal almsgiving +was of the decadence of Rome. + +However, the work has to be done; and such as it is, it is especially +fitted for young unmarried ladies. It requires no deep knowledge of +human nature. It makes them aware of the amount of suffering and +struggling which lies around them, without bringing them in that most +undesirable contact with the coarser forms of evil which house-visitation +must do; and the mere business habits of accuracy and patience to which +it compels them, are a valuable practical schooling for them themselves +in after-life. It is tiresome and unsentimental drudgery, no doubt; but +perhaps all the better training on that account. And, after all, the +magic of sweetness, grace, and courtesy may shed a hallowing and +humanising light over the meanest work, and the smile of God may spread +from lip to lip, and the light of God from eye to eye, even between the +giver and receiver of a penny, till the poor woman goes home, saying in +her heart, “I have not only found the life of my hand—I have found a +sister for time and for eternity.” + +But there is another field of parish usefulness which I cannot recommend +too earnestly, and that is, the school. There you may work as hard as +you will, and how you will—provided you do it in a loving, hearty, +cheerful, _human_ way, playful and yet earnest; two qualities which, when +they exist in their highest power, are sure to go together. I say, how +you will. I am no pedant about schools; I care less what is taught than +how it is taught. The merest rudiments of Christianity, the merest +rudiments of popular instruction, are enough, provided they be given by +lips which speak as if they believed what they said, and with a look +which shows real love for the pupil. Manner is everything—matter a +secondary consideration; for in matter, brain only speaks to brain; in +manner, soul speaks to soul. If you want Christ’s lost-lambs really to +believe that He died for them, you will do it better by one little act of +interest and affection, than by making them learn by heart whole +commentaries—even as Miss Nightingale has preached Christ crucified to +those poor soldiers by acts of plain outward drudgery, more livingly, and +really, and convincingly than she could have done by ten thousand +sermons, and made many a noble lad, I doubt not, say in his heart, for +the first time in his wild life, “I can believe now that Christ died for +me, for here is one whom He has taught to die for me in like wise.” And +this blessed effect of school-work, remember, is not confined to the +children. It goes home with them to the parents. The child becomes an +object of interest and respect in their eyes, when they see it an object +of interest and respect in yours. If they see that you look on it as an +awful and glorious being, the child of God, the co-heir of Christ, they +learn gradually to look on it in the same light. They become afraid and +ashamed (and it is a noble fear and shame) to do and say before it what +they used to do and say; afraid to ill-use it. It becomes to them a +mysterious visitor (sad that it should be so, but true as sad) from a +higher and purer sphere, who must be treated with something of courtesy +and respect, who must even be asked to teach them something of its new +knowledge; and the school, and the ladies’ interest in the school, become +to the degraded parents a living sign that those children’s angels do +indeed behold the face of their Father which is in heaven. + +Now, there is one thing in school-work which I wish to press on you; and +that is, that you should not confine your work to the girls; but bestow +it as freely on those who need it more, and who (paradoxical as it may +seem) will respond to it more deeply and freely—_the boys_. I am not +going to enter into the reasons _why_. I only entreat you to believe me, +that by helping to educate the boys, or even (when old enough), by taking +a class (as I have seen done with admirable effect) of grown-up lads, you +may influence for ever not only the happiness of your pupils, but of the +girls whom they will hereafter marry. It will be a boon to your own sex +as well as to ours to teach them courtesy, self-restraint, reverence for +physical weakness, admiration of tenderness and gentleness; and it is one +which only a lady can bestow. Only by being accustomed in youth to +converse with ladies, will the boy learn to treat hereafter his +sweetheart or his wife like a gentleman. There is a latent chivalry, +doubt it not, in the heart of every untutored clod; if it dies out in him +(as it too often does), it were better for him, I often think, if he had +never been born: but the only talisman which will keep it alive, much +more develop it into its fulness, is friendly and revering intercourse +with women of higher rank than himself, between whom and him there is a +great and yet a blessed gulf fixed. + +I have left to the last the most important subject of all; and that is, +what is called “visiting the poor.” It is an endless subject; if you go +into details, you might write volumes on it. All I can do this afternoon +is to keep to my own key-note, and say, Visit whom, when, and where you +will; but let your visits be those of woman to woman. Consider to whom +you go—to poor souls whose life, compared with yours, is one long malaise +of body, and soul, and spirit—and do as you would be done by; instead of +reproving and fault-finding, encourage. In God’s name, encourage. They +scramble through life’s rocks, bogs, and thornbrakes, clumsily enough, +and have many a fall, poor things! But why, in the name of a God of love +and justice, is the lady, rolling along the smooth turnpike-road in her +comfortable carriage, to be calling out all day long to the poor soul who +drags on beside her over hedge and ditch, moss and moor, bare-footed and +weary-hearted, with half-a-dozen children at her back: “You ought not to +have fallen here; and it was very cowardly to lie down there; and it was +your duty, as a mother, to have helped that child through the puddle; +while, as for sleeping under that bush, it is most imprudent and +inadmissible?” Why not encourage her, praise her, cheer her on her weary +way by loving words, and keep your reproofs for yourself—even your +advice; for _she_ does get on her way, after all, where _you_ could not +travel a step forward; and she knows what she is about perhaps better +than you do, and what she has to endure, and what God thinks of her +life-journey. The heart knoweth its own bitterness, and a stranger +intermeddleth not with its joy. But do not be a stranger to her. Be a +sister to her. I do not ask you to take her up in your carriage. You +cannot; perhaps it is good for her that you cannot. It is good sometimes +for Lazarus that he is not fit to sit at Dives’s feast—good for him that +he should receive his evil things in this life, and be comforted in the +life to come. All I ask is, do to the poor soul as you would have her do +to you in her place. Do not interrupt and vex her (for she is busy +enough already) with remedies which she does not understand, for troubles +which you do not understand. But speak comfortably to her, and say: “I +cannot feel _with_ you, but I do feel _for_ you: I should enjoy helping +you, but I do not know how—tell me. Tell me where the yoke galls; tell +me why that forehead is grown old before its time: I may be able to ease +the burden, to put fresh light into the eyes; and if not, still tell me, +simply because I am a woman, and know the relief of pouring out my own +soul into loving ears, even though in the depths of despair.” Yes, +paradoxical as it may seem, I am convinced that the only way to help +these poor women humanly and really, is to begin by confessing to them +that you do not know how to help them; to humble yourself to them, and to +ask their counsel for the good of themselves and of their neighbours, +instead of coming proudly to them, with nostrums ready compounded, as if +a doctor should be so confident in his own knowledge of books and +medicine as to give physic before asking the patient’s symptoms. + +Therefore, I entreat you to bear in mind (for without this all visiting +of the poor will be utterly void and useless), that you must regulate +your conduct to them, and in their houses, even to the most minute +particulars, by the very same rules which apply to persons of your own +class. Never let any woman say of you (thought fatal to all confidence, +all influence!): “Yes, it is all very kind: but she does not behave to me +as she would to one of her own quality.” Piety, earnestness, +affectionateness, eloquence—all may be nullified and stultified by simply +keeping a poor woman standing in her own cottage while you sit, or +entering her house, even at her own request, while she is at meals. She +may decline to sit; she may beg you to come in, all the more reason for +refusing utterly to obey her, because it shows that that very inward gulf +between you and her still exists in her mind, which it is the object of +your visit to bridge over. If you know her to be in trouble, touch on +that trouble as you would with a lady. Woman’s heart is alike in all +ranks, and the deepest sorrow is the one of which she speaks the last and +least. We should not like anyone—no, not an angel from heaven, to come +into our houses without knocking at the door, and say: “I hear you are +very ill off—I will lend you a hundred pounds. I think you are very +careless of money, I will take your accounts into my own hands;” and +still less again: “Your son is a very bad, profligate, disgraceful +fellow, who is not fit to be mentioned; I intend to take him out of your +hands and reform him myself.” Neither do the poor like such +unceremonious mercy, such untender tenderness, benevolence at horse-play, +mistaking kicks for caresses. They do not like it, they will not respond +to it, save in parishes which have been demoralised by officious and +indiscriminate benevolence, and where the last remaining virtues of the +poor, savage self-help and independence, have been exchanged (as I have +too often seen them exchanged) for organised begging and hypocrisy. + +I would that you would all read, ladies, and consider well the traits of +an opposite character which have just come to light (to me, I am ashamed +to say, for the first time) in the Biography of Sidney Smith. The love +and admiration which that truly brave and loving man won from everyone, +rich or poor, with whom he came in contact, seems to me to have arisen +from the one fact, that without perhaps having any such conscious +intention, he treated rich and poor, his own servants and the noblemen +his guests, alike, and _alike_ courteously, considerately, cheerfully, +affectionately—so leaving a blessing and reaping a blessing wheresoever +he went. + +Approach, then, these poor women as sisters, and you will be able +gradually to reverse the hard saying of which I made use just now: “Do +not apply remedies which they do not understand, to diseases which you do +not understand.” Learn lovingly and patiently (aye, and reverently, for +there is that in every human being which deserves reverence, and must be +reverenced if we wish to understand it)—learn, I say, to understand their +troubles, and by that time they will have learnt to understand your +remedies, and they will appreciate them. For you _have_ remedies. I do +not undervalue your position. No man on earth is less inclined to +undervalue the real power of wealth, rank, accomplishments, manners—even +physical beauty. All are talents from God, and I give God thanks when I +see them possessed by any human being; for I know that they, too, can be +used in His service, and brought to bear on the true emancipation of +woman—her emancipation, not from man (as some foolish persons fancy), but +from the devil, “the slanderer and divider” who divides her from man, and +makes her live a life-long tragedy, which goes on in more cottages than +in palaces—a vie à part, a vie incomprise—a life made up half of +ill-usage, half of unnecessary, self-willed, self-conceited martyrdom, +instead of being (as God intended) half of the human universe, a helpmeet +for man, and the one bright spot which makes this world endurable. +Towards making her that, and so realising the primeval mission by every +cottage hearth, each of you can do something; for each of you have some +talent, power, knowledge, attraction between soul and soul, which the +cottager’s wife has not, and by which you may draw her to you with (as +the prophet says) human bonds and the cords of love: but she must be +drawn by them alone, or your work is nothing, and though you give the +treasures of Ind, they are valueless equally to her and to Christ; for +they are not given in His name, which is that boundless tenderness, +consideration, patience, self-sacrifice, by which even the cup of cold +water is a precious offering—as God grant your labour may be! + + + + +THE SCIENCE OF HEALTH. {21} + + +WHETHER the British race is improving or degenerating? What, if it seem +probably degenerating, are the causes of so great an evil? How they can +be, if not destroyed, at least arrested? These are questions worthy +attention, not of statesmen only and medical men, but of every father and +mother in these isles. I shall say somewhat about them in this Essay; +and say it in a form which ought to be intelligible to fathers and +mothers of every class, from the highest to the lowest, in hopes of +convincing some of them at least that the science of health, now so +utterly neglected in our curriculum of so-called education, ought to be +taught—the rudiments of it at least—in every school, college, and +university. + +We talk of our hardy forefathers; and rightly. But they were hardy, just +as the savage is usually hardy, because none but the hardy lived. They +may have been able to say of themselves—as they do in a State paper of +1515, now well known through the pages of Mr. Froude: “What comyn folk of +all the world may compare with the comyns of England, in riches, freedom, +liberty, welfare, and all prosperity? What comyn folk is so mighty, and +so strong in the felde, as the comyns of England?” They may have been +fed on “great shins of beef,” till they became, as Benvenuto Cellini +calls them, “the English wild beasts.” But they increased in numbers +slowly, if at all, for centuries. Those terrible laws of natural +selection, which issue in “the survival of the fittest,” cleared off the +less fit, in every generation, principally by infantile disease, often by +wholesale famine and pestilence; and left, on the whole, only those of +the strongest constitutions to perpetuate a hardy, valiant, and +enterprising race. + +At last came a sudden and unprecedented change. In the first years of +this century, steam and commerce produced an enormous increase in the +population. Millions of fresh human beings found employment, married, +brought up children who found employment in their turn, and learnt to +live more or less civilised lives. An event, doubtless, for which God is +to be thanked. A quite new phase of humanity, bringing with it new vices +and new dangers: but bringing, also, not merely new comforts, but new +noblenesses, new generosities, new conceptions of duty, and of how that +duty should be done. It is childish to regret the old times, when our +soot-grimed manufacturing districts were green with lonely farms. To +murmur at the transformation would be, I believe, to murmur at the will +of Him without whom not a sparrow falls to the ground. + + The old order changeth, yielding place to the new, + And God fulfils himself in many ways, + Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. + +Our duty is, instead of longing for the good old custom, to take care of +the good new custom, lest it should corrupt the world in like wise. And +it may do so thus: + +The rapid increase of population during the first half of this century +began at a moment when the British stock was specially exhausted; namely, +about the end of the long French war. There may have been periods of +exhaustion, at least in England, before that. There may have been one +here, as there seems to have been on the Continent, after the Crusades; +and another after the Wars of the Roses. There was certainly a period of +severe exhaustion at the end of Elizabeth’s reign, due both to the long +Spanish and Irish wars and to the terrible endemics introduced from +abroad; an exhaustion which may have caused, in part, the national +weakness which hung upon us during the reign of the Stuarts. But after +none of these did the survival of the less fit suddenly become more easy; +or the discovery of steam power, and the acquisition of a colonial +empire, create at once a fresh demand for human beings and a fresh supply +of food for them. Britain, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, +was in an altogether new social situation. + +At the beginning of the great French war; and, indeed, ever since the +beginning of the war with Spain in 1739—often snubbed as the “war about +Jenkins’s ear”—but which was, as I hold, one of the most just, as it was +one of the most popular, of all our wars; after, too, the once famous +“forty fine harvests” of the eighteenth century, the British people, from +the gentleman who led to the soldier or sailor who followed, were one of +the mightiest and most capable races which the world has ever seen, +comparable best to the old Roman, at his mightiest and most capable +period. That, at least, their works testify. They created—as far as man +can be said to create anything—the British Empire. They won for us our +colonies, our commerce, the mastery of the seas of all the world. But at +what a cost! + + Their bones are scattered far and wide, + By mount, and stream, and sea. + +Year after year, till the final triumph of Waterloo, not battle only, but +worse destroyers than shot and shell—fatigue and disease—had been +carrying off our stoutest, ablest, healthiest young men, each of whom +represented, alas! a maiden left unmarried at home, or married, in +default, to a less able man. The strongest went to the war; each who +fell left a weaklier man to continue the race; while of those who did not +fall, too many returned with tainted and weakened constitutions, to +injure, it may be, generations yet unborn. The middle classes, being +mostly engaged in peaceful pursuits, suffered less of this decimation of +their finest young men; and to that fact I attribute much of their +increasing preponderance, social, political, and intellectual, to this +very day. One cannot walk the streets of any of our great commercial +cities without seeing plenty of men, young and middle-aged, whose whole +bearing and stature shows that the manly vigour of our middle class is +anything but exhausted. In Liverpool, especially, I have been much +struck not only with the vigorous countenance, but with the bodily size +of the mercantile men on ’Change. But it must be remembered always, +first, that these men are the very élite of their class; the cleverest +men; the men capable of doing most work; and next, that they are, almost +all of them, from the great merchant who has his villa out of town, and +perhaps his moor in the Highlands, down to the sturdy young volunteer who +serves in the haberdasher’s shop, country-bred men; and that the question +is, not what they are like now, but what their children and +grandchildren, especially the fine young volunteer’s, will be like? A +very serious question I hold that to be, and for this reason. + +War is, without doubt, the most hideous physical curse which fallen man +inflicts upon himself; and for this simple reason, that it reverses the +very laws of nature, and is more cruel even than pestilence. For instead +of issuing in the survival of the fittest, it issues in the survival of +the less fit: and therefore, if protracted, must deteriorate generations +yet unborn. And yet a peace such as we now enjoy, prosperous, civilised, +humane, is fraught, though to a less degree, with the very same ill +effect. + +In the first place, tens of thousands—who knows it not?—lead sedentary +and unwholesome lives, stooping, asphyxiated, employing as small a +fraction of their bodies as of their minds. And all this in dwellings, +workshops, what not?—the influences, the very atmosphere of which tend +not to health, but to unhealth, and to drunkenness as a solace under the +feeling of unhealth and depression. And that such a life must tell upon +their offspring, and if their offspring grow up under similar +circumstances, upon their offspring’s offspring, till a whole population +may become permanently degraded, who does not know? For who that walks +through the by-streets of any great city does not see? Moreover, and +this is one of the most fearful problems with which modern civilisation +has to deal—we interfere with natural selection by our conscientious care +of life, as surely as does war itself. If war kills the most fit to +live, we save alive those who—looking at them from a merely physical +point of view—are most fit to die. Everything which makes it more easy +to live; every sanitary reform, prevention of pestilence, medical +discovery, amelioration of climate, drainage of soil, improvement in +dwelling-houses, workhouses, gaols; every reformatory school, every +hospital, every cure of drunkenness, every influence, in short, which +has—so I am told—increased the average length of life in these islands, +by nearly one-third, since the first establishment of life insurances, +one hundred and fifty years ago; every influence of this kind, I say, +saves persons alive who would otherwise have died; and the great majority +of these will be, even in surgical and zymotic cases, those of least +resisting power, who are thus preserved to produce in time a still less +powerful progeny. + +Do I say that we ought not to save these people if we can? God forbid. +The weakly, the diseased whether infant or adult, is here on earth; a +British citizen; no more responsible for his own weakness than for his +own existence. Society, that is, in plain English, we and our ancestors, +are responsible for both; and we must fulfil the duty, and keep him in +life; and, if we can, heal, strengthen, develop him to the utmost; and +make the best of that which “fate and our own deservings” have given us +to deal with. I do not speak of higher motives still; motives which, to +every minister of religion, must be paramount and awful. I speak merely +of physical and social motives, such as appeal to the conscience of every +man—the instinct which bids every human-hearted man or woman to save +life, alleviate pain, like Him who causes His sun to shine on the evil +and on the good, and His rain to fall on the just and on the unjust. + +But it is palpable that in doing so we must, year by year, preserve a +large percentage of weakly persons who, marrying freely in their own +class, must produce weaklier children, and they weaklier children still. +Must, did I say? There are those who are of opinion—and I, after +watching and comparing the histories of many families, indeed of every +one with whom I have come in contact for now five-and-thirty years, in +town and country, can only fear that their opinion is but too well +founded on fact—that in the great majority of cases, in all classes +whatsoever, the children are not equal to their parents, nor they, again, +to their grand-parents of the beginning of the century; and that this +degrading process goes on most surely and most rapidly in our large +towns, and in proportion to the antiquity of those towns, and therefore +in proportion to the number of generations during which the degrading +influences have been at work. + +This and cognate dangers have been felt more and more deeply, as the +years have rolled on, by students of human society. To ward them off, +theory after theory has been put on paper, especially in France, which +deserve high praise for their ingenuity, less for their morality, and, I +fear, still less for their common sense. For the theorist in his closet +is certain to ignore, as inconvenient to the construction of his Utopia, +certain of those broad facts of human nature which every active parish +priest, medical man, or poor-law guardian has to face every day of his +life. + +Society and British human nature are what they have become by the +indirect influences of long ages, and we can no more reconstruct the one +than we can change the other. We can no more mend men by theories than +we can by coercion—to which, by-the-bye, almost all these theorists look +longingly as their final hope and mainstay. We must teach men to mend +their own matters, of their own reason, and their own free-will. We must +teach them that they are the arbiters of their own destinies; and, to a +fearfully large degree, of their children’s destinies after them. We +must teach them not merely that they ought to be free, but that they are +free, whether they know it or not, for good and for evil. And we must do +that in this case, by teaching them sound practical science; the science +of physiology as applied to health. So, and so only, can we cheek—I do +not say stop entirely—though I believe even that to be ideally possible; +but at least cheek the process of degradation which I believe to be +surely going on, not merely in these islands, but in every civilised +country in the world, in proportion to its civilisation. + +It is still a question whether science has fully discovered those laws of +hereditary health, the disregard of which causes so many marriages +disastrous to generations yet unborn. But much valuable light has been +thrown on this most mysterious and most important subject during the last +few years. That light—and I thank God for it—is widening and deepening +rapidly. And I doubt not that in a generation or two more, enough will +be known to be thrown into the shape of practical and provable rules; and +that, if not a public opinion, yet at least, what is more useful far, a +widespread private opinion will grow up, especially among educated women, +which will prevent many a tragedy and save many a life. + +But, as to the laws of personal health: enough, and more than enough, is +known already, to be applied safely and easily by any adults, however +unlearned, to the preservation not only of their own health, but of that +of their children. + +The value of healthy habitations, of personal cleanliness, of pure air +and pure water, of various kinds of food, according as each tends to make +bone, fat, or muscle, provided only—provided only—that the food be +unadulterated; the value of various kinds of clothing, and physical +exercise, of a free and equal development of the brain power, without +undue overstrain in any one direction; in one word, the method of +producing, as far as possible, the mentem sanam in corpore sano, and the +wonderful and blessed effects of such obedience to those laws of nature, +which are nothing but the good will of God expressed in facts—their +wonderful and blessed tendency, I say, to eliminate the germs of +hereditary disease, and to actually regenerate the human system—all this +is known; known as fully and clearly as any human knowledge need be +known; it is written in dozens of popular books and pamphlets. And why +should this divine voice, which cries to man, tending to sink into +effeminate barbarism through his own hasty and partial civilisation: “It +is not too late. For your bodies, as for your spirits, there is an +upward, as well as a downward path. You, or if not you, at least the +children whom you have brought into the world, for whom you toil, for +whom you hoard, for whom you pray, for whom you would give your +lives,—they still may be healthy, strong, it may be beautiful, and have +all the intellectual and social, as well as the physical advantages, +which health, strength, and beauty give.”—Ah, why is this divine voice +now, as of old, Wisdom crying in the streets, and no man regarding her? +I appeal to women, who are initiated, as we men can never be, into the +stern mysteries of pain, and sorrow, and self-sacrifice;—they who bring +forth children, weep over children, slave for children, and, if they have +none of their own, then slave, with the holy instinct of the sexless bee, +for the children of others—Let them say, shall this thing be? + +Let my readers pardon me if I seem to write too earnestly. That I speak +neither more nor less than the truth, every medical man knows full well. +Not only as a very humble student of physiology, but as a parish priest +of thirty years’ standing, I have seen so much unnecessary misery; and I +have in other cases seen similar misery so simply avoided; that the sense +of the vastness of the evil is intensified by my sense of the easiness of +the cure. + +Why, then—to come to practical suggestions—should there not be opened in +every great town in these realms a public school of health? It might +connect itself with—I hold that it should form an integral part of—some +existing educational institute. But it should at least give practical +lectures, for fees small enough to put them within the reach of any +respectable man or woman, however poor, I cannot but hope that such +schools of health, if opened in the great manufacturing towns of England +and Scotland, and, indeed, in such an Irish town as Belfast, would obtain +pupils in plenty, and pupils who would thoroughly profit by what they +hear. The people of these towns are, most of them, specially accustomed +by their own trades to the application of scientific laws. To them, +therefore, the application of any fresh physical laws to a fresh set of +facts, would have nothing strange in it. They have already something of +that inductive habit of mind which is the groundwork of all rational +understanding or action. They would not turn the deaf and contemptuous +ear with which the savage and the superstitious receive the revelation of +nature’s mysteries. Why should not, with so hopeful an audience, the +experiment be tried far and wide, of giving lectures on health, as +supplementary to those lectures on animal physiology which are, I am +happy to say, becoming more and more common? Why should not people be +taught—they are already being taught at Birmingham—something about the +tissues of the body, their structure and uses, the circulation of the +blood, respiration, chemical changes in the air respired, amount +breathed, digestion, nature of food, absorption, secretion, structure of +the nervous system—in fact, be taught something of how their own bodies +are made and how they work? Teaching of this kind ought to, and will, in +some more civilised age and country, be held a necessary element in the +school course of every child, just as necessary as reading, writing, and +arithmetic; for it is after all the most necessary branch of that +“technical education” of which we hear so much just now, namely, the +technic, or art, of keeping oneself alive and well. + +But we can hardly stop there. After we have taught the condition of +health, we must teach also the condition of disease; of those diseases +specially which tend to lessen wholesale the health of townsfolk, exposed +to an artificial mode of life. Surely young men and women should be +taught something of the causes of zymotic disease, and of scrofula, +consumption, rickets, dipsomania, cerebral derangement, and such like. +They should be shown the practical value of pure air, pure water, +unadulterated food, sweet and dry dwellings. Is there one of them, man +or woman, who would not be the safer and happier, and the more useful to +his or her neighbours, if they had acquired some sound notions about +those questions of drainage on which their own lives and the lives of +their children may every day depend? I say—women as well as men. I +should have said women rather than men. For it is the women who have the +ordering of the household, the bringing up of the children; the women who +bide at home, while the men are away, it may be at the other end of the +earth. + +And if any say, as they have a right to say—“But these are subjects which +can hardly be taught to young women in public lectures;” I rejoin—of +course not, unless they are taught by women—by women, of course, duly +educated and legally qualified. Let such teach to women, what every +woman ought to know, and what her parents will very properly object to +her hearing from almost any man. This is one of the main reasons why I +have, for twenty years past, advocated the training of women for the +medical profession; and one which countervails, in my mind, all possible +objections to such a movement. And now, thank God, we are seeing the +common sense of Great Britain, and indeed of every civilised nation, +gradually coming round to that which seemed to me, when I first conceived +of it, a dream too chimerical to be cherished save in secret—the +restoring woman to her natural share in that sacred office of healer, +which she held in the Middle Ages, and from which she was thrust out +during the sixteenth century. + +I am most happy to see, for instance, that the National Health Society, +{36} which I earnestly recommend to the attention of my readers, +announces a “Course of Lectures for Ladies on Elementary Physiology and +Hygiene,” by a lady, to which I am also most happy to see, governesses +are admitted at half-fees. Alas! how much misery, disease, and even +death might have been prevented, had governesses been taught such matters +thirty years ago, I, for one, know too well. May the day soon come when +there will be educated women enough to give such lectures throughout +these realms, to rich as well as poor—for the rich, strange to say, need +them often as much as the poor do—and that we may live to see, in every +great town, health classes for women as well as for men, sending forth +year by year more young women and young men taught, not only to take care +of themselves and of their families, but to exercise moral influence over +their fellow-citizens, as champions in the battle against dirt and +drunkenness, disease and death. + +There may be those who would answer—or rather, there would certainly have +been those who would have so answered thirty years ago, before the +so-called materialism of advanced science had taught us some practical +wisdom about education, and reminded people that they have bodies as well +as minds and souls—“You say, we are likely to grow weaklier, unhealthier. +And if it were so, what matter? Mind makes the man, not body. We do not +want our children to be stupid giants and bravos; but clever, able, +highly educated, however weakly Providence or the laws of nature may have +chosen to make them. Let them overstrain their brains a little; let them +contract their chests, and injure their digestion and their eyesight, by +sitting at desks, poring over books. Intellect is what we want. +Intellect makes money. Intellect makes the world. We would rather see +our son a genius than a mere athlete.” Well: and so would I. But what +if intellect alone does not even make money, save as Messrs. Dodson and +Fogg, Sampson Brass, and Montagu Tigg were wont to make it, unless backed +by an able, enduring, healthy physique, such as I have seen, almost +without exception, in those successful men of business whom I have had +the honour and the pleasure of knowing? What if intellect, or what is +now called intellect, did not make the world, or the smallest wheel or +cog of it? What if, for want of obeying the laws of nature, parents bred +up neither a genius nor an athlete, but only an incapable unhappy +personage, with a huge upright forehead, like that of a Byzantine Greek, +filled with some sort of pap instead of brains, and tempted alternately +to fanaticism and strong drink? We must, in the great majority of cases, +have the _corpus sanem_ if we want the _mentem sanem_; and healthy bodies +are the only trustworthy organs for healthy minds. Which is cause and +which is effect, I shall not stay to debate here. But wherever we find a +population generally weakly, stunted, scrofulous, we find in them a +corresponding type of brain, which cannot be trusted to do good work; +which is capable more or less of madness, whether solitary or epidemic. +It may be very active; it may be very quick at catching at new and grand +ideas—all the more quick, perhaps, on account of its own secret malaise +and self-discontent; but it will be irritable, spasmodic, hysterical. It +will be apt to mistake capacity of talk for capacity of action, +excitement for earnestness, virulence for force, and, too often; cruelty +for justice. It will lose manful independence, individuality, +originality; and when men act, they will act from the consciousness of +personal weakness, like sheep rushing over a hedge, leaning against each +other, exhorting each other to be brave, and swaying about in mobs and +masses. These were the intellectual weaknesses which, as I read history, +followed on physical degradation in Imperial Rome, in Alexandria, in +Byzantium. Have we not seen them reappear, under fearful forms, in Paris +but the other day? + +I do not blame; I do not judge. My theory, which I hold, and shall hold, +to be fairly founded on a wide induction, forbids me to blame and to +judge; because it tells me that these defects are mainly physical; that +those who exhibit them are mainly to be pitied, as victims of the sins or +ignorance of their forefathers. + +But it tells me too, that those who, professing to be educated men, and +therefore bound to know better, treat these physical phenomena as +spiritual, healthy, and praiseworthy; who even exasperate them, that they +may make capital out of the weaknesses of fallen man, are the most +contemptible and yet the most dangerous of public enemies, let them cloak +their quackery under whatsoever patriotic, or scientific, or even sacred +words. + +There are those again honest, kindly, sensible, practical men, many of +them; men whom I have no wish to offend; whom I had rather ask to teach +me some of their own experience and common sense, which has learned to +discern, like good statesmen, not only what ought to be done, but what +can be done—there are those, I say, who would sooner see this whole +question let alone. Their feeling, as far as I can analyse it, seems to +be that the evils of which I have been complaining, are on the whole +inevitable; or, if not, that we can mend so very little of them, that it +is wisest to leave them alone altogether, lest, like certain sewers, “the +more you stir them, the more they smell.” They fear lest we should +unsettle the minds of the many for whom these evils will never be mended; +lest we make them discontented; discontented with their houses, their +occupations, their food, their whole social arrangements; and all in +vain. + +I should answer, in all courtesy and humility—for I sympathise deeply +with such men and women, and respect them deeply likewise—but are not +people discontented already, from the lowest to the highest? And ought a +man, in such a piecemeal, foolish, greedy, sinful world as this is, and +always has been, to be anything but discontented? If he thinks that +things are going all right, must he not have a most beggarly conception +of what going right means? And if things are not going right, can it be +anything but good for him to see that they are not going right? Can +truth and fact harm any human being? I shall not believe so, as long as +I have a Bible wherein to believe. For my part, I should like to make +every man, woman, and child whom I meet discontented with themselves, +even as I am discontented with myself. I should like to awaken in them, +about their physical, their intellectual, their moral condition, that +divine discontent which is the parent, first of upward aspiration and +then of self-control, thought, effort to fulfil that aspiration even in +part. For to be discontented with the divine discontent, and to be +ashamed with the noble shame, is the very germ and first upgrowth of all +virtue. Men begin at first, as boys begin when they grumble at their +school and their schoolmasters, to lay the blame on others; to be +discontented with their circumstances—the things which stand around them; +and to cry, “Oh that I had this!” “Oh that I had that!” But by that way +no deliverance lies. That discontent only ends in revolt and rebellion, +social or political; and that, again, still in the same worship of +circumstances—but this time desperate—which ends, let it disguise itself +under what fine names it will, in what the old Greeks called a tyranny; +in which—as in the Spanish republics of America, and in France more than +once—all have become the voluntary slaves of one man, because each man +fancies that the one man can improve his circumstances for him. + +But the wise man will learn, like Epictetus the heroic slave, the slave +of Epaphroditus, Nero’s minion—and in what baser and uglier circumstances +could human being find himself?—to find out the secret of being truly +free; namely, to be discontented with no man and no thing save himself. +To say not—“Oh that I had this and that!” but “Oh that I were this and +that!” Then, by God’s help—and that heroic slave, heathen though he was, +believed and trusted in God’s help—“I will make myself that which God has +shown me that I ought to be and can be.” + +Ten thousand a year, or ten million a year, as Epictetus saw full well, +cannot mend that vulgar discontent with circumstances which he had +felt—and who with more right?—and conquered, and despised. For that is +the discontent of children, wanting always more holidays and more sweets. +But I wish my readers to have, and to cherish, the discontent of men and +women. + +Therefore I would make men and women discontented, with the divine and +wholesome discontent, at their own physical frame, and at that of their +children. I would accustom their eyes to those precious heirlooms of the +human race, the statues of the old Greeks; to their tender grandeur, +their chaste healthfulness, their unconscious, because perfect might: and +say—There; these are tokens to you, and to all generations yet unborn, of +what man could be once; of what he can be again if he will obey those +laws of nature which are the voice of God. I would make them +discontented with the ugliness and closeness of their dwellings; I would +make them discontented with the fashion of their garments, and still more +just now the women, of all ranks, with the fashion of theirs; and with +everything around them which they have the power of improving, if it be +at all ungraceful, superfluous, tawdry, ridiculous, unwholesome. I would +make them discontented with what they call their education, and say to +them—You call the three Royal R’s education? They are not education: no +more is the knowledge which would enable you to take the highest prizes +given by the Society of Arts, or any other body. They are not education: +they are only instruction; a necessary groundwork, in an age like this, +for making practical use of your education: but not the education itself. + +And if they asked me, What then education meant? I should point them, +first, I think, to noble old Lilly’s noble old “Euphues,” of three +hundred years ago, and ask them to consider what it says about education, +and especially this passage concerning that mere knowledge which is +nowadays strangely miscalled education. “There are two principal and +peculiar gifts in the nature of man, knowledge and reason. The one”—that +is reason—“commandeth, and the other”—that is knowledge—“obeyeth. These +things neither the whirling wheel of fortune can change, nor the +deceitful cavillings of worldlings separate, neither sickness abate, nor +age abolish.” And next I should point them to those pages in Mr. +Gladstone’s “Juventus Mundi,” where he describes the ideal training of a +Greek youth in Homer’s days; and say—There: that is an education fit for +a really civilised man, even though he never saw a book in his life; the +full, proportionate, harmonious educing-that is, bringing out and +developing—of all the faculties of his body, mind, and heart, till he +becomes at once a reverent yet self-assured, a graceful and yet a +valiant, an able and yet an eloquent personage. + +And if any should say to me—“But what has this to do with science? +Homer’s Greeks knew no science;” I should rejoin—But they had, +pre-eminently above all ancient races which we know, the scientific +instinct; the teachableness and modesty; the clear eye and quick ear; the +hearty reverence for fact and nature, and for the human body, and mind, +and spirit; for human nature in a word, in its completeness, as the +highest fact upon this earth. Therefore they became in after years, not +only the great colonisers and the great civilisers of the old world—the +most practical people, I hold, which the world ever saw; but the parents +of all sound physics as well as of all sound metaphysics. Their very +religion, in spite of its imperfections, helped forward their education, +not in spite of, but by means of that anthropomorphism which we sometimes +too hastily decry. As Mr. Gladstone says: “As regarded all other +functions of our nature, outside the domain of the life to Godward—all +those functions which are summed up in what St. Paul calls the flesh and +the mind, the psychic and bodily life, the tendency of the system was to +exalt the human element, by proposing a model of beauty, strength, and +wisdom, in all their combinations, so elevated that the effort to attain +them required a continual upward strain. It made divinity attainable; +and thus it effectually directed the thought and aim of man + + Along the line of limitless desires. + +Such a scheme of religion, though failing grossly in the government of +the passions, and in upholding the standard of moral duties, tended +powerfully to produce a lofty self-respect, and a large, free, and varied +conception of humanity. It incorporated itself in schemes of notable +discipline for mind and body, indeed of a lifelong education; and these +habits of mind and action had their marked results (to omit many other +greatnesses) in a philosophy, literature, and art, which remain to this +day unrivalled or unsurpassed.” + +So much those old Greeks did for their own education, without science and +without Christianity. We who have both: what might we not do, if we +would be true to our advantages, and to ourselves? + + + + +THE TWO BREATHS {49} + + +LADIES,—I have been honoured by a second invitation to address you, and I +dare not refuse it; because it gives me an opportunity of speaking on a +matter, knowledge and ignorance about which may seriously affect your +health and happiness, and that of the children with whom you may have to +do. I must apologise if I say many things which are well known to many +persons in this room: they ought to be well known to all: but it is +generally best to assume total ignorance in one’s hearers, and to begin +from the beginning. + +I shall try to be as simple as possible; to trouble you as little as +possible with scientific terms; to be practical; and at the same time, if +possible, interesting. + +I should wish to call this lecture “The Two Breaths:” not merely “The +Breath;” and for this reason: every time you breathe you breathe two +different breaths; you take in one, you give out another. The +composition of those two breaths is different. Their effects are +different. The breath which has been breathed out must not be breathed +in again. To tell you why it must not would lead me into anatomical +details, not quite in place here as yet; though the day will come, I +trust, when every woman entrusted with the care of children will be +expected to know something about them. But this I may say: Those who +habitually take in fresh breath will probably grow up large, strong, +ruddy, cheerful, active, clear-headed, fit for their work. Those who +habitually take in the breath which has been breathed out by themselves, +or any other living creature, will certainly grow up, if they grow up at +all, small, weak, pale, nervous, depressed, unfit for work, and tempted +continually to resort to stimulants, and become drunkards. + +If you want to see how different the breath breathed out is from the +breath taken in, you have only to try a somewhat cruel experiment, but +one which people too often try upon themselves, their children, and their +workpeople. If you take any small animal with lungs like your own—a +mouse, for instance—and force it to breathe no air but what you have +breathed already; if you put it in a close box, and while you take in +breath from the outer air, send out your breath through a tube, into that +box, the animal will soon faint: if you go on long with this process, it +will die. + +Take a second instance, which I beg to press most seriously on the notice +of mothers, governesses, and nurses. If you allow a child to get into +the habit of sleeping with its head under the bed-clothes, and thereby +breathing its own breath over and over again, that child will assuredly +grow pale, weak, and ill. Medical men have cases on record of scrofula +appearing in children previously healthy, which could only be accounted +for from this habit, and which ceased when the habit stopped. Let me +again entreat your attention to this undoubted fact. + +Take another instance, which is only too common: If you are in a crowded +room, with plenty of fire and lights and company, doors and windows all +shut tight, how often you feel faint—so faint that you may require +smelling-salts or some other stimulant. The cause of your faintness is +just the same as that of the mouse’s fainting in the box; you and your +friends, and, as I shall show you presently, the fire and the candles +likewise, having been all breathing each other’s breaths, over and over +again, till the air has become unfit to support life. You are doing your +best to enact over again the Highland tragedy, of which Sir James Simpson +tells in his lectures to the working-classes of Edinburgh, when at a +Christmas meeting thirty-six persons danced all night in a small room +with a low ceiling, keeping the doors and windows shut. The atmosphere +of the room was noxious beyond description; and the effect was, that +seven of the party were soon after seized with typhus fever, of which two +died. You are inflicting on yourselves the torments of the poor dog, who +is kept at the Grotto del Cane, near Naples, to be stupefied, for the +amusement of visitors, by the carbonic acid gas of the Grotto, and +brought to life again by being dragged into the fresh air; nay, you are +inflicting upon yourselves the torments of the famous Black Hole of +Calcutta: and, if there was no chimney in the room, by which some fresh +air could enter, the candles would soon burn blue, as they do, you know, +when ghosts appear; your brains become disturbed; and you yourselves ran +the risk of becoming ghosts, and the candles of actually going out. + +Of this last fact there is no doubt; for if, instead of putting a mouse +into the box, you will put a lighted candle, and breathe into the tube as +before, however gently, you will in a short time put the candle out. + +Now, how is this? First, what is the difference between the breath you +take in and the breath you give out? And next, why has it a similar +effect on animal life and a lighted candle? + +The difference is this. The breath which you take in is, or ought to be, +pure air, composed, on the whole, of oxygen and nitrogen, with a minute +portion of carbonic acid. + +The breath which you give out is an impure air, to which has been added, +among other matters which will not support life, an excess of carbonic +acid. + +That this is the fact you can prove for yourselves by a simple +experiment. Get a little lime-water at the chemist’s, and breathe into +it through a glass tube; your breath will at once make the lime-water +milky. The carbonic acid of your breath has laid hold of the lime, and +made it visible as white carbonate of lime—in plain English, as common +chalk. + +Now I do not wish, as I said, to load your memories with scientific +terms: but I beseech you to remember at least these two, oxygen gas and +carbonic acid gas; and to remember that, as surely as oxygen feeds the +fire of life, so surely does carbonic acid put it out. + +I say, “the fire of life.” In that expression lies the answer to our +second question: Why does our breath produce a similar effect upon the +mouse and the lighted candle? Every one of us is, as it were, a living +fire. Were we not, how could we be always warmer than the air outside +us? There is a process; going on perpetually in each of us, similar to +that by which coals are burnt in the fire, oil in a lamp, wax in a +candle, and the earth itself in a volcano. To keep each of those fires +alight, oxygen is needed; and the products of combustion, as they are +called, are more or less the same in each case—carbonic acid and steam. + +These facts justify the expression I just made use of—which may have +seemed to some of you fantastical—that the fire and the candles in the +crowded room were breathing the same breath as you were. It is but too +true. An average fire in the grate requires, to keep it burning, as much +oxygen as several human beings do; each candle or lamp must have its +share of oxygen likewise, and that a very considerable one, and an +average gas-burner—pray attend to this, you who live in rooms lighted +with gas—consumes as much oxygen as several candles. All alike are +making carbonic acid. The carbonic acid of the fire happily escapes up +the chimney in the smoke: but the carbonic acid from the human beings and +the candles remains to poison the room, unless it be ventilated. + +Now, I think you may understand one of the simplest, and yet most +terrible, cases of want of ventilation—death by the fumes of charcoal. A +human being shut up in a room, of which every crack is closed, with a pan +of burning charcoal, falls asleep, never to wake again. His inward fire +is competing with the fire of charcoal for the oxygen of the room; both +are making carbonic acid out of it: but the charcoal, being the stronger +of the two, gets all the oxygen to itself, and leaves the human being +nothing to inhale but the carbonic acid which it has made. The human +being, being the weaker, dies first: but the charcoal dies also. When it +has exhausted all the oxygen of the room, it cools, goes out, and is +found in the morning half-consumed beside its victim. If you put a giant +or an elephant, I should conceive, into that room, instead of a human +being, the case would be reversed for a time: the elephant would put out +the burning charcoal by the carbonic acid from his mighty lungs; and +then, when he had exhausted all the air in the room, die likewise of his +own carbonic acid. + +Now, I think, we may see what ventilation means, and why it is needed. + +Ventilation means simply letting out the foul air, and letting in the +fresh air; letting out the air which has been breathed by men or by +candles, and letting in the air which has not. To understand how to do +that, we must remember a most simple chemical law, that a gas as it is +warmed expands, and therefore becomes lighter; as it cools, it contracts, +and becomes heavier. + +Now the carbonic acid in the breath which comes out of our mouth is warm, +lighter than the air, and rises to the ceiling; and therefore in any +unventilated room full of people, there is a layer of foul air along the +ceiling. You might soon test that for yourselves, if you could mount a +ladder and put your heads there aloft. You do test it for yourselves +when you sit in the galleries of churches and theatres, where the air is +palpably more foul, and therefore more injurious, than down below. + +Where, again, work-people are employed in a crowded house of many +storeys, the health of those who work on the upper floors always suffers +most. + +In the old monkey-house of the Zoological Gardens, when the cages were on +the old plan, tier upon tier, the poor little fellows in the uppermost +tier—so I have been told—always died first of the monkey’s constitutional +complaint, consumption, simply from breathing the warm breath of their +friends below. But since the cages have been altered, and made to range +side by side from top to bottom, consumption—I understand—has vastly +diminished among them. + +The first question in ventilation, therefore, is to get this carbonic +acid safe out of the room, while it is warm and light and close to the +ceiling; for if you do not, this happens: The carbonic acid gas cools and +becomes heavier; for carbonic acid, at the same temperature as common +air, is so much heavier than common air, that you may actually—if you are +handy enough—turn it from one vessel to another, and pour out for your +enemy a glass of invisible poison. So down to the floor this heavy +carbonic acid comes, and lies along it, just as it lies often in the +bottom of old wells, or old brewers’ vats, as a stratum of poison, +killing occasionally the men who descend into it. Hence, as foolish a +practice as I know is that of sleeping on the floor; for towards the +small hours, when the room gets cold, the sleeper on the floor is +breathing carbonic acid. + +And here one word to those ladies who interest themselves with the poor. +The poor are too apt in times of distress to pawn their bedsteads and +keep their beds. Never, if you have influence, let that happen. Keep +the bedstead, whatever else may go, to save the sleeper from the carbonic +acid on the floor. + +How, then, shall we get rid of the foul air at the top of the room? +After all that has been written and tried on ventilation, I know no +simpler method than putting into the chimney one of Arnott’s ventilators, +which may be bought and fixed for a few shillings; always remembering +that it must be. fixed into the chimney as near the ceiling as possible. +I can speak of these ventilators from twenty-five years’ experience. +Living in a house with low ceilings, liable to become overcharged with +carbonic acid, which produces sleepiness in the evening, I have found +that these ventilators keep the air fresh and pure; and I consider the +presence of one of these ventilators in a room more valuable than three +or four feet additional height of ceiling. I have found, too, that their +working proves how necessary they are, from this simple fact: You would +suppose that, as the ventilator opens freely into the chimney, the smoke +would be blown down through it in high winds, and blacken the ceiling: +but this is just what does not happen. If the ventilator be at all +properly poised, so as to shut with a violent gust of wind, it will at +all other moments keep itself permanently open; proving thereby that +there is an up-draught of heated air continually escaping from the +ceiling up the chimney. Another very simple method of ventilation is +employed in those excellent cottages which Her Majesty has built for her +labourers round Windsor. Over each door a sheet of perforated zinc, some +eighteen inches square, is fixed; allowing the foul air to escape into +the passage; and in the ceiling of the passage a similar sheet of zinc, +allowing it to escape into the roof. Fresh air, meanwhile, should be +obtained from outside, by piercing the windows, or otherwise. And here +let me give one hint to all builders of houses: If possible, let bedroom +windows open at the top as well as at the bottom. + +Let me impress the necessity of using some such contrivances, not only on +parents and educators, but on those who employ workpeople, and above all +on those who employ young women in shops or in work-rooms. What their +condition may be in this city I know not; but most painful it has been to +me in other places, when passing through warehouses or workrooms, to see +the pale, sodden, and, as the French would say, “etiolated” countenances +of the girls who were passing the greater part of the day in them; and +painful, also, to breathe an atmosphere of which habit had, alas! made +them unconscious, but which to one coming out of the open air was +altogether noxious, and shocking also; for it was fostering the seeds of +death, not only in the present but future generations. + +Why should this be? Everyone will agree that good ventilation is +necessary in a hospital, because people cannot get well without fresh +air. Do they not see that by the same reasoning good ventilation is +necessary everywhere, because people cannot remain well without fresh +air? Let me entreat those who employ women in workrooms, if they have no +time to read through such books as Dr. Andrew Combe’s “Physiology applied +to Health and Education,” and Madame de Wahl’s “Practical Hints on the +Moral, Mental, and Physical Training of Girls,” to procure certain tracts +published by Messrs. Jarrold, Paternoster Row, for the Ladies’ Sanitary +Association; especially one which bears on this subject: “The Black-hole +in our own Bedrooms;” Dr. Lankester’s “School Manual of Health;” or a +manual on ventilation, published by the Metropolitan Working Classes +Association for the Improvement of Public Health. + +I look forward—I say it openly—to some period of higher civilisation, +when the Acts of Parliament for the ventilation of factories and +workshops shall be largely extended, and made far more stringent; when +officers of public health shall be empowered to enforce the ventilation +of every room in which persons are employed for hire: and empowered also +to demand a proper system of ventilation for every new house, whether in +country or in town. To that, I believe, we must come: but I had sooner +far see these improvements carried out, as befits the citizens of a free +country, in the spirit of the Gospel rather than in that of the Law; +carried out, not compulsorily and from fear of fines, but voluntarily, +from a sense of duty, honour, and humanity. I appeal, therefore, to the +good feeling of all whom it may concern, whether the health of those whom +they employ, and therefore the supply of fresh air which they absolutely +need, are not matters for which they are not, more or less, responsible +to their country and their God. + +And if any excellent person of the old school should answer me: “Why make +all this fuss about ventilation? Our forefathers got on very well +without it”—I must answer that, begging their pardons, our ancestors did +nothing of the kind. Our ancestors got on usually very ill in these +matters: and when they got on well, it was because they had good +ventilation in spite of themselves. + +First. They got on very ill. To quote a few remarkable instances of +longevity, or to tell me that men were larger and stronger on the average +in old times, is to yield to the old fallacy of fancying that savages +were peculiarly healthy, because those who were seen were active and +strong. The simple answer is, that the strong alone survived, while the +majority died from the severity of the training. Savages do not increase +in number; and our ancestors increased but very slowly for many +centuries. I am not going to disgust my audience with statistics of +disease: but knowing something, as I happen to do, of the social state +and of the health of the Middle and Elizabethan Ages, I have no +hesitation in saying that the average of disease and death was far +greater then than it is now. Epidemics of many kinds, typhus, ague, +plague—all diseases which were caused more or less by bad air—devastated +this land and Europe in those days with a horrible intensity, to which +even the choleras of our times are mild. The back streets, the +hospitals, the gaols, the barracks, the camps—every place in which any +large number of persons congregated, were so many nests of pestilence, +engendered by uncleanliness, which defiled alike the water which was +drunk and the air which was breathed; and as a single fact, of which the +tables of insurance companies assure us, the average of human life in +England has increased twenty-five per cent. since the reign of George I., +owing simply to our more rational and cleanly habits of life. + +But secondly, I said that when our ancestors got on well, they did so +because they got ventilation in spite of themselves. Luckily for them, +their houses were ill-built; their doors and windows would not shut. +They had lattice-windowed houses, too; to live in one of which, as I can +testify from long experience, is as thoroughly ventilating as living in a +lantern with the horn broken out. It was because their houses were full +of draughts, and still more, in the early Middle Age, because they had no +glass, and stopped out the air only by a shutter at night, that they +sought for shelter rather than for fresh air, of which they sometimes had +too much; and, to escape the wind, built their houses in holes, such as +that in which the old city of Winchester stands. Shelter, I believe, as +much as the desire to be near fish in Lent, and to occupy the rich +alluvium of the valleys, made the monks of Old England choose the +river-banks for the sites of their abbeys. They made a mistake therein, +which, like most mistakes, did not go unpunished. These low situations, +especially while the forests were yet thick on the hills around, were the +perennial haunts of fever and ague, produced by subtle vegetable poisons, +carried in the carbonic acid given off by rotten vegetation. So there, +again, they fell in with man’s old enemy—bad air. Still, as long as the +doors and windows did not shut, some free circulation of air remained. +But now, our doors and windows shut only too tight. We have plate-glass +instead of lattices; and we have replaced the draughty and smoky, but +really wholesome open chimney, with its wide corners and settles, by +narrow registers, and even by stoves. We have done all we can, in fact, +to seal ourselves up hermetically from the outer air, and to breath our +own breaths over and over again; and we pay the penalty of it in a +thousand ways unknown to our ancestors, through whose rooms all the winds +of heaven whistled, and who were glad enough to shelter themselves from +draughts in the sitting-room by the high screen round the fire, and in +the sleeping-room by the thick curtains of the four-post bedstead, which +is now rapidly disappearing before a higher civilisation. We therefore +absolutely require to make for ourselves the very ventilation from which +our ancestors tried to escape. + +But, ladies, there is an old and true proverb, that you may bring a horse +to the water, but you cannot make him drink. And in like wise it is too +true, that you may bring people to the fresh air, but you cannot make +them breath it. Their own folly, or the folly of their parents and +educators, prevents their lungs being duly filled and duly emptied. +Therefore the blood is not duly oxygenated, and the whole system goes +wrong. Paleness, weakness, consumption, scrofula, and too many other +ailments, are the consequences of ill-filled lungs. For without +well-filled lungs, robust health is impossible. + +And if anyone shall answer: “We do not want robust health so much as +intellectual attainment; the mortal body, being the lower organ, must +take its chance, and be even sacrificed, if need be to the higher +organ—the immortal mind”—To such I reply, You cannot do it. The laws of +nature, which are the express will of God, laugh such attempts to scorn. +Every organ of the body is formed out of the blood; and if the blood be +vitiated, every organ suffers in proportion to its delicacy; and the +brain, being the most delicate and highly specialised of all organs, +suffers most of all, and soonest of all, as everyone knows who has tried +to work his brain when his digestion was the least out of order. Nay, +the very morals will suffer. From ill-filled lungs, which signify +ill-repaired blood, arise year by year an amount not merely of disease, +but of folly, temper, laziness, intemperance, madness, and, let me tell +you fairly, crime—the sum of which will never be known till that great +day when men shall be called to account for all deeds done in the body, +whether they be good or evil. + +I must refer you on this subject again to Andrew Combe’s “Physiology,” +especially chapters iv. and vii.; and also to chapter x. of Madame de +Wahl’s excellent book. I will only say this shortly, that the three most +common causes of ill-filled lungs, in children and in young ladies, are +stillness, silence, and stays. + +First, stillness; a sedentary life, and want of exercise. A girl is kept +for hours sitting on a form writing or reading, to do which she must lean +forward; and if her schoolmistress cruelly attempts to make her sit +upright, and thereby keep the spine in an attitude for which Nature did +not intend it, she is thereby doing her best to bring on that disease, so +fearfully common in girls’ schools, lateral curvature of the spine. But +practically the girl will stoop forward. And what happens? The lower +ribs are pressed into the body, thereby displacing more or less something +inside. The diaphragm in the meantime, which is the very bellows of the +lungs, remains loose; the lungs are never properly filled or emptied; and +an excess of carbonic acid accumulates at the bottom of them. What +follows? Frequent sighing to get rid of it; heaviness of head; +depression of the whole nervous system under the influence of the poison +of the lungs; and when the poor child gets up from her weary work, what +is the first thing she probably does? She lifts up her chest, stretches, +yawns, and breathes deeply—Nature’s voice, Nature’s instinctive cure, +which is probably regarded as ungraceful, as what is called “lolling” is. +As if sitting upright was not an attitude in itself essentially +ungraceful, and such as no artist would care to draw. As if “lolling,” +which means putting the body in the attitude of the most perfect ease +compatible with a fully-expanded chest, was not in itself essentially +graceful, and to be seen in every reposing figure in Greek bas-reliefs +and vases; graceful, and like all graceful actions, healthful at the same +time. The only tolerably wholesome attitude of repose, which I see +allowed in average school-rooms, is lying on the back on the floor, or on +a sloping board, in which case the lungs must be fully expanded. But +even so, a pillow, or some equivalent, ought to be placed under the small +of the back: or the spine will be strained at its very weakest point. + +I now go on to the second mistake—enforced silence. Moderate reading +aloud is good: but where there is any tendency to irritability of throat +or lungs, too much moderation cannot be used. You may as well try to +cure a diseased lung by working it, as to cure a lame horse by galloping +him. But where the breathing organs are of average health let it be said +once and for all, that children and young people cannot make too much +noise. The parents who cannot bear the noise of their children have no +right to have brought them into the world. The schoolmistress who +enforces silence on her pupils is committing—unintentionally no doubt, +but still committing—an offence against reason, worthy only of a convent. +Every shout, every burst of laughter, every song—nay, in the case of +infants, as physiologists well know, every moderate fit of +crying—conduces to health, by rapidly filling and emptying the lung, and +changing the blood more rapidly from black to red, that is, from death to +life. Andrew Combe tells a story of a large charity school, in which the +young girls were, for the sake of their health, shut up in the hall and +school-room during play hours, from November till March, and no romping +or noise allowed. The natural consequences were, the great majority of +them fell ill; and I am afraid that a great deal of illness has been from +time to time contracted in certain school-rooms, simply through this one +cause of enforced silence. Some cause or other there must be for the +amount of ill-health and weakliness which prevails especially among girls +of the middle classes in towns, who have not, poor things, the +opportunities which richer girls have, of keeping themselves in strong +health by riding, skating, archery,—that last quite an admirable exercise +for the chest and lungs, and far preferable to croquet, which involves +too much unwholesome stooping.—Even a game of ball, if milliners and +shop-girls had room to indulge in one after their sedentary work, might +bring fresh spirits to many a heart, and fresh colour to many a cheek. + +I spoke just now of the Greeks. I suppose you will all allow that the +Greeks were, as far as we know, the most beautiful race which the world +ever saw. Every educated man knows that they were also the cleverest of +all races; and, next to his Bible, thanks, God for Greek literature. + +Now, these people had made physical as well as intellectual education a +science as well as a study. Their women practised graceful, and in some +cases even athletic, exercises. They developed, by a free and healthy +life, those figures which remain everlasting and unapproachable models of +human beauty: but—to come to my third point—they wore no stays. The +first mention of stays that I have ever found is in the letters of dear +old Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene, on the Greek coast of Africa, about four +hundred years after the Christian era. He tells us how, when he was +shipwrecked on a remote part of the coast, and he and the rest of the +passengers were starving on cockles and limpets, there was among them a +slave girl out of the far East, who had a pinched wasp-waist, such as you +may see on the old Hindoo sculptures, and such as you may see in any +street in a British town. And when the Greek ladies of the neighbourhood +found her out, they sent for her from house to house, to behold, with +astonishment and laughter, this new and prodigious, waist, with which it +seemed to them it was impossible for a human being to breathe or live; +and they petted the poor girl, and fed her, as they might a dwarf or a +giantess, till she got quite fat and comfortable, while her owners had +not enough to eat. So strange and ridiculous seemed our present fashion +to the descendants of those who, centuries before, had imagined, because +they had seen living and moving, those glorious statues which we pretend +to admire, but refuse to imitate. + +It seems to me that a few centuries hence, when mankind has learnt to +fear God more, and therefore to obey more strictly those laws of nature +and of science which are the will of God—it seems to me, I say, that in +those days the present fashion of tight lacing will be looked back upon +as a contemptible and barbarous superstition, denoting a very low level +of civilisation in the peoples which have practised it. That for +generations past women should have been in the habit—not to please men, +who do not care about the matter as a point of beauty—but simply to vie +with each other in obedience to something called fashion—that they +should, I say, have been in the habit of deliberately crushing that part +of the body which should be specially left free, contracting and +displacing their lungs, their heart, and all the most vital and important +organs, and entailing thereby disease, not only on themselves but on +their children after them; that for forty years past physicians should +have been telling them of the folly of what they have been doing; and +that they should as yet, in the great majority of cases, not only turn a +deaf ear to all warnings, but actually deny the offence, of which one +glance of the physician or the sculptor, who know what shape the human +body ought to be, brings them in guilty—this, I say, is an instance +of—what shall I call it?—which deserves at once the lash, not merely of +the satirist, but of any theologian who really believes that God made the +physical universe. Let me, I pray you, appeal to your common sense for a +moment. When any one chooses a horse or a dog, whether for strength, for +speed, or for any other useful purpose, the first thing almost to be +looked at is the girth round the ribs; the room for heart and lungs. +Exactly in proportion to that will be the animal’s general healthiness, +power of endurance, and value in many other ways. If you will look at +eminent lawyers and famous orators, who have attained a healthy old age, +you will see that in every case they are men, like the late Lord +Palmerston, and others whom I could mention, of remarkable size, not +merely in the upper, but in the lower part of the chest; men who had, +therefore, a peculiar power of using the diaphragm to fill and to clear +the lungs, and therefore to oxygenate the blood of the whole body. Now, +it is just these lower ribs, across which the diaphragm is stretched like +the head of a drum, which stays contract to a minimum. If you advised +owners of horses and hounds to put their horses or their hounds into +stays, and lace them up tight, in order to increase their beauty, you +would receive, I doubt not, a very courteous, but certainly a very +decided, refusal to do that which would spoil not merely the animals +themselves, but the whole stud or the whole kennel for years to come. +And if you advised an orator to put himself into tight stays, he, no +doubt, again would give a courteous answer; but he would reply—if he was +a really educated man—that to comply with your request would involve his +giving up public work, under the probable penalty of being dead within +the twelve-month. + +And how much work of every kind, intellectual as well as physical, is +spoiled or hindered; how many deaths occur from consumption and other +complaints which are the result of this habit of tight lacing, is known +partly to the medical men, who lift up their voices in vain, and known +fully to Him who will not interfere with the least of His own physical +laws to save human beings from the consequences of their own wilful +folly. + +And now—to end this lecture with more pleasing thoughts—What becomes of +this breath which passes from your lips? Is it merely harmful; merely +waste? God forbid! God has forbidden that anything should be merely +harmful or merely waste in this so wise and well-made world. The +carbonic acid which passes from your lips at every breath—ay, even that +which oozes from the volcano crater when the eruption is past—is a +precious boon to thousands of things of which you have daily need. +Indeed there is a sort of hint at physical truth in the old fairy tale of +the girl, from whose lips, as she spoke, fell pearls and diamonds; for +the carbonic acid of your breath may help hereafter to make the pure +carbonate of lime of a pearl, or the still purer carbon of a diamond. +Nay, it may go—in such a world of transformations do we live—to make +atoms of coal strata, which after being buried for ages beneath deep +seas, shall be upheaved in continents which are yet unborn, and there be +burnt for the use of a future race of men, and resolved into their +original elements. Coal, wise men tell us, is on the whole breath and +sunlight; the breath of living creatures who have lived in the vast +swamps and forests of some primeval world, and the sunlight which +transmuted that breath into the leaves and stems of trees, magically +locked up for ages in that black stone, to become, when it is burnt at +last, light and carbonic acid as it was at first. For though you must +not breathe your breath again, you may at least eat your breath, if you +will allow the sun to transmute it for you into vegetables; or you may +enjoy its fragrance and its colour in the shape of a lily or a rose. +When you walk in a sunlit garden, every word you speak, every breath you +breathe, is feeding the plants and flowers around. The delicate surface +of the green leaves absorbs the carbonic acid, and parts it into its +elements, retaining the carbon to make woody fibre, and courteously +returning you the oxygen to mingle with the fresh air, and be inhaled by +your lungs once more. Thus do you feed the plants; just as the plants +feed you: while the great life-giving sun feeds both; and the geranium +standing in the sick child’s window does not merely rejoice his eye and +mind by its beauty and freshness, but repays honestly the trouble spent +on it; absorbing the breath which the child needs not, and giving to him +the breath which he needs. + +So are the services of all things constituted according to a Divine and +wonderful order, and knit together in mutual dependence and mutual +helpfulness—a fact to be remembered with hope and comfort: but also with +awe and fear. For as in that which is above nature, so in nature itself; +he that breaks one physical law is guilty of all. The whole universe, as +it were, takes up arms against him; and all nature, with her numberless +and unseen powers, is ready to avenge herself on him, and on his children +after him, he knows not when nor where. He, on the other hand, who obeys +the laws of nature with his whole heart and mind, will find all things +working together to him for good. He is at peace with the physical +universe. He is helped and befriended alike by the sun above his head +and the dust beneath his feet; because he is obeying the will and mind of +Him who made sun, and dust, and all things; and who has given them a law +which cannot be broken. + + + + +THRIFT {77} + + +LADIES,—I have chosen for the title of this lecture a practical and +prosaic word, because I intend the lecture itself to be as practical and +prosaic as I can make it, without becoming altogether dull. + +The question of the better or worse education of women is one far too +important for vague sentiment, wild aspirations, or Utopian dreams. + +It is a practical question, on which depends not merely money or comfort, +but too often health and life, as the consequences of a good education, +or disease and death—I know too well of what I speak—as the consequences +of a bad one. + +I beg you, therefore, to put out of your minds at the outset any fancy +that I wish for a social revolution in the position of women; or that I +wish to see them educated by exactly the same methods, and in exactly the +same subjects, as men. British lads, on an average, are far too +ill-taught still, in spite of all recent improvements, for me to wish +that British girls should be taught in the same way. + +Moreover, whatever defects there may have been—and defects there must be +in all things human—in the past education of British women, it has been +most certainly a splendid moral success. It has made, by the grace of +God, British women the best wives, mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, +that the world, as far as I can discover, has yet seen. + +Let those who will, sneer at the women of England. We who have to do the +work and to fight the battle of life know the inspiration which we derive +from their virtue, their counsel, their tenderness, and—but too +often—from their compassion and their forgiveness. There is, I doubt +not, still left in England many a man with chivalry and patriotism enough +to challenge the world to show so perfect a specimen of humanity as a +cultivated British woman. + +But just because a cultivated British woman is so perfect a personage; +therefore I wish to see all British women cultivated. Because the +womanhood of England is so precious a treasure; I wish to see none of it +wasted. It is an invaluable capital, or material, out of which the +greatest possible profit to the nation must be made. And that can only +be done by Thrift; and that, again, can only be attained by knowledge. + +Consider that word Thrift. If you will look at “Dr. Johnson’s +Dictionary,” or if you know your “Shakespeare,” you will see that Thrift +signified originally profits, gain, riches gotten—in a word, the marks of +a man’s thriving. + +How, then, did the word Thrift get to mean parsimony, frugality, the +opposite of waste? Just in the same way as economy—which first, of +course, meant the management of a household—got to mean also the opposite +of waste. + +It was found that in commerce, in husbandry, in any process, in fact, men +throve in proportion as they saved their capital, their material, their +force. + +Now this is a great law which runs through life; one of those laws of +nature—call them, rather, laws of God—which apply not merely to political +economy, to commerce, and to mechanics; but to physiology, to society; to +the intellect, to the heart, of every person in this room. + +The secret of thriving is thrift; saving of force; to get as much work as +possible done with the least expenditure of power, the least jar and +obstruction, least wear and tear. + +And the secret of thrift is knowledge. In proportion as you know the +laws and nature of a subject, you will be able to work at it easily, +surely, rapidly, successfully; instead of wasting your money or your +energies in mistaken schemes, irregular efforts, which end in +disappointment and exhaustion. + +The secret of thrift, I say, is knowledge. The more you know, the more +you can save yourself and that which belongs to you; and can do more work +with less effort. + +A knowledge of the laws of commercial credit, we all know, saves capital, +enabling a less capital to do the work of a greater. Knowledge of the +electric telegraph saves time; knowledge of writing saves human speech +and locomotion; knowledge of domestic economy saves income; knowledge of +sanitary laws saves health and life; knowledge of the laws of the +intellect saves wear and tear of brain; and knowledge of the laws of the +spirit—what does it not save? + +A well-educated moral sense, a well-regulated character, saves from +idleness and ennui, alternating with sentimentality and excitement, those +tenderer emotions, those deeper passions, those nobler aspirations of +humanity, which are the heritage of the woman far more than of the man; +and which are potent in her, for evil or for good, in proportion as they +are left to run wild and undisciplined; or are trained and developed into +graceful, harmonious, self-restraining strength, beautiful in themselves, +and a blessing to all who come under their influence. + +What, therefore, I recommend to ladies in this lecture is thrift: thrift +of themselves and of their own powers: and knowledge as the parent of +thrift. + +And because it is well to begin with the lower applications of thrift, +and to work up to the higher, I am much pleased to hear that the first +course of the proposed lectures to women in this place will be one on +domestic economy. + +I presume that the learned gentleman who will deliver these lectures will +be the last to mean by that term the mere saving of money; that he will +tell you, as—being a German—he will have good reason to know, that the +young lady who learns thrift in domestic economy is also learning thrift +of the very highest faculties of her immortal spirit. He will tell you, +I doubt not—for he must know—how you may see in Germany young ladies +living in what we more luxurious British would consider something like +poverty; cooking, waiting at table, and performing many a household +office which would be here considered menial; and yet finding time for a +cultivation of the intellect, which is, unfortunately, too rare in Great +Britain. + +The truth is, that we British are too wealthy. We make money, if not too +rapidly for the good of the nation at large, yet too rapidly, I fear, for +the good of the daughters of those who make it. Their temptation—I do +not, of course, say they all yield to it—but their temptation is, to +waste of the very simplest—I had almost said, if I may be pardoned the +expression, of the most barbaric—kind; to an oriental waste of money, and +waste of time; to a fondness for mere finery, pardonable enough, but +still a waste; and to the mistaken fancy that it is the mark of a lady to +sit idle and let servants do everything for her. + +But it is not of this sort of waste of which I wish to speak to-day. I +only mention the matter in passing, to show that high intellectual +culture is not incompatible with the performance of homely household +duties, and that the moral success of which I spoke just now need not be +injured, any more than it is in Germany, by intellectual success +likewise. I trust that these words may reassure those parents, if any +such there be here, who may fear that these lectures will withdraw women +from their existing sphere of interest and activity. That they should +entertain such a fear is not surprising, after the extravagant opinions +and schemes which have been lately broached in various quarters. + +The programme to these lectures expressly disclaims any such intentions; +and I, as a husband and a father, expressly disclaim any such intention +likewise. + +“To fit women for the more enlightened performance of their special +duties;” to help them towards learning how to do better what we doubt not +many of them are already doing well; is, I honestly believe, the only +object of the promoters of this scheme. + +Let us see now how some of these special duties can be better performed +by help of a little enlightenment as to the laws which regulate them. + +Now, no man will deny—certainly no man who is past forty-five, and whose +digestion is beginning to quail before the lumps of beef and mutton which +are the boast of a British kitchen, and to prefer, with Justice Shallow, +and, I presume, Sir John Falstaff also, “any pretty little tiny +kickshaws”—no man, I say, who has reached that age, but will feel it a +practical comfort to him to know that the young ladies of his family are +at all events good cooks; and understand, as the French do, thrift in the +matter of food. + +Neither will any parent who wishes, naturally enough, that his daughters +should cost him as little as possible; and wishes, naturally enough also, +that they should be as well dressed as possible, deny that it would be a +good thing for them to be practical milliners and mantua-makers; and, by +making their own clothes gracefully and well, exercise thrift in +clothing. + +But, beside this thrift in clothing, I am not alone, I believe, in +wishing for some thrift in the energy which produces it. Labour +misapplied, you will agree, is labour wasted; and as dress, I presume, is +intended to adorn the person of the wearer, the making a dress which only +disfigures her may be considered as a plain case of waste. It would be +impertinent in me to go into any details: but it is impossible to walk +about the streets now without passing young people who must be under a +deep delusion as to the success of their own toilette. Instead of +graceful and noble simplicity of form, instead of combinations of colour +at once rich and delicate, because in accordance with the chromatic laws +of nature, one meets with phenomena more and more painful to the eye, and +startling to common sense, till one would be hardly more astonished, and +certainly hardly more shocked, if in a year or two, one should pass +someone going about like a Chinese lady, with pinched feet, or like a +savage of the Amazons, with a wooden bung through her lower lip. It is +easy to complain of these monstrosities: but impossible to cure them, it +seems to me, without an education of the taste, an education in those +laws of nature which produce beauty in form and beauty in colour. For +that the cause of these failures lies in want of education is patent. +They are most common in—I had almost said they are confined to—those +classes of well-to-do persons who are the least educated; who have no +standard of taste of their own; and who do not acquire any from +cultivated friends and relations: who, in consequence, dress themselves +blindly according to what they conceive to be the Paris fashions, +conveyed at third-hand through an equally uneducated dressmaker; in +innocent ignorance of the fact—for fact I believe it to be—that Paris +fashions are invented now not in the least for the sake of beauty, but +for the sake of producing, through variety, increased expenditure, and +thereby increased employment; according to the strange system which now +prevails in France of compelling, if not prosperity, at least the signs +of it; and like schoolboys before a holiday, nailing up the head of the +weather-glass to insure fine weather. + +Let British ladies educate themselves in those laws of beauty which are +as eternal as any other of nature’s laws; which may be seen fulfilled, as +Mr. Ruskin tells us, so eloquently in every flower and every leaf, in +every sweeping down and rippling wave; and they will be able to invent +graceful and economical dresses for themselves, without importing tawdry +and expensive ugliness from France. + +Let me now go a step farther, and ask you to consider this: There are in +England now a vast number, and an increasing number, of young women who, +from various circumstances which we all know, must in after life be +either the mistresses of their own fortunes, or the earners of their own +bread. And, to do that wisely and well, they must be more or less women +of business, and to be women of business they must know something of the +meaning of the words Capital, Profit, Price, Value, Labour, Wages, and of +the relation between those two last. In a word, they must know a little +political economy. Nay, I sometimes think that the mistress of every +household might find, not only thrift of money, but thrift of brain; +freedom from mistakes, anxieties, worries of many kinds, all of which eat +out the health as well as the heart, by a little sound knowledge of the +principles of political economy. + +When we consider that every mistress of a household is continually +buying, if not selling; that she is continually hiring and employing +labour in the form of servants; and very often, into the bargain, keeping +her husband’s accounts: I cannot but think that her hard-worked brain +might be clearer, and her hard-tried desire to do her duty by every +subject in her little kingdom, might be more easily satisfied, had she +read something of what Mr. John Stuart Mill has written, especially on +the duties of employer and employed. A capitalist, a commercialist, an +employer of labour, and an accountant—every mistress of a household is +all these, whether she likes it or not; and it would be surely well for +her, in so very complicated a state of society as this, not to trust +merely to that mother-wit, that intuitive sagacity and innate power of +ruling her fellow-creatures, which carries women so nobly through their +work in simpler and less civilised societies. + +And here I stop to answer those who may say—as I have heard it said—That +a woman’s intellect is not fit for business; that when a woman takes to +business, she is apt to do it ill, and unpleasantly likewise, to be more +suspicious, more irritable, more grasping, more unreasonable, than +regular men of business would be: that—as I have heard it put—“a woman +does not fight fair.” The answer is simple. That a woman’s intellect is +eminently fitted for business is proved by the enormous amount of +business she gets through without any special training for it: but those +faults in a woman of which some men complain are simply the results of +her not having had a special training. She does not know the laws of +business. She does not know the rules of the game she is playing; and +therefore she is playing it in the dark, in fear and suspicion, apt to +judge of questions on personal grounds, often offending those with whom +she has to do, and oftener still making herself miserable over matters of +law or of business, on which a little sound knowledge would set her head +and her heart at rest. + +When I have seen widows, having the care of children, of a great +household, of a great estate, of a great business, struggling heroically, +and yet often mistakenly; blamed severely for selfishness and ambition, +while they were really sacrificing themselves with the divine instinct of +a mother for their children’s interest: I have stood by with mingled +admiration and pity, and said to myself: “How nobly she is doing the work +without teaching! How much more nobly would she have done it had she +been taught! She is now doing her work at the most enormous waste of +energy and of virtue: had she had knowledge, thrift would have followed +it; she would have done more work with far less trouble. She will +probably kill herself if she goes on; while sound knowledge would have +saved her health, saved her heart, saved her friends, and helped the very +loved ones for whom she labours, not always with success.” + +A little political economy, therefore, will at least do no harm to a +woman; especially if she have to take care of herself in after life; +neither, I think, will she be much harmed by some sound knowledge of +another subject, which I see promised in these lectures: “Natural +philosophy, in its various branches, such as the chemistry of common +life, light, heat, electricity, etc. etc.” + +A little knowledge of the laws of light, for instance, would teach many +women that by shutting themselves up day after day, week after week, in +darkened rooms, they are as certainly committing a waste of health, +destroying their vital energy, and diseasing their brains, as if they +were taking so much poison the whole time. + +A little knowledge of the laws of heat would teach women not to clothe +themselves and their children after foolish and insufficient fashions, +which in this climate sow the seeds of a dozen different diseases, and +have to be atoned for by perpetual anxieties, and by perpetual doctors’ +bills; and as for a little knowledge of the laws of electricity, one +thrift I am sure it would produce—thrift to us men, of having to answer +continual inquiries as to what the weather is going to be, when a slight +knowledge of the barometer, or of the form of the clouds and the +direction of the wind, would enable many a lady to judge for herself, and +not, after inquiry on inquiry, regardless of all warnings, go out on the +first appearance of a strip of blue sky, and come home wet through, with +what she calls “only a chill,” but which really means a nail driven into +her coffin—a probable shortening, though it may be a very small one, of +her mortal life; because the food of the next twenty-four hours, which +should have gone to keep the vital heat at its normal standard, will have +to be wasted in raising it up to that standard, from which it has fallen +by a chill. + +Ladies, these are subjects on which I must beg to speak a little more at +length, premising them by one statement, which may seem jest, but is +solemn earnest—that, if the medical men of this or any other city were +what the world now calls “alive to their own interests”—that is, to the +mere making of money; instead of being, what medical men are, the most +generous, disinterested, and high-minded class in these realms, then they +would oppose by all means in their power the delivery of lectures on +natural philosophy to women. For if women act upon what they learn in +those lectures—and having women’s hearts, they will act upon it—there +ought to follow a decrease of sickness and an increase of health, +especially among children; a thrift of life, and a thrift of expense +besides, which would very seriously affect the income of medical men. + +For let me ask you, ladies, with all courtesy, but with all +earnestness—Are you aware of certain facts, of which every one of those +excellent medical men is too well aware? Are you aware that more human +beings are killed in England every year by unnecessary and preventable +diseases than were killed at Waterloo or at Sadowa? Are you aware that +the great majority of those victims are children? Are you aware that the +diseases which carry them off are for the most part such as ought to be +specially under the control of the women who love them, pet them, educate +them, and would in many cases, if need be, lay down their lives for them? +Are you aware, again, of the vast amount of disease which, so both wise +mothers and wise doctors assure me, is engendered in the sleeping-room +from simple ignorance of the laws of ventilation, and in the schoolroom +likewise, from simple ignorance of the laws of physiology? from an +ignorance of which I shall mention no other case here save one—that too +often from ignorance of signs of approaching disease, a child is punished +for what is called idleness, listlessness, wilfulness, sulkiness; and +punished, too, in the unwisest way—by an increase of tasks and +confinement to the house, thus overtasking still more a brain already +overtasked, and depressing still more, by robbing it of oxygen and of +exercise, a system already depressed? Are you aware, I ask again, of all +this? I speak earnest upon this point, because I speak with experience. +As a single instance: a medical man, a friend of mine, passing by his own +schoolroom, heard one of his own little girls screaming and crying, and +went in. The governess, an excellent woman, but wholly ignorant of the +laws of physiology, complained that the child had of late become +obstinate and would not learn; and that therefore she must punish her by +keeping her indoors over the unlearnt lessons. The father, who knew that +the child was usually a very good one, looked at her carefully for a +little while; sent her out of the schoolroom; and then said, “That child +must not open a book for a month.” “If I had not acted so,” he said to +me, “I should have had that child dead of brain-disease within the year.” + +Now, in the face of such facts as these, is it too much to ask of +mothers, sisters, aunts, nurses, governesses—all who may be occupied in +the care of children, especially of girls—that they should study thrift +of human health and human life, by studying somewhat the laws of life and +health? There are books—I may say a whole literature of books—written by +scientific doctors on these matters, which are in my mind far more +important to the schoolroom than half the trashy accomplishments, +so-called, which are expected to be known by governesses. But are they +bought? Are they even to be bought, from most country booksellers? Ah, +for a little knowledge of the laws to the neglect of which is owing so +much fearful disease, which, if it does not produce immediate death, too +often leaves the constitution impaired for years to come. Ah the waste +of health and strength in the young; the waste, too, of anxiety and +misery in those who love and tend them. How much of it might be saved by +a little rational education in those laws of nature which are the will of +God about the welfare of our bodies, and which, therefore, we are as much +bound to know and to obey, as we are bound to know and obey the spiritual +laws whereon depends the welfare of our souls. + +Pardon me, ladies, if I have given a moment’s pain to anyone here: but I +appeal to every medical man in the room whether I have not spoken the +truth; and having such an opportunity as this, I felt that I must speak +for the sake of children, and of women likewise, or else for ever +hereafter hold my peace. + +Let me pass on from this painful subject—for painful it has been to me +for many years—to a question of intellectual thrift—by which I mean just +now thrift of words; thrift of truth; restraint of the tongue; accuracy +and modesty in statement. + +Mothers complain to me that girls are apt to be—not intentionally +untruthful—but exaggerative, prejudiced, incorrect, in repeating a +conversation or describing an event; and that from this fault arise, as +is to be expected, misunderstandings, quarrels, rumours, slanders, +scandals, and what not. + +Now, for this waste of words there is but one cure: and if I be told that +it is a natural fault of women; that they cannot take the calm judicial +view of matters which men boast, and often boast most wrongly, that they +can take; that under the influence of hope, fear, delicate antipathy, +honest moral indignation, they will let their eyes and ears be governed +by their feelings; and see and hear only what they wish to see and hear—I +answer, that it is not for me as a man to start such a theory; but that +if it be true, it is an additional argument for some education which will +correct this supposed natural defect. And I say deliberately that there +is but one sort of education which will correct it; one which will teach +young women to observe facts accurately, judge them calmly, and describe +them carefully, without adding or distorting: and that is, some training +in natural science. + +I beg you not to be startled: but if you are, then test the truth of my +theory by playing to-night at the game called “Russian Scandal;” in which +a story, repeated in secret by one player to the other, comes out at the +end of the game, owing to the inaccurate and—forgive me if I say +it—uneducated brains through which it has passed, utterly unlike its +original; not only ludicrously maimed and distorted, but often with the +most fantastic additions of events, details, names, dates, places, which +each player will aver that he received from the player before him. I am +afraid that too much of the average gossip of every city, town, and +village is little more than a game of “Russian Scandal;” with this +difference that while one is but a game, the other is but too mischievous +earnest. + +But now, if among your party there shall be an average lawyer, medical +man, or man of science, you will find that he, and perhaps he alone, will +be able to retail accurately the story which has been told him. And why? +Simply because his mind has been trained to deal with facts; to ascertain +exactly what he does see or hear, and to imprint its leading features +strongly and clearly on his memory. + +Now, you certainly cannot make young ladies barristers or attorneys; nor +employ their brains in getting up cases, civil or criminal; and as for +chemistry, they and their parents may have a reasonable antipathy to +smells, blackened fingers, and occasional explosions and poisonings. But +you may make them something of botanists, zoologists, geologists. + +I could say much on this point: allow me at least to say this: I verify +believe that any young lady who would employ some of her leisure time in +collecting wild flowers, carefully examining them, verifying them, and +arranging them; or who would in her summer trip to the sea-coast do the +same by the common objects of the shore, instead of wasting her holiday, +as one sees hundreds doing, in lounging on benches on the esplanade, +reading worthless novels, and criticising dresses—that such a young lady, +I say, would not only open her own mind to a world of wonder, beauty, and +wisdom, which, if it did not make her a more reverent and pious soul, she +cannot be the woman which I take for granted she is; but would save +herself from the habit—I had almost said the necessity—of gossip; because +she would have things to think of and not merely persons; facts instead +of fancies; while she would acquire something of accuracy, of patience, +of methodical observation and judgment, which would stand her in good +stead in the events of daily life, and increase her power of bridling her +tongue and her imagination. “God is in heaven, and thou upon earth; +therefore let thy words be few;” is the lesson which those are learning +all day long who study the works of God with reverent accuracy, lest by +misrepresenting them they should be tempted to say that God has done that +which He has not; and in that wholesome discipline I long that women as +well as men should share. + +And now I come to a thrift of the highest kind, as contrasted with a +waste the most deplorable and ruinous of all; thrift of those faculties +which connect us with the unseen and spiritual world; with humanity, with +Christ, with God; thrift of the immortal spirit. I am not going now to +give you a sermon on duty. You hear such, I doubt not, in church every +Sunday, far better than I can preach to you. I am going to speak rather +of thrift of the heart, thrift of the emotions. How they are wasted in +these days in reading what are called sensation novels, all know but too +well; how British literature—all that the best hearts and intellects +among our forefathers have bequeathed to us—is neglected for light +fiction, the reading of which is, as a lady well said, “the worst form of +intemperance—dram-drinking and opium-eating, intellectual and moral.” + +I know that the young will delight—they have delighted in all ages, and +will to the end of time—in fictions which deal with that “oldest tale +which is for ever new.” Novels will be read: but that is all the more +reason why women should be trained, by the perusal of a higher, broader, +deeper literature, to distinguish the good novel from the bad, the moral +from the immoral, the noble from the base, the true work of art from the +sham which hides its shallowness and vulgarity under a tangled plot and +melodramatic situations. She should learn—and that she can only learn by +cultivation—to discern with joy, and drink in with reverence, the good, +the beautiful, and the true; and to turn with the fine scorn of a pure +and strong womanhood from the bad, the ugly, and the false. + +And if any parent should be inclined to reply: “Why lay so much stress +upon educating a girl in British literature? Is it not far more +important to make our daughters read religious books?” I answer—Of +course it is. I take for granted that that is done in a Christian land. +But I beg you to recollect that there are books and books; and that in +these days of a free press it is impossible, in the long run, to prevent +girls reading books of very different shades of opinion, and very +different religious worth. It may be, therefore, of the very highest +importance to a girl to have her intellect, her taste, her emotions, her +moral sense, in a word, her whole womanhood, so cultivated and regulated +that she shall herself be able to discern the true from the false, the +orthodox from the unorthodox, the truly devout from the merely +sentimental, the Gospel from its counterfeits. + +I should have thought that there never had been in Britain, since the +Reformation, a crisis at which young Englishwomen required more careful +cultivation on these matters; if at least they are to be saved from +making themselves and their families miserable; and from ending—as I have +known too many end—with broken hearts, broken brains, broken health, and +an early grave. + +Take warning by what you see abroad. In every country where the women +are uneducated, unoccupied; where their only literature is French novels +or translations of them—in every one of those countries the women, even +to the highest, are the slaves of superstition, and the puppets of +priests. In proportion as, in certain other countries—notably, I will +say, in Scotland—the women are highly educated, family life and family +secrets are sacred, and the woman owns allegiance and devotion to no +confessor or director, but to her own husband or to her own family. + +I say plainly, that if any parents wish their daughters to succumb at +least to some quackery or superstition, whether calling itself +scientific, or calling itself religious—and there are too many of both +just now—they cannot more certainly effect their purpose than by allowing +her to grow up ignorant, frivolous, luxurious, vain; with her emotions +excited, but not satisfied, by the reading of foolish and even immoral +novels. + +In such a case the more delicate and graceful the organisation, the more +noble and earnest the nature, which has been neglected, the more certain +it is—I know too well what I am saying—to go astray. + +The time of depression, disappointment, vacuity, all but despair must +come. The immortal spirit, finding no healthy satisfaction for its +highest aspirations, is but too likely to betake itself to an unhealthy +and exciting superstition. Ashamed of its own long self-indulgence, it +is but too likely to flee from itself into a morbid asceticism. Not +having been taught its God-given and natural duties in the world, it is +but too likely to betake itself, from the mere craving for action, to +self-invented and unnatural duties out of the world. Ignorant of true +science, yet craving to understand the wonders of nature and of spirit, +it is but too likely to betake itself to non-science—nonsense as it is +usually called—whether of spirit-rapping and mesmerism, or of miraculous +relics and winking pictures. Longing for guidance and teaching, and +never having been taught to guide and teach itself, it is but too likely +to deliver itself up in self-despair to the guidance and teaching of +those who, whether they be quacks or fanatics, look on uneducated women +as their natural prey. + +You will see, I am sure, from what I have said, that it is not my wish +that you should become mere learned women; mere female pedants, as +useless and unpleasing as male pedants are wont to be. The education +which I set before you is not to be got by mere hearing lectures or +reading books: for it is an education of your whole character; a +self-education; which really means a committing of yourself to God, that +He may educate you. Hearing lectures is good, for it will teach you how +much there is to be known, and how little you know. Reading books is +good, for it will give you habits of regular and diligent study. And +therefore I urge on you strongly private study, especially in case a +library should be formed here of books on those most practical subjects +of which I have been speaking. But, after all, both lectures and books +are good, mainly in as far as they furnish matter for reflection: while +the desire to reflect and the ability to reflect must come, as I believe, +from above. The honest craving after light and power, after knowledge, +wisdom, active usefulness, must come—and may it come to you—by the +inspiration of the Spirit of God. + +One word more, and I have done. Let me ask women to educate themselves, +not for their own sakes merely, but for the sake of others. For, whether +they will or not, they must educate others. I do not speak merely of +those who may be engaged in the work of direct teaching; that they ought +to be well taught themselves, who can doubt? I speak of those—and in so +doing I speak of every woman, young and old—who exercise as wife, as +mother, as aunt, as sister, or as friend, an influence, indirect it may +be, and unconscious, but still potent and practical, on the minds and +characters of those about them, especially of men. How potent and +practical that influence is, those know best who know most of the world +and most of human nature. There are those who consider—and I agree with +them—that the education of boys under the age of twelve years ought to be +entrusted as much as possible to women. Let me ask—of what period of +youth and manhood does not the same hold true? I pity the ignorance and +conceit of the man who fancies that he has nothing left to learn from +cultivated women. I should have thought that the very mission of woman +was to be, in the highest sense, the educator of man from infancy to old +age; that that was the work towards which all the God-given capacities of +women pointed; for which they were to be educated to the highest pitch. +I should have thought that it was the glory of woman that she was sent +into the world to live for others, rather than for herself; and therefore +I should say—Let her smallest rights be respected, her smallest wrongs +redressed: but let her never be persuaded to forget that she is sent into +the world to teach man—what, I believe, she has been teaching him all +along, even in the savage state—namely, that there is something more +necessary than the claiming of rights, and that is, the performing of +duties; to teach him specially, in these so-called intellectual days, +that there is something more than intellect, and that is—purity and +virtue. Let her never be persuaded to forget that her calling is not the +lower and more earthly one of self-assertion, but the higher and the +diviner calling of self-sacrifice; and let her never desert that higher +life, which lives in others and for others, like her Redeemer and her +Lord. + +And if any should answer that this doctrine would keep woman a dependent +and a slave, I rejoin—Not so: it would keep her what she should be—the +mistress of all around her, because mistress of herself. And more, I +should express a fear that those who made that answer had not yet seen +into the mystery of true greatness and true strength; that they did not +yet understand the true magnanimity, the true royalty of that spirit, by +which the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and +to give His life a ransom for many. + +Surely that is woman’s calling—to teach man: and to teach him what? To +teach him, after all, that his calling is the same as hers, if he will +but see the things which belong to his peace. To temper his fiercer, +coarser, more self-assertive nature, by the contact of her gentleness, +purity, self-sacrifice. To make him see that not by blare of trumpets, +not by noise, wrath, greed, ambition, intrigue, puffery, is good and +lasting work to be done on earth: but by wise self-distrust, by silent +labour, by lofty self-control, by that charity which hopeth all things, +believeth all things, endureth all things; by such an example, in short, +as women now in tens of thousands set to those around them; such as they +will show more and more, the more their whole womanhood is educated to +employ its powers without waste and without haste in harmonious unity. +Let the woman begin in girlhood, if such be her happy lot—to quote the +words of a great poet, a great philosopher, and a great Churchman, +William Wordsworth—let her begin, I say— + + With all things round about her drawn + From May-time and the cheerful dawn; + A dancing shape, an image gay, + To haunt, to startle, and waylay. + +Let her develop onwards— + + A spirit, yet a woman too, + With household motions light and free, + And steps of virgin liberty. + A countenance in which shall meet + Sweet records, promises as sweet; + A creature not too bright and good + For human nature’s daily food; + For transient sorrows, simple wiles, + Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. + +But let her highest and her final development be that which not nature, +but self-education alone can bring—that which makes her once and for +ever— + + A being breathing thoughtful breath; + A traveller betwixt life and death. + With reason firm, with temperate will + Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill. + A perfect woman, nobly planned, + To warn, to comfort, and command. + And yet a spirit still and bright + With something of an angel light. + + + + +NAUSICAA IN LONDON; +OR, +THE LOWER EDUCATION OF WOMEN. + + +FRESH from the Marbles of the British Museum, I went my way through +London streets. My brain was still full of fair and grand forms; the +forms of men and women whose every limb and attitude betokened perfect +health, and grace, and power, and self-possession and self-restraint so +habitual and complete that it had become unconscious, and +undistinguishable from the native freedom of the savage. For I had been +up and down the corridors of those Greek sculptures, which remain as a +perpetual sermon to rich and poor, amid our artificial, unwholesome, and +it may be decaying pseudo-civilisation, saying with looks more expressive +than all words—Such men and women can be; for such they have been; and +such you may be yet, if you will use that science of which you too often +only boast. Above all, I had been pondering over the awful and yet +tender beauty of the maiden figures from the Parthenon and its kindred +temples. And these, or such as these, I thought to myself, were the +sisters of the men who fought at Marathon and Salamis; the mothers of +many a man among the ten thousand whom Xenophon led back from Babylon to +the Black Sea shore; the ancestresses of many a man who conquered the +East in Alexander’s host, and fought with Porus in the far Punjab. And +were these women mere dolls? These men mere gladiators? Were they not +the parents of philosophy, science, poetry, the plastic arts? We talk of +education now. Are we more educated than were the ancient Greeks? Do we +know anything about education, physical, intellectual, or æsthetic, and I +may say moral likewise—religious education, of course, in our sense of +the world, they had none—but do we know anything about education of which +they have not taught us at least the rudiments? Are there not some +branches of education which they perfected, once and for ever; leaving us +northern barbarians to follow, or else not to follow, their example? To +produce health, that is, harmony and sympathy, proportion and grace, in +every faculty of mind and body—that was their notion of education. To +produce that, the text-book of their childhood was the poetry of Homer, +and not of—But I am treading on dangerous ground. It was for this that +the seafaring Greek lad was taught to find his ideal in Ulysses; while +his sister at home found hers, it may be, in Nausicaa. It was for this, +that when perhaps the most complete and exquisite of all the Greeks, +Sophocles the good, beloved by gods and men, represented on the Athenian +stage his drama of Nausicaa, and, as usual, could not—for he had no +voice—himself take a speaking part, he was content to do one thing in +which he specially excelled; and dressed and masked as a girl, to play at +ball amid the chorus of Nausicaa’s maidens. + +That drama of Nausicaa is lost; and if I dare say so of any play of +Sophocles’, I scarce regret it. It is well, perhaps, that we have no +second conception of the scene, to interfere with the simplicity, so +grand, and yet so tender, of Homer’s idyllic episode. + +Nausicaa, it must be remembered, is the daughter of a king. But not of a +king in the exclusive modern European or old Eastern sense. Her father, +Alcinous, is simply primus inter pares among a community of merchants, +who are called “kings” likewise; and Mayor for life—so to speak—of a new +trading city, a nascent Genoa or Venice, on the shore of the +Mediterranean. But the girl Nausicaa, as she sleeps in her “carved +chamber,” is “like the immortals in form and face;” and two handmaidens +who sleep on each side of the polished door “have beauty from the +Graces.” + +To her there enters, in the shape of some maiden friend, none less than +Pallas Athené herself, intent on saving worthily her favourite, the +shipwrecked Ulysses; and bids her in a dream go forth—and wash the +clothes. {110} + + Nausicaa, wherefore doth thy mother bear + Child so forgetful? This long time doth rest, + Like lumber in the house, much raiment fair. + Soon must thou wed, and be thyself well-drest, + And find thy bridegroom raiment of the best. + These are the things whence good repute is born, + And praises that make glad a parent’s breast. + Come, let us both go washing with the morn; + So shalt thou have clothes becoming to be worn. + + Know that thy maidenhood is not for long, + Whom the Phoeacian chiefs already woo, + Lords of the land whence thou thyself art sprung. + Soon as the shining dawn comes forth anew, + For wain and mules thy noble father sue, + Which to the place of washing shall convey + Girdles and shawls and rugs of splendid hue, + This for thyself were better than essay + Thither to walk: the place is distant a long way. + +Startled by her dream, Nausicaa awakes, and goes to find her parents— + + One by the hearth sat, with the maids around, + And on the skeins of yarn, sea-purpled, spent + Her morning toil. Him to the council bound, + Called by the honoured kings, just going forth she found. + +And calling him, as she might now, Pappa phile, Dear Papa, asks for the +mule-waggon: but it is her father’s and her five brothers’ clothes she +fain would wash,— + + Ashamed to name her marriage to her father dear. + +But he understood all—and she goes forth in the mule-waggon, with the +clothes, after her mother has put in “a chest of all kinds of delicate +food, and meat, and wine in a goatskin;” and last but not least, the +indispensable cruse of oil for anointing after the bath, to which both +Jews, Greeks, and Romans owed so much health and beauty. And then we +read in the simple verse of a poet too refined, like the rest of his +race, to see anything mean or ridiculous in that which was not ugly and +unnatural, how she and her maids got into the “polished waggon,” “with +good wheels,” and she “took the whip and the studded reins,” and “beat +them till they started;” and how the mules, “rattled” away, and “pulled +against each other,” till + + When they came to the fair flowing river + Which feeds good lavatories all the year, + Fitted to cleanse all sullied robes soever, + They from the wain the mules unharnessed there, + And chased them free, to crop their juicy fare + By the swift river, on the margin green; + Then to the waters dashed the clothes they bare + And in the stream-filled trenches stamped them clean. + + Which, having washed and cleansed, they spread before + The sunbeams, on the beach, where most did lie + Thick pebbles, by the sea-wave washed ashore. + So, having left them in the heat to dry, + They to the bath went down, and by-and-by, + Rubbed with rich oil, their midday meal essay, + Couched in green turf, the river rolling nigh. + Then, throwing off their veils, at ball they play, + While the white-armed Nausicaa leads the choral lay. + +The mere beauty of this scene all will feel, who have the sense of beauty +in them. Yet it is not on that aspect which I wish to dwell, but on its +healthfulness. Exercise is taken, in measured time, to the sound of +song, as a duty almost, as well as an amusement. For this game of ball, +which is here mentioned for the first time in human literature, nearly +three thousand years ago, was held by the Greeks and by the Romans after +them, to be an almost necessary part of a liberal education; principally, +doubtless, from the development which it produced in the upper half of +the body, not merely to the arms, but to the chest, by raising and +expanding the ribs, and to all the muscles of the torso, whether +perpendicular or oblique. The elasticity and grace which it was believed +to give were so much prized, that a room for ball-play, and a teacher of +the art, were integral parts of every gymnasium; and the Athenians went +so far as to bestow on one famous ball-player, Aristonicus of Carystia, a +statue and the rights of citizenship. The rough and hardy young +Spartans, when passing from boyhood into manhood, received the title of +ball-players, seemingly from the game which it was then their special +duty to learn. In the case of Nausicaa and her maidens, the game would +just bring into their right places all that is liable to be contracted +and weakened in women, so many of whose occupations must needs be +sedentary and stooping; while the song which accompanied the game at once +filled the lungs regularly and rhythmically, and prevented violent +motion, or unseemly attitude. We, the civilised, need physiologists to +remind us of these simple facts, and even then do not act on them. Those +old half-barbarous Greeks had found them out for themselves, and, +moreover, acted on them. + +But fair Nausicaa must have been—some will say—surely a mere child of +nature, and an uncultivated person? + +So far from it, that her whole demeanour and speech show culture of the +very highest sort, full of “sweetness and light.”—Intelligent and +fearless, quick to perceive the bearings of her strange and sudden +adventure, quick to perceive the character of Ulysses, quick to answer +his lofty and refined pleading by words as lofty and refined, and pious +withal;—for it is she who speaks to her handmaids the once so famous +words: + + Strangers and poor men all are sent from Zeus; + And alms, though small, are sweet. + +Clear of intellect, prompt of action, modest of demeanour, shrinking from +the slightest breath of scandal; while she is not ashamed, when Ulysses, +bathed and dressed, looks himself again, to whisper to her maidens her +wish that the Gods might send her such a spouse.—This is Nausicaa as +Homer draws her; and as many a scholar and poet since Homer has accepted +her for the ideal of noble maidenhood. I ask my readers to study for +themselves her interview with Ulysses, in Mr. Worsley’s translation, or +rather in the grand simplicity of the original Greek, {114} and judge +whether Nausicaa is not as perfect a lady as the poet who imagined +her—or, it may be, drew her from life—must have been a perfect gentleman; +both complete in those “manners” which, says the old proverb, “make the +man:” but which are the woman herself; because with her—who acts more by +emotion than by calculation—manners are the outward and visible tokens of +her inward and spiritual grace, or disgrace; and flow instinctively, +whether good or bad, from the instincts of her inner nature. + +True, Nausicaa could neither read nor write. No more, most probably, +could the author of the Odyssey. No more, for that matter, could +Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, though they were plainly, both in mind and +manners, most highly-cultivated men. Reading and writing, of course, +have now become necessaries of humanity; and are to be given to every +human being, that he may start fair in the race of life. But I am not +aware that Greek women improved much, either in manners, morals, or +happiness, by acquiring them in after centuries. A wise man would sooner +see his daughter a Nausicaa than a Sappho, an Aspasia, a Cleopatra, or +even an Hypatia. + +Full of such thoughts, I went through London streets, among the Nausicaas +of the present day; the girls of the period; the daughters and hereafter +mothers of our future rulers, the great Demos or commercial middle class +of the greatest mercantile city in the world: and noted what I had noted +with fear and sorrow, many a day, for many a year; a type, and an +increasing type, of young women who certainly had not had the +“advantages,” “educational” and other, of that Greek Nausicaa of old. + +Of course, in such a city as London, to which the best of everything, +physical and other, gravitates, I could not but pass, now and then, +beautiful persons, who made me proud of those grandes Anglaises aux joues +rouges, whom the Parisiennes ridicule—and envy. But I could not help +suspecting that their looks showed them to be either country-bred, or +born of country parents; and this suspicion was strengthened by the fact +that, when compared with their mothers, the mother’s physique was, in the +majority of cases, superior to the daughters’. Painful it was, to one +accustomed to the ruddy well-grown peasant girl, stalwart, even when, as +often, squat and plain, to remark the exceedingly small size of the +average young woman; by which I do not mean mere want of height—that is a +little matter—but want of breadth likewise; a general want of those large +frames, which indicate usually a power of keeping strong and healthy not +merely the muscles, but the brain itself. + +Poor little things. I passed hundreds—I pass hundreds every day—trying +to hide their littleness by the nasty mass of false hair—or what does +duty for it; and by the ugly and useless hat which is stuck upon it, +making the head thereby look ridiculously large and heavy; and by the +high heels on which they totter onward, having forgotten, or never +learnt, the simple art of walking; their bodies tilted forward in that +ungraceful attitude which is called—why that name of all others?—a +“Grecian bend;” seemingly kept on their feet, and kept together at all, +in that strange attitude, by tight stays which prevented all graceful and +healthy motion of the hips or sides; their raiment, meanwhile, being +purposely misshapen in this direction and in that, to hide—it must be +presumed—deficiencies of form. If that chignon and those heels had been +taken off, the figure which would have remained would have been that too +often of a puny girl of sixteen. And yet there was no doubt that these +women were not only full grown, but some of them, alas! wives and +mothers. + +Poor little things.