Chapter II: Preface (1)

The preparation of the ensuing pages has been a labour of love, and has cost me many an anxious hour. “Of the writing of books,” says the learned Psalmist (or more probably a Syro-Chaldæic scribe of the third century) “there is no end”; and truly it is a very solemn thought that so many writers, furnishing the livelihood of so many publishers, these in their turn supporting so many journals, reviews and magazines, and these last giving bread to such a vast army of editors, reviewers, and what not--I say it is a very solemn thought that this great mass of people should be engaged upon labour of this nature; labour which, rightly applied, might be of immeasurable service to humanity, but which is, alas! so often diverted into useless or even positively harmful channels: channels upon which I could write at some length, were it not necessary for me, however, to bring this reflection to a close.

A fine old Arabic poem--probably the oldest complete literary work in the world--(I mean the Comedy which we are accustomed to call the Book of Job)[5] contains hidden away among its many treasures the phrase, “Oh! that mine enemy had written a book!” This craving for literature, which is so explicable in a primitive people, and the half-savage desire that the labour of writing should fall upon a foeman captured in battle, have given place in the long process of historical development to a very different spirit. There is now, if anything, a superabundance of literature, and an apology is needed for the appearance of such a work as this, nor, indeed, would it have been brought out had it not been imagined that Lambkin’s many friends would give it a ready sale.

Animaxander, King of the Milesians, upon being asked by the Emissary of Atarxessus what was, in his opinion, the most wearying thing in the world, replied by cutting off the head of the messenger, thus outraging the religious sense of a time to which guests and heralds were sacred, as being under the special protection of Ζεύς (pronounced “Tsephs”).

Warned by the awful fate of the sacrilegious monarch, I will put a term to these opening remarks. My book must be its own preface, I would that the work could be also its own publisher, its own bookseller, and its own reviewer.

It remains to me only to thank the many gentlemen who have aided me in my task with the loan of letters, scraps of MSS., portraits, and pieces of clothing--in fine, with all that could be of interest in illustrating Lambkin’s career. My gratitude is especially due to Mr. Binder, who helped in part of the writing; to Mr. Cook, who was kind enough to look over the proofs; and to Mr. Wallingford, Q.C., who very kindly consented to receive an advance copy. I must also thank the Bishop of Bury for his courteous sympathy and ever-ready suggestion; I must not omit from this list M. Hertz, who has helped me with French, and whose industry and gentlemanly manners are particularly pleasing.

I cannot close without tendering my thanks in general to the printers who have set up this book, to the agencies which have distributed it, and to the booksellers, who have put it upon their shelves; I feel a deep debt of gratitude to a very large number of people, and that is a pleasant sensation for a man who, in the course of a fairly successful career, has had to give (and receive) more than one shrewd knock.

THE CHAPLAINCY,
BURFORD COLLEGE,
OXFORD.

P.S.--I have consulted, in the course of this work, Liddell and Scott’s _Larger Greek Lexicon_, Smith’s _Dictionary of Antiquities_, Skeats’ _Etymological Dictionary_, _Le Dictionnaire Franco-Anglais, et Anglo-Français_, of Boileau, Curtis’ _English Synonyms_, Buffle on _Punctuation_, and many other authorities which will be acknowledged in the text.

Lambkin’s Remains

_Being the unpublished works of J. A. Lambkin, M.A. sometime Fellow of Burford College_

I.

INTRODUCTORY

It is without a trace of compunction or regret that I prepare to edit the few unpublished essays, sermons and speeches of my late dear friend, Mr. Lambkin. On the contrary, I am filled with a sense that my labour is one to which the clearest interests of the whole English people call me, and I have found myself, as the work grew under my hands, fulfilling, if I may say so with due modesty, a high and noble duty. I remember Lambkin himself, in one of the last conversations I had with him, saying with the acuteness that characterised him, “The world knows nothing of its greatest men.” This pregnant commentary upon human affairs was, I admit, produced by an accident in the _Oxford Herald_ which concerned myself. In a description of a Public Function my name had been mis-spelt, and though I was deeply wounded and offended, I was careful (from a feeling which I hope is common to all of us) to make no more than the slightest reference to this insult.

The acute eye of friendship and sympathy, coupled with the instincts of a scholar and a gentleman, perceived my irritation, and in the evening Lambkin uttered the memorable words that I have quoted. I thanked him warmly, but, if long acquaintance had taught him my character, so had it taught me his. I knew the reticence and modesty of my colleague, the almost morbid fear that vanity (a vice which he detested) might be imputed to him on account of the exceptional gifts which he could not entirely ignore or hide; and I was certain that the phrase which he constructed to heal my wound was not without some reference to his own unmerited obscurity.

The world knows nothing of its greatest men! Josiah Lambkin! from whatever Cypress groves of the underworld which environs us when on dark winter evenings in the silence of our own souls which nothing can dissolve though all attunes to that which nature herself perpetually calls us, always, if we choose but to remember, your name shall be known wherever the English language and its various dialects are spoken. The great All-mother has made me the humble instrument, and I shall perform my task as you would have desired it in a style which loses half its evil by losing all its rhetoric; I shall pursue my way and turn neither to the right nor to the left, but go straight on in the fearless old English fashion till it is completed.

