Past and Present Part 21

Not on Ilion's or Latium's plains; on far other plains and places henceforth can n.o.ble deeds be now done. Not on Ilion's plains; how much less in Mayfair's drawingrooms! Not in victory over poor brother French or Phrygians; but in victory over Frost-jotuns, Marsh-giants, over demons of Discord, Idleness, Injustice, Unreason, and Chaos come again. None of the old Epics is longer possible. The Epic of French and Phrygians was comparatively a small Epic: but that of Flirts and Fribbles, what is that? A thing that vanishes at c.o.c.k-crowing,--that already begins to scent the morning air! Game-preserving Aristocracies, let them 'bush' never so effectually, cannot escape the Subtle Fowler. Game seasons will be excellent, and again will be indifferent, and by and by they will not be at all. The Last Partridge of England, of an England where millions of men can get no corn to eat, will be shot and ended. Aristocracies with beards on their chins will find other work to do than amuse themselves with trundling-hoops.

But it is to you, ye Workers, who do already work, and are as grown men, n.o.ble and honourable in a sort, that the whole world calls for new work and n.o.bleness. Subdue mutiny, discord, wide-spread despair, by manfulness, justice, mercy and wisdom. Chaos is dark, deep as h.e.l.l; let light be, and there is instead a green flowery World. Oh, it is great, and there is no other greatness. To make some nook of G.o.d's Creation a little fruitfuller, better, more worthy of G.o.d; to make some human hearts a little wiser, manfuler, happier,--more blessed, less accursed! It is work for a G.o.d. Sooty h.e.l.l of mutiny and savagery and despair can, by man's energy, be made a kind of Heaven; cleared of its soot, of its mutiny, of its need to mutiny; the everlasting arch of Heaven's azure overspanning _it_ too, and its cunning mechanisms and tall chimney-steeples, as a birth of Heaven; G.o.d and all men looking on it well pleased.

Unstained by wasteful deformities, by wasted tears or heart's-blood of men, or any defacement of the Pit, n.o.ble fruitful Labour, growing ever n.o.bler, will come forth,--the grand sole miracle of Man; whereby Man has risen from the low places of this Earth, very literally, into divine Heavens. Ploughers, Spinners, Builders; Prophets, Poets, Kings; Brindleys and Goethes, Odins and Arkwrights; all martyrs, and n.o.ble men, and G.o.ds are of one grand Host; immeasurable; marching ever forward since the beginnings of the World. The enormous, all-conquering, flame-crowned Host, n.o.ble every soldier in it; sacred, and alone n.o.ble. Let him who is not of it hide himself; let him tremble for himself. Stars at every b.u.t.ton cannot make him n.o.ble; sheaves of Bath-garters, nor bushels of Georges; nor any other contrivance but manfully enlisting in it, valiantly taking place and step in it. O Heavens, will he not bethink himself; he too is so needed in the Host! It were so blessed, thrice-blessed, for himself and for us all! In hope of the Last Partridge, and some Duke of Weimar among our English Dukes, we will be patient yet a while.

'The Future hides in it Gladness and sorrow; We press still thorow, Nought that abides in it Daunting us,--onward.'

SUMMARY AND INDEX.

SUMMARY.

BOOK I.--PROEM.

Chap. I. _Midas._

The condition of England one of the most ominous ever seen in this world: Full of wealth in every kind, yet dying of inanition.

Workhouses, in which no work can be done. Dest.i.tution in Scotland.

Stockport a.s.sizes. (p. 3.)--England's unprofitable success: Human faces glooming discordantly on one another. Midas longed for gold, and the G.o.ds gave it him. (7.)

Chap. II. _The Sphinx._

The grand unnamable Sphinx-riddle, which each man is called upon to solve. Notions of the foolish concerning justice and judgment. Courts of Westminster, and the general High Court of the Universe. The one strong thing, the just thing, the true thing. (p. 10.)--A n.o.ble Conservatism, as well as an ign.o.ble. In all battles of men each fighter, in the end, prospers according to his right: Wallace of Scotland. (15.)--Fact and Semblance. What is Justice? As many men as there are in a Nation who can _see_ Heaven's Justice, so many are there who stand between it and perdition. (17.)

Chap. III. _Manchester Insurrection._

Peterloo not an unsuccessful Insurrection. Governors who wait for Insurrection to instruct them, getting into the fatalest courses.

Unspeakable County Yeomanry. Poor Manchester operatives, and their huge inarticulate question: Unhappy Workers, unhappier Idlers, of this actual England! (p. 19.)--Fair day's-wages for fair day's-work: Milton's 'wages,' Cromwell's. Pay to each man what he has earned and done and deserved; what more have we to ask?--Some not _in_supportable approximation indispensable and inevitable. (24.)

Chap. IV. _Morrisons Pill._

A state of mind worth reflecting on. No Morrison's Pill for curing the maladies of Society: Universal alteration of regimen and way of life: Vain jargon giving place to some genuine Speech again. (p. 29.)--If we walk according to the Law of this Universe, the Law-Maker will befriend us; if not, not. Quacks, sham heroes, the one bane of the world. Quack and Dupe, upper side and under of the selfsame substance.

