If we speak of our actual world, not of an ideal world, this fact is too patent to need proving. Forty-five years ago a band of enthusiasts5 fought for the establishment of universal elementary education. The survivors6 of that band confess that the splendid results they anticipated have not been secured. One is, indeed, tempted7 sometimes to wonder whether there was not more zeal8 for culture among the workers half a century ago than there is to-day. When you listen to a conversation, of workers or of average middle-class people, on politics or theology or some other absorbing topic, you are astounded9 at the slender amount of personal thinking and the slavery to phrases which they have heard. Their minds seem to resemble the screen of a kaleidoscope, on which the coloured phrases they have read in journals or cheap literature weave automatic patterns. I speak, of course, of the mass. I have given hundreds of scientific lectures to keen audiences of working men, and I know that tens of thousands of them have excellent collections of familiar books. But the result of forty-five years of education is far from satisfactory. It was thought that, when the people learned to read, and the ideas of an Emerson or a Darwin could be appropriated by any man of moderate endowment, the level of the race would rise materially. It has not risen as much as was expected. The phrases are learned and repeated: the ideas are not vitally assimilated, because the intellect is not sufficiently10 developed.
Two classes of people will impatiently retort that there is no need for further development. One class consists of those who dread11 a higher intelligence in the workers because it leads to discontent with their condition. To which one may reply that this concern comes too late. One needs little intelligence to perceive the inequalities of the distribution of wealth. The workers of the world have perceived it, and, although only an extreme Socialist12 minority demands equalisation, the mass of the workers demand a higher reward. Midway between Australia and England, on the deck of a liner, I heard a group of middle-class men and women contrasting the menace of the Australian workers with the industrial content of the mother-country. We landed, to find from the journals that the whole United Kingdom was punctuated13 by strikes, agitations14, and demands. It is too late. A distinguished15 Belgian prelate was taken into a large foundry, and, observing the workers, he impulsively16 cried: “What a slave’s life!” “Hush, they will hear you,” said the manager. In repeating the experience he added: “They have heard: it is too late.” It will be better now if, in the industrial struggle of the future, there is intelligence as well as principle on both sides. If any large proportion of work in the human economy requires the sacrifice of the intelligence, there is something wrong with the work.
Curiously17 enough, the other class of people who are impatient of the design to stimulate18 their minds consists of the mass of the workers themselves. After eight or nine or ten hours of heavy muscular work every day, they say, they have no inclination19 or fitness for serious literature, serious lectures, or serious art. They prefer a drink, a bioscope, a music-hall. Eight hours’ work, eight hours’ play, eight hours’ sleep; that is the ideal. A very natural and symmetrical ideal, but—it is just the ideal which “the capitalist” wishes them to cultivate, and this might suggest reflection. Someone will do the thinking while they play. Democratic government is a mischief20 and a blunder unless Demos is capable of thinking. If the workers of the world have an ambition to control their destinies, they must realise that their destinies are things too large and complex and important to be controlled by men with sleepy brains. There is no solution of the broad social problem of this planet which does not imply that every adult man and woman, of normal powers, shall be alert and informed and self-assertive enough to take an intelligent part in its administration.
Therefore, it seems to many that a scheme of education which ceases to operate at the age of fourteen, which teaches children to read and has no further concern with what they read, which impresses on their cortex a mass of facts of no utility or stimulation, is not a fulfilment of a nation’s duty, or a proper consideration of a nation’s interest. The grander lessons of history, the more impressive truths of science, the vital features of economics and sociology, the ennobling characters of fine art, cannot be even faintly impressed on the young mind. Yet they can be impressed on the minds of nearly all adults, and it would be an incalculable gain to the race if they were. What is being done, and what might be done, to effect this?
The nation at present leaves it to commercial interest and to philanthropy to carry out, in some measure, this important function, and we may at once eliminate the commercial interest. It supplies, at a proper profit, what is demanded. A minority ask for cheap works of science and art and history, and several admirable series of manuals and serial21 publications are supplied. A majority, an overwhelming majority, asks only to be entertained, and there is a mighty22 flood of novels and amusing works, a rich crop of music-halls and bioscope-shows and theatres and skating rinks. It will readily be understood that, regarding happiness as the ultimate ideal, I regard entertainment as a proper part of life. The comedian23 and the story-teller and the professional football-player are rendering24 good service, and it is intellectual snobbery25 to murmur26 that they “merely entertain” people. A good deal of nonsense is written about sport and entertainment. Many of us can, with pleasant ease, suspend a severely27 intellectual task for a few hours to witness a first-class football match. One wonders if some of the ascetics28 who speak about “mudded oafs” and “the football craze” are aware that the game (except for professional players) occupies merely an hour and a half a week (or alternate week) for little more than half a year.
