The Rise and Fall of England, X; C. Carson

CLARENCE B. CARSON 1£uglault 10. THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTE·D THERE WAS a saying among Amer ican troops in Europe after World War II, something like this. If a soldier complained about some thing, anything, he was berated in the following fashion. "What are you complaining about? You never had it so good. You know what your trouble is? You just can't stand prosperity." Quite likely, many of those who taunted gripers in this fashion meant to be using irony. Soldiers rarely think of their lot as a happy one. But, given the context, the words were probably spoken straight at first. They may have been deliv ered by a combat veteran to a Dr. Carson, Professor of History at Grove City College, Pennsylvania, will be remembered for his earlier FREEMAN series, The Fateful Turn, The American Tradition, and The Fli4ht from Reality. new arrival who had not experi enced the rigors of war. If so, he was saying, in effect, that the griper should be glad that he could sleep in a building instead of out side, that he was not subject to strafing, artillery fire, and rockets, that his hours were regular rather than determined by the exigencies of war, and so on.

It is possible, too, that the words were directed to a combat veteran. For the memory of pain and hard ship is exceedingly short-lived. A man who has been suffering almost unbearable pain will fall to com plaining of trivialities shortly after it is relieved. It is the way of human beings to lose sight of their blessings and complain of their inconveniences. That which has only lately brought great re746 THE FREEMAN December lief may itself shortly become an object for scorn. Familiarity Breeds Contempt So it was for some of the Eng lish, in any case. All indications were that in the middle of the nineteenth century the lot of most Englishmen was vastly improved over what it had been. Signs abounded that they were better paid, better fed, had more leisure, and could avail themselves of more of the things which adorn life rather than merely sustain it. Nor was there any reason for doubt ing that these benefits could be attributed, directly or indirectly, to Britain's stable and balanced government, to the security of persons and property, to the free dom of trade, to the moral code which prevailed, to hard work, to capital investment, and to tech nological innovations. Yet, in the midst of this spreading prosperity, these very things began to come under attack. A shorthand phrase for those conditions and means by which prosperity was achieved is "The Victorian Way." The Vic torian Way came under assault during the Victorian period, though its repudiation would not be completed until early in the twentieth century.

But it would be unjust to the English people and historically in accurate to suggest that they forgot so quickly. The nagging, ques tioning, and doubting of the valid ity of the Victorian Way did get underway in the midst of its tri umph. Its inception and spread forms a part of what is to be told here. At the outset, however, this challenge to the Victorian Way was made by a minority, most likely a tiny minority, whereas the vast majority accepted and prized it. Indeed, there were clergymen who pointed out the moral char acter of the Victorian Way, his torians who wove it into its place in English history, statesmen who expounded and defended it, philos ophers who claimed it within gen eral theories of progress:, a.nd writers who advocated the expan sion of it. This story should be alluded to before attending to the critics. Though Frederic Harrison was exaggerating when he wrote the following in 1882, and obviously more than a little piqued by it all, his words do indicate that there were many who saw virtue in the developments which brought England to greatness: Surely no century in all human history was ever so much praised to its face for its wonderful achieve ments, its wealth and its power, its unparalleled ingenuity and its mi raculous capacity for making itself comfortable and generally enj oying 1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 747 life. British Associations, and all sorts of associations, economic, scien tific, and mechanical, are perpetually executing cantatas in honour of the age of progress. . . . The journals perform the part of orchestra, bang ing big drums and blowing trum pets .... 1 Macaulay's Whig Interpretation of the History of England Thomas Babington Macaulay, the historian, is usually credited, or blamed, for being the leading apologist for the Victorian Way.

