§ 10. Value of physique shown by the physical qualifications exacted from candidates for the Army and other competitive examinations. § 11. Summary of the relative importance of Mind, Muscular Strength, and Power of Endurance. SKETCH VALUE OF PHYSIQUE IN MODERN LIFE § 1. General impression of a decline in the value of physique, due to multiplication of labour-saving appliances, facilities afforded by inventions, and to spectacle of numbers of persons gaining a living without need of muscular power. § 2. The impression is true to a slight extent of one part of physique quite untrue of the other: partly true with regard to muscular strength: quite the reverse with regard to power of endurance. § 3. In warfare, muscular strength is not needed by the modern as it was by the mediaeval soldier with his heavy arms. Skill and mobility are the modern requisites. § 4. But apart from the actual fighting, it is needed now as much as ever: e.g. for getting heavy guns on to hills or extricating foundered vehicles. § 5. Power of endurance in warfare. The Forced March: what it means. Lord Roberts' march from Cabul to Candahar. § 6. In civil life, muscular strength is not needed by merchants, shopkeepers, professional men, or skilled artisans. But it is needed as much as ever by colliers, navvies, crews of fishing-smacks, porters and police, the muscular strength of the last-named having a definite moral value in the preservation of order. § 7. Power of endurance in civil life: urgently needed by those who live in great cities, who have to work for long periods at a stretch without the pleasant relief of active exercise in fresh air. Needed by skilled artisans, professional and business men, and for success in competitive examinations: § 8. also for all whose occupations involve fatigue without exercise, e.g. signalmen, tramcar drivers and conductors, shop-assistants, clerks. § 9. The reason why the paramount value of this kind of physique escapes notice is that, unlike a feat of muscular strength, its exercise makes no show: also men who possess muscular strength are usually more symmetrical and healthy-looking than those who possess power of endurance. § 10. Value of physique attested by the existence of a medical examination of candidates for the Army and other examinations. Fallacy of the assertion often made that the physique of officers has deteriorated under the examination system. The kind of man that is wanted. § 11. Mind essential: Endurance essential: Muscle a valuable auxiliary. ANALYSIS XII. THE SWORD, THE TONGUE, THE PEN, AS INSTRUMENTS OF GOVERNMENT § 1. At first sight, Sword seems strongest. § 2. Not correct: even in ancient times. § 3. Sword really weakest. Moral force stronger than physical force. § 4. Good government impossible under the Sword. § 5. Persuasion: its power. § 6. Power of Speech at the present day. § 7. Eighteenth Century orators had smaller audience but less responsibility. § 8. Nineteenth Century oratory has to be circumspect: and is therefore the better as an instrument of government. 9. This removes the peculiar danger of government by speech. § 10. Advantage of the Pen over the Tongue. § 11. The governing power of the Press. SKETCH THE SWORD, THE TONGUE, THE PEN, AS INSTRUMENTS OF GOVERNMENT § 1. At first sight, the Sword seems strongest: brute force seems stronger than moral force at all events in ancient times. § 2. But this is not correct: even in ancient times, e.g. the tongue of Ulysses was as much dreaded by the Trojans as the sword of Achilles. § 3. In reality, the Sword is the weakest: e.g. Russia, Turkey, England under Cromwell. Moral force beats physical force in the long run: e.g. the Protestants of the Netherlands; and Christianity itself. § 4. No stability of government under the rule of the Sword: which is properly for external, not internal use. § 5. The orator and the writer, wielding the force of persuasion, are the real governors of the people. § 6. Oratory: its operation in England: of late years enhanced by its diffusion through the Press. § 7. English oratory in the eighteenth century: narrower area of influence but less responsibility than in the nineteenth. § 8. Oratory of the nineteenth century has to be more circumspect and less vehement than in the eighteenth century; but is therefore all the better as an instrument of government. § 9. Danger of government by Speech. A Speaker is not necessarily a Statesman. § 10. The Pen, wielding like the Tongue, the force of persuasion, has the advantage in its power of iteration, and of reaching all who can read. § 11. The part of the Press, the Fourth Estate as it is called, in the government of the country. Its manifold functions described in detail. THE ESSAYS I. PEACE HATH HER VICTORIES NO LESS RENOWNED THAN WAR with those of War. Note I. THE Victories of Peace are gained over the forces of Victories Nature over disease: over civil tyranny and class op- of Peace pression over ignorance and immorality. They are contrasted bloodless conquests. They cost no orphan's curse: no widow's tears. They cause no suffering: on the contrary, they alleviate it. They leave no homesteads in smoking ruins, no maimed limbs or mutilated corpses, no barren fields or wasted crops. Where there is solid gain, it is true there must be solid loss. But the gains of Peace are like land reclaimed from the sea, and the sea is not perceptibly the poorer for its loss. The adversaries against whom Peace arrays her powers can afford to lose. The nineteenth century is pre-eminently the age of the 19th cenVictories of Peace. The inventor, the engineer, the tury the doctor, the sanitary reformer, the political reformer, the age of such social reformer have each his achievements to record. It is an epoch of triumphant progress in every department of life. Victories. Nature. Foremost among those who have won these triumphs Victory stand the inventor and the engineer. They have over- over come the powers of Nature. They have mastered the Forces of great agent of electricity, and out of a destructive force 2 Inventor they have created a valuable servant, which propels and vehicles, supplies light, rings bells and takes messages. Engineer. The telegraph beats the very sun in his course and Note 2. annihilates time and space. Steam laughs at wind and Note 4. sea. Photography 5 faithfully fixes and retains the repre- Note 5. sentation of men and things. Even of the spoken word, than which nothing is more fleeting or more easily lost, Note 3. |