Josiah Abraham Lambkin was born of well-to-do and gentlemanly parents in Bayswater[6] on January 19th, 1843. His father, at the time of his birth, entertained objections to the great Public Schools, largely founded upon his religious leanings, which were at that time opposed to the ritual of those institutions. In spite therefore of the vehement protestations of his mother (who was distantly connected on the maternal side with the Cromptons of Cheshire) the boy passed his earlier years under the able tutorship of a Nonconformist divine, and later passed into the academy of Dr. Whortlebury at Highgate.[7]

Of his school-days he always spoke with some bitterness. He appears to have suffered considerably from bullying, and the Headmaster, though a humane, was a blunt man, little fitted to comprehend the delicate nature with which he had to deal. On one occasion the nervous susceptible lad found it necessary to lay before him a description of the treatment to which he had been subjected by a younger and smaller, but much stronger boy; the pedagogue’s only reply was to flog Lambkin heartily with a light cane, “inflicting,” as he himself once told me, “such exquisite agony as would ever linger in his memory.” Doubtless this teacher of the old school thought he was (to use a phrase then common) “making a man of him,” but the object was not easily to be attained by brutal means. Let us be thankful that these punishments have nearly disappeared from our modern seminaries.

When Josiah was fifteen years of age, his father, having prospered in business, removed to Eaton Square and bought an estate in Surrey. The merchant’s mind, which, though rough, was strong and acute, had meanwhile passed through a considerable change in the matter of religion; and as the result of long but silent self-examination he became the ardent supporter of a system which he had formerly abhorred. It was therefore determined to send the lad to one of the two great Universities, and though Mrs. Lambkin’s second cousins, the Crumptons, had all been to Cambridge, Oxford was finally decided upon as presenting the greater social opportunities at the time.[8]

Here, then, is young Lambkin, in his nineteenth year, richly but soberly dressed, and eager for the new life that opens before him. He was entered at Burford College on October the 15th, 1861; a date which is, by a curious coincidence, exactly thirty-six years, four months, and two days from the time in which I pen these lines.

Of his undergraduate career there is little to be told. Called by his enemies “The Burford Bounder,” or “dirty Lambkin,” he yet acquired the respect of a small but choice circle who called him by his own name. He was third _proxime accessit_ for the Johnson prize in Biblical studies, and would undoubtedly have obtained (or been mentioned for) the Newdigate, had he not been pitted against two men of quite exceptional poetic gifts--the present editor of “The Investor’s Sure Prophet,” and Mr. Hound, the well-known writer on “Food Statistics.”

He took a good Second-class in Greats in the summer of 1864, and was immediately elected to a fellowship at Burford. It was not known at the time that his father had become a bankrupt through lending large sums at a high rate of interest to a young heir without security, trusting to the necessity under which his name and honour would put him to pay. In the shipwreck of the family fortunes, the small endowment was a veritable godsend to Josiah, who but for this recognition of his merits would have been compelled to work for his living.

As it was, his peculiar powers were set free to plan his great monograph on “Being,” a work which, to the day of his death, he designed not only to write but to publish.

There was not, of course, any incident of note in the thirty years during which he held his fellowship. He did his duty plainly as it lay before him, occasionally taking pupils, and after the Royal Commission, even giving lectures in the College hall. He was made Junior Dean in October, 1872, Junior Bursar in 1876, and Bursar in 1880, an office which he held during the rest of his life.

In this capacity no breath of calumny ever touched him. His character was spotless. He never offered or took compensations of any kind, and no one has hinted that his accounts were not accurately and strictly kept.

He never allowed himself to be openly a candidate for the Wardenship of the College, but it is remarkable that he received one vote at each of the three elections held in the twenty years of his residence.

He passed peacefully away just after Hall on the Gaudy Night of last year. When his death was reported, an old scout, ninety-two years of age, who had grown deaf in the service of the College, burst into tears and begged that the name might be more clearly repeated to him, as he had failed to catch it. On hearing it he dried his eyes, and said he had never known a better master.

His character will, I think, be sufficiently evident in the writings which I shall publish. He was one of nature’s gentlemen; reticent, just, and full of self-respect. He hated a scene, and was careful to avoid giving rise even to an argument. On the other hand, he was most tenacious of his just rights, though charitable to the deserving poor, and left a fortune of thirty-five thousand pounds.

In the difficult questions which arise from the superior rank of inferiors he displayed a constant tact and judgment. It is not always easy for a tutor to control and guide the younger members of the aristocracy without being accused of pitiless severity on the one hand or of gross obsequiousness on the other. Lambkin, to his honour, contrived to direct with energy and guide without offence the men upon whom England’s greatness depends.

He was by no means a snob--snobbishness was not in him. On the other hand, he was equally removed from what is almost worse than snobbishness--the morbid terror of subservience which possesses some ill-balanced minds.

His attitude was this: that we are compelled to admit the aristocratic quality of the English polity and should, while decently veiling its cruder aspects, enjoy to the full the benefits which such a constitution confers upon society and upon our individual selves.

By a genial observance of such canons he became one of the most respected among those whom the chances of an academic career presented to him as pupils or parents. He was the guest and honoured friend of the Duke of Cumberland, the Duke of Pembroke, the Duke of Limerick (“Mad Harry”), and the Duke of Lincoln; he had also the honour of holding a long conversation with the Duke of Berkshire, whom he met upon the top of an omnibus in Piccadilly and instantly recognised. He possessed letters, receipts or communications from no less than four Marquises, one Marquess, ten Barons, sixteen Baronets and one hundred and twenty County Gentlemen. I must not omit Lord Grumbletooth, who had had commercial dealings with his father, and who remained to the end of his life a cordial and devoted friend.[9]

His tact in casual conversation was no less remarkable than his general _savoir faire_ in the continuous business of life. Thus upon one occasion a royal personage happened to be dining in Hall. It was some days after the death of Mr. Hooligan, the well-known Home Rule leader. The distinguished guest, with perhaps a trifle of licence, turned to Lambkin and said “Well, Mr. Bursar, what do you think of Hooligan?” We observed a respectful silence and wondered what reply Lambkin would give in these difficult circumstances. The answer was like a bolt from the blue, “De mortuis nil nisi bonum,” said the Classical Scholar, and a murmur of applause went round the table.