He was the man who first made what is usually called the Whig interpretation of history. He did so in his History of England which made its appearance in the middle of the nineteenth century. It sold unusually well for a history, or for anything else. When the first two volumes appeared, 13,000 copies were sold in four months. The next two volumes sold 26,500 copies in ten weeks. 2 Macaulay certainly was not one to hide his light under a bushel; whatever views he held, he held firmly and expressed forthrightly. One gets a sense of the measure of the man in this reference to a work by 1 Quoted in Walter E. Houghton, The Victorian Frame of Mind, 1830-1870 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957), p. 39. 2 David Thomson, England in the Nineteenth Century (Baltimore: Pen guin Books, 1950), p. 103. Robert Southey, Poet Laureate of England: It would be scarcely possible for a man of Mr. Southey's talents and acquirements to write two volumes so large as these before us, which should be wholly destitute of infor mation and amusement. • • • We have, for some time past, observed with great regret the strange infatu ation which leads the Poet Laureate to abandon those departments of literature in which he might excel, and to lecture the public on sciences of which he has still the very alpha bet to learn. He has now, we think, done his worst. 3 It is not surprising that his own works have come in for strong criticism. Be that as it may, his work pointed out the improvements that had occurred in England since the Glorious Revolution and as cribed these to the security of lib erty and property and stable gov ernment, among other things. He opened his History by declaring that "the general effect of this chequered narrative will be to ex cite thankfulness in all religious minds and hope in the breasts of all patriots. For the history of our country during the last hundred and sixty years is eminently the history of physical, of moral, and 3 Thomas B. Macaulay, 1lJiscellaneous Essays and Poems, I (Philadelphia: Porter and Coates, 1879), p. 475.

748 THE FREEMAN December of intellectual improvement."4 In short, he maintained that "the his tory of England is emphatically the history of progress."5 In ex plaining the difference between England and France - the France of the July (1830) Revolution Macaulay ascribed it to the politi cal institutions of liberty: To what are we to attribute the unparalleled moderation and human ity which the English people have displayed at this great conjuncture? The answer is plain. This modera tion, this humanity are the fruits of a hundred and fifty years of liberty. ... For many generations we have had the trial by jury, the Habeas Corpus Act, the freedom of the press, the right of meeting to discuss pub lic affairs, the right of petitioning the legislature. A vast portion of the population has long been accustomed to the exercise of political functions. . . . Thus our institutions had been so good that they had educated us into a capacity for better institu tions. 6 Lecky and free Trade In like manner, W. E. H. Lecky, who published his prodigious History of Rationalism at the age of 27, was unstinting in his ad miration for and praise of Eng lish leadership and economic de velopment. He pointed out that England has been the leader in 4 Quoted in Thomson, Ope cit., p. 104.

5 Quoted in Houghton, Ope cit., p. 39. 6 Macaulay, Ope cit., p. 769. the development of political econ omy as a science as well as in me chanical inventions. "It is not sur prising," he said, "that a land which has attained this double su premacy, and which possesses at the same time almost unlimited coal-mines, an unrivaled navy, and a government that can never long resist the natural tendency of affairs, should be pre-eminently the land of manufacturers."7Lecky was an enthusiastic follower and expounder of developments in po litical economy from Smith through Say, and ascribed the peace of his times to the appli cations of these doctrines, par ticul~rly to the freeing of trade. He declared that an understand ing and application of political economy is the corrective to the evil of war. Political economy denies, he said, that one nation's gain in trade-is another's loss. Instead, It teaches . . . that each nation has a direct interest in the prosperity of that with which it trades, just as a shopman has an interest in the wealth of his customers. It teaches too that the different markets of the world are so closely connected, that it is quite impossible for a serious derangement to take place in any one of them without its evil effects 7 W. E. H. Lecky, History of Rational ism in Europe, II (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1904, originally pub.

1865), p. 351.

1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 749 vibrating through all .... Each suc cessive developement of political economy has brought these truths into clearer relief .... Every fresh commercial enterprise is therefore an additional guarantee of peace. 8 The "scheme of progress which political economy reveals" goes something like this, according to Lecky. Men form habits of thrift and self-restraint in order to im prove their material condition. As that improves, they develop the gentler ways of civilization. ... And the same principle that creates civilisation creates liberty, and regulates and sustains morals. The poorer classes, as wealth, and consequently the demand for their labour, have increased, cease to be the helpless tools of their masters. Slavery, condemned by political econ omy, gradually disappears. The stig ma tha t a ttached to labour is re moved. War is repressed as a folly and despotism as an invasion of the rights of property. The sense of common interests unites the different sections of mankind, and the con viction that each nation should di rect its energies to that form of produce for which it is naturally most suited, effects a division of la bour which renders each dependent upon the others. Under the influence of industrial occupations, passions are repressed, the old warlike habits are destroyed, a respect for law, a consideration for the interests of 8 Ibid., p. 356.

others, a sobriety and perseverance of character are inculcated. 9 In such fashion, the Victorian Way became a part of the histori cal perspective for many. from Throne and Pulpit Men in other walks of life af firmed the Victorian Way also. Prince Albert, consort to Queen Victoria, declared in 1851: "We are living at a period of most wonderful transition, which tends rapidly to accomplish that great end to which indeed all history points - the realization of the unity of mankind. "10 In a speech before Parliament, Lord Palmerston said: "We have shown the example of a nation, in which every class of society accepts with cheerfulness the lot which Providence has assigned to it; while at the same time every individual of each class is constantly striving to raise himself in the so cial scale - not by injustice and wrong, not by violence and illegality, but by preserving good conduct, and by the steady and energetic execu tion of the moral and intellectual faculties with which his creator has endowed him."ll Speaking from the pulpit, the 9 Ibid., p. 367.