The mischief is that so much of our entertainment appeals to and fosters a state of mind or taste which does exclude culture. We have to-day an army of puritan scouts29, watching our music-halls and cinematograph films, our picture-cards and novels, our open spaces by night and our bathing-beaches by day, calculating minutely what amount of dress or undress or sexual allusion30 they may permit. Certainly we need coercion31 in these matters. No one who moves amongst our average people, in any rank of society, can fail to recognise that there would be in time a volcanic32 outpour of sexuality if we did not impose restriction33. Whether this chaste34 pruriency35 of the modern Churches is an admirable thing, and whether its hirelings are a desirable supplement to the police-force, need not be discussed here; but what amuses one is their intense zeal to detect the narrowest fringe of impropriety and their utter obtuseness36 to graver matters. I have sometimes, when waiting before a lecture in the dressing-room of a variety theatre, been confronted with a notice that “the curtain will be rung down on any artist who says ‘Damn’ or mentions the lodger,” or, more candidly37 (in the Colonies): “Don’t swear. We don’t care a damn, but the public does.” The general public would, if it were consulted, probably make the same reply as the framers of the notice, and would blame the police for the restriction of liberty. There is, in a word, an appalling38 poverty of taste in the general public, and it pays the purveyor39 of entertainment to adapt his wares40 to it as far as the police will permit. To this lamentable41 lack of taste and culture (in the broad sense) officials and moralists are entirely42 indifferent as long as the comédienne does not refer to the seventh commandment. The public may be as ignorant and vulgar as they like, but they must not give expression to a natural effect of this.
The music-hall and the bioscope are the great academies of our people to-day, and their work is largely stupefying. Sentimental43 songs of the most vapid44 description alternate with patriotic45 songs of a medieval crudeness and humorous songs which might have appealed to a prehistoric46 intelligence. Bloodthirsty melodramas47, sensational49 scenes, and infinite variations of “The girl who did what we are forbidden to talk about,” evoke50 and inflame51 elementary emotions at the lowest grade of culture. Clergymen give certificates of high moral efficacy to crude representations of passion in high life which are designed to appeal to raw feelings. The posters alone—the eccentric costumes and daubed faces and attempts at novelty in the way of leering—warn away people of moderate taste or intelligence. The bioscope is almost as bad. Apart from a few excellent travel and scenic52 and scientific pictures, the show is a mass of crude faking and boorish53 horse-play which presupposes an elementary intelligence in the spectators. Pictorial54 post-cards add to the monstrosities and puerilities of this kind of public education, and a large proportion of the stories published, especially in the periodicals which are read by girls and boys and uneducated women, fall in the same category. We may trust that the idea will not occur to anyone of making a collection of our picture-cards, films, music-hall posters, novelties, etc., for preservation55 as typical amusements of the twentieth century.
It is stupid to watch this lamentable exposure of our low average of culture week by week with complete indifference56 until more underclothing is displayed than we think proper. The bioscope and music-hall—I speak of the majority—are not merely entertaining; they are undoing57 the work of the educator. They are fostering the raw and primitive59 emotions which it is the task of education to refine and bring under control, debasing public taste, and appealing to a standard which is essentially60 unintellectual. The idea that fun may be utterly61 stupid and crude, provided it is “clean,” is the idea of a narrow-minded fanatic62, an enemy of society.
When we pass to the next cultural level of entertainment—the better music-hall, the metropolitan63 type of theatre, the concert, the novel, etc.—we have a vast provision of entertainment which amuses or interests without cultural prejudice; rising at times to a positive measure of artistic64 education or intellectual stimulation. Two things only need be noticed here. The first is the stupidity of the kind of censorship which we tolerate; of which little need be said, since it is generally recognised. The amateur moral censorship of art reaches the culmination66 of its absurdity67 in our dramatic inquisition. The dramatist may deal with sex-passion as pruriently68 and provokingly as he likes, provided he leaves enough to the spectator’s facile imagination; but he must not attempt to raise love as an intellectual issue. Our people may feel love: they must not think about it as a serious problem.
The other, and more needed observation, regards the novel. There are novels of fine artistic value, like those of Phillpotts: novels of great intellectual use, like those of Wells: and novels of a general and more subtle educational value, like those of Meredith. There are novels which, like the melodrama48, counteract69 education by their low standard of art and intelligence, and there are novels—the great majority—which entertain without prejudice. Since we have as much right to be entertained as to be instructed, novel-reading is a normal part of a normal life. Seeing, however, that a very large proportion of the community read nothing but novels, it has been felt that the novel might be used as a vehicle of instruction, and the didactic or historical novel has become an institution. Many believe that they are being educated when they read this literature.
Against this comforting assumption it is necessary to protest. Even the greatest historical novelists, Dumas and Scott, have taken remarkable70 liberties with the known facts, and added to the picture of the time a mass of imaginative detail. Many historical novels, like Quo Vadis or Kingsley’s Hypatia, misrepresent personalities71 or periods for controversial purposes; and the bulk of modern historical novels are worthless jumbles72 of fact and imagination. It is, as a rule, the same with the sociological novel. You must know the facts in advance—you must know where the facts end and the fiction begins—or else merely regard the book as a form of entertainment. Lately I read a serious historical work, by a distinguished writer, in which Hypatia (who was fifty or sixty years old when she was murdered) is described as a “girl-philosopher”; clearly because Kingsley, for controversial purposes, thought fit in his novel to make her a young and rather foolish maiden. Thousands of people take their convictions from “novels with a purpose,” especially religious or sociological novels, without reflecting that the author may legitimately73 give them either fact or fiction. Such novels are often profoundly mischievous74. A conscientious75 didactic novelist like Mr. Wells aims rather at raising issues and stimulating76 reflection, and in this Mr. Wells has done splendid service. Others have done equal disservice, and have used artificially constructed characters for the purpose of raising prejudice against certain ideas, or have misled by a calculated mixture of fact and fiction. It was in recommending to the public one of these novels—an exceptionally silly and crude piece of work—that the Bishop77 of London described Christianity as “woman’s best friend.”
