VI SCIENCE AND CULTURE 143 



antiquity, and of one another. Special, local, and 

 temporary advantages being put out of account, 

 that modern nation will in the intellectual and 

 spiritual sphere make most progress, which most 

 thoroughly carries out this programme. And 

 what is that but saying that we too, all of us, as 

 individuals, the more thoroughly we carry it out, 

 shall make the more progress ? " 1 



We have here to deal with two distinct 

 propositions. The first, that a criticism of life is 

 the essence of culture ; the second, that literature 

 contains the materials which suffice for the con- 

 struction of such a criticism. 



I think that we must all assent to the first 

 proposition. For culture certainly means some^ 

 thing quite different from learning^ 1 technical 

 skill. It implies the possession of an ideal, and 

 the habit of critically estimating the value of 

 things by comparison with a theoretic standard. 

 Perfect culture should supply a complete theory 

 of life, based upon a clear knowledge alike of its 

 possibilities and of its limitations. 



But we may agree to all this, and yet strongly 

 dissent from the assumption that literature alone 

 is competent to supply this knowledge. After 

 having learnt all that Greek, Roman, and Eastern 

 antiquity have thought and said, and all that 

 modern literatures have to tell us, it is not self- 

 evident that we have laid a sufficiently broad 



1 Essays in Criticism, p. 37. 