—And this they have gained by so-called civilisation: +the power of aping the “fashions” by which the worn-out “Parisienne” +hides her own personal defects; and of making themselves, by innate want +of that taste which the “Parisienne” possesses, only the cause of +something like a sneer from many a cultivated man; and of something like +a sneer, too, from yonder gipsy woman who passes by, with bold bright +face, and swinging hip, and footstep stately and elastic; far better +dressed, according to all true canons of taste, than most town-girls; and +thanking her fate that she and her “Rom” are no house-dwellers and +gaslight-sightseers, but fatten on free air upon the open moor. + +But the face which is beneath that chignon and that hat? Well—it is +sometimes pretty: but how seldom handsome, which is a higher quality by +far. It is not, strange to say, a well-fed face. Plenty of money, and +perhaps too much, is spent on those fine clothes. It had been better, to +judge from the complexion, if some of that money had been spent in solid +wholesome food. She looks as if she lived—as she too often does, I +hear—on tea and bread-and-butter, or rather on bread with the minimum of +butter. For as the want of bone indicates a deficiency of phosphatic +food, so does the want of flesh about the cheeks indicate a deficiency of +hydrocarbon. Poor little Nausicaa:—that is not her fault. Our boasted +civilisation has not even taught her what to eat, as it certainly has not +increased her appetite; and she knows not—what every country fellow +knows—that without plenty of butter and other fatty matters, she is not +likely to keep even warm. Better to eat nasty fat bacon now, than to +supply the want of it some few years hence by nastier cod-liver oil. But +there is no one yet to tell her that, and a dozen other equally simple +facts, for her own sake, and for the sake of that coming Demos which she +is to bring into the world; a Demos which, if we can only keep it healthy +in body and brain, has before it so splendid a future: but which, if body +and brain degrade beneath the influence of modern barbarism, is but too +likely to follow the Demos of ancient Byzantium, or of modern Paris. + +Ay, but her intellect. She is so clever, and she reads so much, and she +is going to be taught to read so much more. + +Ah well—there was once a science called Physiognomy. The Greeks, from +what I can learn, knew more of it than any people since: though the +Italian painters and sculptors must have known much; far more than we. +In a more scientific civilisation there will be such a science once more: +but its laws, though still in the empiric stage, are not altogether +forgotten by some. Little children have often a fine and clear instinct +of them. Many cultivated and experienced women have a fine and clear +instinct of them likewise. And some such would tell us that there is +intellect in plenty in the modern Nausicaa: but not of the quality which +they desire for their country’s future good. Self-consciousness, +eagerness, volubility, petulance in countenance, in gesture, and in +voice—which last is too often most harsh and artificial, the breath being +sent forth through the closed teeth, and almost entirely at the corners +of the mouth—and, with all this, a weariness often about the wrinkling +forehead and the drooping lids;—all these, which are growing too common, +not among the Demos only, nor only in the towns, are signs, they think, +of the unrest of unhealth, physical, intellectual, spiritual. At least +they are as different as two types of physiognomy in the same race can +be, from the expression both of face and gesture, in those old Greek +sculptures, and in the old Italian painters; and, it must be said, in the +portraits of Reynolds, and Gainsborough, Copley, and Romney. Not such, +one thinks, must have been the mothers of Britain during the latter half +of the last century and the beginning of the present; when their sons, at +times, were holding half the world at bay. + +And if Nausicaa has become such in town: what is she when she goes to the +seaside, not to wash the clothes in fresh-water, but herself in salt—the +very salt-water, laden with decaying organisms, from which, though not +polluted further by a dozen sewers, Ulysses had to cleanse himself, +anointing, too, with oil, ere he was fit to appear in the company of +Nausicaa of Greece? She dirties herself with the dirty saltwater; and +probably chills and tires herself by walking thither and back, and +staying in too long; and then flaunts on the pier, bedizened in garments +which, for monstrosity of form and disharmony of colours, would have set +that Greek Nausicaa’s teeth on edge, or those of any average Hindoo woman +now. Or, even sadder still, she sits on chairs and benches all the weary +afternoon, her head drooped on her chest, over some novel from the +“Library;” and then returns to tea and shrimps, and lodgings of which the +fragrance is not unsuggestive, sometimes not unproductive, of typhoid +fever. Ah, poor Nausicaa of England! That is a sad sight to some who +think about the present, and have read about the past. It is not a sad +sight to see your old father—tradesman, or clerk, or what not—who has +done good work in his day, and hopes to do some more, sitting by your old +mother, who has done good work in her day—among the rest, that heaviest +work of all, the bringing you into the world and keeping you in it till +now—honest, kindly, cheerful folk enough, and not inefficient in their +own calling; though an average Northumbrian, or Highlander, or Irish +Easterling, beside carrying a brain of five times the intellectual force, +could drive five such men over the cliff with his bare hands. It is not +a sad sight, I say, to see them sitting about upon those seaside benches, +looking out listlessly at the water, and the ships, and the sunlight, and +enjoying, like so many flies upon a wall, the novel act of doing nothing. +It is not the old for whom wise men are sad: but for you. Where is your +vitality? Where is your “Lebens-glückseligkeit,” your enjoyment of +superfluous life and power? Why you cannot even dance and sing, till now +and then, at night, perhaps, when you ought to lie safe in bed, but when +the weak brain, after receiving the day’s nourishment, has roused itself +a second time into a false excitement of gaslight pleasure. What there +is left of it is all going into that foolish book, which the womanly +element in you, still healthy and alive, delights in; because it places +you in fancy in situations in which you will never stand, and inspires +you with emotions, some of which, it may be, you had better never feel. +Poor Nausicaa—old, some men think, before you have been ever young. + +And now they are going to “develop” you; and let you have your share in +“the higher education of women,” by making you read more books, and do +more sums, and pass examinations, and stoop over desks at night after +stooping over some other employment all day; and to teach you Latin, and +even Greek! + +Well, we will gladly teach you Greek, if you learn thereby to read the +history of Nausicaa of old, and what manner of maiden she was, and what +was her education. You will admire her, doubtless. But do not let your +admiration limit itself to drawing a meagre half-mediævalised design of +her—as she never looked. Copy in your own person; and even if you do not +descend as low—or rise as high—as washing the household clothes, at least +learn to play at ball; and sing, in the open air and sunshine, not in +theatres and concert-rooms by gaslight; and take decent care of your own +health; and dress not like a “Parisienne”—nor, of course, like Nausicaa +of old, for that is to ask too much:—but somewhat more like an average +Highland lassie; and try to look like her, and be like her, of whom +Wordsworth sang: + + A mien and face + In which full plainly I can trace + Benignity, and home-bred sense, + Ripening in perfect innocence. + Here scattered, like a random seed, + Remote from men, thou dost not need + The embarrassed look of shy distress + And maidenly shamefacedness. + Thou wear’st upon thy forehead clear + The freedom of a mountaineer. + A face with gladness overspread, + Soft smiles, by human kindness bred, + And seemliness complete, that sways + Thy courtesies, about thee plays. + With no restraint, save such as springs + From quick and eager visitings + Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach + Of thy few words of English speech. + A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife + That gives thy gestures grace and life. + +Ah, yet unspoilt Nausicaa of the North; descendant of the dark +tender-hearted Celtic girl, and the fair deep-hearted Scandinavian +Viking, thank God for thy heather and fresh air, and the kine thou +tendest, and the wool thou spinnest; and come not to seek thy fortune, +child, in wicked London town; nor import, as they tell me thou art doing +fast, the ugly fashions of that London town, clumsy copies of Parisian +cockneydom, into thy Highland home; nor give up the healthful and +graceful, free and modest dress of thy mother and thy mother’s mother, to +disfigure the little kirk on Sabbath days with crinoline and corset, +high-heeled boots, and other women’s hair. + +It is proposed, just now, to assimilate the education of girls more and +more to that of boys. If that means that girls are merely to learn more +lessons, and to study what their brothers are taught, in addition to what +their mothers were taught; then it is to be hoped, at least by +physiologists and patriots, that the scheme will sink into that limbo +whither, in a free and tolerably rational country, all imperfect and +ill-considered schemes are sure to gravitate. But if the proposal be a +bonâ-fide one: then it must be borne in mind that in the Public schools +of England, and in all private schools, I presume, which take their tone +from them, cricket and football are more or less compulsory, being +considered integral parts of an Englishman’s education; and that they are +likely to remain so, in spite of all reclamations: because masters and +boys alike know that games do not, in the long run, interfere with a +boy’s work; that the same boy will very often excel in both; that the +games keep him in health for his work; and the spirit with which he takes +to his games when in the lower school, is a fair test of the spirit with +which he will take to his work when he rises into the higher school; and +that nothing is worse for a boy than to fall into that loafing, +tuck-shop-haunting set, who neither play hard nor work hard, and are +usually extravagant, and often vicious. Moreover, they know well that +games conduce, not merely to physical, but to moral health; that in the +playing-field boys acquire virtues which no books can give them; not +merely daring and endurance, but, better still, temper, self-restraint, +fairness, honour, unenvious approbation of another’s success, and all +that “give and take” of life which stand a man in such good stead when he +goes forth into the world, and without which, indeed, his success is +always maimed and partial. + +Now: if the promoters of higher education for women will compel girls to +any training analogous to our public-school games; if, for instance, they +will insist on that most natural and wholesome of all exercises, dancing, +in order to develop the lower half of the body; on singing, to expand the +lungs and regulate the breath; and on some games—ball or what not—which +will ensure that raised chest, and upright carriage, and general strength +of the upper torso, without which full oxygenation of the blood, and +therefore general health, is impossible; if they will sternly forbid +tight stays, high heels, and all which interferes with free growth and +free motion; if they will consider carefully all which has been written +on the “half-time system” by Mr. Chadwick and others; and accept the +certain physical law that, in order to renovate the brain day by day, the +growing creature must have plenty of fresh air and play, and that the +child who learns for four hours and plays for four hours, will learn +more, and learn it more easily, than the child who learns for the whole +eight hours; if, in short, they will teach girls not merely to understand +the Greek tongue, but to copy somewhat of the Greek physical training, of +that “music and gymnastic” which helped to make the cleverest race of the +old world the ablest race likewise; then they will earn the gratitude of +the patriot and the physiologists, by doing their best to stay the +downward tendencies of the physique, and therefore ultimately of the +morale, in the coming generation of English women. + +I am sorry to say that, as yet, I hear of but one movement in this +direction among the promoters of the “higher education of women.” {126} +I trust that the subject will be taken up methodically by those gifted +ladies, who have acquainted themselves, and are labouring to acquaint +other women, with the first principles of health; and that they may avail +to prevent the coming generations, under the unwholesome stimulant of +competitive examinations, and so forth, from “developing” into so many +Chinese—dwarfs—or idiots. + +_October_, 1873. + + + + +THE AIR-MOTHERS. + + + 1869. + + Die Natur ist die Bewegung + +WHO are these who follow us softly over the moor in the autumn eve? +Their wings brush and rustle in the fir-boughs, and they whisper before +us and behind, as if they called gently to each other, like birds +flocking homeward to their nests. + +The woodpecker on the pine-stems knows them, and laughs aloud for joy as +they pass. The rooks above the pasture know them, and wheel round and +tumble in their play. The brown leaves on the oak trees know them, and +flutter faintly, and beckon as they pass. And in the chattering of the +dry leaves there is a meaning, and a cry of weary things which long for +rest. + +“Take us home, take us home, you soft air-mothers, now our fathers the +sunbeams are grown dull. Our green summer beauty is all draggled, and +our faces are grown wan and wan; and the buds, the children whom we +nourished, thrust us off, ungrateful, from our seats. Waft us down, you +soft air-mothers, upon your wings to the quiet earth, that we may go to +our home, as all things go, and become air and sunlight once again.” + +And the bold young fir-seeds know them, and rattle impatient in their +cones. “Blow stronger, blow fiercer, slow air-mothers, and shake us from +our prisons of dead wood, that we may fly and spin away north-eastward, +each on his horny wing. Help us but to touch the moorland yonder, and we +will take good care of ourselves henceforth; we will dive like arrows +through the heather, and drive our sharp beaks into the soil, and rise +again as green trees toward the sunlight, and spread out lusty boughs.” + +They never think, bold fools, of what is coming to bring them low in the +midst of their pride; of the reckless axe which will fell them, and the +saw which will shape them into logs; and the trains which will roar and +rattle over them, as they lie buried in the gravel of the way, till they +are ground and rotted into powder, and dug up and flung upon the fire, +that they too may return home, like all things, and become air and +sunlight once again. + +And the air-mothers hear their prayers, and do their bidding: but +faintly; for they themselves are tired and sad. + +Tired and sad are the air-mothers, and their gardens rent and wan. Look +at them as they stream over the black forest, before the dim +south-western sun; long lines and wreaths of melancholy grey, stained +with dull yellow or dead dun. They have come far across the seas, and +done many a wild deed upon their way; and now that they have reached the +land, like shipwrecked sailors, they will lie down and weep till they can +weep no more. + +Ah, how different were those soft air-mothers when, invisible to mortal +eyes, they started on their long sky-journey, five thousand miles across +the sea! Out of the blazing caldron which lies between the two New +Worlds, they leapt up when the great sun called them, in whirls and +spouts of clear hot steam; and rushed of their own passion to the +northward, while the whirling earth-ball whirled them east. So +north-eastward they rushed aloft, across the gay West Indian isles, +leaving below the glitter of the flying-fish, and the sidelong eyes of +cruel sharks; above the cane-fields and the plantain-gardens, and the +cocoa-groves which fringe the shores; above the rocks which throbbed with +earthquakes, and the peaks of old volcanoes, cinder-strewn; while, far +beneath, the ghosts of their dead sisters hurried home upon the +north-east breeze. + +Wild deeds they did as they rushed onward, and struggled and fought among +themselves, up and down, and round and backward, in the fury of their +blind hot youth. They heeded not the tree as they snapped it, nor the +ship as they whelmed it in the waves; nor the cry of the sinking sailor, +nor the need of his little ones on shore; hasty and selfish even as +children, and, like children, tamed by their own rage. For they tired +themselves by struggling with each other, and by tearing the heavy water +into waves; and their wings grew clogged with sea-spray, and soaked more +and more with steam. But at last the sea grew cold beneath them, and +their clear steam shrank to mist; and they saw themselves and each other +wrapped in dull rain-laden clouds. Then they drew their white +cloud-garments round them, and veiled themselves for very shame; and +said: “We have been wild and wayward; and, alas! our pure bright youth is +gone. But we will do one good deed yet ere we die, and so we shall not +have lived in vain. We will glide onward to the land, and weep there; +and refresh all things with soft warm rain; and make the grass grow, the +buds burst; quench the thirst of man and beast, and wash the soiled world +clean.” + +So they are wandering past us, the air-mothers, to weep the leaves into +their graves; to weep the seeds into their seed-beds, and weep the soil +into the plains; to get the rich earth ready for the winter, and then +creep northward to the ice-world, and there die. + +Weary, and still more weary, slowly and more slowly still, they will +journey on far northward, across fast-chilling seas. For a doom is laid +upon them, never to be still again, till they rest at the North Pole +itself, the still axle of the spinning world; and sink in death around +it, and become white snow-clad ghosts. + +But will they live again, those chilled air-mothers? Yes, they must live +again. For all things move for ever; and not even ghosts can rest. So +the corpses of their sisters, piling on them from above, press them +outward, press them southward toward the sun once more; across the floes +and round the icebergs, weeping tears of snow and sleet, while men hate +their wild harsh voices, and shrink before their bitter breath. They +know not that the cold bleak snow-storms, as they hurtle from the black +north-east, bear back the ghosts of the soft air-mothers, as penitents, +to their father, the great sun. + +But as they fly southwards, warm life thrills them, and they drop their +loads of sleet and snow; and meet their young live sisters from the +south, and greet them with flash and thunder-peal. And, please God, +before many weeks are over, as we run Westward-Ho, we shall overtake the +ghosts of these air-mothers, hurrying back toward their father, the great +sun. Fresh and bright under the fresh bright heaven, they will race with +us toward our home, to gain new heat, new life, new power, and set forth +about their work once more. Men call them the south-west wind, those +air-mothers; and their ghosts the north-east trade; and value them, and +rightly, because they bear the traders out and home across the sea. But +wise men, and little children, should look on them with more seeing eyes; +and say, “May not these winds be living creatures? They, too, are +thoughts of God, to whom all live.” + +For is not our life like their life? Do we not come and go as they? Out +of God’s boundless bosom, the fount of life, we came; through selfish, +stormy youth and contrite tears—just not too late; through manhood not +altogether useless; through slow and chill old age, we return from Whence +we came; to the Bosom of God once more—to go forth again, it may be, with +fresh knowledge, and fresh powers, to nobler work. Amen. + +Such was the prophecy which I learnt, or seemed to learn, from the +south-western wind off the Atlantic, on a certain delectable evening. +And it was fulfilled at night, as far as the gentle air-mothers could +fulfil it, for foolish man. + + There was a roaring in the woods all night; + The rain came heavily and fell in floods; + But now the sun is rising calm and bright, + The birds are singing in the distant woods; + Over his own sweet voice the stock-dove broods, + The jay makes answer as the magpie chatters, + And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters. + +But was I a gloomy and distempered man, if, upon such a morn as that, I +stood on the little bridge across a certain brook, and watched the water +run, with something of a sigh? Or if, when the schoolboy beside me +lamented that the floods would surely be out, and his day’s fishing +spoiled, I said to him—“Ah, my boy, that is a little matter. Look at +what you are seeing now, and understand what barbarism and waste mean. +Look at all that beautiful water which God has sent us hither off the +Atlantic, without trouble or expense to us. Thousands, and tens of +thousands, of gallons will run under this bridge to-day; and what shall +we do with it? Nothing. And yet: think only of the mills which that +water would have turned. Think how it might have kept up health and +cleanliness in poor creatures packed away in the back streets of the +nearest town, or even in London itself. Think even how country folks, in +many parts of England, in three months’ time, may be crying out for rain, +and afraid of short crops, and fever, and scarlatina, and cattle-plague, +for want of the very water which we are now letting run back, wasted, +into the sea from whence it came. And yet we call ourselves a civilised +people.” + +It is not wise, I know, to preach to boys. And yet, sometimes, a man +must speak his heart; even, like Midas’s slave, to the reeds by the river +side. And I had so often, fishing up and down full many a stream, +whispered my story to those same river-reeds; and told them that my Lord +the Sovereign Demos had, like old Midas, asses’ ears in spite of all his +gold, that I thought I might for once tell it the boy likewise, in hope +that he might help his generation to mend that which my own generation +does not seem like to mend. + +I might have said more to him: but did not. For it is not well to +destroy too early the child’s illusion, that people must be wise because +they are grown up, and have votes, and rule—or think they rule—the world. +The child will find out how true that is soon enough for himself. If the +truth be forced on him by the hot words of those with whom he lives, it +is apt to breed in him that contempt, stormful and therefore barren, +which makes revolutions; and not that pity, calm and therefore helpful, +which makes reforms. + +So I might have said to him, but did not— + +And then men pray for rain: + +My boy, did you ever hear the old Eastern legend about the Gipsies? How +they were such good musicians, that some great Indian Sultan sent for the +whole tribe, and planted them near his palace, and gave them land, and +ploughs to break it up, and seed to sow it, that they might dwell there, +and play and sing to him. + +But when the winter arrived, the Gipsies all came to the Sultan, and +cried that they were starving. “But what have you done with the +seed-corn which I gave you?” “O Light of the Age, we ate it in the +summer.” “And what have you done with the ploughs which I gave you?” “O +Glory of the Universe, we burnt them to bake the corn withal.” + +Then said that great Sultan—“Like the butterflies you have lived; and +like the butterflies you shall wander.” So he drove them out. And that +is how the Gipsies came hither from the East. + +Now suppose that the Sultan of all Sultans, who sends the rain, should +make a like answer to us foolish human beings, when we prayed for rain: +“But what have you done with the rain which I gave you six months since?” +“We have let it run into the sea.” “Then, ere you ask for more rain, +make places wherein you can keep it when you have it.” “But that would +be, in most cases, too expensive. We can employ our capital more +profitably in other directions.” + +It is not for me to say what answer might be made to such an excuse. I +think a child’s still unsophisticated sense of right and wrong would soon +supply one; and probably one—considering the complexity, and difficulty, +and novelty, of the whole question—somewhat too harsh; as children’s +judgments are wont to be. + +But would it not be well if our children, without being taught to blame +anyone for what is past, were taught something about what ought to be +done now, what must be done soon, with the rainfall of these islands; and +about other and kindred health-questions, on the solution of which +depends, and will depend more and more, the life of millions? One would +have thought that those public schools and colleges which desire to +monopolise the education of the owners of the soil; of the great +employers of labour; of the clergy; and of all, indeed, who ought to be +acquainted with the duties of property, the conditions of public health, +and, in a word, with the general laws of what is now called Social +Science—one would have thought, I say, that these public schools and +colleges would have taught their scholars somewhat at least about such +matters, that they might go forth into life with at least some rough +notions of the causes which make people healthy or unhealthy, rich or +poor, comfortable or wretched, useful or dangerous to the State. But as +long as our great educational institutions, safe, or fancying themselves +safe, in some enchanted castle, shut out by ancient magic from the living +world, put a premium on Latin and Greek verses: a wise father will, +during the holidays, talk now and then, I hope, somewhat after this +fashion: + +“You must understand, my boy, that all the water in the country comes out +of the sky, and from nowhere else; and that, therefore, to save and store +the water when it falls is a question of life and death to crops, and +man, and beast; for with or without water is life or death. If I took, +for instance, the water from the moors above and turned it over yonder +field, I could double, and more than double, the crops in that field, +henceforth.” + +“Then why do I not do it?” + +“Only because the field lies higher than the house; and if—now here is +one thing which you and every civilised man should know—if you have +water-meadows, or any ‘irrigated’ land, as it is called, above a house, +or, even on a level with it, it is certain to breed not merely cold and +damp, but fever or ague. Our forefathers did not understand this; and +they built their houses, as this is built, in the lowest places they +could find: sometimes because they wanted to be near ponds, from whence +they could get fish in Lent; but more often, I think, because they wanted +to be sheltered from the wind. They had no glass, as we have, in their +windows, or, at least, only latticed casements, which let in the wind and +cold; and they shrank from high and exposed, and therefore really +healthy, spots. But now that we have good glass, and sash windows, and +doors that will shut tight, we can build warm houses where we like. And +if you ever have to do with the building of cottages, remember that it is +your duty to the people who will live in them, and therefore to the +State, to see that they stand high and dry, where no water can drain down +into their foundations, and where fog, and the poisonous gases which are +given out by rotting vegetables, cannot drain down either. You will +learn more about all that when you learn, as every civilised lad should +in these days, something about chemistry, and the laws of fluids and +gases. But you know already that flowers are cut off by frost in the low +grounds sooner than in the high; and that the fog at night always lies +along the brooks; and that the sour moor-smell which warns us to shut our +windows at sunset, comes down from the hill, and not up from the valley. +Now all these things are caused by one and the same law; that cold air is +heavier than warm; and, therefore, like so much water, must run +down-hill.” + +“But what about the rainfall?” + +“Well, I have wandered a little from the rainfall: though not as far as +you fancy; for fever and ague and rheumatism usually mean—rain in the +wrong place. But if you knew how much illness, and torturing pain, and +death, and sorrow arise, even to this very day, from ignorance of these +simple laws, then you would bear them carefully in mind, and wish to know +more about them. But now for water being life to the beasts. Do you +remember—though you are hardly old enough—the cattle-plague? How the +beasts died, or had to be killed and buried, by tens of thousands; and +how misery and ruin fell on hundreds of honest men and women over many of +the richest counties of England: but how we in this vale had no +cattle-plague; and how there was none—as far as I recollect—in the +uplands of Devon and Cornwall, nor of Wales, nor of the Scotch Highlands? +Now, do you know why that was? Simply because we here, like those other +up-landers, are in such a country as Palestine was before the foolish +Jews cut down all their timber, and so destroyed their own rainfall—a +‘land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of +valleys and hills.’ There is hardly a field here that has not, thank +God, its running brook, or its sweet spring, from which our cattle were +drinking their health and life, while in the clay-lands of Cheshire, and +in the Cambridgeshire fens—which were drained utterly dry—the poor things +drank no water, too often, save that of the very same putrid ponds in +which they had been standing all day long, to cool themselves, and to +keep off the flies. I do not say, of course, that bad water caused the +cattle-plague. It came by infection from the East of Europe. But I say +that bad water made the cattle ready to take it, and made it spread over +the country; and when you are old enough I will give you plenty of +proof—some from the herds of your own kinsmen—that what I say is true.” + +“And as for pure water being life to human beings: why have we never +fever here, and scarcely ever diseases like fever—zymotics, as the +doctors call them? Or, if a case comes into our parish from outside, why +does the fever never spread? For the very same reason that we had no +cattle-plague. Because we have more pure water close to every cottage +than we need. And this I tell you: that the only two outbreaks of deadly +disease which we have had here for thirty years, were both of them, as +far as I could see, to be traced to filthy water having got into the poor +folks’ wells. Water, you must remember, just as it is life when pure, is +death when foul. For it can carry, unseen to the eve, and even when it +looks clear and sparkling, and tastes soft and sweet, poisons which have +perhaps killed more human beings than ever were killed in battle. You +have read, perhaps, how the Athenians, when they were dying of the +plague, accused the Lacedæmonians outside the walls of poisoning their +wells; or how, in some of the pestilences of the Middle Ages, the common +people used to accuse the poor harmless Jews of poisoning the wells, and +set upon them and murdered them horribly. They were right, I do not +doubt, in their notion that the well-water was giving them the +pestilence: but they had not sense to see that they were poisoning the +wells themselves by their dirt and carelessness; or, in the case of poor +besieged Athens, probably by mere overcrowding, which has cost many a +life ere now, and will cost more. And I am sorry to tell you, my little +man, that even now too many people have no more sense than they had, and +die in consequence. If you could see a battle-field, and men shot down, +writhing and dying in hundreds by shell and bullet, would not that seem +to you a horrid sight? Then—I do not wish to make you sad too early, but +this is a fact that everyone should know—that more people, and not strong +men only, but women and little children too, are killed and wounded in +Great Britain every year by bad water and want of water together, than +were killed and wounded in any battle which has been fought since you +were born. Medical men know this well. And when you are older, you may +see it for yourself in the Registrar-General’s reports, blue-books, +pamphlets, and so on, without end.” + +“But why do not people stop such a horrible loss of life?” + +“Well, my dear boy, the true causes of it have only been known for the +last thirty or forty years; and we English are, as good King Alfred found +us to his sorrow a thousand years ago, very slow to move, even when we +see a thing ought to be done. Let us hope that in this matter—we have +been so in most matters as yet—we shall be like the tortoise in the +fable, and not the hare; and by moving slowly, but surely, win the race +at last.” + +“But now think for yourself: and see what you would do to save these +people from being poisoned by bad water. Remember that the plain +question is this: The rain-water comes down from heaven as water, and +nothing but water. Rain-water is the only pure water, after all. How +would you save that for the poor people who have none? There; run away +and hunt rabbits on the moor: but look, meanwhile, how you would save +some of this beautiful and precious water which is roaring away into the +sea.” + + * * * * * + +“Well? What would you do? Make ponds, you say, like the old monks’ +ponds, now all broken down. Dam all the glens across their mouths, and +turn them into reservoirs.” + +“‘Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings’—Well, that will have to be +done. That is being done more and more, more or less well. The good +people of Glasgow did it first, I think; and now the good people of +Manchester, and of other northern towns, have done it, and have saved +many a human life thereby already. But it must be done, some day, all +over England and Wales, and great part of Scotland. For the mountain +tops and moors, my boy, by a beautiful law of nature, compensate for +their own poverty by yielding a wealth which the rich lowlands cannot +yield. You do not understand? Then see. Yon moor above can grow +neither corn nor grass. But one thing it can grow, and does grow, +without which we should have no corn nor grass, and that is—water. Not +only does far more rain fall up there than falls here down below, but +even in drought the high moors condense the moisture into dew, and so +yield some water, even when the lowlands are burnt up with drought. The +reason of that you must learn hereafter. That it is so, you should know +yourself. For on the high chalk downs, you know, where farmers make a +sheep-pond, they never, if they are wise, make it in a valley or on a +hillside, but on the bleakest top of the very highest down; and there, if +they can once get it filled with snow and rain in winter, the blessed +dews of night will keep some water in it all the summer through, while +the ponds below are utterly dried up. And even so it is, as I know, with +this very moor. Corn and grass it will not grow, because there is too +little ‘staple,’ that is, soluble minerals, in the sandy soil. But how +much water it might grow, you may judge roughly for yourself, by +remembering how many brooks like this are running off it now to carry +mere dirt into the river, and then into the sea.” + +“But why should we not make dams at once; and save the water?” + +“Because we cannot afford it. No one would buy the water when we had +stored it. The rich in town and country will always take care—and quite +right they are—to have water enough for themselves, and for their +servants too, whatever it may cost them. But the poorer people are—and +therefore usually, alas! the more ignorant—the less water they get; and +the less they care to have water; and the less they are inclined to pay +for it; and the more, I am sorry to say, they waste what little they do +get; and I am still more sorry to say, spoil, and even steal and sell—in +London at least—the stop-cocks and lead-pipes which bring the water into +their houses. So that keeping a water-shop is a very troublesome and +uncertain business; and one which is not likely to pay us or anyone round +here.” + +“But why not let some company manage it, as they manage railways, and +gas, and other things?” + +“Ah—you have been overhearing a good deal about companies of late, I see. +But this I will tell you; that when you grow up, and have a vote and +influence, it will be your duty, if you intend to be a good citizen, not +only not to put the water-supply of England into the hands of fresh +companies, but to help to take out of their hands what water-supply they +manage already, especially in London; and likewise the gas-supply; and +the railroads; and everything else, in a word, which everybody uses, and +must use. For you must understand—at least as soon as you can—that +though the men who make up companies are no worse than other men, and +some of them, as you ought to know, very good men; yet what they have to +look to is their profits; and the less water they supply, and the worse +it is, the more profit they make. For most water, I am sorry to say, is +fouled before the water companies can get to it, as this water which runs +past us will be, and as the Thames water above London is. Therefore it +has to be cleansed, or partly cleansed, at a very great expense. So +water companies have to be inspected—in plain English, watched—at a very +heavy expense to the nation by Government officers; and compelled to do +their best, and take their utmost care. And so it has come to pass that +the London water is not now nearly as bad as some of it was thirty years +ago, when it was no more fit to drink than that in the cattle-yard tank. +But still we must have more water, and better, in London; for it is +growing year by year. There are more than three millions of people +already in what we call London; and ere you are an old man there may be +between four and five millions. Now to supply all these people with +water is a duty which we must not leave to any private companies. It +must be done by a public authority, as is fit and proper in a free +self-governing country. In this matter, as in all others, we will try to +do what the Royal Commission told us four years ago we ought to do. I +hope that you will see, though I may not, the day when what we call +London, but which is really nine-tenths of it, only a great nest of +separate villages huddled together, will be divided into three great +self-governing cities, London, Westminster, and Southwark; each with its +own corporation, like that of the venerable and well-governed city of +London; each managing its own water-supply, gas-supply, and sewage, and +other matters besides; and managing them, like Dublin, Glasgow, +Manchester, Liverpool, and other great northern towns, far more cheaply +and far better than any companies can do it for them.” + +“But where shall we get water enough for all these millions of people? +There are no mountains near London. But we might give them the water off +our moors.” + +“No, no, my boy, + + “He that will not when he may, + When he will, he shall have nay. + +Some fifteen years ago the Londoners might have had water from us; and I +was one of those who did my best to get it for them: but the water +companies did not choose to take it; and now this part of England is +growing so populous and so valuable that it wants all its little rainfall +for itself. So there is another leaf torn out of the Sibylline books for +the poor old water companies. You do not understand: you will some day. +But you may comfort yourself about London. For it happens to be, I +think, the luckiest city in the world; and if it had not been, we should +have had pestilence on pestilence in it, as terrible as the great plague +of Charles II.’s time. The old Britons, without knowing in the least +what they were doing, settled old London city in the very centre of the +most wonderful natural reservoir in this island, or perhaps in all +Europe; which reaches from Kent into Wiltshire, and round again into +Suffolk; and that is, the dear old chalk downs.” + +“Why, they are always dry.” + +“Yes. But the turf on them never burns up, and the streams which flow +through them never run dry, and seldom or never flood either. Do you not +know, from Winchester, that that is true? Then where is all the rain and +snow gone, which falls on them year by year, but into the chalk itself, +and into the green-sands, too, below the chalk? There it is, soaked up +as by a sponge, in quantity incalculable; enough, some think, to supply +London, let it grow as huge as it may. I wish I too were sure of that. +But the Commission has shown itself so wise and fair, and brave +likewise—too brave, I am sorry to say, for some who might have supported +them—that it is not for me to gainsay their opinion.” + +“But if there was not water enough in the chalk, are not the Londoners +rich enough to bring it from any distance?” + +“My boy, in this also we will agree with the Commission—that we ought not +to rob Peter to pay Paul, and take water to a distance which other people +close at hand may want. Look at the map of England and southern +Scotland; and see for yourself what is just, according to geography and +nature. There are four mountain-ranges; four great water-fields. First, +the hills of the Border. Their rainfall ought to be stored for the +Lothians and the extreme north of England. Then the Yorkshire and +Derbyshire Hills—the central chine of England. Their rainfall is being +stored already, to the honour of the shrewd northern men, for the +manufacturing counties east and west of the hills. Then come the Lake +mountains—the finest water-field of all, because more rain by far falls +there than in any place in England. But they will be wanted to supply +Lancashire, and some day Liverpool itself; for Liverpool is now using +rain which belongs more justly to other towns; and besides, there are +plenty of counties and towns, down into Cheshire, which would be glad of +what water Lancashire does not want. At last come the Snowdon mountains, +a noble water-field, which I know well; for an old dream of mine has +been, that ere I died I should see all the rain of the Carnedds, and the +Glyders, and Siabod, and Snowdon itself, carried across the Conway river +to feed the mining districts of North Wales, where the streams are now +all foul with oil and lead; and then on into the western coal and iron +fields, to Wolverhampton and Birmingham itself: and if I were the +engineer who got that done, I should be happier—prouder I dare not +say—than if I had painted nobler pictures than Raffaelle, or written +nobler plays than Shakespeare. I say that, boy, in most deliberate +earnest. But meanwhile, do you not see that in districts where coal and +iron may be found, and fresh manufactures may spring up any day in any +place, each district has a right to claim the nearest rainfall for +itself? And now, when we have got the water into its proper place, let +us see what we shall do with it.” + +“But why do you say ‘we’? Can you and I do all this?” + +“My boy, are not you and I free citizens; part of the people, the +Commons—as the good old word runs—of this country? And are we not—or +ought we not to be in time—beside that, educated men? By the people, +remember, I mean, not only the hand-working man who has just got a vote; +I mean the clergy of all denominations; and the gentlemen of the press; +and last, but not least, the scientific men. If those four classes +together were to tell every government—‘Free water we will have, and as +much as we reasonably choose;’ and tell every candidate for the House of +Commons: ‘Unless you promise to get us as much free water as we +reasonably choose, we will not return you to Parliament:’ then, I think, +we four should put such a ‘pressure’ on Government as no water companies, +or other vested interests, could long resist. And if any of those four +classes should hang back, and waste their time and influence over matters +far less important and less pressing, the other three must laugh at them, +and more than laugh at them; and ask them: ‘Why have you education, why +have you influence, why have you votes, why are you freemen and not +slaves, if not to preserve the comfort, the decency, the health, the +lives of men, women, and children—most of those latter your own wives and +your own children?’” + +“But what shall we do with the water?” + +“Well, after all, that is a more practical matter than speculations +grounded on the supposition that all classes will do their duty. But the +first thing we will do will be to give to the very poorest houses a +constant supply, at high pressure; so that everybody may take as much +water as he likes, instead of having to keep the water in little +cisterns, where it gets foul and putrid only too often.” + +“But will they not waste it then?” + +“So far from it, wherever the water has been laid on at high pressure, +the waste, which is terrible now—some say that in London one-third of the +water is wasted—begins to lessen; and both water and expense are saved. +If you will only think, you will see one reason why. If a woman leaves a +high-pressure tap running, she will flood her place and her neighbour’s +too. She will be like the magician’s servant, who called up the demon to +draw water for him; and so he did: but when he had begun he would not +stop, and if the magician had not come home, man and house would have +been washed away.” + +“But if it saves money, why do not the water companies do it?” + +“Because—and really here there are many excuses for the poor old water +companies, when so many of them swerve and gib at the very mention of +constant water-supply, like a poor horse set to draw a load which he +feels is too heavy for him—because, to keep everything in order among +dirty, careless, and often drunken people, there must be officers with +lawful authority—water-policemen we will call them—who can enter people’s +houses when they will, and if they find anything wrong with the water, +set it to rights with a high hand, and even summon the people who have +set it wrong. And that is a power which, in a free country, must never +be given to the servants of any private company, but only to the officers +of a corporation or of the Government.” + +“And what shall we do with the rest of the water?” + +“Well, we shall have, I believe, so much to spare that we may at least do +this: In each district of each city, and the centre of each town, we may +build public baths and lavatories, where poor men and women may get their +warm baths when they will; for now they usually never bathe at all, +because they will not—and ought not, if they be hard-worked folk—bathe in +cold water during nine months of the year. And there they shall wash +their clothes, and dry them by steam; instead of washing them as now, at +home, either under back sheds, where they catch cold and rheumatism, or +too often, alas! in their own living rooms, in an atmosphere of foul +vapour, which drives the father to the public-house and the children into +the streets; and which not only prevents the clothes from being +thoroughly dried again, but is, my dear boy, as you will know when you +are older, a very hot-bed of disease. And they shall have other +comforts, and even luxuries, these public lavatories; and be made, in +time, graceful and refining, as well as merely useful. Nay, we will +even, I think, have in front of each of them a real fountain; not like +the drinking-fountains—though they are great and needful boons—which you +see here and there about the streets, with a tiny dribble of water to a +great deal of expensive stone: but real fountains, which shall leap, and +sparkle, and plash, and gurgle; and fill the place with life, and light, +and coolness; and sing in the people’s ears the sweetest of all earthly +songs—save the song of a mother over her child—the song of ‘The Laughing +Water.’” + +“But will not that be a waste?” + +“Yes, my boy. And for that very reason, I think we, the people, will +have our fountains; if it be but to make our governments, and +corporations, and all public bodies and officers, remember that they +all—save Her Majesty the Queen—are our servants, and not we theirs; and +that we choose to have water, not only to wash with, but to play with, if +we like. And I believe—for the world, as you will find, is full not only +of just but of generous souls—that if the water-supply were set really +right, there would be found, in many a city, many a generous man who, +over and above his compulsory water-rate, would give his poor +fellow-townsmen such a real fountain as those which ennoble the great +square at Carcasonne and the great square at Nismes; to be ‘a thing of +beauty and a joy for ever.’” + +“And now, if you want to go back to your Latin and Greek, you shall +translate for me into Latin—I do not expect you to do it into Greek, +though it would turn very well into Greek, for the Greeks know all about +the matter long before the Romans—what follows here; and you shall verify +the facts and the names, etc., in it from your dictionaries of antiquity +and biography, that you may remember all the better what it says. And by +that time, I think, you will have learnt something more useful to +yourself, and, I hope, to your country hereafter, than if you had learnt +to patch together the neatest Greek and Latin verses which have appeared +since the days of Mr. Canning.” + + * * * * * + +I have often amused myself, by fancying one question which an old Roman +emperor would ask, were he to rise from his grave and visit the sights of +London under the guidance of some minister of state. The august shade +would, doubtless, admire our railroads and bridges, our cathedrals and +our public parks, and much more of which we need not be ashamed. But +after awhile, I think, he would look round, whether in London or in most +of our great cities, inquiringly and in vain, for one class of buildings, +which in his empire were wont to be almost as conspicuous and as +splendid, because, in public opinion, almost as necessary, as the +basilicas and temples: “And where,” he would ask, “are your public +baths?” And if the minister of state who was his guide should answer: +“Oh great Cæsar, I really do not know. I believe there are some +somewhere at the back of that ugly building which we call the National +Gallery; and I think there have been some meetings lately in the East +End, and an amateur concert at the Albert Hall, for restoring, by private +subscriptions, some baths and wash-houses in Bethnal Green, which had +fallen to decay. And there may be two or three more about the +metropolis; for parish vestries have powers by Act of Parliament to +establish such places, if they think fit, and choose to pay for them out +of the rates.” Then, I think, the august shade might well make answer: +“We used to call you, in old Rome, northern barbarians. It seems that +you have not lost all your barbarian habits. Are you aware that, in +every city in the Roman empire, there were, as a matter of course, public +baths open, not only to the poorest freeman, but to the slave, usually +for the payment of the smallest current coin, and often gratuitously? +Are you aware that in Rome itself, millionaire after millionaire, emperor +after emperor, from Menenius Agrippa and Nero down to Diocletian and +Constantine, built baths, and yet more baths; and connected with them +gymnasia for exercise, lecture-rooms, libraries, and porticoes, wherein +the people might have shade, and shelter, and rest? I remark, +by-the-bye, that I have not seen in all your London a single covered +place in which the people may take shelter during a shower. Are you +aware that these baths were of the most magnificent architecture, +decorated with marbles, paintings, sculptures, fountains, what not? And +yet I had heard, in Hades down below, that you prided yourselves here on +the study of the learned languages; and, indeed, taught little but Greek +and Latin at your public schools?” + +Then, if the minister should make reply: “Oh yes, we know all this. Even +since the revival of letters in the end of the fifteenth century a whole +literature has been written—a great deal of it, I fear, by pedants who +seldom washed even their hands and faces—about your Greek and Roman +baths. We visit their colossal ruins in Italy and elsewhere with awe and +admiration; and the discovery of a new Roman bath in any old city of our +isles sets all our antiquaries buzzing with interest.” + +“Then why,” the shade might ask, “do you not copy an example which you so +much admire? Surely England must be much in want, either of water, or of +fuel to heat it with?” + +“On the contrary, our rainfall is almost too great; our soil so damp that +we have had to invent a whole art of subsoil drainage unknown to you; +while, as for fuel, our coal-mines make us the great fuel-exporting +people of the world.” + +What a quiet sneer might curl the lip of a Constantine as he replied: +“Not in vain, as I said, did we call you, some fifteen hundred years ago, +the barbarians of the north. But tell me, good barbarian, whom I know to +be both brave and wise—for the fame of your young British empire has +reached us even in the realms below, and we recognise in you, with all +respect, a people more like us Romans than any which has appeared on +earth for many centuries—how is it you have forgotten that sacred duty of +keeping the people clean, which you surely at one time learnt from us? +When your ancestors entered our armies, and rose, some of them, to be +great generals, and even emperors, like those two Teuton peasants, Justin +and Justinian, who, long after my days, reigned in my own Constantinople: +then, at least, you saw baths, and used them; and felt, after the bath, +that you were civilised men, and not ‘sordidi ac foetentes,’ as we used +to call you when fresh out of your bullock-waggons and cattle-pens. How +is it that you have forgotten that lesson?” + +The minister, I fear, would have to answer that our ancestors were +barbarous enough, not only to destroy the Roman cities, and temples, and +basilicas, and statues, but the Roman baths likewise; and then retired, +each man to his own freehold in the country, to live a life not much more +cleanly or more graceful than that of the swine which were his favourite +food. But he would have a right to plead, as an excuse, that not only in +England, but throughout the whole of the conquered Latin empire, the +Latin priesthood, who, in some respects, were—to their honour—the +representatives of Roman civilisation and the protectors of its remnants, +were the determined enemies of its cleanliness; that they looked on +personal dirt—like the old hermits of the Thebaid—as a sign of sanctity; +and discouraged—as they are said to do still in some of the Romance +countries of Europe—the use of the bath, as not only luxurious, but also +indecent. + +At which answer, it seems to me, another sneer might curl the lip of the +august shade, as he said to himself: “This, at least, I did not expect, +when I made Christianity the state religion of my empire. But you, good +barbarian, look clean enough. You do not look on dirt as a sign of +sanctity?” + +“On the contrary, sire, the upper classes of our empire boast of being +the cleanliest—perhaps the only perfectly cleanly—people in the world: +except, of course, the savages of the South Seas. And dirt is so far +from being a thing which we admire, that our scientific men—than whom the +world has never seen wiser—have proved to us, for a whole generation +past, that dirt is the fertile cause of disease and drunkenness, misery, +and recklessness.” + +“And, therefore,” replies the shade, ere he disappears, “of discontent +and revolution: followed by a tyranny endured, as in Rome and many +another place, by men once free; because tyranny will at least do for +them what they are too lazy, and cowardly, and greedy, to do for +themselves. Farewell, and prosper; as you seem likely to prosper, on the +whole. But if you wish me to consider you a civilised nation: let me +hear that you have brought a great river from the depths of the earth, be +they a thousand fathoms deep, or from your nearest mountains, be they +five hundred miles away; and have washed out London’s dirt—and your own +shame. Till then, abstain from judging too harshly a Constantine, or +even a Caracalla; for they, whatever were their sins, built baths, and +kept their people clean. But do your gymnasia—your schools and +universities, teach your youth naught about all this?” + + + + +THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE. + + +THE more I have contemplated that ancient story of the Fall, the more it +has seemed to me within the range of probability, and even of experience. +It must have happened somewhere for the first time; for it has happened +only too many times since. It has happened, as far as I can ascertain, +in every race, and every age, and every grade of civilisation. It is +happening round us now in every region of the globe. Always and +everywhere, it seems to me, have poor human beings been tempted to eat of +some “tree of knowledge,” that they may be, even for an hour, as gods; +wise, but with a false wisdom; careless, but with a frantic carelessness; +and happy, but with a happiness which, when the excitement is past, +leaves too often—as with that hapless pair in Eden—depression, shame, and +fear. Everywhere, and in all ages, as far as I can ascertain, has man +been inventing stimulants and narcotics to supply that want of vitality +of which he is so painfully aware; and has asked nature, and not God, to +clear the dull brain, and comfort the weary spirit. + +This has been, and will be perhaps for many a century to come, almost the +most fearful failing of this poor, exceptional, over-organised, diseased, +and truly fallen being called Man, who is in doubt daily whether he be a +god or an ape; and in trying wildly to become the former, ends but too +often in becoming the latter. + +For man, whether savage or civilised, feels, and has felt in every age, +that there is something wrong with him. He usually confesses this +fact—as is to be expected—of his fellow-men, rather than of himself; and +shows his sense that there is something wrong with them by complaining +of, hating, and killing them. But he cannot always conceal from himself +the fact that he, too, is wrong, as well as they; and as he will not +usually kill himself, he tries wild ways to make himself at least feel—if +not to be—somewhat “better.” Philosophers may bid him be content; and +tell him that he is what he ought to be, and what nature has made him. +But he cares nothing for the philosophers. He knows, usually, that he is +not what he ought to be; that he carries about with him, in most cases, a +body more or less diseased and decrepit, incapable of doing all the work +which he feels that he himself could do, or expressing all the emotions +which he himself longs to express; a dull brain and dull senses, which +cramp the eager infinity within him; as—so Goethe once said with pity—the +horse’s single hoof cramps the fine intelligence and generosity of his +nature, and forbids him even to grasp an object, like the more stupid +cat, and baser monkey. And man has a self, too, within, from which he +longs too often to escape, as from a household ghost; who pulls out, at +unfortunately rude and unwelcome hours, the ledger of memory. And so +when the tempter—be he who he may—says to him, “Take this, and you will +‘feel better.’ Take this, and you shall be as gods, knowing good and +evil:” then, if the temptation was, as the old story says, too much for +man while healthy and unfallen, what must it be for his unhealthy and +fallen children? + +In vain we say to man: + + ’Tis life, not death, for which you pant; + ’Tis life, whereof your nerves are scant; + More life, and fuller, that you want. + +And your tree of knowledge is not the tree of life: it is in every case, +the tree of death; of decrepitude, madness, misery. He prefers the voice +of the tempter: “Thou shalt not surely die.” Nay, he will say at last: +“Better be as gods awhile, and die: than be the crawling, insufficient +thing I am; and live.” + +He—did I say? Alas! I must say she likewise. The sacred story is only +too true to fact, when it represents the woman as falling, not merely at +the same time as the man, but before the man. Only let us remember that +it represents the woman as tempted; tempted, seemingly, by a rational +being, of lower race, and yet of superior cunning; who must, therefore, +have fallen before the woman. Who or what the being was, who is called +the Serpent in our translation of Genesis, it is not for me to say. We +have absolutely, I think, no facts from which to judge; and Rabbinical +traditions need trouble no man much. But I fancy that a missionary, +preaching on this story to Negroes; telling them plainly that the +“Serpent” meant the first Obeah man; and then comparing the experiences +of that hapless pair in Eden, with their own after certain orgies not yet +extinct in Africa and elsewhere, would be only too well understood: so +well, indeed, that he might run some risk of eating himself, not of the +tree of life, but of that of death. The sorcerer or sorceress tempting +the woman; and then the woman tempting the man; this seems to be, +certainly among savage peoples, and, alas! too often among civilised +peoples also, the usual course of the world-wide tragedy. + +But—paradoxical as it may seem—the woman’s yielding before the man is not +altogether to her dishonour, as those old monks used to allege who hated, +and too often tortured, the sex whom they could not enjoy. It is not to +the woman’s dishonour, if she felt, before her husband, higher +aspirations than those after mere animal pleasure. To be as gods, +knowing good and evil, is a vain and foolish, but not a base and brutal, +wish. She proved herself thereby—though at an awful cost—a woman, and +not an animal. And indeed the woman’s more delicate organisation, her +more vivid emotions, her more voluble fancy, as well as her mere physical +weakness and weariness, have been to her, in all ages, a special source +of temptation; which it is to her honour that she has resisted so much +better than the physically stronger, and therefore more culpable, man. + +As for what the tree of knowledge was, there really is no need for us to +waste our time in guessing. If it was not one plant, then it was +another. It may have been something which has long since perished off +the earth. It may have been—as some learned men have guessed—the sacred +Soma, or Homa, of the early Brahmin race; and that may have been a still +existing narcotic species of Asclepias. It certainly was not the vine. +The language of the Hebrew Scripture concerning it, and the sacred use to +which it is consecrated in the Gospels, forbid that notion utterly; at +least to those who know enough of antiquity to pass by, with a smile, the +theory that the wines mentioned in Scripture were not intoxicating. And +yet—as a fresh corroboration of what I am trying to say—how fearfully has +that noble gift to man been abused for the same end as a hundred other +vegetable products, ever since those mythic days when Dionusos brought +the vine from the far East, amid troops of human Mænads and half-human +Satyrs; and the Bacchæ tore Pentheus in pieces on Cithæron, for daring to +intrude upon their sacred rites; and since those historic days, too, +when, less than two hundred years before the Christian era, the Bacchic +rites spread from Southern Italy into Etruria, and thence to the matrons +of Rome; and under the guidance of Poenia Annia, a Campanian lady, took +at last shapes of which no man must speak, but which had to be put down +with terrible but just severity, by the Consuls and the Senate. + +But it matters little, I say, what this same tree of knowledge was. Was +every vine on earth destroyed to-morrow, and every vegetable also from +which alcohol is now distilled, man would soon discover something else +wherewith to satisfy the insatiate craving. Has he not done so already? +Has not almost every people had its tree of knowledge, often more deadly +than any distilled liquor, from the absinthe of the cultivated Frenchman, +and the opium of the cultivated Chinese, down to the bush-poisons +wherewith the tropic sorcerer initiates his dupes into the knowledge of +good and evil, and the fungus from which the Samoiede extracts in autumn +a few days of brutal happiness, before the setting in of the long six +months’ night? God grant that modern science may not bring to light +fresh substitutes for alcohol, opium, and the rest; and give the white +races, in that state of effeminate and godless quasi-civilisation which I +sometimes fear is creeping upon them, fresh means of destroying +themselves delicately and pleasantly off the face of the earth. + +It is said by some that drunkenness is on the increase in this island. I +have no trusty proof of it: but I can believe it possible; for every +cause of drunkenness seems on the increase. Overwork of body and mind; +circumstances which depress health; temptation to drink, and drink again, +at every corner of the streets; and finally, money, and ever more money, +in the hands of uneducated people, who have not the desire, and too often +not the means, of spending it in any save the lowest pleasures. These, +it seems to me, are the true causes of drunkenness, increasing or not. +And if we wish to become a more temperate nation, we must lessen them, if +we cannot eradicate them. + +First, overwork. We all live too fast, and work too hard. “All things +are full of labour, man cannot utter it.” In the heavy struggle for +existence which goes on all around us, each man is tasked more and +more—if he be really worth buying and using—to the utmost of his powers +all day long. The weak have to compete on equal terms with the strong; +and crave, in consequence, for artificial strength. How we shall stop +that I know not, while every man is “making haste to be rich, and +piercing himself through with many sorrows, and falling into foolish and +hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.” How we +shall stop that, I say, I know not. The old prophet may have been right +when he said: “Surely it is not of the Lord that the people shall labour +in the very fire, and weary themselves for very vanity;” and in some +juster, wiser, more sober system of society—somewhat more like the +Kingdom of The Father come on earth—it may be that poor human beings will +not need to toil so hard, and to keep themselves up to their work by +stimulants, but will have time to sit down, and look around them, and +think of God, and God’s quiet universe, with something of quiet in +themselves; something of rational leisure, and manful sobriety of mind, +as well as of body. + +But it seems to me also, that in such a state of society, when—as it was +once well put—“every one has stopped running about like rats:”—that those +who work hard, whether with muscle or with brain, would not be +surrounded, as now, with every circumstance which tempts toward drink; by +every circumstance which depresses the vital energies, and leaves them an +easy prey to pestilence itself; by bad light, bad air, bad food, bad +water, bad smells, bad occupations, which weaken the muscles, cramp the +chest, disorder the digestion. Let any rational man, fresh from the +country—in which I presume God, having made it, meant all men, more or +less, to live—go through the back streets of any city, or through whole +districts of the “black countries” of England; and then ask himself: Is +it the will of God that His human children should live and toil in such +dens, such deserts, such dark places of the earth? Lot him ask himself: +Can they live and toil there without contracting a probably diseased +habit of body; without contracting a certainly dull, weary, sordid habit +of mind, which craves for any pleasure, however brutal, to escape from +its own stupidity and emptiness? When I run through, by rail, certain +parts of the iron-producing country—streets of furnaces, collieries, slag +heaps, mud, slop, brick house-rows, smoke, dirt—and that is all; and when +I am told, whether truly or falsely, that the main thing which the +well-paid and well-fed men of those abominable wastes care for is—good +fighting-dogs: I can only answer, that I am not surprised. + +I say—as I have said elsewhere, and shall do my best to say it again—that +the craving for drink and narcotics, especially that engendered in our +great cities, is not a disease, but a symptom of disease; of a far deeper +disease than any which drunkenness can produce; namely, of the growing +degeneracy of a population striving in vain by stimulants and narcotics +to fight against those slow poisons with which our greedy barbarism, +miscalled civilisation, has surrounded them from the cradle to the grave. +I may be answered that the old German, Angle, Dane, drank heavily. I +know it: but why did they drink, save for the same reason that the fenman +drank, and his wife took opium, at least till the fens were drained? why +but to keep off the depressing effects of the malaria of swamps and new +clearings, which told on them—who always settled in the lowest grounds—in +the shape of fever and ague? Here it may be answered again that +stimulants have been, during the memory of man, the destruction of the +Red Indian race in America. I reply boldly that I do not believe it. +There is evidence enough in Jacques Cartier’s “Voyages to the Rivers of +Canada;” and evidence more than enough in Strachey’s “Travaile in +Virginia”—to quote only two authorities out of many—to prove that the Red +Indians, when the white man first met with them, were, in North and South +alike, a diseased, decaying, and, as all their traditions confess, +decreasing race. Such a race would naturally crave for “the water of +life,” the “usquebagh,” or whisky, as we have contracted the old name +now. But I should have thought that the white man, by introducing among +these poor creatures iron, fire-arms, blankets, and above all, horses +wherewith to follow the buffalo-herds, which they could never follow on +foot, must have done ten times more towards keeping them alive, than he +has done towards destroying them by giving them the chance of a week’s +drunkenness twice a year, when they came in to his forts to sell the +skins which, without his gifts, they would never have got. + +Such a race would, of course, if wanting vitality, crave for stimulants. +But if the stimulants, and not the original want of vitality, combined +with morals utterly detestable, and worthy only of the gallows—and here I +know what I say, and dare not tell what I know, from eye-witnesses—have +been the cause of the Red Indians’ extinction, then how is it, let me +ask, that the Irishman and the Scotsman have, often to their great harm, +been drinking as much whisky—and usually very bad whisky—not merely twice +a year, but as often as they could get it, during the whole Iron Age, +and, for aught anyone can tell, during the Bronze Age, and the Stone Age +before that, and yet are still the most healthy, able, valiant, and +prolific races in Europe? Had they drunk less whisky they would, +doubtless, have been more healthy, able, valiant, and perhaps even _more_ +prolific, than they are now. They show no sign, however, as yet, of +going the way of the Red Indian. + +But if the craving for stimulants and narcotics is a token of deficient +vitality, then the deadliest foe of that craving, and all its miserable +results, is surely the Sanatory Reformer; the man who preaches, and—as +far as ignorance and vested interests will allow him, procures—for the +masses, pure air, pure sunlight, pure water, pure dwelling-houses, pure +food. Not merely every fresh drinking-fountain, but every fresh public +bath and wash-house, every fresh open space, every fresh growing tree, +every fresh open window, every fresh flower in that window—each of these +is so much, as the old Persians would have said, conquered for Ormuzd, +the god of light and life, out of the dominion of Ahriman, the king of +darkness and of death; so much taken from the causes of drunkenness and +disease, and added to the causes of sobriety and health. + +Meanwhile one thing is clear: that if this present barbarism and anarchy +of covetousness, miscalled modern civilisation, were tamed and drilled +into something more like a Kingdom of God on earth, then we should not +see the reckless and needless multiplication of liquor shops, which +disgraces this country now. + +As a single instance: in one country parish of nine hundred inhabitants, +in which the population has increased only one-ninth in the last fifty +years, there are now practically eight public-houses, where fifty years +ago there were but two. One, that is, for every hundred and ten—or +rather, omitting children, farmers, shop-keepers, gentlemen, and their +households, one for every fifty of the inhabitants. In the face of the +allurements, often of the basest kind, which these dens offer, the +clergyman and the schoolmaster struggle in vain to keep up night schools +and young men’s clubs, and to inculcate habits of providence. + +The young labourers over a great part of the south and east, at least of +England—though never so well off, for several generations, as they are +now—are growing up thriftless, shiftless; inferior, it seems to me, to +their grandfathers in everything, save that they can usually read and +write, and their grandfathers could not; and that they wear smart cheap +cloth clothes, instead of their grandfathers’ smock-frocks. + +And if it be so in the country, how must it be in towns? There must come +a thorough change in the present licensing system, in spite of all the +“pressure” which certain powerful vested interests may bring to bear on +governments. And it is the duty of every good citizen, who cares for his +countrymen, and for their children after them, to help in bringing about +that change as speedily as possible. + +Again: I said just now that a probable cause of increasing drunkenness +was the increasing material prosperity of thousands who knew no +recreation beyond low animal pleasure. If I am right—and I believe that +I am right—I must urge on those who wish drunkenness to decrease, the +necessity of providing more, and more refined, recreation for the people. + +Men drink, and women too, remember, not merely to supply exhaustion, not +merely to drive away care; but often simply to drive away dulness. They +have nothing to do save to think over what they have done in the day, or +what they expect to do to-morrow; and they escape from that dreary round +of business thought in liquor or narcotics. There are still those, by no +means of the hand-working class, but absorbed all day by business, who +drink heavily at night in their own comfortable homes, simply to recreate +their over-burdened minds. Such cases, doubtless, are far less common +than they were fifty years ago: but why? Is not the decrease of drinking +among the richer classes certainly due to the increased refinement and +variety of their tastes and occupations? In cultivating the æsthetic +side of man’s nature; in engaging him with the beautiful, the pure, the +wonderful, the truly natural; with painting, poetry, music, horticulture, +physical science—in all this lies recreation, in the true and literal +sense of that word, namely, the re-creating and mending of the exhausted +mind and feelings, such as no rational man will now neglect, either for +himself, his children, or his workpeople. + +But how little of all this is open to the masses, all should know but too +well. How little opportunity the average hand-worker, or his wife, has +of eating of any tree of knowledge, save of the very basest kind, is but +too palpable. We are mending, thank God, in this respect. Free +libraries and museums have sprung up of late in other cities beside +London. God’s blessing rest upon them all. And the Crystal Palace, and +still later, the Bethnal Green Museum, have been, I believe, of far more +use than many average sermons and lectures from many average orators. + +But are we not still far behind the old Greeks, and the Romans of the +Empire likewise, in the amount of amusement and instruction, and even of +shelter, which we provide for the people? Recollect the—to +me—disgraceful fact, that there is not, as far as I am aware, throughout +the whole of London, a single portico or other covered place, in which +the people can take refuge during a shower: and this in the climate of +England! Where they do take refuge on a wet day the publican knows but +too well; as he knows also where thousands of the lower classes, simply +for want of any other place to be in, save their own sordid dwellings, +spend as much as they are permitted of the Sabbath day. Let us put down +“Sunday drinking” by all means, if we can. But let us remember that by +closing the public-houses on Sunday, we prevent no man or woman from +carrying home as much poison as they choose on Saturday night, to +brutalise themselves therewith, perhaps for eight-and-forty hours. And +let us see—in the name of Him who said that He had made the Sabbath for +man, and not man for the Sabbath—let us see, I say, if we cannot do +something to prevent the townsman’s Sabbath being, not a day of rest, but +a day of mere idleness; the day of most temptation, because of most +dulness, of the whole seven. + +And here, perhaps some sweet soul may look up reprovingly and say: “He +talks of rest. Does he forget, and would he have the working man forget, +that all these outward palliatives will never touch the seat of the +disease, the unrest of the soul within? Does he forget, and would he +have the working man forget, who it was who said—who only has the right +to say: “Come unto Me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I will +give you rest”? Ah no, sweet soul. I know your words are true. I know +that what we all want is inward rest; rest of heart and brain; the calm, +strong, self-contained, self-denying character; which needs no +stimulants, for it has no fits of depression; which needs no narcotics, +for it has no fits of excitement; which needs no ascetic restraints, for +it is strong enough to use God’s gifts without abusing them; the +character, in a word, which is truly temperate, not in drink or food +merely, but in all desires, thoughts, and actions; freed from the wild +lusts and ambitions to which that old Adam yielded, and, seeking for +light and life by means forbidden, found thereby disease and death. Yes, +I know that; and know, too, that that rest is found only where you have +already found it. + +And yet, in such a world as this, governed by a Being who has made +sunshine, and flowers, and green grass, and the song of birds, and happy +human smiles, and who would educate by them—if we would let Him—His human +children from the cradle to the grave; in such a world as this, will you +grudge any particle of that education, even any harmless substitute for +it, to those spirits in prison whose surroundings too often tempt them, +from the cradle to the grave, to fancy that the world is composed of +bricks and iron, and governed by inspectors and policemen? Preach to +those spirits in prison, as you know far better than we parsons how to +preach; but let them have besides some glimpses of the splendid fact, +that outside their prison-house is a world which God, not man, has made; +wherein grows everywhere that tree of knowledge, which is likewise the +tree of life; and that they have a right to some small share of its +beauty, and its wonder, and its rest, for their own health of soul and +body, and for the health of their children after them. + + + + +GREAT CITIES AND THEIR INFLUENCE FOR GOOD AND EVIL. {187} + + +THE pleasure, gentlemen and ladies, of addressing you here is mixed in my +mind with very solemn feelings; the honour which you have done me is +tempered by humiliating thoughts. + +For it was in this very city of Bristol, twenty-seven years ago, that I +received my first lesson in what is now called Social Science; and yet, +alas! more than ten years elapsed ere I could even spell out that lesson, +though it had been written for me (as well as for all England) in letters +of flame, from the one end of heaven to the other. + +I was a school-boy in Clifton up above. I had been hearing of political +disturbances, even of riots, of which I understood nothing, and for which +I cared nothing. But on one memorable Sunday afternoon I saw an object +which was distinctly not political. Otherwise I should have no right to +speak of it here. + +It was an afternoon of sullen autumn rain. The fog hung thick over the +docks and lowlands. Glaring through that fog I saw a bright mass of +flame—almost like a half-risen sun. + +That, I was told, was the gate of the new gaol on fire. That the +prisoners in it had been set free; that—But why speak of what too many +here recollect but too well? The fog rolled slowly upward. Dark +figures, even at that great distance, were flitting to and fro across +what seemed the mouth of the pit. The flame increased—multiplied—at one +point after another; till by ten o’clock that night I seemed to be +looking down upon Dante’s Inferno, and to hear the multitudinous moan and +wail of the lost spirits surging to and fro amid that sea of fire. + +Right behind Brandon Hill—how can I ever forget it?—rose the great +central mass of fire; till the little mound seemed converted into a +volcano, from the peak of which the flame streamed up, not red alone, +but, delicately green and blue, pale rose and pearly white, while crimson +sparks leapt and fell again in the midst of that rainbow, not of hope, +but of despair; and dull explosions down below mingled with the roar of +the mob, and the infernal hiss and crackle of the flame. + +Higher and higher the fog was scorched and shrivelled upward by the +fierce heat below, glowing through and through with red reflected glare, +till it arched itself into one vast dome of red-hot iron, fit roof for +all the madness down below—and beneath it, miles away, I could see the +lonely tower of Dundie shining red;—the symbol of the old faith, looking +down in stately wonder and sorrow upon the fearful birth-throes of a new +age. Yes.—Why did I say just now despair? I was wrong. Birth-throes, +and not death pangs, those horrors were. Else they would have no place +in my discourse; no place, indeed, in my mind. Why talk over the signs +of disease, decay, death? Let the dead bury their dead, and let us +follow Him who dieth not; by whose command + + The old order changeth, giving place to the new, + And God fulfils himself in many ways. + +If we will believe this,—if we will look on each convulsion of society, +however terrible for the time being, as a token, not of decrepitude, but +of youth; not as the expiring convulsions of sinking humanity, but as +upward struggles, upward toward fuller light, freer air, a juster, +simpler, and more active life;—then we shall be able to look calmly, +however sadly, on the most appalling tragedies of humanity—even on these +late Indian ones—and take our share, faithful and hopeful, in supplying +the new and deeper wants of a new and nobler time. + +But to return. It was on the Tuesday or Wednesday after, if I recollect +right, that I saw another, and a still more awful sight. Along the north +side of Queen Square, in front of ruins which had been three days before +noble buildings, lay a ghastly row, not of corpses, but of +corpse-fragments. I have no more wish than you to dilate upon that +sight. But there was one charred fragment—with a scrap of old red +petticoat adhering to it, which I never forgot—which I trust in God that +I never shall forget. It is good for a man to be brought once at least +in his life face to face with fact, ultimate fact, however horrible it +may be; and have to confess to himself, shuddering, what things are +possible upon God’s earth, when man has forgotten that his only welfare +lies in living after the likeness of God. + +Not that I learnt the lesson then. When the first excitement of horror +and wonder were past, what I had seen made me for years the veriest +aristocrat, full of hatred and contempt of these dangerous classes, whose +existence I had for the first time discovered. It required many +years—years, too, of personal intercourse with the poor—to explain to me +the true meaning of what I saw here in October twenty-seven years ago, +and to learn a part of that lesson which God taught to others thereby. +And one part at least of that lesson was this: That the social state of a +city depends directly on its moral state, and—I fear dissenting voices, +but I must say what I believe to be truth—that the moral state of a city +depends—how far I know not, but frightfully, to an extent as yet +uncalculated, and perhaps incalculable—on the physical state of that +city; on the food, water, air, and lodging of its inhabitants. + +But that lesson, and others connected with it, was learnt, and learnt +well, by hundreds. From the sad catastrophe I date the rise of that +interest in Social Science; that desire for some nobler, more methodic, +more permanent benevolence than that which stops at mere almsgiving and +charity-schools. The dangerous classes began to be recognised as an +awful fact which must be faced; and faced, not by repression, but by +improvement. The “Perils of the Nation” began to occupy the attention +not merely of politicians, but of philosophers, physicians, priests; and +the admirable book which assumed that title did but re-echo the feeling +of thousands of earnest hearts. + +Ever since that time, scheme on scheme of improvement has been not only +proposed but carried out. A general interest of the upper classes in the +lower, a general desire to do good, and to learn how good can be done, +has been awakened throughout England, such as, I boldly say, never before +existed in any country upon earth; and England, her eyes opened to her +neglect of these classes, without whose strong arms her wealth and genius +would be useless, has put herself into a permanent state of confession of +sin, repentance, and amendment, which I verily trust will be accepted by +Almighty God; and will, in spite of our present shame and sorrow, {192} +in spite of shame and sorrow which may be yet in store for us, save alive +both the soul and the body of this ancient people. + +Let us then, that we may learn how to bear our part in this great work of +Social Reform, consider awhile great cities, their good and evil; and let +us start from the facts about your own city of which I have just put you +in remembrance. The universal law will be best understood from the +particular instance; and best of all, from the instance with which you +are most intimately acquainted. And do not, I entreat you, fear that I +shall be rude enough to say anything which may give pain to you, my +generous hosts; or presumptuous enough to impute blame to anyone for +events which happened long ago, and of the exciting causes of which I +know little or nothing. Bristol was then merely in the same state in +which other cities of England were, and in which every city on the +Continent is now; and the local exciting causes of that outbreak, the +personal conduct of A or B in it, is just what we ought most carefully to +forget, if we wish to look at the real root of the matter. If +consumption, latent in the constitution, have broken out in active +mischief, the wise physician will trouble his head little with the +particular accident which woke up the sleeping disease. The disease was +there, and if one thing had not awakened it some other would. And so, if +the population of a great city have got into a socially diseased state, +it matters little what shock may have caused it to explode. Politics may +in one case, fanaticism in another, national hatred in a third, hunger in +a fourth—perhaps even, as in Byzantium of old, no more important matter +than the jealousy between the blue and the green charioteers in the +theatre, may inflame a whole population to madness and civil war. Our +business is not with the nature of the igniting spark, but of the powder +which is ignited. + +I will not, then, to begin, go as far as some who say that “A great city +is a great evil.” We cannot say that Bristol was in 1830 or is now, a +great evil. It represents so much realised wealth; and that, again, so +much employment for thousands. It represents so much commerce; so much +knowledge of foreign lands; so much distribution of their products; so +much science, employed about that distribution. + +And it is undeniable, that as yet we have had no means of rapid and cheap +distribution of goods, whether imports or manufactures, save by this +crowding of human beings into great cities, for the more easy despatch of +business. Whether we shall devise other means hereafter is a question of +which I shall speak presently. Meanwhile, no man is to be blamed for the +existence, hardly even for the evils, of great cities. The process of +their growth has been very simple. They have gathered themselves round +abbeys and castles, for the sake of protection; round courts, for the +sake of law; round ports, for the sake of commerce; round coal mines, for +the sake of manufacture. Before the existence of railroads, penny-posts, +electric telegraphs, men were compelled to be as close as possible to +each other, in order to work together. + +When the population was small, and commerce feeble, the cities grew to no +very great size, and the bad effects of this crowding were not felt. The +cities of England in the Middle Age were too small to keep their +inhabitants week after week, month after month, in one deadly vapour-bath +of foul gas; and though the mortality among infants was probably +excessive, yet we should have seen among the adult survivors few or none +of those stunted and etiolated figures so common now in England, as well +as on the Continent. The green fields were close outside the walls, +where lads and lasses went a-maying, and children gathered flowers, and +sober burghers with their wives took the evening walk; there were the +butts, too, close outside, where stalwart prentice-lads ran and wrestled, +and pitched the bar, and played backsword, and practised with the +long-bow; and sometimes, in stormy times, turned out for a few months as +ready-trained soldiers, and, like Ulysses of old, + + Drank delight of battle with their peers, + +and then returned again to the workshop and the loom. The very mayor and +alderman went forth, at five o’clock on the summer’s morning, with hawk +and leaping-pole, after a duck and heron; or hunted the hare in state, +probably in the full glory of furred gown and gold chain; and then +returned to breakfast, and doubtless transacted their day’s business all +the better for their morning’s gallop on the breezy downs. + +But there was another side to this genial and healthy picture. A hint +that this was a state of society which had its conditions, its limit; and +if those were infringed, woe alike to burgher and to prentice. Every now +and then epidemic disease entered the jolly city—and then down went +strong and weak, rich and poor, before the invisible and seemingly +supernatural arrows of that angel of death whom they had been pampering +unwittingly in every bedroom. + +They fasted, they prayed; but in vain. They called the pestilence a +judgment of God; and they called it by a true name. But they know not +(and who are we to blame them for not knowing?) what it was that God was +judging thereby—foul air, foul water, unclean backyards, stifling attics, +houses hanging over the narrow street till light and air were alike shut +out—that there lay the sin; and that to amend that was the repentance +which God demanded. + +Yet we cannot blame them. They showed that the crowded city life can +bring out human nobleness as well as human baseness; that to be crushed +into contact with their fellow-men, forced at least the loftier and +tender souls to know their fellow-men, and therefore to care for them, to +love them, to die for them. Yes—from one temptation the city life is +free, to which the country life is sadly exposed—that isolation which, +self-contented and self-helping, forgets in its surly independence that +man is his brother’s keeper. In cities, on the contrary, we find that +the stories of these old pestilences, when the first panic terror has +past, become, however tragical, still beautiful and heroic; and we read +of noble-hearted men and women palliating ruin which they could not cure, +braving dangers which seemed to them miraculous, from which they were +utterly defenceless, spending money, time, and, after all, life itself +upon sufferers from whom they might without shame have fled. + +They are very cheering, the stories of the old city pestilences; and the +nobleness which they brought out in the heart of many a townsman who had +seemed absorbed in the lust of gain—who perhaps had been really absorbed +in it—till that fearful hour awakened in him his better self, and taught +him, not self-aggrandisement, but self-sacrifice; begetting in him, out +of the very depth of darkness, new and divine light. That nobleness, +doubt it not, exists as ever in the hearts of citizens. May God grant us +to see the day when it shall awaken to exert itself, not for the +palliation, not even for the cure, but for the prevention, yea, the utter +extermination, of pestilence. + +About the middle of the sixteenth century, as far as I can ascertain, +another and even more painful phenomenon appears in our great cities—a +dangerous class. How it arose is not yet clear. That the Reformation +had something to do with the matter, we can hardly doubt. At the +dissolution of the monasteries, the more idle, ignorant, and profligate +members of the mendicant orders, unable to live any longer on the alms of +the public, sunk, probably, into vicious penury. The frightful +misgovernment of this country during the minority of Edward the Sixth, +especially the conversion of tilled lands into pasture, had probably the +effect of driving the surplus agricultural population into the great +towns. But the social history of this whole period is as yet obscure, +and I have no right to give an opinion on it. Another element, and a +more potent one, is to be found in the discharged soldiers who came home +from foreign war, and the sailors who returned from our voyages of +discovery, and from our raids against the Spaniards, too often crippled +by scurvy, or by Tropic fevers, with perhaps a little prize money, which +was as hastily spent as it had been hastily gained. The later years of +Elizabeth, and the whole of James the First’s reign, disclose to us an +ugly state of society in the low streets of all our sea-port towns; and +Bristol, as one of the great starting-points of West Indian adventure, +was probably, during the seventeenth century, as bad as any city in +England. According to Ben Jonson, and the playwriters of his time, the +beggars become a regular fourth-estate, with their own laws, and even +their own language—of which we may remark, that the thieves’ Latin of +those days is full of German words, indicating that its inventors had +been employed in the Continental wars of the time. How that class sprung +up, we may see, I suppose, pretty plainly, from Shakespeare’s “Henry the +Fifth.” Whether Nym, Pistol, and Bardolph, Doll and Mrs. Quickly, +existed in the reign of Henry the Fifth, they certainly existed in the +reign of Elizabeth. They are probably sketches from life of people whom +Shakespeare had seen in Alsatia and the Mint. + +To these merely rascal elements, male and female, we must add, I fear, +those whom mere penury, from sickness, failure, want of employment drove +into dwellings of the lowest order. Such people, though not criminal +themselves, are but too likely to become the parents of criminals. I am +not blaming them, poor souls; God forbid! I am merely stating a fact. +When we examine into the ultimate cause of a dangerous class; into the +one property common to all its members, whether thieves, beggars, +profligates, or the merely pauperised—we find it to be this loss of +self-respect. As long as that remains, poor souls may struggle on +heroically, pure amid penury, filth, degradation unspeakable. But when +self-respect is lost, they are lost with it. And whatever may be the +fate of virtuous parents, children brought up in dens of physical and +moral filth cannot retrieve self-respect. They sink, they must sink, +into a life on a level with the sights, sounds, aye, the very smells, +which surround them. It is not merely that the child’s mind is +contaminated, by seeing and hearing, in overcrowded houses, what he +should not hear and see: but the whole physical circumstances of his life +are destructive of self-respect. He has no means for washing himself +properly: but he has enough of the innate sense of beauty and fitness to +feel that he ought not to be dirty; he thinks that others despise him for +being dirty, and he half despises himself for being so. In all raged +schools and reformatories, so they tell me, the first step toward +restoring self-respect is to make the poor fellows clean. From that +moment they begin to look on themselves as new men—with a new start, new +hopes, new duties. For not without the deepest physical as well as moral +meaning, was baptism chosen by the old Easterns, and adopted by our Lord +Jesus Christ, as the sign of a new life; and outward purity made the +token and symbol of that inward purity which is the parent of +self-respect, and manliness, and a clear conscience; of the free +forehead, and the eye which meets boldly and honestly the eye of its +fellow-man. + +But would that mere physical dirt were all that the lad has to contend +with. There is the desire of enjoyment. Moral and intellectual +enjoyment he has none, and can have none: but not to enjoy something is +to be dead in life; and to the lowest physical pleasures he will betake +himself, and all the more fiercely because his opportunities of enjoyment +are so limited. It is a hideous subject; I will pass it by very shortly; +only asking of you, as I have to ask daily of myself—this solemn +question: We, who have so many comforts, so many pleasures of body, soul, +and spirit, from the lowest appetite to the highest aspiration, that we +can gratify each in turn with due and wholesome moderation, innocently +and innocuously—who are we that we should judge the poor untaught and +overtempted inhabitant of Temple Street and Lewin’s Mead, if, having but +one or two pleasures possible to him, he snatches greedily, even foully, +at the little which he has? + +And this brings me to another, and a most fearful evil of great cities, +namely, drunkenness. I am one of those who cannot, on scientific +grounds, consider drunkenness as a cause of evil, but as an effect. Of +course it is a cause—a cause of endless crime and misery; but I am +convinced that to cure, you must inquire, not what it causes, but what +causes it? And for that we shall not have to seek far. + +The main exciting cause of drunkenness is, I believe, firmly, bad air and +bad lodging. + +A man shall spend his days between a foul alley where he breathes +sulphuretted hydrogen, a close workshop where he breathes carbonic acid, +and a close and foul bedroom where he breathes both. In neither of the +three places, meanwhile, has he his fair share of that mysterious +chemical agent without which health is impossible, the want of which +betrays itself at once in the dull eye, the sallow cheek—namely, light. +Believe me, it is no mere poetic metaphor which connects in Scripture, +Light with Life. It is the expression of a deep law, one which holds as +true in the physical as in the spiritual world; a case in which (as +perhaps in all cases) the laws of the visible world are the counterparts +of those of the invisible world, and Earth is the symbol of Heaven. + +Deprive, then, the man of his fair share of fresh air and pure light, and +what follows? His blood is not properly oxygenated: his nervous energy +is depressed, his digestion impaired, especially if his occupation be +sedentary, or requires much stooping, and the cavity of the chest thereby +becomes contracted; and for that miserable feeling of languor and craving +he knows but one remedy—the passing stimulus of alcohol;—a passing +stimulus; leaving fresh depression behind it, and requiring fresh doses +of stimulant, till it becomes a habit, a slavery, a madness. Again, +there is an intellectual side to the question. The depressed nervous +energy, the impaired digestion, depress the spirits. The man feels low +in mind as well as in body. Whence shall he seek exhilaration? Not in +that stifling home which has caused the depression itself. He knows none +other than the tavern, and the company which the tavern brings; God help +him! + +Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is easy to say, God help him; but it is not +difficult for man to help him also. Drunkenness is a very curable +malady. The last fifty years has seen it all but die out among the upper +classes of this country. And what has caused the improvement? + +Certainly, in the first place, the spread of education. Every man has +now a hundred means of rational occupation and amusement which were +closed to his grandfather; and among the deadliest enemies of +drunkenness, we may class the printing-press, the railroad, and the +importation of foreign art and foreign science, which we owe to the late +forty years’ peace. We can find plenty of amusement now, beside the old +one of sitting round the table and talking over wine. Why should not the +poor man share in our gain? But over and above, there are causes simply +physical. Our houses are better ventilated. The stifling old four-post +bed has given place to the airy curtainless one; and what is more than +all—we wash. That morning cold bath which foreigners consider as Young +England’s strangest superstition, has done as much, believe me, to +abolish drunkenness, as any other cause whatsoever. With a clean skin in +healthy action, and nerves and muscles braced by a sudden shock, men do +not crave for artificial stimulants. I have found that, coeteris +paribus, a man’s sobriety is in direct proportion to his cleanliness. I +believe it would be so in all classes had they the means. + +And they ought to have the means. Whatever other rights a man has, or +ought to have, this at least he has, if society demands of him that he +should earn his own livelihood, and not be a torment and a burden to his +neighbours. He has a right to water, to air, to light. In demanding +that, he demands no more than nature has given to the wild beast of the +forest. He is better than they. Treat him, then, as well as God has +treated them. If we require of him to be a man, we must at least put him +on a level with the brutes. + +We have then, first of all, to face the existence of a dangerous class of +this kind, into which the weaker as well as the worst members of society +have a continual tendency to sink. A class which, not respecting itself, +does not respect others; which has nothing to lose and all to gain by +anarchy; in which the lowest passions, seldom gratified, are ready to +burst out and avenge themselves by frightful methods. + +For the reformation of that class, thousands of good men are now working; +hundreds of benevolent plans are being set on foot. Honour to them all; +whether they succeed or fail, each of them does some good; each of them +rescues at least a few fellow-men, dear to God as you and I are, out of +the nether pit. Honour to them all, I say; but I should not be honest +with you this night, if I did not assert most solemnly my conviction, +that reformatories, ragged schools, even hospitals and asylums, treat +only the symptoms, not the actual causes, of the disease; and that the +causes are only to be touched by improving the simple physical conditions +of the class; by abolishing foul air, foul water, foul lodging, +overcrowded dwellings, in which morality is difficult and common decency +impossible. You may breed a pig in a sty, ladies and gentlemen, and make +a learned pig of him after all; but you cannot breed a man in a sty, and +make a learned man of him; or indeed, in the true sense of that great +word, a man at all. + +And remember, that these physical influences of great cities, physically +depressing and morally degrading, influence, though to a less extent, the +classes above the lowest stratum. + +The honest and skilled workman feels their effects. Compelled too often +to live where he can, in order to be near his work, he finds himself +perpetually in contact with a class utterly inferior to himself, and his +children exposed to contaminating influences from which he would gladly +remove them; but how can he? Next door to him, even in the same house +with him, may be enacted scenes of brutality or villainy which I will not +speak of here. He may shut his own eyes and ears to them; but he cannot +shut his children’s. He may vex his righteous soul daily, like Lot of +old, with the foul conversation of the wicked; but, like Lot of old, he +cannot keep his children from mixing with the inhabitants of the wicked +city, learning their works, and at last being involved in their doom. +Oh, ladies and gentlemen, if there be one class for whom above all others +I will plead, in season and out of season; if there be one social evil +which I will din into the ears of my countrymen whenever God gives me a +chance, it is this: The honest and the virtuous workman, and his +unnatural contact with the dishonest and the foul. I know well the +nobleness which exists in the average of that class, in men and in +wives—their stern uncomplaining, valorous self-denial; and nothing more +stirs my pity than to see them struggling to bring up a family in a moral +and physical atmosphere where right education is impossible. We lavish +sympathy enough upon the criminal; for God’s sake let us keep a little of +it for the honest man. We spend thousands in carrying out the separation +of classes in prison; for God’s sake let us try to separate them a little +before they go to prison. We are afraid of the dangerous classes; for +God’s sake let us bestir ourselves to stop that reckless confusion and +neglect which reign in the alleys and courts of our great towns, and +which recruit those very dangerous classes from the class which ought to +be, and is still, in spite of our folly, England’s strength and England’s +glory. Let us no longer stand by idle, and see moral purity, in street +after street, pent in the same noisome den with moral corruption, to be +involved in one common doom, as the Latin tyrant of old used to bind +together the dead corpse and the living victim. But let the man who +would deserve well of his city, well of his country, set his heart and +brain to the great purpose of giving the workmen dwellings fit for a +virtuous and a civilised being, and like the priest of old, stand between +the living and the dead, that the plague may be stayed. + +Hardly less is the present physical state of our great cities felt by +that numerous class which is, next to the employer, the most important in +a city. I mean the shopmen, clerks, and all the men, principally young +ones, who are employed exclusively in the work of distribution. I have a +great respect, I may say affection, for this class. In Bristol I know +nothing of them; save that, from what I hear, the clerks ought in general +to have a better status here than in most cities. I am told that it is +the practice here for merchants to take into their houses very young +boys, and train them to their business; that this connection between +employer and employed is hereditary, and that clerkships pass from father +to son in the same family. I rejoice to hear it. It is pleasant to find +anywhere a relic of the old patriarchal bond, the permanent nexus between +master and man, which formed so important and so healthful an element of +the ancient mercantile system. One would gladly overlook a little +favouritism and nepotism, a little sticking square men into round holes, +and of round men into square holes, for the sake of having a class of +young clerks and employés who felt that their master’s business was their +business, his honour theirs, his prosperity theirs. + +But over and above this, whenever I have come in contact with this clerk +and shopman class, they have impressed me with considerable respect, not +merely as to what they may be hereafter, but what they are now. + +They are the class from which the ranks of our commercial men, our +emigrants, are continually recruited; therefore their right education is +a matter of national importance. + +The lad who stands behind a Bristol counter may be, five-and-twenty years +hence, a large employer—an owner of houses and land in far countries +across the seas—a member of some colonial parliament—the founder of a +wealthy family. How necessary for the honour of Britain, for the welfare +of generations yet unborn, that that young man should have, in body, +soul, and spirit, the loftiest, and yet the most practical of educations. + +His education, too, such as it is, is one which makes me respect him as +one of a class. Of course, he is sometimes one of those “gents” whom +Punch so ruthlessly holds up to just ridicule. He is sometimes a vulgar +fop, sometimes fond of low profligacy—of betting-houses and casinos. +Well—I know no class in any age or country among which a fool may not be +found here and there. But that the “gent” is the average type of this +class, I should utterly deny from such experience as I have had. The +peculiar note and mark of the average clerk and shopman, is, I think, in +these days, intellectual activity, a keen desire for self-improvement and +for independence, honourable, because self-acquired. But as he is +distinctly a creature of the city; as all city influences bear at once on +him more than on any other class, so we see in him, I think, more than in +any class, the best and the worst effects of modern city life. The +worst, of course, is low profligacy; but of that I do not speak here. I +mean that in the same man the good and evil of a city life meet. And in +this way. + +In a countryman like me, coming up out of wild and silent moorlands into +a great city, the first effect of the change is increased intellectual +activity. The perpetual stream of human faces, the innumerable objects +of interest in every shop-window, are enough to excite the mind to +action, which is increased by the simple fact of speaking to fifty +different human beings in the day instead of five. Now in the city-bred +youth this excited state of mind is chronic, permanent. It is denoted +plainly enough by the difference between the countryman’s face and that +of the townsman. The former in its best type (and it is often very +noble) composed, silent, self-contained, often stately, often listless; +the latter mobile, eager, observant, often brilliant, often +self-conscious. + +Now if you keep this rapid and tense mind in a powerful and healthy body, +it would do right good work. Right good work it does, indeed, as it is; +but still it might do better. + +For what are the faults of this class? What do the obscurantists (now, +thank God, fewer every day) allege as the objection to allowing young men +to educate themselves out of working hours? + +They become, it is said, discontented, conceited, dogmatical. They take +up hasty notions, they condemn fiercely what they have no means of +understanding; they are too fond of fine words, of the excitement of +spouting themselves, and hearing others spout. + +Well. I suppose there must be a little truth in the accusation, or it +would not have been invented. There is no smoke without fire; and these +certainly are the faults of which the cleverest middle-class young men +whom I know are most in danger. + +But—one fair look at these men’s faces ought to tell common sense that +the cause is rather physical than moral. Confined to sedentary +occupations, stooping over desks and counters in close rooms, unable to +obtain that fair share of bodily exercise which nature demands, and in +continual mental effort, their nerves and brain have been excited at the +expense of their lungs, their digestion, and their whole nutritive +system. Their complexions show a general ill-health. Their mouths, too +often, hint at latent disease. What wonder if there be an irritability +of brain and nerve? I blame them no more for it than I blame a man for +being somewhat touchy while he is writhing in the gout. Indeed less; for +gout is very often a man’s own fault; but these men’s ill-health is not. +And, therefore, everything which can restore to them health of body, will +preserve in them health of mind. Everything which ministers to the +_corpus sanum_, will minister also to the _mentem sanam_; and a walk on +Durham Downs, a game of cricket, a steamer excursion to Chepstow, shall +send them home again happier and wiser men than poring over many wise +volumes or hearing many wise lectures. How often is a worthy fellow +spending his leisure honourably in hard reading, when he had much better +have been scrambling over hedge and ditch, without a thought in his head +save what was put there by the grass and the butterflies, and the green +trees and the blue sky? And therefore I do press earnestly, both on +employers and employed, the incalculable value of athletic sports and +country walks for those whose business compels them to pass the day in +the heart of the city; I press on you, with my whole soul, the excellency +of the early-closing movement; not so much because it enables young men +to attend mechanics’ institutes, as because it enables them, if they +choose, to get a good game of leap-frog. You may smile; but try the +experiment, and see how, as the chest expands, the muscles harden, and +the cheek grows ruddy and the lips firm, and sound sleep refreshes the +lad for his next day’s work, the temper will become more patient, the +spirits more genial; there will be less tendency to brood angrily over +the inequalities of fortune, and to accuse society for evils which as yet +she knows not how to cure. + +There is a class, again, above all these, which is doubtless the most +important of all; and yet of which I can say little here—the capitalist, +small and great, from the shopkeeper to the merchant prince. + +Heaven forbid that I should speak of them with aught but respect. There +are few figures, indeed, in the world on which I look with higher +satisfaction than on the British merchant; the man whose ships are on a +hundred seas; who sends comfort and prosperity to tribes whom he never +saw, and honourably enriches himself by enriching others. There is +something to me chivalrous, even kingly, in the merchant life; and there +were men in Bristol of old—as I doubt not there are now—who nobly +fulfilled that ideal. I cannot forget that Bristol was the nurse of +America; that more than two hundred years ago, the daring and genius of +Bristol converted yonder narrow stream into a mighty artery, down which +flowed the young life-blood of that great Transatlantic nation destined +to be hereafter, I believe, the greatest which the world ever saw. +Yes—were I asked to sum up in one sentence the good of great cities, I +would point first to Bristol, and then to the United States, and say, +That is what great cities can do. By concentrating in one place, and +upon one object, men, genius, information, and wealth, they can conquer +new-found lands by arts instead of arms; they can beget new nations; and +replenish and subdue the earth from pole to pole. + +Meanwhile, there is one fact about employers, in all cities which I know, +which may seem commonplace to you, but which to me is very significant. +Whatsoever business they may do in the city, they take good care, if +possible, not to live in it. As soon as a man gets wealthy nowadays, his +first act is to take to himself a villa in the country. Do I blame him? +Certainly not. It is an act of common sense. He finds that the harder +he works, the more he needs of fresh air, free country life, innocent +recreation; and he takes it, and does his city business all the better +for it, lives all the longer for it, is the cheerfuller, more genial man +for it. One great social blessing, I think, which railroads have +brought, is the throwing open country life to men of business. I say +blessing; both to the men themselves and to the country where they +settle. The citizen takes an honest pride in rivalling the old country +gentleman, in beating him in his own sphere, as gardener, agriculturist, +sportsman, head of the village; and by his superior business habits and +his command of ready money, he very often does so. For fifty miles round +London, wherever I see progress—improved farms, model cottages, new +churches, new schools—I find, in three cases out of four, that the author +is some citizen who fifty years ago would have known nothing but the +narrow city life, and have had probably no higher pleasures than those of +the table; whose dreams would have been, not as now, of model farms and +schools, but of turtle and port-wine. + +My only regret when I see so pleasant a sight is: Oh that the good man +could have taken his workmen with him! + +Taken his workmen with him? + +I assure you that, after years of thought, I see no other remedy for the +worst evils of city life. “If,” says the old proverb, “the mountain will +not come to Muhammed, then Muhammed must go to the mountain.” And if you +cannot bring the country into the city, the city must go into the +country. + +Do not fancy me a dreamer dealing with impossible ideals. I know well +what cannot be done; fair and grand as it would be, if it were done, a +model city is impossible in England. We have here no Eastern despotism +(and it is well we have not) to destroy an old Babylon, as that mighty +genius Nabuchonosor did, and build a few miles off a new Babylon, +one-half the area of which was park and garden, fountain and +water-course—a diviner work of art, to my mind, than the finest picture +or statue which the world ever saw. We have not either (and it is well +for us that we have not) a model republic occupying a new uncleared land. +We cannot, as they do in America, plan out a vast city on some delicious +and healthy site amid the virgin forest, with streets one hundred feet in +breadth, squares and boulevards already planted by God’s hand with +majestic trees; and then leave the great design to be hewn out of the +wilderness, street after street, square after square, by generations yet +unborn. That too is a magnificent ideal; but it cannot be ours. And it +is well for us, I believe, that it cannot. The great value of land, the +enormous amount of vested interests, the necessity of keeping to ancient +sites around which labour, as in Manchester, or commerce, as in Bristol, +has clustered itself on account of natural advantages, all these things +make any attempts to rebuild in cities impossible. But they will cause +us at last, I believe, to build better things than cities. They will +issue in a complete interpenetration of city and of country, a complete +fusion of their different modes of life, and a combination of the +advantages of both, such as no country in the world has ever seen. We +shall have, I believe and trust, ere another generation has past, model +lodging-houses springing up, not in the heart of the town, but on the +hills around it; and those will be—economy, as well as science and good +government, will compel them to be—not ill-built rows of undrained +cottages, each rented for awhile, and then left to run into squalidity +and disrepair, but huge blocks of building, each with its common +eating-house, bar, baths, washhouses, reading-room, common conveniences +of every kind, where, in free and pure country air, the workman will +enjoy comforts which our own grandfathers could not command, and at a +lower price than that which he now pays for such accommodation as I +should be ashamed to give to my own horses; while from these great blocks +of building, branch lines will convey the men to or from their work by +railroad, without loss of time, labour, or health. + +Then the city will become what it ought to be; the workshop, and not the +dwelling-house, of a mighty and healthy people. The old foul alleys, as +they become gradually depopulated, will be replaced by fresh warehouses, +fresh public buildings; and the city, in spite of all its smoke and dirt, +will become a place on which the workman will look down with pride and +joy, because it will be to him no longer a prison and a poison-trap, but +merely a place for honest labour. + +This, gentlemen and ladies, is my ideal; and I cannot but hope and +believe that I shall live to see it realised here and there, gradually +and cautiously (as is our good and safe English habit), but still +earnestly and well. Did I see but the movement commenced in earnest, I +should be inclined to cry a “Nunc Domine dimittis”—I have lived long +enough to see a noble work begun, which cannot but go on and prosper, so +beneficial would it be found. I tell you, that but this afternoon, as +the Bath train dashed through the last cutting, and your noble vale and +noble city opened before me, I looked round upon the overhanging crags, +the wooded glens, and said to myself: There, upon the rock in the free +air and sunlight, and not here, beneath yon pall of smoke by the lazy +pools and festering tidal muds, ought the Bristol workman to live. Oh +that I may see the time when on the blessed Sabbath eve these hills shall +swarm as thick with living men as bean-fields with the summer bees; when +the glens shall ring with the laughter of ten thousand children, with +limbs as steady, and cheeks as ruddy, as those of my own lads and lasses +at home; and the artisan shall find his Sabbath a day of rest indeed, in +which not only soul but body may gather health and nerve for the week’s +work, under the soothing and purifying influences of those common natural +sights and sounds which God has given as a heritage even to the gipsy on +the moor; and of which no man can be deprived without making his life a +burden to himself, perhaps a burden to those around him. + +But it will be asked: Will such improvements pay? I respect that +question. I do not sneer at it, and regard it, as some are too apt to +do, as a sign of the mercenary and money-loving spirit of the present +age. I look on it as a healthy sign of the English mind; a sign that we +believe, as the old Jews did, that political and social righteousness is +inseparably connected with wealth and prosperity. The old Psalms and +prophets have taught us that lesson; and God forbid that we should forget +it. The world is right well made; and the laws of trade and of social +economy, just as much as the laws of nature, are divine facts, and only +by obeying them can we thrive. And I had far sooner hear a people asking +of every scheme of good, Will it pay? than throwing themselves headlong +into that merely sentimental charity to which superstitious nations have +always been prone—charity which effects no permanent good, which, whether +in Hindostan or in Italy, debases, instead of raising, the suffering +classes, because it breaks the laws of social economy. + +No, let us still believe that if a thing is right, it will sooner or +later pay; and in social questions, make the profitableness of any scheme +a test of its rightness. It is a rough test; not an infallible one at +all, but it is a fair one enough to work by. + +And as for the improvements at which I have hinted, I will boldly answer +that they will pay. + +They will pay directly and at once, in the saving of poor-rates. They +will pay by exterminating epidemics, and numberless chronic forms of +disease which now render thousands burdens on the public purse; +consumers, instead of producers of wealth. They will pay by gradually +absorbing the dangerous classes; and removing from temptation and +degradation a generation yet unborn. They will pay in the increased +content, cheerfulness, which comes with health in increased goodwill of +employed towards employers. They will pay by putting the masses into a +state fit for education. They will pay, too, in such fearful times as +these, by the increased physical strength and hardihood of the town +populations. For it is from the city, rather than from the country, that +our armies must mainly be recruited. Not only is the townsman more ready +to enlist than the countryman, because in the town the labour market is +most likely to be overstocked; but the townsman actually makes a better +soldier than the countryman. He is a shrewder, more active, more +self-helping man; give him but the chances of maintaining the same +physical strength and health as the countryman, and he will support the +honour of the British arms as gallantly as the Highlander or the +Connaughtman, and restore the days when the invincible prentice-boys of +London carried terror into the heart of foreign lands. In all ages, in +all times, whether for war or for peace, it will pay. The true wealth of +a nation is the health of her masses. + +It may seem to some here that I have dealt too much throughout this +lecture with merely material questions; that I ought to have spoken more +of intellectual progress; perhaps, as a clergyman, more also of spiritual +and moral regeneration. + +I can only answer, that if this be a fault on my part, it is a deliberate +one. I have spoken, whether rightly or wrongly, concerning what I +know—concerning matters which are to me articles of faith altogether +indubitable, irreversible, Divine. + +Be it that these are merely questions of physical improvement. I see no +reason in that why they should be left to laymen, or urged only on +worldly grounds and self-interest. I do not find that when urged on +those grounds, the advice is listened to. I believe that it will not be +listened to until the consciences of men, as well as their brains, are +engaged in these questions; until they are put on moral grounds, shown to +have connection with moral laws; and so made questions not merely of +interest, but of duty, honour, chivalry. + +I cannot but see, moreover, how many phenomena, which are supposed to be +spiritual, are simply physical; how many cases which are referred to my +profession, are properly the object of the medical man. I cannot but +see, that unless there be healthy bodies, it is impossible in the long +run to have a generation of healthy souls; I cannot but see that mankind +are as prone now as ever to deny the sacredness and perfection of God’s +physical universe, as an excuse for their own ignorance and neglect +thereof; to search the highest heaven for causes which lie patent at +their feet, and like the heathen of old time, to impute to some +capricious anger of the gods calamities which spring from their own +greed, haste, and ignorance. + +And, therefore, because I am a priest, and glory in the name of a priest, +I have tried to fulfil somewhat of that which seems to me the true office +of a priest—namely, to proclaim to man the Divine element which exists in +all, even the smallest thing, because each thing is a thought of God +himself; to make men understand that God is indeed about their path and +about their bed, spying out all their ways; that they are indeed +fearfully and wonderfully made, and that God’s hand lies for ever on +them, in the form of physical laws, sacred, irreversible, universal, +reaching from one end of the universe to the other; that whosoever +persists in breaking those laws, reaps his sure punishment of weakness +and sickness, sadness and self-reproach; that whosoever causes them to be +broken by others, reaps his sure punishment in finding that he has +transformed his fellow-men into burdens and curses, instead of helpmates +and blessings. To say this, is a priest’s duty; and then to preach the +good news that the remedy is patent, easy, close at hand; that many of +the worst evils which afflict humanity may be exterminated by simple +common sense, and the justice and mercy which does to others as it would +be done by; to awaken men to the importance of the visible world, that +they may judge from thence the higher importance of that invisible world +whereof this is but the garment and the type; and in all times and +places, instead of keeping the key of knowledge to pamper one’s own power +or pride, to lay that key frankly and trustfully in the hand of every +human being who hungers after truth, and to say: Child of God, this key +is thine as well as mine. Enter boldly into thy Father’s house, and +behold the wonder, the wisdom, the beauty of its laws and its organisms, +from the mightiest planet over thy head, to the tiniest insect beneath +thy feet. Look at it, trustfully, joyfully, earnestly; for it is thy +heritage. Behold its perfect fitness for thy life here; and judge from +thence its fitness for thy nobler life hereafter. + + + + +HEROISM. + + +IT is an open question whether the policeman is not demoralising us; and +that in proportion as he does his duty well; whether the perfection of +justice and safety, the complete “preservation of body and goods,” may +not reduce the educated and comfortable classes into that lap-dog +condition in which not conscience, but comfort, doth make cowards of us +all. Our forefathers had, on the whole, to take care of themselves; we +find it more convenient to hire people to take care of us. So much the +better for us, in some respects; but, it may be, so much the worse in +others. So much the better; because, as usually results from the +division of labour, these people, having little or nothing to do save to +take care of us, do so far better than we could; and so prevent a vast +amount of violence and wrong, and therefore of misery, especially to the +weak; for which last reason we will acquiesce in the existence of +policemen and lawyers, as we do in the results of arbitration, as the +lesser of two evils. The odds in war are in favour of the bigger bully, +in arbitration in favour of the bigger rogue; and it is a question +whether the lion or the fox be the safer guardian of human interests. +But arbitration prevents war; and that, in three cases out of four, is +full reason for employing it. + +On the other hand, the lap-dog condition, whether in dogs or in men, is +certainly unfavourable to the growth of the higher virtues. Safety and +comfort are good, indeed, for the good; for the brave, the +self-originating, the earnest. They give to such a clear stage and no +favour, wherein to work unhindered for their fellow-men. But for the +majority, who are neither brave, self-originating, nor earnest, but the +mere puppets of circumstance, safety and comfort may, and actually do, +merely make their lives mean and petty, effeminate and dull. Therefore +their hearts must be awakened, as often as possible, to take exercise +enough for health; and they must be reminded, perpetually and +importunately, of what a certain great philosopher called, “whatsoever +things are true, honourable, just, pure, lovely, and of good report;” “if +there be any manhood, and any just praise, to think of such things.” + +This pettiness and dulness of our modern life is just what keeps alive +our stage, to which people go to see something a little less petty, a +little less dull, than what they see at home. It is, too, the cause of—I +had almost said the excuse for—the modern rage for sensational novels. +Those who read them so greedily are conscious, poor souls, of capacities +in themselves of passion and action for good and evil, for which their +frivolous humdrum daily life gives no room, no vent. They know too well +that human nature can be more fertile, whether in weeds and poisons, or +in flowers and fruits, than it is usually in the streets and houses of a +well-ordered and tolerably sober city. And because the study of human +nature is, after all, that which is nearest to everyone and most +interesting to everyone, therefore they go to fiction, since they cannot +go to fact, to see what they themselves might be had they the chance; to +see what fantastic tricks before high heaven men and women like +themselves can play, and how they play them. + +Well, it is not for me to judge, for me to blame. I will only say that +there are those who cannot read sensational novels, or, indeed, any +novels at all, just because they see so many sensational novels being +enacted round them in painful facts of sinful flesh and blood. There are +those, too, who have looked in the mirror too often to wish to see their +own disfigured visage in it any more; who are too tired of themselves and +ashamed of themselves to want to hear of people like themselves; who want +to hear of people utterly unlike themselves, more noble, and able, and +just, and sweet, and pure; who long to hear of heroism and to converse +with heroes; and who, if by chance they meet with an heroic act, bathe +their spirits in that, as in May-dew, and feel themselves thereby, if but +for an hour, more fair. + +If any such shall chance to see these words, let me ask them to consider +with me that one word Hero, and what it means. + +Hero; Heroic; Heroism. These words point to a phase of human nature, the +capacity for which we all have in ourselves, which is as startling and as +interesting in its manifestations as any, and which is always beautiful, +always ennobling, and therefore always attractive to those whose hearts +are not yet seared by the world or brutalised by self-indulgence. + +But let us first be sure what the words mean. There is no use talking +about a word till we have got at its meaning. We may use it as a cant +phrase, as a party cry on platforms; we may even hate and persecute our +fellow-men for the sake of it: but till we have clearly settled in our +own minds what a word means, it will do for fighting with, but not for +working with. Socrates of old used to tell the young Athenians that the +ground of all sound knowledge was—to understand the true meaning of the +words which were in their mouths all day long; and Socrates was a wiser +man than we shall ever see. So, instead of beginning an oration in +praise of heroism, I shall ask my readers to think with me what heroism +is. + +Now, we shall always get most surely at the meaning of a word by getting +at its etymology—that is, at what it meant at first. And if heroism +means behaving like a hero, we must find out, it seems to me, not merely +what a hero may happen to mean just now, but what it meant in the +earliest human speech in which we find it. + +A hero or a heroine, then, among the old Homeric Greeks, meant a man or +woman who was like the gods; and who, from that likeness, stood superior +to his or her fellow-creatures. Gods, heroes, and men, is a threefold +division of rational beings, with which we meet more than once or twice. +Those grand old Greeks felt deeply the truth of the poet’s saying— + + Unless above himself he can + Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man. + +But more: the Greeks supposed these heroes to be, in some way or other, +partakers of a divine nature; akin to the gods; usually, either they, or +some ancestor of theirs, descended from a god or goddess. Those who have +read Mr. Gladstone’s “Juventus Mundi” will remember the section (cap. ix. +§ 6) on the modes of the approximation between the divine and the human +natures; and whether or not they agree with the author altogether, all +will agree, I think, that the first idea of a hero or a heroine was a +godlike man or godlike woman. + +A godlike man. What varied, what infinite forms of nobleness that word +might include, ever increasing, as men’s notions of the gods became purer +and loftier, or, alas! decreasing, as their notions became degraded. The +old Greeks, with that intense admiration of beauty which made them, in +after ages, the master-sculptors and draughtsmen of their own, and, +indeed, of any age, would, of course, require in their hero, their +god-like man, beauty and strength, manners too, and eloquence, and all +outward perfections of humanity, and neglect his moral qualities. +Neglect, I say, but not ignore. The hero, by virtue of his kindred with +the gods, was always expected to be a better man than common men, as +virtue was then understood. And how better? Let us see. + +The hero was at least expected to be more reverent than other men to +those divine beings of whose nature he partook, whose society he might +enjoy even here on earth. He might be unfaithful to his own high +lineage; he might misuse his gifts by selfishness and self-will; he +might, like Ajax, rage with mere jealousy and wounded pride till his rage +ended in shameful madness and suicide. He might rebel against the very +gods, and all laws of right and wrong, till he perished his ἀτασθαλίη— + + Smitten down, blind in his pride, for a sign and a terror to mortals. + +But he ought to have, he must have, to be true to his name of Hero, +justice, self-restraint, and αἰδώς—that highest form of modesty, for +which we have, alas! no name in the English tongue; that perfect respect +for the feelings of others which springs out of perfect self-respect. +And he must have too—if he were to be a hero of the highest type—the +instinct of helpfulness; the instinct that, if he were a kinsman of the +gods, he must fight on their side, through toil and danger, against all +that was unlike them, and therefore hateful to them. Who loves not the +old legends, unsurpassed for beauty in the literature of any race, in +which the hero stands out as the deliverer, the destroyer of evil? +Theseus ridding the land of robbers, and delivering it from the yearly +tribute of boys and maidens to be devoured by the Minotaur; Perseus +slaying the Gorgon, and rescuing Andromeda from the sea-beast; Heracles +with his twelve famous labours against giants and monsters; and all the +rest— + + Who dared, in the god-given might of their manhood, + Greatly to do and to suffer, and far in the fens and the forests + Smite the devourers of men, heaven-hated brood of the giants; + Transformed, strange, without like, who obey not the golden-haired + rulers. + +These are figures whose divine moral beauty has sunk into the hearts, not +merely of poets or of artists, but of men and women who suffered and who +feared; the memory of them, fables though they may have been, ennobled +the old Greek heart; they ennobled the heart of Europe in the fifteenth +century, at the re-discovery of Greek literature. So far from +contradicting the Christian ideal, they harmonised with—I had almost said +they supplemented—that more tender and saintly ideal of heroism which had +sprung up during the earlier Middle Ages. They justified, and actually +gave a new life to, the old noblenesses of chivalry, which had grown up +in the later Middle Ages as a necessary supplement of active and manly +virtue to the passive and feminine virtue of the cloister. They +inspired, mingling with these two other elements, a literature both in +England, France, and Italy, in which the three elements, the saintly, the +chivalrous, and the Greek heroic, have become one and undistinguishable, +because all three are human, and all three divine; a literature which +developed itself in Ariosto, in Tasso, in the Hypnerotomachia, the +Arcadia, the Euphues, and other forms, sometimes fantastic, sometimes +questionable, but which reached its perfection in our own Spenser’s +“Fairy Queen”—perhaps the most admirable poem which has ever been penned +by mortal man. + +And why? What has made these old Greek myths live, myths though they be, +and fables, and fair dreams? What—though they have no body, and, +perhaps, never had—has given them an immortal soul, which can speak to +the immortal souls of all generations to come? + +What but this, that in them—dim it may be and undeveloped, but still +there—lies the divine idea of self-sacrifice as the perfection of +heroism, of self-sacrifice, as the highest duty and the highest joy of +him who claims a kindred with the gods? + +Let us say, then, that true heroism must involve self-sacrifice. Those +stories certainly involve it, whether ancient or modern, which the +hearts, not of philosophers merely, or poets, but of the poorest and the +most ignorant, have accepted instinctively as the highest form of moral +beauty—the highest form, and yet one possible to all. + +Grace Darling rowing out into the storm towards the wreck. The “drunken +private of the Buffs,” who, prisoner among the Chinese, and commanded to +prostrate himself and kotoo, refused in the name of his country’s honour: +“He would not bow to any China-man on earth:” and so was knocked on the +head, and died surely a hero’s death. Those soldiers of the Birkenhead, +keeping their ranks to let the women and children escape, while they +watched the sharks who in a few minutes would be tearing them limb from +limb. Or, to go across the Atlantic—for there are heroes in the Far +West—Mr. Bret Harte’s “Flynn of Virginia,” on the Central Pacific +Railway—the place is shown to travellers—who sacrificed his life for his +married comrade: + + There, in the drift, + Back to the wall, + He held the timbers + Ready to fall. + Then in the darkness + I heard him call: + “Run for your life, Jake! + Run for your wife’s sake! + Don’t wait for me.” + + And that was all + Heard in the din— + Heard of Tom Flynn— + Flynn of Virginia. + +Or the engineer, again, on the Mississippi, who, when the steamer caught +fire, held, as he had sworn he would, her bow against the bank, till +every soul save he got safe on shore: + + Through the hot black breath of the burning boat + Jim Bludso’s voice was heard; + And they all had trust in his cussedness, + And knew he would keep his word. + And sure’s you’re born, they all got off + Afore the smokestacks fell; + And Bludso’s ghost went up alone + In the smoke of the Prairie Belle. + + He weren’t no saint—but at the judgment + I’d run my chance with Jim + ’Longside of some pious gentlemen + That wouldn’t shake hands with him. + He’d seen his duty—a dead sure thing— + And went for it there and then; + And Christ is not going to be too hard + On a man that died for men. + +To which gallant poem of Colonel John Hay’s—and he has written many +gallant and beautiful poems—I have but one demurrer: Jim Bludso did not +merely do his duty but more than his duty. He did a voluntary deed, to +which he was bound by no code or contract, civil or moral; just as he who +introduced me to that poem won his Victoria Cross—as many a cross, +Victoria and other, has been won—by volunteering for a deed to which he, +too, was bound by no code or contract, military or moral. And it is of +the essence of self-sacrifice, and therefore of heroism, that it should +be voluntary; a work of supererogation, at least towards society and man; +an act to which the hero or heroine is not bound by duty, but which is +above though not against duty. + +Nay, on the strength of that same element of self-sacrifice, I will not +grudge the epithet “heroic,” which my revered friend Mr. Darwin justly +applies to the poor little monkey, who once in his life did that which +was above his duty; who lived in continual terror of the great baboon, +and yet, when the brute had sprung upon his friend the keeper, and was +tearing out his throat, conquered his fear by love, and, at the risk of +instant death, sprang in turn upon his dreaded enemy, and bit and +shrieked till help arrived. + +Some would nowadays use that story merely to prove that the monkey’s +nature and the man’s nature are, after all, one and the same. Well: I, +at least, have never denied that there is a monkey-nature in man, as +there is a peacock-nature, and a swine-nature, and a wolf-nature—of all +which four I see every day too much. The sharp and stern distinction +between men and animals, as far as their natures are concerned, is of a +more modern origin than people fancy. Of old the Assyrian took the +eagle, the ox, and the lion—and not unwisely—as the three highest types +of human capacity. The horses of Homer might be immortal, and weep for +their master’s death. The animals and monsters of Greek myth—like the +Ananzi spider of Negro fable—glide insensibly into speech and reason. +Birds—the most wonderful of all animals in the eyes of a man of science +or a poet—are sometimes looked on as wiser, and nearer to the gods, than +man. The Norseman—the noblest and ablest human being, save the Greek, of +whom history can tell us—was not ashamed to say of the bear of his native +forests that he had “ten men’s strength and eleven men’s wisdom.” How +could Reinecke Fuchs have gained immortality, in the Middle Ages and +since, save by the truth of its too solid and humiliating theorem—that +the actions of the world of men were, on the whole, guided by passions +but too exactly like those of the lower animals? I have said, and say +again, with good old Vaughan: + + Unless above himself he can + Exalt himself, how mean a thing is man. + +But I cannot forget that many an old Greek poet or sage, and many a +sixteenth and seventeenth century one, would have interpreted the +monkey’s heroism from quite a different point of view; and would have +said that the poor little creature had been visited suddenly by some +“divine afflatus”—an expression quite as philosophical and quite as +intelligible as most philosophic formulas which I read nowadays—and had +been thus raised for the moment above his abject selfish monkey-nature, +just as man requires to be raised above his. But that theory belongs to +a philosophy which is out of date and out of fashion, and which will have +to wait a century or two before it comes into fashion again. + +And now, if self-sacrifice and heroism be, as I believe, identical, I +must protest against the use of the word “sacrifice” which is growing too +common in newspaper-columns, in which we are told of an “enormous +sacrifice of life;” an expression which means merely that a great many +poor wretches have been killed, quite against their own will, and for no +purpose whatsoever; no sacrifice at all, unless it be one to the demons +of ignorance, cupidity, or mismanagement. + +The stout Whig undergraduate understood better the meaning of such words, +who, when asked, “In what sense might Charles the First be said to be a +martyr?” answered, “In the same sense that a man might be said to be a +martyr to the gout.” + +And I must protest, in like wise, against a misuse of the words “hero.” +“heroism,” “heroic,” which is becoming too common, namely, applying them +to mere courage. We have borrowed the misuse, I believe, as we have more +than one beside, from the French press. I trust that we shall neither +accept it, nor the temper which inspires it. It may be convenient for +those who flatter their nation, and especially the military part of it, +into a ruinous self-conceit, to frame some such syllogism as this: +“Courage is heroism: every Frenchman is naturally courageous: therefore +every Frenchman is a hero.” But we, who have been trained at once in a +sounder school of morals, and in a greater respect for facts, and for +language as the expression of facts, shall be careful, I hope, not to +trifle thus with that potent and awful engine—human speech. We shall +eschew likewise, I hope, a like abuse of the word “moral,” which has +crept from the French press now and then, not only into our own press, +but into the writings of some of our military men, who, as Englishmen, +should have known better. We were told again and again, during the late +war, that the moral effect of such a success had been great; that the +_morale_ of the troops was excellent; or again, that the _morale_ of the +troops had suffered, or even that they were somewhat demoralised. But +when one came to test what was really meant by these fine words, one +discovered that morals had nothing to do with the facts which they +expressed; that the troops were in the one case actuated simply by the +animal passion of hope, in the other simply by the animal passion of +fear. This abuse of the word “moral” has crossed, I am sorry to say, the +Atlantic; and a witty American, whom we must excuse, though we must not +imitate, when some one had been blazing away at him with a revolver, he +being unarmed, is said to have described his very natural emotions on the +occasion, by saying that he felt dreadfully demoralised. We, I hope, +shall confine the word “demoralisation,” as our generals of the last +century would have done, when applied to soldiers, to crime, including, +of course, the neglect of duty or of discipline; and we shall mean by the +word “heroism,” in like manner, whether applied to a soldier or to any +human being, not mere courage, not the mere doing of duty, but the doing +of something beyond duty; something which is not in the bond; some +spontaneous and unexpected act of self-devotion. + +I am glad, but not surprised, to see that Miss Yonge has held to this +sound distinction in her golden little book of “Golden Deeds,” and said, +“Obedience, at all costs and risks, is the very essence of a soldier’s +life. It has the solid material, but it has hardly the exceptional +brightness, of a golden deed.” + +I know that it is very difficult to draw the line between mere obedience +to duty and express heroism. I know also that it would be both invidious +and impertinent in an utterly unheroic personage like me, to try to draw +that line; and to sit at home at ease, analysing and criticising deeds +which I could not do myself; but—to give an instance or two of what I +mean: + +To defend a post as long as it is tenable is not heroic. It is simple +duty. To defend it after it has become untenable, and even to die in so +doing, is not heroic, but a noble madness, unless an advantage is to be +gained thereby for one’s own side. Then, indeed, it rises towards, if +not into, the heroism of self-sacrifice. + +Who, for example, will not endorse the verdict of all ages on the conduct +of those Spartans at Thermopylæ, when they sat “combing their yellow hair +for death” on the sea-shore? They devoted themselves to hopeless +destruction; but why? They felt—I must believe that, for they behaved as +if they felt—that on them the destinies of the Western World might hang; +that they were in the forefront of the battle between civilisation and +barbarism, between freedom and despotism; and that they must teach that +vast mob of Persian slaves, whom the officers of the Great King were +driving with whips up to their lance-points, that the spirit of the old +heroes was not dead; and that the Greek, even in defeat and death, was a +mightier and a nobler man than they. And they did their work. They +produced, if you will, a “moral” effect, which has lasted even to this +very day. They struck terror into the heart, not only of the Persian +host, but of the whole Persian empire. They made the event of that war +certain, and the victories of Salamis and Platæa comparatively easy. +They made Alexander’s conquest of the East, one hundred and fifty years +afterwards, not only possible at all, but permanent when it came; and +thus helped to determine the future civilisation of the whole world. + +They did not, of course, foresee all this. No great or inspired man can +foresee all the consequences of his deeds; but these men were, as I hold +inspired to see somewhat at least of the mighty stake for which they +played; and to count their lives worthless, if Sparta had sent them +thither to help in that great game. + +Or shall we refuse the name of heroic to those three German cavalry +regiments who, in the battle of Mars-la-Tour, were bidden to hurl +themselves upon the chassepots and mitrailleuses of the unbroken French +infantry, and went to almost certain death, over the corpses of their +comrades, on and in and through, reeling man over horse, horse over man, +and clung like bull-dogs to their work, and would hardly leave, even at +the bugle-call, till in one regiment thirteen officers out of nineteen +were killed or wounded? And why? + +Because the French army must be stopped, if it were but for a quarter of +an hour. A respite must be gained for the exhausted Third Corps. And +how much might be done, even in a quarter of an hour, by men who knew +when, and where, and why to die! Who will refuse the name of heroes to +these men? And yet they, probably, would have utterly declined the +honour. They had but done that which was in the bond. They were but +obeying orders after all. As Miss Yonge well says of all heroic persons: +“‘I have but done that which it was my duty to do,’ is the natural answer +of those capable of such actions. They have been constrained to them by +duty or pity; have never deemed it possible to act otherwise; and did not +once think of themselves in the matter at all.” + +These last true words bring us to another element in heroism: its +simplicity. Whatsoever is not simple; whatsoever is affected, boastful, +wilful, covetous, tarnishes, even destroys, the heroic character of a +deed; because all these faults spring out of self. On the other hand, +wherever you find a perfectly simple, frank, unconscious character, there +you have the possibility, at least, of heroic action. For it is nobler +far to do the most commonplace duty in the household, or behind the +counter, with a single eye to duty, simply because it must be done—nobler +far, I say, than to go out of your way to attempt a brilliant deed, with +a double mind, and saying to yourself not only—“This will be a brilliant +deed,” but also—“and it will pay me, or raise me, or set me off, into the +bargain.” Heroism knows no “into the bargain.” And therefore, again, I +must protest against applying the word “heroic” to any deeds, however +charitable, however toilsome, however dangerous, performed for the sake +of what certain French ladies, I am told, call “faire son salut”—saving +one’s soul in the world to come. I do not mean to judge. Other and +quite unselfish motives may be, and doubtless often are, mixed up with +that selfish one: womanly pity and tenderness; love for, and desire to +imitate, a certain Incarnate ideal of self-sacrifice, who is at once +human and divine. But that motive of saving the soul, which is too often +openly proposed and proffered, is utterly unheroic. The desire to escape +pains and penalties hereafter by pains and penalties here; the balance of +present loss against future gain—what is this but selfishness extended +out of this world into eternity? “Not worldliness,” indeed, as a +satirist once said with bitter truth, “but other-worldliness.” + +Moreover—and the young and the enthusiastic should also bear this in +mind—though heroism means the going beyond the limits of strict duty, it +never means the going out of the path of strict duty. If it is your duty +to go to London, go thither: you may go as much farther as you choose +after that. But you must go to London first. Do your duty first; it +will be time after that to talk of being heroic. + +And therefore one must seriously warn the young, lest they mistake for +heroism and self-sacrifice what is merely pride and self-will, discontent +with the relations by which God has bound them, and the circumstances +which God has appointed for them. I have known girls think they were +doing a fine thing by leaving uncongenial parents or disagreeable +sisters, and cutting out for themselves, as they fancied, a more useful +and elevated line of life than that of mere home duties; while, after +all, poor things, they were only saying, with the Pharisees of old, +“Corban, it is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me;” +and in the name of God, neglecting the command of God to honour their +father and mother. + +There are men, too, who will neglect their households and leave their +children unprovided for, and even uneducated, while they are spending +their money on philanthropic or religious hobbies of their own. It is +ill to take the children’s bread and cast it to the dogs; or even to the +angels. It is ill, I say, trying to make presents to God, before we have +tried to pay our debts to God. The first duty of every man is to the +wife whom he has married, and to the children whom she has brought into +the world; and to neglect them is not heroism, but self-conceit; the +conceit that a man is so necessary to Almighty God, that God will +actually allow him to do wrong, if He can only thereby secure the man’s +invaluable services. Be sure that every motive which comes not from the +single eye, every motive which springs from self, is by its very essence +unheroic, let it look as gaudy or as beneficent as it may. + +But I cannot go so far as to say the same of the love of approbation—the +desire for the love and respect of our fellow-men. That must not be +excluded from the list of heroic motives. I know that it is, or may be +proved to be, by victorious analysis, an emotion common to us and the +lower animals. And yet no man excludes it less than that true hero, St. +Paul. + +If those brave Spartans, if those brave Germans, of whom I spoke just +now, knew that their memories would be wept over and worshipped by brave +men and fair women, and that their names would become watchwords to +children in their fatherland, what is that to us, save that it should +make us rejoice, if we be truly human, that they had that thought with +them in their last moments to make self-devotion more easy, and death +more sweet? + +And yet—and yet—is not the highest heroism that which is free even from +the approbation of our fellowmen, even from the approbation of the best +and wisest? The heroism which is known only to our Father who seeth in +secret? The Godlike deeds alone in the lonely chamber? The Godlike +lives lived in obscurity?