“I maintain that their most illustrious men were not produced in the public schools, don’t you see,” replied the doctor. “Of philosophers, Bacon, Hume, Hobbes, Berkley, Shaftesbury, Dugald Stewart, and Hartley; of men of science, Newton, Flamstead, Napier, Davy, Priestley, and Black; of statesmen, Burleigh, Clarendon, Wolsey, Cromwell, Raleigh, Temple, Burke, and Pitt; of divines, Tillotson, Chillingworth, More, Jeremy Taylor, Selden, and Sherlock; of heroes, Hampden, Russell, Marlborough, Clive, and Wolfe; and of poets, Shakspeare, Ben Jonson, Spenser, Goldsmith, Pope, and Thomson; besides numberless others I cannot now remember; attained their eminence without any assistance from public schools.”
“I suppose you equally condemn their royal societies and academies?” inquired Fortyfolios.
“I do, so far as concerns their utility, don’t you see,” said Tourniquet. “Did their royal societies ever produce a great man? What eminent philosopher or distinguished man of science did they ever create? And as for their royal academies, when you can point out to me the great painters and great musicians they have given to the world, I will acknowledge the benefit society has received from them, but not till then.”
“It is not to be expected that all institutions will perfectly answer the end for which they were designed,” remarked the professor. “The object for which they were founded was wise and admirable, and to a certain extent they realise that object. They collect together the talent in the country, and then as much as possible make it known to the public.”
“They neglect much more talent than they collect, don’t you see,” replied the doctor; “and these being usually governed by a select few who have no conception of such a thing as impartiality, he is considered the greatest man amongst them who possesses the most patronage. But the manner in which superior intelligence was regarded by the government of England was exceedingly discouraging to men of genius. They would lavish pensions upon profligates, spies, political apostates, the tools of power, and the slaves of intrigue; but the man who strived to exercise talents from which his country would derive a certain and lasting advantage was left to struggle on without the slightest assistance. Any person, however ignorant, if he could manage by prostituting his soul to every kind of meanness and chicanery to scrape together a sufficient sum of money, might aspire to the dignity of a title of honour; and sometimes, but very rarely, the same title was conferred upon a favourite painter or physician; minds of the highest order were obliged to be satisfied without any such distinction. The pliant orator, the successful soldier, and the ready lawyer were ennobled; but genius, and virtue, and honour, and worth, such as were developed in the wisest and best of men, were not thought worthy of a regard.”
“Notwithstanding all this, the literature, and science, and art of England flourished till it became the admiration of surrounding nations, and excited the wonder of each succeeding generation,” observed the professor.
“Which proves that neither universities, nor public schools, nor royal societies, nor academies, nor artificial distinctions, such as existed in England, were of any advantage in increasing the intelligence of the people, don’t you see,” added his companion. “All such institutions might be rendered highly serviceable to the state; but the system upon which they were conducted was so faulty, their government so illiberal, and their influence so ineffective, that I cannot conscientiously afford to give them any praise, as they existed among the ancients. As for their extensive libraries, on what principle could a government defend the policy of not only withholding from men of genius the patronage they ought to afford them, but robbing every author of several copies of every book he produced without the slightest recompence—merely for the purpose of augmenting their libraries? The wealthiest state then existing was guilty of this meanness. The philosopher might exist as he could—starve—die—rot—in any obscure hole in which he could find refuge, without attracting the least attention: but immediately his works were published—no matter how expensive they were to him, or how much labour and suffering they had cost him—down came a demand for eleven copies for the public libraries, for which the author never in any shape saw a consideration.”
“But the author had proper protection for his publications,” said Fortyfolios.
“Nothing of the kind,” replied the doctor; “the law of copyright, as it was called, then in existence for the protection of authors in the sale of their works, was the most bungling atrocity that ever originated in a legislature. An author was allowed to possess his property, the product of his own labour, only for a certain time. Any man might leave to his heir the land he had received from his father—any man was allowed to bestow on his child the wealth that he possessed; but the children of the man of genius could not inherit any right in the acknowledged property of their parent. After the term had expired in which he was allowed to possess his own—think of their generosity in allowing this!—his labours might enrich any one who chose to make them profitable, and he and his children, and his children’s children, were left to starve. The man who writes a book which acquires a certain value by publication, has as much right to consider all the profits it may produce as belonging to him and to his heirs for ever, as is the man who becomes possessed of land or other property entitled to continue it in the possession of his family from generation to generation: and it is nothing better than an act of robbery for any government to deprive either of a right to which they have so perfect a claim.”