登陆注册
4712000000021

第21章

Whilst they are thus instinct with a spirit of order, and of calculation, it must be owned they are capable of larger views; but the indulgence is expensive to them, costs great crises, or accumulations of mental power. In common, the horse works best with blinders. Nothing is more in the line of English thought, than our unvarnished Connecticut question, "Pray, sir, how do you get your living when you are at home?" The questions of freedom, of taxation, of privilege, are money questions. Heavy fellows, steeped in beer and fleshpots, they are hard of hearing and dim of sight. Their drowsy minds need to be flagellated by war and trade and politics and persecution. They cannot well read a principle, except by the light of fagots and of burning towns.

Tacitus says of the Germans, "powerful only in sudden efforts, they are impatient of toil and labor." This highly-destined race, if it had not somewhere added the chamber of patience to its brain, would not have built London. I know not from which of the tribes and temperaments that went to the composition of the people this tenacity was supplied, but they clinch every nail they drive. They have no running for luck, and no immoderate speed. They spend largely on their fabric, and await the slow return. Their leather lies tanning seven years in the vat. At Rogers's mills, in Sheffield, where I was shown the process of making a razor and a penknife, I was told there is no luck in making good steel; that they make no mistakes, every blade in the hundred and in the thousand is good. And that is characteristic of all their work, -- no more is attempted than is done.

When Thor and his companions arrive at Utgard, he is told that "nobody is permitted to remain here, unless he understand some art, and excel in it all other men." The same question is still put to the posterity of Thor. A nation of laborers, every man is trained to some one art or detail, and aims at perfection in that; not content unless he has something in which he thinks he surpasses all other men. He would rather not do any thing at all, than not do it well.

I suppose no people have such thoroughness; -- from the highest to the lowest, every man meaning to be master of his art.

"To show capacity," a Frenchman described as the end of a speech in debate: "no," said an Englishman, "but to set your shoulder at the wheel, -- to advance the business." Sir Samuel Romilly refused to speak in popular assemblies, confining himself to the House of Commons, where a measure can be carried by a speech. The business of the House of Commons is conducted by a few persons, but these are hard-worked. Sir Robert Peel "knew the Blue Books by heart." His colleagues and rivals carry Hansard in their heads. The high civil and legal offices are not beds of ease, but posts which exact frightful amounts of mental labor. Many of the great leaders, like Pitt, Canning, Castlereagh, Romilly, are soon worked to death. They are excellent judges England of a good worker, and when they find one, like Clarendon, Sir Philip Warwick, Sir William Coventry, Ashley, Burke, Thurlow, Mansfield, Pitt, Eldon, Peel, or Russell, there is nothing too good or too high for him.

They have a wonderful heat in the pursuit of a public aim Private persons exhibit, in scientific and antiquarian researches, the same pertinacity as the nation showed in the coalitions in which it yoked Europe against the empire of Bonaparte, one after the other defeated, and still renewed, until the sixth hurled him from his seat.

Sir John Herschel, in completion of the work of his father, who had made the catalogue of the stars of the northern hemisphere, expatriated himself for years at the Cape of Good Hope, finished his inventory of the southern heaven, came home, and redacted it in eight years more; -- a work whose value does not begin until thirty years have elapsed, and thenceforward a record to all ages of the highest import. The Admiralty sent out the Arctic expeditions year after year, in search of Sir John Franklin, until, at last, they have threaded their way through polar pack and Behring's Straits, and solved the geographical problem. Lord Elgin, at Athens, saw the imminent ruin of the Greek remains, set up his scaffoldings, in spite of epigrams, and, after five years' labor to collect them, got his marbles on shipboard. The ship struck a rock, and went to the bottom. He had them all fished up, by divers, at a vast expense, and brought to London; not knowing that Haydon, Fuseli, and Canova, and all good heads in all the world, were to be his applauders. In the same spirit, were the excavation and research by Sir Charles Fellowes, for the Xanthian monument; and of Layard, for his Nineveh sculptures.

The nation sits in the immense city they have builded, a London extended into every man's mind, though he live in Van Dieman's Land or Capetown. Faithful performance of what is undertaken to be performed, they honor in themselves, and exact in others, as certificate of equality with themselves. The modern world is theirs.

They have made and make it day by day. The commercial relations of the world are so intimately drawn to London, that every dollar on earth contributes to the strength of the English government. And if all the wealth in the planet should perish by war or deluge, they know themselves competent to replace it.

They have approved their Saxon blood, by their sea-going qualities; their descent from Odin's smiths, by their hereditary skill in working in iron; their British birth, by husbandry and immense wheat harvests; and justified their occupancy of the centre of habitable land, by their supreme ability and cosmopolitan spirit.