—a heroism rare among us men, who live perforce +in the glare and noise of the outer world: more common among women; women +of whom the world never hears; who, if the world discovered them, would +only draw the veil more closely over their faces and their hearts, and +entreat to be left alone with God. True, they cannot always hide. They +must not always hide; or their fellow-creatures would lose the golden +lesson. But, nevertheless, it is of the essence of the perfect and +womanly heroism, in which, as in all spiritual forces the woman +transcends the man, that it would hide if it could. + +And it was a pleasant thought to me, when I glanced lately at the golden +deeds of women in Miss Yonge’s book—it was a pleasant thought to me, that +I could say to myself—Ah! yes. These heroines are known, and their fame +flies through the mouths of men. But if so, how many thousands of +heroines there must have been, how many thousands there may be now, of +whom we shall never know. But still they are there. They sow in secret +the seed of which we pluck the flower and eat the fruit, and know not +that we pass the sower daily in the street; perhaps some humble, +ill-dressed woman, earning painfully her own small sustenance. She who +nurses a bedridden mother, instead of sending her to the workhouse. She +who spends her heart and her money on a drunken father, a reckless +brother, on the orphans of a kinsman or a friend. She who—But why go on +with the long list of great little heroisms, with which a clergyman at +least comes in contact daily—and it is one of the most ennobling +privileges of a clergyman’s high calling that he does come in contact +with them—why go on, I say, save to commemorate one more form of great +little heroism—the commonest, and yet the least remembered of all—namely, +the heroism of an average mother? Ah, when I think of that last broad +fact, I gather hope again for poor humanity; and this dark world looks +bright, this diseased world looks wholesome to me once more—because, +whatever else it is or is not full of, it is at least full of mothers. + +While the satirist only sneers, as at a stock butt for his ridicule, at +the managing mother trying to get her daughters married off her hands by +chicaneries and meannesses, which every novelist knows too well how to +draw—would to heaven he, or rather, alas! she would find some more +chivalrous employment for his or her pen—for were they not, too, born of +woman?—I only say to myself—having had always a secret fondness for poor +Rebecca, though I love Esau more than Jacob—Let the poor thing alone. +With pain she brought these girls into the world. With pain she educated +them according to her light. With pain she is trying to obtain for them +the highest earthly blessing of which she can conceive, namely, to be +well married; and if in doing that last, she manœuvres a little, commits +a few basenesses, even tells a few untruths, what does all that come to, +save this—that in the confused intensity of her motherly self-sacrifice, +she will sacrifice for her daughters even her own conscience and her own +credit? We may sneer, if we will, at such a poor hard-driven soul when +we meet her in society; our duty, both as Christians and ladies and +gentlemen, seems to me to be—to do for her something very different +indeed. + +But to return. Looking at the amount of great little heroisms, which are +being, as I assert, enacted around us every day, no one has a right to +say, what we are all tempted to say at times: “How can I be heroic? This +is no heroic age, setting me heroic examples. We are growing more and +more comfortable, frivolous, pleasure-seeking, money-making; more and +more utilitarian; more and more mercenary in our politics, in our morals, +in our religion; thinking less and less of honour and duty, and more and +more of loss and gain. I am born into an unheroic time. You must not +ask me to become heroic in it.” + +I do not deny that it is more difficult to be heroic, while circumstances +are unheroic round us. We are all too apt to be the puppets of +circumstances; all too apt to follow the fashion; all too apt, like so +many minnows, to take our colour from the ground on which we lie, in +hopes, like them, of comfortable concealment, lest the new tyrant deity, +called Public Opinion, should spy us out, and, like Nebuchadnezzar of +old, cast us into a burning fiery furnace—which public opinion can make +very hot—for daring to worship any god or man save the will of the +temporary majority. + +Yes, it is difficult to be anything but poor, mean, insufficient, +imperfect people, as like each other as so many sheep; and, like so many +sheep, having no will or character of our own, but rushing altogether +blindly over the same gap, in foolish fear of the same dog, who, after +all, dare not bite us; and so it always was and always will be. + +For the third time I say, + + Unless above himself he can + Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man. + +But, nevertheless, any man or woman who _will_, in any age and under any +circumstances, can live the heroic life and exercise heroic influences. + +If any ask proof of this, I shall ask them, in return, to read two +novels; novels, indeed, but, in their method and their moral, partaking +of that heroic and ideal element, which will make them live, I trust, +long after thousands of mere novels have returned to their native dust. +I mean Miss Muloch’s “John Halifax, Gentleman,” and Mr. Thackeray’s +“Esmond,” two books which no man or woman ought to read without being the +nobler for them. + +“John Halifax, Gentleman,” is simply the history of a poor young clerk, +who rises to be a wealthy mill-owner in the manufacturing districts, in +the early part of this century. But he contrives to be an heroic and +ideal clerk, and an heroic and ideal mill-owner; and that without doing +anything which the world would call heroic or ideal, or in anywise +stepping out of his sphere, minding simply his own business, and doing +the duty which lies nearest him. And how? By getting into his head from +youth the strangest notion, that in whatever station or business he may +be, he can always be what he considers a gentleman; and that if he only +behaves like a gentleman, all must go right at last. A beautiful book. +As I said before, somewhat of an heroic and ideal book. A book which did +me good when first I read it; which ought to do any young man good who +will read it, and then try to be, like John Halifax, a gentleman, whether +in the shop, the counting-house, the bank, or the manufactory. + +The other—an even more striking instance of the possibility, at least, of +heroism anywhere and everywhere—is Mr. Thackeray’s “Esmond.” On the +meaning of that book I can speak with authority. For my dear and +regretted friend told me himself that my interpretation of it was the +true one; that this was the lesson which he meant men to learn therefrom. + +Esmond is a man of the first half of the eighteenth century; living in a +coarse, drunken, ignorant, profligate, and altogether unheroic age. He +is—and here the high art and the high morality of Mr. Thackeray’s genius +is shown—altogether a man of his own age. He is not a sixteenth-century +or a nineteenth-century man born out of time. His information, his +politics, his religion, are no higher than of those round him. His +manners, his views of human life, his very prejudices and faults, are +those of his age. The temptations which he conquers are just those under +which the men around him fall. But how does he conquer them? By holding +fast throughout to honour, duty, virtue. Thus, and thus alone, he +becomes an ideal eighteenth-century gentleman, an eighteenth-century +hero. This was what Mr. Thackeray meant—for he told me so himself, I +say—that it was possible, even in England’s lowest and foulest times, to +be a gentleman and a hero, if a man would but be true to the light within +him. + +But I will go farther. I will go from ideal fiction to actual, and yet +ideal, fact; and say that, as I read history, the most unheroic age which +the civilised world ever saw was also the most heroic; that the spirit of +man triumphed most utterly over his circumstances at the very moment when +those circumstances were most against him. + +How and why he did so is a question for philosophy in the highest sense +of that word. The fact of his having done so is matter of history. +Shall I solve my own riddle? + +Then, have we not heard of the early Christian martyrs? Is there a doubt +that they, unlettered men, slaves, weak women, even children, did +exhibit, under an infinite sense of duty, issuing in infinite +self-sacrifice, a heroism such as the world had never seen before; did +raise the ideal of human nobleness a whole stage—rather say, a whole +heaven—higher than before; and that wherever the tale of their great +deeds spread, men accepted, even if they did not copy, those martyrs as +ideal specimens of the human race, till they were actually worshipped by +succeeding generations, wrongly, it may be, but pardonably, as a choir of +lesser deities? + +But is there, on the other hand, a doubt that the age in which they were +heroic was the most unheroic of all ages; that they were bred, lived, and +died, under the most debasing of materialist tyrannies, with art, +literature, philosophy, family and national life dying, or dead around +them, and in cities the corruption of which cannot be told for very +shame—cities, compared with which Paris is the abode of Arcadian +simplicity and innocence? When I read Petronius and Juvenal, and +recollect that they were the contemporaries of the Apostles; when—to give +an instance which scholars, and perhaps, happily, only scholars, can +appreciate—I glance once more at Trimalchio’s feast, and remember that +within a mile of that feast St. Paul may have been preaching to a +Christian congregation, some of whom—for St. Paul makes no secret of that +strange fact—may have been, ere their conversion, partakers in just such +vulgar and bestial orgies as those which were going on in the rich +freedman’s halls; after that, I say, I can put no limit to the +possibility of man’s becoming heroic, even though he be surrounded by a +hell on earth; no limit to the capacities of any human being to form for +himself or herself a high and pure ideal of human character; and, without +“playing fantastic tricks before high heaven,” to carry out that ideal in +every-day life; and in the most commonplace circumstances, and the most +menial occupations, to live worthy of—as I conceive—our heavenly +birthright, and to imitate the heroes, who were the kinsmen of the gods. + + + + +THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS. + + + Speech in behalf of Ladies’ Sanitary Association. {257} + +LET me begin by asking the ladies who are interesting themselves in this +good work, whether they have really considered what they are about to do +in carrying out their own plans? Are they aware that if their Society +really succeeds, they will produce a very serious, some would think a +very dangerous, change in the state of this nation? Are they aware that +they would probably save the lives of some thirty or forty per cent. of +the children who are born in England, and that therefore they would cause +the subjects of Queen Victoria to increase at a very far more rapid rate +than they do now? And are they aware that some very wise men inform us +that England is already over-peopled, and that it is an exceedingly +puzzling question where we shall soon be able to find work or food for +our masses, so rapidly do they increase already, in spite of the thirty +or forty per cent. which kind Nature carries off yearly before they are +five years old? Have they considered what they are to do with all those +children whom they are going to save alive? That has to be thought of; +and if they really do believe, with some political economists, that +over-population is a possibility to a country which has the greatest +colonial empire that the world has ever seen; then I think they had +better stop in their course, and let the children die, as they have been +in the habit of dying. + +But if, on the other hand, it seems to them, as I confess it does to me, +that the most precious thing in the world is a human being; that the +lowest, and poorest, and the most degraded of human beings is better than +all the dumb animals in the world; that there is an infinite, priceless +capability in that creature, fallen as it may be; a capability of virtue, +and of social and industrial use, which, if it is taken in time, may be +developed up to a pitch, of which at first sight the child gives no hint +whatsoever; if they believe again, that of all races upon earth now, the +English race is probably the finest, and that it gives not the slightest +sign whatever of exhaustion; that it seems to be on the whole a young +race, and to have very great capabilities in it which have not yet been +developed, and above all, the most marvellous capability of adapting +itself to every sort of climate and every form of life, which any race, +except the old Roman, ever has had in the world; if they consider with me +that it is worth the while of political economists and social +philosophers to look at the map, and see that about four-fifths of the +globe cannot be said as yet to be in anywise inhabited or cultivated, or +in the state into which men could put it by a fair supply of population, +and industry, and human intellect: then, perhaps, they may think with me +that it is a duty, one of the noblest of duties, to help the increase of +the English race as much as possible, and to see that every child that is +born into this great nation of England be developed to the highest pitch +to which we can develop him in physical strength and in beauty, as well +as in intellect and in virtue. And then, in that light, it does seem to +me, that this Institution—small now, but I do hope some day to become +great and to become the mother institution of many and valuable +children—is one of the noblest, most right-minded, straightforward, and +practical conceptions that I have come across for some years. + +We all know the difficulties of sanitary legislation. One looks at them +at times almost with despair. I have my own reasons, with which I will +not trouble this meeting, for looking on them with more despair than +ever: not on account of the government of the time, or any possible +government that could come to England, but on account of the peculiar +class of persons in whom the ownership of the small houses has become +more and more vested, and who are becoming more and more, I had almost +said, the arbiters of the popular opinion, and of every election of +parliament. However, that is no business of ours here; that must be +settled somewhere else; and a fearfully long time, it seems to me, it +will be before it is settled. But, in the meantime, what legislation +cannot do, I believe private help, and, above all, woman’s help, can do +even better. It can do this; it can improve the condition of the working +man: and not only of him; I must speak also of the middle classes, of the +men who own the house in which the working man lives. I must speak, too, +of the wealthy tradesman; I must speak—it is a sad thing to have to say +it—of our own class as well as of others. Sanitary reform, as it is +called, or, in plain English, the art of health, is so very recent a +discovery, as all true physical science is, that we ourselves and our own +class know very little about it, and practise it very little. And this +society, I do hope, will bear in mind that it is not simply to seek the +working man, not only to go into the foul alley: but it is to go to the +door of the farmer, to the door of the shopkeeper, aye, to the door of +ladies and gentlemen of the same rank as ourselves. Women can do in that +work what men cannot do. The private correspondence, private +conversation, private example, of ladies, above all of married women, of +mothers of families, may do what no legislation can do. I am struck more +and more with the amount of disease and death I see around me in all +classes, which no sanitary legislation whatsoever could touch, unless you +had a complete house-to-house visitation by some government officer, with +powers to enter every dwelling, to drain it, and ventilate it; and not +only that, but to regulate the clothes and the diet of every inhabitant, +and that among all ranks. I can conceive of nothing short of that, which +would be absurd and impossible, and would also be most harmful morally, +which would stop the present amount of disease and death which I see +around me, without some such private exertion on the part of women, above +all of mothers, as I do hope will spring from this institution more and +more. + +I see this, that three persons out of every four are utterly unaware of +the general causes of their own ill-health, and of the ill-health of +their children. They talk of their “afflictions,” and their +“misfortunes;” and, if they be pious people, they talk of “the will of +God,” and of “the visitation of God.” I do not like to trench upon those +matters here; but when I read in my book and in your book, “that it is +not the will of our Father in Heaven that one of these little ones should +perish,” it has come to my mind sometimes with very great strength that +that may have a physical application as well as a spiritual one; and that +the Father in Heaven who does not wish the child’s soul to die, may +possibly have created that child’s body for the purpose of its not dying +except in a good old age. For not only in the lower class, but in the +middle and upper classes, when one sees an unhealthy family, then in +three cases out of four, if one will take time, trouble, and care enough, +one can, with the help of the doctor, who has been attending them, run +the evil home to a very different cause than the will of God; and that +is, to stupid neglect, stupid ignorance, or what is just as bad, stupid +indulgence. + +Now, I do believe that if those tracts which you are publishing, which I +have read and of which I cannot speak too highly, are spread over the +length and breadth of the land, and if women—clergymen’s wives, the wives +of manufacturers and of great employers, district visitors and +schoolmistresses, have these books put into their hands, and are +persuaded to spread them, and to enforce them, by their own example and +by their own counsel—that then, in the course of a few years, this system +being thoroughly carried out, you would see a sensible and large increase +in the rate of population. When you have saved your children alive, then +you must settle what to do with them. But a living dog is better than a +dead lion; I would rather have the living child, and let it take its +chance, than let it return to God—wasted. O! it is a distressing thing +to see children die. God gives the most beautiful and precious thing +that earth can have, and we just take it and cast it away; we toss our +pearls upon the dunghill and leave them. A dying child is to me one of +the most dreadful sights in the world. A dying man, a man dying on the +field of battle—that is a small sight; he has taken his chance; he is +doing his duty; he has had his excitement; he has had his glory, if that +will be any consolation to him; if he is a wise man, he has the feeling +that he is dying for his country and his queen: and that is, and ought to +be, enough for him. I am not horrified or shocked at the sight of the +man who dies on the field of battle; let him die so. It does not horrify +or shock me, again, to see a man dying in a good old age, even though the +last struggle be painful, as it too often is. But it does shock me, it +does make me feel that the world is indeed out of joint, to see a child +die. I believe it to be a priceless boon to the child to have lived for +a week, or a day: but oh, what has God given to this thankless earth, and +what has the earth thrown away; and in nine cases out of ten, from its +own neglect and carelessness! What that boy might have been, what he +might have done as an Englishman, if he could have lived and grown up +healthy and strong! And I entreat you to bear this in mind, that it is +not as if our lower or our middle classes were not worth saving: bear in +mind that the physical beauty, strength, intellectual power of the middle +classes—the shopkeeping class, the farming class, down to the lowest +working class—whenever you give them a fair chance, whenever you give +them fair food and air, and physical education of any kind, prove them to +be the finest race in Europe. Not merely the aristocracy, splendid race +as they are, but down and down and down to the lowest labouring man, to +the navigator—why, there is not such a body of men in Europe as our +navigators; and no body of men perhaps have had a worse chance of growing +to be what they are; and yet see what they have done! See the +magnificent men they become, in spite of all that is against them, +dragging them down, tending to give them rickets and consumption, and all +the miserable diseases which children contract; see what men they are, +and then conceive what they might be! It has been said, again and again, +that there are no more beautiful race of women in Europe than the wives +and daughters of our London shopkeepers; and yet there are few races of +people who lead a life more in opposition to all rules of hygiene. But, +in spite of all that, so wonderful is the vitality of the English race, +they are what they are; and therefore we have the finest material to work +upon that people ever had. And, therefore, again, we have the less +excuse if we do allow English people to grow up puny, stunted, and +diseased. + +Let me refer again to that word that I used; death—the amount of death. +I really believe there are hundreds of good and kind people who would +take up this subject with their whole heart and soul if they were aware +of the magnitude of the evil. Lord Shaftesbury told you just now that +there were one hundred thousand preventable deaths in England every year. +So it is. We talk of the loss of human life in war. We are the fools of +smoke and noise; because there are cannon-balls, forsooth, and swords and +red coats; and because it costs a great deal of money, and makes a great +deal of talk in the papers, we think: What so terrible as war? I will +tell you what is ten times, and ten thousand times, more terrible than +war, and that is outraged Nature. War, we are discovering now, is the +clumsiest and most expensive of all games; we are finding that if you +wish to commit an act of cruelty and folly, the most costly one that you +can commit is to contrive to shoot your fellow-men in war. So it is; and +thank God that so it is; but Nature, insidious, inexpensive, silent, +sends no roar of cannon, no glitter of arms to do her work; she gives no +warning note of preparation; she has no protocols, nor any diplomatic +advances, whereby she warns her enemy that war is coming. Silently, I +say, and insidiously she goes forth; no! she does not even go forth; she +does not step out of her path; but quietly, by the very same means by +which she makes alive, she puts to death; and so avenges herself of those +who have rebelled against her. By the very same laws by which every +blade of grass grows, and every insect springs to life in the sunbeam, +she kills, and kills, and kills, and is never tired of killing; till she +has taught man the terrible lesson he is so slow to learn, that, Nature +is only conquered by obeying her. + +And bear in mind one thing more. Man has his courtesies of war, and his +chivalries of war; he does not strike the unarmed man; he spares the +woman and the child. But Nature is as fierce when she is offended, as +she is bounteous and kind when she is obeyed. She spares neither woman +nor child. She has no pity; for some awful, but most good reason, she is +not allowed to have any pity. Silently she strikes the sleeping babe, +with as little remorse as she would strike the strong man, with the spade +or the musket in his hand. Ah! would to God that some man had the +pictorial eloquence to put before the mothers of England the mass of +preventable suffering, the mass of preventable agony of mind and body, +which exists in England year after year; and would that some man had the +logical eloquence to make them understand that it is in their power, in +the power of the mothers and wives of the higher class, I will not say to +stop it all—God only knows that—but to stop, as I believe, three-fourths +of it. + +It is in the power, I believe, of any woman in this room to save three or +four lives—human lives—during the next six months. It is in your power, +ladies; and it is so easy. You might save several lives apiece, if you +choose, without, I believe, interfering with your daily business, or with +your daily pleasure; or, if you choose, with your daily frivolities, in +any way whatsoever. Let me ask, then, those who are here, and who have +not yet laid these things to heart: Will you let this meeting to-day be a +mere passing matter of two or three hours’ interest, which you may go +away and forget for the next book or the next amusement? Or will you be +in earnest? Will you learn—I say it openly—from the noble chairman, how +easy it is to be in earnest in life; how every one of you, amid all the +artificial complications of English society in the nineteenth century, +can find a work to do, a noble work to do, a chivalrous work to do—just +as chivalrous as if you lived in any old magic land, such as Spenser +talked of in his “Faërie Queene;” how you can be as true a knight-errant +or lady-errant in the present century, as if you had lived far away in +the dark ages of violence and rapine? Will you, I ask, learn this? Will +you learn to be in earnest; and to use the position, and the station, and +the talent that God has given you to save alive those who should live? +And will you remember that it is not the will of your Father that is in +Heaven that one little one that plays in the kennel outside should +perish, either in body or in soul? + + + + +“A MAD WORLD, MY MASTERS.” {271} + + +THE cholera, as was to be expected, has reappeared in England again; and +England, as was to be expected, has taken no sufficient steps towards +meeting it; so that if, as seems but too probable, the plague should +spread next summer, we may count with tolerable certainty upon a loss of +some ten thousand lives. + +That ten thousand, or one thousand, innocent people should die, of whom +most, if not all, might be saved alive, would seem at first sight a +matter serious enough for the attention of “philanthropists.” Those who +abhor the practice of hanging one man would, one fancies, abhor equally +that of poisoning many; and would protest as earnestly against the +painful capital punishment of diarrhoea as against the painless one of +hempen rope. Those who demand mercy for the Sepoy, and immunity for the +Coolie women of Delhi, unsexed by their own brutal and shameless cruelty, +would, one fancies, demand mercy also for the British workman, and +immunity for his wife and family. One is therefore somewhat startled at +finding that the British nation reserves to itself, though it forbids to +its armies, the right of putting to death unarmed and unoffending men, +women, and children. + +After further consideration, however, one finds that there are, as usual, +two sides to the question. One is bound, indeed, to believe, even before +proof, that there are two sides. It cannot be without good and +sufficient reason that the British public remains all but indifferent to +sanitary reform; that though the science of epidemics, as a science, has +been before the world for more than twenty years, nobody believes in it +enough to act upon it, save some few dozen of fanatics, some of whom have +(it cannot be denied) a direct pecuniary interest in disturbing what they +choose to term the poison-manufactories of free and independent Britons. + +Yes; we should surely respect the expressed will and conviction of the +most practical of nations, arrived at after the experience of three +choleras, stretching over a whole generation. Public opinion has +declared against the necessity of sanitary reform: and is not public +opinion known to be, in these last days, the Ithuriel’s spear which is to +unmask and destroy all the follies, superstitions, and cruelties of the +universe? The immense majority of the British nation will neither +cleanse themselves nor let others cleanse them: and are we not governed +by majorities? Are not majorities, confessedly, always in the right, +even when smallest, and a show of hands a surer test of truth than any +amount of wisdom, learning, or virtue? How much more, then, when a whole +free people is arrayed, in the calm magnificence of self-confident +conservatism, against a few innovating and perhaps sceptical +philosophasters? Then surely, if ever, vox populi is vox coeli. + +And, in fact, when we come to examine the first and commonest objection +against sanitary reformers, we find it perfectly correct. They are said +to be theorists, dreamers of the study, who are ignorant of human nature; +and who in their materialist optimism, have forgotten the existence of +moral evil till they almost fancy at times that they can set the world +right simply by righting its lowest material arrangements. The complaint +is perfectly true. They have been ignorant of human nature; they have +forgotten the existence of moral evil; and if any religious periodical +should complain of their denying original sin, they can only answer that +they did in past years fall into that folly, but that subsequent +experience has utterly convinced them of the truth of the doctrine. + +For, misled by this ignorance of human nature, they expected help, from +time to time, from various classes of the community, from whom no help +(as they ought to have known at first) is to be gotten. Some, as a fact, +expected the assistance of the clergy, and especially of the preachers of +those denominations who believe that every human being, by the mere fact +of his birth into this world, is destined to endless torture after death, +unless the preacher can find an opportunity to deliver him therefrom +before he dies. They supposed that to such preachers the mortal lives of +men would be inexpressibly precious; that any science which held out a +prospect of retarding death in the case of “lost millions” would be +hailed as a heavenly boon, and would be carried out with the fervour of +men who felt that for the soul’s sake no exertion was too great in behalf +of the body. + +A little more reflection would have quashed their vain hope. They would +have recollected that each of these preachers was already connected with +a congregation; that he had already a hold on them, and they on him; that +he was bound to provide for their spiritual wants before going forth to +seek for fresh objects of his ministry. They would have recollected that +on the old principle (and a very sound one) of a bird in the hand being +worth two in the bush, the minister of a congregation would feel it his +duty, as well as his interest, not to defraud his flock of his labours by +spending valuable time on a secular subject like sanitary reform, in the +hope of possibly preserving a few human beings, whose souls he might +hereafter (and that again would be merely a possibility) benefit. + +They would have recollected, again, that these congregations are almost +exclusively composed of those classes who have little or nothing to fear +from epidemics, and (what is even more important) who would have to bear +the expenses of sanitary improvements. But so sanguine, so reckless of +human conditions had their theories made them, that they actually +expected that parish rectors, already burdened with over-work and vestry +quarrels—nay, even that preachers who got their bread by pew-rents, and +whose life-long struggle was, therefore, to keep those pews filled, and +those renters in good humour—should astound the respectable house-owners +and ratepayers who sat beneath them by the appalling words: “You, and not +the ‘Visitation of God,’ are the cause of epidemics; and of you, now that +you are once fairly warned of your responsibility, will your brothers’ +blood be required.” Conceive Sanitary Reformers expecting this of +“ministers,” let their denomination be what it might—many of the poor +men, too, with a wife and seven children! Truly has it been said, that +nothing is so cruel as the unreasonableness of a fanatic. + +They forgot, too, that sanitary science, like geology, must be at first +sight “suspect” in the eyes of the priests of all denominations, at least +till they shall have arrived at a much higher degree of culture than they +now possess. + +Like geology, it interferes with that Deus e machinâ theory of human +affairs which has been in all ages the stronghold of priestcraft. That +the Deity is normally absent, and not present; that he works on the world +by interference, and not by continuous laws; that it is the privilege of +the priesthood to assign causes for these “judgments” and “visitations” +of the Almighty, and to tell mankind why He is angry with them, and has +broken the laws of nature to punish them—this, in every age, has seemed +to the majority of priests a doctrine to be defended at all hazards; for +without it, so they hold, their occupation were gone at once. {276} No +wonder, then, if they view with jealousy a set of laymen attributing +these “judgments” to purely chemical laws, and to misdoings and ignorance +which have as yet no place in the ecclesiastical catalogue of sins. +True, it may be that the Sanitary Reformers are right; but they had +rather not think so. And it is very easy not to think so. They only +have to ignore, to avoid examining, the facts. Their canon of utility is +a peculiar one; and with facts which do not come under that canon they +have no concern. It may be true, for instance, that the eighteenth +century, which to the clergy is a period of scepticism, darkness, and +spiritual death, is the very century which saw more done for science, for +civilisation, for agriculture, for manufacture, for the prolongation and +support of human life than any preceding one for a thousand years and +more. What matter? That is a “secular” question, of which they need +know nothing. And sanitary reform (if true) is just such another; a +matter (as slavery has been seen to be by the preachers of the United +States) for the legislator, and not for those whose kingdom is “not of +this world.” + +Others again expected, with equal wisdom, the assistance of the political +economist. The fact is undeniable, but at the same time inexplicable. +What they could have found in the doctrines of most modern political +economists which should lead them to suppose that human life would be +precious in their eyes, is unknown to the writer of these pages. Those +whose bugbear has been over-population, whose motto has been an +euphuistic version of + + The more the merrier; but the fewer the better fare— + +cannot be expected to lend their aid in increasing the population by +saving the lives of two-thirds of the children who now die prematurely in +our great cities; and so still further overcrowding this unhappy land +with those helpless and expensive sources of national poverty—rational +human beings, in strength and health. + +Moreover—and this point is worthy of serious attention—that school of +political economy, which has now reached its full development, has taken +all along a view of man’s relation to Nature diametrically opposite to +that taken by the Sanitary Reformer, or indeed by any other men of +science. The Sanitary Reformer holds, in common with the chemist or the +engineer, that Nature is to be obeyed only in order to conquer her; that +man is to discover the laws of her existing phenomena, in order that he +may employ them to create new phenomena himself; to turn the laws which +he discovers to his own use; if need be, to counteract one by another. +In this power, it has seemed to them, lay his dignity as a rational +being. It was this, the power of invention, which made him a progressive +animal, not bound as the bird and the bee are, to build exactly as his +forefathers built five thousand years ago. + +By political economy alone has this faculty been denied to man. In it +alone he is not to conquer nature, but simply to obey her. Let her +starve him, make him a slave, a bankrupt, or what not, he must submit, as +the savage does to the hail and the lightning. “Laissez-faire,” says the +“Science du néant,” the “Science de la misère,” as it has truly and +bitterly been called; “Laissez-faire.” Analyse economic questions if you +will: but beyond analysis you shall not step. Any attempt to raise +political economy to its synthetic stage is to break the laws of nature, +to fight against facts—as if facts were not made to be fought against and +conquered, and put out of the way, whensoever they interfere in the least +with the welfare of any human being. The drowning man is not to strike +out for his life lest by keeping his head above water he interfere with +the laws of gravitation. Not that the political economist, or any man, +can be true to his own fallacy. He must needs try his hand at the +synthetic method though he forbids it to the rest of the world: but the +only deductive hint which he has as yet given to mankind is, quaintly +enough, the most unnatural “eidolon specûs” which ever entered the head +of a dehumanised pedant—namely, that once famous “Preventive Check,” +which, if a nation did ever apply it—as it never will—could issue, as +every doctor knows, in nothing less than the questionable habits of +abortion, child-murder, and unnatural crime. + +The only explanation of such conduct (though one which the men themselves +will hardly accept) is this—that they secretly share somewhat in the +doubt which many educated men have of the correctness of their +inductions; that these same laws of political economy (where they leave +the plain and safe subject-matter of trade) have been arrived at somewhat +too hastily; that they are, in plain English, not quite sound enough yet +to build upon; and that we must wait for a few more facts before we begin +any theories. Be it so. At least, these men, in their present temper of +mind, are not likely to be very useful to the Sanitary Reformer. + +Would that these men, or the clergy, had been the only bruised reed in +which the Sanitary Reformers put their trust. They found another reed, +however, and that was Public Opinion; but they forgot that (whatever the +stump-orators may say about this being the age of electric thought, when +truth flashes triumphant from pole to pole, etc.) we have no proof +whatsoever that the proportion of fools is less in this generation than +in those before it, or that truth, when unpalatable (as it almost always +is), travels any faster than it did five hundred years ago. They forgot +that every social improvement, and most mechanical ones, have had to make +their way against laziness, ignorance, envy, vested wrongs, vested +superstitions, and the whole vis inertiæ of the world, the flesh, and the +devil. They were guilty indeed, in this case, not merely of ignorance of +human nature, but of forgetfulness of fact. Did they not know that the +excellent New Poor-law was greeted with the curses of those very farmers +and squires who now not only carry it out lovingly and willingly to the +very letter, but are often too ready to resist any improvement or +relaxation in it which may be proposed by that very Poor-law Board from +which it emanated? Did they not know that Agricultural Science, though +of sixty years’ steady growth, has not yet penetrated into a third of the +farms of England; and that hundreds of farmers still dawdle on after the +fashion of their forefathers, when by looking over the next hedge into +their neighbour’s field they might double their produce and their +profits? Did they not know that the adaptation of steam to machinery +would have progressed just as slowly, had it not been a fact patent to +babies that an engine is stronger than a horse; and that if cotton, like +wheat and beef, had taken twelve months to manufacture, instead of five +minutes, Manchester foresight would probably have been as short and as +purblind as that of the British farmer? What right had they to expect a +better reception for the facts of Sanitary Science?—facts which ought to, +and ultimately will, disturb the vested interests of thousands, will put +them to inconvenience, possibly at first to great expense; and yet facts +which you can neither see nor handle, but must accept and pay hundreds of +thousands of pounds for, on the mere word of a doctor or inspector who +gets his living thereby. Poor John Bull! To expect that you would +accept such a gospel cheerfully was indeed to expect too much! + +But yet, though the public opinion of the mass could not be depended on, +there was a body left, distinct from the mass, and priding itself so much +on that distinctness that it was ready to say at times—of course in more +courteous—at least in what it considered more Scriptural language: “This +people which knoweth not the law is accursed.” To it therefore—to the +religious world—some over-sanguine Sanitary Reformers turned their eyes. +They saw in it ready organised (so it professed) for all good works, a +body such as the world had never seen before. Where the religions public +of Byzantium, Alexandria, or Rome numbered hundreds, that of England +numbered its thousands. It was divided, indeed, on minor points, but it +was surely united by the one aim of saving every man his own soul, and of +professing the deepest reverence for that Divine Book which tells men +that the way to attain that aim is, to be good and to do good; and which +contains among other commandments this one—“Thou shaft not kill.” Its +wealth was enormous. It possessed so much political power, that it would +have been able to command elections, to compel ministers, to encourage +the weak hearts of willing but fearful clergymen by fair hopes of +deaneries and bishoprics. Its members were no clique of unpractical +fanatics—no men less. Though it might number among them a few martinet +ex-post-captains, and noblemen of questionable sanity, capable of no more +practical study than that of unfulfilled prophecy, the vast majority of +them were landowners, merchants, bankers, commercial men of all ranks, +full of worldly experience, and of the science of organisation, skilled +all their lives in finding and in employing men and money. What might +not be hoped from such a body, to whom that commercial imperium in +imperio of the French Protestants which the edict of Nantes destroyed was +poor and weak? Add to this that these men’s charities were boundless; +that they were spending yearly, and on the whole spending wisely and +well, ten times as much as ever was spent before in the world, on +educational schemes, missionary schemes, church building, reformatories, +ragged schools, needlewomen’s charities—what not? No object of distress, +it seemed, could be discovered, no fresh means of doing good devised, but +these men’s money poured bountifully and at once into that fresh channel, +and an organisation sprang up for the employment of that money, as +thrifty and as handy as was to be expected from the money-holding classes +of this great commercial nation. + +What could not these men do? What were they not bound by their own +principles to do? No wonder that some weak men’s hearts beat high at the +thought. What if the religious world should take up the cause of +Sanitary Reform? What if they should hail with joy a cause in which all, +whatever their theological differences, might join in one sacred crusade +against dirt, degradation, disease, and death? What if they should rise +at the hustings to inquire of every candidate: “Will you or will you not, +pledge yourself to carry out Sanitary Reform in the place for which you +are elected, and let the health and the lives of the local poor be that +‘local interest’ which you are bound by your election to defend? Do you +confess your ignorance of the subject? Then know, sir, that you are +unfit, at this point of the nineteenth century, to be a member of the +British Senate. You go thither to make laws ‘for the preservation of +life and property.’ You confess yourself ignorant of those physical +laws, stronger and wider than any which you can make, upon which all +human life depends, by infringing which the whole property of a district +is depreciated.” Again, what might not the “religious world,” and the +public opinion of “professing Christians,” have done in the last +twenty—ay, in the last three years? + +What it has done, is too patent to need comment here. + +The reasons of so strange an anomaly are to be approached with caution. +It is a serious thing to impute motives to a vast body of men, of whom +the majority are really respectable, kind-hearted, and useful; and if in +giving one’s deliberate opinion one seems to blame them, let it be +recollected that the blame lies not so much on them as on their teachers: +on those who, for some reasons best known to themselves, have truckled +to, and even justified, the self-satisfied ignorance of a comfortable +moneyed class. + +But let it be said, and said boldly, that these men’s conduct in the +matter of Sanitary Reform seems at least to show that they value virtue, +not for itself, but for its future rewards. To the great majority of +these men (with some heroic exceptions, whose names may be written in no +subscription list, but are surely written in the book of life) the great +truth has never been revealed, that good is the one thing to be done, at +all risks, for its own sake; that good is absolutely and infinitely +better than evil, whether it pay or not to all eternity. Ask one of +them: “Is it better to do right and go to hell, or do wrong and go to +heaven?”—they will look at you puzzled, half angry, suspecting you of +some secret blasphemy, and, if hard pressed, put off the new and +startling question by saying, that it is absurd to talk of an impossible +hypothesis. The human portion of their virtue is not mercenary, for they +are mostly worthy men; the religious part thereof, that which they keep +for Sundays and for charitable institutions, is too often mercenary, +though they know it not. Their religion is too often one of “Loss and +Gain,” as much as Father Newman’s own; and their actions, whether they +shall call them “good works” or “fruits of faith,” are so much spiritual +capital, to be repaid with interest at the last day. + +Therefore, like all religionists, they are most anxious for those schemes +of good which seem most profitable to themselves and to the denomination +to which they belong; and the best of all such works is, of course, as +with all religionists, the making of proselytes. They really care for +the bodies, but still they care more for the souls, of those whom they +assist—and not wrongly either, were it not that to care for a man’s soul +usually means, in the religious world, to make him think with you; at +least to lay him under such obligations as to give you spiritual power +over him. Therefore it is that all religious charities in England are +more and more conducted, just as much as those of Jesuits and Oratorians, +with an ulterior view of proselytism; therefore it is that the religious +world, though it has invented, perhaps, no new method of doing good; +though it has been indebted for educational movements, prison +visitations, infant schools, ragged schools, and so forth, to Quakers, +cobblers, even in some cases to men whom they call infidels, have gladly +adopted each and every one of them, as fresh means of enlarging the +influence or the numbers of their own denominations, and of baiting for +the body in order to catch the soul. A fair sample of too much of their +labour may be seen anywhere, in those tracts in which the prettiest +stories, with the prettiest binding and pictures, on the most +secular—even, sometimes, scientific—of subjects, end by a few words of +pious exhortation, inserted by a different hand from that which indites +the “carnal” mass of the book. They did not invent the science, or the +art of story-telling, or the woodcutting, or the plan of getting books up +prettily—or, indeed, the notion of instructing the masses at all; but +finding these things in the hands of “the world,” they have “spoiled the +Egyptians,” and fancy themselves beating Satan with his own weapons. + +If, indeed, these men claimed boldly all printing, all woodcutting, all +story-telling, all human arts and sciences, as gifts from God Himself; +and said, as the book which they quote so often says: “The Spirit of God +gives man understanding, these, too, are His gifts, sacred, miraculous, +to be accounted for to Him,” then they would be consistent; and then, +too, they would have learnt, perhaps, to claim Sanitary Science for a +gift divine as any other: but nothing, alas! is as yet further from their +creed. And therefore it is that Sanitary Reform finds so little favour +in their eyes. You have so little in it to show for your work. You may +think you have saved the lives of hundreds; but you cannot put your +finger on one of them: and they know you not; know not even their own +danger, much less your beneficence. Therefore, you have no lien on them, +not even that of gratitude; you cannot say to a man: “I have prevented +you having typhus, therefore you must attend my chapel.” No! Sanitary +Reform makes no proselytes. It cannot be used as a religious engine. It +is too simply human, too little a respecter of persons, too like to the +works of Him who causes His sun to shine on the evil and the good, and +His rain to fall on the just and on the unjust, and is good to the +unthankful and to the evil, to find much favour in the eyes of a +generation which will compass sea and land to make one proselyte. + +Yes. Too like the works of our Father in heaven, as indeed all truly +natural and human science needs must be. True, to those who believe that +there is a Father in heaven, this would, one supposes, be the highest +recommendation. But how many of this generation believe that? Is not +their doctrine, the doctrine to testify for which the religious world +exists, the doctrine which if you deny, you are met with one universal +frown and snarl—that man has no Father in heaven: but that if he becomes +a member of the religious world, by processes varying with each +denomination, he may—strange paradox—create a Father for himself? + +But so it is. The religious world has lost the belief which even the +elder Greeks and Romans had, of a “Zeus, Father of gods and men.” Even +that it has lost. Therefore have man and the simple human needs of man, +no sacredness in their eyes; therefore is Nature to them no longer “the +will of God exprest in facts,” and to break a law of nature no longer to +sin against Him who “looked on all that He had made, and behold, it was +very good.” And yet they read their Bibles, and believe that they +believe in Him who stood by the lake-side in Galilee, and told men that +not a sparrow fell to the ground without their Father’s knowledge—and +that they were of more value than many sparrows. Do those words now seem +to some so self-evident as to be needless? They will never seem so to +the Sanitary Reformer, who has called on the “British Public” to exert +themselves in saving the lives of thousands yearly; and has received +practical answers which will furnish many a bitter jest for the Voltaire +of the next so-called “age of unbelief,” or fill a sad, but an +instructive chapter in some future enlarged edition of Adelung’s “History +of Human Folly.” + +All but despairing, Sanitary Reformers have turned again and again to her +Majesty’s Government. Alas for them! The Government was ready and +willing enough to help. The wicked world said: “Of course. It will +create a new department. It will give them more places to bestow.” But +the real reason of the willingness of Government seems to be that those +who compose it are thoroughly awake to the importance of the subject. + +But what can a poor Government do, whose strength consists (as that of +all English Governments must) in not seeming too strong; which is allowed +to do anything, only on condition of doing the minimum? Of course, a +Government is morally bound to keep itself in existence; for is it not +bound to believe that it can govern the country better than any other +knot of men? But its only chance of self-preservation is to know, with +Hesiod’s wise man, “how much better the half is than the whole,” and to +throw over many a measure which it would like to carry, for the sake of +saving the few which it can carry. + +An English Government, nowadays, is simply at the mercy of the forty or +fifty members of the House of Commons who are crotchety enough or +dishonest enough to put it unexpectedly in a minority; and they, with the +vast majority of the House, are becoming more and more the delegates of +that very class which is most opposed to Sanitary Reform. The honourable +member goes to Parliament not to express his opinions, (for he has stated +most distinctly at the last election that he has no opinions whatsoever), +but to protect the local interests of his constituents. And the great +majority of those constituents are small houseowners—the poorer portion +of the middle class. Were he to support Government in anything like a +sweeping measure of Sanitary Reform, woe to his seat at the next +election; and he knows it; and therefore, even if he allow the Government +to have its Central Board of Health, he will take good care, for his own +sake, that the said Board shall not do too much, and that it shall not +compel his constituents to do anything at all. + +No wonder, that while the attitude of the House of Commons is such toward +a matter which involves the lives of thousands yearly, some educated men +should be crying that Representative institutions are on their trial, and +should sigh for a strong despotism. + +There is an answer, nevertheless, to such sentimentalists, and one hopes +that people will see the answer for themselves, and that the infection of +Imperialism, which seems spreading somewhat rapidly, will be stopped by +common sense and honest observation of facts. + +A despotism doubtless could carry out Sanitary Reform: but doubtless, +also, it would not. + +A despot in the nineteenth century knows well how insecure his tenure is. +His motto must be, “Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die;” and, +therefore, the first objects of his rule will be, private luxury and a +standing army; while if he engage in public works, for the sake of +keeping the populace quiet, they will be certain not to be such as will +embroil him with the middle classes, while they will win him no +additional favour with the masses, utterly unaware of their necessity. +Would the masses of Paris have thanked Louis Napoleon the more if, +instead of completing the Tuileries, he had sewered the St. Antoine? All +arguments to the contrary are utterly fallacious, which are drawn from +ancient despotisms, Roman, Eastern, Peruvian, or other; and for this +simple reason, that they had no middle class. If they did work well +(which is a question) it was just because they had no middle class—that +class, which in a free State is the very life of a nation, and yet which, +in a despotism, is sure to be the root of its rottenness. For a despot +who finds, as Louis Napoleon has done, a strong middle class already +existing, must treat it as he does; he must truckle to it, pander to its +basest propensities, seem to make himself its tool, in order that he may +make it his. For the sake of his own life, he must do it; and were a +despot to govern England to-morrow, we should see that the man who was +shrewd enough to have climbed to that bad eminence, would be shrewd +enough to know that he could scarcely commit a more suicidal act than, by +some despotic measure of Sanitary Reform, to excite the ill-will of all +the most covetous, the most stupid, and the most stubborn men in every +town of England. + +There is another answer, too, to “Imperialists” who talk of +Representative institutions being on their trial, and let it be made +boldly just now. + +It will be time to talk of Representative institutions being good or bad, +when the people of England are properly represented. + +In the first place, it does seem only fair that the class who suffer most +from epidemics should have some little share in the appointment of the +men on whose votes extermination of epidemics now mainly depends. But +that is too large a question to argue here. Let the Government see to it +in the coming session. + +Yet how much soever, or how little soever, the suffrage be extended in +the direction of the working man, let it be extended, at least in some +equal degree, in the direction of the educated man. Few bodies in +England now express the opinions of educated men less than does the +present House of Commons. It is not chosen by educated men, any more +than it is by _prolétaires_. It is not, on an average, composed of +educated men; and the many educated men who are in it have, for the most +part, to keep their knowledge very much to themselves, for fear of +hurting the feelings of “ten-pound Jack,” or of the local attorney who +looks after Jack’s vote. And therefore the House of Commons does not +represent public opinion. + +For, to enounce with fitting clearness a great but much-forgotten truth, +To have an opinion, you must have an opinion. + +Strange: but true, and pregnant too. For, from it may be deduced this +corollary, that nine-tenths of what is called Public Opinion is no +opinion at all; for, on the matters which come under the cognizance of +the House of Commons (save where superstition, as in the case of the +Sabbath, or the Jew Bill, sets folks thinking—generally on the wrong +side), nine people out of ten have no opinion at all; know nothing about +the matter, and care less; wherefore, having no opinions to be +represented, it is not important whether that nothing be represented or +not. + +The true public opinion of England is composed of the opinions of the +shrewd, honest, practical men in her, whether educated or not; and of +such, thank God, there are millions: but it consists also of the opinions +of the educated men in her; men who have had leisure and opportunity for +study; who have some chance of knowing the future, because they have +examined the past; who can compare England with other nations; English +creeds, laws, customs, with those of the rest of mankind;—who know +somewhat of humanity, human progress, human existence; who have been +practised in the processes of thought; and who, from study, have formed +definite opinions, differing doubtless in infinite variety, but still all +founded upon facts, by something like fair and scientific induction. + +Till we have this class of men fairly represented in the House of +Commons, there is little hope for Sanitary Reform: when it is so +represented, we shall have no reason to talk of Representative +institutions being on their trial. + +And it is one of the few hopeful features of the present time, that an +attempt is at last being made to secure for educated men of all +professions a fair territorial representation. A memorial to the +Government has been presented, appended to which, in very great numbers, +are the names of men of note, of all ranks, all shades in politics and +religion, all professions—legal, clerical, military, medical, and +literary. A list of names representing so much intellect, so much +learning, so much acknowledged moderation, so much good work already done +and acknowledged by the country, has never, perhaps, been collected for +any political purpose; and if their scheme (the details of which are not +yet made public) should in anywise succeed, it will do more for the +prospects of Sanitary Reform than any forward movement of the quarter of +a century. + +For if Sanitary Reform, or perhaps any really progressive measure, is to +be carried out henceforth, we must go back to something like the old +principle of the English constitution, by which intellect, as such, had +its proper share in the public councils. During those middle ages when +all the intellect and learning was practically possessed by the clergy, +they constituted a separate estate of the realm. This was the old +plan—the best which could be then devised. After learning became common +to the laity, the educated classes were represented more and more only by +such clever young men as could be thrust into Parliament by the private +patronage of the aristocracy. Since the last Reform Bill, even that +supply of talent has been cut off; and the consequence has been, the +steady deterioration of our House of Commons toward such a level of +mediocrity as shall satisfy the ignorance of the practically electing +majority, namely, the tail of the middle class; men who are apt to +possess all the failings with few of the virtues of those above them and +below them; who have no more intellectual training than the simple +working man, and far less than the average shopman, and who yet lose, +under the influence of a small competence, that practical training which +gives to the working man, made strong by wholesome necessity, chivalry, +endurance, courage, and self-restraint; whose business morality is made +up of the lowest and narrowest maxims of the commercial world, unbalanced +by that public spirit, that political knowledge, that practical energy, +that respect for the good opinion of his fellows, which elevate the large +employer. On the hustings, of course, this description of the average +free and independent elector would be called a calumny; and yet, where is +the member of Parliament who will not, in his study, assent to its truth, +and confess, that of all men whom he meets, those who least command his +respect are those among his constituents to secure whom he takes most +trouble; unless, indeed, it be the pettifoggers who manage his election +for him? + +Whether this is the class to whose public opinion the health and lives of +the masses are to be entrusted, is a question which should be settled as +soon as possible. + +Meanwhile let every man who would awake to the importance of Sanitary +questions, do his best to teach and preach, in season and out of season, +and to instruct, as far as he can, that public opinion which is as yet +but public ignorance. Let him throw, for instance, what weight he has +into the “National Association for the Advancement of Social Science.” +In it he will learn, as well as teach, not only on Sanitary Reforms, but +upon those cognate questions which must be considered with it, if it is +ever to be carried out. + +Indeed, this new “National Association” seems the most hopeful and +practical move yet made by the sanitarists. It may be laughed at +somewhat at first, as the British Association was; but the world will +find after a while that, like the British Association, it can do great +things towards moulding public opinion, and compel men to consider +certain subjects, simply by accustoming people to hear them mentioned. +The Association will not have existed in vain, if it only removes that +dull fear and suspicion with which Englishmen are apt to regard a new +subject, simply because it is new. But the Association will do far more +than that. It has wisely not confined itself to any one branch of Social +Science, but taken the subject in all its complexity. To do otherwise +would have been to cripple itself. It would have shut out many +subjects—Law Reform, for instance—which are necessary adjuncts to any +Sanitary scheme; while it would have shut out that very large class of +benevolent people who have as yet been devoting their energies to +prisons, workhouses, and schools. Such will now have an opportunity of +learning that they have been treating the symptoms of social disease +rather than the disease itself. They will see that vice is rather the +effect than the cause of physical misery, and that the surest mode of +attacking it is to improve the physical conditions of the lower classes; +to abolish foul air, fouled water, foul lodging, and overcrowded +dwellings, in which morality is difficult, and common decency impossible. +They will not give up—Heaven forbid that they should give up!—their +special good works; but they will surely throw the weight of their names, +their talents, their earnestness, into the great central object of +preserving human life, as soon as they shall have recognised that +prevention is better than cure; and that the simple and one method of +prevention is, to give the working man his rights. Water, air, light. A +right to these three at least he has. In demanding them, he demands no +more than God gives freely to the wild beast of the forest. Till society +has given him them, it does him an injustice in demanding of him that he +should be a useful member of society. If he is expected to be a man, let +him at least be put on a level with the brutes. When the benevolent of +the land (and they may be numbered by tens of thousands) shall once have +learnt this plain and yet awful truth, a vast upward step will have been +gained. Because this new Association will teach it them, during the next +ten or twenty years, may God’s blessing be on it, and, on the noble old +man who presides over it. Often already has he deserved well of his +country; but never better than now, when he has lent his great name and +great genius to the object of preserving human life from wholesale +destruction by unnecessary poison. + +And meanwhile let the Sanitary Reformer work and wait. “Go not after the +world,” said a wise man, “for if thou stand still long enough the world +will come round to thee.” And to Sanitary Reform the world will come +round at last. Grumbling, scoffing, cursing its benefactors; boasting at +last, as usual, that it discovered for itself the very truths which it +tried to silence, it will come; and will be glad at last to accept the +one sibylline leaf, at the same price at which it might have had the +whole. The Sanitary Reformer must make up his mind to see no fruit of +his labours, much less thanks or reward. He must die in faith, as St. +Paul says all true men die, “not having received the promises;” worn out, +perhaps, by ill-paid and unappreciated labour, as that truest-hearted and +most unselfish of men, Charles Robert Walsh, died but two years ago. But +his works will follow him—not, as the preachers tell us, to heaven—for of +what use would they be there, to him or to mankind?—but here, on earth, +where he set them, that they might go on in his path, after his example, +and prosper and triumph long years after he is dead, when his memory +shall be blessed by generations not merely “yet unborn,” but who never +would have been born at all, had he not inculcated into their unwilling +fathers the simplest laws of physical health, decency, life—laws which +the wild cat of the wood, burying its own excrement apart from its lair, +has learnt by the light of nature; but which neither nature nor God +Himself can as yet teach to a selfish, perverse, and hypocritical +generation. + + + + +FOOTNOTES + + +{3} This lecture was one of a series of “Lectures to Ladies,” given in +London in 1855, at the Needlewoman’s Institution. + +{21} The substance of this Essay was a lecture on Physical Education, +given at the Midland Institute, Birmingham, in 1872. + +{36} 9, Adam Street, Adelphi, London. + +{49} A Lecture delivered at Winchester, May 31, 1869. + +{77} Lecture delivered at Winchester, March 17, 1869. + +{110} I quote from the translation of the late lamented Philip Stanhope +Worsley, of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. + +{114} Odyssey, book vi. 127–315; vol. i. pp. 143–150 of Mr. Worsley’s +translation. + +{126} Since this essay was written, I have been sincerely delighted to +find that my wishes had been anticipated at Girton College, near +Cambridge, and previously at Hitchin, whence the college was removed: and +that the wise ladies who superintend that establishment propose also that +most excellent institution—a swimming-bath. A paper, moreover, read +before the London Association of School-mistresses in 1866, on “Physical +Exercises and Recreation for Girls,” deserves all attention. May those +who promote such things prosper as they deserve. + +{187} Lecture delivered at Bristol, October 5, 1857. + +{192} This was spoken during the Indian Mutiny. + +{257} Delivered at St. James’s Hall, London, 1859. + +{271} Fraser’s Magazine, No. CCCXXXVII. 1858. + +{276} We find a most honourable exception to this rule in a sermon by +the Rev. C. Richson, of Manchester, on the Sanitary Laws of the Old +Testament, with notes by Dr. Sutherland. + + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SANITARY AND SOCIAL LECTURES AND +ESSAYS*** + + +******* This file should be named 1637-0.txt or 1637-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/3/1637 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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: Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays + + +Author: Charles Kingsley + + + +Release Date: February 23, 2013 [eBook #1637] +[This file was first posted on September 17, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SANITARY AND SOCIAL LECTURES AND +ESSAYS*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1880 Macmillan and Co. edition by David +Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<h1>SANITARY AND SOCIAL<br /> +LECTURES AND ESSAYS</h1> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY</span><br +/> +CHARLES KINGSLEY</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">London:<br /> +MACMILLAN AND CO.<br /> +1880.</p> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> +<table> +<tr> +<td><p> </p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>Woman’s Work in a Country Parish</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page3">3</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>The Science of Health</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page21">21</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>The Two Breaths</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page49">49</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>Thrift</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page77">77</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>Nausicaa in London; or, the Lower Education of Women</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page107">107</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>The Air-Mothers</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page131">131</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>The Tree of Knowledge</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page167">167</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>Great Cities and their Influence for Good and Evil</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page187">187</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>Heroism</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page225">225</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>The Massacre of the Innocents</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page257">257</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>“A mad world, my masters.”</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page271">271</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<h2><a name="page3"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +3</span>WOMAN’S WORK IN A COUNTRY PARISH. <a +name="citation3"></a><a href="#footnote3" +class="citation">[3]</a></h2> +<p>I <span class="smcap">have</span> been asked to speak a few +words to you on a lady’s work in a country parish. I +shall confine myself rather to principles than to details; and +the first principle which I would impress on you is, that we must +all be just before we are generous. I must, indeed, speak +plainly on this point. A woman’s first duties are to +her own family, her own servants. Be not deceived: if +anyone cannot rule her own household, she cannot rule the Church +of God. If anyone cannot sympathise with the servants with +whom she is in contact all day long, she will not really +sympathise with the poor whom she sees once a week. I know +the temptation not to believe this is very great. It seems +so much easier to women to do something for the poor, than for +their own ladies’ maids, and house-maids, and cooks. +And why? Because they can treat the poor as <i>things</i>: +but they <i>must</i> treat their servants as persons. A +lady can go into a poor cottage, lay down the law to the +inhabitants, reprove them for sins to which she has never been +tempted; tell them how to set things right, which, if she had the +doing of them, I fear she would do even more confusedly and +slovenly than they. She can give them a tract, as she might +a pill; and then a shilling, as something sweet after the +medicine; and she can go out again and see no more of them till +her benevolent mood recurs: but with the servants it is not +so. She knows their characters; and, what is more, they +know hers; they know her private history, her little +weaknesses. Perhaps she is a little in their power, and she +is shy with them. She is afraid of beginning a good work +with them, because, if she does, she will be forced to carry it +out; and it cannot be cold, dry, perfunctory, official: it must +be hearty, living, loving, personal. She must make them her +friends; and perhaps she is afraid of doing that, for fear they +should take liberties, as it is called—which they very +probably will do, unless she keeps up a very high standard of +self-restraint and earnestness in her own life—and that +involves a great deal of trouble, and so she is tempted, when she +wishes to do good, to fall back on the poor people in the +cottages outside, who, as she fancies, know nothing about her, +and will never find out whether or not she acts up to the rules +which she lays down for them. Be not deceived, I say, in +this case also. Fancy not that they know nothing about +you. There is nothing secret which shall not be made +manifest; and what you do in the closet is surely proclaimed (and +often with exaggeration enough and to spare) on the +house-top. These poor folks at your gate know well enough, +through servants and tradesmen, what you are, how you treat your +servants, how you pay your bills, what sort of temper you have; +and they form a shrewd, hard estimate of your character, in the +light of which they view all that you do and say to them; and +believe me, that if you wish to do any real good to them, you +must begin by doing good to those who lie still nearer to you +than them. And believe me, too, that if you shrink from a +hearty patriarchal sympathy with your own servants, because it +would require too much personal human intercourse with them, you +are like a man who, finding that he had not powder enough to fire +off a pocket-pistol, should try to better matters by using the +same quantity of ammunition in an eighty-four pound gun. +For it is this human friendship, trust, affection, which is the +very thing you have to employ towards the poor, and to call up in +them. Clubs, societies, alms, lending libraries are but +dead machinery, needful, perhaps, but, like the iron tube without +the powder, unable to send the bullet forth one single inch; dead +and useless lumber, without humanity; without the smile of the +lip, the light of the eye, the tenderness of the voice, which +makes the poor woman feel that a soul is speaking to her soul, a +heart yearning after her heart; that she is not merely a +<i>thing</i> to be improved, but a sister to be made conscious of +the divine bond of her sisterhood, and taught what she means when +she repeats in her Creed, “I believe in the communion of +saints.” This is my text, and my +key-note—whatever else I may say to-day is but a carrying +out into details of the one question, How may you go to these +poor creatures as woman to woman?</p> +<p>Your next duties are to your husband’s or father’s +servants and workmen. It is said that a clergyman’s +wife ought to consider the parish as <i>her</i> flock as well as +her husband’s. It may be so: I believe the dogma to +be much overstated just now. But of a landlord’s, or +employer’s wife (I am inclined to say, too, of an +officer’s wife), such a doctrine is absolutely true, and +cannot be overstated. A large proportion, therefore, of +your parish work will be to influence the men of your family to +do their duty by their dependants. You wish to cure the +evils under which they labour. The greater proportion of +these are in the hands of your men relatives. It is a +mockery, for instance, in you to visit the fever-stricken +cottage, while your husband leaves it in a state which breeds +that fever. Your business is to go to him and say, +“<i>Here is a wrong</i>; <i>right it</i>!” +This, as many a beautiful Middle Age legend tells us, has been +woman’s function in all uncivilised times; not merely to +melt man’s heart to pity, but to awaken it to duty. +But the man must see that the woman is in earnest: that if he +will not repair the wrong by justice, she will, if possible (as +in those old legends), by self-sacrifice. Be sure this +method will conquer. Do but say: “If you will not +new-roof that cottage, if you will not make that drain, I +will. I will not buy a new dress till it is done; I will +sell the horse you gave me, pawn the bracelet you gave me, but +the thing shall be done.” Let him see, I say, that +you are in earnest, and he will feel that your message is a +divine one, which he must obey for very shame and weariness, if +for nothing else. This is in my eyes the second part of a +woman’s parish work. I entreat you to bear it in mind +when you hear, as I trust you will, lectures in this place upon +that <i>Sanitary Reform</i>, without which all efforts for the +bettering of the masses are in my eyes not only useless, but +hypocritical.</p> +<p>I will suppose, then, that you are fulfilling home duties in +self-restraint, and love, and in the fear of God. I will +suppose that you are using all your woman’s influence on +the mind of your family, in behalf of tenants and workmen; and I +tell you frankly, that unless this be first done, you are paying +a tithe of mint and anise, and neglecting common righteousness +and mercy. But you wish to do more: you wish for personal +contact with the poor round you, for the pure enjoyment of doing +good to them with your own hands. How are you to set about +it? First, there are clubs—clothing-clubs, +shoe-clubs, maternal-clubs; all very good in their way. But +do not fancy that they are the greater part of your parish +work. Rather watch and fear lest they become substitutes +for your real parish work; lest the bustle and amusement of +playing at shopkeeper, or penny-collector, once a week, should +blind you to your real power—your real treasure, by +spending which you become all the richer. What you have to +do is to ennoble and purify the <i>womanhood</i> of these poor +women; to make them better daughters, sisters, wives, mothers: +and all the clubs in the world will not do that; they are but +palliatives of a great evil, which they do not touch; cloaks for +almsgiving, clumsy means of eking out insufficient wages; at +best, kindly contrivances for tricking into temporary thriftiness +a degraded and reckless peasantry. Miserable, miserable +state of things! out of which the longer I live I see less hope +of escape, saving by an emigration, which shall drain us of all +the healthy, strong, and brave among the lower classes, and leave +us, as a just punishment for our sins, only the cripple, the +drunkard, and the beggar.</p> +<p>Yet these clubs <i>must</i> be carried on. They make +life a little more possible; they lighten hearts, if but for a +moment; they inculcate habits of order and self-restraint, which +may be useful when the poor man finds himself in Canada or +Australia. And it is a cruel utilitarianism to refuse to +palliate the symptoms because you cannot cure the disease +itself. You will give opiates to the suffering, who must +die nevertheless. Let him slip into his grave at least as +painlessly as you can. And so you must use these charitable +societies, remembering all along what a fearful and humbling sign +the necessity for them is of the diseased state of this England, +as the sportula and universal almsgiving was of the decadence of +Rome.</p> +<p>However, the work has to be done; and such as it is, it is +especially fitted for young unmarried ladies. It requires +no deep knowledge of human nature. It makes them aware of +the amount of suffering and struggling which lies around them, +without bringing them in that most undesirable contact with the +coarser forms of evil which house-visitation must do; and the +mere business habits of accuracy and patience to which it compels +them, are a valuable practical schooling for them themselves in +after-life. It is tiresome and unsentimental drudgery, no +doubt; but perhaps all the better training on that account. +And, after all, the magic of sweetness, grace, and courtesy may +shed a hallowing and humanising light over the meanest work, and +the smile of God may spread from lip to lip, and the light of God +from eye to eye, even between the giver and receiver of a penny, +till the poor woman goes home, saying in her heart, “I have +not only found the life of my hand—I have found a sister +for time and for eternity.”</p> +<p>But there is another field of parish usefulness which I cannot +recommend too earnestly, and that is, the school. There you +may work as hard as you will, and how you will—provided you +do it in a loving, hearty, cheerful, <i>human</i> way, playful +and yet earnest; two qualities which, when they exist in their +highest power, are sure to go together. I say, how you +will. I am no pedant about schools; I care less what is +taught than how it is taught. The merest rudiments of +Christianity, the merest rudiments of popular instruction, are +enough, provided they be given by lips which speak as if they +believed what they said, and with a look which shows real love +for the pupil. Manner is everything—matter a +secondary consideration; for in matter, brain only speaks to +brain; in manner, soul speaks to soul. If you want +Christ’s lost-lambs really to believe that He died for +them, you will do it better by one little act of interest and +affection, than by making them learn by heart whole +commentaries—even as Miss Nightingale has preached Christ +crucified to those poor soldiers by acts of plain outward +drudgery, more livingly, and really, and convincingly than she +could have done by ten thousand sermons, and made many a noble +lad, I doubt not, say in his heart, for the first time in his +wild life, “I can believe now that Christ died for me, for +here is one whom He has taught to die for me in like +wise.” And this blessed effect of school-work, +remember, is not confined to the children. It goes home +with them to the parents. The child becomes an object of +interest and respect in their eyes, when they see it an object of +interest and respect in yours. If they see that you look on +it as an awful and glorious being, the child of God, the co-heir +of Christ, they learn gradually to look on it in the same +light. They become afraid and ashamed (and it is a noble +fear and shame) to do and say before it what they used to do and +say; afraid to ill-use it. It becomes to them a mysterious +visitor (sad that it should be so, but true as sad) from a higher +and purer sphere, who must be treated with something of courtesy +and respect, who must even be asked to teach them something of +its new knowledge; and the school, and the ladies’ interest +in the school, become to the degraded parents a living sign that +those children’s angels do indeed behold the face of their +Father which is in heaven.</p> +<p>Now, there is one thing in school-work which I wish to press +on you; and that is, that you should not confine your work to the +girls; but bestow it as freely on those who need it more, and who +(paradoxical as it may seem) will respond to it more deeply and +freely—<i>the boys</i>. I am not going to enter into +the reasons <i>why</i>. I only entreat you to believe me, +that by helping to educate the boys, or even (when old enough), +by taking a class (as I have seen done with admirable effect) of +grown-up lads, you may influence for ever not only the happiness +of your pupils, but of the girls whom they will hereafter +marry. It will be a boon to your own sex as well as to ours +to teach them courtesy, self-restraint, reverence for physical +weakness, admiration of tenderness and gentleness; and it is one +which only a lady can bestow. Only by being accustomed in +youth to converse with ladies, will the boy learn to treat +hereafter his sweetheart or his wife like a gentleman. +There is a latent chivalry, doubt it not, in the heart of every +untutored clod; if it dies out in him (as it too often does), it +were better for him, I often think, if he had never been born: +but the only talisman which will keep it alive, much more develop +it into its fulness, is friendly and revering intercourse with +women of higher rank than himself, between whom and him there is +a great and yet a blessed gulf fixed.</p> +<p>I have left to the last the most important subject of all; and +that is, what is called “visiting the poor.” It +is an endless subject; if you go into details, you might write +volumes on it. All I can do this afternoon is to keep to my +own key-note, and say, Visit whom, when, and where you will; but +let your visits be those of woman to woman. Consider to +whom you go—to poor souls whose life, compared with yours, +is one long malaise of body, and soul, and spirit—and do as +you would be done by; instead of reproving and fault-finding, +encourage. In God’s name, encourage. They +scramble through life’s rocks, bogs, and thornbrakes, +clumsily enough, and have many a fall, poor things! But +why, in the name of a God of love and justice, is the lady, +rolling along the smooth turnpike-road in her comfortable +carriage, to be calling out all day long to the poor soul who +drags on beside her over hedge and ditch, moss and moor, +bare-footed and weary-hearted, with half-a-dozen children at her +back: “You ought not to have fallen here; and it was very +cowardly to lie down there; and it was your duty, as a mother, to +have helped that child through the puddle; while, as for sleeping +under that bush, it is most imprudent and +inadmissible?” Why not encourage her, praise her, +cheer her on her weary way by loving words, and keep your +reproofs for yourself—even your advice; for <i>she</i> does +get on her way, after all, where <i>you</i> could not travel a +step forward; and she knows what she is about perhaps better than +you do, and what she has to endure, and what God thinks of her +life-journey. The heart knoweth its own bitterness, and a +stranger intermeddleth not with its joy. But do not be a +stranger to her. Be a sister to her. I do not ask you +to take her up in your carriage. You cannot; perhaps it is +good for her that you cannot. It is good sometimes for +Lazarus that he is not fit to sit at Dives’s +feast—good for him that he should receive his evil things +in this life, and be comforted in the life to come. All I +ask is, do to the poor soul as you would have her do to you in +her place. Do not interrupt and vex her (for she is busy +enough already) with remedies which she does not understand, for +troubles which you do not understand. But speak comfortably +to her, and say: “I cannot feel <i>with</i> you, but I do +feel <i>for</i> you: I should enjoy helping you, but I do not +know how—tell me. Tell me where the yoke galls; tell +me why that forehead is grown old before its time: I may be able +to ease the burden, to put fresh light into the eyes; and if not, +still tell me, simply because I am a woman, and know the relief +of pouring out my own soul into loving ears, even though in the +depths of despair.” Yes, paradoxical as it may seem, +I am convinced that the only way to help these poor women humanly +and really, is to begin by confessing to them that you do not +know how to help them; to humble yourself to them, and to ask +their counsel for the good of themselves and of their neighbours, +instead of coming proudly to them, with nostrums ready +compounded, as if a doctor should be so confident in his own +knowledge of books and medicine as to give physic before asking +the patient’s symptoms.</p> +<p>Therefore, I entreat you to bear in mind (for without this all +visiting of the poor will be utterly void and useless), that you +must regulate your conduct to them, and in their houses, even to +the most minute particulars, by the very same rules which apply +to persons of your own class. Never let any woman say of +you (thought fatal to all confidence, all influence!): +“Yes, it is all very kind: but she does not behave to me as +she would to one of her own quality.” Piety, +earnestness, affectionateness, eloquence—all may be +nullified and stultified by simply keeping a poor woman standing +in her own cottage while you sit, or entering her house, even at +her own request, while she is at meals. She may decline to +sit; she may beg you to come in, all the more reason for refusing +utterly to obey her, because it shows that that very inward gulf +between you and her still exists in her mind, which it is the +object of your visit to bridge over. If you know her to be +in trouble, touch on that trouble as you would with a lady. +Woman’s heart is alike in all ranks, and the deepest sorrow +is the one of which she speaks the last and least. We +should not like anyone—no, not an angel from heaven, to +come into our houses without knocking at the door, and say: +“I hear you are very ill off—I will lend you a +hundred pounds. I think you are very careless of money, I +will take your accounts into my own hands;” and still less +again: “Your son is a very bad, profligate, disgraceful +fellow, who is not fit to be mentioned; I intend to take him out +of your hands and reform him myself.” Neither do the +poor like such unceremonious mercy, such untender tenderness, +benevolence at horse-play, mistaking kicks for caresses. +They do not like it, they will not respond to it, save in +parishes which have been demoralised by officious and +indiscriminate benevolence, and where the last remaining virtues +of the poor, savage self-help and independence, have been +exchanged (as I have too often seen them exchanged) for organised +begging and hypocrisy.</p> +<p>I would that you would all read, ladies, and consider well the +traits of an opposite character which have just come to light (to +me, I am ashamed to say, for the first time) in the Biography of +Sidney Smith. The love and admiration which that truly +brave and loving man won from everyone, rich or poor, with whom +he came in contact, seems to me to have arisen from the one fact, +that without perhaps having any such conscious intention, he +treated rich and poor, his own servants and the noblemen his +guests, alike, and <i>alike</i> courteously, considerately, +cheerfully, affectionately—so leaving a blessing and +reaping a blessing wheresoever he went.</p> +<p>Approach, then, these poor women as sisters, and you will be +able gradually to reverse the hard saying of which I made use +just now: “Do not apply remedies which they do not +understand, to diseases which you do not understand.” +Learn lovingly and patiently (aye, and reverently, for there is +that in every human being which deserves reverence, and must be +reverenced if we wish to understand it)—learn, I say, to +understand their troubles, and by that time they will have learnt +to understand your remedies, and they will appreciate them. +For you <i>have</i> remedies. I do not undervalue your +position. No man on earth is less inclined to undervalue +the real power of wealth, rank, accomplishments, +manners—even physical beauty. All are talents from +God, and I give God thanks when I see them possessed by any human +being; for I know that they, too, can be used in His service, and +brought to bear on the true emancipation of woman—her +emancipation, not from man (as some foolish persons fancy), but +from the devil, “the slanderer and divider” who +divides her from man, and makes her live a life-long tragedy, +which goes on in more cottages than in palaces—a vie +à part, a vie incomprise—a life made up half of +ill-usage, half of unnecessary, self-willed, self-conceited +martyrdom, instead of being (as God intended) half of the human +universe, a helpmeet for man, and the one bright spot which makes +this world endurable. Towards making her that, and so +realising the primeval mission by every cottage hearth, each of +you can do something; for each of you have some talent, power, +knowledge, attraction between soul and soul, which the +cottager’s wife has not, and by which you may draw her to +you with (as the prophet says) human bonds and the cords of love: +but she must be drawn by them alone, or your work is nothing, and +though you give the treasures of Ind, they are valueless equally +to her and to Christ; for they are not given in His name, which +is that boundless tenderness, consideration, patience, +self-sacrifice, by which even the cup of cold water is a precious +offering—as God grant your labour may be!</p> +<h2><a name="page21"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 21</span>THE +SCIENCE OF HEALTH. <a name="citation21"></a><a href="#footnote21" +class="citation">[21]</a></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Whether</span> the British race is +improving or degenerating? What, if it seem probably +degenerating, are the causes of so great an evil? How they +can be, if not destroyed, at least arrested? These are +questions worthy attention, not of statesmen only and medical +men, but of every father and mother in these isles. I shall +say somewhat about them in this Essay; and say it in a form which +ought to be intelligible to fathers and mothers of every class, +from the highest to the lowest, in hopes of convincing some of +them at least that the science of health, now so utterly +neglected in our curriculum of so-called education, ought to be +taught—the rudiments of it at least—in every school, +college, and university.</p> +<p>We talk of our hardy forefathers; and rightly. But they +were hardy, just as the savage is usually hardy, because none but +the hardy lived. They may have been able to say of +themselves—as they do in a State paper of 1515, now well +known through the pages of Mr. Froude: “What comyn folk of +all the world may compare with the comyns of England, in riches, +freedom, liberty, welfare, and all prosperity? What comyn +folk is so mighty, and so strong in the felde, as the comyns of +England?” They may have been fed on “great +shins of beef,” till they became, as Benvenuto Cellini +calls them, “the English wild beasts.” But they +increased in numbers slowly, if at all, for centuries. +Those terrible laws of natural selection, which issue in +“the survival of the fittest,” cleared off the less +fit, in every generation, principally by infantile disease, often +by wholesale famine and pestilence; and left, on the whole, only +those of the strongest constitutions to perpetuate a hardy, +valiant, and enterprising race.</p> +<p>At last came a sudden and unprecedented change. In the +first years of this century, steam and commerce produced an +enormous increase in the population. Millions of fresh +human beings found employment, married, brought up children who +found employment in their turn, and learnt to live more or less +civilised lives. An event, doubtless, for which God is to +be thanked. A quite new phase of humanity, bringing with it +new vices and new dangers: but bringing, also, not merely new +comforts, but new noblenesses, new generosities, new conceptions +of duty, and of how that duty should be done. It is +childish to regret the old times, when our soot-grimed +manufacturing districts were green with lonely farms. To +murmur at the transformation would be, I believe, to murmur at +the will of Him without whom not a sparrow falls to the +ground.</p> +<blockquote><p>The old order changeth, yielding place to the +new,<br /> +And God fulfils himself in many ways,<br /> +Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Our duty is, instead of longing for the good old custom, to +take care of the good new custom, lest it should corrupt the +world in like wise. And it may do so thus:</p> +<p>The rapid increase of population during the first half of this +century began at a moment when the British stock was specially +exhausted; namely, about the end of the long French war. +There may have been periods of exhaustion, at least in England, +before that. There may have been one here, as there seems +to have been on the Continent, after the Crusades; and another +after the Wars of the Roses. There was certainly a period +of severe exhaustion at the end of Elizabeth’s reign, due +both to the long Spanish and Irish wars and to the terrible +endemics introduced from abroad; an exhaustion which may have +caused, in part, the national weakness which hung upon us during +the reign of the Stuarts. But after none of these did the +survival of the less fit suddenly become more easy; or the +discovery of steam power, and the acquisition of a colonial +empire, create at once a fresh demand for human beings and a +fresh supply of food for them. Britain, at the beginning of +the nineteenth century, was in an altogether new social +situation.</p> +<p>At the beginning of the great French war; and, indeed, ever +since the beginning of the war with Spain in 1739—often +snubbed as the “war about Jenkins’s +ear”—but which was, as I hold, one of the most just, +as it was one of the most popular, of all our wars; after, too, +the once famous “forty fine harvests” of the +eighteenth century, the British people, from the gentleman who +led to the soldier or sailor who followed, were one of the +mightiest and most capable races which the world has ever seen, +comparable best to the old Roman, at his mightiest and most +capable period. That, at least, their works testify. +They created—as far as man can be said to create +anything—the British Empire. They won for us our +colonies, our commerce, the mastery of the seas of all the +world. But at what a cost!</p> +<blockquote><p>Their bones are scattered far and wide,<br /> +By mount, and stream, and sea.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Year after year, till the final triumph of Waterloo, not +battle only, but worse destroyers than shot and +shell—fatigue and disease—had been carrying off our +stoutest, ablest, healthiest young men, each of whom represented, +alas! a maiden left unmarried at home, or married, in default, to +a less able man. The strongest went to the war; each who +fell left a weaklier man to continue the race; while of those who +did not fall, too many returned with tainted and weakened +constitutions, to injure, it may be, generations yet +unborn. The middle classes, being mostly engaged in +peaceful pursuits, suffered less of this decimation of their +finest young men; and to that fact I attribute much of their +increasing preponderance, social, political, and intellectual, to +this very day. One cannot walk the streets of any of our +great commercial cities without seeing plenty of men, young and +middle-aged, whose whole bearing and stature shows that the manly +vigour of our middle class is anything but exhausted. In +Liverpool, especially, I have been much struck not only with the +vigorous countenance, but with the bodily size of the mercantile +men on ’Change. But it must be remembered always, +first, that these men are the very élite of their class; +the cleverest men; the men capable of doing most work; and next, +that they are, almost all of them, from the great merchant who +has his villa out of town, and perhaps his moor in the Highlands, +down to the sturdy young volunteer who serves in the +haberdasher’s shop, country-bred men; and that the question +is, not what they are like now, but what their children and +grandchildren, especially the fine young volunteer’s, will +be like? A very serious question I hold that to be, and for +this reason.</p> +<p>War is, without doubt, the most hideous physical curse which +fallen man inflicts upon himself; and for this simple reason, +that it reverses the very laws of nature, and is more cruel even +than pestilence. For instead of issuing in the survival of +the fittest, it issues in the survival of the less fit: and +therefore, if protracted, must deteriorate generations yet +unborn. And yet a peace such as we now enjoy, prosperous, +civilised, humane, is fraught, though to a less degree, with the +very same ill effect.</p> +<p>In the first place, tens of thousands—who knows it +not?—lead sedentary and unwholesome lives, stooping, +asphyxiated, employing as small a fraction of their bodies as of +their minds. And all this in dwellings, workshops, what +not?—the influences, the very atmosphere of which tend not +to health, but to unhealth, and to drunkenness as a solace under +the feeling of unhealth and depression. And that such a +life must tell upon their offspring, and if their offspring grow +up under similar circumstances, upon their offspring’s +offspring, till a whole population may become permanently +degraded, who does not know? For who that walks through the +by-streets of any great city does not see? Moreover, and +this is one of the most fearful problems with which modern +civilisation has to deal—we interfere with natural +selection by our conscientious care of life, as surely as does +war itself. If war kills the most fit to live, we save +alive those who—looking at them from a merely physical +point of view—are most fit to die. Everything which +makes it more easy to live; every sanitary reform, prevention of +pestilence, medical discovery, amelioration of climate, drainage +of soil, improvement in dwelling-houses, workhouses, gaols; every +reformatory school, every hospital, every cure of drunkenness, +every influence, in short, which has—so I am +told—increased the average length of life in these islands, +by nearly one-third, since the first establishment of life +insurances, one hundred and fifty years ago; every influence of +this kind, I say, saves persons alive who would otherwise have +died; and the great majority of these will be, even in surgical +and zymotic cases, those of least resisting power, who are thus +preserved to produce in time a still less powerful progeny.</p> +<p>Do I say that we ought not to save these people if we +can? God forbid. The weakly, the diseased whether +infant or adult, is here on earth; a British citizen; no more +responsible for his own weakness than for his own +existence. Society, that is, in plain English, we and our +ancestors, are responsible for both; and we must fulfil the duty, +and keep him in life; and, if we can, heal, strengthen, develop +him to the utmost; and make the best of that which “fate +and our own deservings” have given us to deal with. I +do not speak of higher motives still; motives which, to every +minister of religion, must be paramount and awful. I speak +merely of physical and social motives, such as appeal to the +conscience of every man—the instinct which bids every +human-hearted man or woman to save life, alleviate pain, like Him +who causes His sun to shine on the evil and on the good, and His +rain to fall on the just and on the unjust.</p> +<p>But it is palpable that in doing so we must, year by year, +preserve a large percentage of weakly persons who, marrying +freely in their own class, must produce weaklier children, and +they weaklier children still. Must, did I say? There +are those who are of opinion—and I, after watching and +comparing the histories of many families, indeed of every one +with whom I have come in contact for now five-and-thirty years, +in town and country, can only fear that their opinion is but too +well founded on fact—that in the great majority of cases, +in all classes whatsoever, the children are not equal to their +parents, nor they, again, to their grand-parents of the beginning +of the century; and that this degrading process goes on most +surely and most rapidly in our large towns, and in proportion to +the antiquity of those towns, and therefore in proportion to the +number of generations during which the degrading influences have +been at work.</p> +<p>This and cognate dangers have been felt more and more deeply, +as the years have rolled on, by students of human society. +To ward them off, theory after theory has been put on paper, +especially in France, which deserve high praise for their +ingenuity, less for their morality, and, I fear, still less for +their common sense. For the theorist in his closet is +certain to ignore, as inconvenient to the construction of his +Utopia, certain of those broad facts of human nature which every +active parish priest, medical man, or poor-law guardian has to +face every day of his life.</p> +<p>Society and British human nature are what they have become by +the indirect influences of long ages, and we can no more +reconstruct the one than we can change the other. We can no +more mend men by theories than we can by coercion—to which, +by-the-bye, almost all these theorists look longingly as their +final hope and mainstay. We must teach men to mend their +own matters, of their own reason, and their own free-will. +We must teach them that they are the arbiters of their own +destinies; and, to a fearfully large degree, of their +children’s destinies after them. We must teach them +not merely that they ought to be free, but that they are free, +whether they know it or not, for good and for evil. And we +must do that in this case, by teaching them sound practical +science; the science of physiology as applied to health. +So, and so only, can we cheek—I do not say stop +entirely—though I believe even that to be ideally possible; +but at least cheek the process of degradation which I believe to +be surely going on, not merely in these islands, but in every +civilised country in the world, in proportion to its +civilisation.</p> +<p>It is still a question whether science has fully discovered +those laws of hereditary health, the disregard of which causes so +many marriages disastrous to generations yet unborn. But +much valuable light has been thrown on this most mysterious and +most important subject during the last few years. That +light—and I thank God for it—is widening and +deepening rapidly. And I doubt not that in a generation or +two more, enough will be known to be thrown into the shape of +practical and provable rules; and that, if not a public opinion, +yet at least, what is more useful far, a widespread private +opinion will grow up, especially among educated women, which will +prevent many a tragedy and save many a life.</p> +<p>But, as to the laws of personal health: enough, and more than +enough, is known already, to be applied safely and easily by any +adults, however unlearned, to the preservation not only of their +own health, but of that of their children.</p> +<p>The value of healthy habitations, of personal cleanliness, of +pure air and pure water, of various kinds of food, according as +each tends to make bone, fat, or muscle, provided +only—provided only—that the food be unadulterated; +the value of various kinds of clothing, and physical exercise, of +a free and equal development of the brain power, without undue +overstrain in any one direction; in one word, the method of +producing, as far as possible, the mentem sanam in corpore sano, +and the wonderful and blessed effects of such obedience to those +laws of nature, which are nothing but the good will of God +expressed in facts—their wonderful and blessed tendency, I +say, to eliminate the germs of hereditary disease, and to +actually regenerate the human system—all this is known; +known as fully and clearly as any human knowledge need be known; +it is written in dozens of popular books and pamphlets. And +why should this divine voice, which cries to man, tending to sink +into effeminate barbarism through his own hasty and partial +civilisation: “It is not too late. For your bodies, +as for your spirits, there is an upward, as well as a downward +path. You, or if not you, at least the children whom you +have brought into the world, for whom you toil, for whom you +hoard, for whom you pray, for whom you would give your +lives,—they still may be healthy, strong, it may be +beautiful, and have all the intellectual and social, as well as +the physical advantages, which health, strength, and beauty +give.”—Ah, why is this divine voice now, as of old, +Wisdom crying in the streets, and no man regarding her? I +appeal to women, who are initiated, as we men can never be, into +the stern mysteries of pain, and sorrow, and +self-sacrifice;—they who bring forth children, weep over +children, slave for children, and, if they have none of their +own, then slave, with the holy instinct of the sexless bee, for +the children of others—Let them say, shall this thing +be?</p> +<p>Let my readers pardon me if I seem to write too +earnestly. That I speak neither more nor less than the +truth, every medical man knows full well. Not only as a +very humble student of physiology, but as a parish priest of +thirty years’ standing, I have seen so much unnecessary +misery; and I have in other cases seen similar misery so simply +avoided; that the sense of the vastness of the evil is +intensified by my sense of the easiness of the cure.</p> +<p>Why, then—to come to practical suggestions—should +there not be opened in every great town in these realms a public +school of health? It might connect itself with—I hold +that it should form an integral part of—some existing +educational institute. But it should at least give +practical lectures, for fees small enough to put them within the +reach of any respectable man or woman, however poor, I cannot but +hope that such schools of health, if opened in the great +manufacturing towns of England and Scotland, and, indeed, in such +an Irish town as Belfast, would obtain pupils in plenty, and +pupils who would thoroughly profit by what they hear. The +people of these towns are, most of them, specially accustomed by +their own trades to the application of scientific laws. To +them, therefore, the application of any fresh physical laws to a +fresh set of facts, would have nothing strange in it. They +have already something of that inductive habit of mind which is +the groundwork of all rational understanding or action. +They would not turn the deaf and contemptuous ear with which the +savage and the superstitious receive the revelation of +nature’s mysteries. Why should not, with so hopeful +an audience, the experiment be tried far and wide, of giving +lectures on health, as supplementary to those lectures on animal +physiology which are, I am happy to say, becoming more and more +common? Why should not people be taught—they are +already being taught at Birmingham—something about the +tissues of the body, their structure and uses, the circulation of +the blood, respiration, chemical changes in the air respired, +amount breathed, digestion, nature of food, absorption, +secretion, structure of the nervous system—in fact, be +taught something of how their own bodies are made and how they +work? Teaching of this kind ought to, and will, in some +more civilised age and country, be held a necessary element in +the school course of every child, just as necessary as reading, +writing, and arithmetic; for it is after all the most necessary +branch of that “technical education” of which we hear +so much just now, namely, the technic, or art, of keeping oneself +alive and well.</p> +<p>But we can hardly stop there. After we have taught the +condition of health, we must teach also the condition of disease; +of those diseases specially which tend to lessen wholesale the +health of townsfolk, exposed to an artificial mode of life. +Surely young men and women should be taught something of the +causes of zymotic disease, and of scrofula, consumption, rickets, +dipsomania, cerebral derangement, and such like. They +should be shown the practical value of pure air, pure water, +unadulterated food, sweet and dry dwellings. Is there one +of them, man or woman, who would not be the safer and happier, +and the more useful to his or her neighbours, if they had +acquired some sound notions about those questions of drainage on +which their own lives and the lives of their children may every +day depend? I say—women as well as men. I +should have said women rather than men. For it is the women +who have the ordering of the household, the bringing up of the +children; the women who bide at home, while the men are away, it +may be at the other end of the earth.</p> +<p>And if any say, as they have a right to say—“But +these are subjects which can hardly be taught to young women in +public lectures;” I rejoin—of course not, unless they +are taught by women—by women, of course, duly educated and +legally qualified. Let such teach to women, what every +woman ought to know, and what her parents will very properly +object to her hearing from almost any man. This is one of +the main reasons why I have, for twenty years past, advocated the +training of women for the medical profession; and one which +countervails, in my mind, all possible objections to such a +movement. And now, thank God, we are seeing the common +sense of Great Britain, and indeed of every civilised nation, +gradually coming round to that which seemed to me, when I first +conceived of it, a dream too chimerical to be cherished save in +secret—the restoring woman to her natural share in that +sacred office of healer, which she held in the Middle Ages, and +from which she was thrust out during the sixteenth century.</p> +<p>I am most happy to see, for instance, that the National Health +Society, <a name="citation36"></a><a href="#footnote36" +class="citation">[36]</a> which I earnestly recommend to the +attention of my readers, announces a “Course of Lectures +for Ladies on Elementary Physiology and Hygiene,” by a +lady, to which I am also most happy to see, governesses are +admitted at half-fees. Alas! how much misery, disease, and +even death might have been prevented, had governesses been taught +such matters thirty years ago, I, for one, know too well. +May the day soon come when there will be educated women enough to +give such lectures throughout these realms, to rich as well as +poor—for the rich, strange to say, need them often as much +as the poor do—and that we may live to see, in every great +town, health classes for women as well as for men, sending forth +year by year more young women and young men taught, not only to +take care of themselves and of their families, but to exercise +moral influence over their fellow-citizens, as champions in the +battle against dirt and drunkenness, disease and death.</p> +<p>There may be those who would answer—or rather, there +would certainly have been those who would have so answered thirty +years ago, before the so-called materialism of advanced science +had taught us some practical wisdom about education, and reminded +people that they have bodies as well as minds and +souls—“You say, we are likely to grow weaklier, +unhealthier. And if it were so, what matter? Mind +makes the man, not body. We do not want our children to be +stupid giants and bravos; but clever, able, highly educated, +however weakly Providence or the laws of nature may have chosen +to make them. Let them overstrain their brains a little; +let them contract their chests, and injure their digestion and +their eyesight, by sitting at desks, poring over books. +Intellect is what we want. Intellect makes money. +Intellect makes the world. We would rather see our son a +genius than a mere athlete.” Well: and so would +I. But what if intellect alone does not even make money, +save as Messrs. Dodson and Fogg, Sampson Brass, and Montagu Tigg +were wont to make it, unless backed by an able, enduring, healthy +physique, such as I have seen, almost without exception, in those +successful men of business whom I have had the honour and the +pleasure of knowing? What if intellect, or what is now +called intellect, did not make the world, or the smallest wheel +or cog of it? What if, for want of obeying the laws of +nature, parents bred up neither a genius nor an athlete, but only +an incapable unhappy personage, with a huge upright forehead, +like that of a Byzantine Greek, filled with some sort of pap +instead of brains, and tempted alternately to fanaticism and +strong drink? We must, in the great majority of cases, have +the <i>corpus sanem</i> if we want the <i>mentem sanem</i>; and +healthy bodies are the only trustworthy organs for healthy +minds. Which is cause and which is effect, I shall not stay +to debate here. But wherever we find a population generally +weakly, stunted, scrofulous, we find in them a corresponding type +of brain, which cannot be trusted to do good work; which is +capable more or less of madness, whether solitary or +epidemic. It may be very active; it may be very quick at +catching at new and grand ideas—all the more quick, +perhaps, on account of its own secret malaise and +self-discontent; but it will be irritable, spasmodic, +hysterical. It will be apt to mistake capacity of talk for +capacity of action, excitement for earnestness, virulence for +force, and, too often; cruelty for justice. It will lose +manful independence, individuality, originality; and when men +act, they will act from the consciousness of personal weakness, +like sheep rushing over a hedge, leaning against each other, +exhorting each other to be brave, and swaying about in mobs and +masses. These were the intellectual weaknesses which, as I +read history, followed on physical degradation in Imperial Rome, +in Alexandria, in Byzantium. Have we not seen them +reappear, under fearful forms, in Paris but the other day?</p> +<p>I do not blame; I do not judge. My theory, which I hold, +and shall hold, to be fairly founded on a wide induction, forbids +me to blame and to judge; because it tells me that these defects +are mainly physical; that those who exhibit them are mainly to be +pitied, as victims of the sins or ignorance of their +forefathers.</p> +<p>But it tells me too, that those who, professing to be educated +men, and therefore bound to know better, treat these physical +phenomena as spiritual, healthy, and praiseworthy; who even +exasperate them, that they may make capital out of the weaknesses +of fallen man, are the most contemptible and yet the most +dangerous of public enemies, let them cloak their quackery under +whatsoever patriotic, or scientific, or even sacred words.</p> +<p>There are those again honest, kindly, sensible, practical men, +many of them; men whom I have no wish to offend; whom I had +rather ask to teach me some of their own experience and common +sense, which has learned to discern, like good statesmen, not +only what ought to be done, but what can be done—there are +those, I say, who would sooner see this whole question let +alone. Their feeling, as far as I can analyse it, seems to +be that the evils of which I have been complaining, are on the +whole inevitable; or, if not, that we can mend so very little of +them, that it is wisest to leave them alone altogether, lest, +like certain sewers, “the more you stir them, the more they +smell.” They fear lest we should unsettle the minds +of the many for whom these evils will never be mended; lest we +make them discontented; discontented with their houses, their +occupations, their food, their whole social arrangements; and all +in vain.</p> +<p>I should answer, in all courtesy and humility—for I +sympathise deeply with such men and women, and respect them +deeply likewise—but are not people discontented already, +from the lowest to the highest? And ought a man, in such a +piecemeal, foolish, greedy, sinful world as this is, and always +has been, to be anything but discontented? If he thinks +that things are going all right, must he not have a most beggarly +conception of what going right means? And if things are not +going right, can it be anything but good for him to see that they +are not going right? Can truth and fact harm any human +being? I shall not believe so, as long as I have a Bible +wherein to believe. For my part, I should like to make +every man, woman, and child whom I meet discontented with +themselves, even as I am discontented with myself. I should +like to awaken in them, about their physical, their intellectual, +their moral condition, that divine discontent which is the +parent, first of upward aspiration and then of self-control, +thought, effort to fulfil that aspiration even in part. For +to be discontented with the divine discontent, and to be ashamed +with the noble shame, is the very germ and first upgrowth of all +virtue. Men begin at first, as boys begin when they grumble +at their school and their schoolmasters, to lay the blame on +others; to be discontented with their circumstances—the +things which stand around them; and to cry, “Oh that I had +this!” “Oh that I had that!” But by +that way no deliverance lies. That discontent only ends in +revolt and rebellion, social or political; and that, again, still +in the same worship of circumstances—but this time +desperate—which ends, let it disguise itself under what +fine names it will, in what the old Greeks called a tyranny; in +which—as in the Spanish republics of America, and in France +more than once—all have become the voluntary slaves of one +man, because each man fancies that the one man can improve his +circumstances for him.</p> +<p>But the wise man will learn, like Epictetus the heroic slave, +the slave of Epaphroditus, Nero’s minion—and in what +baser and uglier circumstances could human being find +himself?—to find out the secret of being truly free; +namely, to be discontented with no man and no thing save +himself. To say not—“Oh that I had this and +that!” but “Oh that I were this and +that!” Then, by God’s help—and that +heroic slave, heathen though he was, believed and trusted in +God’s help—“I will make myself that which God +has shown me that I ought to be and can be.”</p> +<p>Ten thousand a year, or ten million a year, as Epictetus saw +full well, cannot mend that vulgar discontent with circumstances +which he had felt—and who with more right?—and +conquered, and despised. For that is the discontent of +children, wanting always more holidays and more sweets. But +I wish my readers to have, and to cherish, the discontent of men +and women.</p> +<p>Therefore I would make men and women discontented, with the +divine and wholesome discontent, at their own physical frame, and +at that of their children. I would accustom their eyes to +those precious heirlooms of the human race, the statues of the +old Greeks; to their tender grandeur, their chaste healthfulness, +their unconscious, because perfect might: and say—There; +these are tokens to you, and to all generations yet unborn, of +what man could be once; of what he can be again if he will obey +those laws of nature which are the voice of God. I would +make them discontented with the ugliness and closeness of their +dwellings; I would make them discontented with the fashion of +their garments, and still more just now the women, of all ranks, +with the fashion of theirs; and with everything around them which +they have the power of improving, if it be at all ungraceful, +superfluous, tawdry, ridiculous, unwholesome. I would make +them discontented with what they call their education, and say to +them—You call the three Royal R’s education? +They are not education: no more is the knowledge which would +enable you to take the highest prizes given by the Society of +Arts, or any other body. They are not education: they are +only instruction; a necessary groundwork, in an age like this, +for making practical use of your education: but not the education +itself.</p> +<p>And if they asked me, What then education meant? I should +point them, first, I think, to noble old Lilly’s noble old +“Euphues,” of three hundred years ago, and ask them +to consider what it says about education, and especially this +passage concerning that mere knowledge which is nowadays +strangely miscalled education. “There are two +principal and peculiar gifts in the nature of man, knowledge and +reason. The one”—that is +reason—“commandeth, and the other”—that +is knowledge—“obeyeth. These things neither the +whirling wheel of fortune can change, nor the deceitful +cavillings of worldlings separate, neither sickness abate, nor +age abolish.” And next I should point them to those +pages in Mr. Gladstone’s “Juventus Mundi,” +where he describes the ideal training of a Greek youth in +Homer’s days; and say—There: that is an education fit +for a really civilised man, even though he never saw a book in +his life; the full, proportionate, harmonious educing-that is, +bringing out and developing—of all the faculties of his +body, mind, and heart, till he becomes at once a reverent yet +self-assured, a graceful and yet a valiant, an able and yet an +eloquent personage.