Indeed his political views were perhaps the most remarkable feature in a remarkable character. He died a convinced and staunch Liberal Unionist, and this was the more striking as he was believed by all his friends to be a Conservative until the introduction of Mr. Gladstone’s famous Bill in 1885.

In the delicate matter of religious controversy his own writings must describe him, nor will I touch here upon a question which did not rise to any considerable public importance until after his death. Perhaps I may be permitted to say this much; he was a sincere Christian in the true sense of the word, attached to no narrow formularies, but following as closely as he could the system of Seneca, stiffened (as it were) with the meditations of Marcus Aurelius, though he was never so violent as to attempt a practice of what that extreme stoic laid down in theory.

Neither a ritualist nor a low-churchman, he expressed his attitude by a profound and suggestive silence. These words only escaped him upon one single occasion. Let us meditate upon them well in the stormy discussions of to-day: “Medio tutissimus ibis.”

His learning and scholarship, so profound in the dead languages, was exercised with singular skill and taste in the choice he made of modern authors.

He was ignorant of Italian, but thoroughly conversant with the French classics, which he read in the admirable translations of the ‘Half-crown Series.’ His principal reading here was in the works of Voltaire, wherein, however, he confessed, “He could find no style, and little more than blasphemous ribaldry.” Indeed, of the European languages he would read German with the greatest pleasure, confining himself chiefly to the writings of Lessing, Kant, and Schiller. His mind acquired by this habit a singular breadth and fecundity, his style a kind of rich confusion, and his speech (for he was able to converse a little in that idiom) was strengthened by expressions of the deepest philosophic import; a habit which gave him a peculiar and individual power over his pupils, who mistook the Teutonic gutturals for violent objurgations.

Such was the man, such the gentleman, the true ‘Hglaford,’ the modern ‘Godgebidden Eorldemanthingancanning,’ whose inner thoughts shall unroll themselves in the pages that follow.

II.

Lambkin’s Newdigate

POEM WRITTEN FOR “NEWDIGATE PRIZE” IN ENGLISH VERSE

BY J. A. LAMBKIN, ESQ., OF BURFORD COLLEGE

_N.B._--[_The competitors are confined to the use of Rhymed Heroic Iambic Pentameters, but the introduction of_ LYRICS _is permitted_]

Subject: “THE BENEFITS CONFERRED BY SCIENCE, ESPECIALLY IN CONNECTION WITH THE ELECTRIC LIGHT”

_For the benefit of those who do not care to read through the Poem but desire to know its contents, I append the following headings_:

INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

Hail! Happy Muse, and touch the tuneful string!
The benefits conferred by Science[10] I sing.

HIS THEME: THE ELECTRIC LIGHT AND ITS BENEFITS

Under the kind Examiners’[11] direction
I only write about them in connection
With benefits which the Electric Light
Confers on us; especially at night.
These are my theme, of these my song shall rise.
My lofty head shall swell to strike the skies,[12]
And tears of hopeless love bedew the maiden’s eyes.

SECOND INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

Descend, O Muse, from thy divine abode,

OSNEY

To Osney, on the Seven Bridges Road;
For under Osney’s solitary shade
The bulk of the Electric Light is made.
Here are the works, from hence the current flows
Which (so the Company’s prospectus goes)

POWER OF WORKS THERE

Can furnish to Subscribers hour by hour
No less than sixteen thousand candle power,[13]
All at a thousand volts. (It is essential
To keep the current at this high potential
In spite of the considerable expense.)

STATISTICS CONCERNING THEM

The Energy developed represents,
Expressed in foot-tons, the united forces
Of fifteen elephants and forty horses.
But shall my scientific detail thus
Clip the dear wings of Buoyant Pegasus?

POETICAL OR RHETORICAL QUESTIONS

Shall pure statistics jar upon the ear
That pants for Lyric accents loud and clear?
Shall I describe the complex Dynamo
Or write about its commutator? No!

THE THEME CHANGES

To happier fields I lead my wanton pen,
The proper study of mankind is men.

THIRD INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

Awake, my Muse! Portray the pleasing sight
That meets us where they make Electric Light.

A PICTURE OF THE ELECTRICIAN

Behold the Electrician where he stands:
Soot, oil, and verdigris are on his hands;
Large spots of grease defile his dirty clothes,
The while his conversation drips with oaths.
Shall such a being perish in its youth?
Alas! it is indeed the fatal truth.
In that dull brain, beneath that hair unkempt,
Familiarity has bred contempt.
We warn him of the gesture all too late;
Oh, Heartless Jove! Oh, Adamantine Fate!

HIS AWFUL FATE

Some random Touch--a hand’s imprudent slip--
The Terminals--a flash--a sound like “Zip!”
A smell of Burning fills the startled Air--
The Electrician is no longer there!