10 Quoted in Thomson, Ope cit., pp. 102-03. 11 Quoted in Asa Briggs, The Age of Improvement (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1859), p. 404.

750 THE FREEMAN December Reverend Charles Kingsley pro claimed the reasons why English men should give thanks to God. He tells how others' have been be set by wars and destructionand yet here we are, going about our business in peace and safety in a land which we and our forefathers have found, now for many a year, that just laws make a quiet and prosperous people; that the effect of righteousness is peace, and the fruit of righteousness, quietness and as surance for ever; - a land in which the good are not terrified, the indus trious hampered, and the greedy and lawIess made eager and restless by expectation of change in govern ment; but every man can boldly and hopefully work in his calling, and "whatsoever his hand finds to do, do it with all his might," in fair hope that the money which he earns in his manhood he will be able to enjoy quietly in his old age, and hand it down safely to his children, and his children's children .... Oh, my friends, who made us to differ from others, or what have we that we did not receive? Not to ourselves do we owe our blessings. . . . We owe it to our wise Constitution and to our wise Church, the principle of which is that God is Judge and Christ is King. . . .12 12 Charles Kingsley, Sermons for the Times (London: Macmillan, 1890, first pub. by Macmillan in 1863), pp. 195-96.

This is the same Charles Kingsley who, along with F. D. Maurice, was an early Christian socialist. This description of him, however, may be misleading. Not Spencer Optimistic Herbert Spencer rendered at least a part of the Victorian Way into a philosophical framework. There was probably much about mid-Victorian England that Spen cer did not approve, but he ap proved the general trend toward establishing greater freedom, and mainly wanted the principle ex panded until it became universal. His statements on free trade illus trate this penchant in his works: Fortunately it is now needless to enforce the doctrine of commercial freedom by any considerations of policy. After making continual at tempts to impro:ve upon the laws of trade, from the time. of Solon down wards, men are at length beginning to see that such attempts are worse than useless. Political economy has shown us in this matter - what in deed it is its chief mission to show - that our wisest plan is to lei things take their own course. An in creasing sense of justice, too, has as· sisted in convincing us. We haVE here learned, what our forefather~ learned in some cases, and what alas! we have yet to learn in man~ only does the above quotation not indio cate any socialist sentiments, such a!

we have come to recognize them, bu1 there is good reason to believe that h~ was a pre-statist socialist. "He looke< rather to the extension of the coopera, tive principle and to sanitary reforn for the amelioration of the condition 0: the people than to any radical politica change." Encyclopedia Britannica (Chi cago, 1955), XIII, 399.

1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 751 more, that nothing but evil can arise from inequitable regulations. The necessity of respecting the principles of abstract rectitude - this it is that we have had another lesson upon. Look at it rightly and we shall find that all the Anti-Corn-Law League did, with its lectures, its newspapers, its bazaars, its monster meetings, and its tons of tracts, was to teach people - what should have been very clear to them without any such teaching - that no good can come of violating men's rights. By bitter ex perience and a world of talk we have at length been made partially to believe as much. Be it true or not in other cases, we are now quite certain that it is true in trade. In respect to this at least we have de clared that, for the future, we will obey the law of equal freedom. 13 Spencer was optimistic in think ing that the British had learned their lesson about trade once and for all, but this was the one thing that libertarians managed to get almost all parties to agree to as a cardinal principle for so long.

Samuel Smiles on Thrift This examination can be closed by referring to the man who has often been singled out as the stereotype of the apologists for the Victorian Way, Samuel Smiles. Samuel Smiles was a popu.;, lar writer in the latter part of the 13 Herbert Spencer, Social Statics (New York: Appleton, 1865), p. 334. nineteenth century who did indeed approve the Victorian Way, and who devoted his pen to elucidating its virtues. The titles of his works show what he considered some of those virtues to be: Self-H elp, Thrift, Character, and Duty. He placed great emphasis upon work, saving, honesty, perseverance, charity, and self-help. Self-Help made its appearance in 1859 and sold 20,000 copies that year. In addition, some 130,000 copies were sold in the next thirty years. But the reference here will be to an other work, in which he discusses saving, capital, and labor: The men who economize by means of labor become the owners of capi tal which sets other labor in motion.