</p> +<p>And if any should say to me—“But what has this to +do with science? Homer’s Greeks knew no +science;” I should rejoin—But they had, pre-eminently +above all ancient races which we know, the scientific instinct; +the teachableness and modesty; the clear eye and quick ear; the +hearty reverence for fact and nature, and for the human body, and +mind, and spirit; for human nature in a word, in its +completeness, as the highest fact upon this earth. +Therefore they became in after years, not only the great +colonisers and the great civilisers of the old world—the +most practical people, I hold, which the world ever saw; but the +parents of all sound physics as well as of all sound +metaphysics. Their very religion, in spite of its +imperfections, helped forward their education, not in spite of, +but by means of that anthropomorphism which we sometimes too +hastily decry. As Mr. Gladstone says: “As regarded +all other functions of our nature, outside the domain of the life +to Godward—all those functions which are summed up in what +St. Paul calls the flesh and the mind, the psychic and bodily +life, the tendency of the system was to exalt the human element, +by proposing a model of beauty, strength, and wisdom, in all +their combinations, so elevated that the effort to attain them +required a continual upward strain. It made divinity +attainable; and thus it effectually directed the thought and aim +of man</p> +<blockquote><p>Along the line of limitless desires.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Such a scheme of religion, though failing grossly in the +government of the passions, and in upholding the standard of +moral duties, tended powerfully to produce a lofty self-respect, +and a large, free, and varied conception of humanity. It +incorporated itself in schemes of notable discipline for mind and +body, indeed of a lifelong education; and these habits of mind +and action had their marked results (to omit many other +greatnesses) in a philosophy, literature, and art, which remain +to this day unrivalled or unsurpassed.”</p> +<p>So much those old Greeks did for their own education, without +science and without Christianity. We who have both: what +might we not do, if we would be true to our advantages, and to +ourselves?</p> +<h2><a name="page49"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 49</span>THE +TWO BREATHS <a name="citation49"></a><a href="#footnote49" +class="citation">[49]</a></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Ladies</span>,—I have been honoured +by a second invitation to address you, and I dare not refuse it; +because it gives me an opportunity of speaking on a matter, +knowledge and ignorance about which may seriously affect your +health and happiness, and that of the children with whom you may +have to do. I must apologise if I say many things which are +well known to many persons in this room: they ought to be well +known to all: but it is generally best to assume total ignorance +in one’s hearers, and to begin from the beginning.</p> +<p>I shall try to be as simple as possible; to trouble you as +little as possible with scientific terms; to be practical; and at +the same time, if possible, interesting.</p> +<p>I should wish to call this lecture “The Two +Breaths:” not merely “The Breath;” and for this +reason: every time you breathe you breathe two different breaths; +you take in one, you give out another. The composition of +those two breaths is different. Their effects are +different. The breath which has been breathed out must not +be breathed in again. To tell you why it must not would +lead me into anatomical details, not quite in place here as yet; +though the day will come, I trust, when every woman entrusted +with the care of children will be expected to know something +about them. But this I may say: Those who habitually take +in fresh breath will probably grow up large, strong, ruddy, +cheerful, active, clear-headed, fit for their work. Those +who habitually take in the breath which has been breathed out by +themselves, or any other living creature, will certainly grow up, +if they grow up at all, small, weak, pale, nervous, depressed, +unfit for work, and tempted continually to resort to stimulants, +and become drunkards.</p> +<p>If you want to see how different the breath breathed out is +from the breath taken in, you have only to try a somewhat cruel +experiment, but one which people too often try upon themselves, +their children, and their workpeople. If you take any small +animal with lungs like your own—a mouse, for +instance—and force it to breathe no air but what you have +breathed already; if you put it in a close box, and while you +take in breath from the outer air, send out your breath through a +tube, into that box, the animal will soon faint: if you go on +long with this process, it will die.</p> +<p>Take a second instance, which I beg to press most seriously on +the notice of mothers, governesses, and nurses. If you +allow a child to get into the habit of sleeping with its head +under the bed-clothes, and thereby breathing its own breath over +and over again, that child will assuredly grow pale, weak, and +ill. Medical men have cases on record of scrofula appearing +in children previously healthy, which could only be accounted for +from this habit, and which ceased when the habit stopped. +Let me again entreat your attention to this undoubted fact.</p> +<p>Take another instance, which is only too common: If you are in +a crowded room, with plenty of fire and lights and company, doors +and windows all shut tight, how often you feel faint—so +faint that you may require smelling-salts or some other +stimulant. The cause of your faintness is just the same as +that of the mouse’s fainting in the box; you and your +friends, and, as I shall show you presently, the fire and the +candles likewise, having been all breathing each other’s +breaths, over and over again, till the air has become unfit to +support life. You are doing your best to enact over again +the Highland tragedy, of which Sir James Simpson tells in his +lectures to the working-classes of Edinburgh, when at a Christmas +meeting thirty-six persons danced all night in a small room with +a low ceiling, keeping the doors and windows shut. The +atmosphere of the room was noxious beyond description; and the +effect was, that seven of the party were soon after seized with +typhus fever, of which two died. You are inflicting on +yourselves the torments of the poor dog, who is kept at the +Grotto del Cane, near Naples, to be stupefied, for the amusement +of visitors, by the carbonic acid gas of the Grotto, and brought +to life again by being dragged into the fresh air; nay, you are +inflicting upon yourselves the torments of the famous Black Hole +of Calcutta: and, if there was no chimney in the room, by which +some fresh air could enter, the candles would soon burn blue, as +they do, you know, when ghosts appear; your brains become +disturbed; and you yourselves ran the risk of becoming ghosts, +and the candles of actually going out.</p> +<p>Of this last fact there is no doubt; for if, instead of +putting a mouse into the box, you will put a lighted candle, and +breathe into the tube as before, however gently, you will in a +short time put the candle out.</p> +<p>Now, how is this? First, what is the difference between +the breath you take in and the breath you give out? And +next, why has it a similar effect on animal life and a lighted +candle?</p> +<p>The difference is this. The breath which you take in is, +or ought to be, pure air, composed, on the whole, of oxygen and +nitrogen, with a minute portion of carbonic acid.</p> +<p>The breath which you give out is an impure air, to which has +been added, among other matters which will not support life, an +excess of carbonic acid.</p> +<p>That this is the fact you can prove for yourselves by a simple +experiment. Get a little lime-water at the chemist’s, +and breathe into it through a glass tube; your breath will at +once make the lime-water milky. The carbonic acid of your +breath has laid hold of the lime, and made it visible as white +carbonate of lime—in plain English, as common chalk.</p> +<p>Now I do not wish, as I said, to load your memories with +scientific terms: but I beseech you to remember at least these +two, oxygen gas and carbonic acid gas; and to remember that, as +surely as oxygen feeds the fire of life, so surely does carbonic +acid put it out.</p> +<p>I say, “the fire of life.” In that +expression lies the answer to our second question: Why does our +breath produce a similar effect upon the mouse and the lighted +candle? Every one of us is, as it were, a living +fire. Were we not, how could we be always warmer than the +air outside us? There is a process; going on perpetually in +each of us, similar to that by which coals are burnt in the fire, +oil in a lamp, wax in a candle, and the earth itself in a +volcano. To keep each of those fires alight, oxygen is +needed; and the products of combustion, as they are called, are +more or less the same in each case—carbonic acid and +steam.</p> +<p>These facts justify the expression I just made use +of—which may have seemed to some of you +fantastical—that the fire and the candles in the crowded +room were breathing the same breath as you were. It is but +too true. An average fire in the grate requires, to keep it +burning, as much oxygen as several human beings do; each candle +or lamp must have its share of oxygen likewise, and that a very +considerable one, and an average gas-burner—pray attend to +this, you who live in rooms lighted with gas—consumes as +much oxygen as several candles. All alike are making +carbonic acid. The carbonic acid of the fire happily +escapes up the chimney in the smoke: but the carbonic acid from +the human beings and the candles remains to poison the room, +unless it be ventilated.</p> +<p>Now, I think you may understand one of the simplest, and yet +most terrible, cases of want of ventilation—death by the +fumes of charcoal. A human being shut up in a room, of +which every crack is closed, with a pan of burning charcoal, +falls asleep, never to wake again. His inward fire is +competing with the fire of charcoal for the oxygen of the room; +both are making carbonic acid out of it: but the charcoal, being +the stronger of the two, gets all the oxygen to itself, and +leaves the human being nothing to inhale but the carbonic acid +which it has made. The human being, being the weaker, dies +first: but the charcoal dies also. When it has exhausted +all the oxygen of the room, it cools, goes out, and is found in +the morning half-consumed beside its victim. If you put a +giant or an elephant, I should conceive, into that room, instead +of a human being, the case would be reversed for a time: the +elephant would put out the burning charcoal by the carbonic acid +from his mighty lungs; and then, when he had exhausted all the +air in the room, die likewise of his own carbonic acid.</p> +<p>Now, I think, we may see what ventilation means, and why it is +needed.</p> +<p>Ventilation means simply letting out the foul air, and letting +in the fresh air; letting out the air which has been breathed by +men or by candles, and letting in the air which has not. To +understand how to do that, we must remember a most simple +chemical law, that a gas as it is warmed expands, and therefore +becomes lighter; as it cools, it contracts, and becomes +heavier.</p> +<p>Now the carbonic acid in the breath which comes out of our +mouth is warm, lighter than the air, and rises to the ceiling; +and therefore in any unventilated room full of people, there is a +layer of foul air along the ceiling. You might soon test +that for yourselves, if you could mount a ladder and put your +heads there aloft. You do test it for yourselves when you +sit in the galleries of churches and theatres, where the air is +palpably more foul, and therefore more injurious, than down +below.</p> +<p>Where, again, work-people are employed in a crowded house of +many storeys, the health of those who work on the upper floors +always suffers most.</p> +<p>In the old monkey-house of the Zoological Gardens, when the +cages were on the old plan, tier upon tier, the poor little +fellows in the uppermost tier—so I have been +told—always died first of the monkey’s constitutional +complaint, consumption, simply from breathing the warm breath of +their friends below. But since the cages have been altered, +and made to range side by side from top to bottom, +consumption—I understand—has vastly diminished among +them.</p> +<p>The first question in ventilation, therefore, is to get this +carbonic acid safe out of the room, while it is warm and light +and close to the ceiling; for if you do not, this happens: The +carbonic acid gas cools and becomes heavier; for carbonic acid, +at the same temperature as common air, is so much heavier than +common air, that you may actually—if you are handy +enough—turn it from one vessel to another, and pour out for +your enemy a glass of invisible poison. So down to the +floor this heavy carbonic acid comes, and lies along it, just as +it lies often in the bottom of old wells, or old brewers’ +vats, as a stratum of poison, killing occasionally the men who +descend into it. Hence, as foolish a practice as I know is +that of sleeping on the floor; for towards the small hours, when +the room gets cold, the sleeper on the floor is breathing +carbonic acid.</p> +<p>And here one word to those ladies who interest themselves with +the poor. The poor are too apt in times of distress to pawn +their bedsteads and keep their beds. Never, if you have +influence, let that happen. Keep the bedstead, whatever +else may go, to save the sleeper from the carbonic acid on the +floor.</p> +<p>How, then, shall we get rid of the foul air at the top of the +room? After all that has been written and tried on +ventilation, I know no simpler method than putting into the +chimney one of Arnott’s ventilators, which may be bought +and fixed for a few shillings; always remembering that it must +be. fixed into the chimney as near the ceiling as possible. +I can speak of these ventilators from twenty-five years’ +experience. Living in a house with low ceilings, liable to +become overcharged with carbonic acid, which produces sleepiness +in the evening, I have found that these ventilators keep the air +fresh and pure; and I consider the presence of one of these +ventilators in a room more valuable than three or four feet +additional height of ceiling. I have found, too, that their +working proves how necessary they are, from this simple fact: You +would suppose that, as the ventilator opens freely into the +chimney, the smoke would be blown down through it in high winds, +and blacken the ceiling: but this is just what does not +happen. If the ventilator be at all properly poised, so as +to shut with a violent gust of wind, it will at all other moments +keep itself permanently open; proving thereby that there is an +up-draught of heated air continually escaping from the ceiling up +the chimney. Another very simple method of ventilation is +employed in those excellent cottages which Her Majesty has built +for her labourers round Windsor. Over each door a sheet of +perforated zinc, some eighteen inches square, is fixed; allowing +the foul air to escape into the passage; and in the ceiling of +the passage a similar sheet of zinc, allowing it to escape into +the roof. Fresh air, meanwhile, should be obtained from +outside, by piercing the windows, or otherwise. And here +let me give one hint to all builders of houses: If possible, let +bedroom windows open at the top as well as at the bottom.</p> +<p>Let me impress the necessity of using some such contrivances, +not only on parents and educators, but on those who employ +workpeople, and above all on those who employ young women in +shops or in work-rooms. What their condition may be in this +city I know not; but most painful it has been to me in other +places, when passing through warehouses or workrooms, to see the +pale, sodden, and, as the French would say, +“etiolated” countenances of the girls who were +passing the greater part of the day in them; and painful, also, +to breathe an atmosphere of which habit had, alas! made them +unconscious, but which to one coming out of the open air was +altogether noxious, and shocking also; for it was fostering the +seeds of death, not only in the present but future +generations.</p> +<p>Why should this be? Everyone will agree that good +ventilation is necessary in a hospital, because people cannot get +well without fresh air. Do they not see that by the same +reasoning good ventilation is necessary everywhere, because +people cannot remain well without fresh air? Let me entreat +those who employ women in workrooms, if they have no time to read +through such books as Dr. Andrew Combe’s “Physiology +applied to Health and Education,” and Madame de +Wahl’s “Practical Hints on the Moral, Mental, and +Physical Training of Girls,” to procure certain tracts +published by Messrs. Jarrold, Paternoster Row, for the +Ladies’ Sanitary Association; especially one which bears on +this subject: “The Black-hole in our own Bedrooms;” +Dr. Lankester’s “School Manual of Health;” or a +manual on ventilation, published by the Metropolitan Working +Classes Association for the Improvement of Public Health.</p> +<p>I look forward—I say it openly—to some period of +higher civilisation, when the Acts of Parliament for the +ventilation of factories and workshops shall be largely extended, +and made far more stringent; when officers of public health shall +be empowered to enforce the ventilation of every room in which +persons are employed for hire: and empowered also to demand a +proper system of ventilation for every new house, whether in +country or in town. To that, I believe, we must come: but I +had sooner far see these improvements carried out, as befits the +citizens of a free country, in the spirit of the Gospel rather +than in that of the Law; carried out, not compulsorily and from +fear of fines, but voluntarily, from a sense of duty, honour, and +humanity. I appeal, therefore, to the good feeling of all +whom it may concern, whether the health of those whom they +employ, and therefore the supply of fresh air which they +absolutely need, are not matters for which they are not, more or +less, responsible to their country and their God.</p> +<p>And if any excellent person of the old school should answer +me: “Why make all this fuss about ventilation? Our +forefathers got on very well without it”—I must +answer that, begging their pardons, our ancestors did nothing of +the kind. Our ancestors got on usually very ill in these +matters: and when they got on well, it was because they had good +ventilation in spite of themselves.</p> +<p>First. They got on very ill. To quote a few +remarkable instances of longevity, or to tell me that men were +larger and stronger on the average in old times, is to yield to +the old fallacy of fancying that savages were peculiarly healthy, +because those who were seen were active and strong. The +simple answer is, that the strong alone survived, while the +majority died from the severity of the training. Savages do +not increase in number; and our ancestors increased but very +slowly for many centuries. I am not going to disgust my +audience with statistics of disease: but knowing something, as I +happen to do, of the social state and of the health of the Middle +and Elizabethan Ages, I have no hesitation in saying that the +average of disease and death was far greater then than it is +now. Epidemics of many kinds, typhus, ague, +plague—all diseases which were caused more or less by bad +air—devastated this land and Europe in those days with a +horrible intensity, to which even the choleras of our times are +mild. The back streets, the hospitals, the gaols, the +barracks, the camps—every place in which any large number +of persons congregated, were so many nests of pestilence, +engendered by uncleanliness, which defiled alike the water which +was drunk and the air which was breathed; and as a single fact, +of which the tables of insurance companies assure us, the average +of human life in England has increased twenty-five per cent. +since the reign of George I., owing simply to our more rational +and cleanly habits of life.</p> +<p>But secondly, I said that when our ancestors got on well, they +did so because they got ventilation in spite of themselves. +Luckily for them, their houses were ill-built; their doors and +windows would not shut. They had lattice-windowed houses, +too; to live in one of which, as I can testify from long +experience, is as thoroughly ventilating as living in a lantern +with the horn broken out. It was because their houses were +full of draughts, and still more, in the early Middle Age, +because they had no glass, and stopped out the air only by a +shutter at night, that they sought for shelter rather than for +fresh air, of which they sometimes had too much; and, to escape +the wind, built their houses in holes, such as that in which the +old city of Winchester stands. Shelter, I believe, as much +as the desire to be near fish in Lent, and to occupy the rich +alluvium of the valleys, made the monks of Old England choose the +river-banks for the sites of their abbeys. They made a +mistake therein, which, like most mistakes, did not go +unpunished. These low situations, especially while the +forests were yet thick on the hills around, were the perennial +haunts of fever and ague, produced by subtle vegetable poisons, +carried in the carbonic acid given off by rotten +vegetation. So there, again, they fell in with man’s +old enemy—bad air. Still, as long as the doors and +windows did not shut, some free circulation of air +remained. But now, our doors and windows shut only too +tight. We have plate-glass instead of lattices; and we have +replaced the draughty and smoky, but really wholesome open +chimney, with its wide corners and settles, by narrow registers, +and even by stoves. We have done all we can, in fact, to +seal ourselves up hermetically from the outer air, and to breath +our own breaths over and over again; and we pay the penalty of it +in a thousand ways unknown to our ancestors, through whose rooms +all the winds of heaven whistled, and who were glad enough to +shelter themselves from draughts in the sitting-room by the high +screen round the fire, and in the sleeping-room by the thick +curtains of the four-post bedstead, which is now rapidly +disappearing before a higher civilisation. We therefore +absolutely require to make for ourselves the very ventilation +from which our ancestors tried to escape.</p> +<p>But, ladies, there is an old and true proverb, that you may +bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make him drink. +And in like wise it is too true, that you may bring people to the +fresh air, but you cannot make them breath it. Their own +folly, or the folly of their parents and educators, prevents +their lungs being duly filled and duly emptied. Therefore +the blood is not duly oxygenated, and the whole system goes +wrong. Paleness, weakness, consumption, scrofula, and too +many other ailments, are the consequences of ill-filled +lungs. For without well-filled lungs, robust health is +impossible.</p> +<p>And if anyone shall answer: “We do not want robust +health so much as intellectual attainment; the mortal body, being +the lower organ, must take its chance, and be even sacrificed, if +need be to the higher organ—the immortal +mind”—To such I reply, You cannot do it. The +laws of nature, which are the express will of God, laugh such +attempts to scorn. Every organ of the body is formed out of +the blood; and if the blood be vitiated, every organ suffers in +proportion to its delicacy; and the brain, being the most +delicate and highly specialised of all organs, suffers most of +all, and soonest of all, as everyone knows who has tried to work +his brain when his digestion was the least out of order. +Nay, the very morals will suffer. From ill-filled lungs, +which signify ill-repaired blood, arise year by year an amount +not merely of disease, but of folly, temper, laziness, +intemperance, madness, and, let me tell you fairly, +crime—the sum of which will never be known till that great +day when men shall be called to account for all deeds done in the +body, whether they be good or evil.</p> +<p>I must refer you on this subject again to Andrew Combe’s +“Physiology,” especially chapters iv. and vii.; and +also to chapter x. of Madame de Wahl’s excellent +book. I will only say this shortly, that the three most +common causes of ill-filled lungs, in children and in young +ladies, are stillness, silence, and stays.</p> +<p>First, stillness; a sedentary life, and want of +exercise. A girl is kept for hours sitting on a form +writing or reading, to do which she must lean forward; and if her +schoolmistress cruelly attempts to make her sit upright, and +thereby keep the spine in an attitude for which Nature did not +intend it, she is thereby doing her best to bring on that +disease, so fearfully common in girls’ schools, lateral +curvature of the spine. But practically the girl will stoop +forward. And what happens? The lower ribs are pressed +into the body, thereby displacing more or less something +inside. The diaphragm in the meantime, which is the very +bellows of the lungs, remains loose; the lungs are never properly +filled or emptied; and an excess of carbonic acid accumulates at +the bottom of them. What follows? Frequent sighing to +get rid of it; heaviness of head; depression of the whole nervous +system under the influence of the poison of the lungs; and when +the poor child gets up from her weary work, what is the first +thing she probably does? She lifts up her chest, stretches, +yawns, and breathes deeply—Nature’s voice, +Nature’s instinctive cure, which is probably regarded as +ungraceful, as what is called “lolling” is. As +if sitting upright was not an attitude in itself essentially +ungraceful, and such as no artist would care to draw. As if +“lolling,” which means putting the body in the +attitude of the most perfect ease compatible with a +fully-expanded chest, was not in itself essentially graceful, and +to be seen in every reposing figure in Greek bas-reliefs and +vases; graceful, and like all graceful actions, healthful at the +same time. The only tolerably wholesome attitude of repose, +which I see allowed in average school-rooms, is lying on the back +on the floor, or on a sloping board, in which case the lungs must +be fully expanded. But even so, a pillow, or some +equivalent, ought to be placed under the small of the back: or +the spine will be strained at its very weakest point.</p> +<p>I now go on to the second mistake—enforced +silence. Moderate reading aloud is good: but where there is +any tendency to irritability of throat or lungs, too much +moderation cannot be used. You may as well try to cure a +diseased lung by working it, as to cure a lame horse by galloping +him. But where the breathing organs are of average health +let it be said once and for all, that children and young people +cannot make too much noise. The parents who cannot bear the +noise of their children have no right to have brought them into +the world. The schoolmistress who enforces silence on her +pupils is committing—unintentionally no doubt, but still +committing—an offence against reason, worthy only of a +convent. Every shout, every burst of laughter, every +song—nay, in the case of infants, as physiologists well +know, every moderate fit of crying—conduces to health, by +rapidly filling and emptying the lung, and changing the blood +more rapidly from black to red, that is, from death to +life. Andrew Combe tells a story of a large charity school, +in which the young girls were, for the sake of their health, shut +up in the hall and school-room during play hours, from November +till March, and no romping or noise allowed. The natural +consequences were, the great majority of them fell ill; and I am +afraid that a great deal of illness has been from time to time +contracted in certain school-rooms, simply through this one cause +of enforced silence. Some cause or other there must be for +the amount of ill-health and weakliness which prevails especially +among girls of the middle classes in towns, who have not, poor +things, the opportunities which richer girls have, of keeping +themselves in strong health by riding, skating, +archery,—that last quite an admirable exercise for the +chest and lungs, and far preferable to croquet, which involves +too much unwholesome stooping.—Even a game of ball, if +milliners and shop-girls had room to indulge in one after their +sedentary work, might bring fresh spirits to many a heart, and +fresh colour to many a cheek.</p> +<p>I spoke just now of the Greeks. I suppose you will all +allow that the Greeks were, as far as we know, the most beautiful +race which the world ever saw. Every educated man knows +that they were also the cleverest of all races; and, next to his +Bible, thanks, God for Greek literature.</p> +<p>Now, these people had made physical as well as intellectual +education a science as well as a study. Their women +practised graceful, and in some cases even athletic, +exercises. They developed, by a free and healthy life, +those figures which remain everlasting and unapproachable models +of human beauty: but—to come to my third point—they +wore no stays. The first mention of stays that I have ever +found is in the letters of dear old Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene, +on the Greek coast of Africa, about four hundred years after the +Christian era. He tells us how, when he was shipwrecked on +a remote part of the coast, and he and the rest of the passengers +were starving on cockles and limpets, there was among them a +slave girl out of the far East, who had a pinched wasp-waist, +such as you may see on the old Hindoo sculptures, and such as you +may see in any street in a British town. And when the Greek +ladies of the neighbourhood found her out, they sent for her from +house to house, to behold, with astonishment and laughter, this +new and prodigious, waist, with which it seemed to them it was +impossible for a human being to breathe or live; and they petted +the poor girl, and fed her, as they might a dwarf or a giantess, +till she got quite fat and comfortable, while her owners had not +enough to eat. So strange and ridiculous seemed our present +fashion to the descendants of those who, centuries before, had +imagined, because they had seen living and moving, those glorious +statues which we pretend to admire, but refuse to imitate.</p> +<p>It seems to me that a few centuries hence, when mankind has +learnt to fear God more, and therefore to obey more strictly +those laws of nature and of science which are the will of +God—it seems to me, I say, that in those days the present +fashion of tight lacing will be looked back upon as a +contemptible and barbarous superstition, denoting a very low +level of civilisation in the peoples which have practised +it. That for generations past women should have been in the +habit—not to please men, who do not care about the matter +as a point of beauty—but simply to vie with each other in +obedience to something called fashion—that they should, I +say, have been in the habit of deliberately crushing that part of +the body which should be specially left free, contracting and +displacing their lungs, their heart, and all the most vital and +important organs, and entailing thereby disease, not only on +themselves but on their children after them; that for forty years +past physicians should have been telling them of the folly of +what they have been doing; and that they should as yet, in the +great majority of cases, not only turn a deaf ear to all +warnings, but actually deny the offence, of which one glance of +the physician or the sculptor, who know what shape the human body +ought to be, brings them in guilty—this, I say, is an +instance of—what shall I call it?—which deserves at +once the lash, not merely of the satirist, but of any theologian +who really believes that God made the physical universe. +Let me, I pray you, appeal to your common sense for a +moment. When any one chooses a horse or a dog, whether for +strength, for speed, or for any other useful purpose, the first +thing almost to be looked at is the girth round the ribs; the +room for heart and lungs. Exactly in proportion to that +will be the animal’s general healthiness, power of +endurance, and value in many other ways. If you will look +at eminent lawyers and famous orators, who have attained a +healthy old age, you will see that in every case they are men, +like the late Lord Palmerston, and others whom I could mention, +of remarkable size, not merely in the upper, but in the lower +part of the chest; men who had, therefore, a peculiar power of +using the diaphragm to fill and to clear the lungs, and therefore +to oxygenate the blood of the whole body. Now, it is just +these lower ribs, across which the diaphragm is stretched like +the head of a drum, which stays contract to a minimum. If +you advised owners of horses and hounds to put their horses or +their hounds into stays, and lace them up tight, in order to +increase their beauty, you would receive, I doubt not, a very +courteous, but certainly a very decided, refusal to do that which +would spoil not merely the animals themselves, but the whole stud +or the whole kennel for years to come. And if you advised +an orator to put himself into tight stays, he, no doubt, again +would give a courteous answer; but he would reply—if he was +a really educated man—that to comply with your request +would involve his giving up public work, under the probable +penalty of being dead within the twelve-month.</p> +<p>And how much work of every kind, intellectual as well as +physical, is spoiled or hindered; how many deaths occur from +consumption and other complaints which are the result of this +habit of tight lacing, is known partly to the medical men, who +lift up their voices in vain, and known fully to Him who will not +interfere with the least of His own physical laws to save human +beings from the consequences of their own wilful folly.</p> +<p>And now—to end this lecture with more pleasing +thoughts—What becomes of this breath which passes from your +lips? Is it merely harmful; merely waste? God +forbid! God has forbidden that anything should be merely +harmful or merely waste in this so wise and well-made +world. The carbonic acid which passes from your lips at +every breath—ay, even that which oozes from the volcano +crater when the eruption is past—is a precious boon to +thousands of things of which you have daily need. Indeed +there is a sort of hint at physical truth in the old fairy tale +of the girl, from whose lips, as she spoke, fell pearls and +diamonds; for the carbonic acid of your breath may help hereafter +to make the pure carbonate of lime of a pearl, or the still purer +carbon of a diamond. Nay, it may go—in such a world +of transformations do we live—to make atoms of coal strata, +which after being buried for ages beneath deep seas, shall be +upheaved in continents which are yet unborn, and there be burnt +for the use of a future race of men, and resolved into their +original elements. Coal, wise men tell us, is on the whole +breath and sunlight; the breath of living creatures who have +lived in the vast swamps and forests of some primeval world, and +the sunlight which transmuted that breath into the leaves and +stems of trees, magically locked up for ages in that black stone, +to become, when it is burnt at last, light and carbonic acid as +it was at first. For though you must not breathe your +breath again, you may at least eat your breath, if you will allow +the sun to transmute it for you into vegetables; or you may enjoy +its fragrance and its colour in the shape of a lily or a +rose. When you walk in a sunlit garden, every word you +speak, every breath you breathe, is feeding the plants and +flowers around. The delicate surface of the green leaves +absorbs the carbonic acid, and parts it into its elements, +retaining the carbon to make woody fibre, and courteously +returning you the oxygen to mingle with the fresh air, and be +inhaled by your lungs once more. Thus do you feed the +plants; just as the plants feed you: while the great life-giving +sun feeds both; and the geranium standing in the sick +child’s window does not merely rejoice his eye and mind by +its beauty and freshness, but repays honestly the trouble spent +on it; absorbing the breath which the child needs not, and giving +to him the breath which he needs.</p> +<p>So are the services of all things constituted according to a +Divine and wonderful order, and knit together in mutual +dependence and mutual helpfulness—a fact to be remembered +with hope and comfort: but also with awe and fear. For as +in that which is above nature, so in nature itself; he that +breaks one physical law is guilty of all. The whole +universe, as it were, takes up arms against him; and all nature, +with her numberless and unseen powers, is ready to avenge herself +on him, and on his children after him, he knows not when nor +where. He, on the other hand, who obeys the laws of nature +with his whole heart and mind, will find all things working +together to him for good. He is at peace with the physical +universe. He is helped and befriended alike by the sun +above his head and the dust beneath his feet; because he is +obeying the will and mind of Him who made sun, and dust, and all +things; and who has given them a law which cannot be broken.</p> +<h2><a name="page77"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 77</span>THRIFT +<a name="citation77"></a><a href="#footnote77" +class="citation">[77]</a></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Ladies</span>,—I have chosen for the +title of this lecture a practical and prosaic word, because I +intend the lecture itself to be as practical and prosaic as I can +make it, without becoming altogether dull.</p> +<p>The question of the better or worse education of women is one +far too important for vague sentiment, wild aspirations, or +Utopian dreams.</p> +<p>It is a practical question, on which depends not merely money +or comfort, but too often health and life, as the consequences of +a good education, or disease and death—I know too well of +what I speak—as the consequences of a bad one.</p> +<p>I beg you, therefore, to put out of your minds at the outset +any fancy that I wish for a social revolution in the position of +women; or that I wish to see them educated by exactly the same +methods, and in exactly the same subjects, as men. British +lads, on an average, are far too ill-taught still, in spite of +all recent improvements, for me to wish that British girls should +be taught in the same way.</p> +<p>Moreover, whatever defects there may have been—and +defects there must be in all things human—in the past +education of British women, it has been most certainly a splendid +moral success. It has made, by the grace of God, British +women the best wives, mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, that +the world, as far as I can discover, has yet seen.</p> +<p>Let those who will, sneer at the women of England. We +who have to do the work and to fight the battle of life know the +inspiration which we derive from their virtue, their counsel, +their tenderness, and—but too often—from their +compassion and their forgiveness. There is, I doubt not, +still left in England many a man with chivalry and patriotism +enough to challenge the world to show so perfect a specimen of +humanity as a cultivated British woman.</p> +<p>But just because a cultivated British woman is so perfect a +personage; therefore I wish to see all British women +cultivated. Because the womanhood of England is so precious +a treasure; I wish to see none of it wasted. It is an +invaluable capital, or material, out of which the greatest +possible profit to the nation must be made. And that can +only be done by Thrift; and that, again, can only be attained by +knowledge.</p> +<p>Consider that word Thrift. If you will look at +“Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary,” or if you know your +“Shakespeare,” you will see that Thrift signified +originally profits, gain, riches gotten—in a word, the +marks of a man’s thriving.</p> +<p>How, then, did the word Thrift get to mean parsimony, +frugality, the opposite of waste? Just in the same way as +economy—which first, of course, meant the management of a +household—got to mean also the opposite of waste.</p> +<p>It was found that in commerce, in husbandry, in any process, +in fact, men throve in proportion as they saved their capital, +their material, their force.</p> +<p>Now this is a great law which runs through life; one of those +laws of nature—call them, rather, laws of God—which +apply not merely to political economy, to commerce, and to +mechanics; but to physiology, to society; to the intellect, to +the heart, of every person in this room.</p> +<p>The secret of thriving is thrift; saving of force; to get as +much work as possible done with the least expenditure of power, +the least jar and obstruction, least wear and tear.</p> +<p>And the secret of thrift is knowledge. In proportion as +you know the laws and nature of a subject, you will be able to +work at it easily, surely, rapidly, successfully; instead of +wasting your money or your energies in mistaken schemes, +irregular efforts, which end in disappointment and +exhaustion.</p> +<p>The secret of thrift, I say, is knowledge. The more you +know, the more you can save yourself and that which belongs to +you; and can do more work with less effort.</p> +<p>A knowledge of the laws of commercial credit, we all know, +saves capital, enabling a less capital to do the work of a +greater. Knowledge of the electric telegraph saves time; +knowledge of writing saves human speech and locomotion; knowledge +of domestic economy saves income; knowledge of sanitary laws +saves health and life; knowledge of the laws of the intellect +saves wear and tear of brain; and knowledge of the laws of the +spirit—what does it not save?</p> +<p>A well-educated moral sense, a well-regulated character, saves +from idleness and ennui, alternating with sentimentality and +excitement, those tenderer emotions, those deeper passions, those +nobler aspirations of humanity, which are the heritage of the +woman far more than of the man; and which are potent in her, for +evil or for good, in proportion as they are left to run wild and +undisciplined; or are trained and developed into graceful, +harmonious, self-restraining strength, beautiful in themselves, +and a blessing to all who come under their influence.</p> +<p>What, therefore, I recommend to ladies in this lecture is +thrift: thrift of themselves and of their own powers: and +knowledge as the parent of thrift.</p> +<p>And because it is well to begin with the lower applications of +thrift, and to work up to the higher, I am much pleased to hear +that the first course of the proposed lectures to women in this +place will be one on domestic economy.</p> +<p>I presume that the learned gentleman who will deliver these +lectures will be the last to mean by that term the mere saving of +money; that he will tell you, as—being a German—he +will have good reason to know, that the young lady who learns +thrift in domestic economy is also learning thrift of the very +highest faculties of her immortal spirit. He will tell you, +I doubt not—for he must know—how you may see in +Germany young ladies living in what we more luxurious British +would consider something like poverty; cooking, waiting at table, +and performing many a household office which would be here +considered menial; and yet finding time for a cultivation of the +intellect, which is, unfortunately, too rare in Great +Britain.</p> +<p>The truth is, that we British are too wealthy. We make +money, if not too rapidly for the good of the nation at large, +yet too rapidly, I fear, for the good of the daughters of those +who make it. Their temptation—I do not, of course, +say they all yield to it—but their temptation is, to waste +of the very simplest—I had almost said, if I may be +pardoned the expression, of the most barbaric—kind; to an +oriental waste of money, and waste of time; to a fondness for +mere finery, pardonable enough, but still a waste; and to the +mistaken fancy that it is the mark of a lady to sit idle and let +servants do everything for her.</p> +<p>But it is not of this sort of waste of which I wish to speak +to-day. I only mention the matter in passing, to show that +high intellectual culture is not incompatible with the +performance of homely household duties, and that the moral +success of which I spoke just now need not be injured, any more +than it is in Germany, by intellectual success likewise. I +trust that these words may reassure those parents, if any such +there be here, who may fear that these lectures will withdraw +women from their existing sphere of interest and activity. +That they should entertain such a fear is not surprising, after +the extravagant opinions and schemes which have been lately +broached in various quarters.</p> +<p>The programme to these lectures expressly disclaims any such +intentions; and I, as a husband and a father, expressly disclaim +any such intention likewise.</p> +<p>“To fit women for the more enlightened performance of +their special duties;” to help them towards learning how to +do better what we doubt not many of them are already doing well; +is, I honestly believe, the only object of the promoters of this +scheme.</p> +<p>Let us see now how some of these special duties can be better +performed by help of a little enlightenment as to the laws which +regulate them.</p> +<p>Now, no man will deny—certainly no man who is past +forty-five, and whose digestion is beginning to quail before the +lumps of beef and mutton which are the boast of a British +kitchen, and to prefer, with Justice Shallow, and, I presume, Sir +John Falstaff also, “any pretty little tiny +kickshaws”—no man, I say, who has reached that age, +but will feel it a practical comfort to him to know that the +young ladies of his family are at all events good cooks; and +understand, as the French do, thrift in the matter of food.</p> +<p>Neither will any parent who wishes, naturally enough, that his +daughters should cost him as little as possible; and wishes, +naturally enough also, that they should be as well dressed as +possible, deny that it would be a good thing for them to be +practical milliners and mantua-makers; and, by making their own +clothes gracefully and well, exercise thrift in clothing.</p> +<p>But, beside this thrift in clothing, I am not alone, I +believe, in wishing for some thrift in the energy which produces +it. Labour misapplied, you will agree, is labour wasted; +and as dress, I presume, is intended to adorn the person of the +wearer, the making a dress which only disfigures her may be +considered as a plain case of waste. It would be +impertinent in me to go into any details: but it is impossible to +walk about the streets now without passing young people who must +be under a deep delusion as to the success of their own +toilette. Instead of graceful and noble simplicity of form, +instead of combinations of colour at once rich and delicate, +because in accordance with the chromatic laws of nature, one +meets with phenomena more and more painful to the eye, and +startling to common sense, till one would be hardly more +astonished, and certainly hardly more shocked, if in a year or +two, one should pass someone going about like a Chinese lady, +with pinched feet, or like a savage of the Amazons, with a wooden +bung through her lower lip. It is easy to complain of these +monstrosities: but impossible to cure them, it seems to me, +without an education of the taste, an education in those laws of +nature which produce beauty in form and beauty in colour. +For that the cause of these failures lies in want of education is +patent. They are most common in—I had almost said +they are confined to—those classes of well-to-do persons +who are the least educated; who have no standard of taste of +their own; and who do not acquire any from cultivated friends and +relations: who, in consequence, dress themselves blindly +according to what they conceive to be the Paris fashions, +conveyed at third-hand through an equally uneducated dressmaker; +in innocent ignorance of the fact—for fact I believe it to +be—that Paris fashions are invented now not in the least +for the sake of beauty, but for the sake of producing, through +variety, increased expenditure, and thereby increased employment; +according to the strange system which now prevails in France of +compelling, if not prosperity, at least the signs of it; and like +schoolboys before a holiday, nailing up the head of the +weather-glass to insure fine weather.</p> +<p>Let British ladies educate themselves in those laws of beauty +which are as eternal as any other of nature’s laws; which +may be seen fulfilled, as Mr. Ruskin tells us, so eloquently in +every flower and every leaf, in every sweeping down and rippling +wave; and they will be able to invent graceful and economical +dresses for themselves, without importing tawdry and expensive +ugliness from France.</p> +<p>Let me now go a step farther, and ask you to consider this: +There are in England now a vast number, and an increasing number, +of young women who, from various circumstances which we all know, +must in after life be either the mistresses of their own +fortunes, or the earners of their own bread. And, to do +that wisely and well, they must be more or less women of +business, and to be women of business they must know something of +the meaning of the words Capital, Profit, Price, Value, Labour, +Wages, and of the relation between those two last. In a +word, they must know a little political economy. Nay, I +sometimes think that the mistress of every household might find, +not only thrift of money, but thrift of brain; freedom from +mistakes, anxieties, worries of many kinds, all of which eat out +the health as well as the heart, by a little sound knowledge of +the principles of political economy.</p> +<p>When we consider that every mistress of a household is +continually buying, if not selling; that she is continually +hiring and employing labour in the form of servants; and very +often, into the bargain, keeping her husband’s accounts: I +cannot but think that her hard-worked brain might be clearer, and +her hard-tried desire to do her duty by every subject in her +little kingdom, might be more easily satisfied, had she read +something of what Mr. John Stuart Mill has written, especially on +the duties of employer and employed. A capitalist, a +commercialist, an employer of labour, and an +accountant—every mistress of a household is all these, +whether she likes it or not; and it would be surely well for her, +in so very complicated a state of society as this, not to trust +merely to that mother-wit, that intuitive sagacity and innate +power of ruling her fellow-creatures, which carries women so +nobly through their work in simpler and less civilised +societies.</p> +<p>And here I stop to answer those who may say—as I have +heard it said—That a woman’s intellect is not fit for +business; that when a woman takes to business, she is apt to do +it ill, and unpleasantly likewise, to be more suspicious, more +irritable, more grasping, more unreasonable, than regular men of +business would be: that—as I have heard it +put—“a woman does not fight fair.” The +answer is simple. That a woman’s intellect is +eminently fitted for business is proved by the enormous amount of +business she gets through without any special training for it: +but those faults in a woman of which some men complain are simply +the results of her not having had a special training. She +does not know the laws of business. She does not know the +rules of the game she is playing; and therefore she is playing it +in the dark, in fear and suspicion, apt to judge of questions on +personal grounds, often offending those with whom she has to do, +and oftener still making herself miserable over matters of law or +of business, on which a little sound knowledge would set her head +and her heart at rest.</p> +<p>When I have seen widows, having the care of children, of a +great household, of a great estate, of a great business, +struggling heroically, and yet often mistakenly; blamed severely +for selfishness and ambition, while they were really sacrificing +themselves with the divine instinct of a mother for their +children’s interest: I have stood by with mingled +admiration and pity, and said to myself: “How nobly she is +doing the work without teaching! How much more nobly would +she have done it had she been taught! She is now doing her +work at the most enormous waste of energy and of virtue: had she +had knowledge, thrift would have followed it; she would have done +more work with far less trouble. She will probably kill +herself if she goes on; while sound knowledge would have saved +her health, saved her heart, saved her friends, and helped the +very loved ones for whom she labours, not always with +success.”</p> +<p>A little political economy, therefore, will at least do no +harm to a woman; especially if she have to take care of herself +in after life; neither, I think, will she be much harmed by some +sound knowledge of another subject, which I see promised in these +lectures: “Natural philosophy, in its various branches, +such as the chemistry of common life, light, heat, electricity, +etc. etc.”</p> +<p>A little knowledge of the laws of light, for instance, would +teach many women that by shutting themselves up day after day, +week after week, in darkened rooms, they are as certainly +committing a waste of health, destroying their vital energy, and +diseasing their brains, as if they were taking so much poison the +whole time.</p> +<p>A little knowledge of the laws of heat would teach women not +to clothe themselves and their children after foolish and +insufficient fashions, which in this climate sow the seeds of a +dozen different diseases, and have to be atoned for by perpetual +anxieties, and by perpetual doctors’ bills; and as for a +little knowledge of the laws of electricity, one thrift I am sure +it would produce—thrift to us men, of having to answer +continual inquiries as to what the weather is going to be, when a +slight knowledge of the barometer, or of the form of the clouds +and the direction of the wind, would enable many a lady to judge +for herself, and not, after inquiry on inquiry, regardless of all +warnings, go out on the first appearance of a strip of blue sky, +and come home wet through, with what she calls “only a +chill,” but which really means a nail driven into her +coffin—a probable shortening, though it may be a very small +one, of her mortal life; because the food of the next twenty-four +hours, which should have gone to keep the vital heat at its +normal standard, will have to be wasted in raising it up to that +standard, from which it has fallen by a chill.</p> +<p>Ladies, these are subjects on which I must beg to speak a +little more at length, premising them by one statement, which may +seem jest, but is solemn earnest—that, if the medical men +of this or any other city were what the world now calls +“alive to their own interests”—that is, to the +mere making of money; instead of being, what medical men are, the +most generous, disinterested, and high-minded class in these +realms, then they would oppose by all means in their power the +delivery of lectures on natural philosophy to women. For if +women act upon what they learn in those lectures—and having +women’s hearts, they will act upon it—there ought to +follow a decrease of sickness and an increase of health, +especially among children; a thrift of life, and a thrift of +expense besides, which would very seriously affect the income of +medical men.</p> +<p>For let me ask you, ladies, with all courtesy, but with all +earnestness—Are you aware of certain facts, of which every +one of those excellent medical men is too well aware? Are +you aware that more human beings are killed in England every year +by unnecessary and preventable diseases than were killed at +Waterloo or at Sadowa? Are you aware that the great +majority of those victims are children? Are you aware that +the diseases which carry them off are for the most part such as +ought to be specially under the control of the women who love +them, pet them, educate them, and would in many cases, if need +be, lay down their lives for them? Are you aware, again, of +the vast amount of disease which, so both wise mothers and wise +doctors assure me, is engendered in the sleeping-room from simple +ignorance of the laws of ventilation, and in the schoolroom +likewise, from simple ignorance of the laws of physiology? from +an ignorance of which I shall mention no other case here save +one—that too often from ignorance of signs of approaching +disease, a child is punished for what is called idleness, +listlessness, wilfulness, sulkiness; and punished, too, in the +unwisest way—by an increase of tasks and confinement to the +house, thus overtasking still more a brain already overtasked, +and depressing still more, by robbing it of oxygen and of +exercise, a system already depressed? Are you aware, I ask +again, of all this? I speak earnest upon this point, +because I speak with experience. As a single instance: a +medical man, a friend of mine, passing by his own schoolroom, +heard one of his own little girls screaming and crying, and went +in. The governess, an excellent woman, but wholly ignorant +of the laws of physiology, complained that the child had of late +become obstinate and would not learn; and that therefore she must +punish her by keeping her indoors over the unlearnt +lessons. The father, who knew that the child was usually a +very good one, looked at her carefully for a little while; sent +her out of the schoolroom; and then said, “That child must +not open a book for a month.” “If I had not +acted so,” he said to me, “I should have had that +child dead of brain-disease within the year.”</p> +<p>Now, in the face of such facts as these, is it too much to ask +of mothers, sisters, aunts, nurses, governesses—all who may +be occupied in the care of children, especially of +girls—that they should study thrift of human health and +human life, by studying somewhat the laws of life and +health? There are books—I may say a whole literature +of books—written by scientific doctors on these matters, +which are in my mind far more important to the schoolroom than +half the trashy accomplishments, so-called, which are expected to +be known by governesses. But are they bought? Are +they even to be bought, from most country booksellers? Ah, +for a little knowledge of the laws to the neglect of which is +owing so much fearful disease, which, if it does not produce +immediate death, too often leaves the constitution impaired for +years to come. Ah the waste of health and strength in the +young; the waste, too, of anxiety and misery in those who love +and tend them. How much of it might be saved by a little +rational education in those laws of nature which are the will of +God about the welfare of our bodies, and which, therefore, we are +as much bound to know and to obey, as we are bound to know and +obey the spiritual laws whereon depends the welfare of our +souls.</p> +<p>Pardon me, ladies, if I have given a moment’s pain to +anyone here: but I appeal to every medical man in the room +whether I have not spoken the truth; and having such an +opportunity as this, I felt that I must speak for the sake of +children, and of women likewise, or else for ever hereafter hold +my peace.</p> +<p>Let me pass on from this painful subject—for painful it +has been to me for many years—to a question of intellectual +thrift—by which I mean just now thrift of words; thrift of +truth; restraint of the tongue; accuracy and modesty in +statement.</p> +<p>Mothers complain to me that girls are apt to be—not +intentionally untruthful—but exaggerative, prejudiced, +incorrect, in repeating a conversation or describing an event; +and that from this fault arise, as is to be expected, +misunderstandings, quarrels, rumours, slanders, scandals, and +what not.</p> +<p>Now, for this waste of words there is but one cure: and if I +be told that it is a natural fault of women; that they cannot +take the calm judicial view of matters which men boast, and often +boast most wrongly, that they can take; that under the influence +of hope, fear, delicate antipathy, honest moral indignation, they +will let their eyes and ears be governed by their feelings; and +see and hear only what they wish to see and hear—I answer, +that it is not for me as a man to start such a theory; but that +if it be true, it is an additional argument for some education +which will correct this supposed natural defect. And I say +deliberately that there is but one sort of education which will +correct it; one which will teach young women to observe facts +accurately, judge them calmly, and describe them carefully, +without adding or distorting: and that is, some training in +natural science.</p> +<p>I beg you not to be startled: but if you are, then test the +truth of my theory by playing to-night at the game called +“Russian Scandal;” in which a story, repeated in +secret by one player to the other, comes out at the end of the +game, owing to the inaccurate and—forgive me if I say +it—uneducated brains through which it has passed, utterly +unlike its original; not only ludicrously maimed and distorted, +but often with the most fantastic additions of events, details, +names, dates, places, which each player will aver that he +received from the player before him. I am afraid that too +much of the average gossip of every city, town, and village is +little more than a game of “Russian Scandal;” with +this difference that while one is but a game, the other is but +too mischievous earnest.</p> +<p>But now, if among your party there shall be an average lawyer, +medical man, or man of science, you will find that he, and +perhaps he alone, will be able to retail accurately the story +which has been told him. And why? Simply because his +mind has been trained to deal with facts; to ascertain exactly +what he does see or hear, and to imprint its leading features +strongly and clearly on his memory.</p> +<p>Now, you certainly cannot make young ladies barristers or +attorneys; nor employ their brains in getting up cases, civil or +criminal; and as for chemistry, they and their parents may have a +reasonable antipathy to smells, blackened fingers, and occasional +explosions and poisonings. But you may make them something +of botanists, zoologists, geologists.</p> +<p>I could say much on this point: allow me at least to say this: +I verify believe that any young lady who would employ some of her +leisure time in collecting wild flowers, carefully examining +them, verifying them, and arranging them; or who would in her +summer trip to the sea-coast do the same by the common objects of +the shore, instead of wasting her holiday, as one sees hundreds +doing, in lounging on benches on the esplanade, reading worthless +novels, and criticising dresses—that such a young lady, I +say, would not only open her own mind to a world of wonder, +beauty, and wisdom, which, if it did not make her a more reverent +and pious soul, she cannot be the woman which I take for granted +she is; but would save herself from the habit—I had almost +said the necessity—of gossip; because she would have things +to think of and not merely persons; facts instead of fancies; +while she would acquire something of accuracy, of patience, of +methodical observation and judgment, which would stand her in +good stead in the events of daily life, and increase her power of +bridling her tongue and her imagination. “God is in +heaven, and thou upon earth; therefore let thy words be +few;” is the lesson which those are learning all day long +who study the works of God with reverent accuracy, lest by +misrepresenting them they should be tempted to say that God has +done that which He has not; and in that wholesome discipline I +long that women as well as men should share.</p> +<p>And now I come to a thrift of the highest kind, as contrasted +with a waste the most deplorable and ruinous of all; thrift of +those faculties which connect us with the unseen and spiritual +world; with humanity, with Christ, with God; thrift of the +immortal spirit. I am not going now to give you a sermon on +duty. You hear such, I doubt not, in church every Sunday, +far better than I can preach to you. I am going to speak +rather of thrift of the heart, thrift of the emotions. How +they are wasted in these days in reading what are called +sensation novels, all know but too well; how British +literature—all that the best hearts and intellects among +our forefathers have bequeathed to us—is neglected for +light fiction, the reading of which is, as a lady well said, +“the worst form of intemperance—dram-drinking and +opium-eating, intellectual and moral.”</p> +<p>I know that the young will delight—they have delighted +in all ages, and will to the end of time—in fictions which +deal with that “oldest tale which is for ever +new.” Novels will be read: but that is all the more +reason why women should be trained, by the perusal of a higher, +broader, deeper literature, to distinguish the good novel from +the bad, the moral from the immoral, the noble from the base, the +true work of art from the sham which hides its shallowness and +vulgarity under a tangled plot and melodramatic situations. +She should learn—and that she can only learn by +cultivation—to discern with joy, and drink in with +reverence, the good, the beautiful, and the true; and to turn +with the fine scorn of a pure and strong womanhood from the bad, +the ugly, and the false.</p> +<p>And if any parent should be inclined to reply: “Why lay +so much stress upon educating a girl in British literature? +Is it not far more important to make our daughters read religious +books?” I answer—Of course it is. I take +for granted that that is done in a Christian land. But I +beg you to recollect that there are books and books; and that in +these days of a free press it is impossible, in the long run, to +prevent girls reading books of very different shades of opinion, +and very different religious worth. It may be, therefore, +of the very highest importance to a girl to have her intellect, +her taste, her emotions, her moral sense, in a word, her whole +womanhood, so cultivated and regulated that she shall herself be +able to discern the true from the false, the orthodox from the +unorthodox, the truly devout from the merely sentimental, the +Gospel from its counterfeits.</p> +<p>I should have thought that there never had been in Britain, +since the Reformation, a crisis at which young Englishwomen +required more careful cultivation on these matters; if at least +they are to be saved from making themselves and their families +miserable; and from ending—as I have known too many +end—with broken hearts, broken brains, broken health, and +an early grave.</p> +<p>Take warning by what you see abroad. In every country +where the women are uneducated, unoccupied; where their only +literature is French novels or translations of them—in +every one of those countries the women, even to the highest, are +the slaves of superstition, and the puppets of priests. In +proportion as, in certain other countries—notably, I will +say, in Scotland—the women are highly educated, family life +and family secrets are sacred, and the woman owns allegiance and +devotion to no confessor or director, but to her own husband or +to her own family.</p> +<p>I say plainly, that if any parents wish their daughters to +succumb at least to some quackery or superstition, whether +calling itself scientific, or calling itself religious—and +there are too many of both just now—they cannot more +certainly effect their purpose than by allowing her to grow up +ignorant, frivolous, luxurious, vain; with her emotions excited, +but not satisfied, by the reading of foolish and even immoral +novels.</p> +<p>In such a case the more delicate and graceful the +organisation, the more noble and earnest the nature, which has +been neglected, the more certain it is—I know too well what +I am saying—to go astray.</p> +<p>The time of depression, disappointment, vacuity, all but +despair must come. The immortal spirit, finding no healthy +satisfaction for its highest aspirations, is but too likely to +betake itself to an unhealthy and exciting superstition. +Ashamed of its own long self-indulgence, it is but too likely to +flee from itself into a morbid asceticism. Not having been +taught its God-given and natural duties in the world, it is but +too likely to betake itself, from the mere craving for action, to +self-invented and unnatural duties out of the world. +Ignorant of true science, yet craving to understand the wonders +of nature and of spirit, it is but too likely to betake itself to +non-science—nonsense as it is usually called—whether +of spirit-rapping and mesmerism, or of miraculous relics and +winking pictures. Longing for guidance and teaching, and +never having been taught to guide and teach itself, it is but too +likely to deliver itself up in self-despair to the guidance and +teaching of those who, whether they be quacks or fanatics, look +on uneducated women as their natural prey.</p> +<p>You will see, I am sure, from what I have said, that it is not +my wish that you should become mere learned women; mere female +pedants, as useless and unpleasing as male pedants are wont to +be. The education which I set before you is not to be got +by mere hearing lectures or reading books: for it is an education +of your whole character; a self-education; which really means a +committing of yourself to God, that He may educate you. +Hearing lectures is good, for it will teach you how much there is +to be known, and how little you know. Reading books is +good, for it will give you habits of regular and diligent +study. And therefore I urge on you strongly private study, +especially in case a library should be formed here of books on +those most practical subjects of which I have been +speaking. But, after all, both lectures and books are good, +mainly in as far as they furnish matter for reflection: while the +desire to reflect and the ability to reflect must come, as I +believe, from above. The honest craving after light and +power, after knowledge, wisdom, active usefulness, must +come—and may it come to you—by the inspiration of the +Spirit of God.</p> +<p>One word more, and I have done. Let me ask women to +educate themselves, not for their own sakes merely, but for the +sake of others. For, whether they will or not, they must +educate others. I do not speak merely of those who may be +engaged in the work of direct teaching; that they ought to be +well taught themselves, who can doubt? I speak of +those—and in so doing I speak of every woman, young and +old—who exercise as wife, as mother, as aunt, as sister, or +as friend, an influence, indirect it may be, and unconscious, but +still potent and practical, on the minds and characters of those +about them, especially of men. How potent and practical +that influence is, those know best who know most of the world and +most of human nature. There are those who +consider—and I agree with them—that the education of +boys under the age of twelve years ought to be entrusted as much +as possible to women. Let me ask—of what period of +youth and manhood does not the same hold true? I pity the +ignorance and conceit of the man who fancies that he has nothing +left to learn from cultivated women. I should have thought +that the very mission of woman was to be, in the highest sense, +the educator of man from infancy to old age; that that was the +work towards which all the God-given capacities of women pointed; +for which they were to be educated to the highest pitch. I +should have thought that it was the glory of woman that she was +sent into the world to live for others, rather than for herself; +and therefore I should say—Let her smallest rights be +respected, her smallest wrongs redressed: but let her never be +persuaded to forget that she is sent into the world to teach +man—what, I believe, she has been teaching him all along, +even in the savage state—namely, that there is something +more necessary than the claiming of rights, and that is, the +performing of duties; to teach him specially, in these so-called +intellectual days, that there is something more than intellect, +and that is—purity and virtue. Let her never be +persuaded to forget that her calling is not the lower and more +earthly one of self-assertion, but the higher and the diviner +calling of self-sacrifice; and let her never desert that higher +life, which lives in others and for others, like her Redeemer and +her Lord.</p> +<p>And if any should answer that this doctrine would keep woman a +dependent and a slave, I rejoin—Not so: it would keep her +what she should be—the mistress of all around her, because +mistress of herself. And more, I should express a fear that +those who made that answer had not yet seen into the mystery of +true greatness and true strength; that they did not yet +understand the true magnanimity, the true royalty of that spirit, +by which the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to +minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.</p> +<p>Surely that is woman’s calling—to teach man: and +to teach him what? To teach him, after all, that his +calling is the same as hers, if he will but see the things which +belong to his peace. To temper his fiercer, coarser, more +self-assertive nature, by the contact of her gentleness, purity, +self-sacrifice. To make him see that not by blare of +trumpets, not by noise, wrath, greed, ambition, intrigue, +puffery, is good and lasting work to be done on earth: but by +wise self-distrust, by silent labour, by lofty self-control, by +that charity which hopeth all things, believeth all things, +endureth all things; by such an example, in short, as women now +in tens of thousands set to those around them; such as they will +show more and more, the more their whole womanhood is educated to +employ its powers without waste and without haste in harmonious +unity. Let the woman begin in girlhood, if such be her +happy lot—to quote the words of a great poet, a great +philosopher, and a great Churchman, William Wordsworth—let +her begin, I say—</p> +<blockquote><p>With all things round about her drawn<br /> +From May-time and the cheerful dawn;<br /> +A dancing shape, an image gay,<br /> +To haunt, to startle, and waylay.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Let her develop onwards—</p> +<blockquote><p>A spirit, yet a woman too,<br /> +With household motions light and free,<br /> +And steps of virgin liberty.<br /> +A countenance in which shall meet<br /> +Sweet records, promises as sweet;<br /> +A creature not too bright and good<br /> +For human nature’s daily food;<br /> +For transient sorrows, simple wiles,<br /> +Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But let her highest and her final development be that which +not nature, but self-education alone can bring—that which +makes her once and for ever—</p> +<blockquote><p>A being breathing thoughtful breath;<br /> +A traveller betwixt life and death.<br /> +With reason firm, with temperate will<br /> +Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill.<br /> +A perfect woman, nobly planned,<br /> +To warn, to comfort, and command.<br /> +And yet a spirit still and bright<br /> +With something of an angel light.</p> +</blockquote> +<h2><a name="page107"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +107</span>NAUSICAA IN LONDON;<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">OR,</span><br /> +THE LOWER EDUCATION OF WOMEN.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">Fresh</span> from the Marbles of the +British Museum, I went my way through London streets. My +brain was still full of fair and grand forms; the forms of men +and women whose every limb and attitude betokened perfect health, +and grace, and power, and self-possession and self-restraint so +habitual and complete that it had become unconscious, and +undistinguishable from the native freedom of the savage. +For I had been up and down the corridors of those Greek +sculptures, which remain as a perpetual sermon to rich and poor, +amid our artificial, unwholesome, and it may be decaying +pseudo-civilisation, saying with looks more expressive than all +words—Such men and women can be; for such they have been; +and such you may be yet, if you will use that science of which +you too often only boast. Above all, I had been pondering +over the awful and yet tender beauty of the maiden figures from +the Parthenon and its kindred temples. And these, or such +as these, I thought to myself, were the sisters of the men who +fought at Marathon and Salamis; the mothers of many a man among +the ten thousand whom Xenophon led back from Babylon to the Black +Sea shore; the ancestresses of many a man who conquered the East +in Alexander’s host, and fought with Porus in the far +Punjab. And were these women mere dolls? These men +mere gladiators? Were they not the parents of philosophy, +science, poetry, the plastic arts? We talk of education +now. Are we more educated than were the ancient +Greeks? Do we know anything about education, physical, +intellectual, or æsthetic, and I may say moral +likewise—religious education, of course, in our sense of +the world, they had none—but do we know anything about +education of which they have not taught us at least the +rudiments? Are there not some branches of education which +they perfected, once and for ever; leaving us northern barbarians +to follow, or else not to follow, their example? To produce +health, that is, harmony and sympathy, proportion and grace, in +every faculty of mind and body—that was their notion of +education. To produce that, the text-book of their +childhood was the poetry of Homer, and not of—But I am +treading on dangerous ground. It was for this that the +seafaring Greek lad was taught to find his ideal in Ulysses; +while his sister at home found hers, it may be, in +Nausicaa. It was for this, that when perhaps the most +complete and exquisite of all the Greeks, Sophocles the good, +beloved by gods and men, represented on the Athenian stage his +drama of Nausicaa, and, as usual, could not—for he had no +voice—himself take a speaking part, he was content to do +one thing in which he specially excelled; and dressed and masked +as a girl, to play at ball amid the chorus of Nausicaa’s +maidens.</p> +<p>That drama of Nausicaa is lost; and if I dare say so of any +play of Sophocles’, I scarce regret it. It is well, +perhaps, that we have no second conception of the scene, to +interfere with the simplicity, so grand, and yet so tender, of +Homer’s idyllic episode.</p> +<p>Nausicaa, it must be remembered, is the daughter of a +king. But not of a king in the exclusive modern European or +old Eastern sense. Her father, Alcinous, is simply primus +inter pares among a community of merchants, who are called +“kings” likewise; and Mayor for life—so to +speak—of a new trading city, a nascent Genoa or Venice, on +the shore of the Mediterranean. But the girl Nausicaa, as +she sleeps in her “carved chamber,” is “like +the immortals in form and face;” and two handmaidens who +sleep on each side of the polished door “have beauty from +the Graces.”</p> +<p>To her there enters, in the shape of some maiden friend, none +less than Pallas Athené herself, intent on saving worthily +her favourite, the shipwrecked Ulysses; and bids her in a dream +go forth—and wash the clothes. <a name="citation110"></a><a +href="#footnote110" class="citation">[110]</a></p> +<blockquote><p> Nausicaa, wherefore doth thy +mother bear<br /> + Child so forgetful? This long time doth +rest,<br /> + Like lumber in the house, much raiment fair.<br /> + Soon must thou wed, and be thyself well-drest,<br /> + And find thy bridegroom raiment of the best.<br /> + These are the things whence good repute is born,<br +/> + And praises that make glad a parent’s +breast.<br /> + Come, let us both go washing with the morn;<br /> +So shalt thou have clothes becoming to be worn.</p> +<p> Know that thy maidenhood is not for long,<br +/> + Whom the Phoeacian chiefs already woo,<br /> + Lords of the land whence thou thyself art sprung.<br +/> + Soon as the shining dawn comes forth anew,<br /> + For wain and mules thy noble father sue,<br /> + Which to the place of washing shall convey<br /> + Girdles and shawls and rugs of splendid hue,<br /> + This for thyself were better than essay<br /> +Thither to walk: the place is distant a long way.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Startled by her dream, Nausicaa awakes, and goes to find her +parents—</p> +<blockquote><p> One by the hearth sat, with the +maids around,<br /> + And on the skeins of yarn, sea-purpled, spent<br /> + Her morning toil. Him to the council bound,<br +/> +Called by the honoured kings, just going forth she found.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And calling him, as she might now, Pappa phile, Dear Papa, +asks for the mule-waggon: but it is her father’s and her +five brothers’ clothes she fain would wash,—</p> +<blockquote><p>Ashamed to name her marriage to her father +dear.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But he understood all—and she goes forth in the +mule-waggon, with the clothes, after her mother has put in +“a chest of all kinds of delicate food, and meat, and wine +in a goatskin;” and last but not least, the indispensable +cruse of oil for anointing after the bath, to which both Jews, +Greeks, and Romans owed so much health and beauty. And then +we read in the simple verse of a poet too refined, like the rest +of his race, to see anything mean or ridiculous in that which was +not ugly and unnatural, how she and her maids got into the +“polished waggon,” “with good wheels,” +and she “took the whip and the studded reins,” and +“beat them till they started;” and how the mules, +“rattled” away, and “pulled against each +other,” till</p> +<blockquote><p> When they came to the fair +flowing river<br /> + Which feeds good lavatories all the year,<br /> + Fitted to cleanse all sullied robes soever,<br /> + They from the wain the mules unharnessed there,<br +/> + And chased them free, to crop their juicy fare<br /> + By the swift river, on the margin green;<br /> + Then to the waters dashed the clothes they bare<br +/> +And in the stream-filled trenches stamped them clean.</p> +<p> Which, having washed and cleansed, they +spread before<br /> + The sunbeams, on the beach, where most did lie<br /> + Thick pebbles, by the sea-wave washed ashore.<br /> + So, having left them in the heat to dry,<br /> + They to the bath went down, and by-and-by,<br /> + Rubbed with rich oil, their midday meal essay,<br /> + Couched in green turf, the river rolling nigh.<br /> + Then, throwing off their veils, at ball they +play,<br /> +While the white-armed Nausicaa leads the choral lay.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The mere beauty of this scene all will feel, who have the +sense of beauty in them. Yet it is not on that aspect which +I wish to dwell, but on its healthfulness. Exercise is +taken, in measured time, to the sound of song, as a duty almost, +as well as an amusement. For this game of ball, which is +here mentioned for the first time in human literature, nearly +three thousand years ago, was held by the Greeks and by the +Romans after them, to be an almost necessary part of a liberal +education; principally, doubtless, from the development which it +produced in the upper half of the body, not merely to the arms, +but to the chest, by raising and expanding the ribs, and to all +the muscles of the torso, whether perpendicular or oblique. +The elasticity and grace which it was believed to give were so +much prized, that a room for ball-play, and a teacher of the art, +were integral parts of every gymnasium; and the Athenians went so +far as to bestow on one famous ball-player, Aristonicus of +Carystia, a statue and the rights of citizenship. The rough +and hardy young Spartans, when passing from boyhood into manhood, +received the title of ball-players, seemingly from the game which +it was then their special duty to learn. In the case of +Nausicaa and her maidens, the game would just bring into their +right places all that is liable to be contracted and weakened in +women, so many of whose occupations must needs be sedentary and +stooping; while the song which accompanied the game at once +filled the lungs regularly and rhythmically, and prevented +violent motion, or unseemly attitude. We, the civilised, +need physiologists to remind us of these simple facts, and even +then do not act on them. Those old half-barbarous Greeks +had found them out for themselves, and, moreover, acted on +them.</p> +<p>But fair Nausicaa must have been—some will +say—surely a mere child of nature, and an uncultivated +person?</p> +<p>So far from it, that her whole demeanour and speech show +culture of the very highest sort, full of “sweetness and +light.”—Intelligent and fearless, quick to perceive +the bearings of her strange and sudden adventure, quick to +perceive the character of Ulysses, quick to answer his lofty and +refined pleading by words as lofty and refined, and pious +withal;—for it is she who speaks to her handmaids the once +so famous words:</p> +<blockquote><p>Strangers and poor men all are sent from Zeus;<br +/> + And alms, though small, are +sweet.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Clear of intellect, prompt of action, modest of demeanour, +shrinking from the slightest breath of scandal; while she is not +ashamed, when Ulysses, bathed and dressed, looks himself again, +to whisper to her maidens her wish that the Gods might send her +such a spouse.—This is Nausicaa as Homer draws her; and as +many a scholar and poet since Homer has accepted her for the +ideal of noble maidenhood. I ask my readers to study for +themselves her interview with Ulysses, in Mr. Worsley’s +translation, or rather in the grand simplicity of the original +Greek, <a name="citation114"></a><a href="#footnote114" +class="citation">[114]</a> and judge whether Nausicaa is not as +perfect a lady as the poet who imagined her—or, it may be, +drew her from life—must have been a perfect gentleman; both +complete in those “manners” which, says the old +proverb, “make the man:” but which are the woman +herself; because with her—who acts more by emotion than by +calculation—manners are the outward and visible tokens of +her inward and spiritual grace, or disgrace; and flow +instinctively, whether good or bad, from the instincts of her +inner nature.</p> +<p>True, Nausicaa could neither read nor write. No more, +most probably, could the author of the Odyssey. No more, +for that matter, could Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, though they +were plainly, both in mind and manners, most highly-cultivated +men. Reading and writing, of course, have now become +necessaries of humanity; and are to be given to every human +being, that he may start fair in the race of life. But I am +not aware that Greek women improved much, either in manners, +morals, or happiness, by acquiring them in after centuries. +A wise man would sooner see his daughter a Nausicaa than a +Sappho, an Aspasia, a Cleopatra, or even an Hypatia.</p> +<p>Full of such thoughts, I went through London streets, among +the Nausicaas of the present day; the girls of the period; the +daughters and hereafter mothers of our future rulers, the great +Demos or commercial middle class of the greatest mercantile city +in the world: and noted what I had noted with fear and sorrow, +many a day, for many a year; a type, and an increasing type, of +young women who certainly had not had the +“advantages,” “educational” and other, of +that Greek Nausicaa of old.</p> +<p>Of course, in such a city as London, to which the best of +everything, physical and other, gravitates, I could not but pass, +now and then, beautiful persons, who made me proud of those +grandes Anglaises aux joues rouges, whom the Parisiennes +ridicule—and envy. But I could not help suspecting +that their looks showed them to be either country-bred, or born +of country parents; and this suspicion was strengthened by the +fact that, when compared with their mothers, the mother’s +physique was, in the majority of cases, superior to the +daughters’. Painful it was, to one accustomed to the +ruddy well-grown peasant girl, stalwart, even when, as often, +squat and plain, to remark the exceedingly small size of the +average young woman; by which I do not mean mere want of +height—that is a little matter—but want of breadth +likewise; a general want of those large frames, which indicate +usually a power of keeping strong and healthy not merely the +muscles, but the brain itself.</p> +<p>Poor little things. I passed hundreds—I pass +hundreds every day—trying to hide their littleness by the +nasty mass of false hair—or what does duty for it; and by +the ugly and useless hat which is stuck upon it, making the head +thereby look ridiculously large and heavy; and by the high heels +on which they totter onward, having forgotten, or never learnt, +the simple art of walking; their bodies tilted forward in that +ungraceful attitude which is called—why that name of all +others?—a “Grecian bend;” seemingly kept on +their feet, and kept together at all, in that strange attitude, +by tight stays which prevented all graceful and healthy motion of +the hips or sides; their raiment, meanwhile, being purposely +misshapen in this direction and in that, to hide—it must be +presumed—deficiencies of form. If that chignon and +those heels had been taken off, the figure which would have +remained would have been that too often of a puny girl of +sixteen. And yet there was no doubt that these women were +not only full grown, but some of them, alas! wives and +mothers.</p> +<p>Poor little things.—And this they have gained by +so-called civilisation: the power of aping the +“fashions” by which the worn-out +“Parisienne” hides her own personal defects; and of +making themselves, by innate want of that taste which the +“Parisienne” possesses, only the cause of something +like a sneer from many a cultivated man; and of something like a +sneer, too, from yonder gipsy woman who passes by, with bold +bright face, and swinging hip, and footstep stately and elastic; +far better dressed, according to all true canons of taste, than +most town-girls; and thanking her fate that she and her +“Rom” are no house-dwellers and gaslight-sightseers, +but fatten on free air upon the open moor.</p> +<p>But the face which is beneath that chignon and that hat? +Well—it is sometimes pretty: but how seldom handsome, which +is a higher quality by far. It is not, strange to say, a +well-fed face. Plenty of money, and perhaps too much, is +spent on those fine clothes. It had been better, to judge +from the complexion, if some of that money had been spent in +solid wholesome food. She looks as if she lived—as +she too often does, I hear—on tea and bread-and-butter, or +rather on bread with the minimum of butter. For as the want +of bone indicates a deficiency of phosphatic food, so does the +want of flesh about the cheeks indicate a deficiency of +hydrocarbon. Poor little Nausicaa:—that is not her +fault. Our boasted civilisation has not even taught her +what to eat, as it certainly has not increased her appetite; and +she knows not—what every country fellow knows—that +without plenty of butter and other fatty matters, she is not +likely to keep even warm. Better to eat nasty fat bacon +now, than to supply the want of it some few years hence by +nastier cod-liver oil. But there is no one yet to tell her +that, and a dozen other equally simple facts, for her own sake, +and for the sake of that coming Demos which she is to bring into +the world; a Demos which, if we can only keep it healthy in body +and brain, has before it so splendid a future: but which, if body +and brain degrade beneath the influence of modern barbarism, is +but too likely to follow the Demos of ancient Byzantium, or of +modern Paris.</p> +<p>Ay, but her intellect. She is so clever, and she reads +so much, and she is going to be taught to read so much more.</p> +<p>Ah well—there was once a science called +Physiognomy. The Greeks, from what I can learn, knew more +of it than any people since: though the Italian painters and +sculptors must have known much; far more than we. In a more +scientific civilisation there will be such a science once more: +but its laws, though still in the empiric stage, are not +altogether forgotten by some. Little children have often a +fine and clear instinct of them. Many cultivated and +experienced women have a fine and clear instinct of them +likewise. And some such would tell us that there is +intellect in plenty in the modern Nausicaa: but not of the +quality which they desire for their country’s future +good. Self-consciousness, eagerness, volubility, petulance +in countenance, in gesture, and in voice—which last is too +often most harsh and artificial, the breath being sent forth +through the closed teeth, and almost entirely at the corners of +the mouth—and, with all this, a weariness often about the +wrinkling forehead and the drooping lids;—all these, which +are growing too common, not among the Demos only, nor only in the +towns, are signs, they think, of the unrest of unhealth, +physical, intellectual, spiritual. At least they are as +different as two types of physiognomy in the same race can be, +from the expression both of face and gesture, in those old Greek +sculptures, and in the old Italian painters; and, it must be +said, in the portraits of Reynolds, and Gainsborough, Copley, and +Romney. Not such, one thinks, must have been the mothers of +Britain during the latter half of the last century and the +beginning of the present; when their sons, at times, were holding +half the world at bay.</p> +<p>And if Nausicaa has become such in town: what is she when she +goes to the seaside, not to wash the clothes in fresh-water, but +herself in salt—the very salt-water, laden with decaying +organisms, from which, though not polluted further by a dozen +sewers, Ulysses had to cleanse himself, anointing, too, with oil, +ere he was fit to appear in the company of Nausicaa of +Greece? She dirties herself with the dirty saltwater; and +probably chills and tires herself by walking thither and back, +and staying in too long; and then flaunts on the pier, bedizened +in garments which, for monstrosity of form and disharmony of +colours, would have set that Greek Nausicaa’s teeth on +edge, or those of any average Hindoo woman now. Or, even +sadder still, she sits on chairs and benches all the weary +afternoon, her head drooped on her chest, over some novel from +the “Library;” and then returns to tea and shrimps, +and lodgings of which the fragrance is not unsuggestive, +sometimes not unproductive, of typhoid fever. Ah, poor +Nausicaa of England! That is a sad sight to some who think +about the present, and have read about the past. It is not +a sad sight to see your old father—tradesman, or clerk, or +what not—who has done good work in his day, and hopes to do +some more, sitting by your old mother, who has done good work in +her day—among the rest, that heaviest work of all, the +bringing you into the world and keeping you in it till +now—honest, kindly, cheerful folk enough, and not +inefficient in their own calling; though an average Northumbrian, +or Highlander, or Irish Easterling, beside carrying a brain of +five times the intellectual force, could drive five such men over +the cliff with his bare hands. It is not a sad sight, I +say, to see them sitting about upon those seaside benches, +looking out listlessly at the water, and the ships, and the +sunlight, and enjoying, like so many flies upon a wall, the novel +act of doing nothing. It is not the old for whom wise men +are sad: but for you. Where is your vitality? Where +is your “Lebens-glückseligkeit,” your enjoyment +of superfluous life and power? Why you cannot even dance +and sing, till now and then, at night, perhaps, when you ought to +lie safe in bed, but when the weak brain, after receiving the +day’s nourishment, has roused itself a second time into a +false excitement of gaslight pleasure. What there is left +of it is all going into that foolish book, which the womanly +element in you, still healthy and alive, delights in; because it +places you in fancy in situations in which you will never stand, +and inspires you with emotions, some of which, it may be, you had +better never feel. Poor Nausicaa—old, some men think, +before you have been ever young.</p> +<p>And now they are going to “develop” you; and let +you have your share in “the higher education of +women,” by making you read more books, and do more sums, +and pass examinations, and stoop over desks at night after +stooping over some other employment all day; and to teach you +Latin, and even Greek!</p> +<p>Well, we will gladly teach you Greek, if you learn thereby to +read the history of Nausicaa of old, and what manner of maiden +she was, and what was her education. You will admire her, +doubtless. But do not let your admiration limit itself to +drawing a meagre half-mediævalised design of her—as +she never looked. Copy in your own person; and even if you +do not descend as low—or rise as high—as washing the +household clothes, at least learn to play at ball; and sing, in +the open air and sunshine, not in theatres and concert-rooms by +gaslight; and take decent care of your own health; and dress not +like a “Parisienne”—nor, of course, like +Nausicaa of old, for that is to ask too much:—but somewhat +more like an average Highland lassie; and try to look like her, +and be like her, of whom Wordsworth sang:</p> + +<blockquote><p> A +mien and face<br /> +In which full plainly I can trace<br /> +Benignity, and home-bred sense,<br /> +Ripening in perfect innocence.<br /> +Here scattered, like a random seed,<br /> +Remote from men, thou dost not need<br /> +The embarrassed look of shy distress<br /> +And maidenly shamefacedness.<br /> +Thou wear’st upon thy forehead clear<br /> +The freedom of a mountaineer.<br /> +A face with gladness overspread,<br /> +Soft smiles, by human kindness bred,<br /> +And seemliness complete, that sways<br /> +Thy courtesies, about thee plays.<br /> +With no restraint, save such as springs<br /> +From quick and eager visitings<br /> +Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach<br /> +Of thy few words of English speech.<br /> +A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife<br /> +That gives thy gestures grace and life.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Ah, yet unspoilt Nausicaa of the North; descendant of the dark +tender-hearted Celtic girl, and the fair deep-hearted +Scandinavian Viking, thank God for thy heather and fresh air, and +the kine thou tendest, and the wool thou spinnest; and come not +to seek thy fortune, child, in wicked London town; nor import, as +they tell me thou art doing fast, the ugly fashions of that +London town, clumsy copies of Parisian cockneydom, into thy +Highland home; nor give up the healthful and graceful, free and +modest dress of thy mother and thy mother’s mother, to +disfigure the little kirk on Sabbath days with crinoline and +corset, high-heeled boots, and other women’s hair.</p> +<p>It is proposed, just now, to assimilate the education of girls +more and more to that of boys. If that means that girls are +merely to learn more lessons, and to study what their brothers +are taught, in addition to what their mothers were taught; then +it is to be hoped, at least by physiologists and patriots, that +the scheme will sink into that limbo whither, in a free and +tolerably rational country, all imperfect and ill-considered +schemes are sure to gravitate. But if the proposal be a +bonâ-fide one: then it must be borne in mind that in the +Public schools of England, and in all private schools, I presume, +which take their tone from them, cricket and football are more or +less compulsory, being considered integral parts of an +Englishman’s education; and that they are likely to remain +so, in spite of all reclamations: because masters and boys alike +know that games do not, in the long run, interfere with a +boy’s work; that the same boy will very often excel in +both; that the games keep him in health for his work; and the +spirit with which he takes to his games when in the lower school, +is a fair test of the spirit with which he will take to his work +when he rises into the higher school; and that nothing is worse +for a boy than to fall into that loafing, tuck-shop-haunting set, +who neither play hard nor work hard, and are usually extravagant, +and often vicious. Moreover, they know well that games +conduce, not merely to physical, but to moral health; that in the +playing-field boys acquire virtues which no books can give them; +not merely daring and endurance, but, better still, temper, +self-restraint, fairness, honour, unenvious approbation of +another’s success, and all that “give and take” +of life which stand a man in such good stead when he goes forth +into the world, and without which, indeed, his success is always +maimed and partial.</p> +<p>Now: if the promoters of higher education for women will +compel girls to any training analogous to our public-school +games; if, for instance, they will insist on that most natural +and wholesome of all exercises, dancing, in order to develop the +lower half of the body; on singing, to expand the lungs and +regulate the breath; and on some games—ball or what +not—which will ensure that raised chest, and upright +carriage, and general strength of the upper torso, without which +full oxygenation of the blood, and therefore general health, is +impossible; if they will sternly forbid tight stays, high heels, +and all which interferes with free growth and free motion; if +they will consider carefully all which has been written on the +“half-time system” by Mr. Chadwick and others; and +accept the certain physical law that, in order to renovate the +brain day by day, the growing creature must have plenty of fresh +air and play, and that the child who learns for four hours and +plays for four hours, will learn more, and learn it more easily, +than the child who learns for the whole eight hours; if, in +short, they will teach girls not merely to understand the Greek +tongue, but to copy somewhat of the Greek physical training, of +that “music and gymnastic” which helped to make the +cleverest race of the old world the ablest race likewise; then +they will earn the gratitude of the patriot and the +physiologists, by doing their best to stay the downward +tendencies of the physique, and therefore ultimately of the +morale, in the coming generation of English women.</p> +<p>I am sorry to say that, as yet, I hear of but one movement in +this direction among the promoters of the “higher education +of women.” <a name="citation126"></a><a href="#footnote126" +class="citation">[126]</a> I trust that the subject will be +taken up methodically by those gifted ladies, who have acquainted +themselves, and are labouring to acquaint other women, with the +first principles of health; and that they may avail to prevent +the coming generations, under the unwholesome stimulant of +competitive examinations, and so forth, from +“developing” into so many +Chinese—dwarfs—or idiots.</p> +<p><i>October</i>, 1873.</p> +<h2><a name="page131"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 131</span>THE +AIR-MOTHERS.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center">1869.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">Die Natur ist die Bewegung</p> +<p><span class="smcap">Who</span> are these who follow us softly +over the moor in the autumn eve? Their wings brush and +rustle in the fir-boughs, and they whisper before us and behind, +as if they called gently to each other, like birds flocking +homeward to their nests.</p> +<p>The woodpecker on the pine-stems knows them, and laughs aloud +for joy as they pass. The rooks above the pasture know +them, and wheel round and tumble in their play. The brown +leaves on the oak trees know them, and flutter faintly, and +beckon as they pass. And in the chattering of the dry +leaves there is a meaning, and a cry of weary things which long +for rest.</p> +<p>“Take us home, take us home, you soft air-mothers, now +our fathers the sunbeams are grown dull. Our green summer +beauty is all draggled, and our faces are grown wan and wan; and +the buds, the children whom we nourished, thrust us off, +ungrateful, from our seats. Waft us down, you soft +air-mothers, upon your wings to the quiet earth, that we may go +to our home, as all things go, and become air and sunlight once +again.”</p> +<p>And the bold young fir-seeds know them, and rattle impatient +in their cones. “Blow stronger, blow fiercer, slow +air-mothers, and shake us from our prisons of dead wood, that we +may fly and spin away north-eastward, each on his horny +wing. Help us but to touch the moorland yonder, and we will +take good care of ourselves henceforth; we will dive like arrows +through the heather, and drive our sharp beaks into the soil, and +rise again as green trees toward the sunlight, and spread out +lusty boughs.”</p> +<p>They never think, bold fools, of what is coming to bring them +low in the midst of their pride; of the reckless axe which will +fell them, and the saw which will shape them into logs; and the +trains which will roar and rattle over them, as they lie buried +in the gravel of the way, till they are ground and rotted into +powder, and dug up and flung upon the fire, that they too may +return home, like all things, and become air and sunlight once +again.</p> +<p>And the air-mothers hear their prayers, and do their bidding: +but faintly; for they themselves are tired and sad.</p> +<p>Tired and sad are the air-mothers, and their gardens rent and +wan. Look at them as they stream over the black forest, +before the dim south-western sun; long lines and wreaths of +melancholy grey, stained with dull yellow or dead dun. They +have come far across the seas, and done many a wild deed upon +their way; and now that they have reached the land, like +shipwrecked sailors, they will lie down and weep till they can +weep no more.</p> +<p>Ah, how different were those soft air-mothers when, invisible +to mortal eyes, they started on their long sky-journey, five +thousand miles across the sea! Out of the blazing caldron +which lies between the two New Worlds, they leapt up when the +great sun called them, in whirls and spouts of clear hot steam; +and rushed of their own passion to the northward, while the +whirling earth-ball whirled them east. So north-eastward +they rushed aloft, across the gay West Indian isles, leaving +below the glitter of the flying-fish, and the sidelong eyes of +cruel sharks; above the cane-fields and the plantain-gardens, and +the cocoa-groves which fringe the shores; above the rocks which +throbbed with earthquakes, and the peaks of old volcanoes, +cinder-strewn; while, far beneath, the ghosts of their dead +sisters hurried home upon the north-east breeze.</p> +<p>Wild deeds they did as they rushed onward, and struggled and +fought among themselves, up and down, and round and backward, in +the fury of their blind hot youth. They heeded not the tree +as they snapped it, nor the ship as they whelmed it in the waves; +nor the cry of the sinking sailor, nor the need of his little +ones on shore; hasty and selfish even as children, and, like +children, tamed by their own rage. For they tired +themselves by struggling with each other, and by tearing the +heavy water into waves; and their wings grew clogged with +sea-spray, and soaked more and more with steam. But at last +the sea grew cold beneath them, and their clear steam shrank to +mist; and they saw themselves and each other wrapped in dull +rain-laden clouds. Then they drew their white +cloud-garments round them, and veiled themselves for very shame; +and said: “We have been wild and wayward; and, alas! our +pure bright youth is gone. But we will do one good deed yet +ere we die, and so we shall not have lived in vain. We will +glide onward to the land, and weep there; and refresh all things +with soft warm rain; and make the grass grow, the buds burst; +quench the thirst of man and beast, and wash the soiled world +clean.”</p> +<p>So they are wandering past us, the air-mothers, to weep the +leaves into their graves; to weep the seeds into their seed-beds, +and weep the soil into the plains; to get the rich earth ready +for the winter, and then creep northward to the ice-world, and +there die.</p> +<p>Weary, and still more weary, slowly and more slowly still, +they will journey on far northward, across fast-chilling +seas. For a doom is laid upon them, never to be still +again, till they rest at the North Pole itself, the still axle of +the spinning world; and sink in death around it, and become white +snow-clad ghosts.</p> +<p>But will they live again, those chilled air-mothers? +Yes, they must live again. For all things move for ever; +and not even ghosts can rest. So the corpses of their +sisters, piling on them from above, press them outward, press +them southward toward the sun once more; across the floes and +round the icebergs, weeping tears of snow and sleet, while men +hate their wild harsh voices, and shrink before their bitter +breath. They know not that the cold bleak snow-storms, as +they hurtle from the black north-east, bear back the ghosts of +the soft air-mothers, as penitents, to their father, the great +sun.</p> +<p>But as they fly southwards, warm life thrills them, and they +drop their loads of sleet and snow; and meet their young live +sisters from the south, and greet them with flash and +thunder-peal. And, please God, before many weeks are over, +as we run Westward-Ho, we shall overtake the ghosts of these +air-mothers, hurrying back toward their father, the great +sun. Fresh and bright under the fresh bright heaven, they +will race with us toward our home, to gain new heat, new life, +new power, and set forth about their work once more. Men +call them the south-west wind, those air-mothers; and their +ghosts the north-east trade; and value them, and rightly, because +they bear the traders out and home across the sea. But wise +men, and little children, should look on them with more seeing +eyes; and say, “May not these winds be living +creatures? They, too, are thoughts of God, to whom all +live.”</p> +<p>For is not our life like their life? Do we not come and +go as they? Out of God’s boundless bosom, the fount +of life, we came; through selfish, stormy youth and contrite +tears—just not too late; through manhood not altogether +useless; through slow and chill old age, we return from Whence we +came; to the Bosom of God once more—to go forth again, it +may be, with fresh knowledge, and fresh powers, to nobler +work. Amen.</p> +<p>Such was the prophecy which I learnt, or seemed to learn, from +the south-western wind off the Atlantic, on a certain delectable +evening. And it was fulfilled at night, as far as the +gentle air-mothers could fulfil it, for foolish man.</p> +<blockquote><p>There was a roaring in the woods all night;<br /> +The rain came heavily and fell in floods;<br /> +But now the sun is rising calm and bright,<br /> +The birds are singing in the distant woods;<br /> +Over his own sweet voice the stock-dove broods,<br /> +The jay makes answer as the magpie chatters,<br /> +And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But was I a gloomy and distempered man, if, upon such a morn +as that, I stood on the little bridge across a certain brook, and +watched the water run, with something of a sigh? Or if, +when the schoolboy beside me lamented that the floods would +surely be out, and his day’s fishing spoiled, I said to +him—“Ah, my boy, that is a little matter. Look +at what you are seeing now, and understand what barbarism and +waste mean. Look at all that beautiful water which God has +sent us hither off the Atlantic, without trouble or expense to +us. Thousands, and tens of thousands, of gallons will run +under this bridge to-day; and what shall we do with it? +Nothing. And yet: think only of the mills which that water +would have turned. Think how it might have kept up health +and cleanliness in poor creatures packed away in the back streets +of the nearest town, or even in London itself. Think even +how country folks, in many parts of England, in three +months’ time, may be crying out for rain, and afraid of +short crops, and fever, and scarlatina, and cattle-plague, for +want of the very water which we are now letting run back, wasted, +into the sea from whence it came. And yet we call ourselves +a civilised people.”</p> +<p>It is not wise, I know, to preach to boys. And yet, +sometimes, a man must speak his heart; even, like Midas’s +slave, to the reeds by the river side. And I had so often, +fishing up and down full many a stream, whispered my story to +those same river-reeds; and told them that my Lord the Sovereign +Demos had, like old Midas, asses’ ears in spite of all his +gold, that I thought I might for once tell it the boy likewise, +in hope that he might help his generation to mend that which my +own generation does not seem like to mend.</p> +<p>I might have said more to him: but did not. For it is +not well to destroy too early the child’s illusion, that +people must be wise because they are grown up, and have votes, +and rule—or think they rule—the world. The +child will find out how true that is soon enough for +himself. If the truth be forced on him by the hot words of +those with whom he lives, it is apt to breed in him that +contempt, stormful and therefore barren, which makes revolutions; +and not that pity, calm and therefore helpful, which makes +reforms.</p> +<p>So I might have said to him, but did not—</p> +<p>And then men pray for rain:</p> +<p>My boy, did you ever hear the old Eastern legend about the +Gipsies? How they were such good musicians, that some great +Indian Sultan sent for the whole tribe, and planted them near his +palace, and gave them land, and ploughs to break it up, and seed +to sow it, that they might dwell there, and play and sing to +him.</p> +<p>But when the winter arrived, the Gipsies all came to the +Sultan, and cried that they were starving. “But what +have you done with the seed-corn which I gave you?” +“O Light of the Age, we ate it in the summer.” +“And what have you done with the ploughs which I gave +you?” “O Glory of the Universe, we burnt them +to bake the corn withal.”</p> +<p>Then said that great Sultan—“Like the butterflies +you have lived; and like the butterflies you shall +wander.” So he drove them out. And that is how +the Gipsies came hither from the East.</p> +<p>Now suppose that the Sultan of all Sultans, who sends the +rain, should make a like answer to us foolish human beings, when +we prayed for rain: “But what have you done with the rain +which I gave you six months since?” “We have +let it run into the sea.” “Then, ere you ask +for more rain, make places wherein you can keep it when you have +it.” “But that would be, in most cases, too +expensive. We can employ our capital more profitably in +other directions.”</p> +<p>It is not for me to say what answer might be made to such an +excuse. I think a child’s still unsophisticated sense +of right and wrong would soon supply one; and probably +one—considering the complexity, and difficulty, and +novelty, of the whole question—somewhat too harsh; as +children’s judgments are wont to be.</p> +<p>But would it not be well if our children, without being taught +to blame anyone for what is past, were taught something about +what ought to be done now, what must be done soon, with the +rainfall of these islands; and about other and kindred +health-questions, on the solution of which depends, and will +depend more and more, the life of millions? One would have +thought that those public schools and colleges which desire to +monopolise the education of the owners of the soil; of the great +employers of labour; of the clergy; and of all, indeed, who ought +to be acquainted with the duties of property, the conditions of +public health, and, in a word, with the general laws of what is +now called Social Science—one would have thought, I say, +that these public schools and colleges would have taught their +scholars somewhat at least about such matters, that they might go +forth into life with at least some rough notions of the causes +which make people healthy or unhealthy, rich or poor, comfortable +or wretched, useful or dangerous to the State. But as long +as our great educational institutions, safe, or fancying +themselves safe, in some enchanted castle, shut out by ancient +magic from the living world, put a premium on Latin and Greek +verses: a wise father will, during the holidays, talk now and +then, I hope, somewhat after this fashion:</p> +<p>“You must understand, my boy, that all the water in the +country comes out of the sky, and from nowhere else; and that, +therefore, to save and store the water when it falls is a +question of life and death to crops, and man, and beast; for with +or without water is life or death. If I took, for instance, +the water from the moors above and turned it over yonder field, I +could double, and more than double, the crops in that field, +henceforth.”</p> +<p>“Then why do I not do it?”</p> +<p>“Only because the field lies higher than the house; and +if—now here is one thing which you and every civilised man +should know—if you have water-meadows, or any +‘irrigated’ land, as it is called, above a house, or, +even on a level with it, it is certain to breed not merely cold +and damp, but fever or ague. Our forefathers did not +understand this; and they built their houses, as this is built, +in the lowest places they could find: sometimes because they +wanted to be near ponds, from whence they could get fish in Lent; +but more often, I think, because they wanted to be sheltered from +the wind. They had no glass, as we have, in their windows, +or, at least, only latticed casements, which let in the wind and +cold; and they shrank from high and exposed, and therefore really +healthy, spots. But now that we have good glass, and sash +windows, and doors that will shut tight, we can build warm houses +where we like. And if you ever have to do with the building +of cottages, remember that it is your duty to the people who will +live in them, and therefore to the State, to see that they stand +high and dry, where no water can drain down into their +foundations, and where fog, and the poisonous gases which are +given out by rotting vegetables, cannot drain down either. +You will learn more about all that when you learn, as every +civilised lad should in these days, something about chemistry, +and the laws of fluids and gases. But you know already that +flowers are cut off by frost in the low grounds sooner than in +the high; and that the fog at night always lies along the brooks; +and that the sour moor-smell which warns us to shut our windows +at sunset, comes down from the hill, and not up from the +valley. Now all these things are caused by one and the same +law; that cold air is heavier than warm; and, therefore, like so +much water, must run down-hill.”</p> +<p>“But what about the rainfall?”</p> +<p>“Well, I have wandered a little from the rainfall: +though not as far as you fancy; for fever and ague and rheumatism +usually mean—rain in the wrong place. But if you knew +how much illness, and torturing pain, and death, and sorrow +arise, even to this very day, from ignorance of these simple +laws, then you would bear them carefully in mind, and wish to +know more about them. But now for water being life to the +beasts. Do you remember—though you are hardly old +enough—the cattle-plague? How the beasts died, or had +to be killed and buried, by tens of thousands; and how misery and +ruin fell on hundreds of honest men and women over many of the +richest counties of England: but how we in this vale had no +cattle-plague; and how there was none—as far as I +recollect—in the uplands of Devon and Cornwall, nor of +Wales, nor of the Scotch Highlands? Now, do you know why +that was? Simply because we here, like those other +up-landers, are in such a country as Palestine was before the +foolish Jews cut down all their timber, and so destroyed their +own rainfall—a ‘land of brooks of water, of fountains +and depths that spring out of valleys and hills.’ +There is hardly a field here that has not, thank God, its running +brook, or its sweet spring, from which our cattle were drinking +their health and life, while in the clay-lands of Cheshire, and +in the Cambridgeshire fens—which were drained utterly +dry—the poor things drank no water, too often, save that of +the very same putrid ponds in which they had been standing all +day long, to cool themselves, and to keep off the flies. I +do not say, of course, that bad water caused the +cattle-plague. It came by infection from the East of +Europe. But I say that bad water made the cattle ready to +take it, and made it spread over the country; and when you are +old enough I will give you plenty of proof—some from the +herds of your own kinsmen—that what I say is +true.”</p> +<p>“And as for pure water being life to human beings: why +have we never fever here, and scarcely ever diseases like +fever—zymotics, as the doctors call them? Or, if a +case comes into our parish from outside, why does the fever never +spread? For the very same reason that we had no +cattle-plague. Because we have more pure water close to +every cottage than we need. And this I tell you: that the +only two outbreaks of deadly disease which we have had here for +thirty years, were both of them, as far as I could see, to be +traced to filthy water having got into the poor folks’ +wells. Water, you must remember, just as it is life when +pure, is death when foul. For it can carry, unseen to the +eve, and even when it looks clear and sparkling, and tastes soft +and sweet, poisons which have perhaps killed more human beings +than ever were killed in battle. You have read, perhaps, +how the Athenians, when they were dying of the plague, accused +the Lacedæmonians outside the walls of poisoning their +wells; or how, in some of the pestilences of the Middle Ages, the +common people used to accuse the poor harmless Jews of poisoning +the wells, and set upon them and murdered them horribly. +They were right, I do not doubt, in their notion that the +well-water was giving them the pestilence: but they had not sense +to see that they were poisoning the wells themselves by their +dirt and carelessness; or, in the case of poor besieged Athens, +probably by mere overcrowding, which has cost many a life ere +now, and will cost more. And I am sorry to tell you, my +little man, that even now too many people have no more sense than +they had, and die in consequence. If you could see a +battle-field, and men shot down, writhing and dying in hundreds +by shell and bullet, would not that seem to you a horrid +sight? Then—I do not wish to make you sad too early, +but this is a fact that everyone should know—that more +people, and not strong men only, but women and little children +too, are killed and wounded in Great Britain every year by bad +water and want of water together, than were killed and wounded in +any battle which has been fought since you were born. +Medical men know this well. And when you are older, you may +see it for yourself in the Registrar-General’s reports, +blue-books, pamphlets, and so on, without end.”</p> +<p>“But why do not people stop such a horrible loss of +life?”</p> +<p>“Well, my dear boy, the true causes of it have only been +known for the last thirty or forty years; and we English are, as +good King Alfred found us to his sorrow a thousand years ago, +very slow to move, even when we see a thing ought to be +done. Let us hope that in this matter—we have been so +in most matters as yet—we shall be like the tortoise in the +fable, and not the hare; and by moving slowly, but surely, win +the race at last.”</p> +<p>“But now think for yourself: and see what you would do +to save these people from being poisoned by bad water. +Remember that the plain question is this: The rain-water comes +down from heaven as water, and nothing but water. +Rain-water is the only pure water, after all. How would you +save that for the poor people who have none? There; run +away and hunt rabbits on the moor: but look, meanwhile, how you +would save some of this beautiful and precious water which is +roaring away into the sea.”</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * * * *</p> +<p>“Well? What would you do? Make ponds, you +say, like the old monks’ ponds, now all broken down. +Dam all the glens across their mouths, and turn them into +reservoirs.”</p> +<p>“‘Out of the mouths of babes and +sucklings’—Well, that will have to be done. +That is being done more and more, more or less well. The +good people of Glasgow did it first, I think; and now the good +people of Manchester, and of other northern towns, have done it, +and have saved many a human life thereby already. But it +must be done, some day, all over England and Wales, and great +part of Scotland. For the mountain tops and moors, my boy, +by a beautiful law of nature, compensate for their own poverty by +yielding a wealth which the rich lowlands cannot yield. You +do not understand? Then see. Yon moor above can grow +neither corn nor grass. But one thing it can grow, and does +grow, without which we should have no corn nor grass, and that +is—water. Not only does far more rain fall up there +than falls here down below, but even in drought the high moors +condense the moisture into dew, and so yield some water, even +when the lowlands are burnt up with drought. The reason of +that you must learn hereafter. That it is so, you should +know yourself. For on the high chalk downs, you know, where +farmers make a sheep-pond, they never, if they are wise, make it +in a valley or on a hillside, but on the bleakest top of the very +highest down; and there, if they can once get it filled with snow +and rain in winter, the blessed dews of night will keep some +water in it all the summer through, while the ponds below are +utterly dried up. And even so it is, as I know, with this +very moor. Corn and grass it will not grow, because there +is too little ‘staple,’ that is, soluble minerals, in +the sandy soil. But how much water it might grow, you may +judge roughly for yourself, by remembering how many brooks like +this are running off it now to carry mere dirt into the river, +and then into the sea.”</p> +<p>“But why should we not make dams at once; and save the +water?”</p> +<p>“Because we cannot afford it. No one would buy the +water when we had stored it. The rich in town and country +will always take care—and quite right they are—to +have water enough for themselves, and for their servants too, +whatever it may cost them. But the poorer people +are—and therefore usually, alas! the more +ignorant—the less water they get; and the less they care to +have water; and the less they are inclined to pay for it; and the +more, I am sorry to say, they waste what little they do get; and +I am still more sorry to say, spoil, and even steal and +sell—in London at least—the stop-cocks and lead-pipes +which bring the water into their houses. So that keeping a +water-shop is a very troublesome and uncertain business; and one +which is not likely to pay us or anyone round here.”</p> +<p>“But why not let some company manage it, as they manage +railways, and gas, and other things?”</p> +<p>“Ah—you have been overhearing a good deal about +companies of late, I see. But this I will tell you; that +when you grow up, and have a vote and influence, it will be your +duty, if you intend to be a good citizen, not only not to put the +water-supply of England into the hands of fresh companies, but to +help to take out of their hands what water-supply they manage +already, especially in London; and likewise the gas-supply; and +the railroads; and everything else, in a word, which everybody +uses, and must use. For you must understand—at least +as soon as you can—that though the men who make up +companies are no worse than other men, and some of them, as you +ought to know, very good men; yet what they have to look to is +their profits; and the less water they supply, and the worse it +is, the more profit they make. For most water, I am sorry +to say, is fouled before the water companies can get to it, as +this water which runs past us will be, and as the Thames water +above London is. Therefore it has to be cleansed, or partly +cleansed, at a very great expense. So water companies have +to be inspected—in plain English, watched—at a very +heavy expense to the nation by Government officers; and compelled +to do their best, and take their utmost care. And so it has +come to pass that the London water is not now nearly as bad as +some of it was thirty years ago, when it was no more fit to drink +than that in the cattle-yard tank. But still we must have +more water, and better, in London; for it is growing year by +year. There are more than three millions of people already +in what we call London; and ere you are an old man there may be +between four and five millions. Now to supply all these +people with water is a duty which we must not leave to any +private companies. It must be done by a public authority, +as is fit and proper in a free self-governing country. In +this matter, as in all others, we will try to do what the Royal +Commission told us four years ago we ought to do. I hope +that you will see, though I may not, the day when what we call +London, but which is really nine-tenths of it, only a great nest +of separate villages huddled together, will be divided into three +great self-governing cities, London, Westminster, and Southwark; +each with its own corporation, like that of the venerable and +well-governed city of London; each managing its own water-supply, +gas-supply, and sewage, and other matters besides; and managing +them, like Dublin, Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool, and other +great northern towns, far more cheaply and far better than any +companies can do it for them.”</p> +<p>“But where shall we get water enough for all these +millions of people? There are no mountains near +London. But we might give them the water off our +moors.”</p> +<p>“No, no, my boy,</p> +<blockquote><p>“He that will not when he may,<br /> +When he will, he shall have nay.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Some fifteen years ago the Londoners might have had water from +us; and I was one of those who did my best to get it for them: +but the water companies did not choose to take it; and now this +part of England is growing so populous and so valuable that it +wants all its little rainfall for itself. So there is +another leaf torn out of the Sibylline books for the poor old +water companies. You do not understand: you will some +day. But you may comfort yourself about London. For +it happens to be, I think, the luckiest city in the world; and if +it had not been, we should have had pestilence on pestilence in +it, as terrible as the great plague of Charles II.’s +time. The old Britons, without knowing in the least what +they were doing, settled old London city in the very centre of +the most wonderful natural reservoir in this island, or perhaps +in all Europe; which reaches from Kent into Wiltshire, and round +again into Suffolk; and that is, the dear old chalk +downs.”</p> +<p>“Why, they are always dry.”</p> +<p>“Yes. But the turf on them never burns up, and the +streams which flow through them never run dry, and seldom or +never flood either. Do you not know, from Winchester, that +that is true? Then where is all the rain and snow gone, +which falls on them year by year, but into the chalk itself, and +into the green-sands, too, below the chalk? There it is, +soaked up as by a sponge, in quantity incalculable; enough, some +think, to supply London, let it grow as huge as it may. I +wish I too were sure of that. But the Commission has shown +itself so wise and fair, and brave likewise—too brave, I am +sorry to say, for some who might have supported them—that +it is not for me to gainsay their opinion.”</p> +<p>“But if there was not water enough in the chalk, are not +the Londoners rich enough to bring it from any +distance?”</p> +<p>“My boy, in this also we will agree with the +Commission—that we ought not to rob Peter to pay Paul, and +take water to a distance which other people close at hand may +want. Look at the map of England and southern Scotland; and +see for yourself what is just, according to geography and +nature. There are four mountain-ranges; four great +water-fields. First, the hills of the Border. Their +rainfall ought to be stored for the Lothians and the extreme +north of England. Then the Yorkshire and Derbyshire +Hills—the central chine of England. Their rainfall is +being stored already, to the honour of the shrewd northern men, +for the manufacturing counties east and west of the hills. +Then come the Lake mountains—the finest water-field of all, +because more rain by far falls there than in any place in +England. But they will be wanted to supply Lancashire, and +some day Liverpool itself; for Liverpool is now using rain which +belongs more justly to other towns; and besides, there are plenty +of counties and towns, down into Cheshire, which would be glad of +what water Lancashire does not want. At last come the +Snowdon mountains, a noble water-field, which I know well; for an +old dream of mine has been, that ere I died I should see all the +rain of the Carnedds, and the Glyders, and Siabod, and Snowdon +itself, carried across the Conway river to feed the mining +districts of North Wales, where the streams are now all foul with +oil and lead; and then on into the western coal and iron fields, +to Wolverhampton and Birmingham itself: and if I were the +engineer who got that done, I should be happier—prouder I +dare not say—than if I had painted nobler pictures than +Raffaelle, or written nobler plays than Shakespeare. I say +that, boy, in most deliberate earnest. But meanwhile, do +you not see that in districts where coal and iron may be found, +and fresh manufactures may spring up any day in any place, each +district has a right to claim the nearest rainfall for +itself? And now, when we have got the water into its proper +place, let us see what we shall do with it.”</p> +<p>“But why do you say ‘we’? Can you and +I do all this?”</p> +<p>“My boy, are not you and I free citizens; part of the +people, the Commons—as the good old word runs—of this +country? And are we not—or ought we not to be in +time—beside that, educated men? By the people, +remember, I mean, not only the hand-working man who has just got +a vote; I mean the clergy of all denominations; and the gentlemen +of the press; and last, but not least, the scientific men. +If those four classes together were to tell every +government—‘Free water we will have, and as much as +we reasonably choose;’ and tell every candidate for the +House of Commons: ‘Unless you promise to get us as much +free water as we reasonably choose, we will not return you to +Parliament:’ then, I think, we four should put such a +‘pressure’ on Government as no water companies, or +other vested interests, could long resist. And if any of +those four classes should hang back, and waste their time and +influence over matters far less important and less pressing, the +other three must laugh at them, and more than laugh at them; and +ask them: ‘Why have you education, why have you influence, +why have you votes, why are you freemen and not slaves, if not to +preserve the comfort, the decency, the health, the lives of men, +women, and children—most of those latter your own wives and +your own children?’”</p> +<p>“But what shall we do with the water?”</p> +<p>“Well, after all, that is a more practical matter than +speculations grounded on the supposition that all classes will do +their duty. But the first thing we will do will be to give +to the very poorest houses a constant supply, at high pressure; +so that everybody may take as much water as he likes, instead of +having to keep the water in little cisterns, where it gets foul +and putrid only too often.”</p> +<p>“But will they not waste it then?”</p> +<p>“So far from it, wherever the water has been laid on at +high pressure, the waste, which is terrible now—some say +that in London one-third of the water is wasted—begins to +lessen; and both water and expense are saved. If you will +only think, you will see one reason why. If a woman leaves +a high-pressure tap running, she will flood her place and her +neighbour’s too. She will be like the +magician’s servant, who called up the demon to draw water +for him; and so he did: but when he had begun he would not stop, +and if the magician had not come home, man and house would have +been washed away.”</p> +<p>“But if it saves money, why do not the water companies +do it?”</p> +<p>“Because—and really here there are many excuses +for the poor old water companies, when so many of them swerve and +gib at the very mention of constant water-supply, like a poor +horse set to draw a load which he feels is too heavy for +him—because, to keep everything in order among dirty, +careless, and often drunken people, there must be officers with +lawful authority—water-policemen we will call +them—who can enter people’s houses when they will, +and if they find anything wrong with the water, set it to rights +with a high hand, and even summon the people who have set it +wrong. And that is a power which, in a free country, must +never be given to the servants of any private company, but only +to the officers of a corporation or of the Government.”</p> +<p>“And what shall we do with the rest of the +water?”