* * * * *

HE CHANGES HIS THEME

But let us turn with true Artistic scorn
From facts funereal and from views forlorn
Of Erebus and Blackest midnight born.[14]

FOURTH INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

Arouse thee, Muse! and chaunt in accents rich
The interesting processes by which
The Electricity is passed along:
These are my theme, to these I bend my song.

DESCRIPTION OF METHOD BY WHICH THE CURRENT IS USED

It runs encased in wood or porous brick
Through copper wires two millimetres thick,
And insulated on their dangerous mission
By indiarubber, silk, or composition,
Here you may put with critical felicity
The following question: “What is Electricity?”

DIFFICULTY OF DETERMINING NATURE OF ELECTRICITY

“Molecular Activity,” say some,
Others when asked say nothing, and are dumb.
Whatever be its nature: this is clear,
The rapid current checked in its career,
Baulked in its race and halted in its course[15]
Transforms to heat and light its latent force:

CONSERVATION OF ENERGY. PROOFS OF THIS: NO EXPERIMENT NEEDED

It needs no pedant in the lecturer’s chair
To prove that light and heat are present there.
The pear-shaped vacuum globe, I understand,
Is far too hot to fondle with the hand.
While, as is patent to the meanest sight,
The carbon filament is very bright.

DOUBTS ON THE MUNICIPAL SYSTEM, BUT--

As for the lights they hang about the town,
Some praise them highly, others run them down.
This system (technically called the arc)
Makes some passages too light, others too dark.

NONE ON THE DOMESTIC

But in the house the soft and constant rays
Have always met with universal praise.

ITS ADVANTAGES

For instance: if you want to read in bed
No candle burns beside your curtains’ head,
Far from some distant corner of the room
The incandescent lamp dispels the gloom,

ADVANTAGES OF LARGE PRINT

And with the largest print need hardly try
The powers of any young and vigorous eye.

FIFTH INVOCATION TO THE MUSE

Aroint thee, Muse! inspired the poet sings!
I cannot help observing future things!

THE ONLY HOPE OF HUMANITY IS IN SCIENCE

Life is a vale, its paths are dark and rough
Only because we do not know enough.
When Science has discovered something more
We shall be happier than we were before.

PERORATION IN THE SPIRIT OF THE REST OF THE POEM

Hail! Britain, mistress of the Azure Main,
Ten Thousand Fleets sweep over thee in vain!
Hail! mighty mother of the brave and free,
That beat Napoleon, and gave birth to me!
Thou that canst wrap in thine emblazoned robe
One quarter of the habitable globe.
Thy mountains, wafted by a favouring breeze,
Like mighty hills withstand the stormy seas.

WARNING TO BRITAIN

Thou art a Christian Commonwealth. And yet
Be thou not all unthankful--nor forget
As thou exultest in Imperial might
The benefits of the Electric Light.

III.

Some Remarks on Lambkin’s Prose Style

No achievement of my dear friend’s produced a greater effect than the English Essay which he presented at his examination. That so young a man, and a man trained in such an environment as his, should have written an essay at all was sufficiently remarkable, but that his work should have shown such mastery in the handling, such delicate balance of idea, and so much know-ledge (in the truest sense of the word), coupled with such an astounding insight into human character and contemporary psychology, was enough to warrant the remark of the then Warden of Burford: “If these things” (said the aged but eminent divine), “if these things” (it was said in all reverence and with a full sense of the responsibility of his position), “If these things are done in the green wood, what will be done in the dry?”

Truly it may be said that the Green Wood of Lambkin’s early years as an Undergraduate was worthily followed by the Dry Wood of his later life as a fellow and even tutor, nay, as a Bursar of his college.

It is not my purpose to add much to the reader’s own impressions of this _tour de force_, or to insist too strongly upon the skill and breadth of treatment which will at once make their mark upon any intelligent man, and even upon the great mass of the public. But I may be forgiven if I give some slight personal memories in interpretation of a work which is necessarily presented in the cold medium of type.

Lambkin’s hand-writing was flowing and determined, but was often difficult to read, a quality which led in the later years of his life to the famous retort made by the Rural Dean of Henchthorp to the Chaplain of Bower’s Hall.[16] His manuscript was, like Lord Byron’s (and unlike the famous Codex V in the Vatican), remarkable for its erasures, of which as many as three may be seen in some places super-imposed, ladderwise, _en échelle_, the one above the other, perpendicularly to the line of writing.

This excessive fastidiousness in the use of words was the cause of his comparatively small production of written work; and thus the essay printed below was the labour of nearly three hours. His ideas in this matter were best represented by his little epigram on the appearance of Liddell and Scott’s larger Greek Lexicon. “Quality not quantity” was the witty phrase which he was heard to mutter when he received his first copy of that work.

The nervous strain of so much anxiety about his literary work wearied both mind and body, but he had his reward. The scholarly aptitude of every particle in the phrase, and the curious symmetry apparent in the great whole of the essay are due to a quality which he pushed indeed to excess, but never beyond the boundary that separates Right and Wrong; we admire in the product what we might criticise in the method, and when we judge as critics we are compelled as Englishmen and connoisseurs to congratulate and to applaud.

He agreed with Aristotle in regarding lucidity as the main virtue of style. And if he sometimes failed to attain his ideal in this matter, the obscurity was due to none of those mannerisms which are so deplorable in a Meredith or a Browning, but rather to the fact that he found great difficulty in ending a sentence as he had begun it. His mind outran his pen; and the sentence from his University sermon, “England must do her duty, or what will the harvest be?” stirring and patriotic as it is, certainly suffers from some such fault, though I cannot quite see where.