Religious literature is particularly offensive in this respect, but I will give special consideration to it later. Our press-criticism of books is a very imperfect system of checking the vagaries78 and prejudices of authors. The criticisms are very frequently marked by ignorance of the subject and by personal or doctrinal hostility79 to the author, while the more learned and conscientious journals often show the most ludicrous pedantry80. I once published a novel, pseudonymously, and was amused to read in a London weekly, which takes great pride in the smartness of its reviews, that the author had neither an elementary knowledge of the art of writing nor an elementary acquaintance with the subject on which he wrote. I had already at that time written about twenty volumes, and I had had twelve years’ intimate experience of the monastic life with which the book was concerned. Mr. Clement81 Shorter, not knowing the author, had generously described the book as “a brilliant novel.” On another occasion an historical work of mine was gravely censured82, though no specific errors were noted83 in it, by our leading literary organ, on the ground that I was not an expert on the period. I looked up the same journal’s critique of a work written on the same historical period by an academic authority, and published by his university, and I found that, though there were dozens of errors in the work, it had passed the censor65 with full honours. I add with pleasure that some of the most generous notices of my works have appeared in papers (such as The Daily Telegraph and The Spectator) to which my ideas must be repugnant. But most literary men agree with me that reviewing is, to a large extent, prejudiced and incompetent84, and few of us would cross a room to read ordinary press-notices of our books.
One might extend this criticism to the general work of the press as the great popular educator. We must, however, reflect that the press is hampered85 by restrictions86 which the public ought to bear in mind: a journal is always a commercial transaction with a particular section of the public, and it is generally pledged to political partisanship87. It is only just to remark that this materially restricts the educational ambition of many journalists. The public themselves are to blame that a large section of our press devotes so much space to sensational murders, adulteries, burglaries, royal births and marriages, wars and other crimes and follies88. Sunday journals often contain twenty columns of this rubbish, and the worst parts of it are, with the most disgusting hypocrisy89, thrust into prominence90 by especially large head-lines announcing “A Painful Case.” One imagines the working man spending five or six hours of the Sabbath reading this sort of stuff. Great and grave things, which he ought to know, are happening all over the world, but he must have sharp eyes if he is to catch the obscure little paragraphs which—if there is any reference at all—tell him how many have been put to death in Russia in the last quarter, or how the republican experiment fares in Portugal, or how democracy advances in Australia or the United States. The space is needed for pictures of burned mansions91 and notorious murderers and the commonplace relatives of politicians, for verbatim reports of divorce and criminal cases, for inquests and royal processions, and for the magnificent speeches of Cabinet Ministers and would-be Cabinet Ministers.
This stricture applies to the press generally. How far it sacrifices to these meretricious92 purposes the serious function of educating the public has been painfully impressed on us by recent experience. Only one or two journals in England surpassed our drowsy94 politicians in sagacity and foresight95. Though an extensive reader of German literature (scientific and historical), it had never been my business to follow political or military utterances96; yet, when the war broke out and I looked back on Germany’s enormous output in this department, I realised that there had been in London for a year or two enough German literature to convince any moderate observer that war was fast approaching—and this was only a fragment of an enormously larger literature. Our press had ridiculed97 the one or two men and journals who warned the public of the danger. Further, when it transpired98 that our Government had met the crisis with painful slowness and inefficiency99, nearly the whole press again conspired100 to check criticism, and it is probable that when the war is over the press will unite with the Churches in cultivating a foolish and dangerous contentment on the part of the public. Our press is, in fact, very largely an instrument of our corrupt101 party-system. It never initiates102 reform, and it mirrors, day by day, all the crimes and follies and maladies of our social order without the least resentment103 or the faintest suggestion of reconstruction104. Journals are constantly appearing with the professed105 intention of correcting these defects, yet they are almost invariably spoiled by illiberalism in one or more departments of their work, or by gross exaggerations, hysterical106 language, or impracticable proposals.
All this is a reflection of the generally low state of public culture, and it will not alter until we devote serious care to the education of the general intelligence. We begin at school to cultivate the child’s imagination, though it is the quality of a child’s mind which least requires stimulating and is most in need of subordinating to intelligence. In later years, when the feeble intellectual stimulation we have given is exhausted107, we have to appeal to the imagination or go unheard. “I have not read a book since I left school,” a music-hall artist observed to me. At twenty-five he had become incapable108 of doing more than look at illustrations, as he had done in his childhood. We go on until we make the imagination itself feeble on its constructive109 side. Miles of generally dauby and grotesque110 posters line our streets; tons of the trashiest literature for the young are discharged from marble palaces in the neighbourhood of Fleet Street; novels multiply until the general public takes the words author and novelist to be synonymous; and the daily organ of the millions tends more and more to be a collection of pictures of unimportant events and persons, with a very slender and peculiar111 quantity of news.