</p> +<p>“Well, we shall have, I believe, so much to spare that +we may at least do this: In each district of each city, and the +centre of each town, we may build public baths and lavatories, +where poor men and women may get their warm baths when they will; +for now they usually never bathe at all, because they will +not—and ought not, if they be hard-worked folk—bathe +in cold water during nine months of the year. And there +they shall wash their clothes, and dry them by steam; instead of +washing them as now, at home, either under back sheds, where they +catch cold and rheumatism, or too often, alas! in their own +living rooms, in an atmosphere of foul vapour, which drives the +father to the public-house and the children into the streets; and +which not only prevents the clothes from being thoroughly dried +again, but is, my dear boy, as you will know when you are older, +a very hot-bed of disease. And they shall have other +comforts, and even luxuries, these public lavatories; and be +made, in time, graceful and refining, as well as merely +useful. Nay, we will even, I think, have in front of each +of them a real fountain; not like the +drinking-fountains—though they are great and needful +boons—which you see here and there about the streets, with +a tiny dribble of water to a great deal of expensive stone: but +real fountains, which shall leap, and sparkle, and plash, and +gurgle; and fill the place with life, and light, and coolness; +and sing in the people’s ears the sweetest of all earthly +songs—save the song of a mother over her child—the +song of ‘The Laughing Water.’”</p> +<p>“But will not that be a waste?”</p> +<p>“Yes, my boy. And for that very reason, I think +we, the people, will have our fountains; if it be but to make our +governments, and corporations, and all public bodies and +officers, remember that they all—save Her Majesty the +Queen—are our servants, and not we theirs; and that we +choose to have water, not only to wash with, but to play with, if +we like. And I believe—for the world, as you will +find, is full not only of just but of generous souls—that +if the water-supply were set really right, there would be found, +in many a city, many a generous man who, over and above his +compulsory water-rate, would give his poor fellow-townsmen such a +real fountain as those which ennoble the great square at +Carcasonne and the great square at Nismes; to be ‘a thing +of beauty and a joy for ever.’”</p> +<p>“And now, if you want to go back to your Latin and +Greek, you shall translate for me into Latin—I do not +expect you to do it into Greek, though it would turn very well +into Greek, for the Greeks know all about the matter long before +the Romans—what follows here; and you shall verify the +facts and the names, etc., in it from your dictionaries of +antiquity and biography, that you may remember all the better +what it says. And by that time, I think, you will have +learnt something more useful to yourself, and, I hope, to your +country hereafter, than if you had learnt to patch together the +neatest Greek and Latin verses which have appeared since the days +of Mr. Canning.”</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * * * *</p> +<p>I have often amused myself, by fancying one question which an +old Roman emperor would ask, were he to rise from his grave and +visit the sights of London under the guidance of some minister of +state. The august shade would, doubtless, admire our +railroads and bridges, our cathedrals and our public parks, and +much more of which we need not be ashamed. But after +awhile, I think, he would look round, whether in London or in +most of our great cities, inquiringly and in vain, for one class +of buildings, which in his empire were wont to be almost as +conspicuous and as splendid, because, in public opinion, almost +as necessary, as the basilicas and temples: “And +where,” he would ask, “are your public +baths?” And if the minister of state who was his +guide should answer: “Oh great Cæsar, I really do not +know. I believe there are some somewhere at the back of +that ugly building which we call the National Gallery; and I +think there have been some meetings lately in the East End, and +an amateur concert at the Albert Hall, for restoring, by private +subscriptions, some baths and wash-houses in Bethnal Green, which +had fallen to decay. And there may be two or three more +about the metropolis; for parish vestries have powers by Act of +Parliament to establish such places, if they think fit, and +choose to pay for them out of the rates.” Then, I +think, the august shade might well make answer: “We used to +call you, in old Rome, northern barbarians. It seems that +you have not lost all your barbarian habits. Are you aware +that, in every city in the Roman empire, there were, as a matter +of course, public baths open, not only to the poorest freeman, +but to the slave, usually for the payment of the smallest current +coin, and often gratuitously? Are you aware that in Rome +itself, millionaire after millionaire, emperor after emperor, +from Menenius Agrippa and Nero down to Diocletian and +Constantine, built baths, and yet more baths; and connected with +them gymnasia for exercise, lecture-rooms, libraries, and +porticoes, wherein the people might have shade, and shelter, and +rest? I remark, by-the-bye, that I have not seen in all +your London a single covered place in which the people may take +shelter during a shower. Are you aware that these baths +were of the most magnificent architecture, decorated with +marbles, paintings, sculptures, fountains, what not? And +yet I had heard, in Hades down below, that you prided yourselves +here on the study of the learned languages; and, indeed, taught +little but Greek and Latin at your public schools?”</p> +<p>Then, if the minister should make reply: “Oh yes, we +know all this. Even since the revival of letters in the end +of the fifteenth century a whole literature has been +written—a great deal of it, I fear, by pedants who seldom +washed even their hands and faces—about your Greek and +Roman baths. We visit their colossal ruins in Italy and +elsewhere with awe and admiration; and the discovery of a new +Roman bath in any old city of our isles sets all our antiquaries +buzzing with interest.”</p> +<p>“Then why,” the shade might ask, “do you not +copy an example which you so much admire? Surely England +must be much in want, either of water, or of fuel to heat it +with?”</p> +<p>“On the contrary, our rainfall is almost too great; our +soil so damp that we have had to invent a whole art of subsoil +drainage unknown to you; while, as for fuel, our coal-mines make +us the great fuel-exporting people of the world.”</p> +<p>What a quiet sneer might curl the lip of a Constantine as he +replied: “Not in vain, as I said, did we call you, some +fifteen hundred years ago, the barbarians of the north. But +tell me, good barbarian, whom I know to be both brave and +wise—for the fame of your young British empire has reached +us even in the realms below, and we recognise in you, with all +respect, a people more like us Romans than any which has appeared +on earth for many centuries—how is it you have forgotten +that sacred duty of keeping the people clean, which you surely at +one time learnt from us? When your ancestors entered our +armies, and rose, some of them, to be great generals, and even +emperors, like those two Teuton peasants, Justin and Justinian, +who, long after my days, reigned in my own Constantinople: then, +at least, you saw baths, and used them; and felt, after the bath, +that you were civilised men, and not ‘sordidi ac +foetentes,’ as we used to call you when fresh out of your +bullock-waggons and cattle-pens. How is it that you have +forgotten that lesson?”</p> +<p>The minister, I fear, would have to answer that our ancestors +were barbarous enough, not only to destroy the Roman cities, and +temples, and basilicas, and statues, but the Roman baths +likewise; and then retired, each man to his own freehold in the +country, to live a life not much more cleanly or more graceful +than that of the swine which were his favourite food. But +he would have a right to plead, as an excuse, that not only in +England, but throughout the whole of the conquered Latin empire, +the Latin priesthood, who, in some respects, were—to their +honour—the representatives of Roman civilisation and the +protectors of its remnants, were the determined enemies of its +cleanliness; that they looked on personal dirt—like the old +hermits of the Thebaid—as a sign of sanctity; and +discouraged—as they are said to do still in some of the +Romance countries of Europe—the use of the bath, as not +only luxurious, but also indecent.</p> +<p>At which answer, it seems to me, another sneer might curl the +lip of the august shade, as he said to himself: “This, at +least, I did not expect, when I made Christianity the state +religion of my empire. But you, good barbarian, look clean +enough. You do not look on dirt as a sign of +sanctity?”</p> +<p>“On the contrary, sire, the upper classes of our empire +boast of being the cleanliest—perhaps the only perfectly +cleanly—people in the world: except, of course, the savages +of the South Seas. And dirt is so far from being a thing +which we admire, that our scientific men—than whom the +world has never seen wiser—have proved to us, for a whole +generation past, that dirt is the fertile cause of disease and +drunkenness, misery, and recklessness.”</p> +<p>“And, therefore,” replies the shade, ere he +disappears, “of discontent and revolution: followed by a +tyranny endured, as in Rome and many another place, by men once +free; because tyranny will at least do for them what they are too +lazy, and cowardly, and greedy, to do for themselves. +Farewell, and prosper; as you seem likely to prosper, on the +whole. But if you wish me to consider you a civilised +nation: let me hear that you have brought a great river from the +depths of the earth, be they a thousand fathoms deep, or from +your nearest mountains, be they five hundred miles away; and have +washed out London’s dirt—and your own shame. +Till then, abstain from judging too harshly a Constantine, or +even a Caracalla; for they, whatever were their sins, built +baths, and kept their people clean. But do your +gymnasia—your schools and universities, teach your youth +naught about all this?”</p> +<h2><a name="page167"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 167</span>THE +TREE OF KNOWLEDGE.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> more I have contemplated that +ancient story of the Fall, the more it has seemed to me within +the range of probability, and even of experience. It must +have happened somewhere for the first time; for it has happened +only too many times since. It has happened, as far as I can +ascertain, in every race, and every age, and every grade of +civilisation. It is happening round us now in every region +of the globe. Always and everywhere, it seems to me, have +poor human beings been tempted to eat of some “tree of +knowledge,” that they may be, even for an hour, as gods; +wise, but with a false wisdom; careless, but with a frantic +carelessness; and happy, but with a happiness which, when the +excitement is past, leaves too often—as with that hapless +pair in Eden—depression, shame, and fear. Everywhere, +and in all ages, as far as I can ascertain, has man been +inventing stimulants and narcotics to supply that want of +vitality of which he is so painfully aware; and has asked nature, +and not God, to clear the dull brain, and comfort the weary +spirit.</p> +<p>This has been, and will be perhaps for many a century to come, +almost the most fearful failing of this poor, exceptional, +over-organised, diseased, and truly fallen being called Man, who +is in doubt daily whether he be a god or an ape; and in trying +wildly to become the former, ends but too often in becoming the +latter.</p> +<p>For man, whether savage or civilised, feels, and has felt in +every age, that there is something wrong with him. He +usually confesses this fact—as is to be expected—of +his fellow-men, rather than of himself; and shows his sense that +there is something wrong with them by complaining of, hating, and +killing them. But he cannot always conceal from himself the +fact that he, too, is wrong, as well as they; and as he will not +usually kill himself, he tries wild ways to make himself at least +feel—if not to be—somewhat +“better.” Philosophers may bid him be content; +and tell him that he is what he ought to be, and what nature has +made him. But he cares nothing for the philosophers. +He knows, usually, that he is not what he ought to be; that he +carries about with him, in most cases, a body more or less +diseased and decrepit, incapable of doing all the work which he +feels that he himself could do, or expressing all the emotions +which he himself longs to express; a dull brain and dull senses, +which cramp the eager infinity within him; as—so Goethe +once said with pity—the horse’s single hoof cramps +the fine intelligence and generosity of his nature, and forbids +him even to grasp an object, like the more stupid cat, and baser +monkey. And man has a self, too, within, from which he +longs too often to escape, as from a household ghost; who pulls +out, at unfortunately rude and unwelcome hours, the ledger of +memory. And so when the tempter—be he who he +may—says to him, “Take this, and you will ‘feel +better.’ Take this, and you shall be as gods, knowing +good and evil:” then, if the temptation was, as the old +story says, too much for man while healthy and unfallen, what +must it be for his unhealthy and fallen children?</p> +<p>In vain we say to man:</p> +<blockquote><p>’Tis life, not death, for which you pant;<br +/> +’Tis life, whereof your nerves are scant;<br /> +More life, and fuller, that you want.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>And your tree of knowledge is not the tree of life: it is in +every case, the tree of death; of decrepitude, madness, +misery. He prefers the voice of the tempter: “Thou +shalt not surely die.” Nay, he will say at last: +“Better be as gods awhile, and die: than be the crawling, +insufficient thing I am; and live.”</p> +<p>He—did I say? Alas! I must say she likewise. +The sacred story is only too true to fact, when it represents the +woman as falling, not merely at the same time as the man, but +before the man. Only let us remember that it represents the +woman as tempted; tempted, seemingly, by a rational being, of +lower race, and yet of superior cunning; who must, therefore, +have fallen before the woman. Who or what the being was, +who is called the Serpent in our translation of Genesis, it is +not for me to say. We have absolutely, I think, no facts +from which to judge; and Rabbinical traditions need trouble no +man much. But I fancy that a missionary, preaching on this +story to Negroes; telling them plainly that the +“Serpent” meant the first Obeah man; and then +comparing the experiences of that hapless pair in Eden, with +their own after certain orgies not yet extinct in Africa and +elsewhere, would be only too well understood: so well, indeed, +that he might run some risk of eating himself, not of the tree of +life, but of that of death. The sorcerer or sorceress +tempting the woman; and then the woman tempting the man; this +seems to be, certainly among savage peoples, and, alas! too often +among civilised peoples also, the usual course of the world-wide +tragedy.</p> +<p>But—paradoxical as it may seem—the woman’s +yielding before the man is not altogether to her dishonour, as +those old monks used to allege who hated, and too often tortured, +the sex whom they could not enjoy. It is not to the +woman’s dishonour, if she felt, before her husband, higher +aspirations than those after mere animal pleasure. To be as +gods, knowing good and evil, is a vain and foolish, but not a +base and brutal, wish. She proved herself +thereby—though at an awful cost—a woman, and not an +animal. And indeed the woman’s more delicate +organisation, her more vivid emotions, her more voluble fancy, as +well as her mere physical weakness and weariness, have been to +her, in all ages, a special source of temptation; which it is to +her honour that she has resisted so much better than the +physically stronger, and therefore more culpable, man.</p> +<p>As for what the tree of knowledge was, there really is no need +for us to waste our time in guessing. If it was not one +plant, then it was another. It may have been something +which has long since perished off the earth. It may have +been—as some learned men have guessed—the sacred +Soma, or Homa, of the early Brahmin race; and that may have been +a still existing narcotic species of Asclepias. It +certainly was not the vine. The language of the Hebrew +Scripture concerning it, and the sacred use to which it is +consecrated in the Gospels, forbid that notion utterly; at least +to those who know enough of antiquity to pass by, with a smile, +the theory that the wines mentioned in Scripture were not +intoxicating. And yet—as a fresh corroboration of +what I am trying to say—how fearfully has that noble gift +to man been abused for the same end as a hundred other vegetable +products, ever since those mythic days when Dionusos brought the +vine from the far East, amid troops of human Mænads and +half-human Satyrs; and the Bacchæ tore Pentheus in pieces +on Cithæron, for daring to intrude upon their sacred rites; +and since those historic days, too, when, less than two hundred +years before the Christian era, the Bacchic rites spread from +Southern Italy into Etruria, and thence to the matrons of Rome; +and under the guidance of Poenia Annia, a Campanian lady, took at +last shapes of which no man must speak, but which had to be put +down with terrible but just severity, by the Consuls and the +Senate.</p> +<p>But it matters little, I say, what this same tree of knowledge +was. Was every vine on earth destroyed to-morrow, and every +vegetable also from which alcohol is now distilled, man would +soon discover something else wherewith to satisfy the insatiate +craving. Has he not done so already? Has not almost +every people had its tree of knowledge, often more deadly than +any distilled liquor, from the absinthe of the cultivated +Frenchman, and the opium of the cultivated Chinese, down to the +bush-poisons wherewith the tropic sorcerer initiates his dupes +into the knowledge of good and evil, and the fungus from which +the Samoiede extracts in autumn a few days of brutal happiness, +before the setting in of the long six months’ night? +God grant that modern science may not bring to light fresh +substitutes for alcohol, opium, and the rest; and give the white +races, in that state of effeminate and godless quasi-civilisation +which I sometimes fear is creeping upon them, fresh means of +destroying themselves delicately and pleasantly off the face of +the earth.</p> +<p>It is said by some that drunkenness is on the increase in this +island. I have no trusty proof of it: but I can believe it +possible; for every cause of drunkenness seems on the +increase. Overwork of body and mind; circumstances which +depress health; temptation to drink, and drink again, at every +corner of the streets; and finally, money, and ever more money, +in the hands of uneducated people, who have not the desire, and +too often not the means, of spending it in any save the lowest +pleasures. These, it seems to me, are the true causes of +drunkenness, increasing or not. And if we wish to become a +more temperate nation, we must lessen them, if we cannot +eradicate them.</p> +<p>First, overwork. We all live too fast, and work too +hard. “All things are full of labour, man cannot +utter it.” In the heavy struggle for existence which +goes on all around us, each man is tasked more and more—if +he be really worth buying and using—to the utmost of his +powers all day long. The weak have to compete on equal +terms with the strong; and crave, in consequence, for artificial +strength. How we shall stop that I know not, while every +man is “making haste to be rich, and piercing himself +through with many sorrows, and falling into foolish and hurtful +lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.” +How we shall stop that, I say, I know not. The old prophet +may have been right when he said: “Surely it is not of the +Lord that the people shall labour in the very fire, and weary +themselves for very vanity;” and in some juster, wiser, +more sober system of society—somewhat more like the Kingdom +of The Father come on earth—it may be that poor human +beings will not need to toil so hard, and to keep themselves up +to their work by stimulants, but will have time to sit down, and +look around them, and think of God, and God’s quiet +universe, with something of quiet in themselves; something of +rational leisure, and manful sobriety of mind, as well as of +body.</p> +<p>But it seems to me also, that in such a state of society, +when—as it was once well put—“every one has +stopped running about like rats:”—that those who work +hard, whether with muscle or with brain, would not be surrounded, +as now, with every circumstance which tempts toward drink; by +every circumstance which depresses the vital energies, and leaves +them an easy prey to pestilence itself; by bad light, bad air, +bad food, bad water, bad smells, bad occupations, which weaken +the muscles, cramp the chest, disorder the digestion. Let +any rational man, fresh from the country—in which I presume +God, having made it, meant all men, more or less, to +live—go through the back streets of any city, or through +whole districts of the “black countries” of England; +and then ask himself: Is it the will of God that His human +children should live and toil in such dens, such deserts, such +dark places of the earth? Lot him ask himself: Can they +live and toil there without contracting a probably diseased habit +of body; without contracting a certainly dull, weary, sordid +habit of mind, which craves for any pleasure, however brutal, to +escape from its own stupidity and emptiness? When I run +through, by rail, certain parts of the iron-producing +country—streets of furnaces, collieries, slag heaps, mud, +slop, brick house-rows, smoke, dirt—and that is all; and +when I am told, whether truly or falsely, that the main thing +which the well-paid and well-fed men of those abominable wastes +care for is—good fighting-dogs: I can only answer, that I +am not surprised.</p> +<p>I say—as I have said elsewhere, and shall do my best to +say it again—that the craving for drink and narcotics, +especially that engendered in our great cities, is not a disease, +but a symptom of disease; of a far deeper disease than any which +drunkenness can produce; namely, of the growing degeneracy of a +population striving in vain by stimulants and narcotics to fight +against those slow poisons with which our greedy barbarism, +miscalled civilisation, has surrounded them from the cradle to +the grave. I may be answered that the old German, Angle, +Dane, drank heavily. I know it: but why did they drink, +save for the same reason that the fenman drank, and his wife took +opium, at least till the fens were drained? why but to keep off +the depressing effects of the malaria of swamps and new +clearings, which told on them—who always settled in the +lowest grounds—in the shape of fever and ague? Here +it may be answered again that stimulants have been, during the +memory of man, the destruction of the Red Indian race in +America. I reply boldly that I do not believe it. +There is evidence enough in Jacques Cartier’s +“Voyages to the Rivers of Canada;” and evidence more +than enough in Strachey’s “Travaile in +Virginia”—to quote only two authorities out of +many—to prove that the Red Indians, when the white man +first met with them, were, in North and South alike, a diseased, +decaying, and, as all their traditions confess, decreasing +race. Such a race would naturally crave for “the +water of life,” the “usquebagh,” or whisky, as +we have contracted the old name now. But I should have +thought that the white man, by introducing among these poor +creatures iron, fire-arms, blankets, and above all, horses +wherewith to follow the buffalo-herds, which they could never +follow on foot, must have done ten times more towards keeping +them alive, than he has done towards destroying them by giving +them the chance of a week’s drunkenness twice a year, when +they came in to his forts to sell the skins which, without his +gifts, they would never have got.</p> +<p>Such a race would, of course, if wanting vitality, crave for +stimulants. But if the stimulants, and not the original +want of vitality, combined with morals utterly detestable, and +worthy only of the gallows—and here I know what I say, and +dare not tell what I know, from eye-witnesses—have been the +cause of the Red Indians’ extinction, then how is it, let +me ask, that the Irishman and the Scotsman have, often to their +great harm, been drinking as much whisky—and usually very +bad whisky—not merely twice a year, but as often as they +could get it, during the whole Iron Age, and, for aught anyone +can tell, during the Bronze Age, and the Stone Age before that, +and yet are still the most healthy, able, valiant, and prolific +races in Europe? Had they drunk less whisky they would, +doubtless, have been more healthy, able, valiant, and perhaps +even <i>more</i> prolific, than they are now. They show no +sign, however, as yet, of going the way of the Red Indian.</p> +<p>But if the craving for stimulants and narcotics is a token of +deficient vitality, then the deadliest foe of that craving, and +all its miserable results, is surely the Sanatory Reformer; the +man who preaches, and—as far as ignorance and vested +interests will allow him, procures—for the masses, pure +air, pure sunlight, pure water, pure dwelling-houses, pure +food. Not merely every fresh drinking-fountain, but every +fresh public bath and wash-house, every fresh open space, every +fresh growing tree, every fresh open window, every fresh flower +in that window—each of these is so much, as the old +Persians would have said, conquered for Ormuzd, the god of light +and life, out of the dominion of Ahriman, the king of darkness +and of death; so much taken from the causes of drunkenness and +disease, and added to the causes of sobriety and health.</p> +<p>Meanwhile one thing is clear: that if this present barbarism +and anarchy of covetousness, miscalled modern civilisation, were +tamed and drilled into something more like a Kingdom of God on +earth, then we should not see the reckless and needless +multiplication of liquor shops, which disgraces this country +now.</p> +<p>As a single instance: in one country parish of nine hundred +inhabitants, in which the population has increased only one-ninth +in the last fifty years, there are now practically eight +public-houses, where fifty years ago there were but two. +One, that is, for every hundred and ten—or rather, omitting +children, farmers, shop-keepers, gentlemen, and their households, +one for every fifty of the inhabitants. In the face of the +allurements, often of the basest kind, which these dens offer, +the clergyman and the schoolmaster struggle in vain to keep up +night schools and young men’s clubs, and to inculcate +habits of providence.</p> +<p>The young labourers over a great part of the south and east, +at least of England—though never so well off, for several +generations, as they are now—are growing up thriftless, +shiftless; inferior, it seems to me, to their grandfathers in +everything, save that they can usually read and write, and their +grandfathers could not; and that they wear smart cheap cloth +clothes, instead of their grandfathers’ smock-frocks.</p> +<p>And if it be so in the country, how must it be in towns? +There must come a thorough change in the present licensing +system, in spite of all the “pressure” which certain +powerful vested interests may bring to bear on governments. +And it is the duty of every good citizen, who cares for his +countrymen, and for their children after them, to help in +bringing about that change as speedily as possible.</p> +<p>Again: I said just now that a probable cause of increasing +drunkenness was the increasing material prosperity of thousands +who knew no recreation beyond low animal pleasure. If I am +right—and I believe that I am right—I must urge on +those who wish drunkenness to decrease, the necessity of +providing more, and more refined, recreation for the people.</p> +<p>Men drink, and women too, remember, not merely to supply +exhaustion, not merely to drive away care; but often simply to +drive away dulness. They have nothing to do save to think +over what they have done in the day, or what they expect to do +to-morrow; and they escape from that dreary round of business +thought in liquor or narcotics. There are still those, by +no means of the hand-working class, but absorbed all day by +business, who drink heavily at night in their own comfortable +homes, simply to recreate their over-burdened minds. Such +cases, doubtless, are far less common than they were fifty years +ago: but why? Is not the decrease of drinking among the +richer classes certainly due to the increased refinement and +variety of their tastes and occupations? In cultivating the +æsthetic side of man’s nature; in engaging him with +the beautiful, the pure, the wonderful, the truly natural; with +painting, poetry, music, horticulture, physical science—in +all this lies recreation, in the true and literal sense of that +word, namely, the re-creating and mending of the exhausted mind +and feelings, such as no rational man will now neglect, either +for himself, his children, or his workpeople.</p> +<p>But how little of all this is open to the masses, all should +know but too well. How little opportunity the average +hand-worker, or his wife, has of eating of any tree of knowledge, +save of the very basest kind, is but too palpable. We are +mending, thank God, in this respect. Free libraries and +museums have sprung up of late in other cities beside +London. God’s blessing rest upon them all. And +the Crystal Palace, and still later, the Bethnal Green Museum, +have been, I believe, of far more use than many average sermons +and lectures from many average orators.</p> +<p>But are we not still far behind the old Greeks, and the Romans +of the Empire likewise, in the amount of amusement and +instruction, and even of shelter, which we provide for the +people? Recollect the—to me—disgraceful fact, +that there is not, as far as I am aware, throughout the whole of +London, a single portico or other covered place, in which the +people can take refuge during a shower: and this in the climate +of England! Where they do take refuge on a wet day the +publican knows but too well; as he knows also where thousands of +the lower classes, simply for want of any other place to be in, +save their own sordid dwellings, spend as much as they are +permitted of the Sabbath day. Let us put down “Sunday +drinking” by all means, if we can. But let us +remember that by closing the public-houses on Sunday, we prevent +no man or woman from carrying home as much poison as they choose +on Saturday night, to brutalise themselves therewith, perhaps for +eight-and-forty hours. And let us see—in the name of +Him who said that He had made the Sabbath for man, and not man +for the Sabbath—let us see, I say, if we cannot do +something to prevent the townsman’s Sabbath being, not a +day of rest, but a day of mere idleness; the day of most +temptation, because of most dulness, of the whole seven.</p> +<p>And here, perhaps some sweet soul may look up reprovingly and +say: “He talks of rest. Does he forget, and would he +have the working man forget, that all these outward palliatives +will never touch the seat of the disease, the unrest of the soul +within? Does he forget, and would he have the working man +forget, who it was who said—who only has the right to say: +“Come unto Me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I +will give you rest”? Ah no, sweet soul. I +know your words are true. I know that what we all want is +inward rest; rest of heart and brain; the calm, strong, +self-contained, self-denying character; which needs no +stimulants, for it has no fits of depression; which needs no +narcotics, for it has no fits of excitement; which needs no +ascetic restraints, for it is strong enough to use God’s +gifts without abusing them; the character, in a word, which is +truly temperate, not in drink or food merely, but in all desires, +thoughts, and actions; freed from the wild lusts and ambitions to +which that old Adam yielded, and, seeking for light and life by +means forbidden, found thereby disease and death. Yes, I +know that; and know, too, that that rest is found only where you +have already found it.</p> +<p>And yet, in such a world as this, governed by a Being who has +made sunshine, and flowers, and green grass, and the song of +birds, and happy human smiles, and who would educate by +them—if we would let Him—His human children from the +cradle to the grave; in such a world as this, will you grudge any +particle of that education, even any harmless substitute for it, +to those spirits in prison whose surroundings too often tempt +them, from the cradle to the grave, to fancy that the world is +composed of bricks and iron, and governed by inspectors and +policemen? Preach to those spirits in prison, as you know +far better than we parsons how to preach; but let them have +besides some glimpses of the splendid fact, that outside their +prison-house is a world which God, not man, has made; wherein +grows everywhere that tree of knowledge, which is likewise the +tree of life; and that they have a right to some small share of +its beauty, and its wonder, and its rest, for their own health of +soul and body, and for the health of their children after +them.</p> +<h2><a name="page187"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +187</span>GREAT CITIES AND THEIR INFLUENCE FOR GOOD AND EVIL. <a +name="citation187"></a><a href="#footnote187" +class="citation">[187]</a></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> pleasure, gentlemen and ladies, +of addressing you here is mixed in my mind with very solemn +feelings; the honour which you have done me is tempered by +humiliating thoughts.</p> +<p>For it was in this very city of Bristol, twenty-seven years +ago, that I received my first lesson in what is now called Social +Science; and yet, alas! more than ten years elapsed ere I could +even spell out that lesson, though it had been written for me (as +well as for all England) in letters of flame, from the one end of +heaven to the other.</p> +<p>I was a school-boy in Clifton up above. I had been +hearing of political disturbances, even of riots, of which I +understood nothing, and for which I cared nothing. But on +one memorable Sunday afternoon I saw an object which was +distinctly not political. Otherwise I should have no right +to speak of it here.</p> +<p>It was an afternoon of sullen autumn rain. The fog hung +thick over the docks and lowlands. Glaring through that fog +I saw a bright mass of flame—almost like a half-risen +sun.</p> +<p>That, I was told, was the gate of the new gaol on fire. +That the prisoners in it had been set free; that—But why +speak of what too many here recollect but too well? The fog +rolled slowly upward. Dark figures, even at that great +distance, were flitting to and fro across what seemed the mouth +of the pit. The flame increased—multiplied—at +one point after another; till by ten o’clock that night I +seemed to be looking down upon Dante’s Inferno, and to hear +the multitudinous moan and wail of the lost spirits surging to +and fro amid that sea of fire.</p> +<p>Right behind Brandon Hill—how can I ever forget +it?—rose the great central mass of fire; till the little +mound seemed converted into a volcano, from the peak of which the +flame streamed up, not red alone, but, delicately green and blue, +pale rose and pearly white, while crimson sparks leapt and fell +again in the midst of that rainbow, not of hope, but of despair; +and dull explosions down below mingled with the roar of the mob, +and the infernal hiss and crackle of the flame.</p> +<p>Higher and higher the fog was scorched and shrivelled upward +by the fierce heat below, glowing through and through with red +reflected glare, till it arched itself into one vast dome of +red-hot iron, fit roof for all the madness down below—and +beneath it, miles away, I could see the lonely tower of Dundie +shining red;—the symbol of the old faith, looking down in +stately wonder and sorrow upon the fearful birth-throes of a new +age. Yes.—Why did I say just now despair? I was +wrong. Birth-throes, and not death pangs, those horrors +were. Else they would have no place in my discourse; no +place, indeed, in my mind. Why talk over the signs of +disease, decay, death? Let the dead bury their dead, and +let us follow Him who dieth not; by whose command</p> +<blockquote><p>The old order changeth, giving place to the +new,<br /> +And God fulfils himself in many ways.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>If we will believe this,—if we will look on each +convulsion of society, however terrible for the time being, as a +token, not of decrepitude, but of youth; not as the expiring +convulsions of sinking humanity, but as upward struggles, upward +toward fuller light, freer air, a juster, simpler, and more +active life;—then we shall be able to look calmly, however +sadly, on the most appalling tragedies of humanity—even on +these late Indian ones—and take our share, faithful and +hopeful, in supplying the new and deeper wants of a new and +nobler time.</p> +<p>But to return. It was on the Tuesday or Wednesday after, +if I recollect right, that I saw another, and a still more awful +sight. Along the north side of Queen Square, in front of +ruins which had been three days before noble buildings, lay a +ghastly row, not of corpses, but of corpse-fragments. I +have no more wish than you to dilate upon that sight. But +there was one charred fragment—with a scrap of old red +petticoat adhering to it, which I never forgot—which I +trust in God that I never shall forget. It is good for a +man to be brought once at least in his life face to face with +fact, ultimate fact, however horrible it may be; and have to +confess to himself, shuddering, what things are possible upon +God’s earth, when man has forgotten that his only welfare +lies in living after the likeness of God.</p> +<p>Not that I learnt the lesson then. When the first +excitement of horror and wonder were past, what I had seen made +me for years the veriest aristocrat, full of hatred and contempt +of these dangerous classes, whose existence I had for the first +time discovered. It required many years—years, too, +of personal intercourse with the poor—to explain to me the +true meaning of what I saw here in October twenty-seven years +ago, and to learn a part of that lesson which God taught to +others thereby. And one part at least of that lesson was +this: That the social state of a city depends directly on its +moral state, and—I fear dissenting voices, but I must say +what I believe to be truth—that the moral state of a city +depends—how far I know not, but frightfully, to an extent +as yet uncalculated, and perhaps incalculable—on the +physical state of that city; on the food, water, air, and lodging +of its inhabitants.</p> +<p>But that lesson, and others connected with it, was learnt, and +learnt well, by hundreds. From the sad catastrophe I date +the rise of that interest in Social Science; that desire for some +nobler, more methodic, more permanent benevolence than that which +stops at mere almsgiving and charity-schools. The dangerous +classes began to be recognised as an awful fact which must be +faced; and faced, not by repression, but by improvement. +The “Perils of the Nation” began to occupy the +attention not merely of politicians, but of philosophers, +physicians, priests; and the admirable book which assumed that +title did but re-echo the feeling of thousands of earnest +hearts.</p> +<p>Ever since that time, scheme on scheme of improvement has been +not only proposed but carried out. A general interest of +the upper classes in the lower, a general desire to do good, and +to learn how good can be done, has been awakened throughout +England, such as, I boldly say, never before existed in any +country upon earth; and England, her eyes opened to her neglect +of these classes, without whose strong arms her wealth and genius +would be useless, has put herself into a permanent state of +confession of sin, repentance, and amendment, which I verily +trust will be accepted by Almighty God; and will, in spite of our +present shame and sorrow, <a name="citation192"></a><a +href="#footnote192" class="citation">[192]</a> in spite of shame +and sorrow which may be yet in store for us, save alive both the +soul and the body of this ancient people.</p> +<p>Let us then, that we may learn how to bear our part in this +great work of Social Reform, consider awhile great cities, their +good and evil; and let us start from the facts about your own +city of which I have just put you in remembrance. The +universal law will be best understood from the particular +instance; and best of all, from the instance with which you are +most intimately acquainted. And do not, I entreat you, fear +that I shall be rude enough to say anything which may give pain +to you, my generous hosts; or presumptuous enough to impute blame +to anyone for events which happened long ago, and of the exciting +causes of which I know little or nothing. Bristol was then +merely in the same state in which other cities of England were, +and in which every city on the Continent is now; and the local +exciting causes of that outbreak, the personal conduct of A or B +in it, is just what we ought most carefully to forget, if we wish +to look at the real root of the matter. If consumption, +latent in the constitution, have broken out in active mischief, +the wise physician will trouble his head little with the +particular accident which woke up the sleeping disease. The +disease was there, and if one thing had not awakened it some +other would. And so, if the population of a great city have +got into a socially diseased state, it matters little what shock +may have caused it to explode. Politics may in one case, +fanaticism in another, national hatred in a third, hunger in a +fourth—perhaps even, as in Byzantium of old, no more +important matter than the jealousy between the blue and the green +charioteers in the theatre, may inflame a whole population to +madness and civil war. Our business is not with the nature +of the igniting spark, but of the powder which is ignited.</p> +<p>I will not, then, to begin, go as far as some who say that +“A great city is a great evil.” We cannot say +that Bristol was in 1830 or is now, a great evil. It +represents so much realised wealth; and that, again, so much +employment for thousands. It represents so much commerce; +so much knowledge of foreign lands; so much distribution of their +products; so much science, employed about that distribution.</p> +<p>And it is undeniable, that as yet we have had no means of +rapid and cheap distribution of goods, whether imports or +manufactures, save by this crowding of human beings into great +cities, for the more easy despatch of business. Whether we +shall devise other means hereafter is a question of which I shall +speak presently. Meanwhile, no man is to be blamed for the +existence, hardly even for the evils, of great cities. The +process of their growth has been very simple. They have +gathered themselves round abbeys and castles, for the sake of +protection; round courts, for the sake of law; round ports, for +the sake of commerce; round coal mines, for the sake of +manufacture. Before the existence of railroads, +penny-posts, electric telegraphs, men were compelled to be as +close as possible to each other, in order to work together.</p> +<p>When the population was small, and commerce feeble, the cities +grew to no very great size, and the bad effects of this crowding +were not felt. The cities of England in the Middle Age were +too small to keep their inhabitants week after week, month after +month, in one deadly vapour-bath of foul gas; and though the +mortality among infants was probably excessive, yet we should +have seen among the adult survivors few or none of those stunted +and etiolated figures so common now in England, as well as on the +Continent. The green fields were close outside the walls, +where lads and lasses went a-maying, and children gathered +flowers, and sober burghers with their wives took the evening +walk; there were the butts, too, close outside, where stalwart +prentice-lads ran and wrestled, and pitched the bar, and played +backsword, and practised with the long-bow; and sometimes, in +stormy times, turned out for a few months as ready-trained +soldiers, and, like Ulysses of old,</p> +<blockquote><p>Drank delight of battle with their peers,</p> +</blockquote> +<p>and then returned again to the workshop and the loom. +The very mayor and alderman went forth, at five o’clock on +the summer’s morning, with hawk and leaping-pole, after a +duck and heron; or hunted the hare in state, probably in the full +glory of furred gown and gold chain; and then returned to +breakfast, and doubtless transacted their day’s business +all the better for their morning’s gallop on the breezy +downs.</p> +<p>But there was another side to this genial and healthy +picture. A hint that this was a state of society which had +its conditions, its limit; and if those were infringed, woe alike +to burgher and to prentice. Every now and then epidemic +disease entered the jolly city—and then down went strong +and weak, rich and poor, before the invisible and seemingly +supernatural arrows of that angel of death whom they had been +pampering unwittingly in every bedroom.</p> +<p>They fasted, they prayed; but in vain. They called the +pestilence a judgment of God; and they called it by a true +name. But they know not (and who are we to blame them for +not knowing?) what it was that God was judging thereby—foul +air, foul water, unclean backyards, stifling attics, houses +hanging over the narrow street till light and air were alike shut +out—that there lay the sin; and that to amend that was the +repentance which God demanded.</p> +<p>Yet we cannot blame them. They showed that the crowded +city life can bring out human nobleness as well as human +baseness; that to be crushed into contact with their fellow-men, +forced at least the loftier and tender souls to know their +fellow-men, and therefore to care for them, to love them, to die +for them. Yes—from one temptation the city life is +free, to which the country life is sadly exposed—that +isolation which, self-contented and self-helping, forgets in its +surly independence that man is his brother’s keeper. +In cities, on the contrary, we find that the stories of these old +pestilences, when the first panic terror has past, become, +however tragical, still beautiful and heroic; and we read of +noble-hearted men and women palliating ruin which they could not +cure, braving dangers which seemed to them miraculous, from which +they were utterly defenceless, spending money, time, and, after +all, life itself upon sufferers from whom they might without +shame have fled.</p> +<p>They are very cheering, the stories of the old city +pestilences; and the nobleness which they brought out in the +heart of many a townsman who had seemed absorbed in the lust of +gain—who perhaps had been really absorbed in it—till +that fearful hour awakened in him his better self, and taught +him, not self-aggrandisement, but self-sacrifice; begetting in +him, out of the very depth of darkness, new and divine +light. That nobleness, doubt it not, exists as ever in the +hearts of citizens. May God grant us to see the day when it +shall awaken to exert itself, not for the palliation, not even +for the cure, but for the prevention, yea, the utter +extermination, of pestilence.</p> +<p>About the middle of the sixteenth century, as far as I can +ascertain, another and even more painful phenomenon appears in +our great cities—a dangerous class. How it arose is +not yet clear. That the Reformation had something to do +with the matter, we can hardly doubt. At the dissolution of +the monasteries, the more idle, ignorant, and profligate members +of the mendicant orders, unable to live any longer on the alms of +the public, sunk, probably, into vicious penury. The +frightful misgovernment of this country during the minority of +Edward the Sixth, especially the conversion of tilled lands into +pasture, had probably the effect of driving the surplus +agricultural population into the great towns. But the +social history of this whole period is as yet obscure, and I have +no right to give an opinion on it. Another element, and a +more potent one, is to be found in the discharged soldiers who +came home from foreign war, and the sailors who returned from our +voyages of discovery, and from our raids against the Spaniards, +too often crippled by scurvy, or by Tropic fevers, with perhaps a +little prize money, which was as hastily spent as it had been +hastily gained. The later years of Elizabeth, and the whole +of James the First’s reign, disclose to us an ugly state of +society in the low streets of all our sea-port towns; and +Bristol, as one of the great starting-points of West Indian +adventure, was probably, during the seventeenth century, as bad +as any city in England. According to Ben Jonson, and the +playwriters of his time, the beggars become a regular +fourth-estate, with their own laws, and even their own +language—of which we may remark, that the thieves’ +Latin of those days is full of German words, indicating that its +inventors had been employed in the Continental wars of the +time. How that class sprung up, we may see, I suppose, +pretty plainly, from Shakespeare’s “Henry the +Fifth.” Whether Nym, Pistol, and Bardolph, Doll and +Mrs. Quickly, existed in the reign of Henry the Fifth, they +certainly existed in the reign of Elizabeth. They are +probably sketches from life of people whom Shakespeare had seen +in Alsatia and the Mint.</p> +<p>To these merely rascal elements, male and female, we must add, +I fear, those whom mere penury, from sickness, failure, want of +employment drove into dwellings of the lowest order. Such +people, though not criminal themselves, are but too likely to +become the parents of criminals. I am not blaming them, +poor souls; God forbid! I am merely stating a fact. +When we examine into the ultimate cause of a dangerous class; +into the one property common to all its members, whether thieves, +beggars, profligates, or the merely pauperised—we find it +to be this loss of self-respect. As long as that remains, +poor souls may struggle on heroically, pure amid penury, filth, +degradation unspeakable. But when self-respect is lost, +they are lost with it. And whatever may be the fate of +virtuous parents, children brought up in dens of physical and +moral filth cannot retrieve self-respect. They sink, they +must sink, into a life on a level with the sights, sounds, aye, +the very smells, which surround them. It is not merely that +the child’s mind is contaminated, by seeing and hearing, in +overcrowded houses, what he should not hear and see: but the +whole physical circumstances of his life are destructive of +self-respect. He has no means for washing himself properly: +but he has enough of the innate sense of beauty and fitness to +feel that he ought not to be dirty; he thinks that others despise +him for being dirty, and he half despises himself for being +so. In all raged schools and reformatories, so they tell +me, the first step toward restoring self-respect is to make the +poor fellows clean. From that moment they begin to look on +themselves as new men—with a new start, new hopes, new +duties. For not without the deepest physical as well as +moral meaning, was baptism chosen by the old Easterns, and +adopted by our Lord Jesus Christ, as the sign of a new life; and +outward purity made the token and symbol of that inward purity +which is the parent of self-respect, and manliness, and a clear +conscience; of the free forehead, and the eye which meets boldly +and honestly the eye of its fellow-man.</p> +<p>But would that mere physical dirt were all that the lad has to +contend with. There is the desire of enjoyment. Moral +and intellectual enjoyment he has none, and can have none: but +not to enjoy something is to be dead in life; and to the lowest +physical pleasures he will betake himself, and all the more +fiercely because his opportunities of enjoyment are so +limited. It is a hideous subject; I will pass it by very +shortly; only asking of you, as I have to ask daily of +myself—this solemn question: We, who have so many comforts, +so many pleasures of body, soul, and spirit, from the lowest +appetite to the highest aspiration, that we can gratify each in +turn with due and wholesome moderation, innocently and +innocuously—who are we that we should judge the poor +untaught and overtempted inhabitant of Temple Street and +Lewin’s Mead, if, having but one or two pleasures possible +to him, he snatches greedily, even foully, at the little which he +has?</p> +<p>And this brings me to another, and a most fearful evil of +great cities, namely, drunkenness. I am one of those who +cannot, on scientific grounds, consider drunkenness as a cause of +evil, but as an effect. Of course it is a cause—a +cause of endless crime and misery; but I am convinced that to +cure, you must inquire, not what it causes, but what causes +it? And for that we shall not have to seek far.</p> +<p>The main exciting cause of drunkenness is, I believe, firmly, +bad air and bad lodging.</p> +<p>A man shall spend his days between a foul alley where he +breathes sulphuretted hydrogen, a close workshop where he +breathes carbonic acid, and a close and foul bedroom where he +breathes both. In neither of the three places, meanwhile, +has he his fair share of that mysterious chemical agent without +which health is impossible, the want of which betrays itself at +once in the dull eye, the sallow cheek—namely, light. +Believe me, it is no mere poetic metaphor which connects in +Scripture, Light with Life. It is the expression of a deep +law, one which holds as true in the physical as in the spiritual +world; a case in which (as perhaps in all cases) the laws of the +visible world are the counterparts of those of the invisible +world, and Earth is the symbol of Heaven.</p> +<p>Deprive, then, the man of his fair share of fresh air and pure +light, and what follows? His blood is not properly +oxygenated: his nervous energy is depressed, his digestion +impaired, especially if his occupation be sedentary, or requires +much stooping, and the cavity of the chest thereby becomes +contracted; and for that miserable feeling of languor and craving +he knows but one remedy—the passing stimulus of +alcohol;—a passing stimulus; leaving fresh depression +behind it, and requiring fresh doses of stimulant, till it +becomes a habit, a slavery, a madness. Again, there is an +intellectual side to the question. The depressed nervous +energy, the impaired digestion, depress the spirits. The +man feels low in mind as well as in body. Whence shall he +seek exhilaration? Not in that stifling home which has +caused the depression itself. He knows none other than the +tavern, and the company which the tavern brings; God help +him!</p> +<p>Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is easy to say, God help him; +but it is not difficult for man to help him also. +Drunkenness is a very curable malady. The last fifty years +has seen it all but die out among the upper classes of this +country. And what has caused the improvement?</p> +<p>Certainly, in the first place, the spread of education. +Every man has now a hundred means of rational occupation and +amusement which were closed to his grandfather; and among the +deadliest enemies of drunkenness, we may class the +printing-press, the railroad, and the importation of foreign art +and foreign science, which we owe to the late forty years’ +peace. We can find plenty of amusement now, beside the old +one of sitting round the table and talking over wine. Why +should not the poor man share in our gain? But over and +above, there are causes simply physical. Our houses are +better ventilated. The stifling old four-post bed has given +place to the airy curtainless one; and what is more than +all—we wash. That morning cold bath which foreigners +consider as Young England’s strangest superstition, has +done as much, believe me, to abolish drunkenness, as any other +cause whatsoever. With a clean skin in healthy action, and +nerves and muscles braced by a sudden shock, men do not crave for +artificial stimulants. I have found that, coeteris paribus, +a man’s sobriety is in direct proportion to his +cleanliness. I believe it would be so in all classes had +they the means.</p> +<p>And they ought to have the means. Whatever other rights +a man has, or ought to have, this at least he has, if society +demands of him that he should earn his own livelihood, and not be +a torment and a burden to his neighbours. He has a right to +water, to air, to light. In demanding that, he demands no +more than nature has given to the wild beast of the forest. +He is better than they. Treat him, then, as well as God has +treated them. If we require of him to be a man, we must at +least put him on a level with the brutes.</p> +<p>We have then, first of all, to face the existence of a +dangerous class of this kind, into which the weaker as well as +the worst members of society have a continual tendency to +sink. A class which, not respecting itself, does not +respect others; which has nothing to lose and all to gain by +anarchy; in which the lowest passions, seldom gratified, are +ready to burst out and avenge themselves by frightful +methods.</p> +<p>For the reformation of that class, thousands of good men are +now working; hundreds of benevolent plans are being set on +foot. Honour to them all; whether they succeed or fail, +each of them does some good; each of them rescues at least a few +fellow-men, dear to God as you and I are, out of the nether +pit. Honour to them all, I say; but I should not be honest +with you this night, if I did not assert most solemnly my +conviction, that reformatories, ragged schools, even hospitals +and asylums, treat only the symptoms, not the actual causes, of +the disease; and that the causes are only to be touched by +improving the simple physical conditions of the class; by +abolishing foul air, foul water, foul lodging, overcrowded +dwellings, in which morality is difficult and common decency +impossible. You may breed a pig in a sty, ladies and +gentlemen, and make a learned pig of him after all; but you +cannot breed a man in a sty, and make a learned man of him; or +indeed, in the true sense of that great word, a man at all.</p> +<p>And remember, that these physical influences of great cities, +physically depressing and morally degrading, influence, though to +a less extent, the classes above the lowest stratum.</p> +<p>The honest and skilled workman feels their effects. +Compelled too often to live where he can, in order to be near his +work, he finds himself perpetually in contact with a class +utterly inferior to himself, and his children exposed to +contaminating influences from which he would gladly remove them; +but how can he? Next door to him, even in the same house +with him, may be enacted scenes of brutality or villainy which I +will not speak of here. He may shut his own eyes and ears +to them; but he cannot shut his children’s. He may +vex his righteous soul daily, like Lot of old, with the foul +conversation of the wicked; but, like Lot of old, he cannot keep +his children from mixing with the inhabitants of the wicked city, +learning their works, and at last being involved in their +doom. Oh, ladies and gentlemen, if there be one class for +whom above all others I will plead, in season and out of season; +if there be one social evil which I will din into the ears of my +countrymen whenever God gives me a chance, it is this: The honest +and the virtuous workman, and his unnatural contact with the +dishonest and the foul. I know well the nobleness which +exists in the average of that class, in men and in +wives—their stern uncomplaining, valorous self-denial; and +nothing more stirs my pity than to see them struggling to bring +up a family in a moral and physical atmosphere where right +education is impossible. We lavish sympathy enough upon the +criminal; for God’s sake let us keep a little of it for the +honest man. We spend thousands in carrying out the +separation of classes in prison; for God’s sake let us try +to separate them a little before they go to prison. We are +afraid of the dangerous classes; for God’s sake let us +bestir ourselves to stop that reckless confusion and neglect +which reign in the alleys and courts of our great towns, and +which recruit those very dangerous classes from the class which +ought to be, and is still, in spite of our folly, England’s +strength and England’s glory. Let us no longer stand +by idle, and see moral purity, in street after street, pent in +the same noisome den with moral corruption, to be involved in one +common doom, as the Latin tyrant of old used to bind together the +dead corpse and the living victim. But let the man who +would deserve well of his city, well of his country, set his +heart and brain to the great purpose of giving the workmen +dwellings fit for a virtuous and a civilised being, and like the +priest of old, stand between the living and the dead, that the +plague may be stayed.</p> +<p>Hardly less is the present physical state of our great cities +felt by that numerous class which is, next to the employer, the +most important in a city. I mean the shopmen, clerks, and +all the men, principally young ones, who are employed exclusively +in the work of distribution. I have a great respect, I may +say affection, for this class. In Bristol I know nothing of +them; save that, from what I hear, the clerks ought in general to +have a better status here than in most cities. I am told +that it is the practice here for merchants to take into their +houses very young boys, and train them to their business; that +this connection between employer and employed is hereditary, and +that clerkships pass from father to son in the same family. +I rejoice to hear it. It is pleasant to find anywhere a +relic of the old patriarchal bond, the permanent nexus between +master and man, which formed so important and so healthful an +element of the ancient mercantile system. One would gladly +overlook a little favouritism and nepotism, a little sticking +square men into round holes, and of round men into square holes, +for the sake of having a class of young clerks and +employés who felt that their master’s business was +their business, his honour theirs, his prosperity theirs.</p> +<p>But over and above this, whenever I have come in contact with +this clerk and shopman class, they have impressed me with +considerable respect, not merely as to what they may be +hereafter, but what they are now.</p> +<p>They are the class from which the ranks of our commercial men, +our emigrants, are continually recruited; therefore their right +education is a matter of national importance.</p> +<p>The lad who stands behind a Bristol counter may be, +five-and-twenty years hence, a large employer—an owner of +houses and land in far countries across the seas—a member +of some colonial parliament—the founder of a wealthy +family. How necessary for the honour of Britain, for the +welfare of generations yet unborn, that that young man should +have, in body, soul, and spirit, the loftiest, and yet the most +practical of educations.</p> +<p>His education, too, such as it is, is one which makes me +respect him as one of a class. Of course, he is sometimes +one of those “gents” whom Punch so ruthlessly holds +up to just ridicule. He is sometimes a vulgar fop, +sometimes fond of low profligacy—of betting-houses and +casinos. Well—I know no class in any age or country +among which a fool may not be found here and there. But +that the “gent” is the average type of this class, I +should utterly deny from such experience as I have had. The +peculiar note and mark of the average clerk and shopman, is, I +think, in these days, intellectual activity, a keen desire for +self-improvement and for independence, honourable, because +self-acquired. But as he is distinctly a creature of the +city; as all city influences bear at once on him more than on any +other class, so we see in him, I think, more than in any class, +the best and the worst effects of modern city life. The +worst, of course, is low profligacy; but of that I do not speak +here. I mean that in the same man the good and evil of a +city life meet. And in this way.</p> +<p>In a countryman like me, coming up out of wild and silent +moorlands into a great city, the first effect of the change is +increased intellectual activity. The perpetual stream of +human faces, the innumerable objects of interest in every +shop-window, are enough to excite the mind to action, which is +increased by the simple fact of speaking to fifty different human +beings in the day instead of five. Now in the city-bred +youth this excited state of mind is chronic, permanent. It +is denoted plainly enough by the difference between the +countryman’s face and that of the townsman. The +former in its best type (and it is often very noble) composed, +silent, self-contained, often stately, often listless; the latter +mobile, eager, observant, often brilliant, often +self-conscious.</p> +<p>Now if you keep this rapid and tense mind in a powerful and +healthy body, it would do right good work. Right good work +it does, indeed, as it is; but still it might do better.</p> +<p>For what are the faults of this class? What do the +obscurantists (now, thank God, fewer every day) allege as the +objection to allowing young men to educate themselves out of +working hours?</p> +<p>They become, it is said, discontented, conceited, +dogmatical. They take up hasty notions, they condemn +fiercely what they have no means of understanding; they are too +fond of fine words, of the excitement of spouting themselves, and +hearing others spout.</p> +<p>Well. I suppose there must be a little truth in the +accusation, or it would not have been invented. There is no +smoke without fire; and these certainly are the faults of which +the cleverest middle-class young men whom I know are most in +danger.</p> +<p>But—one fair look at these men’s faces ought to +tell common sense that the cause is rather physical than +moral. Confined to sedentary occupations, stooping over +desks and counters in close rooms, unable to obtain that fair +share of bodily exercise which nature demands, and in continual +mental effort, their nerves and brain have been excited at the +expense of their lungs, their digestion, and their whole +nutritive system. Their complexions show a general +ill-health. Their mouths, too often, hint at latent +disease. What wonder if there be an irritability of brain +and nerve? I blame them no more for it than I blame a man +for being somewhat touchy while he is writhing in the gout. +Indeed less; for gout is very often a man’s own fault; but +these men’s ill-health is not. And, therefore, +everything which can restore to them health of body, will +preserve in them health of mind. Everything which ministers +to the <i>corpus sanum</i>, will minister also to the <i>mentem +sanam</i>; and a walk on Durham Downs, a game of cricket, a +steamer excursion to Chepstow, shall send them home again happier +and wiser men than poring over many wise volumes or hearing many +wise lectures. How often is a worthy fellow spending his +leisure honourably in hard reading, when he had much better have +been scrambling over hedge and ditch, without a thought in his +head save what was put there by the grass and the butterflies, +and the green trees and the blue sky? And therefore I do +press earnestly, both on employers and employed, the incalculable +value of athletic sports and country walks for those whose +business compels them to pass the day in the heart of the city; I +press on you, with my whole soul, the excellency of the +early-closing movement; not so much because it enables young men +to attend mechanics’ institutes, as because it enables +them, if they choose, to get a good game of leap-frog. You +may smile; but try the experiment, and see how, as the chest +expands, the muscles harden, and the cheek grows ruddy and the +lips firm, and sound sleep refreshes the lad for his next +day’s work, the temper will become more patient, the +spirits more genial; there will be less tendency to brood angrily +over the inequalities of fortune, and to accuse society for evils +which as yet she knows not how to cure.</p> +<p>There is a class, again, above all these, which is doubtless +the most important of all; and yet of which I can say little +here—the capitalist, small and great, from the shopkeeper +to the merchant prince.</p> +<p>Heaven forbid that I should speak of them with aught but +respect. There are few figures, indeed, in the world on +which I look with higher satisfaction than on the British +merchant; the man whose ships are on a hundred seas; who sends +comfort and prosperity to tribes whom he never saw, and +honourably enriches himself by enriching others. There is +something to me chivalrous, even kingly, in the merchant life; +and there were men in Bristol of old—as I doubt not there +are now—who nobly fulfilled that ideal. I cannot +forget that Bristol was the nurse of America; that more than two +hundred years ago, the daring and genius of Bristol converted +yonder narrow stream into a mighty artery, down which flowed the +young life-blood of that great Transatlantic nation destined to +be hereafter, I believe, the greatest which the world ever +saw. Yes—were I asked to sum up in one sentence the +good of great cities, I would point first to Bristol, and then to +the United States, and say, That is what great cities can +do. By concentrating in one place, and upon one object, +men, genius, information, and wealth, they can conquer new-found +lands by arts instead of arms; they can beget new nations; and +replenish and subdue the earth from pole to pole.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, there is one fact about employers, in all cities +which I know, which may seem commonplace to you, but which to me +is very significant. Whatsoever business they may do in the +city, they take good care, if possible, not to live in it. +As soon as a man gets wealthy nowadays, his first act is to take +to himself a villa in the country. Do I blame him? +Certainly not. It is an act of common sense. He finds +that the harder he works, the more he needs of fresh air, free +country life, innocent recreation; and he takes it, and does his +city business all the better for it, lives all the longer for it, +is the cheerfuller, more genial man for it. One great +social blessing, I think, which railroads have brought, is the +throwing open country life to men of business. I say +blessing; both to the men themselves and to the country where +they settle. The citizen takes an honest pride in rivalling +the old country gentleman, in beating him in his own sphere, as +gardener, agriculturist, sportsman, head of the village; and by +his superior business habits and his command of ready money, he +very often does so. For fifty miles round London, wherever +I see progress—improved farms, model cottages, new +churches, new schools—I find, in three cases out of four, +that the author is some citizen who fifty years ago would have +known nothing but the narrow city life, and have had probably no +higher pleasures than those of the table; whose dreams would have +been, not as now, of model farms and schools, but of turtle and +port-wine.</p> +<p>My only regret when I see so pleasant a sight is: Oh that the +good man could have taken his workmen with him!</p> +<p>Taken his workmen with him?</p> +<p>I assure you that, after years of thought, I see no other +remedy for the worst evils of city life. “If,” +says the old proverb, “the mountain will not come to +Muhammed, then Muhammed must go to the mountain.” And +if you cannot bring the country into the city, the city must go +into the country.</p> +<p>Do not fancy me a dreamer dealing with impossible +ideals. I know well what cannot be done; fair and grand as +it would be, if it were done, a model city is impossible in +England. We have here no Eastern despotism (and it is well +we have not) to destroy an old Babylon, as that mighty genius +Nabuchonosor did, and build a few miles off a new Babylon, +one-half the area of which was park and garden, fountain and +water-course—a diviner work of art, to my mind, than the +finest picture or statue which the world ever saw. We have +not either (and it is well for us that we have not) a model +republic occupying a new uncleared land. We cannot, as they +do in America, plan out a vast city on some delicious and healthy +site amid the virgin forest, with streets one hundred feet in +breadth, squares and boulevards already planted by God’s +hand with majestic trees; and then leave the great design to be +hewn out of the wilderness, street after street, square after +square, by generations yet unborn. That too is a +magnificent ideal; but it cannot be ours. And it is well +for us, I believe, that it cannot. The great value of land, +the enormous amount of vested interests, the necessity of keeping +to ancient sites around which labour, as in Manchester, or +commerce, as in Bristol, has clustered itself on account of +natural advantages, all these things make any attempts to rebuild +in cities impossible. But they will cause us at last, I +believe, to build better things than cities. They will +issue in a complete interpenetration of city and of country, a +complete fusion of their different modes of life, and a +combination of the advantages of both, such as no country in the +world has ever seen. We shall have, I believe and trust, +ere another generation has past, model lodging-houses springing +up, not in the heart of the town, but on the hills around it; and +those will be—economy, as well as science and good +government, will compel them to be—not ill-built rows of +undrained cottages, each rented for awhile, and then left to run +into squalidity and disrepair, but huge blocks of building, each +with its common eating-house, bar, baths, washhouses, +reading-room, common conveniences of every kind, where, in free +and pure country air, the workman will enjoy comforts which our +own grandfathers could not command, and at a lower price than +that which he now pays for such accommodation as I should be +ashamed to give to my own horses; while from these great blocks +of building, branch lines will convey the men to or from their +work by railroad, without loss of time, labour, or health.</p> +<p>Then the city will become what it ought to be; the workshop, +and not the dwelling-house, of a mighty and healthy people. +The old foul alleys, as they become gradually depopulated, will +be replaced by fresh warehouses, fresh public buildings; and the +city, in spite of all its smoke and dirt, will become a place on +which the workman will look down with pride and joy, because it +will be to him no longer a prison and a poison-trap, but merely a +place for honest labour.</p> +<p>This, gentlemen and ladies, is my ideal; and I cannot but hope +and believe that I shall live to see it realised here and there, +gradually and cautiously (as is our good and safe English habit), +but still earnestly and well. Did I see but the movement +commenced in earnest, I should be inclined to cry a “Nunc +Domine dimittis”—I have lived long enough to see a +noble work begun, which cannot but go on and prosper, so +beneficial would it be found. I tell you, that but this +afternoon, as the Bath train dashed through the last cutting, and +your noble vale and noble city opened before me, I looked round +upon the overhanging crags, the wooded glens, and said to myself: +There, upon the rock in the free air and sunlight, and not here, +beneath yon pall of smoke by the lazy pools and festering tidal +muds, ought the Bristol workman to live. Oh that I may see +the time when on the blessed Sabbath eve these hills shall swarm +as thick with living men as bean-fields with the summer bees; +when the glens shall ring with the laughter of ten thousand +children, with limbs as steady, and cheeks as ruddy, as those of +my own lads and lasses at home; and the artisan shall find his +Sabbath a day of rest indeed, in which not only soul but body may +gather health and nerve for the week’s work, under the +soothing and purifying influences of those common natural sights +and sounds which God has given as a heritage even to the gipsy on +the moor; and of which no man can be deprived without making his +life a burden to himself, perhaps a burden to those around +him.</p> +<p>But it will be asked: Will such improvements pay? I +respect that question. I do not sneer at it, and regard it, +as some are too apt to do, as a sign of the mercenary and +money-loving spirit of the present age. I look on it as a +healthy sign of the English mind; a sign that we believe, as the +old Jews did, that political and social righteousness is +inseparably connected with wealth and prosperity. The old +Psalms and prophets have taught us that lesson; and God forbid +that we should forget it. The world is right well made; and +the laws of trade and of social economy, just as much as the laws +of nature, are divine facts, and only by obeying them can we +thrive. And I had far sooner hear a people asking of every +scheme of good, Will it pay? than throwing themselves headlong +into that merely sentimental charity to which superstitious +nations have always been prone—charity which effects no +permanent good, which, whether in Hindostan or in Italy, debases, +instead of raising, the suffering classes, because it breaks the +laws of social economy.</p> +<p>No, let us still believe that if a thing is right, it will +sooner or later pay; and in social questions, make the +profitableness of any scheme a test of its rightness. It is +a rough test; not an infallible one at all, but it is a fair one +enough to work by.</p> +<p>And as for the improvements at which I have hinted, I will +boldly answer that they will pay.</p> +<p>They will pay directly and at once, in the saving of +poor-rates. They will pay by exterminating epidemics, and +numberless chronic forms of disease which now render thousands +burdens on the public purse; consumers, instead of producers of +wealth. They will pay by gradually absorbing the dangerous +classes; and removing from temptation and degradation a +generation yet unborn. They will pay in the increased +content, cheerfulness, which comes with health in increased +goodwill of employed towards employers. They will pay by +putting the masses into a state fit for education. They +will pay, too, in such fearful times as these, by the increased +physical strength and hardihood of the town populations. +For it is from the city, rather than from the country, that our +armies must mainly be recruited. Not only is the townsman +more ready to enlist than the countryman, because in the town the +labour market is most likely to be overstocked; but the townsman +actually makes a better soldier than the countryman. He is +a shrewder, more active, more self-helping man; give him but the +chances of maintaining the same physical strength and health as +the countryman, and he will support the honour of the British +arms as gallantly as the Highlander or the Connaughtman, and +restore the days when the invincible prentice-boys of London +carried terror into the heart of foreign lands. In all +ages, in all times, whether for war or for peace, it will +pay. The true wealth of a nation is the health of her +masses.</p> +<p>It may seem to some here that I have dealt too much throughout +this lecture with merely material questions; that I ought to have +spoken more of intellectual progress; perhaps, as a clergyman, +more also of spiritual and moral regeneration.</p> +<p>I can only answer, that if this be a fault on my part, it is a +deliberate one. I have spoken, whether rightly or wrongly, +concerning what I know—concerning matters which are to me +articles of faith altogether indubitable, irreversible, +Divine.</p> +<p>Be it that these are merely questions of physical +improvement. I see no reason in that why they should be +left to laymen, or urged only on worldly grounds and +self-interest. I do not find that when urged on those +grounds, the advice is listened to. I believe that it will +not be listened to until the consciences of men, as well as their +brains, are engaged in these questions; until they are put on +moral grounds, shown to have connection with moral laws; and so +made questions not merely of interest, but of duty, honour, +chivalry.</p> +<p>I cannot but see, moreover, how many phenomena, which are +supposed to be spiritual, are simply physical; how many cases +which are referred to my profession, are properly the object of +the medical man. I cannot but see, that unless there be +healthy bodies, it is impossible in the long run to have a +generation of healthy souls; I cannot but see that mankind are as +prone now as ever to deny the sacredness and perfection of +God’s physical universe, as an excuse for their own +ignorance and neglect thereof; to search the highest heaven for +causes which lie patent at their feet, and like the heathen of +old time, to impute to some capricious anger of the gods +calamities which spring from their own greed, haste, and +ignorance.</p> +<p>And, therefore, because I am a priest, and glory in the name +of a priest, I have tried to fulfil somewhat of that which seems +to me the true office of a priest—namely, to proclaim to +man the Divine element which exists in all, even the smallest +thing, because each thing is a thought of God himself; to make +men understand that God is indeed about their path and about +their bed, spying out all their ways; that they are indeed +fearfully and wonderfully made, and that God’s hand lies +for ever on them, in the form of physical laws, sacred, +irreversible, universal, reaching from one end of the universe to +the other; that whosoever persists in breaking those laws, reaps +his sure punishment of weakness and sickness, sadness and +self-reproach; that whosoever causes them to be broken by others, +reaps his sure punishment in finding that he has transformed his +fellow-men into burdens and curses, instead of helpmates and +blessings. To say this, is a priest’s duty; and then +to preach the good news that the remedy is patent, easy, close at +hand; that many of the worst evils which afflict humanity may be +exterminated by simple common sense, and the justice and mercy +which does to others as it would be done by; to awaken men to the +importance of the visible world, that they may judge from thence +the higher importance of that invisible world whereof this is but +the garment and the type; and in all times and places, instead of +keeping the key of knowledge to pamper one’s own power or +pride, to lay that key frankly and trustfully in the hand of +every human being who hungers after truth, and to say: Child of +God, this key is thine as well as mine. Enter boldly into +thy Father’s house, and behold the wonder, the wisdom, the +beauty of its laws and its organisms, from the mightiest planet +over thy head, to the tiniest insect beneath thy feet. Look +at it, trustfully, joyfully, earnestly; for it is thy +heritage. Behold its perfect fitness for thy life here; and +judge from thence its fitness for thy nobler life hereafter.</p> +<h2><a name="page225"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +225</span>HEROISM.</h2> +<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is an open question whether the +policeman is not demoralising us; and that in proportion as he +does his duty well; whether the perfection of justice and safety, +the complete “preservation of body and goods,” may +not reduce the educated and comfortable classes into that lap-dog +condition in which not conscience, but comfort, doth make cowards +of us all. Our forefathers had, on the whole, to take care +of themselves; we find it more convenient to hire people to take +care of us. So much the better for us, in some respects; +but, it may be, so much the worse in others. So much the +better; because, as usually results from the division of labour, +these people, having little or nothing to do save to take care of +us, do so far better than we could; and so prevent a vast amount +of violence and wrong, and therefore of misery, especially to the +weak; for which last reason we will acquiesce in the existence of +policemen and lawyers, as we do in the results of arbitration, as +the lesser of two evils. The odds in war are in favour of +the bigger bully, in arbitration in favour of the bigger rogue; +and it is a question whether the lion or the fox be the safer +guardian of human interests. But arbitration prevents war; +and that, in three cases out of four, is full reason for +employing it.</p> +<p>On the other hand, the lap-dog condition, whether in dogs or +in men, is certainly unfavourable to the growth of the higher +virtues. Safety and comfort are good, indeed, for the good; +for the brave, the self-originating, the earnest. They give +to such a clear stage and no favour, wherein to work unhindered +for their fellow-men. But for the majority, who are neither +brave, self-originating, nor earnest, but the mere puppets of +circumstance, safety and comfort may, and actually do, merely +make their lives mean and petty, effeminate and dull. +Therefore their hearts must be awakened, as often as possible, to +take exercise enough for health; and they must be reminded, +perpetually and importunately, of what a certain great +philosopher called, “whatsoever things are true, +honourable, just, pure, lovely, and of good report;” +“if there be any manhood, and any just praise, to think of +such things.”</p> +<p>This pettiness and dulness of our modern life is just what +keeps alive our stage, to which people go to see something a +little less petty, a little less dull, than what they see at +home. It is, too, the cause of—I had almost said the +excuse for—the modern rage for sensational novels. +Those who read them so greedily are conscious, poor souls, of +capacities in themselves of passion and action for good and evil, +for which their frivolous humdrum daily life gives no room, no +vent. They know too well that human nature can be more +fertile, whether in weeds and poisons, or in flowers and fruits, +than it is usually in the streets and houses of a well-ordered +and tolerably sober city. And because the study of human +nature is, after all, that which is nearest to everyone and most +interesting to everyone, therefore they go to fiction, since they +cannot go to fact, to see what they themselves might be had they +the chance; to see what fantastic tricks before high heaven men +and women like themselves can play, and how they play them.</p> +<p>Well, it is not for me to judge, for me to blame. I will +only say that there are those who cannot read sensational novels, +or, indeed, any novels at all, just because they see so many +sensational novels being enacted round them in painful facts of +sinful flesh and blood. There are those, too, who have +looked in the mirror too often to wish to see their own +disfigured visage in it any more; who are too tired of themselves +and ashamed of themselves to want to hear of people like +themselves; who want to hear of people utterly unlike themselves, +more noble, and able, and just, and sweet, and pure; who long to +hear of heroism and to converse with heroes; and who, if by +chance they meet with an heroic act, bathe their spirits in that, +as in May-dew, and feel themselves thereby, if but for an hour, +more fair.</p> +<p>If any such shall chance to see these words, let me ask them +to consider with me that one word Hero, and what it means.</p> +<p>Hero; Heroic; Heroism. These words point to a phase of +human nature, the capacity for which we all have in ourselves, +which is as startling and as interesting in its manifestations as +any, and which is always beautiful, always ennobling, and +therefore always attractive to those whose hearts are not yet +seared by the world or brutalised by self-indulgence.</p> +<p>But let us first be sure what the words mean. There is +no use talking about a word till we have got at its +meaning. We may use it as a cant phrase, as a party cry on +platforms; we may even hate and persecute our fellow-men for the +sake of it: but till we have clearly settled in our own minds +what a word means, it will do for fighting with, but not for +working with. Socrates of old used to tell the young +Athenians that the ground of all sound knowledge was—to +understand the true meaning of the words which were in their +mouths all day long; and Socrates was a wiser man than we shall +ever see. So, instead of beginning an oration in praise of +heroism, I shall ask my readers to think with me what heroism +is.</p> +<p>Now, we shall always get most surely at the meaning of a word +by getting at its etymology—that is, at what it meant at +first. And if heroism means behaving like a hero, we must +find out, it seems to me, not merely what a hero may happen to +mean just now, but what it meant in the earliest human speech in +which we find it.</p> +<p>A hero or a heroine, then, among the old Homeric Greeks, meant +a man or woman who was like the gods; and who, from that +likeness, stood superior to his or her fellow-creatures. +Gods, heroes, and men, is a threefold division of rational +beings, with which we meet more than once or twice. Those +grand old Greeks felt deeply the truth of the poet’s +saying—</p> + +<blockquote><p> Unless +above himself he can<br /> +Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But more: the Greeks supposed these heroes to be, in some way +or other, partakers of a divine nature; akin to the gods; +usually, either they, or some ancestor of theirs, descended from +a god or goddess. Those who have read Mr. Gladstone’s +“Juventus Mundi” will remember the section (cap. ix. +§ 6) on the modes of the approximation between the divine +and the human natures; and whether or not they agree with the +author altogether, all will agree, I think, that the first idea +of a hero or a heroine was a godlike man or godlike woman.</p> +<p>A godlike man. What varied, what infinite forms of +nobleness that word might include, ever increasing, as +men’s notions of the gods became purer and loftier, or, +alas! decreasing, as their notions became degraded. The old +Greeks, with that intense admiration of beauty which made them, +in after ages, the master-sculptors and draughtsmen of their own, +and, indeed, of any age, would, of course, require in their hero, +their god-like man, beauty and strength, manners too, and +eloquence, and all outward perfections of humanity, and neglect +his moral qualities. Neglect, I say, but not ignore. +The hero, by virtue of his kindred with the gods, was always +expected to be a better man than common men, as virtue was then +understood. And how better? Let us see.</p> +<p>The hero was at least expected to be more reverent than other +men to those divine beings of whose nature he partook, whose +society he might enjoy even here on earth. He might be +unfaithful to his own high lineage; he might misuse his gifts by +selfishness and self-will; he might, like Ajax, rage with mere +jealousy and wounded pride till his rage ended in shameful +madness and suicide. He might rebel against the very gods, +and all laws of right and wrong, till he perished his +ἀτασθαλίη—</p> +<blockquote><p>Smitten down, blind in his pride, for a sign and a +terror to mortals.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But he ought to have, he must have, to be true to his name of +Hero, justice, self-restraint, and +αἰδώς—that highest form of +modesty, for which we have, alas! no name in the English tongue; +that perfect respect for the feelings of others which springs out +of perfect self-respect. And he must have too—if he +were to be a hero of the highest type—the instinct of +helpfulness; the instinct that, if he were a kinsman of the gods, +he must fight on their side, through toil and danger, against all +that was unlike them, and therefore hateful to them. Who +loves not the old legends, unsurpassed for beauty in the +literature of any race, in which the hero stands out as the +deliverer, the destroyer of evil? Theseus ridding the land +of robbers, and delivering it from the yearly tribute of boys and +maidens to be devoured by the Minotaur; Perseus slaying the +Gorgon, and rescuing Andromeda from the sea-beast; Heracles with +his twelve famous labours against giants and monsters; and all +the rest—</p> +<blockquote><p>Who dared, in the god-given might of their +manhood,<br /> +Greatly to do and to suffer, and far in the fens and the +forests<br /> +Smite the devourers of men, heaven-hated brood of the giants;<br +/> +Transformed, strange, without like, who obey not the +golden-haired rulers.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>These are figures whose divine moral beauty has sunk into the +hearts, not merely of poets or of artists, but of men and women +who suffered and who feared; the memory of them, fables though +they may have been, ennobled the old Greek heart; they ennobled +the heart of Europe in the fifteenth century, at the re-discovery +of Greek literature. So far from contradicting the +Christian ideal, they harmonised with—I had almost said +they supplemented—that more tender and saintly ideal of +heroism which had sprung up during the earlier Middle Ages. +They justified, and actually gave a new life to, the old +noblenesses of chivalry, which had grown up in the later Middle +Ages as a necessary supplement of active and manly virtue to the +passive and feminine virtue of the cloister. They inspired, +mingling with these two other elements, a literature both in +England, France, and Italy, in which the three elements, the +saintly, the chivalrous, and the Greek heroic, have become one +and undistinguishable, because all three are human, and all three +divine; a literature which developed itself in Ariosto, in Tasso, +in the Hypnerotomachia, the Arcadia, the Euphues, and other +forms, sometimes fantastic, sometimes questionable, but which +reached its perfection in our own Spenser’s “Fairy +Queen”—perhaps the most admirable poem which has ever +been penned by mortal man.</p> +<p>And why? What has made these old Greek myths live, myths +though they be, and fables, and fair dreams? +What—though they have no body, and, perhaps, never +had—has given them an immortal soul, which can speak to the +immortal souls of all generations to come?</p> +<p>What but this, that in them—dim it may be and +undeveloped, but still there—lies the divine idea of +self-sacrifice as the perfection of heroism, of self-sacrifice, +as the highest duty and the highest joy of him who claims a +kindred with the gods?</p> +<p>Let us say, then, that true heroism must involve +self-sacrifice. Those stories certainly involve it, whether +ancient or modern, which the hearts, not of philosophers merely, +or poets, but of the poorest and the most ignorant, have accepted +instinctively as the highest form of moral beauty—the +highest form, and yet one possible to all.</p> +<p>Grace Darling rowing out into the storm towards the +wreck. The “drunken private of the Buffs,” who, +prisoner among the Chinese, and commanded to prostrate himself +and kotoo, refused in the name of his country’s +honour: “He would not bow to any China-man on +earth:” and so was knocked on the head, and died surely a +hero’s death. Those soldiers of the Birkenhead, +keeping their ranks to let the women and children escape, while +they watched the sharks who in a few minutes would be tearing +them limb from limb. Or, to go across the +Atlantic—for there are heroes in the Far West—Mr. +Bret Harte’s “Flynn of Virginia,” on the +Central Pacific Railway—the place is shown to +travellers—who sacrificed his life for his married +comrade:</p> +<blockquote><p>There, in the drift,<br /> +Back to the wall,<br /> +He held the timbers<br /> +Ready to fall.<br /> +Then in the darkness<br /> +I heard him call:<br /> +“Run for your life, Jake!<br /> +Run for your wife’s sake!<br /> +Don’t wait for me.”</p> +<p>And that was all<br /> +Heard in the din—<br /> +Heard of Tom Flynn—<br /> +Flynn of Virginia.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Or the engineer, again, on the Mississippi, who, when the +steamer caught fire, held, as he had sworn he would, her bow +against the bank, till every soul save he got safe on shore:</p> +<blockquote><p>Through the hot black breath of the burning +boat<br /> + Jim Bludso’s voice was heard;<br /> +And they all had trust in his cussedness,<br /> + And knew he would keep his word.<br /> +And sure’s you’re born, they all got off<br /> + Afore the smokestacks fell;<br /> +And Bludso’s ghost went up alone<br /> + In the smoke of the Prairie Belle.</p> +<p>He weren’t no saint—but at the judgment<br /> + I’d run my chance with Jim<br /> +’Longside of some pious gentlemen<br /> + That wouldn’t shake hands with him.<br /> +He’d seen his duty—a dead sure thing—<br /> + And went for it there and then;<br /> +And Christ is not going to be too hard<br /> + On a man that died for men.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>To which gallant poem of Colonel John Hay’s—and he +has written many gallant and beautiful poems—I have but one +demurrer: Jim Bludso did not merely do his duty but more than his +duty. He did a voluntary deed, to which he was bound by no +code or contract, civil or moral; just as he who introduced me to +that poem won his Victoria Cross—as many a cross, Victoria +and other, has been won—by volunteering for a deed to which +he, too, was bound by no code or contract, military or +moral. And it is of the essence of self-sacrifice, and +therefore of heroism, that it should be voluntary; a work of +supererogation, at least towards society and man; an act to which +the hero or heroine is not bound by duty, but which is above +though not against duty.</p> +<p>Nay, on the strength of that same element of self-sacrifice, I +will not grudge the epithet “heroic,” which my +revered friend Mr. Darwin justly applies to the poor little +monkey, who once in his life did that which was above his duty; +who lived in continual terror of the great baboon, and yet, when +the brute had sprung upon his friend the keeper, and was tearing +out his throat, conquered his fear by love, and, at the risk of +instant death, sprang in turn upon his dreaded enemy, and bit and +shrieked till help arrived.</p> +<p>Some would nowadays use that story merely to prove that the +monkey’s nature and the man’s nature are, after all, +one and the same. Well: I, at least, have never denied that +there is a monkey-nature in man, as there is a peacock-nature, +and a swine-nature, and a wolf-nature—of all which four I +see every day too much. The sharp and stern distinction +between men and animals, as far as their natures are concerned, +is of a more modern origin than people fancy. Of old the +Assyrian took the eagle, the ox, and the lion—and not +unwisely—as the three highest types of human +capacity. The horses of Homer might be immortal, and weep +for their master’s death. The animals and monsters of +Greek myth—like the Ananzi spider of Negro +fable—glide insensibly into speech and reason. +Birds—the most wonderful of all animals in the eyes of a +man of science or a poet—are sometimes looked on as wiser, +and nearer to the gods, than man. The Norseman—the +noblest and ablest human being, save the Greek, of whom history +can tell us—was not ashamed to say of the bear of his +native forests that he had “ten men’s strength and +eleven men’s wisdom.” How could Reinecke Fuchs +have gained immortality, in the Middle Ages and since, save by +the truth of its too solid and humiliating theorem—that the +actions of the world of men were, on the whole, guided by +passions but too exactly like those of the lower animals? I +have said, and say again, with good old Vaughan:</p> + +<blockquote><p> Unless +above himself he can<br /> +Exalt himself, how mean a thing is man.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But I cannot forget that many an old Greek poet or sage, and +many a sixteenth and seventeenth century one, would have +interpreted the monkey’s heroism from quite a different +point of view; and would have said that the poor little creature +had been visited suddenly by some “divine +afflatus”—an expression quite as philosophical and +quite as intelligible as most philosophic formulas which I read +nowadays—and had been thus raised for the moment above his +abject selfish monkey-nature, just as man requires to be raised +above his. But that theory belongs to a philosophy which is +out of date and out of fashion, and which will have to wait a +century or two before it comes into fashion again.</p> +<p>And now, if self-sacrifice and heroism be, as I believe, +identical, I must protest against the use of the word +“sacrifice” which is growing too common in +newspaper-columns, in which we are told of an “enormous +sacrifice of life;” an expression which means merely that a +great many poor wretches have been killed, quite against their +own will, and for no purpose whatsoever; no sacrifice at all, +unless it be one to the demons of ignorance, cupidity, or +mismanagement.</p> +<p>The stout Whig undergraduate understood better the meaning of +such words, who, when asked, “In what sense might Charles +the First be said to be a martyr?” answered, “In the +same sense that a man might be said to be a martyr to the +gout.”</p> +<p>And I must protest, in like wise, against a misuse of the +words “hero.” “heroism,” +“heroic,” which is becoming too common, namely, +applying them to mere courage. We have borrowed the misuse, +I believe, as we have more than one beside, from the French +press. I trust that we shall neither accept it, nor the +temper which inspires it. It may be convenient for those +who flatter their nation, and especially the military part of it, +into a ruinous self-conceit, to frame some such syllogism as +this: “Courage is heroism: every Frenchman is naturally +courageous: therefore every Frenchman is a hero.” But +we, who have been trained at once in a sounder school of morals, +and in a greater respect for facts, and for language as the +expression of facts, shall be careful, I hope, not to trifle thus +with that potent and awful engine—human speech. We +shall eschew likewise, I hope, a like abuse of the word +“moral,” which has crept from the French press now +and then, not only into our own press, but into the writings of +some of our military men, who, as Englishmen, should have known +better. We were told again and again, during the late war, +that the moral effect of such a success had been great; that the +<i>morale</i> of the troops was excellent; or again, that the +<i>morale</i> of the troops had suffered, or even that they were +somewhat demoralised. But when one came to test what was +really meant by these fine words, one discovered that morals had +nothing to do with the facts which they expressed; that the +troops were in the one case actuated simply by the animal passion +of hope, in the other simply by the animal passion of fear. +This abuse of the word “moral” has crossed, I am +sorry to say, the Atlantic; and a witty American, whom we must +excuse, though we must not imitate, when some one had been +blazing away at him with a revolver, he being unarmed, is said to +have described his very natural emotions on the occasion, by +saying that he felt dreadfully demoralised. We, I hope, +shall confine the word “demoralisation,” as our +generals of the last century would have done, when applied to +soldiers, to crime, including, of course, the neglect of duty or +of discipline; and we shall mean by the word +“heroism,” in like manner, whether applied to a +soldier or to any human being, not mere courage, not the mere +doing of duty, but the doing of something beyond duty; something +which is not in the bond; some spontaneous and unexpected act of +self-devotion.</p> +<p>I am glad, but not surprised, to see that Miss Yonge has held +to this sound distinction in her golden little book of +“Golden Deeds,” and said, “Obedience, at all +costs and risks, is the very essence of a soldier’s +life. It has the solid material, but it has hardly the +exceptional brightness, of a golden deed.”</p> +<p>I know that it is very difficult to draw the line between mere +obedience to duty and express heroism. I know also that it +would be both invidious and impertinent in an utterly unheroic +personage like me, to try to draw that line; and to sit at home +at ease, analysing and criticising deeds which I could not do +myself; but—to give an instance or two of what I mean:</p> +<p>To defend a post as long as it is tenable is not heroic. +It is simple duty. To defend it after it has become +untenable, and even to die in so doing, is not heroic, but a +noble madness, unless an advantage is to be gained thereby for +one’s own side. Then, indeed, it rises towards, if +not into, the heroism of self-sacrifice.</p> +<p>Who, for example, will not endorse the verdict of all ages on +the conduct of those Spartans at Thermopylæ, when they sat +“combing their yellow hair for death” on the +sea-shore? They devoted themselves to hopeless destruction; +but why? They felt—I must believe that, for they +behaved as if they felt—that on them the destinies of the +Western World might hang; that they were in the forefront of the +battle between civilisation and barbarism, between freedom and +despotism; and that they must teach that vast mob of Persian +slaves, whom the officers of the Great King were driving with +whips up to their lance-points, that the spirit of the old heroes +was not dead; and that the Greek, even in defeat and death, was a +mightier and a nobler man than they. And they did their +work. They produced, if you will, a “moral” +effect, which has lasted even to this very day. They struck +terror into the heart, not only of the Persian host, but of the +whole Persian empire. They made the event of that war +certain, and the victories of Salamis and Platæa +comparatively easy. They made Alexander’s conquest of +the East, one hundred and fifty years afterwards, not only +possible at all, but permanent when it came; and thus helped to +determine the future civilisation of the whole world.</p> +<p>They did not, of course, foresee all this. No great or +inspired man can foresee all the consequences of his deeds; but +these men were, as I hold inspired to see somewhat at least of +the mighty stake for which they played; and to count their lives +worthless, if Sparta had sent them thither to help in that great +game.</p> +<p>Or shall we refuse the name of heroic to those three German +cavalry regiments who, in the battle of Mars-la-Tour, were bidden +to hurl themselves upon the chassepots and mitrailleuses of the +unbroken French infantry, and went to almost certain death, over +the corpses of their comrades, on and in and through, reeling man +over horse, horse over man, and clung like bull-dogs to their +work, and would hardly leave, even at the bugle-call, till in one +regiment thirteen officers out of nineteen were killed or +wounded? And why?</p> +<p>Because the French army must be stopped, if it were but for a +quarter of an hour. A respite must be gained for the +exhausted Third Corps. And how much might be done, even in +a quarter of an hour, by men who knew when, and where, and why to +die! Who will refuse the name of heroes to these men? +And yet they, probably, would have utterly declined the +honour. They had but done that which was in the bond. +They were but obeying orders after all. As Miss Yonge well +says of all heroic persons: “‘I have but done that +which it was my duty to do,’ is the natural answer of those +capable of such actions. They have been constrained to them +by duty or pity; have never deemed it possible to act otherwise; +and did not once think of themselves in the matter at +all.”</p> +<p>These last true words bring us to another element in heroism: +its simplicity. Whatsoever is not simple; whatsoever is +affected, boastful, wilful, covetous, tarnishes, even destroys, +the heroic character of a deed; because all these faults spring +out of self. On the other hand, wherever you find a +perfectly simple, frank, unconscious character, there you have +the possibility, at least, of heroic action. For it is +nobler far to do the most commonplace duty in the household, or +behind the counter, with a single eye to duty, simply because it +must be done—nobler far, I say, than to go out of your way +to attempt a brilliant deed, with a double mind, and saying to +yourself not only—“This will be a brilliant +deed,” but also—“and it will pay me, or raise +me, or set me off, into the bargain.” Heroism knows +no “into the bargain.” And therefore, again, I +must protest against applying the word “heroic” to +any deeds, however charitable, however toilsome, however +dangerous, performed for the sake of what certain French ladies, +I am told, call “faire son salut”—saving +one’s soul in the world to come. I do not mean to +judge. Other and quite unselfish motives may be, and +doubtless often are, mixed up with that selfish one: womanly pity +and tenderness; love for, and desire to imitate, a certain +Incarnate ideal of self-sacrifice, who is at once human and +divine. But that motive of saving the soul, which is too +often openly proposed and proffered, is utterly unheroic. +The desire to escape pains and penalties hereafter by pains and +penalties here; the balance of present loss against future +gain—what is this but selfishness extended out of this +world into eternity? “Not worldliness,” indeed, +as a satirist once said with bitter truth, “but +other-worldliness.”</p> +<p>Moreover—and the young and the enthusiastic should also +bear this in mind—though heroism means the going beyond the +limits of strict duty, it never means the going out of the path +of strict duty. If it is your duty to go to London, go +thither: you may go as much farther as you choose after +that. But you must go to London first. Do your duty +first; it will be time after that to talk of being heroic.</p> +<p>And therefore one must seriously warn the young, lest they +mistake for heroism and self-sacrifice what is merely pride and +self-will, discontent with the relations by which God has bound +them, and the circumstances which God has appointed for +them. I have known girls think they were doing a fine thing +by leaving uncongenial parents or disagreeable sisters, and +cutting out for themselves, as they fancied, a more useful and +elevated line of life than that of mere home duties; while, after +all, poor things, they were only saying, with the Pharisees of +old, “Corban, it is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be +profited by me;” and in the name of God, neglecting the +command of God to honour their father and mother.</p> +<p>There are men, too, who will neglect their households and +leave their children unprovided for, and even uneducated, while +they are spending their money on philanthropic or religious +hobbies of their own. It is ill to take the +children’s bread and cast it to the dogs; or even to the +angels. It is ill, I say, trying to make presents to God, +before we have tried to pay our debts to God. The first +duty of every man is to the wife whom he has married, and to the +children whom she has brought into the world; and to neglect them +is not heroism, but self-conceit; the conceit that a man is so +necessary to Almighty God, that God will actually allow him to do +wrong, if He can only thereby secure the man’s invaluable +services. Be sure that every motive which comes not from +the single eye, every motive which springs from self, is by its +very essence unheroic, let it look as gaudy or as beneficent as +it may.</p> +<p>But I cannot go so far as to say the same of the love of +approbation—the desire for the love and respect of our +fellow-men. That must not be excluded from the list of +heroic motives. I know that it is, or may be proved to be, +by victorious analysis, an emotion common to us and the lower +animals. And yet no man excludes it less than that true +hero, St. Paul.</p> +<p>If those brave Spartans, if those brave Germans, of whom I +spoke just now, knew that their memories would be wept over and +worshipped by brave men and fair women, and that their names +would become watchwords to children in their fatherland, what is +that to us, save that it should make us rejoice, if we be truly +human, that they had that thought with them in their last moments +to make self-devotion more easy, and death more sweet?</p> +<p>And yet—and yet—is not the highest heroism that +which is free even from the approbation of our fellowmen, even +from the approbation of the best and wisest? The heroism +which is known only to our Father who seeth in secret? The +Godlike deeds alone in the lonely chamber? The Godlike +lives lived in obscurity?—a heroism rare among us men, who +live perforce in the glare and noise of the outer world: more +common among women; women of whom the world never hears; who, if +the world discovered them, would only draw the veil more closely +over their faces and their hearts, and entreat to be left alone +with God. True, they cannot always hide. They must +not always hide; or their fellow-creatures would lose the golden +lesson. But, nevertheless, it is of the essence of the +perfect and womanly heroism, in which, as in all spiritual forces +the woman transcends the man, that it would hide if it could.</p> +<p>And it was a pleasant thought to me, when I glanced lately at +the golden deeds of women in Miss Yonge’s book—it was +a pleasant thought to me, that I could say to myself—Ah! +yes. These heroines are known, and their fame flies through +the mouths of men. But if so, how many thousands of +heroines there must have been, how many thousands there may be +now, of whom we shall never know. But still they are +there. They sow in secret the seed of which we pluck the +flower and eat the fruit, and know not that we pass the sower +daily in the street; perhaps some humble, ill-dressed woman, +earning painfully her own small sustenance. She who nurses +a bedridden mother, instead of sending her to the +workhouse. She who spends her heart and her money on a +drunken father, a reckless brother, on the orphans of a kinsman +or a friend. She who—But why go on with the long list +of great little heroisms, with which a clergyman at least comes +in contact daily—and it is one of the most ennobling +privileges of a clergyman’s high calling that he does come +in contact with them—why go on, I say, save to commemorate +one more form of great little heroism—the commonest, and +yet the least remembered of all—namely, the heroism of an +average mother? Ah, when I think of that last broad fact, I +gather hope again for poor humanity; and this dark world looks +bright, this diseased world looks wholesome to me once +more—because, whatever else it is or is not full of, it is +at least full of mothers.</p> +<p>While the satirist only sneers, as at a stock butt for his +ridicule, at the managing mother trying to get her daughters +married off her hands by chicaneries and meannesses, which every +novelist knows too well how to draw—would to heaven he, or +rather, alas! she would find some more chivalrous employment for +his or her pen—for were they not, too, born of +woman?—I only say to myself—having had always a +secret fondness for poor Rebecca, though I love Esau more than +Jacob—Let the poor thing alone. With pain she brought +these girls into the world. With pain she educated them +according to her light. With pain she is trying to obtain +for them the highest earthly blessing of which she can conceive, +namely, to be well married; and if in doing that last, she +manœuvres a little, commits a few basenesses, even tells a +few untruths, what does all that come to, save this—that in +the confused intensity of her motherly self-sacrifice, she will +sacrifice for her daughters even her own conscience and her own +credit? We may sneer, if we will, at such a poor +hard-driven soul when we meet her in society; our duty, both as +Christians and ladies and gentlemen, seems to me to be—to +do for her something very different indeed.</p> +<p>But to return. Looking at the amount of great little +heroisms, which are being, as I assert, enacted around us every +day, no one has a right to say, what we are all tempted to say at +times: “How can I be heroic? This is no heroic age, +setting me heroic examples. We are growing more and more +comfortable, frivolous, pleasure-seeking, money-making; more and +more utilitarian; more and more mercenary in our politics, in our +morals, in our religion; thinking less and less of honour and +duty, and more and more of loss and gain. I am born into an +unheroic time. You must not ask me to become heroic in +it.”</p> +<p>I do not deny that it is more difficult to be heroic, while +circumstances are unheroic round us. We are all too apt to +be the puppets of circumstances; all too apt to follow the +fashion; all too apt, like so many minnows, to take our colour +from the ground on which we lie, in hopes, like them, of +comfortable concealment, lest the new tyrant deity, called Public +Opinion, should spy us out, and, like Nebuchadnezzar of old, cast +us into a burning fiery furnace—which public opinion can +make very hot—for daring to worship any god or man save the +will of the temporary majority.</p> +<p>Yes, it is difficult to be anything but poor, mean, +insufficient, imperfect people, as like each other as so many +sheep; and, like so many sheep, having no will or character of +our own, but rushing altogether blindly over the same gap, in +foolish fear of the same dog, who, after all, dare not bite us; +and so it always was and always will be.</p> +<p>For the third time I say,</p> + +<blockquote><p> Unless +above himself he can<br /> +Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>But, nevertheless, any man or woman who <i>will</i>, in any +age and under any circumstances, can live the heroic life and +exercise heroic influences.</p> +<p>If any ask proof of this, I shall ask them, in return, to read +two novels; novels, indeed, but, in their method and their moral, +partaking of that heroic and ideal element, which will make them +live, I trust, long after thousands of mere novels have returned +to their native dust. I mean Miss Muloch’s +“John Halifax, Gentleman,” and Mr. Thackeray’s +“Esmond,” two books which no man or woman ought to +read without being the nobler for them.</p> +<p>“John Halifax, Gentleman,” is simply the history +of a poor young clerk, who rises to be a wealthy mill-owner in +the manufacturing districts, in the early part of this +century. But he contrives to be an heroic and ideal clerk, +and an heroic and ideal mill-owner; and that without doing +anything which the world would call heroic or ideal, or in +anywise stepping out of his sphere, minding simply his own +business, and doing the duty which lies nearest him. And +how? By getting into his head from youth the strangest +notion, that in whatever station or business he may be, he can +always be what he considers a gentleman; and that if he only +behaves like a gentleman, all must go right at last. A +beautiful book. As I said before, somewhat of an heroic and +ideal book. A book which did me good when first I read it; +which ought to do any young man good who will read it, and then +try to be, like John Halifax, a gentleman, whether in the shop, +the counting-house, the bank, or the manufactory.</p> +<p>The other—an even more striking instance of the +possibility, at least, of heroism anywhere and +everywhere—is Mr. Thackeray’s +“Esmond.” On the meaning of that book I can +speak with authority. For my dear and regretted friend told +me himself that my interpretation of it was the true one; that +this was the lesson which he meant men to learn therefrom.</p> +<p>Esmond is a man of the first half of the eighteenth century; +living in a coarse, drunken, ignorant, profligate, and altogether +unheroic age. He is—and here the high art and the +high morality of Mr. Thackeray’s genius is +shown—altogether a man of his own age. He is not a +sixteenth-century or a nineteenth-century man born out of +time. His information, his politics, his religion, are no +higher than of those round him. His manners, his views of +human life, his very prejudices and faults, are those of his +age. The temptations which he conquers are just those under +which the men around him fall. But how does he conquer +them? By holding fast throughout to honour, duty, +virtue. Thus, and thus alone, he becomes an ideal +eighteenth-century gentleman, an eighteenth-century hero. +This was what Mr. Thackeray meant—for he told me so +himself, I say—that it was possible, even in +England’s lowest and foulest times, to be a gentleman and a +hero, if a man would but be true to the light within him.</p> +<p>But I will go farther. I will go from ideal fiction to +actual, and yet ideal, fact; and say that, as I read history, the +most unheroic age which the civilised world ever saw was also the +most heroic; that the spirit of man triumphed most utterly over +his circumstances at the very moment when those circumstances +were most against him.</p> +<p>How and why he did so is a question for philosophy in the +highest sense of that word. The fact of his having done so +is matter of history. Shall I solve my own riddle?</p> +<p>Then, have we not heard of the early Christian martyrs? +Is there a doubt that they, unlettered men, slaves, weak women, +even children, did exhibit, under an infinite sense of duty, +issuing in infinite self-sacrifice, a heroism such as the world +had never seen before; did raise the ideal of human nobleness a +whole stage—rather say, a whole heaven—higher than +before; and that wherever the tale of their great deeds spread, +men accepted, even if they did not copy, those martyrs as ideal +specimens of the human race, till they were actually worshipped +by succeeding generations, wrongly, it may be, but pardonably, as +a choir of lesser deities?</p> +<p>But is there, on the other hand, a doubt that the age in which +they were heroic was the most unheroic of all ages; that they +were bred, lived, and died, under the most debasing of +materialist tyrannies, with art, literature, philosophy, family +and national life dying, or dead around them, and in cities the +corruption of which cannot be told for very shame—cities, +compared with which Paris is the abode of Arcadian simplicity and +innocence? When I read Petronius and Juvenal, and recollect +that they were the contemporaries of the Apostles; when—to +give an instance which scholars, and perhaps, happily, only +scholars, can appreciate—I glance once more at +Trimalchio’s feast, and remember that within a mile of that +feast St. Paul may have been preaching to a Christian +congregation, some of whom—for St. Paul makes no secret of +that strange fact—may have been, ere their conversion, +partakers in just such vulgar and bestial orgies as those which +were going on in the rich freedman’s halls; after that, I +say, I can put no limit to the possibility of man’s +becoming heroic, even though he be surrounded by a hell on earth; +no limit to the capacities of any human being to form for himself +or herself a high and pure ideal of human character; and, without +“playing fantastic tricks before high heaven,” to +carry out that ideal in every-day life; and in the most +commonplace circumstances, and the most menial occupations, to +live worthy of—as I conceive—our heavenly birthright, +and to imitate the heroes, who were the kinsmen of the gods.</p> +<h2><a name="page257"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 257</span>THE +MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS.</h2> +<p style="text-align: center">Speech in behalf of Ladies’ +Sanitary Association. <a name="citation257"></a><a +href="#footnote257" class="citation">[257]</a></p> +<p><span class="smcap">Let</span> me begin by asking the ladies +who are interesting themselves in this good work, whether they +have really considered what they are about to do in carrying out +their own plans? Are they aware that if their Society +really succeeds, they will produce a very serious, some would +think a very dangerous, change in the state of this nation? +Are they aware that they would probably save the lives of some +thirty or forty per cent. of the children who are born in +England, and that therefore they would cause the subjects of +Queen Victoria to increase at a very far more rapid rate than +they do now? And are they aware that some very wise men +inform us that England is already over-peopled, and that it is an +exceedingly puzzling question where we shall soon be able to find +work or food for our masses, so rapidly do they increase already, +in spite of the thirty or forty per cent. which kind Nature +carries off yearly before they are five years old? Have +they considered what they are to do with all those children whom +they are going to save alive? That has to be thought of; +and if they really do believe, with some political economists, +that over-population is a possibility to a country which has the +greatest colonial empire that the world has ever seen; then I +think they had better stop in their course, and let the children +die, as they have been in the habit of dying.</p> +<p>But if, on the other hand, it seems to them, as I confess it +does to me, that the most precious thing in the world is a human +being; that the lowest, and poorest, and the most degraded of +human beings is better than all the dumb animals in the world; +that there is an infinite, priceless capability in that creature, +fallen as it may be; a capability of virtue, and of social and +industrial use, which, if it is taken in time, may be developed +up to a pitch, of which at first sight the child gives no hint +whatsoever; if they believe again, that of all races upon earth +now, the English race is probably the finest, and that it gives +not the slightest sign whatever of exhaustion; that it seems to +be on the whole a young race, and to have very great capabilities +in it which have not yet been developed, and above all, the most +marvellous capability of adapting itself to every sort of climate +and every form of life, which any race, except the old Roman, +ever has had in the world; if they consider with me that it is +worth the while of political economists and social philosophers +to look at the map, and see that about four-fifths of the globe +cannot be said as yet to be in anywise inhabited or cultivated, +or in the state into which men could put it by a fair supply of +population, and industry, and human intellect: then, perhaps, +they may think with me that it is a duty, one of the noblest of +duties, to help the increase of the English race as much as +possible, and to see that every child that is born into this +great nation of England be developed to the highest pitch to +which we can develop him in physical strength and in beauty, as +well as in intellect and in virtue. And then, in that +light, it does seem to me, that this Institution—small now, +but I do hope some day to become great and to become the mother +institution of many and valuable children—is one of the +noblest, most right-minded, straightforward, and practical +conceptions that I have come across for some years.</p> +<p>We all know the difficulties of sanitary legislation. +One looks at them at times almost with despair. I have my +own reasons, with which I will not trouble this meeting, for +looking on them with more despair than ever: not on account of +the government of the time, or any possible government that could +come to England, but on account of the peculiar class of persons +in whom the ownership of the small houses has become more and +more vested, and who are becoming more and more, I had almost +said, the arbiters of the popular opinion, and of every election +of parliament. However, that is no business of ours here; +that must be settled somewhere else; and a fearfully long time, +it seems to me, it will be before it is settled. But, in +the meantime, what legislation cannot do, I believe private help, +and, above all, woman’s help, can do even better. It +can do this; it can improve the condition of the working man: and +not only of him; I must speak also of the middle classes, of the +men who own the house in which the working man lives. I +must speak, too, of the wealthy tradesman; I must speak—it +is a sad thing to have to say it—of our own class as well +as of others. Sanitary reform, as it is called, or, in +plain English, the art of health, is so very recent a discovery, +as all true physical science is, that we ourselves and our own +class know very little about it, and practise it very +little. And this society, I do hope, will bear in mind that +it is not simply to seek the working man, not only to go into the +foul alley: but it is to go to the door of the farmer, to the +door of the shopkeeper, aye, to the door of ladies and gentlemen +of the same rank as ourselves. Women can do in that work +what men cannot do. The private correspondence, private +conversation, private example, of ladies, above all of married +women, of mothers of families, may do what no legislation can +do. I am struck more and more with the amount of disease +and death I see around me in all classes, which no sanitary +legislation whatsoever could touch, unless you had a complete +house-to-house visitation by some government officer, with powers +to enter every dwelling, to drain it, and ventilate it; and not +only that, but to regulate the clothes and the diet of every +inhabitant, and that among all ranks. I can conceive of +nothing short of that, which would be absurd and impossible, and +would also be most harmful morally, which would stop the present +amount of disease and death which I see around me, without some +such private exertion on the part of women, above all of mothers, +as I do hope will spring from this institution more and more.</p> +<p>I see this, that three persons out of every four are utterly +unaware of the general causes of their own ill-health, and of the +ill-health of their children. They talk of their +“afflictions,” and their “misfortunes;” +and, if they be pious people, they talk of “the will of +God,” and of “the visitation of God.” I +do not like to trench upon those matters here; but when I read in +my book and in your book, “that it is not the will of our +Father in Heaven that one of these little ones should +perish,” it has come to my mind sometimes with very great +strength that that may have a physical application as well as a +spiritual one; and that the Father in Heaven who does not wish +the child’s soul to die, may possibly have created that +child’s body for the purpose of its not dying except in a +good old age. For not only in the lower class, but in the +middle and upper classes, when one sees an unhealthy family, then +in three cases out of four, if one will take time, trouble, and +care enough, one can, with the help of the doctor, who has been +attending them, run the evil home to a very different cause than +the will of God; and that is, to stupid neglect, stupid +ignorance, or what is just as bad, stupid indulgence.</p> +<p>Now, I do believe that if those tracts which you are +publishing, which I have read and of which I cannot speak too +highly, are spread over the length and breadth of the land, and +if women—clergymen’s wives, the wives of +manufacturers and of great employers, district visitors and +schoolmistresses, have these books put into their hands, and are +persuaded to spread them, and to enforce them, by their own +example and by their own counsel—that then, in the course +of a few years, this system being thoroughly carried out, you +would see a sensible and large increase in the rate of +population. When you have saved your children alive, then +you must settle what to do with them. But a living dog is +better than a dead lion; I would rather have the living child, +and let it take its chance, than let it return to +God—wasted. O! it is a distressing thing to see +children die. God gives the most beautiful and precious +thing that earth can have, and we just take it and cast it away; +we toss our pearls upon the dunghill and leave them. A +dying child is to me one of the most dreadful sights in the +world. A dying man, a man dying on the field of +battle—that is a small sight; he has taken his chance; he +is doing his duty; he has had his excitement; he has had his +glory, if that will be any consolation to him; if he is a wise +man, he has the feeling that he is dying for his country and his +queen: and that is, and ought to be, enough for him. I am +not horrified or shocked at the sight of the man who dies on the +field of battle; let him die so. It does not horrify or +shock me, again, to see a man dying in a good old age, even +though the last struggle be painful, as it too often is. +But it does shock me, it does make me feel that the world is +indeed out of joint, to see a child die. I believe it to be +a priceless boon to the child to have lived for a week, or a day: +but oh, what has God given to this thankless earth, and what has +the earth thrown away; and in nine cases out of ten, from its own +neglect and carelessness! What that boy might have been, +what he might have done as an Englishman, if he could have lived +and grown up healthy and strong! And I entreat you to bear +this in mind, that it is not as if our lower or our middle +classes were not worth saving: bear in mind that the physical +beauty, strength, intellectual power of the middle +classes—the shopkeeping class, the farming class, down to +the lowest working class—whenever you give them a fair +chance, whenever you give them fair food and air, and physical +education of any kind, prove them to be the finest race in +Europe. Not merely the aristocracy, splendid race as they +are, but down and down and down to the lowest labouring man, to +the navigator—why, there is not such a body of men in +Europe as our navigators; and no body of men perhaps have had a +worse chance of growing to be what they are; and yet see what +they have done! See the magnificent men they become, in +spite of all that is against them, dragging them down, tending to +give them rickets and consumption, and all the miserable diseases +which children contract; see what men they are, and then conceive +what they might be! It has been said, again and again, that +there are no more beautiful race of women in Europe than the +wives and daughters of our London shopkeepers; and yet there are +few races of people who lead a life more in opposition to all +rules of hygiene. But, in spite of all that, so wonderful +is the vitality of the English race, they are what they are; and +therefore we have the finest material to work upon that people +ever had. And, therefore, again, we have the less excuse if +we do allow English people to grow up puny, stunted, and +diseased.</p> +<p>Let me refer again to that word that I used; death—the +amount of death. I really believe there are hundreds of +good and kind people who would take up this subject with their +whole heart and soul if they were aware of the magnitude of the +evil. Lord Shaftesbury told you just now that there were +one hundred thousand preventable deaths in England every +year. So it is. We talk of the loss of human life in +war. We are the fools of smoke and noise; because there are +cannon-balls, forsooth, and swords and red coats; and because it +costs a great deal of money, and makes a great deal of talk in +the papers, we think: What so terrible as war? I will tell +you what is ten times, and ten thousand times, more terrible than +war, and that is outraged Nature. War, we are discovering +now, is the clumsiest and most expensive of all games; we are +finding that if you wish to commit an act of cruelty and folly, +the most costly one that you can commit is to contrive to shoot +your fellow-men in war. So it is; and thank God that so it +is; but Nature, insidious, inexpensive, silent, sends no roar of +cannon, no glitter of arms to do her work; she gives no warning +note of preparation; she has no protocols, nor any diplomatic +advances, whereby she warns her enemy that war is coming. +Silently, I say, and insidiously she goes forth; no! she does not +even go forth; she does not step out of her path; but quietly, by +the very same means by which she makes alive, she puts to death; +and so avenges herself of those who have rebelled against +her. By the very same laws by which every blade of grass +grows, and every insect springs to life in the sunbeam, she +kills, and kills, and kills, and is never tired of killing; till +she has taught man the terrible lesson he is so slow to learn, +that, Nature is only conquered by obeying her.</p> +<p>And bear in mind one thing more. Man has his courtesies +of war, and his chivalries of war; he does not strike the unarmed +man; he spares the woman and the child. But Nature is as +fierce when she is offended, as she is bounteous and kind when +she is obeyed. She spares neither woman nor child. +She has no pity; for some awful, but most good reason, she is not +allowed to have any pity. Silently she strikes the sleeping +babe, with as little remorse as she would strike the strong man, +with the spade or the musket in his hand. Ah! would to God +that some man had the pictorial eloquence to put before the +mothers of England the mass of preventable suffering, the mass of +preventable agony of mind and body, which exists in England year +after year; and would that some man had the logical eloquence to +make them understand that it is in their power, in the power of +the mothers and wives of the higher class, I will not say to stop +it all—God only knows that—but to stop, as I believe, +three-fourths of it.