Whilst, therefore, grace of manner, politeness of behaviour, elegance of demeanour, and all the arts that contribute to make life pleasant and beautiful, are worthy of cultivation, it must not be at the expense of the more solid and enduring qualities of honesty, sincerity, and truthfulness. The fountain of beauty must be in the heart; more than in the eye, and if art do not tend to produce beautiful life and noble practice, it will be of comparatively little avail. Politeness of manner is not worth much, unless accompanied by polite action. Grace may be but skin-deep--very pleasant and attractive, and yet very heartless. Art is a source of innocent enjoyment, and an important aid to higher culture; but unless it leads to higher culture, it will probably be merely sensuous. And when art is merely sensuous, it is enfeebling and demoralizing rather than strengthening or elevating. Honest courage is of greater worth than any amount of grace; purity is better than elegance; and cleanliness of body, mind, and heart, than any amount of fine art.
In fine, while the cultivation of the graces is not to be neglected, it should ever be held in mind that there is something far higher and nobler to be aimed at--greater than pleasure, greater than art, greater than wealth, greater than power, greater than intellect, greater than genius--and that is, purity and excellence of character. Without a solid sterling basis of individual goodness, all the grace, elegance, and art in the world would fail to save or to elevate a people.
NOTES
(1) Locke thought it of greater importance that an educator of youth should be well-bred and well-tempered, than that he should be either a thorough classicist or man of science. Writing to Lord Peterborough on his son's education, Locke said: "Your Lordship would have your son's tutor a thorough scholar, and I think it not much matter whether he be any scholar or no: if he but understand Latin well, and have a general scheme of the sciences, I think that enough. But I would have him WELL-BRED and WELL-TEMPERED."(2) Mrs. Hutchinson's 'Memoir of the Life of Lieut.-Colonel Hutchinson,' p. 32.
(3) 'Letters and Essays,' p. 59.
(4) 'Lettres d'un Voyageur.'
(5) Sir Henry Taylor's 'Statesman,' p. 59.
(6) Introduction to the 'Principal Speeches and Addresses of His Royal Highness the Prince Consort,' 1862.
(7) "When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes, I all alone beween my outcast state, And troubled deaf heaven with my bootless cries, And look upon myself and curse my fate;WISHING ME LIKE TO ONE MORE RICH IN HOPE, Featured like him, like him with friends possessed, Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy, contented least;Yet in these thoughts, MYSELF ALMOST DESPISING, Haply I think on thee," &c.--SONNET XXIX.
"So I, MADE LAME by sorrow's dearest spite," &c.--SONNET XXXVI(8) "And strength, by LIMPING sway disabled," &c.--SONNET LXVI.
"Speak of MY LAMENESS, and I straight will halt."--SONNET LXXXIX.
(9) "Alas! 'tis true, I have gone here and there, And MADE MYSELF A MOTLEY TO THE VIEW, Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, Made old offences of affections new," &c.--SONNET CX.
"Oh, for my sake do you with fortune chide!
The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, That did not better for my life provide, THAN PUBLIC MEANS, WHICH PUBLIC MANNERS BREED;Thence comes it that my name receives a brand, And almost thence my nature is subdued, To what it works in like the dyer's hand," &c.--SONNET CXI.
(10) "In our two loves there is but one respect, Though in our loves a separable spite, Which though it alter not loves sole effect;Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight, I may not evermore acknowledge thee, Lest MY BEWAILED GUILT SHOULD DO THEE SHAME."--SONNET XXXVI.
(11) It is related of Garrick, that when subpoenaed on Baretti's trial, and required to give his evidence before the court--though he had been accustomed for thirty years to act with the greatest self-possession in the presence of thousands--he became so perplexed and confused, that he was actually sent from the witness-box by the judge, as a man from whom no evidence could be obtained.
(12)Mrs. Mathews' 'Life and Correspondence of Charles Mathews,' (Ed.
1860) p. 232.
(13) Archbishop Whately's 'Commonplace Book.'