If we agree that democracy will advance until the majority rule in reality, and not merely in theory, these things must concern us. It is of little use to point to the occasional periodical with small circulation which endeavours to educate, to the occasional educative column in more important journals, or to the occasional lecture or serious concert or drama. The broad fact remains112 that our future rulers are increasingly encouraged to refrain from mental cultivation113, to mistake an appeal to the imagination for knowledge, and to debase their taste more and more with raw representations of crime and passion. The working man reads with indignation of fashionable ladies struggling to find a place in court when a man is being tried for a series of sordid114 murders; and the working man then reads, day after day, a three-column verbatim report of the trial, and regrets that there is not more of it.
In order to meet this grave public need an earlier generation invented night-schools and Mechanics’ Institutes. Many of these still do useful work, but their number shrinks rather than increases. The Co-operative Movement, again, set up in the early days a fine ambition to educate its adult members, but this ambition has not been generally sustained in the vast modern movement. Hundreds of lecture-societies were founded, and hundreds (about seven hundred in Great Britain, I believe) exist to-day and do some excellent work; but many of the societies which adhered most faithfully to the educational ideal are in difficulties or extinct. The travel-lecture or funny lecture and the “popular” concert encroach more and more on the serious programme. Free libraries were another hope of the reformers of the last generation, and they are now endowed by millionaires and maintained by municipalities. They exhibit, perhaps, the saddest perversion115 of social ambition. Neither Mr. Carnegie nor any serious municipality thinks it a duty to provide gratuitous116 entertainment, but at least two-thirds of their resources are really devoted117 to this. The enormously greater part of the work of free libraries is to beguile118 the idle hours of young men and the idle days of young women with novels that rarely contain a particle of intellectual stimulation.
Public museums were another device for educating the mass of the people, and they have largely failed. There has been in recent years a little more regard for the public, as well as for students, but it is still painful to see crowds passing with bovine119 eyes amidst our accumulated treasures. The grouping and labelling are still too academic: the general scheme and the immense wealth of detail daze120 the eye of the inexpert. More guides and lecturers, in touch with and informally accessible to the public, and a closer association with University Extension and Gilchrist and other lectures, are very much needed. Saturday afternoon in the British Museum is a melancholy121 spectacle of wasted wealth. A small model museum, designed solely122 for the education of the general public, would be more useful in this respect than our magnificent national museum. Unfortunately, the small museums copy the academic defects of the larger. The curator of one, on whom I urged the needs of the public, replied wearily: “Well, it will take me three years to arrange my Cephalopods, and then I will see what I can do.”
We need a comprehensive and serious organisation123 and development of our resources for educating the adult. Our Education Department needs to throw out a new wing with the purpose of preventing the utter waste of its work upon young children. Institutions like the British Museum ought to be relieved of the control of the Archbishop of Canterbury and one or two other somnolent124 gentlemen, and made the centre of a splendid and energetic system of popular instruction and stimulation. From such centres the educational officials (as distinct from learned curators and youths from Oxford125 and Cambridge who look upon the public as a nuisance) might issue attractive invitations and publications, and be prepared to welcome the non-student, either with “showmen” who understand the public mind or by a general and affable accessibility of the whole staff. Municipal museums and libraries and picture-galleries could be organised on similar lines by the Department, and useful private foundations, such as the Bishopsgate Institute, could be invited to co-operate, without interference in their management. The supply of novels ought to be restricted to the great masters of every country and a few moderns. The rich supply of serious literature ought to be made attractive and easily accessible to the public by good bibliographical126 guidance and constant lectures. These things are, of course, being done. It is not so much the local officials one quarrels with as the nation and its leaders. We want an immense co-ordination and development of our resources and efforts out of national funds. Lecture-societies and all kinds of educative centres and institutes—there are thousands in the country—need to be affiliated127, encouraged, advised, and supplemented. The State should not even shrink from publishing. The trade supplies only the actual demand: the State must create a new and larger demand. Music would be an integral part of this scheme of education, and here again we have a large material ready for organisation.
Any man who has engaged in the work of educating and stimulating the general public will realise how urgently some such scheme is needed, and how splendid a service it would render. He will realise also that the task will be formidable. I do not for a moment conceive the general public as thirsting for culture. That is very largely due to the way in which the work has hitherto been done. The recent success of small but authoritative128 manuals of science and history, and of several cheap series of literary works of high value, shows that a fairly large public responds to every enlightened effort to assist them. It will become very much larger when the work is organised on a national scale and conceived as a really important function of the State. That even then the majority of the nation would rush to the reconstructed libraries and museums and lecture or concert-halls no one will imagine for a moment. We do not undo58 in a few years the effect of centuries of evil traditions. I am assuming, however, that these various reforms I am discussing will proceed more or less simultaneously129, and will enormously assist each other. The abolition130 of war would release rich funds for educational purposes: the reorganisation of industry would provide a little more leisure and capacity for mental recreation: other reforms would give a general intellectual stimulation. Even now, however, much of this work could be done. If we think it sufficient that our people remain in a condition of elementary literacy and half-developed intelligence, if we fancy that the race will advance because it sets aside a special caste of scholars for the promotion131 of culture, we may regard our actual situation without concern. But if we desire that general alertness of mind and decision of character which a democratic rule implies, we cannot be indifferent. Aristocrats132 justly rail at the democracy of Athens and Rome; it was an uneducated democracy—literate, but uneducated, like ours. We need to advance, if we are not to recede133; and the uplifted race of the days to come will honour the generation that taught men the compatibility of culture and entertainment.
