THE EDUCATION OF AFTER-LIFE. 



257 



Goldsmith's fond belief that he possessed a 

 knowledge of medicine is known to all. Possibly 

 it hastened his death, for he would prescribe for 

 himself. Eugene Sue labored under a delusion 

 of the same kind ; only for his there was some 

 slight ground in fact, the author of the " Mys- 

 teries of Paris " having actually been a regi- 

 mental surgeon in his youth. It must be ad- 

 mitted, too, that a droll anecdote about Sue's 

 performances in his later years indicates rather 

 that he was sometimes very drunk than that he 

 utterly lacked professional skill. He had one 

 day dined with his friend Romieu at the Cafe de 

 Paris, and had dined well — in fact, they had both 

 dined well ; and as they sauntered along the 

 boulevards, by way of aiding digestion, Romieu 

 slipped, fell down, and hurt his leg. Sue called 

 a cab, put his friend in, and drove home, where 

 he dressed the wound. He then put Romieu to 

 bed, and settled himself into an arm-chair for the 



night. Next morning he hastened to examine 

 the wound, only to discover that he had tended 

 the wrong leg ! 



Few, indeed, are the men who have been 

 great in more than one department of human 

 knowledge and skill; though (if one may avail 

 one's self of the Oxford terminology) there have 

 been a respectable number who have combined a 

 first-class reputation in one field of distinction 

 with a second-class in another. It is pleasant, in 

 this year of the Rubens Tercentenary, to re- 

 member that the famous painter acquitted him- 

 self with credit in a diplomatic capacity. A lady 

 once asked Casanova " whether Rubens had not 

 been an embassador who amused himself with 

 painting." " I beg pardon, madam," replied the 

 artist ; " he was a painter who amused himself 

 with embassies." One shudders to think of the 

 depths of ignorance or impertinence the lady's 

 question reveals. — Cornhill Magazine. 



THE EDUCATION OF AFTER-LIFE. 1 



Bt ARTHUR P. STANLEY. 



IT is said that the late King of Prussia, on see- 

 ing Eton College, exclaimed, " Happy is that 

 country where the old is ever entwined with the 

 new, where the new is ever old, and the old is 

 ever new." That is most true ; but, if he had 

 come to Bristol at this time, he might have even 

 improved on his remark, and said, " Happy is that 

 country where the old is ever giving birth to the 

 new, where the new is ever springing from the 

 old." For in the cathedral he would have seen 

 the Abbey Church of Robert Fitzharding, the 

 fine old descendant of the wild sea-kings, awak- 

 ening into a new life, and stretching forth a gigan- 

 tic arm which had seemed to be paralyzed to its 

 very socket. And he would have seen the new 

 start of a young institution of teachers sent into 

 this commercial city, in large measure by the en- 



1 An address delivered by Dean Stanley on the oc- 

 casion of the new session of University College, Bris- 

 tol, October 27, 1877. 2 



3 University College, Bristol, was founded in 1876, 

 11 to supply for persons of both sexes above the ordi- 

 nary school age the means of continuing their stud- 

 ies in science, lansuasjes, history, and literature; and 

 more particularly to afford appropriate instruction in 

 those branches of applied science which are employed 

 in the arts and manufactures." The funds of the col- 

 lege are chiefly derived from local contributions ; but 

 the college receives subsidies from Balliol College and 

 New College, Oxford, and from the Worshipful the 

 Clothworkers' Company of London. 



53 



ergies of two ancient colleges, which a hundred 

 years ago would have been thought the most retro- 

 grade and the most exclusive of all our academi- 

 cal communities. I have spoken of the Cathe- 

 dral of Bristol in the proper place. Let me now 

 say a few words on its new college. 



I will not go back to the question of the util- 

 ity of such institutions themselves. This was 

 sufficiently set forth some years ago by my excel- 

 lent friend the Master of Balliol, who has done 

 so much for Oxford and for Bristol, and by those 

 many other distinguished persons who then ad- 

 dressed you. The college has been begun, and 

 it is not of the college, but of its work, that I 

 have to speak. And, in so doing, it has been 

 suggested to me that it might be useful to make 

 a few general remarks on a commonplace subject 

 —"The Education of After-Life." It is closely 

 connected with the special functions of this in- 

 stitution, and it has this further advantage, that 

 its consideration may not be altogether without 

 profit to the more miscellaneous public. 



In what sense can education be said to be car- 

 ried on at all in an institution so rudimentary, so 

 slightly equipped as this? You have no build- 

 ings, you have no antiquity, you have no tradi- 

 tions, you have no discipline, you have none of 



