ing that he has a sympathetic nature-can master to good result the common speech and the unlettered poetry. A Cambridge education, for example, did not prevent Tennyson from writing astonishing ballads or dramatic poems in ballad measure in the difficult dialect of the northern English peasant. Indeed, in English literature the great Romantic reformers were all, or nearly all, well schooled men, but they were men who had artistic spirit enough to conquer the prejudices with which they were born, and without heeding the mockery of their own class, bravely worked to extract from simple peasant lore those fresh beauties which give such desirable qualities to Victorian poetry. Indeed, some went further-Sir Walter Scott, for example, who rode about the country, going into the houses of the poorest people, eating with them and drinking with them, and everywhere coaxing them to sing him a song or tell him a story of the past. I suppose there were many people who would then have laughed at Scott. But those little peasant songs which he picked out started the new English poetry. The whole literary tone of the eighteenth century was changed by them. Therefore I should certainly venture to hope that there yet may be a Japanese Walter Scott, whose learning will not prevent him from sympathising with the unlearned. Now I have said quite enough on that subject; and I have ventured it only through a sense of duty. The rest of what I have to say refers only to literary work. I suppose that most of you, on leaving the University, will step into some profession likely to absorb a great deal of your time. Under these circumstances many a young man who loves literature resigns himself foolishly to give up his pleasures in this direction; such young scholars imagine that they have no time now for poetry or romance or drama-not even for much private study. I think that this is a very great mistake, and that it is the busy man who can best give us new literature-with the solitary exception perhaps of poetry. Great poetry requires leisure, and much time for solitary thinking. But in other departments of literature I can assure you that the men-of-letters throughout the West have been, and still are, to a great extent, very busy men. Some are in the government service, some in post offices, some in the army and navy (and you know how busy military and naval officers have to be), some are bankers, judges, consuls, governors of provinces, even merchants-though these are few. The fact is that it is almost impossible for anybody to live merely by producing fine literature, and that the literary man must have, in most cases, an occupation. Every year the necessity for this becomes greater. But the principle of literary work is really not to do much at one time, but to do a little at regular intervals. I doubt whether any of you can ever be so busy that you will not be able to spare twenty minutes or half an hour in the course of one day to literature. Even if you should give only ten minutes a day, that will mean a great deal at the end of the year. Put it in another way. Can you not write five lines of literary work daily? If you can, the question of being busy is settled at once. Multiply three hundred and sixty-five by five. That means a very respectable amount of work in twelve months. How much better if you could determine to write twenty or thirty lines every day. I hope that if any of you really love literature, you will remember these few words, and never think yourselves too busy to study a little, even though it be only for ten or fifteen minutes every day. And now good-bye. INDEX "Adalantado of the Seven Cities, The," 101 Addison, Joseph, 140 "Aglavaine and Selysette," 162 Aldrich, Thomas Bailey, 362 Andersen, Hans Christian, 56, 58, 73 Andrews, Bishop Lancelot, 44 "Annabel Lee," 152, 153 "Apocalypse, The," 48 "Arabian Nights, The," 71 "Arachne," 261-263 Ariosto, Ludovico, 74 Arnold, Matthew, 207, 272, 278, 279, 283, 316-318, 355, 356 "Art of Worldly Wisdom, The," 214 "Atalanta in Calydon," 279, 280 Bacon, Francis, 9, 69 "Ballad of the French Fleet, The," 194 Ballads, 104-117 "Ballads and Poems," 117 "Battle of Lake Regillus, The," 92 Beaumont, Francis, 3 "Bells, The," 152, 153, 154-158, 164 Blake, William, 41, 119, 250 82 Boccaccio, Giovanni, 314 Bonaparte, Napoleon, 2, 6, 7, 15 "Book of Common Prayer, The," 43 Bourdillon, Francis William, 351 Bruce, Michael, 289, 290, 291, 292 Lytton, Edward George "Burly, dozing humble-bee," 252 "Busy, curious, thirsty fly," 250 Byron, Lord George Gordon Noel, "Fair daffodils, we weep to see," 123 129 "Falcon of Ser Federigo, The,”_314 "Fifine at the Fair," 243 Fitzgerald, Edward, 75 Fletcher, John, 3, 26 "Flowers of Evil," 82 Ford, John, 26 "Frederick and Alice," 159 Freneau, Philip, 257, 258 "From this bleeding hand of mine," Froude, James Anthony, 26, 201 "Garden of Cyrus, The," 67 "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may," 128 "Lear" (King Lear), 25, 274 Leopardi, Giacomo, 350 "Lines Written in Kensington Gar- Locke, John, 140, 142, 143, 144 199, 200, 309, 311-314, 315, 342- "Lord Thomas and Fair Annet," 116 "Love's Labour's Lost," 19 Lowell, James Russell, 231, 233, 235, "Lo! where the moon along the Lucretius (Titus Lucretius Carus), 130 Lyly, John, 60, 61 "Lyrical Ballads," 116 Macaulay, Thomas Babington, 65, 69, Malory, Sir Thomas, 60, 61 Medici, Lorenzo de, 129 "Meditation Under Stars," 327-333 Meredith, George, 123, 216, 294, 296– "Midsummer Night's Dream, A,” 274 |