(31.)

Chap. V. _Aristocracy of Talent._

All misery the fruit of unwisdom: Neither with individuals nor with Nations is it fundamentally otherwise. Nature in late centuries universally supposed to be dead; but now everywhere a.s.serting herself to be alive and miraculous. The guidance of this country not sufficiently wise. (p. 34.)--Aristocracy of talent, or government by the Wisest, a dreadfully difficult affair to get started. The true _eye_ for talent; and the flunky eye for respectabilities, warm garnitures and larders dropping fatness: Bobus and Bobissimus. (37.)

Chap VI. _Hero-wors.h.i.+p._

Enlightened Egoism, never so luminous, not the rule by which man's life can be led. A _soul_, different from a stomach in any sense of the word. Hero-wors.h.i.+p done differently in every different epoch of the world. Reform, like Charity, must begin at home. 'Arrestment of the knaves and dastards,' beginning by arresting our own poor selves out of that fraternity. (p. 41.)--The present Editor's purpose to himself full of hope. A Loadstar in the eternal sky: A glimmering of light, for here and there a human soul. (45.)

BOOK II.--THE ANCIENT MONK.

Chap. I. _Jocelin of Brakelond._

How the Centuries stand lineally related to each other. The one Book not permissible, the kind that has nothing in it. Jocelin's 'Chronicle,' a private Boswellean Notebook, now seven centuries old.

How Jocelin, from under his monk's cowl, looked out on that narrow section of the world in a really _human_ manner: A wise simplicity in him; a _veracity_ that goes deeper than words. Jocelin's Monk-Latin; and Mr. Rokewood's editorial helpfulness and fidelity. (p. 51.)--A veritable Monk of old Bury St. Edmunds worth attending to. This England of ours, of the year 1200: Coeur-de-Lion: King Lackland, and his thirteenpenny ma.s.s. The poorest historical Fact, and the grandest imaginative Fiction. (55.)

Chap. II. _St. Edmundsbury._

St. Edmund's Bury, a prosperous brisk Town: Extensive ruins of the Abbey still visible. a.s.siduous Pedantry, and its rubbish-heaps called 'History.' Another world it was, when those black ruins first saw the sun as walls. At lowest, O dilettante friend, let us know always that it _was_ a world. No easy matter to get across the chasm of Seven Centuries: Of all helps, a Boswell, even a small Boswell, the welcomest. (p. 60.)

Chap. III. _Landlord Edmund._

'Battle of Fornham,' a fact, though a forgotten one. Edmund, Landlord of the Eastern Counties: A very singular kind of 'landlord.' How he came to be 'sainted.' Seen and felt to have done verily a man's part in this life-pilgrimage of his. How they took up the slain body of their Edmund, and reverently embalmed it. (p. 65.)--Pious munificence, ever growing by new pious gifts. Certain Times do crystallise themselves in a magnificent manner, others in a rather shabby one.

(71.)

Chap. IV. _Abbot Hugo._

All things have two faces, a light one and a dark: The Ideal has to grow in the Real, and to seek its bed and board there, often in a very sorry manner. Abbot Hugo, grown old and feeble. Jew debts and Jew creditors. How approximate justice strives to accomplish itself. (p.

73.)--In the old monastic Books almost no mention whatever of 'personal religion.' A poor Lord Abbot, all stuck-over with horse-leeches: A 'royal commission of inquiry,' to no purpose. A monk's first duty, obedience. Magister Samson, Teacher of the Novices.

The Abbot's providential death. (76.)

Chap. V. _Twelfth Century._

Inspectors or Custodiars; the King not in any breathless haste to appoint a new Abbot. Dim and very strange looks that monk-life to us.

Our venerable ancient spinning grandmothers, shrieking, and rus.h.i.+ng out with their distaffs. Lakenheath eels too slippery to be caught.

(p. 79.)--How much is alive in England, in that Twelfth Century; how much not yet come into life. Feudal Aristocracy; Willelmus Conquaestor: Not a steeple-chimney yet got on end from sea to sea. (82.)

Chap. VI. _Monk Samson._

Monk-Life and Monk-Religion: A great heaven-high Unquestionability, encompa.s.sing, interpenetrating all human Duties. Our modern Arkwright Joe-Manton ages: All human dues and reciprocities changed into one great due of 'cash-payment.' The old monks but a limited cla.s.s of creatures, with a somewhat dull life of it. (p. 84.)--One Monk of a taciturn nature distinguishes himself among those babbling ones. A Son of poor Norfolk parents. Little Samson's awful dream: His poor Mother dedicates him to St. Edmund. He grows to be a learned man, of devout grave nature. Sent to Rome on business; and returns _too_ successful: Method of travelling thither in those days. His tribulations at home.

Strange conditions under which Wisdom has sometimes to struggle with folly. (86.)