PLEA FOR AN UNLMARNED PEOPLE.
-"I HATE Lord Stanley, he is so damned rational ! " exclaimed a man blasé in the world of public speaking. That was an un- gracious expression ; but it must be confessed that. Lord Stanley, having devoted himself to little boys and mechanics' institutions with most laudable zeal, has contracted the malady of enthusiasm in didactics • and he can no-Yr/seldom rise in a public place with- IA(
out telli the number of little boys who can " read and write
imperf ," or the proportion of volumes in the different insti- tutions of anehester, Salford, and Warrington with the objects, pleasures, and advantages of science. Lord Stanley wishes to hit upon that course which would be possible for a labourer who toils long hours in the day and has only the leisure of an evening to snatch. Such a man, he says, cannot become either an astronomer, a geologist, a chemist, or a physiologist ; but even the greatest philosophers have pursued studies in hours stolen from other occupations. With the assistance of the tens of thousands of books which exist, the working man hmayacquire some knowledge of existing laws ; may ask himself " VV at am I ? what is this universe around me? " and may reply to these queries—" which have taxed the human intellect for three thousand years, and will do so for three thousand years more "—in a general way. He may acquire " that foundation of a complete and rational educa- tion which lies in a knowledge of natural laws as deduced from recorded facts, the laws of inorganic substances, as well as those of organized existences " ; and he may advance from physiology and cosmology to " sociology."
It is not indeed that Lord Stanley would limit the working classes exclusively to these profound studies ; for although " a grave, earnest, energetic, reflective, but rather sombre cast of mind, has for many years distinguished the people of this nation," the human brain must not be too much taxed. Bodily labour may alternate with mental labour, and Lord Stanley has no objec- tion to lighter pursuits : he is far from objecting to the study of French ; he demands rational amusements, since " men die from want of cheerfulness, as plants die for want of air." In the OldhamLyceum Lord Stanley inculcates the study of sportive- mess: the managers should establish a Cheerful Class. But, with the help of such supports, he holds that " intellectual competition should be stimulated in every direction" !
Lord Stan's.), only falls in with a common habit. The English people must always take up with some favourite vice. In the last generation men were addicted to drinking ; in our day they are too much given to thinkidg. The aim of our active men is to make everything a matter of study. They will fail, of Bourse, as they ought to fail. The multitude never will adapt themselves to this studious and scholastic turn, and they ought not. The only danger is, lest Lord Stanley and men of his class should attain a partial success ; lest they should screw a few more scholars and philosophers out of the multitude than it was ever meant by Providence to supply. He is mistaken physiologically. Man, he says, must not over-tax his brain ; but he speaks of bodily labour as a relief from the working of the brain,—how erroneously, most physiologists know. The brain may be as much worked by a very common kind of labour as by the most intellectual. It seems to be exhausted in proportion to the concentrated atten- tion which is bestowed upon any pursuit : an anxious study, while working with foul thread to prevent faults in a weft of calico, or to keep an accurate balance in a tradesman's compli- cated books, will bring on exactly the same diseases of the brain as the study of mathematics or metaphysics. Besides, Lord Stanley's notion is false in the very foundation of political economy : it tends to make all men teachers—every man his own schoolmaster ; an arrangement which would end in multiplying stupid pedagogues and dull pupils. It is neither possible nor desirable for every man to think, know, and be learned. Genius may set a working man to study in the inter- vals of bodily toil, but it would not be possible or pleasant if every carpenter were to become a Professor Lee. The world would thns be overlaid with works on Hebrew literature, while its box- milting and cabinetmaking would be at a standstill. Chemistry must be the servant of the farmer ; but, says Sir James Graham, "the farmer is not a chemical professor, he is not a mechanical inventor, and it is of no use to attempt to make him what he is not." If every farmer were a mechanical inventor, we should have a surplus of machines and a deficiency of growing crops. Loid Stanley is for over-developing the machinery of life, and he forgets life itself. The fundamental principle of all political eco- nomy is division of employments ; but we lose the leisure, the pleasure, and the profit, that we get from handing over special pursuits to special geniuses, if all the world is to be a set of ge- niuses and philosophers. If every man is teacher, all are at- tempting the duty that can be better done by the few. Thinking, in the high sense of the word, is a serious labour ; it must be per- formed by the statesman, the student of science, the mechanical inventor : but it is enough if the work is done by the right classes, who undertake the duties allotted to them in the division of em- ployments. Every one has to take some thought—in the pursuit of his own proper business. For the rest, he may reflect too, even in after-hours, and may study to develop his faculties, so that with common faculties, and common demands upon him, he strain not vainly to study more than "common things." It is nothing but selfishness and dishonesty that makes it necessary for so many of us to learn so much, or we might trust the few to study for us, and do with their report. Study tends to destroy the very choicest blessings of life; the rarest gifts of genius. How pale are the studious ! Mow many a promising artist loses all his freshness in the toil of the studio ! How school spoils the healthy cherub-cheeked'ohild.! The intel- lect of special power does, not suffer, because.it has special power ; but even the finest intellect may be unequal to' intellectual drudgery. The mechanical reformers who are for the " equality of the sexes," and confound equal rights with identical capacities, are not only striving to make a studious multitude, but they are attempting to drill women into manly students ; as if the Venus de' Medici and Angelioa, or even Portia and Aspasia, could become Doctors of Medicine or Barristers at Law. Man must do the study ; and in discussing his labours with his fairer helpmate, he will often find a clearer perception of the truth he seeks, a more delicate expression of the struggling thought. But the beauty of the gentler intellect, like its hands, though imprcived by action, would be spoiled and deadened by drudgery. Adam delved to grow the &x, and Eve span the- linen. Woman must not do the kibour of thinking. Children should not be taught too early. Mankind should live, and not suffer the curse of thought. Even Stanley should unbend, at times ; and in the spring which his mind would acquire from an interval of repose; he n light jump
be to the higher conclusion, that amusement, to perfect, should be irrational, unintellectual, unthinking—idle, free, and purposeless, save " for the fun of the thing "—for the pleasure of healthy movement, and the enjoyment of natural life. The highest art ends there—it comes back to nature.
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