</p> +<p>It is in the power, I believe, of any woman in this room to +save three or four lives—human lives—during the next +six months. It is in your power, ladies; and it is so +easy. You might save several lives apiece, if you choose, +without, I believe, interfering with your daily business, or with +your daily pleasure; or, if you choose, with your daily +frivolities, in any way whatsoever. Let me ask, then, those +who are here, and who have not yet laid these things to heart: +Will you let this meeting to-day be a mere passing matter of two +or three hours’ interest, which you may go away and forget +for the next book or the next amusement? Or will you be in +earnest? Will you learn—I say it openly—from +the noble chairman, how easy it is to be in earnest in life; how +every one of you, amid all the artificial complications of +English society in the nineteenth century, can find a work to do, +a noble work to do, a chivalrous work to do—just as +chivalrous as if you lived in any old magic land, such as Spenser +talked of in his “Faërie Queene;” how you can be +as true a knight-errant or lady-errant in the present century, as +if you had lived far away in the dark ages of violence and +rapine? Will you, I ask, learn this? Will you learn +to be in earnest; and to use the position, and the station, and +the talent that God has given you to save alive those who should +live? And will you remember that it is not the will of your +Father that is in Heaven that one little one that plays in the +kennel outside should perish, either in body or in soul?</p> +<h2><a name="page271"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +271</span>“A MAD WORLD, MY MASTERS.” <a +name="citation271"></a><a href="#footnote271" +class="citation">[271]</a></h2> +<p><span class="smcap">The</span> cholera, as was to be expected, +has reappeared in England again; and England, as was to be +expected, has taken no sufficient steps towards meeting it; so +that if, as seems but too probable, the plague should spread next +summer, we may count with tolerable certainty upon a loss of some +ten thousand lives.</p> +<p>That ten thousand, or one thousand, innocent people should +die, of whom most, if not all, might be saved alive, would seem +at first sight a matter serious enough for the attention of +“philanthropists.” Those who abhor the practice +of hanging one man would, one fancies, abhor equally that of +poisoning many; and would protest as earnestly against the +painful capital punishment of diarrhoea as against the painless +one of hempen rope. Those who demand mercy for the Sepoy, +and immunity for the Coolie women of Delhi, unsexed by their own +brutal and shameless cruelty, would, one fancies, demand mercy +also for the British workman, and immunity for his wife and +family. One is therefore somewhat startled at finding that +the British nation reserves to itself, though it forbids to its +armies, the right of putting to death unarmed and unoffending +men, women, and children.</p> +<p>After further consideration, however, one finds that there +are, as usual, two sides to the question. One is bound, +indeed, to believe, even before proof, that there are two +sides. It cannot be without good and sufficient reason that +the British public remains all but indifferent to sanitary +reform; that though the science of epidemics, as a science, has +been before the world for more than twenty years, nobody believes +in it enough to act upon it, save some few dozen of fanatics, +some of whom have (it cannot be denied) a direct pecuniary +interest in disturbing what they choose to term the +poison-manufactories of free and independent Britons.</p> +<p>Yes; we should surely respect the expressed will and +conviction of the most practical of nations, arrived at after the +experience of three choleras, stretching over a whole +generation. Public opinion has declared against the +necessity of sanitary reform: and is not public opinion known to +be, in these last days, the Ithuriel’s spear which is to +unmask and destroy all the follies, superstitions, and cruelties +of the universe? The immense majority of the British nation +will neither cleanse themselves nor let others cleanse them: and +are we not governed by majorities? Are not majorities, +confessedly, always in the right, even when smallest, and a show +of hands a surer test of truth than any amount of wisdom, +learning, or virtue? How much more, then, when a whole free +people is arrayed, in the calm magnificence of self-confident +conservatism, against a few innovating and perhaps sceptical +philosophasters? Then surely, if ever, vox populi is vox +coeli.</p> +<p>And, in fact, when we come to examine the first and commonest +objection against sanitary reformers, we find it perfectly +correct. They are said to be theorists, dreamers of the +study, who are ignorant of human nature; and who in their +materialist optimism, have forgotten the existence of moral evil +till they almost fancy at times that they can set the world right +simply by righting its lowest material arrangements. The +complaint is perfectly true. They have been ignorant of +human nature; they have forgotten the existence of moral evil; +and if any religious periodical should complain of their denying +original sin, they can only answer that they did in past years +fall into that folly, but that subsequent experience has utterly +convinced them of the truth of the doctrine.</p> +<p>For, misled by this ignorance of human nature, they expected +help, from time to time, from various classes of the community, +from whom no help (as they ought to have known at first) is to be +gotten. Some, as a fact, expected the assistance of the +clergy, and especially of the preachers of those denominations +who believe that every human being, by the mere fact of his birth +into this world, is destined to endless torture after death, +unless the preacher can find an opportunity to deliver him +therefrom before he dies. They supposed that to such +preachers the mortal lives of men would be inexpressibly +precious; that any science which held out a prospect of retarding +death in the case of “lost millions” would be hailed +as a heavenly boon, and would be carried out with the fervour of +men who felt that for the soul’s sake no exertion was too +great in behalf of the body.</p> +<p>A little more reflection would have quashed their vain +hope. They would have recollected that each of these +preachers was already connected with a congregation; that he had +already a hold on them, and they on him; that he was bound to +provide for their spiritual wants before going forth to seek for +fresh objects of his ministry. They would have recollected +that on the old principle (and a very sound one) of a bird in the +hand being worth two in the bush, the minister of a congregation +would feel it his duty, as well as his interest, not to defraud +his flock of his labours by spending valuable time on a secular +subject like sanitary reform, in the hope of possibly preserving +a few human beings, whose souls he might hereafter (and that +again would be merely a possibility) benefit.</p> +<p>They would have recollected, again, that these congregations +are almost exclusively composed of those classes who have little +or nothing to fear from epidemics, and (what is even more +important) who would have to bear the expenses of sanitary +improvements. But so sanguine, so reckless of human +conditions had their theories made them, that they actually +expected that parish rectors, already burdened with over-work and +vestry quarrels—nay, even that preachers who got their +bread by pew-rents, and whose life-long struggle was, therefore, +to keep those pews filled, and those renters in good +humour—should astound the respectable house-owners and +ratepayers who sat beneath them by the appalling words: +“You, and not the ‘Visitation of God,’ are the +cause of epidemics; and of you, now that you are once fairly +warned of your responsibility, will your brothers’ blood be +required.” Conceive Sanitary Reformers expecting this +of “ministers,” let their denomination be what it +might—many of the poor men, too, with a wife and seven +children! Truly has it been said, that nothing is so cruel +as the unreasonableness of a fanatic.</p> +<p>They forgot, too, that sanitary science, like geology, must be +at first sight “suspect” in the eyes of the priests +of all denominations, at least till they shall have arrived at a +much higher degree of culture than they now possess.</p> +<p>Like geology, it interferes with that Deus e machinâ +theory of human affairs which has been in all ages the stronghold +of priestcraft. That the Deity is normally absent, and not +present; that he works on the world by interference, and not by +continuous laws; that it is the privilege of the priesthood to +assign causes for these “judgments” and +“visitations” of the Almighty, and to tell mankind +why He is angry with them, and has broken the laws of nature to +punish them—this, in every age, has seemed to the majority +of priests a doctrine to be defended at all hazards; for without +it, so they hold, their occupation were gone at once. <a +name="citation276"></a><a href="#footnote276" +class="citation">[276]</a> No wonder, then, if they view +with jealousy a set of laymen attributing these +“judgments” to purely chemical laws, and to misdoings +and ignorance which have as yet no place in the ecclesiastical +catalogue of sins. True, it may be that the Sanitary +Reformers are right; but they had rather not think so. And +it is very easy not to think so. They only have to ignore, +to avoid examining, the facts. Their canon of utility is a +peculiar one; and with facts which do not come under that canon +they have no concern. It may be true, for instance, that +the eighteenth century, which to the clergy is a period of +scepticism, darkness, and spiritual death, is the very century +which saw more done for science, for civilisation, for +agriculture, for manufacture, for the prolongation and support of +human life than any preceding one for a thousand years and +more. What matter? That is a “secular” +question, of which they need know nothing. And sanitary +reform (if true) is just such another; a matter (as slavery has +been seen to be by the preachers of the United States) for the +legislator, and not for those whose kingdom is “not of this +world.”</p> +<p>Others again expected, with equal wisdom, the assistance of +the political economist. The fact is undeniable, but at the +same time inexplicable. What they could have found in the +doctrines of most modern political economists which should lead +them to suppose that human life would be precious in their eyes, +is unknown to the writer of these pages. Those whose +bugbear has been over-population, whose motto has been an +euphuistic version of</p> +<blockquote><p>The more the merrier; but the fewer the better +fare—</p> +</blockquote> +<p>cannot be expected to lend their aid in increasing the +population by saving the lives of two-thirds of the children who +now die prematurely in our great cities; and so still further +overcrowding this unhappy land with those helpless and expensive +sources of national poverty—rational human beings, in +strength and health.</p> +<p>Moreover—and this point is worthy of serious +attention—that school of political economy, which has now +reached its full development, has taken all along a view of +man’s relation to Nature diametrically opposite to that +taken by the Sanitary Reformer, or indeed by any other men of +science. The Sanitary Reformer holds, in common with the +chemist or the engineer, that Nature is to be obeyed only in +order to conquer her; that man is to discover the laws of her +existing phenomena, in order that he may employ them to create +new phenomena himself; to turn the laws which he discovers to his +own use; if need be, to counteract one by another. In this +power, it has seemed to them, lay his dignity as a rational +being. It was this, the power of invention, which made him +a progressive animal, not bound as the bird and the bee are, to +build exactly as his forefathers built five thousand years +ago.</p> +<p>By political economy alone has this faculty been denied to +man. In it alone he is not to conquer nature, but simply to +obey her. Let her starve him, make him a slave, a bankrupt, +or what not, he must submit, as the savage does to the hail and +the lightning. “Laissez-faire,” says the +“Science du néant,” the “Science de la +misère,” as it has truly and bitterly been called; +“Laissez-faire.” Analyse economic questions if +you will: but beyond analysis you shall not step. Any +attempt to raise political economy to its synthetic stage is to +break the laws of nature, to fight against facts—as if +facts were not made to be fought against and conquered, and put +out of the way, whensoever they interfere in the least with the +welfare of any human being. The drowning man is not to +strike out for his life lest by keeping his head above water he +interfere with the laws of gravitation. Not that the +political economist, or any man, can be true to his own +fallacy. He must needs try his hand at the synthetic method +though he forbids it to the rest of the world: but the only +deductive hint which he has as yet given to mankind is, quaintly +enough, the most unnatural “eidolon specûs” +which ever entered the head of a dehumanised pedant—namely, +that once famous “Preventive Check,” which, if a +nation did ever apply it—as it never will—could +issue, as every doctor knows, in nothing less than the +questionable habits of abortion, child-murder, and unnatural +crime.</p> +<p>The only explanation of such conduct (though one which the men +themselves will hardly accept) is this—that they secretly +share somewhat in the doubt which many educated men have of the +correctness of their inductions; that these same laws of +political economy (where they leave the plain and safe +subject-matter of trade) have been arrived at somewhat too +hastily; that they are, in plain English, not quite sound enough +yet to build upon; and that we must wait for a few more facts +before we begin any theories. Be it so. At least, +these men, in their present temper of mind, are not likely to be +very useful to the Sanitary Reformer.</p> +<p>Would that these men, or the clergy, had been the only bruised +reed in which the Sanitary Reformers put their trust. They +found another reed, however, and that was Public Opinion; but +they forgot that (whatever the stump-orators may say about this +being the age of electric thought, when truth flashes triumphant +from pole to pole, etc.) we have no proof whatsoever that the +proportion of fools is less in this generation than in those +before it, or that truth, when unpalatable (as it almost always +is), travels any faster than it did five hundred years ago. +They forgot that every social improvement, and most mechanical +ones, have had to make their way against laziness, ignorance, +envy, vested wrongs, vested superstitions, and the whole vis +inertiæ of the world, the flesh, and the devil. They +were guilty indeed, in this case, not merely of ignorance of +human nature, but of forgetfulness of fact. Did they not +know that the excellent New Poor-law was greeted with the curses +of those very farmers and squires who now not only carry it out +lovingly and willingly to the very letter, but are often too +ready to resist any improvement or relaxation in it which may be +proposed by that very Poor-law Board from which it +emanated? Did they not know that Agricultural Science, +though of sixty years’ steady growth, has not yet +penetrated into a third of the farms of England; and that +hundreds of farmers still dawdle on after the fashion of their +forefathers, when by looking over the next hedge into their +neighbour’s field they might double their produce and their +profits? Did they not know that the adaptation of steam to +machinery would have progressed just as slowly, had it not been a +fact patent to babies that an engine is stronger than a horse; +and that if cotton, like wheat and beef, had taken twelve months +to manufacture, instead of five minutes, Manchester foresight +would probably have been as short and as purblind as that of the +British farmer? What right had they to expect a better +reception for the facts of Sanitary Science?—facts which +ought to, and ultimately will, disturb the vested interests of +thousands, will put them to inconvenience, possibly at first to +great expense; and yet facts which you can neither see nor +handle, but must accept and pay hundreds of thousands of pounds +for, on the mere word of a doctor or inspector who gets his +living thereby. Poor John Bull! To expect that you +would accept such a gospel cheerfully was indeed to expect too +much!</p> +<p>But yet, though the public opinion of the mass could not be +depended on, there was a body left, distinct from the mass, and +priding itself so much on that distinctness that it was ready to +say at times—of course in more courteous—at least in +what it considered more Scriptural language: “This people +which knoweth not the law is accursed.” To it +therefore—to the religious world—some over-sanguine +Sanitary Reformers turned their eyes. They saw in it ready +organised (so it professed) for all good works, a body such as +the world had never seen before. Where the religions public +of Byzantium, Alexandria, or Rome numbered hundreds, that of +England numbered its thousands. It was divided, indeed, on +minor points, but it was surely united by the one aim of saving +every man his own soul, and of professing the deepest reverence +for that Divine Book which tells men that the way to attain that +aim is, to be good and to do good; and which contains among other +commandments this one—“Thou shaft not +kill.” Its wealth was enormous. It possessed so +much political power, that it would have been able to command +elections, to compel ministers, to encourage the weak hearts of +willing but fearful clergymen by fair hopes of deaneries and +bishoprics. Its members were no clique of unpractical +fanatics—no men less. Though it might number among +them a few martinet ex-post-captains, and noblemen of +questionable sanity, capable of no more practical study than that +of unfulfilled prophecy, the vast majority of them were +landowners, merchants, bankers, commercial men of all ranks, full +of worldly experience, and of the science of organisation, +skilled all their lives in finding and in employing men and +money. What might not be hoped from such a body, to whom +that commercial imperium in imperio of the French Protestants +which the edict of Nantes destroyed was poor and weak? Add +to this that these men’s charities were boundless; that +they were spending yearly, and on the whole spending wisely and +well, ten times as much as ever was spent before in the world, on +educational schemes, missionary schemes, church building, +reformatories, ragged schools, needlewomen’s +charities—what not? No object of distress, it seemed, +could be discovered, no fresh means of doing good devised, but +these men’s money poured bountifully and at once into that +fresh channel, and an organisation sprang up for the employment +of that money, as thrifty and as handy as was to be expected from +the money-holding classes of this great commercial nation.</p> +<p>What could not these men do? What were they not bound by +their own principles to do? No wonder that some weak +men’s hearts beat high at the thought. What if the +religious world should take up the cause of Sanitary +Reform? What if they should hail with joy a cause in which +all, whatever their theological differences, might join in one +sacred crusade against dirt, degradation, disease, and +death? What if they should rise at the hustings to inquire +of every candidate: “Will you or will you not, pledge +yourself to carry out Sanitary Reform in the place for which you +are elected, and let the health and the lives of the local poor +be that ‘local interest’ which you are bound by your +election to defend? Do you confess your ignorance of the +subject? Then know, sir, that you are unfit, at this point +of the nineteenth century, to be a member of the British +Senate. You go thither to make laws ‘for the +preservation of life and property.’ You confess +yourself ignorant of those physical laws, stronger and wider than +any which you can make, upon which all human life depends, by +infringing which the whole property of a district is +depreciated.” Again, what might not the +“religious world,” and the public opinion of +“professing Christians,” have done in the last +twenty—ay, in the last three years?</p> +<p>What it has done, is too patent to need comment here.</p> +<p>The reasons of so strange an anomaly are to be approached with +caution. It is a serious thing to impute motives to a vast +body of men, of whom the majority are really respectable, +kind-hearted, and useful; and if in giving one’s deliberate +opinion one seems to blame them, let it be recollected that the +blame lies not so much on them as on their teachers: on those +who, for some reasons best known to themselves, have truckled to, +and even justified, the self-satisfied ignorance of a comfortable +moneyed class.</p> +<p>But let it be said, and said boldly, that these men’s +conduct in the matter of Sanitary Reform seems at least to show +that they value virtue, not for itself, but for its future +rewards. To the great majority of these men (with some +heroic exceptions, whose names may be written in no subscription +list, but are surely written in the book of life) the great truth +has never been revealed, that good is the one thing to be done, +at all risks, for its own sake; that good is absolutely and +infinitely better than evil, whether it pay or not to all +eternity. Ask one of them: “Is it better to do right +and go to hell, or do wrong and go to heaven?”—they +will look at you puzzled, half angry, suspecting you of some +secret blasphemy, and, if hard pressed, put off the new and +startling question by saying, that it is absurd to talk of an +impossible hypothesis. The human portion of their virtue is +not mercenary, for they are mostly worthy men; the religious part +thereof, that which they keep for Sundays and for charitable +institutions, is too often mercenary, though they know it +not. Their religion is too often one of “Loss and +Gain,” as much as Father Newman’s own; and their +actions, whether they shall call them “good works” or +“fruits of faith,” are so much spiritual capital, to +be repaid with interest at the last day.</p> +<p>Therefore, like all religionists, they are most anxious for +those schemes of good which seem most profitable to themselves +and to the denomination to which they belong; and the best of all +such works is, of course, as with all religionists, the making of +proselytes. They really care for the bodies, but still they +care more for the souls, of those whom they assist—and not +wrongly either, were it not that to care for a man’s soul +usually means, in the religious world, to make him think with +you; at least to lay him under such obligations as to give you +spiritual power over him. Therefore it is that all +religious charities in England are more and more conducted, just +as much as those of Jesuits and Oratorians, with an ulterior view +of proselytism; therefore it is that the religious world, though +it has invented, perhaps, no new method of doing good; though it +has been indebted for educational movements, prison visitations, +infant schools, ragged schools, and so forth, to Quakers, +cobblers, even in some cases to men whom they call infidels, have +gladly adopted each and every one of them, as fresh means of +enlarging the influence or the numbers of their own +denominations, and of baiting for the body in order to catch the +soul. A fair sample of too much of their labour may be seen +anywhere, in those tracts in which the prettiest stories, with +the prettiest binding and pictures, on the most +secular—even, sometimes, scientific—of subjects, end +by a few words of pious exhortation, inserted by a different hand +from that which indites the “carnal” mass of the +book. They did not invent the science, or the art of +story-telling, or the woodcutting, or the plan of getting books +up prettily—or, indeed, the notion of instructing the +masses at all; but finding these things in the hands of +“the world,” they have “spoiled the +Egyptians,” and fancy themselves beating Satan with his own +weapons.</p> +<p>If, indeed, these men claimed boldly all printing, all +woodcutting, all story-telling, all human arts and sciences, as +gifts from God Himself; and said, as the book which they quote so +often says: “The Spirit of God gives man understanding, +these, too, are His gifts, sacred, miraculous, to be accounted +for to Him,” then they would be consistent; and then, too, +they would have learnt, perhaps, to claim Sanitary Science for a +gift divine as any other: but nothing, alas! is as yet further +from their creed. And therefore it is that Sanitary Reform +finds so little favour in their eyes. You have so little in +it to show for your work. You may think you have saved the +lives of hundreds; but you cannot put your finger on one of them: +and they know you not; know not even their own danger, much less +your beneficence. Therefore, you have no lien on them, not +even that of gratitude; you cannot say to a man: “I have +prevented you having typhus, therefore you must attend my +chapel.” No! Sanitary Reform makes no +proselytes. It cannot be used as a religious engine. +It is too simply human, too little a respecter of persons, too +like to the works of Him who causes His sun to shine on the evil +and the good, and His rain to fall on the just and on the unjust, +and is good to the unthankful and to the evil, to find much +favour in the eyes of a generation which will compass sea and +land to make one proselyte.</p> +<p>Yes. Too like the works of our Father in heaven, as +indeed all truly natural and human science needs must be. +True, to those who believe that there is a Father in heaven, this +would, one supposes, be the highest recommendation. But how +many of this generation believe that? Is not their +doctrine, the doctrine to testify for which the religious world +exists, the doctrine which if you deny, you are met with one +universal frown and snarl—that man has no Father in heaven: +but that if he becomes a member of the religious world, by +processes varying with each denomination, he may—strange +paradox—create a Father for himself?</p> +<p>But so it is. The religious world has lost the belief +which even the elder Greeks and Romans had, of a “Zeus, +Father of gods and men.” Even that it has lost. +Therefore have man and the simple human needs of man, no +sacredness in their eyes; therefore is Nature to them no longer +“the will of God exprest in facts,” and to break a +law of nature no longer to sin against Him who “looked on +all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.” +And yet they read their Bibles, and believe that they believe in +Him who stood by the lake-side in Galilee, and told men that not +a sparrow fell to the ground without their Father’s +knowledge—and that they were of more value than many +sparrows. Do those words now seem to some so self-evident +as to be needless? They will never seem so to the Sanitary +Reformer, who has called on the “British Public” to +exert themselves in saving the lives of thousands yearly; and has +received practical answers which will furnish many a bitter jest +for the Voltaire of the next so-called “age of +unbelief,” or fill a sad, but an instructive chapter in +some future enlarged edition of Adelung’s “History of +Human Folly.”</p> +<p>All but despairing, Sanitary Reformers have turned again and +again to her Majesty’s Government. Alas for +them! The Government was ready and willing enough to +help. The wicked world said: “Of course. It +will create a new department. It will give them more places +to bestow.” But the real reason of the willingness of +Government seems to be that those who compose it are thoroughly +awake to the importance of the subject.</p> +<p>But what can a poor Government do, whose strength consists (as +that of all English Governments must) in not seeming too strong; +which is allowed to do anything, only on condition of doing the +minimum? Of course, a Government is morally bound to keep +itself in existence; for is it not bound to believe that it can +govern the country better than any other knot of men? But +its only chance of self-preservation is to know, with +Hesiod’s wise man, “how much better the half is than +the whole,” and to throw over many a measure which it would +like to carry, for the sake of saving the few which it can +carry.</p> +<p>An English Government, nowadays, is simply at the mercy of the +forty or fifty members of the House of Commons who are crotchety +enough or dishonest enough to put it unexpectedly in a minority; +and they, with the vast majority of the House, are becoming more +and more the delegates of that very class which is most opposed +to Sanitary Reform. The honourable member goes to +Parliament not to express his opinions, (for he has stated most +distinctly at the last election that he has no opinions +whatsoever), but to protect the local interests of his +constituents. And the great majority of those constituents +are small houseowners—the poorer portion of the middle +class. Were he to support Government in anything like a +sweeping measure of Sanitary Reform, woe to his seat at the next +election; and he knows it; and therefore, even if he allow the +Government to have its Central Board of Health, he will take good +care, for his own sake, that the said Board shall not do too +much, and that it shall not compel his constituents to do +anything at all.</p> +<p>No wonder, that while the attitude of the House of Commons is +such toward a matter which involves the lives of thousands +yearly, some educated men should be crying that Representative +institutions are on their trial, and should sigh for a strong +despotism.</p> +<p>There is an answer, nevertheless, to such sentimentalists, and +one hopes that people will see the answer for themselves, and +that the infection of Imperialism, which seems spreading somewhat +rapidly, will be stopped by common sense and honest observation +of facts.</p> +<p>A despotism doubtless could carry out Sanitary Reform: but +doubtless, also, it would not.</p> +<p>A despot in the nineteenth century knows well how insecure his +tenure is. His motto must be, “Let us eat and drink, +for to-morrow we die;” and, therefore, the first objects of +his rule will be, private luxury and a standing army; while if he +engage in public works, for the sake of keeping the populace +quiet, they will be certain not to be such as will embroil him +with the middle classes, while they will win him no additional +favour with the masses, utterly unaware of their necessity. +Would the masses of Paris have thanked Louis Napoleon the more +if, instead of completing the Tuileries, he had sewered the St. +Antoine? All arguments to the contrary are utterly +fallacious, which are drawn from ancient despotisms, Roman, +Eastern, Peruvian, or other; and for this simple reason, that +they had no middle class. If they did work well (which is a +question) it was just because they had no middle class—that +class, which in a free State is the very life of a nation, and +yet which, in a despotism, is sure to be the root of its +rottenness. For a despot who finds, as Louis Napoleon has +done, a strong middle class already existing, must treat it as he +does; he must truckle to it, pander to its basest propensities, +seem to make himself its tool, in order that he may make it +his. For the sake of his own life, he must do it; and were +a despot to govern England to-morrow, we should see that the man +who was shrewd enough to have climbed to that bad eminence, would +be shrewd enough to know that he could scarcely commit a more +suicidal act than, by some despotic measure of Sanitary Reform, +to excite the ill-will of all the most covetous, the most stupid, +and the most stubborn men in every town of England.</p> +<p>There is another answer, too, to “Imperialists” +who talk of Representative institutions being on their trial, and +let it be made boldly just now.</p> +<p>It will be time to talk of Representative institutions being +good or bad, when the people of England are properly +represented.</p> +<p>In the first place, it does seem only fair that the class who +suffer most from epidemics should have some little share in the +appointment of the men on whose votes extermination of epidemics +now mainly depends. But that is too large a question to +argue here. Let the Government see to it in the coming +session.</p> +<p>Yet how much soever, or how little soever, the suffrage be +extended in the direction of the working man, let it be extended, +at least in some equal degree, in the direction of the educated +man. Few bodies in England now express the opinions of +educated men less than does the present House of Commons. +It is not chosen by educated men, any more than it is by +<i>prolétaires</i>. It is not, on an average, +composed of educated men; and the many educated men who are in it +have, for the most part, to keep their knowledge very much to +themselves, for fear of hurting the feelings of “ten-pound +Jack,” or of the local attorney who looks after +Jack’s vote. And therefore the House of Commons does +not represent public opinion.</p> +<p>For, to enounce with fitting clearness a great but +much-forgotten truth, To have an opinion, you must have an +opinion.</p> +<p>Strange: but true, and pregnant too. For, from it may be +deduced this corollary, that nine-tenths of what is called Public +Opinion is no opinion at all; for, on the matters which come +under the cognizance of the House of Commons (save where +superstition, as in the case of the Sabbath, or the Jew Bill, +sets folks thinking—generally on the wrong side), nine +people out of ten have no opinion at all; know nothing about the +matter, and care less; wherefore, having no opinions to be +represented, it is not important whether that nothing be +represented or not.</p> +<p>The true public opinion of England is composed of the opinions +of the shrewd, honest, practical men in her, whether educated or +not; and of such, thank God, there are millions: but it consists +also of the opinions of the educated men in her; men who have had +leisure and opportunity for study; who have some chance of +knowing the future, because they have examined the past; who can +compare England with other nations; English creeds, laws, +customs, with those of the rest of mankind;—who know +somewhat of humanity, human progress, human existence; who have +been practised in the processes of thought; and who, from study, +have formed definite opinions, differing doubtless in infinite +variety, but still all founded upon facts, by something like fair +and scientific induction.</p> +<p>Till we have this class of men fairly represented in the House +of Commons, there is little hope for Sanitary Reform: when it is +so represented, we shall have no reason to talk of Representative +institutions being on their trial.</p> +<p>And it is one of the few hopeful features of the present time, +that an attempt is at last being made to secure for educated men +of all professions a fair territorial representation. A +memorial to the Government has been presented, appended to which, +in very great numbers, are the names of men of note, of all +ranks, all shades in politics and religion, all +professions—legal, clerical, military, medical, and +literary. A list of names representing so much intellect, +so much learning, so much acknowledged moderation, so much good +work already done and acknowledged by the country, has never, +perhaps, been collected for any political purpose; and if their +scheme (the details of which are not yet made public) should in +anywise succeed, it will do more for the prospects of Sanitary +Reform than any forward movement of the quarter of a century.</p> +<p>For if Sanitary Reform, or perhaps any really progressive +measure, is to be carried out henceforth, we must go back to +something like the old principle of the English constitution, by +which intellect, as such, had its proper share in the public +councils. During those middle ages when all the intellect +and learning was practically possessed by the clergy, they +constituted a separate estate of the realm. This was the +old plan—the best which could be then devised. After +learning became common to the laity, the educated classes were +represented more and more only by such clever young men as could +be thrust into Parliament by the private patronage of the +aristocracy. Since the last Reform Bill, even that supply +of talent has been cut off; and the consequence has been, the +steady deterioration of our House of Commons toward such a level +of mediocrity as shall satisfy the ignorance of the practically +electing majority, namely, the tail of the middle class; men who +are apt to possess all the failings with few of the virtues of +those above them and below them; who have no more intellectual +training than the simple working man, and far less than the +average shopman, and who yet lose, under the influence of a small +competence, that practical training which gives to the working +man, made strong by wholesome necessity, chivalry, endurance, +courage, and self-restraint; whose business morality is made up +of the lowest and narrowest maxims of the commercial world, +unbalanced by that public spirit, that political knowledge, that +practical energy, that respect for the good opinion of his +fellows, which elevate the large employer. On the hustings, +of course, this description of the average free and independent +elector would be called a calumny; and yet, where is the member +of Parliament who will not, in his study, assent to its truth, +and confess, that of all men whom he meets, those who least +command his respect are those among his constituents to secure +whom he takes most trouble; unless, indeed, it be the +pettifoggers who manage his election for him?</p> +<p>Whether this is the class to whose public opinion the health +and lives of the masses are to be entrusted, is a question which +should be settled as soon as possible.</p> +<p>Meanwhile let every man who would awake to the importance of +Sanitary questions, do his best to teach and preach, in season +and out of season, and to instruct, as far as he can, that public +opinion which is as yet but public ignorance. Let him +throw, for instance, what weight he has into the “National +Association for the Advancement of Social Science.” +In it he will learn, as well as teach, not only on Sanitary +Reforms, but upon those cognate questions which must be +considered with it, if it is ever to be carried out.</p> +<p>Indeed, this new “National Association” seems the +most hopeful and practical move yet made by the +sanitarists. It may be laughed at somewhat at first, as the +British Association was; but the world will find after a while +that, like the British Association, it can do great things +towards moulding public opinion, and compel men to consider +certain subjects, simply by accustoming people to hear them +mentioned. The Association will not have existed in vain, +if it only removes that dull fear and suspicion with which +Englishmen are apt to regard a new subject, simply because it is +new. But the Association will do far more than that. +It has wisely not confined itself to any one branch of Social +Science, but taken the subject in all its complexity. To do +otherwise would have been to cripple itself. It would have +shut out many subjects—Law Reform, for instance—which +are necessary adjuncts to any Sanitary scheme; while it would +have shut out that very large class of benevolent people who have +as yet been devoting their energies to prisons, workhouses, and +schools. Such will now have an opportunity of learning that +they have been treating the symptoms of social disease rather +than the disease itself. They will see that vice is rather +the effect than the cause of physical misery, and that the surest +mode of attacking it is to improve the physical conditions of the +lower classes; to abolish foul air, fouled water, foul lodging, +and overcrowded dwellings, in which morality is difficult, and +common decency impossible. They will not give +up—Heaven forbid that they should give up!—their +special good works; but they will surely throw the weight of +their names, their talents, their earnestness, into the great +central object of preserving human life, as soon as they shall +have recognised that prevention is better than cure; and that the +simple and one method of prevention is, to give the working man +his rights. Water, air, light. A right to these three +at least he has. In demanding them, he demands no more than +God gives freely to the wild beast of the forest. Till +society has given him them, it does him an injustice in demanding +of him that he should be a useful member of society. If he +is expected to be a man, let him at least be put on a level with +the brutes. When the benevolent of the land (and they may +be numbered by tens of thousands) shall once have learnt this +plain and yet awful truth, a vast upward step will have been +gained. Because this new Association will teach it them, +during the next ten or twenty years, may God’s blessing be +on it, and, on the noble old man who presides over it. +Often already has he deserved well of his country; but never +better than now, when he has lent his great name and great genius +to the object of preserving human life from wholesale destruction +by unnecessary poison.</p> +<p>And meanwhile let the Sanitary Reformer work and wait. +“Go not after the world,” said a wise man, “for +if thou stand still long enough the world will come round to +thee.” And to Sanitary Reform the world will come +round at last. Grumbling, scoffing, cursing its +benefactors; boasting at last, as usual, that it discovered for +itself the very truths which it tried to silence, it will come; +and will be glad at last to accept the one sibylline leaf, at the +same price at which it might have had the whole. The +Sanitary Reformer must make up his mind to see no fruit of his +labours, much less thanks or reward. He must die in faith, +as St. Paul says all true men die, “not having received the +promises;” worn out, perhaps, by ill-paid and unappreciated +labour, as that truest-hearted and most unselfish of men, Charles +Robert Walsh, died but two years ago. But his works will +follow him—not, as the preachers tell us, to +heaven—for of what use would they be there, to him or to +mankind?—but here, on earth, where he set them, that they +might go on in his path, after his example, and prosper and +triumph long years after he is dead, when his memory shall be +blessed by generations not merely “yet unborn,” but +who never would have been born at all, had he not inculcated into +their unwilling fathers the simplest laws of physical health, +decency, life—laws which the wild cat of the wood, burying +its own excrement apart from its lair, has learnt by the light of +nature; but which neither nature nor God Himself can as yet teach +to a selfish, perverse, and hypocritical generation.</p> +<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2> +<p><a name="footnote3"></a><a href="#citation3" +class="footnote">[3]</a> This lecture was one of a series +of “Lectures to Ladies,” given in London in 1855, at +the Needlewoman’s Institution.</p> +<p><a name="footnote21"></a><a href="#citation21" +class="footnote">[21]</a> The substance of this Essay was a +lecture on Physical Education, given at the Midland Institute, +Birmingham, in 1872.</p> +<p><a name="footnote36"></a><a href="#citation36" +class="footnote">[36]</a> 9, Adam Street, Adelphi, +London.</p> +<p><a name="footnote49"></a><a href="#citation49" +class="footnote">[49]</a> A Lecture delivered at +Winchester, May 31, 1869.</p> +<p><a name="footnote77"></a><a href="#citation77" +class="footnote">[77]</a> Lecture delivered at Winchester, +March 17, 1869.</p> +<p><a name="footnote110"></a><a href="#citation110" +class="footnote">[110]</a> I quote from the translation of +the late lamented Philip Stanhope Worsley, of Corpus Christi +College, Oxford.</p> +<p><a name="footnote114"></a><a href="#citation114" +class="footnote">[114]</a> Odyssey, book vi. 127–315; +vol. i. pp. 143–150 of Mr. Worsley’s translation.</p> +<p><a name="footnote126"></a><a href="#citation126" +class="footnote">[126]</a> Since this essay was written, I +have been sincerely delighted to find that my wishes had been +anticipated at Girton College, near Cambridge, and previously at +Hitchin, whence the college was removed: and that the wise ladies +who superintend that establishment propose also that most +excellent institution—a swimming-bath. A paper, +moreover, read before the London Association of School-mistresses +in 1866, on “Physical Exercises and Recreation for +Girls,” deserves all attention. May those who promote +such things prosper as they deserve.</p> +<p><a name="footnote187"></a><a href="#citation187" +class="footnote">[187]</a> Lecture delivered at Bristol, +October 5, 1857.</p> +<p><a name="footnote192"></a><a href="#citation192" +class="footnote">[192]</a> This was spoken during the +Indian Mutiny.</p> +<p><a name="footnote257"></a><a href="#citation257" +class="footnote">[257]</a> Delivered at St. James’s +Hall, London, 1859.</p> +<p><a name="footnote271"></a><a href="#citation271" +class="footnote">[271]</a> Fraser’s Magazine, No. +CCCXXXVII. 1858.</p> +<p><a name="footnote276"></a><a href="#citation276" +class="footnote">[276]</a> We find a most honourable +exception to this rule in a sermon by the Rev. C. Richson, of +Manchester, on the Sanitary Laws of the Old Testament, with notes +by Dr. Sutherland.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SANITARY AND SOCIAL LECTURES AND +ESSAYS***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 1637-h.htm or 1637-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/3/1637 + + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +This etext was prepared from the 1880 Macmillan and Co. edition +by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +Sanitary and Social Lectures and Essays + + + + +Contents: + +Woman's Work in a Country Parish +The Science of Health +The Two Breaths +Thrift +Nausicaa in London; or, the Lower Education of Women +The Air-Mothers +The Tree of Knowledge +Great Cities and their Influence for Good and Evil +Heroism +The Massacre of the Innocents +"A mad world, my masters." + + + + +WOMAN'S WORK IN A COUNTRY PARISH {1} + + + +I have been asked to speak a few words to you on a lady's work in +a country parish. I shall confine myself rather to principles +than to details; and the first principle which I would impress on +you is, that we must all be just before we are generous. I must, +indeed, speak plainly on this point. A woman's first duties are +to her own family, her own servants. Be not deceived: if anyone +cannot rule her own household, she cannot rule the Church of God. +If anyone cannot sympathise with the servants with whom she is in +contact all day long, she will not really sympathise with the poor +whom she sees once a week. I know the temptation not to believe +this is very great. It seems so much easier to women to do +something for the poor, than for their own ladies' maids, and +house-maids, and cooks. And why? Because they can treat the poor +as THINGS: but they MUST treat their servants as persons. A lady +can go into a poor cottage, lay down the law to the inhabitants, +reprove them for sins to which she has never been tempted; tell +them how to set things right, which, if she had the doing of them, +I fear she would do even more confusedly and slovenly than they. +She can give them a tract, as she might a pill; and then a +shilling, as something sweet after the medicine; and she can go +out again and see no more of them till her benevolent mood recurs: +but with the servants it is not so. She knows their characters; +and, what is more, they know hers; they know her private history, +her little weaknesses. Perhaps she is a little in their power, +and she is shy with them. She is afraid of beginning a good work +with them, because, if she does, she will be forced to carry it +out; and it cannot be cold, dry, perfunctory, official: it must +be hearty, living, loving, personal. She must make them her +friends; and perhaps she is afraid of doing that, for fear they +should take liberties, as it is called--which they very probably +will do, unless she keeps up a very high standard of self- +restraint and earnestness in her own life--and that involves a +great deal of trouble, and so she is tempted, when she wishes to +do good, to fall back on the poor people in the cottages outside, +who, as she fancies, know nothing about her, and will never find +out whether or not she acts up to the rules which she lays down +for them. Be not deceived, I say, in this case also. Fancy not +that they know nothing about you. There is nothing secret which +shall not be made manifest; and what you do in the closet is +surely proclaimed (and often with exaggeration enough and to +spare) on the house-top. These poor folks at your gate know well +enough, through servants and tradesmen, what you are, how you +treat your servants, how you pay your bills, what sort of temper +you have; and they form a shrewd, hard estimate of your character, +in the light of which they view all that you do and say to them; +and believe me, that if you wish to do any real good to them, you +must begin by doing good to those who lie still nearer to you than +them. And believe me, too, that if you shrink from a hearty +patriarchal sympathy with your own servants, because it would +require too much personal human intercourse with them, you are +like a man who, finding that he had not powder enough to fire off +a pocket-pistol, should try to better matters by using the same +quantity of ammunition in an eighty-four pound gun. For it is +this human friendship, trust, affection, which is the very thing +you have to employ towards the poor, and to call up in them. +Clubs, societies, alms, lending libraries are but dead machinery, +needful, perhaps, but, like the iron tube without the powder, +unable to send the bullet forth one single inch; dead and useless +lumber, without humanity; without the smile of the lip, the light +of the eye, the tenderness of the voice, which makes the poor +woman feel that a soul is speaking to her soul, a heart yearning +after her heart; that she is not merely a THING to be improved, +but a sister to be made conscious of the divine bond of her +sisterhood, and taught what she means when she repeats in her +Creed, "I believe in the communion of saints." This is my text, +and my key-note--whatever else I may say to-day is but a carrying +out into details of the one question, How may you go to these poor +creatures as woman to woman? + +Your next duties are to your husband's or father's servants and +workmen. It is said that a clergyman's wife ought to consider the +parish as HER flock as well as her husband's. It may be so: I +believe the dogma to be much overstated just now. But of a +landlord's, or employer's wife (I am inclined to say, too, of an +officer's wife), such a doctrine is absolutely true, and cannot be +overstated. A large proportion, therefore, of your parish work +will be to influence the men of your family to do their duty by +their dependants. You wish to cure the evils under which they +labour. The greater proportion of these are in the hands of your +men relatives. It is a mockery, for instance, in you to visit the +fever-stricken cottage, while your husband leaves it in a state +which breeds that fever. Your business is to go to him and say, +"HERE IS A WRONG; RIGHT IT!" This, as many a beautiful Middle Age +legend tells us, has been woman's function in all uncivilised +times; not merely to melt man's heart to pity, but to awaken it to +duty. But the man must see that the woman is in earnest: that if +he will not repair the wrong by justice, she will, if possible (as +in those old legends), by self-sacrifice. Be sure this method +will conquer. Do but say: "If you will not new-roof that +cottage, if you will not make that drain, I will. I will not buy +a new dress till it is done; I will sell the horse you gave me, +pawn the bracelet you gave me, but the thing shall be done." Let +him see, I say, that you are in earnest, and he will feel that +your message is a divine one, which he must obey for very shame +and weariness, if for nothing else. This is in my eyes the second +part of a woman's parish work. I entreat you to bear it in mind +when you hear, as I trust you will, lectures in this place upon +that SANITARY REFORM, without which all efforts for the bettering +of the masses are in my eyes not only useless, but hypocritical. + +I will suppose, then, that you are fulfilling home duties in self- +restraint, and love, and in the fear of God. I will suppose that +you are using all your woman's influence on the mind of your +family, in behalf of tenants and workmen; and I tell you frankly, +that unless this be first done, you are paying a tithe of mint and +anise, and neglecting common righteousness and mercy. But you +wish to do more: you wish for personal contact with the poor +round you, for the pure enjoyment of doing good to them with your +own hands. How are you to set about it? First, there are clubs-- +clothing-clubs, shoe-clubs, maternal-clubs; all very good in their +way. But do not fancy that they are the greater part of your +parish work. Rather watch and fear lest they become substitutes +for your real parish work; lest the bustle and amusement of +playing at shopkeeper, or penny-collector, once a week, should +blind you to your real power--your real treasure, by spending +which you become all the richer. What you have to do is to +ennoble and purify the WOMANHOOD of these poor women; to make them +better daughters, sisters, wives, mothers: and all the clubs in +the world will not do that; they are but palliatives of a great +evil, which they do not touch; cloaks for almsgiving, clumsy means +of eking out insufficient wages; at best, kindly contrivances for +tricking into temporary thriftiness a degraded and reckless +peasantry. Miserable, miserable state of things! out of which the +longer I live I see less hope of escape, saving by an emigration, +which shall drain us of all the healthy, strong, and brave among +the lower classes, and leave us, as a just punishment for our +sins, only the cripple, the drunkard, and the beggar. + +Yet these clubs MUST be carried on. They make life a little more +possible; they lighten hearts, if but for a moment; they inculcate +habits of order and self-restraint, which may be useful when the +poor man finds himself in Canada or Australia. And it is a cruel +utilitarianism to refuse to palliate the symptoms because you +cannot cure the disease itself. You will give opiates to the +suffering, who must die nevertheless. Let him slip into his grave +at least as painlessly as you can. And so you must use these +charitable societies, remembering all along what a fearful and +humbling sign the necessity for them is of the diseased state of +this England, as the sportula and universal almsgiving was of the +decadence of Rome. + +However, the work has to be done; and such as it is, it is +especially fitted for young unmarried ladies. It requires no deep +knowledge of human nature. It makes them aware of the amount of +suffering and struggling which lies around them, without bringing +them in that most undesirable contact with the coarser forms of +evil which house-visitation must do; and the mere business habits +of accuracy and patience to which it compels them, are a valuable +practical schooling for them themselves in after-life. It is +tiresome and unsentimental drudgery, no doubt; but perhaps all the +better training on that account. And, after all, the magic of +sweetness, grace, and courtesy may shed a hallowing and humanising +light over the meanest work, and the smile of God may spread from +lip to lip, and the light of God from eye to eye, even between the +giver and receiver of a penny, till the poor woman goes home, +saying in her heart, "I have not only found the life of my hand--I +have found a sister for time and for eternity." + +But there is another field of parish usefulness which I cannot +recommend too earnestly, and that is, the school. There you may +work as hard as you will, and how you will--provided you do it in +a loving, hearty, cheerful, HUMAN way, playful and yet earnest; +two qualities which, when they exist in their highest power, are +sure to go together. I say, how you will. I am no pedant about +schools; I care less what is taught than how it is taught. The +merest rudiments of Christianity, the merest rudiments of popular +instruction, are enough, provided they be given by lips which +speak as if they believed what they said, and with a look which +shows real love for the pupil. Manner is everything--matter a +secondary consideration; for in matter, brain only speaks to +brain; in manner, soul speaks to soul. If you want Christ's lost- +lambs really to believe that He died for them, you will do it +better by one little act of interest and affection, than by making +them learn by heart whole commentaries--even as Miss Nightingale +has preached Christ crucified to those poor soldiers by acts of +plain outward drudgery, more livingly, and really, and +convincingly than she could have done by ten thousand sermons, and +made many a noble lad, I doubt not, say in his heart, for the +first time in his wild life, "I can believe now that Christ died +for me, for here is one whom He has taught to die for me in like +wise." And this blessed effect of school-work, remember, is not +confined to the children. It goes home with them to the parents. +The child becomes an object of interest and respect in their eyes, +when they see it an object of interest and respect in yours. If +they see that you look on it as an awful and glorious being, the +child of God, the co-heir of Christ, they learn gradually to look +on it in the same light. They become afraid and ashamed (and it +is a noble fear and shame) to do and say before it what they used +to do and say; afraid to ill-use it. It becomes to them a +mysterious visitor (sad that it should be so, but true as sad) +from a higher and purer sphere, who must be treated with something +of courtesy and respect, who must even be asked to teach them +something of its new knowledge; and the school, and the ladies' +interest in the school, become to the degraded parents a living +sign that those children's angels do indeed behold the face of +their Father which is in heaven. + +Now, there is one thing in school-work which I wish to press on +you; and that is, that you should not confine your work to the +girls; but bestow it as freely on those who need it more, and who +(paradoxical as it may seem) will respond to it more deeply and +freely--THE BOYS. I am not going to enter into the reasons WHY. +I only entreat you to believe me, that by helping to educate the +boys, or even (when old enough), by taking a class (as I have seen +done with admirable effect) of grown-up lads, you may influence +for ever not only the happiness of your pupils, but of the girls +whom they will hereafter marry. It will be a boon to your own sex +as well as to ours to teach them courtesy, self-restraint, +reverence for physical weakness, admiration of tenderness and +gentleness; and it is one which only a lady can bestow. Only by +being accustomed in youth to converse with ladies, will the boy +learn to treat hereafter his sweetheart or his wife like a +gentleman. There is a latent chivalry, doubt it not, in the heart +of every untutored clod; if it dies out in him (as it too often +does), it were better for him, I often think, if he had never been +born: but the only talisman which will keep it alive, much more +develop it into its fulness, is friendly and revering intercourse +with women of higher rank than himself, between whom and him there +is a great and yet a blessed gulf fixed. + +I have left to the last the most important subject of all; and +that is, what is called "visiting the poor." It is an endless +subject; if you go into details, you might write volumes on it. +All I can do this afternoon is to keep to my own key-note, and +say, Visit whom, when, and where you will; but let your visits be +those of woman to woman. Consider to whom you go--to poor souls +whose life, compared with yours, is one long malaise of body, and +soul, and spirit--and do as you would be done by; instead of +reproving and fault-finding, encourage. In God's name, encourage. +They scramble through life's rocks, bogs, and thornbrakes, +clumsily enough, and have many a fall, poor things! But why, in +the name of a God of love and justice, is the lady, rolling along +the smooth turnpike-road in her comfortable carriage, to be +calling out all day long to the poor soul who drags on beside her +over hedge and ditch, moss and moor, bare-footed and weary- +hearted, with half-a-dozen children at her back: "You ought not +to have fallen here; and it was very cowardly to lie down there; +and it was your duty, as a mother, to have helped that child +through the puddle; while, as for sleeping under that bush, it is +most imprudent and inadmissible?" Why not encourage her, praise +her, cheer her on her weary way by loving words, and keep your +reproofs for yourself--even your advice; for SHE does get on her +way, after all, where YOU could not travel a step forward; and she +knows what she is about perhaps better than you do, and what she +has to endure, and what God thinks of her life-journey. The heart +knoweth its own bitterness, and a stranger intermeddleth not with +its joy. But do not be a stranger to her. Be a sister to her. I +do not ask you to take her up in your carriage. You cannot; +perhaps it is good for her that you cannot. It is good sometimes +for Lazarus that he is not fit to sit at Dives's feast--good for +him that he should receive his evil things in this life, and be +comforted in the life to come. All I ask is, do to the poor soul +as you would have her do to you in her place. Do not interrupt +and vex her (for she is busy enough already) with remedies which +she does not understand, for troubles which you do not understand. +But speak comfortably to her, and say: "I cannot feel WITH you, +but I do feel FOR you: I should enjoy helping you, but I do not +know how--tell me. Tell me where the yoke galls; tell me why that +forehead is grown old before its time: I may be able to ease the +burden, to put fresh light into the eyes; and if not, still tell +me, simply because I am a woman, and know the relief of pouring +out my own soul into loving ears, even though in the depths of +despair." Yes, paradoxical as it may seem, I am convinced that +the only way to help these poor women humanly and really, is to +begin by confessing to them that you do not know how to help them; +to humble yourself to them, and to ask their counsel for the good +of themselves and of their neighbours, instead of coming proudly +to them, with nostrums ready compounded, as if a doctor should be +so confident in his own knowledge of books and medicine as to give +physic before asking the patient's symptoms. + +Therefore, I entreat you to bear in mind (for without this all +visiting of the poor will be utterly void and useless), that you +must regulate your conduct to them, and in their houses, even to +the most minute particulars, by the very same rules which apply to +persons of your own class. Never let any woman say of you +(thought fatal to all confidence, all influence!): "Yes, it is +all very kind: but she does not behave to me as she would to one +of her own quality." Piety, earnestness, affectionateness, +eloquence--all may be nullified and stultified by simply keeping a +poor woman standing in her own cottage while you sit, or entering +her house, even at her own request, while she is at meals. She +may decline to sit; she may beg you to come in, all the more +reason for refusing utterly to obey her, because it shows that +that very inward gulf between you and her still exists in her +mind, which it is the object of your visit to bridge over. If you +know her to be in trouble, touch on that trouble as you would with +a lady. Woman's heart is alike in all ranks, and the deepest +sorrow is the one of which she speaks the last and least. We +should not like anyone--no, not an angel from heaven, to come into +our houses without knocking at the door, and say: "I hear you are +very ill off--I will lend you a hundred pounds. I think you are +very careless of money, I will take your accounts into my own +hands;" and still less again: "Your son is a very bad, +profligate, disgraceful fellow, who is not fit to be mentioned; I +intend to take him out of your hands and reform him myself." +Neither do the poor like such unceremonious mercy, such untender +tenderness, benevolence at horse-play, mistaking kicks for +caresses. They do not like it, they will not respond to it, save +in parishes which have been demoralised by officious and +indiscriminate benevolence, and where the last remaining virtues +of the poor, savage self-help and independence, have been +exchanged (as I have too often seen them exchanged) for organised +begging and hypocrisy. + +I would that you would all read, ladies, and consider well the +traits of an opposite character which have just come to light (to +me, I am ashamed to say, for the first time) in the Biography of +Sidney Smith. The love and admiration which that truly brave and +loving man won from everyone, rich or poor, with whom he came in +contact, seems to me to have arisen from the one fact, that +without perhaps having any such conscious intention, he treated +rich and poor, his own servants and the noblemen his guests, +alike, and ALIKE courteously, considerately, cheerfully, +affectionately--so leaving a blessing and reaping a blessing +wheresoever he went. + +Approach, then, these poor women as sisters, and you will be able +gradually to reverse the hard saying of which I made use just now: +"Do not apply remedies which they do not understand, to diseases +which you do not understand." Learn lovingly and patiently (aye, +and reverently, for there is that in every human being which +deserves reverence, and must be reverenced if we wish to +understand it)--learn, I say, to understand their troubles, and by +that time they will have learnt to understand your remedies, and +they will appreciate them. For you HAVE remedies. I do not +undervalue your position. No man on earth is less inclined to +undervalue the real power of wealth, rank, accomplishments, +manners--even physical beauty. All are talents from God, and I +give God thanks when I see them possessed by any human being; for +I know that they, too, can be used in His service, and brought to +bear on the true emancipation of woman--her emancipation, not from +man (as some foolish persons fancy), but from the devil, "the +slanderer and divider" who divides her from man, and makes her +live a life-long tragedy, which goes on in more cottages than in +palaces--a vie e part, a vie incomprise--a life made up half of +ill-usage, half of unnecessary, self-willed, self-conceited +martyrdom, instead of being (as God intended) half of the human +universe, a helpmeet for man, and the one bright spot which makes +this world endurable. Towards making her that, and so realising +the primeval mission by every cottage hearth, each of you can do +something; for each of you have some talent, power, knowledge, +attraction between soul and soul, which the cottager's wife has +not, and by which you may draw her to you with (as the prophet +says) human bonds and the cords of love: but she must be drawn by +them alone, or your work is nothing, and though you give the +treasures of Ind, they are valueless equally to her and to Christ; +for they are not given in His name, which is that boundless +tenderness, consideration, patience, self-sacrifice, by which even +the cup of cold water is a precious offering--as God grant your +labour may be! + + + +THE SCIENCE OF HEALTH {2} + + + +Whether the British race is improving or degenerating? What, if +it seem probably degenerating, are the causes of so great an evil? +How they can be, if not destroyed, at least arrested? These are +questions worthy attention, not of statesmen only and medical men, +but of every father and mother in these isles. I shall say +somewhat about them in this Essay; and say it in a form which +ought to be intelligible to fathers and mothers of every class, +from the highest to the lowest, in hopes of convincing some of +them at least that the science of health, now so utterly neglected +in our curriculum of so-called education, ought to be taught--the +rudiments of it at least--in every school, college, and +university. + +We talk of our hardy forefathers; and rightly. But they were +hardy, just as the savage is usually hardy, because none but the +hardy lived. They may have been able to say of themselves--as +they do in a State paper of 1515, now well known through the pages +of Mr. Froude: "What comyn folk of all the world may compare with +the comyns of England, in riches, freedom, liberty, welfare, and +all prosperity? What comyn folk is so mighty, and so strong in +the felde, as the comyns of England?" They may have been fed on +"great shins of beef," till they became, as Benvenuto Cellini +calls them, "the English wild beasts." But they increased in +numbers slowly, if at all, for centuries. Those terrible laws of +natural selection, which issue in "the survival of the fittest," +cleared off the less fit, in every generation, principally by +infantile disease, often by wholesale famine and pestilence; and +left, on the whole, only those of the strongest constitutions to +perpetuate a hardy, valiant, and enterprising race. + +At last came a sudden and unprecedented change. In the first +years of this century, steam and commerce produced an enormous +increase in the population. Millions of fresh human beings found +employment, married, brought up children who found employment in +their turn, and learnt to live more or less civilised lives. An +event, doubtless, for which God is to be thanked. A quite new +phase of humanity, bringing with it new vices and new dangers: +but bringing, also, not merely new comforts, but new noblenesses, +new generosities, new conceptions of duty, and of how that duty +should be done. It is childish to regret the old times, when our +soot-grimed manufacturing districts were green with lonely farms. +To murmur at the transformation would be, I believe, to murmur at +the will of Him without whom not a sparrow falls to the ground. + + +The old order changeth, yielding place to the new, +And God fulfils himself in many ways, +Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. + + +Our duty is, instead of longing for the good old custom, to take +care of the good new custom, lest it should corrupt the world in +like wise. And it may do so thus: + +The rapid increase of population during the first half of this +century began at a moment when the British stock was specially +exhausted; namely, about the end of the long French war. There +may have been periods of exhaustion, at least in England, before +that. There may have been one here, as there seems to have been +on the Continent, after the Crusades; and another after the Wars +of the Roses. There was certainly a period of severe exhaustion +at the end of Elizabeth's reign, due both to the long Spanish and +Irish wars and to the terrible endemics introduced from abroad; an +exhaustion which may have caused, in part, the national weakness +which hung upon us during the reign of the Stuarts. But after +none of these did the survival of the less fit suddenly become +more easy; or the discovery of steam power, and the acquisition of +a colonial empire, create at once a fresh demand for human beings +and a fresh supply of food for them. Britain, at the beginning of +the nineteenth century, was in an altogether new social situation, + +At the beginning of the great French war; and, indeed, ever since +the beginning of the war with Spain in 1739--often snubbed as the +"war about Jenkins's ear"--but which was, as I hold, one of the +most just, as it was one of the most popular, of all our wars; +after, too, the once famous "forty fine harvests" of the +eighteenth century, the British people, from the gentleman who led +to the soldier or sailor who followed, were one of the mightiest +and most capable races which the world has ever seen, comparable +best to the old Roman, at his mightiest and most capable period. +That, at least, their works testify. They created--as far as man +can be said to create anything--the British Empire. They won for +us our colonies, our commerce, the mastery of the seas of all the +world. But at what a cost! + + +Their bones are scattered far and wide, +By mount, and stream, and sea. + + +Year after year, till the final triumph of Waterloo, not battle +only, but worse destroyers than shot and shell--fatigue and +disease--had been carrying off our stoutest, ablest, healthiest +young men, each of whom represented, alas! a maiden left unmarried +at home, or married, in default, to a less able man. The +strongest went to the war; each who fell left a weaklier man to +continue the race; while of those who did not fall, too many +returned with tainted and weakened constitutions, to injure, it +may be, generations yet unborn. The middle classes, being mostly +engaged in peaceful pursuits, suffered less of this decimation of +their finest young men; and to that fact I attribute much of their +increasing preponderance, social, political, and intellectual, to +this very day. One cannot walk the streets of any of our great +commercial cities without seeing plenty of men, young and middle- +aged, whose whole bearing and stature shows that the manly vigour +of our middle class is anything but exhausted. In Liverpool, +especially, I have been much struck not only with the vigorous +countenance, but with the bodily size of the mercantile men on +'Change. But it must be remembered always, first, that these men +are the very elite of their class; the cleverest men; the men +capable of doing most work; and next, that they are, almost all of +them, from the great merchant who has his villa out of town, and +perhaps his moor in the Highlands, down to the sturdy young +volunteer who serves in the haberdasher's shop, country-bred men; +and that the question is, not what they are like now, but what +their children and grandchildren, especially the fine young +volunteer's, will be like? A very serious question I hold that to +be, and for this reason. + +War is, without doubt, the most hideous physical curse which +fallen man inflicts upon himself; and for this simple reason, that +it reverses the very laws of nature, and is more cruel even than +pestilence. For instead of issuing in the survival of the +fittest, it issues in the survival of the less fit: and +therefore, if protracted, must deteriorate generations yet unborn. +And yet a peace such as we now enjoy, prosperous, civilised, +humane, is fraught, though to a less degree, with the very same +ill effect. + +In the first place, tens of thousands--who knows it not?--lead +sedentary and unwholesome lives, stooping, asphyxiated, employing +as small a fraction of their bodies as of their minds. And all +this in dwellings, workshops, what not?--the influences, the very +atmosphere of which tend not to health, but to unhealth, and to +drunkenness as a solace under the feeling of unhealth and +depression. And that such a life must tell upon their offspring, +and if their offspring grow up under similar circumstances, upon +their offspring's offspring, till a whole population may become +permanently degraded, who does not know? For who that walks +through the by-streets of any great city does not see? Moreover, +and this is one of the most fearful problems with which modern +civilisation has to deal--we interfere with natural selection by +our conscientious care of life, as surely as does war itself. If +war kills the most fit to live, we save alive those who--looking +at them from a merely physical point of view--are most fit to die. +Everything which makes it more easy to live; every sanitary +reform, prevention of pestilence, medical discovery, amelioration +of climate, drainage of soil, improvement in dwelling-houses, +workhouses, gaols; every reformatory school, every hospital, every +cure of drunkenness, every influence, in short, which has--so I am +told--increased the average length of life in these islands, by +nearly one-third, since the first establishment of life +insurances, one hundred and fifty years ago; every influence of +this kind, I say, saves persons alive who would otherwise have +died; and the great majority of these will be, even in surgical +and zymotic cases, those of least resisting power, who are thus +preserved to produce in time a still less powerful progeny. + +Do I say that we ought not to save these people if we can? God +forbid. The weakly, the diseased whether infant or adult, is here +on earth; a British citizen; no more responsible for his own +weakness than for his own existence. Society, that is, in plain +English, we and our ancestors, are responsible for both; and we +must fulfil the duty, and keep him in life; and, if we can, heal, +strengthen, develop him to the utmost; and make the best of that +which "fate and our own deservings" have given us to deal with. I +do not speak of higher motives still; motives which, to every +minister of religion, must be paramount and awful. I speak merely +of physical and social motives, such as appeal to the conscience +of every man--the instinct which bids every human-hearted man or +woman to save life, alleviate pain, like Him who causes His sun to +shine on the evil and on the good, and His rain to fall on the +just and on the unjust. + +But it is palpable that in doing so we must, year by year, +preserve a large percentage of weakly persons who, marrying freely +in their own class, must produce weaklier children, and they +weaklier children still. Must, did I say? There are those who +are of opinion--and I, after watching and comparing the histories +of many families, indeed of every one with whom I have come in +contact for now five-and-thirty years, in town and country, can +only fear that their opinion is but too well founded on fact--that +in the great majority of cases, in all classes whatsoever, the +children are not equal to their parents, nor they, again, to their +grand-parents of the beginning of the century; and that this +degrading process goes on most surely and most rapidly in our +large towns, and in proportion to the antiquity of those towns, +and therefore in proportion to the number of generations during +which the degrading influences have been at work. + +This and cognate dangers have been felt more and more deeply, as +the years have rolled on, by students of human society. To ward +them off, theory after theory has been put on paper, especially in +France, which deserve high praise for their ingenuity, less for +their morality, and, I fear, still less for their common sense. +For the theorist in his closet is certain to ignore, as +inconvenient to the construction of his Utopia, certain of those +broad facts of human nature which every active parish priest, +medical man, or poor-law guardian has to face every day of his +life. + +Society and British human nature are what they have become by the +indirect influences of long ages, and we can no more reconstruct +the one than we can change the other. We can no more mend men by +theories than we can by coercion--to which, by-the-bye, almost all +these theorists look longingly as their final hope and mainstay. +We must teach men to mend their own matters, of their own reason, +and their own free-will. We must teach them that they are the +arbiters of their own destinies; and, to a fearfully large degree, +of their children's destinies after them. We must teach them not +merely that they ought to be free, but that they are free, whether +they know it or not, for good and for evil. And we must do that +in this case, by teaching them sound practical science; the +science of physiology as applied to health. So, and so only, can +we cheek--I do not say stop entirely--though I believe even that +to be ideally possible; but at least cheek the process of +degradation which I believe to be surely going on, not merely in +these islands, but in every civilised country in the world, in +proportion to its civilisation. + +It is still a question whether science has fully discovered those +laws of hereditary health, the disregard of which causes so many +marriages disastrous to generations yet unborn. But much valuable +light has been thrown on this most mysterious and most important +subject during the last few years. That light--and I thank God +for it--is widening and deepening rapidly. And I doubt not that +in a generation or two more, enough will be known to be thrown +into the shape of practical and provable rules; and that, if not a +public opinion, yet at least, what is more useful far, a +widespread private opinion will grow up, especially among educated +women, which will prevent many a tragedy and save many a life. + +But, as to the laws of personal health: enough, and more than +enough, is known already, to be applied safely and easily by any +adults, however unlearned, to the preservation not only of their +own health, but of that of their children. + +The value of healthy habitations, of personal cleanliness, of pure +air and pure water, of various kinds of food, according as each +tends to make bone, fat, or muscle, provided only--provided only-- +that the food be unadulterated; the value of various kinds of +clothing, and physical exercise, of a free and equal development +of the brain power, without undue overstrain in any one direction; +in one word, the method of producing, as far as possible, the +mentem sanam in corpore sano, and the wonderful and blessed +effects of such obedience to those laws of nature, which are +nothing but the good will of God expressed in facts--their +wonderful and blessed tendency, I say, to eliminate the germs of +hereditary disease, and to actually regenerate the human system-- +all this is known; known as fully and clearly as any human +knowledge need be known; it is written in dozens of popular books +and pamphlets. And why should this divine voice, which cries to +man, tending to sink into effeminate barbarism through his own +hasty and partial civilisation: "It is not too late. For your +bodies, as for your spirits, there is an upward, as well as a +downward path. You, or if not you, at least the children whom you +have brought into the world, for whom you toil, for whom you +hoard, for whom you pray, for whom you would give your lives,-- +they still may be healthy, strong, it may be beautiful, and have +all the intellectual and social, as well as the physical +advantages, which health, strength, and beauty give."--Ah, why is +this divine voice now, as of old, Wisdom crying in the streets, +and no man regarding her? I appeal to women, who are initiated, +as we men can never be, into the stern mysteries of pain, and +sorrow, and self-sacrifice;--they who bring forth children, weep +over children, slave for children, and, if they have none of their +own, then slave, with the holy instinct of the sexless bee, for +the children of others--Let them say, shall this thing be? + +Let my readers pardon me if I seem to write too earnestly. That I +speak neither more nor less than the truth, every medical man +knows full well. Not only as a very humble student of physiology, +but as a parish priest of thirty years' standing, I have seen so +much unnecessary misery; and I have in other cases seen similar +misery so simply avoided; that the sense of the vastness of the +evil is intensified by my sense of the easiness of the cure. + +Why, then--to come to practical suggestions--should there not be +opened in every great town in these realms a public school of +health? It might connect itself with--I hold that it should form +an integral part of--some existing educational institute. But it +should at least give practical lectures, for fees small enough to +put them within the reach of any respectable man or woman, however +poor, I cannot but hope that such schools of health, if opened in +the great manufacturing towns of England and Scotland, and, +indeed, in such an Irish town as Belfast, would obtain pupils in +plenty, and pupils who would thoroughly profit by what they hear. +The people of these towns are, most of them, specially accustomed +by their own trades to the application of scientific laws. To +them, therefore, the application of any fresh physical laws to a +fresh set of facts, would have nothing strange in it. They have +already something of that inductive habit of mind which is the +groundwork of all rational understanding or action. They would +not turn the deaf and contemptuous ear with which the savage and +the superstitious receive the revelation of nature's mysteries. +Why should not, with so hopeful an audience, the experiment be +tried far and wide, of giving lectures on health, as supplementary +to those lectures on animal physiology which are, I am happy to +say, becoming more and more common? Why should not people be +taught--they are already being taught at Birmingham--something +about the tissues of the body, their structure and uses, the +circulation of the blood, respiration, chemical changes in the air +respired, amount breathed, digestion, nature of food, absorption, +secretion, structure of the nervous system--in fact, be taught +something of how their own bodies are made and how they work? +Teaching of this kind ought to, and will, in some more civilised +age and country, be held a necessary element in the school course +of every child, just as necessary as reading, writing, and +arithmetic; for it is after all the most necessary branch of that +"technical education" of which we hear so much just now, namely, +the technic, or art, of keeping oneself alive and well. + +But we can hardly stop there. After we have taught the condition +of health, we must teach also the condition of disease; of those +diseases specially which tend to lessen wholesale the health of +townsfolk, exposed to an artificial mode of life. Surely young +men and women should be taught something of the causes of zymotic +disease, and of scrofula, consumption, rickets, dipsomania, +cerebral derangement, and such like. They should be shown the +practical value of pure air, pure water, unadulterated food, sweet +and dry dwellings. Is there one of them, man or woman, who would +not be the safer and happier, and the more useful to his or her +neighbours, if they had acquired some sound notions about those +questions of drainage on which their own lives and the lives of +their children may every day depend? I say--women as well as men. +I should have said women rather than men. For it is the women who +have the ordering of the household, the bringing up of the +children; the women who bide at home, while the men are away, it +may be at the other end of the earth. + +And if any say, as they have a right to say--"But these are +subjects which can hardly be taught to young women in public +lectures;" I rejoin--of course not, unless they are taught by +women--by women, of course, duly educated and legally qualified. +Let such teach to women, what every woman ought to know, and what +her parents will very properly object to her hearing from almost +any man. This is one of the main reasons why I have, for twenty +years past, advocated the training of women for the medical +profession; and one which countervails, in my mind, all possible +objections to such a movement. And now, thank God, we are seeing +the common sense of Great Britain, and indeed of every civilised +nation, gradually coming round to that which seemed to me, when I +first conceived of it, a dream too chimerical to be cherished save +in secret--the restoring woman to her natural share in that sacred +office of healer, which she held in the Middle Ages, and from +which she was thrust out during the sixteenth century. + +I am most happy to see, for instance, that the National Health +Society, {3} which I earnestly recommend to the attention of my +readers, announces a "Course of Lectures for Ladies on Elementary +Physiology and Hygiene," by a lady, to which I am also most happy +to see, governesses are admitted at half-fees. Alas! how much +misery, disease, and even death might have been prevented, had +governesses been taught such matters thirty years ago, I, for one, +know too well. May the day soon come when there will be educated +women enough to give such lectures throughout these realms, to +rich as well as poor--for the rich, strange to say, need them +often as much as the poor do--and that we may live to see, in +every great town, health classes for women as well as for men, +sending forth year by year more young women and young men taught, +not only to take care of themselves and of their families, but to +exercise moral influence over their fellow-citizens, as champions +in the battle against dirt and drunkenness, disease and death. + +There may be those who would answer--or rather, there would +certainly have been those who would have so answered thirty years +ago, before the so-called materialism of advanced science had +taught us some practical wisdom about education, and reminded +people that they have bodies as well as minds and souls--"You say, +we are likely to grow weaklier, unhealthier. And if it were so, +what matter? Mind makes the man, not body. We do not want our +children to be stupid giants and bravos; but clever, able, highly +educated, however weakly Providence or the laws of nature may have +chosen to make them. Let them overstrain their brains a little; +let them contract their chests, and injure their digestion and +their eyesight, by sitting at desks, poring over books. Intellect +is what we want. Intellect makes money. Intellect makes the +world. We would rather see our son a genius than a mere athlete." +Well: and so would I. But what if intellect alone does not even +make money, save as Messrs. Dodson and Fogg, Sampson Brass, and +Montagu Tigg were wont to make it, unless backed by an able, +enduring, healthy physique, such as I have seen, almost without +exception, in those successful men of business whom I have had the +honour and the pleasure of knowing? What if intellect, or what is +now called intellect, did not make the world, or the smallest +wheel or cog of it? What if, for want of obeying the laws of +nature, parents bred up neither a genius nor an athlete, but only +an incapable unhappy personage, with a huge upright forehead, like +that of a Byzantine Greek, filled with some sort of pap instead of +brains, and tempted alternately to fanaticism and strong drink? +We must, in the great majority of cases, have the CORPUS SANEM if +we want the MENTEM SANEM; and healthy bodies are the only +trustworthy organs for healthy minds. Which is cause and which is +effect, I shall not stay to debate here. But wherever we find a +population generally weakly, stunted, scrofulous, we find in them +a corresponding type of brain, which cannot be trusted to do good +work; which is capable more or less of madness, whether solitary +or epidemic. It may be very active; it may be very quick at +catching at new and grand ideas--all the more quick, perhaps, on +account of its own secret malaise and self-discontent; but it will +be irritable, spasmodic, hysterical. It will be apt to mistake +capacity of talk for capacity of action, excitement for +earnestness, virulence for force, and, too often; cruelty for +justice. It will lose manful independence, individuality, +originality; and when men act, they will act from the +consciousness of personal weakness, like sheep rushing over a +hedge, leaning against each other, exhorting each other to be +brave, and swaying about in mobs and masses. These were the +intellectual weaknesses which, as I read history, followed on +physical degradation in Imperial Rome, in Alexandria, in +Byzantium. Have we not seen them reappear, under fearful forms, +in Paris but the other day? + +I do not blame; I do not judge. My theory, which I hold, and +shall hold, to be fairly founded on a wide induction, forbids me +to blame and to judge; because it tells me that these defects are +mainly physical; that those who exhibit them are mainly to be +pitied, as victims of the sins or ignorance of their forefathers. + +But it tells me too, that those who, professing to be educated +men, and therefore bound to know better, treat these physical +phenomena as spiritual, healthy, and praiseworthy; who even +exasperate them, that they may make capital out of the weaknesses +of fallen man, are the most contemptible and yet the most +dangerous of public enemies, let them cloak their quackery under +whatsoever patriotic, or scientific, or even sacred words. + +There are those again honest, kindly, sensible, practical men, +many of them; men whom I have no wish to offend; whom I had rather +ask to teach me some of their own experience and common sense, +which has learned to discern, like good statesmen, not only what +ought to be done, but what can be done--there are those, I say, +who would sooner see this whole question let alone. Their +feeling, as far as I can analyse it, seems to be that the evils of +which I have been complaining, are on the whole inevitable; or, if +not, that we can mend so very little of them, that it is wisest to +leave them alone altogether, lest, like certain sewers, "the more +you stir them, the more they smell." They fear lest we should +unsettle the minds of the many for whom these evils will never be +mended; lest we make them discontented; discontented with their +houses, their occupations, their food, their whole social +arrangements; and all in vain. + +I should answer, in all courtesy and humility--for I sympathise +deeply with such men and women, and respect them deeply likewise-- +but are not people discontented already, from the lowest to the +highest? And ought a man, in such a piecemeal, foolish, greedy, +sinful world as this is, and always has been, to be anything but +discontented? If he thinks that things are going all right, must +he not have a most beggarly conception of what going right means? +And if things are not going right, can it be anything but good for +him to see that they are not going right? Can truth and fact harm +any human being? I shall not believe so, as long as I have a +Bible wherein to believe. For my part, I should like to make +every man, woman, and child whom I meet discontented with +themselves, even as I am discontented with myself. I should like +to awaken in them, about their physical, their intellectual, their +moral condition, that divine discontent which is the parent, first +of upward aspiration and then of self-control, thought, effort to +fulfil that aspiration even in part. For to be discontented with +the divine discontent, and to be ashamed with the noble shame, is +the very germ and first upgrowth of all virtue. Men begin at +first, as boys begin when they grumble at their school and their +schoolmasters, to lay the blame on others; to be discontented with +their circumstances--the things which stand around them; and to +cry, "Oh that I had this!" "Oh that I had that!" But by that way +no deliverance lies. That discontent only ends in revolt and +rebellion, social or political; and that, again, still in the same +worship of circumstances--but this time desperate--which ends, let +it disguise itself under what fine names it will, in what the old +Greeks called a tyranny; in which--as in the Spanish republics of +America, and in France more than once--all have become the +voluntary slaves of one man, because each man fancies that the one +man can improve his circumstances for him. + +But the wise man will learn, like Epictetus the heroic slave, the +slave of Epaphroditus, Nero's minion--and in what baser and uglier +circumstances could human being find himself?--to find out the +secret of being truly free; namely, to be discontented with no man +and no thing save himself. To say not--"Oh that I had this and +that!" but "Oh that I were this and that!" Then, by God's help-- +and that heroic slave, heathen though he was, believed and trusted +in God's help--"I will make myself that which God has shown me +that I ought to be and can be." + +Ten thousand a year, or ten million a year, as Epictetus saw full +well, cannot mend that vulgar discontent with circumstances which +he had felt--and who with more right?--and conquered, and +despised. For that is the discontent of children, wanting always +more holidays and more sweets. But I wish my readers to have, and +to cherish, the discontent of men and women. + +Therefore I would make men and women discontented, with the divine +and wholesome discontent, at their own physical frame, and at that +of their children. I would accustom their eyes to those precious +heirlooms of the human race, the statues of the old Greeks; to +their tender grandeur, their chaste healthfulness, their +unconscious, because perfect might: and say--There; these are +tokens to you, and to all generations yet unborn, of what man +could be once; of what he can be again if he will obey those laws +of nature which are the voice of God. I would make them +discontented with the ugliness and closeness of their dwellings; I +would make them discontented with the fashion of their garments, +and still more just now the women, of all ranks, with the fashion +of theirs; and with everything around them which they have the +power of improving, if it be at all ungraceful, superfluous, +tawdry, ridiculous, unwholesome. I would make them discontented +with what they call their education, and say to them--You call the +three Royal R's education? They are not education: no more is +the knowledge which would enable you to take the highest prizes +given by the Society of Arts, or any other body. They are not +education: they are only instruction; a necessary groundwork, in +an age like this, for making practical use of your education: but +not the education itself. + +And if they asked me, What then education meant? I should point +them, first, I think, to noble old Lilly's noble old "Euphues," of +three hundred years ago, and ask them to consider what it says +about education, and especially this passage concerning that mere +knowledge which is nowadays strangely miscalled education. "There +are two principal and peculiar gifts in the nature of man, +knowledge and reason. The one"--that is reason--"commandeth, and +the other"--that is knowledge--"obeyeth. These things neither the +whirling wheel of fortune can change, nor the deceitful cavillings +of worldlings separate, neither sickness abate, nor age abolish." +And next I should point them to those pages in Mr. Gladstone's +"Juventus Mundi," where he describes the ideal training of a Greek +youth in Homer's days; and say--There: that is an education fit +for a really civilised man, even though he never saw a book in his +life; the full, proportionate, harmonious educing-that is, +bringing out and developing--of all the faculties of his body, +mind, and heart, till he becomes at once a reverent yet self- +assured, a graceful and yet a valiant, an able and yet an eloquent +personage. + +And if any should say to me--"But what has this to do with +science? Homer's Greeks knew no science;" I should rejoin--But +they had, pre-eminently above all ancient races which we know, the +scientific instinct; the teachableness and modesty; the clear eye +and quick ear; the hearty reverence for fact and nature, and for +the human body, and mind, and spirit; for human nature in a word, +in its completeness, as the highest fact upon this earth. +Therefore they became in after years, not only the great +colonisers and the great civilisers of the old world--the most +practical people, I hold, which the world ever saw; but the +parents of all sound physics as well as of all sound metaphysics. +Their very religion, in spite of its imperfections, helped forward +their education, not in spite of, but by means of that +anthropomorphism which we sometimes too hastily decry. As Mr. +Gladstone says: "As regarded all other functions of our nature, +outside the domain of the life to Godward--all those functions +which are summed up in what St. Paul calls the flesh and the mind, +the psychic and bodily life, the tendency of the system was to +exalt the human element, by proposing a model of beauty, strength, +and wisdom, in all their combinations, so elevated that the effort +to attain them required a continual upward strain. It made +divinity attainable; and thus it effectually directed the thought +and aim of man + + +Along the line of limitless desires. + + +Such a scheme of religion, though failing grossly in the +government of the passions, and in upholding the standard of moral +duties, tended powerfully to produce a lofty self-respect, and a +large, free, and varied conception of humanity. It incorporated +itself in schemes of notable discipline for mind and body, indeed +of a lifelong education; and these habits of mind and action had +their marked results (to omit many other greatnesses) in a +philosophy, literature, and art, which remain to this day +unrivalled or unsurpassed." + +So much those old Greeks did for their own education, without +science and without Christianity. We who have both: what might +we not do, if we would be true to our advantages, and to +ourselves? + + + +THE TWO BREATHS {4} + + + +Ladies,--I have been honoured by a second invitation to address +you, and I dare not refuse it; because it gives me an opportunity +of speaking on a matter, knowledge and ignorance about which may +seriously affect your health and happiness, and that of the +children with whom you may have to do. I must apologise if I say +many things which are well known to many persons in this room: +they ought to be well known to all: but it is generally best to +assume total ignorance in one's hearers, and to begin from the +beginning. + +I shall try to be as simple as possible; to trouble you as little +as possible with scientific terms; to be practical; and at the +same time, if possible, interesting. + +I should wish to call this lecture "The Two Breaths:" not merely +"The Breath;" and for this reason: every time you breathe you +breathe two different breaths; you take in one, you give out +another. The composition of those two breaths is different. +Their effects are different. The breath which has been breathed +out must not be breathed in again. To tell you why it must not +would lead me into anatomical details, not quite in place here as +yet; though the day will come, I trust, when every woman entrusted +with the care of children will be expected to know something about +them. But this I may say: Those who habitually take in fresh +breath will probably grow up large, strong, ruddy, cheerful, +active, clear-headed, fit for their work. Those who habitually +take in the breath which has been breathed out by themselves, or +any other living creature, will certainly grow up, if they grow up +at all, small, weak, pale, nervous, depressed, unfit for work, and +tempted continually to resort to stimulants, and become drunkards. + +If you want to see how different the breath breathed out is from +the breath taken in, you have only to try a somewhat cruel +experiment, but one which people too often try upon themselves, +their children, and their workpeople. If you take any small +animal with lungs like your own--a mouse, for instance--and force +it to breathe no air but what you have breathed already; if you +put it in a close box, and while you take in breath from the outer +air, send out your breath through a tube, into that box, the +animal will soon faint: if you go on long with this process, it +will die. + +Take a second instance, which I beg to press most seriously on the +notice of mothers, governesses, and nurses. If you allow a child +to get into the habit of sleeping with its head under the bed- +clothes, and thereby breathing its own breath over and over again, +that child will assuredly grow pale, weak, and ill. Medical men +have cases on record of scrofula appearing in children previously +healthy, which could only be accounted for from this habit, and +which ceased when the habit stopped. Let me again entreat your +attention to this undoubted fact. + +Take another instance, which is only too common: If you are in a +crowded room, with plenty of fire and lights and company, doors +and windows all shut tight, how often you feel faint--so faint +that you may require smelling-salts or some other stimulant. The +cause of your faintness is just the same as that of the mouse's +fainting in the box; you and your friends, and, as I shall show +you presently, the fire and the candles likewise, having been all +breathing each other's breaths, over and over again, till the air +has become unfit to support life. You are doing your best to +enact over again the Highland tragedy, of which Sir James Simpson +tells in his lectures to the working-classes of Edinburgh, when at +a Christmas meeting thirty-six persons danced all night in a small +room with a low ceiling, keeping the doors and windows shut. The +atmosphere of the room was noxious beyond description; and the +effect was, that seven of the party were soon after seized with +typhus fever, of which two died. You are inflicting on yourselves +the torments of the poor dog, who is kept at the Grotto del Cane, +near Naples, to be stupefied, for the amusement of visitors, by +the carbonic acid gas of the Grotto, and brought to life again by +being dragged into the fresh air; nay, you are inflicting upon +yourselves the torments of the famous Black Hole of Calcutta: +and, if there was no chimney in the room, by which some fresh air +could enter, the candles would soon burn blue, as they do, you +know, when ghosts appear; your brains become disturbed; and you +yourselves ran the risk of becoming ghosts, and the candles of +actually going out. + +Of this last fact there is no doubt; for if, instead of putting a +mouse into the box, you will put a lighted candle, and breathe +into the tube as before, however gently, you will in a short time +put the candle out. + +Now, how is this? First, what is the difference between the +breath you take in and the breath you give out? And next, why has +it a similar effect on animal life and a lighted candle? + +The difference is this. The breath which you take in is, or ought +to be, pure air, composed, on the whole, of oxygen and nitrogen, +with a minute portion of carbonic acid. + +The breath which you give out is an impure air, to which has been +added, among other matters which will not support life, an excess +of carbonic acid. + +That this is the fact you can prove for yourselves by a simple +experiment. Get a little lime-water at the chemist's, and breathe +into it through a glass tube; your breath will at once make the +lime-water milky. The carbonic acid of your breath has laid hold +of the lime, and made it visible as white carbonate of lime--in +plain English, as common chalk. + +Now I do not wish, as I said, to load your memories with +scientific terms: but I beseech you to remember at least these +two, oxygen gas and carbonic acid gas; and to remember that, as +surely as oxygen feeds the fire of life, so surely does carbonic +acid put it out. + +I say, "the fire of life." In that expression lies the answer to +our second question: Why does our breath produce a similar effect +upon the mouse and the lighted candle? Every one of us is, as it +were, a living fire. Were we not, how could we be always warmer +than the air outside us? There is a process; going on perpetually +in each of us, similar to that by which coals are burnt in the +fire, oil in a lamp, wax in a candle, and the earth itself in a +volcano. To keep each of those fires alight, oxygen is needed; +and the products of combustion, as they are called, are more or +less the same in each case--carbonic acid and steam. + +These facts justify the expression I just made use of--which may +have seemed to some of you fantastical--that the fire and the +candles in the crowded room were breathing the same breath as you +were. It is but too true. An average fire in the grate requires, +to keep it burning, as much oxygen as several human beings do; +each candle or lamp must have its share of oxygen likewise, and +that a very considerable one, and an average gas-burner--pray +attend to this, you who live in rooms lighted with gas--consumes +as much oxygen as several candles. All alike are making carbonic +acid. The carbonic acid of the fire happily escapes up the +chimney in the smoke: but the carbonic acid from the human beings +and the candles remains to poison the room, unless it be +ventilated. + +Now, I think you may understand one of the simplest, and yet most +terrible, cases of want of ventilation--death by the fumes of +charcoal. A human being shut up in a room, of which every crack +is closed, with a pan of burning charcoal, falls asleep, never to +wake again. His inward fire is competing with the fire of +charcoal for the oxygen of the room; both are making carbonic acid +out of it: but the charcoal, being the stronger of the two, gets +all the oxygen to itself, and leaves the human being nothing to +inhale but the carbonic acid which it has made. The human being, +being the weaker, dies first: but the charcoal dies also. When +it has exhausted all the oxygen of the room, it cools, goes out, +and is found in the morning half-consumed beside its victim. If +you put a giant or an elephant, I should conceive, into that room, +instead of a human being, the case would be reversed for a time: +the elephant would put out the burning charcoal by the carbonic +acid from his mighty lungs; and then, when he had exhausted all +the air in the room, die likewise of his own carbonic acid. + +Now, I think, we may see what ventilation means, and why it is +needed. + +Ventilation means simply letting out the foul air, and letting in +the fresh air; letting out the air which has been breathed by men +or by candles, and letting in the air which has not. To +understand how to do that, we must remember a most simple chemical +law, that a gas as it is warmed expands, and therefore becomes +lighter; as it cools, it contracts, and becomes heavier. + +Now the carbonic acid in the breath which comes out of our mouth +is warm, lighter than the air, and rises to the ceiling; and +therefore in any unventilated room full of people, there is a +layer of foul air along the ceiling. You might soon test that for +yourselves, if you could mount a ladder and put your heads there +aloft. You do test it for yourselves when you sit in the +galleries of churches and theatres, where the air is palpably more +foul, and therefore more injurious, than down below. + +Where, again, work-people are employed in a crowded house of many +storeys, the health of those who work on the upper floors always +suffers most. + +In the old monkey-house of the Zoological Gardens, when the cages +were on the old plan, tier upon tier, the poor little fellows in +the uppermost tier--so I have been told--always died first of the +monkey's constitutional complaint, consumption, simply from +breathing the warm breath of their friends below. But since the +cages have been altered, and made to range side by side from top +to bottom, consumption--I understand--has vastly diminished among +them. + +The first question in ventilation, therefore, is to get this +carbonic acid safe out of the room, while it is warm and light and +close to the ceiling; for if you do not, this happens: The +carbonic acid gas cools and becomes heavier; for carbonic acid, at +the same temperature as common air, is so much heavier than common +air, that you may actually--if you are handy enough--turn it from +one vessel to another, and pour out for your enemy a glass of +invisible poison. So down to the floor this heavy carbonic acid +comes, and lies along it, just as it lies often in the bottom of +old wells, or old brewers' vats, as a stratum of poison, killing +occasionally the men who descend into it. Hence, as foolish a +practice as I know is that of sleeping on the floor; for towards +the small hours, when the room gets cold, the sleeper on the floor +is breathing carbonic acid. + +And here one word to those ladies who interest themselves with the +poor. The poor are too apt in times of distress to pawn their +bedsteads and keep their beds. Never, if you have influence, let +that happen. Keep the bedstead, whatever else may go, to save the +sleeper from the carbonic acid on the floor. + +How, then, shall we get rid of the foul air at the top of the +room? After all that has been written and tried on ventilation, I +know no simpler method than putting into the chimney one of +Arnott's ventilators, which may be bought and fixed for a few +shillings; always remembering that it must be. fixed into the +chimney as near the ceiling as possible. I can speak of these +ventilators from twenty-five years' experience. Living in a house +with low ceilings, liable to become overcharged with carbonic +acid, which produces sleepiness in the evening, I have found that +these ventilators keep the air fresh and pure; and I consider the +presence of one of these ventilators in a room more valuable than +three or four feet additional height of ceiling. I have found, +too, that their working proves how necessary they are, from this +simple fact: You would suppose that, as the ventilator opens +freely into the chimney, the smoke would be blown down through it +in high winds, and blacken the ceiling: but this is just what +does not happen. If the ventilator be at all properly poised, so +as to shut with a violent gust of wind, it will at all other +moments keep itself permanently open; proving thereby that there +is an up-draught of heated air continually escaping from the +ceiling up the chimney. Another very simple method of ventilation +is employed in those excellent cottages which Her Majesty has +built for her labourers round Windsor. Over each door a sheet of +perforated zinc, some eighteen inches square, is fixed; allowing +the foul air to escape into the passage; and in the ceiling of the +passage a similar sheet of zinc, allowing it to escape into the +roof. Fresh air, meanwhile, should be obtained from outside, by +piercing the windows, or otherwise. And here let me give one hint +to all builders of houses: If possible, let bedroom windows open +at the top as well as at the bottom. + +Let me impress the necessity of using some such contrivances, not +only on parents and educators, but on those who employ workpeople, +and above all on those who employ young women in shops or in work- +rooms. What their condition may be in this city I know not; but +most painful it has been to me in other places, when passing +through warehouses or workrooms, to see the pale, sodden, and, as +the French would say, "etiolated" countenances of the girls who +were passing the greater part of the day in them; and painful, +also, to breathe an atmosphere of which habit had, alas! made them +unconscious, but which to one coming out of the open air was +altogether noxious, and shocking also; for it was fostering the +seeds of death, not only in the present but future generations. + +Why should this be? Everyone will agree that good ventilation is +necessary in a hospital, because people cannot get well without +fresh air. Do they not see that by the same reasoning good +ventilation is necessary everywhere, because people cannot remain +well without fresh air? Let me entreat those who employ women in +workrooms, if they have no time to read through such books as Dr. +Andrew Combe's "Physiology applied to Health and Education," and +Madame de Wahl's "Practical Hints on the Moral, Mental, and +Physical Training of Girls," to procure certain tracts published +by Messrs. Jarrold, Paternoster Row, for the Ladies' Sanitary +Association; especially one which bears on this subject: "The +Black-hole in our own Bedrooms;" Dr. Lankester's "School Manual of +Health;" or a manual on ventilation, published by the Metropolitan +Working Classes Association for the Improvement of Public Health. + +I look forward--I say it openly--to some period of higher +civilisation, when the Acts of Parliament for the ventilation of +factories and workshops shall be largely extended, and made far +more stringent; when officers of public health shall be empowered +to enforce the ventilation of every room in which persons are +employed for hire: and empowered also to demand a proper system +of ventilation for every new house, whether in country or in town. +To that, I believe, we must come: but I had sooner far see these +improvements carried out, as befits the citizens of a free +country, in the spirit of the Gospel rather than in that of the +Law; carried out, not compulsorily and from fear of fines, but +voluntarily, from a sense of duty, honour, and humanity. I +appeal, therefore, to the good feeling of all whom it may concern, +whether the health of those whom they employ, and therefore the +supply of fresh air which they absolutely need, are not matters +for which they are not, more or less, responsible to their country +and their God. + +And if any excellent person of the old school should answer me: +"Why make all this fuss about ventilation? Our forefathers got on +very well without it"--I must answer that, begging their pardons, +our ancestors did nothing of the kind. Our ancestors got on +usually very ill in these matters: and when they got on well, it +was because they had good ventilation in spite of themselves. + +First. They got on very ill. To quote a few remarkable instances +of longevity, or to tell me that men were larger and stronger on +the average in old times, is to yield to the old fallacy of +fancying that savages were peculiarly healthy, because those who +were seen were active and strong. The simple answer is, that the +strong alone survived, while the majority died from the severity +of the training. Savages do not increase in number; and our +ancestors increased but very slowly for many centuries. I am not +going to disgust my audience with statistics of disease: but +knowing something, as I happen to do, of the social state and of +the health of the Middle and Elizabethan Ages, I have no +hesitation in saying that the average of disease and death was far +greater then than it is now. Epidemics of many kinds, typhus, +ague, plague--all diseases which were caused more or less by bad +air--devastated this land and Europe in those days with a horrible +intensity, to which even the choleras of our times are mild. The +back streets, the hospitals, the gaols, the barracks, the camps-- +every place in which any large number of persons congregated, were +so many nests of pestilence, engendered by uncleanliness, which +defiled alike the water which was drunk and the air which was +breathed; and as a single fact, of which the tables of insurance +companies assure us, the average of human life in England has +increased twenty-five per cent. since the reign of George I., +owing simply to our more rational and cleanly habits of life. + +But secondly, I said that when our ancestors got on well, they did +so because they got ventilation in spite of themselves. Luckily +for them, their houses were ill-built; their doors and windows +would not shut. They had lattice-windowed houses, too; to live in +one of which, as I can testify from long experience, is as +thoroughly ventilating as living in a lantern with the horn broken +out. It was because their houses were full of draughts, and still +more, in the early Middle Age, because they had no glass, and +stopped out the air only by a shutter at night, that they sought +for shelter rather than for fresh air, of which they sometimes had +too much; and, to escape the wind, built their houses in holes, +such as that in which the old city of Winchester stands. Shelter, +I believe, as much as the desire to be near fish in Lent, and to +occupy the rich alluvium of the valleys, made the monks of Old +England choose the river-banks for the sites of their abbeys. +They made a mistake therein, which, like most mistakes, did not go +unpunished. These low situations, especially while the forests +were yet thick on the hills around, were the perennial haunts of +fever and ague, produced by subtle vegetable poisons, carried in +the carbonic acid given off by rotten vegetation. So there, +again, they fell in with man's old enemy--bad air. Still, as long +as the doors and windows did not shut, some free circulation of +air remained. But now, our doors and windows shut only too tight. +We have plate-glass instead of lattices; and we have replaced the +draughty and smoky, but really wholesome open chimney, with its +wide corners and settles, by narrow registers, and even by stoves. +We have done all we can, in fact, to seal ourselves up +hermetically from the outer air, and to breath our own breaths +over and over again; and we pay the penalty of it in a thousand +ways unknown to our ancestors, through whose rooms all the winds +of heaven whistled, and who were glad enough to shelter themselves +from draughts in the sitting-room by the high screen round the +fire, and in the sleeping-room by the thick curtains of the four- +post bedstead, which is now rapidly disappearing before a higher +civilisation. We therefore absolutely require to make for +ourselves the very ventilation from which our ancestors tried to +escape. + +But, ladies, there is an old and true proverb, that you may bring +a horse to the water, but you cannot make him drink. And in like +wise it is too true, that you may bring people to the fresh air, +but you cannot make them breath it. Their own folly, or the folly +of their parents and educators, prevents their lungs being duly +filled and duly emptied. Therefore the blood is not duly +oxygenated, and the whole system goes wrong. Paleness, weakness, +consumption, scrofula, and too many other ailments, are the +consequences of ill-filled lungs. For without well-filled lungs, +robust health is impossible. + +And if anyone shall answer: "We do not want robust health so much +as intellectual attainment; the mortal body, being the lower +organ, must take its chance, and be even sacrificed, if need be to +the higher organ--the immortal mind"--To such I reply, You cannot +do it. The laws of nature, which are the express will of God, +laugh such attempts to scorn. Every organ of the body is formed +out of the blood; and if the blood be vitiated, every organ +suffers in proportion to its delicacy; and the brain, being the +most delicate and highly specialised of all organs, suffers most +of all, and soonest of all, as everyone knows who has tried to +work his brain when his digestion was the least out of order. +Nay, the very morals will suffer. From ill-filled lungs, which +signify ill-repaired blood, arise year by year an amount not +merely of disease, but of folly, temper, laziness, intemperance, +madness, and, let me tell you fairly, crime--the sum of which will +never be known till that great day when men shall be called to +account for all deeds done in the body, whether they be good or +evil. + +I must refer you on this subject again to Andrew Combe's +"Physiology," especially chapters iv. and vii.; and also to +chapter x. of Madame de Wahl's excellent book. I will only say +this shortly, that the three most common causes of ill-filled +lungs, in children and in young ladies, are stillness, silence, +and stays. + +First, stillness; a sedentary life, and want of exercise. A girl +is kept for hours sitting on a form writing or reading, to do +which she must lean forward; and if her schoolmistress cruelly +attempts to make her sit upright, and thereby keep the spine in an +attitude for which Nature did not intend it, she is thereby doing +her best to bring on that disease, so fearfully common in girls' +schools, lateral curvature of the spine. But practically the girl +will stoop forward. And what happens? The lower ribs are pressed +into the body, thereby displacing more or less something inside. +The diaphragm in the meantime, which is the very bellows of the +lungs, remains loose; the lungs are never properly filled or +emptied; and an excess of carbonic acid accumulates at the bottom +of them. What follows? Frequent sighing to get rid of it; +heaviness of head; depression of the whole nervous system under +the influence of the poison of the lungs; and when the poor child +gets up from her weary work, what is the first thing she probably +does? She lifts up her chest, stretches, yawns, and breathes +deeply--Nature's voice, Nature's instinctive cure, which is +probably regarded as ungraceful, as what is called "lolling" is. +As if sitting upright was not an attitude in itself essentially +ungraceful, and such as no artist would care to draw. As if +"lolling," which means putting the body in the attitude of the +most perfect ease compatible with a fully-expanded chest, was not +in itself essentially graceful, and to be seen in every reposing +figure in Greek bas-reliefs and vases; graceful, and like all +graceful actions, healthful at the same time. The only tolerably +wholesome attitude of repose, which I see allowed in average +school-rooms, is lying on the back on the floor, or on a sloping +board, in which case the lungs must be fully expanded. But even +so, a pillow, or some equivalent, ought to be placed under the +small of the back: or the spine will be strained at its very +weakest point. + +I now go on to the second mistake--enforced silence. Moderate +reading aloud is good: but where there is any tendency to +irritability of throat or lungs, too much moderation cannot be +used. You may as well try to cure a diseased lung by working it, +as to cure a lame horse by galloping him. But where the breathing +organs are of average health let it be said once and for all, that +children and young people cannot make too much noise. The parents +who cannot bear the noise of their children have no right to have +brought them into the world. The schoolmistress who enforces +silence on her pupils is committing--unintentionally no doubt, but +still committing--an offence against reason, worthy only of a +convent. Every shout, every burst of laughter, every song--nay, +in the case of infants, as physiologists well know, every moderate +fit of crying--conduces to health, by rapidly filling and emptying +the lung, and changing the blood more rapidly from black to red, +that is, from death to life. Andrew Combe tells a story of a +large charity school, in which the young girls were, for the sake +of their health, shut up in the hall and school-room during play +hours, from November till March, and no romping or noise allowed. +The natural consequences were, the great majority of them fell +ill; and I am afraid that a great deal of illness has been from +time to time contracted in certain school-rooms, simply through +this one cause of enforced silence. Some cause or other there +must be for the amount of ill-health and weakliness which prevails +especially among girls of the middle classes in towns, who have +not, poor things, the opportunities which richer girls have, of +keeping themselves in strong health by riding, skating, archery,-- +that last quite an admirable exercise for the chest and lungs, and +far preferable to croquet, which involves too much unwholesome +stooping.--Even a game of ball, if milliners and shop-girls had +room to indulge in one after their sedentary work, might bring +fresh spirits to many a heart, and fresh colour to many a cheek. + +I spoke just now of the Greeks. I suppose you will all allow that +the Greeks were, as far as we know, the most beautiful race which +the world ever saw. Every educated man knows that they were also +the cleverest of all races; and, next to his Bible, thanks, God +for Greek literature. + +Now, these people had made physical as well as intellectual +education a science as well as a study. Their women practised +graceful, and in some cases even athletic, exercises. They +developed, by a free and healthy life, those figures which remain +everlasting and unapproachable models of human beauty: but--to +come to my third point--they wore no stays. The first mention of +stays that I have ever found is in the letters of dear old +Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene, on the Greek coast of Africa, about +four hundred years after the Christian era. He tells us how, when +he was shipwrecked on a remote part of the coast, and he and the +rest of the passengers were starving on cockles and limpets, there +was among them a slave girl out of the far East, who had a pinched +wasp-waist, such as you may see on the old Hindoo sculptures, and +such as you may see in any street in a British town. And when the +Greek ladies of the neighbourhood found her out, they sent for her +from house to house, to behold, with astonishment and laughter, +this new and prodigious, waist, with which it seemed to them it +was impossible for a human being to breathe or live; and they +petted the poor girl, and fed her, as they might a dwarf or a +giantess, till she got quite fat and comfortable, while her owners +had not enough to eat. So strange and ridiculous seemed our +present fashion to the descendants of those who, centuries before, +had imagined, because they had seen living and moving, those +glorious statues which we pretend to admire, but refuse to +imitate. + +It seems to me that a few centuries hence, when mankind has learnt +to fear God more, and therefore to obey more strictly those laws +of nature and of science which are the will of God--it seems to +me, I say, that in those days the present fashion of tight lacing +will be looked back upon as a contemptible and barbarous +superstition, denoting a very low level of civilisation in the +peoples which have practised it. That for generations past women +should have been in the habit--not to please men, who do not care +about the matter as a point of beauty--but simply to vie with each +other in obedience to something called fashion--that they should, +I say, have been in the habit of deliberately crushing that part +of the body which should be specially left free, contracting and +displacing their lungs, their heart, and all the most vital and +important organs, and entailing thereby disease, not only on +themselves but on their children after them; that for forty years +past physicians should have been telling them of the folly of what +they have been doing; and that they should as yet, in the great +majority of cases, not only turn a deaf ear to all warnings, but +actually deny the offence, of which one glance of the physician or +the sculptor, who know what shape the human body ought to be, +brings them in guilty--this, I say, is an instance of--what shall +I call it?