Free Opinions: Freely Expressed on Certain Phases of Modern Social Life and Conduct

This essential of education is sadly lacking among the general majority of "educated" persons in Great Britain, and I think I may say America. Especially among those of the "upper" classes, in both countries. When we speak of these "upper" classes, we mean of course those, who by chance or fortune have been born either to such rank or to such sufficient wealth as to be lifted above the toiling million, and who may be presumed to have had all the physical, mental and social advantages that tuition, training and general surroundings can give them. Yet it is precisely among these that we find the ones who cannot read, who frequently cannot spell, and whose handwriting is so bad as to be well-nigh illegible. When it is said that they cannot read, that statement is not intended to convey the idea that if a book or newspaper be given to them they do not understand the letters or the print in which the reading matter is presented to their eyes. They do. But such letters and such print impress no meaning upon their minds. Anyone can prove this by merely asking them what they have been reading. In nine cases out of ten they "don't know." And if they ever did know, during one unusual moment of brain-activity, they "forget." The thinking faculty is, with them, like a worn-out sieve, through which everything runs easily and drops to waste. The news of the day, be it set forth never so boldly in no matter what startlingly stout headlines, barely excites their interest for more than a second. They may perhaps glance at a couple of newspaper placards and lazily observe, "Russia at it again," but of the ins and outs of policy, the difficulties of Government, the work of nations, they grasp absolutely nothing. Thus it happens that when they are asked their opinion on any such events of the hour as may be making history in the future, they display their utter ignorance in such a frankly stupid fashion that any intelligent enquirer is bound to be stunned by their lack of knowledge, and will perhaps murmur feebly: "Have you not read the news?" to which will come the vague reply: "Oh, yes, I read all the newspapers! But I really don't remember the particulars just now!" What they do rememberthese "cultured" persons, (and the more highly they are cultured, the more tenacious appears to be their memory in this respect)is a divorce case. They always read that carefully over and over again. They comment upon it afterwards with such gusto as to make it quite evident to the merest tyro, that they have learned all its worst details by heart. If they can only revel in the published shame and disgrace of one or two of their very "dearest" friends, they enjoy and appreciate that kind of mental fare more than all the beautiful poems and idyllic romances ever written. The "million" have long ago learned to read,and are reading. The last is the most important fact, and one which those who seek to govern them would do well to remember. For their reading is of a most strange, mixed, and desultory orderand who can say what wondrous new notions and disturbing theories may not leap out sprite-like from the witch's cauldron of seething ideas round which they gather, watching the literary "bubble, bubble, toil and trouble," wherein the "eye of newt and toe of frog" in the book line may contrast with something which is altogether outside the boiling hotch-potch,namely that "sick eagle looking at the sky" which is the true symbol of the highest literary art. But the highest literary art, particularly in its poetic form, is at a discount nowadays. And why? Simply because even the million do not know "how" to read. Moreover, it is very difficult to make them learn. They have neither the skill nor the patience to study beautiful thoughts expressed in beautiful language. They want to "rush" something through. Whether poem, play, or novel, it must be "rushed through" and done with.

Dettagli