Capital accumulates in their hands, and they employ other laborers to work for them. Thus trade and com merce begin. The thrifty build houses, ware houses, and mills. They fit manu factories with tools and machines. They build ships and send them to various parts of the world. They put their capital together, and build railroads, harbors, and docks. They open up mines of coal, iron, and cop per; and erect pumping-engines to keep them clear of water. They em ploy laborers to work the mines, and thus give rise to an immense amount of employment. All this is the result of thrift. It is the result of economizing money, 752 THE FREEMAN December and employing it for beneficial pur poses••••14 This was surely an abstract of the English experience, put into lan guage that every man could under stand. The Victorian Way was not without its exponents, apologists, and defenders, then. Indeed, num bered among them were some, or most, of the illustrious names of the century. But they were matched, and eventually over matched, by a rising chorus of critics in the course of the nine teenth and early twentieth cen tury. In the wake of this mount ing criticism, the work of many of the most able exponents fell into disrepute, in many circles anyhow. It happened to Macaulay, to Spencer, and, of course, to Smiles. More importantly, the ideas, principles, and practices which were at the heart of the Victorian Way became suspect, and were eventually rejected.

Hybrid Nature of Socialism To understand the character of this attack on things Victorian and its eventual impact, some ob servations about socialism are in order. Not that the critics were necessarily socialists: some were, and some were not. But the criti14 Samuel Smiles, Thrift (Chicago: Belfords, Clarke and Co., 1879), pp. 20 21. cism was certainly grist for the mills of socialists, and they man aged somehow to identify them selves with all of it. Socialism was a product of the nineteenth cen tury, and it remains stuck in the grooves of the nineteenth century. More, it is the hybrid product of two contradictory strains in nine teenth century thought. It is a hybrid because it is infertile and unproductive (having always to borrow from freedom such inno vations as it adopts). It is the product of abstract rationalism, on the one hand, and romanticism, on the other. To put it another way, socialism is the stubborn mule sired by the· donkey, abstract rationalism, bred to the flighty mare, romanticism. Like the mule, socialism has some of the worst traits of its forebears: it is as unimaginative as the donkey and as irrational as the horse.

Nonetheless, socialism has an almost irresistible attraction to a certain turn of mind. It attracts because of its criticism and re j ection of the way things are, and its promises of the way things will be when they have been re constructed. Socialism appeals particularly to those who are alienated from and thus do not feel a part of the society in which they live. Its greatest attraction is for intellectuals, particularly those of a literary and artistic 1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 753 bent. It is probable that, in ear lier times, most such men found some religious vocation. But in the eighteenth century, they be gan to be more numerous as lay men. Since that time, they appear to have increased greatly in num ber and influence. Enter, the Critic Much of the initial criticism of Victorian society -came from liter ary romantics, from poets, from architects, from essayists, from novelists, and from dilettanti who dabbled in all these things.

They not only justified their alien ation from society but also gloried in it. To be alienated from so ciety was a badge of distinction to many romantics; it was a sign of superiority. Society was vulgar, insensitive, unaesthetically in clined, materialistic, practical, and almost wholly unattractive. -More over, society has a way of impos ing its standards, however subtly, upon all within its orbit. Many romantics had subsumed liber tarian ideas into their outlook and would think of themselves as liber als; but they went beyond seeking freedom from governmental re straint; they also sought freedom from the prescriptions of society. They tended toward anarchy. But some romantic intellectuals went even further, seeking not only to be free from social prescription but at the same time trying to prescribe for society. When they sought to do this by governmental action, they ~sually became so cialists of some sort.

There was a great range and variety to the criticism of Vic torian England, from the criti cism of flaws to the wholesale condemnation of the social order. Charles Dickens was one who highlighted many of the flaws in his numerous novels. He satirized "poor law institutions, Chancery, and judicial procedure in general, profiteering private schools, and many other social ills of his times . . . . Having been a poor boy him self he had an instinctive and burning sympathy with the poor."15 Nor should there be any doubt that he frequently had a re formist purpose in mind. "In all my writings," he said on one oc casion, "I hope I have taken every available opportunity of showing the want of sanitary improve ments in the neglected dwellings of the poor."16 Even so, it is not clear that·Dickens had much more in mind than that men should re form their ways, and that the poor should struggle to better themselves.