I am speaking, in the main, of the mass of the workers, but it would be entirely unjust to insinuate134 that they alone need adult education. The conventions of social life, the extraordinary slavery to fashions and artificial rules, betray an intellectual flabbiness in the wealthier members of society which just as urgently calls for stimulation. We seem at times quite incapable of drawing a line between acts of real courtesy and taste, which imply a certain grace or delicacy135 of character, and conventional usages which have no rational basis. The insistence136 on these conventional usages is part of that general slavery to false traditions which I am assailing137.
The most flagrant instance of this weakness of mind and character is the docility138 with which we meet changes of fashion in dress, or retain eccentric forms of clothing. Hardly any other feature so strongly impresses the close observer with the fact that the race, as a whole (and I speak only of civilised communities), advances little in intelligence and self-possession in spite of the progress made by its intellectual experts. One would say that here, especially, we need a strong draught139 of the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche,—the gospel of self-assertion, of strong personality, of severe reasoning,—but I have not observed that our modern Nietzscheans differ much from their neighbours in such matters. Yet the commercial expansion of modern times is making this tyranny of fashion more ludicrous than it ever was before.
The fashion-plates and descriptions contained in ladies’ journals have always provoked the furtive140 smile of the male. A coterie141 of tradesmen, who are eager to promote business, and of wealthy ladies who are equally eager to show that their purses are unlimited142, decree that the hat or costume shall continually vary in shape and colour. The Anglo-French jargon143 of the sartorial144 journalist then impresses on a larger circle of ladies the need of alertness and the horror of being démodée,—it would be proof of incapacity to say “out of fashion,”—and, as the season approaches, the proclamation of the forthcoming colour or model is awaited with more feverish145 anxiety than the announcement of the national budget. Schools of artists are secretly inventing some variation—the wider the variation the better—on the thousands of costumes which have already graced the feminine frame, or discussing bold suggestions of reviving an ancient model which has long disappeared even from the shops of wardrobe-dealers. Privileged ladies rise in prestige by obtaining and whispering advance information. At length the shop-windows blaze with the new colour, the journals depict146 an ingenious new combination of edges and folds and puckers147, and womanhood plunges148 to the bottom of its purse with an eagerness to avoid the suspicion of financial stringency149; while the discarded hats and dresses percolate150 romantically through lower strata151 of society. Is it not good for trade?
The masculine smile is, however, wearing thinner, as the absurd despotism is now almost as great among the stronger sex. Here also a group of commercial mathematicians152 evolve, every few months, a new combination of brim and crown and curve, and artists design new patterns of cloth and new contours of garment, and tyrannical journalists hold up to public execration153 the man of means or position who dares to find last year’s fashion sufficiently comfortable or decorative154. “Not worn now, sir,” says the shopman, with indulgent smile, when you go to renew the hat or coat that has pleased you. The bewildering thing is, not that manufacturers should be eager to sell us new garments every few weeks, but that we bow with such docility to this ludicrous fiction of monarchy155. Long trousers or short trousers, creased156 trousers or turned-up trousers, tight coats or loose coats, bowlers157 or trilbys—we listen submissively to the mandate159, without the least consideration of our appearance or convenience.
Indeed, the only things that are permanent in this extravagant160 procession of fashions are the things that are ugly, inconvenient161, or unhealthy, especially on the masculine side. The silk hat and the hard felt hat linger as if in these extraordinary creations the manufacturer had discovered the ideal head-covering. The swallow-tail coat survives as if æsthetics could advance no further in the attiring162 of wealthy men; even the buttons at the back, to which our fiery163 ancestor attached his sword, must not be abandoned. The more comfortable dinner-jacket remains a privileged client at the gate until some audacious peer or prince will dispel164 the oppressive reverence165 for the ancient swallow-tail; and peers and princes know how dangerous it is to tamper166 with the spirit of reverence. The starched167 collar and shirt are as rigidly168 prescribed as sacred vestments on high occasions. The lady must still hang a thick and heavy screen of cloth from her hips169; first having it made too long and then holding it up with her hand in order to escape the rich organic deposit on our streets and the filth170 with which we suffer “domestic pets” to make our squares hideous171. Her abdominal172 organs must, if one may credit the marvellous photographs published by the corset-makers, be reconstructed every few years to accommodate the latest scheme of body-curves. And from these upper reaches of our intellectual world, the tyranny descends173 through level after level of the community until it lays its last stern injunctions on the junior clerk and the post-office assistant; or passes beyond the seas and compels the Chinaman or the Japanese to discard his beautiful robe in favour of a frock-coat and silk hat, or a striped tweed and bowler158, when he presents himself at the entrance-gate to civilisation174.