--which deserves at once the lash, not merely of the +satirist, but of any theologian who really believes that God made +the physical universe. Let me, I pray you, appeal to your common +sense for a moment. When any one chooses a horse or a dog, +whether for strength, for speed, or for any other useful purpose, +the first thing almost to be looked at is the girth round the +ribs; the room for heart and lungs. Exactly in proportion to that +will be the animal's general healthiness, power of endurance, and +value in many other ways. If you will look at eminent lawyers and +famous orators, who have attained a healthy old age, you will see +that in every case they are men, like the late Lord Palmerston, +and others whom I could mention, of remarkable size, not merely in +the upper, but in the lower part of the chest; men who had, +therefore, a peculiar power of using the diaphragm to fill and to +clear the lungs, and therefore to oxygenate the blood of the whole +body. Now, it is just these lower ribs, across which the +diaphragm is stretched like the head of a drum, which stays +contract to a minimum. If you advised owners of horses and hounds +to put their horses or their hounds into stays, and lace them up +tight, in order to increase their beauty, you would receive, I +doubt not, a very courteous, but certainly a very decided, refusal +to do that which would spoil not merely the animals themselves, +but the whole stud or the whole kennel for years to come. And if +you advised an orator to put himself into tight stays, he, no +doubt, again would give a courteous answer; but he would reply--if +he was a really educated man--that to comply with your request +would involve his giving up public work, under the probable +penalty of being dead within the twelve-month. + +And how much work of every kind, intellectual as well as physical, +is spoiled or hindered; how many deaths occur from consumption and +other complaints which are the result of this habit of tight +lacing, is known partly to the medical men, who lift up their +voices in vain, and known fully to Him who will not interfere with +the least of His own physical laws to save human beings from the +consequences of their own wilful folly. + +And now--to end this lecture with more pleasing thoughts--What +becomes of this breath which passes from your lips? Is it merely +harmful; merely waste? God forbid! God has forbidden that +anything should be merely harmful or merely waste in this so wise +and well-made world. The carbonic acid which passes from your +lips at every breath--ay, even that which oozes from the volcano +crater when the eruption is past--is a precious boon to thousands +of things of which you have daily need. Indeed there is a sort of +hint at physical truth in the old fairy tale of the girl, from +whose lips, as she spoke, fell pearls and diamonds; for the +carbonic acid of your breath may help hereafter to make the pure +carbonate of lime of a pearl, or the still purer carbon of a +diamond. Nay, it may go--in such a world of transformations do we +live--to make atoms of coal strata, which after being buried for +ages beneath deep seas, shall be upheaved in continents which are +yet unborn, and there be burnt for the use of a future race of +men, and resolved into their original elements. Coal, wise men +tell us, is on the whole breath and sunlight; the breath of living +creatures who have lived in the vast swamps and forests of some +primeval world, and the sunlight which transmuted that breath into +the leaves and stems of trees, magically locked up for ages in +that black stone, to become, when it is burnt at last, light and +carbonic acid as it was at first. For though you must not breathe +your breath again, you may at least eat your breath, if you will +allow the sun to transmute it for you into vegetables; or you may +enjoy its fragrance and its colour in the shape of a lily or a +rose. When you walk in a sunlit garden, every word you speak, +every breath you breathe, is feeding the plants and flowers +around. The delicate surface of the green leaves absorbs the +carbonic acid, and parts it into its elements, retaining the +carbon to make woody fibre, and courteously returning you the +oxygen to mingle with the fresh air, and be inhaled by your lungs +once more. Thus do you feed the plants; just as the plants feed +you: while the great life-giving sun feeds both; and the geranium +standing in the sick child's window does not merely rejoice his +eye and mind by its beauty and freshness, but repays honestly the +trouble spent on it; absorbing the breath which the child needs +not, and giving to him the breath which he needs. + +So are the services of all things constituted according to a +Divine and wonderful order, and knit together in mutual dependence +and mutual helpfulness--a fact to be remembered with hope and +comfort: but also with awe and fear. For as in that which is +above nature, so in nature itself; he that breaks one physical law +is guilty of all. The whole universe, as it were, takes up arms +against him; and all nature, with her numberless and unseen +powers, is ready to avenge herself on him, and on his children +after him, he knows not when nor where. He, on the other hand, +who obeys the laws of nature with his whole heart and mind, will +find all things working together to him for good. He is at peace +with the physical universe. He is helped and befriended alike by +the sun above his head and the dust beneath his feet; because he +is obeying the will and mind of Him who made sun, and dust, and +all things; and who has given them a law which cannot be broken. + + + +THRIFT {5} + + + +Ladies,--I have chosen for the title of this lecture a practical +and prosaic word, because I intend the lecture itself to be as +practical and prosaic as I can make it, without becoming +altogether dull. + +The question of the better or worse education of women is one far +too important for vague sentiment, wild aspirations, or Utopian +dreams. + +It is a practical question, on which depends not merely money or +comfort, but too often health and life, as the consequences of a +good education, or disease and death--I know too well of what I +speak--as the consequences of a bad one. + +I beg you, therefore, to put out of your minds at the outset any +fancy that I wish for a social revolution in the position of +women; or that I wish to see them educated by exactly the same +methods, and in exactly the same subjects, as men. British lads, +on an average, are far too ill-taught still, in spite of all +recent improvements, for me to wish that British girls should be +taught in the same way. + +Moreover, whatever defects there may have been--and defects there +must be in all things human--in the past education of British +women, it has been most certainly a splendid moral success. It +has made, by the grace of God, British women the best wives, +mothers, daughters, sisters, aunts, that the world, as far as I +can discover, has yet seen. + +Let those who will, sneer at the women of England. We who have to +do the work and to fight the battle of life know the inspiration +which we derive from their virtue, their counsel, their +tenderness, and--but too often--from their compassion and their +forgiveness. There is, I doubt not, still left in England many a +man with chivalry and patriotism enough to challenge the world to +show so perfect a specimen of humanity as a cultivated British +woman. + +But just because a cultivated British woman is so perfect a +personage; therefore I wish to see all British women cultivated. +Because the womanhood of England is so precious a treasure; I wish +to see none of it wasted. It is an invaluable capital, or +material, out of which the greatest possible profit to the nation +must be made. And that can only be done by Thrift; and that, +again, can only be attained by knowledge. + +Consider that word Thrift. If you will look at "Dr. Johnson's +Dictionary," or if you know your "Shakespeare," you will see that +Thrift signified originally profits, gain, riches gotten--in a +word, the marks of a man's thriving. + +How, then, did the word Thrift get to mean parsimony, frugality, +the opposite of waste? Just in the same way as economy--which +first, of course, meant the management of a household--got to mean +also the opposite of waste. + +It was found that in commerce, in husbandry, in any process, in +fact, men throve in proportion as they saved their capital, their +material, their force. + +Now this is a great law which runs through life; one of those laws +of nature--call them, rather, laws of God--which apply not merely +to political economy, to commerce, and to mechanics; but to +physiology, to society; to the intellect, to the heart, of every +person in this room. + +The secret of thriving is thrift; saving of force; to get as much +work as possible done with the least expenditure of power, the +least jar and obstruction, least wear and tear. + +And the secret of thrift is knowledge. In proportion as you know +the laws and nature of a subject, you will be able to work at it +easily, surely, rapidly, successfully; instead of wasting your +money or your energies in mistaken schemes, irregular efforts, +which end in disappointment and exhaustion. + +The secret of thrift, I say, is knowledge. The more you know, the +more you can save yourself and that which belongs to you; and can +do more work with less effort. + +A knowledge of the laws of commercial credit, we all know, saves +capital, enabling a less capital to do the work of a greater. +Knowledge of the electric telegraph saves time; knowledge of +writing saves human speech and locomotion; knowledge of domestic +economy saves income; knowledge of sanitary laws saves health and +life; knowledge of the laws of the intellect saves wear and tear +of brain; and knowledge of the laws of the spirit--what does it +not save? + +A well-educated moral sense, a well-regulated character, saves +from idleness and ennui, alternating with sentimentality and +excitement, those tenderer emotions, those deeper passions, those +nobler aspirations of humanity, which are the heritage of the +woman far more than of the man; and which are potent in her, for +evil or for good, in proportion as they are left to run wild and +undisciplined; or are trained and developed into graceful, +harmonious, self-restraining strength, beautiful in themselves, +and a blessing to all who come under their influence. + +What, therefore, I recommend to ladies in this lecture is thrift: +thrift of themselves and of their own powers: and knowledge as +the parent of thrift. + +And because it is well to begin with the lower applications of +thrift, and to work up to the higher, I am much pleased to hear +that the first course of the proposed lectures to women in this +place will be one on domestic economy. + +I presume that the learned gentleman who will deliver these +lectures will be the last to mean by that term the mere saving of +money; that he will tell you, as--being a German--he will have +good reason to know, that the young lady who learns thrift in +domestic economy is also learning thrift of the very highest +faculties of her immortal spirit. He will tell you, I doubt not-- +for he must know--how you may see in Germany young ladies living +in what we more luxurious British would consider something like +poverty; cooking, waiting at table, and performing many a +household office which would be here considered menial; and yet +finding time for a cultivation of the intellect, which is, +unfortunately, too rare in Great Britain. + +The truth is, that we British are too wealthy. We make money, if +not too rapidly for the good of the nation at large, yet too +rapidly, I fear, for the good of the daughters of those who make +it. Their temptation--I do not, of course, say they all yield to +it--but their temptation is, to waste of the very simplest--I had +almost said, if I may be pardoned the expression, of the most +barbaric--kind; to an oriental waste of money, and waste of time; +to a fondness for mere finery, pardonable enough, but still a +waste; and to the mistaken fancy that it is the mark of a lady to +sit idle and let servants do everything for her. + +But it is not of this sort of waste of which I wish to speak to- +day. I only mention the matter in passing, to show that high +intellectual culture is not incompatible with the performance of +homely household duties, and that the moral success of which I +spoke just now need not be injured, any more than it is in +Germany, by intellectual success likewise. I trust that these +words may reassure those parents, if any such there be here, who +may fear that these lectures will withdraw women from their +existing sphere of interest and activity. That they should +entertain such a fear is not surprising, after the extravagant +opinions and schemes which have been lately broached in various +quarters. + +The programme to these lectures expressly disclaims any such +intentions; and I, as a husband and a father, expressly disclaim +any such intention likewise. + +"To fit women for the more enlightened performance of their +special duties;" to help them towards learning how to do better +what we doubt not many of them are already doing well; is, I +honestly believe, the only object of the promoters of this scheme. + +Let us see now how some of these special duties can be better +performed by help of a little enlightenment as to the laws which +regulate them. + +Now, no man will deny--certainly no man who is past forty-five, +and whose digestion is beginning to quail before the lumps of beef +and mutton which are the boast of a British kitchen, and to +prefer, with Justice Shallow, and, I presume, Sir John Falstaff +also, "any pretty little tiny kickshaws"--no man, I say, who has +reached that age, but will feel it a practical comfort to him to +know that the young ladies of his family are at all events good +cooks; and understand, as the French do, thrift in the matter of +food. + +Neither will any parent who wishes, naturally enough, that his +daughters should cost him as little as possible; and wishes, +naturally enough also, that they should be as well dressed as +possible, deny that it would be a good thing for them to be +practical milliners and mantua-makers; and, by making their own +clothes gracefully and well, exercise thrift in clothing. + +But, beside this thrift in clothing, I am not alone, I believe, in +wishing for some thrift in the energy which produces it. Labour +misapplied, you will agree, is labour wasted; and as dress, I +presume, is intended to adorn the person of the wearer, the making +a dress which only disfigures her may be considered as a plain +case of waste. It would be impertinent in me to go into any +details: but it is impossible to walk about the streets now +without passing young people who must be under a deep delusion as +to the success of their own toilette. Instead of graceful and +noble simplicity of form, instead of combinations of colour at +once rich and delicate, because in accordance with the chromatic +laws of nature, one meets with phenomena more and more painful to +the eye, and startling to common sense, till one would be hardly +more astonished, and certainly hardly more shocked, if in a year +or two, one should pass someone going about like a Chinese lady, +with pinched feet, or like a savage of the Amazons, with a wooden +bung through her lower lip. It is easy to complain of these +monstrosities: but impossible to cure them, it seems to me, +without an education of the taste, an education in those laws of +nature which produce beauty in form and beauty in colour. For +that the cause of these failures lies in want of education is +patent. They are most common in--I had almost said they are +confined to--those classes of well-to-do persons who are the least +educated; who have no standard of taste of their own; and who do +not acquire any from cultivated friends and relations: who, in +consequence, dress themselves blindly according to what they +conceive to be the Paris fashions, conveyed at third-hand through +an equally uneducated dressmaker; in innocent ignorance of the +fact--for fact I believe it to be--that Paris fashions are +invented now not in the least for the sake of beauty, but for the +sake of producing, through variety, increased expenditure, and +thereby increased employment; according to the strange system +which now prevails in France of compelling, if not prosperity, at +least the signs of it; and like schoolboys before a holiday, +nailing up the head of the weather-glass to insure fine weather. + +Let British ladies educate themselves in those laws of beauty +which are as eternal as any other of nature's laws; which may be +seen fulfilled, as Mr. Ruskin tells us, so eloquently in every +flower and every leaf, in every sweeping down and rippling wave; +and they will be able to invent graceful and economical dresses +for themselves, without importing tawdry and expensive ugliness +from France. + +Let me now go a step farther, and ask you to consider this: There +are in England now a vast number, and an increasing number, of +young women who, from various circumstances which we all know, +must in after life be either the mistresses of their own fortunes, +or the earners of their own bread. And, to do that wisely and +well, they must be more or less women of business, and to be women +of business they must know something of the meaning of the words +Capital, Profit, Price, Value, Labour, Wages, and of the relation +between those two last. In a word, they must know a little +political economy. Nay, I sometimes think that the mistress of +every household might find, not only thrift of money, but thrift +of brain; freedom from mistakes, anxieties, worries of many kinds, +all of which eat out the health as well as the heart, by a little +sound knowledge of the principles of political economy. + +When we consider that every mistress of a household is continually +buying, if not selling; that she is continually hiring and +employing labour in the form of servants; and very often, into the +bargain, keeping her husband's accounts: I cannot but think that +her hard-worked brain might be clearer, and her hard-tried desire +to do her duty by every subject in her little kingdom, might be +more easily satisfied, had she read something of what Mr. John +Stuart Mill has written, especially on the duties of employer and +employed. A capitalist, a commercialist, an employer of labour, +and an accountant--every mistress of a household is all these, +whether she likes it or not; and it would be surely well for her, +in so very complicated a state of society as this, not to trust +merely to that mother-wit, that intuitive sagacity and innate +power of ruling her fellow-creatures, which carries women so nobly +through their work in simpler and less civilised societies. + +And here I stop to answer those who may say--as I have heard it +said--That a woman's intellect is not fit for business; that when +a woman takes to business, she is apt to do it ill, and +unpleasantly likewise, to be more suspicious, more irritable, more +grasping, more unreasonable, than regular men of business would +be: that--as I have heard it put--"a woman does not fight fair." +The answer is simple. That a woman's intellect is eminently +fitted for business is proved by the enormous amount of business +she gets through without any special training for it: but those +faults in a woman of which some men complain are simply the +results of her not having had a special training. She does not +know the laws of business. She does not know the rules of the +game she is playing; and therefore she is playing it in the dark, +in fear and suspicion, apt to judge of questions on personal +grounds, often offending those with whom she has to do, and +oftener still making herself miserable over matters of law or of +business, on which a little sound knowledge would set her head and +her heart at rest. + +When I have seen widows, having the care of children, of a great +household, of a great estate, of a great business, struggling +heroically, and yet often mistakenly; blamed severely for +selfishness and ambition, while they were really sacrificing +themselves with the divine instinct of a mother for their +children's interest: I have stood by with mingled admiration and +pity, and said to myself: "How nobly she is doing the work +without teaching! How much more nobly would she have done it had +she been taught! She is now doing her work at the most enormous +waste of energy and of virtue: had she had knowledge, thrift +would have followed it; she would have done more work with far +less trouble. She will probably kill herself if she goes on; +while sound knowledge would have saved her health, saved her +heart, saved her friends, and helped the very loved ones for whom +she labours, not always with success." + +A little political economy, therefore, will at least do no harm to +a woman; especially if she have to take care of herself in after +life; neither, I think, will she be much harmed by some sound +knowledge of another subject, which I see promised in these +lectures: "Natural philosophy, in its various branches, such as +the chemistry of common life, light, heat, electricity, etc. etc." + +A little knowledge of the laws of light, for instance, would teach +many women that by shutting themselves up day after day, week +after week, in darkened rooms, they are as certainly committing a +waste of health, destroying their vital energy, and diseasing +their brains, as if they were taking so much poison the whole +time. + +A little knowledge of the laws of heat would teach women not to +clothe themselves and their children after foolish and +insufficient fashions, which in this climate sow the seeds of a +dozen different diseases, and have to be atoned for by perpetual +anxieties, and by perpetual doctors' bills; and as for a little +knowledge of the laws of electricity, one thrift I am sure it +would produce--thrift to us men, of having to answer continual +inquiries as to what the weather is going to be, when a slight +knowledge of the barometer, or of the form of the clouds and the +direction of the wind, would enable many a lady to judge for +herself, and not, after inquiry on inquiry, regardless of all +warnings, go out on the first appearance of a strip of blue sky, +and come home wet through, with what she calls "only a chill," but +which really means a nail driven into her coffin--a probable +shortening, though it may be a very small one, of her mortal life; +because the food of the next twenty-four hours, which should have +gone to keep the vital heat at its normal standard, will have to +be wasted in raising it up to that standard, from which it has +fallen by a chill. + +Ladies, these are subjects on which I must beg to speak a little +more at length, premising them by one statement, which may seem +jest, but is solemn earnest--that, if the medical men of this or +any other city were what the world now calls "alive to their own +interests"--that is, to the mere making of money; instead of +being, what medical men are, the most generous, disinterested, and +high-minded class in these realms, then they would oppose by all +means in their power the delivery of lectures on natural +philosophy to women. For if women act upon what they learn in +those lectures--and having women's hearts, they will act upon it-- +there ought to follow a decrease of sickness and an increase of +health, especially among children; a thrift of life, and a thrift +of expense besides, which would very seriously affect the income +of medical men. + +For let me ask you, ladies, with all courtesy, but with all +earnestness--Are you aware of certain facts, of which every one of +those excellent medical men is too well aware? Are you aware that +more human beings are killed in England every year by unnecessary +and preventable diseases than were killed at Waterloo or at +Sadowa? Are you aware that the great majority of those victims +are children? Are you aware that the diseases which carry them +off are for the most part such as ought to be specially under the +control of the women who love them, pet them, educate them, and +would in many cases, if need be, lay down their lives for them? +Are you aware, again, of the vast amount of disease which, so both +wise mothers and wise doctors assure me, is engendered in the +sleeping-room from simple ignorance of the laws of ventilation, +and in the schoolroom likewise, from simple ignorance of the laws +of physiology? from an ignorance of which I shall mention no other +case here save one--that too often from ignorance of signs of +approaching disease, a child is punished for what is called +idleness, listlessness, wilfulness, sulkiness; and punished, too, +in the unwisest way--by an increase of tasks and confinement to +the house, thus overtasking still more a brain already overtasked, +and depressing still more, by robbing it of oxygen and of +exercise, a system already depressed? Are you aware, I ask again, +of all this? I speak earnest upon this point, because I speak +with experience. As a single instance: a medical man, a friend +of mine, passing by his own schoolroom, heard one of his own +little girls screaming and crying, and went in. The governess, an +excellent woman, but wholly ignorant of the laws of physiology, +complained that the child had of late become obstinate and would +not learn; and that therefore she must punish her by keeping her +indoors over the unlearnt lessons. The father, who knew that the +child was usually a very good one, looked at her carefully for a +little while; sent her out of the schoolroom; and then said, "That +child must not open a book for a month." "If I had not acted so," +he said to me, "I should have had that child dead of brain-disease +within the year." + +Now, in the face of such facts as these, is it too much to ask of +mothers, sisters, aunts, nurses, governesses--all who may be +occupied in the care of children, especially of girls--that they +should study thrift of human health and human life, by studying +somewhat the laws of life and health? There are books--I may say +a whole literature of books--written by scientific doctors on +these matters, which are in my mind far more important to the +schoolroom than half the trashy accomplishments, so-called, which +are expected to be known by governesses. But are they bought? +Are they even to be bought, from most country booksellers? Ah, +for a little knowledge of the laws to the neglect of which is +owing so much fearful disease, which, if it does not produce +immediate death, too often leaves the constitution impaired for +years to come. Ah the waste of health and strength in the young; +the waste, too, of anxiety and misery in those who love and tend +them. How much of it might be saved by a little rational +education in those laws of nature which are the will of God about +the welfare of our bodies, and which, therefore, we are as much +bound to know and to obey, as we are bound to know and obey the +spiritual laws whereon depends the welfare of our souls. + +Pardon me, ladies, if I have given a moment's pain to anyone here: +but I appeal to every medical man in the room whether I have not +spoken the truth; and having such an opportunity as this, I felt +that I must speak for the sake of children, and of women likewise, +or else for ever hereafter hold my peace. + +Let me pass on from this painful subject--for painful it has been +to me for many years--to a question of intellectual thrift--by +which I mean just now thrift of words; thrift of truth; restraint +of the tongue; accuracy and modesty in statement. + +Mothers complain to me that girls are apt to be--not intentionally +untruthful--but exaggerative, prejudiced, incorrect, in repeating +a conversation or describing an event; and that from this fault +arise, as is to be expected, misunderstandings, quarrels, rumours, +slanders, scandals, and what not. + +Now, for this waste of words there is but one cure: and if I be +told that it is a natural fault of women; that they cannot take +the calm judicial view of matters which men boast, and often boast +most wrongly, that they can take; that under the influence of +hope, fear, delicate antipathy, honest moral indignation, they +will let their eyes and ears be governed by their feelings; and +see and hear only what they wish to see and hear--I answer, that +it is not for me as a man to start such a theory; but that if it +be true, it is an additional argument for some education which +will correct this supposed natural defect. And I say deliberately +that there is but one sort of education which will correct it; one +which will teach young women to observe facts accurately, judge +them calmly, and describe them carefully, without adding or +distorting: and that is, some training in natural science. + +I beg you not to be startled: but if you are, then test the truth +of my theory by playing to-night at the game called "Russian +Scandal;" in which a story, repeated in secret by one player to +the other, comes out at the end of the game, owing to the +inaccurate and--forgive me if I say it--uneducated brains through +which it has passed, utterly unlike its original; not only +ludicrously maimed and distorted, but often with the most +fantastic additions of events, details, names, dates, places, +which each player will aver that he received from the player +before him. I am afraid that too much of the average gossip of +every city, town, and village is little more than a game of +"Russian Scandal;" with this difference that while one is but a +game, the other is but too mischievous earnest. + +But now, if among your party there shall be an average lawyer, +medical man, or man of science, you will find that he, and perhaps +he alone, will be able to retail accurately the story which has +been told him. And why? Simply because his mind has been trained +to deal with facts; to ascertain exactly what he does see or hear, +and to imprint its leading features strongly and clearly on his +memory. + +Now, you certainly cannot make young ladies barristers or +attorneys; nor employ their brains in getting up cases, civil or +criminal; and as for chemistry, they and their parents may have a +reasonable antipathy to smells, blackened fingers, and occasional +explosions and poisonings. But you may make them something of +botanists, zoologists, geologists. + +I could say much on this point: allow me at least to say this: I +verify believe that any young lady who would employ some of her +leisure time in collecting wild flowers, carefully examining them, +verifying them, and arranging them; or who would in her summer +trip to the sea-coast do the same by the common objects of the +shore, instead of wasting her holiday, as one sees hundreds doing, +in lounging on benches on the esplanade, reading worthless novels, +and criticising dresses--that such a young lady, I say, would not +only open her own mind to a world of wonder, beauty, and wisdom, +which, if it did not make her a more reverent and pious soul, she +cannot be the woman which I take for granted she is; but would +save herself from the habit--I had almost said the necessity--of +gossip; because she would have things to think of and not merely +persons; facts instead of fancies; while she would acquire +something of accuracy, of patience, of methodical observation and +judgment, which would stand her in good stead in the events of +daily life, and increase her power of bridling her tongue and her +imagination. "God is in heaven, and thou upon earth; therefore +let thy words be few;" is the lesson which those are learning all +day long who study the works of God with reverent accuracy, lest +by misrepresenting them they should be tempted to say that God has +done that which He has not; and in that wholesome discipline I +long that women as well as men should share. + +And now I come to a thrift of the highest kind, as contrasted with +a waste the most deplorable and ruinous of all; thrift of those +faculties which connect us with the unseen and spiritual world; +with humanity, with Christ, with God; thrift of the immortal +spirit. I am not going now to give you a sermon on duty. You +hear such, I doubt not, in church every Sunday, far better than I +can preach to you. I am going to speak rather of thrift of the +heart, thrift of the emotions. How they are wasted in these days +in reading what are called sensation novels, all know but too +well; how British literature--all that the best hearts and +intellects among our forefathers have bequeathed to us--is +neglected for light fiction, the reading of which is, as a lady +well said, "the worst form of intemperance--dram-drinking and +opium-eating, intellectual and moral." + +I know that the young will delight--they have delighted in all +ages, and will to the end of time--in fictions which deal with +that "oldest tale which is for ever new." Novels will be read: +but that is all the more reason why women should be trained, by +the perusal of a higher, broader, deeper literature, to +distinguish the good novel from the bad, the moral from the +immoral, the noble from the base, the true work of art from the +sham which hides its shallowness and vulgarity under a tangled +plot and melodramatic situations. She should learn--and that she +can only learn by cultivation--to discern with joy, and drink in +with reverence, the good, the beautiful, and the true; and to turn +with the fine scorn of a pure and strong womanhood from the bad, +the ugly, and the false. + +And if any parent should be inclined to reply: "Why lay so much +stress upon educating a girl in British literature? Is it not far +more important to make our daughters read religious books?" I +answer--Of course it is. I take for granted that that is done in +a Christian land. But I beg you to recollect that there are books +and books; and that in these days of a free press it is +impossible, in the long run, to prevent girls reading books of +very different shades of opinion, and very different religious +worth. It may be, therefore, of the very highest importance to a +girl to have her intellect, her taste, her emotions, her moral +sense, in a word, her whole womanhood, so cultivated and regulated +that she shall herself be able to discern the true from the false, +the orthodox from the unorthodox, the truly devout from the merely +sentimental, the Gospel from its counterfeits. + +I should have thought that there never had been in Britain, since +the Reformation, a crisis at which young Englishwomen required +more careful cultivation on these matters; if at least they are to +be saved from making themselves and their families miserable; and +from ending--as I have known too many end--with broken hearts, +broken brains, broken health, and an early grave. + +Take warning by what you see abroad. In every country where the +women are uneducated, unoccupied; where their only literature is +French novels or translations of them--in every one of those +countries the women, even to the highest, are the slaves of +superstition, and the puppets of priests. In proportion as, in +certain other countries--notably, I will say, in Scotland--the +women are highly educated, family life and family secrets are +sacred, and the woman owns allegiance and devotion to no confessor +or director, but to her own husband or to her own family. + +I say plainly, that if any parents wish their daughters to succumb +at least to some quackery or superstition, whether calling itself +scientific, or calling itself religious--and there are too many of +both just now--they cannot more certainly effect their purpose +than by allowing her to grow up ignorant, frivolous, luxurious, +vain; with her emotions excited, but not satisfied, by the reading +of foolish and even immoral novels. + +In such a case the more delicate and graceful the organisation, +the more noble and earnest the nature, which has been neglected, +the more certain it is--I know too well what I am saying--to go +astray. + +The time of depression, disappointment, vacuity, all but despair +must come. The immortal spirit, finding no healthy satisfaction +for its highest aspirations, is but too likely to betake itself to +an unhealthy and exciting superstition. Ashamed of its own long +self-indulgence, it is but too likely to flee from itself into a +morbid asceticism. Not having been taught its God-given and +natural duties in the world, it is but too likely to betake +itself, from the mere craving for action, to self-invented and +unnatural duties out of the world. Ignorant of true science, yet +craving to understand the wonders of nature and of spirit, it is +but too likely to betake itself to non-science--nonsense as it is +usually called--whether of spirit-rapping and mesmerism, or of +miraculous relics and winking pictures. Longing for guidance and +teaching, and never having been taught to guide and teach itself, +it is but too likely to deliver itself up in self-despair to the +guidance and teaching of those who, whether they be quacks or +fanatics, look on uneducated women as their natural prey. + +You will see, I am sure, from what I have said, that it is not my +wish that you should become mere learned women; mere female +pedants, as useless and unpleasing as male pedants are wont to be. +The education which I set before you is not to be got by mere +hearing lectures or reading books: for it is an education of your +whole character; a self-education; which really means a committing +of yourself to God, that He may educate you. Hearing lectures is +good, for it will teach you how much there is to be known, and how +little you know. Reading books is good, for it will give you +habits of regular and diligent study. And therefore I urge on you +strongly private study, especially in case a library should be +formed here of books on those most practical subjects of which I +have been speaking. But, after all, both lectures and books are +good, mainly in as far as they furnish matter for reflection: +while the desire to reflect and the ability to reflect must come, +as I believe, from above. The honest craving after light and +power, after knowledge, wisdom, active usefulness, must come--and +may it come to you--by the inspiration of the Spirit of God. + +One word more, and I have done. Let me ask women to educate +themselves, not for their own sakes merely, but for the sake of +others. For, whether they will or not, they must educate others. +I do not speak merely of those who may be engaged in the work of +direct teaching; that they ought to be well taught themselves, who +can doubt? I speak of those--and in so doing I speak of every +woman, young and old--who exercise as wife, as mother, as aunt, as +sister, or as friend, an influence, indirect it may be, and +unconscious, but still potent and practical, on the minds and +characters of those about them, especially of men. How potent and +practical that influence is, those know best who know most of the +world and most of human nature. There are those who consider--and +I agree with them--that the education of boys under the age of +twelve years ought to be entrusted as much as possible to women. +Let me ask--of what period of youth and manhood does not the same +hold true? I pity the ignorance and conceit of the man who +fancies that he has nothing left to learn from cultivated women. +I should have thought that the very mission of woman was to be, in +the highest sense, the educator of man from infancy to old age; +that that was the work towards which all the God-given capacities +of women pointed; for which they were to be educated to the +highest pitch. I should have thought that it was the glory of +woman that she was sent into the world to live for others, rather +than for herself; and therefore I should say--Let her smallest +rights be respected, her smallest wrongs redressed: but let her +never be persuaded to forget that she is sent into the world to +teach man--what, I believe, she has been teaching him all along, +even in the savage state--namely, that there is something more +necessary than the claiming of rights, and that is, the performing +of duties; to teach him specially, in these so-called intellectual +days, that there is something more than intellect, and that is-- +purity and virtue. Let her never be persuaded to forget that her +calling is not the lower and more earthly one of self-assertion, +but the higher and the diviner calling of self-sacrifice; and let +her never desert that higher life, which lives in others and for +others, like her Redeemer and her Lord. + +And if any should answer that this doctrine would keep woman a +dependent and a slave, I rejoin--Not so: it would keep her what +she should be--the mistress of all around her, because mistress of +herself. And more, I should express a fear that those who made +that answer had not yet seen into the mystery of true greatness +and true strength; that they did not yet understand the true +magnanimity, the true royalty of that spirit, by which the Son of +man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give +His life a ransom for many. + +Surely that is woman's calling--to teach man: and to teach him +what? To teach him, after all, that his calling is the same as +hers, if he will but see the things which belong to his peace. To +temper his fiercer, coarser, more self-assertive nature, by the +contact of her gentleness, purity, self-sacrifice. To make him +see that not by blare of trumpets, not by noise, wrath, greed, +ambition, intrigue, puffery, is good and lasting work to be done +on earth: but by wise self-distrust, by silent labour, by lofty +self-control, by that charity which hopeth all things, believeth +all things, endureth all things; by such an example, in short, as +women now in tens of thousands set to those around them; such as +they will show more and more, the more their whole womanhood is +educated to employ its powers without waste and without haste in +harmonious unity. Let the woman begin in girlhood, if such be her +happy lot--to quote the words of a great poet, a great +philosopher, and a great Churchman, William Wordsworth--let her +begin, I say - + + +With all things round about her drawn +From May-time and the cheerful dawn; +A dancing shape, an image gay, +To haunt, to startle, and waylay. + + +Let her develop onwards - + + +A spirit, yet a woman too, +With household motions light and free, +And steps of virgin liberty. +A countenance in which shall meet +Sweet records, promises as sweet; +A creature not too bright and good +For human nature's daily food; +For transient sorrows, simple wiles, +Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles. + + +But let her highest and her final development be that which not +nature, but self-education alone can bring--that which makes her +once and for ever - + + +A being breathing thoughtful breath; +A traveller betwixt life and death. +With reason firm, with temperate will +Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill. +A perfect woman, nobly planned, +To warn, to comfort, and command. +And yet a spirit still and bright +With something of an angel light. + + + +NAUSICAA IN LONDON; OR, THE LOWER EDUCATION OF WOMEN + + + +Fresh from the Marbles of the British Museum, I went my way +through London streets. My brain was still full of fair and grand +forms; the forms of men and women whose every limb and attitude +betokened perfect health, and grace, and power, and self- +possession and self-restraint so habitual and complete that it had +become unconscious, and undistinguishable from the native freedom +of the savage. For I had been up and down the corridors of those +Greek sculptures, which remain as a perpetual sermon to rich and +poor, amid our artificial, unwholesome, and it may be decaying +pseudo-civilisation, saying with looks more expressive than all +words--Such men and women can be; for such they have been; and +such you may be yet, if you will use that science of which you too +often only boast. Above all, I had been pondering over the awful +and yet tender beauty of the maiden figures from the Parthenon and +its kindred temples. And these, or such as these, I thought to +myself, were the sisters of the men who fought at Marathon and +Salamis; the mothers of many a man among the ten thousand whom +Xenophon led back from Babylon to the Black Sea shore; the +ancestresses of many a man who conquered the East in Alexander's +host, and fought with Porus in the far Punjab. And were these +women mere dolls? These men mere gladiators? Were they not the +parents of philosophy, science, poetry, the plastic arts? We talk +of education now. Are we more educated than were the ancient +Greeks? Do we know anything about education, physical, +intellectual, or aesthetic, and I may say moral likewise-- +religious education, of course, in our sense of the world, they +had none--but do we know anything about education of which they +have not taught us at least the rudiments? Are there not some +branches of education which they perfected, once and for ever; +leaving us northern barbarians to follow, or else not to follow, +their example? To produce health, that is, harmony and sympathy, +proportion and grace, in every faculty of mind and body--that was +their notion of education. To produce that, the text-book of +their childhood was the poetry of Homer, and not of--But I am +treading on dangerous ground. It was for this that the seafaring +Greek lad was taught to find his ideal in Ulysses; while his +sister at home found hers, it may be, in Nausicaa. It was for +this, that when perhaps the most complete and exquisite of all the +Greeks, Sophocles the good, beloved by gods and men, represented +on the Athenian stage his drama of Nausicaa, and, as usual, could +not--for he had no voice--himself take a speaking part, he was +content to do one thing in which he specially excelled; and +dressed and masked as a girl, to play at ball amid the chorus of +Nausicaa's maidens. + +That drama of Nausicaa is lost; and if I dare say so of any play +of Sophocles', I scarce regret it. It is well, perhaps, that we +have no second conception of the scene, to interfere with the +simplicity, so grand, and yet so tender, of Homer's idyllic +episode. + +Nausicaa, it must be remembered, is the daughter of a king. But +not of a king in the exclusive modern European or old Eastern +sense. Her father, Alcinous, is simply primus inter pares among a +community of merchants, who are called "kings" likewise; and Mayor +for life--so to speak--of a new trading city, a nascent Genoa or +Venice, on the shore of the Mediterranean. But the girl Nausicaa, +as she sleeps in her "carved chamber," is "like the immortals in +form and face;" and two handmaidens who sleep on each side of the +polished door "have beauty from the Graces." + +To her there enters, in the shape of some maiden friend, none less +than Pallas Athene herself, intent on saving worthily her +favourite, the shipwrecked Ulysses; and bids her in a dream go +forth--and wash the clothes. {6} + + +Nausicaa, wherefore doth thy mother bear +Child so forgetful? This long time doth rest, +Like lumber in the house, much raiment fair. +Soon must thou wed, and be thyself well-drest, +And find thy bridegroom raiment of the best. +These are the things whence good repute is born, +And praises that make glad a parent's breast. +Come, let us both go washing with the morn; +So shalt thou have clothes becoming to be worn. + +Know that thy maidenhood is not for long, +Whom the Phoeacian chiefs already woo, +Lords of the land whence thou thyself art sprung. +Soon as the shining dawn comes forth anew, +For wain and mules thy noble father sue, +Which to the place of washing shall convey +Girdles and shawls and rugs of splendid hue, +This for thyself were better than essay +Thither to walk: the place is distant a long way. + + +Startled by her dream, Nausicaa awakes, and goes to find her +parents - + + +One by the hearth sat, with the maids around, +And on the skeins of yarn, sea-purpled, spent +Her morning toil. Him to the council bound, +Called by the honoured kings, just going forth she found. + + +And calling him, as she might now, Pappa phile, Dear Papa, asks +for the mule-waggon: but it is her father's and her five +brothers' clothes she fain would wash, - + + +Ashamed to name her marriage to her father dear. + + +But he understood all--and she goes forth in the mule-waggon, with +the clothes, after her mother has put in "a chest of all kinds of +delicate food, and meat, and wine in a goatskin;" and last but not +least, the indispensable cruse of oil for anointing after the +bath, to which both Jews, Greeks, and Romans owed so much health +and beauty. And then we read in the simple verse of a poet too +refined, like the rest of his race, to see anything mean or +ridiculous in that which was not ugly and unnatural, how she and +her maids got into the "polished waggon," "with good wheels," and +she "took the whip and the studded reins," and "beat them till +they started;" and how the mules, "rattled" away, and "pulled +against each other," till + + +When they came to the fair flowing river +Which feeds good lavatories all the year, +Fitted to cleanse all sullied robes soever, +They from the wain the mules unharnessed there, +And chased them free, to crop their juicy fare +By the swift river, on the margin green; +Then to the waters dashed the clothes they bare +And in the stream-filled trenches stamped them clean. +Which, having washed and cleansed, they spread before +The sunbeams, on the beach, where most did lie +Thick pebbles, by the sea-wave washed ashore. +So, having left them in the heat to dry, +They to the bath went down, and by-and-by, +Rubbed with rich oil, their midday meal essay, +Couched in green turf, the river rolling nigh. +Then, throwing off their veils, at ball they play, +While the white-armed Nausicaa leads the choral lay. + + +The mere beauty of this scene all will feel, who have the sense of +beauty in them. Yet it is not on that aspect which I wish to +dwell, but on its healthfulness. Exercise is taken, in measured +time, to the sound of song, as a duty almost, as well as an +amusement. For this game of ball, which is here mentioned for the +first time in human literature, nearly three thousand years ago, +was held by the Greeks and by the Romans after them, to be an +almost necessary part of a liberal education; principally, +doubtless, from the development which it produced in the upper +half of the body, not merely to the arms, but to the chest, by +raising and expanding the ribs, and to all the muscles of the +torso, whether perpendicular or oblique. The elasticity and grace +which it was believed to give were so much prized, that a room for +ball-play, and a teacher of the art, were integral parts of every +gymnasium; and the Athenians went so far as to bestow on one +famous ball-player, Aristonicus of Carystia, a statue and the +rights of citizenship. The rough and hardy young Spartans, when +passing from boyhood into manhood, received the title of ball- +players, seemingly from the game which it was then their special +duty to learn. In the case of Nausicaa and her maidens, the game +would just bring into their right places all that is liable to be +contracted and weakened in women, so many of whose occupations +must needs be sedentary and stooping; while the song which +accompanied the game at once filled the lungs regularly and +rhythmically, and prevented violent motion, or unseemly attitude. +We, the civilised, need physiologists to remind us of these simple +facts, and even then do not act on them. Those old half-barbarous +Greeks had found them out for themselves, and, moreover, acted on +them. + +But fair Nausicaa must have been--some will say--surely a mere +child of nature, and an uncultivated person? + +So far from it, that her whole demeanour and speech show culture +of the very highest sort, full of "sweetness and light."-- +Intelligent and fearless, quick to perceive the bearings of her +strange and sudden adventure, quick to perceive the character of +Ulysses, quick to answer his lofty and refined pleading by words +as lofty and refined, and pious withal;--for it is she who speaks +to her handmaids the once so famous words: + + +Strangers and poor men all are sent from Zeus; +And alms, though small, are sweet. + + +Clear of intellect, prompt of action, modest of demeanour, +shrinking from the slightest breath of scandal; while she is not +ashamed, when Ulysses, bathed and dressed, looks himself again, to +whisper to her maidens her wish that the Gods might send her such +a spouse.--This is Nausicaa as Homer draws her; and as many a +scholar and poet since Homer has accepted her for the ideal of +noble maidenhood. I ask my readers to study for themselves her +interview with Ulysses, in Mr. Worsley's translation, or rather in +the grand simplicity of the original Greek, {7} and judge whether +Nausicaa is not as perfect a lady as the poet who imagined her-- +or, it may be, drew her from life--must have been a perfect +gentleman; both complete in those "manners" which, says the old +proverb, "make the man:" but which are the woman herself; because +with her--who acts more by emotion than by calculation--manners +are the outward and visible tokens of her inward and spiritual +grace, or disgrace; and flow instinctively, whether good or bad, +from the instincts of her inner nature. + +True, Nausicaa could neither read nor write. No more, most +probably, could the author of the Odyssey. No more, for that +matter, could Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, though they were plainly, +both in mind and manners, most highly-cultivated men. Reading and +writing, of course, have now become necessaries of humanity; and +are to be given to every human being, that he may start fair in +the race of life. But I am not aware that Greek women improved +much, either in manners, morals, or happiness, by acquiring them +in after centuries. A wise man would sooner see his daughter a +Nausicaa than a Sappho, an Aspasia, a Cleopatra, or even an +Hypatia. + +Full of such thoughts, I went through London streets, among the +Nausicaas of the present day; the girls of the period; the +daughters and hereafter mothers of our future rulers, the great +Demos or commercial middle class of the greatest mercantile city +in the world: and noted what I had noted with fear and sorrow, +many a day, for many a year; a type, and an increasing type, of +young women who certainly had not had the "advantages," +"educational" and other, of that Greek Nausicaa of old. + +Of course, in such a city as London, to which the best of +everything, physical and other, gravitates, I could not but pass, +now and then, beautiful persons, who made me proud of those +grandes Anglaises aux joues rouges, whom the Parisiennes ridicule- +-and envy. But I could not help suspecting that their looks +showed them to be either country-bred, or born of country parents; +and this suspicion was strengthened by the fact that, when +compared with their mothers, the mother's physique was, in the +majority of cases, superior to the daughters'. Painful it was, to +one accustomed to the ruddy well-grown peasant girl, stalwart, +even when, as often, squat and plain, to remark the exceedingly +small size of the average young woman; by which I do not mean mere +want of height--that is a little matter--but want of breadth +likewise; a general want of those large frames, which indicate +usually a power of keeping strong and healthy not merely the +muscles, but the brain itself. + +Poor little things. I passed hundreds--I pass hundreds every day- +-trying to hide their littleness by the nasty mass of false hair-- +or what does duty for it; and by the ugly and useless hat which is +stuck upon it, making the head thereby look ridiculously large and +heavy; and by the high heels on which they totter onward, having +forgotten, or never learnt, the simple art of walking; their +bodies tilted forward in that ungraceful attitude which is called- +-why that name of all others?--a "Grecian bend;" seemingly kept on +their feet, and kept together at all, in that strange attitude, by +tight stays which prevented all graceful and healthy motion of the +hips or sides; their raiment, meanwhile, being purposely misshapen +in this direction and in that, to hide--it must be presumed-- +deficiencies of form. If that chignon and those heels had been +taken off, the figure which would have remained would have been +that too often of a puny girl of sixteen. And yet there was no +doubt that these women were not only full grown, but some of them, +alas! wives and mothers. + +Poor little things.--And this they have gained by so-called +civilisation: the power of aping the "fashions" by which the +worn-out "Parisienne" hides her own personal defects; and of +making themselves, by innate want of that taste which the +"Parisienne" possesses, only the cause of something like a sneer +from many a cultivated man; and of something like a sneer, too, +from yonder gipsy woman who passes by, with bold bright face, and +swinging hip, and footstep stately and elastic; far better +dressed, according to all true canons of taste, than most town- +girls; and thanking her fate that she and her "Rom" are no house- +dwellers and gaslight-sightseers, but fatten on free air upon the +open moor. + +But the face which is beneath that chignon and that hat? Well--it +is sometimes pretty: but how seldom handsome, which is a higher +quality by far. It is not, strange to say, a well-fed face. +Plenty of money, and perhaps too much, is spent on those fine +clothes. It had been better, to judge from the complexion, if +some of that money had been spent in solid wholesome food. She +looks as if she lived--as she too often does, I hear--on tea and +bread-and-butter, or rather on bread with the minimum of butter. +For as the want of bone indicates a deficiency of phosphatic food, +so does the want of flesh about the cheeks indicate a deficiency +of hydrocarbon. Poor little Nausicaa:- that is not her fault. +Our boasted civilisation has not even taught her what to eat, as +it certainly has not increased her appetite; and she knows not-- +what every country fellow knows--that without plenty of butter and +other fatty matters, she is not likely to keep even warm. Better +to eat nasty fat bacon now, than to supply the want of it some few +years hence by nastier cod-liver oil. But there is no one yet to +tell her that, and a dozen other equally simple facts, for her own +sake, and for the sake of that coming Demos which she is to bring +into the world; a Demos which, if we can only keep it healthy in +body and brain, has before it so splendid a future: but which, if +body and brain degrade beneath the influence of modern barbarism, +is but too likely to follow the Demos of ancient Byzantium, or of +modern Paris. + +Ay, but her intellect. She is so clever, and she reads so much, +and she is going to be taught to read so much more. + +Ah well--there was once a science called Physiognomy. The Greeks, +from what I can learn, knew more of it than any people since: +though the Italian painters and sculptors must have known much; +far more than we. In a more scientific civilisation there will be +such a science once more: but its laws, though still in the +empiric stage, are not altogether forgotten by some. Little +children have often a fine and clear instinct of them. Many +cultivated and experienced women have a fine and clear instinct of +them likewise. And some such would tell us that there is +intellect in plenty in the modern Nausicaa: but not of the +quality which they desire for their country's future good. Self- +consciousness, eagerness, volubility, petulance in countenance, in +gesture, and in voice--which last is too often most harsh and +artificial, the breath being sent forth through the closed teeth, +and almost entirely at the corners of the mouth--and, with all +this, a weariness often about the wrinkling forehead and the +drooping lids;--all these, which are growing too common, not among +the Demos only, nor only in the towns, are signs, they think, of +the unrest of unhealth, physical, intellectual, spiritual. At +least they are as different as two types of physiognomy in the +same race can be, from the expression both of face and gesture, in +those old Greek sculptures, and in the old Italian painters; and, +it must be said, in the portraits of Reynolds, and Gainsborough, +Copley, and Romney. Not such, one thinks, must have been the +mothers of Britain during the latter half of the last century and +the beginning of the present; when their sons, at times, were +holding half the world at bay. + +And if Nausicaa has become such in town: what is she when she +goes to the seaside, not to wash the clothes in fresh-water, but +herself in salt--the very salt-water, laden with decaying +organisms, from which, though not polluted further by a dozen +sewers, Ulysses had to cleanse himself, anointing, too, with oil, +ere he was fit to appear in the company of Nausicaa of Greece? +She dirties herself with the dirty saltwater; and probably chills +and tires herself by walking thither and back, and staying in too +long; and then flaunts on the pier, bedizened in garments which, +for monstrosity of form and disharmony of colours, would have set +that Greek Nausicaa's teeth on edge, or those of any average +Hindoo woman now. Or, even sadder still, she sits on chairs and +benches all the weary afternoon, her head drooped on her chest, +over some novel from the "Library;" and then returns to tea and +shrimps, and lodgings of which the fragrance is not unsuggestive, +sometimes not unproductive, of typhoid fever. Ah, poor Nausicaa +of England! That is a sad sight to some who think about the +present, and have read about the past. It is not a sad sight to +see your old father--tradesman, or clerk, or what not--who has +done good work in his day, and hopes to do some more, sitting by +your old mother, who has done good work in her day--among the +rest, that heaviest work of all, the bringing you into the world +and keeping you in it till now--honest, kindly, cheerful folk +enough, and not inefficient in their own calling; though an +average Northumbrian, or Highlander, or Irish Easterling, beside +carrying a brain of five times the intellectual force, could drive +five such men over the cliff with his bare hands. It is not a sad +sight, I say, to see them sitting about upon those seaside +benches, looking out listlessly at the water, and the ships, and +the sunlight, and enjoying, like so many flies upon a wall, the +novel act of doing nothing. It is not the old for whom wise men +are sad: but for you. Where is your vitality? Where is your +"Lebens-gluckseligkeit," your enjoyment of superfluous life and +power? Why you cannot even dance and sing, till now and then, at +night, perhaps, when you ought to lie safe in bed, but when the +weak brain, after receiving the day's nourishment, has roused +itself a second time into a false excitement of gaslight pleasure. +What there is left of it is all going into that foolish book, +which the womanly element in you, still healthy and alive, +delights in; because it places you in fancy in situations in which +you will never stand, and inspires you with emotions, some of +which, it may be, you had better never feel. Poor Nausicaa--old, +some men think, before you have been ever young. + +And now they are going to "develop" you; and let you have your +share in "the higher education of women," by making you read more +books, and do more sums, and pass examinations, and stoop over +desks at night after stooping over some other employment all day; +and to teach you Latin, and even Greek! + +Well, we will gladly teach you Greek, if you learn thereby to read +the history of Nausicaa of old, and what manner of maiden she was, +and what was her education. You will admire her, doubtless. But +do not let your admiration limit itself to drawing a meagre half- +mediaevalised design of her--as she never looked. Copy in your +own person; and even if you do not descend as low--or rise as +high--as washing the household clothes, at least learn to play at +ball; and sing, in the open air and sunshine, not in theatres and +concert-rooms by gaslight; and take decent care of your own +health; and dress not like a "Parisienne"--nor, of course, like +Nausicaa of old, for that is to ask too much: --but somewhat more +like an average Highland lassie; and try to look like her, and be +like her, of whom Wordsworth sang: + + +A mien and face +In which full plainly I can trace +Benignity, and home-bred sense, +Ripening in perfect innocence. +Here scattered, like a random seed, +Remote from men, thou dost not need +The embarrassed look of shy distress +And maidenly shamefacedness. +Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clear +The freedom of a mountaineer. +A face with gladness overspread, +Soft smiles, by human kindness bred, +And seemliness complete, that sways +Thy courtesies, about thee plays. +With no restraint, save such as springs +From quick and eager visitings +Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach +Of thy few words of English speech. +A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife +That gives thy gestures grace and life. + + +Ah, yet unspoilt Nausicaa of the North; descendant of the dark +tender-hearted Celtic girl, and the fair deep-hearted Scandinavian +Viking, thank God for thy heather and fresh air, and the kine thou +tendest, and the wool thou spinnest; and come not to seek thy +fortune, child, in wicked London town; nor import, as they tell me +thou art doing fast, the ugly fashions of that London town, clumsy +copies of Parisian cockneydom, into thy Highland home; nor give up +the healthful and graceful, free and modest dress of thy mother +and thy mother's mother, to disfigure the little kirk on Sabbath +days with crinoline and corset, high-heeled boots, and other +women's hair. + +It is proposed, just now, to assimilate the education of girls +more and more to that of boys. If that means that girls are +merely to learn more lessons, and to study what their brothers are +taught, in addition to what their mothers were taught; then it is +to be hoped, at least by physiologists and patriots, that the +scheme will sink into that limbo whither, in a free and tolerably +rational country, all imperfect and ill-considered schemes are +sure to gravitate. But if the proposal be a bona-fide one: then +it must be borne in mind that in the Public schools of England, +and in all private schools, I presume, which take their tone from +them, cricket and football are more or less compulsory, being +considered integral parts of an Englishman's education; and that +they are likely to remain so, in spite of all reclamations: +because masters and boys alike know that games do not, in the long +run, interfere with a boy's work; that the same boy will very +often excel in both; that the games keep him in health for his +work; and the spirit with which he takes to his games when in the +lower school, is a fair test of the spirit with which he will take +to his work when he rises into the higher school; and that nothing +is worse for a boy than to fall into that loafing, tuck-shop- +haunting set, who neither play hard nor work hard, and are usually +extravagant, and often vicious. Moreover, they know well that +games conduce, not merely to physical, but to moral health; that +in the playing-field boys acquire virtues which no books can give +them; not merely daring and endurance, but, better still, temper, +self-restraint, fairness, honour, unenvious approbation of +another's success, and all that "give and take" of life which +stand a man in such good stead when he goes forth into the world, +and without which, indeed, his success is always maimed and +partial. + +Now: if the promoters of higher education for women will compel +girls to any training analogous to our public-school games; if, +for instance, they will insist on that most natural and wholesome +of all exercises, dancing, in order to develop the lower half of +the body; on singing, to expand the lungs and regulate the breath; +and on some games--ball or what not--which will ensure that raised +chest, and upright carriage, and general strength of the upper +torso, without which full oxygenation of the blood, and therefore +general health, is impossible; if they will sternly forbid tight +stays, high heels, and all which interferes with free growth and +free motion; if they will consider carefully all which has been +written on the "half-time system" by Mr. Chadwick and others; and +accept the certain physical law that, in order to renovate the +brain day by day, the growing creature must have plenty of fresh +air and play, and that the child who learns for four hours and +plays for four hours, will learn more, and learn it more easily, +than the child who learns for the whole eight hours; if, in short, +they will teach girls not merely to understand the Greek tongue, +but to copy somewhat of the Greek physical training, of that +"music and gymnastic" which helped to make the cleverest race of +the old world the ablest race likewise; then they will earn the +gratitude of the patriot and the physiologists, by doing their +best to stay the downward tendencies of the physique, and +therefore ultimately of the morale, in the coming generation of +English women. + +I am sorry to say that, as yet, I hear of but one movement in this +direction among the promoters of the "higher education of women." +{8} I trust that the subject will be taken up methodically by +those gifted ladies, who have acquainted themselves, and are +labouring to acquaint other women, with the first principles of +health; and that they may avail to prevent the coming generations, +under the unwholesome stimulant of competitive examinations, and +so forth, from "developing" into so many Chinese--dwarfs--or +idiots. + +October, 1873. + + + +THE AIR-MOTHERS--1869--Die Natur ist die Bewegung + + + +Who are these who follow us softly over the moor in the autumn +eve? Their wings brush and rustle in the fir-boughs, and they +whisper before us and behind, as if they called gently to each +other, like birds flocking homeward to their nests. + +The woodpecker on the pine-stems knows them, and laughs aloud for +joy as they pass. The rooks above the pasture know them, and +wheel round and tumble in their play. The brown leaves on the oak +trees know them, and flutter faintly, and beckon as they pass. +And in the chattering of the dry leaves there is a meaning, and a +cry of weary things which long for rest. + +"Take us home, take us home, you soft air-mothers, now our fathers +the sunbeams are grown dull. Our green summer beauty is all +draggled, and our faces are grown wan and wan; and the buds, the +children whom we nourished, thrust us off, ungrateful, from our +seats. Waft us down, you soft air-mothers, upon your wings to the +quiet earth, that we may go to our home, as all things go, and +become air and sunlight once again." + +And the bold young fir-seeds know them, and rattle impatient in +their cones. "Blow stronger, blow fiercer, slow air-mothers, and +shake us from our prisons of dead wood, that we may fly and spin +away north-eastward, each on his horny wing. Help us but to touch +the moorland yonder, and we will take good care of ourselves +henceforth; we will dive like arrows through the heather, and +drive our sharp beaks into the soil, and rise again as green trees +toward the sunlight, and spread out lusty boughs." + +They never think, bold fools, of what is coming to bring them low +in the midst of their pride; of the reckless axe which will fell +them, and the saw which will shape them into logs; and the trains +which will roar and rattle over them, as they lie buried in the +gravel of the way, till they are ground and rotted into powder, +and dug up and flung upon the fire, that they too may return home, +like all things, and become air and sunlight once again. + +And the air-mothers hear their prayers, and do their bidding: but +faintly; for they themselves are tired and sad. + +Tired and sad are the air-mothers, and their gardens rent and wan. +Look at them as they stream over the black forest, before the dim +south-western sun; long lines and wreaths of melancholy grey, +stained with dull yellow or dead dun. They have come far across +the seas, and done many a wild deed upon their way; and now that +they have reached the land, like shipwrecked sailors, they will +lie down and weep till they can weep no more. + +Ah, how different were those soft air-mothers when, invisible to +mortal eyes, they started on their long sky-journey, five thousand +miles across the sea! Out of the blazing caldron which lies +between the two New Worlds, they leapt up when the great sun +called them, in whirls and spouts of clear hot steam; and rushed +of their own passion to the northward, while the whirling earth- +ball whirled them east. So north-eastward they rushed aloft, +across the gay West Indian isles, leaving below the glitter of the +flying-fish, and the sidelong eyes of cruel sharks; above the +cane-fields and the plantain-gardens, and the cocoa-groves which +fringe the shores; above the rocks which throbbed with +earthquakes, and the peaks of old volcanoes, cinder-strewn; while, +far beneath, the ghosts of their dead sisters hurried home upon +the north-east breeze. + +Wild deeds they did as they rushed onward, and struggled and +fought among themselves, up and down, and round and backward, in +the fury of their blind hot youth. They heeded not the tree as +they snapped it, nor the ship as they whelmed it in the waves; nor +the cry of the sinking sailor, nor the need of his little ones on +shore; hasty and selfish even as children, and, like children, +tamed by their own rage. For they tired themselves by struggling +with each other, and by tearing the heavy water into waves; and +their wings grew clogged with sea-spray, and soaked more and more +with steam. But at last the sea grew cold beneath them, and their +clear steam shrank to mist; and they saw themselves and each other +wrapped in dull rain-laden clouds. Then they drew their white +cloud-garments round them, and veiled themselves for very shame; +and said: "We have been wild and wayward; and, alas! our pure +bright youth is gone. But we will do one good deed yet ere we +die, and so we shall not have lived in vain. We will glide onward +to the land, and weep there; and refresh all things with soft warm +rain; and make the grass grow, the buds burst; quench the thirst +of man and beast, and wash the soiled world clean." + +So they are wandering past us, the air-mothers, to weep the leaves +into their graves; to weep the seeds into their seed-beds, and +weep the soil into the plains; to get the rich earth ready for the +winter, and then creep northward to the ice-world, and there die. + +Weary, and still more weary, slowly and more slowly still, they +will journey on far northward, across fast-chilling seas. For a +doom is laid upon them, never to be still again, till they rest at +the North Pole itself, the still axle of the spinning world; and +sink in death around it, and become white snow-clad ghosts. + +But will they live again, those chilled air-mothers? Yes, they +must live again. For all things move for ever; and not even +ghosts can rest. So the corpses of their sisters, piling on them +from above, press them outward, press them southward toward the +sun once more; across the floes and round the icebergs, weeping +tears of snow and sleet, while men hate their wild harsh voices, +and shrink before their bitter breath. They know not that the +cold bleak snow-storms, as they hurtle from the black north-east, +bear back the ghosts of the soft air-mothers, as penitents, to +their father, the great sun. + +But as they fly southwards, warm life thrills them, and they drop +their loads of sleet and snow; and meet their young live sisters +from the south, and greet them with flash and thunder-peal. And, +please God, before many weeks are over, as we run Westward-Ho, we +shall overtake the ghosts of these air-mothers, hurrying back +toward their father, the great sun. Fresh and bright under the +fresh bright heaven, they will race with us toward our home, to +gain new heat, new life, new power, and set forth about their work +once more. Men call them the south-west wind, those air-mothers; +and their ghosts the north-east trade; and value them, and +rightly, because they bear the traders out and home across the +sea. But wise men, and little children, should look on them with +more seeing eyes; and say, "May not these winds be living +creatures? They, too, are thoughts of God, to whom all live." + +For is not our life like their life? Do we not come and go as +they? Out of God's boundless bosom, the fount of life, we came; +through selfish, stormy youth and contrite tears--just not too +late; through manhood not altogether useless; through slow and +chill old age, we return from Whence we came; to the Bosom of God +once more--to go forth again, it may be, with fresh knowledge, and +fresh powers, to nobler work. Amen. + +Such was the prophecy which I learnt, or seemed to learn, from the +south-western wind off the Atlantic, on a certain delectable +evening. And it was fulfilled at night, as far as the gentle air- +mothers could fulfil it, for foolish man. + + +There was a roaring in the woods all night; +The rain came heavily and fell in floods; +But now the sun is rising calm and bright, +The birds are singing in the distant woods; +Over his own sweet voice the stock-dove broods, +The jay makes answer as the magpie chatters, +And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters. + + +But was I a gloomy and distempered man, if, upon such a morn as +that, I stood on the little bridge across a certain brook, and +watched the water run, with something of a sigh? Or if, when the +schoolboy beside me lamented that the floods would surely be out, +and his day's fishing spoiled, I said to him--"Ah, my boy, that is +a little matter. Look at what you are seeing now, and understand +what barbarism and waste mean. Look at all that beautiful water +which God has sent us hither off the Atlantic, without trouble or +expense to us. Thousands, and tens of thousands, of gallons will +run under this bridge to-day; and what shall we do with it? +Nothing. And yet: think only of the mills which that water would +have turned. Think how it might have kept up health and +cleanliness in poor creatures packed away in the back streets of +the nearest town, or even in London itself. Think even how +country folks, in many parts of England, in three months' time, +may be crying out for rain, and afraid of short crops, and fever, +and scarlatina, and cattle-plague, for want of the very water +which we are now letting run back, wasted, into the sea from +whence it came. And yet we call ourselves a civilised people." + +It is not wise, I know, to preach to boys. And yet, sometimes, a +man must speak his heart; even, like Midas's slave, to the reeds +by the river side. And I had so often, fishing up and down full +many a stream, whispered my story to those same river-reeds; and +told them that my Lord the Sovereign Demos had, like old Midas, +asses' ears in spite of all his gold, that I thought I might for +once tell it the boy likewise, in hope that he might help his +generation to mend that which my own generation does not seem like +to mend. + +I might have said more to him: but did not. For it is not well +to destroy too early the child's illusion, that people must be +wise because they are grown up, and have votes, and rule--or think +they rule--the world. The child will find out how true that is +soon enough for himself. If the truth be forced on him by the hot +words of those with whom he lives, it is apt to breed in him that +contempt, stormful and therefore barren, which makes revolutions; +and not that pity, calm and therefore helpful, which makes +reforms. + +So I might have said to him, but did not - +And then men pray for rain: + +My boy, did you ever hear the old Eastern legend about the +Gipsies? How they were such good musicians, that some great +Indian Sultan sent for the whole tribe, and planted them near his +palace, and gave them land, and ploughs to break it up, and seed +to sow it, that they might dwell there, and play and sing to him. + +But when the winter arrived, the Gipsies all came to the Sultan, +and cried that they were starving. "But what have you done with +the seed-corn which I gave you?" "O Light of the Age, we ate it +in the summer." "And what have you done with the ploughs which I +gave you?" "O Glory of the Universe, we burnt them to bake the +corn withal." + +Then said that great Sultan--"Like the butterflies you have lived; +and like the butterflies you shall wander." So he drove them out. +And that is how the Gipsies came hither from the East. + +Now suppose that the Sultan of all Sultans, who sends the rain, +should make a like answer to us foolish human beings, when we +prayed for rain: "But what have you done with the rain which I +gave you six months since?" "We have let it run into the sea." +"Then, ere you ask for more rain, make places wherein you can keep +it when you have it." "But that would be, in most cases, too +expensive. We can employ our capital more profitably in other +directions." + +It is not for me to say what answer might be made to such an +excuse. I think a child's still unsophisticated sense of right +and wrong would soon supply one; and probably one--considering the +complexity, and difficulty, and novelty, of the whole question-- +somewhat too harsh; as children's judgments are wont to be. + +But would it not be well if our children, without being taught to +blame anyone for what is past, were taught something about what +ought to be done now, what must be done soon, with the rainfall of +these islands; and about other and kindred health-questions, on +the solution of which depends, and will depend more and more, the +life of millions? One would have thought that those public +schools and colleges which desire to monopolise the education of +the owners of the soil; of the great employers of labour; of the +clergy; and of all, indeed, who ought to be acquainted with the +duties of property, the conditions of public health, and, in a +word, with the general laws of what is now called Social Science-- +one would have thought, I say, that these public schools and +colleges would have taught their scholars somewhat at least about +such matters, that they might go forth into life with at least +some rough notions of the causes which make people healthy or +unhealthy, rich or poor, comfortable or wretched, useful or +dangerous to the State. But as long as our great educational +institutions, safe, or fancying themselves safe, in some enchanted +castle, shut out by ancient magic from the living world, put a +premium on Latin and Greek verses: a wise father will, during the +holidays, talk now and then, I hope, somewhat after this fashion: + +"You must understand, my boy, that all the water in the country +comes out of the sky, and from nowhere else; and that, therefore, +to save and store the water when it falls is a question of life +and death to crops, and man, and beast; for with or without water +is life or death. If I took, for instance, the water from the +moors above and turned it over yonder field, I could double, and +more than double, the crops in that field, henceforth." + +"Then why do I not do it?" + +"Only because the field lies higher than the house; and if--now +here is one thing which you and every civilised man should know-- +if you have water-meadows, or any 'irrigated' land, as it is +called, above a house, or, even on a level with it, it is certain +to breed not merely cold and damp, but fever or ague. Our +forefathers did not understand this; and they built their houses, +as this is built, in the lowest places they could find: sometimes +because they wanted to be near ponds, from whence they could get +fish in Lent; but more often, I think, because they wanted to be +sheltered from the wind. They had no glass, as we have, in their +windows, or, at least, only latticed casements, which let in the +wind and cold; and they shrank from high and exposed, and +therefore really healthy, spots. But now that we have good glass, +and sash windows, and doors that will shut tight, we can build +warm houses where we like. And if you ever have to do with the +building of cottages, remember that it is your duty to the people +who will live in them, and therefore to the State, to see that +they stand high and dry, where no water can drain down into their +foundations, and where fog, and the poisonous gases which are +given out by rotting vegetables, cannot drain down either. You +will learn more about all that when you learn, as every civilised +lad should in these days, something about chemistry, and the laws +of fluids and gases. But you know already that flowers are cut +off by frost in the low grounds sooner than in the high; and that +the fog at night always lies along the brooks; and that the sour +moor-smell which warns us to shut our windows at sunset, comes +down from the hill, and not up from the valley. Now all these +things are caused by one and the same law; that cold air is +heavier than warm; and, therefore, like so much water, must run +down-hill." + +"But what about the rainfall?" + +"Well, I have wandered a little from the rainfall: though not as +far as you fancy; for fever and ague and rheumatism usually mean-- +rain in the wrong place. But if you knew how much illness, and +torturing pain, and death, and sorrow arise, even to this very +day, from ignorance of these simple laws, then you would bear them +carefully in mind, and wish to know more about them. But now for +water being life to the beasts. Do you remember--though you are +hardly old enough--the cattle-plague? How the beasts died, or had +to be killed and buried, by tens of thousands; and how misery and +ruin fell on hundreds of honest men and women over many of the +richest counties of England: but how we in this vale had no +cattle-plague; and how there was none--as far as I recollect--in +the uplands of Devon and Cornwall, nor of Wales, nor of the Scotch +Highlands? Now, do you know why that was? Simply because we +here, like those other up-landers, are in such a country as +Palestine was before the foolish Jews cut down all their timber, +and so destroyed their own rainfall--a 'land of brooks of water, +of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills.' +There is hardly a field here that has not, thank God, its running +brook, or its sweet spring, from which our cattle were drinking +their health and life, while in the clay-lands of Cheshire, and in +the Cambridgeshire fens--which were drained utterly dry--the poor +things drank no water, too often, save that of the very same +putrid ponds in which they had been standing all day long, to cool +themselves, and to keep off the flies. I do not say, of course, +that bad water caused the cattle-plague. It came by infection +from the East of Europe. But I say that bad water made the cattle +ready to take it, and made it spread over the country; and when +you are old enough I will give you plenty of proof--some from the +herds of your own kinsmen--that what I say is true." + +"And as for pure water being life to human beings: why have we +never fever here, and scarcely ever diseases like fever--zymotics, +as the doctors call them? Or, if a case comes into our parish +from outside, why does the fever never spread? For the very same +reason that we had no cattle-plague. Because we have more pure +water close to every cottage than we need. And this I tell you: +that the only two outbreaks of deadly disease which we have had +here for thirty years, were both of them, as far as I could see, +to be traced to filthy water having got into the poor folks' +wells. Water, you must remember, just as it is life when pure, is +death when foul. For it can carry, unseen to the eve, and even +when it looks clear and sparkling, and tastes soft and sweet, +poisons which have perhaps killed more human beings than ever were +killed in battle. You have read, perhaps, how the Athenians, when +they were dying of the plague, accused the Lacedaemonians outside +the walls of poisoning their wells; or how, in some of the +pestilences of the Middle Ages, the common people used to accuse +the poor harmless Jews of poisoning the wells, and set upon them +and murdered them horribly. They were right, I do not doubt, in +their notion that the well-water was giving them the pestilence: +but they had not sense to see that they were poisoning the wells +themselves by their dirt and carelessness; or, in the case of poor +besieged Athens, probably by mere overcrowding, which has cost +many a life ere now, and will cost more. And I am sorry to tell +you, my little man, that even now too many people have no more +sense than they had, and die in consequence. If you could see a +battle-field, and men shot down, writhing and dying in hundreds by +shell and bullet, would not that seem to you a horrid sight? +Then--I do not wish to make you sad too early, but this is a fact +that everyone should know--that more people, and not strong men +only, but women and little children too, are killed and wounded in +Great Britain every year by bad water and want of water together, +than were killed and wounded in any battle which has been fought +since you were born. Medical men know this well. And when you +are older, you may see it for yourself in the Registrar-General's +reports, blue-books, pamphlets, and so on, without end." + +"But why do not people stop such a horrible loss of life?" + +"Well, my dear boy, the true causes of it have only been known for +the last thirty or forty years; and we English are, as good King +Alfred found us to his sorrow a thousand years ago, very slow to +move, even when we see a thing ought to be done. Let us hope that +in this matter--we have been so in most matters as yet--we shall +be like the tortoise in the fable, and not the hare; and by moving +slowly, but surely, win the race at last." + +"But now think for yourself: and see what you would do to save +these people from being poisoned by bad water. Remember that the +plain question is this: The rain-water comes down from heaven as +water, and nothing but water. Rain-water is the only pure water, +after all. How would you save that for the poor people who have +none? There; run away and hunt rabbits on the moor: but look, +meanwhile, how you would save some of this beautiful and precious +water which is roaring away into the sea." + +* * * + +"Well? What would you do? Make ponds, you say, like the old +monks' ponds, now all broken down. Dam all the glens across their +mouths, and turn them into reservoirs." + +"'Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings'--Well, that will have +to be done. That is being done more and more, more or less well. +The good people of Glasgow did it first, I think; and now the good +people of Manchester, and of other northern towns, have done it, +and have saved many a human life thereby already. But it must be +done, some day, all over England and Wales, and great part of +Scotland. For the mountain tops and moors, my boy, by a beautiful +law of nature, compensate for their own poverty by yielding a +wealth which the rich lowlands cannot yield. You do not +understand? Then see. Yon moor above can grow neither corn nor +grass. But one thing it can grow, and does grow, without which we +should have no corn nor grass, and that is--water. Not only does +far more rain fall up there than falls here down below, but even +in drought the high moors condense the moisture into dew, and so +yield some water, even when the lowlands are burnt up with +drought. The reason of that you must learn hereafter. That it is +so, you should know yourself. For on the high chalk downs, you +know, where farmers make a sheep-pond, they never, if they are +wise, make it in a valley or on a hillside, but on the bleakest +top of the very highest down; and there, if they can once get it +filled with snow and rain in winter, the blessed dews of night +will keep some water in it all the summer through, while the ponds +below are utterly dried up. And even so it is, as I know, with +this very moor. Corn and grass it will not grow, because there is +too little 'staple,' that is, soluble minerals, in the sandy soil. +But how much water it might grow, you may judge roughly for +yourself, by remembering how many brooks like this are running off +it now to carry mere dirt into the river, and then into the sea." + +"But why should we not make dams at once; and save the water?" + +"Because we cannot afford it. No one would buy the water when we +had stored it. The rich in town and country will always take +care--and quite right they are--to have water enough for +themselves, and for their servants too, whatever it may cost them. +But the poorer people are--and therefore usually, alas! the more +ignorant--the less water they get; and the less they care to have +water; and the less they are inclined to pay for it; and the more, +I am sorry to say, they waste what little they do get; and I am +still more sorry to say, spoil, and even steal and sell--in London +at least--the stop-cocks and lead-pipes which bring the water into +their houses. So that keeping a water-shop is a very troublesome +and uncertain business; and one which is not likely to pay us or +anyone round here." + +"But why not let some company manage it, as they manage railways, +and gas, and other things?" + +"Ah--you have been overhearing a good deal about companies of +late, I see. But this I will tell you; that when you grow up, and +have a vote and influence, it will be your duty, if you intend to +be a good citizen, not only not to put the water-supply of England +into the hands of fresh companies, but to help to take out of +their hands what water-supply they manage already, especially in +London; and likewise the gas-supply; and the railroads; and +everything else, in a word, which everybody uses, and must use. +For you must understand--at least as soon as you can--that though +the men who make up companies are no worse than other men, and +some of them, as you ought to know, very good men; yet what they +have to look to is their profits; and the less water they supply, +and the worse it is, the more profit they make. For most water, I +am sorry to say, is fouled before the water companies can get to +it, as this water which runs past us will be, and as the Thames +water above London is. Therefore it has to be cleansed, or partly +cleansed, at a very great expense. So water companies have to be +inspected--in plain English, watched--at a very heavy expense to +the nation by Government officers; and compelled to do their best, +and take their utmost care. And so it has come to pass that the +London water is not now nearly as bad as some of it was thirty +years ago, when it was no more fit to drink than that in the +cattle-yard tank. But still we must have more water, and better, +in London; for it is growing year by year. There are more than +three millions of people already in what we call London; and ere +you are an old man there may be between four and five millions. +Now to supply all these people with water is a duty which we must +not leave to any private companies. It must be done by a public +authority, as is fit and proper in a free self-governing country. +In this matter, as in all others, we will try to do what the Royal +Commission told us four years ago we ought to do. I hope that you +will see, though I may not, the day when what we call London, but +which is really nine-tenths of it, only a great nest of separate +villages huddled together, will be divided into three great self- +governing cities, London, Westminster, and Southwark; each with +its own corporation, like that of the venerable and well-governed +city of London; each managing its own water-supply, gas-supply, +and sewage, and other matters besides; and managing them, like +Dublin, Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool, and other great northern +towns, far more cheaply and far better than any companies can do +it for them." + +"But where shall we get water enough for all these millions of +people? There are no mountains near London. But we might give +them the water off our moors." + +"No, no, my boy, + + +"He that will not when he may, +When he will, he shall have nay. + + +Some fifteen years ago the Londoners might have had water from us; +and I was one of those who did my best to get it for them: but +the water companies did not choose to take it; and now this part +of England is growing so populous and so valuable that it wants +all its little rainfall for itself. So there is another leaf torn +out of the Sibylline books for the poor old water companies. You +do not understand: you will some day. But you may comfort +yourself about London. For it happens to be, I think, the +luckiest city in the world; and if it had not been, we should have +had pestilence on pestilence in it, as terrible as the great +plague of Charles II.'s time. The old Britons, without knowing in +the least what they were doing, settled old London city in the +very centre of the most wonderful natural reservoir in this +island, or perhaps in all Europe; which reaches from Kent into +Wiltshire, and round again into Suffolk; and that is, the dear old +chalk downs." + +"Why, they are always dry." + +"Yes. But the turf on them never burns up, and the streams which +flow through them never run dry, and seldom or never flood either. +Do you not know, from Winchester, that that is true? Then where +is all the rain and snow gone, which falls on them year by year, +but into the chalk itself, and into the green-sands, too, below +the chalk? There it is, soaked up as by a sponge, in quantity +incalculable; enough, some think, to supply London, let it grow as +huge as it may. I wish I too were sure of that. But the +Commission has shown itself so wise and fair, and brave likewise-- +too brave, I am sorry to say, for some who might have supported +them--that it is not for me to gainsay their opinion." + +"But if there was not water enough in the chalk, are not the +Londoners rich enough to bring it from any distance?" + +"My boy, in this also we will agree with the Commission--that we +ought not to rob Peter to pay Paul, and take water to a distance +which other people close at hand may want. Look at the map of +England and southern Scotland; and see for yourself what is just, +according to geography and nature. There are four mountain- +ranges; four great water-fields. First, the hills of the Border. +Their rainfall ought to be stored for the Lothians and the extreme +north of England. Then the Yorkshire and Derbyshire Hills--the +central chine of England. Their rainfall is being stored already, +to the honour of the shrewd northern men, for the manufacturing +counties east and west of the hills. Then come the Lake +mountains--the finest water-field of all, because more rain by far +falls there than in any place in England. But they will be wanted +to supply Lancashire, and some day Liverpool itself; for Liverpool +is now using rain which belongs more justly to other towns; and +besides, there are plenty of counties and towns, down into +Cheshire, which would be glad of what water Lancashire does not +want. At last come the Snowdon mountains, a noble water-field, +which I know well; for an old dream of mine has been, that ere I +died I should see all the rain of the Carnedds, and the Glyders, +and Siabod, and Snowdon itself, carried across the Conway river to +feed the mining districts of North Wales, where the streams are +now all foul with oil and lead; and then on into the western coal +and iron fields, to Wolverhampton and Birmingham itself: and if I +were the engineer who got that done, I should be happier--prouder +I dare not say--than if I had painted nobler pictures than +Raffaelle, or written nobler plays than Shakespeare. I say that, +boy, in most deliberate earnest. But meanwhile, do you not see +that in districts where coal and iron may be found, and fresh +manufactures may spring up any day in any place, each district has +a right to claim the nearest rainfall for itself? And now, when +we have got the water into its proper place, let us see what we +shall do with it." + +"But why do you say 'we'? Can you and I do all this?" + +"My boy, are not you and I free citizens; part of the people, the +Commons--as the good old word runs--of this country? And are we +not--or ought we not to be in time--beside that, educated men? By +the people, remember, I mean, not only the hand-working man who +has just got a vote; I mean the clergy of all denominations; and +the gentlemen of the press; and last, but not least, the +scientific men. If those four classes together were to tell every +government--'Free water we will have, and as much as we reasonably +choose;' and tell every candidate for the House of Commons: +'Unless you promise to get us as much free water as we reasonably +choose, we will not return you to Parliament:' then, I think, we +four should put such a 'pressure' on Government as no water +companies, or other vested interests, could long resist. And if +any of those four classes should hang back, and waste their time +and influence over matters far less important and less pressing, +the other three must laugh at them, and more than laugh at them; +and ask them: 'Why have you education, why have you influence, +why have you votes, why are you freemen and not slaves, if not to +preserve the comfort, the decency, the health, the lives of men, +women, and children--most of those latter your own wives and your +own children?'" + +"But what shall we do with the water?" + +"Well, after all, that is a more practical matter than +speculations grounded on the supposition that all classes will do +their duty. But the first thing we will do will be to give to the +very poorest houses a constant supply, at high pressure; so that +everybody may take as much water as he likes, instead of having to +keep the water in little cisterns, where it gets foul and putrid +only too often." + +"But will they not waste it then?" + +"So far from it, wherever the water has been laid on at high +pressure, the waste, which is terrible now--some say that in +London one-third of the water is wasted--begins to lessen; and +both water and expense are saved. If you will only think, you +will see one reason why. If a woman leaves a high-pressure tap +running, she will flood her place and her neighbour's too. She +will be like the magician's servant, who called up the demon to +draw water for him; and so he did: but when he had begun he would +not stop, and if the magician had not come home, man and house +would have been washed away." + +"But if it saves money, why do not the water companies do it?" + +"Because--and really here there are many excuses for the poor old +water companies, when so many of them swerve and gib at the very +mention of constant water-supply, like a poor horse set to draw a +load which he feels is too heavy for him--because, to keep +everything in order among dirty, careless, and often drunken +people, there must be officers with lawful authority--water- +policemen we will call them--who can enter people's houses when +they will, and if they find anything wrong with the water, set it +to rights with a high hand, and even summon the people who have +set it wrong. And that is a power which, in a free country, must +never be given to the servants of any private company, but only to +the officers of a corporation or of the Government." + +"And what shall we do with the rest of the water?" + +"Well, we shall have, I believe, so much to spare that we may at +least do this: In each district of each city, and the centre of +each town, we may build public baths and lavatories, where poor +men and women may get their warm baths when they will; for now +they usually never bathe at all, because they will not--and ought +not, if they be hard-worked folk--bathe in cold water during nine +months of the year. And there they shall wash their clothes, and +dry them by steam; instead of washing them as now, at home, either +under back sheds, where they catch cold and rheumatism, or too +often, alas! in their own living rooms, in an atmosphere of foul +vapour, which drives the father to the public-house and the +children into the streets; and which not only prevents the clothes +from being thoroughly dried again, but is, my dear boy, as you +will know when you are older, a very hot-bed of disease. And they +shall have other comforts, and even luxuries, these public +lavatories; and be made, in time, graceful and refining, as well +as merely useful. Nay, we will even, I think, have in front of +each of them a real fountain; not like the drinking-fountains-- +though they are great and needful boons--which you see here and +there about the streets, with a tiny dribble of water to a great +deal of expensive stone: but real fountains, which shall leap, +and sparkle, and plash, and gurgle; and fill the place with life, +and light, and coolness; and sing in the people's ears the +sweetest of all earthly songs--save the song of a mother over her +child--the song of 'The Laughing Water.'" + +"But will not that be a waste?" + +"Yes, my boy. And for that very reason, I think we, the people, +will have our fountains; if it be but to make our governments, and +corporations, and all public bodies and officers, remember that +they all--save Her Majesty the Queen--are our servants, and not we +theirs; and that we choose to have water, not only to wash with, +but to play with, if we like. And I believe--for the world, as +you will find, is full not only of just but of generous souls-- +that if the water-supply were set really right, there would be +found, in many a city, many a generous man who, over and above his +compulsory water-rate, would give his poor fellow-townsmen such a +real fountain as those which ennoble the great square at +Carcasonne and the great square at Nismes; to be 'a thing of +beauty and a joy for ever.'" + +"And now, if you want to go back to your Latin and Greek, you +shall translate for me into Latin--I do not expect you to do it +into Greek, though it would turn very well into Greek, for the +Greeks know all about the matter long before the Romans--what +follows here; and you shall verify the facts and the names, etc., +in it from your dictionaries of antiquity and biography, that you +may remember all the better what it says. And by that time, I +think, you will have learnt something more useful to yourself, +and, I hope, to your country hereafter, than if you had learnt to +patch together the neatest Greek and Latin verses which have +appeared since the days of Mr. Canning." + +* * * + +I have often amused myself, by fancying one question which an old +Roman emperor would ask, were he to rise from his grave and visit +the sights of London under the guidance of some minister of state. +The august shade would, doubtless, admire our railroads and +bridges, our cathedrals and our public parks, and much more of +which we need not be ashamed. But after awhile, I think, he would +look round, whether in London or in most of our great cities, +inquiringly and in vain, for one class of buildings, which in his +empire were wont to be almost as conspicuous and as splendid, +because, in public opinion, almost as necessary, as the basilicas +and temples: "And where," he would ask, "are your public baths?" +And if the minister of state who was his guide should answer: "Oh +great Caesar, I really do not know. I believe there are some +somewhere at the back of that ugly building which we call the +National Gallery; and I think there have been some meetings lately +in the East End, and an amateur concert at the Albert Hall, for +restoring, by private subscriptions, some baths and wash-houses in +Bethnal Green, which had fallen to decay. And there may be two or +three more about the metropolis; for parish vestries have powers +by Act of Parliament to establish such places, if they think fit, +and choose to pay for them out of the rates." Then, I think, the +august shade might well make answer: "We used to call you, in old +Rome, northern barbarians. It seems that you have not lost all +your barbarian habits. Are you aware that, in every city in the +Roman empire, there were, as a matter of course, public baths +open, not only to the poorest freeman, but to the slave, usually +for the payment of the smallest current coin, and often +gratuitously? Are you aware that in Rome itself, millionaire +after millionaire, emperor after emperor, from Menenius Agrippa +and Nero down to Diocletian and Constantine, built baths, and yet +more baths; and connected with them gymnasia for exercise, +lecture-rooms, libraries, and porticoes, wherein the people might +have shade, and shelter, and rest? I remark, by-the-bye, that I +have not seen in all your London a single covered place in which +the people may take shelter during a shower. Are you aware that +these baths were of the most magnificent architecture, decorated +with marbles, paintings, sculptures, fountains, what not? And yet +I had heard, in Hades down below, that you prided yourselves here +on the study of the learned languages; and, indeed, taught little +but Greek and Latin at your public schools?" + +Then, if the minister should make reply: "Oh yes, we know all +this. Even since the revival of letters in the end of the +fifteenth century a whole literature has been written--a great +deal of it, I fear, by pedants who seldom washed even their hands +and faces--about your Greek and Roman baths. We visit their +colossal ruins in Italy and elsewhere with awe and admiration; and +the discovery of a new Roman bath in any old city of our isles +sets all our antiquaries buzzing with interest." + +"Then why," the shade might ask, "do you not copy an example which +you so much admire? Surely England must be much in want, either +of water, or of fuel to heat it with?" + +"On the contrary, our rainfall is almost too great; our soil so +damp that we have had to invent a whole art of subsoil drainage +unknown to you; while, as for fuel, our coal-mines make us the +great fuel-exporting people of the world." + +What a quiet sneer might curl the lip of a Constantine as he +replied: "Not in vain, as I said, did we call you, some fifteen +hundred years ago, the barbarians of the north. But tell me, good +barbarian, whom I know to be both brave and wise--for the fame of +your young British empire has reached us even in the realms below, +and we recognise in you, with all respect, a people more like us +Romans than any which has appeared on earth for many centuries-- +how is it you have forgotten that sacred duty of keeping the +people clean, which you surely at one time learnt from us? When +your ancestors entered our armies, and rose, some of them, to be +great generals, and even emperors, like those two Teuton peasants, +Justin and Justinian, who, long after my days, reigned in my own +Constantinople: then, at least, you saw baths, and used them; and +felt, after the bath, that you were civilised men, and not +'sordidi ac foetentes,' as we used to call you when fresh out of +your bullock-waggons and cattle-pens. How is it that you have +forgotten that lesson?" + +The minister, I fear, would have to answer that our ancestors were +barbarous enough, not only to destroy the Roman cities, and +temples, and basilicas, and statues, but the Roman baths likewise; +and then retired, each man to his own freehold in the country, to +live a life not much more cleanly or more graceful than that of +the swine which were his favourite food. But he would have a +right to plead, as an excuse, that not only in England, but +throughout the whole of the conquered Latin empire, the Latin +priesthood, who, in some respects, were--to their honour--the +representatives of Roman civilisation and the protectors of its +remnants, were the determined enemies of its cleanliness; that +they looked on personal dirt--like the old hermits of the Thebaid- +-as a sign of sanctity; and discouraged--as they are said to do +still in some of the Romance countries of Europe--the use of the +bath, as not only luxurious, but also indecent. + +At which answer, it seems to me, another sneer might curl the lip +of the august shade, as he said to himself: "This, at least, I +did not expect, when I made Christianity the state religion of my +empire. But you, good barbarian, look clean enough. You do not +look on dirt as a sign of sanctity?" + +"On the contrary, sire, the upper classes of our empire boast of +being the cleanliest--perhaps the only perfectly cleanly--people +in the world: except, of course, the savages of the South Seas. +And dirt is so far from being a thing which we admire, that our +scientific men--than whom the world has never seen wiser--have +proved to us, for a whole generation past, that dirt is the +fertile cause of disease and drunkenness, misery, and +recklessness." + +"And, therefore," replies the shade, ere he disappears, "of +discontent and revolution: followed by a tyranny endured, as in +Rome and many another place, by men once free; because tyranny +will at least do for them what they are too lazy, and cowardly, +and greedy, to do for themselves. Farewell, and prosper; as you +seem likely to prosper, on the whole. But if you wish me to +consider you a civilised nation: let me hear that you have +brought a great river from the depths of the earth, be they a +thousand fathoms deep, or from your nearest mountains, be they +five hundred miles away; and have washed out London's dirt--and +your own shame. Till then, abstain from judging too harshly a +Constantine, or even a Caracalla; for they, whatever were their +sins, built baths, and kept their people clean. But do your +gymnasia--your schools and universities, teach your youth naught +about all this?" + + + +THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE + + + +The more I have contemplated that ancient story of the Fall, the +more it has seemed to me within the range of probability, and even +of experience. It must have happened somewhere for the first +time; for it has happened only too many times since. It has +happened, as far as I can ascertain, in every race, and every age, +and every grade of civilisation. It is happening round us now in +every region of the globe. Always and everywhere, it seems to me, +have poor human beings been tempted to eat of some "tree of +knowledge," that they may be, even for an hour, as gods; wise, but +with a false wisdom; careless, but with a frantic carelessness; +and happy, but with a happiness which, when the excitement is +past, leaves too often--as with that hapless pair in Eden-- +depression, shame, and fear. Everywhere, and in all ages, as far +as I can ascertain, has man been inventing stimulants and +narcotics to supply that want of vitality of which he is so +painfully aware; and has asked nature, and not God, to clear the +dull brain, and comfort the weary spirit. + +This has been, and will be perhaps for many a century to come, +almost the most fearful failing of this poor, exceptional, over- +organised, diseased, and truly fallen being called Man, who is in +doubt daily whether he be a god or an ape; and in trying wildly to +become the former, ends but too often in becoming the latter. + +For man, whether savage or civilised, feels, and has felt in every +age, that there is something wrong with him. He usually confesses +this fact--as is to be expected--of his fellow-men, rather than of +himself; and shows his sense that there is something wrong with +them by complaining of, hating, and killing them. But he cannot +always conceal from himself the fact that he, too, is wrong, as +well as they; and as he will not usually kill himself, he tries +wild ways to make himself at least feel--if not to be--somewhat +"better." Philosophers may bid him be content; and tell him that +he is what he ought to be, and what nature has made him. But he +cares nothing for the philosophers. He knows, usually, that he is +not what he ought to be; that he carries about with him, in most +cases, a body more or less diseased and decrepit, incapable of +doing all the work which he feels that he himself could do, or +expressing all the emotions which he himself longs to express; a +dull brain and dull senses, which cramp the eager infinity within +him; as--so Goethe once said with pity--the horse's single hoof +cramps the fine intelligence and generosity of his nature, and +forbids him even to grasp an object, like the more stupid cat, and +baser monkey. And man has a self, too, within, from which he +longs too often to escape, as from a household ghost; who pulls +out, at unfortunately rude and unwelcome hours, the ledger of +memory. And so when the tempter--be he who he may--says to him, +"Take this, and you will 'feel better.' Take this, and you shall +be as gods, knowing good and evil:" then, if the temptation was, +as the old story says, too much for man while healthy and +unfallen, what must it be for his unhealthy and fallen children? + +In vain we say to man: + + +'Tis life, not death, for which you pant; +'Tis life, whereof your nerves are scant; +More life, and fuller, that you want. + + +And your tree of knowledge is not the tree of life: it is in +every case, the tree of death; of decrepitude, madness, misery. +He prefers the voice of the tempter: "Thou shalt not surely die." +Nay, he will say at last: "Better be as gods awhile, and die: +than be the crawling, insufficient thing I am; and live." + +He--did I say? Alas! I must say she likewise. The sacred story +is only too true to fact, when it represents the woman as falling, +not merely at the same time as the man, but before the man. Only +let us remember that it represents the woman as tempted; tempted, +seemingly, by a rational being, of lower race, and yet of superior +cunning; who must, therefore, have fallen before the woman. Who +or what the being was, who is called the Serpent in our +translation of Genesis, it is not for me to say. We have +absolutely, I think, no facts from which to judge; and Rabbinical +traditions need trouble no man much. But I fancy that a +missionary, preaching on this story to Negroes; telling them +plainly that the "Serpent" meant the first Obeah man; and then +comparing the experiences of that hapless pair in Eden, with their +own after certain orgies not yet extinct in Africa and elsewhere, +would be only too well understood: so well, indeed, that he might +run some risk of eating himself, not of the tree of life, but of +that of death. The sorcerer or sorceress tempting the woman; and +then the woman tempting the man; this seems to be, certainly among +savage peoples, and, alas! too often among civilised peoples also, +the usual course of the world-wide tragedy. + +But--paradoxical as it may seem--the woman's yielding before the +man is not altogether to her dishonour, as those old monks used to +allege who hated, and too often tortured, the sex whom they could +not enjoy. It is not to the woman's dishonour, if she felt, +before her husband, higher aspirations than those after mere +animal pleasure. To be as gods, knowing good and evil, is a vain +and foolish, but not a base and brutal, wish. She proved herself +thereby--though at an awful cost--a woman, and not an animal. And +indeed the woman's more delicate organisation, her more vivid +emotions, her more voluble fancy, as well as her mere physical +weakness and weariness, have been to her, in all ages, a special +source of temptation; which it is to her honour that she has +resisted so much better than the physically stronger, and +therefore more culpable, man. + +As for what the tree of knowledge was, there really is no need for +us to waste our time in guessing. If it was not one plant, then +it was another. It may have been something which has long since +perished off the earth. It may have been--as some learned men +have guessed--the sacred Soma, or Homa, of the early Brahmin race; +and that may have been a still existing narcotic species of +Asclepias. It certainly was not the vine. The language of the +Hebrew Scripture concerning it, and the sacred use to which it is +consecrated in the Gospels, forbid that notion utterly; at least +to those who know enough of antiquity to pass by, with a smile, +the theory that the wines mentioned in Scripture were not +intoxicating. And yet--as a fresh corroboration of what I am +trying to say--how fearfully has that noble gift to man been +abused for the same end as a hundred other vegetable products, +ever since those mythic days when Dionusos brought the vine from +the far East, amid troops of human Maenads and half-human Satyrs; +and the Bacchae tore Pentheus in pieces on Cithaeron, for daring +to intrude upon their sacred rites; and since those historic days, +too, when, less than two hundred years before the Christian era, +the Bacchic rites spread from Southern Italy into Etruria, and +thence to the matrons of Rome; and under the guidance of Poenia +Annia, a Campanian lady, took at last shapes of which no man must +speak, but which had to be put down with terrible but just +severity, by the Consuls and the Senate. + +But it matters little, I say, what this same tree of knowledge +was. Was every vine on earth destroyed to-morrow, and every +vegetable also from which alcohol is now distilled, man would soon +discover something else wherewith to satisfy the insatiate +craving. Has he not done so already? Has not almost every people +had its tree of knowledge, often more deadly than any distilled +liquor, from the absinthe of the cultivated Frenchman, and the +opium of the cultivated Chinese, down to the bush-poisons +wherewith the tropic sorcerer initiates his dupes into the +knowledge of good and evil, and the fungus from which the Samoiede +extracts in autumn a few days of brutal happiness, before the +setting in of the long six months' night? God grant that modern +science may not bring to light fresh substitutes for alcohol, +opium, and the rest; and give the white races, in that state of +effeminate and godless quasi-civilisation which I sometimes fear +is creeping upon them, fresh means of destroying themselves +delicately and pleasantly off the face of the earth. + +It is said by some that drunkenness is on the increase in this +island. I have no trusty proof of it: but I can believe it +possible; for every cause of drunkenness seems on the increase. +Overwork of body and mind; circumstances which depress health; +temptation to drink, and drink again, at every corner of the +streets; and finally, money, and ever more money, in the hands of +uneducated people, who have not the desire, and too often not the +means, of spending it in any save the lowest pleasures. These, it +seems to me, are the true causes of drunkenness, increasing or +not. And if we wish to become a more temperate nation, we must +lessen them, if we cannot eradicate them. + +First, overwork. We all live too fast, and work too hard. "All +things are full of labour, man cannot utter it." In the heavy +struggle for existence which goes on all around us, each man is +tasked more and more--if he be really worth buying and using--to +the utmost of his powers all day long. The weak have to compete +on equal terms with the strong; and crave, in consequence, for +artificial strength. How we shall stop that I know not, while +every man is "making haste to be rich, and piercing himself +through with many sorrows, and falling into foolish and hurtful +lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition." How we +shall stop that, I say, I know not. The old prophet may have been +right when he said: "Surely it is not of the Lord that the people +shall labour in the very fire, and weary themselves for very +vanity;" and in some juster, wiser, more sober system of society-- +somewhat more like the Kingdom of The Father come on earth--it may +be that poor human beings will not need to toil so hard, and to +keep themselves up to their work by stimulants, but will have time +to sit down, and look around them, and think of God, and God's +quiet universe, with something of quiet in themselves; something +of rational leisure, and manful sobriety of mind, as well as of +body. + +But it seems to me also, that in such a state of society, when--as +it was once well put--"every one has stopped running about like +rats:"--that those who work hard, whether with muscle or with +brain, would not be surrounded, as now, with every circumstance +which tempts toward drink; by every circumstance which depresses +the vital energies, and leaves them an easy prey to pestilence +itself; by bad light, bad air, bad food, bad water, bad smells, +bad occupations, which weaken the muscles, cramp the chest, +disorder the digestion. Let any rational man, fresh from the +country--in which I presume God, having made it, meant all men, +more or less, to live--go through the back streets of any city, or +through whole districts of the "black countries" of England; and +then ask himself: Is it the will of God that His human children +should live and toil in such dens, such deserts, such dark places +of the earth? Lot him ask himself: Can they live and toil there +without contracting a probably diseased habit of body; without +contracting a certainly dull, weary, sordid habit of mind, which +craves for any pleasure, however brutal, to escape from its own +stupidity and emptiness? When I run through, by rail, certain +parts of the iron-producing country--streets of furnaces, +collieries, slag heaps, mud, slop, brick house-rows, smoke, dirt-- +and that is all; and when I am told, whether truly or falsely, +that the main thing which the well-paid and well-fed men of those +abominable wastes care for is--good fighting-dogs: I can only +answer, that I am not surprised. + +I say--as I have said elsewhere, and shall do my best to say it +again--that the craving for drink and narcotics, especially that +engendered in our great cities, is not a disease, but a symptom of +disease; of a far deeper disease than any which drunkenness can +produce; namely, of the growing degeneracy of a population +striving in vain by stimulants and narcotics to fight against +those slow poisons with which our greedy barbarism, miscalled +civilisation, has surrounded them from the cradle to the grave. I +may be answered that the old German, Angle, Dane, drank heavily. +I know it: but why did they drink, save for the same reason that +the fenman drank, and his wife took opium, at least till the fens +were drained? why but to keep off the depressing effects of the +malaria of swamps and new clearings, which told on them--who +always settled in the lowest grounds--in the shape of fever and +ague? Here it may be answered again that stimulants have been, +during the memory of man, the destruction of the Red Indian race +in America. I reply boldly that I do not believe it. There is +evidence enough in Jacques Cartier's "Voyages to the Rivers of +Canada;" and evidence more than enough in Strachey's "Travaile in +Virginia"--to quote only two authorities out of many--to prove +that the Red Indians, when the white man first met with them, +were, in North and South alike, a diseased, decaying, and, as all +their traditions confess, decreasing race. Such a race would +naturally crave for "the water of life," the "usquebagh," or +whisky, as we have contracted the old name now. But I should have +thought that the white man, by introducing among these poor +creatures iron, fire-arms, blankets, and above all, horses +wherewith to follow the buffalo-herds, which they could never +follow on foot, must have done ten times more towards keeping them +alive, than he has done towards destroying them by giving them the +chance of a week's drunkenness twice a year, when they came in to +his forts to sell the skins which, without his gifts, they would +never have got. + +Such a race would, of course, if wanting vitality, crave for +stimulants. But if the stimulants, and not the original want of +vitality, combined with morals utterly detestable, and worthy only +of the gallows--and here I know what I say, and dare not tell what +I know, from eye-witnesses--have been the cause of the Red +Indians' extinction, then how is it, let me ask, that the Irishman +and the Scotsman have, often to their great harm, been drinking as +much whisky--and usually very bad whisky--not merely twice a year, +but as often as they could get it, during the whole Iron Age, and, +for aught anyone can tell, during the Bronze Age, and the Stone +Age before that, and yet are still the most healthy, able, +valiant, and prolific races in Europe? Had they drunk less whisky +they would, doubtless, have been more healthy, able, valiant, and +perhaps even MORE prolific, than they are now. They show no sign, +however, as yet, of going the way of the Red Indian. + +But if the craving for stimulants and narcotics is a token of +deficient vitality, then the deadliest foe of that craving, and +all its miserable results, is surely the Sanatory Reformer; the +man who preaches, and--as far as ignorance and vested interests +will allow him, procures--for the masses, pure air, pure sunlight, +pure water, pure dwelling-houses, pure food. Not merely every +fresh drinking-fountain, but every fresh public bath and wash- +house, every fresh open space, every fresh growing tree, every +fresh open window, every fresh flower in that window--each of +these is so much, as the old Persians would have said, conquered +for Ormuzd, the god of light and life, out of the dominion of +Ahriman, the king of darkness and of death; so much taken from the +causes of drunkenness and disease, and added to the causes of +sobriety and health. + +Meanwhile one thing is clear: that if this present barbarism and +anarchy of covetousness, miscalled modern civilisation, were tamed +and drilled into something more like a Kingdom of God on earth, +then we should not see the reckless and needless multiplication of +liquor shops, which disgraces this country now. + +As a single instance: in one country parish of nine hundred +inhabitants, in which the population has increased only one-ninth +in the last fifty years, there are now practically eight public- +houses, where fifty years ago there were but two. One, that is, +for every hundred and ten--or rather, omitting children, farmers, +shop-keepers, gentlemen, and their households, one for every fifty +of the inhabitants. In the face of the allurements, often of the +basest kind, which these dens offer, the clergyman and the +schoolmaster struggle in vain to keep up night schools and young +men's clubs, and to inculcate habits of providence. + +The young labourers over a great part of the south and east, at +least of England--though never so well off, for several +generations, as they are now--are growing up thriftless, +shiftless; inferior, it seems to me, to their grandfathers in +everything, save that they can usually read and write, and their +grandfathers could not; and that they wear smart cheap cloth +clothes, instead of their grandfathers' smock-frocks. + +And if it be so in the country, how must it be in towns? There +must come a thorough change in the present licensing system, in +spite of all the "pressure" which certain powerful vested +interests may bring to bear on governments. And it is the duty of +every good citizen, who cares for his countrymen, and for their +children after them, to help in bringing about that change as +speedily as possible. + +Again: I said just now that a probable cause of increasing +drunkenness was the increasing material prosperity of thousands +who knew no recreation beyond low animal pleasure. If I am right- +-and I believe that I am right--I must urge on those who wish +drunkenness to decrease, the necessity of providing more, and more +refined, recreation for the people. + +Men drink, and women too, remember, not merely to supply +exhaustion, not merely to drive away care; but often simply to +drive away dulness. They have nothing to do save to think over +what they have done in the day, or what they expect to do to- +morrow; and they escape from that dreary round of business thought +in liquor or narcotics. There are still those, by no means of the +hand-working class, but absorbed all day by business, who drink +heavily at night in their own comfortable homes, simply to +recreate their over-burdened minds. Such cases, doubtless, are +far less common than they were fifty years ago: but why? Is not +the decrease of drinking among the richer classes certainly due to +the increased refinement and variety of their tastes and +occupations? In cultivating the aesthetic side of man's nature; +in engaging him with the beautiful, the pure, the wonderful, the +truly natural; with painting, poetry, music, horticulture, +physical science--in all this lies recreation, in the true and +literal sense of that word, namely, the re-creating and mending of +the exhausted mind and feelings, such as no rational man will now +neglect, either for himself, his children, or his workpeople. + +But how little of all this is open to the masses, all should know +but too well. How little opportunity the average hand-worker, or +his wife, has of eating of any tree of knowledge, save of the very +basest kind, is but too palpable. We are mending, thank God, in +this respect. Free libraries and museums have sprung up of late +in other cities beside London. God's blessing rest upon them all. +And the Crystal Palace, and still later, the Bethnal Green Museum, +have been, I believe, of far more use than many average sermons +and lectures from many average orators. + +But are we not still far behind the old Greeks, and the Romans of +the Empire likewise, in the amount of amusement and instruction, +and even of shelter, which we provide for the people? Recollect +the--to me--disgraceful fact, that there is not, as far as I am +aware, throughout the whole of London, a single portico or other +covered place, in which the people can take refuge during a +shower: and this in the climate of England! Where they do take +refuge on a wet day the publican knows but too well; as he knows +also where thousands of the lower classes, simply for want of any +other place to be in, save their own sordid dwellings, spend as +much as they are permitted of the Sabbath day. Let us put down +"Sunday drinking" by all means, if we can. But let us remember +that by closing the public-houses on Sunday, we prevent no man or +woman from carrying home as much poison as they choose on Saturday +night, to brutalise themselves therewith, perhaps for eight-and- +forty hours. And let us see--in the name of Him who said that He +had made the Sabbath for man, and not man for the Sabbath--let us +see, I say, if we cannot do something to prevent the townsman's +Sabbath being, not a day of rest, but a day of mere idleness; the +day of most temptation, because of most dulness, of the whole +seven. + +And here, perhaps some sweet soul may look up reprovingly and say: +"He talks of rest. Does he forget, and would he have the working +man forget, that all these outward palliatives will never touch +the seat of the disease, the unrest of the soul within? Does he +forget, and would he have the working man forget, who it was who +said--who only has the right to say: "Come unto Me, all ye who +are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest"? Ah no, +sweet soul. I know your words are true. I know that what we all +want is inward rest; rest of heart and brain; the calm, strong, +self-contained, self-denying character; which needs no stimulants, +for it has no fits of depression; which needs no narcotics, for it +has no fits of excitement; which needs no ascetic restraints, for +it is strong enough to use God's gifts without abusing them; the +character, in a word, which is truly temperate, not in drink or +food merely, but in all desires, thoughts, and actions; freed from +the wild lusts and ambitions to which that old Adam yielded, and, +seeking for light and life by means forbidden, found thereby +disease and death. Yes, I know that; and know, too, that that +rest is found only where you have already found it. + +And yet, in such a world as this, governed by a Being who has made +sunshine, and flowers, and green grass, and the song of birds, and +happy human smiles, and who would educate by them--if we would let +Him--His human children from the cradle to the grave; in such a +world as this, will you grudge any particle of that education, +even any harmless substitute for it, to those spirits in prison +whose surroundings too often tempt them, from the cradle to the +grave, to fancy that the world is composed of bricks and iron, and +governed by inspectors and policemen? Preach to those spirits in +prison, as you know far better than we parsons how to preach; but +let them have besides some glimpses of the splendid fact, that +outside their prison-house is a world which God, not man, has +made; wherein grows everywhere that tree of knowledge, which is +likewise the tree of life; and that they have a right to some +small share of its beauty, and its wonder, and its rest, for their +own health of soul and body, and for the health of their children +after them. + + + +GREAT CITIES AND THEIR INFLUENCE FOR GOOD AND EVIL {9} + + + +The pleasure, gentlemen and ladies, of addressing you here is +mixed in my mind with very solemn feelings; the honour which you +have done me is tempered by humiliating thoughts. + +For it was in this very city of Bristol, twenty-seven years ago, +that I received my first lesson in what is now called Social +Science; and yet, alas! more than ten years elapsed ere I could +even spell out that lesson, though it had been written for me (as +well as for all England) in letters of flame, from the one end of +heaven to the other. + +I was a school-boy in Clifton up above. I had been hearing of +political disturbances, even of riots, of which I understood +nothing, and for which I cared nothing. But on one memorable +Sunday afternoon I saw an object which was distinctly not +political. Otherwise I should have no right to speak of it here. + +It was an afternoon of sullen autumn rain. The fog hung thick +over the docks and lowlands. Glaring through that fog I saw a +bright mass of flame--almost like a half-risen sun. + +That, I was told, was the gate of the new gaol on fire. That the +prisoners in it had been set free; that-- But why speak of what +too many here recollect but too well? The fog rolled slowly +upward. Dark figures, even at that great distance, were flitting +to and fro across what seemed the mouth of the pit. The flame +increased--multiplied--at one point after another; till by ten +o'clock that night I seemed to be looking down upon Dante's +Inferno, and to hear the multitudinous moan and wail of the lost +spirits surging to and fro amid that sea of fire. + +Right behind Brandon Hill--how can I ever forget it?--rose the +great central mass of fire; till the little mound seemed converted +into a volcano, from the peak of which the flame streamed up, not +red alone, but, delicately green and blue, pale rose and pearly +white, while crimson sparks leapt and fell again in the midst of +that rainbow, not of hope, but of despair; and dull explosions +down below mingled with the roar of the mob, and the infernal hiss +and crackle of the flame. + +Higher and higher the fog was scorched and shrivelled upward by +the fierce heat below, glowing through and through with red +reflected glare, till it arched itself into one vast dome of red- +hot iron, fit roof for all the madness down below--and beneath it, +miles away, I could see the lonely tower of Dundie shining red;-- +the symbol of the old faith, looking down in stately wonder and +sorrow upon the fearful birth-throes of a new age. Yes.