15 Thomson, op. cit., pp. 113-14. 16 Quoted in G. D. Klingopulos, "The Literary Scene," From Dickens to Hardy, Boris Ford, ed. (Baltimore: Pen guin Books, 1958), p. 70.

754 THE FREEMAN December Thomas Ca.rlyle was quite dif ferent from Dickens and a much deeper critic of his age..He saw the age as common and unheroic, and lacking in leadership or tra ditions that make for greatness. One of his characters exclaims: "Thus, too, does an observant eye discern everywhere that saddest spectacle : The Poor perishing, like neglected, foundered Draught-Cattle, of Hunger and Overwork; the Rich still more wretchedly of Idleness, Satiety, and Over-growth. The High est in rank, at length, without hon our from the Lowest; scarcely, with a little mouth-honour, as from tavern waiters who expect to put in the bill. Once-sacred Symbols fluttering as empty Pageants, whereof men grudge even the expense; a World becoming dismantled: in one word, the Church fallen speechless, from obesity and apoplexy; the State shrunken into a Police-Office, strait ened to get its pay! "17 Of Carlyle's impact, an historian says: "By the strength of his con victions and the extraordinary language in which he clothed them, he caused many English men to share his dissatisfaction with the materialism of the age and to give more thought to moral and social issues."18 17 Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus (New York: Dutton, 1908), pp. 174-75.

18 W. E. Lunt, History of England (New York: Harper, 1957, 4th ed.), p. 752. Matthew Arnold's "Populace" Matthew Arnold was a much clearer case of the rejecter of Vic torian England. He satirized and held up to scorn the Englishman's fascination with ma.chinery, his worship of wealth, and his vaunted liberty to do as he pleased. The middle class, he said, we-re Philis tines. "For Philistine gives the notion of something particularly stiff-necked and perverse in the resistance to light and its chil dren; and therein it specially suits our middle class, who not only do not pursue sweetness and light, but who even prefer to them that sort of machinery of busi ness, chapels, tea-meetings, and addresses from Mr. Murphy [Mr. Murphy was depicted as boorishly intolerant of Roman Catholics] l which makes up the dismal and illiberal life on which I have se often touched."19 The Englisll aristocracy he calls the Barbar ians. In a passage dripping witll satire, Arnold describes some 01 the salient features of this class: ... The Barbarians, to whom WE all owe so much, and who reinvigo rated and renewed our ·worn-oui Europe, had, as is well known, emi nent merits. . . . The Barbarianf brought with them that staunch in dividualism, as the modern phras~ 19 Matthew Arnold, Culture and An archy, R. H. Super, ed. (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1965), P 140.

1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY: AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 755 is and that passion for doing as one likes. . . • The Barbarians, again, had the passion for field-sports; and they have handed it on to our aristocratic class, who of this pas sion too, as of the passion for assert ing one's personal liberty, are the great natural stronghold .... 20 He would classify as Philistines, too, all that portion of the working class which either by its ambitions seeks to be a part of the middle class or by organizing in labor unions hopes to occupy the place of dominance held by the middle cla.ss. ... But that vast portion, lastly, of the working class which, raw and half-developed, has long lain half hidden amidst its poverty and squalor, and is now issuing from its hiding-place to assert an English man's heaven-born· privilege of do ing as he likes, and is beginning to perplex us by marching where it likes, meeting where it likes, bawl ing what it likes, breaking what it likes, - to this vast residuum we may with great propriety give the name of Populace. 21 What was the point of all this, and much more besides? What was the· point of describing Eng land as divided into Barbarians, Philistines, and Populace? Mat thew Arnold was saying that Vic torian England lacked true culture and was tending toward anarchy 20 Ibid., pp. 140-4l.