We find an almost equally ludicrous tyranny of tradition or fashion in almost every part of the ritual of social life. Twenty years ago I issued from a rite-bound monastery175 into the free life of the world, to find it similarly swathed in ritual bonds. I purchased, and stealthily mastered, the “ceremonial” (as we used to call our rite-book) of this new world—a book on “etiquette”—and led for some months a strenuous176 and exacting177 life. I entered drawing-rooms with a nervous recollection of about a score of rules that had to be observed in the first five minutes, while the ritual of the mundane178 table entailed179 for a long time a good deal of furtive observation of my fellows and trembling under the butler’s eye. To this day I am not quite clear at what precise angle the elbow must stand in shaking hands. Social life is overspread by a network of these prescriptions180 of the unwritten law or the judicial181 decisions of the aristocracy which we call “manners.” There is, as a rule, so little discrimination between the formal rules of an artificial code and the real impulses of a gentlemanly nature that one has often to listen gravely and silently while ladies commend the “perfect manners” of a man whom one knows to be an adventurous182 ninny or a beast.
We need a new conception of civilisation, a sustained stimulation of the intelligence throughout life, a strong infusion183 of the Nietzschean gospel of personality and self-assertion. Some day we shall regard education as half of the nation’s serious business, and will devote half our national revenue to it. Let it not be imagined that this suggests a generation of dour184 and frightfully serious people who never smoke or play bridge. I omit the function of entertainment only because it has never been neglected. The supreme185 business of a State is to make its people happy, strong, and prosperous. We shall approach the ideal when we abolish war and reduce pauperism186 and crime by registering all workers, organising all industry, reforming justice and the penal187 system, and removing the morally diseased.
In those days education will be a vast, humane188, scientific scheme for guiding the growth of human embryos189 into industrious190 and orderly citizens, and enabling the adult citizen pleasurably to cultivate his mind and taste. The development of each child will be followed as the development of a pupil is followed in the Jesuit Society, but with a care to develop its individuality fully93, in harmony with the individualities of others. The child will not pass from the sphere of the educator at puberty, with unformed mind and character, to swell191 the great army of the intellectually listless. Ruskin’s noble ideal of “as many as possible full-breathed, bright-eyed, and happy-hearted human creatures” will replace the narrow standards of our Education Department, with which the child can have no sympathy. From the first dawn of intelligence it will feel that a well-wishing parent, the community, is training it to derive192 all the joy it can from life, consistently with the joy of others and the day’s duties, when its turn comes to don the toga virilis. It will have learned by that time that a development of its characteristic human powers is the richest possession it can have, and, coming to adolescence193, will not at once cast aside the work of the teacher and dissipate its energy in the crude indulgence of elementary passions and futile194 imaginings. Neither child nor adult will shrink from work which stimulates195 the intelligence or refines the taste, and a fine alert race, impatient of untruth, injustice196, and suffering, will set itself to develop fully the resources of this planet.
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maiden
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| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
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stimulation
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| n.刺激，激励，鼓舞 | |
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lamentably
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| adv.哀伤地，拙劣地 | |
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distractions
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| n.使人分心的事[人]( distraction的名词复数 )；娱乐，消遣；心烦意乱；精神错乱 | |
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enthusiasts
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| n.热心人，热衷者( enthusiast的名词复数 ) | |
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survivors
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| 幸存者，残存者，生还者( survivor的名词复数 ) | |
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7
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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8
zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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9
astounded
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| v.使震惊(astound的过去式和过去分词)；愕然；愕；惊讶 | |
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10
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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11
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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12
socialist
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| n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的 | |
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13
punctuated
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| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的过去式和过去分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
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14
agitations
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| （液体等的）摇动( agitation的名词复数 )； 鼓动； 激烈争论； （情绪等的）纷乱 | |
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15
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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16
impulsively
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| adv.冲动地 | |
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17
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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18
stimulate
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| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
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19
inclination
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| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
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20
mischief
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| n.损害，伤害，危害；恶作剧，捣蛋，胡闹 | |
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21
serial
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| n.连本影片，连本电视节目；adj.连续的 | |
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22
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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23
comedian
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| n.喜剧演员；滑稽演员 | |
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24
rendering
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| n.表现，描写 | |
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25
snobbery
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| n. 充绅士气派, 俗不可耐的性格 | |
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26
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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27
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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28
ascetics
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| n.苦行者，禁欲者，禁欲主义者( ascetic的名词复数 ) | |
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29
scouts
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| 侦察员[机，舰]( scout的名词复数 )； 童子军； 搜索； 童子军成员 | |
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30
allusion
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| n.暗示，间接提示 | |
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31
coercion
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| n.强制，高压统治 | |
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32
volcanic
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| adj.火山的；象火山的；由火山引起的 | |
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33
restriction
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| n.限制，约束 | |
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34
chaste
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| adj.贞洁的；有道德的；善良的；简朴的 | |
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35
pruriency
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| n.好色；迷恋；淫欲；（焦躁等的）渴望 | |
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36
obtuseness
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| 感觉迟钝 | |
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37
candidly
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| adv.坦率地，直率而诚恳地 | |
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38
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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39
purveyor
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| n.承办商，伙食承办商 | |
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40
wares
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| n. 货物, 商品 | |
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41
lamentable
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| adj.令人惋惜的，悔恨的 | |
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42
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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43
sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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44
vapid
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| adj.无味的；无生气的 | |
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45
patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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46
prehistoric
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| adj.（有记载的）历史以前的，史前的，古老的 | |
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47
melodramas
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| 情节剧( melodrama的名词复数 ) | |
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48
melodrama
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| n.音乐剧；情节剧 | |
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49
sensational
