Family and Nation
SIR,—It is wholly intelligible that Sir Ernest Barker should sigh for the writers of his formative years, Robert Browning, George Eliot and George Meredith, particularly as his fame rests on the careful evalua- tions he has made of those reputations that he still exists to celebrate.
But the prominence that you have given to his views may be unfortun- ate if it gives the impression that there is any body of informed opinion in the country today which holds that the moral and material achieve- ments of the past can best be revived by a deliberate return to its literary ideals. The splendour of the age of the first Elizabeth was a triumph of the modern spirit in a world where the great pundits of European learning still looked longingly over their shoulders- to what Sir Ernest Barker would probably have described as "the quiet family life" of the Dark Ages. The hopes to which a second Elizabethan age naturally give rise can only be fulfilled by a similar awareness and appreciation of the contemporary world.—Yours faithfully,
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