No More Learning

The
vassals of the feudal lord entered into his quarrels with the most
inexorable rage. Just or unjust was no consideration of theirs. It was a
family feud; no farther inquiry was made; and from age to age, the
parties, who never injured each other, breathed nothing but mutual
rancour and revenge. And actions, suitable to this horrid spirit,
everywhere confessed its virulent influence. Such were the late days of
Europe, admired by the ignorant for the innocence of manners. Resentment
of injury, indeed, is natural; and there is a degree which is honest,
and though warm, far from inhuman. But if it is the hard task of
humanized virtue to preserve the feeling of an injury unmixed with the
slightest criminal wish of revenge, how impossible is it for the savage
to attain the dignity of forgiveness, the greatest ornament of human
nature. As in individuals, a virtue will rise into a vice, generosity
into blind profusion, and even mercy into criminal lenity, so civilized
manners will lead the opulent into effeminacy. But let it be considered,
this consequence is by no means the certain result of civilization.
Civilization, on the contrary, provides the most effectual preventive of
this evil. Where classical literature prevails the manly spirit which it
breathes must be diffused; whenever frivolousness predominates, when
refinement degenerates into whatever enervates the mind, literary
ignorance is sure to complete the effeminate character. A mediocrity of
virtues and of talents is the lot of the great majority of mankind; and
even this mediocrity, if cultivated by a liberal education, will
infallibly secure its possessor against those excesses of effeminacy
which are really culpable. To be of plain manners it is not necessary to
be a clown, or to wear coarse clothes; nor is it necessary to lie on the
ground and feed like the savage to be truly manly. The beggar who,
behind the hedge, divides his offals with his dog has often more of the
real sensualist than he who dines at an elegant table. Nor need we
hesitate to assert, that he who, unable to preserve a manly elegance of
manners, degenerates into the _petit maitre_, would have been, in any
age or condition, equally insignificant and worthless.
Some, when they
talk of the debauchery of the present age, seem to think that the former
ages were all innocence. But this is ignorance of human nature. The
debauchery of a barbarous age is gross and brutal; that of a gloomy,
superstitious one, secret, excessive, and murderous; that of a more
polished one, much happier for the fair sex,[30] and certainly in no
sense so big with political unhappiness. If one disease has been
imported from America,[31] the most valuable medicines have likewise
been brought from those regions; and distempers, which were thought
invincible by our forefathers, are now cured. If the luxuries of the
Indies usher disease to our tables the consequence is not unknown; the
wise and the temperate receive no injury, and intemperance has been the
destroyer of mankind in every age. The opulence of ancient Rome produced
a luxury of manners which proved fatal to that mighty empire. But the
effeminate sensualists of those ages were not men of intellectual
cultivation. The enlarged ideas, the generous and manly feelings
inspired by a liberal education, were utterly unknown to them. Unformed
by that wisdom which arises from science and true philosophy, they were
gross barbarians, dressed in the mere outward tinsel of
civilization. [32] Where the enthusiasm of military honour characterizes
the rank of gentlemen that nation will rise into empire. But no sooner
does conquest give a continued security than the mere soldier
degenerates; and the old veterans are soon succeeded by a new
generation, illiterate as their fathers, but destitute of their virtues
and experience. Polite literature not only humanizes the heart, but also
wonderfully strengthens and enlarges the mind. Moral and political
philosophy are its peculiar provinces, and are never happily cultivated
without its assistance. But, where ignorance characterizes the body of
the nobility, the most insipid dissipation and the very idleness and
effeminacy of luxury are sure to follow. Titles and family are then the
only merit, and the few men of business who surround the throne have it
then in their power to aggrandize themselves by riveting the chains of
slavery. A stately grandeur is preserved, but it is only outward; all is
decayed within, and on the first storm the weak fabric falls to the
dust.