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| adj.使人感动的，非常好的，轰动的，耸人听闻的 | |
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50
evoke
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| vt.唤起，引起，使人想起 | |
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51
inflame
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| v.使燃烧；使极度激动；使发炎 | |
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52
scenic
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| adj.自然景色的，景色优美的 | |
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53
boorish
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| adj.粗野的，乡巴佬的 | |
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54
pictorial
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| adj.绘画的；图片的；n．画报 | |
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55
preservation
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| n.保护，维护，保存，保留，保持 | |
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56
indifference
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| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
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57
undoing
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| n.毁灭的原因，祸根；破坏，毁灭 | |
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58
undo
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| vt.解开，松开；取消，撤销 | |
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59
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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60
essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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61
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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62
fanatic
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| n.狂热者，入迷者；adj.狂热入迷的 | |
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63
metropolitan
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| adj.大城市的，大都会的 | |
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64
artistic
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| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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65
censor
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| n./vt.审查，审查员；删改 | |
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66
culmination
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| n.顶点；最高潮 | |
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67
absurdity
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| n.荒谬，愚蠢；谬论 | |
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68
pruriently
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| adv.好色地，挑逗性地 | |
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69
counteract
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| vt.对…起反作用，对抗，抵消 | |
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70
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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71
personalities
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| n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
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72
jumbles
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| 混杂( jumble的名词复数 )； （使）混乱； 使混乱； 使杂乱 | |
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73
legitimately
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| ad.合法地；正当地，合理地 | |
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74
mischievous
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| adj.调皮的，恶作剧的，有害的，伤人的 | |
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75
conscientious
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|
| adj.审慎正直的，认真的，本着良心的 | |
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76
stimulating
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| adj.有启发性的，能激发人思考的 | |
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77
bishop
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| n.主教，（国际象棋）象 | |
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78
vagaries
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| n.奇想( vagary的名词复数 )；异想天开；异常行为；难以预测的情况 | |
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79
hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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80
pedantry
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| n.迂腐，卖弄学问 | |
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81
clement
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| adj.仁慈的；温和的 | |
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82
censured
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|
| v.指责，非难，谴责( censure的过去式 ) | |
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83
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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84
incompetent
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| adj.无能力的，不能胜任的 | |
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85
hampered
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| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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86
restrictions
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|
| 约束( restriction的名词复数 )； 管制； 制约因素； 带限制性的条件（或规则） | |
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87
Partisanship
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| n. 党派性, 党派偏见 | |
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88
follies
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| 罪恶，时事讽刺剧； 愚蠢，蠢笨，愚蠢的行为、思想或做法( folly的名词复数 ) | |
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89
hypocrisy
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| n.伪善，虚伪 | |
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90
prominence
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| n.突出；显著；杰出；重要 | |
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91
mansions
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| n.宅第，公馆，大厦( mansion的名词复数 ) | |
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92
meretricious
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| adj.华而不实的，俗艳的 | |
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93
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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94
drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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95
foresight
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| n.先见之明，深谋远虑 | |
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96
utterances
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| n.发声( utterance的名词复数 )；说话方式；语调；言论 | |
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97
ridiculed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄，奚落( ridicule的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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98
transpired
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| （事实，秘密等）被人知道( transpire的过去式和过去分词 )； 泄露； 显露； 发生 | |
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99
inefficiency
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| n.无效率，无能；无效率事例 | |
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100
conspired
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| 密谋( conspire的过去式和过去分词 )； 搞阴谋； （事件等）巧合； 共同导致 | |
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101
corrupt
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| v.贿赂，收买；adj.腐败的，贪污的 | |
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102
initiates
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| v.开始( initiate的第三人称单数 )；传授；发起；接纳新成员 | |
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103
resentment
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| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
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104
reconstruction
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| n.重建，再现，复原 | |
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105
professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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106
hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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107
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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108
incapable
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| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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109
constructive
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| adj.建设的，建设性的 | |
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110
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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111
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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112
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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113
cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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114
sordid
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| adj.肮脏的，不干净的，卑鄙的，暗淡的 | |
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115
perversion
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| n.曲解；堕落；反常 | |
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116
gratuitous
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| adj.无偿的，免费的；无缘无故的，不必要的 | |
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117
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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118
beguile
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| vt.欺骗，消遣 | |
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119
bovine
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| adj.牛的；n.牛 | |
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120
daze
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| v.(使)茫然，(使)发昏 | |
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121
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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122
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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123
organisation
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| n.组织，安排，团体，有机休 | |
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124
somnolent
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| adj.想睡的，催眠的；adv.瞌睡地；昏昏欲睡地；使人瞌睡地 | |