The Oxymoron, the Aposiopesis, the Nominativus Pendens, the Anacoluthon and the Zeugma he looked upon with abhorrence and even with dread. He was a friend to all virile enthusiasm in writing but a foe to rhetoric, which (he would say) “Is cloying even in a demagogue, and actually nauseating in the literary man.” He drew a distinction between _eloquence_ and rhetoric, often praising the one and denouncing the other with the most abandoned fervour: indeed, it was his favourite diversion in critical conversation accurately to determine the meaning of words. In early youth he would often split an infinitive or end a sentence with a preposition. But, ever humble and ready to learn, he determined, after reading Mrs. Griffin’s well-known essays in the _Daily American_, to eschew such conduct for the future; and it was a most touching sight to watch him, even in extreme old age, his reverend white locks sweeping the paper before him and his weak eyes peering close at the MSS. as he carefully went over his phrases with a pen, scratching out and amending, at the end of his day’s work, the errors of this nature.

He commonly used a gilt “J” nib, mounted upon a holder of imitation ivory, but he was not cramped by any petty limitations in such details and would, if necessity arose, make use of a quill, or even of a fountain pen, insisting, however, if he was to use the latter, that it should be of the best.

The paper upon which he wrote the work that remains to us was the ordinary ruled foolscap of commerce; but this again he regarded as quite unimportant. It was the matter of what he wrote that concerned him, not (as is so often the case with lesser men) the mere accidents of pen or paper.

I remember little else of moment with regard to his way of writing, but I make no doubt that these details will not be without their interest; for the personal habits of a great man have a charm of their own. I read once that the sum of fifty pounds was paid for the pen of Charles Dickens. I wonder what would be offered for a similar sacred relic, of a man more obscure, but indirectly of far greater influence; a relic which I keep by me with the greatest reverence, which I do not use myself, however much at a loss I may be for pen or pencil, and with which I never, upon any account, allow the children to play.

But I must draw to a close, or I should merit the reproach of lapsing into a sentimental peroration, and be told that I am myself indulging in that rhetoric which Lambkin so severely condemned.

IV.

Lambkin’s Essay on “Success”

ON “SUCCESS:” ITS CAUSES AND RESULTS

[Sidenote: Difficulty of Subject]

In approaching a problem of this nature, with all its anomalies and analogues, we are at once struck by the difficulty of conditioning any accurate estimate of the factors of the solution of the difficulty which is latent in the very terms of the above question. We shall do well perhaps, however, to clearly differentiate from its fellows the proposition we have to deal with, and similarly as an inception of our analysis to permanently fix the definitions and terms we shall be talking of, with, and by.

[Sidenote: Definition of Success]

Success may be defined as the _Successful Consummation of an Attempt_ or more shortly as the _Realisation of an imagined Good_, and as it implies Desire or the Wish for a thing, and at the same time action or the attempt to get at a thing,[17] we might look at Success from yet another point of view and say that _Success is the realisation of Desire through action_. Indeed this last definition seems on the whole to be the best; but it is evident that in this, as in all other matters, it is impossible to arrive at perfection, and our safest definition will be that which is found to be on the whole most approximately the average mean[18] of many hundreds that might be virtually constructed to more or less accurately express the idea we have undertaken to do.

So far then it is evident that while we may have a fairly definite subjective visual concept of what Success is, we shall never be able to convey to others in so many words exactly what our idea may be.

“What am I?
, . . . .
An infant crying for the light
That has no language but a cry”

[Sidenote: Method of dealing with Problem]

It is, however, of more practical importance nevertheless, to arrive at some method or other by which we can in the long run attack the very serious problem presented to us. Our best chance of arriving at any solution will lie in attempting to give objective form to what it is we have to do with. For this purpose we will first of all divide all actions into (א) Successful and (ב) Non-successful[19] actions. These two categories are at once mutually exclusive and collectively universal. Nothing of which Success can be truly predicated, can at the same time be called with any approach to accuracy Unsuccessful; and similarly if an action finally result in Non-success, it is quite evident that to speak of its “Success” would be to trifle with words and to throw dust into our own eyes, which is a fatal error in any case. We have then these two primary catēgories what is true of one will, with certain reservations, be untrue of the other, in most cases (we will come to that later) and _vice-versâ_.

(1) Success.
(2) Non-success.

[Sidenote: First great Difficulty]

But here we are met at the outset of our examination by a difficulty of enormous dimensions. There is not one success; there are many. There is the success of the Philosopher, of the Scientist, of the Politician, of the Argument, of the Commanding Officer, of the Divine, of the mere unthinking Animal appetite, and of others more numerous still. It is evident that with such a vast number of different subsidiary catēgories within our main catēgory it would be impossible to arrive at any absolute conclusions, or to lay down any firm general principle. For the moment we had erected some such fundamental foundation the fair structure would be blown to a thousand atoms by the consideration of some fresh form, aspect or realisation, of Success which might have escaped our vision, so that where should we be then? It is therefore most eminently a problem in which we should beware of undue generalisations and hasty dogmatism. We must abandon here as everywhere the immoral and exploded cant of mediæval deductive methods invented by priests and mummers to enslave the human mind, and confine ourselves to what we absolutely _know_. Shall we towards the end of this essay truly _know_ anything with regard to Success? Who can tell! But at least let us not cheat ourselves with the axioms, affirmations and dogmas which are, in a certain sense, the ruin of so many; let us, if I may use a metaphor, “abandon the _à priori_ for the _chiaro-oscuro_.”

