The Pleasures of England | Page 2

to do that which is right in his own eyes? Or
only kings of terror, and the obscene empires of Mammon and Belial?
Or will you, youths of England, make your country again a royal throne
of kings; a sceptred isle; for all the world a source of light, a centre of
peace; mistress of Learning and of the Arts;--faithful guardian of great
memories in the midst of irreverent and ephemeral visions--faithful
servant of time-tried principles, under temptation from fond
experiments and licentious desires; and amidst the cruel and clamorous
jealousies of the nations, worshipped in her strange valour, of goodwill

towards men?"
The fifteen years that have passed since I spoke these words must, I
think, have convinced some of my immediate hearers that the need for
such an appeal was more pressing than they then imagined;--while they
have also more and more convinced me myself that the ground I took
for it was secure, and that the youths and girls now entering on the
duties of active life are able to accept and fulfil the hope I then held out
to them.
In which assurance I ask them to-day to begin the examination with me,
very earnestly, of the question laid before you in that seventh of my last
year's lectures, whether London, as it is now, be indeed the natural, and
therefore the heaven-appointed outgrowth of the inhabitation, these
1800 years, of the valley of the Thames by a progressively instructed
and disciplined people; or if not, in what measure and manner the
aspect and spirit of the great city may be possibly altered by your acts
and thoughts.
In my introduction to the Economist of Xenophon I said that every
fairly educated European boy or girl ought to learn the history of five
cities,--Athens, Rome, Venice, Florence, and London; that of London
including, or at least compelling in parallel study, knowledge also of
the history of Paris.
A few words are enough to explain the reasons for this choice. The
history of Athens, rightly told, includes all that need be known of
Greek religion and arts; that of Rome, the victory of Christianity over
Paganism; those of Venice and Florence sum the essential facts
respecting the Christian arts of Painting, Sculpture, and Music; and that
of London, in her sisterhood with Paris, the development of Christian
Chivalry and Philosophy, with their exponent art of Gothic
architecture.
Without the presumption of forming a distinct design, I yet hoped at the
time when this division of study was suggested, with the help of my
pupils, to give the outlines of their several histories during my work in
Oxford. Variously disappointed and arrested, alike by difficulties of
investigation and failure of strength, I may yet hope to lay down for
you, beginning with your own metropolis, some of the lines of thought
in following out which such a task might be most effectively
accomplished.

You observe that I speak of architecture as the chief exponent of the
feelings both of the French and English races. Together with it,
however, most important evidence of character is given by the
illumination of manuscripts, and by some forms of jewellery and
metallurgy: and my purpose in this course of lectures is to illustrate by
all these arts the phases of national character which it is impossible that
historians should estimate, or even observe, with accuracy, unless they
are cognizant of excellence in the aforesaid modes of structural and
ornamental craftsmanship.
In one respect, as indicated by the title chosen for this course, I have
varied the treatment of their subject from that adopted in all my former
books. Hitherto, I have always endeavoured to illustrate the personal
temper and skill of the artist; holding the wishes or taste of his
spectators at small account, and saying of Turner you ought to like him,
and of Salvator, you ought not, etc., etc., without in the least
considering what the genius or instinct of the spectator might otherwise
demand, or approve. But in the now attempted sketch of Christian
history, I have approached every question from the people's side, and
examined the nature, not of the special faculties by which the work was
produced, but of the general instinct by which it was asked for, and
enjoyed. Therefore I thought the proper heading for these papers should
represent them as descriptive of the Pleasures of England, rather than
of its Arts.
And of these pleasures, necessarily, the leading one was that of
Learning, in the sense of receiving instruction;--a pleasure totally
separate from that of finding out things for yourself,--and an extremely
sweet and sacred pleasure, when you know how to seek it, and receive.
On which I am the more disposed, and even compelled, here to insist,
because your modern ideas of Development imply that