Essay No. 19
A New Way of Life*
BY
John St. Loe Strachey
(Editor of "The Spectator.")
"SOLOMOM tells us of a poor wise man who saved a city by his counsel. It hath often happened that a private soldier, by some unexpected brave attempt, hath been instrumental in obtaining a great victory. How many obscure men have been authors of very useful inventions, whereof the world now reaps the benefit ? The very example of honesty and industry in a poor tradesman will sometimes spread through a neighbourhood, when others see how successful he is; and thus so many useful members are gained for which the whole body of the public is the better. Whoever is blessed with a true public spirit, God will certainly put it into his way to make use of that blessing for the ends it was given him, by some means or other. And therefore it hath been observed in most ages, that the greatest actions for the benefit of the commonwealth have been performed by the wisdom or courage, the contrivance or industry, of particular men, and not of numbers; and that the
* This leaflet is made up from passages taken from a little book with a similar title, published by me with Messrs. Macmillan this spring.—J. Sr. L. S.
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safety of a kingdom hath often been owing to those hands from whence it was least expected."
The above quotation is to be found in Swift's sermon on "Doing Good." Swift shows that no man can deem service to his country too high for his endeavour. Those who give way to the feeling that they are too weak to affect the great march of events, and that all they can do is to submit in anxious acquiescence to the decrees of destiny, are guilty of a crime against the State. Such impotent pessimism is base. In patriotism as in every scene of life the victory is won in the spirit. If the nation with a single heart will determine that, no matter what the sacrifice, she will be worthy of herself and of her mission, there can be no doubt as to the result. All that is wanted is the will to insist that no effort shall be neglected which will secure the moral strength of the nation.
We have got as a nation to face a situation which can only be adequately met by a "new way of life." When I say this I must not be thought to be yielding to the pessimism which has affected a certain section of the population, or to give encouragement to the notion that we have become decadent as a people. I am not among those who think that the nation has suffered in its moral health, or that we are worse from that point of view than our forefathers. On the contrary, I believe that the nation was never better in this respect, and that there never was a
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larger proportion of the population anxious to do right, and to act in accordance with what it believes to be the will of God. Again, I doubt whether there ever was a time when men were more sincerely patriotic and more anxious to maintain the Empire "in health and wealth long to live." It is true, no doubt, that now, as when Wordsworth wrote his famous sonnet, there is much to deplore in the national character, and much that needs change; we are far too much given to luxury and softness. Our life is still too often the "mean handiwork of craftsman, cook, or groom." But though these are evils that cry aloud for remedy, and though I do not forget them, they are not the evils on which I want to dwell at the present moment. While I do not deny the continuous need for higher moral ideals, what I specially desire to emphasise is the need of a greater steadfastness of outlook. What we have got to change is a certain light-heartedness or complacency of temper that has lately marked our people—the easy belief that everyone must admire and respect our good intentions and our noble and humanitarian point of view. We have got in future to face the world, not as we should like it to be, but as it is.
Marston in the prologue to one of his tragedies warns his audience that if they have been too long "nuzzled 'twixt the breasts of happiness," and if they dare not face life as it is, and realise what men have been and will be, they had better avoid his play.
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As far as the great external national responsibilities are concerned, we as a nation have been too long "nuzzled 'twixt the breasts of happiness "; or, as another Elizabethan poet has said, we have come very near to being "drowned in security." Like the Anglo-Saxons so well described by Carlyle, we have gone about our business in " pot-bellied equanimity," good-temperedly oblivious of the hard realities of life, and sure that nothing disastrous could ever overtake us. Carlyle, remember, went on to point out how the Norman invasion woke the Anglo-Saxon out of this "pot-bellied equanimity," and braced him for higher things.
If I am asked specifically how we are to reach the new way of life, I should answer, in the first place, by refusing to feed ourselves any longer upon what Wordsworth called "emasculating food "—the food of sentiment and unreality. We must not pretend that the world is better than it is or different from what it is, but take its true measure and face the facts like men. The new way of life which I desire to see in this country must not be confined to the political outlook or to naval and military preparations, though these are of vast importance. It must go deep into the fibre of the people. Every man, whether he is tilling the soil, hewing coal, laying bricks, writing books, organising business, or planning some industrial work, great or small, must accustom himself to feel that he is doing it, not for
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himself or his family alone, but partly for his country. In every form of activity the Motherland must be the silent partner who calls upon him for an extra margin of effort, energy, and self-sacrifice.
I can best put the matter in concrete form by recalling a criticism made of this country by a very friendly and most able German professor. " You Englishmen," he said in effect, "differ from us Germans in the way in which you regard your business, whether it is writing books, manufacturing industrial products, or doing work under Government. The Englishman is always looking forward to the time when he will be able to give up the boredom of the shop or office, and retire to amuse himself by field sports, or golf, or travel, or literature, or whatever interests him as an individual. His object is to make enough money to become what he calls a free man. In Germany a man's object is different. He wants to be able to feel that he has done the particular work in which he has been engaged better than anyone else has ever done it—that he has written the very best book or compiled the very best table of statistics on the special matter which he has in hand, or that he has produced the very best material product that the world has ever seen, or developed the best organisation conceivable, either in his own trade or in a -Government office. His work is not a servitude to be got over, but a passion. He believes himself to
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be doing patriotic and public work, no matter what the particular drudgery in which he is engaged, and he knows that his fellow-countrymen as a whole will understand this, and will give him the reward of praise and sympathy according as he shall deserve it. Hence he does not look for his reward in relief from his work, but in its more complete accomplishment."
That the contrast was too strongly drawn may be true, but it is a criticism which is endorsed from many quarters. For example, our latest Transatlantic critic, Mr. Collier, tells us very wittily that an American is always "going to business," while an Englishman is always "going home."
Our new way of life as a nation must be to copy the German spirit. It ought not to seem the most natural thing in the world to say that a man is going to give up work, not because his health and energy are exhausted, but because he has earned the right to go and amuse himself. Hitherto Englishmen have thought that rather a fine thing and a noble thing to say, and a proof of how little they care for money and material concerns. I trust it will not be so regarded in future, but that instead a man may feel proud to say : "I could leave off work if I liked, but I mean to stick to my job, pleasant or unpleasant, as long as I feel I can do it thoroughly and well, because what I want is not an easy time, but to do my share of the nation's work as a whole."
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At the crisis of the Revolution Danton, copying Bacon, told his countrymen that what was needed was "Boldness, Boldness, and again Boldness." It is not necessary for me, or for anyone else, to say that to the British people, for they have enough, perhaps too much, of boldness and recklessness in their composition. The word that they need said to them, and I hope it may be said to them by voices that will reach farther than my own, is "Prepare, Prepare, and again Prepare." Preparation is the need of the moment—moral, physical, and intellectual. But want of preparation has always been, though I trust it may not be in future, the chief of our national weaknesses. Our new way of life must be a way of preparing ourselves to maintain our national ideals, to carry out our mission, and to do our duty as a nation in that state to which it has pleased God to call us. Wordsworth said that the Happy Warrior must "make his moral being his prime care." The time has come when it is the duty of every Briton to remember his words, and to act upon them. If not, we and our Empire must fail as miserably as the old Empires of Egypt and Assyria, of Rome and Carthage.
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