[Sidenote: Second much greater Difficulty]

But if the problem is complex from the great variety of the various kinds of Success, what shall we say of the disturbance introduced by a new aspect of the matter, which we are now about to allude to! Aye! What indeed! An aspect so widespread in its consequences, so momentous and so fraught with menace to all philosophy, so big with portent, and of such threatening aspect to humanity itself, that we hesitate even to bring it forward![20] _Success is not always Success: Non-success (or Failure) is an aspect of Success, and vice-versâ._ This apparent paradox will be seen to be true on a little consideration. For “Success” in any one case involves the “Failure” or “Non-success” of its opposite or correlative. Thus, if we bet ten pounds with one of our friends our “Success” would be his “Non-success,” and _vice-versâ_, collaterally. Again, if we desire to fail in a matter (_e.g._, any man would hope to fail in being hanged[21]), then to succeed is to fail, and to fail is to succeed, and our successful failure would fail were we to happen upon a disastrous success! And note that the _very same act_, not this, that, or another, but THE VERY SAME, is (according to the way we look at it) a “successful” or an “unsuccessful” act. Success therefore not only _may_ be, but _must_ be Failure, and the two catēgories upon which we had built such high hopes have disappeared for ever!

[Sidenote: Solemn considerations consequent upon this]

Terrible thought! A thing can be at once itself and not itself--nay its own opposite! The mind reels, and the frail human vision peering over the immense gulf of metaphysical infinity is lost in a cry for mercy and trembles on the threshold of the unseen! What visions of horror and madness may not be reserved for the too daring soul which has presumed to knock at the Doors of Silence! Let us learn from the incomprehensible how small and weak a thing is man!

[Sidenote: A more cheerful view]

But it would ill-befit the philosopher to abandon his effort because of a kind of a check or two at the start. The great hand of Time shouts ever “onward”; and even if we cannot discover the Absolute in the limits of this essay, we may rise from the ashes of our tears to better and happier things.

[Sidenote: The beginning of a Solution]

A light seems to dawn on us. We shall not arrive at the full day but we shall see “in a glass darkly” what, in the final end of our development, may perhaps be more clearly revealed to us. It is evident that we have been dealing with a relative. _How_ things so apparently absolute as hanging or betting can be in any true sense relative we cannot tell, because we cannot conceive the majestic whole of which Success and Failure, plus and minus, up and down, yes and no, truth and lies, are but as the glittering facets of a diamond borne upon the finger of some titled and wealthy person.

Our error came from foolish self-sufficiency and pride. We thought (forsooth) that our mere human conceptions of contradiction were real. It has been granted to us (though we are but human still), to discover our error--there is no hot or cold, no light or dark, and no good or evil, all are, in a certain sense, and with certain limitations (if I may so express myself) the Aspects----

_At this point the bell rang and the papers had to be delivered up. Lambkin could not let his work go, however, without adding a few words to show what he might have done had time allowed. He wrote:--_

“No Time. Had intended examples--Success, Academic, Acrobatic, Agricultural, Aristocratic, Bacillic ... Yaroslavic, Zenobidic, etc. Historical cases examined, Biggar’s view, H. Unity, Univ. Consciousness, Amphodunissa,[22] Setxm .”

V.

Lambkin on Sleep

[_This little gem was written for the great Monograph on “Being,” which Lambkin never lived to complete. It was included, however, in his little volume of essays entitled “Rictus Almae Matris.” The careful footnotes, the fund of information, and the scholarly accuracy of the whole sketch are an example--(alas! the only one)--of what his full work would have been had he brought it to a conclusion. It is an admirable example of his manner in maturer years._]

In sleep our faculties lie dormant.[23] We perceive nothing or almost nothing of our surroundings; and the deeper our slumber the more absolute is the barrier between ourselves and the outer world. The causes of this “Cessation of Consciousness” (as it has been admirably called by Professor M‘Obvy)[24] lie hidden from our most profound physiologists. It was once my privilege to meet the master of physical science who has rendered famous the University of Kreigenswald,[25] and I asked him what in his opinion was the cause of sleep. He answered, with that reverence which is the glory of the Teutonic mind, “It is in the dear secret of the All-wise Nature-mother preserved.” I have never forgotten those wise and weighty words.[26]

Perhaps the nearest guess as to the nature of Sleep is to be discovered in the lectures of a brilliant but sometimes over-daring young scholar whom we all applaud in the chair of Psychology. “Sleep” (he says) “is the direct product of Brain Somnolence, which in its turn is the result of the need for Repose that every organism must experience after any specialised exertion.” I was present when this sentence was delivered, and I am not ashamed to add that I was one of those who heartily cheered the young speaker.[27]

We may assert, then, that Science has nearly conquered this last stronghold of ignorance and superstition.[28]

As to the Muses, we know well that Sleep has been their favourite theme for ages. With the exception of Catullus (whose verses have been greatly over-rated, and who is always talking of people lying awake at night), all the ancients have mentioned and praised this innocent pastime. Everyone who has done Greats will remember the beautiful passage in Lucretius,[29] but perhaps that in Sidonius Apollinaris, the highly polished Bishop of Gaul, is less well known.[30] To turn to our own literature, the sonnet beginning “To die, to sleep,” etc.,[31] must be noted, and above all, the glorious lines in which Wordsworth reaches his noblest level, beginning--

“It is a pleasant thing to go to sleep!”

lines which, for my part, I can never read without catching some of their magical drowsy influence.[32]

All great men have slept. George III. frequently slept,[33] and that great and good man Wycliffe was in the habit of reading his Scriptural translations and his own sermons nightly to produce the desired effect.[34] The Duke of Wellington (whom my father used to call “The Iron Duke”) slept on a little bedstead no larger than a common man’s.