--Why did +I say just now despair? I was wrong. Birth-throes, and not death +pangs, those horrors were. Else they would have no place in my +discourse; no place, indeed, in my mind. Why talk over the signs +of disease, decay, death? Let the dead bury their dead, and let +us follow Him who dieth not; by whose command + + +The old order changeth, giving place to the new, +And God fulfils himself in many ways. + + +If we will believe this,--if we will look on each convulsion of +society, however terrible for the time being, as a token, not of +decrepitude, but of youth; not as the expiring convulsions of +sinking humanity, but as upward struggles, upward toward fuller +light, freer air, a juster, simpler, and more active life;--then +we shall be able to look calmly, however sadly, on the most +appalling tragedies of humanity--even on these late Indian ones-- +and take our share, faithful and hopeful, in supplying the new and +deeper wants of a new and nobler time. + +But to return. It was on the Tuesday or Wednesday after, if I +recollect right, that I saw another, and a still more awful sight. +Along the north side of Queen Square, in front of ruins which had +been three days before noble buildings, lay a ghastly row, not of +corpses, but of corpse-fragments. I have no more wish than you to +dilate upon that sight. But there was one charred fragment--with +a scrap of old red petticoat adhering to it, which I never forgot- +-which I trust in God that I never shall forget. It is good for a +man to be brought once at least in his life face to face with +fact, ultimate fact, however horrible it may be; and have to +confess to himself, shuddering, what things are possible upon +God's earth, when man has forgotten that his only welfare lies in +living after the likeness of God. + +Not that I learnt the lesson then. When the first excitement of +horror and wonder were past, what I had seen made me for years the +veriest aristocrat, full of hatred and contempt of these dangerous +classes, whose existence I had for the first time discovered. It +required many years--years, too, of personal intercourse with the +poor--to explain to me the true meaning of what I saw here in +October twenty-seven years ago, and to learn a part of that lesson +which God taught to others thereby. And one part at least of that +lesson was this: That the social state of a city depends directly +on its moral state, and--I fear dissenting voices, but I must say +what I believe to be truth--that the moral state of a city +depends--how far I know not, but frightfully, to an extent as yet +uncalculated, and perhaps incalculable--on the physical state of +that city; on the food, water, air, and lodging of its +inhabitants. + +But that lesson, and others connected with it, was learnt, and +learnt well, by hundreds. From the sad catastrophe I date the +rise of that interest in Social Science; that desire for some +nobler, more methodic, more permanent benevolence than that which +stops at mere almsgiving and charity-schools. The dangerous +classes began to be recognised as an awful fact which must be +faced; and faced, not by repression, but by improvement. The +"Perils of the Nation" began to occupy the attention not merely of +politicians, but of philosophers, physicians, priests; and the +admirable book which assumed that title did but re-echo the +feeling of thousands of earnest hearts. + +Ever since that time, scheme on scheme of improvement has been not +only proposed but carried out. A general interest of the upper +classes in the lower, a general desire to do good, and to learn +how good can be done, has been awakened throughout England, such +as, I boldly say, never before existed in any country upon earth; +and England, her eyes opened to her neglect of these classes, +without whose strong arms her wealth and genius would be useless, +has put herself into a permanent state of confession of sin, +repentance, and amendment, which I verily trust will be accepted +by Almighty God; and will, in spite of our present shame and +sorrow, {10} in spite of shame and sorrow which may be yet in +store for us, save alive both the soul and the body of this +ancient people. + +Let us then, that we may learn how to bear our part in this great +work of Social Reform, consider awhile great cities, their good +and evil; and let us start from the facts about your own city of +which I have just put you in remembrance. The universal law will +be best understood from the particular instance; and best of all, +from the instance with which you are most intimately acquainted. +And do not, I entreat you, fear that I shall be rude enough to say +anything which may give pain to you, my generous hosts; or +presumptuous enough to impute blame to anyone for events which +happened long ago, and of the exciting causes of which I know +little or nothing. Bristol was then merely in the same state in +which other cities of England were, and in which every city on the +Continent is now; and the local exciting causes of that outbreak, +the personal conduct of A or B in it, is just what we ought most +carefully to forget, if we wish to look at the real root of the +matter. If consumption, latent in the constitution, have broken +out in active mischief, the wise physician will trouble his head +little with the particular accident which woke up the sleeping +disease. The disease was there, and if one thing had not awakened +it some other would. And so, if the population of a great city +have got into a socially diseased state, it matters little what +shock may have caused it to explode. Politics may in one case, +fanaticism in another, national hatred in a third, hunger in a +fourth--perhaps even, as in Byzantium of old, no more important +matter than the jealousy between the blue and the green +charioteers in the theatre, may inflame a whole population to +madness and civil war. Our business is not with the nature of the +igniting spark, but of the powder which is ignited. + +I will not, then, to begin, go as far as some who say that "A +great city is a great evil." We cannot say that Bristol was in +1830 or is now, a great evil. It represents so much realised +wealth; and that, again, so much employment for thousands. It +represents so much commerce; so much knowledge of foreign lands; +so much distribution of their products; so much science, employed +about that distribution. + +And it is undeniable, that as yet we have had no means of rapid +and cheap distribution of goods, whether imports or manufactures, +save by this crowding of human beings into great cities, for the +more easy despatch of business. Whether we shall devise other +means hereafter is a question of which I shall speak presently. +Meanwhile, no man is to be blamed for the existence, hardly even +for the evils, of great cities. The process of their growth has +been very simple. They have gathered themselves round abbeys and +castles, for the sake of protection; round courts, for the sake of +law; round ports, for the sake of commerce; round coal mines, for +the sake of manufacture. Before the existence of railroads, +penny-posts, electric telegraphs, men were compelled to be as +close as possible to each other, in order to work together. + +When the population was small, and commerce feeble, the cities +grew to no very great size, and the bad effects of this crowding +were not felt. The cities of England in the Middle Age were too +small to keep their inhabitants week after week, month after +month, in one deadly vapour-bath of foul gas; and though the +mortality among infants was probably excessive, yet we should have +seen among the adult survivors few or none of those stunted and +etiolated figures so common now in England, as well as on the +Continent. The green fields were close outside the walls, where +lads and lasses went a-maying, and children gathered flowers, and +sober burghers with their wives took the evening walk; there were +the butts, too, close outside, where stalwart prentice-lads ran +and wrestled, and pitched the bar, and played backsword, and +practised with the long-bow; and sometimes, in stormy times, +turned out for a few months as ready-trained soldiers, and, like +Ulysses of old, + + +Drank delight of battle with their peers, + + +and then returned again to the workshop and the loom. The very +mayor and alderman went forth, at five o'clock on the summer's +morning, with hawk and leaping-pole, after a duck and heron; or +hunted the hare in state, probably in the full glory of furred +gown and gold chain; and then returned to breakfast, and doubtless +transacted their day's business all the better for their morning's +gallop on the breezy downs. + +But there was another side to this genial and healthy picture. A +hint that this was a state of society which had its conditions, +its limit; and if those were infringed, woe alike to burgher and +to prentice. Every now and then epidemic disease entered the +jolly city--and then down went strong and weak, rich and poor, +before the invisible and seemingly supernatural arrows of that +angel of death whom they had been pampering unwittingly in every +bedroom. + +They fasted, they prayed; but in vain. They called the pestilence +a judgment of God; and they called it by a true name. But they +know not (and who are we to blame them for not knowing?) what it +was that God was judging thereby--foul air, foul water, unclean +backyards, stifling attics, houses hanging over the narrow street +till light and air were alike shut out--that there lay the sin; +and that to amend that was the repentance which God demanded. + +Yet we cannot blame them. They showed that the crowded city life +can bring out human nobleness as well as human baseness; that to +be crushed into contact with their fellow-men, forced at least the +loftier and tender souls to know their fellow-men, and therefore +to care for them, to love them, to die for them. Yes--from one +temptation the city life is free, to which the country life is +sadly exposed--that isolation which, self-contented and self- +helping, forgets in its surly independence that man is his +brother's keeper. In cities, on the contrary, we find that the +stories of these old pestilences, when the first panic terror has +past, become, however tragical, still beautiful and heroic; and we +read of noble-hearted men and women palliating ruin which they +could not cure, braving dangers which seemed to them miraculous, +from which they were utterly defenceless, spending money, time, +and, after all, life itself upon sufferers from whom they might +without shame have fled. + +They are very cheering, the stories of the old city pestilences; +and the nobleness which they brought out in the heart of many a +townsman who had seemed absorbed in the lust of gain--who perhaps +had been really absorbed in it--till that fearful hour awakened in +him his better self, and taught him, not self-aggrandisement, but +self-sacrifice; begetting in him, out of the very depth of +darkness, new and divine light. That nobleness, doubt it not, +exists as ever in the hearts of citizens. May God grant us to see +the day when it shall awaken to exert itself, not for the +palliation, not even for the cure, but for the prevention, yea, +the utter extermination, of pestilence. + +About the middle of the sixteenth century, as far as I can +ascertain, another and even more painful phenomenon appears in our +great cities--a dangerous class. How it arose is not yet clear. +That the Reformation had something to do with the matter, we can +hardly doubt. At the dissolution of the monasteries, the more +idle, ignorant, and profligate members of the mendicant orders, +unable to live any longer on the alms of the public, sunk, +probably, into vicious penury. The frightful misgovernment of +this country during the minority of Edward the Sixth, especially +the conversion of tilled lands into pasture, had probably the +effect of driving the surplus agricultural population into the +great towns. But the social history of this whole period is as +yet obscure, and I have no right to give an opinion on it. +Another element, and a more potent one, is to be found in the +discharged soldiers who came home from foreign war, and the +sailors who returned from our voyages of discovery, and from our +raids against the Spaniards, too often crippled by scurvy, or by +Tropic fevers, with perhaps a little prize money, which was as +hastily spent as it had been hastily gained. The later years of +Elizabeth, and the whole of James the First's reign, disclose to +us an ugly state of society in the low streets of all our sea-port +towns; and Bristol, as one of the great starting-points of West +Indian adventure, was probably, during the seventeenth century, as +bad as any city in England. According to Ben Jonson, and the +playwriters of his time, the beggars become a regular fourth- +estate, with their own laws, and even their own language--of which +we may remark, that the thieves' Latin of those days is full of +German words, indicating that its inventors had been employed in +the Continental wars of the time. How that class sprung up, we +may see, I suppose, pretty plainly, from Shakespeare's "Henry the +Fifth." Whether Nym, Pistol, and Bardolph, Doll and Mrs. Quickly, +existed in the reign of Henry the Fifth, they certainly existed in +the reign of Elizabeth. They are probably sketches from life of +people whom Shakespeare had seen in Alsatia and the Mint. + +To these merely rascal elements, male and female, we must add, I +fear, those whom mere penury, from sickness, failure, want of +employment drove into dwellings of the lowest order. Such people, +though not criminal themselves, are but too likely to become the +parents of criminals. I am not blaming them, poor souls; God +forbid! I am merely stating a fact. When we examine into the +ultimate cause of a dangerous class; into the one property common +to all its members, whether thieves, beggars, profligates, or the +merely pauperised--we find it to be this loss of self-respect. As +long as that remains, poor souls may struggle on heroically, pure +amid penury, filth, degradation unspeakable. But when self- +respect is lost, they are lost with it. And whatever may be the +fate of virtuous parents, children brought up in dens of physical +and moral filth cannot retrieve self-respect. They sink, they +must sink, into a life on a level with the sights, sounds, aye, +the very smells, which surround them. It is not merely that the +child's mind is contaminated, by seeing and hearing, in +overcrowded houses, what he should not hear and see: but the +whole physical circumstances of his life are destructive of self- +respect. He has no means for washing himself properly: but he +has enough of the innate sense of beauty and fitness to feel that +he ought not to be dirty; he thinks that others despise him for +being dirty, and he half despises himself for being so. In all +raged schools and reformatories, so they tell me, the first step +toward restoring self-respect is to make the poor fellows clean. +From that moment they begin to look on themselves as new men--with +a new start, new hopes, new duties. For not without the deepest +physical as well as moral meaning, was baptism chosen by the old +Easterns, and adopted by our Lord Jesus Christ, as the sign of a +new life; and outward purity made the token and symbol of that +inward purity which is the parent of self-respect, and manliness, +and a clear conscience; of the free forehead, and the eye which +meets boldly and honestly the eye of its fellow-man. + +But would that mere physical dirt were all that the lad has to +contend with. There is the desire of enjoyment. Moral and +intellectual enjoyment he has none, and can have none: but not to +enjoy something is to be dead in life; and to the lowest physical +pleasures he will betake himself, and all the more fiercely +because his opportunities of enjoyment are so limited. It is a +hideous subject; I will pass it by very shortly; only asking of +you, as I have to ask daily of myself--this solemn question: We, +who have so many comforts, so many pleasures of body, soul, and +spirit, from the lowest appetite to the highest aspiration, that +we can gratify each in turn with due and wholesome moderation, +innocently and innocuously--who are we that we should judge the +poor untaught and overtempted inhabitant of Temple Street and +Lewin's Mead, if, having but one or two pleasures possible to him, +he snatches greedily, even foully, at the little which he has? + +And this brings me to another, and a most fearful evil of great +cities, namely, drunkenness. I am one of those who cannot, on +scientific grounds, consider drunkenness as a cause of evil, but +as an effect. Of course it is a cause--a cause of endless crime +and misery; but I am convinced that to cure, you must inquire, not +what it causes, but what causes it? And for that we shall not +have to seek far. + +The main exciting cause of drunkenness is, I believe, firmly, bad +air and bad lodging. + +A man shall spend his days between a foul alley where he breathes +sulphuretted hydrogen, a close workshop where he breathes carbonic +acid, and a close and foul bedroom where he breathes both. In +neither of the three places, meanwhile, has he his fair share of +that mysterious chemical agent without which health is impossible, +the want of which betrays itself at once in the dull eye, the +sallow cheek--namely, light. Believe me, it is no mere poetic +metaphor which connects in Scripture, Light with Life. It is the +expression of a deep law, one which holds as true in the physical +as in the spiritual world; a case in which (as perhaps in all +cases) the laws of the visible world are the counterparts of those +of the invisible world, and Earth is the symbol of Heaven. + +Deprive, then, the man of his fair share of fresh air and pure +light, and what follows? His blood is not properly oxygenated: +his nervous energy is depressed, his digestion impaired, +especially if his occupation be sedentary, or requires much +stooping, and the cavity of the chest thereby becomes contracted; +and for that miserable feeling of languor and craving he knows but +one remedy--the passing stimulus of alcohol;--a passing stimulus; +leaving fresh depression behind it, and requiring fresh doses of +stimulant, till it becomes a habit, a slavery, a madness. Again, +there is an intellectual side to the question. The depressed +nervous energy, the impaired digestion, depress the spirits. The +man feels low in mind as well as in body. Whence shall he seek +exhilaration? Not in that stifling home which has caused the +depression itself. He knows none other than the tavern, and the +company which the tavern brings; God help him! + +Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is easy to say, God help him; but it +is not difficult for man to help him also. Drunkenness is a very +curable malady. The last fifty years has seen it all but die out +among the upper classes of this country. And what has caused the +improvement? + +Certainly, in the first place, the spread of education. Every man +has now a hundred means of rational occupation and amusement which +were closed to his grandfather; and among the deadliest enemies of +drunkenness, we may class the printing-press, the railroad, and +the importation of foreign art and foreign science, which we owe +to the late forty years' peace. We can find plenty of amusement +now, beside the old one of sitting round the table and talking +over wine. Why should not the poor man share in our gain? But +over and above, there are causes simply physical. Our houses are +better ventilated. The stifling old four-post bed has given place +to the airy curtainless one; and what is more than all--we wash. +That morning cold bath which foreigners consider as Young +England's strangest superstition, has done as much, believe me, to +abolish drunkenness, as any other cause whatsoever. With a clean +skin in healthy action, and nerves and muscles braced by a sudden +shock, men do not crave for artificial stimulants. I have found +that, coeteris paribus, a man's sobriety is in direct proportion +to his cleanliness. I believe it would be so in all classes had +they the means. + +And they ought to have the means. Whatever other rights a man +has, or ought to have, this at least he has, if society demands of +him that he should earn his own livelihood, and not be a torment +and a burden to his neighbours. He has a right to water, to air, +to light. In demanding that, he demands no more than nature has +given to the wild beast of the forest. He is better than they. +Treat him, then, as well as God has treated them. If we require +of him to be a man, we must at least put him on a level with the +brutes. + +We have then, first of all, to face the existence of a dangerous +class of this kind, into which the weaker as well as the worst +members of society have a continual tendency to sink. A class +which, not respecting itself, does not respect others; which has +nothing to lose and all to gain by anarchy; in which the lowest +passions, seldom gratified, are ready to burst out and avenge +themselves by frightful methods. + +For the reformation of that class, thousands of good men are now +working; hundreds of benevolent plans are being set on foot. +Honour to them all; whether they succeed or fail, each of them +does some good; each of them rescues at least a few fellow-men, +dear to God as you and I are, out of the nether pit. Honour to +them all, I say; but I should not be honest with you this night, +if I did not assert most solemnly my conviction, that +reformatories, ragged schools, even hospitals and asylums, treat +only the symptoms, not the actual causes, of the disease; and that +the causes are only to be touched by improving the simple physical +conditions of the class; by abolishing foul air, foul water, foul +lodging, overcrowded dwellings, in which morality is difficult and +common decency impossible. You may breed a pig in a sty, ladies +and gentlemen, and make a learned pig of him after all; but you +cannot breed a man in a sty, and make a learned man of him; or +indeed, in the true sense of that great word, a man at all. + +And remember, that these physical influences of great cities, +physically depressing and morally degrading, influence, though to +a less extent, the classes above the lowest stratum. + +The honest and skilled workman feels their effects. Compelled too +often to live where he can, in order to be near his work, he finds +himself perpetually in contact with a class utterly inferior to +himself, and his children exposed to contaminating influences from +which he would gladly remove them; but how can he? Next door to +him, even in the same house with him, may be enacted scenes of +brutality or villainy which I will not speak of here. He may shut +his own eyes and ears to them; but he cannot shut his children's. +He may vex his righteous soul daily, like Lot of old, with the +foul conversation of the wicked; but, like Lot of old, he cannot +keep his children from mixing with the inhabitants of the wicked +city, learning their works, and at last being involved in their +doom. Oh, ladies and gentlemen, if there be one class for whom +above all others I will plead, in season and out of season; if +there be one social evil which I will din into the ears of my +countrymen whenever God gives me a chance, it is this: The honest +and the virtuous workman, and his unnatural contact with the +dishonest and the foul. I know well the nobleness which exists in +the average of that class, in men and in wives--their stern +uncomplaining, valorous self-denial; and nothing more stirs my +pity than to see them struggling to bring up a family in a moral +and physical atmosphere where right education is impossible. We +lavish sympathy enough upon the criminal; for God's sake let us +keep a little of it for the honest man. We spend thousands in +carrying out the separation of classes in prison; for God's sake +let us try to separate them a little before they go to prison. We +are afraid of the dangerous classes; for God's sake let us bestir +ourselves to stop that reckless confusion and neglect which reign +in the alleys and courts of our great towns, and which recruit +those very dangerous classes from the class which ought to be, and +is still, in spite of our folly, England's strength and England's +glory. Let us no longer stand by idle, and see moral purity, in +street after street, pent in the same noisome den with moral +corruption, to be involved in one common doom, as the Latin tyrant +of old used to bind together the dead corpse and the living +victim. But let the man who would deserve well of his city, well +of his country, set his heart and brain to the great purpose of +giving the workmen dwellings fit for a virtuous and a civilised +being, and like the priest of old, stand between the living and +the dead, that the plague may be stayed. + +Hardly less is the present physical state of our great cities felt +by that numerous class which is, next to the employer, the most +important in a city. I mean the shopmen, clerks, and all the men, +principally young ones, who are employed exclusively in the work +of distribution. I have a great respect, I may say affection, for +this class. In Bristol I know nothing of them; save that, from +what I hear, the clerks ought in general to have a better status +here than in most cities. I am told that it is the practice here +for merchants to take into their houses very young boys, and train +them to their business; that this connection between employer and +employed is hereditary, and that clerkships pass from father to +son in the same family. I rejoice to hear it. It is pleasant to +find anywhere a relic of the old patriarchal bond, the permanent +nexus between master and man, which formed so important and so +healthful an element of the ancient mercantile system. One would +gladly overlook a little favouritism and nepotism, a little +sticking square men into round holes, and of round men into square +holes, for the sake of having a class of young clerks and employes +who felt that their master's business was their business, his +honour theirs, his prosperity theirs. + +But over and above this, whenever I have come in contact with this +clerk and shopman class, they have impressed me with considerable +respect, not merely as to what they may be hereafter, but what +they are now. + +They are the class from which the ranks of our commercial men, our +emigrants, are continually recruited; therefore their right +education is a matter of national importance. + +The lad who stands behind a Bristol counter may be, five-and- +twenty years hence, a large employer--an owner of houses and land +in far countries across the seas--a member of some colonial +parliament--the founder of a wealthy family. How necessary for +the honour of Britain, for the welfare of generations yet unborn, +that that young man should have, in body, soul, and spirit, the +loftiest, and yet the most practical of educations. + +His education, too, such as it is, is one which makes me respect +him as one of a class. Of course, he is sometimes one of those +"gents" whom Punch so ruthlessly holds up to just ridicule. He is +sometimes a vulgar fop, sometimes fond of low profligacy--of +betting-houses and casinos. Well--I know no class in any age or +country among which a fool may not be found here and there. But +that the "gent" is the average type of this class, I should +utterly deny from such experience as I have had. The peculiar +note and mark of the average clerk and shopman, is, I think, in +these days, intellectual activity, a keen desire for self- +improvement and for independence, honourable, because self- +acquired. But as he is distinctly a creature of the city; as all +city influences bear at once on him more than on any other class, +so we see in him, I think, more than in any class, the best and +the worst effects of modern city life. The worst, of course, is +low profligacy; but of that I do not speak here. I mean that in +the same man the good and evil of a city life meet. And in this +way. + +In a countryman like me, coming up out of wild and silent +moorlands into a great city, the first effect of the change is +increased intellectual activity. The perpetual stream of human +faces, the innumerable objects of interest in every shop-window, +are enough to excite the mind to action, which is increased by the +simple fact of speaking to fifty different human beings in the day +instead of five. Now in the city-bred youth this excited state of +mind is chronic, permanent. It is denoted plainly enough by the +difference between the countryman's face and that of the townsman. +The former in its best type (and it is often very noble) composed, +silent, self-contained, often stately, often listless; the latter +mobile, eager, observant, often brilliant, often self-conscious. + +Now if you keep this rapid and tense mind in a powerful and +healthy body, it would do right good work. Right good work it +does, indeed, as it is; but still it might do better. + +For what are the faults of this class? What do the obscurantists +(now, thank God, fewer every day) allege as the objection to +allowing young men to educate themselves out of working hours? + +They become, it is said, discontented, conceited, dogmatical. +They take up hasty notions, they condemn fiercely what they have +no means of understanding; they are too fond of fine words, of the +excitement of spouting themselves, and hearing others spout. + +Well. I suppose there must be a little truth in the accusation, +or it would not have been invented. There is no smoke without +fire; and these certainly are the faults of which the cleverest +middle-class young men whom I know are most in danger. + +But--one fair look at these men's faces ought to tell common sense +that the cause is rather physical than moral. Confined to +sedentary occupations, stooping over desks and counters in close +rooms, unable to obtain that fair share of bodily exercise which +nature demands, and in continual mental effort, their nerves and +brain have been excited at the expense of their lungs, their +digestion, and their whole nutritive system. Their complexions +show a general ill-health. Their mouths, too often, hint at +latent disease. What wonder if there be an irritability of brain +and nerve? I blame them no more for it than I blame a man for +being somewhat touchy while he is writhing in the gout. Indeed +less; for gout is very often a man's own fault; but these men's +ill-health is not. And, therefore, everything which can restore +to them health of body, will preserve in them health of mind. +Everything which ministers to the CORPUS SANUM, will minister also +to the MENTEM SANAM; and a walk on Durham Downs, a game of +cricket, a steamer excursion to Chepstow, shall send them home +again happier and wiser men than poring over many wise volumes or +hearing many wise lectures. How often is a worthy fellow spending +his leisure honourably in hard reading, when he had much better +have been scrambling over hedge and ditch, without a thought in +his head save what was put there by the grass and the butterflies, +and the green trees and the blue sky? And therefore I do press +earnestly, both on employers and employed, the incalculable value +of athletic sports and country walks for those whose business +compels them to pass the day in the heart of the city; I press on +you, with my whole soul, the excellency of the early-closing +movement; not so much because it enables young men to attend +mechanics' institutes, as because it enables them, if they choose, +to get a good game of leap-frog. You may smile; but try the +experiment, and see how, as the chest expands, the muscles harden, +and the cheek grows ruddy and the lips firm, and sound sleep +refreshes the lad for his next day's work, the temper will become +more patient, the spirits more genial; there will be less tendency +to brood angrily over the inequalities of fortune, and to accuse +society for evils which as yet she knows not how to cure. + +There is a class, again, above all these, which is doubtless the +most important of all; and yet of which I can say little here--the +capitalist, small and great, from the shopkeeper to the merchant +prince. + +Heaven forbid that I should speak of them with aught but respect. +There are few figures, indeed, in the world on which I look with +higher satisfaction than on the British merchant; the man whose +ships are on a hundred seas; who sends comfort and prosperity to +tribes whom he never saw, and honourably enriches himself by +enriching others. There is something to me chivalrous, even +kingly, in the merchant life; and there were men in Bristol of +old--as I doubt not there are now--who nobly fulfilled that ideal. +I cannot forget that Bristol was the nurse of America; that more +than two hundred years ago, the daring and genius of Bristol +converted yonder narrow stream into a mighty artery, down which +flowed the young life-blood of that great Transatlantic nation +destined to be hereafter, I believe, the greatest which the world +ever saw. Yes--were I asked to sum up in one sentence the good of +great cities, I would point first to Bristol, and then to the +United States, and say, That is what great cities can do. By +concentrating in one place, and upon one object, men, genius, +information, and wealth, they can conquer new-found lands by arts +instead of arms; they can beget new nations; and replenish and +subdue the earth from pole to pole. + +Meanwhile, there is one fact about employers, in all cities which +I know, which may seem commonplace to you, but which to me is very +significant. Whatsoever business they may do in the city, they +take good care, if possible, not to live in it. As soon as a man +gets wealthy nowadays, his first act is to take to himself a villa +in the country. Do I blame him? Certainly not. It is an act of +common sense. He finds that the harder he works, the more he +needs of fresh air, free country life, innocent recreation; and he +takes it, and does his city business all the better for it, lives +all the longer for it, is the cheerfuller, more genial man for it. +One great social blessing, I think, which railroads have brought, +is the throwing open country life to men of business. I say +blessing; both to the men themselves and to the country where they +settle. The citizen takes an honest pride in rivalling the old +country gentleman, in beating him in his own sphere, as gardener, +agriculturist, sportsman, head of the village; and by his superior +business habits and his command of ready money, he very often does +so. For fifty miles round London, wherever I see progress-- +improved farms, model cottages, new churches, new schools--I find, +in three cases out of four, that the author is some citizen who +fifty years ago would have known nothing but the narrow city life, +and have had probably no higher pleasures than those of the table; +whose dreams would have been, not as now, of model farms and +schools, but of turtle and port-wine. + +My only regret when I see so pleasant a sight is: Oh that the +good man could have taken his workmen with him! + +Taken his workmen with him? + +I assure you that, after years of thought, I see no other remedy +for the worst evils of city life. "If," says the old proverb, +"the mountain will not come to Muhammed, then Muhammed must go to +the mountain." And if you cannot bring the country into the city, +the city must go into the country. + +Do not fancy me a dreamer dealing with impossible ideals. I know +well what cannot be done; fair and grand as it would be, if it +were done, a model city is impossible in England. We have here no +Eastern despotism (and it is well we have not) to destroy an old +Babylon, as that mighty genius Nabuchonosor did, and build a few +miles off a new Babylon, one-half the area of which was park and +garden, fountain and water-course--a diviner work of art, to my +mind, than the finest picture or statue which the world ever saw. +We have not either (and it is well for us that we have not) a +model republic occupying a new uncleared land. We cannot, as they +do in America, plan out a vast city on some delicious and healthy +site amid the virgin forest, with streets one hundred feet in +breadth, squares and boulevards already planted by God's hand with +majestic trees; and then leave the great design to be hewn out of +the wilderness, street after street, square after square, by +generations yet unborn. That too is a magnificent ideal; but it +cannot be ours. And it is well for us, I believe, that it cannot. +The great value of land, the enormous amount of vested interests, +the necessity of keeping to ancient sites around which labour, as +in Manchester, or commerce, as in Bristol, has clustered itself on +account of natural advantages, all these things make any attempts +to rebuild in cities impossible. But they will cause us at last, +I believe, to build better things than cities. They will issue in +a complete interpenetration of city and of country, a complete +fusion of their different modes of life, and a combination of the +advantages of both, such as no country in the world has ever seen. +We shall have, I believe and trust, ere another generation has +past, model lodging-houses springing up, not in the heart of the +town, but on the hills around it; and those will be--economy, as +well as science and good government, will compel them to be--not +ill-built rows of undrained cottages, each rented for awhile, and +then left to run into squalidity and disrepair, but huge blocks of +building, each with its common eating-house, bar, baths, +washhouses, reading-room, common conveniences of every kind, +where, in free and pure country air, the workman will enjoy +comforts which our own grandfathers could not command, and at a +lower price than that which he now pays for such accommodation as +I should be ashamed to give to my own horses; while from these +great blocks of building, branch lines will convey the men to or +from their work by railroad, without loss of time, labour, or +health. + +Then the city will become what it ought to be; the workshop, and +not the dwelling-house, of a mighty and healthy people. The old +foul alleys, as they become gradually depopulated, will be +replaced by fresh warehouses, fresh public buildings; and the +city, in spite of all its smoke and dirt, will become a place on +which the workman will look down with pride and joy, because it +will be to him no longer a prison and a poison-trap, but merely a +place for honest labour. + +This, gentlemen and ladies, is my ideal; and I cannot but hope and +believe that I shall live to see it realised here and there, +gradually and cautiously (as is our good and safe English habit), +but still earnestly and well. Did I see but the movement +commenced in earnest, I should be inclined to cry a "Nunc Domine +dimittis"--I have lived long enough to see a noble work begun, +which cannot but go on and prosper, so beneficial would it be +found. I tell you, that but this afternoon, as the Bath train +dashed through the last cutting, and your noble vale and noble +city opened before me, I looked round upon the overhanging crags, +the wooded glens, and said to myself: There, upon the rock in the +free air and sunlight, and not here, beneath yon pall of smoke by +the lazy pools and festering tidal muds, ought the Bristol workman +to live. Oh that I may see the time when on the blessed Sabbath +eve these hills shall swarm as thick with living men as bean- +fields with the summer bees; when the glens shall ring with the +laughter of ten thousand children, with limbs as steady, and +cheeks as ruddy, as those of my own lads and lasses at home; and +the artisan shall find his Sabbath a day of rest indeed, in which +not only soul but body may gather health and nerve for the week's +work, under the soothing and purifying influences of those common +natural sights and sounds which God has given as a heritage even +to the gipsy on the moor; and of which no man can be deprived +without making his life a burden to himself, perhaps a burden to +those around him. + +But it will be asked: Will such improvements pay? I respect that +question. I do not sneer at it, and regard it, as some are too +apt to do, as a sign of the mercenary and money-loving spirit of +the present age. I look on it as a healthy sign of the English +mind; a sign that we believe, as the old Jews did, that political +and social righteousness is inseparably connected with wealth and +prosperity. The old Psalms and prophets have taught us that +lesson; and God forbid that we should forget it. The world is +right well made; and the laws of trade and of social economy, just +as much as the laws of nature, are divine facts, and only by +obeying them can we thrive. And I had far sooner hear a people +asking of every scheme of good, Will it pay? than throwing +themselves headlong into that merely sentimental charity to which +superstitious nations have always been prone--charity which +effects no permanent good, which, whether in Hindostan or in +Italy, debases, instead of raising, the suffering classes, because +it breaks the laws of social economy. + +No, let us still believe that if a thing is right, it will sooner +or later pay; and in social questions, make the profitableness of +any scheme a test of its rightness. It is a rough test; not an +infallible one at all, but it is a fair one enough to work by. + +And as for the improvements at which I have hinted, I will boldly +answer that they will pay. + +They will pay directly and at once, in the saving of poor-rates. +They will pay by exterminating epidemics, and numberless chronic +forms of disease which now render thousands burdens on the public +purse; consumers, instead of producers of wealth. They will pay +by gradually absorbing the dangerous classes; and removing from +temptation and degradation a generation yet unborn. They will pay +in the increased content, cheerfulness, which comes with health in +increased goodwill of employed towards employers. They will pay +by putting the masses into a state fit for education. They will +pay, too, in such fearful times as these, by the increased +physical strength and hardihood of the town populations. For it +is from the city, rather than from the country, that our armies +must mainly be recruited. Not only is the townsman more ready to +enlist than the countryman, because in the town the labour market +is most likely to be overstocked; but the townsman actually makes +a better soldier than the countryman. He is a shrewder, more +active, more self-helping man; give him but the chances of +maintaining the same physical strength and health as the +countryman, and he will support the honour of the British arms as +gallantly as the Highlander or the Connaughtman, and restore the +days when the invincible prentice-boys of London carried terror +into the heart of foreign lands. In all ages, in all times, +whether for war or for peace, it will pay. The true wealth of a +nation is the health of her masses. + +It may seem to some here that I have dealt too much throughout +this lecture with merely material questions; that I ought to have +spoken more of intellectual progress; perhaps, as a clergyman, +more also of spiritual and moral regeneration. + +I can only answer, that if this be a fault on my part, it is a +deliberate one. I have spoken, whether rightly or wrongly, +concerning what I know--concerning matters which are to me +articles of faith altogether indubitable, irreversible, Divine. + +Be it that these are merely questions of physical improvement. I +see no reason in that why they should be left to laymen, or urged +only on worldly grounds and self-interest. I do not find that +when urged on those grounds, the advice is listened to. I believe +that it will not be listened to until the consciences of men, as +well as their brains, are engaged in these questions; until they +are put on moral grounds, shown to have connection with moral +laws; and so made questions not merely of interest, but of duty, +honour, chivalry. + +I cannot but see, moreover, how many phenomena, which are supposed +to be spiritual, are simply physical; how many cases which are +referred to my profession, are properly the object of the medical +man. I cannot but see, that unless there be healthy bodies, it is +impossible in the long run to have a generation of healthy souls; +I cannot but see that mankind are as prone now as ever to deny the +sacredness and perfection of God's physical universe, as an excuse +for their own ignorance and neglect thereof; to search the highest +heaven for causes which lie patent at their feet, and like the +heathen of old time, to impute to some capricious anger of the +gods calamities which spring from their own greed, haste, and +ignorance. + +And, therefore, because I am a priest, and glory in the name of a +priest, I have tried to fulfil somewhat of that which seems to me +the true office of a priest--namely, to proclaim to man the Divine +element which exists in all, even the smallest thing, because each +thing is a thought of God himself; to make men understand that God +is indeed about their path and about their bed, spying out all +their ways; that they are indeed fearfully and wonderfully made, +and that God's hand lies for ever on them, in the form of physical +laws, sacred, irreversible, universal, reaching from one end of +the universe to the other; that whosoever persists in breaking +those laws, reaps his sure punishment of weakness and sickness, +sadness and self-reproach; that whosoever causes them to be broken +by others, reaps his sure punishment in finding that he has +transformed his fellow-men into burdens and curses, instead of +helpmates and blessings. To say this, is a priest's duty; and +then to preach the good news that the remedy is patent, easy, +close at hand; that many of the worst evils which afflict humanity +may be exterminated by simple common sense, and the justice and +mercy which does to others as it would be done by; to awaken men +to the importance of the visible world, that they may judge from +thence the higher importance of that invisible world whereof this +is but the garment and the type; and in all times and places, +instead of keeping the key of knowledge to pamper one's own power +or pride, to lay that key frankly and trustfully in the hand of +every human being who hungers after truth, and to say: Child of +God, this key is thine as well as mine. Enter boldly into thy +Father's house, and behold the wonder, the wisdom, the beauty of +its laws and its organisms, from the mightiest planet over thy +head, to the tiniest insect beneath thy feet. Look at it, +trustfully, joyfully, earnestly; for it is thy heritage. Behold +its perfect fitness for thy life here; and judge from thence its +fitness for thy nobler life hereafter. + + + +HEROISM + + + +It is an open question whether the policeman is not demoralising +us; and that in proportion as he does his duty well; whether the +perfection of justice and safety, the complete "preservation of +body and goods," may not reduce the educated and comfortable +classes into that lap-dog condition in which not conscience, but +comfort, doth make cowards of us all. Our forefathers had, on the +whole, to take care of themselves; we find it more convenient to +hire people to take care of us. So much the better for us, in +some respects; but, it may be, so much the worse in others. So +much the better; because, as usually results from the division of +labour, these people, having little or nothing to do save to take +care of us, do so far better than we could; and so prevent a vast +amount of violence and wrong, and therefore of misery, especially +to the weak; for which last reason we will acquiesce in the +existence of policemen and lawyers, as we do in the results of +arbitration, as the lesser of two evils. The odds in war are in +favour of the bigger bully, in arbitration in favour of the bigger +rogue; and it is a question whether the lion or the fox be the +safer guardian of human interests. But arbitration prevents war; +and that, in three cases out of four, is full reason for employing +it. + +On the other hand, the lap-dog condition, whether in dogs or in +men, is certainly unfavourable to the growth of the higher +virtues. Safety and comfort are good, indeed, for the good; for +the brave, the self-originating, the earnest. They give to such a +clear stage and no favour, wherein to work unhindered for their +fellow-men. But for the majority, who are neither brave, self- +originating, nor earnest, but the mere puppets of circumstance, +safety and comfort may, and actually do, merely make their lives +mean and petty, effeminate and dull. Therefore their hearts must +be awakened, as often as possible, to take exercise enough for +health; and they must be reminded, perpetually and importunately, +of what a certain great philosopher called, "whatsoever things are +true, honourable, just, pure, lovely, and of good report;" "if +there be any manhood, and any just praise, to think of such +things." + +This pettiness and dulness of our modern life is just what keeps +alive our stage, to which people go to see something a little less +petty, a little less dull, than what they see at home. It is, +too, the cause of--I had almost said the excuse for--the modern +rage for sensational novels. Those who read them so greedily are +conscious, poor souls, of capacities in themselves of passion and +action for good and evil, for which their frivolous humdrum daily +life gives no room, no vent. They know too well that human nature +can be more fertile, whether in weeds and poisons, or in flowers +and fruits, than it is usually in the streets and houses of a +well-ordered and tolerably sober city. And because the study of +human nature is, after all, that which is nearest to everyone and +most interesting to everyone, therefore they go to fiction, since +they cannot go to fact, to see what they themselves might be had +they the chance; to see what fantastic tricks before high heaven +men and women like themselves can play, and how they play them. + +Well, it is not for me to judge, for me to blame. I will only say +that there are those who cannot read sensational novels, or, +indeed, any novels at all, just because they see so many +sensational novels being enacted round them in painful facts of +sinful flesh and blood. There are those, too, who have looked in +the mirror too often to wish to see their own disfigured visage in +it any more; who are too tired of themselves and ashamed of +themselves to want to hear of people like themselves; who want to +hear of people utterly unlike themselves, more noble, and able, +and just, and sweet, and pure; who long to hear of heroism and to +converse with heroes; and who, if by chance they meet with an +heroic act, bathe their spirits in that, as in May-dew, and feel +themselves thereby, if but for an hour, more fair. + +If any such shall chance to see these words, let me ask them to +consider with me that one word Hero, and what it means. + +Hero; Heroic; Heroism. These words point to a phase of human +nature, the capacity for which we all have in ourselves, which is +as startling and as interesting in its manifestations as any, and +which is always beautiful, always ennobling, and therefore always +attractive to those whose hearts are not yet seared by the world +or brutalised by self-indulgence. + +But let us first be sure what the words mean. There is no use +talking about a word till we have got at its meaning. We may use +it as a cant phrase, as a party cry on platforms; we may even hate +and persecute our fellow-men for the sake of it: but till we have +clearly settled in our own minds what a word means, it will do for +fighting with, but not for working with. Socrates of old used to +tell the young Athenians that the ground of all sound knowledge +was--to understand the true meaning of the words which were in +their mouths all day long; and Socrates was a wiser man than we +shall ever see. So, instead of beginning an oration in praise of +heroism, I shall ask my readers to think with me what heroism is. + +Now, we shall always get most surely at the meaning of a word by +getting at its etymology--that is, at what it meant at first. And +if heroism means behaving like a hero, we must find out, it seems +to me, not merely what a hero may happen to mean just now, but +what it meant in the earliest human speech in which we find it. + +A hero or a heroine, then, among the old Homeric Greeks, meant a +man or woman who was like the gods; and who, from that likeness, +stood superior to his or her fellow-creatures. Gods, heroes, and +men, is a threefold division of rational beings, with which we +meet more than once or twice. Those grand old Greeks felt deeply +the truth of the poet's saying - + + +Unless above himself he can +Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man. + + +But more: the Greeks supposed these heroes to be, in some way or +other, partakers of a divine nature; akin to the gods; usually, +either they, or some ancestor of theirs, descended from a god or +goddess. Those who have read Mr. Gladstone's "Juventus Mundi" +will remember the section (cap. ix. 6) on the modes of the +approximation between the divine and the human natures; and +whether or not they agree with the author altogether, all will +agree, I think, that the first idea of a hero or a heroine was a +godlike man or godlike woman. + +A godlike man. What varied, what infinite forms of nobleness that +word might include, ever increasing, as men's notions of the gods +became purer and loftier, or, alas! decreasing, as their notions +became degraded. The old Greeks, with that intense admiration of +beauty which made them, in after ages, the master-sculptors and +draughtsmen of their own, and, indeed, of any age, would, of +course, require in their hero, their god-like man, beauty and +strength, manners too, and eloquence, and all outward perfections +of humanity, and neglect his moral qualities. Neglect, I say, but +not ignore. The hero, by virtue of his kindred with the gods, was +always expected to be a better man than common men, as virtue was +then understood. And how better? Let us see. + +The hero was at least expected to be more reverent than other men +to those divine beings of whose nature he partook, whose society +he might enjoy even here on earth. He might be unfaithful to his +own high lineage; he might misuse his gifts by selfishness and +self-will; he might, like Ajax, rage with mere jealousy and +wounded pride till his rage ended in shameful madness and suicide. +He might rebel against the very gods, and all laws of right and +wrong, till he perished his [Greek text] - + + +Smitten down, blind in his pride, for a sign and a terror to +mortals. + + +But he ought to have, he must have, to be true to his name of +Hero, justice, self-restraint, and [Greek text]--that highest form +of modesty, for which we have, alas! no name in the English +tongue; that perfect respect for the feelings of others which +springs out of perfect self-respect. And he must have too--if he +were to be a hero of the highest type--the instinct of +helpfulness; the instinct that, if he were a kinsman of the gods, +he must fight on their side, through toil and danger, against all +that was unlike them, and therefore hateful to them. Who loves +not the old legends, unsurpassed for beauty in the literature of +any race, in which the hero stands out as the deliverer, the +destroyer of evil? Theseus ridding the land of robbers, and +delivering it from the yearly tribute of boys and maidens to be +devoured by the Minotaur; Perseus slaying the Gorgon, and rescuing +Andromeda from the sea-beast; Heracles with his twelve famous +labours against giants and monsters; and all the rest - + + +Who dared, in the god-given might of their manhood, +Greatly to do and to suffer, and far in the fens and the forests +Smite the devourers of men, heaven-hated brood of the giants; +Transformed, strange, without like, who obey not the golden-haired +rulers. + + +These are figures whose divine moral beauty has sunk into the +hearts, not merely of poets or of artists, but of men and women +who suffered and who feared; the memory of them, fables though +they may have been, ennobled the old Greek heart; they ennobled +the heart of Europe in the fifteenth century, at the re-discovery +of Greek literature. So far from contradicting the Christian +ideal, they harmonised with--I had almost said they supplemented-- +that more tender and saintly ideal of heroism which had sprung up +during the earlier Middle Ages. They justified, and actually gave +a new life to, the old noblenesses of chivalry, which had grown up +in the later Middle Ages as a necessary supplement of active and +manly virtue to the passive and feminine virtue of the cloister. +They inspired, mingling with these two other elements, a +literature both in England, France, and Italy, in which the three +elements, the saintly, the chivalrous, and the Greek heroic, have +become one and undistinguishable, because all three are human, and +all three divine; a literature which developed itself in Ariosto, +in Tasso, in the Hypnerotomachia, the Arcadia, the Euphues, and +other forms, sometimes fantastic, sometimes questionable, but +which reached its perfection in our own Spenser's "Fairy Queen"-- +perhaps the most admirable poem which has ever been penned by +mortal man. + +And why? What has made these old Greek myths live, myths though +they be, and fables, and fair dreams? What--though they have no +body, and, perhaps, never had--has given them an immortal soul, +which can speak to the immortal souls of all generations to come? + +What but this, that in them--dim it may be and undeveloped, but +still there--lies the divine idea of self-sacrifice as the +perfection of heroism, of self-sacrifice, as the highest duty and +the highest joy of him who claims a kindred with the gods? + +Let us say, then, that true heroism must involve self-sacrifice. +Those stories certainly involve it, whether ancient or modern, +which the hearts, not of philosophers merely, or poets, but of the +poorest and the most ignorant, have accepted instinctively as the +highest form of moral beauty--the highest form, and yet one +possible to all. + +Grace Darling rowing out into the storm towards the wreck. The +"drunken private of the Buffs," who, prisoner among the Chinese, +and commanded to prostrate himself and kotoo, refused in the name +of his country's honour: "He would not bow to any China-man on +earth:" and so was knocked on the head, and died surely a hero's +death. Those soldiers of the Birkenhead, keeping their ranks to +let the women and children escape, while they watched the sharks +who in a few minutes would be tearing them limb from limb. Or, to +go across the Atlantic--for there are heroes in the Far West--Mr. +Bret Harte's "Flynn of Virginia," on the Central Pacific Railway-- +the place is shown to travellers--who sacrificed his life for his +married comrade: + + +There, in the drift, +Back to the wall, +He held the timbers +Ready to fall. +Then in the darkness +I heard him call: +"Run for your life, Jake! +Run for your wife's sake! +Don't wait for me." + +And that was all +Heard in the din - +Heard of Tom Flynn - +Flynn of Virginia. + + +Or the engineer, again, on the Mississippi, who, when the steamer +caught fire, held, as he had sworn he would, her bow against the +bank, till every soul save he got safe on shore: + + +Through the hot black breath of the burning boat +Jim Bludso's voice was heard; +And they all had trust in his cussedness, +And knew he would keep his word. +And sure's you're born, they all got off +Afore the smokestacks fell; +And Bludso's ghost went up alone +In the smoke of the Prairie Belle. + +He weren't no saint--but at the judgment +I'd run my chance with Jim +'Longside of some pious gentlemen +That wouldn't shake hands with him. +He'd seen his duty--a dead sure thing - +And went for it there and then; +And Christ is not going to be too hard +On a man that died for men. + + +To which gallant poem of Colonel John Hay's--and he has written +many gallant and beautiful poems--I have but one demurrer: Jim +Bludso did not merely do his duty but more than his duty. He did +a voluntary deed, to which he was bound by no code or contract, +civil or moral; just as he who introduced me to that poem won his +Victoria Cross--as many a cross, Victoria and other, has been won- +-by volunteering for a deed to which he, too, was bound by no code +or contract, military or moral. And it is of the essence of self- +sacrifice, and therefore of heroism, that it should be voluntary; +a work of supererogation, at least towards society and man; an act +to which the hero or heroine is not bound by duty, but which is +above though not against duty. + +Nay, on the strength of that same element of self-sacrifice, I +will not grudge the epithet "heroic," which my revered friend Mr. +Darwin justly applies to the poor little monkey, who once in his +life did that which was above his duty; who lived in continual +terror of the great baboon, and yet, when the brute had sprung +upon his friend the keeper, and was tearing out his throat, +conquered his fear by love, and, at the risk of instant death, +sprang in turn upon his dreaded enemy, and bit and shrieked till +help arrived. + +Some would nowadays use that story merely to prove that the +monkey's nature and the man's nature are, after all, one and the +same. Well: I, at least, have never denied that there is a +monkey-nature in man, as there is a peacock-nature, and a swine- +nature, and a wolf-nature--of all which four I see every day too +much. The sharp and stern distinction between men and animals, as +far as their natures are concerned, is of a more modern origin +than people fancy. Of old the Assyrian took the eagle, the ox, +and the lion--and not unwisely--as the three highest types of +human capacity. The horses of Homer might be immortal, and weep +for their master's death. The animals and monsters of Greek myth- +-like the Ananzi spider of Negro fable--glide insensibly into +speech and reason. Birds--the most wonderful of all animals in +the eyes of a man of science or a poet--are sometimes looked on as +wiser, and nearer to the gods, than man. The Norseman--the +noblest and ablest human being, save the Greek, of whom history +can tell us--was not ashamed to say of the bear of his native +forests that he had "ten men's strength and eleven men's wisdom." +How could Reinecke Fuchs have gained immortality, in the Middle +Ages and since, save by the truth of its too solid and humiliating +theorem--that the actions of the world of men were, on the whole, +guided by passions but too exactly like those of the lower +animals? I have said, and say again, with good old Vaughan: + + +Unless above himself he can +Exalt himself, how mean a thing is man. + + +But I cannot forget that many an old Greek poet or sage, and many +a sixteenth and seventeenth century one, would have interpreted +the monkey's heroism from quite a different point of view; and +would have said that the poor little creature had been visited +suddenly by some "divine afflatus"--an expression quite as +philosophical and quite as intelligible as most philosophic +formulas which I read nowadays--and had been thus raised for the +moment above his abject selfish monkey-nature, just as man +requires to be raised above his. But that theory belongs to a +philosophy which is out of date and out of fashion, and which will +have to wait a century or two before it comes into fashion again. + +And now, if self-sacrifice and heroism be, as I believe, +identical, I must protest against the use of the word "sacrifice" +which is growing too common in newspaper-columns, in which we are +told of an "enormous sacrifice of life;" an expression which means +merely that a great many poor wretches have been killed, quite +against their own will, and for no purpose whatsoever; no +sacrifice at all, unless it be one to the demons of ignorance, +cupidity, or mismanagement. + +The stout Whig undergraduate understood better the meaning of such +words, who, when asked, "In what sense might Charles the First be +said to be a martyr?" answered, "In the same sense that a man +might be said to be a martyr to the gout." + +And I must protest, in like wise, against a misuse of the words +"hero." "heroism," "heroic," which is becoming too common, namely, +applying them to mere courage. We have borrowed the misuse, I +believe, as we have more than one beside, from the French press. +I trust that we shall neither accept it, nor the temper which +inspires it. It may be convenient for those who flatter their +nation, and especially the military part of it, into a ruinous +self-conceit, to frame some such syllogism as this: "Courage is +heroism: every Frenchman is naturally courageous: therefore +every Frenchman is a hero." But we, who have been trained at once +in a sounder school of morals, and in a greater respect for facts, +and for language as the expression of facts, shall be careful, I +hope, not to trifle thus with that potent and awful engine--human +speech. We shall eschew likewise, I hope, a like abuse of the +word "moral," which has crept from the French press now and then, +not only into our own press, but into the writings of some of our +military men, who, as Englishmen, should have known better. We +were told again and again, during the late war, that the moral +effect of such a success had been great; that the MORALE of the +troops was excellent; or again, that the MORALE of the troops had +suffered, or even that they were somewhat demoralised. But when +one came to test what was really meant by these fine words, one +discovered that morals had nothing to do with the facts which they +expressed; that the troops were in the one case actuated simply by +the animal passion of hope, in the other simply by the animal +passion of fear. This abuse of the word "moral" has crossed, I am +sorry to say, the Atlantic; and a witty American, whom we must +excuse, though we must not imitate, when some one had been blazing +away at him with a revolver, he being unarmed, is said to have +described his very natural emotions on the occasion, by saying +that he felt dreadfully demoralised. We, I hope, shall confine +the word "demoralisation," as our generals of the last century +would have done, when applied to soldiers, to crime, including, of +course, the neglect of duty or of discipline; and we shall mean by +the word "heroism," in like manner, whether applied to a soldier +or to any human being, not mere courage, not the mere doing of +duty, but the doing of something beyond duty; something which is +not in the bond; some spontaneous and unexpected act of self- +devotion. + +I am glad, but not surprised, to see that Miss Yonge has held to +this sound distinction in her golden little book of "Golden +Deeds," and said, "Obedience, at all costs and risks, is the very +essence of a soldier's life. It has the solid material, but it +has hardly the exceptional brightness, of a golden deed." + +I know that it is very difficult to draw the line between mere +obedience to duty and express heroism. I know also that it would +be both invidious and impertinent in an utterly unheroic personage +like me, to try to draw that line; and to sit at home at ease, +analysing and criticising deeds which I could not do myself; but-- +to give an instance or two of what I mean: + +To defend a post as long as it is tenable is not heroic. It is +simple duty. To defend it after it has become untenable, and even +to die in so doing, is not heroic, but a noble madness, unless an +advantage is to be gained thereby for one's own side. Then, +indeed, it rises towards, if not into, the heroism of self- +sacrifice. + +Who, for example, will not endorse the verdict of all ages on the +conduct of those Spartans at Thermopylae, when they sat "combing +their yellow hair for death" on the sea-shore? They devoted +themselves to hopeless destruction; but why? They felt--I must +believe that, for they behaved as if they felt--that on them the +destinies of the Western World might hang; that they were in the +forefront of the battle between civilisation and barbarism, +between freedom and despotism; and that they must teach that vast +mob of Persian slaves, whom the officers of the Great King were +driving with whips up to their lance-points, that the spirit of +the old heroes was not dead; and that the Greek, even in defeat +and death, was a mightier and a nobler man than they. And they +did their work. They produced, if you will, a "moral" effect, +which has lasted even to this very day. They struck terror into +the heart, not only of the Persian host, but of the whole Persian +empire. They made the event of that war certain, and the +victories of Salamis and Plataea comparatively easy. They made +Alexander's conquest of the East, one hundred and fifty years +afterwards, not only possible at all, but permanent when it came; +and thus helped to determine the future civilisation of the whole +world. + +They did not, of course, foresee all this. No great or inspired +man can foresee all the consequences of his deeds; but these men +were, as I hold inspired to see somewhat at least of the mighty +stake for which they played; and to count their lives worthless, +if Sparta had sent them thither to help in that great game. + +Or shall we refuse the name of heroic to those three German +cavalry regiments who, in the battle of Mars-la-Tour, were bidden +to hurl themselves upon the chassepots and mitrailleuses of the +unbroken French infantry, and went to almost certain death, over +the corpses of their comrades, on and in and through, reeling man +over horse, horse over man, and clung like bull-dogs to their +work, and would hardly leave, even at the bugle-call, till in one +regiment thirteen officers out of nineteen were killed or wounded? +And why? + +Because the French army must be stopped, if it were but for a +quarter of an hour. A respite must be gained for the exhausted +Third Corps. And how much might be done, even in a quarter of an +hour, by men who knew when, and where, and why to die! Who will +refuse the name of heroes to these men? And yet they, probably, +would have utterly declined the honour. They had but done that +which was in the bond. They were but obeying orders after all. +As Miss Yonge well says of all heroic persons: "'I have but done +that which it was my duty to do,' is the natural answer of those +capable of such actions. They have been constrained to them by +duty or pity; have never deemed it possible to act otherwise; and +did not once think of themselves in the matter at all." + +These last true words bring us to another element in heroism: its +simplicity. Whatsoever is not simple; whatsoever is affected, +boastful, wilful, covetous, tarnishes, even destroys, the heroic +character of a deed; because all these faults spring out of self. +On the other hand, wherever you find a perfectly simple, frank, +unconscious character, there you have the possibility, at least, +of heroic action. For it is nobler far to do the most commonplace +duty in the household, or behind the counter, with a single eye to +duty, simply because it must be done--nobler far, I say, than to +go out of your way to attempt a brilliant deed, with a double +mind, and saying to yourself not only--"This will be a brilliant +deed," but also--"and it will pay me, or raise me, or set me off, +into the bargain." Heroism knows no "into the bargain." And +therefore, again, I must protest against applying the word +"heroic" to any deeds, however charitable, however toilsome, +however dangerous, performed for the sake of what certain French +ladies, I am told, call "faire son salut"--saving one's soul in +the world to come. I do not mean to judge. Other and quite +unselfish motives may be, and doubtless often are, mixed up with +that selfish one: womanly pity and tenderness; love for, and +desire to imitate, a certain Incarnate ideal of self-sacrifice, +who is at once human and divine. But that motive of saving the +soul, which is too often openly proposed and proffered, is utterly +unheroic. The desire to escape pains and penalties hereafter by +pains and penalties here; the balance of present loss against +future gain--what is this but selfishness extended out of this +world into eternity? "Not worldliness," indeed, as a satirist +once said with bitter truth, "but other-worldliness." + +Moreover--and the young and the enthusiastic should also bear this +in mind--though heroism means the going beyond the limits of +strict duty, it never means the going out of the path of strict +duty. If it is your duty to go to London, go thither: you may go +as much farther as you choose after that. But you must go to +London first. Do your duty first; it will be time after that to +talk of being heroic. + +And therefore one must seriously warn the young, lest they mistake +for heroism and self-sacrifice what is merely pride and self-will, +discontent with the relations by which God has bound them, and the +circumstances which God has appointed for them. I have known +girls think they were doing a fine thing by leaving uncongenial +parents or disagreeable sisters, and cutting out for themselves, +as they fancied, a more useful and elevated line of life than that +of mere home duties; while, after all, poor things, they were only +saying, with the Pharisees of old, "Corban, it is a gift, by +whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me;" and in the name of +God, neglecting the command of God to honour their father and +mother. + +There are men, too, who will neglect their households and leave +their children unprovided for, and even uneducated, while they are +spending their money on philanthropic or religious hobbies of +their own. It is ill to take the children's bread and cast it to +the dogs; or even to the angels. It is ill, I say, trying to make +presents to God, before we have tried to pay our debts to God. +The first duty of every man is to the wife whom he has married, +and to the children whom she has brought into the world; and to +neglect them is not heroism, but self-conceit; the conceit that a +man is so necessary to Almighty God, that God will actually allow +him to do wrong, if He can only thereby secure the man's +invaluable services. Be sure that every motive which comes not +from the single eye, every motive which springs from self, is by +its very essence unheroic, let it look as gaudy or as beneficent +as it may. + +But I cannot go so far as to say the same of the love of +approbation--the desire for the love and respect of our fellow- +men. That must not be excluded from the list of heroic motives. +I know that it is, or may be proved to be, by victorious analysis, +an emotion common to us and the lower animals. And yet no man +excludes it less than that true hero, St. Paul. + +If those brave Spartans, if those brave Germans, of whom I spoke +just now, knew that their memories would be wept over and +worshipped by brave men and fair women, and that their names would +become watchwords to children in their fatherland, what is that to +us, save that it should make us rejoice, if we be truly human, +that they had that thought with them in their last moments to make +self-devotion more easy, and death more sweet? + +And yet--and yet--is not the highest heroism that which is free +even from the approbation of our fellowmen, even from the +approbation of the best and wisest? The heroism which is known +only to our Father who seeth in secret? The Godlike deeds alone +in the lonely chamber? The Godlike lives lived in obscurity?--a +heroism rare among us men, who live perforce in the glare and +noise of the outer world: more common among women; women of whom +the world never hears; who, if the world discovered them, would +only draw the veil more closely over their faces and their hearts, +and entreat to be left alone with God. True, they cannot always +hide. They must not always hide; or their fellow-creatures would +lose the golden lesson. But, nevertheless, it is of the essence +of the perfect and womanly heroism, in which, as in all spiritual +forces the woman transcends the man, that it would hide if it +could. + +And it was a pleasant thought to me, when I glanced lately at the +golden deeds of women in Miss Yonge's book--it was a pleasant +thought to me, that I could say to myself--Ah! yes. These +heroines are known, and their fame flies through the mouths of +men. But if so, how many thousands of heroines there must have +been, how many thousands there may be now, of whom we shall never +know. But still they are there. They sow in secret the seed of +which we pluck the flower and eat the fruit, and know not that we +pass the sower daily in the street; perhaps some humble, ill- +dressed woman, earning painfully her own small sustenance. She +who nurses a bedridden mother, instead of sending her to the +workhouse. She who spends her heart and her money on a drunken +father, a reckless brother, on the orphans of a kinsman or a +friend. She who--But why go on with the long list of great little +heroisms, with which a clergyman at least comes in contact daily-- +and it is one of the most ennobling privileges of a clergyman's +high calling that he does come in contact with them--why go on, I +say, save to commemorate one more form of great little heroism-- +the commonest, and yet the least remembered of all--namely, the +heroism of an average mother? Ah, when I think of that last broad +fact, I gather hope again for poor humanity; and this dark world +looks bright, this diseased world looks wholesome to me once more- +-because, whatever else it is or is not full of, it is at least +full of mothers. + +While the satirist only sneers, as at a stock butt for his +ridicule, at the managing mother trying to get her daughters +married off her hands by chicaneries and meannesses, which every +novelist knows too well how to draw--would to heaven he, or +rather, alas! she would find some more chivalrous employment for +his or her pen--for were they not, too, born of woman?--I only say +to myself--having had always a secret fondness for poor Rebecca, +though I love Esau more than Jacob--Let the poor thing alone. +With pain she brought these girls into the world. With pain she +educated them according to her light. With pain she is trying to +obtain for them the highest earthly blessing of which she can +conceive, namely, to be well married; and if in doing that last, +she manoeuvres a little, commits a few basenesses, even tells a +few untruths, what does all that come to, save this--that in the +confused intensity of her motherly self-sacrifice, she will +sacrifice for her daughters even her own conscience and her own +credit? We may sneer, if we will, at such a poor hard-driven soul +when we meet her in society; our duty, both as Christians and +ladies and gentlemen, seems to me to be--to do for her something +very different indeed. + +But to return. Looking at the amount of great little heroisms, +which are being, as I assert, enacted around us every day, no one +has a right to say, what we are all tempted to say at times: "How +can I be heroic? This is no heroic age, setting me heroic +examples. We are growing more and more comfortable, frivolous, +pleasure-seeking, money-making; more and more utilitarian; more +and more mercenary in our politics, in our morals, in our +religion; thinking less and less of honour and duty, and more and +more of loss and gain. I am born into an unheroic time. You must +not ask me to become heroic in it." + +I do not deny that it is more difficult to be heroic, while +circumstances are unheroic round us. We are all too apt to be the +puppets of circumstances; all too apt to follow the fashion; all +too apt, like so many minnows, to take our colour from the ground +on which we lie, in hopes, like them, of comfortable concealment, +lest the new tyrant deity, called Public Opinion, should spy us +out, and, like Nebuchadnezzar of old, cast us into a burning fiery +furnace--which public opinion can make very hot--for daring to +worship any god or man save the will of the temporary majority. + +Yes, it is difficult to be anything but poor, mean, insufficient, +imperfect people, as like each other as so many sheep; and, like +so many sheep, having no will or character of our own, but rushing +altogether blindly over the same gap, in foolish fear of the same +dog, who, after all, dare not bite us; and so it always was and +always will be. + +For the third time I say, + + +Unless above himself he can +Exalt himself, how poor a thing is man. + + +But, nevertheless, any man or woman who WILL, in any age and under +any circumstances, can live the heroic life and exercise heroic +influences. + +If any ask proof of this, I shall ask them, in return, to read two +novels; novels, indeed, but, in their method and their moral, +partaking of that heroic and ideal element, which will make them +live, I trust, long after thousands of mere novels have returned +to their native dust. I mean Miss Muloch's "John Halifax, +Gentleman," and Mr. Thackeray's "Esmond," two books which no man +or woman ought to read without being the nobler for them. + +"John Halifax, Gentleman," is simply the history of a poor young +clerk, who rises to be a wealthy mill-owner in the manufacturing +districts, in the early part of this century. But he contrives to +be an heroic and ideal clerk, and an heroic and ideal mill-owner; +and that without doing anything which the world would call heroic +or ideal, or in anywise stepping out of his sphere, minding simply +his own business, and doing the duty which lies nearest him. And +how? By getting into his head from youth the strangest notion, +that in whatever station or business he may be, he can always be +what he considers a gentleman; and that if he only behaves like a +gentleman, all must go right at last. A beautiful book. As I +said before, somewhat of an heroic and ideal book. A book which +did me good when first I read it; which ought to do any young man +good who will read it, and then try to be, like John Halifax, a +gentleman, whether in the shop, the counting-house, the bank, or +the manufactory. + +The other--an even more striking instance of the possibility, at +least, of heroism anywhere and everywhere--is Mr. Thackeray's +"Esmond." On the meaning of that book I can speak with authority. +For my dear and regretted friend told me himself that my +interpretation of it was the true one; that this was the lesson +which he meant men to learn therefrom. + +Esmond is a man of the first half of the eighteenth century; +living in a coarse, drunken, ignorant, profligate, and altogether +unheroic age. He is--and here the high art and the high morality +of Mr. Thackeray's genius is shown--altogether a man of his own +age. He is not a sixteenth-century or a nineteenth-century man +born out of time. His information, his politics, his religion, +are no higher than of those round him. His manners, his views of +human life, his very prejudices and faults, are those of his age. +The temptations which he conquers are just those under which the +men around him fall. But how does he conquer them? By holding +fast throughout to honour, duty, virtue. Thus, and thus alone, he +becomes an ideal eighteenth-century gentleman, an eighteenth- +century hero. This was what Mr. Thackeray meant-- for he told me +so himself, I say--that it was possible, even in England's lowest +and foulest times, to be a gentleman and a hero, if a man would +but be true to the light within him. + +But I will go farther. I will go from ideal fiction to actual, +and yet ideal, fact; and say that, as I read history, the most +unheroic age which the civilised world ever saw was also the most +heroic; that the spirit of man triumphed most utterly over his +circumstances at the very moment when those circumstances were +most against him. + +How and why he did so is a question for philosophy in the highest +sense of that word. The fact of his having done so is matter of +history. Shall I solve my own riddle? + +Then, have we not heard of the early Christian martyrs? Is there +a doubt that they, unlettered men, slaves, weak women, even +children, did exhibit, under an infinite sense of duty, issuing in +infinite self-sacrifice, a heroism such as the world had never +seen before; did raise the ideal of human nobleness a whole stage- +-rather say, a whole heaven--higher than before; and that wherever +the tale of their great deeds spread, men accepted, even if they +did not copy, those martyrs as ideal specimens of the human race, +till they were actually worshipped by succeeding generations, +wrongly, it may be, but pardonably, as a choir of lesser deities? + +But is there, on the other hand, a doubt that the age in which +they were heroic was the most unheroic of all ages; that they were +bred, lived, and died, under the most debasing of materialist +tyrannies, with art, literature, philosophy, family and national +life dying, or dead around them, and in cities the corruption of +which cannot be told for very shame--cities, compared with which +Paris is the abode of Arcadian simplicity and innocence? When I +read Petronius and Juvenal, and recollect that they were the +contemporaries of the Apostles; when--to give an instance which +scholars, and perhaps, happily, only scholars, can appreciate--I +glance once more at Trimalchio's feast, and remember that within a +mile of that feast St. Paul may have been preaching to a Christian +congregation, some of whom--for St. Paul makes no secret of that +strange fact--may have been, ere their conversion, partakers in +just such vulgar and bestial orgies as those which were going on +in the rich freedman's halls; after that, I say, I can put no +limit to the possibility of man's becoming heroic, even though he +be surrounded by a hell on earth; no limit to the capacities of +any human being to form for himself or herself a high and pure +ideal of human character; and, without "playing fantastic tricks +before high heaven," to carry out that ideal in every-day life; +and in the most commonplace circumstances, and the most menial +occupations, to live worthy of--as I conceive--our heavenly +birthright, and to imitate the heroes, who were the kinsmen of the +gods. + + + +THE MASSACRE OF THE INNOCENTS {11} + + + +Let me begin by asking the ladies who are interesting themselves +in this good work, whether they have really considered what they +are about to do in carrying out their own plans? Are they aware +that if their Society really succeeds, they will produce a very +serious, some would think a very dangerous, change in the state of +this nation? Are they aware that they would probably save the +lives of some thirty or forty per cent. of the children who are +born in England, and that therefore they would cause the subjects +of Queen Victoria to increase at a very far more rapid rate than +they do now? And are they aware that some very wise men inform us +that England is already over-peopled, and that it is an +exceedingly puzzling question where we shall soon be able to find +work or food for our masses, so rapidly do they increase already, +in spite of the thirty or forty per cent. which kind Nature +carries off yearly before they are five years old? Have they +considered what they are to do with all those children whom they +are going to save alive? That has to be thought of; and if they +really do believe, with some political economists, that over- +population is a possibility to a country which has the greatest +colonial empire that the world has ever seen; then I think they +had better stop in their course, and let the children die, as they +have been in the habit of dying. + +But if, on the other hand, it seems to them, as I confess it does +to me, that the most precious thing in the world is a human being; +that the lowest, and poorest, and the most degraded of human +beings is better than all the dumb animals in the world; that +there is an infinite, priceless capability in that creature, +fallen as it may be; a capability of virtue, and of social and +industrial use, which, if it is taken in time, may be developed up +to a pitch, of which at first sight the child gives no hint +whatsoever; if they believe again, that of all races upon earth +now, the English race is probably the finest, and that it gives +not the slightest sign whatever of exhaustion; that it seems to be +on the whole a young race, and to have very great capabilities in +it which have not yet been developed, and above all, the most +marvellous capability of adapting itself to every sort of climate +and every form of life, which any race, except the old Roman, ever +has had in the world; if they consider with me that it is worth +the while of political economists and social philosophers to look +at the map, and see that about four-fifths of the globe cannot be +said as yet to be in anywise inhabited or cultivated, or in the +state into which men could put it by a fair supply of population, +and industry, and human intellect: then, perhaps, they may think +with me that it is a duty, one of the noblest of duties, to help +the increase of the English race as much as possible, and to see +that every child that is born into this great nation of England be +developed to the highest pitch to which we can develop him in +physical strength and in beauty, as well as in intellect and in +virtue. And then, in that light, it does seem to me, that this +Institution--small now, but I do hope some day to become great and +to become the mother institution of many and valuable children--is +one of the noblest, most right-minded, straightforward, and +practical conceptions that I have come across for some years. + +We all know the difficulties of sanitary legislation. One looks +at them at times almost with despair. I have my own reasons, with +which I will not trouble this meeting, for looking on them with +more despair than ever: not on account of the government of the +time, or any possible government that could come to England, but +on account of the peculiar class of persons in whom the ownership +of the small houses has become more and more vested, and who are +becoming more and more, I had almost said, the arbiters of the +popular opinion, and of every election of parliament. However, +that is no business of ours here; that must be settled somewhere +else; and a fearfully long time, it seems to me, it will be before +it is settled. But, in the meantime, what legislation cannot do, +I believe private help, and, above all, woman's help, can do even +better. It can do this; it can improve the condition of the +working man: and not only of him; I must speak also of the middle +classes, of the men who own the house in which the working man +lives. I must speak, too, of the wealthy tradesman; I must speak- +-it is a sad thing to have to say it--of our own class as well as +of others. Sanitary reform, as it is called, or, in plain +English, the art of health, is so very recent a discovery, as all +true physical science is, that we ourselves and our own class know +very little about it, and practise it very little. And this +society, I do hope, will bear in mind that it is not simply to +seek the working man, not only to go into the foul alley: but it +is to go to the door of the farmer, to the door of the shopkeeper, +aye, to the door of ladies and gentlemen of the same rank as +ourselves. Women can do in that work what men cannot do. The +private correspondence, private conversation, private example, of +ladies, above all of married women, of mothers of families, may do +what no legislation can do. I am struck more and more with the +amount of disease and death I see around me in all classes, which +no sanitary legislation whatsoever could touch, unless you had a +complete house-to-house visitation by some government officer, +with powers to enter every dwelling, to drain it, and ventilate +it; and not only that, but to regulate the clothes and the diet of +every inhabitant, and that among all ranks. I can conceive of +nothing short of that, which would be absurd and impossible, and +would also be most harmful morally, which would stop the present +amount of disease and death which I see around me, without some +such private exertion on the part of women, above all of mothers, +as I do hope will spring from this institution more and more. + +I see this, that three persons out of every four are utterly +unaware of the general causes of their own ill-health, and of the +ill-health of their children. They talk of their "afflictions," +and their "misfortunes;" and, if they be pious people, they talk +of "the will of God," and of "the visitation of God." I do not +like to trench upon those matters here; but when I read in my book +and in your book, "that it is not the will of our Father in Heaven +that one of these little ones should perish," it has come to my +mind sometimes with very great strength that that may have a +physical application as well as a spiritual one; and that the +Father in Heaven who does not wish the child's soul to die, may +possibly have created that child's body for the purpose of its not +dying except in a good old age. For not only in the lower class, +but in the middle and upper classes, when one sees an unhealthy +family, then in three cases out of four, if one will take time, +trouble, and care enough, one can, with the help of the doctor, +who has been attending them, run the evil home to a very different +cause than the will of God; and that is, to stupid neglect, stupid +ignorance, or what is just as bad, stupid indulgence. + +Now, I do believe that if those tracts which you are publishing, +which I have read and of which I cannot speak too highly, are +spread over the length and breadth of the land, and if women-- +clergymen's wives, the wives of manufacturers and of great +employers, district visitors and schoolmistresses, have these +books put into their hands, and are persuaded to spread them, and +to enforce them, by their own example and by their own counsel-- +that then, in the course of a few years, this system being +thoroughly carried out, you would see a sensible and large +increase in the rate of population. When you have saved your +children alive, then you must settle what to do with them. But a +living dog is better than a dead lion; I would rather have the +living child, and let it take its chance, than let it return to +God--wasted. O! it is a distressing thing to see children die. +God gives the most beautiful and precious thing that earth can +have, and we just take it and cast it away; we toss our pearls +upon the dunghill and leave them. A dying child is to me one of +the most dreadful sights in the world. A dying man, a man dying +on the field of battle--that is a small sight; he has taken his +chance; he is doing his duty; he has had his excitement; he has +had his glory, if that will be any consolation to him; if he is a +wise man, he has the feeling that he is dying for his country and +his queen: and that is, and ought to be, enough for him. I am +not horrified or shocked at the sight of the man who dies on the +field of battle; let him die so. It does not horrify or shock me, +again, to see a man dying in a good old age, even though the last +struggle be painful, as it too often is. But it does shock me, it +does make me feel that the world is indeed out of joint, to see a +child die. I believe it to be a priceless boon to the child to +have lived for a week, or a day: but oh, what has God given to +this thankless earth, and what has the earth thrown away; and in +nine cases out of ten, from its own neglect and carelessness! +What that boy might have been, what he might have done as an +Englishman, if he could have lived and grown up healthy and +strong! And I entreat you to bear this in mind, that it is not as +if our lower or our middle classes were not worth saving: bear in +mind that the physical beauty, strength, intellectual power of the +middle classes--the shopkeeping class, the farming class, down to +the lowest working class--whenever you give them a fair chance, +whenever you give them fair food and air, and physical education +of any kind, prove them to be the finest race in Europe. Not +merely the aristocracy, splendid race as they are, but down and +down and down to the lowest labouring man, to the navigator--why, +there is not such a body of men in Europe as our navigators; and +no body of men perhaps have had a worse chance of growing to be +what they are; and yet see what they have done! See the +magnificent men they become, in spite of all that is against them, +dragging them down, tending to give them rickets and consumption, +and all the miserable diseases which children contract; see what +men they are, and then conceive what they might be! It has been +said, again and again, that there are no more beautiful race of +women in Europe than the wives and daughters of our London +shopkeepers; and yet there are few races of people who lead a life +more in opposition to all rules of hygiene. But, in spite of all +that, so wonderful is the vitality of the English race, they are +what they are; and therefore we have the finest material to work +upon that people ever had. And, therefore, again, we have the +less excuse if we do allow English people to grow up puny, +stunted, and diseased. + +Let me refer again to that word that I used; death--the amount of +death. I really believe there are hundreds of good and kind +people who would take up this subject with their whole heart and +soul if they were aware of the magnitude of the evil. Lord +Shaftesbury told you just now that there were one hundred thousand +preventable deaths in England every year. So it is. We talk of +the loss of human life in war. We are the fools of smoke and +noise; because there are cannon-balls, forsooth, and swords and +red coats; and because it costs a great deal of money, and makes a +great deal of talk in the papers, we think: What so terrible as +war? I will tell you what is ten times, and ten thousand times, +more terrible than war, and that is outraged Nature. War, we are +discovering now, is the clumsiest and most expensive of all games; +we are finding that if you wish to commit an act of cruelty and +folly, the most costly one that you can commit is to contrive to +shoot your fellow-men in war. So it is; and thank God that so it +is; but Nature, insidious, inexpensive, silent, sends no roar of +cannon, no glitter of arms to do her work; she gives no warning +note of preparation; she has no protocols, nor any diplomatic +advances, whereby she warns her enemy that war is coming. +Silently, I say, and insidiously she goes forth; no! she does not +even go forth; she does not step out of her path; but quietly, by +the very same means by which she makes alive, she puts to death; +and so avenges herself of those who have rebelled against her. By +the very same laws by which every blade of grass grows, and every +insect springs to life in the sunbeam, she kills, and kills, and +kills, and is never tired of killing; till she has taught man the +terrible lesson he is so slow to learn, that, Nature is only +conquered by obeying her. + +And bear in mind one thing more. Man has his courtesies of war, +and his chivalries of war; he does not strike the unarmed man; he +spares the woman and the child. But Nature is as fierce when she +is offended, as she is bounteous and kind when she is obeyed. She +spares neither woman nor child. She has no pity; for some awful, +but most good reason, she is not allowed to have any pity. +Silently she strikes the sleeping babe, with as little remorse as +she would strike the strong man, with the spade or the musket in +his hand. Ah! would to God that some man had the pictorial +eloquence to put before the mothers of England the mass of +preventable suffering, the mass of preventable agony of mind and +body, which exists in England year after year; and would that some +man had the logical eloquence to make them understand that it is +in their power, in the power of the mothers and wives of the +higher class, I will not say to stop it all--God only knows that-- +but to stop, as I believe, three-fourths of it. + +It is in the power, I believe, of any woman in this room to save +three or four lives--human lives--during the next six months. It +is in your power, ladies; and it is so easy. You might save +several lives apiece, if you choose, without, I believe, +interfering with your daily business, or with your daily pleasure; +or, if you choose, with your daily frivolities, in any way +whatsoever. Let me ask, then, those who are here, and who have +not yet laid these things to heart: Will you let this meeting to- +day be a mere passing matter of two or three hours' interest, +which you may go away and forget for the next book or the next +amusement? Or will you be in earnest? Will you learn--I say it +openly--from the noble chairman, how easy it is to be in earnest +in life; how every one of you, amid all the artificial +complications of English society in the nineteenth century, can +find a work to do, a noble work to do, a chivalrous work to do-- +just as chivalrous as if you lived in any old magic land, such as +Spenser talked of in his "Faerie Queene;" how you can be as true a +knight-errant or lady-errant in the present century, as if you had +lived far away in the dark ages of violence and rapine? Will you, +I ask, learn this? Will you learn to be in earnest; and to use +the position, and the station, and the talent that God has given +you to save alive those who should live? And will you remember +that it is not the will of your Father that is in Heaven that one +little one that plays in the kennel outside should perish, either +in body or in soul? + + + +"A MAD WORLD, MY MASTERS." {12} + + + +The cholera, as was to be expected, has reappeared in England +again; and England, as was to be expected, has taken no sufficient +steps towards meeting it; so that if, as seems but too probable, +the plague should spread next summer, we may count with tolerable +certainty upon a loss of some ten thousand lives. + +That ten thousand, or one thousand, innocent people should die, of +whom most, if not all, might be saved alive, would seem at first +sight a matter serious enough for the attention of +"philanthropists." Those who abhor the practice of hanging one +man would, one fancies, abhor equally that of poisoning many; and +would protest as earnestly against the painful capital punishment +of diarrhoea as against the painless one of hempen rope. Those +who demand mercy for the Sepoy, and immunity for the Coolie women +of Delhi, unsexed by their own brutal and shameless cruelty, +would, one fancies, demand mercy also for the British workman, and +immunity for his wife and family. One is therefore somewhat +startled at finding that the British nation reserves to itself, +though it forbids to its armies, the right of putting to death +unarmed and unoffending men, women, and children. + +After further consideration, however, one finds that there are, as +usual, two sides to the question. One is bound, indeed, to +believe, even before proof, that there are two sides. It cannot +be without good and sufficient reason that the British public +remains all but indifferent to sanitary reform; that though the +science of epidemics, as a science, has been before the world for +more than twenty years, nobody believes in it enough to act upon +it, save some few dozen of fanatics, some of whom have (it cannot +be denied) a direct pecuniary interest in disturbing what they +choose to term the poison-manufactories of free and independent +Britons. + +Yes; we should surely respect the expressed will and conviction of +the most practical of nations, arrived at after the experience of +three choleras, stretching over a whole generation. Public +opinion has declared against the necessity of sanitary reform: +and is not public opinion known to be, in these last days, the +Ithuriel's spear which is to unmask and destroy all the follies, +superstitions, and cruelties of the universe? The immense +majority of the British nation will neither cleanse themselves nor +let others cleanse them: and are we not governed by majorities? +Are not majorities, confessedly, always in the right, even when +smallest, and a show of hands a surer test of truth than any +amount of wisdom, learning, or virtue? How much more, then, when +a whole free people is arrayed, in the calm magnificence of self- +confident conservatism, against a few innovating and perhaps +sceptical philosophasters? Then surely, if ever, vox populi is +vox coeli. + +And, in fact, when we come to examine the first and commonest +objection against sanitary reformers, we find it perfectly +correct. They are said to be theorists, dreamers of the study, +who are ignorant of human nature; and who in their materialist +optimism, have forgotten the existence of moral evil till they +almost fancy at times that they can set the world right simply by +righting its lowest material arrangements. The complaint is +perfectly true. They have been ignorant of human nature; they +have forgotten the existence of moral evil; and if any religious +periodical should complain of their denying original sin, they can +only answer that they did in past years fall into that folly, but +that subsequent experience has utterly convinced them of the truth +of the doctrine. + +For, misled by this ignorance of human nature, they expected help, +from time to time, from various classes of the community, from +whom no help (as they ought to have known at first) is to be +gotten. Some, as a fact, expected the assistance of the clergy, +and especially of the preachers of those denominations who believe +that every human being, by the mere fact of his birth into this +world, is destined to endless torture after death, unless the +preacher can find an opportunity to deliver him therefrom before +he dies. They supposed that to such preachers the mortal lives of +men would be inexpressibly precious; that any science which held +out a prospect of retarding death in the case of "lost millions" +would be hailed as a heavenly boon, and would be carried out with +the fervour of men who felt that for the soul's sake no exertion +was too great in behalf of the body. + +A little more reflection would have quashed their vain hope. They +would have recollected that each of these preachers was already +connected with a congregation; that he had already a hold on them, +and they on him; that he was bound to provide for their spiritual +wants before going forth to seek for fresh objects of his +ministry. They would have recollected that on the old principle +(and a very sound one) of a bird in the hand being worth two in +the bush, the minister of a congregation would feel it his duty, +as well as his interest, not to defraud his flock of his labours +by spending valuable time on a secular subject like sanitary +reform, in the hope of possibly preserving a few human beings, +whose souls he might hereafter (and that again would be merely a +possibility) benefit. + +They would have recollected, again, that these congregations are +almost exclusively composed of those classes who have little or +nothing to fear from epidemics, and (what is even more important) +who would have to bear the expenses of sanitary improvements. But +so sanguine, so reckless of human conditions had their theories +made them, that they actually expected that parish rectors, +already burdened with over-work and vestry quarrels--nay, even +that preachers who got their bread by pew-rents, and whose life- +long struggle was, therefore, to keep those pews filled, and those +renters in good humour--should astound the respectable house- +owners and ratepayers who sat beneath them by the appalling words: +"You, and not the 'Visitation of God,' are the cause of epidemics; +and of you, now that you are once fairly warned of your +responsibility, will your brothers' blood be required." Conceive +Sanitary Reformers expecting this of "ministers," let their +denomination be what it might--many of the poor men, too, with a +wife and seven children! Truly has it been said, that nothing is +so cruel as the unreasonableness of a fanatic. + +They forgot, too, that sanitary science, like geology, must be at +first sight "suspect" in the eyes of the priests of all +denominations, at least till they shall have arrived at a much +higher degree of culture than they now possess. + +Like geology, it interferes with that Deus e machina theory of +human affairs which has been in all ages the stronghold of +priestcraft. That the Deity is normally absent, and not present; +that he works on the world by interference, and not by continuous +laws; that it is the privilege of the priesthood to assign causes +for these "judgments" and "visitations" of the Almighty, and to +tell mankind why He is angry with them, and has broken the laws of +nature to punish them--this, in every age, has seemed to the +majority of priests a doctrine to be defended at all hazards; for +without it, so they hold, their occupation were gone at once. {13} +No wonder, then, if they view with jealousy a set of laymen +attributing these "judgments" to purely chemical laws, and to +misdoings and ignorance which have as yet no place in the +ecclesiastical catalogue of sins. True, it may be that the +Sanitary Reformers are right; but they had rather not think so. +And it is very easy not to think so. They only have to ignore, to +avoid examining, the facts. Their canon of utility is a peculiar +one; and with facts which do not come under that canon they have +no concern. It may be true, for instance, that the eighteenth +century, which to the clergy is a period of scepticism, darkness, +and spiritual death, is the very century which saw more done for +science, for civilisation, for agriculture, for manufacture, for +the prolongation and support of human life than any preceding one +for a thousand years and more. What matter? That is a "secular" +question, of which they need know nothing. And sanitary reform +(if true) is just such another; a matter (as slavery has been seen +to be by the preachers of the United States) for the legislator, +and not for those whose kingdom is "not of this world." + +Others again expected, with equal wisdom, the assistance of the +political economist. The fact is undeniable, but at the same time +inexplicable. What they could have found in the doctrines of most +modern political economists which should lead them to suppose that +human life would be precious in their eyes, is unknown to the +writer of these pages. Those whose bugbear has been over- +population, whose motto has been an euphuistic version of + + +The more the merrier; but the fewer the better fare - + + +cannot be expected to lend their aid in increasing the population +by saving the lives of two-thirds of the children who now die +prematurely in our great cities; and so still further overcrowding +this unhappy land with those helpless and expensive sources of +national poverty--rational human beings, in strength and health. + +Moreover--and this point is worthy of serious attention--that +school of political economy, which has now reached its full +development, has taken all along a view of man's relation to +Nature diametrically opposite to that taken by the Sanitary +Reformer, or indeed by any other men of science. The Sanitary +Reformer holds, in common with the chemist or the engineer, that +Nature is to be obeyed only in order to conquer her; that man is +to discover the laws of her existing phenomena, in order that he +may employ them to create new phenomena himself; to turn the laws +which he discovers to his own use; if need be, to counteract one +by another. In this power, it has seemed to them, lay his dignity +as a rational being. It was this, the power of invention, which +made him a progressive animal, not bound as the bird and the bee +are, to build exactly as his forefathers built five thousand years +ago. + +By political economy alone has this faculty been denied to man. +In it alone he is not to conquer nature, but simply to obey her. +Let her starve him, make him a slave, a bankrupt, or what not, he +must submit, as the savage does to the hail and the lightning. +"Laissez-faire," says the "Science du neant," the "Science de la +misere," as it has truly and bitterly been called; "Laissez- +faire." Analyse economic questions if you will: but beyond +analysis you shall not step. Any attempt to raise political +economy to its synthetic stage is to break the laws of nature, to +fight against facts--as if facts were not made to be fought +against and conquered, and put out of the way, whensoever they +interfere in the least with the welfare of any human being. The +drowning man is not to strike out for his life lest by keeping his +head above water he interfere with the laws of gravitation. Not +that the political economist, or any man, can be true to his own +fallacy. He must needs try his hand at the synthetic method +though he forbids it to the rest of the world: but the only +deductive hint which he has as yet given to mankind is, quaintly +enough, the most unnatural "eidolon specus" which ever entered the +head of a dehumanised pedant--namely, that once famous "Preventive +Check," which, if a nation did ever apply it--as it never will-- +could issue, as every doctor knows, in nothing less than the +questionable habits of abortion, child-murder, and unnatural +crime. + +The only explanation of such conduct (though one which the men +themselves will hardly accept) is this--that they secretly share +somewhat in the doubt which many educated men have of the +correctness of their inductions; that these same laws of political +economy (where they leave the plain and safe subject-matter of +trade) have been arrived at somewhat too hastily; that they are, +in plain English, not quite sound enough yet to build upon; and +that we must wait for a few more facts before we begin any +theories. Be it so. At least, these men, in their present temper +of mind, are not likely to be very useful to the Sanitary +Reformer. + +Would that these men, or the clergy, had been the only bruised +reed in which the Sanitary Reformers put their trust. They found +another reed, however, and that was Public Opinion; but they +forgot that (whatever the stump-orators may say about this being +the age of electric thought, when truth flashes triumphant from +pole to pole, etc.) we have no proof whatsoever that the +proportion of fools is less in this generation than in those +before it, or that truth, when unpalatable (as it almost always +is), travels any faster than it did five hundred years ago. They +forgot that every social improvement, and most mechanical ones, +have had to make their way against laziness, ignorance, envy, +vested wrongs, vested superstitions, and the whole vis inertiae of +the world, the flesh, and the devil. They were guilty indeed, in +this case, not merely of ignorance of human nature, but of +forgetfulness of fact. Did they not know that the excellent New +Poor-law was greeted with the curses of those very farmers and +squires who now not only carry it out lovingly and willingly to +the very letter, but are often too ready to resist any improvement +or relaxation in it which may be proposed by that very Poor-law +Board from which it emanated? Did they not know that Agricultural +Science, though of sixty years' steady growth, has not yet +penetrated into a third of the farms of England; and that hundreds +of farmers still dawdle on after the fashion of their forefathers, +when by looking over the next hedge into their neighbour's field +they might double their produce and their profits? Did they not +know that the adaptation of steam to machinery would have +progressed just as slowly, had it not been a fact patent to babies +that an engine is stronger than a horse; and that if cotton, like +wheat and beef, had taken twelve months to manufacture, instead of +five minutes, Manchester foresight would probably have been as +short and as purblind as that of the British farmer? What right +had they to expect a better reception for the facts of Sanitary +Science?--facts which ought to, and ultimately will, disturb the +vested interests of thousands, will put them to inconvenience, +possibly at first to great expense; and yet facts which you can +neither see nor handle, but must accept and pay hundreds of +thousands of pounds for, on the mere word of a doctor or inspector +who gets his living thereby. Poor John Bull! To expect that you +would accept such a gospel cheerfully was indeed to expect too +much! + +But yet, though the public opinion of the mass could not be +depended on, there was a body left, distinct from the mass, and +priding itself so much on that distinctness that it was ready to +say at times--of course in more courteous--at least in what it +considered more Scriptural language: "This people which knoweth +not the law is accursed." To it therefore--to the religious +world--some over-sanguine Sanitary Reformers turned their eyes. +They saw in it ready organised (so it professed) for all good +works, a body such as the world had never seen before. Where the +religions public of Byzantium, Alexandria, or Rome numbered +hundreds, that of England numbered its thousands. It was divided, +indeed, on minor points, but it was surely united by the one aim +of saving every man his own soul, and of professing the deepest +reverence for that Divine Book which tells men that the way to +attain that aim is, to be good and to do good; and which contains +among other commandments this one--"Thou shaft not kill." Its +wealth was enormous. It possessed so much political power, that +it would have been able to command elections, to compel ministers, +to encourage the weak hearts of willing but fearful clergymen by +fair hopes of deaneries and bishoprics. Its members were no +clique of unpractical fanatics--no men less. Though it might +number among them a few martinet ex-post-captains, and noblemen of +questionable sanity, capable of no more practical study than that +of unfulfilled prophecy, the vast majority of them were +landowners, merchants, bankers, commercial men of all ranks, full +of worldly experience, and of the science of organisation, skilled +all their lives in finding and in employing men and money. What +might not be hoped from such a body, to whom that commercial +imperium in imperio of the French Protestants which the edict of +Nantes destroyed was poor and weak? Add to this that these men's +charities were boundless; that they were spending yearly, and on +the whole spending wisely and well, ten times as much as ever was +spent before in the world, on educational schemes, missionary +schemes, church building, reformatories, ragged schools, +needlewomen's charities--what not? No object of distress, it +seemed, could be discovered, no fresh means of doing good devised, +but these men's money poured bountifully and at once into that +fresh channel, and an organisation sprang up for the employment of +that money, as thrifty and as handy as was to be expected from the +money-holding classes of this great commercial nation. + +What could not these men do? What were they not bound by their +own principles to do? No wonder that some weak men's hearts beat +high at the thought. What if the religious world should take up +the cause of Sanitary Reform? What if they should hail with joy a +cause in which all, whatever their theological differences, might +join in one sacred crusade against dirt, degradation, disease, and +death? What if they should rise at the hustings to inquire of +every candidate: "Will you or will you not, pledge yourself to +carry out Sanitary Reform in the place for which you are elected, +and let the health and the lives of the local poor be that 'local +interest' which you are bound by your election to defend? Do you +confess your ignorance of the subject? Then know, sir, that you +are unfit, at this point of the nineteenth century, to be a member +of the British Senate. You go thither to make laws 'for the +preservation of life and property.' You confess yourself ignorant +of those physical laws, stronger and wider than any which you can +make, upon which all human life depends, by infringing which the +whole property of a district is depreciated." Again, what might +not the "religious world," and the public opinion of "professing +Christians," have done in the last twenty--ay, in the last three +years? + +What it has done, is too patent to need comment here. + +The reasons of so strange an anomaly are to be approached with +caution. It is a serious thing to impute motives to a vast body +of men, of whom the majority are really respectable, kind-hearted, +and useful; and if in giving one's deliberate opinion one seems to +blame them, let it be recollected that the blame lies not so much +on them as on their teachers: on those who, for some reasons best +known to themselves, have truckled to, and even justified, the +self-satisfied ignorance of a comfortable moneyed class. + +But let it be said, and said boldly, that these men's conduct in +the matter of Sanitary Reform seems at least to show that they +value virtue, not for itself, but for its future rewards. To the +great majority of these men (with some heroic exceptions, whose +names may be written in no subscription list, but are surely +written in the book of life) the great truth has never been +revealed, that good is the one thing to be done, at all risks, for +its own sake; that good is absolutely and infinitely better than +evil, whether it pay or not to all eternity. Ask one of them: +"Is it better to do right and go to hell, or do wrong and go to +heaven?"--they will look at you puzzled, half angry, suspecting +you of some secret blasphemy, and, if hard pressed, put off the +new and startling question by saying, that it is absurd to talk of +an impossible hypothesis. The human portion of their virtue is +not mercenary, for they are mostly worthy men; the religious part +thereof, that which they keep for Sundays and for charitable +institutions, is too often mercenary, though they know it not. +Their religion is too often one of "Loss and Gain," as much as +Father Newman's own; and their actions, whether they shall call +them "good works" or "fruits of faith," are so much spiritual +capital, to be repaid with interest at the last day. + +Therefore, like all religionists, they are most anxious for those +schemes of good which seem most profitable to themselves and to +the denomination to which they belong; and the best of all such +works is, of course, as with all religionists, the making of +proselytes. They really care for the bodies, but still they care +more for the souls, of those whom they assist--and not wrongly +either, were it not that to care for a man's soul usually means, +in the religious world, to make him think with you; at least to +lay him under such obligations as to give you spiritual power over +him. Therefore it is that all religious charities in England are +more and more conducted, just as much as those of Jesuits and +Oratorians, with an ulterior view of proselytism; therefore it is +that the religious world, though it has invented, perhaps, no new +method of doing good; though it has been indebted for educational +movements, prison visitations, infant schools, ragged schools, and +so forth, to Quakers, cobblers, even in some cases to men whom +they call infidels, have gladly adopted each and every one of +them, as fresh means of enlarging the influence or the numbers of +their own denominations, and of baiting for the body in order to +catch the soul. A fair sample of too much of their labour may be +seen anywhere, in those tracts in which the prettiest stories, +with the prettiest binding and pictures, on the most secular-- +even, sometimes, scientific--of subjects, end by a few words of +pious exhortation, inserted by a different hand from that which +indites the "carnal" mass of the book. They did not invent the +science, or the art of story-telling, or the woodcutting, or the +plan of getting books up prettily--or, indeed, the notion of +instructing the masses at all; but finding these things in the +hands of "the world," they have "spoiled the Egyptians," and fancy +themselves beating Satan with his own weapons. + +If, indeed, these men claimed boldly all printing, all +woodcutting, all story-telling, all human arts and sciences, as +gifts from God Himself; and said, as the book which they quote so +often says: "The Spirit of God gives man understanding, these, +too, are His gifts, sacred, miraculous, to be accounted for to +Him," then they would be consistent; and then, too, they would +have learnt, perhaps, to claim Sanitary Science for a gift divine +as any other: but nothing, alas! is as yet further from their +creed. And therefore it is that Sanitary Reform finds so little +favour in their eyes. You have so little in it to show for your +work. You may think you have saved the lives of hundreds; but you +cannot put your finger on one of them: and they know you not; +know not even their own danger, much less your beneficence. +Therefore, you have no lien on them, not even that of gratitude; +you cannot say to a man: "I have prevented you having typhus, +therefore you must attend my chapel." No! Sanitary Reform makes +no proselytes. It cannot be used as a religious engine. It is +too simply human, too little a respecter of persons, too like to +the works of Him who causes His sun to shine on the evil and the +good, and His rain to fall on the just and on the unjust, and is +good to the unthankful and to the evil, to find much favour in the +eyes of a generation which will compass sea and land to make one +proselyte. + +Yes. Too like the works of our Father in heaven, as indeed all +truly natural and human science needs must be. True, to those who +believe that there is a Father in heaven, this would, one +supposes, be the highest recommendation. But how many of this +generation believe that? Is not their doctrine, the doctrine to +testify for which the religious world exists, the doctrine which +if you deny, you are met with one universal frown and snarl--that +man has no Father in heaven: but that if he becomes a member of +the religious world, by processes varying with each denomination, +he may--strange paradox--create a Father for himself? + +But so it is. The religious world has lost the belief which even +the elder Greeks and Romans had, of a "Zeus, Father of gods and +men." Even that it has lost. Therefore have man and the simple +human needs of man, no sacredness in their eyes; therefore is +Nature to them no longer "the will of God exprest in facts," and +to break a law of nature no longer to sin against Him who "looked +on all that He had made, and behold, it was very good." And yet +they read their Bibles, and believe that they believe in Him who +stood by the lake-side in Galilee, and told men that not a sparrow +fell to the ground without their Father's knowledge--and that they +were of more value than many sparrows. Do those words now seem to +some so self-evident as to be needless? They will never seem so +to the Sanitary Reformer, who has called on the "British Public" +to exert themselves in saving the lives of thousands yearly; and +has received practical answers which will furnish many a bitter +jest for the Voltaire of the next so-called "age of unbelief," or +fill a sad, but an instructive chapter in some future enlarged +edition of Adelung's "History of Human Folly." + +All but despairing, Sanitary Reformers have turned again and again +to her Majesty's Government. Alas for them! The Government was +ready and willing enough to help. The wicked world said: "Of +course. It will create a new department. It will give them more +places to bestow." But the real reason of the willingness of +Government seems to be that those who compose it are thoroughly +awake to the importance of the subject. + +But what can a poor Government do, whose strength consists (as +that of all English Governments must) in not seeming too strong; +which is allowed to do anything, only on condition of doing the +minimum? Of course, a Government is morally bound to keep itself +in existence; for is it not bound to believe that it can govern +the country better than any other knot of men? But its only +chance of self-preservation is to know, with Hesiod's wise man, +"how much better the half is than the whole," and to throw over +many a measure which it would like to carry, for the sake of +saving the few which it can carry. + +An English Government, nowadays, is simply at the mercy of the +forty or fifty members of the House of Commons who are crotchety +enough or dishonest enough to put it unexpectedly in a minority; +and they, with the vast majority of the House, are becoming more +and more the delegates of that very class which is most opposed to +Sanitary Reform. The honourable member goes to Parliament not to +express his opinions, (for he has stated most distinctly at the +last election that he has no opinions whatsoever), but to protect +the local interests of his constituents. And the great majority +of those constituents are small houseowners--the poorer portion of +the middle class. Were he to support Government in anything like +a sweeping measure of Sanitary Reform, woe to his seat at the next +election; and he knows it; and therefore, even if he allow the +Government to have its Central Board of Health, he will take good +care, for his own sake, that the said Board shall not do too much, +and that it shall not compel his constituents to do anything at +all. + +No wonder, that while the attitude of the House of Commons is such +toward a matter which involves the lives of thousands yearly, some +educated men should be crying that Representative institutions are +on their trial, and should sigh for a strong despotism. + +There is an answer, nevertheless, to such sentimentalists, and one +hopes that people will see the answer for themselves, and that the +infection of Imperialism, which seems spreading somewhat rapidly, +will be stopped by common sense and honest observation of facts. + +A despotism doubtless could carry out Sanitary Reform: but +doubtless, also, it would not. + +A despot in the nineteenth century knows well how insecure his +tenure is. His motto must be, "Let us eat and drink, for to- +morrow we die;" and, therefore, the first objects of his rule will +be, private luxury and a standing army; while if he engage in +public works, for the sake of keeping the populace quiet, they +will be certain not to be such as will embroil him with the middle +classes, while they will win him no additional favour with the +masses, utterly unaware of their necessity. Would the masses of +Paris have thanked Louis Napoleon the more if, instead of +completing the Tuileries, he had sewered the St. Antoine? All +arguments to the contrary are utterly fallacious, which are drawn +from ancient despotisms, Roman, Eastern, Peruvian, or other; and +for this simple reason, that they had no middle class. If they +did work well (which is a question) it was just because they had +no middle class--that class, which in a free State is the very +life of a nation, and yet which, in a despotism, is sure to be the +root of its rottenness. For a despot who finds, as Louis Napoleon +has done, a strong middle class already existing, must treat it as +he does; he must truckle to it, pander to its basest propensities, +seem to make himself its tool, in order that he may make it his. +For the sake of his own life, he must do it; and were a despot to +govern England tomorrow, we should see that the man who was shrewd +enough to have climbed to that bad eminence, would be shrewd +enough to know that he could scarcely commit a more suicidal act +than, by some despotic measure of Sanitary Reform, to excite the +ill-will of all the most covetous, the most stupid, and the most +stubborn men in every town of England. + +There is another answer, too, to "Imperialists" who talk of +Representative institutions being on their trial, and let it be +made boldly just now. + +It will be time to talk of Representative institutions being good +or bad, when the people of England are properly represented. + +In the first place, it does seem only fair that the class who +suffer most from epidemics should have some little share in the +appointment of the men on whose votes extermination of epidemics +now mainly depends. But that is too large a question to argue +here. Let the Government see to it in the coming session. + +Yet how much soever, or how little soever, the suffrage be +extended in the direction of the working man, let it be extended, +at least in some equal degree, in the direction of the educated +man. Few bodies in England now express the opinions of educated +men less than does the present House of Commons. It is not chosen +by educated men, any more than it is by proletaires. It is not, +on an average, composed of educated men; and the many educated men +who are in it have, for the most part, to keep their knowledge +very much to themselves, for fear of hurting the feelings of "ten- +pound Jack," or of the local attorney who looks after Jack's vote. +And therefore the House of Commons does not represent public +opinion. + +For, to enounce with fitting clearness a great but much-forgotten +truth, To have an opinion, you must have an opinion. + +Strange: but true, and pregnant too. For, from it may be deduced +this corollary, that nine-tenths of what is called Public Opinion +is no opinion at all; for, on the matters which come under the +cognizance of the House of Commons (save where superstition, as in +the case of the Sabbath, or the Jew Bill, sets folks thinking-- +generally on the wrong side), nine people out of ten have no +opinion at all; know nothing about the matter, and care less; +wherefore, having no opinions to be represented, it is not +important whether that nothing be represented or not. + +The true public opinion of England is composed of the opinions of +the shrewd, honest, practical men in her, whether educated or not; +and of such, thank God, there are millions: but it consists also +of the opinions of the educated men in her; men who have had +leisure and opportunity for study; who have some chance of knowing +the future, because they have examined the past; who can compare +England with other nations; English creeds, laws, customs, with +those of the rest of mankind; who know somewhat of humanity, human +progress, human existence; who have been practised in the +processes of thought; and who, from study, have formed definite +opinions, differing doubtless in infinite variety, but still all +founded upon facts, by something like fair and scientific +induction. + +Till we have this class of men fairly represented in the House of +Commons, there is little hope for Sanitary Reform: when it is so +represented, we shall have no reason to talk of Representative +institutions being on their trial. + +And it is one of the few hopeful features of the present time, +that an attempt is at last being made to secure for educated men +of all professions a fair territorial representation. A memorial +to the Government has been presented, appended to which, in very +great numbers, are the names of men of note, of all ranks, all +shades in politics and religion, all professions--legal, clerical, +military, medical, and literary. A list of names representing so +much intellect, so much learning, so much acknowledged moderation, +so much good work already done and acknowledged by the country, +has never, perhaps, been collected for any political purpose; and +if their scheme (the details of which are not yet made public) +should in anywise succeed, it will do more for the prospects of +Sanitary Reform than any forward movement of the quarter of a +century. + +For if Sanitary Reform, or perhaps any really progressive measure, +is to be carried out henceforth, we must go back to something like +the old principle of the English constitution, by which intellect, +as such, had its proper share in the public councils. During +those middle ages when all the intellect and learning was +practically possessed by the clergy, they constituted a separate +estate of the realm. This was the old plan--the best which could +be then devised. After learning became common to the laity, the +educated classes were represented more and more only by such +clever young men as could be thrust into Parliament by the private +patronage of the aristocracy. Since the last Reform Bill, even +that supply of talent has been cut off; and the consequence has +been, the steady deterioration of our House of Commons toward such +a level of mediocrity as shall satisfy the ignorance of the +practically electing majority, namely, the tail of the middle +class; men who are apt to possess all the failings with few of the +virtues of those above them and below them; who have no more +intellectual training than the simple working man, and far less +than the average shopman, and who yet lose, under the influence of +a small competence, that practical training which gives to the +working man, made strong by wholesome necessity, chivalry, +endurance, courage, and self-restraint; whose business morality is +made up of the lowest and narrowest maxims of the commercial +world, unbalanced by that public spirit, that political knowledge, +that practical energy, that respect for the good opinion of his +fellows, which elevate the large employer. On the hustings, of +course, this description of the average free and independent +elector would be called a calumny; and yet, where is the member of +Parliament who will not, in his study, assent to its truth, and +confess, that of all men whom he meets, those who least command +his respect are those among his constituents to secure whom he +takes most trouble; unless, indeed, it be the pettifoggers who +manage his election for him? + +Whether this is the class to whose public opinion the health and +lives of the masses are to be entrusted, is a question which +should be settled as soon as possible. + +Meanwhile let every man who would awake to the importance of +Sanitary questions, do his best to teach and preach, in season and +out of season, and to instruct, as far as he can, that public +opinion which is as yet but public ignorance. Let him throw, for +instance, what weight he has into the "National Association for +the Advancement of Social Science." In it he will learn, as well +as teach, not only on Sanitary Reforms, but upon those cognate +questions which must be considered with it, if it is ever to be +carried out. + +Indeed, this new "National Association" seems the most hopeful and +practical move yet made by the sanitarists. It may be laughed at +somewhat at first, as the British Association was; but the world +will find after a while that, like the British Association, it can +do great things towards moulding public opinion, and compel men to +consider certain subjects, simply by accustoming people to hear +them mentioned. The Association will not have existed in vain, if +it only removes that dull fear and suspicion with which Englishmen +are apt to regard a new subject, simply because it is new. But +the Association will do far more than that. It has wisely not +confined itself to any one branch of Social Science, but taken the +subject in all its complexity. To do otherwise would have been to +cripple itself. It would have shut out many subjects--Law Reform, +for instance--which are necessary adjuncts to any Sanitary scheme; +while it would have shut out that very large class of benevolent +people who have as yet been devoting their energies to prisons, +workhouses, and schools. Such will now have an opportunity of +learning that they have been treating the symptoms of social +disease rather than the disease itself. They will see that vice +is rather the effect than the cause of physical misery, and that +the surest mode of attacking it is to improve the physical +conditions of the lower classes; to abolish foul air, fouled +water, foul lodging, and overcrowded dwellings, in which morality +is difficult, and common decency impossible. They will not give +up--Heaven forbid that they should give up!--their special good +works; but they will surely throw the weight of their names, their +talents, their earnestness, into the great central object of +preserving human life, as soon as they shall have recognised that +prevention is better than cure; and that the simple and one method +of prevention is, to give the working man his rights. Water, air, +light. A right to these three at least he has. In demanding +them, he demands no more than God gives freely to the wild beast +of the forest. Till society has given him them, it does him an +injustice in demanding of him that he should be a useful member of +society. If he is expected to be a man, let him at least be put +on a level with the brutes. When the benevolent of the land (and +they may be numbered by tens of thousands) shall once have learnt +this plain and yet awful truth, a vast upward step will have been +gained. Because this new Association will teach it them, during +the next ten or twenty years, may God's blessing be on it, and, on +the noble old man who presides over it. Often already has he +deserved well of his country; but never better than now, when he +has lent his great name and great genius to the object of +preserving human life from wholesale destruction by unnecessary +poison. + +And meanwhile let the Sanitary Reformer work and wait. "Go not +after the world," said a wise man, "for if thou stand still long +enough the world will come round to thee." And to Sanitary Reform +the world will come round at last. Grumbling, scoffing, cursing +its benefactors; boasting at last, as usual, that it discovered +for itself the very truths which it tried to silence, it will +come; and will be glad at last to accept the one sibylline leaf, +at the same price at which it might have had the whole. The +Sanitary Reformer must make up his mind to see no fruit of his +labours, much less thanks or reward. He must die in faith, as St. +Paul says all true men die, "not having received the promises;" +worn out, perhaps, by ill-paid and unappreciated labour, as that +truest-hearted and most unselfish of men, Charles Robert Walsh, +died but two years ago. But his works will follow him--not, as +the preachers tell us, to heaven--for of what use would they be +there, to him or to mankind?--but here, on earth, where he set +them, that they might go on in his path, after his example, and +prosper and triumph long years after he is dead, when his memory +shall be blessed by generations not merely "yet unborn," but who +never would have been born at all, had he not inculcated into +their unwilling fathers the simplest laws of physical health, +decency, life--laws which the wild cat of the wood, burying its +own excrement apart from its lair, has learnt by the light of +nature; but which neither nature nor God Himself can as yet teach +to a selfish, perverse, and hypocritical generation. + + + +Footnotes: + +{1} This lecture was one of a series of "Lectures to Ladies," +given in London in 1855, at the Needlewoman's Institution. + +{2} The substance of this Essay was a lecture on Physical +Education, given at the Midland Institute, Birmingham, in 1872. + +{3} 9, Adam Street, Adelphi, London. + +{4} A Lecture delivered at Winchester, May 31, 1869. + +{5} Lecture delivered at Winchester, March 17, 1869. + +{6} I quote from the translation of the late lamented Philip +Stanhope Worsley, of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. + +{7} Odyssey, book vi. 127-315; vol. i. pp. 143-150 of Mr. +Worsley's translation. + +{8} Since this essay was written, I have been sincerely delighted +to find that my wishes had been anticipated at Girton College, +near Cambridge, and previously at Hitchin, whence the college was +removed: and that the wise ladies who superintend that +establishment propose also that most excellent institution--a +swimming-bath. A paper, moreover, read before the London +Association of School-mistresses in 1866, on "Physical Exercises +and Recreation for Girls," deserves all attention. May those who +promote such things prosper as they deserve. + +{9} Lecture delivered at Bristol, October 5, 1857. + +{10} This was spoken during the Indian Mutiny. + +{11} Speech in behalf of Ladies' Sanitary Association. Delivered +at St. James's Hall, London, 1859. + +{12} Fraser's Magazine, No. CCCXXXVII. 1858. + +{13} We find a most honourable exception to this rule in a sermon +by the Rev. C. Richson, of Manchester, on the Sanitary Laws of the +Old Testament, with notes by Dr. Sutherland. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext Sanitary and Social Lectures by Kingsley + diff --git a/old/sasle10.zip b/old/sasle10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4cae3f4 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/sasle10.zip |