21 Ibid., P. 143. - to the loss of cohesion, to disin tegration. England would be saved, if at all, he taught, by turning to the State. Thus, in our eyes, the very frame work and exterior order of the State, whoever may administer the State, is sacred; and culture is the most resolute enemy of anarchy, because of the great hopes and designs for the State which culture teaches us to nourish. But as, believing in right reason, and having faith in the prog ress of humanity towards perfec tion, and ever labouring for this end, we grow to have clearer sight of the ideas of right reason, and of the elements and helps of perfection, and come gradually to fill the frame work of the State with them, to fash ion its internal composition and all its laws and institutions con formably to them, and to make the State more and more the expression, as we say, of our best self, which is not manifold, and vulgar, and un stable, and contentious, and ever varying, but one, and noble, and se cure, and peaceful, and the same for all mankind. . ..22 Arnold is a near perfect ex ample of the confused joining of abstract rationalism and roman ticism to reach a conclusion with deep inner contradictions. He ab stracted society so as to arrive at disintegration in his description, a disintegration which his very analysis produced. Then, he turned 22 Ibid., pp. 223-24.

756 THE FREEMAN December off his analytical powers, such as they were, when he looked at the state, and made it an object of romantic adoration. He wa.s, of course, following the path already trod by many German romantics and by the spiritual godfather of all romantics, Jean J a.cques Rous seau. Ruskin's Romanticism The final step from the rej ec tion and denunciation of the Vic torian Way can be illustrated by reference to John Ruskin. Ruskin disliked machinery, repetitive tasks, mass prod uced articles, . laissez-faire, competition, the law of supply and demand, and just about everything associated with Victorian 'England. He longed, mainly, to see-medieval society re stored, or, at least, medieval craftsmanship, and things of that sort. He described his' ideal so ciety in this way: I have already stated that no ma chines moved by artificial power are to be used on the estates of the so ciety; wind, water, and animal 'force are to be the only motive powers em ployed, and there is to be as little trade or importation as possible; the utmost simplicity of life, and re striction of possession, being com bined with the highest attainable re finement of temper and thought.

Everything that the members of any household can sufficiently make for themselves, they are so to make, however clumsily; but the carpenter and smith, trained to perfectest work in wood and iron, are to be em ployed on the parts of houses and implements in which finish is essen tial to strength. The ploughshare and spade must be made by the smith, and the roof and floors by a carpenter; but the boys of the house must be able to make either a horse shoe, or a table. 23 Ruskin could, of course, be pre cise and analytical, as in his dis courses on political economy, but when he visualized the society to supplant the present one, he be came a full-fledged romantic. That he became a socialist, of some va riety, will appear from the fol lowing. "The first duty of a state," he said, "is to see that every child born therein shall be well housed, clothed, fed and educated, till it attains years of discretion." To accomplish this, "the government must have an authority over the people of which we do not so much as dream."24 Of course, the above only touches the surface of the cri tiques, attacks, denunciations, and rejection of the Victorian Way.

Many other people and works would have to be examined to get to its full flavor, and many other facets of the attack examined. For 23 John Ruskin, Ruskin's Views oj Social Justice, James Fuchs, ed. (New York: Vanguard Press, 1926), pp.29-30. 24 Briggs, Ope cit., p. 473.

1968 THE VICTORIAN WAY~ AFFIRMED AND REJECTED 757 eventually everything Victorian became suspect: the architecture, the furniture, the morals, the pro ductive system, the government, and so on. The debunking of things Victorian reached its peak in the 1920's, following the pub lication of Lytton Strachey's Eminent Victorians (1918) and Queen Victoria (1921). In the wake of this rejection, D. H. Lawrence said: Now although perhaps nobody knew it, it was ugliness which really betrayed the spirit of man in the nineteenth century. The great crime which the moneyed classes and pro moters of industry committed in the palmy Victorian days was the con demning of the workers to ugliness, ugliness, ugliness: meanness and formless and ugly' surroundings, ugly ideals, ugly religion, ugly hope, ugly love, ugly clothes, ugly furni ture, ugly houses, ugly relationship between workers and employers. 25 The English people, then, did not simply forget the principle,s and practices which had made England great. They were turned against them. The attack upon the Victorian Way was kept up until the very thought of it began to be distasteful, at least to anyone of literary ,or artistic awareness.

Those who had defended it and expounded its principles became suspect also. The rejection of ex isting society was but a prelude, of course, to a vision of a new so ciety to supplant it. Such visions were most effectively pushed by socialists. To that part of the story we may now turn. ~ 25 Klingopulos, Ope cit., p. 14. The next article in this series will pertain to uThe Fabian Thrust to Socialism." THE FREEMAN ON MICROFILM Microfilm copies of current as well as of back issues of THE FREEMAN may be purchased from Xerox University Microfilms 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106.