As for the various positions in which one may sleep, I treat of them in my little book of Latin Prose for Schools, which is coming out next year.[35]

VI.

Lambkin’s Advice to Freshmen

Mr. Lambkin possessed among other great and gracious qualities the habit of writing to his nephew, Thomas Ezekiel Lambkin,[36] who entered the college as an undergraduate when his uncle was some four years a Fellow. Of many such communications he valued especially this which I print below, on account of the curious and pathetic circumstances which surrounded it. Some months after Thomas had been given his two groups and had left the University, Mr. Lambkin was looking over some books in a second-hand book shop--not with the intention of purchasing so much as to improve the mind. It was a favourite habit of his, and as he was deeply engaged in a powerful romance written under the pseudonym of “Marie Corelli”[37] there dropped from its pages the letter which he had sent so many years before. It lay in its original envelope unopened, and on turning to the flyleaf he saw the name of his nephew written. It had once been his! The boy had so treasured the little missive as to place it in his favourite book!

Lambkin was so justly touched by the incident as to purchase the volume, asking that the price might be entered to his account, which was not then of any long standing. The letter he docketed “to be published after my death.” And I obey the wishes of my revered friend:

“MY DEAR THOMAS,

“Here you are at last in Oxford, and at Burford, ‘a Burford Man.’ How proud your mother must be and even your father, whom I well remember saying that ‘if he were not an accountant, he would rather be a Fellow of Burford than anything else on earth.’ But it was not to be.

“The life you are entering is very different from that which you have left behind. When you were at school you were under a strict discipline, you were compelled to study the classics and to play at various games. Cleanliness and truthfulness were enforced by punishment, while the most instinctive habits of decency and good manners could only be acquired at the expense of continual application. In a word, ‘you were a child and thought as a child.’

“Now all that is changed, you are free (within limits) to follow your own devices, to make or mar yourself. But if you use Oxford aright she will make you as she has made so many of your kind--a perfect gentleman.

“But enough of these generalities. It is time to turn to one or two definite bits of advice which I hope you will receive in the right spirit. My dear boy, I want you to lay your hand in mine while I speak to you, not as an uncle, but rather as an elder brother. Promise me three things. First never to gamble in any form; secondly, never to drink a single glass of wine after dinner; thirdly, never to purchase anything without paying for it in cash. If you will make such strict rules for yourself and keep them religiously you will find after years of constant effort a certain result developing (as it were), you will discover with delight that your character is formed; that you have neither won nor lost money at hazards, that you have never got drunk of an evening, and that you have no debts. Of the first two I can only say that they are questions of morality on which we all may, and all _do_, differ. But the third is of a vital and practical importance. Occasional drunkenness is a matter for private judgment, its rightness or wrongness depends upon our ethical system; but debt is fatal to any hope of public success.

“I hesitate a little to mention one further point; but--may I say it?--will you do your best to avoid drinking neat spirits in the early morning--especially Brandy? Of course a Governor and Tutor, whatever his abilities, gets removed in his sympathies from the younger men.[38] The habit may have died out, and if so I will say no more, but in my time it was the ruin of many a fair young life.

“Now as to your day and its order. First, rise briskly when you are called, and into your cold bath, you young dog![39] No shilly-shally; into it. Don’t splash the water about in a miserable attempt to deceive your scout, but take an Honest British Cold Bath like a man. Soap should never be used save on the hands and neck. As to hot baths, never ask for them in College, it would give great trouble, and it is much better to take one in the Town for a shilling; nothing is more refreshing than a good hot bath in the Winter Term.

“Next you go out and ‘keep’ a Mosque, Synagogue, or Meeting of the Brethren, though if you can agree with the system it is far better to go to your College Chapel; it puts a man right with his superiors and you obey the Apostolic injunction.[40]

“Then comes your breakfast. Eat as much as you can; it is the foundation of a good day’s work in the Vineyard. But what is this?--a note from your Tutor. Off you go at the appointed time, and as you may be somewhat nervous and diffident I will give you a little Paradigm,[41] as it were, of a Freshman meeting his Tutor for the first time.

“[_The Student enters, and as he is half way through the door says:--_]

“_St._--Good morning! Have you noticed what the papers say about--[_Here mention some prominent subject of the day._]

“[_The Tutor does not answer but goes on writing in a little book; at last he looks up and says:--_]

“_Tut._--Pray, what is your name?

“_St._--M. or N.

“_Tut._--What have you read before coming up, Mr. ----?

“_St._--The existing Latin authors from Ennius to Sidonius Apollinaris, with their fragments. The Greek from Sappho to Origen including Bacchylides.

[_The Tutor makes a note of this and resumes...._]

“_Tut._--Have you read the Gospels?

“_St._--No, Sir.

“_Tut._--You must read two of them as soon as possible in the Greek, as it is necessary to the passing of Divinity, unless indeed you prefer the beautiful work of Plato. Come at ten to-morrow. Good morning.

“_St._--I am not accustomed to being spoken to in that fashion.