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125
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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126
bibliographical
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| 书籍解题的，著书目录的 | |
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127
affiliated
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| adj. 附属的, 有关连的 | |
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128
authoritative
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| adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的 | |
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129
simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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130
abolition
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| n.废除，取消 | |
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131
promotion
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| n.提升，晋级；促销，宣传 | |
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132
aristocrats
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| n.贵族( aristocrat的名词复数 ) | |
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133
recede
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| vi.退(去)，渐渐远去；向后倾斜，缩进 | |
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134
insinuate
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| vt.含沙射影地说，暗示 | |
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135
delicacy
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| n.精致，细微，微妙，精良；美味，佳肴 | |
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136
insistence
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| n.坚持；强调；坚决主张 | |
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137
assailing
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| v.攻击( assail的现在分词 )；困扰；质问；毅然应对 | |
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docility
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| n.容易教，易驾驶，驯服 | |
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139
draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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140
furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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141
coterie
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| n.(有共同兴趣的)小团体，小圈子 | |
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142
unlimited
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| adj.无限的，不受控制的，无条件的 | |
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143
jargon
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| n.术语，行话 | |
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144
sartorial
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| adj.裁缝的 | |
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145
feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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146
depict
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| vt.描画，描绘；描写，描述 | |
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147
puckers
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| v.（使某物）起褶子或皱纹( pucker的第三人称单数 ) | |
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148
plunges
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| n.跳进，投入vt.使投入，使插入，使陷入vi.投入，跳进，陷入v.颠簸( plunge的第三人称单数 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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149
stringency
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| n.严格，紧迫，说服力；严格性；强度 | |
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150
percolate
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| v.过滤，渗透 | |
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151
strata
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| n.地层（复数）；社会阶层 | |
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152
mathematicians
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| 数学家( mathematician的名词复数 ) | |
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153
execration
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| n.诅咒，念咒，憎恶 | |
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154
decorative
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| adj.装饰的，可作装饰的 | |
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155
monarchy
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| n.君主，最高统治者；君主政体，君主国 | |
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156
creased
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| （使…）起折痕，弄皱( crease的过去式和过去分词 )； （皮肤）皱起，使起皱纹； 皱皱巴巴 | |
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157
bowlers
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| n.（板球）投球手( bowler的名词复数 )；圆顶高帽 | |
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158
bowler
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| n.打保龄球的人，（板球的）投（球）手 | |
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159
mandate
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| n.托管地；命令，指示 | |
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extravagant
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| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
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inconvenient
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| adj.不方便的，令人感到麻烦的 | |
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162
attiring
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| v.使穿上衣服，使穿上盛装( attire的现在分词 ) | |
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fiery
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| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
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164
dispel
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| vt.驱走，驱散，消除 | |
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165
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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166
tamper
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| v.干预，玩弄，贿赂，窜改，削弱，损害 | |
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167
starched
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| adj.浆硬的，硬挺的，拘泥刻板的v.把（衣服、床单等）浆一浆( starch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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rigidly
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| adv.刻板地，僵化地 | |
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169
hips
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| abbr.high impact polystyrene 高冲击强度聚苯乙烯，耐冲性聚苯乙烯n.臀部( hip的名词复数 )；[建筑学]屋脊；臀围（尺寸）；臀部…的 | |
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170
filth
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| n.肮脏，污物，污秽；淫猥 | |
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171
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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172
abdominal
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| adj.腹（部）的，下腹的；n.腹肌 | |
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descends
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| v.下来( descend的第三人称单数 )；下去；下降；下斜 | |
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174
civilisation
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| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
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175
monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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176
strenuous
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| adj.奋发的，使劲的；紧张的；热烈的，狂热的 | |
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exacting
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| adj.苛求的，要求严格的 | |
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178
mundane
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| adj.平凡的；尘世的；宇宙的 | |
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179
entailed
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| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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180
prescriptions
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| 药( prescription的名词复数 )； 处方； 开处方； 计划 | |
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181
judicial
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| adj.司法的，法庭的，审判的，明断的，公正的 | |
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182
adventurous
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| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
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183
infusion
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| n.灌输 | |
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184
dour
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| adj.冷酷的，严厉的；（岩石）嶙峋的；顽强不屈 | |
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185
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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186
pauperism
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| n.有被救济的资格，贫困 | |
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187
penal
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| adj.刑罚的；刑法上的 | |
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188
humane
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| adj.人道的，富有同情心的 | |
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189
embryos
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| n.晶胚；胚，胚胎( embryo的名词复数 ) | |
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190
industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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191
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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192
derive
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| v.取得；导出；引申；来自；源自；出自 | |
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193
adolescence
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| n.青春期，青少年 | |
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194
futile
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| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
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195
stimulates
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| v.刺激( stimulate的第三人称单数 )；激励；使兴奋；起兴奋作用，起刺激作用，起促进作用 | |
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196
injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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