同类推荐
  • 阳宅三要

    阳宅三要

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 警世钟

    警世钟

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 明伦汇编家范典姊妹部

    明伦汇编家范典姊妹部

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 琅琊漫抄

    琅琊漫抄

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 无事生非

    无事生非

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 万古无敌天帝系统

    万古无敌天帝系统

    少年叶星辰,血脉被夺,却意外获得天帝系统。创建至高皇朝,吞纳诸天气运。驾驭周天星斗,凝聚无上神兵,征战诸天三千界。神界之上,我为天帝。
  • 中国航空工业改革开放三十年

    中国航空工业改革开放三十年

    本书选择了航空工业的典型事例,强调时代背景,突出发展变化,从体制创新、民用飞机、科技创新三个方面回顾了中国航空工业改革开放30年的历程。改革开放30年来,中国航空工业不断转变观念,积极探索体制改革,适时调整战略,努力开拓市场,推进资本运作,取得了令人瞩目的成就。随着集团公司的重新整合,实施“两融、三新、五化、万亿”战略,中国航空工业必将在新一轮市场经济大潮中蓬勃发展。本书既可给航空工业从业人员以启迪与借鉴,也能为航空工业相关产业及对航空工业感兴趣的社会读者提供参考。
  • 爱情故事

    爱情故事

    无数事实、经验和理性已经证明:好故事可以影响人的一生。而以我们之见,所谓好故事,在内容上讲述的应是做人与处世的道理,在形式上也应听得进、记得住、讲得出、传得开,而且不会因时代的变迁而失去她的本质特征和艺术光彩。为了让更多的读者走进好故事,阅读好故事,欣赏好故事,珍藏好故事,传播好故事,我们特编选了一套“故事会5元精品系列”以飨之。其选择标准主要有以下三点:一、在《故事会》杂志上发表的作品。二、有过目不忘的艺术感染力。三、有恒久的趣味,对今天的读者仍有启迪作用。愿好故事伴随你的一生!
  • 万界监狱长

    万界监狱长

    作为一名有责任心的万界狱警,林凡觉得,像那些法宝啊丹药啊等危险品,必须收缴,杜绝私藏!此外,那些破坏位面和谐的,比如女儿国里全是女性这怎么能行,阴阳失衡,必须调节;兰若寺里女鬼勾搭书生,这不耽误人家赶考嘛,有能耐冲我来;还有斗破苍穹里,萧炎你过分了啊,给云韵同学吃啥不良药品了,老缠我是什么意思……
  • The Emerald City of Oz

    The Emerald City of Oz

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 宅男的韩娱

    宅男的韩娱

    宅男逆袭女神,屌丝霸气上位,且看扑街作家如何成为辉煌编剧,才华倾倒整个韩国。
  • 《老子》64个人生智慧

    《老子》64个人生智慧

    本书对《老子》一书在原文解释的章句今译的基础上,结合我们当前社会的现实“请”老子直接走上讲坛,面对我们这个时代发言,与我们进行面对面的“对话”,这也是老子思想在现代社会的发展和延伸。本书为使哲学走出哲学家的殿堂,走向大众,加深人们作为民族文化源泉的中华古文化的认识,弘扬老子的哲学思想,在学以致用,古为今用方面作出了努力。
  • 卡耐基说话技巧与人际交往

    卡耐基说话技巧与人际交往

    本书将会教会你:赢得他人赞同的说话技巧;赢得他人合作的说话技巧;有效说服的说话技巧;当众说话的沟通艺术;如何做一个受人欢迎的说话高手;如何克服恐惧建立自信;如何学会当众讲话让别人相信和接受你……如果获得了这些技巧,你将迎来崭新的人生!
  • 狼女很萌:爹爹,疼我!

    狼女很萌:爹爹,疼我!

    【本文纯属虚构,请勿模仿】狼,也是有感情的!重生为狼女,是她的幸,还是不幸?命运兜兜转转,要怎样去安排?得尽天下宠爱,却又颠沛流离,历尽时间冷暖苦寒。江山多娇,美人如玉,韶华如梦,沉醉红颜!无数奇迹般的邂逅,那些如传奇般的爱情,谁才是她的真命天子?只愿,繁华过后,花好月圆,伊人执手,静好如初!
  • 凰栖枝

    凰栖枝

    前世大婚之日,眼看着要与心上人终成眷属,她却被人从高台上推下,煮熟的鸭子就这么飞走!重生后再算计男人心,最后稀里糊涂,却被别人算计到手。重活一世,她发现,怎么这些人和事都不一样了……阴谋……一定有阴谋……