[_The Tutor will turn to some other Student, and the first Student will leave the room._]

“I have little more to say. You will soon learn the customs of the place, and no words of mine can efficiently warn you as experience will. Put on a black coat before Hall, and prepare for that meal with neatness, but with no extravagant display. Do not wear your cap and gown in the afternoon, do not show an exaggerated respect to the younger fellows (except the Chaplain), on the one hand, nor a silly contempt for the older Dons upon the other. The first line of conduct is that of a timid and uncertain mind; it is of no profit for future advancement, and draws down upon one the contempt of all. The second is calculated to annoy as fine a body of men as any in England, and seriously to affect your reputation in Society.

“You will find in every college some club which contains the wealthier undergraduates and those of prominent position. Join it if possible at once before you are known. At its weekly meetings speak soberly, but not pompously. Enliven your remarks with occasional flashes of humour, but do not trench upon the ribald nor pass the boundary of right-reason. Such excesses may provoke a momentary laugh, but they ultimately destroy all respect for one’s character. Remember Lot’s wife!

“You will row, of course, and as you rush down to the river after a hurried lunch and dash up to do a short bit of reading before Hall, your face will glow with satisfaction at the thought that every day of your life will be so occupied for four years.

“Of the grosser and lower evils I need not warn you: you will not give money to beggars in the street, nor lend it to your friends. You will not continually expose your private thoughts, nor open your heart to every comer in the vulgar enthusiasm of some whom you may meet. No, my dear Ezekiel, it would be unworthy of your name, and I know you too well, to fear such things of you. You are a Gentleman, and that you may, like a gentleman, be always at your ease, courteous on occasion, but familiar never, is the earnest prayer of--

“JOSIAH LAMBKIN.”

VII.

Lambkin’s Lecture on “Right”

Of the effects of Mr. Lambkin’s lectures, the greatest and (I venture to think) the most permanent are those that followed from his course on _Ethics_. The late Dean of Heaving-on-the-Marsh (the Honourable Albert Nathan-Merivale, the first name adopted from his property in Rutland) told me upon one occasion that he owed the direction of his mind to those lectures (under Providence) more than to any other lectures he could remember.

Very much the same idea was conveyed to me, more or less, by the Bishop of Humbury, who turned to me in hall, only a year ago, with a peculiar look in his eyes, and (as I had mentioned Lambkin’s name) said suddenly, like a man who struggles with an emotion:[42] “Lambkin(!)[43] ... did not he give lectures in your hall ... on Ethics?” “Some,” I replied, “were given in the Hall, others in Lecture Room No. 2 over the glory-hole.” His lordship said nothing, but there was a world of thought and reminiscence in his eyes. May we not--knowing his lordship’s difficulties in matters of belief, and his final victory--ascribe something of this progressive and salutary influence to my dear friend?

ON “RIGHT”

[_Being Lecture V. in a course of Eight, delivered, in the Autumn
Term of 1878._]

We have now proceeded for a considerable distance in our journey towards the Solution. Of eight lectures, of which I had proposed to make so many milestones on the road, the fifth is reached, and now we are in measurable distance of the Great Answer; the Understanding of the Relations of the Particular to the Universal.

It is an easy, though a profitable task to wander in what the late Sir Reginald Hawke once called in a fine phrase “the flowery meads and bosky dells of Positive Knowledge.” It is in the essence of any modern method of inquiry that we should be first sure of our facts, and it is on this account that all philosophical research worthy of the name must begin with the physical sciences. For the last few weeks I have illustrated my lectures with chemical experiments and occasionally with large coloured diagrams, which, especially to young people like yourselves have done not a little to enliven what might at first appear a very dull subject. It is therefore with happy, hopeful hearts, with sparkling eyes and eager appetite that we leave the physical entry-hall of knowledge to approach the delicious feast of metaphysics.

But here a difficulty confronts us. So far we have followed an historical development. We have studied the actions of savages and the gestures of young children; we have enquired concerning the habits of sleepwalkers, and have drawn our conclusions from the attitudes adopted in special manias. So far, then, we have been on safe ground. We have proceeded from the known to the unknown, and we have correlated Psychology, Sociology, Anatomy, Morphology, Physiology, Geography, and Theology (_here Mr. Darkin of Vast, who had been ailing a long time, was carried out in a faint; Mr. Lambkin, being short-sighted, did not fully seize what had happened, and thinking that certain of his audience were leaving the Hall without permission, he became as nearly angry as was possible to such a man. He made a short speech on the decay of manners, and fell into several bitter epigrams. It is only just to say that, on learning the occasion of the interruption, he regretted the expression “strong meat for babes” which had escaped him at the time._)

So far so good. But there is something more. No one can proceed indefinitely in the study of Ethics without coming, sooner or later, upon the Conventional conception of _Right_. I do not mean that this conception has any philosophic value. I should be the last to lay down for it those futile, empirical and dogmatic foundations which may satisfy narrow, deductive minds. But there it is, and as practical men with it we must deal. What is _Right_? Whence proceeds this curious conglomeration of idealism, mysticism, empiricism, and fanaticism to which the name has been given?

It is impossible to say. It is the duty of the lecturer to set forth the scheme of truth: to make (as it were) a map or plan of Epistemology. He is not concerned to demonstrate a point; he is not bound to dispute the attitude of opponents. Let them fall of their own weight (_Ruant mole suâ_). It is mine to show that things _may_ be thus or thus, and I will most steadily refuse to be drawn into sterile argument and profitless discussion with mere affirmations.